Chapter 10: Well Begun is Half Done

Your grandmother's tale of Prince Draco's escape washes over you, alternately numbing and thrilling. You can almost hear the details, nearly see them: The courtiers fleeing, panicked. The raucous throng of angry commoners outside. Lady Vengeance herself, stark in the crowd with serenity, eyes trustfully closed. Prince Draco's steady hand on her shoulder, guiding each step, while she battled his demon inside her own mind.

Your grandmother describes the king and queen of her story as a pair of twin stars, a far-off glimmer, swimming upstream through the castle's molten chaos. They looked secure in their own little world, she tells you. Distant from the others, but as tranquil together as if they were one; as if they had never been parted.

"I found myself frozen for a moment," your grandmother admits, and it's the first time she references herself within the context of her story. True, she began by saying she was a witness to Lady Vengeance's defeat of the so-called curse (which you now realize wasn't a curse, strictly speaking, even if it definitely was), but it hasn't occurred to you to ask from which position she observed these events. Was she the wise professor? One of the handmaidens? Was she the noblewoman who helped spark the rebellion? Some sidelong courtier's daughter, perhaps?

Was she possibly even… Lady Vengeance herself?

You don't really think of your grandfather as princely, much less the sole heir to an ancient royal line, but perhaps it's something to consider. You do have quite a respected family name—constant fodder for the Prophet, given your father's political career—and after all, how else would your grandmother know? (Grandfather's portrait winks down at you over your grandmother's shoulder, and half a smile tugs at your mouth. Your grandmother was always the storyteller in the family, but Grandfather loved a good joke.)

You're about to give into your curiosity, opening your mouth to ask, when your grandmother cuts you off. "Don't rush me, petal," she says curtly. "After all, the story only begins with a demon; it does not end with one."

No, you interject without thinking, the story began with Lady Vengeance. The demon was always secondary; an obstacle, a villain, and perhaps, from time to time, a curse. Yes, there was a handsome prince, a court of secrets, and a spell to be broken by true love, so perhaps this has been a fairytale like most of the stories from your childhood.

But as to where this particular story begins and ends, that has always been Lady Vengeance.

"Why, so it has, petal," says your grandmother after a moment, softening long enough to smile. "So it has."

The Fall of King Draco I, 1726
Ministry of Magic, London, England
Upon Occasion of The Rise

When the door disappeared into the vacancy of the seventh floor, Hermione turned to Draco. For several moments, neither of them spoke, nor even moved. Outside the castle were shouts and cries, and Peeves, a talented anarchist, had contributed a series of small explosions to the ongoing distress—but here, on the seventh floor, there was nothing but contemplation; perhaps even the temporary paralysis of disbelief.

"Is it done, then?" asked Draco, with an unusual (and possibly so normal as to be un-kingly) degree of reticence.

Hermione took another moment to collect herself, taking stock of the situation. On the one hand, here was her husband whom she had not seen in months, looking once more like nothing she had ever seen from him previously. She had always presumed Draco's beauty to be, in part, the implication of some cosmetic extravagance; an eyeful of opulence (given, of course, the clothes, the deep silks, the rings glittering from his fingers, the crown he typically wore atop his golden curls). She had never known him without his privilege, only now he was half-starved and tormented; in their estrangement he had been left to waste away, locked inside the palace that his own doomed father had built. Stripped of even his base conceits, left with only the framework of what he'd been, Draco was wholly unrecognizable.

He was also the person she knew most fully, most unquestionably, in the entire world.

Hermione touched a finger gingerly to his cheek, which another person might have called slightly too-sharp, and slid away the grime of his hair, gruesomely too-long. "He's gone," she said, because he was. Voldemort was sealed in the walls of Hogwarts, trapped within the only magic he could not escape.

The black stone on her finger glinted again, confirmation that she was real, and Draco, too; as real as the castle they stood in. It was, as Draco had said, a matter of occlumency and legilimency both, true and false in equal doses; a duality of mind and matter.

This was real, and the door between realms was closed, and Voldemort was gone.

Some questions remained: how much of this had been Hermione herself—the resiliency that was her own—and how much had been the Hallow she only half-believed in? She supposed she might never know, but she was grateful all the same. What a lovely irony, she thought, that a boy cursed with a demon would give her the means to take possession of her own mind.

"Though," she remarked carefully, "even with him gone, I don't suppose that means it's done."

Draco took a step towards her, drawn in by the pulse of something divine, some inescapable tide. What a contrast they were: she in her ridiculous costumery of silks and furs, he in his bare prisoner's garb. She had half a mind to mock him for it, just to watch him scowl. It felt vaguely safer, less dangerous to her general well-being, to try and love him less, only she doubted it would work. His unpalatable tempers had failed to cheapen him before, and probably would again.

