Author's Notes:
1. Marked 'poly-fic, possible triad' in the summary because while this will definitely be a poly-fic, the story, itself, will dictate if there's to be any M/M sequences or romantic plot as it goes along.
2. Corvus Selwyn is [one of] my take[s] on the canon character of Selwyn (the other being Augustin Selwyn).
3. Fic (and title) inspired by a "Your YA book title" post (one of those lists that makes you select things based on your birthday and first letter of your name) shared by my friend xxDustNight88 (give her FB group DustNight Fanfiction Readers a lookie ).
4. Updates will be sporadic. Chapter lengths will vary (some may be over 4k, some may be under 2k).
5. Some plot elements will revisit points I've touched upon in other fics (mostly to do with Hermione's heritage/lineage).
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Fancast: Sebastian Stan as Corvus Selwyn
DISCLAIMER:I do not own Harry Potter, or any affiliated characters, and make no profit from this story.
CHAPTER ONE
Hermione shivered at the feel of his teeth raking over the skin just below her ear, but she pulled away, tutting at him. "We can't do this now."
Feigning a pout—it really was wonderful how much freer and livelier he seemed since the War's end—Draco met her gaze. "And why not, exactly?"
She slipped from his embrace, even as she laced her fingers though his to tug him along behind her. He was putting up a fight, though, putting his leanly-muscled weight into standing perfectly still as he yanked on her arm, causing her to slingshot back to him.
Giggling, she let out a huffing breath as he nipped at her throat, once more. Lord, how she wanted to stay in this darkened corridor nook and just let him have his way, but no. Everyone knew their faces by now, if they weren't in there soon . . . .
"Draco? Dinner is about to start, if we're not in the Great Hall when McGonagall begins her welcome speech, people are going to notice."
"Mmm," he exhaled the sound, seeming unconvinced by her argument as he spared a moment to nibble at her earlobe. The way she all but melted against him and uttered that little mewling whine in the back of her throat had him sure he'd won. "Oh, yes. A boyfriend and girlfriend of consenting adult age conspicuously missing at the same time. I'm sure they'll just be sending out search parties!"
Hermione forced herself to focus. If she gave into him now when they'd only been dating for a few weeks—since that fateful mid-August afternoon when they'd run into each other at Flourish and Blotts and somehow an argument over which book was a better source for counter-curse research had ended in them snogging right there in the bookshop—it would set an awful precedent for their relationship.
Tugging out of his arms once more, she started determinedly pulling him along behind her. "Funny one, you are. But no, let's not begin our final year with delinquency."
Recognizing that he had, in fact, lost, he let his head fall back and sighed. "Your definition of delinquent and mine are so different."
Laughing, she shook her head. "Besides, I already have a long night ahead of me. I've been assigned to do some research for Professor McGonagall."
Draco's shoulders drooped even as he allowed her to continue dragging him along. "You've got assignments already?"
"Not exactly, it's more to assist the professors, since people haven't exactly been clamoring to fill the Defense Against the Dark Arts post, some of the teachers are pulling double-duty to fill in. Given my personal war record, Professor McGonagall . . . okay, I'm lying."
Draco stopped short, though this time there was no giggling or nuzzling her neck when she, again, slingshot back into him. "What?"
The witch averted her gaze, shrugging. "Partially lying. I didn't want to make a fuss, but Professor McGonagall asked me, because of my war record—and because this is me, apparently—if I could fill in on the DADA post with the first years, just until they do find a permanent teacher."
His brow furrowed as he searched her gaze. "And you didn't tell me because . . . ?"
She choked out a scoffing sound. "Because of all the things we've always heard about the post. That it was cursed, that bad things always happen to those who dare take it up."
"Even if that were true, I think that curse died with, well, you know who."
Hermione didn't think he quite sounded convinced of his own words. The wounds of the War were still healing, pointing out that he was still in dread of even speaking Voldemort's name would only cause a fight.
She smiled, her eyebrows pinching together. "I just didn't want you to worry."
"Hey," he said in a low voice, grinning, "if there's anyone who can handle themselves in a dangerous situation, it's you."
"Mm-hmm." She nodded, feeling much better as they started walking, again. "So you think teaching first years is a dangerous situation?"
