When Draco awoke it was light outside. He had a crick in his neck from lying with his head on the back of the couch all night and his limbs felt like dead weights. Hermione was deeply asleep. She had turned towards him in her sleep and her head was in a rather precarious position on his lap. Thank Merlin he'd put a cushion under her or she would have awoken in a very awkward position.

With a lot of quiet manoeuvring, he managed to get himself out from under her head and put another cushion under her. She hardly even stirred as he did so. He went quickly upstairs to relieve himself and brush his teeth – his breath could probably stop a hippogriff. He was just about to change when he heard her calling from downstairs. He virtually flew down the stairs.

"Draco? Draco!" She sounded terrified.

He ran into the room and straight to her. She was sitting up on the couch, tears in her eyes.

"Hermione, it's okay. I'm here." He knelt on the floor in front of her and put one hand on her shoulder and the other on her face.

Tears were silently falling from her eyes.

"Hermione?"

She just shook her head as the tears continued.

"Hermione, what's wrong? You're scaring me." He used his thumb to wipe a tear away as it fell.

"You-" She took a deep breath and calmed a little. "You weren't here."

"Oh, Granger." He sat beside her and pulled her into a hug. She latched onto him again tightly, as she had done the previous night. "I'm sorry. I was just upstairs. I thought I might change out of these stinking clothes so at least you'd have something fresh to smell when you hug me."

He felt her laugh a little against him and he pulled away slightly to study her face. She looked tired – that was a given – but all in all, she didn't look too bad.

"How are you feeling?" he asked her.

"I've been better." She smiled a little.

"Seriously, Granger. Does anything hurt? Do you need any pain potion?"

"Not hurting exactly. I'm just all fuzzy. Like my arms and legs feel heavy and my head is like it's filled with cotton wool or something."

"We've still got some of the Primum ens Melissae left over. You can have some of that with breakfast. Hopefully it'll help."

"Thank you." She said, and buried her face in his neck again.

"There's nothing to thank me for Granger. I'm just so glad you're okay. Relatively speaking." He rubbed circles on her back.

"You got me out, Draco."

"I wouldn't have needed to if I'd been more vigilant. If I'd not been stupid enough to leave you on your own for so long."

"Constant vigilance." She laughed to herself, and he worried whether the Cruciatus had affected her mind a little.

"What?"

"Something Moody used to say. But you weren't to know he would come Draco."

"When I got home yesterday," he mused, burying his face deeper into her hair, "And you weren't here, it was- I didn't know what to do. All I could think of was getting you out of there. You've come to mean a great deal to me, Miss Granger."

She chuckled in his ear. "Likewise Mr Malfoy."

"Well this is cosy." Theo's voice came from the doorway to the living room. He was leaning against the frame and smiling at Draco in a knowing way that made him a little uncomfortable.

"Theo!" Hermione leapt up and ran to Theo, stumbling a little as she went. Draco reached out to grab her but Theo caught her before she could fall and he pulled her into a hug.

"You okay, Granger?" he asked.

"I'll get there. Thank you for yesterday. For helping bring me home."

"Don't scare us like that again." Theo scolded. He let her go and held her by her shoulders in front of him. "Seriously love, I think Draco nearly had a heart attack when he realised you weren't here. Almost let on that he cared."

Theo gave Draco a significant look over Hermione's shoulder that clearly said 'We need to talk'.

"Why are you here, Theo?" Draco asked, tersely.

"I'm hurt, Draco." Theo pulled Hermione around to his side and put an arm around her shoulders. "Hurt deeply, that you are not overjoyed to see your best friend." He put his free hand to his chest to emphasise the point.

Draco rolled his eyes.

"Theo." Draco said, a note of warning to his voice. He was all good with Theo's sense of humour, but only when it suited. And right now, it was far too early for him to deal with it.

"Merlin, you're no fun in the morning. I came to make you lovely folks breakfast. Something told me neither of you would exactly be feeling like cooking right now. So I'm here to cook for you today. Well, this morning at least. I'm not a house elf after all!"

"That's sweet, Theo, thank you." Hermione said. "Do you want any help?"

"No, love. You need to relax." He gave her a hand back to the sofa. Draco had the feeling Theo was going to try to corner him, and he'd really rather do it later than sooner. And preferably after some kind of energy potion or at the very least a cup of coffee. Merlin, it was early.

