A/N: Hello there, everyone—how are you all doing?
I hope you're enjoying the fic, but I need to talk about something. When I first started writing this about 6–7 months ago, I didn't really have much writing skill. Honestly, my writing wasn't great—I just had an idea and went with it. Back then, I also had a lot more free time, so I wrote quite a lot.
Now things have changed. I'm starting to run out of chapters. I currently have about 8 chapters ready and around 10 older ones that still need editing. With work and personal life getting busier, I just don't have the time or energy to write new chapters consistently.
Because of that, a break might be coming. Writing is fun when you're doing it in your free time, but it becomes really difficult when you have a lot of other responsibilities. These days, I leave home around 9–10 in the morning and don't get back until 10 at night.
I'll still try my best to keep up with uploads, but I wanted to be honest with you all about the situation.
As always, thank you so much for your support. Please keep commenting, reviewing, and sending power stones—it really helps a lot.
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In the long, winding underground passage, two small points of light drifted and lingered — like Draco and Vega glimmering in a dark sky — following each other slowly through the dark toward Hogwarts Castle.
"Right. Summaries for me again the things you must absolutely never do." The boy held up his wand, long since returned to him, and his serious voice echoed through the empty tunnel.
"Draco! You haven't stopped lecturing me since you opened your eyes — more nagging than my grandfather!" Hermione said irritably. "Why do you have to go on like this?"
Honestly. When you were lying contentedly in the arms of your adorable boyfriend, stroking his platinum-blond hair in the gradually brightening light while birds called outside — having waited patiently for those mesmerising grey eyes to open — fully intending to whisper something sweet or perhaps steal a morning kiss, and the very first words out of his mouth were, "Hermione Granger, we are establishing some ground rules today" — well. All romantic feeling evaporated at once.
"Because it's necessary!" Draco ignored her annoyance and reminded her bluntly, "Who was it that got so drunk I had to pin them down on the sofa? Who spent most of the night whimpering with headaches and thirst, making a fuss about everything?"
"How should I know who that was—" she rolled her eyes in the dark and said, feigning innocence in a perfectly clear voice. "I don't remember any of it."
"You don't remember?" The light at the tip of his wand trembled with disbelief. "Nothing at all?"
"Nothing at all!" she said evasively. "Therefore, I refuse to accept any of your accusations. All anyone has ever told me is that I hold my drink perfectly well!"
"Have you ever had this much to drink in front of anyone else?" Draco's voice rose, and his chest clenched.
Using the faint glow of his wand-light, she glanced at him and said, forcing a defiant tone, "No."
Draco breathed a quiet sigh of relief.
Hermione couldn't quite hold the expression. Her guilty conscience lasted all of two seconds before defiance surged back.
Even so, who was to say he wouldn't use it as an excuse to exaggerate everything wildly?
Draco muttered, as if to himself, "What you got up to was already excessive, without any exaggeration required…"
She had spent the whole night tucked into his arms and kept him awake until dawn.
Who could have guessed that a Gryffindor's drinking habits would be quite so chaotic?
That wilful, reckless little drunkard!
She had shown no awareness of the length of her summer uniform skirt, no concern about the thinness of her white shirt, and appeared entirely oblivious to the effect she was having.
She had not only drunk far more than she could handle — she had got properly drunk in front of him and then, with every appearance of sincerity, invited him to hold her while she slept.
What made it all worse was that once they were in bed, she had called his name without rest.
If he didn't answer, she called again. If he did, she stopped — and entered another mode entirely: snuffling around in his arms like a small, determined puppy.
The calming effect of this would last two minutes at most. Then she would announce her head was aching and ask him to rub it. He would rub it, and she would start calling his name again, waiting eagerly for his response.
Round and round it went.
When she finally ran out of complaints, he thought at last she might settle. But she made a face and declared she was "very thirsty" — and then she pounced on him to find his lips.
Before Draco had any chance to react, she had already succeeded.
She was like a grapevine, desperate for water, joyfully winding herself around the sturdy hawthorn tree beside her and sighing with satisfaction.
She cupped his flushed cheeks in both hands, looked at him with tremendous determination, and kissed him soundly — making an outrageous request: "Open up. I need something to drink…"
Draco opened his lips in surprise, only to find them very thoroughly captured.
She sought him out with the tip of her tongue. It was an unprecedented, overwhelming sensation — unexpected and entirely unrestrained.
He sighed and pulled her closer.
In that moment he was, once again, absolutely certain of what they were to each other. He adored her — her faint air of command, her small spoiled streak, her sweet lack of restraint. Every movement she made, every innocent glance, every curious touch, every faint sound of pleasure — all of it aligned perfectly with whatever it was she stirred in him.
She wound her lush branches and vines around him, and with her vivid, living warmth, she revived him.
His once-hollow tree began to grow a heart again.
The joy of it — like a fledgling bird on the edge of first flight — fluttered wildly through his dazed chest.
And then came the endless internal struggle.
He was utterly captivated by her sweet, eager lips, intoxicated by her warmth. He could have let her kiss him forever. But he knew his own character too well — if this went on, he would absolutely lose control.
