Grrr! I'm doing my best to finish up this story since I've got like 5,000 brilliant Dramione fictions swarming in my head. But I'm going to finish this story, I'm aiming 1 more chapter after this one, and no, they will not be boring, this one will have the big twist in it…YAY! I love plot twists…happy sigh
Reviewers, reviewers I love you all so!!
Disclaimer: If Harry Potter were mine, I wouldn't be having such a hard time finishing this fic!!
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"Unless the girl that kicked us out, wasn't Hermione. But one of Malfoy's little monsters setting us up, so we'd leave them alone."
Harry groaned and rolled his eyes,
"Could you bee any thicker Ron? Trust me, that was definitely Hermione. No actress, no matter how good she was, could fake the kind of emotion I felt coming from her. It was definitely 'Mione" he assured his friend, who leaned his head on the table and emitted a frustrated groan.
"I guess there's always the chance that Hermione actually likes him, and that she actually trusts him, and that there's actually a small chance that he may have somehow changed and is a respectable human being" the raven haired man thought out loud.
"Now who's the thick one?" Ron said rolling his eyes.
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(A few hours later, and back at the Malfoy Manor)
"Draco, can you take this god forsaken spell off of me? I'm sick of looking in every reflective surface and seeing someone who's so…not me" Hermione pleaded.
Draco sighed, she had been nagging him all night, "I suppose so".
A wand movement, a few muttered words, and a tingling sensation later, Hermione glanced back in the mirror and sighed with relief as she saw her usual curly brown hair, and chocolate eyes.
"Thanks" she said, giving him a quick peck on the lips.
But as she pulled back, he took the back of her neck and pulled her towards him for more, which she was more than willing to oblige to.
The couple kissed deeply, Hermione's arms latched around his neck, as he ran his fingers gently through her hair. Both were deeply immersed in the kiss, unable to notice their surroundings.
That is, until a chillingly cold voice broke them from their daze.
"You little traitor!" the last word was spat is if it burned the person's tongue, just saying it. The voice was full of disgust.
Draco and Hermione broke apart instantly, and stared at the people before them.
"Oh. My. God." Hermione whispered very quietly. Before them stood two men. One with long, silver hair, much like Draco's, and the other wore a hood over his face, but his chilling, and snakelike voice suggested who he might be.
"Father, my Lord" Draco offered quietly. He looked as though it pained him to say the words.
"You have betrayed us! And for what? A little wretched mudblood?" Lucious Malfoy sneered.
"You were ordered to kill this…thing. And here we find you kissing the little animal?" he looked as though he were going to throw up.
"Draco, we placed a very important task upon your shoulders. We thought you had completed it. But because of your…affections, or whatever the hell stopped you from completing it, all three of the only people who stand in our way are alive and walking! I didn't ask you to kill her just for kicks, we need her out of the way if we are to succeed!" Voldemort added in, speaking as though Hermione were not in the room.
Hermione's hand quietly, and unnoticeably reached for Draco's, which gave hers a gentle squeeze before he stood up to face the men before them.
But not being able to find words, he stood there waiting, for the others to speak first, whether it was out of humility or the fact that he was completely frightened, being caught with someone he had supposedly killed, by the two evilest people alive, he wasn't quite sure. But he had a bad feeling that it was a mixture of the two.
Voldemort took a deep breath, as if for some bizarre reason he was trying to stay calm in this situation.
"I'm giving you until the end of the day to kill the girl. If after the sun sets, and for some strange reason, the mudblood is still alive, I will personally punish you by killing her slowly and painfully, before your very eyes. And then, I will kill you." The Dark Lord warned venomously.
And with those disturbing words, Voldemort and Lucious disappeared with a loud crack, leaving Hermione and Draco speechless.
Draco's eyes slowly turned to look at Hermione, slightly afraid of what he would see.
Her skin was unnaturally pale, almost like a ghost. Her face looked blank, and unemotional, as if she was an empty shell. Draco could tell by these simple changes in appearance that she was utterly terrified.
"Mya, it's going to be ok. I promise. I told you that nothing was going to happen to you, and I meant it"
Hermione frantically shook her head while fighting back a bought of tears that she hadn't been expecting.
"No Draco, it's not! Either way I end up dead, either at your hand or his! How is that going to be ok?" she asked him. Her breathing was fast and shallow.
Draco seated himself back on the couch next to her and wrapped his arms comfortingly around her. He placed his chin on top of her head while she leaned her head against his chest, silent tears running down her face.
"I don't see how we're going to be able to get out of this one" she sighed, small sobs and random sniffles interrupting her sentences.
"I mean, this is the Dark Lord we're talking about. They don't call him that because he gets fooled by petty tricks by petty people who think they can pull the petty wool over his petty eyes!" she shrieked, surpassing distressed and going straight to hysterical.
Draco was unsure of how to get her to calm down, so he simply resided to tightening his arms around her small body, and gently stroking her hair.
As her body shook beneath him, Draco realized that he would do anything for this girl. He would give anything to make her tears stop, and to make it so that the world could never hurt her again. He realized that he truly, flat out loved Hermione Granger.
But his thoughts were interrupted by two men storming into the room. Hermione couldn't see who they were, and she instantly tensed, thinking that it was Voldemort and Lucious back to kill either her or Draco…or both.
