A/N: The perfect pure blood song, just cause I have nothing else to say. "Hit the Floor" - Linkin Park, Meteora

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"Well, if I may be so cliché as to say it…" Draco joked quietly.

Alex, for her part, jumped out of her skin. Her face was bleach white as she whirled towards the new sound.

"…it's later?" he finished, putting his hands up in mute appeal against the wand currently pointed at his heart. For a long moment neither of them moved, then she snapped out of it, pocketing the wand and gasping for breath.

"Draco!"

"Merlin Alexandria! What the hell is wrong with you!" He almost asked her what she was so afraid of, but his good sense got the better of him. It was only the Stims making her so jumpy. An extended overdose of adrenaline would do that to anyone.

She swallowed hard and glanced around; but Draco had chosen his timing well. They were entirely alone in one of the dungeons' back hallways.

"I…" Alex hesitated then clenched her hands together. "You can't tell anyone about this Draco."

"Why?" he asked cautiously.

"Because I'm calling in your Blood Debt Thanks!" she flared.

"Oh." Draco had a sudden sinking feeling. What was she doing? What was he getting into? Why the hell was he sticking his nose in? Because she's a Slytherin.

Of course.

"Draco….I'm failing." Alex's hesitant statement reclaimed his attention. "I can't hold it together and I'm failing all of my classes!" A cough that almost covered a sob echoed in his ears.

Somewhere, abstractly, Draco felt a headache begin to form….but it did all make perfect sense now. Stress from home, from the Moody Project and probably from a dozen other sources she'd never talk about had conspired to distract her just when she hit new material. Because, as intensive as their homeschooling was, they still very much needed to attend Hogwarts.

Draco himself had had the same issues with some of his classes last year and Greg and Vince had tutored him through it.

Well, if this was a matter of pride he'd keep silent for her(Draco resolutely ignored the binding of the Debt of Honor) and if no one else could know…he sighed softly.

"I'll help you."

Alex froze. "W-what?"

"I said, 'I will help you' Alex." Draco repeated slowly. "You don't want to know what kind of score I almost got in Charms last year. Now come on, let's get back to Common room."

"Why?"

"Why? So we can both get our books and 'do homework' until the place empties out."

"You know very well that's not what I meant Draco Malfoy!"

He sighed. Sometimes humoring her was more trouble than it was worth. "As I said, you don't want to know what scores I almost got in Charms last year. Besides, if you know and I know and I've been sworn to secrecy then who else is going to get you back up to speed?"

As he watched Draco saw something frantic and suitably desperate fill her. She swallowed hard and tried once more. "we have more important things to do Draco. Like Moody and-"

"Bugger Moody! I won't have you besmirching House honor. Now go back to Common Room and go get your books. March!"

And completely contradicting words with actions Draco gentlemanly offered her his arm and, when she took it, escorted her back down the hall.

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It was forty six minutes past midnight, they'd covered the basics of every subject she was taking and one thing had become entirely too clear to Draco.

Alexandria Bellmonte was lying.

The girl in question stifled a yawn with one hand and leaned across the couch to the small study table for, this time, a tea cup. Draco snatched it before her fingers could close on the handle.

"Not a chance Bellmonte. I don't care how badly you're flunking you will be sleeping tonight." And with a flourish of wand-wielding skills the tea, the powerful stimulants and the cup itself vanished into the fireplace.

Alex's eyes followed it painfully.

"Now, you know I enjoy your presence to help warm cold nights, but the night isn't all that cold Alex." Draco's calm sarcasm was softened to the point of teasing, but even so a mask slid over her face. He frowned in annoyance. Would it ever be possible to step rightly with this girl? What was so very wrong that even the chance to bite his head off went unseen as she delved deeper into her shell?

"I'm sorry for the inconvenience, Draco." She replied in a voice that would have been biting if it hadn't also been so tired. "I think it is time to remind you that for all your power the Malfoys have yet to purchase Hogwarts and as such it is still my right to be here despite your objections."

Rubbing the back of his neck Draco muttered, "Sweet Merlin," at the ceiling of Common Room.

"What?" she twisted in her seat to look at him.

"You don't have to leave, Alex...but you don't have to lie to me either."

"I'm not lying."

"You're also not behind, lost or confused in or by any of these subjects." He gestured to the texts spread across the table in front of him. "What's the point of all this if you already know it? It's nearly one o'clock in the morning. You're going to disgrace the House tomorrow in your condition. You're very nearly disgracing it now. Go to sleep."

