Chapter 8-Leading Events

Hermione's POV:

Skimming my tired eyes over the long stretch of parchment in my hands, I was vaguely aware of Harry and Ron watching me. I tried to ignore their insistent stares as I performed a speedy spell-check on my History of Magic essay but I couldn't find the will to concentrate. Their nosey eyes were irritating me and the fatigue was starting to breach my safety walls; hammering it down with crashing blows and scurrying through the cracks like desperate insects. This was all they had done for days now-watched me. And then they watched me some more. And a bit more. I couldn't escape their ever-prodding eyes as they waited for me to crumple into a mental break down. But they didn't realise that I had already had one of those-and that they had missed it. Malfoy had seen it though. I groaned inwardly at the memory.

Then, unable to shake the irritation of their stares, my head snapped up and I glared at my two friends.

"What?" I sighed, weary and frustrated. Ron's eyes flitted downwards to land on the glowing fire in front of him, embarrassment splashed across his face as his ears bloomed pink. Harry on the other hand, remained focused on me. His green eyes sparkled in the flame's light and his expression never faltered.

"We're just worried about you Hermione."

I threw down my essay onto the table in front of me with a sudden snap of my hand and slouched back into the lush crimson chair, completely fed up.

"That's all everyone is at the moment. Worried." I spat. "Why can't you understand that I don't want anyone's pity or concern?"

Ron looked back at me again. The frustration that laced with his features probably mirrored my own.

"Well why can't you understand that we want to be concerned about you? We're your friends Hermione."

I only gave him the pleasure of my attention for a few seconds before I began to look around the large Gryffindor common room, avoiding his gaze. I didn't know how to make him see that what he thought was right, wasn't right for me. So I tried to ignore him. Although the fire was roaring brightly beside us, the room was still very dim as we were the only people downstairs so no extra candle light was required to make the dark night visible. The bubbly glow that enveloped us faded slowly into bleak darkness as it edged away from us; making it impossible to see much else of the room. But I still tried. I examined the painting that hung above the fireplace for longer than was necessary. The ginger quidditch player in the image stared back at me with a grin, his robes flowing gently out behind him in an invisible breeze and his thick hair twitching across his forehead.

"Hermione." Harry said sternly, forcing me to drop my reluctant gaze onto him once more.

"We only think that you're pushing yourself too hard. With all of the extra homework that you're doing, surely you need to let go of some responsibilities for the DA?" He pressed.

The mention of Dumbledore's Army made me groan. We had begun to set everything up over the past week, doing our best to avoid Umbridge's notice. But there was still a lot to do and it was becoming very complicated very fast.

"Harry, I missed a lot of school so I'm catching up. There's nothing wrong with that." I muttered, my thoughts now latched onto the DA. I had accidentally neglected it today whilst I busied myself with my own schoolwork-meaning that our pace of progress would decrease again. That was another thing added to the pile of worries that would claw relentlessly at my brain as I tried to sleep tonight. Why had I promised to sort everything alone?

But I wouldn't ask for help. I had said I would do it so I refused to back out now.

"I know that I could never persuade you to stop trying so hard to learn what you missed. But I'm saying that you could let me and Ron handle some of the DA things. If you tell us what needs doing then I'm sure that we could do it for you." A tiny smile crawled up his lips. But the cheerful sight-however forced it may be-did nothing to comfort me as it usually did.

"Harry." I sighed, leaning forward to rest my head in my hands as my bushy curls tumbled forward and shrouded my face-which I was thankful for. "You mean well-I get that-but you don't seem to realise how accurately this whole operation needs to be planned out. Everything has got to be perfect. And if I leave anything for you pair to do, then for one thing it could go wrong and for another I'll be worrying about it going wrong even if it doesn't. So sorry but no. I can handle it anyway."

"It doesn't seem like you can." Ron muttered, speaking for the first time in a while. I lifted my head to meet his determined gaze. The flame's light hurt my eyes after being absorbed by the darkness for so long underneath my hands.

