A/N- My damn yahoo mail is not working! Thanks to jessirose85 for brtaing and for going through all the extra trouble.
Disclaimer- I own nothing of Harry Potter. It belongs to JK and JK only. But the featured story is fortunately mine.
It was two days later.
She stood on the sand looking out to the sea, the March wind tucking her robes around her legs, whipping strands of hair across her cheeks.
Hermione was in another world. Body, braced against the cold, she shivered form time to time but she didn't move either to seek warmth or to escape the threat of the pounding surf. Hermione had fallen victim to the sea.
So when she noticed Draco standing directly before her, she sucked in a breath and pressed a hand to her chest.
"Where were you?" he asked quietly.
"Miles away," she said. "I am not sure what happened. One minute I was here, and then…"
"The ocean has a way of doing that. Of transporting your mind from one place to another." He cleared his throat, "first it lures you by the sense of freedom. In no time you are caught, laid open and exposed."
His voice lowered as he studied her face carefully, "Falling victim to the sea means baring one's soul. It can be painful."
For a minute they simply looked at one another.
"That evaluation was worthy of Dumbledore, Draco Malfoy," Hermione said at last, smiling softly.
He smirked, "Oh, I can be deep, Granger. Now buck up, we need to get moving."
"Malfoy, are you sure about this?" Hermione asked looking skeptical.
"Dumbledore seems to be sure enough," he said shrugging. "The Manor is being heavily watched by the Ministry, see, after I disclosed that Voldemort could use it as his headquarters. He would be mad to try and break into it. The Manor is the safest option right now for us. No one will know we are living in there except for a few selected people."
Hermione jumped when warm fingers brushed a strand of hair form her mouth and her eyes flew to Draco's.
"Your cheeks are getting wind burned," he explained, cupping her cheeks and rubbing them in his hands.
Hermione shivered and this time it had nothing to do with the cold. She finally admitted to herself that she was not only completely and utterly attracted to this man, but she had come to care for him as well. She tried to decide when it had happened and found that somewhere along the line of enmity, confused passion and living together in the face of danger, she had given a piece of her heart to Draco Malfoy. And there was no taking it back.
They walked back to the house silently. Picking up their belongings that they had packed earlier, Draco and Hermione then went into Ameera's room.
"Isn't she the sweetest baby ever?" Draco gushed, leaning on the doorpost and staring at Ameera's sleeping face.
Hermione smiled. Ameera did look just like a little baby doll with her dark curls, chubby cheeks and dimples. Right now, she had her thumb in her mouth, making little cooing sounds in her sleep.
"You know, Malfoy, when I was pregnant, I loathed her. I loathed having a child of a death eater inside me," Hermione said her smile fading. "It was like a constant reminder of all those months of torture. The night I first realized that I was carrying a baby, I felt so contaminated, I wanted to get rid of it so badly…" her voice trailed away sadly, "But now that I look at her, I hate myself for ever hating her. She is the only reason I find the strength to go through all these. She has no one and that's why I have to survive no matter what"
"We will survive this, Granger. Voldemort will be defeated and soon." He assured.
Hermione nodded uncertainly.
"Oh, and Granger, did you notice, we keep switching between first name and last name. Will you decide once and for all what we should call each other?"
"Well you are Draco when you are nice, Malfoy when you are a prat and Draco Malfoy when you go all silent and moody," Hermione tucked her tongue inside her cheek, "it's really up to your behavior, see?"
"Then, I will just call you mudblood all the time, shall I?"
"Shut up, you pureblood snob. Let's get breakfast now so that Ameera can sleep a little longer. She was being such a baby last night…"
***
"Alright, Granger, you and Ameera take that room on the North wing, and I will take this opposite room. And we will be using only the attached kitchen and parlor in my room. Rest of the house off limits and no owl posts from this place, understood?"
"Wow, your room has an attached kitchen? How come?
"Because my room has always been like an own private apartment. I don't think I have ever actually set foot in that kitchen but my father used to think I should grow up with a sense of independency."
"Um, alright."
Draco pushed a door open and dumped Hermione and Ameera's things in the room and proceed to do the same thing with his own stuff in the opposite room.
The house was giving him the creeps. Making his way upstairs, earlier, he had ruthlessly avoided looking at the main living room where Voldemort had killed his father. All the furniture was draped in white cloths and the place had become filthy in months. He wondered how his mother would react when she saw her once spotless and beyond well groomed house in this state.
"Can I use the library, at least?" Hermione called from her room.
"Oh yeah! That's a must!" he said trying in vain to make the socurgifying spell work and missing Dobby a lot at the moment, "We need to find out all we can about blood changer thing. Malfoy Manor has one of the best libraries and maybe we will also find an old journal or something of my ancestors. That would help a lot."
"Hmn, I can't believe you never knew about the blood changer. It's supposed to have been in your family for centuries. Do you need help with the cleaning?"
"No thanks," he said attacking the bed sheets to rid them of the dust, "I am more interested about how my family lost the blood changer in the first place and how the heck it reached you of all people."
He could hear Hermione doing some dusting of her own in her room, coughing form time to time. Draco decide that she was distracted enough to safely land another bomb on her.
"Uh, Hermione, we need to go for a little visit to my aunt's. My mother is getting rather impatient because I haven't been to see her in ages."
"You go! I am not coming!" she yelled from her room, "Your mother hates my guts, in case you forgot. And does she even know I am staying here with you?"
"Hermione, I can't leave you alone in this place! And no my mother doesn't know yet but she will soon."
She popped a head into his room, "how come I get to visit your mother but I am not allowed to see my friends and family?"
"Potter and Weasly should be back for Easter. You can meet them then."
Draco was now examining a trunk full of childhood stuff. He picked up a gleaming golden snitch that started fluttering in his fists. It was the snitch he had caught on his first ever Quidditch win at Hogwarts. There was a discarded ancestral ring that he had stopped wearing a few years back, omniculars from the World Cup, his prefect badge, a hand made silk dress robe that had been his last present from his father, a gold wizard chess set and a few photo albums and letters. These were his treasured possessions collected from various points of his life.
Hermione strolled into the room, feeding Ameera from a small bottle. She sat down beside Draco and picked up a framed photo.
"Merlin, Malfoy! Is that you?" she exclaimed.
She was showing him an eight year old picture of himself where he was wearing hairclips and was engrossed in a book called, 'How to get Even with your Enemy'. The blond haired chubby cheeked boy in the picture kept smirking and frowning at the book in turn.
"You look so adorable! Why were you wearing hairclips?"
"I suppose I was getting a haircut or something." he said taking Ameera for Hermione because the baby was now spitting milk all over the floor.
"Oh, listen, you will need this for the visit to my aunt's," he said summoning a plastic bag.
Hermione opened the bag hesitantly and pulled out the white sundress he had bought for her from Diagon Alley. She gasped.
"Malfoy, I am not wearing this! Its too expensive, not to mention a little too revealing!"
"My mother approves of style, Granger. If you want to make a good impression you have to wear it."
He could see her dilemma clearly and almost laughed out loud as she gazed at the dress in confusion.
"No, it's too much." came her verdict.
Draco decided to relent for the night at least. But Hermione would wear the dress. He would make sure she did.
***
A/N- Thank you for reading. Now please, please, please review!
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