"I think I might be drunk," Hermione said. She'd eased herself down until she was sitting on the neatly trimmed lawn with her back to the stone wall surrounding the roses. Moody would approve. It was an easily defensible spot and she could see the Manor from here, lit up and glowing.
Malfoy sat down next to her, a little closer than she would have liked, but she didn't think she could object when he passed the bottle of champagne back to her like a perfect gentleman and said nothing as she took a swig far too hefty to be ladylike. The bubbles tickled her nose and she almost sneezed. With immense self-control, she managed to not. She did, however, hand the bottle back to Malfoy so he could help himself to more, which he did. After he wiped his mouth on the back of his hand he propped the bottle between his knees and said, "Anyone who made that bastard bleed should celebrate."
She looked up at the big, glittering house. "I hate all of them," she said. "Death Eaters."
"Me too," he said. The words were soft enough to be a confession but filled with so much self-loathing she had a hand on his leg before her brain could stop her.
"You aren't like them," she said.
"Don't fool yourself," he said.
"You're not," she said. She shook her head to emphasize the point and considered, as the world wobbled a bit, that that may have been a bad idea. Champagne, she remembered too late, hit you fast and hard and whatever was between Malfoy's legs was a league beyond anything she'd had before. "You're… I mean, you're an arsehole," she said, enunciating as carefully as she could because she didn't want him to misunderstand, "but you are not a bad person."
"Try not to kill me with the praise, Granger," he said but he might have sounded a bit gratified by her pronouncement.
"Hermione," she said. His head almost whipped around to look at her at that and she shrugged. "If we are in love, and all, you'd – "
"Yeah," he said. "I guess I would. It's just peculiar, is all. Hermione."
"Was that so bad?" she asked, half-teasing.
He actually stuck his tongue out at her as if he were five and she laughed with sudden delight, giddy on the duel and the wine and the utter, ridiculous happiness she felt leaning up against a cold, stone wall with this boy – this man – who'd always been her enemy. Life was funny. She'd dreaded the party, had a terrible time, but right now she wanted the night to never end. Bless whoever had invented champagne.
"Your turn," he said. She blinked a few times, trying to figure out what he meant, so he prompted her. "If I'm going to use your name, even in private, you should return the favor."
"Draco," she said. She rolled her tongue around the name, then said it again. "Draco." It wasn't horrible. She'd already been thinking of him as Draco half the time in her head, sometimes to differentiate him from his parents – the house really had too many Malfoys – and sometimes because when a man shows up at your door after a bout of torture it broke down a few barriers.
As did being a spy for the Order.
"Why are you doing it?" she asked. She didn't bother to specify what it was. One of the many easy things about Draco was that he followed her easily. She'd already figured that out.
"You saw me last night," he said. "Isn't that reason enough?"
She didn't quite think so. It was reason to not support these people. But working against them? Saving Harry? Helping her funnel out information. She suspected all the inner circle had experienced Yaxley's idea of discipline and she didn't expect to see the Carrows turn on him any time soon. Or Dolohov.
Or maybe not, with Dolohov. Everything was spinning and there were plots inside plots. She couldn't tell who was on whose side. She was fairly sure, though, that none of them, save maybe Draco, were on hers.
"You could just keep your head down," she said. "You're rich enough."
"Falling for the big house already?"
She ignored that. "You could be as influential as you wanted. You could be a power – "
"I hate them," he said. That was as bald and honest as she'd ever heard anyone be. Harry talked sometimes about right and wrong, and carrying on Dumbledore's legacy. Ron would never leave Harry. Molly and Moody's paths, all their paths, had been set before she'd ever set foot in the wizarding world. She couldn't think of anyone else who'd turned away like this, who'd rejected something easy for something hard.
"Draco," she said. She wasn't sure what she wanted to say. You're a marvel, maybe, or I don't understand but she thought she did. Maybe. A little. Too much fear. Too much pain. Not enough of the carrot and too much of the stick and he didn't like the stick.
She settled on, "Thank you. For helping."
He picked up the bottle and took a long drink. There couldn't be much left and she held her hand out to get one last swallow from this oh-so-expensive excellent vintage of real champagne. Not bubbling wine, not this. This had come from France. This was authentic. And it tasted like heaven. She wanted more.
"I had no idea you liked that stuff so much," Draco said watching her drain the rest. "I'll make sure it's served at meals."
"You don't have to – "
"Let me make some things decent," he said. "Please. It really isn't much." He took the bottle out of her hand and set it against the wall. Some part of her objected to just leaving rubbish out, but there were gardeners, or she could walk out in the morning and fetch it. It probably didn't matter. Narcissa Malfoy didn't seem the sort to allow trash to gather around her house.
"If I drink this at dinner I might tell your father he's a right idiot," Hermione said. She closed her eyes and imagined the beauty of just blaming the alcohol and letting her mouth tell Lucius Malfoy what she thought of him. That would be glorious. You did this, she could say. You helped make this happen. How do you like it? I hope it burns, you bastard. I hope it burns every night. I hope you can't sleep for the pain of it all.
"And what would you tell me?" Draco asked. "That I'm just as bad?"
