A/N: Once again, thank you for all the lovely reviews. I'm surprised I'm getting this many, but it's wonderful! I have an idea for another Dramione fanfic bouncing around in my head, and when I'm done with this one, I'll probably get to writing it. Maybe even before I finish with this one. As you're going to see in this chapter, the events are going to go off a bit more from the original books, but I hope to keep it in line with The Half Blood Prince and The Deathly Hallows as much as I can.

JKR owns this wonderful world, I just rearrange it.

Draco found himself lying in his bed, staring at the ceiling and twiddling his thumbs yet again. Last night was, for lack of a better word, fun. Hermione made him beat up the old vanishing cabinet he had worked so hard to repair and it felt exhilarating to finally be rid of the bloody thing. He had gotten a full nights rest, and he would have slept through the rest of the day if Knott hadn't woken him up. He went to his classes, but he didn't see Hermione around anywhere. That wasn't surprising; Gryffindors and Slytherins weren't scheduled to have a class together for a while.

Then when are we going to talk to Dumbledore? He wondered, not that the thought of talking to Dumbledore didn't frighten him immensely, but he just wanted this to be over with.

A thought kept nudging him in the back of his head, what if she wanted me to do it alone?

He gulped. After all, she had never specified. But there was no way he was going to just march into the headmaster's office and spill his guts, confessing that he was sent to kill him. No, that certainly was not going to happen.

Days went by and he hadn't heard a word about Hermione, let alone seen her. One good thing was that Potter was too preoccupied with his new bloodtraitor girlfriend to pay much attention to him. In fact, it seemed like the whole incident was wiped from his head. The other Weasley seemed less reluctant to let it go, giving Draco threatening glares that only amused him. But without his best mate Potter, he wasn't going to act on anything, and they both knew it.

After one rather nasty conversation in the common room between the aspiring Death Eaters, Draco decided to head to the library, figuring that was the best place to look for Hermione.

He beamed when he saw her sitting by her lonesome, sitting at a table stacked with books. She was scribbling furiously on a piece of parchment, occasionally looking back at one of her open books. Draco leaned against a shelf of books and crossed his arms, watching her. She didn't notice his presence, and he took the opportunity to watch her for his own amusement. He thought it was cute the way she mumbled incoherent words to herself as she wrote her essay, which he found out was on Charms, when he looked over her shoulder. She still didn't notice him.

Now it was getting annoying. Either she was avoiding him for an unknown reason, or she was really into her studies. Draco figured it was the latter and cleared his throat loudly. She still made no acknowledgment that he was there. Three voice clears later, his throat was starting to hurt and she was still deep in her books.

A smirk played upon his visage as he leaned his head towards her almost-tamed hair and located the spot where her ear would most likely be.

"Miss Granger," he said in a stern voice.

She jerked so much she nearly fell back toward the floor. Her eyes wildly searched for where the noise had come from, and finally they rested on Draco Malfoy. It might have been a trick of the light, but her eyes seemed to light up for a fraction of a second. She put her hand next to her heart and took a deep breath, trying to resume a normal heartbeat.

"Don't scare me like that," she whispered, but he knew she wasn't mad.

"Sorry," Draco shrugged his shoulders and plopped on a chair next to her.

"Did you really not notice me?" he questioned.

"What do you mean?" she demanded.

Draco left out a low chuckle. "I was standing here for at least ten minutes, and I cleared my voice a few times too. You still didn't notice me. I was starting to think that you were avoiding me."

Only one thing registered in the witch's mind. "You were watching me?" she asked, starting to blush.

"Oh, most defiantly," he grinned.

She blushed even redder and gazed at him, shaking her head in mock-like disapproval. It brought to mind her fourth year, when another young man liked to watch her study. She silently laughed at her thought. It was preposterous to think that Draco liked watching her for the same reason that Krum did.

"What's so funny?' Draco's question brought her out of her thoughts.

"Nothing," she composed herself into a content expression.

"So where have you been? Not backing out on the plan are you?" she asked him.

"I might ask you the same question. I'm here aren't I? I was wondering when we were going to talk to him," articulated Draco.

"Are you ready right now?"

This was a small surprise to Draco; he didn't expect to actually find Hermione here today, but it didn't matter.

"As ready as I'm going to be," he said.

She smiled with her triumphantly."Just help me put these books back."

"Sure," Draco replied.

He couldn't imagine why Hermione had near twenty books, but then again, this was Hermione Granger. Putting the books back wasn't hard, and they were done in a couple of minutes.

He followed her to Dumbledore's study, trying to control his hammering heart on the way. This is it, he thought.

"Toffee éclairs," announced Hermione to the gargoyle statue. Draco gave her a questioning look, so she shrugged and replied "Harry told me what the password was."

They went up on the spiral staircase, and in a blur, Hermione was curtly knocking on the door, then she was gently nudging him through the headmaster's study.

"My, my, what an unlikely couple," Dumbledore said, with no surprise in his voice, only childlike amusement.

"Good evening Professor," said Hermione.

