Forbidden
By: Leah
Chapter Two
Amour dans les bras d'un ennemi
The minutes in the Head's carriage ticked on in an uncomfortable silence. The two occupants made sure to sit as far away from each other as possible, and both glared at the scenery outside the windows, hoping that by some mystical force if they glared hard enough they'd be able to make the other person in the carriage's head explode.
No such luck.
"Malfoy," Hermione's voice shattering the awkward silence. "Look, since we're gonna be living together for most of the year, maybe we should try to um...be friends?" She winced a bit when it came out like more of a question than the firm statement she was hoping for.
Draco looked at her like she had grown an extra head before chuckling. He leaned over until his face was inches from hers.
"Look Granger," He filled the word with as much malice as he could. "The last thing I want is to be friends with you. I may have been on your side during the war, but that doesn't mean that I like you, and it sure as hell doesn't mean I like your two idiot friends either. Honestly, I can barely tolerate your presence. So no, we shouldn't try to be... friends." He said the word sickly sweet, then turned his attention back to the window.
Hermione sighed and looked down at her hands in her lap.
'One good hex, that's all I want.'
The Head girl slumped into a seat at the Gryffindor table between Ron and Ginny and pinched the bridge of her nose; trying to hold back the migraine that she knew was coming.
"How was the ride with the prat?" Ron mumbled as the first year's clamored into the Great Hall nervously waiting to be sorted into their houses.
"Oh it was just perfect. We talked and laughed and revealed our deepest darkest secrets and became best friends." Hermione mumbled back, not bothering to spare him a glance.
She forgot sarcasm was wasted on the boy.
"Are you serious?" He nearly shouted.
Hermione's rolled her eyes over to him and gave him a deadpan look. "No."
McGonagall walked into the hall holding the sorting hat and placed it onto the three-legged stool, it cleared its throat and the entire Hall fell silent.
Hermione wasn't really paying attention as the hat began its song. After seven years, three-headed dogs, evil journals and getting attacked by foliage, a talking hat didn't really hold her attention as it had before. Instead, her thoughts drifted to a certain blond haired, slimy git that she would have the pleasure of spending the rest of the year with.
She was practically bursting with joy.
She was jerked out of her cheerful thoughts of which hex was best for rodent extermination by a sharp jab to her ribs, courtesy of Ginny.
"Hey, are you ok? You're looking a little out of it." The younger girl asked, the hall was buzzing with excitement -and the occasional cheer- as the hat continued to sort children into their houses.
"Hmm?" Her eyes jumped to her friend's. "Oh, yeah, I'm fine." Ginny looked skeptical, but remained silent.
The sorting hat was placed on the final student. "Hmm...Hufflepuff!" The little brunette's she scurried over to the table, grinning broadly.
The loud screech of a chair turned the dull hum of the hall to silence. Dumbledore stood at the head of the Professors table and cleared his throat..
"To our new students welcome, and to our older students, welcome back to another year at Hogwarts School for Witchcraft and Wizardry."
Malfoy sighed and ran his fingers through his hair, Dumbledore was still talking. How much could one old man talk anyway? He was bloody hungry dammit!
He groaned and rested his chin in his upturned palm. He zoned in and out of Dumbledore's -much too long- speech, just incase the old man said anything important.
Blah blah blah...forest's off limits, blah blah blah, Filch will be patrolling, blah blah blah, he needs to kick the bucket already, blah blah blah...
"I am pleased to announce this years Head Boy and Girl! Our new Head Girl is Gryffindor's, Hermione Granger." Malfoy's eyes shot across the room to the Gryffindor, landing on Hermione, who blushed and stood. The Hall erupted in loud applause, and a few hisses from the table under the green banner.
"And," Dumbledore's voice rang out over the cheering, causing it to stop. "This year's Head Boy is Slytherin's Draco Malfoy." He said, his eye's twinkled with humor. Draco ignored it and stood, sending his trademark smirk to a few fan girls who giggled and swooned. The Hall once again erupted in applause (albeit much less applause) with a few half hearted claps from Gryffindor, where a certain Head Girl was glaring daggers at a certain blond haired Slytherin git.
As if sensing the tension between the two Dumbledore cleared his throat. "Now then, let the feast begin!"
"Hermione? Hermione! Hermione Granger!"
"Huh?" Ginny shook her head and sighed.
"You're killing your baked potato." The red head said, pointing to the smashed and stabbed baked potato that lay in ruins on Hermione's plate.
