It had been 2 days since she had returned from seeing Ron. She was becoming more aware as the day went on that tonight was the night that he would come to her. She would allow it, she would go through with it willingly to save her self and, reluctantly, him, but she wouldn't like it. She resigned herself to the idea that it was like any other physical activity that she had to do but didn't like. She reminded herself of doing PE in primary school, always trying to sit out, but being forced to participate regardless. She would always willingly do it, but her reluctance, in her mind, was always clear.
After the evening meal, she tried to study in the common room for a while, without much success, before taking a shower and going to bed. She remembered what she had said about wearing no pants, so she kicked them off before curling up under the covers
Sleep eluded her as she waited for him to come into her room. It would be painful, it would be traumatic but the lingering feeling of lethargy and useless magic should go away. If it didn't, then they wouldn't have to do it again.
She knew, somehow she knew it would work. She had read all the books that she could find, all the books that McGonagall had given her plus books that Malfoy had arranged his House Elf to bring to him. It was those very books where Bellatrix had most likely learnt of the curse that she inflicted upon them both and it was those books that outlined the facts, as plain as day.
Hermione and Malfoy would have to seal their bond through marriage and remain married to have any kind of long term relief. Sex would give them brief periods of relief but over time, the frequency of their need to satisfy the bond would increase until it forced them to marry and seal the bond.
Normally, bonds were acts of fate, drawing people together, tugging at their innate desire to recognise their bond, to consummate their bond and ultimately, to marry out of love and fulfil the bonds ultimate plan. This curse, this horrid thing that had been done to Hermione, overlooked that one part that was usually a driving force for bonds: desire.
She woke in the morning, not having received a visit from Malfoy. She dressed quickly and avoided everyone as she hurried to breakfast. A very small part of her had the hide to feel rejected, as though they had made plans and didn't follow through.
Across the hall Malfoy looked a mess. She hadn't actually seen him look so bad, normally he was OK in her presence, perhaps he stayed somewhere else. Perhaps he couldn't bring himself to sully with a mudblood. The thought made her skin crawl.
That night again, she slept without her pants, for practicality reasons, however, as much as she worked herself up for it, he didn't come.
Not did he come the following night.
She was beginning to worry and began to feel the effects of the curse worsening, the longer this was put off. By the following day, she could barely drag herself out of bed. She knew somehow that he wasn't staying there. That he hadn't slept on the other side of the wall. She headed for the hospital wing to have an extra dose of potion, to have something to give her the strength to carry on through the day, however she stopped in her tracks when she saw Narcissa Malfoy talking with Madame Pomphrey and Malfoy laying in a bed nearby.
The moment was awkward, Malfoy was unconscious and his mother was hurriedly whispering to the witch at her side, however, as soon as she entered, the conversation stopped and Narcissa returned to her sons bedside
"Can I help you today Miss Granger?
"Uh yes, I was hoping for another potion" she said quietly.
"I, uh I'm sorry, you've exceeded your allowed dose already" she said, looking at a piece of parchment inside a clipboard marked HG DM. Subtle, she thought.
"What can you give me then? What answers do you have?" Hermione demanded.
"I'm sorry, I have no new information"
Hermione ran her hand through her messy hair and came up with only one solution.
"Admit me then. I need to stay here" she said, looking towards Malfoy.
"That is probably not wise"
"Wise? Is wise is allowing me to stumble around the castle without magic? Is wise having me wait till you have a curse breaker who is intelligent enough to put me out of my misery? Is wise making me want to die just so I don't have to go through... She looked to Malfoy who was now sitting up talking quietly to his mother... Never mind" she said.
She was about to leave when Narcissa placed her hand in her shoulder.
"Miss Granger, I'd like it if you stayed" she said. Looking from Malfoy to her and back again.
Hermione looked to Madame Pomphrey who simply nodded in resignation and directed her to a bed beside Malfoy's, separated by a thin curtain. Sure as hell, she started feeling better once she was in his proximity again.