She didn't answer that. Some confessions were best kept unuttered and unconsidered. Instead she said, "I hated you. At school."
"I hated you, too," he said. Safe ground, this. "You were stuck up, a know-it-all."
"You were a bigot," she said. "A bully."
"You weren't exactly a simpering bit of kindness yourself," he said. "At least no one on Gryffindor had to buy his way onto the team," he said, and she knew he was quoting her. She cringed to hear her young self parroted back, all self-righteous surety. He'd called her a mudblood right after that. She remembered that too. Children could be so nasty to one another, and all over a game that hadn't even mattered. She wished she could go back and apologize. Did he?
Weren't the saddest words in any language supposed to be, 'too late'?
"No, I wasn't that nice," she admitted. She'd been a lot of things at school but nice hadn't really been one of them. Not nice. Not kind. Certainly not to him. She'd liked being able to make him hurt the same way he did her. And now? What were they now? "Friends?" she asked.
"You and me?" He sounded incredulous.
She worried for a moment she'd overstepped. She'd never been good at people. Her first vivid memory of Ron was his saying she was a horror, and he'd been right. She was good at books and cleverness, but maybe she'd read this all wrong the way she so often did and all they were was co-conspirators. Co-conspirators was fine. It was great. It was a lot more than she'd hoped for when she'd looked down at the heavy diamond bracelet still on her wrist.
"Friends would be… I'd like that," Draco said. He leaned over and rested his head on her shoulder and that fine hair of his brushed against her neck. He'd had a lot of the champagne too, and at least another whole glass before the duel had started.
"If you want," she said.
"I do," he said. He took her hand, ran a thumb over the family heirloom he'd enchanted, then laced his fingers through hers.
"You weren't what I expected," she said. "Aren't."
"Yeah, well, neither are you," he said. He fell silent for a long moment and she could hear the sounds of the party. Someone had opened the door again and music hung in the air and the occasional sharp laugh cut through it to jab at her. "You were something tonight."
She closed her eyes at that and they sat, listening to the sounds and letting the cold seep through their clothes. The world had gotten too wobbly, and just as she wondered how she was going to make it back to her room without stumbling into walls, Draco sat up. "We should go," he said. "Back behind locked doors before someone decides they want to test themselves against you too."
She let him pull her up. They avoided the guests thanks to his knowledge of side doors and servants' passages. She stopped with her hand on the knob of her room and raised the other to rest against his cheek. "Thank you," she said. "For being decent."
She wanted to tell him she'd had fun, actual fun. That she'd enjoyed drinking with him. That she was glad they were friends. That 'just in time' wasn't so bad. His mouth twisted into a mocking smile at what she did say, however, so she stopped there. "You have a bad habit of that," he said. "I'll see you at breakfast?"
"Yes," she said.
She shut the door behind her, making sure the lock clicked into place, and kicked off her shoes. She had one hand on the zipper of her robes and was already thinking about breakfast and getting another look at stash of Death Eater documents, the ones they didn't want to move to the Ministry, when she idly turned over a sheet of parchment on her desk just to check. She wasn't expecting anything.
Mum said she'd send this off, it read.
She sank into the chair, robes still half on, and picked up the paper with shaking hands. Ron had written her. She knew the writing. Molly had to have been the one to do the charm work because he'd never mastered that but, even if it was a note his mother had read, it was still a note. It was still a word from friends.
We're still with the D's. They've taken us in because of C and F. I can't understand a word anyone says because except for G none of them speak English. Won't even try. Miss you. Hope you're OK. Hex that wanker M for me when he's not looking. H says hullo.
She knew she had to burn it. It had been an insane risk to send. It could have blown her cover. If anyone had seen this they'd have known she wasn't mad for Draco Malfoy. They'd have known she was still in touch with Harry. He'd been so stupid. He'd listed right where they were. Still in France. With the Delacours. Even Amycus Carrow would have been able to decode his pathetic attempt at secrecy. Dolohov wouldn't have even noticed the attempt.
She was so grateful to get it her hands were shaking. They hadn't forgotten her. They all still cared.
She had to burn it.
She read it again, then again and again and again. Finally, when she had the words memorized twice over, she tore the part that said Miss you out very carefully, tucked it away inside a book, and knelt down to set the rest of the missive against the grate in the fireplace. She watched the precious words as the flames took them and didn't even realize she was crying until it was all gone.
She opened the book again. Miss you.
She'd gone drinking with Draco Malfoy. She'd had fun. She'd laughed and called him a friend and enjoyed herself. She'd enjoyed herself. That made her feel dirty. She wasn't here to make friends. She wasn't here to have a good time or drink good champagne or feel Draco Malfoy's fine hair brush up against her skin as he told her she'd been something to see. She'd come to get them all out, and now she was sending them information so they could find a way to get Yaxley out of power.
That was all.
She closed the book and got ready for bed in as emotionless a state as she could manage. She hung the pretty robes with the swans up. She set her shoes very neatly in the wardrobe. She brushed her teeth and took a shower and pulled a nightgown on. She lay down and the world spun and she told herself it was from the champagne. Too much champagne. Nothing else.
. . . . . . . . . .
A/N – Thank you to Salazars for beta reading, and to you for reading at all!