A/N: Mwahahahaha!

*scuttles away before the axes are thrown*

xx-Kitten.

Addicted to You

By Kittenshift17

Chapter 14

Draco's eyebrows rose as the softly spoken admission and his mouth pulled down into a frown. His wolf was positively howling for the chance to claim her when she'd surrendered so sweetly, but he couldn't do it here in the corridor. Not if she was a virgin. Not when anyone might happen upon them at any given moment. He didn't want to hurt her, confound it all, and the monster inside his soul was baring his teeth and growling at the very thought of anyone else laying eyes on her while he took her.

His intention of claiming her lips for a hot kiss was thwarted by her modest words and he almost wanted to growl at her in frustration. He was pleased that no one else had laid a hand on his witch, but he really didn't want to have to fight with his instincts as he took her, warring between the need to completely dominate her to ensure she knew just who and what her mate was, and the need to keep from hurting her.

"You're a virgin?" he asked hoarsely.

She blinked at him, leaning back a little, her cheeks cutting crimson, though with embarrassment or annoyance, he couldn't be sure.

"That surprises you?" she asked in retort, obviously not pleased by the question.

Draco knew that answering such a question would be dangerous. If he said that he'd never doubted she was virginal, she might take it to mean she was far too unattractive to have lured anyone into bed with her. But if he said that he was shocked, she might think that he thought her a tart and Draco didn't much fancy facing off against her in either scenario.

"We need to get out of the corridor," Draco said, frowning and forcing himself to remove his hands from her person, lest he succumb to his wolf's desire. "We can't do this here. Not if it's your first time."

"You're actually going to bother about ensuring my first time isn't something hurried and awkward in a corridor?" she asked, seeming surprised and Draco growled at her.

"Being a werewolf doesn't undo the years of etiquette drummed into me about being a proper gentleman, Granger," he argued quietly. "I'm not about to shag you for the first time in a dingy secret passage with your wand and the dagger you used to stab me littering the floor. I'm not going to be much use shagging with a bleeding hole stabbed in my lung, anyway, so you're probably going to have to heal me before things can proceed."

She frowned, blinking and nodding, her eyes darting to the bloodstain on his shirt before she looked at the front of her own robes and realised she was covered in his blood, too. Not that she seemed overly concerned by the fact that he could very well be bleeding to death under his clothes. She looked far too nervous and more than a little resigned, but she didn't exactly look repentant or worried for him in the slightest. He didn't know if he should be relieved that despite being fated for one another, they weren't being forced to feel anything for the other that wasn't entirely organic, or if he should be growling and shoving her against something and calling her a cruelhearted bitch for stabbing him and caring little that he might very well be in agony.

"You know if we don't… you know, get this out of the way… I'm probably going to… um… chicken out," she said.

"You don't get to chicken out," Draco growled in a low voice, his eyes flashing a warning in the dimly lit corridor. "Its this or risking it when I lose control and shove you into something in front of people. And if that happens, I won't have the rationality or the finesse to keep from hurting you for your first time. Since we have to do this, let's just bloody well do it right, yeah? We'll get it over with, and then we can go back to hating each other's guts from opposite sides of the classroom. Just, slap on some of that courage you sodding Gryffindors are so infamous for, and it'll be out of the way before you know it. Alright?"

She frowned at him for a long moment, clearly not all that pleased about the notion of losing her virginity being described not as some romantic offering, but something ugly and dirty and obligated that they needed to get over and done with before life could go on. He watched her nibble her lower lip, clearly biting her tongue on the urge to tell him to go suck a lemon and forget this nonsense before nodding her head.

"Good," Draco said. "Then collect your belongings and follow me."

