Hiya everyone!
I know it's been ages since my last update, but it's been ages since I've been able to actually get access to a computer.
New chappie. This one's gonna be longer.
I do not own Harry Potter. Sometimes, I wish I did, then I realise that I don't… and then I'm sad… and then I realise that I have fanfiction and then I'm happy again and writing to you lovely people.
And well done to all those who remembered from chappie one that Nott had been the original Draco's only real friend.
Also, I got a new laptop. It's a Samsung called Sammy-chan (unoriginal, I know, but I didn't have a lot of time to think) and it's blue! My favourite colour.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Dreaming and Dementors
"We have forever
So one day you will find
The way of life you knew
From another place in time"—Lose the Style, Frontliner
Death.
Screaming.
Pain.
A figure stood on a hill, surrounded by other dark robed figures. They were all wearing alabaster skull masks and discussing something. A raid?
The scene changed, now the figure stood with his back turned, he was washing something off his hands…blood?
A weedy man, begging on his knees. A Muggle. His family stood cowering behind him. The man was offering his life for his family's. The figure raised one hand and whispered 'Crucio' and the weedy man collapsed on the ground, screaming in agony. After a few minutes of it, the figure got bored. He said something and a flash of green light burst from his wand. The man fell to the ground. His family screamed. His children were only seven and two.
The figure was unaffected by the deed and more green light flashed and the family dropped down. Dead.
The figure calmly Apparated away.
Draco's eyes flashed open as he sat up, sweating profusely and panting.
What the hell was that? A nightmare?
But it felt so real.
He closed his eyes and covered his ears, trying to block out the sound of the man's screams. And the figure just walked away, completely unaffected.
Draco couldn't breathe; he felt like he was having a panic attack, this was worse than the time with the Dementor.
Eventually, he managed to calm down without waking anyone. After that he couldn't bring himself to sleep and lay awake in his bed.
This was the fifteenth one in two months.
For a while now, Draco had been experiencing these nightmares and they were always similar, torture and death or something along those lines, and all done by this figure that he hadn't seen the face of yet.
He moaned and wiped the sweat away. At least there was something to look forward to. It was the start of October and Quidditch was soon and he was itching to get on a broom again, be up so high he could barely breathe and his head went all fuzzy and he could just…forget.
Then there was Dementor lessons. Nott said he was studying for an Arithmancy re-take and couldn't be of any help, but a week ago he'd passed his re-test and now they were free.
Since that time in the library, he and Nott, whom he now called Theo, had been hanging out more often. He stopped spending as much time with Crabbe and Goyle and Blaise had lost interest in him.
It was strange. When they were children, Draco and Theo had been introduced and often were brought together. But they had had no interest in each other, Nott thought he was a brat and Draco thought he, in turn, was boring.
And yet now it felt natural to be friends.
Draco felt comfortable in Theo's presence. He felt like he could trust him.
Draco only felt that way about one other person and that was Hermione.
Of course, his attachment to Theo didn't come close to his affection for Hermione. And as much as he liked Theo, Hermione was still a complete secret. Actually, it felt like they were keeping a lot of secrets from each other. And the strange thing was, Draco had the weirdest feeling that that was not how it was supposed to be.
Hermione sometimes joked about the Hippogriff being the thing that brought them together and tried to compare it to her troll. Draco wasn't even going to contemplate that.
The next day, he was so tired.
Theo slumped into the seat beside him and began to spoon bacon onto his plate. He glanced in his direction. "You look awful," he said plainly.
"Nah, you think?" Draco groaned and poured himself some black coffee. For some reason, he'd taken a liking to the stuff. "I'm fine," he said when he was feeling a little better. "Just…had a bit of trouble sleeping," Draco hadn't told Theo about the dreams, he felt afraid and ashamed of what he saw each night.
"You've been having a lot of trouble sleeping lately," Theo observed.
Draco finished his coffee and decided to skip on breakfast. His stomach was feeling a bit queasy.
"Hey," Theo said suddenly, pushing his plate away. "Meet me outside," and he stood and left.
Draco waited about fifteen minutes before following Theo out. He met Theo sitting by the statue of the one-eyed witch, reading a small pocket book.