"I'm just tired tonight."

"It seems like you're tired every night." Ron stated plainly, watching me with a mixture of intent and concern plastered on his face. His brow was furrowed and his mouth was set in a deep frown that didn't suit his face.

"For Merlin's sake, if I say that I'm fine then it means I'm fine. So leave me alone. You're making everything worse!" I screeched, drained and annoyed at having to repeat myself over and over again. I knew I was being cruel but they simply weren't listening.

My suspicions were proved correct as Harry and Ron both recoiled as if I had slapped them. The hurt was displayed openly on their face, seeming to suck the life out of their soft features. But I did nothing to console them-although every fibre in my body was shrieking at me, ordering me to make my two best friends feel better. I clenched my jaw to prevent myself from speaking and tensed my arms firmly by my sides. But it was no use. I longed to comfort them even though I wouldn't let them comfort me in my time of need.

"I'm going to bed." I stood and snatched up my abandoned essay from the wooden table, not bothering to check it again. Then I scrambled for my long forgotten quill and ink pot before clutching my wand and performing Lumos. An eerily white glowing orb was emitted from the fine-tipped end of my wand as I trudged forward, almost tripping over a book that had been left carelessly on the floor. Part of me urged to pick it up. But I was far too exhausted and fed up of being awake. So I continued to walk away from my friends, leaving them feeling hurt and still rather confused. I knew that I wasn't being my usual self-I hadn't been for days-but I needed this tough outer shell to get by. Eventually I was absorbed by the darkness and disappeared suddenly into the menacing shadows. When I reached the stairs, I clambered unceremoniously up them with my left palm gliding across the stone walls to guide me before slipping through the door to my dormitory.

Draco's POV:

Leaning back against the headboard of my four poster bed, I listened absently to the slow and shallow breathing of my fellow Slytherins as they slumbered around the shadowed room. My silk green quilt was pulled up to my waist and the rest of me was exposed to the cold night air. The frosty chill struck at the ghostly pale skin on my chest and nipped at it bitterly with every collision. The flicker of candles were absent as none of them were lit, so the sparkling yet ominous moonbeams that slithered through the high windows provided the only sight that I currently possessed. Sleep had been unsuccessful in capturing me and calling me its prisoner. So I lay awake-as I had done for the past two hours, silent and alone.

Leaning sideways to grab a book from my bedside table, the whole bed groaned in discomfort at my transferred weight. Pausing to make sure that I had not awoken any of the other boys in the room, I listened. But I heard no sound of movement or disgruntlement. So with the book firmly clutched in my hand, I fell back into my previous position. It wasn't exactly comfortable but I didn't have the energy to change it. I was locked in a slight paradox; with not enough energy to make myself comfortable but with too much energy to sleep. It was extremely irritating.

"Draco?" Someone's hushed voice pierced the quite soothing silence. With an inward sigh I answered.

"What? Who is it?" I snapped-perhaps a little too rudely considering I had probably just woken them up.

"It's Blaise."

Part of me rejoiced that I wouldn't have to converse with Crabbe, Goyle or other such idiots-I had recently grown weary of their mindless rambling. But at the same time, my stomach dropped. Blaise always had too much to say about me and most of the time it annoyed me. Perhaps I had just come to hate socialisation.

"How did you know it was me?" I asked reluctantly, not entirely wanting to encourage him.

"You can't ever keep still. I've been awake for ages trying to figure out who else it was that wasn't asleep but as soon as you started moving, I knew it was you. You fidget a lot you know." He spoke almost cheerfully.

"Yes Blaise I know." I sighed. No doubt he would engage me in some form of conversation after discovering that I was awake. And I wasn't in the mood at all.

