The Fool, the Emperor, and the Hanged Man

Title: The Fool, the Emperor, and the Hanged Man
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, graphic violence, madness, non-consensual sexual acts, abuse, oral, M/F, and overall darkness. Dark!Harry included.
Summary: DH-EWE: Ten years after the fall of the Dark Lord, Hermione Granger leads of life of self-imposed obscurity, that is, until the day Headmistress Minerva McGonagall is murdered and a certain 'hero' is responsible.
Author's Notes: This fic is in 1st person POV, so take heed. It will eventually be a DM/HG, but there is a squicky scene that might make you think otherwise. There is some non-con in this fic, so if it squicks you, don't read it for Merlin's sake! Comments and ConCrit is welcomed!

Note: Most of Voldemort's and Lucius' dialogue has been lifted from JKR's Book 4, HP and the Goblet of Fire.

Special thanks to onduril with the German incantations used in this part!



The Fool, the Emperor, and the Hanged Man

Part 23





The world expanded around us, and I saw that we stood on the very edge of a dark cemetery. In the distance, I could see a small chapel with a yew tree in the yard—very near the glow of fire and wand tips among the stones.

The first thing the three of us did, realizing where we were was to draw our wands, Disillusion ourselves, and kneel close to the ground. The Dark Mark floated high in the sky, and distantly I could hear Harry’s muffled cries, and Voldemort’s voice.

“Go, Severus, be safe!” I whispered desperately, my hand finding Draco’s.

I could not tell if Severus had Apparated away, but I could no longer feel his physical presence at my side. Instead, Draco and I moved to kneel behind a large gravestone, scanning the cemetery. We could see a reborn Voldemort in the centre of the yard…and dark cloaked figures standing in a circle around him. We could not discern one Death Eater from the other, and I knew Draco was trying to see which was his father.

Tied to a particularly ornate marker, was a fourteen year old Harry Potter, and lying in the distance was Cedric Diggory, and beyond him, the Tri-Wizard Cup.

Everything was in place, just as Harry had described it to my younger self. However, what I needed to find was the older Harry hiding, somewhere.

“The Cloak, my dear…” Draco whispered.

“Do you see him?” I whispered back.

“No.”

With a Disillusioned hand, I pulled out Harry’s Invisibility Cloak, draped it over myself and my other cloak, and was soon completely obscured from sight.

“I’ll move up toward the chapel. You move a bit closer to the Dark Lord. Wands out—both of them,” Draco hissed.

He could not see me nod, or that I already was pulling my wands from my holster, but I could just see him, barely.

“Draco?” I whispered.

“What?”

I pulled the hood of the cloak up and kissed him, awkwardly, missing his mouth and kissing his cheek. I then felt his hands on my face, and we kissed properly, Draco’s tongue tasting the inside of my mouth before quickly pulling away.

“Go. Now!” he hissed.

Suddenly, he was gone, and I could no longer see or hear him. I was alone, and I shivered as I heard Voldemort’s cruel voice drifting between the stones. Steeling my resolve, I moved. Under the Cloak, I did not need to crouch, but instead lightly stepped around the stones, dancing over the uneven ground. I stopped short of the circle of Death Eaters, kneeling behind an above ground stone sarcophagus, able to watch the circle of people from between the stone box and the ground as it was lifted up on stone feet.

“Crucio!”

Voldemort hissed the Unforgivable, his yew wand pointing to the Death Eater from the left of where I hid. Immediately, one of the black clad figures began to writhe on the ground. I could see Harry’s wide eyes, his arms working against the bonds that held him to Tom Riddle’s grave.

“Get up, Avery…”

I had stopped listening to Voldemort’s high, thin, and cruel voice, and instead began scanning the graveyard. Surely, Harry was hiding somewhere nearby, watching as I was, the events that we had both considered the past.

Besides the many stones, the yew tree, and the chapel, there were not many places one could hide oneself completely. I had the Invisibility Cloak, and I was the only one completely hidden from view. I then scanned the graveyard for Draco, focusing upon the chapel and the yew tree, the place he said he would go, but saw no one.