"Alright, I'm here. What couldn't you say it in the hall?"
Theo looked up. "Hogsmeade's in two weeks."
"Yeah, so?"
"So this. Patronus training, meet me outside the Hog's Head."
Draco frowned. "Why? Why Hogsmeade and why can't we just both go?"
Theo smirked. "Because what we're doing might get us into a heap of trouble." When Draco didn't let up his frown, Theo held his hands up. "Alright, fine." He held his wand and whispered, "Silencio."
"What's that?" Draco asked as Theo put away his wand.
"Silencing charm. Anyone who comes close won't hear a thing and when they leave they won't even remember seeing us talking. Learnt it from my father."
Draco marvelled at the spell. "You learnt a lot of things from your father, don't you?"
Theo frowned and a dark look briefly crossed his face. Any normal person would have missed it, but recently, Draco had become very good at reading Theo. It was strange, none of his expressions or habits were a surprise to him and right now, warning bells were going off in his head at the mention of Theo's father? Draco was suddenly filled with disgust for a man who he'd never met before.
"Never mind," he said quickly. "Hogsmeade?"
"The Dementors aren't allowed to come too close to Hogwarts. But they roam about near the edge of Hogsmeade," Theo said. "For a while now I've been watching them and I think I know when we can isolate one."
Draco gaped at him. "Are you bloody mental? You want us to go looking for Dementors?"
Theo looked at him as if Draco were the mad one. "Of course. What, did you think we were going to use a Boggart, ask Potter along? Think about it Draco, the only way you learn to fight a lion is to go to the lion's den. What's the point of learning a Patronus without an actual reason to defend? It's only a pretty light show then and when a real Dementor shows up, your light show won't be good enough."
He made sense; Draco had to admit, but just imagining those creatures, poking around his mind, the coldness, the numbness - the memories that weren't his.
"Of course we won't go after the Dementors straight away. First you need to learn the principle of a Patronus, you need to learn to cast one, and then use the Dementor as practice." He said, as if that made a world of difference.
"So how and where would we practice?" Draco asked. "I still think you're barking, but still."
"Last year I found a room, on the seventh floor. I was skiving, did an all-nighter for something and needed some sleep. Then the room appeared and in it was everything I needed. Since then I've noticed, the room appears whenever you need something. So I went in a few weeks ago and asked for a room I could learn a Patronus in and got a room. We can practice there during free time, on the weekends, after dinner and whenever really."
Draco did not like this - dealing with real Dementors. He wasn't ready to see what they might show him.
But he agreed to these lessons, he couldn't back down now. "Are you sure about this?" Draco asked again.
"Absolutely. That's how I learned. Only without the extra practice." He said grimly. "You don't have to worry about failing and getting your soul sucked out, My Patronus's solid."
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The next day Draco skipped lunch to meet up with Theo for their first Patronus lesson. They met on the seventh floor. Draco waited for about half an hour before Theo came ambling up the corridor casually. That was something he hated about him, Theo was always late.
"Where the hell were you?" Draco exclaimed. "I almost got caught by Filch twice!"
"Calm down, I'm here now." He completely ignored Draco having a hissy fit and turned to the wall. Draco watched in interest. "I thought we were looking for a room?"
"We are," Theo snapped. "Now shut up, I can't concentrate." He closed his eyes and then suddenly, the stones on the wall melted away to form a large door, great oak doors towering above.
"Whoa!" he gasped.
Theo smirked. "Yeah. That's what I said. Come on."
The room was big and spacey with thousands of flickering candles and a large dusty mirror in the corner. Theo chucked his bag to the side. "Well. Let's get started then."
Draco wasn't listening. The second he stepped into this room, he was overwhelmed with déjà vu. He'd been here before, but how?
"Draco?"
He blinked. "Sorry, Theo, wasn't listening."
"That's fine. Wasn't saying anything yet. But you better listen up now. Get your wand out." He sat in one of the armchairs and Draco sat opposite.
"Dementors are soulless beings who feed on happy memories. They suck the good feelings right out of you and fill you with coldness. They can't kill you, you know, or attack you with their hands - that's not their style. The worst they can do though, is far worse. When they get carried away they can suck out your soul."
