12

The next few days were not nearly as stressful as the first day of group therapy. Hermione thought that the aftermath of the first session, Seamus's outburst and everyone's overwhelming reaction to seeing Luna's traumatic memories, was enough to make the counselors think they should take it slow for a few days.

"When dealing with intense trauma," Walt said the morning following their trip into the pensieve, "the tolerable dose is only minutes long. Right now, you all are at a stage where your trauma is still new, like a wound that hasn't quite healed yet, so we can revisit it momentarily, as we did last night while watching Luna's memories. After a few moments of close examination of traumatic memories, the brain starts to do things to protect itself, some of which we saw last night… anger, resentment, fear, grief. These are all normal. We need to slowly begin to revisit these traumatic memories through forced therapeutic events, in doses that we're all comfortable with, and by doing so, the brain can be reprogrammed to feel in control of those memories rather than feeling controlled by them."

So, they attended their own private counseling sessions and went over their journals. Hermione still had kitchen duty with Malfoy three times a day, but after Hermione caught his interaction with Luna in the hallway, he made it a point to not speak to her. He rushed through each meal and finished most of the dishes before Hermione even made it through her morning tea. She wanted to ask him about Dobby, but seeing how angry he was with Luna, Hermione didn't want to push him.

They had all fallen into a sort of routine, Seamus and Malfoy each making sure they were never near one another during sessions or alone together for that matter. And outside of those events, Hermione never heard Draco speak at all.

Altogether, Hermione found her first week at The Willows to be incredibly depressing and lonely. She was sharing more about herself than she had in her entire life, but only with Alys during their private sessions. After that first night's events, it appeared that no one was ready to jump in and share their own memories just yet. They discussed goals, how they were feeling about each day, and played icebreaker games. Outside of learning that she and Seamus both once had a dog named Bodie and that Nicola and Draco both spoke four languages, Hermione hadn't stepped away feeling any closer to any of the other "guests" at all.

Seamus and Parvati spent all of their time together, and anytime Hermione was nearby, Seamus clammed up entirely. She did talk to Dennis on occasion, but it always seemed forced. And though Hermione tried to talk to her, Nicola seemed almost like two different people. Some days, she was incredibly easy to talk to, reminding Hermione of conversations with her mother. On those days, Nicola was caring, energetic, and warm in a way that Hermione hadn't experienced since obliviating her parents. But, other days, she seemed like a different woman entirely, cold, distant, and short. She wasn't rude really, but she just seemed to be somewhere else mentally. Hermione didn't push her. She knew what it was like to be lost in her head.

There had been no more random conversations with Malfoy either. Hermione found herself even missing that little bit of conversation, and the desire to speak to him about what she saw in Luna's memories and the conversation with her afterward grew every day. She would have forced the conversation already, but she really didn't even know where to begin.

All of this culminated in Hermione feeling more alone than she ever had.

I thought this was supposed to make everything better.

She wrote to Harry and Ginny every day, but she never talked to them about how she was feeling. They had enough going on already, and she didn't want them to continue worrying about her. Maybe when all this was over, they would believe she was better, and she could do a better job of hiding it. She wanted to ask Harry about what Luna said about Dobby as well, but then that would lead to a whole slew of questions that she knew she couldn't answer without breaking the confidentiality of the group sessions.

She was getting more exercise than she was before coming, though. Every morning they went for a group hike through the woods surrounding The Willows. The fresh air and time spent in nature was supposed to boost their serotonin levels, but Hermione only felt winded by the end. She had to admit that it was beautiful though. They were in a magically concealed version of Galloway Forest Park in Scotland, something Seamus seemed to really enjoy. When they found out where they were, he shared with the group that he and his parents used to come here every summer, but he hadn't been in years. He said this, and for the first time since coming to The Willows, he looked so much like his old self that Hermione felt maybe they had reached a turning point for the chip on his shoulder. Instead, he finished speaking, and as if he just noticed the smile was on his face, he immediately scowled and was even more sullen for the rest of the day.

