"Draco, what is the meaning of this?" Hermione asked laughingly, as he pulled her bodily into the empty classroom and shut the door behind them.

The commencement ceremony had ended some two hours ago, and the parents who'd attended had left, following a reception which had just ended. Many of the new graduates had left with their families, but Hermione had not. She had kissed her parents goodbye and promised them she'd see them tomorrow; she couldn't resist the prospect of spending one last night in her Head Girl room- or perhaps, she had thought with a private little grin, Draco's Head Boy room- in the school she had come to love like a second home. She wanted her last night here, and she wanted to ride the Hogwarts Express home, one last time, with her friends.

So at the conclusion of the reception, when her parents had been ushered away along with all the other Muggle relatives for group transport back to London, she had headed off toward the library, hoping that perhaps Draco would be there, waiting for her. They had shared several brief, yet meaningful glances during the ceremony; aside from Harry and Ron, it had been Draco to whom her eyes had been drawn most often as she stood at the podium, giving the traditional Head Girl commencement speech- and when it had been Draco's turn to address the assembled students, faculty and family members as Head Boy, she had noticed that he had sought her gaze several times as well- but they hadn't had a chance to actually speak all day, and she was dying to talk to him... well, and snog him senseless... but no, really, first and foremost they needed to talk; she wouldn't be seeing him every day after they left Hogwarts, and the more she thought about that fact, the more painful it became to bear. There was no denying it to herself anymore-

She was in love with Draco Malfoy.

And she needed to know whether he felt the same way. She needed to know whether, now that they would no longer have such constant easy access to each other, he'd be willing to go out of his way to keep their relationship alive. Maybe even... to renounce the Death Eaters and take things to the next level...?

Dare she hope?

It was as she'd been walking briskly toward the library, all her thoughts turned inward, pondering these uncertainties, that he'd reached out from behind a statue and grabbed her, catching her completely off-guard, slapping a hand over her mouth to stifle her startled cry, and yanking her into the nearest classroom.

Now, releasing her, he dropped her a quick, cheeky wink and then turned his attention to locking the door; first bolting it, then sealing it magically as well, just to make extra-sure there would be no untimely interruptions.

"My friends are going to be missing me, Malfoy," Hermione exclaimed, crossing her arms over her chest and tapping one foot in mock anger- but she couldn't suppress the smile that was curving her lips upward in spite of herself. No one would be looking for her for at least an hour; she had made her excuses before she'd left the party, since she'd planned all the while to go looking for Draco.

But the fact that he had been looking for her too- not just waiting in the library, but actively looking for her, as evidenced by his hallway ambush- went a long way toward answering her not-yet-voiced questions about whether he was as interested in continuing their relationship as she was.

She opened her mouth to speak again, but before she could get a single word out, Draco bent and captured her lips with his, pulling her into a deep, passionate kiss. When he pulled back a long moment later, it looked as though he was also fighting a losing battle against the impulse to grin like an idiot. "So are mine," he said simply. "Fuck 'em. They can wait a little while. This is important."

Hermione's expression took on a bemused quality. Though Draco was still smiling, his eyes held an intensity she had never seen in them before. "Draco," she repeated, more quietly this time, and feeling suddenly, inexplicably, a bit breathless, "what's going on?"

"I've got to give you your graduation present," Draco replied, reaching into a deep fold of the dress robes he was wearing- they both were wearing their finest clothes, neither having changed since commencement.

"Oh, no!" she cried, suddenly dismayed. "Draco, I didn't-"

"Get me anything? Don't worry about it. Just say yes. That's the best gift you could give me."

Hermione went abruptly very, very still, her eyes widening as she grasped the fact that Draco was apparently about to ask her a very serious question. She felt her heart skip a beat. She had been seeking him in the hopes of discussing a potential future together- it appeared that he had been seeking her with the same thing in mind.

Oh my gosh, she thought crazily, am I ready for this? Because it sure sounds as if...

Merlin, was he about to-?

