Chapter 21

A/N: Hello readers! Thanks so much for all the reviews! It really motivates me to get editing (most of the time, I hate editing)! Also thanks to Claire96 and Bulba-chan for their wonderful betaing skills!

Only two chapters after this! I put somewhere that there's only going to be 22, but it's actually 23. So one more than a lot of you were thinking... Good, right?

I'm reminding you now: don't worry. Happy ending, remember? Okay. On with the chapter! I'm sure you're impatient.

~Frosty

Paling, Hermione took an almost equally large drink of her own alcohol. "He's decided that he needs to die to keep me happy?" she squeaked out when the burning in her throat had receded.

Blaise nodded. "I tried to stop him, but he went all Veela on me and nearly ripped my throat out." The Slytherin winced as he ran his hand over a thin scratch near the hollow of his throat.

Hermione was shocked that Malfoy had come so close to injuring his friend. He must have been almost completely under the control of his Veela to no longer recognise Blaise. Frowning to herself, she pushed her surprise aside and focused on more pressing matters.

"Why are you not more concerned? Could you have gone after him? You can't just-"

"Granger!" he interrupted her outpouring of questions. "Draco is a Malfoy, and the whole lot of them are Slytherin to the core. He won't do anything drastic until he knows that being away from you will actually make the curse stop. My job was supposed to be watching you and reporting if the curse seems to be fading."

He refilled both of their glasses. "This is why I'm such a good friend. Dealing with hysterical Gryffindors is not one of my favourite things to do."

Hermione ignored the comment; that was something Malfoy was going to have to deal with when she found him and dragged him back to the school by his ear. Blaise was right though, he was a good friend. She'd make sure to have a word with her Veela about leaving his friends to deal with his problems while she was angry at him.

"Do you know where he is?" she asked.

His glass made a clinking sound as he sat it on the table; it was the only sound in the room. She waited with bated breath for his answer. Sure, she would probably be able to find the blond given enough time, but she wanted to find him and yell at him while her anger was still fresh. It would be so much more effective that way.

Blaise stared at his empty glass for a moment, as if gathering his thoughts. In actuality, he was preparing himself for an explosion. Gryffindors were known for their passion, which sometimes made them a little volatile.

"I know where he is, but I'm not going to tell you until tomorrow."

Her eyes were probably comically widened, but Hermione wasn't paying attention to her expression at the moment. She was contemplating launching herself at the Slytherin and demanding answers while she hit him repeatedly – preferably with something pointy. But, knowing Blaise and his infuriating ways, hitting him would probably only make him clam up and refuse to give her any answers. She was going to have to use her words, no matter how much she wanted to use her fists – or her wand.

"Why?" was all she asked.

"Honestly? Because the idiot needs to spend some time alone to straighten out his thoughts. He doesn't seem to realize something that's completely obvious to everyone else: that you care about him aside from your bond. The idiot thinks you'll just... recover if he dies, but everyone else can see that it'll tear you up inside."

Hermione exhaled heavily and let herself fall against the back of the sofa. "So I just have to wait here and hope he doesn't kill himself with only your word reassuring me that he's fine?"

Grinning, Blaise lifted the bottle of alcohol that had been sitting with him. "Want to get completely smashed while we wait?" It was the only thing he could think of to help her at the moment. Drinking was what Draco did when he was upset, could his mate really be that different?

Despite her protests that she didn't want to drink, Blaise watched as the Gryffindor drank enough alcohol to put her back to sleep. When she was fully unconscious on the sofa, the Slytherin tiredly rubbed a hand over his face. He didn't have anything personal against Hermione, but hysterical females were not his thing. Draco supplied more than enough emotional turmoil for three people; Blaise didn't need to deal with his best friend's girlfriend as well.

Summoning a blanket from his room, he placed it over the sleeping Gryffindor and then collapsed back into the chair he'd previously occupied. Rivalries between houses weren't what they'd been before the war, but it still wouldn't be wise to leave Hermione Granger asleep and vulnerable in the heart of Slytherin territory. If something happened to Hermione, Blaise didn't doubt for a minute that Draco would murder whoever harmed her and then go through with his idiotic plan of suicide anyway out of heartbreak.

She wasn't the only one worried about the idiot blond, Blaise was concerned about his friend as well, but he didn't have the luxury of unconsciousness. Instead, he had to watch over Hermione while she got to sleep.

Blaise sighed and leant his head against the back of his chair, prepared for a long night. He really was an amazing friend.

Hermione woke up with a horrible taste in her mouth and a quartet of Slytherin first years gathered around her. They didn't look menacing, merely curious, but they still weren't a nice sight to wake up to. One of them was prodding her with his wand.

"Oi! Clear off!" Blaise shouted as he came back into the room. "I leave for one minute to brush my teeth and you gather around Hermione like a bunch of vultures!"

