Shards of Nuance

Hermione escorted Mr. and Mrs. Weasley home while Bellatrix ostensibly tied up some loose ends with the purchases. It wasn’t until she had already spent half an hour at the Burrow consoling her friends that she became anxious about having let Bellatrix waltz through the halls of the Ministry alone, without magic and without an advocate. To what extent would the Black family name protect the woman these days?

Mr. Weasley asked her a halting question about how she and Bellatrix were related in the events of the afternoon. She used an answer that she knew the Weasleys would accept, but it felt almost like a betrayal coming out of her mouth. “She owes me a favor for saving her life.”

Hermione returned to the Manor in time to see Andromeda entering ahead of her under the ornate “Toujours Pur” emblazoned over the entryway. Shedding her coat, she headed to the Great Room where she heard the sisters’ voices.

“So what other things are you fucking up in the Wizengamot?” said Bellatrix’ haughtiest voice.

Andromeda flinched at the affront. “What are you talking about?”

“We,” Bellatrix gestured at Hermione., “just came from a meeting in which the Weasley fortune was almost seized by the Ministry without compensation for the muggle expansion project. I thought you were leading a counter-proposal, but your signature is on the original. What else are you not telling us?”

“Bella, it’s complicated. I had to.”

“You had to do the exact opposite of what you said you were going to do? I don’t get it.”

“The situation changed.”

“Your job is to deal with changing situations without screwing them up.” The dark-haired sister didn’t look as peeved as she sounded.

“They were going to imprison you again!” Andromeda lost her composure and yelled.

“Excuse me?” Narcissa blinked.

“The Wizengamot voted to pass my counter-proposal only with the corollary that you would be seized immediately and detained for research indefinitely. They want to study the long-term effects of magic removal, and you are the best candidate for a blood magic research project since Rod died in custody.”

Narcissa was still the only one who seemed able to speak. “How many seats voted for it?”

“Everyone but our bound voting bloc. I had to kill the bill while we were still in session somehow, so I re-proposed the original. It was passed almost unanimously.”

“They’ve figured out how to force our hand. We need to re-formulate our strategies now.” Narcissa’s mind was already back to the drawing board.

The dark-haired woman shrugged. She took her time selecting four thin-stemmed glasses from the room’s cupboard and called for some elvish wine before speaking to them. “Well, at least we acquired all the Weasley land today.” She filled each glass almost to the brim. Looking very smug, she carefully handed one to each of the other women, her sisters gaping at her. “For a very modest price I might add. The entire Weasley inheritance is subject to the Black family in perpetuity. Cheers!”

They clinked glasses. Andromeda stuttered while Narcissa opened her mouth to congratulate her sister. Hermione sat waiting for Bellatrix to reveal the rest, now beginning to understand the magnitude of the eldest Black sister’s actions that day.

“Oh, I almost forgot. We also own the Forbidden Forest and the Hogwarts grounds – including the Black Lake and its water rights.”

“Fuck Merlin’s mother.” Narcissa’s blue eyes lost their iciness, and a delighted grin replaced her usual smirk. Hermione had never heard the youngest Black sister curse before. She had to admit, she looked dazzling doing it.

Andromeda was another matter. “The Forbidden Forest…. Hogwarts… But that’s…”

“Not the building; just the land. I wouldn’t do that to you; your magic and the Hogwarts castle would be a doozy of a combo and absolutely impossible to deal with. Don’t worry - payment came equally from the Lestrange, Malfoy, and Black accounts.”

The auburn-haired woman’s eyes darted back and forth before they took on a vexed anxiety. “Oh my god, Bella. Tell me you didn’t set this whole thing up?”

Bellatrix only gave her a devilish smile.

“Oh my god, you did, didn’t you? The expansion project, the Wizengamot vote, the seizure of the Weasley property – all of it?”

The dark witch was silent while she traced her fingertips on the rim of her glass.

“Was any of it real?”

“It was all real. It would have all happened. That’s the beauty of it. We faked nothing, and no one is the wiser. Everyone involved believes they acted freely on their own grand ideas.”

“What the hell were you thinking? You could have been arrested again and probably killed! What if I’d done what you asked and let them pass the fucking bill?”

