Die Zauberflöte
Pamina was sleeping.
Hermione watched in wonder as Monostatos approached her and gazed upon her, his eyes ablaze with something she'd seen before. Want. Desire. Admiration. Something so much deeper. Monostatos wanted Pamina back, but he couldn't have her. She didn't want him back. He sang to her, an aria of self-deprecation and longing.
Hermione could feel eyes upon her, and when she turned her face, she realised that Draco wasn't watching the opera at all. She smiled a tiny bit at him and whispered,
"Are you bored?"
"No," he whispered back, shaking his head. "Mesmerised."
Hermione's cheeks went very warm then. She'd dressed up properly for the opera tonight. She'd worn a floor-length sheath gown in burgundy sequins, long-sleeved with a plunging neckline that she'd accented with a triangular golden pendant. She wore gold triangle earrings, too. She looked a proper Gryffindor when it came to colour, she knew. She'd tamed her hair into a French twist at the back of her head with a few strands carefully curling down around her face. She'd lined her eyes with thick black kohl and had worn lipstick of the deepest red to match her gown. She was glamour tonight, she knew, and she'd really tried. She'd never focused much on her appearance, but it was fun to feel pretty every now and then, and tonight she did feel very pretty.
"Draco." Hermione stared at him, watching out of the corner of her eye as Monostatos approached the object of his desire on the stage. Draco's blue eyes seemed almost warm then. He wasn't staring at Hermione's chest. He wasn't staring at her waist. He was studying her face, the lines and planes of it. His gaze was soft, almost gentle.
The Queen of the Night began singing the most famous opera in Mozart's repertoire, and Hermione tore her eyes away from Draco. Every once in a while she glanced over to him to see that he seemed genuinely impressed. Hermione listened to the soprano expertly touch at Mozart's ridiculous high notes, and she remembered the fine dinner they'd had before coming to the opera. Duck with cherry reduction, roast potato with shallot, brussels sprouts… lots of Apothic Red wine.
They'd talked about everything. They'd talked about the way that Draco's father had been so disgusted with him that he'd claimed he no longer had a son, about how Narcissa still sent Draco owls every now and then out of desperation. They talked about how Dolohov, Travers, Rookwood and others were rotting away in Azkaban. They couldn't help laughing a little at the thought of Dolores Umbridge in pink-and-white striped inmate attire - ludicrous, they knew, but somehow amusing.
They'd talked about how Hermione had gone to Australia, searching high and low for dentists by the name of Granger. She'd found them in Melbourne, living under the delusion that they had no child. She'd brought them home and watched as every memory flooded back into their minds. Draco had told Hermione that it was damned impressive for her to be able to perform such magic.
They'd discussed the duck they were eating, the soft rain outside, the way that this particular opera had become so famous among Muggles, the re-emergence of rock music in the Magical world after Voldemort's fall. They'd talked and talked and talked as if it were the easiest thing in all the world to do. It had felt easy. He had been his sarcastic self through it all, peppering in snarky comments here and there and smirking incessantly. But Hermione liked it. She liked him.
When the curtain fell on Act Two, after Sarastro announced the Sun's triumph over darkness, Hermione flew to her feet and applauded with the rest of the audience. Draco clapped, too, but his eyes turned again to Hermione, and he asked through the din of the applause,
"Will you come home with me tonight?"
"Yes," Hermione answered at once, not hesitating for a moment to reply. The applause faded and the crowd began to clear out. Hermione held her gold satin clutch in one hand and Draco's fingers in the other. They made their way out of the opulent Royal Opera House and out onto the sweet cool relief of the sidewalk. Draco led them to a quiet spot a ways down the road, and Hermione gasped as she was wrenched by Side-Along Apparition.
When they came to, they were inside Draco's bedroom in Kensington. Hermione gave him a rather serious look and set her clutch down on the bench at the end of his elegant bed.
"Well, this was presumptuous of you," she scolded him. "Bringing us straight into your -"
He quieted her by taking her face in his hands and touching his lips to hers. He asked softly,
"Have you enchanted this lipstick to stay put, or am I going to have burgundy colouring smeared all over my face?"
Hermione laughed a little and assured him,
"I've charmed it, as any witch worth her salt knows to do."
