Beautiful Darkness by EssTheDreamer
***Chapter One***
The Decision
Draco Malfoy awakes in a silver and green room, and briefly wonders if he's back at the Manor, even though he went out to walk to refresh himself.
And then it all comes crashing down - he collided with a muggle girl, and … she stupefied him?
"But she's a muggle? How did she use my wand properly then?" thought Draco.
He blinks once, twice, and decides that sitting around in a room that could be owned by potentially psychotic muggles is not a good decision, no not at all.
Just as he swings one leg off of the bed, the door opens, and walks in one girl with voluminous curly hair. She's wearing muggle jeans and a loose, bright yellow top with the word "MAGICAL" written on it, and Draco wonders if she is magical, or if he imagined everything and just somehow wound up in some girl's bed.
"I'm Hermione Granger," says the girl, jostling Draco out of his thoughts. Just then, he wonders if she's related to the Dagworth-Grangers, but why would a Dagworth-Granger live in the muggle world? They were famous potioneers, and they mysteriously disappeared when their only daughter and heir, Emma Dagworth-Granger, vanished.
Draco nods, and doesn't bother to say his name, until the girl-Hermione-looks at him, waiting for an answer. Deciding that he could always obliviate her, he enlightens her. "I'm Draco Malfoy. Can I please have my … thing back?" He doesn't know whether or not to say wand, so he just says "thing".
The girl's lips curve into a smile, and she pulls out his wand from her jean's pocket. Draco reaches for it, but the girl puts it back in her pocket.
Draco sighs, exasperated. He really needs to get his wand back, get the hell out of here, and explain to the Dark Lord and his parents where and why he's been out so long.
"Look, I don't know who you are, and I really need to get back, so can I please get the stick back, and I'll leave you alone."
"Not so fast," says Hermione. "You can call it a "wand," you know. You don't need synonyms to replace it," she says, this time, her smile replaced with a small smirk.
"Fine, give me back my wand … I really need it," says Draco.
"I'll give it back … eventually. I just … need to get some answers."
Draco furrows his brows. If the questions cause him to reveal the wizarding world, the Ministry may find out and arrest him, and Malfoy Manor really doesn't need anymore attention, not with Lord Voldemort inside it. But … after he gets his wand back, he could obliviate her. Finding a suitable plan, he nods his head and waits for the girl to start talking.
Hermione looks at him, suspicion evident in her eyes, but she moves to the bed. She crouches, and opens a drawer, a drawer that blends in perfectly to the bed, and pulls out a giant red book with an ornate H inscribed on it.
"This book … Hogwarts: A History, references magic, and wizarding school. How do you gain entrance to it?"
Draco snorts. Of course, she was just another muggle who wanted to go on a fantasy adventure. How she wound up with the book, Draco doesn't know, but he knows his obliviating job is going to a bit harder now that he knows she has knowledge of the wizarding world.
"Yes. Hogwarts is one of the many schools dedicated to teaching students on magic and their abilities. I personally, go to Durmstrang, though I'll be transferring to Hogwarts next year. But, you can't go unless you have magical ability."
"I do have magic! I have it, and I can show you," says Hermione, her tone angry and ready to prove her powers.
Draco is yet again placed in a road where his decision could impact everything else. Finally making a decision, he asks her. "You don't have to show me...I can see it myself, if you'll let me," he says to her.
She looks pensive, and bites the edge of her lip, as if she doesn't know whether or not to trust this strange stranger. Finally, she nods her head, and Draco reaches out to her chin and tilts her head up so that his silver eyes can make contact with her golden ones.
All of a sudden, an onslaught of memories attacks him.
A tiny girl with bushy brown hair walk into a class full of other tiny kids. She sees a cluster of kids playing with dolls, and she asks to join. One of the kids shakes her head and pushed Hermione down to the ground.
Hermione's eyes fill with tears, and as she bursts into tears, the dolls' heads pop off.
A girl a bit older walks into a school labeled "K.J Lowring Middle School", and again is lonely and without friends.
She sits alone in the library, and all of a sudden, she makes her books float. She is surprised, but she tests her abilities and notices that she can make all the books around her float in midair, as well as the fact that she can make their pages flip without even touching them.
The library is empty, and no one notices her, especially not the reading librarian.
In a different scene, she is surrounded in a circle with kids pointing at her; she had a yellow-post it with the word "FREAK" scribbled on it, and tears once again flood her eyes.
All of a sudden, the child responsible for the note gets a horrid nosebleed, and when they try to stop it with their hand, more blood pours out from all the places that their skin made contact with skin.
The children look at Hermione fearfully, and they leave her alone, calling for the teacher.
Hermione looks shocked yet again, but then, she mumbles, "They deserve it."
Hermione is in a different scene now, and looks closer to the age that she is now. She is in what seems to be a muggle locker room, and she is packing up her bag, when a trio of girls comes in to her aisle of lockers.
"Granger, the witch. Can't you see that you don't belong here? I sure wish they still did those witch burnings, then we could burn you right here."
"Go away, Kaitlin. I never did anything to bother you," says Hermione, staring the bully head on.
The bully cocks her head and plasters a fake smile on her face, before taking a step forward, and smacks Hermione straight across the face, sending her curls flying.
"Don't talk back to me, witch." This time, there seems to be no shock in Hermione's expression, but pure anger as a red hand print shows up on her skin.
She stands up slowly, and slings her bag across her shoulder.
