A/N: Good news! After a four year hiatus, I'm continuing this story. (!)

Unnatural Eloquence

"No."

"No?" Hermione echoed dumbly, staring at the Hogwarts matron.

"Lady Evans, I understand your predicament, but I am not authorized to treat any House-Wizards, let alone that one," Madam Pomfrey added as if she'd just eaten something disgusting, her supposedly unbiased professionalism slipping slightly with the words. "This may seem like just another school wing to you, but it's actually a highly respected medical facility. There's a Healer training clinic in Hogsmeade that takes House-Wizards; I'm sure you can ship him out in the morning."

Hermione clenched her jaw to keep herself from gaping stupidly at the woman. This was a severely injured human being; didn't taking a medical vow upon the completion of Healer training include aiding all who needed saving, regardless of social position?

"Lord Ronáld will be highly displeased if he dies," she sniffed, trying to sound more miffed than worried. "You don't want that, do you?"

"Death for that creature isn't a concern. That's one's got a Pacemaker charm on his heart. A gradual healing enchantment kicks in when it's activated."

Hermione had never heard of a 'Pacemaker' healing charm, but was aware of what a Muggle pacemaker was. Feigning ignorance, she asked irritably, "And that's supposed to be helpful when he's bleeding to death...?"

"In cases like this it'll keep the Fusty alive long enough for the Mediwitch students to undo most long-lasting damage tomorrow," Pomfrey said impatiently. "Obviously it doesn't work for things like the Killing Curse, certain poisons, major arterial bleeds and constant internal hemorrhaging…"

Pomfrey carelessly threw out the explanation as if there was nothing wrong with it, when everything was. Was this what the Weasleys, what even Hogwarts did to keep House-Wizards and Witches alive and tormentable without lifting a finger to heal them themselves? This was a human rights violation of the highest degree - how was it not considered a crime?

"Well, I want to use him now!" she said, stomping her foot.

The matron shook her head firmly, her mouth tensely pressed in a thin line. "I'm quite sorry, Lady Evans, but that's all I can do. Now if you'll kindly remove… that from my ward – " She gestured disgustedly outside her office door, where she'd made Hermione leave a still-unconscious Malfoy on the floor, and stepped forward as if to brush past Hermione into the main body of the clinic.

Pacemaker spell or not, Hermione quickly sidestepped in front of her, trying not to let her expression belay her panic. "Madam Pomfrey, really, you don't have to be so unreasonable about something like this." She was desperate, which meant that it was time to pull out the only card she had left. She frowned theatrically. "Oh, I'd just hate to have to call my mother..."

She said it quietly enough that she may as well have been talking to herself, but Pomfrey stopped walking out the doorway of her starkly decorated office. "Your mother?" she asked warily.

"Of course!" Hermione widened her eyes innocently, nonchalantly twirling some unnaturally smooth hair around her finger, and forced her mind to think past the pressure in her chest, so intense she felt like she was about to go into cardiac arrest. "If I talk to her, I'm just certain she'd be able to arrange something…"

Pomfrey spun abruptly. "I might be able to take a look at him. But legally, I can only do so much." She gave Hermione a scathing look but headed back into her office, and gestured for Hermione to follow.

For a moment, Hermione wondered at the type of person Lily Evans must be to cause such apprehension in even the most stubborn of individuals, but Pomfrey's next question cut her contemplation short.

"He isn't covered; who should I bill for the treatment?" she asked briskly, pulling some paperwork from her desk instead of helping the man who was bloody well suffering on the floor outside!

"The Weasleys, of course!" Hermione snapped, trying to hold in her desperation.

She regretted her lapse of apathy when Pomfrey glanced up at her irately. "Lady Evans, really, there's no need to cause a fuss. I told you I'd take care of the worst of it."

Hermione silently cursed herself. By this point, she was near certain that Pomfrey would give Malfoy the worst care possible if only to get back at her. Her mind quickly attempted to construct a more sympathy-inducing situation. "It's just, you see - Ronáld and I are doing so well, I just can't stand the thought of ruining our relationship over something as silly as my being unable to return his House-Wizard to him on time tomorrow morning. You understand, don't you?" She wrung her hands and looked at Madam Pomfrey beseechingly.

Pomfrey studied her for a moment, then sighed as if surrendering and began to scribble out the forms in front of her. "Oh, yes, I know the joy of relationships all too well - my husband can't stand me being gone eight months out the year. Bloody snit doesn't offer to come here and visit, though, does he? Are you currently in possession of his lead?"

She was speaking so briskly that Hermione almost lost track of where the rant ended and the question began. She stared at the woman blankly, but after a second followed Pomfrey's gaze until it landed on the large gold wristwatch still clutched tightly in her hand. "Oh, yes." She held it out, silently wanting to shake the Mediwitch to hurry her pace. "Here."

"No, I just need to see it. Sign here."

Hermione practically snatched up the pen and began to carefully write 'Hermi-' before she caught herself with a lurch. Was that still considered her full name here? Or was it My, but which My? My Evans? My Granger Evans?

She scribbled a nearly illegible 'MGE' to avoid any mess about lack of signature alignment with the old My. "Is that all?" she asked brusquely.

"Yes, yes, calm yourself, Lady Evans, I'll have a look at him now."

Though she had given her reassurance that she'd at least treat the worst of Malfoy's wounds, Pomfrey still looked somewhat disgusted as she headed into the Hospital Wing. Hermione guessed the Mediwitch would at the least fix what was broken and/or punctured, but she wasn't going to take the chance of being caught unprepared if Pomfrey considered any of his other injuries "too beneath her" to heal.

Miserable bint.

"I'll just be waiting in here, then!" Hermione trilled after her, turning her gaze to the walls of Pomfrey's small but stocked office the minute the witch moved from her line of sight. She forced a nervous giggle. "Blood and all, wouldn't you know…"

She had "borrowed" a few healing creams from the Hospital Wing on more than a few occasions that the Trio had gotten into messes they weren't supposed to have messed with. From a quick survey, she found that the Pomfrey of this universe seemed to have the same organizational skills as the Pomfrey she knew.

