Sixth Year, Part 9, 1997

Harry had been so convinced for so long that Malfoy - Draco that is - was up to something. Harry was worse than a dog with a bone when it came to stuff like this, and despite Hermione's insistence that Draco was not a Death Eater and was surely NOT up to anything nefarious at all, her friend refused to listen to logic or reason.

She couldn't very well come right out and tell Harry that she was involved with Draco's father and that Lucius had told her flat out that Draco was not a marked Death Eater - yet. Nor could she tell him that according to her lover, the Dark Lord was specificallynotmarking anyone who was underage. And she most certainly could not tell her friend that Draco had been given some sort of mysterious task by the Dark Lord either, so she'd resorted to arguing with Harry on a regular basis and trying to deflect his concerns with logic and reason.

Hermione did have to admit to herself though thatall was not well with Lucius's son. As the year progressed, he'd lost weight, and he looked continually exhausted and nervous or stressed. She knew he had a task of some kind, and it was obvious it weighed heavily on him. Her promise to Lucius to watch over his son remained, and she'd gone so far as to make a few polite overtures toward Draco if she saw him alone in the library or in the halls. He was dismissive of her, and she was surprised that he didn't take the opportunity to lash out at her or call her names. If anything, he'd gone out of his way to ignore her, which naturally Harry also saw as suspicious. She had expressed her concern to Lucius via her bracelet, but he was noncommittal, insisting that his son was merely worried about school or about his mother's possible involvement with her deranged sister.

Everything had reached a boiling point by spring, although she didn't realise it in advance.

One sunny afternoon, Draco seemed particularly distraught when she saw him leave the library, so against her better judgment, she decided to follow him. She discreetly tailed him across the castle, all the way into Moaning Myrtle's favorite girls' lavatory. Malfoy was bent over one of the sinks, the ghost beside him offering comforting words.

She thought about leaving. He seemed distraught, and he obviously had not wanted anything to do with her before. She wasn't sure what she was even doing here or what she hoped to accomplish, but the stalemate that had existed almost all year was driving her insane. She had to do something.

"Malfoy?"

He startled at her voice and spun around.

"What the hell are you doing here, Granger? Get lost. You aren't wanted," he spit angrily. Hermione was shocked to realise that he looked as if he'd been crying.

She held up her hands in a defensive manner meant to show that she intended no harm. "Malfoy, I just...I don't know what's going on with you, but I just wanted to check on you, to see if you're okay. Is there anything I can do? Shall I… shall I get someone for you?"

God, this was a mistake, she thought. She shouldn't have come in here. He was never going to open up to her about anything. This had been a stupid, Gryffindor-ish move on her part.

His face twisted into a sneer as he wiped his eyes. "You? Why would I need YOU for anything, you stupid, filthy little mudblood!" he spat.

The insult was a slap in the face to Hermione, who had to remind herself that despite the physical resemblance, Draco was not his father.

"I just wanted to help," she said defensively. "There's no need to call me names."

He glared at her then. "What is it about you, Granger?" he demanded. "It's not enough that you've convinced all the professors here but Snape that the sun rose and set on your arse, it's not enough that you have to be the best in everything. No, you've somehow managed to convince my father - MY FATHER - that you are somehow untouchable!"

Hermione was speechless. Lucius had told Draco she was untouchable? She'd asked her lover before if Draco knew about them, and he'd answered in the negative. Based on his response, she had not expected Lucius to say anything at all to Draco about their involvement. Yet apparently he had.

"When I saw him last he told me that I was to leave you alone. You! You're NOTHING!" he spat.

She swallowed hard at his angry remark. Just what exactly had Lucius told him? She tried to keep her focus on Draco, on his rising anger and the potential for this situation to go very badly, but she could not help but feel awed that Lucius had told his son to leave her alone. In his own way, Lucius was protecting her from afar.

