The Floo network spun her into a large, handsome stone hearth. Hermione took a cautious step out of the fireplace and blinked to get her bearings.
"Welcome," called a familiar voice. "I'm surprised you actually arrived via Floo."
Hermione dusted her sleeves and trousers and stepped further into the largest private library she'd ever seen. Malfoy stood some twenty paces away, in his usual ensemble of black.
"And how else would I have gotten here?"
"Are you telling me you weren't tempted to put those wings to use?"
"I'm hardly going to try flying about the countryside."
Malfoy smirked and approached her.
"Well?" He cast a hand behind him, gesturing towards the vast stacks teeming with knowledge.
"Impressive," Hermione said honestly.
"Yes, I suppose it is," he drawled. "Is it exactly how you imagined it?"
"Hmm, I thought there'd be a labyrinth and perhaps a minotaur involved. Some sort of imposing guardian over all your sacred, pureblood texts."
"Only on Wednesdays. Reliable minotaurs are so hard to find these days."
"Even with your level of wealth?"
"It's a creature scarcity issue, really. I should bring it up with the Ministry."
Her lips twitched and she thought his might have too. An odd, honest movement of a mouth that she only thought could dole out smarm, snark, or a winsome platitude meant to cajole others. Or perhaps hiss a threat. Or something darker still. A command to heed.
It inspired a moment's hesitation. The sensible choice would be to leave right now and head straight to St. Mungo's. But what if the healers there, like Ron with her skin and Harry with her fangs, couldn't see the wings either? Hermione would be stuck waiting possibly hours in a queue only to be declared mentally unsound.
The folded wings twitched beneath her blouse.
The amount of books before her lit a fire within; an excitement in chasing the unknown. Gods she hadn't felt it in so long; that thrill of researching the Sorcerer's stone, or identifying horcruxes, or… or...
"If you wanted to direct me to the Transfiguration section, I think I'll begin my search there."
Malfoy nodded briskly, all trace of genuine amusement gone. He gestured for her to follow and she dutifully fell into step behind him. He walked along several aisles, seeming unsure where to lead her.
He eventually came to a stop and waved a hand ahead towards one. "It might be best if you start here."
Hermione couldn't understand the hesitancy. This was the man's childhood home, surely he knew which shelves housed which topical sections? She withheld an unkind barb about him being so spoiled that he neglected to take advantage of all this knowledge at his fingertips.
Hermione strolled down it, still unsure of her destination. None of the tomes called to her. None of the books had that pull of the inevitable. That siren song of select me and I can show you everything.
"Would you like my help?"
The siren song wasn't coming from a book at all. It came from a man standing twenty feet down the aisle blocking the only way out.
"I wouldn't want to occupy your evening. You're probably hosting a gala or something in the opposite wing."
Malfoy huffed out a reluctant-sounding laugh and rubbed the back of his neck.
"No, Granger. No galas this particular evening. I'll be sure to invite you to the next one."
"Oh? I'd be allowed to sully your ballroom?"
His nostrils flared. Malfoy, incensed. The Draco Malfoy who'd been bested in their year once again by a girl of inferior blood. The Draco Malfoy who'd been turned into a ferret in front of the entire school. The Draco Malfoy who'd lost the quidditch cup to Gryffindor. The Draco Malfoy who had… lost something important to him.
"As a guest in my home, you may sully whatever you wish here. Tonight or any other."
He gave her no time to reply to his bitter words, but instead stalked away and sat in an armchair facing the fire. Hermione wasn't sure what in particular she'd said to cause him offence, but she'd seemingly put him off her company.
She wandered the aisles and sections, feeling lost. Her head spun with ideas and theories, but nothing she read as far as titles on spines registered.
She began to feel dizzy. Her wings twitched again, and seemed to rustle impatiently. Let us out, let us out, let us out, we're you. That curious surge of energy flared up again. Her magic wanted a direction, wanted a purpose.
She stumbled slightly and closed her eyes, centering mind, body, and breathing. Hermione needed to think her way out of this, but rational thought seemed to have eluded her. What did she know thus far?
