Hi everyone! Can you believe it's already February? I was thinking about how far away February was while writing this chapter, only to realize that today was the 3rd. Oops. I certainly hope you enjoy this one! I'll probably have to cut down to posting every two weeks due to the way my schedule is now. Thank you so, so much for your kind words on the last chapter, and for your faves and follows!

~ Anna =)

Disclaimer: I only own Heidi.

When I lay in bed later that night, with Hermione's light snoring to my right and Malfoy's lips on my neck reduced to the ghost of a touch, reality began to grip me. Or, rather, the insanity of my current reality.

Frozen, I stared up at the hangings on the bed, willing my heart to stop pounding. Memories of Malfoy began to flash through my brain in the way I imagine your life does when you're moments from death. I remembered him fighting with me at Malfoy Manor when we were eight, getting Pansy to hex me on my eleventh birthday, mocking me at the Yule Ball for going alone. I remembered escaping our mothers in Paris to go exploring on our own, Blaise being too far away to incorporate into this spur-of-the-moment plan. It was the first real time we'd been together just the two of us, and I must say that he'd made an excellent partner in crime until I ended up having to push him off the quay and into the river over something horrible he said. But this year had been so different from anything we'd had before; this year, he had become a downright necessity to me.

"Hermione! Hermione, wake up!" I hissed through the darkness, gripped by massive panic at this thought.

Hermione bolted up, her nest of hair flying over her face.

"Whmpf!" she grunted as she raked her curls apart to better see me. "Heidi? Are you … are you alright?"

I swallowed nervously. This had been the first time we'd spoken in ages.

"I …"

She arched an eyebrow, waiting for me to finish.

Malfoy and I are on good terms.

"I'm fine," I heard myself say.

Snogging terms.

"Just a nightmare I think."

Hermione paused, her face shifting like she'd wanted to begin saying something. Clearly thinking the better of it, she laid back down and drew her blankets to her chin. I fought back the urge to yell at her.

The next morning, after a fit of exhausting dreamless sleep, I had awoken with a strengthened resolve that stemmed from frustration and not much else. I was sick of dodging my place at the Gryffindor table, sick of hearing ever-evolving whispers about the (as of latest) mentally addled girl who'd apparently had a few too many Firewhiskeys and hit Harry Potter with a mean right hook. The fact that I had finally found favour with the Slytherins was only serving to irritate me more.

"Zabini! Hey, Zabini!"

I looked up to see one of the kids that had glared at me on my trip to the Slytherin common room with Pansy pushing past the crowd that had gathered outside the Great Hall for breakfast.

"What is it?" I asked as he stopped short of me. He was barely any taller than I was, leading me to suspect that he couldn't be any older than thirteen.

"I'll pay you seven galleons to punch my mate in the face."

I blinked at him. "Come again?"

"Clean punch, like you did to Potter," he explained.

"What?"

"Don't worry, he's into it."

"Are you mental?" I spluttered.

"Is that a no?" he asked, drawing his thick eyebrows together in annoyance.

To my mortification, Harry had briefly appeared within earshot.

"She doesn't wanna do it," the kid called out to someone a few feet away as he slinked away, but not before throwing me an expletive over his shoulder.

"Nice kid," said Harry. "His fault for undershooting, though. Should have offered you twenty."

"Harry, I—"

He was already walking into the Great Hall, Ron not far behind him.

I felt myself twitch sideways, wanting desperately to trace a familiar path to the kitchens and get my food there instead.

Come on, Heidi, toughen up. Just pretend it's one of the times you and Malfoy were fighting. You never avoided the Great Hall on his account, did you?

Deep down, I knew that this was well different than a rift with Malfoy, but it was a good enough excuse on the surface to get me walking through the doors. My eyes flew over to a gap between Hermione and Parvati that I could have easily slipped into. I swallowed and kept walking. Perhaps I'd try again at dinner…

I realized that I had managed to walk the length of the table without having found a place to sit. Somewhat embarrassed, I walked back until I found another gap, this time between a group of first years and a pair of fifth years. I grabbed a bowl of porridge and a copy of the Prophet, and flipped it open to find nothing but bad news. More prisoners had gone on the run as of a week ago. Death Eaters were rumoured to have doubled in number.

