I'm Not That Girl

September 1, 1992

The sun is beaming down across the row of muggle cars, heating Hermione’s face as she approaches King’s Cross.

“Have you got everything, love?” Her dad asks, holding his wife’s hand, both of them beaming.

“Yes, Dad. Mum, tell him not to worry,” Hermione implores her mother.

“Impossible, my dear. It’s our job to worry,” her Mum says, tucking an errant curl behind her daughter’s ear.

They make their way down the platforms until they find the brick wall that gives way to Platform 9 & ¾. 

“I’ll never get used to it,” Mr. Granger says as he watches his daughter push her trolley cart through the wall.

His wife chuckles and follows her through.

The magical platform is already teeming with people, excitedly saying hello to their friends and goodbye to their families.

Mr. Granger helps Hermione lift her trunk onto the train and then each of them exchange a series of hugs.

“Mum,” Hermione moans as her Mum steps forwards for a third embrace.

“I’m stocking up. It’ll be months before I can squeeze you again,” Mrs. Granger says, holding back tears. It had been so wonderful to have Hermione back home for the entire summer. Their home had felt so empty during the school year and neither of Hermione’s parents wanted to think of another year without her.

“We are so proud of you, Hermione,” Mr. Granger says, wrapping an arm around his wife’s shoulders to stop her from holding their daughter hostage.

Hermione turns towards the train and looks for signs of Harry and Ron. There is a swarm of red hair a ways down the platform where she is sure to find her friends.

But first, she turns back around and throws her arms around both of her parents, not caring if her classmates laugh or think she is babyish.

Hermione Granger knows how lucky she is to have the parents she does.

And she is going to miss them.

“Go on, you don’t want to miss the train,” her Mum says, wiping at her cheek.

“We love you,” her Dad adds.

Hermione tells them both that she loves them and reminds them that she will write soon enough.

She finds her way onto the train and searches for Harry and Ron.

At the other end of the platform, Draco Malfoy is saying goodbye to his own parents. They had floo’d in directly from the manor and a house elf had already placed his trunk, along with his new racing broom, on the train.

Draco’s stomach hurts, as it usually does when his father gives him a lecture about living up to the Malfoy name.

He had spent most of his summer stuck inside, taking extra lessons with tutors from around the world. 

When their first year grades had been mailed home early on in the summer, Draco had been rather chuffed with himself. He’d managed near perfect marks. His mother had arranged for his favourite dinner to be served that night and they had waited together to share the good news with his father.

Instead, his father returned home with his own news. A muggle born girl had earned the best marks in Draco’s class. Not him. 

Hermione Granger.

Lord Malfoy was more than disappointed. He was disgusted.

After reminding Draco of the standards he was expected to meet Lucius had spent the rest of the summer ignoring his son.

Now, they stand on the platform, flawless to any onlookers. The picture of pureblood excellence.

“Just write if you’ve forgotten anything.” Lady Malfoy cups Draco’s chin gently, calming him with her loving eyes.

“Don’t coddle the boy, Narcissa,” Lucius snaps.

Lady Malfoy drops her hand and Draco instantly misses it. He glances down the platform and spots Hermione Granger hugging both of her muggle parents.

Remembering what she had cost him, Draco sneers and turns away.

“I will be watching, son. Do not disappoint me again,” Lord Malfoy instructs, his hand tightening on the head of his walking stick.

“I won’t, Father,” Draco vows, solemnly.

They don’t hug. Neither parent tells their son that they will miss him, though Lady Malfoy certainly will.

Draco walks away with his chin held high and his shoulders squared. He knows what is expected of him. And he was raised to be a Malfoy. So a Malfoy he will be.

I really don’t think they should let the other sort in, do you? They’re just not the same, they’ve never been brought up to know our ways. Some of them have never even heard of Hogwarts until they get the letter, imagine. I think they should keep it in the old wizarding families.

No one asked your opinion, you filthy little Mudblood.

Want one, Granger? I’ve got loads. But don’t touch my hand, now. I’ve just washed it, you see, don’t want a Mudblood sliming it up.

So, Granger, I’ll have five from you for being rude about our headmistress… Oh yeah, I forgot, you’re a Mudblood, Granger, so ten for that…

If you’re wondering what the smell is, Mother, a Mudblood just walked in.

Sixth Year, 1996

Hermione Granger has a good head on her shoulders. She is too bright to allow Draco Malfoy to upset her so much.

“If you’re wondering what the smell is, Mother, a Mudblood just walked in,” Malfoy had said.

It was no worse than anything else he’d said about her.

Except that she isn’t the same person she was last year. She had spent the summer staring for hours at the puckered pink scar left behind by Dolohov’s curse.

The remnants of a near death experience with Draco’s father.

So his words were coupled with physical pain now. She couldn’t separate her childhood bully from the wizards and witches who wanted her, and everyone like her, dead.

It has been a week since they all returned to Hogwarts and the fear following Umbridge’s stint as headmistress seems to have slipped out of everyone’s minds.

Sure, Harry already has his theories about Malfoy taking the dark mark, but even he is acting like everything else is perfectly normal. 

Hermione isn’t going to just stand idle as their enemies amass against them. Dumbledore’s Army had been about more than rebelling against Umbridge. It had been about making sure they were ready when the fight arrived. The battle at the Ministry had reminded her that they are all still children. No matter how much they all play at being grown up.

She slips away from her friends every evening, reading up on the first war as much as she can. Parsing out which accounts are based in fact and which lean more towards fantasy.

Those that make it out like there was only the light and the dark. But you can’t draw sharp lines down the middle of a war. Not without ignoring the realities that each person involved lives in.

All of the books, articles, and court transcripts are tainted by the victors of the day.

For the first time in her life, Hermione realises that she can’t find a solution between the pages of a book.

So she goes looking elsewhere.

Draco has been on edge all summer. And Potter thinks he knows something he doesn’t. It would almost be a relief to be marked. At least then he wouldn’t feel so much like a failure. 

Returning to Hogwarts used to be a relief. He could shed the constant fear of finding his father in a bad mood.

Now, it is like visiting a graveyard with his headstone already etched.

He finds the vanishing cabinet easily enough, muddles his way through the first week of classes. Thinks of the necklace his mother had given to him, currently sitting in the bottom of his trunk.

Professor Slughorn, apparently not a fan of the Malfoy name, is busy lecturing about some love potion.

Draco tunes it out, not interested in hearing what Granger already knows from her summer reading.

He’s given up on trying to outperform Granger. He has a task far more important than getting house points and Outstandings. A task that is his alone. 

When Potter waltzes in, late, with Weasley on his tail, Draco barely looks up from his textbook, wishing he could just leave and work on the cabinet.

School feels rather pointless now that he is meant to kill the Headmaster.

“Snape would never have us brewing something so dangerous on the first day,” Pansy says, collecting ingredients for the both of them. She’s become increasingly clingy ever since she heard that he was given a special task by their Dark Lord. Like proximity will make her anything more than the spoiled daughter of a Death Eater low on the totem pole.

Still, she’ll probably have no problem doing Draco’s homework for him, so he just nods.

By the end of the lesson, he’s frustrated and sweaty. 

His potion looks like little more than a cure for intelligence as his godfather would say. 

And somehow Potter’s is “perfect!”

Draco hangs back, thinking of nicking some lesser poison from the closet. Perhaps spiking a bottle of mead.

Unfortunately, Granger remains behind as well.

Professor Slughorn disappears into his office, apparently oblivious to his students.

More unfortunately, and almost enough for Draco to bang his head on his desk, Granger approaches him, toting her textbooks and pushing her frizzy hair behind her ear, only for it to pop right back into place. Untamed mess.

“Malfoy,” she greets, offering what he is sure she intended to be a smile. It resembles a grimace instead.

“Going to take points for loitering, Granger?” He asks, remembering how he’d taken points from her during his time on the Inquisitorial Squad. How good it had felt knowing that there was nothing she could do about it. 

“Is he building an army?” She asks.

The question hangs between them, her too nervous to add to it, and him too confused to understand it.

“Do you know where he is? What is he planning?”

Draco understands now.

Granger has lost it. Cracked up. 

Why else would she risk asking a suspected Death Eater things about someone he has allegedly pledged loyalty to?

“I don’t have to tell you anything. Now, if you’ll get out of my way, I have another class to get to.” He stands up and collects his bag, plans of nicking poison completely forgotten.

She doesn’t move.

He glares and notices that there seem to be a thousand thoughts running through her mind. Her eyes are so open. Foolish.