"May I speak with you?" Narcissa asked. Hermione couldn't think of why not. It was clear that she knew, at least on some level what was going on.
"I'd like to apologise to you my dear. You shouldn't be going through this, it shouldn't be your burden to bear" she said.
"Nor is it yours. With all due respect, assuming you're aware of the situation, your sister was deranged. To do this to her own Nephew... Your son and I have never seen eye to eye but he doesn't deserve this" she said, indicating towards the thin partition.
"That is very kind of you to say. Please, if there is anything I can do, reparations, anything..." Narcissa said.
"Honestly, there is no need. I have been well compensated for my efforts last year, I just want to get through this, find a way to get past it and move on" she said.
"Well, the offer is there. You're a very beautiful bright young lady, Miss Granger" Narcissa said, placing her hand on Hermione cheek. It felt oddly soothing and she realised it was a motherly trait, one she hadn't experienced in so long.
Sure, molly was great. She doted on her kids and provided for them, cared for them day and night but she never really took to Hermione after 4th year when Rita Skeeter wrote those articles about Hermione.
"Thank you" Hermione said as the older witch walked away.
She laid down in the bed listening to Malfoy and his mother having an attempted hushed conversation. He was clearly feeling much better and his mother was admonishing him for trying to do this without being in her proximity. Mostly he apologised to his mother, telling her she as right, being the true pure blood son that he should be.
She knew it was all a farce though. As soon as his mother would leave he'd follow her out the door and find another place to wallow and let himself fall apart.
She started at the ceiling for the longest time, taking in the silence, revelling in how good it felt to feel mostly OK. As the hours ticked by, She felt her magic expand through her very skin, warming her from the inside out. She hated that it was him, she hated that there was one solution. She hated that he hated it.
"Looks you're both feeling much better" Narcissa said.
"Just proves that this isn't some joke" she said sadly.
"They told you... The next logical step?" Narcissa asked sadly, looking around awkwardly.
Hermione nodded.
"I'm willing to try. It's not that your son isn't attractive, we just have a history, as you're probably aware and it makes it all the more difficult to fathom" she said.
"I can't imagine. My sister was cruel and inhumane. To do this to children..." she said.
"I'd like to think that we can be adult about it. We're both intelligent logical thinking people. If it has to be done to keep us both alive then it has to be done" Hermione said knowing damn well that Malfoy was on the other side of the curtain listening in.
"You are a much braver woman than I" Narcissa said.
"Thank you, Mrs Malfoy. I must say, you're certainly not what I have come to expect from a Malfoy" Hermione said.
Narcissa smiled and looked to her son and back to Hermione. "I never really was. Not completely. Besides, under any other circumstances I'd welcome a bond between yourself and my troubled son" she said, offering Hermione a smile and her son a worried glance, before slipping out of the room.
After a while, Hermione felt healthy enough to go back to the dorms, hoping that Malfoy would feel the same. She needed to take control here, put her foot down.
She peered behind the curtain and saw Malfoy laying in his back with his hands linked under his head, staring at the ceiling.
"I'm leaving now, in case you wanted to leave as well. It's past evening meal so I'll go to the dorm" she said, rambling slightly. She had to come out and say what needed to be said. "Come to my room at 10pm. If you're not there by 10 past 10, I'll go to you" she said, noticing his sigh of resignation before she turned and left.
She spent some time, while she still felt well, fixing her room up and, with her magic in tact, she carved out a two way door between their rooms. This way, no one would see, no one would know. It could remain their secret.
She knew he must have returned to his room because she didn't return to the lifeless lethargic almost muggles that she left she had become in recent days.
At 9:55, she heard a tap on the door on her side and she jumped up, almost too quickly, and opened it.
"You're early" she said, noticing that he had dark circles under his eyes, his hair was dull and he had lost about a stone. She also noticed that he was wearing plain grey pyjama pants and a cotton shirt, something very unlike what she thought he'd slep in. She had imagined he'd sleep in satin or silk, or more likely, nothing at all.
