Unspoken

Her heels clacked against the smooth stone flooring of the Hall of Prophecies. All the debris from the explosion had been cleared away; not a single shard of glass or speck of rubble had been spared. Apparently Painswick had authorized a specialized cleaning team to come in, without supervision, as soon as he had received the closing report - security protocols be damned. 

Lazy geezer.

Hermione had snatched the inventory from her assistant as soon as she realized Painswick was trying to wrestle control away from her. No one within the department seemed surprised when she announced she would take on the review single handedly. The only protest came from Elizabeth, who was sure Hermione was going to overwork herself again.

At the end of the aisle, she stopped and put a hand to the wall. There were scars in the stonework, older than just a few weeks. Underneath her palm, she could feel the dull chill of ancient wards. 

- - - - - - -

To you,

With great aggravation, I now lay claim to being the foremost expert on prophecies, baring Keeper Wentworth.

I find it incredibly offensive that a top tier research facility is not doing research. The Hall of Prophecies is nothing more than a storage facility. There is so much potential for study of the esoteric but the Ministry is content to just leave it as it is: a chamber of glass balls no one touches and an old man - no one knows how old he is, by the way, I cannot seem to find an employee file for him - who supposedly catalogs their inscriptions and occasionally resets the runic wards.

Even with my special access to the entirety of the Ministry’s archives, I have found out very little about the creation or capture of the prophecies we have in our possession. Keeper Wentworth has been seemingly generous with his knowledge when I have approached him with questions, but as I can barely make out most of what he says, he has sadly been of little use.

Most of the published books on divination are only suited to be used as kindling for the fireplaces at Hogwarts. As such, I have had to make avail of what little information DOM does have enscrolled. The statistical reporting was worth a brief comb over. Less than 40% of prophecies since 1763 have been recognized as fulfilled, decreasing exponentially into the twentieth century. More than 81% of those prophecies have come to pass within a year, but there is an instance of one prophecy made a hundred years before the event transpired. There was a small notation during the 1830’s regarding the ‘power of belief’ but I could not find anything to follow up on.

It would be suspicious of me to dedicate too much of my time to examining the Hall, looking for any clues as to my demise. I have had to be discrete in my visitations, using the lack of protocols as an excuse for my scrutiny. I have not been able to find any of the prophecies I have been witness to, but I must believe they exist somewhere in that endless maze of orbs. Not that I would dare to pick one up. I cannot decide if I am more frightened at the prospect of going mad if I am wrong… or being proved that this is all real.

What I have found is all written in the purple planner. Maybe you will see something in that mess that I could not. I’ll continue to search, however. I have never given up before.

Seriously Irritated, Me

- - - - - - -

The coldness of the stone diminished further under the warmth of her hand. However strong these wards had been in the past, with the Keeper still at St. Mungo’s, the protections of the Hall were deteriorating. 

She tried not to frown as she whisked her wand at the floating clipboard to mark off another row of prophecies accounted for.

A proper inventory was necessary to move forward, but it was of little help to her predicament. No such inventory had taken place after 1995, the summer in which the Deatheaters infiltrated the Ministry. The budget for the rebuild was tight, and there had been no pushback from the Keeper to do so. Who knew what might have gone missing in the year Voldemort had control of the magical government. One of the larger scrolls in her office contained an outline of a five-year plan for DOM and a full inventory of the Hall had been marked as a top priority. Now it was just another task Granger had not been able to accomplish before she disappeared.

Her feet ached. Even with a Cushioning Charm, these heels were a pain after standing in them for a few hours. Hermione spun around to take her baring again, marveling at how far the Hall reached back in front of her. The inventory would take weeks. It wasn’t as though she could abandon her other work responsibilities. She felt a surge of empathy for her predecessor.

There would be no clues for her here. The sad little report she had retrieved from Jefferies was all she had to go on. She set a personalized ward over the entrance before taking her leave. 

Hermione walked back to her office, her head down to read the report for the twentieth or so time. It went extensively into the damage that had been caused, the state of the wards, but concluded that as there were no magical signatures, there was nothing further to search for. She had half a mind to go up to MLE and ask if this was their idea of a proper investigation, but the thought of Harry’s annoyed expression and the mysterious, dangerous figures lurking in positions of power lead her to bury that particular thought.

“Oh, Hermione, are you back to take lunch?” 

The question from her assistant was timely. Hermione, distracted by her clipboard, stopped just short of walking straight into Elizabeth’s desk and saved her poor shins a couple of new bruises. 

