The Price of a World

Chapter Two

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The sky outside was dark and you could only just see the silver outline of the snowy mountain peaks. The library was lit up with gorgeous candelabra's. Hermione was half way through her fifth book when a loud footstep rung throughout the room. It scared Hermione so much she screamed and jumped out of her seat. She turned towards the door.

There stood a very, sexy young man. He wore black pants and shoes with an evergreen cotton polo neck shirt. His silky hair hung loosely with small strands falling over his forehead. He flicked his head back quickly so that the hair over his forehead was no longer in his eyes. Hermione felt her face flush; he was so sexy that she didn't realize her mouth was open. She closed it quickly hoping that he didn't realize.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to startle – "

"Oh its o - " Hermione seemed to choke on her words.

"Granger? Is that you?"

"M-Malfoy!? What are you doing here?" Hermione was kicking herself inside. 'Why didn't you recognize him! Damn why does he have to be so sexy!' Hermione thought to herself.

"It's none of your business what I am doing here. What are you doing here?"

"Well then… it's none of your business what I'm doing here." Hermione turned away from him and sat back down and continued to read. Draco walked over to a lounge near Hermione, sat down and started to read. They both sat reading in silence.

"My father owns this hotel, he sent my mother and I here for the Christmas holidays." Draco said this as he continued to read his book. Hermione's eyes looked up at Draco. She smiled to herself.

"My parents brought me here for the Christmas holidays." Draco cleared his throat and continued to read. Draco seemed to be different. Hermione thought he was pretty nice when he wasn't being rude and impertinent. It made her actually, have some sort of feeling for him. He seemed, lonely. Like he needed a friend, not just someone like his followers at school but a real friend. He actually seemed really sweet and innocent, sort of pathetic really.

"So what are you reading?" Hermione asked. Draco looked up from his book. He didn't reply straight away, it was like he was thinking of some sort of rude thing to say to it. Hermione looked right back at Draco. The thing that stood out the most about him was his eyes. They were bluey-grey and when you looked into them you could see terror. Terrified, like there was a child in there, trapped.

"Some muggle book…" He said shortly. Draco's voice woke her out of her trace straight away.

"Oh, " Hermione smiled at him but she didn't receive one in return. "Shit, look at the time. I really have to go. I guess I'll see you around," Hermione stood and put her book back on the shelf and left.

She was in such a daze that she totally forgot to go to the restaurant to have dinner; she slowly made her way back to her room. It was only 11pm; she knew her parents wouldn't be back yet.

'Damn Draco… he just had to be so sexy! Why do I feel like this!? I love Harry, but I'm attracted to Draco. No… no, I don't love Draco, he calls me mudblood and insults me at every opportunity. But… today he seemed so much nicer; he didn't insult me at all. He was…different…' These thoughts ran through Hermione's head all night. She tossed and turned in bed, thoughts scrambling with each other and images of Harry and Draco flashing here and there.

** * **

'What's with the mudblood? Why…why couldn't I think of anything rude to say to her? Not only couldn't I think of something to say I didn't want to say anything to hurt her. She looked so beautiful sitting there, reading her book with her hair just falling gorgeously around her face and those tight jeans. And how the fire's light lay a red glow across her olive skin and giving her hair a red tinge. Damn, why did she have to be so sexy! NO! I'm thinking about a mudblood! Shit! What was I thinking about her for! Stupid, filthy, sexy mudblood.' Draco thought as he made his was back to his bedroom in the penthouse. "Damn, I'm going to have to get Granger out of my head." Draco said aloud in the lift up to the penthouse. "But on the other hand, abit of fun with a mudblood wont hurt."

** * **

"Dumbledore, I can see it in you. You're worried. Why can't you tell me what it is?" Minerva McGonagall was sitting in a large red lounge chair in front of Dumbledore's desk in his office. Dumbledore sat at his desk, his elbows on the desk, eyes closed and his fingers massaging his temples.

"Minerva, you know as much as I do at this present moment."

"That's not what I'm referring to Albus. What are you worried about?" Dumbledore sighed. He clicked his fingers and the blinds shut and the door locked.

"Minerva, Voldemort's strength is rising to higher levels. I don't think I've ever seen him with this much power, strength and as many followers. He said he'd come back, but I wasn't expecting his forces to be twice as strong."

"Oooh Albus. What are we going to do?" Minerva seemed truly worried.

"Minerva, I hate to say this. But I'm starting to doubt Harry's ability to with stand the torments Voldemort has in store for him."