"Bunch of rowdy eleven year olds not yet in control of their magic? Yes, Ma'am!"
Even as she laughed, she winced. "I see your point."
"And you've got homework before the first bloody day of classes!"
Forcing a shrug that was much more carefree than it felt, she said, "If there's anyone who can manage to pick up a class assignment before lessons even started—"
"It's you."
"It's so me."
Their discussion, however, managed to take up the same amount of time Hermione'd dreaded spending out in the corridor to begin with. By the time they walked into the Great Hall, Professor McGonagall had just opened her mouth to begin speaking. Spying the very familiar pair of faces strolling into the massive chamber—late and holding hands—she unexpectedly paused a moment. Her faltering caused literally ever other head in the Great Hall to turn and look at them.
Hermione flushed, swallowing hard as she forced a smile. "This is your fault," she said to Draco in a hissing whisper.
A snicker edged his words. "It so is, just not for the reason I was hoping."
The rest of the first night's feast was relatively uneventful, though Hermione did have to field a few questions from some rabidly curious friends. Ginny had already been made aware of the relationship by Ron, who seemed to take the entire situation as a personal insult, despite that his own relationship with Hermione hadn't lasted longer than the first few weeks following the War. Ginny had understood, Harry had understood . . . even Molly! And the Weasley matriarch was hardly the most forgiving sort, but she had tried explaining to her son that sometimes things that seemed perfect turned out not to be a proper fit at all once they were given a chance.
In that respect, she supposed she was relieved that Ron had decided not to return to formally finish his education—she wouldn't have to deal with his sour disposition every day. Though she was sad Harry'd also chosen not to return, she did think that felt right, somehow. Ron had his hands full helping George without trying to seem like he was attempting to replace Fred, and Harry with his Auror training and making sure Ron and George didn't off one another when no one was looking.
Despite all that, she did miss them terribly.
As dessert was served, Hermione swore she could feel the weight of someone's gaze pressing on her. Frowning, she turned to look at the Slytherin table. Draco was engrossed in some discussion with Blaise—though it looked more like an argument. Probably Zabini having trouble wrapping his head around his pure-blood friend, formerly so vehemently blood-purist, dating a proud Muggleborn.
Draco caught her gaze and stopped mid-sentence to send her a flirty grin and a wink—really, he'd changed so much since the War, not that she was complaining, he was also still snarky, quick to lob an insult, and annoyingly judgmental, a bit like herself if she stopped to think on it long enough—she knew he was not the source of the feeling. Certainly, at the beginning of the meal, there were still flickering glances landing on her and Draco, but the attention had just as quickly died away as conversations struck up and food was dug into.
Chewing slow, she continued scanning the room. It felt oddly like the boisterous discussions going on around her suddenly fell hushed . . . like there was nothing in this grand room except for her and the unsettling sensation tickling along her skin.
What only seemed a heartbeat later, she snapped back to her senses. As she looked about, everyone was getting up from their places and starting out of the Great Hall.
Ginny was tugging at her sleeve as she passed, though Hermione didn't quite catch what the ginger-haired witch was saying. Something about heading up to Gryffindor tower, she thought?
Not wanting to worry the other young woman with her own strangely scatterbrained moment, Hermione stood, but shook her head. "I've got something to see to for Professor McGonagall."
Ginny nodded, not seeming terribly surprised, and turned to follow the flood of students pouring out the wide double doors.
With a glance back around the quickly emptying chamber, Hermione convinced herself the strange feeling had been her imagination.
Looking up from the scroll bearing Professor McGonagall's list of suggested research material, Hermione scanned the shelf once more. Where on earth was the school's copy of Hexes and Hauntings?
A sound like a footfall somewhere behind her made her jump a bit and she looked over her shoulder. Even Madam Pince wasn't here tonight, making the library—which had always felt a little bit like home to Hermione Granger—feel empty and echoing. Surely, that was her imagination.
Just like feeling someone watching her at dinner?
Giving herself a shake, she returned her attention to the shelf before her. After all, she had even thought it only sounded like a footfall. Old buildings made funny sounds all the time, and it wasn't as though Hogwarts wasn't haunted. It was probably just a ghost.
She nearly snickered at herself a moment. To think, in the world she'd been born into, telling oneself an odd noise was 'probably just a ghost' was not a comforting notion.