She hardly knew whether to be relieved or disappointed when he withdrew his hand- and she saw that he was holding a large yellow envelope, sealed with red wax.

Not a jewelry box. Not, more specifically, a ring box.

She knew it was perfectly acceptable for couples in the wizarding world to wed at seventeen, eighteen, nineteen years of age. She just didn't know if she herself was ready for such a commitment at this point. Or at least, that's what her rational mind told her...

But beneath her veneer of cool logic, she couldn't deny the fact that, had it been a ring box, had he been about to ask her the question, she would have said yes. She may have stipulated a long engagement... but she would have said yes.

She loved him, after all, so help her God.

It would have been conditional, of course, upon his willingness to shift his loyalty away from the Dark Lord, to the side of the Light... but such a willingness would have had to be inherent in his asking her that question in the first place- he couldn't possibly plan to be a Death Eater with a Muggleborn wife; the danger to both of them in such a scenario would be extreme.

But it was all moot, of course, since it didn't appear that he going to propose to her anyway... so then, what on earth-?

Her train of thought was cut off as Draco thrust the envelope toward her with an uncharacteristic brusque nervousness and said simply, "open it."

She gave him one last quizzical look before turning her attention to the envelope, breaking the wax seal, reaching in her hand, and pulling out...

"Photos?"

"Photos of your graduation gift, Granger," he drawled, seeming to recover his composure. "Do try to keep up."

"But I don't understand," she said- whispered, really- her brow knitted as she shuffled through the half-dozen or so photographs in her hands. "These are all pictures of..." she trailed off then, raising wide and suddenly shocked eyes to meet Draco's. "But you can't have... you..." Staring up at him, she read the truth in his face.

"Oh... oh, my," she said weakly. "Draco, you... bought me a house?"

Draco leaned forward, placing the palms of each hand flat on the wall behind her, one on either side of her body, effectively pinning her in place with no physical contact whatsoever, though their faces were now so close together that their breath intermingled and their noses nearly touched.

"Correction. I bought-" he paused and dropped a kiss on the tip of her nose- "us a house."

She dropped her eyes to the topmost photo, which had apparently been taken from across the road, because it showed not only the cottage, but also the fact that it was located right next to the Hogsmeade library- stared at it for a long moment, then raised wondering eyes back to Draco, opened her mouth, closed it, opened it again, and finally managed, "you're asking me to move in with you?"

A slight frown settled over Draco's features. "In a manner of speaking," he replied, a bit evasively. "The house is yours. It's already in your name. It even comes complete with a house elf-" he paused momentarily, allowing himself a small smirk at the thunderclouds that were clearly gathering in her expression, before he continued, "a house elf that wears clothes, has moved into the smallest bedroom, expects a salary of three galleons per week, with an additional one galleon per week going into a retirement fund- and insists on taking every Sunday off. Believe me, she wasn't easy to find, and you can be sure that no one else will have her, so think on that before you send her packing. I believe the two of you will suit each other perfectly. As for me..." he sighed and ran a hand through his near-colorless hair. "It will not be my primary residence, though I intend to spend as much time there, with you, as I possibly can." He closed his eyes for a moment, a pained expression flitting across his face. "You must believe me when I say that I wish our circumstances were different. But they are what they are and the fact is, you and I both still have our priorities in life, which come with certain... obligations-"

"You're still going to be a Death Eater," she whispered, feeling suddenly as though she'd been slapped.

Draco sighed. "I remain true to my cause, Granger, just as I accept that you remain true to yours-"

"Yes, but-"

"But yours is right, I know," he said, sounding suddenly weary. "We've been through this all-"

"There's more to it than that!" she practically shouted. She couldn't believe the turn this conversation had taken. One moment she'd been contemplating a life with the man she (unwisely, oh God, so unwisely) loved in this picture-perfect little home, and the next he was telling her that- that-