“Master, we crave to know…we beg you to tell us…”

It was Lucius’ voice, louder than before, and I realized that it was Lucius who stood nearest to me.

He voice was so placating, so strange. It was the voice he used when addressing Voldemort, and not the voice I had come to know thirteen years later.

I listened to Voldemort’s explanation as to why he had lost the night he tried to kill the babe Harry Potter. I listened to his explanation as to how he came to be reborn, the plot with Crouch, Jr., and the death of Bertha Jorkins. To me, it was almost ancient history, but to the Death Eaters, and the younger Harry tied to the stone, it was shocking.

“Crucio!”

I nearly cried out as I watched Harry’s young body writhe against the stone marking the grave of Tom Riddle, the Muggle father of the man called Voldemort. My heart was breaking as I watched his beautiful emerald eyes roll back in his head, but I could do nothing. I could not risk being seen, or casting a spell to stop Voldemort’s cruel spell. The only satisfactions I could imagine were the day the horrible man would be destroyed—and that I knew many more spells more terrible than the Cruciatus.

Finally, it was over, and Voldemort instructed Wormtail to cut Harry’s bonds. I knew what was to happen next, and I bit my lip. Priori Incantatem.

I again turned my attention away from the circle, and began searching the graveyard again. I saw no one.

Voldemort spoke, and I wondered if the old bastard simply liked hearing his own voice. Harry had his wand again, and was stumbling, the Death Eaters circling about like a pack of hungry wolves. I finally moved from my spot and glided around the circle so that I was across from the yew tree and Cedric’s body.

“Avada Kedavra!”

“Expelliarmus!”

I gasped as light filtered the night sky, and Harry and Voldemort’s bodies rose into the air, floating past the yew tree and into the yard below the chapel. The Death Eaters clamoured to follow, and I moved again, passing the grave of Voldemort’s father, pausing next to Cedric Diggory’s body. I grimaced as I studied his blank, young face.

Phoenix song alighted the air, and I turned away, moving to stand just where Voldemort had been earlier. Bursts of light came from the golden thread between their wands, and I remembered what Harry had told Ron and I about seeing Cedric, the old caretaker, Bertha Jorkins, and his parents, but I could not see anything but spheres of gold magic.

Then I remembered—I needed to get out of the way! Harry would run to Cedric’s body, casting hexes, Voldemort casting hexes.

Skipping to press myself behind old Tom Riddle’s stone, I panted as I heard Voldemort’s cruel and incredulous voice.

“Stun him!”

My eyes widened as the younger Harry Potter dashed toward me, but then dove behind a marble angel, rolling before coming to his feet again.

“Impedimenta!”

Death Eaters were falling, trying to catch up, and I bit my lip as I watched. Even though I knew Harry would make it to Cedric’s body and Summon the Cup, my nerves were on edge.

“Stand aside! I will kill him! He is mine!”

Harry stumbled to Cedric’s body just a few yards from me. I could see the sweat and blood on his face, and his frightened emerald eyes.

“ACCIO!”

The Cup flew into Harry’s outstretched hand and I whimpered as with a ‘whoosh’ Harry Potter, the Harry I had once loved, was gone.

“UGHHHH!”

Voldemort’s scream was deafening and I cowered lowered behind the grave marker.

I knew the time had come; the fourteen-year-old Harry was gone. I rose up from behind the stone and stepped back, still safe under the Cloak.

“He’s gone, my Lord!” one of the Death Eaters gasped, having recovered from Harry’s hex.

“Yes, you fool, I can see that!” Voldemort screamed, grasping his white, skull-like head.

Dark energy swirled around the man, but I did not cower, as I once would have as a girl. The man who called himself Voldemort ceased to frighten me years ago.

“Crouch will bring him back!” Voldemort hissed, more to himself than to his minions.

My body whirled as I heard a sound of twigs cracking behind me, and in the dark, I saw a body raise up from a crouch, a figure that had unruly, long hair, and luminous green eyes.

Merlin.

“My Lord!” Lucius shouted, pointing toward the chapel, and all eyes turned, even mine.