He had yet another outburst in group that night, and Walt, seeming to finally have had enough of his attitude, said, "You know, Seamus, if you worked as hard to make your life better as you do to make sure nothing changes, you could be extraordinarily successful at it."

Seamus was so taken aback that he left in the middle of the session, the rest of them continuing as if nothing was at all amiss.

When Friday night rolled around, they all reported to their group session and took their seats. Walt walked in and welcomed everyone, as he did every night, and then said, "Before we begin with our session tonight, we want to prepare you all for our first group outing tomorrow."

Alys cleared her throat and said, "Yes, so without beating around the bush at all, we've noticed that you all seem to have secluded yourselves from one another. You're still getting comfortable with us and with each other, and that's perfectly normal. We're hoping though that we can start having you all work together as a team, so tomorrow we've planned a trip to take you all to a ropes course." She looked around expectantly, her smile beaming.

The rest of the group looked around as well, but they were looking questioningly at one another.

"I'm going to go out on a limb and say that none of them knows what that is, Alys," Walt said with a chuckle.

"It's going to be a blast. We'll all be hooked up to these harnesses, and we have to travel across all these obstacles while up a tree."

Up a…

"I'm sorry, did you say, up in a tree?" Nicola asked, just as Hermione was opening her mouth to ask the same thing.

"Yes, up a tree. It's way up high. So, we all have to work together to help one another, and cheer each other on. It's a challenge in teamwork and overcoming your fears." She nodded with a sense of finality, still grinning like being in the top of a tree was something to be beyond excited about.

Hermione groaned, and Walt asked, "Are you afraid of heights, Hermione?"

"It's not the heights I'm afraid of, actually. It's the falling."

"If I remember correctly, didn't you ride on a dragon at some point?" Dennis asked.

Hermione felt her face grow red as everyone turned to look at her. and Nicola's mouth dropped open.

"Um, yes, I did, but it was kind of a means to an end. It wasn't exactly a pleasurable experience."

She felt herself shiver at the memory of it. It had been her idea, of course, leaping onto the back of the dragon to escape from the bottommost vaults of Gringotts, but it was terrifying. Almost as bad as riding on the Thestrals before the battle at the Ministry. At least she could see the dragon. The Thestral, on the other hand, remained invisible for the flight, which Hermione supposed was a good thing given the nature of their magical ability, but she definitely hadn't been pleased with it when all she could see was London 20,000 feet beneath her as she held onto what appeared to be nothing at all.

"Wait, you rode on a dragon?" Malfoy asked. It was the first time he had addressed her personally since they did dishes together on their first full day here.

"Yes. We used it to escape from Gringotts."

She knew the Ministry had kept the story under lock and key so that others didn't think Gringotts was so easy to rob, but she assumed that alone would be enough to make sure everyone in the Wizarding World had heard it by now. She looked around the circle, but everyone was looking at her with complete astonishment.

"Escape from Gringotts?" Nicola asked.

"Seriously, none of you know this story?" Hermione asked.

Even Walt looked enraptured.

When she hesitated, he said, "This is a safe space. We're all sworn to secrecy in this room, right?"

Everyone agreed and waited for her to continue.

Why the hell not?

"Well… we broke into Gringotts to steal… well, to steal something from … someone's vault."

This was going to be harder than she thought. The very mention of horcruxes was completely banned by the Wizengamot. Nobody wanted another Voldemort running around trying to make himself immortal.

"You can't elaborate on that at all?" Seamus asked, rolling his eyes.

She hesitated again. "Um… no, I can't elaborate on that. Suffice it to say that we needed something specific, and it was necessary to defeat Voldemort."

There was a simultaneous cringe throughout the circle.

"We, myself, Harry, and Ron, that is, we were being attacked by the goblins, and we had a dragon on hand, so…" She shrugged.

They were all still looking at her, wanting more.

"There was a dragon conveniently in the vaults of Gringotts?" Nicola asked.

