PART I

Hermione Jean Granger was born many things.

A natural brunette with a mane of curls that quickly outgrew her small, baby body before she could even walk. A certifiable genius, boasting a voracious and lightning-quick mind that had her reading by the age of three and writing by the age of five. A bit of a hothead, wielding a sharp temper, one that she acquired from neither of her parents, both of whom were mild mannered dentists.

And, most unfortunately, a seer.

She’d had the gift for as long as she could remember, but she supposed it all started at her third birthday party. Fresh with the thrill of learning language, she’d gone on to announce every single gift she’d received before she even removed the wrapping. Her parents had laughed and cooed over her foresight, dubbed her a seer, an oracle, and played it off as a joke. For what else could it be?

But her gift continued to exhibit itself in the most outlandish of ways.

She was accused of cheating in Year Two, pulled into the principal’s office after reciting every test answer before the test was even passed out. Her parents had been cross, but the school was unable to prove anything. The principal hadn’t taken kindly to being called an idiot by a seven-year-old, but Hermione had little patience, even then, for fools.

Upon returning home, her parents had been in a tizzy, eventually settling back on their old moniker: Hermione Granger, Seer, Oracle, a funny little title to explain the funny little occurrences that continued to happen around her. Not something to be taken seriously. After all, they didn’t believe in magic.

But Hermione knew that she was different.

While many people may believe the gift of foresight to be a desirable one—imagining the ability to see one’s future and prevent unfortunate outcomes as something to be envied, sought after even—for Hermione, the gift had only been… well, quite frankly, a royal pain.

Apart from ostracizing herself from the other children—no one wanted to hang out with the odd woo-woo girl who could see the future—her very conservative middle-class parents were at an utter loss of what to do with her by the age of eleven.

So much so that they practically wept when Hermione received her invitation to join a magical boarding school in Scotland meant for children who were different. Her parents often said special, but Hermione knew better. There was no harm in being different; they really needn’t make such a fuss.

She was secretly relieved too. While she had accepted and understood why the other children found her odd—she was very logical, if nothing else—she could acknowledge that it was an incredibly lonely feeling. And, despite being quite used to it, when she was feeling more fanciful than usual—which wasn’t often—she found herself wishing to feel understood, like she belonged even.

So, when her eyes scanned the Hogwarts acceptance letter signed off by a very sensible sounding woman named Professor Minerva McGonagall, Hermione felt alright admitting to herself that she felt an errant glimmer of hope.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t to last.

Right as she waved her final goodbye to her parents—who, in turn, scurried off, unable to fully contain their excitement that their lives would temporarily return to normal—the trouble for Hermione was just beginning.

You see, looking back on her life, it wasn’t that Hermione minded being a seer precisely; it was the way others reacted to it that she found particularly tiresome. Never mind that she had prevented the imminent destruction of the wizarding world time and time again. Single-handedly, she might add. No, it was the way that other people continued to insist that she was some hack, instead of acknowledging her usefulness, instead of acknowledging that, hey, maybe Hermione Granger knows what she's talking about from time to time, that drove her a bit insane.

Frankly, Hermione was tired of trying to decipher the reason why her methods elicited such disdain. Surely, jabbing a wooden stick at things and screaming about was just as silly of a way to save lives as having visions. But one was wildly more respected than the other.

Mad.

But that was the way the world worked. Denying it until her throat was hoarse would award her no favors. Unfortunately, her reputation for being a bit batty was established on her very first foray into the wizarding world, on that fateful train ride itself.

As soon as the large, red train left the station, she came face-to-face—or, rather, face-to-toe—with a mangy rat.

Only he wasn’t a rat. He was a wizard. Her vision came upon her rapidly, and she stumbled before clutching the wall, gripping her head as painful images were forced inside her skull; an enchanted map, a silver hand, a man whose face was so snakelike he was more snake than man. Once her vision cleared, she knew immediately what she had to do.

She stomped on the man-rat. Killing him in one fell squish.

Satisfied, she turned to be greeted by a freckle-faced redhead whose expression was so screwed up in anger, his ears were bright red. “That was my rat!” the boy, who she later learned was named Ron Weasley, objected.

Hermione shrugged. “He was evil.”

This had apparently been the wrong thing to say, and Ron continued to yell at her for the better part of thirty minutes until a messy haired boy, who she later learned was named Harry Potter, dragged him away.

She had tried to explain to Professor McGonagall that the rat, Scabbers, had actually been a dark wizard named Peter Pettigrew, and, though she had been let off with a warning, she earned an enemy for life in the red-haired boy, and his friend, the famous Harry Potter, looked at her in not much better light. A most unfortunate development as they were both in her house and much more popular than she could ever hope to be.

Word spread quickly, and, soon enough, Hogwarts was just the same as her primary school, lonely and disappointing. No one wanted to be friends with the weird girl who killed other people’s pets.

She did manage to befriend the groundskeeper, Hagrid. A large man who was clearly half-giant, but Hermione was much too polite to say it outright. Apart from a fondness for Harry Potter and a drinking problem, Hagrid was quite excellent company, as long as she insisted on bringing her own snacks.

Which was probably why—after several months of friendship— she urged him to enroll in an Alcoholics Anonymous program. It had been one of her visions that spurred the idea. Right when Hagrid had poured a nip of something into his tankard of tea, she had doubled over and seen a three-headed dog, a shiny amber stone, and that same snake-faced man. Once again, she knew exactly what she must do.

Now, despite popular opinion, she wasn’t some woo-woo ya-ya psychic, prancing about and acting only upon her whims and feelings. True, she acted on instinct a lot of the time—case in point, Scabbers—but generally Hermione tried to research each and every one of her visions to make sure that she was coming to the correct, logical conclusion. So what if those conclusions coincided with her initial instinct ninety-nine point nine percent of the time? She was willing to do the work, wasn’t she? That had to count for something.

So, after several hours of research in the library, she discovered the existence of the Sorcerer’s Stone, and, after exploring every inch of the castle until she heard a growl from behind a door in the third-floor corridor, she just knew that, for whatever reason, Hogwarts was keeping it safe. And, unfortunately, Hagrid’s alcoholism was putting it at risk.

She organized a controlled intervention featuring herself, Professor McGonagall, and a bemused Professor Dumbledore, which ended with Hermione being wrapped in one of Hagrid’s large bear hugs, then drowned in tearful apologies. “Just get better, Hagrid,” she said once he released her and air returned to her lungs.

And that was that. The Sorcerer’s Stone remained uncompromised, and, soon after term ended, she received news that Professor Quirrell died of natural causes. She smirked. Natural causes. If that’s what they called being eaten by a giant spider after sneaking into the Forbidden Forest to murder unicorns, so be it.

While she was optimistic at first, her second and third year at Hogwarts went just as poorly for Hermione. After burning Ginny Weasley’s journal with Fiendfyre during their first week back at school, the altercation cemented her place as the sworn enemy of the Weasley clan.

The girl was beside herself in tears, despite Hermione insisting it was for her own good. She was still thrown again in front of Professor McGonagall. She tried to explain that the journal was actually the soul of the not-so-dead dark wizard, Voldemort—her research had determined, without question, the identity of the snake-faced man from her visions—and a few tests of the older witch’s wand revealed the diary was indeed infused with dark magic.

McGonagall’s only response was to pinch her brow and ask, “And how exactly do you know the counter-curse for Fiendfyre?”

Hermione’s face lit up. “Well, it’s just a simple transdimensional banishing spell really. So, how it works—”

“Never mind, Miss Granger,” McGonagall interrupted, rubbing her temples. “That will be all. Try to stay out of trouble.”

Hermione frowned as she was given the boot, and, while there was no discipline for her actions, she felt supremely disappointed knowing that she’d once again failed to make a good impression on her Head of House. Perhaps it was a long shot, but she had really hoped that McGonagall would agree to be her mentor that year.

This made it sting all the worse when she was finally able to snag a mentor third year, and it was the absolute last person she would have picked for herself.

Stepping into the misty Divination classroom on her first day, Professor Trelawney identified her as a seer on sight and practically begged to take Hermione on as an apprentice. The woman was ridiculous, but Hermione wasn’t in the business of turning down friends at the moment. So, she put up with Sybill’s crazy glasses and nonsense visions, multi-hued crystals and crystal balls—well, okay, Hermione did have a crystal ball all her own, but that was only because she had done quite a bit of research on the best way to optimize her gift, and all the reference books swore by them, okay? It was only practical… obviously.

She almost immediately regretted the decision, because being seen with Trelawney only further ostracized her from the student body.

That was the thing that nagged at her the most, if she was being honest with herself. In the Muggle world she had always been viewed as odd but still smart. Her classmates never made any secret that they would cheat off her during exams or try to sneak glimpses of her homework. The seer stuff was just seen as a weird hobby, a passing fancy. After all, there were plenty of little girls with active imaginations who viewed themselves as princesses or fairies or fairy princesses, or whatever.

The Magical world however... Well, in some ways, it was actually quite conservative when it all came down to it. It was as if, because they already had a mainstream accepted form of magic, there wasn’t room for the things that Hermione did, things that were most often seen as a load of hooey, a sprinkle of superstition. Her gift made her, at the best of times, a freak, and, at the worst, bloody off her rocker.

No one seemed to care or notice that Hermione was inherently logical, someone who thought things through from every angle before acting. She couldn’t help it if she had access to more resources than the average witch or wizard. Why was it automatically her problem that her methods made them feel all squirmy?

The only person who seemed to get it was her friend, Luna, a Ravenclaw a year behind her. Luna was perhaps the only girl at school who may have a worse reputation than Hermione did. The other students had the tendency to confuse her name for Loony which… alright, it wasn't that far off if Hermione was being honest with herself. Luna definitely fell more so on the Trelawney end of cracked, hardly what one would call an ordinary companion. Still, Hermione found herself attending every study date, clearing her schedule for séances, and nodding blandly whenever Luna waxed poetic about wrackspurts and nargles.

It went without saying that Luna was a little different from her, but there was little mystery as to why she continued to pursue the friendship despite that. It was the same reason Hermione often found herself sitting down to painful teas with Trelawney or attending Alcoholics Anonymous meetings with Hagrid; she was still dreadfully lonely. And being with people, even those who didn’t quite get you, was better than being alone, wasn’t it?

Hermione finally received some of the acknowledgment that she thought was well past due during fourth year. During the first week of classes—at the welcoming feast actually—she had a vision about the new professor, Mad-Eye Moody. Only he wasn’t Mad-Eye Moody at all!

Hermione clutched her head as she was shown a dark fortress in the middle of a stormy sea, a sobbing man she knew was of the Ministry, and a shiny flask that Hermione was able to identify as the same one in Professor Moody’s hands once her visions finally cleared. So, after a few days of light stalking, Hermione managed to swipe the flask when the fraudster wasn’t looking and sprinkle a bit of grated taro root into it, an ingredient that would render Polyjuice potion completely ineffective.

Sure enough, at breakfast the next morning, the Great Hall watched slack jawed as Professor Moody transformed into a particularly grungy looking fellow who turned out to be some manic, escaped Death Eater. The Hall erupted in an uproar, which Hermione found unnecessary as Professor Dumbledore was quite quick on his feet to detain the madman. Professor Dumbledore also managed to sniff out the useless Polyjuice in due course, and, as his eyes met Hermione’s across the Hall, she was practically brimming with pride, excited that she would finally, finally, get some sort of acknowledgment regarding the advantages of her gift.

Thus armed with an extra fifty points for Gryffindor and a begrudging respect from most of the student body—sans Weasleys—Hermione was fairly content to hunker down and keep her head low for the remainder of her schooling. She was quite tired of being looked askance and treated like an other. Her reputation was finally… palatable. She vowed to no longer tamper in any events—barring world-ending cataclysms—and just let the chips fall as they may.

Her visions for the most part cooperated with her. No colossal headaches crippled her, which meant there was no end-of-the-world doom-and-gloom sort of stuff on the horizon. She mostly experienced small twinges here and there, where small actions made her life slightly less chaotic. She was able to use it to help Hagrid find his escaped niffler and to prevent Fred Weasley from falling down the bloody stairs—not that she got even the faintest of a thank you for that one. The boy would have snapped his neck without her! Weasleys!

No, for the remainder of her time at Hogwarts, she focused on what was important, her studies… and the occasional séance with Luna, and the tea readings with Trelawney, and teaching Hagrid how to bake. No, really, she was quite focused, all things considered… she just had a few… side projects.

Like writing to the wrongfully imprisoned Sirius Black, assisting on his appeals case, and she supposed her continuous filing of complaints against Dolores Umbridge could be considered some form of errant hobby—that one even perplexed Luna, who didn’t understand Hermione’s obsession with a low-level Ministry employee no matter how many times Hermione insisted that she was evil. “You’ve never even met her,” Luna said. Hermione just sniffed.

With relatively little on her plate and a quiet wizarding world, Hermione finished out her seventh year with nine N.E.W.T.s—thank you very much—and a very perplexed not-quite-advisor in McGonagall, who frowned when she saw Hermione’s results and mumbled under her breath, “Never knew she had it in her.” Hermione wanted to punch something.

Still, free of Hogwarts and armed with a killer resume, Hermione felt like she was on the cusp of something, a fresh start, perhaps for the first time. She was ready to take on the wizarding world by storm, ready to prove once and for all that she, Hermione Granger, Seer, Oracle, was also determined and logical and just what the wizarding world asked for—thank you very much.

Which is why Hermione was annoyed to find herself on the steps of Malfoy Manor, after a head-splitting feels-like-you’re-going-to-literally-die vision that made every one before it pale in comparison.

She had seen fire and blood, screams and terror, and then a terrifying sense of nothing that left Hermione feeling more frightened than she cared to admit.

Once the torrent subsided, and her head stopped feeling as if it had been split open by an axe, a sense of clarity formed, as it did with each and every one of her other visions, a certainty of what she was to do next. She packed her things, apparated on the spot, and found herself performing three resounding knocks, the metal of the great bronze knockers still cool in her hands. She steeled herself for what came next. Her duty. Her mission. Hers alone to fulfill, which she would, because all of existence depended on it.

But she didn’t have to like it.

So, when the grand doors opened before her, revealing the unpleasant face of a platinum blond Draco Malfoy, she returned his sneer with a scowl all her own. Looking a bit confused, he asked, “What are you doing here, Granger?”

He eyed the multitude of bags and boxes scattered around her, containing all her worldly possessions—and some otherworldly ones for that matter—Hermione just growled. “Believe me, Malfoy, I don’t want to be here any more than you want me to be. But neither of us has any choice in the matter.”

And she pushed past him and stomped into the manor.

PART II

1.

Convincing Draco Malfoy that the fate of the world depended on the two of them sticking together proved to be much more of a pain than she initially anticipated. So much for her reputation preceding her.

He scoffed, folding his arms and looking her up and down after she finished explaining the situation. “A likely story. What are you really doing here, Granger?”

Hermione huffed. “What purpose would it serve to lie to you, Malfoy? Like I said, I had a vision—”

“And I already told you,” he interrupted, quite rudely. “Don’t give me any of that psychic bullshit; I’m not Lovegood,” he sneered.

“Oh, my mistake, I’ll just fuck off then,” she said hotly.

He only smirked. “See that you do.”

She let out a heavy exhale of hot air, eying the blond up and down. She’d never interacted with him much at school; they didn’t exactly run in the same circles—not that Hermione really had a circle.