Draco nearly rolls his eyes at the absurdity of her still being such an oblivious know-it-all even after five years. How someone could be so smart and so stupid was baffling.

If he wanted to read her every thought she would be powerless against him.

But then her hand is on his wrist.

He can’t pull it away before she has his sleeve pushed up, revealing unmarred skin.

“Not what you were expecting?” He bites out, wrenching his wrist from her grip.

He shoves his sleeve back down and shoulders past her, over this experiment in lunacy.

“Exactly what I was expecting actually,” Granger says as he walks away.

He doesn’t turn back or bark out some insult. 

Draco just flees from the girl who is meddling in things that ought not be meddled in.

She corners him again. This time as he emerges from the Room of Requirement, having failed to do little more than open and close the cabinet door.

This time, she doesn’t hit him with a barrage of questions or check his arm to make sure he hadn’t popped out for an evening of being marked by the Dark Lord.

“Legilimens,” she shocks him, pushing straight into his mind with a viciousness he had only experienced once before. The first time he had met the Dark Lord.

He shuts her out in less than a second but the damage is done.

Hermione Granger has seen the task the Dark Lord has given him.

Draco wants to be outraged, recalcitrant. 

He hadn’t expected such a goody two shoes to use such an invasive bit of magic.

“You can’t do it,” Granger says, dragging him back into the Room of Requirement with her wand to his throat.

“Get the fuck off of me, Mudblood,” he spits out, finally feeling the rage he should have felt from the moment she opened her mouth and invaded his mind.

“You don’t have to do it,” she changes her tune, her eyes brightening.

Already coming up with a plan to get them both killed, he is sure.

He thinks back to every time he sat and smiled at the grades he had earned. Each year thinking there was no way she could have gotten better marks than he had. And every year paying the price for being wrong.

He finally manages to pull his wand from his robes and presses it to her neck, making her back off a few inches.

“You have no idea what you’re talking about, Granger. Piss off and save someone else,” he bites out.

She narrows her eyes and lowers her wand.

He fixes his robes and mirrors her, too exhausted to pretend he’s got a hex powerful enough to hurt her right now.

“I’ll help you get out. Please, Malfoy. Don’t do anything rash,” she implores.

Fucking Saint Granger is really going to give Saint Potter a run for his galleons. 

So smart. 

“If you say a word to anyone,” he starts, thinking of the worst curses his father had ever shown him.

“You’ll kill me?” She asks, having the audacity to smirk. “I won’t say a word. And when you change your mind, I’ll still help you.”

She turns on the spot and leaves, much like he had the week before.

Draco slumps against an old rickety desk covered in old parchment and broken quills and curses.

Who does she think she is?

Don’t do anything rash. What a cunt.

Draco approaches her after Halloween. Having spent the last three weeks thinking about what he’d done to Katie Bell. His stomach was eating away at itself. 

“I did it,” he blurts, cornering Hermione in the potions store after Advanced Potions, setting half a dozen silencing charms and security wards in place.

“Let me out, Malfoy,” Hermione demands, her eyes steely.

Her hand is already reaching for her wand, and Draco knows she feels differently about what she’d said to him a few weeks prior.

Why should she still help him when he is clearly a lost cause?

“Please,” he hisses. It physically pains him, but he’s made his choice. He isn’t a murderer.

She should curse him, leave him lying against the rows of ingredients to await a professor or student finding him.

But he knows that she can see the desperation in his eyes that convinces her to allow him a chance to explain.

“Speak.”

“I gave the necklace to Katie Bell,” he confesses, his voice low and ashamed.

Hermione doesn’t move, doesn’t breathe.

So he continues. “I didn’t intend for her to get hurt. It was in a box. And wrapped in paper. I swear it, Granger,” he rushes his words.

“Why?” Hermione asks the most obvious of questions.

The light at the end of his wand is barely enough to see the anger in her eyes.

“You know why,” he whispers.

It was meant for Dumbledore. Had Katie not dropped the parcel. Had the necklace not slipped from its box. It would have reached him.

“Not why did you nearly kill Katie Bell. Why are you here right now?”

Draco swallows. He hadn’t anticipated her listening.

“Because I’ve changed my mind.”

Hermione blinks in the darkness of the potions store. She knows that Voldemort ordered him to kill Professor Dumbledore. She knows that it is his way of joining the fold. Bringing honour to his family. Proving himself.

She breathes out at his words, insisting he’s changed his mind, because she can’t hold it in any longer.

“Granger. I can’t do it. I will fail, and he will kill me for it.”

Hermione wants to ask him what she is supposed to do about it. Wants to point out that he had gone and done exactly what she had told him not to.

And Katie. It was awful. What he’d done. 

But she can’t ignore the part of herself that is terrified for the boy in front of her. 

Because really, that is all he is. Just a boy. A child, like the rest of them.

He isn’t a Death Eater yet. 

“I’ll still help you,” she says, reminding herself more than him of what she had promised him a few weeks ago. It feels like it has been a lifetime since then.

Both of their fates are different now. Intertwined in a way that could mean death or survival for both of them.

Draco can’t help but suddenly be grateful for the fact that Hermione Granger has always outdone him. She is better than Draco at everything. He is finally ready to concede that fact.

Better at school, magic, forgiveness. Better at making friends and making good decisions. 

And better at surviving. 

When he was twelve years old, there was nothing he was more afraid of than disappointing his father. And so hating her came easy.

She was the reason that Draco failed his father again and again. 

Now, it is because of her that he is willing to fail his father once more. Willing to throw away his legacy, his inheritance, his family. 

He is done trying to best Hermione Granger.

Now, he is going to let her save him, even if he doesn’t deserve it.

Harry Potter is so busy being the star pupil of one Horace Slughorn to notice that things are different between Granger and Draco.

Potter doesn’t even realise when Granger stays behind, waiting for the classroom to empty.

Each table cleans up and vacates even if their potions aren’t finished, putting them under stasis charms. Forgetting they exist until the next class rolls around and they are stuck with some spoiled brew.

Draco watches as Hermione finishes, bottles, and stores her Dreamless Sleep. He doesn’t miss the single bottle she slips into her own bag. 

Now that she was helping him figure out how to survive the year, Draco paid a lot more attention to her.

No longer viewing each of her actions through a distorted lens. She’s efficient, practical, and hardworking. It’s only mildly infuriating.

Draco cleans his own station and then waits for Parvati and Edgecomb to leave.

Granger is taking notes now, probably recording how much she had made, what she was unsure about. Taking care even with a simple potion. Her hair has deflated a bit and she looks calmer than she had at the start of the lesson.

“Are you finished with the moonwart?” Draco interrupts her serenity.

Granger looks up and noticeably tries not to step back when she notices how close Draco is, just standing at the corner of her work station.

“What?” She asks, eyes darting around the empty classroom and then softening.

“The moonwart. Are you done with it?” he repeats, pointing at the small jar sitting between them on the tabletop. 

“Yes.”

Draco reaches for it, but so does she, their hands bumping into each other.

She pulls back like a snake has bitten her.

Draco’s hand pauses in the air before reaching forward and grabbing the jar.

“I’ll see you later,” he murmurs, turning away from her and heading for the potions store.

The moonwart had been the only ingredient left out on her station. It would have only taken a moment for her to put it away.

Draco couldn’t really explain why he had done what he had.

When he emerges, he is relieved to find her gone.

It didn’t take long for her to figure out how to help Malfoy.

He was in the perfect position to act as a spy for the Order. Malfoy told her everything he knew, and Hermione used that information to figure out a lot of other things.

Like the fact that Snape was a spy for Dumbledore more than the Order.

And that Dumbledore wasn’t going to help Malfoy. 

Hermione had gone to him only once, asking what might happen if she could convince Malfoy to change sides.

Not showing her cards.

The old wizard had made it clear that even Draco Malfoy had his part to play.

After watching Dumbledore manipulate Harry for years, Hermione decided he hadn’t done anything to deserve her trust.

So she didn’t care if he had to die for Draco to be truly embedded with the Death Eaters.

When Hermione had told Malfoy that he would still have to make it seem like he was trying, he’d been angry.

But he listened. And eventually, came around to see her view of things.

She helped him with the cabinet, pacing it so that they would have months before he would be faced with letting Voldemort’s followers into Hogwarts.

The cabinet was easy once the two of them were able to talk through the hurdles, which left them with time.

Time that Granger didn’t let go to waste.

They met in the Room of Requirement just as frequently.

“Just think of a happy memory,” Draco imitates Hermione. “Like it’s that fucking simple.”

