The End is the Beginning is the End - Draco/Hermione - 1/1
Title: The End is the Beginning is the End
Author: Tonya (_fullofgrace) - tcooksey@gmail.com
Rating: PG/PG-13
Pairing: Draco/Hermione
Disclaimer: We all know the drill. No own, no sue. I’m just borrowing to kill some boredom.
Summary: The final battle is never over when you think it is.
A/N: Be forewarned, this is not my typical format. And as is what my muse loves, here lieth angst.
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Hermione stumbled upon the figure kneeling in the mud with his head down, and she could hear the ragged sound of each breath he took. Her fingers tensed around the smooth wood of her wand as she took as shallow of a breath as the pain surging up her side would allow. She stood perfectly still and ready as she waited for the Death Eater to acknowledge her presence, to at least look up to place a face to the person who was about to finish them off.
But he didn’t.
An arm wrapped around his midsection as the other hand braced in the mud, grasping at what little grass was under his fingers, the Death Eater kept his eyes trained on the ground.
“Look at me,” she finally ordered.
She could never curse someone with their back turned, with their defenses so down. That was *their* way, the way of Voldemort’s followers, not her. But with the rain continuing to fall from the early evening sky and her body screaming out in pain she had never known existed, she was beginning to rethink her philosophy on battle etiquette.
After a moment, the figure finally acknowledged her existence, slowly raising his head to look at her.
Gray eyes stared back at her under rain-slicked hair, and her breath caught in her throat.
“Stop staring, Granger.”
Hermione’s fingers gripped tighter to her wand, her heart pounding violently against her ribcage. She watched as Draco strolled casually through the front room of her flat, lingering near her fireplace. Her eyes darted from him to her nearest exit and back as she calculated the odds of a successful escape if necessary.
“Get. Out. Now,” she ordered with a growl.
He didn’t even acknowledge her words as he studied the framed pictures of family and friends she had lined across her mantle.
Hermione took another step in his direction, debating just summoning The Order to deal with him. She wasn’t sure how he had managed to get into her flat in the first place. It was protected by some of the best charms the Aurors could provide, and yet here he was. In her home. Touching her things. Acting as if this was just another bloody visit between old friends.
“How did you get in here?” she asked when it became obvious that he would not be leaving as she had commanded.
He finally turned to her, gray eyes studying her as if *she* were the intruder in this situation. His gaze slowly traveled to the wand pointed at his chest before venturing back to meet her eyes. “Is the wand really necessary, Granger?”
She blinked at him, and she couldn’t hold in the shocked laugh that escaped her lips. “You are a killer,” she replied simply.
“It’s a war,” he replied with a shrug. He casually walked over to her couch, taking a seat, his arms draped over the back. “We’re all killers. Yourself included.”
Hermione watched him, her earlier fear morphing into irritation as he seemed to make himself at home. “I am nothing like you. I don’t kill innocent people.”
“Neither do I,” he replied in a bored tone.
Her blood boiled as she stormed over to him, effectively closing the gap she had kept between them since she had returned home to find him loitering around her flat. “What do you call Neville Longbottom then?!” she yelled. “Or Zacharias Smith?! Or the countless others you’ve murdered?!”
He was on her before she even had a chance to react.
Draco caught her by her wand arm, spinning her until her arm was pinned firmly to her own back. He pulled her back flush against his body, and she could feel his free hand tightening in her hair near her scalp. He yanked her head painfully to the side, and Hermione simply cringed in response, refusing to give him the satisfaction of hearing her cry out in any manner.
“They were unfortunate,” he said harshly into her ear, his breath warm against her skin. His grip of her hair did not lessen as he spoke. “Now, I came here tonight, Granger, to offer you a bit of assistance. I didn’t expect a warm welcome, but all this hostility is just unacceptable.”
“Let me go now, Malfoy,” she replied, her voice steady even as she could feel her pulse pounding.
“Only if you promise to behave yourself like a good girl.”
Hermione frowned in response, silently thinking up ways to curse him once free from his grip.
“Do we have a deal?” he asked after a long moment of silence between them.
“No,” she stated bluntly.
Draco rolled his eyes in response. “Of course not.”
He pushed her away from him, and Hermione stumbled over her own feet, grabbing hold of the arm of the couch before she could completely lose her footing. She raised her wand at him again, her arm shakier than she would have liked it to have been. Draco raised his hands slightly in an insincere sign of defeat.
“Notice I have yet to draw *my* wand on *you*, Granger.” He shrugged. “If I had wanted, I could have done anything to you." His lips curled into that familiar smirk she had hated so much during their years together at Hogwarts. “Absolutely anything.”
“And why didn’t you?”
“I have my reasons. Now, if we can move this little meeting along.” He returned to his seat on her couch. “As I was saying, I’m here to help.”
Hermione scowled at him. “If you haven’t noticed, Malfoy? You and I? Are not playing for the same team.”
“Of course not,” Draco scoffed. “I’d rather be placed under an Unforgivable before working for the likes of Potter.”
She stared at him, confused by this entire situation. “Then why are you even offering your help?”
“Because I can,” he stated simply.
She blinked at him, her wand arm dropping only slightly.
“Look,” he said, his voice serious as he stood, “the next raid you and your little boyfriend plan to make on that group of Death Eaters outside London? If you go, it’ll be your last.”
“How did you know about--?”
