Disclaimer- I own nothing
A.N – Thanks so much for all the love guys. I have a bit of a love and hate relationship with this chapter, since I re-wrote the second half at least three times. It turned out a lot longer than I anticipated—eek! Finally, I give you the fruits of my insanity. Hopefully it's up to par.
Bright side: The semester is over so I can spend tons of time writing in June and July! I've outlined this story up to Chapter 20. It'll probably have 30-40 chapters appx. So yay!
A special thanks to olivieblakefor beta'ing the Voldemort scene, and for being such an awesome person! The rest is unbeta'd and all mistakes belong to me.
To olivieblake, , Guest(1), Guest (2), EStrunk, Guest (3), DragonxEye, viola1701e, Chester99, lakelady8425, 813, LadyRana, Nichole O, danielap, and sarahmicaela88: Thank you guys so much for your kind words and encouragement. I'm soo happy that you all are enjoying this story as much as I'm enjoying writing it. If I could give each of you a hug, I would! Eeh, take a mental hug anyway! Haha. Hope you all enjoy!
To all who've favorite'd, followed, or read silently, I feel the love! :)
/For all the ones I've ever loved, and all the paths I've crossed that led me to this place
I may never find my way back to you, but still I step into the flame
Go on and take the wheel, turn it back to the stars
And let the fates collide—if I choose to live
Life on the edge, so close until I touch
The other side—still breathing/
-Still Breathing, Dig the Kid
Chapter 7 – The Blindness of Lady Justice
Hermione honestly thought that she had never felt more tense than she did in front of Snape, inside of Malfoy Manor, surrounded by darkness and shadows.
The chandelier sparkled like a thousand little diamonds in the sun, and the silence squeezed out all of the warmth in the room. The cool marble under her bare feet chilled her deeply.
Memories of the last hour proceeded to flit through her mind, quick and slow simultaneously.
"Get your cloak on," Draco had rushed into their bedroom. They were set to go to Hogwarts tomorrow, so everything in the hotel suite was an organized mess. If it had been up to Draco, one of their personal house elves would have taken care of it in an a few moments, and that would have been that.
"Why?"
"Just do it!" He had thrown Hermione's cloak at her, and without another word apparated them out of there—not caring a whit that she had been shoeless and braless.
Gravity.
Weightlessness.
Heaviness.
"Stay in this room until someone comes to get you," Draco had whispered. There had been a franticness to his eyes that belied his stiff and poised frame.
"Why would you bring me here?" Hermione had whispered harshly, the accusation clear in her voice.
"Because you and me, Granger," he'd let his fingers trail her lips and cheek softly for a second. There hadn't been any softness in his gaze, though. Only a presence that astounded and grounded Hermione. "You and me are in this together."
"Why do you think you're here Miss Granger?" Snape asked in that silky tone of his.
"Mrs. Malfoy," Hermione corrected him with a slight sneer. She might be a Muggle-born, but in this house, a house that she would inherit one day, she was the superior one. "And I would assume I'm here to see Voldemort."
SLAP!
The sound of Snape's hand smacking against Hermione's cheek ricocheted off the walls. Her head snapped to the side from the force of it. Yes, Snape had always been unpleasant, but he hadn't been extremely cruel. He hadn't been this, whatever this was.
His hooked nose looked down on her, and Hermione couldn't help herself. This was the man that had killed Dumbledore. Everyone knew it. Everyone that mattered. Everyone that was on the right side. The good side. The bad side, too.
In these walls, walls that stood erect and proud, it didn't matter that Snape had killed Dumbledore on Dumbledore's own orders. It didn't matter that Snape was technically on the right side. Not here. Not when the darkness seemed to creep up her arms, raising goosebumps as it went.
His hair hung limply in that distracting fashion, and his outer robes were tossed aside, leaving him in a simple black dress shirt that was unbuttoned at the top, and equally dark pants. His Death Eater's mask hung loosely in his left hand.
The Mask for Revels, which spoke more than any words he could ever give her.
"You don't say his name," Snape said, as though nothing was amiss. He spoke as though he hadn't just slapped her.
Hermione's head spun at the realization that in here, in here he was a Death Eater. Just like Draco. Especially Draco who had so much more to lose. Parents. A wife.
She didn't question why she was so sure she factored in any equation for Draco; she didn't need to lie to herself. Not anymore. Not for a long time. Not since he'd propositioned her and forced her to confront their truth.
I love you.
I'm yours.
"You may refer to him as the Dark Lord," Snape continued, as if he were in a Potions class giving a customary lecture. "You may call him My Lord when you see him. Nothing else. Ever."
His eyes bore into hers, and for a moment she could see the man he might have been—warm and protective.
Hermione realized that he might have been a Death Eater, but he was also a Phoenix of the Order, and this was his way of helping her. This, though simple, was the first step to survival in these halls.
But…her thoughts couldn't focus on how to survive. Her thoughts were a jumble of kisses and passion and I love yous and I'm yours.
Just want to go home, just want to go home, Hermione's mind supplied the words like a prayer and a mantra. Over and over again, until she couldn't see anything except Draco's lips descending on hers and his liquid-cement eyes filling her essence.
"Focus, you stupid girl!" Snape invaded her space, and his presence, so much greater than hers, commanded her attention.
"I'm listening," Hermione lied with a brave face. "I'm here."
Snape went to speak, probably to say something especially scathing, but Draco strolled through the doors with Bellatrix, Fenrir Greyback, Lucius Malfoy, and a few others Hermione didn't know.
Draco stepped up to her, and smoothed his hand through her hair. A moment later, he repeated the action, but instead of running his hand through until the end, he tightened his hold on her hair at the roots and pulled.
Hermione's eyes flashed in anger, indignation, and a little bit of desire, too.
Good, he thought. He wanted her angry. He wanted her filled with a fire so strong that nothing that might happen tonight could crush her.
"Remember who you are," he said strongly. To others listening, it was a reminder of her place, despite her elevated and protected status as his wife. To her, well, she knew it meant something. She was just short on specifics.
Remember who you are. She wanted to ask, but knew it would be unwise, and so she nodded tersely.
He let her go, and the door swung open again.
Voldemort glided into the grand ballroom, Pettigrew at his heals, other Death Eaters appearing behind him like a force of nature. Countless faces, both covered and unconcealed, all with that dreadful mask on their person walked into the ballroom, crowding the space. Hermione could almost let herself feel insignificant in the face of such greatness.
The man, if one could call him that, liked an entrance.
Breathe. Breathe.
But Hermione felt like the world was going too fast. Why was she here? Why was she here?
