september 1st
almost 11 months earlier
first night of sixth year
Draco Malfoy had always been quite astonishingly beautiful. In a dark, ethereal sort of way. The kind that was meant to be photographed or drawn and hung in a museum, somewhere far from here.
On the first night of their sixth year, as every Hogwart's student sat in the Great Hall, Hermione Granger caught herself wondering if Malfoy knew how beautiful he was. Blonde, perfectly pale skin that lacked a single impurity, narrowed blue eyes. Just for a moment.
Quickly, she decided that he must've known, otherwise, he probably wouldn't have been the arrogant arsehole whom all of Hogwarts had come to despise.
And yet, on the eve before the first day of the term, while all of Gryffindor awaited the arrival of Harry Potter– who was irresponsibly and unexplainably late– Hermione couldn't seem to keep her eyes off of that blonde haired boy.
It was a strange, unsettling sight, to see Draco Malfoy sitting there with his lips pressed together and his chin resting in his palm. His eyes seemed fixed to the floor on the opposite side of the table; a stare that was rather vacant and lost. His hair was perfectly combed, as it always was, gelled into immovable perfection. Beautiful and nearly white, highlighting the porcelain paleness of his skin. Perhaps a bit longer than it had been at the end of last year.
Slytherin boys around Malfoy laughed as they basked in their endlessly replenishing suppers. Hermione imagined they were taking turns making rude comments, seeing who could do the worst damage on tonight's target. But while she watched them, Malfoy didn't join in their laugher, whatever it was they were howling about. In fact, he didn't seem to hear them at all. On his opposite hand, Hermione noted the dark haired girl– Pansy Parkinson, as she too watched the blonde.
"Ron? Ginny?" Hermione cleared her throat, trying to return her focus to her own table. The young witch blinked twice, as if she was erasing what she'd just seen, and looked to Ginny in the seat across from her. Ginny, with that beautifully long straight hair and sweet dotted freckles, eyed her from across the table.
Ron sat a bit straighter in the spot next to her, staring at her as he finished another bite of his supper. His great blue eyes watched her for another moment before she spoke, taking just a glance back over at the Slytherin table.
"Did either of you happen to hear why Malfoy has given up his prefect duties this year?" Hermione asked, transfixed at the sight of him once again. There was something so uneasy about seeing Draco Malfoy with his eyes low and his mouth closed. Sitting there so quietly, wordlessly– not making cruel jokes or insulting remarks– he hardly even looked like Malfoy.
For the first time since the very day she had met him, Hermione was intrigued. The young witch was swept into the sneaking desire of understanding why he hadn't yet come over to intentionally offend a Gryffindor or mock a Hufflepuff. Swept into the punishable curiosity as to why Malfoy had given up his prefect duties before the term had even begun. Or why he looked so misplaced– perhaps even considerably sad? And why hadn't he opened his mouth to speak– not even once whilst she watched him.
She hardly heard Ginny and Ron as they exchanged curiosities, wondering if they'd find him on the Quidditch pitch this year.
"Seriously..." Hermione now intended to shake away the thought of that Slytherin, no matter how strange and unusual. There were bigger concerns to overanalyze, she reminded herself. "Of course Harry manages to get into trouble on the first night of school. No one else in the world would be so idiotic. He should be here by now, even if he did miss the carriages."
In the next few minutes, Harry did arrive to the Great Hall in a rush of disheveled glory. It was fitting, of course, for a boy prone to as much trouble as Harry had proven to be. He kept the tale of his bloodied nose to himself, even though Hermione was certain to have asked him twelve times before Professor Dumbledore finished another lengthy speech.
The young witch stood the moment their headmaster finished addressing the students.
"See you all tomorrow, then?" Hermione asked, already slipping into the crowd of standing students trying to get to their dormitories for the first time in months. She nudged her way through the hall, murmuring polite variants of "'scuse me" and "sorry."
As Head Girl, she had been tasked with the responsibility of leading Gryffindor's first years to their dormitory. When she reached them, children of only eleven, Hermione felt her heart swell. Eleven seemed so long ago now, but their young faces made it easy to remember the way she'd felt to have been placed in Gryffindor. Terrified and brave, all at the same time.
She began leading the first years out of the Great Hall, chattering with the curious new wizards and witches while they asked her questions and made her laugh. She made a mental note to teach them about trolls, should the subject ever come up.