Having failed to kill him at his worst, Hermione doubted she could resist him now.

"Well," Draco said gruffly. "What do you plan to do about the revolt you've so recklessly brought to our door, my little spark of mutiny?"

"Nothing," said Hermione, and Draco blinked, taken aback by her answer. Perhaps he had expected her to link her arm in his and return them both home, fetching her good earrings and bathing in the leisure of being some half-hearted queen. "You didn't actually think you could regain your throne after this, did you? Draco," she scoffed, "you nearly subjected your kingdom to rule by demonic possession. I hardly think that qualifies you for political supremacy."

"I don't appreciate your tone," retorted Draco, though he seemed to recognize (however sullenly) that he was in no position to argue. "And what exactly did you think would happen if I were no longer king, my celestial flame?" he demanded. "People cannot simply rule themselves."

"I'm sure they can, given the proper means," replied Hermione indignantly. "Or do you really still think you ought to be in charge? You're running your kingdom into the ground, Draco," she reminded him, hoping he knew enough of his own treasury and courtiers to recognize as much, "and truly, you haven't the faintest idea what life is like for an ordinary witch or wizard."

"So now I'm being punished for my exceptionality? Tragic," said Draco with an exhausted sigh. "Unacceptable."

Hermione opened her mouth to remind him that his court, prejudiced by blood and by class and by an insurmountable devotion to their own wealth and stature, had rendered the monarchy nothing more than a tool for their own privilege. Would it be Minister against king forever, with the courtiers falling behind whichever party most stood to gain? It was a recipe for tyranny, for the natural demons belonging grossly to mankind, and in her frustration, Hermione's lips parted to inform him that she—with whatever claim she had to righteousness; or, at the very least, her intimate familiarity with being inconsequentially born—would never stand for it.

But rather than argue, Draco stepped closer, telling her with the immediacy of his presence and the conviction of his refuge that wherever she led, he would undoubtedly follow. His eyes, always alluring, were made exquisite for the certainty within them; for knowing he had withstood the pain of loneliness and treachery and her, and by now had chosen the latter without hesitation. His faith in her was regal, kingly, just as it was blind, stubbornly unbending. In response, Hermione stood a little straighter, feeling like a true queen at last; if not of magic, then of something; of everything.

"Well," said Draco, taking her face between his hands, "shall we end this, then?"

Among her own certainties, Hermione knew only that the next person who dared to harm him would meet the full venom of her wrath. Still, the situation merited some educated guesswork.

"Can we ever truly end it?" Hermione asked, glancing at the wall concealing her abandoned mirror-world; the empty realm where she had buried a demon. "It seems we'll live in doubt so long as we live."

For a moment, Draco didn't answer. Instead he glanced down, taking her hand in his, and gave the ring on her finger a little tug; perhaps out of security, or for comfort. It didn't budge, as always.

Then he slid the Elder Wand from where he'd tucked it into the waistband of his breeches, aiming it carefully at the ring.

"Maybe there will be some doubt from time to time," he acknowledged, "and, perhaps, someday you'll miss being able to summon the world you made. But is it better to own a piece of death," he asked quietly, locking eyes with her, "or to live?"

She smiled up at him, invulnerable and no longer alone, and briefly, there was a glimmer from her finger.

"This," she corrected him. "This is the world we made."

Then, and only then, did the ring finally come loose.

'The Fall' was a correct but unnecessarily theatrical name for everything that followed what eventually became known as the Battle of Hogwarts. Quite a small percentage of the magical population had actually been present, but in those days, without much for news and even less for literacy, stories spread far more quickly than facts. Rumor was a magic of its own, and before long the whole kingdom believed that Lord Voldemort, a noble beset with demonic ambitions, had been killed by a group of common rebels fighting the oppression of the wizarding beau monde. It was salacious enough that everyone, from aging witches in Yorkshire to social-climbing Warlocks in London, whispered that perhaps the king had no place in magical governance after all. Shouldn't some better, more reliable Ministry be enough?

Ultimately, the end of the world came with a great deal of tedium, though Draco supposed he shouldn't have been surprised; kinging had always been nothing but paperwork and tiresome quarrels with an excess of fancy new waistcoats (those being the only things he would miss). Once his missing courtiers had awoken from various states of slumber, mysteriously returned to their palace chambers—bemused, certainly, but otherwise unharmed—it was nothing but questions, questions, questions. Even amid the process of perilously falling, nothing much about the institution of kingship had changed. King Lucius' worst nightmare, the end of the monarchy, was somehow equally Draco's own: constant, unceasing annoyance.

