God is a Witch Chapter 35: BELIEVER, a harry potter fanfic

DISCLAIMER: the only thing I own are the plot and the original characters of this story, everything else you may recognize belongs to J.K. Rowling. My only profit is my personal entertainment and hopefully yours.

WARNINGS: pureblood!Hermione, OOC, rated M for sexual encounters, language, mentions of violence; modern.

This fanfiction comes with dedicated website: godisawitchfic dot tumblr dot com. You can also find me as slytherinsauce on both tumblr and pinterest with more content dedicated to this story. Beware of spoilers.

Author's notes: hello there! It's finally time for our guys have that trip to Australia. I'm not going to be long in this notes because I actually want to use the time to move forward with the story (I'm currently writing chapter 40th), but there's something I wanted to address even though the story is rated M; if you're uncomfortable with smut and do not wish to read the sex scene in this chapter (I was high and it just came out AND IM NOT BLUSHING YOU ARE BLUSHING, KAREN) skip the fourth sequence and go directly to Theo at the Ministry of Magic. I hope you enjoy the new chapter!

35.

BELIEVER

"I reckon immaculate, sound about accurate
I know that strength, it don't come without strategy
I know that sweet, it don't come with cavities
I know that passages come with some traffic
I start from the basement, end up in the attic

(...) is you a believer?
I get a unicorn out of a zebra
I wear my uniform like a tuxedo

(...) I know that bloomin' don't come without rain
I know the losin' don't come without shame
I know the beauty don't come without, uh"

(Victoria Street n. 23, The Penthouse - WizVille, London, England;
October 27th, 09:00 p.m.)

The group met up at Hermione's place sometime before dinner, which they consumed together as many suitcases surrounded the table in her dining room.

She seldom got a chance to use it, usually eating her meals by herself or with little company, and mostly outside the house, but it was nice to see it packed with friends for a change.

The only downside of their impromptu Australian holiday was that Luna and her brother weren't able to join her, but overall what waited for the witch were two days of basking in the sun and having fun with some of the people she cared about the most.

Once she got back to England she had to pour all her energies in MagiTech's upcoming launch, a night she dreaded, and she was excited at the idea of postponing the thought for a bit longer.

Hermione Granger was extremely scared of the way her company was going to be perceived, well aware of how little wizarding Britain was open to change and innovation. It liked to stick to old traditions and antiquated beliefs, crushing down or making an outcast of those who didn't impersonate their stiff doctrine.

She'd had her fair share of magical bigotry, thank you very much.

As Hermione Granger she'd been fully exposed to what large part of the community thought of Muggleborn wizards and witches, while as Eloise Nott - the two coexisted - she was experiencing the discrimination Purebloods had been subjected to since the end of the war.

The public opinion didn't seem to realize there ought not to always be an oppressor and a victim, that people could live next to one another and respect each other's freedom, and both the politics and the press seemed more than happy to encourage this attitude.

Surveying the space around her, she couldn't help but to focus on Pansy, who just tonight had arrived with her last shipment of hate mail, some regarding her shop and some about her relationship with Harry.

Ever since the two had been spotted together the paparazzi had exploited every chance they got to stalk them, and gossip magazines often featured ominous speculations on how the pair had come to be.

After they'd announced their engagement, things had blown out of proportion.

It was the opinion of the majority she was dosing The-Boy-Who-Lived with Amortentia to ride the wave of his popularity, and though Pansy usually played it down as bitches being bitches, Hermione knew her best friend too well not to know she was actually bothered by it.

She could understand why.

Every since she'd returned to her motherland the press had started haunting her, too, throwing allegations and fabricating impossible theories, ultimately making her question her choice to leave Australia, if temporarily, on a daily basis.

It wasn't as if the press was above certain behaviours in the southern hemisphere, but having dealt with them as Victoria Sallow, an identity she'd built specifically for the spotlight, journalists and photographers had known of her only what she had wanted them to, and things had been overall more easily manageable.

"I can't believe we're actually leaving for Australia in a hour", Ginny mused, setting aside what was left of her second slice of cake. "We should eat Pansy's brownies more often".

"Decisions taken when you're stoned are the best decisions", Harry nodded approvingly.

He received more than one dubious glance: there was Blaise, who in his time in the muggle world had one night been so high he'd gotten a smiling emoji tattooed on his ass, and on the other side of the table sat Draco, who in similar circumstances had once decided to try and hit on the girlfriend of a muggle gang member and then returned home with both his eyes black and a broken rib.

Hermione raised her flute of champagne at him. "I'll have to second that".

"My, my. Listen to yourself, Prefect Granger", Ginny teased.

"What would McGonagall say?", Draco backed her up.

Hermione raised up her chin, defiantly. "She'd say I'm right, obviously. You could say all my money comes out of a giant bake sale, if you can catch the drift".

"Ten points to Gryffindor, ladies and gentlemen", Harry came to her aid.

"I can work with that", Ginny shrugged before she raised her flute as well. "To Gryffindor!"

Blaise brought a hand to his heart, sighing dramatically. "Oh, my poor wounded heart".

Pansy patted him on the shoulder, sympathetically. "Unluckily, without Theo and Luna to mess with our numbers, it's three of each for the time being".

Everybody's gaze fell on the seventh person in the room.

Draco's daughter was currently napping peacefully in a mini sofa they'd conjured not far from the table and surrounded with a Bubble Charm that was making sure they didn't wake Adhara up with their banter.

Zabini's pout grew deeper as he turned to Draco. "No way she's a snake".

"Or a lion", Pansy added. "There's a limit as to how far an apple can fall from the tree".

"Father would most definitely have a stroke", Malfoy noted. "I can't believe I'm saying it, but perhaps it wouldn't be so bad if she was to become a disciple of Godric".

Quite obviously, his voice was laced with sarcasm. It was just difficult to assign it to its element (the stroke or Gryffindor?), which made the joke all the more funny.

