I took way too long to write this. My bad dawg. (The poem is Pablo Neruda)
They're twined around each other on the loveseat, her soft breasts pressed against him. A knitted blanket is draped over their legs and there's a fire in the hearth, crackling in a language not meant for men. He can't remember ever being so happy. No Christmas at the Manor, no Golden Snitch fluttering in his fist, not even a "Well done, Draco" from his father: nothing, nothing can compare to it. The warmth in his chest is the blissful contentment of being with Hermione Granger. Draco brings a hand to her cheek and strokes the delicate bone, marveling at her. She raises her sleepy face to his and graces him with a smile that has his heart skipping a beat. She loves him, she said so.
He's always wanted to be loved. Had hoped for a romance like that of his parents since he could remember. He'd been certain he would have it before coming to Hogwarts. But the past few years left him doubting himself. While there were girls who had made their interest known, they always left a pit in his stomach. Something about the way they approached felt false, and he knew deep down that their parents had put them up to it. None of his "admirers" had interacted with him prior to their advances and all were members of prominent pureblooded families. None of them liked him, they liked what he could do for them. The wealth and status that came along with the name. The closer he came to marriageable age, the more he'd despaired of finding "her" in time. He'd always thought that when he went off into the world that love would "just happen". But it hadn't. He'd thought maybe Pansy was the real deal for awhile, but she had no patience for him and only spoke gently when she wanted something. Mother had said he shouldn't worry. That whoever he married, "love will come with time." But Draco doesn't believe that. His friends had given him a glimpse of reality complaining about their parents relationships, and he has come to realize that Lucius and Narcissa are in the minority where arranged matrimony is concerned. Draco knew his parents would procure him a suitable and attractive bride, but he couldn't be sure that he would love her. And if he did, what if she couldn't find room in her heart for him? Especially with this writhing thing in his arm.. His outlook grew bleaker and bleaker. And then everything changed.
"Say it again," Draco whispers.
Hermione hums in amusement, but obliges him.
"I love you."
It's the sweetest thing.
He leans forward and kisses her forehead, lingering to breathe her in. His love smells like vanilla. He's always been partial to vanilla. He presses his lips to her temple next, then that exquisite cheekbone. Draco pulls back, needing to see her skin in the firelight. Gorgeous. He feels like a fool as he peppers kisses across the bridge of Hermione's freckled nose. How could he have spent so many years bickering with her and getting her into trouble? They could've been together. Such a waste of time. He swears he'll never allow them to go back there. She's his Eltanin, the brightest star within him.
"And I you." He gathers his courage, unsure of how this works in Muggle culture and what her expectations might be. He'd gotten the impression that they were rather more casual about it all. He lifts the hand splayed over his collarbone to his mouth. A featherlight kiss, a deep breath and - "When I turn seventeen... would you do me the great honor of becoming my wife?"
Hermione jerks her head off his shoulder, eyes wide.
"Draco.."
Stupid! He didn't have a ring or even a token of his affection to prove his devotion!
"I know that Muggles do things differently," he hurries. "I've been raised my whole life knowing I'd be wed young and likely wouldn't have much say in to whom. But Hermione... I can't. I can't live the rest of my life knowing you're out there and I can't have you for myself. I'll die of jealousy watching you with anyone else. I won't see you wear a ring that's not mine or have a son I didn't father. I know it's you. You're not like anyone else I've ever met. You just shine." He pauses to watch her lick her lips, occluding away the mad desperation he feels. Continuing softly, he says "I can already see it, can't you? You'd be a Malfoy to be reckoned with. The things we could accomplish together. I'll give you the world, I'll help you take it. Let me, please. I adore you. Say you'll be my wife Hermione."
He hopes his ardor hasn't scared her off, his independent Muggle girl. But he needn't have worried. It was true love.
