Hermione tugged on her dragonhide gloves; the left one always needed an extra yank to get it passed her wrist. Beside her, Draco had already opened the wooden box of aconite and extracted a flower. Hermione did the same.
Something was different tonight. Draco looked stiff; he'd barely acknowledged her since she walked in. To be fair, that was how most of the Slytherins behaved these days. None of them seemed to appreciate Harry publicly naming their parents as Death Eaters, especially now that the nearly whole school no longer considered Harry to be a daft lunatic.
Hermione had very little sympathy for them and instead turned her thoughts to the Patronus Charm. Harry had confided in her that he wanted to try and teach the D.A. how to cast it sometime soon, and Hermione hadn't been able to stop wondering what form her own might take. And what if it was something embarrassing, like — like a sloth? Or some ridiculous looking animal that ate its young and —
Draco's knife slipped and skidded along the wood of the benchtop.
What would his Patronus be? Snake was too obvious, and she didn't think he was subtle enough, anyway. Something feline, maybe? Hyena? He'd hate that, wouldn't he...
"You know, Granger, I have to admit I'm very impressed."
His tone chilled her blood, and for an absurd moment, she thought the hyena might be right. Surely this was what prey must feel like. "What for?"
"This nonsense is obviously all your doing. Well done. You took my advice to heart and you didn't even spare me in return. Not even Salazar himself could have asked for more. Top marks, Granger."
Hermione clenched the knife's handle as she pried the stem from the delicate petal. "What on Earth are you talking about, Malfoy?"
"A prouder Gryffindor might have excluded any information about my family as a display of gratitude for my advice, but you took advantage of an opportunity and, for that, I commend you."
Hermione's knife slammed onto the wood. "Oh, that's rich!" she cried, turning to him with a sudden surge of fury. "And for your information, I had the idea for the interview before your little speech on how to be a snake. And if you have a problem with the world knowing your father is a Death Eater, I suggest you take it up with him!"
"He was acquitted!"
"He was at Voldemort's side less than a year ago!" Draco flinched at the name, his expression darkening even further, but she pre-empted him before he could voice whatever foul insult was brewing in his head. "Call me a Mudblood if you want. It won't change the facts."
For a moment, they glared at each other, breathing heavily; then Draco picked up his knife with shaking movements and pulled a new flower from the box. "You know," he said, struggling to keep his voice calm, "everything would be a lot easier if you'd stop sticking your nose where it doesn't belong."
Hermione scoffed, "And what would you have me do, exactly?"
"Just accept that other people have different opinions and move on! Grow the fuck up, Granger!"
"Your 'opinions' say I'm worthless!" She was getting emotional now; she could hear it in the cracking of her voice and feel the prickling in her eyes. She hated it. "Your 'opinions' say I don't deserve to exist! How am I supposed to just agree to disagree with that? Would you, if I said people like you weren't allowed to have things like an education and — and jobs and dignity?"
"It's different —"
"It's not! It's not different at all, and you know it."
Malfoy tossed his pile of monkshood petals into the cauldron. "We're done here," he muttered, though whether he referred to the potion or the conversation, Hermione couldn't be sure. She added her own petals, put the stripped stems back into their box, and picked up her bag.
The second they stepped into the corridor, a matching set of footsteps materialised to their right, and they saw Harry step out from Professor Snape's office. He spotted them immediately; Hermione felt Malfoy grow even more hostile beside her.
"Potter," he spat and then, without a glance in her direction, he stormed off to his common room.
Harry watched him go with an exhausted look on his face. "I dunno how you stand it, Hermione," he admitted as they slowly started the trek back to their tower, "having to deal with that every night?"
Hermione shrugged evasively. She felt a bit guilty; until tonight, Draco had been almost pleasant. She doubted Harry could say the same of Snape.
"How was Occlumency?"
"Not much better than your potion, I reckon."
Hermione didn't pry and they walked in silence. They'd almost reached the third floor when Harry suddenly spoke again.
"Do you think Ginny's good at Quidditch?"
