Dangerous Games
26 December 1996
The Burrow’s living room was empty, save for the steady crackle of the fire and the hushed but urgent voices of Harry and Ron. Hermione sat stiffly in the armchair across from them, arms crossed as she stared at the flames, willing herself not to let her expression betray her abundant thoughts.
“So,” Ron said finally, his voice thick with disbelief. “Malfoy kissed you?”
Hermione flinched, but her tone remained steady. “Yes.”
They agreed to wait until they could find a quiet moment alone with Ron to share the news. After spending the holidays at home with her parents and baby sister, Hermione couldn’t stop replaying Malfoy’s kiss in her mind. She agonized over every word he said, analyzing every detail, trying to make sense of why he had kissed her in the first place.
Harry sat forward, the flickering light casting shadows across his face. “And?”
“And what?” Hermione snapped. “It was—nothing. A mistake!” The truth was, Ron had been openly flirting with (and snogging) Lavender Brown before the Christmas break, completely disregarding how much it hurt her. But even so, she couldn’t stand the idea of Ron thinking she had actually wanted that kiss from Malfoy.
“A mistake we can use,” Harry pressed. “Think about it, Hermione. Malfoy’s unraveling. I overheard him talking to Snape about some mission just before you showed up and then you saw it yourself. He’s under pressure, and now he’s let something slip. He’s reaching out to you.”
Ron made a disgusted noise. “More like reaching onto you.”
Hermione shot him a glare before turning back to Harry. “So what? What do you want me to do?” She knew where he was headed but she needed him to be perfectly clear with her.
“Use it,” Harry said simply, “Let him think he has some kind of… connection with you. Get him to talk. Find out what he’s up to.”
Hermione hesitated, something in her stomach twisting uncomfortably. Harry explicitly wasn’t saying to use her body to form such a connection, but it was implied, by any means necessary. “You want me to manipulate him?”
Ron scoffed. “You had no problem doing it to Rita Skeeter.” recalling how Hermione trapped Rita’s unregistered Animagus beetle form in a bottle during the Triwizard tournament to blackmail her into never writing slander about them again.
“This is different.” Hermione wasn’t sure if she was pouting. She had come to a similar conclusion to this conversation on her own but didn’t know if she could actually go through with it.
She had just turned 17 in September and Malfoy was only her second kiss? Well, magic kiss... first-ever, magical or not, was Viktor in their fourth year. She had shared a kiss and some light groping with a muggle boy last summer but it was ultimately a moot point. She’d only ever really wanted to snog Ron and now that thought was tarnished too by his stupidity and Lavender’s tongue.
“Is it?” Harry’s voice was quiet, but firm. “Hermione, this could be our best chance to figure out what Malfoy is planning. He’s hiding something—we know that much. If you can get him to trust you…”
Hermione clenched her fists, her mind warring between reason and something else she didn’t want to name. “I’ll think about it.”
She didn’t tell them that she already had, at length.
13 January 1997, a week since returning to Hogwarts.
Hermione “found” Draco alone in the library, a book open in front of him, though his eyes weren’t scanning the pages. This was the first chance she’d gotten where Harry actually saw him on the Marauder's Map. They had a sneaking suspicion Malfoy was in the Room of Requirement a lot because his name tag hadn't been showing up on the map anywhere. But here he was, in the traceable library and he was alone.
He looked utterly exhausted, dark shadows bruising the hollowed skin beneath his eyes, fingers clenched too tightly around the parchment in his hands. Hermione realized she’d never really looked at him before—bullies were best avoided, after all. But lately, he kept resurfacing in her thoughts, and to her reluctant surprise, his face wasn’t nearly as awful as his temperament.
She took a slow breath and stepped forward. “Malfoy.”
He tensed but hardly looked up, he kind of expected her to find him one of these days. “Granger.”
She slid into the seat across from him, putting down her bookbag, feigning nonchalance. “You’ve been avoiding me.” And he had been, in every class Gryffindor shared with Slytherin, even in the Great Hall, he’d kept quiet, to himself, no longer heckling anyone, not even Harry!
Draco’s lip curled with sarcasm. “I wonder why.” Honestly, he was too drained to keep avoiding her. Part of him felt a flicker of guilt for forcing that kiss on her—but another part didn’t. Maybe, deep down, that’s why he’d shown up in the library tonight at all—so she could find him in her arena.
Hermione tilted her head, eyeing him in his usual sharp uniform. The emerald and silver tie perfectly knotted, the jumper sitting neatly on his shoulders. Yet, despite the polished appearance, there was something disheveled beneath the surface. “Maybe because you slipped up at Slughorn’s party,” she said quietly. “And you know it.”
His fingers flexed slightly. “I don’t know what you mean.” Draco wasn’t exactly sure why he bothered pretending at this point. Why he clung to this worn-out game of denial, but this was their pattern, wasn’t it? Always circling, always cryptic.
She leaned forward, the table between them, her wand close in her robe pocket but she didn’t feel the need to hold it as Ron had begged she do in case Malfoy snapped at her. Voice lowering. “You don’t believe in what they taught you, do you? Not anymore.”
Draco’s jaw locked. “Careful, Granger.”
She nearly smirked but didn’t want to give anything away. This was going exactly as she had played out in all the times she rehearsed getting into his confidence.
“Or what?” she pressed. “You’ll curse me? Turn me over to the Dark Lord?” She let the words linger before adding, softer, “You won’t.”
His nostrils flared, anger and something else flashing in his eyes. “You think you know me?”
Draco was giving her exactly what she wanted and in return, he hoped he’d plant that seed that he needed her help without actually asking for it.
“I think I understand you better now than you want me to.”
A silence stretched between them, taut and charged. Glaring at each other. Hermione wondered when he stopped slicking back his hair and Draco was surprised the freckles dusting her nose still gave her a sunkissed look even in the dead of winter.
Then, finally, Draco exhaled, he was so tired and dragged a hand through his hair. “You’re a bloody nightmare.”
Now Hermione smirked openly, he was right where she needed him. “And you’re running out of options.”
He didn’t deny it this time. Instead, he reached for his book again, flipping a page without reading it. “I don’t need your help.” Draco was a good liar.
“Maybe not,” she said, standing. “But you need someone.”
Draco didn’t stop her as she gathered her bag over her shoulder and walked away. But she knew she’d planted that seed, and he was listening.