"Malfoy." A single word, a name that held so much history and pain.
"Granger." A rather annoying annecdote, that brought to his mind so much history and pain.
"I'm to...to escort you. Snape's orders."
He sneers, rolling his eyes. "Ah, of course. Retriubtion for my attitude lately, I suppose."
Now it's her turn to sneer. "You honestly think that running away from Headquarters twice in one week is merely part of your attitude?" And she was off again, arguing in that way she had, in that way that drove him absotluely batty, that made him wish his ears would just start to bleed already.
"I didn't mean to run away." He breaks in, when she has stopped for breath.
"Didn't mean to get caught, more like." She says, rolling her eyes.
"I'm not a sodding prisoner, Granger, and I get rather sick of being treated like one. The war was over weeks ago, you'd think the Order would be more humane towards me."
"Humane?" She shrieks, her voice shrill. "After what you did, after who you..." She stops, still unable to say it.
"Go on, Granger. Say his fucking name. Say it like he wasn't the one who was willing to give you and Potty up to spare his own life, say it like you really knew he loved you, say it like he's a fucking hero."
"Ron would never have given his friends up, unlike you, Malfoy."
"If it wasn't for me you'd be dead! If I hadn't killed him, offered that distraction, you and Potter would've been captured!"
"I'm not saying you didn't help our side, Malfoy...but to act like you saved my life..."
Draco stares at her for a long moment, something not quite familiar swirling in his ice blue eyes. So she didn't know...didn't realize..."Don't you dare act like I was the betrayer, like I was saving my own skin simply because the Death Eaters were failing, our side losing...my choice to help the Order was not a selfish one."
"Then how would you like me to act?"
"Acknowledge me! Fucking realize that I stuck my own neck out there so you could walk free!"
It wasn't as though she didn't believe him. Believing him was the easy part. The hard part was convincing herself he hadn't done it for her. "You want me to act like you, Draco Malfoy, killed my boyfriend, because he was going to give me, a mudblood, up to the Death Eaters?"
"You still don't get it. I killed Weasley because if I hadn't, it would've been you burned at the stake."
"You want me to say this was an act done out of love?"
"Fuck, Granger, it's all I ever wanted."
"If you're saying you-"
"Of course I'm saying it! I would have thought that my presence here...the way I follow you around the house, the way I look at you...the bleeding way I put up with you and that arrogant mouth of yours..."
"And how long are you suppose to have loved me?"
"I don't know...it wasn't like...it wasn't like I fucking knew I felt this way, but when McNair brought you three into our camp, I knew I had to save you."
"I never asked to be saved by you, Draco."
"I never asked to love you, Hermione."
"Then why do you?"
A shrug of those broad shoulders, a rustle of the white blonde hair as its pushed out of his breathtaking eyes. "I don't have an answer...and I doubt you'd believe anything I said. This hearing, Granger...it's going to decide the rest of my life. If I go to Azkaban..."
Hermione shakes her head. "You're going to go free, Draco. You know better than I do the defenses the Order has in place for you."
"And if I do go?" He asks.
"I won't let that happen."
"Oh? And how can you assure me of that?"
"I can't. But you've said you love me. And that's all that matters. If you love me, trust me. I'll find a way to save you, the same way you saved me."
Draco chuckles. "How ironic...and Snape, I'm sure, has known of my feelings since that day I saved you and Potter...this is my punishment, you understand."
"He's dangling me in front of you?"
"You, and the idea of freedom."
"It's going to be okay." Hermione says, rather lamely.
"Tell me you love me."
"Why?"
"I have to be fighting the Ministry for a reason. Now tell me you love me."
Hermione's eyes flutter shut as he draws nearer, as his scent of pine and fresh parchment invade her senses. She can feel his breath, warm on her cheek, and knows his lips are only centimeters away from her own.
"Say it." He says, his arm enveloping her, his palm pressed into the small of her back.
She opens her eyes, and looks up into his. And it was then he knew, and she knew, that she always had loved him. And he knew, knew without a shadow of a doubt, that he had always loved her.
"I love you." She whispers.