Hermione blinked. "I don't know, Harry. I don't know anything about Quidditch."
"Yeah, but you go to most of Gryffindor's matches…"
"I do, and Gryffindor lost to Hufflepuff last week, so —"
"But Ginny caught the Snitch." Clearly, this was a bigger issue than Hermione could understand. Harry seemed to wrestle with himself before he spoke. "It's just… What if they don't want me back? If I'm ever even allowed to play Quidditch again, that is…"
"Oh, Harry, don't say that. You're an amazing Seeker —"
"Even after I won't have touched a Snitch — won't have touched a broom in a year? They'd be mad to give me my spot back."
"Harry — they love you, Katie and the rest. I'm sure they can't wait to have you back —"
"If they let me back because of sentimental reasons and not because I'm the best player, then it's no better than when Malfoy bought his way into the team."
Hermione's mouth opened and closed again. She didn't know what to say to that.
Harry sighed. "I'm sorry. I'm not asking you to make me feel better. I'm just... worried, I think. It just feels like everything's being taken away from me and — what's left to take anymore?"
"Ah," declared the Fat Lady as they approached the portrait, "my two stragglers. Always out late, aren't you?"
"Abstinence," said Harry, and the frame swung open.
Hermione followed him in and found the common room nearly empty, save for a few older students.
"Good night, Hermione. See you tomorrow," sighed Harry with a tight smile before he disappeared up the boys' staircase.
Hermione watched him go with an aching feeling in her heart. How easy would it be to tell him everything would be alright? But that would be an empty promise, and the world felt pretty empty as it was.
Everything would be a lot easier if you'd stop sticking your nose where it doesn't —
Sod off, Malfoy! Get out of my head!
Hermione stared out the window as she waited for sleep to come and wished she could see the stars.
March passed in a tragic flurry of sacked teachers, but at least most of the student body was now solidly on Harry's side. Seamus even went out of his way to apologise to Harry, which Hermione found very admirable. Malfoy remained stoic and bitter, but what did that matter?
Hermione's otter twirled through the air, seeking out other corporeal Patronuses to play with. There weren't many; Harry's stag occasionally appeared as a demonstration, and Luna's hare had been one of the first to take shape. And a long, ill-defined shape that Hermione estimated to be a giraffe had taken to trotting around the room's perimeter shortly after.
It was indescribable, like bathing in joy itself. Hermione wished they could do this every day, just to prove they could still feel something other than the morose, impending doom which stuck to everything these days.
Perhaps predictably, it had all been too good to last. Lying in her bed hours later, after Umbridge's raid and sudden ascension to headmistress, with hot, angry tears leaving sticky tracks on her cheeks, Hermione silently cursed Umbridge in all the ways she knew how. She cursed the woman for her tyranny, Dumbledore for fleeing in their hour of need, and herself for setting them up for disaster in the first place.
I should have never suggested Harry start that group!
But pride at her own accomplishments — at everyone's still warmed her blood, and she couldn't bring herself to regret it. Not all the way.
Hermione squinted at the scale, waiting for the two sides to equalise. Nearly there. She added a few more grains of South African sea salt and watched the left side lower a few millimetres until it hung evenly with the dish of eagle eyes.
"Could you confirm this is right, please?"
Malfoy came over and took her position, squinting at the delicate scales. When he declared them even, they set about the next step in not-quite-companionable silence. Malfoy's new Inquisitorial Squad badge shone merrily, taunting Hermione's periphery. Last she'd seen, the Gryffindor hourglass had been reduced to nearly half, whilst the Slytherin one had nearly doubled its contents. It was so flagrantly unfair.
Malfoy muttered something; Hermione whirled around, already defensive. "What did you say?"
"Nothing, Granger. Mind your own business," he sneered without looking at her.
Several minutes passed during which Hermione poured the salt into a silver chalice and watched it sit for exactly 482 seconds before grinding it into a fine powder. The air still hummed with tension, and she found herself longing for the almost-pleasant time when they'd been able to have civil conversation while they brewed. They had fallen asleep in this room once. Together. Hermione tried to imagine it happening now and laughed at her own foolishness.