"I wanted mashed potatoes." Hermione lied lamely, making Ginny grin.
"No, you wanted that to be a certain Head Boy's head." Hermione faked an appalled look.
"Never!" She said in faux shock. "I much rather it be all of him." Ginny giggled and Hermione sent an icy glare across the Hall at the blond who was laughing with a dark haired boy, who, if she remembered correctly, was named Blaise Zabini.
There was a loud scraping sound of a chair dragging against the floor, the Hall's attention flew to Dumbledore standing at the head of the Professors table.
"I regret to say that the feast is now ended, and it is time for you all to retire for the night. The Prefects will lead you to your common room. Tomorrow is the first day of classes, sleep well."
The loud rustling of moving bodies echoed through the Great Hall as students emptied out of the room.
"I'll talk to you later Gin, I've gotta go with McGonagall and the git." Ginny nodded and tried to push her way to the front of the crowd, she was now a prefect after all.
Glancing across the room, Hermione noticed Malfoy was also headed to the teacher's table where McGonagall was patiently waiting for them.
"Follow me please." McGonagall said to the pair who refused to look at each other. They nodded mutely and followed the professor who led them to the fifth floor, and through countless hallways. Hermione had finally given up on trying to keep track of where they were going when they finally stopped in front of a large portrait of a girl who had the most amazing silvery blond hair that reached her waist. Her eyes were a bright blue eyes that matched her 18th century French dress, and moonlight pale skin. She stopped playing with her white fuzz ball of a cat and looked up to the three newcomers.
"This is Kyara; she will be the guard portrait to your dormitories." McGonagall said, gesturing to the portrait who smiled prettily and waved. "You can pick the password. Please remember to schedule a meeting with the prefects tomorrow. Goodnight." McGonagall nodded her head to the portrait and walked back down the hallway, leaving the two people to pick their password.
"You arrre ze new Heads, yes?" Kyara asked in her thick French accent, bringing the two people's attention to her.
"Yes we are, I'm Hermione," The head girl smiled at the portrait who smiled back brightly. "And that thing is Malfoy." Hermione scowled at the boy who sent her a hateful glare.
"'Tis a pleasure to meet ze both of you. Do you 'ave a password?" The girl asked.
"How about 'Draco is the sexiest man alive'?" Malfoy smirked and Hermione scoffed.
"How about 'Draco's got an ego the size of Mars'?" She mumbled making the portrait giggle.
"What was that Granger?" Draco practically growled at the infuriating girl.
"You're an arse Malfoy." She snapped.
"At least I'm not a useless mudblood." He snapped back.
"I much rather be an useless mudblood than an obnoxious, conceited, self centered, egotistic-"
"Ah, excuse me, but ze password?" Kyara cut in sensing the beginning of a terribly long argument.
"Hold on!" They both yelled at the portrait then turned hateful glares to each other.
"No! I 'ave a suggestion." They both turned curious looks to the portrait who sighed, thankful for the silence.
"Amour dans les bras d'un ennemi." She said with a small smile. Hermione's eyes lit up and she smiled faintly, it was a bit long but she it sounded nice enough. Of course she had no idea what it meant, but she always did love the French language.
Draco sent a speculative glare at the portrait for a second before sighing, he was fluent in French. He made a mental note to have it out with the audacious portrait later, but at least the harpy next to him stopped screeching at her suggestion. He nodded to the portrait.
Kyara practically squealed and swung open, she was all too happy to get rid of the two people who had ruined her peace and quiet.
Hermione stepped into the common room, her breath nearly caught in her throat. The place was huge, nearly twice the size of the Gryffindor common room.
Surprisingly it wasn't decorated in either house colors, instead it had more of a neutral color theme. There was a glass table in the center of the common room right in front of a rather large fireplace. There was a huge sofa in front of the table and a cream coloured love seat across from the fire and two single seating chairs and ottomans. There were two spiraling staircases on either side of the room that lead to their respective bedrooms. And there was even a small kitchen on one side of the room, right next to the entrance, with a fully stocked fridge, and a small table for two.
Malfoy, unlike Hermione -who was practically giddy as she looked around the room- looked thoroughly unimpressed; he did live in Malfoy Manor after all.
"Well, I'll be seeing you mudblood...or not if I'm lucky." He muttered and brushed past her, heading to the stairs that he guessed lead to his dormitory (the green sash tied to the railing was not at all a dead giveaway.)
