Disclaimer: all characters and the wider wizarding world belong to J. K. Rowling.
Following the attack, Harry, Ron, and Hermione wasted no time making their theoretical revival of Dumbledore's Army a more practical affair. News of the attack and the subsequent additional security measures were announced at dinner the following Monday. Neville made eye contact with Harry and from then on galleons were charmed and Neville began work on the room of requirement, coaxing it into producing a suitable space whilst it still recovered from the fiendfyre.
Hermione had cautiously approached Draco on her return to the school and asked him if he'd like to continue his Patronus classes either one-to-one or as part of the DA. He had taken so long to answer that she had almost lost her nerve and run, but he took a deep breath and insisted that not only would he be there but the rest of the Slytherin older years would want in too. Ron had scoffed when he'd repeated the offer over lunch.
His dented pride had made it his mission to prove them wrong.
He told Theo first who had cursed and sworn and then got drunk and worried where he would live over the next holidays if dear old dad had decided to return home. Draco had cleaned him up when he'd vomited in their shared bathroom later and given him a dose of dreamless sleep. In the morning he'd told him about the DA and the plan to prepare - not to fight - and Theo had sworn some more to the point where Draco started to back-pedal his ideas.
"Of course I want in, you idiot! Did you think just because I had to get thoroughly rat-arsed to forget what a nightmare my father was last year, I would let you and Granger run off into battle without me? Moron."
Blaise and Greg had been happy to follow his lead and the girls had followed them all. Pansy hadn't even twitched when he'd mentioned it to them.
"Maybe with Granger and Potter teaching us as well we might pass our Defense NEWT," Daphne mused.
They all got thoroughly drunk thinking about the consequences of going against their families if it came to it, but they all agreed. Hermione presented them with the same contract as before, pimple curse and all and despite the fact she wouldn't tell them what word would grace the faces of anyone who betrayed them, they signed it without fuss.
The first DA meeting was held the first Friday after the attack. When the Headmistress had got wind of what they had planned she had moved not only her weekly meeting with Hermione and Michael but a nasty detention with Filch that Seamus had earned to "a time less likely to clash with anything significant", which they took as her blessing. The room had provided a practice space not unlike the one they had used before, only bigger and with a seating area to allow people to rest and recover in between bouts.
Blaise whistled in appreciation when the Slytherins arrived.
"Nice digs. I assume this is where you were hiding all that time? I remember the look on Drake's face when we ended up in that broom cupboard with Filch. Man, those were good times."
Draco used his wand to mimic a pea shooter and flicked a small wad of conjured paper at the back of his friend's head. Theo snickered but stopped when that earned him a thunderous look from the blond.
"Ok, alright, settle down," Ron boomed over everyone. "Hermione, can you conjure some chairs?"
Hermione, Draco, and Theo conjured enough chairs for everyone and took a seat at the front as Harry addressed the gathered seventh years.
"Right, well we all know why we're here," he began, wringing his hands. He had always hated public speaking. He threw Hermione an apologetic look before continuing. "Bellatrix Lestrange is back."
To their credit, the crowd barely murmured. Someone shifted their chair noisily.
"She must have made a horcrux, like Voldemort, and her husband and his brother, along with other supporters-" his eyes flicked to the Slytherins almost involuntarily, "have brought her back. She's taken up residence at Malfoy Manor and has already begun her attacks. The Ministry, under Kingsley Shacklebolt's guidance, is working out how to neutralise her and her followers once and for all."
Draco and Theo sat impassively. Hermione wished she had the ability to look that unflustered. Just hearing the name of that mad woman had her reeling - albeit less than before, now she was expecting it. She briefly wondered what the long-term effects of stress would be and made a note to research it when she wasn't in the midst of it.
"We're not joining the fight this time," Harry continued. There was more murmuring and chair shuffling. "I appreciate why some of you may want to. I wanted to as soon as I heard the news, but the authorities are working on it so it's not for a bunch of school kids - no matter how experienced we might be - to chase escaped criminals."
"So what are we gonna do?" Seamus asked, earning more murmurs and nods. "What's the plan, Harry?"
"We prepare."
Ron's voice carried in the silence as he stepped up to stand next to his best friend. Harry threw him a grateful smile.
