A/N: Holy smoking bananas! Thanks for all the reviews, my lovelies! Due to popular demand, I give you Chapter 12, in which we discover a lie, accept an olive branch and create the possibility of chaos. Oh, and Draco is back down to boxers (also by popular demand)! :)
To my lovely reviewers – please forgive me! I haven't had time to reply to everyone this week and I feel like a real jerk. I made the decision to post another chapter instead after reading all the reviews that are urging me to do so. As a matter of fact, that's why you have this chapter early.
Anywho, please review if you have a chance and let me know how it's going. I'm writing for you and I aim to please. :)
-Elvee
(The Obligatory Disclaimer: I don't own the characters or the world, they are the property of their respective author and copyright holders. The plot, Magicaine and the magic sink are mine. You may use the items if you like, just extend professional courtesy by PMing me and referencing this work in your own disclaimer.)
Snatch
Chapter Twelve
"Make no little plans; they have no magic to stir men's blood."
-Daniel Burnham
Malfoy and Snape had been playing the same game of chess for several hours. Hermione wished she would have had time to watch them square off. She was sure she'd learn much more than getting regularly trounced by Malfoy. Instead she had to settle for sizing the board and players up every few pages. Two men, one dark and worn, one light and fresh, hiding behind a checkered board and expressionless masks. Watching two Slytherins go head to head over chess was like watching them play poker with pawns.
If she had to make a guess, Hermione would have said Malfoy was sizing up his former Head of House. If she had to make another, she would have put hard galleons on the fact that Snape was sizing her up, even though he gave the impression of watching Malfoy. Without a doubt he'd been to see Dumbledore before returning this morning. The melding of those two minds was something to be very wary of.
Perhaps she'd risked too much today telling the Ferret anything, but time was running out and she had to start somewhere. She couldn't help the fact that he knew how to press her buttons almost as well as she pressed his. She also couldn't help surreptitiously admiring him. She was finally ready to admit it was a cheap thrill keeping him in nothing but socks for days on end. If it had been Crabbe or Goyle, she would have covered them to protect her delicate sensibilities. She'd have withheld food or sleep, even oxygen; she'd rather do anything besides look at the giant slabs of jiggling flesh their robes were sure to conceal. Malfoy, however vile, however arrogant, however insulting, was nothing if not a beautiful specimen of the human male form.
He clearly wasn't as idiotic as some of his comments would lead her to believe. He was playing his own game, and if he bought into her trust, she was going to see his full hand very soon. The real question she pondered as she hid behind her book, was how much she could safely tell him. How in the hell would she keep him calm when he found out Lucius would probably fail his last task? How in the hell would she stay calm and go through with the wedding?
If the wedding happened, they would be permanently bound. Bound in ways that would ruin both their lives permanently. No sex with anyone but each other and if either of them did something stupid and died, well tough luck, the other would follow in a matter of months. This type of magical contract didn't even recognize the concept of divorce. That was horrible enough, but the thing that terrified her, truly down to the marrow of her bones, was Malfoy's reaction. He wouldn't want to be married to her and she sure as hell didn't want to be Mrs. Bouncing Ferret, not even if he was an extraordinary physical specimen. Every time he opened his mouth, he'd ruin it. Consequently, if they married, she would bet her copy of Hogwarts: A History on the fact that she'd die a virgin.
Wasn't that a kick in the teeth?
No, he'd be as horrified as she was and would have no problem at all with running away, or even hurting her to keep from going through with it. He wasn't selfless enough to sacrifice for the greater good. She doubted it was even in his vocabulary. No. No matter how much she trusted him, she couldn't tell him.
She shook her head to clear it. No sense dwelling on it when the die was already cast. After another glance at the two men over the chess board, she turned back to the task at hand, and flipped to the next page. After a few more chapters of reading on magical sinks, she had to start taking notes. Her head was simply getting too full of academic facts from her current book and invisible intrigue from the other end of the table.
She scribbled in her own short hand, a code she'd used for her notes at Hogwarts composed of squiggles that represented sounds in the English language. She felt fairly confident neither Snape nor Malfoy had been to secretarial school, and so would be unable to unravel her shopping list for Dobby at a glance.
A groan sounded from behind the curtain. Snape stood immediately and ducked into the privacy of the sheet. As soon as he disappeared she scribbled: He's a legilimens on the back of her list and shoved it down the table to Malfoy. He read it, raised one eyebrow, then pushed the paper back to her.
A buzzing noise was coming from behind the curtain. Snape was masking a conversation. Viktor was awake. She exchanged a look with Malfoy. If he'd been watched by anyone else, she doubted they'd catch the subtle change in his demeanor. His shoulders tensed almost imperceptibly, but she'd done her share of Ferret watching the last week and a half herself. At least he'd been easy on the eyes.
At that moment the laptop signaled an incoming call.
Hermione hitched her head to indicate Malfoy should pull up a chair with her behind the laptop. "Are you sure?" He asked then wandlessly put up a muffliato charm of his own.
