Chapter 4: Granger's Guile
Remus
For a moment, Remus hadn't been certain whether the Malfoy boy had been a werewolf or not; from the way the boy's hand had darted to his neck as if to check for a wound, Remus had been certain the blood dripping from Greyback's mouth had been Malfoy red. But, of course, the image of Greyback had been only that; an image; a boggart – thankfully. The boggart's other forms suggested the boy had a fear of losing his parents – from the ugly gashes on their necks, to his father receiving the Kiss – and the Malfoy boy's final fear had taken the form of fear itself; a Dementor, the same as James's boy.
After sending the young Malfoy to his dormitory, Remus had stayed in the DADA classroom and tried to grapple with his own worst fears. He'd pressed his lips together in thought that night, staring up at the moon and hoping against hope that the Malfoy boy had not endured the same fate as himself. Fenrir's bite had been hungry, and he'd crunched through Remus's child-sized wrist – a wrist as delicate as a twig. Agony.
As a teacher, he was obligated to tell the headmaster, but as a man – as a human – he had to ask about the boy's safety and wellbeing.
"I was not aware." Dumbledore had said, eyes pensive behind half-moon specs. "Just as when you attended Hogwarts, it is compulsory for parents or guardians to disclose the nature of the student."
"Yes, well, you know Lucius Malfoy." Lupin said, nodding at the headmaster. "Having his only pureblood heir 'tainted' with this affliction is certainly not good for one's image."
Dumbledore had waved the notion away and Lupin had left, sucking on a lemon drop, without a definitive answer nor any worry from Dumbledore.
Then the young Malfoy had spilled the beans on exactly what he knew about Remus's condition, whilst also managing to continue his air of vagueness. Afterwards, Remus had dissected the issue at hand in length, not sure if the boy was like him or just exceedingly bright. When Remus had said as much after the Hufflepuff v. Gryffindor match, the boy had shifted, uncomfortable with the lavish praise – which was so unlike the expected Malfoy arrogance. His and Miss Granger's essays were always so detailed and beyond what any thirteen-year-old could accomplish, and so, when Draco spoke to him after class on Monday, he wasn't at all shocked when the boy said:
"Sirius Black is innocent."
Perturbed, yes, curious, of course, but he had expected outlandish ideas.
"So, Pettigrew is at fault then?" Remus asked, arms crossing as he took a seat atop his desk. "Since you believe he's alive, then surely." He shrugged, playing along.
"I don't see why not." Malfoy nodded from his seat in front of the desk, flaxen hair shining like snow under the sunlight streaming into the office.
"All the evidence pointed to Sirius Black, and there is no indication of whether Peter is still alive." Said Remus, thumb and index finger anxiously playing with a loose thread on his bobbly sweater vest.
"Call it a feeling, then." The boy shrugged. "Intuition."
"It's a good thing the Wizengamot doesn't run things solely on intuition then."
Draco leant his head onto his hands, rubbing his face as he did so. It seemed the turmoil of explaining himself was getting to the boy – or perhaps it was the weight of too many secrets.
"Mr Malfoy, I realise I've asked you this before, but I shall ask again, for I am nothing if not persistent." He crouched next to the arm of Malfoy's chair with a smile, trying his best to look comforting despite the scars and scabbed over scratches on his face and neck. "Are you okay? Do you wish to talk?"
Malfoy looked down his nose at him. "I thought that's what we were doing right now."
"I meant about things of a personal nature." Remus touched his shoulder.
Malfoy eyed the scratches on Remus's knuckles as his bottom lip poked out and a vulnerable fury took hold of his bright grey eyes. Sensing the touch was unwanted, Remus pulled his hand away, hiding both of them in his trouser pockets as he stood.
"You wish to know about why my boggart was Fenrir?" The boy asked. "You want to know why I fear my parents' death and my father's soul being sucked out by one of those things outside 'protecting' the school?" He spat the words, anger bubbling from his throat.
