Lights of Questionable Faith

Lovely Reviewers:

I'm not going to address y'all till next chapter. I am having such difficulties with this one alone. Just trying to get it put up. Sorry. I love y'all.

Doctors are a thorn in my side. They are going to try to tell me that I am just stressed and have anxiety. And that that is my problem. I seriously doubt it. But I will end up with their nasty happy pills! I hate those damn things.

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It was four weeks later when Hermione awoke to the familiar banging on the door. She’d not left the room and not allowed Lucius to enter it. She’d covered the mirrors with sheets so he could not spy on her.

BAM! BAM! BAM! BAM!

Hermione jerked from the uncomfortable sleep in the large bed. She pulled the covers tight around her thin nightgown clad body.

“Hermione, are you in there?” Lucius whimpered, rapping his fist against the door. None of his magic worked to open the doors. Whichever of his ancestors thought this damn spell up ought to be brought back to life so Mr. Malfoy could kill him. He was supposed to have her at his side. “Hermione.”

Hermione shifted.

Sick, twisted creature. Claiming to love her. Forcing her into bonding with him.

Those weren’t actions of a man who loved a woman. She would not leave this room. The house-elves were quite happy to bring her what she needed. She’d had the floo set up and even had Harry, Ginny, and Ron to visit. During the visit, she’d seen Lucius with his face pressed to the glass of the balcony doors pouting. She’d stood up and cast a spell so he could not peep in at her.

“Hermione, I’m your husband,” Mr. Malfoy said, slamming his fist against the door. “Let me in!”

“NO WAY IN HELL, YOU DEVIL-SPAWN!” she yelled back. “You can’t make me!”

“Hermione, why do you run from me? You always run from me.”

Lucius was pacing in front of her door. He had angry tears in his eyes before he flung himself against the heavy ash doors. He was flung back into the wall across the hall.

“You’re my wife. You belong in my arms, in my bed. You always run from me. Never let me explain!”

“You would have hit me, you sick fuck,” Hermione called back wrapping a night robe around her body as she walked toward the door.

“You hit me first. You stabbed me before our bonding was completed, you hellcat!”

Hermione stood on the other side of the door listening to the angry pacing.

“Why do you have to be so difficult?” Lucius shouted at the door.

“Why do you have to be such an arsehole?”

“Hermione, please,” Lucius said unable to hold the tears back as he stood and pounded on the door. “Let me in.”

“No, I don’t want to see you.”

“LET ME IN! Let—me—in!” Mr. Malfoy demanded, stomping his foot like a child who wasn't given the sweet he wanted. “I am the Lord of this house.”

“You are a raving lunatic!”

She heard a whimper and the sound of his palm sliding down the door and the thunk of his knees hitting the carpet in the hallway.

“Hermione, let me see you,” he said. "I'm Lucius."

“No.”

Tap. Tap. Tap.

Hermione turned to look out the balcony doors. Draco stood there.

She walked over to him.

“Prove it’s you,” she said, pointing her wand at him.

“I spoke to you the morning before your wedding to ask you to be nice to my father,” Draco responded, and his eyes widened as he added. “You’re failing.”

“Come in,” Hermione said. She loved the spells on these rooms. Loved that only those that she called for could enter them. Loved that they had to leave if she asked. She just wished she could leave the house, but she didn’t dare.

“You are being cruel to him, you know,” Draco said. “It’s been a month of this nonsense. This fighting.”

“I don’t want to see him. I don’t have to see him.”

“He hurts enough without you torturing him.”

“He has no idea how to treat me. I won’t be a punching bag for him when he loses his temper.”

“You started the hitting at the reception.”

“Like I can hurt him.”

“You may not be able to physically hurt my father,” Draco admitted, “But you are and have damaged his psychological health greatly. It wasn’t so great before you raging through. You're more cruel than my mother was to him.”

“He wants me to be his slave.”

“He wants you to love him,” Draco said, “Come on, what happened to that damned Gryffindor compassion? Where’s your courage?”

“He doesn’t deserve it!”

“Isn’t that what compassion is, helping and being kind to someone who doesn’t deserve it?” Draco returned, collapsing into a chair before the hearth when Hermione motioned to him to do so.

“I really hate you right now.”

“Slytherin, Hermione. Or should I call you Mum? She used to yell at him and tell him he was nuts too.”

