October 8, 2003

Granger was still fast asleep, despite the morning sunlight brightening her bedroom. Over the years, the deviant side of Draco's imagination had supplied any number of scenarios in which he had he fucked her, but he had never pictured waking up next to her, so vulnerable and trusting, with her lightly freckled nose and rumpled curls making her look like an innocent little girl.

He smirked to himself. Last night had proven Granger was no such thing. The sex had been feral. As rough as they'd gotten, though, he hadn't felt so much as a tickle on his wrist from the Vow. Draco thought it was because he had merely been acceding to Granger's demands. She was a bossy, vocal little thing, in bed and out.

She was still naked under the sheet, lying on her stomach with her face buried in the pillow. Draco propped himself up on one elbow for a better view, idly counting the few freckles sprinkled on her top of her shoulders, interspersed among the bruises left by his fingers. Granger had marked him, too, and he had no intention of Healing the scratches she'd left along his back, arms and torso, not when they were reminders of such an excellent night.

Draco wondered how much of that excellence was due to the Weasley WonderWitch potion and how much was due to the volatile chemistry he and Granger shared. His Galleons were heavily on the latter. George Weasley would be locked up in Azkaban if his WonderWitch products routinely caused underage girls to act like rabid bitches in heat. And the dead sexy bra and knickers Draco had torn off Granger's body were strong evidence that she'd had seduction in mind even before being dosed with the pink potion. Draco mentally wrote off the couple of Galleons he'd spent on the Weasley potion as an unnecessary expenditure.

Of course, further experimentation would be needed to ascertain if Granger was just as eager and responsive without the benefit of the potion. Draco thought she would be. His cock was eager to prove that hypothesis now. His morning erection was more persistent than usual, due to the lingering smell of sex in the room and Granger's proximity.

He reached out a hand and lightly stroked from the top of her head down to the curve of her buttocks. There was no response, not even a sleepy grumble or change to her deep, even breathing. He reversed the motion, with the same lack of result, and grinned ruefully. There would be no waking her for a romp between the sheets this morning. It probably for the best. He was due in the office for an early meeting and his father would not accept "shagging Hermione Granger" as a valid excuse for being late.

With some reluctance, Draco left Granger's warm bed and efficiently collected his clothes - including, most critically, his suit jacket with his wand ensconced in an interior pocket - from where they'd been scattered around Granger's flat and made his way to the bathroom.

It was a tiny room, so small that it had only a shower stall but no bath. Despite the older fixtures and a cracked tile here and there, Granger kept it scrupulously clean. He conducted a quick reconnaissance, snooping in her medicine cabinet with wand in hand. When he found the packets of pills Theo had described, his Vow provided no impediment to a simple Switching Spell. After all, sugar pills were harmless.

As he ducked his head to avail himself of the shower, Draco reminded himself to get on with furnishing the flat Nott had found for him in Knightsbridge. It had a lovely marble ensuite bath off the master bedroom with a shower large enough for shagging and a soaking tub big enough to share.

After a quick shower and employing a few charms to shave, clean and press his suit, and change the color of his shirt and tie, Draco was ready for the day. He ducked back into the bedroom, where Granger was still deeply asleep, to leave a note on the nightstand inviting her to lunch. His presence was required at Astoria's birthday dinner this evening, but he would find time this afternoon to spend with Hermione.

Giving into a momentary temptation, he kissed her bare, bruised shoulder before pulling the corner of the duvet up higher, making sure she was covered and warm as she slept.

(x) (x) (x)

Mundungus Fletcher groaned and pulled his hat lower over his eyes. A few pints with Aberforth at the Hog's Head had turned into a few too many, and he had woken up in the goat pen. Again.

He consulted his tarnished pocket watch and groaned a second time, more loudly. At the last Order meeting, he had been assigned to check in on Hermione Granger and advised that the best time to catch the busy girl was as she left her flat in the morning. For at least the tenth time, he was already too late.

Except when Dung cast the Point Me spell directed to Hermione's Muggle driving license, his wand spun aimlessly around in his palm, indicating that she was still at home, concealed by a Death Eater's wards. It seemed the lass was having a bit of a lie-in this morning.

