1Chapter One
Hermione Granger sat in her brown leather beanbag chair watching her enemy sleep away on the couch. Why had she let him in? Why hadn't she left him outside in the rain where he belonged?
She had let him in without thinking, without even realizing who he was. Perhaps that was her Healer instinct to help anybody in need, despite how much you dislike them. Since she was studying to become a Healer, she had done the only thing she could think of: She had bandaged the wounds on his chest, head, and arms, not daring to remove his pants. She glared over the top of the romance novel she held in her grasp as Draco turned on the sofa.
Laying there like that, he almost seemed...human. Hermione let her gaze wander over Draco's body. She had had to cut away his shirt, leaving a well-toned chest and tight, touch-me abs exposed. His long blonde hair fell over his sleeping face–and, oh, what a face!–making him look almost angelic. Angelic. Ha! He is no angel, she thought to herself.
Hermione knew what he had done two nights ago. Was he here to kill her as well? He had taken the most beloved and respected man she had ever known away from her forever, and she held a feeling of hatred so deep, she could think of nothing else. But if she was going to kill him, she wanted him conscious enough to know what she was doing.
Checking once more that Draco was indeed still alive, Hermione went upstairs and fell asleep, but only after locking her bedroom door with three different spells.
It was another three days of tossing and turning and falling in and out of consciousness before Hermione saw Draco open his eyes. She watched him lay there on the couch as he took in his surroundings. Coming out of the kitchen, she stopped dead in front of him on the sofa and crossed her arms over her chest.
"You'd better have a pretty damn good excuse as to why you're here, Malfoy," she said, tapping her foot on the oak floor. "Well? I'm waiting for an answer."
"Is that my name? 'Malfoy'? That's a strange name, don't you think?" He looked at Hermione with such a strange look in his eye.
"What do you mean? Do you not know who you are?" Now she was growing impatient with him.
"No. I know nothing before now. Please tell me you know who I am." Draco continued to stare at her, looking genuinely confused.
Groaning, Hermione joined Draco on the couch. Looking at him, she replied,"Your name is Draco Malfoy. I don't know your middle name, or if you even have one, seeing as we were never that close to one another. You just finished your sixth year at Hogwarts. Hogwarts is a school for special students, students who retain certain abilities."
"What kind of abilities? And why weren't we ever close? You're beautiful. Do you know that?" This made Hermione blush as no one had ever told her she was beautiful before. Pretty, yes. That she looked good, yes. But never that she was beautiful.
"Abilities such as magic. Real magic. You're a wizard, and there were circumstances that never allowed us to get close. You and your family thought you were better than people like me. You came from a long line of pureblooded wizards, and I came from mortal parents, making me a muggleborn, or in your eyes, a mudblood. A mudblood is someone of dirty blood." Hermione forced herself not to cry. Perhaps, just perhaps, if Malfoy was telling the truth, and he really did have amnesia like he claimed, she could find out if there was any ounce of goodness left in him to rescue.
"Bloodlines shouldn't matter. A mixed breed of dog isn't any less than a purebred dog. Maybe in a breeders eyes, but in the eyes of an average, kind person, it shouldn't." Hermione felt Draco lay a hand on her arm as one single tear slipped passed her no-tear barrier and rolled down her cheek.
"I need to run into town. I'll see about getting something to help restore your memory. And some clothes."
With that, Hermione rose from the sofa and left the house, grabbing her purse and wand on her way out the door. Once outside, Hermione apparated to Diagon Alley where she could bury herself in a butterbeer.