"Oh Draco," she sighs. His inner Slytherin admires the glint in her eyes just before she closes them and leans in for a kiss; that raw ambition she's never quite learned how to hide. They'll have to work on that. But that spark, that desire for the world in the palm of her hand - that is what will spur on the legacy of House Malfoy. His parents will forgive him for choosing a Muggleborn once they see what she can do. She pulls away, flashing another devastating smile. "Hermione Malfoy..." She giggles.
"Hermione Malfoy," he repeats against her neck, sweeping his tongue out to taste. "My wife."
Her answering moan is a religious experience. His hand seems to glide against the smoothness of her skin. I love her legs, he thinks, hooking one around his slim hip as he curls above her. His witch combs her fingers through the short hairs at the nape of his neck. It feels so good, everything she does is good. That thought has him thumbing the edge of her little lace panties. He should get her pregnant. Just to be safe. She'll have to marry him then. He can hide her away in Iceland till the baby comes, in the secret estate. When things clear over, he can announce it to the press and then there's nothing his parents will be able to do about it. They'll be furious, enough that they might even disown him, but he'll have enough time to squirrel away some galleons. Once he's of age they won't be able to revoke his vaults at Gringotts. Merlin knows there are plenty of assets he's been gifted that he could liquidate. The family tapestry will register his nuptials, but he can glamour it. It's not as though his parents expect him to wed without their consent. They won't be checking it, especially not with their ominous houseguests distracting them. And when he's sure he has her, then he'll tell her. He'll cut his arm off if she doesn't want it touching her. Whatever it takes until Potter can defeat the Dark Lord and he can be hers and hers alone.
His thoughts are frantic as he licks at the apex of her thighs. The juices of his forbidden fruit drip down his chin. As he slips his fingers inside her wet heat he promises himself that there will be a way, he'll find it. He'll make it if he has to, because she's for him and -
Draco wrenches awake, confused. His arms are empty. Where is...
Gutted all over again.
He asked her to MARRY him. Her. He was plotting to leave his family. Give her his name, sell heirlooms to provide for her. He wanted to get her with child so she couldn't run away from him. Merlin, what kind of man did that make him? Is that what he had to resort to in order to keep a Muggleborn? Was he so desperate? His father would laugh at him and call him a green boy, panting after his first taste of pussy.
He can't carry on wallowing in their little love nest like this. And that's exactly what he'd been doing hadn't he? Hadn't he half hoped to run to the Room of Requirement and meet her there, wait for her timid knock at the door? As though she was his reality and the rest of his miserable life was the dream. He has to put her out of his head. He has to see Snape.
Draco often prepared himself for stressful situations by imagining the worst possible outcome. It was a technique taught to him by his father, who had a far easier time compartmentalizing his emotions. In Draco's more sensitive nature, the habit had fostered a somewhat overwhelming paranoia. His deliberately cultivated personality was designed to help him succeed, but he had a suspicion he wasn't cut from quite the same cloth as his sire.
In the root of his psyche, in a place where thoughts don't need words, he knows that if Lucius Malfoy were in this situation he'd kill her. Not right away, but he'd find the opportunity and he'd wipe his shame from the face of the Earth. He refuses to allow the idea to form, because it means something that would rend him in two were he to look at it head on. The ugly truth is best left in his peripherals, acknowledged in only the most abstract way. Much like his mounting horror at the danger he's put Hermione in.
When steadying himself at the door back to the world and his problems, he'd confronted his prospects. He'd had sex with a (hot in a sexy librarian/teacher kind of a way) Mudblood. Half the school wouldn't care at all, aside from getting their chuckles out of it. But those people were half-bloods, Muggle spawn, and blood traitors, none of which could be found in his social circle. Purebloods generally went one of two ways in regard to affairs with Muggles and those with dirty blood: either they were good for a quick, meaningless fuck or you might as well have committed bestiality. Draco, like many Slytherins, had been raised by parents who believed laying with Muggles or their magic thieving children to be disgraceful and dangerous. No one knew how Mudbloods took their magic, it was a carefully guarded secret amongst them. His father had warned him to never touch one if he could help it, lest they siphon away his magic. Most assuredly there will be those who refuse to interact with him. His on again off again thing with Pansy will definitely be off again. She's a terribly resentful girl, envious to a fault, and he can't imagine she'll have any sympathy for him. The damage to his reputation is going to follow him for the rest of his life. He may be ostracized..
Even so, he has to open the door. He has too much to do and he can't be distracted by pretty Muggleborn girls or the opinions of his oblivious peers.
Get cleaned up, find food, find Snape.
Three things. Stay focused, how hard could it be?
Pretty hard, as it turned out. His morning started easily enough. He'd woken up early, before the Saturday Hogsmeade crowd. On his way to the fifth floor Prefect's bathroom he encounters only a sleepwalking Luna Lovegood (whom he prods back in the direction of the Ravenclaw tower with a practiced ease every Prefect has mastered) and some little Gryffindor snot side eyeing him. After profoundly schooling the kid in poisonous looks, he'd stripped off his robes and skivvies and scrubbed. Draco knew he'd been scourgified out the ass in the Hospital Wing, but he could swear he could still smell her skin on him. Massaging soap into his hair, he tries to forget the feeling of her dainty fingernails scratching his scalp. (He's unsuccesful)
Draco hadn't allowed himself to relax and enjoy a hot bath in months. Maybe since last school year. His reluctance to leave costs him precious time. As he steps through the portrait and into the corridor he almost collides with Ernie MacMillan.
"Malfoy." He's smirking, the fuck. "Gotten into anything interesting lately?"
"Fuck off Puff," he says, stepping around the pompous twat and giving him a two finger salute. "Why don't you go find a girl for yourself, instead of imagining me getting my rocks off? Been thinking about it a lot have you?"
He ignores the indignant gasp, but soon finds himself facing many more. Rushing to get down to the village, droves of students clutter the hallways. He's fucked the Princess of Hogwarts. And her subjects are pissed. Even the portraits whisper through their frames.
"I bet you anything he gave her the - '
"- right prick, that poor girl."
"Ha! That's exactly what you get for picking on Muggleborns! That is too-"
Truthfully, he's surprised. He didn't think people liked Granger this much. She was paraded about as the pride of Gryffindor, but even the lions seemed to tolerate her and nothing more. The sheer amount of house points she'd deducted in her time as a Prefect should've tamped down the outrage of the student body. But here they were, piqued on her behalf. He wonders if any of them had ever genuinely disliked her, or if they secretly adored her for giving them something to watch, something to discuss in the slow, meandering hours of their lives. He wonders if he - no. There lies madness. (There are not many things Draco Malfoy can't have, but those few things are simply impossible, so he endeavors not to want them)
He'd planned on stopping by the Great Hall, but thinks better of it as he sees Padma Patil's fingers twitch around her wand. The dark glare she gives him never wavers and he turns the corner quickly, headed for a hidden staircase that will spit him out just above the kitchens.
So concerned about his status as a blood traitor, Draco had overlooked one important factor: people might suspect him of seducing Granger with the philter. A cold trill of fear races down his spine. He can't stand the thought of being rumored a rapist. But he feels like one, seeing with his own eyes how upset she'd gotten in the Infirmary. In the same token he feels violated himself. It is not so much sleeping with Granger, it's having his decision making stripped away. It's having his soul laid bare before a girl he'd inevitably face on the opposite side of a war. The forced intimacy is jarring. He wants to beg her to disappear, take her Muggle parents and run. Anywhere else.
The crazy part was, were she a pureblood? He'd have proposed years ago. His parents would've made him. Lucius would've singled her out early and discreetly discouraged other families from pursuing a betrothal contract. He was a Malfoy, and Malfoys had to have the best of everything. Even if the best had a loud mouth and sentient hair.
But Hermione Granger had been born to Muggles, plain Muggles, and there was nowhere she'd be safe in the Dark Lord's world.
He abandons the depressing train of thought and stretches to tickle the pear on the portrait guarding the kitchens. Maybe a full stomach will put him at ease.
