"It's freezing in here," complained Ron, wrapping his arms around his chest.
"It's the air conditioning, Ron," offered Hermione, still rifling through Flamel's box.
"Air conditioning?" grumbled Ron. "Conditioning for what? Living on the sun?" Hermione rolled her eyes and ignored him.
They had decided to take the train out of the country. It was the Muggle train, but it was efficient enough, and they all agreed that it was best to keep moving. Hermione had suggested the International Floo Network, considering none of them had ever been to Albania and the probability of splinching was very high.
Harry had flatly refused to go anywhere near the Ministry, let alone enlist their aid for two very important reasons. First off, he believed everyone in the Ministry was a stupid git (except for Mr. Weasley, of course). Second, the Ministry was probably full of Death Eater spies. So, the train it was. The four of them sat in a private compartment. Harry and Ron were playing Exploding Snap (courtesy of Fred and George) and Malfoy was sitting in stony silence.
Hermione flipped open the diary and absently placed Malfoy's hand on it, trying desperately to ignore the blush rising in her cheeks as she touched his hand again. She had hoped that it would be easier to decipher the journal with Flamel's notes, but it was proving even more complicated with the vast new influx of information. She splayed the notes all over her lap and began reading, muttering aloud.
"The First Key is that which opens …hmm…this Stone has a bright glittering: it contains a Spirit of a sublime original; it is the Sea of the Wise, in which they angle for their mysterious Fish." She sighed. "No…wait…Pisces—or Aquarius? Bugger all…"
She closed her eyes for a moment and looked away from the diary, rubbing her eyes. "Harry…you were in Divination, do you remember if the astrological signs of the ocean will be in their seventh house before the summer solstice?"
Harry looked at her in alarm, quite taken aback that she would be asking him an actual fact. For one thing, she was apparently supposed to know everything, and for another, he probably felt that he should only be consulted as an authority in matters involving life or death last minute decisions. Ron gave her an equally glazed, slack jawed expression.
Malfoy snickered. "All I heard was blah, blah, blah, Sea, blah, blah, blah, Fish…" he said, though no one had asked for his opinion anyway.
Ron immediately started laughing at this, and even Harry chuckled. After a moment, Ron suddenly stopped laughing, and scowled at Malfoy quite defensively, obviously very upset that he had laughed at a joke that Malfoy told, and equally upset that Malfoy had a sense of humor that did not involve the sadistic torture of Muggles.
"Shut up, Malfoy," said Ron, folding his arms sulkily. Malfoy rolled his eyes and went back to staring out the window.
000
"I'm hungry," Weasley complained, after a pause.
"I think there was a food stand at the other end of the train," offered Potter. They both stood up, and began moving towards the door. Draco suddenly snapped his head around and stared at Potter very intently, his eyes uncertain. He folded his hands on his lap, indicating in a very non-threatening manner that he was not going to reach for the wand in his pocket at any time soon. Weasley looked at him, obviously missing the point.
"Fine," Weasley said exasperatedly. "I guess you can have some candy."
Though he was only confused for a moment, Draco gave him his best "are you insane?" look, his lip curling. Weasley was appropriately irritated by this and walked out of the compartment. Potter followed behind him, but not before pausing for a moment in the doorway.
"You can keep your wand, Malfoy," he said evenly. "I don't care. Unless of course, you want me to keep it for you because you think you might accidentally light your shirt on fire or something..." Potter smirked at him.
"Screw you, Potter," he retorted instantly.
"Thought so," said Potter, shutting the door behind him. He was alone in the compartment with Granger again, but she was deeply involved in the diary, and seemed to be doing her best to ignore his presence.
He stared at her, for sometime, his thoughts wandering into strange places.
000
Draco Malfoy was a prat.
He was staring at her again. Well—he was staring at her—now he was looking pointedly out the window. What was he staring at? Probably thinking of creative new ways to murder her and say it was an accident.
He was infuriating, and his gaze—it—it unnerved her just a little but. She usually knew what people were thinking or feeling. She was remarkably intuitive, but she had no idea what he was thinking. He was…complicated. Whatever was going on behind those piercing gray eyes, she couldn't tell. He was silent. That was what disturbed her.
He was such an enigma. She thought she understood him—he was a bigoted, shallow, bullying prat. He swaggered around the halls, and people dove out of his way, and that was the way he liked it.
Over the past few days, though, she had seen that—maybe—however unlikely—there was a little more to him than she thought. She didn't know whether that upset her or intrigued her. Maybe both. Did she even want to know more about him?
