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Chapter Text

Magic was balanced. A witch’s magical core could be drained if they performed too many spells too quickly. If they cast too many curses in succession. If they apparated long distances without breaks. 

That balance was easy to see, and to feel.

It was the same with transfiguration. Magic from the core was used to perform a transfiguration. Undoing it would return some portion of the magic back to the caster.  The more adept the caster, the greater the return of magic. Magical efficiency

So how did matter just cease to exist when an Evanesco was cast. It was a transfiguration spell without a counter, there was no way to undo an Evanesco , to make an object reappear. So why does it have such a small magical cost to completely remove matter from existence?

When she’d asked this question her classmates had laughed at her. Not an uncommon occurrence, though 8 years in, it still stung.

Professor McGonagall calmly explained that the energy was released back into the magical world to be reabsorbed into the magical cores of plants, fungi and magical beings.

Hermione didn’t understand how this wouldn’t result in a catastrophic explosion. Turning even a small amount of matter into energy resulted in the release of astronomical amounts of energy. She was sure that Einstein’s E=mc squared applied to all direct matter-energy transformations, including magical transfigurations. 

There may be some energy released, but she was sure that there was something missing. She needed to investigate.

Being the practical witch that she was, Hermione started in the Hogwarts Library. Though she was sure that McGonagall was correct, and she would never question the extent of her professor’s knowledge or acumen, she just could not be convinced that matter could just turn into magical energy in a way that didn’t cause an explosion.

She found nothing. Even after 3 consecutive weekends of missed Hogsmeade visits, and many nights where she’d had to ask Dobby to bring her a plate of food after missing dinner.

Her next course of action was a bit more dramatic. She’d practice vanishing things on her body. She knew it was possible. She’d read many books featuring scenes where witches were able to vanish their clothes instantly, surely she’d be able to accomplish that. 

She started off small, vanishing a sock (an odd one so she wouldn’t miss it). 

Items of clothing were simple and she encountered no problems with any item, or combination of items, she removed with the spell.

Next she tried small parts of her body.

The mole on her left hip. Vanished. Never to be seen again. 

Interesting.

Next she tried something that should grow back. The toenail on her left pinky toe.

That too, disappeared with no minor problems. 

Within two weeks the nail had grown back. The mole did not reappear.

Fascinating.

Her next trial successfully removed the small hairs on the tops of her toes. 

A week later the hairs were fully regrown.  There could be a market for this, she thought to herself. Many witches were vain and untrusting of muggle contraptions like disposable razors. How else could they maintain smooth toes, if not for a spell to remove them. Less painful than waxing for sure.

She cast the spell again, and again.

The hairs always grew back.

She knew from the little biology she’d studied in her school breaks (courtesy of her parents requiring a muggle science education to supplement her magical one) - that removing the hair wouldn’t stop the hair from growing back unless the follicle was damaged or also removed.

So she attempted to vanish the hair follicles on the top of her left pinky toe.

Unfortunately, she vanished the whole bloody toe.

Chapter Text

She gasped in shock and stared at the space her pinky toe had previously occupied.

There wasn't any pain. There was a bit of blood, though.

She waved her wand; causing the Gryffindor bed hangings to quickly wrap around; cocooning her on her bed.

Whatever she’d done, it had completely severed the entire digit - as cleanly as a severing hex - not that she'd had any experience with the use of such a hex, she’d only read of it in the library of course.

She swiveled her foot clockwise, watching her other four toes clench and flex with the motion. This didn’t result in any pain either. She activated the muscles that should have resulted in a slight outward flex of the pinky toe. 

Still no pain. Interesting. Had the spell removed the nerves? Were there any sensory nerves in that part of the toe? The basic biology texts in her childhood home didn’t really cover that. There must be, otherwise it wouldn’t hurt every time she’d had her toes stood on during dance practice for the Yule ball, or when she stubbed it hurrying out of the common room and catching on the bedpost nearest the door in her haste.  

Since she hadn’t been a cat since 2nd year, and thus could definitely not be killed by curiosity, she conjured a mirror to make a closer inspection of her missing toe.

The wound was a perfect cross-section - a precision cut. The lack of any spurting blood meant she hadn’t disturbed an artery. Pressure should be enough to staunch the bleeding. 

Hermione really wasn’t prepared for this eventuality. She’d need something sterile. Conducting this investigation in a bed was not her brightest moment - though at least she had privacy.  Glancing around she noticed the socks she’d discarded. A scourgify should be enough to clean the sock of any bacteria. Hopefully.

Two clean socks in hand, Hermione put her Outstanding (according to her O.W.L’s) transfiguration skills to work - transfiguring one sock into a stack of gauze pads and the other into a sticky plaster. Taking a few squares of gauze, she dabbed tentatively at the end of the toe.

Her nerves ignited. 

That teensy bit of pressure, initiated a deluge of pain. Instantaneous and excruciating, but passing; the sensation reminded her of the pain experienced when she inadvertently rammed her toe against something unyielding.

Hermione dabbed at the open wound again, albeit more cautiously. Even with her tender ministration, she still winced in pain. She withdrew the gauze to observe. Thankfully there wasn’t much blood so she wouldn’t need to worry about bleeding through socks and shoes, but she would have to figure out a way to regrow the appendage. If a mole wouldn’t regrow, it seemed unlikely that a whole toe would.

She decided that rest would be best. Using the sticky plaster, she created a small bandage over the nub where her toe had previously existed. A impervius charm for extra protection. 

She lay out on her bed covers, and began plotting ways to get into Madam Pomfrey’s stores. 

****

At least it wasn’t an essential toe for walking. That’s what she told herself, as her teeth unwillingly clenched with every step on the way to the great hall.  

Going down stairs was a particular agony.

She'd tried a multitude of ways, all of which resulted in pain, and while some of them were more effective than others, they came with an unfortunate side effect - well two really. The first was an observable limp. The second was much worse:

Well-meaning questions.

“Hermione, you’re limping. What’ve you done to yourself now?”  Lavender seemed to be under the impression that Hermione was in a constant state of injury. She wasn’t.

“Just a stubbed toe.” Hermione had replied with a grimace. 

“Must be pretty bad for you to be hopping down the stairs like that.” Lavender opined, her nose wrinkled in disgust at Hermione’s lack of dignity as she continued her awkward gait.

Neville politely intercepted their conversation, offering his arm to help her down the stairs. She accepted gratefully, gripping onto his muscular forearm with her left hand and bracing herself against the wall with her right. 

When they entered the Great Hall, he guided her toward her customary seat. She clambered onto the bench next to Harry and reached across the table to pour herself a goblet of juice.

“What’s wrong with your foot, ‘Mione?” Ron’s cerulean eyes, still like water on a lake, held hers - waiting for her reply. They really were quite beautiful.
She looked away from his gaze. Lying to his face, staring into his big eyes was not an option. 

“Oh nothing much, Ron. I just stubbed my toe quite badly last night”

“The bedpost again? You know if you went to bed earlier you wouldn’t need to rush to ..."

“No, Ronald. Not the bedpost; though I thank you ever so much for bringing that up. Again” She glared at him across the table. 

“Ease up, Hermione. It’s a fair enough assumption - you’ve stumped it on that post - what, 4 times this year already?” Harry elbowed her playfully, almost causing her to spill the juice that was on its way to her mouth, all over herself. 

“Yes, well. As I said. It wasn’t the post.” She didn’t need to give them an explanation. She’d heard them in the common-room a week or so ago, laughing about her conversation with McGonagall - they didn’t need more ammunition. Hermione was fully aware that while what she was doing wasn’t forbidden, per se, it would be frowned upon. Experimenting with magic on your own body could be perceived by some as being perilously close to dark magic.