Looking terrified, the first years scurried off.

When she turned to Blaise, she saw that he was watching the fleeing students contemplatively. At her questioning look, he grinned. "They ran for the door quite quickly. Not as good as Draco could have done, but pretty impressive nonetheless."

"You can hardly compare yourself to him, he learned from the best," Hermione muttered, remembering Lucius' cold stare. That man could probably freeze a volcano with his eyes alone if he wanted to. When she remembered why it was that she was sleeping in the Slytherin common room, her half-smile fell right off her face. "Are you going to tell me where Draco is now?"

"Promise me something first."

If it would make him tell her where Draco was, Hermione was willing to promise quite a lot. Blaise had been right; it would tear her up inside if the Veela actually went through with it and killed himself so she could be happy. He was a moron for thinking that in the first place! What kind of person did that? Better yet, what kind of person was happy that someone else had killed themselves for their benefit?

She took a deep breath to calm the resurgence of her anger. "That depends on what you want me to promise," Hermione said, knowing from experience that it was best to clarify when speaking to Slytherins.

"Promise me you won't let him off easy because you're glad he's not hurt or because he was doing something 'sweet' in his misguided, stupid way. You need to thoroughly chew him out for being an idiot."

Oh. That was something she could do. In fact, she was more than willing to scold him so completely that his ears were on fire when she was done. "I don't think that's going to be a problem," she said with a grin.

Blaise nodded. "Good. He's in the Shrieking Shack."

She was out the door practically before he'd finished the word 'shack'. "Give him a good kick in the shins from me. I sure as hell wouldn't get away with it!" Blaise called after her.

Hermione ran through the castle and out the front doors. Luckily, there were few students on the grounds so early in the morning. Otherwise, she may have had to postpone her trip so she didn't inadvertently show a bunch of younger students a way to break school rules. It really wouldn't reflect well on her as Head Girl.

After grabbing a stick and hitting the knot, Hermione rushed past the frozen branches and climbed down into the tunnel. She briefly wondered how it was that Draco had managed to get off of school property without knowing about the passage, but was then distracted. She'd been thinking of him as Draco. He wasn't 'Malfoy' to her anymore, not really. He was someone she cared about, and that meant it was time to drop the formality – though she'd probably still use his last name to yell at him. Yelling at 'Malfoy' was something of a habit for her.

The Shrieking Shack was almost the same as she remembered it. There was possibly more dust than she recalled, but that was to be expected as it had been a few years since she'd last seen the place. It didn't take her long to find Draco. He was staring out the window in the room Sirius had lead them when they'd still thought he was a murder. The Veela must have been thinking about something really important, because he didn't seem to hear her sneaking up on him.

Hermione crossed her arms and prepared herself for a confrontation. "You're an idiot," she said, making him jump and whip around.

"How'd you find me?"

Hermione shrugged. "Blaise."

"That bloody interfering sod."

She folded her arms over her chest. "He was only trying to help me fix some of the mess your half-witted idea caused. You know, Blaise said something that I think you would benefit from hearing. He said that you think I'll recover if you die, but everyone else can see that it'll tear me up inside."

While Draco stood there speechless, Hermione crossed the room and stood toe-to-toe to him. "Do you know Blaise had to get me to drink a bunch of alcohol to calm down enough to actually go to sleep? I spent the night on a sofa in the Slytherin common room and woke up with a bunch of first years poking at me. That was what happened when I found out you were missing. What do you think would happen if you were dead?"

He had the grace to look properly chastened. Hermione took advantage of his inattention to kick him in the shin. Hard.

"What was that for?" he demanded.

Completely unrepentant, Hermione glared. "That was from Blaise. He had to deal with a distraught Gryffindor, which was probably a stressful experience for him. And apparently you tried to rip his throat out?"

If she hadn't been watching him closely, she probably would have missed the slight pinkness that stained his cheeks. "I didn't mean to, but I was in quite a state when I tried to leave, and Blaise grabbed my arm to try and stop me. The Veela took over and threatened him, but I never actually touched him."

The blond watched her warily. "You're not going to hit me again, are you?" He could read her mind, but she was getting good at carefully not thinking about her actions until she was already in motion. The contemplative look she was directing at him was worrying. She was about to do something – probably kick him again. It already felt like she'd chipped the bone in his leg a little.

"Lean down a bit," Hermione ordered.

He was tensed for another attack, but Draco did as she'd asked. He'd dug himself so deep that it was probably better to just let her get her anger out and then talk reason to her. Instead of the slap he was expecting, she kissed his cheek. "You're an idiot," she said again, with more affection than last time. "But your heart was in the right place, even if your brain was noticeably absent."