"Replicatus," she murmured, duplicating the jar of burn cream and then the flask of Nerve Soother Tonic and shrinking them to the size of small pebbles. For a moment, she considered her leave-nothing-to-the-imagination uniform for any potential hiding places and settled upon slipping them underneath the top of her thigh-high stocking. She still needed a simple pain draught, though.

Briefly glancing behind her to ensure Pomfrey was well out of viewing range, she stood on tiptoe and began to rifle through the rack of vials at the very top of Pomfrey's storage cabinet-

"Lady Evans!"

Hermione leapt as high as a startled rabbit, her eyes flying in dread to the office door.

The room was still empty.

She gasped in a breath of relief, clutching at her pounding chest. The Mediwitch must have been right outside the office door, she thought, as Pomfrey continued, "You can come out now."

Sweet Morgana, I've got to learn to control that!

She closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths to compose herself. Alright. Calm down, Hermione. Finish what you started!

Quickly, she silently summoned the pain draught, duplicated it, and stored it with her other spoils. Within a matter of seconds, she was sashaying outside her in My gait. She couldn't imagine that Pomfrey had finished, especially with injuries as severe as Malfoy's, so what could she have needed -?

In what was thankfully becoming habit, she again had to force her mouth from dropping open when she saw that Draco Malfoy was still sprawled, unconscious, dirty, and blood-covered on the cold tile where she had left him, large burns and bruises still horribly stark against his dirty but ghostly pale skin. Madam Pomfrey was standing over him, her wand hanging beside her; it appeared she hadn't even crouched beside him while she had "healed" him. High disgust filled the older woman's expression as she briefly appraised a man still horribly wounded.

"This one's out of harm's way," she said tautly. "Ship him out in the morning if you'd like more done, but he can't stay here. I won't have Fusty filth like that on my floor."

She spit out "Fusty" as derogatorily as "Mudblood," and a wave of nausea threatened to explode from Hermione's throat. Even if the prejudice wasn't directed at her anymore, she remembered the experience of being subjected to it as clearly as if it still was. When it had been only insults, she'd easily brushed it aside. But here, where bigoted words directly translated to violent actions, she felt herself again growing angry for Malfoy.

"Oh, of course; I'll just go back to where I came from and call him from there," she said perkily, momentarily swallowing her anger out of necessity. She stared at Malfoy in subdued horror. Had the bloody woman treated him at all?

"What in Merlin's name was wrong with him?" she asked innocently, if only to ascertain that Pomfrey really had done something.

"Collapsed lung, some broken ribs, fractured femur." Pomfrey stuck her wand in her belt and stepped over Malfoy and into her office. "Nothing that couldn't be dealt with quickly."

Right, that's why you made Cormac McLaggern spend over three days in the Hospital Wing after he took a bludger to the chest with similar injuries, she thought darkly, but didn't press the subject.

It was a worst case scenario quality of care, but Hermione knew better than to press her luck. If that was the most professional work she could get out of Pomfrey, so be it. At least she had handled the most complicated injuries, rather than leave Malfoy to suffer through near death and a 'gradual healing enchantment.'

After a moment, she remembered she had to at least pretend to be grateful. She turned and leaned around the doorframe into Pomfrey's office, giving the Mediwitch a saccharine smile. "Oh, Madam Pomfrey, I just couldn't have done this without you!"

"That I don't doubt," she heard Pomfrey mutter.

I heard that, you old toad.

"What?" Hermione asked sweetly, though she knew full well what the woman had said.

"I said, just see your way out, Lady Evans. Give my best regards to your mother."


Draco Malfoy was in hell.

His entire body burned. Hot fire coursed through his legs like electricity. His lungs seared with every breath he took. He was screaming on the inside, and on the outside, everyone howled with laughter, sneering the familiar chant: Fusty, Fusty, worthless filthy Fusty…

And there was nothing he could do about it. He couldn't even die.

Flames blazed around him. He struggled to move, to run, to do something, anything, but his limbs remained motionless, filled with pure lead. He tried to choke in a breath but couldn't breathe. All he could do was squeeze his eyes shut, unable and unwilling to give them all the added pleasure of seeing his emotions, his pain, even though it hurt so much... so much...

But then - inexplicably - the familiar nightmare changed.

As if a wave of water had crashed over him, coolness doused the flames. He gasped in relief as it enveloped him like a soothing balm. From very far away, is if someone was calling from the other side of a tunnel, a familiar female voice echoed, "Haaarrry… Are you alriiight, Haarrrry?"

Not - Harry, he thought in frustration. But in the middle of the nightmare that forever surrounded him, it was better than nothing, and he sank into the voice anyway as it gently wrapped around him. The raw fear and agony that was constant always slowly drained from his mind, from his tense yet useless muscles as she repeated, over and over, "Harrrry… It's alright, Harry…. Can you hear me? Are you conscious?"

Oddly, gradually, her voice began to grow louder and more tangible, as if she was walking toward him. But in the gray darkness surrounding him, he couldn't see from where.

"Wake up. Wake up…"

Suddenly, the voice was right in his ear. "Malfoy, wake up!"

Draco's heart lurched and began pounding in his chest.

She had... had she just... said his name?

Some part of his mind began to struggle for answers, but complete thoughts failed to piece themselves together. He longed to open his eyes, but the left felt heavier than a Hungarian Horntail, the right not far behind. It took a moment to realize that the lack of pain in his chest didn't mean he was dead or in some strange sort of netherworld, but that he was breathing normally, and it didn't hurt. His legs didn't feel as if someone had tried to rip them off, and succeeded. He wasn't lying cramped in a hollowed cell, but was stretched out on something indescribably soft. And his hands - his fingers twitched weakly, connecting with cool, smooth fabric - were they at his sides, unchained?