Hermione scratched a spot on her palm and felt herself sweating heavily under the weight of their collective gaze. She took a deep breath and said, "Yes, they use dragons in Gringotts. They've been barbarically trained to avoid certain sounds and objects, which keeps the goblins safe. I'm not sure if they have any others, but we leapt onto the back of one. I shot a small jinx at it to get it moving, and we flew out through the roof. We destroyed the majority of Gringotts in the process." She chuckled to herself and added, "Honestly, if Kingsley hadn't intervened, I think they would have given us a lifelong ban."

When she looked up, they were all smiling at her in amazement. Well, neither Seamus nor Malfoy were looking at her, but everyone else seemed to be thoroughly impressed.

"How the hell did you even break in? I thought that was impossible!" Dennis said, shaking his head in disbelief.

"I polyjuiced myself as Bellatrix Lestrange." Malfoy looked at her then. She saw it out of the corner of her eye, but she refused to look back.

A collective gasp went around the circle before Seamus asked, "How the hell did you pull that off?" Even he seemed impressed.

Hermione absently scratched at the scar across her forearm. When she looked down, she noticed the MU was barely visible, so she pulled her sleeves down and folded her arms in her lap.

"I was able to get one of her hairs when … when I was close to her once." She finally looked at Malfoy then. She didn't know what she expected. Anger maybe, at coming so close to mentioning what she had gone through at his house while he stood idly by and watched. She knew it wasn't fair. There's no telling what all he himself had been through at the hands of his own family, but after seeing how he jumped and saved Luna, a part of her was bitter at the fact that he did nothing to protect her as well. What could he have done though? In Luna's situation, he had the perfect opportunity to jump in. When she lay on the cold floor of his drawing room, stripped of most of her clothes and all of her dignity, they were surrounded by Death Eaters. Logically, she knew there was nothing he could've done, but still, a part of her resented him for it.

But he wasn't looking at her in anger. Instead, his eyebrows were furrowed in what could only be sadness. As soon as their eyes met, he dropped his gaze to the floor.

He should be ashamed, she thought before immediately feeling awful for it.

"Yeah, so that's pretty much the whole story. We're not supposed to talk about it. They don't want people to think it's easy to rob Gringotts, I suppose. Really, it was anything but easy. I don't know how we even made it out of there. And now you can see why I like to keep both of my feet on the ground," she said, tipping her head toward Walt.

He gave her a broad smile. "I think someone who can do that can easily climb a tree." She shifted in her seat and noticed that Malfoy was looking at Walt with a strange expression on his face.

Walt continued, "So, we'll all portkey out tomorrow after breakfast. It's a Muggle place, so we'll be taking Muggle transportation to get there. "

"The bus? How quaint," Nicola said, wincing. Nicola wasn't the type of woman who rode on a bus, clearly.

Ignoring Nicola's whinging, Walt said, "Everyone please wear clothes that you can move around freely in and won't be conspicuous around Muggles, of course. If any of you don't have that, please let us know, so we can acquire something for you."

Walt clapped his hands together once and said, "So, moving on. With tomorrow's festivities in mind, tonight we're going to talk about fear. We've taken it back a few paces after delving into Luna's memories, just to give you all a break, but tonight we're going to dig a little deeper. We have a list here." He pulled a piece of paper from the clipboard on the floor by his chair. "So, there are a few specific fears that we'd like to address with each of you. Some of you we'll get to tonight; others will be discussed over the next week or so."

"Draco," Walt turned his face toward Draco, who looked like the last thing he wanted to do was talk about his fears in front of a room full of people. "Would you care to talk to the group about your reason for not going back to Hogwarts last year?"

At the mention of Hogwarts, Malfoy's face softened slightly. Hermione was intrigued. She also chose to not go back to Hogwarts last year.

"Couldn't really go from Azkaban cou-"

"Seamus, this is the very last time I will tolerate an outburst from you in this room. After that you can pack your bags." Walt never even looked at him. Instead, he was still looking at Malfoy encouragingly.

Seamus snapped his mouth shut and glared at the wall across from him.

"Yes, I was in Azkaban," Malfoy said, twirling the large silver signet ring on his pinky. "I was actually given the option to go to Hogwarts for part of the year in order to finish my classes."