She was protected, she tried to console herself. Voldemort, regardless of how demented, evil, and wrong he was, wouldn't risk breaking a cardinal rule like attacking the wife of one of his Death Eaters. He'd do a lot, but not that. At least not yet.
Not while Draco wasn't in disgrace.
"My loyal subjects," Voldemort raised his hands on either side like a king. His snake-like features were striking, and monstrous, yet beautiful in a sick way. "We are here to celebrate tonight, and to welcome the wife of one of our very own, Draco Malfoy."
People didn't start to murmur or applaud. No, this was much more prodigious than that. The air was heavy with almost everyone's giddiness. Malicious and insidious smiles lifted the lips of everyone in the room except for Hermione.
"Come Draco," Voldemort beckoned Draco, and finally, finally she caught sight of the Dark Lord that was worshiped. Draco kneeled before him readily, head bowed, eyes lowered. He was a deposed king, kneeling to a usurper, and the fire only glowed brighter inside of Hermione.
That was her husband. Yes, she might hate him. Yes, she might despise him more than not, but he was hers. He was hers, and no one, especially a man who wasn't really a man, deserved the right to have Draco kneeled before him.
No one had that right but her.
"M'Lord," Draco's words carried like lightning on the wind. "Allow me the pleasure to introduce to you my wife."
Voldemort beckoned his head, and though Hermione was planted in the middle of the crowd, Voldemort's eyes found hers easily. His red eyes glittered, and Hermione wanted to run, hide, disappear.
Snape clamped a hand on her arm, stopping her in her tracks though it only appeared as though he were helping her along to the front.
"Come, Mrs. Malfoy," Voldemort said smoothly. No traces of insanity. Only calculation. Only coldness.
Hermione knew what she had to do. She knew it, but her feet wouldn't move. Her heartbeat wouldn't slow. Her gaze swept past Draco's form, unmoved from his position, blonde hair serving as a halo around his head. An angel among demons. She knew that if Draco, the boy raised to be a King and born a Dragon, whatever the heck that meant, could kneel, then so could she.
Hermione felt bile rise in her throat at the fact that she had thought Voldemort beautiful in his monstrosity even for a second.
Her legs propelled her forward awkwardly, and just as stiltedly she let one knee crash onto the hard floor, then the other. Her chocolate eyes stared into Voldemort's and all she saw was death. All she saw was decay. All she saw was everything that had been during Grindelwald's reign, and could be again.
Voldemort stood, powerful, immune to the fear coursing throughout the room at the fact that Hermione hadn't lowered her gaze.
Remember who you are. Well, she was Hermione Granger, best friend of Harry Potter, defender of the Light. She was the girl who had stood against a group of Death Eaters when she was fifteen and lived to tell the tale.
Voldemort scowled slowly, in that way that demonstrated control and authority. His scowl deepened until there was an indent where his eyebrows should have been. His pale and translucent hand lifted to her chin, and Hermione gasped at the coolness of it.
"Such pride," Voldemort chided. "Such pride, indeed. But where will your pride take you, Mrs. Malfoy?"
Fear was a living thing inside of her, choking her words. She could only shake her head, whatever the motion meant. She wasn't in control. She wasn't. Fear had taken control of her body, already.
Breathe. Breathe. Don't panic.
"You are married to such a loyal follower of mine," Voldemort continued despite her silence. His voice rolled around her and inside of her, like he was latching onto her very soul. "I allowed that. I could have easily told him 'no.' I could have simply shaken my head like you just did, and you would still be Hermione Granger, Harry Potter's mudblood consort. But I allowed it. And now you are witch. Am I not merciful? Am I not kind?"
Tears that Hermione hadn't been able to shed the other night came swiftly to her eyes. Just want to go home, just want to go home.
"Am I not great?" Voldemort asked her, and his touch didn't waiver. He didn't try to own her. He didn't try to force her to submit. No. That wasn't what he was trying to do at all. "Am I not great?"
Voldemort let his magic swirl around them. Hermione felt the hungry looks on her back, wanting to feel his magic so close to them, wanting to bathe in the darkness and power he exudes. It made her heady, and yet, she wanted to recoil.
The darkness in his magic was wrong. It was fragmented in a way it shouldn't have been.
"Am I not great?" Voldemort repeated as he snatched all of his magic back into himself. He snatched his magic away from her grasp much like an adult snatched candy away from a child.
And shamefully, disgustedly, Hermione yearned.
"Am I not great?" Voldemort's fingers tightened painfully on her chin, and his eyes blazed with barely contained fury—the kind that legends are made of.
Remember who you are. Remember who you are. She was Hermione Granger.
Remember who you are. She was Harry and Ron's best friend.
Remember who you are. She was a defender of the Light. Always.
Remember who you are. Voldemort's eyes burned her, and Draco subtly invaded her mind. The stars spinning above their heads on their wedding night, their passion losing control among blood-red silk sheets, Voldemort's manic glee as Fenrir tore a man limb by limb with his bare hands, Voldemort's lust filled gaze as houses upon houses burned to the ground, Draco's own lust, fueled as an extension of Voldemort's, diamonds glittering and falling caked in blood from Voldemort's hands as a person's body explodes from Voldemort's sheer will.
Remember who you are. Hermione found her voice.
"Yes, M'lord," Hermione whispered croakily and shakily. "You are great."
Voldemort smiled slowly, assured in his lordship over her.
"And am I not merciful? Allowing you to bind yourself to one of my most promising?"
"Yes, M'lord," Hermione answered as she lowered her gaze, which was branded with those images in her mind. "You are merciful."
"And am I not kind? You who were a mudblood, are witch, now. Am I not kind?" Voldemort's grip tightened and tightened as he spoke, a frenzied gleam in his eyes. Finally, as though he exploded, he yelled, "Am I not kind?!"
"Yes, M'lord." Hermione shook in fear and awe as a surge of magic so powerful embraced everyone from Voldemort's explosion. Hermione could barely believe it, such raw power in such a monster. "You are kind."
You are kind.
"Yes. Yes, I am kind" Voldemort relaxed suddenly, like a cobra that had been poised to strike but had changed its mind. Suddenly, he let go of Hermione and raised a condescending and noble eyebrow at the crowd. "Perhaps too kind."
With that one sentence, Hermione could feel the shake of the ground as everyone dropped to their knees as well, wherever they stood.
Together, mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers, lovers and friends, sons and daughters exulted the Dark Lord.
Remember who you are.
"Rise my loyal followers," Voldemort bid everyone to stand, and he shed his grace, his magic, over them all as he did. And as he continued to speak, his bloodlust bled into that magic, and into everyone's being. "You are my most loyal. You deserve to celebrate, so tonight we will make the rivers run red with blood. We will make symphonies out of the screams of the weak, and we will show the power of our magic to our enemies!"