"Are you saying that… he might fail?" Dumbledore sighed; he lay his hands on the table and looked into Minerva's eyes.

"Yes, but we can't start thinking that. Harry needs all the support he can get. I'm organising a meeting with Harry and his closest friends when school starts back. I need to stress that Harry will need support and I need to warn them of how Voldemort may try to get at Harry through his friends."

"Hmm… that does sound reasonable. But Dumbledore, we can't expect him to do a certain thing. We have to keep our options open. I know that I should wait until the meeting to bring this up but we need the Order. Without the Order, we have no chance." Dumbledore shook his head slowly.

"No Minerva, the Order is finished. Everyone is too scared to join or have gone over to the other side. Its useless…" Dumbledore stood and walked over to the fireplace. The fire was blazing away, its golden flame cast a red glow across Dumbledore's face. Every crease, line and wrinkle was highlighted on his face. Usually Dumbledore didn't look his age, but at this moment you would've thought he was triple his age.

"Albus you need rest. I shall see you in the morning." With that, McGonagall stood and left the office leaving Dumbledore looking wearily into the wild flame's flickering against the stone floo wall.

** * **

It was about 7am when her mother woke her.

"Hermione, come on. It's a beautiful day for skiing!"

"Uhhhh…." Hermione just grunted and rolled over. A few minutes later her sleep was disturbed again.

"Hermione, get up! I want to go skiing now!" Her dad pulled the covers of her, and instinctly Hermione moved straight into the fetal position to keep warm.

"Fine Hermione, we'll go without you. If and when you decide to get up we'll be on the skiing plain. Bye dear." Hermione's mother leaned over and kissed her cheek and then pulled the covers back over her. Hermione was now half awake and she knew she wouldn't be able to get back to sleep. She heard her parents close the room door behind them and their footsteps slowly faded, as they got further away.

Hermione got out of bed and looked around the room. She went and took a long hot bath; there was a bottled of complimentary lavender scented bubble crystals so she added them to her bath. Half an hour later her skin started to go wrinkly from the water so she decided to get out. Whilst she was getting dressed she ate a bit of toast her parents had left her. Once she was ready she checked herself in the mirror, she wore her black cord pants, her chocolate boots (same as the day before) and a white top. She smiled at her reflection, opened the heavy drapes and looked out over the Swiss mountains. It was a glorious day, and her mother was correct, it was a beautiful day for skiing. She grabbed her parker, left the room and headed out towards the skiing plain.

** * **

Hermione had found her parents but she didn't really want to ski with them. She skied off down the mountain right to the bottom where her locker was. She decided to do abit of snowboarding. She got her snowboard and took the ski lift up to the slalom. She was having great fun dodging all the obstacles when another snowboarder cut sharply across in front of her leaving her no other option to sharply steer off to the left. She was so shocked she lost control and fell backwards onto her bottom. What really annoyed her was that the person didn't even stop to say sorry.

"Are you alright?" Hermione turned around to face the person. She just looked at him. The person offered their hand out to help her up.

"Thank you… Draco." She said politely.

"Are you hurt?" Draco asked her quickly, looking around.

"No, not that I know of."

"Okay then." With that Draco got back on his snowboard and sped off down the mountain. Hermione smiled to herself, she got a pretty good view of his arse from up where she was. She laughed and got back onto her snowboard and slowly made her way back to the bottom.

** * **

It was half way through Hermione's second week at the hotel and she hadn't seen Draco since their encounter on the mountain. Ever since that day Hermione needed to see Draco. It was like she needed to know he was okay, she needed to hear his voice again.

It was Wednesday morning and Hermione sat at the table in her room eating breakfast looking out over the mountains. Her parents had gone shopping in Bern, shopping wasn't one of her favourite things to do so she stayed behind. It was something like –23 degrees (Celsius) outside and it was snowing heavily.

Hermione put on her white bikini with hot pink and yellow tropical flowers. And her warmer clothes on over top. She headed down to the spa rooms. She went into spa room number 4; in this room it was a large spa sort of pool sized. There were a few people in the spa. Hermione went in and left her things on a bench and slowly slid into the warm pool of water.

As the hours went by, slowly people left. Hermione guessed it was around lunchtime that's why there was no one about. She was glad for some peace and quiet and some time to herself. She rested her head back against the side and closed her eyes. Breathing in the smell of frangipani incense and chlorine from the water. The click of the door closing woke her from her daydream. Her eyes flew open and darted towards the door. The person who stood there brought a smile to her face but she quickly hid it. She suddenly realized that she was in her bikini, showing off more of her body that even Harry hadn't seen and Draco Malfoy was standing there looking at her. She quickly got out of the pool and wrapped her towel around her. She stood there looking at him, wide eyed.