Whatever sort of dream this was, he surrendered every inch of himself to it willingly, his body practically crying out in relief.

"Oh, bugger it," he heard someone mutter who was not a Weasley.

Something cold touched his chest, and searing pain exploded through his senses.

Draco gasped before he could help it, his right eye flying open of its own accord to see a small, windowless bedroom or sitting room, dimly illuminated from a fire burning in a nearby hearth and a light source somewhere behind them. And he was on a bed.

"Bloody-!" exclaimed a woman's voice.

Cold fear surged through him. His body instinctively tried to shove itself backward, only to meet a solid surface blocking his retreat. His already exhausted head began to pound, and he couldn't see out of his left eye; the entire left side of his face felt five sizes too big, in fact...

The unmistakable sound of a fire spitting sparks cut through the bewilderment crippling him, and his limited gaze shot toward the crackling flames. Terror in the form of pure adrenaline exploded through his chest, and he cringed backward; this wasn't a dream, this was still the same unending nightmare-

"Malfoy?"

He flinched in surprise, the vocalization unexpected and all too near. Swiveling his head toward it, his panicked gaze met wide, familiar brown eyes.

He froze.

My Granger was staring back at him, looking as sleek and smooth as ever. With one hand over her chest, she even had the nerve to look startled, laughable as that was. What could he possibly do to her?

All his senses quivering, Draco stared at her, the pain from his abrupt motions radiating belatedly through his body. Frantically, he tried to make a lick of sense of the sight before him: his hands were indeed unchained, his previously raw-rubbed wrists wrapped in gauze, and just as quickly noticed that one of her own hands - hovering in front of her - was covered with orange slime. He again looked around the room, the plush mahogany furniture and rich decor convincing him more firmly that this was no sitting room. The mattress he was laying on alongside the wall was smaller than he would have expected, but he - was he in her bedroom?

"Malfoy," she repeated again, this time more firmly.

At once, his heart began to pound so hard he was afraid it might burst.

No, not this, please not this -

Desperately, he searched the edges of the unfamiliar space for some sign of either Weasley. He had become all too familiar with their methods of torture, but at least those he could anticipate, could steel himself for; this was new, unexpected, and with her -

The fire crackled loudly again, a constant reminder of torture to come. His eyes shot back toward it and his breath hitched; against his will, his brain switched off entirely. He wanted to run, to hide, to plead for them to forget he existed, but base instinct immobilized him. Fighting to control his breaths, to breathe at all, he waited in dread, the flames blurring before him.

Please let it be over soon, please, please-

"Does that... bother you?" Granger asked suddenly, her voice oddly... hesitant. "The fire?"

Her voice jerked Draco's focus from his frantic thoughts back to her. She had glanced toward the fireplace as well, but then she looked at him. And her expression... her expression - it was...

Unexpectedly, something inside him broke that he hadn't even realized was still held together.

Granger's expression wasn't of arrogance, or detachment or disdain or hate or ridicule, but a gentleness and seemingly genuine concern he hadn't seen directed toward him, toward anyone around him since before... before the...

He couldn't bring himself to finish a thought that would conjure an agonizing memory of happier times.

For once in his imprisonment, some part of him actually felt drawn to respond to her. His parched lips parted, but past experience pinned him in place. Was this a dream, or was this a game? Questions were never for his benefit and always for theirs; if this was a game, he certainly wasn't going to voluntarily offer up his weaknesses -

Suddenly, from the edge of view, the flames blinked out of sight, as if they'd been Vanished.

Draco stared toward the abruptly empty fireplace dumbly. He swallowed hard, blinking rapidly.

"I... thought you'd remember, but... Malfoy, it's safe here," Granger said gently, then. "I know that may seem hard to believe, but I swear to you, it's alright."

His incredulous gaze shifted swiftly back toward her. Watching him just as closely, she held up one normal and one slime-covered hand, as if to demonstrate she was unarmed. "I'm the only one in this room, beside you. There's no one else. It's just me." Her voice was soft, as if soothing a wild animal. "I'm not going to hurt you. Do you remember what I told you, outside the common room? I'm helping you. I'm helping you. You don't... have to be afraid."

Her eyes were unnaturally kind. Draco was trapped in them like he had been in the courtyard outside Hogwarts, when she'd healed his back, tried to free him, even... acted like someone he didn't even know. But that - he'd thought that had been just a dream. He'd spent the rest of that day - and the one after - going over her actions. No explanation he could rationalize or imagine, however mad, had seemed even halfway plausible otherwise.

But then...

Blurred memories he'd rather not recall flooded him anyway, and he internally winced as he felt the sensation of lines of fire slowly tracing across his body, of the hexes, the insults, the curses that his mind had partially attempted to block from recollection. Through the haze, he vaguely remembered Granger talking to him, telling him she couldn't say why she was helping him... refusing to just let him die.

Only after his racing thoughts began to slow did he realize he was calming down.

"Malfoy?" she said again, sounding tentative.

Draco could literally count on both hands the amount of times his real name had been used to address him since he'd been imprisoned. The fact that she was saying it so much now made his ears ring.

He blinked, refocusing on her cautiously poised figure. Now that the initial rush of adrenaline had drained from him, he just felt utterly spent, and his exhausted muscles collapsed beneath him as he slumped back down on the blessedly soft mattress.

"Lady Evans," he croaked, even though she didn't sound a bit like shallow My Granger. The words grated painfully against his dry throat.

She stiffened, lowering her hands. "I'd... rather you didn't call me that, actually."

He winced, trying to shift his weight off his arm. "You'd... prefer - 'Your Highness?' "

As soon as the hoarse words left his mouth unbidden, he reflexively flinched and mentally braced himself for a backhand or worse. He was surprised when a swift punishment never came. Instead, she only shot him a withering look. "Granger works just as well." She glanced back down at the orange concoction on her hand, then nodded pointedly at his throbbing chest. "Now, if you feel up for it, I'd rather like to use this burn cream on its intended target before it starts healing me."