Regardless, Draco Malfoy made his opinions about blood status quite clear, so she’d been keen to avoid him. Whenever a vision would crackle on the edge of her periphery in his presence, she would quickly find herself sprinting in the opposite direction. The last thing she needed in her life was more trouble, and—since he’d been so hell bent on one-upping Harry Potter at every which way turn—it’d been an easy enough feat to manage.

She racked her brain trying to recall every scrap of detail she knew about the unpleasant wizard. She remembered him being passable at potions and even moderately good at Ancient Runes and Arithmancy. She could admire the studiousness of him even if the rest of him left something to be desired.

Unfortunately, one thing about him absolutely ensured that it did.

Draco Malfoy was an utter and uncompromising arse.

At Hogwarts, he made such a habit of walking around with his nose held high in the air that she wouldn’t be surprised to discover that he frequently knocked it on the ceiling. The risk grew greater and greater with every passing year as he grew taller and taller. Really, it wasn’t fair to anyone else in the slightest.

However, Hermione had to reluctantly acknowledge that she appeared to be one of the few who found the dreadful man’s demeanor so off-putting. He had all sorts of fan clubs and groupies back at school. She knew that money and looks could be great motivators, but, quite honestly, that all served to prove to her that the magical world could be just as silly as the Muggle one.

Still, just because the whole world seemed content to worship the ground he walked on, it didn’t mean that she was going to take any of Draco bloody Malfoy’s shite.

“Don’t be daft, Malfoy, you know very well that I have visions. I mean, you saw what happened with Mad-Eye—erm, Barty Crouch Junior.”

Malfoy waved a hand. “Do I? That whole thing was such a mess; who knows what really happened? I mean, you could have had insider information or a great number of other things that would preclude you having a so-called vision.”

She opened her mouth to retort but paused. It wasn’t a completely illogical line of thinking. She’d never once factored that in before, never once considered that Draco bloody Malfoy might be… well, logical.

Still… it didn’t make it any less frustrating.

She balled her hands on her hips. “Fine, but surely you remember what happened with Sir Codagan?”

“Sir who?”

She frowned. “Sir Codagan.”

“The bloody painting?”

“Yes,” she continued impatiently. “You must remember how I stopped him from staging a coup alongside the other portraits? The aftermath of that would have been—”

“Says you,” he sneered.

“Says me what?”

“Says you that he would have done it,” he continued petulantly. “I’m not even half-convinced that hack could have achieved such a feat. He’s positively off his rocker.”

True, Hermione chewed her lip, though she didn’t like the look in Malfoy’s eyes, the one that seemed to say, Off his rocker just like you.

She breathed a sigh of frustration; all things considered, she supposed that she wouldn’t believe herself either.

See, that was another frustrating thing about her gift. She actually understood why people didn’t believe her, understood why they were skeptical of the things that she could do. Because—if she was being truly honest with herself—she knew that she would be the one leading the charge of skepticism if the situation was reversed.

She anxiously tapped her foot; she would have to try another approach.

“Is there anything that I can say that would convince you?” she asked impatiently. “You must know that I’m not leaving. There’s too much at stake.”

He huffed a laugh and turned to walk away. “Loiter all bloody day, if you must. I’m Flooing Father. Perhaps a representative of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement could dissuade you of your illusions.”

This wasn’t good. There had to be another way, something else she could use, something else she could do. Embarrassment bloomed in her belly, along with the bit of knowledge from a vision years ago that she'd tried to suppress, one that she suddenly knew was the answer in the way she was prone to know such things. Bugger, this is going to be unpleasant.

“Your pants!” she blurted.

Malfoy paused—a look of genuine confusion on his face—and turned to face her. “What about my pants, Granger?”

“They’re blue,” she stammered. “With little snitches on them.”

He blinked, his cheeks going decidedly red. “You’re trying to tell me that power of yours gives you the ability to see people’s undergarments?”

She sighed, rubbing her brow. “Not like that, I can’t see them. I just know.”

Cool amusement cut through his tone. “And this is something that applies to everyone?”

“Just you,” she admitted, and, when his eyes flickered to his groin, she groaned. “Not like that, okay? Once again, I can’t see through your clothes, and, before you ask me, I don’t know why my gift wants me to know the details of your underthings, Malfoy. Perhaps it’s because it knows that you’re so bloody stubborn and that this was the only way to convince you!”

“All I know is that today they are blue with snitches, and tomorrow they’ll be green with little brooms. You go through the whole spectrum of the rainbow and the whole spectrum of Quidditch sporting equipment every week,” she snapped, ignoring how Malfoy’s ears grew redder and redder the longer her tirade continued.

“Now, either the wards surrounding Malfoy Manor are utter shite and I’ve been spying on you—which we both know is not true—or you can just bloody trust me that I know what I’m bloody talking about.”

He stared at her as if struck, his jaw hanging agape; she didn’t let that stop her. “So, if you don’t mind, will you please re-affix your mouth to your face and show me where my room is. Actually,” she declared, throwing up her hands. “Don’t bother! I already know where it is.”

She enchanted her baggage to follow behind her and stomped past, leaving a stunned Draco Malfoy standing frozen in the foyer.

2.

Dinner at Malfoy Manor was in the running to be the most awkward affair Hermione had ever encountered.

She wasn’t exactly sure what Malfoy told his parents about their situation, but, when a house-elf appeared in her rooms a few hours later, announcing that dinner was served in the dining room, she didn’t see any other choice but to attend. Besides, she was feeling a bit peckish.

Perhaps it shouldn’t surprise her that the Malfoys sat down to a formal dinner every night—she could hardly imagine them popping down to Maccies for a burger and chips—but she still marveled at the second course of the evening, a fresh spring vegetable-based broth. It was just as delicious as her salad had been, with its rooty vegetables and light balsamic dressing.

She took a moment to examine the two Malfoys sitting on opposite ends of the long table. She’d never met them, only witnessed them from afar, picking up and dropping off their son at the Hogwarts Express.

Narcissa Malfoy seemed to be everything a Pure-blood society wife should be—well-mannered, impeccably dressed, and reserved. Her motions were precise and practiced; she took the lead in ensuring conversation flowed during the meal, however stilted and halting. She asked Hermione all sorts of questions about her life and interests, but what Hermione found most impressive was that she never once uttered What the hell are you doing in my house. A marvel of a woman, truly.

Lucius was a bit harder to read. He’d been close-lipped the entire meal, uttering nary a word, but his grimacing sneer rivaled that of his son’s. Long platinum hair and hands that looked like they never saw a day’s work in their life complemented his Lordly appearance. A deeply unpleasant man by any stretch of the imagination, but she had to admit that she was somewhat intrigued by him. Though, the intrigue had little to do with who he was as a person but rather with the way her gift reacted when her eyes met his.

The vision came upon her suddenly; her spoon clattered to the table with a clang as she gripped the edge, and her sight blurred. The flames were larger this time, engulfing the entire world, licking at the mountaintops swallowed in fire. Then, a growing darkness, the embodiment of nothing, seemed to suck the air out of her chest. She struggled to breathe, her lungs scrambling for the sweet release of oxygen. And then it suddenly returned, along with a lone flash of one Draco Malfoy before she was left gasping for breath in a way that she was sure was most unflattering.

For once, she didn’t know what it all meant. While she caught her breath beneath the stupefied stares of her dining companions, she vainly searched within herself for the clarity that normally came with her visions. But her instinct remained thus unstirred.

She let out a slow breath, recognizing that her vision, at least, left a bit of a resonance, the same as the first vision had. When she first saw Malfoy, she was hit with a sense of foreboding, a barbed, twisty, unpleasant feeling that she could only describe as imminent danger; she’d felt the same when she looked at Narcissa, or the gardener, or anyone else for that matter. It was stronger for those who resided at Malfoy Manor, but it felt a bit like everyone’s fates were tied together. Except for Lucius. Instead of a sense of doom, Lucius radiated a sense of… well, nothing. Lucius was… for lack of a better word, clean.

Meanwhile, the youngest Malfoy was shooting her dark looks across the table. As if she could control when and where the visions would strike! She picked up her discarded spoon and flashed Malfoy a smirk, raising one eyebrow and letting her eyes flick downward, towards his snitch-covered pants under the table. A reminder. A threat. His eyes grew mutinous, but he didn’t utter a word. She took a victory swig from her goblet, a lightly spiced mulled wine.

“Remind me again why exactly you’re here, Miss Granger,” Lucius Malfoy’s cool drawl pierced the silence. She turned to face him, and he was eying her as if she was a flobberworm he wanted to squish. “My son nattered on something about you being some sort of seer and that the world was in grave peril unless we tolerated your presence in our home. Did I understand that correctly?”

Hermione set her goblet down and turned to Lucius. “Yes, that about sums it.”

“I see,” was all he said at first, his face unreadable. “I’m assuming your gift is registered at the Ministry and that my son hasn’t let in some cheap-trick carnival performer off the street.”

“I am,” she confirmed. Unfortunately, she added mentally. Really, she would have preferred to keep the whole matter to herself, but Trelawney had insisted, and, in the end, Hermione’s stupid sense of rule-following won out.

Lucius clicked his tongue as if he expected no less but also nothing at all. “And how much longer should we anticipate your presence…. Here.” In my dining room. Eating my soup.

“Unfortunately, I can’t answer that,” Hermione explained with a sigh. Two house-elves appeared to clear away plates and present the main course, some sort of lamb with boiled potatoes. Her mouth started to water. “My visions can be spotty at best. I’ve learned to trust my gut when it comes to acting on them, which is why I’m here. But never you mind, I intend to do extensive research in the coming weeks to discover more regarding the imminent threat to the world at large.”

Lucius’s eyes narrowed. “I suppose you’ll need our libraries for that.”

Hermione speared a potato and raised it to her lips, eating half in one bite. She wanted to cry; it was that delicious. She waved a hand. “Oh, I’m sure Draco can show me.”

Across the table, Malfoy stiffened, and his eyes narrowed. Lucius spoke first, “You seem quite familiar with my son. Were the two of you…” his eyes flickered “…friends at school.”

“Oh, Good Godric, not at all,” Hermione answered quickly and took her first bite of lamb. She had to stifle her moan. It. Was. Heaven. She chewed, reluctantly swallowed, and said, “Bit of a twat, wasn’t he?”

She ignored the gasp from Narcissa and the working of Lucius’s jaw as she turned back to her food, until she felt a swift kick to her shin. She looked up, wincing, to find Malfoy glaring daggers at her. “What?” she asked. “You were, always walking around like you were better than everyone else. I wouldn’t worry about it. It’s nothing a bit of humbling life experience won’t fix.”

Malfoy’s mouth opened and closed. Narcissa was taking deep throated swallows of wine. Lucius’s face had a curious expression that Hermione could only describe as perplexed. He raised his goblet to his lips; he still hadn’t touched his food. Such an odd man. He decided to ignore the comment about his son completely. “And you’re sure that you are… qualified to do that sort of research? Given your… background.”

She sighed. This again, she thought. She set her utensils down regretfully. “Yes, I am. I’m a seer. I know that it can be an uncomfortable idea to most of the wizarding world, but, really, I assure you, it makes me no less capable or any less logical than the next wizard.” She went back to her food, cutting up the so-tender-it-was-almost-buttery meat and clicking her tongue. “Really, it all comes down to prejudice in the end, which is such a silly thing to let hamper your judgment.”

No one seemed to have anything else to say to that, and Hermione was content to leave them to their exchanging of wary looks while she continued to shovel into the potatoes.

3.

After several weeks of living at Malfoy Manor, Hermione fell into a comfortable routine.

She rarely saw the Malfoys unless it was at their nightly dinners or when she dragged the youngest to help her sort through the library. And oh what a library it was.

Several stories high, filled with more books than she had ever seen, it was a marvel, truly. Malfoy didn’t feel obliged to stay with her, only lingering long enough to allow her to pass through the blood wards. She preferred the solitude—really, she did—and, while she knew she should be researching her vision, those first few weeks, she found herself… well… distracted.

She tried not to be too hard on herself. After all, how often did you find yourself with unlimited access to one of the most extensive libraries in Britain?

By her tally, she’d already read one-hundred and thirty-two books during her first month at the Manor: ten biographies, three history texts, a smattering of novels both Wizard and Muggle alike, and she had actually grown quite attached to a thirty-four volume Wizard comic book about an Obscurus named Sunshine. On her least productive days, she often found herself curled up in one of the library’s bay windows, doubled over in laughter while reading that particular series.

She spent most of her days there and usually lingered pretty late into the night. The weather had been quite rainy, so time spent outside had been limited, and, with Luna off on extended holiday, she didn’t have much of a social life to attend to.

So, it was quite late on a Tuesday when she passed a door left slightly ajar on her way back to her rooms. A now familiar voice drifted into the corridor, “Father, it’s long past time for me to assist in these matters.”

“You’re not ready, Draco. This requires a delicate hand.”

She froze, her curiosity piqued; this was Lucius’s office. She acknowledged that her nosiness was one of her less desirable qualities, that, along with her stubbornness and, okay, her lack of tact on occasion—truly how the wizarding world could expect her to have impeccable social skills one minute while ostracizing her the next was beyond her.

Still, she couldn’t help that they didn’t bother to close the door, and so what if she inched a bit closer to the study? It was on the way to her rooms after all. Her steps grew quieter in order to be considerate, nothing more, and, if her ears strained to hear more, it was only natural as—Oh, bugger, she was eavesdropping. No other way to spin it.

“Father.” She could clearly make out Malfoy’s annoyed tone, lacking its usual drawl. She was surprised to note that he sounded… earnest? Strange. “I will never be ready if you continue to keep me at arm’s length. How else am I to learn? If you would just tell me what your trips entail, I could—”

“You could nothing, Draco,” Lucius cut off his son. “I have told you that this is a delicate matter; have I not raised you to trust my judgment? If you are choosing now to doubt it, I suggest reflecting as to why. Now, I have much to do, and you are becoming a nuisance. Be gone.”

The scraping of chairs and the thudding of footsteps came upon her so quickly and unexpectedly that she barely managed to scamper away in time to avoid a full-on collision. Still, her presence was immediately obvious as Malfoy stormed from the room and froze in place as he spotted her.

Behind him, the light spilling into the hallway flashed green, an indication that Lucius had left via the fireplace. “What are you doing, here?” Malfoy snarled.

She drew herself up, refusing to cower. “Heading back to my room.”

“No, you were clearly eavesdropping.”

“I was not!” she objected.

“You were too!” he growled, taking one step forward to loom over her, his expression dark. It caught her a bit off guard.

She huffed. “And so what if I was? You’re the one who left the door ajar, what else was I supposed to do? Clamp my hands over my ears and run away?”

He snorted. “Oh, yes, and hovering outside with your ear pressed to the door was similarly out of your control?”

Her mouth opened and closed, and he smirked as it settled in that he’d caught her. She felt embarrassed which unfortunately made her feel suddenly petty. “What’s wrong, Malfoy? Upset Daddy won’t take you on his trip?”

She expected him to flare up at her words, for his face to collapse into that constipated rage that he so often directed at Harry Potter. She expected a petulant tirade of insults to be spat at her, spewed forth in a regressive display of originality.