"What are you that Lucius Malfoy gives a damn? Why does a mudblood matter to my father?" he demanded.

Oh. So he hadn't told Draco they were romantically involved, she realised. That was...a tiny bit disappointing, if she was perfectly honest with herself, but it was not exactly surprising.

She saw Draco go for his wand then, and the months of training from Lucius kicked in automatically as she immediately drew her own wand and cast a powerful defensive shield. So much for Draco listening to his father's apparent demand to leave her alone, she thought wryly as the first curse flew at her.

He fired hex after hex at her, and each time, she held her shield and refused to fight back. With everything she'd learned from Lucius and the books he'd shared, she was fairly confident that she could take Draco down, but she didn't want to have to explain to her lover why she'd injured his son.

"Fight back, damn you!" he yelled, firing a hex that blasted into the wall behind her and sent debris flying. She darted out of the way of the crumbling bits of stone.

"Malfoy, stop!" she called out. "I don't want to fight."

"What did you do to my father, Granger? I want to know!" He shot back.

A spell bounced off her shield and ricocheted into one of the porcelain sinks, sending a spray of water onto the floor.

The curses he threw were getting progressively darker, but thanks to his father's supplemental education, Hermione was able to block them. She knew they were making an awful racket and tearing up the lavatory in the process. It was only a matter of time before they were caught by a professor. A professor would surely put a stop to Malfoy's outburst, but then she'd be in the uncomfortable position of trying to explain why Draco was attacking her in the girls' lavatory.

She should have known that Harry would be obsessively checking the Marauders' Map in between his classes.

She should have known that he'd see her name and Malfoy's in Moaning Myrtle's lavatory and come running.

She should have known.

She should have fought back, even if it meant inflicting minor injuries on Malfoy. It would have been worth the risk of incurring Lucius's ire for harming his precious heir.

Instead, she was still hiding behind her shield when Harry burst into the bathroom and drew his own wand. She yelled at them both to stop, to please put their wands down, that they were all going to get into trouble for this. She was unsurprised that no one heeded her pleas, and she knew she'd have to take drastic action.

What happened next would haunt Hermione.

Harry fired at Draco, yelling out sectumsempra, a spell that was wholly unfamiliar to Hermione. At the same time, Draco raised his wand at Harry and spit out what sounded an awful lot like crucio.

She knew from her studies with Lucius that no shield could truly block the cruciatus, but a powerful witch or wizard could cast a strong enough shield to least lessen the impact of the curse, especially if the cruciatus was cast by someone of lesser magical strength or who did not put enough anger behind it. To successfully cast the cruciatus, you had to truly mean it. Draco was certainly angry enough, but she had not considered that he would go that far.

Desperate to protect Lucius's son AND prevent Harry from being hit with a dangerous curse, Hermione threw herself in between the two wizards. Perhaps some rational part of her brain thought that she'd be able to maintain her shield and thus block both curses and bring calm to an escalating situation. Or perhaps, she reasoned much later on, it was yet another glaring example of her muggle upbringing that she would automatically go for the physical response and throw herself in between Harry and Draco instead of using magic to stupefy the both of them.

Time seemed to move in slow motion then. The heat of a curse barely grazed her shoulder from behind, and excruciating pain spiraled out from the point of contact. It was like nothing she'd ever felt before or ever wanted to feel again. The extreme mental concentration needed to hold onto her shield broke then, just for a second, but it was enough.

Her shield faltered and then dissipated in a shimmer of magic and dust. She lost her grip on her wand and heard the vine wood clatter to the stone floor as she was left defenseless. For the briefest fraction of a second, pain left her body as she heard Draco's cry of horror.

And then the curse cast by Harry hit her squarely in the chest, sending searing pain across her torso and dropping her onto the stone floor.