Draco stared dumbly at her again - at her intentions, one, and that she was was even asking permission to do what she wanted with him, above all. After a beat too long, he nodded - what choice did he have really, even still? - and she began to work on him. He was astonished when the "burn cream" did indeed turn out to be burn cream, not some kind of pain-inducing amalgam, and after the initial shock of contact, it soothed and numbed the charred skin entirely.

Feeling nauseous, Draco bit his lip so hard he tasted the bitter tang of blood and forced his gaze away from the wounds and scars covering his body - a body he no longer even recognized, felt detached from. It had become nothing more than a vehicle for the infliction of pain, and if he could mentally sever himself from it completely, he would in a heartbeat.

Then again, technically it wasn't even 'his' body anymore, he thought dully.

Despair, cold and absolute, crept through his chest straight to his heart. He closed his eye before the tears suddenly burning it could visibly manifest themselves, gripping the smooth folds of the blanket beneath him, willing himself to stop caring, stop thinking, stop feeling. Every time he made the mistake of allowing himself to be anything but numb, it proved to be too painful, too much... and right now, he was feeling far, far too much.

Suddenly desperate to move, if only to reassure himself that he actually could, he weakly lifted a hand to gingerly feel the skin around his immobile left eye.

"Don't touch that," she said abruptly.

Draco froze, the Ordered words the equivalent of a slap across the face. His dread faded to confusion when she added quickly, "Sorry, I mean - it's covered with bruise cream. You'll spread it. The inflammation should go down in a few hours."

He slowly lowered his hand, clenching it at his side. "Why... are you... doing this, Granger?" he rasped.

She sighed.

"I already told you, Malfoy. It's… private." She briefly glanced at him sideways with an expression that actually appeared apologetic. "I'm sorry."

Even that didn't make sense. "There's absolutely…" His knackered mind struggled to verbally piece together the main thought that had confounded him since My Granger had abruptly reappeared in his existence, "Absolutely nothing in it for you…"

She was silent for a moment. "Yes, there is," she said quietly. "You needed help. And I'm giving it to you. That's what's in it for me."

"My Granger doesn't have a conscience," he breathed hoarsely.

"Look, as hard as it may be for you to stop questioning my motives, you're going to have to," she said brusquely. "Right now, I'd quite like to focus on finishing healing you, if you don't mind."

Draco's head was spinning. There was no way on earth he was laying next to My Granger. My Granger was not this well-spoken. My Granger didn't know how to heal. My Granger would never treat him or any conservative like this. It was almost as if he was actually talking to…

He didn't allow himself to finish the thought; it'd be a sure sign he'd gone mad if he did. To avoid even more confusion, he decided to pretend that she wasn't really My Granger at all, but rather someone completely different who was inhabiting her body, with the aid of Polyjuice Potion, perhaps. Someone like... Pansy.

Fondness that was well overshadowed by profound anguish gripped him at the thought of his oldest childhood friend, killed in Dumbledore's final suppression of the conservative resistance. He swallowed back the grief, forcing himself to picture Pansy's warm, smiling face.

Yes. Just pretend she's Pansy.

"Finish?" he eventually echoed, finally processing her last words. For a moment, he wondered if someone else was speaking for him; he barely recognized his own voice anymore.

"Pomfrey started the job, as much as she hated every second of it."

His head jerked up in his haste to look toward her. In all the days of his captivity, no Healer had ever treated him. "Madam Pomfrey… healed me?"

Scorn and distaste flooded her features, the expression making her look so like My Granger that it foiled any attempt on his part to imagine she had morphed into Pansy. "Well, she wasn't exactly happy about it. She did address of some of the more difficult injuries - your leg, lungs, ribs. How do those feel, by the way?"

He inhaled deeply, then glanced toward her to find her carefully following his movements with uncharacteristically keen eyes. "My chest's - alright." He shifted weakly, his muscles burning. When he tried to pull his right leg toward him, though, pain exploded through it like a thousand knives. He swiftly clamped down on his cheek to bite back the cry on his lips; instead, he forced himself to focus on breathing. "That may - hurt a bit," he gritted through clenched teeth.

At his admittance, Granger let out a string of Shakespearean-force curses aimed at the Mediwitch that would have made Pansy blush.

Draco stared at her in shock.

Different person! he reminded himself.

He could only beg heaven, hell and everything in between that this person wouldn't change anytime soon into the self-centered, cruelly careless woman she'd always been.


Hermione awoke slowly, legs stiff from a cramped night on a spare sofa the Room of Requirement had provided. She hadn't the slightest idea what time her class was, and, frankly, she didn't even care. Shoving her face into the pillow, she gratefully stretched her legs over the sofa's edge, her aching muscles protesting.

She had fallen into an exhausted but troubled slumber beneath an extra Gryffindor-red quilt shortly after she'd finished doing the best she could for Malfoy and had left him to sleep on the bed. The horrid disgrace of a Mediwitch had seared his broken femur together, but sloppily, and had done absolutely nothing for the muscles around it, which were also injured. The muscles, Hermione managed to heal, but she suspected that unless she actually broke his bone again and repaired it correctly - a highly advanced medical procedure - she'd have little chance of eliminating, at minimum, a minor limp. Since she wasn't a fully trained Mediwitch, she wasn't prepared to subject him to that kind of pain if it might not even work.

Malfoy had seemed to take the prospect of a permanent impairment in stride, though she didn't see how he could. But he had also readily accepted a dreamless sleep potion when she'd offered it to him.

Drifting in the gray tendrils between sleep and awareness, Hermione considered the Wizex 'lead.' Considering its value and specificity, she highly doubted it could be secretly duplicated, and she was hesitant to tamper with it like she had the Marauders' Map in case sensor charms had been incorporated that would raise some sort of alarm with Sovereignty officials.

