Disclaimer: They belong to JKR, I'm only playing.
A/N: Here's where I go 'oops!' and tell you I made a mistake. In the second section of the previous chapter there's a line that goes, "One Tuesday towards the end of August, the Gryffindor Quidditch team practised without their captain." It should read September, not August. Sorry! And hugs to victoria_tonks who picked it up!
Now, before you read this chapter, it's probably a good idea to call your dentist--but hey, they're in love, so what can you expect?
As always, thank you so much for reading and reviewing and I replied to most of the reviews, but if I missed anyone please forgive me, I'll get to it soon. And thanks as always to my lovely beta miconic, you honestly are the best.
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Chapter Five
He began at the hollow below her throat.
She was still breathing hard from her nightmare, her skin salty but her body beginning to cool. He pressed his lips lightly on her skin, nuzzling her neck, his touch a whisper, an entreaty and an endearment all at once.
Hermione, it's okay, okay, just a dream..
He pressed upward along her neck and over her damp cheeks and back again, and she made soft noises low in her throat in response. They were much different than the choked gasps and sobs of her nightmares and he didn't quite know what they meant yet, but he thought he would soon. He felt he existed only at those points where he touched her, his lips, fingertips, body covering hers. Her hands were tangled in his hair. Harry, she breathed out and her throat resonated under his lips.
Suddenly it didn't matter that she couldn't speak because she was telling him everything, always had, even through the gale of fear and guilt that thrashed and screamed through their day.
Harry Harry Harry
He paused to look at her, her head at an odd angle since she slept without a pillow, her pyjamas rumpled. Her eyes were heavy with interrupted sleep and tears and something else, something much sweeter but dark as well. Her lips were caught halfway between a teary smile and his name. He abandoned his slow path and reached up to kiss her. She angled her head for him, hands winding around his neck.
He hoped he was doing it right. But then, she was probably thinking the same thing herself. They were both probably doing it all wrong but it didn't matter, it felt right. The one thing, the only thing that did.
**
He'd waited and waited. And he'd planned. He thought his plan was flawless. Smooth. By the time he was finished today, the Dark Lord would have a new right-hand man.
She was late this morning. He checked his watch and wondered if he'd missed her. He inched along the painting and poked his head around the mahogany doorway. The light inside was dim and slivered by swathes of cobwebs. He squinted; the ledge where she normally sat was bare. Satisfied, he settled back behind the painting. Although she comes in under that dratted Invisibility Cloak, she takes it off when she's sure no one's around. At least, that's what she thinks. He tried to stop the smirk spreading over his face and failed.
Fifteen minutes passed. He poked his head around the doorway again; the ledge was still bare. He lit his wandtip green and drew an 'S' in the air. Two heavy forms emerged from behind two stone pillars a few feet off on either side of the ledge.
"You two all right there?"
"Yeah, but where is she?"
"Should be here soon, be patient."
"You think you got the time right, Draco?"
"'Course I did, you great big sloth, now get back in there!"
He was damned sure of the time. He had followed her for weeks now, hadn't he? The only other person who knew the mudblood's whereabouts so well had to be Potter.
Filth, both of them.
He pulled out the timetable. Today she had Arithmancy first, so she should be here now; the Arithmancy classroom was the closest to the third floor. She doesn't go far in the mornings. It's only in the afternoons that she wanders off on the grounds.
He sat back. He'd wait a few minutes more. In his mind he mapped her afternoon haunts, wondering if it would be wise to switch plans. It would be a little more difficult out in the open grounds in broad daylight but hell, it's not like she can scream, the slut.
He felt confident.
Do the worst you can, Draco, the worst you can imagine. But on one condition. She must be alive at the end of it.
Yes, Master.
**
Hermione pushed open her windows and leaned out. There was the sun and there was the blue sky. True, the light was a little wintery and the blue fingerprinted with grey, but still. She smiled and padded back to her dresser, reaching for a hairbrush. She tried not to look at herself in the mirror; that would just deepen the blush already on her cheeks.
