Draco sat up in bed on top of the coverlet, wearing a black tee and boxers and holding a bottle of firewhiskey. His pocket watch was perched atop a pillow, lighting up the small space.
He'd been haunting the school corridors since dinner, unsure of what he sought. All day he'd felt a familiar thrumming in his veins, that low-level rage just under his skin. It had been a constant companion during the war and now it had returned, accompanied by a twisting in the gut. He didn't understand it. Even the watch seemed to sense something, ticking low and steady in time with his blood.
Upon returning in his bedroom, he was treated to an owl from his mother. He had sent a note thanking her for the wands and this was what he had. Good deeds never paid.
Dearest son:
A wild rainstorm swept Wiltshire last night, bringing ominous portents. The peacock coops were flooded, and a few feathers made their way into the Manor, a clear sign of loss, misfortune, illness or death.
Beware.
Draco shook his head over the parchment before tossing it into the fire. Those creepy birds had always hated him.
He retreated to his bed with a bottle of firewhiskey, grateful that Tennant was off somewhere. For over an hour he drank steadily, ignoring the faint rustling sounds under his bed. The Belladonna was restive. Even worse, the whiskey was getting low—soon there would be none to share. As if a certain Gryffindor prude would deign to put that smart mouth on his bottle anyway. "That's not on the table, Malfoy."
Growling, he flung the bottle to shatter against the bedpost, spilling its contents in a brown-orange trickle onto the coverlet, which promptly began to smolder. The pocket watch's ticking grew louder and faster. That was when Granger arrived, of course, right on the dot of ten. She still wore that tight dress she'd been parading around in all day, in front of everybody.
"Granger," he spat. "Sorry to ruin your night."
She looked from the whiskey-covered bedpost to the now-smoking coverlet to him. "You're drunk."
"You should try it sometime."
"I have." Granger unwound her purse strap from that distracting torso. "It doesn't work."
He leaned closer. "It works all too well."
She pushed him away, hard enough so he fell back against another bedpost. "You reek of whiskey, Malfoy. And there's glass everywhere. What is wrong with you?"
Draco barked a laugh. "So many things. Where do I start?" He closed his eyes, unable to look at her—so vivid and bright, hissing like a teakettle.
The warm hand on his forehead took him by surprise, and his eyes popped open. Her face filled his vision, and when she sat back, putting space between them again, he could see she had vanished the tiny, heatless flames as well as the spilled firewhiskey and shattered bottle.
"Where were you?" he demanded. "You're still dressed."
"Well spotted."
"Where were you?" No answer. "Were you with him?" Again, no answer. Draco lunged forward and grabbed her arm. "Tell me!"
Instantly he felt a wand point under his chin. "Get ... your ... hand ... off ... me."
Draco fell backward again and looked down at his clenched fists. She had been with him.
He eyed her malevolently. "You're just like Vane," he spat. "Out fucking around when you're supposed to be here."
Granger laughed at that. "This is the last place I'm supposed to be." She had tucked away her wand, but Draco was sure it was at the ready. She rubbed her eyes and sighed. "I lost track of time."
"Doing what," he bit out.
She shrugged and pulled a washcloth out of her bag, wetting it with her wand. "You've already answered that question for yourself, Malfoy. Who am I to argue?"
Draco blinked. Even drunk, he knew all about cagey replies. Maybe she'd been fucking the Puff, or maybe not. She'd arrived fully dressed, after all, looking frustrated.
He watched her run the damp cloth over her cheeks and hands, her face pinkening. He didn't know what his own face looked like, but when she glanced over and met his eyes, her expression softened.
"Were you?" he asked. "With him?" His voice was smaller than he wanted it to be.
She sighed and tucked the cloth back into her bag. "Yes, I was with Justin."
"We were fixing my Astrarium clock," she continued. "Or trying to fix it, anyway. Pure silver is a devil to work with, our Pluto kept flattening out. We tried aquamarine for Neptune but that was no better. Kept cracking. We'll try a water sapphire next."
She grimaced. "We fiddled with those Godric-damned planets for hours. I was walking back to Gryffindor Tower when I was brought here."
Granger tucked her chin on her knees, her arms around her legs. "Don't worry, nobody saw." She looked broodingly at nothing.
Draco felt the simmering flame under his skin cool slightly for the first time all day. Only Granger would meet up with a wizard looking like that and spend the night tinkering with a useless clock. Merlin, Hufflepuffs really were pathetic.
"You'll fix it," he said.
She blinked over at him. "Are you trying to make me feel better?"
"No."
Granger chuckled. "You were." She reached out and patted his hand.
"Don't touch me," he said, more harshly than he intended.
