WARNING! To avoid Slash content:

At the line: 'Open the door to your right, you moron!' you should start skimming up to the end of that scene (&&&&&&&&&&&). Then you're safe for a couple more lines.

At the line: "There were just too many things in there that she should not be seeing." You should start skimming again until Hermione says: "My eyes! My virgin eyes!" Then you're clear.

Chapter 9

Hermione was in the Gryffindor common room doing her homework. It was the first evening in weeks she had spent unaccompanied by Draco Malfoy and soon there were many of them to follow. It was May 31st, which meant that tomorrow the Veela mating season would be over. In light of celebration, Malfoy had gone to fly a couple of laps around the Quidditchfield. Normally Hermione wouldn't have let him go unaccompanied, but she knew that Harry was currently in the shower so there really was no objection.

In only a couple of hours Malfoy wouldn't need her anymore and Hermione could try to get over her distorted crush on him. She was getting quite tired of constantly casting smell-repelling charms on herself, so Malfoy wouldn't be able to smell her attraction to him. She felt silly and pathetic and she was going to nip this thing in the bud. It just a typical nurse-falls-in-love-with-her-patient situation. Nothing that can't be fixed by staying away from said patient.

"Has anyone seen Harry?" Neville asked as he descended the stairs that led to the boys' dorms. "He still has my Herbology book."

"He's in the showers," Hermione answered while flipping over another page of her book.

"No he isn't, I just checked" Neville replied.

"What?" Hermione shrieked, slamming her books shut. "Ron! You said Harry was taking a shower!"

"He is" Ron said calmly. "In the Quidditch locker room."

"WHAT?" Hermione shrieked in horror as she jumped from her seat and ran towards the portrait hole.

Shit! Shit! SHIT!

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Draco was walking back to the castle after having taken a quick shower in the locker room. He quite liked to push himself while flying. He loved the rush of that went along with it. It made him feel free. And now that experience was doubled, having also having been freed of his Veela-problem.

In a few hours anyway.

Coming tomorrow, he was going to be able to fly without sporting a hard-on in the front and a tail in the back; which should be a big improvement on his flying skills.

As he strode through the walkway underneath the bleachers, a sudden sensation made him halt.

That smell...

That goddamn intoxicating smell!

A sudden rush of heat spread throughout his body. All senses in Draco's body told him to 'Open the door to your right, you moron!'

Draco turned the knob, which he knew granted access to the Gryffindor locker room, and opened the door. At the sight that met him, all of the blood in Draco's body was immediately drawn towards his nether regions.

It was Potter, naked except for the towel that covered his midsection. Potter looked up with the same kind of awareness that Draco had felt moments before; the presence of his mate.

Draco was breathing heavily, his cock was throbbing heavily in the confinements of his pants and there was not enough blood left to let his brain function properly. Potter's skin looked so soft. Draco just wanted to reach out and caress it to see how it felt against his fingertips. He was slender, yet nicely built. Draco licked his lips as he though that Potter's nipples were just begging to be nibbled on. His hair was damp and tousled and it looked absolutely adorable on him. He was returning Draco's gaze with a lusty look that probably matched his own. Draco could clearly see Potter's arousal making his towel into a tent. He just wanted to rip the offending cloth off the Gryffindor's body and claim him as his.

Draco couldn't take this torture anymore.

He had to have him.

Now!

Draco launched himself forwards, grabbed Potter's face between his two hands and enveloped the other boy in a bone-crushing kiss. Tongues met each other, fingers tangled in damp hair and fingers met sensitive skin. All the while, as Draco was nearing to claiming Potter as his, the mating pull was ringing in his ears like a chant. 'Mine! Mine! Mine!'

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"OhGod OhGod OhGod OhGod OhGod OhGod" Hermione kept repeating to herself as she spurted towards the Quidditch field. She should have known better than not to ask where Harry was showering. From Harry's point of view, he was randomly jumping other men for no apparent reason. It is only natural that he would have a problem with showering with the rest of the guys.

Stupid! Stupid! Stupid!

She ran along the footpath underneath the bleachers towards the Gryffindor locker room. To her distress, she could see that out on the Quidditch field Malfoy was nowhere to be seen. She arrived at her destination, slammed the door open and let out a squeal at witnessing the sight that met her.

There were just too many things in there that she should not be seeing.

Harry seemed to be desperatly trying to figure out the quickest way in discarding Draco from his clothes whilst straddling him on the floor, while at the same time Draco was trying to keep Harry as close to him as possible. Hermione could clearly see the scrapes and bruises Draco had carved upon Harry's back during their apparent foreplay. And there also was rubbing involved again.

Oh God, naked Harry!

Naked and very aroused Harry.