Unless of course, those magics enhanced a witch’s appearance - glamour charms and the like. Those were special cases. Exceptions to the rule - as many societies were want to do in situations where ignoring the rules benefited the sexual needs of men.
She ate through the toast that appeared on her plate, courtesy of Harry, and let her mind wander - dreaming of the many different ways in which she would disrupt the patriarchy in the future.

Ron and Harry were standing up, and Harry had been trying to get her attention. He smiled at her when she looked up to meet his gaze. 

“I’m just saying, you might want to get Pomfrey to have a look at it.” Harry smiled kindly at her, his green eyes showing that he really was concerned for her wellbeing - even if it was the fifth time she’d ‘stubbed her toe’.

She returned his smile and nodded, the beginnings of a plan creeping into her head.

“Yeah. Good idea, Harry. I’ll uh, I’ll go now.” She reached for his hand to help her up. She balanced precariously on the heel of her left foot as she attempted to swing her right leg over the bench. Losing her balance, she sought to right herself by leaning against Harry’s shoulder. She overcorrected and inadvertently shoved him back onto the bench. Harry grunted at the impact of the table against his ribs.

Hermione reached down and grabbed the satchel he dropped, handing it back to him as he rubbed his side.

“I’m so sorry, Harry.”

He waved her off, muttering ‘s’ok’s’.

Hermione apologised again, laying it on a little too thick, considering it had been an accident. 

She stepped back and began her slow limp toward the Hospital wing. Thankfully she didn’t have a class until after lunch today, so there was plenty of time to complete the next step in her plan.

***

Hermione wasn’t particularly good at sneaking around. She also wasn’t good at reaching things in high places since she wasn’t particularly tall. Some might say that this was a disadvantage, and if she were a muggle with a vertical impairment and inability to reach items on the top shelf of cupboards she’d agree. But she wasn’t a muggle. She was a witch. So she could levitate items from shelves. She could wingardium leviosa to her heart’s content. 

She could also, at the age of 19, still fit under Harry’s invisibility cloak without needing to hunch.

Chapter Text

Hermione waited until lunch time before finding her way to a rarely used alcove near the infirmary. She cast a muffliato on her shoes, shrouded herself in Harry’s cloak and peeked out from behind the tapestry. Seeing that the coast was clear, she moved into the hallway and down toward  the open door that led to the infirmary. Madam Pomfrey was bustling about with a number of students who’d been involved in a particularly unproductive lesson with a new plant Professor Sprout had the 5th year’s working on.  

She sometimes wondered if the medicinal benefits of certain parts of a plant outweighed the damage caused by other parts of those plants during their cultivation. Particularly when children were involved in their cultivation. Mandrakes were a prime example of this. What business did 12-year-olds have being in a position where a slight knock to their earmuffs could render them dead? None, and yet their professor had them repotting baby Mandrakes in 2nd year. 

She’d justified it by saying that their shrieks weren’t deadly (yet!). No, their shrieks would just knock them out for a few hours. What’s a small stint of unconsciousness in the grand scheme of things?

The students currently lying prone on their cots with various states of vision loss would likely agree with her sentiments.

Pomfrey seemed to be administering eye drops to the students before supporting them in eating their lunch. Hermione watched as she moved away from the bed 3rd from the small office and toward the entry. A quick count told her there were at least another 8 students to have their medication. If Pomfrey followed a clockwise path from where she’d been, she would be on the opposite side of her office when dealing with the final student, a perfect position for Hermione to exit the office without the motion of the door revealing her trespass. 

Hermione moved quickly through the ward, keeping to the far set of beds, where 4 students waited patiently for their lunch. She could see that no-one had bothered to cast stasis charms on their soup. It would be cold by the time the matronly witch got to them. She quickly rectified the situation. Being temporarily blinded was one thing. Being temporarily blinded and fed cold tomato soup! No one should suffer that fate. 

In the end, she needn’t have worried about the door revealing her - Its resident had left it ajar. Open wide enough to allow Hermione through without even having to turn sideways. She cast a quiet alohomora on the cabinet where she knew Skele-gro was kept, having seen Pomfrey retrieve the potion for Harry in second year. The sight of his boneless arm still made her skin crawl. 

She’d need to find some dittany as well.  The Skele-gro would help with the bones, but she needed the flesh to regrow as well. She knew that the essence of dittany was effective at regrowing skin. Hopefully between the two medicines she’d be able to fix the whole ‘missing toe’ situation.

She found both remedies were well stocked in the cupboard. Using her wand, she conjured two small glass vials. Hermione stood on her tiptoes, all nine of them, and reached toward the back of the cupboard. It wouldn’t do to take what she needed from the containers at the front. It would arouse suspicion. 

Instead she took the jar third from the back. She could hear Pomfrey speaking with Gordon Bevan, a 5th year Ravenclaw. He’d been at the end of the first row of students. She still had plenty of time. 

Opening the Skele-gro first, she carefully siphoned off a tablespoon into the first of the conjured vials, then repeated the process with the essence of dittany. She levitated the jars back onto their shelves and carefully maneuvered them into position. Perfect, no one would know she was here. 

Stepping back, she carefully closed the double doors to the cupboard and cast a locking charm on them. Honestly, considering that Alohomora was taught in First Year, it was positively irresponsible for professors to keep important things behind such simple spells.

She peered from behind the door and was pleased to see Pomfrey’s back. Pocketing the two vials, she slipped out of the office, walking quickly and quietly back towards the entry doors. She must have become accustomed to the pain of her missing toe, as it definitely wasn’t bothering her as much as it had been even an hour earlier. 

Back in her bedroom, Hermione once again closed the curtains around her bed and prepared to do some field medicine on her toe. Before beginning, she thought it would be wise to check the condition of her damaged appendage. 

This time she was a little more prepared, and had brought some tissues to transfigure into gauze, and a ribbon to turn into a bandage. Lavender had enough of both that they wouldn’t be missed.

Tentatively, she peeled one edge of the sticky plaster away from her skin. She was thankful that there wasn’t much in the way of hair on her toes at the moment because that would have made the removal of the plaster quite a bit more painful. As it was, she removed it fairly smoothly from her skin. 

The angle at which she was sitting - leaning back against the head of her bed with her left leg crossed over right knee, didn’t give her much of a view of the affected toe. She squirmed to the right, trying to get a better look, before remembering that the previous evening she’d used a mirror. It still lay on her side-table.

She summoned it, moved it into position and observed the damage.

It looked about the same as it had the day before. She dipped one of the gauze pads into a bowl of water she’d brought with her, careful lest she move abruptly and wet her bed.

Dabbing at the wound, she again felt less pain than she had the previous night which was promising. She didn’t fancy spending the next week or so hobbling around, awaiting the eventual regrowth of a relatively insignificant digit.

She opened the vial of dittany and conjured a pipette. She hadn’t taken enough to be wasteful with its use - every drop must count. Squeezing the bulb of the pipette to get rid of the air and create a vacuum, she lowered it into the essence of dittany. A column of fluid filled the tube as she slowly released the pressure at the top. 

She released exactly 3 drops of the essence of dittany onto the stub. That would do it.  She covered the wound with fresh gauze and the conjured bandage, before drinking half the Skele-gro. 

Hermione packed up her belongings, stowing the spare gauze, bandage and the medicines under her pillow for safe-keeping. Grabbing her bag, she set off for her next class - Alchemy - hoping that the doses she’d taken were enough. How long should it take to grow back a few phalanges? Surely not too long - Harry’s entire arm had regrown overnight. And this was only a few teeny-tiny bones.

