Authentic Apologies
Hermione chose to stay sequestered in her room for the remainder of the day, content to immerse herself in research in the form of Magicke Moste Evile and every other book Godelot had written. She’d sent a begrudging Kreatcher down to the library no less than three times to find her any other books connected to what she found in the tombes’ pages.
By the time she heard other people’s voices seeping through her door, the sun had long set and her skin felt positively slimy from what she’d read. It unsettled Hermione to note that while her brain was still rather broken, it was wholly capable of retaining all the inner mechanisms of creating, housing, and destroying horcruxes.
Not to long after she’d thrown one of the last books away from her in disgust was there a knock on her door.
“Go away Harry!” She shouted in response, her magic was still boiling under her skin in righteous anger, and the fingers on her wand hand were itching to throw a curse at him.
That in and of itself was frightening to Hermione. Never before had she wanted to curse her former best friend. Hex maybe, but she’d never desired to actually harm him in any way before. She didn’t actually want to send him away, but she was fearful that if she let him through that doorway her feeble hold on her temper might slip and she would hurt him before she was able to stop herself.
“S’not Harry” came the voice from the other side of the door. She probably should’ve recognized it, but between the thick oak door between her and the voice’s owner and the way her rage swirled viciously in her mind, Hermione couldn’t bring herself to identify it. She hoped the voice was telling the truth, that Harry wouldn’t be standing on the other side of her door when she dropped the locking charm.
Hermione wasn’t sure who she’d been hoping to be on the other side of the door, but Ron Weasley definitely was nowhere near the top of her list. He just stood there, his substantial figure filling the doorway.
He made no move to enter nor leave, he simply just stood there, staring down his nose at her where she’d settled on the floor. His expression was somewhere between curiosity and distaste, but there was something else shining in his frosty blue eyes.
“Why’re you always sitting on the floor? You’ve a perfectly good bed not three feet away from you.” He gestured to the bed without taking his eyes off of her. It didn’t escape Hermione’s notice that his wand was grasped in the hand he kept hanging down at his side.
She could’ve chosen to be snarky, or she could’ve just ignored him entirely. But Hermione admitted to herself that she’d had enough arguing and tension for one day. So rather, she did something that went against every fiber of her being; she told the truth.
“I suppose over the years I got kind of used to the hard ground of my cell. The bed is too soft, I find it…” she trailed off as she scoured her vocabulary for the right word. “Unsettling.”
Ron just nodded carefully, before he entered into her room further, settling himself on the floor across from her with his back leaning against the side of the bed. He was sitting directly in front of her now, his legs outstretched in front of him in such a way that they brushed the knee of one of her crossed legs.
He didn’t say anything once he’d settled himself on the floor, he actually seemed rather content to just stare at her searchingly. Hermione tried to wait him out, but her patience had been tried one too many times today, and she didn’t last very long before she caved and broke the quiet.
“What are you doing here Ron?”
“I live here.” he shot back. He flashed what Hermione was sure he thought to be a cheeky grin at her, but it just came of as a bit slimy.
“I meant in my room, don’t be purposely obtuse.” The grin slid off his face at her words, his expression shifting into one that was more reminiscent of the fifteen year old version of him that Hermione vaguely remembered; uncertain and nervous.
“Harry told me about your argument.” he admitted with an uncomfortable shrug of his shoulders.
“I see, and you’re here to what exactly? List off all the ways he was right, hold me at wandpoint until I say I’m sorry ?” She gestured harshly to the wand in his grasp, her lip pulling back into a snarl of its own volition.
“No Hermione,” she couldn’t manage to completely suppress the growl that escaped her at his use of her name, but Ron carried on unphased. “I’m here to apologize.” Her breath quite literally caught in her throat at that, and Hermione gaped stupidly at him, lost for words. Ron kept talking anyways, his eyes glued to her face, searching.
“I have no excuse for abandoning you when everything went down before sixth year. Harry, me and my family, we were the closest thing you had to a family in the magical world. We should’ve been there for you after you were accused, but Dumbledore seemed so sure you were a lost cause. He convinced my Mum and Dad that you were dangerous.” Ron shook his head disgustingly when he spoke of the dead wizard, which Hermione thought was interesting.
