4.
"How would you like this to go then, Granger?"
The once pristine pencil skirt was hitched up around Hermione's hips, exposing her bare legs. Her brown curls, practically black under the dimmed lighting in his office, tumbled down her back in rolling waves, while the charmed lipstick on her slightly bruised lips were still perfect, as if in complete denial as to where they had been moments before.
She tilted her head. "So you agree with my proposal?"
Draco raised a brow, a smirk at the corner of his mouth. "I had an option to refuse?"
"Of course," she dismissed, leaning back slightly on his desk amongst the forgotten bits of paperwork, and smiled at him. "Choice is king; I'd never force someone to do something they don't want to."
"And suppose...I did refuse?"
She shrugged, dark hair spilling over the front of her white blouse. "I have other options, but you seemed like my best fit."
Quirking an eyebrow, he leaned forward to capture her lips with his. He sucked almost thoughtfully, tasting a hint of himself on the sensitive skin before dragging his teeth against it as he pulled away. She went to follow, barely swallowing the moan of disapproval at his retreat.
"Best fit, hmm?"
Leaning towards him now, her voice low, she divulged, "You're the closest thing to pure-blood royalty." He'd always told her back then that that was who he was on the scale of social standing; how far his star could fall.
"Yes," he agreed with a hint of sarcasm, "the exiled prince."
"Prince, nonetheless," she remarked, brows lifting, "and who am I but a Muggle-born peasant?"
"The Champion for the Common People?" He waved his hand as if highlighting a headline, the conversation a reminder of their argument so many years ago about her feeble attempts at creature reform with S.P.E.W. and his insistence that slavery was as much a tradition as it was an institution. Clearly, one of them had to be wrong and Hermione had two on him.
"The common people don't know me. To be honest, they wouldn't know their heads from their arses if someone didn't tell them which to shit out of," she added, with a hint of bitterness. It wasn't entirely their faults but people were so swayed by what the media owned government wanted them to believe that it gave her a headache. It seemed no one in Magical Britain had ever heard of a conflict of interest. "Fortunately, I do have the reputation of being the Brightest Witch of Our Age."
"And clearly, she'd know better."
"Clearly."
"Who else would you have picked, hmm? Clearly, you're the brains of this operation," he mused, leaning back again just as she did. The faint light from the setting sun peeked in through the curtains just then, separating them for a moment. "Any decent pure-blood would do."
"Not true. I need someone – just as clever – who wants the same things I do," she said firmly. It was a decision that didn't take long for Hermione to make once she had decided on him.
She'd already seen the result of choosing someone like Ron to hedge her future on; drawn into the role of the forgotten woman to another attempting to be a red one; no, it wouldn't do for her plans to have that reputation, and she couldn't risk it happening again.
If she could somehow create the perfect partner in crime, as it were, it would be someone with the same goals; someone not averse to working in the grey and someone willing to play the game with her at all times.
Draco, for all his undercover charity work and known reputation as a Death Eater, was perfect. Even without the added benefit of reclaiming what they had put aside for the sake of their sanities at the time.
"Mindless puppets are easier to control and predict. Freewill is bothersome," he observed. Free will made mistakes; chose the wrong course of action; bit into that poisoned apple. The free will of their pawns led to the downfalls of Voldemort and Dumbledore; their grand schemes ultimately destroyed by their failure in grooming their pawns for sacrifice; it was why Hermione had originally stayed with Ron but she knew how well that turned out.
It was for their betterment, in the end.
Harry hadn't used the resurrection stone to bring back Dumbledore, instead, he'd brought himself back, and Draco had risked life and limb to get Harry a wand and win the Battle of Hogwarts - ultimately defeating Voldemort.
"Perhaps, but one can't rely on a single person or organization to think for them. Progress isn't made that way, dictatorship is."
In the end it had worked out - Magical Britain had avoided dictatorship on either side, but the future both wizards left behind, as a result of their deaths, was a fragile state that lacked a figure prominent enough to fill the void they had left; to create a vision that would dictate the future of their society.
What remained of their legacy, thanks to them, was the limbo that they existed in now.
"Wouldn't that be easier?"
She allowed, "Only for someone without imagination."
He smirked. "That arrogance will tank everything."
"Which is why I need you," Hermione urged, the last wink of the sun catching that dangerously determined glint in her eyes. "I may have grown up in this world but you were raised in it. You know exactly how the wizarding community functions; how it reacts when pricked; how it responds when threatened...all the ways it can unravel. You would know."
