October

If Astoria's wedding had anything going for it, the seating arrangement at the reception was probably Draco's favorite part. Too often, society weddings liked to place entire families together, making for a boring, isolated experience for any young person wanting to escape their parents' clutches and indulge in a little too much expensive, complimentary wine. Not that Draco would have had a problem if that sort of seating arrangement had been enforced; his parents were not in attendance.

As it stood, Astoria had curated tables of acquaintances, placing Draco and Hermione with Theo, Blaise, Pansy, and Pansy's date: a rather tall, dark, dour looking fellow whose name Draco remembered long enough to repeat back to him in greeting and immediately purge from his memory.

Draco relaxed against his chair, pleasantly full from a delicious meal. He let his arm drape across the back of Hermione's chair, fingers grazing her back, shoulders, and arms ever-so-casually, every-so-often. He felt her tense and shiver each time. It was her own fault, though, wearing a beautiful silver gown that nearly robbed him of the ability to process complex thought.

She twisted in her seat beside him, hand pressing against her ribs.

"Uncomfortable?" he asked, dipping his head to deliver the words quietly, to her alone.

"It's very snug."

"I know I've said it—"

"—several—"

"—yes, several times. But you look gorgeous."

"That's all fine and well. But, it's definitely too tight at my waist. I told Pansy I wasn't interested in spending a fortune on a new wardrobe so she keeps having her own pieces tailored for me."

"Come to think of it, that does look like something Pans would wear."

"I've informed her of my measurements on more than one occasion and yet, they keep coming to me just a touch more snug than I would prefer."

A smile stole his expression, followed by a small laugh. "How very Slytherin of her. I do imagine the difference is by design."

Hermione shot him a severely unamused frown. "Well. It's unpleasantly tight."

"I don't want you to be uncomfortable," he said, truly meaning it.

"But? It sounded like there was meant to be a but there." She settled the angle of her head and jaw into a demanding sort of tilt.

Honesty gushed out of him on low, appreciative breath. "You look extraordinary."

She rolled her eyes. "Do you know she told me what undergarments to wear as well? You should see what I have on under this." She sipped her wine such that Draco almost missed the devious little smirk pulling at the corners of her mouth.

He leaned closer, just brushing against her ear. "I plan to. Perhaps you have, too. Is it in that blasted planner of yours? Show Draco the scandalous lingerie Pansy made me wear?"

This time, he saw her smirk break over the rim of her wine glass as she held his gaze: a challenge, confirmation, or perhaps a suggestion that he might soon find out for himself.

From Hermione's other side, Pansy interrupted.

"Quit flirting, you two, we have things to discuss. We're in agreement, yes? An autumn wedding: entirely unfavorable."

Hermione put her glass down, angling her body into a neutral position facing the table. Draco hadn't even noticed she'd turned to him, giving him her undivided attention. Pansy continued, unrepentant in her interruption.

"You'd prefer something spring or summer, yes Granger?"

The blush bloomed almost instantaneously, springtime in her skin to match Pansy's suggestion.

They hadn't talked much about their plans. It had only been a couple of weeks, after all. And that scant time had felt like something of a dream: happy conversations with their friends, with her family, informing those most important to them that they were officially engaged. But they hadn't gotten anywhere close to picking dates. Hadn't considered any concrete plans.

"I don't know yet, Pansy. Draco and I haven't—"

"Oh no, who cares what Draco thinks. Your wedding is about you. And you agree, don't you? That an autumn wedding is just—not ideal unless you're on a timeline." She arched a brow, gaze drifting from Hermione, to Draco, and back again. "For example, if you're expecting. You're not expecting, are you, Granger?"

Draco watched that fine blush creep further up the side of Hermione's neck.

"What? No—Pansy. I'm literally drinking wine right in front of you."

Pansy just shrugged.

"So that's a no?" This time, Pansy's gaze darted to Hermione's stomach. "The dress is fitting rather tight."