Draco hadn't noticed until now that he was staring pointedly at the ground. He snapped back up "Hello…Professor."

Dumbledore beamed.

"A good evening to you both! Please, sit," he exclaimed, waving his wand and bringing two chairs flying to the other side of his desk.

"What brings you two here tonight?" he asked when they awkwardly sat down.

Although something told Hermione he knew exactly why they were there. He never missed a thing, Dumbledore.

When no one spoke, Hermione nudged Draco a little too hard in the ribs.

He cleared his throat quickly. "Er. Right. Professor, I don't know how I'm going to tell you this," Draco started to talk but stopped when Dumbledore put his pointer finger to his mouth, indicating that he wanted silence.

Draco closed his mouth and gulped. He noticed Hermione's foot was slightly shaking, and she too looked pale. At least he wasn't the only one who was scared.

"Am I about to be regaled with a tale of how you have been thrust into the clutches of the Death Eaters, finally becoming one yourself? And then will I hear of how Voldemort himself assigned you the task of killing me? How you have been feebly attempting, injuring innocent students in the process? Perhaps, you'll tell me all about that tricky little piece of magic, the vanishing cabinet?"

Draco stared with wide eyes of horror as Dumbledore basically recapped his entire year.

"If that's what you came here to tell me, Draco, then obviously I know all of that. But I have a feeling you have something more to say?" Dumbledore finished with a question.

"I destroyed the vanishing cabinet," spurted out Draco. It was the first thing he could think of saying.

"Oh?" Dumbledore said with a twinkle in his eyes and smile.

"He did, Professor. I helped him. It's completely demolished," Hermione said shyly.

"Very well, very well. I'm proud of both of you."

Draco fought hard to swallow the lump in his throat. "If you knew, why didn't you try to stop me?" he asked.

"Dear boy, if Lord Voldemort knew that I suspected you, you would be dead for sure. I'm ever glad that you came for help yourself, that takes great courage."

"She's the one who convinced me," Draco threw a quick glance at Hermione. She shrunk down in her chair.

Dumbledore continued to smile radiantly.

"Now, I assume you want your family to be protected as well? Your father is safe in Azkaban at the moment, but we will address him when the time is right. Do you want to hear the plan I have come up with?"

Draco and Hermione merely nodded.

"It's quite simple, actually. In just a few minutes, you, Draco, will be taken away to reside at the quarters of the Order of the Phoenix, who I will notify beforehand of the current situation. I accept them to treat you as any other guest. You, Miss Granger, will leave to go to your dormitory as soon as I'm done telling you the plan. You may tell your two friends, but proceed with caution; I hear they have ill tempers at times like these. I shall tell Severus to come in here at the appropriate time, acting as a witness to the event of the duel between you and me, Mr. Malfoy."

Draco remained silent until this. "What?" he burst out.

Dumbledore merely chuckled.

"We are not actually going to duel. Rather, I am going to pretend that you burst in here in a fit of rage, and we enticed in a duel. It wouldn't be hard to believe that you died fighting me, no offense towards you. I will also tell the Order to collect your mother and keep her safe, under the impression to the Death Eaters that we are capturing her. While you are safe back at the quarters, I will do the necessary magic to portray that you really are dead. Severus will be able to deliver this information back to Voldemort. I think that is all, unless you have any other questions?"

Hermione shook her head, and Draco stared at the old man in wonder. It seemed as if he had given this a lot of thought.

"Did…did you know that I would ask for help?" Draco asked weakly.

"No. But I hoped," his voice was filled with pride.

Draco nodded his head. This was all too much.

"Miss Granger, I suggest you leave now to avoid the confusion of you being here when a student was killed," said Dumbledore.

Hermione rose out of her seat.

"Thank you, Professor."

She turned to glance at Draco. It looked as if a little bit of color might be coming back to him. She smiled to herself as she imagined the fit Mr. Weasley was going to have when she saw his emaciated form.

Draco couldn't express how much he had to thank her for, how much this meant. He mouthed 'thanks' to her, and she seemed to understand.

"Well, bye," she called finally as she descended down the spiral staircase.

Dumbledore was in the process of sending out a few patronuses, and talking through the fireplace, so Draco sat back in his seat, waiting for the old man to finish. A few minutes passed of him communicating with unknown people, and he spoke to Draco.

"The arrangements are made. You will be glad you made this choice. I have opened a one-way passage to the quarters through the Floo Network."

Draco nodded yet again and noticed that that was all he seemed to be doing around Dumbledore. He just couldn't form the words to speak his gratitude. He took the powder and stepped into the fireplace.

"Thank you, Professor Dumbledore. For everything," he managed to speak.

Dumbledore's smile widened and he gave Draco a curt nod as he disappeared into the flames.

A/N- Kind of a cliffy, huh? So who thinks that Snape should still kill Dumbledore? If that were to happen, who thinks that the gang should know that it's not murder, but a request on Dumbledore's behalf? I've already planned out what's going to happen, but it would be interesting to read what you suspect. Review (: