“beyond wandpoint” 073b by gingerbred
“11 11m Tuesday - Sub-Optimally 3 Flinching” Part 2
Hermione, Severus, Draco, Theo Nott, Luna, the Bloody Baron, Morag MacDougal, Blaise Zabini, Tracey Davis, Daphne Greengrass, Alberta Runcorn, Vincent 'Vince' Crabbe, Gregory Goyle, Pansy Parkinson, Millicent 'Millie' Bulstrode, Harper Hutchinson, Hestia and Flora Carrow, Valerie Vaisey, Crooks, Sunny, the Centaurs
Originally Published: 2018-05-10 on AO3
Chapter: 073 part 2
The original version of this chapter exceeded livejournal’s maximum post length. It’s been split in two parts.
Severus is thoroughly tired of considering a certain witch and whatever is going on with her. Which is fine, more than reasonable, and makes perfect sense, but unfortunately doesn't help as every time he resolves to ignore her, some new wave of... emotion gets through and calls her back to mind again.
It's wearing.
Thoroughly disgruntled, he is not grumpy, he rises from the couch and makes his unsteady way to his laboratory. "I'm fine," he tells a disbelieving cat, lifting a long-fingered hand in an arresting gesture to dissuade him from commenting (he may be drunker than he realises), opening the door and sort of tumbling into the room, eloquently making Crook's point for him.
Severus needs to fetch a Sober Up Potion to have at the ready, on hand before he's not in any shape to do so. He never knows when he'll be called... He glares at his left arm as if it were responsible for all the evils in the world and had subjected him to them instead of the other way around. Not that he's called during school, really. Certainly not during classes. Usually not even during the week, to be honest. There's no need to exaggerate the situation.
It's unbelievably bad enough as is. He sighs.
As he enters the laboratory he spots a portrait, face down on the floor. He'd almost forgotten. He laughs darkly. Oh yes, Minerva's centaurs. Just what he needs. He goes over and picks it up, the centaurs - still effectively almost completely immobilised - look worried, but perhaps not worried enough. No matter. They'll learn.
He's a teacher after all. He smiles.
He props it against the cupboards beneath his work table and then begins to cast about for an... appropriate substance. He settles on a bottle of Spirit of Turpentine. And then he Summons a very fine short bristled brush.
"And how are we today?" He enquires menacingly of the portrait. There can be no answer. He's trying to decide how he feels about that, there are pros and cons, and then decides to defer any decision about lifting or altering the Curse that holds the ungulates still until he's sober. It wouldn't do to have overlooked something and have them escape the portrait.
No. It wouldn't do at all.
But they'd sat, stood, whatever, watching, listening to Miss Granger's cries, her screams and pleas for help. He'd seen the boys' memories. He knew that she had. He'd seen her tears. He would now rather like to hear their screams. Honestly, he'd sort of like to hear the boys' screams as well, but he'll settle for the centaurs'. For the moment.
They'd just taken it all in, eager to see the... show. He'll assume they liked the sight of her in that chair, and he won't argue that she'd been... memorable, but he can find no justification - no matter how...
He stops.
He chooses to avoid adjectives. It would seem they're... dangerous. Every one he's thought of - and instantly rejected, of course - seems to be admitting something there will be no admitting.
No.
But no matter how she'd appeared in that chair, for which there are no suitable descriptors, there was no earthly excuse for watching. For not getting help. For not fetching him. Well, or any other staff, really, but currently he has that privilege. Apparently. Bondmates after all.
And these nags had put her at risk.
They're about to see the error of their ways. Or at least regret them. He's fine with just that.
He casts a Charm to clean the brush, he's a professional after all, dips it in the turpentine and then leaning in very closely towards the portrait runs his thumb over the bristles, directing a fine spray of the solvent towards the lower left hand corner of the painting. When he's finished, he repeats the process from the upper right. It takes a moment for the effect to occur. Slowly the paint seems to begin to melt from hundreds of small speckled spots in the areas affected.
Now the centaurs look properly panicked.
"Oh, not to worry," he assures him. If they're capable of thought, they won't find his tone remotely reassuring. "I won't keep that up.
"Today.
"We have plenty of time. And you'll be seeing a lot of me."
He lifts the painting, the colours in the opposite corners still blending and mixing badly, the landscape slowly disappearing from whatever had been touched, and approaches the wall over his work space. Not quite willing to mar the beautifully crafted frame, he appreciates good woodworking, now doesn't he, he finally settles on a Sticking Charm to attach it backwards to the wall. Just in case it makes a difference for the portrait's subjects, he makes it deliberately very crooked, muttering, "A lot of me and not much else," satisfied they're now staring at the wall.
He may have to do a little research into making things worse for them. Once he finishes his other thousand chores. He laughs.
Maybe not.
He thinks it over a moment and decides that even if he never changed a thing, he knows this will be bad enough. Trapped in their own bodies, staring at nothing. Their world shrinking around them. No conversation, no intellectual stimulation. Just... nothing until the end of time. Yes, that seems quite... adequate.
He's pleased with the solution.
He stoppers the bottle and sets it on the countertop beneath the painting, magicks the brush clean and lays it close by. He makes a mental note to do this at least a couple of times a week, though. Merlin, he can keep this up until he meets his inevitable end. He may need to devise a more esoteric Sticking Charm, though, so no one else undoes it after his untimely demise. That would be a shame.
He almost forgets what he came in for, only remembering when he's at the door. He Summons his Sober Up, closes and wards the door behind him, and then returns to stand before the couch he's now contradictorily both too pleased and too cross to sit on again. He misses his chair, damn it. He frowns at his chair again, by now it may be more of a pout, and then scowls at the couch.
