Protector

24th December, 1996

Hermione looked at herself again in the mirror of the dormitory, she wondered again about how she had landed herself into this situation? She had to make Ron jealous, yes. But was this really worth it? She would have to endure an entire evening with McLaggen. Draco had told her that this was not a good idea, but she had paid no mind.

She looked at Crookshanks' sleeping form for once, grabbed her clutch purse, and made her way down towards the common room. Before reaching the end of the staircase, she held her breath and peeked from behind the wall.

Ron was sitting on the couch with 'Lav-Lav' and was muttering nonsense to each other. She exhaled and started walking briskly towards the hole. From the corner of her eye, she saw that Ron had paid no mind to her. Great, he was already ignoring her. She thought about what would be his reaction when she would come back with Mclaggen after the party and smirked, a habit she had learned from Draco. Thinking of Draco, she thought what would be his reaction? He was already a bit aggravated when she had told him that she would take McLaggen to the party.

When she saw Mclaggen, she knew that his aggravation was not futile. McLaggen was wearing a deep crimson-colored suit and was smiling a bit stupidly at her. He came to her and took her palm. He then placed a breathy and wet kiss on it. She felt incredibly uncomfortable and took her palm back from his grasp. He stood up again and smiled at her again.

"Hermione," He said, "You look beautiful tonight, you also seem to have behaved your hair, they are incredibly frizzy sometimes, you know. We will look really good together," he said, grinning stupidly at her. He was watching her hungrily again.

Hermione was fuming but managed to keep herself under control. "Thank you, McL-Cormac, I used a smoothening potion for them, I think we should get going now." She smiled at him in false sweetness.

He nodded and Hermione looked back at Ron, who was being straddled by Lavender. Her idea was indead futile. They began walking toward the professor's office. Their walk was filled with McLaggen talking abou himself, quidditch, school quidditch, quidditch outside school, brooms, his suit, hair, meeting with the minister, and other things that Hermione never found interesting.

When they reached the party, she immediately spotted Harry and Luna. She walked over to them briskly and unfortunately, McLaggen followed her too.

"Hello, Harry, Luna, your...dress looks amazing." She smiled brightly to make the girl feel good.

"Hello, Potter! glad to see you!" He said and shook Harry's hand. He then rather hardly grabbed Hermione's waist."This party is good, but its nothing like the party I went to last summer, It was fabulous. I will tell you about it later." He completely Luna and this along with his groping of Hermione didn't go unnoticed to Harry. He went from warm to nonchalant in a few moments.

"Dear, can I bring you a drink?" Mclaggen asked, Hermione was currently looking around, searching for exactly what? she didn't know and came back to her senses "Wha-yes, a butterbeer would be nice." She said.

As McLaggen went to take their drinks, Hermione moved to Harry, "Save me, He is worse than expected, wait, is there an exit through the back? I could really get out of here. If I talk to him again, I might get a strain." She pleaded.

"Relax, He isn't that bad," Harry said. Hermione glared at him.

"Okay, maybe He is. Just stay with us, and Luna can tell us more about Snorkacks and Nargles." He said looking at her.

"I think I should go and ask Sanguini if he is allergic to cats," Luna said. She was staring into space.

A loud thud made them whip their heads around. They saw that a crowd of people circling someone near the bar. They walked over to them and peeked from behind the shoulders.

McLaggen was sprawled on the floor, three bottles of butterbeer were broken and spilled around him. Hermione looked around for his sudden fall and saw that Draco was leaning on the counter relaxed, sipping firewhiskey, and had an amused look on his face.

"I-I am fine, no, no I will stand up, thank you," McLaggen said as he stood up. He threw a one-way glance at Draco and began walking towards them.

"Mclaggen, I think you should sit down," Harry said.

"But drinks?" Mclaggen said.

"I will get them," Hermione said, as she had a sudden urge to go to Draco.

She walked over to the bar and Draco was smirking at her, "I see that you are enjoying your date, Hermione." He said. Hermione glared at him and then at his half-filled glass.

"What is this?" She asked.

"Firewhiskey with butterbeer." He said. Hermione snatched the glass and smelled it once, "I don't think you should-" But Hermione had already drained it.

"This is probably the worst date of my life. Can you get me out of here?" He nodded and was about to take her when McLaggen reached them.

"What's taking you so long?" He said.

"Nothing," She said. Mclaggen shook his head and snatched three bottles from the counter and started walking back to their table, with Hermione in tow. She looked back at the counter and saw that Draco had disappeared. She sighed in resignation. When she reached the table, she gave her butterbeer to Luna, feeling that she would throw up.