With his last word, Voldemort swept out of the room in a haze of black shadows, and most everyone followed, pulled by his magic and will.
Yes, M'lord. You are kind.
Draco and Hermione didn't move for a moment, but Hermione guessed that the pull of the Mark wouldn't let him sit this one out. They stood, that great chandelier sparkling and shinning above their heads.
Hermione knew what Draco would have to do tonight. She knew that he'd kill and torture, and he would do it with her name upon his lips. She wanted to punch him and tell him to never touch her again.
Murderer. Torturer. Disgusting, foul, loathsome cockroach!
Draco, still, waited for her to shun him like she did the last time she had come face to face with the reality of his life as a Death Eater.
I'm yours.
Instead, Hermione stepped so close that her breasts grazed his front. She lifted her lips to his and kissed him with all the despair she felt in her body. Her traitorous body that had wanted more of Voldemort's magic. Her weak body that had given into her fear, and had been struck immobile in the face of evil.
Draco crushed her in his hold, as his lips slanted over hers with a wildness and roughness so consuming that both could barely breathe.
Hermione pushed him away slightly and gasped for breath like a woman drowning. Maybe she was. Maybe she was drowning in him.
Remember who you are.
"Whatever you do tonight," Hermione gripped at his arms firmly. He was there. He existed. This wasn't a dream. They survived. "Whatever sins you might commit—they don't define you. Whoever you kill tonight doesn't define you."
Draco felt like a tornado had formed in his ribcage at her words. Perhaps she meant it, or perhaps she didn't. It didn't matter either way, because she said it. She said it, and even if she didn't mean it today, she might mean it tomorrow. Hope.
Yea, it was a hope that poisoned and hurt like a thousand knives, but it was still hope. At least, some form of it.
Whoever you kill tonight doesn't define you.
But Draco Malfoy had lost the ability to believe in hope a long time ago. Maybe he'd accept it for what it was one day. Maybe one day, but not today.
Instead, Draco kissed Hermione swiftly, like water colors on a canvas, and said, "I'll see you back at home."
He disappeared in a blur of smoke, shadows, and darkness like the rest of the Death Eaters.
I'll see you back at home. Home: a hotel suite that they had somehow, between fits of anger and passion, made theirs.
Remember who you are.
A scuffle against the marbled floor alerted Hermione to someone's presence and she turned around, her black cloak billowing around her frame.
Snape stood there, regal and imposing as always.
They stared at each other, scrutinizing, observing, searching for holes in the other's mask to pick at.
"Well done, Miss Granger," Snape nodded once after a moment. "Well done."
"Mrs. Malfoy," Hermione corrected automatically but Snape was already gone into the darkness as well.
Remember who you are.
Remember who you are.
She was Hermione Malfoy, wife to Draco Malfoy, a dragon born and a king bred, and she was fierce.
"Mrs. Malfoy," Hermione corrected to no one in the dark, before she too left the grandiose ballroom behind to await her husband at home, whatever hour he might arrive.
Her husband.
Because they were in this together, now.
By the time Draco had returned to their hotel suite, Hermione had fallen into a deep sleep brought on by exhaustion and frayed nerves.
The first stray lights of dawn had been streaking across the sky, and he could have sworn he had fallen asleep to the smell of blood in the air.
Hermione awoke with the light streaming into the bedroom, chasing all the shadows away, and Draco's hand on her breast. It wasn't romantic, or sexual. But there was something so very possessive about it that forced her to be still.
For the first time since they had bound themselves to each other, Hermione actually felt married. She felt like a wife.
She turned her head to face him, and, in this morning light, Hermione could see a thousand mornings like this. She could see their future untarnished by war or fear.
Except there was a speck of blood on his neck that didn't belong to him.
The more she stared at him, the more she realized he was covered in blood, here and there.
She wanted to scream in horror, but she couldn't look away. She couldn't look away. This was her husband.
I love you.
I'm yours.
He deserved better, didn't he? He deserved more.
Even if all she could think was, whose blood is that? Is it a child's blood?
When he had arrived last night, he hadn't bothered to clean up. He had taken off his cloak and mask, and had thrown himself onto the bed.
He had craved being near Hermione, if only to remember her words. Whoever you kill tonight doesn't define you.
He had wanted to believe it desperately. He wanted to believe it still, as he opened his eyes, and beheld the world in the dark pools of Hermione's gaze.
They didn't say a word to each other.
They didn't need to.
Remember who you are.
Whoever you kill tonight doesn't define you.
It was enough. It was enough, so they both rolled out of bed and silently prepared themselves for one of the hardest days of their lives: going back to Hogwarts.
Last night weighed on Draco, forcing him to stand erect or else collapse under the burden of it as he dressed and combed his hair to perfection. Hermione had to continuously fight the imagined screams of the tortured from her head as she tied her shoes, her contempt for him and their situation only growing with every passing moment as the silence prevailed.
But silence always has a way of saying so much, and there was so much to be said between them. This silence followed them as they left the hotel suite, and journeyed through the city in a black limousine cab. This silence stretched and oppressed them as they reached the 9 and ¾ platform, the people buzzing around them, the colors bright and breathtaking with youthful jubilance—an innocence so pure that Hermione and Draco felt as though they could taint it simply with their presence.
Silence caressed and choked the space between them as they both entered the train, loaded their trunk into a compartment, and stared at each other, conscious of the fact that Hermione wanted to leave to find her friends. Or perhaps simply to escape the sharpness of his eyes which were so stifling at times.
"You're not chained to me," Draco shrugged, though his taut stance and tense shoulders spoke volumes.
"Aren't I?"
It was an automatic rebuttal—the words had simply flown from her mouth before she could think to stop them.
She bit her lips in consternation.
You're not chained to me.
Aren't I?
The words were about so much more than her going to another compartment on the train. It was about how trapped she felt in her own life. How trapped he made her feel.
"Don't go there, Granger."
"Where? To the truth?" All she could see as she looked upon his fair skin, and shiny shoes was all the blood that had marred his skin this morning. All she could see was the haunted look in his gray eyes. So haunted, so trapped—trapped like she was.
But the more she thought about how effected he was by whatever had transpired last night, the more her anger burned. He doesn't get to feel bad, she thought. He chose the wrong side.
It had been his choice. It had always been his choice.
Someone opened the compartment door. Hermione didn't recognize the person but it didn't matter because Draco snapped a quick and brutal, "get out," before the door slid shut again.