The furniture seems duly impressed.
Largely undaunted by the furniture's apathy, he settles on the floor, sliding into the space in front of the currently offending sofa. He Summons his glass and the Ogden's with which he means to keep filling it. Soon the Kneazle joins him as though he'd been Summoned as well. Not that that works, of course, but there the creature is, curled up at his side, having his head scratched and apparently enjoying it.
Severus half envies him.
Miss Granger's Charms... He snorts. Yes. Her Charms had worked too well and there's precious little fur left lying about. He was somewhat disappointed. But as his own robes haven't received the same attention, now that he and the animal seem to have gotten... chummy, he's able to gather and Banish the fur from them straight to Crabbe's bed. He does so with relish. That earns the cat another thorough scratching, and butting his head against Severus' hand, Crooks responds with a protracted purr.
Draco's returning from the Owlery, the letter to his mother well underway. Mercury is likely to make his way to her directly, not wasting time sleeping or hunting. He's very well trained. Draco had been careful to go into some detail about his recovery from his injuries, lobbying somewhat transparently for sympathy. His mother had been concerned about his well being, naturally. She had asked after his condition, of course, seeking confirmation of Severus' report, but she was far more, far more concerned about his evident moral decline.
He's feeling a bit loathsome, deservedly, he's reasonably sure, when he runs into Morag MacDougal, who's apparently on her way back from visiting her friends in the Infirmary. Morag is sort of like a female version Severus, first and foremost, striking. Draco thinks it looks better on her, but that might be because he's a heterosexual male. She's tall with a lanky build, incredibly pale with exceedingly long, straight, silky black hair. Not beautiful, but probably still pretty, although the distinctiveness of her looks tends to overshadow that aspect. Her hands are elegant, capable, and her mouth so very expressive.
Not that he's spent all that much time watching it, but he had happened to have noticed.
Draco hesitates fractionally as she approaches, not sure quite where they stand. They had just been hexing one another not so very long ago. Well, she him more so than the reverse, but still...
Morag solves that by calling out rather cheerily, "Malfoy!" Hailing him almost as one might a friend. It leaves Draco a little confused. "Did you come for more?" She asks.
His confusion must be showing, although she misinterprets the reason for it. She gestures towards his face, "The red is almost completely gone. I could refresh it for you?" Her tone is playful, almost flirtatious. She reminds him a little of Myrtle. And no one else outside of his House speaks to him that way.
Morag is completely at ease around him. It helps that she hasn't got her friends there to judge her for it, and that Malfoy hasn't got his posse leering, trying to live up to some silly reputation... That she's confident of her abilities with her wand, and that she's blissfully unaware of his true capabilities. She feels safe in her thoroughly unrealistic little bubble. It also helps that Morag wasn't in the DA, and hasn't many of the associations with Malfoy and his lot that some of her friends do. For her, he's just another classmate. And a fairly cute one, too.
She just keeps coming as Draco doesn't answer. When she's right in front of him, too close, really, she lifts a hand to his face and with one finger extended trails softly along the line of his cheekbone, still ever so slightly reddened, following the line to his ear where she begins to do the same. Frankly, it sends a shiver down Draco's spine, for more reasons than one.
He'd been feeling low, very low after reading his mother's letter. She'd made it all too clear how little she thought of his recent actions, and honestly, he's inclined to agree. He can't think of a single valid argument to raise in response. There's nothing to be said in his defence. He's fairly convinced he's Death Eater scum. Plain and simple.
Ugly.
MacDougal's presence, her manner... They really do remind of Myrtle, and have him beginning to feel better for similar reasons. There's an acceptance there. A lack of fear or judgment that he finds... comforting. If she isn't frightened of him, isn't disgusted by him... Then maybe he isn't the monster his mother seems to think he's become.
Or the girl's just stupid.
It's a strong possibility.
She certainly doesn't clearly see who is standing before her, but then that had been one of the key ingredients in his relationship with Moaning Myrtle, too. They don't know who he really is. It definitely devalues their acceptance. Still, he welcomes even the illusion of it.
There's something surreal in having the Muggle-born, the Mudblood standing there, effectively caressing him. He has to fight with himself not to stop her, not to roll up his sleeve to attest to the complete absurdity of her gesture...
And truthfully, she's good with her hands. Merlin knows, he's watched them often enough in Potions.
He's almost purring as her index finger works its way down his ear when she pulls back slightly and... tweaks it. Bloody buggering...
"Merlin's blighted..." he whines.
"Bollocks," she interrupts. "I know. 'Merlin's blah blah...' What is it with you pure-bloods? It's like you don't know how to curse." He's staring at her as though she were an alien being. It's not inappropriate, as she essentially is.
"Someone tweaks your freshly Hexed ear, the proper response is 'Fuck.'" And now he's staring at her lips. Morag, of course, is very aware of it. The Fuck-me-Raw lippy she'd gotten at Harrods helps ensure that response, anyway. Those were several well-invested quid.
Unaffected, she continues, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, "You have no idea how much time I've invested in teaching ours to swear properly. And this, Malfoy, is what comes from not having any Muggle-borns in your House."
Then she leans in, so closely, and whispers into that freshly Hexed ear. If he thought her finger stroking his cheek was surreal... His brain might be melting, just a little. "Come on," she breathes, and he swears to Merlin the hairs on the back of his neck are standing at attention, "Say it with me.
"'Fuck.'"