She wondered if My had a lead for Pansy. If yes, Hermione had no idea what it was.

Releasing a heavy sigh, she reluctantly rolled over, squinting in the dim light of the room.

Her eyes abruptly met startled grey.

With a lurch of surprise, Hermione sucked in a sharp breath and sat up.

Just as quickly, Malfoy averted his gaze, staring down at his lap. Tangled platinum hair that she'd attempted to clean the night before tumbled limply around his face and toward his shoulders. He was seated beside the now-abandoned bed in the same armchair she'd used while treating him, as far from her as possible while still facing in her direction. He'd wrapped the bed's plush maroon blanket tightly around him, obscuring any view of how his battered body had responded to her hasty treatment of him.

Neither of them spoke. Though Malfoy was still deathly pale, the nasty swelling around his left eye had faded to a faint bruise. But a large, unmistakable pink 'W' was still buried beneath the smudges of dirt on his cheek, despite the healing cream she'd used on it.

Hermione felt ill the longer she stared at the mark, a distinct hatred of Ronáld kindling in her veins. She looked away before she was tempted to unleash a tirade, biting her lip.

"Surprised you didn't murder me in my sleep," she ventured cautiously. With the dreamless sleep potion, she was actually surprised Malfoy was awake at all. How long had she been asleep?

For a moment, the same surprise - or perhaps suspicion - that he'd emoted so strongly around her over their past encounters entered his expression. After a too-long pause, he gestured at the oversized Wizex strapped awkwardly to her wrist. "I can't. You've got that."

His voice had lost some of its dry rasp and was stronger than it had been the night before. "Anyway, I-" his jaw visibly tensed, and he shifted his gaze away, his spindly fingers tightening around the thin arm of the chair, "I owe you my life. I'm not about to... kill you."

All too vividly, Hermione remembered his heartfelt plea. From that comment, she could only assume Malfoy had no idea about the complex healing enchantments that had been placed upon him to keep him from the losing the very thing he thought he owed her. But he genuinely appeared to have recovered some, thank Merlin... she wasn't certain now was the best time to tell him his tormentors could keep him alive indefinitely.

"I thought you didn't want to - live." Her voice hitched on the word.

Malfoy continued to steadily stare at the wall beside her head. "If you were me, you… wouldn't have, either," he said dully.

Emotions surged through her, the strongest and most immediate being a stubborn streak of self-preservation that wrangled violently with a slow-boiling rage at Malfoy's unspeakably abusive treatment. The power of the latter frightened her, went far beyond every ire she'd ever felt at the plight of House-Elves in Universe A, if that was even possible, but... she couldn't ignore it. Not for Malfoy's sake... or her own sanity.

Finally, Hermione sat up fully, her legs swinging to the ground, and focused back on him, her lips pressed together determinedly. "I swear to you: I'm going to get you away from him."

A short jet of air puffed from Malfoy's nose, as if in a faint, humorless laugh, and he shook his head. "You shouldn't make promises you can't keep," he muttered roughly.

"Don't patronize me, I know bloody well what I'm saying. I might have been off my trolley before, but I'm not now."

He looked back at her, searching her face, though for what, she didn't know - but for a moment, like she had in the courtyard outside, she felt trapped in his gaze, felt as though his perceptive silver eyes could and did penetrate the very depths of her soul.

"Yes, I… I'm starting to see that," he eventually said in a low voice, his eyes filled with that soft, benevolent intensity that was so different from anything she had experienced with the Draco Malfoy she'd known... was so different from most anyone she'd ever known.

The urge to move suddenly gripped her. Tearing herself from his gaze, she flung the blanket from her legs and stood abruptly. Her skirt and shirt were still rolled up and tightened beyond belief from her previous night's desperate performance, and she quickly straightened them before looking over at him. "Are you hungry?"

The question was almost rhetorical; of course he must have been. Still, Malfoy's mouth opened and shut before he looked down. "Not… especially," he said tonelessly.

The shuttered desperation behind his expression betrayed the calm restraint he was showing otherwise.

Hermione studied his emaciated face and frame in concern. "Malfoy, you need to eat," she said quietly. Merlin knows when you'll have the chance to again. When he didn't respond, she added, "Well, I'm hungry, and this room can't conjure us food, so I'm going to get some. If you're placing an order, now's the time."

He hesitated again, though she noticed his arm subtly move to wrap around his abdomen. Even from across the room, she could swear she heard his stomach make a noise.

After several seconds, he muttered, "With the... way things have been, I'm - I'm not... certain I could keep much down."

Hermione blinked. Of course, she should have realized... when she thought about the few times during the war that she had been truly hungry - the closest experience she'd ever had to starvation - she would have surely vomited if she'd stuffed herself with rich food, especially that of Hogwarts ilk.

"Something bland and light, then," she said briskly. "Porridge, bananas, bread, broth, that sort of thing - do any of those sound tolerable?"

After a moment, Malfoy's pale brows raised ever-so-slightly. Slowly, he lifted his head, staring at her once more. His lips parted briefly, but he swallowed hard and pushed them together tightly - as if he'd wanted to say something and then thought better of it.

Something tugged deep in Hermione's chest. It wasn't the first time he'd done it, and just as Pansy had originally been afraid to speak freely to her, she didn't want the same to be true of Malfoy, either - as bizarre as that concept was in the first place. "What is it?" she asked gently.

Instead of responding, Malfoy's gaze intently yet aimlessly searched the floor for several seconds. When he finally looked up at her, the vulnerability in his expression had faded slightly to something entirely different, though Hermione couldn't quite name what.

"You know," he began slowly, "if you're going to be venturing out, you might want to..." He trailed off, gesturing at his hair.

She frowned, then caught his meaning and reached up to smooth down her own. While it felt as abnormally silky as ever, her fingers met knots; she winced and tugged at them until they pulled out. When Malfoy's lips simply twitched upward, however, Hermione crossed her arms. "What?" she demanded.

