Friday, June 6th, 2003.

Draco had received Granger's answer the previous night, around one o'clock. Thank Salazar Blaise had stayed at Greengrass' that night. Receiving an owl from Granger this late would have triggered a lot of unwanted and disgraceful comments from the lad.

Draco had been trying not to get drunk the only way he knew how, and, if working like a madman did take a lot of concentration - thus keeping his urge to down firewhiskey from a crystal glass in a corner of his mind where he could forget about it - it still had the notorious side-effect to add layers upon layers of irritability to his now constant state of near madness. So, her quick note had come with an unexpected, but welcome, calming effect on his nerves.

The slight relief had been short-lived though. She'd written that she'd read the oath, but that what she'd found wasn't satisfying. It still implied she'd found something, and it had been all he'd been able to think about ever since. And after a full night and a full day of trying to guess what it was she'd found, satisfying or not, he was back to being a wreck.

Now, he'd just passed the security at the Ministry, and hoped that he wouldn't cross Greengrass on his way to Law Enforcement atop everything else. It was seven o'clock but Blaise whined about his girlfriend staying late at work enough that she could still be in there.

Draco took the lift without seeing anyone he knew and reached an empty secretary desk. Good. He went around it, and stopped at the end of the corridor, before Granger's door. He knocked and was answered by her muffled voice:

"Come in." He did quickly before anyone could poke his head out of their office.

If he hadn't been coming with a dreadful sensation that twisted his guts, he would have laughed. The office was a complete mess. There were files, books and scrolls of parchment all over the place and Granger seemed to be trying to write on two scrolls simultaneously. What was really funny though, even if he didn't find it in him to actually laugh, was Granger herself.

Her hair to be precise.

She'd apparently tried to keep the mass out of the way and had packed it carelessly atop her head, in what looked like a giant nest made of straw. Strands of frizzy hair poked out of it from everywhere and when she lifted her face to him, they jiggled awkwardly.

She looked utterly exhausted. Which was another reason why he didn't laugh. Her face and her late answer the previous night and Draco realised she'd been working days and nights. He only hoped it wasn't because of him.

"Sit. I'll only be a minute." He nodded, and did as told. She finished her sentence on one of the scrolls and, without using her wand, muttered something under her breath. Her notes rearranged themselves. Draco blinked a few times in an astonishment he hoped she wouldn't notice.

"What's that charm?" He couldn't help but ask though.

She answered without looking at him: "Organising charm. You write all you want to include and it sorts it through in categories. Useful but not entirely reliable. I'll need to check it later." She grabbed her wand then, and banished the mess to a small table by the little window at her right. The scrolls and files arranged themselves in two neat piles and the books went back to a bookshelf he hadn't noticed behind her.

"So." She said, opening the one file that still laid in front of her. She grimaced before continuing: "This is horrific." That wasn't really encouraging. She kept going before he could comment: "I read it whole, at least ten times. Has anyone else read it?" She asked, finally looking at him.

"No."

"So you didn't notice that it was an evolving contract?" She cringed, wariness even in her frown.

"A what?" He asked and she growled, looking even more drenched. Eventually she took a deep breath and explained:

"Err … It means that it evolves according to certain events. It adapts." Of course it did. Of course.

Hermione watched his face discompose for a fraction of a second. Obviously this came as a surprise to him. A bad surprise. He composed himself quickly though, as usual, and said:

"Really? It never changed …"

"Because your situation never changed either." She explained. "As I read it, each time I thought of something to counter it, details developed under each point."

"Wh … Fuck."

His blank mask slipped away, the information apparently too much for his self-control. Hermione understood his distress though and let him gather himself before continuing: "Exactly what I thought. Although it's not totally a bad thing. It can be both a disadvantage and an advantage."

"How? If it adapts it must cover everything ..." He countered, trying to pull back his mask but his sudden torment was still visible in his eyes.

"Let me explain please. It's ... Terribly precise. Especially about means to destroy the company, so I outed that option. But there's only one other thing about which this is really precise too, it's the heir." Hermione opened the contract and turned a few pages to show him. "See, the entire section here is all about your heir, his err … training," She didn't even try to hide her distaste at the word, what she thought of Lucius' idea of educating children shouldn't stay a secret, even to his son. "How to pass the company on etc. But there's a flaw. Look," She turned a few more pages. "Here, the only detail required for a wife, is suitable. Any means as to get her to marry you, for instance, are carefully not precise. You could bribe her or even threaten her for all I know the contract wouldn't move. I know that there isn't so many pure-bloods available these days, and I could bet my hand that if all of them were to marry, the contract would erase suitable and manage a way to write half-blood subtly. But it could take years and it's not solving the problem." She paused to take a breath. He seemed to be reflecting on that.