The Alchemy class was small, according to McGonagall. Hermione thought small was over-reaching really. There were just 5 students studying Alchemy for the N.E.W.T’s, though it was composed of students across all four houses; Terry Boot and Padma Patil representing Ravenclaw, Ernie MacMillan from Hufflepuff and Malfoy from Slytherin, and her. 

She took her seat next to Padma. Terry and Ernie had taken the front desk, closest to the door, while she and Padma had chosen the next twin desk - also in the front row (of course). She didn’t actually know where Malfoy chose to sit. He sauntered in after them and sat somewhere in the back, but since he never spoke, and she didn’t make a habit of turning around to look at him, his location relative to hers was unknown.

“Good afternoon, students. As you now know, Alchemy is the quest for perfect materials. While one branch of alchemy, the commonly known one, explores the transmutation of common metals into gold - the other delves into the production and nature of perfect materials. In metals, perfection can be many things. Could anyone name an aspect of metal that would make it ‘perfect’?” 

Hermione’s hand shot into the air. In the past she’d been made to feel ashamed, or embarrassed, about the vigour with which she offered to answer questions. She had the answers - she should give them. It really was as simple as that. 

“Yes Miss Granger” Her professor eyed her quivering hand with a raised eyebrow.

“Purity, Professor.” Hermione’s answer was quick and precise. If McGonagall wanted extrapolation on her response, she’d give it. 

“Excellent example, Miss Granger. How does one produce a pure metal?” McGonagall looked across the four of them sitting at the front bench, none of whom had their hands raised. Hermione knew that metals could be pure, but actually wasn’t sure how that happened. She made a mental note to find a text on metal purity in the Library after dinner. It wouldn’t do to not know the ‘why’ of something.

McGonagall’s eyes broke from the front row, and a small smile spread across her face. “Yes, Mister Malfoy, Can you tell us more about this?”

Hermione and her peers spun on their stools, turning to face Malfoy. He’d been sitting directly behind her, two rows back. He cleared his throat. 

“It’s to do with the extraction of the metals from their mineral ores - the ways in which the metal atoms are chemically and physically separated from the minerals that make up the ore.” Malfoy smirked like the cat who got the cream. Besting Hermione in their classes had been a game he’d been at for years and it wasn’t often that he had an answer when she did not.

When Malfoy met her eyes and raised an eyebrow, she realised she’d been staring. She shouldn’t be surprised, it wasn’t often that he knew more than her, but it always caught her off guard.

“Excellent, Mister Malfoy, 10 points to Slytherin. Yes, metals come from mineral ores. As Mister Malfoy said, purity is a result of the refinement of that ore into a metal. When the metal is impure there are signs. One of these signs is imperfections in the lattice of the metal.” McGonagall’s tone conveyed her approval of the Slytherin’s response.  

Hermione heard scratching on the whiteboard, her sign to turn around and pay attention to their professor, and not the git who apparently knew more about metal processing than she did. How, though? She’d read a bit about mineral ores; the word was familiar to her - though she’d not been able to think about them quickly enough to answer the earlier question. Her parents' insistence on her understanding the Biological and Physical sciences - but who would provide that for him?

The question continued to plague her as she dutifully copied diagrams of crystal lattice structures, charming her notes to create a 3 dimensional rotating model of the ‘face-centred-cubic’ pattern. She was adding annotations to her diagram when she heard an odd phrase - one she’d certainly never expected to hear inside the walls of Hogwarts.

“X-rays can be used to examine the structure of crystal lattices - by examining the patterns that are made when these waves pass through the crystal. The challenging part for us will be to create X-rays to study the lattices of different crystals.”  McGonagall added her name to the list of Hogwarts teachers having the students do dangerous things for their education. 

Hermione raised her hand. 

“Yes, Miss Granger?” 

“X-rays are a dangerous type of radiation, professor. How will we be able to do this safely?”

“Excellent question. Thankfully for us, a Protego charm will work as well against X-ray radiation as it will against curses. Our main challenge will be learning the adjusted Lumos. Instead of casting a Lumos that produces light in the visible spectrum - we’ll be producing light with much higher frequencies.” Their professor grimaced. “It is quite a challenging spell to master, so we shall begin today.” Hermione valiantly refrained from asking why a Protego charm would only protect against certain wavelengths, while allowing visible light through...

The five students spent the next 50 minutes casting Lumos after Lumos. Focusing their intent on shorter wavelengths. The incantation required intent and sharp flick forward to cast. The faster the flick, the higher the frequency of light. 

By the end of the lesson Terry was consistently casting a violet light with his Lumos, nearing the Ultraviolet region of the spectrum but nowhere near the X-ray waves they required.  Pardma’s and Ernie’s were both blue. Hermione however, was not producing any light and was frustrated beyond measure. Is it the wrist flick? Maybe it’s too slow? Was she angling her wand incorrectly?  

“Watch where you’re casting, Granger!” Malfoy thundered. She looked across the room and saw him clutching at his arm.

“Oh dear” McGonagall moved to Malfoy and he removed his hand from the spot on his arm. A small section of his right forearm was marred; alabaster skin now tomato-toned. Goodness. What could have caused that?

“My, my.” McGonagall said, with… appreciation? “It seems Miss Granger is casting her Lumos in the Ultraviolet region of the spectrum. 10 points to Gryffindor”  

Oh, well, she should have realised. She wasn’t the problem - she had been casting perfectly the entire time. Well, closer to perfect than her peers. Brightest witch of her age and all.

“You’re kidding me. She’s burned me and you’re giving her house points?” Malfoy scowled in Hermione’s direction. 

“It’s like a little sunburn, Mister Malfoy. Miss Granger, please take Mister Malfoy’s things and accompany him to the Infirmary.”  

If it were ‘ just a little sunburn’ why the bloody hell couldn’t he carry his own things? Hermione returned his scowl, with interest.

She packed away her things. He swatted at her hand when she attempted to liberate him of the burden of his own satchel-bag. 

“I can carry it myself.” 

“Of course, well I’ll just… err, make sure you get there then.” 

He huffed. Of course he would huff. Should have been a ‘puff’ with the amount of huffing he did.

They walked together in what was definitely not companionable silence. What could she possibly have to say to him? Oh, right. She should say something about the burn. 

“I’m, er, sorry about the burn, Malfoy. I didn’t know.” 

Another huff in response. Surely he had a better vocabulary than that - in fact she’d heard it just this lesson.

“Malfoy, why do you know about ores?” 

That got his attention. They kept walking, but she caught him looking at her, a slight tilt to his head as they strode the tiled corridor. He sucked in the corner of one cheek, probably considering where to answer the question, or just continue to ignore her; as he’d done for the last 6 or so years.

“I know a lot of things about them. I’m quite fond of rowing”  The smirk reached its final position on his face. 

“You. What. Rowing?” She stumbled her way through the oration of her scrambling thoughts.

“Yes as I said, very fond.” He was nearly grinning now and his eyes were sparkling with mirth. He was toying with her.

“Mineral Ores, you git.” She corrected as she slapped at his uninjured arm.

What the heck had that been. A reflex. Years of listening to the gentle teasing from Harry and Ron, the slap was a Pavlovian response. She thought someone a ‘git’ and then slapped at the person.  It had never been anyone except her Gryffindor boys.

“What the hell, Granger? I didn’t know you could be so violent.” His eyes were still sparkling though. Was he… enjoying this?

“Only when required.” This time it was she who huffed, before resuming the journey to the infirmary. 