Gobsmacked, he does. But probably because it's the only appropriate response, "Fuck." It's just as whispered as hers was, and he has to lick his lips and swallow hard before he can do so.
"Good boy," she answers, her lips just brushing his ear.
He stands there blinking, thoroughly idiotically, and she withdraws. "I saw you hesitate to Hex me. That's bollocks. I can handle myself." He would tend to agree. His general inability to form thoughts, never mind words, backs that up. Fucking hell. "Next time, don't flinch." And then she leans forward and plants a light kiss on his cheek, which is now very red again for entirely different reasons, as though that hadn't been drummed out of him as a Firstie, and she wanders off down the corridor with a wave, "I have History of Magic next, but I'll see you in Herbology."
Fuck indeed.
Hermione gets to Arithmancy early, which is hardly anything new. For the classes she has without Harry and Ron, she tends to be... overly punctual, as she doesn't have to hang about waiting for her... friends. The little... rotters.
Hmm. Yes. Well.
She's wasted enough time worrying about them today, and she doesn't feel like letting them put a damper on the mood Luna had... conjured. That's about right, really, because she truly does work magic.
Hermione props herself against the wall, waiting for Professor Vector to arrive and let them into the classroom. She's rather had her fill of pasties, but the grapes... They really are calling out to her. Luna had seemed to agree, they were delicious. She floats her books next to her with a Wingardium Leviosa and resumes snacking on her fruit.
With a smile, she's just considering pulling out one of her candleholders and adding it to the still life. A little atmosphere... It might be nice.
Which of course is precisely when Malfoy arrives. Thinking of rotters...
It's just the two of them in the hallway, no one else in sight, and he freezes when he sees her and the two stand there staring at one another, unsure quite what to do or say.
Well, not entirely unsure. Hermione drew her wand instantly, that much at least seemed clear, and Draco holds his hands palms out, lifted away from his body, trying to appear as non-threatening as he can. Right now, that's probably a lost cause, but it's a well intentioned start, and helps. At least a little.
She hasn't Hexed him yet, anyway.
He's just about to back out of the hallway and go wait somewhere else, anywhere else, there's little point provoking the witch, when the Bloody Baron suddenly appears between them, nodding quietly at them both.
He doesn't whisper a word.
Draco's not entirely certain, but if he had to say one way or another, he'd say the Baron stands... floats closer to Granger. Madam Snape. And he's surprised to see her posture seem to relax as he does so. So much so, that she returns to her previous position, lounging against the wall, and goes back to eating. Perhaps more slowly and vigilantly, but then he isn't to know that.
He watches her do so with a little envy. It's making him more conscious of the fact he'd skipped lunch.
He's also acutely aware that all it had taken was her minute flinch when she saw him to have him feeling even worse than he'd done after reading his mother's owl. Anything he might have told himself because MacDougal was comfortable bussing his cheek, anything self-deluding along the lines that he wasn't some monstrous creature... Well, that's done now.
Over.
He's a toad, suited for nothing but the Frog Choir, a misnomer if ever there were one. If the person responsible were gathering Potions ingredients, they'd have the castle reduced to rubble inside of a week.
Draco moves so he's as far from her as the space permits and on the opposite side of the corridor, but subconsciously he's soon mimicking her pose, leaning against his own patch of wall.
He's thinking about her response to him. It had clearly been instinctive, visceral. She sees precisely the beast his mother fears he's becoming. It makes every accusation of hers seem all the more true. Deserved.
He's back to that again.
He contrasts her response to MacDougal's, not that he wants Granger pecking his cheek... Merlin, Severus would gut him. More thoroughly than Potter had, that's a certainty... But he'd just fought with MacDougal, less than an hour before, and she had no issues with him. No apprehension. No... fear.
He knows Granger isn't timid. She's not fearful, she's proven that often enough. She took on his father and his cohorts, outnumbered two to one and didn't surrender, and as he understands it, had come close to being gutted at the end of Dolohov's wand herself. No, she's not easily frightened.
But she'd flinched when she saw him.
He hangs his head and the threesome stands there, floats there, silently.
That is until that silence is broken by the growling of his stomach.
Granger and the Baron both turn to look at him.
Granger stares for a moment, and then looks down at the books floating next to her and then back up at him. She looks down again, and he can almost see her thinking. He could swear, he inhales, yes, he's pretty sure she has a pastie there as well. And, irrationally, he's almost got his hopes up when she raises her head to look at him again and then...
Hermione looks down at her food and very deliberately aims her wand and... Vanishes the pastie.
Then she goes back to eating her grapes.
The look on Malfoy's face was priceless. He was practically drooling.
Draco just stands there wondering if all Muggle-borns are destined to lead him around by the nose.
He suspects so.
Hermione feels a little guilty for wasting food, but honestly? She's kind of proud of herself for overcoming that and doing what she had. Malfoy's stomach growls again and she almost laughs. She settles for smirking instead and keeps eating her grapes. Somehow, they taste even better now.
They stand there in awkward silence for a while and finally Malfoy speaks, "How is Severus?"
She looks at him startled, and the Baron quietly observes the exchange. She replies, her tone accusing, "I'm supposed to believe you care? After what he did to you last night?"
"That was... complicated," Draco allows. He doesn't think he could ever explain it, and even if he could, it probably wouldn't be safe. And then he wonders why he even feels the desire to do so. He's really not sure. "He's still my godfather. And whatever happened to him yesterday wouldn't have if I hadn't..." He trails off. She probably knows that best of all.
"No. It wouldn't have." Her agreement comes swiftly and provides no relief.