"If I knew, don't you think I would have done something about it for my own benefit?"
"You were out of moves, Draco. You didn't have Snape's double-agent status to manipulate in your favor, and you don't have enough emotional pull with McGonagall to get her to speak kindly of you. All you had was your youth to absolve you." And he used it well. The recon she did on him spoke highly of his ability to adapt, survive, and thrive in the shadows – something she genuinely wasn't sure he was capable of being, considering the spoilt rich boy she knew in school.
From business dealings done in back rooms to legitimate claims to repossess the Black and Malfoy vaults, the media coverage that labeled him a money-grabbing war criminal - when he successfully challenged the Wizengamot practically single-handed - was excessive.
Draco was correct: people would refer to him as a monster even as an orphaned seventeen-year-old; despite squaring up to the government that sent children to fight their war; he would always be seen as the bad guy.
He bared his teeth in a smirk; vaguely impressed at the extent of her knowledge of him but bitter that she knew it at all. "What makes my role different?"
"I'm in play, you use me." When he only raised a brow, she explained, "You were out of moves because you had no one to vouch for you, now you do. What's better is that I don't want anything from you but your support. I have no malicious intent towards you, and you have nothing to fear from me banking on any favors you want from my end."
"Right now, you mean."
Hermione blinked as if the thought hadn't occurred to her, and it actually made him ill to think it hadn't; that, despite her scheming, there was still a part of her that believed in the good in people; the good in him.
"I won't turn on you." You know I won't, she wanted to add, but swallowed it down because...does he? Instead, she repeated firmly, "I won't."
"Everyone does at some point."
"Well, I'm not going to. That, at least, I can promise you," she said softly. "We want the same things, you and I, and we'll get it."
When he could offer her nothing more than that look that always broke her heart, something between hope and despair that she knew so intimately that she had to breathe through the terror she could feel trembling beneath her skin of losing you again, leaving you again – oh God, don't take him –
"You want to know why I won't keep my legacy?"
His silence was prompting enough.
"It's the same reason I choose to follow Harry even when I had my suspicions about Dumbledore – because that was the role given to me." She sighed. "I thought, for the past few years when the war ended, that everything was wrong. Everything. Not just because I didn't think I'd make it out alive, but that I did. I did, and it wasn't fair."
He knew the feeling intimately and his grip tightened around hers.
"Dean died. We were on the same team; we went on missions together nearly all the time. One night I didn't go with them and...and they died. The only reason I didn't go that day was because I was told 'Harry needs you'. I waited around like an idiot for the message to come in; for Harry to come in, bloody and broken, and need me." And wasn't that just so like her? Always wanting to help, always wanting to be needed; goody-goody Granger.
Hermione laughed mirthlessly at that thought.
"Little did I know, it was because they were using my team as a sacrifice so someone else could escape, so someone else could live, and H-Harry...Harry didn't even know," her voice cracked suddenly and Draco had a suspicion that Potter still didn't.
"The only reason I wasn't with them that day was because Harry needed me in an abstract sense. Losing Sirius had already pushed him to the edge, he couldn't lose anyone else," she continued quietly, the walls of ice around her heart cracking even as she closed her eyes tightly to hold them together through sheer force. "I was that 'anyone else'."
He closed the distance between them again, tugging her off his desk and into his lap. His hand guided her head to nestle under his chin before he wrapped his arms firmly around her. His solid hold absorbed the hiccup that burst from her chest and she swallowed hard against the burning in her throat.
"I suppose that's one thing Potter did right. I'd thank him if I didn't still want to punch him."
She chuckled despite herself, brushing away a stray tear and pulling away slightly so they could see one another. "A lot of Muggle-borns didn't get out of that war but, just because they didn't, doesn't mean there aren't more coming to take their place. I don't want to give the Ministry the chance to do that. They've done next to nothing themselves to rectify the mistakes of the past without you telling them otherwise so, from where I'm sitting, you're better for us than the Ministry could ever pretend to be. We need you." She paused before continuing resolutely, "I need you."
Draco dearly wanted to squish that bit of hope fluttering incessantly in his chest, but all he could do was take a sharp inhale through his nose. "You have a way, Granger, of making anyone sound like a hero."
"It's easier when they actually are one."
