Don't Look Back
- 29 -
Child's Play / Gruesome Prayer
She has nothing with her.
No books, no potions. No fixings for an altar. Nothing but her own conviction — and she tells him so.
I will guide you, says the stranger softly, and she swears for a moment that she can feel him at her back. The warmth of a presence. Phantom hands gently caressing her hips — a phantom chin resting against her shoulder from behind.
It's a small feat to maintain her focus in the face of it, but there are questions that need answering.
"What will this do?" She clears her throat and speaks firmly. "The truth, this time. No riddles."
She's grown to hate riddles.
As of now, we are two halves of a whole, he says. No hesitation. The bond between paramours is eternal, and many choose to take it no further. In bonds less complex — less volatile — simple rituals and mutual affection are all that is needed to feel fulfilled. Your Malfoy has made this impossible. He strikes blows at the foundation of our bond every hour. Every minute. He cannot be trusted with its fate.
"And what would this change?"
The Descent is an exchange of life force. An offering of flesh — of a piece of you — to prove your devotion to your paramour. Once done, it cannot be undone. Once done, we are no longer two halves of a whole. We are the same whole, and only whole together.
A slow, unsteady breath falls from her lips. "In...in what way? I'd — feel more of him? More of you? Those sensations would be—"
No, Hermione.
She bites down on the tip of her tongue, staring into the darkness and waiting for words she's sure she isn't ready for.
You will be stronger than ever before. You'll feel a vibrance — a vitality you've never known. As will he. As will I. Your life force will transcend beyond that of simply human. But, to endure, this life force must be fed.
"...Fed?" she echoes.
You will need to feed off of us. And we off of you.
Her stomach twists. "I don't — what...what does that mean, exactly? Feed? You'll have to..." She swallows thickly. "What, drink my blood?"
The stranger hums gently. Almost a laugh. Of the many ways to feed, I would not call that my favorite.
"Then what is your favorite?"
A part of her is terrified to hear the answer, but once more he doesn't hesitate.
Oh, to be inside of you.
Her breath catches, a startled pulse of something warm sweeping across her nerve endings.
To feed off of every gasp and every cry. I'd wager we could survive for weeks off the sounds you make when you come undone.
She forces herself to breathe out. Feigns calm, albeit poorly.
"Well. That..." Her throat runs dry. "That doesn't sound so bad."
No, it doesn't. A faint smile in his voice. I can think of nothing better in the world.
Warmth fills her from his side of the bond, as though he allows himself to be consumed by the idea for a moment. Then—
But there is no going back. Once complete, you will no longer breathe each breath alone.
Perhaps she should be more apprehensive in light of this. But she finds — even after taking a moment to search herself — that she only has one overwhelming concern.
"Won't Malfoy need to consent? To all of this?"
She finds it hard to believe he ever would. The thought of Malfoy agreeing to depend on her for the rest of his life is almost laugh—
He already did.
Her thoughts cut short. "What?"
The Descent is only complete when performed by both halves of the bond. And your Malfoy has already done it.
Everything unravels, confusion running rampant like a wildfire. "What? When? I don't — when?"
Paramour, we are running out of time—
"Please," she splutters. "I have to know. Please."
He pauses. Breathes a soft sigh. Have a look at your arm.
Her eyes widen — desperately try to adjust to the dark as she rushes to drag up her sleeve. She can just barely see the glimmer of those scars, like muted light in dark water.
That is no standard magic, the stranger tells her. Your Malfoy demanded to know the price of saving you, and that is what it cost.
"I don't understand..." she breathes, absently tracing her fingers over the marks.
Together, we gave a piece of our life force to you. Sealed your wounds with it. Malfoy's Descent is complete, regardless of how determined he is to behave otherwise.
She can't resist any longer, twisting where she sits to reach her wand.
"Incendio."
The fireplace crackles to life in the corner of the room, casting enough amber light over the scars to allow her to trace them accurately.
It seems impossible. Unbelievable. She can't even bring herself to picture it — Malfoy sacrificing something like that.
Her voice is breathless. Dazed by the prospect. "You gave a piece of your life...to me?"
Happily, he murmurs.