“But you didn’t, did you, Andy? I knew you wouldn’t do what I asked. You wouldn’t stick to the plan. You wouldn’t let them pass it. You are predictably independent, and you performed wonderfully.”

“And you set them up. The Weasleys. You stole everything from them. It’s all they had, Bella!”

Bellatrix shrugged again. “Their loss. Although, from my perspective they’re considerably better off than they were before.”

“You’re the worst person I know.”

“And what exactly does that make you, Andy?”

The woman refused to bite the baited question. “You are a nightmare.”

“Is that what you’re calling your wet dreams these days?”

Andromeda’s hands were covering her face, but an explosion sounded above Bellatrix’ head. The dark-haired witch laughed salaciously as chunks of stone rained down on her from the gouge Andromeda’s magic made in the wall.

“Bella, I fucking adore you.” Narcissa pecked her oldest sister on the cheek before prancing out of the room.

“What about you, baby girl?” The dark-haired woman offered her other cheek to her middle sister with a wink.

“I’ll kill you,” was the muttered reply.

“No doubt.” Then Bellatrix practically skipped away, leaving Hermione alone with the tortured middle Black sister.

There was a long enough silence for Hermione to have reasonably chosen to leave several times before the woman spoke, but she chose to stay.

“You must think I’m crazy.”

Hermione watched the woman’s elegant hands fidget inelegantly in her lap. They were both awkward. “I prefer not to.” Besides, she was also willingly putting up with the eldest Black sister’s sick games.

“Maybe I am. All that time away. All that time getting better, getting over losing them. Just to run right back into the thick of all the messy manipulation and desperation.”

“Seems like it would be hard to stay away.” Hermione was probably speaking for the both of them.

“It was.” The woman wrinkled her forehead in an intangible pain. “It took everything I had not to come back earlier, to not leave my husband and my child. Which is terrible. There wasn’t even anything to come back to for a while.”

“Maybe it - they - couldn’t exist without you.” Hermione wasn’t sure this was a helpful thing to say, but she was thinking about her conversation with Bellatrix about her sister’s power.

“It couldn’t exist without Bella. Nothing I love or fear would.”

“I’m not so sure, Andy. You are….” She searched for a suitable word.

“Sick? Egregious? Cursed? It would make things so much easier if I knew I were cursed.”

“I was going to say ‘magnificent.’” Shit.

The woman slumped her shoulders with a sigh. “Do you love my sister?”

“I suppose so.” Hermione proceeded carefully into uncharted territory. “Do you?”

“Hell if I know. Not the way I love Cissy. Or Dora. Or even…” The woman paused, looking miserable. “Or even Ted.”

“I think about Dora often,” Hermione said softly because it was the only thing that made sense to say.

“So do I. All the time.”

Hermione didn’t have anything to offer the tormented woman, and that grieved her. She surprised herself by putting a timid hand on the woman’s shoulder, brushing aside soft auburn curls to do so, then pulling her into her own arms in a tender embrace. She met no resistance, and the woman collapsed into her and sent a wave of forlorn magic through her body. Without warning, she was pitched into inky blackness, emerging into a scene in the Black Manor’s east wing.

A very young, devastatingly beautiful Andromeda, probably still a Black, cast a spiteful glare over her shoulder. Deep purple bloomed from her. Disgust had never looked so lovely, so perfect, on a face. A tall man loomed nearby.

“I said no, Riddle, and I meant it.”

“Andromeda. Don’t be unreasonable.”

“I’m not unreasonable. I’m doing what I think is right.”

“You’re making excuses. You know Hogwarts is holding you back. Your father is holding you back. Your privilege is holding you back. Creating a new, falsely superior moral code for yourself is just going to hold you back even more.”

The woman stiffened. “Don’t patronize me.”

“I’m not. I’m speaking the truth, and you know it. Your power far exceeds the rest of your family, probably anyone you know. You deserve to use it to its fullest extent.”

“I’ll use it the way I see fit.”

“You aren’t using it. It’s using you. It’ll destroy you if you keep repressing it like this.”

“Riddle! I know you’re a fucking halfblood. Don’t use the facts of my own blood status against me.”

The man chuckled. “The irony of that statement.”

Andromeda turned. She looked as if she were about to spit at him. “Your cause is evil. Your manipulation of my father and the others is awful. You will fail, because you are wrong.”