She blinked at his casual use of wandless magic, before another tone from the laptop brought her back to the task at hand. "Negotiations are done for the day. This is for you." Hermione slid the headset over her ears but left them unplugged so he could hear through the speakers. With her index finger she hit the button to connect the call.
"Yes?" She typed, then without a second thought fished around for the proper cable and plugged in the microphone.
A woman's voice, thready and thin answered, "I was asked to contact you." Upon jearing his mother's voice, Malfoy's face immediately crumpled into a scowl.
Hermione motioned to the microphone, mouthing, "Talk to her."
With a grateful look, Malfoy grabbed the microphone with both hands and brought it to his nose, saying loudly, "Mother? Are you alright?" Hermione adjusted his arms so the microphone was in front of his mouth. He threw her an annoyed glance until he understood what she was doing.
"Draco? My darling is that really you?" Narcissa sounded out of breath, like each word was an effort.
"Yes, it's me." These first few words were said eagerly, then he hesitated and asked softly, "Mother, what's the matter?"
The pause gave her lie away. "Nothing dear, I'm just very tired."
Horror crawled across his face. "What did he do to you? I'll kill him," Malfoy hissed.
"You mustn't speak about your father so. He's under a lot of stress." Even beaten as Malfoy's threats implied, her voice radiated a motherly scolding, but she couldn't hold the tone for long, "I'll be fine, sweetheart. Don't worry about me. How are you?"
"I'm good, Mother. As a matter of fact, I was sitting at the table playing chess. They tell me I'll be home soon." He forced cheer into his voice without effort. Hermione had to hand it to him, he was an excellent liar.
"Of course you will. Your father is working very hard to secure your release." As thin as her voice was, it was filled with certainty. So, Lucius Malfoy was an animal that kept his promises. That still didn't make him father of the year, and it certainly didn't change her plan one iota.
Malfoy gave Hermione a long, measured look. Then he surprised her by asking, "Mother which prisoner was sent to secure my release?"
"Prisoner? Draco, I don't understand." She sounded fragile and confused.
Malfoy scrunched his brows together, confused himself for a moment, then cleared his throat and continued lightly, "Never mind. It was a silly question. Are you in bed?"
"I am in your father's study. It's the only room that still has the privacy charm on it."
"Mother, I insist you go to bed right away. Get Minky to call the healer. Please?" In that moment, Malfoy sounded like the man he had become: commanding and persuasive.
"Oh, you don't know, do you? Our healer was found dead in Diagon Alley last week. I'll be alright. Severus came by this morning and left me a few things." The mention of Snape seemed to take some of the worry out of her voice. The trust in her words was obvious.
He put the microphone in a stranglehold, shaking with the effort not to break it. Malfoy's eyes darkened with anger, but he kept his voice light, "There you are then. Take what Uncle Sev gave you and try to get some rest. I'll be home before you know it and we'll have tea in the garden."
Narcissa's voice was now just a shade above a whisper, "Alright. I love you, sweetheart."
"I love you, too, Mother." For the first time Malfoy's voice held real longing and emotion. It was almost as if he'd forgotten Hermione was there.
At his nod, she disconnected the call and pried the microphone out of Malfoy's white knuckled hands. She began disconnecting her laptop, speaking softly, "Play it smart, Draco. Your mother probably isn't the type to check her morning coffee."
His eyes were flashing and his face was flushed. Hermione had never seen him this angry. He hissed, "He said it was a prisoner trade. He said he couldn't see her or get a message to her. Lying sack of..."
Hermione gripped his elbow firmly and whispered, "Soon. Very soon."
At the opposite end of the table Snape watched every movement between them with glittering black eyes.
"Thanks, Granger." He said, his face carefully blank. Hermione gave him a small nod and he picked up his chair, returning to the chess game.
She tapped her list of ingredients for the magic sink with her wand. The words changed from shorthand to English. Quickly she scribbled instruction on the bottom that all of her purchases were to be put in a velvet bag before returning. The last thing she needed was for Snape to see she was building a magical sink. She called Dobby and asked him if he could pick up a few things. Dobby took the list along with the purse she handed him and with a crack, disapperated away.
Dobby returned within the hour, laden with a large, lumpy purple velvet bag. Hermione stuffed it immediately in her beaded bag and asked for an early supper. No one mentioned the bag, but it was like the giant purple flobberworm in the middle of the room.
She tried to make easy conversation as Dobby served roast turkey and mashed potatoes. Once she caught Snape's eye, she indicated the curtain with a twitch of her head. "How is he?"
Snape lowered his goblet and sat back as Dobby filled his plate. "As expected." He shrugged. "I gave him a pain potion and a strong sedative. His body needs time to heal."In other words, he wasn't leaving any time soon. That was the wrong answer..
"Good. So he's out of danger. When will you be able to move him?" It was a softly veiled threat, like a knife in a velvet sheath. It was a dead giveaway that Malfoy had told her what they'd discussed at breakfast. It was her challenge to his lie.
Snape was accomplished in deception, the challenge washed easily over his smooth features. He replied, "I am not a healer, therefore I am going to err on the side of caution and say three or four days."
