Ooh. Time for chapter three! Sorry it took so long. For some reason the servers were too busy to let me update. O well, problem solved. Here's the next installment. Please read and review!

Chapter 3

Hermione leaned her back against the cold metal door and put her face in her hands. She was stuck outside during a magical storm with the most pompous, arrogant guy in the school. Could the day get any better?

Draco was still pounding on the door demanding entrance.
"You do know that we're stranded outside now, right?" Hermione said through her hands. Draco growled in reply.

'OK, deep breaths. The storm is only going to last a couple of hours...I hope,' thought Hermione. 'We just need to find shelter and we should be good,'

Draco sat down on the ground with his back to the door as well.

"Why me?" Draco asked outloud, shivering as the wind started to pick up. Hermione snorted.

"Cram it, Granger. So since they can't let us in, let's just stay here until the storm passes," Draco suggested.

"No! We can't!" Hermione exclaimed, her eyes wide with terror.

"Why not?!" Draco questioned indignantly.

"Metal attracts lightning. This door right here would act like a giant conductor. If a bolt of lightning hit it, we'd be killed!"

"What're the odds of that?"

"I don't want to find out..."

"Fine," Draco sighed. "Let's go try to find somewhere. What about that oaf Hagrid's hut?"

"Locked...Oh! What about one of the greenhouses!" Hermione suggested brightly. Draco nodded and led the way. Another bolt of lightning crackled across the dreary canvas of the sky. Hermione clutched at her robes fearfully. A normal storm was bad enough, who knew what could happen in a magical storm?

The wind whipped the rain into their faces as they crossed the wooden bridge once more. Draco led fearlessly, his robes swirling about him and his bangs blowing idly in the wind. Even at a time like this Draco managed to look good.

Hermione on the other hand, wasn't faring that well. Her soaked robes smelled like wet dog, and were ripped from where Fang's claws had caught them. Parts of her hair stuck to her face and neck while the rest blew in the wind, tangling itself mercilessly. Hermione groaned aloud at the thought of spending hours detangling it. Draco heard the groan and turned around and raised an eyebrow. Hermione kept her head down and Draco kept walking.

Hermione glanced to her right. Through the wooden pillars of the bridge she saw the waters below. They swirled and crashed on the rocks on the sides, reaching higher and higher up the natural wall as the water level rose. Hermione walked steadily behind Draco, but kept her eyes on the water. It swirled in dark colors before exploding into foamy white. Hermione was brought back to reality when she collided into Draco's back. But Draco didn't say anything about it.

"On three, we run. Got it?" he said. Hermione nodded.

"One....Two....Three!" the two took off, Draco leading but Hermione trailing close behind. As if the storm knew what the teens were up to, it started pouring harder. Each raindrop felt like a marble dropping against their skin. The path was gravel luckily, and wasn't too slippery. It crunched under their footsteps and sprayed backwards as they propelled themselves forward.

The path went around the side of the school. Hermione looked up and saw the towers through the rain. The faint light of candles could be seen through the windows, and Hermione imagined sitting in front of a toasty fire in the Gryffindor common room sipping hot chocolate in between her best friends with a blanket spread across her lap.

'Well that's not what's gonna happen, so stop thinking like that and keep running,' a voice inside Hermione's voice dictated. Hermione set her jaw and ran a little faster.

From the side of the school a tall wall appeared and the tops of the glass greenhouses could be seen. An opening in the wall could be seen and Hermione and Draco raced towards it.

'Just a little bit further,' Hermione encouraged herself. As she ran she noted a huge spike in Fahrenheit. It was getting colder by the minute...

Draco dashed behind the opening in the wall and Hermione ran close behind. The tree where she had once gathered fire seeds from sat there like a normal tree, not even smouldering. She looked around and saw Draco furiously trying to open the door to one of the greenhouses. He finally used his shoulder and bashed it in, and motioned to Hermione to follow him.

