Songs - To Die For by Sam Smith, Bones by MS MR, and Like an Animal by Rufus du Sol
Chapter Nine: Munde Openian
Draco wasn't sure what had woken him, a dream perhaps, but when he turned to the other side of the bed reaching out his arm to wrap around Hermione's waist, she wasn't there. Suddenly worried that he had overslept, he opened his eyes slowly, squinting slightly as he anticipated being blinded by the morning sun. Instead, he found the world outside was still dark and quiet, the only light in the room creeping in from around the partially close door. He turned his head, glancing at the clock next to the bed and sighed.
I'm really going to have a talk with her about the importance of uninterrupted beauty sleep, he thought, throwing his head back onto the pillow.
He lay there for a few minutes, trying to will himself back to sleep, but quickly accepted that rest would remain elusive until he found out what Hermione was doing awake at this ungodly hour. Groaning, he threw the covers off of his body, pulled on the pair of briefs he had tossed across the room late last night, and walked toward the source of the light, stretching his tired limbs as he moved toward to door.
Mornings had never been his favorite time of day – it was hard enough dragging his tired body out of bed on the days when he needed to be at the Ministry before sunrise – but this kind of early was another thing entirely. And if Hermione hadn't looked so damned adorable, wrapped up in a blanket humming to herself as she flipped through a large book in her lap, he might just have told her so.
"Granger?" he said softly, fighting back a yawn as he approached the couch.
Startled, Hermione nearly dropped the book on the floor. "Oh, I'm sorry," she said, her surprise quickly replaced with a small smile, "I didn't mean to wake you."
"You didn't," Draco told her, pausing to place a soft kiss on her lips as she tilted her head back toward him. "You know it's three in the morning, right?" he asked, not waiting for a response. He jumped over the back of the couch and settled in next to her. "If you weren't tired, you should have woken me up. There are an endless number of activities I can think of that are more exciting than reading whatever this is in the middle of the night," he added with a smirk.
Hermione blushed. "You were snoring," she quipped. "I doubt you could have handled anything other than sleeping."
"I guess we'll never know," Draco replied, wrapping an arm around her and resting his chin on her shoulder. "What are you reading?"
"Work stuff," Hermione offered, closing to book to show him the cover.
Draco rolled his eyes. "You know there's a thing called normal working business hours for that."
"I couldn't sleep," she admitted, shrugging.
In truth, she hadn't slept well for the past few nights. The aftermath of her talk with Ron had been difficult for her to digest – not because she regretted how she left things with him, but because she had finally realized just how deep her feelings were for Draco, and it scared her. She had never fallen for someone like this before, definitely not as fast as she had for him, and she was terrified that he didn't feel the same way.
"Hmm," Draco mumbled.
He could almost hear the wheels turning in her head. Despite insisting that her conversation with Ron had brought closure, she had been consumed by her own thoughts for days and he was afraid of what that meant.
"Anything you want to talk about?" he asked, somewhat timidly.
Hermione was surprised by the uneasiness in Draco's voice, but then again, she hadn't quite been herself the past few days, and he was probably worried that something was going on. Knowing she needed to reassure him, she moved the large book to the coffee table and turned to face him.
"I've just been doing a lot of thinking," she said, trying to find the right words to explain what had been going on in her head. "About us."
"Oh?" Draco said quietly, not trusting his voice to handle anything else.
"Not in a bad way," Hermione added quickly when she saw the panicked look on his face. "I just– I'm worried that I've been a little too obsessive."
Well, I guess I should have been expecting this, Draco thought, relaxing. She always has been exceptionally skilled at overthinking things.
"What makes you think that?" he asked, moving a hand to the side of her face, his thumb tracing the line of her jaw.
Hermione closed her eyes and leaned into his hand, enjoying the warmth of his skin against her cheek. "We spend nearly every minute of every day together, and yet I still can't stop thinking about you," she said as her eyes fluttered open again.
"And that's a bad thing?" Draco queried, moving his hand to rub the back of her neck.