Dung smiled and thought that this just might be his lucky day. It was chilly and overcast in Hogsmeade, but he knew the forecast in London was for sun and unseasonable warmth. It would be pleasant to lounge in the little park across from the Granger girl's building, watching pretty birds stroll by and cadging spare change from open-handed students, until she made her appearance.

Decision made, Dung Apparated to a discreet alleyway and took up his position on a park bench with a perfect view of the entrance to her building. Had he been a mere fifteen minutes earlier, he would have been treated to the sight of Draco Malfoy leaving, whistling a jaunty Weird Sisters song and wearing a very contented smile along with his bespoke Muggle suit.

Instead, Mundungus spent nearly three uneventful but mildly profitable hours waiting for the Granger girl to emerge from her flat. He was on the verge of leaving to find some grub for his growling stomach when she finally left the building, wearing sunglasses and a light jacket with a silk scarf that couldn't quite hide a livid bite mark on her neck. Even from across the street, he could tell that she had the satisfied look of a Kneazle that had gotten into the cream and then topped it off with some caviar. Dung raised his eyebrows and wondered if the lucky bloke was still recovering upstairs in her bedroom.

"'Scuse me, miss," he intercepted Hermione on the sidewalk, "but can you spare a few pence for an old War veteran?"

She stopped short and Dung mentally kicked himself. It had been more than two years, but he still hadn't forgotten her interrogation on his Muggle military service record and subsequent tongue-lashing when she found his answers unconvincing.

Hermione lifted her sunglasses and gave him a searching look, taking in his cracked boots, shabby cloak, and battered fedora. An unexpected smile curved her lips as she reached into her bag. "I suppose every army has its rogues as well as its heroes."

She dropped several coins into his palm. "Don't spent it all at the same pub, soldier."

Mundungus waited until she had disappeared down the street before counting his largess. "Morgana's saggy tits!" he swore. In the midst of the Muggle pence and pound pieces, a bronze Knut stood out.

Dutifully, Dung took out a battered notebook and recorded the details of his encounter with the curly-haired witch. Between that and two Death Eater punks asking him yesterday to buy a Weasley lust potion, most likely so they could go bugger each other, he would have quite a report to offer at the next meeting of the Order.

(x) (x) (x)

Malcolm was waiting for her outside the quaint little bistro. His lingering kiss, his warm hand between her shoulder blades, and the polite way he drew back her chair dispelled some of Hermione's irrational morning-after fear that his charming behavior had been nothing more than a ruse to get her into bed and shag her until she barely knew her own name.

From the smug prat's smirk as she gingerly seated herself, Malcolm was not suffering from any false modesty about his prowess in her bed, or on her couch, or in the tiny hallway connecting her living room and bedroom. Hermione could feel her cheeks heating up at as he looked at her.

"How was your morning?" he asked, innocuously enough. "Did you get much done at the lab?"

"I slept in and came straight here," she confessed.

Malcolm's smirk reappeared. "Words cannot express how flattered I am to have diverted Hermione Granger, swot extraordinaire, from her studies."

Hermione smiled weakly. That wasn't all he had diverted her from, but that awkward conversation would have to wait until there wasn't a waiter hovering at her elbow.

"I'll have the potato leek soup, please," she requested.

Malcolm looked at her over the top of his menu but made no comment. However, when the waiter turned to him, he took the liberty of ordering more for her.

"I'll have the steak frites, rare. She'll have the same, but medium-rare. And a carafe of your house red."

She began to protest as soon as the waiter was out of earshot, but he forestalled her. "Speaking for myself, I'm ravenous. I have to imagine you feel the same, especially if you skipped breakfast."

"I do," she admitted, "but I only have five pounds in my wallet and - "

"You thought I was such a cheap bastard that I wouldn't buy you lunch?" Malcolm asked, insulted.

"No, of course not! It's just that - "

"You knew that I would buy you lunch but your stubborn pride makes you reluctant to accept?"

"Something like that," she muttered.

"Hermione, look at me," he said, leaning across the table. "I invited you to lunch, so it is only proper etiquette that I should pay."

Hermione nodded. That was reasoning she could accept.

