Secrets and Masks

20. Angels in the gardens

10th March

"Time heals all wounds."

Funny, Hermione had never really paid much attention to that phrase before, just considered it something her frail, declining hero of a grandfather used to say.

"Time heals all wounds, my darling," he used to say to anyone who needed to hear it, a twinkle in his eyes and moustache crinkling with his smile. "Time, and a good cup of tea."

No matter how shallow or mountainous a problem was, they were his answer to everything.

He would murmur it to her grandmother whenever he put the kettle on the stove - even as technology advanced, he'd refused to adapt, and preferred the old method of pot and fire to heat his beloved cup of tea. Said it tasted better. Hermione agreed.

He'd said it to Hermione's mother as he added milk and two sugars - just the way she liked it - and handed her a mug after she'd had a near-miss car accident.

He'd hushed it into Hermione's hair when she fell off her bicycle as a child. And that time she was bitten by a squirrel.

He'd even said it at her grandmothers funereal, whispered it under his breath as he'd watched the coffin that held his soulmate be lowered into the ground, his parting love letter to her carried by the wind until they would meet again.

Hermione was sure she'd found the one thing that time, or even the best cup of tea, could never heal.

She was certain, as she lay screaming in a bath filled with Seamus's blood, that time couldn't heal the crater that was forming in her chest.

She knew, as Astoria lathered her hair with shampoo and pealed chunks of matted flesh from her curls, that no amount of time could heal this pain, this wrenching fucking grief that felt like her spine had been ripped from her body and was being used to strangle her with.

No, time couldn't heal this.

Not in a week.

Not in a month.

Not even in a year.

And a good cup of fucking tea certainly wouldn't do the job either.

28th March

"What do you think, Hermione?" Astoria chirped. "Which do you prefer?"

Hermione's head snapped up to stare at the two different bunches of flowers Astoria was holding over the new vase on her bedside table; white roses, or pink peonies.

Hermione gave a tight-lipped smile, then turned in her perch to face the window again. "l'll leave it up to you. Your taste is much better than mine.

Astoria sighed heavily behind her, a little defeated, then started clipping the flowers with her wand.

In the weeks following Seamus's death, after Astoria had washed the blood from Hermione's hair, after she'd held her in the bath while she'd sobbed and mourned her friend, she'd barely left Hermione's side. She became like a protective mother bee, constantly fussing and hovering over Hermione's every move.

Despite her small size and delicate demeanour, her protectiveness was far more effective than Hermione would have given her credit for. None of the men would go near Hermione if Astoria was around. Wouldn't so much as step over the threshold into her bedroom if Astoria was perched on the window ledge with her. Not her husband. Not Nott. And not even the Demon Mask to who the window belonged.

Hermione had refused to leave her room since the attack. She didn't want to. The thought of running into Malfoy, the thought of seeing the puppet master behind her marionette strings made her skin crawl.