"How can we possibly cede power to the Ministry?" demanded Crabbe, whose bulk had been returned with a slip of parchment bearing a beautifully scripted message: From the revolution, with love. "Surely they cannot be expected to serve this kingdom faithfully!"

(By 'faithfully' he of course meant as he had done, and his father before him. People, mind you, do not care for things being done differently than that which their imaginations, however limited, have the capacity to comprehend.)

Many courtiers shared Lord Crabbe's position. A still dazed Lord Parkinson, who would soon retire to his country estate to spend the rest of his days gazing with absent fondness at his sheep, managed to add, "Who would even be Minister?"

"Someone with a head for numbers, I expect," replied Draco, who still struggled fruitlessly to entertain the chatter of his soon-to-be former courtiers. "Though I'm sure my clever wife has someone quite appropriate in mind."

She almost certainly did, though Draco was mostly doing a thing she pretended to hate by putting all the troublesome bits of ruling into her masterly hands, thus skirting the laborious details. Truthfully, Draco's attention was elsewhere, what with the return of Theo (very much alive) and Harry (also alive, but more importantly, not a murderer). The extent of Draco's favor involved helpfully delivering their estates back to them, but he had recently discovered—to his unfailing displeasure—that neither man wished to remove himself from his requisite state of death and disgrace.

"I have no intention to fill my father's seat in some defunct privy council that won't even exist," announced Theo stiffly, though when asked what sort of reward he preferred aside from extensive land ownership and generations of pureblooded wealth, he merely replied, "I'll stay dead, thanks."

"I suppose it's best if I die as well," remarked Harry, who had very specifically not been invited to speak. Draco opened his mouth to argue that Harry's death could be readily arranged if he wished it, but Hermione placed a cautioning hand on Draco's shoulder, prompting him to silence.

"I could easily have died in the Battle of Hogwarts," said Harry, "couldn't I?"

"It was hardly a battle," scoffed Theo. "More of a protest, really."

"Plus arson," said Harry.

"Only a bit," replied Theo.

"Yes, well, revolts aside," remarked Draco impatiently, ignoring yet another pulse from pacifying Hermione's hand, "you can't possibly think it's a good idea to let both your estates fall into some other courtier's hands."

"Never mind the estates," cut in Pansy, who gave both Theo and Harry a lethally narrow-eyed glare. "You both have a right to a seat in the Ministry by inheritance. Would you give that to someone like my father instead, or to hers?" she demanded, gesturing with a flutter of her hand to where Daphne sat in restrained (but unquestionable) disapproval. "You have a duty to serve whatever this wretched kingdom becomes!" Pansy chided them, and then, remembering herself, she adjusted the silk of her lilac gown, burying her distress in the necessity of decorum.

"Marvelous," Theo muttered with a sigh, collapsing into the chair beside Draco. It had taken some time to fall into their old rhythms—twenty minutes or so—but by now, it was as if they had never been parted since their golden age of boyhood. Here, at last, was the Theo that Draco remembered, full of contrariness and surly mischief. Helpfully, neither of them had any remaining demons on their backs; unhelpfully, they were no longer discussing petty matters of evading afternoon lessons.

"So I should resurrect from my grave and marry some noblewoman, then?" demanded Theo. "Spend my life having sons and hoping they're not demon-summoners, or at least something shy of totally daft? Wonderful," Theo concluded, adding stubbornly, "What are you doing later?" to a rather taken aback Astoria, who proceeded to scowl.

"The Nott name is irreplaceable," Daphne said quickly, interrupting the altercation before her sister could speak. "As is the Potter name. You cannot simply disappear."

Theo and Harry exchanged a glance that Draco, however regrettably, had come to interpret, and worse, to wholly understand. It was the shared longing for a taste of impermissible wildness; a forbiddenness with aftershocks of impossibility. He had both felt it himself and witnessed it in others because it had been his own, belonging now to his only friend: the utter criminality of devotion.

Draco wished it were easier to make demands of them, as he could of the rest of his courtiers, but that would require knowing less. Draco had been there when Harry, recently freed, had been pacing the floor of their cell, still possessing only the knowledge distributed to him by Lord Voldemort that Theo had died months before. When Theo himself walked in the door, battered and split-lipped but no worse for wear in the wake of Draco's botched execution, Harry had risen to his feet, fists clenched, and looked for a moment as if he would happily bring the altercation to blows.

In the end, he did not. Not conventionally, anyway. He had merely stared at Theo, willing his eyes to adjust, and said finally: "If you had died, it wouldn't have mattered. I would have brought you back myself," at which point Theo had cast aside whatever differences remained and pulled Harry into his arms, muttering something incoherent about forgiveness.