"Yes, because you keep ignoring my actual measurements." Hermione's voice creeped higher, pitching enough that Theo and Blaise looked up from their conversation across the table. Hermione took a deep breath. "No Pansy, I am not pregnant." The straightforward clarity of such a statement seemed necessary, Draco agreed. Pansy could twist even the slightest misunderstanding or omissions into much, much larger things. "Furthermore," Hermione went on. "I think you're all being rather presumptuous about Astoria."

Pansy snorted, undignified, and exactly one of the reasons why Draco liked her so much. "Granger, have you looked at Astoria's dress? That empire waistline? She is definitely pregnant."

Hermione shook her head, exhaling as she reached for her wine again. Pansy did tend to instill a want for libations.

"Let's start with flowers," Pansy said. "If we want them fresh—which, of course, we do—it'll help pin down our preferred seasonality or the wedding. What are your favorites?"

Despite the wine glass, heavily tilted as Hermione sipped—gulped?—Draco still saw her increasing stress under Pansy's interrogation. He might have helped, cut in or redirected the conversation, had Astoria not tapped him on the shoulder at that same moment, asking if he could walk with her.

He rose from his seat, offering an apologetic look to Hermione. Though, he didn't feel too bad about leaving her in Pansy's clutches. After all, Hermione delivered him to Potter and Weasley and then abandoned him there not so long ago. If anything, this was a fair bit of retribution. He hid his smirk with a kiss to her cheek before he departed, offering an arm to the woman he'd once been contracted to marry.

Astoria recommended the gardens, a slow walk as he escorted her through the blooming irises, lilies, and delphiniums. Strangely, he'd never been more comfortable in her presence.

"I wanted to thank you," she said, bringing them to a stop amidst the chrysanthemums. Draco assumed he was meant to say something, anything in response, but found his words lacking. "I was going to go through with it," she continued. "I was hoping you'd love me one day. Maybe you could have, too. But—this is better. Much better."

"I should be thanking you," Draco said, finding his words in the form of true, bone-deep gratitude. "Whatever you said to your father—he was the one who cancelled the contract. Lucius would have forced us to marry whether we wanted to or not."

"I know. I upset my parents quite a lot by refusing to invite them—your parents, that is." She reached to the back of her head, smoothing her perfect, dark hair. Such an action had once felt so cold, so forced to him. It didn't bring the same bother it once had, not now. "I've obviously heard about the disinheritance and, well, I thought I owed you a thanks and an invitation much more than I did them."

"I'm sorry you've upset your parents for me." And for the first time, Draco experienced the tiniest blip of understanding, an infinitesimal fraction of what Hermione must have felt, watching his relationship with his parents disintegrate, in large part, over her.

Astoria laughed. It wasn't a titter, but something truly, genuinely amused: teeth gleaming, eyes sparkling. She should always laugh like that. She should lock up that society laugh of hers and never let it see the light of day again. This laugh was so, so much better.

"It's alright," she said. She placed a hand at the seam of her dress beneath the bust, running it down the front and smoothing the fabric to reveal a small, but noticeable bump. "In the grand scheme of things, it was one of the smaller issues they had to come to terms with."

Draco smiled. "I had assumed. Congratulations."

"I'm sure most have. And thank you."

"You're happy?" He couldn't explain why, but it felt so undeniably important to him that she was.

"I am. And you?"

"I am."

"We might have done alright together," she said. "But I'm so glad we got to choose."

Draco smiled again, an unexpected tension unwinding from the center of his chest. "Me too."

"And honestly, I'm thrilled I don't have to name my children after constellations. Something simple, I think." She held her hand to her stomach a moment longer, presumably lost in a future that blessedly did not involve him.

Hermione found them a few minutes later. She made several apologies for interrupting, which Astoria brushed off with charm and grace and unexpected warmth before she returned to her wedding festivities. Draco offered Hermione his arm, walking her through the autumnal blooms, feeling her considerable stress melt with each step. Her grip on his arm, little pinpricks of pointed fingertips, eased as they walked.