Draco straightened and frowned down at her from the extra height. "I can point out a number of times in the past where you Gryffindors have done dangerous, life threatening things for 'the greater good' or whatever it is that you people fight for."

"Most of those life threatening things were following Harry, and that boy has some serious problems with sitting still until there's a concrete plan and backup behind him," Hermione mumbled.

Grabbing her hand, Draco pulled her over to the bed. He sat down and brought her to stand between his legs, so they were closer to the same level. His face was dead serious as he stared deep into her eyes. "Are you telling me that your side knew all along how suicidal Potter was?"

Hermione laughed. "Harry's a wonderful person and he cares about his friends over everything else. Even he knows that this gets him in trouble sometimes."

At his shell-shocked expression, she laughed some more. "Did you think you 'fighters for the light' were the only ones who had noticed that about him? I bet you thought we were all idiots to following him without knowing his obvious shortcomings."

"How could you follow someone so blatantly flawed?" he asked.

A sharp bark of laughter from Hermione was his answer. "You followed a nose-less psychopath with daddy issues so bad he turned to genocide for comfort."

"A very threatening and unhinged nose-less psychopath. Most of the Death Eaters were just as happy as your side when you won. Living with the Dark Lord was no picnic." He shuddered, obviously reliving some disturbing memories.

"We're off topic," she sighed. "My point is, you're an idiot."

"An idiot whose heart was in the right place," he reminded.

Hermione stepped closer and wrapped her arms around him. "I would have been devastated if you had gone and killed yourself. Never do something like that again."

Not able to make a promise that he knew he may one day have to break, Draco just pulled her closer and kissed her, reopening their connection at the same time. She obviously wasn't going to let him go through with his plan, so there was no point in making them both miserable by continuing to block her out of his mind.

Hermione wasn't fooled. But for a while there, she hadn't been sure she'd ever get to kiss him again, so she allowed him to distract her. She made a mental note to not let him get away with this sort of thing on a regular basis.

He must have heard that last bit, because he tugged her onto his lap and slid a hand up into her hair to pull her closer. He was really quite good at the distraction thing. Internally, she winced when she felt a wave of smugness from him. Great, he'd heard that too and now he was going to be insufferable – well, more insufferable than normal.

Instead of being upset with him for his forwardness, she allowed herself to melt against him. He was holding her as if he'd thought he wasn't going to get to hold her again – which he had. When he slipped his fingers under the edge of her shirt and traced circles across her skin, she hummed her approval, forgetting that she was trying to keep his ego at a reasonable level.

Another wave of smugness brushed against her mind.

This time, there was something else mixed in with the smugness, something warm and protective. She didn't have time to delve further into the appealing emotion because at that moment, the entire house gave a huge shudder.

They pulled apart. "What was that?" Hermione whispered, trying to catch her breath.

"It felt like the whole shack shook on its foundations," Draco said.

The Shrieking Shack wasn't the sturdiest structure in the world; if the whole thing was shaking, it was entirely possible the entire place could come down. He made sure to keep his arms around her, just in case parts of the ceiling were to collapse or something like that. His reflexes were faster than hers and could probably move her out of the way before she was hit.

A horrible thought occurred to Hermione, causing panic to wash over her, and by extension, her mate. What if the curse was going to try and kill them by taking the entire shack down around them?

"We need to get out of here," the Veela said in answer to her thought. He stood up and started dragging her towards the door.

When she glanced back towards the window she froze, eyes wide and horrified. The implications of what she was seeing didn't take long to filter through her sharp mind. So intent was Draco on getting her out of the room that he didn't notice she'd stopped walking and he was dragging her across the dusty floor.

"Draco," Hermione whispered, trying to tug her hand free from his steel grip. He was so focused on getting her out of there that he didn't even hear her protest.

"Draco!" she tried again, slightly louder. He still didn't relent in his efforts to get her out of the room.

"DRACO!" Hermione shouted, grabbing onto the doorframe as he pulled her through it. That time it worked, freezing him in his tracks.

"What wrong? What is it?" he asked, looking her over for injuries. He didn't see how she could have been hurt in the few seconds he'd been trying to pull her out of the room, but she was certainly panicked.

Hermione pointed a shaking finger towards the window. "Look outside."

When he did, the meagre colour he had in his face rapidly faded until he was white as a sheet. He grabbed her hand and pulled her again, but this time she let him. They ran down the hall and into the room next door. Out the window there, it was the same.

"We have to get out of here," Draco said for the second time, sounding more desperate.

Hermione agreed wholeheartedly and followed him as he dragged her down the stairs to the front door. Every window they passed on the way showed the same terrifying thing.

When he ripped open the flimsy pieces of wood that made up the door, they didn't run outside. They couldn't run outside. The scenery outside the door showed the same thing as every window in the entire sack did.

"We're trapped," Hermione said, completely horrified.

They were going to die.