“But I am not wrong about you, Andromeda. You are the future of the House of Black. You can be the future of wizarding Britain if you join me. I am not so arrogant as to deny that you could command the allegiance of the people far more than I ever will.”

“I will never try to.”

“Then you’re wasting yourself.” The man was beginning to show irritation. “All that magic, look at it flowing from you even now. All that magic wasted on someone who’s too weak to use it. Bellatrix wouldn’t waste it.”

“Bella wouldn’t join you either!”

“I wouldn’t be so sure if I were you. She is less scrupulous and would likely find it appealing. It would be slightly disappointing to have her instead of you, but she will suffice if necessary.”

“Stay the fuck away from her.”

“I will if you join me.”

“You’re not going to blackmail me. That’s not how this is going to go.”

The man sneered. “You know she will accept the offer, and, even though she’s strong, you know her magic won’t be able to withstand the sheer force of mine the way yours can. She will be legendary working with me, but she won’t make it. If you really cared about her, then you wouldn’t resist me.”

“I do! You’re wrong! I swear to the gods, Riddle - ” Andromeda spluttered.

But he interrupted her as he exited the room. “I’ll give you one more chance.”

“You stay the fuck away from her!” Andromeda screamed as magic slammed in a tidal wave against the wall in the direction of his receding back.

The woman and her surroundings blurred together in a swirling wash of sepia that coalesced into another scene.

Andromeda, close to the same age she was in the present day, stood with her wand at her side, hair rippling violently over her shoulders and black hooded robe, glaring cold hatred at two bedraggled men bound to rickety chairs with heavy cord. Their faces were scruffy, eyes hollow, and skin creased and dirty. They were also terrified.

“Andromeda, please!” One of the men begged. “It was an accident. I would never try to kill someone who is family. I was aiming at someone else, and she stepped into the spell.”

“Bullshit, Rabastan! I’ve seen the memories. Ripped them out of Molly Weasley myself.”

“Please… What do you want from us? We’ll turn ourselves into the Ministry if that’s what it takes. How does that sound? You can take us in yourself. I heard Shacklebolt has been paying the militias royally for turning the remaining Death Eaters to the aurors, and you’ll be able to claim that reward.”

“No, Rab. The Ministry will never be able give my husband and my daughter the justice they deserve; it doesn’t even want to try. But I can, and I will.”

“Please, Andromeda. I’ll do anything you ask.”

“Shut up. I’m tired of hearing you speak.”

She crossed the short distance to him like lightning, cupped one palm around the bottom of his jaw so that her fingers spread across his mouth and cheekbones and slammed his head back. It made an ungodly cracking sound. She held it in place while she jerked his bare forearm up to her face and closed her teeth around the man’s skin and began to tear at it. His inhuman shriek went on and on in increasing octaves until Andromeda raised her head with a huge chunk of his skin hanging from her teeth. She tossed his bloody arm away from her and removed the flesh from her mouth. The strip of skin contained the entire dark mark tattoo which was writhing like a dying spider. She slipped it into her pocket before turning to the other man, disgust and blood marring her beautiful face.

“Andromeda." The man was shaking with fear. "I didn’t do anything to Ted or Dora. I swear. If you saw the memories, then you know that. I wasn’t even inside Hogwarts during the battle. I did a lot of wrong things, but I didn’t hurt them.”

“You’re right, Antonin. You’re just in the wrong place at the wrong time today. Avada Kedavra.” The man slumped forward against the ropes.

Andromeda wiped her face with the back of her arm and cast a spell with words from a very foreign, probably extant language. Rabastan, a red handprint already blistering on his face, convulsed so violently that his chair keeled over, and he continued seizing and screaming while the witch turned her back on the two men and strode out of the building. On her way out, she licked two fingers and flicked them dismissively over her shoulder, and it exploded into roaring flames.

Hermione was catapulted back through the inky blackness into the present-day Black Manor in time to feel the woman shove her away aggressively. They both rushed back from each other, each trembling for different reasons.

“How the hell did you do that?” the auburn-haired woman hissed.

“I didn’t do it!” Hermione was wide-eyed and bewildered. She had previously thought that carrying on a romantic relationship with Bellatrix Lestrange was the most inconceivable thing she would experience, but now she was reconsidering that. “You did it. You had to have. I don’t know legilimency.”