But, instead, for just a moment, gone so quick she wouldn’t have noticed if he wasn’t hovering so close, he looked hurt. Not by her words, surely not. But by the reminder that they brought, that his father didn’t think he was ready, that his father was leaving him behind.

Despite all logic and past experience, she found herself feeling a spot of… sympathy for Draco Malfoy. Raised his whole life to take over the family estate, and now his father wouldn’t even let him. At least Hermione had a purpose, even if she loathed it most of the time. Nobody was trying to take that away from her.

Her reverie of Draco Malfoy ended as soon as his face closed off, his grey eyes growing hard and unforgiving. “Stay out of my way, Granger,” he said, his voice dangerous.

And okay, so, maybe she didn’t like being told what to do. “Or what?” she challenged.

His jaw worked, and his cold eyes never lost their rigidity. They hung there in that moment, the embodiment of an impasse. Just when she thought the world would crack from their standoff, he was suddenly away, stalking down the hallway leaving Hermione with nothing else to do but release the breath she’d been holding.

Well then.

4.

More weeks passed, and Hermione wasn’t avoiding Malfoy, certainly not. She still sat across from him at dinner and made him take her to the library after all. So what if she found herself doubling back whenever she spotted him in a corridor or ran into him in a hallway? Perhaps she’d forgotten something, okay? It was as simple as that.

Avoiding Draco Malfoy was certainly not why she’d started taking her coffee in the village and then staying there…. All day.

She knew it was against the letter of what her gut was telling her to do. To stay close to Malfoy. But still she felt it was in the spirit. The village and the cafe she frequented were only a fifteen-minute walk from the Manor… if she walked really fast.

Still, with her research pulling up little results—it was absurd how many books existed about fire… couldn’t her vision have been more specific?—she found herself daydreaming about what she would do after all this and what careers she wanted to take. She was contemplating leaving England entirely, maybe finding a community that accepted her gift a bit more readily. She’d always wanted to learn another language.

She stayed at the cafe quite late researching how easy it would be to learn Swahili before she noticed that the barista was glaring at her. With a start, she realized that she was there past closing. She murmured her apology and made her definitely no more than fifteen-minute walk back to the Manor.

The Manor was usually so quiet it was almost eerie. With Lucius out of town more often than not, it was only the three of them and the house-elves on the entire estate. You could yell, and no one would hear you. So, the boisterous sounds of laughs she heard as she stepped over the threshold, followed by the faint thrum of music, were quite different from what she was used to.

She found herself wandering towards the noise, down the long corridor to the east wing where one of the Malfoy smoking parlor doors was slightly ajar, the sounds becoming more distinct as she approached.

Curiosity. There it was again. She didn’t even pretend to be above being nosy this time. It’s best to know oneself, isn’t it?

With a determined step, she pushed through the doors to find the room full of men. But her eyes locked onto Malfoy, sprawled on one of the chaises, his clothing rumpled in a way that would scandalize his mother. There was a cigar hanging from his mouth, and he wasn’t alone.

She vaguely recognized the other attendees surrounding a card table in the middle of the room as members of Slytherin house. The dark and cool Blaise Zabini, the gangly and quiet Theo Nott, the short and mean Vincent Crabbe, and the quiet but burly Greg Goyle. All conversation paused when she entered, their attention turning towards her.

She supposed it was quite the surprise, seeing her there. She was in her Muggle clothing, an old purple sundress, while they all were dressed in wizarding robes, though cloaks had been shed and buttons undone. They were relaxing… indulgently by the heavy cloud of smoke and the half-full glasses of what looked to be firewhisky.

A low whistle came from Blaise. “Now what do we have here?”

Greg frowned. “That’s not that Hermione girl from school, is it?”

Vince laughed. “Yeah, it is. The nutter.” He turned to Malfoy. “Oy, Draco, you shagging her or something?”

The look of disgust on Malfoy’s face made her angry for some reason, but she didn’t give him the chance to respond. She lifted her chin haughtily and replied, “Certainly not!”

“Then why are you here?” Theo asked. He was standing near the fireplace, a little more subdued than the others.

Malfoy flashed her a warning look, the message obvious: Don’t tell them.

She sniffed. As if she would let him dictate what she would or wouldn’t say. “I had a vision.”

Vince snorted, and she thought she heard him mutter, See? Nutter. But she continued, “I’m to stay near Malfoy for the time being. The fate of the world depends on it, apparently.”

Blaise’s chuckle was cool as a billow of smoke puffed between his teeth. “Ah, the infamous Granger visions. Our resident psychic. Or perhaps that was Trelawney? No matter. I must admit I’ve always been curious about your gift.”

Vince guffawed. “She’s cracked. As bad as Loony Lovegood. I don’t believe a word of it. I still think she’s covering for Drakey boy. You like ‘em a bit off their rocker, do ya, Malfoy?”

Malfoy was glaring at her with a ferocity so intense it almost made her want to recoil. She turned her ire on Vince instead. “Crab,” she said.

“Yes, that’s my name.”

“No,” she said. “Crab, the crustacean. That little project you’re working on for admittance into the Most Extraordinary Society of Potioneers? Yeah, you’re going to turn yourself into a crab. It’s going to take months to sort out. And, oh, I almost forgot; you’re not getting in.”

Vince’s jaw hung slack. “How did you know about my—”

Blaise interrupted with a snort. “Are we supposed to be surprised by this? We all knew Crabbe got his position through nepotism. You don’t have enough brain cells to rub together to know what you’re doing.”

Greg and Theo chuckled, but Hermione turned on Blaise. “I wouldn’t talk about qualifications if I were you, considering you can’t even find your own wife.”

She could see it as clearly as anything else, the bride Blaise’s mother had already chosen for him. She was quite pretty; Blaise would be very pleased and desperately in love with her by the end of the year, but she didn’t see a reason to tell him that now.

Blaise’s mouth was working, and Greg muttered, “How could she have known about the arranged marriage?”

She turned on him then, and his mouth snapped shut, a look of terror in his eyes. Hermione frowned, and then she saw why. Greg’s eyes didn’t move to the quiet man by the fireplace, but the invisible bond between them couldn’t mean anything else. Soul-bonded, the red string of fate, whatever you wanted to call it. She couldn’t see how long Greg and Theo had been together, or if they’d acted on their feelings at all, but it couldn’t mean anything else.

She had to admit, she had always been a bit of a sucker for the idea of soulmates. It wasn’t precisely the romance behind them, but the sense of belonging that resonated with her. Not odd for someone who felt so frequently alone, she supposed. Still, they were quite rare; she’d only seen a few. Lucius and Narcissa, Arthur and Molly Weasley, Filch and Mrs. Norris… she had been quite bummed to find that you couldn’t see your own, if it even existed.

She returned to the present, glancing over at Theo, who was quietly staring at the flames, though she could see a tension in his shoulders. She turned back to Greg and said, “I don’t see anything about you.”

Greg’s shoulders sagged in visible relief, but Theo looked up sharply, eyes narrowed as if he knew that she was lying for them. Hermione felt a tug on the edge of her line of sight and turned to find Malfoy staring at her.

Just then, she knew that he knew as well, and, while she thought she detected a modicum of newfound respect in his gaze, she found it odd to find that she felt the same. She hadn’t ever expected Draco Malfoy to be a good friend. Another thing to add to the list of surprises, just behind logical and ahead of only takes baths.

However, it wasn’t the only thing she saw in his expression, she realized. She also saw the accusation, clear as if he’d spoken the words aloud. You’ll lie for my friends but not for me.

She stared back at him in answer. Yes.

Behind her, Vince seemed to have regained his bearings. “I still don’t buy it. Just because you say I’m going to turn into a lobster doesn’t make it true. I bet you’re just using those powers of yours to get closer to Drakey boy over here.”

Hermione’s eyes were still locked on Malfoy, and she wasn’t sure of what to do with the growing… something in her chest. The smoke was still rising from the end of Malfoy’s cigar, the tendrils circling his face. After a moment where she realized that she’d been staring, she drew her nose in the air and stalked out of the parlor, letting the door slam behind her.

5.

Hermione hadn’t so much as asked if she could start her own garden on the grounds so much as she just… did it.

Narcissa’s frown when she spotted Hermione tracking in a layer of mud through the foyer was the only response she received in regard to carving out a space for herself. Hermione took it as an invitation to continue digging out soil to rehome her magical plants and fungi.

She wasn’t really a gardener by choice though. It was just, without access to Trelawney’s supply closet, she found herself in need of very expensive ingredients that she’d once taken for granted. The entire task was an annoyance; it wasn’t as if she wanted to perform séances or summoning rituals, or that she craved putting herself into magically induced trances, but who else had her gift?

She would much rather be researching cures to magical maladies at St. Mungo’s or fighting for elf rights at the Ministry, but she had to leave those pursuits to others, because she was the one who could see the future. Bugger.

The garden was coming along quite nicely though, she thought. She had a few beginning sprouts of venomous tentacula and a few budding dittany plants. She even had a small area dedicated to trying to domesticate aconite, which she was hoping would prove promising. Overall, she was feeling quite proud of herself when she felt a familiar tug in her chest.

Her head shot up, still kneeling in the dirt, her attention fixed to the far end of the grounds, near the copse of trees at the edge of the property. She moved on instinct.

Throwing her bag over her shoulder, she was sprinting across the estate, her breath coming out in sharp gasps, the heavy thud of her bag bouncing against her legs. She’d tossed a bezoar in there this morning, for no discernible reason at the time. It weighed it down, but she had a strange feeling she was going to need it.

As she approached the canopy of trees, she heard a commotion from inside the foliage. “Mother?” Malfoy’s voice pierced through nature’s silence. “Are you alright? Mother!”

She dashed through the brush, crashing into a clearing where Narcissa lay convulsing on the ground. Her hand hung limp beside her, a spilled handful of purple berries on the forest floor.

“What happened?” Hermione asked.

Malfoy looked panicked. “I don’t know! Once minute, she was fine, and the next—”

She didn’t wait for him to finish; she dove to her knees beside the shaking woman, a hand flashing into her bag to pull out the bezoar. Her fingers folded around it with minimal fumbling, as if she was meant to find it right away.

Hermione shoved it into Narcissa’s mouth, ignoring the sound of teeth against stone. The woman’s eyes widened in alarm, a choking sound coming from her throat.

“What the hell are you doing, Granger?” Malfoy bellowed. “You’re killing her!”

“I’m saving her, you nit! This is a bezoar. Didn’t you ever pay attention in Potions?”

Malfoy’s mouth opened and closed mechanically, and she ignored him, focusing instead on the woman below her who was trying within every inch of her life to spit the stone from her mouth.

Hermione held firm, even as Narcissa’s long manicured nails scratched at the back of her hands desperately. She held on until the tremors started to lessen, held on until color returned to Narcissa’s face. Soon, the bezoar did what bezoars were wont to do, and Narcissa came back into herself, albeit breathless.

Hermione removed the stone and placed it back in her bag, helping Narcissa to a seated position where she stayed with one hand on her chest. “What happened?” the older woman asked.

Hermione plucked one of the berries up from the ground. “Where did you find these?”

Narcissa pointed to a nearby bush, and Hermione went to examine it. Narcissa rubbed her hands over her arms. “What is it?” she asked.

“I don’t know,” Hermione muttered, examining the leaves of the plant without actually touching it. “This bush isn’t native to this region; that’s for sure. Someone must have planted it. I’m not sure what it is though. It’s Muggle.”

Narcissa blinked. “You mean to say that Muggles have plants that are this dangerous?”

She looked troubled, though whether due to her near-death experience or being almost taken out by something non-magical, Hermione couldn’t say. Instead, she whispered, “There are plenty of things in the Muggle world that are dangerous.” Hermione stood, brushing the dirt from her legs. “Anyway, you should be alright now. I got here before the poison could do any irreversible damage. If I’d gotten here any later…”

Narcissa paled, and, before she could say anything else, Malfoy stepped forward. “How did you know we were here?”

Hermione just gave him a look, and he stared at her with that expression that was growing so hard to define, somewhere between respect and… something else. She stared at him as the wind swept across them, tousling the tips of his hair, while her own blew tendrils across her face.

They were snapped out of their gaze by Narcissa tsking. “Trust your father to be abroad when all this happens. I could have died—”

“Yes, you could have,” Hermione said quietly. “You need to be more careful.”

Narcissa looked at her then, really looked at her. She felt just as trapped under this analytical gaze as she had under her son’s. Something had changed in that expression, something Hermione hadn’t planned on. Narcissa licked her lips. “Yes, you’re quite right. I suppose thanks are in order.”

“You don’t need to thank me for anything,” Hermione said quickly and turned to leave. Departing swiftly before the two Malfoys she left behind could say another word.

6.

A few weeks passed with little event. Hermione continued to work on the garden, and, with the aid of a little magic, everything was growing faster than anticipated. Which was good, because Luna had written that she would be back in England to perform their quarterly séance, to communicate with the stars for guidance.

It would have been a thoroughly embarrassing exercise if Hermione hadn’t done it so many times before, but this time it was necessary. Apart from the fact that she was still no closer to figuring out the meaning behind her visions of fire and nothing, countless books dictated the importance of these rituals when it came to honing Hermione’s natural gift. If she was going to rely on it, she would do her damndest to utilize it properly.

If that meant getting naked in the middle of the woods and drowning themselves in flowers and incense. So be it.

They’d found an appropriately sheltered clearing in the woods surrounding the manor, and the silver haired girl sat across from Hermione, legs folded, her long hair a flowered curtain covering the important bits. They sat within a circle of mushrooms harvested during Luna’s travels. It wasn’t a true fairy circle—those were for great acts of magic and incredibly rare—but it would work for their purposes.

Hermione was chanting in Latin, while Luna serenely waved a bundle of sage in a circular motion in front of her. Hermione’s hair hung similarly loose, water lilies woven into her curls. Her hair was so long now, it pooled around her middle, tangling with the forest floor.

As she continued her chant and Luna continued administering smoke circles, Hermione began to feel her magic sparking in response, rolling within her and rising up. Her eyelids fluttered closed, and her mind expanded.

She saw troubling things. The threat that brought her here in the first place hadn’t ebbed; the fires still raged in the future, all encompassing, all consuming. Her eyes twitched as she was shown flashes of orange among the flames. Not fire but Ginny Weasley and torn pages burned into ash. The diary?

She’d destroyed that years ago, but she knew she wasn’t being shown a threat but a key. How could the diary be the key to solving the flames? The world shuddered, and she saw more. Flashes of images really. Nothing she could make out, at least not with the same clarity as the flames, or the redhead, or the diary.

But then, just as a silvery haired man started to appear in the din, a stifled, “What?” interrupted everything.

The magic released Hermione from its grip as if it had dropped her on her arse. The smoke snuffed out, and Luna let out a quiet, “ouch!” as the burning sage reached her fingertips. The bundle slipped from her hands and landed on the forest floor where it ignited the dead leaves beneath.

Luna squealed and shifted her attention to putting it out. Meanwhile, Hermione’s head snapped toward their intruder: Draco Malfoy, staring at them through the trees, his mouth agape. Of course, it would be him. She’d been so close to seeing something!

She stood and stomped over to him. “And just what the hell are you doing here?”

His jaw closed. “I saw smoke, and I—”

“Just thought you’d come and interrupt a ritual I’ve spent months planning. Do you have any idea how long it is until the next full moon?”

