They spent hours practicing, for Draco to only produce a small amount of wispy smoke. He threw his wand across the stone room, muttering under his breath.

"This is normal." Hermione reassured. "Most people take at least three or four training sessions to get their patronus fully formed." Hermione added, picking up his wand and handing it back to him.

"Maybe it's my memory, maybe it's not happy enough." Draco whispered, clearly embarrassed by this thought.

"Let's try again tomorrow after classes." Hermione answered, trying to lead him out. Draco nodded and they walked out the large door they once came through. They parted ways and headed to their chambers, both with plenty on their minds.

Hermione was trying not to think about her conversation with Ron. She was almost sure Ginny had something to do with his sudden change. There was zero chance that Ron suddenly faced his emotions on his own, as backwards as those emotions might be. Him not knowing why their relationship fell apart was absurd but also not surprising. Ron was one step below oblivious, it was almost like he purposely didn't notice or understand things. She didn't like the way the conversation went, but she also wasn't going to continue to bend to him. She knew that this was the first conversation of many, and she needed to set her boundaries. She let her mind wander to a multitude of other things, including but not limited to her feelings for Draco as she fell asleep. She woke two hours later covered in sweat, fear lingered in her eyes from the nightmare that woke her.

Draco wasn't sure which part was more infuriating, the fact that Weaslebee screams at everyone for seemingly no real reason, or the fact that he still has the ability to show up unannounced and pull Hermione's heart strings. He knew he couldn't be mad at her for caring, but that didn't mean it didn't sting just a little bit. For a split second he could understand the rage Weaslebee was exhibiting, the raw jealousy and the blinding pain. That being said, he still thought his behavior was unacceptable. He also couldn't stop thinking about his inability to produce a patronus. He knew it wasn't the complexity of the spell, it was his memory. He didn't have many happy memories to begin with, nonetheless a happy enough memory to take on a full patronus form. He was thinking about when Blaise asked him to be the godfather, but it clearly wasn't happy enough. The only other happy memory he could think of was his night with Hermione, but he felt kind of uncomfortable using something like that to perform a spell. He let his mind search for happy memories as he drifted off the sleep, only to awake two hours later drenched in fear and sweat.

Hermione and Draco both took showers and headed out to the castle grounds, book in hand. It seemed they had the same coping mechanism when it came to their nightmares. They both took to the grounds, coming from different directions but heading directly towards each other. Draco saw the other first, and for a split second he wondered if he should leave her be, but he decided against it. She had not looked up and seen him, so she continued to her spot under the big tree and sat down with her book. Draco walked up softly, watching her read a page or two.

"Nightmare?" He asked, joining her on the ground.

"Yea, you?"

"Yea…" He responded dryly, opening his own book and leaning back on the tree."Do you have them every night?"

"Mostly yea, though I didn't have any the past two…" Hermione answered slowly, eyes still on her book.

"Yea…me either." Draco said, and Hermione peeked over her book to look at him.

"Maybe we were just too exhausted to have them?" Hermione offered her opinion, knowing full well it was wrong.

"Or maybe…" Draco started, slipping his arm around her waist. "...it was the company." He kissed her lightly, but she grabbed his face and kissed him again more firmly.

"Too bad we can't have that company on campus…" She said thoughtfully.

"Why can't we?" He asked earnestly.

"Because we are teachers and heads of our houses." Hermione answered dumbly, shocked he didn't think of that.

"McGonagall already knows we are together and doesn't seem too concerned…as long as the students don't see anything, I don't reckon it would matter much." Draco explained, his free hand batting away a stray hair on her head.

"I guess you're right…" Hermione sounded unconvinced.

"So your chambers or mine?" Draco asked, standing up with his arm out to help her up.

"Alternate?" She asked, using his arm as leverage to stand.

"Yes ma'am." He said lightly and she shoved him playfully.

They made their way back to the castle and to Hermione's chambers, which they wordlessly decided on their walk back. They crawled into bed, wrapped their bodies with each other and fell asleep. They both slept perfectly, only waking when it was time to. They took turns taking showers and Draco kissed her on her forehead before heading towards her chambers door but Hermione stopped him by grabbing his hand. She held up her finger to signal him to wait and ruffled through her belongings for a long minute before pulling out an old ratty parchment.

"I solemnly swear that I am up to no good" She muttered. "Okay you are clear, nobody is in that hall at all." She said, folding parchment up neatly and muttering "Mischief Managed."

"How could you possibly know that?" Draco asked, his suspicions high. "And what the bloody hell is that thing?

"Oh it's the Marauder's Map." She exclaimed, handing him what looked like a blank parchment. "Say the phrase I said before and tap your wand to the middle of the parchment." She directed.

"I solemnly swear that I am up to no good." He said tonelessly, tapping his wand on the parchment like she instructed. His eyes lit up when he saw the parchment changed from blank to a map. He pulled it open and saw it show the inner workings of the castle and who was walking where. "This is brilliant, where did you get this?"

"Harry gave it to me, I wasn't planning on using it, as I still think it's quite irresponsible." Hermione answered tersely, sounding just like the goody two shoes he knew she was.

