A/N - Three chapters into the edit. Big changes already (sorry if you're reading this in a half edited state). I will suggest waiting to read until everything has been edited. Promise it will be better/more feminist/less full of Draco's problematic and pretty much abusive behaviour. In LB 2.0 he's more redeemable.

Right, I'm done. Read.


All in all, when Hermione woke the next morning, she felt the prefect meeting of the night before could certainly be considered a success. The aftermath of her less-than-confrontational conversation with Theo had given her a happy glow that she'd carried with her from the remainder of the evening and into Friday morning. She could hardly wait for Tuesday to come around.

The only thing dampening Hermione's mood was, in fact, the very thing that had caused it in the first place. She had to face the facts: she was attracted to Theodore Nott.

But how could she be? He was a Slytherin, his father was a Death Eater who she'd battled against in the Ministry of Magic in her fifth year… but even apart from all that, there was Ron to consider.

She loved Ron. She'd lost her virginity to Ron, just days before he'd left with Harry. After that, how could she even think about being attracted to anybody but Ron? She felt so guilty… but she hadn't actually done anything with Theo. They'd just had a very short, polite, harmless conversation.

Hermione took a shower, trying not to think too much about Theo or Ron or anyone else. After getting dressed, she set off to meet Ginny for breakfast before classes. She was humming softly to herself as she walked into the common room, still in the same pleasant mood as when she had woken up, when she heard a cold voice call out from behind her, making her stop in her tracks.

"So, what the fuck were you doing last night?"

Hermione turned around. Malfoy was leaning against his door frame, looking rather angry.

"Well I was trying to write my History of Magic essay before you swanned in with your pathetic girlfriend-" she began, but Malfoy cut her off.

"Don't get clever with me, Granger. I mean, what were you doing with Nott?"

He slowly walked over to her, staring at her intensely in a way that made the hairs on her arm stand up on end.

"I don't know what you mean."

"Yes you do. I saw the way you were looking at him. I don't know what the fuck you think you're playing at, but Purebloods and your kind don't mix. Ever. Understood?"

Hermione was starting to feel a little intimidated, but stood her ground.

"You can't tell me what to do, Malfoy. He's my patrol partner. I have to spend time with him."

"Be that as it may," he said, coming to a halt very close to her, so close she could almost count every single one of his eyelashes, and she could see the fury in his eyes, "just know that you have no place in Theo's life. You're nothing. You're worth nothing. And despite how he acts, deep down Theo knows that. I'm pretty sure his father knows it too. You've met him already I believe?"

Hermione said nothing.

"Think about that before you go deciding to be the poster girl for house unity. In fact, actually, you can 'unify' with Nott all you like, for all I care. I can't do anything if he decides he wants to slum it with a filthy thing like you. But his father certainly can. Maybe consider what his family might think about it before you go jumping on his dick."

She could feel tears welling up in her eyes. This was humiliating. He leaned even closer towards her, and she instinctively leaned back.

"Know your place, Mudblood," he concluded, breathing the foul word into her ear, before smiling at her and walking past her, out through the portrait hole.

The tears starting flowing freely now. Hermione hated herself for letting such a pathetic, prejudiced person make her feel so worthless. She brushed away her tears, took a deep breath, and walked out through the portrait hole too, her happy mood from the morning most definitely destroyed.


Draco spent the rest of his Friday with a thundercloud over his head. Why couldn't Granger just know her place and keep out of his way?

He didn't exactly know why he'd stepped in to nip things with Theodore and Granger in the bud. It wasn't like he and Nott were particularly close. It was just that he'd gotten so suddenly angry seeing the pair of them flirting right in front of his nose, in broad daylight, without a care in the world. Did Nott not know what he was risking? He'd be shunned, isolated, hunted… Draco had experienced first-hand the consequences of going against one's own family. That was why he stepped in, he told himself, because he wouldn't wish such a fate on his worst enemy.

Draco found out in Potions that Granger had missed the first class of the morning, overhearing the information from his soon-to-be rounds partner, Lavender Brown. He couldn't have upset her that badly, surely? He was just trying to shake her up enough to get her to stay away from Nott. It wasn't as if he'd actually done anything except spit a few nasty words at her. He'd had her pegged as a little tougher than she really was, evidently.

But perhaps that was a good thing. If she was upset enough to miss a class, fucking know-it-all, he was pretty certain he could bet that he'd planted enough of a seed in her mind that she'd stay away from Nott. So now it was time to attend to the other cause of the problem, because as much as he wished he could blame it all on that no-good Mudblood, Draco knew that Theo hadn't exactly been cold to her. Maybe the flirting had been some kind of joke on Theo's part. Maybe he had an ulterior motive - he was a Slytherin after all.