It was almost sardonic, like an act of twisted fate, when the hordes of students leaving the dinning hall merged together and Hermione found herself standing next to Malfoy. Out of all of the students she could have ended up besides, whether it was God's will or destiny or fortune or Merlin himself, her shoulder bounced into Malfoy's upper arm while the merged together.
Like the world somehow knew that they would need each other, even when they hadn't the slightest clue. Like all of the heartache they'd create was a factor of undeniable fate; like they'd been written in the stars, destined from the first time he ever narrowed his eyes at her.
Malfoy was far taller than she was, built tall with shoulders that were both wide and thin, clad in the customary black school robes. Hermione didn't bother to restrain herself from looking up at him– inspecting the left side of his face as if that would reveal why he had abandoned his position as Slytherin's prefect and why he looked so unfamiliar.
The Slytherin took a slight step forward, shuffling his way among the other people, forcing her eyes to rise to the back of his blonde head. As clear as a splotch of neon paint on a clean canvas, Hermione instantly noticed the deep, purpling bruise at the nape of his neck.
The mark stood out like red wine spilt on a fine white blouse or fingerprints dipped in black ink and stamped into parchment. Fingerprints that revealed that he had been grabbed, somewhat forcefully, by the back of his neck.
An impurity.
She'd been wrong– his skin was not the perfect porcelain that she had noticed from across the hall. And, somehow, this only added to the allure of him. That exquisite sort of beauty that surely came from a long line of purposefully gorgeous pureblooded brides arranged with handsome pureblooded husbands.
And as if he could feel her eyes burning into his skin, his large hand reached for his neck. He pressed his fingertips into her accusation, hiding the evidence as his glare shot back on her. Turning, abruptly, to face her.
"Malfoy." She said, quickly, instantly aware of the group of first years behind her that watched in anticipation. "Sorry. Didn't mean to bump you."
Malfoy's eyes met Hermione's in a quick manner. Gray. So gray that they were almost silver. So she'd been wrong twice. She had always thought of him with blue eyes, but now, standing beneath him with his eyes of ice glaring back at her, they were unfathomably gray.
There is was. Like sonder. The awe that came with knowing that there had to be more to him than a blonde head of hair to have bruises like that and gray eyes so terribly disheartened.
"Fine." He returned, but his look was lost and his angered tone was only a drone against the hum of moving students. He had a posture about him that Hermione had never seen him use before. Tense, and at the same time, exhausted.
The eyes looking at her now were not the pair that she remembered from the last occasion that she had seen him: standing in Umbridge's office at the end of last year, his wand pressing into Neville's cheek— sneering at her while Crabbe's thick hand crushed her shoulder.
She blinked, trying to better remember the Malfoy from last year– the bully from her childhood, but she was looking at a different person entirely.
He grown out of any hint of boyishness. His face was slimmed, hard and sculpted. His lips parted then and Hermione noticed the way his eyes narrowed even further, cold and observant.
"What, then?" He muttered, but the phrase was short, forced, and his mouth shut quickly as if he had just remembered something very sinister.
"Sorry–" Hermione replied, just as shortly, but he had already turned and was slipping through the crowd before them, aggressively nudging his was through younger students.
Hermione's brain told her feet to move, which they did, even as she replayed the imagine of his stone gray eyes, glaring yet vacant. Years of vulgar insults and spiteful comments, suddenly disappearing from what she thought she had known about him. She watched his blonde head fade into the crowd and shook the oddity from her chest, allowing it to fade away as he did.
september 2nd
During the twilight hours of that night, Hermione sat in the Gryffindor common room by herself. The fire crackled calmly before her, burning with just enough light for her to read the textbook in her lap. Before she could flip the page to finish reading about how to properly dice dragon's heart, the staircase leading to the girls dormitories creaked.
"'Mione?" called a small voice. Hermione recognized the young girl as one of the first years she'd shown to the dormitories earlier that evening.
"Hello. Amelia, was it?" Hermione smiled and uncurled her legs from her seat. She folded her textbook closed, shifting and she flattened her ruffled, curling hair.
"Yes," replied the little girl, coming into the light of the fire. She was small for eleven, Hermione thought, and her kinky curls and large brown eyes made her look even younger. "I don't feel well, I think."
