He slipped quietly into the classroom and took his place at the worn desk. There were only a few students there this early; class would not start for another fifteen minutes. Professor Vector gave him an approving look once he took out his parchment and quill and Draco felt the overwhelming urge to Transfigure her beady, dark eyes into weeping pools of sludge. Grimacing, he rolled up his sleeve—not the left, never the left—and rested his chin on his hand. Did the bint truly think her lecture about his failing marks this term had been fruitful? That he was now going to take his studies—and this veritable joke of a class—seriously? Fat fucking chance.
He had more nightmares last night. This time it was a vivid, agonizing retelling of Aunt Bella’s nightly crucio lessons from the summer before Sixth Year. Draco’s anguished screams had followed him from the Manor drawing room to the Slytherin boys’ dormitory according to Blaise’s aggravatingly concerned expression upon his sudden ascent into consciousness.
“Mate?” Blaise had whispered dumbly, taking stock of Draco’s dilated pupils and sickly white skin—and the infernal panting.
Draco had curtly waved him off and collected himself. He had peeled off his sweat-soaked sleep shirt and pants, haphazardly dressed in what may have been Weasley’s idea of a put-together ensemble, and made his way down to breakfast—alone. He didn’t want to talk about it; he didn’t even want to fucking think about it, which would have been inevitable if he stayed in that suffocating, dimly-lit dormitory for one more second. However, the Great Hall’s sensory assault via beaming lights, beaming platters of eggs and sausage, and the nauseating, beaming chatter had Draco stalking towards Arithmancy instead—fifteen minutes early.
“You have to mean it, Draco.”
“Look at them in the eyes—like this—and envision them writhing in pain. Relish it. And then the incantation— crucio!”
Draco seethed. Whenever Aunt Bella made her unwelcome, maladious appearance in his nightmares, he suffered the aftershocks for days, even hallucinating her voice during quiet moments. This was probably another colossal fucking mistake; he should’ve taken a Dreamless Sleep Potion and went back to sleep for another day or two.
A shuffle of feet and a gasp—no, more akin to a squeak—removed Draco from his haunting thoughts. Draco looked up and saw the hair before her small face.
Of course she was here early. The fucking swot.
Her dark eyes were narrowed on him, a bit of pink high on her cheeks. She looked like he had just Disarmed her—why was she looking at him like that? Ah—he must have been scowling still. She was seemingly entering a vacant classroom and Draco the Death Eater was looking rather murderous; no wonder she looked poised for a battle.
Draco schooled his expression and raised an eyebrow. “Granger.”
Professor Vector and the few students that were in the classroom fell silent and froze, looking up from their parchment and books to witness the impending duel.
Fuck them.
Granger—observing the atmosphere shift in the room and apparently coming to the conclusion that Draco had actually just decided to attend class today and was not intending to ambush her with some diabolical, undeserving hex—held her books closer to her chest and stepped into the classroom. She let out a breath of air, squared her thin shoulders, directed her eyes to a spot behind Draco, and started walking.
As she passed his desk, Draco inhaled her scent, which he had become quite familiar with since the start of term: laundry soap, vanilla, and lavender. He wanted to snatch her arm so she would stay there for just a moment longer; so he could have that sweet, girlish, and intoxicating mix of aromas pervade his gloomy thoughts for one more second.
Draco had developed a consuming yet purely academic interest in Hermione Granger. He had quietly observed her since the start of their Eighth Year. Her ceaseless curls, her bright and persistent expression, her unwavering confidence and spirit; he knew firsthand—Draco scowled again—the horrors she had suffered during the War. Yet here she was, unchanged; still the same force she was when she was that naive, rabbity thorn-in-his-side First Year.
How?
This had Draco obsessing and ruminating for hours, days—how had she persevered when almost the entirety of their year had arrived back at Hogwarts at the start of the term with perturbed, wary expressions plastered on their battle-worn faces? Even The Chosen Git and Weasel kept quiet; Draco had barely seen the two of them in the three months they’d been back. No, Granger was so frustratingly enduring, her curls still frizzy and her words still swotty.
“Professor, could you look over these charts before we begin?”
“Of course, Miss Granger.”
Draco’s eyes followed Professor Vector’s routine shuffle down the row to the class swot’s desk. He stared at Granger while they pored over her parchment.
Was that… lip gloss? A glamouring charm? That was new. Draco had heard (against his will) from Nott that her and Weasley had dissolved whatever relationship they had back in September (Draco mused that Weasel was probably a horrific fuck) so what—or whom—was this for?
The Granger mystery persists.
Draco resumed his unaffected stance as Professor Vector made her way back to the front of the classroom. Students began pouring inside, their vapid, suffocating chatter following them in their wake. Draco decided it was about time for a nap.
Nott sauntered into the room about five minutes after Professor Vector started her lecture, interrupting Draco’s precious early stages of sleep with a rough, unnecessary slap on the shoulder as he made his way to his seat. Draco's eyes snapped open and he turned around to proclaim Nott’s status as the biggest tosser to ever exist—but his words died in his throat.
Nott was seated next to Granger. He sat awfully close, peering down at the notes she had already scribbled on her parchment. When he took stock of what he had missed, he let out a low whistle; Granger responded by rolling her eyes and nudging him out of her way. Draco swore he caught an upward quirk of her lips and he glared at the two of them with a crackling fury.
This was new too. When the fuck did Nott change his seat? Why the fuck was he sitting next to Granger?