"Seeing the death of your parents is understandable; I think that's a universal fear. But we don't all fear Greyback – thankfully, it seems you are the only child at Hogwarts who has met him."
"Child." The boy shook his head with a light scoff. "Sometimes I forget that's what I am." His eyes avoided Remus, instead focusing where his hand itched absentmindedly at his left forearm. The boy's words came with such a weight that Remus felt his own chest constrict. All at once, Remus understood that this is what being a father would be like; to talk and to comfort, to empathise. A part of his heart – tucked away and made dusty with time, yet never forgotten – jumped as he was reminded of Lily, who'd unknowingly taught him how to empathise and comfort someone. She would've been such a lovely mother.
"Why do you forget that, Draco?"
"With all that's going on in my past and the fut-" He cut himself off.
"It's okay, you can talk."
"It's just…" His shoulders heaved in a shaking breath before dropping as he sighed. "I may be a child, but I'm the only one here who knows anything. I'm the only one who knows how bad this is all going to get."
"How bad what is going to get?" Remus once more crouched to his level, not wishing for the boy's lunar-grey eyes to leave his. "Is this badness at home?"
"In a way." He muttered.
"Are you safe?" Remus asked.
Draco's eyes softened as he whispered, "Much safer than last year."
"Tell me more if you'd like." Remus said, ignoring his own flashes of hazy and pain-filled memories of Fenrir savagely biting into his flesh, ravenous.
Draco's fingers dug into his wrist as his soft expression swiftly vanished under a mask of ice. "Talking about this isn't going to change my circumstances. There's nothing you can do to help. I came here to talk about Black, not my own issues. I wanted to do something good for a change, I wanted to change tim- things, I wanted to change how things are."
Remus stifled a small sigh as he pressed his lips together, nodding at Draco to continue.
"That day Snape set the essay on werewolves, he also talked about animagi." His brows raised as if daring Remus to fill in the blanks. When he neglected to, Draco carried on. "My mother told me about Black possibly being an unregistered one, so what's so hard to believe about Wormy learning that skill from Black and using it to hide all these years?"
Remus turned to the window, barely able to contain his utter terror; the Malfoy boy really was the brightest wizard of his age if he was able to deduce what had actually happened all those years ago at Hogwarts. The Ministry had never known that there used to be three unregistered animagi running around Hogwarts, yet a boy of thirteen had managed to suss it out, aided only by some prodding from Professor Snivellus's lesson and family gossip from Mrs Malfoy. But Peter surely couldn't have thought of such a vile scheme, let alone done it. That would mean that he'd torn apart James and Lily's new family, and the Marauders, just to live as a rat for a while before going into hiding. If there was a chance Sirius was innocent… Remus couldn't help the drum of his aching heart as it filled with utter joy at the thought. Despite this, he made his heart turn to stone, not wanting to suffer the disappointment of losing his best friend again. And so, his mind fell into the familiar routine of convincing himself (yet again) that Black was guilty, so guilty that all that was left of poor Peter was his finger.
"Why frame Sirius?" Remus decided to poke holes in Malfoy's theory, out of personal spite. "Why not someone else?"
"He'd just snitched on Potter's bloody parents!" Draco's hands waved madly about the air. "I doubt he'd care much about Black!"
"Calm down, Draco."
"No, I don't think I will." He stood and Remus saw a flash of Lucius in the indignant and domineering tilt of his chin. "I'm tired of it all. You know I'm right, at least some small part of you knows how right I am."
Draco fled the room, school robes billowing behind him before Remus could respond. He let out a breath he hadn't realised he was holding as the door slammed. The conversations about Sirius and Peter seemed to be getting harder and harder to swallow the more Draco talked. Remus just wished that the right verdict had come all those years ago, and that Sirius had suffered in Azkaban for what he did to Peter, James and Lily. And Harry.
Yet, there was a guilty ache in his chest. An ache to hold Sirius's hand again and to hug him as a free and innocent man. He didn't want to believe that the man he knew and loved was capable of killing anyone let alone poor Peter.
