Mirror Image

Hermione woke early, before the sun rose over the hills across the grounds. She could feel Draco’s arm around her, tight and snug over her waist and his fingers tucked up under her chest. Theo was behind Draco, and though his arms weren’t long enough to tuck over both Draco and Hermione, she could feel his fingertips grazing over her thigh where Theo had his arm draped.

The sky outside turned from ink, to indigo, to something promising before it exploded with sherbet colors. Blue and pink danced together with orange and red and purple clouds.

It was then - as Hermione stared out over the bright sky above her home - that Draco’s arm tightened around her.

“Good morning,” he murmured into Hermione’s ear, adjusting himself to be more in her space. His head tucked into the joint of her neck and shoulder, his lips pushed against the shell of her ear. “How long have you been up?”

Hermione shrugged a shoulder against Draco’s jaw. “A while.”

“Watching the sky?”

Hermione hummed. She could feel Theo tossing around the bed behind Draco, always so full of life even when he was only just waking up. He smacked his lips loudly, his arm disappearing from behind Hermione’s leg and then reappearing as the bed beneath them groaned. His fingers were dancing this time, fully teasing her in the early morning.

“Good morning, Theo,” Hermione sing-songed.

“Good morning, gorgeous.”

“I’ll call for breakfast,” Draco said, pressing kisses to both Hermione and Theo’s heads before wiggling out of bed. He pulled on a shirt and some pajama pants, and then his robe, and then he disappeared from their bedroom. Hermione didn’t scoot backwards to meet Theo, instead Theo just pushed himself closer to the center of the bed and pulled Hermione in tight.

“Are you alright?” he asked. “You don’t usually beat Draco and I up in the morning.”

“I’m fine,” Hermione said. “Just couldn’t sleep anymore.”

“It’s stress, princess,” Theo said. He never ran out of nicknames for her, and for Draco, and their marriage had only made him more affectionate.

They sat there for a while, just pressed together in silence, and then Draco called for them. Theo did as Draco did and got dressed, pulled on his own robe, and slipped from the room while Hermione laid in bed. When he was gone, Hermione heaved and resolved to get out of bed. Get out of bed. Get out of- Hermione pulled on her nightgown from where it was discarded on the ground, then her robe and a pair of slippers. She half-expected the boys to have breakfast served in their sitting room, but they weren’t there when she left the bedroom, so she headed down to the real dining room downstairs.

“- and I just know she won’t be good at that.” Hermione paused, listening to Draco and Theo talking just on the other side of the door.

“She’s not going to look for danger,” Theo sighed. “But I understand the worry. Mya usually doesn’t dive out of the way of trouble.”

Draco snorted. “I’m terrified,” he confessed. “This is the same woman who brought back Tom Riddle without ever telling us. She’s not exactly proven to have a decision making skills that we would endorse, baby.”

Theo’s voice betrayed his smile. “If she was any more cautious, we would have never fallen for her. She’s brilliant and smart and she’s going to come back to us as a hero.”

Hermione pushed the door open then. “If you two think I’m somehow the only one here to be worried about, you’re both crazy. Theodore was living with the Dark Lord for weeks and never knew it so he has absolutely no sense for danger, and Draco is in the center of the Death Eaters. We’re all going to be under constant threat, and I expect both of you to come back to me safe.”

Theo gave her a smile. “Of course, doll.”

“Anything for you, babygirl.” Draco poured her tea, and she sat with them. Breakfast was a strange affair - they were all three feeling very unsettled, knowing what was coming. Hermione excused herself to get dressed and packed, and Theo and Draco waited for her in the Library. By the time she returned to them, Draco had put on his dark robes in preparation for his Death Eaters’ meeting, which he would leave for right after Hermione left for the Weasley wedding.

She got to her tiptoes and pressed a hard, passionate kiss to Draco’s lips, and then another to Theo’s.

“I love you,” she breathed. “My brilliant dragon and my angel. I love you both so much.”

“I love you, Mrs. Malfoy,” Draco breathed. Theo at his side closed his eyes tight for a moment before he smiled.

“I love you, Hermione.”

She hesitated in their arms. Behind them all, out in the main foyer, the sound of a grandfather clock was chiming the hour. Draco squeezed her shoulders. “You have to go. Remember to get down as soon as you get the tip off from Kingsley we are coming. Get low, Mya.”