She knew she'd quite painfully grown wings that morning. She knew the feeling of wings at her back, furling and unfurling as if she were to make a fist with her hand. She knew the sensation of Malfoy's touch on her wings.
And she knew she was alone in the home of a man who had seen her topless just that morning. A fact he'd not yet mentioned. An advantage he'd not pressed.
She'd never known him to be patient. Yet he seemed to be waiting for something.
Hermione opened her eyes but the fog in her brain had yet to clear.
She wanted to know more. She wanted to sleep. She wanted long, pale hands caressing her wings. She wanted to think. Something she'd forgotten how to do momentarily.
Hermione's staggering steps led her back out to find Malfoy seated in front of a roaring fire. It reflected and refracted off his white-blond hair, making it glow all the more.
He looked up when he heard her approach. A neutral, bored gaze.
"Did you find what you needed?"
"No I… I apologise for the intrusion. I think I need to go."
The boredom flickered.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing I just… I think I'm just a bit out of it. Long day at work and the, you know—" she gestured over her shoulders, "the whole wings thing."
A convincing smirk.
"I suppose that means you will need to visit me again."
Hermione no longer had time to play the game of banter and cheek. She needed the sleep and grasped at the hope that things might be better when she woke. She clung to the idea of a new day dawning and clearing the nightmare.
"Would you mind terribly if I came by tomorrow night?"
"No Granger, I wouldn't mind at all."
"Thank you."
He stood and approached. A tower of black, and she had a funny thought about how that applied both to his sartorial preference and his mother's maiden name.
"You have no idea what you're looking for, do you?" he murmured.
Admitting defeat had never been a strong suit of hers. Malfoy stood in front of her and asked her to confess her vulnerability. But his eyes asked for surrendering to other whims and passions.
She couldn't think and her wings ached.
"I can… I think I need… I'll see you tomorrow."
He maintained eye contact even as she spun through the Floo.
"What was she like?"
"Do you actually want to know?"
"Of course I do."
"She… was very protective, obviously. And powerful, people always underestimated her. Sometimes Father included. She had such a vengeful streak, gods, it makes me laugh to think about it."
"How so?"
"She hated my father's cane. He didn't need it, obviously, and she always thought he looked so ridiculous. But he liked it, so she learned to accept it was part of his ensemble for the public. But oh, this one time he'd gotten her so mad… can't remember now what he'd done, and I'd never seen her so angry with him. We had to go to some ball or other, and she'd charmed the cane to shrink an inch with every step he took. He almost fell flat on his face before he realised."
"I'd pay good money to have seen that."
"I think it's my favourite memory of her."
"I'm sorry you lost her."
"Thank you. So am I."
Hermione let the wings spread and inspected them in her bathroom mirror. They shone, almost glistened, today. They were a beautiful feature but they did not belong on her ordinary frame. An adornment slapped onto something plain almost at the last minute to fool an untrained eye that the whole was just as magnificent as the part.
Magnificent. That was how Malfoy had described her wings when she'd shown them off in her office yesterday.
The dizziness had subsided.
The ache to be touched had not.
The temptation to tap into her well of magic hadn't either. It buzzed and hummed within her at a frightening intensity. A raw thing, demanding to be tamed. Then unleashed.
Hermione brought the wings forward to wrap around herself. She burrowed into the slick, smooth skin, trying to self-soothe. A fruitless endeavour. She needed the touch of another and she had someone specific in mind.
Malfoy stared from his usual spot and Hermione wasted no time in approaching him.
"Will you be greeting me first from now on?"
"Good morning Malfoy."
"And to you Granger."
She shifted her weight. One foot to the other in a pathetic stalling tactic. He waited her out.
"Could you come with me to my office again?"
"Of course."
He said nothing else the whole way. He kept quiet as she locked, warded, and silenced the room again. He remained silent as she turned her back, removed her cloak, unbuttoned her shirt and let that fall away.
She set the wings free.
"They appear the same as yesterday," he finally said from his spot across the room. Too far away for what she needed.
"They do. But they feel different."
"How so?"
"They feel… I need…"
"What do you want, Granger?"
