ONE.
"God it's good to be home." Harry threw himself onto his favourite armchair, Ron doing the same beside him.
"I'm hungry."
"Ron! You just ate about seventeen courses!" Hermione shook her head, laughing.
"Yeah but I'm not eating right now?!" They laughed, the fire cackling away beside them. Harry looked at it and pain welled up in his eyes. Ginny sat down on his knee and wrapped her arms around his neck.
"You okay?" she whispered in his ear. He nodded. Ron pulled Hermione onto his knee and kissed her neck, snaking his arm around her waist.
"Stop it, Ronald. Not the time, or the place."
Ron looked up, "Huh?" and Hermione nodded her head towards Harry who sat very still, staring at the flames.
"I keep expecting him to walk in and yell SURPRISE! You know? Like it was all a big scam... All summer in Grimmauld Place, every time I turned a corner I thought I was going to see him. Kreacher thought I was going nuts."
They were quiet for a moment. Hermione glanced at the clock above the fire place. "I'm sorry Harry. I'd better go. Professor McGonagall is meeting me and the head boy and showing us to the Heads' Common Room..." She stood.
"Has she told you who it is yet?" Ginny asked.
"No. She keeps refusing to tell me... I'm so curious!"
"You were the obvious choice for head girl."
"I would've thought Harry would've been head boy, though."
Harry shook his head. "It was one of the first things I said to McGonagall once it was all over. I told her I didn't want to be anything next year. Quidditch captain, yes. But not head boy. She did that knowing smile and head-nodding thing she does."
Ron leaned in, obviously confused. "Why didn't you wanna be head boy?"
"I'll see you all later, sleep well!" Hermione took off at a run across the room, down the steps and across the school. McGonagall was already there, waiting.
"Ah good, Miss Granger. We'll just wait a moment for Mr M- " She stopped herself. "Our new head boy to join us."
"Professor, can you tell me who it is? I've been trying so hard to work it out but next to Harry, there just doesn't seem to be - " she froze solid as a familiar figure approached them. Sauntering across the foyer was none other than the famous blond haired, grey eyed -
"Mr Malfoy, good. We'll be off then." Professor McGonagall took off at a quick pace, leaving Hermione and Draco to glare at each other. "I will not linger!" She called. They quickly followed behind her.
Malfoy. Hermione glanced at him, just to make sure her mind wasn't playing tricks on her. A past Death Eater? Head Boy at Hogwarts? He'll start his own dark arts club or torture first years or something!
"I hope you two are looking at how to get there! It's a little trickier than most places around the school." McGonagall had stopped and was tapping the wall with her wand. "The pattern is one, two three, pause, one, two, pause, one. Understood?" Hermione glanced around her, taking a mental snapshot of where she was in the school, and nodded. She couldn't bring herself to look at Malfoy. The wall shuddered like rubber and with a quick "pop!" a door appeared.
"Your things are in the bedrooms. Ms Granger on the right, Mr Malfoy on the left. Good night, both of you. See you at breakfast." McGonagall handed them their timetables, and departed.
"I'm not stupid enough to turn my back on you for one second, Malfoy. You go in first." Hermione looked up, daggers in her eyes. He shrugged, and entered, Hermione behind him.
"Oh wow." It was a tall room, only a little smaller than the Gryffindor common room, with hangings representing the four houses in each corner. There were two desks, side by side, two arm chairs by the fire, two very puffy couches on either side of a coffee table and two magnificent stair wells, each presumably leading up to the bedrooms.
Draco let out a low whistle. "This is nice."
Hermione didn't respond.
"Aye, Mudblood."
"What did you call me?" She turned to him, only becoming more aggravated when she saw that he was laughing.
"I was just checking you could hear me."
"You know, pureblood is much more of an insult these days, Malfoy."
"I don't particularly like being referred to by that name." He pulled his chest up.
"Did it ever occur to you that I don't like being called mudblood?"
Draco paused. "Sorry."
"What?"
"I've changed my ways, Granger."
"Just like your father did when Voldemort fell the first time, huh."
Malfoy pulled out his wand, quick flash. "Don't tell me I'm like my father."
"You're a spitting image."
"I'm nothing like him."
"Oh different right down to the dark mark on your arm," Hermione was furious. Draco looked like he was about to kill her.
"Go on, Malfoy, kill me. Or are you not man enough to say the words?"
He moved his arm and instinctually Hermione pulled out her wand and disarmed him in one fluid motion. Draco's wand flew across the room from Hermione's charm but he didn't stop looking at her. He had pulled up the sleeve on his robe to show her a gaping wound right where the dark mark should have been.
"You don't know how painful it was to get rid of, Granger."
"Malfoy, don't try -" But he cut her off.
"For the last time don't call me Malfoy!" He turned on his heel and, with his robes billowing behind him, he left the common room and slammed the door of his bedroom. Hermione looked around, bewildered. Did Draco Malfoy just show a little emotion? His wand was still lying at the base of the stairs, so she picked it up on her way past. She knocked tentatively.
"Fuck off, Granger."
"Your wand is outside your door."