Hermione ran in as Draco shoved the door closed. He leaned heavily on the door catching his breath, which fumed out of his mouth and fogged up the glass door. Hermione had bent down with her hands on her knees, panting heavily. After a moment of heavy breathing she looked up at him shivering.

"Well, at least we have shelter now," Hermione said smiling. Draco only nodded.
Over the course of the next few minutes, they became painfully aware of a few things. They were currently in the greenhouse wear Professor Sprout stores the Mandrakes, while the storm raged on outside. The temperature was rapidly decreasing, and there wasn't any food to be found. The only positive fact of their discoveries were that, since the Mandrakes weren't pulled up yet, they were silent.

Around fifteen minutes of silence passed by and each remained where they were. Hermione was looking outside and watching the damage, while Draco still stood by the door, shivering. Hermione looked up and saw the blonde's icy gaze fixed on something outside. She noticed how he was shivering and still dripping water. She examined her own robes and grimaced. Slowly she untied them and shrugged it completely off.

"What're you doing?" Draco said.

"Taking off my robes. They're too wet to do much good to either of us. You should take yours off too," Hermione said as she spread her robe out on a table. Draco stared at the brunette below him before following suit. After he dropped his robes haphazardly and loosening his tie around his neck he went back to staring out the window, his arms folded across his chest, trying to retain warmth.

Hermione had long ago lost interest in what Malfoy was doing, so she occupied herself in seeing what other plants were in their greenhouse. She spotted a vibrant green plant with what appeared to be a spiney mouth. Wracking her brain for a minute she realized what it was.

"A Venus fly trap!" Hermione mumbled in fascination. Draco's ear twitched as he picked up what she was saying. Hermione leaned closer. It looked almost dead so said as she craned her neck to look around it. It didn't move so she thought it was safe to get even closer. She examined one of its leaves and stroked it in between her thumb and index finger. Her hair got free from her ear and hung in her face as well as her tie leaving her chest to hang in front of the plant, suspended from her neck.

-SNAP-

Hermione was suddenly all too aware of something pulling at her neck. She tried to scream but the plant had a strong hold on her tie, choking her, so all she managed to do was squeak out a strangled sound. Draco's eyes flashed towards her and saw Hermione clutching at her neck.

Draco dashed over and saw the plant had a tight hold on Hermione's red and gold Gryffindor tie. He pulled on the tie trying to give Hermione some slack to breath, but it didn't work. Hermione was slowly being strangled and that damned Venus fly trap wasn't going to budge.

Throwing caution to the wind, Draco gripped the thick stem of the plant and started to bend it. Green juices gushed from the side as it started to split open. With a twist of his hands, he had snapped off the head of the plant completely. Hermione flew backwards, still clutching her neck. Draco scrambled down onto his knees next to her and helped her loosen it.

Hermione coughed and gagged, taking in huge gulps of air one at a time. Draco leaned over her watching her carefully. Another emotion Hermione couldn't identify flashed across his silver eyes. After a minute or two of coughing, Hermione sat up with her hand on her chest.

"Thank you," she breathed.

"You should watch what you're doing. You should've known that it was a dangerous plant. We both know we studied it last year in Sprout's class," Draco replied coolly, turning his back on her and hauling himself to sit on a table.

"Sorry..." Hermione muttered.

Pretty soon Hermione's body started to cool down again.

'Must be 45 degrees in here,' Hermione thought to herself as she wrapped her arms around her shoulders. Out of boredom she glanced down at her time turner necklace (AN: which conveniently displays the time). Already she had almost been killed by a plant, and this had only been in the first hour.

'One down, a lot more to go,' she thought sadly as she closed her eyes and curled up in a ball on the floor. Her breath puffed around her as she trembled.

'Lend me strength to survive this,' she silently prayed as she screwed her eyes shut.

Ooh. It's only one hour into the storm. What else might happen? And just WHAT has Draco been watching? (Still debating on whether to go into that or not...if I do, then I have to make something up, and do I really want to do that? lol) Please review and thanks for reading!