WARNING: This fic is not meant for general audiences. There are themes within it that could be triggering. They are: suicidal thoughts, depression, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), physical abuse, emotional/psychological abuse. Please do not read further if you are uncomfortable with any of these themes. Reader discretion is advised.
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19 January 1999
Hermione closes her book and gives Draco a long, hard look.
A minute passes, and then two. She can feel his demeanour shift from that of languor to something more alert; more tense.
She finally opens her mouth. "You'd rather be with all those women…" she lowers her voice to a whisper when Madam Pince walks by, "—you'd rather sleep with them and cause yourself so much pain…than be with me? Do you hate me that much?"
Draco's eyes flicker, tightening as he glares at her.
He's good at that. Glaring at her. If it was a sport, he would be a gold-medallist. Her own gaze drops and she watches his hands instead of his face, as if it will detract from the awkwardness of this conversation.
One long, delicate finger trails along the piece of parchment in front of him, coming to rest at the tip of his eagle-feather quill.
They wait for each other to speak, but then he decides to go for the kill.
And he's not kind about it, either.
"Get this into your head, Granger. You may be my mate," he murmurs, his voice low; dangerous, "but I don't owe you anything . I need you to survive, and that's it. You're nothing to me but a physical necessity, like fucking oxygen, and even that disgusts me. It disgusts me so much that I would willingly jump into Fiendfyre to forget, even for a minute, that I am bound to you. So, yes. Even if it causes me pain, I'd rather fuck other women than be with you because I hate you that much. "
When Draco finishes speaking, he gives her one last scathing look before picking up his quill. It's the scratching of the nib against paper that punctuates the atmosphere between them—discordant; uncomfortable.
It should kill her, maybe. Being spoken to in the way he does. Being looked at like she's nothing. Being treated like dirt.
Like mud.
It could have killed her a year ago, but she's a different person now and these words merely bruise her heart.
Hermione waits a moment longer before a sad sigh tumbles from her lips, unbidden, and she lifts the strap of her bag. Scraping her chair backwards, she rises to stand.
"See you tonight, then."
/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\
Eighth-years—or whatever this mismatched group of traumatised, haunted survivors are—have been given private dorms. They are all of age, and deserve some modicum of luxury after going through a war.
At least, that's the official reason.
The unofficial reason is so they can break down in private.
Hermione sits on the edge of her bed and stares at the wall.
Luxury.
Luxury would be going home to parents who knew her name and her place in their lives. Luxury would be a smooth forearm with only freckles and not the handiwork of a psychotic witch. Luxury would be eating the food served at mealtimes and not getting sick, because it is still too rich and she is used to eating stale bread and unsweetened porridge in a tent.
Luxury would be getting to sleep in her bed at night.
Luxury would be not being Draco Malfoy's mate.
/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\
Once it is quiet, she throws off her covers and leaves the comfort of her room for the cold, drafty quiet of the corridor. Draco's door is three down from hers and she stares at the initials that have been crudely burned into the wood.
One breath. Two breaths. Three breaths.
She knocks once and the door swings open. Draco stands there, one hand braced against the frame and a scowl painting his face.
"You took your sweet fucking time."
It's all he allows her before he turns away into the dark of his room. She steps in behind him, closing the door with a wave of her wand. The silencing spell she performs is more out of habit than necessity, since he barely ever speaks to her.
His room smells like him. Like apples, and spice. And sometimes like tobacco because he likes to sneak a cigar when he does well on a paper for class.
Hermione knows his room in the dark better than she knows her own.
Her feet are steady, practiced, as she walks to the bed. Her wand clatters against the bedside table as she hears him rustle the duvet, getting comfortable again. She waits for him to settle before she crawls under the covers. Carefully. A generous distance still remains between their bodies.
He was splayed out across the mattress before, she can tell, because the sheets are warm against her skin.
It's almost cozy.
This has been their routine for four months now. Every night, they sleep in the same bed—his bed, always—and every morning, she sneaks out before dawn and spends the day avoiding him aside from when they have to study together for Potions. Slughorn was unintentionally cruel when he made them partners for the entire year.
It is frustrating, and embarrassing, and overwhelming to admit that her anxiety melts away when she lays her head against the pillow. This proximity to him expunges the turmoil in her mind. His scent; his warmth is a balm to her frayed nerves.
It's her stash of concentrated, personalised Draught of Peace.
She has always wondered how he feels when she is close to him.
/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\
The first time they slept in the same bed, she woke to find his arms wrapped around her and her head tucked underneath his chin. The feeling of him, her mate, pressed against her so intimately was more than she could bear and it set her mind into overdrive. It was her blinking—her eyelashes tickling the delicate skin of his throat—that woke him up and he threw himself away from her like she was poison the minute he gained full consciousness.
