Fact 1: Harry Potter is owned by JK Rowling.
Fact 2: I am not her.
Conclusion: It isn't mine.
I would like to thank those of you that reviewed or added me to your alerts/favorites lists. Really- THANK YOU! Also, I would like to apologize in advance for any grammatical/spelling/word usage errors. I have read it, re-read it, and tried to proofread, but it's difficult for me to find mistakes in my own work sometimes. I'm not a complete idiot though, I promise!
When I finally drifted off to sleep, I still didn't get much rest. My dreams were haunted by visions of the dark chamber, Lucious Malfoy's face, and the sounds of Clara's screams. After waking up crying and gasping for breath the fourth time, I gave up on sleep and got into the shower.
As the hot water poured over me, I tried to sort out my thoughts. I still wasn't entirely sure what I had gotten myself into by falsely agreeing to "switch sides". I never even heard the big plan that I was supposedly now a part of. I also wasn't sure what had happened to Clara and Pierce. Truthfully, that was one question I would be okay never knowing the answer too. All I knew was that when Draco and I were sent back to Hogwarts last night, we had been the only ones. I vaguely remembered asking him what happened to the other two, but he pretended not to hear me and mumbled something about missing supper. I took that as a sign that I didn't want to know.
Despite how calm I had managed to stay during my encounter with Lucious and the other Death Eaters, once it was behind me and I was back at the castle, I couldn't stop myself from shaking and tears started pouring down my face faster than I could wipe them away. I had eventually given up and slid myself down the wall outside the second floor girl's bathroom and curled myself into a ball in the floor. Logically, I knew that I just needed to get myself to the Gryffindor common room and into my bedroom before someone found me, but I just didn't have the mental or physical strength to get up and move. It was late- probably after midnight, so the halls and corridors of the large castle were empty and hollow. For the first time since I had started to Hogwarts over six years ago, I felt terrified.
I sat there for several minutes, hugging my legs to my chest, rocking back and forth. I had actually forgotten Malfoy was even there until I felt a hand rest gently on my shoulder.
I looked up timidly, worried about what I was going to say if it wasn't Malfoy- but a professor, or another student who had found me.
"Granger, it's going to be alright." His voice sounded annoyed, but the expression on his face was soft, and earnest.
I could hear what he was saying, but the words had no effect on me. My mind was trying too hard to process everything that had happened, and why Draco Malfoy was bent down in the floor, staring at me with his piercing gray eyes, telling me that I was going to be okay.
"They aren't going to come back for you, okay?"
I nodded slightly, and started trying to pull myself up off the floor. Malfoy stepped back to give me room, and I was oddly relieved that he didn't offer to help me up. It offered me at least a little proof that he really was Draco Malfoy.
When I had finally made it up to the common room, and then into my bed I had been so relieved to finally get the sleep I had been so looking forward to before this day went terribly wrong. And yet, here I was, barely after sunrise, taking a shower hours before I actually had to get up.
At least today was a Saturday, and I didn't have to worry about classes. And, Gryffindor was playing Ravenclaw in Quidditch today, so for a few hours I would mainly have the place to myself.
Still, I needed to talk to Malfoy- soon. There were so many questions I had, so many things I needed explained, and as much as I hated to admit it, he was really my only hope for answers.
After I got out of the shower, I got dressed in jeans and a simple long sleeved shirt, and went down to the library. What I was planning to do could have easily been done in my room, or the common room, but I didn't want to run the risk of being disturbed, and early on a Saturday morning the library was easily the best place to be alone.
I walked to one of the back tables, "my" table as I liked to think of it. I sat in my favorite chair, and pulled out a quill and a piece of parchment. I wasn't exactly sure what I wanted to say, I just needed to talk to him. After starting and scratching it out a few times, I finally wrote:
Can we talk? I'll be in the library during Quidditch. -HG
I folded the parchment up, stuck it and my quill in my pocket and hurried out of the library and towards the owlery. I chose a plain, brown owl, one that I hoped would go unnoticed amongst all the others at breakfast. Before tying my parchment to its leg, I unfolded it and quickly scribbled one last word at the end: please.
