Blurb: Hermione Granger's waking up in the mornings dead tired with small unexplained marks and bruises scattered here and there on her body. Sometimes she can't remember what she did the previous night. But that's all rather here nor there. She's got NEWTs to sit and her future to prepare for.
She's a confident young woman by day.
But what is happening to her at night?
Smut, Dramione, Eighth Year Hogwarts
JK Rowling for the characters and setting; me for the plot.
Under her warm duvet, the insistent blare of her wand - set to go at half-past six every morning without fail - slowly penetrated the fog of Hermione's sleep-addled mind. Sticking out an arm, she flailed around for the wand and shut it off. Half-glancing at the time, she decided to have a bit of a lie-in, despite the chaos that would send her revision timetable into; and closed her eyes.
Then she reared up with a shriek. It was already eight o'clock! How could her alarm have gone off for an hour and a bloody half without her noticing? Never mind that, she was late! LATE! Hermione Jean Granger was NEVER late!
Sprinting into the bathroom, she rushed through her ablutions at the speed of light, putting her pantyhose on backwards and forgetting to do up at least half of her shirt buttons. Twisting her still-damp hair into a wonky bun at the nape of her neck, she grabbed her bag, shoved her feet into her school shoes without wasting time on tying the shoelaces and sailed down the many flights of stairs at breakneck speed. She collapsed into a bedraggled heap at the Gryffindor table, next to a bemused Ginny Weasley.
"Here you go," she said, handing Hermione an enormous mug of coffee.
"Ta," Hermione murmured, inhaled it in one gulp, and held the mug out for more.
At the Slytherin table, Draco Malfoy put his third empty cup that once held coffee on the table and took a desultory bite of toast. He smothered a yawn for the dozenth time.
Next to him, Blaise Zabini notched up an eyebrow. "Burning the midnight oil at both ends?" he asked, finishing off his omelette.
Draco frowned, confused. "What in blazes does that mean?" he asked.
Blaise sighed and hauled out his Muggle Study notes from his bag, flipping through the pages. "Oh. It's supposed to be either 'burning the candle at both ends' or 'burning the midnight oil.' It means you're up late, doing stuff." Annoyed, he flung his notes on top of his plate and shoved them away. "I'm never going to pass the test on Muggle idioms today!" he wailed, and banged his head on the table.
Draco absent-mindedly patted his mate on the shoulder. "You knew both, sort of. That should be good for something."
Blaise turned his head and frowned at Draco's wrist. "Are those fingernail marks?"
Draco glanced at his wrist and pulled the cuff of his shirt down to cover it. "Mine," he murmured, looking around for the coffee pot. "Wrist was hurting from writing essays and I got carried away from rubbing it."
Ordinarily, Blaise would have chortled and made some suggestive comment about solo hand work but Draco was already getting up to leave, taking his coffee to go. "See you in Potions," he murmured before heading out of the door, just behind Hermione Granger.
Blaise shrugged and retrieved his Muggle Studies notes, now rather eggier than they were before.
Come Potions class, Hermione was feeling a little more human. She had to nip into a nearest Ladies' to fix the pantyhose and her shirt, once she realised why her gusset felt twisted and why there was a distinct breeze around her bra.
She slid into her seat at the table she shared with Neville Longbottom, prim and proper; with perfect posture and quill set out on the table at exactly ninety degrees to her empty parchment. Neville had already spilled some ink on his and was absent-mindedly mopping it up with his cloak, presumably forgetting he was a wizard and could have cleaned the mess up with a simple charm he learned in First Year.
Hermione noticed the pair sitting next to them, staring at Neville. She nodded at them; formally, of course. "Malfoy. Zabini."
Draco nodded back, but Blaise leaned over the short divide separating the tables. "Granger, I'm in a pickle with this idioms stuff," he whispered. "What in Merlin's name does giving someone the cold shoulder mean? Patil says it's a type of fashion where the material is cut out from the shoulder, but what does that mean, exactly?" His expressive brown eyes were imploring.
"Give over," Draco snarled before Hermione could open her mouth. "Slughorn's here."
Everyone sat up straight as Professor Slughorn strode into the Potions classroom, his tie dotted with the remnants of his breakfast. Today it was egg and tomato. He clutched a sheaf of rather dog-eared parchments, waving them in the air as he pottered to the head of the classroom. All of the students, except Hermione and Draco, groaned at the sight.
"Good morning, class!" Slughorn boomed, ignoring the fug of depression that settled over the students. "Wasn't yesterday's surprise quiz fun?"
He seemed to expect a response, so the class muttered something intelligible back.
"Looks like everyone is progressing nicely towards their Potions N.E.W.T later in the year!" he beamed. "Well, most of us..." he glanced apologetically at Neville, who blushed crimson with shame.