Nott noticed Draco glowering and gave him a sheepish look. He leaned back in his chair and held his hands up. Draco bitterly took note of his unblemished left forearm. “Sorry, mate,” Nott said. “I’m guessing you were actually sleeping.”
Granger looked at him then too, her teeth worrying her full bottom lip. Apparently her anticipation of a wayward hex from Draco was not completely abated. Feeling like a tosser himself, Draco turned back around to Professor Vector and whatever the fuck she was lecturing about. A nap was off the table now; he was wide fucking awake.
After some time, Draco attempted to quell his anger by attempting some seldom-utilized mindlessness techniques or whatever his bloody Ministry-appointed Mind Healer, Healer Dengler, had requested him use when he was feeling frustrated or anxious.
Draco imagined himself in a lush garden.
No, not the Manor’s gardens, where Mother—fuck. He tried again.
Draco imagined himself in a field of lavender underneath a blazing sun.
“What are you smiling at, Nott?”
Draco—calmer now, interestingly—felt his eyes drift toward the indignant Granger. She looked significantly put out, her cheeks pink again. Nott was grinning at her, his dimples on full display.
“Nothing, Granger,” he drawled, now facing her. He moved closer, too close, and Draco’s heart rate spiked again. “You just have a bit of something—”
Then Nott did something that made the quill in Draco’s fist snap in two and fall to the desk, leaving a splatter of ink on his blank parchment: he took Granger’s small, flushed face in his hand and delicately dragged his thumb underneath her pink, shiny lips.
“Right there.”
Granger looked up at the fucking cad, her blush deepening and doe eyes widening even further.
“Mr. Nott! Miss Granger! Please save your canoodling for after class!” Professor Vector boomed. Every pair of eyes in the classroom then turned to Nott and Granger.
Granger—now sporting a shade of red that traveled down her neck and chest—was chagrined, Nott cavalier, and Draco incensed.
Draco, however, did not have the foggiest idea why.
What was that fucking display? Were they fucking—Nott and Granger?
No, Granger wouldn’t. Granger was a good girl.
Granger probably didn’t even fuck the Weasel.
Granger was a virgin.
Was Nott trying to fuck Granger? Draco flared his nostrils and stared pointedly at Nott.
He imagined the two of them in probably one of Nott’s biggest fantasies— Nott asking Granger for some extra help on some translations for Ancient Runes. Granger enthusiastically accepting, inviting him to the Library after she was finished with some of her Head Girl duties that night. Granger sitting next to Nott in the Library and shifting so that their legs were touching. Nott running his hands up Granger’s bare thigh. Granger gasping softly, then biting her lip with uncertainty, and finally summoning her Gryffindor courage and colliding her lips with Nott’s. The kiss becoming feverish. Granger pushing herself onto the table, Nott sliding her skirt up her bum, Nott roughly turning her over, Granger letting out a keen moan, Nott pulling down his trousers, Granger’s wanton, eager mouth—
Draco’s jaw ticked audibly as he brought himself out of his—Nott’s—fantasy. He was suddenly very, painfully aware of his straining trousers and the tightness in his groin.
What the fuck was going on with him?
It had been almost a year since his last shag; he had been too much of a brooding, anxious arse to even consider sex. He needed a fuck. Badly. That could be the only reason why he had a hard-on imagining Hermione fucking Granger being bent over a desk in the Library like the swotty bint she was.
Nott finally looked over at Draco, who was one of the only ones still staring. His expression flashed from smug to concerned. “Mate, you okay?”
Draco was sweating. He must’ve looked fucking mental.
Granger’s eyes darted to him, her brows furrowed. His eyes caught hers.
“Air,” he said, attempting indifference. He did not waver his eye contact with her. Her teeth caught her bottom lip again.
Draco suddenly got up and made his way to the door, abandoning his ruined parchment and broken quill.
“Mr. Malfoy! Where are you going?”
“Air,” he repeated, looking back at Professor Vector. As he approached the threshold, he briefly glanced back at Granger. She was staring at his snapped quill, an anxious expression overtaking her soft features.
Draco scowled as he entered the corridor, his hands raking through his overgrown silvery blond hair. Granger definitely thought he was a violent madman, a savage. Unchanged after the War, just like her. Perhaps she was worried that he was going to follow in the footsteps of his former Lord and go on a fucking murderous rampage.
“Fuck!” Draco said out loud without meaning to, causing a rather frazzled-looking First Year to scream, drop her overlarge books, and run off in the direction she came from.
He watched her scamper away down the stone hall. “Fuck,” he repeated quietly, dejectedly. He ceased his prowl and pinched the bridge of his nose.
Why did he care what Granger thought of him?
Perhaps it was because he was trying to do better. Genuinely. Okay, that was plausible.
Why did he care whether or not Theodore Nott was trying to fuck her?
That one had him stumped.
Perhaps it was because Nott was a cad. No—that wasn’t it. He was just as much as cad as Nott, if not more. Hell would freeze over before Draco Malfoy would become chivalrous, especially towards Granger.
Ah. Perhaps it was because Granger—so unerringly, so unabashedly herself—would be absolutely, assuredly ruined by Nott if she ever relented to him. He would douse her blazing flame like he’d done with his previous conquests.
No, Draco couldn’t let that happen. Hermione Granger was his puzzle. He had to figure out why she kept going on, despite everything. Why she still had the sun in her eyes whilst the words carved crudely on her right arm pulsed with the malice, the anguish she was put through.
She was his. Not Nott’s.
His.