“Did you even hear what I bloody said, Granger?” Draco asked, annoyed. “You lot go there, and you won’t make it out alive. They’ll be there, in waiting. And they will attack before any of you have a chance to think about defending yourselves.”
Hermione studied him, silently, looking for any hint of deception. A facial tic. A shift of his steely gaze. Anything.
But nothing happened.
“And I’m supposed to believe you?” she finally asked.
“Believe what you want,” he replied with a slight shrug of his broad shoulders. “But it’s your own life you’re gambling with here.”
She didn’t want to believe him, didn’t want to trust him. But something in her gut, in her instinct, took his words for truth.
“I don’t trust you,” she said even as her wand arm finally relaxed and returned to her side.
Draco smirked. “Of course not.”
“Because I know what you are.”
“And what’s that?” he asked, his smirk never wavering
Hermione stared at him, searching for the right words.
“You act like you’ve never seen a Death Eater before.”
Hermione lowered her wand as Draco sat up on his knees, finally releasing his steadying grasp of the ground. He looked up at her with that familiar curl of his lips, and Hermione took in how pale he looked even for him. His arm was still wrapped protectively around his middle, and his breathing seemed even shallower than her own felt at the moment.
She studied the gash over his right eye that continued to slowly ooze blood. “You’re hurt.”
“Tell me something I don’t know, Granger.” He coughed and then winced at the pain that surged up in him. “Queen of the bloody obvious.”
She opened her mouth for a nasty retort, but the venom died away as she watched him brace against the ground again. “I thought you….”
Draco looked up at her with a grimace. “What? You didn’t think I’d fight for them?” He slowly pushed himself upright again. “Even you can’t be that daft, Hermione.”
Hermione frowned even deeper. She hated the way her proper name sounded coming from him. It was supposed to sound hateful, sound like every other insult he had ever spit in her direction over the years. It wasn’t supposed to sound so… normal.
“Make a decision, Granger,” he said, nodding towards her wand. “They’re coming.”
Hermione stared at him, and he held her gaze, waiting for her to make the next move.
“Make a decision.”
Hermione stood in the doorway to her bedroom, arms crossed over her chest as she watched him. Draco sat on the edge of her bed, his arms resting on his thighs and his hands clasped in front of him. His head down in thought, he couldn’t see her studying him with a deep frown across her features.
She hated the way he looked sitting in her room, on her bed. She hated the way he seemed to belong there, like it was normal to have Draco Malfoy--Death eater, her best friend’s sworn enemy--loitering in her most personal space. And she most certainly hated the way seeing him sitting there made her want to go up to him and show some form of comfort.
“Just make a decision, Malfoy,” she repeated to his silence. “It’s not that hard.”
A dark chuckle escaped him, but as much as she would have preferred, he didn’t look up. “It’s not that hard?”
“No, it’s not.”
Draco stood, approaching her as he yanked up the sleeve of his shirt and revealed the Dark Mark etched into his skin. “Do you think this is just for bloody decoration, Granger?” he snarled.
She refused to look down at his arm, keeping her eyes level with his.
She had seen the Mark on his arm many times before. When he reached across her to steal a section of the Daily Prophet. When he pulled on his robes before disapparating into the night until their next impromptu meeting. When he held her wrists above her head as he thrust into her.
She had seen that mark more times than she cared to remember.
“Once you get the mark, that’s it,” he said, his eyes burning into hers. “There is no going back.”
“Snape did--”
“Snape?” Draco replied with a laugh. “Don’t tell me you lot still believe he’s *good*? When will you finally see him for what he bloody is? He’s been lying to you all, to Dumbledore, for years. Our former Headmaster was just too thick to realize it, and his refusal to see that git for what he really is got him killed.” He paused with a shake of his head. “Hell, he’d have done away with me years ago if he didn’t make that bloody vow to my mother to protect me.”
“We can protect you. Harry can--”
Draco gave a derisive snort. “I don’t want Potter’s help.”
Hermione shoved him away, hard, and he blinked at her as he stumbled backwards. “Can’t you put away your damn pride for one second?! Why won’t you stop being such a prat and just let me help you?”
He stepped back up to her and stood tall, bracing for another assault as he invaded her personal space again. “Granger, it doesn’t matter what side I’m on in the end of all of this. Because either way, it’s gonna end the same. I join your side, and they hunt me down for the rest of my life until they catch me and kill me. I stay where I am? And Potter will gladly lay a killing curse on me.”
“If it doesn’t matter, then let us help you,” she replied, determined.
“No,” he said, his stubbornness matching hers.
Hermione clenched her fists at her side, resisting the urge to push him again. “I hate you.”
“I know you do,” he replied with a hint of a smile.
Draco took another step closer, closing the gap between them, and placed his hand at the nape of her neck. She didn’t protest as he pulled her smaller frame to his and his warm lips met hers. Her hands clenched at the front of his shirt, the fabric bunching under her fingers. When his lips found the spot just under her earlobe, she tried to speak again before she lost all ability to form coherent sentences.
“Draco…”
His lips stopped their investigation of her skin as he pulled away, his gaze finding hers. “The conversation is over, Hermione.”
Hermione opened her mouth to protest, but whatever argument she had mustered melted into a moan of content as his lips found her neck again and his hand slid under her skirt and between her thighs.
“Draco,” she sighed.