"My eyes! My virgin eyes!" Hermione thought as she covered her eyes in reflex, but then remembered that she had to put a stop to this for both their sakes.

"Stupefy!" she shouted while pointing her wand at Harry, who immediately was thrown off Malfoy and got smacked onto the floor where he remained limp and unconscious.

"NO!" Malfoy shouted in torture at losing contact with his mate after having been so close.

Ropes erupted from the tip of Hermione's wand and wrapped themselves around Malfoy, rendering him immobile.

"Mobilocorpus" she said, levitating Malfoy off the floor. She guided his floating body out the room and down the corridor, farther away from the castle. Malfoy was cursing and screaming at her like a drunken seaman, but she paid no heat to it. When they were at a satisfactory distance, she dropped Malfoy to the ground and left him there while she hasted herself back to the locker room.

"Ennervate" she said, pointing her wand at Harry. He immediately reopened his eyes and looked around dazedly. As Harry was struggling to get off the floor, Hermione picked up Harry's towel and handed it to him while averting her eyes and keeping herself on a respectable distance. It was only then that Harry seemed to realise that he was naked and quickly covered himself up.

"Are you okay?" Hermione asked worriedly.

"I- I don't. I mean. Yeah- I guess-" Harry stammered confusedly as he reached for his clothes and hurriedly started putting them on.

"Oh Gods, I'm so sorry Harry" Hermione said apologetically. "I can't believe I let him out of my sight!"

"Who? What? Where?" Harry asked confusedly as he pulled his shirt on backwards.

"Malfoy is a Veela, Harry" Hermione admitted. "I'm sorry I hadn't told you sooner, but I had promised him not to tell anyone."

"A Veela?"

"Yes" Hermione nodded. "And you were his mate."

"Mate?" Harry asked in horror.

"Not anymore" Hermione reassured. "In approximately one hour and a half mating season will be over."

"A Veela?" Harry asked confusedly as he scrambled the rest of his stuff together.

"I'll explain the rest in the morning," Hermione said. The poor boy was absolutely confused. "First, lets get you back to the castle."

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After Harry had safely returned to Gryffindor tower, Hermione ran back towards the Quidditch field to go and fetch Malfoy. When she cut his binds, she noted that he was in a worse state than Harry was. Having been so close to mating without getting his sexual release had knocked the wind out of him. Hermione had to physically support him while walking back to their dorm. They didn't exchange any words, since Malfoy seemed to even have a hard time breathing. His body was so limp against hers that it almost felt like she was lugging a bag of sand over her shoulder. Hermione helped him into their common room and sat him down on one of the couches. She crouched in front of him and held her hand against his forehead to feel his temperature.

Shite, he was burning up!

He grunted in protest when she urged him on to stand up again, but he didn't seem to have the strength to argue. Hermione guided him into her bathroom and carefully sat him down upon the closed lid of her toilet. After she had made sure that he wouldn't topple to the floor, Hermione walked over to her bath and turned on the cold water. Her heart was beating in her chest. She really had no idea what she was doing. All she knew was that he was hot and that she needed to cool him down.

When she turned back to face Malfoy she felt a pang in her heart; he looked so helpless and childlike as he was sitting there on the toilet, hugging himself and shivering from his fever. Hermione felt like she had found a lost little puppy and was about to give it a bath.

But Malfoy wasn't lost little puppy.

No, she was about to bathe a full-grown man.

If she had felt guilty about sharing his bed, how would her conscience feel after stripping him down and giving him a bath?

"Malfoy, you have a fever and I need to cool you down," Hermione said as she kneeled in front of him. "I'm going to have to put you into the bath. Okay?"

In reply, all she got was some incoherent mumbling.

"Okay then, here we go," she said, more to herself than to Malfoy.

While sitting in front of him, she lifted her arms and started to unbutton Malfoy's shirt. She really wasn't used to doing this. Even on the occasions when Harry or Ron was in the infirmary, she had always left when one of them helped the other in or out of his clothes. It was this universal rule: when skin comes peeking, the opposite sexes leave the room.

And now Hermione was undressing a person who not only was a guy, but a guy she was terribly attracted to.

This really wasn't a good idea!

She felt as if she was taking advantage of the situation, even though she was not.

With each opened button, she found it harder to breath. She felt both mortified as eager and she hated herself for feeling the latter. She shushed herself by thinking that she wasn't going to take off his boxers, so she wasn't going to see anything more than Malfoy would show on a beach. When all his buttons were undone, she grabbed the hem of Malfoy's shirt and pushed it over his shoulders, letting it drop to the floor.

