They lay together for a while, just quietly holding one another and savouring the moment. When Draco closed his eyes he just felt so completely happy and after spilling his inner demons to Hermione he felt like a huge weight had been lifted off his shoulders. Somehow sharing his pain with her had relieved him of some of it.
He felt like maybe he could finally start something real. Maybe he could put the past behind him and move forward, with her.
His head rested on her chest and her fingers gently wove their way through his hair. He would never have let anyone do that before, he had always hated people touching his hair. This time he sighed with content as she ran her hand down the side of his face.
"Couldn't you just lie here forever?" She murmured.
He sighed again. "I know, I love… this. I love this seclusion." He waited anxiously to see what she would say in return.
He wasn't actually going to say that. He said exactly what he wanted to, but somehow when the words came out it scared him a little. It's not that he didn't want to say it; it's just that he had never said it before. Not to anyone.
Her response was delayed but she finally said something. "I know, so do I."
He looked up at her with a smile on his face and kissed her.
"You know we should probably get some sleep, we have to be out of here by ten past six. It's already past midnight." She said.
He pressed his lips into hers again, taking in the feeling. When he pulled away he sat up to take his belt off and he undid the button on his jeans. "Do you mind?" He looked back, for some reason he felt a little bashful.
Hermione smiled at the rosy glow in his cheeks. "Not one bit."
He turned his face away with a little laugh. He slipped his jeans over his hips and kicked them off and onto the floor. When he turned back to face her she had done the same and he let his eyes deviate from her face down over her smooth pale legs.
He looked back up to her red cheeks and smirked a little. "I uh, I think you're blushing Granger." He said arrogantly.
She raised an eyebrow at him with a smile. "Well unless I'm mistaken Malfoy, I believe you are too."
His smirk turned to a scowl as she gave a playful laugh. As she laughed she thought that she probably shouldn't have done so, that kind of thing usually makes him mad, but he shook his head and laughed along, followed by a soft kiss.
As his tongue slipped sweetly behind her teeth he climbed in beside her and pulled her into him. He pulled away to give her a lingering look and push her hair pack behind her ears.
She waited for him to say those little words but she knew that they weren't going to come out of his mouth. Instead his lips met hers again but only for a moment. She wriggled further into his arms and closed her eyes as they lay back.
This was the start of something new and better for Draco, he could already feel himself changing and he couldn't wait to spend another night with her wrapped up tightly in his arms.
"…Draco…" He heard his name in a hazy voice as he was waking up. "…Draco…" He heard it again and a smile spread on his face as his eyes fluttered open.
She hovered over him, blurry but smiling, with her hair still a mess from sleeping. She stroked his cheek with her hand and he smiled back.
"You're beautiful." He whispered.
She laughed sweetly and kissed his nose. "You're groggy and delusional."
"Never." He reached up to steal a kiss.
"Get up, it's already past six and we need to go." She grinned.
Reluctantly he got out of bed and pulled his jeans over his ankles. He yawned as he stood up to pull them on. He caught sight of Hermione redressing herself and became easily distracted.
She turned around as she buttoned up her jeans. "Would you hurry up? We have to go." She said with a big smile. She couldn't stop smiling when she was with him.
"I'm coming." He pulled on his shirt and as he started to button up his pants she grabbed his arm and dragged him to the door. "Why are we in such a hurry?"
"We're almost here." He raised his eyebrows and she checked her watch.
It was ten past six.
She pushed the door open slowly and peeked through the crack. "Come on." She pulled him out and they closed the door behind them.
He finished doing up his belt and she inched around the corner. "What are you looking at?"
"Shhh!"
"Did you hear that?" Draco heard his own voice from around the corner and took a peek.
There they were, time turner around their necks, eleven hours in the past. And it was also happening right now. Draco knew he would get a headache if he tried to think about it too much.
It was only a moment before they were gone.
"What happened?"
"You know I have the strangest sensation of déjà vu from last night." Hermione reached up to kiss his cheek. "We should get back to our dorms and get ready for class. You look a tad scruffy."
"Who's scruffy?" He raised an eyebrow and smiled.
They said their goodbyes and headed back to their dorms for the day. They still had a whole day of classes before they could fully recover.
Hermione felt exhausted, she had been awake for the best part of the night, on both of her experiences and she would have been happy to just go straight back to bed. There was no way she would, there was too much to do in her classes.
When Draco got back to his common room he headed straight for the mirror. He wasn't that scruffy-looking. He straightened himself up and went to collect his uniform; he had advanced potions first up. Even though it was one of his favourite subjects he wasn't very fond of Slughorn, mainly because he didn't like him. It just made potions class annoying.
Today he didn't feel that irritation at having to deal with the stuffy old professor. He just felt better this morning than he had in a long time. Not even Pansy could bring him back down to the level he had been only weeks earlier.
He strapped up his books and put them in his bag to head off for his first class. He felt strangely motivated to do well in his NEWTS even though he had been given a few less than desirable grades. He took his new seat in potions, at the front-right of the class. The only Slytherin who he used to sit with was Goyle, and he was gone now. He stole a quick glance to the back of the class to where they used to sit and snigger together as first and second year students.