She didn't think her knees would hold her up until she finished dressing. She didn't think she could wait till breakfast to see him.
She tied her hair up and went back to the window. She fingered the curtain, thinking that she might leave the window open in her room while she left for classes.
Her bed was made, he'd done that before he left while she was in the bathroom. But her room could do with a bit of tidying. She wondered where to start. Then she picked up her wand.
She had to flick and swipe really close to the books she wanted shelved, the clothes she wanted hung, the clock she wanted wound up but she didn't mind. Her mind was elsewhere. A warm mouth whispering, whispering so close against her skin that she didn't so much hear the words as feel them. Darkening eyes when she mouthed his name and those hands, hesitant and assured at the same time and so eager to finish the sentences his lips had begun.
Hermione surveyed her room, now dusted and straightened and swept, then picked up her bag. She pulled out the books she'd been carrying needlessly for weeks and floated them back to their shelf. No need for an anchor anymore.
True, her throat was still hollow of sound, she still had nightmares, she still wandered blindfolded inside her own head. And he was still keeping something from her, something important he thought he was hiding well, even from himself.
But there was the blue sky and the sun and her swollen lips sweetly aching to touch his again. And those hands.
She pulled out her timetable and filled the bag with the books she needed. Then she sat down on the bed to put her shoes on. Just as she tied up her laces, there was a knock on the door.
"Hermione?"
She straightened, not sure if she should stand. Surely her knees wouldn't hold her up till she crossed the room to the door.
She was relieved to see he had the same blush on his cheeks.
"Hi," he said. She smiled.
It was as if together they'd closed a door to themselves and entered through another. The same eyes but a different warmth, the same hands but a different touch. The same way he said her name but a different note that rolled off his tongue and nestled somewhere in her heart.
"Ready?"
She nodded, dropped her bag and stepped into his arms, lifting her face.
**
They look different. He is daft and clueless most of the time, but he's not blind. They're holding themselves differently, lighter, as if they've just set down something heavy they'd been carrying. They still sit close-but-not-too-close and their hands still only brush as they walk ahead of him now, not quite reaching for each other, but, but, there's something.
They were acting really weird during dinner last night too. Harry had muttered something about a disaster in Potions but didn't seem too keen to discuss the details.
Besides, that hardly explained why they'd both been smiling all through breakfast this morning. And Hermione's actually going to class…
Something's happened. And he had a fair idea what that might've been.
Why haven't they said anything to him, then? Did they think he'd be mad?
Jealous?
Upset?
Left out?
Should he ask?
Ahh, there it is, that thing Harry's doing now--oh…
No. He'd wait for them to tell him.
**
Harry turned around to say something to Hermione before she stepped inside Professor Vector's classroom, but as soon as he looked at her he forgot what it was. She looked at him, questioning. He shook his head and touched the corner of her mouth with his thumb, shyly. She tilted her face into his touch.
**
She'd gone to all her classes, even Charms which she hated because of her faltering wandwork. True, in Potions she caused a minor fire, but still. And she'd staunchly ignored everyone who stared, walking next to him with her head held high.
Harry thought his heart would burst.
He was following her out of their Defence class with Ron ahead of them when Professor Tiresias called.
"Harry, may I have a word?"
Harry looked at Hermione and Ron. Hermione gestured that they'd wait outside and Harry went over to Tiresias's desk. The Professor was collecting his books and rolls of parchment off the desk with deliberate hands, packing them carefully in his bag. His wand lay on the desk. He paused and smiled at Harry. Harry managed a hesitant smile.
"So, Harry, I hear that Hermione attended all her classes today."
"Yes, Professor, she did."
"Well, that must be a great relief for you."
