To Save the Life of a Mudblood

A/N: Well, I got more feedback than I thought, so I decided to go ahead and post the second chapter. I’m being serious when I say I really shouldn’t be writing this with the other things I have to do, but I will continue as long as I get reviews. If the reviews stop, then the story stops. Lol, I really like this idea and I am enjoying it, but if other people don’t want to read it, then…but it sounds like people do, so I give you the next part! Thank you so much for the reviews! Cookies to everybody!


The Repercussions

Draco stood staring out the large window in his bedroom. Hermione was still in the bath and the house-elves had just finished preparing the guest bedroom down from his. He had also ordered the elves to change the linens on his bed, not sure that he could deal with smelling her perfume on his pillows all night. That added to the twinge of guilt he felt when he noticed the small smear of blood from her hymen breaking had him calling on the house-elves immediately.

Now he stood, clad in only his black silk pajama bottoms, watching the moon perched high in the cold night sky, thinking about what had just happened. He never thought it would be possible, but he actually felt bad for Granger. Perhaps it was a sign he had finally grown-up. Either way, it was a different sensation, this odd feeling of…pity.

Suddenly his musings were interrupted by a bang! He turned sharply, seeing his father standing in his doorway, wand out and looking around the room furiously.

“Where is she?” he seethed.

Draco froze, fear running rampant through his mind. How had his father known? “What are you talking about, Father?”

“Draco, don’t. I am not one of your ignorant little school friends. Now tell me, where is the Mudblood?”

Draco opened his mouth to answer, but was interrupted before he could answer. Hermione had unfortunately chosen that moment to exit the bathroom, dressed only in one of Draco’s plush, dark green bathrobes, her wet hair falling in dark curls around her shoulders. She froze when her gaze fell on the elder Malfoy.

Draco watched his fathers face flush with rage, his hand tightened painfully on his wand.

“What have you done?” he hissed at his son, his gaze traveling down to Draco’s bare left ring finger.

The younger Malfoy couldn’t understand his father’s reaction. Lucius Malfoy had hardly been loyal to his wife, granted he had probably never taken a Mud…muggleborn to his bed, but still…

Draco opened his mouth to defend himself when Lucius surged forward catching his son’s arm roughly in his tight grip.

“You stupid boy!” he hissed, dragging his son towards the door. Suddenly he turned, pointing his wand at Hermione. “You, follow me, now,” he commanded.

Hermione, shocked and unsure, followed the enraged Patriarch, praying that he wouldn’t turn his wand on her as she didn’t have her own wand, and wasn’t sure where Malfoy had put it while she was bathing.

Lucius dragged his son roughly down to the bottom floor of the Manor and into the large study. He stopped just inside the door and waited for the muggleborn to enter. He grabbed her arm in his other hand, griping her hard enough to bruise. He dragged both of them to the wall that held the Malfoy Family Tree, stopping at the far right end, the end that held the information about his immediate family. He dropped both arms, turning to face his son.

“Well, Draco, what do you have to say for your…foolish behavior?” he asked, anger evident in every word. Draco was utterly confused until he glanced at the elegant tapestry. Suddenly, all the color faded from his face. Finally he understood his father’s rage. There in the far bottom right corner, where it had once read “Draco Malfoy Astoria Greengrass” it now read “Draco Malfoy Hermione Granger”. He heard Granger gasp on the other side of his father, knowing she had also seen the gold stitching.

“What? How?” she whispered.

“How indeed,” Lucius growled.

“Oh, shit,” Draco whispered, realizing there must have been so much more to that spell, it was the only explanation. Perhaps there was much more to the “physically binding one to another” than simply consummating a marriage.

“The spell. Malfoy! I thought it was simply a matter of…sex! What the hell?” she asked, stepping around the older Malfoy to face his son.

“What spell?”

“In the library, Grandfather’s Romanian Marriage book, the one he gave Grandmother. She didn’t know what it was, she read it out loud. It was late…we didn’t know what else to do,” he tried to explain, feeling like a ten year old caught playing with is father’s broom.

“Show me, NOW!”

Draco led his father and Hermione up to the library, walking over to the pile of books they had left in the floor in their haste to get to his bedroom. He picked up the old thin book, handing it to his father.

Lucius’s face paled. He gently took the book in his hands, opening it and silently reading the words. His knuckles whitened as he griped the leather.

“Do you know what this is Draco?”

“You told me it was a spell used in arranged marriages, to force consummation.”

“Yes, that is what I told you, when you were twelve! It is so much more than that! It is the spell read, by both parties, at the marriage. Then the spell, as well as the marriage, is consummated, binding the couple together. It is old, powerful magic, one of the few things that can dissolve a modern Wizarding marriage. It is a much deeper and stronger bond than the one which you and Astoria chose to participate in.”

