"We'll circle around."
He couldn't remember what else he'd said. It had taken him a moment to get her attention, but it only took her a moment to take in the situation.
He'd almost missed the house himself. The surroundings were thinning out foliage wise, but it would be entirely too easy to stumble into someplace inhabited while he wasn't paying attention. This house wasn't very large and there were no signs of people, but there was no sense taking chances.
"Staying just off the trail? Below it I mean?" she asked quietly, already following him off the trail.
The trail was still raised enough that it was a simple enough matter to get off to one side and keep down while they walked past the building until it was out of sight.
Those were some of the only words that either of them spoke to each other for the morning. It was, oddly enough, probably the most cordial silence that they'd ever enjoyed. But that wasn't what was presently occupying his thoughts.
It was in moments like those that he was guaranteed a good mood. True, those moments were rare indeed. Sometimes years went by between them. Usually they'd happened at school, whenever he would find something new to hang over scar head. Predictably the two dimwits would rarely catch on immediately, but she usually did.
Once he'd loudly joked about bad test scores in Potions when Potter had gotten a horrible grade. The whole thing had backfired as Potter had hid it before anyone else could see it, but she had immediately known what Draco was talking about. He could tell.
No matter what his official verdict on Hermione Granger happened to be at the time, changing as it always was, he couldn't help but think in those moments that they shared a sort of connection. Wishful thinking or not, completely ridiculous or not, there were times when she seemed to understand him immediately. Though that always had the propensity to be quite scary, because she often employed it against him, he couldn't help but give into the rush that it always gave, even if only for a little while.
But wishful thinking was all that was, all that it could ever be. There was nothing between them and there never would be. He doubted she would ever even consider him as a friend, and that was fine by him. He didn't like her, not really. And given the way her mind worked, she no doubt looked at him a lot like she might at a slab of meat that might provide her next meal. Okay, so maybe that wasn't the best comparison, but he knew that she cared about him only as far as he could provide for her intentions, whatever those might be.
But he couldn't say that it was easy to ignore her.
---------------------------------------------
He didn't know where to go. That had been a recurring fact rattling through his mind for the past six days, ever since he'd thrown his lot in with the bushy haired ball of trouble. Even before they'd left the manor this had been a very disturbing flaw in his plan, which made it not much of a plan at all, he guessed. Sure they had the Traveler's Path, but he had no idea where it was leading them. He tried to keep a vague idea of a destination in mind, occasionally switching it, but there was always the nagging feeling that they were still heading for the same place, almost as if they were being led. He didn't know if that idea came from hearing something like that somewhere, or if it was just his imagination. In any case, he couldn't do much more than hope that the path was safe. The griffin had evidently happened onto it by chance. That was a granted danger anywhere now though, given the kind of things the Death Eaters were releasing to spread chaos.
Leach, the griffin—only two occurrences, but it still seemed like she was a magnet for trouble. Both times she had come out mostly unscathed, which was more than a little peculiar, especially with the griffin. He hoped he wasn't letting on how confused he still was that it hadn't so much as looked at her. In fact, there had been moments when it had seemed like it had been purposely ignoring her. Much as he'd like to write it off and move onto more pressing matters, something about that bothered him, even more than their lack of direction did.
He wondered if she had moved past what had happened during the first encounter. It was hard to tell how much Leach's attempt had affected her. He guessed that she probably tried not to think about it, but he doubted that she'd completely gotten over it. Technically not a lot had happened, but it certainly had been more than enough.
When he tried, suddenly it was hard to swallow. For the rest of his life, the barest thought of those few minutes would probably do that to him. He still remembered how damp the air had been, how it had pressed and smelled. How everything had moved in a haze, but still happened so fast.
His fingertips were tingling and he balled his fists, throwing a glance back at her, but it wasn't as if she was going to miraculously pick up on his mood. He was just letting his irrational fears get the better of him.
A few shuddering breaths and the pulsing thoughts that always followed had mostly abated. They'd become worse since he'd discovered how weakened she was.