"I'd rather not-" Alex spat out far too quickly, and then in a very small voice, "if you don't mind."

Draco's eye widened just a little. "Of course I don't mind." He responded automatically, his mind whirling. Her problem was with sleeping? He'd just thought she'd been staying awake trying to solve a different problem, not that her staying up was the issue.

"Thank you."

"So…hmm…" Draco tapped his fingers on the table top as he tried to think of something to say that they hadn't already covered. "You know I don't like you, right?" he said at last.

Alex froze and turned to gaze into the fire. "Oh really?"

"Quite," he continued 'blithely'. "Because of you I spent an extremely entertaining summer trying to plan my revenge against you. The trick was I couldn't have your parents finding out."

Alex's profile was taut as she asked, "What, exactly, are you seeking revenge for?"

"well, Miss Bellmonte, I was just standing there, trying to be polite," Ha! "and you snubbed me cruelly. What made it worse is that, power-wise, you're one of the few people who can."

"In my defensive," and her tone really was defensive, "I was under a deal of stress at the time. It was my coming- out party."

"Point, but it made for an entertaining summer nonetheless. All my elaborate plots would have sprung into motion as soon as I stepped off the train."

"And have they?" it was barely a whisper but in it was the sound of trust crumbling.

Draco sighed. "Unfortunately for me, and my plans, my father found out about one of my rather idiotic abortive attempts to throw you off balance and made me apologize. I walked into a library and discovered a person unworthy of my hatred. In hindsight I was being something of a git."

Alex laughed, more out of relief than humor at his self-insult. "You came to my home ground and threatened me. I apologize if my reaction insulted."

"It did…and I forgive you."

This time there was real humor in her soft laugh. Her entire posture relaxed and her head fell back against the couch.

"So, Draco, what's your favorite subject?"

"Mine? Easy. Transfigurations."

"Really? Even with McGonagall as Professor?"

"She has an overabundance of Gryffindor traits, I'll admit, but she's fair and she knows what she's talking about."

"True. So, why transfigurations?"

"Because…because it's tricky, complicated, a challenge. But everything follows a certain set of rules and once you know what those rules are you can do anything you want badly enough. You can change anything from whatever it is to something different or something better. It's an enormous power to have."

"With just as much responsibility." Alex commented sleepily. "Don't you ever get tired of always having to be responsible for everything?"

"I don't know. I get tired, but I've never known what's it's like to not have all this stuff to deal with."

"Mmm."

A silence fell between them, a comfortable easy thing, like your favorite pair of socks right out of the dryer.

"And what's your favorite subject, Lex?" It was, though neither of them where paying enough attention to realize it, the first time he'd ever used her nickname.

"Hmm?" she stirred, yawning. "Oh I don't really have one…maybe History of Magic though."

"History of Magic!"

"No thanks to the Professor, but, like it says, 'those who don't know the past are doomed to repeat it'. Which means that us humans haven't changed so very much. Which means that by studying the past we can figure out the now and maybe the future. History explains things to me."

Draco paused and considered her words. The more he thought about it the more sense it made. Alex wanted to know things, it was all that drove her. Well that and survival.

"Hey Alex-" the question died on his lips as he looked over at her. She was curled up against the armrest, fast asleep. A tired grin of triumph took its place and he stood to start gathering up the mounds of textbooks and miles worth of parchment.

He hadn't taken two steps, making it only seconds into her sleep, that it started.

She whimpered.

In pain, in fear, in both, he couldn't tell but moving back to her side he saw that her eyes were flying underneath her eyelids and she was barely breathing.

"Alex?" he reached out a lightly touched her shoulder.

"Please don't!" she begged grabbing his hand in a death grip. "Please! I'll be good!"

Draco felt a sympathetic ache in his chest and even had to fight back a sympathetic wave of memories for a moment. It was all too 'normal' to him.

"Alex. Alex, wake up!" he pulled his hand back, lifting her into a sitting position. "Alex!"

She came awake with a wild, violent motion more animal than human and Draco found himself under attack as she desperately tried to escape the couch.

"Alex-come on Lexy please!" he yelped on instinct, ineffectually trying to get out of her range with one of his hands still clasped tightly in a deathgrip.

"Draco?" With recognition all the fight left her. "Oh shit!" she shook her head violently and lurched to her feet. "Shit shit shit shit! I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I...I have to go..."

Alex was halfway across the room before he could even tell his hand was free. Leaving her books behind she was racing for the door. How could this have happened! She'd been so careful! She'd done everything Right! So how the hell had she fallen asleep in front of Draco!

