Notes: I know the characters may seem a little OOC right now, but that's just because of the circumstances they currently find themselves in. This is my longest chapter yet! I've also got the next two chapters written. I hope you read and enjoy!

Chapter Three

The scream jolted Draco out of his dream and back into reality. The realization of where he was, as well as the memory of the previous night came back to him a moment later. He welcomed them as he'd welcomed the Dark Mark when it had first been branded on his skin.

He jumped to his feet and grabbed his wand from the spot where it had fallen on the floor. He must've dropped it from his lap after falling asleep in his chair by the window. He hurried down the hall and was immediately faced with a terrified Hermione, who was trying to squeeze between the sofa and the wall behind it. A moment later he realized why.

The picture he kept hanging over the mantel by the fire was vibrating loudly. It served as his alarm system whenever someone tried to use the Floo Network to enter his home. All the Death Eaters had one as a way of communicating to each other whenever one of them was about to visit.

It obviously held very bad memories for Hermione.

"Shit," Draco swore as he hurried over to his former schoolmate. He grabbed her upper arms and slid his hands into her armpits just before he dragged her away from her would-be hiding place.

Predictably, his actions only caused her to scream louder, and she struggled with all her might to get out of his vice-like grip.

"No! No, please!" Her screams were just as gut wrenching as they'd been last night. Draco didn't even bother trying to reassure her. He knew any comfort he tried to offer her would have no effect. As a Death Eater, he was probably held in the same terrifying regard as her former captor. Hermione continued to scream and plead as she tried to fight her way to freedom.

Draco was simply no match for her, however, and he didn't want to admit to himself just how easy it was for him to drag her pathetically small body into the spare bedroom.

"I'm really sorry, but for now you need to stay in here. I'll come back as soon as I can."

He didn't bother to wait for a reply before he closed the door and sealed it with a complicated locking spell so that a simple Alohomora! could not break it. He half expected to hear kicking and screaming from Hermione's side of the door but all the fight seemed to have left her upon the closing of the door.

He hurried to his room to throw on the first shirt he saw, then returned to the living room, where he was greeted by another old schoolmate of his: Blaise Zabini.

He was currently sitting in the empty spot on the couch Hermione had vacated only moments before, casually polishing his wand as though he had every right to be there. He hardly spared Draco a glance as he entered the living room.

"Had a late night visitor, I see."

Draco's heart jumped to his throat. "What?"

Blaise used his wand to point at the spare set of pajamas that Draco had left out for Hermione. She hadn't touched them and he looked down at them with dawning horror. How could he have forgotten to move them? His brain scrambled to come up with some excuse, but his fellow Death Eater beat him to it.

"Either that or your house-elf was recently fired. And since I know you haven't had one of those in quite some time…" he trailed off and raised his brow suggestively.

"I don't know what you're talking about. I was doing some laundry and I must've dropped them by mistake. What's it to you?" Draco hoped his nervousness wasn't as discernible as he thought it was. He longed to vanish them back to his room but he feared the act would only make Blaise even more suspicious than he already was.

"Nothing." Blaise shrugged, leaned back in his seat and went back to polishing his wand. "I guess I'm just trying to figure out why you left your post in the middle of your shift. I was supposed to relieve you at midnight, but you were already gone. Tom from the Leaky Cauldrom said he saw you leave around eight and didn't see you again."

Draco forced himself to meet Zabini's gaze head on. He had to pretend he had nothing to hide if Hermione was to remain undetected.

"That's not like you, Draco." Blaise's gaze softened, and Draco was reminded of their younger selves. They'd been on good enough terms that Draco once thought of him as a friend. Time and a war had had lasting effects on both of them, and he no longer knew what they were to each other.

"I was sick. I threw up in an alley and didn't have time to call in a replacement."

"You look well enough to me."

"It's amazing what a Pepper-Up Potion will do. You should try it sometime," Draco snapped, then immediately regretted it. The last thing he needed was to get on Zabini's bad side.

"Indeed. Why didn't you alert one of us to your condition? The Dark Lord won't like that you left Diagon Alley unsupervised. He might have to do some digging into your record, and it would be a shame for him to discover some recent rumors that have been circulating as of late."

"You mean the rumors that are unfounded and have no basis in fact?" Draco instantly countered.

"I wouldn't quite go that far. You have refused slaves into your home for the past ten years. Why would a Pureblooded Death Eater do this if he weren't a blood traitor? Owning a slave is practically a right in the world we live in, and for you to expect to keep your status without owning one…well, it doesn't look very good, does it?"