"You think you've got some kind of monopoly on pain?" Draco drawled in that cutting fashion of his which always left her feeling insignificant and full of impotent rage. "You think you're the only one who feels helpless, out of choices? Get over yourself. I didn't chase you to the alter at wand-point, and this little pity party you insist on continuing to throw yourself is getting old fast."
It was a dismissal, but Hermione's rage was too full and overflowing to be stopped. She wasn't insignificant. She wasn't worthless. Not here. Not now. Not to him. Never to him.
If he wanted to hurt her, well, she could hurt him too.
"Oh, poor little Malfoy," Hermione snarled. "Daddy didn't love you enough? Mommy had no backbone to defend you? What? What was it? Because honestly, I'm done guessing what your problem is. You chose this. No one forced you, not last year, and not last night."
"How quick the tables turn," Draco sneered right back. "Last night, high off seeing the Dark Lord you were compassionate and forgiving. What happened, Granger? Woke up and realized the reality of what you sent me out there to do?"
They were in rare form today, and it was a strange comfort to be able to hurt each other. Because Hermione didn't have a monopoly on pain and should get over herself, and Draco did feel at times that his father didn't love him enough (not enough to go against the Dark Lord at least) and his mother never defended him—not that he could see anyhow.
"Don't you dare lay that on me!" Hermione yelled, her hand snapping up as if preparing to strike him. Her eyes burned like fiendfyre and Draco felt a heat spread throughout his body in response. Fuck, he wanted her—to enslave her under his will and punish her with the threat of all the things he feels for her in secret.
"Yea, Granger," Draco pushed her against the compartment door. He didn't try to contain her. No, she wouldn't be tamed or managed right not. Not with all the blood he spilt last night. He wasn't that blind. "Yea, that was all for you. How does it feel? Huh? How does it feel to know that people were slaughtered last night in your name?"
A look of revulsion and disgust settled on Hermione's delicate features, but Draco wasn't ashamed. Oh, he hated himself for what he'd done last night—the disgusting and vile things he'd done that he'd never forget. That he'd never be able to wash away. But he wasn't ashamed. Never that. Because he had killed, burned, and bled in Hermione's name.
To survive. For them to survive. He'd do it again, too.
It had felt like he had been binding himself to her all over again. It felt the same right now as they stood, chest to chest, nose to nose, forehead to forehead, ugly truth mixing with barbed words, hate at themselves and each other masking the desire that's always just under the surface, swaying with the train on its way through the grass green hills and bright blue cloudless sky…to Hogwarts. The home of their hearts.
"I can't be the reason you kill," Hermione whispered. She wanted to vomit as nausea and vertigo assaulted her. "I can't—I just can't."
"I know, I know," he shushed her. Draco let her grief soothe and feed something feral inside of him simultaneously. "I know."
The train jostled roughly suddenly, and they were hurled from the door to the floor. Draco landed hard, and Hermione landed even harder on top of him. Her tousled locks were like ropes made of curly brown strands connecting them.
Draco's arms had wrapped around Hermione during the fall, an instinct to protect her. But now that they were on the floor, he couldn't let her go. He couldn't let her go, and he resented her for it. So bad.
"Don't let me be the reason you kill," Hermione whispered brokenly. She felt his fingers tighten painfully around her, but that was okay, too. It was solid in this ever changing and shifting world. "I don't deserve that. I'm not worth that."
"You're right," Draco breathed her in. His eyes were unsteady with bitterness. His arms shook from the force of containing so much, all the fucking time. "You're not worth it. But—damn you—I can't stop. I can't. I burned down a house, and all I saw were your eyes, those self-righteous eyes of yours staring back at me. I sliced a man in half, and I remembered what you felt like, how good you fucking taste. It's like you've ruined me, Granger. You've ruined me, and there's no going back. There's no going back, so fucking deal with it. Because last night might've been the first time that I killed in your name, but it won't be the last."
You're not chained to me.
Aren't I?
He had lied. They were chained. Equivocally. Forever.
Hermione could only look away in shame…because when she stopped picturing all the blood on Draco, she didn't mind the idea of being chained to him so much.
She was a traitor to her own soul, the part of her soul that was Harry Potter's best friend. It was too much to bear, and the walls felt like they were closing in on her, chasing her to the brink of nightmares and despair.
It would always be too much between Hermione and Draco. She understood that. So did he. They understood it deep in their bones, like a disease destroying them from the inside…or making them stronger through the struggle.
"I don't want to be in a war with you, Granger" Draco sighed; his voice was husky, compelled into smoothness by her heart beating against his chest. This truth was a hard one to accept, because neither were sure that they knew how to not fight. Somewhere in the mix of growing up, they'd long ago fallen in love with the struggle, and had made it a part of themselves. "I don't want our marriage to be a battlefield."
"Then stop fighting me."
"What's the alternative? Let you mold me into Potter 2.0? Because that's not me, Granger. That'll never be me."
"I never asked you to be like Harry!"
"You didn't have to." Draco stared at the ceiling above them instead of her eyes. It was easier this way. He stared at the ceiling, waiting for an enlightenment that might never come. Because he didn't want to care so fucking much…but he did. He cared (in whatever twisted way that his mangled and torn soul could), and wanted, and despised Hermione so fully that sometimes he couldn't find the will to breathe, let alone bow to the Dark Lord. "I'm not some virtuous saint, here to work the war from the inside. That's not who I am. But I see it in your eyes. I saw it last night, too. That's exactly what you want. You want me to wake up one morning and declare myself a puppet for the Order. But I'll never be a puppet again."
"Then who are you?" Hermione gripped at the lapels of his shirt so hard that her knuckles turned white. Her hair was just as wild as her passion and hatred. It was hard for Draco to decipher which emotion ruled her now. Frankly, it was hard for Hermione to decipher which as well. "Tell me, Malfoy! Who are you?"
"I'm a husband," he whispered thickly. He closed his eyes as he let the memory of waking up with his hand on her breast, her eyes on him, assault him. They were married now, truly. In every sense of the word, down to the very core of themselves. He had felt it this morning. In the normalcy of it all. "I'm a husband and a dragon."
"What does that mean?" Hermione gazed upon him, lost in the moment like a person being whipped around in the middle of a tsunami. Maybe Draco was the tsunami. Or perhaps she was.
He didn't answer, and Hermione wasn't willing to crumble under the weight of his silence.
Instead, she stood on wobbly knees, shaking uncontrollably on the inside, and left the compartment without another word.
"So, how's life at Malfoy Manor?" Ginny asked awkwardly. She meant well, but tact wasn't exactly any Weasley's forte.
When Hermione had left Draco on the floor of his compartment, she had gone in search of her friends. It hadn't occurred to her that things would be awkward. It hadn't crossed her mind at all that she hadn't seen Ron and Harry since her wedding.
