When the time finally elapsed she got up and went into the bathroom. She pulled out every remaining vial of potion and poured them down the sink before dropping the vials into the bin.
When she looked up the portrait was there, watching her in the mirror. Always watching. Always silent.
Hermione gave her a bitter smile and then slumped to the ground.
The pale young witch stared at Hermione.
Hermione felt cold, as though she were going into shock. She curled up into a tight ball, hugging her knees and trying to breathe.
She was going to go mad.
She was going to go mad.
She couldn't keep holding on. She didn't even know why she was holding on. Why she hadn't just let herself go while she was locked under Hogwarts.
Malfoy Manor was worse.
She buried her face in her hands. She could feel the fluids from herself and Malfoy on her thighs.
She fell asleep on the floor.
<p>Chapter 23</p>Hermione was standing in the kitchen of Spinner's End. She turned slowly, looking over the surfaces covered with notebooks, prepared ingredients and bubbling potions.
Hermione paused as she noticed one potion shimmering in the corner. She stepped over and watched the spiraling steam rising from the surface. She sniffed it surreptitiously. The spicy, earthy scent of oak moss, smoky undertones of cedar, the bruised scent of oxidizing leaves, and parchment — no. She sniffed again. Papyrus.
She stepped abruptly away and glanced at the other surrounding cauldrons.
"This is quite a variety of love potions you're brewing," she said, looking over to where Severus was stooped over a simmering cauldron.
"A new project for the Dark Lord. He's suddenly developed an interest in trying to weaponise it," Severus said, sneering down at the murky, lumescent liquid he was working over.
Hermione felt her blood run cold. "Is that a possibility?"
Severus shrugged with a faint smile. "I am both skeptical and unmotivated, so most likely not. I believe it was more of a passing notion than anything he has a sincere interest in. I'm drawing up a comprehensive report to present in case he asks about it. And I'm doing it in my home rather than in the lab to ensure no one offers any groundbreaking ideas."
Hermione surveyed the room. There were ten varieties of love potion and a few aphrodisiacs she recognised, as well as an additional fifteen that appeared experimental.
"What would constitute as a weaponised love potion?"
"Something of exceptional power that doesn't require redosage. I believe he images himself using it for interrogations."
"That's — obscene," Hermione finally said.
"Indeed. Fortunately, or perhaps unfortunately, he has other matters he regards as more urgent for Sussex to focus on."
Hermione woke, still lying on the cold floor of the bathroom. She continued to lie there; if there were an upside to her depression it was that it made sleeping easier. It was as though her body had given up. The rage she'd spent months cultivating had melted away and she was left tired and listless, as though her body weighed too much to even carry across the floor.
She could sleep and sleep in a state of despair for most of the day.
