Unexpected Places

A/N I love all my readers and reviewers (just thought ya'll should know) Thank you!


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Draco led Hermione through the dark and into what she thought was another room but she couldn’t see anything so she didn’t know. She heard him push something and then the sound of stone grinding on stone. A faint light came from the hidden doorway.

“This is the reason the Ministry could never find anything in the Manor. This door protects the Malfoy family secrets. Only a Malfoy can open it.” He told her as he led her through it. She jumped when the door slid shut behind them.

“Come and try to be quiet. I don’t want Father alerted to our presence any sooner than we have to.” Draco murmured and Hermione just nodded. No, she did not want Lucius to know where she and her son were. Draco led her through a maze of halls and rooms. Some of them were empty and some had been used for storage. The one thing that Hermione noticed was there was no dust on the floor that might betray their footprints. She resolved to ask Draco about it when they reached the place he was taking her.

It seemed like they had been walking for hours when Draco stopped in the middle of a hallway. He tapped a brick with his wand and a door appeared. He ignored her questioning look and led her in. The door shut behind them and Draco sighed with relief.

“This was my hidey hole when I was a kid. It was my special place and when I was older it… my getaway from my father and mother. Father doesn’t know about it so we should be safe here for a while.” He said lighting the lanterns. Hermione was surprised to find herself in a small room that resembled a library with a small bed and table. The walls were covered in books. Hermione quickly moved and lay Alex down on the bed. He had been asleep for a while so he should be waking soon.

“Draco, why is everything so clean?” she asked, remembering her resolution from before and was surprised when he grinned.

“Because when I was twelve, my father found out I had been down here because of my footprints. He forbid me from returning until he allowed so instead of obeying, I placed a permanent dust charm on the entire catacombs. He couldn’t lift it and he was never able to catch me again.” He said proudly. Hermione nodded.

She opened her mouth to say something and Alex cried out. She rushed back over to his side and picked him up, crooning to him as she readied a bottle for him. She walked around as he fed and when he finished, she changed his nappy. Draco watched her silently. When she laid Alex on the bed again, this time so he could look around, he moved to sit with him. She could tell he was fascinated with him.

“He is going to have your eyes.” He commented finally. She nodded but didn’t say anything, suddenly wondering if he would even live long enough to have her eyes. Draco must have seen the look on her face because he winced.

“I’m sorry, Hermione. All my life I have been given almost everything I wanted and when I wanted you, I had to take you no matter what. I’ll make this up to you if we…” he didn’t finish but Hermione did mentally. If we get out of this alive.

She shook her head, determined not to lose hope. There had to be some way to get out. Nothing was perfect. She started looking on the shelves for something that might help. She was also slightly curious as to what Draco would have hidden away down here. She started to browse through the books, keeping an eye on Draco when a book caught her eye. She reached for it, sure she hadn’t read the title correctly.

She stared at the title for a moment and then looked up to find there were many more just like it. Books by Muggle authors. She turned to find Draco watching her with a wry grin.

“So now you know my dreadful secret.” He said playfully. She looked down at the book in her hands.

“So Long and Thanks for All the Fish.” She read and then laughed. “Have you read this?” she asked and he nodded.

“Oh I love Marvin. Like in the first one ‘I am at a rough estimate thirty billion times more intelligent than you. Let me give you an example. Think of a number, any number…
Er, five… Wrong. You see?’ I love him, he is absolutely funny.”

Draco smiled. "I'd give you advice, but you wouldn't listen. No one ever does." He quoted. Hermione put the book back on the shelf and moved on. She pulled several books down to look at them and finally found one that she thought might be useful. It seemed to be an old journal. Draco frowned.

“I found that in one of the storage rooms but I haven’t had a chance to read it. I think it was written by an ancestor, Lora Malfoy. Do you think it could have something?” he asked moving over to her. She shrugged and opened it. Together they looked through it.

It seemed like it had been hours since they had opened it. Lora Malfoy had incredibly illegible handwriting and quite a few times they had been unable to decipher certain words. They finally found something that could help though. She had drawn a small map of the catacombs inside the journal and had actually labeled the exits. Draco looked them over and then looked up at Hermione with a small smile.

“Are you sure you didn’t take the lucky potion? I can’t believe we found this…it’s unreal. Look, I know this one is caved in because I looked but this one, the one she labeled the bolt hole sounds so familiar.”

He began to pace, muttering to himself before finally turning to Hermione. “My mother told me about it. I think it isn’t affected when the Manor is locked down. I think it was left open so that people could get messages out.” He mused. He gave her a steady look and she returned it. “What do you think? Should we go?”

She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I think we should. We will die here if we don’t because sooner or later he will find us. We have to take the chance that we may be able to get out there.” She said glancing at her son. If they made a mistake, it would mean all of their lives.

Draco nodded and began gathering their things together. He took out what they would not need to lighten the burden because they would need to move fast. He knew his father would be aware they were not in the main part of the Manor by now. He knew he would be prowling around looking for them. He carried Hermione’s bag and let her carry the baby. She had fashioned a baby sling from the blanket on the bed so that her hands were free.