They had maintained a healthy distance ever since, and never spoke of it again—that brief moment when their eyes caught, before he knew what he was doing—and it was heaven. The minutes of her life that would play in a loop whenever she was feeling particularly down.
It had been a one-off, she knew that now. A mistake.
And never again did Hermione wake up in the arms of Draco Malfoy.
/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\
His hand is flat against the mattress, palm facing up.
Waiting for hers.
Hermione knows this hand like it is her own. She knows its size and its shape, and every callus and scar that decorates its surface.
She knows all of this because this hand is her only point of physical contact with Draco. Every night, this is the connection they share to satisfy the Veela bond as much as he allows.
This connection is the only thing that keeps her sane.
She slips her smaller hand into his and feels his muscles tense—fingers curling forward to intertwine with hers for a brief half-second before he relaxes again.
It's not holding hands, per se. It's just her palm resting against his.
But it's everything .
/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\
When she wakes, he's already sitting up, elbows resting on his knees. Her eyes adjust to the scrap of light coming from his wand and she lifts her head.
All she can hear is his soft breathing.
This is another part of Draco. This pre-dawn, calm Draco who is too haunted by his nightmares to haunt her.
"Are you okay?" she asks, and it's fifty-fifty chance that he'll either tell her to fuck off or blurt out his problems. She's his pseudo-therapist, his confidante, and his soulmate even.
His lover?
Not if she was the last woman on earth.
Sometimes she wonders if this is her penance. The war is still fresh in her mind and her hands are not clean. Surely this is the price—the punishment for everything she has ever done.
Most of all, for obliviating her parents.
The guilt still eats at her, all these months later, and she knows it will probably do so for the rest of her life.
What better punishment than condemning Hermione Granger to be the mate of the man who despises her most?
She'd known little about Veela before he shoved her into a dark alcove and told her what he was. After that, after realising why she had been drawn to him for so long, it had been difficult to stop researching. Book after book, she devoured as much knowledge as she possibly could on the subject matter. Veela. Their mates. And everything in between.
One day in December, Draco had given her a book about Veela from his family's personal library; a book that had gone out of print over two centuries ago. It filled in all the blanks and continues to do so now.
"Leave, Granger."
She's quick to push the cover off her legs, reaching for her robe. A hand, warm against the chill of the room, wraps around her forearm, holding her down.
"Wait."
She does.
He tugs her to face him, but her head remains bowed. This is out of the ordinary and she doesn't know what to do.
Cold fingers press against her chin, forcing her to look at him. The hand around her wrist lets go and comes up to her hair to tuck an errant curl behind her ear.
"Malfoy—"
"So weak," he whispers, closing his eyes. The gentleness of his touch is so at odds with the words that fall from his mouth. "So fucking weak ."
For a split second, Hermione thinks he might lean in—close the distance and kiss her like she's been dreaming he might.
But he blinks and the moment is over.
He wrenches himself away and storms into his bathroom, so she picks up her robe and leaves.
/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\
22 January 1999
As she slides into her seat for Advanced Runes, Hermione says hello to Parvati, her new deskmate. Lavender is dead, and Hermione doesn't have Ron or Harry with her anymore so it works out well.
"All good?" Parvati asks. "You look like you didn't get much sleep last night." Her friend scrunches her nose, smiling.
Hermione gives her good-natured grimace before pulling a quill from her bag.
It's funny, really.
It's their silly inside joke, because Hermione doesn't ever get a good night's sleep. Parvati first asked her if she was okay when, two weeks into being the mate of a reluctant arse of a Veela, she appeared to breakfast with dark smudges under her eyes.
Now, it is a recurring thing; something Parvati would ask out of habit rather than concern. The shadows are a permanent feature on Hermione's face and no one cared enough to worry.
Besides, there is no time for pondering other peoples' problems when each of the eighth-years has their own troubles.
/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\
If her younger self saw her now, she'd be ashamed.
Probably as ashamed as Draco is to be seen with her.
/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\
It's a letter from Harry that almost makes her smile for the first time in weeks, even if the message is brief.
Dear Hermione,
I miss you. Thanks for the last letter, it was great to hear what's been happening at Hogwarts. Say hello to McGonagall for me.
Auror training is going well, Ron's already complaining as expected. He says he'll write to you soon. I have to wrap this up now, but I'll send a longer letter on the weekend.
How are you?
Love you,
Harry
It's painful to hide the truth from Harry, her brother in everything but blood, but she can't help but be embarrassed.
And Draco would lose his mind if he found out that Harry Potter knew the truth about him.