"Don't worry, Neville," Hermione whispered. "Now Harry and Ron aren't here to screw up my revision timetable, I'll put some tutoring time aside for you."
"T-thanks, Hermione," Neville stuttered as Slughorn handed his test results back. Patting Neville on the shoulder, Slughorn whispered "There's still time to change subjects if you want, Longbottom," he said in a low voice. "Have a think about it."
Frowning at the Professor's back while he handed the results to Draco and Blaise, Hermione quickly glanced at her mark and was satisfied. Not pleased, you understand. She never came first in Potions, that was Malfoy's claim. She'd gotten used to it.
She was in the middle of sketching out a tutoring plan for Neville when Slughorn announced "Well done, everyone! Especially to Miss Granger, who achieved top marks. Twenty points to Gryffindor!"
"Well done!" Neville whispered, giving a rather shell-shocked Hermione a one-armed hug. Hermione glanced at Draco, but his head was bent over next to Blaise's, discussing something quietly.
When class ended, Hermione struggled to get out of the room while Blaise begged her to help out with his idioms. In between shuffling both herself and Blaise out of the room as Third Years streamed in while explaining what a cold shoulder meant in idiomatic terms, Draco passed close by. So close she could smell his... cologne? She glanced up.
"Congratulations, Granger," he said simply, and smiled.
He was gone before she could reply. But the smell of that cologne lingered.
At dinner, Hermione made patterns in her mashed potato and nodded in the right places to Ginny's enthusiastic description of this afternoon's Quidditch practice. Her glances to the Slytherin table were getting longer. Hermione tried to tell herself that she was curious about how Blaise got on with his idioms test – probably not well, considering how haunted he looked – but it was the young blonde man sitting next to him that had all the spare attention she had left to give.
He looked up, and their eyes met. A frission of desire pooled low in her belly, and she swallowed.
Draco's eyes were good. He saw her irises dilate, and knew what it meant. It was too soon after last time, but...
He knew where she'd be, later. When she arrived and when she left to go to bed.
He hardened inside his trousers, and adjusted his napkin over his thighs.
It was late at night when Draco drifted by Hermione's favourite desk in the Library. It was nestled in an out-of-the-way nook by the stained glass windows, close to the Restricted Section. Everyone knew Hermione's Desk, and woe betide them if they dared to park their arse on the Gryffindor Princess's throne.
She looked at as a tantalising smell – another one – wafted past her nostrils. "Hey, Malfoy," she whispered, laying down her quill and stretching her arms. "Time for a break?"
Draco drew up a chair opposite her, sat down, and produced a carafe of hot chocolate and two mugs. Pouring the luscious liquid into both, he pulled out a flask of Firewhisky. Unstopping the cap, he waggled it in front of her but she demurred. He added a slash of alcohol to his brew and they both took a long, comforting sip.
"Yum." Hermione's eyes slid closed and she took another sip. "You're too good to me."
Draco smiled but said nothing, looking idly out of the patterned window. Then he blurted "Thanks for being my friend, Hermione. If that doesn't sound too corny."
She shook her curly head. "The feeling is mutual," she said earnestly. "It's nice to be able to study together and converse about something other than Quidditch and the gossip from Witch Weekly. It's... it makes me feel sort of sad that we wasted all these years hating each other when we could have been mates, maybe."
Draco's face shadowed, and she knew that he was thinking back to his recent past and all the horrible things he'd had to do. Slipping from her chair she scooted around to his side of the desk, leaning her bottom against it while she took his hands in hers. "Come back to me," she gently urged. "Think about your future, all its possibilities."
He drew her hands to lips and kissed them gently, one by one. "I'm afraid there's one goal in my future that I'll never be able to obtain," he muttered.
"Bullshit," Hermione replied with aclarity. "There's a new world out beyond the gates of this school. No more old boy networks – one's skills and abilities are what counts now, not who your old man was or what they forced you to do in the war. You'll" –
Draco looked up and focused on her lovely, determined, face. "It's not a career that troubles me," he said gently. "It's being unable to be with the woman I'm in love with."
Hermione hid the hit to her solar plexus rather well. Who the hell is this bitch? she snarled to herself. She rearranged her face to make sure the appropriate expression was showing, and asked faintly: "Why can't you be with her?"
Draco bit his lip. "She's far too good for me. I'd ruin her reputation and who knows what else."
Hermione looked sceptical. "How can you be so sure?"
His eyes reflected the colours of the stained glass behind her. "I know," he said simply.
"Well..." Hermione sighed sadly and looked at her shoes. "I wish there was something I could do to help," she murmured.
