His mouth twitched as he straightened and stared down at her. His expression was a mask, but she could see the restrained rage in his eyes.
“Despite”—the word was bitten out—“your reassurance to me yesterday, you were at Hogwarts. When I discovered it, I tried to grab you, and you proceeded to apparate into a creek. I had to stun you; I thought you might drown yourself before you realised it was me.”
She sat up gingerly, still slightly sore and dazed. She shook her head, trying to clear it of the remaining grogginess. “You were masked; I didn't recognize you.”
She looked down. Her clothes were dry. Her lungs felt clear, as though it had been a long time since she'd been knocked out. She glanced at her watch, and her stomach dropped sharply. Hours had passed. It was nearly evening.
“How long did you leave me here, unconscious?” Her voice was disbelieving as she looked up at Draco.
His expression was cold. “I wasn't available to disappear with you. Once I had the water out of your lungs and you were safe, I had to return to fulfill my duties.”
Hermione looked away.
Harry.
Ron.
Almost everyone had been at Hogwarts. Aside from Severus, she might be the only remaining active member of the Order.
She pressed her lips together for a minute, collecting herself before she looked up. “I don't understand. What happened? How did they find our prison?”
He looked away, his hands were clenched into fists. She could almost feel the seething rage rippling around him.
“I don't know the details of how precisely it occurred. I told you, the Dark Lord is suspicious now. He barely confides in anyone, and he provides different information to each general in an attempt to identify where the intelligence is getting out. I was informed of ten different plans for attack, and none of them were legitimate. I do know he was in Sussex last night, working alone according to all the reports I had. By the time I learned we had your prison, the Resistance was already at Hogwarts. There was no opportunity to send word.”
Hermione sat on the edge of the bed as she absorbed it. She felt too dazed and devastated to even think clearly.
Draco was seething. His hands kept opening and closing as though he were suppressing the urge to break something.
He stood beside her for another moment and then turned and began pacing around the room as though he were a caged animal. “I thought this was supposed to be the Order's final blow? Did Potter think letting the Dark Lord kill him would somehow win the war? Or did he just decide to give up?”
Hermione twitched.
“Harry was a horcrux,” she said in a dead voice.
Draco frozen and looked at her sharply. She dropped her eyes and stared at her lap. Her jeans were torn on both knees.
She swallowed and drew her feet back. “I didn't know — until today. I only realised it after the battle had started. There was a prophecy made twenty years ago, 'either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives.' Harry thought if all the other horcruxes were destroyed, that having the Dark Lord kill him would cause them both to die.”
The sight of Harry's expression going blank flashed before her eyes. Her throat contracted, and her whole body shook. Her cheekbones and chest ached. She felt as though she were on the verge of breaking into pieces.
She was glass, only a breath away from shattering.
She gripped the edge of the bed and watched her knuckles turn white. “We missed one. There's another horcrux. I thought — I thought we'd found them all — but I was wrong.”
There was a stabbing pain in the back of her throat as she swallowed. “We have to find it.”
“The Resistance has lost,” Draco said in a flat voice. “The war is over.”
Hermione jerked sharply at Draco's words, and there was a flush of heat that burst through her.
“I know. You don't need to tell me. I know we lost!” Her voice was ragged.
She drew a sharp breath, and it burned in her lungs. She pressed her lips together and pressed her hands against her eyes as she exhaled and tried control herself.
“I'm not saying the war isn't over.” Her voice was still shaking slightly. “I'm saying we have to find the horcrux. We have to find it. If we can destroy it, he'll die — maybe not immediately, but if he loses all his horcruxes, he'll die.” She kept speaking, faster and faster. “The Death Eaters don't share goals with the Dark Beings, the regime will crumble without him. It's not as though he'll ever groom a successor. We just — we have to find it.”
There was physically fractured sensation laced through her as she sat there. She felt as though her heart had broken, but she was still too shocked to feel it.
She dropped her head down and pressed her jaw against her shoulder. “The Resistance — is lost. I know. There are maybe a few cells left that were less involved with the Order, but most of our able force was at Hogwarts today. A few people may escape, but otherwise, Severus and I are the only active members of the Order left. We—” she felt as though she were being ground into dust. The weight of everything was too much. “Until we find the remaining horcrux, we can't try to rescue anyone. They'll all be traced, we can't risk both you and Severus trying to get them free. The horcrux has to be the priority. That's the only way for us to actually end this and really save them.”
“There's no us. You're leaving Britain.”
Hermione looked up at Draco.
His eyes were still burning with rage, but his expression was set. “I'll find it. You're leaving. There's no Order left to keep you. Potter is dead.”
She flinched.
He paused for a moment and seemed to be weighing what he was about to say next. “Weasley will be dead within the week. There's no reason for you to stay. You can't remain active; it will be easier for me to work if the Dark Lord assumes a victory. If he thinks the Order is still a threat, it will make finding any remaining horcruxes more difficult.”
Hermione's mouth twitched. “Fine,” she finally said in a tight voice. “I can collaborate long-distance initially.”
Draco's eyes flickered for the briefest moment, and she knew it was his intention to make the arrangement permanent. He would do everything in his power to prevent her from ever returning to Britain if he thought there was any risk from it.
She swallowed and stared at him.
“I'll go on one condition.”
She watched Draco tense and calculate.
“Ginny Weasley, she has to come with me.”
“No.” His expression was cold. “You said no rescues.”
“It's not a rescue. She's at a safe house. Only Ginny. I won't—” she wavered, and her throat caught, “I won't ask you to save anyone else. But I have to take Ginny with me. I won't go without her. She's just at a safehouse. I can go get her.”
His jaw clenched, and there was something unreadable in his expression.
Hermione pressed forward. “I have to send word to the safe houses, make sure they know that the Order is compromised and tell them to go to ground. Then I'll get Ginny, and we'll — we'll go.”
She stood. She was leaning so heavily into her occlumency she felt almost removed from her body. Physically, she was shattered with grief. There was a pain in her chest as though her sternum were refractured. A phantom pain that always seemed to occur when she was stressed.
But she was managing to occlude the mental aspects somewhat.
Draco shifted as she extended her wand to cast a patronus.
She flicked her hand in the familiar motion and said the words.
Nothing.
She swallowed hard and forced her occlumency walls more firmly into place, taking a deep breath before she tried again.