"A child of mine in Slytherin is almost inevitable", Harry mused.

Three pair of Slytherin eyes were suddenly on him.

Ginny and Hermione, who already knew where he was going with that, laughed.

"What makes you think so, Potter?", asked Zabini, sounding genuinely intrigued.

"The Sorting Hat wanted to place me in Slytherin at first", he shared.

It wasn't something he usually liked to think about, to the point he'd kept the detail out of his best-selling autobiography, but the words were coming out of him naturally. Of course good and bad wizards had come out of every one of the four Hogwarts Houses, but any time Salazar's was mentioned the first thing that came to his mind was Voldemort, followed by the Basilisk who'd almost killed his best friend.

"He said I could be great, and that it was all in my head", Harry said, tapping a finger on his temple. "Then I just kept begging the Hat not to put me in there until it actually listened".

By this point a second round of champagne was poured into the glasses for those who wanted it.

Having to go to MagiTech's private clinic as soon as they got to Australia, Draco and Hermione refused.

The witch rose from her seat, graciously sending the dirty dishes and leftovers to the kitchen with a simple gesture of her hand.

The only reason she still used her wand from time to time was that she didn't want potential enemies to be able to calibrate the extent of her powers, but day after day it was becoming increasingly difficult to remember to take it out of her pocket for trivial things that in reality she could accomplish with just a thought.

"I'm going to make sure the PortKey is ready for our departure. Meet me downstairs with your luggage as soon as you're ready", she excused herself.

Picking up her own suitcase, she preceded her friends in the PentHouse's basement, where she was joined by the others barely ten minutes later as she was still checking the PortKey's parameters.

As soon as she was done, she hushed them inside the cabin, where she pressed one last bottom before bracing herself for the trip.

She managed an encouraging smile at Draco, who had his still sleeping daughter inside of a baby sling he kept on his chest, before the magic swallowed them whole.

(Council of Magic, Sydney, Australia;
October 28th, 2003, around 09:10 a.m.)

Wizarding Australia diverged immensely from its British equivalent.

It was subject to the Statute of Secrecy, too, and a few other laws from the International Confederation of Wizards that applied no matter where you were in the world, but that was about it. Anything else was dealt with differently on this side of the planet.

For starters, the edge between Light and Dark magic was way blurrier than it was in England, and attention was placed on intention rather than one's spell of choice. Sometimes, you could be incarcerated for an improper use of Alohomora, but still get away with an Avada if it had been a reasonable case of self-defence.

In the United Kingdom every town with a considerably sized population possessed some sort of magical neighborhood, and though not many of them could rival with Diagon Alley for extent or economic prowess, places where magical beings could go about their lives without ever encountering muggles were scattered pretty much all over the state, smaller islands included.

They followed the Statute with a rigor that was rare elsewhere in the world, still wary because of the witch-hunts who'd decimated the magical population in previous centuries.

Scholars had never managed to discover if muggles were descendants of ancient wizards and witches who'd lost their connection to magic, or if wizards were merely muggles who'd found that connection and distanced themselves from those who didn't.

Australia had never needed to guess about it.

Before the arrival of muggle colonizers in the seventeenth century the indigenous people had lived side by side regardless of what their status was, cooperating and trying to make the most out of what little the land had to offer to them.

There were gifted people, and people who were not.

Nobody really cared as long as everyone was sheltered and had a full belly.

It hadn't been long after James Cook's arrival that things had started to change.

The muggles who started coming to the continent were nothing like the natives, and soon a separation of sorts was needed. The scientific method made many of their costumes or farming techniques inexplicable, and muggles were always afraid of what they couldn't understand.

Even when violence escalated and wizards and witches were killed because of their otherness, the drift between the magical and non magical population wasn't as profound as it had been in other countries.

They simply couldn't picture a separation so neat you couldn't coexist in both worlds.

Wizards had started hiding their magic, confining it to the privacy of their own homes, and the wizarding side of Sydney, one of the biggest magical cities in the world, had been built.

In the following century magical people had started to move to Australia, too, and they'd discovered the existence of the Statute of Secrecy, which had been signed in 1689 and made official three years later, with nobody asking for their consent or opinion.

At first, they tried to fight both the Statute and the Confederation, which, again, they had never given their adherence to, but when the Salem trials happened a couple years later people had surrendered to facts: it was in their best interest to protect their gift.

It was not as if they hadn't stopped practicing magic in public, already.

The regulation of Australian magical transportation came with a set of rules so extensive it was very easy to break one by coincidence.

Apparition points were scarce throughout the country and they required special permission outside of the magical side of Sydney, so the majority of wizards and witches used the Council's PortKey network for their travels.

As impressive as the system had already been five years ago, when Hermione had first moved there, stepping out of her specially reserved Portkey landing point she couldn't help but have her chest filled with pride as she spotted MagiTech's logo pretty much everywhere in the room.

As soon as she'd found a way to stabilize the magic involved in the transits, she'd set out on creating permanent PortKeys, objects that wouldn't de-activate upon using, but who could be reprogrammed from time to time to get the user to different locations.

Pansy and the others followed suit and left the cabin, entering the network's lobby.

As much as the Slytherin witch didn't regret her choice to return to England, she had missed the place who'd took her in and helped her lick her wounds for three years, when she'd finally got rid of her toxic family and the nonsense they stood for.

In Australia she'd felt free for the first time and it was a memory she truly cherished.

She had no sneaky remark for Harry when he placed a hand on the small of her back, drawing her close, and used the other to wipe away a solitary tear from her left cheek.

"The Council of Magic is pleased to welcome you back to Sydney, Mrs. Sallow".

The man who'd talked was around his fifties, short in stature and with a very prominent nose, on top of which was perched a pair of reading spectacles.