Hermione's mind was reeling. Why would he turn that down to sit in a cell in Azkaban? There may no longer be dementors, but the place still wasn't an easy experience. They were still mostly secluded from other people and from any use of magic at all.

Malfoy closed his eyes for a moment and took a breath. When he opened them, Hermione noticed they were once again dark grey, ghosted over. "I chose not to go back."

"Why did you make that decision?" Walt asked, politely pushing him to answer the question.

"I wasn't able to go back there."

"Go on," Walt said.

Malfoy's composure slipped a bit and he blinked a few times. He twisted in his seat and chewed his bottom lip.

Hermione couldn't recall ever seeing him fidget or stammer.

"I couldn't face it after… after everything. And I knew that no one wanted me there."

"But multiple professors spoke on your behalf. Clearly, there were some who did want you there."

Professors vouched for him? Who?

"Yes, professors, but not other students. It was hard enough for anyone to go back, I'm sure. Me being there would have made that worse."

That sounded familiar. "I'm sorry that my being here makes this harder for you." He said that at their introduction meeting, apologizing to her because he had to be here.

"So," Walt continued, a skeptical look on his face. "You chose not to go back to save others from having to be around you?"

"No. I knew they didn't want me there, and I suppose I didn't want to be where I knew I wasn't wanted." He glanced at Seamus then, only briefly, before his eyes shifted to Hermione's.

"How do you think they would have reacted? These people who you thought didn't want you there?"

"If the massive number of howlers I receive on a daily basis are any indication, then I'm fairly certain that I wouldn't have made it out of there unscathed."

Hermione's brow furrowed. Had he actually been threatened? And in Azkaban? Wasn't his mail being screened for that sort of thing? She tried to quiet her thoughts, but the social justice warrior in her angered at the idea that someone, anyone, was being threatened while under the care of the Ministry.

"I wasn't really scared so much as I was tired. I've been fighting for years. I thought Azkaban was at least somewhere I didn't have to do that." He scoffed and added, "Wrong about that, too though, so I should've just gone back."

"What do you mean by that?" Susan asked, speaking up for the first time.

"There's still plenty of fighting in there. I had to stay separated from everyone else at all times. Turns out I'm not even welcome amongst other criminals." Malfoy laughed mirthlessly; a sound so familiar to his former self that Hermione had to blink her memories away. She was instantly reminded of being the butt of his jokes, hearing that laugh at her expense or at one of her friends, only this time it seemed it was aimed at himself.

"So, you believe you made the wrong decision then?" Walt asked.

Malfoy didn't hesitate. "No, I don't. I definitely didn't make the wrong decision…" He stopped and closed his eyes for a split second. He sniffed sharply and cleared his throat, as if he was resigning himself to just speaking freely. "I actually did go back, briefly, but I couldn't have stayed there. Honestly, I don't see how anyone went back after the war. They made everything look exactly the same, as if none of it happened. Maybe if they'd left some of the blood behind, an outline in chalk here and there, it would have been easier." His voice took on a different quality, deadened somehow, and his eyes clouded over. "They could put down new brick and paper over the gory details, but all of it was still there just beneath the surface. I could still see all of them, all the people I saw die there, and watch it happen over and over again."

The entire room was silent. Hermione wasn't sure if they were all shocked for the same reason she was, but they were all definitely shocked. Hermione was speechless. These were almost the exact same words she said to Harry about why she couldn't go back. She knew it was morbid, grotesque even, but it felt like a slap in the face to just go on with life as if none of it happened. Malfoy seemed to feel the same way.

Seamus looked as if he was going to explode. He wore a deep grimace, his lips stretched into a thin line as if physically holding his mouth shut was the only way to prevent the words from coming out. Hermione was certain he desperately wanted to lay all those deaths at Malfoy's feet, like he was to blame more than Voldemort.

He started to open his mouth, but Hermione beat him to it.