"But Malfoy—"
I feel a great many things when it comes to your Malfoy, most of them unkind, the stranger admits. But you should know that in that moment, he did not hesitate.
Her chest tightens, closing in around something raw and hollow.
The question remains, Hermione. Will you give a piece of your life? To save us?
With those scars gleaming back at her, she finds the word slips off her tongue as effortlessly as her own name.
"Happily."
Even in the Wizarding World, it's considered a bad omen to break a mirror.
But this ritual forbids the use of a wand.
Blood magic as sacred as this comes from within, not from any vessel, the stranger explains, voice almost breathless with anticipation as he watches her take hold of a heavy, brass candelabra.
She steps up to the full-length mirror adjacent to the bed, her reflection's grip tightening around the base. There's a feral look in her eyes. Desperation. It drives her to swing with all the strength she possesses.
The glass shatters like nothing — loud and jarring as the pieces rain down to the floor. Kneeling beside them, she wonders whether her seven years start now.
Nothing but good comes from this, he assures her.
Gathering a slow breath, she leans forward, spreading out the shards — separating them from one another.
The sharper it is, the less it will hurt.
She finds a long, thin piece, shaped to a lethal point when it broke, and the stranger hums his approval.
Now she just has to make the altar.
Evidently, they come in many forms. And this one requires no special herbs. No black candles or ancient stones. Just offerings, as the stranger put it. Pieces of herself.
She understands, now, how Malfoy was able to perform it that night — naked and wandless.
Moving the chair and sofa out of the way, she clears a large space on the floor near the foot of the bed. Enough to take a seat cross-legged with nothing at her back.
Your first offering, the stranger prompts. A piece of her clothes.
And the shard of glass makes for awkward scissors as she attempts to slice a strip from the hem of her skirt. The cotton frays and fights her, but eventually she manages to separate a thin piece. Lays it carefully out on the floor in front of her.
Very good, he murmurs. And your second?
A lock of hair.
She twists a curl free from the rest, pulling it taut and drawing the jagged edge across it without a second thought. The stranger instructs her to lay it across the strip of her skirt, forming an 'X.'
Lovely.
Her next breath is nervous, and he gives her a moment to prepare herself before he speaks.
And now the third.
The third offering is blood.
And she's not sure whether she's more frightened of the pain, or of Malfoy's reaction. Minutes ago, when she found him on the Marauder's Map, he was on the Grounds. No doubt searching for some miracle growth of aconite. But once he feels the cut of glass, the clock starts ticking. They'll only have a finite amount of time before he finds her.
It's this she's afraid of. She's certain of it, now.
Because she knows pain. Real pain. The scream of her lungs and the muted snap of bone. The emptiness of watching him turn his back and walk out that door.
What's the bite of a knife to that? Child's play. A twinge. A paper cut.
She's not afraid of pain, she's afraid to be stopped.
Hermione...
The stranger's voice is suddenly anxious.
Are you—
"I'm not having second thoughts," she says, straightening her spine. "No. I'm just..." A deep breath. "Just taking a moment to ground myself."
He seems to take a deep breath of his own. I'll never know how to thank you for this.
She rests her left hand on her knee, palm up and fingers spread. "Don't thank me." And she poises the tip of the shard against her skin — some of the last she's got that doesn't already bear a scar. "Just take the emptiness away."
I swear it.
The cutting edge meets her flesh, carving the first mark of a rune she's never heard of. A rune to symbolize two souls intertwining — just a simple curved line, and then another crossing through it in the middle. It reminds her of an hourglass, tipped on its side. And perhaps that's fitting, because halfway through the second line, she feels the faint coil of muscles that aren't her own. Malfoy going tense.
She feels him shake out that hand — and when he finds the pain doesn't fade, she feels the rage and fear collide like two rogue waves meeting in the middle.
A moment later, he's on the move. Running, perhaps. She can't be sure. The bond is clouded.
He knows, the stranger warns. He's coming.
She can only nod, completing the second line as the blood starts to pool in the center of her palm. Setting the shard aside, she gathers her hand into a careful fist, moving it to hover over the other two offerings. "He'll never make it in time."
And with a sharp exhale, she squeezes that fist as tight as she can, tipping it sideways to let the blood trickle out.