He'd been assigned to Hermione's personal Portkey years before, and over time the witch had come to appreciate the dedication he put into his work. His paperwork was punctual and precise and, unlike some of his colleagues, he managed to look professional and not like a gaping fish when dealing with the most influential woman in Australia, wizarding and muggle alike.

Her technology had entered the market and revolutionized it, while the secrecy clauses and consequential silencing and binding spells that every MagiTech employee had to sign up upon being hired had managed to keep her competitors at bay.

There was just so much they could accomplish with their traditional exploitation of magic.

"I'm Lachlan Taylor and I work for the Immigration Office. Welcome to Australia", the short man continued, now addressing the others. "The law requires registration for first time visitors..."

He trailed off, producing a piece of parchment with his wand and glancing down at it.

"If Mr. Malfoy, Mr. Potter, Mrs. Weasley and Mr. Zabini would temporarily consign me their wands, please, it shouldn't take longer than a couple of minutes", Lachlan said, reading their names from the paper. "You're free to wait in the cafeteria, if you wish, Mrs. Parkinson. Your visa has been stamped already".

Pansy nodded at him, but gave no sign of considering the option, standing right by Harry's side as the four newcomers drew out their wand and passed them to Mr. Taylor one at a time, who checked them thoroughly before signing up their information on his roll of parchment.

In the wizarding world, your wand was your identity card.

According to the Council's employee it wasn't required for Adhara to be registered, but he recommended they did just in case. Otherwise, if anything untoward happened, the toddler wasn't going to be able to access the national healthcare system.

Since the one in Sydney was the only entirely magical area in the continent, registrations at the Ministry were transferred, albeit modified to fit the Statute, to the muggle government.

The measure had been endorsed to prevent the magical folk to go about the country and commit crimes where it would have been harder to apprehend them.

For this very reason, every police station in Australia had an undercover and highly trained wizard in its ranks, a figure easily comparable to that of an Auror. Their main purpose was to keep the order while preserving secrecy, and according to the official data the system worked wonderfully.

As soon as Zabini's generalities were written down, Lachlan rolled up the parchment and smiled brightly at the baby cradled in Malfoy's arms. "Now, if this little girl is ready to register".

He seemed to have a soft spot for children.

Having no idea of what documents were, not to mention the meaning of the word registration, Adhara glanced up at her dad to determine whether or not she should accept the hand this very short wizard was offering her.

When Draco nodded, taking a couple of steps towards Mr. Taylor, his daughter elongated her small right arm and observed with fascination as the wizard grabbed her index finger and placed it on the parchment, where strange symbols she vaguely recognized started appearing thanks to her touch.

It was only a couple months since she'd started talking, therefore her reading lessons with Granny Cissa were just at the beginning. She beamed proudly when she distinguished her own name among the other words.

"Adhara Malfoy", she chanted, confidently.

The adults with her showered her with compliments, and by the time they were done Lauchlan Taylor was ready to bis his farewell.

"Everything's gone according to plan", he announced, returning the wands to their owners and vanishing the parchment with another flick of his wand. "I hope you'll have a pleasurable stay. If there's anything you need, the Council of Magic will be glad to help you".

He made a curtsy in their direction, eyes lingering on Hermione.

"As always, it's been a pleasure to serve you, Mrs. Sallow. Ladies, gentlemen".

His final greeting was professional and abrupt, just what they were hoping for, and soon he disappeared around a corner, ready for his next visitors to register.

Only then Draco realized he'd been holding his breath.

Taking Adhara out of her baby sling, he put his daughter on the more than capable hands of Aunt Pansy, who escorted her to the previously mentioned cafeteria to get some ice-cream.

Perhaps it wasn't healthy, considering the child's biological clock was tuned to England and therefore, for all her body knew, it was the middle of the night.

The wizard cleared his throat, uncomfortably. "Oi, Potter".

"Yeah?"

"Why do you think he let us go so quickly?", he asked.

Harry wiggled his eyebrows. "I'm not sure what's the question".

"Well, it's not like my record is immaculate", the blond supplied, lowering his voice so that nobody else could hear him. It was common knowledge, but he still dreaded public scrutiny.

"I have no idea how the law works outside of England", Potter shrugged.

Hermione, who'd been pretended not to listen up until that point, decided it was better if she intervened and squashed his insecurities as they presented themselves.

"They don't know much about the war, here", she explained. "News came late and with little detail. Most people wouldn't even know who Voldemort was. You have nothing to fear, Malfoy".

The Slytherin gritted his teeth, but before he could think of the proper way to tell Granger he wasn't afraid per se, but only of the possibility some crazy Australian Auror would try and do him harm while he was in a foreign country and with his daughter in tow.

She seemed to read his mind. "Nothing will happen. I promise".

"And if something does happen, Malfoy, there are four of us here who will have your back and your child's. Five when Pansy returns from the cafeteria", Harry added.

Uneasy silence fell between the three, who were now feeling a bit more defensive and scrutinizing the space around us, but Blaise and Ginny, who hadn't listened to their conversation, didn't notice.

"What do you suggest we do first?", the red-headed asked, understandably excited.

The last time she'd had a trip for pleasure had been after her first year at Hogwarts, when the Weasleys had traveled to Egypt to visit Bill, who at the time worked there, but in the following summers the family hadn't been able to afford another vacation.

Once Ginny had started making her own (copious) money with the Harpies, training sessions and Quidditch tournaments had prevented her from ever leaving the United Kingdom. Until now.

Technically she'd been to Hermione's island not too long ago, but that hardly counted.

It had been a rescuing mission, not a journey of pleasure.

"Pansy's in charge of the schedule for the first half of the day, which means you'll probably spend most of your time in her favourite boutiques, but knowing you I'd ask her to see the Quidditch Stadium", Hermione suggested. "If Draco's visit doesn't take too long, you can join us around lunch and I'll give you a tour of MagiTech's Headquarters if you want".

