AUTHOR'S NOTES:

This was my pinch-hit for the 2013 HP-Drizzle Fest (hp-drizzle . livejournal . com) entry. The fest is over and reveals are out, so now I can post this for you here. This fanfic is a one-shot. Here was the prompt I worked from:

Prompt: #H6 - Draco has a secret that happens to him only during the first rain of every spring. It's a heritage thing (passed through the Malfoy line). He cannot ignore the pull of going out into the rain at that time. SHE (see pairings below for the suggested witches for this prompt) catches him and finds out his secret. - Draco x Hermione or Draco x Astoria or Draco x Ginny or Draco x Pansy - Let your imagination run wild, author. Can be a hair colour/length change, he turns into a water dragon, his skin sheds, he grows a mer-tail, he becomes incredibly horny and shags anything that moves... whatever! Let your imagination take you where it will.

Thank you to my beta, LadySashi, for another fast turn-around and helping me brainstorm this one! Thank you to the Mods of this fest, nearlyconscious and flyingharmony. This was such a wonderful, original idea and I enjoyed participating!

Please review!

DISCLAIMER: "Harry Potter" is the property of J.K. Rowling and Warner Bros. This fanfiction was written entirely for fun, not for profit, and no copyright infringement is intended.

TIMELINE: Hogwarts Era - 7th Year, A/U (year: 1998).

MAIN CHARACTERS FEATURED (alphabetical order, last name): Hermione Granger, Draco Malfoy

SUMMARY: Head Boy Draco Malfoy has got a secret, and it's kind of em-bar-ras-sing! When he tells Hermione Granger, his fellow Head Girl, hoping she'll be able to help him somehow end the curse (she is the brightest witch of their age, supposedly), things don't exactly go the way he'd planned…

RATING: PG-13

WARNINGS: Implied nudity (tame), one teensy swear word (very tame), pranking (including stinky animal spray, and the intentional misuse of Transfiguration and a Statis Charm), use of the 'c' word (not the profanity, but the OTHER 'c' word - the one every manly-man dreads being called), and threats to bathe with foo-foo soap and give a pretty pedicure to a boy (awww…).

CUTE, LITTLE STINKER

By: RZZMG

"Well, I can't say I'm totally surprised. You always were a little stinker, Malfoy."

Draco glared up at Hermione, flicking his soggy, wet tail at her in annoyance.

She burst into giggles.

Crouching down before him, balancing on her toes, she patted him on his small, pointy head with one hand, while the other held her umbrella over the both of them. "Oh, come now, there are a lot worse animals you could have changed into as part of your family's curse," she chided. "Imagine if you'd been something as ugly as a star-nosed mole, or as immobile as a sea cucumber. How awful would that have been?"

He chittered at her and stomped his front paws.

Could have been worse? Was the woman daft? This was… well, it was bloody awful, that's what it was!

Curse that foul hag who had hexed his long-ago ancestor, Brutus! Not that the man hadn't had it coming, pulling a runner and leaving her at the altar as he had, but still… Now every Malfoy male was doomed to share this same curse the first spring rain before their coming of age. Sadly, the transformation happened annually after that, and only 'true love's kiss' could break it.

How common and cliché.

Besides, just how was he supposed to find a female who would accept something as ridiculous as this?

Granger rubbed him under his chin to placate him. "It's not that bad, is it? You've a lovely albino coat that matches your hair's natural colour, and your tail is quite handsome. You're a splendid example of the species, Malfoy."

He wuffed, huffed, and wiggled his long, white tail, clearly irritated.

This was an outrage! The Head Girl was supposed to be helping him find a way out of this predicament, not placating him! That was the whole point behind telling her in the first place. If anyone could have figured out a solution to his dilemma, he'd figured it would be the all-too-compassionate, goody-good Granger. Instead, all she'd done so far is coo at him. It was humiliating… and irritating.

"Truthfully, I've always thought skunks absolutely adorable. Blame it on Disney," she admitted.

She rubbed the soft, damp fur over his ears and to his chagrin, his body moved all on its own to press against her fingertips, enjoying the touch. He sighed, and it came out as an adorable growly noise.

He hated this. Malfoys didn't do 'cute'. They did 'powerful', 'manly', and 'manipulative' – never any shade of the 'c' word. She'd better not say it. He was liable to lose it if she actually called him that evil word.

"All right, I won't tell anyone," she conceded with a sly smirk, "for a price."

He blinked up at her, astonished. Was Granger really was attempting to blackmail him? Hot damn, he'd rubbed off on her, hadn't he? Well, it was about bloody time. It had only taken him a year of conjuring some rather imaginative pranks to bring out the Slytherin lying in wait inside her.