His thoughts were nearly gone. His mind was dissolving in the exquisite sensation of her. Summoning every last scrap of willpower, he drew her into one long, deep kiss — and then, barely, broke free. He pulled back. He lay still beside the girl as she went limp on the bed.
He forced himself to breathe. Forced himself to think.
He tried to give her enough water, using a straw and a great deal of patience.
Even this simple task managed to fire the imagination beyond all reasonable measure.
She became inexplicably obedient — following every instruction with trusting compliance. If the spectacle of that alone weren't enough to rattle a boy with a powerful instinct for control, the soft, struggling sounds she made as she sucked water through a straw certainly finished the job. They ignited certain wicked thoughts in his mind that he absolutely should not have been having.
She seemed quite naturally gifted at sucking. She applied herself very thoroughly.
Draco stroked her cheek with a dreamy sort of expression and praised her inwardly — good girl — and for one catastrophic moment wished he could simply devour her, or let her devour him, and see what happened.
But she was entirely unaware of it all. She leaned against the pillow, eyes sliding half-shut, and said sadly, "I feel awful… I can't sleep here… I need to find somewhere comfortable."
"All right, find wherever you like." He snapped back to reality immediately, tucked the disastrous thought away, and set the empty bottle on the bedside table.
The next second, she began to climb him like a vine that had finally had its fill of water — absolutely determined to locate the supposed "comfortable place" — and clamped onto him like a human bolster.
"Hermione — could you let me go?" he said with some difficulty, attempting to disentangle himself from the beautifully curved, soft-lipped, alarmingly warm vine twined around his increasingly fraught body.
"No!" she refused, with great force.
"Come on, let's find somewhere else, please —" He was in a terrible state, trying to ease away from her before he lost all sense; but she immediately looked pitiful.
"Don't push me away… I just found this spot…" she said, on the verge of tears, clinging stubbornly and refusing to budge.
"Fine. Stay." He surrendered, still clinging to the sliver of hope that if she stayed put, he could somehow keep himself focused and under control.
But before he'd even managed to arrange a single mental barrier, she murmured "it's so warm" and began fumbling haphazardly with the buttons of her shirt.
Merlin's beard. Draco glanced into the half-open neckline and discovered that, from this particular angle, certain aspects of her figure were lively enough to make any boy's head empty entirely.
He swallowed hard and seized her hand, preventing her from undoing another button and dealing him any further damage.
Or rather — she seized the opportunity to take his hand. Their fingers interlaced, and the little drunkard used both her hands to pin both of his.
"Hermione, stop—" Draco said urgently.
He looked up at her face — delicate, flushed, entirely too close — and gave up trying to look anywhere else. He felt as though his insides had been scorched to ash.
He looked up at his beloved little menace and asked, voice unsteady, "What do you actually want?"
The girl above him lowered her lashes, gazed at him with a hazy, half-focused look, and smiled enigmatically.
"I—" she blushed, then leaned close to his ear, barely whispering, "I want you… Draco…"
He shuddered so hard he nearly unseated her. She pressed on, voice proud and soft, brushing against the fine hairs near his ear: "Don't move… you're mine… you have to do as I say…"
Merlin. Her possessive, commanding manner was so completely captivating that Draco looked up at her with an infatuated expression and smiled despite himself.
He obeyed. He stayed still. She nuzzled his cheek happily, breathed deep, and announced with great satisfaction, "Honestly, you smell like heaven…"
Draco felt he was probably the most pathetic boy alive.
What sins had he committed in some previous life to deserve this — this particular test of will and physical endurance?
Hermione, with her rare and devastating coquettishness, had brought him to heel. Her unguarded touches had made resistance impossible. Her overly direct words had poured something very like a full vial of love potion straight into his chest.
And the tragedy of it: he was desperate, and yet far too honourable to cross the line.
Draco had never considered himself a gentleman. Yet here he seemed to have become something even worse.
A coward. An absolute coward.
He counted a hundred such terms for himself.
When he exhausted English, he continued in French, Spanish, and Latin.
He suspected ancient Greek had something equally apt, though perhaps only the very charming girl whose hands and feet refused to stay still would know exactly how to say it.
In his previous life, Draco Malfoy would have heard "I want you" and acted without hesitation — no thought for consequences, no thought for how she might feel come morning. But in this life, he had learned patience. Restraint. Care.
He did not want to ruin anything. Not anything that had to do with her.
She was completely drunk. He was not. She could be wilful and unrestrained under the influence of Firewhisky; he had no such excuse.
Of course he wanted her. Desperately. So much it had haunted his dreams. But this was never how it was supposed to happen — not while she was muddled and disoriented.
Hermione Granger was proud, sensitive, fiercely self-possessed, and in full command of herself when sober. She would never forgive herself for losing her head, and she would never forgive him for allowing it.
He could not risk it — he reminded himself of this, again and again — and this, and only this, was why he was still sane.
Eventually, after a considerable interval of blushing and private suffering, she had her fill of him and found a comfortable position of her own.
Yes — she nestled against him, pressed her ear to his chest, listened intently to his heartbeat, and laughed to herself, soft and innocent and happy, as though she were the finest, warmest blanket in the world — folding around him, making him afraid to breathe.