“I would never have shown you that!”

Mutual disbelief fomented between them as they each tried to decide if they would now distrust the other. Andromeda looked like a cornered, feral cat on the brink of attack. Hermione was doing her best to process multiple things simultaneously while also remaining present enough to navigate the woman in front of her. Andromeda had been the Dark Lord’s first recruit, his first choice; Andromeda brutally murdered two pleading men after the war was over and the new judiciary process for Death Eaters was already under way; mere physical contact between them had just thrust Hermione deep into the darkest recesses of the older woman’s mind.

After several moments, Hermione dared to speak something else. “Does Bella know?”

“No.”

“Who does?”

“No one. Except now you.”

“Why did that just happen?”

“You underestimate your magic.” Andromeda licked her lips with suspicion, muscles still loaded and waiting to spring into fight or flight.

“I won’t tell her, Andy.”

“About the memories or about what just happened?”

“Either, I guess. If that’s what you want.” Hermione felt like she was balancing on a very thin wire above some abyss that she had never before noticed.

“That’s what I want.” The abyss crinkled with a static-y magic.

What else could Hermione do? Their silence formed a truce between them, and the thin wire widened. The older woman relaxed somewhat, and the younger let herself breathe normally again.

Hermione thought that it shouldn’t have been so easy to overlook Andromeda’s newly revealed unsavoriness and senselessly horrific actions, but in that moment she very simply just moved on. She already knew what she wanted, so she continued to venture cautiously.

“Do you remember the day you stormed into Dumbledore’s office when Harry, Ron, and I were there?”

Andromeda closed her eyes and snorted. “Yes. Why?”

“Some of the students said you kissed the Head Boy and nearly killed him.”

The woman rolled her eyes, but amusement threatened to turn up her lips.

“Others said you tied him up with real, live snakes. Oh, and some of them thought you burned off his cheeks with goo from his eyes.”

It worked. Auburn curls shivered to accompany a chuckle. The woman bit her lip in a small smile and said, “One of those things might be true.”

Hermione felt very pleased with herself and basked in the return of the magnificent woman’s favor. The abyss continued to yawn at her from below, but she now stood comfortably on a narrow path above it, side by side with Andromeda Tonks.

**

Almost four years had passed since the Death Eater trials when Hermione stood in Bellatrix Lestrange’s old bedroom in the Black Manor getting ready for the sisters’ second ball. The first had been a flash-bang event meant to take the wizarding world by surprise: it was announced, it was happening, and then it was over. Narcissa made sure this next one was publicized well in advance. She made formal invitations during trade negotiations. Harry dropped hints about it at the Ministry. Draco – who, it turned out, took after his oldest aunt in many ways – sweet-talked and bullied his apothecary clientele and his those in his budding nightlife business into attending with various stipulations. Andromeda made it clear she expected both her allies and enemies to be there, the latter of which couldn’t refuse the threatening invitations given them.

Bellatrix just let it all happen. She was in the long process of transitioning all Lestrange accounts, properties, and blood claims into the Black estate since Rod had mysteriously passed away in the care of the Ministry professionals in charge of the Death Eater research post-trial. At some point she was going to let herself grieve him, but she hadn’t undertaken that task yet. She and Rod had been thick as thieves in school and decided that their arranged marriage was rather fortuitous for them, given their mutual understanding. They did sleep together a few times, mostly out of curiosity, before agreeing to just wingman for one another. There were also more than a few nights when he cradled her in the crook of his neck as she cried herself to sleep after Andromeda’s departure. They had a closeness that no completely platonic or completely romantic relationship provided either of them. She missed him in Azkaban, when she was lucid enough to remember. After the break-out, they never could reach each other across the void of unending fog and despair that the prison wedged between them. She ached for him again after the trials when she finally heard about his death. Preserving his estate with the Black property contracts really did seem the least she could do; it was an inconsequential thing that Rabastan’s inheritance came along with it.

