Twenty-Five

Draco wakes the next day with Hermione sprawled in his arms, contented and warm, and the idea of unearthing the nastiness and conflict of the day before yesterday seems an unnecessary evil. Especially considering his knee is still sore and strained, and he's limping badly when he gets up to use the loo. There will be no fighting for him until his knee has healed, and why bother bringing up conflict before then? So he just doesn't. He lets sleeping dogs lie. He figures Hermione must feel much the same because she doesn't bring it up either.

Instead, they have a normal day – or what passes for normal for them.

He smiles at her and kisses her in the morning before she slides out of the spare room bed, and he follows her limping back through to their room. She seems happy, and he does his best to foster that feeling after the miserable few days they've had. They eat breakfast with everyone like usual, and she glares at Potter and Weasley while he shoots them discreet smirks. Potter, in particular, is blossoming with visible greenish-yellow bruises, and that gives Draco a hint of childish pride. He didn't do too badly for it being two against one.

And then after that, they slide into their usual routine.

He works out – careful of his knee – showers, shaves, and eats lunch with Hermione in Lupin's office. He spends part of the afternoon in the office with her, assisting her while she faux-complains he's really a hindrance. And when shared glances and little touches become more heated as time goes on, Lupin eventually catches on and mutters something under his breath long-sufferingly and banishes them with a smile. Draco limps his way upstairs after Hermione, who rolls her eyes at his slowness. She's been an odd mix of annoyed and concerned about his injuries. Draco gets the feeling she wants to fuss over him, even as she's unimpressed with his choice to engage Potter and Weasley.

The sun throws gold over the bedroom as he pushes the door shut behind him with a click, and she's smiling, her hair loose and wild as she slides her arms around his neck. A waterfall of fluffy curls, loose and waving, haloing her heart-shaped face, her eyes glowing amber as they catch the late afternoon light. So fucking beautiful. Her cheeks are pink, and there's a nervous energy to her, buzzing around her. She pushes up on tiptoes and kisses him, and she's trembling a little, and Draco's not sure if it's fear or want. He very much wants to just repeat last night. To just fuck her. It's so tempting.

But instead, his mouth is soft on hers as his hands settle at her waist, letting her lead this time, and in response, she's greedy and pushing. Fantastically demanding. Her fingers curl in the shorter hairs at the nape of his neck as they stand locked together, her on her tiptoes and him with his head bent to her. She shoves up against him, her lower abdomen pressed against his dick, and he can feel himself getting hard against her. There's a shivering frisson in the air and a glorious, frenetic energy bubbling off her, spilling everywhere. He's caught in it, struggling to keep his head.

She's panting and he's hard as iron when she breaks the kiss and tries to drag his shirt off over his head, clumsy and impatient. He finishes yanking it off when she struggles, dropping it on the floor and rolling his shoulders back, wondering what she thinks of him. He's more battered than usual right now. Draco wouldn't say he's self-conscious exactly because he hardly ever thinks of it, but when he does, he finds it hard to believe his scars are appealing – although his chest and abdomen are scattered with old, odd scars, rather than a thick lacework of whiplashes, it's still not pretty. He already has a lifetime of scars and he's only twenty, although the only one visible usually is the thin lash cutting from the hinge of his jaw up to just beneath his left eye.

"I can't believe they did this to you." Her hands ignore any scars, sweeping warm over his skin to very gently trace the large, healing bruises with a wince, her touch so light and careful he can hardly feel it. She's clearly still angry with Potter and Weasley, from the edge in her tone.

"They're hardly unscathed," he points out, with the hint of a smirk he can't quite suppress. Luckily, Hermione's not looking at his expression. Her eyes are on his body, and she seems to be admiring it, something which makes Draco feel oddly exposed and pleased as he stands obediently still under her hands. Her fingers glide up his sides and over his chest, brushing past his nipples before one hand drifts down to his belly button. Pokes it. "Urgh, don't do that," he protests. It feels weird and he reacts on instinct, batting her hand aside and she snickers, playful, that giddy energy still filling the room. He kisses the laugh out of her mouth, tongue curling against the inside of her teeth and she moans, a muffled, wanting sound that makes his cock twitch.