"I don't see where you're going …" He finally frowned.

"There's nothing required from a wife except that she should be suitable. You could intentionally marry a woman who's err … infertile."

"So I couldn't produce an heir? How does that solve …" His eyes widened as he understood: "Oh, it evolves! You think I could pick …"

"Possibly."

"You're not certain though." He deflated.

"No. But I'm pretty sure your father wouldn't want his line to end with you."

"Sure." He nodded. "So, I would need a woman unfortunate enough to not be able to bear children."

He blanched all of a sudden. Hermione felt something drop at the pit of her stomach. Damn, the look on his face. So, he'd added one and one. He'd understood her argument with Harry after all. He knew. What was she supposed to say? He seemed frozen, his face contorted in something close to anguish, his grey eyes wide on her. Hermione swallowed and decided to continue as if nothing, berating herself for the trembling in her voice:

"Or old enough. I think it would allow you to pick the heir, adopt or simply give it to a relative. If you were infertile it would have saved a lot of trouble you wouldn't need to get married and could possibly pick the heir but ..."

"But I'm not." He cut quietly. His face still seemed as hard as a rock. Tenser than she'd ever seen it which was definitely saying something. She ignored it the best she could:

"Right. The contract would have moved if you were anyway. It's linked to you by blo …"

"I'm sorry." He cut abruptly before swallowing. Merlin no. They weren't there to talk about that, she never wanted to talk about that. Certainly not with him. He had an issue, and it was why he was there.

"To be fertile? That's a weird thing to be sorry about Malfoy." She tried, hoping he'd take the hint. He didn't.

"I .. no, I mean ... You …" He stumbled with his words, which gave her the opportunity to cut the matter.

"Don't. I don't want to talk about that. Plus it's nothing to do with your issue." She said, realising he would hear the pleading edge in her voice, and not liking it a bit.

"Right." He nodded sharply and after an awkward swallow, went back to the subject at hands: "So I should marry ... Or more likely bribe someone to marry me. Someone err … old as to choose my own heir then."

"Yes. But there's a possibility the contract will only allow you to adopt then, though if it's not precise enough you could adopt Blaise."

He chuckled to his apparent surprise. He frowned right after.

"Great. I'm off to find an old woman to bribe into marrying me so we can adopt Blaise and give him a company he doesn't want." He grunted bitterness strong in his voice.

"I'm sorry."

"Not your fault." He dismissed, lowering his tormented eyes to his hands.

"Right. I'll keep working on it anyway but for now … it's all I could come up with."

He nodded, and rubbed his face in his hands. The sight was painful. Hermione turned from it and pretended to fuss with the file, to let him collect himself without feeling her gaze. After a moment, he spoke in a thick voice:

"How am I supposed to find someone infertile anyway?" He sounded defeated, his face was defeated. He wasn't hiding anything from her any more. It was just awful, she needed to find something else. She needed to work on that sodding Montgomery case too. But his eyes were so … she couldn't turn away from them. The sometimes steel grey was now more a cloudy colour, swirling with things Hermione couldn't place. He seemed to notice her sudden worry and added, the joking tone not convincing:

"You don't happen to know a club for the elderly?" It still made her stifle a laugh.

"Publish an add on the prophet." She suggested. He rolled his eyes:

"Very good idea. Way to keep this silent." She cringed at his bitterness:

"I'm sorry. Trying to play it is the only loophole I found. Yet. I mean it's clever, but magical. There's no brain behind it, it only reacts to certain events and possibilities. The ones your father thought about only. It can be tricked but it won't be pleasant anyway."

"Fantastic." He scowled.

"I'm sorry …"

"Don't be. It's not your fault."

He smiled then but Hermione could see he was faking it. She should probably try to control her face too. It clenched her heart that her only solution was a forced marriage that could perhaps allow him to choose to whom he'd pass the company. If someone was pressuring him, she'd have to come up with better.

She knew he noticed right away her mental ordeal.

What he said next, obviously only to lighten the mood, was proof enough and brought silence between them for a very awkward second:

"Would be easier if you'd just marry me." Shock registered on his face right away. When he lifted a hand to slap his forehead in sudden horror, Hermione burst out laughing. This was the most ridiculous thing she'd ever heard. He was quick to join her, having apparently realised she hadn't taken it wrong. She managed to collect herself after a moment of uncontrollable giggles, that surely had been brought up more by her state of nerves, than by his mediocre and somehow unthoughtful joke.