In short, Hermione had been absolutely right. Beds were dangerous. Extraordinarily dangerous.
But now, having dragged himself reluctantly out of last night's memories, Draco was furious to learn she remembered "absolutely nothing."
He exhaled a breath's worth of the anger that had been building in him since dawn into the cold tunnel air, and tried again. "Hermione Granger. Tell me what you are never to do again."
Knowing she was in the wrong, Hermione accepted her fate and repeated, with great reluctance, what had been covered approximately a thousand times since they'd got up that morning.
"All right. First: never drink more than three butterbeers in front of anyone other than you—"
"Not just butterbeer — no alcohol at all. And the amount depends on the strength. Flame Whiskey, for example — I think half a glass would have you on the floor…" Draco added, rambling on as he led her forward.
Hermione rolled her eyes silently in the dark, feeling quite helpless in the face of his meticulous control.
This was entirely her own fault for getting caught in the first place.
Merlin, where had the aloof and independent Draco gone? He seemed to get louder and more particular every single day. Although, she admitted privately, he could still be considered somewhat endearing.
She waited patiently through the rest of his commentary, then pouted and continued when he finally demanded it: "Secondly, never assume you can overpower a man on physical strength alone… even one who looks slight…"
"What do you mean, slight — am I slight?" Draco asked sharply.
Had she just subtly insulted him?
Perhaps she required a more thorough education on the difference between looking slender and being weak?
"I would never think that now… How was I supposed to know what you were like under all those robes… you look so perfectly harmless on the outside…" Hermione murmured.
She had wisely replaced "lean and soft" with "perfectly harmless" to avoid another outburst, and was privately grateful for the darkness concealing the colour in her cheeks.
Draco was satisfied. He straightened slightly and continued with an air of great authority: "Never surrender your wand except when facing me… Also, you should learn some non-magical defence. If you lack physical strength, compensate with intelligence. Learn to target vulnerable points on the body, and think about what tools you have available…"
"I thought you'd only ever tell me to keep my wand on me!" Hermione said in genuine surprise. "Don't wizards assume a wand can solve everything?"
"What do you mean, wizards like us?" he asked, puzzled. "Where does this prejudice come from?"
"Those who consider themselves above Muggles," she said pointedly, refraining from adding pure-blood wizard and all the sarcasm that phrase carried. "Who think anything Muggles invent is rubbish, and a wand can handle everything—"
"A wand is merely the most fundamental instrument — a vessel through which a wizard channels their magic," Draco said carefully.
"But you've always treated your wand as though losing it were a catastrophe. You didn't seem to think it was quite so simple," Hermione said.
"Much of that is because mine is a destined wand."
"A destined wand?" Hermione asked. "Is that what Mr Ollivander meant — the wand choosing the wizard?"
"Precisely. You'd be hard-pressed to find another that conducts your magic so smoothly, or understands your intent so well. Anyone else's wand will always feel clumsy by comparison."
He thought briefly of his previous life, when even his mother Narcissa's wand had refused to understand him — let alone a stranger's.
That was why he had gone to the Room of Requirement to confront Harry. He had needed his own wand back.
"Like when Ron used to have his brother Charlie's old wand, which never worked properly?" Hermione asked, curious.
"Exactly. The wrong wand holds a wizard back. Haven't you noticed that Ron's improved considerably since getting his own destined wand?" Draco reminded her. "Professor McGonagall certainly hasn't pulled him up in Transfiguration in quite some time."
"That makes sense. I never expected you to observe Ron so closely." Hermione glanced at him in mild surprise. "You actually pay a great deal of attention to the people around you in private — even while putting on an air of not caring in the least."
Draco's expression grew complicated.
Hermione Granger, I am keeping a very close eye on every man who comes into your life. Any potential threat will be dealt with — by whatever means necessary, he thought, saying nothing.
"But what does it actually feel like to have an incompatible wand? I'd have to ask Ron, or Neville." Hermione, entirely unaware of his private thoughts, carried on cheerfully. "From what you're describing, they sound almost like living things…"
Seeing her genuine interest, Draco set those particular thoughts aside.
"Longbottom's wand isn't his own either?" he asked casually.
"Oh — that's his father's, apparently," Hermione said. "Now that I think about it, Neville's struggles with wand-work might partly be down to that. He's always done well in Herbology, which doesn't require one. Should I mention it to him…"
Draco felt a prickle of irritation at her apparent keenness to play nursemaid to other boys.
He needed to redirect her attention immediately.
"No need to ask them. I know exactly what that feeling is like," he said, with a note of mystery.
"Really? Tell me?" she asked at once.
Draco cleared his throat with great drama and dredged up an explanation: "Being poorly matched with a wand is… awkward in a very specific way. Like wearing shoes that don't fit. The wand resists you — it fights you, almost. There's a mental friction to it."
"So wands have something like a will of their own?" Hermione recalled what Ollivander had said when she first went to Diagon Alley, and extended the thought further. "Your destined wand helps you release your magic more fully?"
"Yes. It maintains a more stable, more fluid, more personal response during casting," Draco said.