"Don't you understand, you have no bloody choice but to accept that I remain true to my cause! I couldn't defect to your cause if I wanted to, because they'd never accept me! They think I was born inferior! They wouldn't have me! They would kill me if I approached them! But you... you could cross over, there's nothing stopping you except for your own sheer bloody-mindedness! So of course you accept that I remain true to my cause, but I will not, I cannot accept that you will remain true to yours, going to your Death Eater meetings, plotting the mass murder of people just like me, and all the while keeping me tucked away for your leisure time like some... some... little mudblood pet-"

"That is not fair!" Draco shouted. "This is not the way I wanted things to be! You seem to think I have a choice, but I have none- I must be true to my family, I'm the only child, there is no one else! You're an only child too, Granger, you must understand something of the burden that I carry, the expectations my parents placed on me at birth that I have to live up to! I can't let down my family; I'm all they have. If I lay down my burden, there is nobody else to pick it up. I had hoped that you would understand that at least." He shook his head. "But no, of course not, you're so fucking righteous, how could you ever step outside yourself for even one bloody moment and see..."

"Malfoy-"

"Do you think I WANT to marry Pansy?!?" he suddenly exploded, pounding a fist unexpectedly into the wall mere inches from her head. "Damn it, Granger, I never wanted to, but I had come to terms with it, I had learned to accept it... until you! Now that... that I've seen what the alternative is, walking down that aisle is going to feel like being led to the Dementors for a Kiss... and it's all your goddamn fault-"

Hermione's voice, though now barely audible- she was suddenly having trouble even breathing, let alone speaking- nonetheless cut through Draco's tirade like the crack of a whip. "You're marrying Pansy?"

Draco fell silent for a moment, breathing hard, looking down at Hermione, who was paler than parchment, and looked as if the classroom wall was all that was holding her upright at the moment. He took a deep breath, squeezed his pale, tormented eyes closed, opened them again, and said, "of course I'm marrying Pansy. I've always been going to marry Pansy. It's been arranged for years. I just wanted to build something with you to sustain me through my life with her... a light at the end of my tunnel, knowing- just knowing you were- bloody hell, Hermione, why do you make me spell everything out?!? It's so fucking obvious! I don't love her, I-"

WHAP.

For the third time in her life, Hermione Granger slapped Draco Malfoy, hard across the face. He took two steps back, but did not otherwise react.

"Don't," she spat out, literally shaking with rage. "Don't... you... say it, don't you dare speak to me of love in the same... fucking... breath as you just told me you're marrying someone else. You disgusting... you... vile... it was bad enough when I thought you wanted to keep me as a pet, but this- this is a thousand times worse, you want to go off and marry Pansy and keep me on the side as your little mudblood whore... and the worst thing about it, the very worst, is that even now I don't think you see anything wrong with it- I can see it in your eyes, you think I'm overreacting, you can't... understand why I'm- I'm- you probably think I ought to feel privileged or something-" she paused to catch her breath; she was nearly panting. She had been speaking rapidly, the words fairly tumbling over one another, and moreover, she had progressed from feeling as though she had been slapped to feeling as though she'd been punched several times in the stomach, so profound was her distress- "but let me tell you something, Draco Malfoy," she managed to continue at last, "you might consider me low-born, but I am above being any man's whore- even one that... that... I..."

She trailed off again, and this time was unable to regain her composure, no matter how she tried. Wrapping her arms about herself, it was all she could do to keep herself from dissolving into tears. She wouldn't let him see her cry.

She wouldn't.

With a supreme effort, she managed to choke out, "just leave, Malfoy. Go away and leave me alone."

But he didn't move. He just stood there staring at her, with her handprint blazing red on his cheek, appearing more bewildered than anything else, as though he couldn't, for the life of him, pinpoint exactly when or why this conversation had gone all to hell. He looked stunned. It was as she had said. He literally could not grasp why his proposition should be unacceptable to her.

"Did you hear me?" Her voice was rising, as she attempted, with only partial success, to fight off the hysteria that was threatening to overwhelm her. "Leave, Malfoy, you bastard! Go away and LEAVE ME ALONE!" Realizing that she was still clutching the photos of the cottage, she hurled them at him. They flew every which way, as photos will, before fluttering forlornly to his feet.

