Summary: After a wayward spell ruins Greenhouse Four, Draco Malfoy learns just what it means to work with your hands—and the change an innocent sapling can make.
Written for a_gypsys_dance in the DG Fic Exchange on LiveJournal.
A/N: I tried to keep this as best to the prompt as I could, and as best to canon as I could. Thank you to my beta, hannah-askance.
A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees.
William Blake
A tree against the sky possesses the same interest, the same character, the same expression as the figure of a human.
Georges Rouault
A tree is known by its fruit; a man by his deeds. A good deed is never lost; he who sows courtesy reaps friendship, and he who plants kindness gathers love.
Saint Basil
xtxtx
Of Saplings and the Night
xtxtx
Part One – The Punishment
xtxtx
A woodland in full color is awesome as a forest fire, in magnitude at least, but a single tree is like a dancing tongue of flame to warm the heart.
Hal Borland
September 1995
Spells layered upon others could be very powerful indeed. Draco was learning that the hard way.
Of course, if he had been a little faster in getting away, it would have just been the Weasley girl stuck being punished.
But no, they'd smashed Sprout's "very favorite most important greenhouse", on a Friday afternoon, on the first Hogsmeade weekend of the year.
The punishment was ridiculous, really. Spending the entire weekend in a bloody greenhouse (or what remained of it, really. The greenhouse, that was, not the weekend). If Sprout actually expected him to sit with the red haired chit and keep the ruddy plants warm, the old witch had another thing coming.
xtxtx
He was seriously stuck in the ruddy greenhouse! Snape wasn't letting him off! In fact, his godfather demanded he get back down there!
Draco Malfoy was not happy.
xtxtx
It was nearly curfew by the time he got back down to Greenhouse Four, and the stupid ginger wasn't even there yet! Furiously, he took note of the time and stuffed the small slip of parchment he'd written it on in his front robe pocket.
"Malfoy?" Her voice seemed much too quiet for the loudness of her hair.
"Weasle—y," he replied, forcing himself to call her by name instead of Weaslette—which was what had gotten them in this mess in the first place (not that he'd admit it was his fault).
"Professor Sprout says we have to warm the saplings up with individual warming charms and water them as well. The charms need renewing every few hours since the greenhouse is. . . uh. . . gone."
"Very eloquent," he muttered to himself. He turned around to see the witch extremely close to him with her wand pointed in a very precise location.
"Look, Malfoy. I'm sure you don't want your vapid friends knowing your tickling charm backfired when it hit my hair coloring charm, especially since you'll be spending the next two nights and two days with the 'stupid Weasley bint'. You made your share of this mess so you'll deal with the consequences, my eloquence notwithstanding," she snarled.
Though her response surprised him, he wasn't about to back down. He smirked at her (a very un-confident smirk, but she didn't know that). When she blinked, he reached forward and curled a lock of her fiery hair around his finger.
"We'll see, Weas-el-lee." He drew her last name out, smirking wider when it had the desired effect.
"Oh shut it and start casting, Malfoy." She blushed and pushed him along.
A few minutes passed with Draco standing about, shuffling between two rows of saplings. "Weasley?" he asked, looking away from her. She looked up, but he did not see it.
"Yes, Malfoy?" she asked, slowly making the wand movements for another warming charm. A faint pink tinge came to his cheeks, but was gone a second later. She could not see it, and for that he was glad.
"How. . . how do you cast a warming charm? It wasn't covered in class." She blinked a couple of times in surprise.
"Very eloquent," she blurted out. He turned to face her angrily.
"Oh shove off, you stupid chit." They stared at each other, embarrassment and anger reflecting in each of their eyes.
"Have you never been cold, Malfoy?" she asked him. He could see her hand gripping her wand tightly to stop herself from. . . well, for all he knew, maybe she wanted to hit him with her bare fist like a Muggle.
"Of course I have, Red. That's why I wear the amulet." Why else would he wear such a gaudy thing? It certainly didn't attract any witches. Actually, he wore it under his shirt, so it really didn't matter. It wasn't like anyone was trying to get under there.
At the moment, anyway.
Or at all.
Why was he thinking about that now?
"Amulet? I didn't know anyone even used charmed amulets for warmth anymore. It's a bit, well archaic, isn't it? I can show you the charm. Works on a few plants at once. Not like you can wrap all these saplings in your amulet," she rambled on.
"Archaic? I can name a few other-" he started.
She cut him off, her hand over his mouth. She smelled like vanilla and another scent he didn't quite recognise. "You hear that?" she asked him, slowly removing her hand.
Though he hadn't before, he now faintly heard the tinkling of bells and dripping water. The pair looked around as she cast a few hasty warming charms to at least sate the saplings.
He saw it before she did.
A small sapling was spilled out of a pot, its meager roots peeking out from the dry dirt. The faint gold glow that indicated the magical plant's struggle to survive was disappearing and the tinkling of the magic was as well. He couldn't seem to speak as he struggled to save the tiny life in his hands.
The amulet.
Draco took it off his neck and carefully wrapped it around the struggling sapling. A tiny leaf fell.
"Malfoy? You find it?" Weasley asked, coming his direction. He looked up at her helplessly.
Would this tiny little tree die because they were too proud to walk away?
"Oh, Merlin. It's so little and helpless. It's an oak sapling," she murmured, gently scooping the tree into the pot.
"Weasley?" He was quiet. She looked straight at him.
"We will have to check on him often, Draco. Watch him grow big and strong. Who cares if he's a little damaged. We all are."
