Shards of Nuance

Ron was at the Ministry that day only to deliver his most recently sealed case to Harry after Harry got out of the meeting with the Minister. He told himself that morning – just like he did every morning – that he didn’t mind reporting to his best friend; after all, he had recommended Harry for the job when the Head Auror position opened, even if he seemed a little young for the title. Ron directed his own team, it was true, but it produced just average results. It would’ve been one thing to give said average results to an older, less personal director. It was another thing entirely to give them to his best friend and brother-in-law. Harry never indicated any disappointment in him, but it still felt rather awkward for their friendship.

Still, it was a mild morning. His team’s biggest case had been wrapped up three days ago. They’d been surprisingly efficient with documentation, and he had been able to take off the previous afternoon. A few drinks and a rowdy pick-up game of quidditch with some friends left him feeling rather light. Now, he was almost whistling strolling into the Ministry. Surprise – more surprise than when that vampire had barfed muggle condiments on his head – washed over him when a head full of light brown waves belonging to Britain’s favorite (his favorite too) and most conspicuously absent witch stepped out of a floo in front of him.

“Hermione!” He shouldered his way through a few Ministry employees crowding the walkway. “Hermione!”

She did not turn around. In fact, she seemed to walk faster, arms pumping at her sides. He had to run to catch up to her, and by the time he did people had already begun to recognize her.

“Hey, Hermione! Wait up!” He reached for her arm.

“Not now, Ron.” She shook him off without turning to look at him. A few cameras began to flash.

“Hermione, what’s up?” He had to pace quickly to keep up with her as she rounded her way towards the Minister’s offices.

“I need to speak to Shacklebolt.” People began to part in front of her, some murmuring with confusion, others calling out her name cheerfully. She gave no indication she heard them.

Ron had to resort to following in her wake due to the thickening crowd. “He’s in a meeting right now. He’ll be done in an hour or so. Why don’t we go get a cup of tea til then?” This behavior was very unlike her, and he began to get a bad feeling.

“Nope. He’ll speak to me right now.”

Once Ron was next to her again, he hated the auror instinct requiring him to check her eyes for signs of an imperius curse. She looked perfectly lucid, but it still didn’t feel right to him. It had been a long time since he’d seen his friend, but even in the worst stress of the war her eyes hadn’t boiled like this. It made him feel more disconnected from her than all the years, kilometers, and unanswered letters had.

He paced her until they reached the front desk queue for visiting upper level Ministry officials. She marched straight past the early morning line to the revolving door in the middle of the administrative booths. She pushed through it even as he tried to grab her robes to stop her. He had to dodge one of the doors, so he was late following her out on the other side.

A flustered administrative worker was blocking her path. “Ma’am. This is a violation of procedure. You must go back to the queue.”

“I am seeing Shacklebolt.”

“You are violating security. The Minister is seen by appointment only and only with proper documentation.”

She drew her wand, “Get out of my way.”

Ron drew his own, cursing at her. “Damn it, Hermione. You can see him in a little bit. Don’t do this.”

The official stepped out of the way of the wand pointed at him, muttering something about not getting paid enough for this, and Hermione continued forward unabated.

“What the hell are you doing? Just wait!” Ron was struggling to bring himself to hex his friend.

The official must have pulled the alarm, because a blaring caterwaul filled the hall as they advanced toward the Minister’s front office. Four aurors rounded the corner with their wands drawn. Ron, not wishing to be seen hesitating, resolutely pointed his wand at her. “Hermione, please!”

He heard no sound come from her; her lips did not even move. She only slashed her wand through the air, and all four aurors were thrown back into the wall violently, their wands scattered about the room. Bloody hell. When did she get that powerful? He stilled his wand again, afraid to draw her magic toward himself.

The Minister’s secretary knocked her chair and her nameplate (“Ms. Julia Sparks”) over in her hurry to get up from her desk when Hermione burst into her office, Ron close behind her.

“Where’s Shacklebolt?”