“My father…”

“Please don’t say ‘My father will hear about this’, Malfoy. Just, don’t. Please?” She really did not want to deal with Lord Lucius Malfoy coming to Hogwarts. The last time he’d come around, in fifth year when a particular professor thought it would be fun to transfigure Malfoy into a ferret, she’d inadvertently witnessed him berating the offending professor. It was… an epiphany of sorts. To find out that he held similar views to her on the teaching practices at Hogwarts.  That he was also incredibly handsome did not at all play into the crush she subsequently developed on a man she’d seen only a handful of times, and who was older enough to be her father.  

Eww..  She was well aware that it was a very stupid crush, but her teenage hormones did not give a hoot.

Malfoy looked at her, puzzled. She’d noticed him glancing in her direction, watching her, throughout their walk.

“I was going to say that my father owns several mines. I’ve been learning about the family business and he insists that an understanding of the processes is required for when I…” He abruptly stopped his explanation. “My father taught me.” His sharp tone implied an end to the discussion.

They continued in silence, Hermione pondering the tidbits of information she’d gleaned from her brief conversation with Malfoy. Had he been… opening up to her?  Surely not. They had nothing in common. Pureblood - Muggleborn. Slytherin - Gryffindor. Blonde - Brunette… Err.  

“Malfoy, do you drink Coffee?” The question appeared out of nowhere. What other differences did they have?

“No.”

She tried again. “Tea then?”

“Indeed.”

Bother. 

“You ask very strange questions, Granger.” He shook his head, possibly trying to figure out where she’d been going with the bizarre line of questioning.

They knocked at the door to the infirmary - announcing their arrival. 

“What can I do for you, dears?” Madam Pomfrey asked them.

Before Hermione could tell her what had happened in Alchemy, Malfoy piped up.

“Granger’s injured. She’s limping.”

That git. She managed to stop the reflex before she hit him in front of a teacher. That was a step too far.

Chapter Text

Hermione stilled. She would, under no circumstances, be revealing the state of her toe to madam Pomfrey. Firstly, because it would cause all sorts of questions that she had no interest in answering yet, and secondly, because Pomfrey would need to get the exact things Hermione had stolen the day before and was, therefore, more likely to find that a theft had occurred.

She needed to deflect Pomfrey’s attention away from her and onto Malfoy.

“Malfoy has burns, madam Pomfrey.” Hermione said, gesturing towards his reddened forearm.

“Oh dear.” She tutted quietly to herself, casting a diagnostic charm over his arm and observing the display.

“2nd degree burns, Mr. Malfoy. Potions, was it?” She asked.

He shook his head, wincing as she prodded at the skin with her wand. Had she sanitised it first? Probably not, Hermione thought. More likely she had no consideration for sterile technique and prodded her wand student to student, direct transmission of pathogens almost guaranteed.

“Alchemy,” he supplied between gritted teeth.

The woman was clearly shocked by this admission. Hermione watched as Pomfrey searched his face for any hint of a lie. There was none to be found, since he was not lying.

“I’ll need to apply a salve. Wait here please, Mr. Malfoy.”

Draco sighed, watching the woman return to her office and potion store.

As soon as she was out of earshot he turned, his eyes trained on Hermione’s face. The intensity of his gaze cut through her. 

“You were limping.” he said bluntly. “You’ve been limping all day.”

True, but there was no way on God’s green earth she’d be letting either him or Pomfrey find out why.

“Was not.”

“Were too.”

Honestly, such a childish argument but she simply couldn’t help herself. He brought out the snarking, childish brat in her. His gaze moved between her face and her left foot, which was definitely supporting her full weight.

“Tell me, Granger. Trust me.”

She laughed. “Trust you. Why would I trust you? We’re not friends. Besides, I’m not keeping any secrets.”

“Very well then, I’ll wait while Pomfrey inspects your foot and then she and I will both know. Or..” he raised an eyebrow at her. “You tell me, and I’ll whisk you out of here before she gets a glimpse of whatever is going on down there.”

“There’s nothing ‘going on down there’, Malfoy. It’s just a stubbed toe.” she retorted. She could feel the heat on her cheeks. Dammit, why must she be such a terrible liar in situations like these. 

“If there’s nothing to see, then let me see it.” He prodded at her.

“No.”

“Fine.”

Their conversation at a halt, they waited in silence until Madam Pomfrey returned, a white jar in her hands.

This time she cast a sanitising spell over the area before applying the cream to his raw skin. 

Hermione startled when his least affected arm twitched, and his hand grasped her. She glanced down, noting the rings on his fingers that curled around her wrist. Her skin was burning under his touch.

“Sorry” He muttered, loosening his grip as a blush spread across his pale cheeks.

He moved his hand away. Without thinking, Hermione reached out and clasped his hand with hers - giving a gentle squeeze of support. It must have been quite painful for him to seek comfort from her. She’d caused the injuries, the least she could do is be an outlet for him as he squeezed her fingers to keep himself from crying out.

He grimaced, clearly not pleased with his own mis-step in decorum, but Hermione held tightly until Pomfrey declared herself finished with that arm and asked for the other.

Hermione released his hand, her own two hands finding each other in her lap as she twiddled her fingers nervously - hoping he’d be able to stomach the pain without the help she provided. Thankfully the right arm, the one she’d held first, wasn’t as badly burned as the left - likely since he didn’t cast with that arm and he had a tendency to brace it behind his back when he was focusing. 

Still, it was damaged enough to require treatment and she admired the lines of his face as his jaw tightened with each stroke pushing the salve into his skin.

“You’ll need to keep them covered until the skin grows back.” Pomfrey informed Draco as she placed some cotton wadding over the wounds and spelled bandages to wrap around them. “Come back tomorrow to replace the bandages.”

Draco nodded. “Thank you, Madam Pomfrey.” The elderly witch began to pack up her things, preparing to walk away with them when he interrupted her.

“Granger still needs attention.” He stated boldly. That bloody twat.

“Of course, of course. Silly me. Up on the bed dearie and pop your shoe off.”

Hermione walked around the bed Draco was sitting on and sat herself on the next one across, as far from him as possible and facing away. Not that it deterred him. He swung his body around on the bed he sat on moved to stand behind her, leaning over to observe as she spelled her laces to untie.

The git. How was she supposed to vanish the bandages - to hide the evidence - when he was watching her every movement so intently?  

She paused with only the sock remaining on her foot.

“Need some help, Granger?” Draco asked cockily over her shoulder.

“Thanks, but no. Believe it or not, I am actually capable of taking my own socks off.”

He chuckled lightly at her snarky retort. She hated the way her body responded to that sound.

Pomfrey pulled a stool over and rested Hermione’s heel on it. She sat on another stool and carefully peeled the sock down over Hermione’s ankle and then off her foot. 

Hermione closed her eyes, knowing that whatever was about to happen she’d need to think up an exceptionally good lie.

A spider ate it? No - there were no flesh eating spiders in the castle. Not anymore - Crooks had seen to that.

Stuck in the drain of the bathtub? Possible, but she didn’t want to put the image of herself bathing into Draco’s head. She didn’t want to think about him thinking about her bath…  No, not that one.

A heavy book? That could explain the bandage - but not why a toe was missing. Merlin’s saggy tits, she needed to come up with something quickly.

She opened her eyes as Pomfrey peeled away the dressing from the stub of her toe.  Her toe. Her actual toe. Not a stub. A whole toe. Thank Godric.

Pomfrey hummed as she observed the toe from multiple angles. The nail hadn’t completely grown back for some reason.

“I kicked something and… er… damaged the nail. It has been a bit sore while it regrows.” Hermione said. A satisfactory explanation for a bloody miracle. She’d regrown a whole toe. Why was she able to regrow a toe while people who were cursed couldn’t regrow body parts? She thought of George and his golden ear. Those twins; she should have known better than to let them play with muggle fireworks.