"I didn't go either. For the same reason." Malfoy's eyes snapped up to hers and she thought that if he could share this vulnerability with the rest of them then she could as well. "I tried to go back too, actually made it a couple of days. I was able to go early, so I didn't have to take the train or anything. Luckily, the other students weren't there yet, so I was able to have my breakdowns without anyone watching. It's like you said," she nodded toward Malfoy. "It just didn't feel like the same place. It was darker, and… terrifying. Everywhere I looked, I saw loss, like a constant replay of every bad thing. So, I… I finished my N.E.W.T.s through correspondence courses."

"Me too," Malfoy and Seamus said in unison. They both then looked at one another quickly before turning away again, as if neither of them was willing to acknowledge having anything in common.

"Seamus," Walt said. "You chose to not go back either?"

"Yeah, being tortured for the entire year made it pretty difficult to really focus on my studies," Seamus said, cutting his eyes at Malfoy. "And after everything, I didn't want to go back. I doubt I ever will."

They went around the circle, some offering their own stories about Hogwarts. Parvati broke down talking about how it wasn't home for her either, not anymore. She said going back there without her sister or Lavender beside her would have been impossible. Dennis quietly agreed but offered no more information.

Hermione anxiously wondered to herself what Walt would bring up when it was her turn to talk about fears.

The next morning, they all hastily ate their breakfast, and for the first time, there was actual chatter around the breakfast table. Hermione wasn't sure if it was nerves or excitement at being able to leave the compound after six days of confinement. For her, it was absolutely nerves. Her stomach felt like a churning cauldron, and she was afraid to eat any more than a piece of toast.

Malfoy, of all people, was the only one who seemed to notice. He sat down beside her and asked if she would pass the honey. He looked down at her plate, noticing the two bites taken from her toast smothered with apricot jam, and asked, "You aren't eating?"

"I'm afraid I'll throw up on someone," she replied, looking down and frowning at the offensive piece of bread in front of her.

"I'm astounded that someone as deeply-rooted in Gryffindor as yourself is afraid of something as boring as heights." He poured an obscene amount of honey into his Earl Grey, causing her to crinkle her nose in disgust.

"Well, perhaps we aren't all as one-dimensional as you." She picked her toast back up and forced herself to take a bite.

"Please," he said, filling his own plate with eggs and sausage. "I bet you bleed in red and gold."

Her toast turned to ash in her mouth, and she had to bite the tip of her tongue to keep from saying that he should know, being the only one here who's seen it.

He must've realized his faux pas because his cheeks bloomed pink and he didn't speak again throughout breakfast.

Afterward she and Malfoy cleaned the kitchen, almost entirely in silence yet again. Their one interaction came when she couldn't help but snicker at his obvious discomfort with wearing Muggle denims. She couldn't recall having ever seen him in anything but slacks and chinos, and he kept shaking one leg slightly when he thought nobody was watching. Once she inadvertently let a snort out, and he turned around and glared at her. "How the hell Muggles wear these, I'll never know. I feel like a vagrant."

She turned to put the dishes into the cabinet, smirking to herself and said, "You look nice."

She didn't really think about what she just said, until she saw him stop washing dishes. It was only for a split second, but her seemingly innocent comment definitely made him pause.

Why did I just compliment Malfoy? Maybe she really was losing her mind.

They all met at the apparition point just outside the grounds ready to portkey to the bus station. They stood in a circle and Walt directed them all to take hands. He pulled a small tube of toothpaste from his pocket and, looking down at his watch, began to count down from five. When he reached one, the tube gave a jerk, and they all inhaled sharply as they were magically transported.

An hour later, after taking two separate buses and watching Nicola recoil a dozen times at the "unsanitary conditions" of bus travel, they stood beneath their supposed fun for the day, and Hermione felt even more like she was going to throw up.

