Ron and Harry re-entered the tiny section talking in hushed voices. They seemed to be having a heated discussion about something. When they reached the table they stopped abruptly and Ron flopped huffily down into his chair, folding his arms and pouting moodily. Harry rolled his eyes at his grumpy friend and sat more nimbly in his own chair. Hermione looked up from her sheaf of parchment and raised her eyebrows in question at Harry. Harry motioned for her to come closer and he started whispering in her ear. "...jackass..." "...embarrassed beyond belief..." "...throttle him..." Were the only things Draco and Ron could hear. Ron was now glaring at Hermione's parchment as though it was its fault. Draco heard the words but studiously ignored them, although he knew it was what Ron had said about him. Harry and Hermione glanced up at Ron and Draco who were sat side by side, each staring at their respective parchments, although Ron's was more of a glare. Ron suddenly seemed to notice that Draco was still there.

"Are you still here, Git? Haven't you finished yet?" Ron spat out as though irritated by Draco's mere presence, which to be frank, he was. "You came back already?" Draco feigned surprise, as though he had only just realised Ron was there. "Oh. Damn, I was rather enjoying your absence." "What, with Hermione?" Ron barked, his tone brittle. "Well, her absence would have helped too, of course, but you can't have everything," Draco drawled, in a falsely polite tone that served to infuriate Ron even more. "Really? I thought that was what your father used his money for. Buying you the things you want." Ron's own voice was falsely interested and sarcastic as he replied. "Not that I care what you think anyway, Weasley, but you don't know what you are talking about." Draco's voice had turned icy and had even more bite to it than usual, and the harshness in his tone was soon capturing Hermione and Harry's undivided attention. "So turn around, start walking and don't stop till you hit the wall." He continued, his steely grey eyes now cold and flashing angrily.

"What? Don't your parents care about you?" Ron took no heed of the warning in Draco's eyes but carried on regardless, his voice falsely sympathetic. "Well, there's a surprise." Ron's tone switched quickly back to sarcasm. As Ron said this, Hermione looked at Draco to watch his reaction; he tensed as soon as Ron mentioned his parents, just as she had expected. That really was a sore spot for him, she mused thoughtfully.

Draco stood up quickly, grabbing Ron's collar fiercely as he shot from his chair and pulling the redhead's face close to his, eyes narrowing. The blonde was shaking with barely contained rage and shook Ron hard as he hissed his next words, "Listen, Weasley. You've thrown your punches already, and we've just seen what a disaster that was, don't tempt me to return the favour. Because believe me, with or without wands, that would be uncharacteristically stupid...even for you. Back off. Now."

Ron had enough sense to shrink back as the venom in Draco's words hit him. Sensing Ron's fear but too angry to make anything of it, Draco threw the redhead back in disgust and irately sat back down, hurling his lean frame into the armchair. He was staring resolutely at the parchment, but he could still see Ron's mocking face, hear the last retort in his mind. Each echo annoyed him more, unable to keep himself from tensing angrily as he thought on it.

Ron lunged at Draco but was stopped by Harry and Hermione who each grabbed hold of one of his arms. With Ron still struggling and pulling against them trying to get at Draco they forcefully dragged him out of the little area, grabbing their things as they left. Draco just watched, out of the corner of his eye, daring Ron all the time to shake them off and try him. There was a horrible challenge in those grey eyes, no longer cold but blazing, and under the table he clenched one hand into a tight fist, under his nails threatened to draw blood from his palm. Usual icy self-control aside, the unwitting words had roused his temper, and if Potter and Granger hadn't dragged their furious friend away, he wasn't sure what would have happened...

Dammit... he wanted a fight now! Even Weasley would have done.

Once the three Gryffindors had exited the library Ron wrenched free of his friends' grasp and stormed off in the direction of the Great Hall. Hermione and Harry exchanged weary glances and hurried after him. By the time they had reached the Gryffindor table and had sat down, Ron had calmed down and was pretending the whole incident with Draco had never happened. The three of them chatted absently about random things until Hermione suddenly let out a squeal when they were in the middle of eating their desserts. Harry and Ron both looked at her. Hermione was frantically shifting through her pieces of parchment as though looking for something. "Waa yoo loft?" Ron said through a mouthful of chocolate pudding. Hermione just looked at him eyebrows raised. Ron swallowed quickly. "What have you lost?" Ron repeated rolling his eyes back at her. "I haven't lost anything!" Hermione replied snobbishly, "You left my parchment in the library with Malfoy!" Harry laughed as Ron's face took on a guiltily sheepish look. "Oops?" he offered the sighing girl. Hermione rolled her eyes once again. "Once you two have finished we will have to go and get it." Was all she said before going back to eating her own pudding. Ron and Harry exchanged sniggering glances before following Hermione's lead.