Again, he can't really explain the drive to do so, but he looks at her, practically begging her to see him, and very sincerely tells her, "I meant it, yesterday. I am sorry."
But this time she doesn't reply.
The Baron floats there keenly observing them both.
The Slytherins have a rather unique arrangement with their House ghost. He assists the Prefects with their duties. He can move much faster through the castle, unhindered by most walls and doors, and he's able to discover misbehaving students far more reliably and quickly than the human Prefects will ever be able to. When he finds something promising, he reports to them, and they step in, docking points accordingly. It makes the Slytherin Prefects seem more competent, more thorough, a credit to their House while saving them work, and it increases the points other Houses lose in the bargain. They find the solution... elegant.
As such, he's worked with the current Malfoy for the last two years. Which makes his stupidity Friday even more glaring. Assuming one could forgive the stupidity, not a given, there were still the... dishonourable actions to address. The Baron is not... pleased with the boys. However, he does... appreciate an apology. When it's sincere. In fact, he feels very strongly that apologies must be made.
The Obliviations should complicate that. Greatly. That leaves him... conflicted.
He's less sure how he feels about forgiveness. That's ironic, given he's had almost a millennium to come to a conclusion, but he changes his mind too often, every decade or so, and doesn't feel... entitled to make demands in that respect.
The Baron has an odd relationship to his students. He can remember Malfoy's parents, his father had been a Prefect as well. He knew the grandparents, all four of them, two of them had been Prefects, the great grandparents, all eight, three Prefects, the great great grandparents, all sixteen, five Prefects, the spread in ages had helped... He likes that about the pure-bloods, that he can list all of their relatives, sometimes going all the way back to his own school days. Forty generations, give or take. It helps tremendously, of course, that very few do, and that those overlap a great deal between the family trees.
Sometimes, when he's trying to make sure he's still... there, sometimes he does just that, listing them all for all of his students. He's proud of his memory. It takes concentration, however. That can be more difficult.
It's something he finds disconcerting about the Muggle-born. There's no... context. He doesn't know Madam Snape's people. It makes her harder to... understand.
What he does understand, however, is where his duty lies. He floats closer to the Head's wife, clearly taking up position. He then surprises both students by speaking in his hoarse whisper, "He's survived worse." Madam Snape doesn't look like she finds that comforting, probably because she really doesn't. Malfoy's just surprised he spoke. The Baron tries again, apparently he's not good at being reassuring. "He will recover."
That seems to do a better job. The witch relaxes a little.
The silence stretches and then, after Draco had given up on her saying anything, she answers after all. "He's out of the Infirmary."
"I know," he tells her. "I saw him."
It's Hermione's turn to start, warring between asking him why he asked such a stupid question then and wanting to know how the Professor is. The second impulse wins out. "How was he?"
Malfoy's answer sounds far more.. patient, kinder than she expected. "I saw him. But that's not quite the same as knowing how he's doing." Having seen the man in action Friday night, she immediately sees the truth in that. "He was upright. That's not saying much."
"Actually, given how much of the past few days he's spent horizontal, that's a huge improvement." Malfoy smiles faintly in response. He looks... relieved. The silence stretches again, and then she takes pity on him, because he seems to... care. Not because it's important to him, she couldn't give a toss, but because that matters to her. "Madam Pomfrey says he'll make a full recovery. She expects him back in classes tomorrow," and Malfoy actually sighs audibly in relief at that, she's sure it was genuine, so she continues, giving him an honest answer, "But he probably shouldn't be. He was very badly hurt." She shrugs, "He's just very..."
"Stubborn?"
"I was going to say 'determined', but yeah, 'stubborn' works as well."
Malfoy nods and looks less pleased again, a little grim in fact, and the silence returns.
She's not sure what made her do it, and again she hears the Professor's voice telling her not to share information about him with others, but she'd just been so... Worried. It's nice to know someone else cares what happens to him. Madam Pomfrey had been right, going by people's reactions today. Too few do. It's really been doing a number on her. She just wants to lash out at them all, the callous... bastards.
Unexpectedly, very much so, it's making Malfoy easier to... stomach.
She stands there thinking about it, mulling it over, trying to understand her feelings, because she doesn't really. It's strange, and she's having a hard time comprehending it, but somehow she blames Malfoy less for... this... than Ron. 'This' is hard to define. Friday. The bonding. The Professor's injuries. The general response towards the same... All of it.
Actually, she's beginning to get it. For one thing, she understands Malfoy's response to Ron's mockery of what Harry had done to him. The attack. She gets that completely. She'd even done so Friday, before things got out of hand, but that's not really the issue. Naturally she understands it more so after the fights she's had with Ron the last two days.
It takes a... rotten thing and makes it... so much worse. It had certainly made her angry. Or since when does she run around Hexing people in the hallways?
And she grasps why Malfoy had been more focused on the Halloween costume than his initial attack even, because frankly she cares more about Ron's response to... 'this' than she does about her attack.
She supposes it helps, loads, obviously, that they both clearly survived the original incidents. Largely unharmed. They had survived. That was something. An accomplishment, really. But then to have someone come along and make fun of you for it... No, it left her seeing red too.
She doesn't like him. She'll never like him. But, looking at Malfoy now, she thinks she might be able to tolerate him.
If he keeps his mouth shut and his wand to himself.
She's just getting comfortable with that, feeling proud of herself, and just a touch smug as she finishes her grapes, confident, as though she's mastered her fears when Nott appears and she's back to the bloody beginning. Tense. Her wand in hand.