“Time is wasting, Granger.” He took a deep breath, closing his eyes. “Let’s get this over with.”
“Just get up, Malfoy,” she replied, her voice tired. “End this now.”
His eyes opened, and she almost wished he’d focus his silver gaze elsewhere. “Well, I’m *trying* to, but you’re making this quite difficult.” He sighed, shifting his weight in the mud but making no move to stand. “It takes two simple words, Granger, and you’ve used them before so just say them again.”
“This is different, and you know it.”
“No, it’s not.”
“Yes, it is,” she argued, waving her wand at him angrily. “You’re… you’re…”
“The last of the Malfoy lineage. A notorious Death Eater. A killer.” He shrugged casually. “You’ve said so yourself many times.”
“Don’t make me do this!” she snapped, her anger finally getting the best of her as her voice raised. “You want to die some stupid noble death or be some bloody martyr, you’ll do it without me. You want to just lie there and give up? Fine, but I will not help you.”
“This isn’t giving up,” he replied in his same even tone, unfazed by her outburst. “This is survival.”
“No,” she said with a shake of her head. “I won’t.”
Draco exhaled deeply, placing his free hand to the gash above his eye. He growled quietly, and she wasn’t sure if it was at his pain or at her. “Granger….”
Hermione shifted against the warm body lying beside her, the only indication that she had even heard him say her name. She was too tired, too sated, to stay up and argue with Draco over whatever the topic would be tonight. It always seemed to happen without fail that he would take these moments afterwards to start with her. Sometimes it would be serious matters about the war, about her friends. Other nights it would be petty rows over Crookshanks having the audacity to lie on his robes that *he* had recklessly discarded onto her carpet in his need to ravage her.
Tonight, Hermione just wanted to lie beside him and sleep peacefully.
Or at least not speak.
“You won’t be able to do it, you know.”
Hermione slowly opened one eye and then the other to peer at the man lying beside her. Arms folded under his head and his eyes closed as if asleep, for a moment, she thought she had imagined him speaking.
But then she saw the corner of his lip twitch into the beginnings of that all too familiar smirk.
She hastily pushed herself up onto her elbows, brushing her wild curls out of her eyes. “Won’t be able to do what?”
“You know what,” he replied, never once moving from his peaceful position. “You’re gonna have your chance to take your shot at me, and you won’t take it.”
Hermione frowned as she realized he was using now, when she was naked and flushed and drained, to bring up the conversation they had been avoiding for months. The exact conversation they had been tiptoeing around ever since his meetings with her had started to lead to bedroom encounters. Though the topic had never been brought up before, Hermione thought about it every night, about what would happen if and when they came face to face during the final battle. She had never allowed herself to visualize the outcome of that future encounter. She feared what she would see….
She studied him, frowning. “If you had your chance at me, would you take it?”
His eyes finally fluttered open as he smirked at her. “Of course.”
She narrowed her eyes at him as she angrily tossed back the covers to climb out of bed. It was during moments like these that she wished these meetings between them happened somewhere outside her own flat so that she could storm out of the room and disapparate and leave him to imagine how deep her anger with him really reached.
But tonight, she had to settle on snatching her robe from the floor and cinching it tightly around her body. Fuming, she walked away from the bed to stand at her bedroom window.
“Oh come on, Granger,” Draco said with a laugh, pushing back his own covers. He didn’t bother to cover himself as he approached her, stopping just over her shoulder. “Did you expect anything less?”
She stared out into the darkness of the late evening, her arms wrapped protectively around herself. “I expected too much obviously,” she finally admitted after a few moments of suffocating silence.
“Granger….”
He placed a hand on her shoulder, and she ducked from his touch. In a flash, she turned, hand raised to slap him in a way she hadn’t done since they were teenagers. However, unlike when they were thirteen, Draco caught her wrist before her fingers could even think of assaulting his face.
He raised an amused eyebrow at her, his hand still firmly gripping her wrist. “Temper temper, love.”
“Malfoy,” she threatened.
“Hermione, when the day comes when you and I have our final little showdown?” he asked, ignoring the threatening tone and the glare he was receiving as he held onto her wrist. “It’s gonna be about instinct. Survival.”
Hermione simply replied with a scowl.
“It’s a bloody war,” he said to her disapproving glare. He finally released his grip of her with a shake of his head. “You’ll need to start thinking here--” He tapped her temple with his fingers. “--for a change.”
In response, she jabbed him hard in the chest. “Or perhaps you should think here.”
“Look, Granger, just promise me something,” he sighed. “When that time comes? If I ask you to off me? Just bloody do it. Don’t hesitate. Don’t go all fucking stubborn on me like you like to do. And most certainly do not start going all sentimental and female. Just shut your mouth, and do it.”
Hermione stared at him, taking in his words. “You want me to kill you?”
“Yes.”
“With pleasure,” she replied flatly.
Hermione moved to push past him and return to bed, but Draco grabbed hold of her arm before she could get far. She glared at him, silently ordering him to release her, but he ignored her look of death and dismemberment as he pulled her to him. She fell into him, her free hand bracing against his chest for balance.
“You won’t be able to do it, you know,” he whispered, returning them full circle. “I know you too well.”
“You don’t know me well enough,” she countered before he kissed her, their argument ending for another night.
“I knew you wouldn’t be able to do it.”