She looked briefly baffled by what he could mean, before she stooped down to scoop up her knife and her wand, tucking them back into their hiding places upon her person. Unable to keep his hands entirely to himself, and despite the amount of blood staining their skin, Draco found himself reaching for her hand, interlocking their fingers and leading her back down the corridor. He wracked his brain, trying to think of the best place to take her. He could hardly take her to his bed in the Slytherin dormitories, though all of his friends undoubtedly knew about his condition and his predicament as a result, by now. He'd chased her - hunted her – twice this evening, bailing on the farce of a training lesson to dog her steps through the castle and pursue her through the forest before cornering her like the wretched predator he was. If they didn't know, they were bloody thick, so he assumed that his immediate dorm-mates would know what was going on and likely wouldn't dare to interrupt him. They might all know about his being a sodding werewolf and being bloody mated to Hermione sodding Granger, but none of the other Slytherin students did, and he didn't fancy having to explain just why he was dragging Granger into his bed - covered in blood, no less - to the likes of Pansy Parkinson, or the other snobby, pompous, prejudiced little fucks he shared a House with.

He briefly considered the Room of Requirement, knowing they both knew of its existence, and knowing that in short order she would have proof that he was a Death Eater when she spotted his tattoo the minute he was naked. But that wouldn't do, either. Too many people might spot them leaving together, and too many people could access it. The last thing he wanted was to have someone walking in on the two of them when he claimed her. He expected it would be primal and animalistic and violent. And if anyone saw, his secret would be out, and he'd been run out of the school and driven off like the filthy half-breed he was.

The irony was not lost of him that not so very long ago, he'd been one of the ones leading the charge and spreading the vicious truth about Lupin that had driven the wolf to resign despite his being the best bloody Defence teacher they'd had.

"I don't suppose there's any way we'd get by your friends and the rest of your dorm-mates to do this in your bed?" he asked, slanting a glance at her.

She scoffed at the very idea.

"You literally just threatened to kill Harry," she reminded him. "If you think he'd just stand by while I led you up to my bed, you're barmy. He's probably sitting in the common room seething at this very moment and plotting your imminent doom."

Draco growled under his breath.

"Well, I can hardly take you to my bed, Granger," he said, frowning fiercely.

"Worried your little blood prejudiced minions will think ill of you?" she sneered.

"Worried they'll ask too many questions about why I'd be shagging you in the first place, which might lead them to exposing me as a werewolf and would probably see me thrown out of the school," Draco replied. "And you along with me when they learn you're my mate. The ignorant fucking fools."

"I hardly think Dumbledore would throw you out for a werewolf when he's let you stay this long as a Death Eater," she sneered.

Draco growled at her.

"There's the Room of Requirement," he suggested, despite his thoughts that it might be a bad idea and despite the urge he had to bite her viciously for sassing him.

"Where anyone could walk in?" she raised her eyebrows. "I thought you wanted to keep this mess a secret?"

"As opposed to anywhere else in the castle?" he challenged. "There's really not that many options to get this done without being spotted or getting caught, you know?"

She frowned for a long moment as they walked.

"I know a place," she said. "No one will find us in there."

Draco regarded her for a moment in silence before shrugging his shoulders. "Then lead the way, Granger."

"Are you going to be able to do this when you're bleeding like that?" she asked, peeking out the entrance to the secret passage when they reached the lower corridor.

"Oh, now you care that I'm bleeding to death and struggling to breathe thanks to the hole you stabbed in my lung?" he scoffed.

"Do you have to be a git, Malfoy?" she asked, looking annoyed and still not sounding at all repentant. Merlin's bloody boots, he was fated to a psychopath! "I already don't want to do this. Don't make it worse by being your usually, soddish self, yeah?"

"Eat me, Granger," he growled at her.

"I don't like the taste of ferret, thank you," she replied.

Draco narrowed his eyes before baring his fangs at her, letting her see just how much a wolf he really was. She recoiled ever so slightly, but she didn't let go of his hand, hurrying down the corridor and taking a sharp turn toward a little used part of the castle beyond the library that he'd never visited before.

"What is this place?" he asked, noting the fact that none of the torches lit up as they traversed the corridors, and the fact that the layers of dust coating the windowsills and the floor was thick and undisturbed.

