Chapter Text
"You'll die before your knife reaches home." The hissed words caress her ear, cruel and teasing and without a hint of warmth.
Hermione's hand doesn't shake—it hasn't in years—even with his wand tip at her temple.
In a flicker of an instant, she weighs the odds.
The tip of her dagger is at his throat, a trickle of blood breaking from the puncture and sliding, insidious, down the alabaster column of his throat.
She knows he's right; if she kills him, he will take her out too. She could cut his throat and spill his blood in a swift movement, but the jolting tell of his magic will crash down upon her.
They're at an impasse, and it isn't the first time.
Hermione has long known Voldemort wants her dead. She's even known that it's him who's been tasked to take her out. It might be amusing if her death didn't currently hang on the tip of his wand, some sort of strange irony she might enjoy under other circumstances.
On the other hand, it's a little flattering.
Draco Malfoy, one of the highest ranked lieutenants in the Dark Lord's forces. A Death Eater of the inner circle. He's come a long way from the frightened sixteen-year-old she remembers from Hogwarts.
The petulant little boy he had been.
She can see the hardened weariness that she knows so well in his grey eyes through the silver and black mask. Can hear the anger, raw and unfettered, in his voice.
He hates her—wants her dead. Almost as much as she does him.
It might be a twisted game if not for the fact that any day could be her last.
She can see it in his eyes, now—the way he would kill her in an instant, without hesitation or remorse.
But he knows her, too. They've been at this for months now, tracking one another, threatening to end the other's existence.
And he knows she won't hesitate either.
She can see the same careful weighing of the situation, can feel the press of his wand tip to her brow.
He stands over her by nearly a foot, and his stature would be imposing if she weren't so well trained.
They come to the same conclusion at once. His grip falters—only for an instant—as she shifts her hold on the dagger.
Their eyes meet.
"Watch your back," she snaps, close enough to scent the peppermint on his breath.
A whiz of magic skims her robes as she Disapparates.
Back at the resistance safehouse where she currently lives, Hermione allows herself the deep breath she never could have taken in front of Malfoy.
Every day, her life is at risk.
Most of the time, she knows she can win.
She can cast better than most of the Death Eaters, outrun and outmanoeuvre. Hard lessons learned through the painful years since the Battle of Hogwarts went south.
They'd made it out but only just.
And every day she survives is another gift.
She knows better than to let her guard down—but somehow Malfoy continues to find her. It's only a matter of time before one of them catches the other unaware and ends the game at last.
Or so she's been telling herself for months.
If any of the Death Eaters are on her level, it's Malfoy. Unfortunately, since they've been after one another for so long they've learned the intricacies, the tells, the vulnerabilities that drive the other. The strengths.
To underestimate him will lead almost certainly to her own demise.
Remnants of the Order, a key component of the new resistance, are holed up in a small, rundown safehouse in a rural area beyond the outskirts of Bristol. Privacy has long been a thing of the past, but still, Hermione hates the stares as she stalks through the door, unsuccessful yet again.
Idly, she wonders when they'll tire of her attempts and remove her from the task.
She can feel Warrington's cold judgement as she walks past, rolling the day's strain from her shoulders. Tries and fails to miss Harry's disappointment.
Everything has felt especially dire in the last few months since a routine raid went horribly wrong, their already depleted numbers suffering a great loss. Since they'd lost many friends and allies.
Hermione strides past them all, seeking the small room she's lucky to call hers though it's little more than a closet with a cot and a small table for her few meagre possessions. She hangs her pack on a hook on the wall, pulling her hair from its tight bun and massaging the beginnings of a headache at her temples.
Harry walks in without so much as a knock but she's used to it. "Nothing?" he asks. "Did you find him?"
She wouldn't lie to him, even if she didn't know better. They haven't carried lies or misdirection against each other for years. Since they lost Ron, they're all the other has.