As I headed out of the owlery, I could hear students talking in the corridors. I glanced at my watch and saw that it was time for breakfast. My stomach was growling, but the thought of sitting there with Harry, Ron, and my other classmates trying to make small talk and keep myself from bursting out in tears at any moment was too terrifying to even consider going down to the dining hall.
So, instead, I headed to the girls bathroom and hid in a stall until I thought it was safe to go back to the common room. I tried to focus on my Herbology paper, and then on my astronomy homework, but I couldn't concentrate. No matter how I looked at it, I had gotten myself into an impossible situation. I would lose either way.
After an hour or so, students started slowly trickling into the common room, talking amongst one another, so I got up quietly and went up to my bedroom. I knew my friends would be wondering where I was, but I just couldn't bare to face them yet- not until after I talked to Malfoy, anyway.
I was lying across my bed, mentally going over transfiguration spells in my head to keep other thoughts out when the door swung open and Ginny walked in.
"There you are! Hermione, Harry and Ron are going crazy wondering where you are. They've come up with all these crazy things that could have happened to you.. sleep walked into the forbidden forest, eaten by a mutant spider - that one was Ron's idea of course." Ginny shook her head and laughed at their stupid ideas, but their crazy theories only reminded me of what really had happened to me and I felt my chest start to constrict.
Ginny's care-free expression changed quickly when she saw the look on my face. Her brow furrowed, and worry crossed her face as she walked across the room and sat at the edge of my bed.
"Hermione, are you okay?"
"Yeah, Gin. I'm okay. Just haven't been feeling so great. I had a headache all day yesterday, and today I'm just feeling kind of nauseous." I hoped that Ron would remember me mentioning my headache yesterday and that it would make my story more believable.
"You want to go to the hospital wing... you don't look so great... no offense."
I tried to smile, but even I could tell that it was a weak attempt and probably not very convincing.
"I'll be fine. Just need to rest, I think. You guys have fun at the game today, though, and tell the boys good luck for me, okay?"
Ginny reluctantly got off the bed, and wished for me to "feel better" before closing the door behind her.
It wasn't hard to tell when it was getting close to time for the game to start, because the noise level in the common room went up at first, and then it became almost completely silent.
I breathed a sigh of relief, and started making my way towards to library. I really hoped that Malfoy would be there, but I didn't have my hopes up very high. I hadn't been at breakfast, so I couldn't even be sure that he had gotten my note. Plus, he was Draco Malfoy after all. Why would he want to meet with a mudblood like me? But, when I walked into the library, there he sat... at my table.
I pulled the chair across from his out from the table, and he looked up at me slowly as I sat down. We sat there for a few minutes, just looking at each other. Despite the number of times Malfoy and I had faced each other in the past, the number of times we had spat insults or threatened each other with one hex or another, it suddenly struck me that this was the first time he had really looked at me. He was looking at me like I was a person... like I was someone actually worth his time.
Malfoy sighed loudly and opened his mouth to talk, but no words actually came out. I knew I should have been the one to say something... this little meeting was my idea. ... but I just didn't know where to start.
"I know you are probably confused."
I looked up from the table expectantly, only to see him looking at me with the same expression. I nodded slowly, and bit my lip hoping this conversation would consist of more than us confirming that I was confused.
"Okay, Granger, look... " he paused for a minute, like he was looking for the right words, and looked down at his hands.
"I don't really know how to do this. I know you probably hate me, and you have no reason to believe me, but I really am sorry that you got pulled into this. It's my fight and I should be strong enough to fight it alone. I don't know how much, my father told you about all of this, but..."
He lowered his eyes back to the table and shook his head slightly. I could tell how hard this was for him.
"They didn't tell me anything. Not really. Just that there is some plan, and that Slytherins couldn't do it, or couldn't do it alone, or... something. I guess I wasn't paying much attention."
"Paying attention? Hell, Granger... I had you picked to be the first to fall apart. I never thought that a mud- that you would be the one to make it out of there unharmed."
I flinched at the reminder that I was the only one to make it out alive, and he apparently noticed.