She realized that she was yelling and tried to settle her breathing, but her chest was moving up and down with the effort. Meanwhile Malfoy continued to stare at her but not at a loss for words, she realized. He was staring at her, her body. His eyes roved over the curve of her exposed breasts and dipped below to her hips and her sex. His pupils were entirely blown out.

Oh, right, she was naked.

Hermione’s first instinct was to cover herself. She was hardly a prude, but this wasn’t about sex; this was about research, and she certainly hadn’t planned on Draco Malfoy seeing her naked. Why shouldn’t she go about her business how she chose? She lived here, didn’t she?

Because she’d given him no other choice.

No, she shook her head stubbornly. She wasn’t going to cower beneath his gaze, still fixed on the private bits of her while his throat bobbed as he swallowed. She cleared her throat, and he met her gaze as if caught with his hand in the biscuit jar.

She raised her chin haughtily and called to her friend, “Luna, it’s no use. We’ll have to reschedule. Care to stay for a cup of tea?”

Malfoy seemed to realize that they weren’t alone, and, when he saw that Luna was similarly naked, he cleared his throat and blushed. Draco Malfoy blushed. She wouldn’t have believed it if she hadn’t seen it herself.

“That would be lovely,” Luna said, waving her wand, and all the séance material disappeared into her bag. “Do you have an Indian chai?”

“We can raid the kitchens,” Hermione said absently, her gaze still on Malfoy as she gestured for Luna to take her hand. She didn’t break eye contact until Luna’s cool fingertips entwined with hers, turning to walk back to the Manor.

But, even as she lost sight of him, she could still feel his gaze following them as they made their leave, burning into her, searing her, marking her.

7.

Hermione tried to pretend that Malfoy’s eyes weren’t following her whenever she entered a room for the next few weeks, but they were, and it was annoying, and denial really wasn’t her style.

What the hell was his problem anyway? That was the question that raged through her whenever she caught him staring at her chest. Who was he to judge her for her body? That had to be what it was, after all, the only explanation that seemed to match that look in his eyes. He’d taken one look at her, standing before him covered in leaves and mud, and was disgusted. Well, she wasn’t trying to impress him or anyone else, so he could go shove it.

Still, it was a bit of a sting to her pride, wasn’t it? Though part of her wondered if that was really the case at all. She’d seen herself in the mirror; she wasn’t grotesque or anything. If Malfoy had an issue with her body, perhaps it was in regard to what ran through her veins, not what it looked like on the outside.

Or maybe it wasn’t about her at all. Perhaps it was about what he’d caught them doing. Once that idea dawned on her, it all made sense. After all, she’d been dealing with wizards’ discomfort towards her abilities for her entire life. Somehow, though, that only made her angrier.

So what? She was too woo-woo for him now? She’d literally busted his door down claiming she had to stay near him due to some vision. Just what the hell did he think that meant exactly? Did he expect her to tote around half-ass like Trelawney did? Spend her time drinking a lot of tea and imagining pretty pictures in the dregs?

No, this was magic, and magic sometimes required getting your hands dirty, getting down into the dirt—sometimes literally. How dare he judge her!

So, she started meeting his stares with glowers, which caught him off guard at first, blinking at her as if she’d slapped him. This only bothered her more. What right did he have to look offended? He was the one judging her. She scowled so aggressively into her potatoes one evening that the house-elf delivering the next course squeaked and ran away. She immediately felt awful, and it was entirely Draco Malfoy’s fault.

On one Friday evening, shortly after the glowers started, she heard a commotion in the hall outside her bedroom. Her curiosity led her to her door, peeking through the crack to see Malfoy stumbling in from a night out, as he was prone to do. Rolling her eyes, she was ready to turn away when she heard a feminine giggle. He wasn’t alone.

Some blonde was draped over his arm, looking equally as sloshed and tripping over her feet. Her shoes were held in her hands. “Oh, Drakey,” the unidentified woman cooed. “Your house is gorgeous.”

“It is, isn’t it,” Malfoy answered with a shit-eating grin. He seemed to be talking louder than he normally would, as if projecting his voice for some reason. “Something that would impress any witch, I’d imagine.”

As the woman was reduced to simpers, Hermione snorted, and Malfoy’s eyes shot to hers through the door frame. Her stomach dropped, and she felt the blush rise to her cheeks before she slammed the door shut and stormed over to her bed, pulling the covers over her head aggressively as she slipped in.

Now the stupid git would think she’d been watching him. Nonsense. He shouldn’t have been so bloody loud in the hall! What was he thinking with that actually? Though Lucius still wasn’t in the country, Hermione highly doubted Narcissa would approve of Malfoy’s current choice of company. The woman had been remarkably warmer towards Hermione after the poisoning, and Hermione felt a bit outraged on Narcissa’s behalf.

She heard the click of a door close, and she released a sigh of relief. At least, she wouldn’t have to hear anymore of whatever they got up to. Not that she cared; she just wanted to be able to sleep is all.

She closed her eyes, trying to find her inner peace and drift into dreams. When that didn’t work, she started counting hippogriffs. When that failed, it was arithmancy problems. That did the trick; the doldrum of the numbers pulled her further and further, until—

A rhythmic thumping on the wall that she shared with Malfoy’s room pulled her from the edge of sleep.

Merlin's shit on a stick, really?

She groaned and rolled over, trying to cover her ears with a pillow, but that’s when the shrieking started. And she would in fact call it shrieking. It sounded like Malfoy had trapped a bloody banshee in there. After a few wails, she heard the muffled sound of grunting, and all the blood ran from her face.

Gods, she was trying to sleep! Cast a Muffliato charm like normal people! But, just as she was about to cast one herself, she felt it, that pull, along with a vision of a niffler with blonde hair, the pull towards Malfoy’s Room.

Dread pooled in her belly. Oh, bugger.

There was nothing to be done about it though; she reluctantly threw back the sheets and slipped into her orange cat slippers, summoning her dressing robe. She tied it tightly around her middle and stomped from the room, quickly bursting through Malfoy’s door.

The couple lay in the bed, the woman bouncing about like a kangaroo atop Malfoy’s lap, while he rested with his hands behind his head. His eyes met Hermione’s immediately, unperturbed by the intrusion. “Why, hello, Granger.”

The bobbing witch was two steps behind him. “Erm, that’s not my name.”

Malfoy rolled his eyes. “No, I’m not talking to you, erm, Nina?”

“Nancy.”

“Right.”

Hermione cleared her throat. “Pardon me, I don’t mean to interrupt—”

“Yes, you do,” Malfoy said, a grin spreading across his face.

She sighed. “Yes, but—”

“Is somebody here?” The woman finally turned to see Hermione standing in the doorway. She made no move to slow her bouncing. “Oh, Merlin, is that your wife?”

“No!” both Malfoy and Hermione said in unison.

“Oh.” The woman frowned. “Is she joining us then?”

Malfoy’s eyes went wide, but Hermione had already had enough. She held up her hands. “Listen, Malfoy, I hate to break it to you, but your girl’s been stealing from you.”

The woman finally stopped. “Excuse me?”

Hermione rolled her eyes and stormed over to the discarded bag on the floor alongside the stripped dress and strappy heels. When she grabbed it, the woman scrambled off of Malfoy—who quickly covered himself with a sheet—and screeched, “Hey! That’s mine!”

Hermione turned to face the woman, glaring at her. “Is this also yours?”

She turned the bag upside down, and several things fell out. A few golden candelabras, a bust of Abraxas Malfoy, several of those fancy soaps that Narcissa liked that were shaped like rocks, and a whole marinated rump roast that Hermione knew was to be tomorrow evening’s dinner. She blinked at the contents; she hadn’t expected the thief to be this adept at stealing… or extension charms.

The woman’s mouth opened and closed. “That’s not—I mean—I didn’t—”

“I think you should go,” is all Hermione said.

And then Hermione and Malfoy got front row tickets to watch a woman flee the scene of a crime. She dressed hastily, one strap not quite making it over her shoulder leaving one boob exposed and flapping about. She gathered the things she actually owned and cast a forlorn look towards the roast, as if lamenting the lost loot, but then quickly disappeared out of the door.

Which left Hermione and Malfoy alone.

Again.

She finally leveled a glare at the security breach and was surprised to see him remarkably calm considering that he was almost the victim of larceny. He was staring at her from the bed, the sheet only covering the middle bits of him, his exposed chest and torso were not… unpleasant to look at. She was surprised to see a bit of chest hair; he was such a pretty boy, she fully expected him to be one who would wax.

The hair trailing down to the V of his hips was partially covered by the swath of cotton, but Hermione’s eyes trailed over his uncovered legs, and she finally understood the expression broom thighs.

He cleared his throat, and, with a start, she realized that she’d been ogling him. When she met his gaze, he seemed uncomfortably aware of that fact as well. He smirked at her, one of his eyebrows perfectly arched.

Well, so what if she was? He ogled her first after all. And, besides, he was practically naked! It was a perfectly natural reaction for any young witch. Right, of course, it was.

“Well, then,” she said, trying not to stammer. “Best be off. Do be more careful with the next witch you bring home, alright?”

She quickly crossed the room and was out of the door, but, before it could click shut behind her, she thought she heard him whisper, “Oh, I will.”

8.

Weeks passed without Malfoy bringing home any more women, not that Hermione cared. Their interactions could be described as tense at best, uncomfortable, awkward, stressful, unbearable at worst.

It was entirely Malfoy’s fault, of course. Why’d he have to bring home a burglar in the first place? Then she wouldn’t know what he looked like under those finely cut tailored robes, wouldn’t become distracted by broom thighs whenever she caught him returning from Quidditch on the grounds.

It wasn’t like his stares were any better. It was like he’d never seen Muggle clothing before. She nearly smacked him when he blatantly stared at her backside when she had the audacity to wear denims of all things. Denims!

What was worse is that she hadn’t had a single vision since that fateful night, and Luna wasn’t available at all during the next full moon, delaying any scrying for at least another month. Hermione was beginning to feel that perhaps her gift had finally led her astray, that perhaps there was no threat, perhaps the threat was Hermione coming close to strangling Malfoy more and more with every passing day.

She was debating going back home, returning to her parents and helping in the dental office until she could figure out her next plan. Dentistry. Ugh, well, she supposed there were worse fates, even if none were coming to mind at the moment.

So, when she felt the familiar pull in her gut one night, she followed it like the wind. Rushing from her rooms and down corridors until she found herself padding towards Lucius’s study. Unusually, the light was on.

Lucius may as well have been a ghost in his own home, barely there long enough to leave so much as an arse-print on a chaise, let alone burden their nightly dinners with his presence. So, it wasn’t a surprise when Hermione peeked through the cracked door, and it wasn’t Lucius that she saw sitting at the desk, huddled over paperwork, but his son.

Why did her gift keep leading her to him?

Still, he hadn’t noticed her yet, so she allowed herself the indulgence of staring at him unabashedly. His hair was tousled as if he’d been running his hands through it, the top few buttons of his shirt were undone, and the sleeves were rolled to the elbow, allowing her to admire his exposed forearms. Curses, she was a sucker for forearms.

He looked tired though, more so than she’d ever seen him. His brow furrowed as he stared at a parchment in one hand, a grip tight on his glass of firewhisky in the other.

She didn’t know why she did it, she didn’t feel the tug that she was so used to feeling, but something… else made her want to go to him. Without hesitation, she pushed open the door.

His head shot up, but then he relaxed. “Oh, it’s you.”

“Such a lady killer, you are.”

He snorted as she lowered herself into one of the chairs on the other side of the desk without invitation. “What are you doing?” she asked.

“None of your business. Estate matters.”

“That’s bollocks, and you know it. Your father won’t let you anywhere near the estate.”

He shot her a steely glare over the edge of the page. “And how would you know about that? Spying again, were you?”

“Um, hello?” She rapped her own head. “Seer, remember? But also yes.”

He rolled his eyes and looked back down at the page before tossing it to the side, raking his fingers through his hair. She tried to ignore how the silky locks fell onto his forehead just so.

“Draco,” she said. His eyes flashed to hers, alert again. She so rarely used his given name. She pressed on quietly, “You can trust me, you know.”

She didn’t know what possessed her to say that, and, as his eyes continued to bore into hers, she was just as surprised to find that the words were true. Just as shocking, she found that she knew that it was a two-way street, that she could also trust him. It didn’t make any sense, this certainty, this quiet faith. But, with her gift, she’d long since learned not to question things that had no business making sense.

A wordless agreement seemed to pass between them, a mutual understanding, an accord, but she couldn’t fully stifle her astonishment when he said, “I think my father is up to something.”

He pushed from the desk chair and walked to the fireplace, his hands behind his back. She stood to follow him cautiously, pausing when she felt the lick of the fire’s warmth on her shins. She wore her dressing robes, but they were undone; the nightdress beneath left her legs bare.

She looked up at Malfoy’s face and watched the shadow of flames pass across it. When he spoke, his voice sounded haunted. “He’s never traveled this much before. At first, I thought it was only to avoid you, but…” He licked his lips. “He’s being cagey in his letters and, as you so kindly mentioned, won’t let me touch the estate finances. It’s…”

“Strange?” she offered.

“Yes.”

Hermione looked to the flames and couldn’t help but compare them to the ones in her vision. Couldn’t help but remember the shadowy form from the séance in the woods. “I think I saw him,” she said.

“Hmm?”

“In the woods, before you interrupted, I mean—” she shot him a glare, daring him to look smug, but his expression remained somber “—I was trying to figure out more about why I need to stay close to you, about what it all means…”

“Did you find out?” he asked.

“Find out what?”

“What it all means?”

His eyes betrayed an intensity that she hadn’t seen before. She’d thought him an ostentatious arse, a pompous fop. As he continued to reveal new layers, the logic, the loyalty, the… depth… she wasn’t sure what to do with the more serious man who stood before her, the one whose eyes were burrowing into hers with the intensity of storms.

“Not yet,” she whispered.

The silence stretched, and then Malfoy pulled away. “Look at me, buying into your psychic crap. You’re a bad influence, Granger.”

She huffed. “Oh, sure, I’m the bad influence.”

“I’m a nobleman.”

“You’re an asshole.”

He chuckled. “Perhaps. Regardless, I’m likely overreacting. What’s the worst that could happen?”

Her mood wasn’t lightened, quite the opposite. She turned back to look at the fire, instead of remembering her current vision, she thought of all the others, all the narrowly avoided futures that could have been. A rat returning to a snake. The death of a hero. The corruption of a generation. A boy assigned to kill a legend.

She turned to look at him, and his face dropped when she met his gaze. “You’re not overreacting,” was all she said before she left him alone in his father’s study.

PART III

1.

After that night in Lucius’s study, it became an unspoken thing that Hermione and Malfoy met there every night. Together, they combed through Lucius’s papers trying to get to the bottom of his plans, searching for hidden compartments, roving for secret missives.

Lucius’s Pensieve closet became a bit of an obsession for Malfoy, remaining stubbornly locked despite his surprisingly impressive array of curse-breaking knowledge. When he wasn’t casting counter charms at it, he was pacing in front of it.

Hermione took a more practical approach. Which is to say, she attempted to convene with the spirits in the middle of the carpet, cross-legged and waving so much sage-smoke about that Malfoy was perpetually coughing. She tried to channel spirits in the hope that they would provide additional clues, but they remained stubbornly silent, the future remaining hopelessly vague.