Allowing herself to be vulnerable with anyone else stings, a harsh burn in her chest that goes against every newly ingrained instinct.
"I found him," she allows at last, pulling her dirt and blood-soiled singlet over her head, though the sports bra beneath is little better. Stretches out her arms and shoulders before drawing her dagger from its holster and sinking cross-legged to her bed. For a second, she eyes the dried blood on its pointed tip. "But he found me first."
Harry curses under his breath, leaning back against the wall. "Did he harm you?"
"No." Not for any lack of trying on his part. She knows Malfoy's Crucio implicitly within every nerve, and it's a small blessing she wasn't subjected to it today. "But I didn't get anything from him." She releases a long, put-upon sigh. "You know if I don't catch him soon Cassius and Kingsley are going to decide my usefulness has run its course."
Once, Harry might have opposed the thought. But he remains silent, green eyes locked on the wall behind her bed.
Everyone's changed, and mostly for the worst.
"It just seems..." Harry trails off, squaring his jaw. "He's too well prepared. It's hard to believe you can't catch him off his guard."
"Malfoy only exists in one state: guarded."
They ponder the thought for a moment, and Hermione doesn't care for the shiver that races down her spine at the thought that he might be in possession of inside information. They would be foolish not to consider the idea, though. Blind optimism has cost them too much.
Hermione knows exactly what's on Harry's mind when he gives her a grim look. "Maybe you're right. And if he weren't so important, I'd think we should change tactics."
The unspoken conclusion weighs thick in the air between them. Malfoy knows too much, and he's one of the only Death Eater lieutenants who regularly leaves their headquarters without a squadron at his flank. To attack the rest would be akin to inviting slaughter on their own feeble forces.
He operates alone—like Hermione.
But to take him out would be a fierce blow to the opposition. No one knows exactly how, but Malfoy's become one of the only soldiers Voldemort trusts with his plans.
Hermione dreams of his blood blooming in a pool and seeping into the hard earth, his grey eyes open and dulled, wand rolling free of his lifeless fingertips.
And she knows his dreams are likely the same, after so long.
"You'll get him," Harry says at last, sinking into the end of the bed. Sweeps an aggravated hand through his hair. "I'm leading a raid into Bristol. Kings' orders."
Hermione schools her surprise by dipping a cloth into the tabletop basin and cleans the blood from her knife. "How many?"
"Four of us. That's all we can spare right now."
The number sounds inadequate to her ears, when the raid they'd lost numbered over a dozen. She hums in response. "When will you return?"
"Tomorrow." Harry shrugs, adjusts his glasses. He would hate to know he's so obvious, but she notes the slight tremble in his fingers at the nervous tic. "Provided everything goes to plan."
"I'll come," she offers. "If the pattern holds, I won't have another shot at Malfoy for at least another week."
"You don't know the pattern will hold."
She recognises the words as direct from Kingsley's mouth, but says nothing. She knows better than to argue, even if she hates how futile it makes her. Rummaging in her bag, Hermione draws a whetstone and begins to sharpen the blade for lack of anything else to do with her hands. The blade is still sharp enough to cut clean through flesh, but she never knows how to sit still anymore.
Hasn't for a long time.
"Let me know when you're back," is all she says.
"Right." Harry rises from the bed with a nod. When he squares his shoulders, he shifts from friend to soldier, much as she knows she must when she dons her gear. The time for carefree laughs and easy camaraderie is long past. "Watch yourself."
"And you," she returns quietly, after the door's closed behind him.
The leaves crunch beneath his boots, and the air carries an uneasy chill. Draco is frustrated but not surprised. He's already tensed for the punishment that is to come.
Another day—another failure.
He promised himself—and others—long ago that he would be the one to put down the brains of the resistance. Where the rest of them are brute and brawn, Granger remains the same brilliant mind she has always been, if not a hell of a lot more ruthless.
It will be his pleasure to put her out of her misery at last. The knives strapped to his thigh and hip would readily draw her blood, but there's always been a certain finesse behind magical means over Muggle.