Remus hung his head, staring at the scratches along the wooden floor, chest rife with shameful longing.
...
Draco
He didn't know when Granger had started stalking him, either when her ever watchful eyes found Hagrid's hand guiding him from the hospital wing or when he'd become interested in McGonagall's book or some other instance he was unaware of. The way she followed him through the library stacks and peeked through shelves as he memorised passages from the red book, and sat closer in class, and watched him from the Gryffindor table at meals was beginning to remind him of Potter in sixth year. The constant watch failed to do anything but annoy him, and he doubted Granger had gathered much intel for the dumb duo who mooched off her intellect. He couldn't see why they had taken an interest either, he'd tried to keep a low profile about how different he was, but then again, maybe it was the low profile that gave him away. No one was used to this subdued version of himself, and for those who had known him in first and second year, this change must seem quite stark.
Apart from dodging Granger and his old Slytherin 'friends', he'd been doing his own stalking of a flaxen haired girl, no taller than his shoulders. Ever since seeing her by the edge of the Forbidden Forest from his seat in the library, he'd been thinking of ways to approach Luna.
Figuring out how to talk to her was his new side-project.
He'd failed to convince Lupin of Wormtail's deceit and had been too late to persuade father into dropping the matter of the hippogriff, and so his last hope was to return to his time before he made any lasting damage to the timeline. It seemed time was set; nothing would change, like the ink on a page, never to be altered. Although, ink could be tampered with by water, and could make the ink run wild like black tears. Draco had thought he could be the change… he'd thought he could help. Why else would he have been sent back to this exact time? Why not first year? Why not before Hogwarts or in sixth year? It must have something to do with what goes on this year, and that was most likely to do with Black and Wormtail. Draco just didn't remember how things played out, and how he was going to change time – or even if he should change it.
Or perhaps – and Draco saw this as the most likely outcome – appearing in third year was just a random occurrence, a consequence of the unknown number of times he'd span the sundial.
He huffed, rubbing a hand along his forehead as he hunkered down in his regular window seat in the library. Opening the red book, he pressed his lips together, itching at the spot where his Dark Mark used to be as he began the final chapter. A few passages in, he perked up.
An ancestor of the Time Turner is the Cadran Solaire which transports one's mind, rather than physical form, into the past.
That sounded like his necklace! He tapped the page, chest feeling lighter than air. His French lessons finally paid off: Cadran meant dial, whereas Solaire meant solar, which was in the same field as 'sun'.
Time Turners are Omni-Directional, thus suggesting that one can travel forwards in time, yet to do so would not be without great risk to oneself and the timeline. Terrible occurrences can happen to Wizards who meddle with time, as was found in 1899 when the Ministry of Magic conducted experiments…
He read on.
However, unlike the Time Turner, the Cadran Solaire is not Omni-directional, thus there is no return to the present.
Draco's heart clattered in his ribcage as he carried on reading with desperate fervour. No return.
By the time he'd read the final page, an outlandish plan had formed. The only way home was to find a Time Turner, but that would mean travelling in physical form; there would be two of him. A child and an eighteen-year-old…Would the older version of himself have the new memories he'd created this year? Would he know of Lupin's awkward kindness, or Hagrid's hand leading him from the hospital wing, or Ginny's terror upon seeing the son of the man who gave her a sentient diary? Would he remember the strange empathy for Granger and Potter? Or would he travel to the future and meet a stranger who knew him better than anyone?
Would he have to share his inheritance? Merlin, no.
Yet, Draco was handy at fixing things; the vanishing cabinet was a testament to that. Surely there could be some way to forge his own way home. Perhaps there was some way to combine a Time Turner with a Cadran Solaire? He already knew the whereabouts of the sundial necklace, tucked into a hollow red book in his father's study. Draco decided that over Christmas – which sped towards them at an alarming rate – he'd find the sundial necklace in his father's study no matter how hard it would be to break in without magic.