All she knew in that next moment was that she was wet, and she was in pain. Draco had destroyed more than one sink in his anger with her, and she'd landed in a heap on the wet stone floor. The front of her clothes were wet too though. That was decidedly odd to her, considering the burning sensation in her chest. She felt strangely disassociated from her body. Would pain do that to you, make you disassociate like that, she wondered to herself. Even when hit with a curse, she couldn't make her mind quiet itself.

Her vision was a bit spotty, and pain wrapped around her body like a wet rope, and she could hear someone yelling.

"Hermione! Oh my god, Hermione! Are you okay?"

"No she's not okay. What the fuck is wrong with you, Potter? You could have killed someone!"

"Me? You were the one trying to kill Hermione! And you cast an unforgivable curse at me!"

Were they really yelling at each other still? She opened her mouth to tell them both to shut up but found she couldn't speak. She felt someone touching her and could see Harry's worried face hovering over her own.

"Why did you do that? Hermione, why would you do something so stupid?"

"Move, Potter, before she bleeds to death. Of all the ignorant, insufferable..."

Harry's face disappeared from her view, replaced by the cold black stare of Professor Snape. He looked fuzzy to her, but she thought his wand was drawn, and she felt an odd tingling in her chest before she passed out completely.

~oOo~

When Hermione awoke sometime later in the hospital wing, she felt numb from the neck down, a sensation that engendered a rising sense of panic. She made a pathetic attempt to move her limbs and reassure herself that she was not paralyzed from the curses that struck her in the lavatory. Within seconds, Madam Pomfrey was hovering over her, pouring another foul potion down her throat and making vaguely soothing noises at her. She lost consciousness again.

The world was hazy when she awoke an undetermined amount of time later. It was dark and quiet in the hospital wing, and her body felt heavy, but there was no pain. She blinked a few more times and tried to focus her vision, the blurriness likely a side effect of some of the potions she'd been given.

"Awake, Granger?"

The voice was quiet, barely above a whisper.

"Who...?" she managed to croak out.

She heard the shuffling sound of someone moving closer to her and then she caught a blur of light color above her. She blinked a few more times. In the dark of the room, dressed all in black, his fair hair and pale skin were like a floating beacon of light to her.

"Malfoy?"

"Potter nearly killed you, you know."

"Harry?" she whispered. Her mind felt jumbled, addled even. In the past when she'd injured herself, she been given mild pain relieving draughts. She'd never been so heavily drugged like this. She tried to force herself to remember. Why would Harry want to hurt her? He wouldn't.

It came back to her then in a jumbled rush. Draco. Moaning Myrtle's lavatory. The fight. Harry interrupting and thinking the worst, casting an unknown spell at Malfoy.

"Of course, being the precious golden boy that he is, he'll get away with it. Anyone else would have been expelled for nearly killing someone with that sort of egregious use of grey magic," Draco said bitterly.

"He didn't know...wouldn't hurt me," she rasped. Her throat felt parched, and she wished for water but doubted Malfoy would be all that accommodating.

"Did you know? Sectumsempra. Did you know what it would do?" he asked.

She managed to shake her head in the negative.

"You're damned lucky Professor Snape was nearby, or you would have bled to death on the floor."

How odd, she thought to herself, that she should owe her survival then to Professor Snape. She was certain he loathed her.

"Still can't believe you wouldn't fight back," he muttered under his breath.

"Wouldn't...didn't want...hurt you," she slurred. Did Malfoy have a point to all of this, she wondered. It obviously night, judging by the darkness of the ward, and she was so very sleepy.

His face was suddenly close to hers, and Hermione startled, as she hadn't realised he'd moved.

"Why did you it? WHY, Granger? You took an unknown curse. For me. I want to know why!" he hissed.

Her vision was still blurry, and looking at Draco was like looking at a younger Lucius. Her mind wandered to her lover. Lucius had surely been beautiful when he was Draco's age. Devastatingly handsome. She wished she'd been a student at Hogwarts at the same time with him. He would be unhappy with her though because she failed to block Harry's curse. She was supposed to be better trained than that. She had done as he'd asked though and protected Draco, so surely he would not be too angry with her.

