A/N: as always, thanks for reading, my cherubs! Am I the luckiest fanfic writer or what!
Chapter 3
"A ball? That's exciting, isn't it?" Ginny said to her after the Prefects meeting. She had been named head of the decorations committee, which she quickly committed to, despite already having her extracurriculars busy with Quidditch. "It has been sort of dreary around here. Depressing, almost, and I can't even come up with a reason why. But starting off the year with a ball would be a brilliant idea to liven things up!"
"Brilliant," Hermione admitted, "but exhausting. He sprung this up on us last-minute. Malfoy and I were completely blindsided."
"Well, I have faith in you," her friend said, and Hermione held back the urge to roll her eyes. What was with the sudden frequency of that phrase this year? It was getting to be awfully annoying and increasingly less inspiring. "How is that going, by the way? With Malfoy."
Ginny considered herself Hermione's closest female friend, and was therefore obliged to ask about the things Harry and Ron felt they couldn't. Not that Hermione minded – it's just that she rarely talked about what happened between her and Draco after sixth year. She denied it mattered but it was always so personal, even the parts that still stung, that she shut down every time anybody asked her about it. So they stopped asking. Except Ginny, of course, who at least knew a thing or two about tact.
"Just swimmingly, as you might have observed during the meeting," she said dryly, as they turned the corner.
"I thought I was the only one! It was like the beginning of the new Ice Age," Ginny commented, though carefully. "Swear I thought I saw icicles forming on the ceiling. If the meeting went any longer I thought I'd lose my toes to frostbite."
"I'm sure you weren't the only one." She should have been more concerned about the way she and Malfoy looked to the Prefects, but right now she barely had the energy to even think about trying to pretend to be chummy. The effects from their last explosive face-off still lingered with her, and every time she so much as saw his face she felt that deep-seated anger boiling up again. But she was perfectly civil – not warm, but civil. Maybe even to a fault.
"All right, enough talk about wankers. Let's talk about gentlemanly prospects for your date to the ball. You have thought about it, haven't you?" When Hermione gave her a dry look, Ginny nodded. "That's okay, I thought just as much. But now at least I've introduced the concept. Things can only look up from here."
"Finding a date for this godforsaken ball," Hermione said, "is the last thing on my mind. I'm more focused on how on God's green earth I'm going to survive the next month working with Malfoy."
"Well," grinned Ginny. "At least we know Malfoy's out."
ooo
She caught a glimpse of his strikingly blond hair as she sat alone in her corner, pouring herself over her Herbology project. She didn't even look up.
"If you're here to ask me to the Yule Ball, you're too late," she said, as she dipped her quill into her ink bottle. "Viktor's already asked me."
"Well you didn't need to know Divination to reckon that, would you?" he drawled, leaning up against the shelf with his arms coolly crossed.
"Just as much as I have no need for Divination to know that you've probably asked some pretty girl with half a brain to be your date," she said, smirking up at him. "Though you've got to wonder how it is they can have so much hair and keep their neck balanced when they've got nothing substantial in their skulls. Just another one of God's little mysteries, I guess."
He almost hesitated. "Pansy asked me."
Hermione stared at him, watching his face. "And you finally gave in? You poor sod."
"She cornered me, Blackwell."
"She's cornered you before and that's never stopped you from stomping all over her false hopes with your pretentious Italian leather boots."
He only shrugged. "It's just the once. I figure, why not? She'll look smashing in a dress and my father will finally get off my back about her. At least for a few months."
Hermione reached out her arm and poked him. He flinched in surprise. "Bloody hell! What was that for?"
"Just checking to see if you'd gone soft," she said. "And if you must know, you have." Draco rolled his eyes, taking one of her spare quills and running one fingertip down the side. "You don't even like her, Draco. I know this because I've had to sit and hear you whine about how your father thinks your ideal match is Pansy and how it sickens you some nights you want to fling yourself off your terrace."
"This," he said to her, "is just a pot calling a tea kettle black. You don't like Viktor either, Miss High and Mighty."
"That's different. He's actually a gentleman. Pansy's the devil's meaner older sister reincarnated."
"A gentleman with a unibrow and breath that smells like dehydrated meat," he deadpanned. "And those were your own words, I believe."
"With a sparkling, kind personality underneath," she finished. "Which is what matters. You know this. Which is why you loathe Pansy. And now you're going to have to spend the entire night with her, which will be your own doing, so I don't feel sorry for you at all."
"Good. I don't need you feeling sorry for me, Blackwell, because I'll be the one in hysterics when he's stepping all over your toes with his clubfeet."