It doesn't. Draco is just as nervous after being stuffed with eggs and can feel a light sheen of sweat breaking out along his body. Can't put it off any longer, he thinks as he heads for Snape's office. There's nothing for it. He has to get her out of his head before he sees her there. Everything is at risk if he cannot.
He hesitates at the heavy wooden door, embarrassment coursing through him. The memory of Snape walking in on him defiling Hermione is still painfully vivid. He sighs, feeling his face flush.
Just as he brings his fist up to knock he hears his Professor call out, "Enter Mr. Malfoy."
How like Snape to disallow you even the dignity of knocking. With an irritated eye roll, he steps forward and pulls open the door. His teacher is seated behind his oversized walnut desk, grading essays from the looks of it. Draco leans forward slightly and sees the man underline an elegantly scrawled Abysmal not once, not twice, but thrice. Pretty fucking abysmal then.
Draco clears his throat. "Professor," he offers.
Snape sets aside his quill and takes his sweet time about it if you want to hear his opinion. But no one ever does these days. Finally looking up at his pupil, Draco can see the faintest hint of amusement in his Professor's expression. Great.
"Mr. Malfoy. You've been unaccounted for since you fled the Hospital Wing last night." Snape says as he gestures for Draco to take a seat in one of the uncomfortable wooden chairs facing his desk. Draco can feel his ass numbing already.
"Yes, well. My responsibilities remain, despite my unfortunate situation." There was truly no way to feel at ease in these chairs. An intentional choice, he's positive.
"I am glad to hear you know it. Though I did not appreciate the necessity of making excuses for you. Your mother was here. I had to tell the Headmaster you'd taken Dreamless Sleep and wouldn't wake until morning."
His heart plummets at the lost opportunity to see Mother. If she'd been able to leave, it was by stealth and who knew when another chance would come..
His disappointment must be palpable, because the Professor clears his throat and pulls an envelope of buttercream parchment from his robes.
"She left you this," he says, holding out the only comfort Draco will receive regarding his disastrous affair. He takes it and gently tucks her letter into an inner pocket. He itches to open it, but won't read it in front of Snape. The man has seen just about enough of him and doesn't need to see any more.
"Thank you."
The older man nods and fixes him with a scrutinizing look.
"I assume you're not here to discuss your Defense essay?"
"No. I need to speak with you about the side effects. You had begun to tell me about the dreams before I - (bolted? panicked? ran for my fucking life?) left the Infirmary."
Any lingering trace of mirth is snuffed out, just like that, and Draco knows it's going to be bad. Snape twirls his wand, and the room somehow seems to go still. A privacy charm.
"Bendis Pharmicka is a... complicated potion. Any slight difference in brewing temperature or time can alter it's symptoms and their severity. Afterward, most people experience a brief hyperawareness of the object of their obsession and anyone who has ingested the philter has the dreams. In extreme cases they've been known to last up to a year after exposure. It's not a potion one can brew or obtain easily. Its ingredients are classified as controlled substances and are expensive aside. A board of healers has to approve its medicinal use on a case by case basis. Whoever dosed you has resources at their disposal."
That narrows things down a bit. Gives him somewhere to start, if he ever finds time to investigate anything other than the inside of that bloody vanishing cabinet.
"In both you and Miss Granger the potion will have heightened fertility. I'm going to be honest with you, to do otherwise would be doing you a disservice. Considering the amount of time you spent together, it might not be a question of whether or not she is pregnant, but if the.. measures I took to prevent a viable pregnancy will be enough."
A horrible fear roars to life in his chest, pounding in his ears even as his Professor drawls on. The words come too quickly, and he scrambles to make sense of them.
"I brewed the abortifacient myself, the strongest I could give her without damaging her internally. But to be frank with you Mister Malfoy, Bendis Pharmicka is given to women with severe reproductive issues. Cases in which there are no other options. In a young, healthy Muggleborn? The odds are not in your favor. You may be a father."