Nott doesn't even notice.
Malfoy does.
Hermione, Severus, Draco, Theo Nott, Luna, the Bloody Baron, Morag MacDougal, Blaise Zabini, Tracey Davis, Daphne Greengrass, Alberta Runcorn, Vincent 'Vince' Crabbe, Gregory Goyle, Pansy Parkinson, Millicent 'Millie' Bulstrode, Harper Hutchinson, Hestia and Flora Carrow, Valerie Vaisey, Crooks, Sunny, the Centaurs
Originally Published: 2018-05-10 on AO3
Chapter: 073 part 2
The original version of this chapter exceeded livejournal’s maximum post length. It’s been split in two parts.
Severus is thoroughly tired of considering a certain witch and whatever is going on with her. Which is fine, more than reasonable, and makes perfect sense, but unfortunately doesn't help as every time he resolves to ignore her, some new wave of... emotion gets through and calls her back to mind again.
It's wearing.
Thoroughly disgruntled, he is not grumpy, he rises from the couch and makes his unsteady way to his laboratory. "I'm fine," he tells a disbelieving cat, lifting a long-fingered hand in an arresting gesture to dissuade him from commenting (he may be drunker than he realises), opening the door and sort of tumbling into the room, eloquently making Crook's point for him.
Severus needs to fetch a Sober Up Potion to have at the ready, on hand before he's not in any shape to do so. He never knows when he'll be called... He glares at his left arm as if it were responsible for all the evils in the world and had subjected him to them instead of the other way around. Not that he's called during school, really. Certainly not during classes. Usually not even during the week, to be honest. There's no need to exaggerate the situation.
It's unbelievably bad enough as is. He sighs.
As he enters the laboratory he spots a portrait, face down on the floor. He'd almost forgotten. He laughs darkly. Oh yes, Minerva's centaurs. Just what he needs. He goes over and picks it up, the centaurs - still effectively almost completely immobilised - look worried, but perhaps not worried enough. No matter. They'll learn.
He's a teacher after all. He smiles.
He props it against the cupboards beneath his work table and then begins to cast about for an... appropriate substance. He settles on a bottle of Spirit of Turpentine. And then he Summons a very fine short bristled brush.
"And how are we today?" He enquires menacingly of the portrait. There can be no answer. He's trying to decide how he feels about that, there are pros and cons, and then decides to defer any decision about lifting or altering the Curse that holds the ungulates still until he's sober. It wouldn't do to have overlooked something and have them escape the portrait.
No. It wouldn't do at all.
But they'd sat, stood, whatever, watching, listening to Miss Granger's cries, her screams and pleas for help. He'd seen the boys' memories. He knew that she had. He'd seen her tears. He would now rather like to hear their screams. Honestly, he'd sort of like to hear the boys' screams as well, but he'll settle for the centaurs'. For the moment.
They'd just taken it all in, eager to see the... show. He'll assume they liked the sight of her in that chair, and he won't argue that she'd been... memorable, but he can find no justification - no matter how...
He stops.
He chooses to avoid adjectives. It would seem they're... dangerous. Every one he's thought of - and instantly rejected, of course - seems to be admitting something there will be no admitting.
No.
But no matter how she'd appeared in that chair, for which there are no suitable descriptors, there was no earthly excuse for watching. For not getting help. For not fetching him. Well, or any other staff, really, but currently he has that privilege. Apparently. Bondmates after all.
And these nags had put her at risk.
They're about to see the error of their ways. Or at least regret them. He's fine with just that.
He casts a Charm to clean the brush, he's a professional after all, dips it in the turpentine and then leaning in very closely towards the portrait runs his thumb over the bristles, directing a fine spray of the solvent towards the lower left hand corner of the painting. When he's finished, he repeats the process from the upper right. It takes a moment for the effect to occur. Slowly the paint seems to begin to melt from hundreds of small speckled spots in the areas affected.
Now the centaurs look properly panicked.
"Oh, not to worry," he assures him. If they're capable of thought, they won't find his tone remotely reassuring. "I won't keep that up.
"Today.
"We have plenty of time. And you'll be seeing a lot of me."
He lifts the painting, the colours in the opposite corners still blending and mixing badly, the landscape slowly disappearing from whatever had been touched, and approaches the wall over his work space. Not quite willing to mar the beautifully crafted frame, he appreciates good woodworking, now doesn't he, he finally settles on a Sticking Charm to attach it backwards to the wall. Just in case it makes a difference for the portrait's subjects, he makes it deliberately very crooked, muttering, "A lot of me and not much else," satisfied they're now staring at the wall.
He may have to do a little research into making things worse for them. Once he finishes his other thousand chores. He laughs.
Maybe not.
He thinks it over a moment and decides that even if he never changed a thing, he knows this will be bad enough. Trapped in their own bodies, staring at nothing. Their world shrinking around them. No conversation, no intellectual stimulation. Just... nothing until the end of time. Yes, that seems quite... adequate.
He's pleased with the solution.
He stoppers the bottle and sets it on the countertop beneath the painting, magicks the brush clean and lays it close by. He makes a mental note to do this at least a couple of times a week, though. Merlin, he can keep this up until he meets his inevitable end. He may need to devise a more esoteric Sticking Charm, though, so no one else undoes it after his untimely demise. That would be a shame.
He almost forgets what he came in for, only remembering when he's at the door. He Summons his Sober Up, closes and wards the door behind him, and then returns to stand before the couch he's now contradictorily both too pleased and too cross to sit on again. He misses his chair, damn it. He frowns at his chair again, by now it may be more of a pout, and then scowls at the couch.