After a week of this, while Hermione was chanting in an archaic form of ancient Greek and Malfoy was beating the Pensieve cupboard with a steel pipe—his latest attempt to get inside—they heard the fireplace flare to life, green flames licking the logs.

They looked at each other in a panic and dove for the best hiding spot that they could find on short notice, which happened to be behind the exact same curtain panel, her body smashed against his as they hurriedly tried to charm the fabric to hang normally.

Moments later, Lucius strode out of the flames, snapping his fingers and calling for Lolly. The small elf appeared in the room a moment later. “You called, Master Malfoy.”

“Please owl Mr. Elderberry and Madame Potts and inform them that I will be running a few minutes late to our meeting later today. I have some other business to attend to this morning.”

Hermione gasped; this was their first lead! They needed to figure out a way to be at that meeting! Before she could start formulating plots and plans, a hand covered her mouth; a frustrated shh followed from the man behind her.

She tried to wiggle in protest, but all that came of it was a firm grunt along with the realization of the precariousness of their position. Her eyes widened.

Her bum was pressed directly against Malfoy’s crotch. And he was hard.

Fuck.

Really? Now? She didn’t mean to body shame. She tried to remind herself that it was probably just his body’s natural response to stimuli; she was quite familiar with the Random Boner Syndrome phenomenon, thank you very much. Quite right. It had nothing to do with her specifically; she shouldn’t read too much into it. Just like she shouldn’t read too much into her own heat brewing inside, about how acutely aware she was of his precise hand placements, one gripping her hip, the other still across her mouth.

This shouldn’t be arousing. She loved to talk. Nothing about being silenced should be thrilling. And yet…

Stop it! That wasn’t why they were here. She didn’t even want Malfoy anyway, not like that. It was just her stupid body and this bloody curtain and—Merlin, from the feel of it—the quite thick something pressed against her bum.

No! She reeled in her thoughts. Tried to settle her breathing, tried to focus on what Lucius was saying, but it was hard to do so when Malfoy’s breath felt hot against her neck.

She watched Lucius open the Pensieve closet, pulling a silvery memory from his head and dropping it into the stone bowl inside before turning on his heel for the fireplace. He was in such a rush, he left the door ajar. She inhaled a sharp breath, and Malfoy’s grip over her mouth tightened, which caused her to shift back, which, in turn, caused the something pressed against her to twitch. Heat pooled in her belly. Merlin, this couldn’t be happening!

Not a moment too soon, Lucius was suddenly away, disappearing into the Floo again, and Hermione and Malfoy tumbled out from behind the curtain as if their lives depended on it. Gulping back clean, Malfoy-less air, she nervously smoothed her robes, while she pretended not to notice him adjusting his trousers.

“Well, then,” she said, still a bit flushed. “It’s clear what we must do.”

“It is?” he asked, eyes looking a bit glazed. She saw them flicker to the hem of her skirt and, once again, chose to ignore it.

“Yes, we must be at that meeting.”

“And how do you propose we do that? We don’t even know when and where the meeting will be.”

She gestured to the open cabinet, and the two of them rushed to parse through what looked to be mostly a string of mundane memories. It took a few minutes to realize Lucius was using this ancient and rare and incredibly expensive magical marvel to remember dates and appointments. “He uses this Pensieve as a bloody calendar,” she murmured.

“I think I found it,” Malfoy said, and they both dipped into a memory of Lucius scribbling a meeting reminder between one Mr. Elderberry and one Madame Potts. Three PM, Ministry, Third Floor.

“This is perfect, Draco!” she said, forgetting herself and clutching his arm, before quickly pulling away.

His mask was already back in place, and he looked annoyingly unruffled. He said, “That’s great, but the question remains; how are we supposed to attend this meeting seeing that neither of us are either Mr. Elderberry or Madame Potts?”

Hermione worried her lip. What she would give for an invisibility cloak! After a moment, she suggested, “Polyjuice?”

“And just where do you propose to get Polyjuice on a whim?”

She smirked. “I know a guy.”

2.

“Finest stuff on the market, the bloke assured me,” Hagrid was saying, handing two vials to Hermione in a darkened corner of Knockturn alley.

“Thank you, Hagrid,” she said, wordlessly passing the second vial to Malfoy who hovered at her shoulder, curiously lacking his usual smarm.

Hagrid eyed the blond behind her warily. “You sure you’re alright, Hermione? You seem to be hanging with a different… crowd these days.”

“Yes, perfectly alright. Thank you, Hagrid,” she said quickly, in no mood to explain herself.

The large man merely shrugged and nodded. “Alright then, best be off. I got word on a new lead for some dragon eggs— erm, I mean, hide, yes, dragonhide boots, ya see? Expensive but the best thing for mucking about the Forbidden Forest.”

He blushed, and she nodded benignly, not needing her powers to know she’d have to send a few owls later to make sure that deal never went through.

Hagrid shuffled away from them and apparated on the spot. Hermione winced and then immediately felt awful about it. Hagrid had re enrolled at Hogwarts her third year, after an argument between herself and Professor Dumbledore where she pointed out that making Hagrid a teacher—which had been Dumbledore’s initial idea—was a shortsighted solution to a larger problem and, incidentally, would result in the death of Buckbeak the hippogriff.

Still, she worried over Hagrid even after he passed his apparation exams with flying colors—that was just a whole lot of man to move from point to point!

She turned and saw Malfoy still being uncharacteristically quiet.

“What’s wrong with you?”

“Nothing,” he said quickly, but her eyes narrowed, and he sighed. “I feel a bit bad, I suppose. Here he is helping us when my father tried to get him kicked out of school. Do you think he knows about that?”

“He doesn’t.” Hermione had made sure of it—it only would have made Hagrid more nervous than he already was.

Malfoy let out a sigh of relief, and she gestured for him to follow her into the street, once again going over their plan. Step one, take the Leaky’s Floo to the Ministry. Step two, corner Mr. Malcolm Elderberry and Madame Henrietta Potts and stun them to obtain their hairs. Step three, crash said meeting and lie through their teeth.

She could admit it was a half-assed plan. But time was not on their side to develop a better one.

She was pleased to say that step one went off without a hitch. Though they had to wait in line and Confund the receptionist so she wouldn’t remember who they were. Not that that was hard—they were both nobodies.

It was the second step that proved tricky. For that, they chose to divide and conquer, and Hermione set off to track down Henrietta Potts, receptionist to the Head of the D.M.L.E. She found her on the second floor and quickly cast a disillusionment charm upon herself in order to observe.

Henrietta was a buxom woman who seemed to highly value hydration by the way she continued to down glasses of water. That was all Hermione needed to know as she snuck into one of the bathrooms, realizing that it was only a matter of time before Henrietta made her way there.

Crouching unseen in a stall, she finally heard the click of heels against porcelain. Hermione held her breath until she heard the door in the stall next to her swing shut. She steeled herself for a moment and then popped over the top of the stall and stunned Henrietta, casting a simultaneous cushioning charm so the poor woman wouldn’t crash to the floor.

No one expects to be attacked from above when using the loo. No one.

A few hairs from atop Henrietta’s head were quickly dispatched, and Henrietta was stuffed in a broom closet with a healthy dose of Dreamless Sleep potion. Hermione took a swig of the gross liquid—it tasted of acetone and blueberry daiquiri—and watched her appearance change in the mirror.

Henrietta was taller than her, so her once work-appropriate skirt was now a titch too short for her liking, and the buttons of her blouse strained a bit causing some gaping, but, overall, she didn’t see the need for additional modification charms—it was likely only herself that would notice.

She made haste to stand outside the lift bay, impatiently tapping her foot as she waited for Malfoy to appear. Having no idea what one Mr. Elderberry actually looked like, she found herself blatantly ogling every passerby, wondering if the hunched bald man was Malfoy or perhaps the man with the goatee?

Eventually, a wizard almost the size of Hagrid entered the hall, large and intimidating, armed with a menacing scowl. She almost dismissed him out of hand when he passed her, but then she heard him whisper, “Pssst! Granger?”

“Malfoy?”

The large man rolled his eyes in the most Malfoy-like way. “Who else would be calling you Granger when you look like…” he trailed off, the beady eyes of Malcolm Elderberry panning up and down the body of Henrietta Potts before settling on the globes perched high on her chest. “That,” he finished lamely.

She rolled her eyes and whispered. “Come on, let’s go. We’re going to be late. You took forever.” She pushed past him and led the way to the meeting rooms.

He fell into step beside her. “Oh, I’m sorry. Have you not seen what a behemoth this guy is? It took three stunners to take him down. It’s not my fault you picked the one made of mostly silicone.”

“The boobs aren’t that big.”

Malfoy snorted.

They turned a corner and entered the conference room. She was hoping they would have enough time to go over the plan once more, but, before they could utter a word, Lucius swept in, cloak billowing behind him in all his stately glory.

“Henrietta, Malcolm,” he greeted as the door shut behind him. “Thank you for agreeing to push the meeting.”

She blinked stupidly at him for a moment, Malfoy, or Malfoy-Malcolm, seemed to be doing the same. “O-O-Of course,” she eventually stammered. “Shall we take a seat?”

Lucius nodded and lowered himself to the chair nearest the door while Hermione-Henrietta and Malfoy-Malcolm took the opposite chairs. Lucius eyed them strangely and, after several moments, finally said, “Malcolm, how’s your wife?”

When Malfoy just stared at Lucius, Hermione had to stomp on his toe to remind him that Lucius was speaking to him. He tried to cover his yelp with a cough. “Very good,” he choked, while summoning a glass of water.

Lucius’s eyes flickered, but he said nothing before turning to Hermione. “And Henrietta, how are the kids?”

“Oh,” she waved a hand, trying her best to be blasé. “You know me, off to school, out of my hair.”

Lucius frowned. “You send the goats to school?”

She blinked, panic settling in. Malfoy-Malcolm was faster on his feet. “She means the slaughterhouse.”

She shot him a withering glare while Lucius’s eyelids flickered. “I thought they were your pets.”

“Pets… snacks…” She waved a hand and tried to chuckle casually; it came out more like she was being strangled. “Same thing, really.”

Lucius still looked baffled, and she shot another murderous look at Malfoy, who admittedly looked a bit sheepish. She was going to kill him.

“Anyway.” She quickly cleared her throat. “Shall we get down to business?”

“Indeed,” Lucius drawled, but his eyes still flicked between the pair of them suspiciously.

She took a deep breath. “I was thinking that maybe you could… lead us off. Let us know what you’d like to discuss… specifically?” she offered hopefully.

Lucius leveled a stare at her. “Did you not read the itinerary Lolly sent over this morning?”

Malfoy-Malcolm let out such a grunt of forced laughter that it caused the entire table to jerk. “Oh, you know how it is, Lucius. We got a bit busy.”

Lucius’s eyes narrowed. “Busy, you say? What must that be like?”

“What Malcolm means to say,” she cut in sharply, “is that we haven’t gotten the chance to look at it in the level of detail that we’d like. Perhaps you could start us off?”

Lucius clicked his tongue. “If you don’t have a status update on my Dementor transfer, then I really—”

“Dementor transfer?”

Lucius pinched his brow. “Yes, the Dementor transfer from Azkaban that I explicitly asked you to initiate weeks ago. I have need of them for personal reasons.”

“Right, that,” she said quickly, scrambling for something to say. “And… what was it you needed them for again?”

Lucius abruptly stood, sweeping one side of his cloak over his shoulder like a scarf and looking down his nose at them in a level of such disdain that she worried it would burn. “It is clear that this has been a waste of my time. Do see that you are more prepared for our next meeting, or I will find someone else that can aide me instead.”

He swept from the room leaving Hermione-Henrietta and Malfoy-Malcolm alone in the room. They exchanged glances; the silence such that you could hear a pin drop. Then, the yelling started.

“What the fuck was that, Malfoy?”

“You call that casual, Granger?”

“I have never seen someone so shit at undercover in my life.”

“Says the woman who couldn’t have bothered to alter her clothing—it looks ready to bust off!”

“‘Slaughterhouse,’ really?”

“It was the best I could think of.”

“Well, clearly, you’re an idiot!”

As they yelled, the effects of the Polyjuice gradually started to fade, Malfoy shrinking, his shoulders losing some of their broadness. She huffed. “Finally! Now I won’t have to crane my neck as I yell at you some more!”

He snorted. “I can’t say the same, Granger. I’m going to miss those fabulous tits.”

“Enough about the tits, Malfoy!” she huffed and raked her fingers through her hair. It was already starting to curl again, and the result was her yanking painfully at the knots. She gave up after a few moments of frustration, sure it looked like a frizzy mess. “Let’s focus on what we learned.”

“Bloody nothing,” he grumbled.

“Hardly,” she said. “We learned that Lucius has requested the services of Dementors.”

“But not why he needed them.” Malfoy started pacing as he was wont to do.

She chewed at her lip, watching him work from one end of the room to the other. She could feel her borrowed height diminishing to her normal stature as the potion worked through her system. “Any ideas?”

He shook his head. “They’re used as guards mostly.”

She frowned. “What would he need to guard with any more safety than what’s at Gringotts?”

He threw up his hands, clearly at a loss, and continued to pace. She rubbed at her temples, trying to make synapses fire, trying to make connections. She grasped for the first stray thread that she could find. “You know, Dementors are a bit like house-elves.”

He snorted, running his hand through his hair. “Ah yes, Lolly does tend to suck my soul out when she’s cross with me.”

“Not what I meant.” She scowled, balling her hands into fists in frustration. “What I mean is that they have their own magic, different from wizard magic.”

“And?”

She rolled her eyes. “And maybe he wants to use it?”

“To do what exactly?”

She threw up her hands. Merlin, he was frustratingly dense! “Oh, I don’t know, Malfoy. Try anything? There are thousands of uses for other magics. Why just second year, I—”

“Hey! Who are you? What are you doing in here?” A head poked into the conference room, eying their ruffled clothing and looking quite cross.

They had planned on taking another dose before they left, so her first instinct was to panic—she didn’t have an excuse ready. Before she could think of one, Malfoy grabbed her arm and yanked her out of her seat. “Got lost. Sorry, mate. We’ll just get going now.”

“Hey—Ow!” she exclaimed as she was tugged along. The angry man watched them leave, shaking his head.

When they shuffled past him, he grumbled, “Youth these days. Get a room.”

Her jaw dropped. “Excuse me! What did you say—?”

“Right, thanks.” Malfoy said loudly, tightening his grip on her arm and increasing his pace. He pulled the both of them around the corner and out of sight.

Once he pressed the button for the lifts, she yanked her arm away. “Merlin, Malfoy! Does he think we were—?”

“Yes.”

She felt a blush rise to her cheeks and turned on her heel, “Then, we need to correct him.”

He caught her arm again and yanked her back, rolling his eyes. “No,” he said sternly. “We don’t. Besides, he won’t believe you anyway, not with your clothes looking all rumpled like that.”

She glanced down and noticed the wrinkled skirt and stretched out top. He was probably right. She scowled.

He patted her on the back. “Oh, come now, don’t look so cross. So what? Some old guy thinks that you’ve shagged Draco Malfoy. Your reputation will survive.”

The lift doors opened, and they stepped inside. “I don’t think it will,” she grumbled.

“Oh, bite your tongue,” he said as the doors closed.

3.

After they infiltrated the Ministry, Lucius stayed in town, which meant a return to nightly dinners with the cold man alongside a very jumpy Hermione and Malfoy.