She shrugged. "It's nothing a little shielding charm won't fix. And there's no spell big enough to make Pansy disappear without anyone else noticing." She paused, thinking. "However grateful they may be."
Draco set down her quill, making sure it laid straight and parallel to her other spare quill. His attention to detail never ceased to amaze her. He was frowning. "Looks like we're just going to have to go to the ball with less-than-ideal partners then."
She sighed dramatically. "How are we going to live through something as important and life-changing as the Yule Ball?"
He shook his head at her, as if she was the impossible one here. "I would have asked you, you know. Insufferable as you are. If you'd only waited."
"And I would've said yes, if only you'd hurried the bloody hell up." She couldn't deny the truth behind this, either. She'd been hoping he'd ask her just so they wouldn't have to muck about with all the unnecessary fuss that came with finding a date for the ball, but Viktor had beat him to the punch. She had no real reason to believe that Draco would even ask her, aside from her own practical hopes. If she'd waited for him she might have been left waiting forever. Dateless. Not that she'd mind going alone, but why be dateless when she didn't have to be in the first place?
He began to walk out of her aisle. "Next time, don't go around saying yes too quickly to the first Neanderthal that asks you to be his date. You don't want to seem too desperate. Might ruin your reputation."
"Remind me that next time there's a cataclysmic event that involves dancing so I remember to turn you down the first time you ask me."
"Dream on, Hermione," he called out, a smirk in his voice, as he disappeared from her view.
She stared after him for a moment, smiling to herself, before getting back to work. "Merlin, I can't stand him," she muttered to herself, as she grabbed her quill.
ooo
"I've been owling every single wizarding band I can think of," she was saying, "but they're all booked until next year." She looked at them. "You guys can't play any instruments, can you?"
"Not only can I not play an instrument," Harry said, as Dean shook his head in response, "I literally repel them. They actually combust upon the sight of me coming."
"Great," Hermione sighed. "Just great."
"Sorry, but isn't Malfoy supposed to be helping you with all this ball stuff?" Harry asked, chewing on a chicken leg. "Or are we just supposed to pretend he doesn't exist?"
"If only pretending was enough. But he's in charge of the other things, like sending out invitations and making sure Hogwarts alumni as well as its the other sponsors come. And," she said, picking up an asparagus from his plate and examining it before taking a bite, "I'd rather not talk to him."
"That sounds like a winning plan. Not talking to the Head Boy all year," Harry said dryly, but stopped when he saw the look on her face. "Blimey, he did something, didn't he?"
"Like what?" Ron said, finally joining them for dinner. He was out of breath, having clearly just run over from class. "Like trip over his massive ego?"
"No," Hermione said, shaking her head. "He didn't do anything. Aside from be himself."
"Which is a capital offense all in itself," Ginny frowned.
"Anyway," Hermione sighed, slinging her satchel bag over her shoulder, "I better go. I've got loads of homework to do after spending all afternoon reading polite rejection letters from wizarding bands all over the United Kingdom. I even reached out to one Swedish band, and even they rejected me. In Swedish."
"I'm sure you'll have better luck looking for a date, though," Ginny offered. "I've already overheard a few of the Prefect boys talking about you."
Ron looked up, his mouth already full. "Date? Who said anything about a date?" He glared at Hermione. "You never said we had to have a date for this sodding ball!"
Hermione shook her head. "Go alone if you'd like, Ronald. I really don't care much about dates right now, either," she said, giving Ginny a pointed look, before heading out of the Great Hall.
"It can't hurt to have a bit of fun, Hermione! That's all!" Ginny called out.
Hermione sighed to herself, closing her eyes. Fun. Fun, to her, right now, was finding a quiet corner in the library and getting her work done, all the while pretending they had chosen another Head Boy instead, one that didn't make her shiver with rage every time he did so much as step into the same room as her. But it comforted her at least a little to know the feeling was probably mutual.
She found her usual spot in the library and began to strategize her plan of attack for tonight. She had more than enough work to keep her busy for at least the next four hours before she had to go check up on the Prefects on tonight's patrol. She laid out her spare quills and ink bottles, opened up her books, and got to work.
It was towards the end of her Ancient Runes essay when she'd heard talking on the other side of the shelf. It was quiet enough that she could easily tune it out, but then she thought she'd heard Draco's name being mentioned. She paused, listening closely, before dotting the end of her sentence with a period and looking up.
"…Not sure what's going on with him, really. Even Blaise's been asking around. Says he's been acting weird and disappearing a lot. I told him it's probably just Heads business but now that he's brought it up I'm finding it a bit suspicious."