"Are you going to stare at me or are you going to let me in?" he asked.
"So polite Malfoy, anyone would think you're here for a cup of tea" she said.
"Can we just... Not talk?" he asked his face pained.
"uh, sure... I guess" she said, shakily removing her jumper, but too nervous to do anything else.
She was all confidence earlier, determined to make this happen to see if it worked, but now that he was standing in front of her and it was actually going to happen, she was frozen in place.
He looked from her to the bed and back to her, and she caught the sign. Her feet caught up and she took the few steps to the bed, laying in the middle with her feet pressed together.
He stepped to the edge of the bed and she looked away as he removed his pants. She realised she still had hers in as he climbed on the bed and she hastily removed them and tossed them to the side.
"I'll cast a lubrication spell" he said in monotone. She just nodded.
She felt wetness spread between her thighs and when his hand touched her, she jolted.
"I thought you said you were OK to do this?" he asked.
"I was... I am..." she said as she parted her legs for him to settle there.
She couldn't bring herself to look at him, instead focusing on a picture that hung on her wall. She felt his hand make its way between them to position himself and when his warmth touched her entrance she hesitated.
"Go slow, OK? " she said.
He stopped what he was doing and looked to her face for the first time since arriving, forcing her to look back at him.
"Are you..." he began, but she shook her head violently.
"That's what I was doing the other night... Rectifying the problem" she said.
"it's not a problem" he muttered as he repositioned and pressed slowly against her.
She winced as she felt him slide into her. He went slow but it was still very painful. Betraying tears sprung from her eyes and she quickly wiped them away as he sunk deeper into her.
"Fuck... Merlin.. I uh... Sorry" he said as he came to a halt, buried to the hilt. She shook her head, unable to formulate words to tell him not to bother apologising.
He began to move and she could hear him hissing through his teeth. She supposed it was anger, disgust or annoyance.
The pain was now tolerable and she was grateful that he was going slow. She didn't know what to expect, how long this would last.
"Fuck" he hissed through his teeth as he started to build in speed and pace.
"Sorry" she muttered, causing him to stop.
"You haven't done anything wrong" he said.
"Why the curse words then?" she asked.
"You really are inexperienced" he said.
"I'm sorry Malfoy, sex wasn't high on my agenda while I was out trying to kill Voldemort" she said.
"The cursing is... It's a good thing. It means that it feels good... For me at least" he said, shocking her into silence. She thought he'd be disgusted, mortified.
He reached his hand down and took her knee, pulling her leg up so he could get a different angle it felt deeper and she realised, with another hiss between his teeth that he was actually liking this.
With the new angle, she could feel him pressing against parts of her she didn't know existed. It was almost good, almost felt pleasurable. Still, her head was fighting with her body, telling her to zone out to just get this over and done with so they could both feel better and get on with things.
When she heard a groan escape him, accompanied by a few quick sharp thrusts, she knew it was over and she felt relieved. She laid still while he caught his breath with his forehead pressed firmly against her shoulder. She wondered what the formality for this was.
Once he had recovered and caught his breath, he withdrew from her causing her to wince. He rolled over gracefully and recovered his pants from the floor, putting them on while she pulled the covers over bare legs. If she thought the lead up to this was awkward, it was nothing compared to how she felt now.
She watched as he hesitated, turned to face her, nodded once then left through the doorway between their rooms.
Once he was gone, she allowed herself to feel all the emotions she had been feeling, all the fear, frustration and rage that she had been holding back for months. It was like a floodgate had opened and she curled up into a ball under the covers and cried herself to sleep.
The next morning shone bright and glorious, as though a haze had been lifted from her eyes. She stretched her arms and kegs out and realised that her joints didn't hurt anymore and her muscles felt relaxed instead of tense.