Draco's fingers go to her shirt as they kiss some more – she's wearing one that buttons down the front, and he unbuttons it nimbly as he pushes kisses into her, and her fingers clutch at his upper arms, her mouth slanting and eager against his. Under her shirt, Hermione wears only a thin vest, and her breasts are soft and warm when he palms them gently. He pulls her vest up out of her leggings and slides his hands beneath it, over her abdomen, and oh Merlin, her skin is like hot silk. He pokes her belly button teasingly, and she makes an indignant sound into his mouth and pulls away, huffing a laugh. "Hey!"

"You started it, Granger," he tells her with a half-smile, infected by her mood, and tugs her back to him, his hands light at her wrists – always careful. But she's grinning as he ducks his head and nuzzles her throat, stripping her shirt down her arms and letting it fall to the floor. A series of breathless, squeaking laughs huff out of her as he wraps his arms around her and places wet and nibbling kisses under her ear. Her hands pat at his head and grab fistfuls of his hair as she squirms, giggling. His arms loop around her and he kisses her ear, jaw, chin, the corner of her mouth, her nose, her eyebrow, all sloppy and teasing as he backs her toward the bed. She's laughing. It's fucking wonderful.

They tip onto the bed, and he catches himself on his hands above her. Her hair is everywhere, and he smoothes it back from her face. One wild section flops right back over her eyes, and he sweeps it off her face and twirls the offending section of hair into one thick twist, tucking it behind her ear as he dips his lips down to hers. She makes a funny, shuddering little gasp as he twirls it, but then he's kissing that away. Her mouth is so soft, and so sweet. So pliable, and motionless, and she's shivering, and – "Hermione?" Draco pulls back and looks at her, dread creeping up cold and thick. Her eyes are open, but she's not there, staring blankly at the ceiling. Her breath is coming in little panting gasps through her mouth now that he's not kissing her.

Oh shit. He doesn't know what he's done to trigger it, but she's like she was after the dinner. That thought makes him remember it sharply, and rage and horror rise up sickly in him. They'd done things he can barely stand to remember while he'd just sat and watched, and smiled. As he scrambles up and off the bed, she just lies there, with her hands lax at her sides like a corpse, still utterly gone behind the eyes. Catatonic. Feeling sick to his stomach, Draco does much the same as what he did after the dinner, once they had finished with her and he'd been able to take her back to their room. He talks to her reassuringly as he gently sits her up, and she moves with him, unresisting and obedient, although she's frowning now. Her eyes squeeze shut. There are tears trickling out from beneath her lashes.

She's coming back, that awful moment of absence passing. A terrible relief washes through him.

"It's alright. It's okay. Come on. There we go. You're alright. You're safe. It's okay," he says, a litany of useless reassurances spilling from his lips as he gets her settled on the edge of the bed and crouches at her feet. "It's over, Hermione. It's just me. You aren't there anymore." Her hair is falling forward over her face as she drops her chin, and he reaches up to push it back, and she flinches away with a whimper. Her fear of him is like a knife to the gut. He drops his hand. "It's okay," he makes himself say, afraid to touch her now, not knowing what to do as she sits there trembling, hugging herself. He doesn't know how to help her. "You're safe, Hermione." At least when he says it now, it's true. She is safe.

Time passes – over half an hour by the clock – and eventually, Draco falls silent as she sits there with her head down and her hair hiding her face, breathing in ragged little sips. He settles cross-legged and still shirtless at her feet in the afternoon sun, thinking of the mansion and the way she'd sat in her armchair, and how he'd fallen asleep at her feet more than once as she huddled in that chair silently, lost in pain. He stares at his hands in his lap and feels so fucking useless . He looks up when he hears a strangled sob. She's crying. Her face buried in her hands, shoulders shaking, and Draco swears silently, hating this. Despising it. Hating himself for whatever he did to trigger it – and he's been trying to figure that out as he sat there at her feet, and all he can think is that it's the particular way he touched her hair.

Something so fucking simple. Touching her hair.

And there's nothing Draco can do. He just sits and listens to Hermione cry – watches her fall apart even as she holds herself stiff and frozen, as if moving will destroy her – and he's too scared to touch her, in case he makes it worse. He tells her he loves her. He tells her it's okay. He tells her he'll do whatever she wants, whatever she needs, she only needs to tell him and he'll do it. She's in control. She's in charge. It feels like forever before she abruptly slides off the edge of the bed, and all but flings herself into Draco's lap. An armful of shaking, tear-wet, clutching girl burying her face into the crook of his neck as she plasters herself against him.