"Er, yes. It is"
Tiresias snapped the clasp and laid the bag on the desk. Close to, Harry saw that the Professor's hands had a slight tremor, something he had never noticed before. He looked up at the eyes that always sat so still in the lined face, their gaze direct and without emotion.
"Did anything happen, Harry? Anything that you think might have caused this sudden change?"
Harry blushed and dropped his gaze.
"Er, n-nothing unexpected, Professor. I, erm, don't know exactly why."
Tiresias nodded. Harry thought his gestures were strangely agitated, devoid of their usual fluidity.
"There is something else I've been meaning to ask you, Harry. Professor Dumbledore mentioned that while you were at the Burrow, Hermione had a very unsettling nightmare."
Harry swallowed and nodded. "Yes, Professor."
"And you weren't there when it happened?"
"No."
"What I want to know Harry, is whether she's been having those nightmares since then."
Harry thought of tear-filled whimperings and fisted hands and the salty dampness of fear, all merging in the dark that crowded around a low-burning candle.
"Yeah, she does. Every night."
Tiresias tapped his fingers on the wood.
"I'm sorry to put you through this, Harry, but I need to know whether she's revealed anything during those nightmares. It might be the only time when her mind considers what--must have happened."
"She doesn't really say anything most of the time, just--seems very upset. But a couple of times I thought she said something like--" He slid his bag off one shoulder and hoisted it over the other.
"What did she say, Harry?"
"I may have it wrong, it was dark, but she sort of mouthed, 'you were there, why didn't you say something' or something like that. Or it might have been 'why didn't you tell me', or both--I don't know." He pushed his hands in his pockets.
"Was she actually talking to you, or was the 'you' someone else?"
Harry shrugged. "I dunno."
Then his head snapped up.
Was she talking to him? Because if she was, then she did have a good reason to say what she did, or what he thought she did.
Why didn't you tell me?
"Harry?"
"Er, sorry, Professor, what did you say?"
"Has she said anything else?"
Harry shuffled his feet. "Sometimes she says that--that it wasn't real and that she knew it. She says it over and over again."
"What wasn't real? Any idea?"
"No." He suddenly wished he'd paid more attention to her nightmares. But when she was twisted into that horrible darkness all he wanted to do was uncoil her from it, not examine the shape of the twists and knots.
Tiresias moved from the desk. He paced past the cabinet behind his desk, pulling at his collar distractedly as if it was too tight. Abruptly, he stopped and swung around.
"Something else I've been meaning to ask you, Harry. Professor Dumbledore said that in one of your Occlumency lessons you had this strange feeling as if--" he made a vague gesture "--you had something inside your skin, running up and down."
"Yeah, it was quite strange. Like I could suddenly feel the blood pumping inside my skin."
"Have you felt it since?"
"It comes and goes. And sometimes I don't even notice it. Professor, you don't think it had anything to do with--the disappearance?"
"It does seem that way, doesn't it? You felt it for the first time while she was gone, didn't you? You haven't noticed a pattern to it since then, have you?"
"No."
Tiresias sighed and leaned his hands against the desk. Then he looked up.
"Very well, Harry, thank you. I've kept you long enough, you may go." Tiresias smiled.
Harry turned and left quickly, trying to silence the clamour that had flared in his head.
You have to tell her, Harry. No excuse now, especially now. You have to tell her.
**
How could it go wrong? Where the fuck was she all day long? She's been sneaking under that fucking Cloak for weeks and weeks, why did she stop now?
"Draco, where are we going?"
"Shut up and just keep walking, Goyle, or is that too much for your flabby legs?"
"Draco--"
"I don't want to hear it, Crabbe!"
He swung round the corridor and mounted the steps in double strides. A mouse scampered across the topmost step. He kicked it. The creature bleated in pain.
"Miserable vermin!" He hissed and stepped over it. Crabbe and Goyle panted behind him, trying to keep up. He strode down the corridor, rounded another corner and stopped.
"There she is, the worthless mudblood!"