"I want you to touch them. Like you did yesterday."
Her soft-spoken plea netted his instant compliance. Malfoy was at her back immediately, fingers running along the wings and she could sink into this, this luxury of a touch that felt so incendiary she might very well catch alight and not only self-immolate, but take the rest of the room, the Ministry, the world with her.
"Is this what you want?" came his low tone.
What she wanted was to turn around and wrap her wings around the two of them together. Enshroud them in this phenomenon she couldn't puzzle out and see if proximity to him might help.
"I asked you a question, Granger."
Her wings betrayed her again. They fluttered as if pleased by his bossiness, his impertinence. Her wings may have been a part of her physically, but they seemed a rather traitorous sort, willing to preen for this man and his unbelievably tender hands.
"Do you want to drag me up to your office for this every single day?"
Yes.
It felt so distressingly wonderful the way his hands comforted and soothed her new skin, while simultaneously awakening every other part of her.
"It's hardly allowing for a productive morning for you, is it? Surely you don't want to fall behind on your work?"
I don't care.
How bold would it be for her to ask if he'd like to walk around to her front again? Would he be just as swiftly obliging as he'd been with her strange, personal request to stand there, fully clothed, running his hands all over her bare back?
Malfoy was right, she didn't want this. She didn't want him in here every morning caressing her wings.
There were other areas he could caress.
Hermione didn't want the wings.
His touch left her. As did the two features he'd been touching for a good few minutes.
"They're gone," she said. Before she could think the instinct through, Hermione whirled around to face him.
Instantly his arms were flush to his sides, hands balled into fists against black fabric. Malfoy snapped his gaze to her right, pointed chin and sharpened features now facing her desk surface. Nowhere near her bare breasts.
"Sorry," she mumbled, and hastily donned her discarded shirt. Malfoy said nothing, just continued his staring contest with the top of her desk. He nodded once at it then finally met her eyes again.
"Have you not put it together yet?"
"I wanted them gone."
"Correct."
"But why should that matter?"
"How have you handled the other changes to your body?"
"Just the same. I simply had to actively think about how I wanted it gone. How I wanted to return to normal." Hermione huffed in frustration. "But what's instigating all this in the first place? Why is this happening to me?"
Anxiety bloomed and spiked inside her. How could she explain this to a medical professional without sounding insane and paranoid?
She didn't know why at that moment she turned to Malfoy with a hopeful, trusting look. She thought for just a second, that it felt natural to throw out a question at him, to see what sort of response he might make.
"I don't know. However," he continued, "I think your best chance of getting to the bottom of this is combing through my library. Before you wake up transformed into some sort of creature that can no longer communicate effectively."
"Could I stop by this evening?"
"As I told you before, yes. Any evening you desire."
"You're being very gracious. Very helpful."
"You sound suspicious."
"I'm not. I'm grateful, truly."
Except it wasn't the whole truth. Gratefulness was a tiny lie that she needed to latch onto for a bit of courage. A fib that allowed her to step closer to him. Malfoy didn't move a muscle. As he had said yesterday about his library, she apparently needed to come to him.
"I'm very appreciative," Hermione stated. A slight reword that conveyed information she'd just imparted. An opening for him.
He had to know what she was doing. Yet he made no sign towards encouragement or a rebuff. Something unreadable passed over his face: a shadow over marble. Instinct told Hermione to keep her hands to herself as she rose up on her toes.
"Thank you," she whispered.
Her kiss landed at the corner of his mouth. Right at the edge of where his lips would curl into a smirk, should they be making such an expression.
She pulled back and searched his face. Nothing.
What would it take to get a reaction from this man?
She'd been half naked in front of him. She'd shown him the mysterious wings and requested he stroke them in the middle of her office.
What had all those mornings of gentle pestering been about if not for this? For her to show actual interest in the form of physical affection?
He at least did not appear offended by the lingering peck, but Hermione thought she might prefer that reaction as opposed to this unnerving nothingness.
He hadn't stepped away from her though. Hermione moved away instead, deciding to give Malfoy space for refusal or escape.
