Chapter Text
Disclaimer: HP doesn't belong to me. I just like to have fun with the characters.
Note: This is a different world from the canon where Voldemort's reign began more secretly and successfully, to the point where the timeline has been changed and Hermione was not enrolled into Hogwarts.
Chapter 1
He was late today.
Hermione glanced at the clock embedded into the wall. Five minutes late even, which was odd for the stranger she had observed for the past year and a half.
It wasn't that she was stalking him, really. He was just so incredibly peculiar that she had no choice but to notice him. It was like watching a polar bear stroll down the streets of London without a care in the world. That was just it—the stranger stood out.
But for some reason today he was late and that bothered her more than it should have.
She sighed and lowered the book from her face, letting it fall into her lap as she lost all pretense of reading it in favor of looking around for the now-familiar sight of his pale hair, impeccably smoothed back every day without fail. There was always a cool expression on his face, never flickering despite the pushing crowds as he seemed to glide to his destination. Alone. Wearing a cloak.
A cloak. In this day and age. Hermione's neck already itched just thinking about it suffocating her. There were plenty of sensible outer wear options, such as jackets or coats to keep warm, easily picked up from any bargain bin, yet the stranger insisted on a cloak of deep green, so dark it appeared black without light. It fluttered dramatically around him as he walked, but seemed more suited for an opera set in the 18th century than a dirty train station with used gum dotting the gray cement. No one seemed to notice his odd dress except for her, perhaps assuming he was an actor of some sort.
She doubted that he was an actor though. In the past, she had had her share of dates with those who believed themselves to be the next Laurence Olivier, and the stranger lacked the same glint of desperation in his eyes. He reminded her of a self-assured cat who knew his place in the world and strolled where he pleased, always on some mysterious business that made others invisible to him.
She pushed up her thick, bushy brown hair into a makeshift bun without caring that more than a few strands escaped her. She stood up as her train arrived, casting one last look around the station for the stranger. The flimsy plastic doors parted, its packed occupants jerking forward, but refusing to step out, their toes on the very edge of the car in front of the gap. They glared at her, as if daring her to even try shoving her way in.
She rubbed the bridge of her nose and sat back down. She wasn't in a hurry anyway. The doors closed and the passengers visibly sucked in their guts to let it seal them in. The train lurched forward, picking up speed into the gaping tunnel. She picked up her book again and stuck her nose into it. She was only a few paragraphs in when her eyes wandered above the top of the pages to the platform on the other side.
The stranger walked, his well polished shoes briskly clipping into the station floor. Italian, they looked like. Expensive too. She cricked her neck at an uncomfortable angle when the crowd slipped in front of him and she lost visual. He appeared again and what he did then made her jaw drop and question her sanity.
The stranger stepped straight into a brick wall and disappeared.
She whipped her head around, mouth agape, silently demanding if anyone else had seen what she had just witnessed. She thankfully resisted the urge to point. She jumped from the bench with the idea to investigate the wall when her phone buzzed in her purse. She dug through its depths and saw Deanna's text.
Deanna: WHERE ARE YOU!!!?????
Hermione: About to get on the Tube. Why?
Deanna: GENEVIVE GOING BALLISTIC. COME IN ASAP.
She almost groaned out loud. Genevive, her boss. The head curator at the Museum of London and resident mad woman. She lingered wistfully, staring at her phone and then at the wall. She had a brief fantasy of throwing her phone into the gap and running after the stranger, grabbing him and asking him exactly what kind of trick he had employed. The phone buzzed again in her hand.
Deanna: NONE OF THE EXHIBITIONS HAVE ARRIVED! WHAT ARE WE GOING TO DO????!!!!
Oh. That was a problem. She sighed. The stranger and his freakish wall would have to wait.
– –
Draco loathed the train station.
A year and a half ago, the Dark Lord returned to power and half of the wizarding world went into hiding. There had been signs of what to come for a long time. Slowly, Death Eaters had infiltrated the upper echelons of the Ministry. It became extremely rare that Muggle children were extended invitations to join Hogwarts. The smart witches and wizards packed their bags and left the country. Meanwhile, there were idiots like him too stupid or too brave to leave.
He thought of the Malfoy Villa in Italy, far, far away from dreary London and its disgusting train stations. At first it had been a matter of pride that his parents had remained in England. After all, the Malfoys were staunch supporters of the Dark Lord from the very start. Draco knew it would end badly if they stayed, but his parents stubbornly stayed and waited for the return.
Then Draco's father was thrown into Azkaban and his mother refused to leave, even after it became clear that the second coming of the Dark Lord was not as glorious as the Purebloods seemed to remember it. The two decades of peace had been good to the Malfoys, thought they'd never admit it.
When the Dark Lord's reign resumed, he took residence in the Malfoy ancestral home, claiming it for himself. He freed Lucius Malfoy, only to give him the task of executing Dumbledore, the former Headmaster of Hogwarts and an old enemy. When Lucius failed, there was punishment to be had.
Draco curled his fists, shaking at the memory. It would have been better if the Dark Lord had killed his father. Instead, what was left behind was a frail shell, dribbling mucus and staring blankly with crusted eyes. Gritting his teeth, he stepped through the wall into the hidden tunnel that snaked underground into countless passageways. He pulled out his wand and muttered, “Lumos.”
A small orb of light formed at the tip of the wand, letting him see the way. He knew it by heart. He made the journey every day from his pathetic little flat that he was reduced to living in. He was sure his mother knew what it was that he was doing, but she never said a word. This morning she hadn't even looked up as he walked out the door. He wondered what would happen if they were found. Would she let herself be killed? With that grim thought in his mind, he put as many locks and spells as he could possibly conjure up on the flat before he left.
The tunnel he turned into had a stone archway that seemed to be walled up for centuries. He positioned himself to the first of the three carved raven heads staring down at him. He touched their beaks with his wand in a memorized pattern. The beaks snapped closed and the ground rumbled as the wall moved away to reveal a set of stairs. He climbed them and reached a heavy wooden door he knew not to open.
Instead, he reached into the dark and found a heavy ring floating in the air. He knocked it five times and waited until a different door appeared, allowing him entry into 12 Grimmauld Place.
Kingsley Shacklebolt waited in the hall, a deep frown carved into his features.
“You're late,” he said.