"Nothing, really, it's only - last I checked, the kitchen elves generally tend to flee from anyone who appeared even slightly psychotic. Of course," he mused as horror crossed her expression, "a lot of things have probably changed since then…"

Fearing the worse - that the smudge-proof cosmetics spell Pansy had taught her wasn't truly smudge-proof after all - Hermione rushed into the small, partitioned-off alcove beside the sofa that held a toilet, washbasin and mirror, expecting to see her oh-so-plentiful makeup smeared across her face; she obviously hadn't been thinking about removing it last night...

She stopped dead.

Her hair was a bit mussed, her uniform shirt a tad bit wrinkled, but otherwise... she looked perfectly normal.

Her mouth dropped open.

Had he... Had he been teasing her?

Hermione sourly exited the alcove to see that Malfoy's lip twitching had grown into a full-blown smirk, and suddenly he looked very much like the Draco Malfoy she knew. "You tale-telling wanker; do you really think I needed those extra ten seconds of panic right now?" she exclaimed.

A short laugh escaped him, and for a moment, such surprised delight filled his eyes that she didn't have the heart to be really angry with him. He cleared his throat. "Just helping keep you on your toes, Granger," he said, his smile faint but genuine - which, honestly, was quite remarkable, given where he'd been only 12 hours earlier. "Can't have anyone else suspecting you… aren't yourself."

"If that's what you call help, I really don't need it, thanks," she retorted, reluctant to release the smile she was surprised to realize she wanted to.

"To be fair, that was probably the most disheveled I've ever seen you - erm - not you." His speech was unhurried, almost leisurely, nowhere near as rapid nor snide as Malfoy's from Universe A. "You do know she'd have reacted the exact same way."

Hermione's brow lifted interestedly, curiosity snuffing her irritation. "Really?"

"Well - no." He winced slightly. "She'd have been a bit nastier. Might've clawed my eyes out. Likely would still be throwing a tantrum now. But the panicked impersonation wasn't half bad."

It suddenly occurred to her that Malfoy knew and had named her game. She frowned, worrying her lip. Obviously he wasn't stupid. It wasn't as though she could have still pretended to be harebrained My while she skillfully healed him, and of course Malfoy would have had to have been deaf and daft not to notice. Like Pansy, he clearly couldn't possibly pinpoint who she was, exactly - just some clueless impersonator in My Granger's body, likely - but to have him speak of it so blatantly, and oddly, seem much more accepting and comfortable with it than even Pansy had immediately been, still made her edgy.

As if he noticed her concern, Malfoy's gaze softened. "Your secret's safe with me, Granger. Whatever it is." He paused. Then, averting his gaze, he added quietly, "And if you... happened to return with any of the more tasteless forms of sustenance you mentioned earlier, I'd... I'd be very grateful."

Hermione studied him for a moment, then nodded once - an assessment, and an agreement. It would have to do for now.


When she returned to the Room of Requirement, the fraction of lightness that had preceded her departure was gone.

Malfoy was still in the bedside chair, but he appeared significantly cleaner, his hair wet, as if he'd made handy use of the side room's washbasin in the twenty minutes she'd been away. Over his tattered trousers, he had put on a loose, long-sleeved gray shirt that he must have found in one of the dressers.

When he slowly approached the small table beyond the sofa where Hermione unloaded pumpkin and chicken soup, fresh rolls, apples and porridge, he clearly favored his right leg, the limp unmistakable, even though he claimed it didn't bother him.

They ate in silence, mostly because Malfoy was carefully consuming more food than he'd likely had to eat in weeks, and Hermione was fuming. When she'd entered the kitchens (and this was the first time she had, in Universe B), Winky's familiar face had greeted her at the fruit portrait. She had of course kept her request polite, even though she'd feigned a socialite persona... but then Winky had turned, and Hermione noticed what was behind her.

Humans.

A number of them, bedraggled, some young, some old, some she vaguely recognized, though in the brief time she had to scan their faces, their names escaped her. They all wore the same bland gray uniforms that Pansy first had before Hermione had let her borrow whatever she wanted of My's clothing. When Winky had snapped her fingers and a command that included Hermione's request, a middle-aged woman and a younger man were physically jerked out of their rote cooking work, lifelessly fulfilling the order.

Hermione was horrified all over again. She supposed she should be glad House-Elves seemed to have some rights here, but if those rights included shifting their roles to be slave drivers of human House-Witches/Wizards, it wasn't truly an improvement, though it certainly might have seemed that way to them.

Surprisingly, Malfoy was the one to jar her from her troubled thoughts. "Where –" His voice cracked, and he cleared his throat, gesturing at their surroundings, "Where are we?"

Hermione blinked, realizing that, though her fork was poised over her food, she hadn't actually eaten any of it. She shook her head, sighing, and glanced around the bedroom-like setting.

"This is the Room of Requirement, also called the Come and Go Room," she explained. "It's enchanted - it can only be discovered by someone in need. It then typically changes its form and contents to meet that need, whatever it is. Some people have an easier time summoning it than others, though no one knows why."

She found herself easily recounting the Room's description provided in Hogwarts, A History. The Universe A familiarity of the action abruptly caused tears to prickle at her eyes. "Aside from a broom closet, I've never seen it manifest itself quite this small. Then again, we've always needed quite a lot of space when we've used it before," she concluded, focusing on speaking facts rather than remembering people. "What's important is that it's Unplottable, which is helping us a great deal at the moment."

When Hermione glanced back at Malfoy, he was gaping at her as if he was still trying to completely understand her. "What?" she asked defensively.

He blinked, then shook his head and returned his attention to his food, some long locks of blond hair sweeping over his forehead and into his eyes.

She sighed. "Too much information. I know."

"No." Malfoy looked back up again and hesitated. "I was thinking more that you've become… unnaturally eloquent."

