Chapter Text
Prologue
2012
Hermione stared out into the sea of people, seeing nothing. They weren’t looking at her. They didn’t see her, either.
She stood ramrod straight, feet together, hands clasped. Her lavender robes were pressed and her usually riotous hair was pulled back immaculately. Today, it was important she was immaculate.
The Minister was speaking before a large audience of journalists and ministerial staff , as well as the general public. Hermione, as his advisor, was required to be there. Standing there on the stage, squeezed between the Minister's secretary and under-secretary, she felt overheated. Smothered and suffocated. There was no air in the room.
It was hard to stay present in the moment. Hermione felt her mind drifting, but she quickly reined it back in. No- she would focus. She had to focus. It was an important day.
Her eyes were still blurry as she tried to find a blonde head in the crowd, something she could ground herself on. Then, like a bell, she heard her name through the white sound. The minister was still speaking, his tone smooth and strong, booming across the large space with the sonorus charm. Reassuring yet absolute, as it always was. He was smiling at her, with that ever-present grin. It had never looked right on his face, not natural. At least, not to her. That was fine, because she was smiling now too, a twin of his own smile, as though she was being pulled by strings. The Minister held the rod, and she was the marionette.
“…and for that we have to thank our very own Hermione Granger, for time and time again she proves that she truly is the brightest witch of our age”, the Minister said to the crowd. “She has worked tirelessly, selflessly-.”
Hermione fixed her smile and tuned him out, a lump in her throat. Her heart was beating at an alarming rate, and she wished she could run out of this room, out of this building, out of this life that she had built with straw and hay. This life that could burn down any moment now, before her eyes.
“- ‘impossible’ is a word only found in the dictionary of fools”, the Minister droned on, his eyes still trained on Hermione, flashing iridescent blue. “Nothing is impossible, if you try. And victory belongs only to the most deserving, to those who try to achieve what everyone else tells them they can not, they should not*. I welcome you to join me in my endeavours to create a magical society that looks to the future, and not the past. Thank you for coming today.”
Applause filled the room, and a spokesperson took over, directing the audience to the next item on the itinerary. She hadn’t been able to find that blonde head in the audience, even though she knew it was there somewhere. It would have given her some sense of calm, if only she could find him. She closed her eyes for a second as the cameras flashed brighter and harsher. Suddenly, a thunderous crash vibrated across the room. Then, an echoing feminine scream.
A deep, masculine voice said, projecting from far away-
“Crucio maxima!”
Hermione’s eyes flew open in horror to see the Minister crumple to the ground, unearthly screams tearing from his throat unlike any sound she had ever heard him make. People rushed past and away from her, bellowing at the top of their voices, grabbing at the Minister, making pointless demands and statements.
Hermione swayed on the spot.
“Wait,” she said, her voice hoarse but cutting through the noise ahead of her. “Let me through!”
She repeated herself again and again as she pushed through the throng of people. The Minister came into view, and she collapsed at his side.
He was foaming at the mouth, with flecks of blood covering his face, which was pale as chalk. His eyes had turned inward, his arms flailing uncontrollably. He looked so powerless then, that she couldn’t recognise him and she paused, her hand hovering above the minister’s chest as she tried to filter out the voices surrounding them.
“…went right over my head, could’ve hit me—“
“…it’s like it’s the war all over again, I’m telling you, it’s starting again—“
“Another minister, why does it this keep—“
“Is he okay? Merlin, he got hit right in the chest—“
“You heard the curse right? It’s got to be one of Everlast lot—“
Hermione swallowed. Her heart drummed erratically in her throat as she called into the crowd.
“A healer,” she said, raising her voice above the noise. “Is there a healer here?”
Seconds. A minute, an hour, a year. She lost all ability to recognise time as she waited and waited.Finally a healer came, then two para-healers, and somehow Hermione was cradling the Minister’s head with her two shaking hands.
It was no use, in the end.