"I'll see you later tonight?" she asked, seeking confirmation that she'd not completely misread the entire situation.
"The Floo will be open for you," he said and then turned on his heel and left the office.
"Sorry! I didn't mean to… to…"
"It's fine."
"Right. Sorry."
"I'm fine."
"Okay."
"You're all right?"
"Yes, I got out of the way in time. Glad I could shield you too, even if I had to um…"
"Essentially embrace me for about a full minute."
"Right, sorry for that."
"Why do you keep apologising?"
"Well I had to touch you for a while there and I know that's sort of a thing with you."
"A thing? What do you mean?"
"You don't like being touched."
"What on earth gave you that impression?"
"You always keep such a healthy physical distance between us, I've noticed. And when the work requires us to be in close proximity you seem to almost be holding your breath the entire time. You practically jump out of your skin if we graze hands. I'm sorry if it bothered you because you often seem so… touch averse."
"No, Granger. I can assure you that I'm not touch averse."
Hermione stood in front of the Floo, a handful of powder at the ready. Could she really show her face at Malfoy Manor after what had happened earlier? The longer she thought about it, the more her gut churned in embarrassment.
She decided to stop somewhere else first for answers. Or perhaps just consolation.
"Hey Hermione," said Ron with an affable grin.
"Joining us for dinner?" asked Susan.
"Sorry no," said Hermione with a shake of her head. "Could I talk to you?"
Ron and Susan sat side by side, Hermione across from them.
She brandished her notebook. "Over the past few weeks, I've experienced some strange physical symptoms. They're a bit… difficult to explain and there's no pattern as far as I can tell."
She flipped her book open onto the table and turned it towards them. "I've written down everything I—"
Ron and Susan looked down at the book. Hermione did too.
It was blank.
"Wait—but—that's not—" she yanked it back and flipped through the entire thing. All empty pages.
"Sure you won't stay for dinner?" asked Ron. Neither he nor Susan seemed perturbed by her shoving an empty book at them.
"I—I should—go. Sorry. Thanks."
Neither protested as she almost ran back towards the fireplace. Hermione took deep breaths, swallowing her panic and misery. She was fine. She was fine.
Unreciprocated kisses or no, Hermione needed the man who hadn't dismissed her fears. Her next trip through the Floo ended back in his library.
"Good evening Granger."
Malfoy greeted her normally, cordially.
As if they hadn't shared several downright odd experiences recently. As if Hermione showing up at night to Malfoy Manor to research why she'd grown all manner of physical embellishments was just any other day for him.
As if Hermione hadn't kissed him partially on the mouth mere hours ago. As if she hadn't pathetically begged him to touch her.
Besides the mounting fear about her notebook, something else niggled at her.
"I'm a bit surprised there's nothing waiting here for me."
"What were you expecting? I'm here, aren't I?"
She regarded him thoughtfully.
"No, I'm surprised that for all your talk of your family's private collection that you haven't taken the liberty of compiling the texts you'd think I need."
Hermione gestured at the reading table devoid of books.
"I have no idea what it is you need Granger."
"Yet you've previously boasted your library would contain the knowledge I require."
"True. But as this is such a vast collection and your… problem remains so nebulous and ever-changing I didn't think I could compete."
"Compete?"
"With the speed of your intellect. Are you telling me you haven't already mentally compiled the names of a dozen books you want to pull from the shelves that you never thought you could access?"
"I… I've been a bit preoccupied."
"With what?"
She had no rational response. Indignant anger flared up inside her and she breezed by him, intent on ignoring his question, his gaze, and everything else about Malfoy that formed a grip around her will and then bent it in his direction.
"Could it be a curse?" Hermione tossed the question over her shoulder at him as she stalked past the heads of a few aisles.
Why couldn't she decide where to go? Hermione used to pride herself on something of a sixth sense in the way she knew how to navigate the layout of libraries. The information called to her; wanted her, specifically her, to seek it out and drink in the knowledge.
But as she stared out over the endless towering shelves lit only by the eerie, fading glow of lamps, she felt utterly lost.