"No, it's not bad," Hermione said quickly, shivering slightly under his gaze. "I'm really happy to have you in my life. I just don't want to scare you away." She paused trying to think of how to articulate what she wanted to say next without sounding ridiculous but was suddenly overcome with the feeling that she was over analyzing things, again, and found herself unable to continue.
Draco was quiet for a moment. He thought, despite her silence, that he understood what she was struggling to say. "I'm scared too, you know," he admitted. "I've never had anyone mean so much to me so quickly."
Her face relaxed. "How is it," she began, her eyes studying his perfectly kissable lips before settling back into the depths of his eyes, "that you always seem to know exactly what I'm trying to say even when I can't find the words to say it?"
"Magic," he told her, smiling to which she rolled her eyes. "Honestly? I'd like to think I know you pretty well by now," he said, brushing his thumb against her lips. "And I think we're both spending too much time worrying about how fast this has happened, and not enough time telling each other how important we are to each other."
Hermione smiled, thankful for his innate ability to calm her even when her thoughts threatened to consume her. "I do care about you," she said, her fingers running along his exposed chest. "A lot," she emphasized with a smile.
"And I you," Draco said, dropping his arms back down around her waist and pulling her against him. "Probably more than you know," he told her, placing a kiss on her forehead.
Before Hermione, he would have never made himself so vulnerable around someone else, but she had changed everything. Every time he looked at her, he had to fight the urge to wrap her in his arms and word-vomit his emotions all over her. It wasn't complicated, being with her, and for the first time in a long time he didn't feel so alone. For once, he had found something that he didn't feel the urge to run away from.
"Is it crazy that I can't stop thinking about all the ways that I'm going to screw this up?" Hermione asked nervously, turning to look up at him again, the dull light reflecting off the golden flecks in her eyes.
"No," Draco responded, burying his hands in her hair. "But if it makes you feel any better, there's really nothing you can do to scare me off. You're stuck with me."
"Draco, I'm being serious."
"So am I," he responded quickly, unable to tear his eyes away from her. "You really need to start listening to me when I say you can't get rid of me that easily."
"I'm sorry," she said, letting out a breath as she snuggled her head against his chest. "I can be my own worst enemy sometimes. I'm always stuck in my head."
"Well, maybe you should try telling me about all the crazy things swimming around in here," Draco said, jokingly poking the top of her head. "Better yet, I'm rather gifted with Legilimency so I'm sure I could think of some way to unlock your mind to me permanently."
"Ridiculous," she said, looking up. "You can't possibly–"
Oh my god.
Hermione bolted upright nearly knocking Draco off the couch and knelt on the floor in front of the book laying at the edge of the coffee table.
Unlock… open…
"Uh, Granger?"
"It was in front of me the whole time," she mumbled as she hastily flipped through the pages. "How could I have missed it?"
"Care to fill me in?" Draco asked as he inched his body forward, wondering what could possibly have gotten her so excited.
"We just need a key!"
"Granger, what in–"
"Draco, the boy! What if his memories weren't erased? What if they were just locked away? What if, instead of reversing a spell that erased his memories, we just have to open his mind?"
Draco's eyes widened in understanding. "Fuck."
"Exactly!" Hermione's eyes were wide. "Draco, I think we just figured out how to repair the boy's memories."
"Are you sure one of these is going to work?" Harry asked as he eyed the pile of parchment laying on the floor near the boy's bed.
Hermione swung her head around and glared. "Of course, I'm not sure," she responded, annoyed, "but this approach is completely different from what we've been trying the past couple of weeks. If I'm right, it would explain why nothing we've tried has worked so far."
Mere minutes after her middle of the night revelation, Hermione had dragged Draco to the Ministry, and they had spent the early hours of the morning compiling a list of new spells to try. By the time the sun came up, her office looked as if a tornado had blown through it with papers strewn about her desk and open books filling every corner of the floor. Harry had made the unknowing mistake of stopping by on his way to his own office a couple of hours later, and Draco had silently apologized as Hermione roped him into coming with them to the hospital.
"Potter," Draco whispered as Hermione returned her attention back to the list of incantations in her hand, "when has her intuition about something this important ever been wrong?"
"Honestly?" Harry replied quietly. "Never."