Hermione had to be careful with her silverware, her hands were so shaky. The fork and knife clanged loudly against her plate whenever she used them; so much so that she found herself eating with her hands as much as possible.

“Must you insist on eating like a barbarian, Miss Granger?” Lucius said sharply one evening as she bit into her roast potato as if it were an apple.

“What?” She squeaked, dropping the potato, her knees banging against the table as she involuntarily leapt from her seat.

Lucius closed his eyes as the entire table rattled, and Malfoy attempted a nervous laugh to cover the commotion. Lucius sighed, “Surely, you must have a better use for your hands?”

“My hands?”

Lucius pinched his nose. “The silverware, Miss Granger. If I must dine with you, I insist upon its use.”

She nervously chuckled and picked up her fork, exchanging a glance with Malfoy.

Lucius returned to his meal and shook his head. “I swear, by the way you two are acting, you would think you’re sleeping together.”

“We are not!” they both protested in unison to the rolling of Lucius’s eyes and Narcissa hiding a smile behind a glass of wine.

It was a miracle that they made it through the week and onto their next opportunity to spy.

The Gringotts Charity Ball was in many ways the highlight of the social season and a big to-do around the estate as Narcissa was the organizer. Apart from being a peak opportunity to get your picture in the Daily Prophet, anybody who's anybody would be there.

Which meant it was also a prime opportunity to observe Lucius interact with any number of people he may be working with on his Dementor project. Which was why Hermione found herself dressed in a gold, shimmery dress, trying to figure out how to tame her unruly hair.

Luna was usually the whiz at arranging her curls in intricate patterns interwoven with flowers from Hagrid’s garden, but Luna was in Romania following the Circus Arcanus. So, Hermione opted for a sleeker look, a low chignon that made her do a double take whenever she caught a glimpse of herself in a reflective surface, unused to the neatness of the slicked back hairstyle.

She slung her beaded bag over her shoulder and slipped into the hallway. She heard the click of another door and turned to see Malfoy joining her in the hall.

She started.

He looked… well, good.

His tailored black dress robes cut him just so, and his hair was swept back in a devil may care sort of way. Had he always been this tall?

She sucked in a breath, and that's when she realized that her mouth was hanging open. She cleared her throat and thought she heard him do the same. “Good evening, Malfoy.”

“Granger.”

They stared at each other, their gaze a heavy, tangible thing. “Erm,” she started. “Shall we go over the plan?”

“What plan?” he sneered. “Oh, you mean the one where we eavesdrop on my father and not get caught?”

“Yes, that one,” she said tartly. “Think you can manage it?”

He rolled his eyes. “Well, I won't have to worry about you mucking up your cover, so that's a point in our favor.” She glared at him, and he continued, “And those mosquito bites you call tits will hardly be the distraction that Madame Henrietta’s were.”

She was indignant. “They are not mosquito bites!”

His eyes seemed to flash, and she felt his gaze rake over her as if it were his hands. “No,” he murmured. “I suppose not.”

She held his gaze for a moment longer, seeing a fire there that she had no idea what to do with, before huffing and storming past him. That blasted man. Why did he have to be so annoying? She tried to ignore the burning sensation settling in her lower gut, but it refused to cool even after they’d stepped through the Floo.

The great hall of Gringotts looked decidedly grander, cleared of the processing desks and grumpy Goblins—not that the Goblins had gone anywhere, they were just decidedly less grumpy. Laughing and carousing, dressed in their finest, she noted that they looked quite dapper in their tux and tails, ballgowns and glittering jewels. With its arching ceilings and glittering decor, Hermione felt as if she’d stepped into the center of a diamond.

Malfoy was still grumbling beside her, rubbing Floo dust from his trousers.

“Alright, do you see him?” she asked.

“One second,” he muttered, still buffing out the fabric.

“Oh, stop being such a ninny about your trousers.”

“They’re Armani!”

She rolled her eyes and looked out over the hall, trying to spot Lucius. It didn’t take long to find him, surrounded by admirers and simperers. “There he is!” she said, gesturing.

“Stop pointing, Granger,” Malfoy said, yanking her arm down. “You’re making a scene.”

She was about to fix him with a glare, but then she felt the blood drain from her face. “Shit!” she said.

“What?”

Malfoy turned and cursed as well when he saw what she was looking at, or rather, who she was looking at: Henrietta and Malcolm. The pair looked quite stern as they stepped into the hall, dressed in a way that accentuated their most notable features.

“What are they doing here?” She hissed.

“You think they're here for my father?” Malfoy asked.

Hermione watched the pair search the hall in a manner too precise to be casual before spotting Lucius and starting to stride toward him with purpose. “I very much think so,” she groaned.

“Shit, what do we do?” Malfoy cursed.

Hermione's mind was racing, time seemed to move in slow motion as the gap between the Ministry employees and Lucius narrowed. “Distraction,” she blurted.

“What?”

“We need to distract them. You take Henrietta and Malcolm. I’ll take Lucius.” And she was off, striding towards the eldest Malfoy and his sea of sycophants.

“Granger, wait!” Malfoy called after her.

“Now!” she hissed and continued forth, storming across the Hall with not a clue of what she would say once she got there.

Lucius eyed her before she even reached him, spotted her over the heads of his fan club. Like father, like son, she thought wryly, remembering Malfoy’s time spent at Hogwarts.

Lucius’s eyes narrowed as she approached, ignoring the crowd. “Miss Granger.” The gatherers parted. “I see they just invited anyone this year.”

“It's a public event,” she said.

“So it would appear.”

Hermione knew a dismissal when she heard one, and a large part of her wanted to scurry away, leave him to his pomp and circumstance, his parties and blind flattery. But, when he made to turn away, Hermione saw that it would put Henrietta and Malcolm in his direct line of sight. The pair were paused on the dance floor where Malfoy had successfully intercepted them. She felt a surge of something akin to pride when she noticed that he managed to keep his eyes off Madame Pott’s chest. It was quickly replaced by panic.

“Lucius!” she exclaimed loudly.

He looked at her, clearly annoyed. “What?”

“Erm, it was just,” she faltered, wringing her hands. “I was just wondering… erm… if you thought about what we spoke about the other night?”

“The other night?” he asked deadpan.

“Erm, yes, over dinner.”

Some people blinked at the admission that Lucius Malfoy had dined with Hermione Granger. Though she was sure some of those people were also wondering, Who the hell is Hermione Granger? Lucius’s voice was ice, clearly unamused in every which way. “What specifically did I say at dinner, Miss Granger?”

She blushed, scrambling for something, anything. “We were talking about the best way to use my hands, sir,” she blurted.

Someone coughed, and Lucius shot them and her a set of murderous glares. “Your lack of manners is hardly appropriate party conversation.” He made to dismiss her again.

“But sir,” she reached out and grabbed his arm. His eyes lowered to her hand as if she were a three-headed dog who’d just slobbered all over his sleeve. “Erm, it’s just, I’m sure there’s so much more that you can teach me.”

The crowd tittered; Lucius’s jaw worked, but, this time, he didn’t engage, just swept away in the opposite direction. Hermione glanced to the side and saw that Malfoy had successfully diverted Henrietta and Malcolm to the other side of the room, in the direction of the bar.

She felt her shoulders sag in relief. Conflict averted. For now.

The respite was a brief one.

Hermione found herself running interference all night, so much so that she successfully interrupted every single one of Lucius’s conversations. The man’s silent rage towards her continued to grow with each hindrance.

She intruded on a crowd of men planning their next Quidditch scrimmage; she cut in right as he was talking to a venture capitalist specializing in Skele-Gro. When she eventually interrupted his conversation with the Minister of Magic, Lucius finally snapped, seizing her by the arm and hauling her into the hallway.

“I don’t know what you’re on about, girl, but you’ve officially worn my patience thin.”

“I’m sorry, I don’t know what you—”

“Oh, shove it,” he growled, and then Hermione was shoved into a broom closet, the door slamming in her face.

“He-Hey!” she yelled, hearing an anti-Alohomora charm muttered on the doorknob and the diminishing sound of footsteps walking away. She uselessly pounded on the door for a few minutes, hollering to be let out, but it seemed a silencing charm had been cast as well.

She turned around and leaned against the door, huffing a heavy sigh.

Well, this was going well.

Before she could truly wallow in her unexpected imprisonment, the door suddenly opened again, and the weight she’d entrusted to it gave out.

As she wobbled and started to fall, the door-opener said. “Granger? Ah-AH!”

Several things happened at once. Hermione fell into Malfoy, right as a cater waiter came rushing through the corridor, clipping Malfoy with a catering tray. He tumbled forward into the closet, and the door slammed shut behind them both, trapping them in the confined space once more.

“Malfoy,” she yelled, turning on him, her face practically pressed against his chest. “What the hell are you doing?”

“Saving you!”

“Oh, well done then. Bang up job. You dolt! Now, we’re both trapped.”

He huffed. “You are the most infuriating—”

“And you are the most incompetent—”

They spiraled into a deluge of insults and complaints; her rage spewing forth blacked out any comprehension of what she was saying. All she knew is that she was mad, and this blond-haired, infuriatingly tall, much too good looking for his own good arse was to blame!

So lost in the torrent, it took her a moment to realize that they were both panting heavily, their chests rising and falling, practically pressed against each other. His eyes raged flames, and it seemed to stoke the inferno inside her. Her words died on her tongue at much the same time as his did.

They stood there in that space, the air swathed around them, cloistered and heady. She could smell the scent of, well… him everywhere, like an impregnable, undeniable thing.

His eyes darted across her face, looking on the verge of a great, big decision. What was this feeling in her chest? It was a… pull. Towards him. Towards Malfoy.

His breath ghosted across her face, and she wondered if he could feel hers as well; they were that close. When had she risen to her toes? Was he stooping? She gazed up at his molten silver gaze, her heart rattling in her chest. His lips parted, almost grazing hers. Her eyelids fluttered closed, and then—

The door opened again, and they sprang apart like frogs on a log as the door-opener muttered, “My, my, my.”

It was Narcissa, a serene but amused expression across her face. “I just informed my husband that locking people into closets just because they annoyed him was not proper etiquette,” she said to Hermione. “But I didn’t realize you had… company.”

“It’s not what it looks like,” Malfoy stammered at the same time Hermione blurted, “Malfoy is not company!”

If their protestations had any effect on Narcissa, her face gave no sign of it. She simply turned to her son and said, “Draco, some of the guests are starting to depart. We must bid them farewell.”

She turned, expecting her son to follow, and he did. Hermione’s hand clutched her chest, trying to steady her breathing, but then Malfoy looked back; his searing gaze froze her in place again, flayed her of all pretense. After a flicker of those eyelids, he turned away and was gone.

Crap, now she had to start all over again.

After several rounds of breathing exercises and a failed attempt at meditation—really, unless she was channeling spirits, she found the practice only moderately helpful—she was about to turn back into the ballroom when she heard a voice drift from around the corner, a cool drawl she hadn’t heard since Hogwarts, “Is it done?”

“We cannot speak here, Severus,” Lucius’s cool voice snapped, and Hermione had to stifle her gasp, quickly flattening herself against the wall, praying that they wouldn’t stumble upon her.

Severus’s response sounded annoyed. “Then where exactly? You’ve been dodging my Patronus calls for a month.”

“I’ve been busy,” Lucius said. “There have been a few… hiccups in the plan.”

Severus’s voice was cold. “If anyone were to learn of this—”

“Not those kinds of hiccups,” Lucius interrupted. “Just… annoyances.”

Hermione felt redness rise to her cheek as he continued, “Like I said, best not to talk here. I will meet you at our meeting spot on Wednesday.”

“Will you even bother to show up this time?” Snape sneered. “Last time, you kept me waiting in the Forest of Dean for hours.”

“Silence, you fool!” Lucius hissed. “No one can know about this.”

“Alright, Lucius. I suppose we’ll speak of this Wednesday.”

She heard the swirling of cloaks and footsteps in her direction, and that’s how she found herself back in the same broom cupboard, hiding as both men continued on their way. Once she was sure they were clear of her, she finally let out a breath.

The Forest of Dean.

Wednesday.

She had to tell Malfoy. She reached for the handle and found it wouldn’t budge. She was locked in. Again.

Oh, bugger.

4.

The trouble with only having a date and location in regard to a super-secret meeting rather than a precise time is that you spend a whole lot of your day just standing around. Who knew spying could be such boring work?

Both Malfoy and Hermione were huddled under a bush, safely hidden under the guise of disillusionment charms, but they still had to sit more or less motionless for all manner of hours, and all of her limbs were starting to ache. To say nothing of the twig that had been poking her derrière for longer than she cared to admit. Lovely.

They were pretty sure they had found the correct meeting place. The Forest of Dean was large, but they found a clearing with a heavy magical residue—Lucius and Snape must have used the forest often enough for whatever nefarious deeds were afoot.

“What do you think it is?” Malfoy finally whispered.

“Shut up,” she hissed.

“No one is here, and I’m just asking,” he snapped.

She could almost make out his annoyed expression among the foliage, or maybe she was just imagining it. That leaf looked rather like a sneer if she squinted hard enough. “I don’t know. But I don’t think I overheard that conversation by accident. I don’t question coincidence, Malfoy. My powers lead me where they must.”

“That sounds a bit like they’re controlling you,” he said quietly.

She froze. That was exactly how it felt sometimes. She squinted, and she could make out the vague outline of his face or at least enough to know that his eyes were on her. But perhaps having a respite from the full weight of his gaze allowed her to speak freely. “Yes… well, sometimes I feel like life hasn’t granted me any say in my choices. Like I was fated to end up here. In these woods. With you.”

She was thankful for the disillusionment, thankful he couldn’t see the blush in her cheeks. “That must be incredibly…” he trailed off, as if searching for the right words. “Lonely.”

The wind picked up just then, the rustling of the trees hiding her small gasp. It was lonely. And isolating. And disappointing. And a whole slew of other things that she didn’t like to think about. But, for the first time, having someone… well, understand… she didn’t feel quite as alone anymore.

There was a crack that snapped whatever was between them, and both of their heads jerked to the clearing where Severus Snape appeared in all his black-caped glory.

A second crack brought Lucius into the same clearing.

Both men eyed the other warily. Lucius spoke first. “All through Hogwarts you slept with a stuffed toy. What was it?”

Snape’s eyes narrowed. “A pygmy puff. Must you bring that up every time?”

“Severus,” Lucius warned.

Snape sighed. “What gift did you almost give Narcissa for your first anniversary before I talked you out of it.”

Lucius’s eyes narrowed. “A sonnet I wrote entitled How Fair thy Yellowish Hair.”

Malfoy snorted, and Hermione punched him in the arm. Luckily the sound was covered by a rustling wind rattling the branches.

Though Snape’s expression remained cool, she thought she caught a twitching of his lips. Finally, Lucius said, “Did you bring it?

“Yes.” Snape reached into his cloak, pulling out an object wrapped in black cloth. Lucius took it, handling it with caution. Hermione immediately stiffened, a wave of darkness seemed to emanate from the package, making her feel cold and anxious all at once. The feeling was a bit familiar actually.

“Is this the last one?” Lucius asked.

“It should be,” Snape replied. “Will you handle it like you did the others?”

“That is one of the wrinkles that I’ve been dealing with,” Lucius said, clicking his tongue. “Ministry incompetence prevented me from acquiring additional Dementors.”

