Chapter Text
Hermione stared at the letter in her hands until the candle burned low beside her bed.
The ink — or blood — refused to fade.
She tried every spell she knew, even a quick dip in a revealing potion she snuck from Slughorn’s stores. Nothing changed. The message remained.
“The bond is older than you know. Do not trust the castle.”
She didn’t sleep that night.
Because for the first time… she believed it.
---
The next day, she didn’t bother sneaking off alone. She walked straight up to Draco in the middle of the courtyard, shoved the letter into his chest, and hissed, “Read.”
He scanned it, jaw tightening, and said nothing. But his knuckles whitened.
“We’re being watched,” she said. “Maybe followed. And the bond is… it’s doing something to me. To my magic.”
Draco glanced around, then tugged her behind a column. “What do you mean?”
“I levitated three desks in Charms without a wand. I didn’t even realize I’d done it until Flitwick gave me house points.”
His eyes widened. “That’s not normal.”
“I know.”
They stared at each other for a long moment — and then the bond pulsed again.
Hard.
It knocked the air out of both of them, a wave of gold and heat crashing through their bodies like fire.
Hermione gasped, stumbling. Draco caught her by the shoulders.
“I saw—” she panted. “Draco, I saw something—”
“So did I.”
They looked at each other, both pale. Both shaking.
It had been a memory.
But not theirs.
A boy with Draco’s face and a girl with Hermione’s curls, standing in the middle of a battlefield centuries old — wands raised, backs to each other. A flash of a kiss. Blood on their hands. A final spell cast in unison.
And the sound of a name being erased from the fabric of time.
---
Later, in the Room of Threads — as they’d started to call it — the basin shimmered again. They didn’t have to touch it this time.
The room wanted them to see.
A vision hovered above the basin: two figures, cloaked and hooded, binding their magic with golden thread. The woman’s voice echoed:
"When our world falls, may our souls find each other again — across lifetimes, across blood, across war."
Hermione whispered, “They were reborn.”
Draco nodded slowly. “Us.”
The room pulsed once.
And then… the walls darkened.
A second voice — ancient, cold, and cracking like thunder — echoed from nowhere:
"The bond must be severed, or fate will bleed magic dry again. They must not remember who they were. They must not awaken."
The vision vanished.
Hermione grabbed Draco’s hand without thinking. “Someone cursed us.”
“Someone still wants us dead.”
---
When they left the room, everything felt sharper. The castle halls too quiet. The portraits too still. Even the staircases seemed to hesitate as they passed.
And watching from the shadows, one figure smiled.
They’d waited a long time for the bond to reawaken.
This time, they would be ready.
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