Blaise grinned. "I'll definitely be taking advantage of that".

The Slytherin had been following her company practically since day one, gathering information and wishing their products would be sold in England, and it was now a pretty much established fact that he was one of its biggest fans.

"I had no doubts", the witch chuckled. "If I feel generous I may even show you the secret lab".

Pansy returned in that moment.

"There was a bit of a line, but nothing I couldn't overcome by flashing my badge", she said, indicating the stamp pinned to her shirt as she juggled with the baby cradled in her arms, currently intent on slurping on her strawberry ice-cream cone.

Underneath the same logo that was on the Portkeys around them, her name and titles were written in black over the white background: Pansy Parkinson, Head of Public Relations.

Hermione's eyes narrowed, but before she could reprimand her friend an alarm set out on her phone. It was almost time for Draco's appointment with the Healer.

"I'm afraid we'll have to split now", she said. "We'll see you guys later".

The brunette waited patiently as Draco calmed Adhara's fit.

The toddler wanted to stay with her father, and only the mention of a carousel convinced her to give her hand to Uncle Blaise and listen to reason.

From there their paths diverged, and while Draco and Hermione rushed down the hallways to get to the exit, the others walked at a less frantic pace as Pansy started listing their activities for the morning.

An awful amount of shopping seemed to be involved, but nobody could accuse her of having thought just of herself: a visit to the Stadium was already in schedule along with a session of wand-surfing she knew Harry and Blaise were going to absolutely adore.

She hadn't gone as far as to plan lunch, hoping by then they'd be reunited with the rest of the group.

Smiling brightly as she took in the sights of magical Sydney, Pansy's only thought was that an awesome two days were ahead of her. She kissed her boyfriend hard on the mouth.

(Healers of Tomorrow, Sydney, Australia;
October 28th, 2003, around 10:00 a.m.)

As soon as they'd exited the Council and entered the buzzing alley Granger had grabbed him by the hand and dis-apparated them both without any warning, causing the blond to land less gracefully than he would have liked right in the middle of a lobby that wasn't much different from any other hospital he'd ever been to, magical or muggle.

Draco was about to say something about her lack of poise, but the room fell completely silent.

All eyes were on them, or rather on the witch on his side, and the looks they were receiving reminded him of his childhood. Years before Hogwarts, and the war, people used to stare at Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy as if they were practically wizarding royalty every time they showed up in public, and he grimaced at the memory of how powerful and respectable it used to make him feel.

Of one thing was sure. Nobody did that anymore.

Hermione tugged at his hand. "This way", she instructed.

He gave it a light squeeze, following her without questioning.

It was the first time she held his hand outside of the muggle world, and even though he'd never been too fond of the practice, a smug smile made its way to his lips as his chest inflated with something akin to pride.

It wasn't any bloke who got to stake that kind of claim on the woman beside him.

If She found him worth it, then perhaps he wasn't quite the waste of space he sometimes thought he was.

"Good morning, Mrs. Sallow", greeted the man behind the desk, reverently. "What can I do for you today?"

"Good morning to you, Samuel", she replied, leaning forward to read his name on the badge pinned to his chest. "I've scheduled an appointment with Healer Singh".

The secretary nodded, typing something on the keyboard of his computer.

"Yes, yes. Of course", he sputtered. "Mr. Malfoy, complete post trauma check-up...", his eyebrows furrowed, as if it was the first time he read that particular line on his desktop, "...And physiatric inspection. Healer Singh is already waiting for you. Seventh floor, room three".

Draco remained quiet as Hermione — or rather, Victoria, as she was currently impersonating her billionaire alter-ego — confirmed the reservation and was handed a piece of paper with his name and a bar-code printed on it.

Glancing around the spacious room, he noted the plaque on the wall, just above the lifts, where the name of the building, Healers of Tomorrow, was finely engraved in handwriting.

It was the same name she'd given to the private clinic that would open in WizVille after MagiTech's launch party, an alternative to St. Mungo's he felt was much needed.

A biased government was awful enough without throwing a prejudiced hospital in the mix.

Hermione waited for the doors of the lift to close before she turned to him, her hand still hidden in his much bigger one.

"Are you ready?", she asked, softly.

The blond forced a smile. He was a little concerned about the outcome of the examination, now that he thought about it.

"Yeah, sure", he lied. "Just can't wait to be done with this thing and enjoy the rest of my time here".

He paired the line with his trademark saucy wink, but the witch ignored it, too focused on studying his expression to notice.

Just as he thought he couldn't keep up his devil-may-care attitude much longer, Draco was saved by the lift as a Ding! echoed in the small space and the metal screeched when the doors opened.

Once more he followed her silently, eyes fixed on her legs as she confidently strolled down the hallway.

It was currently summer in Australia, as she'd written at least a dozen times in the group-chat that had been created on Mirror for the occasion of their trip, which meant her lovely sundresses were back.

The one she was wearing today was made of a thin material and red, dotted with a flowery pattern; the sleeves were flowy and went down to just above her elbows, while a string of press-on buttons ran from the lowest point of the V-neck to the hem of the skirt.

The fabric hung to her round hips in a way that was driving him crazy, and more than once since he'd looked at her in it, back at the Penthouse, he'd fantasized about taking it off with a single gesture, hopefully with some of the buttons falling on the floor.

They hadn't been intimate for some time, and Draco was as thirsty as a man in the desert.

How could he not?

Granger looked positively edible.

At first he'd been told by the Healer at St. Mungo's to avoid any kind of physical exertion (sex included) for at least two weeks and then they'd been interrupted by their friends the day their trip to Australia had been planned.

Last but not least, the whole Astoria accident had happened, and right after that, even though they had had a time and a place to get down to it, he'd thought better than to try to seduce her.

He'd thought it was crass.