“Yes, thank you, Elizabeth. I finished aisles 32-41 this morning.” Hermione pulled the parchment off the clipboard and handed it over to be put with the other completed sections. “Any new information on Keeper Wentworth?”

Elizabeth shook her head sadly.

“Damn. Please interrupt me at any time if you get news.”

Distracted by thoughts of what to do about the failing wards, Hermione did not notice the green apple on her desk until she had crossed behind it. She fell into her chair with a heavy heart and stared at the apple.

It was Friday. Draco had been avoiding her since their arrival together to the Ministry on Tuesday morning. He had side-Apparated her to one of the public entrances, then popped away without a word. Since then, he had not come to check on her and her schedule was so full due to her time out of office that she hadn’t been able to seek him out herself.

Yet every day when she had returned from some meeting or errand that had taken her out of her office, there had been an apple waiting for her. Bramley variety, with a polished shine to it that made her feel like a schoolteacher. Hermione knew what it really meant though - a bittersweet reminder to eat properly. 

Elizabeth was beyond flustered as to how Draco was getting into the office without her knowledge. Her assistant could not discern how he was doing it. Hermione would have liked to know as well, so that she could catch him. She had tried sneaking away early from one of her meetings yesterday, but he had already placed the piece of fruit before she arrived back.

She missed him. What part of him she missed, Hermione was unsure. She had seen him almost everyday since- well, the beginning.

Suddenly she felt a flare of determination; she assumed this was what Granger had called ‘Gryffindor courage’. Hermione got back on her feet, grabbed the apple, and stopped at Elizabeth’s desk.

“Who is on the schedule for the Brain Room today?” she asked.

Her assistant jumped at her sudden appearance and question, but quickly pulled out the research schedules for the month and flipped it open.

“Um, the Dream Team was in there from from eight to noon, the Fairweather Grant is now until three, at four-”

Got you. 

Hermione thanked Elizabeth and started down the corridor in the direction of the Brain Room.

“What about your lunch?” called Elizabeth, befuddled.

“Got an apple!” she called behind her, holding up the Bramley clasped in her hand.

The wail of “ Again?!” echoed after Hermione as she turned the corner.

- - - - - - -

The luminous glow of the tanks was soft against the darkness. Draco and Goldstein - Anthony, she reminded herself - were observing a hovering diagram of a brain, presumably the brain currently floating in the isolated tank. The sparkling image bobbed to and fro in sync with its living partner. 

Not wanting to startle their work, Hermione knocked lightly on the wall. Both men looked over their shoulder with faces of displeasure at being interrupted. Upon seeing who their uninvited guest was, Goldstein adjusted his expression to a welcoming smile.

Draco did not.

Her heart faltered for a moment. Direct confrontation was not something she had experience with.

Seems the Granger thing to do, though. 

That thought was kicked away like a quaffle. This was not about Granger. The dead-and-gone Golden Girl had never been friends with Draco. Draco was Hermione’s first friend, not some pass over from her predecessor. 

“What brings you to our dark domain?” asked Goldstein with a gesture to join them at the tanks.

Hermione took the invitation immediately and crossed over to stand next to their illuminated brain figure. Draco took a slight side step that could have easily been missed but she caught the movement out of the corner of her gaze. The small rejection flamed her intentions anew.

“I came to speak with Draco.” she told the dark-haired wizard, setting a hand on one hip and shifting her gaze from Goldstein to the target in question.

Goldstein’s eyes blew wide at the use of Draco’s first name, wide enough to see the reflection of the tanks. He looked disconcertedly at Draco and then back to Hermione. The former Ravenclaw took a swift assessment and did the smart thing.

“I think I need a cup of tea before we tackle this next part. I’ll leave you to it?”

He was out of the Brain Room faster than a niffler digging for gold. 

Draco pursed his lips unhappily and turned slightly away from her, concentrating again on his work. A small flick of his wrist and the image spun, a portion of the brain lighting up in the hippocampus region. She waited a few moments, hoping he would at least look at her. Then she hoped he would at least say something.

She gave in first.

“I’m sorry.” Hermione said softly.

Even in the darkness, she detected a momentary pause, a hitch of breath from the wizard next to her. Draco turned his body a little further away, his blonde locks falling into his face and hiding his eyes as he moved from his diagram to observe the brain in the tank. 

“Am I not allowed to apologize?” she asked, heart thudding in her ribcage.

He paused again, and Hermione almost didn’t hear his reply of, “Why?”

“Why am I sorry?” she asked, confused.

No answer.

