A/N: I'm convinced I have the best reviewers in the world! You all are amazing - thanks so much for reading and commenting on my story!
Hermione's Plan, Part II: The Setup
Seven Hours Later
Draco laid lifelessly on the stone floor of the cage, exhaustedly staring ahead at nothing at all. His face throbbed. Excruciating pain stabbed through his abdomen every time he breathed. His arms, his wrists burned as they stretched limply somewhere in front of him. Every bone in his body ached, and if someone had yanked him up and fired a Killing Curse at his chest, Longbottom's multiple Adflicto Affligo curses had left him so weak he couldn't have even moved to try to stop them.
But he felt much more deeply broken than that.
She had left.
He'd learned that much last night between Longbottom and Thomas's curses and insults.
"He's an idiot," he heard Thomas snort. "She's as cracking as she's ever been. I don't care how much he's supposedly 'gotten over her;' there's no way he can't lose against that."
"Why d'you think I wanted a chance at this one tonight, mate? Who knows how long it'll be until she opens him up to the public."
A sudden wave of razor-like pain slashed at his stomach to his very core, and Draco clamped down on his cheek to hold back a scream.
"—all knew she'd go back to him eventually. Weasley and My are like bread and butter. Never thought it'd be quite that dramatic a reunion though."
He felt his heart stop. They couldn't have - possibly meant…?
"Well, that's her style, My. No doubt they'll both be enjoying themselves tonight. Y'know - Fighting and make-up shags and all that."
He didn't think he'd had the energy to react, but he must have done something, because Longbottom and Thomas' conversation stopped abruptly, their attention turning fully toward him.
No, no, no…
Draco squeezed his eyes shut, trying to breathe evenly. He wanted to yank away but the ropes binding him to the ceiling dug deep into his wrists, holding him firmly in place. He knew the words that were coming long before they even left Thomas's mouth.
"Oh - this is precious. Does the ickle Fusty still have an ickle crush?"
Something that wasn't a curse stabbed straight through Draco's gut. He gritted his jaw, didn't allow himself to speak. If it stopped them from guessing the truth, he wouldn't correct them.
He flinched when they both burst out laughing. "He does! Blimey, that's bloody classic! Weasley'll throw a wobbly when he finds out."
Dread soaked him to his bones.
Through a burning haze of blood and sweat, he saw Longbottom step closer, still laughing, a contemptuous smile on his face. Draco weakly turned his head into his shoulder, refusing to look at him. "Are you that dense, maggot? My Evans is one of the Elite. What are you? You aren't even nothing - you're worse than nothing. Carpets are thrown down so she can step over filth like you."
She had left.
My was back, and Hermione… she was gone.
The single thought at first had been enough to send him into a panic so debilitating he could hardly breathe. He hadn't realized just how much he'd come to rely on her, on the hope she gave him, on everything about her presence that was a rush of life and air in the suffocating hell that was his existence. He should have known better, should have stopped himself before it happened, especially after the final suppression that had led to the destruction of everything and everyone he'd ever held dear, but…
For some reason, it hurt more than he ever remembered.
As the loss seeped into his soul, he slowly stopped feeling every frantic emotion burning through his chest.
All that remained now was just numbness. Just defeat.
Perhaps he finally was going mad. Perhaps it truly had been My who'd thrown the Cruciatus curse at him, out of spite and not something else; perhaps everything else he'd experienced with her over the past few weeks really only had been a dream, a hallucination, an effort by his flagging mind to block out the indescribable pain of the torture however it could.
But now, even the dreams were gone.
All he knew was that he had never felt so alone.
He didn't know how much time passed while he stared blankly out the bars. He didn't know what day it was, what time it was - the cage was charmed so he couldn't see or hear anything that wasn't very near or directly in front of it. Some part of him wanted to hug his knees to his chest, but another part easily overpowered the impulse; the effort it would have required was too much.
Abruptly, the door of the cage blew open. Draco blinked but didn't even flinch when Weasley's enraged face appeared.
"You. I'll kill you," he snarled, raising his wand.
The spell he fired caused Draco to fly out of the cage; he distantly caught sight of an overturned chair and demolished coffee table nearby before he slammed into another armchair.
A crack resonated from his arm, and searing pain burst through his shoulder.
Suddenly, Draco was very awake.
Weasley followed his fall wearing only a robe and shorts, blasting another chair out of the way with a fury Draco had rarely seen, even from him.
Adrenaline exploded through every nerve in his beaten body. Feebly, he tried to drag himself somewhere, anywhere in a futile attempt to protect himself as Weasley flung the tip of his wand down at him and said vehemently, "Avada—"
The curse never finished.
Draco gasped in ragged breaths, pain stabbing through his chest with each, and realized he was no longer clutching carpet but smooth stone floor.
