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1. St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries
Emma
The venom ventured deep into his arm, turning it blue, purple then black, inch by inch, faster than you can say Acromantula. Emma tied a tight rope around his arm to stop the venom from protruding any further. Gently, she poured the potion into his mouth whispering affirmations in his ear. She also slipped in some Sleeping Draught for him to find some peace from the pain before the antidote kicked in.
Scribbling away on her clipboard, she made her way down towards the second floor to check up on the kid with dragon pox. It was a usual, simple day in St. Mungo's, nothing special, no chaos, no trauma. That gave Emma a warm feeling of peace which disappeared when she heard a commotion from the fourth floor. People were running upstairs pushing past her with wands out.
Her heart skipped a beat and for a moment, she felt the dread she had felt five years ago at Hogwarts when the war broke in. She stopped Celine, a fellow healer, and asked what was all the noise about. Celine just dragged Emma by the arm, telling her they needed all hands on deck.
They reached the fourth floor. Commotion and noise filled the place, making the other sick wizards react too. Emma rushed to stop a heavily bandaged lady, admitted due to an apparition accident, from falling off her bed in fear. The whole ordeal was chaotic. It took all the healers and helpers they had to tame the patients.
After distracting Gilderoy Lockhart with a children's book, Emma made her way to the crowd of healers trying to wrestle a man in his bed, who was the reason for this commotion. Jack Dawsey, another healer, was preparing a potion in a small cup. "What's wrong with him?" asked Emma, trying to glimpse the sick man's face.
"He's an Auror. Harry Potter brought him in. Said some people tortured him with the Cruciatus Curse for weeks." And with that, Jack dived in to help out the others to restrain the man.
Harry was here.
For a split moment, Emma thought of smiling. She was good friends with Harry and hadn’t seen him for months. But then she came to terms with what Jack said and felt dread creep in. They brought in an Auror. She knew all the Aurors. The thought it could be one of her friends made her nauseated. She tried to get closer, struggling to get a tiny peek at least. All she could see was a jumble of limbs and a number of hands holding wands.
Everyone was shouting. Amid all their voices, there was a loud STUPIFY and suddenly there was an explosion, pushing away men and women alike in all directions. At the epicenter of the explosion, stood a frail man with torn clothes, mad eyes and silver blonde hair laced with black dirt. Emma tripped too. She landed right behind the man.
He turned around. A gasp left her mouth when she realized she was staring into the mad, grey eyes of Draco Malfoy.
He had a wand. An armed Draco Malfoy with a deranged look seemed scarier than he did when he bullied her in Hogwarts. He was seething, his eyes locked with hers. Everything happened in a flash. Draco lifted the wand towards Emma and before he could utter a single syllable, Emma had stunned him unconscious.
~~~~
Emma
Emma assisted Mrs. Perrymore in healing Draco's wounds. He looked so frail, she wouldn’t have recognized him if it weren't for his signature blonde hair and everlasting scowl.
Draco Malfoy always had a bad reputation in her head. But after the war and after him becoming an Auror, she had let go of some of her judgments about him. She still despised him for all the bullying he did to her. The almost diminished creature that lay in front of her replaced her dislike for him with concern. What happened to him? Who did this?
"Bandage the elbow to set the bone. I have healed it but it still must be sore. I have to go check up on that child with the Murtlap bites." Mrs. Perrymore was a stout, little woman always in a hurry but an excellent and the most caring healer.
"And dear, give him the sleeping draught as soon as he wakes up, will you?"
"Sure, Mrs. Perrymore."
Emma twirled her wand, and the bandages tightened around Malfoy’s elbow. She then turned to the table next to the bed and poured the sleeping drought in a little chalice. There was a rustling behind her. Malfoy’s face was contorted into an even deeper scowl and a deep quiver took hold of his body. Emma hesitated before placing her hand on his shoulder. His eyes shot open the moment her fingers brushed across his shoulder.