"Same as we did in fifth year," Ron continued. "We know what could happen, worst case. We survived a war at this school. That's a long way off, at the moment it's only, like, six people, but if it happens again, we need to be ready. So we prepare. We practise, we get ready, we plan to protect the school and the younger years. If we have to.
"If it comes to that," he added sombrely.
"Ok, but what are they doing here?" Dean stood next to Seamus pointing his wand at the gathered Slytherins. "At least two of them have family members on the other side and one of them is a marked Death Eater. What makes you think we can trust them, that they won't betray us and sign up for the other side as soon as they see the tide turning?"
Harry and Ron moved to speak up but before they could Hermione was on her feet and pointing her wand at Dean and Seamus.
"Stop it, Dean!" She shouted. "Haven't you and I experienced enough prejudice based on who our parents were, and then you go spouting the same rubbish from a different point of view? Shame on you! Anyone who wants to prepare and learn what we can to protect this school is welcome here."
"Plus, they signed the contract," Ron interjected.
Dean lowered his wand, seemingly satisfied with Ron's explanation.
"Why didn't you just say that?"
Hermione made a frustrated sound and stamped her foot.
"Because it shouldn't take a magically binding contract with undisclosed, horrible consequences for us to trust one another. We should be able to foster trust just by virtue of all being here and working to a common goal. I trust them - that should be enough to start from."
She sat back down and tried to hide the shakes in her hands as Harry and Ron began the lesson on the different types of shield charm. Draco made eye contact with Theo who put an arm around her and led her to the comfy seating area away from Harry's lesson.
"Thank you, Princess," he murmured, holding her shaking hands in his as her breathing levelled out. "You didn't have to do that, you know."
Hermione scrunched up her face in a look Theo thought was part adorable and part startlingly transparent.
"What? Defend you? For simply being related to your father? For something so completely out of your control, for something you didn't choose?" She scoffed. "Dean is muggleborn, same as me; he should know better."
Theo glanced up to Draco and Blaise who were facing away, somewhat blocking them from view of the rest of the class. Hermione followed his gaze, blushing and averting her stare when Draco turned slightly and caught her eye.
"Not all of us had no choice," Theo whispered.
Hermione considered his statement for a moment. She knew Draco had willingly taken the Mark, but there were other ways choices were made for people. She shook her head.
"If you mean Draco and that abysmal tattoo on his arm, you're wrong. He didn't have a choice about that either."
Theo's lips parted slightly, and his eyes widened just a fraction. Hermione supposed that must be the Slytherin equivalent of jaw-dropping surprise.
"I'm not sure he sees it that way," Theo explained. "He won't let anyone see the Mark, even in the dorm he wears long sleeves all the time. If it weren't for sixth year when he showed off when he was drunk, I'd swear it wasn't even there. I mean, I don't even know if it's faded, he's been that careful."
"Oh, it's there - I've seen it."
This time Theo's eyes really did widen.
"Well, Princess," he drawled, recovering himself. "You are honoured indeed. I don't recall Drake ever letting anyone that close to him before."
She made a very unladylike sound in response.
"No, Theo, I think not. He can barely look at me-"
"If you say so, Princess."
Theo kissed the back of her knuckles in a formal farewell just as Ron bounded over and dragged her speechless from the chair.
"Come on, Mione. I need a partner for stunning spells and as much as I'd love to try to put ferret boy on his arse at least if I'm with you it won't hurt when you send me sailing across the room."
Theo joined Draco and Blaise at the edge of the lesson.
"So," Blaise began, pitching his voice so only they would hear him without it looking like they were conspiring. "She trusts us."
"She trusts us," Theo countered, raising an eyebrow at Blaise. "Not sure she even knows you, you wanker."
Blaise punched him on the arm, just hard enough to bruise.
"She trusts us because we've worked hard this year to mend bridges," Draco interrupted the brewing squabble. He felt something stir in his chest, a sense of achievement and an overwhelming warmth he had previously suspected was the stuff of poetic licence. "We earned it."
Blaise made eye contact with the blond and seemed to rethink his words.
"Don't fuck it up, Drake."
"Nothing to fuck up, Blaise."
Blaise cracked a smile at that and caught Theo's eye for a fraction of a second before he returned to staring at the group of practising students.
"Just don't fuck it up."
With the DA and partnering in Defence, Draco and Hermione revived a tentative friendship. They weren't continuing the Patronus lessons one-on-one – being alone was a little too awkward still – but they had lunch or studied together as part of a group regularly enough to make Ron tease her.
