Draco took a long, slow drink of his beer and watched his Veela. Her dress swirled around her like smoke, and the eyes she'd shaded with dark paints flashed whenever she looked at him. Blaise kept her spinning, heedless of the resentful glances cast her way. A woman who'd been a few years ahead of him at school made a point of pulling herself out of Hermione's way as though her touch would contaminate, and Draco memorized her face. She'd find herself unemployed by Monday. By Wednesday her landlord would apologize profusely as he gave her an eviction notice.

"I thought you didn't let her near other people."

Draco looked at Pansy. He'd seen her working her way around the room out of the corner of his eyes but hadn't acknowledged her yet. She'd poured herself into corsets and heels she probably thought were enticing, and a headband with grey ears that sat half askew topped her head.

"What are you supposed to be?" he asked though he knew. She was nothing if not predictable.

"I'm a mouse," she said. "Duh. You loaning her out now?"

Draco dismissed Pansy and returned to watching the dancers. Blaise smirked at him for a moment and he rolled his eyes at the dare that he step in. Blaise could dance with her all night and she's still be his. She was dancing for him to see, and they all knew it. She couldn't even touch Blaise. She didn't want to. She wanted him to watch and he could barely tear his eyes away. He could feel every pulse of blood pounding in Hermione's veins as she moved. Seeing her alive and happy like this made his breath quicken and his mouth dry. The music stopped as the set ended and her dance stopped but his heart didn't even slow its insistent rhythm. Blaise held her gloved hand and she curtsied to him and they both looked back at him, laughter in their eyes. He raised his bottle toward them in a toast and their smiles grew. If it were anyone but Blaise, or maybe that wretched Potter, he'd be planning murder. If it were anyone but Hermione, he'd be making his excuses to Goyle and taking her home.

"What are you?" Pansy asked, still trying to get his attention.

"A crow," he said. Hermione approached and held her hand out for her drink. He passed it over and tried not to stare at her mouth as she put her lips around the neck of the bottle and sucked down a long swallow of beer. He'd promised himself he wouldn't take advantage. The moment he touched her mouth, she'd be lost. It would be wrong.

"Nice," said Pansy. "You've always looked good in black."

Blaise waved his hand to order another one of his disgusting concoctions. He swallowed half of it then made a disgusted noise. "Who invited the Veela?" he asked.

Draco could feel his hackles rise almost instinctively, but he knew the other man couldn't mean Hermione and so he followed Blaise's gaze until his eyes settled on a blond man making his way toward them. He seemed to almost glow and moved with an ethereal, impossible grace. Almost every woman in the room stopped what she was doing and turned to follow his progress. They were a field of sunflowers facing an unreachable star.

"Huh," said Blaise. "I didn't know that about Theo."

Draco glanced over at their friend, surprised he was here, though it seemed everyone was. He'd even seen one of the interchangeable Weasley brothers. Theo, though, was quiet and solitary. He hated things like this and had rarely left Nott Manor since the war. Now he stood, bathed in pulsing light and balancing on the balls of his feet. He leaned toward the passing Veela, blank yearning on his narrow face.

"Huh," Draco said in agreement. He expected to see the same glazed longing on Hermione's face, and braced himself against seeing her that way for someone else, but she was just reading the label on her bottle.

"Did you know this has chocolate in it?" she asked. "Maybe that's why it's so good."

"Hermione," Pansy cooed. "You remember Jean, don't you?"

Hermione glanced up and finally saw the approaching Veela. "Jean," she said with what sounded like genuine, clear-headed pleasure. "I didn't know you were in Britain. You should have told me."

Jean bowed over her hand before he said, faint guilt coloring his words, "I wasn't sure you'd want to see me."

"You didn't know," she said. "It wasn't your fault."

Draco narrowed his eyes and studied the Veela with his glow and his French accent and then turned to Pansy. She was watching the reunion with malicious anticipation written all over her face, but as Hermione and Jean exchanged the pleasantries of people happy enough to meet again despite being mostly indifferent to one another, her glee faded and a sullen, forced smile took its place. There would be no fireworks here.

"I didn't realize it was a costume party," Jean said. "I feel very silly without so much as a mask."

Draco pulled his off and said, "A gift."

A trade, he thought.

