AN: Here comes the delicious part. Don't forget to drop a review, sexy people.
Disclaimer: Nah, don't own them. Just... poking 'em around.
Dedications at the bottom, of course. Scroll down, and you might just see your name.
Chapter Twelve: A Bubbly Interlude
Intimacy among the scented bubbles.
- O.A.F.
"No. Stay on your side of the pool."
"You can't stay that prickly forever, Hermione. Sooner or later you'll fall victim to my irresistible charms"
"Stuff it."
It was in the middle of November, and the weather outside was viciously frigid. However, inside the charmed tent, the swimming pool was toasty and warm, not to mention incredibly relaxing.
Hermione leaned back against the edge of the pool, letting the warm bubbles ease the tension from her shoulders. God knows just how much I've been stressing myself. she thought lazily.
"Well?"
Draco's expectant voice carried from across the pool, where he was sitting by the waterfall. Hermione closed her eyes and took her time in replying.
"Well what?"
"Aren't you going to bicker with me?"
"No. I'm too relaxed."
He sounded petulant. "Oh, come on. I was beginning to enjoy it."
"No. Play with yourself for a while."
Draco laughed. "Won't that make me go blind?"
Hermione's eyes blinked open and she spluttered. "I... didn't mean it like that!" Draco smirked at her. "Well, if you insist..."
"No!" Hermione pushed away from the edge of the pool, where she had been reclining a while ago.
"Watch out, you're leaning... Hey!"
*splash*
"Ouch!" She saw stars, and then dull pain, which grew into blinding agony.
Hermione gasped, placing her palm to her forehead, where she had slipped and crashed into the cold tile wall of the pool. She stood in the chest-deep water, eyes shut tight, and when she looked at her palm, there was blood.
"Ohh..."
"What happened?"
Draco knelt by the side of the pool, bending down to her, his wand in his outstretched palm. "Come here." Hermione shook her head slowly, and the pain throbbed behind her eyelids.
An impatient sniff, a slight splash, and Hermione was aware that Draco was standing right in front of her in the pool. She felt the water swash around her body, and she shivered, despite the warmth in the bubbles.
She kept her eyes closed against the ache, knowing that if she opened them, the world would spin around and it would be washed away from underneath her in a swirl of scented bubbles. Hermione felt Draco's hand under her chin, and gently, but firmly, tip her face up.
"And I thought you were the mediwizard." he told her calmly. "It's nothing... just a bruise with some blood... that's all."
"Then why does it hurt so much?" Hermione cried out, angry at his calm behavior.
"Shh. Paladins are supposed to be calm and collected and cool..."
"Paladins are also supposed to avoid all physical injury of the sort... ohh..." Hermione pointed out, but something so painfully cold swept over the pain in her forehead, something that ached horribly for the briefest of moments, something that reached down to her very bones and left her knees weak...
"What in bloody hell was... that?" she opened her eyes and the pain was gone. Just. Like. That.
Draco stood in front of her with a smug grin on his face and his wand in his hand. "That, my dear, was an example of the highest form of Medical Healing. Maybe I should have been my own Paladin."
Hermione frowned at him. Now that the white-hot pain in her head was gone, she began to feel some of the old irritation sweeping back. "Oh, shut up. You know very well you probably won't survive ten minutes with the De..."
Draco's expression flickered. "You're still bleeding." Hermione stopped dead. "What?" She put her hand up to her forehead, and it came back wet and sticky with crimson blood. "Ohh... Draco!"
He grabbed her, held her steady. "Don't panic. It doesn't hurt, does it?" His silvery eyes, suddenly dark with worry, searched hers. Hermione looked away. "No... it doesn't... but still..."
*drip*
A drop of blood slid down her cheek and fell into the pink water, the tendrils of red spreading out like a thousand ghostly arms. Hermione stared down at it in horror.
Draco sighed. "I don't know any spell that stops Numb Bleeding... but I know that it's an after-effect of the spell I used to heal you. You'll just have to... wait." Angry tears began to sparkle in Hermione's eyes. "Can't you think of anything?" she almost wailed, holding her hand up to her forehead, the frustration finally too much for her.
He considered her with cool, grey eyes. "Well, my mother used to tell me that a kiss would heal anything." Hermione felt the warm tears slip down her cheek, and mingle with the thin trickle of blood. "If you're just going to poke fun at me..."
She stopped dead.
Draco drew her near, and kissed her lightly on the forehead.
When he pulled away, she saw that there was blood on his bare chest, where she had pressed close to him. She blushed, and tried to avoid his steady gaze.
"Go on. Blush. It matches the blood."
"You aren't doing anything to make this stop, you know."
She pulled herself up to the side of the pool and grabbed her wand, and began whispering tourniquet charms to herself.
"I can kiss you again."
"Forget it. You'll just get blood all over you."
"I don't mind."
He drew closer, setting down his wand on the dry ground outside the pool. Hermione put down her wand beside his, distracted. "It's beginning to thin out, Draco... don't you think that's a good..."
She closed her eyes in surprise as she felt his warm, moist lips touch her forehead again. She sucked in her breath, bit her lip, wondering just exactly why he was playing her emotions like this.
He looked down at her, and she frowned angrily down at her hands. Why?!
"Should I do that again?" he whispered softly.
Hermione felt her heartbeat pounding furiously in her ears. Why?!
He moved closer, and she could feel his warm breath on her cheek.
She looked up, opened her mouth to speak...
and met his lips in a kiss.
~*~
She felt the whole world spin and dissolve into the pink, foamy water bubbling softly around their bodies. She wondered vaguely if it was loss of blood... then she felt the soft pressure of his lips upon hers...
Oh.
Hermione shut her eyes, and put her palms on Draco's chest, meaning to push away, but his hand found the nape of her neck, and pressed her closer, deeper into the kiss. She tried, half-heartedly, to move away... but when she felt his tongue touch her lips, she realized that it didn't matter. Nothing did anymore.
The heat, the touch, the pressure, his lips, his hands, his mouth, his tongue...
Draco.
She could feel his heart beating against hers, and she could hear a heartbeat pounding in her ears again... but if it was his, or hers, she didn't care. Hermione felt his wet hands slide down her body, to encircle her waist and pull her to him in a crushing embrace.
She gasped softly, then stared up at him with wide eyes. Draco looked down at her, and his eyes had deepened to the verge of jet black. They stayed like that for a million eternities, teetering on the brink of temptation and practicality... breath to breath, body to body...
And Hermione did something she would probably regret later on.
She grabbed Draco and kissed him.
Deeply. Madly. Impulsively.
I need you.
And I just won't admit it.
~*~