Besides all the questions without definitive answers and frantic plans running through his mind, there was another glaring issue. How would he get his hands on a Time Turner?
"Are you done with the book yet?"
Head shooting up from the page, he found Granger stood there, tucking a gold chain under her collar before slapping her hands to her hips.
"It's been a week, hasn't it?" Asked Granger.
"Just about." Draco said, lip raised as he prepared to snarl his way out of talking to her. "Why have you been following me?"
She sputtered, "I have not!"
"Deny it all you want." His eyes turned back to the final page, ignoring her.
"I can return the book to McGonagall." Said Granger. "It's on my way."
He flipped through the book and a devilish smirk took hold as he landed on page 1. "I'd like to go over it some more. I'll return it myself when I'm done."
With her button nose scrunched in anger, she fled, hair bouncing with every step until she disappeared around the stack. Draco rolled his eyes; obviously the little know-it-all was crap at espionage. Return the book for him? That was almost painful to watch. She clearly wanted to know something about him. It was clear he'd been too obvious about knowing Lupin's condition, causing her wild mind to deduce he had something to do with lycanthropy – which had once been true. Perhaps he'd been too forward about wanting the book, but there was no way Granger would ever figure he was from a different time.
At least, he hoped not.
Perturbed by the red book, he set it aside and began to re-read some of the other books on time just in case he'd missed anything. It was then that he saw Granger's name in some of the Checked-Out indexes. After book hunting for the rest of the volumes about time, he found her name in every index of every book. Fear dribbled down his chest like cold water – she couldn't put the pieces together. She couldn't.
…
He returned Instruments of Time to McGonagall before dinner, catching her marking papers in the Transfiguration classroom. She looked up at him, blank face filling with the hint of distain when she saw who was in her doorway.
Upon her short greeting, he came forward towards her desk. The coal-grey evening light that spilled into the classroom was interrupted by the single candle McGonagall marked essays under, causing light to spill upwards and cast her face in shadow. Her pointy hat cast a black shadow on the wall behind her, reminding him of a burnt Christmas tree.
"Thank you, Mr Malfoy." She said when he placed the book on her desk.
Without pause, he asked, "I was wondering if you knew how one acquires a Time Turner?"
"Well…" She pursed her wrinkled lips as she debated her words, looking every bit like a scarecrow with a sewn-on scowl. "The Ministry has the majority of them."
"So, not all of them?"
"No, not all, Mr Malfoy. The Ministry keeps them for experimentation – or, that's what they used to do."
"They stopped because of a possibility of endangering the timeline, yes?"
She nodded. "That is what the book says."
"So, how would one go about acquiring one?"
"Either special permission from the Ministry of Magic or… I think you know the other way." She narrowed her eyes pointedly and caused an agitated frown to tease his lips.
She was on about the Black Market. Perhaps he could find one there, or perhaps in his own house over Christmas – there were many objects, dark, light and every magic in-between, that had accumulated in his house, yet the secret chamber under the drawing room floor was the most discombobulating. Much like the Room of Hidden Things, were he'd lost flesh and fingernails trying to repair the vanishing cabinet, it was filled to the brim with Dark Arts stuff. In this time, the Ministry hadn't done a sweep, and so, everything would still be there; dusty and uncategorised and so terribly dangerous because of the disorder.
"I must ask, why the fascination?" She squinted at him over her spectacles.
"Am I not allowed to be curious?" He shrugged. Before she could speak or gift him with another condescendingly raised brow or annoying and wrinkled purse of her lips, he said, "Forgive me, Professor, but I must ask why Granger seemed to have an almost unlimited amount of time with this book whereas I was only afforded one week?"
"A week? I said no such thing." The Professor gawked at his sass.
He blinked, eyes focusing on her pointy shadow on the wall as the cogs turned in his mind like the delicate workings of a clock. With a gritted jaw, he neglected to say his goodbyes, leaving with one question on his mind: why had Granger lied?