In any other situation, the two men would have laughed, but at the moment they were more concerned with what Hermione would do if they caused her to lose her concentration again – hex their mouths shut probably – and so they just looked at each other and held back their sniggers.
"I told you she was the best," Harry dared after a few moments.
"You say that like I ever doubted you," Draco replied quietly, feigning hurt by placing a hand over his heart.
"I distinctly remember you asking me how good she was with memory charms after I made it clear she was the best," Harry retorted, raising an eyebrow. "I think that's the definition of doubt."
"I was merely curious," Draco said, waving a hand nonchalantly. "If you remember, I wasn't exactly speaking with her much then. Plus, I was a little preoccupied with the whole torture thing."
"Yes, fine," Harry mumbled. "I still told you, though," he added with a smirk.
Draco chuckled quietly.
"If you two are done whispering to each other," Hermione said sternly, his arms crossed across her chest as she turned to look at them, "I think we should get started."
"How will you know for sure if anything works?" Harry inquired, attempting to ignore the murderous look being thrown his way.
"Since the boy is still being dosed with sleeping draught, I'll have to peek into his mind after each spell," Draco explained. "It's the same thing we've been doing for the past couple of weeks," he added for Harry's benefit, giving Hermione a reassuring smile.
Despite her continued concern that he would encounter other harmful memories when he re-entered the boy's healed mind, Hermione knew there really wasn't a better way. Today, however, she was thoroughly convinced they had stumbled upon the right approach, and so bringing Harry along had been her last-ditch effort to provide Draco with some sort of protection in case anything went horribly wrong.
Harry, who hadn't been filled in on this part of the process, looked between Draco and Hermione and sighed. "Well at least now my presence here makes some sort of sense," he mumbled. "It's definitely possible that the boy's memories contain more instances of torture."
"Yes," Hermione admitted sadly. She paused before continuing, turning so that her whole body was facing Draco and Harry. "Which is exactly why Draco will not linger. He will only spend enough time in the boy's mind to determine whether or not any new memories have appeared," she added with particular emphasis.
Harry opened his mouth to respond, but Draco quickly nudged him into silence. Not the time, he mouthed, covering his movement with a cough.
Hermione eyed the two men suspiciously. It wouldn't be the first time they had planned something behind her back – fine, or the second – and while she wanted nothing more than to lecture them, to remind them that she could refuse to help at any time, she reluctantly decided to save her words for later. Right now, she needed to focus on helping the boy.
Draco watched as she turned back around. "Whatever you do, just make sure I don't come back a vegetable," he told Harry quietly. "I doubt she'd be as eager to shag a carrot."
Harry rolled his eyes. "Wonderful timing with the jokes as always, Malfoy."
"Just trying to lighten the mood," Draco said as he stepped away, his arms extended outward in jest before he spun around on his feet, leaving Harry alone at the end of bed.
Truthfully, Draco was nervous. If the rest of the boy's memories were as horrible as the one that he'd already seen, it was likely he'd have a hard time pulling away before being consumed with pain, but he tried to push his nerves aside as he moved next to Hermione.
When he stopped next to her, he quickly squeezed her hand. "It's going to be fine," he said softly, still not really sure if he could believe his own words.
"Ready?" she asked nervously.
He nodded.
Hermione lifted her wand and began working down the list of incantations they had spent all morning drafting. Between each spell, she paused to let Draco quickly search the boy's mind, only continuing once he opened his eyes and shook his head, confirming that nothing had changed. Despite the urgency they both felt, it was tedious and slow work, neither of them willing to rush the process. However, as the list of rejected spells grew, so too did Hermione's frustration. She was sure this had to be the right approach, so why wasn't anything working?
When she reached the bottom of the fourth page, she glanced at the final line and exhaled deeply. Well, at least we still have one more to go through, she thought as she raised her wand again, bracing for yet another failure.
"Munde Openian," she muttered weakly, her voice betraying her feeling of hopelessness.
But as soon as she released the spell, she knew something was different. A shiver ran down her spine as she felt the magic leave her fingertips, and she cast her eyes frantically toward Draco, who seemed to sense her change in demeanor before returning her gaze. She watched, holding her breath, as he lifted his wand, and almost fell over when she saw the color leave his face.