The furniture seems duly impressed.
Largely undaunted by the furniture's apathy, he settles on the floor, sliding into the space in front of the currently offending sofa. He Summons his glass and the Ogden's with which he means to keep filling it. Soon the Kneazle joins him as though he'd been Summoned as well. Not that that works, of course, but there the creature is, curled up at his side, having his head scratched and apparently enjoying it.
Severus half envies him.
Miss Granger's Charms... He snorts. Yes. Her Charms had worked too well and there's precious little fur left lying about. He was somewhat disappointed. But as his own robes haven't received the same attention, now that he and the animal seem to have gotten... chummy, he's able to gather and Banish the fur from them straight to Crabbe's bed. He does so with relish. That earns the cat another thorough scratching, and butting his head against Severus' hand, Crooks responds with a protracted purr.
Draco's returning from the Owlery, the letter to his mother well underway. Mercury is likely to make his way to her directly, not wasting time sleeping or hunting. He's very well trained. Draco had been careful to go into some detail about his recovery from his injuries, lobbying somewhat transparently for sympathy. His mother had been concerned about his well being, naturally. She had asked after his condition, of course, seeking confirmation of Severus' report, but she was far more, far more concerned about his evident moral decline.
He's feeling a bit loathsome, deservedly, he's reasonably sure, when he runs into Morag MacDougal, who's apparently on her way back from visiting her friends in the Infirmary. Morag is sort of like a female version Severus, first and foremost, striking. Draco thinks it looks better on her, but that might be because he's a heterosexual male. She's tall with a lanky build, incredibly pale with exceedingly long, straight, silky black hair. Not beautiful, but probably still pretty, although the distinctiveness of her looks tends to overshadow that aspect. Her hands are elegant, capable, and her mouth so very expressive.
Not that he's spent all that much time watching it, but he had happened to have noticed.
Draco hesitates fractionally as she approaches, not sure quite where they stand. They had just been hexing one another not so very long ago. Well, she him more so than the reverse, but still...
Morag solves that by calling out rather cheerily, "Malfoy!" Hailing him almost as one might a friend. It leaves Draco a little confused. "Did you come for more?" She asks.
His confusion must be showing, although she misinterprets the reason for it. She gestures towards his face, "The red is almost completely gone. I could refresh it for you?" Her tone is playful, almost flirtatious. She reminds him a little of Myrtle. And no one else outside of his House speaks to him that way.
Morag is completely at ease around him. It helps that she hasn't got her friends there to judge her for it, and that Malfoy hasn't got his posse leering, trying to live up to some silly reputation... That she's confident of her abilities with her wand, and that she's blissfully unaware of his true capabilities. She feels safe in her thoroughly unrealistic little bubble. It also helps that Morag wasn't in the DA, and hasn't many of the associations with Malfoy and his lot that some of her friends do. For her, he's just another classmate. And a fairly cute one, too.
She just keeps coming as Draco doesn't answer. When she's right in front of him, too close, really, she lifts a hand to his face and with one finger extended trails softly along the line of his cheekbone, still ever so slightly reddened, following the line to his ear where she begins to do the same. Frankly, it sends a shiver down Draco's spine, for more reasons than one.
He'd been feeling low, very low after reading his mother's letter. She'd made it all too clear how little she thought of his recent actions, and honestly, he's inclined to agree. He can't think of a single valid argument to raise in response. There's nothing to be said in his defence. He's fairly convinced he's Death Eater scum. Plain and simple.
Ugly.
MacDougal's presence, her manner... They really do remind of Myrtle, and have him beginning to feel better for similar reasons. There's an acceptance there. A lack of fear or judgment that he finds... comforting. If she isn't frightened of him, isn't disgusted by him... Then maybe he isn't the monster his mother seems to think he's become.
Or the girl's just stupid.
It's a strong possibility.
She certainly doesn't clearly see who is standing before her, but then that had been one of the key ingredients in his relationship with Moaning Myrtle, too. They don't know who he really is. It definitely devalues their acceptance. Still, he welcomes even the illusion of it.
There's something surreal in having the Muggle-born, the Mudblood standing there, effectively caressing him. He has to fight with himself not to stop her, not to roll up his sleeve to attest to the complete absurdity of her gesture...
And truthfully, she's good with her hands. Merlin knows, he's watched them often enough in Potions.
He's almost purring as her index finger works its way down his ear when she pulls back slightly and... tweaks it. Bloody buggering...
"Merlin's blighted..." he whines.
"Bollocks," she interrupts. "I know. 'Merlin's blah blah...' What is it with you pure-bloods? It's like you don't know how to curse." He's staring at her as though she were an alien being. It's not inappropriate, as she essentially is.
"Someone tweaks your freshly Hexed ear, the proper response is 'Fuck.'" And now he's staring at her lips. Morag, of course, is very aware of it. The Fuck-me-Raw lippy she'd gotten at Harrods helps ensure that response, anyway. Those were several well-invested quid.
Unaffected, she continues, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, "You have no idea how much time I've invested in teaching ours to swear properly. And this, Malfoy, is what comes from not having any Muggle-borns in your House."
Then she leans in, so closely, and whispers into that freshly Hexed ear. If he thought her finger stroking his cheek was surreal... His brain might be melting, just a little. "Come on," she breathes, and he swears to Merlin the hairs on the back of his neck are standing at attention, "Say it with me.
"'Fuck.'"