It seemed like something Universe A's Malfoy would say, with his smarmy, scathing wit. I suppose some things don't change, she thought, and snorted slightly. "'Unnaturally eloquent,' " she repeated sarcastically. "Aren't you an inveigler."

He raised his eyebrows at her, as if to say, See?, but the lack of humor or malice in his gaze indicated he had meant no insult. "I'm just being honest. It is unnatural, from her. But from you, it isn't at all."

Hermione wasn't quite certain what that meant, but it was enough to cause her to continue staring at him long after he'd resumed eating.

Well… maybe they do.


When Malfoy held out his hands to her so she could replace the shackles around his already deeply scarred wrists, his clenched fists couldn't mask their trembling. Though she hardly knew this Draco Malfoy, the idea of willingly handing him back over to people who would simply continue torturing him made Hermione feel physically ill, and she couldn't begin to imagine how he felt about it. But the hands of the Wizex told her she'd nearly run out of time.

The chains locked into place with a sickening click. Almost instantaneously, as if a five-ton weight had simultaneously been placed around his neck, Malfoy's gaunt shoulders slumped and posture collapsed. The amusement he'd worn so easily in the yearbook photo and but for a moment that morning was nowhere to be seen.

Hermione swallowed back bile, recalling how chafed his skin had been beneath the handcuffs, although it was healed for the moment.

"Wait," she said on inspiration as he began to lower his arms. Though she wasn't certain how well it would work, she added a Cushioning Charm to the metal to lessen its harshness. "Does that feel any better?"

As if to test her theory, Malfoy shifted his wrists cautiously - still seated at the table to avoid putting pressure on his injured leg. Swiftly, he looked up at her, the answer plain in his incredulous expression.

Relieved to have lessened more of his pain, even if only slightly, Hermione frowned in thought. "I should add some Glamoured injuries as well - just a few cosmetic additions. So they don't realize you're doing better than Pomfrey left you, and wonder how you got there." Or hurt you immediately to make up for it. It was an awful thought, but one Hermione certainly wouldn't put past any of the Gryffindor upperclassmen she'd seen standing over Malfoy last night.

Another weak, humorless breath of air escaped Malfoy's lips. "Glamoured injuries," he said wearily. "Now there's a refreshing change."

Despite his attempt at jocularity, Hermione couldn't help but feel as if she herself was fully complicit in the most heinous State-sponsored oppression as she spelled fake bruises and blood and dirt back onto his knuckles, his clothing and his head. She didn't want to think about the gaping burns on his chest, but he'd kept them covered from the moment she'd awakened, so she hadn't had the chance to see how they'd healed and could only assume they had.

She assiduously avoided making eye contact at all with this bizarrely easygoing version of the Slytherin prince, until her attention shifted out of necessity to recreating the faded swelling around his left brow and temple.

She froze.

Though his grey eyes were locked somewhere on the wall behind her, it was impossible not to see that they were glistening with emotion.

Unbidden, unwanted, Hermione's own eyes began to burn. For his sake as much as hers, she'd desperately been trying to avoid this situation from the moment she saw the extent of his injuries, but suddenly every horrendous, despicable sentiment about herself and her inability to help him spilled over.

"Malfoy, I am so, so sorry," she whispered. His red-rimmed gaze shot to hers, which only made it worse. She sucked in a sharp breath, briefly pressing her thumb and forefinger to the corners of her eyes and willing herself to pull it together. "I'm sorry for what's happened to you. I'm sorry for what's happened to your friends. I'm sorry that I can't keep you from going back to those wretched beasts-"

Suddenly, Malfoy grasped her arm lightly in both his hands, a pool of warmth blossoming beneath his touch. "Granger-"

Although his voice was unnaturally gentle, Hermione twitched in surprise and stopped speaking, the entire scene eerily reminiscent of his half-conscious plea for death the night before.

Oddly, Malfoy seemed even more surprised by his actions than she. He momentarily froze, staring at their connection, before he quickly released her.

For a moment, neither of them spoke.

"I am... grateful, for that apology, more than I can say," he said slowly, his voice almost too level. "But you've read me wrong, I think." A visible tremor wracked his hands; he clasped them tightly, staring at the floor. "I... I haven't been treated like a human being in years. I thought... I never thought I would be again, but - however this is happening - you have shown me there is still some goodness in this world." He looked up at her, the same earnestness in his expression that had been in his request to die. "And for that, you should never apologize."

Hermione's throat closed. The sincerity in his pale eyes was paralyzing, and she had no idea how long she simply stared at him, every mental wall she had desperately built up since she'd woke on the Hogwarts Express laid flat. Then she reached up, scrubbing harshly at her eyes.

"Of all the people in this world, you do not deserve this," she said thickly.

Malfoy blinked rapidly, his eyes still glassy. He shook his head. "No one deserves this, Granger. Not even them. But sometimes, it just happens." His voice was rough with emotion. "It happens faster than you can blink."

If 'them' constituted who Hermione thought it did, then she was slowly starting to realize that the Draco Malfoy of Universe B may shockingly have been even more egalitarian than she was - because right now she wouldn't have minded seeing every person responsible for this horrific violation of human rights in a cage, yet he was the one who was imprisoned.

She thought of Bill and Fleur's Wedding - of the happiness and celebrations, until Kingsley's Patronus had delivered the urgent news that the Ministry had fallen seconds before Death Eaters had attacked.

A government overtaken, and their lives irreparably changed... in a blink.

"You're right. Sometimes it does," she murmured. "But that doesn't mean it isn't wrong."

Something stark but unnamable shifted in Malfoy's expression as he continued to look at her steadily. "No," he agreed softly.

The choked feeling in her throat slipped down to her stomach, and Hermione abruptly wrenched herself from the kindness in his gaze - kindness, after everything he'd been through. As genuine as he seemed, the idea of Draco Malfoy being kind at all was so foreign to her that a part of her couldn't help but wonder if he was only having one over on her so she'd continue helping him, couldn't really believe she was having this honest of a conversation with anyone here at all.