"Uhh, Granger," Draco said, coming back to himself, almost unable to believe what he had just seen. "Whatever you just did definitely worked."
Harry, who had slumped in a chair on the other side of the room with his head in his hands, jumped up. "It worked?!" he asked excitedly.
Draco nodded. "I didn't linger, but there definitely is a lot more in there than there was before."
"Fuck," Harry breathed, his eyes wide with disbelief.
The two men looked over at Hermione expecting to find her as relieved as they were but found that she was still standing next to the boy's bed, staring oddly at the list in her hand.
Harry spoke first. "Hermione, you did it."
When she didn't respond, Draco placed a hand on her back and whispered, "Hermione?"
She looked up at him confused as if she had forgotten that she wasn't alone in the room. "It's strange," she said finally, relaxing slightly as Draco moved his hand to the small of her back. "Most of the spells we use today have some basis in Latin, but the incantation that worked wasn't even a derivative of it."
Draco and Harry looked at her confused.
"Munde Openian is derived from Old English," she explained. "I only added it to the list because I wanted to make sure we tried all the languages we could trace back to Britain, but it just doesn't make sense to me."
Draco cocked his head, suddenly understanding her concern. "Hmm."
"Why wouldn't it make sense?" Harry asked, realizing that he was missing a key piece of information.
"The language, at least in its later years, isn't exactly associated with a group of people who were very accepting of those that were different, let alone anything remotely magical in nature," Draco clarified, his hand rubbing his chin. "It's a wonder that Beowulf was even recorded in Old English."
"Beowulf?" Harry asked, confused.
"Beowulf, hero of the Geats? The monster Grendel? The dragon?" Draco said, his eyes widening as Harry continued to shake his head.
Draco's mouth opened in surprise. "I can see why Hermione was always grumbling about you not doing your homework."
"I'm going to ignore that," Harry said, narrowing his eyes at Draco before speaking again. "I need to send an owl to Kingsley," he continued, his fingers twitching around his wand as he began to formulate plans in his head. "Hermione, I know you want to figure this out, but we need to catalog the boy's memories first." Harry paused, glancing over at Hermione who, despite the look on her face that suggested she wanted to protest, quickly nodded in agreement. "Draco, are you still willing–?"
"Yes," Draco answered before Harry could finish the question, his eyes darting nervously over to Hermione.
Harry nodded in thanks and rushed out of the room.
Once they were alone, Draco turned toward Hermione and found her already deep in thought. "Hermione," he said softly. "You are allowed a moment of peace before you go chasing after the answer to the next mystery."
"Yes, you're right," she replied, her eyes refocusing. "I suppose I should be happy we finally figured this out."
"You figured it out," Draco corrected, moving closer to her.
Hermione frowned. "I wouldn't have figured this out without you," she asserted, unsure why he couldn't see that. "You've been helping me every single day. You're the one who made me think of this idea." She paused, inhaling deeply. "Without you, the boy would have never remembered."
Draco could sense her spiraling into a dark place and decided to risk a bit of humor. "Okay, so we'll share the awards then. I'll take 70 percent of the credit because I'm obviously your greatest inspiration and you–"
Hermione smacked Draco on the shoulder with the rolled up piece of parchment in her hands.
"Abuse, Granger," he said, happy that his gamble had paid off – and happy that it wasn't one of her gigantic books in her hands. "But fine, I'll give you the 70 percent because you're so damn sexy and because I like getting you nak–"
She smacked him with the parchment again, but immediately started laughing when she saw the impish look on his face. While it was mildly infuriating that he could cheer her up in the middle of such a serious situation, she was relieved to have someone around who had that kind of effect on her.
"He could wake up," she said, gesturing to the boy as Draco wrapped his arms around her waist.
Draco chuckled. "They've been giving him enough sleeping draught to knock out a hippogriff. I doubt he's going to wake up the moment I start making sexually charged comments about you."
Hermione groaned, but didn't resist when he pulled her all the way against his body, letting the piece of parchment fall to the ground.