His heart in his throat, he managed to turn his leaden head enough to see between matted snarls of unshorn hair not a rampaging Weasley, but an incredibly beautiful woman in a sheer, billowing robe standing in front of him. Early morning sunlight streamed through a window behind her, shadowing her features. He blinked in the unnaturally bright light, trying to understand what was happening. Was this… was this some strange form of death?
But then the woman moved, reaching down and grabbing his arm. "Draco, come on!"
Her form finally blocked the rays of direct sunlight as she tried unsuccessfully to heave him up, and Draco realized with a bolt of shock akin to electrocution that the woman was My.
Or… Could it actually be…?
Hope gripped him.
"Herm-" he began numbly, but his voice cracked, "Hermione—?"
Her impeccably made-up face was suddenly inches from him, as if she'd crouched beside him. "Yes, yes, it's me," she said in a low voice. "We have to get out of here. I'll explain everything later, I swear!"
His eyes began to burn, and he struggled to restrain the emotion with a strength he didn't quite have. "You're… real?" he croaked.
For a moment, her voice lost some of its forceful tension. "Yes. I'm real," she said quietly, though she sounded surprised. Her fingers grazed his aching face, brushing some hair out of his eyes. She gasped and mumbled, "Oh Merlin, I thought we'd prevented…"
She trailed off, and he sank into her gentle touch with a relief so profound he didn't think any language on earth could express it in words.
"Draco, you have to get up," she suddenly said tensely. "Right now. Now, Draco."
The insistent urgency to her voice jolted through his fleeting moment of peace. With shaking hands, he tried to push himself to his feet. He'd hardly moved before his right arm crumpled beneath him, and he bit back a yelp of pain, his entire drained body collapsing back to the ground as though he was heavy as lead.
She gasped again. "Merlin, I'm - Wait, don't even try to move yet. Torperus!" Abruptly, the pain in his arm, his stomach, his legs became nothing but a dull ache. "I'm sorry, that's all I've got time for, but it'll temporarily numb the pain." She heaved up his shoulders slightly. "Now, come on - I'll help you!"
He shook his head, the motion so weak he wasn't even sure he'd actually moved. He fought back a wave of confusion and frustration. "I... can't," he choked out, desperate for her to understand. "Adflicto… affligo…"
Her eyes widened in comprehension.
"Of course! Rennervate!" she whispered.
Energy akin to a lightning strike jolted through his body. His arms and legs twitched, and he could have gasped in relief. Her hand gripped his left arm, his right hanging uselessly at his side. With the newfound strength the spell provided, he stumbled to his feet, trying to remember exactly how to move his muscles in order to stand.
Hermione propped herself against his left side and immediately took off, dragging him forward faster than his feet could shuffle even though she was the one in high-heels. For the first time, he noticed his surroundings and realized that he was in the hallway outside the Gryffindor common room.
No sooner had they turned into the next corridor when a loud bang! echoed off the walls behind them, as if the portrait hole had been violently thrown open.
The leg Pomfrey had poorly fixed promptly gave out. He stumbled, would have fallen entirely if Hermione hadn't shouldered more of his weight than he'd expected she could.
"Weasley!"
Draco stopped breathing.
Hermione cursed under her breath and swiftly veered to the right, into the niche-like indentation between two of the columns lining the hallway, and leaned him against the side of the column. As she began muttering spells he vaguely recognized as wards, the muscles in his chained hands began to spasm uncontrollably, and with his uninjured hand, he clenched the other tightly, exhaustedly sliding to the ground.
"Weasley, what the devil's going on?" continued the voice - Longbottom's, he suddenly recognized - it and the rapid footsteps accompanying it growing closer.
Draco could have asked the same question. Whatever it was, it was about to end. Why were they running as if he could actually escape the House-Wizard bond? It was impossible - he couldn't.
And if anything happened to her because of him, he would never, ever forgive himself.
"Hermione, no!" he whispered desperately. "Please just go!"
She dropped to her knees beside him and pressed a hand over his mouth. "Sssh!"
His stomach jumped to his throat when she moved flush against him in the same motion, so close she was practically on top of him, and flung what he only hoped was her Invisibility Cloak over the both of them…
Just as a more fully-dressed Weasley strode around the corner, looking even more murderous than he had minutes earlier.
Draco froze, his heart pounding so rapidly he thought it might actually explode from his chest. His panicking eyes shifted toward Hermione — Weasley could say his name at any second and he wouldn't be able to hide anymore — but she just shook her head tensely, her face inches from his.
Longbottom jogged around the same bend a few seconds later. "Weasley! Bloody hell." He caught Weasley's arm, jerking him to a stop a stone's throw from the hollow in the wall where Draco and Hermione were crouched. "I take it last night didn't go so well?"
"Never mind last night," Weasley snarled, spinning back toward him. "She took him. That smarmy bitch actually took him. Father's going to kill me. What am I supposed to do now?"
Longbottom held up his hands. "Blow me, Weasley, even Lavender Brown could have told you it was going to end like this."
"No it wasn't; I was supposed to sodding win!"
With a growl, Weasley violently flung a curse straight toward them.