She realised then that Malfoy wanted an answer from her.

"Promised," she mumbled, her eyelids drifting shut.

"Granger! Wake up!" he hissed. "Who did you promise?"

"Lucius."

"You promised my father?" Malfoy prodded.

"Said...protect you. He worries. You. Loves you," she mumbled, closing her eyes again. Her eyelids were so very heavy.

"My father asked you to protect me?" he asked in disbelief

She opened her eyes again and tried to force herself awake, annoyed that Malfoy couldn't seem to understand her, even though she was quite certain she was explaining herself clearly.

"Loves you. So much."

Malfoy pushed away from her cot, a strange, muffled sound coming from him. His footsteps echoed on the stone floor as he walked away.

That was odd, she thought to herself. Her eyes must have watered because it looked like Malfoy's face was wet.

She heard the close of a door, and then slipped back into dreamless sleep.

~oOo~

When Hermione woke again, she had the faintest of memories of a nighttime visitor, of talking to Malfoy, but she had a hard time believing that he would ever waste his precious time checking on a mudblood. By the time the fogginess from the pain potions cleared, she had convinced herself that his visit had been nothing but a strange drug-induced dream.

In total, she spent four days in the hospital wing, bitterly upset with the entire situation. It had been a mistake to reach out to Draco. It had been a mistake to forget about Harry and his damned map. She wished she could go back in time and undo it all.

Her frustration was exacerbated by Harry. Harry hovered. A lot. At first he was deeply apologetic, insisting that the Prince's book only said the spell was 'for enemies,' and he had no idea it would result in the deep cuts on her body. And anyway, he'd not meant to hit her at all, surely she had to know that he would never, ever want to hurt her.

She knew. She knew Harry felt horribly guilty that she'd been injured, guilty enough that she didn't bother to tell him that his awful spell had left scars on her chest and belly. She was not a generally vain person or overly obsessed with her appearance, but it did bother her to know that the next time she was with Lucius, he would see her marked up body. She tried to avoid even thinking about how she'd explain this entire mess to the man she loved.

She'd seen neither hide nor hair of Draco since regaining full consciousness in the hospital wing, and she was unsure what to think about him. She was reasonably certain that he'd grazed her with the cruciatus curse, a curse that carried with it a mandatory sentence in Azkaban. Had he intended to hit her with it? Or was he aiming at Harry? Had her shield blunted at least some of the impact of the curse? Or had he hit her full on with it?

He'd been so angry at her, angry and confused and upset. Had he owled his father? Had he demanded that Lucius explain himself? What would Lucius tell his son? She was desperate to contact Lucius, but she didn't dare use his bracelet in the hospital wing where anyone could walk in and catch her conversing with a suspected Death Eater.

Professor Dumbledore and Professor Snape both came to see her in the hospital wing the day after the incident to question her. The headmaster looked weary and ill enough that she considered asking him if he wanted to sit down. Professor Snape looked tense. She kept her occulemency shields firmly in place as she tried to play the entire thing off as one big misunderstanding: she'd been practising shielding spells and had let an argument with Malfoy escalate in the hopes he'd hex her so she could test out her shield against someone who wouldn't hold back. Harry was in the wrong place at the wrong time and acted rashly to defend another student. She'd thrown herself in between them in an attempt to prevent further dueling.

It wasn't the most plausible of explanations, but it was the most benign story she could think up on short notice that what Professor Snape had witnessed.

She felt the slight prodding sensation in her mind that indicated Dumbledore was using legilimency on her, and she immediately looked away, over at Professor Snape, whilst concentrating on the amount of pain she'd been in, flooding her thoughts with memories of pain and confusion from the sectumsempra curse to distract him. Dumbledore withdrew from her mind, and she tried not to glare at him. Had she not glanced over at Professor Snape, she would have missed the slight quirk to his eyebrow as he watched her.