…
Blood-mouthed Thestrals swarmed around him like reluctant moths to an alien flame as he unwrapped a chunk of raw meat he'd stolen from the kitchens, the kind of meat that would've made his stomach flutter with hunger around the full moon if he was still a werewolf.
Early that morning, he'd munched on his breakfast – an algae-green apple – as he trekked the path through the forest Luna had led him down a few times in eighth year, hoping to see her before Pansy or Nott dragged him out to watch the new Slytherin Seeker – whoever that may be. Already, he felt as if he'd made another mistake in this time by quitting. Quidditch had been fun but fleeting, and they really hadn't had much opportunity to play after the war. He hadn't flown since his laps with Ginevra, and even then, he didn't fly much. On occasion, he still woke, sweaty and dazed, feeling like fiendfyre was on his ankles as Potter flew him out of the Room of Hidden Things.
Draco supposed he could always fly in the future – if he made it there. Being wrapped up in quidditch now would only slow his research.
He tossed the raw meat to the youngling Thestral and they gobbled it up much like Hagrid's hippogriff had eaten the dead ferret. Crouching to study the youngling, he reached out a hand to smooth along its ribs. The soft flesh was pulled taught, and touching the ribs was much like running your fingers over the bones on the back of your hand.
Draco had been curious about whether he'd still be able to see them, not quite certain about the magic behind them. His younger eyes and mind had never perceived death in the flesh, thus he supposed that maybe he'd be blind to them once more. Yet, when he crossed into the area Thestrals dwelled in, he'd found that what McGonagall's book had said of the Cadran Solaire was true – one's own lifeforce is what travelled back, and that was what enabled him to see them. His very core had been changed by death, and it would never revert to its former state of innocence. He supposed that this core, his soul, was the very thing Dementors were so hungry for.
A light squeak came from behind followed by the hissing of leaves as a small animal of some sort – likely a squirrel – traversed the ground, trying to escape being a Thestral's next meal. Before Draco could turn to it, a twig snapped. Cautious, he studied the trees and the brown leaves below them for any signs of movement. Upon a mud berm stood a large black dog. It padded closer, eyeing the hand which had held the meat in it not long ago. Draco took a step back, not sure if he should get his wand out from his robes. The animal came closer still, it's eyes a vicious grey, much like the storm cloud Potter had fallen from during quidditch.
"I didn't bring meat for you." He said, allowing the dog to sniff his bag. The fur was matted and tatty, and as black as a Dementor. The dog gave a final sniff before he met Draco's eyes. Grey on grey; like the moon looking down at its own reflection on the Black Lake.
Draco gave a silent gasp. "Black?"
There was a fleeting second of recognition in the dog's eyes before terror flashed over them. Its jowls wrinkled as sharp teeth were displayed. Draco stepped back, flinching when his foot snapped a dry twig.
"Sirius?"
The dog gave a feral growl before turning and fleeing down the path he'd came. Dropping his bag, Draco rushed after him, wand at the ready. He ran through trees, avoided tripping on vines and slipping on patches of dewy grass and frost covered mud. The dog was almost out of sight. But then something else came into view. Someone. A mass of purple and blonde that made Draco cease his mad dash.
Luna stood there, wand tucked behind her ear, dressed head to toe, er, head to ankle in purple – her shoes were missing – as she munched on a sugar quill. She watched his chest heave without so much as a curious raise of her brows. By this point, Draco knew that if anything weird happened, Luna would be the most accepting of it – and Draco Malfoy running through the forest after a massive dog, red cheeked, and out of breath, was a bit of a weird sight.
Searching the treeline, he found the dog had vanished.
"Why were you chasing Toad?" She frowned.
He wanted to ask why she'd named a dog 'Toad' but instead found himself nodding in acceptance.
"Did he steal something of yours?" She asked, voice light as it lilted towards him. She wiggled her toes. "I know the feeling."