"They Magical Theorem classrooms," she answered. "But when Headmaster Dippett took over, the subject was phased out as being too 'boring'. Most of the students don't actually know this part of the castle exists. There are charms to prevent us from seeing these corridors to avert wandering, but because we're both prefects, we can get in. During third year, when I was taking so many subjects, I was given special permission to use these rooms when I needed to let all of my turns with the Time Turner catch up. There's an old teaching quarters down here that I was allowed to use when I needed to catch up on sleep where I couldn't accidentally stumble upon myself or be caught for being in two places at once."

Draco eyed her like she'd gone mad.

"They gave you a Time Turner in third year? Just to get to all your lessons, rather than forcing you to pick only as many as are accessible on a regular timetable?" he scoffed. "Fucking hell, you Gryffindors really are the teachers' favourites, you know that, yeah?"

"Don't be bitter, Malfoy."

"I wanted to take more classes in third year, you know," he grumbled. "But I was told that it would be too much of a workload and to forget the notion. They made me pick as many as my timetable could hold and told me to forget the rest."

"Yes, but I'm cleverer than you," she said, sounding smug as she turned the doorknob of a classroom at the very end of the corridor before leading him inside a long-forgotten classroom. The dust was thick upon the few remaining desks that were stacked up, dust bunnies gathering in the corners, undisturbed.

Draco's nose twitched at the choking scent of dust cloying the still air, and he noted idly that despite the layers of decay, there was a well-trodden path leading across the classroom floor and up the stairs that must lead to the teacher's quarters she'd spoken of.

"Cleverer?" he scoffed. "You're maybe a few percentiles ahead of me in class and that's only because I, unlike you, have to actually grind every fucking grade out of the teachers because I was sorted into Slytherin, rather than Gryffindor and the biased wankers can't stand the thought that I might be smarter than their golden girl."

"Are you insinuating I don't deserve the grades I get?" she demanded, halting abruptly and looking very much like his answer could be a deal breaker if he didn't tread carefully.

"I'm saying that no matter how much information you cram into our essays, and no matter how often you go off on tangents and don't keep to the topic at hand, and how often you just regurgitate information from the textbook rather than extrapolating the information concisely, you don't get marked down for those things by anyone other than Snape. I, on the other hand, get fucking blistered if I go a single line over the word limit or a half-inch over the prescribed length. Where you get to skate through, regardless of your cleverness, because you're the teacher's bloody pet and you answer every sodding question in every bloody class, me and the rest of my friends have to bloody earn every percentile of a grade, and even then, the teachers rake through our work looking for any reason to mark us down to make sure that you remain the head of the class."

She blinked at him before narrowing her eyes.

"Rubbish," she declared, yanking her hand out of her grip and shoving over the door that led to what must surely be her sodding nest.

The entire room of the teaching quarters had been taken over by the haughty Gryffindor girl. That much was clear from the fact that while the classroom beyond was overflowing with dust, this room was spotless. An antique mahogany desk gleamed in the middle of the office, strewn though it was with text books, inkwells, parchment and screwed up bits of parchment. It was clear to Draco suddenly that the witch must have been spending a good deal of time locked away in here. She'd made herself right at home, by the looks of things.

"You don't believe me?" he challenged, spying a doorway off the main office that clearly led to the sleeping quarters. The door was open and the bed inside was made, topped with a thick, brightly patterned woollen blanket. It was more than obvious that she'd spent many a night sleeping here, rather than up in her dormitory with her dorm-mates. Draco wondered if it was because it meant she was less likely to be caught out after curfew when she was booted out of the library at closing time each night.

"Of course, I don't believe you. The teachers, excluding Professor Snape, are always fair and unbiased. They are above House rivalry outside the Quidditch pitch, I'm sure."

"Delusional, as well as conceited," he accused, though he couldn't help smirking a little when Granger propped her hands on her hips and glared at him across the office while the hearth fire flickered to life. "Really think you're that clever, do you?"

"Compared to you?" she replied. "Yes. I do."

"Alright fine, why don't be swap essays?" Draco challenged. "The one McGonagall gave back today. You read mine and I'll read yours. They're already marked, so you don't need to turn your nose up at the idea of anyone cheating off you."

"I hardly have it on me," she rolled her eyes.

"Well, I didn't bloody mean now, did I?" Draco scoffed. "I have matters a bit more pressing to see to where you're concerned, just now."