In that moment, back in the forest when Leach had been casually offering him something that drove excitement through his veins, running away was, for once, not the easiest thing to do.
It would've been so simple. They certainly would've thought no differently of him. The act itself wouldn't have made them respect him anymore than they did now, maybe even just the opposite when they whispered about him, but she was Hermione Granger. It would've been something for them to trumpet, whether or not she was still friends with the glorious Harry Potter.
He had told her he would have never helped Leach. Maybe he never would've, but at the time that thought hadn't stopped him from feeling the horrible thrill, the possibility that had made his blood boil. That hadn't stopped him from assessing how easy it could've been, to take what he'd been told all of his life that he couldn't have, what he had dreamed about in secret for so long. And to take it in the way he was expected, to finally show them what he could do.
But no matter how basely stirring it'd been to see her on the ground like that, frantically fighting, no matter how hard it had been to pull away from the possibility, he couldn't stop that horrible feeling in his stomach.
It made him feel sick to think that some mere guilty feeling was why he'd made the hardest choice of the three. He'd like to think that there was more to it, more than just what he thought of her along with some instilled sense of guilt.
She was a person, and no one deserved that. It wasn't right. Even given the way everything else had blurred together these past few months, seeing her eyes like that, like he never wanted to see again, made right and wrong become clear for the first time in a long time.
It was hard to remember what it had been like to truly judge her by the social standards he'd been brought up by. To be honest, their years at school were blurring together, no matter how hard he fought it. Sometimes he would just lay awake at night, trying to sort and categorize them, going by the significant events that had marked their passing. Actually he'd been doing that a lot lately. It was something to take his mind off of other things, off of her.
But he didn't think he could keep this charade up much longer. He longed to ask her where she thought they should go. She'd have some kind of idea—an excessively educated opinion at the very least. She said she never would have been able to come up with something like a Traveler's Path. As pleasing as that was to think, he wished above anything else to hear where she wanted to go. It didn't have to be anywhere important. He'd almost asked her enough times that he was getting remarkably good at covering up his choked off questions.
But if he asked that, she would figure everything out. She figured everything out eventually. Her guessing about Ginny honestly scared the Bubotuber pus out of him. Granted, he'd been drunk and had probably let slip more than his memory could account for, but still. Even the usually pleasing notion that they shared some kind of special connection didn't even begin to account for something like that.
He knew she would figure out their lack of a destination eventually. Then what would she think of him, leading her around pointlessly for days on end, practically getting them both killed? She'd probably leave for good then. He still had no idea why she hadn't yet. Giving into the persistent hopes that that fact conjured wasn't an option for him. No, she'd think him about as intelligent as Longbottom if she found out. And that was only if his present luck held.
Things were different now between them, though. He had no idea how or by how much, but it was clear that a change greater than anything before had come over them both. It would probably be wise for him to at least test the waters while it was present, if not push it for what it was worth. If he'd known before, during some of their previous spats, that getting her to scream that she hated him would make her this docile, he probably would've had her doing it every other day.
Firmly reminding himself that she had not screamed it, to little improvement in his disposition, he let his eyes move cautiously back to where she was still walking with her gaze following the ground. He pursed his lips.
She did not scream it.
As slow as they had both been walking, it took only a few steps for her to come up beside him when he nearly stopped. He matched her pace and wondered if she really hadn't noticed him or if she was faking it.
"Hey." It sounded almost friendly, almost like he was greeting some other person he hadn't seen in a long time.
She glanced up and over at him with enough surprise on her face for him to be assured that she hadn't been faking.
"Hey." It was a small and tentative voice.
"Do you want to talk?" It was an easy enough sentence; keeping the look of absolute dismay off his face wasn't quite so easy.
"Why?" Less tentativeness, more suspicion.
Okay, he could do this. He could. He was Draco Malfoy, and she was Hermione Granger. Just let the etiquette flow.
"Doesn't something happen if you go so long without talking," cue strategically selected smirk, "You randomly combust? World implodes? Your hair straightens out? You know, something generally perceived to be impossible."
"Why?" she repeated.