Harry Potter was behind me, though he could not see me, but it was not Harry Potter all eyes had turned to. Instead, it was a glowing shape on the top of the embankment, growing more distinct as it approached the group.

My heart lurched again, and I grasped my chest.

It was a Patronus, in the form of a doe.

My lips moved to form Severus’ name, and the pressure of dread and fear lessened. I could tell that the future Harry had paused from creeping any further forward toward Voldemort.

‘Dread Lord, I must offer apologies for not coming at your Summons. Pardon your humble servant…’

Severus’ voice drifted across the graveyard, and I knew Harry was seething behind me, only a few yards away.

‘Let me make up for my absence by informing you that Potter has returned to Hogwarts and has revealed your location to Dumbledore. Aurors will be descending upon you at any moment. I beg you, Dread Lord, please away as quickly as possible. Your loyal servant will dispatch Potter soon.’

The Patronus shifted, and Severus’ voice continued as the doe’s head bowed.

‘I pledge my everlasting faith and loyalty, my Lord.’

And with that, the spell ended, the doe dissipating into a small burst of silver magic.

It seemed Voldemort was stunned, as was his Death Eaters, and then with what seemed to be silent signal, the black-clad figures, one by one, Apparated away. Only Wormtail and Voldemort remained.

“My Lord?” Wormtail asked, still cradling his silver arm.

“Let’s away, now is not the time, Wormtail…” Voldemort hissed, and like two columns of inky, black smoke, they disappeared upon the wind.

I was a panting, tears in my eyes.

Severus had successfully convinced the group to scatter… Voldemort would doubtless call Severus to him for an explanation, and the Death Eaters would lament that they could not finally take on the Ministry.

I whirled back to see Harry, but he was no longer where he had been.

I could not breathe. What if Harry had somehow followed Voldemort?

“No! NO!”

I gasped, whirling again to see a familiar shape standing just where Voldemort had been.

“Damn you, Snape!” Harry screamed, grabbing his dirty black hair with his left, pulling at it so that chunks seem to fall loose. A dirty bandage was wrapped about the stump of his right hand, and I could see blood and yellowness on the bandages where infection had doubtless set in.

I blinked from under the cloak as Harry spun around in the same spot. He wore rags of what had once been fine cloths. And his face was scratched terribly. He certainly was dressed to play the part of a mad man. The only incongruous elements were the fine cloak over his shoulders and the cracked stone set into a ring on his left ring finger.

The Resurrection Stone.

It was as Harry was slapping his stump into his scratched scar that Draco seemed to seep into existence from the darkness, standing just past the yew tree. I opened my mouth, but said nothing, gripping my wands tighter in my hands.

“Potter!”

No! Draco could not face him alone, and not so suddenly!

Harry whirled, snarling, flicking his hand so that a hidden wand in his sleeve slipped into his left hand.

“Malfoy…”

Again, I could not breathe, but I ran as if my legs were not my own.

This is no time to be daydreaming, Hermione…Severus voice scolded.

I was gasping, the sound of Severus’ voice shocking me. But I ran—around Harry, around the stones until I stood on the embankment between Harry and Draco. I had to be the one to confront Harry.

I wrenched away the Invisibility Cloak, throwing it at the base of the yew tree, shaking my hair free, and adjusting my wands in my fingers.

“You,” he growled.

Draco stiffened at my unveiling, and began to move to stand before me, but angrily, I stretched my arms out to stop him.

“This is my duty!” I snarled.

I could not understand it, my insides were still quivering, but my voice, my body, was resolute, and I knew it was not Severus’ doing. Slowly my insides began to catch up with my exterior, and all the anger, all the grief I had felt from Harry came back.

Even in the dim light of the evening, I could see Harry’s hate etched across his twisted features. He seemed much older than a mere twenty-seven. His malice, his pain had aged him beyond his years.

I swallowed and lowered my hips, planting my feet upon the dark ground, my wands rising in a defensive position to duel. I had never, truly dueled in my life, but it seemed that my body knew how to poise itself.

“This ends now.”

Harry’s severe mouth quivered and his eyes flashed.