Without warning Hermione grabbed onto his sleeve before he could leave. Malfoy turned surprised eyes to the hand holding onto his robes. His expression quickly turned from shock to ill concealed disgust in seconds, he snatched his hand away successfully pulling his sleeve from Hermione's grasp.
"Personal space means nothing to you does it Granger?" He sneered, looking down at her.
"Um...can we talk, it's kind of important... I mean we are going to be liv-" He held up a hand to cut her off, he nearly smirked as her cheeks reddened, he could practically see her hair stand and crackle with anger.
"I take it that if I said no you would keep going with your incessant dribble until I gave up?" He drawled lazily. Hermione's lips remained shut, he guessed she was suppressing all manor of curses from slipping out of her mouth.
Suppressing a smirk, he strode to the table in the kitchen and took a seat, he had a feeling that this was going to be long winded. Then again, in the six years he had known the girl, he had yet to hear her explain something, and not be long winded about it.
"Well...?" He drawled, waiting for her to take a seat and begin her -no doubt- boring speech, about -he guessed- how they should try to get along.
For the sake of his sanity, he doubted that would ever happen.
Hermione took a calming breath and willed herself into a less homicidal state. Stiffly, she moved to the kitchen table. "Well," she took a breath, "I think that since we are on going to be living with each other, we should at least try to be civil and treat each other... nic-...politely."
He glared at her across the table, sometimes he hated being right. "Do you actually expect me to agree to that?"
She looked up to the ceiling, he was sure she was asking some higher being for the strenght to not throttle him. "I'm not asking for us to be friends or anything," she began again once again, her eyes turning to him. "Just for us to be civil. I'll still hate you, and you'll still undoubtedly hate me, we'd just have to tolerate each other, even ignoring each other would be better than starting a screaming match every moment that we're here."
Malfoy arched an eyebrow. "What exactly would this..."tolerating" entail?" The brilliant smile Hermione sent him made him more than a little suspicious. His comfort zone was hateful glares and scowls, this was completely new territory.
"Well, for starters, you can stop calling me mudblood." She smirked at his outraged look.
If he weren't a Malfoy he would have sputtered. "Fine, but you have to stop calling me ferret." Hermione looked up in thought for a second, then nodded and went on with her list of demands.
"You'll have to stop playing jokes on me to embarrass me in front of your Slytherin followers." He scowled but nodded and said nothing so she continued. "And you've got to stop calling Harry and Ron, Potty and Weasel."
"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" He slammed his hands on the table in outrage. "Now that is where I draw the line Granger! I refuse to stop making fun of Potty and Weasel," He continued in a strained voice, "It's the only thing that gives my day meaning." He paused, and creased his brow in thought before continuing. "Well, maybe not the only thing." He smirked, his implication hanging in the air.
Hermione cleared her throat, "about that... there is to be no "shagging" in here, it's against school rules and I will not allow it." Hermione said and braced herself for his outburst.
She was not disappointed, "Are you completely mental Granger!? Do you know how many women you are disappointing right now!" Hermione sent him a flat look, 'Count on Malfoy to turn any situation into a melo-drama.'
The boy continued his tirade, shaking an indignant finger in the air. "I don't believe you expect me to go a year without sex! The longest I've ever lasted was two weeks! And that was because I was trapped in the Infirmary, and trust me it wasn't for lack of trying!" Hermione let out a sound of ill-covered laughter.
"You're pathetic."
"No, I'm a guy." Hermione snorted.
"I have my doubts." He sent her a deadly glare, which she completely ignored. "You do bare a remarkable resemblance to Kyara."
There was a moment of silence in which the girl closed her eyes and mentally gave herself a pat on the back for shutting the boy up. When she opened her eyes however Malfoy's face was mere centimeters from hers.
"Well Hermione," He breathed out her name, making her shiver in what could only be described as revulsion. "If you ever want me to prove how much of a man I am, just say the word. When I'm finished with you you'll think 'Draco' is the only word you know."
Malfoy smirked and sat back down, carelessly running a hand through his blond hair. He looked over at the girl, who still looked a little dazed, and almost grinned; he had that affect on most women. And although Granger thought she was different, he knew she was just like the rest of them.
Hermione licked her inexplicably dry lips as her mind went into overdrive. 'He did not just do that!' She was sure her cheeks were burning red, and if the look on the face of the dope sitting across from her was any indication, he thought it was a blush of embarrassment, he'd never been more wrong in his life.