The rest of the party was spent with Harry and McLaggen talking about Quidditch, Luna staring into oblivion, and Hermione being silent. She could see that Harry was also getting tired of McLaggen.

The party slowly began to die down and the guests started leaving. Hermione tried to show McLaggen that she was getting tired and wanted to leave, but McLaggen wasn't minding, he wanted to talk to every ministry official and quidditch player at the party. By the time they left, they were the last once to leave. Harry was already escorting Luna to the Ravenclaw common room.

When they were finally outside the office, McLaggen started talking again and she started thinking about her schoolwork and other things. She was so lost in self-rewarding her potions essay, that she didn't notice where they were going. It was one of the corridors that she had never seen.

"Where are we going, Cormac?" She said.

"Oh, this is a long way, and I wanted to show you something." He replied.

She felt slightly cold and shuddered in her sleeveless dress. McLaggen noticed this and draped an arm around her roughly. Hermione immediately squirmed away from him.

He stopped abruptly and looked around. He then walked up to her and pinned her to the wall.

"What-" She was stopped when he kissed her roughly. She tried to kick him, but he was too strong. She felt his hands on the straps of her dress above her shoulders, as he was about to bring it down. Hermione's eyes widened in fear and she started crying but couldn't scream, his mouth was blocking her's.

And then he stopped, and there was a loud thud. Hermione finally opened her eyes to see that McLaggen was lying on the floor, stunned. She looked around and saw Draco standing a few feet away from her, wand outstretched, his face contorted in disgust and fury.

He looked up at her and his expressions seem to soften. Hermione leaned against the wall and started crying. She felt two strong arms around her body and felt incredibly warm on being drawn into them. She let her head fall onto Draco's chest, as she ruined his shirt with her tears.

"It's alright, Hermione, you are safe." He breathed into her hair.

"Are you hurt?" He asked,

"No, just," and then anger and disgust replaced her tears as she backed away from Draco, walked over to where McLaggen was lying, and summoned her wand from her purse. Draco was impressed at her use of wandless magic and then was horrified for what she was about to do next.

"Hermione, you should-" He tried to stop her, but she glared at him through tear-filled eyes. She pointed her wand at McLaggen and muttered, "Renervate."

Mclaggen groggily opened his eyes. "Hermione, I-" He was stopped as Hermione kicked him in his crotch, hard.

"You filthy pervert!" She shrieked, as she slapped him across his face, broke his nose, and then body-binded him. She turned his hair pink and his suit into a floral tutu.

She then turned her head towards Draco, who was staring at her in shock.

"Remind me to never piss you off. What would you do with him now?" He said.

"Let Filch find him," She said with an evil grin.

"Well, with that settled," He said, looking around, "Do you have any idea where you are?"

"No, and what are you doing here?" she asked in curiosity.

He smirked, "This is the way to Slytherin common room, love. and I was coming back from a meeting with Snape."

"Oh, now, how do I get out of here?" She asked.

"Follow me." He said.

When they were out of the dungeons, she felt the cold wind again and shrugged. Draco noticed this, as he took off his coat and draped it around her shoulders.

"That's two coats now." He said. And Hermione laughed.

After some more time of walking and a bit of talking, they were standing in front of the Fat Lady. She was eyeing them suspiciously.

"Thank you Draco, I was too shocked to say that." She bit her lip. She did that too much these days, and it was somehow very arousing to Draco, how her teeth grazed her plump, pink lower lip. Only if he could do that for her,

He shrugged at that thought and then stammered, "Y-you are welcome, Hermione," He smiled, "and I must say, Granger, you have a terrible taste in men." He said and she laughed again.

Then they locked eyes again. Very reminiscent of how they did exactly two years ago. They saw a myriad of emotions in each other's eyes, anguish, care, sadness, anger, an awful lot of security.

Hermione made her move first, she gently placed her palm over his right cheek and leaned forward with her lips, but instead of his lips, she felt his palm covering her mouth.

He gently placed his forehead upon hers and quietly said, "I am sorry Hermione, but you know we cannot be what you want us to be, whatever we have between us is unexplainable but beautiful, and I can't afford to destroy it. Please,"

She closed her eyes and nodded. They shared another embrace and then broke away.

"Good night then," Draco said with a rueful smile, which she returned,

"Good night and Merry Christmas." She smiled again. He nodded and walked down the corridor.

She looked at Fat Lady, who also had tears in her eyes. "You know, lass, I think that lad cares a lot about you."

Hermione wiped her eyes, nodded, muttered the password, and entered. Boys were just too hard for her to get.