A/N: Okay, I feel like it's only getting worse and worse… Should I just give up?

Disclaimer: Harry Potter belongs to JK Rowling

INGENUE
Day 03: Of doubts and understanding

It was ten in the morning, and Hermione was dying. She may have been Hermione Granger, but even she had problems sticking through hours after hours of reading non-fiction. And that was all she had been doing since the previous afternoon. Or trying to do, at least.

She had had no chance to nimbly avoid his traps while spinning her own, as she had hazily planned. After lunch, Malfoy had still considered her too boring to bestow with the gift of his voice and tossed her The East Asian Financial Crisis to while away her time. He, meanwhile, spent most of his time staring at various articles of furniture or out the window. Hermione was pretty sure he was not daydreaming though, as the wand in his hand constantly twitched in tandem with the unobtrusive motions of his hand mimicking writing.

She, on the other hand, had spent most of her time wondering what he was wondering about. She had been waiting for him to make the first move, but as it didn't appear to be forthcoming, she would have to act first. She had many things to find out from him. How he had got past the wards around her house, exactly what spell he was using to keep her bound to her bed, and how he managed to remove it to let her use the bathroom without her seeing him use his wand.

She knew a fair number of spells, but she couldn't seem to recognise this one. She had tried to leave the bed the first time he used the bathroom, but the minute her feet had hit the floor, she'd been flipped right back onto the bed, narrowly missing cracking her head on the wall and eliciting an agonised creak from her bed. There were several barrier spells that operated quite similarly to this, but the barriers were vertical rather than horizontal, and all of them definitely required a wand to call off.

She wondered if finding out any of this would even help her escape, anyway. It would just give her a bit more information about the situation, and that was it. But she knew she had to at least do something. Sitting here doing nothing was driving her crazy. In honesty, what was really bothering her was her fear that the Death Eaters were using her as a pawn against Harry. She had dismissed the idea that she was being held captive in order to weaken the capabilities of the Order, for she was definitely not yet considered a truly formidable enemy. After all, even the Order had not felt her threatened enough to insist she reside in the Order's headquarters immediately, or relocate somewhere safer than her parent's home in the outskirts of London. She had also considered that the Death Eaters wanted to pry information out of her, but Malfoy's lack of interest in talking to her appeared to negate this possibility. However, her link as one of Harry's best friends would make her an effective weapon against him, and no one would know that better than Malfoy (and Snape?). What if they were threatening Harry with her capture at this moment?

Hermione gripped her coverlet, feeling the soft cotton bunch into the grooves of her hand. She hated to admit it, but she knew part of the reason she had refrained from doing anything till now was also because she was quite sure she was safe at the moment and she was afraid of upsetting the equilibrium. For all his apparent calm, what did she really know about Malfoy? What if he flipped out and killed her if she said the wrong thing?

She tightened her hold on the sheets. Harry was more important than this, she told herself. Harry was willing to die for her, and so should she. Surely she at least had the guts to ask a person some simple questions?

"Malfoy," she paused. "Are you really intending for us to go through the next week without talking?"

Malfoy looked at her funnily. "Well…yes." He turned back to her bookcase, his furniture of staring choice for that hour.

Okay, way to go, you just reached a dead end, Hermione thought icily to herself. She wondered how she could get him to talk. She thought back to the story he had spun the first night, that he was using her room as a hide-out. Why had he not continued that excuse? Surely, if he had given her the whole long yarn, he might have been able to successfully fool her. Or was this some reverse psychology thing, where he assumed by being suspicious about it she would think it less suspicious as his act would seem more honest? She blinked. Did that make sense? Maybe he was waiting for her to ask him that question, so that he would seem more genuine if he revealed it. Well, she could test that theory by asking him, surely.

"Malfoy, what are you hiding from?" she asked. She realised her shoulders were tense and tried to relax them as discreetly as possible.

He looked at her in annoyance. "Is your book so boring? I could pass you another one. Fiction or non-fiction?" He plucked two random books off her table and waved them at her. She realised suddenly that he had been careful to choose Muggle books. Further proof the hide-out reason was a lie! As a Death Eater, of course he would not want her to learn new spells, or read about the last war against Voldemort.

"No…" Hermione started, but was cut off by Malfoy.

"I did say that book was nonsense though," Malfoy said somewhat smugly, nodding at The East Asian Financial Crisis lying open on the bed, its spine staring defiantly at him. "You can learn all you need to know about the crisis by talking to the right people, and it'd be a lot less boring too. Anyway, Muggles can only see their side of the story. It was mainly Death -" Malfoy stopped quickly, glancing at Hermione.

"What do you mean?" Hermione asked curiously.

"It's none of your concern," Malfoy said crossly. "Now go back to reading your book."

Hermione sighed quietly and turned back to the book, staring at the bold font emblazoned on the cover. There had to be some way… She paused suddenly as an idea occurred to her.