"A considerable advantage in spellwork," Hermione said with a smile, running a thumb along her own wand. "I ought to thank mine properly. It's rather contributed to my record in Transfiguration and Charms."
"Hermione, your wand helps you perform better — but it doesn't make you invincible. There are still meaningful differences between wizards in ability and magical power."
He posed a question: "Think about a duel. If both wizards had their own destined wands and knew the same spells — what would decide the outcome?"
She considered this. "Spellcasting skill, perhaps. Flexibility, proficiency under pressure. And the wizard's own innate magical power?"
"Exactly. Inherent magical power matters enormously." His tone carried approval, and he seized the opening. "Do you remember the Dark Arts lesson — Barty Crouch Junior, disguised as Professor Moody?"
"Who could forget that?" she said immediately. "Are you talking about his contempt for students who attempted the Killing Curse on him?"
He smiled with satisfaction at her quickness. "That's the one. He said it would barely give him a nosebleed."
"Do you think he was telling the truth?" Hermione sounded sceptical. "I used to wonder if he was trying to frighten us. How could it really be so trivial?"
"I don't think he was lying," Draco said carefully. "The Unforgivable Curses have a critical weakness: their effectiveness depends on the caster's intent. A Killing Curse cast without genuine intent to kill may not be fatal."
"Like my Patronus Charm, which requires a strong, clear conviction to conjure properly," she said. "Speaking of which — when are you going to manage yours? Haven't you found your happiness yet?"
"I have." He squeezed her hand. "But… perhaps it isn't quite enough yet."
"Then make more happiness!" she declared confidently. "If there's anything I can do—"
"Believe me, you've already contributed considerably in that area," he said absently, thinking of her masterful vine impression from the previous evening.
"That sounds rather perfunctory," she said suspiciously. "Draco, I shall be checking on this periodically. Don't think you can let it slide just because progress is slow."
"I'm not letting anything slide." He coughed lightly. "Shall we return to the Unforgivable Curses? I think power and intent are both relevant factors."
Amid her sceptical hum, he continued: "Consider Barty Crouch Junior himself — twelve OWLs, extraordinary raw magical ability. Power enough to break free of the Imperius Curse."
Hermione gave a sharp breath of reluctant admiration.
"I know he's monstrous — everything he did appals me. But there's a sadness to it, too, isn't there?" Her voice held a note of melancholy. "Such a brilliant mind, and he ended up… there. His father died haunted by it. Where does something like that go so terribly wrong?"
"I couldn't say. Only he would know," Draco said quietly.
"I suspect he practised those Unforgivable Curses extensively — which is why he could describe them with such frightening fluency." Hermione gripped his hand tighter. "How many people has he tortured? How many lives has he ruined? Talent applied to cruelty is a catastrophe."
"Yes. A catastrophe." Draco's expression was shadowed in the dark.
In his previous life, he had been an agent of exactly that sort of catastrophe. He had been precisely the kind of person she despised.
If she knew the things he had done, she would loathe him — just as she had in that other life.
Would she still hold his hand like this? Draco was suddenly, quietly, very unsure.
After a moment, Hermione spoke again, her voice brightening: "Draco — I think I understand what you mean about differences in magical power. A Muggle couldn't cast spells even with the most powerful wand ever made, could they?"
She explained her reasoning eagerly. "Because magic itself is an innate gift, and the wand merely helps channel it. The wand is a conduit — the magic comes from the wizard."
"Precisely." Draco tried to set his unease aside and keep his voice level. "And some wizards can cast spells without a wand at all — wandless magic. Though that's somewhat beside the point."
"Wandless magic — another term I've never encountered." She laughed with delight. "You always manage to tell me something new, Draco. I enjoy this."
"The pleasure is mine." He listened to her laughter in the darkness, and the cold weight in his chest eased a little.
"What I really want to emphasise is that a wand isn't the only thing that can cause serious harm. If you're disarmed — are you simply going to accept that and wait for whatever comes next?"
"You always criticise Harry for relying too much on his wand, and yet here you are telling me to think beyond it," she said with amusement. "You're quite contradictory."
"His fault is undervaluing his wand. Most wizards' fault is relying on it exclusively. Both errors are dangerous — particularly in a real fight."
"Are you teaching me duelling, then? An undefeated duelling champion?" Hermione asked, smiling.
"I'm afraid these aren't techniques only for a duelling arena. They're for the kind of situation where the stakes are considerably higher." His voice had gone quiet.
"The way you talk about it sounds as though you've actually been through a battlefield," she said lightly.
She was as perceptive as ever. Draco went silent.
Yes. The battle he would never forget — the one that had shredded his pride, his convictions, and very nearly his soul.
Even now, four years removed from it, the memory of his panicked flight during the Battle of Hogwarts made him shudder.
It was then he had understood how weak his defences were. How laughable his practical knowledge of combat.
Since his rebirth, he had worked to correct both — combat skills, spell repertoire, reaction time.
He would never again be at anyone's mercy. He would not leave those same regrets behind.
Draco Malfoy's previous life: a catalogue of things he would never repeat.