"Good." He kissed her again, and Hermione remembered the first time she'd kissed him, when she had not charmed her red lipstick, when he'd wound up with it all over him. But he kissed her so carefully now that he probably wouldn't have made a mess anyway. One of his arms snared around the back of Hermione's dress and pulled down at the zip. Hermione shut her eyes and listened to the low, slow grind of the zip descending, and she tried to keep her breath steady as she stepped out of the elaborate gown. She pulled her wand from her Expanded clutch and Conjured a hanger, Banishing the gown to dangle over the edge of Draco's bathroom door. He cocked up an eyebrow at her and noted,
"Clever. You've always been so damned clever, haven't you?"
"I've tried," Hermione whispered, setting her wand down. She let Draco unclasp her bra and pull it away, let him push down the hem of her satin knickers, which she stepped out of along with her black ballet flats. Suddenly she was naked and he was still in his elegant black suit, and she murmured,
"You should take your clothes off."
"I mean to exercise some degree of self-control this time, and being mostly clothed will probably help." Draco seemed very serious, but Hermione didn't know what he meant. She watched him carefully take off his suit jacket and his tie and hang them in his wardrobe, and he kicked off his dress shoes. He jerked his chin toward the bed and asked,
"Will you lie down?"
"All right." Hermione frowned a little and made her way to the bed, climbing up and leaning back against the pillows. She was very nervous all of a sudden, especially when Draco - still in his white dress shirt and black trousers - came slithering up onto the bed with her. He slowly parted her legs and asked,
"When's the last time someone used his mouth on you, Granger?"
She smirked, her heart accelerating, and she shook her head.
"Never."
"Stupid boy." Draco shook his head, and Hermione knew he meant Ron. Draco stared between Hermione's legs, making her feel very self-conscious, and his breath audibly quickened. She watched his narrow throat bob, and he admitted, "I've never done this, so please tell me if I'm making you miserable."
"I'm very certain you won't make me miserable," Hermione said. Then, sensing absolute terror from him, she whispered, "Come here, Draco."
He leaned down toward her, his lips hovering a hair's breadth from hers. She reached up and messed up his hair, making his pale brows furrow with frustration, and she laughed a little. She pulled a lock of hair in front of his face, down his forehead, and she told him,
"Even when I wanted to spend all day every day Hexing you into oblivion, Draco Malfoy, you were devastatingly handsome."
"Oh, well, thanks." Draco licked his bottom lip and curled up the left half of his mouth. Then he kissed Hermione once, gently, and informed her in a whisper, "I want to feel you come. Not from a spell. I want to… I want you to…"
"Yes, please," Hermione interrupted him. She reached up to hold his face and sensed heat on his cheeks. She touched their lips together again and promised him, "I'm not going to criticise you. I'm no more an expert on receiving anything than you are on giving anything. I promise I'll reciprocate sometime."
"Mmph." Draco seemed to like the idea of that very much. He sat back up and arranged himself between Hermione's legs again. He urged her to bend her knees, and for a long moment, he just stared at her whilst he stroked at her thighs. His fingers moved like ten dancers, gliding smoothly up the inside, along sensitive skin. He was more firm and grasping near her hips. Hermione tipped her head back a little and gasped softly. This felt good. This already felt very, very good. She felt herself go sopping wet between her legs, and her hands found purchase on the blankets. She wrenched her eyes shut, unable for some reason to keep them open.
She felt Draco's fingers dust over her entrance, and he hummed with delight at the feel of being able to spread the slick evidence of her arousal around. The pad of his middle finger explored her folds, inside and out, and then dipped inside of her and curled.
"Draco!" Hermione's back arched up a little, and her eyes flew open. His pale gaze went wide and round, and he edged another finger inside of her. His thumb flicked a little at her clitoris, and Hermione growled as she insisted, "Oh, please, please, please do what you said you were going to do."
Draco tipped his head. "What was it that I said I was going to do again? Oh, yes. I think I said I was going to make you…"
He descended then, sliding down onto his stomach and smirking up at her from between her legs.
"Come. I think I said I was going to make you come, didn't I?"
"Draco." Hermione was desperate now. The throb between her legs was so strong that she could hardly breathe. She watched Draco grind his hips against the bed, humping it a little as he continued to use his fingers to play. She knew he must be feeling powerful arousal, too, and his back heaved with his quick breath.