“He’s in a conference,” the secretary squeaked. “You can’t come in like this! I’ll call the aurors.”

“Call them. I don’t bloody care,” Hermione headed to the door marked for conferences.

Ron glanced helplessly at the secretary as Hermione slammed the door open with such force that the doorknob left a hole in the wall behind it.

An ornate, umber table hovered above the ground. Around it leaned Shacklebolt with a calm look on his face, Harry dressed in newly tailored Head Auror robes, their old transfiguration professor who was now the Hogwarts Headmaster, and the ever-radiant Andromeda Tonks whose only display of emotion at Hermione’s entrance was to tilt her head slightly to the side.

Shacklebolt grinned. “Ms. Granger, I am glad that you’ve decided to accept our invitation. We’ll have to catch you up, but better late than never. Mr. Weasley, why don’t you join us? Ms. Sparks, please let the aurors know that they can stand down.”

Hermione ignored the Minister because her eyes had settled on Harry, who tugged at his collar, nervous under the irate glare of his friend. She strode toward him aggressively.

“Harry. What the hell is this?” She tossed a bronze cylindrical object with bright blue streaks that now made a faintly audible crackling noise.

Harry swallowed. “I – I don’t know.”

“The hell you don’t.” She now had both hands on the table, using her standing position to lean over him.

“It’s a bullet from a muggle handgun. Maybe a 9mm. Looks like it’s been heavily cursed,” an unphased voice came from Andromeda. Her face showed only mild interest, and she remained reclined in her chair with her legs crossed. Clearly, she did not share Harry’s discomfort.

“Exactly.” Hermione spared Andromeda only a brief glance before returning her attention to Harry.

“Where… where did it come from?” Harry’s voice was thick.

“I pulled it out of Bellatrix Lestrange’s bleeding stomach.”

Silence. For the first time in his life, Ron felt something pulsing in the air, a force lapping at the walls. The tension was tangible and fragile.

“What?” A small whisper escaped Andromeda’s lips. She hadn’t changed position, but something like fear washed over her face. “Is she ok?”

“She’s stable.” Hermione didn’t stop to pity the woman.

Harry squirmed under her gaze. “Look, these things happen. Lots of people are probably after Lestrange. We’ll look into it and send a healer over. Tell me - how did you find her? We’ve been searching for her for months; the trace they placed on her isn’t working as well as it ought.”

“No, Harry!” Hermione raised her voice. “You tell me why a woman who was wrongly sent to Azkaban for 14 years and whose own magic was cut out by some fucking Ministry experiment so that she can’t even defend herself against magic is laying in my living room half-dead from a wound inflicted by an enchanted muggle weapon wielded by someone with a bloody auror badge – someone who apparently reports to you!” She jabbed her finger at Harry’s newly embroidered collar. He flinched multiple times during her tirade.

“We’ll investigate it immediately, Hermione.” Shacklebolt’s calm voice broke the tension. “I’ll dispatch an interdepartmental team right now.”

“Would it be wise to wait until she’s healed?” McGonagall asked. “I’m sure Andromeda can pull one of her top healers to see her this morning before an investigation overwhelms her.”

Harry tried to abate his anxiety by snapping into action. “Ron, assemble your team. They need to be ready to go as soon as possible.”

Ron opened his mouth to protest, but Hermione saved him. “Absolutely not. No fucking aurors are going to step foot into my house.” The force of her bitterness intimidated him further.

“I’ll go.” Andromeda spoke up. “I’ll go before we start any documentation in St. Mungo’s or the Ministry. I can work off the record until it makes sense to involve the ministry.”
“It seems like the Ministry is already involved.” McGonagall sighed.

Hermione levelled her gaze at Andromeda; the two witches held eye contact for a long time, each sizing the other up. The older, auburn-haired woman with the overwhelming magic confused Hermione, and Hermione didn’t like to trust things that confused her.

“Please.” Andromeda’s whisper came again.

Hermione’s shoulders relaxed slightly. “I’ll send a patronus with instructions on how to arrive as soon as I’m home.” Then she whirled on the others. “Don’t any of you dare try to come or send anyone else or they’ll be ruined by the blood wards.”