Harry and Ron's gut reaction phrase, "He's evil," was equally as shallow. He was a person, still quite young, and he hadn't committed any real atrocities yet. He wasn't a monster like Voldemort, or many of those who served him. But…there was a darkness in him. He had grown up in a world that she didn't even know existed until six years ago, and the part of it he lived in not only tolerated darkness, it thrived on it. He was just doing what he had learned to do. That didn't exactly excuse his behavior—but it did complicate things.
And then there were the events that had transgressed just a few hours ago. He had saved her life. Why? Even though he was in her debt, he could have easily let her die. He actually went out of his way to save her—even though she was the type of person that his family had been telling him was worthless for the past seventeen years.
She couldn't properly wrap her head around it. Perhaps she was afraid if she did, she would realize something about him she didn't want to. She went back to concentrating on the diary.
000
Draco Malfoy was obsessed.
He had always been, he realized, but he wasn't sure exactly what that meant. Granger was deeply absorbed in the Black diary. He was next to her again—out of necessity of course—and his hand was resting on the diary in her lap.
He watched her critically. He was used to staring into the back of that bushy brown head in every class he shared with her. He hated her—or he thought he did. He didn't really have words for it. He had wasted a lot of his time over the years thinking about her. He had always assumed it was because he hated her—the way one constantly dwells upon their mortal enemies and their blood boils because of it—but lately he suspected it was something else.
It wasn't hate exactly—and it certainly couldn't be anything else—it was just—there. And it wasn't even on purpose. Her face just…popped into his head. There weren't any emotions at all attached to her face in his mind—not as far as he could tell. Except hatred. (And maybe jealousy, but that didn't make sense either. He had everything and she had nothing. She was nothing, wasn't she?)
When his father railed off about Mudbloods—Granger popped into his head. His failing grades first and second year were obviously Granger's fault. He saw her hand waving frantically in his head every time he thought about class. He watched Muggles flailing in the air during the Quidditch World Cup—and there was Granger, the first thing to pop into his head. Granger. Granger. Granger. It was enough to drive him slowly insane.
Unlike most people, who dove out of the way when he swaggered down the hall, Granger merely glared at him, arms folded defiantly. She wasn't intimidated by him in the least. Anyone else—even Weasley without the company of his better halves, showed him an appropriate amount of respect. It seemed she was always in his face, telling him off without the slightest inhibition. At first this had amused him greatly—she was just a worthless Mudblood after all—but he had been somewhat intimidated by her presence ever since that incident third year when she—well…his cheek stung for hours afterward. And Crabbe and Goyle had been standing right there. Right there next to him! And she still slapped him across the face!
He couldn't explain it at all. She noticed he was staring at her and raised an eyebrow quizzically. He quickly turned away and stared out the window of the train, watching as the English countryside whizzed past.
Why had he saved her life? It was an insane thing to do—the kind of self-righteous idiocy that he despised in people like Potter. He couldn't recall any conscious, coherent thought when he saw that she was in danger. He just…reacted. Did that mean his instincts were to save the Mudblood? That was just…insane. He was going insane.
Draco had always assumed Granger was filth, as he had been instructed his entire life, but he was quickly finding that assumptions were fleeting, unreliable things, and the more he looked to them for reassurance, the quicker they evaporated. He felt lost. He was sitting in a Muggle train compartment with Hermione Granger, a Mudblood, and supposedly one of his least favorite people, leaving behind everything that remotely resembled familiar territory.
Hermione wasn't like anyone else he knew. She knew things. When she glared out at him through those narrow brown eyes of her, he sometimes felt as though she was staring right through him. And he knew she wasn't reading his thoughts—she was reading him. Sizing him up, and probably deciding that she wasn't terribly impressed with what she saw. SHE WAS SUPPOSED TO BE IMPRESSED. Anyway, most girls in school did not have the capacity to do that. Pansy, for example, certainly didn't. And Draco was quite sure that she didn't fully comprehend just exactly what it was Draco was doing to elicit those doe-eyed looks of admiration for her—how dark it was, how monstrous.
And, he was quickly coming to the most unthinkable, horrible conclusion he had ever dared to imagine. Granger probably was probably aware of more of him right now than anyone else in the world, and she thought he was disgusting. That was quite unfortunate. He would indeed appreciate some goddamn assistance right now—but—not from her, dammit! She was the problem. She was a Mudblood. And she was stubborn. And annoying. And a stupid know-it-all. And her very existence went against everything his family had ever taught him. And she was annoying. Did he mention that already?