The joviality in Theo's voice was gone and replaced with a more serious, sombre mood. He sat forward with his fingers threaded together, elbows resting on his knees while he stared off into space.
Draco sat in the same way.
"The Patronus charm," he continued, "acts as a blocker. It's created by magic and enforced by happy memories, so the Dementor feeds of it instead. It's not sustaining and eventually the Dementor becomes unable to feed of it for too long, forcing them to flee. Patronus' come in two forms, a regular Patronus and a Corporeal Patronus. The first kind is a kind of wispy fog, and the second kind often takes the form of an animal."
"Like your falcon!" Draco exclaimed.
"Exactly," Theo nodded. "This is very advanced magic, and it takes ages to learn properly. So if you don't get it, don't worry, we can always try the Dementor another time."
"I'll get it," Draco said firmly. "Make no mistake about that."
Theo smirked. "I thought as much." He stood and brandished his wand. "This is the incantation. Expecto Patronum!" and with that the tip of his wand glowed and a silver falcon burst out and swooped across the room, cawing every now and again. Draco took a moment to marvel in the brilliancy of it before it faded away.
"The trick," said Theo, "is to think of a happy memory, a powerful memory. It has to be powerful, the better the memory, the stronger the Patronus."
Draco frowned. A happy memory?
"Now, I've got this spell, and it supposedly replicates the same sensation of a Dementor feeding off you. I think we could try that for now."
"Where'd you learnt that? Wait, don't tell me. Your father?"
Theo nodded.
Draco sighed. What else could he do? This was what he signed up for. But he couldn't think of a memory.
Theo meanwhile had already crossed the room. "Close your eyes and think about it. Ready?"
Draco thought, and then found something. "Alright, ready."
Draco never saw it coming, suddenly he was cold, and he felt something pulling at his mind. The screams were beginning to mount.
"Expecto Patronum!" he called but it didn't work, the coldness got sharper and the images began.
The pain. The frustration. There were bodies at his feet. Merlin, someone make it stop!
Suddenly it was gone and Draco felt a hand on his back as someone tried to pull him to his feet. "Come on Draco, up you get."
Draco let Theo push him back into the armchair. He shuddered for a moment in the aftermath of the coldness as the fire from the candles began to warm him up, what was that?
"What the hell did you think about?" Theo demanded.
"The first time I ever did magic. Mother was so proud, I was four."
Theo rolled his eyes. "That's not good enough. Draco, mate, this memory has to be something huge. It's got to be something you'd think back to in your darkest moments, just flashes of it in your mind fills you with happiness. It's got to be strong. Something like that's useless. You crumbled barely two seconds into the spell, imagine what'll happen with a real Dementor?"
He was right; Draco gripped the fabric of the chair and hoisted himself up. "Again."
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But Draco didn't get it that lesson. Nor did he get it in the next or the lesson after that. Eight lessons and Draco was getting nowhere. Theo suggested he take some time off and really think about it. He needed a good memory, a strong one.
But how could he come up with a happy memory when he was dreaming about death and torture almost every night?
And Draco wasn't sure where Theo learned that Dementor spell, but he hoped it never got around. It was as bad as the real thing.
He sat on the grass by the library, feeling frustrated with himself.
The worst part was those supposed memories. And the dreams.
He closed his eyes and groaned loudly.
Suddenly he felt someone sit down loudly beside him and growl.
Draco opened his eyes and held up a hand as a shield from the sun. "Hermione?" he asked, just being able to make out her outline.
"Don't ask," she snapped. Draco wasn't going to ask anything. But now that he was looking at her properly, he saw she was scowling and clutching a furry orange monster to her chest.
"Ron is such a prat!" she said suddenly.
Draco laughed. "Hey, no arguments here."
"I mean," she continued, completely unaware of his input. "I understand where he's coming from, but he's being downright unkind now. And he's being awful to poor old Crookshanks."
"Hermione," Draco called out. "I don't understand? Who's Crookshanks again?"