The day she had tied herself to their sworn enemy. Once her enemy, too. Heck, maybe he still was her enemy. The battle lines blurred more each day, with each kiss and fight.
"We haven't stayed at Malfoy Manor, actually," Hermione tried to answer nonchalantly. She was sitting next to Ron, who's barely looked at her since she walked in. The moving train made their shoulders and thighs bump into each other. It was uncomfortable on a whole new level for them. "It's sort of the Dark Lord's home base right now, so…"
"Dark Lord?" Harry raised an eyebrow. He didn't mean to say it in such a tone, but he couldn't help it either.
"Voldemort," Hermione corrected quickly. "Sorry, Professor Snape's negative reinforcement kind of does the trick. Can't go around calling Voldemort by his name to his face. Needed to break the habit, so Professor Snape took it upon himself to make sure I remembered."
"What did he do?" Ron finally looked at her. There was a fire in his eyes raging in her defense. A warmth that Hermione had missed swept through her at her friend. Because despite it all, they were still friends. They'd always be friends.
It was nice to remember that. Even if things were spectacularly strange between them currently.
"Nothing worth talking about," she smiled lightly at him.
"So where are you guys staying?" Ginny inquired.
"Probably in a mansion somewhere by the coast," Ron said bitterly. The warmth that had spread swiftly cooled, and all Hermione was left with was a chill in her bones.
"Actually," Hermione pursed her lips. She knew he didn't mean to attack her, but she still felt attacked. She felt alone in this compartment filled with the people closest to her. "We've been staying at a muggle hotel."
"Guess you're a good influence on him," Harry joked but it fell flat.
None of them were in a joking mood—not Ron who still felt like his chest was caving in on itself whenever he looked at Hermione—because damn it, he still didn't understand why not him—, not Ginny who had no idea how to navigate such a complicated situation, and not Hermione who felt like she was in a perpetual tug of war.
The silence settled over them, and Harry couldn't stand it. This wasn't them. This wasn't who they were ever allowed to be. Not ever.
"Gin," Harry turned to Ginny with soft eyes. "Can you give us the room?"
Ginny smiled tenderly at him, her fiancé, and nodded.
As she walked out of the room, Harry stared after her with a strange pang in his stomach. He knew that deep down she wasn't the one he wanted, but he tried anyway. He had promised to marry her so as to protect her from marrying someone else, someone she didn't care about, someone who might be under Voldemort's thumb. The papers had been signed and sealed, simply awaiting the wedding date.
"She loves you," Hermione pointed out. She was out of superfluous words. She wanted to talk about something that mattered.
"She's loved him since her First Year," Ron snorted. "Bloody hell, maybe even before that."
"Must be nice," Hermione shrugged and looked out the window. "To be loved like that. Remember how she jumped to the chance to help you at the end of Fifth Year? Went head first into danger without a second thought for herself."
"It does feel good," Harry admitted, his green eyes piercing her like bolts of lightning. "It feels really good. I just wish—I wish I could love her the way she deserves."
Something about the phrasing didn't sit right with Hermione. She understood the sentiment, but the word choice, deserves, didn't settle under her skin right.
You deserve to celebrate, so tonight we will make the rivers run red with blood.
Don't let me be the reason you kill. I don't deserve that.
Hermione tried to shake the words from her memory. She didn't want Draco to infuse his presence into this conversation without even being in the room. Hermione didn't want to make her world all about him. She didn't want all roads to lead back to Draco, even if it felt like they already did somehow.
"It's never about what anyone deserves," Ron spoke up in that randomly insightful way that he has a habit of doing. It always surprised Hermione and Harry when he did, and reminded them that Ron was the heart of the Trio. Whereas Hermione was the brains and logic, and Harry was the strength and hope, Ron was the heart that reminded them to believe in each other. "Love isn't arithmetic. We love who we love. All anyone can do is try to be worthy of being loved, I guess."
Harry sighed and nodded his understanding. Ron was trying to tell him that he understood and wouldn't hold it against him. They were brothers, and even this wouldn't break them. Harry not loving Ron's sister enough wouldn't be the wedge that separated them.
As long as he treated her right and fair. As long as he tried to live up to being loved by her. Ron only wished he could have been given the same chance with Hermione.
But it was too late for those thoughts now. Too late to do anything but try to not picture how Malfoy probably touched her at night.
"Is Malfoy treating you alright?" Ron turned to Hermione. His sky blue eyes were steady as he gazed into her, searching for any lies she might tell.
But how could she tell them that Draco was a complicated mess and she was right there with him? How could she tell them that her relationship had become a ball of I love you, I'm yours, remember who you are, whoever you kill doesn't define you, and you're not chained to me.
Statements that meant everything and nothing.
How could she ever define that? In what universe could she ever explain that Draco expelled his demons by making love to her—hard, rough. By what grace could she ever say that when Draco purged himself in her, she felt like she could do anything in the world.
"You know that if he's mistreating you, if you were wrong, it's okay," Harry leaned forward and grasped her hand in his warm ones. "You can tell us."
If he were treating her as awfully as they thought, Hermione could tell them. She could run screaming to the hills—Harry and Ron would protect her because that was what they all did; they protected each other. Together.
Draco was killing in her name, and trekking blood into their make-shift home, possibly scarring her mentally, but he wasn't treating her the way they imagined—beating her in the middle of the night or anything else horrific.
"He's not a monster, guys," Hermione chided softly. It was the only defense because she couldn't tell them the truth. The truth that tore at her in random moments—that she liked it when he hurt her, because she liked to hurt him too. "He's an enormous prat, and needs some serious therapy, but he's not a monster."
Don't think about the blood. Don't think about the blood. Her brain tried to shut out the image of waking up in a bed filled with dried blood—so dark and red—that hadn't belonged to her or Draco.
"Voldemort was pretty happy last night," Harry's gaze didn't waiver and Hermione couldn't pull away. He was the light. Surely Harry would guide her out of the darkness. Of course Harry could save her from herself. He was the light. He was her best friend.
"What did you see?" she muttered.
"Not much," he shrugged, though there was an anxiety that he couldn't shake and couldn't hide. "Just bits and pieces here and there. Mostly it was just his feelings that came through. Kept me up most of the night, actually."
They were waiting for her to fill in the blanks. The parts they couldn't see without her help. They were waiting, but all Hermione said was, "Well, you can bet if Voldemort was so happy that it meant nothing good for anyone."
"What happened last night, Hermione?" Harry asked outright finally. It was so straightforward, so open and trusting of a question, because he trusted that she'd tell him the truth, that Hermione wouldn't lie.
He was the light.
