Carpathian

Two Weeks Later - Thursday, 5:32 pm

Nowhere in the timeline did it mention how Draco had run to avoid a loveless marriage despite it fitting his pureblood expectations. Not a single word about the Dark Mark he had covered less than a year after the war had ended. No description of how he cared for the dragons. How he had spent the past four years devoid of his wealth to escape the pain of his past. How he shed his old persona like an outgrown skin and accepted complacency as the closest thing he'd ever find to true happiness. No friendship with Charlie Weasley or Muggleborns Markus and Aurel. No helping Walker so that he, too, could be a dragon keeper without magical powers of his own. No actual depiction of who Draco Malfoy was today. Those truths were immaterial in the prospect of profit.

Each word made her ache, made her want to barge into the Daily Prophet and set the record straight , made her understand why it had been easier for Draco to escape everything he'd ever known when this was the welcome party the world had awaiting him. The coverage went on for days. Each minuscule aspect of the night's events was stretched and expanded until every last Knut was wrung out of the story. Co-workers glanced her way; Ron and Harry exchanged furtive looks.

Hermione didn't mention Draco either.

Harry and Ron were waiting for her to bring it up. Hermione understood that. They were letting Hermione be the one to share what had happened between her and Draco—the moments not disclosed in the Auror reports. To explain what in Merlin's name would cause him to take that curse for her. But it was none of their business. At least, not yet. Not while she and Draco had matters they still needed to discuss themselves.

The only person to bring him up was Daphne, and even then, it hadn't been by name. Hermione had been in her office a grand total of eighty-seven minutes on Monday morning when Daphne barged past Harry and flung open the door to Hermione's office.

She held Friday's edition of the Daily Prophet in her lifted grip. "Dare I ask what this is?"

At the insistent look on Daphne's face, Hermione felt her first smile in days. Leave it to Daphne and her garrulous interests to be the first one to crack. But unlike Ron and Harry—and despite the dubious history between Draco and the Greengrass family—Daphne was, perhaps, the person who could possibly understand the situation best. After all, at one point, even if only briefly, she and Draco had been friends, too.

So Hermione told her everything. Their abrupt first encounter and his subsequent avoidance of the bonfire. The initial peace offering by means of a single four prong fork. His appeal to her for help. The insistence that she stay. The tattoo that covered his Dark Mark; the conflict he felt for abandoning his family, London, and Astoria without a single goodbye; the strides he made to prove he was a better man.

By the end of it, Daphne was staring at her in pure amazement.

"Draco's been in Romania this entire time?"

Hermione nodded.

"Doing physical labour?"

Another nod.

"And you fancy him?"

Hermione frazzled. "I— What?"

Okay, so maybe Hermione hadn't told Daphne everything. But from the undeniable blush that scorched her cheeks, Hermione knew Daphne had tricked the whole truth out of her. There was no denying it. Even if the picture hadn't spoken countless volumes, Hermione knew how she felt about Draco.

While it had taken eighty-seven minutes for Daphne to barge into her office, it had only taken thirteen for Hermione to submit her two-week notice.

It was the easiest decision she had ever made. Now, however, came the difficult part.