“Yes, Hermione, it must,” he said, and for a moment I saw lucidity pass over his features and was gone again.

Harry raised his mangled hand before me, and fell back on his left foot, his other wand raising. It was a dark wood wand, but I neither had the time to consider its construction nor did I have time to blink.

“Crucio!” he screamed.

But I had no need to vocalize as I cast a Stunning hex with the Elder Wand, the light of the spells crashing together. Then with my walnut wand in my left hand I cast a shield Charm, which combined with the Stunner, canceling the torture Curse.

My feet slid in the grass a foot or more, as did Harry’s, from the force of the spell.

Harry laughed, much as Voldemort had moments earlier and lowered his wand.

“Is it fair that you have two wands—and a protector behind you, Hermione? I only have myself and one wand…” he mocked.

“This is not supposed to be fair, Harry,” I gritted out, adjusting my body again.

“But you were always so fair-minded, Hermione. And isn’t dueling confined to the rules?” Harry shouted.

I took a cleansing breath and said, “This is not to be a duel, old friend. This is an extermination.”

Harry’s eyes widened for a moment, but I stepped forward, my dragon hide boots pounding into the ground as I cast a disarming spell with the Elder Wand.

“Protego!” Harry snarled.

The spell was easily cast aside, but I countered with the walnut wand, a banishing hex, ‘Gebannt’…one which Harry attempted to counter, but caught part of the spell and was blown back down the embankment, rolling to a stop against one of the gravestones.

I advanced quickly, but Harry kicked up to his feet, his face inhuman.

“Sectumsempra!” he screeched, but I jumped as the spell flew past me, my feet coming to the ground, sliding down the embankment.

I circled Harry, my eyes upon him as my feet moved. I came to stand at the spot where Voldemort had been reborn, my wands training on Harry as he turned to face me again. I caught sight of Draco, moving quietly around the edge of the embankment, his wands drawn, but at his sides.

“You ruined everything, Hermione…and Snape…and Malfoy…everything!” Harry muttered.

I did not reply to him as he stepped toward me, standing atop old Tom Riddle’s grave.

“I’ll try again, and again, and again, Hermione, until it is all right,” he spat.

I clenched my teeth. I would have to kill him.

“It would have to be you, wouldn’t it? With your perfect sense of right and wrong?

Tell me, Hermione, do ever dream of what the world would have been like if Voldemort had never been reborn? What the world would have been like if we could have lived without fear?”

Harry’s voice was still wracked with emotion, but no longer anger—it was pain.

“I should have gone back to the night my parents were killed, or the day Voldemort was born!”

I shook my head, “No, Harry, it would have made no difference.”

Harry’s pained face shifted once more into a bestial snarl. “No difference? No difference? It would have made all the difference to us!”

It was no use trying to reason with him, he would never see that by killing one dark wizard another would surely rise in its place. That was how Fate worked. Mankind must suffer, it was what we did best. Without suffering, we would never be able to see ahead or advance.

“It is over, Harry…” I whispered.

I moved to cast—cast a spell from ‘The Hanged Man.’ A severing curse, ‘Trenne,’ aimed at Harry’s neck. I was above casting Unforgivables.

“Erebus!” Harry screamed, and I blinked in middle of casting.

Erebus was not a spell.

Suddenly a dark blur appeared before Harry, like a Patronus of blackness, forming into the shape of a human figure.

Draco appeared at my side as I let my focus shift from the spell to the figure standing before Harry. I could see that the figure was human, but I could not see its face. It was something like a Dementor and fear seeped into my heart.

“Did you think I would come here alone, Hermione? You have your Malfoy—I have Erebus,” he cackled terribly.

I blinked at the figure that stood like a sentinel before Harry. Harry moved to stand at the figure’s side, and I noticed that the black figure was slightly taller, its frame slightly larger. I narrowed my eyes at the figure as slowly an arm raised with a gloved hand, a finger pointing at me, and not a wand.

I felt Draco’s wand tip poke sharply into my back and I winced.

