Hello lovelies!
I don't think I can coherently express how happy I am that this story is going as I planned, and the Dramione is being ushered in how I wanted. So happy. Thank you for sticking with me whilst I do so. Just thank you.
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Disclaimer: Harry Potter belongs to J.K. Rowling, and only the story line and any OC's belong to me.
Wednesday, September 1st, 1976
The compartment rattled slightly as the train began to roll forward, beginning its journey to Scotland.
Hermione Potter was half out the window, waving at her parents until they were but specks in the distance—it was getting increasingly more difficult to pry herself from her parents' embrace every time she had to leave them, burdened with the knowledge that their time together was a precious, limited commodity.
She slid back inside, and was easily caught by Draco who helped her right herself—she shot him a small smile in gratitude and then focused her attention on the other occupants of the compartment.
Remus was yawning, rubbing a hand through his short, sandy blond locks—his Mother had clearly given him a haircut sometime in the last couple weeks (he'd left a couple days before Sirius to spend part of his summer with his parents).
Hermione smiled fondly, kicking off her slip on shoes and placing her feet in Remus's lap—the werewolf smiled gently at her before he laid his head back, obviously intending to get some sleep.
Sirius was beside Remus, arms crossed over his chest, his eyes glazed over as if lost in thought—his thumb subtlety rubbing his left forearm where his nasty scar still lay.
Sirius woke up—briefly—a few hours after Riley had arrived at St. Mungo's: when the Healers were finished tending to him, one of them told the anxious Potters that it was a wonder that he'd managed to survive. It dawned on Hermione in that moment that the Pack bond might have been what saved his life, but she'd kept her mouth clamped shut aside from thanking the Healer.
When Sirius was informed that he'd have to be sequestered to a bed for the remainder of his summer, his face twisted into a severely sour expression, but in actuality he was still shaken up and scared out of his mind.
When he saw Riley he began to relax, but after a few moments his eyes flooded with fear and he raspily told her that he was poison, and that he was no good for her before the sleeping draught kicked in and knocked him out.
Hermione was about to ask him if he was okay when James and Peter slid open the compartment door and joined them: Peter slipped in beside Sirius with a small bag of sweets and James closed the door and then fell onto the seat beside Draco—ruffling his brother's hair before asking Peter for one of his sweets.
Then, like a child bouncing and oozing joy on Christmas morning, James asked excitedly, "Wormtail, did you get yours?"
Hermione groaned, throwing up silencing charms: she knew exactly where this was going. She froze however, something wasn't quite right, she sniffed the air, everything seemed the same.
Peter had just popped a chocolate curl into his mouth when James asked his question, and his brow drew together instantly in tight confusion.
"James," Remus said, his head raising up as he looked at Wormtail with a deep frown of his own.
Hermione removed her legs from Remus's lap, and instead leant forward to clasp his hand, Draco stood up and looked to his Alpha, feeling the hurt rumbling in his soul, and detested that he had no idea about what he could do to stop it.
"Stop playing around, Wormtail," Sirius said irritably. "We're not in public—we kind of freaked out when we first saw our scars too."
"Sirius, I have no idea what you're talking about," Peter replied, scrunching up his nose before he popped another chocolate into his mouth.
The chocolate made a crunchy, sort of popping sound as Peter chewed it—the sound was the only thing filling the compartment until Remus quietly said, "he isn't a part of the pack, Padfoot."
Sirius barked out a disbelieving laugh, head turning to look at Remus, but the laughter died in his throat once he saw Remus's crestfallen expression. "What do you mean?"
"Of course I'm part of the pack," Wormtail said in an affronted tone of voice, exposing his slightly chocolate covered teeth in the process.
"You're our best mate, Pete," Draco said carefully, taking a step closer to Remus and Hermione, "but you aren't pack."
"Knock it off, Draco," James snarled, standing up, walking over to his brother and staring him dead in the eye.
"He doesn't have the mark—" Draco started.
"Bollocks, of course he does—" James said, half turning to look at Peter, whose fists were clenched as he looked between all of them in confusion.
"What mark do you keep bloody going on about?" Peter asked in enraged befuddlement, hands moving to clutch his bag of sweets tightly.
"He doesn't have it—"
"Because he didn't fully accept himself as part of the pack, not really," Hermione interjected and finished for Draco.
Draco's mouth parted, and he worked his jaw in silence for a few moments before he added, grey eyes drowning in sorrow, "so when the pack bond sealed…it didn't include Pete. It's the only thing that makes any sense."
The tension was so dense that everyone had to hold their breath for what seemed to be an eternity.
Peter clenched his sweets tighter, tighter, tighter, the bag crinkling loudly. "I'm going to go find Kira and the others," he announced bitterly before he jumped up, magic crackling around him as he threw open the door and left.
