~I'm sorry it took so long to get this out. The blame can all point to me, Slytherin Girl. I could go into detail with all the things that kept me from finishing this chapter, but it's been months, you probably just want to read this. I posted this without the consent of my fellow authors, because they wouldn't reply to my e-mail. So if this is deleted, don't be surprised. But, I sent the message that this chapter was done two weeks ago and haven't had either of them give me the go ahead, so. That said, on with the chapter.~

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                Charms the next day was even more intolerable than usual. Draco and Hermione were not only not speaking to each other, it took them over an hour to find any books on Portuguese. Peeves must have thought it was funny to rearrange some of the books because even Madam Pince had no idea where they were.

                Hermione was trying to keep her thoughts straight but her conversation with Professor Snape kept floating into her mind. Then there was the fact, one that she had realized a long time after she had gone to bed, that Draco had said he had been worried about her. That one stumped her almost as much as the Snape thing. Who, by the way, she planned on seeing tonight about this Charm.

                Things did not start to look up as the class went on. Draco translated his first page wrong and blamed it on Hermione and when she finished her first page he went on to call her a know-it-all mudblood, among other things.

                "Give that to me," he snapped reaching for the page. Hermione whimpered as he hit her wrist. "Wh-." He stopped as she pulled up her robe sleeve. His finger marks were standing out in a violent purple against her pale flesh. "My God." He said looking up at her. She refused to meet his gaze, though, and kept looking at her papers. "Granger-."

                "Get back to work, Malfoy," Hermione said quietly as she started to translate the next page. "Don't bother wasting time with things you don't really care about."

                Draco didn't argue and just started to re-translate his page. He knew he had hurt her the other night. He just didn't realize how much. This wasn't how he wanted his life to be. His father was the one who lived this life. He wasn't his father.

                "What?" Hermione asked looking up.

                "Huh?"

                "You're talking to yourself."

                "I was translating this."

                "I'm sure that paper doesn't say 'I'm not like my father'."

                "Shut-up, Granger and mind your own business."

                "Talking to yourself is the first sign on insanity you know."

                Was she teasing him? Did she actually have the nerve to tease him? No, she was scared of him. He had seen to that the other night.

                "You would know, wouldn't you, Granger?"
                "Depends who you talk to." She replied and went back to her translating.

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                The rest of the day sped by and Hermione and Draco weren't having much luck with their research. What they did translate didn't make sense. They realized this was because all of the papers were way out of order. They had decided to translate them in the order they were arranged but after discovering this they just divided the papers in half and went their separate ways.

                Unfortunately after her first page, Hermione was having no luck. It took her three hours to get half of her 4th page done. By the time she thought about going to Snape again, it was way past curfew and she didn't want to bug him. Draco had fallen asleep over his papers by the fire. She didn't bother to wake him, just walked up to her room and got ready for bed.

                This project was turning out to be one of the most trying things she had ever done. That was saying a lot since she went to Hogwarts. She doubted any partner would have made it easier. If she really was honest with herself, Draco was probably the best partner she could have in this situation. Only because of the fact that he was Head Boy and from this she could guess he was smarter than most in their year. As much as she hated to admit it.

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                Sunlight streamed into Hermione's face and she jumped up. Then she checked the clock and slowed down. She still had an hour before Transfigurations. She couldn't wait for the weekend. She needed to sleep.

                As Hermione walked across the common room to the bathroom she tripped over something she only recognized as Malfoy when he swore.

                "What are you doing?"

                "I was going to ask you the same thing." Hermione said standing up. "Can you please tell me why you're sleeping in the middle of the floor?"
                "The obvious answer is because I fell asleep. What I want to know is why you weren't watching where you were going."

                "Well I didn't expect anyone to be sleeping in the middle of the floor."

                "Just go, continue on your merry Gryffindor way."

                "Did you find anything useful about this stupid charm." She asked.

                "No. I have a feeling none of it's going to make sense until all of it is put together."

                "I had a feeling that it was going to be like that." She said as she walked out of the common room and headed for the Great Hall.

                "Hermione," Harry called as she walked in. "Could you perform some curse or charm or anything that would kill me without pain?"

                "I know a few potions," she answered. "Why?"

                "This charms project is going to kill me if you don't."

                "I don't know why you're complaining. At least you have a normal charm. I have some unknown charm that's in a different language and my partner isn't helping things at all."

                "Thanks, Granger, love you, too. Now I have a question."

                "The high and mighty Malfoy has a question? I don't believe it." Harry said.

                "No one asked you, Potter."

                "All right. Stop, my head hurts. I can not take your fighting this morning. Malfoy, what do you want?"

                "You didn't tell me whether you found anything or not."

                "I found a couple of pages about death. That's all they were. They went on and on about death and nothing about the charm. Well at least not that I could tell."             

                Malfoy nodded and headed to the Slytherin table.

                "I wish you didn't have to work with him, Hermione." Ron said.

                "Me neither, Ron, but life is full of unpleasant things. Draco Malfoy is just one of them."

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                As the weeks began to pass, they were getting nowhere. Nothing was adding up. Not one page went with the other. All, though, had a similar subject, death. No page was complete without five paragraphs on death. It was a very morbid charm, that was for sure.