He’s frustrated because he can’t quite manage a corporeal Patronus.

She’d been trying to teach him for weeks.

She figures that after Dumbledore is dead, Draco will be forced to flee. He’ll return to his family estate and swear fealty to Voldemort. Barring anything going horribly wrong, he’d be in the perfect position to pass along information.

Being able to communicate with one another through their patronuses would be invaluable.

If he can manage to do it.

“It is that fucking simple,” she huffs.

Draco laughs at her unusual use of an expletive.

It is just as strange now as it was the first time it happened. She’d made some off colour comment about Ronald after seeing him curled so tight around Lavender he resembled an anaconda.

“Maybe you need to try a different memory. What are you using anyway?”

“Watching the World Cup with my father.”

Hermione bites her tongue, but her face must say what she is thinking because he nods.

“Fine. Maybe you are right. I don’t have a whole lot of other options, Granger.”

She thinks of her own memory, when Harry and Ron had saved her from the troll in the dungeon. “Saved” being a fairly loose word for what the three of them had managed.

“It isn’t just happiness. What I mean to say, is that the memory has to be strong. Something that makes you feel good even now.”

Malfoy rolls his eyes but raises his wand.

She watches as he concentrates and this time, the blue hue is stronger as he casts the spell.

“I’ll never get it,” he shakes his head.

“Try again. With that same memory,” she insists. When he fixes her with an annoyed stare she repeats herself. “Try again.”

The side eye that he gives her nearly makes her throw a stinging jinx his way, but she resists.

He’s become tolerable and she doesn’t want to do anything to strain things between them.

He raises his arm.

“Expecto Patronum,” he says, concentrating.

His magic is strong enough that a blue light fills the space, a huge animal taking shape.

Hermione stands up straight from where she had been leaning and watches as a massive bear lumbers through the air.

Draco lowers his wand and the bear fades away, lowering onto its two front paws before disappearing.

“It’s not exactly inconspicuous,” Hermione says, surprised.

She’d been expecting a snake. Or a bird maybe. A ferret even.

But a bear? 

“Not exactly,” Draco boasts, a mile wide smile on his face.

He casts it again, and Hermione casts hers, watching as the otter and bear twist together.

“What memory did you use?” Hermione can’t help herself.

“My mother and I in the garden on my eighth birthday. My father didn’t make it home for dinner, and I was upset, to say the least. She brought me outside and we laid on the ground and she pointed out all of the constellations of our family. It wasn’t particularly dignified, laying out in the garden. But Maman did it to cheer me up. It was my favourite birthday.”

“That sounds lovely, Draco,” Hermione murmurs.

Hermione isn’t sure what will happen over the next few months, but she does know that Draco Malfoy asking her for help could very well change the outcome of the war.

She just hopes that change is for the better.

After the war

The trials were a farce. A lot like the trials of the first war. Skewed to favour those who repented. Arranged to point fingers at those deemed dangerous or worse than all the rest.

Hermione sat through every single one, making her objections clear.

They wanted the trials done quickly. 

Which made them a mess.

The saving grace was that most of the Death Eaters were killed at the Battle of Hogwarts. 

Bellatrix, who would be missed by no one.

Greyback, who burned to death, screaming in anguish.

Severus Snape, whose name would be etched in the same stone as the victims.

Lucius Malfoy, who stepped in front of his wife when the Dark Lord realised she had lied to him.

Harry testified more than once.

For Pansy Parkison, simply to make clear that he didn’t care she’d wanted to turn him over to Voldemort. She’d just wanted to survive.

For Narcissa Malfoy, who saved his life, and was pardoned for her many crimes.

And against Draco Malfoy, believing him to be the reason Dumbledore died. 

Hermione was forced to listen as her best friend condemned Draco Malfoy for all of the horrible acts he had committed during the war.

The Astronomy tower. The Manor. The Room of Requirement. Dumbledore, Hermione, the Diadem.

By the time Harry stepped down, the room was certain of Draco Malfoy’s fate.

He would be sentenced to Azkaban, probably facing the Dementor’s kiss. Afterall, he was clearly guilty.

“Is there any other witch or wizard who wishes to speak in the name of justice?” Kingsley Shacklebolt asked the gathered room, more a formality than a real invitation.

She stood up.

Was lauded for her bravery. Praised for her willingness to face a man who would have seen her dead.

But then she started speaking, and the room fell into pandemonium.

She was questioned, opposed, and doubted by everyone. Forced to supply evidence, memories, and proof.

Hermione’s testimony saved Draco Malfoy.

They were forced to listen to her as she revealed the truth.

Draco Malfoy was a spy for the light. 

He had alerted Severus Snape to the arrival of Death Eaters and lowered his wand atop that tower.

Spent months passing along information on planned attacks to the Order, using Hermione as an intermediary.

Went to his aunt’s vault and destroyed one of Voldemort’s Horcruxes at Hermione’s behest.

Alerted Dobby as to Harry Potter, Ronald Weasley, and Hermione Granger’s capture by snatchers.

Stalled for time, risking his own family’s safety, refusing to identify Harry Potter.

Draco killed Fenrir Greyback and saved Lavender Brown’s life at the Battle of Hogwarts.

Stopped a wall from collapsing on top of Fred Weasley.

Cast the fiendfyre that destroyed the diadem.

Watched as his father was murdered.

And stood on the side of the light.

When Hermione was done recounting everything Draco had done, she turned to the gallery.

“Draco Malfoy risked everything to do the right thing. And because I am still holding on to a sliver of faith in wizardkind , I ask that you do the right thing now.”

Interim Minister for Magic Kingsley Shacklebolt took a vote. Even given everything she had just told them, several hands went up in favour of condemning him.

Far more voted to free him.

Draco Malfoy was cleared of all wrongdoing, and released that same afternoon. He emerged from the Ministry with his head held high and his mother’s hand in his own. 

Hermione wasn’t there to watch as he took his first breath of truly free air. Unburdened after so many years.

She was still watching the trials, making sure that the living weren’t used as scapegoats simply because they survived.

Draco wanted to see her.

Thought of sending his Patronus a dozen times. Now that they weren’t sending short coded messages anymore, he wasn’t sure it was the right way to reach out. He wrote out feeble words onto parchment that later went into the fireplace of his study.

When a letter arrived from Hogwarts, he was stupid enough to think it was from her.

Instead it was an invitation to return to the school and complete his education. 

The school year would begin October 1.

He had seen the articles detailing the school’s reconstruction.

There had been a photograph in the Prophet showing Granger at the site, her wand raised as she knitted a wall back together.

Draco was fairly certain she would be finishing her education.

So he wrote back to Headmistress McGonagall, accepting the invitation.

He has a lot to say to the Golden Girl.

Eighth Year

The castle was different. Not just the turrets and tunnels that had been reknit into the architecture by a magic stronger than Hermione had seen before. Rather, it was the cautious quiet that hung over every hallway and classroom. The subtle calming effect of the new portraits and the old stone guards.

Defenders of Hogwarts.

She’d never really paid them much attention. After reading about them in Hogwarts: A History first year, she had dismissed them.

Surely in her seven years at the magical school there would be no reason for them to defend the school. Hah.

The returning students were different too.

Less than she’d hoped. Quieter and less enthused by the prospect of a magical castle.

Though she could understand. Beauxbatons and Durmstrang offered positions to any student who did not want to return to Hogwarts.

Most of the students in her year had decided not to bother with their last year of education.

Harry and Ron had both decided to train with the Aurors.

Dean and Seamus decided to open a shop in Diagon Alley, selling magically imbued clothing. Rain resistant jumpers and anxiety calming socks. Blankets that kept out bad dreams.

Hermione had been their first customer, stocking up on everything they had that would help her live without her friends in the one place she had thought would always keep her safe.

Classes don’t start until a week after everyone has arrived.

They spend each day acclimating to the changes. Noise dampening charms in the Great Hall, stairs that had remained stationary since the reconstruction. They walked the new students through the castle, showing them around in a way Hermione couldn’t have done until her third year probably.

The classrooms are brighter, the house common rooms stuffed full of things to help teenagers cope with everything they had lived through.

Hermione spends most of the week lying in her bed, crying.

All of the survival tactics that she had relied upon for months slipping away and leaving her emotions wrecked and raw.

It feels good by the end, like she has purged the fear from her soul.

The night before classes start she takes hours in the Prefect’s bath just floating, ignoring knocks and attempts by other students to get in.

And the next day, she walks to the dungeons with a gentle cadence, her bag only carrying what she needs for the day. Though there is a spare bottle of dittany tucked into a side pocket.