Hermione watched as Draco clung tighter to his midsection, his head lowering in pain.
“Because you know me too well,” she mumbled under her breath.
She continued to watch him for a moment before sighing softly and kneeling down in front of him, ignoring the mud clinging to her pants. His head still lowered, he glanced upward at her with a frown.
“Get up, Granger,” he ordered, followed by a hiss of pain. “Get up and finish this.”
Hermione ignored his order, instead reaching out and taking hold of the arm he had kept close to his stomach since she had stumbled on him. He resisted at first, but was either too tired or no longer cared to fight as she pulled his arm away. Under his arm, his tan shirt was soaked through with blood. Hermione held her breath as she glanced up nervously at his face, but he kept his gaze elsewhere, avoiding her look of panic.
“Malfoy, we need to get you out of here,” Hermione said as she moved to lift the bottom of his shirt to see the actual damage.
With what little strength he still had, he reached out and grabbed her wrist as her fingers danced over the sticky fabric of his shirt. “Get. Up.” He growled at her, his eyes filled with intensity. “Get up and finish the fucking job.”
Hermione snatched her arm out of his grip. “And if I don’t?”
“The crimes I’ve committed, Granger?” he asked, placing his arm back across his stomach. “All those people you like to remind me I killed? Their deaths are nothing but a one way ticket to Azkaban and a rendezvous with a Dementor.”
“But--”
“And as for staying with my own side? Not going to happen since I was labeled a traitor by my former mentor.”
Hermione frowned deeply. “Snape.”
“I would have made his death a bit more painful, but I was running on a schedule,” he smirked weakly. “So given the choices of a life spent running and hiding like a bloody coward, a Dementor torturing me for past sins, or you just doing the deed here? I’ll take the latter.”
“Maybe if I talk to the Order, I can get you some sort of leniency….”
“You don’t have that kind of power, Hermione.”
Of all the times for him to be right, she knew he was. To the Order, to the Ministry, he would simply be another Death Eater. And all of Voldemort’s followers had to meet the same fate for their crimes. She could plead to them all she wanted that Draco Malfoy was a changed man, that he was a victim of circumstances, but only she had seen that side of him. Only she had seen him at his most human, most sincere.
And only she cared whether he lived or died.
“Or you could just sit there gawking at me like a mute and I could slowly bleed out,” he said to her silence, raising an eyebrow in her direction.
She exhaled deeply, dropping her gaze to the mud soaking into her pants legs. “Draco….”
“Don’t.”
She looked up, confused by his simple order. “Don’t what?”
“Don’t say whatever it is you’re about to say.” He frowned at her. “Don’t tell me you’re sorry about what’s happened. Don’t tell me you wish things were different, and most certainly don’t tell me you love me.”
She hesitated for only a moment. “I hadn’t planned on it.”
He gave her a knowing smirk in response. “Of course you hadn’t.” He clenched tighter at his stomach. “So, are you going to do this, or are we going to sit out here all night?”
She didn’t want to do this. She couldn’t even put into words how much she didn’t want to do this, to be there, at that moment. Back in Hogwarts, she had always envisioned this moment-where she would have to face off against Draco Malfoy. She had imagined insults being yelled, taunts being delivered, and finally curses being thrown.
But back then, she never thought she’d find herself swallowing down the urge to cry.
“Granger,” he sighed, his voice tired as he studied her with weary eyes. “Please don’t make this harder than it has to be.”
Hermione blinked quickly, hoping to get rid of the stinging sensation building in her eyes. “I hate you,” she finally said.
He smiled. “The feeling is mutual.”
Hermione leaned forward, placing a hand gently on his face as she kissed him, finally allowing the tears to fall as she did so. She felt his free hand clench in her hair, holding her into their frenzied kiss. When she finally pulled away, she was breathless and sure that her lips would be bruised in the morning. Draco’s hand still clenched possessively in her hair, she closed her eyes and rested her forehead against his.
“Hermione,” he said softly.
Hermione clenched her eyes tighter together in response, chewing on her lower lip until she tasted the bitterness of her own blood.
“I told you you couldn’t do it,” he replied to her silence. “Now, do what you do best, and prove me wrong.”
Hermione finally opened her eyes to gray ones staring back at her.
“Prove me wrong then if that will make you feel better,” Draco said, leaning lazily against the back of her couch. “But it won’t be on my conscience when you walk right into their trap.” He stood up straight. “I’m giving you fair warning that the London raid will not be what you think. You can do whatever you feel like with this new knowledge.”
Hermione stopped pacing across her carpet, studying him with a confused tilt of her head. “I still don’t understand why you’re doing this.”
Draco shrugged and crossed his arms over his chest. “Because it’s the only way to get into your knickers.”
She narrowed her eyes at him. “Don’t hold your breath on that one, Malfoy.”
His lips curled into a smile. “Oh, I don’t plan to, Granger.”
When Hermione returned to her friends and former classmates, the celebrating rang loudly through the gathered crowd of survivors. Cheers could be heard for the end of Voldemort. For the end of the second war. For the survival of the infamous Boy Who Lived.
Friends hugged her and told her that they were glad to see she was okay. They didn’t question the mud on her clothes, in her hair. They didn’t question her tired appearance, the flush to her cheeks. But when they questioned her red eyes, her puffy lids, Hermione simply offered a weak smile and told them she had been crying tears of joy at their long-awaited victory.