The dam has broken, and she clings to him, weeping uncontrollably. "I – I wish I – could just – forget," she gasps wetly between heaving sobs, and Draco holds her close and careful, his heart cracking, trying not to cry himself. His hands smooth up and down her spine – avoiding her hair just in case, although he has a mouthful of it, and it's tickling his face. "The – the dinner," she gets out as if trying to explain, and Draco holds her tighter, rocking slowly side to side as if she's a child, shushing her gently.

"I know," he says softly, wanting to take apart every single wizard who'd been in that fucking room. Who'd hurt her. To break them into bloody chunks. To make them scream as he rips them open. "I know, love. I know. I'm so sorry." He rocks her ceaselessly, and her face is wet against his skin, and her fingers dig into his back. "I'm so fucking sorry." He wonders if there could've been a way to shield her from what they'd done. He couldn't have avoided taking her to the dinner, but he wonders if he should have obliviated her afterwards. If he should've given her a potion to make it blurry and dark in her mind. Has he failed her? Should he have done more?

"I'm so sorry."

"Stop saying sorry," she gasps during a break in her sobs, thumping her fist against his shoulder. "It's not your fault!" But it feels like his fault. Draco remembers sitting there making pleasant conversation as they used her, and she wept, and sobbed, and screamed, and begged with raw desperation for him to save her, and it feels like his fault. He'd smiled, and laughed, and made small talk about using her, and about how much prettier she looked weeping, and listened to them talk about how she felt. How good she felt. How slick she was, once she began bleeding. How well she choked for them. How she looked better with her face covered in their cum.

He gags.

His head falls forward against hers, face blindly burying in her hair – no thought of avoiding triggering her now – and he breathes in the scent of her. Clean and sweet. Fresh. That night, she'd smelled of blood, sweat, and other things he doesn't want to think about. That he can't stand to think about. "I'm so sorry," he gasps, and he's nearly crying now, his eyes stinging as his stomach roils, and he clings to her tighter. She makes a startled, hiccupping sound and stiffens for a second, and then her hand pets over his hair, and she makes a shaky, hitching shush of reassurance through her own tears.

"I'm sorry," he says again, rocking her in his arms as he tries to wrestle himself back under control, and the day feels dark. A cloud has fallen over the sun.

It takes a long while before Hermione's calm enough to disentangle from him, a hollow sort of exhaustion etched into her face as she climbs off his lap and slumps beside him on the floor. He scoops her up like a child, settling her into their bed like he used to at the mansion. Tucking the blankets around her, and – very carefully – brushing the hair off her face. "I'm sorry," she says in a very small voice, her eyes huge in her face, and he shakes his head.

"Don't," he says. "Don't ever be sorry."

It's a stark reminder that things haven't been fixed, not by a long shot, and it's a stark reminder that while they're moving forward, it won't be simple or without setbacks. Just because they've made new memories, it doesn't mean the old ones are erased. They still linger, waiting to be triggered.

He brings Hermione dinner in their room that evening and has to coax her to eat.

But then later that night, while they spoon together in bed, she turns to him and kisses him gently, and it somehow slides into hours of slow, luxurious intimacy. She sets the pace and the tone, and it's careful and easy at once. Kissing and touching, shedding clothes like autumn leaves, searching over each other's bodies before his mouth finally finds her cunt, and he licks her until she comes on his tongue. And then, when he sits back on his knees between her legs, wiping her juices from his lips with no thought of doing anything else on his mind – not after what happened earlier – she pulls him down to her. She takes his dick in her hand, lifting her hips and guiding it inside the soaking wet, tight heat of her, and Merlin, he loves her so much.

Days go past in some fragile, carefully constructed bubble. Happy but delicately balanced. Always edged with a dark underbelly. There's always the past, a spectre looming. And no one has any idea what the future will hold. But the present? The present is good, right now.

Every time Draco is in Lupin's office while the older wizard is there, Hermione feels jittery, wondering if he'll ask Lupin about fighting. His knee is healing fast, and if he wanted to join the active Order members on a mission, he'd probably be cleared for it. But he doesn't ask. Not yet. And Lupin keeps his word and doesn't say anything. She has a respite, for now, and she embraces it. She doesn't know what she'll do if he does ask. The thought of Draco going out there still terrifies her because no matter what he's said, she doesn't believe he values his own life. He called himself expendable; she can't forget that. That had been the truth, in his voice. He couldn't take that back, no matter what he said. No – he would have to convince her he didn't feel that way any more.