He knew that technically he'd done nothing wrong, considering he'd rejected Astoria immediately and they could barely called what had happened a kiss, but he still felt as if he'd wronged her somehow, and preferred to leave it to Hermione to initiate their next rendezvous.

So here Draco was, with half a boner inside of a hospital.

Attention still captured by the sway of her hips as she walked just a step ahead of him, he was so distracted he almost headbutted the door when she abruptly came to a halt.

She giggled, albeit mockingly. "If you're quite done checking me out, Malfoy..."

Granger released his hand to knock on the door, bringing it to the handle when a female voice invited them in. As it was half on its way down the witch paused and turned to him with a smirk.

"The sooner we're done, the sooner you can get me out of this thing".

Draco had no idea who could hate him to the point of trying to kill him with purpose.

He thought those things to be in his past, locked inside his memories of the war, but apparently he'd been wrong.

Since the end of his parole he'd kept his head down and stood as far from the public eye as it was humanly possible, at least for a Malfoy. It was painfully clear that hadn't been enough.

As much as the blond wanted to be the better person, sit this one out and let justice take its course, deep in his gut he felt he needed to do something. Which he completely intended to do, as soon as Hermione heard back from the guy who was investigating the weird paper for her.

Draco was so feverishly focused on his thoughts he didn't notice the change of scenery around him. He didn't see the white walls of the hospital turn into a full glass window that looked down on Sydney from the highest floor of a skyscraper and ignored the familiar tug at his stomach when she apparated them both inside of her personal office at MagiTech's Headquarters.

But her voice — Salazar, her voice — as her hands locked behind his neck and she tiptoed, despite the heels, so that she could speak directly over his mouth, well, that was a siren's lullaby Draco couldn't have missed even if his life depended on it.

"What do you think?"

"Well, I- I can't believe you saved my life twice in less than a month", he admitted.

It wasn't a lie, but it wasn't the full truth, either. Of one thing he was sure: he didn't want to spoil their first vacation together by letting her in on his plots for vengeance.

He had a feeling she was quite talented in that department and, if he'd gotten to know her as much as he liked to believe he did, probably very prone to it, but it could wait until they got back to London.

Right now there were more pressing matters he needed to give his attention to, like her red sundress and how marvelous she looked inside of it.

He couldn't really remember an instance where she hadn't looked beautiful, besides from their first years at Hogwarts and the war. Not that somebody had managed to look good on the battlefield, anyway.

"I did no such thing", she said, her lips moving so close to his that his own tingled. "Healer Singh did all the work, really".

"But you're the one who trapped me into coming here", he teased, all scorn forgotten about her ploy to get him to Australia today.

Determined not to lose another second, Draco brought his hands to her sides, grabbing her hips to pull her closer as his mouth finally touched hers.

The kiss started slowly, a delicate brush of reconnaisance that branded her flavor in his brain and in the depths of his nervous system. Knowing what she tasted like after a lifetime of wondering, he'd come to realize in the last months, he wasn't sure he could ever let go.

His hands traveled further as the blond bit on her lower lip and used his tongue to soothe the ache, one hand on the small of her back as the other circled her neck from behind, gentle but firm.

With a shaky breath her lips drew apart and that was the only sign he needed for his tongue to start his invasion of her mouth as their eyes fluttered close.

He had a moment of hesitation after realizing her body was now completely sprawled over his own, fearing he'd been too forceful in his attempt at seduction after promising himself he'd let her establish the pace, but upon further inspection it had been Hermione to pull him closer, one hand reaching down to grab his ass as the other disappeared in his hair, tugging gently at its roots.

When their kiss came to an end, it was only for the lack of oxygen.

"Thank you", he felt compelled to say as they stood, forehead to forehead.

Her eyes were glossy, lit by his favourite strain of Granger fire.

"I missed you", was her reply. She gave his ass a squeeze. "And this".

It was about all the overture he needed.

She seemed to have planned their time between the hospital and reuniting with the rest of the group rather meticulously.

His suspicions were confirmed when the side of the glass window that faced the inside of the building magically started to change appearance and from see-through it turned to a privacy-friendly dark grey, as if there was fog trapped inside of it.

He kissed her again, this time allowing his hands to roam more freely.

The sides of her face, her shoulders, arms, hips, mid-rif. Her breasts.

"I missed you, too".

Draco felt predictable, but he couldn't care less.

His hands settled on her exceptionally tempting arse, using it as leverage to lift her up.

The witch crossed her legs behind his back as her mouth looked for his once again.

From his experience Granger wasn't her usual chatty self under certain circumstances — dirty talk hardly qualified as conversation — so he knew it was bound to be good when she pulled back after a good five minutes of obscene grinding.

"Where do you want to do it?"

Draco doubted he was ever going to hear a sweeter question soon, or at least until the next time Hermione decided she wanted to have her wicked way with him.

Without thinking about twice and still holding her up he went for the desk, where he let himself fall into the chair and they promptly resumed their session of dry-humping.

If he was fucking a Queen, then he might as well do it on her throne, shouldn't he?

Immagination running wild — fucking a Queen made him some kind of King, didn't it? — Draco felt her small fingers play with the waist band of his muggle jeans before she pulled off his t-shirt.

Her eyes scanned the entire perimeter of his chest and she released a satisfied sigh before she leaned down and left a trail of wet kisses from the back of his ear to his clavicle and further down, but the blond wasn't happy with just sitting and letting her have all the fun.

Grunting, he finally set out on accomplishing the task which had been tormenting him for hours: getting Granger out of her dress.

Just like he'd imagined, after popping open the first button he just needed to apply a little more pressure in a downward motion for the others to come undone as well.

So here she was, almost naked in all her glorious beauty.

As he'd suspected during his previous exploration, she wasn't wearing a bra.

Come to think about it, she did that a lot. Not that he minded.

His gaze instantly dropped to her bosom, where each of his thumb and index finger started playing with her nipples as his hands gently cupped her breasts.