Professor Slughorn is kind when he sees her, and only asks one too many personal questions before pointing her towards a list posted on the wall.

“You’ll all have a partner this year, to make up for teaching both years in the same class.”

Hermione hopes she is partnered with Ginny or Parvati.

Her eyes scan over the list.

Granger & Malfoy

Hermione turns to ask Professor Slughorn why he’d paired them, but the man is already talking to another student.

So she puts her bag down and gathers the cauldron and ingredients she’ll need for the day's assignment.

She hadn’t heard from him all summer.

By the time she returns to her station, Malfoy is standing in front of the list.

Hermione waits for him to realise. To find their names and turn back to Slughorn just as she had.

Except that isn’t what he does. 

Draco reads the parchment slowly, and then walks over to their station.

He sets his bag down and offers an awkward sort of nod in greeting.

Hermione doesn’t say anything, just starts laying out the ingredients into two fair piles. Hermione even takes the rat tails, even though they are her least favourite ingredient to work with.

“The tails go in with the lacewing flies,” he says drolly.

“Yes,” she agrees, having memorised the brewing process in third year.

“You’ve left both on your station. It will slow us down,” he points out.

Hermione glances down at the ingredients, agreeing with him, but not wanting to say as much. She was only trying to make things fair. 

“I’ll do the rat tails,” he says, reaching over and grabbing the pouch she was dreading opening.

What is he doing? Does he know she hates cutting up the tails?

She nods along and sets to work on her pile, waiting for him to criticise her in some way.

Glancing over, she is impressed by the speed with which he chops the tails into tiny pieces, all equal in size.

She wonders if he’d ever tried muggle cooking. Probably not, Hermione.

The cauldron is already lit, so it doesn’t take long before it comes to the stirring portion of the exercise.

“Would you,” he passes the instrument to her.

Nodding, Hermione accepts that she’ll likely be responsible for the rest of the potion. He’s done enough to show he tried to work with her.

“Do you think we’ll need more than ten vials?”

She is surprised by his question, but covers it by looking into the cauldron.

“I shouldn’t think so,” she shakes her head.

“Careful,” Draco says, his hand coming up to gently push back a curl that had fallen from behind her ear.

Hermione practically jumps backwards, confused.

“Sorry,” Draco says, giving her space. “I’ll grab the vials.”

She just bobs her head and swallows the lump in her throat.

What is going on?

When he returns with the vials, Hermione ignores him, continuing with the stirring instructions.

He cleans up both of their preparation stations and then stands beside her until she is finished.

“It should be cool enough to bottle in half an hour,” she says without looking at him.

“I can stay,” he offers.

He’s gone mad. It’s the only explanation.

She had assumed that now that the war was over he would never bother with her again. They’d been partners in the war only so far as to reach their desired outcome.

He’d been polite, but never overly so.

And honestly, she had assumed that he hadn’t changed his views on her blood.

Perhaps she was wrong.

Over the next few weeks they only speak in class. Rarely about anything other than whatever potion they are working on. He continues to be considerate and focused, working equally as hard as her at each task.

Hermione finds it refreshing.

Though, she wished that they would talk about the war. Everything that each of them had been forced to do. What she had said at his trial. Maybe it is better that they haven’t.

Hermione can live in the delusion that he thinks of her as anything more than a nosy know-it-all muggleborn.

By November, she is grateful that Professor Slughorn partnered them together. She learns a lot from watching Draco.

She doesn’t watch his face, though she has noticed that his chin and nose have softened since last year. No, she watches his hands. The way his fingers hold the knife so expertly and the silver ring on his other hand, acting almost as a guard from the sharp blade. For how else could he have the confidence to slice everything with such speed?

Every motion is deliberate and fast.

When she had seen him at the trial, he had looked haggard and pale.

In the soft light of the candles he could be cut from marble.

The statue of David, come to life.

He keeps his sleeves rolled up, out of the way, and she admires the muscled lines of his forearms. 

When he catches her staring, he stills and she pulls her eyes from his hands to meet his stare.

“Sorry,” she mumbles, so softly he may not have heard it.

He sets down his knife and turns so they are facing one another head on. He doesn’t say anything for a long moment. Just stares into her eyes.

“Granger, I think I hated you because you were everything I could never be,” he matches her tone, but each word is sharp and crystal clear. 

She opens her mouth, but he keeps talking before she can say a word.

“I should have told you how grateful I am to you months ago. Last year, even. You saved me. Gave me a future. Made sure that I could live with myself when it was all over. But I couldn’t find the words. I despised you for your brilliance and judged you for your kindness. I saw you as inferior because it was the only reason I could come up with to hate you. So I am the one who is sorry. And I'm grateful.” The words rush out of him.

It isn’t exactly a thank you. And it barely qualifies as an apology.

But Hermione has been so wrong about how Draco feels that she just offers him a useless shrug, parsing through his words.

“Hand me the mortar and pestle?” She asks.

He turns back towards the table and does as she asks, before resuming his chopping.

They stand side by side, her grinding bicorn powder and him chopping rat tails.

She still watches his hands.

Another week passes and Hermione can firmly say that she and Draco Malfoy are friends. 

They still don’t talk outside of the potions classroom, but they do start to talk about things other than potions. Her friends, his friends, their other classes. Things they hope to do after graduation.

More and more frequently, they end up being the last two people in the classroom, bottling their expert brews or taking on extra assignments. Professor Slughorn usually leaves them be, retreating to his office for a nice brandy.

It isn’t until mid-November that things change once more.

They are nearly done brewing an exquisite double batch of Veritaserum when Draco angles his body, his normally perfect posture skewed by the slant of his shoulders, blocking Hermione from the rest of the room’s view.

“What are you doing?” She asks, suddenly nervous.

He smirks, the left corner of his mouth tilting upwards. 

“Something idiotic,” he replies before leaning closer.

Hermione doesn’t step back, though she has enough time between when she registers the idiotic thing that he is doing that she could have.

Instead, she lets him kiss her, and even kisses him back.

He’s so tall she has to tilt her head back, but his lips are soft, and sweet, and gentler than she’d have thought possible.

When he pulls back, his eyes are on her lips and he swipes his tongue over his bottom lip.

“Was that alright?” He asks.

Hermione wants to nod. To pull his face back down to hers and kiss him again. 

But the logical part of her brain comes up with a half dozen other questions that go much deeper than was that alright?

Why did he do that?

Did he have romantic feelings for her?

Why would he possibly have feelings for her?

When did he develop feelings for her?

Does she have feelings for him?

Was it alright for him?

Because it was certainly alright for Hermione. She hadn’t exactly recognized her feelings for Draco moving from mild distaste to passive interest to… she really isn’t sure what. But sure enough, she can tell that she feels a lot more than alright about him.

“I’m sorry,” he says, stepping back, taking her silence for displeasure.

“No!” she half-shouts, making the moment all the more awkward. “It was fine. Better than fine.”

“Yeah?” He asks, and the shyness in his eyes makes Hermione decide to do something equally idiotic. Something that she should definitely wait to do until she has answers to any one of her valid questions.

She reaches a gentle hand up and pulls at the front of his robes, pulling him back towards her.

This time, she focuses on the way she feels as his lips press against her own.

Her heart is hammering and her head is fuzzy, but there is a warmth blossoming in her stomach that is a familiar pleasure.

Something she hadn’t felt since before the war.

Draco’s hands encircle her waist and they both break apart, their breath intermingling.

She loosens her grip on his robes, flattening her palm against his chest.

Looking up at him, Hermione wishes she could hear what he is thinking.

A year ago, she would have told someone they were crazy for thinking that she could have feelings for Draco Malfoy other than loathing.

She’s certain he would say the same.

So what changed?
It’s almost laughable. That question.

So much has changed. They both lost parts of their families. Saw their friends and professors die. Survived a war. Even the school they are standing in is not the same one they spent their childhoods in.

Yet, she hasn’t changed. She is still a muggle born witch. A know-it-all with a need to be right. Golden Girl.

And Draco is still a Malfoy. The pureblood prince of Slytherin. An elitist prat with daddy issues. Spawn of a Death Eater.

On paper, they are like oil and water. People would always look at them and see reasons why they don’t match. Why they shouldn’t be together.

But here, in this moment, Hermione can’t help but feel like they are more similar than the world would like to admit.

Of course, nothing is ever really that simple.

After that day, whenever both of them aren’t busy with school or their respective friends, they slip away to far off corners of the castle, wrapped up in one another and ignoring the rest of the world.

