Title: truce

School: Hogwarts

Year: 6

Main prompt: [Genre] Drama

[Emotion] Admiration

Word Count: 1003

"It's all your fault!" Hermione Granger yelled at him for what felt like the umpteenth time.

"How was I supposed to know that thing would chase after us?" Malfoy snapped back, walking ahead of her with his annoyingly long legs as if he was taunting her with his general tallness, which knowing him the way she did, he totally was taunting her (Luna would probably say that he wasn't, always the one to jump in his defence, being cousins and all, but she didn't care).

It felt like they were walking for weeks, trying to find their way out of the woods. It was his fault in the first place. If he didn't taunt that centaur during what was supposed to be simple detention, they wouldn't have gotten lost in the woods.

"First of all, that wasn't a thing, it's a living and breathing creature, excuse you －,"

"Tell that to yourself, Granger," He snorted. "You screamed like a girl and run away －,"

"I am sorry, is that supposed to be an insult? I would have you know, Malfoy, that I am indeed a girl, and do you know insulting it is that you consider one gender like a lower gender? Just because your male ego seems to think your whole gender is superior in every way, it doesn't mean that you can go around spouting nonsense like this －,"

"Do please continue, Granger. I do not think the faeries heard you yet. Why don't you try being a little louder?"

"Oh please, Malfoy, there's no such thing as faeries －,"

"Of course faeries are real, are you daft?" He retorted, barely managing not to trip over piece of branch left on the ground. "There's reason why wizarding parents warn their children about them through nursery rhymes －,"

"Is this where you tell me how I would not be able to understand it because I am not witch enough?"

"Well, I wasn't going to say that, but now that you mention it," She swatted him on the arm. "For Salazar's sake, woman, keep those hands to yourself. I thought you Gryffindors were supposed to be against a violence of any sort."

She snorted. "You'll heal."

"But what if I do not? You have to take a responsibility for my body －,"

"Oh my god, do you even hear yourself?" She screeched. "You are not some fallen woman in Victorian London who's begging to have someone marry her before in a futile attempt to save her name before being doomed in the eyes of a society －,"

"Please, if I was a woman in Victorian London, I would make sure that didn't happen in the first place."

"What do you even know about being a woman, you egoistic maniac －," There was a sound of a wolf howl in the distance, and she stopped, gulping down hard. "Say, what do you think about working together to get the hell out of here?"

"Truce?"

She agreed. "Truce."

"So, we went that way, and it lead to nowhere."

"I don't think we should go south either."

"So, north?"

He nodded. "North."

He ended up having to carry her because she stepped on something, and it injured her foot, leaving her with no other choice but to trust he wouldn't suddenly decide to drop her out of nowhere.

"Why do you hate me?" Maybe she was sleepy, or maybe she was feeling ridiculously brave, but the question popped out of her mouth before she could stop herself. "Other than the obvious?"

He stopped walking for a minute, then continued. "I never said that I hated you."

"But you always provoke me and try to prove me wrong －,"

"Because you are annoying with how adamant you are to always be the right one. But that doesn't mean I hate you." He said. "I suppose I admire you a bit. You always do what you think is right without even thinking of the consequences it may have. I do not have that sort of a freedom. Everything I do, it comes with a heavy consequence."

Her heart beat way too quickly for her comfort in her chest, and she clutched to him a little tighter than before.

"Malfoy?"

There was a short silence before he continued, "If you ever repeat anything I said to you to anyone, I would deny I've ever said it, and you would end up looking like a fool."

She giggled.

That was more like him.

They arrived at Hogwarts the next morning. It was a long and exhausting walk (on his part, he did most of the walking), and they had to spend the night in the woods, but they've arrived perfectly fine, save for a few injuries on her part.

"Hermione, you are alright!" Ginny Weasley hugged her tight from where she sat in infirmary, throwing daggers at Draco Malfoy's blond head. "He didn't try to do anything to you, did he? If he did, I would so beat his ass."

She shook her head. "No," She said. "He was actually sort of helpful."

Malfoy was pointedly doing his best to ignore them from where he was currently laying on the bed on the other side of the hospital wing, Theodore Nott seemingly teasing relentlessly by his bed side.

Now that Hermione thought about it, she never really thought about whether he really had genuine friends. She just assumed that he only had cronies to keep him a company, but the way Nott and Malfoy acted around each other, it suggested a close friendship.

"When do you think I would be able to get out of the hospital wing?"

"You sprained your ankle, Hermione," Ginny reminded her. "My guess? Not for another few weeks."

Hermione let out a very long sigh.

She still had a homework to complete, and she wasn't even allowed to go to the class?

What was the point of coming back to the school then?

She supposed she would have to make do with what she had.