She got to her feet and stepped back, staring down at him, roll-tapping her fingernails over her pursed lips. "Hmm… now what should I ask for?"

Uh-oh. She had that look about her. The one that said she was in for some retaliation. He may have wanted her to be more cunning and naughty, in general, but right now would not be the time to dig deep and drag that sort of thing to the surface, as he had bigger problems to consider. She should be using all of that big brain power of hers to help him solve his current dilemma, not thinking up ways to make him suffer worse.

"I suppose I could make you publicly apologise to Harry and Ron for putting laxatives in those chocolate bon-bons you sent them on Valentine's Day. Or, I could get you to stand up in the Great Hall and announce to the whole school that you–the "Prince of Potions"–cheated off my last test on the subject because you'd stayed up all the night before shagging your brains out with Marietta Edgecombe and were too exhausted to remember a thing the next morning."

Draco ambled around in circles as she listed off a number of unpleasant ideas. He made grumbling, growly noises the whole time, telling her what she could do with those absurd thoughts.

Act contrite to Potter and the Weasel King? Admit to deception?

Evil wench, had she no heart?!

"Oh, wait! I have the perfect idea!" she announced with great enthusiasm. "You can give me a pedicure! The thought of you on your knees before me, serving my feet… How absolutely cute you'd look with nail polish and a pumice stone in hand." She seemed to consider it for a moment longer, before definitively making up her mind with a nod. "Yes, I think I enjoy that visual. You could use a little humbling, anyway, Malfoy."

Draco saw red.

She said it. She used the 'c' word… And serving her? Really? He didn't think so. It was time to shut her down, and put her back in her place. He turned his backside in her direction and let loose his skunk-self's natural defence mechanism.

Granger screamed as if someone had just thrown a bucket of snakes at her, and she backed up so fast that she tripped and fell into the Black Lake.

Even insensible to his own scent as he was, Draco could tell the smell was horrific. Watching Hermione gag made him chortle with glee. The cruel tart deserved it! She'd been using his weakness to her advantage… which was totally unacceptable! Only he was allowed to do such things to her.

Finally, unable to stand a moment more of the stench, she tossed her umbrella away and threw herself fully into the Black Lake, trying to alleviate some of the awful odour. An oily residue coated the surface around her, so she quickly shucked her clothing (all of which sunk to the bottom of the lake, except for her lacy, white bra, which floated around her) and then she dove under the water. She resurfaced ten feet away, coughing.

Draco felt the tingle of the magic hex wearing off (for now), and went through the strange reverse transformation back into his own skin. It felt as queer this time as it had the first, when he'd morphed into his cursed form.

When he opened his eyes again, he was standing on the lake short, buck naked, but wholly human once more. "Better," he sighed, and then chanced at glance at Granger.

She was gaping at him, as if it had never occurred to her that he was a man under his clothing. Her bloodshot eyes were as wide as saucers, and her yawning mouth was a newly formed cave, full of possibilities.

"Getting a good look?" he asked, turning about and flashing his arse. It was one of his finest attributes, after all. He was rather proud of his firm, round bum, pale as it was.

The Head Girl sputtered. "None of this is funny, you… you…" She was so angry she couldn't even form a good enough insult.

"It's bloody hilarious, Granger," he stated, chuckling. "Now you'll have to wash up. Give that nasty brain a thorough scrubbing while you're at it."

"I did not deserve that!" she shouted, slamming the flat of her hand onto the top of the water. The stink was clearly still all over her, and she sneezed repeatedly. "You jerk!"

Still chuckling up a storm, Draco moved towards his pile of clothing further down the opposite end of the beach from where he'd sprayed. "You deserved it, trying to blackmail me," he shouted at her. He began pulling on his trousers. "Shoe's on the other foot now, though, eh?"

He felt rather proud about getting one up on her… again.

Hermione, he noted from his peripheral vision, tried not to stare and blush as he pulled his slacks up and over his naked hips. "I didn't really intend to go through with it," she sullenly confessed, treading water and moving closer to the shore. Even from the distance he could see that her lips were turning blue from the cold, but she stubbornly refused to come out of the water.

"Yes, you would have," he countered. "You've become as ruthless as I've always suspected you were capable of being." He tossed her a grin. "I'm rather fond of you now for it."

Draco shrugged into his dress shirt and began buttoning it up, shivering as the chilly Scottish air quickly kissed his exposed skin. As a skunk, he'd had a fur lining to keep him toasty, but human skin was much less adapted to barely-out-of-winter weather.

From the shore, he could hear Hermione's teeth chattering. "Kindly get me my wand before I freeze to death in here!" she whined.

Pausing while pulling on his socks and shoes, he tossed her a wide, boyish grin. "Why don't you come out and get it, if you want it so badly?"