"Interested in a repeat of the last time we were in a garden at a wedding?" he asked, memories of Harry Potter's wedding and the Burrow's herb garden surfacing inside his head. For a moment, he swore he smelled rosemary, a hint of sage.

Hermione smiled beside him. "I hadn't considered it, but I can't say I'd be opposed. It was a spectacular kiss, after all."

"It was perfect."

Her tension eased more. He led her to a stone bench where they could sit, relax, chat with each other in privacy. Only the faint sound of strings playing beyond the gardens accompanied them.

"Are you alright?" Draco asked as she twisted her fingers together, popping a knuckle.

"Pansy might have overloaded me."

Draco's throaty laugh might not have been entirely appropriate—or helpful—but it burst from him regardless.

"She does that," he said.

"Questions about flowers and color palettes and fabric preferences and music and location and size and menu—"

"Breathe, love." He pulled her hands into his, lifting them to his lips. "Pansy is used to a certain—type of wedding. And she's inexplicably invested in, and excited about, ours."

"Ours," Hermione repeated. She let out a long breath, letting her shoulders and chest and lungs collapse, ridding herself of the bad air that seemed to plague her.

"Weddings like what Pansy is used to—well, they are quite a lot. And they take a long time to plan. I'm sure she has a litany of observations about how thrown together this one is."

"Thrown together? Draco, this is the most beautiful wedding I've ever been to."

"I'm sure Astoria would be very pleased to hear that. But I'm certain it's not passed muster in Pansy's eyes."

She shook her head, as if dislodging the absurdity of such a thing from her loose curls, worn half-up, half-down, entirely beautiful.

"We don't have to figure any of this out now," he said, still holding her hand. His thumb brushed over her ring, still unused to having it there when he traced her fingers with his. "We can take however much time we'd like."

Hermione smiled, offering no further comment. Instead, she leaned in, taking a kiss from him. And it was so lovely, he forgot about all the rest.

"Granger, I'm impressed. A silk blouse? A skirt that wouldn't pass the Ministry's dress regulations? Not bad."

Pansy said she was impressed, but only sounded tepidly committed to such a sentiment, arms crossing as she offered her assessment of Hermione's outfit.

"You picked it out yourself?" she asked. "You didn't let Draco help, did you?"

The annoyed scoff that erupted from Hermione's throat amused Draco nearly as much as it surprised him.

"I'm not completely hapless, you know. I do have taste. I just don't often care to put this much effort into what I'm wearing."

"And yet," Pansy began, ushering them to follow her through Nott manor with a dramatic wave. "You're wearing that."

"I do like to feel a little dressed up every so often. And this is surprisingly comfortable." Hermione gripped Draco's hand, a familiar squeeze she often used as an outlet for her annoyance.

Pansy's smirk puckered, far too pleased. "You're welcome."

"I wasn't thanking you."

"Certainly sounded like it."

Draco couldn't feel his fingers, but he found himself enjoying the exchange far too much to liberate his hand. Hermione gave as good as she got, sniping at Pansy with equal force and, despite the pressure cracking his joints, she almost looked like she might be enjoying herself.

Draco was certainly enjoying himself. Pansy and Hermione were—well, they were sort of fun to watch banter.

It was a relief, too, that Hermione didn't outright hate Pansy. Draco's friends came in a variety of different tastes, and Pansy probably took the longest to acquire. He'd never had any doubt that Hermione would get along with Theo. Theo was something of a Pinot Grigio, ridiculously easy to drink. Barely even wine: gulpable, honestly. Light and enjoyable. Blaise was more of a Pinot Noir. Easy to enjoy if one liked reds, though not necessarily as easy to swallow. But Pansy, she was a rich, full bodied Cabernet Sauvignon. She was tannic. She had grit. Best had with a meal and small sips, heavy aeration required. Evidently, Hermione seemed to enjoy a robust red.