"Don't pretend like my sense of humor isn't half of the reason why you keep me around," he said with a smirk. "Also, I'm very attracted to you, and at this particular moment I'm finding it very difficult to keep it to myself."
"You are ridiculous," she replied before pulling him in for a quick kiss, her hands traveling around to his backside to playfully squeeze his arse.
"Hands, Granger," Draco whispered, his lips inches away from hers.
Hermione smiled and rested her head against his chest, but despite the brief distraction, her worried thoughts quickly clawed their way back into the front of her brain.
"What do you think it means?" she asked.
"The spell?" Draco replied, his breath tangling itself within her curls while his hands moved along her spine.
She nodded against his chest.
"I don't know," he admitted, inhaling the sweet scent of her shampoo. "But you'll figure it out. I know you will."
They stood there quietly for a moment, their arms wrapped around each other before Hermione pulled away and looked up at him, her eyes swimming with a level of worry Draco hadn't seen since pulling away from his second, terrifying venture into the boy's mind.
"Can't someone else search his memories?" she begged, her fingers tugging at the collar of his shirt. "I know there are other Aurors who can use Legilimency."
Draco sighed. "Yes, there are," he said simply, "but I have more experience than any of them. It has to be me."
"Don't you think getting hurt the first two times should exclude you from repeating this particular task?" Hermione asked, her voice shaking with a dangerous combination of nerves and anger. She had been prepared for his answer – he always was a stubborn one – but his seemingly nonchalant attitude toward the situation was maddening.
"Repairing the boy's memories was always just one part of my assignment," Draco tried to remind her, letting his arms fall sadly to his sides as she stepped away. "Whether we repaired them or not, I was always going to have to search the boy's mind again. At least now there will be other things for me to search."
"But–"
"Hermione, I know you're worried, but it's my job. I can't just walk away from this," he argued, trying to ignore the pained look on her face. "I'm not going to unload this responsibility on someone else. It's the least I can do to make up for all the horrible things I've done."
"You can't spend the rest of your life atoning for the mistakes you made when you were young, Draco," Hermione replied heatedly, her face suddenly red with anger. "If you keep putting yourself at risk to find forgiveness, one of these times you're going to get hurt. Or worse…"
Draco took another step back and shoved his hands in his pockets. "I wouldn't exactly consider this a super high-risk scenario."
"You do remember what happened the first two times, right?" she nearly shouted, tears forming in her eyes. "Or have you already forgotten what it did to you?"
He cringed. "I haven't forgotten, no."
"Do you even care what happens to you?" Hermione asked, her hands now balled into fists at her sides.
"I do," Draco replied, his voice almost a whisper as he looked into her eyes sadly. But even as he said the words, he knew they weren't entirely true.
"Have you forgotten what it did to me to see you like that?" she continued as a tear slid down her cheek. "I couldn't help you. No one can help you if you get stuck in another memory like that. What am I supposed to do if you can't pull away?"
"Hermione–"
"If you want me in your life, you can't keep treating it like it's disposable," she declared, her eyes darkening with anger.
He opened his mouth, ready to respond, but was interrupted when at that very moment, Harry decided to walk back into the room. Attempting to hide the evidence of their argument, Hermione quickly brushed away the tears that had escaped down her cheeks and hastily turned her head toward the floor. Draco, similarly embarrassed, fixed his gaze on a ceiling tile on the other side of the room.
"What did I miss?" Harry asked, immediately taking note of the tension in the room.
"Nothing," Hermione said quickly – too quickly – lifting her head slightly. "I just need some air." And before anyone could say anything else, she pulled open the door and stormed out into the hallway.
"Well, that's obviously a lie," Harry said as he turned to Draco. "What happened?"
Draco exhaled slowly, tilting his head back and bringing a hand to his face before finally looking over at Harry.
"She doesn't want me to search the boy's memories again," he explained, pausing to take a deep breath. "She's worried I'm going to get hurt. Said something about me needing to stop treating my life like it's disposable."
Harry groaned inwardly. After all the years that he'd known Hermione, he really should have seen this one coming. "Sounds like Hermione," he confirmed quietly.