Pomfrey gently touched the sides of the toe and Hermione was surprised to find there was no pain there, just the cool touch of the witch’s hands.

“Well dear, it looks to be healing nicely. There’s no need to cover it now, though I’d advise against running until the nail is fully grown.”

“Thank you. I’ll refrain.” She heard Draco scoff behind her. She was not the type to run anywhere. Walk briskly? Of course, but run… Heavens no.

“Back to class then. Mr Malfoy I’ll see you at lunch tomorrow to replace the bandages. Don’t forget.”

Hermione quickly replaced her sock and shoe, grabbed her satchel off the bed and strode out the doors of the infirmary. Draco’s long strides echoed in the hall behind her. 

Firm hands grabbed her - pulling her sideways into an alcove behind a tapestry of Dedalus the Daunted. 

Draco’s hands held her tightly, his grasp on her shoulders firmed as he stared into her eyes. 

“You weren’t scared of showing her a broken toenail, Granger. Tell me what’s going on.” He demanded, squeezing her shoulders with the cadence of his words.

“No." She snapped.  "Sod off.” 

“Tell me.” He demanded again.

“Why, Malfoy. Why would I tell you anything, hmm?”

“You’re up to something, Granger, and I will find out what. One way or another.” His voice had dropped an octave and their vibrations hit her eardrums, causing a shiver through her body. She needed to get control of this.

“I’m not.” She writhed in his grip, trying to escape.

He smirked at her. “I don’t believe you. You’ve been acting odd. Ever since you asked all the professors about where the vanished things go.”

She stilled at his words. How much attention had he been paying to her, to notice something so small? 

“What did you say?” She hissed

“Oh, hit a nerve, have I?” He smirked and brought his face closer to hers. “Don’t tell me you’re still on that wild peacock chase, Granger. They don’t go anywhere.”

Her ire grew. Not only was he physically restraining her, breathing his stupid minty breath all over her face, he now had the audacity to belittle her ideas. Again.

“They do, and I’m going to prove it” She lifted her knee, connecting it firmly with his gut. She exited the alcove, leaving him groaning behind her.  She really shouldn’t have said that.

Seated again on her four-poster bed in Gryffindor tower, Hermione used the conjured mirror to inspect the regrown toe. Scientifically speaking, she should probably take photographs of anything she planned to vanish in the future. She needed to know if it was exactly the same or if there would be tiny differences. It seemed the toe she’d regrown was an exact replica of the one she’d vanished.

Was there a toe floating in the aether somewhere? Were her toe hairs floating in that same place? 

She laid back on her pillows, calculations and theories running through her head. She needed to find a way to go to the place where vanished things go. 

Chapter Text

After a good night’s sleep Hermione came to the obvious conclusion that sending herself to the place where the vanished things go was, quite honestly, the stupidest idea she’d ever had. 

What she actually required was a way to see into the place she knew the vanished things went. 

Briefly, she allowed her mind to wander, fancying her name recorded in magical textbooks for a reason other than her contributions to the war.  A role model, an inspiration, for students left unsatisfied when their inquiries into magical theory were met with a hand wave and ‘that’s just the way it is’.

It was lazy, and irksome. A flagrant disregard for the extent of their privilege. The whole of magical society  going about their business with, in most cases, no understanding of the magic they harnessed.

Thirsty? Cast an aguamenti.

Need a cup but too lazy to get one from the cupboard? Conjure one.

Need something from the endless abyss that was the space inside every school bag to ever exist? Accio. 

Made a mess? Evanesco.  

Frivolous uses of magic with nary a perception of how. 

She shook her head vigorously and gave herself a gentle smack on the cheek for good measure.  Getting lost in fantasies, and spiraling in an undercurrent of negative observations was no way to start a weekend.

Hermione’s gait was steady as she entered the hall for breakfast. Harry scooted along the crowded bench to make space for her. His sparkling green eyes and wide smile meant he hadn’t discovered her treachery. 

“Toe’s better?” Ron asked around a mouthful of crumpet. 

“Yes, as I said - it was just a stubbed toe.”

“You know we worry about you, ‘Mione. You wouldn’t be running into things so much if you got more sleep, you know?” Harry elbowed her playfully, failing in his attempt to bring a lighthearted touch to a conversation they’d already had many times that year.

“I know. I am sleeping. It’s not nightmares, if that’s what you’re worried about. I just… I’m taking a lot of classes. It’s a lot to study for.”

“We know,” Ron agreed, this time his mouth crunching around a slice of pear.

“If it is the nightmares… well, talking helps.  You can talk to us. You know that right? I know everything’s different after last year and none of us expected to be back here, but we’re still us…” 

She bumped her shoulder affectionately against Harry’s arm and leaned her head to rest against his shoulder. Gone were the days when she could rest it on his shoulder, he’d grown far too tall for that.  

“Hermione, why’s Malfoy looking at you?” Dean’s question caught her off guard. She spun around, and managed to catch the rapid movement of Malfoy’s head as he turned to snarl at the younger Slytherin seated next to him. 

“Gin said she saw you both walking the corridors yesterday.” Harry said.

“To the infirmary. I burned his arm with wandlight.”

“You did what? I didn’t even know that was possible? It’s just light, innit?” Ron’s face bore the puzzled expression that so often fell upon those confronted with magic outside their expectations. She loved Ron, truly she did. But he and his family were a prime example of using magic for menial tasks without understanding. She didn’t begrudge them its use, that would be hypocritical of her - she certainly didn’t want to wash dishes by hand either - but she was frustrated that they took it for granted.

“It’s not just light, Ron. It’s a spectrum of waves of different frequencies. If you project all colours you get white light and if you choose only certain frequencies in the visible range you get a particular colour.”

Ron’s brow furrowed. “Light’s a wave?”

Hermione closed her eyes and took a deep breath in through her nose. It wasn’t his fault he had no understanding of basic scientific principles. 

“Yes.”

“You’re so smart, ‘Mione.” He reached over to tap his knuckles against her head. “Dunno how you fit it all in there.” She returned his infectious grin.

“One day, if I put too much in, it might blow up.”

“Would it really?” Dean asked.  

“No.” Hermione grabbed a banana off the table and stood. “I’ve got some research to do today. See you at lunch.”

********

Hermione stood in front of the old Headmaster’s portrait and waited patiently for him to wake from his, seemingly peaceful, slumber. She was patient, she would wait until he was ready. Even if he was a portrait, it would be rude to wake him up. Wouldn’t it?

That patience lasted approximately 16 minutes while he snored and occasionally muttered in his sleep. Honestly. He was a portrait, what need did he have for sleep?

“Excuse me, Professor Dumbledore, Sir?” She asked tentatively.

He continued to snore.

She cleared her throat at twice the volume.

For goodness sake.

She rapped her knuckles firmly on the frame of his portrait. Success!

“Miss Granger, how delightful to see you.”

“I’m very sorry to wake you, Headmaster, but I have a project I’m working on and I could use some help.”

Dumbledore raised his brow and peered over his half-moon glasses.

“It must be quite some project, if it requires you to wake the dead.” He smirked at her.

Her cheeks flushed crimson. “I’m so sorry, Sir. I’ll go.”

“Don’t go, Miss Granger. I jest. Help will always be given to students in need. Tell me more about your project.”

Hermione swallowed the retort she wanted to spit out at his statement. He could think of more than a dozen times where he’d been here and hadn’t bothered to help students in need. A particular blonde Slytherin came to mind. She couldn’t be sidetracked, there was a task at hand and she hoped he’d be able to help her. Considering it wasn’t a life-or-death situation, he probably would.