"Draco--"
"Shh, you idiot!"
He stepped back round the corner to conceal himself and peered out. She was sitting on the floor outside the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom. There was no one else about. What's she doing there?
Then, as he watched, the classroom door opened. He pulled back.
"Fuck! Scarhead's here!"
"R-really? Then we'd better clear out, Draco!"
"Are you off your rocker?" He glared at Goyle. "And you, stop grunting like a pig!" He hissed at Crabbe who was clutching the wall, out of breath, face red. He waited a few moments, listening for footsteps. Then he put his head back out, trying to see what was happening.
"But, Draco--"
"Shut up, Crabbe, d'you think I'd let those two good-for-nothing--ohhhhhh!"
The words died in his mouth.
A grin spread across his face, glinting like a newly sharpened blade.
He straightened and surveyed the scene before him.
Perfect.
Better than planned.
"Draco, what's happening?"
He chuckled under his breath and turned around.
"Boys, we have just hit gold." He grabbed a handful of each of their hair and pushed their heads out round the wall.
"Have a good gawk you two, the Prophet will pay good galleons to hear about this!"
Such excellent timing.
New plans formed instantly in his head. He pushed out his chest and grinned wider.
It wasn't going to be that hard to make life living hell for Potter. He didn't even have to go out of his way. The blaze was right there, just waiting to be stoked.
Perfect.
**
Harry closed the door to Tiresias's class behind him. Hermione was sitting crosslegged against the wall outside, her bag beside her.
"Sorry, did it take long?"
She smiled and shook her head, a question skimming beneath the smile.
"He just--he just wanted to know how you were doing."
She raised her eyebrows.
"I said you were doing very well." He grinned and held out a hand to pull her up.
She stood up and looked at him, her hand still in his.
Don't look at me like that, don't look at me like you know there's more to it than that. Because there is. There's much, much more. Things--something--that might even make you change your mind--about this…
He dropped his bag and pulled her towards him, one arm around her waist. With the other hand, he traced her face. The urgency of their first kiss seemed far, far away. Now all he wanted to do was stretch these long, gentle minutes, feel her body grow heavier within his arms and wonder at this feeling that swelled beneath his skin, like a drop of liquid gold coursing in his blood, warm, glowing. He hardly understood any of it but she probably did, as she did with most things. He wasn't sure where it would lead, what it would mean, for him, for her, for everyone else and everything else from now on but none of that really mattered. What mattered was him, her, here.
"You are doing well today, aren't you?" He whispered against her lips.
She rubbed her cheek against his in reply and reached again for his mouth.
**
"So, where did Ron go?" Harry asked Hermione as they made their way to dinner after the Defence class.
Hermione shrugged. 'Said he had something to do.' She gestured. Then she touched his arm and mouthed, 'He was awfully quiet today.' Harry looked at her for a moment, trying to unravel the look on her face. Then he let out a breath.
"Oh. Do you think--he--us.."
Hermione lifted a shoulder, a worried look on her face. She slipped her hand into his and squeezed his fingers. 'We should tell him, you know. Before he finds out some other way.'
"Yeah, we should." Harry replied uncertainly. They were standing outside the Great Hall. People streamed past them, some shooting them curious glances, others preoccupied with their own conversations. Over the weeks, the general fascination with Hermione had waned, although the tide had picked up a little today because she was seen in all her classes. Harry winced to think of what would happen once the news got out that she, that he and she, that they were--
Hermione tugged at his hand, nibbling her lip. 'It'll be okay, don't worry', she mouthed. Harry tried to summon a smile, returning the pressure on his fingers.
"Yeah, yeah it will." The image of Ron's face rose in his mind and kept him from sounding convinced. They turned to walk through the door, letting go of each other's hands.