Perhaps the challenge called to her.

As they entered what had become their de facto entertaining room every Friday night, a cavernous space with a bar and an enormous round table in the center of the room, it became clear that Pansy wasn't the only one forcing fun on them that evening. Theo bounced with just as much energy, welcoming them, ferrying drinks from Blaise's position mixing at the bar to their seats at the table.

Hermione sipped her drink, smiling through her confusion as Pansy automatically began dealing cards. Blaise delivered a selection of wines to the table as he took his own seat, picking up his cards and throwing a few galleon chips to the center of the table.

Hermione leaned into him, voice low against his shoulder. "What are we playing, exactly?"

"Unclear. Pansy hasn't really explained it. She wins every time, anyway." He waved his cards at her. "I mostly pretend to play for a hand or two and then distract myself with drinking or conversation."

The purse at Hermione's mouth didn't go unnoticed. He could see it, the thought, begging to be spoken into existence. "You just—you let her win? What if—"

Draco laughed. Of course Hermione wanted to win.

"If you can't stomach letting Pansy rob us blind, which is probably a good decision for our finances, truth be told, you can ask her how to play. But be warned, she's vicious."

That warning evidently landed as a challenge. Hermione leaned away from him again, switching her focus to Pansy who, to her credit, looked overjoyed to have another party actually invested in her game.

Draco only realized he'd accepted and subsequently consumed the two shots Theo handed him after the fact, throat burning. He supposed they'd be doing that kind of drinking this evening, then.

"I'm telling you," Theo said, pouring a very generous serving of scotch into Draco's tumblr. "Aconite can be grown in sunlight with the right soil drainage." Theo nodded as if to confirm the veracity of his own statement. "I'm certain of it. Would make for stronger wolfsbane."

Draco took a hefty gulp of his drink, trying to banish that statement's idiocy from his brain by way of liquor. "That's—the stupidest thing you've said in a long time, Theo. Aconite is painfully temperamental. It can barely be grown in greenhouses; it does best in the wild. And the whole point of its use in wolfsbane is that there's very little sunlight in the growing process—"

"The contradictory properties would—"

"You're making this up. When was the last time you brewed?"

"Not—that long ago?" Theo tilted his head, a touch off-balance as he considered that answer.

"With aconite? Have you ever even brewed wolfsbane? It's an exceedingly complicated potion." If Draco really considered it, his world felt a bit wobbly. He kept sipping his drink, arguing pointless potions debates with Theo, while Pansy, Hermione, and Blaise engaged in some kind of card game. "You don't even like potions, or herbology," Draco concluded.

"Ah, but I like arguing."

"You're insane."

"Probably a little."

Draco glared.

Theo lifted his hands in defense. "Fine, fine. I'll stop. You look about ten seconds from challenging me to a duel."

"Maybe a duel would do you some good."

Theo shrugged. "It's possible." He knocked back another shot. Where it came from, Draco couldn't reliably say. But when he looked down, Draco found a shot glass of his own waiting beside his scotch.

"Oh, you know what?" Theo leaned in, dropping his voice, low and conspiratorial. "I was rooting around dear old dead dad's offices again. I found something really interesting in his study."

"Did you?"

Draco didn't know what to expect. Theo's definition of interesting could range from facts about muggle technology to Class A prohibited materials.

Theo dropped his voice even lower, a bit of waggle in his brows.

"You want to know what it is?"

"I suspect you're going to tell me." Draco dutifully downed his mysterious shot. "Would you like me to beg?"

"Save that for Granger." A grimace. "Fine, I'll tell you. A time turner."

"A—you found a what?"

Theo hushed him, dramatically and immediately. He cast some very suspicious glances to either side, as if anyone was listening in. "And it's not—well, it's not a normal one from what I can tell. I've been fiddling a bit."

"Fiddling with time turner magic." He lowered his voice as Theo hushed him again. "That could be—that's—wow."