Draco and Hermione, enduringly royal, had politely turned away. Daphne and Pansy, faultless in their breeding, had done little more than lock eyes, discreetly understanding. It was then that Draco had come to understand how the savagery of unbridled affection was for luckier men, or at least for freer ones.

Which was positively demonic, and thus, as a rule, could no longer stand.

"Fine," said Draco, rising sharply to his feet. "Lord Potter and Lord Nott perished in the conflicts surrounding the fall of this monarchy. In the wake of my abdication, their lands and titles will fall to their next of kin."

"We have no next of kin," said Harry, bewildered, but Draco held up a hand, exhausted by the unremitting torment that was the necessity of benevolent kingship.

"Your wives," Draco clarified, gesturing to the blinking set of Pansy and Daphne, sitting as erect as their bloodlines required of their spines. "I don't care which is which. The marriages were secret, obviously," he added with a diffident flutter of his fingers in their respective directions, "but, in the absence of a king at the time, those unions are retroactively approved. The edicts will be provided alongside the distribution of this palace to the Ministry for public use. Is there any opposition?" he demanded, turning expectantly to rebellious Hermione, who would surely have something to say.

"You do realize women cannot inherit," commented predictable Hermione.

"Widows can," Draco said defensively.

"Mm," replied Hermione, "though, does that really seem fair?"

She was giving him a placid sort of expression that he had since learned to consider especially dangerous.

"Fine," said Draco disinterestedly, "add that to the pile of edicts as well."

Her smile broadened, approving, and his chest gave an unhelpful lurch.

It was woefully, completely barbaric how beholden he was to her smile.

"And for Minister?" prompted Hermione. "I suppose they ought to vote."

"Which 'they'?" demanded Draco. "The mob?"

"The mob," Hermione confirmed, "otherwise known as your people."

"Even for you that's madness," said Draco to his clearly unstable wife, and she rose to her feet, giving a little shrug that meant she would likely get her way.

"Well, let's give them a try, shall we?" she said. "Though, if we could agree in this room on a viable candidate, I think we ought to try."

She gave a slow sweep of her head, observing her options.

"Dead," remarked Theo and Harry in unison.

"Inconveniently female," added Pansy, as Daphne said, "Not very good with public speaking, if we're being candid."

"Disgraced former king," contributed Draco, though he knew he was not strictly being asked.

Hermione's smile twitched faintly, and then she turned to Ron and Neville.

"Well, I suppose I could run," said Neville thoughtfully, though he paused to glance at Ron. "Unless you'd like to?"

"You've already got a voice with them," said Ron, adding with a bit of a lopsided grin, "and besides, I'm not sure the courtiers are ready for a Minister completely lacking any sort of fortune."

"You can have mine," said Astoria unthinkingly, prompting every head in the room to turn to her. She sat half-forgotten beside her sister, her cheeks immediately turning a shade of pink that matched her delicately embroidered gown. "That is," she amended, clearing her throat, "if we're in the business of bargaining for this kingdom's future, then I suppose I have a duty to offer what I can, do I not? Maybe to the rest of you I'm nothing more than my gowns and my looks," she commented hotly, "but someone will have to take on the apparent lesser responsibility of marriage and children." She paused, threatening them all to argue with a slow, revolving glance. "After all, how will any of this prevail if no one in this room has heirs?"

"That's true," said secretive Hermione, with her covert little smile. She, in Draco's opinion, had gotten very mysterious since becoming an erstwhile queen; having the monarchy removed from her shoulders had driven her to a fashionable air of intrigue, which Draco did his best not to blatantly admire. "Only if you want to," she added to Ron, who had not dropped his freckled gaze from Astoria since she'd first opened her mouth.

"I suppose I can make arrangements," said Ron, "though I hope you'll agree to my terms."

At that, Astoria looked up, primly approaching outrage.

"Your terms?" she echoed stiffly. "Am I not the one with the money?"

"Yes, but I will have to make my own demands." Ron rose sharply to his feet, approaching her, and hesitated only long enough to crouch down beside her voluminous skirts, pausing a moment to look her in the eye.

"I will not marry you for money," he said, as Astoria blinked with surprise, "because there isn't a price in the world for you that comes in the form of gold coins. I will marry you, yes, but on a variety of conditions: that you will know me, first," he said, startling the remainder of the room. "That you will have weighed my value in something more than duty and responsibility; that I will have worth to you, and you to me, beyond matters of vaults or blood. I will not marry you unless you can stomach having the entirety of my heart, which will belong to you eternally, or better yet, until you have asked for it. I will not marry you unless you can love me," he finished quietly. "Not until you can see your future when you look at me, and it looks like something you can stand."