Silently pleading that he wouldn't continue talking, I sat still and slowed my breathing. Perhaps if I sounded as though I was asleep, he would leave me alone. Then again, he might attempt to stir me with mumbled conversation. But I tried my luck. Staring down at the book-which I could only see the faint outline of-in my tensed pale hands, I cursed myself when I realised that to read it I would have to cast a Lumos. That would let Blaise know for sure that I was awake. With a deep sigh, I leant sideways again to put the aged book back. My hand ached and shook slightly with exhaustion as it hovered above the bedside table whilst holding the square object. After barely lowering my hand, I un-wrapped my slim fingers from around the book and let it drop into the darkness; hopefully onto the desired wooden table. The dull thud of hard material hitting and equally hard wooden object told me what I needed to know. Then lacking much effort, I slipped backwards. But instead of remaining sat upright as I had done before, I managed to sink down into the comfort of the plush mattress beneath my drained body. It appeared that sleep had finally found a way to trap me. Grateful for this, I allowed my eyes to slam shut and my muscles to loosen. It only took a few more seconds for me stop thinking and start floating around in the airy bliss of semi-consciousness. Then a thick, unpleasant noise shattered the delicate glass of my perfect reverie. The shards cluttered down around me and pierced long wounds in my body as the edges grazed my fragile, unprepared mind.

Furious, my eyes thrust themselves open and my upper body jerked upwards. The noise had been Blaise talking at me again.

"What?" I hissed, unsure of what exactly it was that he had said and reluctant to answer him. The silence was stretched on throughout the darkness for a while. I had probably offended him with my spiteful tone. But I wasn't concerned. If he was offended then he wouldn't talk to me-which I preferred greatly. But just as I was about to fall back into my pillow, he spoke. Typical.

"I said, do you think that you'll join the Inquisitorial Squad?" He said almost coldly through the shadows.

"What's that?"

"Umbridge came up with it. If you join then you get extra credit and stuff-you also get to take points away from people."

I cocked my head to the side-slightly interested-even though I could barely see Blaise's outline due to the lack of lighting in the warm room.

"What are they doing at the moment? Do you know?"

"Well Pansy signed up and got picked already so she told me that they basically look for people breaking the rules. But right now they're supposed to be watching Potter and his friends-there's a whole group of them that are acting really weird and sneaking around so obviously Umbridge is suspicious." Blaise explained in a hushed tone.

Granger.

As soon as the name popped into my head my entire body jerked backwards and my face scrunched up in disgust. Thankful that Blaise had been unable to see my reaction; I shook my head as if cleansing my mind of the horrifying thought.

But then I thought of her mother-as I had been doing often since Granger revealed her secret to me. Even though I had never even met the woman, she still filled my thoughts almost constantly. Whenever I saw the Gryffindor girl-which I tried not to do-my thoughts jumped to her mother. I would then spend too long pondering how Granger could be feeling. Whenever I received a letter from my own mother, I couldn't help but think about how I would react if she were slowly dying inside. I had even told Pansy to stop moping about a cold with the excuse of 'at least you don't have a terminal illness'. This had shocked even me.

Although, the thought of lording over Potter by taking away his precious Gryffindor points held quite a lot appeal...

"How do I join?" I spoke before I had thoroughly thought it through.

"You have to go and see Umbridge-sign a form or something-and then she picks the people from the list. You're bound to get a spot considering your family name and such."

"Alright, thanks. But can you please let me sleep now? I almost begged. Blaise released a slight chuckle so I didn't bother to extract a proper answer from him. Exhaustion was plummeting down upon me now. Surrendering, I lowered myself down and yanked the green silk quilt up to my neck. Finally I could glide along the lonely but peaceful road to unconsciousness.

Sorry for the wait but I had some serious writer's block :( I knewwhat to write but I didn't knowhow to write it. Sorry again. Also I've been reading The Mortal Instruments which is VERY time consuming because it's literally SO SO SO good. Please read it.

Anyway, the actual Dramione should be picking up really soon. I just didn't want them to be all suddenly in love and stuff like that because c'mon that's a little unrealistic ;) Reviews are appreciated guys x)