"This is Crookshanks!" Hermione exclaimed as she thrust the furry creature in his face. Draco suddenly realised that it was a cat, a half-Kneazel by the looks of it. He glanced at Hermione's face who was staring at him expectantly.
"Ummm…cute?" he said, quite unsure of himself and taking a dive.
"I know!" she exclaimed and cuddled the creature. Draco let out a sigh, glad that he said the right thing.
"Here, hold him!" she said as she dumped the animal on his stomach. Draco sat up quickly and choked. He and cats did not get on well.
But surprisingly the creature curled up in his lap and started purring. Hermione beamed. "See, isn't he the sweetest thing?"
Not exactly what he had in mind, but with her smiling like that, he would have agreed to anything. "Yeah," he said.
"And Ron keeps on calling him horrid names. You know no one wanted him in the pet store?"
"I can't imagine why," he said, forcing the sarcasm out of his voice.
If possible she beamed even more. And Draco scratched the furry abomination behind the ear. It purred even more.
"Cats chase mice, right?" she began to explain. "And Scabbers is a rat, so obviously Crookshanks will chase him. Isn't that right?!" Draco didn't understand a word of what she was saying, but he nodded.
"Exactly my point. And he's built up some weird conspiracy that Crookshanks had it in for his bloody pet rat. If you ask me, he's the one who's bloody mental, carrying it around in his bag like that, he's baiting poor Crookshanks."
"I agree," Draco said, who was beginning to enjoy himself, pretending to understand her.
She sighed and lay back in the grass. Draco resumed his original position while Crookshanks curled up on his stomach and fell asleep.
Suddenly he felt something warm and soft in his hand and when he looked down, he realised it was Hermione's own hand, grasped within his.
They'd been friends for a long time, and of course they held hands if she was leading him somewhere. But this was the first time she'd done so without there being any reason to do so.
His heart was beating so fast while his mouth had gone dry. He could feel her hand so clearly and was resisting the urge to tighten his grip on it. She felt warm and feminine.
"Thanks for listening," she said.
"Huh?" he snapped out of his focus on their hands. "What was that?"
"Just, you listen to me, Draco. I don't know if you know how much I appreciate that. You never bug me for my studying habits or anything." She squeezed his hand and smiled radiantly at him. "You know, sometimes I really count myself lucky it was your compartment on the train that I stepped into that day."
Draco was speechless. He felt light and bubbly - he didn't know it was possible to feel this happy.
He turned his head away so she couldn't see the silly smile on his face.
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The next Hogsmeade weekend, Draco realised that he was probably never going to get it. Perhaps the Patronus charm was for people with good and honest souls. Not people who dreamt about the evil things he did.
He and Nott took the coach together with Crabbe and Goyle since the both of them agreed that Draco wasn't ready to deal with a Dementor on his own yet. This would be a trip purely for the fun of it.
They visited Honeydukes and Zonko's and when Theo wasn't looking Draco slipped into the stationery shop and bought Hermione some new quills since he knew she was running out.
But as they were about to enter the four Broomsticks for some Butterbeer, Draco suddenly felt his head throbbing.
"Draco?" Theo called from the doorway as Crabbe and Goyle stood by gormlessly
"Just go, I'm going to head down to the Shrieking Shack. Need a bit of quite time," he waved them off. Theo didn't question him, used to Draco's sudden bouts of spontaneity.
"Sure, I'll head over later. Need a pick-me-up first," he called and the three of them entered the pub.
Draco stumbled to the cliff that overlooked the valley where the Shrieking Shack was built. He leant on the railing, breathing in deeply.
Ever since the beginning of the dreams, Draco sometimes got these sudden headaches where images would pour through. At first he fought them like they were a hungry pack of wolves, but eventually the pain became too immense and he found that it was a lot less painful when he just let it happen, although his definition of painful changed when he was actually seeing the images.
The figure again, a man, Draco realised. Younger, less harsh, still he could not make out a face. He was torturing someone now. The screams reverberated through Draco's mind like an echo in a cave, growing louder and shriller with each passing moment before reaching its crescendo as the woman succumbed to the pain and fell dead.
This man seemed to kill a lot.