"What exactly are you implying?"

Blaise shrugged, stood up, and finally pocketed his wand. He focused his attention directly on Draco for the first time since arriving in his home, and Draco fought hard not to punch him and demand that he leave at once.

"Only that your actions aren't quite as overlooked as you'd like to believe. Ever since your father's continuous mishaps and your mother's obvious disdain for the Dark Arts, what's left of your family has been looked into. Consider this a warning. You don't want to go around making mistakes just now."

"Is that so?" Draco gave his former friend one final appraising look, as though his warning had barely fazed him, then indicated the fireplace. "Thanks for dropping by. I always look forward to our little chats. Now if you don't mind, I need to see about some more potion. Somehow I seem to be feeling nauseated all of a sudden."

"Don't say I didn't warn you," Blaise said as he grabbed some floo powder from the small pot above the fireplace.

The next moment he was gone.

Draco let himself feel the smallest sense of relief before gathering up the offending pajamas from the floor. He had half a mind to charge into the spare room and fling them at Hermione for the trouble she'd caused him.

But when he let himself into the room, the sight of her pushed any thoughts of retaliation out of his mind.

Hermione was curled up in a ball in the far corner of the room, as she always seemed to be, with tears flowing freely down her cheeks. She flinched violently at the sound of the door closing behind him. Draco didn't want to think about the implications that simple action made. With every step he took into the room, she shrank back that much further, until she was as pressed to the farthest wall from him as she could be without becoming a permanent fixture.

"It's okay," he said softly, feeling as though he were talking to a scared wild animal. Which, he thought disdainfully, was exactly what he was doing. "I'm just here to give these to you and see if you wanted breakfast."

He indicated the pajamas he still held and made very obvious gestures as he stepped forward to place them as carefully as he could on the bed. Her eyes kept track of his every move, the tears still leaking from them silently. At least she was no longer screaming.

"Do you want some breakfast? I can use the last of my food for that much. You may not know this about me, but I can whip up a mean omelet."

His small attempt at humor was overlooked, as he knew it would be. He had to try, though, to put her at ease. How else was she supposed to get comfortable here?

Since when was that my intention? He suddenly thought to himself. Since when was I trying to make her comfortable here? Is this to be her home from now on?

He didn't like the idea of permanently sharing his modest home with a Mudblood, especially Granger of all people. But short of kicking her out, he didn't know what else he could do. Where else could she go? Potter and Weasley were dead. He didn't know about any of the other Weasleys, but he couldn't imagine they were still out there when the Death Eaters roamed every street and presided over every Wizarding shop in existence. There had been nine of them before the start of the war, and he knew that at least two of them were dead for sure. That left seven family members scrambling to survive, and in the ten years since Voldemort had taken over, he couldn't see how they'd managed to evade capture or death.

And what of Hermione's parents? Were they still out there? Draco had never given any thought to what happened to them and assumed they were dead. If life was difficult for wizards, pureblooded or not, life for Muggles must be downright impossible. He supposed Hermione was just as in the dark about their fates as he was. Ten years as a slave meant no news of the outside world. It seemed cruel to ask her about their fate.

When she gave no answer, Draco decided to leave her. It would do no good to push her when she was clearly not ready to leave the safety of the invisible wall she'd built around herself. "I'll just let you get settled for now. Come find me if you need anything."

Draco turned to leave the room, but was stopped by the two words spoken in the softest voice he'd ever heard from anyone.

" I'm sorry."

He paused then turned around to face her once more. "Come again?"

Hermione was shaking, and she'd loosened the grip she kept on the hands that were wrapped tightly around her legs. She refused to meet his gaze, but she took a steadying breath and said again, " I'm sorry."

"What for?" Draco longed to kneel in front of her and demand an explanation for why she was sorry, but refrained from doing so. He kept his feet firmly planted right where they were and decided he wasn't going to leave until she elaborated. To his astonishment it didn't take very long.

"I got you in trouble. I didn't mean to."

Her words were rough, as though it had been a while since she'd last spoken. She seemed determined to try, however, and that act alone gave Draco hope that perhaps all was not lost for this woman.

"The only person who got me in trouble was me. Do you understand? You didn't ask to be taken home with me. You didn't demand that I leave my post in the middle of my shift. It was my fault and I'll pay the bloody consequences. Not you."