It was familiar how they sat on his palms, he'd memorized them to perfection by now, but that didn't make it any less exciting. Sex with Granger was like nothing else he'd done in his life: he learned something different about her body and, surprisingly, himself, every single time they did it.

She whimpered in his mouth when his hands migrated south, leaving her chest for the time being and reaching down to stroke the outer sides of her thighs.

Draco particularly loved her legs. Despite her not-so-impressive height — without heels on, her forehead barely reached his shoulders — they were long and chiseled, toned but very soft to the touch.

"You're so beautiful", he managed to voice his appraisal in between kisses, cherishing the way she looked at him in the eyes from behind her long lashes, a delightful blush spreading all over the surface of her cheeks. "And I'm so lucky".

For someone used to the public attention, and to see her face plastered all over magazines on a daily basis, Hermione always looked embarrassed upon receiving a compliment, which in turn only made him want to give her more.

"Mmh", she acknowledged his previous statement.

Her eyes roamed appreciatively over his bare chest, the tip of one finger tracing an invisible line around the contours of his abs. Draco knew she had a particular fascination with them, it was the main reason sit-ups were the only part of his work-out routine he'd already resumed since the accident.

"Yeah, lucky", she repeated, and then her hand traveled further down, to stroke his manhood from above his jeans. "I think I know what you mean".

Her cheeky grin was rapidly covered by his mouth as he leaned in for another feverish kiss.

If possible, his dick grew harder upon receiving the compliment, blissfully happy in the hands of what the thing now simply considered his mistress, no questions asked.

Technically speaking, Draco knew he was well-endowed, but to hear it from her usually played quite the number on his self-esteem, and today it was no exception.

Her hands worked with the single button of his jeans and undid his zip, while she retreated just a little on his lap so that she could more comfortably carry on with her ministrations.

Only a layer of fabric now separated her from the pulsing center of his arousal as her lips connected with his neck once more, kissing and biting and sucking the tender skin just above his clavicle.

For a moment he thought he'd died, for that certainly felt like heaven.

The blond felt exceptionally cold when Hermione abruptly stood up, but only to feel the temperature raise once more as her hands went to her hips and, with expert tardiness, she grabbed the elastic waistband and pulled her lacy knickers down her legs.

In passing, Draco duly noted they were a remarkable shade of Slytherin green.

Promptly he reached out to her, sitting a little straighter on the office chair as he set out on touching her in the most intimate nook of her body.

A single stroke of a finger was enough to tell him she was wet. Indisputably so.

His index finger was joined by another as he started producing small circles over her clitoris, but Granger shushed his hand away and leaned on, grabbing the frontal belt loops of his jeans and tugging them down. He helped by bucking his hips towards the ceiling and, consequentially, her.

"We don't have time for that", she announced, her voice lower and huskier than it usually was.

Her eyes were shining with something he couldn't quite understand, but her body language screamed of urgency as she removed the last barrier between them and got him out of his boxers, which joined his trousers in the pool at his feet.

She covered the small distance between them and took his hands in her own, leading them to her breasts.

"I want you, now", she added, coyly.

"I'm yours. By all means, do with me as you please", was all the reply he managed to vocalize, followed by a "Fuck, Granger" he couldn't stop when she did exactly as he'd required.

Climbing back on top of his lap and helping herself with a hand to align his cock to her entrance, she slid down the length of his shaft as her arms hugged each side of his neck, stretching herself inside out.

It was blissfully warm and tight in there. He'd missed it with a passion.

"Fuck me", she countered. She bucked her hips up and down a couple times, using her knees as leverage, but then she paused to flash him a cocky smile. "Though, technically, I'm the one who's fucking you, Malfoy".

Draco fumbled for a witty reply, but came up empty-handed when she resumed her motion and, straightening her spine, she used her grip on the back of his head to demand another kiss.

For once, he really didn't care if she got the last word.

At first, Hermione made love to him with an excruciatingly slow pace, kissing and licking every inch of skin she could reach, her open dress fluttering behind her like an halo, and for some time he really let her do as she pleased, taking what she wanted the way she wanted it, his hands merely a light presence on her hips as she staked her claim over him, supporting but not demanding.

Soon enough his own body revolted against his chivalry, hips moving to meet her halfway as he grabbed her hair and lightly pulled at them to expose her throat, where he sent his mouth to feast.

Her rhythm hastened when his tongue ran across her collarbone and down her sternum just before it reached the erect mountain peak of her left breast, which, according to his theory, was for some unspecified reason way more sensitive than the other.

Deciding to be fair and just, he set his hand on taking care of her other nipple, pinching it with just the right amount of pressure that was usually needed to undo her.

The woman's eyes were shut, lips slightly parted as small breaths frantically escaped from her mouth, but Draco couldn't bring himself to close his own.

Granger riding him was a sight to behold, and he carefully stored every detail in his mind for a later use. There were no doubts he was going to think of this moment the next time he touched himself.

Their current position didn't allow for yet another increase in speed, so she removed her arms from the sides of his neck to place her hands on the edge of the desk behind her, using it as leverage as her gasps for hair became shorter and more quickly paced, in a mixture of moans — "Draco", she would chant from time to time, as if his name tasted particularly sweet on her tongue — and orders — faster, harder, more.

By this point she didn't need to voice her commands for him to comply, and clasping her hips he put the muscles of his back and thighs to good use as he fucked her deeper from the new angle.

Draco's eyes fluttered close, heart pounding in his chest as the familiar tingling started diffusing in his groin and from there spread to the base of his spine.

Every pound of flesh in his body was working towards the same glorious purpose — orgasm — but Draco Malfoy was nothing if not a gentleman, and he was going to make sure Granger got to the finish line before he did.

It didn't matter how much his balls were screaming it was impossible.