"I met Voldemort," Hermione began. Ron, feeling the shift in the conversation, automatically put his arms around her in comfort. His heart beat against her arm, and it was secure. She felt safe and surrounded by them. Never mind that he was memorizing how it felt to hold her, even just like this. Never mind that Hermione knew it, too. "He's a bit unhinged, a bit mad, but there was something there, y'know? Something…I don't know. Doesn't matter, either. There was a Revel last night."
"You didn't have to attend did you?" Ron smothered a horrified gasp.
"No," Hermione shook her head. "I just went to meet him, bow down to him, but that was it. It was all he wanted from me."
"How was it?" Harry couldn't help but ask. It was an insight that he'd never been able to have—how others outside of Voldemort's followers besides himself saw him.
"Scary," she confessed. "Really scary. Like, Molly Weasley on a rampage scary."
They all looked at each other for a moment, marinating on the image in their heads, and then they all grinned in quiet mirth; they had all seen Mrs. Weasley on the warpath at least once or twice.
In their upturned lips, in the light that sparked in their eyes, Hermione remembered exactly who she was.
In their relaxed state as they sat comfortably crossed legged in the compartment and began playing exploding snap, trying to get back to that ease that was so intrinsic to their friendship, Hermione wondered why she couldn't be Mrs. Malfoy and who she'd always been.
She wondered and wondered, even as the majestic Hogwarts could be seen glowing bright in the distance.
Darkness was a thing made of shadows and silence, Hermione decided as she entered Draco's dorm room. It must be a living entity, perhaps even a dark creature, she determined, as she gazed at the decadent furniture being kissed by darkness in the private, and ridiculously large dorm room.
Slytherins, once they hit Sixth Year, got their own dorm rooms, and so Snape decided that anyone married to a Slytherin would simply move into said Slytherin's dorm room. Snape, with his sneering mouth and lofty chin, stood tonight where Dumbledore once stood during the feast.
He had announced with zero fanfare that all married Slytherins were to live with their spouse—apparently Draco and Blaise were the only two to actually take the plunge. Many people were engaged, but few had actually married; most were probably waiting for the law to blow over. Others were just scared of binding themselves to someone so young. The Elite, of course, simply didn't want to ruin their impeccable pure-blooded lineage.
But none of this had seemed to phase Snape or McGonagall.
McGonagall had sat to his right glaring daggers at the Carrows who had sat at the other end of the table, a mad glee in their eyes. Alecto Carrow was set to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts, which Hermione had the sinking suspicion would become just the Dark Arts soon.
Hermione had received a few curious gazes—her wedding had been in all of the magical newspapers, so the stares were expected. What she hadn't anticipated were the questions about the Carrows—why did Snape hire them? Are they really Death Eaters?
Apparently being Mrs. Malfoy made Hermione privy to all sorts of information that she'd otherwise never be subject to, or at least everyone thought.
Frankly, by the time the meal had been over she'd been more than grateful to run off to her bed…only she couldn't go to her bed. Draco had clearly had the same thought because he had appeared at her side like an angel of death, his dark robes contrasting so heavily against his pale skin and head that Hermione thought he was dressed in his Death Eater garb for a moment.
"Are you ready?" Draco had asked, not sparing a glance for Ron or Harry.
It had been a simple question, but Hermione could hear the undercurrent washing over her. Was she ready to live among Slytherins—the answer had been a definite "no," but she wouldn't say that and risk looking weak. Instead, she had nodded her acquiescence, and Draco had swept her away from the Gryffindor table. Ron and Harry's worried stare following her.
Blaise had walked with them, next to Draco, while Tilly had walked next to Hermione. Whereas the girl had seemed demure before, like a flower in bloom, shinning, then, not in the company of the pureblood elite, she had opened up; the girl was practically a chatter box!
"Did you hear that Luna Lovegood and Theo Nott are in talks for an engagement. Apparently no one's quite sure if the girl's a pureblood or not."
"I wasn't aware, no."
"Oh yes," Tilly had hummed agreeably, and Hermione's eyes had begun to water from the exertion to not roll them. She felt as though she were having a conversation with Pavarti or Lavender. Merlin, help her. "That can happen sometimes—you know how some families keep to themselves. Well, the Lovegoods really keep to themselves—a bit strange and all that—and honestly Brits act like we're the only wizards in the world sometimes. Anyhow, no one ever bothered to ask before, and now that the woman's dead—Luna's mother, that is—well, now it's just bad form to ask. Because her blood status kind of fell through the cracks, now that the Marriage Law's in place, she can actually marry a Pureblood, Half-blood or Muggle-born since she can just decide whether or not to be Pureblood—it's not like anyone will refute her."
"Really?"
"Of course!" Tilly linked their arms as though they were the best of friends sharing a bit of good natured gossip. Hermione couldn't help but like the girl, but then she remembered the way Draco's gaze had lingered, and an acrimonious taste swarmed in her mouth. It didn't matter that she hated him, he was hers. "Honestly, the same thing happened to the Crabbe's a few generations back, I think. As long as no one talks about it, well, they're considered pureblood. Not pure enough to marry into some families, but still. Even though I guess that doesn't really matter anymore, thanks to the Marriage Law."
"Hmm," Hermione hummed amicably, though she had thought the entire conversation a tad hypocritical.
The girl was a half-blood, after all. Though in Tilly's defense, her father, like most Muggle-borns, had been swept up in the world of magic and had left the Muggle world behind. Tilly truly had been born and bred among wizards, despite her heritage, so Hermione couldn't blame her...much.
"Also, I have it on very good authority that the only reason Nott's really considering it is because Lovegood's so close to Potter. Well, you can just imagine—if the Dark Lord wins, then he's obviously safe, and if Potter wins, then he'll still be safe. Lovegood wouldn't let her husband go to jail! Can you even imagine?!"
"Can't say that I can, no," Hermione had raised an eyebrow in the same derisive way she'd seen Draco do a thousand times. Suppose she really was a Malfoy now.
Although even more ironic was that Tilly had no qualms about discussing such things with Hermione, who for all intents and purposes, was still Harry Potter's best friend and firmly on the Light Side. Sadly, Hermione understood why Tilly hadn't spared Hermione's friendships a second thought—allegiances were shifting all around them. As Draco had so cruelly pointed out to her at Blaise's wedding, people were playing both sides of this war, and if Tilly's nonchalant reaction had been any indication, it wasn't exactly a secret.
Who was Hermione to judge? Hadn't she been the one to bow before Voldemort last night? She could have made a stand and taken death over dishonor of her morals, but she had been afraid. She hadn't wanted to die. None of them did.
It had been a sobering realization that bit at the heels of Hermione's feet like rabid dogs.
