A/N: Hello again all! Sorry for the slight wait on this chapter. I've been crazy busy lately.
For those of you who read the last chapter before I reposted it, you should know that has ffnet instated a new rule in which authors are not allowed to give personal responses to reviews. Because I don't want my story to be deleted, I have gone through and removed all the review responses from previous chapters, and will not include responses in any future chapters. I want you all to know that I am furious about this, and that it is no reflection on you guys. I still want to hear everything you have to say, and I still appreciate your feedback more than you know. I'm hoping that this is only a temporary thing, and that the moderators will see reason and change this rule. Until then, I just want to say that I love all of you and still want to hear from everyone.
Quick answer to a question I've gotten repeatedly in reviews: Many people have asked why Draco and Hermione don't just go to Snape and get him to help them. The answer to this is because, although my story was tossed firmly into the realm of AU by the events of HBP, I have tried to avoid any blatantly non-HBP compatible scenes or events since the book came out. You will therefore not hear mentions of Dumbledore or Snape anymore because I simply don't feel comfortable as a writer at this point in so obviously going off into my own little world with complete disregard for canon. I wasn't willing to rewrite what I'd already written in order to make it fit with HBP, but because this story was never intended to be AU, I'd just like to avoid going directly against the Harry Potter universe as written by JKR. I don't mind ignoring it, but I don't really want to oppose it.
Anyway, on to the chapter!
Chapter 19: Out of the Shadows of Nightmares
For a long time, Draco simply lay there, staring into the darkness and willing his heart to stop racing. He made no move to reach for his wand or light the lamp on his bedside table, half-afraid that the light would reveal a gray bedroom and haunting, sapphire eyes.
He'd had many nightmares in his time. Sometimes he was forced to relive real-life terrors, and other times his subconscious found more original images with which to torment him. Never had one shaken him so badly, or left him with so many questions. He knew he would not be able to sleep again that night. At the moment, he felt as though he would never sleep again.
Throwing back his blankets, he sat on the edge of his bed, gathering the immense courage required to reach out, grab his wand, and mutter "Lumos." He let out a breath he didn't realize he'd been holding when the dim glow revealed green satin sheets on his bed and multi-colored books scattered on his desk.
This was not the twilight world of his dreams. No dark, accusing eyes gazed out of the many shadows. No pitiful sobs echoed off the room's stone walls. Somehow, though, he had an overwhelming, paralyzing fear that all that was on the verge of changing, and that at any moment he could be plunged back into the shadows of his nightmares. He couldn't stay there, not for another minute. He threw on a pair of dark jeans and a black sweater, wrapped a cloak around his shoulders, and went out the door.
As good as Draco was at being the center of attention, he was even better at remaining unseen. Despite a near run-in with Filch, he was able to slip out the front door with little more trouble than he might have had if he'd walked outside in broad daylight. He was going (somewhat predictably, his inner voice snorted derisively) to the lake.
A chilly breeze blew off the water, blowing his hair off of his face. It was just cold enough to be uncomfortable, but he welcomed it, even relished it, because it gave him something tangible to focus on besides the dream. He was going to think about it, he was, but he wanted a few moments of peace first, a few moments in which there were no blue eyes to haunt him, no nightmares to plague him, and no silly, compassionate Mudblood girls to confuse him.
For a few blessed minutes, he got it.
After her abrupt return to consciousness, Hermione sat in her armchair, blinking into the fire, her heart racing painfully in her chest. Despite the warmth of the dwindling flames, she felt chilled.
That dream . . . it was almost frightening her just to think about it. Though it hadn't been the first of Draco's dreams that she'd witnessed, she'd never brought more away from those experiences than vague feelings and the occasional random image. This time, however, she remembered every detail with vivid, terrifying clarity, like it was an especially disturbing horror movie that she had watched just before going to bed.
She had not been a participant, exactly, the way she was when inside one of Draco's memories. Harry had once described to her what it was like to be inside a Pensieve; it was the closest comparison she had, the only difference being that their link had remained intact within the dream, and she was therefore privy to his emotional reactions to the nightmare. Now that she was back in the waking world, however, his reactions concerned her less than her own did.
