The Prime Princess

Blaise stood up to Cith with his sidearm and a wand. Cith seemed to be confused by the wooden stick for a second but on the next she had him face down and groaning. Draco hadn’t moved at all. He was slashed up to unrecognizing, covered with grime and burns. Cith swung her gauge at him and placed her finger on the 14-pound trigger. Cith pulled the first couple of notches and held the trigger partly tensed as she stepped to Draco and shoved the barrel right in his face.

“Bye Draco!” said Cith singing and felt the tiny hitch right before the smooth home stretch as she pulled the trigger even more. Just few more pounds and… The barrel started to shake a little, her hand was unsteady and fingers felt sweaty. Cith stared down at her traitorous hand and was about to switch when she suddenly couldn’t breath. Collapsing, she let go of the rifle and grasped at her throat.
***
“Draco… Oh my God,” gasped Hermione, crawling on her knees and hands next to bloody Draco. Her head was a mess, everything was spinning but in the center of the whirlpool was a blond wizard.

“Please, be alive,” she whispered and placed her fingers on his neck. After awhile she finally found his weak pulse and sighed. Hermione gathered him into her lap and cradled him.

“So sorry…” sniffed Hermione and held back her tears that scraped her throat. “I didn’t mean to… all of this… it just took over,” sobbed Hermione and held Draco close to her. The Mark inside her palm was glowing as it brushed over Draco’s face. The symbol of Eternity shined stronger every time Hermione opened up her heart.

“I wish… oh,” sighed Hermione and let her marked hand linger on his cheek as she tried to figure things out. Suddenly a hand shoot out and seized her arm. Hermione gasped and stared into azure blue eyes of Blaise.

The Mark burned brightly against Draco’s skin and the pulsing sensation surged through Hermione’s hand and spread all over. Blaise’s eyes shot wide open as he felt the Mark making its way up his hand, crawling under his skin, making everything prickle.

Hermione gazed at Blaise without blinking and silently asked forgiveness. She had lost her voice but not the need to apologize, explain things she herself didn’t understand and make things better again. Blaise’s face expressed shock but his hand gripped even harder at her hand. He held her gaze for a long time until the current flowing between them became too much to stand. Ripping free, he fell aside and the eye contact was broken. Hermione’s eyes flew to Draco in her lap and she gasped.

“How’s…” she wanted to ask but was too stunned. Draco was looking up at her with his silver eyes shining in the light of a new mark on his cheek. Three rings entwined together. Massive injuries had faded into unnoticeable scratches on both wizards and that puzzled Hermione even more. She raised her hand and looked at her Mark that had also transformed into Three Rings. Next to them, Blaise tried to stand up and rubbed his forearm.

“Nice mark you got there,” commented Draco groggily and closed his eyes to take a breath. Blaise found his Mark on his forearm and stared it.

“You… you marked me?!”

“I...” Hermione startled and then something hit her. “Paris!”

All three turned their gazes at the Major who lay down in the sand. Hermione’s discolored eyes welled up in tears when she remembered her deeds as Cith. She eased Draco off of her and staggered to her feet. Blaise followed her.

Major Paris was breathing raggedly but he was alive. Hermione fell down beside him and reached out to him but was afraid to touch him, she was afraid to hurt him even more. Paris smiled with an effort and took her shaking hands and pressed them onto his chest.

“I never stop loving you,” told Paris. Hermione whimpered and hot tears started to fall.

“Hey, it’s okay,” hushed Paris and looked over her shoulder at Blaise. “I see you have defeated Cith. Don’t cry. It’s all right. I finally feel I have given a part of me to save one of you, Hermione.”

“No,” wailed Hermione, “Don’t say such things!”

“Take care of them,” said Paris, brought her hands to his lips and kissed her wrists.

“Paris,” sobbed Hermione, “You-you are not gonna…” She even couldn’t finish her sentence because the thought of it took all the strength. Hermione stared with teary eyes at fading Paris and leaned down. Her lips only grazed his but it was enough to bring a spark back to his eyes.

“You’ll go back to Hel and she’ll cure you from death,” whispered Hermione, looking deeply into his eyes. Kissing him briefly, she took his arm, twisted it around and activated the Dialing Arrival Dimension and Home device. Paris smirked and the opening portal beneath him in the sand sucked him into violet halo.

