A Dish Served Cold

Chapter 27 – Hardship

Walking beside her on the way back to their rooms, Severus could almost see the leaden depression that had settled over his wife like a dark cloak. Mistress Goody had said it happened that way for certain women and it was perfectly normal, but he wasn’t certain of that. Hermione had shown so much bravery up until now that this sudden despair was worrying.

It was just that he hadn’t a clue as to what to do. He wasn’t exactly the sort of fellow who was good at cheering people up. More likely any attempt he made would drive her to suicide rather than make her laugh. Besides, he was still trying to figure out how he felt about the pregnancy himself.

It was time for desperate measures.

Avram noticed the elderly Headmaster tottering up the stairs long before he said anything. Hiding in plain sight was one of Avram’s better tricks and so he merely shifted a little into deeper shadows. Considering how the English wizard had ignored them all before, Avram was unprepared for the bag of sweets that was suddenly thrust under his nose.

“Jelly Baby?” the Headmaster asked and Avram merely stared for a moment before tentatively taking a sweet. He found himself looking into a pair of shrewd blue eyes that seemed to miss nothing. It was rather disconcerting, but the candy was good and unlike his grandmother, these eyes held no malice, merely curiosity and sparkling humor.

“Todah Rabah,” Avram replied politely.

“B’vakashah.” Avram was startled by the Headmaster’s use of Hebrew and those eyes crinkled up in amusement as the boy’s face gave him away.

“I have done some traveling in my life young man, and learned one or two things along the way,” the Headmaster said with a smile and settled down beside Avram on the spiral staircase. He stuck out his feet to reveal brightly patterned stockings and purple boots with pointed toes. Avram waited and said nothing, something he was exceptionally good at. “One of my teachers noticed you trailing along behind Sarit.”

Avram nodded. So the brown-haired man had been a teacher; that explained much. He cocked his head and studied the stranger beside him. All his life he had only trusted the family; he had been trained to silence and waiting like the finest of butlers. He knew better than to confide in someone who was not family. He knew better… and yet… There was something about this particular wizard. Maybe it was the boots and stockings, maybe it was the way he sat calmly waiting on Avram’s decision as though it made no difference to him whether the Yidoni talked or not.

“Safta Sarit gave something to Kaleen’s son. It could not have been a good thing, because she is so very pleased with herself.” Avram paused and the old man nodded in comprehension. He reached into a pocket and pulled out a small marble. Avram peered at the bright clear orb and saw that imbedded deep within was a single candle flame that flickered and danced. He could feel his eyes going wide and his mouth dropping open, but he couldn’t help it. He had never seen anything like it.

“Is it a djinn?” he whispered, awestruck. The white beard trembled with suppressed mirth and the eyes filled with laughter.

“No, merely a spell.” Without another word the Headmaster dropped the marble into Avram’s hand, then rose and headed down the staircase. “I suspect that you will have need of protection soon, my boy. Keep the orb near you; you will be glad that you did.” The words drifted back up to him as he sat on the step and he found his hand curling around the object with great reverence.

“Todah rabah m’ode” Avram murmured and then pocketed the orb. He got up and headed off to his room and bed. This had been a very interesting day and he had much to ponder.

Lucius reclined on his cot in Azkaban and reflected on the irony that he felt more comfortable in this filthy prison than in his Master’s hospitable chambers. At least here he had some peace and quiet, if one discounted the terrible wailing and misery of the other prisoners.

Voldemort’s sanity had always been… problematic, at best. Yet until recently, Lucius had felt that the outcome was inevitable: Voldemort would win and Lucius would be well-placed to direct his Master’s actions from a less visible position. The last few meetings with Voldemort had been worrying, however. Lucius was never one to burn bridges – you never knew in which direction you might be forced to retreat – but he was a master of the exit strategy and now might be a good time to start planning his alternate routes.

He pulled out parchment and paper and began writing.

He had a great deal of groundwork to lay.