Her gaze stopped at the burned 'W,' painfully stark against the deathly pale skin of his face, enough to alter his entire appearance, even. Without thinking, she reached toward it; only his eyes flinched - whether at the sudden movement or her closeness at all, Hermione wasn't certain, but she swiftly realized her error and jerked her hand to a stop.

"Sorry- erm." She hesitated as the word spilt automatically from her mouth, and instead nodded at his cheek, steeling her voice to keep from it the extraordinary amount of emotion coursing through her. "He used Dark Magic. I did what I could, but I can't prevent the scarring."

Malfoy studied her another moment, as if recognizing her quick change of subject and consciously deciding if he wanted to follow her down it. Then he lifted his chained hands, slowly tracing his fingers over the obvious, raised lines of the thick W. "It's bad, isn't it?" he asked dully.

She thought of Bill's scars after he'd been attacked by Greyback, how Harry's scar had marked him apart from the rest of the world for life... the horrifically extensive remnants of trauma that had covered what she had viewed of Malfoy's own arms and torso. "It isn't tiny, but… I've seen worse."

"Well." He shook his head, then gave her the faintest of limp smiles that didn't quite reach his eyes. "Thanks to you, at least it doesn't hurt."

"At least there's that gone right, then," Hermione said wearily, looking at the watch. Her heart thudded once, harder, when she saw it was 10:52. "Right. We have to move."

Quickly, she added some final Glamoured dirt and bruising to his cheeks. Though it wasn't quite 11:00, Ronáld was likely having a conniption by now, and she would have to fully defuse his anger if she wanted to protect Malfoy from any initial ire. He was so volatile he might very well try to accuse her of stealing the blond wizard when she tried to return him.

When she was finished, she stepped back. "There. That should do it." She nodded once, more for herself than for him. "Are you ready for this?"

As soon as the words left her mouth, she realized they were idiotic and entirely unnecessary. Who on earth would be prepared to return to the hellish captivity from which he'd come?

But the Slytherin took a deep breath and briefly closed his eyes, swallowing visibly. After a moment, he said hoarsely, "If I said no, I suppose it wouldn't be of much help, would it?"

"It was a stupid thing to ask; I shouldn't have said it," Hermione replied savagely, angry at herself and the situation rather than at him.

With a wince, he slowly got to his feet. "At least you did me the courtesy of asking at all," he said so quietly she almost didn't hear him, and wondered if she was even meant to.

In what was becoming an all-too-frequent habit, hatred for the Weasleys exploded through her.

She hesitated, weighing the risks of sharing with him her largest discomfort about pulling off this entire caper - the one fear that had almost kept her from acting on his behalf at all, although now that she'd interacted with him a bit more, she felt slightly more secure that Malfoy wouldn't mention to anyone else how much she'd changed, unless coerced.

After a second, Hermione decided his experiences might give him more insight than she had. "I'm... more than a bit concerned of what might happen if Ronáld directly orders you to share the sordid details of your time with me, actually. So if you have any input..."

To her surprise, his brow furrowed only briefly at the question before he responded. "Just order me not to tell them anything you've told me. That should be enough."

She frowned. "Can't they override any order I give?"

Malfoy shook his head. "If I receive conflicting orders from different people who've got the lead, I can choose which one to obey. I... don't think it's a consequence of multiple ownership that they anticipated, nor are particularly pleased about," he added, his voice careful, "but it's… really the only freedom I have, I've found."

Hermione nodded, and bit her lip. "Right." Of course, she'd already ordered Pansy out of necessity, and a part of her had expected she might have to do it again, but... she still couldn't help her instinctive aversion to the thought of giving anyone a binding "Order."

He must have seen her hesitation, because he said quietly, "Granger, this isn't something you're forcing on me, it's the only thing that can keep us safe. Please... order me for both our sakes."

His tone actually reassured her. The irony of it was so astounding that Hermione almost laughed. In the cruelty she'd found at every turn in this world, impossibly, inexplicably, something about the man who was Draco Malfoy was an indescribable relief.

She took a breath, tilting her head back to look at him. Now that he was on his feet, rather than sitting or laying, Hermione was reminded of how tall Malfoy had actually been- there, and here.

Her words were chosen carefully and spoken slowly.

"Tell no one of anything that's transpired between us since I was given the lead - and never, under any circumstances, reveal our future interactions to anyone, either," Hermione added on afterthought - because, what if? "If you're asked about last night, say you don't know where I took you. I never let you see. All you know is that you felt pain, and I seemed pleased enough. And if anyone ever asks you about me in the future, deny seeing me recently." She paused. "Is that clear?"

Malfoy nodded once, his attention again so inescapably focused on her she wondered if, even if the room had been filled with a crowd of people, it would have been any different.

The need to get away suddenly clawed at her chest. She knew herself, knew that somehow, in this extremely short time, she had grown comfortable with him a way that almost resembled friendship. She couldn't afford to feel comfortable like that with anyone, not in this universe, and least of all not with Slytherin's favorite son. Indoctrinated bigot and elitist in one world, it was clear any connection with him in this one could simply make her a massive target... and make her feel even worse about herself than she already did for the abhorrent things she knew were happening here, but couldn't stop.

"I'll summon you once I'm in the common room," she said tautly, reaching for the door.

Unexpectedly, Malfoy reached out again, his hands brushing her arm for only a fraction of a second to catch her attention. "Granger, wait..."

Steeling herself, Hermione briefly closed her eyes before she looked over at him.

His expressive gray gaze held hers for only a moment before it lowered. "Look, I – I still don't understand any of this. I don't understand it at all. But… thank you." He hesitated, looking like he wanted to say more, but instead just shook his head and repeated in a low voice, "Thank you."

Tears burned at her eyes. Clenching her jaw, Hermione nodded, not trusting her voice, and swiftly left before she would have to speak or look at him again.