How times have changed.
His thoughts were interrupted by Slughorn and his ability to completely disregard one's personal space.
"Uh, Mr Malfoy, I have received word from the Headmistress requesting that you go straight to her office before the start of class." He said with a loose smile.
"Are you sure I won't miss anything important?" He asked.
"Oh, my no dear boy, just some simple healing potions, well, simple for myself, one of your age may not find them to be so-"
"I'll collect some notes later." He said a little curtly and left his chair to head up to McGonagall's new office.
He hadn't been in the headmaster's office much, a few times for some particularly devious behaviour in the first few years of school but after that he got away with more than he should have. He was about to knock on the door when it swung open before him. Wandering in he looked up at all of the previous headmasters including Dumbledore and the newest addition was Snape. He gave Draco the slightest of smiles and he wasn't sure whether he was wasting his time smiling back at it or not.
"Good morning Mr Malfoy." McGonagall looked up from where she was scratching something in ink to give him one of her forced smiles.
"Morning Headmistress." He said awkwardly as he stood in front of the desk.
"Please, sit." She gestured with her quill to the armchairs before the desk.
He did so begrudgingly. She put down her quill and gave him a quick look-over.
"I don't mean to be rude, but what am I doing here?" He asked with a quizzical look.
"I merely wanted to ask how you were settling back in to life at Hogwarts?" She placed one hand over the other and tilted her head to the side.
He nodded a little. "Do you do this to all students?" He knew that he was being slightly rude but he almost couldn't help it.
"All students who were profoundly affected by the battle, yes." She said.
"Are you worried I'll do something like last time?"
"Mr Malfoy, had I any belief in the idea that you may pose a threat to anyone in the castle do you think I would have allowed you to return to your studies in this institution?"
He looked away and then back up at her. "Why did you let me back here?"
Her expression softened only slightly. "It is my belief that there were many witches and wizards who acted out of fear rather than loyalty. I don't believe that you can be blamed for your actions Draco."
"Is that what the ministry said?" He thought back to the interrogation room he had been forced into and the pressure he had been under to confess things that weren't completely truthful.
"As a matter of fact, the ministry recommended that we did not accept you for the completion of your final year." That hit his quite hard. The look on his face was pure shock. "The choice was mine alone, and I believe that I made the right one so if you don't mind I will ask again. How are you settling in?"
"Um, alright." He said, still a little dumbfounded over the facts that she had laid out for him.
"I would have to say that as of late they have been a little more than that." This time she had a sly twinkle in her eye that he couldn't quite recognise.
"I'm starting to pick up my studies…"
"I am aware of your academic records and current progress Mr Malfoy, it is how you are interacting with the other students that has you here today. I had been worried that you would be chastised for the part you played but as it turns out some students are more willing to forgive than others." He had no idea what to say.
He just sat there staring with his mouth partly open. She didn't know. Impossible.
"I don't know what you mean, everything is the same as it always was." He said.
She smiled a little. "I did not ask you here to embarrass you, I merely wanted to make sure that you were on track and that any distractions, advantageous as they may be, are not going to stop you from reaching your full potential." He just nodded and exhaled heavily.
"I won't hold you back any longer. I am sure that Professor Slughorn will still be mid-way through an old memory of his. You should have plenty of time to make it back before you begin." She smiled and picked up her quill to continue with her paperwork.
He nodded again and got up to leave. He was very much in a daze as the door to the office closed on him .
McGonagall's smile grew substantially larger once he was out of sight. The all-but-lost marauders map sitting beside her ink pot converted back to a plain piece of parchment. During the battle it had been taken from Harry for safe keeping with McGonagall and since then he has not requested it back. She quite liked having the option to keep an eye on her students when they least expected it.
Over the last few weeks she had noticed quite the odd pairing of footsteps on the map. Sometimes it was almost as though one followed the other unintentionally, this was what she had thought it was to start with, or an error on the map. But the map never lies.
Since she first saw the two names meet on the golden parchment she had watched the two of them closely. She would have been a fool to notice nothing different about them. The longer she observed the more she realised that they seemed to complement one another. It was a match that she would never have expected nor that she would have ever thought possible. Yet somehow through the troubled times and strained atmosphere that often hung in the castle walls it had become something. Something quite remarkable.
It seemed like a way to patch a tear in the relationships of the students. The Slytherins had become a segregated part of Hogwarts and this was not something that sat well with the headmistress. Perhaps with the two of them setting an example it would show the others that an individual should not hold the blame for something out of their control and it was hardly the Slytherins who were to blame. Even the first years were being cordoned off and Minerva found it unsettling.
Though she wanted the union of Hogwarts as one, she would let events play out in their own time. She was glad that Draco had not been completely cast away, she didn't believe him to be truly evil after all, just mischievous at heart. She liked to think that she was like Dumbledore in that way. And with that thought in her mind her smile grew wider and she took a moment to remember him.
She looked up at his portrait on the wall and he smiled, looking down over his half-moon spectacles, almost as if he knew what she was thinking.