"Sick bastards," I found myself whispering as I read through an article on muggle killings. A pair of voices drew me out of my reading.

"—doing for Valentine's day?"

"I dunno, Romilda. I've only just broken up with Alexander."

"All I'm saying is that you'd better hurry up, Susanna, or you'll find yourself without a date to Puddifoot's," Romilda Vane said to her friend.

"Well who do you have?" Susanna asked while I tried to calculate exactly how far we were from Valentine's Day. Not far enough, according to my mathematics.

"I'm working on a few. Some you'd disapprove of."

"Who?" pressed Susanna eagerly, her fork forgotten halfway to her mouth as she looked at her friend in anticipation.

"Harry Potter."

"Why would I disapprove of Harry Potter? He's dating Ginny, though. You know that, right?"

"Michael Corner," Romilda continued.

"He's alright."

"Draco Malfoy," she said smugly.

I averted my gaze downwards and took in a huge spoonful of porridge. Neither girl seemed to realize my eavesdropping.

"Draco Malfoy?" said Romilda's friend. "Romi, he's a Slytherin!"

"So? He's a rich Slytherin," she said.

"Isn't that a little bit … weird?"

"Why? I don't think he's dating anyone. And besides, he's quite handsome, isn't he? Just look at him."

My head shot up. Was Malfoy in the Great Hall too? I had grown so used to him avoiding the place that I hadn't even bothered to look.

I looked to the Slytherin table, past the thirteen-year-old that had tried to bribe me, past Pansy and my brother who were deep in conversation, and, sure enough, found him sitting to their left with Greengrass beside him.

"I don't think he'd date a Gryffindor," Susanna mused.

"He's a male, Suze. He'll date anyone as long as they're pretty enough."

I watched him talk to Daphne and noticed, with growing annoyance, that she'd put her hand on his forearm and that he hadn't pulled it away.

"Do you think he's with that blonde girl?" asked Susanna.

I bit hard into a piece of toast as I watched Greengrass lean in towards him.

"I wouldn't be surprised. I heard she's his type," said a third girl whose name I wasn't sure of.

"She looks a little desperate, doesn't she? Crawling all over him?" commented Romilda.

The girl snorted. "Unlike the pictures you took for him? Have you given those to the boys yet, or are you waiting for a good time to do it?"

"Sod off, Alice."

That I couldn't ignore. I turned to Romilda and blinked.

"Hi, Heidi," she said with a smile. I strained to return it. "Pretend you didn't hear that, yeah?"

"…Yeah."

I chugged the last of my juice and got up to leave for class, feeling slightly ill. As I walked through the row of tables, I caught sight of Malfoy once again. He had tugged his shirt up under Daphne's gaze, the pale of his ribs visible. I forced myself to look away and swallowed down my nausea.

D&D&D&D&D&D&D&D&D&D&D&D&D&D&D&D&D&D

"Zabini, you're strangling it!" snapped Malfoy as he grabbed our Heaving Fern from me.

"Sprout said to grip firmly," I countered, trying and failing to snatch it back.

"I don't think you fully understand what that means," he lowered his voice, "and I'm not sure that I want any part of my body to be the thing that helps you figure it out," he said, out of Blaise's earshot. Before I could come up with a retort, he continued with "Something got you angry, Zabini?"

I stiffened. "No. What makes you say that?"

"The fact that you were glaring at your desk in Potions and Transfiguration this morning. And at me."

"I think we need to meet after class," I finally managed to say.

"Zabini, we always meet on Fridays."

I clenched my jaw.

"Oh, I see. You were trying to be dramatic. Here, ask me again and I'll pretend to be reluctant about it."

"Why are you in such good spirits!" I snapped, feeling in a rather petty area of my soul that he had no right to be after his show in the Great Hall.

Malfoy raised an eyebrow.

"Well, let's see: I came back from the dead a couple of days ago, where I learned that you'd taken my mother to fucking Puddifoot's of all places. I then got told by Pansy that you punched Harry Potter square in the face, and I had three particularly good cups of coffee this morning."

I frowned.

"You shouldn't drink that much coffee in such a short amount of time. It's bad for your heart."

"It's nice to see you finally care about my heart, Zabini," he said with a smirk.

"Stop," I mouthed as my brother looked up from his fern with a confused frown.

"Have you written to Dad yet?" Blaise asked, taking the opportunity to inject himself into the conversation.

I rolled my eyes. "Yes."

"No you haven't, you liar. He's asked me about your plans for Easter twice in a row now."

"I never got a letter from him."

"That isn't what I asked. I'm warning you right now, you better write to Dad or I'm telling Mum that you're being a right bitch," snapped Blaise.

"It's February, Blaise. I'm not stupid. I know this isn't about Easter. He just wants to get me talking to him again like everything's normal; like he didn't—"

"If you don't write to him by Sunday, I'm going to be speaking to you in much harsher tones."

"Oh no, not your harsh tones," I said sarcastically, just as Sprout made her rounds towards our workspace.

"Too much talking over here, you three," she commented as she passed by.

"Looks like you'll have to save your 'harsh tones' for later," I whispered mockingly at Blaise.

Malfoy sniggered from beside me and, having found a common target in my brother, I temporarily forgot how cross I was with him. I was reminded of my annoyance not too long after we found ourselves in our room later that evening, however.

"Your brother's right, you know," Malfoy said before I'd even had a chance to put my things down. I wheeled on him.

"What?"

Malfoy didn't waiver.

"Blaise is right. You need to write to your father."

My mouth dropped open.

"I don't need to do anything. And don't pry into my business!"

"Right, Zabini. I know how much you hate the idea of prying into one's personal business," he said sardonically.

"When I do it, it's because I care. When you do it, it's because… because…"

"Because I care?" he suggested.

I tried hard not to snort. "Sure. Let's call it that."

Malfoy frowned. "What else are we supposed to call it? Shame on me for not wanting you to do something you'll only end up regretting."

"Speaking of things one regrets," I began, gesturing at him and hoping he'd take the conversation from there.

"Yes?"

I scoffed. He walked past me and sat down nonchalantly in his armchair, infuriating me more.

"I don't really think it's fair that I'm the one that has to say it, Malfoy," I said, following suit and dropping onto my sofa with a huff.

"Say what?"

"That you're regretting what went on between us yesterday. That you want this to stop."

He crossed his arms leaned calmly back in his chair, looking unaffected.

"What tipped you off? The part where I told you I cared about you?"

"The part where you ignored me in Potions today, and berated me in Transfiguration," I replied.

"I thought we agreed to keep this a secret," he said.

"No, we agreed to act normal," I insisted.

"I didn't ignore you in Potions, I was focused on getting the steps right. And I didn't berate you in Transfiguration, I corrected you."

"In front of everybody, including McGonagall!" I snapped. "And why were you exposing yourself to Daphne Greengrass in the Great Hall this morning?"

Malfoy's eyebrows shot up. He uncrossed his arms.

"Please go on. This one I'm actually excited to hear about."

"I saw you pulling up your shirt, letting her take a good long look."

Malfoy wavered for a moment, before bursting into laughter.

"She was asking me how I'd healed up. She thinks you did shit work on the bandages. Did you really use tape?"

"No," I lied, suddenly feeling sheepish.

"Well either way, I was just proving to her that you did a great job, tape notwithstanding. I didn't realize it looked quite so risqué from your position at the Gryffindor table." He smirked. "Were those first years you were sitting beside today, by the way?"

"There were fifth years too!" I snapped defensively. "And — wait, how do you know?"

"I was looking. You realize I look at you, right? It sort of comes with the territory of kissing you," he said with a half-smile.

I let this sentence sink in.