The sting is nothing to her. She finds she barely notices, so focused on the way that dark, ruby red stains the fabric. Seeps into the brown of her hair.
Now, the recitation.
His voice pulls her from a sort of daze. She blinks and leans back a fraction, taking up the shard once more. As the stranger explained it, she needs to carve the same rune into the other palm. Left-handed.
And its lines are far more jagged — its cut more biting. She's sliced deeper thanks to an unsteady grip.
Malfoy's pace seems to double.
"Remind me of the words..." she whispers, watching the blood rush to the surface as the stained shard falls from her hand. She remembers what he told her to do, but one wrong syllable and the ritual is broken. She can't afford to make a mistake.
Here, I press my skin to earth, he begins.
"Here, I press my skin to earth." Slowly, she joins her two hands in the middle, bleeding palms open as though in offering. The blood from both runes starts to mix — a shallow pond cupped in front of her.
Here, I yield. I forfeit.
"Here, I yield. I forfeit." With this, she bends forward, leaning across the altar to press her elbows to the floor. A pose of supplication.
In your shadow, I kneel to all things. Here, in flesh. In certainty.
She echoes him, then proceeds without thinking. Somehow remembers the rest.
"For this blood is my blood and my offering. This blood is my blood and is yours."
And with the final word, she bows her head, brow resting against the floor's cool wood.
The stranger allows a long silence to elapse before he murmurs his praise, voice almost reverent in its softness. Exquisite.
But from here, she has no notion of what comes next. The stranger's description was vague — words with so many possible meanings — and there hadn't been time to question it.
Your Malfoy must accept your offering.
She wanted to ask him how. To ask him what she's expected to do should he refuse it, which seems more likely than ever. And these questions rise in her throat again, now that she's down on her knees, blood seeping through her fingers onto the floor below.
But she's terrified to speak. Terrified she might somehow disturb the recitation.
And as the carved runes start to throb for the first time, she's forced to grapple with the position she's put herself in. Something that goes against everything she stands for and everything she is. Kneeling — as though in gruesome prayer — to Malfoy. Malfoy, who believes she belongs there. That she's less than. Unclean.
Malfoy, to whom she now offers her inferior blood.
She spends those many long seconds waiting to feel shame — the five or six minutes it takes him to seek her out.
The shame never comes, but he does. With a tidal wave of fury at his back. She left the door unlocked, though he doesn't bother to check, and it nearly tears off its hinges with the force of whatever hex he throws.
Her body jolts at the noise. Can't help it, even when she felt him coming. And it takes an unexpected reserve of strength to remain in her pose of supplication — to keep her head bowed.
A moment passes in shrill silence as Malfoy hesitates in the doorway. She both hears and feels it when he breathes out. And then—
"What the fuck is this?"
The stranger soothes her before she has the chance to feel stung.
Pay that mouth no mind. Search for his pulse.
She swallows hard, exhaling against the cold floor.
Do you feel it?
Yes. Racing like a machine moments from failure.
"Granger," Malfoy snaps. "What is this?"
Look him in the eye.
The stranger says it like he's passing sentence. Like it'll somehow deliver the final blow.
When she drags her forehead up from the ground, she thinks perhaps it may. Her gaze meets his through stray curls — through her lashes — and the rage warping his features vanishes in an instant. Flattens out, as though something physically strikes it away and leaves him stunned.
His pulse stops. Just stops.
Either that, or she's lost touch with it through their bond.
And she watches his throat bob, lips parting and lids fluttering drunkenly. The wand clutched in the hand at his side gives away its trembling.
Offer it to him.
When she lifts her palms towards him, they're shaking too; some of the blood escapes, spilling down her wrists. She can't look away. "Here," she whispers, because she can think of nothing else to say. No way to explain what she's offering.
But the shock in his gaze tells her he already knows — and a moment later, he confirms it.
"...Why?"
The word is a breath. Desperate and disbelieving.
To save your life, the stranger growls, and from the way Malfoy tenses up, it's clear he's speaking to both of them. Ungrateful—
"To thank you," she interrupts, rising fully up onto her knees. Stretching her palms out further towards him. "For saving mine."