With great bravado, I moved, not bothering to think about the figure—mental shouting, ‘Gebannt!’ and banishing the blot of darkness into the air. I did not hesitate, did not bother to see the figure being thrown through the air and out of sight. Instead, I advanced on Harry, whose eyes were wide with fear, back stepping up the embankment toward the yew tree.

“Zerfleische!”

I gasped as a spell just missed my face, but cut my cheek under my right eye, the wound so deep that it went to the bone. Blood ran down my face, but I squashed my reaction to the pain. It had been a ‘maiming’ hex from ‘The Hanged Man.’ The German word was literally translated as ‘tear to pieces,’ and it was a spell of a high degree of bodily harm.

I continued moving, Harry back stepping until he bumped into the trunk of the yew tree.

I raised my wands, preparing to cast the severing curse. I poured all my pain and grief into the wand motion, all my hate. The frightened man had once been my friend, the best friend I had ever had. My thoughts raced back to the boy I had seen tied to the gravestone, and back to the man before me. They were completely different people to me.

It pained me to know that Harry—the older Harry had gone mad, when he could have been so happy. I could not entirely blame Voldemort or Albus; it had been Harry who had decided to immerse himself in the past.

My lips moved to incant the spell silently, the spell that would take Harry’s head from his body and end the nightmare.

“Erstick!”

I screamed—but the spell had not been mine.



I blinked. Time seemed to nearly stop as I watched a red jet of light burst from Harry’s wand and float past me, my body twisting to dodge the curse. I exhaled as I turned, my eyes following the jet of magic. Behind me, Draco’s mouth opened in a yell of warning, but no sound came. He had begun to move to dodge, Severus’ wand in the middle of casting a counter Charm. Instead, the jet of red struck him in the chest and I could see the breath being stolen from his lungs, visible breathe sucked out into the night air.

Draco’s body flew backward, his cloak flapping on the air, his long silver hair flying free, and his face pale with shock. His body arched high, and in the slow progression of time, I watched in horror when he landed, his head smashing into the statue of a marble angel, shattering the stone wings before he hit the ground, disturbing the grass and dust. His silver eye was open wide, his mouth open slightly, and he did not move.

“NO!” I screamed, and time reoriented itself.

Harry was cackling, his stub of a right hand against his belly as he bent over laughing.

I whirled back to face Harry, breathing through flaring nostrils, my wands up to attack.

“Harry Potter!” I screamed, and before Harry could straighten to gaze back at me—he was hanging upside down.

Levicorpus!

Gefesselt!

Harry’s laughs had turned to bestial screams as he found himself hanging by one leg from the branches of the yew tree, his arms bound behind his back. His wand had fallen to the ground below and his hair hanged in matted tangles. Also hanging, from his neck, was the Time-Turner.

“Hermione!” he wailed, struggling to free himself and failing miserably as the Conjured ropes dug into his leg and arms.

With Harry incapacitated, I turned to move to Draco, my eyes burning.

“Hermione!”

I paid Harry no mind as I slid down the embankment, stumbling to run to Draco’s side.

“No…”

I collided with the black clad figure of the one Harry had called Erebus, falling back to land on my ass. The voice was otherworldly, and an icy hand of fear gripped my heart.

No, Miss Granger, you must finish!

My chest was heaving, but I jumped to my feet, spinning to move around the figure of Erebus to get to Draco. I had to get to Draco.

No! Potter first!

I shook my head roughly even as the figure of Erebus glided to block my path again. I sidestepped in the other direction only to be blocked.

“Move, damn you!” I screamed, my wands rising.

And then I found my face in the ground. I had been struck. I could only see darkness for an instance, the force of the blow nearly knocking me out cold.

Regaining my bearings, I snarled, climbing to my feet again, only to have my wands knocked free from my hands and my body fly halfway up the embankment to Harry’s snarling, laughing body.

“Kill her, Erebus, kill her!” Harry spat, but was ignored as Erebus’s gloved hand rose, again a finger pointing, but not at me.

The black phantom was pointing to Harry.

“Draco! Draco!” I screamed, again ignoring the phantom.

Again, I ran, spinning around the phantom, but found that I had been caught, a black-gloved hand wrenching away my cloak, the fastening below my throat ripping so that my Transfigured cloak fell to the ground.

