The Worst That Could Happen

He had no right to treat her the way he did. No right at all.

She had known the events of the morning would unfold the way they had, that was why she had decided to leave.

She went to Diagon Alley to rent a room at the Leaky Cauldron and was traveling down Knockturn Alley when she saw a very familiar half-giant with a large mug of mead in his oversized hands.

"Hagrid?" she asked cautiously.

The eight and one half foot tall man turned around at the sound of her voice. "Hermione?" he asked in shock. He dropped his mug and pulled her into a tight embrace. "We though' we'd los' you," he slurred. "Though' you'd been taken' by 'em. Though' you'd been killed or somethin'."

"I'm fine," she said, wriggling her way out of his grasp.

"Did ya hear?" he asked. "Someone's gone and betrayed the Order. Let a mass o' Death Eaters in. Killed everyone..."

"Y-you're kidding?" she asked nervously. "Wh-when did this happen?"

"When you let them in yesterday," said a familiar voice from behind her. Hermione turned around, shocked and terrified.

"That curse hurt like hell, Hermione," the ex-professor confessed. "I'm surprised you knew it. What text book did you pick that up from, any way?" he asked.

Hermione felt as though she couldn't breathe. That curse was meant to kill a werewolf, not allow them to live!

"The Wolfsbane potion helped keep me alive," Lupin clarified. "Though I doubt you'll have such luck in the near future. We're a lot like your precious Voldemort, Hermione," the werewolf revealed. "We kill those who betray us as well."

"No," she squeaked, feeling the tears burn at her eyes. "No, don't!"

Lupin raised his wand.

Hermione shook in terror.

"Stupefy," the werewolf said softly.

Hermione woke some time later in a dimly lit room. She was lying on a soft bed with opaque curtains closing her off from the rest of the room. She sat up, confused as to where she was, or even if she was. She pulled the curtain aside and stood up. There was a desk under a window at the foot of the bed, and a table next to the head; bookshelves lined the other two walls with gaps for both another window and a door.

There was a woven rug in the center of the room, covering a polished hardwood floor and the desk was cherry, as was the ornate chair beside it.

Hermione walked to the door, not expecting to be able to get out, but feeling the need to try. As she had suspected, the door wouldn't budge. She walked over to one of the windows and opened it. The day was late and the sun was beginning to sink in the western sky. She looked down, hoping to see ground not too far below, but no, she was at least four stories up. There was no way she would risk that fall.

She reached inside of her robes to see if they had left her her wand and found, unsurprisingly, that they had taken that as well. She was a prisoner, yet again.

Sighing heavily, she returned to the bed and collapsed on it.

Hours later, when the sun had completely disappeared from the sky, the door opened and candles were lit as someone entered.

"Brought you some food," a hauntingly familiar voice informed her. She couldn't really see him, but she knew him, she knew she did. She wasn't quite sure what it was, but--no, it wasn't possible.

"What are you doing here?" she asked in shock.

"This is my house," the man replied. "I go where I please."

"But...you died."

"I fell," he corrected. "You just didn't stick around long enough to find out."

He sounded so angry with her. He sounded like he hated her after so long of being her friend.

He turned and faced her for the first time. "Why?" he demanded, sounding near tears.

"You don't understand," she whispered. "I didn't have a choice."

"You always have a choice, Hermione!" he yelled.

She shook her head franticly. "They would have killed us," she whispered. "When Malfoy took me with him, he--he almost killed me, Harry!" she sobbed. "And then I told him, and he took me to Voldemort. He forced me to become one of them! I didn't want to!" she sobbed. "I didn't...I'm so sorry."

Harry closed his eyes to the sight of her small form, to the sound of her heart-wrenching tears, to the lies.

"You were dead," she whispered. "What more was there to fight for? Without you, we'd lost. There was no point in fighting anymore. I was weak, Harry," she said thickly. "I was weak because I was alone and you were not there. I lost you...."

Harry turned back to the desk he had put her food on and gripped the edge to keep from screaming at her. She could tell he did not want to believe her--lies were always so much better than the truth anyway. But she had to tell him.

"Voldemort said that if I delivered him the Order, he would spare me. I didn't want to, but I didn't see another way out of it. I wasn't just saving my own life when I opened the door, Harry, I was saving someone else's as well."

"Two people are more important to you than thirty?" he asked in a dark voice. "Two people in this world are more important to you than Molly, Ron, Arthur, Lupin and everyone else?"

"No," she answered softly.

"Then why did you do it?" he demanded. "Why did you end all of those lives? Why did you turn a werewolf's blood to silver? You could have killed him as well."

"I thought I had," Hermione confessed. "I didn't realize that Wolfsbane potion would help him survive...."

"Tell me why," Harry ordered softly. He had turned to face her again and the look in his eyes crushed her. They were so cold, yet so warm. They promised her forgiveness, yet swore to kill her. They were so dark with anger and fury, yet they seemed to glow from somewhere within.

"To save my son," she whispered.

The silence in the room was deafening.

"To save your what?" he whispered after the silence had grown between them.

"Malfoy's son," she revealed. "When he took me, it was as his slave. Because of yesterday, they consider me his wife."

"Does anyone else know?" Harry asked.

Hermione shook his head. "He made sure no one else knew. That's why he made me become a Death Eater. He told me to kill the baby because he would not be connected to some half-breed that was the result of his lust.

"I refused. I couldn't have done it no matter what. He threatened to kill it himself, but he wouldn't have been able to without killing me as well, and he seemed to have wanted me alive at that point.

"So he told me that I would become a Death Eater. He told me that he would release me from my servitude and that he was to talk to Voldemort about changing my status.

"According to them, I'm a pureblood witch now," she whispered. "And the wife of the youngest Malfoy."

The fury seemed to be coming off of Harry in waves. "No, you're not," he informed her. "You're not a Death Eater, a Malfoy, a wife or a slave. You are Hermione Granger, my best friend and the only one I trust anymore."

She stared at him in shock. "You still trust me?" she asked. "After what I did?"

Harry's eyes locked with hers. "You did what you had to do. I'm not happy about it, but if I didn't forgive you, I'd be just like him."

She felt hot tears spill from her eyes. He was back. He was alive. She was saved.