It wasn't until the war broke out that he had finally understood the truth about himself. He had still been living in some sheltered, nihilistic world, convinced he was the exceptionally talented and promising young heir of the Malfoy family, lacking only the right opportunity to prove himself.
Meanwhile, Harry and Hermione — and so many others — had long since grown up. They could tell right from wrong. They were willing to risk their lives for what they believed in. They stood alone against evil and didn't flinch.
Those were the great questions of a human life that Draco Malfoy had never been given the chance to answer — or had refused to face.
And it wasn't until war arrived that he was forced to acknowledge the one truth he had avoided:
The Malfoys had chosen the wrong side. The dark side. The side that led to ruin for themselves and everyone around them.
He had been wrong. Entirely wrong. And he had gone so far down that path — could he have turned back?
When he saw the teachers and students of Hogwarts prepare to fight to the end, his flight had stuttered.
He had watched Professor McGonagall conjure the last defenders of Hogwarts — suits of armour, caked in dust, no longer gleaming but marching forward with a weight that struck through him.
He had seen the Hogwarts graduates rushing back toward the castle against the tide of people fleeing it, wands out, faces set.
He had seen Professor Slughorn — a Slytherin, of all people — standing alone in a corner of the courtyard, trembling as he cast a defensive web into the sky. Protego Maxima. Fianto Duri. Repello Inimicum.
Some Slytherins had stayed.
Were Gryffindors the only ones who thought of Hogwarts as home? Hadn't those seven years been the most important of his life as well? Weren't there beautiful memories buried beneath those ruins?
This had been his home. No one should have trampled on it.
But Draco had not been brave enough to stay and fight.
He had seen young faces — students who had been shouting Expelliarmus only moments before — lying dead on the ground. That was what had broken him.
He had not been prepared for the Death Eaters. He had witnessed enough death and absorbed enough fear that it had eaten through his bones.
In that moment, Draco had seen his own soul for what it was:
Draco Malfoy had never been noble. He had never possessed the sterling moral core he'd imagined.
He was foolish, blind, selfish, cowardly, and small.
He hated his weakness at that time with an intensity that had not faded. He hated wagging his tail for Death Eaters. He hated lowering the head he had always held so high, in exchange for the barest sliver of survival.
Even if you had the will, he had told himself, you lacked the power. You would have only thrown your life away. He had believed it. It had been a convenient thing to believe.
He had been afraid of dying. He hadn't wanted to die meaninglessly.
He had not known then that in choosing to abandon Hogwarts, he had saved his life and damaged his soul in equal measure.
After the war, his soul had been perpetually gnawed at. The ruins of Hogwarts had grown in his mind. Those empty-eyed faces had surfaced without warning — questioning him, tormenting him, mocking him.
Only the Mind-Freezing Charm could stop the thoughts. Freeze the tormented parts. Grant him a moment's peace.
Why was he thinking of this now? He had sealed those memories away. Why were they surfacing—
As he struggled against the ache in his chest, the girl's voice came through — clear and bright, dispersing the rising dark.
"Draco, what did you mean by 'beyond a wand'? I know about some Muggle weapons — but are they actually effective against wizards?" Hermione asked.
"If you act quickly, strike unexpectedly, and use whatever you have properly — there is no useless weapon." Draco came back to himself. "Think about it. A wand can usually respond to one wand — not six at once."
"Does the same hold true for Muggle weapons?"
"Exactly." He pressed her along. "We could Vanish a single dagger thrown at us. But what if a dagger came from behind at the same moment — or five or six from different directions? Could you respond to all of them in time?"
"You'd need extraordinary alertness," she murmured. "You'd need to track every target — direction, number, speed — and cast on all of them at once."
"Right. Which means, beyond spellcasting, there are other things worth training — vigilance, defensive instinct, situational awareness, speed, agility, combat thinking." Draco kept his voice low. "In my opinion, some knowledge of physical self-defence is essential for you."
Even someone like Bellatrix — powerful, mad, unpredictable — practised regularly with daggers and blades.
In a dire enough moment, a Muggle weapon might achieve something a wand could not.
"Draco, why are you thinking so much about all of this? Wait—" Hermione paused. "Have you been training yourself in these things? Is that why you always know spells well beyond our year — so that when you face Voldemort or his Death Eaters someday, you won't be caught defenceless?"
"You have a very sharp eye." Something meaningful settled into his voice. "There are Death Eaters beyond McNeil in the world — some a great deal more dangerous."
"Like Barty Crouch Junior, who managed to impersonate Professor Moody for an entire year," she said, with a shiver of remembered fear.
"And others still at large. Even those in Azkaban are not necessarily there forever."
"Like Peter Pettigrew, who escaped once already," she said.
And Bellatrix, Draco thought grimly.
He chose to be direct. "Those Death Eaters have never been exclusively after Harry. They're after anyone who might stand in their way. We can't guarantee we'll never run into one."
"That's true," Hermione said gravely.
She realised in that moment how far his thinking extended beyond her own.
To her, Voldemort and his followers were terrifying, but always separated from her by some invisible barrier. As long as Dumbledore stood at Hogwarts, she had always felt — without quite deciding to — that they were safe.