"You know, Malfoy, how do I know you're actually borrowing the use of my room for a while, and not holding me for some ulterior motive?" Hermione asked.

Malfoy looked annoyed. "Do I care what you think?"

"What if you're keeping me hostage as part of a Death Eater mission to threaten Harry Potter with the harming of his friends?" Hermione asked earnestly.

Hermione cheered silently as Malfoy's eyebrows furrowed. Reverse psychology was indeed a powerful thing.

"This is not a Death Eater mission," Malfoy said sharply.

"But if you're not going to give me any other reasonable explanation, what else can I think?" Hermione replied.

Malfoy sighed. "I don't want to have to talk about it, okay?"

"You don't have to talk about it, you just have to tell me," Hermione insisted. "Then I'll shut up."

Malfoy considered for a long while.

"Well, after all I guess by the time you can tell anyone this, I'll be far away." Malfoy said slowly

Hermione frowned a little. What did that mean?

"In a nutshell, I'm just waiting for my plane out of this country."

Hermione blinked. "Why do you need to hide before you take a plane?" She paused. "Why are you taking Muggle transportation, anyway?"

Malfoy paused for a length of time. Hermione noticed that at some point he had started twirling his wand, dark mahogany against white fingers.

"I'm on the run from the Death Eaters," he said calmly. The wand spun faster.

"What!?" Hermione gasped. "Why?" Was it because you failed to kill Professor Dumbledore?

Malfoy shrugged. "I just didn't feel like being part of them anymore," he said.

Hermione shook her head, but it didn't seem to make her thoughts any clearer. "Okay, no I don't get it. You don't want to be a Death Eater why?"

On retrospect, that was a stupid question. She could think of plenty of reasons why a normal person wouldn't want anything to do with Death Eaters or Voldemort. Malfoys didn't quite fit under the tag of 'normal', though.

"I've already answered your question, I think that'll do," Malfoy said rather acidly.

"Wait, no, are you defecting? Are you joining the Order?" Did he intend to be another Snape?

Malfoy started at the sound of the name and his wand clattered to the floor. He picked it up swiftly.

"Of course not," Malfoy said. "Are you crazy?"

Hermione wondered briefly if being crazy with confusion counted. "Okay so you don't want to be a Death Eater but you don't want to fight against Voldemort either? So what do you want to do? You can't just sit around here, you'll get pulled into either side eventually."

Malfoy looked at her like she was a little slow in the head. "That's why I'm leaving the country and going somewhere no one can find me?"

Hermione gaped. "You're running away?" she almost yelled. "What kind of cowardly action is-"

"Shut the hell up, you damned Mudblood!" Malfoy shouted, his fist rattling the table as he stood up. Hermione felt her breath quicken, her eyes trained warily on the wand tip pointed at her. Seconds passed by, both sides unmoving. Hermione felt the blood get louder in her eardrums. She couldn't blink.

Finally Malfoy sat down with a thump, resting his elbow on the table and glaring hatefully at her. "Stupid fucking Mudblood," he mumbled to himself. "Think she's so smart and great; that she has the right to comment on me, when she's probably been pampered her whole life. Her blood's probably so dirty she can't even see she's an ugly bitch whose head is too big for her body, literally."

Hermione bristled. What the hell? That was some kind of low-level insult! She guessed Malfoy hadn't changed that much, after all. And he was still one heck of a coward. She looked at him in disgust. Malfoy was absolutely revolting. Running away? Come on, she had even less respect for him now than when (she thought?) he was a Death Eater. Was that why he had been unable to kill Professor Dumbledore? Not because his conscience was eating at him, but because he was too scared?

Malfoy glanced up at her. "Don't look at me like that," he spat, and the wand shivered in the tightness of his grip. "I don't owe you any damn explanation."

Hermione forced herself to look away. It was not a good idea to further anger him now. He seemed very unstable, and she didn't know what was his tipping point. If there really was a tipping point? Hermione was confused. She had (did?) really believed him when he said he was running away. He had seemed too realistic to be lying…or was he just an astonishingly good actor?

Hermione breathed out slowly. To figure that out, she'd have to break him down slowly.

"Uh, Malfoy…" Hermione started hesitantly. Draco? Should she call him that? Probably not, that'd make him more suspicious than relaxed.

"Malfoy, why don't you join the Order?" Hermione asked in a sudden inspiration. As Malfoy turned to give her a very strange look, she hurried on. "Maybe not actually join the Order, but ask for their protection. You need protection from the Death Eaters, right? That's why you're in hiding now?"

"Are you crazy?" Malfoy demanded, and Hermione did think he was quite right. Had she just asked a probable Death Eater to join the Order? "You're just going to torture information on the Dark Lord out of me. Do you think I'm stupid?"

"We'd never do that!" Hermione said indignantly. "We're the good side!"