She looked up and met his gaze for the first time since he'd stumbled upon her. Her wide brown eyes were so unsure, so full of fear that it caused his heart to contract painfully in his chest. She seemed to be searching for something from him, but he had no idea what she wanted. Certainly nothing she'd ever received from him in all her years with him at Hogwarts. He'd been nothing but a bully to her and her friends from the moment they'd met, so there couldn't possibly be anything she hoped to gain from staring into his eyes with a desperation that he'd never seen before on her narrow, dirty face.

"Do you want to come with me to the kitchen?"

Perhaps it was too much to hope for, but the few words she'd spoken, anguished and fearful though they were, had given him hope that this broken woman would become the Hermione Granger he was used to.

She turned away from him with something that he suspected was disappointment, and shook her head. She wrapped her arms tighter around herself once more and refused to look at him any longer.

"I'll be here if you need me. Try to get some more sleep."

After he closed the door gently behind him he ventured into the kitchen to make them both some breakfast. If she wouldn't come to the food he would bring the food to her. As much as he wanted to use it to lure her out of the bedroom, he knew it would be unfair of him to do so. It wasn't fair to deny her the nourishment she so desperately needed just to appease his loneliness and impatience.

He couldn't help feeling guilty as he got out the ingredients he needed for the omelets. Fortunately he'd misjudged the amount of food in his possession the previous night and had just enough to make breakfast for the two of them. He may not be directly responsible for the state that Granger was in, but the people he called colleagues and the closest things he had to friends were, and he was determined to fix the mess they made, if not just for her sake then for his own.

Soon he had two plates filled with ham and cheese omelets. He might have overdone it with the cheese, but he wasn't about to complain and he didn't think his houseguest would either.

He returned to the spare bedroom, the door to which was still closed, and knocked once. "Hermione? I'm going to come in. I brought breakfast."

When she made no reply he opened the door slowly and carefully with one hand, balancing the plates and forks he'd brought in the other. He stepped in, careful to keep his steps as exaggeratingly open and obvious as possible so that she could keep track of every move he made. He had no desire to scare her any more than she already was.

"I brought breakfast. Omelets as promised. I hope you like them because they're pretty much all I know how to make."

He thought he saw the smallest glimmer of a smile begin to form on her lips, but it disappeared just as quickly. He stifled a small sigh and held one of the plates out to her. She hesitated only for a moment before snatching the plate from his hand, clearly expecting him to change his mind and take it away. Even the thought of doing something so underhanded filled him with a rage that he found difficult to suppress. It was something he might have done in his younger days just to annoy someone. He'd never do it to intentionally break someone's spirit, as someone had clearly done to her.

He sat down on the opposite side of the room from Hermione and crossed his legs in order to rest the plate in his lap. Hermione looked alarmed and suspicious that he wasn't leaving her alone, but she didn't say anything. She didn't scream at him to get out or demand that he leave her alone. She just scrutinized him as she picked her omelet up with both hands and bit into it, completely disregarding the fork he'd given her.

She ate with such intensity and desperation that he wasn't completely sure what to make of it. It was clear from her gaunt frame that she'd been deprived of healthy portions of food for some time.

"You may want to slow down. If you don't you might make yourself sick."

But she paid him no heed as she continued to devour her omelet. He'd barely taken a bite out of his own before she'd finished hers. She set the plate carefully beside her and stared at his own with a longing that nearly did him in. He wanted to give his breakfast to her, but he knew if she ingested much more at this point, it would only cause her to throw it right back up.

His suspicions were confirmed a moment later when her face paled and she blanched in sudden horror. Before he'd fully registered what she was doing, she stood up and hurried out of the room with her left hand clamped over her mouth. As she passed him he had a clear look at the 'M' branded on her forearm. It filled his stomach with bile and he found he was no longer hungry. He set his plate and mostly untouched omelet aside and followed her.

She'd found the bathroom.

When he caught up with her he found her hunched over the toilet, heaving into the bowl, the very image of misery. Draco could only stare, unsure what to do for her. He finally settled on standing behind her and gently gathered her bushy mess of hair into his hands and held it up for her. It was the least he could do. And in her despair, she hadn't flinched away.

It seemed as though a hundred years had passed before she'd finally stopped heaving and sat back. Fresh tears were falling down her cheeks. She wiped the remnants of her mess with her hand and refused to meet his eye.

Draco couldn't have that.

He dropped her hair and knelt down to gather up a wad of toilet paper, which he used to wipe her mouth. It felt awful to do this for her when he knew perfectly well that the old Hermione Granger was more than capable of taking care of herself. However, it was painfully clear that this was not the old Hermione Granger.

When he finished he threw the toilet paper into the toilet, then flushed it and the sick away. They both took deep breaths and sat in silence for a while, unsure what to do next.