She forced herself into a state of mental calm, though strangling the life out of the prat would make her feel better -so much better- he wasn't worth losing her head girl position and all of it's lovely perks.
Letting out a long breath, she opened her eyes and said, in what she hoped was a calm voice. "You're going to have to choose." He was clearly not expecting her to say that, and it showed plainly on his face.
"What?" He sent the girl an incredulous stare.
'There is something terribly wrong with this girl.'
Hermione sighed and shook her head. "You'll have to choose between being almost human to Harry and Ron, or having your little tarts in here." She waited patiently for him to say something for nearly a minute.
"Hurry up Malfoy, it's not that hard, either call my friends by their proper name, or its just going to be you and your hand for the rest of the year." He made a face then sighed.
"Fine, I won't call them Potty and Weasel."
"Great!" Hermione couldn't help but smile.
"How about Potty and his shadow...or Scarhead and-"
"Good Merlin Malfoy, do you have a list or something?" Hermione asked, effectively cutting him off, and gave him a suspicious look.
His lips twitched into a classic Malfoy smirk, "I've got to do something to keep myself busy over the summer."
Hermione sighed loudly and muttered "Merlin help me." Before rubbing her temples and looking over to the Slytherin, she wasn't even sure if he was joking or not.
"Ok, just try and say: Harry and Ron."
"You've got to be mental Granger, I will not call them that!" Hermione sent him a fierce glare, the message was clear, either he called them by their names, or he was going to be a very lonely boy this year.
Malfoy glared at her then ran a hand through his silver hair and let out a resigned sigh. He opened and closed his mouth several times, no sound coming out either time.
"H-Ha-Harry, and Ro-ron." He finished with a grimace, after flinching a few times and looking extremely disgusted, but Hermione only smiled brightly at him as he turned a very odd shade of green.
"Now that wasn't so hard was it?" She asked in a babying voice.
"Not at all." Malfoy grumbled and got up. "Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to have to go soap my mouth for some other reason." Hermione watched him walk up the stairs to his room, slamming the portrait door as loudly as he could.
She grinned to herself and headed to her room. She stopped for a moment to think up a password to give to her portrait of a lion, settling on Elizabeth, her middle name. She smiled widely when she saw her room. It was huge. Of course it was decorated in gold and red as she expected. There was a canopy bed in the middle of her room, the sheets and comforter were a deep red with golden pillows. The walls were the same deep red with vines and leaves painted on in a rich golden colour that accented the red. There were two glass doors that apparently lead to her balcony overlooking the Quidditch pitch. She had a vanity and a huge closet on one side of the room. A dark red oak desk sat in the corner, her bags and Crookshanks' cage rested on the floor in front of it.
She walked over to the door that led to her shared bathroom, it was locked. Apparently Malfoy held true to his word about soaping out his mouth. She grinned and took Crookshanks out of his cage.
Her friends were never going to believe that she actually had a semi-civil conversation with Draco Malfoy.
She giggled to herself and dropped onto her bed with the orange cat in her arms; she couldn't wait 'til morning to tell them.
"I still don't trust the ferret." Ron grumbled after Hermione retold the events of the prior night, choosing to omit Malfoy's...comment.
"Yeah Hermione, he's still Malfoy." Harry agreed as they walked down to the Great Hall for breakfast. Hermione had met them in the Gryffindor tower, just because she no longer resided in the Gryffindor dorms didn't mean she would give up her duties as the boys' alarm clock.
"Well, well, well," The all to familiar drawl came from behind them, stopping whatever Hermione was about to say. He was coming up the hallway to the Great Hall followed of course by his loyal lackeys. "If it isn't Potty, Weasel and the mu-" Hermione sent him a look that clearly said 'Are you sure you want to continue that sentence?'
Malfoy sighed and glared at the trio. "I mean, if it isn't H-Ha-Har- hell, it would be easier to just ignore you both." He muttered a string of curses and brushed past them into the Great Hall, followed by his disgruntled lackeys.
"I can't believe he's going to ignore you guys now, I should make him apologize and-"
"NO!" Both boys yelled cutting off Hermione. Ron cleared his throat and put an arm around his girlfriend.
"We mean it's OK, Malfoy ignoring us is way better than Malfoy being civil with us."
"Yeah Hermione, we can live with this, the less Malfoy, the better."
Hermione grinned and linked arms with her two best friends.