She was about to repeat her unanswered question to Malfoy when a flickering lamp caught her eye. The dying flame danced within its glass encasement, casting shadows far too large for its small size. An excitable little flame, leveraging the shape of its shadow to attract her attention. A beacon in the dark. No, a beacon to the dark.
The last aisle of the library at Malfoy Manor.
It sounded like the perfect murder scene locale. Hermione held in her snort at that ludicrous thought and pointed.
"What's down there?
"Would you like me to show you?"
Hermione approached the end of the rows slowly then came to a sudden halt a few feet away.
"I… which section is that? How have you organised those books?"
"I haven't organised them at all."
She whirled around to face him and almost jumped back when she found him right behind her. She swallowed her surprise and channelled it into a glare up at him.
"If I think I've been cursed, do you think there's a book down there that will help me find out and potentially reverse it?"
"I think you'll know what you need when you see it. Go on, have a look and see what you can find, witch."
"Ugh, you're suddenly no longer feeling helpful I see," she muttered petulantly into his grinning face.
She turned away and stalked toward the last aisle. She came up short again, and couldn't seem to find it within her to peruse it.
Hermione did not believe in things like auras, she'd quit Divination after all, but a chill emanated from the space. A haunted, twisted place. The abandoned house at the end of the lane you don't dare approach on Hallowe'en. The cellar door you don't dare open when you're home alone. The wooded path you don't dare cut through at night even if it would be the quickest way home.
Only darkness awaited her there.
She'd apparently paused too long, as Malfoy then strode by her and took up his post at the head of the aisle.
The dancing flame now cast a half-shadow on him.
What should she make of this man?
Her benevolent guide? The Virgil to her Dante? Or instead the Mephistopheles to her Faustus?
Let me help you find your way.
Come here and find anything you could ever want.
Hermione turned around and ventured back toward a better lit part of the library.
"You're going the wrong way Granger," Malfoy called.
"I think I know what's down there now, and I've told you before. There's got to be a way that doesn't involve Dark magic."
Hermione picked an aisle at random and scurried down it.
She needed distance and breathing room from him. She needed a solution to her problem that didn't involve fantasies of seduction and enclosed spaces. Tight grips and shallow gasps and bare skin.
She realised belatedly that she'd just initiated a game of cat and mouse. She heard the click of his shoes against the floor and backed further down the row. Malfoy paused several times, she assumed, to peer down and finding her missing, moved to the next aisle.
Heart hammering in her chest, Hermione tried to quiet her breathing, but remained in her chosen place. Running would be fruitless at this point, as he'd see her immediately if she tried to dart past him. Malfoy Manor's library would of course only have dead-end aisles. A fittingly creepy feature for such a foreboding house.
As his footsteps slowed and he finally sauntered into view, Hermione felt an itch to reach for her wand.
"This is not the aisle I directed you to," he said. A hint of an admonishment coloured his amusement.
"No, but it's the one I think has what I need," she lied.
"Is that so?"
"Yes."
She was acting ridiculous. Hermione had no reason to be afraid of Malfoy. She could best him in a duel with a hand behind her back should things ever escalate in that direction.
Hermione faced the tall stacks and searched the many titles, looking for something, anything, on spontaneous human transfiguration and a way to hide her flushed cheeks. Her pulse no longer raced from low-level fear. A different sort of thrill took hold of her now.
"I think you're a very bad listener," he murmured.
He stood right behind her as she faced the shelves. She reached out a hand to grab a book that seemed promising but heard a tsking noise from behind.
"Ah, ah, Granger. Don't you know it's bad form to touch without asking?"
Her hand dropped to her side. The books could wait.
"May I please?"
"May you please what?"
Hermione didn't dare cross into that dreaded aisle at the end. But she could cross another line tonight. She spun around to face him.
"May I please touch?"
Her fingers hovered in front of his chest.
In a surprising denial, Malfoy bit his lip and slowly shook his head back and forth.
"No."
She let out a frustrated huff. Why crowd her in like this, why play this game if not for the carnal victory? And if he was so averse to her presence, why hadn't he moved away?