"Oh." For a moment there was silence, and then Astoria swallowed heavily, loud enough to be heard even throughout the high-ceilinged grandeur of Draco's rooms. "Yes, well. Perhaps as soon as possible, then," she said brusquely, and thoughtful Hermione, sparing the girl the indecency of overwhelming them with her emotions, turned to the others.

"Well," she said, "if that's all settled—"

"But where will you go?" asked Pansy, turning a hard glance of scrutiny between the two defrocked royals.

At that, Hermione and Draco exchanged a glance, smiling a new and secret smile. In his mind, she kissed his cheek, and he stroked her hair. Every door was open, light streaming from all directions. In the Hogwarts they had made, the sun had a tendency to shine.

"Well, the world is a very big place," said practical Hermione. "I would so hate for us to miss it."

The ring she wore on her finger was duller now than previous trinkets. Just a gold wedding band with no powers to speak of, but Draco had come to prefer the way it shone in the light. He had given it to her beside the enchanted lake that had been his mother's, savoring the view for one last glance. The memories there were tired now, overused, symbolic of lonelier lifetimes. He had no plans to return.

It was no one's business where he went anymore. If that was unearned or soon to collapse, he wouldn't waste a moment questioning it.

"Now get out of my palace," said Draco conclusively, waking them all from their respective trances and ushering them out the door. "If we stay a moment longer, I may burn the whole place to the ground."

Hermione watched the newly minted Minister Longbottom sign Draco's abdication into law with a mix of sadness and relief. True, her husband had been a disastrous king, and more importantly, kings in general had such a long history of disaster, but abandoning his birthright was never going to be as easy as he made it look. Still, better to leave things in the hands of someone else. There were other things to be done in the meantime.

She and the newly-demoted Prince Draco (a conciliatory title, given mostly as a token of appreciation for his voluntary exile) would be leaving the kingdom—the country, that is—to go… somewhere. They hadn't quite decided where, though at least no demons would have anything to say about it either. Hermione had already parted tearfully with Professor McGonagall, promising that she would be back soon, though she wasn't sure how true that would be. Yes, one day she felt quite certain she would return to Hogwarts, but she didn't want anyone to wait. She hugged Ginny in farewell, declining yet another escapade on brooms, and blew a kiss to Peeves (ducking what she was relieved to discover was merely a benign shower of garden snails) before heading down to the once-familiar rooms below the lake, finding the person she'd felt it most pressing to speak with.

"Lady Astoria," Hermione said, knocking quietly on the open frame, and Astoria turned, looking up from an owl and hastily smothering an overbroad smile. Romance, it seemed, persisted; in the days leading up to the Greengrass-Weasley wedding, Astoria had been packing her things from the castle and arranging the home they would eventually fill, but Ron, who was away helping Neville and Ginny at the Ministry, was clearly not too busy to write.

"Your Majesty," said Astoria, acknowledging her with a curtsey, and Hermione smiled.

"Not anymore," she said. "I'll need another title. Former alchemy assistant," she suggested, motioning within the castle walls, though it was hard to believe she had ever been that. Harder still to believe she had once coveted Astoria's position so dearly; now the world was open for her, waiting, and however wide it would turn out to be, it was still beyond her fondest imaginings.

"Dull," ruled Astoria, who was young and beautiful, and easily bored. "Something more exciting, at least."

"Lady Malfoy, then?" asked Hermione.

"Lady Vengeance," replied Astoria teasingly. "The woman who turned a kingdom upside down."

Hermione stepped inside the room with a smile, closing the door in her wake, and beckoned for Astoria to sit beside her. They had grown comfortable with each other after so many months, and by now it was hardly monumental for them to have a little chat.

"Tea?" asked Astoria.

"Please," said Hermione. "A bit of lemon, if you have it."

Astoria flicked her wand, stirring in a few drops, and levitated the cup to Hermione, taking a moment to settle her ample skirts beneath her. By then, Hermione had taken to wearing the simple riding dress that she preferred, foregoing most of her queenly accessories. Astoria was dressed precisely like the courtier's daughter that she was, outfitted in cerulean silk that matched her intended's eyes. Styles were changing, as they had a tendency to do, and this time, influence came from the wizarding court of Versailles; Astoria looked thoroughly unable to breathe, but cheerfully so.

"I do hope we'll see each other again," she remarked, pouring a bit of sugar into her own cup of tea. "I'm ever so devastated not to have you at the wedding."

"Oh, I think I'd be a bit of a distraction," said Hermione, chuckling a little as she sipped her tea, testing its warmth. "It's probably best, anyway, if Draco and I disappear as soon as possible. Eventually people will forget we ever existed and move forward."