Because the battle was finally done.
Author: Tonya (_fullofgrace) - tcooksey@gmail.com
Rating: PG/PG-13
Pairing: Draco/Hermione
Disclaimer: We all know the drill. No own, no sue. I’m just borrowing to kill some boredom.
Summary: The final battle is never over when you think it is.
A/N: Be forewarned, this is not my typical format. And as is what my muse loves, here lieth angst.
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Hermione stumbled upon the figure kneeling in the mud with his head down, and she could hear the ragged sound of each breath he took. Her fingers tensed around the smooth wood of her wand as she took as shallow of a breath as the pain surging up her side would allow. She stood perfectly still and ready as she waited for the Death Eater to acknowledge her presence, to at least look up to place a face to the person who was about to finish them off.
But he didn’t.
An arm wrapped around his midsection as the other hand braced in the mud, grasping at what little grass was under his fingers, the Death Eater kept his eyes trained on the ground.
“Look at me,” she finally ordered.
She could never curse someone with their back turned, with their defenses so down. That was *their* way, the way of Voldemort’s followers, not her. But with the rain continuing to fall from the early evening sky and her body screaming out in pain she had never known existed, she was beginning to rethink her philosophy on battle etiquette.
After a moment, the figure finally acknowledged her existence, slowly raising his head to look at her.
Gray eyes stared back at her under rain-slicked hair, and her breath caught in her throat.
“Stop staring, Granger.”
Hermione’s fingers gripped tighter to her wand, her heart pounding violently against her ribcage. She watched as Draco strolled casually through the front room of her flat, lingering near her fireplace. Her eyes darted from him to her nearest exit and back as she calculated the odds of a successful escape if necessary.
“Get. Out. Now,” she ordered with a growl.
He didn’t even acknowledge her words as he studied the framed pictures of family and friends she had lined across her mantle.
Hermione took another step in his direction, debating just summoning The Order to deal with him. She wasn’t sure how he had managed to get into her flat in the first place. It was protected by some of the best charms the Aurors could provide, and yet here he was. In her home. Touching her things. Acting as if this was just another bloody visit between old friends.
“How did you get in here?” she asked when it became obvious that he would not be leaving as she had commanded.
He finally turned to her, gray eyes studying her as if *she* were the intruder in this situation. His gaze slowly traveled to the wand pointed at his chest before venturing back to meet her eyes. “Is the wand really necessary, Granger?”
She blinked at him, and she couldn’t hold in the shocked laugh that escaped her lips. “You are a killer,” she replied simply.
“It’s a war,” he replied with a shrug. He casually walked over to her couch, taking a seat, his arms draped over the back. “We’re all killers. Yourself included.”
Hermione watched him, her earlier fear morphing into irritation as he seemed to make himself at home. “I am nothing like you. I don’t kill innocent people.”
“Neither do I,” he replied in a bored tone.
Her blood boiled as she stormed over to him, effectively closing the gap she had kept between them since she had returned home to find him loitering around her flat. “What do you call Neville Longbottom then?!” she yelled. “Or Zacharias Smith?! Or the countless others you’ve murdered?!”
He was on her before she even had a chance to react.
Draco caught her by her wand arm, spinning her until her arm was pinned firmly to her own back. He pulled her back flush against his body, and she could feel his free hand tightening in her hair near her scalp. He yanked her head painfully to the side, and Hermione simply cringed in response, refusing to give him the satisfaction of hearing her cry out in any manner.
“They were unfortunate,” he said harshly into her ear, his breath warm against her skin. His grip of her hair did not lessen as he spoke. “Now, I came here tonight, Granger, to offer you a bit of assistance. I didn’t expect a warm welcome, but all this hostility is just unacceptable.”
“Let me go now, Malfoy,” she replied, her voice steady even as she could feel her pulse pounding.
“Only if you promise to behave yourself like a good girl.”
Hermione frowned in response, silently thinking up ways to curse him once free from his grip.
“Do we have a deal?” he asked after a long moment of silence between them.
“No,” she stated bluntly.
Draco rolled his eyes in response. “Of course not.”
He pushed her away from him, and Hermione stumbled over her own feet, grabbing hold of the arm of the couch before she could completely lose her footing. She raised her wand at him again, her arm shakier than she would have liked it to have been. Draco raised his hands slightly in an insincere sign of defeat.
“Notice I have yet to draw *my* wand on *you*, Granger.” He shrugged. “If I had wanted, I could have done anything to you." His lips curled into that familiar smirk she had hated so much during their years together at Hogwarts. “Absolutely anything.”
“And why didn’t you?”
“I have my reasons. Now, if we can move this little meeting along.” He returned to his seat on her couch. “As I was saying, I’m here to help.”
Hermione scowled at him. “If you haven’t noticed, Malfoy? You and I? Are not playing for the same team.”
“Of course not,” Draco scoffed. “I’d rather be placed under an Unforgivable before working for the likes of Potter.”
She stared at him, confused by this entire situation. “Then why are you even offering your help?”
“Because I can,” he stated simply.
She blinked at him, her wand arm dropping only slightly.
“Look,” he said, his voice serious as he stood, “the next raid you and your little boyfriend plan to make on that group of Death Eaters outside London? If you go, it’ll be your last.”
“How did you know about--?”