Draco took two deep breaths, forcing himself not to embarrass himself in front of his father. He turned his gaze toward Hermione, noticing that she had collapsed in the leather chair he had occupied earlier that night. Her face was devoid of any color, a look of horror graced her features.

“So, how do we fix this?” he asked his father once he had regained the use of his voice.

“As far as I know, we can’t.”

“What?” Hermione yelped.

“As I said, this is Old Magic. There is a reason the Ministry stopped using this particular spell. While it is rare, wizards and witches at times find that they wish to dissolve their marriages, so a weaker binding spell was used in place of ones such as this. I don’t know if it can be reversed.”

“But, Father, we didn’t both read the spell. Only Granger did.”

“But you took her to your bed, willingly, am I correct?”

Draco blushed. “Yes.”

“Then the end result is the same.”

The younger Malfoy stood in the middle of the library, unsure what to say or where to go from there. He could hear sniffling coming from behind him and guessed that Granger was crying.

“I am going to owl Maurice and Helena. I suggest you get some sleep, if possible, for tomorrow, all hell will break lose,” his father drawled, anger still very evident in his words. “Now, get out of my sight, and take Granger with you.”

Draco walked over the arm chair, taking Hermione’s arm in his hand, not griping as hard as his father, but still holding her firmly. He pulled her out of the library and led her back to his room.

“Fuck, Granger, I’m screwed,” he told her, taking her wand out of the drawer in his bedside table and handing it to her.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, wondering what the hell could have possessed her to read the unknown words. She hadn’t known they were an incantation, but dear Merlin, she was smarter than that! Her eyes landed on Draco’s discarded wedding ring. “Malfoy, what is the point of having a Fidelity Charm on a ring you can take off?” she asked, hoping to distract her thoughts for a minute from their situation.

Draco looked up confused, then understanding dawned on him when he saw his ring. He walked over and picked it up, turning it over in his hand.

“This ring and Astoria’s are my great-grandparents’ rings. They have been in our family for generations. The Fidelity Charm is standard and rather common amongst Pureblood families. When placed on an object it can last for hundreds of years, never needing to be recast. Normally the ring is also enchanted to be irremovable. Astoria and I…chose not to charm the rings, preferring to be able to remove them if we wanted to.”

Hermione raised an eyebrow. “You meant to cheat on your wife?”

“No, but…Granger, I don’t expect you to understand. I didn’t marry for love. I married for influence, for political reasons. The match was a good one. Her family is powerful and well-known, but I do not love her. It wasn’t so much that I was planning on infidelity, it was more that I just didn’t care whether she was loyal or not, as long as she gave me an heir and was discreet…” he trailed off, shrugging his shoulders.

Hermione bit her tongue, deciding to withhold her thoughts on his marriage. “How long do you have before Astoria realizes what happened?”

“There’s a good chance she already knows. Once the marriage was dissolved, she wouldn’t have been able to wear the ring any longer; it would have burnt her hand.”

“Oh. I’m sorry.”

“Well you should be!” he finally snapped. “Damn it, Granger! Even Goyle knows not to read from an unknown book!”

Hermione flinched as his words. “I know! I don’t know why I read it! It…it’s like it was calling to me, tempting me…” she whispered.

He found his anger draining, exhaustion taking over. “Let me show you where you can sleep for the night, tomorrow we’ll…we’ll figure something out.” He led her out to the hall, then down to the next door.

“Thank you,” she whispered, afraid to enrage him again.

He didn’t answer, just turned and made his way back to his room, slamming the door. He glanced down at his fisted hand, opening it to reveal his ring. “Shit,” he mumbled.

“Kipsy,” he called out.

“Yes, master?” the small elf appeared, bowing to Draco.

“Make sure Miss Granger has everything she needs…transfigure something for her to sleep in,” he ordered.

The elf bowed once more before popping out again.

It was so easy to blame Granger, to hate her for fucking up his life, but he knew it wasn’t only her fault. He should have been paying closer attention to what she was doing. He also should have known more about the spell. He had blindly taken her to his bed, without thinking that there could have been more to the spell. Now her life was as fucked up as his. He had a feeling her friends weren’t going to be thrilled with this latest development.

Draco lay down in his bed, his thoughts spinning out of control. Finally he fell into an uneasy sleep, plagued with dreams of his wife…ex-wife casting the Cruciatus Curse numerous times, then Granger standing before him, a young brown-haired, grey eyed little boy standing beside her and finally of his father, disappointment etched on his face, turning his wand on the small boy and shouting “Avada Kedavra!”

A/N: Well, again, tell me what you think. I have one more chapter written, then I just have ideas. If you still like it and think I should continue, please let me know! Thank you for reading!  Thanks again Kady, for betaing, I am looking for a permanent beta, so you can get back to your life! I love ya darling! I promise Hermione will be much more animated in the coming chapters. She’s just in shock at the moment, I plan on having good ole Hermione back when she wakes up the next morning.