Anchor and Rose | Dramione

Twenty-Eight.

Apparently, the moment Hermione stepped into Grimmauld Place, she passed out as soon as Walburga Black's portrait began to scream at her.

She didn't wake for what felt like days, and when she did, she felt rather disoriented and rather sick. She woke to a soft thudding in her forehead and a dull piercing ache in her bones.

There was a tedious burning on her forearm that she tried desperately to ignore.

The room she had woken in was dark, and if it wasn't for the soft sheets draped over her body, she would've thought she was back inside the Manor's dungeon.

When Hermione's eyes focused and adjusted to the light, she could see a tall thin lamp holding a beaten candle burning, engulfing a small dresser, green and gold wallpaper, and a bookshelf holding hundreds of old artefacts in a warm yellow light.

She then realised, with a warm beating feeling coasting through her veins, this had been the room she occupied with Ginny all those years ago, when Grimmauld Place remained as the headquarters for The Order Of The Phoenix.

Though she didn't have time to dwell on her surroundings, because the door was being pushed open with a loud creak, and in walked Luna.

"Hermione, are you awake?" Her voice was quiet, fearful almost. Hermione sat up against the headboard with a hiss of pain and gave her a smile. "Ah, good, you're up..."

Luna sat beside the bed on what Hermione assumed was a stool and switched on the bedside lamp, coating her in light.

"How are you feeling now?" She asked, her face twitching with some sort of nervousness. "The swelling on your face is almost all gone, which is good. You've been asleep for about twelve hours, without any dreamless sleep potion..."

"I'm-" Hermione's voice came out much more coarse than she had expected it to, and had to clear her throat harshly before speaking. "I'm okay, I guess, I'm just a little confused."

Luna pursed her lips together and ran her fingers over the dreadlock falling over her torso, fingering it apprehensively.

"Yes, I assumed you would be." Luna sighed, "Let me explain it to you, but your head must still hurt, doesn't it? Try your best to understand, okay?"

And then Luna rambled on for what felt like hours.

She started by speaking about why she was even at Malfoy Manor in the first place. The Snatchers had kidnapped Luna in a bid to stop her father publishing any more provocative Quibbler issues. Apparently, he had taken a liking to brandishing drawings of Voldemort's head sitting on a chicken's body.

Then, she very slowly and very carefully explained why and how Pansy Parkinson was staying at Grimmauld Place.

"It's best if you hear it from her, but she's-well she is somewhat apprehensive to speak to you. So I'll try my best to explain it from her side of things." Luna started, propping her elbows up on the bed. "All that stuff, in the papers, about her and Theodore Nott-"

She paused, took a deep breath and rested a hand on top of Hermione's. "It's rubbish. Absolute rubbish."

Hermione's head began to pound with confusion.

"But how-"

She paused when the door creaked open and Pansy Parkinson's face poked around the edge of the door, the candle catching the speckles of green within her eyes and making them glimmer beneath it.

"Am I interrupting?" She asked, her voice small. "I can come back later, when she feels better? Draco is insisting I speak to her now, but if she's sick-"