Draco's body instinctively cringed sharply and he hated himself for it, but suddenly his exposed head and shoulders were swiftly pulled tightly against someone as if they were trying to block him. Too late, he realized in horror that that someone was Hermione. He immediately jerked to try to push her aside, but the chains yanked his wrists back together and his arms were locked in her suddenly suffocating hold, so he simply froze, feverishly praying to any god who'd listen that she hadn't been hit.
When a few seconds passed and she didn't react, he let out grateful breath against the smooth skin of her collarbone - The spell must have missed them by inches.
A thick silence followed. Hermione stayed stock still, not releasing her iron grip on him, and Draco held his breath lest it give them away. He knew she'd done the same when he literally felt her chest stop moving, the heavy exhalations against the top of his head vanishing.
"So she was… pretty good then, eh?" Longbottom asked. He sounded slightly calmer than he had before, as if the curse had actually diffused some of the tension.
When Weasley spoke again, it was almost as though he transfigured into another person. "She was… bloody fucking amazing. Holy mother of Merlin."
After a moment, Draco heard footsteps again, as if they'd begun walking. After a few seconds, another spell sounded like it'd been fired somewhere down the hall, and Weasley's worshipful tone was gone. "Sodding good thing I have Dark Arts this morning; I feel like killing something slowly…"
Their voices faded. Another silence followed their disappearance, this time broken only by his and her ragged breaths. His tired, bewildered mind was spinning as surely as if someone had bashed him in the head with a bludger.
He hadn't understood the meaning behind half of what they'd said, but one sentence had stood out clearly:
She took him.
What - What did that...?
Just then, Hermione loosened her grip on him, sighing heavily, and slumped down slightly, her forehead brushing his as she did. At the sudden contact, she jerked back, and in a rush of toned, tanned skin that met his gaze, Draco was suddenly reminded of exactly how close he was to her, of what she was wearing… of what she wasn't wearing.
His mind stopped working.
"We still have a bit of a ways to go. Do you think you can keep walking?" she was saying as he desperately attempted not to stare at her, with embarrassingly little success. He tried to breathe and inhaled the scent of roses. "Draco?"
"W-What — ?" he stammered out before he could stop himself, his voice strangled, and then he wanted to bash in his own head.
She followed his gaze downward. "Oh god. Sorry." She muttered a spell, and suddenly she was wearing not pink and white lingerie but a stunning red dress that still made his mouth go dry. She pulled the sheer material of the robe around her tightly, looking embarrassed when she had absolutely no bloody reason to, and quickly tucked long, curled hair back behind her ears before she retrained her gaze on him. "Right. Walking. Can you?"
"Why—" Draco cleared his throat, trying to redeem a sliver of his already nonexistent dignity, "Why hasn't he just summoned me back?"
For a moment, she didn't respond. "Because he can't," she said finally.
Quickly, his gaze shot to her face and searched it blankly, unable to comprehend what she was implying. Neither Weasley had ever been completely unable to summon him before. Had she stolen his lead? But that wouldn't work - his demon of a sister could just override it. At the thought of Ginevra, his lower arms began to jerk again; he gritted his teeth, trying to hold them steady, hoping she didn't notice. "What do you mean, he… can't?"
Hermione looked down. He followed her actions in numb incomprehension as she Vanished the chains around his wrists and took his tremoring hands firmly, holding them still. "I mean, he can't hurt you anymore. They can't hurt you anymore," she said fiercely. She looked back up at him, her eyes resolute. "Come with me. I'll explain everything when we're somewhere safe."
They wove through achingly familiar hallways Draco hadn't in a thousand years imagined he'd ever see again. He shuffled beside her numbly, wearing the Invisibility Cloak, tensing whenever another student passed by and swallowing the urge to tense again when Justin Finch-Fletchy nodded to her with a wicked smirk and held up a jingling sack of coins. "Never doubted you for a second, Evans."
Hermione just gave him a very uncharacteristic, smug smirk back.
Draco didn't know what any of it meant, and his exhausted mind had reached a point where it was unwilling to generate anymore possibilities. All he could do was wait for her explanation as they climbed staircase after staircase.
"What you did - " he suddenly began when they topped yet another flight of stairs and no one else seemed to be present, "When Weasley threw that spell at us - "
Hermione glanced toward him even though he knew she couldn't seem him, furrowing her brow. "What'd I do?"
"You covered me." The very memory of it sickened him. "You shouldn't have. I should've been the one jumping in front of you."
She frowned. "Why's it matter who's jumped in front of who?"