"Oh now why did you go do that?" Draco said with a smirk.

"Excuse me!?"

"You look sexy in that bit of cloth." Hermione made a choking noise. She stared at Draco. His hair hung loosely with small strands falling over his forehead. He wore black billabong board shorts… and no shirt. His chest was muscular and tanned; with his six pack standing out clearly.

Draco smirked as he noticed she was checking him out. Draco put down his towel and got in. He looked up at Hermione.

"Are you just going to stand there or are you going to get back in?" Hermione just looked at him. He shrugged and lay back in the water. He closed his eyes but not completely, keeping a little gap open where he could see what Hermione was doing. Hermione gave in and slowly took her towel off and slid back into the water. Both of them sat in silence.

Suddenly Draco flicked some water and splashed it in Hermione's face obviously on purpose.

"Eek!" Hermione shrieked, and stared at Draco. Draco just smirked. Straight away Hermione splashed him back. That sure did wipe the smirk off Draco's face. Draco splashed a lot more water at Hermione this time. Hermione laughed. And splashed Draco again. This time Draco swam over, picked Hermione up and threw her into the water. She shrieked and wiped the water from her eyes. She stood in the water shocked.

"Did you just grab my arse!?" Hermione said. Draco laughed and Hermione joined in. Hermione's hair was in a ponytail but now hung down with the weight of the water. She picked up her clasp from her bag and pulled all her hair up into it. Draco moved through the water over to Hermione.

"Your bikini strap around your neck…" Draco said as he moved behind her.

"…What about it…" Hermione said, watching him moving only her eyes.

"It's coming undone." Draco said. He leaned closer to her and re-tied Hermione's bikini. When he finished he stayed where he was, with is hands on her shoulders. Hermione turned her head around so that her right cheek was touching Draco's right cheek. Draco leaned in closer and kissed Hermione's neck. Her skin burst out in goose bumps.

"Malfoy…" Hermione whispered. Draco kissed her neck again.

"Yes…" Kiss. "…Hermione…" Hermione couldn't believe her ears. Draco Malfoy had just called her Hermione. It shocked her so much that she totally forgot that she was flirting with and being kissed by that very person, Draco Malfoy. Hermione pulled away from him, and turned to face him.

"Draco, I don't know…"

"What?"

"You have always called me…a mudblood… and you have never stopped bugging me, Harry, Ron and other of my friends. I don't understand why you're being like this now!"

"I don't know…" Hermione stopped and looked into his eyes, trying to see what she saw in him. Thinking of what to do, whether he was worth it.

"I'm sorry Draco. But 'I don't know' isn't a good enough answer to make me forgot the suffering you put me and my friends through for the last 5 years." Hermione got out of the spa and put her clothes back on just before she left she stopped and turned to look at Draco.

"I like you for who you are, not the person you pretend to be." With that she turned and left as quickly as she could.

Hermione's stomach was in knots. Millions of knots. She had just been mucking around with Draco Malfoy; Draco Malfoy had just been kissing her neck. She had just walked away from Draco Malfoy; she knew it was the right thing to do. Because she loves Harry and she is his girlfriend. But she didn't want to leave, being kissed like that by Draco sent goose bumps and shivers all over her body. It made her want more, she craved it. She thought she loved Harry, but experiencing these new feelings made her doubt her love for Harry.

Thinking these thoughts almost brought tears to her eyes. Every time she thought about Draco, about how much she hated him from being such a prat just made her feelings for him stronger. It was tearing her up inside. And what was worse was that she wasn't sure whether she loved Harry any more. She kept telling herself that it would never work with Draco, it just wouldn't. 'I do love Harry; I keep thinking I don't love him any more because I haven't been around him for so long. It'll all be different when I get back to school.' Hermione tried to convince herself this was true, but no matter how hard she tried part of her kept reminding her of Draco.

** * **

"Shit." Draco punched the water. "I shouldn't have done that."

'Father was right Mudbloods are trouble. They make a person weak; I have to do something about this. I cannot let that stupid Granger girl turn me into a complete fag. But… I don't understand. I experience emotions, when I'm with her that I've never felt before. Why can't I bring myself to hurt her? What's wrong with me!? Why do I have feelings for her? I have never had feelings like this for anyone. Why am I attracted to her? What is it about her?' Draco wandered aimlessly back to his private room thinking over what had just happened in the spa.

** * **