There it was. The manic and haunted look in his eyes. He widened them, glaring into her black ones and holding her gaze with such intensity, it felt like a crime to Emma to even blink. He suddenly caught her wrist, the one holding his shoulder. His eyes didn’t leave hers but the terror in them transformed into sorrow and she could see tears forming in them. Draco Malfoy is crying. Never in her life did she imagine witnessing such a predicament.
His breathing was shallow and he struggled out a whisper of words with a soft, teary smile that took Emma by surprise. “You’re here. You’re really here. You are real.”
For a moment, she did not know how to react. The relief on his face mixed with tears had such an impact on her, she was taken aback. The curiosity she had about his fate with whatever mission he was on turned into concern. Who broke Draco Malfoy to this extent?
He was holding on to her wrist as tight as his strength would allow him to. She snapped back to her senses, put on her ‘Healer face’ and said as gently as she could, “I’m here Malfoy. This is real. You’re in St. Mungo’s now. You’re safe here. If you could just get up for a bit and take this potion, it would help-”, but he interrupted her. Draco gripped her other wrist and looked at her as if he had seen a human being for the first time in a long while. He cried out with so much pain and longing, it made Emma tear up too.
“You’re here. You are actually here. You were right, Emma Jones. You were right. I did it, Jones! I did it.” He was sobbing wildly in her arms. And she couldn’t help but cradle his head and hush his sobs. She felt confused beyond imagination. Draco Malfoy, the tyrant that bullied her until she wept, who laughed at her every chance he got, who scowled at her at every Ministry meeting, was right here in her arms weeping like a mere child. She collected her scattered wits and acted like the Healer she was.
“Malfoy? Mr. Malfoy? Draco! Look at me,” she held his face in both hands, leveling hers with his. “I am here Draco. I am real. You did it, ok? You are safe now and I am not going anywhere. You need to rest and take some potion to help heal your wounds. Will you drink it for me?” She talked to him like he was a child.
He nodded, still smiling up at her with his watery eyes. Emma helped him with the Sleeping Draught and made him lie down. He was slowly drowsing off but his eyes never left hers and that smile of relief persisted until he dozed off into an uneasy slumber.
~~~~
The third floor of St. Mungo's Hospital comprised all the plant poisoned wizards. Emma was coming out of the Green Room which was on the same floor when she heard a deafening echo of screams from the floor above.
Yet again, upon reaching the ward upstairs, she found a Draco Malfoy created chaos. It was almost a funny sight.
While the comatose patients seemed dead to the ear-splitting noise, the conscious one's were a whole different story. Alice Longbottom was crouched like a ball beneath her bed while her husband was whimpering violently, covering his ears. Gilderoy Lockhart was screaming on top of his lungs, laughing maniacally and doing somersaults. An old lady, Mrs. Gills, another victim of a memory charm gone wrong, was sobbing into her palms.
But the main person of this fiasco was a Mr. Lewis Puddles, who was brought in from Azkaban for crimes against the muggle race. He had gotten a hold of Jack Dawsey's wand. Jack was crouching by a bed, nursing his bloody head in his palms. Lewis Puddles had the wand tip pressed against his neck and he was screaming at the top of his lungs with his voice amplified to maximum by using the Sonorous charm.
The sound was painful on Emma's ears. They felt like they would start bleeding any minute. Her mind had gone numb. Her palms clutched at her ears and temples, hoping she could tear through her skin and cover her eardrums too. She proceeded inside the ward, glancing at Draco Malfoy banging his head bloody on the wall. Dottie Johnson, a nurse, was laying right beside him, unconscious.
Mrs. Perrymore was the one who broke the spell. She disarmed Lewis and stunned him before he could lunge at her. His body went taut and fell motionless by his bed. The silence burst in the room and to Emma, it felt louder than Lewis's screams. Mrs. Perrymore was the only one in the room unfazed. She was wearing earmuffs and she looked furious.
Everyone in the room was either on their knees or crouched over, heaving and clutching at their ears and foreheads. Two of the helpers gathered themselves up to help the patients to their beds. The Longbottoms were given sleeping draughts as they were amongst the most disturbed. Gilderoy had to be stunned to stop his laughing which started off again after a few minutes of silence.