Draco sat in his room and pouted. He knew that it was not his best expression, so he made sure only to use it in the privacy of his room. What he really wanted to do was lie down on the floor and have a full-blown temper tantrum, with all of the attendant kicking and screaming that that entailed. However, it really wasn’t as effective now as it had been when he was little.

The room itself was large, beautifully decorated and extremely pleasant, but right now Draco was feeling rather dissatisfied with everything. Being a Malfoy, he of course had access to the biggest room in the Slytherin dorms with his own bathroom, sitting room and dining area. He had everything of the best and it was all arranged to his satisfaction. He was not looking forward to losing it all. The married couple wing had plenty of space as well and he could transport all his belongings to the new chambers. Still, the hidden passages and perfect privacy of his suite would be lost to him. It was yet another irritation.

Susan Bones was short plump and plain, which was not what he had wanted for himself either. In the last six and half years he had paid absolutely no attention to the fact of her existence. Now, suddenly, she was center of all of his thoughts. It was annoying in the extreme.

“Draco?” Pansy’s voice from the hallway erased his pout and he slid off of his bed to open the door for her. He wasn’t so sure he liked the short-cropped black hair that Pansy sported these days. It did make her eyes look very pale and blue, but it was also fairly Muggle-ish. He was quite surprised to see her here. She rarely came to his rooms and hadn’t at all since the Marriage Law was enacted. Looking at her made Susan even less desirable. Pansy was the one he had wanted to marry, slim, pretty Pansy. Slytherin to the core and intensely loyal, he had always known they would make a great team.

“Pansy,” he greeted her with a bored air despite his intense curiosity about her visit, and stepped aside to let her in. Like himself, Pansy’s bids had been met with horrified scrambling and abrupt marriages to other people. Her understandable arrogance towards the Muggleborns and Half-bloods had left behind more hurt feelings than her good birth and fortune alone could erase.

“Draco,” she returned with an equally bored expression. The delicate maneuvering of pureblood politics was in full bloom, he noted with amusement. She must want something.

“Tea?” he asked politely and gestured her towards his little parlor area. A steaming pot and china teacups awaited their attention.

“Certainly, thank you.” She dropped gracefully into a chair and accepted a teacup from him with perfect form. Pansy had always been a model debutante. He would have been pleased to have her as a wife; she would never embarrass him, and he knew that. Merlin could only guess how that Hufflepuff would behave.

“Sugar or cream?” he continued the dance with his usual flawless performance.

“Both, please,” she answered calmly.

They sat sipping and exchange polite chitchat for a while before she got around to her reason for the visit. The familiar ritual of tea and polite gossip soothed him. At least here he knew where he stood, and he knew the rules.

“I have received not one acceptance to my bids,” she began with a casual air and he nodded politely. “Yet, somehow the rumor has it that you are marrying a pureblood,” she added and her eyes narrowed a bit as she spoke.

“A Hufflepuff,” he reminded her sourly, but her response was not what he had expected. Instead of commiserating over his misfortune, she hissed angrily.

“At least she’s pure and of decent lineage! I will end up married to some impure filth and being forced to take it to bed!” Her disgust wasn’t feigned and Draco quickly hid his own surprise at her sudden change of mood. No one liked the impure of course, but her response was a bit extreme.

“Only until you can be rid of him,” he reminded her with a soothing tone and she shook her head in angry negation.

“I would prefer to do away with the creature before the wedding night,” she ground out. Her eyes darted around the room wildly, as though the impure were lurking in corners ready to pounce.

“I think that would be even more suspicious than the other deaths, don’t you think?” Draco was growing concerned. Pansy was obviously distraught. She jumped up from her chair and began pacing back and forth with frenzied aggravation.

“I can’t bear the thought that some animal would touch me like that,” she nearly whispered. “I saved myself all this time and now to have it wasted on some beast.” She turned and pinned him with her gaze. He looked into eyes that had been pushed over the edge and felt himself shiver. Maybe he had been wrong about Pansy, maybe she wasn’t the perfect little debutante he had imagined her to be. Her blue eyes were flat and hard and she was looking at him with predatory eyes.

