Damnation of Memory

Title: Damnation of Memory
Author: ianthe_waiting
Rating: MA/NC-17
Disclaimer: The Harry Potter books and their characters are the property of JK Rowling. This is a work of fan-fiction. No infringement is intended, and no money is being made from this story. I am just borrowing the puppets, but this is my stage.
Genre: Suspense, romance, angst
Warnings: Character Death, Violence, Adult Situations
Summary: DH-EWE: With every generation, a Dark Wizard rises. Hermione Granger has survived one. However, after nearly thirteen years, a dead man returns to inform her that she must fight again, and this time, Harry Potter will not be the one to save the world from madness.
Author's Notes: This is my 1st full length SS/HG fic and my second 1st person POV fic. Please note that not every detail is canon, including the canon floor plan of Grimmauld Place. This chapter is also unbeta’d, so please, pardon the mistakes!




Damnation of Memory - XXI






Fire thrived in the abundance of oxygen, and the natural process of life that kept the great tree alive aided in the burn.

I set myself on fire. It was just as it had been when I was a child; fire surrounded me, spewing like blood from my hands. I could feel flame in my nostrils and in my mouth. I could feel it in my bones and my muscle, and there was no pain.

Through the scald of heat, I watched Severus fall away, gliding over the ground as a black kite caught on the back draft. I could see his hair singeing, his clothes turning to ash from the heat, as he gathered up Ron. Nimue was gone. Severus was gone, pressing himself behind one of the megalithic stones that comprised the ancient circle.

Leaves and limbs caught like dry kindling, apples melting on the branch. The seed near my feet turned to ash, the hair curling and melting. The trunk was blackening and the golden light had darkened from within. The tree was dying.

I pulled upon the untouched arm, the fingers slipping from my throat. There was only the sound of fire as I grasped the wrist, the hand searching. For a moment, I though the fingers were grasping to injure me in some way, but as the arm shook free, the hand took my right hand into an embrace

There was pain and fear in the grip, but as fingers intertwined with mine in a gentle hold, I knew there was relief. It was an end of an age, perhaps. It was liberty as it was death.

The fire engulfed the tree, and smoke blinded me. Soon, I could not see an inch before my face.

And then, I was flying, pulled off my feet toward the charred wood, my cheek slamming into the blackened bark. I think I screamed as my arm disappeared into the crack of the tree, my fire blazing at my spike of shock. The force of the pull on my wrist was excruciating, and I knew then that the being inside wanted to pull me to my death. The inside of the trunk was like a furnace and I could feel flames moving along the inside, burning hotter than any of what was outside. White flame licked at my skin and the sleeve of my shirt, and the dragon hide and mesh melted away. This was the only burn I felt, scoring into my flesh and muscle, the skin blistering and bursting.

“There is always a cost to killing.”

My right hand burned where it was held. An object pressed into my palm, and a brand was pressed all the way into the bone.

I screamed from the depths of my soul, an earsplitting scream that did not seem possible coming from a human being. However, as I screamed, I was released.

I fell away from the tree, down, down, into the earth as the roots of the tree turned to ash, as did the apples and limbs. I held my right had into my chest, fire whirling around me, cinders raining down upon me. I fell into the bowels of Avalon, until even my fire could not light the darkness. I was lost.






Ginny Potter was scowling at me when I voluntarily opened my eyes. She had been shining a lighted wand tip into my eyes when I raised a hand, my left hand, to swipe at the obtrusive sight.

I blinked slowly as Ginny’s face turned from a scowl to a smile.

“Welcome back,” she whispered, and then she was gone.

I could not move, but I could stare at an unfamiliar ceiling with sculpted plaster friezes in some old Victorian design. I closed my eyes again, until the raucous clamour of voices drifted into earshot.

Several faces appeared before my eyes. First was Harry, then, Fannie. Pansy was next, her tears seemingly a permanent feature to her face as I could recall. Lastly, Greg Goyle bent down, his lop sided grin filling my vision. Of all the faces, his looked the worst. Both of his eyes had been blackened at some point, his noise broken and bandaged, he was missing teeth as well. If I had not known who he was, his face would have frightened me.

They all spoke to me, but I did not understand until much later what they were saying.

