Legal: I own nothing.
Chapter 7
oOo-xXx-oOo
Hermione's cheeks flushed the most delightful shade when embarrassed, he realized, and Theo couldn't — nor did he wish to — avert his eyes at the captivating tableau in front of him. The halo of riotous curls framing her flushed face, the warm eyes that sparkled like onyx in the flickering lantern light, her lower lip a bright ruby red from where her teeth had worked it over.
In a word, she looked… ravished. His heart skipped a beat as affection and desire flooded through him, and it was all he could do to refrain from reaching across the table and being the one to lay claim to her appearance instead.
Over the years he'd witnessed her as she'd studied — in the library or in class — presenting in a similar fashion as she was now, with unruly hair, ink stained fingers and chewed lips from over-concentration; but never had he been afforded the view in such close proximity. He now delighted in noticing details such as a spattering of soft freckles that skimmed along her nose and upper cheeks, and how her left eye was larger than the right, but only slightly.
No one knew of his fascination with the witch in front of him. He'd been entranced by her for years —eons before the Yule ball, before it seemed the whole school had clued in to what he himself already had — but his captivation was not just of a physical nature. It had sprouted out of an admiration of her intelligence, her tenacity, her silvered tongue and her ability to give back as well as she got — and typically better — and had grown from there.
He'd been utterly besotted, and as his interest in her grew, he became extremely careful to lock it all away; back to the deepest recesses of his mind, lest that information fall upon the wrong ears or tongue.
Information was the highest form of currency in his world, and as such, he much preferred to play pauper whilst silently amassing his fortunes.
It had been one of his most closely guarded secrets — his fascination with the forbidden fruit — and it was only now, with the threat of Voldemort eliminated and his father removed from the equation, that he felt he could pursue her acquaintance.
Unashamedly and publicly.
To hear that she herself had been observing him, for years it seemed…
Well, it'd be a lie to pretend he was anything short of floored, extremely flattered, and desperate to hear more.
"Well, erm…" she shifted in her seat and let out a huff of what he assumed to be annoyance at having to actually answer. He wasn't polite enough to let the subject drop, and unlike Draco — who assumed the world hung on his every move and would have taken her interest as his due — Theo couldn't believe that he had attracted her attention, nor retained it like she inferred. He craved to know why.
It wasn't like he stood out in a crowd. He made damn sure of that! And he'd never noticed her eyes linger on him except for once, in the library during fifth year, after the Ministry fiasco that had landed his father back in Azkaban for a stretch.
He'd felt her eyes, but not the accompanying looks of judgment, anger or disgust thrown by others. Just… eyes, quietly observing.
"You were always around," she was saying, "but, not, not really. Part of the crowd that was usually at loggerheads with my mates and I, but never actively participating in the vile taunts and bullying, nor really even a spectator. You were an enigma, for… other reasons as well." She said.
He lifted an eyebrow, subtly prodding her to expound further.
"Other reasons?" He smirked, his left cheek dimpling ever so slightly. He wasn't prone to vanities, but he was very fond of the dimple and the effect it seemed to have on others when he chose to flash it.
She sighed, rolling her eyes at him in exasperation but continuing on none the less. He could have sworn he saw her stare momentarily at the dimple.
He desperately hoped so.
"The biggest reason is simple. You're smart, Nott. Like, truly brilliant. I've seen you effortlessly master a spell or magical concept, sometimes even before me, and the look that comes over your eyes when you know the answer to a question is…" she broke off and gave a delicate cough, her cheeks flushing rouge once more. Biting her lip once more.
He desperately wished to know the cause of her blush, to know what caused her to clam up mid sentence. He wanted to be the one biting that lip, tasting the reddened flesh…
So focused was he on Hermione and his amorous thoughts, that he failed to acknowledge nor anticipate how perceptive a witch she was.
"Mostly, you defer." She replied, shrugging as if that explained it all. "That's why."
It was as if a bucket of ice had been turned upside down upon his head for how suddenly his flames of ardor were doused and his senses were springing to full alert.