She got up, showered and dressed before making her way down to breakfast, feeling better than she had in months.
She practically skipped through the doors to the great hall and sat down with her friends. It was nice to sit and listen to their conversations and actually hear what they were saying. No one mentioned anything, she thought that the topic of her health had become something that people around her just avoided. And in a way she was glad.
When she looked over at the Slytherin table she saw that Malfoy appeared to be back to his regular self just as she was. His friends were all gathered around and once again, he was the centre of the Slytherin world.
She was happy for him. And she supposed happy for herself. She was still mortified beyond belief that she had to go to the extremes she did just to feel like herself again. Her body shivered when she thought about what they did... about his body pressing down on hers, about him, inside of her. She recalled the sound of his breath, the feel of his hair in her face... It wasn't disgust, just a general sense of embarrassment or complete mortification.
She froze when he caught her gaze, locking eyes, he clocked his head to the side just slightly and she nodded just a little. A strange non verbal way of letting each other know that it worked... It wasn't all for nothing.
She spent the next two weeks nose deep in books in the library. Between studying for NEWTS keeping up with Harry, writing to Ron, who didn't even acknowledge what happened between them, something she was grateful for, and researching the Enemy Bond Curse, she had very little time for anything else.
This meant she also had very little time to realise that she was starting to slip again, beginning to feel tired, weak, lethargic.
It was McGonagall who pulled her aside in advanced Transfiguration and asked her the questions she hadn't been hoping to answer.
She wanted to deny it, to deny that she slept with Malfoy in order to satisfy a stupid curse, but then it would put everything into question and the research might come to an end. She was frank and honest with McGonagall who thanked her for her candour and was pleased to find out that consent was mutual. When McGonagall advised that she saw signs of both of them slipping again, Hermione became anxious at the thought of sleeping with Malfoy again.
She wanted to put it off for as long as possible. It was clear that he was happy without having to be near her and she was more than satisfied without the need to be near him too.
However as the days rolled by, the intensity of the curse returned at full effect and they soon found themselves struggling to get out of bed in the mornings.
After almost exactly one month, Hermione wrote on a piece of parchment, 10pm and slipped it under their shared door. Somehow, deep down inside of her, she knew once wouldn't be enough, but when she was feeling great she clung onto hope that it could be. That the curse was different. That it wouldn't want their whole lives to be wrapped around each other.
At 10pm precisely, he knocked on her door and she opened it without looking at him. Without saying a word, she climbed into her bed and took her under pants off under her nightdress. She verbally cast a lubrication spell which was half effective and laid back waiting for him to begin.
He got into the bed beside her and she allowed him to manoeuvre on top of her and settle between her legs.
"Ready?" he asked quietly as he lined himself up with her entrance.
"Not particularly, but do I have a choice?" she said humourlessly.
"Yes, Granger you do have a choice. This isn't rape" he said, anger in his voice
"Merlin, I don't mean that. I just mean, I'm OK with this. I know from an intellectual stand point that it has to happen, I'd always just thought that my sex life would consist of passion and lust. Not this. Not sex to preserve life" she said sadly.
"I'm... I'm sorry that it's not like that. I sorry I'm not that, for you" he said, easing himself into her
"Don't tell me, Malfoy has a soul?" she asked, wincing at the burn of the intrusion.
"Let's just do this so we can get on with our lives and you don't have to speak to me for another month" he said, sliding himself in and out of her.
"Right. Or so you don't have to speak to me" she said, turning her head and putting and end to the conversation.
She found a spot on the wall and stared at it while they pandered to the curses need. She hoped it would be enough. She hoped it would last but something was telling her that this was going to get much worse before it got better.
Much the same as last time, he took her knee and hitched it up for a deeper angle. She knew he was growing closer because his breathing increased and his movements became quicker. With a soft grunt, he was done. He didn't take time to catch his breath, instead he pulled out of her, put his pants on and left, while she lay there knowing that this wasn't going to be the end of it.