"You don't think?" Hermione echoed, extending her hand to the girl. "Let's see..." Amelia took her hand and, with the other, Hermione pressed the back of her palm into her small forehead. "You know, Amelia, you feel rather hot. What do you say we walk to the infirmary? I'll introduce you to Madam Pomfrey."
The prefect stood up, smoothed out the old pajama pants she'd thrown on, and offered her hand to Amelia. The little girl took it gingerly and together they left the common room.
The castle halls were completely darkened, shadowing the corridor in a dull gloom. Hermione realized that it was later than she'd thought.
"Lumos." She whispered, holding her glowing wand in front of them. Amelia stared at the glow, awed by the light.
"Here," Hermione opened her hand. "You can hold it."
With that, the old Gryffindor and the new walked through the empty corridor and down staircase after staircase. When they arrived at the hospital wing, Hermione knocked at the giant wooden door. Madam Pomfrey and the rows of hospital beds slowly came into view, a gentle yellow light pouring onto the Gryffindor girls. The infirmary, which smelt pleasantly of fresh bandages, welcomed Hermione and the young girl.
"Oh dear me," Pomfrey sighed. "A little feverish, are we?"
"I'm afraid so." said Hermione. Then to the young Gryffindor who was reluctant to release her hand: "Go on, it's all right."
"And I trust that everything is well with you, Miss Granger?" Pomfrey asked in a polite manner, but a bored tone. She turned, walking calmly back to her large desk. "Come along, you'll need to sign the young one in as it is after hours. Why don't you find the young one a bed, I'll be over in a moment."
"Right," Hermione responded, walking in with Amelia.
The hospital was smaller than Hermione remember, most likely because she had been smaller the last time she was here. Still, each wall was lined with empty cots— the most uncomfortable things, each with their own bedside table. She imagined Harry in the second bed on the left hand side, where he had to spend the night during their second year after Gilderoy Lockhart had accidentally removed the bones from his arm. Then she saw herself in the fourth bed on the right, where she had been petrified for three weeks. And she pictured Ronald, sixth bed on right, where he laid and watched Harry and Hermione reverse time.
This place was filled with memories.
In the present, Madame Pomfrey showed Amelia to a bed as Hermione quilled on the fresh piece of parchment, certifying that she checked Amelia in. Just as she went to set the quill down, Madame Pomfrey's voice filled the quiet air once again.
"Can't we get on with this? I intended to be back in Slytherin before sunrise."
Hermione felt herself still at the recognition of Draco Malfoy's voice.
"Young man, I've already told you. Like I said, you will have to come with a note for a prescription like that."
"I've told you, nurse, Professor Snape advised me to come to you. He's given me the permission. I shouldn't need anything else."
"You need a note, Mister Malfoy. Or even better– a Healer's order. Come see me when you've got one of those and an actual diagnoses. Now, please, go back to your house before you disrupt my hospital any more."
Footsteps.
"And Malfoy–" Pomfrey called, just had sharply as before. "Hold that door for Miss Granger. I intend to lock it behind the both of you."
Hermione hadn't realized that she'd been frozen, hovering over the parchment, to listen to their conversation. She quickly stood upright, as if to make up for lost time, and turned towards the exit. There, Malfoy already stood with his hand on the door.
The young witch felt something tighten in her stomach– embarrassment? The air in the room felt thick and discomforting as she thanked Madame Pomfrey.
The blonde said nothing as his eyes dogged from Pomfrey and back to Hermione. Her shoes clicked against the stone floor, drawing her towards the exit. Towards Malfoy, slowly opening the door.
Malfoy kept his eyes trained on the wall in front of him– she would have though him impatient if he hadn't looked so tired. The moment she stepped through the doorway, he followed behind her. The warm light from the infirmary faded as the door closed.
It wasn't until the students were left in total, complete darkness that Hermione realized she was wandless. The young witch stopped, instantly. In the next moment, Malfoy's large hands were on each of her shoulders, pushing her forwards to stop himself from slamming into her.
"Merlin–" The blonde groaned beneath his breath, releasing her less than a fragment of a second later, pushing himself away to avoid their collision.
"My wand." She defended her sudden stop, even though he hadn't asked her to. "I've left my wand with Amelia."
Malfoy, now only a shadow, didn't seem to care as he walked away from her, like she hadn't said anything at all. His strides were long and sluggish, heels barely clicking against the floor and he continued into the darkness.
Hermione turned back towards the door, giving the handle a fierce tug. Madam Pomfrey meant it when she said she was locking the door right after them.