"Aren't you done yet?" the figure turned to see another robed man with a skull mask. "The Dark Lord does not like to be kept waiting"
"Yeah," the figure called, his voice sounding very familiar. He looked at the body of the Muggle woman and her husband and children. He wasn't sorry for what he did; it was either their life or his. But he did pity them. The woman's hair was brown, she reminded him of someone and looking at her dead was painful.
"Yeah, I'm done."
Draco opened his eyes and cried out as he started stumbling forwards.
This was the first time anyone in these visions ever spoke.
The Dark Lord? Wasn't that what his father sometimes called Voldemort?
Why was it suddenly so easy to say his name?
What was happening to him!?
Draco clutched his head. The sound of the woman's torturous scream would not leave him. He was so confused, so lost and so out of it he didn't notice the sudden coldness that had begun to zero in on him, till he looked up and saw that in his stumbling he had wondered out of Hogsmeade and was into the vicinity of a single Dementor.
Oh shite.
He stumbled backwards; words were caught in his throat. The charm, the Patronus charm. There was nothing for it, he hadn't conjured one yet but he'd have to now.
The Dementor began to glide towards him and as it got closer, the screaming began in his mind.
"E-expecto…" he stuttered, the screaming got louder. No, he couldn't give in.
"Expecto Patronum!" he thought about Quidditch, the feeling of being on a broom, a brilliant feeling.
Nothing, his wand lay in his hands like a useless piece of wood while the Dementor closed in on him, almost lazily, as if it knew he wasn't going to do anything, he couldn't.
The screams! The pain. The woman and her family cries filled Draco's mind as she begged while the figure killed her children. Who was he?! Why were that man's memories tormenting him?
The woman fell now, her dark brown hair reminded him of Hermione…
Then another image broke through, Hermione when she sat next to him on the grass and complained about Weasley bullying her cat. The way she squeezed his hand and smiled, how she told him she was happy he was with her, and how light and happy he felt then. The happiest he'd felt in ages.
Draco opened his eyes and a strange feeling came over him, one a little like the feeling he had in the Chamber of Secrets. He stood and held out his wand just as Theo came running towards him.
"Expecto Patronum!" he said softly but firmly, and then his wand tip glowed bright and from it burst a shape, so tiny it didn't look like it could be that dangerous, but it emitted a soft light. The Dementor couldn't seem to move past that tiny light, though it only reached about an inch of his cloak. Eventually it fled, gliding away and taking its cold with it.
Draco watched it go as he collapsed to his knees exhausted as Theo rushed to help him up. But just before his long-awaited Patronus disappear, Draco saw its form. A scorpion.
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"Did you say a scorpion?" Theo said astonished.
Draco nodded from his seat.
After the Dementor left, Theo somehow managed to get Draco into a carriage and they left quickly before anyone could notice they'd gone. Dementors had no voice so no one would know of their near brush with death.
Draco still expected to be accosted by Snape or some other teacher upon his arrival to the castle, but to his surprise he was not. Then he found it was because the teachers had more important things to worry over. Sirius Black had broken into the castle while they were away and had tried to break into the Gryffindor common room.
Draco usually would find this little bit of information fascinating, but he was still too shaken up to care.
In the Slytherin common room later, after all their housemates had gone to sleep, Draco and Theo decided they needed to talk about what had happened.
Firstly, Theo told him he was an idiot with no self-preservation skills to go looking for a Dementor with no experience with the Patronus and then Draco retaliated by telling that he hadn't gone looking for a Dementor, it had suddenly found him.
When that was all said and done, Theo marvelled at Draco's Corporeal Patronus on a first try.
"But it's so tiny," Draco complained. "How am I supposed to do anything with it?"
"Hey, you know what they say," Theo said carelessly, "the tinier the scorpion, the more deadly its sting." He was silent for a moment more, before sitting up and saying, "You know a Patronus is a reflection of a person. The only truer reflection would be an animagus form. For me, my falcon denotes my intellectual freedom, practically the only freedom I have," he muttered darkly. Then he smiled. "But a scorpion, that's interesting."
"What does that represent?" Draco asked, adjusting himself in the armchair.