Hermione's thoughts were occupied, over the coming week, with what Malfoy had said; 'it's not rape'. He was right, it wasn't, but part of her felt like she was still having sex against her will. If not for the curse she'd be a virgin still... Waiting for someone to sweep her off her feet, give her roses, talk sweetly to her. Malfoy would never be that person for her. She wondered if it would even be possible for her to have someone else in her life. She hadn't read anything about it because it was so laughable that it felt preposterous.
She wondered if her whole life would be based on a schedule for sex with Malfoy to keep her alive. It didn't seem like the curse breakers working on this were getting anywhere and she had an ominous feeling that this was her life now.
Two occurrences of sex with Malfoy made her know that he wasn't in it to make it feel good, for her anyway. She wondered if she even wanted him to. If she wanted his hands on her, if she would like the feel of his mouth on her skin. When they were both at their healthiest, he looked good, he was fit and muscular and attractive, however, she couldn't get beyond the fact that this was Malfoy, of all people her enemy. Her school bully. The person who tormented her for years. Yet, she had to open her legs for him in order to survive. The more she thought about it, the more she envisioned scenarios in her mind, the more she realised that Bellatrix Lestrange was truly the most cruel woman. She was glad she was dead.
It had been almost 3 weeks since the last time. Despite her continual ruminating, she had felt great, but the lethargy, the reduction in her magical abilities, the loss of willpower for anything were now returning at full force. She looked at a calendar and noticed that the curse returned quicker than last time. It was only logical, she thought, for the curse to get stronger than the treatment, over time. She had come to terms with the fact that she had to have bad sex to fix it but she had also decided that it wouldn't dictate her future. She could live her life in between and go to him as required and he could do the same. It was manageable with floos and apparation and if they had some kind of schedule, they could make sure they were never feeling too weak to travel.
That night she knocked in his door for the first time, realising she hadn't been to him so far. He opened it and looked dreadful.
"You look about as well as I feel" she said, walking in when he stepped aside.
Almost as if on auto pilot, she laid on his bed and waited for him to approach. His face was contorted with hesitation as he slowly walked towards the bed.
"Look, I know this isn't great. If you told 13 year old Draco that this would be his future, I'm sure he'd throw himself off the astronomy tower, but can we please just do this and not make a fuss. You can pretend I'm pansy if you like and I'll pretend you're... Leonardo DeCaprio" she said.
"I'd rather a troll than Pansy" he said.
She was surprised.
"I thought you and Pansy were a thing?" she asked.
He just looked at her for a moment.
"Didn't you say you wanted to get this over and done with?" he asked.
"Absolutely" she said, shimmying out of her knickers and holding them in her hand.
He climbed on top of her and prodded her entrance before retreating.
She watched in curiosity as he leant to his bed side drawers and squirted some kind of lotion on his hand before reaching down and covering his erection with it.
When he pressed against her again, she realised that it was a kind of lubricant. She held her breath waiting for the stinging burning sensation that came with the first minute or so but it didn't come. She determined that she was now acclimatised to him.
He started moving and she pulled her own leg up, the way she had come to figure he liked, as he got into a rhythm. She closed her eyes and wished that this could be different. That he could be someone she liked, that she could be someone he would at least want to do this with, or find attractive, at bare minimum.
When he slowed, she opened her eyes.
"Are you picturing that Leonardo decapitated guy?" he asked.
"No" she responded, "just realising it doesn't hurt anymore" she said.
He didn't say anything as he resumed the task.
It wasn't long before he finished and rolled off her. She hesitated before she realised she was in his room and quickly put her knickers on and headed for the door.
"See you next time" he said as she went to leave. She turned to look at him and saw the colour return to his face, his looks returning. She supposed she was changing too.
"yeah, until then..." she said sadly, as she headed back to her room.
AN- As i said, dubious consent. Let me know what you think - without calling me a sicko. You're the one reading still, freaks ;-)