Hermione knew it was wrong to ogle, but she just couldn't help herself. She had seen shirtless boys and men before, but never had the sight of any of them been able to make her stomach start to flutter and her throat closing up. He was just beautiful. If her eyes had been her mouth, she would have swallowed Malfoy whole without chewing. Hermione had never known that the male upper body could have such an effect on her. She felt her nipples hardening just from the mere sight of the velvety pale skin that covered Malfoy's upper body. Hermione highly doubted that it had ever seen the sun. Whoever said that pale skin makes a person look ill should get whacked upside the head with a shovel for uttering blasphemy. Hermione just wanted to run her tongue along Malfoy's perfectly sculptured collarbone and caress his well-defined upper arms with her fingertips. The only hair that graced his upper body was a light dusting of golden hair on his lower belly. Her eyes followed the trail until the waistband of Malfoy's pants blocked Hermione's vision.

"I think you better turn the water off."

"What?" Hermione squeaked as she quickly turned her gaze away from Malfoy's lower abdomen and redirected it to his face.

In reply, Malfoy nodded weakly in the direction of the bath. Hermione followed his gaze and quickly reacted in turning off the water flow, which had already gone past its required amount.

"I can do this!" she said to herself as she kept her agonised face towards the tub and out of Malfoy's vision.

She turned back to Malfoy and she pulled his shoes off. Hermione looked up at him and saw that he had his eyes closed and seemed to be concentrating on his breathing.

"I can do this!" she told herself again as she stripped him of his socks.

"I can do this!" she repeated as she unbuckled Malfoy's belt and unzipped the fly of his pants.

"I can do this!" she said again as she pulled his pants off, one leg at the time.

"I can-"

Hermione was now practically panting. She had stripped Malfoy of all but his boxers. Hermione noticed that he had not been lying when he had said that 'boy scouts could camp inside his trousers'. No fig leaf could cover up any crucial parts of this godly shaped specimen. Moreover, Malfoy's recent encounter with Harry had made him so aroused that his cock had outgrown the confinements of his boxers and the purple-coloured tip was proudly waving hello from under the waistband. Hermione gasped at the sight and fought the urge to cover her eyes. She reckoned that after having just seen Harry butt naked and aroused it was fairly stupid to now be covering her 'virgin eyes'.

Her eyes were soiled and so was her dirty, dirty, mind.

She did praise God, Satan and every single Deity for the fact that Malfoy's boxers were black. White underwear plus water plus overexcited teenage girl equals 'MAYDAY! MAYDAY!'

Hermione hooked her arm around Malfoy's shoulder and helped him in getting off the toilet seat. When he got to his feet he swaggered a little and Hermione was forced to shortly wrap her other arm around him for support. He landed on her smaller frame with a small 'thud', but she managed to keep her balance while also supporting his weight. As she hugged him tightly –which basically was what she was doing- she had this overwhelming feeling of belonging. Her eyes just reached over his shoulder, her nose was pressed against his skin and she couldn't stop herself from inhaling his scent. How could she ever been thinking of him as 'ew'? She liked his body, she loved his skin, and she revelled in his scent. Even the feel of his erection against her stomach and the pre-cum leaking through her shirt and unto her stomach didn't make her recoil.

Instead, she just wished that it had been her who he'd have this reaction to.

Hermione pulled her act together and helped Malfoy over to the tub, if somewhat clumsily. She used her body as support so he could help himself into the tub.

"OH FUCKING SHIT!" Malfoy cried out as he sat himself down in the tub and his heated flesh met the cold water. His nails dug into Hermiones shoulder, yet she didn't withdraw. Instead, she clutched him into a tight hug, so he could grab onto her and squeeze out some of his distress.

When she felt him relaxing under her, she let go of him and went to grab a washcloth and a cup. Having clutched unto Malfoy while he was in the tub had made Hermione herself considerably drenched; yet, she ignored it.

With the washcloth and the cup in her hands, she sat herself on the ground next to the tub. She leaned over the edge, moistened the washcloth in the water and slowly ran it over Malfoy's face. In instinct, he arced into her caress; having accustomed to the cold and now actually welcoming it. Hermione remoistened the cloth and ran it over his neck. She bit her lip as she heard him making little mumblings in approval. She now fully realised what a truly intimate act this was; something that usually only transpires between lovers or a mother and her children. Hermione dropped the cloth next to her, took the cup in replacement and filled it with water. She slowly poured the cup over Malfoy's head and stroked her fingers through his hair. He really did have nice hair. She had always loved it, even when she hated him. It was as if sunlight and moonlight were combined and had been spun into threads of silk. She repeated the action several times while watching the water cascade down his upper body. Little beads of water were slowly dripping down his face, neck and torso to disappear back under the water surface. His chest was rising with every struggled breath he took. His pale nipples were hard enough to cut glass and Hermione just knew it had to be painful. She resisted the urge to run her fingers over the rosy treats to warm them up again. Instead, her eyes drifted towards Malfoy's midsection. The water had made his boxers cling to his skin, leaving nothing to the imagination. The tip of his erection was still weeping for attention and Hermione could clearly see the outline of the swollen sacks of his balls.

