Chapter 4
Hermione opened her eyes. The crackling of the fire was what had awoken her. Primrose was still in her embrace. Hermione looked around, it still looked gloomy outside - damn this Manor, she could not tell how much time had passed. Hermione set a diagnostic on the room and suddenly it made sense as to why she had slept — the room was laced with sleeping wards.
Why on Earth would someone even have that? It seemed so unnecessary and quite frankly stupid.
Her thoughts were interrupted by the dark tingling magic that suddenly entered the room.
Draco Malfoy. For a moment he stiffened, and Hermione felt like in that moment he recognised her but it was gone just as fast as it had appeared. He must’ve reasoned to himself that Hermione (who had not been recognised in a decade and was most likely dead) couldn’t possibly be here, in his sitting room, holding his child.
He walked towards her. Hermione gently got up - Prim still in her arms. She bowed exactly how it was expected of her to do so, ever the purebloood and waited patiently for what Malfoy had to say. Waiting for what Supreme head Malfoy had to say. The title for which he abandoned her for. Not that Hermione cared anymore. War had hardened her thoughts on love and she had buried her affections for Malfoy deep within her soul, deep behind her occulemency.
It was at that moment that she felt the very gently intrusion of her mind, Malfoy may have been skilled but Hermione was deadly at her craft, she very swiftly manipulated her visions to what Malfoy was essentially looking for. Ophelia Meadows life and what lead to her departure and her sudden return at the request of her dear friend Astoria Malfoy. The truth was that Ophelia Meadows had passed away in muggle France as her lover had taken his life. Tragic but she was the perfect disguise.
Malfoy seemed satisfied with what he had seen. The Elf appeared again.
”Show the governess to her quarters.” And with not even a glance at her again, he left the room once more.
”I’ll show you where to place the lady Miss Meadows” She hurriedly followed the elf as to not get lost again.
Following the elf, Hermione realised just how vast and luxurious the manor truly was, crazy how perspectives change when you’re not on the floor being tortured by a deranged (now dead) witch. Oh how she reviled in the fact that she was the one to kill Bellatrix Lestrange. It bought her true satisfaction and walking past the drawing room, internally made Hermione smile brighter. That bitch had got everything she deserved and more.
She had certainly paid for Ron’s death and created quite a mess within the inner circles of Voldemort. The halls of the manor had not changed in the slightest and as she went up the stairs she wondered how Malfoys mustered living here. It was so cold it felt unbearable.
Walking to Primroses bedroom, she was initially surprised by the lack of colour or any remnants of childhood within the room. The Order did not have much at all, but they all did their best in aiding the children in colouring tools or any homemade toys. It surprised Hermione that a child who supposedly had so much, had nothing at all really. She lay Primrose in her bed, tucking her in before following the elf out.
The Manor was huge as it was lonely. Hermione was informed by the elf (which she later found out was called Popsy) that she would be residing in the servant chambers which was directly next to the elf halls. Trust that only Pure-blooded, rich freaks would have different chambers for different types of helpers.
Her room was bare but it was lavish in its own ways. The order safe-houses usually housed 7-8 members in a singular room, the conditions were livable sure, but they were horrible. Hermione had previously shared a room with the other girls, but after Dean had witnessed one of her torture sessions, the girls had all scrambled and clearly found refuge somewhere else. It had upset her at the time, especially when she had witnessed one of the girls sleeping on the floor in the living room — was she really that horrendous of a person?
Ron had very kindly decided to share with her. Ron.
She was bought to some sick reality once more. This is where she was. She was a bloody spy and she was out to seek blood. The residents of the home had surprised her, Primrose she could only assume took straight from her mother. Hermione had only spoken to Astoria a handful of times during their times at Hogwarts and she had seen pleasant enough for a pure blood princess. And Malfoy, he just seemed so opposite. Opposite of the man she had once kissed under a dim candle light, opposite of the man she had fought for, opposite if the man she had loved.
In a way it made this whole ordeal way more bearable. He was no longer the man she loved and she was thankful for it, she would be able to be more objective this time and she would never let her heart get in the way again. She promised she would live for Ron and that was exactly what she tended to do.
She put away her belongings and lay in her cold room, blankets wrapped tightly around her and she dreamt that night. A restless dream, because war knows no boundaries, and she dreamt of herself running around in circles, hearing the pleading of those she had tortured and this oxymoronic feeling between knowing that these people had committed heinous crimes and knowing that she was doing the exact same thing, in the name of “the greater good”.
What a pathetic statement that truly was.
***
She awoke the next morning with a slight headache and tremors on her right hand. She had researched and had found that it was due to non other than her consumption of black magic — not a surprise at all there. She washed her face and when she exited the bathroom she was surprised to see that her uniform was laying on a perfectly made bed. Hermione looked at the pretty red dress and wondered what exactly bothered her about it. Maybe it was the material of it. She touched the dress carefully, enjoying the velvety feel of it. She had no time or resources to express her femininity for the worser part of a decade.