"How is a map irresponsable?" He asked, chuckling lightly.

"Because it really can be used for bad very easily."

"So can most things." He said lightly, and she nodded rather reluctantly. "Who made this anyway? How did Potter have it?"

"Lupin, -"

"As in Professor Lupin?" Draco's shock could not be hidden.

"Yes." She chuckled. "Moony - Lupin, Wormtail - Pettigrew, Padfoot - Sirius and Prongs - James Potter." Hermione explained, pointing to each name as she said them.

"Wait, hold on." Draco said, sitting on her bed bewildered. "Okay Moony makes sense, he was a werewolf. Even Padfoot, Sirius was that big black dog…Pettigrew and James Potter…as in Potter's dad?" Draco was reeling, his brain working overtime.

"Pettigrew was an animagus who turned into a rat, and yes Harry's dad, he was also an animagus who turned into a stag." Hermione explained, joining him on the edge of the bed.

"And they were all friends?" He asked and she nodded. "So that's how you got this, it was passed on to Harry?"

"Well no…" Hermione started and knew Draco needed her to explain more. "Fred and George swiped it from Filch's office and had it for years, they gave it to Harry in our third year."

"And Potter didn't even know it was his father's creation?" He asked and Hermione shook her head. "That must have been rough." Hermione pulled him into a surprisingly forceful kiss. "What was that for?" He asked, smiling widely.

"Nothing…now go!" She ordered and he pecked her on the cheek before sprinting out of her chambers.

They met again in the great hall for breakfast, making sure to greet each other normally. They parted ways and went about their days. Draco gave Nott yet another detention, this time for purposely aiming a jinx at another student. As much as Draco wanted to scare this kid into changing, he was growing tired of the never ending detentions. He knew today was probably the day that Nott would discover his pureblood line was not pure, and he knew it would cause a slew of problems for him. Nonetheless, he got through his work day and met Nott in his chambers directly after dinner.

"Mr Nott, on time for a change I see." Draco greeted, swiftly shutting the door behind him.

"What is this?" Nott asked angrily, pointing at a section of the massive family tree book.

"That's your great great grandparents." Draco answered evenly.

"But he's a muggle!" Nott shouted.

"That's right."

"Well that's obviously a lie!" The boy was filled with rage and embarrassment.

"These books don't lie." Draco answered evenly.

"I'm a pureblood." He said defiantly.

"To right you are."

"Which means this is a lie!" He spat, shutting the book aggressively.

"There is not one single pureblood line that is completely pure Mr Nott. That is why blood superiority is not only not a real thing, but is not allowed in my house." Draco's tone wasn't aggressive, but it wasn't friendly either.

"I'm going to ask my father about this!" Nott spat, similarly to how Draco himself used to.

"Go right ahead, you're free to go Nott." Draco said tersely, and the boy looked shocked.

"But detention didn't even start yet…"

"You're free to go, unless you want to stay."

"No, I'll go!" The boy responded quickly, Draco fought the urge to laugh.

Draco didn't see any reason to hold Nott in detention after he already made the discovery that the detention was intended for. He knew the likelihood of this all backfiring on him was extremely high, so let the boy run to his daddy sooner rather than later. He started walking aimlessly, when he realized he was close to the greenhouses. He saw Neville setting up what had to be a complicated lesson on gilly weed, seeing as he had more gillyweed than Draco could have ever imagined.

"Hey Longbottom, you going swimming?" Draco asked with a laugh.

"Something like that…" Neville answered, seeming a bit distracted. "I'm not allowed to use the lake…"

"You mean Minerva won't let you have students swim in the lake full of sea monsters?" Draco asked, mocking a bit.

"It would be such a good lesson!" He said stubbornly.

"There has to be a spell for a large body of water…" Draco pondered.

"Not that I know of…anyway, what's up?"

"Well I'd bet that in a day's time I'll be in major trouble."

"Why's that?"

"Nott stumbled upon his not so pure lineage today." Draco said and Neville got noticeably nervous.

"Well it's been nice working with you mate!" Neville said with a laugh, patting Draco on the back.

"Yea yea, I did have kind of a personal question for you."

"Shoot."

"Do you know how to produce a patronus?" Draco asked awkwardly.

"Er yea I do, Harry taught me back in sixth year." Neville answered, clearly not sure where this was going.

"Hermione is trying to teach me, I don't think my memory is happy enough." Draco said softly, clearly not comfortable admitting this.

"Which is understandable, you've been through a lot of not happy things." Neville said encouragingly. "My best advice is whatever gets you through those bad things normally should be what you think about. It doesn't have to be a specific memory, like you won the house cup or something, it just has to be something that gives you hope. Whether that is a person, place or thing is entirely dependent on the person." Neville explained, and Draco nodded.

"Thanks." Draco said gratefully.

"Where are you practicing? The room of requirement?" Neville asked but then his face lit up. "That's it! Sorry mate, I've got to go! Goodluck!" Neville called as he ran towards the castle.

Draco made his way to the room of requirement, knowing Hermione was in there waiting for him. He thought he knew what Neville meant, something that gives him hope…the only thing that gives him hope is a person…Hermione.