The dream had frightened her in more ways than one. In it, Draco had seen her as terrified, helpless, in need of protection. She hadn't liked seeing herself that way, didn't want to think that Draco might be seeing a weakness in her that she was too stubborn or proud to admit existed. The thought made her too uneasy to allow herself to remain seated, and she stood up and began to wander restlessly around the common room.
And what of Draco in all of this? What was she to make of his desire to protect her, the pain her suffering seemed to cause him? What had his subconscious mind been trying to tell him, tell them both, by making Draco himself the villain of the piece? She knew she would not be able to sleep again until those questions were answered, and perhaps not even then.
Her aimless wandering had led her to one of the many windows lining the circular room. She gazed out at the landscape unseeingly for a moment, lost in her troubled thoughts. The moon was full that night, and its light bathed the Hogwarts grounds in a veil of silver and shadow. 'It looks like a scene from a black and white movie,' Hermione thought wryly, not missing the irony despite her lack of sleep and the upsetting nature of her recent experience.
It was while she was contemplating the strange sense of humor that fate seemed to possess that she noticed the lone figure standing beside the silvered lake. A billowing black cloak, windblown hair the color of stardust, a shadowy but aristocratic profile; well, speak of the devil.
She watched Draco stare out over the lake for a few seconds before deciding that there was no time like the present for an awkward but unavoidable confrontation. They were both up anyway, weren't they? She ducked into her bedroom to pull on a pair of worn out jeans and a pair of trainers and, wrapping her cloak around herself, she slipped out of the Gryffindor common room and began to make her way downstairs.
Draco knew the instant she stepped out onto the grounds, though he heard neither the creak of the enormous front doors nor the sound of her footsteps. Her determination and the confusion and worry that simmered just beneath it, pulsed in the air around him. Though she was the last person on earth he wanted to see in that moment, he could not help but turn to look at her.
She stood on the slope of the hill that led up to the castle steps. She was looking at him, with her dark, serious eyes; eyes so unlike those that had belonged to the dead witch, and yet so like them at the same time. They had the same quiet strength, the same brave defiance, and, at the moment, the same pleading expression. They both fascinated him and tore at his already raw emotions, and as much as he wanted to turn away, he found that he wasn't capable of doing so.
He stared at her for a long time, not moving at all. She stared back, but apparently she was finding more purpose and strength in doing so than he was, because she then did was he could not; she started walking toward him.
Hermione stopped walking when she was a few feet away from him and gazed up at him with solemn features and a furrowed brow. Even if he could have thought of anything to say, he seemed to have lost all ability to move in any meaningful manner. Besides, there was no need to ask her what she was doing there. Her eyes were haunted now, and old, like he knew his own to be. She had seen it all.
"We need to talk about it," she said calmly, the wind whipping her sleep-disheveled hair away from her face at the same moment that his own was blown into his eyes. Her words seemed to break whatever spell had been holding him captive, because he found all of the sudden that he was able to tear his gaze away from hers and turn away.
"No, we don't," he replied in what he hoped was a tone that rang with authoritative finality. She didn't seem impressed.
"Oh, yes, we do." He heard her footsteps draw nearer, felt her determination and concern increase in strength, and registered the sweet scent of her shampoo all at the same time.
"No, we don't," he replied, turning his head just enough to glare down at her. She glared back, her irritation beginning to rise and overshadow the other, more disturbing feelings.
"Saying the opposite of what I say is not a valid argument," she snapped.
Just for the hell of it, he sent her a smirk and replied, "Yes, it is." She scowled and doggedly matched him step for step as he began to walk away.
"I want to know why it scared you so much when you realized it was me." Draco halted at these particular words, feeling a jolt of surprise followed by what could only be considered very undignified panic. He began to open his mouth to deny the accusation, but she frowned at him and held a hand up. "And don't you dare try to lie to me, Draco Malfoy. Not only will I be able to feel that you're lying, but I happen to know very well what I'm talking about. Tell me why you were so afraid."