That was what seemed to finally break the odd, uncomprehending sort of paralysis that had been gripping him. "Fine," he said, in a flat, overly calm voice, "fine, Granger," and he turned on his heel and made for the door.

00000

He paused, however, just inside the doorway- though he did not look back at her. Internally, a battle was raging that he gave no outward indication of, except for the tension in his shoulders and his steadfast refusal to look back. He stayed that way for a long, agonizing moment, before one half of his warring soul won. He reached into a pocket and retrieved a small, burgundy jewelry box. Again he stood still for a long time, staring down at the box, which he held with an odd gentleness in his left hand, while his right was so tightly clenched the knuckles were white... then he placed it carefully on the top of a waist-high bookshelf that ran the length of the room and terminated where he was standing, at the door. He spoke without turning, in a voice that was soft, yet so tight that it indicated something within him was dangerously close to snapping.

"This ring is for you, Granger. I don't care what you do with it; keep it or not, as you see fit. It doesn't matter anymore. But do not give it away to anyone else, and if you dispose of it, do it in such a way that no one else will find it. It has been custom tailored to you; to your magic. It carries wards and enchantments meant to protect you, that would be... detrimental to anyone else who tried to wear it. It is intended only to be handled by you or me, or-"

You or me, or any offspring we produce- that was what he'd been going to say, as that was, indeed, the stipulation upon the ring... but it seemed an utterly ridiculous thing to say under the circumstances, so-

he broke off abruptly, gave his head a single, sharp shake, and opened the door.

"Good bye, Granger," he said, his voice now sounding nearly strangled. "I..." he swallowed hard. "Good luck. Not that you'll need it; you-" he broke off, unable to say any more, stepped through the door, and closed it firmly behind him.

00000

Once on the other side of it, he leaned back against the cool, smooth wood, immensely grateful to the door for simply existing in that place and time; for being something solid to hold him up.

He thought that without it, he may very well have collapsed.

The reason was simple, really; his life was now officially void of any remote possibility for true happiness. A loveless marriage to Pansy would have been bearable if he could have known that he had Hermione too- two relationships, two families, two lives; one for his duty, the other solely for himself- he could have pulled it off- he certainly could have afforded it- he could have been a happy man. But now that chance was gone; only duty remained, and he would do his duty; it had never been up for debate- he had always been going to do right by his family.

But God, his life looked bleak.

He closed his hand around the other ring box in his pocket. The ring that had been chosen for duty. The diamond ring that had been selected based purely on size, cost and prestige. The stone was huge and flawless; Pansy would love it.

He grimaced, before schooling his face into a smooth mask of indifference and setting off down the corridor to do what he had always known he would have to do upon leaving Hogwarts; ask Pansy to be his wife.

The corridor looked darker, somehow, than it had before he and Hermione had entered the deserted classroom, even though no more than twenty minutes could have passed.

The whole world looked darker to him.

00000

He never would have guessed how bad of a time Hermione was having within the classroom, on the other side of the door he had closed. She had managed to hold herself together in front of him; barely, but still- outwardly displaying only indignant fury at his so-called proposal, refusing to let him see how utterly and completely devastated she had been when the realization had hit her of just what he was asking her to do- to be.

That was all he thought of her.

He'd wanted her to be his mistress, his... his lifelong whore. While he married Pansy Parkinson and raised a "respectable" pureblood family (if by respectable one meant the next generation of Muggle hating fanatics and Death Eaters) with her, he wanted Hermione to set up house in a place of his choosing and keep herself available to him and only him for the rest of her life, to be visited by him- another woman's husband- whenever his schedule and whim allowed it.

It was disgusting and degrading and... and the worst thing, the very worst, was that she was so damn far gone in love with him that for a split second she had actually considered it.

She had actually considered being a Muggle-hating Death Eater's whore.