He couldn't believe that she of all people didn't comprehend the obvious answer to that question. "Because you've - you've risked your life for me over and over, and I'm not…" He broke off, looking away from her. "I know you're aware of this, but it bears repeating that this world isn't a forgiving one. If you're caught out of line once, just once, your entire life will be…"
He trailed off as memories flooded him: of his mother working endless hours at whatever lowly jobs were offered to her so she could afford to put even the cheapest food on the table, of being turned away from almost every store in the Sovereignty when trying to purchase school supplies, of being snubbed for academic opportunities because he refused to openly practice Dark Magic, of shepherding families and children into burrows while Dumbledore's Army burned through Conservative villages, of being thrown down in chains in the Hall of Justice while Dumbledore and the Sovereign Elite sat high above and Barty Crouch's father intoned tonelessly, Draco Malfoy, for civil disobedience, conspiracy to insurrection, sabotage, and other deliberate crimes of destruction against the Sovereignty, you are hereby charged as an adult and sentenced to seven hundred and eighty-two years of civil servitude…
He blinked and looked up at her intently. "Hermione, you need to focus on protecting yourself!"
Without warning, she reached over and yanked back the hood of the Invisibility Cloak, and Draco couldn't hide his startled eyes. "You're just as worthy of protection as I am!" she hissed.
He shook his head. "No. Not anymore." Though the words pained him to say aloud and he was unable to look at her when he did, it didn't make them any less true. He fixed his gaze back on her. "But you still have the chance to be free of this horror."
She met his eyes just as stubbornly, and her own seemed unwilling to let him in, to understand that her life was far too valuable to throw away on a prisoner with an irreversible lifelong sentence. After a moment, she bit out, "We are not having this conversation here. Not when you're a - a floating head!"
In any other situation, Draco would have laughed at that, but now he couldn't. He needed her to realize that he didn't want anyone else to be enslaved because of him, to die because of him, and most of all not her.
"I don't want you to risk your life for me," he repeated determinedly.
Hermione lifted her chin, iron determination scrawled across every inch of her body language. "My life is mine to risk however I please, just as yours should belong to you to live and die however you please. And if I've chosen to risk it for you, then I'd simply appreciate a nod and a 'thank you!' "
Draco desperately wanted to dissuade her again, but the fire that had leapt to her eyes and the words she spoke rendered him speechless. She hadn't the slightest idea, did she - of how rare her idealism was here, of how the basic freedoms in which she seemed to believe with all her soul were not so basic to him, to everyone else he knew who had suffered even worse fates? Oh, he knew she was well aware of how dangerous it was, but despite that, despite everything, she was still willing to fight for those freedoms - fight to such an extent that he was impossibly, inexplicably standing with her here, and not lying dead chained to the floor of the Gryffindor Common Room.
No, a simple 'thank you' would not even begin to convey the depth of the gratitude he felt.
Slowly, his shaking hand lifted beneath the Cloak, reaching out toward her unyielding face. He froze when he realized what he was doing, then quickly yanked it back to his chest, clenching it into a fist.
She was right. All he had were words.
Looking into her eyes, he willed everything in him into what he was about to say.
"Thank you," he whispered.
Her eyes widened slightly, and the hard edge to her expression wavered. For several seconds nothing was said or done, but then a burst of conversation several floors below them caused them both to jerk.
Hermione blinked rapidly, turning away. "You're welcome," she said brusquely. "Come on - we're almost there."
Draco didn't know what else he'd expected to happen in that moment, but he felt his shoulders slump.
Nothing. He was nothing; this was nothing.
Nothing, and yet... it had also quickly become everything.
They took shelter in the Room of Requirement again, though it looked more like they'd Apparated to a patient room at St. Mungo's, stocked with various healing creams and tinctures, and a bed that thankfully felt infinitely more comfortable than any of the aging, hard cots in the dilapidated Conservative Wizard Clinic attached to the back of the hospital. Hermione told him he needed to "recover here first," though for what would come second, he didn't know, and she promptly began to treat his wounds with the efficiency of a professional Mediwitch.
"You're awfully good at patching me up," he humorously noted through a wince as she set his right shoulder.
"Years of practice," she replied wryly, giving him a short smile before moving on to his wrists.
Draco tried to smile back if only to ward off the overwhelmingly acute fear that he was at any moment going to end up back in the nearly-destroyed Gryffindor Common Room facing another Killing Curse. He restrained his desperate need for answers for as long as he could bear he before he burst out, "Are you going to tell me what's going on, Hermione?"
She stopped, balm-covered fingers hovering near his cheek. "Oh! Merlin, I just got so…"
She trailed off before she stepped back, setting down the jar of bruise cream and sitting down across from him on the hospital bed. "Sorry. Right." She shifted, biting her lip. "Alright, I'm not quite sure how to say this without just coming out and saying it." She looked back up at him, and he was almost propelled backward at the ferocity in her gaze. "You don't belong to that vile family anymore."
The ferocity was not aimed at him, he realized.
Then what she said actually sank in.
He stared at her, afraid to hope, to think, to move, to even breathe. For a moment, his ability to speak failed him.
"What?" he finally whispered.
Hermione reached into her robe pocket and pulled out a loosely rolled sheet of crisp parchment. She glanced down at it, then held it out to him. "This is the ownership deed - your ownership deed. It was signed over to me this morning."