The hall was filled with candlelight and chatter as usual. The staff table was still empty and food hadn't yet appeared on the tables. Harry and Hermione pushed past people gathered in small knots. Harry could see Ron at the Gryffindor table, sitting next to Seamus. To the right of the main aisle the Slytherin table seemed more crowded than usual. He realised it was because Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle were perched on the table, swinging their legs. The rest of Slytherin were gathered around them in a tight circle.
When he saw them, Malfoy's mouth stretched into a smug leer. He said something to the other Slytherins. They all turned around. Harry moved to Hermione's right side and kept walking, trying to get to the Gryffindor table as quickly as possible.
But it was no use.
"Well, well, well. Look who's here, boys and girls." Malfoy crossed his arms across his chest. A few snickers fizzled up from the crowd around him.
"So, Granger, I hear that you decided to grace our classes with your presence today. All of them." He cocked his head and looked at Hermione with a mock appraising look. Harry's ears began to ring.
"Must have been difficult, very difficult…"
He hopped off the desk. "I wonder what brought about this sudden change--"
"Get lost, Malfoy." Harry hissed. Hermione had stiffened next to him. He stepped closer.
Malfoy shot his eyebrows up dramatically.
"Phew. No need to get nasty, Potter, I'm just making conversation."
Harry glared and tried to step past them, his hand on Hermione's arm. But Malfoy shot his arm out in front of them. The occupants of the other tables were beginning to stare. Out of the corner of his eye, Harry saw that most at the Gryffindor table had stood up too.
To make matters worse, Harry was distracted by the tingling feeling inside his skin which had suddenly flared.
"Hang on a minute, Potter. I think I'm speaking for the whole school when I say that we all have a vested interest in certain affairs of yours." He waved his hands theatrically. "After all, you are supposed to be--what's the word--the saviour of the wizarding world, so it's only fair that we all become familiar with certain developments in your life…" He spread out his hands. "What do you say, boys and girls?"
The Slytherin table issued a chorus of 'yeah'. Harry gritted his teeth. Hermione nudged him gently with her shoulder. He tried to heed the warning on her face.
"Developments such as this--"
Malfoy pulled out his wand and brandished it in the air, muttering something. A greenish cloud appeared in the air above their heads, in full view of everyone in the Hall. Harry barely had the time to register the shimmering, green-edged imprint of him and Hermione entangled in each other outside the door to the Defence class. The Hall erupted.
"Oh my!"
"Bloody hell!"
"When was that?"
"Is that for real?"
"I knew it!"
"Everybody knew it!"
"But that spell, you're not supposed to use it!"
"Who cares!"
"YOU SICK BASTARD!"
A hundred pairs of startled eyes turned towards the Gryffindor table. Harry wasn't sure what was happening. He pulled Hermione to a side. A flash of red hair incandescent with rage plunged down the aisle. People yelped and scrambled aside. Ron was heading straight at Malfoy. Malfoy looked alarmed, the swagger seeping out of him.
Ron pounced on him.
The Hall erupted again.
"Ron, let go of him!"
"Oh my god!"
"What the--"
Harry tried to reach Ron but he and Hermione were surrounded by gasps and screams and bodies. Hermione clapped a hand over her mouth, squashed behind Harry.
Plates clattered and smashed over the Slytherin table. Ron's face blazed. Malfoy, or what little could be seen of him, looked white as death. A group of Slytherins pulled at him, while Gryffindors tried to pull Ron away. But Ron's jaw was clenched, his fist landing clumsily on whatever part of Malfoy he could reach.
Ernie McMillan stood up on the table and yelled, waving his arms, but no one listened. Susan Bones, the new Head Girl, waved her wand, trying to find a proper aim for a spell to pull Malfoy and Ron apart.
No one noticed the door open.
"WHAT IS GOING ON HERE?"
Tiresias stood on the doorway, hands at his hips. His still eyes flashed.
Everybody began to talk at once.
"Quiet!" He strode towards the Slytherin table. "Mr McMillan, Miss Bones, if you are here, could you kindly explain to me what's happening?"