His gaze flickers almost instinctively to the scars on her arm, now streaked with her blood as it drips down. And his brows twitch — just for a fraction of a second, as though he's offended by the idea. Can't fathom it.
He does not think he deserves to be thanked, says the stranger. Nor do I.
"I do," she insists, invigorated by the truth of it. Malfoy's wide eyes flit back to hers, and she nods, lifting her palms higher. "I do."
He shakes his head like he's shaking away a stupor, jaw suddenly tightening. And then a bitter scoff fights its way out. Forced. Unnatural.
"Oh, I see. What — did it lie to you?"
With each passing second, the pool of blood diminishes in her hands. Dries. Spills free. And the panic manifests in her voice. "What?"
"That monster in our heads," Malfoy snaps. "Did it lie to you? Tell you this was another one of those gentle rituals? Something meaningless and forgivable?"
"He is not the monster." She does her best to sound calm, even as the muscles in her arms begin to strain. "You have to know that. And he didn't lie."
Malfoy steps forward, tense as he points to the ground. To the bloodstained altar. "Do you have any idea what this means?"
"Yes."
"What it will—"
"Yes."
He goes very still, expression torn — a constant shift between fury and uncertainty.
"Yes," she whispers again. "I do. And I'm offering it to you."
Malfoy appears to grapple with his own conviction, desperately searching for outs. "Offering it to me..." he echoes.
"Yes."
"You? The stubborn little know-it-all who never accepts help from anyone." He shakes his head. "You expect me to believe you'd choose to rely on someone — on me — for the rest of your life?"
She says what comes naturally and nothing else.
"I'm your paramour."
And when she stretches out her palms one final time — as far as her body will allow — the breath leaves him in a wave.
His shoulders sink, and it's almost rapturous to watch his resolve shatter. So easy. So easy.
He is hopeless to resist you — and well aware of it. Your blood smells like Amortentia.
She's not certain she believes this until he suddenly turns and shuts the door. For almost half a minute, she's left staring at his back — watching it rise and fall with each slow breath. His palm remains splayed out on the door's wood, and for the briefest moment she thinks she sees his forehead press against it. Hears a final exhale blast across the surface.
Then, with a murmured locking charm, he turns to face her. The wand slips carelessly out of his hand and clatters to the floor.
Her heart starts to pound, this time with something other than panic.
Accept.
This is where he accepts. How does he accept? Does he even know how to—
Malfoy sinks to his knees in front of her and her thoughts run dry.
His eyes come level with hers, full to the brim with anguish and doubt — but his hands feel so sure of themselves when they take hold of her wrists. And that pained look softens to something almost like concern as he stares at her. Stares like he's hoping to communicate thoughts he can't put into words.
The words he does manage aren't what she expects.
"I swore I wouldn't." It's a whisper. Barely audible. Beseeching like his own form of prayer, and an admission of defeat all the same. "I promised myself. Damn you for this."
Before she can even begin to consider a response, he drags her palms towards him, forcing them apart as they reach his face. The blood pours out — down over his cheeks and lips. Down his chin and onto his chest, staining his shirt. She can't hold in her gasp, watching wide-eyed as he flattens her palms against his jaw and draws them across his skin. Spreads red everywhere. Closes his eyes and dips his head and accepts it.
Without flinching.
In the midst of her stunned silence, the stranger sighs — a rasp of relief, followed shortly by words that make her pulse seize up.
Don't be frightened.
She has just enough time to suck in a sharp breath, and then it hits.
The world falls out from under her, and gravity ceases to exist.
All at once, Malfoy's grip on her wrists falls away, and shortly after she falls away too. Falls up. Or is it down? She suddenly has no notion of direction. Only of the blinding, exquisite light that explodes across the room and of the all-encompassing sensation of free fall. Her body arches, weightless limbs grasping for nothing as whatever power this is takes hold.
The light emanates from her, if her bleary eyes have any truth to them. A glow beneath the skin. And whatever it is, it floods her with warmth.
Warmth. Safety. Compassion. Strength. That feeling of looking into a lover's eyes for the first time. Water to a parched throat. The tingling itch before a laugh and the electric pulse through the spine before ecstasy. Sugar on her tongue and painkillers in her veins. A high to put all others to shame.