Draco unrolled it slowly, saw the official Sovereignty letterhead stamped across the top and a single signature that was not the two Weasleys' at the bottom. For a moment he thought it must have been counterfeit, but the raised Phoenix seal on the corner looked too real for it to be so.
His lips unconsciously parted. Any oxygen in the room was abruptly sucked out, and dark walls closed in on his mind.
With one piece of paper, his entire world reeled.
He had never once doubted that he would surely live and die at the sadistic hand of the Weasleys. No one on earth - certainly no one he had known, since none had escaped the final suppression - had the power and the capability to pry or buy him from the iron hands of the Second Viceroy's family. He had steeled himself to die, had prayed for it on many days, even.
But now that irreparable knowledge was suddenly upended and flung on its side.
The paper trembled violently in his hands.
He remembered to breathe then and sucked in a breath, still not entirely convinced he wasn't simply going mad. His mind struggled to pull forth words that formed a comprehensible sentence.
"B-But - But now… you own me," he managed to piece together.
Hermione shook her head quickly, as if she knew what he was thinking. "No, absolutely not, not like that, not ever. I mean, I suppose I do, but — only on this piece of paper. For all intents and purposes, you're as free as you're ever going to be under that despicable bond."
He didn't know how long he stared at the parchment, at that all-important line that said, Signed into the ownership of Lady My G. Evans, this Sunday, September 21…
"How in the nine circles of hell did you get him to give you this?" he finally whispered hoarsely.
For a moment, she didn't speak. "I, erm - Well, that's a rather long story…"
Three Days Earlier
Once Harry told her about Ronáld's particular penchant for the Sunday Quidditch betting booth - and that there was a Sunday betting booth - Hermione stamped her own signature of approval on her now fully formed plan.
Before Harry could demand exactly why she wanted to know Ronáld's gambling propensity, she headed for a closet that quite possibly could have been as large as her family's entire living room in Universe A. She quickly searched through an army of shoes before she found what she was looking for: the tallest pair of nude high-heels she could find.
While Harry, Pansy, and Peia watched suspiciously, she emerged and dropped them to the floor, then headed to one of the dressers for some very specific clothing items she'd disgustedly discovered about a week earlier while looking for a normal bra.
"Where in the bloody hell…" she muttered, digging through the first drawer of lingerie and then the second…
Harry gave her a sharp look and stood abruptly. "You're about to do something idiotic."
"I'd say it's quite clever, actually," she retorted brusquely, averting his gaze as she pulled out the hated items that could hardly be classified as clothing. She shrunk them to the size of thumbtacks before Peia, Merlin save her, had a chance to see them, setting them on the top of her dresser. She had the props - check. Now she just needed to execute the setup.
It would be intricate for one person to pull off, she admitted, but it could be done.
When she turned back around, Pansy was also standing, biting her lip as she watched her worriedly. "You can't go alone," she said suddenly. She gave Harry a pointed expression, at which he took one look and then glared at Hermione fiercely.
"You can't go at all. I have no idea what you've planned, but I'm not about to let you cock it up and throw suspicion on yourself and by extension Pansy!"
"Harry…" Pansy grabbed his arm and began whispering to him, her face determined. His jaw tightened before he looked back at Hermione, his eyes deadly.
"Fine. I'm going with you."
Hermione paused. She couldn't deny that the setup, at least, would be so much easier with a partner, especially one as close to Ronáld as Harry was, but bloody Morgana, was she prepared to trust Harry Evans with something this important?
That thought effectively made her decision, and she gave Pansy a considerably less terse expression than what she would have Harry. "I appreciate the thought, but I'll work better knowing I don't have other people to worry about."
"You have to worry about people?" Harry crossed his arms, stepping in front of the door to probably block her if she had any thought of exiting. "Considering you've never worried about anyone a day in your life and have an intellect the size of a stunted pigmy puff, I'd say we're the ones who have considerably more to worry about. I'm not letting you jeopardize the both of us doing whatever antics you have planned without taking along someone who actually has some sense."
Pansy sighed, taking his hand and rubbing it with her own. "Harry, darling, I told you, she's incredibly intelligent now."
"Not bloody likely, if she thinks she can barter for Malfoy with a pair of bleeding stilettos."
Hermione reluctantly looked between his stony features and Pansy's pleading ones, and knew this was one battle she was going to lose no matter what she said.
Strangely, the moment she accepted she'd have to work with Harry Evans, she was flooded with ideas of exactly how useful he could be.
"Fine," she said. She focused on his surprised face, as if he hadn't expected her to relent so easily. "Then your role starts tonight."
"My role? Care to share your asinine plan with everyone else who'll be involved?"
She held out Peia's box to him. He took it suspiciously and read the print. "You can't be serious. This is your brilliant idea? What is this - Weasleys' Wizarding Wheeze?"
As Pansy took it from him, reading it as well, Hermione couldn't help but again smile grimly. "It means we'll be using their family's own product against them. Even if it is from another universe."