Emma noticed the absence of Draco Malfoy and made her way to the unconscious Dottie Johnson near the windows. It looked like someone hit her on the back of her head which was bleeding, drenching her blonde hair in red. Emma quickly started her healing charm and helped her to a chair nearby.
"Where is Malfoy, Dottie? Dottie?" She gently tapped Dottie's cheeks to wake her up. She was murmuring and her head kept lolling around.
Soft cries coming from behind the window curtains pulled her attention from the half-conscious nurse. She made her way to the beige curtains and drew them aside to find the blonde man twisted in a ball. He was shaking and his hands were bloody. The blood was so prominent on his silver hair, the injury looked worse than it was. She gingerly brushed his shoulder. He looked up and shifted away from her touch with horror plastered over his face. Blood ran down his forehead and covered his lips and teeth. He was crying too. His eyes were as red as his forehead.
"Malfoy," she whispered and tried to touch his shoulder again. "It's just me Malfoy. It's Jones." The stormy grey of his eyes looked glassy and broken at the same time. She had always wanted to see Draco Malfoy defeated and hurt. But to this extent? At that moment, she thought he didn't deserve it.
"It's all my fault," he croaked out in gasps. He clutched her hand so tight, it hurt. "I'm so… I'm sorry. It's my fault."
She gripped his shoulder and crouched next to him. "Hey. It's ok. Just help me get you to your bed, will you?" He did not look up at her from his hands clutching hers. After a few seconds, he nodded ever so slightly and let her help him to his bed.
Jack Dawsey was yelling at Mrs. Perrymore when Emma left Draco’s side to help other patients. “We need to move them out of here. Treating criminals here is going to affect all these people who have already suffered enough. And keeping a Death Eater here is an absolute disrespect to so many in this room!” The nasty wound on his forehead must’ve hurt like hell but he looked like he didn’t care, towering over Mrs. Perrymore like that. And the old healer just stood there with her arms crossed over her chest with a calm air about her. There was a pause. She did not speak and looked at Dawsey with a reproachful gaze.
“You should mind what you say lad. We are healers. Not the Ministry. We have taken an oath to save lives. Doesn’t matter whose life. We’re here to save them. If you have forgotten that, you’re free to walk out.” Her tone was simple. Monotonous even. But it seemed like it hit hard because Jack immediately hung his head in defeat and walked away. Mrs. Perrymore eyed everyone who was looking at her, daring them to point out what Jack had. Everyone just went back to their work, cleaning up the mess and calming down the patients. She made her way over to Dottie, helping her off the chair and taking her towards the exit.
On her way, she glanced at Emma, “Em, honey, I trust you will take care of our two VIPs here, won’t you? Meet me in my office once you put them to sleep.” And with that, she left the ward with a wobbling Dottie on her arm.
Emma, with the help of two nurses, managed to put a twitching Mr. Lewis Puddles to bed and then made her way towards Malfoy’s bed. He was sitting with his eyes fixed on his hands in his lap. The blood on his forehead had started to dry up. If he felt pain, he didn’t show it. He just sat there, not moving at all, not even shivering. Only that signature scowl of his gave any indication that he was conscious.
“I will clean your wound now. And then I’ll heal it. It’s going to hurt a bit.” Hesitating, she touched his forehead with the alcohol damped cloth. He didn’t flinch and didn’t move his gaze from his palms. Emma found it difficult to clean and heal his wound from that angle as he didn’t budge even a little to let her have a better look. She somehow managed covering him up with bandages and stood there, watching him for a minute, contemplating if she should say something without setting off his mental, mad-man switch.
Sighing, she decided to go with a simple, “Are you okay?” Wait what? Was she mad? Are you okay? Really? Who bloody asks that after a scene like this? Of course, he wasn’t okay! Apparently, Malfoy thought the same as he scoffed a little, a bitter and sad smirk appearing on his lips. He still didn’t look up, though and his smirk vanished as soon as it had appeared, replaced with his usual scowl.