"To be fair, I probably didn't argue my side very well," Draco admitted, squeezing his temples with his hand as if to fight off an approaching headache. "I'm just trying to do what's right." He paused, dropping his hand. "And it's not like I can ignore the fact that I've done some pretty fucked up things in my life. I still have a lot to make up for."
"Do you?" Harry prompted, crossing his arms across his chest.
"Isn't that why you hired me as an Auror? A chance at redemption or whatever Chosen One mumbo jumbo you fed me," Draco retorted, looking back at his friend.
"Sure, but that was years ago," Harry replied, leaning his body against the wall as he spoke. "You've done more for the Ministry than anyone since the end of the war – and yes, that includes Kingsley or myself. I think it's obvious you're a different person now."
"I guess I always thought I'd have to spend my entire life trying to undo all the bad I did," Draco confessed, dropping his eyes awkwardly to the floor.
If he was being totally honest with himself, he wasn't even sure if a lifetime of good deeds would ever be enough. Harry and Hermione – and everyone else for that matter – seemed to have forgiven him for his past blunders, but despite his normally calm exterior, he was still struggling to forgive himself.
"Listen, I may not know what it's like to overcome a past like yours, but I do know what it's like to feel a sense of duty no matter the consequences," Harry said, tilting his head as he studied Draco. "Just remember, those consequences affect the people in your life too."
Draco lifted his eyes. "I guess I don't have a lot of practice with people actually caring about me. I've always felt expendable," he tried to explain, placing a hand on his neck and leaning his head back against the top of his hand as he took a few deep breaths.
"Fucking, hell. She's always right, isn't she?" he mumbled after a few moments.
To Draco's surprise, Harry started to laugh. "She really must love you," he said, shaking his head as he pushed himself off the wall and moved next to his friend.
"What? We– she hasn't– I–"
"Relax," Harry began, throwing a hand on Draco's back. "I'm not saying you two have actually said the words to each other, but when Hermione loves someone, she will do anything to protect them. Anything," he emphasized, "including storming off in the middle of an argument to make you see her point."
Draco groaned. "I should go after her."
"That would probably be wise," Harry responded, a smile creeping on his face.
With a quick thanks, Draco strode out of the room and into the hallway. While he had no idea where exactly she had gone, he assumed she had used 'fresh air' literally, so he headed downstairs to the main entrance and walked outside. In the end, he found her pacing outside an alleyway not too far away from the entrance to the hospital.
"Hermione," he said tentatively.
She looked up, her eyes swollen from tears. "Oh, hello," she replied softly.
"I'm sorry," Draco said as he ran a hand through his hair. "You were right when you said I've been treating my life like it's disposable. I have been."
Hermione began chewing the inside of her cheek as if she was turning her thoughts over in her head but remained quiet.
"To be honest, I haven't really had much practice sharing my life with someone else," Draco continued, afraid that if he didn't keep talking that she would ask him to leave her alone. "I've forgotten what it means to have someone care about me," he admitted weakly. "I shouldn't be so cavalier about things that could hurt both of us. I'm sorry."
He took a couple steps toward her, hoping she would let him continue.
"If you really aren't comfortable with me searching the boy's memories again, I'll ask Harry to bring in someone else," he offered.
She studied him for a moment, her eyes lingering on his defeated stance, and found herself regretting her childish outburst and subsequent storming off.
"I know you have to do it," she said finally. "I just wish there was a way I could protect you."
"I don't have to do anything. I can say no," Draco said as he took another couple of steps, closing the last few paces between them.
Hermione looked up at him, the anguish behind his eyes still utterly transparent. "I can't let you do that," she affirmed.
"Granger, you are impossible," Draco grumbled, moving a hand to the side of his neck. "First, you get mad at me for saying that I need to do it. Now, you're telling me that you won't let me not do it."
"Yes, I suppose I am being a bit difficult," she confessed, pausing to bite down on her lower lip. "What I meant was, I know you need to do this. I understand how important it is even if I don't like you putting yourself at risk," she explained, placing her hands on his chest and hoping desperately that he wasn't angry enough to push her away.