A sneer curls his lips at the thought.
He slides through the wards of the manor, a shiver of magic darting down his spine. Some days he basks in it, the feel of the ancient wards welcoming him home. Other times it feels cold, insidious; he braces himself for what comes next.
He's proven his worth over the years, but his master has little tolerance for failure. He grinds his teeth, twirls his wand and holsters it, carefully schooling his expression.
How Granger remains a step ahead of him is a mystery—but one thing is for certain. He's been assigned to take her out, and he intends to fulfil that oath. The Mark on his forearm already burns, an intermittent but persistent sting; the Dark Lord is angry.
Draco's steps don't falter.
As one of the Dark Lord's highest ranking enforcers, he's doled out more than his share of punishments, and he knows it's always worse if the recipient fights.
By the time he arrives in the hall and approaches the dais upon which his master sits, he's passed several Death Eaters, most of whom are doing their best to avoid the room. He removes his hood and mask, and ducks his head in a bow.
When he looks up to meet his master's narrowed red gaze, he keeps his expression blank.
"Draco."
He remains silent.
"Tell me you have good news for us today."
A handful of Death Eaters are present, but the room is otherwise empty. Draco spies Yaxley watching and fights the urge to sneer. "I caught Granger, my lord—but she was prepared for me. If I had moved for her life she would have been in position to claim mine as well."
The Dark Lord's expression tightens, deeply displeased. He steeples his fingers. "I see." A tense silence characterises the room, but Draco knows better than to look away or fidget. "And did it occur to you, Draco, that Hermione Granger dead is of more value to me than you alive?"
He refrains from flinching.
Despite everything he's done—the despicable, unmentionable atrocities—on his lord's behalf, Draco suffers no delusions as to any perceived value he might offer.
"I apologise, My Lord," he merely says, ducking his chin again.
"If I didn't know better," the Dark Lord presses on, "I might suspect you've left her alive out of weakness or mercy."
The accusation stings. "I assure you, I am doing everything in my power to remove her from the equation."
"And yet, she continues to best you."
If she had truly bested him, even once, Draco wouldn't still be here. Again, he opts to let the remark slide. "I will get her, My Lord. It is only a matter of time. I've learned her methods and I know where to find her next."
He can sense the Dark Lord has already tired of the conversation, and Draco straightens his shoulders, steeling his resolve.
"You have two months." The cold words sink in, seeping through Draco's skin and into his bones. "And if you do not give me evidence as to Miss Granger's demise, it will be your death providing the entertainment instead."
Dread settles within him, courses through his veins like ice, and he nods. "Of course, My Lord." He ducks his chin, clasping his mask in unsteady hands.
Two months.
They've circled each other like lions on the prowl for longer.
Draco swallows, straightens his shoulders, and meets his master's deadened eyes. "You are far too generous."
He doesn't allow a sound when the first Crucio hits.
A strange tension carries Hermione through her days.
The raid into Bristol comes back late, and it's all too easy to slip into worst case scenarios these days as the resistance's ranks grow thinner. She doesn't know how to express herself most of the time anymore, but the relief was all-encompassing when she saw Harry's messy hair slip through the door.
She feels as though the war hangs on a knife's edge, each day shifting towards something she can't comprehend. Something that doesn't even make sense anymore.
They had been so sure of their path, early on. But as the weeks, months, years slip past, Hermione continues to lose sight of what matters most. As she watches friends and comrades fall; as the deadly spells slip from her wand with an ease and frequency that would have frightened her once.
The Order had no choice early on but to fight fire with fire—to become as ruthless as the competition. Even so, the ideals that once led them dissolved on the wind into the scraps that now comprise the resistance.
It's the reason her knife has seen so many shades of blood.
She slips from the cramped safehouse one morning before the sun crests the horizon, a satchel with provisions on her back, knives and wand at the ready. She's tired of failures and near misses, and she knows where to find her mark.