And in that moment, if offered a choice, she'd choose to never come down.
But the laws of nature insist.
Vaguely, she's aware of hands finding her waist, though she never gets the chance to perceive much else. What goes up must come down, and gravity returns just as everything collapses into darkness.
It's the first time in weeks — perhaps even months — that she wakes feeling rested.
There's no soreness. No aches or discomforts. Just the room slowly coming into focus.
It's still the middle of the night, by the looks of it. Still the Gryffindor Head Girl's dormitory. The broken mirror flickers in the corner, catching the firelight from the hearth, and the bed is soft beneath her. She blinks until all the blurry edges are defined.
Malfoy is watching her.
Propped against one of the canopy posts at the foot of the bed, he sits on the mattress with both knees pulled to his chest, unreadable eyes flitting between each of hers as she rises up onto her elbows.
The blood has been cleaned from his face — unless she somehow imagined that piece of the ritual.
No, she couldn't have. Moments later, her eyes land on the bowl at his side, half-full of water and bearing a blood-soaked rag.
"What happened?" she asks, voice quiet. When she manages to sit up, she notices her hands are clean as well. Only the sealed runes remain.
Malfoy takes a long while to answer. His face is wan, the consequences of the Wolfsbane still evident in the sharp angle of his jaw. Gaunt. Starved.
"It's done," he murmurs at last.
And as the fog of sleep fades, she feels the full brunt of him for the first time in ages. Feels his tension sweeping over her like a mist. Feels the ache in his chest and the doubt in his mind.
"We're now flesh-bonded," he says, voice rough. "We require the presence of one another to survive."
Forever...
It's the first of his thoughts she's heard in ages, too. And though she can't quite riddle out his tone, she can make an educated guess.
"You regret it."
His weary gaze fixes on her sharply, brutal in its honesty. "I'm terrified of it."
Hermione pushes herself back against the headboard, leveling out their eye lines. "You were going to breach us. I did what I had to."
A tired, humorless laugh falls from his lips — more of a huff, really. "Do you leave the knife in a wound, or do you pull it out?"
What a ridiculous metaphor. "What?" she scoffs. "You think you're the knife?"
He just shakes his head, gaze darkening a fraction.
No, he doesn't. He's saying she is.
Your paramour is a gift. Not a mortal wound.
Malfoy's eyes narrow at the sound of the stranger's voice.
And you are fortunate she's taken the reins of our bond out of your sad, fumbling hands—
"Don't," she cuts him off. "Please, don't. We — we need to move on from here. Move forward. Not back."
Another bitter huff from Malfoy. "There is no back. Not anymore. Don't you remember?"
Those words scrawled on the page of the ritual flash behind her eyes.
Not to be undone.
"This is permanent. We're now fully symbiotic."
His own thoughts are an undercurrent, raw and much less in control.
—can hardly bear how far apart we—
—worse than ever—
—could reach out and touch her so easily, but then I'd—
"Malfoy..." she implores, just a breath. Can't help herself. "Are you ever going to stop?"
His eyes are downcast now. "Stop what?"
"Fighting it."
Yet another laugh, this one so forced it looks as though the effort actually causes him pain. "Love the way you say that. Like it's some simple, petty thing I could just—" He pauses to demonstrate. "— snap my fingers and be rid of. Just like that." His head thunks back against the bedpost, and he lets a long silence elapse before he speaks again. "Try and remember that I was raised to hate you, Granger. Everything about you. I grew up under the notion that losing to a Muggleborn — anything, mind you... a contest, an argument, a fucking card game, anything — was a disgrace to my family name. So, naturally, the brightest girl in our year had to be you. And you realized that fear. I can't even describe to you the shame on my father's face when he learned I was second in my class, and second to a Mudblood."
Her hands tense into fists at her sides, jaw clenching. "Am I supposed to feel sorry for you?"
The stranger laughs softly inside her head. She's not sure whether Malfoy can hear him.
