NOTE: I do not own any recognizable characters, etc. It is all Rowling.
Hermione placed her five knuts in the pouch on the owl's leg and removed the copy of the Daily Prophet. Unfurling it, she tried to ignore Ron and Harry, who were comparing their schedules and complaining.
"Double potions? And double transfiguration? In the same day? Back to back?" Ron's voice got more shrill and outraged with every realization about this unfortunate scheduling.
"I know, mate," Harry sympathized. "You got Divination dropped, right?"
"Of course I got it dropped. I am only taking the classes I need to be an Auror." Ron replied. "Shacklebolt said he might give us credits for these classes so we don't have to take them in training."
"Hermione, let me see your schedule." Harry didn't wait for her to reply – he just reached over to grab it. Not that she minded, being thoroughly absorbed in an article about Muggle techniques being used in Wizard medicine. "Let's see… We have Potions, Transfiguration, Charms, Herbology and DADA with you. And then, for Ancient Runes and Arithmancy, you're on your own. Geez, Hermione. I thought we were planning on taking it easy this year."
"Maybe you were," she sniffed from behind her paper. "But not all of us have a career already picked out and handed to us."
"Don't push her when she's like this," cautioned Ron. "You know how she gets. Probably already has her NEWT study schedule planned out." Hermione thumped him with her newspaper, but smiled.
-O-O-O-O-
The three of them made their way down to Potions dungeon. Since there weren't that many eighth years taking potions, they were all in the same class. This had been done with a lot of classes, as there were so few of them and the teachers wanted to keep the years separate in their academics as much as possible.
The tables inside the classroom were set up in pairs, and Hermione sat at the table next to Ron and Harry's. Usually they fought over who got to sit next to her, but they were distracted by once again discussing Quidditch. Hermione turned around and started chatting with Sarah Fawcett and Anthony Goldstein, both from Ravenclaw. In the corner, Zabini and Daphne Greengrass appeared deep in conversation. Hermione realized she was the only person sitting alone, and hoped she wouldn't have to work by herself.
Just then, Professor Slughorn came through the door. Making his ponderous way up to the front of the classroom, he nodded jovially and smiled at them. Counting heads, he frowned slightly.
"It seems we are missing som – " in the middle of his sentence, the door to the classroom opened, and Malfoy walked in. Hermione tensed, knowing the only open seat was next to her. "Ah, Mr. Malfoy! So good of you to join us. Take a seat, take a seat. Ah – there's an open one next to Ms. Granger. Excellent, excellent." Hermione stared straight ahead, expecting a drawling insult any second. But Malfoy remained silent, pulling out his Potions book as Slughorn explained the potion they were going to be working on – with the person sitting next to them.
"We should get started then," She briskly once Slughorn had finished his introduction, trying to just get through the lesson. "Let's see… we'll need some salamander eggs and beetle wings to start." Malfoy nodded slowly.
"Do you want to get those and I'll start cutting up these roots?" He motioned to the gnarly sticks lying in front of them. Slughorn had specially set them out from the store of more advanced ingredients. Hermione nodded, still carefully not looking at him, and made here way to the ingredient cabinet. Finding what she was looking for, she returned to find Malfoy already simmering the roots in their cauldron. He looked up when she approached. He still looked exhausted and thin, and his eyes were guarded. But he was looking better than he had in Diagon Alley. He hesitated, and then spoke.
"You know, if you add a little bit of beetle juice, the salamander eggs become more potent." His voice was husky and quiet. She hadn't really heard him speak without a sneer in his voice, and it was a pleasant change.
"Alright, let's try it." He crushed a beetle wit the flat of his knife and watched as black goop spurted out. Flicking a few drops onto the salamander eggs, he added them to the cauldron, which emitted a faint cloud of orange smoke that quickly disappeared. Slughorn came over to see what they were doing.
"Beetle juice?" he asked. When they nodded, he barked out a laugh. "Excellent. Excellent! Twenty points to both Slytherin and Gryffindor. My word…" Hermione stole a glance at Draco, who seemed amused by the man standing in front of them. Slughorn drifted away, still chuckling, and Hermione turned back to the cauldron.
"Any other tips?" she asked, somewhat annoyed that he had known something she hadn't, and slightly impressed that he had. His eyes scanned down the page, and he shook his head.
"I don't think so. There are some things that you can replace with others if you don't have them, but that doesn't really matter since we have everything we need here."
"How do you know all of this?" she couldn't help but ask. A brief smile flitted across his face.