That was too long to have Snape underfoot. If everything went smoothly, it was going to interfere with her plan. In three days she'd be up to her eyeballs with the arrangements in France. "You have two," she said. Her voice was soft, but it brooked no argument. If they weren't gone, she'd get rid of them, courtesy of the contents of the velvet bag. She needed to deal with them soon, just like she'd told Malfoy earlier.
He glared at her, sneering, "Very well. I'll be sure to tell him about your hospitality."He all but spat the last word.
"You do that," she said with a brittle smile, taking a bite of her turkey.
The rest of dinner was an awkward affair. The only sound was the clinking of cutlery and the refilling of goblets. As the last of the dessert plates were cleared away, Hermione said to Malfoy, "Time for bed. You were up far too early this morning."
Malfoy exchanged a glance with Snape, but rose from the table. He stripped to a t-shirt and his boxers before flopping on the bed and pulling up his blanket. She conjured a shackle on his left hand, then placed the most difficult ward she knew over it, making a small cut on her hand and dipping her wand in the wound before casting. It was a blood ward, the strongest kind, requiring her magical signature to break the shackle.
Malfoy shifted uneasily when the hair on his arms stood on end as the powerful magic was channeled around his wrist. It was Hermione's turn to exchange a look with Snape. She smirked. Unfortunately, it wasn't the resounding victory she'd hoped for. He'd smirked, too.
She fished around in her pocket and held up a blue vial, asking sweetly, "Are you gonna take it like a good boy, or am I going to have to stun you again?"
"Fine," he pouted. "Give it here." She handed him the vial of charmed blue milk she'd made earlier. To Malfoy's credit, he didn't give it away. He swallowed it down without a sign that it didn't taste like bubotuber pus.
Hermione returned to her book and a short time later, she'd finished it. She groped in her bag for another, this time skimming the table of contents and index before thumbing through the pages. As long as she was waiting for Snape to sleep, she would learn everything she could about the construction of magical sinks.
Much later, after her old Potions Professor was sleeping, Hermione cast a powerful sleeping charm on him. Malfoy sat up at once. With a flick of her wand he was free. She hissed urgently, "Quickly, get dressed. I need an extra pair of hands."
She pulled the purple velvet bag out and emptied the contents on the table. Draco was pulling his sweater over his head as he approached the table, "This is for the magic sink?"
Hermione nodded and propped open her book. "You ever made one?"
He was taken aback by her question, "No way. They're contraband."
"What's the matter Malfoy? Five years in Azkaban scare you?" Her eyes glittered in challenge.
"You wish, Granger." He looked over the instructions in the book. "Says here we take the copper box and insert the amethyst geode." They continued, taking turns reading and constructing the magic sink from dozens of components, potions and powders.
Around two in the morning, they sat at the table staring at a four inch copper cube etched in runes. A tiny light skittered and danced along the engravings. The hinged lid was open and the geode glowed a dull red.
"Now what?" Malfoy asked with a yawn.
"Now I take some Pepper Up and you get some sleep. I have a lot of casting to do and someone still has to keep an eye on him tomorrow." She hitched her thumb at Snape's sleeping form.
Malfoy climbed back into bed as Hermione scribbled calculations on a scrap of parchment with one hand and threw back a bottle of Pepper Up with the other. She went over and over her calculations meticulously and studied her results carefully. Too much power would make the magic sink unstable, too little and it wouldn't be effective. She double checked her equation and began casting expulso charms into the sink's magical core with as much force behind them as she could muster. The geode glowed an almost blinding red by the time she couldn't throw anything else at it.
After a mere fifteen minutes of casting, she was exhausted. It was an effort to lift her wand to cast the last stasis spell. She wasn't done with the spells the sink would store, and she scribbled down notes before tucking everything carefully in her beaded bag.
She changed into her pajamas and settled into her cot. With a flick of her wand, she ended the sleeping charm on Snape. His snoring lost it's rhythm. She slammed her eyes shut and pretended to sleep. She didn't relax until she heard his breathing even back out.
Only one spell was left and it was too important to leave undone. If Snape suspected she charmed him, her wand would be the first place he would look. She mumbled a powerful variation of the deletrius charm to erase the traces of her night's casting.
Unexpectedly, Malfoy's voice whispered to her in the darkness. "Granger?" He waited until he heard her mumbled reply before continuing, "My shackle?"
She shook her head, attempting to stave off sleep for a few more minutes and muster the little power she had left. "Right. How stupid of me." She crossed over to his bed and conjured the shackle, resetting the blood ward.
"You're not stupid," he said softly. "Don't say that." When she didn't reply he asked, "What's going to happen?"
She bit her lip as she considered how to answer him. Her mind made up, she bent over him and whispered, "I'm going to save the damsel in distress, kill the bad guys without lifting a finger and live to a ripe old age in the South of France." She paused for a beat as if deciding something, then asked with a brilliant smile in the reddish glow of the fire, "You in?"
He gave her a smile that made her knees weak in return. "Wild thestrals couldn't keep me away, Granger. Merlin help the dunderheads that stand in our way."