It was corny, and only a few hours ago, he would have teased and taunted her for it. But he remembered that helpless feeling.
One day, that could be him.
Would anyone warm him up and guide him home?
"I'm still going to make fun of you," he snapped out, trying to regain his composure. Her grin couldn't be much wider.
"Good. I like things that way."
xtxtx
They received detention half an hour later for fighting.
For detention the next day, they had to help put the glass in.
A glass pane was broken.
Detention was separate the next time.
xtxtx
The next few months passed in a similar fashion, though hindered by Umbridge. Draco knew her schedule nearly as well as his own.
And he knew when to avoid her so that she wouldn't face the Squad.
xtxtx
But every few weeks he visited the tiny little sapling they'd saved that night. It grew, and as it did, the fiery red amulet grew with it.
xtxtx
Part Two - Stricken
xtxtx
A stricken tree, a living thing, so beautiful, so dignified, so admirable in its potential longevity, is, next to man, perhaps the most touching of wounded objects.
Edna Ferber
xtxtx
September 1996
This year was different. She had known that as soon as the last one had ended. And now, a year after they had saved the tiny little sapling, she scarcely saw him. He no longer waited in the hallway after Transfiguration to spar. He didn't give her any reason to enjoy their fighting. He never had. After she'd taught him the warming charm and they'd fought about the watering cans, she'd thought they'd started a playful, perhaps even flirty dance where they fought and teased and with all that entailed, she'd considered him at least in some way her friend.
But he didn't even look in her direction.
If she had to wager a guess, he looked sad.
xtxtx
She visited their tree. Professor Sprout had to move it to the courtyard once it had gotten too big for the little pot. Since it was a magical variety of oak, it had grown faster and was now taller than she was. She couldn't tell the height for certain, and gaging depth and the like had never been easy for her.
Still resting around the trunk was the amulet, whose chain had disappeared into the tree itself.
She missed him. Whatever it was they had last year, she missed it.
The tree was all too similar.
It was split down the middle, like two separate halves.
xtxtx
She caught him a few weeks later in the girl's bathroom haunted by Moaning Myrtle. He was gripping the edge of a sink tightly, his fingers turning red.
"Malfoy?" she asked quietly. He turned to her, his face red and his eyes spiked with tears.
This was a side of Draco Malfoy she had never seen.
The next thing she knew they were sprawled on the floor, her arms wrapped tightly around him.
She felt a stirring in her stomach as he looked up at her, his eyes searching.
"What, Weasley? Are you going to kiss me?" She could hear the hesitation in his voice as he asked.
"No, I don't think I will kiss you, although you need kissing badly. That's what's wrong with you. You should be kissed, and often, and by someone who knows how." She didn't know why she said it. She knew she wanted to kiss him then. But she also knew, she supposed, that he wasn't ready for her.
She left him then.
xtxtx
A few hours later, she stumbled back to the Gryffindor Common Room, trying to walk off a rather intense tickling charm.
xtxtx
What she didn't know was that she was his only sanity that year.
xtxtx
By the end of the year, she understood it all.
xtxtx
Part Three - The Prize
A tree growing out of the ground is as wonderful today as it ever was. It does not need to adopt new and startling methods.
Robert Henri
xtxtx
September 1997
Every year was different.
The last two had been especially hard.
The worst was yet to come and he knew that.
He visited the tree.
It was growing in two halves, but they only touched at the base.
xtxtx
Draco Malfoy lost almost everything.
His family were basically slaves.
His life was gone.
xtxtx
He still fought with Red-the Weasley girl. But never when others were around for the start of the fight.
No one else could see the spark in her eyes.
xtxtx
His heart was pounding in his chest. The Dark Lord stood there, beckoning for him to come.
"Draco!" His mother's fervent cries. His father's hope in his two syllable name.
"Draco!" Weasley's barely audible plead.
He went to them. To his family.
They were [the ones] who mattered.
The Dark Lord gathered Draco in his arms. Draco wanted to rip the beast's heart out.
Draco walked to his mother, felt her arms envelop him.
"Run. Run." The words were light and soft.
"Draco?" His mother's voice in his ear.
"Mother. Run from here." He could scarcely believe he was saying it.
"Not without you, Draco."
"Mother. She has to stay safe. Who else could help her but me?"
He didn't know why he said it, why he walked away from his mother.
But he walked right past the Dark Lord. Felt the cold beast's eyes on him.
Beneath a young oak tree split in twain, stood a red-headed girl under a ruby amulet.
The two trunks wrapped around each other.
Together.
He took her hand and faced the Dark Lord.
A tree is an incomprehensible mystery.
Jim Woodring
Original Prompt from a_gypsys_dance:
Briefly describe what you'd like to receive in your fic: Since we're going back to our roots, I'd like my fic to take place during Hogwarts, although part of it can extend afterwards if needed. It can incorporate any amount of canon you would like. Draco and Ginny are forced to work together (detention, tutoring, class, whatever you want
as long as it isn't too OOC) and keep running into each other afterwards, gradually developing some sort of friendship/relationship, though they refuse to acknowledge it as such.
The tone/mood of the fic: Dark humor; optimistic ending
An element/line of dialogue/object you would specifically like in your fic: "No, I don't think I will kiss you, although you need kissing
badly. That's what's wrong with you. You should be kissed, and often, and by someone who knows how."
Preferred rating of the the fic you want: PG-13 or higher
Canon or AU? Either
Deal Breakers (anything you don't want?): Pregnancy