He'd kept his unaffected composure in her office, but he made one critical error now: his eyes fell to her mouth.
It tipped the scales for Hermione, and she committed to taking back control. She'd experienced a frightening lack of command over her own body lately, and that frustration coupled with her attraction to this man incited a bold idea.
So instead of lowering her fingers, Hermione brought them to her own neck. Malfoy's eyes followed. The simple movement back and forth along her own skin transfixed him.
"May I please touch?"
The gleam in his eyes had already answered for him, but Hermione waited until Malfoy leaned down from his considerable height to put his lips just beside her ear.
"Of course."
The fingers on her neck moved down to her collarbone as her other hand joined the game, caressing her abdomen. Malfoy stared before inching even closer, bringing both hands to rest on either side of her head against the shelves, as if he needed support to stay upright. He peered down at her wandering, trailing fingers.
His proximity inspired Hermione to escalate the situation: one hand came up, the other moved down, and she took hold of her breasts. She gently kneaded and squeezed, hearing and feeling the breathing against her ear. How far should she take this?
"Does it feel good?" asked his gruff voice. Lower and rougher than she'd ever heard before.
"Yes. May I continue?"
"If that is what you want," came his strained reply.
His hips were so close it would take but a quick movement forward to grind against him. But she could be patient. She could listen. He'd said "no" to her touching him and she'd respect his wishes.
Instead, Hermione continued to massage one breast over her blouse, but skimmed the other hand down her torso, coming to a halt at the top of her trousers.
"Would you like to help me?"
"No," he whispered in another puzzling refusal to participate. "You're a very capable woman, or so I've been told."
Well, if Malfoy wanted to watch her be in control of her own pleasure, so be it.
Her hands paused their self-exploration to unbutton her trousers and then her blouse for good measure. Hermione's touch was as shaky as his breathing against her ear. She desperately wished she could see his face, to see how she affected him here.
But as Hermione looked down between them, she saw the significant bulge straining against his trouser placket.
One hand eased down the cups of her bra so she could slowly circle a nipple. The other hand rested inside her knickers, building herself up to an almost unbearable point before she finally allowed it to move down.
She was not surprised in the least at her wetness; with this man crowding her space, almost but not quite leaning against her. His breathing stuttered as she swirled her own fingers around her clit and whimpered. His mouth was so close to her skin.
"Do you like watching me?" Hermione asked, desperate for the verbal confirmation separate from his physical response.
"Yes."
She eased one finger inside herself then another. Building up the speed in and out led to combined obscene sounds from both her mouth and fingers that had no business in the hallowed stacks of collective knowledge. But Hermione no longer cared.
Malfoy decided to finally participate. Vocally, at least.
"Isn't self-discovery fun?" he murmured to her. "All this learning you're doing all by yourself. Do you love it Granger?"
"Yes," she gasped, hips bucking against her own hand. Malfoy shifted his lower body away from her, but his head stayed put just beside hers.
"Soaking up knowledge in my library. What a pretty sight you make."
She was so close. She adjusted her touch so she could rub her clit too.
"Haven't you always wanted this?"
"I—"
"I could help you learn so many new things, Granger."
"Please I—"
"All you have to do is—"
"Please—Malfoy, please—I want you to—"
"—let me show you."
She released an undignified breathless cry as she came. Now she felt his mouth on her skin as her hips writhed and jerked, fingers working furiously. He hadn't kissed her by any means, more of a curling of his lips as he smirked into her body.
Malfoy had one final knee-buckling statement to deliver as she pulled her hand out of her knickers.
"You're such a good girl, but I think we can break that habit if you're willing."
He pushed back from the shelves and looked her up and down in self-satisfied triumph as she stood shaking and panting.
He'd ruined her without laying a finger on her, without letting her lay a finger on him.
He took out his wand and quietly muttered a cleansing charm for her fingers and then flicked his wand again so her clothes buttoned and righted themselves.
"Come back tomorrow night and we'll begin."
And with that cryptic pronouncement, Malfoy left her with nothing but the sound of her thumping heart and the click of his retreating shoes.
A/N: thanks for reading, this story should be around 7 chapters.