The entire thing was actually making him rather angry. The Mudblood had absolutely no place being inside his head, no matter what the circumstances. She had no right to judge him. She was probably judging him right now, that stupid bint.
000
Hermione almost dropped the diary. Malfoy had his hand on her thigh. He had just—put it there. Not low enough to qualify as a reassuring, androgynous reassurance pat (why the hell would Malfoy be doing that anyway?), but just barely high enough to qualify as a place a boy should not be touching you—at least not until you had been dating for awhile. His hand was not on the diary. It was on her leg.
That wasn't even the real problem. The problem was that his hand was causing intense warm shivers to dance across her skin, and that was simply not right. It was powerful, unfamiliar and extremely distracting. She squirmed, inhaling sharply.
She could have reacted to this in any number of ways, but instead she went ahead and rapped his knuckles with the journal like a crazed, ruler wielding Catholic school nun. Malfoy withdrew his hand and scowled like the spoiled child that he was, obviously not pleased. Hermione had the vague idea that as a privileged, wealthy son, he was used to getting things that he wanted, and now he looked distinctly miffed. But what the bloody hell did he want? Was this some kind of weird plan to mock her? Jackass.
She glared at him. "What are you doing?"
"Nothing," he replied in almost a pout, clutching his hand. "Why did you smack me?"
"Why were you touching me, you git?" she countered, incredulous.
"I was not," he said.
She opened her mouth in protest. "You were too."
"Was not."
"Were too—arg!" she frowned. "This is ridiculous! Don't touch me."
"You're always grabbing my hand," he pointed out indignantly. She thought he hated that.
"I need it to read the diary, you ponce!" she replied hotly. Ooh, he was so, infuriating. They both fell silent. Hermione was fuming. Malfoy looked moodily out the window. Oh where were Harry and Ron with that bloody food?
000
"That's Dark Magic, you know," said Draco, pointing towards the paper she was holding. One of Flamel's notes and its corresponding clues in the diary, it was covered in symbols and words that were all too familiar to Draco.
"It's not Dark Magic," she said stubbornly. "It's just…old magic."
"Of course Dark Magic is old," he said icily. "It's primitive and powerful. Why do you think the old families practice it? It's a status symbol—a pure form of magic that others aren't privileged to wield."
Granger looked irritated. "Oh, don't start with your Pureblooded nonsense," she snapped, but she looked uncertain for a fleeting second. He was right after all. Though not everything in the diary or the box was like it, that particular spell she was holding could easily qualify as Dark Magic.
"You should talk, Granger," he drawled, sneering. "What would your dear little friends say if they saw you practicing the Dark Arts?"
"I don't practice the Dark Arts," she said haughtily.
"Of course not," he smirked superiorly. She didn't, but he was having fun pressing her buttons. He searched his memory for something else that would annoy her. "I wouldn't be in this mess if it weren't that stupid house-elf," he said, grinning slyly.
"You're right," she said, temper flaring. "You'd probably be dead."
"Ouch, touched a sensitive spot there, Granger?" he sneered. "Oh, that's right—Hermione Granger, champion of repressed vermin everywhere." She looked livid and he continued, pressing his advantage. He didn't even know why he was still talking. It seemed like a very bad idea. "What was that stupid thing? Spew?"
"S-P-E-W," she hissed through gritted teeth. "And shut up. I wouldn't expect you to understand—or care about anyone other than yourself."
That he didn't like. That wasn't true. She didn't know him. She had no idea what he felt. She still had her…his own temper flared, and he started to lose his advantage in the direction of the conversation.
"You're just like Potter," he hissed. "You think you're better than everyone else—so obsessed with doing the right thing."
"Do you even know what the right thing is, Malfoy?" she said furiously. "Because I've never seen evidence that you've remotely explored the concept!"
"You don't know anything about me!"
"What's there to know? You're a selfish, spoiled brat, and you'd probably leave us right now if it wasn't for the Death Eaters after your blood—"
"At least I don't have to go running to my stupid little friends every time—"
"At least I have friends, what do you call those people you hang around with—"
"My friends are human at least," he retorted, matching her volume. "You run about with werewolves and half-breeds and house-elves and all other manner of low creatures. It's absolutely disgusting—"
That was it, he realized. It didn't matter how many times he called her Mudblood—the minute he insulted those she cared about, her patience broke. He knew this, because at that moment her hand was flying towards his face in a very familiar arch. He caught her hand deftly, a dull slapping noise resonating as his hand wrapped around her wrist. Years as a Seeker had vastly honed his reflexes. His only regret was that he had not been this prepared last time she had attempted—and succeeded—in slapping him across the face.
