Draco wasted no time in finding out what Granger was up to. When the weekend rolled around, he made sure to be aware of her whereabouts and managed to waylay her on her way to Hogsmead with the Weasel. They were going late after the main body of students had already gone off, the pair of them walking along in deep conversation.
Draco slipped out of the shadows and snagged Granger by the arm, yanking her back a step.
"Hey!" Weasley cried, startled and then flushing with anger. "Get your hands off of her, Malfoy!"
"Piss off, Weasley!" Draco snapped, no more willing to deal with him now than he ever was.
"Draco!" Hermione cried, horrified at his spite, and immediately, warningly, said, "Ronald, don't you dare!"
Ron's face was brick red and furious but he dropped his balled up fist.
Draco merely smirked and lifted an eyebrow at him, dropping Granger's arm and leaning nonchalantly against the wall.
"Ronald Weasley, I mean it!" Hermione firmly said, putting a restraining hand on Ron's arm. "Let me handle this, please."
"Hermione, what on earth is wrong with you, lately?" Ron demanded. "Why are you even speaking to him?"
"That is my business, Ronald—not yours," Hermione said, lifting her chin in a familiar, stubborn gesture. "Now please go find Harry and tell him that I will meet you both later. Now, Ronald!"
"You've certainly got him trained well," Draco remarked, making sure the rangy red-head heard it as he walked off.
"This had better be a dire emergency, Draco," Hermione said, arms crossed and that mutinous expression back on her face. "I have absolutely no desire to be anywhere near you—"
"Oh, nonsense," Draco said, waving his hand a little in dismissal. He shoved off of the wall and took her arm in hand again, dragging her back into the main hall and off into a side passage. The touch wiped the angry look of her face, even though it wasn't bare skin, and she softened in his grip, her lashes lowering a little.
"Where are we going?" she asked, her voice a little breathless. She dug in her heels a little and urgently said, "Honestly, Draco, I can't be near you right now!"
"I don't care," Draco told her, and slipped his hand from her arm to grip her fingers tightly—skin on skin contact slapped her right back where he wanted her and she stopped resisting, a flush rising on her cheeks. "What have you been up to, Granger?"
"Nothing," she weakly said, following him now to a darker passageway. "Draco, please don't do this now, I'm really not in any mood—"
"Sod your bloody mood. And don't get all sullen towards me," Draco snapped, hauling her into the dim byway. "It's hardly my fault that your little love-interest won't ever pluck up the balls to ask you out."
"No, but it is your fault I won't be a virgin on my wedding night," Hermione pointedly reminded.
"Anyone who expects that is out of their bloody mind," Draco meanly told her, slinging her against the wall. "Don't get smart with me, Granger—a girl of your appetites should always be careful how far she pushes the one who can hurt her worst."
She mimicked his stance, crossing her arms over her chest and glaring at him.
"Well?" he demanded, brows rising beneath the spill of his white-blond hair.
Hermione's mouth pursed even more, her brown eyes glittering in the semi-darkness and her expression mulish.
"Well what?" she tightly asked, stubbornly refusing to cave in.
Draco sighed, fingers clenching on his arms in exasperation.
"Granger," he lowly said to her, pinning her with his grey eyes. "It would be in your best interest to tell me what you've been up to. Studying, was it? You've researched a bit, have you?"
Hermione blew her breath out, sending a curl of hair floating up away from her face. She cut her eyes away from him, looking down and fidgeting with discomfort.
"Is there someplace we can go?" she softly asked, looking up at him from the corner of her eyes.
Draco gave her an inquisitive look, not sure if he'd heard her correctly.
"I don't want to talk about it in front of anyone else," she hastily said, looking truly uncomfortable.
"Come on," Draco shortly said, heading off towards the deeper parts of the castle that he'd explored in his first years at Hogwarts. There were places in the castle that no one went to anymore, places that even the ghosts left alone—it was too vast a place for thorough use, and many areas remained nominally sealed off and largely forgotten.
Granger followed him in silence, deep in thought, looking somehow alright in her shabby hooded sweatshirt and loose jeans. Her eyes were dark with thoughts, shuttered beneath her heavy lashes.
Draco found the door he was looking for and pushed on it, leaning into it until it reluctantly groaned open on its hinges and unleashed a draft of cool, musty air that made Granger reflexively hug herself. The Gryffindor babies didn't like the cold shadows or darkness—that was Slytherin territory.
"Come on," Draco said, and held out his hand to her.
She took it warily, the oppressive darkness too reminiscent of those vile things that cavorted in her deepest dreams. In darkness anything could happen, and it would always stay in darkness, a secret forever.
He gripped her cold fingers and pulled her into the stifling black room, shoving the door closed behind them and sliding the bolt home.
"I can't see you," she said, lost in the darkness.
"Which means that I can't see you," Draco retorted, though he could—his night vision was remarkable thanks to the gloom that always reigned in Malfoy Manor. "And thank god for small favors, I say."
"Haven't I told you before that you're not funny?" Hermione bit out, her tone icy.
"You're just a sore loser," Draco informed her. "What did you want to tell me?"
He heard her take a raspy breath, could make out the shadowy form of her hugging herself.
"It isn't going to be easy, Draco," she said.
"Telling me? Yes it is, you just open your constantly running mouth—"
"No!" she snapped, cutting him off. "It isn't going to be easy to break our bond!"
Draco stiffened, anger slowly welling in him.
"You refused to tell me how it was done," he tightly said. "You insisted on keeping it from me! I will not be stuck with you, mudblood! You will tell me now!"
"I'm really very sorry, Draco," she hastily said, her voice mournful. "It isn't as if I fancy being stuck with you, either!"
"Get to the point!" he shouted, grabbing her shadowy form by the shoulders and giving her a shake.
"I…I didn't realize that…it's just—if the love-struck bond isn't broken within a few weeks then it's nearly impossible to break," she said, and her voice was thick with real tears, her small hands clutching his arms helplessly. "The longer it's kept active, the stronger it gets, growing in proportion with the incubi's or succubus' power."
Draco only half-listened, his keen mind quickly doing the math.
"It's been nearly three weeks, has it?" he asked, confirming his suspicions. "What were you going to do, Granger? Avoid me until enough time had passed?"
"No!" she cried, frustrated and outraged all at once. "No, of course not! Draco, I don't know how to break the bond! I didn't have time to find out before you ambushed me in the library! Once the damage was done I read the book completely and I realized that it didn't have a recantation!"
In a small, almost inaudible voice she added, "I've been searching like mad for it, Draco, but I'm not even sure anymore if a way exists."