"I heard he'd gotten initiated over summer. Is it true?" said a familiar husky voice. Hermione recognized her to be Millicent Bullstrode, who had never really understood the idea of whispering.
"Quiet Millie! Bloody hell," said the harsh whisper, which Hermione suspected to be none other than Pansy Parkinson. It surprised her enough that they were actually in the library, let alone the fact that they had even known where it was. "But that's the rumor. I tried asking him about it on the train but he straight up deflected me. Which gives me even more reason to believe he did. They've just got to be secretive about it, and all. Even to us. They say Dumbledore's on the lookout for anyone suspicious in Hogwarts. With Draco as Head Boy and all, he'll be watching him the closest. Blaise says that's why he was chosen, you know. So that Dumbledore could keep a close eye on him, what with his father a known Death Eater and all."
Hermione closed her eyes, taking a silent but shuddering breath. Even with their hostile relations now, it was still hard on her to remember the changes that had happened to Malfoy over their sixth year. Even before her news had come out, she'd had the suspicion that things had only gotten worse for him. She could feel it when she was around him; see it on him when he was across the room. His face only got harder and sharper, his eyes only darker and more dangerous. In the last few weeks before her secret was exposed, she had felt the shadow that both followed and preceded him. It was so strong that it became almost tangible and made her want to reach out and reassure him that everything was going to be okay.
But after she had been outed, she had been expelled from knowing even the vaguest details of his life. She had become an outsider and was only privileged to the rumors everyone had heard and passed on, to the physical minutiae she could only observe with her eyes. She sat there and watched everything happen. Sat and watched the darkness of his life swallow him up. She watched him grow colder and didn't do a thing about it because she hated him too much.
And now he was a rumored Death Eater, or at least one in pending, and she had to share a common room with him and work with him on a daily basis. Her, the girl that paraded around as a Pureblood when she was anything but. Her, one-half of Harry Potter's confidants. Her, the girl that was probably the first on the Dark Lord's list of filthy, undeserving Mudbloods to finally rid the Wizarding World of in one fell swoop.
Suddenly she felt sick. She stood up and quietly ran out of her aisle, heading towards the toilets. In the bathroom she stuck her head inside the toilet and retched until all that was left inside her were her guts, and even those didn't feel completely intact. When she finally got off her shaky knees to clean herself up at the sink, she felt woozy. She felt a million things. Shame, rage, sadness, disgust, agony, and so many other emotions that made her want to submerge herself in a sinkful of ice water and never come back up.
She spent a few minutes in the loo, composing herself, before she returned to her place in the library. By then, Pansy and Millicent had disappeared. Ironically, so had most of her focus. She glanced at her watch and sighed, sitting back in her chair. It was twenty minutes until she was supposed to head out and check on the Prefects, but she couldn't stand a minute more indoors. She quickly packed her things and started towards the Astronomy Tower.
ooo
It was her fifth year and she couldn't sleep. She laid in bed, staring up at her ceiling, listening to the synchronized snores of her Housemates. Then, finally, she pulled on a jumper, grabbed her wand, and snuck out of the dormitories.
The thing about being a rule-follower was that you also had to be diligent about attaining the skills to make sure you didn't get caught once you eventually did break the rules. She had made sure of this, so she was able to make it to the Astronomy Tower without running into a single soul. Once she was there, however, she realized that she wasn't the only one who escaped to the Astronomy Tower every now and then for a bit of peace and quiet.
"Draco," she said, surprised and out of breath. He turned around and gave her the same look of cool curiosity. "I take it you're up to no good."
"Of course," he drawled. "How couldn't I be? Standing in a dark tower, in my pajamas, all alone. How sinister of me."
She rolled her eyes and came closer to him, tucking her wand away. The dim torches in the tower did very little to illuminate much beyond the corridors, but the moon was full and giant tonight, which gave her clear view of his face. He looked troubled, like he was wrestling with something. Something heavy.
"What's the matter?" she asked, gently.
"I just couldn't sleep," he said, curtly. "Blaise snores like a congested dragon."
"You could always just cast a silencing charm," she suggested. "I do it sometimes when it gets unbearable. You'd be surprised whose a snorer. Some of the prettiest girls, actually," she said, with a hint of pride. "Some of the ones you'd never even suspect sound remarkably like blowhorns in the dead of the night."
He shook his head, his face drawing back down in thought. "It's not just that. You know it isn't."
She watched him. "No, I can't say I really do."
He looked at her. His eyes were like pearls when the moonlight struck them in just the right way. She almost felt her breath catch. "Do you know who you are?"