It was just another thing for her to be bitter about. It left a sour taste in her mouth, this red dress. It symbolised in a way the right of passage that was taken away from her. Hermione couldn’t grow up and experiment with her hair, or her clothing style. She couldn’t do anything like that because she had no time. She refused to look at herself once she wore that dress.
She applied the makeup and hair charms that she had been taught and looked for Popsy. The elf was sat in the kitchen with a dozen or more elves all having breakfast. As she approached them, she realised that all of them were very polite and even cheerful. They asked her many times if there was anything else they could make for her but she insisted that the cup of tea was enough.
She was about to prepare enemy territory and she needed to have her wits about her.
She checked the clocks and realised that it would be soon time for her lessons with the children, Popsy had already informed her of the timetable that the children would be having. Today’s morning consisted of Herbology, followed by the history of Magic and transfiguration . And then after lunch, she was to have to have astronomy with Primrose for the afternoon; whilst Scorpious was to be trained specifically by Malfoy in the dark arts. Hermione scoffed. Taking a look into the curriculum that Malfoy wanted her to follow, she was quick to realise that these children were being trained, it made sense, they were indeed the future of voldemorts regime but she had assumed, that Malfoy wouldn’t subject his own children to it.
But alas she was proven wrong. He seemed all the more willing to use his children as some prototype as to what future may entail.
She waited for the children to arrive to the classroom. One observation that she had made was that this room had no wards. Nothing. No protection charms, she had ran the tests twice to ensure that she hadn’t messed things up. Especially because the rest of the manor was heavily warded. Interesting.
She was stopped by her train of thoughts as the blonde family decided to bless her with their presence. Pristine and polished oozed out of both the children and she stopped to wonder just how much time it had taken for them to be trained in this way, from their mannerisms, etiquette and behaviour. Children should never be this prim and proper, they were children for heavens sake — she sighed internally — just another reason as to why she disliked pureblood society.
The somewhat awkwardly tall boy introduced himself,
“Good morning Miss Meadows, I am the Malfoy heir, Scorpious.” Now, although the sentence itself was said in all blunder that pureblood customs use, it lacked confidence and the child in front of her, was rather timid. He looked constantly at his feet and clearly did not want to even have this introduction in the first place.
A Malfoy heir that lacked all the attributes associated with being heir — excluding of course, the platinum blonde hair.
It now made perfect sense as to why many of Scorpious’s timetable seemed to be handled by Malfoy, clearly his father had realised the ‘weakness’ his son possessed and how he intended to fix it was beyond Hermione. She had always been a firm believer of letting children grow up and out of certain things, one including confidence.
She smiled softly and bowed her head slightly, an acknowledgment to show the professional dynamic between them, and replied, “Okay children, why don’t you both take a seat at your designated desks and we shall start”.
***
After the children’s morning classes had finished, they had promptly been escorted to lunch by one of the elves from the kitchen. Hermione had attempted to try finding her way back to the elf quarters yet after three right turns and two staircases, she was utterly lost. This stupid stupid manor. Why the hell did it need to be so damn big? She was now not only lost, missed her lunch, but now, she couldn’t even make her way back to the children’s study.
For Merlin’s sake.
She had however, stumbled across a door, which seemingly had some living individual on the other side, mainly due to the incessant coughing. She knocked on the door twice and without waiting for a response entered the room.
There on the bed lay a ghostly figure. For a second, Hermione thought that perhaps it had been the ghost of Astoria. From where she was stood, the woman looked like an older version of the girl who she had tutored in Astronomy at her time in Hogwarts. Her painful coughs were what broke Hermione's train of thought and is what eventually forced her to examine the women more closely. When she had reached the bed however, a shocking revelation came down to her.
The woman who was laying down was certainly a Greengrass, and yes she had been presumed to be dead; however this was not Astoria. This was the woman who had tortured and killed 10 of the most powerful death eaters 3 years ago without trying to conceal her identity at all. She was then very publicly humiliated, tortured and then brutally executed on live broadcast showcased to the entirety of the wizarding world to see, a clear reminder to all of what defiance to the dark lord had in-store for you. Her execution being especially brutal as she was one of the inner commanders of Voldemorts army.
He had then proceeded to murder her two sons. Her young children who were innocent to all of this and yet they had been murdered because of the command of a madman. That too had been broadcasted. It had been especially hard for Hermione to watch it because children amidst a war is horrific. Watching someone intentionally murdering a child is horrific. War itself is horrific.
She looked back at the woman lying on the bed.
What the hell was Daphne Greengrass doing here in Malfoy Manor and more importantly how on earth, was she alive?
Just before she could run her diagnostic spell, she felt that same dark energy protruding behind her. She could taste the anger seething from the individual. She slowly turned around and there before her was Draco Malfoy, and before she could even get a word out, he disarmed her. Hermione pondered what she should do in that moment.
She was still a spy at the end of the day, and being killed for stumbling upon Malfoy’s dark secret was a really stupid way for to end up dying. So she ended up deciding there that the only way she was going to get the Death Eater to calm down, would be through throwing a bone at him, something she knew he would want to know the answer to.