But Malcolm wasn't finished. "It is also my pleasure to buy you lunch, or really anything else your heart desires. I'm not doing it with the expectation of getting anything in return and I'm certainly not doing it as payment for services rendered."

She looked at him, unconvinced.

"Look," he sighed, "the way that I was raised, buying expensive presents is the way to show affection. In case you haven't figured it out, I like you - quite a bit - and it makes me very happy to spoil you. So please stop balking every time I try to do something nice for my girlfriend."

Hermione was disarmed by Malcolm's unusual candor about his childhood and description of her as his girlfriend. She had not been seeing anyone else, but they had never discussed their relationship status.

"I promise to try, but I was raised with the idea that a girl should pay her own way. And that's how it's been with my boyfriends in the past."

"What a sorry lot of impoverished wankers you must have dated, princess. I'll try to make it up to you."

"And I'll try to let you - within reason," she stressed in the face of his rather triumphant smile at her concession.

Hermione fidgeted in her seat. Their ongoing skirmishes over who paid for what was trivial to her horrified realization this morning when brushing her teeth. "There's something else we need to discuss."

Malcolm looked at her with a mix of amusement and exasperation. "What has you worried now, Hermione?" he asked.

"Last night, we should have used protection, but we didn't," she told him, brown eyes serious.

His grey eyes were unreadable. "Aren't you on birth control pills or something like that? Are you telling me I might have gotten you pregnant?"

Despite his even tone and impassive expression, she had the odd thought that he was secretly delighted rather than outraged at the prospect. "I am on the Pill, but it doesn't protect against any STI," she explained. "We both should have gotten tested before having sex, or at least used condoms."

Malcolm looked at her with blank incomprehension.

Hermione huffed a frustrated sigh at his not-unexpected reaction. Her boyfriend could be rather snobbish and narrow-minded in his thinking.

"I know a lot of people think that sexually transmitted diseases are limited to people who are promiscuous or 'dirty,' but that's just nonsense," she told him. "Even if you've only slept with one person in a committed relationship, you've still effectively slept with every person they've ever slept with. And if you've been cheated on, well, then . . . "

For just a moment, he looked murderous. Then his expression smoothed over. "I get what you're saying," Malcolm said agreeably. "You don't have to twist my arm. How do we get tested?"

Hermione blinked in surprise. She had thought he would be more resistant. "It's a simple blood draw - just a pinprick really. We can go to the student health center after lunch, if you'd like."

"Fine," he assented. "I don't think we have anything to worry about, but it's important to you, so let's get tested."

"It is important," she asserted. "The entire premise of my research is aimed at solving the shortage of blood products due to the large number of donors who are screened out due to a STI. I know the risks, and I've always tried to be so careful."

Indeed, after Monica's reminder about the importance of protecting herself, Hermione had gone out and purchased a box of condoms before Malcolm arrived for dinner. And then they had completely slipped out of her mind.

"I just don't know what got into me last night!" she fretted.

From the look on Malcolm's face, he was thinking of one thing that had gotten into her last night, repeatedly, but the lecherous prat prudently held his tongue and turned his attention to his lunch instead.

(x) (x) (x)

It was chilly inside the student health center and the smell of Muggle antiseptic made Draco's nose itch.

He noticed Granger was shivering. He draped an arm over her shoulders and tugged her closer across the vinyl seats in the waiting area, to share in the warmth of his body. She rested her head against his shoulder and he was taken aback at how utterly comfortable it felt.

"Better?" he asked in a low voice.

"Much," she affirmed. "I just hate anyplace that reminds me of a hospital. And I'm worried that Andy might have infected me with something nasty and now I might have passed it along to you."

Draco realized his brave little Gryffindor had been shivering from fear rather than cold and hugged her more tightly. He had noticed she wasn't wearing the bracelet he had given her, probably because she was going into the lab, and it made a real difference in her level of anxiety.

"It'll be fine," he reassured her. "Just a little pinprick, like you said, and then you won't have to worry anymore once you get the results." And Draco would offer whatever bribes were necessary to get those results in an expeditious manner. He didn't want her to worry unduly and, of course, shagging with a johnnie on his prick would do nothing to advance his agenda.