“Did you even hear what I bloody said, Granger?” Draco asked, annoyed. “You lot go there, and you won’t make it out alive. They’ll be there, in waiting. And they will attack before any of you have a chance to think about defending yourselves.”
Hermione studied him, silently, looking for any hint of deception. A facial tic. A shift of his steely gaze. Anything.
But nothing happened.
“And I’m supposed to believe you?” she finally asked.
“Believe what you want,” he replied with a slight shrug of his broad shoulders. “But it’s your own life you’re gambling with here.”
She didn’t want to believe him, didn’t want to trust him. But something in her gut, in her instinct, took his words for truth.
“I don’t trust you,” she said even as her wand arm finally relaxed and returned to her side.
Draco smirked. “Of course not.”
“Because I know what you are.”
“And what’s that?” he asked, his smirk never wavering
Hermione stared at him, searching for the right words.
“You act like you’ve never seen a Death Eater before.”
Hermione lowered her wand as Draco sat up on his knees, finally releasing his steadying grasp of the ground. He looked up at her with that familiar curl of his lips, and Hermione took in how pale he looked even for him. His arm was still wrapped protectively around his middle, and his breathing seemed even shallower than her own felt at the moment.
She studied the gash over his right eye that continued to slowly ooze blood. “You’re hurt.”
“Tell me something I don’t know, Granger.” He coughed and then winced at the pain that surged up in him. “Queen of the bloody obvious.”
She opened her mouth for a nasty retort, but the venom died away as she watched him brace against the ground again. “I thought you….”
Draco looked up at her with a grimace. “What? You didn’t think I’d fight for them?” He slowly pushed himself upright again. “Even you can’t be that daft, Hermione.”
Hermione frowned even deeper. She hated the way her proper name sounded coming from him. It was supposed to sound hateful, sound like every other insult he had ever spit in her direction over the years. It wasn’t supposed to sound so… normal.
“Make a decision, Granger,” he said, nodding towards her wand. “They’re coming.”
Hermione stared at him, and he held her gaze, waiting for her to make the next move.
“Make a decision.”
Hermione stood in the doorway to her bedroom, arms crossed over her chest as she watched him. Draco sat on the edge of her bed, his arms resting on his thighs and his hands clasped in front of him. His head down in thought, he couldn’t see her studying him with a deep frown across her features.
She hated the way he looked sitting in her room, on her bed. She hated the way he seemed to belong there, like it was normal to have Draco Malfoy--Death eater, her best friend’s sworn enemy--loitering in her most personal space. And she most certainly hated the way seeing him sitting there made her want to go up to him and show some form of comfort.
“Just make a decision, Malfoy,” she repeated to his silence. “It’s not that hard.”
A dark chuckle escaped him, but as much as she would have preferred, he didn’t look up. “It’s not that hard?”
“No, it’s not.”
Draco stood, approaching her as he yanked up the sleeve of his shirt and revealed the Dark Mark etched into his skin. “Do you think this is just for bloody decoration, Granger?” he snarled.
She refused to look down at his arm, keeping her eyes level with his.
She had seen the Mark on his arm many times before. When he reached across her to steal a section of the Daily Prophet. When he pulled on his robes before disapparating into the night until their next impromptu meeting. When he held her wrists above her head as he thrust into her.
She had seen that mark more times than she cared to remember.
“Once you get the mark, that’s it,” he said, his eyes burning into hers. “There is no going back.”
“Snape did--”
“Snape?” Draco replied with a laugh. “Don’t tell me you lot still believe he’s *good*? When will you finally see him for what he bloody is? He’s been lying to you all, to Dumbledore, for years. Our former Headmaster was just too thick to realize it, and his refusal to see that git for what he really is got him killed.” He paused with a shake of his head. “Hell, he’d have done away with me years ago if he didn’t make that bloody vow to my mother to protect me.”
“We can protect you. Harry can--”
Draco gave a derisive snort. “I don’t want Potter’s help.”
Hermione shoved him away, hard, and he blinked at her as he stumbled backwards. “Can’t you put away your damn pride for one second?! Why won’t you stop being such a prat and just let me help you?”
He stepped back up to her and stood tall, bracing for another assault as he invaded her personal space again. “Granger, it doesn’t matter what side I’m on in the end of all of this. Because either way, it’s gonna end the same. I join your side, and they hunt me down for the rest of my life until they catch me and kill me. I stay where I am? And Potter will gladly lay a killing curse on me.”
“If it doesn’t matter, then let us help you,” she replied, determined.
“No,” he said, his stubbornness matching hers.
Hermione clenched her fists at her side, resisting the urge to push him again. “I hate you.”
“I know you do,” he replied with a hint of a smile.
Draco took another step closer, closing the gap between them, and placed his hand at the nape of her neck. She didn’t protest as he pulled her smaller frame to his and his warm lips met hers. Her hands clenched at the front of his shirt, the fabric bunching under her fingers. When his lips found the spot just under her earlobe, she tried to speak again before she lost all ability to form coherent sentences.
“Draco…”
His lips stopped their investigation of her skin as he pulled away, his gaze finding hers. “The conversation is over, Hermione.”
Hermione opened her mouth to protest, but whatever argument she had mustered melted into a moan of content as his lips found her neck again and his hand slid under her skirt and between her thighs.
“Draco,” she sighed.