On the third Tuesday of every month, he meets in private with an informant—one of the roaming mercenaries who offer no loyalty to the Death Eaters or the resistance but to the power of the almighty Galleon.
Hermione's fingers tingle with the need for action, adrenaline nudging at her as it swells in her veins.
Imbued with as many concealing, disillusionment, and protective spells as she knows, Hermione watches the exchange from a nearby rooftop. She can't hear the conversation, but it's a small price to pay in exchange for a clear shot. She detects innumerable glamours obscuring the informant's features; a professional, then. It's unsurprising.
At last they break apart, and her gaze tracks Malfoy as he begins to walk away. She follows his smooth gait, observes the hint of pale blond hair peeking out from his hood. The intricate silver swirls on his mask.
Even if she didn't know his identity, she would recognise the way he carries himself. She's more familiar with the man than she cares for. Disgust curls her lip as she watches him begin down the road, a hint of swagger in his step.
As the strength of the resistance wanes, the Death Eaters grow increasingly emboldened. It doesn't surprise her to see him out in the open—or a modicum of it, at least. The rendezvous is on private land, but the wards aren't nearly comprehensive enough.
Clutching her wand in one hand and dagger in the other, Hermione debates her plan of attack. After she found herself at his wand point the week before, she isn't keen for another showdown.
She could simply hit him with a spell and be done with it. It almost seems an anticlimactic end to the long play in which they've been engaged.
Malfoy continues down the road, his gaze fixed in the opposite direction, and she's just decided his end can be mediocre and nondescript—like him. But in the split seconds wherein she considers her plan, she falters.
A bolt of green magic shoots past her.
She didn't even see him make a move for his wand.
Then he's staring in her direction, slipping his mask up to rest on the top of his head, as cavalier as she's ever seen him. She knows he can't see through her disillusionment, but it wouldn't be the first time he's detected her in hiding.
"Honestly, Granger," he drawls, twirling his wand. "You're losing your touch if you think I didn't know you were there all along. Luckily, I don't care what you heard because it's all irrelevant—" He pauses, whether in consideration or for effect, she doesn't know. "And you're not making it out of here anyway."
Another whiz of magic—red this time—skirts past her and clips the outside of her arm, singeing her sleeve and drawing a hiss from her teeth as it burns her flesh.
It's a disastrous, instinctive mistake, as he's drastically narrowed down her location. Cautiously, Hermione rounds to the opposite corner of the rooftop, ensuring her protective spells are in place.
Malfoy smiles, close-lipped, as if in mild enjoyment of her pain.
"Really," he carries on, oblivious to the one-sided nature of the conversation. "You've got me at a disadvantage, haven't you?"
His gleaming eyes bely the game.
Hermione fires a stunner; he throws up a shield just in time and her spell ricochets off the corner of the building, leaving a crumbled pile of stone in its wake. While Malfoy peers up at the rooftop, Hermione twists into a silent Apparition to the ground behind the building, observing him from around the corner.
He's kept the shielding spell erect, strong enough to deflect any spell she casts.
"If you think I don't know by now how you operate…" he muses, a hint of cruel humour curling his lips. "I must confess, Granger, I'm not in the mood today."
In a sudden, relentless sting, a barrage of spells flies from his wand, shooting straight towards her. Hermione manages to dodge the first two before she raises a shield of her own, and the rest glance harmlessly off.
The war has crept into this part of London, and the land is part of an old factory district that's been abandoned. Most of the buildings already show the ravages of war.
Sometimes she wonders what sort of magic conceals it all from Muggle eyes, but most of the time she has more pressing concerns.
Without waiting for him to make another move, Hermione leaps into action, firing a lethal string of her own spells—and while Malfoy deflects them one by one with startling accuracy, she takes aim and throws her blade.