Hermione was honored when the dark-haired witch told her these things about Rod. The intimate conversation was part of the reason she said yes when Bellatrix asked her to accompany her to the ball. In the mirror, she smoothed the front of her shimmering red dress. The rings on her hands absorbed the color and shone out a softer hue tinged with silver. Matching necklace and earrings stood out around her shoulders. The fact that the strapless dress also dipped down to show her bare lower back had concerned her; a patronizing house elf assured her it would be fine but cast an extra sticking charm to make her feel better. With the edges of the top layer of her hair swept back in a braid hanging loosely over the rest of it, she decided she looked nice – almost remarkable, even.

A tap on the door was followed by Narcissa’s blonde head. “Come. It’s time.”

She smoothed her dress again and followed the youngest Black to the landing behind the staircase. “Must it be a big thing again?”

The youngest Black sister laughed. “Again? We never do anything small.”

“Damn right.” Charcoal eyes and hair materialized out of the shadows; the woman made a point of dramatically looking Hermione up and down, per usual. “Looks like you got the memo about it.” Her tongue flicked out between parted lips. “Oh look, baby girl’s here to spoil the mood.”

Arriving, Andromeda shot her older sister a withering look. Then she turned to Hermione. “Are you sure you want to do this?” There was a haunting in her voice that subdued her sisters. “Once you step out there, there’s no going back. It’ll never be the same.”

A thousand things jockeyed for attention in Hermione’s mind, as she stood transfixed before the entirety of the Black family magic simmering in the figure before her.

Playing grown-up in the living room at her birthday party. Her father’s delight in Diagon Alley and Hogwarts. That coffee cup she hadn’t even taken a sip of before she left them forever. Devouring books about horcruxes and the Black family in the library. Molly Weasley surrounded by a pile of bodies. Bella’s magic draining before the Wizengamot. The fish smell that permeated her entire being in that muggle bar. Equations for dark magic. Substituting ingredients, spells, people. The guts of Grimmauld Place belching magic. Andromeda and Teddy at Bella’s trial. The portrait of Ashlys Black. Katie Bell’s fingers on her inner arm. Pieces of shattered Bella suspended mid-air. Andromeda resting the back of her head on Hermione’s kitchen cabinet. The woman she’d stayed with in Germany. Narcissa’s glazed eyes in front of Neville’s parents. The first time she kissed Bella. Andromeda trembling with lust. Andromeda trembling with rage. Muggle music. Ron in the rain. Bella and her shield collapsing on the Wizengamot floor. Andromeda storming through a dozen halls a dozen times. The birds, so many years of little birds. Fireworks. Bella forcing herself through the light at the Department of Ministries. Andromeda’s tortured soul pouring out through her eyes. Andromeda, Andromeda, Andromeda. Magic isn’t inherently dark, Hermione; the witch makes it dark.

Her own eyes were locked with the endless auburn ones of her friend’s mother, her lover’s sister. The Manor reverberated with an exponential magic: purple, gold, red, blue, silver rising from the floor to claw at the two women. She wished her little birds weren’t spinning in a tizzy above her and was almost embarrassed when the older woman gently scooped one out of the air. Hermione readily gave the woman her hand when she reached for it. Andromeda carefully cupped the bird in its owner’s palm and then folded her own around them; together they were soft, strong, and safe. Neither broke eye contact to see the other two sisters holding their breath, unsure of how to react to the magic threatening to erupt through the ceiling.

“They shouldn’t have that much chemistry,” Bellatrix whispered.

“Which one are you jealous of?” The comment earned the blonde woman a thudding flick behind her ear.

Then Hermione spoke only to the middle Black sister. “I do want this. I’m ready.”

The magic didn’t collapse, but the birds disappeared into the overwhelming, glorious woman’s chest when they separated. Bellatrix offered an arm, and Narcissa’s fingertips in the small of Hermione’s back pushed her forward. She took a deep breath. The lights were blinding.

**

Ron blinked and rubbed his eyes to help them recover from the lights bursting forth from the staircase. All the air expelled from his lungs as his heart sank. Under the menacing glint of the “Toujours Pur” engraved in the arch stood the woman he thought he loved most in the world with her hand resting intimately in the crook of the arm of the darkest witch he was aware of, emerging from pure light into a new life in a new world. She and the ex-Death Eater slowly descended the center of the stairs, stopping halfway down to share a shy look. Then, to his horror, Hermione lifted her chin and narrowed her eyes at the audience while Bellatrix Lestrange looked on with adoration. The guests erupted in the loudest roar of applause he’d heard in his life.