From the corner of her eye she saw Draco shift and his expression harden.
There was something he was trying to communicate to her, but she was too tired to try to guess what it was. Her head hurt too much, and her entire body was aching from the exertion of walking down the hallway.
She looked across the room at the portrait. The blonde witch was in frame picking flowers in an Impressionist style garden.
“Is that your mother?”
The portrait stilled and looked up.
“Why do you ask?” Draco's voice was suspiciously casual.
Hermione shrugged a shoulder. “You have her mouth. It's different from the Malfoy features that your father and most of the portraits have.”
“She had it painted to keep my father company when he left Hogwarts. He graduated the year before she did,” Draco said, staring across the room at the portrait. “Due to the circumstances of her death, none of the later portraits ever woke.”
He looked away. “You should sleep in your room. It's safer there.” He seemed to hesitate for a moment. “Can you walk?”
Hermione stared at him and wondered what he'd do if she said no. Levitate her? Carry her?
Tell her to sleep on the floor?
She blinked. No. That was before; when she'd first arrived.
“I can walk.” She pushed herself up and realised she'd forgotten to bring new robes with her and only had a towel. She gripped it tightly around herself and avoided looking at Draco as she slipped off the bed.
When she glanced over, she found he was staring pointedly away from her and holding his cloak out towards her. She stared for only a moment before taking it and pulling it over her shoulders.
The towel dropped to the floor, but she didn't try to pick it up. The house-elves could banish it from the floor as easily as the bed. If she knelt down, she was afraid her muscle atrophy would result in her staying there.
She walked to the door without looking at Draco; the fabric dragging across the wood floor. Draco was only a few steps behind her, she could feel him, but his footsteps were silent, and that fact set her on edge.
“What kinds of wards do you have on my room?”
She could sense the way Draco grew colder at the question.
“Only a few.”
Lie.
“You've got a lot of protective wards on this room, Malfoy.”
She thought back to how he'd been outside her room immediately after the New Year's Party and sent her to bed.
“With all the wards Malfoy added to your wing in the manor, I was afraid I'd never reach you again.”
The explosion necessary for Astoria to get through the door.
His haste to get her back to her room after she'd tried to throw herself over the balcony. How he'd insisted on coming to her room when she was fertile.
It was always an intense relief when she returned to it. She'd always been able to stay calm and clear-headed in her room, until she'd become pregnant and her anxiety had finally exceeded whatever enchantments he'd imbued it with.
“I have gone to considerable expense and effort to maintain her environment.”
He'd probably been being honest with Stroud.
She tried to walk quickly. It was only four doors down the hall to her room, but she felt as though her legs were already on the verge of giving out as she passed the second door. She stumbled.
Draco instantly caught her left elbow, and she froze. Her stomach plummeted so sharply that she gasped and felt her chest contract until she couldn't breathe. She reached desperately for the wall until her fingertips brushed it. She pressed her body tightly against it and struggled to inhale.
Draco's hand withdrew as though burned, and her heart shattered. She suddenly felt the stark, cruel reality of everything, and it was like being crushed to death.
“I just—,” her voice shook and then broke. “I don't know how to do this. I don't know how to be alright with what happened. I don't know how to try to come to terms with it.” Her shoulders were shaking, and she pressed her forehead against the wall.
“I don't know how we're supposed to fix this. Draco, why did this happen to us? How is it ever going to be alright now?” Her voice was trembling, and she gave a low sob and then burst into tears, sliding down the wall to the floor.
“I don't know how to do this.” She kept saying it over and over as she pressed herself against the wall and cried.
Chapter End Notes
Additional Illustrations:
Draco by thegirlthatreadsfantasybooks.
Past and Present Cover by artofmiha
"Why did this happen to us?" by elivrayn.
Chapter 65
June 2005
She pressed her hands over her mouth as she kept crying and crying.
Draco didn't touch her. When her sobbing finally slowed, she sat slumped against the wall, her shoulders still shaking.
She heard him inhale slowly.
"You don't need to do anything. I'm not expecting anything of you," he finally said in a quiet voice. "I won't approach again. Wait here, I'll call Topsy."
He shifted and turned, but her hand shot out, and she grabbed the hem of his robes. "No. No, don't leave."
Her hand shook, but she didn't let go.
"Don't go. I don't want you to go."
He stood beside her while she tangled her fingers in the fabric and kept leaning against the wall.
It took her half an hour before she could stand up and walk the rest of the way to her room. She paused in the doorway, her chest still hitching.
"How many wards?"
He was silent for several seconds.
"About eighty now."
She made it across the room and dropped on her side onto the bed, burying her face in the fabric of his cloak. It smelled like him. Cedar, oakmoss, and papyrus.
He pulled the coverlet up over her shoulder. She caught hold of his hand and gripped it. His skin was as warm as she remembered it. She pulled his hand against her jaw, her eyes tightly closed, and gripped it for several minutes.
She slowly let go of him. "You have to come see me so I know you're alright. Otherwise — I'll worry."
The next day Topsy brought a strengthening potion.
Hermione walked slowly around her room and then into the hallway, trailing her fingers along the wall.
Her head hurt less than it had in over a month, and her memories of Draco were growing clearer. They still felt distant, as though she were viewing them through a telescope in the back of her mind. The gaps in her recollection slowly closed. She remembered Severus' Unbreakable Vow and how she'd managed to trick Draco into leaving for long enough for her to go to Sussex.
It was increasingly clear why he'd been so paranoid about inspecting all her memories and ensuring in exhaustive detail that he knew precisely what schemes she had. She'd tricked him once; as Severus had said, Draco never intended to trust her again.
The realisation felt like an additional weight in her chest.
He wasn't using legilimency on her, but he still skimmed her mind using the manacles. He kept her under constant supervision.
He was still lying to her.
She'd suspected it for days, but now that she was able to think coherently, she was certain. She thought it was partly to keep her calm and partly to manage her.
She mulled it over, trying to sense the holes in the new, carefully crafted narrative he'd started feeding her since she'd regained consciousness. Where were the gaps? What were the inconsistencies?