Nausea rolled over her, sudden and intense, completely unexpected, and in the next instant she found herself bent double over the nearest wooden desk, vomiting onto the floor, her whole body heaving with an intensity that she had never experienced before in her life- she was practically convulsing, seeing bursts of light before her eyes with every body wracking heave.

It went on for a long, long time- until there was nothing left, and then for longer still until even the dry heaves had subsided, leaving her shaking and exhausted. She finally pushed herself up off the desk and stumbled backward, fetching up against the wall where her legs gave out, sliding her down to the floor, amidst the scattered photos of the little house.

Her little house.

It was astonishing that she had any energy left to cry, but cry she did then, and her sobs came with nearly as much force as had her illness of a moment ago... it was almost as though she were a puppet being controlled by some force outside herself, because she certainly didn't want to be crying like this- with such intensity that it was nearly physically painful- but she couldn't help herself. She couldn't stop.

First she had heaved herself dry; now she sobbed herself dry.

She then spent a very long time sitting at the base of the wall, leaning back against it, her eyes red and glazed and out of focus, looking nothing short of catatonic, not moving except for the occasional hiccup as her hitching breath returned to normal.

By the time she dragged herself to her feet, pulled out her wand and vanished the mess she'd made on the floor with a flick of her wrist- vanished the photos right along with it- the light coming through the classroom windows was slanted and had more than a tint of evening about it, and Draco was an engaged man.

She moved slowly, unsteadily, to the door, reached out and grasped the handle, and was about to pass through it- when her attention was caught by the small burgundy box sitting on the shelf, just inches from her.

A violent shudder passed through her whole body just looking at it.

She knew she should leave it sitting right where it was... to hell with what he had said about it, it was probably all lies anyway, just as anything he had ever professed to feel for her had obviously been a lie... not that he had ever said he loved her- he hadn't- she had just been damn fool enough to believe that she'd caught glimpses of love in some of the other things he'd said, in some of the things he'd done...

"Stupid," she whispered hoarsely, aloud. "Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid..."

How could she have been so stupid? Why was she still acting stupid even now? For against her better judgment, she was reaching for the box.

The velvet of the box was smooth and soft under her fingers. She popped it open and drew in a deep, unsteady breath, staring down at the ring nestled within.

"Oh God," she breathed, "Oh, Draco." Even though she hadn't the strength left to weep, tears were leaking from her eyes, a steady slow trickle that she was only marginally aware of.

The ring was exquisite. It suited her taste perfectly; she herself could not have selected a ring she would have liked better.

No diamond ring, this- and that was just fine with Hermione, she was not a diamond kind of girl. Sure, she allowed that they were pretty... but in a cold and glittering, impersonal way. Diamonds reminded Hermione of ice, and her personality, her spirit, was much better matched to fire. And this ring had fire, in abundance.

It was the most beautiful opal she had ever seen. It was a smooth oval cabochon, about the size of one of her fingernails, in a plain bezel setting of what appeared to be pure gold. She held the open box up to the evening light streaming through the nearest window and tilted it first this way, then that. As the stone was moved thus, great rolling flashes of color chased themselves across its surface; scarlet, then green, then scarlet again. As with the best quality opals, all colors of the rainbow flashed in the light; but by far the most intense colors in this particular stone were those flashes of deep crimson red and emerald green.

It took her breath away. The stone itself, in its understated setting, but not only that- the symbolism of it, with the red and green, and the amount of care that must have gone into selecting it- just the right stone that had those qualities- for unlike diamonds, which all looked more or less the same; the good ones sparkly, the poor ones dull- Hermione knew that each and every opal in the world was unique- no one exactly like any other. And that fact suggested that Draco had looked very hard for this one.

But why?

Why, when he had made it crystal clear- diamond clear, she thought, with a bitter, ironic curve of her mouth- through his proposal that he was not in love with her, that what he felt was, was... an odd combination of affection and desire; an emotion strong enough, certainly, that he had suggested spending the rest of their lives together... in a strange, twisted way that would benefit only him... but it wasn't love, not really.

