Draco watches as she tilts her pale face towards the sky. The warmth of the sun driving away the cold in her cheeks.
Her soft auburn hair falls in wild curls around her face, tucked haphazardly into the green scarf he had insisted she wear when she had asked him to take a break.
Snowflakes the size of sickles land amongst her curls, catching the light in a dazzling fashion. He could watch her forever.
“Draco, come out here,” she extends a gloved hand, feigning annoyance at his refusal to stand in the middle of a snowstorm.
He stays leaning against the stone wall, tucked under the shelter of the castle. His hands are tucked deep into his pockets and he has his own scarf, but he is already chilled to the bone.
“You are going to catch your death out there,” he shakes his head, knowing she’ll chip away at his resolve.
“The sun feels so good,” she spins, eyes closed, face to the sky.
Apricity. When the sun’s warmth shines through the cold.
Watching her spin, Draco knows she is the source of his warmth.
They’d been studying with Potter and Weasley for hours. NEWTs were still happening, even though most of them had jobs already lined up after graduation.
Heroes of the War.
Draco hated the title hero. Three years ago, he’d gone running to Potter; practically begged for his help. He was a coward. A lucky coward.
Unsurprisingly, Potter had actually done as he promised. He saved Draco and his family. Protected them from prosecution from the Ministry and gave them the knowledge they needed to survive the Dark Lord.
What was a surprise was Granger.
Hermione. She’d made sure he never had to take the Dark Mark. She taught him magic he never would have dreamed of performing. She helped him build up the mental walls he needed against- Voldemort. A shiver runs down his spine.
Hermione helped him understand what they were meant to be fighting for. Helped him leave behind the bigotry and hate he had been raised to believe in.
He’d spent his entire seventh year working as a spy. Not for the bloody Order of the Phoenix. For Potter and Granger.
“Draco, if you don’t come out here right now, I am going to dump all of the snow on the roof on your head,” Hermione stops twirling, putting her hands on her hips and fixing him with a glare that he can’t take seriously.
Her nose is pink. There are snowflakes on her lashes. Her lips are blue.
Draco pushes off the wall and steps out into the snow, the cold wind cutting at his exposed skin.
He trembles in the cold, but it is worth it because she walks forwards and leans up on her tiptoes, her arms wrapping around his neck.
“There you are,” she whispers, her nails scratching the back of his neck.
“Your lips are blue.”
“Perhaps you could come up with a solution?” She cocks her head to the side, smiling mischievously.
Perhaps he can.
Draco had realized he loved Hermione before he even really knew he was capable of loving. Before she threw herself into his arms after the final battle. Before she laid on the floor of his childhood home, tortured by his own blood. Before she left him alone to go off chasing something that seemed impossible.
Draco had offered to go with Harry when he had explained there was something out there that would help defeat Voldemort.
Not to help the war effort. Not to avoid being forced to live with the Dark Lord. But because he knew Hermione was going to be in danger. He thought he was going to lose her before he ever got to tell her what she meant to him. Draco had regrets, but none of them would have cut so deep as missing his chance at loving Hermione Granger.
Leaning down, Draco presses his mouth to hers, the cold of her lips sending another shiver through him.
He exhales against her, letting the warmth of his breath defrost her lips. She breathes against him and he feels like he has a molten core.
His warmth.
She kisses along his jaw and he pulls her flush against him, not caring about the chill in his fingers.
“Better?” He asks.
She nods into his shoulder.
“Everything is so beautiful right now,” she pulls away, looking up at the crisp white snow covering the castle. Following the war, the castle had changed. The magic in its walls had changed to accommodate the new needs of the students.
A new tower for the returning eighth-year students. Rooms filled with plants and cushions and whatever else helped one get through a panic attack. The dangers that once drove students to investigate the halls had turned into safe places to escape to for a quiet moment to oneself. Life was quieter this year.
Draco may not like the freezing weather found in the highland hills, but if she thinks it is beautiful, he can try to appreciate the white blanket over everything.
“Enough fresh air?” He asks, pulling his hands from around her waist to shove them back into the warmth of his coat.
It doesn’t help. His fingertips are frozen.
“Already?” She pouts, looking at him with her round eyes. “You do look like a popsicle.”
She giggles and he scowls.
Popsicles were a muggle dessert he had tried with her before the term began when he met her parents. He’d learned about them in Muggle Studies. They were better than he had thought they would be.
“If we stand out here any longer, I worry you’ll lose the tip of your nose,” he presses a kiss to the tip of her nose.
She pulls back and brushes her nose with the back of her wool-covered hand.
“Fine. We will go straight back to studying the brewing instructions for Veritaserum,” she shrugs, looping her arm through his and trudging towards the castle doors.
“We could always take a detour,” he smirks, reaching for the metal door handle.
He pulls but it doesn’t open.
“It won’t open,” he says, glancing at Hermione.
She pulls her arm from his elbow. He uses both hands this time, pulling harder on the cold metal.
“I don’t understand,” he turns towards her again. “Hermione?”
She’s gone.
“Hermione?” he asks again, turning to look out at the curtain of snow falling faster now. He exhales, his breath a thick cloud in front of him.
When he turns back to the door, all he finds is a stone wall.
He presses a hand against the grey slate, confused.
Closing his eyes against the wind whipping against him, he feels in his pocket for his wand. It isn’t there.
Panic sets in. What is happening?
He opens his eyes, and reality comes rushing towards him.
Granger was never there. Or rather, he was never there. At Hogwarts.
The last warm cells in his body go cold. The dementors have come for the last cracked pieces of his soul.
Here, in the cell he was thrown into months ago. Draco Malfoy had been sentenced to three years in Azkaban for his role in the war.
Draco shuts his eyes tight, clinging to the mirage of her chestnut eyes and pale skin. Her blue lips slip from his mind as the cloaked figure consumes the brief joy he’d dreamt, leaving despair in its place.
He tries to cling to the cold stone of his cell, preferring his reality to the misery that the dementors bring with their icy decay.
Wrapping his arms around himself, he trembles. There is no warmth here. No sun.