Nonetheless, Tilly had gone on and on about this and that, so much so that Hermione couldn't help but perk her ear up for Draco's conversation that had been going on only a few paces in front of her.
"How's it feel being a married man?" Blaise had ribbed good-naturedly.
Clearly being married had been treating him well. His dark skin glowed magnificently, showing no signs of fatigue, and his eyes glittered like black diamonds. He was an Adonis made of the darkest and finest marble; Hermione could see why so many women fawned over him.
"Fucking exhausting," Draco had growled, and Hermione had glared into his back in response.
"Ouch," Blaise had flinched exaggeratedly. "Guess the Dark Lord kind of put a damper on things, huh?"
"More like the bride is a sanctimonious hypocrite," Draco had explained. But Hermione had already had enough—he didn't get to assassinate her character just because he was still upset over their last argument.
"More like the groom is an insensitive prat," Hermione interjected in their conversation.
Tilly's eyes widened comically at Hermione's audacity, and a hush fell upon the Slytherins that were walking around them. But Hermione couldn't focus on that. Not when Draco's eyes were like steel and a wrath so powerful shown in his eyes as he turned slowly.
"I dare you, Granger," Draco's hand clamped down on her forearm like a force of nature in the guise of guiding her next to him like a gentleman. His words were said lowly through clenched teeth so only she could hear, his face a mask of nonchalance and indifference. "Please, please fucking embarrass me so you can see the kind of husband I can be."
The threat had been clear, and Hermione hadn't wanted to test his patience—she hadn't been sure if the threat had been empty or not, but she hadn't wanted to find out.
But now, in the darkness of his room, in the space that would occupy them both, Hermione was willing to test all those waters. She was willing to fight and make him bleed because she wasn't a mudblood and she wouldn't let herself be treated like one, even by him. Especially by him.
"Let it go, Granger," Draco waltzed into the room like he walked into every room—like he paid for its very existence.
"Let what go?" Hermione folded her arms and smiled coldly. She was the picture of a dutiful wife, waiting poised by the bed for her lord and master husband in a silk light blue negligee that stopped mid-thigh. But she had no master. Her husband would never be her lord, and she would never submit. "Let the fact that you manhandled me in front of all of Slytherin earlier go? Let go of the fact that the Carrows will be teaching DADA tomorrow? Let go of our sham of a marriage? Let what go?"
"Fuck, Granger!" Draco whirled on her with an agitated gleam in his eyes, his hands running roughly through is hair. He was so close to the edge. They both were. They always were. "Can I just breathe for a second? It's like you woke up today determined to fight."
"I woke up with blood on my sheets from innocents!"
"Oh please," Draco scoffed as he started to strip. He didn't care where his clothes landed as long as they came off and went away from him. The bedroom, in its elegant silver and green furniture, had a red and golden blanket covering the bed. Probably Snape's idea of a joke. It clashed horribly and was distracting, but not enough to drown out his words. "You'd like to think that every person that died last night was innocent. It's easier for you lot to break everything up like that. But newsflash: just because we're the bad guys doesn't suddenly turn everyone else into saints. You think there weren't murderers and rapists, and everyday criminals among the fray? Wake up!"
"They may not have been saints, but they didn't deserve what happened to them!"
There was that word again: deserve. It had been thrown about too much in the last two days. It seemed that everywhere she turned that word was haunting her.
"Does anyone?" he stood there in his silk boxers, skin flawless at first glance, but the longer and harder she looked the more she noticed little welts over his chest and back as he walked around to his side of the bed.
It pissed her off that he even had a side of the bed, that they're that married already.
Nonetheless, she couldn't ignore the marks that hadn't been there before. She couldn't ignore that someone had whipped and marred that unsullied skin. Her husband.
"Who did that to you?" she jumped onto the bed and knelt next to him. Her hand trembled as she held it above the raised skin on his chest. He had a light smattering of blonde hair on his chest that were smooth and raised goosebumps on her arms.
"I'm okay," he said tersely, but she couldn't just let this go. Not this. Not him. Not ever.
Not if the sky fell down around them and the world caved in. They were linked. They were bound, and that silk thread never felt tighter as it did right now, seeing the cost of living on the dark side.
"Who did this?" Hermione whispered harshly. She knew the answer in her heart, but she still had to hear it. She needed to hear the name fall from his lips—those lips that pressed against hers and made her feel like she was flying and sinking.
"The Dark Lord, of course," Draco rolled his eyes. "You thought your disobedience didn't have a cost?"
"But why didn't he punish me?" Hermione asked almost frantically. No, no, no. This wasn't right. This wasn't okay. She'd been the one who took too long to bow down. Draco might deserve a lot of things but not this—not for something he hadn't done.
"You're my wife," Draco lifted his hand, grasped hers, and lifted it to his lips. His lips traced her fingers lightly, remembering the feel of them on him. Reminding her of his vows that fateful day he'd convinced her to marry him. "He knew that the moment he touched you, he'd lose my allegiance…men'll take a lot, even threats to their families. But once that threat becomes action, well, that's not the way to gain loyalty. Even he understands that, even if he doesn't feel love and loyalty to anyone but himself."
"I'm sorry that you were hurt," Hermione looked away from his lips nipping at her fingers. It was the closest to an apology that he would ever get from her for her hypocritical behavior and accusing stare all day.
A familiar blush spread over her cheeks and chest at his ministrations. Draco smiled a rare smile in response, and lifted her over him with his other arm. His strength didn't surprise her, but his swiftness did. She hadn't expected to be straddling him simply because she admitted to acting slightly irrational. She might not had proclaimed it out loud, but it was enough for them.
They understood, even in the silence, and it was nice. It was nice even when it was bad—horrific, dangerous, and what-is-wrong-with-the-universe crazy.
Draco's dangerous smile didn't vanish as he leaned against the headboard, ground Hermione against him, and threw his head back in silent surrender and bliss.
"Fuck, you always feel so good," he reveled in the satisfaction of having her above him, with him, because Hermione hadn't stopped rotating her hips.
Out of habit, Hermione had stopped wearing underwear to bed, since Draco always seemed to rip them off on the nights he loved her hard. Honestly, he loved her hard often. She preferred it that way, too. It reminded her that all of this was real. It reminded her that she wasn't floating in out of space, lost in a dream made up of Dark Marks and random moments of pleasure.
Her body slid against his, and damn the world if he wasn't at her mercy. She felt powerful, so powerful. She couldn't stop the wicked smile the fell on her own lips, like a piece of heaven touching down on Earth.
His hands roamed her body—her neck, cheek, shoulders, breasts, thighs, stomach. He wanted to touch all of her, to remind her why she married him in the first place.