But Draco seemed to live with a different understanding. From his manner, it was clear he regarded the Death Eaters as opponents he might face at any moment — not as distant threats, but as a real and present danger to prepare for.
And perhaps he wasn't wrong. A Death Eater had walked freely through the most heavily guarded event at Hogwarts — the Triwizard Tournament — without a single vigilant eye catching him. How invulnerable could the castle really be?
Think of what had been done to those champions in the maze. Think of Cedric's haunted face at the graveyard.
Danger might already be very close.
When they had chosen to defy Voldemort in secret, they had known they were dancing on the edge of a knife. That danger was not so different from the one Harry faced — not as different as Hermione had told herself.
She felt, in the quiet that followed, a strange kind of relief.
Because in that moment, Hermione seemed to understand the wariness and guardedness that she had once found cold in Draco. She thought she understood what Cedric had called unfathomable in him.
It wasn't a calculated strategy to deflect distrust, nor some ulterior motive. It was practice. Self-imposed pressure. A meticulous, thorough preparation made in advance for dangers he could see coming.
Hermione appreciated meticulous preparation. She always had.
And she was certain, now, that the boy walking beside her in the dark, sharing his thoughts with her in the quiet, did not distrust her.
"Your guardedness is directed at enemies, isn't it?" Hermione said, with conviction.
"Of course," Draco said softly. He paused, a thought catching him off guard. "Hermione — was it because of my wariness that you cast that Disarming Charm yesterday? Did it make you uneasy?"
"No — at least not any longer." There was a note of exhilaration in her voice. "I've seen a side of it today that I actually admire — forward-thinking, thorough. I may have misunderstood something yesterday."
"I'm glad," Draco said. A small doubt lingered at the back of his mind — he wasn't quite sure what she meant — but he did not ask.
He felt guilty enough for what he had kept from her. He was relieved she hadn't pressed further on the questions she'd raised about him.
This was fine. She wouldn't ask, and he wouldn't say any more. The status quo was enough.
As long as she didn't despise him the way she despised Barty Crouch Junior — that was all that mattered.
The conversation wound to a close. They walked together in silence, each caught in their own thoughts.
As they neared the castle, she took his hand and asked quietly, "But why?"
"Why what?" he said, confused.
In the dark, she said softly, "Draco — how does someone who never stops sharpening his alertness and reflexes get disarmed by me? I'm not that kind of duelling master. I'm certainly not your equal in a real fight."
Draco was quiet for a moment.
"I didn't even notice it happening—" he said slowly, after a pause.
"I don't believe you." She stopped walking. "You've never been disarmed. You're extraordinarily vigilant. How?"
"Perhaps it was because he'd had a lot to drink and wasn't paying attention…" Draco said, with a trace of unease.
"That's complete nonsense — you hadn't touched a drop of alcohol. You were drinking sparkling water all evening!" Hermione said, mercilessly accurate.
"I genuinely don't know! You've disarmed Barty Crouch Junior — perhaps your magic is simply too powerful, and I was overwhelmed—"
"That theory is completely absurd. I don't think you put up any resistance at all—" Hermione said bluntly.
"In any case — that's what happened. Congratulations on breaking my record." He tugged her forward and up the last stretch of the stone passage, and kept walking.
Hermione suffered quietly.
Draco. Slippery, infuriating Draco.
He was dancing around it entirely!
He had said it last night. I love you. Right there in his sleep.
And now that he'd woken up and gathered himself, he was going to pretend it hadn't happened. Hermione thought, flushing with equal parts indignation and embarrassment.
She needed a way to verify it.
"Draco — do you remember what happened last night?" she asked, as casually as she could manage, as though it were barely worth asking.
"The part where I rubbed your head and gave you water? Oh — you're welcome," he said lazily, guiding her out through the humpbacked, one-eyed witch's statue and into the soft grey of early morning.
She glanced at him. He seemed entirely untroubled.
She was certain of one thing: he had no memory of the kiss, of her placing his hand over her heart, of the words he had murmured.
Now what? Hermione frowned.
Did he truly love her? Was that whispered I love you a stray fragment from a dream — or a genuine truth rising from somewhere deep?
Could something that quiet and breathless really be a hallucination?
Would it seem too forward to ask outright?
What if he didn't remember? What if he had never meant it at all? How embarrassing would that be — for her to bring it up, earnest and hopeful, while he looked at her in bafflement?
Would it make her seem too eager? Too desperate for this to be real? Hermione turned these questions over and over in her mind, weighing them carefully, unable to arrive at anything definitive.
"Oh — by the way," Draco said not long after, in the same tone he might have used to discuss the weather, "do you remember what you said to me after I gave you water?"
"What — thank you?" Hermione asked blankly. "I was a bit confused by then, wasn't I? Come to think of it — we were kissing on the sofa at some point. How did we end up in bed?"
"You didn't say thank you at the time. But you've made up for it just now," Draco said, managing an expression of mild amusement, while privately breathing a quiet, complicated sigh of relief.
She had blacked out, then. Whatever she had confessed on the sofa, and whatever she had put him through in bed — she had no memory of it.
Well, he thought, with a dim pang of disappointment. Perhaps it had just been the butterbeer talking. Perhaps it shouldn't be taken seriously.