"If you'd just left it well enough alone she wouldn't've locked us out." She griped over her shoulder, even though she could hardly make out the shape of him now. "Oh. Of course."
"Oh, for fuck's sake–" He groaned, like it put him in actual pain to listen to her, but the corridor suddenly illuminated at the tip of his wand. "You cannot honestly be afraid of the dark. Get it in the morning."
"I have seven flights of stair to walk up. I am not doing that in this darkness, thank you." She bit back.
"Then perhaps you shouldn't have come down," He returned, still facing the other direction, but no longer walking.
"I'm a prefect. It's part of my job to–"
"Yes, I read the description last year. Keep quiet before someone hears you."
"Then you know– I was only doing my job. You're exactly the reason why Pomfrey's locked us out and locked my wand in." Had she been waiting for this moment? A piece of revenge, for the years spent tolerating his torment. A way beneath his skin when he, quite obviously, was unwell. Her cheeks were hot.
"Quiet–" He said, even sharper. but still emotionless. "Not all of us are prefects anymore. I don't have permission to be out of bed and if I get caught because of you–"
"Alright, God. Go on back to Slytherin, then." And then something rather evil came to Hermione's mind. "But, so you know, I saw Filch go that way. And I bet he's rather excited to catch his first student of the year."
Malfoy made a small, hum of a noise– amused and hateful all at once. Then he said, "I could've sworn I'd heard him going up the stairs not too long ago."
"Doesn't matter to me. I've told you, I haven't broken any rules."
"Yes, but you don't have a wand. You're defenseless and you never know what an angry man like that will do to a dirty girl like you in the dark."
Hermione's mouth was suddenly dry. There he was, she thought.
Malfoy had always been a bully. Always been such a tirant, who fought like a child and picked fights like a toddler. But he'd lost his boyishness sometime between now and the end of their fifth year and, out of no where, was a far greater threat than a taunting bully.
"That's revolting–" She finally blurted out. "How dare you say that to me."
"You're right, of course. But now it's in your head. Isn't it?" His tone was flat and detached. She couldn't see his face through the darkness, but she imagined that he was grinning. Pleased with himself despite the vacancy in his tone.
"And now you are recognizing that your only option is to come with me. I'll keep you safe in my wandlight in exchange for a bit of your perfect-prefect-politness, should we get caught."
"Are you actually idiotic?" She tried to steady her voice, glad that he couldn't see the redness in her cheeks and the way that he'd unsettled her so quickly. "You have noticed that my dormitory is eight floors above yours. Haven't you?"
"I've got an errand to run. You'll come with me, then I'll take you up to Gryffindor."
There is was again. That sense of sonder.
Her own curiosity clouding any sense of proper judgment.
"Fine." The thickness in the air subsided into something a bit lighter, but still strange. "What kind of errand are you running?"
But Malfoy didn't answer her. Instead, he raised his chin beckoningly and turned down the hall. The sound of his footsteps filled the cold, nighttime air, and Hermione's quickly followed.
They were quiet, walking with a quiet intensity for many minutes.
"What is it that we're doing?"
""We" aren't doing anything. I am running an errand, you are accompanying me." His voice was clinical: pointed and factual, and without the slightest trail of emotion.
"Fine. What are you doing?"
"An errand."
"You said that. I mean, what–"
"A book," He said, this time a bit short tempered, but quickly returning to expressionless. "I need to get a book."
"From the library?"
He cursed beneath his breath, clearly frustrated with her. "No. Not from the library. Have you been paying any attention to where I've been leading you?"
Hermione realized she hadn't. Not at all. She'd been too busy wondering about him. Her cheeks went warm.
"I could've been leading you to your death and you wouldn't've even second guessed me. I'll be damned. You're not as smart as they say you are, Gryffindor."
"My name is Hermione," She snapped back, choosing to deal with one insult at a time.
"I know." There was a long pause, but she could hear that Malfoy was holding his breath with something left unsaid. "My name is Draco."
"Your name is Malfoy."
"My name is Draco," He said once again, not a single change in his tone. But still, somehow, mocking her.
"You're still a Malfoy."
"You're still a Gryffindor. Do you have a point?"
"Your hair is Malfoy. Your shoes are Malfoy. Your designer tie is most certainly Malfoy. And your attitude is revolting."
"You mean to say that because I come from money I do not deserve a first name?"