"Does the blasted stuff even work?"
She shifted. "Well, I've never, erm… that's where you come in."
The look he gave her then was lethal. "No."
"No, she's right, we have to test it first if she's never used it, Harry," Pansy said, obviously finished reading the small print. She gave him a small, mischievous smile. "I promise I'll be gentle with you."
Hermione quickly shook her head and leaned over, pointing down at the bottom of the box. "No, you shouldn't be the one to do it - look at what it says he'll think of you afterward."
Pansy read the instructions again before her eyes widened. "Oh Merlin, you're right!" she gasped. "Thank goodness you saw that! No, I suppose you'll have to do it…"
Simultaneously, she and Hermione both looked at Harry. His head swiveled from Pansy to Hermione before his eyes widened in dawning - and horrified - realization. "I bloody well think not!" he said vehemently, causing Peia to laugh behind them. "I'll Imperio some seventh year to do it before that happens!"
Hermione held out a hand as the volume in the room grew. "Alright, let's all calm down. We've got a great deal more work to do before anyone, erm, uses this on anyone else." She looked back at Harry, whose jaw was tense. "Now, I do have a plan, and it'll sound mad, but I think it could actually work. We've got two objectives to accomplish before Sunday night: Get Ronáld to firmly believe he's no longer interested in me, and build his ego until it's about to burst. We need to make him believe without a shadow of a doubt that he can't possibly lose this bet."
Two Days Earlier
Michael Corner was entirely surprised - and more than a little nervous - when the Sovereign State royalty that was Harry Evans cornered him outside the Great Hall after a late breakfast Saturday. "Corner," he said coldly. "We need to talk."
Michael tensed. Those words never boded well, especially not from an Evans. He frantically wracked his brain, trying to remember if he'd done anything that could even be remotely construed as treachery against the Sovereignty, but came up blank. "I- er - yes?"
"I know about your - feelings for Ginevra."
Michael stiffened in horror, which quickly faded to disbelief as Evans continued matter-of-factly, "Let's just say I've been… neglecting her more than I should be lately. I'm in the middle of a gentlemen's weekend with Weasley - you understand - so I need someone else to show her a good time — take her out to Hogsmeade, make her feel good about herself, keep her busy in the evenings so she doesn't see me around Gryffindor and be reminded of how much she misses me. Can I count on you?"
His mouth flopped open. "Y-Yer - I mean, er - Yeah!" Then he shrugged offhandedly, trying to sound less pleased - and intimidated - than he was. "Y'know me, never one to let a lady dow-"
"Good." Evans narrowed his eyes and leaned toward him, the shadows of his face expressionless but threatening. Fear again stabbed through Michael's heart as he said in a low voice, "This conversation never occurred."
Michael quickly shook his head in agreement.
Before he knew what was happening, Evans slapped him on the back. "Carry on, Corner."
As the Eighth Year walked away without a second glance, Michael gasped in a breath and slumped in relief, unable to believe his luck… or Evans' shocking consideration for Ginevra's welfare. Perhaps Evans wasn't such a terrible boyfriend for her after all. And even if he was, well… perhaps this weekend, Michael could convince her otherwise.
By dinner on Saturday, it was time to test exactly how committed Ronáld was to ending their 'relationship.' Hermione purposely dressed alluringly, throwing him vampish smile after vampish smile. He resolutely ignored her, flirting very obviously with any women who looked even slightly in his direction and appearing for all the world as if he was having the time of his life doing it.
She held back a small but real grin.
All was going according to plan.
One Day Earlier
Before the Gryffindor-Ravenclaw Quidditch match began on Sunday, she and Peia hid under the cover of her Invisibility Cloak in the rafters of the viewing tower directly beside the Gryffindor Quidditch goal posts, Peia to be her second eyes in case she missed any of the quickly moving game.
Apparently, Ronáld was as terrible a Keeper as Ron had initially been, and the Ravenclaws had a brutal offense. The day before, she'd taught herself a very subtle one-two diversion-unification charm that should alter the path of the Quaffle ever-so-slightly… not so it would miss the hoop entirely, which, given how good Ravenclaw apparently was, could be construed as suspicious, but instead would swiftly draw Ronáld and the Quaffle toward each other whenever their trajectories neared, like the opposite ends of two magnets.
He'd have to be more than complete rubbish to miss a giant ball heading straight for his face every time it came at him.
In the minutes after the Quidditch match, Harry and Hermione stood beneath the Invisibility Cloak in the men's loo nearest the Gryffindor Common Room, which Hermione had temporarily warded to subconsciously drive people off to a different one. She felt naked, and she shifted uncomfortably in the red dress Pansy had promptly produced after Hermione had consulted with her about how to look brilliant to everyone else but still manage to turn off Ronáld.
When she heard exactly how Susan Bones and now Parvati Patil had joined Ronáld's growing fan club, she slapped his shoulder out of habit.