"Well …" he stalled, nearly panicking. He of course didn't panic, but at the moment he was doing a fairly good impression of it internally. In regards to her question he had no idea why. Well, he did, but there was no way he was going to tell her.
"I'm just thinking after your well-being." There, that wasn't so bad. Talking with her always felt much harder than it actually was in practice. Not that they'd ever had a lot of practice with it.
"That's comforting," she answered seriously enough, but he thought he caught traces of a thin smile.
Okay, the water is warm.
"Actually," he said, already feeling his momentum building with his confidence, "I have no idea what to talk about presently. I was thinking that since I've been neglecting my duties lately as host, I would open up the floor to you. Bear your soul out at will, Granger, talk about whatever you want. We've got all the time in the world, after all."
"That's weird, you seem to be in a good mood," she was definitely allowing a thin smile now.
"No—more of a chatty mood than anything. Maybe you're starting to rub off on me," he faltered slightly at boxing himself into that choice of words, which conjured up admittedly hilarious images of static electricity and … other things, "But seriously. I'm all ears, Granger. Get it while you can. Say anything you'd like. Like … if you could go anywhere, where would it be?"
He watched in passive horror as days of painstaking effort went down the drain. Fortunately, however, she didn't seem to catch on to the implications within the question.
She was quiet for a moment, staring at something ahead of them. "Aren't you still angry though? I mean—about everything?"
"Everything?" he asked cautiously, though he knew what she was talking about. "I … guess so. Sometimes. It comes in spurts—I guess. But this isn't about me, this is your time, Granger."
Her smile was more wistful. "I imagine you'd think anything I'd have to say would be boring."
"What?" That was a genuine exclamation. He couldn't imagine anything about her being boring, and he told her so. He was probably a slightly biased opinion on that subject though. But he needed a recovery for such an out of character remark. "I mean … I don't think anyone in our kind of circumstances could be considered boring."
"Maybe." She gave a slightly happier looking smile at that.
She nearly caught him staring at that happier looking smile a few seconds later. When he had to turn away he all but stammered, and said the first thing that came to his mind. Fortunately, it wasn't nearly as bad as it could've been.
"I don't know where we're going."
It was almost soothing to get it out, maybe even therapeutic, in a nerve-grinding sort of way.
She didn't say anything immediately, but her eyes predictably weren't wide with surprise for long. A few moments later and out of the corner of his eye he caught the way she inclined her chin, which probably was meant to be a nod.
Just thinking about asking her where she wanted to go again made his stomach squirm. Maybe later.
He was nearly at the brink of a disappointment overdose by the time a solid minute of silence went by. They couldn't stop now. This was almost fun—in a nerve-obliterating sort of way.
"Malfoy …"
His heart was suddenly beating very quickly.
She hesitated, as though she had expected him to answer. "I don't want to fight anymore."
He looked over at her, but she steadily refused to take her eyes off the path ahead.
"That may be the nicest thing you've ever said to me, Granger," he replied almost as quietly.
She had to give him a rueful look for that. "I'm being serious."
"So am I." He didn't smile back, but instead gave his best steady expression to show her that he was indeed being serious. "And I … I don't want to fight anymore either. I mean, at least not like usual."
She smiled softly, nodded, and looked back down at her feet.
"It's just so …" he said, although he knew he never should've started it. While it was a simple enough concept, he was suddenly not sure if he wanted to share it with her. That was if he could get it across without sounding completely dumb.
"What?" she asked after a few seconds.
"—Hard." He settled on that word, still gesturing slightly with his hands.
"What is?" she pressed patiently.
He laughed as he tried to wave his hands around to encompass everything. "This. You. But not really you, it's …"
And then she was looking straight at him, her eyes so bloody inquisitive and still patient.
"I think that—" he found it was easier to think while pretending to examine his hands, "Sometimes it's … hard, to remember that no one is watching."
He caught the tail end of her understanding look.
"Everything's really different now, isn't it?" she said.
Everything culminated into a weary sigh. "Yes, it is."
But he knew that things could be much worse.