"'Mione?" a very familiar voice asked her.
Hermione shifted her position so that she could get a look at her two best friends, relieved to have more company. She gave them a meek smile, as tears continued to flood her eyes. She was trying to do her best to cease them, but her efforts were in vain. She simply couldn't get Voldemort's words out of her mind: I will personally punish you by killing her, slowly and painfully, before your very eyes. And then, I will kill you.
"What's going on?" Ron asked, slightly uncomfortable at the sight of a weeping Hermione in the arms of Draco Malfoy. A few years earlier, she would have been holding on to him or Harry for comfort.
"It's um…You-Know-Who. You see, he's kind of after us. Well, he's more so after her, but if I don't do as he asks, he'll be after me as well" Draco explained, seeing as Hermione seemed to be incompetent of saying anything without bursting again.
"Is there anything we can do to help?" Harry asked, feeling the same way as Ron.
"Unless you can make Voldemort forget about killing the best friend of the boy-who-he's-tried-to-kill-a-million-times-but-has-beat-him-every-time, then I don't think so" Hermione answered meekly with a small, forced laugh.
"I don't know about that, but maybe they can help to get rid of them" Draco offered, slightly releasing Hermione from his grip.
"Them?" Ron asked confused.
"Oh yeah, my father's in on this whole thing as well"
"There's a shocker" Harry muttered under his breath, and Hermione, hearing him, shot him a quick glare.
"When are they coming back?" Ron asked, trying to move this whole thing along.
"Sunset" the girl answered, rubbing the back of her neck.
Harry glanced from his watch to the window, and made a guess of about 2+ hours, seeing as it was roughly 6:00 in the evening.
The four of them stayed in silence, while each individual thought up ideas that would help the couple escape an inevitable death.
"I have an idea, but it's pretty bold…" Hermione offered after a few moments. The men turned to look at her, all eager for any form of plan.
The other three shared looks as she explained.
"What the hell? It's worth a shot" Draco caved with a sigh.
(Roughly 2 hour laters, as the sun is just about to set)
"What if this doesn't work?" Hermione whispered to Draco, her eyes fixed between the window, revealing a sinking sun, and the clock which read 25 after 8.
"Then we improvise" he told her, nodding his head.
"And you do know that I will refuse to just sit here and watch you take care of everything, no matter how creepy the situation is. Just because I'm a female, does not mean that I cannot handle this as much as you can" she insisted, making things clear before they arrived.
"Mya, I know ok? If any one person could handle this, it would be you… you did punch your worst enemy, and most popular guy in school when you were only 13" he reminded her with a knowing smile. She smiled back at him, and at that moment was when two furious people entered the room with a crack.
Hermione and Draco stood to meet them, each with unwavering confidence in their eyes.
"Draco, you have failed us, for the second time in 2 days, and for the last time. Now, you will pay" Voldemort said, flatly, yet venomously. In one swift movement, he had somehow gotten Hermione in front of him, and his wand at her throat.
"But not before we get rid of this piece of filth" he said, pulling her head back and looking at her with disgust.
"Crucio"
Pain shot through Hermione's body like a thousand knives, all stabbing in to her at the same time, causing her to writhe on the floor, biting her tongue, and not allowing herself to scream. She would not give that satisfaction to people as vile as Lucious and Voldemort.
"Are you too stupid to scream girl?" Lucious' voice hissed, "too stupid to call out for help?"
If possible, the pain intensified. At this point, Hermione was numb. The pain had been lasting for seconds, which felt like hours. She felt like her body was being ripped apart, limb by limb. She bit harder into her tongue, a slight taste of blood now in her mouth. This was it, Hermione felt like she was about to die. Hell, she would have taken death over this pain in a heartbeat.
"Scream!" Lucious demanded, Hermione's pain once again increasing, make it utterly unbearable.
She couldn't take it anymore and let out and incredible, ear piercing scream, letting out the decibels.
Draco's face throughout this whole ordeal was absolutely crestfallen. It killed him to see her in so much obvious pain. The worst part of it that it was his very own father, inflicting this incredible pain on her.
The evil duo, feeling satisfied with the mudblood's glass shattering scream, subsided the curse. Hermione lay slumped on the floor, gasping desperately for air. Now to afraid to say or do anything, just incase they decided to reinstate the Cruciatus on her.
At this point, Ron and Harry took it upon themselves to make their appearance, having been watching from around the corner, but having been forced to not take action until they felt it totally necessary.
Draco practically lunged forward at Hermione, as soon as the curse had been lifted, taking her in his arms and pulling her away from their offenders. He laid her on the couch, and proceeded to stand by Harry and Ron.
"What is this? Some kind of rebellion?" Voldemort insisted, almost showing some kind of humor in the fact that he stood before one of his supposed followers, and three of his worst enemies (although one was hardly a threat at the moment)
Wands from every party were drawn, pointing them at the opposite and the words were spoken before anyone of them could think,
"Avada Kedavra!"
Bodies slumped to the floor.
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Oooooo! Who could it be!? Anyway, I've got one more chapter to wrap things up! Should be up possibly by the weekend, or maybe early next week. Only 8 ½ more days of school for me!!! Yay! Reviews please! I need that final push :) -Erin