The basics were: first, I was going to live, but no one elaborated on why I could not move or speak. Second, I was still a wanted woman. Third, Ron was at St. Mungo’s. Lastly, Severus was gone.

Ginny soon shooed everyone away, and knocked me out with a potion.

I did not dream.



I learned that I was in Pansy Parkinson’s house in Cornwall, her parents ushered off to France for vacation following the aftermath of her cancelled nuptials to avoid the press. The Manor house was near the coast, and outside my window, I could hear the sea. The sound unnerved me.

It seemed that most of the Knights of Walpurgis were in the Manor, even the portraits of Abraxas and Arcturus. The only one missing was the one I wanted the most.

When I was able to talk, I told all of them what had happened, portraits brought in by unfamiliar elves and set in chairs facing the bed. The reactions ranged from silence to shouting. I ignored it all. Harry was the one to drive everyone from the room, to sit next to me on the over large bed.

“Severus told us what happened. When he brought you back, he gave us his point of view.”

“Where is he?” I asked, leaning back into the pillows Ginny had placed behind me. She was acting as my unofficial Healer, and declared that she would be returning to the Burrow later in the day, but return tomorrow. I was healing fine, but still Ginny wished to speak to me in private about my overall state of health. I was a bit unsettled by her words.

Harry shrugged at my question. “He said he would be in contact soon. He mentioned something about arranging for some sort of protection for the both of you.”

I frowned, and my face ached, the bruised bump on my forehead still giving me headaches.

“I did not kill him…” I whispered.

Harry smiled sadly. “No, you didn’t.”

“How did he…?” I trailed.

Again, Harry shrugged. “Severus did not say, but Ron was suddenly was in the lobby of St. Mungo’s screaming about the Muggle Bible. Neville took charge of him, and now Ron is in the Spell Damage ward. No one can find out what is wrong with him. They have him restrained…”

I took a shaky breath. I had told Harry and the others about Ron eating the golden apple, but not of its side effects.

“And Greg? How is he, really?”

Harry sighed and crossed his arms before his chest. “I managed to find him at Hogwarts. He does not remember well, but he thinks that the so-called ‘New Order of Merlin’ held him somewhere in Hogsmeade. Goyle escaped with Pansy’s help and McGonagall protected them despite the Ministry trying to interfere. Gumboil and McClaggen wanted Goyle for questioning, but Goyle was so bad off…he…” Harry trailed.

“The Ministry, does it know…?”

“About Ron? I don’t know. I still have my job, but I am purposely being left out of the ‘loop.’”

I huffed, only to wince.

“The Ministry has been moving on the Tor. You realize that over two weeks have passed since then?”

I did not.

“The Prophet is filled with the photographs and names of the dead. Of course, Skeeter is having a hey-day, using you as a scapegoat. Spinnet, on the other hand, is saying that you are a hero and that another Dark uprising has been thwarted. Still, no one really knows why there were thirty or more dead ‘agents’ found on the Tor…”

“Lavender?” I asked suddenly, remembering that when Ron forced me into the Tower that she had been alive…

“Dead.”

My face crumpled.

“Severus killed her,” he said. “He said something like “there can be no witnesses, none with the least bit of sanity left…”

“And Aberforth?”

Harry bit his lip. “There was no body.”

This puzzled me. If Severus said nothing about it to the others then… I sighed.

“You are still wanted for murder, but no longer Percy’s. No matter what wrong the ‘New Order of Merlin’ did, you’re still a fugitive of justice.”

This fact, surprisingly, did not bother me.

“And so far, no one alive outside of those in the house and Arthur, knows of Severus.”

My thoughts drifted to the Weasley family. With the loss of Fred, I had feared that any other would crush the family. The Weasleys were resilient, but there was always a limit.

Harry continued talking to me about Ron, and I listened, inserting comments here and there. He spoke of how since the first time he had met Ron that there was always an element of jealousy to their friendship. I even remembered the various points during out school days that Ron would refuse to speak to Harry, claiming that Harry was actively seeking out danger to experience the glory.

“Even you, to him you were a trophy. He resented me so much because of the time we spent searching for the Hallows.”