Maybe sex will be enough to make him want to live, she thinks wryly sometimes in the wake of it, the times that it doesn't go awry in some embarrassing way. In the past five days, Hermione has learned that blowjobs are not something she's currently capable of without throwing up, and that twirling her hair – such a random, harmless thing – is a bad idea. But even those headlong spins into nightmare don't feel quite as leaden or crushing as they did. And Draco is there, of course, always. When she falls apart, he's there to hold her together. To bring her back.

And there's just something in the air that feels good.

It feels like spring. Not just the weather, which is indeed slowly warming, but something more ephemeral. A general feeling of growth, and freshness. Everything outside is beginning to come back to life, and like a cliché, Hermione feels like she might be too. Hope is burgeoning in her chest. She wakes up and feels okay more often than not; like she has today, feeling warm and content as she swam up to consciousness in the early dawn.

Things don't seem entirely hopeless anymore – Hermione's constant despair has lifted, after months. There is light glimmering at the end of the tunnel, and she can see it. She's reaching for it. She finds herself starting to believe that perhaps she might actually be able to be functional, one day, if they win the war. She's damaged but perhaps not entirely broken.

If Draco didn't want to fight for the Order, then life would be as close to perfect as Hermione could hope for right now as she lies snuggled on her side under the blankets, listening to the early morning birdsong as pale dawn seeps through the crack in their curtains, and watching Draco sleep, sprawled on his stomach with his face turned toward her. He looks so peaceful this morning.

His features are softened and his expression smoothed, all the tension gone. The little crease between his brows is absent, his mouth full and lax, lips just barely parted, and the dark blonde fans of his lashes flutter slightly as his eyes move beneath his lids with their faint tracery of veins. A hint of stubble glints pale gold along his jaw, and above his top lip, and she knows if she kisses him, he'll feel like sandpaper. Aside from the thin purple seam bisecting his left cheek – the slowly healing whiplash scar – his face looks unscathed by war.

He's wearing nothing but black boxers, and he's shoved the blankets half off in his sleep, and Hermione finds herself transfixed by the sight of him in the half-light. His shoulders are broad, and his back is a jagged topography of shadow and light catching over his scarring, rendering him starkly. Beneath the scars lies muscle; defined lines of it that he's slowly honing, and Hermione won't complain about that. He's going from thin and toned to lean, wiry muscle, and it suits him. He's beautiful. His left hand is tucked just under his chin, fingers twitching a little in his sleep.

She can't resist. She reaches out and ghosts her hand along his forearm, fingers trailing lightly alongside the Mark. Shock jolts in her chest as his hand snaps out and grabs hers, sliding up to encircle her wrist. Eyes still shut, he mumbles, "H'mione," and then flops his arm over her sleepily. "You alright?" It makes her heart feel constricted within her chest that his first thought is of her, and whether she's okay.

"Yes," she whispers, and he hums, drowsy and sleepy, eyes slitting open a crack, hazy grey eyeing her before his lids slid shut again, as though weighed down with leaden weights.

"Good. Love you," he says through a yawn, and oh, the way he says that, all slurred and sleepy. His arm is warm and heavy over her and Hermione wriggles closer, a familiar feeling stirring in the pit of her stomach as he hums again and his hand slides down her body. His fingers splay and grip firm over the curve of her bum, his thumb rubbing through her knickers in absent, little circles, and that familiar feeling grows. Warm and swirling. She kisses the sharp point of his chin, and he really does feel sandpapery rough. She smiles.

Arousal swims lazy in her veins as Draco dips his chin without opening his eyes and kisses her properly on the mouth. His lips are plush and the fleeting slide of his tongue sends delicious shivers through her. "You just don't want me to sleep, do you?" he says, a smile in his voice, and Hermione drops a chaste kiss on his lips again, and they curve beneath hers.

"No," she says decidedly, and nuzzles at the underside of his jaw. As far as she knows, he had no nightmares last night, and while she'd woken with a bad one around midnight, she'd slept dreamlessly and heavily besides that, and she feels happy this morning. Not for any reason, not because anything good happened – just a general feeling of well-being. It's a feeling she's still getting used to – it feels like a trap, sometimes. For a while, she had thought she might never feel it again. And now that she does, it's hard to trust the feeling. It feels like, at any minute, the rug is about to be ripped out from under her feet, as though everything is going to fall apart, to tumble down a dark hole.

Her stomach squirms, uncertainty and dread lurching up.