"Harry! You shouldn't have used the Imperius Curse!"
He glared at her. "Don't ever touch me, Granger."
Hermione froze, too late realizing her mistake, and he gave her another dark look before he continued in a low, no-nonsense voice, "It had to be done. I wasn't taking the chance that anyone other than Brown wouldn't have fawned over him otherwise."
She crossed her arms. "I hope you didn't make them sleep with him, too," she spat.
His glower deepened. "I'm not that depraved. Give them some credit - they decided that all on their own."
She wanted to glare but found she was too tense about pulling off her biggest performance yet to summon the additional energy it required. "Right then. Here." She handed him a galleon. "Send a warming charm at this when it's time for me to come in."
He looked down at it. "What've you done to it?"
"Protean charm." She held up her own galleon. "I'll feel it too."
He stared at her. "That's a NEWT-level manipulation, Granger."
"It isn't quite so difficult. I picked it up a few years ago, actually."
He blinked. His eyes narrowed. "How in the hell are you so bloody good at everything?"
Hermione swiftly avoided his piercing stare. "Not at Divination. It's all a bunch of crock, if you ask me."
Abruptly, he grabbed her arm, his fingers digging into her skin. "Don't play dumb; you know exactly what I mean," he hissed. "This entire operation you've designed is the equivalent of a psychological blitz. Pansy might think you're an ally, but I think you're a bloody strategist, and if you really are our age in your universe and you know how to do all of this, I think a lot more's happened where you came from than you're letting on. Now before we do this, I want you to tell me, and this time I want you to make me believe it: which side are you on?"
She ripped her arm from his grip. "Believe I'm a Crumple-Horned Snorkack for all I care! I only side with my own good conscience, something it seems like this world could use a lot more of!" She straightened her dress before it had the chance to slide down her chest any more than it already had, then glared back at him. "Now, we can dither about discussing my autobiography until the sun goes down, or we can try to save an innocent human being from living in hell before it kills him. Are you going back in there or not?"
He pressed his lips together, his gaze cold. "Not until I know you remember all the conditions. Wait for my cue. He spurns you at least three times before you even mention the wager. And if he for whatever reason wants to make it an even bet, if he even mentions Pansy, it's all off."
"Of course I remember!" she hissed, lowering a dark gaze on him. "I'm not an idiot."
For a moment, he only studied at her icily. "Yes," he said. "That's what concerns me."
One Hour Earlier
When Ronáld opened his eyes, gentle rays of early morning light streaming through his chamber's windows, Hermione was leaning on the bedpost at the foot of the bed waiting for him. For a moment, he only stared at her, and she held her breath, her left hand clutching the tangled bedspread, her heart racing in her chest the same way it had for most of a very sleepless eight hours.
"Bloody hell," he breathed, "that - that was…"
His gaze became one of reverent awe, and she knew without a doubt it'd worked. An unspeakable, indescribable wave of resounding relief flooded her tired body, and it took everything she had to withhold a blazingly victorious smile. Instead, she smiled crookedly at him and arched an eyebrow. "Told you I could."
His awed expression froze, then switched to one of horror, and then of fury. "You little - "
When he lunged for his wand, tumbling out of the bed in the process, Hermione swiftly leapt up and raced down the stairs to the Common Room. When she saw Colin Creevey, Harry, Ville and a few others lounging near the betting booth, she forced herself to slow down and tried to make it appear as though she was skipping. "Now, now, Ronnie, fair is fair!"
Ronáld appeared at the staircase, wrenching a robe over his bare chest. "You little bitch!"
In her peripheral vision, she saw a flash of red shoot toward her. She would have fired a Shield Charm but knew My didn't have the ability; she dodged instead, and the coffee table directly beside her exploded.
Bloody—!
Both Colin and Harry leapt up. She shoved past the both of them, ripping both Pansy's and Draco's deeds and leads out of their golden suspension and moving as swiftly as she could toward the portrait hole while still appearing halfway dignified. "I saw it on your face the second you woke up!" she trilled over her shoulder.
Ronáld physically pushed over a chair in his effort to pursue her. "I don't give a blast-headed skrewt's arse about what you thought you saw! Give it back!"
For the briefest of moments, Hermione thought about correcting him - blast-headed skrewts technically didn't have arses - but decided then might not have been the most appropriate time. Thankfully, Colin cut Ronáld off before he made it across the room. "She could take both deeds, that means she won the bet. You can't lie to that metric. They're hers fair and square, Weasley!"
"Out of my way, Creevey." Ronáld shoved him aside, but then Harry was there in his place, holding him back. He bellowed after her, "This is over, My! I don't care how good you were last night! You and me - OVER!"
As the portrait hole opened and Hermione mentally urged it to hurry, she spun around just inside the entrance. "Fine! If you're going to act this way over a silly little bet, then that's just fine with with me!"
As Ronáld kicked aside the already-overturned chair and thundered toward Draco's cage, she flounced out the portrait hole and slammed it shut behind her.
