Chapter Text
Centre Hospitalier de Poissy
The next morning, the air in Paris carried the kind of brightness that made even ordinary streets feel significant.
Hermione dressed with quiet precision, her hands steady though Harry noticed the slight crease between her brows that never smoothed out.
He didn’t press. Instead, he held the car door for her when they set off, their silence companionable but edged with weight.
The hospital hadn’t changed much. The façade was the same pale stone, a little worn at the edges, the kind of place built more for utility than warmth.
Inside, the tiled floors and antiseptic scent struck Hermione immediately.
She paused just a fraction at the threshold, but then squared her shoulders and stepped forward.
Harry caught up beside her, his hand brushing hers in subtle reassurance.
The records office was tucked down a dim corridor, lined with filing cabinets and old computers humming faintly.
A clerk—a woman in her late fifties with reading glasses perched low on her nose—looked up when Hermione approached.
“In need copies of my medical records,” Hermione explained in fluent French, her tone brisk. “Admission, delivery, and discharge. May 2, 1999.”
The clerk nodded, slid a form across. Hermione filled it without hesitation, then passed it back.
Minutes later, a slim folder was set before them. Hermione’s name was printed across the top in faded ink. Her fingers hovered above it for a second before she opened it.
Together, she and Harry pored over the contents at a side desk. Operative notes. Emergency caesarean section for foetal distress. Severe pre-eclampsia complicated by eclampsia, cardiac arrest, and post-delivery intubation. Five-day hospital admission.
Hermione turned each page with the same meticulous care she gave to research.
Every clinical phrase was a reminder of the violence her body had endured, the risks she had never been conscious enough to weigh.
He stayed close, his hand resting against the back of her chair, steadying without pressing, willing his presence to blunt the sharp edges of the words.
Then they reached it: a consent form dated the day of the caesarean. The signature beneath was her father’s.
Hermione’s gaze caught on it, her lips pressing into a fine line. “That part makes sense,” she said, her tone clipped but not cold.
“I wasn’t in any state to sign. With pre-eclampsia as severe as mine, they had to move quickly. Emergency caesarean sections are supposed to happen within thirty minutes of identifying foetal distress. Dad was with me… -next of kin—they needed his consent.”
Her hand hovered above the page, fingers twitching. “There were complications during surgery. My blood pressure was unstable, they told me later. And after… I seized. Eclampsia.” She swallowed, eyes flicking away. “I remember almost nothing, just—just a voice, the paediatrician maybe, saying he wasn’t crying.”
Harry reached out, covering her hand before she could draw it back.
She exhaled shakily. “That’s why this signature doesn’t disturb me. It was standard. What disturbs me is what followed. The documents I never saw. The choices I never made. What they may have slid beneath his name, after I was gone.”
Hermione then asked, in French, whether the hospital retained infant records linked to her medical file.
The records officer consulted a ledger, lips pressed together. “There is a linked entry,” she admitted. “But to access a newborn’s discharge file, you must provide proof of legal standing. As it stands, the paperwork in this file does not establish that.”
Hermione’s hand stilled on the desk. Harry felt the shift beside him — her composure stretched thin.
The officer’s tone remained neutral. “Without that standing, those records remain protected under privacy law. You would need to pursue this through legal channels.”
She closed the folder carefully, as though even paper could shatter. Then Hermione turned to the clerk, her voice clear and deliberate:
“We believe a child was removed from this hospital under forged consent. We are requesting all documentation and staff records related to that event.”
The clerk hesitated, eyes flicking between Hermione and Harry, then disappeared into the back office.
When she returned, her expression had cooled into bureaucratic neutrality. “I cannot provide you with those files. They are categorized separately, under privacy laws.”
Hermione’s eyes sharpened, but she inclined her head. “Then I will put this in writing.”
From her bag, she withdrew a folded document — two copies, one in French, one in English — and placed them on the desk with quiet finality.
The clerk took the letters with careful fingers, sliding them into a tray marked juridique. “You will be contacted,” she said coolly, her tone unyielding.
Hermione slipped the last document into the folder and snapped it shut. The motion was brisk, decisive, but Harry could see the faint tremor in her hands.
He reached out, laying his palm over hers before she could stand. “Wait.”
She stilled, eyes flicking to him.
Harry swallowed; his throat suddenly tight.
The words pushed out, rougher than he meant. “You could have died.” He tapped the folder, then drew his hand back as though the paper itself burned him.
“Severe pre-eclampsia. Seizures. Cardiac Arrest. Emergency surgery—Hermione, you—Merlin.” His breath hitched. “I nearly lost you.”
Her expression softened, and she turned fully to him. “But you didn’t,” she said quietly, as if it were the simplest truth in the world. She reached up and cupped his cheek, thumb brushing the line of his beard. “I’m here, Harry. I’m right here.”
He caught her hand and pressed it to his lips, eyes closing. “The thought of you… lying there, and me not even knowing—” He broke off, shaking his head, chest tight with a surge of helpless anger at himself, at Ginny, at her father, at the years stolen.
Hermione leaned closer, resting her forehead against his. “That’s why we’re doing this,” she whispered. “Not just for Haiden. For us. To reclaim what was stolen, yes—but also to remind ourselves that we survived. Both of us.”
Harry let out a long breath, shaky but steadier with her warmth pressed against him.
His arms came around her, pulling her close until the muted noise of the hospital dissolved around them. “You’re stronger than anyone I know,” he murmured into her hair. “Stronger than me.”
Her lips curved against his neck. “Nonsense,” she said softly. “You’ve always been my strength, Harry. Even when you weren’t here.”
For a long moment, they just breathed together—her steady, him ragged until it smoothed. Only then did Hermione pull back, brushing her fingers over his jaw with quiet resolve.
She looked at him, her voice calm but carrying the weight of resolve. “It’s already two. We should head straight to a solicitor. If the hospital won’t give us answers, we’ll need someone who can demand them.”
Harry held her gaze, his answer steady, without a flicker of doubt. “All right. I’m with you, love. Wherever this takes us.”