Draco leaned forward, and the smell of his cologne swirled around her. "You could tell me to kiss her," he whispered.
She looked up, confused. Draco drew his hands around her waist and pulled her towards him. "I'm in love with you," he breathed, so softly she couldn't be sure if she were dreaming.
She stared at him in silence.
"I know it's too soon for you," Draco hastened to add. "We've only been friends a few months, but I've had this crush on you for years" –
Hermione leapt on top of his thighs and sealed his mouth with hers.
Bathed in the eerie coloured moonlight, Draco and Hermione's bodies drew close together, so close that not a millimetre of air could pass between them. Their kisses grew heated, and their hands soon found their way underneath shirts and inside waistbands.
Hermione moaned when Draco plucked at a delicate nipple from underneath her bra. "We – we'll get caught," she whispered on a gasp of air before returning to his wicked mouth and tongue.
Struggling with one hand, Draco extracted his wand from the mass of loose clothing and conducted whatever silencing charms would take within the cavernous expanse of the library. A second spell locked the great Library doors from within.
"Pince already left," he whispered against her flushed cheek, "and no-one can get in."
Hermione laughed. "Very smart," she marvelled. "It's almost like you've done this before."
A shiver ran, unbidden, along Draco's spine.
"Let me see you," Hermione whispered, as she unbuttoned the remainder of the buttons on her shirt.
He stayed her fingers with one hand, chucking his tie to the floor with the other. "I want to undress you," he said, his grey eyes nearly all black with dilated irises.
He didn't keep her waiting, shedding his clothes with ease while Hermione stood and stared as each perfect limb was exposed. He hid his Mark beneath a glamour, and she wasn't sure what made her sadder: the fact that he had it; or the fact that he felt he had to hide it.
But as for his erection... Draco casually brushed it with a hand while he dropped the last of his clothes, and her mouth filled with saliva. Omigods she wanted to taste it...
It pressed against her, warm and hard while Draco kissed her breathlessly. Not lingering over intimate items of apparel, he divested her of each and every piece until she was as naked as he.
Patterned in the stained glass light, Draco admired her body. Then he sat back in his chair and held out his hand.
Hermione took it, and he lifted her onto his thighs, her wet heat nearly, but not quite, connecting with his cock. Then he lowered her slowly down, inch by hardened inch, onto his shaft, biting back a roar of satisfaction as Hermione's body sealed around his.
They rocked into each other slowly; giving Hermione time to adjust to his considerably-sized body inside hers. Then Hermione took over the pace, dropping down onto him over and over, driving him wild with desire. He caught her when she had all of him taken into her wet heat, and they ground into each other roughly. Sweat dotted their brows, and Draco took each of her beautiful breasts into his mouth, pulling on the taut nipples with his lips. Shaking, Hermione moaned his name and slid her fingers onto to her clitoris, rubbing it hard.
The walls of her drenched pussy clenched, and Draco knew she was near. Standing up and holding Hermione by the waist, he staggered a couple of steps to the table, where he laid her down, pulled her hips to the edge and fucked her. She wailed and wrapped her legs around his waist, feeling the surge of orgasm pulse from her very toes and engulf her body like lightning.
"Draco, oh my gods" – She shuddered and wailed, and Draco closed his eyesm not letting up in pace and praying he would last long enough. But it was damn hard with her beautiful cunt gripping his cock the way it did.
Shaking, Hermione leaned on her elbows and watched Draco pull his slick erection from her body. Wrapping a trembling hand around himself, he met her eyes and stroked his cock until he felt his balls tighten. He spilled himself over her breasts and stomach, the orgasm hitting him so hard he felt momentarily light-headed, and he clutched the edge of the desk for support.
He leaned over and softly kissed her. "Hope you didn't mind the" – he gestured at the ejaculate on her body.
"Not at all," she grinned, kissing him back. "The most vulnerable I've ever seen you is when you came just now."
Draco found his wand and scourgified themselves, then threw a sceptical look at her.
"It's lovely," she laughed, jumping up and standing on tiptoes to kiss him. "Makes me remember you're human."
Draco smiled, a wobbly one. "I feel so vulnerable around you."
Hermione put the last of her clothes back on. "Maybe it's because you said you were in love with me." She wrapped her arms around his neck and whispered: "I think I feel the same way."
Draco's arms snaked around her waist and held her tight.
Heading to the Library doors by the light of their wands, Draco undid the locking spell and courteously opened the door for her.
On the threshold, Hermione looked back and asked "Can we meet tomorrow night?"
"Sure," Draco murmured, and she smiled and continued through. Then with a shaking hand, he drew his wand, pointed it at the back of Hermione's head and whispered "Obliviate."