                In these weeks, Hermione and Draco had come to an understanding. This was to most difficult thing either had every done, and if they were going to finish it, they were going to have to meet each other half way. Sometimes that was harder than the actual project.

                "Do you think maybe this is going to turn out to be another Unforgivable?" Hermione asked.

                "I don't even want to think about that. That's all we need," Draco replied and looked over at her. Her hair was a mess and she was clad in sweatpants and a sweatshirt. It was two in the morning and Draco's mind was clouded. "Can we go to sleep?"

                Hermione didn't bother looking up from her work. "You can if you want. I'm going to go get some coffee and finish this page."

                "You just started that page, it could take you hours."

                "Do you want some coffee?"

                "Yeah, yeah. I'm coming."

                "You don't have to come, I just asked if you wanted some."

                "If I don't come I'll have to work on this and my brain could really use a break."

                Hermione shrugged and stood up. "It's not like we have classes tomorrow anyway."

                "Yes we do."
                "Tomorrow is Saturday."

                "Are you serious? We spend way too much time up here. I've lost track of days," Draco stated. 

                Hermione sighed as they headed out of the common room. The halls were freezing. It was a nice change from their common room, which had had the fire burning non-stop since directly after dinner.

                "Are you going home for Christmas?" Draco asked.

                "Christmas is another two months away."

                "Do you honestly think we'll be done by then?"

                "No, I just meant that I haven't thought about it yet."

                A comfortable silence fell upon them as they continued to the kitchens. Each was lost in their own thoughts. A noise from behind them startled them back to the present and they both spun to see who was there. Peeves bounced in the space in front of them and was smirking at them.

                "Snapey, Snapey, Snapey!" Hermione and Draco looked at each other and then jumped about three feet off the ground at a hand on each of their shoulders.

                "Are you aware of the fact that it is past two in the morning?"

                Hermione tried to catch her lost breath as Draco tried to explain about their project.

                "I don't see what your project has to do with being out so late," Snape said.

                "We were getting coffee, Professor," Hermione told him.

                "Don't you think you should be going to sleep instead?"

                "We thought we'd get some of our project done now, while there aren't any classes tomorrow."

                "Yet, Mr. Malfoy, you seem to have forgotten your Quidditch game."

                "Oh, shit!" Draco exclaimed and then looked sheepishly at Snape who rolled his eyes.

                "Work on your project tomorrow and 10 points from Slytherin and Gryffindor."

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                Draco stumbled into the Great Hall the next morning looking around for the rest of the Slytherin Team. Seeing that they weren't in the Hall he cursed under his breath, grabbed a muffin from the Ravenclaw table, and ran as fast as his sleep-deprived body would carry him. The team glared at him as he entered the locker room. He didn't know why they were so worried. They were only playing against Hufflepuff.

                Half and hour later they were walking onto the field with all of Hogwarts watching them. Draco couldn't stop himself from looking up to the Gryffindor stands and looking if Hermione was there. He saw Potter and Weasley, but the third member of their trio was missing.

                As the game started, Draco couldn't help but think that four hours of sleep wasn't enough for this. Looking around he saw Hermione enter the Gryffindor section and sit in between Potter and Weasley. She looked up at him and smiled. He wasn't surprised. He turned his attention to the Hufflepuff Seeker who was looking wildly around him. That was Hufflepuff's weaknesss, their Seeker. He didn't take time to look everywhere.

                The game lasted 45 minutes before Draco caught the snitch. Slytherin burst into cheers as the rest of the school watched the beaten Hufflepuff team walk back toward their lockers. Draco caught sight of Hermione exiting the stadium, before he was swept away with the rest of the Slytherin team.

                As soon as he was allowed to, Draco hurried back up to his common room and collapsed on a couch. Not 30 seconds later he was asleep.

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                Hermione left the Quidditch game and headed straight towards the library. Harry and Ron had frowned, telling her, once again, she spent way too much time in the library.

                The library was empty, most people still talking over the game. She had finished the page she had been working on that morning and was pleased with the progress. The last words on the page had been death of the one you love. The sentence hadn't been complete, but it gave her a clue as to what the charm might be going towards. She was determined to figure the rest out as soon as possible, even if it meant devoting every second of her day to it. As long as she got her other homework done of course.

                Three hours later she was halfway done with the next page and thoroughly disappointed that it didn't pick up form the last one. Sighing in frustration she head back to her common room to find Draco. She found him asleep on a couch, still in his Quidditch robes. She shook her head and woke him up.

                "What did I miss?" he said drowsily.

                "The shower."

                "Hey!" His eyes were still half closed. "It's your fault. I'm surprised I didn't fall asleep during the game."

                "We need to work on our project."

                "Fine, I'll be out in 20 minutes."

                "15."

                "God, I'll never get a moment's peace until this thing is done."

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~Again, sorry this took so long. It's completely my fault. Hopefully the next chapter won't take half a year to get out. Lol. Actually that wasn't funny. Anyway, thanks for your reviews!~

~Slytherin Girl, Magical Me, Sophiebabe~