If he loved her- really loved her- he'd have asked her to marry him. This would have been her engagement ring. Not a symbol of his "ownership" of some sort of- of- mudblood concubine.

Which, she told herself firmly, was exactly what it had been intended to be.

She snapped the box shut.

But she didn't put it down.

She couldn't.

She rationalized it by recalling his words- that the ring could be dangerous to anyone but her- so surely she had an obligation to safeguard it, to see that it didn't fall into the wrong hands; the wrong hands being anyone's hands but her own.

That was how she rationalized it, but the truth was, she still loved Draco, and she loved this ring. She wouldn't wear it. That would be weakness; it was unthinkable, after he had insulted her so. She wouldn't be that weak.

But she would keep it. She thrust it deep into her pocket.

She would keep it always.

00000

So intense had been her outburst that she had literally made herself ill; she was flushed and feverish as she made her way back to Gryffindor Tower, her hair sticking to her hot, tear streaked face in damp tendrils, her arms wrapped protectively about herself as if she were cold- because, quite suddenly, she was. She felt chilled to the bone in the aftermath of all that had happened, both physically and emotionally; her heart, in particular, felt as if it had been put on ice. She shivered.

If Draco had seen her, he may well have left his brand new fiancée without a second thought in order to rush to her, tend her, use his healing magic on her- in short, he would have been frantic.

But Draco didn't see her.

He was on his way to Hogsmeade with Pansy and several other seventh-year Slytherins- it was against the rules, of course, for students to leave the school grounds on the final night of the term, but it just so happened that Draco knew about this really nifty passageway that originated behind a certain statue of a one-eyed witch... and, as he smirkingly pointed out to his friends (his carefree façade firmly in place and perfect), what would the faculty do if they caught them- expel them? They were celebrating their last ever night at Hogwarts- and, of course, his engagement.

So Hermione was unimpeded as she approached the fat lady, spoke the password in a small, dull, miserable voice, and climbed, somewhat unsteadily, through the portrait hole.

The world was wavering as she straightened up again, one hand pressed against the wall of the common room to steady herself; wavering and going dark around the edges, and beginning to spin slowly, lazily, sickeningly.

"Hermione? What's the matter? Hermione!"

She heard Harry and Ron's voices as if from a long way off; watched them with a strange, floaty sort of detachment- blinking her eyes in an attempt to keep them focused, as her two best friends ran toward her from where, having finished their packing, they had been playing chess by the fire at the opposite end of the room. They had jumped up so quickly at the sight of her that they had upset their game; several pieces had fallen to the floor and one pawn had rolled into the fireplace. It was screaming.

That was the icing on top of the cake of surreality her day had become.

She stepped away from the wall, knowing full well, even as she did so, that she would not be able to stand unsupported.

And true to her prediction, in the next instant she was falling, and her two best friends reached her just barely in time for Ron, drawing swiftly on his Keeper reflexes, to catch her as she fell. He eased her to the floor, going down with her, so that she lay cradled in his lap, and the last thing she saw on her last full day at Hogwarts was her best friends' faces looming over her, pale, stricken, and Ron was smoothing back her hair as Harry shouted for someone to get McGonagall or Pomfrey or better yet, both-

Then everything went dark.

00000

(A/N: what, you think that's the end? Sucker! This is nowhere near over. If it were one of those old-timey movies like "Gone With The Wind", this would be where the screen says INTERMISSION. And there will, in fact, be an intermission of sorts here; I don't see updating for at least a month, as I'm going out of town tomorrow for two weeks and will have no access to a computer, and after I return from that trip I have some serious catching up to do on "Sometimes", which I just can't seem to quite get the hang of again after losing a whole chapter... man, is rewriting a bitch, it just never comes as naturally as the first time around, it's so frustrating because I know it was better before! Then, there's this new fic exchange I've entered with a deadline of September 27th... so anyway, yeah, I wouldn't look for an update on this until October. But it has become by far my favorite story to write so never fear, it will be finished!)