The wizard was ready to focus on pretty much every silly, disgusting thing he could think of to delay the unavoidable, like great-aunt Hydra Black's gigantic and protruding birthmark on the chin, but luckily for him her moans became louder and grew in frequency, and he didn't need to resort to such drastic measures as he felt her whole body tensing, her insides clenching around his shaft.

Hermione rode away her climax, knuckles white because of her grip on the wooden desk.

It didn't take more than a couple of thrusts for the tingling sensation to turn into a raging fire, and his eyes fell shut once more when he felt all the pressure he'd accumulated in his manly parts gradually disappear as a jolt of satisfaction ran through his entire body, relaxing all his muscles at once.

Draco was short of a breath when she placed a kiss on his lips that was slower and sweeter, brushing her naked chest against his own as she hugged him tightly and welcomed inside of her body the undeniable proof of his orgasm, their bodily fluids mixed together as they leaked from her core to his thighs.

Her tongue in his mouth was the only reason he kept silent.

I love you — he felt the urge to scream.

Just as he thought that perhaps this was the best occasion he was ever going to get to come clean about his feelings for her, the unmistakable sound of the doors of a lift opening echoed from the other side of the hallway, followed by different voices.

"I've already told you, Mrs. Parkinson. Victoria didn't come in this morning. We aren't expecting her before the tenth of November".

Whatever moment Draco thought they could have, it was gone now.

Hermione raised her hips and relinquished her hold on him, climbing down his lap as she furiously started buttoning up her dress. In her haste, she failed to notice she'd missed some.

"And I have told you, Dianne, that I know for a fact she is in her office", the blond heard Pansy say as he pulled up his boxers and jeans and set out searching for his shirt.

Once he found it, trapped beneath the chair, Draco wore it again and helped the witch re-do her buttons as the steps got closer and closer.

The glass window returned normal and she tied her hair up on a messy bun, scolding him for making such a mess of it.

"It looks better when it's wild", he confessed, winking at her.

Pansy and her party of five turned the corner just moments later, and even from afar Draco could see her victorious smirk as she indicated the office and turned to a middle-aged woman with dark hair, presumably Dianne.

"Told you", she chirped. "Goodbye, Dianne", she greeted, dismissively, but the witch he would later discover to be Hermione's personal secretary didn't budge.

"We weren't expecting you today, Ms. Sallow", she apologized, cornered between a rock and a hard place.

From what Draco knew Pansy was pretty high in MagiTech's power chain, though she wasn't the boss.

"Mrs. Parkinson insisted she was to meet you up here along with these... guests".

Blaise and Ginny waved their hands at her, unfazed by their friend's antics, while Harry looked totally uncomfortable as he held a sleeping Adhara in his arms.

Why of all people he was the one carrying his child, Draco was dying to know.

Somewhere behind him, pretending to look for something in the bookshelf, Hermione cleared her throat.

"It's fine, Dianne", she said. "They're some of our friends from England. I'm sorry I forgot to give you a heads up, but we'll be touring the Headquarters before lunch. I just needed something from my office first. Here we go, finally".

The witch raised a small envelope with a winning smile, as if she'd just spent the last thirty minutes searching the room for it and had just found something of the utmost importance.

"Of course", Dianne replied, forcing a laugh. "I'll be at my desk if you need me".

With that she turned on her kitten heels and left the room without bothering to say goodbye to anyone else, humming a tone as she awkwardly walked the distance to the lift.

Potter didn't lose time and placed the sleeping child in Draco's arms.

"She drifted off somewhere between brunch and our time at the beach", he told him. "She seemed very tired, so we thought it was best to just let her rest".

"I can't say I'm surprised", Draco admitted. "The trip messed up her whole schedule. Salazar knows she can be a bit of a handful when she doesn't get her sleep".

He raised his eyes from Adhara's sleeping form to meet Hermione's smile.

"Let's start our tour, then. Shall we?"

(Ministry of Magic — Whitehall, London, England;
October 28th, 2003, around 10:00 a.m.)

Theo Nott smiled at the screen of his telephone as he walked the distance between the Wizengamot's office and the atrium, truly engrossed in the absurd selfies he was receiving from the other side of the planet.

Being eleven hours ahead, Hermione, Draco and the others were already finished with their dinner and on their way to a muggle club.

There was a picture of Blaise and Draco splashing in a fountain fully clothed, another of Potter drinking beer from a glass bigger than his face, one more of his sister, Pansy and Ginny posing in front of a lavish building he remembered from his trip to Australia earlier that year.

His friends looked as if they were having a lot of fun, not to mention positively sloshed, and the young wizard really wished he could have joined them on their improvised trip.

His interview with the Warlocks hadn't been to bad after the initial awkwardness as they questioned his opinion about his late father's involvement in the war, and Theodore had managed to work his Nott charms on them and grant himself a second meeting with the board.

Re-claiming ownership of a Wizengamot seat was proving trickier than he'd imagined.

Many of the families who'd founded the magical court had been kicked out of it because of their involvement with Voldemort, even more so when the threat had been vanquished the second time, which for Theo meant the people he had to convince were not many, but none of them matched his background.

The Purebloods there were now a minority and seemed to be doing anything in their power to appear as muggle-loving as they could, although he had suspicion their behaviour was being dictated by their survival instinct rather than their good hearts or stainless souls.

Many of those wizards and witches he remembered from his childhood, from when they rubbed shoulders with people like his father or Lucius Malfoy and supported blood supremacy, and not a single one of them had bothered fighting against the Dark Lord or supporting the Order of the Phoenix.

There were some exceptions, of course, like his uncle Euriphides, but overall the Wizengamot seemed a highly hypocritical farce rather than the paramount of justice it was supposed to be.

However, rather than throwing him off, this awareness had sparked something inside of him that he knew he couldn't put to sleep without some serious effort: now that he knew just how botched things were, Theodore Nott felt the inexplicable need to make it better.