"I'm sorry."

It was the same phrase he'd heard from her all morning, but it still had the same effect on him as it did the first time she'd said it. He turned to look at her and found her staring intently at the tiled floor.

"I already told you that you don't have anything to be sorry for." To his horror the words came out harsher than he'd intended. He hated how she winced from him. It was the last thing he'd wanted.

"B-But I ate it too fast. Even after you t-told me n-not to."

"And I let you. I watched you devour that damn omelet and I didn't stop you. I knew what might happen, and I let you carry on. It's my fault, understand? Not yours. None of this is your fault."

Her brow furrowed as she tried backing even further away from him. It was clear she didn't believe him. Draco knew she wouldn't no matter how many times he tried to assure her. He had a feeling actions would speak louder than words for her for a while.

He stood up and hovered over her. She shrank from him but stopped trying to push herself into the wall. Was that progress or not? He quickly decided that it was and held out his hand, hoping she'd get the message and take it.

But she did no such thing. She merely stared at it as though she expected it to slap her.

"If you don't take my hand I'm going to pick you up. I can't let you stay in here forever."

To his surprise she looked up at him and seemed to steel herself against a bracing attack. "Can you leave me for a moment? I need to use the toilet."

Her face blushed. Draco mentally berated himself for his foolishness. She'd been in his home for close to twelve hours and she had yet to go to the bathroom. How could he be so stupid as to overlook that?

"I'll give you as much time as you need. Please come out when you're done."

She gave no sign that she heard him. He sighed and left the bathroom, closing the door behind him. As much as he wanted to wait right outside in case she needed him he knew she needed her privacy more.

He forced himself to wait in the living room. He tried sitting down, but he couldn't sit still. Instead he paced the room.

When Hermione hadn't emerged after twenty minutes he decided that he might as well check up on her. Surely no one needed twenty minutes in the bathroom?

She wasn't in the bathroom when he checked. For one wild moment Draco thought she'd finally decided to run before he remembered that she would have had to cross the living room in order to get to the front door. Which left the guest bedroom.

She had sat herself back in the furthest corner from the door, making herself as small as possible. Draco debated whether or not he should leave her alone, but decided that if she wanted him gone she would tell him so. He knew enough about Mudblood slaves to know they were left alone far too often.

"Do you want to try the other omelet? I'm not hungry, and you need to eat something. It's either this or more stale bread and I doubt you want that. If you take it slowly you'll probably keep it down this time."

She hesitated only for a moment before nodding once. He tried to hide his relief as he picked up his plate and gave it to her. She seemed to struggle not to shove this one in her mouth as she'd done the other, but she was careful to take small bites. Once the plate was empty he accepted it from her outstretched hand and watched her carefully for any sign that she was going to be sick again.

Fortunately she wasn't. The relief in her features was enough to make him smile, but he wiped it off his face when she stared at him in what he could only call annoyance.

"Do you want to go back to the living room? Or do you want to stay here? You could take a bath if you want. The pajamas from last night are still clean. You must want to get all that dirt and grime off you."

Hermione didn't give him any sign of understanding, though he knew she did. She'd spoken to him enough times for him to know that she was capable of understanding and speech. But she didn't seem to be inclined to do much more than sit in her corner. He waited, hovering awkwardly in case she decided to give him an answer, but her continued silence seemed to be answer enough.

"Okay. I'll just leave you alone for now. But if you change your mind please…"

"S-Stay with me?"

The words were so soft, so doubtful, that he wasn't sure he'd heard them at first. But one look into those brown eyes convinced him that he had heard her.

"If that's what you want."

She gave him one final appraising, skeptical look before she slowly stood up and crossed the room to the bed. He didn't know how she could possibly want to go back to bed in the grimy rags she wore, but he didn't dare voice this concern in case she changed her mind about wanting him there. Once she was in bed she pulled the covers up to her chin and looked up at him.

"Will you stay with me? At least until I fall asleep?"

He knew he shouldn't. This seemed to be the final test of his resolve. If he said yes it meant that she'd be staying here and his fate as blood traitor would be sealed.

But he found that he didn't care. His life had been lonely and torturous for the past ten years, but it was nothing compared to the hell she'd come from. If staying with her gave both of them some kind of reassurance that their dreary circumstances were slowly changing, he'd gladly do so. Even if it was with Hermione Granger, the girl he had once despised.

He conjured a chair with his wand, ignoring the spark of jealousy that fluttered in her eyes for a moment before disappearing, and sat with her in a heavy silence as the burdens of their world settled around them.