Hermione picked up the pot of tea and poured a cup. “Tea, Draco?”

“Just let him see you. Do you know that he has not left the outside of your door except to try to peer in the balcony?” Draco said, nodding his head toward the door. “Yes, I will have tea.”

“Let him drink the potion he’s brewed,” Hermione said, dropping a lump of sugar in the deep blue teacup and pouring a little milk in it before handing it in its saucer to Draco.

“You cry a lot too. You don’t like doing this, no matter how you act. That is one point in your favor. You hate treating him maliciously.”

Hermione sipped the morning tea with Draco.

“Just let him see you. Open the door. He can’t cross the threshold.”

“I don’t want to see him,” Hermione said. “He isn’t the same.”

“Close your eyes,” Draco said, waving his hands mystically. “Imagine the strangeness of it, someone changing in twenty-six years.”

“I don’t like this Draco. I like spoiled, bratty child whose father buys seven Nimbus 2001s and who tries to curse people when their backs are turned. You’re too mature this way.”

“Being told you have to kill someone or watch your parents die before following them will mature you very quickly. I’ve changed just in the years that you’ve known me.”

Hermione set her cup down with a trembling hand.

“Just let him see you. I don’t expect you to leave your little sanctuary. I’m not asking you too. Believe it or not, I don’t want to see you hurt. But you are hurting someone else. I’ve seen my father tortured before, but nothing like this. I spoke to him every day at Hogwarts. He bought magic mirrors so we would be able to talk. He let me go because I begged. I had to tell him that I wanted to go to make him proud, to be like him.”

“I’ll let him see me.”

“And if you’d stop insulting and yelling at him, you’d see a change in behavior. Try to love him. He needs a woman to love him.”

“I’ll let him see me,” Hermione repeated, and she walked to the door.

She opened the door a crack.

Outside the door was the most pitiful thing she’d ever seen.

Lucius was lying on his side curled in ball holding his knees. A magic mirror was next to him. He was completely disheveled. His hair was filthy, and he was still wearing the robes he’d worn at their wedding reception. He had a beard grown in, and he tugged at his knotted hair a bit from time to time. His eyes had no light at all in them, happy, angry, or sad.

“Lucius,” she whispered, opening the door farther.

Lucius rocked a little on his side.

“Lucius,” Hermione said a little louder.

Silver eyes glanced up at her.

“Hermione,” he said, and he instantly rose to his feet. He seemed to do it with just one motion. “Hermione.” He reached his hand for her cheek, but his hand was blocked by the magic of the Lady’s chambers.

Hermione held her breath. He smelled terrible.

Lucius stared at her. Thirty days of being locked in those rooms without being able to see her. She was perfect. He motioned to her. He held his arms open.

“Hermione, please,” he pleaded, motioning his hands as his lips trembled.

Hermione shook her head and took a step back from the door leaving it open.

Lucius walked up to the open door. He couldn’t come in, but he could see her.

“I’m sorry. Hermione, I’m sorry.”

Lucius continued to helplessly motion her to come closer to him. He just wanted her to hug him. She loved him, and he loved her.

Hermione stepped back into the room watching him.

“Hermione,” Lucius said, and his lips were trembling as he touched the magical barrier. “Let me in. I won’t hurt you.”

Hermione shook her head at him, watching his lips quiver and tears fall.

Draco stood up and walked out the door into the hallway.

“I’ll leave the two of you to work on this.”

Lucius paid no attention to his son. He reached for Hermione and stomped his foot.

Hermione watched him.

“We need to talk Lucius,” Hermione said, turning a chair to face the door.

“Yes. Yes, talk,” Lucius said, falling to his knees and running his hand up and down the magic shield that kept him from Hermione. He stared up at her.

“Go and take a shower.”

Lucius nodded, “Then we talk?”

“Yes, we will talk after you take a shower and make yourself presentable.”

Lucius nodded and grabbed up the mirror and several other things.

“Oh, and Lucius, you will not touch me in this room.”

Lucius nodded again. She was going to let him into her sanctum. He would follow her rules. He would at least sit near her. He would be able to smell her. She would talk to him. She would be his Hermione.

Maybe, maybe she would even give him a hug. A nice long one.

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Well, I hope y'all enjoyed it. I will try to have less problems next time. I promise to address y'all in the following chapter. I would feel worse keeping this chapter from you any longer. I had to go through and make all the editing changes a third time.

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