After a few weeks, Hermione thinks she has answers to some of her questions.

She pieces them together from the things Draco whispers in her ear when they are alone.

It is clear that Draco enjoys the physical moments they share tucked into an alcove or pressed up against the stacks of the library. 

They move together like fire and Hermione knows that you can’t fake that sort of connection.

He’d kissed her because he’d wanted to. She’d figured that out when he’d failed to go more than five seconds whenever they were alone together before he was capturing her lips with his own.

He tells her how gorgeous she is, how intelligent, and talented. She accepts all of it as reason enough for his feelings. She believes him.

Of course, other questions make themselves known, needling her at all hours of the day.

It’s past curfew, and they have found themselves on the third floor, in a corridor that had once housed a cerberus.

Draco’s hand is up her blouse and her arms are around his neck, his lips sucking at the tender spot just below her ear.

“Fucking flawless,” he growls out, his other hand palming her arse and pulling her closer.

She tilts her head back and sighs.

A noise from down the hall startles them both and Draco’s hands move to her waist, pushing them farther into the corridor. Farther out of sight.

Hermione catches her breath, not saying a word as footsteps draw closer and two voices, prefects, get louder.

As they fade down the hall, Hermione wonders how horrible it would have been had they been found out.

Sure, she would have a lot of explaining to do with Harry and Ron when they heard, probably some of her housemates. Molly Weasley might have a few choice words.

But then they’d get over it. Maybe even get used to the idea. Or realise that her life choices are none of their business.

“I think they’re gone,” Draco whispers, his thumbs no longer still against the skin of her back.

Why was Draco reluctant for people to know? Was he worried what his friends would think? It plagued her more and more the longer they kept their relationship quiet. A secret.

Draco moves his right hand higher, up her waist, but she pushes it away gently.

“It’s late,” she whispers back. 

His hands disappear and she brushes past him, walking down the corridor and wishing she’d said something different.

Hermione knows that Draco has feelings for her, but she doesn’t know how strong they are.

Maybe he doesn’t feel the same way she does.

By the time she gets back to her room she has convinced herself that none of it is real. That his words of remorse were a lie. That he is using her.

Perhaps she was simply letting herself be fooled by his romantic words and sensual touch.

She crawls into her bed exhausted, the thrill of their late night rendezvous gone. Replaced by the niggling feeling that Draco Malfoy still sees her as the rest of the world does.

Bookish and not beautiful.

Brave but not desirable.

Logical, not lovable.

As she falls asleep, she thinks about how unfair it is that he has made her feel like his dirty little secret.

She dreams of his drawing room floor and the taunts he had hurled at her before the war.

The next day in class, he makes her laugh as he refuses to listen to her about crushing the Sopophorous bean rather than cutting it. His bean rocketing across the room and cracking a jar of pickled eggs. 

And she forgets about her late night anxieties. The pit in her stomach gone with the soft look in Draco’s eyes.

He continues to drag her away to secret places that are just theirs. Continues to whisper sweet nothings in her ear as his hands bring her pleasure like she has never experienced before. 

But eventually, she asks herself why she can’t have more. And then she asks Draco the same thing.

“How much longer are we going to hide this?” She asks, buttoning her blouse after a particularly heated moment in the library.

“What? What do you mean?” Draco asks, but his jaw is tight. He knows exactly what she means.

“You and I. Us. This,” she gestures between them.

“Granger,” he starts. “I don’t want to discuss this right now.” The shrug he offers pisses her off.

She glares as he tightens his tie and weighs her options.
If she drops it, they’ll kiss goodbye and wait for another window to open in their schedules.

And if she pushes, she doesn’t know what could happen.

All she knows is that she is done with accepting empty classrooms and cramped closets as romance.

“Well I do,” she lies, crossing her arms over her chest.

Draco grits his teeth and runs a hand through his hair.

He knew that he couldn’t have her like this forever. That eventually reality would come for both of them. He had only hoped that she would let herself share his delusions.

“There is no us,” he states tersely. He stands up. She stays seated on the window bench.

Draco looks past her out the window at the water of the great black lake.

“I’m going to need more than four words, Malfoy,” she bites back.

An ache settles in his stomach but he knows what he has to say. 

“Did you honestly think that I would court you? That a Malfoy would ever-,” he cuts himself off, forcing his lips into a sneer. Because he cannot force himself to speak such horrid words. Not to her. Not to the witch who brought him back to life. 

“Go on, say it. If this is what you want, you have to say it.”

Draco wishes there were a painless way to do this.

He can’t say what he wants to. He would tell her that he loves her. And it is way too soon for that. 

Draco can’t explain that he needs Hermione like he needs his magic. That she has become so tethered to him she is in his veins.

He knows her well enough to know that if he were honest she’d let him keep loving her up close. Let him hurt her with every mistake.

“I have to go,” he cops out, reaching for his school bag.

“No, you don’t. You are choosing to go. Choosing to leave me.” Her voice warbles. 

“Granger,” he says to allow himself a beat. Some distance. “All I want is for you to be happy. I’d deluded myself into thinking that I could be that for you.” Fuck, that’s too close to the truth. 

“You can! I am happy,” she argues, tears threatening to spill. 

“I think it has been so long that you don’t know what happiness is supposed to feel like anymore. Happiness isn’t the absence of misery, Granger.”

“You aren’t making sense. Why are you doing this?”

Because he doesn’t deserve her.

“You’ll agree with me. Not now,” he assures her. “But soon enough. You’ll find someone who actually brings happiness into your life and you’ll understand why I have to do this.”

“You can’t be serious. You are doing this for me? Fuck you,” she stands up and shoves him in the chest, angry.

He doesn’t even move. He just lets her push him again. He can take it. He wants her to be happy. This is the way.

“You are just going to stand there and make up bullshit excuses because you can’t be honest with me about how you feel? Tell me the truth, Draco, please?” Hermione chokes on the last word, her cheeks wet from her tears.

She’s right to be upset. Her eyes are puffy and red and her breathing is all out of sorts. Her hair is wild and her stance defensive. She looks ready to curse him. It hurts him to look at her. 

He knows that he is doing the right thing.

He just also knows that he will hate himself for it forever. 

“Fine! You want the truth? You really want to know why I don’t want to tell anyone that we-” he runs out of steam. “I could never be with a muggleborn. There are traditions that-.”

Hermione cuts him off this time. “I changed my mind. I don’t want to hear what a coward you are.”

She pulls at the front of her shirt, setting it straight, and grabs her own bag before fixing him with a glare that is undercut by the tears still running down her face.

“I will never forgive you for this, Malfoy.”

Her words are threatening. But her eyes tell the truth. She’s in anguish. A part of her is crumbling away into the vast sea of bitterness that Draco’s own heart was lost to just hours earlier.

He watches her walk away and knows that he will never forgive himself for this either.

But at least she’ll have a chance to find someone good. Someone who isn’t beholden to the world in ways that will never match his love for her.

Hermione barely pays attention to where she is walking as she flees the library. Her heart is splintering. His face had been so cold as he had told her what he thought she wanted to hear. That he wanted her to be happy.

Of course that was before he was finally honest with her. Blood statuts still matters to him.

It isn’t such a surprise. Afterall, people don’t tend to change.

Still, she had thought that everything they had been through over the last year and a half had meant something. That she had succeeded in showing him a different way of thinking. 

Merlin, how could she be such an idiot?

She can’t remember anything she had said. Had she argued? Had she told him how she felt?

Hermione pauses, gripping at the stone wall beside her and running a hand through her hair, gripping it tight enough to hurt.

She was an idiot to think that he would ever want her as anything more than a body in the dark. A notch on his bedpost.

When had she become so naive as to think that a boy who had loathed her for years could find her desirable? How could she have misread things so horribly?

She catches her reflection in a pane of glass and laughs, more tears spilling over.

Perhaps he was right.

He wouldn’t be able to make her happy.

She deserves someone who will love her loudly. To hold her hand in a busy corridor and kiss her without hesitation. Someone who will treat her as an equal.

He’d just made it more than clear that that isn’t who he is.

Taking as deep a breath as she can manage, she continues down the hall, determined to forget all about the soft smiles of Draco Malfoy.

When they return from the holiday break, which Hermione had spent at the Burrow, she is not surprised to find Astoria Greengrass hanging off Draco’s arm.

Malfoy.

Malfoy had found a pureblood to hang off his arm.

Hermione was embarrassed to find herself curious about the girl.

A winsome witch with a blithe smile and gentle blonde curls falling over her petite shoulders. All things Hermione would never be.