"I read, Granger. Despite what you might think, I wasn't planning on sitting in the Manor all day spending money. Besides, I've always liked Potions and Sna– and I had a teacher who was willing to endure my not always well planned experiments."
"Oh," was all Hermione said in reply, and went back to grinding a pig hoof into powder. Her mind was racing, though. She hadn't missed that little slip up about Snape, and wondered about it. She hadn't thought Snape capable of affection, but evidently he and Malfoy had been close. She had also never thought that people would actually miss the man, but apparently she was wrong.
"Alright," came Slughorn's boom from the front of the classroom. "You should be about halfway done. Since it's only your first day back, I took it easy on you and assigned a potion that should only take the class period. Your potions should be orange, clear and thin, unless you have already reached this stage and moved on to a purple color." Hermione looked at her potion. It was exactly as Slughorn had described it. Looking over at Harry and Ron, she saw that they had a red, goopy mess in their cauldron. Malfoy saw where she was looking and smirked a little, but made no comment. The two of them worked in silence until Hermione registered something that Slughorn had said. They were halfway through their two-hour class. And Malfoy had not once taunted, insulted or called her names.
"Malfoy," she said slowly. He turned to look at her. "Why are you being so civil? I thought you hated me for being… being a Mudblood." He paused to consider this.
"First of all, I never really hated you. Second of all, it's been a long year. You can't go through something like that and not change." He paused and took a breath. "It's just not worth trying to keep something living that should have died a long time ago." Seeing her confused face, he elaborated. "All that Mudblood-Pureblood shit. You can't help what you were born as, and I can't help what I was. Why try to fight something you can't change?
"Besides," and here he snorted, "what you're born doesn't change anything about how you turn out. Look at you. Look at Lucius. Look at me for Merlin's sake." His voice had become more frantic as he spoke, and he abruptly fell silent and looked away. Luckily, no one had noticed his rant, engaged as they were in their smoking cauldrons.
"Malfoy?" Hermione said cautiously after a few moments of silence. He didn't look at her.
"We need to add the spider teeth," he said in an expressionless monotone.
"Oh, alright." The rest of the class continued in silence, broken only when they conferred over directions. Hermione wondered what had caused that outburst. He had almost been nice, and had opened up to her. Then again, Malfoy had never seemed to be the kumbaya and tell the world how you feel type of person. Maybe he was ashamed. Maybe he was embarrassed. Then it occurred to her that Malfoy might be lonely. He had the rest of the Slytherins, but they were a small group and he didn't seem particularly close to anyone except Blaise. All these possibilities made Hermione's head hurt. She chose instead to focus on the potion.
At the end of the period, their potion looked picture perfect and exactly how it was described in the book. Ron and Harry's potion had actually turned out all right. Draco bottled and labeled a sample of their potion and brought it to Slughorn, who beamed and gave them each ten points. Hermione cleaned the cauldron and looked around, but the tall blond Slytherin had left. Shrugging her shoulders, she joined Ron and Harry as they discussed the failure of their potion in particular and potion making skills in general. They all grabbed a quick lunch and went to the Transfiguration classroom. Malfoy was already there, but he had seated himself with Zabini and Theo Nott.
-O-O-O-O-
Hermione settled down in the common room to work on her Potions assignment. Professor Slughorn had assigned them an essay but it was neither long nor difficult. While they didn't have Potions the next day, Hermione felt a need to get as much done as she could so that she wouldn't have to cram later. After seven years, Ron and Harry had yet to follow her example, but she felt they paid the price with their many late nights frantically writing in the common room. The essay was on the strengthening of healing potions, and she thought she remembered an essay in the book she had gotten at Flourish and Blotts. She hadn't gotten around to reading that particular one, so she wasn't sure, but it was worth a shot.
She got the book out of her bag and flipped it open. Leafing through the pages, she found the essay, but was shocked to see writing in the margins. Then she remembered that this was Malfoy's copy, and mentally smacked herself for forgetting to put it back. Still it was here, and his notes had all been helpful thus far, so she decided to give it back when she was done with her essay. Smiling slightly, she settled down to read.
A/N: Hope you like. Madame Lure, I hope you are pleased with the tech dept. for getting all my stuff transferred. Took a weight off my chest, that. As always, reviews are much appreciated (comments, concerns, criticism are all gladly received). Gracias! Until next week (I have to start writing... I'm trying to stockpile as my chapters as I can before school starts so I can put them up regularly!)!