She narrowed her eyes suspiciously while Draco made something of a show out of swaggering into the bedroom and dropping down to sit on top of her knitted blanket. From the few little mistakes of missed loops and pulled threads, in addition to the slightly uneven tension of the woollen stitching, Draco suspected she'd knitted herself when she'd been practicing and getting the hang of the craft. From the way her cheeks cut crimson all over again, and the recalcitrant way she levelled him a hateful look whilst refusing to join him, Draco suspected she'd forgotten that she'd invited the big bad wolf into her lair, and that he was planning to devour her just as soon as he could get his paws on her.

"This is a bad idea," she said, refusing to budge.

"You don't want to do it on the bed?" Draco asked, unable to keep from teasing her when she got that stubborn glint in her eyes and that obdurate set to her jaw. Obstinate cow. "I can fuck you on that gleaming desk, if you'd prefer? It's all the same to me, Granger. Either way, you'll be on your hands and knees with me wrapped around you."

"I'm not about to turn my back on you and just let you have your way, Malfoy," she said, her eyes narrowing as she stomped closer, intent on arguing with him.

"What did you think I was going to do when claiming you, Granger?" he smirked. "I'm a wolf. I'm going to rut you like one."

"You're not going to rut me at all, thank you very much," she hissed, crossing the threshold into the bedroom.

Despite the fact that it was her private haven, and that the room whispered of her sweet scent; despite this being her domain, Draco found himself feeling very much like the patient spider and she, the unwitting fly who'd just flown into his web. She seemed to feel it too, because she stopped short in her stomp toward him, intent on getting in his face and reminding him that she wasn't afraid of him – that she'd never be afraid of the foul, loathsome, evil little cockroach whose nose she'd once broken.

Only, Draco wasn't a spider. Or a cockroach. Or a wimpy little ferret. Draco Malfoy was a wolf. A werewolf. And she was the only prey fate dictated would ever be his. She was the witch to his wizard, the woman to his man, the bitch to his wolf. She was his, and he would have her however he saw fit.

Raising one eyebrow in silent challenge, Draco didn't move, sensing the way her scent suddenly soured with the faintest traces of fear, nervousness emitting from her in waves. He could hear the way her heart rate increased, and he caught the ways she took a miniscule step back from him when it occurred to her that he was a predator and she was his prey.

"Malfoy," she warned quietly, losing the defiant look in her eyes as uncertain febrility suffused her. He could almost see the way it weighed on her slim frame, threatening to pull her to her knees when they began to quake, just a little.

It ought to have pleased him, having power like that. It ought to have made him feel triumphant to know that with a single look, he could make her weak-kneed and apprehensive. This brave girl who aligned herself with Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix was just a little fearful in his presence and that ought to have made the spiteful bastard in him cheer.

But it didn't.

The wolf inside his chest wanted her submission, not her terror. He wanted her adoration, not her tolerance. He wanted her inclination, not her resignation.

"I…" she opened her mouth before he could even begin to think of the right thing to say that would put her at ease. He had never been a boy who concerned himself with the happiness or the comfort of others, and he hadn't a clue how to offer reassurance in the face of trepidation.

"I've never done this," she whispered uncertainly, her eyes darting from his face to his groin, and then to the bed behind him. She looked nervous. She looked a little frightened. But she looked a little curious, too. "Have… have you?"

Draco didn't know if he should smile or frown, trying to figure out how to put her at ease and wondering if his answer would do so, or if it would just make things worse.

"Um… once," he admitted, his cheeks warming slightly when her eyes snapped back to his face, widening in surprise. He wondered if it was surprise that he wasn't a virgin, or surprise that he wasn't a slag, no matter the rumours getting around.

