Good Girl Goes Bad

The ball

Hermione and Draco delved into Draco's veela heritage during their breaks whilst continuing to study for their classes. Poring over ancient texts often left them each with some form of headache, but they felt it was worth it for the Malfoy family veela secrets they were able to uncover. As they spent more and more time together their bond grew stronger as they navigated their ever-changing relationship and the rumours spreading throughout the students of Hogwarts regarding Hermione's transformation.

As well as the rumours regarding Draco and Hermione's evident relationship and whether Draco had influenced her negatively, whispers begin about the sightings of one Ronald Weasley conversing happily with Pansy Parkinson despite his earlier outbursts about his sister spending time with those with a checkered past in the war. Hermione is happy to find that sparks fly for her friends as they've been caught flirting on numerous occasions (whether or not they'd realised they were doing it). As their unexpected friendship blossoms, they tackle the challenges presented to them involving Ron's depression at the loss of Lavender causing their connection to strengthen as time goes on.

As Draco navigates his changing energies from the assertion of his veela blood he can often be found flying his broom down at the quidditch pitch to clear his mind and sort through the magical roller coaster ride that is his newly established veela psyche and his regular Draco thought processes.

This is where Hermione finds him the week of the Malfoy family ball.

"Draco!" She calls as she enters the pitch, spotting the blonde running cycles of quidditch plays in the centre of the space.

He flies down gracefully to her and jumps to the ground in one smooth move before leaning against his broom, the classic Nimbus 2000.

"Hey Mia, you okay?" he queries softly with a kiss on her cheek in greeting.

"Yeah, I'm just worried about you, what's been going on with you lately?" she asked, referring to his recent search for solitude.

"This veela thing is just a lot" he shrugged, a frustrated frown on his face.

"Well, do you want to talk about it? You know I'm here for you Dray" she smiled gently, placing her hand on his cheek, her thumb doing soft swipes just under his eye.

"It's just a lot to get used to" he began, taking her hand in his and placing a kiss to her palm, before leading her over to the stands so they could sit and talk. "It's like I have this other person in my head but at the same time it's me, just more possessive of you. And then I get so emotional for no reason other than a speck of dust on my clothes it seems. I just don't know what to do, I know my feelings for you are genuine, I've loved you long enough to know it's not from the veela imperative but at the same time there's this overwhelming need to be with you which feels oppressive and above everything else" he ranted, pacing back and forth in front of her.

"You love me?" she asked shyly, her hands twisting about themselves as her fingers twitched to reach out to him.

Draco stopped short, blushing furiously as he realised what had slipped out during his rant. He slow turned to face her once more, his right hand coming up to rub the back of his neck as he sheepishly said "well ... yeah".

"I... I love you too Draco" she grinned before standing and hugging him tight.

"Oh, thank Merlin" he breathed, burying his head in the crook of her neck and breathing in the fresh strawberry apple scent of her chocolate curls.

"Have you talked to your mother about this Draco?" Hermione then asked.

"What? About loving you?" he replied confused