Half an hour later Ron, Harry and Hermione made their way back up to the library after dropping their bags off in the common room. They reached the restricted section and slipped through before Madam Pince could question them. They quickly came a across the small oak table, but stopped short at the sight before them: Draco was still at the table, but this time he wasn't bending over his parchment studying but sitting, head resting on his arms, fast asleep. A few strands of sleep-tousled platinum blonde hair dropped over his closed eyes, face wearing a faint smile. He looked exhausted, actually, one hand still clutching his parchment tightly. After Ron and Harry had got over their initial shock they started to snigger, loudly. Hermione was stood there, 'Aww' written across her face. "How sweet!" Ron said sarcastically. "Ickle Draco's sleeping." Harry sniggered harder, snorting slightly. Hermione just rolled her eyes. "At least he looks innocent when he sleeps." She commented, searching the table to find a piece of parchment she could read. Ron and Harry both wrinkled their noses. "Malfoy?! Innocent?!" Harry asked, eyes wide and utterly disbelieving. "Are you delusional?! Malfoy couldn't look innocent even if he was!" Hermione just shrugged but tactfully didn't answer Harry's statement. She went over to the table and tugged slightly on the parchment that had a corner under Draco's left elbow. Draco murmured under his breath, moved his hand and slapped it down on the parchment, stopping Hermione from moving it any further. This caused Harry and Ron to start laughing again as Hermione frowned at Draco and the parchment. Rustling from the general direction of the two boys made Hermione turn round.

"What are you doing?" she asked, her voice taking on a long-suffering quality. Harry and Ron looked up and smirked. Ron had just pulled his wand out from his pocket. "What does it look like? Leaving Malfoy something to remember us by." He replied matter-of-factly. Hermione shook her head fiercely. "Uh uh, oh no! Neither of you are doing anything of the sort. Attacking someone whilst they're sleeping would be low even for Malfoy." She told them, her eyes daring them to contradict her.

Before Ron could protest though,

"...No is why, you prick...they'll explode if you transfigure them, playing cards always do...." was heard form the table behind them. Hermione twirled round and Harry and Ron once again burst out laughing. Draco was frowning in his sleep, muttering distractedly to himself, wearing a slight frown and shifting uncomfortably. Hermione raised an eyebrow at the spluttering boys. "Oh, we so have to use that against him!" Harry choked out, clutching his sides. Ron nodded, still laughing, and waving his wand around dangerously. Hermione eyed said wand carefully, "Umm, Ron, maybe you should put your wand down bef..."

A jagged jade smoke erupted from the tip of Ron's wand and hit a shelf of books behind Draco. The three Gryffindors froze staring at the teetering books. As though in slow motion about ten of the books toppled from the shelf, landing with a deafening 'bang!' perilously close to the back of Draco's chair. Draco sat bolt upright with a startled yell. The three Gryffindors looked at each other, "Uh oh!" written identically across all three faces.

Jumping and tensing in his seat, Draco's ragged, open-mouthed breathing betrayed his shock, looking behind him in alarm and then back to the three frozen Gryffindors. Potter...he should have known... As the dust settled from the floored books scattered just behind Draco's chair, he stood up slowly. Buried in his pocket, his fingers slowly grasped his wand, frowning mistrustfully. He looked to the books, back to the Gryffindors, and once again to the mess scattered about him. There was a cautious, cornered wariness about him now, poised. "I fell asleep?" he queried quietly, slightly hoarse, frowning. He tilted his head slightly, eyes catching the wand still clutched in Ron's hand, and his bemusement turned to surprise. Then incredulity. Then amusement.

"You tried to attack me while I was asleep, Weasley?" he drawled, smirking. "So much for Gryffindor honour, I'm sure..." he added mockingly, shaking his head but still quite shaken. His hand was trembling, so he quickly put it behind his back, chiding his fluttering heartbeat to return to normal.

"And you missed!?" he laughed, eyes glinting, quite helpless with mirth and letting himself relax a little, though he wouldn't release the anxious grip on his wand. "That is, without a doubt, the most pathetic thing I have ever seen, Weasley...even Longbottom could curse a still target, and I was asleep!" he sniggered, regaining his composure with some effort.

"I wasn't cursing you! Well, I was, but...I wasn't." Ron stammered, scowling awkwardly under Draco's gimlet gaze and blinking as Harry, embarrassed for him, thumped him sharply on the stomach. "Ow- what!?" Ron demanded, frowning and turning to face a sighing Harry, bemused. Harry just shook his head, realising that his friend had said his piece, and smiled briefly as he and Hermione exchanged glances. Draco's knowing smile was infuriating, even when it wasn't directed at him, and he squirmed silently for the focus of its intent, Ron. "Correct me if I'm wrong here...which I doubt: You march in here, and, finding me asleep, proceed to draw your wand, missing me entirely, I might add, and explode a bookshelf!? And, just remind me on this, you weren't cursing me?" Draco sniggered, slowing counting off the points on his fingers, eyes roaming from one face to the other as he spoke. Ron, fuming silently, shoved his wand into his pocket and glared meaningfully at Draco, a hint of malice in the redhead's amused smile.