"I hate what happened to those two as much as I do."
Draco Malfoy hated that two of his inferiors were killed? Doubtful. I looked at him skeptically, almost daring him to pretend he actually cared. Suddenly it seemed completely absurd that I was here with him in the first place. Why would I expect Malfoy to help me get out of this? Was it not his father who had put me in this position in the first place... and wasn't Draco simply Lucious in younger form?
After a few minutes of silence, I was startled out of my thoughts by Draco slamming his hands down on the table. In the silent library, the noise was deafening. I gasped, and jumped in my seat, looking at him with my mouth open.
"God, Granger... will you just listen to me before you decide I'm lying? I know I've been terrible to you, and to everyone else... and, I'm not making excuses, but you have to understand. When you are raised a certain way and have these beliefs and thoughts pounded into your head from the time you are a baby, it's hard to see things any other way. I don't want to be like my Father. God, that's the last thing I want- killing students and threatening the life of anyone who crosses my path? I would rather die first. But up until now, I haven't felt like I had any option other than playing along for a while."
"Why now?"
"What?" he almost spat the word at me, and I could tell by his tone that he was getting frustrated.
"You said up until now. Why are things different now? And what does any of this have to do with me?"
Draco looked at me for a minute, like he was searching for something on my face... or in my eyes that would give him the answer to my question. As anxious as I was for his reply, the pensive look on his face kept me from urging him to answer. Then, his brow furrowed and the expression on his face became one of pure determination. I could tell that whatever it was he was wondering about, he had made up his mind.
"I guess you deserve to know the whole story now, you won't bloody well do me any good if you don't know what you are doing, no matter how smart you are." With that comment, he smirked at me, but all of the hostility in his voice was gone.
"Lord Voldermort has formed a plan to take over the wizarding world for good. He has thought for some time that the only way to truly rule is for him to influence the teachings of the young witches and wizards. He has attempted to simply put his followers in teaching positions at various schools, but no matter how influencial, one teacher can only do so much towards changing the beliefs of an entire school of students. Ideally, he would take over a school completely. Hogwarts was always his first choice, his only choice really, but he couldn't come here, or wouldn't because of Dumbledore- the only thing stopping him from walking through the doors of this castle at any given moment. The answer seemed simple enough, but who would possibly be strong enough to get rid of Professor Albus Dumbledore? If Lord Voldermort himself can't kill him... then who? And then it struck him, who better to take him down that one of his own loyal subjects. An inside job."
Draco paused for a moment, looking at me sadly before continuing.
"Of course, my father was quick to offer me to do it... but that wouldn't do. Dumbledore has been watching me for years. Expecting me to pull something like this at the demand of my Death Eater father. But, if a student from another house was to help me... he would never suspect. You were perfect... a Gryffindor at the top of her class, best friends with the Golden Boy, far from being pure blood, why would you ever help the Dark Lord?"
I suddenly felt very weak, like the breath had been knocked out of me or I had lost a lot of blood.
"Because I was too scared to say no."
How could I have been so stupid? I walked right into their trap... I lied to Lucious Malfoy, because his son told me to. I trusted Malfoy when he told me they weren't coming back for me... I even requested that he meet me here today, thinking maybe he might help. And here he was, telling me all about my new role in the assassination of the one person who was keeping Lord Voldermort from taking over Hogwarts- the one place I actually felt safe. He actually expected me to help him.
"Oh God... what have I done? I think I'm going to be sick."
I laid my head down on the hard, cool surface of the table and tried to slow my breathing down to a normal rate. This can't be happening. No... please, no.
"Hermione, look at me." His was voice was firm, and commanding, but I still couldn't bring myself to lift my head off the table. To my surprise, I didn't have to- Draco reached across the table and lifted my chin off the table with one of his pale hands.
"This is not your fault, and I'm going to get us out of this. Or maybe I'll get myself killed trying, but I will not be my father's pawn in another of his deadly games. Not when the stakes are this high."
"Why should I trust you?" The words came out angrier than I had intended, but something told me we were way past hurting each other's feelings.
"I'm your only chance... and I think maybe you are mine."