"You're supposed to listen," he snaps, eyes tightening a fraction. "To someone other than yourself for once." When he reaches up to massage the back of his neck, she can feel that he's sweating. Feels the moisture against his palm. His gaze fixes on the canopy above them like he can't make himself look at her. "I don't think you understand what it's like — hating you for so long and then suddenly needing you. It used to mean nothing how you felt. I was expected not to care, and I didn't. But it's a sick joke — reaching a point where I can literally feel it too. Reaching a point where seeing you like that in the forest — ripped open..." The words catch in his throat, and he forces them out like razor blades. "I just...I've never felt so fragile. It used to be so easy to hurt you, and now I'm sick at the thought of it."
She can feel the anger slipping from her face.
"It's not some — some simple, trivial thing to stop fighting it." Malfoy shakes his head at the ceiling. "I want you. My family and my breeding say I shouldn't. The bond says I should — reminds me endlessly that I do. But that thing inside of me..." A muscle works in his jaw. "That monster you met...what it can do to you — what it did..."
"Malfoy—"
"It tells me I can't. Not ever." He looks down then, eyes drained as they meet hers. "So I took the Wolfsbane."
She swallows the knot in her throat. "It would've killed you. Would've killed us both, eventually. I had to stop you."
He scoffs. "By eternally binding our flesh?"
"You did it to save my life. I did it to save yours. An eye for an eye."
Malfoy blinks slowly at her, lips curving up on one side — a bitter smile. "And now we're both blind."
A curious urge flickers to life somewhere deep in her gut. Perhaps it's something to do with that smirk. Those sleepy eyes. Or perhaps it's just been a long time coming.
Bearing down on her nerves, she carefully stretches out her leg, bare foot sliding across the scarlet covers towards him. Bridging the gap between them. "I can see clearly enough."
He tenses up. Not visibly — she can feel it through the bond. And suddenly his thoughts grow loud.
—is she—
—fuck—
—no, I—
—but what if the wolf—
—not like this, not like this—
They make her pause, heart joining his as it starts to race. And in a brief moment of clarity, she thinks to ask.
Stranger?
A long silence, and Malfoy's breathing escalates all the while. If she's doing this correctly, he won't be able to hear.
Why does your tone make me nervous?
There's a wry edge to the stranger's voice, but a great deal of uncertainty as well.
You said you'd never know how to thank me.
He seems to gather a deep breath inside her head, preparing for the inevitable.
I can think of a way.
Thick, conflicted uncertainty courses through her from his side. He knows what she's asking. Can sense the direction of her thoughts.
You must think very highly of my restraint...
There's pain in his voice.
You want to fortify the bond. Heal the rift between the two of you. Earning his trust is half that battle.
A pause.
And you would rather him than me.
Malfoy searches her eyes desperately — must see the flickers in her expression. "What are you saying to it?" he demands, his anxiousness spiking across her own nerve endings.
Inhaling deeply, she searches for the right words.
I would rather the two of you were one.
I gave him Reverence. I let him have what was mine once already. The stranger's voice rises. You'd ask me to—
Yes. Please. Just once more.
"What are you doing?" Malfoy's spine has straightened, tense as though poised for attack.
Please, she implores, struggling to maintain her focus.
"Granger," Malfoy snaps.
Please. For the sake of the bond.
"Granger."
Please...
Abruptly, she feels the stranger's presence shrink away. All at once, like a doused flame, leaving behind nothing but the sharp bite of envy. Envy and pain. It forces the air from her lungs, her shoulders slumping.
"What did you do?" Malfoy breathes, his fear boiling up in her chest — threatening to overwhelm her own determination.
Steeling herself, she leans forward. Shifts up onto her knees and then, slowly, onto all fours.
Malfoy freezes, eyes widening a fraction as she walks her palms towards him across the mattress. And despite whatever consequences this ritual may bring, it does nothing in this moment but surround her with warmth. With every inch of distance she closes, her vision grows clearer. Body stronger and resolve sharper.
"What are you—"
She stops when her arms bracket his thighs, their noses close enough to graze. Speaks gently, as though to frightened prey. "I asked a favor."
She's seen it happen before, though she doesn't think she'll ever find it anything less than exhilarating. Malfoy's cold exterior — his nonchalance — is only as strong as his weakest point. And when caught off guard, that mask slips. The vicious veneer melts away, leaving something vulnerable and thoroughly enticing in its place.