Snape’s lip curled. “I never thought I’d feel pity for what you do to those creatures.”

Lucius sneered. “You wouldn’t if you had served your time in Azkaban like the rest of us instead of hiding behind Dumbledore’s coattails.”

“I’m paying back that cowardice now, aren’t I?” Snape replied.

“I suppose you are.” A heavy silence followed.

“So, what options remain?”

“Cruder ones, I’m afraid,” Lucius said. “But no less effective. I should be able to take care of it tomorrow morning, somewhere… protected.”

A feeling gripped Hermione’s chest, something aching and pressing. A warning. A sign. A vision. Flames raged, and she curled in on herself. She could almost feel the heat. She felt the tugging like a tangible thing. She wanted to cry out, but Malfoy, as if sensing it before it even happened, slapped a hand over her mouth. It stifled any sound and allowed her to hear the next muttered words of conversation.

“Here?” Snape asked.

Lucius shook his head. “Too much kindling, not enough wards.”

“So, a Malfoy property then. Somewhere isolated, I’d imagine.”

Lucius sneered. “Don’t bother yourself. The less you know the better. Just know that tomorrow, this is done. We won’t have to deal with each other any longer.”

“And I thought being Draco’s godfather endeared me to you, Lucius.”

Lucius sniffed and turned to go, but Snape cleared his throat. “While we’re on the subject, regarding Draco’s birthday… has he mentioned anything that he… wants?”

Lucius smirked. “Perhaps a stuffed pygmy puff,” he said and apparated away. Snape cursed and then spun on the spot, leaving the clearing eerily empty.

Once both men were away, both Hermione and Malfoy removed the disillusion and started talking all at once. “Tomorrow. They’re doing it tomorrow!” she said.

“What was that they passed? It made me feel…”

“Prickly, yeah. Like it was evil itself,” she finished.

He shivered. “I didn’t like it.”

“Me either,” she said. “What was it, do you reckon?”

“What are you asking me for?” he asked indignantly. She raised an eyebrow, and he deflated. “Alright, fair enough, but I don’t know.”

She worried her lip. “Did it sound like he was… sacrificing Dementors?”

Malfoy hesitated. “A little bit, yeah.”

“Well, that’s…. Actually, I can’t fault him for that. Spot on. Perhaps we don’t interfere at all.”

“But your visions,” Malfoy reminded.

Eternal flame, cries of pain, end of the world. “Oh, right, that. Bugger. Yeah, best to stop him then, I suppose.”

She chewed her lip. What was so evil you could feel it from several feet away? Something that made her skin crawl. She shivered and wrapped her arms around herself. Before she realized what was happening, Malfoy had blanketed her shoulders with his cloak.

They both froze—he also seemed a bit perplexed by what he’d done. They stared at each other, the only sounds their breathing, the tittering of birds, and the wind through the leaves. The autumn had cooled enough where their breath was visible, entwining together, forming their own cloud.

She felt his gaze like a vice grip. She found her toes lifting her again, bringing her ever closer to—

“Merlin’s shit on a stick! Horcruxes!” she exclaimed suddenly.

“Gesundheit.”

She smacked him across the arm but pressed on. “That had to be what Snape gave Lucius.” That’s why that feeling had felt so familiar. She had felt it before. With Voldemort’s diary.

“What’s a Horcrux?”

“It’s a sliver of a person’s soul.”

Malfoy’s nose scrunched up. “Ew.”

She rolled her eyes. “They’re very powerful but also a bane to destroy.”

“How do you know this?” he asked.

“Well, I destroyed one once.”

“What?” he sputtered, “When?”

She waved a hand. “When I was twelve, now can we—”

“How?” he insisted.

“With Fiendfyre,” she said impatiently. “That’s not the point.”

“I would say that you being able to cast and contain Fiendfyre at age twelve is not only the point but the entire bloody thesis. Granger, have you always been this brilliant?” She leveled him with such a glare that he hastily cleared his throat. “So, do we think my father is making these hor-thingies?”

“Horcruxes, and I don’t know. Has he ever killed anyone?”

“No!” Malfoy said indignantly. “Well, not recently,” he amended. “Besides, shouldn’t your visions tell you this?”

She shook her head. “They don’t work that way.”

“You know, I’m getting bloody tired of hearing that.”

“Well, I’m getting bloody tired of you!” she spat.

He huffed. “Well, sounds like we’ve almost cracked the case, and we can finally be rid of each other.”

“Right,” she said. That was exactly what she wanted. Of course, it was. “So, any ideas on this safe house?” Snape had mentioned a Malfoy property—and wards… lots of them.

Malfoy seemed to pause to consider. “Well, the estate actually has been consolidating a bit. We have less properties than we once did.”

“How much is less?”

“I don’t know? Twelve?”

She snorted. Rich people. “That’s way too many to search before tomorrow,” she sighed.

He held up a finger. “Ah, but only two of them are local enough to apparate or Floo to. The rest would require an international portkey. And if this horned buck—”

“Horcrux,” she corrected.

“Whatever”—he rolled his eyes.—“are as evil as you say, I doubt my father would want to go through official Ministry channels.”

“Good to know that while murder is on the table, defying international travel law is where the line is drawn.”

He shook his head impatiently. “I’m just saying, unless he intends to bring that… thing to the manor. There’s only one other place.”

“Where?”

Malfoy smirked before reaching out to grab her arm and apparating on the spot.

5.

“This can’t be right,” Hermione said, staring at the place Malfoy brought her.

“I assure you that it is,” he said beside her.

“This is a yurt.”

“Yes. Yes, it is.”

The small dome-shaped house stood in the middle of a moor near Cornwall. It looked to be no more the size of the smallest bathroom back at the manor.

She turned to face Malfoy and said flatly, “The only property that the Malfoy line keeps in England besides their ginormous, bigger than Buckingham Palace manor… is a yurt?”

He rolled his eyes. “I don’t know how many more ways I can say yes.”

Flustered, she stormed past him and through the front door, discarding Malfoy’s cloak and glancing about the modest space. To be fair, it was a very posh yurt, all sleek Scandinavian furnishings and surprisingly modern amenities. She fiddled around in the kitchen, marveling at the appliances as she heard Malfoy wander in behind her.

“Is this an electric tea kettle?”

He cocked his head. “Er… yes?”

“Why do you say that like you’re uncertain?”

He shrugged. “Well, I’m not sure what that is.”

She narrowed her eyes. “How else do you make your tea?”

He leaned against the countertop, looking suddenly annoyed. “The house-elves make it for me.”

“What happens when you stay here then?” she asked

“I don’t.”

She stared at him blankly. He cleared his throat. “It’s a VRBO.”

“Gesundheit,” she said with a smirk.

He glared at her. “It’s a vacation rental. Mother is convinced the next big craze will be unconventional spaces for the beatnik crowd.”

She sniffed but pressed on. “Well, it doesn’t look like Lucius is here.”

“We could wait?”

She groaned. “We don’t have time to wait. You heard him talking to Snape! Whatever he’s doing, he said it’s the last one! And, if it’s a Horcrux, that could mean something terrible!”

“Why are you saying all this like it’s my fault?” His voice started to raise. “You’re the one with the bloody visions. You think of something!”

“They don’t work like that!”

“Bullshit!” He kicked a chair and, in one stride, was standing against her, chest to chest. “You arrived at my doorstep six months ago claiming I had to let you in my life because of your ridiculous visions, and now you claim that there are restrictions.”

“There have always been restrictions!” she spat, her temper well and truly risen. “You think I chose to be like this? You think I chose to have my life upended again and again at the fancies of whatever some higher power deigns to throw at me? It’s bloody frustrating is what it is!”

“You claim to know frustrations, Granger?” His jaw worked. “Living with you has been a torment. I’ve had to endure the lack of respect from my parents and the teasing of my friends.”

“Oh boohoo—”

His hand shot out and gripped her by the chin and throat, his eyes boring into hers. “I wasn’t finished.” She swallowed, and his words rolled over her like iron. “I’ve had to endure your scent on my clothes no matter how many times they’re laundered. I’ve had to endure my growing reliance on our conversations at dinner.” His words dropped lower; her heart raced. She didn’t understand. Didn’t— “And that is to say nothing of the agony I’ve felt since finding you bare in the woods.”

She swallowed; his head dipped low. His breath was so hot against her cheek she didn’t understand why it wasn’t smoke. “Do you understand what a trial it has been to go on about my life with that image burned into my soul?” His voice was raspy; his lips barely moved as the sound hissed through his teeth. “So, do not claim to be the one burdened by your visions, when I am the one who would not be in this position without them.”

“I—” she started.

His grip on her face tightened, cutting her off. “The next words out of your mouth better be evidence of another vision, Granger, or I’ll—”

Her vision quaked, a torrent of images washed over her, showing only one thing: silver eyes, heavy panting, skin and sweat, life and death, a begging, an acquiescence. She didn’t know what it meant, didn’t know why her visions would choose to show her that of all things and of all times.

But as they cleared and she was once again trapped beneath Malfoy’s gaze, she didn’t question it.

She’d long since learned not to question things that had no business making sense.

She threw herself at him, her lips crashing into his.

He froze for a moment but then took back control and crushed himself against her, slamming her back against the fridge, his ministrations hungered and eager. She was both shocked by his fervor and not. Perhaps she had been wrong about her stance on denial.

He groaned against her lips. “I guess this works.”

“Shut up, Malfoy,” she panted and teethed his lower lip.

Their hands were a scrabble of limbs, a desperate, searching thing. Hers moved unbidden, fumbling with his buttons while his worked their way from the bottom hem of her shirt and slid up the planes of her stomach, smoothing over her breasts. She gasped, and he snarled when he fingered her bra. “Bloody useless, these things are.”

“Well, actually—” she started.

“Shut up, Granger.” He snapped his fingers, and her top and bra disappeared.

Her eyes widened, resisting the urge to cover herself but paused when she saw what lay behind his storming eyes. Want. Need. She was startled to find it matched her own.

She waited impatiently, almost aching as he took each breast in his palms, a gentle massage that made her toes curl, made her throat whine. His groan was soft, reverent. His head dipped as his mouth lowered to her nipple, and she sucked in a breath as his tongue circled her erect bud, his teeth tugging at her while his other hand continued to knead at the tissue.

Her entire body felt like it was aflame, at war with her own brain. They shouldn’t be doing this—there was no time! But, as if to spite her, another vision rolled through. Of Malfoy on his back while she rode atop him, his hands anchoring her by her breasts.

She shuddered as she returned back to the present. Yanking him back to her lips with a renewed ferocity as she fumbled with the last of his buttons, opening his chest to her, keenly moving on to his trousers, seized with the need to feel more of him. He bucked against her hands through the fabric, as if as eager to be free as she was to free him.

With a swift zip and a tug, the length of him was in her hands, smooth and thick, and he hissed. “Fuck.”

That voice, it rolled through her unlike anything else, igniting further need, a seduction in and of itself. Eager to taste him, she lowered to her knees and wrapped her mouth around the girth of him, he tasted of salt and sin. Her eyes nearly rolled back—she’d never enjoyed this so much before. He groaned, placing a hand behind her head as she took him deeper in her throat, “Granger, fuck, I didn’t need this.”

His other hand gripped the countertop, as if his legs were ready to give out. Her head bobbed; she could feel her tongue fold along the smooth ridges of him. It only made her want him more; her core bubbled as he sucked in a breath. “I’m serious, if the memory of your tits was enough to derail my life, how am I supposed to—supposed to—”

He grunted, suddenly gripping her by the arms. He released from her mouth with a pop as he pulled her up. She whimpered at the loss, at the need denied, but he didn’t give her the chance to recover, flipping her around so she faced the cabinets, her arse pressed against his cock. She pressed back into it, as if committing it to memory.

She wanted to be back between his legs, feeling the girth of him move through her lips but then his hands moved downward, slipping beneath her skirt and finding her slit. Every thought fled from her mind as if it was never there. His fingers delved slowly between her folds. He groaned into her ear. “Fuck, is this all for me?”

She couldn’t respond. He was touching her, and her entire body was liquid, a new sensation; she was a one hit addict. Her head fell back against his shoulder as he explored, his hand making a smooth pass down and then back up, teasing around her clit, leaving a trail of fire in his wake. She arched into him again, wanting more. “Please.” It slipped from her lips before she could stop it.

She couldn’t believe this was happening. There were great things afoot, the fate of the world hung in the balance. But all she could focus on was the length pressed against her bum and his torturous fingers making small circles around her center, making her legs tremble, her knees buckle. Besides, her visions had led her here for a reason, hadn’t they?

And ninety-nine point nine percent of the time she could trust her instincts.

He chuckled against her throat, a deeply rousing sound that quickly drove away any of her objections. “Eager little thing, aren’t you? Is it possible you’ve been just as desperate for this as I have?”

It was like a shot to the gut, lightning striking sand. She squeezed her eyes shut, unwilling to answer, unwilling to submit. But then his motions stilled, the silence a weapon as she throbbed for him. “Use your words, Granger,” he purred.

Oh, this dreadful man.

“Yes,” she panted, pressing herself back into him. It was painful because it was true. She’d been denying it for so long; she wasn’t exactly sure when it had even started. She had never needed anyone before. The world had rejected her, so she in turn rejected it. Better off alone. But somehow Draco bloody Malfoy had wheedled his way in.

She didn’t know why. She didn’t know how. But she knew that she would quite literally die if he didn’t start touching her again. “Please,” she repeated.

“Good girl,” he whispered, sending shivers down her spine. “Was that so hard?”

“Malfoy, I swear to Merlin.”

“Patience, Granger.”

“The world is literally about to end, Malfoy.”

“Well, alright then.”

Then he dropped to his knees, her skirt pooled around her ankles, and she felt like she couldn’t breathe. Malfoy’s palms kneaded her arse, spreading it apart. “What are you—?”

“Shhh,” he said, more of a command than a request. “You’re ruining my best work.”

And then his mouth was on her, and she stifled a groan that seemed to reverberate from every cell. His tongue ran a line through her folds from front to back; her cunt pulsed at the attention as he paused at her opening. She shuddered as he teased her there, swirling, tantalizing, but then his tongue moved further back, all the way to her puckered hole. She gasped, her eyes wide.

“Is this one a virgin, Granger?”

She shivered as his tongue circled the opening, his hands gripped tight on her cheeks. “Yes.”

His chuckle sent tingles down her spine. “Then, perhaps just a teaser for today.”

His tongue continued to lathe, and it was almost the idea of it rather than the feeling that caused all of her to tremble. But then he reached around to stroke her clit. Every single nerve ending of her exploded, gasping, panting, and he wasn’t even inside her yet.

“Grip the countertop if you’re having trouble standing.”

She choked back a gasp. “Malfoy, please.” She wasn’t sure how much more she could take.

His responding rumble sounded almost amused. “Well, since you asked nicely.”

His ministrations stopped, and she would have felt empty at the lack if he didn’t immediately lift her, turning her around until her back was on the sheepskin rug before she could blink. It was soft, such a stark contrast to the mass of taut muscle poised above her.

She was struck by two things. One, this was actually happening. It had been happening. They should be trying to stop Lucius, but instead she was about to fuck his son. Two, not a single part of her wanted it to stop. It felt too good to give in, felt too good to lose control.