He pauses, and even in a man who enunciates for dramatic effect, it chills Draco. There's something even Snape doesn't want to tell him. Something worse than a bastard child?!
"A... little known fact about love potions is that.. they are more effective than they initially seem. If an incompatible match is created under the influence of a philter, when the afflicted party passes the potion they will leave. If a match that could have been compatible outside the influence of the potion occurs..."
"What are you saying?" Draco snaps, rigid (and perhaps a bit guilty) at the implication.
Snape eyes him for a long moment, face blank. With a sudden jolt, he realizes his teacher is occluding. Not good.
"I wonder how well you and Miss Granger really knew one another. You've attended classes with her for over five years, but our impression of a person does not always reflect the truth."
He knew that now. How could he not? After staying up with her all night, whispering every hidden longing he ever had into her hair? After letting her yammer on about two Muggles he'd wouldn't have otherwise given the time of day. After exploring every inch of that coffee colored skin and listening in rapture as she recited her favorite Muggle poems to him.
"If I look at the crystal moon, at the red branch of the slow Autumn at my window, if I touch near the fire the impalpable ash or the wrinkled body of the log, everything carries me to you, as if everything that exists, aromas, light, metals, were little boats that sail toward those isles of yours that wait for me."
"As far as I'm aware," says Snape, gaze roving Draco's face. "Arthur and Molly Weasley had never spoken a word to each other before she slipped a mild love potion into his Pumpkin juice. The.. success of that union has been running around this castle for years."
Draco feels blood rush to his cheeks, scowling at the comparison.
"I am NOT compatible with a filthy mudblood!" He spits. "I don't care about Granger, all I want to know is how much danger I've put my mother in."
Snape raises a brow at his tone and Draco mutters and apology, looking away. He tries Occlumency, with mixed success. Every thought comes back to her. Fear and lust and awe and shame. That's Granger. Already a force of nature and now a catalyst in his universe, a fucking meteor. The Great Undoing.
"Will he name me for a Mudblood lover? Will he punish my mother?" he asks quietly, still looking somewhere over Snape's shoulder.
"I don't think he'll harm her," the man says after a moment. "He doesn't truly care who you bed. But he will certainly humiliate you, especially if Miss Granger is with child. Anything that brings your father low will delight him. If you were thinking of spending your holidays at home... I would advise against it unless summoned."
He will endure any humiliation if Mother is allowed to live.
Draco nods once, unable to speak momentarily. If Miss Granger is with child. The half formed idea had occurred to him more than once in the last few hours. He'd told the girl often enough that he was going to impregnate her. But he'd never heard of the Draught of Bendis. He hadn't known.. Granger. She's somewhere within these walls right now, walking around with a Malfoy inside her. Whether it lived or died sealed their fate.
"Mr. Malfoy I'm sure I don't need to remind you that Miss Granger's association with Mr. Potter and unfortunate presence in the Department of Mysteries earlier this year have made her a target."
Draco's startled out of his anxious reverie, eyes snapping back to his Professor.
"He may ask you.. to rid her of the child. Or to rid yourself of her."
Draco understands the things Snape doesn't say. The Dark Lord is capricious and cruel, a mixture that leaves even his most loyal on their toes. Anything could happen.
He jerks to his feet as nausea overtakes him. Bile rises up in his throat, he has sired a Half-blood. A Halfling that might be dead already and if so, what a mercy to be spared your father's killing blow.
"Thank you for taking the time to speak with me Professor," Draco manages as he flees. He takes the twisting corridors past the Slytherin common room and spills into a rarely used classroom he'd been brooding in for years. But there she is, in the smallest detail. A tiny paper hummingbird she's enchanted flutters softly by. Of course, he'd brought her here, wanting her to know every little thing about him.
He understands now that there's nowhere left to hide. He'd given her everything. Draco reaches out and cups the delicate piece of magic, drawing it closer. Its wings whir. He stares down at the lovely thing he must surely crush in his hands.
He pictures the worst case scenario: he's actually in love with Hermione Granger.