She watched as the Minister’s face went from sickly grey to ghost white, his eyes blown underneath their near-translucent eyelids, dilated and glaring. She would be the last person he would ever see. Then the rattling breaths stopped, and she felt his life seep through her hands.
Later on, Hermione would remember that moment as the longest of her life. But it was only a minute, and then the Minister was dead.
That minute would never end, not as long as she lived.
A camera flashed. Hermione finally caved into herself, into the despair she felt too keenly, as the healers and aurors hovered around her.
The next day there was a photo of her, the Minister’s advisor and friend, printed on the front page of the Daily Prophet. Her head was bowed over the Minister as she wept, hair now loose and unruly around her wet cheeks, still cradling his face.
--
Three weeks later, Hermione Granger was Minister of Magic. The first female Minister. The first muggle-born Minister, she thought to herself.
Hermione raised her head as she stood at the podium, just as she had witnessed two Ministers do before her.
The ghost of them both surrounded her. She would carry them both with her, for the rest of her life.
As surreal as it felt- it was time for her first speech to the public. She looked out into the sea of people, seeing anxious faces. Curious faces. Uncertain and blank faces. She looked to her side. Her shoulders relaxed, and she allowed herself to smile. The breeze pulled a stray curl across her chin and she turned her head to face the crowd again. She cleared her throat, which was suddenly very dry.
“Not nearly so long ago, as you know, I lost a dear friend,” she, the Minister, said. “ Your Minister. And today I stand here, in his place, much sooner than I could ever have known.”
She paused. She waited. She let go of a breath she didn’t know she was holding.
“He was a great man, better than many knew, or appreciated. We didn’t always agree, but we did find common ground. The common ground was- and still is- you.”
She looked out into the sea of people, seeing all of them before her.
“The Wizarding people,” she said. “I say to Magical Britain, what I have always said to my two Ministers before me. I have nothing to offer but my blood, my toil, tears and sweat. I wish to offer all that I have, and meagre as it may be. I am your Minister now, but before that- and still- I am just a witch that wants to live in a safe world.”**
She prostrated her head for a while, watching through the audience through her eyelashes. Some faces relaxed. Some even smiled. She raised her head again.
“We have before us an old ordeal”, she continued. “An old struggle that we must vanquish if we are to move forward as a society. You might ask me what my policies will be. I will say it is to wage war with all our might at discrimination, and those who think monstrous tyranny against others is the way to go forward. We are, all of us, equal in our magic regardless of our parentage. And if we are to survive as a population, we will need to remember that.” **
Hermione paused again, and drew in a breath, as she looked to her side. Looked directly at him, her husband.
“Finally, as your new Minister, I only have left to say,” she said, her voice firm. “That I will never give in. Never, never, never- in nothing, great or small, large or petty- I will always work as hard as I can at this chance I’ve been given. This is what I have strived for. I will never give in, except to convictions of honour and good sense, which should be our most important allies at all times.”**
She finished her speech with her thanks, and the crowd erupted, the applause drumming in her ears along with her heart. In front of her, people were smiling, cheering. To her side, her staff, friends and family were smiling. Most of them were smiling.
Hermione stepped off the podium. A camera flashed, and Hermione closed her eyes. When she opened them her vision was blurry, and she realised she had tears in her eyes. She heard her name called once, and then twice. Then she felt a warm hand on her shoulder, moving to her face. A signet ring grazed her cheek and told her who it was, even if she didn’t already know. The coolness of the platinum grounded her, forcing her to focus her vision onto her husband’s face.
She looked at him, that sharp nose and angular jaw she had come to love so much. The serious grey eyes that held so much tenderness, that it was hard to believe there once was none there for her. A ghost of a smile remained etched on his lips, whispering words no one else could hear.
Well done. I’m proud of you. I love you.
And then:
We did it.
He knew better than anyone else, what they had done. What she had done.
Hermione pushed herself up onto her toes and wound her arms around Draco Malfoy’s neck, pulling him for a kiss as their eyes blazed with triumph.
The world- this world- was hers.