"I didn't," I admitted.

Feeling quite embarrassed now, I took to picking at my nails while thinking furiously of a way to legitimize what I was now starting to recognize was senseless worrying.

"They're after you, you know," I mumbled darkly.

I noticed him grow visibly stiffer.

"Who?"

I remained silent.

"Zabini, who is after me?"

"All the girls."

He let out an audible sigh of relief.

"Romilda Vane's got pictures for you, and I don't think they're of her face."

He scrunched his nose up. "Isn't she in the same house and year as the Weaslette?"

"You mean my house? Yeah, Malfoy, she is. Don't act like you wouldn't like it; she's going around telling everyone that you're rich and handsome."

"How dare she spread such misinformation!" he said in mock outrage before grinning. "Zabini, are you already jealous? It's been a day."

"I'm not jealous," I lied. "I'm just … wary."

"Wary?"

"Yes. I'm being cautious, now that I've got some sense back into me. It's one thing to be kissed by you once, but it's a whole other thing to be able to think … to let myself believe that you want to… to be…"

"Believe it."

I threw my hands up.

"I'm sorry, you literally commissioned Crabbe to ask me to the Yule Ball in front of everybody and reject me before I could even make the word 'no' come out of my mouth. It was humiliating! And now you expect me to accept — the universe to accept — that this is real? I know what you're into, Malfoy. I've seen it, and I've heard all about it from Daphne, and Pansy, and Tracey, and—"

"I had no idea you were such an expert on my romantic preferences, Zabini."

I crossed my arms and looked straight ahead. I felt the sofa shift beside me.

"Go on. What is it I'm into, then?"

I refused to answer, determined to be stubborn. I inhaled sharply as I felt him push my hair aside.

"Tell me," he muttered, hot breath bouncing off my cheek. "Since you know all about it."

"Not short Gryffindor virgins, I know that much," I said, tapping into as much dignity as my tone could afford me with his lips on my neck. He paused what he was doing and, after a moment of contemplation, withdrew from me.

"You're right, Zabini. I don't know why I bother arguing with you anymore. I should know by now that you're always right."

I turned to him in disappointed shock.

"I am?"

He nodded gravely. "I know it's shallow, but now that you've brought it to my attention I don't think I can surmount it after all. "

I tried not to let my upset show.

"I mean, I've been telling Longbottom for years now that there's nothing I hate more than a short Gryffindor virgin, but he just won't stop trying. I think he's in love with me."

I found him grinning.

"Screw you, Malfoy," I snapped, pushing him sideways.

"Not with that grip."

"Malfoy!"

He sniggered and put an arm around me.

"I'm sorry, Zabini, it's just too easy with you. Or some things are, at least."

"Nothing's easy with you," I muttered darkly. "Not a damn thing."

After a moment of intense inner debate, I allowed myself to lean into him and found yesterday's uncertainty disappearing with each stroke of his fingers through my hair.

"So you just accept that you fancy me? Just like that? You're not in denial?" I asked.

Malfoy raised an eyebrow.

"Denial?"

"After years of telling everybody how horrifically disfigured I was, you woke up today, reflected on kissing me and said to yourself, 'yeah, that makes sense'?"

"I never said it made sense, Zabini. But I'm not going to shy away from the one thing that's keeping me sane. Not with the turn my life's taken this year."

"I thought you said I drove you insane," I remarked.

"I think the net effect is positive, ironically enough. As for your disfigurement …" His eyes went south. "Well we both know that's not the case now, don't we?"

I couldn't help but smile a little. "I suppose."

"And what about you?" he asked.

"What about me?"

"Do you still accept your feelings for me? Because if I recall correctly, Zabini, I think you once said you'd make it your mission in life to 'eradicate' mine."

I felt a twang of guilt.

"Malfoy, I want you to live more than I've ever wanted anything in my life." I met his gaze in earnest. "I mean it."

The horrible memory of him convulsing in a pool of his blood coupled with the sheer miracle that he was here with me, warm and alive and sarcastic as ever, made it unthinkable not to kiss him. So I did.