That evening, he walked into the Great Hall, intent on speaking to Theo over dinner. For the first time since the morning, Draco spotted Granger sat next to the irritating red-headed Weasley girl at the Gryffindor table. He also spied Theo sitting on his own, as usual, at the Slytherin table, behind the Gryffindors. Draco walked past Granger and Weasley on his way towards Theo. Granger must have seen him coming, because she looked firmly in the opposite direction until he'd walked past.

Draco slid himself into the free space on the other side of the table to Theo.

"Hi," he said.

Nott looked up and half-smiled at him in greeting before silently returning to his food. He was usually happiest when he was by himself. Helping himself to some food, Draco tried to casually strike up conversation.

"Have you seen Zabini around recently?"

He tried to avoid Theo's eye. Theo tended to stare at people as though he could see inside their heads, and Draco found it a little creepy.

"Why, is my company not good enough for you, Draco?"

"I didn't think you liked company," Draco laughed and gestured to the empty seats either side of Theo, who smiled.

"Just because I don't often have it, doesn't mean I don't like it."

"Maybe you should let some other people know that, then," Draco replied.

"Maybe. Perhaps Crabbe and Goyle could be my sidekicks instead this year. They're beside themselves now you aren't around as much, I'm sure they'd be glad to attach themself to someone else again."

"Oh, you mean someone to do the thinking for them? Honestly, I felt more like an interpretor than anything else when I was with them. I always had to make sure that none of my words had too many syllables, so that they didn't lose track of the conversation."

"That's true - they're hardly eloquent, are they?" Theo remarked.

Both boys laughed and there was a small pause while they ate a little and Draco tried to think of a way to steer the conversation closer to Granger.

"But not having any reason to spend any time with them anymore, you know, since we're not sharing a room, is probably one of the few perks of being Head Boy I suppose," he said, trying his best to sound casual.

"You mean besides the huge private dorm, the prestige, and not having to be in bed by curfew?" smiled Theo.

"Hey, being Head Boy isn't all it's cracked up to be; I mean, I do have to live with Hermione fucking Granger. Who on Earth could stand to live with a jumped up Mudblood like her for a year?"

Theo was silent for a beat, though he didn't look at Draco and kept his eyes on his food.

"She can't be that bad. She's just one girl," he replied, still not looking at Draco, who could feel the first flickers of anger in his stomach.

"She's hardly 'just one girl,'" he growled. "She's Hermione Granger: she's a prude, she thinks she knows everything, she's stuck up and she's a bitch. And even if she weren't all of those things, she's a Mudblood. And we don't associate with them."

"'We'?" asked Theo, at last putting down his knife and fork and looking up at Draco. "I hardly think you can speak for me, Malfoy."

His voice had become slightly sharper. Draco narrowed his eyes.

"What do you mean, Theo?"

There was a very pregnant pause. Theo said nothing.

"God, you like her, don't you?"

"What is it to you if I do?"

There was another pause. Draco was sure there was steam coming out of his ears.

"You're a dumb fuck," he finally spat, angry and incredulous.

"Now who isn't eloquent? Are you sure you don't want to go back to spending more time with Crabbe and Goyle?"

"Don't try and banter your way out of this. I'm trying to look out for you," Draco countered.

"Why? We aren't that close, Malfoy, and you know it. Look," he sighed, "blood status just doesn't bother me anymore. I really don't understand why it's such a big deal to our families. Times have changed. Why should they get a say about who I choose to date?"

If Theo was angry then he was hiding it well, as his tone was calm and even. Draco however, could feel rage bubbling up inside of him.

"So you're saying you want to date her?" he cut in savagely.

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves, I've barely spoken to her. But why shouldn't I, if I want to? Because some people a thousand years ago decided that we're better than people born from non-magical parents and everyone has just been lapping it up since? I mean, even you should be able to see that that's crap, Malfoy," Theo said insistently. "We can all do magic, and she can do it better than most, so why the hell am I supposed to believe that she's not as good as us, that she doesn't deserve to have magic at all, just because she happened to be born to Muggle parents?"

Draco could hear ringing in his ears. He couldn't decide if it was the shock of hearing Nott say all this, or a side effect of his concentrated effort to avoid thinking about the logic of his arguments, because it sounded like it made a suspicious amount of sense. Which, if it did, meant he would have to take a long hard look at his entire life so far and start to question a hell of a lot of it. And since ninety per cent of it had already crumbled to dust around him, he was not ready to let go of the last little comforting piece, logic be damned.