"It has a few meanings," Theo answered. "It's a person who will retaliate if crossed. The scorpion is one of the zodiac signs, Scorpio is often associated with male sexuality—" he smirked, "—destruction, healing and resurrection. It's a symbol of the triumph of life over death."
At these words, Draco felt something inside of him freeze. This meant something to him. "Life over death huh? Where'd you get all this stuff?"
Theo shrugged. "I did a lot of research when I found my Patronus shape. And when I research something, I tend to become a little addicted till I find out everything there is to know," he confessed.
Draco smiled, 'he's a lot like Hermione in that aspect', he realised.
Theo whistled and slumped back. "That must have been some memory," he said. "What did you think about this time?"
Hermione. He had thought about her. "It's personal, sorry."
Theo shrugged, "So, with the Patronus down, what should we try next? Animagus?"
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She sat at the bar, her head bowed, as she tried to look as small as possible.
He knew it was her the moment he walked into the bar, even though she'd charmed her bushy brown hair blond and now had eyes a stunning blue, he knew it was her.
She sat in front of the bartender, a portly woman, and began conveying a message.
So, the Bartender was a freedom fighter, this might be interesting information later when he did not have enough information to report to the Dark Lord.
He was not here on business today. He only came to watch her, his secret guilty pleasure.
She nibbled on her lip and despite himself, his eyes were drawn to them, and he wondered briefly what they tasted like. Almost immediately, he recoiled. Why tempt himself with what would never be?
He hated when she put a concealing charm on herself, though he knew it was for her own protection. He rarely got to see her, and when he did, he wanted to see her as herself. He loved the way she looked. He loved her.
Then another man entered the pub and found the woman, her lip-sticked red lips spread wide in a smile as she kissed the man on the cheek. He had hidden his eyes and face, but not the shock of red hair. Idiot, was he trying to give himself away? Didn't he care that he was endangering her?
Obviously neither of them cared as they kissed on the lips and his hands tightened on his glass of Firewhisky.
But he would watch. He would watch over her until one of them was dead. Preferably himself.
Because he loved her, though he tried not to. And he didn't know how to stop.
So what else he could do for her, other than simply watch.
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Draco woke up the next day feeling slightly melancholy. He recalled that he'd had another strange dream, but unlike the others, this one didn't have him screaming in his bed from horror, he remembered it a little less vividly the next morning.
So there was more to this figure in his dreams. He had someone he loved, someone he wasn't supposed to love.
But other thoughts soon overtook his mind as he found himself unable to stop thinking about that miraculous Patronus.
Sometimes, when he was completely alone or with Theo, he practiced his Patronus and watched the tiny scorpion flit across the room, its tail raised, looking for an opponent to sink into.
Well, he'd always loved the scorpion constellation the most. Perhaps this was a reflection of that secret.
But it was the force of the memory that summoned the scorpion that truly astounded him. It was always Hermione.
It was ridiculous, even tiny memories were enough to bring it out. Draco knew Hermione was precious to him and he treasured her as a friend, but this was insane.
But even he couldn't deny that his feelings for her sometimes felt like they went beyond friendship.
Theo was his friend, but Draco didn't feel an all-consuming need to watch over him like he did Hermione. His heart didn't race when Theo was in the room as it did with her. The whole thing was leaving Draco very confused.
Well, it was certainly a memory he'd been thinking about in his darkest moment. Just thinking about it now, the warmth of her hands, her bushy hair spread out against the grass like a halo, filled him with a sudden thrill.
Quidditch rolled in and the first match was Gryffindor vs Hufflepuff.
Draco didn't watch; he was busy. But he heard that Potter lost his first match ever, due to a horde of Dementors.
Draco hated Potter, but he hated Dementors more.
On another note, Potter's broom broke.
Ouch.
Draco didn't feel sorry for him, but he did feel.
He felt jealous that Hermione was spending every waking moment of her time by his bedside.
Draco barely saw her this year as it was. But what was he to do; all he could do was watch over her diligently.
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The cabinet. The cabinet. He had to finish it, he had to finish it or else…
He was in the Hogwarts library, hidden amongst the books with a bunch of useless tomes scattered around him. This was useless; he would never find a book about how to redirect a vanishing cabinet. And now if he didn't finish it, his parents, his friend, everything he cared about would die.