“Well. You know how magic is balanced and isn’t limitless?” It was more of a statement, than a question but her old headmaster nodded along supportively.

“I don’t understand why removing an object from existence doesn’t release astronomical amounts of energy. Conjuring pulls energy from energy already in a system - from the caster or the environment. Transfiguring is just rearrangement with a little magic being pulled in to make additional mass.  But vanishing things - evanesco, tergio - Sir they remove matter, but the energy doesn’t go back to the environment. The items are gone but there’s no remnant and it…” Her rant left her flustered. “It just doesn’t make any sense! They have to go somewhere.”

Dumbledore scratched the hair at his temple. “An interesting project indeed Miss Granger. And what have you discovered?”

“Well… and before you say anything, I KNOW this was foolish, but I started casting vanishing charms on myself.”

Dumbledore's eyebrows lifted to an impossible new height as he appraised her.  “Go on…” he said, though she thought she could see him mumbling something that sounded an awful lot like ‘smartest witch of her age’.

“I vanished a mole. And it hasn’t come back. Then I vanished some hairs, but they grew back. I think it was because of the pores, the cells the hairs came from, well they were still intact. So I thought, maybe I should vanish the pores, but when I did, I accidentally vanished my whole toe. Don’t worry - it grew back.”  She stopped, giving the old man a moment to think.

“Quite an interesting project. What is your goal here, Miss Granger?” He asked. 

“I want to find out where the vanished things go. Can you help me?”

Dumbledore chuckled and swung his hand around inside his painting. “Are you asking to vanish me, as a portrait, and see if I can communicate from this mythical place?”

Hermione’s brow furrowed. Why hadn’t she thought of that?

“You would…” she started but was cut off by another chuckle.

“I don’t think that would work, even if the place existed, if there isn’t magic there, then the portrait wouldn’t work. I’m quite fond of the view here and would rather stay. Not that I can stop you trying, but I’d rather appreciate remaining in-situ.”

She nodded solemnly. “Of course, I would never dream of....”

“You could try a mirror.”

“A mirror?”

“Mmm. Yes. Generally flat, shiny, and you can see yourself in them.” His eyes sparkled with mischief.

“I don’t understand.”

“Perhaps you are asking the wrong Dumbledore. Good luck Miss Granger.”

Dumbledore wandered off, humming quietly to himself as he sauntered out of the frame.

Classic Dumbledore, really. More than likely knows the answer - and refusing to actually be helpful. Though what he said about ‘the wrong Dumbledore’... Her mind quickly connected the dots. Perhaps she should speak with his brother; Aberforth.

The realisation hit her like a book falling on her face when she fell asleep. She didn’t need a regular mirror. She needed a two-way mirror, like the one she had held a shard of during their 7th year. 

She plopped herself down on the floor and rummaged through her satchel bag. 

Sometimes she missed the trusty beaded bag she’d been so familiar with - it had barely left her body for the better part of a year - but their time on the run had not been kind to the beads. Or the strap. 

Her new bag, with its soft buckskin, was much hardier. And roomier. A fool might have assumed that an undetectable extension charm would result in the inside of the bag being the same size, regardless of the size of the object containing the charm, and they would be right. What that fool would fail to understand, however, was the importance of manoeuvrability when it came to retrieving items from the bag.  It was so much easier to find things when your arm could comfortably fit through the opening, without tiny beads rubbing against the armpit.

So she rummaged. She wasn’t one for wasting magic on accio when a good rummage was so much more satisfying. At least it would have been satisfying had the rummage resulted in her fingers finding the damn mirror.

5 minutes and no fewer than a dozen moderate swears later, Hermione gave up on Adhering to Principles and summoned the damn mirror. Or tried to.

She huffed in frustration, throwing her head back against the wall with a quiet thunk and closing her eyes.

“Well, well. I appear to be witnessing a certified miracle.” Malfoy drawled from where he leaned against the entry arch.

“Bugger off.” She replied, not bothering to open her eyes. 

Hermione was not scared of Malfoy. She had testified at his trial and was, unfortunately, witness to the horrors he’d faced in the years that snakeface had occupied his family’s home. Sometimes the nightmares that woke her weren’t hers, but conjured by the briefest glance into the hell he’d lived through. 

“Is there something you need that is not in that bag?” He asked. She opened her eyes to glare at him.

“There is actually. Don’t happen to have a spare two way mirror on your person, hmm?”

“Depends what you want it for. Who’re you spying on?” He cocked an eyebrow at her and bloody smirked.

“I’m not spying…” she shook her head. “Forget it, Malfoy.”

He didn’t leave. “Are you following me?”

She stared at him. He stared at her.  It was a staring contest she would not lose.

Her hair had other ideas, strands slipping free and covering her face.

“It’s the vanished things. You want to vanish one don’t you? Prove to everyone that you’re right.”

This time it was her brows that furrowed. How had he figured it out?

“What do you want, Malfoy?”

She sat under his gaze, growing uncomfortable as the seconds passed. His eyes roved her face. Thoughts raced through her mind. He wouldn’t hurt her, she was sure of that. The harsh words he’d thrown around had stopped the moment he’d returned to Hogwarts for 8th year. 

“Was it all a show?” She voiced her thoughts aloud.

“What?”

“The way you treated everyone. Was it all for show? Did you really hate us?”

He scowled again, but his eyes remained fixed on her. He didn’t look away as she looked at him, returning his gaze with equal intensity. She could feel the tension between them, as her question hung unanswered in the air. 

“People change, Granger.”

She couldn’t help the huffed laugh that escaped her nose. “That much? That quickly?”

He stood upright and walked towards her. Hermione scrambled to her feet, almost falling as her leg twisted in the strap of her bag. She stood to her full height as he stepped into her personal space and glared down at her.  She pressed back against the wall as he moved even closer, his right palm against the wall, high above her head.

She wasn’t scared. Intimidated, yes. But not scared.

Hermione met his cool grey eyes, watching the tempest inside them as he leaned down toward her face. She could smell the mint of his breath. She saw the fine blonde hairs that sparsely covered his cheeks. Dammit, she could even feel the heat of his body so close to hers. What was going on?

She couldn’t help the flush that spread across her cheeks, she was only human after all. Only an idiot wouldn’t admit that Malfoy was fit. If this was how he intended to intimidate her she’d sign up for it on a daily basis - it was far preferable to slurs and sneers.

“Yes, that much. And yes, that quickly.” He enunciated each word clearly. His eyes bore into hers and she couldn’t help the way her head tilted back, the way it brought their faces closer together. Malfoy’s tongue licked along his lips. “It simply requires a catalyst.”

He pushed away from the wall and smirked at her. 

She couldn’t move. As he walked away, he called over his shoulder.

“There happens to be an expert on vanishing cabinets in the castle. Find him when you’re ready to listen.”

Chapter Text

Hermione rushed down the stairs, her hair flying behind her. She was late. It was already 4:02 and she’d agreed to meet her friends at 4 o’clock. She spun around the corner from the stairs to the main entryway, her shoes gripping tightly to the weathered concrete floors. 

She need not have bothered. Ginny sat on the base of a stone statue, thumbing through a quidditch magazine. Her long hair was braided into a crown. It had been months since Hermione had seen it out and flowing. Near the start of the term, Hermione had asked Ginny about the change in hairstyle. Her friend had grimaced; ‘constant vigilance’ her response.

The war had changed Ginny. Gone was the carefree girl who openly longed for Harry’s love and attention. She still craved it, but it was subtle now - hidden beneath the mask she wore. Hermione supposed it helped her get through the day, allowing her to survive knowing that mere months ago her favourite brother had died not so far away.  