"Haven't you done the same to protect innocent people from being hurt?" he asked, placing his hands over hers. "Wouldn't you still do the same?"
"Yes," Hermione replied, her heartbeat quickening as Draco drew himself closer, their faces now inches apart. And I would risk a hell of a lot more to protect you. "I just don't know what I'd do if I–"
"You are not going to lose me," Draco promised, wrapping his arms around her. "I won't do anything to jeopardize this."
Hermione buried her face against his chest, taking in a few deep breaths as she let his promise reverberate in her head.
"If you hurt, I hurt," she said quietly. "Don't forget that."
"If I hurt, you hurt," Draco repeated.
He held her against him, too afraid to let go, wishing he hadn't argued with her in the first place. He didn't want to fight. He didn't want to make her sad. All he wanted was for her to know how much she meant to him, how he would never let anything come between them, even if that meant letting someone else do his job.
"I would rather spend one lifetime with you than face all of the ages of the world alone*," he mumbled under his breath, only realizing he had uttered the words out loud when Hermione lifted her head to look at him.
"Did you seriously just quote Lord of the Rings at me?" she demanded in disbelief.
Draco shrugged, his embarrassment quickly replaced with amusement when he caught the look in her eyes. "Maybe," he responded, fighting the laughter that was building in the back of his throat.
"You are," she began, a smile threatening to escape her lips, "the actual worst."
She didn't want to break first, but the sight of Draco biting down on his bottom lip, his shoulders shaking as he tried to hold back his laughter was too much, and she gave in moments before him. They clung to each other as their voices rang out across the alleyway, their laughter chasing away the remnants of their argument.
"Granger," Draco said after catching his breath, "did we just make it through our first fight?" And he didn't even care how cheesy it sounded.
Hermione smiled, similarly unbothered. "Yes, I believe we did," she replied as she stared at him longingly.
"We should probably go back inside now," Draco said, his lips suddenly inches away from hers.
His words were begging her to be the better person, to keep them focused on the mountain of work that no doubt awaited them inside, but his body was asking her for something else, and she was more inclined to let her carnal needs take control. When he moved closer still, his lips brushing past hers as his quicksilver eyes darkened with desire, heat erupted deep within her belly, and she knew there was no way she could walk away. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew they had a job to finish, but right now, the only thing she could think about was how badly she wanted to kiss him.
"Do we have to?" she replied, her heart fluttering furiously in her chest.
Draco didn't need her to spell it out for him to know that she wanted him as much as he wanted her, the look on her face was enough, and he pulled her lips against his without another second of hesitation. He threw everything he felt about her into his kiss – his attraction to her, his obsession with her, and his concern for her – and lost control of himself when she moaned softly into his mouth, her whimpers begging him for more. In response, he picked her up, walked them deeper into the alleyway, and shoved her against the brick wall.
Hermione lost herself in his arms, ignoring the logical part of her brain that was trying to warn her that they were still in public, and wrapped her legs around his waist, trapping his body against hers. It didn't matter, she reasoned, his kiss, this kiss, was worth the risk of being found. A growl emanated from the back of Draco's throat as she grabbed ahold of his hair and pulled his head away so she could stare into his eyes. She licked her lips seductively, relishing the look on his face as she heard him suck in a breath.
"You. Drive. Me. Crazy. Woman," he said as he began kissing up the side of her neck.
Hermione moaned again as Draco moved his tongue along her jaw on his way back to her lips, and when his tongue finally met her lips, she caught the tip of his tongue between her teeth, eliciting another guttural sound from deep within his throat. Her whole body melted into his arms as his tongue teased hers, and if it weren't for the position of his arms under her legs supporting most of her weight, she wouldn't have been able to hold the rest of her body up. She wasn't one for potions and muggle drugs, but she imagined this was a better high than anything they could ever offer.
Her hands were buried under his shirt, her fingers teasing the waistband of his jeans, when a bright flash lit up the alley, causing them to tear their faces apart.
"Say cheese," came a slimy voice from the other end of the alley before another flash went off.
Fuck, Draco thought as he quickly placed Hermione on the ground.