"No. But it's a bit difficult to see past when you're flaunting said money while I'm in my hand-me-down pajamas. And by that logic, are you saying that because I am a Gryffindor I do not deserve to be addressed by my first name?"
"No, that isn't what I was saying in the slightest. But then again, it's a bit hard to overlook when your entire persona is Gryffindor's little lioness."
Hermione's hand when to her untamed hair and she was suddenly glad he hadn't spent more than a glance on her. He may have outgrown his boyishness, but it hadn't made him any nicer.
They continued on, quiet once more.
Again, it was Hermione to break their silence, noticing that they had nearly reached the Advanced Potions classroom. "Late night reading about potions."
"Not exactly," He said flatly, approaching the large wooden door. "Wait here. I'll only be a minute."
The blonde haired boy walked past her, straight to the door. He lowered his wand, pressed it closely into the keyhole, and the lock clicked oped. Draco ducked into the potions classroom and quickly retrieved a textbook marked "Advanced" before returning to the corridor. The Gryffindor was standing there, stilled, waiting just as he'd told her to do.
The dull light from his wand made a hazy white glow against the darkness. He tucked the textbook beneath his arm and, without a glance to her, walked.
Out of his peripheral, Draco could make out the distinct shape of her arms crossed against the chest. She held her chin high and when she walked her shoes tapped softly against the stone floor in harmony with his. She was shorter than he had thought, he supposed, or perhaps he'd never cared to notice.
His arm ached from holding his wand and he'd become increasingly and acutely aware of his fatigue. There was a new knot in his side– a stitch. Likely from the lengthy amount of walking, paired with intense dehydration. Both his own fault, he decided as he made these calculations in his head.
He sighed through his nose, craning his neck to either side to alleviate the ache.
"Does it hurt?" Her voice, odd and misplaced, broke the silence of the hall. They kept walking, neither looking at the other.
"What?"
"You've got a bruise. Just on your neck. What is it from?" Now wasn't the time for delicacies. It couldn't get much worse, anyway.
"What makes it any of your business, Gryffindor?" Draco ducked beneath the stone doorway, slipping back into the empty corridor and next to her.
"I knew a boy in Muggle London. Grumpy, like you. I'd catch him at library with bruises. It was his dad and–"
"Oh, fucks sake," Draco spun on the heel of his foot, facing her. His face now resembled the first emotion he'd shown all night– anger. "My father isn't beating me, Gryffindor. He's rotting in Azkaban because of you."
"Malfoy–" Instinctively, she raised a hand to cover her lips. "I'm sorry. That isn't what I'd meant." It was true.
"Of course it is. Don't try to take it back now."
He could rile her up so quickly. There it was again; every remark he'd ever made against her, rising to the surface of her memory. Her throat was on fire.
"Your father wouldn't be in Azkaban if he hadn't tried to kill a group of students. That is not my fault." She was more than just bothered by him. Embarrassed, actually, that she couldn't hold her temper at bay.
"You think he wanted to do that? You really don't know anything other than the last textbook you memorized, do you?" He spoke without a pause and sin of any doubt. So sure of himself. "Allow me to let you in on a well-kept-fact, Gryffindor. He didn't have a choice."
"You would know. You're next in the rankings, aren't you? The youngest Death Eater in over a decade." She spoke with painful accusation, pointed at the soft spot between his ribs.
Malfoy's face hardened. He turned on her with cold, steel eyes that had enough power to kill her right there.
"I saw you. In Bourgin and Burkes." She clenched her teeth together. "Adding another Malfoy to the list of Death Eaters?"
"You've been spying on me, then? Following me around?" He leant into his words, coming closer than he had before. More provoked than before.
"No. It was coincidence."
"You have't got a single clue what you saw, Gryffindor."
"My name is Hermione."
"I don't care what your name is– same way you don't care about mine. I care to know if you plan to announce to the whole castle that they've decided to make me– a teenage boy– a Death Eater. How crazy you'll sound."
"How do I know you aren't just lying?"
"Because I said so."
"And that means you aren't lying?"
"No. That means you'll listen to me before you get yourself hurt, Gryffindor."
"Are you threatening me?"
"Shut up–"
"No! How dare you–"
"No, shh." Malfoy's finger was suddenly raised in the air between them, silencing her. Alerting her to the foots steps that bounced through the halls, even though they'd stopped walking minutes ago.