Hermione didn't know much about penis-sizes, but she supposed that Malfoy was a bit over average. She chewed on her lip as she wondered what it would feel like to have something of that size buried inside you. It was difficult to imagine that there was enough room to suit a penis that size. She didn't really know how deep her cavern was, but it couldn't possibly have been deep enough to fully accommodate that length. Not to mention the girth! But perhaps it was supposed to stretch you to a degree that it was pain bordering pleasure, so you wouldn't forget that you had a piece of another person inside your own body. Hermione briefly wondered if you could actually feel the other person's heartbeat while he was inside of you. She groaned and rubbed her legs together to relieve some of the throbbing ache she felt there.

She wasn't sure if she should be grossed out by seeing Malfoy's 'thingy', but she knew that she shouldn't be turned on by it.

This was wrong. She would be fairly pissed off if the situation had been reversed and she was in the tub with Malfoy ogling her like a piece of meat and visually undressing her of the last scrap of clothes she had on.

"I'll be right back," she said while scrambling herself off the floor.

She left the bathroom and returned shortly with a pair of pyjama's she found in Malfoy's room. After she had checked Malfoy's temperature again –which had dropped to a less frightening degree- she hoisted him out of the tub and sat him back down upon the toilet. He seemed a bit better; instead of being unwell, he just looked very sleepy.

She took her wand out of her pocket, pointed it at Malfoy and muttered a charm to get him dry. A warm draft erupted from the tip of Hermione's wand and started to blow-dry him while he seemed to struggle not to fall asleep on the toilet. After a few moments Hermione gaze was automatically drawn towards his hair.

He really did have curls.

And it actually suited him, the curls giving his pointy face a slightly whimsical look.

Now the whole 'Angel cast down from the heavens'-look was complete.

"Can you raise your arms?" Hermione asked after she had put her wand down and picked up his white cotton shirt for him to sleep in. In response, Malfoy slowly raised his arms. He couldn't get them very high, but Hermione did manage to pull his shirt over his head. She couldn't help but remain highly aware of every inch of skin she touched. It was as if Malfoy's skin was on high voltage; every touch send shivers throughout Hermione's body.

After Hermione had successfully gotten his shirt and pyjama bottoms on she hooked her arm under his armpit and pulled him up again. It really would have been unnecessary distress for him to be logged all the way to his own bed, so she guided him towards her own. She sat him down and urged him to lie down. After she had managed to tuck him in, she let out a sigh of relief. She wasn't exactly sure what she was so relieved about.

Having gotten through this month?

Having Malfoy and Harry prevented from copulating like bunnies?

Having managed to break Malfoy's fever?

Or just having managed all this without jumping Malfoy in a hormonal craze?

Judging by his monotonous breathing, it seemed that Malfoy had dozed off. Hermione changed into her own pyjamas, grabbed an extra pillow and blanket and made herself comfortable into her recliner. She really wasn't going to lay herself next to Malfoy.

If she did that Hermione thought her conscience might just self-destruct.

After watching Malfoy's sleeping face for a while, Hermione closed her tired eyes and followed his example.

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End of Chapter 9

Thanks for reviewing!

Evil Duckie of the BlackLagoon, English-Foxlette, Hermione Double, lollylover, charmed piper, sw33tdohtee, Kiyoko, mandabella, hermyandron4evr, TearsoftheInnocents, Undying at Midsummer, Alenor, Makalani Astral, MagicFairyDuster, hoofservant,

Munku-JGSPTV: I think Hermione/Draco is a fun pairing because it's soooo not going to happen in canon. It's a challenge to make them fit together while making it seem natural. And if Draco was permanently gay, this wouldn't be much of a Het story now would it? :-)

fallenRain27: BANG I warned ya'h. :-)

dizzydragon: I absolutely love 'Back to the Future'! I can just watch it again and again and again... it never gets old. Especially the Darth Vader-scene. That's just hilarious!

Sara: No, it just wares off when mating-season ends. The gay-thing is all hormones really.

Pho3niX BANG Congratulations, you've just been hit by a piano. For further explanation, please consult the A/N on chapter 6. :-) I hope the Slash part in this chapter didn't gross you out too much. It's totally Het from here on on, by the way.

Gr8Sk8er: Breaths a sigh of relief Thank god, someone who gets it! You're my hero!