He cleared his throat. "What are your plans for this? Really...be honest with me. Is it world domination? Gunning for the spot as Minister?"
"What is it with me and being Minister? You're starting to sound like Neville."
"It would suit you," he mused, "you do love to boss everyone around; why not a constituent?"
"Because there's no privacy to be had as Minister," she explained, "not to mention, it isn't exactly the Minister that runs the show."
"Granger," he began, with a sigh, "you were truly put in the wrong house as a child; it really is an injustice."
"Too cunning for a Gryffindor?" she asked, innocently.
"Perhaps," he allowed, "but Malfoys are always in Slytherin."
Her lips quirked in amusement; whatever she needed to prove to him, whatever she tried to make him see, she had, and she breathed a sigh of relief and repeated, "So you accept my proposal?"
"Trophy husband to the Brightest Witch of Our Age?" he asked, pausing to feign contemplation. "I can survive the humiliation, I'm sure."
.
Draco was sitting in the far left-hand corner of the courtroom as discussion resumed on the Werewolf Registration Act.
Her opponents were predictable in the angle they choose to work and his girl was dismantling it piece by piece with reticence. They'd never know how furious it actually made her, how much she wanted to rip into them and set fire to the very platforms they lorded over her from.
The Werewolf Registration Act was not unlike the Muggle-born Protection Initiative that was created just after the war. The pure-bloods and half-bloods, still clinging to their faulty sense of purity, had emphasized the need for protection against the muggle world as incidents where magic had run amok raised suspicion.
The Muggle-borns, newly entering the wizarding world or already established, needed to be tracked and watched; their muggle ties needed surveillance and, if necessary, to be severed.
It was a pointless argument to make when it was magic and the war itself that caused the danger to the Statute of Secrecy, Hermione had argued.
Draco recalled that day with vivid clarity – there was talk that her parents, memory modified and smuggled overseas, could not be retrieved. Hermione hadn't been able to undo the charm and the Ministry refused to aid her.
Though magic had rid her of the bandages, the cuts and bruises, her eyes were so balefully haunted that he almost choked at the sight of them. He was reminded, vividly, of the way she stared at him that day on the floor of the ballroom, months before the end of the war; mutilated and tossed aside like a toy that was no longer interesting.
But there she was, radiating righteous fury; a storm contained in skin; she was practically trembling at the stand, her rage like a bubbling cauldron. "All you're doing is taking advantage of the fear from this war to push your own agenda. I could tell you how wrong it is to have your privacy invaded upon by a society that you didn't even know you were a part of. To have to risk not being able to see your child or your family ever again based on a decision made by a government lacking in resources and with time to fully think of the consequences faced by either end of the spectrum. I could expound on all the ways that it could go wrong, about how much it will hurt people. I could tell you all of that, but you won't care."
She took a breath, closed her eyes, and exhaled slowly; the calm before the detonation, the potion within simmering at the ready.
"So let me speak in a language you understand: This initiative will bankrupt you, all of you. Even with the pilfering of gold from the funds of Death Eaters. Even you, with your summer homes in Vienna and Crete, wouldn't be able to escape it because the only way the Ministry would ever be able to afford this is by taxing every wizard in the United Kingdom. You wouldn't be able to hide from it because the Ministry can't afford to look incompetent again. Not after taking such a monumental breach of privacy in the name of safety. Not after the incompetence of the previous establishment in letting this war get as far is it did. The Ministry can't afford it in any currency, and neither can you."
Despite everything he had known about her in Hogwarts, her penchant for emotional tirades, acts of naivety despite knowing better, and the urging for people to listen to their innate goodness, Hermione had surprised him.
Her opponents then had floundered for a rebuttal and, in the end, she had won.
They knew better this time. They were still doomed to lose, Draco thought with a smirk, but they knew better this time.
Hermione resumed her seat and it was announced that the next discussion would take place on a date to be announced by Owl. By the mutters of the Pro-Registration side, this didn't please them but Hermione was cool as can be. She shook hands with them, nodding her head politely at their inquiries. At the closely offered word by one of the counselors, Draco narrowed his eyes. Her icy smile was all he needed to know that the words exchanged were not of the "gracious loser" variety.
"I sincerely hope you're not threatening our beloved war heroine, Flint."
The startled glance, and the slightly widened eyes, passed by in a flicker before Marcus Flint remembered to hide it. To his left, his entourage of three straightened.