Part of Draco demanded to ask more, to know more. Merlin, part of him wanted Theo to lead the way to the study right that very instant and show him. The curiosity burned hot and sudden in the pit of his stomach. The power in time. The potential.

Hermione laughed from beside him, drawing his attention. She hauled a pile of coins from the center of the table to the space directly in front of her. Pansy frowned; Blaise looked tentatively amused. When Hermione glanced at Draco, she laughed again and winked, fucking winked like the cheeky little winner she was.

Time turners were fickle, fussy things. And that fucking wink was worth far more than he was willing to risk, curiosity or not.

He turned back to Theo. "Be careful?" Phrased as a question. "Time turners are regulated for a reason."

Theo released a forlorn sort of sigh. "I know, I know. But it is fun to experiment. Just a little fucking with the fabric of space and time."

"Theoretically," Draco insisted.

"Theoretically, of course."

Draco leaned back in his chair, half-tempted to lift two legs off the floor and attempt a balance. But he didn't have the preternatural coordination that Blaise did, especially not after several drinks. Instead, he sipped his scotch and watched Hermione play another round as she grinned with the worst sort of poker face he'd ever seen, clearly extremely pleased with her prior successes.

Pansy won that round, taking a new pile of coins from the center of the table and stacking them neatly with the rest of her winnings. When Hermione glanced at him again, he lifted his drink. He tapped the base on the table. Once, twice, three times.

She smiled and set her cards down.

He stood, offering her his hand.

"Where do you two think you're going? The night's just getting started." Pansy sounded genuinely affronted, demanding an answer. "I haven't even had a chance to make any new headway with Granger on floral arrangements."

Hermione took his hand, standing, flush against him. He heard Theo groaning from behind them.

"Sorry, Pans. I'm stealing my fiancée away"—for a moment, his breath escaped him, lost on the unreality of the word fiancée—"and we're probably going to go find ourselves somewhere private to snog for a bit."

"Oh no," came Theo. "Please don't." A retching sound, followed by Pansy's high-pitched, surprised laugh, almost a shriek.

"Gods, are they always like this?" she asked.

Draco caught the motion from Blaise's shrug out of the corner of his eye. "Usually," he said.

"The more dramatic you are, Theo, the less likely I am to teach you any more about submarines," Hermione said.

Oddly, the faux retching ceased.

They'd barely stepped into the corridor before Hermione had her hands all over him, wrapped around his torso, nails dragging down his back, lips latching onto his neck. He laughed, surrendering to the absurd, youthful sort of joy in snogging his girlfriend—his fiancée—just out of sight, of needing an excuse to go do so.

"Blaise has been keeping your drinks well stocked, too, I see. Always so handsy with a little alcohol in your system."

"Mmhmm," she hummed against his neck before pulling back. She laced her fingers with his, guiding him into the next room. It contained a few bookcases, a desk, and a chaise. With the confidence of a witch with a few drinks in her, she pulled Draco to the chaise and pushed him down onto it. A little forceful, not too much, but enough that his interest immediately piqued, pooling below his belt.

"And I've had the perfect amount," she said, swinging her legs over him such that she straddled his lap, skirt riding up. Based on present evidence, he had to agree.

"Is that so? What exactly is the perfect amount?"

She kissed him, warm, sweet lips pressed against his. She sighed against his mouth, a beautiful, whimpering noise spilling from the back of her throat. She pulled just far enough away that she could speak.

"Enough that I'm considering sucking you off in one of the many, rarely-used rooms in this prestigious Manor." She glanced around, mischievousness glinting behind her eyes as she took in the space around them. "This room could do nicely, for example. But I haven't had so much that my fine motor skills are suffering."

With enough alcohol in his own system, Draco groaned, rocking against her in a purely physical response to those words.

"It's an excellent combination for you," she said, lifting herself from his lap.

Gods yes. He didn't know if he said it out loud or entirely in his head. He'd temporarily lost control of his ability to speak; perhaps his fine motor skills had been affected by drink.