Leaving the rest of them in an uncomfortable state as they had no idea what to do about their best mate, and why the pack bond hadn't extended to him.
That evening, at their first feast back at Hogwarts for the school year, Hermione couldn't help but notice that James kept glancing over at Lily—whose crimson hair was longer and prettier than ever—as the redhead gaily laughed with the other Gryffindor girls.
Besides that particular nugget, the feast was a blur, Hermione certainly wasn't paying attention during Dumbledore's speech, and she halfheartedly clapped whenever a first year was sorted into their respective house.
The Marauders were all uncharacteristically quiet: none of them said much of anything, their words had been stolen away, and anything they might have said would be to Peter. Except they couldn't because Peter was sandwiched between Frank and Kira, and was firmly not looking in their direction.
Hermione plastered on a smile when the other girls and her were alone in their room, unpacking their things—Lily figured out that something was amiss, but Hermione shook her head sadly and mimed that she was fine.
The other Gryffindor girls wanted to chat and catch up on their summers, but Hermione's heart just wasn't in it so she politely excused herself, grabbed her broom and swiftly departed.
The turn of the seasons was made apparent by the night air, which had a chilly tinge to it that nipped at her skin when she sprinted out of the Castle, furiously running in the direction of the Quidditch Pitch.
When she arrived, the fulling moon shone its bright light onto the pitch, illuminating the expanse of lush grass that was shaded a darker hue of green because of the all consuming darkness of the night.
Hermione halted abruptly—panting, and she straightened up, her vision blurring out of focus, and after inhaling deeply she let out a vociferous scream that bounced around the pitch until it died somewhere in the stands.
"Feel better?" A voice called from the stands, the figure half obscured in shadow, the lit end of their fag aglow and burning red.
"What are you doing here?" Hermione inquired, squinting as she walked towards the messy haired boy.
"Same as you, I suspect," Draco replied, tapping some of the ashes off the end of his fag.
Hermione swung her leg over her broom, kicking off the ground before flying over to Draco, smoothly sliding off her broom and gracefully landing beside him.
She heavily plopped down beside him, bumping her shoulder against his and asked, "what's on your mind?"
Draco snorted in amusement, running a hand backwards through his hair, and Hermione was suddenly very aware of the fact that Draco's thigh was pressed against hers and heat was spreading wildly across her skin through the thin fabric of her trousers.
"Time just keeps slipping through my fingers," Draco replied after some time.
"And it's like desperately trying to grasp onto grains of sand—a futile exercise that leaves you more frustrated and dissatisfied than anything," Hermione supplied, tucking her hair behind her ears as she looked at him, getting lost in the almost intoxicating intensity of his gaze, it drew her closer, and she slid her hand onto his forearm—his free hand instinctively covering hers.
They sat in silence like that for a while: Hermione and Draco both turning to face forwards and enjoy the peaceful evening.
Hermione found her gaze kept getting drawn back to Draco's side profile, the breeze tousling his hair, the smoke lazily billowing from his lips as he exhaled, his angular features.
"What?" Draco asked suddenly, eyes still fixed somewhere in the distance.
Hermione adamantly shook her head, "it's nothing."
"You sure?" Draco's head pivoted in her direction, his face exceptionally close.
Hermione was drowning in him, drowning in the fresh scent of mint, in his smoky eyes that were currently flecked with silver and dazzling blue, just him; with a shaky intake of breath she nodded her head, knowing full well that he could hear her galloping heartbeat.
She stood up abruptly, her limbs moving jerkily as she stepped away from him, "I ought to go."
Draco raised an eyebrow at her, blowing out a steady stream of smoke as he gazed up at her, "you okay?"
"Never better," Hermione smiled tightly, awkwardly patting his head before twisting around and hastily retreating—her heart in her throat.
Hermione snuck back into the Castle, winking conspiratally at Peeves when he spotted her—the Poltergeist giggled before disappearing through the wall and causing havoc in the opposite direction of her path back to the Gryffindor Tower.
Twenty minutes later she'd successfully reached her dormitory: all the other girls were slumbering away, bundled under their blankets—some curtains were open and some were closed—and Hermione smiled gently, time may be slipping away, but she had them here, she had them all now.
Hermione bent-double to remove her shoes, holding her broom in one hand and holding them in the other, padding over to her trunk and placing all the items neatly on the top.
She went through the motions of getting ready for bed, her mind an even bigger mess of overbearing thoughts and feelings now than it had been before seeing Draco.
She crawled into bed, settling herself under her sheets—hissing at how cold they were—and she laid there, awake, thinking. Hermione wished she could shut off her mind, but every time she closed her eyes she saw the swirling silver mist trapped in Draco's eyes.
So there she lay, thinking. Just thinking.