Yet those eyes had been so sincere. So vivid. Could feeling like that really be manufactured by alcohol alone?
But she showed no sign of remembering. And if he brought it up — was that not its own form of manipulation? A kind of emotional blackmail dressed up as asking?
He considered it. He turned it over. He decided:
Love was not something you could ask about the way you asked whether someone wanted toast. He didn't want to frighten her.
And so the two of them — each carrying their own careful, private thoughts — weighed their own hearts in silence, and arrived together at the portrait of the Fat Lady on the eighth floor.
In their mutual care for what they had — their shared, almost excessive caution — neither of them thought simply to compare what they were each guarding so closely.
"Well then—" he said.
"See you at breakfast?" she asked.
"I could eat an entire hippogriff," Draco said, with great drama.
"Draco! They are not food!" Hermione said, outraged on principle, before catching his expression and realising he was joking.
They both laughed, which woke the Fat Lady from a doze.
She glared at them with great offence: "It's you again. Why can't you come back at a civilised hour? Don't I deserve any peace? Seven days a week, round the clock, no breaks — I've had enough!"
"You get the whole summer off," Draco pointed out. "What exactly are you complaining about?"
"Who cares about summer! You Slytherin brat — heartless, terrible boy! No one understands my suffering! I should organise a portrait strike!" She swung the portrait hole open, still grumbling. "I'd rather be spending every weekend with Violet and the others. The Drunken Monk portrait has invited us several times already…"
With Draco's farewell kiss pressed to her forehead, Hermione Granger stepped through the portrait hole with a beaming smile.
She expected the Gryffindor common room to be deserted. It was barely past six in the morning — who else would be awake, on a day with no classes?
What she did not expect was to hear someone rise from the sofa behind her the moment she tiptoed through.
"Hermione. You're finally back."
Hermione turned around stiffly.
It was Ginny Weasley, holding a very impatient-looking Crookshanks. She stood behind the sofa, casting a weary, searching look at Hermione.
"Why are you up?" Hermione said, startled enough to nearly bite her tongue.
"Why have you only just come back?" Ginny asked, eyes full of suspicion.
"Oh — I got up very early and went out for a walk…" Hermione said, without thinking.
"I've been here since last night without moving. So — when exactly did you leave?" Ginny let Crookshanks go with an expression of long-suffering patience, walked around the sofa, and began examining Hermione's shirt without ceremony.
"Look at the state of this — no one would believe you'd just put it on this morning. That's yesterday's shirt, isn't it?"
Hermione met her gaze guiltily and said nothing.
"And I can smell butterbeer on you." Ginny sniffed, narrowed her eyes, and asked directly, "Where have you been? And what exactly have you been doing?"
In an instant, Hermione was reminded of Mrs Weasley's relentless pursuit of her mischievous twin boys.
She kept her mouth shut. She intended to keep it shut.
Was she going to tell Ginny that she had broken half the school rules in the past twenty-four hours?
She had illegally slipped off to Hogsmeade. Got herself thoroughly drunk. Successfully disarmed Draco Malfoy. Used the opportunity to, well, search him — fairly thoroughly — and then shared a bed with him for the rest of the night. As for the other things she'd done in between, she didn't dare even think about them. Compared to all of that, "spending the night out" was practically minor.
This is what Hermione Granger had been doing since yesterday afternoon, and every single item on that list was astonishing.
She would not confess. Not a word.
But Ginny Weasley, who could be startlingly sharp about everything except Harry Potter, crossed her arms and approached Hermione like a highly focused Auror. She circled her once — and then plucked a single hair from her robes.
A single, platinum-blond hair.
The colour said everything.
"Oh no—" Hermione closed her eyes.
"No — Hermione Granger — no — Merlin's garter belt—" Even somewhat mentally prepared for the worst, Ginny was still visibly staggered by the evidence. Her hand trembled as she held the strand up. "You and him — have you actually — isn't this moving a little fast?"
"I don't know what you're implying," Hermione said, attempting her most composed voice while repeating internally: Stay strong. Take a page from Draco's book. Deny everything.
"Don't know? Then tell me — where did you sleep last night? Please tell me it wasn't his dormitory." Ginny shuddered visibly at the thought.
And this was June. She was shivering.
"Of course not!" Hermione said, with full and genuine indignation.
She was perfectly justified on this point. The attic above the Weasleys' shop was not a Slytherin dormitory.
"Right — fair enough. If you'd walked into the Slytherin common room in daylight, they'd have had you marched to Snape and docked five hundred points before you'd got two steps in."
Hermione nodded quickly. "Exactly. You've definitely misunderstood, Ginny."
Ginny was not deterred.
"Can you swear, then, that you weren't with Malfoy last night?"
Hermione went quiet.
Her face turned red.
Ginny saw it immediately. That was answer enough.
"So you were with him." She studied Hermione's expression, let her imagination catch up, and went bright pink herself. "He's awful. You've only been together a short while, and he's already — he's already—"
Ginny couldn't bring herself to finish it, and changed course. "He's so — infatuated—"
Merlin above, she could not say anything more damning than that. She was afraid that if she spoke it aloud, it would become true.