"It, er, Toad didn't take anything. Uh, how do you know the dog?"
"I found him near the Thestrals – do you know of them?"
Draco nodded.
Her face perked up some, likely happy that she wasn't alone in seeing them anymore. He expected there were lots more people attending Hogwarts who could see them – and even more after the war – yet not many wished to spend time with 'Loony'.
"I was on my way to feed them." She said as she walked past him, dried leaves crunching under her pink feet. "Come along. Draco, is it?"
"Yeah. I fed them…" Draco said as they walked up a vine covered berm.
"Oh, really?"
"Well, I fed the little one. Then the dog came, and you know the rest."
"He comes for the meat sometimes." She nodded, and Draco realised there was something missing from her visage – besides no longer being seventeen-years-old. "You scared him off. I don't think I'll see him for a while now. Do you remember the storm when Harry Potter fell?"
As he nodded, he asked himself 'how could I forget?' as his eyes edged towards the sky in hopes they wouldn't land on a Dementor.
"Well, after that, I didn't see him for a while. Nor around Halloween."
The pieces added up to that scraggly long-faced dog being Sirius. After all, Halloween had been the night Sirius had broken into the school.
When they got to the clearing, they found that Draco's bag had been scavenged by the Thestrals, books and parchment strewn across the dried mud and leaves along with the wrappings he'd covered the meat in. Impatient buggers. Grimacing in disgust, he gathered his things as Luna pulled out a chunk of meat from her bag. She must be really adept at cleaning charms if she was willing to put raw bloody meat in her schoolbag.
The Thestrals lowly crooned in the crisp winter air as she tossed them the meat. They each ate their pieces swiftly and were much appreciative of Luna stroking their shoulders, just under their bat-like wings.
"I wonder if animals who've seen death can see the Thestrals – like Toad." Said Luna. "Or perhaps they can see them already. Muggles think animals have heightened senses when it comes to ghosts, so perhaps they can."
"Or muggles are just dumb." He said, playful in his conviction.
"Oh, but father says…" She carried on for a few minutes, voicing 'brilliant' things muggles had accomplished, and Draco found his lips curling into a half smile. He'd missed her talking on and on about things completely foreign and weird to him.
Once she'd slowed down, he asked, "Aren't your feet cold?" Draco cursed at himself for not thinking to bring something to transfigure into shoes for her. He remembered Luna telling him of the shoe theft in earlier years, and how cold her feet had always been. Every Christmas, her father always bought her a new pair of slippers, the insides as silky as a pygmy puff.
"A little, but I don't mind." She looked to her blue toes. "It seems the only two pairs of shoes I brought have mysteriously disappeared."
"And you suspect nargles are behind it?" He said without a hint of sarcasm.
"You know of them?" Her eyes lit up like two suns.
You're the one who told me. He smirked in delight. "Could be wrackspurts are involved. It's clear that students have stolen from you, but my theory is that possibly wrackspurts had affected the minds of the shoe thieves. Or it's nargles. Either way, the students need to be punished."
They carried on chatting away like old friends until snow fell around them. Christmas was coming.
…
Draco had done a silent headcount of the Transfiguration students when they'd been assigned pair work that was supposed to be carried out until Christmas holidays, and found that the class had an uneven number of people – until Granger popped in. For all he'd said about her skill at espionage being shit, she sure knew how to stay hidden from people. Dithering, Draco watched Longbottom as he gulped and crossed over to Granger's table, hand loosening his tie as he mustered up the courage to ask her to pair with him.
Draco strolled over, chest puffed, before Longbottom could overcome his stutter. "Go join with someone else. I want Granger."
The boy's face paled as his shoulders jumped in fear. Spooked, he went to another table.
"What was that?" Granger glowered as he slumped into the seat next to hers.
