Staring at the ceiling, she didn't get up from the bed as the room slowly brightened with the sun coming up. After she had gone back into the kitchen, he had made food for her again but she wasn't able to finish it much to his dismay. Even though she had started to feel tired and went to try and sleep, she couldn't; the guilt of her still being in that cottage ate away at her and kept her up.
Another question started to bother her: why hadn't Harry and Ron found her yet? Ron still had the Dilluminator, and that's how he found them after he had left the camp. Why hadn't he used it to find her?
She sighed and rolled over, staring out the window and trying to ignore how she felt at that moment. The sky was beautiful, and she allowed herself some time to watch the sunrise for the first time in a long time. In the past she had always enjoyed the sunrise and sunsets; lately though that was a luxury and she found that she hadn't been able to make time for.
After allowing herself another ten minutes to enjoy the sunrise, she stood up and yawned, regretting that she hadn't been able to sleep as she changed clothes. While she had gotten used to not sleeping well when out on the run, being able to actually sleep on a proper bed the past couple of days threw this off and now she was exhausted.
She was also irked by the fact that Malfoy somehow kept catching her off guard in their conversations. While it was easy to outright hate him during school because of his behavior, she couldn't deny that seeing this different, quieter side of him piqued her interest. Now, she was finding that instead of hatred being the first emotion she felt when she thought of him, it had been replaced by sympathy, and even curiosity to find out more about him.
Shaking her head, she glared at nothing in particular as she let out a sharp breath and reminded herself that she was trying to escape to get back to Harry and Ron. And that wouldn't happen if she kept getting distracted by his kindness to her now; she had to put that wall up between them again.
The smell of breakfast hit her as she opened her door, and she continued to remind herself that she wasn't going to let Malfoy stop her today as she pulled her hair up into a bun and walked towards the kitchen. He was already preparing a plate, glancing up at her as she walked through the doorway.
"Good morning," He answered cheerfully, raising an eyebrow when she didn't acknowledge him this time. "Or not."
She ignored the added comment as she grabbed a mug and set it on the counter before reaching for the kettle to fill it with water. He sighed and shook his head setting his plate to the side and grabbing another.
"What all would you like to eat?" He asked, watching her as she moved to the sink.
"I can put my own plate together," She answered, refusing to look at him.
He didn't move though, his brow furrowing slightly. "Are you alright?"
She sighed heavily but didn't look up as she said, "Didn't sleep."
He set the empty plate down and took his own, grabbing silverware before sitting down at the table next to the large window. After filling the kettle she set it back on the stove and turned the stove on, moving to the small island to put a plate of food together. She stood there eating and glancing at the stove every so often, trying to ignore the other person in the room with her.
"You know you can sit down to eat?" He said after a little while.
She glanced over to see him gesturing towards one of the empty seats at the table. Shaking her head, she pointed towards the stove and said, "I'm waiting on water for tea."
He raised an eyebrow again before saying, "I didn't realize you needed to be standing up to do that."
She didn't respond, taking another bite of food and looking back over to the stove. The water boiled after a few minutes, and she went to grab the empty mug she had chosen along with the tea bag she had chosen for that morning, a simple black tea.
After preparing her tea and letting it sit to steep, she went back to the island where her plate was and tried to continue eating. She was sure that she'd find a way to leave today and wanted to at least get a good meal in as she didn't know when she would be able to eat again after leaving.
"Are you still not going to sit down?" He asked, watching her curiously. "You must be exhausted, especially if you haven't slept."
"I'm fine," She answered shortly, somewhat annoyed now.
He sighed unhappily and said, "I thought we were making progress."
This made her look up at him confusedly. "What do you mean?"
Setting down his utensils, he looked back up at her. "I thought things were getting better between us, and that maybe we were getting closer to—"
"You really expect me just to forget every name that you've called me?" She interrupted, narrowing her eyes at him. "Every terrible thing you've said about me, the jinxes and curses you and your friends fired at me, all of the hatred that you directed towards me? None of that goes away just because you've been nice to me for a few days, I haven't forgotten about any of that."
His mouth formed a thin line as he held her gaze. After a few moments he took in a deep breath and quietly let it out before saying, "It would've been a lot worse for you in the end if I hadn't treated you that way; showing any sort of kindness would have put a target on your back as well as mine."
She scoffed at this, abandoning her plate and grabbing her mug. As she crossed the kitchen towards the library, she snapped, "Don't act like you did me any favors by making my life miserable."
With that she disappeared into the library and tried to put him out of her mind, claiming her chair from the day before and setting her mug down on the table next to it. As she went towards the shelves to pull out books again, she heard the sound of a chair moving in the next room and focused on the books in front of her.
"Were things really that bad?"
She looked up to see him leaning against the doorframe, his hands in his pockets. He looked so calm and relaxed, wearing a simple white t-shirt and jeans; she found that another reason it was difficult to hate him was that he looked nothing like how he did when they were in school, as if he were an entirely different person.
She pushed away those thoughts as her eyes narrowed at him again. "Prime example: you told Harry and Ron during second year when the Basilisk was attacking muggleborns that you hoped I was next."
His brow furrowed then and he quickly said, "I never talked to them—"
"They disguised themselves as Crabbe and Goyle because they were trying to get information out of you because they thought you were the heir of Slytherin," She interrupted snappishly.
He stared at her in shock and then let out a loud laugh, throwing his head back as his laughter filled the small cottage. She huffed angrily and turned back to the bookshelves, trying to ignore him as his laughter died into a chuckle.
"That explains why Goyle was so confused when I asked where his reading glasses were the next day," He muttered quietly, shaking his head. He straightened up then and stepped into the room, watching her as she looked through his bookshelves. "For the record, I didn't want you to be next."