"I'm afraid I'll have to decline the offer." She chuckled. He pleated his eyes uneasily, pinching his lips together and she continued: "I hardly fall under the suitable category anyway, the oath wouldn't allow it. Plus, according to witch weekly I'm currently poisoning Blaise for a proposal."

"Shame. We could have been the perfect little family." He grimaced.

"You and I, adopting Blaise?" They both had trouble keeping a serious face again. "That's the weirdest thing someone has ever said to me." He seemed to agree. "No, you saying that it would be easier to be married to me, was the weirdest thing I've ever heard." She corrected.

He blinked.

"I said no such thing."

"Yes, you did."

"Shit, I did." She chuckled and mocked:

"I knew you liked me ferret." He froze and she burst out laughing again.

Blaise heard the laughter from Astoria's office door. They both looked at each other questioningly, Astoria forgetting to pack her scrolls a minute.

"Is that … ?"

"Draco?" He finished. She blinked a couple of times.

"I didn't even hear him come." She scowled and then her eyes widened: "You think she found something?"

"Maybe."

"Well, they seem to be having a good time anyway." She smirked. Blaise pricked his ears for a few seconds and then said:

"Not any more. And I'm not questioning him." He warned with a finger pointed to her face, as she opened her mouth:

"Right, right. He'll tell you if she's found something anyway."

"Yes."

"We should have a drink with them again. To celebrate. Or cheer him up." She offered.

"Not tonight though, I have other plans for tonight." He answered, taking a step to her and wiggling his eyebrows suggestively. She bit her lip before asking:

"And for breakfast?"

"I've got a few plans for breakfast too." He purred. She giggled. She would be the end of him.

"Good. My mother's charity is next week-end by the way. You're invited." Oh damn she would. But not the way he'd first thought.

"Err …"

"As a friend, don't get your knickers in a twist, I planned on inviting Hermione too and maybe …" She shut her mouth abruptly as the door to Granger's office opened and they both listened to what was obviously the end of their conversation.

Draco guessed he'd deserved the mockery, after pulling such an atrocious joke. He didn't even understand how she hadn't yelled at him. He'd just used her ... issue? to make a joke, in a pitiful attempt to ease her worry. What an idiot. She stopped laughing abruptly, cutting his train of self-depreciating thoughts, and seemed to reflect on her laughter a moment. Then she scowled:

"I think I spend way too much time with your sodding best friend."

Draco forced a chuckle, and took the opportunity to change the subject:

"Zabinis are hard to get rid of. Once they got a hand on you, they grip like leeches and never let go." He explained.

"Err … I hope he'll keep that for Astoria." She grimaced. She was probably the only woman on earth completely unaffected by Blaise's looks.

Draco shook his head and she smiled, that small anguished smile she'd sported since he'd arrived. She'd laughed just a moment before, and now she was fidgeting with a corner of a page from his oath, her brown gaze slowly blurring as she looked at nothing above his shoulder. She was thinking again, he knew it, she was trying to find something else.

She'd found something already even if it wasn't 'satisfying', and it was already more than what Draco had expected. Of course, he'd already decided that he'd never marry anyone in the hopes that the contract would move. If it only allowed him to adopt a kid, he'd end up at the exact same point as before, plus the bribed gold digger wife.

It was when her frown deepened that he realised that she was as stuck as he was. She didn't know what to do and he felt a burning wave he had trouble containing, threaten to burst from behind his eyelids. The words left his mouth in a plaintive tone he didn't have the courage to fight:

"I was right, there's really nothing I can do."

She snapped out of it at once and lifted a hand to him. It stayed awkwardly, hesitantly, in the air while she spoke:

"Yes there is Malfoy. I'll keep working on it and in the meantime … Go for older … With a little luck you'll be allowed to choose ..." She tried and as Draco didn't find a word to answer that, her mouth screwed in something he decided not to define, and she lowered her lifted hand to his arm. "I'm sorry, I haven't found anything else yet ..."

"I know. I know." He tried to reassure as soon as her small hand squeezed his sleeve-covered forearm. He closed his eyes then, trying to push away the sudden agonising pang he felt at having Hermione Granger, of all people, trying to comfort him. He passed his hand in his hair, forcing her to withdraw hers from his arm, and tried to ignore the sudden loneliness that threatened to engulf him but failed miserably.

It was a sharp pain, loneliness, especially when facing someone who was as helpless as he was but still trying to help in vain.