She hardly needed the encouragement, though, shooting him a most wicked grin, lips stained a lovely ruby from wine and kissing.

What a Friday night, the best kind of Friday night. Hermione's hands and mouth on him. Friends and fun and conversation, something so simple and so perfect. Something he could spend his whole life enjoying. With a jolt, as his belt buckle clacked metal on metal, he realized he quite literally could spend his whole life enjoying this. Because it actually was his life. And Hermione had promised to spend it with him.

Near the end of the month, Draco stepped through the Floo to find Hermione sitting on their green sofa, Crookshanks curled in her lap. Concern, swallowed by confusion, regurgitated by dread, ascended in his throat.

He always arrived home from work before her. He left before her and returned before her; it had become their routine, a simple consistency he could count on, a predictability he could expect in the absence of the other sorts of routines he'd spend a lifetime abiding by.

"Why—are you—is everything alright?"

"It's fine," Hermione said, scratching Crookshanks behind his ears. "I took part of the day off. Could you sit with me for a moment?"

Despite her smile, despite her words, despite what felt like a painfully forced air of nonchalance, the room chilled. Anxiety shot in disconcerting pulses from Draco's chest, tingling at his fingertips as he crossed the room and sat next to her.

Hermione picked up a piece of parchment from the coffee table—well, one of their coffee tables, as they'd yet to decide what to do with the superfluous one—and handed it to him.

Draco squinted, trying to read the fine, blurry writing.

"Have you considered that you might need reading glasses," Hermione asked, tone instantly shifted from what it had been a moment before. Curiosity had stolen her focus.

"What?" His head tilted, looking at her with confusion.

"You always squint when you're reading. And you get headaches sometimes. And you often do this thing—" She mimed bringing an object closer to her face, then further away again in rapid succession. "Plus, you have a lot of complaints about the size of the text in The Count of Monte Cristo."

"I—do not. I do not."

"I really think you might."

"I have perfect vision. I was a bloody seeker, if you'll recall."

"Well, for one, we're not teenagers anymore." Draco resisted the impulse to cringe, to gasp, to be mortally offended. He was fairly certain this beautiful woman, the love of his life, his very favorite human on the entire fucking planet, had just implied something unbecoming about him aging. "And two, being a seeker is more about being far-sighted. Which you are. You can see long distances just fine."

Draco frowned. Sometimes her logic had a very inconvenient component he didn't enjoy being on the receiving end of. He looked back down at the parchment and caught himself before he adjusted its distance from his face. Squinting, he leaned his head away, just a touch.

She snatched the parchment from his hands.

"I'll just summarize it, you silly, stubborn man."

He lifted his brows, uncertain if he ought to be amused, offended, or some strange combination of the two.

"I disclosed to my employer that we are engaged," she said with a bit of a heaving breath,

"Oh."

"I'm being removed from the manor—well, Malfoy Manor." Draco's heart sank. He opened his mouth, searching for something he might say. "But that's ok—I think it's time, anyway," she said. "There's not that much more than needs to be done. And well, if I'm being honest, I think I'd like to get out of there. Nothing has changed per se, since Christmas." She glanced up at him with a sheepish sort of look. "I still don't see them, your parents. But it's nerve-racking, more so than it used to be."

"I—I don't know what to say, Hermione. You're sure this is alright? You're alright?"

"I told them because I hoped they'd reassign me—conflicts of interest and all."

Draco snorted. "Hardly."

"I've been reassigned, starting in December."

"Where to?"

Uncertainty melted from her features, a glint behind her eyes instead.

"Nott Estate."

Draco matched her grin with his own, breath spilling in laughter that gushed from overflowing lungs. "That's perfect—fucking hell, brilliant. Theo will love it. You—gods, you're never going to finish, though."