"All right, forget Hexes and Hauntings. Where is—?" She paused, hearing the sound again just as she'd decided to move to the next book on her list.
Her shoulders slumped as she turned toward the noise. If that was a ghost, at least she could ask them to keep it down.
"Hello?"
After a moment, her greeting met only by silence, she shook her head. She pivoted back to the shelf, once more.
"Hello?"
"I knew I was hearing something," she whispered to herself as she turned in the direction of that voice, and then just about shouted, "Who's over there?"
The young man who stepped out from behind a bookcase at the far end of the room looked . . . familiar. He was taller than Draco, and had dark hair that fell a bit haphazardly across his forehead and into a set of utterly piercing blue eyes. Obviously her own age—though she had an odd feeling he might actually be a bit older—he wore Slytherin robes.
Though, she had a feeling that wherever she knew him from, it wasn't Hogwarts.
He held up his hands as though he expected her to draw her wand on him. Yet, as he moved closer, she could see the very book for which she'd been searching clutched in his left hand.
"Sorry," he said with a lopsided grin. "Thought I was alone in here."
His voice didn't sound familiar at all, but there was just something about him . . . . She was certain she'd recall that perfect jawline and those chiseled cheekbones anywhere.
Nearly as soon as the thought skittered across her mind, she dropped her attention to the floor, collecting herself. She was with someone, she should not be noticing jawlines and cheekbones . . . or the breadth of shoulders from the corner of her eye.
Shaking her head and forcing herself to meet his gaze once more, she tried for an airy tone. "Well, you're not and I've been looking for that book you're holding."
"Huh?" He shifted his focus to the book in question. "Oh, sorry. The headmistress gave me a list of books, I think there was supposed to be more than one copy, but—"
"You, too?"
"What?"
Frowning, she held up her scroll from Professor McGonagall. "Filling in for a vacant teaching post?"
"Right. I'm to cover for any classes that . . . . Oh. Oh, you're her."
Hermione's brows shot up. "Her?"
"You're teaching the first years? I'm supposed to cover any classes that conflict with your own lessons."
"Who are you?"
Well, she certainly wasn't one to waste time with manners, was she? Clearing his throat, he set down the book and his own copy of the list on the nearest table and held out his hand. "Corvus . . . Selwyn."
Purely reactionary was Hermione's move to shake his hand. The moment his last name fell from his lips, she froze. From the look on his face, she thought perhaps he was prepared for her to respond this way.
Not surprising, now that where she'd seen his face before had clicked. "Selwyn?"
An awkward grimace flickered across his features as he nodded.
Now she knew why he'd approached her like he expected her to attack; he remembered her face as surely as she remembered his. "You were with the Snatchers!"
He shrugged, but looked away. "I was doing my job."
"You're a Death Eater!"
Seeming to hold back some impatient retort, he rolled his eyes. "No one's a Death Eater, anymore, Hermione Granger."
She snatched up the book they both needed, gesturing at him with it. "Why are you even here? You should be—"
"In Azkaban?"
Forcing a gulp down her throat, she nodded.
Meeting her gaze again, his mouth tugged down at the corners in a thoughtful frown. "As I said, I was doing my job. I was a Death Eater, but I crossed battle lines."
"When?" She shouldn't be continuing to ask him anything! She should be storming up to the headmistress' office and demanding to know why she hadn't been told about this!
"After you lot escaped from that mad bat Bellatrix, but before the Battle of Hogwarts." He shrugged. "This is more than you probably care to know, but I was dragged out of Durmstrang by my family and made to join the Death Eaters in my father's place after he died two years ago. This is my probation for my role in the War. Assist with the empty teaching posts while I formally finish my education here."
All the while as he'd spoken, Hermione's gaze had moved along his form in repeated once-overs. "Why wasn't anyone warned of this?"
"Last minute decision, I suppose? I arrived here just as everyone was getting out of the feast. Reported directly to Professor McGonagall and then came here. Any more questions, Warden?"
Her jaw dropped open as she gaped up at him. "I beg your pardon? Given my memories of our last encounter, can you blame me for being cautious?"