Behind Granger's mass of hair, he saw Pansy shooting him a dirty look as she sat next to Nott. Rolling his eyes, he focused on Granger's angered face, button nose wrinkled in that way she had in eighth year when he'd playfully teased her in the library. Later, he'd distanced himself for daring to think she'd looked strangely adorable.
McGonagall, after eyeing Draco and Granger's partnership with consternation, detailed the project with excruciating detail – detail which he knew made Granger's mind hum. He wondered if one day, there would be too much information stored inside her muggle-born skull and if it would drip out from her ears like melted candle wax.
Afterwards, McGonagall let them quietly chatter about the project and Granger took this opportunity to interrogate him.
"Why did you partner with me?"
"You could've said no." He shrugged, turning the page in his Transfiguration textbook with an air of boredom.
"I probably should have, but in terms of practical skill and knowledge, you're the only one in our year who even comes close to getting the same marks as me. Perhaps, this is a chance for us to produce a piece of rather refined work." She said, thoughtful. Instead of arguing about just how 'close' in intellect she thought they were, Draco simply nodded with a twitch of his brows. "So, out with it. Why did you choose me?"
"I was going to ask why you've been stalking me." Said Draco, preparing to watch her reaction with narrowed eyes.
She sputtered, eyes wide in her disquiet.
"Surely," Draco drawled, "there's a reason why you find me so interesting – besides the obvious ones like wealth and handsomeness, and-"
"Perhaps it's that you're such an arse."
His bored expression slipped into a sparkling smile.
"'Interesting?'" She said before scoffing. "I hope you don't mean yourself."
"Oh, of course, I do." He nodded, hand on his chest, mocking hurt.
She settled her narrowed eyes on him. The questions practically swam in the pools of brown, settling in her brain and drowning under the pressure of having to work for answers. His smile deepened, edging on arrogant. For once, he thought it would be interesting – and great for his ego – if Granger considered him an enigma.
She carried on, "I mostly wanted to know if you'd torn any pages out from Instruments of Time, like last year."
"So, you have been following me?" He let out a laugh, disturbing Granger with his lack of malice. "That's why you got Weaselbee to lie for you and say I only had one week with McGonagall's book, yes? Very Slytherin of you, I must say."
"It's not only Slytherins that can lie." She tittered.
"Oh, I'm very aware." He said as he used a considerable dint of will not to dwell on Wormtail's betrayal of the Potter family and Sirius Black. "What did you mention about last year?"
"The page you tore out and tossed at me… remember?"
For a second, he struggled to recall just what had happened – after all, it was a year ago for Granger but much longer for him. He thought he remembered tearing pages out from a few books that year, a new way of letting off minute rebellious energy – an urge that was suddenly quelled after father caught him ripping pages from books in the Malfoy library.
"I need more specificity." He said, dramatically rubbing at the spot between his brows which thudded as if hit by a bludger.
She leant closer and spoke, voice just above a whisper, "The page about basilisks? In a way, I thought you were trying to help."
Her words sparked a vague memory of finding a passage about basilisks in the Malfoy library and snickering as he ripped it out, already plotting of throwing it at Granger.
"Help?" He mockingly queried. "I was trying to threaten you with that page. I flew it your way, expecting to scare you. You were nothing but a filthy mudblood, a prime target."
Incredulous, she asked, "'Were'? And you think otherwise now?"
"All I think… is that I know too much to pretend to be ignorant about blood purity."
Unnerved by his words, she began furiously jotting down notes from her textbook, occasionally asking for his input. He was pleasantly reminded of her competence – yet, at the same time, an intense ball of jealousy rolled around in his stomach. Father had always told him to push himself to be better than that 'magic thieving mudblood.' Draco could never understand how a mudblood did better than him, even though she was as disadvantaged as she was due to growing up in the muggle world.
Halfway down her parchment, she pursed her lips like a miniature McGonagall and said, "Regardless of trying to help or not, you did quite a good job of it by giving me that page. It allowed Harry and Ron to-"
"Of course, it would enable you three." He interrupted, grumbling as his quill scraped across his parchment.