“You’ll let me know tonight that you’re safe?” she whispered, and Draco pressed another kiss to her lips. They would see one another later, but Draco would be focused on the fight and wearing a full Death Eater mask, so Hermione wouldn’t know which of the attackers he was. This would be that last time they saw each other and the last time they really spoke until the war was begun.

“Tonight,” Theo whispered back. “We will all check in tonight. Now go, love.”

Hermione stepped into the Floo before she could stall any longer. She would never leave if she didn’t just do it. When she disappeared from the Library, Theo sort of collapsed into himself, his shoulders hunching and his head falling forward.

“Fuck,” he said.

Draco pulled him upright and kissed him. Draco and Theo had always been able to convey so much in a look or gesture, that even without words, Theo knew what Draco was trying to say in that kiss. I love you, and I’ll come home to you, and I will watch for her during the battle, and please forgive me all at once. The Library swelled with the scent of wandless magic and Draco’s hand shot out to catch his cloak and mask as they flew through the doors. “Stay safe today, and wait for me.”

Theo nodded.

“Say it,” Draco insisted. “Say you’ll wait for me, baby.”

“I’ll wait for you,” Theo breathed, raspy and rough. “In our room.”

Draco nodded and put his mask on, then his outer robes. And then he was gone, too.

~~~

Hermione panted. The red dress she’d bought for Draco’s birthday dinner last year was in tatters now, and there was dirt smudged all over her knees from where she’d hit the ground and crawled her way to Harry and Ron.

“We need to get out of these clothes,” she said. She’d been packing and repacking, planning, and preparing for weeks. She had clothing for herself and the boys to change into. “This way.”

They weaved through the streets of Muggle London. Across the street, Hermione recognized the big theater she and her parents used to go to, and the pizza place Theo and her went to for one of their Muggle dates. She ducked into a cafe and Ron and Harry followed suit.

The boys took longer to change than Hermione did - she just pulled on a pair of well-worn and comfortable jeans and a shrunk jumper she stole from Theo’s dresser. Apparently, Ron’s jeans were an older pair that he had to fight to get on, and Harry had spent time washing and wrapping a gash on his arm with a lot more care than Hermione might have expected.

Just as she was catching her breath, she saw them. Antonin Dolohov and Thorfinn Rowle.

Hermione’s mind went blank except for Draco’s warning. She hit the ground hard, dragging the boys down with her, and then the cafe seemed to explode into chaos. Spells and curses flew across the little room, the tables and chairs were upended and thrown through the air, mirrors and glass cabinets shattered, and mugs went splintering over them all.

It was hard to remember who was casting which spells, and then-

Hermione didn’t know how it happened. All she knew was that Ron and Harry were asking her to use a memory charm again-

They didn’t know she-

She had never used- not since-

Hermione flinched when Ron touched her face, tender and all wrong and not at all the right feeling. His hands were too clammy to be Draco and too rough to be Theo and-

She raised her wand. It was imperative now to use a wand so the scent of her magic was contained.

The spell was easy to cast. Tricking Harry and Ron that she’d wiped the Death Eaters’ minds was hard. But Hermione needed Dolohov and Rowle to go back with this story, she needed them to inadvertently tell Draco she was safe and Toma that she was being careful with her magic. Hermione focused carefully, making sure both Rowle and Dolohov were left with a false memory of a particularly powerful Stupify curse, and then she knocked them both out.

~~~

Number 12 Grimmauld Place was dark. It was actually very grim, and the irony of that wasn’t lost on Hermione, but she was laying in the dark waiting for the house to go silent. Ron was snoring loudly, but Harry was still walking around. Every now and then, there was the sound of a floorboard creaking.

Hermione wanted to be home.

She missed her bed and her husbands. She missed the taste of Tilly’s home cooking and Narcissa’s company and Lucius’ wit. It was not even a day since she was last there, not even a full 20 hours, and she missed it. She missed it with all of her being, with her bones and her magic and her blood and every inch of skin.

