Author's Note: Felines within based on and inspired by real pets.

Chapter Six

Corpse Skin the Cat

In the Ministry restroom, Draco considered his lip intently, almost pressing his face to the mirror over the sink. It was a little puffy, that lip was. Eh. Maybe it would look more kissable that way.

Come to think of it, he could do to look a little puffier all around. He posed a bit in front of the mirror, to no avail. That whole Starvation Diet Regimen he'd been forced to undertake had worked wonders, but they were wonders he hadn't needed. He looked kind of… scrawny.

He saw his scrawny shoulders slump. That was definitely not sexy. Definitely not. Girls needed a little meat on their men.

His scrawny back straightened a little as he put it all in perspective. He was safe, at least for the moment; he was lodging with Hermione Granger, who was quite tolerable when she forgot to pretend she didn't want to throw him on the floor and ravish him; he had indulged in two very filling meals in the past twenty-four hours; and all he had suffered for it was a lip that was a little puffy—not even really puffy. Not even what-poisonous-thing-did-you-try-to-suck-on-now puffy.

The door opened a crack, and a little voice said, "Draco?"

"Yes?" he replied.

"Um, how are you doing?"

"Quite well, thank you; and yourself?"

"Um."

"Succinctly put."

There was a scuffing sound that he thought was probably her shuffling her feet. "Well, I… wanted to say…"

That I want to throw you on the floor and ravish you, Draco prompted mentally. That your slightly-puffy lip is the sexiest thing I've seen since… ever. That scrawny is the new built.

"…that I'm sorry… about… hitting you."

Damn.

"'S fine," he responded calmly. "It being an accident, and all."

"You sure?"

"As sure as I am that people are going to wonder why you're halfway into the men's bathroom, darling."

"Oh, yes. I'd forgotten."

The door closed again, fully, but it was all right, because she was beginning to sound like herself again.

After poking at his lip a bit more, Draco returned to the fray that was the office and once more took up his place in a folding chair next to Hermione's desk. For a while, he was content to watch people come and go, but the place wasn't particularly populous, so that didn't last too long. He ended up emptying Hermione's little cardboard box of paperclips and linking them all together into a chain, which he arranged around the perimeter of her desk like tinsel. That done, he made fifteen origami cranes out of sticky notes and used the remaining adhesive on them to attach them to various surfaces, including nearby sections of the wall. He tried to stick one on his forehead, but it wouldn't stay. After that, Draco Malfoy—the single heir to the Malfoy estate; the dignified; the aristocratic; the tall, light, and handsome; the painfully sexy—was reduced to drawing stick figures in different hats.

Tomorrow, he was going to bring a deck of cards.

He had just stumbled upon the earth-shattering revelation that he could also draw stick figure dogs when Hermione muttered something.

"Come again?" he said.

"I hate my job," she repeated, slightly more audibly.

I hate it, too, Draco thought. But that wasn't very encouraging. "What are you doing, exactly?" he inquired politely.

"Filing complaints," she spat.

As he reflected on ways to stay out of killing range, Draco raised an eyebrow. "Sounds like the best possible way to squander your talents, yes," he decided.

Sighing halfheartedly, Hermione tapped her pen on the latest letter.

"So why don't you quit?" Draco asked.

Hermione sighed again, this time with feeling. "Because I don't know what else I would do."

Draco considered for a moment. Then he bent over his paper and drew a stick figure girl with lightning and flames coming out of her stick wand—at the same time. He proffered it to Hermione.

"That's you," he informed her, pointing.

She cracked a smile.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

When they returned to the purgatory-hole of Hermione's apartment, Draco discovered that was that there was a thing on his couch.

"What's that?" he asked, pointing an accusing finger in the thing's direction.

Hermione looked at the thing. "Oh," she said nonchalantly. "That's my cat."

The thing was a cat? Draco squinted. There was a vague resemblance. Well, more than a vague resemblance. Except that—

"It has three legs," he noted. "And half a left ear."