"I defer, what, exactly?" He asked, casually, as if her possible answer wasn't setting his teeth on edge. As if the fine hairs on the back of his neck, the ones that rose when he felt threatened, were not currently standing at full attention.
She looked to be formulating her response carefully, deliberating internally before continuing without notice of his stilled, tensed, alert form.
"You just don't make sense. You constantly come in behind Malfoy and me for marks — even in the classes that he's not in I see you reign yourself back — when I believe you should be tied with me for class standing. But you never are, and I don't understand why… yes Malfoy's intelligent, a fact he so proudly parades to all and sundry, but you… you seem to go out of your way to downplay or redirect notice and others perceptions…"
She shrugged and opened the notebook in front of her to a fresh leaf of parchment while attempting to tuck a errant curl behind her left ear, without success.
"In any case," she huffed as the curl sprang loose and trailed up to rest near the corner of her eye once more, "that's the main reason I've observed you for as long and as often… I don't like when something or someone acts differently than they appear, or attempts to appear… it makes me unsettled. Twitchy. It's what makes me so adept at research, my tenacity to turn over rocks and uncover potential gems."
Theo sat back, completely unnerved.
'Damn her and her perceptions,' he thought, a chill seeping down his spine, through to the tips of his extremities.
"And you thought I might be a rock to overturn? That I might potentially house hidden gems?" He asked, in a very steady, very cautious tone. The tone that he rarely employed, the only tone that could make even Draco bestow respect and deference.
It appeared to have had no affect on the vexing witch in front of him.
"Potentially," she said thoughtfully and shrugged again, not seemingly aware of the undercurrents of tension emanating from him, or if she did; she was doing a smashing job of ignoring them completely.
"Have you mentioned these… thoughts, these conjectures, to anyone else?" Theo asked, employing all the years of pureblood training to mask his unease and dread.
She gave a short laugh and he realized belatedly why.
"Who would I tell, Nott? Honestly! I can just imagine the sort of conversation this would have stirred up had I mentioned my continued observations of you to either Ron or Harry."
She raised her voice mockingly and said, 'Hello boys.. erm, so I noticed Nott refusing to raise his hand in class today, even though I know he knew the answer! I saw him mouthing it. It's the third time he's done that this week. Malfoy even copies off his parchments and still Nott acts like he's the one struggling with the concepts, not other way round. Care to weigh in?'
"No, Nott," she said, voice returning to her normal pitch and tone, "that would not have gone over well at all. Tact and discretion are not their strongest attributes, lets just leave it at that."
"Red and gold to the core," Theo said dryly, and she nodded ruefully.
"Indeed," she replied, flicking the quill she'd picked up from the table around and through her fingers. Around and around she spun it, threading it through and around her nimble fingers, and Theo stared at the movement almost hypnotized as he attempted to organize his thoughts.
He was still reeling from her admission and he needed to regroup. He could feel years of underlying anxieties and fears attempting to creep past his occlumency shields, threading around looking for cracks.
It was extremely rare that he was taken by surprise, he prided himself on being constantly aware and unflappable in any and all situations; and in a heartbeat she'd bloody well thrown him from a soaring dragon without a wand or a hope.
Her perceptions had not just nicked the surface of his mask, they had fully fucking penetrated. Her perceptions had released his careful grasp upon his sensibilities, there were now too many emotions swirling, becoming overwhelming. He was furious, proud, confused, hell, even pleased that he'd held captive her notice for what appeared to be years but dammit! He wasn't good at processing emotional volatility, nor could he stand being vulnerable.
Never had, which was why…
'No Theo! Focus! Don't go opening doors that should remain closed!' He ordered himself, and dragged his consciousness back to the currently distressing information she'd just disclosed.
The tight control over his emotions, over his tongue snapped. Years of self discipline, eviscerated in his mounting panic; cracks were beginning to form in his mental shields, allowing sands of anxieties to pour through like they would a sieve. He couldn't stop himself from fearing the what-ifs, fearing the potential of all his past discretions and machinations to have been for nought had she been too obvious in her observations or vocal in her deductions.
He'd been so careful.
How could she, of all people, have seen through his mask?
Had others?