Ginny had been a well of information.

Astoria was the youngest of the Greengrass sisters. The Greengrass sisters are like princesses of antiquity. Brought up to be the wives of impressive heirs and carry on bloodlines. She and her sister Daphne had spent the war attending Beauxbatons. Their family avoided taking sides by fleeing to France.

Which meant that although they would probably step over a muggle born before offering them any sort of aid, they had held onto their honour. In the eyes of the wizarding world they are the perfect representation of the old tradition. Proof that it isn’t all biassed and outdated.

Hermione had accepted that she would never be a part of the old tradition at a very young age. Back then, a part of her had wanted to be so connected to the world of magic. To have roots that she could trace back and a history that was connected to her own surname.

She had abandoned that hope early on, after Draco had called her a Mudblood the first time.

After that, all she wanted was to find her place in a world where she was already at a disadvantage.

“And I thought she had a thing for Lucian Bole, but obviously that’s over,” Ginny says, drawing out another game play for her Quidditch practice that afternoon.

Hermione nods, glancing at the pair of Slytherins.

She can’t help the ache in her chest as she notices that their hands sit interlaced on the table.

Astoria is taller than Hermione is, with thin wrists and dainty ankles. She has the sort of posture that makes other people sit up straighter and her cheekbones could cut glass.

Hermione hates knowing that she is jealous of this girl. 

Why should she be?

Hermione is brilliant, and a hero, and the bloody Golden Girl of the Golden Trio.

All titles she hates. But as she watches Draco smile, she holds onto the fact that all of those things make her someone in the wizarding world.

Pulling her gaze away from the happy couple, Hermione focuses on the letter in front of her. 

It is an offer to study with Kenneth Poulter in New York.

She had been thinking about what she wanted to do after graduation.

Ginny had asked her if she wanted to get a flat in London, assuming Hermione would accept the unconditional job offer Kingsley reminded her of at least once a week.

Harry had offered up a room at Grimmauld Place, more out of a desire not to be living alone with Ron for much longer.

Hermione wasn’t sure what she was going to do after graduation, but she was grateful for the many options she had. Especially the ones that allowed her to leave Draco Malfoy and British pureblood beliefs in her rear view.

Graduation arrives with far less excitement than any of the eighth years were expecting. All of them joked that without Harry Potter, Hogwarts was actually a rather dull school.

When Harry and Ron arrived for the ceremony, Ron had joked that something was sure to happen before the ceremony ended. Afterall, they had never had a quiet year at Hogwarts before the war. Why depart from tradition?

Hermione had laughed, but found herself grateful for the quiet mundanity that her exit from Hogwarts would be.

She posed for photos with people she had barely spoken to.

Waved to Mr. and Mrs. Weasley from the dais and pretended they were her own parents.

And she delivered the speech she had been writing since she had first read about Head Girl in Hogwarts: A History. She didn’t do it as Head Girl. Rather, it was as the spokesperson for the eighth year students. She hadn’t been surprised when she had been chosen but she had been shocked to find that her class had been unanimous.

There is a short dedication revealing the memorial for those professors and students that gave their lives during the war, and then the students and their families started the short walk to the boathouse.

It had been rebuilt following the war, but the small boats look just the same.

Even though Harry and Ron hadn’t technically finished their education, McGonagall had invited every student who wanted back for the graduation.

“I was four stone lighter when I was eleven,” Ron points out as everyone climbs into the small wooden boats. 

Hagrid is crying even as he oversees the launch, the sun setting across the water.

“They’re enchanted not to tip over, Ron,” Harry says, repeating what Hermione had told him earlier that day.

She notices him glance over at her, probably wondering why she hasn’t chimed in to tell Ron herself.

Honestly, she hadn’t been paying attention. Her focus is on the other side of the gathered crowd, where Malfoy is standing.

“Come on, let’s go say goodbye to Hagrid,” Harry says, tugging on Ron’s robes.

“We’ll see him next week,” Ron grumbles, but follows his friend anyway.

Hermione knew that Malfoy’s mother would be in attendance, but she wasn’t expecting the rest of the people standing in a small circle with him. She had planned on approaching him and congratulating him. Maybe apologising. That had felt doable when she had thought it would just be him and his mother.

She hadn’t expected Astoria Greengrass and her entire family to be at his side.

When she had spotted him in the crowd during her speech, he had smiled in that soft way of his. She had thought it was her sign to tell him everything she should have months earlier.

But Astoria and her family are there, so she stays on her side of the boathouse, letting the ache she had pushed away come flooding back.

“You should really make your way to a boat, dear,” Molly Weasley finds her, gently prodding her towards the boat Harry and Ron were climbing onto.

She nods and forces her feet to carry her to the boat, thinking of her parents and how much she wishes they could be here.

“Alright?” Harry asks, taking her hand and helping her steady herself.

She grins, eternally grateful for the troll that had nearly killed them seven years ago.

“I’m good,” she tells him, settling on the bench beside him and keeping hold of his hand.

And she is good. Tomorrow she has a portkey to America. She has a couple of weeks before her mastery starts, but she wanted to take the opportunity to do a bit of sightseeing before the work started.

She looks at the setting sun as their boat surges forward.

It is a silly tradition. Riding the boats back across the lake, just as they had before starting their first year. Before even being sorted. Forced into houses that dictated a lot about the next seven years of their lives.

Hermione leans into it though. Letting the nostalgia wash over her. She and her friends had lived through unspeakable horrors, but there had been joy in it too.

She lets the good wash over her as she watches the sun dip below the horizon.

Draco doesn’t know the people in his boat. Seventh year students he assumes. He had waited too long on the shore, speaking with Astoria and her family, to get into a boat with his friends.

He hadn’t wanted to partake in the childish tradition, but his mother had insisted.

Draco turns back and waves at the woman his mother had chosen for him, realising the true futility of this exercise. He’ll have to return to the boathouse in order to apparate with his mother and his future to the Manor for a celebratory dinner.

He turns away from the shore and finds himself searching for wild curls.

It doesn’t take long to spot her, sharing a boat with Potter and Weasley.

He stares, half hoping she will turn back and find him.

Perhaps their eyes would lock and he would find something there that said, follow me instead.

Draco’s future is behind him, but he spends the rest of the short boat ride with his gaze locked on dark curls. She never turns around.

New York is incredible. She wasn’t sure she would be able to keep up with a city so alive with magic, but she found that both the muggle and magical worlds were wide open to her. Being a much younger city, the wizarding streets of the city are incredibly integrated with the no-maj (she was learning) streets they parallel.

Her first week was spent exploring the muggle sights, her guide to the secret magical history of New York’s most popular landmarks tucked in her jacket.

She sent off at least a half dozen postcards on her first day, finding things she wished she could show Harry, Ron and the rest of the Weasleys. She’d sent a copy of the American Quibbler to Luna, pleased to find that it was shelved above The Daily Prophet and had an extensive section dedicated to wizards barely passing as muggles on the streets of New York.

The flat that she was staying in was connected to Columbia University’s Magical Studies Department.

It was on the 3rd and ⅓ floor of Carlton Hall. The other floors, housing muggle undergraduate students, were meant for over a hundred people.

There would only be a dozen on her floor. Each flat was spacious and designed based on an auralogical interview they’d been required to complete after committing to the magical department of the university.

Hermione loves every part of the flat, mostly because it was calibrated to be her most effective study space, curated from her own aura. There were five rooms in total. Her bedroom, lined with shelves that were only sparsely decorated, to allow for her own collection. A bathroom with a gorgeous tub and enough water pressure settings to pretend it is a small water park.

The kitchen was small, perfectly suited to her needs with an adjoining dining room table and three bar stools. Soft green cabinets and cream counters made of goblin-cut quartz give way to an open layout. A salon with a couch, and floor to ceiling windows that you could enchant to show you anything. Hermione had tried out a couple of her favourite places in Britain, but ended up changing it back to show the campus and the rest of the city just outside her windows.

The last room is her office. It is decorated in soft pastels and the large desk faces another tall window. There are plants covering several shelves and Hermione had already written to Neville requesting some tips on how to keep them all alive.

Each night when she arrived home from exploring she felt giddy at the knowledge that the entire space was hers and hers alone.

She’d already unpacked most of her bottomless bag and was feeling quite at home.

This was the right decision.

She’s a week into her mastery when Ken brings a copy of the Daily Prophet into their workroom.

On the cover, above the fold is a photo of Draco Malfoy with his arm around the waist of Astoria Greengrass. Her hand is pressed against the lapel of his dress robes and there is an obnoxious emerald ring on her finger. The flash goes off as Draco pulls her closer against him and she looks up at him with love in her eyes.