Finally, finally, Hermione heard Harry settle down and the house went silent around her. She waited, counted out exact minutes, and then got up and out of her makeshift couch bed. Hermione had a mental map of which parts of the floor seemed to creak the worst, and she wasn’t above using magic. A feather-light charm, weakened just slightly by lack of true intention, made it easy for Hermione to move away from where she and the boys were sleeping on the bottom floor. The rest of the house was in complete disarray, torn apart and neglected for years now. But Hermione needed space between herself and where Harry and Ron were sleeping in the dining room and sitting room. Upstairs, where the bedrooms are, Hermione upped her magical intention. The feather-light charms were stronger, and she was able to glide over the weakened parts of the floor. The first bedroom - the bedroom she’d once shared with Ginny - was utterly destroyed and the beds were each sunk low as if the floor was swallowing them up. The bedroom across from that was also in a bad way, but the more pressing reason Hermione passed that one was the lack of a fireplace.

Further into the house she pushed. There were some bedrooms she recognized for other reasons up there.

Sirius’s room was as Harry described it - there were rock and roll posters of 70s stars on the walls, and color photos of scantily clad women on motorcycles. It was like a time-capsule. Hermione moved over to the wall to see a picture of Sirius, James, Remus, and Peter all together, and below that, Sirius had his original Hogwarts letter. On the bottom, he’d scribbled a little drawing of a lion in some kind of early, pre-sorting rebellion.

She stepped over each pile of laundry and discarded piece of parchment. Hermione wasn’t sure if Harry had been up here yet, but she couldn’t risk moving things and facing questions from Harry on why she’d been in Sirus’s room.

The fireplace in the corner was dark and cold. It didn’t matter - Hermione needed a way out of the house without cracking one of the rotting windows. She let her intention swirl inside her, let Toma’s influence over her magic swell up, and then she was gone.

She tumbled through the air, a near-invisible wisp of black in the night, and then she found herself in her rooms back home. Solid feet found the ground easily. Her vision spun, only to find a familiar sight.

The fireplace was lit. Across from it, there was the familiar sight of Draco, still in his suit, holding a tumbler glass of firewhiskey. Or maybe Ogdens.

Theo was there, too, a book in his lap, but Hermione could tell he really wasn’t reading it.

And Toma in the corner, sitting in one of the armchairs and holding steepled fingers under his chin.

Hermione felt a tear down her cheek before she was moving, throwing herself into Draco’s arms. He gave a surprised gasp, and the liquor in his hand fell to the ground.

“You’re safe,” she said.

“You’re hurt,” Draco countered. He wiped a thumb over Hermione’s cheek where she’d gotten hit by a stinging hex, and she shook her head.

“Leave it,” she said. “Otherwise Harry and Ron will ask questions. Just leave it.”

“Why didn’t you heal it?” Theo asked, joining them.

Toma turned his head and snorted. “Because whenever Hermione uses magic, she reeks of the two of you. She’s trying to preserve her magic and delay the inevitable, to keep both of you safe.”

“And her,” Draco said as he suddenly recognized what Toma was saying. “She can hide her scent with her wand, but if she starts using her own Natural magic, and the witless wonders ever put it together while on the run, she’ll be outcast from their little group.”

Theo and Hermione kissed, and then Hermione and Draco, and then Toma cleared his throat.

“Where are you hiding?” Toma asked.

“Order safehouse,” Hermione said. “Black ancestral house. It’s not secure, but it’ll be fine for a few days.”

“You got Rowle and Dolohov good,” Draco said. “They were incensed.”

“I saw them,” Toma added, smiling. “They looked like they’d swallowed lemons, Mya.”

Hermione smiled. “We’re going to leave Grimmauld Place soon. Within a week or so.”

“Where are you going next?”

“I’ll take the boys to the Forest of Dean,” she confessed easily. “And I’ll put up specific wards. But I won’t be able to leave for a while because the tent is small and my absence would be noticed immediately.”

“Check in with me,” Toma said.

“And leave us delicious notes to be delivered by Toma here,” Theo joked. Hermione and Theo both wrinkled their noses.

“That’s my brother,” Hermione hissed.

Draco snorted in an uncharacteristic break of stoicism. “Good Gods, can you imagine if I told the Death Eaters I was brothers-in-law with the Dark Lord via my Mudblooded wife?”