"No, I was laughing!" he explained slyly, smirking as he awaited Draco's reaction. Something of an anticlimax, as it happened, as the blonde's response was one of utter confusion, arching a brow. "At what?" he demanded, looking around as though the source of the Gryffindors' mirth might spring from the surroundings. Ron, smirking wider than ever, nudged Harry and strummed his fingertips on the table thoughtfully, as though recalling. Putting on a high pitched, overly enunciated drawl, he began: "No is why, you prick...they'll explode...."

And Harry managed, through his laughter, to supplement: "If you transfigure them, playing cards always do!" He reached the last syllable before the two boys descended into a fit of laughter, only heightened by Draco's incredulous bewilderment. "What the hell!?" Draco managed after a moment, the look on his face one of absolutely despairing confusion at what seemed to be a stream of absolute gibberish. He sighed, as though their 'childish antics' were tiring him, and began to pack away his things, trying to ignore the spluttered laughter from in front of him. It was another few moments before Harry recollected himself enough to explain, tauntingly: "Your dream, don't you remember? Ickle Dwaco talks in his sleep!" he teased, and was instantly rewarded with shocked silence from Draco. Crimson patches rose on his cheeks, head bowed over his bag as he digested that last statement, horrified.

"I what? Well...shit. What have you heard?"

The look on his face, something between guilt and bewildered embarrassment, made Harry and Ron pause in their teasing to stare at him, trying to figure it out as they replied. Hermione, stepping back a little from the boys, noted the blush slowly spreading over the Slytherin's pale cheeks and smiled knowingly to herself, amused. Ron, smiling all the more at the blonde's discomfort, repeated the bizarre sentence, slowly, still impersonating Draco's voice keenly and grinning all the while.

"...No is why, you prick...they'll explode if you transfigure them, playing cards always do...."

Draco relaxed, allowing himself a smile and looking up at the two of them, relief written all over his face, Hermione's little smirk slowly widening as she watched him. "That's all? Thank Merlin!" he breathed, combing one hand roughly through his hair and sighing, resuming gathering parchments into his hands. "Fine, fine, whatever..." He replied nonchalantly to the grinning Gryffindors, conceding this small victory happily...he remembered one of his dreams, vaguely, and it could have been a lot worse.

"Why, what else did you dream!?" Ron choked, not sure whether to grin or be terrified, the predatory look in Draco's eyes unnerving him although they were resting on Harry absently. "You weren't included, Weasley, if that's what you're worried about!" he added dryly, casting Ron a disgusted look but still smiling with veiled relief, dusting down his robes with one hand and then leaning against his bag, on the table. From underneath peeked Hermione's decharmed parchment, the sole cause for the three Gryffindors being there at all.

"I should think not!" Ron barked, giving a theatrical shudder and exchanging disgusted looks with Harry, whose meridian green eyes were following Draco distractedly.

At this point, stepping in front of Ron to look between the two boys for a moment, Hermione couldn't help herself. She descended into helpless laughter, covering her lips with one hand in an effort to quell the shrill giggle that echoed around the almost empty library. Harry gave her a slightly odd look, backing away from Draco as he saw her attempt to retrieve the mislaid parchment from beneath the Slytherin's bag, eager just to get it and leave. Ron, though, turned and stared at her in bewildered silence for an incredibly long time. "Hermione...?" he managed after a moment, tugging at her sleeve nervously. "Hermione, I think we should go...you've been working too hard." He muttered, pulling her anxiously away from the now-scowling Draco and looking back towards the door. There was a look of utter, awed confusion lining his freckled face.

"What are you lot doing here, anyway?" Draco demanded, changing the subject deftly and frowning slightly as Hermione tugged at the parchment beneath his bag. "Parchment..." she managed, still weak with laughter and yanking ineffectually at the list. "The one your bag's on..." she giggled, and as Draco realised he hastily hefted his bag onto one shoulder, freeing the parchment and making a still-giggling Hermione stumble back. She made a conscious effort to right herself, taking a deep breath, and gently prised Ron's hand from her arm. With Draco's eyes still watching them warily, the three left in silence, Hermione leading the way out towards their common room. Draco shook his head, fighting the temptation to hurl himself back into the beckoning warmth of the armchair and sleep. After a few moments, he left too, nodding to Madam Pince as he pulled the library door gently shut behind him.

^^ Please R&R. Ask and thy shall receive the next chapter...