"You okay if I go and shower and change while Theo makes breakfast?" Draco knelt in front of Hermione.

"Yeah of course. I was just being silly earlier. Sorry." She blushed and looked down at her hands.

"You've nothing to apologise for, Granger." He said and squeezed her hand. She bit her lip and he thought she might say something, but she shook her head slightly and let his hand go.

Hermione sat at the breakfast table digging into the bacon and syrup pancakes that Theo had laid in front of her. The Primum ens Melissae she had drunk was already kicking in and making her feel better. The pancakes were incredibly sickly and she wasn't even that hungry, but Godric, did they taste good.

She looked at Draco and Theo, who had spent the entirety of breakfast trying to keep her out of her head and distinctly not mentioning what had happened the previous day, and she thought, it could be a lot worse. She could still be in that basement. Or she could be with Lucius Malfoy. She still wanted to know what happened though. How on earth had she managed to escape Voldemort again?

"So boys, what happened yesterday?" she interrupted.

Their reaction was almost comical. They looked at her, eyes wide, then at each other, then they both looked down at their plates and cleared their throats at the same time.

"Nothing happened."

"It was nothing."

They spoke simultaneously.

She narrowed her eyes. "What happened?"

No one spoke. Theo pushed the last piece of bacon on his plate with his fork. Draco scratched at the table.

"Theo?"

No response.

"Draco?"

He rubbed the bridge of his nose. A habit she was beginning to recognise in him.

"Will one of you tell me what's going on?"

Why weren't they telling her? Did this mean something bad had happened? Oh, Merlin, what if…?

"Look, I'm a big girl." She felt her eyes begin to burn, thoughts running fast through her head. "If someone did something to me, besides the Cruciatus, you can tell-"

"Shit, no, Hermione it's nothing like that, I swear." Draco said quickly and looked at her imploringly.

She let out a breath that she hadn't realised she was holding and closed her eyes.

"Well, will one of you please tell me what happened? Because I swear, if you don't, so help me Godric, I will pour all of your precious whiskey down that sink and I will make a scratch on your favourite record."

"Okay, fine!" Draco said and looked back at Theo and then back down at the table. "We, um, that is to say-"

Hermione found it a little amusing. She'd never seen Draco flustered before. If she didn't want answers she'd tease him for it. But she settled with making a mental note to do so later on.

"Out with it, Draco."

"We had to-"

"The Dark Lord thinks you're dead, love." Theo interrupted, without looking up.

"Way to break the news gently, mate." Draco glared at Theo.

Hermione played the words back in her head.

"What exactly led him to think that, Theo?"

"We made a dead body look like you."

"Theo! Salazar's sake, I was not going to tell her like this!" Draco slammed his fork down.

"She has to fucking know what happened, Draco! She's not an invalid, and let's be honest if you didn't want her to know, we both know you'd have acted better."

"That's what the Polyjuice was for." Hermione said quietly.

"Of course I wanted her to know, but there are ways of telling people things, Theo!"

"Wise up, Draco! I only told her like that because you couldn't."

"Excuse me! I am still here, you know." Hermione raised her voice. "Am I correct in assuming that that was actually what the Polyjuice was for?"

"Yes."

"So let me get this straight. Not only did you lie to me about what it was for, but you had the plan to kill off an innocent person and Polyjuice them to look like me from the very first week I came here?"

"No, not kill off an innocent person. That was not part of it!"

"It was a dead Muggle body from a healing place by my father's house, Granger. We didn't kill anyone for you."

"Well I guess that explains the looks you gave us whenever we mentioned it, Theo. I'm guessing you were not entirely on board with this reckless plan of action?"

"Decidedly not, Granger. But my protests fell on deaf ears." He gestured to Draco. "So I shut my mouth about it. But it worked, so I guess I owe Draco an apology."

"Not so fast. Draco, you had this plan from the first week I came here? That night you were upset, and we sat in there and we drank and you told me I could help you with the Polyjuice. You were planning this idiotic, reckless plan since then?"

"Yes." He said dejectedly. "But it wasn't that idiotic, because it work-"

Hermione cut him off by getting up, throwing her arms around his neck and placing a chaste kiss on his cheek.

