A/N: I am soooo sorry that this isn't an update to Powers of Persuasion, which I've honestly barely touched in a while. Summer School is done this week and, given recent events here in the UK, I have to ship my laptop back to the States, so I may be without it for a while. Rest assured that I will be updating PoP fairly soon though!
A note on this piece: the italics is usually referring to a flashback or a character's thoughts.
Chapter 1: Where Elizabeth Stood
For the first time in nearly twenty-three years, Hermione Granger slept in. Her bed, with its enveloping cotton sheets and quilt heavy in both patching and weight, had become a safe haven, a place from which to reflect how her life had just gone terribly, terribly wrong. For naught but her dependable pillow, which faithfully absorbed her tears each night, knew of her despair, and it certainly would not betray her.
She wondered with that philosophical curiosity that always accompanies experienced time travelers what small actions in past helped shape present events, and if she somehow was responsible. What if she had inadvertently given the final push to the event that coincided with her own destruction? How many unconscious nudges had she unknowingly given?
She abandoned these worrisome what-ifs for now and logically drew up her options, but they were few and unappealing and offered no hope whatsoever. And as far as she was concerned, there was only one way to handle this situation. She thought of the women in history who had spent their entire lives waiting for something-a throne, a love one's return-and she resolved to be just as steadfast, just as courageous. After all, there certainly was a reason she had been sorted into Gryffindor. Maybe she had been born for this very test of character.
A light morning breeze was gently blowing through the gauzy curtains of her bedroom. Outside, in the Muggle world beyond the magical confines of the Black family home on Grimmauld Place, she could hear the sounds of laughing children, a lawn being mowed. Inside the house, if she strained her ears hard enough, there was also laughing. She did not want to consider where it might be coming from. Steadfast, she reminded herself. Steadfast and strong. Never mind that each lilting gale was like a needle to her heart, pinning to it painful memory after painful memory of her failures and shortcomings. Never mind the fact that, though she had yet to check her reflection, she guessed that she had aged twenty years overnight. The night of news.
The clock struck the hour with six insistent gongs. Hermione counted each one, smiling to herself as she readied for the monthly Sunday family dinner at the Burrow. Not one to be caught unprepared for something as impacting as weather, she checked the forecast for the evening not an hour before. With the warm pleasant sun already seeming to warm her, she paced her walk-in closet that up to now was still only half full and fingered the floaty material of several as yet unworn sundresses. She did not notice how her secret smile spread until it commanded her expression as she imagined her friends' faces in this dress.
True to her punctual nature, Hermione was dressed and ready early and decided to wait in the foyer for the rest of the traveling party. The corners of her mouth turned down slightly at the thought that she had robbed herself of gliding-down-the-stairs fantasy. She shrugged; there would be other dinners, and other chances to fulfill that particular fancy.
Surprisingly, her best friend and housemate Ron was next, looking bedraggled and sleepy as though he had just fallen out of bed, which she supposed he had given the amount of work he and Harry were being assigned at the Auror office. He waved to her a sleepy hello and she opened her mouth to ask where their other best friend was when Harry appeared at the top of the steps.
Instantly warning bells went off in Hermione's head. Harry trudged down the stairs like a man walking to the scaffold, his face a sickly green and his hands jammed in his pockets as though to anchor. When he reached the bottom, Hermione rushed to him and asked concernedly, "Harry, what's the matter? You look awful, you're all clammy, and-"
"He's fine, Hermione," said Ron, not even looking at her but patting Harry sympathetically on the back.
"He is most definitely not fine, Ron Weasley!" she returned, firing up immediately. She gestured to his hunched shoulders, his downcast eyes and trembling hands. "Are you all right?" she asked, looking into the green of his eyes, made even more so by the intense red of its bloodshot surroundings.
He smiled wanly at her and held his hand out wordlessly to Ron, who, after digging around in his pocket for several seconds, finally placed a simple, black velvet box in Harry's outstretched palm.
"Where is she?" asked Ron, oblivious to Hermione's bemusement as she stared at the fine jeweler's box in their best friend's hand.
"Upstairs, still getting ready," Harry answered quietly as he checked over his shoulder for improbably eavesdroppers. Old habits die hard, Hermione supposed.
Suddenly, as her brain processed the last thirty seconds, Hermione's confusion sharpened into the kind of clarity that reminded her of falling into an icy stream. She was simultaneously numb and alert, for her wonder at the boys' behavior suggested that she was missing something, and Hermione Granger, never missed anything, especially that which had to do with her boys.
Harry must have seen her reaction, because he instantly took a step in her direction, his skin merely a drawn, pale tint, and said words that she was hoping never to hear: "Hermione, there's something I need to tell you."
She gulped involuntarily, already predicting the next words from his lips. Hadn't this very situation plagued her nightmares for years, ever since her met her? She wanted to close her eyes and ears against, but the words still came, buffeting against her in a succession of painful waves of knowledge. The happenings of the last few months slipped in to place: Harry sitting her and Ron down to discuss whether they minded a fourth tenant under their roof, their assurance that, as it was his house, he could do as he pleased, Harry's frequent disappearances over the past week with suspicious excuses like buying more milk or sugar or some other arbitrary household item that he apparently could not do without. It all had lead to this, she reasoned, and she hadn't done a thing to thwart it.
He smiled as he told her the news that would crush her if she weren't careful. She forced a smile in return, the corners of her mouth strained in a way he might have noticed if he hadn't turn back to Ron's encouraging pats on the shoulder. He put both arms around his best friends and Hermione caught snippets of what he was saying through her smothering thoughts-"Couldn't do it without you both there," he was saying, and Hermione felt herself nodding in all the appropriate places as though her head was merely bobbing uncontrollably on her disjointed neck.
She was saved from having to offer any words of advice or support by her entrance. As one, the trio turned their eyes to the top of the stairs, where Elizabeth stood in her breathtaking beauty. She descended slowly, her eyes only for Harry, though Hermione felt their dark gaze sweep her up and down in that calculating way of hers. Elizabeth was Elizabeth, a woman of shining red hair and attractively pale complexion, a woman who commanded respect and admiration from all of those around her, a woman of such cleverness and wit that men tripped over their own feet to speak to her and women wanted to be her. A woman who had held Harry's heart from the very moment he first came upon her. A woman Hermione could never beat.
"Sorry I took so long," she said sweetly as her feet graced the final step.
Hermione sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose. She pushed the covers off her body and staggered out of bed, throwing open the curtains and promising the rays of sunlight that now seared her vision that she would not give up. Hermione Granger would not be forgotten or set aside. Hermione Granger would not be denied. Her steps had already faltered, but she would recover. She may not win, but she would survive.
She could admit it now, as she had refused to before: she was in love with Harry Potter, and she would be damned if she sat by the quayside while he sailed away from her. It was a testament of her blinding love for him that she never saw it coming.
A/N: Thanks for reading! If you would be so kind as to leave a review and let me know what you think. I know, I know, it's rather short, but it's one of those things I woke up with and had to write, so let me know what you think!
-->