"Oh," she said, seeming to be unsure just what to do with the information she'd asked for now that she had it. "Um… well that's… good… then, I suppose. It's probably best if one of us knows what to do. Though I confess, I think I'd have been intimidated if the rumours about you were true, you know? I don't imagine I'll… erm… be very good. And I'm rambling. I should shut it. But I can't. I ramble when I'm nervous and when you look at me like that I feel nervous. Nervous like the last chicken alive in the coop once the fox has gotten in, and the little hen knows he's there somewhere, just waiting to rip her head right off and, Merlin, please don't rip my head off, and don't say things like that you're planning to bend me over the desk and rut me because I honestly think it's going to hurt and it's going to sting and it's going to be terribly uncomfortable because, honestly, I can hardly stand you and this is all just such a mess. And when I get back to the Common room, Harry will be waiting, and he'll have told Ron and probably Ginny, by now, about what he saw in the corridor and they'll know, you know? They'll know, and they'll want an explanation and I'm going to have to tell them you're a werewolf, and a Death Eater, and I'm your mate even though you're a right bloody git and a sod, and a prejudiced, bigoted arse and I've been wanting to slap you almost every day since that time I slapped you in third year and they're going to get in my face and yell at me, and Merlin, I can't let you see me in my knickers, let alone without them. And why is it so bright in here. I think I'd have preferred the corridor. It was darker there, and you wouldn't have been able to see that I forgot to shave my legs this morning, and I haven't tidied up other areas of my body that you're planning to get acquainted with, and this would've been hard enough with some I loved and trusted, let alone with someone I can't stand. And are you really sure that I'm you mate? Because I don't think I'm your mate. You're supposed to be with someone snotty and pompous and bigoted. Someone who doesn't chatter incessantly when she's nervous and someone who actually likes you, rather than someone who will basically be signing her own social death certificate the minute she walks out of this room. Which is what will happen because when he's finished yelling, Harry might actually murder me, especially if he thinks it will hurt you, and I just…."

Draco cut off the incessant stream of words spilling out of her mouth at such a rapid pace that his head was almost spinning, and he wondered how she could breath when she'd barely paused to draw breath even once. He lurched to his feet and crossed the small distance between them, seizing her shoulders and planting his lips on hers before she could actually talk them both into exhaustion.

He had more exciting plans for her busy little mouth, anyway. She squeaked against his lips, her brow furrowing and her whole body attempting to recoil in surprise at the sudden assault, but Draco held her firm, waiting for her to realise that it would be better this way. They needed to get this done, and she was right. They weren't well-suited, and it was going to be awkward no matter what he did. He couldn't deny that though she was his mate, she was also someone who annoyed the stuffing out of him in the day to day dealings they had. No amount of fated bondage was going to change that.

This would be awkward. It was probably going to hurt, because she was tense and scared and embarrassed and utterly uncomfortable and Draco's mind raced as he tried to think of things he could do to make this better, to make it easier for her.

"You're still covered in blood," she muttered against his lips after a few minutes of tentative kissing.

Draco frowned, pulled back a little and glancing down at himself.

She was right. His shirt was stained crimson from where she'd stabbed him, and Draco sighed, realising that she was covered in his blood too, thanks to the way she'd clung to him in the corridor to keep him from attacking Potter.

"Is the wound healed?" she asked, stepping back out of his hold as far as he allowed.

"So eager to get me out of my shirt, Granger?" he couldn't help needling her, smirking just a little.

She narrowed her eyes on him and crossed her arms over her chest, looking even more uncomfortable and Draco sighed again, wondering if things would ever get any easier with her. Running a hand through his hair, he didn't bother making a show of things before pulling his shirt off over his head and revealing his torso to her gaze. Not that either of them could focus on his more pleasing parts when they caught an eyeful of the wretched bloodstains marring his alabaster flesh, in addition to the large gash between his ribs where she'd stabbed him.

"Oh, dear," she sighed, stepping closer and surprising him when she didn't seem uncomfortable or nervous to be seeing his shirtless.

It occurred to him that, having two male best friends who played Quidditch regularly meant she was probably used to the sight of muscle, bare chests. Draco clamped down on the urge he had to growl at the very thought of her being in the same room with a half-naked Potter or Weasley.

"I think I might have something that could help heal this," she told him, touching the inflamed flesh inquisitively and making a face when the wound seeped a little. "Is it still affecting your breathing, or has it healed internally enough that you're not terribly uncomfortable?"