He'd dreamed about getting his hands on the family seat ever since he'd been a little child and his formal lessons on how to be a proper Lord and Head of House had started, but when Cantankerus had died and left it vacant, his natural reaction had been to refuse it.

Not only he didn't think his name could ever recover from the social and political disgrace his father had brought upon it, for the first time in his life the Slytherin had also felt as if he was unworthy.

Knowing his twin sister had posed as Hermione Granger, Muggleborn extraordinaire, had been a huge blow on his self-esteem: he had fought against the dark side in the war, that was true, but nothing of what he'd done — as the muggles said, too little too late — could possibly compare to what Eloise had managed to accomplish.

She was way more deserving of the privilege than he was, so Theo had acted accordingly, never filing in his request until at some point, with all of his time and energies focused entirely on finding her, he'd forgotten about it.

Until she'd brought it up over dinner last week.

He'd tried to convince his sister that she was the one who should take the Nott seat, but she'd waved his protests away one by one, and in the end he'd found himself removing the dust from his childhood dream.

A large crowd was standing in the Ministry's atrium when he finally turned the last corner and reached the room, but it was only upon further inspection that he noticed the floating quills and the magical cameras, tell-tale signs of their identity.

Press conference, then — he thought.

His phone vibrated in the chest pocket of his muggle suit once more, temporarily averting his attention from the scene unfolding in front of his blue eyes.

This last picture portrayed the entire group sitting around a giant hookah and he stared at the happy expression they were sporting until the familiar voice of the wizard who'd just took the small, improvised stage echoed through the air with the help of a Sonorus charm.

It had been years since the last time he'd heard it and instantly his mind drifted back to his time in Hogwarts, to locker-room shenanigans and the smell of the grass in the Quidditch pitch.

The Flint family was one of the few who had avoided the wrath of the Ministry at the end of war, mostly because they'd funded Voldemort's cause but never took the Mark, nonetheless it still felt a bit odd to see Marcus on stage, speaking to the reporters.

From what he knew they weren't doing too well nowadays, what with the heir to their fortune being still celibate and their other son a mere Quidditch player, and Theo's curiosity was instantly picked.

He wondered what the press conference could possibly be about.

"I thank you for your time, ladies and gentlemen", said Marcus to the press. "I'll be brief, as there are more important things that require my attention today. That is, celebrating".

The Slytherin had been famous for having a brilliant way with words, so it didn't really surprised him when from his strategic position at the outskirts of the crowd Theo saw reporters from the main papers hanging to his every word.

"As it is, I'm officially no longer a scion of House Flint. I've just come out of the Office for the Preservation of Magical Ancestry, where the papers that'll cut all my ties to my birth family are being finalized. For too long I've allowed my parents and what they deem as...", Flint paused, dramatically. "...Proper to dictate my life. Today, I finally said no more".

Nott didn't know how to feel rather than, well, confused.

It was usually the only way around, with parents disowning their children for whatever piece of bullshit they found unforgivable in their offspring.

There were hundreds of cases in the records of the Sacred Twenty-Eight where heirs had been repudiated by their elders, but not one of someone voluntarily giving up on their family name — not with the privilege it usually entailed.

Last time he'd checked Marcus hadn't seemed much of the revolutionary type, but then again Theo had never paid much attention to him, or to his Slytherin peers who didn't directly belong to his inner circle of friends.

They'd played Quidditch together and attended the same upper-class parties in their youth, but that was about it.

He'd always thought of Marcus as a casual acquaintance rather than a friend, and for the first time the Nott heir found himself interested in the whereabouts of his existence.

Perhaps there was more to Flint than he'd always believed.

"Lord Flint didn't take it too well when I turned down the last witch he proposed as my future bride. He was downright infuriated when I told him that he'll never see me marry any woman".

Journalists from serious papers retracted at that, annoyed they'd wasted their precious time on something as trivial as gossip, while reporters from less distinct magazines came forward and started throwing questions in rapid succession.

"You don't believe in marriage, Mr. Flint?", asked someone from the first row.

"Who was this girl? Surely she can't be that ugly", sniffed Rita Skeeter in her acid green robes.

"Are you implying that you like wizards, Mr. Flint?"

Theo recognized the last one as an employee from WitchWeekly.

Aiden Kelpis was one of the first people he'd hired upon being gifted with the newspaper by his sister, and he was a young wizard of muggle heritage who'd graduated from Hogwarts at the beginning of the summer.

He was born and raised in London, with fair skin and a slender frame.

He'd been the founder and president of the first LGBT+ student association in the history of the magical school. Attached to his application, a letter from the Headmistress herself had convinced him to give a chance to the young reporter, and so far he hadn't been disappointed once.

His articles were witty, tackling social issues from a fresh perspective, and though he sometimes got a bit carried away by his personal opinions, what he wrote was better than any other rubbish the senior reporters at WitchWeekly served to their affectionate readers.

The crowd braced itself for Marcus reply, Theodore included.

Flint laughed. "I was about to circle around it a little more, Mr?"

"Kelpis, sir. Aiden Kelpis. I'm here with WitchWeekly", the reporter flashed his badge.

"Well, Mr. Kelpis, it appears you are right", Marcus told him before he turned his attention back to the rest of the press. "As if I'm interested in pursuing a romantic relationship only with other males, it's unlikely I'll ever provide House Flint with a heir befitting to their standards. A Pureblood child, that is".

Quills scrabbled furiously over the pieces of parchment.

Theo's attention was drawn to the smirk on the wizard's face. It looked as if Marcus was enjoying it immensely, and he couldn't not sympathize: he knew what it felt to grow up in an ancient family who couldn't care less about your personal well-being; he'd seen with his own eyes Pansy being kicked out of her house, stripped of her titles and money, running away to the other side of the world as year after year Daphne had died a little more on the inside, crippled by her desire to live up to her status until at one point it had been the only thing she had.