"Malfoy, what in the devil are you doing here?"
"Seemed important that I was," he replied, with a shrug. "My cousin's part werewolf and a registry could have consequences, you understand."
The sneer didn't leave, but Draco could see the flash of 'oh shit, how did we forget that' in the other man's eyes.
Social pariah or not, reputation was a currency one could always count on.
Flint may not have been Marked, but everyone knew what Draco had had to go through to be the youngest Death Eater enlisted (or at least had a pretty good idea of what was required). No one would want to get on the wrong side of that especially after his mantle had been tested, both during the war and after it. Only someone touched by the devil could be allowed to commit as many crimes as he did and still walk out richer than anyone after having lost.
"I didn't know you took responsibility for the kid," was the only thing Flint could mutter.
"I don't, really." Tonks had been very clear who would take care of her only child in the event of her death and her maternal cousin was definitely not it. "But Teddy's still family and we're so few, the Blacks and the Malfoys," Draco lamented. When Flint could only clench his jaw in reply, he continued in a way that was both careless and threatening; one hand in a greeting, the other with a wand at his opponent's chest, "We need to watch out for one another."
Behind the other man, one of the solicitors shifted uncomfortably.
Being pure-blood was more than just blood purity, despite the anti-rhetoric; to be a pure-blood meant to honour to the traditions and customs held dear to one's line – loyalty to the death and, above all else, family. No one threatened a pure-blood's family.
"Now," Draco said, magnanimously. "I don't know which side to go with. Really, you both make excellent arguments, I'd hate for it to be tarnished by rumors of intimidation, wouldn't you?"
There was a general paling of complexion, and another mutter, "Of course. I meant no disrespect."
"See that it stays that way."
There was a quick bob of the head in acknowledgment and, as soon as Draco's eyes shifted from Flint's to Hermione, the opposing solicitors turned to leave.
"I could have handled that -" she began to argue.
"I know, but I've never liked Flint's smug face. I must say it looks better when it's terrified."
She rolled her eyes as she began to gather her papers. "If that's all you need, Malfoy."
"A thank-you would be nice," he retorted.
"Pity you won't get one from me," she said, documents gathered and binder pressed against her chest, as she turned to him. "I told you, I could have handled it,"
"And what kind of gentleman would I be if I let you 'handle it', hmm?"
"The kind that is trying desperately to get my attention?"
"You wouldn't be wrong, then."
Her serious expression waned and she had to suppress a smile. "You're terrible at this."
"I admit I expected a warmer reception." He added quietly, "Or is that only reserved for when one of us naked?"
"I thought we agreed that we'd take this slowly?" she whispered, brows raised in meaning.
"I'm sure it'll be more efficient if I bend you over this table -"
"Draco!"
"See, you already know what to say."
Hermione shook her head and rolled her eyes, sidestepping him. "Goodbye, Malfoy."
"You're making me work for this, aren't you?"
Only the sound of her shoes clicking out the courtroom answered him but, if she thought the conversation was over, she had another thing coming.
She just didn't expect it to be her.
.
Half the Ministry was probably all huddled outside her office, eavesdropping on what they hoped would be a colossal argument of epic proportions considering Draco had just barged into her office, demanding to speak to her about her stance on the Werewolf Registration Act.
She had no idea he even knew what it was, let alone was invested in it, and the points he raised infuriated her.
Of course, she knew that more research was required to aid wizards suffering from lycanthropy but surely they would be able to study it from willing volunteers instead of essentially forcing sufferers to act as guinea pigs for experimental treatments!
Hermione was close to ripping him a new one when Draco turned to find everyone in the office staring at them. He then had the gall to demand a private audience which Hermione had no choice but to accept. She fought the urge to stamp her feet as he followed her, quickly casting a silencing charm as he entered.
She waited impatiently for him to say something as he closed the door but, instead, he strode over to her, framing her face in his hands, and kissed her passionately without uttering a single word.
Flustered and furious, Hermione could only think to kiss him back. She grabbed at the front of his robes in retribution until he had her hoisted up against the wall, his body keeping hers suspended as all his edges pressed against all her curves.
Vaguely, she heard a frame fall.
One of her arms came over his shoulders for support as her legs wound around his hips. He stepped closer between her legs; their bodies slotting, almost mockingly, together. She groaned as he brushed his already-hardened length against the heat soaking through her knickers.