Hermione bit her lip. She hadn’t been a good friend to Ginny. She’d been so caught up in the excitement of returning to Hogwarts, that she’d been blind to the obvious changes in all of her friends.

“Hey Gin.” Hermione said, puffing slightly as she sat herself on the other side of the statue. “Sorry I’m a bit late.”

Ginny chuckled. “Hardly, Hermione. I said four because I want to leave at 4:30. You’re early actually.”

Hermione huffed in indignation. “You what?”

Ginny had the absolute audacity to laugh again. “Not to you, to them. I told them 4, but you 4:30.”

She thought back over the conversation with Gin. “Are you sure?” she asked.

Gin reached around and squeezed Hermione’s hand. “Positive. Maybe you were zoned out when I told you and latched onto the time you heard me tell them, yeah?”

That must be it. 

“So then why are you here at 4?” Hermione asked.

“Needed some air. The 7th year girls are constantly grilling me. Asking all these questions about you three and I just don’t want to spend my day answering them. I needed a break. That’s part of why I suggested this. It’s been ages since we went out. Just the four of us. It’ll be like old times”

Hermione very much hoped it would not be like old times. She didn’t miss the awkward glances between Ginny and Harry. She didn’t miss the tension between her and Ron. Their last time to the Leaky as a group of 4 had been in 6th year. There weren’t many fond memories of Ron from that year, nor Harry. 

But that was the past, and she was more than happy to leave it there. The jealousy she’d felt towards Ron, for the way he’d been with Lavender, was well and truly behind her. Time, abandonment and a single uninspiring kiss had torn her teenage fantasies to shreds. 

“Is everything alright with you three?” Ginny asked. Her blue eyes fixed on Hermione’s, searching for the lie she expected.

Hermione sighed. “Not really. You know they didn’t want to come back. But had to, to get their N.E.W.T’s; to be Aurors. I wanted to. I want to be here. I want to learn.” she sighed. “Honestly Gin, it’s been kind of lonely. I have all these questions and voice them, Ron and Harry look at me like I’m a three-headed newt.

Ginny nods along like she’s listening, but Hermione can tell that she’s tuned out. Being raised in a pureblood family she also took magic for granted. At first she’d thought Hermione’s questions charming, and had encouraged them, particularly with her father. But her patience and interest had waned, just like everyone else’s.

They sat in silence, perched on either side of the stone. It wasn’t a comfortable silence. Not awkward, but neither of them were fully at ease. There were too many things unspoken between them, Hermione desperately holding her questions inside and unable to continue with conversations when she was frustrated by the answers she was given at every turn.

“I saw you with Malfoy” Ginny said abruptly, her words slicing through the quiet between them. 

Hermione tensed, wondering when, exactly, they'd been spotted. 

“Yeah, outside the infirmary. Did he hurt you?” Her concern was genuine. Hermione peered around the statue and met her friend's eyes. Ginny’s brows were furrowed and she was biting her lip, a nervous habit she’d developed and had been unsuccessful in abandoning after the war.

“No. Quite the opposite actually.”  

Ginny quirked a brow and tilted her head, questioning.

“Yeah, I. Well I burned him.”

“But you weren’t travelling from the dungeons?” A confused look appeared on Ginny’s face as she tried to understand any other way a burn could occur outside of the infamous potions lab. Hermione could name on one hand the number of students who hadn’t been burned during potions in her time at Hogwarts. And that was from her year, and the year above and below.

“No, alchemy. I was, um, careless with my wand work and gave him a rather nasty sunburn.” Hermione grinned. “It was quite funny actually, you should have seen the look on his face when McGonagall gave me house points. Truly priceless.” She chuckled.

Ginny's confused expression remained, with the addition of a sparkle of glee in her eyes.

“How?” She asked.

Hermione launched into a detailed explanation of how the speed and orientation of the wand movement for lumos could cause waves in different regions of the spectrum, rather than the general white light of the colours in the visible region.

“Wait, wait.. Are you saying that microwaves, like the ones dad’s got hooked up in the shed, that they’re a form of light? Blimey. You’ve got to tell him, Hermione. He’ll go bonkers!”

They both collapsed sideways against the stone in a fit of giggles, thinking about the bug-eyed expression Arthur might wear if he were to learn that his precious microwaves could be made with his wand. 

“What’s so funny?” Ron asked, stopping a few feet in front of them with his arms crossed sourly across his chest.

“Nothing, Ron. Just a funny joke. Girl stuff.” Ginny said, as she leaped from her seat and wrapped her arms around Harry’s neck.

“Right,” Ron cleared his throat, “Well then, let’s get going, yeah?”

Hermione trailed behind them as the Weasley’s and Harry chatted endlessly about quidditch. Her conversation with Ginny had brought her a sense of peace she’d been searching for. Acceptance of her questions and curiosity. It reminded her of what they used to have. Before they’d left her behind.

“Four butterbeers, thanks” Hermione said cheerily to Aberforth. She waved to the portrait of Ariana, and the girl gave her a timid wave in return.

She could hear Ron grousing to Harry from the booth they’d taken near the bar. “Why’d we come here, it’s grimy. The service is shite, the food’s worse. I thought at least I’d get a chance to see Rosie this trip.”

Hermione rolled her eyes. It was such a cliche for her ex boyfriend to be gushing over a woman nearly twice his age. She leaned against the bar, watching as Aberforth dug around behind the counter before pulling out four, mostly transparent, glasses. 

“So, Aberforth. I was wondering about that Mirror you had. Do you know how it was made? Or do you still have it? I would love to pick your brain about it.”  She smiled sweetly at him, her elbows resting on the bar, and her chin on the backs of her hands. The epitome of sweet intrigue.

He scowled. “Don’t know nothing about it, and you’d best not ask any questions either. It’s no good business, that. Those boys had no idea what they were playing with.”

“Do you mean your brother and..?” She was cut off from answering his question.

“Bah! Not him. Though he’d have made one if he knew how. The bit I had was from Black’s mirror.”

“Sirius?”

“Enough questions girly, drink your drinks and leave me be.”

She could hear him muttering about bloody teenagers under his breath as he turned to wipe a grimy glass with an even grimier cloth. She’d not be getting the answers she sought here.

Hermione slid into the booth and handed off the glasses to her friends. No sooner had their lips closed around the lips of their respective glasses than the doorbell rang and a small slither of light entered the dusty room.

“Fucking Malfoy” Ron spat. His unfettered hatred was a visceral reaction to Malfoy’s presence. He blamed Malfoy for so much of what had happened; for Dumbledore’s death, for Fred’s. 

Hermione understood, she really did. Malfoy had been there that night on the Astronomy tower. He had let the death-eaters into Hogwarts - Had tipped the scales in favour of the dark when the strongest member of the light fell. Ron couldn’t see past the darkness on Mafloy’s arm to see the scared boy underneath.

Because he had been scared. She’d noticed the changes in him during sixth year. His ordinarily pale complexion growing pallid. His sharp cheekbones hollowed as he ate less and less at each meal.

But Ron refused to see it. He saw everything in black and white. In yes and no. In right and wrong. It was why he was so vehemently against her inquiry into magic. Magic just was and it shouldn’t be questioned. Malfoy was evil and that fact shouldn’t be questioned.

It was tiresome.

She tuned-out the monologue she’d heard before, finishing her drink quickly. Her friends’ conversation quickly returned to quidditch - a topic she had even less interest in than the state of Malfoy.