"Do you have any idea, Granger, what could have happened had anyone noticed you staring? Or figured out that which you had?" He growled, low and tense. His tone was so unlike any he'd used with her previously that Hermione's eyes widened like saucers and her mouth gapped before his words appeared to penetrate past her immediate shock.
He'd give her this, she didn't shrink away from his outburst, instead meeting him with fire of her own.
Even through the mounting haze of oppressing panic, he admired how glorious she was in her indignation.
Her lips thinned, her jaw bone slid forward obstinately and her eyes narrowed.
"Please give me some credit Nott!" She spat condescendingly. "I'm not an imbecile. It wasn't like I sat there mooning over you like a starving man does a leg of lamb. You weren't even aware of my scrutiny for Merlin's sake, and I know Slytherins pride themselves on being aware of their surroundings; so I obviously do know something about subtlety, about how to avoid detection and attention, thank you."
He made to speak but she cut him off, saying more gently this time, "Of course I thought of how it'd look, should anyone wish to notice. It would have been my neck, not yours, that would have been socially slit; I the societal interloper, you a member of established society. Can you imagine the gossip? A mudblood eye-stalking one of the heirs of the sacred twenty-eight… It wouldn't have been tolerated by your ilk, and most surely would have had me horribly mocked if not worse."
She laughed humorlessly, looking saddened and stung — either by the truth of her last statement or the impact of his previous words — and his heart clenched momentarily at having hurt her by his accusations but still too unnerved to respond with any rationality or logic. He didn't even correct her again her use of his most detested word, his mind was so frazzled.
"Not that I gave a toss about others opinions of me. Gave that up years ago. Had to for my own sanity…"
"I just…" he began but faltered, raking his hands through his hair, adding to his look of utter dishevelment.
Hermione peered at him and Theo watched as she seemed to realize how not ok he was in this moment.
"Theo?" She said softly. Gently, like how one would approach a wounded animal. "What has you so…?" She began but something stopped her and he was pretty certain it was whatever was currently displaying itself upon his face. He didn't like feeling out of control, it'd been years since he'd felt the ground shift below him as it was now. Since cracks had even attempted to permeate his occlumency shields.
Gone was the confident, collected Theo of earlier that evening. In his place sat a rapidly unraveling pureblood on the verge of a panic attack. Something he hadn't suffered from in years.
He didn't even get to relish hearing his given name upon her tongue, said so softly, a gentle caress of the word. He was too entrenched in needing to escape.
Hermione's warm chocolate eyes were staring at him now in surprise and wariness — along with something indiscernible — and he knew he needed to leave before he cocked things up, exposed himself further. Needed to get away from her perceptiveness and niceness… somewhere he could breathe.
"I have to go," he said, and flicked his wrist to secure his belongings back into his bag before hoisting it to his shoulder.
"I'm glad we're partners, Hermione, truly. But I… I have to…"
"Go," she whispered, waving toward from which he'd come, and the speculative contemplation upon her face did nothing to appease his feeling of of icy panic making its way through his veins.
He turned and hurried from the alcove — an 'I'm sorry' upon his lips — thankful it was after curfew and no one was there to witness the inelegant way he fled her presence. As he made his way briskly towards the double doors that would lead him from the library and out into the chilled corridors — their lanterns dimmed low and casting long shadows that danced upon the stone floor — he realized he'd slipped again.
He'd performed wandless magic, for the second time in two days, without thought to exposure.
Two times in two days after having gone three years undetected without a slip. Without even the slightest possibility of making one.
'Fuck, fuck, FUCK!' He roared, and kicked at the stone wall beside him in frustration and self loathing.
"Well I never!" Said the elderly matron in the portrait above where he'd just kicked. "No respect for —"
"Oh, just shut it." Snarled Theo to the old hag, who clutched her neckline tight and gasped as he turned and stalked off towards the corridor that led down to the dungeons. As his toe throbbed nastily inside his shoe, Theo worked to stem the severity of the inevitable panic attack by undertaking the task of reshelving and archiving his thoughts and memories behind his typically impermeable occlumency shields once more.