~.~.~.~.~

Seven years later…

~.~.~.~.~

Transferring to Hogwarts might have been the worst mistake of my life.

It had only been a month since I'd arrived, but as I knelt where I'd tripped and fallen, I quickly checked the lacerations on my hands; they were bleeding badly enough that they'd require a trip to Madam Pomfrey's office. Another one, that was.

This would be the third time over the last two weeks I'd ended up in the Hospital Wing as a result of bullying from the 'hen peckers'. Eventually, the teachers were going to step in, which was something I absolutely did not want. Bad enough people here thought me strange, with my academic achievement and my wild curls and my Muggle clothing. I didn't need them also calling me a snitch and a crybaby.

A chorus of donkey braying filled the corridor behind me, taunting and cruel.

"So graceless and clumsy, Granger," Pansy Parkinson—self-proclaimed 'Queen Under the Mountain' as the established alpha female of Slytherin House—called out as she turned to lead her troop of degenerate cronies away from the scene of the crime before a teacher happened across them and began asking questions. Before she rounded the corner and was out of sight, however, she added, "But then I'd expect nothing less from a no-count Mudblood."

Then she and her pack were gone, and the mad cackling fading out behind them.

I gritted my teeth, biting back on the hexing spells that tickled my tongue and begged for use. I couldn't afford to get kicked out of this school, too. Being marched out of Beauxbatons by Madam Maxine at the end of the last school year had been humiliating enough for one lifetime, and I'd been most fortunate Headmaster Dumbledore had been kind enough to allow me entrance to his institution to continue my education.

"You are too arrogant, too ambitious," the Headmistress had told me when I'd asked why I was being booted out of school. "You are attracted to darkness."

As if such was a sin. Those attributes were Slytherin House's bloody motto, and yet no one at Hogwarts saw such things as an obstacle to teaching their lot. And really, it wasn't as if I was even interested in dark magic. I'd just been reading up on it to know how to recognise and counter it, should it ever come knocking on my door. Having lived in a co-ed school for six years, with a quarter of the population able to claim a Veela heritage, I'd seen the aftermath of more than one sexual assault in my time and had merely wanted to protect myself.

Apparently, though, Madam Maxine felt that spells causing permanent erectile dysfunction weren't appropriate to use against rapists.

Feh. Nonsense.

Using a non-verbal spell to call my wand to my hand, I gathered up the books that had spilled when I'd fallen and repaired the broken strap of my satchel.

That intense concentration is the only excuse I had for allowing someone to sneak up on me.

"Where'd you learn how to do that so well, girlie? Non-verbal spells are hard to master."

I recognised the voice instantly and shuddered with dread.

Oh, joy. It was the King of Smug and Condescension, Cormac McLaggen.

Adjusting my mended satchel across my shoulder, I ignored the pain in my bloodied hands and snubbed the blond boytoy nearby who was determined to ruin what was left of my night. Deviating from my intended plan to visit the library, I instead headed for the Grand Stairwell to cross over to the opposite side for a visit to the school's Healer-Nurse.

"Hey, I asked you a question!" McLaggen called after me as I left him in my dust.

"Sod off," I growled at him and quickened my pace. Frankly, I was in no mood for his harassment today. The git had been after me to be his girlfriend from the first day I'd set foot in the Great Hall. As if I'd date while still in school—much less date a man who'd been kept back a year for his lazy academic performance! "I've told you twice already, I'm not interested! Leave me alone!"

Hot on my heels, despite my attempt to shake him by jumping across a roving staircase before it had stopped moving, the self-professed 'Lion of Gryffindor' refused to take the hint and bugger off. He caught up with me easily, in fact, leaping from staircase to landing with a beast's agility. He reached out, grabbing hold of my arm to stop me.

My wand was at his throat a beat later.

As I stared up at my opponent, I was struck with a tremendous wave of revulsion. McLaggen was one of those affluent, haughty, preening types of boys I'd known back in France; the kind who were as obnoxious as peacocks, but with half the smarts. Rather than engage in normal courting behaviours, they achieved their aims with a single-minded persistence that was more about conquest, and less about respect, wearing women down until they tired and simply gave in. If such tactics failed, however, they were quick to use force to punish the object of their desire, taking their satisfaction at the same time.

Looking into his golden eyes, I knew McLaggen was considering his odds and waiting for my guard to drop.

Before I could act to put him out of commission so I could escape, however, a pale hand holding a wand suddenly appeared from behind my attacker…and the tip of said wand pointed directly at McLaggen's temple.

"Oh!" I said, right as someone else said, "Stupefy!"

A red light flared before my eyes and Gryffindor's star Quidditch Keeper went down, unconscious, smacking his head rather hard on the stone floor as he crumpled in on himself.

Draco Malfoy stood before me, expertly twiddling his wand between his fingers and, in my estimation, looking entirely too pleased with himself for getting the drop on a House rival.

"There you are. I've been looking for you."

He glanced down at McLaggen's unconscious form, a feral smile curling his lips.

"Thank you for finding her for me." In a move that shocked me with its sudden ferocity, he drew his leg back and kicked the insensate boy hard in the belly. "However, I'm afraid that's ten points from Gryffindor for running through the corridors and jumping across stairwells." His Prefect badge glimmered in the torchlight as he said it, lending him an air of authority. "And another ten points for harassing a fellow student." The second blow landed in the same spot, and I knew McLaggen was going to hurt later when he woke up in hospital. I wasn't in the least bit sorry about that, either. "And this is for being a disgusting lecher," he added, landing a solid footballer's kick to McLaggen's ribs. I was sure something must have broken that time and winced, knowing how such a thing felt from personal experience, having fallen off a broom during my first attempt to fly when I was twelve. "'No' means fucking 'no'," he continued on with a sadistic grin. "You might want to learn it, you ignorant troll."

I looked up in surprise at Parkinson's boyfriend and thought I might faint on the spot. Was Malfoy actually defending me—and that afterhe'd helped me get out of a scrape that might have ended in my expulsion?

It took a moment longer for me to get my mind adequately wrapped around the idea: the boy who usually sat back to watch the show whenever his female Housemates decided to make a meal out of me for their amusement had apparently come swooping in to my rescue tonight like that Dark Knight fellow from the comics, bat wings and all.

That was almost a literal interpretation, as I knew Malfoy was sporting a set of some rather impressive looking membranous wings that were attached to his shoulder blades and hidden by an extremely strong glamour. I'd seen them the first week of term when I'd sneaked into the Prefect's bath for a quick shower, hating using the communal one in the girl's dorms. I'd rounded the corner, anticipating a good, hot soak in the bubble tub, and instead I'd come face-to-face with a half-breed masquerading as a pure-blood.

I wondered if that was why Malfoy never actively participated in the antagonism that the coven of Slytherin witches instigated against me on a regular basis—because he feared I'd tell the world that his 'ancient and pure lineage' was actually as 'tainted' as Professor Hagrid's…

"Was this a bribe?" I asked him, indicating the pile of refuse on the floor at our feet. "Guaranteed silence from me regarding…you know." I couldn't help but look over his shoulders, seeking any hint of a shimmer in the air, but the glamour was flawless. Was it fairy in origin, I wondered.

Malfoy's lips curled upwards with a sexy, feline smile. "If you want."

I looked down at McLaggen where he lay. "Then give him another kick for me, right where it counts, and I'll keep my lips sealed until the end of the school year," I agreed.

Turning away, I continued on towards the Hospital Wing.

Behind me, the heavy 'whump' that accompanied Malfoy's foot meeting McLaggen's bollocks made me smile. The result might not be as satisfying as a permanent erectile dysfunction hex, but it was gratifying nonetheless.

TO BE CONTINUED...

AUTHOR'S NOTES:

Lines borrowed (some altered) from "A Court of Thorns and Roses" series and altered for this chapter's use:

"It's like a game… All these pieces, vying for power or dominance, willing to shed blood, if need be."
– Ianthe, A Court of Mist and Fury

"There you are. I've been looking for you. Thank you for finding her for me."
– Rhysand, A Court of Thorns and Roses