He offered a reluctant smile as he nodded. "I suppose not." Nodding again, he pointed to the book. "You take it. If I feel I need it for lessons, then I'll—"
"No, no. You did get it first, after all." She supposed if Professor McGonagall thought he could be trusted on school grounds, the least Hermione could do was try to be civil. Taking a seat, she pulled her quill and ink bottle from her bag. "I'll jot down the chapters I'll want to work on, and when I feel it's time for those lessons, I'll confer with you. If, um, if you're covering for me, then we should be on the same page, for the students' sakes."
He nodded. "That makes sense, okay."
She couldn't help but be aware of him watching her as she noted the portions of the book that she thought would be the most useful. Had he moved to stand behind her?
Upon finishing, she closed the book. "I'll request Madam Pince order another copy tomorrow, but seeing as there are probably so many books being restocked right now, it may be a while."
"Finished?"
"Yes."
She nearly jumped out of her skin as he reached over her shoulder to take the book. No sense of personal space, this one.
Yet, as his left arm disappeared from her line of sight, words tumbled from her lips. She hadn't meant to ask, but after everything Wizarding Britain had been through—in part because so many people had refused to believe someone could come back—she felt prompted. True, she'd seen Draco's arm, but something about his faded Mark didn't seem quite real. Perhaps because he'd only been a Death Eater for such a short time, and only so that Voldemort could hold him over his parents' heads.
"Is he truly gone?"
She thought she could feel the way Corvus tensed behind her, though he wasn't near enough for that. She thought she could sense him moving closer as he considered her question.
"You don't believe the Dark Lord is really dead?"
She shrugged, oddly aware of the pitch of his voice in the quiet of the library. "He . . . ." Licking her lips nervously—why was she nervous all of the sudden?—she shrugged. "He wasn't the last time everyone believed him dead."
He exhaled, a long, low breath . . . that she felt against the skin on her neck and the side of her face. "You know about the Dark Mark?"
Hermione refused to turn her head and look up at him. How had this moment become so oddly strained? Certainly they were the only people in the library, yet it felt strangely like they were the only two people in the entire world in this moment.
"Of course."
He set the book down on the other side of her and then she heard the rustling of fabric behind her head. "So you know that after the First War, the original Death Eaters' Marks didn't fade, because there was still something of him left alive, somehow?"
Aware that only very few of even his precious Death Eaters had known about the Horcruxes, she nodded. It made sense that Corvus would use a term like that if he didn't actually understand what had happened.
"Have a look for yourself, then."
Just as when he grabbed the book, she jumped to find him half-curled around her. He crooked his arm, the sleeve of his robes was rolled up to his elbow and he placed his left forearm before her on the table.
Now she definitely felt his breath dancing across her skin. Ignoring the sensation as best she could—and hating that it set off butterflies in the pit of her stomach for some reason—she examined his Mark. Yes, just like Draco's, it was faded. Just the faintest coal-grey design against the inside of his arm.
She could not say what possessed her, but she turned her head, then. His face was over her shoulder, so close to her own that when he moved to meet her gaze, their noses nearly touched.
Pulling back just a little so that they could see each other properly, he arched a brow. "There. Feel better?"
I certainly feel something. Giving herself a mental shake, she avoided any telling reactions, like clearing her throat or shaking her head as she forced out the words, "Much, thank you."
"Tomorrow before dinner."
Her eyebrows pinched together. "What?"
He slowly rose to his full height, but his eyes remained locked on hers. "I thought we could meet to go over our schedules and the classes, so we'll know when you need me."
For a moment she drew a complete blank. Was it in the way he talked? His nearness? Perhaps it was those piercing eyes or the oddly mesmerizing pitch of his voice.
Dear God, Hermione! Get yourself under control! Did she honestly need to bombard herself with mental images of Draco when she was around this man? How horrible she was!
"Sure. Before dinner sounds good. Twenty minutes should be plenty of time for that."
He nodded, backpedaling. "Goodnight, Hermione Granger."
She didn't move a muscle as she watched him retreating. "Goodnight, Corvus Selwyn."
And she continued to watch him—as though she couldn't manage to tear her gaze from his form as he turned on his heel and sauntered out of the library.
Yet, once he was out the door, she found herself staring around at her environment with a series of rapid blinks. Drawing a deep, shaky breath and letting it out slow, she asked herself in a low tumble of sound, "What the bloody hell was that about?"