It suddenly became all too much, all he wanted to do was crawl in a hole and never get out. And he didn't need Granger to see him like that, he'd displayed too much already, so he stood. The look on her face told him she could see how he felt and as she opened her mouth to say something he spoke first:

"Thank you Granger." He said, and turned his back on her. As he grabbed the doorknob, she snapped:

"You'll thank me when the oath is broken." Draco didn't find anything to say to that, there was something in her voice. Something fierce and so terribly Granger that he was left speechless. The door was already open and he was taking his first step out of her office when she added:

"I'll find something." A strong determination poured from her voice, some sort of bravery that told him she wouldn't stop until she did. Maybe she would. Maybe she would.

"I hope you will." He murmured, not turning back to her, and then went away.

Hermione watched his retreating back, feeling suddenly filled with a determination she hadn't felt in years. She'd been about to reopen the file containing the oath when he stopped just before the door closed after him.

She frowned, and stood. Blaise and Astoria were there, the last sporting an uneasy smile that told Hermione they'd been eavesdropping.

"Greengrass." Malfoy mumbled, clearly not in the mood for small talk. Hermione couldn't blame him.

"Just when I wanted to see you." Astoria started.

"Really?" He droned, starting on her left to go. Hermione took a step out of her office.

"Yes, my mother's hosting a charity party next Saturday. You're invited." Astoria said, making him stop in his tracks.

"Oh. Err …" He grimaced, apparently distracted.

"Hermione's coming too!" She grinned and Hermione berated herself inwardly for being curious. She should have stayed in her office.

"Am I?" She asked, joining them.

"Yes. My mother asked I invited some of my friends. Blaise is coming."

"Err … I don't have any robes, I'll have to pass." She pretexted quickly under Malfoy's frowning gaze.

"We'll find some. You could come with Draco." Both of them blinked. Malfoy was quicker to react:

"I don't think so …" He grimaced and Hermione could only agree with his sudden discomfort:

"Me neither." She said.

"Why? You two get along well enough." Astoria protested.

"We're not that friendly." Malfoy said and Hermione corrected:

"We're barely friendly." He nodded in agreement.

"Right, and I'm ugly." Both ignored Blaise and as Astoria started to frown Malfoy concluded in a clipped tone:

"I'm not coming Greengrass."

"Oh but you are." She ordered.

"And why would I inflict myself so much pain?" He retorted.

"Because you like me." She snapped.

"Since when?"

"Since you've got good taste Malfoy and I'm pretty. You're coming." She said in a final tone. Malfoy turned a supplicating gaze to Hermione then, which she had to admit was funny. She couldn't argue with Astoria on her being pretty though, so she shrugged:

"Well, she is pretty." He scowled and gave her a glare that said 'seriously?'

"See? Now you two are coming together." At those words, Hermione realised what point she'd just pushed and it was her turn to scowl:

"Err …" Malfoy's glare softened, but it still told her 'you're an idiot'.

"Why?" He argued.

"Let's settle on just going." Hermione compromised as Astoria was about to retort. The pretty witch closed her mouth then and after a few seconds where Hermione thought she'd resolved the argument, she turned to Blaise with a smirk:

"What do you say you go with Hermione and I go with Draco?" Blaise blinked and then understanding made his eyes grow wide:

"And show those bints from Witch Weekly that I'm not a moron?" Malfoy snorted loudly and Hermione had to slap her mouth with her hand to muffle an ugly snicker. Which only got them both a glare in answer.

"Or that Hermione doesn't poison people." Astoria continued. Hermione had been about to pretest that she didn't care, but she deflated right away and sighed instead. Malfoy seemed as resigned as she felt, Astoria was a persistent woman. It was useless to argue. As the bickering couple started to plan out their Saturday afternoon, Malfoy growled, and Hermione grimaced in his general direction.

He went to round the couple and go, but stopped and turned to Hermione after only a step:

"Owl if you find anything I can help with."

"I will." She nodded, and as he took a step away, she took one back to her office, she had an oath to break.

A/N: I don't really like to put notes like that but since I have a few things to tell you, I'd better do it fully with a long and polluting paragraph!

First, I wanted to thank you all for the reviews, follows, favourites. It's huge to me, I really enjoy reading your speculations and comments, so thanks a lot!

Also I wanted to let you know that I'm working on - at least - three other dramione stories (a dark one, a romance, and one I have no idea how to define). The dark one - which doesn't have name yet - will probably be out in November.

Second, I'm going to move the two last Epistolary (II and III) to the first one to make a series of one shots (I've got too many ideas to keep posting them separately).

And lastly, I'm probably going to edit the world is upside down, and rewrite the end. I'm not happy with how it turned out, it feels botched.

Thank you all again, hope you enjoy your reading as much as I enjoy writing (even if it's full of mistakes).

Lucie.