But then Draco's laughing quietly at her 'no' and kissing her cheek as he bundles her closer, his hand squeezing her bum blatantly, kneading it. She lets out a little whimper and pushes into his hand. "What do you want then, Granger?" he asks her, all sleepy-husky and teasing, as he brushes his lips over hers, his eyes open now, his gaze somewhere between amused and aroused. She feels heat flush up beneath her skin as her fingers push his fringe back – his hair is so pretty in this dim morning light, nearly white. And so soft. It sticks up a little where she's shoved it back and looks silly, and she hides a smile.

"You," she murmurs in answer, and his eyes flash hungry and she forgets about his hair.

"Really?" he asks, careful and hopeful, and bites his lip when she nods. They'd tried yesterday morning, when she'd discovered she couldn't put his cock in her mouth without throwing up. She swallows hard as she salivates sickly at the memory, and his eyes narrow as if he caught the movement. "Are you sure?" She nods again.

"I want to," she tells him, kissing his lower lip and sucking it into her mouth, biting it herself before she lets go and smiles at him. "Please? Make me feel good, Draco?"

"Mmph," he says inarticulately, kissing her, and things dissolve into warmth and pleasure. His hand sliding over her skin, and his tongue teasing her and licking tingling arousal into her that shoots straight through her insides like an arrow, making delicious things happen inside her; clenching muscles and hypersensitive flesh, and she squeezes her thighs together. She feels hot all over as he kisses her mouth, and her jaw, and wetly down her throat, nipping at her neck, and she squirms and makes a sound between a moan and a squeal as it sends zaps of pleasure down her spine like the sexual equivalent of static electricity.

And then his hands are on her and arranging them both with an efficiency she loves, laying her back and shoving up her vest like he's dying, like it's life and death, and then his mouth is on her left nipple, hot and wet. "Oh," she says faintly, and her hands grab the pillow on either side of her head. "Ohhh nnngh..."

Draco's sprawled long and lean beside her, his body pushed against hers, and she can feel his cock jabbing hard into her thigh as he mouths at her breasts one at a time, his hand behind her back so he can roll her forward to more easily reach her right one. She's helpful; pushing forward into his mouth, one of her hands sinking into his hair. He worships her breasts. Showers them with attention, and she can feel herself getting wetter and wetter, her body winding tighter, a delicious tension building. He's methodical and thorough. After his first, shockingly good assault, he takes it slow.

Stroking featherlight, and then pinching gently. Dotting wet, licking kisses all over Hermione's skin and making her moan with frustration as he just barely avoids her nipple. He teases. The bastard. Licking around her areola, and then pulling back before he hits the nub she wants him to just damn well suck on. She makes annoyed huffs and arches her back, trying to shove her nipple into his mouth and groans as he grins and dodges.

"Please," she begs and he relents, licking and sucking as his hand plays gently with her other breast, and then switches sides and repeats the process, and oh god, it's maddening and amazing. Before long, her breasts are tingling like crazy, and her nipples are so exquisitely hypersensitive that she actually can't take anymore.

"No, no – too much," Hermione gasps and shoves at Draco's head with the heels of her hands, and that's when he starts to move down. He kisses his way down each rib like a ladder, laying a kiss below her sternum, and then another just above her belly button, and then down, and down, and his fingers curl under the band of her knickers. They slide down her hips, and then all the way off as he kneels beside her and then he's sinking between her thighs with a sigh. Hands pressing them open, on his elbows and sliding his hands under her bum, lifting her up. Open mouth pressed to her vulva. Tongue sweeping flat and soft before swirling the tip of it around her clit.

Oh.

His tongue is a revelation, every time. Hermione didn't think the human tongue could be so many radically different things. Soft, hard. Pointed or flat. Forceful, or gentle. It can slowly, sweetly build a warm, liquid ecstasy that seeps through her easily and lullingly like a rising tide, or it can strike a sharp, raging pleasure immediately through her that lights her nerves on fire.

This time, it's soft and sweet.

Hermione reaches out blindly and grabs his pillow, shoving it behind her shoulders, and he pauses and looks up at her questioningly as she gets settled. She's propped up a little more, and now she can see. His hair falling over his eyes, which are silver and steel between the strands, and his mouth grinning before he lowers himself back to his work. She feels like a queen lounging back on her throne, as he worships her with his mouth. Pleasure wells up in her, radiating throughout her. His skin is ivory, and purple scarring, his shoulders flexing and shifting, and fuck, he looks so hot like that, with his face hidden between her thighs.

She doesn't close her eyes until she comes.