It's sheer dumb luck she misses his heart with the slashing arc of his wand arm. Instead, the dagger embeds itself deep in his forearm, and he blinks in surprise before he draws it free.
Hermione holds a breath while he stares, only for a moment, at the glisten of his blood on the blade. He casts a spell she can't hear—some sort of healing spell—and releases a huff.
"Nice throw, Granger."
Then he Disapparates.
Before she has a chance to tense and track him, she feels the cool silver of her dagger against her throat and her concealing spells dissolve as though they were nothing. She feels the firm press of Malfoy at her back, the warmth of his breath on her jaw. His other arm locks firmly around her midsection, trapping her wand arm against her torso.
In a flash, her heart rate leaps, adrenaline pounding behind her ears.
"You know," Malfoy says, the words little more than a purr in her ear. He drags the tip of the dagger along her skin, still wet with his blood, but he doesn't break skin. "You've caused me an awful lot of trouble. Maybe I'll use this pretty blade to deliver your head on a pike."
Her stomach curdles with revulsion as she tries to jerk free. His arm only tightens.
Malfoy has always been tall—even at Hogwarts—but he's filled out more than she even realised, and his grip on her doesn't falter. She can feel the hard bulk of muscle against her back, and the proximity to her sworn nemesis makes her nauseous.
"But there's a part of me that really wants to make you suffer—for old time's sake."
He tilts the blade just so, the tip of it breaking her skin.
"Surprised you'd allow your blood to touch mine," she hisses, her fear and anger combining into white hot fury and threatening to break free. Raw power stirs in her fingertips, even as her wand lies useless against her stomach.
She can't see his face but she can imagine the smirk. He drags the tip of her blade just a little further, away from the rich veins in her throat that would have her bleeding out in moments, and down along the line of her collar. It doesn't surprise her that Malfoy likes to play with his food.
"I'll let you in on a secret, Granger," he says, his voice dropping low. "This isn't about your blood. It's more personal than that. I just despise you."
"It's mutual," she growls. A trickle of blood slides down her collarbone. The toe of Malfoy's boot nudges against her heel and she steadies her breathing, taking stock of the situation as she gathers a coil of raw magic within her. "Maybe the reason I've caused you so much trouble is because you don't actually want to kill me—otherwise you'd have done so already."
He drifts the knife towards her heart, pressing the tip gently into her skin. "Oh, I'm going to kill you—and I'm going to enjoy it."
She can't tell if he's bluffing, but she can't imagine a reason why he would lie. As much as he's been atop her list, she knows the inverse is also true. "Then do it," she murmurs, sliding her eyes shut. She flexes her empty palm, magic accumulating in her fingers, pulse raging within her.
In one swift move, Malfoy wrenches her wand free from where he's had it trapped and spins her, pressing her back to the wall. His grey eyes flash as he assesses her. He's got her blade trained on her and both wands; triumph dances in his face.
"I must admit, Granger, you've been a worthy adversary. Seems a shame to spill your blood in so pedestrian a manner." Keeping the blade against her chest, drawing her blood with a bite, he stows her wand into his holster—a trophy no doubt—and manoeuvres his own into a proper grip. He jams the tip up into the underside of her jaw, the amusement falling from his face. "Goodbye, Granger. Avada Ked—"
"A shame," she says, holding his stare when he falters. "I would have thought you'd at least try to torture me for information."
Malfoy smirks. "I don't need information from you. All I need is your death." He lowers his voice, the narrow wand tip harsh and uncomfortable against the tender skin. "Besides, I already know you won't succumb to torture—remember?"
She remembers. She manages to keep her face blank at the memory of his particular brand of searing hatred. Sometimes she still has nightmares about it.
"Like I said," she whispers, "a shame."
At that, his eyes narrow. She almost thinks his lips twitch with a hint of bemusement. He makes a show of checking his watch, as if he has someone else to track down and murder before sundown. "Fine. Why is it a shame?"