“Time is wasting, Granger.” He took a deep breath, closing his eyes. “Let’s get this over with.”
“Just get up, Malfoy,” she replied, her voice tired. “End this now.”
His eyes opened, and she almost wished he’d focus his silver gaze elsewhere. “Well, I’m *trying* to, but you’re making this quite difficult.” He sighed, shifting his weight in the mud but making no move to stand. “It takes two simple words, Granger, and you’ve used them before so just say them again.”
“This is different, and you know it.”
“No, it’s not.”
“Yes, it is,” she argued, waving her wand at him angrily. “You’re… you’re…”
“The last of the Malfoy lineage. A notorious Death Eater. A killer.” He shrugged casually. “You’ve said so yourself many times.”
“Don’t make me do this!” she snapped, her anger finally getting the best of her as her voice raised. “You want to die some stupid noble death or be some bloody martyr, you’ll do it without me. You want to just lie there and give up? Fine, but I will not help you.”
“This isn’t giving up,” he replied in his same even tone, unfazed by her outburst. “This is survival.”
“No,” she said with a shake of her head. “I won’t.”
Draco exhaled deeply, placing his free hand to the gash above his eye. He growled quietly, and she wasn’t sure if it was at his pain or at her. “Granger….”
Hermione shifted against the warm body lying beside her, the only indication that she had even heard him say her name. She was too tired, too sated, to stay up and argue with Draco over whatever the topic would be tonight. It always seemed to happen without fail that he would take these moments afterwards to start with her. Sometimes it would be serious matters about the war, about her friends. Other nights it would be petty rows over Crookshanks having the audacity to lie on his robes that *he* had recklessly discarded onto her carpet in his need to ravage her.
Tonight, Hermione just wanted to lie beside him and sleep peacefully.
Or at least not speak.
“You won’t be able to do it, you know.”
Hermione slowly opened one eye and then the other to peer at the man lying beside her. Arms folded under his head and his eyes closed as if asleep, for a moment, she thought she had imagined him speaking.
But then she saw the corner of his lip twitch into the beginnings of that all too familiar smirk.
She hastily pushed herself up onto her elbows, brushing her wild curls out of her eyes. “Won’t be able to do what?”
“You know what,” he replied, never once moving from his peaceful position. “You’re gonna have your chance to take your shot at me, and you won’t take it.”
Hermione frowned as she realized he was using now, when she was naked and flushed and drained, to bring up the conversation they had been avoiding for months. The exact conversation they had been tiptoeing around ever since his meetings with her had started to lead to bedroom encounters. Though the topic had never been brought up before, Hermione thought about it every night, about what would happen if and when they came face to face during the final battle. She had never allowed herself to visualize the outcome of that future encounter. She feared what she would see….
She studied him, frowning. “If you had your chance at me, would you take it?”
His eyes finally fluttered open as he smirked at her. “Of course.”
She narrowed her eyes at him as she angrily tossed back the covers to climb out of bed. It was during moments like these that she wished these meetings between them happened somewhere outside her own flat so that she could storm out of the room and disapparate and leave him to imagine how deep her anger with him really reached.
But tonight, she had to settle on snatching her robe from the floor and cinching it tightly around her body. Fuming, she walked away from the bed to stand at her bedroom window.
“Oh come on, Granger,” Draco said with a laugh, pushing back his own covers. He didn’t bother to cover himself as he approached her, stopping just over her shoulder. “Did you expect anything less?”
She stared out into the darkness of the late evening, her arms wrapped protectively around herself. “I expected too much obviously,” she finally admitted after a few moments of suffocating silence.
“Granger….”
He placed a hand on her shoulder, and she ducked from his touch. In a flash, she turned, hand raised to slap him in a way she hadn’t done since they were teenagers. However, unlike when they were thirteen, Draco caught her wrist before her fingers could even think of assaulting his face.
He raised an amused eyebrow at her, his hand still firmly gripping her wrist. “Temper temper, love.”
“Malfoy,” she threatened.
“Hermione, when the day comes when you and I have our final little showdown?” he asked, ignoring the threatening tone and the glare he was receiving as he held onto her wrist. “It’s gonna be about instinct. Survival.”
Hermione simply replied with a scowl.
“It’s a bloody war,” he said to her disapproving glare. He finally released his grip of her with a shake of his head. “You’ll need to start thinking here--” He tapped her temple with his fingers. “--for a change.”
In response, she jabbed him hard in the chest. “Or perhaps you should think here.”
“Look, Granger, just promise me something,” he sighed. “When that time comes? If I ask you to off me? Just bloody do it. Don’t hesitate. Don’t go all fucking stubborn on me like you like to do. And most certainly do not start going all sentimental and female. Just shut your mouth, and do it.”
Hermione stared at him, taking in his words. “You want me to kill you?”
“Yes.”
“With pleasure,” she replied flatly.
Hermione moved to push past him and return to bed, but Draco grabbed hold of her arm before she could get far. She glared at him, silently ordering him to release her, but he ignored her look of death and dismemberment as he pulled her to him. She fell into him, her free hand bracing against his chest for balance.
“You won’t be able to do it, you know,” he whispered, returning them full circle. “I know you too well.”
“You don’t know me well enough,” she countered before he kissed her, their argument ending for another night.
“I knew you wouldn’t be able to do it.”
Hermione watched as Draco clung tighter to his midsection, his head lowering in pain.