I did not make it two steps past the phantom before I was struck again, this time across the face and belly so that I flew back into the embankment again.

What are you doing, Hermione? Potter! You must finish Potter!…Severus roared.

I shook my head again, trying to shake off the ringing in my ears from the strike across my face. I crawled to my feet again and found that Erebus was again pointing at Harry.

I struggled to calm my breathing, and knelt down again. Harry’s protector would not let me pass to see to my own, my Draco. I could not see my wands anywhere, and I tried to summon them with my mind, but they did not come as they should have.

Stop wasting time, Hermione. Kill Potter before he manages to free himself!

I winced, and spat blood from my mouth crudely. I could feel a molar was loose in my mouth from Erebus’s cruel punches, my cheek was bleeding far more than it should.

My hand slipped into my boot where Lucius’ dagger was strapped to my leg. I had not forgotten about the enchanted blade, for I had felt it hum against my skin as I moved. Slipping the cool metal in to my hand, I stood, staring at where Erebus’s face should have been. With a jerk of the phantom’s arm, it pointed at Harry.

Straightening my back, I took a deep breath, trying to see Draco’s body, but was blocked by Erebus’s dark aura and clothing.

I turned, taking a few wobbly steps up the embankment to face Harry, the stiletto in my hand.

“Erebus!” Harry screamed, his eyes moving to the blade in my right hand.

“He won’t help you, Harry.”

Harry’s eyes widened, and his face contorted, even more distorted as he hanged upside down.

“You cannot kill me, Hermione,” he snarled.

I stepped closer so that I was feet away from Harry’s head, which hanged as low as my belly.

I spat more blood and winced as my cheek twitched and the cut stung.

“I can and I will.”

Harry began laughing, straining at his bonds again, the yew tree whining as Harry jerked.

“No, you cannot and will not. If you kill me…Ron will hate you! I will hate you!”

I licked my lips and took a step forward.

“I HATE YOU!” he screamed at me.

I lifted my chin to stare at Harry down the bridge of my nose.

“Ron wanted me to kill you…do you want to know why?

Harry cackled, his eyes flashing. “Ron would never say that.”

“Because of what you did to me…to George…to Ginny…to Minerva…to Aberforth…to Trelawney…and yes, even to the Dursleys. I am sure there are many others…other who have been hurt by your madness, Harry.

So let’s just say, both of your friends have left you…because of you…Harry,” I whispered, shifting the handle in my blade in my palm.

“LIAR! This is a lie, you, Malfoy, all a lie! You belong to me! Me!

How dare you do this! HOW DARE YOU!”

I blinked at him—he was trying to delay the inevitable. And with a grunt, I lifted the stiletto and rushed forward, grasping the chain of the Time-Turner off his neck….

…and burying the stiletto into his heart.

I stumbled back just as Harry’s blood spurted from his chest, hastily slipping the Time-Turner about my neck. Harry’s face was coated in his own blood, but he stared at me, mouth open, and only guttural words coming out.

“I…” he gasped. “I did not think you’d actually do…it…” he rasped as his blood began to pool on the ground below.

I choked at the sight and smell of his blood and his face, which was smoothing out in death into one I recognized, and had once loved.

“I…loved…” he gasped, eyes wide, “…you…”

I took a step forward as the blood began to lessen, my eyes moving from the green handle of the stiletto buried deep in Harry Potter’s chest, to his flickering eyelids and his long, gurgling exhale.

When my hand touched his bloody face, I let out a sob.

It was finished…

But…

As soon as Harry’s last breath was spent, something happened that I would have never expected.

A flash of light seemed to explode from Harry’s dangling body, followed by a violent wave of magic. I found myself flying backward, and the Time-Turner on my chest glowing…

The latch securing the hourglass snapped free and suddenly the cemetery disappeared in a rush even as I flew. What was possibly only three seconds, turned into minutes as my eyes stared at the Time-Turner, hanging by its chain about my neck, whirled and turned—turning time.

All I could think was: fuck.

I landed roughly, my temple caught a weathered grave marker somewhere in time, and I saw and thought no more.