There were dozens of platforms attached at the very tops of insanely tall trees. Have trees always been this tall? The tallest ones were every bit of 20 meters above the ground, and various bridges, ropes, and zig-zag obstacles connected them to one another. Hermione felt like her one piece of toast was about to make a reappearance when she saw a teenage boy leap off the top of another obstacle at least fifteen meters high. He yelled out in what could have only been excitement, but Hermione thought she had to have misheard, because he simply careened toward the ground. Who would be excited about that? She let out an audible gasp and threw her hand over her mouth, thinking he was about to crash in the ground, when the line grew taut and he slowly dropped the last couple meters. His friends standing at the top were cheering him on as he threw a fist in the air in triumph.

"Holy hell. Muggles do this for fun!" Dennis croaked. Hermione turned to see his face just as ashen as she felt.

The only one of them who seemed remotely excited was Seamus. He was looking at that tower, with a slight grin and his eyes twinkling in anticipation.

A woman handed them each a harness and instructed them on how to put them on properly before going over the rules. Supposedly they were completely safe, they would always be attached to a cable by at least one carabiner, a word which had them all looking at one another quizzically. They all realized quickly that attempting to act like Muggles was going to be much harder than they thought, even for those who were Muggle-born.

They were supposed to go in two separate groups since there were too many of them to be on the course at once. Hermione was left standing with Walt, Malfoy, Alys, and Dennis as they waited for the other group to get far enough ahead for them to start.

Alys bounced on the balls of her feet, radiating energy that Hermione wished she could harness somehow. Her sister was an international quidditch star; of course, she'd be a daredevil too. Hermione, on the other hand, was shaking all over and had already bitten two nails down to the quick. Walt and Malfoy were talking about quidditch of all things, and Dennis seemed to be more preoccupied with the pretty blonde instructor than anything else. How was it that she was the only one filled with anxiety about possibly falling to their deaths?

When it was their group's turn, they climbed up what felt like a dozen flights of steps to get to the very top, but when they opened the door to the first platform, Hermione groaned and felt her stomach do a flop when she realized they were actually only about halfway up the course.

"Okay, guys," the instructor said. "You'll start here and work your way up through the course. When you get across one of the obstacles, stay to the right to work your way around, otherwise you'll be missing parts of the course."

Well, there's an idea. She put that thought in the back of her mind and decided that was her failsafe if it felt like too much.

Alys, practically chomping at the bit to get started, went first, with Dennis right behind her. After Malfoy started his trek across the first obstacle, a wobbly bridge with a massive gap between each step, Hermione tentatively took her first step.

Don't think about it, just do it, she told herself.

Noticing the way her legs were shaking as she looked down at the ground below, Walt said from behind her, "You've got this, Hermione."

She took one hand off the cable lining the bridge to give him a thumbs up without turning around. She could feel her blood pumping in her ears as she walked her way through a few obstacles. Just when she started thinking this wasn't all that bad, she came to a "bridge" made of suspended tires, none of which were connected to one another. Of course, she didn't know that until she stepped onto the first one and felt it swing beneath her weight. She let out a squeak, and Malfoy turned from the spiderweb he was working his way through and started to speak, just as Walt asked, "You okay?"

"Yes, I … I didn't know this was going to move."

She hadn't mustered the courage to take the next step yet, so she stood on top of the first tire while it swayed beneath her.

"Just hang tight, and I'll come help you."

"I'm okay now. It just took me by surprise." She managed to counterbalance the swinging of the tire in order to make it stop and took another step. It wasn't nearly as terrifying when she knew it was going to move.

She made it through the next couple obstacles without incident but came to a stop when she realized that Malfoy was standing on the next platform, looking down with a deep frown on his face.

She connected her safety cable to the same platform he was standing on and noticed the same thing he did – there was no bridge. "So, we just jump?" she asked, unable to hide the crack in her voice.

"I think we fly," he said, pointing toward Alys a few obstacles ahead of them flying through the air at what could have been the speed of light.

"Oh, god," Hermione said. "This is insane. Just when I get comfortable, it gets worse."

"You want to go ahead of me?" Malfoy asked.

"Wait, are you scared? I've seen you fly higher than this on a broom."

"No, Granger," he snapped. "I'm not scared." His voice softened as he continued. "I was asking because I know you are. I could… I don't know, cheer you on. 'Work together as a team,' like Alys said." He rolled his eyes.