Theo laughed riotously, and Hermione gave a giggle, and Toma rolled his eyes.

It was so easy here with the boys, so easy to find something good here. Even after the day she had been through - a crashed wedding, running, a duel with some of the most feared Death Eaters, and then sneaking away to Grimmauld Place - and the day Toma had been through - playing pretend dictator with his face carefully hidden away from his followers, and knowing he had sent killers after his sister, and knowing that Draco would be out with them and taking on curses from Order members - and the day Draco had been through - watching Hermione leave, being sent to that same wedding a few hours later to try and kill Order members, and knowing Hermione had escaped but not knowing her condition, and waiting to hear back from her as Dolohov and Rowle bragged about almost killing her - and the day Theo had been through - watching both of his spouses leave, and then his makeshift cousin, and then waiting for them all to come home with no information at all and no one to lean on.

Even with all of their terrible days, they had an easy feeling here in the sitting room together. They were loving and it was safe, and there was an unclenching of their tension.

Like a test. They’d all passed the test today.

Hermione could take care of herself.

Draco could be a soldier.

Toma could become the man he had been before.

Theodore could keep himself holed away.

“You should get back,” Toma said, just so none of the triad had to be the one to break up their reunion. “Before someone notices you’re gone.”

Hermione knew he was right. But she had missed her home so much in the last twelve hours, and she needed this. She needed this, even if it was dangerous.

“One chapter,” Theo said finally. “Let me read this one chapter, and then she can go back.”

It was a lifeline. Toma saw himself out of the room after a tight hug and a whispered “I am glad you are safe” and then Hermione was folded into the couch with Draco and Theo, and Theo cleared his throat.

“There was music from my neighbor’s house through the summer nights,” he started. “In his blue gardens, men and girls came and went like moths among the whisperings and the champagne and the stars. At high tide in the afternoon I watched his guests diving from the tower of his raft or taking the sun on the hot sand of his beach while his two motor-boats slit the waters of the Sound, drawing aquaplanes over cataracts of foam.”

~~~

“It’s him,” Harry breathed, and then he screamed it. “It’s him! ‘Moine! Ron, it’s him!”

Hermione took the stairs quickly, Ron stumbling behind her, and they found Harry in the bedroom across from Sirus’s. Before, when Hermione had been up there, the room had been closed off and Hermione hadn’t really thought about it.

But now the door was thrown open, and Harry was brandishing something. A diary?

“Who is what?”

“Mate, you can’t do that,” Ron huffed. “I thought we were under attack.”

“It’s R.A.B.,” Harry said. “Regulus Arcturus Black, it was him!”

“What are you talking about?” Hermione asked.

“In the locket,” Harry said. “There was a note from someone named R.A.B. who took the real Horcrux from the cave. I thought it was lost, but it was Sirius’s brother all the time. He was a Death Eater back in the day, but I guess he changed his mind before he died. He probably died in the cave.”

The room suddenly became a lot more depressing, but then Hermione’s mind caught up with what Harry was saying. The missing locket, the Horcrux Toma hadn’t reabsorbed, had been a non-issue. When Harry confessed to her before that he and Dumbledore had only recovered a fake locket, Hermione had thought it was lost now. That it wasn’t a part of the equation because it was gone.

But now it was back in play. If they found it, Hermione would need to somehow get it back to Toma and convince Harry and Ron that it had been destroyed. Or she would need to pretend to be helpful and keep them from the locket.

But now that she was thinking about it… There was no buzzing warmth in her mind. There was no familiar feeling like the one she had felt with Toma’s Horcruxes like the Diadem and the Cup. The locket wasn’t here in the house or Hermione would feel it, she would know it. But she couldn’t- it wasn’t- there was no-

“It’s not here,” Harry said, and Hermione’s heart stuttered. “I already looked.”

“So we still don’t know where it is,” Ron said. “That’s not really a revelation, mate.”

“We know who had it,” Harry said. “And we know where it was. If Regulus had the locket, I know who he would have told.”

Hermione’s mind jumped to the same conclusion, and she felt her throat tighten. Because she needed there to be no locket and that stupid, obsessed, devoted thing would have protected something like that for Regulus, especially if it had killed him in the end.

“Kreature,” Harry said. “We need to talk to Kreature.”