“Well, it’s a moot point, right? You haven’t gotten a bid back, have you?” he rushed to remind her, feeling rather scared all of a sudden.

“I will. Eventually I will. You know that, Draco.” She stalked close to him and stared him straight in the eye. “When I do, I will be back here. You can make sure that I never bear some filthy creature’s spawn.” Draco was pretty sure she was hinting at something and he really hoped that he was wrong about what it was.

“Pansy, I think you need to relax a little. Drink a little chamomile or something,” he choked out at her, disconcerted by her steady, unblinking gaze. In an instant she switched, chameleon-like, back to the excessively polite young lady she had been when she entered.

“Probably right,” she agreed, all smiles and amiability and then she left and he pressed his back against the door and wondered just what the fuck had happened.

Severus took a deep breath and then let it out. He had done many terrible and painful things over the years for the sake of the Order, but this may very well be the most humiliating and awful thing he had ever attempted.

He looked around his office for reassurance. The chilly, stone walls and glowing jars filled with all sorts of things, some dating back to at least four potions professors ago, were as they always were, comforting and unchanging. He looked down at his hands, noting the slender fingers, the stains from ingredients, the calluses from chopping and slicing and thought again how utterly unprepared he was for all that was being asked of him.

There came a knock on the door and Severus settled himself behind his desk and took a steadying breath.

“Enter,” he barked and instantly regretted his tone. He was after all, trying to be diplomatic here. The heavy wood door swung open and the bane of his existence entered with a wary and sullen expression.

“Professor, you assigned me detention?” the boy asked with an angry flash of those green eyes and Severus knew he had erred.

“I was trying to be discreet,” Severus replied and it was almost and apology. Potter’s eyebrow climbed in enquiry as he shut the door behind him. Not quite sure how to even begin, he gestured James’ son into a chair and went to fetch tea.

“Discreet about what?” Potter asked and his voice was suspicious, but surprisingly calm. Having expected more hostility, Severus was caught a bit off-guard.

“You are Hermione’s best friend, you and Mr. Weasley,” he began uncertainly. Interested in spite of himself, Potter leaned forward and took the proffered teacup unhesitatingly.

“I like to think so.” It was an odd statement and it brought Severus up short. He looked curiously at the boy. It wasn’t something James would have said; it was, however, quite in character for Lilly.

“Well, are you or aren’t you?” he asked, curiosity overtaking his nervousness. How much of Lily was there really in this boy?

“I love Hermione like a sister. I would do anything for her. I know we’re friends, but I wouldn’t presume to speak for her.” Clear green eyes peered through glass walls at him and he sat down and gave the boy a long look. “What?”

“That was something that your mother might have said,” he admitted grudgingly. The boy turned a look of wistful longing on him and Severus was very much taken aback.

“I wish that I had known her,” he murmured and then his face turned stony as though he realized that he had revealed too much of himself. It was hard work reconciling that moment of grief with the arrogant young sprig he’d seen in his classroom.

“She’d be horrified to see you in the middle of all this,” Severus snapped and saw the hostility rise again in Potter’s eyes. “She hated Voldemort and the war and wished it could all be over and done with,” he added and watched the anger dissipate. He wished that he didn’t have to make nice with the child; there were open wounds there that he didn’t want to explore. His feelings about Lilly were private and not something he wanted to discuss with James’ son.

“I always wondered what she would have thought of the prophecy,” Potter answered and Severus snorted in derision.

“Prophecies are always vague and more use after the fact than before it.” He took a sip of his tea and glared at Potter. How just like the boy to be so concerned with such drivel.

“So you don’t believe in it then?” Potter was watching him with a cool and assessing gaze. How did they get so far away from his real objective here?

“I didn’t go to all this trouble to talk about Trelawney’s idiotic ramblings, Potter,” Severus steered the conversation away from a dangerous precipice.

“No, you said something about Hermione before,” he frowned and his expression was one of concern.

“She is pregnant, Potter.” There, he had said it and the look of utter revulsion in the young man’s face was far more to be expected.