"So...which parent was it?" Draco drawled from behind her. Alex froze and turned to see him watching her, a wry, sympathetic, smile curving his lips.

"E-excuse me?" Oh great, Alex. Really brilliant.

"In your nightmare. Which one was punishing you?"

Alex couldn't bring herself to speak, to admit he was right would only make it worse. Would only make it that much more real.

"It's my father usually," he said after a minute, almost managing to sound casual about it. but he's predictable mad. It's my mother you have to watch out for. She's subtle and sneaky, an all around good Slytherin. And you can never tell when she'll do you in."

"It's..." she swallowed hard, resisting the urge to run from the room. Resisting the equally powerful urge to hold onto him like a lifeline. Somehow not bursting into tears or screams. "It's the other way 'round for me. My mother, you know what makes her mad and you know how she'll respond to you when she is. But m-my father..."

"What?" Draco prompted softly.

"When he's not mad...he's nice."

Even as she watched a slow shudder ran the length of Draco Malfoy's body at her words. Alex felt a sudden flash of understanding. Somehow, impossibly, he knew. Understood even better than Blaise did what it meant to have two sets of parents inside only one couple. The caring and the cruel.

Inside her own mind she firmly removed Draco from the "borderline acquaintance" list and placed him on the "trusted" list. He'd seen her at her absolute lowest and had merely joined her. It was a sacrifice of an impossible kind for a Slytherin, Alex re-found her seat on the couch.

"My mother," he said, moving over to the table and beginning to stack books. "she likes to buy me stuff. Clothes, books, jewelry, furniture...all sorts of crap. I guess cause she likes to destroy my things in front of me as a punishment and it's more satisfying if she knows how expensive it is."

"Or maybe she just wants to make sure you have enough things to make the rampage worthwhile." Alex suggested softly.

"Yeah. That actually sounds more like her than my idea."

"Mmhmm." She moaned softly sinking lower on the couch and rubbing her forehead. "Merlin Draco. I need to sleep. If I don't start soon I really am going to start failing classes."

"I was in Transfigurations today, I entirely believe you." He was silent for a while and Alex twisted her head to get a good look at him.

When he caught her gaze he smiled encouragingly. "I think...I think I have something for you. It's a potion, and no I can't tell you want's in it, but if I promise you that you won't dream would you try it?"

Alex spoke without having to think about it first. "Yes."

He grinned. "I'll be right back." And disappeared up into the boys' dorm.

He was, Alex noted, multitasking as all of his books and papers had gone up with him. He was also, she decided, having nothing else to think about in his absence, being really adorably sweet in a blonde-not-her-type kinda way.

And who the hell said that blondes weren't her type anyway! She'd never had any boyfriends so she sure as heck didn't have a "type" yet!

And why the hell did she care if Draco didn't fall inside her made-up "type"? Just because he was someone she could trust, well okay and who understood her and who put up with her moods and who was undeniably hot and whom she didn't view as a brother...but that didn't mean anything...right?

Alex was still debating if she wanted to selectively ignore this new information when its focus returned. In his hand was a small, mostly empty glass vial at the end of a gold-ish chain.

"Here. It tastes vile, and yes pun very intended as it's the best joke I could come up with this late at night, but I promise you it does work." He handed it over, and leaned on the back of the couch to watch her. "I promise."

"I believe you...about both parts." Alex wrinkled her nose, braced herself and downed the potion. "Oh Merlin, Drac! You don't lie!"

Draco laughed. "Nasty?"

"Vile! Repulsive! Eww!"

"Yes. Of course and I agree. Now," he glanced over at the neat piles on the table, "you think you can make it to your dorm with all that stuff or do you need help?"

"Ha. And can you make it up the stairs to the girls' dorm without help Draco?"

"Hmm...come to think of it. No."

"Okay then. I think I can make it." Alex rose to her feet and pulled her wand. "Wingardium Leviosa."

"Good. And hey," Alex turned back around to face him, her foot on the first stair. "if you do dream you come get me. You know which dorm I'm in."

And that was quite decidedly, that. Nodding once to herself, sharply, as if making up her mind, Alex covered the distance between them and kissed him lightly on the mouth.

When the slowed down mental command made it from brain to arms he made a grab for her, but by then she was already gone. Within seconds she was up the steps and out of sight.

Eventually Draco went to bed himself.

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A/N: Well there you have it. Bonafide Alex/Draco action...sorta. We'll see how it plays out from here. Yule Ball coming up next.