He fixed his eyes on a point a few inches over Hermione's right shoulder and answered through gritted teeth.
"I thought you were in danger. I was worried about you." Though he thought this answer was more than she had any right to expect, she wasn't satisfied.
"Why?" she asked quietly. He threw his hands up in the air and turned away from her.
"I don't bloody well know why! And even if I did, it's none of your damn business, is it?" He felt her grow outraged, and turned around to face her again in the hopes that if she threw a hex at him, he might at least have a chance of blocking it if he didn't have his back turned. Her face was flushed and angry, and her eyes flashed at him in the moonlight.
"You have no right to talk to me like that, Malfoy. I didn't make you dream what you did any more than you chose to dream it. Quit taking your frustration out on me. We're in this together, damn it, and I won't stand for you treating me like this one more second!" She was yelling now, and it both made him angry and soothed his nerves, because this, at least, was something he could understand, something that was normal and comprehensible and familiar. He glared back at her, relishing the anger that surged in his veins.
"So it's back to Malfoy, is it? Well, I have news for you, Granger. I didn't ask to be in this together with you, and I'll treat you any way I damn well please." He felt a dangerous rage bubbling up inside him, and all of the sudden he wanted nothing more than to hurt her the way she was hurting him by making him care. "Besides, I don't take orders from Mudbloods." She froze and stared at him with wide, wounded eyes. Her pain shattered over him like splinters of jagged glass. His resolve wavered, but before he could begin to take it back the hurt was replaced by a consuming fury.
"How dare you call me that, after all we've been through!" she hissed. "How can you even think that anymore?"
"I have to think that!" he yelled back at her, too remorseful and angry and confused to really think about what he was saying as he said it.
"Why?" This single word wasn't yelled, but rather spoken in a soft, pleading voice. He looked into her eyes, dark with sadness and betrayal, and realized that she wanted desperately to know why he still believed it, wanted even more desperately for him to stop believing it at all.
"Because if I don't think it, then I won't have any reason to hate you anymore." It was the most honest thing he had ever said, and as painful as it had been to say, it was even more painful to realize that it was true.
"And you do? Still hate me, I mean." She was still speaking in that quiet, pleading voice and he realized that he was powerless to stop himself from answering her.
"I want to," he replied. It wasn't a lie. Gods, did he want to. It would have been so much easier.
"That isn't what I asked," she pointed out. Her eyes were pleading, and there was a desperation flowing off of her that he didn't quite understand. He didn't know how to answer her without ripping out the final stone that was the only thing keeping the world as he knew it from crumbling around his ears.
"That's the only answer I can give you right now," he said, hoping against hope that she would accept that, and wouldn't continue to question him. Mercifully, she didn't, but her next topic of choice was hardly better.
"In the dream, you were the one I was afraid of. Should I be afraid of you?" There was no deception or manipulation behind the question, and the trust he could see in her eyes pained him as much as the fact that he didn't know the answer to that question any more either.
"I don't know," he replied honestly.
"Would you hurt me on purpose?" she wanted to know. He studied her unremarkable face while he tried to figure it out. He knew that his answers so far that night had been uncharacteristically honest, and he felt strangely compelled to tell her the truth about this as well, so he gave his answer very serious thought before responding.
"Not anymore," he told her quietly. She looked at him for a moment, and then nodded.
"Okay," she said with finality. "That's all I wanted to know." She stepped back from him (when had they gotten so close, he wondered?) and gave him one last searching look before turning toward the castle. He watched her go, feeling a strange lightness in his chest.
A few meters away from him, she stopped and turned back around. A nearby tree cast dappled moonlight over her rather ordinary features, she gave him a small, tentative smile, and for a moment, she was beautiful.
"Goodnight, Draco," she said softly.
"Goodnight," he replied as she turned around. She was far beyond earshot when he finished his sentence, and only the silent moon and silvered lake heard him whisper, " . . . Hermione."
A/N: And there you have it. Hope it was enjoyable for all. Please, PLEASE continue to review! I may not be able to answer them personally, but I still want to get them!