Hermione threw him a death glare. "I think the story of you being magically cursed to become a skunk every spring during the first rain of the season would be a brilliant career-making piece for Rita Skeeter, don't you?"

He laughed again, and put his hands up in surrender. "You were sorted all wrong, Granger. Anyone who says otherwise is a fool." Picking up his own wand, he Accio'd hers to his hand. "Looking for this?"

"Close your eyes tight, and hold it out," she commanded in a prim, I'll-take-none-of-your-shit-today tone, despite her body's stuttering from cold.

His smirk widened, becoming positively shark-like. "You're coming out to me, then?"

She growled. "Yes, of course." She headed closer to shore, but remained under the water continuing to glare at him. "And Malfoy, I swear to the Founders, if you peek, I'll strip your hide and hang you from the Astronomy Tower - naked."

He sighed, giving in. He didn't want to hurt her by forcing hypothermia upon her. "Couldn't have that," he said, shuttering his lids. "There. I can't see. Satisfied?"

Her grumbling was audible all the way to shore. With a fast swipe, she grabbed her wand from his hand. He heard her cast a Scourgify, then a Warming Charm, followed by a Drying spell. Then, she summoned her clothes from the lake, and wrung them out. They stunk, and no amount of magical cleaning them could get the stomach-churning smell out of the fabric, he noted.

Hermione made a sound of disgust, and then he heard her clothing splat as she tossed them to the ground. "They're ruined, thank you very much," she angrily informed him. "What am I going to wear back into the castle?"

Eyes still closed, Malfoy gave her the naughtiest smirk in his arsenal. "You could always wear me, beautiful."

She was quiet for a moment in the face of his blatant flirting. Truth was, he found the annoying bookworm attractive, and there was something about her that drew him in and forced him to keep trying to get her attention (even if it was negative). She'd proven herself a formidable rival, and he respected her. He intentionally annoyed the crike out of her, but it was all in good fun. He hoped she took his banter and teasing (and pranks) in the spirit in which they were intended…

"What an absolutely brilliant proposal, Malfoy," she said, and the tone of her voice told him he was in for a world of hurt. He swallowed, preparing to run. "Just hold still a moment, will you?"

Before he could move, she had him. He'd been hoisted by his own petard.

X~~~~~X

"Hermione, what are you-? Are you wearing a boy's Slytherin uniform?" Ginny asked, looking her up and down. "And… what's that hanging around your neck? Some kind of ugly, ermine stole? Have you been in the Drama Club's costume trunk?"

Hermione smiled. "I'm wearing Malfoy's uniform, to be precise, since the little stinker thought he'd pull a nasty prank on me with a captured skunk. The foul thing sprayed my clothes, so I took his in repayment." She fingered the soft, white fur around her neck. "As for this thing… well, no lasting harm done to the skunk. I just temporarily transfigured it. Didn't want to catch a cold while strolling around the lake."

Ginny wriggled her fingers over the animal's pelt. "It's so soft!" she gasped. She glanced at Hermione through narrowed eyes. "Are you sure you're not hurting it?"

Heading through the Entrance Hall, intending to get Malfoy back to their shared Heads' dorm room so she could give him a real fixing in private, she waved Ginny off. "Not a bit, although Malfoy's in for a world of hurting the moment I next see him."

Against her throat, she could have sworn she felt the skunk swallow heavily.

"I'm in desperate need of a shower, Gin," she told her friend as an excuse to ditch her. "I'll meet you and the boys later for dinner!"

"Bye!" Ginny called after her.

Hurrying away up the stairs, she headed for the sixth floor tower, where the Heads' common room was located. Along the way, she stroked over Malfoy's inert head. Temporary Stasis Charms were really underrated these days…

"Now, Malfoy, I know how much you love that rose-scented soap Professor Sinistra uses," she murmured to her furry companion, snickering. He detested the stuff. In skunk form, with his enhanced sniffer, the fragrance would be so potent he'd probably vomit. "Let's see if we can't procure some for your bath, shall we? And then when we're done-" She stroked over the skunk's long claws. "-I think we'll give you a pedicure instead. Red with gold polka dots. What do you think?"

A weak croak in protest came from the skunk's throat.

"Oh, stop being such a baby, my little stinker," she tutted. "You'll smell fresh and lovely when I'm through with you… like the earth does just after the first spring rain. You'll see. No more stink-bombs, ever. And, as a bonus service, I'll even comb your coat so it'll be shiny - just like you keep it in your non-animal form. You'll be absolutely darling. Cute, even."

She giggled, and even to her ears, it sounded a bit Wicked Witch.

"You wanted my help, Malfoy, well… now you're going to get it."

~FIN~

Author's Notes:

Albino skunks are adorable! Google a pic if you don't believe me! :)

Please review!