She laughed too, reaching out to prevent Crookshanks from escaping the sofa, trapping the cat in her arms. He leveled his yellow eyes at Draco, perhaps to lay blame for his current circumstances or to plea for help.

"Theo is going to spend literally his entire day, every day, pestering you."

She scratched at the sweet spot at the base of Crookshank's skull, temporarily quelling his feline ire.

"So, it won't be any different than working with you." She smirked as she said it.

Indignation flared in two distinct waves. First, "I did not pester. I observed." A pause, the second wave. "And I should hope it ends up a little different. You can't fall in love with Theo; you've already agreed to marry me."

Both waves, evidently, Hermione opted to ignore.

"It feels a bit like a bookend. I'm closing my chapter at Malfoy Manor. Permanently, I hope. I put in my time."

Crookshanks made a feeble noise, twisting his little body in an attempt to escape Hermione's insistent affections. Draco reached out and pried the cat from her grip, surprised when Crookshanks leapt across the cushions and settled himself on Draco's lap in a tight ball, cautious gaze now fixed on Hermione.

She narrowed her eyes, made a prim, hilarious huffing sound, and crossed her arms. Draco could see the question, the annoyance that her cat—arguably theirs, these days—sought him out for refuge. Draco had no interest in revealing that he'd found the secret to earning Crookshanks's affections was in adopting the Theo method: an abundance of treats.

Draco briefly considered rubbing it in, a little jab that the cat actually, genuinely seemed to like him. But a more important thought rose to the surface, demanding acknowledgement.

"Why did you go back? Why agree to go back there, after everything?" Draco swallowed the shameful feeling floating with his curiosities, tangled and inextricable and tasting terrible, rancid. "After everything that happened to you there, because of my family. Why go back?"

All these years later, her fingers found her left arm, exposed, unmarred. "I didn't want to let her win, you know that. Or your family. Or the manor. I—wanted to beat that place. Prove it didn't have anything over me. And I can hardly be upset about it. I got something rather lovely out of it, in the end."

"Oh?"

Crookshanks scampered, clambering from Draco's lap and zipping out of the room at Hermione's quick movement. Suddenly on her knees, leaning back on her heels, perched just beside him, her hands found his face, fingers cradled beneath his jaw.

"I got you," she said.

He leaned into her touch, a small sway as her hands held him.

"I suppose that's not the worst trade off."

"Is that understatement?" Her smile draped him in a contentment that he grew more and more accustomed to each day, realizing he got to keep it. "From Draco Malfoy?" She paused, an exaggerated thinking face pinching her features: lips, nose, brows. "You're getting better at it."

Draco reached for her, finally powering the limbs that had gone limp in surprise at her quick shift. His left hand found her waist, his right, her legs, maneuvering her to sit, partly draped over him. He pulled her close.

"You promise everything is alright? With this change? You're not worried about having been pulled from the manor?" She was shaking her head before he'd even finished his barrage of questions. He couldn't escape the memory of her face, years ago, when his parents had threatened to have her removed from the manor. "It doesn't reflect poorly on your career?"

Another shake of her head, sending her curls swaying and dancing and spiraling with her momentum.

"My job is highly specialized. It requires training and experience. But I'm not the only person trained to do it. Someone else will finish Malfoy Manor, and I'm not put out about it at all."

His fingers pressed deeper into the flesh at her hip. "If you insist."

"And it's honestly a rather happy accident that I get to do Theo's estate. It's been fairly low priority—"

"—Nott Senior would have been terribly insulted—"

She snorted. "—but getting to see Theo every day is hardly the worst outcome for a reassignment. It won't be so bad at all."

"I don't know, Granger," he whispered, dropping a light kiss to her shoulder because he could, because it was right there, all tanned and exposed and dotted with a square of freckles that reminded him of the pegasus constellation. "Theo has a lot of illegal stuff. He joked about trying to acquire Chimaera eggs once."

Hermione stiffened in his lap.

"Those are a Class A—he was kidding, right?"

"With Theo? It's hard to tell."