Ernie scrambled down from the table.
"Er, yes, yes, Professor. Er, just a spot of bother between Malfoy and Weasley, sir.."
The Gryffindors and Slytherins began to yell.
"Spot of bother my foot!"
"That prat Weasley tried to kill Draco--"
"If he kept his mouth shut--"
"It wasn't even about him--"
"And that spell, no one's supposed to use that spell!"
"Quiet, everyone!" Tiresias bellowed again. "What spell? And who used it?"
"Er, it was Malfoy, sir, he, er, he used the Imprimere spell to, to show the school Hermione Granger and Harry in--" Ernie went red in the face. Susan cut across him impatiently.
"It was a private moment, sir. Malfoy had made an imprint of it and he flashed it all across the Hall." Disgust laced her voice. "That's why Ron Weasley lost his temper."
Harry looked at Ron. He was slumped on the Slytherin table with Seamus and Ginny bent over him. Harry glanced at Hermione over his shoulder. Her eyes were wide and she clutched his arm tightly. He wanted to get to Ron but his path was still blocked by bristling bodies.
"Well." Tiresias pocketed his wand and his halting gaze swept around the Hall. For the second time that day, Harry thought the Professor seemed agitated, quite unlike his usual graceful self. His prematurely aged face, soft and wrinkled, was full of tiny movements in contrast to the usual stillness of his eyes, which also now seemed larger and more animated than he'd ever seen. "Shameful behaviour, especially from two prefects. There will be consequences--for both of you. I shall take you to your Heads of House." He rubbed at a spot on his chin. "Mr McMillan, could you kindly accompany us. Miss Bones, could you please settle everyone down in here. And--" He paused and inclined his head. "--Is anyone bleeding? Either one of you hurt? I can sense blood."
"Ron's got a gash on his face, sir." Ginny called out in a tremulous voice. Harry craned his neck but couldn't see anything.
"Very well, to the Hospital Wing first then." Tiresias swung around. People parted to make way for Ron, Malfoy and Ernie and Harry seized the chance to dive across the aisle to Ron, clutching Hermione's arm.
"Ron! Are you okay?" Ron was trying to get up, leaning on Ginny and Seamus. He had one black eye and the skin below his other eye was broken, seeping blood. Harry put a hand on his arm.
Ron looked up.
"So. When were you going to tell me, Harry?"
It didn't sound like Ron's voice. Too quiet, too cold.
Harry stared. Ron's eyes were shuttered. His mouth was set in a line Harry had seen only once before over the blue flames of an enchanted goblet. He withdrew his hand.
"Ron, we were--we were just about to tell you--"
"Oh yeah? After the entire school found out?"
"Ron--"
"Save it, Harry. It's a bit too late for explanations, don't you think?"
Hermione put her hand on Ron's arm.
"I'm fine, Hermione." He barely looked at her.
Ice slithered its way up Harry's spine.
Ginny and Seamus helped Ron to his feet. Mouth dry, Harry watched as Ron hobbled off, leaning on Ginny and Seamus.
He didn't hear the whispering anymore. He didn't hear the hiss of spells and the chink of Slytherin plates being mended. He didn't notice everyone shuffling back to their seats. He didn't see the tatters of his and Hermione's shimmering sickly-green selves drift above their heads and disappear gradually into air.
He stood rooted to the spot and stared after Ron's receding form.
Tiresias walked out with Malfoy bristling ahead of him. Ernie pushed the door open wide to make room for Ron, Ginny and Seamus to go through at the same time. Ginny said something to Ron and he shook his head. Then the door swung close behind them with a heavy groan.
Harry didn't hear Susan mutter at people to stop staring. He didn't see the tables fill up with food, people turning away with only a few curious glances cast their way.
He only heard Hermione's quickened breath next to him and blindly reached for her hand. He knew it would be clammy and white-knuckled, but he also knew it would curl tightly around his own.
****