I blushed slightly at the memory. There had been a time that Harry and I had been close, intimate even, but it was a product of stress and fear. Harry and I had remained friends. I never told Ron about those cold nights Harry and I shared, but I was sure Ron suspected much. It was history, though, and even as adults, Harry, and I would occasionally bring up our adolescent fumblings only to laugh.

“’Vaticinium ex eventu,’ eh?”

“What do you mean?” I asked. I knew the phrase, but…

“Ron always had a ‘darker’ side to him. Maybe you couldn’t see it like I did, but then again, I never expected Ron to strategize so efficiently without us knowing.”

Harry blinked his own words and his expression turned apologetic. He did not have to speak. Ron and I had been estranged for six years.

“But all this wanting to ‘recombine the Magical and the Muggle,’ that would never be a motive hatched from Ron Weasley’s brain…”

I agreed. It sounded like some wild fantasy Arthur Weasley might have.

“I suppose that we will have a long time to ponder his exact motive,” I murmured, turning my eyes to the window and the grey sea beyond.

“And in the meantime, the Weasley’s are going to get a good lashing from the press. Percy not being dead, but pulling a ‘Pettigrew?’ And now with Ron being as he is…”

I said nothing. It was unfortunate and unexpected. It made me question so many things I thought to be true, not to mention everything surrounding the Knights of Walpurgis.

Harry and I sat in silence for a few moments before he inquired as to how I felt.

“In shock, but sore,” I said with a slight smile.

My right arm was wrapped from the tips of my fingers to my shoulder. Ginny had feared that I would lose my arm after the severity of the burns, but in true Healer style, she mended the arm to the best that Magical medicine could provide. Bone and muscle had to be reconstructed, new skin had to be grown and grafted. As for my hand, I had a blackened brand in my palm in the design of the five teardrop shaped apple seeds I had seen growing in the poison golden apples. I could not ponder the design or why it had been branded into my skin and bone. I had little movement in my fingers, and I would never regain any use of them unless Magical medicine were to somehow leap forward in my lifetime.

Other than my arm, I had minor injuries. The stress and strain of my muscles pained me as much as my arm. The bruises and cuts were almost healed; only the bruise on my forehead did not heal fast enough to suit me.

Harry informed me that Severus had only minor injuries, minor compared to mine.

“How did I come to be here?” I asked finally.

Harry smirked. “Severus sent a Patronus from Glastonbury to me.”

The doe, I was sure that the second sighting of it thrilled Harry. However, Harry then told me that it was not a doe, but an Ashwinder. Again, the symbolism escaped me until I could find a more peaceful time to ponder matters. I did know that Patronus forms could change. Tonks’ had changed. I had not thought about her for a while, and I frowned.

Time had flown away from me.

“We considered bringing you to Grimmauld Place, but since I was suspended, the MoM has been watching the house. Just to keep things normal, I suppose to say, Ginny brought the boys back from the Burrow.

Severus’ Patronus frightened Albus as we sat down to dinner, and the voice that came from the Ashwinder made Jamie scream; to top it off, Ginny started having contractions. It was a mess, but the message was relayed.”

I rolled my eyes as Harry began to chuckle. It was nice to hear a bit of laughter after so much that had happened.

“I met Severus at some inn, and from there, we brought you to Cornwall.”

That seemed, to be the end of Harry’s tale, and soon he made his excuses to go, anxious to get home. I was left alone again in a white bedroom in Parkinson’s Cornish Manor.

I found, when I managed to wriggle under the blankets to sit on the edge of the bed, that I had recovered a great deal of strength during my convalescence. No one had forbid me to get out of bed, and even as I rose, the pain was not enough to keep me from moving.

I had had enough of enchanted bedpans and sponge baths. I was wearing a simple night shift with thin straps that allowed access to my bandages. However, as I located the en suite lavatory, I realized that I had no wand. The Vinewood wand, the one I had recovered after the War, the one that was much part of me as my charred limb, was gone forever. As I was a ‘fugitive,’ procuring a new wand would be difficult.

I wanted a proper bath, and short of Charming my bandages waterproof, which I could not, I could not let my arm get the least bit damp with a bath. I settled for using the lavatory and using a flannel to wipe what I could from the sink. The process was time consuming. I kept bumping my wrapped hand against the edge of the sink, having to breathe through the pain before I could move to wash again.