She managed to control her words, but not her gaze — which swept over Hermione with the thoroughness of a Revelio, trying to determine exactly where that Slytherin had left his mark.
Under Ginny's scrutiny, Hermione's face went completely red.
When she thought of everything that had happened, she did rather feel it had all been rather a lot.
After a long silence, Hermione opened her palm and said, rather meekly, "The hair… I'll just take that back…"
"You should worry about yourself, not a strand of hair! You're getting more and more reckless by the day!" Ginny, as though handling something venomous, dropped the hair into Hermione's hand — then staggered back to the sofa and collapsed onto it in a state of great shock.
She lay still. Then she felt someone approach.
Hands on her hair. A gentle voice. "Poor Ginny — you waited up all night. It must have been something important."
Ginny opened her eyes. Looking up at Hermione's warm, sincere face, she felt the flame of her indignation gutter out.
"I just worry about you, Hermione. I'm afraid of you being deceived, or getting hurt. You have to look after yourself —" Ginny said softly. "I don't want you to pour everything into someone, only to have your heart broken."
At Hogwarts, there were many who were quietly pessimistic about this particular match.
Not only because Draco Malfoy's sharp, guarded character was the complete opposite of Hermione's warm openness — but because the young heir of Slytherin, whose family was famously devoted to pure-blood lineage, had been seen in public with a Muggle-born. No one believed such a pairing, with such an enormous gulf in bloodline and social standing, could last.
Students would whisper when they saw them together.
"Granger will be abandoned the moment his family reminds him what she is…"
"She puts all her brainpower into exams and none into common sense, doesn't she?"
"I suppose she had to have at least one weakness…"
How could Ginny ignore words like that, soaked in malice and gleeful anticipation of disaster?
She did, sometimes, worry. She worried about Hermione's future. And when she saw the genuine happiness in Hermione's eyes — undisguised, unguarded — she found it very hard to say anything that might crack it.
"Thank you, Ginny," Hermione said. "I know you're looking out for me."
Ginny sat up from the sofa and hugged her tightly.
Hermione patted her back — and then, entirely by accident, gave something away: "But he wouldn't hurt me. He never would. He's a very gentle person. I even disarmed him yesterday—"
"What?" Ginny pulled back at once, dejection vanishing in an instant.
Hermione blinked. The troubled expression had completely evaporated from Ginny's face, replaced by something very like excitement.
"You disarmed Malfoy?" she exclaimed. "I want to know everything. Tell me the entire story of how your boyfriend was humiliated."
Hermione, of course, could not tell the entire story.
She managed a vague summary: "There aren't many details. I cast a Disarming Charm and took his wand. He didn't notice until it was done."
"That's it?" Ginny frowned, not quite satisfied. "Was he angry?"
"Not at all. He was remarkably calm about it." Hermione recalled the cascade of events that had followed — none of which she could possibly share — and how he had been, in the end, almost endearingly compliant.
"Oh…" Ginny said, in a tone of private contemplation. "So he really does like you."
She wouldn't let herself say more. The little scheme she had suggested to Hermione — part reverse psychology, part small and quietly calculated test — had contained a very specific expectation. Based on every rumour she'd heard, Malfoy would have reacted badly. Instinctively. He would have cursed her, or worse. And the resulting trust crisis would have been instructive.
Instead, he had not reacted at all.
It was, Ginny admitted privately, surprising. She hated being disarmed herself — that particular loss of control was insufferable. Harry himself would have bristled. Even Ginny had her pride.
Did Malfoy have no pride whatsoever when it came to Hermione?
She swallowed her doubts, awarded Malfoy a provisional E — Exceeds Expectations — and decided to let this particular scheme end there.
"So what was it you wanted to tell me?" Hermione asked.
"Oh — Harry spoke to me after you left yesterday," Ginny said, with a smile she couldn't entirely contain.
"That's real progress!" Hermione said encouragingly. "What happened?"
"He actually came to me," Ginny said, a note of pride in it. "After he finished speaking with the Creevey brothers, he brought Crookshanks back and said, 'You seem very fond of this cat…'"
"Crookshanks played his part beautifully," Hermione said, grinning. "I shall reward him with some particularly good dried fish."
"And Harry thanked me — for smoothing things over at dinner yesterday, making it less awkward…" Ginny's expression went slightly dreamy. "And he knew about how Ron and I had tried to get the match suspended from the stands, and thanked me for that too…"
"Wonderful — and how did you respond?" Hermione asked, settling in beside her.
"I said 'thank you' and 'you're welcome.'" Ginny blushed faintly and glanced quickly at Hermione, who was visibly trying not to laugh. "Don't you dare. Those two sentences were my absolute limit."
"I'm not laughing. Honestly — not retreating is its own kind of victory." Hermione put away her teasing look and adopted a brisk, practical air. "Next time, try one more sentence. Ask him how his day's been."
"Hermione, are you giving me homework?" Ginny said, covering her face with her hands. "I'll — I'll try. I can't promise anything, but I'll try…"
"That's all I ask." Hermione smiled warmly. "Yesterday was a very good start."