He pulled his hand from Hermione's soaked entrance and put it straight to her bare breast, massaging and pinching a little as his face moved nearer to the place that was screaming for him. When at last his lips brushed along the length of Hermione's entrance, his hand tightened on her breast, and she thought she might have screamed. His tongue ventured from his mouth and lathed all the way from bottom to top, and then he sucked on her clit in a way that made Hermione's fingers cinch hard on the blankets. She tried not to squirm, which was a useless endeavour. He moved his hand all over her breast, his other one holding her hip steady, and suddenly his face was completely buried in her. His tongue was curling, licking, sliding. His lips were kissing, pulling, pressing. He was suckling; his nose was nuzzling at her. It was so much, so much, and Hermione could feel a climax barreling at her like a freight train.
All of a sudden his cycling hips stopped, and his hands squeezed her thigh and breast so tightly that it hurt a little. Draco moaned loudly against Hermione's entrance, the buzz of his voice sending a wonderful vibration along the lips and nub that he was pleasuring. She knew at once what had happened; he'd driven himself straight over the edge by doing this to her. His hands started to shake on her a little, and for some reason, the thought of Draco Malfoy having come in his trousers because of using his mouth on her was too much to bear.
He dutifully started to lick and suck again, but she was so far gone herself that it only took another little moment before her body snapped like a wire. Her ears rang hot, her vision blurred for a moment, and her skin prickled from head to toe. She could feel the way Draco's lips and tongue were around and inside of her as she clamped down erratically, and his hands went back to stroking her thighs as he groaned against her once more.
Once the searing white pleasure faded a little, Hermione managed to breathe normally and stare at the ceiling for a moment. Draco slowly sat up, and when she turned her eyes to him, he looked so attractive that her breath left her again. His blond hair was a complete disaster. His lips were opalescent, shining with her fluids and swollen from the gusto with which he'd devoured her most intimate place. His high cheekbones were pink, and he raked his fingers through his hair as he whispered,
"I apologise, but I… I sort of…"
"I know." Hermione smiled a bit and flicked her eyes down to the wet spot on the top of one trouser leg. Draco glanced down at his fingers, dragged his tongue over his lip and shuddered, and he said,
"I should… we should both probably take showers. Or else we can just Scour… I dunno."
"You go first," Hermione said gently. She shifted a little where she lay and gave him a weak little smile. "I could use a few moments to recover a bit, anyway. Thank you, by the way."
Draco nodded silently and climbed slowly from the bed. He walked into his bathroom, snatching his wand from beside his wardrobe, and he lit the lanterns on the wall inside. He turned then and gave Hermione a heavy look before he informed her,
"Hermione Granger, I don't suppose I have ever felt about another person what I feel about you. I don't have… I'm not sure how best to word it. I'm not as clever as you when it comes to words. You know that. But you should also know that… that I was very, very glad to go to dinner and the opera tonight with you, and that I think you are remarkably attractive, and that you set me afire in a way I didn't think was possible."
Hermione's eyes burned a little, and all she could do was give him one silent nod. Draco drummed his fingers on the threshold of his bathroom door, and he said,
"Since the end of the war, I've been very alone. I didn't think I minded, Hermione, but now that you're around… well, if I were that alone again, I think I'd mind very much."
Hermione shook her head and insisted, "I'm not going anywhere. I'm going to stay the night, Draco. I'm going to sleep all tangled up with you like we're knotted strings. And I'll touch your scar, carefully and gently, and you'll touch mine, and we'll be alone together until everyone else is willing to join us in the movement. And in the meantime, I would not mind one bit if you considered me… if you said that we… were together, you know?"
He smiled then, in a way that he very rarely did, and he nodded enthusiastically. Then he glanced down at his sullied trousers, started to shut the bathroom door, being mindful of Hermione's hanging gown, and he said,
"I'll be quick in the shower."
Author's Note: Just some fluff n' smut to get us all through Christmas! Ha! The next few days are CHAOS for me, so there's no way I'll be able to write again until after the holiday. In the meantime, if you want to give me an extra-special Christmas present, please leave a review. Haha. Have a wonderful holiday if you're celebrating, and thanks for reading!