Hermione sighed and decided she hated direct confrontation. She didn’t feel brave. She felt desperate. To steady her nerves, she took a deep breath before saying, “Well, to be honest, I’m sorry for a lot of things. I dragged you into this mess I am in. I put you in danger! But at the moment, I’m sorry for hurting you. For not telling you outright that I trust you, not just because I need you. Because you’ve shown to me that you care and that you keep putting me first, even though I have done nothing to deserve your friendship. You were never a monster, Draco.”

BANG.

The side of his fist collided with the glass. The floating organ flashed its tendrils out like a startled squid and fled to the far side of the tank, its corresponding image exploding into fading sparkles. A smaller bang accompanied the first as Draco’s forehead smacked the surface just next to his hand. 

“What the fuck, Granger!”

She took a step back as he dragged his free hand down his face and then back through his hair. His tone was bitter, sharp, but… he was… laughing? Hermione drew herself up as tall as she could, unsure what to expect as Draco finally, finally turned around to look at her. His grey eyes were overbright. His lips were twisted in a pained smile.

“Eight years. Eight. Years. And Eirene help me, I have never once apologized to you, and of course, you had to do it first, you damned goody goody.” 

“Sor-”

“Ah ah! No, I get to apologize next, Granger!” he stated firmly, squaring his shoulders off and trapping her in place with his gaze. “I will never be able to fully atone for what I said and did to you in the past. I was angry at you as a child for being everything my parents taught me was wrong with the world, and then I hated you after the war for being in the right all along. And then I was furious to see you failing. After everything my family put you through, it felt like your wellbeing was my fault, my responsibility, and so I nosed into your business.”

Hermione tried to keep her mouth from twitching up into a grin, but failed miserably. 

“Why are you smiling?” Draco asked, eyes narrowed.

“Technically that was not an apology-”

He opened his mouth and stopped himself, taking a deep breath with his eyes closed while she watched, quietly snickering in her head all the while.

“I am sincerely sorry, Granger.”

“Then, if you want to be forgiven, you’d best start calling me Hermione again.” she admonished, adding as an afterthought, “Please.”

“Saving you from your lack of self-awareness doesn’t weigh in at all?” Draco mused, his own mouth catching a smile in the corner.

“Oh, I calculated all your recent endeavors into my assessment. You aren’t half-bad as a sidekick.”

“Sidekick!?”

Hermione couldn’t help it, she burst out into relieved laughter now. It was cathartic, this banter they so easily slipped into. Once she caught her breath, she admitted, “Merlin, I missed you.”

“Of course you did, I am excellent company.”

His smile dropped just slightly as he looked at her with warm eyes and Hermione felt her stomach drop.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, feeling like she misread the room.

“I… Hermione, I am worried about you.”

She scoffed, flipping a strand of frizz out of her face. “You have made that abundantly clear, Draco.”

“Let me make it crystal clear - you cannot do this alone. It isn’t that I believe you are incapable, far from the fact. But just because you can do it…. doesn’t mean you should.”

His words resonated, a small tingle like a fairy’s wings brushing over her skin crept down her arms. Granger had used those same words. 

“You know… well, you know me very well. And I am grateful.” Hermione said.

“Wait, have you eaten lunch?” he asked suddenly, glancing at the watch on his wrist.

“Someone left me an apple,” she teased.

“That is hardly a meal, Hermione-”

“Harry asked about you, you know.”

That shut Draco up. A grimace crossed over his face, and he sniffed, turning back to the tanks to keep compiling his notes as they talked. “And what did Wonder Boy want to know?”

“Well, apparently you were seen dropping me off at the public entrance on Tuesday by someone in MLE.”

Tuesday evening had seen the arrival of Harry via the floo, Thai takeaway in hand and a list of questions about her relationship with Draco longer than the report she had received from Jefferies. He had berated her at length about the complications of getting into any kind of friendship with Draco - his tone set to make it obvious he did not believe it stopped at mere friendship - but she’d deflected his interrogation time and time again with questions about the wedding and compliments on the tom yum noodle soup.

She didn’t share any of this with Draco, just kept her tone casual and said, “I think he is coming to terms with the fact I enjoy working with you. Speaking of work - what is it you are working on today?”

“At the moment, we are still working on a diagnostic spell, but we haven’t been able to establish-”

The doors to the laboratory opened, much more loudly than they had when Hermione had snuck into the room, and Goldstein bustled back in with a floating tray complete with a steaming kettle and several mismatched teacups. Hermione thanked him quietly as she helped herself to a cup while Draco went on to explain that they were nearing completion of their first phase. They had narrowed down a specific combination of reagents that would allow for the clearest picture of memory and behavioral patterns, but there was an issue.