“No, I’m sorry. Of course, you’re not okay. I meant to ask ‘what are you feeling?’ I mean, do you want to talk about it…?” At that, his face snapped up, looking at her with a deeper scowl. “…. Or not. I just meant that, um, you can tell me or, um, someone if you’re not feeling well. Today wasn’t entirely your fault so, um, you know…. just don’t worry about it too much.” What the hell? Why was she fumbling with her words?
She used to fumble this way in front of him during their early years at Hogwarts. But after her fourth year, she got bolder and never fumbled or cried in front of him once. Now, here she was, feeling like the blubbering mess her eleven-year-old-self felt all those years ago. She guessed she was scared because of his deranged look he had about him the day he was brought to the hospital.
His expression softened and he smiled. Not smirked. Smiled. A tiny smile that didn’t reach his otherwise sad eyes. “It’s fine Jones. I’m fine.” He ran his hand across his face and sighed heavily. He lay down on his bed and turned away from her. “What I’m feeling is none of your business.”
She wasn’t surprised at his change of tone. It didn’t bother her that Draco Malfoy was rude to her. That was normal. They hadn’t had any clashes ever since Hogwarts ended. But they were extremely rude to each other in all their small talks every time they had met during Ministry Meetings.
His smile had surprised her quite a bit. She had never seen Draco Malfoy smile, even a little, ever in her life. She had seen him smirk or smile while sneering in this ugly sort of way. But never really smile. It was so strange yet so normal. Well, one thing she knew, he must be absolutely nuts in his head that he smiled at her.
She made her way upstairs where there were cubicles and little cabins for healers and administrative staff. Mrs. Perrymore was Assistant to the Chief Healer and her dingy little cabin was at the very end of the floor. She was sorting through parchments when Emma knocked at her open door.
“Oh, do have a seat dear. I have to ask something important of you. Let me just find this order bill for the Root Blossom Potion that I have to owl. I’ll just be a few seconds.”
“No problem, Mrs. Perrymore.”
A few minutes later, Mrs. Perrymore returned to her seat and looked at Emma with a calculating and curious expression. Emma’s mind whirled in the suspense of what she would tell her. Was there something the Order wanted her to do? Had they finally agreed to send her on one of their missions?
You see, after the war, the Ministry had a hard time tracking down escaped Death Eaters who had formed several groups to create havoc and torture muggles and wizards alike. The Minister for Magic, Kingsley Shacklebolt, had then let The Order to take over the job led by Hestia Jones. They would conduct missions, sending in Aurors and Healers to places of assault. Harry, Ron, and few of her other friends had gone on to become Aurors and like her, were also members of the Order. She never got to accompany an Auror on his/her mission, no matter how much she begged Harry to put in a good word. Hestia Jones, on consulting Mrs. Perrymore, claimed Emma wasn’t ready yet. That she needed more training.
“What is your relationship with Draco Malfoy?” The Assistant Healer interrupted her thoughts with her sharp tone. That question caught Emma off guard.
“My relationship with Malfoy? I don’t know. I’ve always hated him and he has hated me. I can’t really say enemies but neither are we friends. I’ll go with acquaintances. Why?” Emma’s face scrunched up in confusion at this vague, out-of-nowhere question.
“I had a meeting with Hestia yesterday. Harry Potter told her what had happened when they rescued Malfoy from France. The details were quite shocking.” She paused, her eyes were out of focus as if she was remembering the meeting conversation.
“Okay. How does that involve me?”
“When they found Draco in his almost-dead situation,” Emma flinched at the mental picture that formed in her head and so did Mrs. Perrymore, “he was constantly muttering something through his unconsciousness. They realized a bit later that he was muttering your name over and over. Nothing else. Just your name.”
The cabin fell silent. Emma couldn’t comprehend this news. It sounded terribly absurd. “With all due respect Mrs. Perrymore, are you quite sure it was my name? I mean, he could’ve just been muttering Jones or something else for that matter. I believe I am not the only Jones he might know.”
“Trust me, Em, that was my first response to Hestia when she told me but Harry Potter and James Delaware both confirmed he was muttering only two words: Emma Jones to be precise.”