Chapter 2

Hermione's point of view

Our rooms were in a tower and the entrance to them was a painting of a boy and a girl kissing. The problem with the wizarding world was that people in paintings could move and the sounds of their kisses were overwhelming considering what had just happened.

"Excuse me," I jumped at the sound of Malfoy's rumbling tones but his speech served its purpose. They broke apart and turned to look at us.

"Sorry, you must be the new couple staying in this room. I'm Dominique and this is Gabriel, pleased to meet you. Now password please." Her accent was distinctly French. I noticed the way Gabriel watched Dominique, his face was full of love and admiration. I had once hope for that...

I read the password aloud,"Amour." How cliché, of course it would be the French word for love. Dominique seemed to notice my eye roll and went on to say;

"Would you like to change the password, we chose it as we found it quite fitting. It honours our French heritage and it honours the situation you are in. Don't you like."

"Yes it is nice but we'd like to change it," Malfoy looked to me when he said this and continued, "you can make the decision of the new password." His face was so open so understanding and so kind. I didn't like it or trust it.

"Um, thanks. I'll change it to... Phoenix." I was surprised at how pleasant he was being, I wanted him to have changed but if you were that inherently evil then you couldn't change, could you? I would be cautious around him until he proved to me that he had changed and was now a better man than he had been. I was dubious that such a change had occurred. A little part of me wanted to forgive him to make everything easier, but I couldn't help but remember the horrors I had been forced to endure because of Voldemort and people like him. I would not be quick to forgive, not when my body still bore the marks of such brutality.

The portrait swung open and I stepped through into a living area. It was small and compact- cosy. The room was round and filled with warm tones of brown and rich reds. I liked how rustic the place felt, I liked the scuffed up coffee table and bookcases full of well loved books. The dark brown leather sofas looked worn and well used. There was a bay window with cushions on that would be a perfect spot for reading, it looked out onto the lake and the sun shining off the water was breathtaking. Despite the situation I loved this place and I was instantly at peace here. I never wanted to leave.

I then took notice of Malfoy behind me, he was looking out of the window too. His face was conflicted, he obviously wanted to say something. I turned back to the view, taking in the beautiful scenes that comforted me trying to ignore his presence. Finally he began to talk:

"I'm sorry for everything, I don't expect you to forgive me. I just want for us to be able to be civil with one another and you will control the whole situation. I will not push you do anything. You need to know that I won't do anything to harm you or do anything that you don't want to do. I want to show you that I can and have changed so that we can look to the future a little bit more." His steely grey eyes seemed to pierce deep into my soul, they were so honest and I only wanted to believe him. But I couldn't. I wouldn't.

"I'm going to look upstairs."

"Do you mind if I come with you or do you want to be alone."

"You can come." I headed to the staircase, it spiralled up to the floor above and there was another smaller window seat there too. The stairs led directly to the bedroom. It had the same rich tones as the living room, I immediately felt at ease again. There were his and her desks to the left of the bed, they had pots of ink and spare quills and notebooks on top. The mahogany bed dominated the room. The covers looked so warm and inviting with tartan blankets layered up over one another, maybe the nights were quite cold due to how high up we were; again the views from the windows were stunning. An old looking fire place had plenty of wood so I wasn't too worried about being cold. Another set of stairs led upstairs to a bathroom. It was very different to the vintage feel of the lower two floors, it was very modern and bright. The bath was massive, it was like a swimming pool and it had thousand of taps which had thousands of different labels on them. I read a few and there were a lot of different scents and there were even bubbles. I loved bubble baths.

Malfoy hadn't followed me up here so I took a minute to breathe. I was confused, from what I had seen so far Malfoy was being nice but I felt like I shouldn't accept this 'new' him so easily. I was unnerved that I wasn't as disgusted in his presence as I had expected, I blamed it on our rooms. I was so at home here, back in Hogwarts- back home where I belonged.

Draco's point of view

"You can come." Those three words gave me hope. I concealed my smile and followed her upstairs. The bedroom was as cosy as the first floor. I saw that our things had already been brought up and unpacked into the wardrobe. I loved the feel of the whole place, it felt like a home. I decided not to follow Granger upstairs, she probably needed time to come to terms with everything. I didn't want to push her into accepting all of this, she needed to come to terms with it herself.

I lay on the bed and I sunk into the mattress. The pillows were so soft, probably feather. I felt my eyelids grow heavy and I fought to keep them open but I was fighting a losing battle. I was so tired and I hadn't slept well for months.

Hermione's point of view

Back down in the bedroom Draco was fast asleep on the bed. I pulled his shoes off so he didn't get mud all over the bed- at least that's what I told myself. But I had no explanation for why I picked up a blanket and draped it over his slim lanky form. I studied his face, he was extremely pale and huge bags of purple hung heavy beneath his eyes. Despite all this his face was at peace, he looked so innocent and it was nice to see him without a guarded expression.

My eyelids grew heavy and very gently I climbed under the covers as far away from him as possible. Trying not to disturb him, I snuggled deeper under the covers and tried to get to sleep.

XXXX

It was black, the curtains hadn't been closed so a sliver of silvery light from the moon cascaded through the room. I had woken to the sound of my voice; the sheets around Malfoy were twisted and his skin shone with sweat.

"Hermione...Hermione. No! Get off her. Stop it! No, no, no ,no." I climbed over the bed to him and tried to shake him awake but it wasn't working. I shook him harder and his eyes flew open, panic and pain laced through his beauti.. . his eyes. When he saw me he visibly relaxed and smiled hesitantly. Without thinking I wiped a tear from his cheek and he caught my hand before I could pull it away and cradled it against his chest. His hands ran over my scars and his face changed to horror- he looked at the word carved into my arms. I tried to pull away- I felt so uncomfortable with him staring at it. And so embarrassed, it was so ugly.

"I'm so sorry Hermione, you never deserved anything that happened to you. I'm so sorry."

"It wasn't your fault."

"I could have stopped it though." I had no answer for that so I climbed back under the covers. Malfoy did too and it was silent for a while.

"You called me Hermione."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be."

A/N: Please review, I love getting feedback x.