"Hermione's not in a costume either," Pansy said as Jean smiled his thanks and fixed the feathered mask over his face. That seemed to dim much of his allure and there was an audible exhalation as half the vast room returned to whatever they had been doing before Jean arrived. Hermione remained unmoved one way or the other. She'd been more interested in Blaise and even that would have cut off abruptly if he'd so much as brushed a finger against her arm.

Mine, he thought. Not even a Veela catches her eye.

He felt triumphant until he remembered she was trapped. She hadn't chosen him.

"I'm an obscurial," Hermione said. Her smile was sharper than any knife. "Wild magic turned into a curse."

The music began again and this time it wound slowly through the room inviting couples to sway against one another. His grandmother would have called what people were doing on the dance floor immoral. His mother would have made a cold remark about how dance shouldn't require a contraceptive charm. Draco set his beer down and held his hand out to Hermione. "Would my wild magic favor me with a dance?"

Her bracelet flashed in the light as she took his outreached hand, and Pansy's eyes fell on it. Jealousy and fury warred in her voice as she choked out, "Pretty bracelet , Hermione. Present from Draco?"

Hermione glanced down at her wrist. "Yes," she said simply. Then to Draco, "And yes to you as well."

He folded her against himself on the dance floor. She was a slash of dark ink in her dress, cut by the diamonds he'd refused to remove. "Happy I made you leave it on?" he murmured into her ear.

She laughed and the sound was pure happiness. "Yes. I should listen to you. And can you believe she invited Jean? Poor man."

Draco could absolutely believe Pansy had, but he didn't answer. He just inhaled. Hermione used some kind of rose lotion and the heat of her skin made it stronger than usual. Her hands were wrapped around him and she swayed into him and he wanted her. He'd watched her dance with Blaise. He'd watched her talk to that Veela. Through it all she'd had eyes only for him and she was so beautiful and he wanted her, he wanted her, he wanted. Oh, Salazar, he wanted her. He ached with how much he wanted to tear her skirts off, how he wanted to press her up against one of the steel beams wrapped with fairy lights and take her right there in the middle of this ridiculous party. She had to know. She wasn't a naïve child, and when she looked at him through lashes he'd never appreciated, he knew she did. She felt him pressing into her – how could she not – and she didn't shift away from him. Her tongue licked at her bottom lip and when that lip curved up into a smile that invited, he tightened the fingers he had on her back with such force it had to hurt. She just pressed herself more firmly against him. He wouldn't have thought that was even possible but space bent as she fit herself into every line of his body as though she has been made just for him. Only for him. She shifted her hips as she moved to the hypnosis of the music. It threatened to pull them into its thrall and he couldn't stand it. Everything was her, and the blood pounding through him, and how much he needed her. She was going to drive him mad and, as thought fled, he buried his face in her neck. She smelled even better as he got closer. Rose, and sweat, and her. When his lips met her skin, she sagged and that weight brought him back to reality with a slap.

He couldn't take advantage.

None of this was real. Not for her.

He stepped back. "I'm sorry," he murmured.

She moved closer again until her lips were at his ear. "Don't you dare," she said and he realized with a start that there wasn't a trace of her Veela trance in her voice. She'd fought her way through his unforgivable mistake. He'd pressed his lips to the perfection of her neck and she'd held on.

He knew that meant she'd be too tired to even stand soon.

Unforgivable. He was unforgivable.

"You've been very careful to be hands off all night, my mind is clear, and I want you. Not the creature. Me."

He closed his eyes. "Hermione," he began, unsure how to phrase a rejection he loathed having to make.

"I'm not a child," she hissed, and even in the dark of the warehouse he could see that her eyes were too bright as tears threatened to fall. "Don't you dare treat me like I'm some fragile, broken creature who isn't capable of knowing what she wants. Don't. You. Dare."

"It isn't right," he said.

"Take me home," she said. No one who had grown up with Narcissa Malfoy could miss that that was an order but he hesitated too long and saw her get angry. She pulled herself closer and said, each word a whispered threat, "Take me home or cope with me in full trance mode right here."

Then she kissed his neck. First once, then again. Her body shifted in his arms from angry to pliant but she didn't stop nuzzling him though she made a sigh of utter bliss as she let herself fall into the drugged state that left her utterly vulnerable.

"Fine," he hissed. He couldn't believe he'd been out-maneuvered by a Gryffindor. "You win, you witch. We're leaving."

. . . . . . . . . .

A/N - With a nod to Mean Girls, of course.