“Draco, please.” His given name fell from her lips as her lower half arched towards him unbidden.

He paused, his eyes closed. She could feel the head of him against her core, a request for entry, an invitation to apogee. He spoke, and the low purr seemed to start from his gut. “Well, if the seer says so.”

Then he pressed into her.

If she thought what he did with his mouth and fingers were anything to go by, this was something incomparable. It was oceans crashing. Sun gods clashing. Universes colliding. And what was that silvery gold braided thing tying them together? Holding them. Bonding them.

His eyes widened too. He could feel it. That invisible thing, that invisible bond, made no less tangible by being unseen. Life. Death. Everything. He was everything.

He sunk deeper, her walls clenching along his length as if she didn’t want to let him go. He sighed, a deeply contented sound, as if sated but also not completely satisfied, at least, not yet.

They moved together. She couldn’t say which one received the other. It was such a mutual joining, the moving in and out. She ascended, every inch of her a high. He looked at her as if she were heavens grace. They hadn’t forged the bond between them, it had always been there, but that didn’t stop them from trying.

His mouth covered every part of her that it could reach, suckling at her breasts, licking up her throat, biting at her lips. She marveled at the feel of his skin against hers, arched her back as he found that spot within her. Her line of vision started to quaver in her bliss. She basked in the smoothness of him, the size of him, the newness of him. Why had she fought this?

She was close, cusping her own peak, and, based on his ragged breath against the column of her throat, so was he. “Shall we come together, Hermione?” he groaned into her ear.

Together, he said. Not alone, she added.

She shattered as he spilled into her. Everything crashed in on her all at once. Not just what rolled through her body but what rolled through her mind. Her gift assaulted her with visions, of him slowly penetrating her as she rode the heights, of her cradling his lips between hers, creating an out-of-body experience, both living it and watching from above.

The duality created a clarity that she’d longed for, a clarity that she’d ached for but knew that she was discovering at exactly the right time. Now, before it was too late but also when it was always meant to be discovered.

This had all been leading to Draco Malfoy.

The visions she’d pushed away at school, the flashes of him she’d get when searching for answers, the tugs that always led to him. Always to Draco.

This realization didn’t mean the world wasn’t ending, didn’t mean they wouldn’t have to scramble in the fallout of what they'd done. It just meant that her finding him, claiming him, may not have saved the world, but it just might have saved herself.

6.

Hermione was decidedly calmer as she rolled over, morning sun illuminating the visible sky through the Yurt’s wheel. She pulled the sheepskin rug up to her chin to cover herself. Beside her, Draco’s chest rose and fell, breathless but not asleep.

There hadn’t been a whole lot of sleep. Memories and visions flashed alike, of all the different ways he had taken her, of all the different ways she had taken him. She was beginning to believe her gift was a wanton, horny thing based on what it continued to show her.

“Well, that was…” she started, trailing off.

“Yeah,” he agreed.

She worried her lip. “So… are we?”

“I think so.”

Soul-bonded. She really had never expected to experience it herself. It made her question… well everything really.

Her visions had been showing her how to avoid the end of the world. But they had also been guiding her to him, guiding her to Draco.

It would require further research. She wanted to discover when the bond happened exactly, in which timeline, in which lifetime, but the effects now were a thread connecting the two of them, fortified by their consummation. If she closed her eyes, she could almost feel his breath as if it were her own. She shivered. It was… creepy. But also not.

There was a rattle at the door, and the pair of them shot up, exchanging looks of horror. They summoned their clothes, hurriedly shoving them on as the door opened and a perplexed Swedish family of four gaped at them from the entryway.

“Erm, hello?” Hermione greeted.

“Vem är du?” the woman asked, her mouth agape.

She turned to Draco. “I thought that would be Lucius. Is this not your house?”

“I told you. It’s a rental,” he said. “It must be rented out this weekend.”

“Then Lucius isn’t coming here at all!” She exclaimed, snatching up her bag and continuing to bicker with him as the Swedish family looked on, blinking at them as their fight escalated.

Hermione threw up her hands. “Then where is he?”

“He must be at the manor.”

She scoffed. “You don’t think he’s stupid enough to perform a dangerous dark ritual at your house, do you?”

Draco shrugged. “Stupid? No. Cocky? Yes.”

“Then what the hell are we waiting for?” She grabbed his arm and hauled him out of the yurt, past the Swedish family, and, once they were clear of their line of sight, apparated them away.

They popped into the main foyer of the manor, the lights dim and unwelcome, company clearly not expected. “What’s the most isolated part of the estate, do you reckon?” she asked.

“Likely the ramparts.”

“The what-now?”

Draco closed his hand around her wrist, and they popped onto the top of a large wall. It seemed to border the southern half of the grounds, so far from the main estate that she hadn’t seen it before. The weather had taken a turn for the worse, and a storm was brewing on the horizon. At such a high altitude, the wind buffeting them made it difficult to remain upright.

“Where is he?” she asked.

“There!” Draco pointed across the large clearing.

Lucius stood on the rampart, on the side most opposite them. He didn’t seem to notice their arrival. His gaze was fixed on a sheet of parchment, and he was chanting, the winds blowing his platinum hair behind him like a curtain in the wind.

“What’s he doing?” Draco asked.

Hermione followed Lucius’s line of sight, straight to the middle of the expanse between them where a silver tiara sat dead center. “That must be the Horcrux!” she cried.

“Yes, but what’s he doing?”

She looked back up at Lucius, still muttering some sort of incantation. She wasn’t sure if it was her gift, but she could almost see the magic building around him, swirling to a focal point, ready to spill over.

She racked her brain trying to remember everything she had ever learned about Horcruxes. It wasn’t much, despite having experienced one. When she’d needed to destroy the diary, her visions had shown her how to do it.

Fiendfyre. That’s what she’d used.

Standing in an abandoned clearing such as this one, deep in the Forbidden Forest, she’d trembled as she recited the long incantation required to summon the flames. It was an unwieldy spell at best. Dangerous. One she shouldn’t have attempted at twelve. But, with her gift and an unreasonable level of self-confidence, she’d managed it from memory alone.

In the center of the tiara, she saw a small flame alight, nothing large at first, but how quickly it grew. Engulfing the tiara in a sea of black and red flame.

Thunder clashed, but no rain followed, like the magic that lay in the Horcrux had summoned the preternatural weather patterns, as if it were crying out while it suffocated and burned.

“He’s destroying it.” She gasped.

“What?” Draco asked. “That doesn’t make any sense. Why would he destroy his own Horcrux?”

She shook her head. “Maybe it’s someone else’s.”

“But who?”

Suddenly an image flashed across the sky, the snake-faced man she’d seen time and time again in her visions, Voldemort, all predator, all vicious lines. He made no sound, was more of an image, a shadow, then a sentient being. Hermione could feel only the force of the winds and hear the clashing of thunder, but she knew in the way she knew things that he was wailing, dying.

“I don’t understand,” Draco said.

Neither did Hermione.

As the sky continued to broil, her mind raced. Why would her visions try to stop this? Surely someone trying to destroy a Horcrux was a good thing? No one evil enough to create them deserved to live very long in Hermione’s estimation.

Particularly if their goal was to set the world afire.

Fire.

The flame.

Hermione looked to the decimated remains of the tiara and realized that the Fiendfyre was still spreading.

Shit, why hadn’t Lucius cast the counter-curse?

She looked back up to the chanting man, just as the parchment he was holding was suddenly ripped from him by the wind. He flailed about trying to snatch it back, gesticulating wildly before finally pulling out his wand. A sudden gust blew it straight from his fingertips. It clattered off the edge of the rampart and into the clearing, landing in the growing flames along with the piece of parchment, both incinerated on impact.

Her skin grew slick, the heady heat of the inferno growing stronger with every passing moment. Beside her, she could see beads of sweat rolling down Draco’s face.

“Doesn’t your father know the counter-curse for Fiendfyre?” she asked.

Draco looked at her like she was crazy, his hair blowing wildly around him. “Does anybody? It’s really complicated.”

She closed her eyes; it all made sense now. Lucius didn’t know the counter-curse, hadn’t bothered to learn it because of its complexities. Something like that would require a particularly clever person to memorize, someone not silly, someone not woo-woo. Someone logical.

Suddenly knowing what to do, Hermione closed her eyes and began to chant.

Fiendfyre wasn’t like regular magic. While all magic was binding magic, centuries of finesse and the introduction of wands had streamlined most spells into a word or two, focusing the magic on this plane of existence.

Fiendfyre was different. It didn’t exist here, not really; it was from another realm, another reality. To cast it, one had to open a portal, to summon it forth across time and space. It was a transdimensional spell, as she’d tried to explain to McGonagall all those years ago. In order to banish it, a similar portal needed to be opened. And banishing something was always more difficult than summoning.

A forgotten language spilled from her lips, Latin but not. The words of ancient witches and wizards long deceased and long buried, the users of cruder magics tied up in rituals and rites.

The language had always come easy to her, as if her soul itself was receptive to it, as if she had lived a thousand lives and the learning was just the remembering. Which is why she knew that the something she was starting to feel in her chest were the spirits of wizards past, clamoring at the door of the living, begging for passage. Their leverage, their bargaining chip, was aiding her magic, crafting the door above the raging flame.

It would be up to Hermione to ensure their help went unpaid, a life debt she would only make good on from the grave. She shuddered and continued, starting to waiver on the edge as the magic funneled through her. It was powerful, earth rendering, and she was just a girl.

More voices joined hers, raking at her throat, begging to be released. The wind picked up around them, buffeting them on the rampart. Still, she continued, hoarsely, persistently. She felt a sucking sensation begging her mind to retreat. To seek safety in nothingness. But she had to stay present, had to banish the fire and save the world. It was up to her alone. It had always been her. Alone. She had to—

Draco was suddenly there. Gripping her shoulders and tugging her into him, sinking them to their knees as he shielded her from the racing winds, the growing heat, and the debris of rock and torn trees.

“Keep going, Granger,” he urged as she continued to chant against his chest. “Whatever you’re doing, I think it’s working, there’s something in the sky, a vortex or a—ah!”

And then his magic was there too, covering her like a cloak. She felt it coil around her magic, aiding it as it surged forward and out of her. The spirits tried to hitch a ride, but Draco’s protection was like a sheen of oil, they were unable to grab hold.

Hermione and Draco’s magic swelled, pooling together at a focal point in the sky, connected to them only by a tether, and an opening began to form.

Small and black at first, then growing and swirling. A vortex.

A doorway.

What lay beyond was hard to make out, but Hermione could feel that the Fiendfyre belonged to the beyond as much as the beyond belonged to the flames. She could almost swear she heard them calling out to each other, the fire rushing towards the opening. She could almost hear it hiss, a grating inhuman sound, Homeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.

Once the last of the flames disappeared, she stopped chanting, releasing the magic with a crack. The cord connecting her to the doorway snapped, and the vortex swallowed itself, leaving only a decimated field of scorched earth and the charred remains of a tiara.

She was panting, and she felt a weird sense of emptiness, as if she had been punctured and drained to her limit. Draco seemed shaky as well, his hair askew and full of ash, but he lifted her chin to his face, his eyes searching. He licked his lips, dry and cracked from the heat of the flames. “Are you alright?”

She nodded, her breath still coming out in sharp gasps. “I… I think so.”

“Was that… what your visions wanted from you? Did you do it? Save the world?”

She blinked up at him, wordlessly shaking her head. “I don’t know… I don’t…”

She had never been so close to the brink before, always the answers lie in simple solutions, from the stepping on a rat to the stealing of a diary. But the number of steps to get here, from her soot-stained cheeks to her body wrapped in Draco’s arms, it was as if fate had carefully led her to this moment, as if it had meticulously planted the knowledge she’d need at precisely the right moments, forged in her the strength to follow through.

It made an outsider of her, but perhaps it also gave her an open mind. Made her into someone who could want this particularly scared-looking man looking at her as if he’d almost lost her, looking as if he hadn’t just saved the world himself. The unanswered question was evident in his eyes. Is it over?

“I think it is…” she said. “Over, I mean. We won.”

His gaze remained tense. “Does this mean that you… I mean… Are you leaving?”

The words didn’t have the effect she thought they would. She’d been aching to leave her entire life. To go somewhere else. To start fresh. She would still like to do that. To go places. To see the world. She just needed to make one amendment to those plans.

She reached out to cup his face. “If I do, you’re coming with me.”

The lips that met hers were soft, lacking the urgency of before. It was a celebratory kiss, a slow kiss, a culmination of many things, as sweet as a sigh, as gentle as a cloud.

“Ahem,” a voice cleared beside them.

They pulled apart and stumbled to their feet, though Draco retained a hand on her arm for balance. Lucius stood before them looking considerably sooty and disheveled. The ends of his robes were frayed, and he wore quite the scowl indeed.

“What are you doing here?” he hissed.

“A ‘thank you’ will do,” Hermione said, dusting herself off and picking up a few stray pieces of ash from Draco’s robes, a futile effort given the state of them. She gave up almost immediately.

Lucius’s mouth opened and closed, at the events that had just occurred or Draco’s protective grip on Hermione, she couldn’t be sure. Either were just as likely. “On second thought,” she said. “I’d like an explanation of what you were doing.”

“That’s—”

“Entirely my business, actually, considering I just saved you from burning your house down and the rest of the world along with it.”

He glared at her, no sign of gratitude, no sign of empathy. Lucius Malfoy was a cold, cold man, but it appeared that he knew when he’d lost. He sneered. “Surely a girl with the power to summon a transdimensional spell single-handedly could figure it out.”

Her jaw worked. “It was Voldemort, wasn’t it?”

Lucius winced at the name but then nodded. “The Dark Lord made seven of these… Horcruxes before his not-quite-death, which I have been quietly taking care of. This was the last one.” Lucius looked to the sky, the pained, snake-like figure had long disappeared, leaving only formless clouds that cast odd shadows across his face. His eyes tightened. “He’s gone now.”

“Why?”

His eyes snapped back to hers. “Money, of course.”

Hermione blinked, and Lucius sighed. “Quite frankly, the Dark Lord is bad for business, Miss Granger. Our coffers took a significant hit when he first came to power, one we only just recovered from. I have no intention of facing the same disaster again.”

She sputtered, “So, this wasn’t altruistic in any way? This was all about money?”

Lucius splayed his hands. “What else would it be about?”

She blinked at him wordlessly, unsure of what she expected of him. She’d saved the world. Again. The blood and dirt still evidence of it on her skin. But, in that moment, she knew that no amount of power in the world could conquer the impossible task of making Lucius Malfoy a better person.

She sighed and reached for Draco’s hand, finding it warm and solid as she slipped her fingers between his. All she wanted was a bath, a hot compress, and frankly to sleep for a year. As she turned to go, Lucius objected. “Are the two of you really not going to explain…” he gestured to their clasped hands “… this.”

She turned over her shoulder, eyeing the older man coolly. “No.”

She was done trying to prove herself, done trying to force the world to take her seriously. She was Hermione Granger, gods damnit, Seer, Oracle, and she was done waiting on others’ approval. She would do things on her own.

As she turned to go, her balance lurched; the course of magic that had run through her left her limbs more wobbly and shaky than she’d realized. But Draco was there, catching her before she fell, as if he had sensed it before it happened.

She met his gaze, and a smile tugged at her lips.

Well, maybe not completely on her own anymore, after all.