"I'm done with living by my father's rules, especially since I think they're ridiculous. Besides, I doubt he'll care; he cares more about the Dark Lord than he does about me. But this is definitely none of your business. Why should it matter to you if I associate with Muggleborns?" Theo concluded.

"If you start rubbing shoulders with people like her, you will lose everything. You'll be a target. You'll be isolated and shunned by your family and your friends, and that's if you're lucky. You know what's happening out there," said Draco, gesturing around him. "Something like this could get you killed. Best case scenario, your father pulls some strings and they don't try and kill you for being a blood traitor; you'll still end up with no-one except her. You can't throw everything away on a whim for some Mudblood you barely know."

"Those sound an awful lot like your problems and not mine," Theo replied sharply.

"They're going to be your problems too if you aren't careful," Draco said.

"You know, considering that everyone knows that you're never going to be able to go back to the world you were a part of before, you're investing a lot of time and effort into upholding their arbitrary rules. Even if the Dark Lord wins the war, your father doesn't have the power to get You-Know-Who to spare you after everything you've done. If He wins, you're dead, and that's it. You must know that. So why waste your time getting needlessly upset about blood and Muggleborns and what's right? None of it matters anymore, Draco. None of us will ever be able to go back to normal after all this is over, especially not you. Can't you see that?"

Draco was silent for a moment.

"You have no idea what you're talking about," he said.

He was seething. Theo had no idea what Draco was going through, how could he? He was just to blinded by his bizarre Granger-lust to see the danger he was in.

"The sooner you realise that upholding the ideals of your parents has literally no benefit to you anymore, the sooner you'll stop being so angry and miserable all the time. You're either about to die, or you're going to be thrust into a world where people who think like you are going to end up being shunned by society or in Azkaban," Theo stated, in a very-matter-of-fact tone. "Adapt and thrive, or stay this way and die miserable. It's up to you."

Before Draco could react, Zabini strode behind him, clapped him firmly on the shoulder and sat down.

"Hello, little Ferret. What's got you so worked up?" he asked light-heartedly.

He mistook Draco's murderous glare for a look of insult.

"Oh, lighten up, Draco! It's only a nickname. You may as well embrace it; if it hasn't disappeared after three years it won't be going away anytime soon. And besides, what's a nickname between friends?" he smiled, looking from Draco to Theo and back again noticing the glowers they were giving each other. "Boys! What's the matter? Tell Daddy."

"I'm sorry," said Theo, getting up. "I have somewhere to be."

With that, he swept out of the Great Hall.

"What happened there?" asked Blaise in surprise.

He had rarely seen Theo looking so aggravated. Draco didn't reply, but clenched his fists and tried to quell the anger that was coursing through him. His pulse was pounding in his ears.

"Come on, fuck-face tell me what's the matter," said Blaise, heaping potatoes on his plate. "Actually, no, on second thoughts, I don't care. Pass me the lamb chops?"

"What's gotten you in this disgustingly good mood?" asked Draco sullenly, trying to calm down as he passed the platter of meat.

"Oh, nothing in particular. Although, now that you mention it, I did just spend three rather enjoyable hours in the company of Daphne Greengrass, in the Astronomy Tower… and in the library... and then my dorm..." smirked Blaise with a wink.

"Ahh. Say no more," said Draco.

Maybe listening to Blaise brag about his sexploits would take Draco's mind off the lecture Theo had just given him. Surely none of what he'd said had been true. He wasn't going to die. His fate couldn't be as grim as Theo had described it.

"Although, you have been spending an awful lot of time with Daphne lately."

"Yeah. We… well; we had an encounter at the start of the holidays and spend the rest of it in each other's company." Blaise smirked again. "But I was actually thinking of taking her with me on the Hogsmeade trip at the end of October."

"So it's more than just sex is it?"

"Maybe," he said slyly.

"Good luck with that," Draco replied.

He felt sick. He didn't want to eat any of the food in front of him. He looked up and saw the back of Granger's bushy head not too far away from him at the Gryffindor table, and it made him feel worse.

"Right, I'm off," he said, standing up. "Binns wants three feet of parchment on the International Warlocks Convention of 1289… I don't fancy leaving that until Sunday."

Draco walked slowly back to his dorm. Theo couldn't be right. His only choices after the war was over couldn't be dead or alone, could they? Could they? Somehow, he knew that this new inner turmoil was all Granger's fault.


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