She was also 'Granger' again, however, which grated on her nerves. Four syllables it may be, but how difficult was it to remember her name?
Theo, of course, had noticed the tension immediately after the events of Valentine's day. He'd watched them all-but flirting at the Quidditch game, tentative yes, but it was there, and then it was gone. Like a candle that had flickered briefly before being snuffed out.
He tried to speak to Hermione about it, but she spent her weekend away, caring for her parents, and Draco had shut him down with some colourful words when he'd raised it in their dorm. Whatever had happened neither of them wanted to talk about it.
Theo thought this would have been fine if it weren't for the fact that they were both still crazy about each other and not talking about that was making them miserable.
After a particularly frustrating Arithmancy lesson, Theo offered to walk Hermione back to her common room. He sensed the tension and although he knew a little of what had caused it he also knew they were both too stubborn to do anything to ease it. Would it kill them to admit they liked each other, he wondered? As they entered a particularly underused corridor, she rounded on him.
"Theo, whatever it is I wish you'd just spit it out."
Theo snickered until she sent him a glare that could have withered plants.
"You Gryffs are so direct - it must be exhausting."
"It's not actually," she quipped. "We just have to be honest and be ourselves and that's the easiest thing there is to be. Isn't it exhausting to constantly hide everything important about yourself?"
Theo raised an eyebrow at her double meaning.
"That's not quite quidditch," he mumbled. "You've been spending far too much time with Slytherins, Princess."
Hermione made a very unladylike noise and stamped her foot.
"Would you all stop calling me that bloody nickname?! It's not like I could be any further from being a princess in the magical world unless I were an actual muggle, so would you just pack it in?"
Theo's eyes widened a fraction as Hermione calmed the tell-tale quivering of her lip. She would not cry over this. She blamed the stress she'd been under - she'd researched and found that she was exhibiting no fewer than seven of the common markers of stress, including emotional instability. He remained stoic and silent, virtually unreadable, and the words trickled from her mouth like water.
"It's what you thought - what you all thought - for years," she continued, desperately trying to blink away the moisture in her eyes. "Barely good enough to be at this school, a dirty smudge on the pristine wizarding world. Not good enough to weigh in on important policy like how useless muggle studies is as a subject or how there are no muggleborns on the Wizengamot. Certainly not good enough for your prince to date."
Her voice cracked at the end of her tirade and before she could run off to collect herself in peace Theo had put a firm hand on her elbow and was dragging her into an alcove partially hidden by a tapestry and pushing her to sit on the stone window ledge next to him. She let the tears fall when she was sure they were alone.
"I'm so sorry, Theo," she managed between hiccups and sobs. "I'm not usually like this, just since the war and...recent developments. I'm a mess and I can't seem to stop."
Theo considered for a moment the possibility that this display was all an act to get him to fawn over her or inflate her ego. Then he remembered that it wasn't Pansy or Daphne he was dealing with. She genuinely thought this, and it was obviously upsetting her to the extent that the normally calm and collected Hermione Granger was in an alcove crying over a Slytherin. Somewhere Voldemort was taking ice skating lessons from Lucifer himself, he was sure of it.
"You're the smartest - and arguably the bravest - witch of our age," he began, rubbing what he hoped were comforting circles on her back. "But when it comes to you and Drake, the two most intelligent students in the school can be really dense."
"You're wrong," Hermione stated. Her mind flicked back to the incident with the quill she kept hidden away in its box in her trunk, as if the quill itself were responsible for what happened. She laughed, heat flushing her cheeks at the memory. "He barely talks to me now. We might get back to being friends, but he doesn't want anything more."
Theo scoffed a wholly undignified noise she was sure she'd never heard him make before. Hermione wiped her tears away with her sleeves and shot him a quizzical look.
"Princess - Hermione," he corrected quickly, under the force of her scowl. "Only one of you has the confidence to do something, and he may be my best mate, but Drake has the spine of any good Slytherin. If you like him, you should probably just ask him out."
Hermione gawked at the man. Theo was never this direct. The man was a riddle wrapped in an enigma sprinkled with secrets. But she trusted him - she'd practically shouted it at Dean the other day.
"Just think about it, Princess."
She nodded mutely. She didn't think there was any way she would be able to avoid thinking about it now anyway.
