A/N: It's Saturday again! After spending the week in grading mode (and seeing no end of it, yet), I'm happy I had the chapter written already.
Thank you all for the amazing feedback you give me - it makes me feel glorious, really.
Without my beta's neverending support and comfort, this story (or any of mine) wouldn't be possible. Thank you so much, MrBenzedrine.
"By Salazar, Hermione!" Draco's gasp makes her memory dissolve.
"What?" She wants to pull away, but his grip on her hand tightens, and she feels a jolt of something vaguely magical cursing through her at this feeling. "You swot! You just made a bluebell flame appear in my cell!"
"You're hallucinating again," she counters.
"Am not."
"Obviously, you are. I thought about one, that's for sure, but…"
"Then think of it again!" he demands, almost desperately..
"Don't order me around like a house elf!"
He sighs audibly. "I apologize. Please, try it again?" The fact that Draco Malfoy has apologized and used the word 'please' leads her to the conclusion that either she is the one with the hallucinations, or he really has seen a bluebell flame.
She tries her luck without bothering to reply. Folding her hands in front of her, she conjures the feeling of casting the spell again. The 'click' in the back of her mind when the hazy background sizzling of magic suddenly makes sense and shapes into something corporeal. The joy of mastering what most humans in the world think impossible.
Nothing.
She tries again.
Nothing. Again.
After half a dozen rounds, she gives up, disappointed with herself without any substantial reason.
"I am too weak," she concludes. "The time here has taken a toll not only on my psyche, but also on my magic." Of course, she has tried in the beginning to free herself with wandless magic, even though she has been too agitated to achieve something, too unfocused. So, she has given up after some time. Hearing his mumbled agreement, she asks,"Why don't you give it a try yourself?"
"I know the basics, but wandless magic isn't something I'm very proficient at," he replies.
"You mean you suck at it."
"Basically, yes. I'm good with mind magic, in turn, so there." She grins upon hearing the defiant undertone. He really is her only distraction from her imprisonment. Then it dawns on her: she had been able to conjure the bluebell when she touched him.
It couldn't hurt to try… Hermione sticks her hand through the opening in the wall again, gripping the first batch of warm skin she feels under her fingers.
"Ouch! That's my ear!" Draco complains.
Embarrassed, she mumbles, "Sorry. It's just that...well, I touched you when the flame happened, and I thought-"
"It's okay," he says briskly and guides her hand where she can feel his neck join his shoulder. He twitches as if he wants to remove it, but settles for leaving it there. Beneath her ring finger, she feels his pulse, strong and titillating. Hermione concentrates on this and guides her thoughts towards the magic in her core. With every beat of his heart, she pushes forward to it, feels it cowering in her innermost centre. Slowly, carefully, delicately she creates the image of a bluebell flame in her mind and nudges it towards where her magical power resides. Every witch and wizard is aware that their magic usually flows through them freely, prepared to be directed through a wand, orchestrated and instrumentalized in means to Accio, to Anapneo, to Avada Kedavra. Due to her stay in Azkaban, hers is definitely damaged, scared, fragmented. It would probably heal in time, but for now, it doesn't hold the power it usually has.
Gently, she steers the visualisation of the flame outside, taking some of the magic with it. Her fingertips sizzle, and she rubs them against Draco's skin to ease the feeling. She notices goosebumps arising because of it, but she clings to the image of the flame, on making it shine.
"It works," Draco speaks, in awe again. "It's just a few inches away from my fingertips."
Hermione smiles to herself, almost proudly upon her achievement, even if it is on Draco's side, and experimentally lifts her hand, breaking the contact between them effectively. Instantaneously, it becomes impossible to keep control of her magic, and, like a frightened animal, it draws back inside of her.
"It's gone." Draco's words hold a bit of disappointment. He, too, knows what their new observations mean. Somehow, this could provide them with a way out, but...
"We need to strengthen my magic. And, for whatever reason, you seem to help with it. But with the resources we have, the only way is-"
"-Blood magic," he finishes for her, having come to the same conclusion. "And since I don't expect you to murder me for it and do unholy things with my body, only one option remains…"
A cold realisation comes to Hermione when she looks down to her left ring finger under which she has just felt Draco's heart beating. "A wedding bond," she whispers.
"20 points to Gryffindor for quick thinking," he answers grimly.
She laughs, but the sound holds no happiness, and she isn't sure whether she reacts to the suggestion or his lame joke. "You know that by such a nifty piece of blood magic you'd practically overdo what the new regime exercises with their stupid laws? We would not only erect a connection, based on our powers to create even more magical power, but also establish a magical bond, made to protect magical unions between a man and a woman."
The witch knows she doesn't have to explain how such bindings are supposed to create a certain physical openness towards the partner, even if it is a strictly platonic bond in the first place. He'd know that kind of tidbit as scion of the Sacred Twenty-Eight who practically embedded those customs into their life expectations. In the old times, marriages were arranged based on political power and not on attraction or love. But the magical bond encouraged intimacy, fondness, and protectiveness. And just like that, it assured the conceiving of an heir eventually. Without mentioning it, Hermione knows Draco is aware that they'd probably fall into bed sooner or later.
"Our bond would kick their pathetic attempts into the arse, yes. I imagine my ancestors would be quite proud of me in that aspect. My father...not so much."
"Regardless of my blood status?"
"Even though my father, and in extension, me aren't the best examples of it, the Malfoy line, above all, strives for power. And this power was often found in the old magical families in the past, but not exclusively. And nobody can deny how powerful you are."
"But that's a pretty serious bond, you know? Can you really imagine being magically connected with me for the rest of our lives? What about children? What about the ways to conceive them?" Strangely, she isn't embarrassed to ask those rather intimate questions.
"If we don't get out of here soon, we will have no lives, or at least not ones worth living. Honestly, I can imagine worse witches being bound to."
For a moment, Hermione befalls a bit of giddiness, most probably as reaction to the circumstances. Discussing a life outside of Azkaban is so surreal. "I can imagine us living in a cute little cottage at the Irish coast. Close to Harry and Ron, but not too close, so we'd still have our privacy. Maybe I could open a bookshop. And you've been always good at potions, so maybe you could work as a potioneer."
"Pets? Children? I'd need a greenhouse, too."
The vision of Draco Malfoy peacefully gardening, with two curly haired, platinum blond children chasing a large cat through the gardens is so improbable that it makes the bubble collapse. Hermione sighs heavily and can't help a sob escaping her and some heavy tears running down her cheeks. "It's futile."
A hand reaches through the wall, caressing her cheek with a surprising amount of gentleness. "It isn't. Maybe we should simply take one step after the other. First escaping from Azkaban, then discussing baby names."
Hermione has the uncanny feeling her life will take an unexpected and absurd turn, even compared to her imprisonment.