Perhaps it was the fact that her nerves had her stomach somewhere up in her throat, but she couldn't hold in the guffaw that fell out of her mouth.

When he merely blinked at her, she realized he was being serious. "Um… okay." She reached up to unclip her cable, but he unclipped his own first, moving it behind hers.

Once he had both his cables reconnected, he said, "I watched Alys do it. I think you just sit back and pick up your feet. You don't have to jump really."

"Well, that's a relief," she said, sarcastically.

Malfoy stood behind her, waiting for her to move. When she didn't, he said, "Well, go."

She turned to glower at him. "Is that how you cheer someone on? If so, you're awful at it."

"I'm sorry, let me try again," he said, dripping sardonically. Then added, with a plastered-on smile, "You've got this, Hermione."

"Hmm," she turned back around once more looking at the massive drop beneath her. "You can try being an ass, but you said my real name. That was just the encouragement I needed." She looked back at him over her shoulder, flashing him the same smile he just gave her. "Why, thank you ever so much, Draco," she said, enunciating his name dramatically. Without giving herself a second to reconsider, she closed her eyes and pushed off from the platform. She was hoping that it would be a slap in the face to Malfoy, but there was absolutely nothing graceful or empowering to the way she shrieked as she flew through the air. Clinging to her cable for dear life, she screamed for what felt like an eternity, but then she opened her eyes. She zipped through the trees, quick enough but not nearly as fast as Alys was going a moment ago and realized this was kind of exhilarating. She flew above a small creek and heard someone whooping beneath her. She began to slow and looked down to see the first group under her. They were all yelling encouragements at her as she passed. Slowly, she lifted her hands off the cable and stretched them out on either side of her. Somehow this wasn't nearly as terrifying as riding on the back of an invisible thestral.

She slowed enough to catch herself on the next platform, and though she was shaking all over, she felt great.

She felt the platform shake beneath her, and she turned to see Malfoy coming to a stop as well, a huge smile spread across his face. Noticing how windblown his hair looked, her first instinct was to reach up and try to tame her own. If his looked like he just got off a broom, hers probably looked like some sort of animal.

They worked through the last few obstacles on their own, neither of them speaking, until Hermione said, "You know, if you were afraid, you could have just said so." She didn't have to turn around to know he was scowling at her.

"I told you, I –"

"I know, I know. Malfoy's aren't afraid of anything," she said, in her best impression of his aristocratic drawl.

"Oh, so it's Malfoy now. I thought I was Draco when you were making fun of me. You really have to make up your mind, Granger."

"And I thought I was Hermione when you were pretending to be helpful," she said, turning to give him a sarcastic look to find him smiling at her. Not his normal mocking smirk but an actual smile, albeit different than she'd seen before.

Is he flirting with me?

That thought made her stomach to do a different sort of flip causing her foot to miss the next plank entirely. She let out a yelp just as she stepped onto nothing, and her last thought was that she was going to die knowing her last act was flirting with Malfoy.

He reached out a hand to try and catch her, his eyes growing large in alarm, though likely not as large as her own with the fear of her impending death. She snatched his arm like she was reaching for a lifeline and succeeded only in yanking him off the bridge as well. Somehow, they both ended up hanging suspended in mid-air. It took less than two seconds for her to realize that not only was she not falling to her death, but she was mortifyingly hanging onto Malfoy with her legs wrapped tightly around his hips, clinging to him like the last lifeboat on the Titanic. He had one hand around her back and the other underneath her backside. As soon as his mind caught up with hers, he started to let go just as she shrieked, "Do not let me go!"

"Umm… I'm going to need to move my hand."

Of course, the idea of her Mudblood legs wrapped around him was probably nauseating. To his credit, at least he didn't push her off him in disgust. It seemed even Malfoy had limits to his malice. At this point, without a shred of dignity left, she thought the fall may actually be preferable to looking at his face. Her face couldn't possibly get any redder.