"Thank you." She said and smiled and then went around to hug Theo. "Both of you. Even if half of you weren't actually wholly committed." She smirked at Theo. "I'm going for a bath. Breakfast was delicious, Theo."

"So," Theo said after he cast a quick cleaning charm on the plates. "I was right."

"Right about what?" Draco asked.

"Right about you and her." He leaned back in his chair and folded his arms across his chest, surveying Draco carefully.

"I don't follow." Draco narrowed his eyes slightly.

"What I said yesterday. I was right, wasn't I?"

"Theo, I'm sure you said a lot of things yesterday. Few of which were actually worth remembering. But if you have a question to ask me, mate, then out with it." There was just a hint of malice in Draco's voice. Theo recognised it well. It was a popular tone amongst Slytherins.

"You like her, don't you? Fancy her, I mean."

Theo expected an argument. The throwing of dishes maybe or insults hurled at him. The outright denial of any feelings towards her. He at least expected an unsubtle change of subject.

What he was not expecting was for Draco to sigh, lean back in his chair and say "Is it that obvious?"

"Only to me." Theo shrugged and leaned towards Draco. "I've kind of been looking for it. You look at her differently now than you did at the start. And your face when she kissed you just now was priceless!" He chuckled. "Since when, mate?"

Draco exhaled loudly through his mouth. "No idea. Yesterday, last week, last month, who knows? If you'd tried to have this conversation with me two days ago I probably would have yelled at you."

"That is what I was expecting, mate." Theo laughed.

"I only realised yesterday when I saw her like that." Draco mused without looking at him and he seemed to shudder from the memory. "Theo, you're still good at Occlumency right? The Dark Lord's never read you before?"

"Not since I took the mark, same as you. Why?"

Draco seemed to assess something for a moment while rubbing the bridge of his nose. "Fuck it. I've already told you too much anyway so what's one more thing?" He looked up at Theo with determination. "I'm sending her back to the resistance."

Theo's immediate reaction was shock. But when he played back the words in his head a second after Draco had said them, it all made sense. Hell, he was annoyed at himself for not seeing it sooner. He looked at Draco for a long moment, saw the resolve in his eyes and the set to his jaw and then something clicked and all the pieces fell into place. All the cryptic conversations. All the looks between the pair of them. All the sentences left hanging or cut off when he entered the room.

"Oh fuck." He put his head in his hands. "You're helping them, aren't you?"

When Draco didn't respond he looked up. His jaw had tensed even more.

"Aren't you?"

"You know you can't repeat that."

"Of course I fucking know, mate! Merlin, I swear sometimes you think I want you to be killed!"

Theo exhaled and rubbed the back of his neck.

"I won't help you."

"I didn't ask you to."

"I don't think it will work. Whatever it is you're trying to do."

"I'm trying to get rid of the Dark Lord. Shit, Theo, aren't you sick of all this?"

"Of course I am. But I can't risk it. I don't want to be harsh, mate, but the only family you've got left is a father you loath and a mother who you know is safe from them. My mother may have left but they know where she is. One wrong move from me or my father and her and my sister pay for it. And Daph too. You know I can't risk trying to change things."

"I know, Theo. Which is why I'm doing it. They're going to get stronger. There's still a lot of them left, they're just too scared to group together now. I send her back to them with a plan, and they can rally the troops and cry havoc. They – we – can destroy him. He's not invincible anymore. He just doesn't know it yet."

It all sounded too good to be true. Draco's words gave him the slightest glimmer of hope, but he quashed it quickly. He'd given up hoping long ago. But still…

"From your lips to Merlin's ears." He said and raised his coffee mug in a toast. Draco smiled and did the same.

"Does that mean you want in?"

"Hell, no. I never want to hear you mention it again. I don't want to add you to my list of people to worry about."

"Awh mate, I didn't know you cared." Draco teased.

"Fuck off."

A/N: Sorry I know it's been a little while since the last update. Thank you all for the follows and faves. Special thanks and happy thoughts go out to Frogster, thelight-ofnight, ErikaNeubert, now-you-know-the-real-me, Beth, sed418, xDarkDesiresLightx, GhostQueen147, Judy, lynnchan111 and annaea3077 for the reviews. Your words keep me going!