"What..." he stammers, blinking as he struggles to keep his gaze off her lips. "What favor?"
Some instinct drives her to shift her weight to one arm, movements slow — almost drugged — as she raises the other hand to his face. "Just a favor," she murmurs, drawing her fingers down over his mouth. Dragging his bottom lip down.
His breath hitches, nose brushing hers as he leans forward without really meaning to.
"I—" He swallows the words the first time. "I'm on this side of the bed for a reason." His eyelids are drooping.
"Are you?"
Each exhale warms the pads of her fingers. "Yes."
—have to—
—fucking hell—
—literally beg for it if I—
His thoughts urge her forward, their foreheads meeting as her own eyes slip shut and a smile spreads across her lips. But then, out of nowhere, they take a dark turn, and she no longer has the luxury of time.
—can't—
—wrong. I know it's—
—ruined—
—ruined, ruined, I ruined—
Her hand falls away and her mouth takes its place.
She'll physically force that awful word from his mind — with her lips, with her tongue, with her teeth. Whatever it takes. She never wants to hear it again.
Malfoy gasps into the kiss, stiffening — but his self-control is crippled. A mercy kill, at best. And barely half a second fits between the moment their lips meet and the moment he takes her by the thighs and drags her into his lap.
God...she thinks. That is a feeling.
She's never known a time when her muscles felt so content. When a position felt so right. When something tasted so good.
Malfoy tastes like ripe fruit as it breaks and bleeds under the teeth. Like whatever medicine Madam Pomfrey couldn't manage to brew for her — that final surge of healing that makes the ache in her leg fade away. She forgets the sting of the carved runes on her palms as she presses them to his jaw, pulling him closer. Begging for more pressure.
And the friction of him between her thighs is the first relief she's known in months. Years. Possibly ever.
He's saying something, she thinks. Murmuring words against her tongue she can't hear, but she feels the vibration of his throat.
"What?" she asks, breathless, pulling away only to guide his mouth down along the line of her jaw. Further. Down to the crevice below her ear.
"Don't be stupid." That's what he's saying. Interspersed between kisses. Each time his teeth let go of her flesh. "You — we — don't be stupid. We're being stupid."
Her fingernails scrape down his scalp, fist tangling in his hair, and she feels the chill race through him. "No." She shakes her head and rocks her hips, and they both gasp in tandem. "This is right. This is — we're — god, this is right."
Malfoy's words don't match the way he drags the collar of her shirt aside, bearing her shoulder to his lips. "There are other ways to feed off of each other." His teeth must be leaving bruises. Christ, she hopes there are bruises. "We don't have to do this. Shouldn't. I don't—"
It's then that she pushes him back, though it feels like separating roots from earth. Violent.
Their eyes meet, both panting. His gaze is frenzied, face flushed with blood — what looked so ill moments ago suddenly full of life.
"You don't want this?" she asks, finishing his sentence. There's an edge to her voice she didn't intend.
The panic overwhelms his senses in an instant, plain as day through the bond. "I—"
Her fist tightens, still tangled in his hair. "Say you don't want this."
Malfoy's lips part and the words fail him, chest heaving. And staring at him — feeling him hard against her, so undeniably affected — suddenly dredges up the anger she thought she'd forgotten.
She leans in close, lips at his ear as her voice drops to a whisper. "Lie to me again."
Something convoluted spikes across the bond. A cocktail of arousal and fear.
Her free hand takes hold of his, pulling it from her waist. "Go on. Say it."
—fuck, what is she—
—shouldn't—
—why do I—
"Malfoy?" Her voice is expectant. Calmer than she could've ever hoped.
"I don't want this."
It's just a breath, nervous and rushed.
When she exhales against his ear, he shivers — and she lets his words sink in for a moment before guiding his trapped hand downward. Not between her legs, but between his own. Guiding his fingers to splay out, she forces him to feel his own outline through his trousers.
"And what is that?" she asks.
Malfoy gasps, hand trembling in her grip. Heat pulses through him.
"A lie," he breathes.
She sits back — lets their eyes meet and finds his full of torment. Hungry and terrified.
"Prove it."