Blaise watched her a long time and let her calm down before he went to her and folded his arms around her. Finally he was able to do that again. It felt like years he hadn’t touched her, held her in his arms. Her, Hermione, the Hermione he knew before all this. She turned around in his arms and encircled her hands around his neck, pulling him into her. They just sat there sprawled out on the sand, hugging each other.

“When it’s gonna end?” asked Hermione in low voice. Blaise stroked her long languidly curly hair and inhaled her scent before answering.

“When the end comes.”

“And it just may never come,” said Draco, limping to the cuddling couple and falling down next to them. He was tired but wanted some attention. His plan had worked and he congratulated himself. Hermione had come over Cith with compassion the Hell Bitch never knew.

“Then we’ll make it come,” replied Hermione, entangled one of her arm and pulled Draco into a hug. He let her drag him closer to her until he was in the bundle of hands surrounding him. That’s what he had been missing so long – closeness to Hermione and Blaise. But mainly he had missed her.

They didn’t know how long they had been tangled up but at one point they heard a howling scream whooshing over their heads. Looking up, they saw a titanic ship, a shape of a golden sphere falling down. It was burning in flames and bits and pieces were shattering off of it like comets.

“Oh my God, it’s a Hiveship,” gasped Hermione, thinking of the millions of lives it supported.

“They’ve found it,” cursed Draco and got to his feet, helping Hermione stand up.

“What are we gonna do? Ancient drove it out of the Void and blasted it down here. I can’t imagine how many ships it would take to shoot down a Hive,” asked Blaise and squinted his eyes to count the endless armada scurrying over the sky after the Hiveship.

“Well, we do have a Fighter and a Glider, so there’s a chance to get off this rock before this humongous Hive drops on us and smashes us,” said Draco and pointed out to two vessels capable of flying.

“And then what?” asked Blaise, as he and Hermione ran to the Glider.

“We’ll swing it!” shouted Draco and headed for the Fighter he had learned to drive on the first day on Galantea. It was a smaller ship, a faster one and definitely much meaner machine than Glider.

Blaise and Hermione ran up the ramp of the Glider and strapped themselves in, as Blaise started the engines and took over the controls. A bigger chunks of the Hiveship started to rain around them and Hermione recognized a ripped out stasis pod with someone in it. Was this person alive? She guessed not.

“Get us away from here!” screamed Hermione as another hunk of steel nearly missed them on the way up.

“Relax, Mione, I’m here,” hushed Blaise and guided the ship out of the metal rain. Hermione shivered in her chair next to Blaise and tried to force the visions of dead people out of her head. When she opened her eyes, she saw black space with glittering starts she wasn’t familiar with.

“Where are we?” she finally asked and Blaise drew out a star map over the projected screen. The database identified it as Moon Elen.

“We are not even close to Earth?” squealed Hermione quietly and started processing it. A Fighter flew past them and then turned around and started circling them. Blaise opened a radio channel.

“We’d better get out of this Solar system or we’d be sitting ducks for Ancients,” said Blaise over the radio.

“You’ve got a point there but I’d really like to kick some Ancient butt!” answered Draco and did a 360 with the Fighter. Blaise smirked as Draco was showing off and testing his birdie.

“You’ve got a plan?” asked Blaise, intrigued.

“Sure I got! We go in, whoop some ass and come out and get some medals!”

“That’s your plan?! So why not take down all of them?”

“Yeah, now you’re talkin’!”

“I think he’s high,” murmured Hermione suspiciously.

“Of course he’s high. We’re on the orbit!” said Blaise sarcastically.

“So, who’s in?” asked Draco and did another 360 in front of them. Blaise looked at Hermione who was shrugging her shoulders.

“I’m in,” said Blaise.

“Mione?”

Hermione bite her lower lip and mulled over it a bit. All this was new but she felt Morrigan inside her supporting her actions and giving her some advice.

“I guess I’m in,” she finally said and Draco’s cry of joy filled the air.

“We’re gonna kick some ass or what!” yelled Draco.

“He’s really high,” stated Hermione with a chuckle.