Silence. Draco now regretted drinking so much; he couldn't marshal his thoughts. Trelawney's voice, of all things, echoed in his impaired mind: autumn ... the time when the veil between our world and the spirit world is at its thinnest. The veil between thoughts ... and feelings. Draco pulled the coverlet under his chin, and closed his eyes. With any luck, he'd pass out before he said anything stupid.
No such luck. When he opened his eyes again, Granger was sitting beside him, now under the covers, predictably reading a book. She was, Draco realized, no longer in the dress. Instead she now wore his discarded black silk shirt, which blended into the dark green coverlet. Her face, hands and the skin revealed by the low V of his shirt glowed, even in the pocket watch's thin light. Her skin looked so warm. A soft sweet suntan.
Draco froze in horror, certain that he'd said those last thoughts aloud. But she didn't look at him, just kept reading, eyes flicking over the pages. Terrifying.
Now she looked over at him. "What's terrifying?" she asked.
You. Draco looked up at her, determined not to speak. She returned to her book. He didn't stop watching her, though. She was in his clothes. If she was willing to wear his shirt, smelling of firewhiskey and cologne, perhaps she didn't think he was a monster after all. People didn't wear monsters' clothes.
Granger looked at him again, frowning. "Monster clothes?"
Fucking firewhiskey. He should be asleep by now, not staring up at Granger and spouting nonsense.
"You're not going to be sick, are you?" she asked.
Draco shook his head. He probably deserved to be sick—well, he deserved a lot of unpleasant things. But no, he felt fine, just thinned in the mind.
Granger set her book aside and looked down at him. Draco almost shivered. He wished she'd put her warm hands on him again. But he'd told her not to touch him. Why did he do that? She was ...
"You're so beautiful," he whispered.
She blinked, startled. Then she smiled. "Now I know you're drunk."
"No," he said. "You deserve to know that. From me."
Granger closed her book. "Go to sleep, Malfoy."
"I can't," Draco said petulantly.
"Try." She slid down beneath the covers. "Securus."
Draco's pocket watch snapped shut and he scowled in the direction of his cherished heirloom. Traitor. He couldn't see Granger in the darkness, but he could hear her breathe. He rolled closer.
"Go to sleep, Malfoy."
"Sing to me," he whispered.
A rich chuckle. "Trust me, that's the last thing you want."
"Hum something, then."
Granger huffed. "Fine. Close your eyes." Draco obeyed and she began to hum.
"Is that a tune?" he finally asked.
"Yes."
"You sound like a spinning Billywig."
"Perhaps you'd like to hum something."
Draco yawned. "No, go on."
He expected her to tell him to fuck off or something else equally appropriate, but Granger took up her low droning again. Draco said nothing, just rolled onto his back and lay there like a child, his eyes closed. He was warm under covers, safe behind wards, and a profoundly unmusical woman lay beside him wearing his shirt. Something soft brushed his forehead, and he fell asleep to a rare feeling of peace.
***
Draco sat in the library the following morning, waiting for death. All he wanted to do was put his head on the cool wooden tabletop and let the Reaper take him. Instead, he clenched his quill and tried to read the swimming words of his Herbology essay. He was never drinking firewhiskey again.
He remembered very little of the night before, and the parts he did remember made him cringe. Interrogating Granger about that Hufflepuff. Asking her to sing to him. You called her beautiful. Draco had never called anything—or anyone—beautiful in his life. He rubbed his face with his hands, attempting to physically scrub the entire night from his brain. Just remembering his words made him sweat.
That's not sweat. Draco stared down at his ink-smeared hands. He must look a fright. He fished a small mirror out of his satchel, recoiling at his image, and it recoiled right back. Bloodshot eyes rolled wildly in an ink-smeared face, his collar was twisted and hair tousled. He waved his wand at himself, hoping to sort out his sticky hair at least, but instead lace popped out on the edge of his collar and his eyebrows turned purple.
"Stop that," he hissed at the checkered wand. A few more waves managed to fix his eyebrows and wipe his face as well as smooth his hair. But he still looked terrible. Draco applied a rather clumsy glamour to his eyes, glancing around to ensure no one saw him primping in the library like a Third-Year girl.
As bad as Draco looked, the potted Belladonna on his table looked worse. Granger's estimation of its condition after a day of neglect had been too generous by half. The plant had arrived by owl from Brunhilde's Nursery all green and blooming, dotted with shiny black berries and bell-shaped purple flowers.
But twenty-four hours under Draco's bed had hit the plant hard. The Belladonna was now in its last throes, shedding poisonous black leaves all over his table. Shriveled flowers dangled from spindly branches. Half of its berries had burst, spewing toxic juices. Draco considered just putting the thing out of its misery with a merciful Incendio. But he hated wasted effort, and so had brought the little botanical horror to the library on a Saturday, hoping to draw out a certain swotty Ravenclaw.