After class, since they were headed to the Great Hall for dinner, he walked alongside her in the hallways, ignoring scowls from Slytherins and distrusting disgust from Gryffindors. They mostly talked of the assignment until she changed the subject.
"You're interested in time travel." She spoke, and he tried not to blink dubiously. "Why?"
He wanted to say: because I want to get home to where things are still strained but were actually starting to change for the better. But since he couldn't, he settled on shrugging.
Nonplussed, she copied his shrug with great exaggeration and hissed, "That's all? A shrug?"
He nodded.
She gave a sudden chortle which made him jump. "I saw you with Hagrid in the hospital wing, you know? Hagrid was very reluctant to share exactly what happened."
"I'm sure he was," He drawled, effecting a withering look as he prepared for her to laugh at him, "his bloody chicken bit me."
Her lip trembled as she tried to restrain laughter from spilling.
He rolled his eyes, "Oh, yeah, terribly funny."
Granger's laugh spilled out, lilting into the now empty corridor. When had the students filtered out?
"Buckbeak hurt you again?" She said, smiling wide.
He nodded and then held his palm up. The ragged V had paled in colour now, no longer a pink, more of a yellow arrow pointing directly at his heart just as the sundial necklace had done once.
"I'm quite sure a Dittany would've gotten rid of the scarring." She said, studying his palm as if he were a textbook. He thought that maybe it took effort not to pull his hand closer for inspection and so he removed the temptation by stuffing it in his pocket.
"I didn't want one."
Her eyes met his, likely steeped in confusion at how the Malfoy heir didn't mind being marked forever, especially by a creature he referred to as a 'bloody chicken.'
"I don't mind scars." He said and it was half-true; he mostly just hadn't wanted to spend anymore time in the hospital wing where an unconscious Potter and all his fans stood on the opposite side of the room. Also, he supposed that as long as it was a bite that didn't turn him into a werewolf-chicken – a werechicken – it would be fine. It was also a plus that it wasn't a cursed tattoo, so he shrugged and said, "It'll fade."
"Eventually." She said, eyes dropping from his.
"The hippogriff hurt a Ministry official, did Hagrid tell you?"
She nodded as a small lightning shaped wrinkle formed between her brows.
"I wrote to my father… you probably won't believe me, but I wanted to recant my statements about the bird- chicken- hippogriff. I- I provoked it."
Her expression was one of barely concealed shock. "Well… that's good, I suppose. Does that mean you're actually sorry for something?"
He rolled his eyes, "Yes. And it's so exhausting being sorry for things."
"I suppose I won't badger you into giving Harry or Ron an apology then, not that they'd accept it."
He looked her up and down, "And what about you?"
"What about me?"
"You don't want an apology? For all that I've said and done."
She bit her lip, seemingly taking the time to think about her answer before she spoke. "I think an apology is all well and good, but it's just words. Making amends is what truly heals both you and the offended party."
"And how does one make amends?"
Hesitantly, the corner of her mouth raised, "That's for you to figure out. You're almost as smart as I am, so it shouldn't take too long to think of something."
Before he could snidely reply about his intelligence, he realised they were by the entrance to the Great Hall. She wandered in, sparing a dubious glance over her shoulder at him.
Draco felt as if Granger had snuck into his mind and whispered Lumos, brightly illuminating the space with an idea that should have been obvious. He'd focused on apologising to Hagrid and the hippogriff, but as far as making amends went, he'd failed and given up. He hadn't even bothered to go back to Hagrid's hut to ask how to make amends. And, as Granger took her spot by Saint Potter and Weaselbee, he realised she had basically asked him to not just apologise but make amends with all three of the Golden trio.
He itched his left forearm, trying to chase away the feeling of the phantom Dark Mark twisting beneath bone-white flesh.
…
Thanks for reading! Let me know what you think!
And did anyone else see the gameplay footage for Hogwarts Legacy? What do you think about that and will you play it when it's out?