Draco shrugged. "I'll live, Granger."

"Obviously," she muttered, and Draco had never heard the unspoken 'unfortunately' in anyone's tone quite so clearly before.

She turned away from him, moving toward the bedside table and digging inside of it before holding up a small bottle of dittany and looing mildly triumphant.

"This should speed up the healing process."

"And hurt like fuck," Draco asked, stepping back whilst eyeing the bottle like the torture device it happened to be.

"Nonsense," she said. "Dittany heals wounds. It barely even stings."

"Barely stings you, witch," Draco argued. "I'm a werewolf. Treating a wound inflicted with silver by applying dittany will be like the torture of being healed from the bites that infected me in the first place, all over again. And I screamed bloody murder when my Mother and Father held me down and forced that silver and dittany paste into my wounds after I was bitten. Trust me, Granger, you're not strong enough to pin me down now."

"You're being a child," she huffed. "Come over here, and wash the blood off, at least."

She beckoned him into the bathroom off the sleeping quarters and Draco narrowed his eyes suspiciously as he followed her. When he entered the bathroom, she was wringing out a wash cloth with warm water and she turned to him, not even seeming to think about it as she invaded his space, standing close enough that he could spot a broken twig tangled in her curls from when he'd chased her through the forest. She didn't ask permission before swiping the cloth over his bloodied skin, rubbing hard at the stubborn spots where it had dried.

Draco stood still, trying to ignore the erection throbbing in his pants and the urge he had to thread his hands through all of those curls before stealing another kiss from her lips.

"I can't believe you actually stabbed me," he said when the tension between them grew unbearable as she worked to rid his skin of the blood stains, carefully bathing the edges of the stab wound she'd created.

"I can't believe you challenged me and let me stab you," she replied quietly. "You're supposed to have a stronger sense of self preservation than that, Malfoy. How are you going to survive wearing this, if you're so willing to let other people hurt you?"

She grabbed his left forearm, squeezing it tightly and Draco realised with a jolt that he'd been so fascinated by her presence and her reaction to seeing him shirtless that he'd completely forgotten about the need to hide his Dark Mark.

"You think wearing that means I have to do anything other than holding still and letting people hurt me?" he asked in a low voice and Granger's head snapped up in surprise.

"He tortures you?" she asked, frowning at him.

Draco shrugged his shoulders.

"He tortures everyone who displeases him," Draco said. "It was no accident that I was bitten, you know? He insisted on it to punish my Father for failing to bring him the prophecy when you lot got in the way in the Department of Mysteries in June."

"You're saying it's my fault you're a werewolf?" she asked defensively, frowning at him.

Draco sighed. For a long time after he'd been bitten he'd blamed Potter and Weasley and Grange for his being a werewolf.

"It's my Father's fault," he admitted. "If he hadn't aligned himself with the Dark Lord long before we were even born, I'd never have been bitten. You lot played your role, to be sure, but it's Father's fault for joining the Dark Lord to begin with, and for letting a bunch of teenagers outwit him. But yes, I blamed you, for a time after I was bitten. I blamed everyone. To make matters worse, I'm expected to smile and thank the Dark Lord on bended knee for his mercy. He'd have rather enjoyed killing me, I think, but knew that making me a half-breed monster would be a more lasting and less reconcilable punishment for my father's failures."

She didn't seem to know what to say to that, because she stayed silent, lowering her eyes back to his chest and returning to the process of cleaning the blood from his skin. Draco held his tongue, watching her quietly and letting her clean him up as best she could. The awkwardness stretched once more, soured now from sexual tension into simmering dislike for one another that just didn't seem like it would ever end.

"This is why I quit Divination, you know?" she said when she'd cleaned his chest and stomach so thoroughly that the only spot of blood remaining was the fain red splotch seeping from the gash on his chest. "The idea that some high power, or some crazy old woman with a shawl can dictate my fate is beyond ludicrous. You and I aren't compatible, Malfoy. You're a Death Eater. I'm a member of the Order of the Phoenix, we're at war and you and I are on different sides of it. I'm sure that your wolf is mistaken, and that you just need to get laid by someone who isn't me. You've only got this idea that it's me because of that mess in the forest when I was transformed, and because your wolf was pleased to find another soul in the world not intent on being cruel to him."

