It was long past midnight and Draco Malfoy had given up on sleep; nightmares, memories really had plagued him since the moment he had first closed his eyes. Each time sleep claimed him he saw the terrified faces of those that had died during the war; hundreds of nameless faces that had died either inside his ancestral home or else he'd witness die when forced to attend Death Eater raids during the final year of the war. The true number of fatalities during the final wizarding war was unknown; muggles, wizarding folk and creatures had been murdered in the thousands and many that had been persecuted had fled from Britain and were too scared to return in the aftermath of Voldemort's demise. In the aftermath of the war, the Death Eaters had been rounded up and put on trial, Kingsley Shacklebolt had become Minister for Magic and the Wizarding World had been rebuilt; magic is good at that, rebuilding. A few months after the final battle and you wouldn't know a war had been fought at Hogwarts, that fifty students died in addition to five teachers and one hundred civilians that had come to help when Voldemort attacked the school. If you walked down Diagon Alley or through Hogsmeade you'd never know that innocent store owners had been kidnapped, raped, tortured, and murdered, not now when aesthetically everything had been fixed to how it had been before the war, everything that is except the people.
You can wave a wand to fix a broken wall, to rebuild a castle, you can even fix a broken bone with a wand, but you can't fix a person who is broken. You can't fix the minds of children who had seen and experienced unmentionable terrors. Adults too had been broken by the war but inside the walls of Hogwarts the children were perhaps the most broken of all. Forced during the Carrow Twins reign on the school to cast the Cruciatus on their fellow students, had broken them. Unable to be fully evacuated before the final battle students some as young as eleven and all of them under the age of eighteen had witnessed death, heard the screams, and had first-hand experience of war. They had tried to shelter the younger students during the war, tried to take their punishments as their own, across all four houses they had united to try and preserve the innocence of the youngest in the school, but they had failed.
Only a handful of students had chosen to return following the final battle, many more had chosen to remain home or had transferred to schools outside of the United Kingdom. Draco wondered how those students were coping, the ones that didn't return, did they awake screaming, drenched in sweat and terrified or did a new environment ease their suffering. He wondered if they still jumped in fright when there was a loud noise, did they walk their new schools in group formations, protecting each other from the monsters that might lurk in the darkened corners or had they found peace away from where the worse night of their lives had taken place. Draco had not been given a choice about returning to Hogwarts, after months of House Arrest and a trial where he had been acquitted for his crimes, he had been mandated to return to the school for his Eighth year of education. On some level it was better than Malfoy Manor, his once happy childhood home had been ruined by Voldemort's presence, nobody lived their now, with his father in Azkaban and his Mother living with her sister Andromeda who she had reconnected with after the war, Malfoy Manor had been left to rot. Maybe one day he'd burn it to the ground, it certainly wasn't fit for habitation.
Climbing out of his four-poster bed, Draco slipped his sock covered feet into his Dragon hind boots, wrapped himself in his cloak and his green scarf before silently slipping out of the dungeons, making his way up to the Astronomy Tower, a place that should haunt him after all if he had accepted Dumbledore's help their the night the Headmaster had died, perhaps he wouldn't be haunted by memories, perhaps he could have helped end the war sooner, could have helped save so many people. Instead, each night the place that should haunt him draws him to its slippery ledge, like a moth to a flame he climbs the tower, knowing he might be burned but the thrill, the salvation that she offers is worth the potential pain.
The first time he had ascended the tower during his mandated school year had been a result of morbid curiosity, he wondered if he went to the place where he had made such a life altering decision, that perhaps he would be granted peace, that he could atone for his sins. He hadn't expected to find her there sat on the ledge; muggle cigarette held between two rose tinted lips as she took a drag from the cancer-causing stick, her chocolate eyes hauntingly dead as they stared out at the darkened grounds.
"I sometimes wish I'd never learnt of this world; I could have lived a happy life in the muggle world never knowing magic existed. I could have read fairy tales and imagined a world where magic existed to bring joy, where the good guys concurred the bad and nobody died. When Professor McGonagall told me, I was a witch I never for one moment thought that Magic could be used for evil, that I would be a key player in a war when I was only seventeen," Hermione Granger, the girl his aunt had tortured on his dining room floor had whispered into the night.
"I'm glad you came into this world, without you Voldemort would had succeeded," he'd replied carefully sitting on the other side of the ledge.
"Someone else would have helped Harry and Ron," she'd told him that night her voice quiet as she held out a pack of cigarettes to him, he'd taken one out of curiosity and she had lit it with her wand watching him as he had taken his first drag, her sorrowful dead eyes alighting with humour when he started to cough. Draco wasn't sure why he had returned the following night let alone each further night that followed but Hermione Granger was just as broken as he was and somehow together in the darkened Astronomy Tower a tentative friendship had formed between them. They'd been meeting they're for over two months now, they didn't talk much, they'd drink and smoke, and often sit in complete silence, safe in the presence of the other as they each battled their own demons.
"You took your time," she called to him as he opened the door that led into the tower.
"You started without me I see," he commented dryly staring pointedly at the empty bottle of Firewhiskey by her feet.
"Had a rough day," she shrugged bringing a second bottle to her blue lips and taking a gulp.
"Granger your freezing," Draco frowned at her as he unclasped his cloak from around his neck and approached her quickly wrapping the thick material around the shivering girl.
"Granger why are you out here in only a pair pink satin shorts and a matching lacy camisole," he asked her to look down at pastel pink painted toes which were just as blue as her lips.
"Ron and I broke up, I flooed to his and Harry's flat to surprise him I thought he'd like that, I was going to give him my virginity tonight. Instead, I found him with his prick inside some tramp," she told him sadly, leaning her head against his shoulder her eyes glistening with unshed tears.
"What a fucking moron, any guy would be lucky to call you his witch Granger," he told her as he wrapped the arm closet to her around her waist and used his other to cast a warming charm on the shivering witch.
"I want to hurt him Draco, he will rue the day he made a fool of Hermione Granger," she told him firmly, her hurt eyes full of vengeance, Draco felt the breath leave his lungs, how was it possible for a crying angry drunk girl to be so pretty.
"You will do Granger but first I think you need to sleep off the Firewhiskey, I'll take you back to Gryffindor Tower Granger," he told her quietly helping the girl to her feet.
"I don't know what I'd do without you Draco, you are the only person who understands me these days," she told him honestly leaning up to kiss his cheek, in her drunken state her lips brushed against his instead, her eyes widening for a moment before she lent into him, one hand on his shoulder supporting herself as she tentatively brushed her tongue across his lips, moaning needily as his lips parted, his tongue dancing with hers as his hands gripped her hips, pulling her hard against his hardening bulge.
"Draco," she moaned, and the spell was broken, Draco pulled his lips away from hers with a resigned sigh and gently kissed her forehead.
"Granger, Hermione we are not doing this now, not while you are drunk and heartbroken. I'd love to do so much more to you but not tonight, lets get you back to your tower," he told her quietly before leading her to the Fat Lady's portrait. Hours later after a much-needed cold shower, Draco wasn't sure if he wanted Hermione to remember their drunken encounter or if he wanted their tentative friendship to remain the same, only time will tell.