Chocolate Frog Card: (Gold) Gytrash: Challenge: Write about someone who likes the dark.

Gringotts: Hermione/Rodolphus [Hermione - Pairings]

Ultimate Hermione Pairing Challenge: Hermione/Rodolphus Lestrange

February Event: 12. "Your stubble is tickling me." (dialogue) [10 points]

Word Count: 365

"Dolph?" Hermione murmured sleepily, rubbing her eyes. "What are you doing in here?"

"Just thinking," he replied quietly, smiling at the witch and her bedraggled state. "Go back to bed."

"Ngh," she moaned, stumbling towards him. She narrowly missed a table on her quest to him and he exhaled when she flopped into his arms, her nose immediately resting against his neck where she inhaled. "You know that I can't sleep when you're not there."

He rubbed his hands up and down her back, soothing her. He felt her muscles relax as she almost melted into him.

"Why are you in here?" she asked. "It's dark."

"I like it," he replied. "The darkness, it hides everything. You can pretend that the outside world doesn't exist."

"The dark also hides all the monsters," she commented around a yawn. "You can't see them as they sneak attack."

"You're such a pessimist," he chuckled, squeezing her tighter, burying his face in the crook of her neck. She giggled, a beautiful sound that brought a smile to his face.

"What?"

"Your stubble is tickling me," she replied, leaning back to run a hand along his cheeks and jaw. He shivered at the feeling. "Now, come on," she urged. "Let's get in the light."

"But I like the dark," he whined. She rolled her eyes but didn't argue with him. "It reminds me of my days in Azkaban," he confessed a few minutes later. He felt her stiffen and knew it was because she hated what he'd endured. "There wasn't anything happy about the building, and if there was anything, it was sucked away instantly. But I felt safe in the dark, away from the light where the monsters were. The dark protected me."

"I hate that you had to be put in there. How incompetent are the Aurors to not be able to detect a long standing Imperius?"

He sighed, holding her so tight that he feared she couldn't breathe. Her arms wound around him just as tight.

"Let's not talk about it," he deflected, regretting the decision he made to bring it up. "I'm with you in the dark, instead of anyone else and I couldn't be happier."