She was breathing hard when she finished her impassioned tirade and Draco hated the way his cock throbbed as he watched her, even knowing that every word coming out of her moth was wrong – for perhaps the first time in her life.

"You know that's complete bollocks, don't you?" Draco asked, raising his eyes to hers and staring her down, forcing her to hold his gaze with his fingers under her chin when she tried to look away once more. "You're it for me, Granger. Like it or not. Enemies of war, or not. Bitter, ill-matched arseholes or not. You and I are doomed to be with one another. Don't make this harder than it has to be by continuing to fight, or trying to run again, or arguing bitterly that it simply cannot be, and that there's no such thing as kismet. You're my wolf-mate. You will be until the day we both die. There's no way around that. Believe me, I've tried to wriggle, bargain, argue and weasel my way out of this, Granger. I tried shagging someone else in the hopes that it would bloody dislodge my wolf's obsession with you, and I nearly bloody killed her when my wolf took issue with the idea of me touching any witch who wasn't you. Do you understand? I almost killed someone in the hopes that this wasn't set in stone."

Her eyes widened in surprise and she furrowed her brow at him.

"Who?" she asked, and Draco wondered if she was jealous, or concerned for the welfare of the other girl.

"Jealous?" he asked.

She fixed hi a deadpan glare and Draco sighed, wondering if there might ever be a day when his sense of humour would amuse her, rather than annoying her. Running a hand through his hair and looking away for a long moment, Draco tried to keep from reliving the memories of what he'd done to that poor girl.

"Daphne Greengrass," he admitted quietly, almost not daring to look at Granger.

"She's been fine all year," Granger pointed out, frowning.

Draco looed back at her, his brow furrowing.

"You and your precious Gryffindors really have no clue about what goes on with those of us you consider your enemies, do you?" he asked. "Daphne hasn't been fine all year. She's been under the Imperious curse for more than a month while her body is still healing to prevent her from suffering through the agony and shame of healing from what I did to her."

"You're been using the Imperious curse on her?" Granger gasped, her eyes widening as she took a small step back from him. "That's one of the Unforgiveable curses, Malfoy! You'll be thrown in Azkaban if you're caught!"

Draco's mouth twisted in a bitter caricature of a smile and he laughed coldly before holding his forearm up, Dark Mark facing outward, right in front of her face.

"I'm a Death Eater, Granger," he sneered. "The Imperious is the least of the criminal things I've done and will be commanded to do in future until such time as the Dark Lord falls."

She looked utterly horrified.

"What did you do to Daphne that you thought this was the only way to handle it?" she hissed, stepping back even further, actually manoeuvring herself right out of the bathroom to prevent him from trapping her against the sink.

"I mauled her, Granger," Draco admitted angrily. "Midway through shagging her, I fucking mauled her! Her back is all torn up after I scratched her with my claws out and then I bit her and tore into her the same way a rabid wolf tears into fucking everything. I destroyed her body aesthetically and almost tore her fucking throat out."

"She doesn't look any different?" Granger argued, clearly confused.

"Because I've been using glamour charms to keep her and everyone else from figuring out that she almost bled out in my bathroom at the Manor. She's going to spend the rest of her life, when I lift the glamour charms and lift the Imperious curse, trying to figure out what happened to her and how she survived an attack like that. I even modified her fucking memory to keep her from fearing me and from figuring out I'm a werewolf. Under those glamours she's covered in slashes and bite marks. Some of them still haven't healed completely because I wounded her so deeply when my wolf took control and took issue with her not being you!"

Granger's face was pale, and she looked terrified of him. Draco knew he'd said too much the minute she took another step back, obviously intending to make a run for it, and he growled under his breath, closing his eyes and reaching for patience and the will not to do something he'd regret.

"Don't run again, Granger," he warned her quietly without opening his eyes.

She ran.

And Draco had no choice but to chase her.