Gobsmacked, he does. But probably because it's the only appropriate response, "Fuck." It's just as whispered as hers was, and he has to lick his lips and swallow hard before he can do so.
"Good boy," she answers, her lips just brushing his ear.
He stands there blinking, thoroughly idiotically, and she withdraws. "I saw you hesitate to Hex me. That's bollocks. I can handle myself." He would tend to agree. His general inability to form thoughts, never mind words, backs that up. Fucking hell. "Next time, don't flinch." And then she leans forward and plants a light kiss on his cheek, which is now very red again for entirely different reasons, as though that hadn't been drummed out of him as a Firstie, and she wanders off down the corridor with a wave, "I have History of Magic next, but I'll see you in Herbology."
Fuck indeed.
Hermione gets to Arithmancy early, which is hardly anything new. For the classes she has without Harry and Ron, she tends to be... overly punctual, as she doesn't have to hang about waiting for her... friends. The little... rotters.
Hmm. Yes. Well.
She's wasted enough time worrying about them today, and she doesn't feel like letting them put a damper on the mood Luna had... conjured. That's about right, really, because she truly does work magic.
Hermione props herself against the wall, waiting for Professor Vector to arrive and let them into the classroom. She's rather had her fill of pasties, but the grapes... They really are calling out to her. Luna had seemed to agree, they were delicious. She floats her books next to her with a Wingardium Leviosa and resumes snacking on her fruit.
With a smile, she's just considering pulling out one of her candleholders and adding it to the still life. A little atmosphere... It might be nice.
Which of course is precisely when Malfoy arrives. Thinking of rotters...
It's just the two of them in the hallway, no one else in sight, and he freezes when he sees her and the two stand there staring at one another, unsure quite what to do or say.
Well, not entirely unsure. Hermione drew her wand instantly, that much at least seemed clear, and Draco holds his hands palms out, lifted away from his body, trying to appear as non-threatening as he can. Right now, that's probably a lost cause, but it's a well intentioned start, and helps. At least a little.
She hasn't Hexed him yet, anyway.
He's just about to back out of the hallway and go wait somewhere else, anywhere else, there's little point provoking the witch, when the Bloody Baron suddenly appears between them, nodding quietly at them both.
He doesn't whisper a word.
Draco's not entirely certain, but if he had to say one way or another, he'd say the Baron stands... floats closer to Granger. Madam Snape. And he's surprised to see her posture seem to relax as he does so. So much so, that she returns to her previous position, lounging against the wall, and goes back to eating. Perhaps more slowly and vigilantly, but then he isn't to know that.
He watches her do so with a little envy. It's making him more conscious of the fact he'd skipped lunch.
He's also acutely aware that all it had taken was her minute flinch when she saw him to have him feeling even worse than he'd done after reading his mother's owl. Anything he might have told himself because MacDougal was comfortable bussing his cheek, anything self-deluding along the lines that he wasn't some monstrous creature... Well, that's done now.
Over.
He's a toad, suited for nothing but the Frog Choir, a misnomer if ever there were one. If the person responsible were gathering Potions ingredients, they'd have the castle reduced to rubble inside of a week.
Draco moves so he's as far from her as the space permits and on the opposite side of the corridor, but subconsciously he's soon mimicking her pose, leaning against his own patch of wall.
He's thinking about her response to him. It had clearly been instinctive, visceral. She sees precisely the beast his mother fears he's becoming. It makes every accusation of hers seem all the more true. Deserved.
He's back to that again.
He contrasts her response to MacDougal's, not that he wants Granger pecking his cheek... Merlin, Severus would gut him. More thoroughly than Potter had, that's a certainty... But he'd just fought with MacDougal, less than an hour before, and she had no issues with him. No apprehension. No... fear.
He knows Granger isn't timid. She's not fearful, she's proven that often enough. She took on his father and his cohorts, outnumbered two to one and didn't surrender, and as he understands it, had come close to being gutted at the end of Dolohov's wand herself. No, she's not easily frightened.
But she'd flinched when she saw him.
He hangs his head and the threesome stands there, floats there, silently.
That is until that silence is broken by the growling of his stomach.
Granger and the Baron both turn to look at him.
Granger stares for a moment, and then looks down at the books floating next to her and then back up at him. She looks down again, and he can almost see her thinking. He could swear, he inhales, yes, he's pretty sure she has a pastie there as well. And, irrationally, he's almost got his hopes up when she raises her head to look at him again and then...
Hermione looks down at her food and very deliberately aims her wand and... Vanishes the pastie.
Then she goes back to eating her grapes.
The look on Malfoy's face was priceless. He was practically drooling.
Draco just stands there wondering if all Muggle-borns are destined to lead him around by the nose.
He suspects so.
Hermione feels a little guilty for wasting food, but honestly? She's kind of proud of herself for overcoming that and doing what she had. Malfoy's stomach growls again and she almost laughs. She settles for smirking instead and keeps eating her grapes. Somehow, they taste even better now.
They stand there in awkward silence for a while and finally Malfoy speaks, "How is Severus?"
She looks at him startled, and the Baron quietly observes the exchange. She replies, her tone accusing, "I'm supposed to believe you care? After what he did to you last night?"
"That was... complicated," Draco allows. He doesn't think he could ever explain it, and even if he could, it probably wouldn't be safe. And then he wonders why he even feels the desire to do so. He's really not sure. "He's still my godfather. And whatever happened to him yesterday wouldn't have if I hadn't..." He trails off. She probably knows that best of all.
"No. It wouldn't have." Her agreement comes swiftly and provides no relief.