It was as I had propped a foot up on the edge of the claw footed bath tub to lift the hem of my night dress up to wash my legs that the bedroom door opened. I dropped the flannel and muttered a curse. Perhaps one of Pansy’s many new guests had come to speak to me, or Pansy had come herself to fawn over me like a child.

I think I preferred Pansy Parkinson when she hated me.

I bent slowly to grasp the damp flannel with my fingertips. The unnatural angle made me groan, my muscles stiff and sore.

The sound of a soft chuckle made me drop the cloth again. My foot slipped off the edge of the tub and with some unusual ballet move, I managed to keep myself from falling head long in the tub, but sat down hard on the edge.

“What’s so damn funny?” I snarled even before I realized who was leaning in the doorway.

Severus’ brow shot up in mock offense, his arms crossed before his chest, his shoulder leaning into the doorjamb.

“Parkinson does have elves, or are you adverse to them still?”

I blinked. How had he remembered that?

As if to answer my mental question, Severus sighed. “The mystical power of Avalon seemed to place the lost pieces of my memory back in my eviscerated brain,” he drawled sarcastically. “I remember Hermione Granger, and the many rules she broke. I remember her hand shooting up in the air and blurting out the correct answers even before I could acknowledge you—and most times, I did not. I remember docking House points, and I remember my favourite epithet for you. Insufferable little know-it-all…”

His voice trailed as his eyes moved to my bandaged arm and then to my face. I took a tremulous breath. I had wanted him to forget those things.

“Of course, thirteen years have changed you much, while I…”

“What else do you remember?”

Severus seemed happy at the redirection. “Not much. Whatever I lost when I nearly died is gone forever, much to Potter’s chagrin. It seems he had hoped I would tell him more about his mother.”

I lowered my eyes to my bare toes on the white tile.

“I remember Lily Potter as a insignificant face, James Potter’s plain wife…”

I smirked. I would not comment upon Lily-cursed-Evans-Potter. I had come to dislike her immensely even though she had been dead for over twenty-five years. In fact, I conceded that I was slightly jealous, but dislike won out.

“I passed her son on the way out, giving him a bit of a shock, and he told me that besides the arm, you’re feeling much better?”

I nodded. “I miss my wand,” I muttered pathetically. I then proceeded to tell Severus about my wish to bathe, wear something better than a nightgown, and perhaps eat something more than gruel.

“I will see what I can do,” he said softly.

By some twist of fate, Severus was the one to help me settle down into a hot bath, my bandages properly Charmed. He helped me wash my hair, kneeling next to the tub. He had rolled up the sleeves of his black jumper as he cupped water into his large hands to rinse away suds from my eyes.

Severus spoke to me while I washed my front. Wiping at my breasts, I found them tender, just as the rest of me. I passed the flannel to him to wash my back. Severus’ eyes narrowed slightly, but he took the flannel without a word and began washing. I added the overall experience to my growing list of ‘surreal moments in the life of Hermione Granger.’

He told me about his ordeal before finding me resting against the monolith on the isle. He told me that he had watched Ron push me through the gateway, and that he had followed. However, there was no punt waiting for him on the other side. He had flown by the unnatural ability he had learned, only to fall in the Poison Sea just in sight of the isle. He had to tread water the rest of the way.

For some reason, I found Severus’ ordeal humourous, but did not laugh at the irritation of the memory on his face. As I looked at his face, he seemed different, the colour of his skin healthier, as if he had gotten some sun, somehow.

“I’m sure Potter mentioned that I was making arrangements?”

I nodded, using my left hand to wipe a few suds from my nose. “Although I would like to know what these arrangements entail.”

Severus smirked. “A safe house, a new identity, and a new wand,” he murmured, dipping the soapy flannel in the bathwater to rinse my back. I knew that the fading bruises bothered him by the way his dark eyes narrowed. He managed to overlook my wrapped arm all together.

“And pray tell, where?”

Severus quirked his lips into a type of scowl.

“Despite what you may think of me, I do listen to what you say, even when you are whinging,” he answered cryptically.

TBC...