A man holding a clipboard called their names. "Granger and Foy? This way, please." He led them to a small, curtained-off cubicle containing a countertop and cabinets holding Muggle medical equipment and two chairs.

"I'll go first," Granger volunteered, sitting down in the larger of the two chairs, pushing up her sleeve, and placing her left arm - the one his aunt had left unscarred - on the attached tray. Without comment, the Muggle Healer tied an elastic band around her upper arm. Draco averted his gaze when the man slid a needle into the vein at the crook of her elbow.

"Are you alright, Hermione?" he asked, more to distract himself than her. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see her blood running through the plastic tubing into a tiny glass flask. It was just as scarlet red as the time he had seen her bleeding on the floor of his family's drawing room.

"I'm fine, Malcolm," she answered in a steady voice, more concerned for him. "Would you like to sit down?"

The Muggle was giving him a contemptuous look, so Draco realized he must look even paler than usual. He shook his head with a feigned casualness. "You're almost done, pet. I'd just be switching seats with you."

Mercifully, that was the case. The Muggle swiftly removed the needle, not causing Granger any obvious discomfort, and applied a bandage over the tiny puncture wound.

"Your turn, mate," the Healer told him, with an obscene sort of cheerfulness. Theo had told him the names for various kinds of Muggle medical professionals, but Draco honestly didn't know if this one was a male nurse, or a physician, or some sort of assistant. All that he knew was that the sadistic bastard was grinning at the prospect of sticking a huge needle deep in his arm. Draco was nonchalant. Whatever the bloke did to him, it would be nothing compared to a Crucio.

Draco took his seat and immediately realized there was a problem. "I'm left-handed," he protested.

And if he rolled up the sleeve on his left arm, Granger would see his Dark Mark. She hadn't noticed it last night, due to both positioning and her preoccupation with other parts of his body. Logically, he knew that she would have to see it soon, if he was shagging her on a regular basis, but he would prefer that it not be now, under harsh fluorescent lights and with a Muggle present.

"C'mon, mate," the Muggle said in a low voice. "Stop whinging and put on a good show for your girl. She was brave enough about it."

With that push, Draco resignedly rolled up his sleeve and presented his left arm.

"Nice ink," the Muggle complimented as he stuck the needle in. Draco gritted his teeth, out of exasperation rather than pain. The blood draw was as painless as Hermione had promised, but he didn't need this ignoramus praising a Mark that stood for genocide of his own people.

"What is that?" Granger asked in a sharp tone, a mix of disgust and fear on her face as she looked at his forearm.

Draco refrained from the smart arse answer that it was obviously a tattoo of a human skull imposed on a snake's body. Instead, he opted for a variant of the truth.

"It's a permanent memento of my youthful stupidity," he stated.

"Do tell," Granger prompted, not satisfied by his bare explanation.

"I was drunk in Tijuana, on holiday with a bunch of friends from school, and we somehow decided it would be a brilliant idea to get inked." Draco delivered the agreed-upon story convincingly, while cringing internally.

Years ago, Marcus Flint had been the first of their little group to have to explain his Dark Mark, to an Obliviated Katie Bell. Now he and Theo were stuck with the same story for the sake of consistency. While Draco could easily picture Flint, or his Muggle alter ego, behaving in such an asinine manner, the story was less plausible for him. When it came to the ever-sober Theo, it was ridiculous.

"It looks like a brand," Hermione accurately observed. Voldemort had magically seared the Dark Mark into the arms of his followers. Draco vividly remembered the burning pain and smell of his own charred flesh when he was Marked.

"Can't you have it removed?" she asked, as the Muggle removed the needle from his arm.

Draco shook his head as he rolled down his sleeve. "However it was done, it's permanent. Believe me, I've tried."

Granger offered no further comment, but continued to look uneasily at his now-covered forearm.

A/N: From this point forward, the story has a dub-con warning, due to Hermione's memory loss. Her willingness to have sex with her nice Muggle boyfriend does not necessarily equate to a willingness to have sex with Draco Malfoy. This is a blanket warning, as I will not repeat it for every chapter where it applies.