Rose in a Graveyard (Valentine's Day Drabble)
Suggested listening: Seal - Kiss from a Rose [2]
Prompt: "I'll do it for a kiss"
The Aurors rushed Draco in to St. Mungo's. He was bleeding profusely from hastily flung Dark spells by fugitive Death Eaters.
"Hermione!" Harry yelled, his arm supporting the blond Wizard. "Hermione!"
She appeared from the water closet, dressed in her stained matron uniform.
Her eyes widened. "Put him down on the bed. Quickly."
"What spells?"
"The Sectumsepra and Diffindo, but they missed him—barely."
Hermione flicked her wand in a fast motion to Scourgify her hands and divest Draco of his bloodied shirt and sullied dark trousers. His body was cold and shivering.
Her hands touched his chest, trying to warm him. "You need to go, Harry."
He nodded, "I'll be in the bull pen. Floo me if you need anything. Take care of him, yeah?"
"I always do," she smiled wanly before she summoned the white room divider around the hospital bed.
Hermione shifted him in the bed, earning her a pained groan.
She spent the next few hours stitching him back together. By the time she was done, it was evening. She massaged Essence of Dittany into his wounds. Green smoke billowed around the cot.
When she was done, the bleeding stopped, new skin stitched and stretched over the wounds.
Hermione cracked her neck and left for a short tea break.
It got more difficult each time seeing him hurt. The rage in him and the need to prove himself led him to be reckless.
While they weren't friends, she didn't want—this.
She didn't know much of his life outside of the scary, quiet moments they shared within St. Mungo's. How she attended to his bruises and wounds. The hisses he swallowed. The hooded stares he sent her when she brushed against his stomach.
They rarely spoke outside of that.
When she returned to check on him, he was up, leaning on the headboard, topless and bruised.
[Image: Injured Auror Draco sitting up across the bed from Healer Hermione.]
"Granger, my saviour once again."
The side of her mouth lifted. "Here." She offered him a cup of jasmine tea. "Let me check on the bandages."
He hissed, as she lifted up the sticky fabric clinging to his sensitive skin.
"I'm sorry." Hermione frowned. More jagged scars would mar his body. They would fade, but no amount of Dittany could make them disappear.
"Why so sad?", he asked quietly.
"Your skin—you'll get more scars. Let me get more Dittany. I recently brewed a stronger one."
When she returned, she sat on the edge of the bed, massaging the liquid into his bare skin. She noticed him twitch at her touch.
Without looking up, she said, "I could get Hannah to do this if you don't want me—"
"N-no," he rasped out. "It's fine. I'm just ticklish."
She smirked. "Draco Malfoy, ticklish."
He chuckled lowly, focusing his grey stare on her.
She looked away, immediately trying to fill the silence. "Harry's at the bull pen, filling out paperwork. After a couple of days, you can get back to work. You need to be more careful. I don't want to see you here all the time."
"Is that true?" he asked, his voice suddenly sounding boyish and slightly vulnerable.
Hermione shrugged, trying to sound matter-of-fact. "It's difficult to see you hurt. You're being careless. You don't need to—You've proved yourself eno—"
Draco gripped her hand that hovered above the light, wiry hairs around his belly button.
"Sorry. I know the wound is still fresh there."
His hand shook, as he placed her dry, cracked hand on his cheek—skin dry from years of antiseptic use—and pushed his face into her palm.
"Please be more careful." Her throat was sticky, even as she tried to remove emotion from her voice.
"I'll do it for a kiss."