Fuck, Hermione thought as she saw a man running away with a camera dangling from a strap around his shoulders.
So much for keeping things to themselves.
Despite their concerns about what would happen now that someone other than Harry and Ginny knew about them – and worse, had a damn picture to prove it – they decided, at least for today, to act like nothing had happened. They had a job to finish and didn't want their own seemingly ridiculous personal issues to interfere.
"Harry definitely doesn't need to know, right?" Hermione asked as they paused outside the door, careful to lower her voice so the guard couldn't make out what she was saying.
"I wouldn't necessarily put this high on his priority list right now," Draco responded. "Someone was bound to find out about us eventually," he continued, shrugging as the words left his mouth. "He already knows about us, so it's not like a news article about our relationship will send him into a tizzy."
Hermione exhaled. "I suppose," she said quietly, not entirely sure that was true.
"We should get back in there." Draco gestured to the room. "I promise, I'll be careful with the memories," he added before pulling open the door.
By lunchtime, Harry had pulled Dean from his other projects to help catalog what they could before the Healers began the process of waking the boy. Draco spent the afternoon dictating the new memories to Harry and Dean, none of which, thankfully, contained any more evidence of torture, while Hermione began to arduous task of identifying landmarks and other features from the ever-growing pile of papers Harry was shuffling her way.
However, as the hours passed, the three men became increasingly concerned that there didn't appear to any other memory of Rodolphus buried in the boy's mind at all.
"Seems weird that there isn't anything else, doesn't it?" Harry asked late in the afternoon, keeping his voice low.
Draco cast his eyes nervously over to Hermione, whose head was bent over a book, before replying. "Maybe it will just take a day or two," he offered, unsure of what else to say. "He's been through a hell of a lot in the past couple of weeks."
Dean nodded in agreement. "Plus, some of these–" he said, holding up pages of notes "–might be actually more helpful than we think."
Draco wasn't sure he agreed, but his pessimism probably wasn't the best for anyone at the moment. "If anyone can find something useful in them, she will," he said, casting her eyes toward Hermione again.
"Brightest witch of our age," Harry mumbled in agreement.
When the sun began to set, the Healers announced that they needed to start administering the potions to bring the boy out of his deep sleep. Even though Harry would have liked to continue, he conceded that Draco had probably found everything that was worth recording and ordered everyone home for the night. If the boy was stable when he woke up, they would be able to return and ask him anything else that they needed to know.
"Are you two coming?" Harry asked, following Dean out into the deserted hospital hallway.
"Go ahead," Draco said, unable to tear his eyes away from Hermione. "We need to finish something."
Harry let out a noise that sounded something like snort. "Just be gone before the Healers come back," he called as he walked out of the room shaking his head.
"Need to finish something, huh?" Hermione inquired, raising her eyebrows suggestively.
"Mhmm," Draco replied, pulling her into him. "We were so rudely interrupted before," he said before lowering his head and planting a soft kiss on her lips.
"Well then by all means, take me home and ravish me," she said, much to Draco's complete and utter enjoyment.
"With pleasure," he declared, quickly leading her out of the room.
It was dark when they finally walked outside, and neither Draco nor Hermione were particularly interested in lingering in case there were any reporters lurking around. However, despite their fears of being bombarded, they didn't let go of each other's hands they walked out onto the street. They paused outside the entrance for a moment, only long enough to look at each other and smile, and then Apparated to his flat where they spent the rest of night trying to reassure each other that tomorrow wouldn't be so bad.
a/n: Thank you to everyone who has been keeping up with this story and to everyone who has reviewed! It's been really amazing to see how many people are reading and enjoying this.
Translation: Munde ~ mind (memories/thoughts/intellect), Openian = to open.
I believe that Munde is more accurately characterized as Middle English (from what I can tell - I'm by no means a linguistic specialist) and Mynd might be the more accurate Old English term, but I liked that Munde differed a bit more and went with it. There seem to be a lot of different words that the Anglo-Saxons used for mind/memories/etc., but since the word itself isn't incredibly important to the storyline (just its roots), I didn't dwell on it for too long.