"Yes, well." Hermione was hanging her keys on a hook in the kitchen and setting her bag down. "Crookshanks—" Her voice broke a little. "Crookshanks just died, so—so I went down to the shelter, and nobody wanted Sparky."

The thing's name was Sparky? Draco squinted harder. That shade of gray wasn't sparky by any stretch of the imagination. Rather, as far as he could tell—

"Looks like it should be 'Soot,'" he remarked. "Or maybe 'Ash.' Or maybe 'Corpse Skin.' Does it catch mice?"

"No."

"Does it catch bugs, then?"

"Not that I'm aware of."

Draco raised an eyebrow at the thing. The thing licked its one remaining front paw calmly.

"Does it do anything?"

"It's a he," Hermione corrected, "and he eats and sleeps and wanders around, which is about what you've been doing."

Draco sat down next to the thing and patted its head. It gave him an approving look.

"I think we'll get along splendidly, Corpse Skin," he said.

From the kitchen came a noise that sounded suspiciously like Hermione snorting trying not to laugh.

Draco got up and went to join her, and Sparky followed, twining his body around Draco's ankles, likely seeking to send him tripping to his death. It was probably revenge for the whole 'Corpse Skin' thing, and Draco couldn't really blame him.

He sat down across from Hermione, and the cat leapt into his lap and commenced kneading his leg with one set of claws. Draco winced.

"What's on the agenda for this evening?" he inquired.

Hermione kicked her shoes off and snapped open the newspaper she'd picked up in the lobby. "I dunno," she told him bemusedly. "You might have been wise to pick a better hostess."

Smirking, Draco wondered if there had ever been a time when he had done what was wise. "I think I'll learn to survive," he remarked.

"Oh?"

"This cat and I," he added, "are soul-mates."

Hermione turned a page. "You want to order a pizza or something?"

"I would love nothing more," Draco averred. That wasn't true, of course, but it certainly sounded nice and dramatic.

Upon finding a number in the phone book, he had the unfortunate young man on the other end read him off the alphabetical list of all of their pizzas and what each entailed. By "Vegetarian Supreme" (onions, bell peppers, garlic, chives; jalapeños optional), the employee Draco had taken the opportunity to victimize was sounding more than a little miffed. Draco chose a pizza with all sorts of bizarre things on it, including about a trillion kinds of meat.

Girls need a little meat on their men, he thought. And Draco needs a little meat in his ickle tummykins.

He then proceeded to go into denial that he had so much as thought such a thing.

"Thank you," he told the boy he'd harassed.

"Welcome," the charming tyke growled menacingly.

"Oh, God!" Hermione Granger cried.

Draco jammed the phone in the cradle and crossed over to her in two strides—which would have been a more impressive achievement if the kitchen hadn't been so unbearably small.

The article that had elicited the reaction was titled: "Mysterious Deaths in London Suburb." Trepidation rising cold in his chest, Draco scanned the first few lines.

Henry and Eleanor Johnson, 48 and 44, were found dead in their Wimbledon home Wednesday morning when their maid arrived for routine housekeeping. Cause of death is unknown and has baffled police, as no visible signs of struggle exist and no wounds of any sort are present. Coroner Michael Giré says of the incident that it is "very strange. There's always got to be some sort of mark, but there isn't."

Draco met Hermione's eyes. There was steely resolve in them, and a resigned sort of bravery, but there was also a plea.

It was a feat that she sounded calm when she remarked, "Looks like whoever's after you knows you're around here somewhere."

"Looks like it," he replied, willing his voice to remain steady despite the influx of instincts in him. Run. Hide. Disappear. Flee for your life.

"Let's put that out of our minds, shall we?" Hermione proposed, forcing some cheer into her tight voice.

Before Draco could ask how in the blazes they were supposed to do that, Sparky sat down on the newspaper, smack dab in the middle of the offending article.

"Good Corpse Skin," Draco said, scratching the intact ear. The cat purred.