When Hermione didn't say anything for several seconds, Draco finally tore his gaze from the ownership scroll. "Hermione? What did you do?"
She again shifted, avoiding his inquisitive eyes, and suddenly looked strangely embarrassed. "I, er - may have made a bet I could give him the best night of his life," she muttered.
His mouth fell open. Of all the things he had ever expected her to say, that certainly wasn't one of them. Suddenly everything - her uncharacteristic choice of attire, why Longbottom and Thomas had thought she'd gotten back with Weasley, Weasley's entire conversation, even - made sense.
Something wrenched in Draco's stomach, and he stared back down at the deed.
"And… did you?" he asked hesitantly, though clearly she had or he wouldn't be sitting here holding his own House-Wizard papers right now.
"No."
He shouldn't, should not have felt as much relief as that one word caused.
He quickly looked back at her in confusion as she shifted her long robe aside slightly and pulled something from the sheer stocking along her thigh. She tapped it with her wand and it enlarged, but only slightly, to become a flattened box and small tube that couldn't have been much bigger than his index finger. She handed it to him. "But he sure thinks so."
His eyes were instantly drawn to the words Night-Long Fantasy Gel scrawled in big pink letters across the top of the box. He frowned, squinting at the subheading beneath it, which proclaimed, A Ladies' Way Out: Make Him Believe He Had The Best Night Of His Life Without Even Touching Him!
His eyes flicked up to hers.
A wicked grin broke out across his face.
She mirrored his smile slightly. "Keep going."
He looked back down, squinting at the tiny print.
" 'Stuck with a bloke you'd rather not bonk but have no decent way of extraction or avoidance?' " Hermione mumbled out loud in Ronáld's chamber after she changed into lacy pink and white lingerie with a corset and straps and stockings that she planned to promptly burn afterward. " 'Want to maintain your reputation as wonder lover but get unlucky Leopold off your back? In this uniquely WonderWitch anti-love product, you'll find not a love potion but a good old-fashioned way to gracefully avoid an awkward situation with no lasting side-effects… except him always remembering you as the best shag he ever had!
" 'Instructions: Include in your pre-escape primping a thick coat of our Night-Long Fantasy Gel. Then find a secure location. This step is very important, because once he gets a taste of this, he's not going anywhere for the next eight hours. Next, give him a good kiss on the - Merlin, you can't be serious," she muttered. ('Yes, you have to kiss him once, but think of the hours and perhaps years of pain you'll be spared.')
" 'The gel should sink in within seconds. Then simply sit back and get out of the way while he does all the work. Expect even the most red-blooded male to wake up thinking of you as a love goddess far too divine for his dull mortal self to ever ask on a date again. Warning: Thrashing and other abrupt movements may occur.' " She shook her head. "Feorge, you buggers."
Yes, it might have worked on Harry when he had Imperio'd Parvati to kiss him and Hermione had Obliviated her memory of it afterward (and his, at his demand), but she still held up the tube of lip gloss and studied it with more than a twinge of trepidation.
"Come through for me, baby," she whispered. "You're all I've got."
By the time Draco had finished reading, the sheer brilliance of her deception of Ronáld Weasley had him grinning like Peeves the Poltergeist. That brilliant, brilliant witch! He at once wanted to sweep her off the bed and twirl her or hug her or kiss her or do any number of things that he ultimately didn't because he didn't expect she'd be particularly pleased if he had.
"You marvelously shifty little inveigler," he breathed, using the same vocabulary word she'd thrown at him weeks earlier.
She crossed her arms, lifting her chin. "Such eloquent words; certain you know what they mean?"
He felt another smile tug at his lips, but then a particularly disturbing thought struck him. He looked at her in horror. "Merlin. You didn't have to sit there and watch that, did you? Eight whole hours of - of W-Wea-" his throat constricted and he abruptly felt panicked; he couldn't bring himself to say the name, "-of that weasel making love to himself?"
Her instantaneously disgusted expression clearly said she had, momentarily chasing away the demons that had policed his mind, his voice, his body and very life for nearly two nightmarish years.
A real laugh bubbled out of Draco's chest, the first that had spontaneously escaped him since he had watched his mother die. As if that one noise had opened the floodgates of a deep sense of humor he'd for so long feared he'd lost, he reached out and placed his hand on hers, staring somberly into her startled eyes. "Hermione, I'd just like you to know how very grateful I am for that tremendous sacrifice."
Her serious expression cracked then, too, as if until this point she hadn't quite appreciated the craftiness of what she'd done either. The change lit up her entire face in the widest, most genuinely teasing smile he'd ever seen cross My Granger's countenance. "You bloody well better be. I'm going to have Merlin knows how many nightmares of watching him scream my name whist doing unspeakable things."
Another laugh burst from his lips, and then they were both laughing, Draco uncontrollably so, as if that was the only thing that could stop the flood of a thousand overwhelming emotions within him from instead surging out the corners of his eyes.