By the time dinner rolls around, Hermione is exhausted, but that's normal. She risks a glance at the Slytherin table and her heart flips with grim satisfaction to see Draco hunched over his plate, eyes shut. He looks like he's been pummeled by the Whomping Willow.
Everything she feels, he feels a hundred times.
She knows that she holds some power over him—how badly he needs her—but as she's contemplating this, he catches her watching him.
A jolt of panic startles her and she drops her fork to her plate, a blush heating her cheeks. She looks to Neville, and then Ginny, but no one has noticed her so she eats another bite of her bread roll before clearing her throat.
"I've got a headache," she announces to no one in particular. She gets up and leaves as quickly as she can, almost breaking out in a run by the time she gets to the corridor. It's quiet in the eighth-year common room and she takes the opportunity to sit by the fire.
For a while, it's just the crackle of burning logs that fills her mind, but she keeps getting pulled back to this morning and Draco's gentle caress.
She could close her eyes and pretend it was real.
/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\
"Granger."
His voice makes Hermione bolt upright, scrambling to her feet as quickly as she can. Heart racing, she spins to see Draco standing in the entrance of the common room, his patented frown firmly in place. He must have followed her.
She glances around, even though she knows no one is there apart from them. "Draco, I—"
"I'm shattered. My room in five." He brushes past her. "Get a move on, yeah? Anyone might see."
She watches him walk down the passage, frowning at his back.
There was a time when Draco Malfoy could try to boss her around and she would reply with a hex aimed straight at his chest.
Now—
Now she just obeys without thinking too hard about it, glad for once not to make the decision for herself.
/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\
Draco's door is ajar when Hermione tries to knock, so she pushes in, cautiously.
"Hello?"
The bathroom door is closed and she can hear the shower running, so she slips off her slippers and robe. Underneath, she wears her soft, slightly ratty t-shirt. It used to be either Harry's or Ron's, from when they were in the woods and she ran out of clean nightclothes, but she never gave it back and now it's hers.
It's cozy here, with lit candles flickering on every available surface.
She takes the opportunity to look at his room in the light, since she otherwise sneaks in and out in the darkness. It's roughly the same size as hers, but his sheets are emerald green silk where hers are just standard issue beige.
Slytherin .
He also appears to have replaced all of the regular furniture with a set of carved pieces made from beautiful dark wood.
There are books everywhere.
There are no photographs.
Hermione bends to read the name of the novel on his desk and almost stumbles in shock to see that it's Great Expectations . Yes, the novel is famous, but it's not widely known in the Wizarding world… and the idea that Draco Malfoy has a copy is almost ridiculous.
The bathroom door opens and she swivels, freezing like a deer in headlights.
It's not fair.
It's really not fair, she thinks, that her mate is such a complete arse.
Because he is so beautiful.
He's taller than before the war, thanks to a growth spurt after he came of age. Standing there with a towel wrapped around his waist, he looks like a model in a Muggle magazine. There are beads of water slowly making their way down his muscled abdomen—he's basically the cover of a romance novel at this point—and it's all Hermione can do not to lunge across the room and tackle him to the bed.
She's momentarily lost in him, but not so much that she doesn't catch his gaze flicker up and down her body.
Interesting .
"Granger." He clicks his fingers, snapping her out of her trance. "What the fuck are you doing?"
She shakes her head. "Nothing."
Neither of them have the strength to acknowledge the lie.
He rolls his eyes before jerking his chin to the bed.
/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\/\\\
She knows that from a stranger's point of view, this would look like a perfectly normal scene but it really isn't.
It's only eight in the evening, and Draco is dead to the world. Hermione lies next to him in her usual position, her face half-buried in her pillow. Unable to fall asleep quite so early, she keeps as still as possible so he doesn't wake. Draco extinguished all but two candles when he burrowed beneath the covers.
It's light enough for Hermione to see him—see their arms twisted in a not-quite embrace.
Her left hand lays atop his left.
Because she sleeps on her stomach, it's always her Mudblood scar that presses against his Dark Mark. A cruel twist in an already ridiculous situation.
Maybe Draco realises this.
Then again, he doesn't really care about her so probably not.
She watches him in the dim light, cataloguing the hard planes and contours of his face in ways she can't when he's awake. He's so peaceful when he sleeps and she resists the urge to brush his hair from his forehead.
There are many lines drawn between them, and she cannot cross a single one.
He shifts, his head turning this way and that while he dreams, so she rubs her thumb against his palm to soothe him.
It's the quiet that allows Hermione to think about how different things are now; how different her life is to the one she had when she stepped through the school gates last September.
Something was broken when she came back. Her spirit. Her mind. Her heart.
Something .
And it allowed Draco Malfoy to seep in through the cracks.