The headmaster must have been satisfied with her explanation because he offered her an insincere smile. "Dueling between students, even when done for educational purposes, is forbidden outside of class, Miss Granger. I have taken points from both Gryffindor and Slytherin and Mr. Potter and Mr. Malfoy are serving detention for their role. I believe your injuries though are punishment enough. It is most fortuitous then that you are recovering. I shall advise Professor McGonagall to ensure that you receive your class assignments so you do not fall behind. Come, Severus."

"I must speak with Madam Pomphrey about her need for additional reserves of skele-grow," Snape said tersely.

"Very well. Carry on then. Miss Granger, I appreciate your desire to learn, but in the future, please refrain from testing spells, defensive or otherwise, outside of the classroom," Dumbledore said, nodding at her and Severus both before departing.

An awkward silence filled the room then. She looked at her potions professor, and he looked at her, narrowing his eyes at her.

"The headmaster may believe that drivel, but do not for a second presume that I do," he said slowly.

She was tempted to make a snide remark in response but had to remind herself that her professor had some sort of friendly relationship with Lucius.

"I do not presume anything," she said cooly.

"You are hiding something."

She arched an eyebrow at him in what she hoped was the sort of intimidating stare Lucius was so good at giving to others, and she kept her occulemency shields firmly in place.

"I told you what happened."

"You are a prefect, engaging in a duel outside of class. You should be stripped of your badge," he hissed.

"I was not engaging in a duel. I did not fire a single offensive spell. I cast a shield. That is all. You're welcome to check my wand if you want," she said, gesturing to the vine wand that rested on the bedside table. She might have been willing to protect Draco from Harry's stupid spell, but she wasn't going to take the fall for something she hadn't done. The shielding spell she'd used fell into a grey area - definitely not taught at Hogwarts, but not illegal either.

It occurred to her suddenly then that she was alone in the hospital wing with the Order's spy, and this - this was a prime opportunity to try to protect Draco! She wished she'd thought of this sooner. It would have given her more time to create a better story.

"Professor, there is something not quite...right with Malfoy," she said cautiously.

He raised an eyebrow at her and said nothing.

"He… well, he does not seem like himself lately. I don't know if he's ill, but if you could…" her voice trailed off at the expression on his face.

An awkward silence filled the room.

"I just thought, I mean, you're his head of house, and I thought that he could...well, he could use someone to talk to," she finished lamely.

You've well and truly botched that, she thought to herself. She should have thought of Severus Snape sooner. She should have come up with a way to ask him to look after Draco without giving away her involvement with Lucius. In her mind, the perfect scenario would have been Snape stepping in to help Malfoy, and leading him toward the light and the Order as she was trying to led Lucius.

He looked her up and down as if seeing her for the first time.

"Your concern is duly noted Miss Granger. You would do best to remember that it is also misplaced."

For the briefest moment, the cold look in his eyes and on his face seemed to shift, and she saw so much there. Concern. Frustration. Perhaps even… was that pity? It shifted again, and the sneering expression he wore daily was back.

"Stay away from Mr. Malfoy," he said stiffly.

With those parting words, he turned abruptly and stalked from the room, his black robes billowing dramatically.

~oOo~

This chapter originally had a more light-hearted ending with Hermione and Harry, but you'll get that in the next chapter. I thought we needed a bit of Snape in here. I've read a lot of time travel AUs in the Potter fandom, and I really like the idea expressed in some that certain things are destined to happen, even when you change numerous other events and circumstances. I like to think that the confrontation in the lavatory and the use of the sectumsempra was destined to happen no matter what. That tension between Draco and Harry had built for so long, and that explosion of anger needed to come out. I really loved the idea of Hermione being part of the mix and fulfilling her promise to Lucius.

As always, I welcome your thoughts, comments, critiques, whatever. Thanks so much for reading!

-Elle