Ron gaped; at which part he did not know.

“What, Ron? You think muggleborns can’t have blood wards?” Hermione’s words were biting, and Harry jumped when she directed them back at him. “Harry. I expect you to do something real about it.”

Then she slammed the door behind her and was out of the Ministry before anyone moved to stop her.

**

Andromeda did exactly as she was instructed and arrived less than an hour later. She practically floated out of the fireplace unruffled, none the worse for wear even though Hermione had been roughed up by her own floo route more than once.

“Impressive. That path would be very challenging to trace. But you said there were wards…?”

“They begin some ways back in the route; I adjusted them for you.” They began in the stone oven built into the kitchen wall at the bar, but she wasn’t about to share that information. Andromeda seemed trustworthy, but Hermione still wary of her.

“Where is she?”

Hermione led the older woman to her bedroom where she had just levitated Bellatrix onto the bed. She hadn’t told Bellatrix that Andromeda was coming – only that she had found a trustworthy healer and, yes, it was absolutely necessary. She didn’t know how to tell the dark-haired woman, marooned and lonely in an unforeseen phase of life, that the healer was her estranged sister, and she was anxious about what would happen when she found out.

Andromeda was as good as her reputation, though, and when she entered the room she went right to work without hesitation or fanfare. Everything was as professional, organized, and as polite as if she had been attending to the someone as important and unfamiliar as the muggle prime minister. She was gentle but firm with her hands and her wand - two things Hermione had not been. Her demeanor helped Bellatrix, it seemed, because the injured woman gave only one weak squeak (“Andy!”), which could have been in either protest or relief. For her part, Andromeda gave no indication of the multitude of emotions that Hermione was sure the woman was experiencing. It was a warm, comfortable magic that settled over the room until the healer turned to her.

“Would you make a cup of tea?”

“Um, sure.” Hermione was caught off guard by such a simple request. She went into the kitchen to boil water. As the bubbles began to roll, she was startled by a tired voice behind her.

“We need to talk a minute.” Andromeda wore a pinched look on her face that has been hidden in the bedroom. She was obviously worried.

“Of course.”

“We need to get Narcissa.”

Hermione nearly dropped the teapot. “Narcissa Malfoy? Why?”

“She is the best healer I’ve ever known. Significantly better than I am. Always has been.”

That unexpected revelation was hard for Hermione to comprehend. “It’s that bad?”

“It’s definitely that bad. I could maybe make it work, but Narcissa would be much more likely to be successful.”

“She’s not going to want her to come.” Hermione remembered Bellatrix’ comments about her youngest sister and the trials.

“I know.” Andromeda rubbed her face with both hands. “It just has to be done. It has to be Narcissa.”

“What’s so bad that it has to be her?”

“I haven’t worked on any wound with that dark of magic since the first attack on the Order members.” Andromeda paused, and Hermione wondered if she had cared for the Longbottoms. “Narcissa might know more about healing wounds from dark magic than anyone else…maybe anyone alive right now. There hasn’t been a wizard like the Dark Lord anywhere in the world for a while. That we know of.”

“She healed…. For the Death Eaters?”

“I suppose that’s one way to look at it. She healed some of our worst too.”

“What do you mean?”

“We sent Bill Weasley to her after his run-in with Greyback. Werewolf attack mixed with dark magic was pretty brutal. Bill doesn’t remember. He was obliviated.”

“You asked the wife of Lucius Malfoy to heal Bill Weasley?” Hermione struggled to process what she was hearing.

“I don’t think she is the person you assume she is.”

“Who else knew?”

Andromeda shrugged. “Snape. Dumbledore, I suppose. A couple of my best healers at St. Mungo’s. Don’t look at me like that, Hermione. War was terrible. All I wanted was fewer terrible things to happen to fewer people.”

There was a lull before Hermione said, “So when are you going to tell Bellatrix?”