"You are disgusting," she said, her voice an angry hiss. He had not let go of her hand, predicting, perhaps rightly, that she might have another go at his face if he gave her the opportunity.
000
"I hate you," she said heatedly.
"I hate you," he countered, his voice equally as spiteful.
They stared at each other, both seething with anger, searching each other's faces for some sign of well—anything. A way to make sense of all this mess. His steely grey eyes bored into her brown ones. She glared back at him with equal intensity. For what seemed like eternity, neither of them moved. They sat in absolute silence, until Hermione felt that she might suffocate from the weight and intensity of the tension mounting between them.
And then, without warning, he leaned forward and kissed her. It wasn't just a peck on the cheek—it was the full on, open mouth, passionate abandon that Lavender giggled about incessantly in the dormitories, and his hands were cradling the back of her head, his fingers entwined in her hair. What the hell would possess him to do that? Demons? A gigantic brain tumor? Was he trying to prove something?
That wasn't the worst of it. Not only was he kissing her, but she was kissing him, with equal intensity, her hands gripping bunched handfuls of his shirt. She wasn't quite sure what part of her thought this was a good idea. But she knew that she was furious at his very existence, and the two of them seemed to have fallen into a pattern where they just started responding, automatically and intensely, to whatever the other one did. If he was going to argue with her than she was going to argue right back at him; if she was going to try to slap him across the face, then he was going to grab her hand; if she decided to curse him, he was probably going to curse her right back, and if he suddenly wanted to kiss her—well—
There they were.
She didn't even have time to ponder the madness of this situation, because it was—actually quite wonderful. Anything to relieve the monstrous weight of the hatred, or passion, or whatever the hell it was between them. He had an intensity that sent shivers through her—which made absolutely no sense, but there it was anyway.
Distantly, she heard something rattle in the hallway. They broke apart, gasping, as she shoved him away. She stared at the door, her eyes as wide as galleons. No one came in. Her gaze shifted to the floor, where it remained for the next few moments. After what seemed like hours—but was probably just minutes—Harry and Ron returned, their arms laden with candy bars.
"Look at this stuff," said Ron cheerily, as they both plopped back down on the bench. "Skittles. It's made out of rainbows. Crazy Muggles, eh?"
Hermione could have corrected him, but her voice no longer seemed to be functioning. She was still staring at the floor. Malfoy was staring out the window.
"I'm pretty sure it's just sugar, mate," offered Harry.
"Oh." Ron looked rather disappointed. He continued to explain the Muggle candy, which seemed to be the only food item they had purchased. Harry tossed a candy bar to Hermione, which she accepted numbly and began eating. Malfoy was still staring out the window, though she refused to look at him. A silent pact seemed to have passed between them. Perhaps, if they avoided making eye contact for the rest of their lives, they could forget the entire, traumatic incident that had just occurred.
She was fairly certain that she still hated him. He was still horrid, and mean, and selfish, and none of that would change with just one kiss. One horrible kiss, and it was an anomaly, and it would never, ever, ever happen again.
But, she reflected, it could be said that it was entirely his fault in the first place. After all—he had kissed her first. Her subsequent participation was entirely accidental. And the fact that she had enjoy—er—not entirely hated it…well—temporary insanity.
…right? Malfoy was going through a difficult time, losing his mother, and she—she was still upset over Ron. That was all.
It was going to be a long train ride.
000
AN: Thanks to all my reviewers! I hope you like the kiss, and it wasn't too rushed. There isn't going to be anymore kissing for a little while, so be patient…lol. Harkening back to Buffy, I was going for that Xander/Cordelia moment in season 2 where they're screaming at each other, there's lots of sexual tension, and them they start making out. I don't even know if it was replicable, but there you go. Mortal enemies…sexual tension…
Oh, man, there was a lot of introspection in this chapter, considering they sat on a train for nine pages, lol.
PS: Just because there is kissing doesn't mean they're madly in love. Or in love at all. They're teenagers after all. Love is vastly more complicated. And involved. And it's going to evolve over time and various adventures. Right now they just sort of have high tension sexy hatred, which is my favorite part of their slowly evolving ship. Awesome.
They're going to a Pub/Inn thing next chapter. Just out of curiosity:
1. There should be vampires, just sitting around.
2. Absolutely no vampires. Ugh. I hate ff vampires.
3. There should be vampires, and they should get into a minor scuffle with them.