"I won't," said Astoria staunchly, and Hermione arched a brow. "Fine, forward, maybe," Astoria conceded with a sigh, "but never so far that I forget, and neither will any of my children. Nor will any of theirs," she added, impassioned by the thought.

"Oh, I don't know about that. People often tire of the same stories," Hermione demurred, "and was any of it really so interesting?"

They shared a glance over their teacups, dissolving into quiet laughter.

"Maybe a bit," acknowledged Hermione with a sigh. "But I certainly do not envy your children having to hear about the silly mess we made together."

They each sat in comfortable silence for a moment, steeping their respective thoughts as they sipped their tea. Briefly, Astoria's smile faded in contemplation, and by the time her lips parted, Hermione already knew what she would ask.

"There is, actually, one question I had," Astoria admitted, as Hermione reached for the chain she now wore around her neck, toying with it. "My sister told me about the Hallows," Astoria began, and Hermione nodded permission to continue, having expected someone to bring them up by now. Harry had been part of the decision, of course, and Theo, and Daphne and Pansy and Ron and Neville, but telling Astoria would be the first time she would reveal it to someone who had not been tasked in some way with protecting the Hallows themselves.

"Well, were they—?" Astoria attempted. "Did they, ah—"

"We thought it best to split them," Hermione said.

After a pause, she added, "We also thought it best not to find out whether the stories about them were true."

"What?" asked Astoria, going slightly pale. "You… you didn't even try?"

"No." Hermione stifled a laugh at the expression of dismay on Astoria's lovely face. "One thing I learned from all this is that some things are better not to know. Hard to keep secrets," she explained, having had enough of locked rooms in castles, guarded mind-vaults. They never discovered, after all, what Dumbledore's true intentions had been; perhaps one day the Hallows could be well used by someone, but was it worth the risk? Power, even well-intended, had such a tendency to corrupt, or to be corrupted. "Harder still to keep secrets when they're dangerous."

Astoria blinked, utterly astounded. "But—"

"We're taking the wand," Hermione assured her. "Harry will take the cloak wherever he and Theo happen to go, so everything will be nicely situated at a distance." She smiled a little into nothing at the thought. "For what it's worth, I imagine everything will look quite different the next time Draco and I return. Pansy and Daphne will have constructed a new magical government by then with Neville," she remarked to herself, "so that's certainly something—"

"But the third Hallow," persisted Astoria, glancing up at Hermione with concern, as if she might have irresponsibly miscounted. "Where will the stone be?"

That was a question Hermione only intended to answer a single time. The trouble with moving forward, as Hermione knew by then, was that it was preferable not to be beholden to the past, and therefore some things must be discarded.

Sometimes, to take a step onward, prior burdens would have to go.

"About that," said Hermione Granger, a girl who had once been nothing, and then a captive, and then a queen; a girl who was now a woman joyously unchained, and whose future remained untold. "I wondered if I might ask you a favor."

Your grandmother finishes her tea and sits back for a moment, observing you in silence. Then she rises to her feet unsteadily, and though you motion to assist her, she waves you impatiently away.

"Wait there, petal," she says, and meanders slowly out of the room as you stare down at your teacup, frowning.

You suppose you do know the rest of the story, assuming any of it was even true. Prince Draco never made an official return to England, or so the history books say. He is presumed dead by now, and you know nothing of his consort, whose low birth and troubled reign (less than a year!) wasn't even a footnote in wizarding history. Minister Longbottom, one of your father's esteemed predecessors, is of course widely known and celebrated, as are Lady Nott and Lady Potter, who are now considered the founders of the modern Ministry. Neither remarried after being widowed, though that's all you know aside from the particulars of their once-radical policies; your books say that after long and illustrious careers, both stepped down from public service and retired, tragically unwed, to their country estate, where they lived as fond companions.

One of them is, of course, your grandaunt, who was very helpful to your father's run for Minister. In fact, if not for her support, you doubt Papa would have begun his pursuit of politics to begin with, though your grandmother's story suggests that maybe it was no accident that Papa married Mama, or that he eventually began working in the Ministry, or even that you accepted your new position in the office of a prominent Warlock. Perhaps all of this has always been part of your grandmother's design; Papa being the youngest, she must have tried with your elder uncles as well, only to wind up with her hopes pinned on him, and therefore also on you.

Your grandmother always seemed very strange to you, amusingly so, and so very uppity to Mama. You always knew it was because Grandmother came from a different time—from the dazzle of the monarchical age, so full of glamor and excess compared to the grime of modern commerce and industry—but perhaps there's more to it than that.