Malfoy hissed something under his breath and something in Hermione snapped. She set down the mortar and pestle with a slam and turned on him. "Alright, Malfoy. What the bloody hell do you want? Because if you think you can insult me behind me back —"
"Would you calm the fuck down, Granger?" he snarled, glaring at her with all the malice he could muster. "I didn't say anything about you! Shut up!"
"Then why are you whispering?"
"I'm not — ergh! What was the goblin's name? Who negotiated the treaty that ended the eighth rebellion in 1683 —"
"1689," Hermione corrected automatically.
"Whatever. He negotiated the treaty with the Wizards' Council and then when he went home, goblin society turned on him because they thought he was a traitor to their kind because he'd gone and stopped them all from being executed. But what was his name?"
"Holgrath. And he was executed by his own government because the conditions he agreed upon were extremely unfair and actually laid the groundwork for the ninth goblin rebellion less than twenty years later —"
"I don't need an essay, Granger!"
Hermione didn't say anything, only pursed her lips and watched him grumpily dip eagle eyes in the blood and plum solution they'd made last week.
"Why are you thinking about goblin history?" she diplomatically asked after a moment.
"Well, we've got O.W.L.s soon, don't we? Not all of us can be walking encyclopaedias. And the History of Magic exam covers everything." He ladled out an eyeball and reached for the next one. "Don't tell me you're all prepared already."
"Of course not. I've still got thirteen Principles of Transfiguration I haven't memorised yet, but O.W.L.s are two months away and I've got a revision system all worked out —"
"Principle Number Thirty-Eight."
Hermione stared. "What?"
"Go on. What does it say?"
"Er... Well, that's one of the basic ones about transmuting fluids, isn't it?"
"There's sixteen that say something about fluids."
"Right, but Number Thirty-Eight..." Hermione searched her brain; she'd reviewed this two days ago, so surely she knew the answer! But to have Malfoy quiz her like this was so confusing and distracting that she could hardly keep her head straight. "It governs low to high density transfiguration of liquid… If you have a low-density substance in a sealed container, it cannot be transfigured into a higher density substance without decreasing the volume of the substance or stealing matter from the container itself."
"Or?"
"Or... or altering the temperature of the substance during its transfigurement."
"Well done, Granger. One point to Gryffindor."
Hermione's eyes flashed to the badge on his robes to the impassive smirk on his face. Had he forgotten he had the power to award house points? After watching him gleefully dock Gryffindor points all day, there was no way he would give one back on purpose.
Although I suppose a single point is rather more of an insult than anything else.
For a moment, she looked at the pile of green salt and the few larger grains that still needed crushing. The plopping of thick liquid sounded every few seconds, permeating the warm haze created by the potion's steam. Hermione often wondered what it must smell like without the Bubble-Head Charm. Pity it was so lethal.
Taking the mortar and pestle back in hand, she carefully began, "Alright, then. You said History of Magic is giving you trouble. Tell me about the Reformation of 1860."
Malfoy did, and when he stumbled over describing the concurrent Industrial Revolution, Hermione patiently corrected him. He didn't complain, but nor did he thank her, and instead threw a question on Norse runes that she answered flawlessly. By the time the afternoon's instructions were completed, they'd extensively covered several theories and principles for at least four subjects, and with little to no malice.
Hermione packed up her things feeling a little stunned.
"What time is it?" Draco wondered aloud as he stuffed his gloves back into his bag.
"Nearly four o'clock, I think."
"Damn. I've got practically no time for dinner before Quidditch. Why does this bloody potion insist on being brewed at the most inconvenient hours?"
"Because it has to be brewed when the Moon is out and that time changes throughout the phases —"
"Rhetorical question, Granger, of course I know why."
Right. Sorry.
"See you tomorrow, then." He slipped out the room in a hurry.
"Bye, Malfoy."