She blinked, confused. "Who I am?"
"You know," he said, already beginning to sound frustrated. "Who you are. Not your name or any of that fluff, but on the inside. What you want. Out of life, and all of that nonsense."
"I'd hardly call it nonsense when you're getting so worked up about it," she scoffed.
He gave her a hard, firm look, turning to her completely. "It's important, isn't it? Knowing that about yourself. Asking those questions and having the answers when the time comes."
She nodded, swallowing hard. She lowered her voice to a gentle tone. "Is this about your father, Draco?"
She knew all about Lucius. How could she not? She had learned to attune her senses to feel whenever he was near. She saw the effect he had on his son – his son, this naïve, loving boy that wanted nothing more than his father's validation. His permission. His love. She almost wished she'd never done so – made herself aware – because the truth was so ugly, so disheartening about the Malfoys. That everything had a price. Even a father's love. That in the extravagant beauty of their lives there was a terrible evil and tragedy rotting underneath their blood red roses in eternal bloom.
He turned away, and she found that pulsing knot in his jaw again as he gritted his teeth. "No. Yes. Not just him. Everyone."
"You don't have to listen to him, or anyone," she went on, quietly. "This is your life. He can't tell you otherwise. He may be your father, Draco, but that's all he is. He doesn't deserve anything else from you. Do what you want. Do what you think is right."
He met her eyes again. They were shiny, hard. Searching. Conflicted. "But what if I don't know? What if I can't decide? What if – I feel myself torn in so many directions that half the time I can't even justify what I'm doing with a real reason?"
His voice broke in the middle of it, and she felt her hand instinctively rise up, delicately touching his jaw.
"Have faith in yourself, Draco. I do. I trust you."
And she did. Because even in the inching darkness and the maliciousness of his father she saw him, or at least the essence of him, a lingering flame of light that stubbornly refused to be blown out. She trusted him and she wanted to trust him more, at the same time. Not only him, but the universe. To be careful with him, because he was more fragile than he looked. And to hold him up when he needed the help, because standing up to your destiny was harder than anybody could ever imagine. Especially for a boy that everybody had already written off. The truth was that nobody had faith in Draco Malfoy, not even then. It still remained one of his life's most tragic truths to this day.
"Some nights I catch glimpses of my future," he told her. "But then I wake up, and it's okay. But what if I don't? What happens when the day comes and I can't wake up, because it's real?"
She shook her head. "That," she told him, feeling the sudden weight in her own throat, "is never going to happen."
He scoffed softly. "And you know everything, don't you? Hermione Blackwell, the girl with all the answers. Insufferable Know-It-All."
"Exactly," she said proudly, and he only shook his head, chuckling under his breath. "So trust me. And don't write yourself off yet." She held her hand out. "Now shake on it like a man, Malfoy."
He looked at her for a second, as if hesitating, but did it anyway. They shook on it and that, she'd naively told herself then, sealed it. His fate. He would rise above it. He would be a better man than his father could ever hope to be. He would get his answers.
ooo
She spent half an hour checking on the Prefects and making sure they were where they needed to be. It was an unnecessary formality of being a Head – she and Malfoy were required to take turns doing it – and they hardly caught any of the Prefects breaking the rules. At least, not when they knew she was coming. She did a quick twenty-minute sweep before she started heading up to her room, still thinking about what she had overheard in the library. And as she did, she realized how angry she was becoming, at how much she wanted to march right up to him and beat some sense into him with her fists and demand an explanation, because damn it if she didn't deserve one! Damn it if she didn't deserve a lot of things from him, an explanation in the very least.
Maybe it seemed silly to her now but back then, even with the pressures from his father, she'd never once thought he'd give in. She'd always somehow believed that once it was possible, he would break away from the lifestyle of darkness he'd grown up with. That he'd want more for himself than a life of servitude to anyone.
That was then, Hermione, she firmly thought to herself, feeling the sudden tightness in her throat as she reflected on these ancient ideas of Draco she'd once kept close and dear. Things have changed since then, remember?
This lingered with her as she looked up towards the entrance to their common room. She suddenly froze. The door was ajar and against it laid a heap of school robes on the floor, with its long legs sprawled out. In the dim light she could make out the soles of its shoes. Her heart stopped, her mind reeling in shock. She knew those Italian leather shoes anywhere.
"Just came limping in an hour ago," one of the portraits gruffly informed her, having just been woken up from her gasp. "Didn't even make it past the door."
a strategically-placed cliff-hanger deserves a review, don't you think? :c)