“Is she okay?” That was a good question, Severus sighed to himself.

“Of course not!” he spat out. “She is seventeen, she has been married off against her will and is now pregnant.” His fury at the entire situation boiled over and he expressed far more of his personal anguish than he wanted to. Luckily, Potter only heard what he wanted to hear because he responded only to the anger.

“Well, what do you expect me to do about it?” he shouted back, his hand clenched around the handle of his teacup with white knuckles.

“I expect you to do whatever it is friends do for each other, but I suppose I was expecting too much!” Severus hissed in white-hot fury. He knew that this had been a bad idea.

Potter’s mouth snapped shut and he controlled himself with visible effort.

“I’ll do what I can,” he ground out from between clenched teeth.

“Let’s hope that it’s enough,” Severus grudgingly replied. He hated the necessity of applying to Potter, of all people, for assistance, but he was otherwise at a loss. Neither Minerva nor Albus were going to be able to empathize with the girl in the same way that a peer would. It was Potter or Weasley or it was nothing at all.

Merlin help them.

“In the meantime I have a favor to ask you as well,” Potter choked the words out as though they hurt him profoundly. Severus raised an eyebrow and leaned back in his chair.

“I’m listening,” he answered finally and as Potter spoke his eyebrow climbed higher and higher. The boy was filled with surprises.

Susan Bones looked out the window and tried not to think about the piece of parchment on the desk in front of her. Beside her, Ginny Weasley sat with a far away expression on her face. Marriage seemed to be suiting her because she seemed older, wiser and more mature lately. There was also a sort of wistful sadness about her, something rather Lady of Shalott-ish, but still, she seemed more solid lately.

Susan turned her eyes back down to the politely worded order, because really that is what it was. She was ordered by the Ministry to marry Draco Malfoy.

“I made out with him once, you know. He’s not a bad kisser.” It came out of the blue and Susan gave Ginny a rather baffled look.

“Excuse me?”

“Draco,” Ginny elaborated and Susan stared at her with her mouth hanging open.

“You kissed Malfoy?” Utterly horrified by the very thought Susan almost missed the rather amused look that Ginny flashed her.

“Only the one time, but it wasn’t bad,” Ginny replied with a toss of her head. She gave Susan a small, rather knowing smile. “Everyone thinks that Draco is this dreadful snob and totally evil, but really he’s just horribly insecure. He thinks he has to be like his father, but he’s not and he knows it.”

“So underneath it all he’s a total sweetie?” Susan asked with a dubious air.

“Oh hardly, he’s a right wanker underneath it all,” Ginny chortled. “What I mean is that he’s weak. He’s manageable, if you get my drift.” Ginny gave her a significant look and Susan frowned in thought.

“So you think I won’t have any problems with him?” Susan wasn’t sure if she believed that.

“Oh there’s no doubt you’ll have problems. I just think that you can survive him and more than that, if you can get a hold of the reins.” Susan wasn’t quite sure what Ginny meant by that.

“What makes you so certain that Draco can be ‘managed’?” Her mind was whirling as she tried to wrap it around these new thoughts.

“Well, I did it,” Ginny shrugged. “Look, I decided that he wasn’t much of a challenge, so I dumped him.” Susan knew that she was staring but couldn’t help it. Ginny was usually so quiet… who knew that there was so much going on behind the façade? “I know that I can coach you sufficiently to bend him to your will.”

“Is that how you plan to deal with your husband?” Susan asked curiously. Ginny shook her head and waved off the very idea with both hands.

“Oh no. No one manages Remus,” she admitted. “He may look harmless, but there is a tiger in there.” The mysterious smile was back and Susan got the idea that it didn’t displease Ginny at all that she couldn’t boss her husband around.

“Don’t you mean a wolf?” Susan had meant it as a joke, but all Ginny’s humor vanished at her words and a sober, rather sad young woman looked up at her.

“Yes, I suppose I do,” whispered Ginny and Susan felt as though she had just laughed at a funeral, but she didn’t know why.