His mind was buzzing, everything felt so jumbled up and confused it was a wonder he could still make it to and from his bed each morning let alone to classes. Every day was a struggle not to breakdown and self-destruct and he didn't know what to do.
Groaning, he stood and sombrely began to make his way to the library entrance when something caught his eyes.
The Mudblood girl again. She sat in the corner of the library at one of the tables, her usually bushy brown hair tied up by her neck, her dark eyes concentrated on the thousands of books scattered around her.
What did she need with so many books?
For ages now, his feelings towards this particular Mudblood had wavered on and off now. The Mud…oh what was the use, he didn't have the mental energy left to actually care about her blood status. He was so tired.
She looked peaceful. She always looked peaceful around books. And she looked happy. He'd always noticed this about her, she was ridiculously happy when she had a project to work on. It was usually homework. He'd noticed, because it had astonished him. That someone could actually derive joy from something like homework.
She was insane.
Why was he still watching her?
It was then that he realised that he'd spent a good ten minutes watching her. And this wasn't the first time he'd done so.
Because of the vanishing cabinet, he'd been required to spent vast amounts of time here in the library, and he regularly saw her, reading or studying.
At first he ignored her existence completely. But then his eyes would wander over, just because he needed a distraction from the chaos that was his own life right now, and seeing her, seemingly with no chaos whatsoever, made him feel better.
Seeing her triggered something in his mind that was strangely calming.
She sat up and stretch suddenly, a sound squeezed past her lips, like a short cry of relief.
He found himself sighing. Strange, watching her calmed him. He felt his migraine unwinding.
She was actually rather pretty. But he'd thought so for ages.
Her bushy hair was really wild, and she always knew what to do. He felt like he needed someone telling him what to do now.
And for a moment, in all his madness, he didn't see her as his childhood's annoyance, or as the girl who had thwarted him for the past six years. He didn't even see her as a Mudblood. He was too tired and exhausted to even try to call up pretences. That moment would change his life.
She nibbled on her pencil, a frustrated furrow creasing her brow as she muttered incoherently to herself. And he suddenly realised he was smiling.
It was then that he suddenly realised, in astonishment and in horror, that he loved her.
She would never be merely a Mudblood to him again.
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The days came and went and soon the next Hogsmeade outing rolled in. Draco met Hermione a little before departure by accident. The encounter had his heart pounding by the time she left. She wore one of those moronic Weasley sweaters and a Muggle scarf and jeans. There was snow in her hair and she threw a snowball at his back. He levitated twelve back in her direction. She wasn't amused. He, on the other hand, couldn't have been happier.
Then they went their separate ways as she met up with Weasley, his teeth gritted as her face broke out in a beatific smile.
For some reason, Draco had serious problems with seeing Hermione and Weasley together. Something gnawed at his insides, a sort of fury and desperation to march over and pull her away. Times like this he felt as if something was urging him on, only the knowledge that if he did would cause nothing but trouble for the both of them, stopped him.
He watched from the top of the stairs, where he was waiting for Nott for another Dementor session, as Weasley helped her into the carriage, their fight over his rat obviously forgotten.
On one of the steps Hermione slipped on some ice, Draco almost ran out to catch her but Weasley got there first. Then he saw it, the faint hint of red across her cheeks as she blushed when Weasley caught her by the waist. That shy smile he'd never seen before.
A horror came over him as he realised why her argument with Weasley had troubled her so badly. He'd seen that look in her eyes before, only now it was different. Draco saw her with him and somehow knew this was serious. And the knowledge was like a kick to the stomach.
Hermione liked Ronald Weasley.
New chapter. Sorry it's taking so long. Again, I have school.
Also, some people have been mentioning Draco's strong attachment to Hermione at a young age.
Remember, this is Draco's second time doing things. He can't remember anything solid from his first time, but he does remember intense feelings and sometimes can recall his experiences in times of stress, like in the basilisk chamber. And his feelings for Hermione are carried over from his first self who loved her, into this second self who loves her. His feelings are of two hims so they're doubly strong.
Please review.