He kissed me back just as eagerly and, before I knew it, we'd ended up horizontal due in part to a few quickly-executed maneuvers on my part, and a few on his. Suddenly, he broke his lips away from mine.

"What?" I asked, panicking slightly as our uncompromising position dawned on my brain. "Am I doing something wrong?"

"I'm just looking at you," Malfoy said, candlelight flickering off of his face. His eyes were brilliant even when the rest of the room was dim. "Why, am I not supposed to look at you?"

I wrinkled my nose. "It's weird."

He smiled. I rolled my eyes and pulled his mouth back to mine, deciding that there were far better things he should have been doing with his time than looking at me.

I became acutely aware that his hand had left my cheek, and was beginning to roam slowly up my leg. I returned it to its original position, eliciting a small laugh against my lips. My own hand, hypocrite that it was, had begun to make a journey through his hair, down his chest, up his arm—

Malfoy pulled away sharply, yanking his sleeve down.

"Did I hurt you?" I gasped.

He shook his head.

"What is it, then?"

"Nothing," he muttered as he shifted off of me. His gaze had suddenly turned dark, heavy under the weight of some sort of undoubtedly troubled thoughts.

"It's not nothing, Malfoy. I know that look."

He stared at his hands. "You shouldn't put it on display like that."

"Put what on display?" I asked, before realizing what he was alluding to. "Do you mean the Mark?"

Malfoy stayed silent, but by the clench of his jaw, I could tell that was a yes.

"I've seen it tons of times, Malfoy. You sleep with no shirt on half the time."

He shook his head, still refusing to look at me. "That's different."

"How?"

"It just fucking is, Zabini. It's one thing to see it when I'm going to bed. It's another thing to stare at it and touch it while I'm kissing you on the fucking mouth."

"I wasn't—"

"It isn't part of this!" he said angrily, and I was beginning to think that he was trying mostly to convince himself.

"Okay," I breathed, heart pounding as I sat back up. "Okay, Malfoy. It isn't part of this."

He buried his head in his hands, and I distinctly heard the word 'fuck' leave the space between his palms.

"I'm sorry," I said lamely.

Malfoy sighed, looking no happier.

"Don't be sorry, Zabini. It just has to be dealt with, that's all."

"I know. I…I think I might have an idea of where to start," I said, a brilliant and currently ill-disposed friend coming to mind.

Malfoy frowned. "What is it?"

"I don't want to tell you yet," I admitted.

"That's convincing," he said with a badly hidden eye-roll.

"I'll tell you soon. I just don't want to get your hopes up."

Malfoy sighed. "Fine, Zabini, whatever."

"It might help if you explained a little how exactly you ended up joining in the first place, because all I know is that you popped up at my house one day this summer having suddenly—"

"It's late. Maybe you should head back to your room," he said.

I frowned, feeling like I'd missed some sort of detail.

"It's Friday night. Aren't we supposed to be… sleeping together?"

Malfoy raked a hand through his hair. "Pomfrey gave me something before discharging me. It's been helping."

"Oh. So we no longer have to…?"

"No."

I tried to push down an unexpected wave of disappointment.

"Good. I guess it would be a little too much, now that we're…"

"Yeah."

I glanced reluctantly at my watch.

"I guess I'd better go, then. Don't want Filch to get at me for being out too late."

Malfoy nodded.

"Goodnight, Zabini."

"Night, Drac—Malfoy."

I closed the door behind me with a lump in my throat. What the hell had I done? I replayed it over and over again in my mind as I trekked to the dungeons, trying to find the exact moment where it all had gone so south. Contrary to his belief, I hadn't made a show of touching the Mark at all. In fact, I realized with a sinking feeling of guilt that I'd forgotten all about it in the moment.

The anxiety busied my mind all through the journey to my room, interrupting itself only when I approached my bed and, though the dark, saw Hermione sitting at the foot of it. She looked up at me sheepishly.

"Hi, Heidi."