"Here we are," says your grandmother, interrupting your thoughts. She returns to her chair with cumbersome grace, gritting her teeth a bit from the creaking of her aging bones, and slides a small box across the table to you. "For you, petal."

Your birthday isn't for months. You open your mouth to argue, but your grandmother shakes her head.

"It's time," she says simply, gesturing for you to open the box, and though you frown, still uncertain, you reach for it with hesitant fingers, carefully lifting the lid.

In the box, nestled against velvet so green it nearly looks black, is a ring. A black diamond is set between what looks like the fangs of a snake on either side, and it glints in the light; either the stone is stupendously cut, or, as you frivolously suspect, it gleams a little with portent.

"I had only sons, as you know," says your grandmother, while you stare down at the ring, slightly transfixed. "Dozens of them, I sometimes suspect; enough to trip over, in the end. But there is one thing I haven't told you yet about Lady Vengeance."

"Who was she?" you ask, forcing your gaze away from the ring. Perhaps it's the wrong thing to ask given what's been placed in front of you, but your grandmother gives a little laugh.

"Oh, petal," she says, wistful with approval, "that is the question, isn't it? For we are all Lady Vengeance, my darling; we of our kind, with our little magics. Every woman is herself a piece of Lady Vengeance—or rather," she amends, leaning conspiratorially towards you, "we become her, whenever someone threatens us and ours."

Ah, you think, both touched and slightly deflated. So it's a parable, then, just as you initially suspected. Lady Vengeance and the curse are probably just some silly things your grandmother invented to convince you to stay another hour (or three) to tea, imparting a little wisdom in the form of secrets and whimsy. Perhaps this ring, too, is nothing more than that: a ring, however strangely inviting.

But before you can ask, a throat clears by the door and you look up, startled by an unexpected presence.

"Lady Weasley," says the stranger, calling your grandmother by her now very antiquated title. You haven't heard that in some time, of course; Papa only calls her Mama, and Mama calls her by her name—Astoria; or, to Papa, 'your insufferable mother'—whenever your grandmother isn't there to hear it. Mama is the first lady of the wizarding world, the wife of Minister Weasley and an heiress in her own right, but even she would not accept so stuffy a title as 'Lady Weasley.' Not so for Grandmother, who rarely goes out anymore, preferring to tend to her stories and houseplants in solitude, but every now and then someone slips and calls her by her former name, and you can see in her eyes the person she once was: the jewel of a lost magical court, left to fade against the industrialization of modernity.

"Ah, excellent, right on schedule. Come in," says your grandmother, beckoning to the young man—strange and half-familiar—who stoops slightly in the door frame, bending his head to pass through the low arch of your grandmother's old house. "I'm so pleased you were able to come on such short notice. I've told you about my granddaughter, haven't I?" asks your grandmother, and the young man nods politely, turning in your direction. "Petal, this is Caelum," your grandmother supplies, glancing askance as you fumble the box in your hands, suddenly fearing you might swallow your tongue. "A family friend, one might say."

"Miss Rose," says Caelum, turning to you and bowing his gleaming head, which is adorned with loose golden curls. When his eyes meet yours—deep and brown like a perfect cut of amber, his skin bronzed by tendrils of faraway sun—you feel a little flutter of wings inside your chest, and for a moment, you know madness as surely as you know your own name; some distant future, however improbable, has just taken flight.

You become hideously ungainly, the ring tumbling loose from the box to land in your palm, and when Caelum reaches for your hand, you realize belatedly they're already full; one with the box, one with the ring. In an episode of awkwardness never to be surpassed, you hastily slip the ring onto your finger, tossing the box aside and placing your hand hurriedly in his. It would be rude, after all, to make him wait.

"A pleasure to meet you," says Caelum, who is so golden and regal you half expect to go blind from the sight of him, and then he raises your hand to his lips.

He kisses your hand, and you—you, Rose Weasley, daughter of the Minister for Magic, youngest legal clerk in over a century and the first woman to hold the post (yes, you, with all your modern ideas and your boundless maturity and your singular refusal to go weak-kneed at the sight of a handsome man!)—blurt out something so foolish you think you may simply shrivel up and die.

Would he like some tea?

Caelum smiles so beautifully your stomach contorts with anguish. "I'd love some," he says, and though you've been drinking tea for the entire day and have every intention to return home before dark, he turns to procure another chair, rendering that impossible. Meanwhile, you resume your seat, mumbling something about how pleased you are while your grandmother stifles a laugh.

You glare at her, and she shrugs, haughtily amused. Understandable, she mouths, and regrettably, you turn to look at him again, just to see; just to look. From the side profile, you realize with a jolt where you've seen Caelum before, and you blink—Could it be?