An engagement announcement. 

She can’t help but stare at his face. She hadn’t been able to look at him so freely ever since he’d broken things off.

He is smiling.

He has the audacity to appear truly happy with someone other than her.

There is a quote in the first paragraph of the article that turns her stomach.

“Astoria and I are pleased to carry on the long tradition of a magical union.”

Insert the word pureblood, she thinks.

Astoria Greengrass, blood so pure you could trace her lines back millenia.

Someone that Hermione could never be.

Of course, it made sense.

The Malfoy heir would never love a Mudblood. Would never betray a thousand years of tradition.

Would never be capable of feeling for her what he clearly feels for Astoria Greengrass.

Hermione can’t help but stare at Astoria’s perfect skin and goldspun hair. 

She has no right to be upset. 

“Are you okay?” Ken asks, offering her a cup of coffee in a styrofoam cup.

The muggle invention would stand out in the Hogwarts potions classroom, but here it just adds to the eclectic mix of muggle and magical items Ken surrounds himself with.

She takes a deep sip, wishing it were a strong cup of English Breakfast, and then nods.

“I am now. You wanted to work on increasing concentrations of erumpent horn while still keeping the trace potion inert, right?”

And she sets to work, ignoring the feelings that have been drummed up by the announcement.

He’s going to be married. 

Oddly enough, she’d been holding out hope that something might change.

By the time she and Ken break for lunch, she has managed to lock Draco Malfoy back out of her heart.

Thousands of miles away, across the ocean, Draco Malfoy was also reading the Daily Prophet. His mother had brought it to breakfast, wanting to see how well the announcement came out.

But on the third page, there was an article that Draco was far more interested in than the press shots his mother had arranged.

Golden Girl Takes Prestigious Mastery.

There’s no picture, just a few inches on the potions mastery that Hermione had started a week earlier.

There is a quote from a Professor Kenneth Poulter whom Draco has never heard of before.

“I was more than honoured by Miss. Granger’s acceptance of my offer to study inert and explosive potions here at Columbia University’s Magical Studies Program. Her intellect is rare and magnificent. I have no doubt that she will change the field of potions as we know it.”

What a twat.

Draco flips through the paper until he finds it. The same photo and article they have published in every edition since the war ended.

Potter, Weasley, and Hermione standing in the courtyard of Hogwarts. Declaring their victory over darkness.

He stares at the hard line of Hermione’s mouth and wishes he could see her smile. It has been so long since he was privy to her quiet joy.

“Draco, darling. Perhaps you could spend the day showing Astoria the gardens?” His mother asks, pulling him from his daydreams.

He lowers the paper onto the table, the two women looking at him expectantly.

“It would be my pleasure,” he says, thinking of how long he would have to spend with Astoria before it was appropriate to retreat to his father’s study and drink himself blind.

“Perhaps we could pick a site for the binding ceremony,” Astoria suggests, her tea spoon clinking annoying against the plate.

Draco just nods and picks the Prophet back up, pretending to read an article about some florist opening in the Alley.

After three months in New York, Hermione feels like she is living a life she had only ever dreamed about.

She has friends that she loves, a job that challenges her, and a love life that doesn’t make her cry herself to sleep.

New York has helped her shed a lot of her self doubt and she is grateful for it.

Which is why when there is a knock at her flat door, the last person she expects to see is Narcissa Malfoy.

“Lady Malfoy. This is a surprise.” Hermione manages to resist wiping her hands down the front of her robes. Settling instead for twisting the cap onto the bottle in her hands. She had been expecting her neighbour Shaela. They’d made plans to watch some Disney movie Hermione had missed because she was fighting a war.

Against the woman standing in front of her.

“Miss. Granger, I apologise for not making an appointment. I was hoping to speak with you about my son,” Narcissa says, glancing at the couch in Hermione’s living room and then looking back at her, as though deciding it isn’t an option.

She remains standing in the door frame.

“What about your son?” Hermione asks, thinking of the last photo spread she had seen of Draco and Astoria in the Prophet.

Shopping for wedding flowers at some new florist in Diagon Alley. Hermione had thrown the paper out almost immediately after reading the short blurb.

“You have to understand, this is quite difficult for me,” Narcissa says, looking anywhere but at Hermione. “But I believe that my son is in love with you.”

Difficult for her.

The clock hanging on the wall beside Hermione clicks with each passing second, but she doesn’t have anything to say.

Draco had made his choice.

“You don’t seem surprised,” Narcissa says after a long awkward moment.

“Why are you here?” 

Even if Draco told his mother that he loved Hermione, Narcissa had no reason to act on that information.

“Everything I have ever done was to make my son happy. When he finally responded to my letters concerning a betrothal- well, I should have known that he was running from something real. I probably did know, deep down. I just ignored it because he was finally acquiescing to the one thing I have always wanted for him.”

“A pureblood wife,” Hermione exhales, remembering how much it had hurt the first time she had seen Astoria on Draco’s arm.

“A good marriage,” Narcissa corrects her.

Hermione can’t help but snort. 

“It may seem naive to you, Miss Granger, but I believed that she could make him happy.”

Narcissa pulls a piece of parchment from her robes and extends her arm for Hermione to take it.

From the colour of the parchment, it is old. Maybe a few years.

“I found this tucked in a book in our family library. When I asked Draco about it, he refused to discuss it.”

Hermione takes the paper and unfolds it.

It’s a draft of a note she certainly never got from him.

There are lines through his many attempts to admit his feelings, but only one really draws her attention.

Everytime I look at you I feel like the words are going to tumble from my lips. I love you, but you can’t know. I’m not worth all you would have to give up.

She can’t help but search for what he had said to her over eight months ago. About why he couldn’t court her.

He’d known that if he had admitted his feelings, Hermione never would have let him walk away. She wouldn’t have stood for him breaking her heart.

“This is from school. It’s been a long time. I’m sure his feelings have changed,” Hermione folds the note back up and tries to hand it back to Narcissa.

“Keep it. I know my son, Miss. Granger. I can see that he isn’t happy.”

“This note doesn’t change the fact that Draco is getting married.”

“Is he? I live with him and I can promise you he has made no efforts to set a date or make any concrete plans.”

She thinks of the article about their florist.

“Astoria thinks that she is marrying my son, but I am not so sure,” Narcissa adds, and Hermione wonders if she had stolen into her mind.

“What would you have me do? Surely you don’t want him to marry me instead?”

It’s a vicious thing to ask. Justified, though.

“As I have said, all I want is for him to be happy,” Narcissa says earnestly, holding eye contact with Hermione. “I would ask that you talk to him. That’s all. I am not asking you to forgive him what I can see was a painful entanglement.”

Hermione can’t believe that Narcissa travelled all this way.

Simply to ask Hermione to speak to her son.

“I’ll think about it,” Hermione says.

Narcissa looks like she wants to say more but she doesn’t.

“Thank you. I will take my leave.”

Perhaps Hermione should have invited the witch in. Thanked her for saving Harry. Offered to let her use her emergency international portkey.

But she isn’t sure she could have handled any of that.

She has a life in the city. 

Why should she rip open a wound that is only just healing over?

Hermione doesn’t speak to Draco.

She pushes forward, focusing on herself.

Ken and her figure out how to keep potions with potentially explosive ingredients inert for longer periods of time, extending shelf life and lowering prices.

It takes them nearly the entire year of her mastery, but by the end companies and foundations are throwing money at them.

She decides to take full advantage of the grant money and stays in New York.

Columbia’s Magical Studies Program offers her a chance to earn her doctoral degree while mentoring mastery students.

She is interviewed by the New York Ghost.

She keeps her apartment, her friends, and her work.

Holds onto everything that makes her happy.

Afterall, wasn’t that what Draco had told her to do?

The article in the New York Ghost is published in The Daily Prophet too.

It sings the praises of a witch changing the wizarding world, one breakthrough at a time.

There is a picture of Hermione to accompany the article.

She’s smiling.

Draco stares at the brightness in her eyes and the curve of her mouth.

“Something interesting, darling?” Draco’s mother asks.

He lowers the paper.

Guilt pinches. Now that it is just the two of them at the breakfast table, in the manor, he should be doing a better job of keeping her company.

“Apologies, Maman. Would you like to go for a walk?”

Narcissa agrees and the two of them walk through the gardens that surround the property.

She glances up at him every so often and is pained to see the hurt in his eyes.

He tries to make it seem like he is seeing anything other than her smile.