Alex was looking around with an avid curiosity that touched Draco’s heart and it was with great reluctance that he pointed his wand at him and muttered a spell. Alex immediately fell asleep. Draco gave Hermione an apologetic look but she shook her head. She understood the reason. Any noise that Alex made could bring Lucius to them. Draco memorized the small map before slipping it into Hermione’s pocket.

“If we meet him, run. Let me deal with him and you find your way out of here.” He told her and when she opened her mouth to speak he kissed her gently.

“I don’t want to face Sev and Potter to tell them that I let you die. If we both live through this, they will probably kill me anyway.” He said with a smile. She laughed softly and nodded, knowing they would have a lot of explaining to do when they got out.

Draco tapped the door with his wand and it opened. They slipped out into the hall and down the corridor cautiously, making no noise. It was nerve wracking for both of them, stopping at every noise or movement they saw. Draco had not used Lumos but there were torches lit ever so often, throwing the corridor into flickering shadows and Hermione thought she would go mad.

They walked for what seemed like hours, but Hermione knew it couldn’t have been that long when they found the door that Draco had found on the map. It supposedly led into a cave, he had told her in a voice that had been lower than a whisper. Hermione leaned against the wall looking both ways for the elder Malfoy while Draco examined the lock.

“It can be opened by Alohomora.” He murmured to her and she nodded, relieved that it was not more complex. He waved his wand and the door unlocked. He reached for the knob, praying to Merlin and any gods that cared to listen for it to open and when it did, he was so surprised that he almost fell backwards. He peered inside but there was only inky darkness.

He waved to Hermione to follow and entered the cave that led outside the Manor. She followed him through the door and let out a startled scream when it slammed shut behind her. A sudden flare of light blinded them both for a moment but when their sight cleared, they could see Lucius standing before them in all of his icy glory. He smirked at them.

“I knew your idiot of a mother would have told you about this so I didn’t bother even searching for you. You did take your time though.” He drawled coldly. Draco moved closer to Hermione.

“Don’t be a fool, Draco. You can’t protect her. Or the child and I don’t know why you would want to. She is a filthy mudblood and that is the child of a blood traitor.” He sneered, pointing his wand at Alex who was still sleeping soundly.

“Why are you so eager to kill Snape’s child?” Hermione demanded, thinking to distract him for at least a moment.

Lucius glared at her. “Because it is Snape’s bastard. My wife was in love with him, bore him a child before she bore mine. I got rid of the first one. Told he Dark Lord that Snape had a child with some Muggle woman and anyone who knew that Narcissa bore it wouldn’t dare go against me. I was the one who cast the killing curse on the little rat. Now I just have to get rid of the second one.” He said coldly, watching Draco closely. Hermione had the feeling he was very aware of what she had tried to do.

Draco hadn’t moved. He knew if he did, they were both dead. He also knew his father couldn’t be reasoned with. The only way they were going to get out of this was to fight. He tensed himself to be ready for when he saw an opening.

“So you killed Narcissa?” Hermione questioned and Lucius laughed.

“Yes, I killed the whore. She had just bore another man’s child and I would have killed her sooner but the Dark Lord had forbid it. He thought the child was mine and I couldn’t tell him it wasn’t or else I would be admitting weakness.”

Hermione bit her lip trying to think of something else to ask but Lucius laughed.

“It won’t work. You won’t distract me. You know, your Order friends are outside trying to smash through. Imagine the look on poor Harry Potter’s face when I release the wards and he sees his best friend’s dead body. Imagine Snape finding the body of his son. I shall be far away but not you three.” He laughed again and Hermione was reminded of the way Voldemort had laughed when he had faced Harry in the final battle. Lucius’s laugh had the same hint of madness to it that Voldemort’s had.

He pointed his wand at Hermione. “I wonder if I could get two for one?” he asked rhetorically.

“Avada Kedavra.”

When Hermione heard those deadly words, she closed her eyes. Behind her eyelids she saw the flash of green that had become so familiar to her and heard a thud as something heavy hit the ground. She opened her eyes the moment she realized she was still alive. At her feet, lay the body of Draco Malfoy, who had thrown himself between her and his father’s lethal spell.

Lucius was looking on with a bemused expression on his face as if he had not expected Draco to do that. Hermione kneeled down and leaned over his body and looked at his face. He looked so peaceful, she thought. She looked back up at Lucius who was scowling.

“I had planned on torturing him for betraying this family but I guess you will have to do.” He said sulkily as if his favorite toy had just been taken away. He took a few steps towards her. Hermione glared at him with all the hatred she could muster, raised Draco’s wand, which she had grabbed when she knelt and screamed.

“Avada Kedavra”

She watched numbly as his body fell to the ground with the same thud that Draco’s had. He had only a moment to show surprise before the life had fled his body. Hermione leaned over Draco’s body and began to sob. That was how Snape and Harry found her fifteen minutes later.


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A/N Well? What do you think?

To Jen: It says that Snape’s girlfriend was a pureblood but someone told Voldemort that the baby had a Muggle mother so he ordered it killed. As you find out in this chapter it was Lucius’s way of getting revenge on Snape for having Narcissa first. As for the age difference, its not canon so I can tweak it a bit. No matter what I write it won’t be canon because I am not JKR so might as well make it the way I want it. Thank you for your comment though.