“There are no patterns.” sighed Goldstein, gulping down some of his tea and waving at the brains in annoyance. “Nothing to pinpoint to any magical methodologies. Malfoy even secured us a private viewing of Da Vinci’s bio-magical diagrams at the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Firenze, but his genius sadly didn’t extend to psychometry.”

“Psychology.” corrected Hermione.

“The cases we have been studying post-War are very similar to the muggle concept of ‘disassociation’,” Draco explained, staving off further explanation as Hermione nodded knowingly. “We are seeing it a lot in our generation specifically. And dissociative amnesia is difficult enough to treat in the muggle populace.”

“We have postulated that there is a deeper level of trauma that requires attending to. The  magical instincts of a witch or wizard could mean that what we are seeing in magical disassociation is a result of involuntary casting that doesn’t follow normal magical rules.” 

Draco looked at her pointedly while Goldstein jotted some notes.

“Do you mean to say, as in spontaneous magic? Like in a magical child?” asked Hermione. It was all rather fascinating, so much so that she wasn’t even thinking about how it might all correlate with the current situation she was in.

“Similar to a degree. Amnesia due to Obliviation follows a distinct pattern that directly links to the series of mind modification spells such Confundus, a Jelly-Brain Jinx, even Imperio. While there are varying degrees of difference, the underlying sequence is the same.”

Hermione crossed her arms and tapped her fingers against her forearm. “So, rather than the magic being channeled through a medium like our wands, you are saying that this magical disassociation is due to innate magical ability?”

A few agreeing nods had her contemplating that thought further. 

“Then, rather than follow magical theory based on wandwork, why aren’t you digging into the unique structure of the witch or wizard’s magical signature? Spontaneous magic done by children is often outside of what we learn to cast as we get older.”

Both wizards were staring at her now like they had no idea what she was talking about. 

“We can cast magic without wands, yes?”

More agreeing nods.

“So. Throw away the pattern. This isn’t a mind-modification spell. It’s not spellwork at all - it’s just pure magic. Call it wild magic, raw magic, whatever, but it’s not going to follow a pattern other than that of the magical being involved.”

“What are you on about?” asked Goldstein, but Draco seemed to be catching on.

“You are comparing our magic to that of magical fauna and flora?”

Hermione shrugged and turned to stare at the brain in the solitary tank. “Are we not magical fauna ourselves?”

“So, if we study the problem as though this was intuitive casting-” repeated Goldstein.

“- you can review examples of non-channeled magic from an individual and use that to see what could be undone to the dissociative damage.” announced Hermione.

“Why were you not in Ravenclaw?!”

She laughed at the annoyed and ecstatic expression on Goldstein’s face then found herself being swung around by the waist. Draco had picked Hermione up and twirled her in her air, her hair flying wildly around both of their heads as he set her back on her feet and plated a kiss on her cheek.

It was fleeting. Just a momentary touch of his lips against her skin, a bloom of warmth that she pressed her fingers against as she watched Draco turn to his partner to immediately begin on a new outline for methods and reagents to move forward with.

She was blushing. And since Hermione had already accomplished what she had come here to do, it felt like a cue to make her exit. They were completely immersed in the new discussion and Hermione still had work left on her desk and a lunch she hadn’t eaten. As quietly as she slipped in, she attempted to slip out.

Draco caught her by the hand at the door.

“Oh, I didn’t want to interrupt you any further-” she said, feeling sheepish for trying to sneak away and hoping the blush had faded. Though it was liable to come back if he just kept holding her hand

He shook his head and glanced back at Goldstein before saying, “I’ll come over tonight, if that’s alright?”

“Really?” asked Hermione, praying she didn’t sound as hopeful as she felt.

“We still have to talk about next steps, don’t we?”

“I thought, well, I thought maybe you felt… after Monday… we shouldn’t proceed.”

Draco ran his free hand through his hair. “Well, I think we have to. And dinner is on me. I don’t think going out is… well.”

“Sounds great.” she said brightly, “My place?”

“Yeah, actually, how about I just pick you up at your office at five and we go together? Maybe the Salted Duck delivers.”

Hermione almost said, ‘It’s a date’ but bit her lip and nodded.

“See you then, Hermione.” Draco squeezed her hand gently, winked, and disappeared back into the darkness of the Brain Room.

She hummed all the way back to her office.

She hummed while she ate her lunch, still warm cutesy of the charmed cozy.

She hummed until Elizabeth stared at her through the open door and asked if she’d been hit with a Humming Hex and did they need to go to St. Mungo’s. 

Yes, today was a good day.