For the previous evening had made one thing clear—he needed a distraction. Desperately. Six nights of Granger and he was a wreck. And it could take weeks to reverse the Vanishing spell now that it apparently was pinned to Granger herself and not to her bed. Night after night of sheer torture. Draco would be dead of rage and sexual frustration in a month. He didn't deserve this. Well, yes, he did deserve this, but that wasn't the point. The point was that Granger's presence was shredding his self-control. He couldn't stay away from her. He couldn't stop touching her. When sleeping, he draped himself over her like a puppy. When intoxicated, he called her beautiful and grilled her about other men. This had to stop. She didn't want him. He needed another witch to take the edge off. Hogwarts was full of swotty witches ripe for seduction. He didn't need her.
So Draco was in the library, nursing his hangover and half-dead poison plant, and setting a trap for one such bookworm. He snapped shut his watch: another thirty minutes, and then he'd explode his little pot of death and go back to his room for a nap. Maybe he'd ...
"Is that a Belladonna?" Isobel MacDougal stood beside his table, eyes wide behind her glasses.
Draco nodded in relief and shoved his hands under the table to hide the trembling. No more firewhiskey.
"What happened to it?"
"I don't know," Draco croaked. He cleared his throat. "I think it might be cursed." The plant rolled its berries at him in contempt.
"Have you been watering it?" MacDougal asked. Draco was pleased to see the witch sit opposite him to look at the plant more closely. She was also smart enough not to touch it. Vane probably would have shoved half the berries in her mouth and gasped out her last on the library floor, sending Draco on a one-way trip back to Azkaban.
"Yes," Draco lied. "I even found it a nice sunny corner."
MacDougal tilted her head and regarded the plant with narrowed eyes, reminding Draco uncomfortably of the way Granger looked at himself.
"You should give it some flobberworms," she pronounced.
"Why?" Draco regretted the question immediately.
"Flobberworm mucus adds important nutrients to the soil," she said. "Of course they'll all die of the plant's toxins, so you'll have to replace the worms before they explode and all the mucus runs out. The pus tends to spurt out when ..."
She eyed Draco owlishly. "What's wrong? You look pale."
"I'm always pale," Draco managed to say. He swallowed hard.
MacDougal gave him a little close-lipped smile. "Yes, well. You're particularly pale today. Why are your hands trembling? Are you nervous?"
Splendid, he looked as creepy as Tennant now. "I've been working too hard," Draco said.
The Ravenclaw nodded and stood. "I know a good place for transplanting," she said. "Belladonnas don't like pots."
Draco rose to his feet, excited by the prospect of getting rid of the thing. He stood a little too quickly, however, and struggled to keep his balance. The girl came around the table and put a hand on his arm to steady him. First contact. Excellent.
"Are you sure you're not ill?" she asked.
"Just ... just tired," Draco said, adding a little stammer for effect. Bookworms liked their men stupid and helpless. That certainly explained Granger's affinity for wizards like the Weasel and Justin Foot-Fluffhead.
MacDougal frowned. "You should rest."
"Let's take care of our little friend first," Draco said.
Their little friend seemed to agree, curling obligingly in its pot as Isobel crooned at it. Draco vanished all the toxic detritus from his table and followed her out of the castle. Students stared open-mouthed as they walked by, but MacDougal seemed not to notice, except for a slight blush. Draco glared at anyone who caught his eye.
The bright sun made his hungover head swim a bit, and Isobel took his hand to steady him as they walked. Better and better. He didn't even mind passing the new Dumbledore memorial statue. The dead codger had a marble tomb by the lake, but that wasn't enough for some people, so the Ministry added a statue by the castle entrance.
The memorial had been ridiculously expensive, of course. Draco knew this because the Malfoy estate had borne nearly the entire cost, and his mother's letters to him in Azkaban over the summer had been filled with complaints about rising expenses and constant delays. Now the marble Headmaster stood gleaming in the sunlight atop a circular pedestal ringed by steps. The white statue looked disturbingly lifelike, and Draco could swear Dumbledore's eyes twinkled at him over his little carved spectacles.
"This way," MacDougal said, pulling at his hand.
Draco hadn't realized he'd stopped, and hastened to move away. "Where are we going?" he asked. They were crossing the grounds, heading toward a dark, ominous shadow against the vivid blues and greens of the Scottish lakes and mountains.
"To the best place for a young Belladonna," MacDougal said. "The Forbidden Forest."
NEXT UP: Draco and Tennant agree on something.