Again, he can't really explain the drive to do so, but he looks at her, practically begging her to see him, and very sincerely tells her, "I meant it, yesterday. I am sorry."
But this time she doesn't reply.
The Baron floats there keenly observing them both.
The Slytherins have a rather unique arrangement with their House ghost. He assists the Prefects with their duties. He can move much faster through the castle, unhindered by most walls and doors, and he's able to discover misbehaving students far more reliably and quickly than the human Prefects will ever be able to. When he finds something promising, he reports to them, and they step in, docking points accordingly. It makes the Slytherin Prefects seem more competent, more thorough, a credit to their House while saving them work, and it increases the points other Houses lose in the bargain. They find the solution... elegant.
As such, he's worked with the current Malfoy for the last two years. Which makes his stupidity Friday even more glaring. Assuming one could forgive the stupidity, not a given, there were still the... dishonourable actions to address. The Baron is not... pleased with the boys. However, he does... appreciate an apology. When it's sincere. In fact, he feels very strongly that apologies must be made.
The Obliviations should complicate that. Greatly. That leaves him... conflicted.
He's less sure how he feels about forgiveness. That's ironic, given he's had almost a millennium to come to a conclusion, but he changes his mind too often, every decade or so, and doesn't feel... entitled to make demands in that respect.
The Baron has an odd relationship to his students. He can remember Malfoy's parents, his father had been a Prefect as well. He knew the grandparents, all four of them, two of them had been Prefects, the great grandparents, all eight, three Prefects, the great great grandparents, all sixteen, five Prefects, the spread in ages had helped... He likes that about the pure-bloods, that he can list all of their relatives, sometimes going all the way back to his own school days. Forty generations, give or take. It helps tremendously, of course, that very few do, and that those overlap a great deal between the family trees.
Sometimes, when he's trying to make sure he's still... there, sometimes he does just that, listing them all for all of his students. He's proud of his memory. It takes concentration, however. That can be more difficult.
It's something he finds disconcerting about the Muggle-born. There's no... context. He doesn't know Madam Snape's people. It makes her harder to... understand.
What he does understand, however, is where his duty lies. He floats closer to the Head's wife, clearly taking up position. He then surprises both students by speaking in his hoarse whisper, "He's survived worse." Madam Snape doesn't look like she finds that comforting, probably because she really doesn't. Malfoy's just surprised he spoke. The Baron tries again, apparently he's not good at being reassuring. "He will recover."
That seems to do a better job. The witch relaxes a little.
The silence stretches and then, after Draco had given up on her saying anything, she answers after all. "He's out of the Infirmary."
"I know," he tells her. "I saw him."
It's Hermione's turn to start, warring between asking him why he asked such a stupid question then and wanting to know how the Professor is. The second impulse wins out. "How was he?"
Malfoy's answer sounds far more.. patient, kinder than she expected. "I saw him. But that's not quite the same as knowing how he's doing." Having seen the man in action Friday night, she immediately sees the truth in that. "He was upright. That's not saying much."
"Actually, given how much of the past few days he's spent horizontal, that's a huge improvement." Malfoy smiles faintly in response. He looks... relieved. The silence stretches again, and then she takes pity on him, because he seems to... care. Not because it's important to him, she couldn't give a toss, but because that matters to her. "Madam Pomfrey says he'll make a full recovery. She expects him back in classes tomorrow," and Malfoy actually sighs audibly in relief at that, she's sure it was genuine, so she continues, giving him an honest answer, "But he probably shouldn't be. He was very badly hurt." She shrugs, "He's just very..."
"Stubborn?"
"I was going to say 'determined', but yeah, 'stubborn' works as well."
Malfoy nods and looks less pleased again, a little grim in fact, and the silence returns.
She's not sure what made her do it, and again she hears the Professor's voice telling her not to share information about him with others, but she'd just been so... Worried. It's nice to know someone else cares what happens to him. Madam Pomfrey had been right, going by people's reactions today. Too few do. It's really been doing a number on her. She just wants to lash out at them all, the callous... bastards.
Unexpectedly, very much so, it's making Malfoy easier to... stomach.
She stands there thinking about it, mulling it over, trying to understand her feelings, because she doesn't really. It's strange, and she's having a hard time comprehending it, but somehow she blames Malfoy less for... this... than Ron. 'This' is hard to define. Friday. The bonding. The Professor's injuries. The general response towards the same... All of it.
Actually, she's beginning to get it. For one thing, she understands Malfoy's response to Ron's mockery of what Harry had done to him. The attack. She gets that completely. She'd even done so Friday, before things got out of hand, but that's not really the issue. Naturally she understands it more so after the fights she's had with Ron the last two days.
It takes a... rotten thing and makes it... so much worse. It had certainly made her angry. Or since when does she run around Hexing people in the hallways?
And she grasps why Malfoy had been more focused on the Halloween costume than his initial attack even, because frankly she cares more about Ron's response to... 'this' than she does about her attack.
She supposes it helps, loads, obviously, that they both clearly survived the original incidents. Largely unharmed. They had survived. That was something. An accomplishment, really. But then to have someone come along and make fun of you for it... No, it left her seeing red too.
She doesn't like him. She'll never like him. But, looking at Malfoy now, she thinks she might be able to tolerate him.
If he keeps his mouth shut and his wand to himself.
She's just getting comfortable with that, feeling proud of herself, and just a touch smug as she finishes her grapes, confident, as though she's mastered her fears when Nott appears and she's back to the bloody beginning. Tense. Her wand in hand.
Nott doesn't even notice.
Malfoy does.