“I guess now. I’ll send a patronus to Narcissa once I’m fairly sure Bella won’t do anything stupid. Will you manage the wards for her?”

“Yes.”

**

Hermione didn’t wait to hear the results from Andromeda’s conversation with her sister. Instead, she surprised herself by donning her robes for the second time that day and apparated to Malfoy Manor. She felt much less confident knocking on the Malfoy gates than she had storming the Ministry. She announced herself with her wand out but not in an active stance, aware that she certainly was being watched by someone in the house if not by the house itself.

A house elf who looked uncomfortably like Dobby peered through the gate. “State your business,” it growled.

“Hermione Granger here to see Narcissa Malfoy on behalf of her sister.”

“And your sister’s name is?”

She coughed, “No, I’m here for Lady Malfoy’s sister.” She hoped it wasn’t a mistake to lead with this.

The elf curled its lip, though not in disgust, and disappeared into the building. Shortly, a steady clicking could be heard in the entrance, and the gates in front of Hermione swung open without warning. She licked her lips, reminding herself of her strength, and watched Narcissa Malfoy come into view. The woman was wearing a long grey dress with fur-lined black robes wrapped around her upper body. Hermione refused to wonder about the creature from which that fur came. A distinct rhythm of clip-clopping accompanied her gait. Every other footstep was always punctuated by the hollow sound of her cane striking the floor. Her eyes were locked on Hermione, much as they had been on Platform 9 ¾ so many years ago. The woman was unreadable.

She came to a stop, looking down her nose and three steps at Hermione. “Ms. Granger.”

“Mrs. Malfoy.”

“I assume you’re not here to exchange pleasantries.”

“Yes, I….” Hermione hadn’t prepared herself for this conversation the way she had for the one in the Ministry that morning.

Narcissa lifted her chin ever so slightly and began to turn back toward the house. “It seems you’re wasting my time.”

“Andromeda is about to send you a patronus.” Hermione blurted. The blonde woman froze on the landing, back still to Hermione. “Asking for your help.”

“My help?” It sounded like the woman facing away from her snorted.

“It’s Bellatrix. She’s injured. It’s bad. Andromeda said you’re maybe the only one who can really treat her.”

Narcissa’s squared shoulders turned slowly, supported by the cane. “She sent you?”

“Not exactly.” Hermione threw all her eggs in one basket. “I’m just here to ask you to do what she asks, if only this once, and save Bellatrix.”

The woman’s icy gaze gave the impression that she was trying to penetrate Hermione’s mind, but she felt no probe or anything else that suggested her mind was being attacked. Perhaps the woman’s curiosity was simply that fierce.

“Where is she?”

“They’re at my house.”

“Both of my sisters… at your house?”

Hermione nodded, her throat dry. At that moment, an iridescent kelpie galloped through the gates, its streaming mane whipping with the tug of the wards. Andromeda’s urgent voice rang out from it pleading with her younger sister, ending with the promise that Hermione would be in touch with instructions on how to get to them if she agreed to help.

The blonde woman was silent for almost a whole minute after the kelpie dissolved into wisps. Then without changing her expression, she said, “Wait here. I will gather my things.” The woman left her on the front steps of the manor but returned rather quickly for someone who walked with a limp, a small bag in tow. “You’ll apparate me through your wards.”

It was not a question, but Hermione answered it anyway. “Yes.”

She felt a small twinge of pride that such a notorious pureblood assumed she had blood wards at her little muggle flat. Narcissa Malfoy placed her hand in the crook of Hermione Granger’s arm, and they disappeared from the manor steps.