“Harry was so angry too ‘Mione” He didn’t even seem to notice his use of her old nickname, continuing talk so fast her mind had trouble keeping up with his words. “I think he felt like you’d left him, and nobody could even bring up your name without him practically attacking them, he almost fucking killed Malfoy that year for talking about you. I think I was scared that if I tried to talk about you to him that he’d leave me too. Not very Gryffindor of me eh?” He laughed bitterly, still not taking his eyes away from hers.
There was a long pause. Oh , he was actually waiting for her to respond.
“What do you mean he almost killed Malfoy? Like Malfoy as in Draco Malfoy!?” Memories flashed through her mind, cruel in the way only children knew how to be. Vicious digs at her appearance, hexes when her back was turned, disdain swirling in silver eyes as hateful words slipped off his tongue.
These memories did not make her flinch the way her other memories did. These ones were childish in their pain. Hermione knew what real visceral and psychological suffering was now, and schoolyard bullying was not it.
“Oh, ah, I don’t think I was meant to tell you that bit..” Ron looked a bit embarrassed now, his free hand coming up to rub the back of his flushing neck.
“Too late, tell me.” Her tone left no room for argument. Ron had never been particularly good at holding up under her piercing gaze, one she’d learned from mimicking Molly Weasley.
“It’s no big deal ‘Mione” he grumbled defeatedly “there was just a small incident in the bathroom, Malfoy was fine. Snape fixed him up right as rain and Harry got all the detentions after.” Hermione glared at him once more, before Ron broke and confessed the whole story.
And so on her bedroom floor that early evening, Hermione heard the story of the Half Blood Prince, Vanishing Cabinets, and Sectumsempra spells. By the time the story was over, she was furious.
Before she truly understood what was happening, Hermione was on her feet once more. She marched with a purpose through the winding halls and staircases of Grimmauld place, not sure exactly where she was going, but she knew that at the end of her path she would find Harry.
“Harry James Potter!” She practically screeched, her magic flinging the door open so hard that it slammed into the wall behind it, the handle getting caught in the broken drywall. “You used a spell that you had no idea what it did! A spell titled ‘for enemies’! On Malfoy! Are you an idiot?!”
It escaped her notice until the end of her tirade that Harry was not alone in the room. In fact, the room she’d barged into - a formal dining room in she were to wager a guest - was teeming with familiar and unfamiliar faces. Luna and Ginny sat to one side of Harry, Luna with a serene look on her face and Ginny with a hand clapped over her mouth to contain what sounded like giggles. On Harry’s other side sat Sirius, who was barking loud laughs while being shushed by a tired - yet amused - looking Remus. Among the room’s other occupants included Neville, Fred, George, and four other people her age that she did not recognize.
What did not escape her notice however, was that every single person in the room - save for Luna, Neville, Sirius, and a shocked Harry - had their wand trained at her chest.
There were heavy footsteps behind her as Ron finally caught up behind her. He started to stutter out an apology, but the words seemed to die on his lips as he obviously took stock of the situation in front of him.
“‘Mione you don’t understand!” Harry finally found his voice after an uncomfortably tense silence.
“Enlighten me” she scoffed disbelievingly, opening her hands in a prompting gesture.
“He tried to cruicio me!” The room went eerily still at that, as though the air around them had turned to ice.
“He. Did. WHAT?!” Hermione could tangibly feel her magic around her, swirling and pulsing in a rioutous mess of vengeance and fury as her anger morphed from indignance to pinpointed murderous rage, directed at the bastard who would aim an unforgivable at her Harry. It spread out from her body, as though it was hunting for the source of her ire. She watched as those around her flinched away as it rubbed against them before moving on, searching for Malfoy though she knew it would not find him.
The only ones who did not shy away from her brush of magic were Sirius and Luna. Sirius seemed to open his own magic up to her in return, the darkness in hers acknowledging it in his before moving on. Luna did not flinch from her because the witch had somehow snuck around Hermione when she’d been distracted by her anger.
In fact, Hermione did not even notice Luna was no longer at the table until she felt a wand tap her lightly on the temple, and heard the girl’s breathy voice whisper an almost apologetic somnus.
The last thing Hermione saw before everything around her went black was Harry leaping across the table. He seemed as though he were reaching for her, but that didn’t make sense. Harry wouldn’t try to catch her, not anymore. No, Harry would let her fall.