Any Other Universe
Hermione’s voice was hoarse from screaming. Her limbs trembled as the wound continued to bleed, dark sticky liquid pooling around her body.
Voldemort and Bellatrix Disapparated from the Manor. His aunt sneered at him to take care of the trash.
His parents were off … somewhere. Probably huddling in their bedroom.
The Drawing Room, once bright and welcoming, was dark and fecund with dark magic and the smells of torture.
Hermione curled in on herself. Even small movements took considerable effort. Her brown eyes, crusted with tears and salt, were unfocused.
Draco thought, just as well. He couldn’t handle her striking glare on him.
He kneeled down by this girl he'd known forever and who was simultaneously a stranger. His hand snaked around her waist, trying to prop her up on his lap. Her blood was all over him. He barely noticed.
Strange thing to be bothered by. He scolded his younger self. They were the same on the inside.
“H-Harry?” Her voice stuttered.
“No,” he said.
Her brows crumpled and she tried her best to place his face. “Malfoy?”
“Granger.”
“Don’t. No more please.”
“No more,” he promised her.
She sobbed with relief. She was in so much pain.
His eyes stared down at the jagged letters etched in her forearm, deep and ugly, reeking of dark magic. His chest clenched. Before he could help himself, he cupped her cheek in some misguided action to comfort her. His thumb dragged across her cheek, leaving a trail of her blood.
Hermione’s eyes grew bleary again. “D-did we make it?” Her words were garbled.
He tried to keep her awake. Keep her with him. “Stay with me. C‘mon. Gotta get you back to Potter.”
A dribble of blood sneaked out the corner of her mouth. She shook her head.
“Where’s that courage you idiots all talk about?” His voice creaked. If he weren't suffocating with grief, he might have felt shame.
Hermione lifted her mouth in some semblance of a smile, showing blood stained teeth and a masticated tongue.
“Did we make it?”, she asked again. She stared at him blankly, but he didn’t know who she saw. Draco wasn’t sure to whom she was talking. If it were him she was addressing. Or Potter or Weasley. But she stared at him like she knew him. Could see him. More than anyone.
For whatever reason, he kissed her on her forehead. In that moment, Draco knew he would be forever damned. Wrenched from some unknown depths of his magic, the words found him. Something deep in his twisted and wretched heart, he knew to be true. He would swear his Magic on it. “We did, in another universe.”
He felt her smile against his throat. A tear crept down her cheek, staining his skin pressed to hers.
She was drifting now, her head lolling back. His hand moved up to the sweaty nape of her neck to support her.
Her bloody fingers slipped down to intertwine with his, as his wand fell free from his cuff into his palm. Cool wood met warm skin. They felt the rigid hawthorn rolling between them.
He aimed it at her abdomen, “Avada kedavra.”
[Image: Hands clasped together, dripping blood. One forearm says ‘Mudblood.’]
Art by the wonderful and incomparable BelleMedusa.