Draco's lips left hers as he lowered himself a little to get rid of the obstruction; impatient fingers tugging at the sensible white button-up shirt she had chosen for work today; his teeth chasing after it, scraping against the column of her neck as he exposed it. His fingers dipped lower until they brushed against the waistband of her pantsuit, the button of it coaxed from its hole with a tug.
"Pants, really?" he demanded through his teeth.
"If I knew I was going to get accosted in my office, I'd have picked something sensible for an afternoon romp," she retorted, her shallow breath turning into a gasp as he tugged her pants off her hips, rolling her knickers along with it. The cool air of the room making her squirm as the length of him ghosted past her once more. "What happened to taking it slow?"
"You wanted it slow," he quipped, "I wanted you on the desk."
"Not a desk."
He cast a brief glance to the offending piece of furniture a few feet away, and growled, "Too far."
Before she could reply, he branded his hands against her hips and sunk to his knees; his lips instantly on hers.
They were as pink and panting as he hoped and, Merlin; there was some kind of divinity to be found in it. It was his own brand of addiction; every lap of his tongue and suck of those pouting lips.
Hermione gasped; she squirmed and writhed; she demanded more; she pleaded for more; his name a mantra with every drawn-out whimper.
Grasping her hips to keep her steady, he took all he could. One hand traced the delicious dip of her arse further until he was opening her up from behind. She thrust her hips against the wall as his hand completed the journey to the welcoming softness of her silken heat. How often had he actually thought of having her like this since they had begun? Countless, he was sure.
She wanted to tear her clothes off from the heat rising within her, setting every nerve ending on fire as he too set her alight with every skillful thrust of fingers and tongue; every promise he uttered between her thighs.
She was overheating; wearing too much, feeling too much; they had to stop before she –
Her fingers were tangled in his hair, slightly damp from their activity, as he continued to dive into her, uncaring for the way she tugged almost painfully at his platinum locks.
Draco's eyes were closed, lashes practically translucent against the marble paleness of his face.
He could well have been a statue if his fingers didn't know just the right rhythm to play inside her as they thrummed along the pulsing of her core, one melody after another in a skillful concerto. If his tongue wasn't spelling her name –
H – E – R – M- I –
There were stars blinking at her from behind closed lids –
M – A – L – F – O – O – O – O – O –
She could taste herself on him as he swallowed the sound of her shattering moans; he soothed her bare arse with cool fingers and full palms, lovingly stroking the heated flesh from her irate movements earlier on, as he nudged her slowly back to a semblance of rational thought. He helped her to her feet, her legs still shaking as she leaned on the wall for support.
"I heard Weasley proposed to you in here," he eventually said, stroking her hair back now as they rested their foreheads against one another.
Still blinking back stars, she stuttered out, "H-how did you…? Who told you that?"
"Doesn't matter," Draco dismissed, "only that I hope I erased the memory of it for you."
"You won't if you talk about it," she retorted.
He tsked, "I suppose, I need a do-over then."
"I suppose you do," she mused lightly, thinking to herself that, if she had to ever see a man on his knees before her, she much preferred it to be him.
.
It took an hour for them to emerge and everyone pretended that they weren't waiting on something to have happened. It wasn't every day that Draco was seen out in public, let alone in the Ministry. He wasn't welcomed by most of respectable society but even less so at the government offices. He had his spies; people were sure, so he had no reason to come unless it was important.
But to see Hermione, of all people?
The rumor mill had been on overdrive since the pair of them had walked in, obviously irritated with one another, which stopped everyone from working in their tracks.
There was the reminder that they weren't friends in school, they fought on different sides of the war, not to mention Hermione had been tortured in Malfoy's house; they had no reason to like each other, no reason to interact.
It was definitely odd and there was a silent consensus to Floo-call Harry, or even Ron, immediately to find out what was happening.
But no one had, as of yet, although her best friends were sure to find out eventually. It was the biggest thing to happen to Hermione since Cormac!
Fewer people were huddled at her door than in the beginning, but extendable ears were in full use.
Unfortunately, it seemed one of them had cast a silencing charm and so nothing new could be reported on the matter until their reappearance.
To everyone's surprise, both parted on friendlier terms and, towards the end of the day, a bouquet of white violets arrived for Hermione.
A rather brave, and extremely nosy, secretary snuck a peek at the card within and shared the news: The most notable Death Eater, besides Voldemort himself, had just asked Hermione to dinner.