"'The good side!'" Malfoy scoffed. "Look, I know you're all proud of being all pure and white-robed, but get real, alright? The world's not al white and black. I know for a fact Dumbledore secretly used the Cruciatus curse on Death Eaters to get them to reveal information."

"I don't believe you!" Hermione exclaimed, aghast. "Who told you that?"

"My…" Malfoy stopped suddenly. "My father."

"Ha!" Hermione crowed. "Lucius is…" Hermione just managed to prevent herself from saying 'an evil, lying bastard'. "…not particularly reliable," she ended somewhat lamely.

"He had proof!" Malfoy retorted.

"What proof?" Hermione asked.

"Death Eaters who had suffered the curse," Malfoy said confidently.

"But…they're not really reliable either," Hermione said. She was dying to scream at him, 'Come on! They're Death Eaters! Do you think you can trust them?'

Malfoy glared mutinously at her. "Do you think I'm more likely to believe my father or you?"

Hermione stared at him, his aggressively hunched back, the long nails rapidly scratching his wand. She felt suddenly sorry for him. What kind of sad life it must be to grow up believing and looking up to an evil, power-hungry mass murderer? No wonder Malfoy was so messed up. She thought of how it must have been like for him, being indoctrinated with the ways of the Dark Lord since infancy, led through all his formative years immersed in dark beliefs. It must have been a shock to him when he was dropped into Hogwarts, where things were so very different, and his beloved father was more feared than admired and hated than revered. Was that why, pushed into a corner, the coward had reacted like a coward, and pushed and kicked and shouted like a bully?

"My father," Malfoy said harshly, "is great. He may be rather ruthless, and he may have beliefs that many people don't agree with, but he is brave. He's willing to stand up against the common tide and fight for his belief, tooth and nail. I can see that if no one else can."

Okay… Hermione thought. That was one way to glorify a twisted killer. She looked at Malfoy. He seemed so much like a child at that moment, a little boy wearing clothes too big for him, trying to fill a role ready for him, but that he was not yet ready to fill.

"But," Malfoy said abruptly. "But he doesn't need me. He doesn't need my help to prove to the world his greatness. He'll be out of Azkaban in no time and then you'll know. The others are already working on an esca- Anyway, I'm sure he'll be alright with my decision...mostly. I've been selfish and cowardly my whole life, anyway."

Hermione stared on in a kind of morbid fascination. Malfoy was clearly trying to rationalise with himself his reasons for running away. Aloud. In her presence. This felt like some twisted psychological experiment, and the side of her that craved knowledge couldn't help dancing in joy.

"Why do you want to…leave?" Hermione asked carefully, hoping she would not push him into reticence.

"I cannot stand this life," he said bitterly. "I don't believe in the cause like Father does. I cannot do the things the Dark Lord asks of his followers."

In other words, Hermione thought silently, he was too cowardly to kill and torture others. That was so Malfoy, Hermione thought, and for once, it wasn't all a bad thing.

"But…what about your mother?" Hermione asked. She remembered there had been mention his mother was under threat if he did not carry out the orders of the Dark Lord.

"She'll be alright," Malfoy said with a smile, and Hermione was sure he hadn't noticed the upward quirk of his lips. "Father has guaranteed her safety. The Dark Lord cannot operate without my father," he ended proudly.

"When he was first put in Azkaban it was different. The Dark Lord was upset with his carelessness and over-confidence in obtaining the prophecy. But now he's convinced the Dark Lord of his worth again, and besides, he'll be out in under a fortnight."

Hermione was over the moon. Malfoy was practically vomiting information into her lap! He must be really lonely. That was probably why he'd been so chatty too. He had no one to talk to.

Hermione paused in her thoughts. Wait a minute, she was thinking as if every word of Malfoy's was true! She couldn't be sure it was…was it part of his ruse to make her think he was harmless? Maybe after that he'd probe for information on Harry or the Order. Could he be after information on the Horcruxes? Not that he'd get much anyway. The search was on but not yielding results so far, and Harry and Ron hadn't even joined the hunt yet. Moody had thought it more important that they spend at least a month brushing up on their skills first, since they would be up against more dangerous foes more often now. She was due to join their training midway, after she'd spent some time with her parents.

"Can you not tell anyone else this?" Malfoy's voice cut into her thoughts.

"Huh?" Hermione said.

"About me running away; defending my father. He would hate to know this. It would hurt his pride."

Hermione didn't know what to say. This was not the kind of thing a Malfoy would say. This was not even the kind of thing Ron or Harry would say. It required a staggering amount of humility. Malfoy really loved his father, Hermione thought sadly.

"Okay," she said.

"I don't believe you," he said shortly.

Hermione didn't reply.

"Of course you'd tell Potter and the others. How else could you explain why I bunked over in your house for ten days? Anyway, it's your duty."

And he was right, of course. Why had she lied?

More worrisome, why had she meant it when she said it?

"If we could read the secret history of our enemies, we should find in each person's life sorrow and suffering enough to disarm all hostility."
--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow