What Comes After
Draco’s POV
Waking up with Hermione in his arms still felt like something out of a dream.
A quiet, impossible dream.
She was curled against him, her hand resting just above his heart, breath warm against his chest. The sheets tangled around them like they'd never meant to be anywhere else.
Draco hadn’t slept. Not really.
He’d spent most of the night staring at the ceiling, repeating her words in his mind like a sacred litany. I love you. I love you. I love you.
He wasn’t sure what to do with it.
It was more terrifying than war. More permanent than magic. More intimate than anything they’d shared, even the moments pressed together in the dark, pretending not to feel too much.
This wasn’t pretending anymore.
He looked down at her. She was still asleep, her curls half hiding her face, her mouth slightly parted in the way it always was when she was dreaming deeply.
He brushed a thumb gently over her knuckles.
Granger.
Still Granger to him.
Even now, even after I love you, even after everything.
She stirred slightly, stretching into him without opening her eyes.
“You’re thinking too loud,” she mumbled.
He smirked. “You always say that.”
“It’s always true.”
She peeked one eye open. “You look worried.”
“I’m not.”
She hummed. “Liar.”
He leaned down and pressed a kiss to her hairline, breathing her in. She smelled like lavender and something warmer—something that had become home to him.
“You know what I’m going to say,” she said sleepily, pressing her nose to his collarbone.
Draco raised an eyebrow. “No, but I’m already dreading it.”
Hermione tilted her head, grinning lazily. “It’s Malfoy now. You should probably start getting used to that.”
Draco froze for a heartbeat.
Then smiled—slow and stunned.
Every damn time.
“You’re never going to stop surprising me, are you?”
She shrugged. “Not if I can help it.”
Later that day, while she was in the study responding to some dry Ministry correspondence, he slipped away.
It was stupid, probably.
Overdramatic, sentimental. Not at all something he would’ve done before her.
But he couldn’t stop thinking about what she said the night before. About wanting a family. About seeing their future in vivid color.
He wasn’t ready for children. Not yet.
But he was ready to give her something. Something that meant forever.
When she found the box on her pillow that evening, she hesitated.
“Draco?”
He didn’t look up from the chair in the corner where he sat reading. “Open it.”
Hermione sat, lifting the lid slowly.
Inside lay a delicate silver chain, and at the center, nestled in a graceful vine-like setting, was a single emerald. Dark. Deep. Like forest and shadow and life all tangled together.
She stared.
He cleared his throat. “It’s warded. Protective enchantments. Custom.”
Her fingers trembled slightly as she lifted it. “It’s beautiful.”
He looked up. “It’s not just jewelry.”
“I know.”
“I didn’t want you walking into the Ministry without something of mine on you.”
She blinked, breath catching in her throat. “Something of yours?”
He stood and moved toward her, taking the necklace from her hands and stepping behind her. He fastened it gently, the emerald settling just above her heart.
His lips brushed the curve of her shoulder. “Now everyone will know you’re mine.”
She turned, eyes soft. “You really think anyone doesn’t already know?”
He gave her that half-smile—sharp and reverent. “I need them to remember.”
Hermione’s POV
She wore it the next day.
And the day after that.
Even when she was angry with him for snapping at a Wizengamot official (who definitely deserved it), she still reached for it before she left the house. The weight of it was oddly comforting.
Like him.
And maybe that was why the letter hit so hard.
It was waiting for her on her desk one afternoon. No name. No crest. Just creamy parchment and a single line written in ink far too elegant for the venom it carried.
“A Mudblood in emerald is still a stain in green.”
She stared at it for a long time.
She didn’t cry. Didn’t scream.
But she burned.
Draco’s POV
He found her that evening on the balcony, arms folded, the wind tugging at her curls.
He didn’t say anything at first.
Just moved to stand beside her.
“I got a letter,” she said calmly.
His blood ran cold. “From who?”
“Doesn’t say.”
She handed it to him.
Draco read it once.
Twice.
Then he tore it in half.
And again.
And again.
Until the pieces scattered like ashes in the wind.
“I’ll triple the wards.”
“You don’t have to—”
“I will, Hermione.”
She turned to him, her eyes stormy. “I’m not ashamed of who I am.”
“I know that.”
“I won’t be afraid.”
“I know that, too.”
He reached for her, hand sliding behind her neck, thumb brushing the edge of her jaw.
“But if they come for you,” he said, voice low and steady, “they’ll learn what it really means to provoke a Malfoy.”
Hermione exhaled, tension slowly bleeding from her spine as she leaned into him.
“I didn’t want to tell you,” she murmured. “I knew it would ruin your night.”
He kissed her temple.
“You are my night.”