“Because you know me too well,” she mumbled under her breath.
She continued to watch him for a moment before sighing softly and kneeling down in front of him, ignoring the mud clinging to her pants. His head still lowered, he glanced upward at her with a frown.
“Get up, Granger,” he ordered, followed by a hiss of pain. “Get up and finish this.”
Hermione ignored his order, instead reaching out and taking hold of the arm he had kept close to his stomach since she had stumbled on him. He resisted at first, but was either too tired or no longer cared to fight as she pulled his arm away. Under his arm, his tan shirt was soaked through with blood. Hermione held her breath as she glanced up nervously at his face, but he kept his gaze elsewhere, avoiding her look of panic.
“Malfoy, we need to get you out of here,” Hermione said as she moved to lift the bottom of his shirt to see the actual damage.
With what little strength he still had, he reached out and grabbed her wrist as her fingers danced over the sticky fabric of his shirt. “Get. Up.” He growled at her, his eyes filled with intensity. “Get up and finish the fucking job.”
Hermione snatched her arm out of his grip. “And if I don’t?”
“The crimes I’ve committed, Granger?” he asked, placing his arm back across his stomach. “All those people you like to remind me I killed? Their deaths are nothing but a one way ticket to Azkaban and a rendezvous with a Dementor.”
“But--”
“And as for staying with my own side? Not going to happen since I was labeled a traitor by my former mentor.”
Hermione frowned deeply. “Snape.”
“I would have made his death a bit more painful, but I was running on a schedule,” he smirked weakly. “So given the choices of a life spent running and hiding like a bloody coward, a Dementor torturing me for past sins, or you just doing the deed here? I’ll take the latter.”
“Maybe if I talk to the Order, I can get you some sort of leniency….”
“You don’t have that kind of power, Hermione.”
Of all the times for him to be right, she knew he was. To the Order, to the Ministry, he would simply be another Death Eater. And all of Voldemort’s followers had to meet the same fate for their crimes. She could plead to them all she wanted that Draco Malfoy was a changed man, that he was a victim of circumstances, but only she had seen that side of him. Only she had seen him at his most human, most sincere.
And only she cared whether he lived or died.
“Or you could just sit there gawking at me like a mute and I could slowly bleed out,” he said to her silence, raising an eyebrow in her direction.
She exhaled deeply, dropping her gaze to the mud soaking into her pants legs. “Draco….”
“Don’t.”
She looked up, confused by his simple order. “Don’t what?”
“Don’t say whatever it is you’re about to say.” He frowned at her. “Don’t tell me you’re sorry about what’s happened. Don’t tell me you wish things were different, and most certainly don’t tell me you love me.”
She hesitated for only a moment. “I hadn’t planned on it.”
He gave her a knowing smirk in response. “Of course you hadn’t.” He clenched tighter at his stomach. “So, are you going to do this, or are we going to sit out here all night?”
She didn’t want to do this. She couldn’t even put into words how much she didn’t want to do this, to be there, at that moment. Back in Hogwarts, she had always envisioned this moment-where she would have to face off against Draco Malfoy. She had imagined insults being yelled, taunts being delivered, and finally curses being thrown.
But back then, she never thought she’d find herself swallowing down the urge to cry.
“Granger,” he sighed, his voice tired as he studied her with weary eyes. “Please don’t make this harder than it has to be.”
Hermione blinked quickly, hoping to get rid of the stinging sensation building in her eyes. “I hate you,” she finally said.
He smiled. “The feeling is mutual.”
Hermione leaned forward, placing a hand gently on his face as she kissed him, finally allowing the tears to fall as she did so. She felt his free hand clench in her hair, holding her into their frenzied kiss. When she finally pulled away, she was breathless and sure that her lips would be bruised in the morning. Draco’s hand still clenched possessively in her hair, she closed her eyes and rested her forehead against his.
“Hermione,” he said softly.
Hermione clenched her eyes tighter together in response, chewing on her lower lip until she tasted the bitterness of her own blood.
“I told you you couldn’t do it,” he replied to her silence. “Now, do what you do best, and prove me wrong.”
Hermione finally opened her eyes to gray ones staring back at her.
“Prove me wrong then if that will make you feel better,” Draco said, leaning lazily against the back of her couch. “But it won’t be on my conscience when you walk right into their trap.” He stood up straight. “I’m giving you fair warning that the London raid will not be what you think. You can do whatever you feel like with this new knowledge.”
Hermione stopped pacing across her carpet, studying him with a confused tilt of her head. “I still don’t understand why you’re doing this.”
Draco shrugged and crossed his arms over his chest. “Because it’s the only way to get into your knickers.”
She narrowed her eyes at him. “Don’t hold your breath on that one, Malfoy.”
His lips curled into a smile. “Oh, I don’t plan to, Granger.”
When Hermione returned to her friends and former classmates, the celebrating rang loudly through the gathered crowd of survivors. Cheers could be heard for the end of Voldemort. For the end of the second war. For the survival of the infamous Boy Who Lived.
Friends hugged her and told her that they were glad to see she was okay. They didn’t question the mud on her clothes, in her hair. They didn’t question her tired appearance, the flush to her cheeks. But when they questioned her red eyes, her puffy lids, Hermione simply offered a weak smile and told them she had been crying tears of joy at their long-awaited victory.
Because the battle was finally done.