"I'm not going to let you go," he said, as he shifted his hand from her butt to her lower back. "Just grab onto the ledge beside you and pull yourself up."

She pulled one shaking hand from around his neck and grabbed the edge of the platform. She felt like an idiot when she realized that she had screamed like she was dying when in all actuality, she had fallen no further than her waist. She pulled herself onto the platform and then offered him her hand. He pulled himself up without her help and straightened his clothes. The harness had managed to ride up quite far, causing his denims to rise up right along with it. Hermione realized quickly that she was wrong before. Her face actually could get redder, and it did, when she realized she had been caught staring at his groin. She felt the blush rising up her neck when her eyes widened slightly at the obvious bulge in his jeans.

She quickly looked up, cursing herself for having turned around to look at him on the bridge in the first place. She opened her mouth with the intention of apologizing when he spoke up. "You know, Hermione." He said her name pointedly, clearly mocking their previous conversation. "If you wanted to climb all over me, all you had to do was ask."

She gave him a stony glare, not willing to give him the satisfaction of a response, but when he quirked an eyebrow at her and lifted one side of his mouth into a smug grin, she couldn't help herself. Knowing now that there was no real danger, she pushed him as hard as she could off the platform. The look on his face as he fell that short distance was all the gratification she needed.

She finished the last two ziplines as quickly as possible, eager to put as much distance between herself and Draco – damn, him! – Malfoy, his name was Malfoy – as she could.

She made it to the last platform and immediately felt sick again. It was the one she saw when they first arrived, with the boy free-falling before the slack caught two meters from the ground. She looked down and let out a shuddering breath. It seemed so much further from this angle.

She didn't know how long she stood there before she felt the platform sway again. Without looking up, she said, "You want to go ahead of me? Not because I'm afraid, of course, but so I can cheer you on."

He laughed beside her and said, "Definitely not. I'll admit that this one is terrifying. It's all yours." He paused, and then said, "At least I'm not pushing you."

She immediately stepped away from him, as if he was lying and was really about to push her off.

He laughed again. "I said I wasn't going to push you, Granger. One of us has decorum."

"You deserved that." She looked up at him, lifting her eyebrows in defiance.

"I was kidding," he said, tilting his head to one side, as if she was a complete moron for not realizing it.

"Well pardon me for not realizing that Draco Malfoy is capable of joking. You'll forgive me if I've only ever seen your malicious side."

His smile faltered, and his expression hardened again. Without another word, he switched his cable in front of hers and took a deep breath.

"Malfoy, you don't have to –"

And then he simply stepped off the platform. It seemed like such a long way down, but it was only a split second before the woman from the beginning of the course unclipped his cable and signaled the all-clear for Hermione to come down.

She took one last look and, determined to not let Draco fucking Malfoy outdo her, stepped off the platform as well.

They were all in good spirits as they hung their harnesses on the pegs by the entrance. Apparently, Alys was onto something in thinking that these kinds of activities would help them all to feel more comfortable with one another. She was certain it would take more than a few ziplines to make Malfoy and Seamus comfortable with one another, but at least everyone else was talking more freely now.

They took the bus back to the alleyway where they portkeyed into earlier, and Walt had them all take hands again. Just like before, he counted backwards from five, and Hermione felt the feeling of her insides being squished as they were transported back to The Willows.

Walt dismissed them all to eat and get cleaned up before group that night, and as they were all walking inside, Hermione slowed down a bit so that Malfoy could catch up with her.

"I think I may have taken it too far again, and I apologize. And I never said thank you for saving my life when I wasn't actually dying earlier," she said, smiling at him slightly.

"It's fine, Granger. You were right. I'm a jerk." He walked away, leaving her standing by the doors. Then, he turned back around. "And no need to thank me. I got all the thanks I need, remember?" he asked, lifting his eyebrows and flexing the hand that had been holding her by the bum. Then he turned on heel, chuckling to himself, and walked inside.

She couldn't help but smile, and then, realizing she was smiling at the thought of being groped by Malfoy, she groaned and threw her hand over her eyes.

What is wrong with me?