This desire that laid between them—so deranged and disgusting in its illogical greatness.
"We should fight more often," he quipped.
Hermione shook her head, the smile gone from her mouth in seconds at the thought. "We fight all the time."
"Not like today," he smirked, and oh, he was born dangerous, Hermione was sure. "You were a whole new level of annoying."
"I wasn't the one that brought the war into our bed!" Hermione pinched his chest, forgetting about the welts.
A hiss escaped Draco, but she wasn't sorry. She couldn't be because as soon as she had pinched him, his hand had flown through the air and landed on her bottom with a resounding SMACK!
Yes, yes. This kind of pain she could handle. This kind of pain made her grind herself harder on him. It was the kind of pain that couldn't exist without pleasure.
"Tsk, tsk, wife," Draco purred as he maneuvered his shorts off without upsetting Hermione's position. It was a testament to his determination that he succeeded.
"Still not okay," Hermione gasped as Draco slid into her like he had been destined to be just there.
"I know," Draco wrapped his hand around her hair and pulled. He loved the way she arched her back when he did that. He loved gazing upon her as she rode him to her release—it felt like he was watching poetry in motion, or the greatest sonata in action ever written. He felt submerged in her. "I know, but it's better this way."
Hermione went slow, so slow. She wanted to hear him, each gasp and groan. Each word because she knew this meant something. They were on the precipice of some kind of middle ground in their ever rampant war.
"How was me waking up to a scene from a horror movie better?" her eyes widened incredulously, though she lost concentration because his hand found her bottom again. SMACK! SMACK!
Yes, yes. Just like that.
She wanted to focus, she wanted to focus so bad but it felt too good. Too perfect. She wished they could be like this forever.
"Because," Draco's hand gripped her waist hard enough to bruise, stopping her movements. "Now you've seen what I can do. You've seen what I'm willing to do, and how far I can go. Knowing and seeing aren't the same thing, Granger. They can't be—so now you've seen and really know. Now, if you can—if you can still—if you still want me, then it'd be real."
He wanted to ask her, Hermione knew, but he just couldn't. His pride wouldn't let him ask what they both knew he was trying to ask anyway.
Say no, say no, her head screamed at her. She didn't want him anymore. How could she? He hadn't just killed for her, he'd done monstrous things. He'd ruined any idea she could've had of him being misunderstood and secretly virtuous.
He'd never be a paradigm of virtue or harmless.
Say no, say no.
But Hermione couldn't stop.
It's not about what anyone deserves.
She leaned forward, let her hands trail up his stomach muscles that rippled as she went, and kissed his mouth; her kisses were better than wine, and just as intoxicating.
I'm yours.
I love you.
He drove into her recklessly, and she pushed down on him, body pulsing irrepressibly. They were immersed in the fury of their passion, in the ardor of their truths.
"This is real," Draco said roughly as though the words had been torn from his chest.
Maybe they were. Perhaps every second inside of her was like an exorcism of the best kind. Abruptly, she went slow again, agonizingly slow. Draco grunted his need, for he was at her mercy. Hermione's hands reached for his, and lifted it until the Dark Mark was in front of her.
There it stood imbedded in his forearm, glorious in its cruelty and permanent in its monstrosity. It mocked her, whispering horrendous things in her ear with its presence, but she felt the fullness of being stretched by Draco, and it overtook her. He overtook her.
She loathed him for it, maybe just as much as he despised her sometimes, too. But they were too far gone to care.
Say no, say no.
Her lips burned as they touched the Dark Mark; Draco inhaled sharply, floored, moved, and in the greatest throes of hunger and sensuality; there was nothing sexier and more arousing than Hermione Granger kissing his Dark Mark—proof of his hideous soul, and she kissed it anyway, pink tongue peeking ever so slightly out of swollen lips; they were going direct to Heaven, they were going direct the other way; none of it mattered because they were connected; they were connected to each other and destroyed by each other.
"I still want you," Hermione whispered huskily. It was like the words were the just right cord that had been struck, because her body started to move desperately and violently.
Draco moved right along with her.
She bit at his chest, and he dug his fingers into her bottom, powerful in every thrust.
Don't stop. Don't stop.
Never.
Yes, yes, yes.
Take it, Granger. Take all of me.
Please, please, Malfoy. More.
Hermione felt his Dark Mark burn against her, and she could only imagine the kind of pain it caused him. But it didn't matter. Not right now. Not as he drove harder and deeper, so fucking deep that she cried out. Her cries were like the siren's song condemning him so sweetly, because he could never go back. Not anymore. Not after the feel of her wrapped around him was seared into his very flesh.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
Yes, yes, yes.
Merlin, Granger, so fucking good.
I can't—I can't stop.
Don't stop. Let go, Granger. Fuck—.
I can't—I'm going to—
That's it. Just like that.
She could have been a queen, and her body the throne at which Draco worshipped, because as she dug her nails into his skin, and whispered "I still want you" like a mantra and a hysterical vow as she twitched and shuddered, he worshipped her. He worshipped her like he had never thought he could.
Nothing mattered as they flew through each other, and into the arms of rapture.
Rapture was a beautiful thing made of all the colors of the rainbows sometimes. Other times, like tonight, rapture was made of Darkness, that living creature that Hermione would swear presided over her life lately.
It was indeed only in the dark that they spoke most Truths—any truths that mattered. Maybe that would change, someday.
"You can't fix everything with sex, you know," Hermione murmured once she'd rolled off him and was comfortably settled on her stomach, face towards him, chin propped on top of the back of her hands on her pillow.
His silver eyes indulged in the greatest mystery of her body—drinking in the beads of sweat on her neck and exposed back.
You can't fix everything with sex.
She meant it as an admonishment, but he was Draco Malfoy, and he'd perfected the art of hearing what he wanted to hear a long time ago.
That dangerous smirk, the one filled with passion, lust, and a quiet challenge, graced his lips like an anointment from the gods themselves.
You can't fix everything with sex.
"Like hell I can't," Draco whispered in return as his hands grasped her firmly, flipped her onto her side, her back to his front, lifted an elegantly smooth and shapely leg, and plunged into her again. Her moans ricocheted off the walls, beautiful, animalistic, and so fucking satisfied. "Like hell I can't."
Soo, what do you guys think? Too much? Not enough? I tried not to be too graphic, but I might have failed superbly. Also, I'm desperately looking for another quote (appx a paragraph long) to surround the next four or five or seven chapters around since A Tale of Two Cities quote has come to an end, so if anyone has any suggestions, I'm all ears! Anywho, love it? Hate it? Let me know and Review! **Reviews are love** :)