With another scoff, she looked up at him. "Do you really expect me to believe that?"
"No, I suppose not," He said with a sigh, walking towards his chair and sitting down. "I do mean it though; I didn't want you to be attacked by the Basilisk."
"I still was," She muttered, pulling a book off the shelf. "I just happened to survive it."
"How did you get the idea of the mirror?" He asked then, watching her curiously.
"Well, Harry told me that he was hearing voices in the walls whenever he would walk through the corridors," She started explaining absentmindedly as she continued looking through the books. "Since we had recently discovered he was a Parselmouth, and neither Ron nor I could hear the voice Harry was hearing, I suspected that it was possible whatever was attacking people was some sort of snake. And of course, Salazar Slytherin's symbol was a snake so it just made sense. But I didn't know what kind of snake; I had my suspicions but couldn't quite figure out what type of snake until it hit me. Literally."
He raised an eyebrow at this but smiled slightly. "What do you mean, literally?"
"A balled-up piece of paper on Basilisks hit me in the back of the head in the library," She said with a slight laugh, pulling another book off the shelf. "I still have no idea who threw it at me but it definitely was the missing piece of information I needed. Moaning Myrtle had mentioned seeing eyes before she suddenly died; I couldn't figure out the connection between her death and the others' being petrified, but after reading that looking directly into a Basilisk's eyes cause death it all made sense. There were reflective surfaces around all the other victims, so the most logical solution was always looking into a reflective surface."
"That's incredibly resourceful," He said then, almost proudly. "Then again, you were always the smartest in our class."
This made her pause and look at him with a raised eyebrow. "I'm surprised you'd openly admit that."
"It's taken a while to come to terms with," He shrugged. "But it's pointless trying to argue over how intelligent you are."
She watched him quietly for a few moments before turning away, her thoughts a blur as she tried and failed to read one book's title over and over again. At that moment she was incredibly conflicted on how she was supposed to feel; reminders that she was needing to escape then were ignored as she realized that he had caught her off guard yet again. And the fact that he had basically praised her intelligence; it stirred up a feeling that was very similar to when Ron would praise her before.
She was relieved when he started talking again.
"What on earth made you all think I was the heir of Slytherin?" He asked amusedly, resting his chin in his hand and smiling.
"Please, if you had seen the way you acted that year, you would have believed it too," She answered. "Harry was the one to propose that particular idea though."
"Can't say I'm surprised," He said with a laugh. "He suspected me nearly every time there was an issue."
"Frankly, you did cause a lot of problems for him," She countered, looking over to him. "Can you really blame Harry for that?"
"I suppose not," He shrugged, pulling one leg up to rest on the other knee as his foot bounced up and down slightly. "I will say though, we all suspected Potter was the heir."
"I heard those rumors; I thought they were absolutely ridiculous." She pulled another random book off the shelf before turning slightly to look at him. "Why did you think he was the heir?"
"The guy talks to snakes," He answered, gesturing towards nothing. "It's common knowledge that all of Slytherin's biological heirs could talk to snakes; and it's Potter, who else would be the logical heir in our year?"
She raised an eyebrow at him and he laughed again. "The Malfoy family can be traced back generations; trust me, if we were related to Salazar Slytherin, you would have never heard the end of it."
"Fair point, I guess," She said before turning back to the shelves. "Can't imagine how much more insufferable you would have been if that were the case."
He let out a fake offended noise and she couldn't help but smile to herself, reaching for another book as she said, "You really have no idea how prideful you were back then, do you?"
"Unfortunately, I do," He grimaced. "When you're alone most of the time, there's no one to distract you from reflecting on everything you've done."
The tone in his voice made her pause and she turned again to look at him. He was looking away from her now, his chin resting in his hand as he focused on something else. In that moment she realized that she felt sorry for him, and the feeling surprised her immensely.
"To be honest..." She started, causing him to glance at her. "...You've actually been nice to be around the past few days."
His eyebrows shot up in surprise but he smiled at this. "Really?"
She nodded and then added, "Well, when you're used to being jinxed in some way, the bar is set a bit low."
He laughed at this and she looked back towards the bookshelves, stifling a yawn.
He looked up from his book after noticing that she hadn't turned a page in a while, seeing that she had fallen asleep with her head propped up in her hand and the book she had tried to read open on the arm of the chair. She looked so peaceful, and he watched her quietly for a few moments before standing up and walking over to her.
"Hermione," He said quietly, gently shaking her shoulder.
She didn't wake up but let out a groan as she curled into a ball with her head resting on the arm of the chair now. Without a word, he grabbed the blanket from the back of the other chair and draped it over her before reaching for the open book and setting it on the table next to the mug of tea that was half-gone.
As he returned to his chair, he hesitated returning to his book and glanced towards her again. Should he try to take her to her bed? The chair couldn't be that comfortable, he had sat in that chair many times and didn't think he could ever fall asleep in it no matter how tired he was.
This made him wonder just what it was like for her on the run for nearly a year with no stable shelter, especially living in a forest. How did she survive that long? It was clear that it had taken a toll on her given her current state, and the way she looked the day she had been taken to the Manor.
His brow furrowed as he thought back to that day and he rubbed his face in frustration, immediately pushing those thoughts away. He didn't want to think about just what she had gone through there, and how he did nothing to stop it.
Standing up from his chair, he quietly left the room and walked down the front hallway, taking a left and opening the door to his room. There wasn't much in it, which he didn't mind; a dresser on one wall facing a large bedframe with a bedside table next to it. He went to the small table, opening the top drawer out of habit. He wasn't sure why he checked anymore; he knew she had never gone near his room.
But he always checked just to make sure that not only was his wand still there, but hers as well.