**

Hermione felt out of place in her own home. Six months ago, any one of the Black sisters in her home would have been unthinkable; now Narcissa Malfoy, Andromeda Tonks, and Bellatrix Lestrange took up all the physical and emotional space in her bedroom, the heads of the first two close together while they worked perfectly in sync. She had not accompanied Narcissa into the room when they arrived; she couldn’t even imagine the reunion between the three, especially considering the circumstances. Time had passed without any word, so she eventually let herself in to bring them tea. When Bellatrix beckoned for her to stay, she summoned a small chair to sit next to the head of the bed. Hermione saw both of Bellatrix’s sisters register when she clenched Hermione’s hand during a painful spell, but their eyes did not linger. They said nothing, so Hermione stayed put. Narcissa was uncommonly talented. She had as much poise and attention to detail in her hands as she did in social interaction, perhaps more. She and Andromeda worked mostly in silence, the latter handing the blonde witch a potion or an unknown instrument at different times without so much as a word or eye contact between the two. Hermione felt as if a great body of water were settling peacefully around them, stirring only to remind her of its power with a rumble every now and then. When Bellatrix seemed to fall into a light sleep, she excused herself from the room just to escape the weight of the sisters’ chemistry.

Narcissa and Andromeda emerged about an hour later to a much cleaner living room and kitchen. The woman with the auburn hair lifted herself to sit on the counter and rested her head back on the cabinet. She closed her eyes and exhaled deeply. The blonde sister reached for the teapot still steaming on the stove. Right before grabbing the handle, she cast a glance at Hermione and asked, “May I?”

Hermione nodded. “How is she?”

Narcissa filled a mug before answering. “She will be ok. I wasn’t sure at first, but I don’t think she’ll have much more extraordinary trouble.”

“She is extraordinary trouble.” Andromeda didn’t open her eyes. Narcissa sniffed into her cup to hide an untimely snort.

Hermione didn’t find it amusing yet. “What was it?”

“Basically, a curse that seemed to be designed to turn flesh into mineral compounds. The bullet tore open significant amounts of tissue so that the curse could attach itself to vulnerable cells. Blood vessels in her abdominal organs were beginning to mineralize inappropriately.”

“Shit.” Hermione wasn’t sure what appropriate mineralization would be in this situation, but that didn’t lessen the hellishness of the idea.

“Have you ever seen anything like it before, Cissy?” Andromeda asked.

“No. None of the Dark Lord’s followers attempted high level spell engineering with dark magic. Not really even the Dark Lord. He was too concerned with dramatic spellwork. Other people’s deaths were not actually that important to him, just incidental to his purposes.” Neither of the other women in the room knew how to respond to Narcissa freely discussing the late Dark Lord. He had been a fact of her life in a way they could not comprehend

Hermione ventured an indirect question. “I found it because of a little goblin knife. It seemed like drew itself to the bullet of its own accord.”

Narcissa looked at her sharply. “Where did you get the knife?”

“It’s hers.” Hermione was not sure she wanted the woman to know she had had a Black family object in her possession for years.

“A long time ago, goblins forged objects for the Sacred 28, specially bound to each of the houses. They obey their masters only.”

“Like the sword of Gryffindor,” Hermione mused.

She also recalled her conversation with Sirius about the pureblood estates alive and obeying a master. How had muggleborn witches and wizards ever gained any traction in the wizarding world? The old pureblood families had rigged everything in their favor so long ago. It was so frustrating that the purebloods probably hadn’t even truly understood what they were doing and its implications for the future.

“Yes - although the sword of Gryffindor has been mythologized to the point of limiting its capacity to serve those who wield it. A well cared for goblin object is more active than passive; it could – can – evaluate the magic in their immediate vicinity to assess for danger to their masters as well as opportunities to enact offensive and defensive magic.” Narcissa was clearly having mixed feelings about the younger woman.

“Cissy. Thank you for coming.” Andromeda’s whisper ended their tense exchange. One tear trailed out of the corner of her left eye. It ran to her chin, down her neck, and disappeared somewhere around her collarbone.

Narcissa spoke even more quietly than her sister. “Thank you for asking.” Hermione felt like she was intruding, but the blonde woman raised her head to look at her. “I suppose I should be thanking you too.”

“Well, I, um, I’m just grateful I was there. And that both of you came so quickly.”

“Ms. Granger, I don’t know how you became the person who found my sister and for whom she kept asking for while being treated.” Those blue eyes were piercing her. “But I do hope you’ll be discrete about what’s happened here. And about any other information you have about her.”