Draco had told Hermione that he couldn’t make her happy.

He’d believed it back then.

Of course, Hermione didn’t need someone to love her to be happy.

She finds happiness in far noble places.

Across an ocean, Hermione Granger is happy without him.

And here, in his childhood home, Draco is miserable.

When the second member of the Malfoy family appears at her door, Hermione isn’t alone.

She has friends over, celebrating the extension of her studies in America.

They all see themselves out quickly, leaving Draco to stand in her entryway and search for the right words.

The words that don’t ruin his grand gesture.

“I want us both to be happy,” Draco says, shoulders back, vulnerability in his face.

The yelling that follows is like a torrent of water breaking through a dam. She says things she doesn’t mean, and he says everything he does. He confesses things he never thought he would be free or brave enough to say. Towards the end of the torrent of good arguments and bad she slaps him across the face, hating the smug look he gives her when she runs out of steam.

And then Hermione kisses him.

Too fiercely. 

And Draco holds her too tightly.

Both of them letting go of everything they have been through. No longer allowing blame to prevent them from diving head first.

Draco carries her into her bedroom, claiming her skin with each kiss.

“I can’t believe,” she sighs against him, gripping the hair at the nape of his neck.

“What?” He sucks at the skin below her ear, making it nearly impossible for her to find the words.

“That you are here,” she exhales. She tightens her thighs against his waist, arching her back to expose more of her neck.

Draco’s touch becomes harsher, cupping her arse and nipping at her neck.

He pulls back to look into her eyes, “Not in my wildest dreams, Granger.” And he presses his lips to hers, drinking in her sweet nectar.

Their bodies move as one, leaning into the pleasure flooding them both.

His kisses are fierce, and she craves the tight hold he has over her, both physically and mentally. 

Draco turns so he can lift her from his lap, laying her down on the mattress and moving to hover over her.

“I fell under your spell,” he murmurs, a hand lifting at the hem of her shirt, thumb brushing against her soft skin. She sits up and lets him pull it gently over her head, tossing it to the side.

“Resistance was always going to be futile,” she smirks, reaching for his shirt and pulling it over his head.

He growls lowly and kisses her once more, relishing the feel of her body beneath his own.

Hermione lifts her hips and he helps her out of her jeans, noticing how lovely they make her arse look.

Though the silk knickers she has on underneath win by a narrow margin.

He presses his hands against her hips, holding her in place as he teases her, pressing lazy kisses across her chest.

“Draco,” she says, vulnerable.

Every cell in her body yearns for his touch.

Draco looks different than he had just over a year ago, more filled out. His shoulders seem broader, his arms stronger.

Hermione lifts a hand to his sternum, feeling the smooth skin of his own body. The taut muscles he must have gotten from auror training.

Her touch is gentle, where his own hands are more deliberate. Draco knows exactly what he is doing.

It sends a flush to Hermione’s face, reminding her that he’d always known just how to touch her to make her heart beat faster.

“Is this alright?” He asks, sensing her trepidation.

Looking up into his eyes, Hermione thinks about everything they have been through together and apart. Everything that has brought them to this place. To this moment.

“As long as you’re mine,” she replies, cupping his face.

“As long as you’ll have me,” he swears, his oath sealed with a kiss softer than any they have shared before. It isn’t shy or cautious, rather it is sweet and promising. A vow that Hermione never dreamed possible.

Sliding her calf along Draco’s own leg, she makes it clear that this is what she wants.

Draco sheds his own trousers before settling on his knees between her spread legs. He caresses the side of her knee, taking in the sight of her perfect body.

Her breasts rise and fall with each breath and Draco thanks every deity he knows for the silk set she had donned that morning.

Hermione looks like a goddess, her trim waist and wide hips so inviting his cock grows hard in his boxers.

Draco wants to take it slow, but he's certain that no matter what he does, it will be over too fast.

They start slowly, painstakingly so, with his hands learning every curve of her body. He traces runes he learned a decade ago into her skin, eliciting gasps of pleasure. She keens for more, but Draco knows exactly how he wants this to go.

So while he moves his hands higher, to the flesh of her thighs, he lightens his touch, watching her face as she watches his hands.

“More,” she sighs, running a hand through her hair and clenching the sheets with the other. “Please.”

Draco chuckles, his left hand slipping to the band of her knickers, scratching gently.

“Draco,” she throws him a soft glare, arching her back.

“I’d insist on patience, but I love to hear you purring,” Draco grins slyly, pulling on the waistband and sliding her knickers down her legs.

When a moan falls from her lips he nearly comes right in his own knickers.

Even in castle alcoves, Draco had been quick to notice that Hermione is no innocent doe. She is a vixen.

He wishes he could remember every moment.

Draco shifts so that he is kneeling on the floor, pulling her legs over his shoulders and staring at her glistening pussy before gripping her tight and bringing his face to her core.

Heaven.

It isn’t so much the sweet taste of her wetness and the smooth feel of her skin but the sound she makes as his tongue runs over her skin that makes Draco let out his own moan.

Draco draws the same runes with his tongue as he had with his fingers and Hermione grips his hair in her hand, her breathing filling the air around them.

She runs her other hand over her stomach and across her breasts, disbelieving of the heat running through her.

Draco lifts his head and smirks at the sight of his witch in the throes of pleasure.

“Don’t stop,” she pants.

Draco resumes his ministrations, sliding the hand he had on her outer thigh to her knee, pulling her legs further apart.

He sucks at the bud of nerves between her legs and her pussy floods.

Lifting his face once more, he lowers Hermione’s legs from his shoulders and slips a hand between her folds, trailing a finger teasingly.

“You’re so sweet, Granger. Like a sugar quill.”

Hermione tries to press her knees together, for friction.

He takes that as an invitation to slip a digit between her lips, into her soaked pussy. 

“What was that?” Hermione asks, shivering slightly.

“My finger,” Draco answers, kissing her sternum and moving his finger back and forth, adding a second once she feels like she can take it.

“No, the cold,” she shakes her head, her hands in fists once more.

For a moment, he doesn’t understand. But then he looks down and realises his ring is still on his little finger.

Pulling his fingers from her cunt, Draco shifts her further up the bed, straddling her and pressing his body alongside hers.

He kisses her, and pushes her thighs apart once more. Only this time, he doesn’t slip his fingers back inside of her.

No, he drags his ring across her clit, gently, once, twice.

“The Malfoy family ring,” he murmurs against her lips.

Generations of Malfoys are rolling in their graves and Draco couldn’t care less.

When he moves the cool silver against her again, Hermione closes her legs on his hand and twists her body against his, hiding her face in his neck.

“Please, I need more,” Hermione moans.

He is happy to oblige.

This time, he sheds the rest of his clothes and sidles up close to his witch.

He resumes his ministrations, but it doesn’t take long before his cock is rigid and Hermione’s body is wriggling for more.

Knowing how close to the edge they both are, Draco straddles her and braces himself by his hands on either side of her waist.

When he finally enters her, neither one of them can hold back the sounds of pleasure and ecstasy.

Hermione wraps her arms around Draco’s torso and he kisses her even as he moves slowly in and out of her.

“More,” Hermione begs.

Draco moves faster, quickly losing control. He pumps harder too, stimulating her g-spot and enjoying how slick she is around him.

“Are you close?” He asks, praying he’d elicited enough of her pleasure before giving himself over to the primal need to be inside her.

Hermione only nods, a gasp seemingly stuck in her throat.

With each thrust, she seems to rise up to meet him, taking his cock all the way.

They dissolve into a passionate rhythm and both of them come; Hermione first, and Draco barreling after her, both loudly expressing their pleasure.

She tightens around him, preventing him from pulling out and then she kisses him, her arms clinging to him and her breathing heavy.

Draco’s own breathing syncs with hers as he lets his weight rest against her own, shifting their bodies so they are side by side. His softening cock pulling from her hot core. Evidence of both of their orgasms on his shaft.

Draco can’t help but stare at her pebbled skin and stiff nipples as her heart tries to slow in her chest.

“Thank you,” Hermione whispers.

He blinks, confused by her words.

“Sorry,” she adds. “I just mean that- that was everything I could have ever wanted.”

“Even in my wildest dreams it wouldn’t be better than that,” he repeats, in full agreement.

They lie together, in the soft light of dusk.

Draco thinks of everything they had been through together and apart that brought them to this moment. This day.

As much as they still needed to talk, to figure out how they were going to move forward, he was grateful that they hadn’t waited to do this. 

It was one hell of a way to make up for lost time.