The bully, Kaitlin, stands tall and proud of slapping Hermione, and thinks Hermione admitted defeat as she walks away. Kaitlin goes to the other girls starts to gloat to the other girls in the locker room about how she "put the Granger witch, the teacher's pet, in her place by slapping her," and Hermione feels her anger escalating like it never did before. Especially when Kaitlin brings up the fact that she is raised by a single mother, saying that her father probably left because she was too freaky and the only reason her mother stayed behind only because she felt sorry for her.
Hermione explodes. She sends Kaitlin flying into the wall and shatters all the mirrors in the locker room.
"Insult me all you want, but don't you dare hurt me or talk bad about my mother. Just because you're all pampered arseholes doesn't mean I am, too."
With that, Hermione leaves the locker room, and makes sure to use her powers to mark all of the girls in scarlet ink, proclaiming them as "FREAKS,"just like they once did with her.
It's not perfect revenge for all they did to her, but it's getting there.
A week or so later, Hermione's locker is bombarded with comments about how she doesn't belong, how she's not human, and other hateful comments that are too horrible to even be repeated.
She's tripped over during lunch, food is thrown at her, during dodgeball, she is viciously attacked, and she can frequently find herself attacked with spit balls. The teachers seem to notice, but they don't act, either not caring, or to scared to attack kids with rich parents that donate to the school.
Hermione sanctuary is an old-abandoned library, labeled "Magyck Librarium". This is where she practices her magic, finding spells into old books, and where she also found Hogwarts:A History and discovered there were more people like her. She wishes she knew where Diagon Alley was located so that she could run away from it all.
The final memory is of her finding a crate of books labeled "DARK MAGIC: DO NOT TOUCH!"
She decides that she will learn them next time; she wants to be strong, and she wants to protect herself.
Most of all, she wants to burn those who harmed her.
When Draco pulls out from her thoughts, he makes yet another life changing decision. He can't let this girl, this powerful, amazing, girl with so much magical potential stick it out in this despicable muggle world where she would be tormented on a daily basis. Sure, there may be some nice ones out there, but he couldn't let a fellow magical being have to survive alone, tormented like the times where witches were burned, but this time with words and actions.
He brings his hand down from her chin and sticks it out to her. "Do you want to learn magic? I can show you."
Hermione is shocked, the emotion is all but hidden in her golden eyes, and she stutters "I don't - I couldn't possibly - I don't want to bother you - But I - No, I - Yes, I - I -"
"It's a simple question with a simple answer," interrupts Draco. "Hermione, listen, this could make you stronger, I know how to help you, and if you get good enough … then you can come to Hogwart's with me," he adds, putting extra emphasis on her name.
Hermione looks up at Draco's eyes from the ground, and she makes her life changing decision. "Yes. Yes, I'll learn, and yes, I'll see everything, anything you need to show me. To make me stronger, better. Yes," she says, taking Draco's outstretched hand.
He smiles at her, and then, raising one eyebrow, he asks, "My wand?"
Hermione smiles sheepishly, and pulls it out and places it in his palm.
"We can get you a wand, say, next time we meet?" Draco says it nonchalantly, but he is worried that this powerful girl would back out.
Hermione's radiating smile in response calms him, and he says "Au revoir, mademoiselle. I'll see you soon," before disapparating with a pop.
Hermione doesn't know how he'll find her, but she already trusts him enough to know that he'll keep his promises. If she ever wondered how it's possible to trust a complete stranger, she now knows that it is indeed possible, especially a stranger that saves you from a horrible existence.
One day, I'll show them just how powerful I am. One day.
Twin souls meet
they collide
and dance around each other
but they soon merge together
into a powerful force
helping and guiding
each other into
greatness
and
power
AN: Whoo hoo, my first Dramione multi-chapter story!
Super excited about this, and I'll tell you all how I got the idea for this. I was yet again defending Dramione (it's a pastime of mine, now) and a friend said that if Hermione didn't get into magic like she did, and Draco met her later when he was more mature, maybe Dramione would be a possibility. I believe that Dramione is possible anywhere, but my brain stewed over what she said, and this fanfiction was born, and I've combined a few of my plot bunnies into here.
Follow this story if you want to see Hermione's adventure into a powerful witch, and Draco's into a wizard to be reckoned with. I'm not sure if I want Hermione to go full on dark on this, but we'll see. Updates will come whenever I finish a new chapter, and will be fairly frequent until the 3rd of January (2016!), and when school starts, it will be updated, but not as frequently.
Oh, and I hope you all like the cover, I made it myself, it's my first cover, and I plan to do this to all of my fics from now on rather than just using a generic image from Google, lol.
Bye, and see you all next chapter, (expect long author's notes 99% of the time, sorry)
Ess
Edit: Someone sent me a tumblr aesthetic about muggle Hermione and a helpful Draco, like the idea of never receiving a Hogwarts letter. So, if it sounds familiar, I guess that's why, but I honestly didn't see it till I got it sent to me. Anyway, I hope everyone likes this story, and I can't wait to explore the rest of the story with you all!
Edit #2: Colubrina, an amazing writer for HP here, also wrote a story, its called "Without Her Letter", on Hermione never receiving her letter. Now, I posted this before WHL, so I hope no one suggests I copied. I recommend you all check it out as well, its a three-parter, and its an amazing story, much like the writer! :D
Edit #3: Well, I found this amazing image on this Dramione page, and I decided to update the cover using an edited version of it, so the edit of the cover, meaning the background of it, is NOT mine. I did edit it to make it my cover, but the base image is not mine. By the way, I obviously do not own Harry Potter, I forgot to mention this, haha.
Review are Hermione's dreams, Follow's are Draco's help, and Favorites are their combined thanks.
(lol, haha, I don't know why I did this)