“Hermione’s been discrete for years, Cissy. She’s been harder to get a hold of than you since the trials.”

“I’m not hard to get a hold of, Andy. You can just walk right up to my gate any time, and a house elf will answer in seconds.”

“If someone were to come looking, they’d want to talk to you, not a house elf. That’s kind of the point.”

“What exactly would you have done if you were in my situation after Bella’s trial?” Narcissa hissed with both anger and pain.

Andromeda was abashed and was not brave enough to say anything else to her sister about that. She changed the subject. “That reminds me. Where the hell are we going to put her?”

“What do you mean?”

“She’s going to be recovering for a while, and there’s clearly someone out for blood.”

“It could’ve been a one off.”

“C’mon, Cissy. Playing daft doesn’t suit you.”

“Fine. So she needs to be somewhere safer than she has been.”

“Hermione, do you know where she has been staying?”

“No. I’ve never asked, and she doesn’t say.” It felt strange to admit her deliberate ignorance to the sisters, but it didn’t seem to bother them. “She comes through town once or twice a week these days.”

Andromeda narrowed her eyes to look at her younger sister. “What if she stayed with you?”

“Absolutely not. The media is bad enough there already. Neither she nor I would get any peace. Not to mention Draco. The rumors would be outrageous.”

“The rumors will always be outrageous, Cissy. Why not make them worthwhile?”

“I don’t hear you offering your house.”

“I already did once. She left within days.” Andromeda said painfully. “There’s too much baggage there, and you know it.”

“Don’t make excuses, Andy. You’re the one who - ”

“I don’t want to do this right now.” The two faced off, jaws set squarely and eyes blazing. Andromeda spoke again after a moment. “She could go home…”

“To the Black Manor??”

“Think about it. The blood wards are already in place; hardly anyone can access it. The house elves are still there; they love her. There’s plenty to do to stay occupied. We could visit her whenever.”

“We could visit her? At the Black Manor?” Narcissa let out an incredulous laugh. “You’ve changed your tune a bit, haven’t you?”

“Merlin! Give it a rest, Cissy! I fucked up. I knew it a long time ago. I thought I was all out of chances to do something about it, so I’m not going to give this one up so easily.”

Narcissa sighed and eyed her desperate middle sister. “She might refuse.”

“Me or the manor?”

“I think… I think just the manor.”

Narcissa’s sudden gentleness and Andromeda’s vulnerability made the air thick. They seemed to have forgotten Hermione was there. She felt increasingly awkward but couldn’t figure a way out of the situation.

“How long can she stay here, Hermione?” Andromeda startled her.

“Uh, I guess, well, ah – how long would you need?”

“A week or two at most.” Narcissa said. “She won’t be able to travel for a few days and shouldn’t for a while after that. I think I can work something out for her by that time though. She seems comfortable enough with you.” They didn’t ask if Hermione was comfortable with Bellatrix.

“Ok, that’s fine.” There was one thing still bothering her. “Andromeda, what’s the Ministry going to do?”

The auburn-haired woman sighed. “Probably nothing sufficient. On one hand, I want them to pull every resource to track down the person who did this. On the other, I don’t want any word to get out because the headache that would cause would be miserable.”

“Don’t file an official report yet.” Narcissa interrupted. “We may be able to come up with an alternative that will safeguard her and us better than the Ministry would.” We, us, better, safeguard, alternative – so much was packed into that sentence that neither Andromeda nor Hermione were ready for.

Several years ago, this would have bothered Hermione endlessly. Now, however, she did doubt the Ministry’s ability and willingness to address the situation competently, though she was still dubious about Narcissa Malfoy’s “alternative.” After they hashed out a few more practical details, Hermione left the two women to say goodbye to their sister and collect their things before helping them apparate through her wards to a bus station in Dover. She checked on a sleeping Bellatrix one more time before flopping down on the couch. It had been a very long day, and she was asleep instantly.