Caelum, whoever he is, looks precisely like the portrait of Prince Draco.

Before you can say anything, however, Caelum is on his way back with a chair, so you direct your attention elsewhere; to the ring on your finger, specifically, realizing you've forgotten it entirely in your haste to impersonate refinement. You give it a tug in displeasure, finding it wildly ostentatious and not at all to your taste, but the obvious immediately becomes clear.

It's stuck.

"What an interesting ring," remarks Caelum, placing his seat beside yours and startling you with his proximity. He smells of cedar on an autumn breeze, the longing quietude of a secret kiss, the fantasy of a midnight whisper. The bloom of what's to come (maybe, possibly!) settles between you, as crisp as the smile on his face. "I don't suppose there's a story to it, is there?"

You open your mouth to protest something only half-formed in your mind—Let me be clear, I do not believe in curses or Hallows, and certainly not in soulmates!—but it's no use.

Before you can say a word, your grandmother laughs and laughs and laughs.

"Do you think he'll stay gone?" asked the prince of Lady Vengeance, turning to her beneath the flicker of a single candle's flame. Later they would remember this evening for the wine, the food and conversation; the lovemaking beside the window, just to be closer to open sky. They would not remember whether they were in Spain when it happened, or in France or in Mongolia, or somewhere lost to any pre-existing map. They would remember only the way their bodies were lit by the single flickering candle, and the whispers that slid from sated lips.

"Will we be besieged by a demon forever?"

"Maybe; maybe not," said Lady Vengeance. "He was a very clever demon; surely someone will seek him out." (Greed never dies, after all, and neither do demons. To expect otherwise is to live with one's eyes closed.) "It will be someone else's job, then."

The prince called his wife something silly ('painted starlight' or 'pearl of daybreak'—not because they remained who they had once been, but because by now it made her laugh) and pulled her closer, still growing accustomed to the luxury of nearness.

(Never forget the splendor of loving, and the gift of being loved. Savor it, sip it, let it dance on your tongue, delicate and sweet. It can be gone from your grasp in an instant, so do not be the fool with careless fingers. Treasure always what you hold in your hands.)

Lady Vengeance drew her prince's palm down to the span of her belly, where very soon a new heartbeat would be felt. The prince would choose a name of starlight, like his mother's and like his own, and Lady Vengeance would readily agree. Their children would not be princes or kings but beloved by mother and father, free to wander, to laugh or to cry, even to scream if need be. Free, with the wide world and all its reflections before them. Free, with only the ghosts of ancient history to keep them vigilant in the night.

"I suppose we should sleep," said the prince. He had already spent hours that day studying the curves of her; once with his brush, twice with his hands. His body, tragically mortal, was suffering tiny, ordinary deaths: the numbness of exhaustion.

Lady Vengeance didn't mind. She had her own exhaustion—joyfulness—and was spent, overfull, bursting with it. She would fall asleep thinking of celestial things; of star names, the mythologies of foregone worlds. She who had been nothing (who now had everything) was full of things to come, swollen with possibility. With magic she would teach to strangers. With stories she would use to arm her children. With diligence, with quietude, because for the rest of her life, she would look into every mirror and know the danger hidden on the other side.

Perhaps the demon was with her now. Perhaps he had come here, to the reflection of this very spot, traveling her mirror-world to come and sit beside her. Perhaps at this very moment, he stared into vacant shadows of nothing while she lay in her prince's arms, warmed beneath the vastness of the stars. At the thought, Lady Vengeance cracked one eye and smiled into darkness, daring him with her certainty: Cross me and see what a storm I truly am.

She waited, but there was no response. Gradually, she let out a breath.

"Sleep, then," she agreed, letting her prince pull her closer. He had his habits, as she had hers, and he curled up to breathe in the smell of her curls. He was to her as she was to him, each like mirrored pieces of the other.

"My love," said the prince to Lady Vengeance, as she said back to him: "My love."

Then Lady Vengeance closed her eyes and slept, peacefully at rest.

FIN

a/n: For aurorarsinistra, with love. To those of you who followed me through this world, either willingly or not, I am grateful. It was the story I wanted to tell.

For my books and original work, find me at olivieblake dot com, where my new fantasy series will be available come December. The playlist for this fic is now available on Spotify, where I am olivieblake. If you enjoy a fic, a reminder: please consider reviewing and recommending to friends/groups/blogs, both for my own stories and any others you enjoy. Next for me will be my 2019 advent, posting December 1-25 in my Amortentia story collection, and the remaining epilogical diaries in Modern Romance.

It has been an honor to put the words down for you; as always, I sincerely hope you've enjoyed the story.

xx, Olivie