His wand hand never wavers; he's too good for that. Hermione knows if she makes a move for her wand, he'll forgo indulging her tactics entirely and put an end to this; she holds perfectly still, a trickle of her own blood sticky as it blooms into her shirt.
"Because," she whispers, searching the silver flecks in his grey eyes. "I thought you knew better than to underestimate me by now."
At once, she fires the bolt of raw magic into his dragonhide boot, searing through the leather, and, seizing his momentary distraction, twists her other wrist to summon her wand from where he's stowed it in his holster.
By the time her fingers curl around the wand, he's fired off no fewer than three spells, and Hermione ducks to the side, swinging one arm wildly to erect a feeble shield as she shoots a string of lethality back at him.
In a split second, they've gone from tentative peace to an all out duel. Hermione's adrenaline builds into laser focus, their magic flowing together in a dance with which she's familiar.
They've been here before—more times than she can count. She might almost consider him her best duelling partner if the situation weren't so convoluted.
She catches his side with a spell, the angry sizzle of burnt fabric and skin filling the air, but he doesn't flinch as he blocks her next hex with cruel efficiency and throws something in an ugly shade of purple back at her which she narrowly avoids.
Hermione knows she could Disapparate and they could have this fight again another day, in another place.
But she's tired.
They've been caught in this impasse for longer than she wants to consider, and cold fury coils within her with each spell, relentless and persistent, her magic a deadly, explosive force. Caught in a duel, everything becomes instinctive, her training brought to life with a living target before her.
Malfoy's gaze tightens with focus, his footwork sure and casting impeccable. She might almost admire him if he weren't trying to kill her.
If each spell that flew by or deflected on her shields wasn't designed to inflict exquisite torture and death.
The taunting on both sides is gone, replaced by this, the drive to survive, the desire to end. Hermione wants nothing more than Draco Malfoy, cold and unmoving on the ground before her.
Raw magic spirals within her and before she recognises the strength of it, she fires a devastating blow from her bare palm in tandem with the block from her wand.
Caught by surprise, Malfoy is blasted back, and she sees the momentary surprise in his face as he stumbles. It's enough to cost him.
Hermione darts forward, seizing the opportunity, a death curse already hanging on her lips. She jams her wand into his heart, heavy, seizing breaths falling from her lips. His chest heaves with the exertion, and she can read the question in his eyes, even as it mingles with resignation.
"You can't honestly tell me you like serving that sociopath," Hermione huffs, grappling for his wand. "You, born into privilege."
She isn't certain, but maybe if she tries to imagine she's doing him a favour, it'll be easier to put him down. As much as she hates him, they've been embroiled in this mess for so long that there's a sort of kinship in their hatred of each other.
For a flicker of an instant, something passes through his gaze that she's never seen before. A furrow knits the skin between his brow. She can't tell if his reaction is a response to her words or to the fact that she's bested him.
But he only shakes his head, tiny, infinitesimal. "You don't know a fucking thing."
As she opens her mouth, scrounging for courage, she suddenly freezes. Her chest is unbearably tight and she can't manage to draw breath. Her eyes flicker down and she sees his hand coiled into a fist, his grey eyes dull and deadened as he squeezes tighter.
What little oxygen remains in her lungs gutters. Her vision begins to swim as he holds his grip firm, as she suffocates on nothing.
True fear darts through her for the first time since the altercation began. The strength vanishes from her hand, and he easily reclaims his wand but leaves hers alone. Something like a flicker of resignation passes over his face.
As she feels herself begin to black out, her lungs desperate for breath, he finally releases. Hermione sucks in a great, heaving breath.
And they only stare at each other. Malfoy's hands hang loose at his sides, but his wand is still aimed vaguely towards her. He looks as though he might say something, but he secures his mask back in place on his face. With a step backwards, his gaze locks on her once more.
He snarls, "You fucking owe me, Granger." Then, before her confusion can fully register, she hears a soft, "Stupefy," and the world goes dark.