She stood abruptly “I’m going to Tomes and Scrolls. Don’t wait for me, I’ll see you for dinner in the castle.” Ginny and Harry cast none-to-subtle looks at each other - unspoken queries..’think she’ll be okay?’, ‘yeah, she’ll be okay’, ‘should I go with her?’.  Ginny moved as if to accompany her. 

“Stay, Gin. Enjoy the afternoon.” Hermione walked away from the table only slightly disappointed that her friends hadn’t argued more to spend time with her.

Tomes and Scrolls had nothing on magical two-way mirrors, much to her chagrin and not at all to her surprise. 

The sun was still high in the sky when she made her way along the path that led back to Hogwarts. She hummed Vivaldi’s spring to herself as she walked, closing her eyes to enjoy the feel of the sunlight against them. The birds sang with her and the wind carried her voice away.

It also masked the sound of approaching footsteps.

“Wait up.”

Ernie’s large strides ate up the ground between them in a matter of moments. She smiled at her friend.

“Hi Ernie. I didn’t realise you were in Hogsmeade today”. The Hufflepuff blushed a rather charming shade of red. 

“Oh, yes. Well I had a date, but it didn’t go very well. I was trying to leave and saw you walking alone, said that you’d promised to meet me in the Library for some Alchemy study and left rather abruptly. Hope you don’t mind.”

Hermione’s feet pulled her to a stop. She turned to face him. “You what?” she demanded.

“I said you’d promised…”

“You used a fabricated homework assignment with me to get out of a date? Yes I heard that, Ernie. My confusion is why you think that is an appropriate thing to do?” She huffed. These were boys. Such boys. No manners, no decency. “You can’t do that to a witch, regardless of how the date is going. Get back there right now.”

Ernie’s face continued to redden as his expression turned from embarrassment to anger.

“Well I did. So you can either stand here on your own, or walk with me back to the castle and go to the Library like I said we would.”

“No, thankyou” she said curtly “I’ll stay right here. Bugger off, MacMillan.”

“Granger, just come with..” 

“The lady said no. As she said, fuck off MacMillan.”  Malfoy’s signature drawl thrummed through her skin.

“I don’t need you to rescue me, Malfoy!” Ire raging inside her. She was not some damsel in distress, waiting around to be rescued by a handsome prince. “I had it handled.”

“Indeed.” She followed Malfoy’s gaze, his eyes fixed on Ernie’s rapidly retreating form.

“May I escort you to the castle, Granger?” He asked politely, offering her the crook of his arm.

She scoffed. “No.” 

He was following her back to Hogwarts. If she stopped, he stopped. If she deviated from the path, he’d follow with his eyes.  He didn’t approach her again. Didn’t speak to her. He was just there.

“Why are you following me, Malfoy?” Hermione demanded.

“I’m not. I’m just walking back to Hogwarts and you happen to also be walking back to Hogwarts.”

“Well don’t.” She snapped.

“Don’t walk?” He asked, his lips quirking as he teased her.

“Yes.”

She huffed and resumed her trek to the castle. He was still behind her.

“Morgana’s tits Malfoy, go in front if you must walk.”

“Alright.”

She watched as his long strides bridged the gap between them. Her breath caught when he passed so close to her she could smell his cologne. She bit her lip. She would not react. If he wanted to walk to the castle - fine. He could walk to the castle. In front of her.

He kept walking and she started after him. She admired the set of his shoulders as he walked. Watched as he drummed his fingers against his leg to an unknown rhythm and tilted his head side to side as if he were listening to a song. The journey to the castle passed much quicker with entertainment to accompany her racing thoughts.

Hermione glowered at the Gargoyle statue. “Lemon sherbet”.

It didn’t move.

“Gum drop” 

Nothing.

“Oh for goodness sake I just want to speak to the headmaster let me up”

Silence.

She settled in against the wall to wait. The walk to the castle had given her time for her mind to wander. After she’d finished admiring Malfoy’s form, she spent the remaining time contemplating the functionality of the paired mirrors. She’d read something in Cosmos about a phenomenon known as quantum entanglement. Where a pair of particles could be linked in such a way that whatever happened to one, would happen to the other - no matter how far apart they were.

Hermione supposed that the same principle was what allowed for the functionality of the two way mirrors. With the images and sounds captured on one side being received on the other. If she could find a book on quantum entanglement, maybe she could figure out how to create a pair of mirrors like the Dumbledore’s had used.  

But that sort of book would not be among the tomes in the Hogwarts Library, nor any wizarding library. She would need somewhere with access to Quantum Physics Research. Somewhere that could help her untangle the mystery of quantum entanglement and figure out a way to magically entangle two mirrors. 

She could send one to the place where vanished things go and peak into that realm.

Excitement thrummed in her veins at the prospect of once again integrating her muggle and magical education.

“Miss Granger?”. The headmistress asked. “Are you quite alright?”

Hermione opened her eyes and blinked the headmistress's concerned face into focus.

“Oh, Sorry Headmistress, I must have fallen asleep. I was waiting to see you. I have a request you see.”

McGonagall pursed her lips.

“Go on.”

“I’d like a day pass if possible, to visit a library in London.”

“Just you?” 

“Yes. I won’t be long. There are some books I need to find and I think I could find them in the British Library.”

“Well, you are of age. Come on up and we’ll fill in the paperwork”

Chapter Text

Granger was most definitely up to something, of this Draco was absolutely certain. He’d disillusioned himself soon after entering the castle and followed her. If you asked him, he couldn’t say exactly why. It was more of a feeling. Intrigue.

He managed, with much restraint, to contain the laughs that threatened to escape when the stone golem refused to let her pass. The indignation on her face was unparalleled. This was a witch who was unfamiliar with being turned away and it was delightful to watch as understanding flitted across her face. The realisation that she wouldn’t be allowed to circumvent the statue’s password requirement. It was delightful and well worth the walk.

After her 3rd attempt, when her body language suggested preparation for a physical assault on the stone, he watched as she shook her head then slumped down onto the grey slate floors on the opposite side of the corridor. Within moments her eyes had fluttered shut, and her breaths grew slow and steady.

He couldn’t help but stare at her. Was it peaceful sleep or exhaustion? Merlin knew the witch spent half her life in the library if Theo’s accounts were anything to go by. But how? How could she feel safe to just lay down? Surely she didn’t feel safe? It must be utter exhaustion. Exhaustion was the only possible reason a witch as clever as her would dare be so vulnerable in such an open space. 

He should probably stay and make sure that creepy MacMillan didn’t return. 

He wasn’t being creepy - staying to watch over her as she slept.

It was protective. He’d been seen with her - returning to Hogwarts. If anything happened to her, he was the last one seen with her… well, he’d prefer nothing happened to her.

So it wasn’t creepy to stand guard while she slept on the floor of a vacant corridor. It was for her own good.

Salazar knew she needed protection  if her encounter with the deranged Hufflepuff was any indication. It was careless, irresponsible really, for her to fall asleep in such a place. It was a fairly busy corridor, with professors and students often hurrying through.

Draco should cast a notice-me-not on her sleeping form. She was huddled close enough to the wall that it was unlikely anyone would bump into her, but an extra measure of protection wouldn’t be unwarranted. He cast one on himself as well, not wanting to be caught lurking in the hallways. That often didn’t end well for him.

His footsteps were whisper quiet as he crossed the stone floor, the smooth soles of his dragonhide boots barely making a noise. He looked down at her peaceful form, admiring the curve of her nose and the freckles that splattered across her cheeks. Her face seemed younger like this, carefree - as it should be.

It was a stark contrast to its usual expressive form. Draco thought back on the way her breath had hitched in the Trophy room - the way her eyes had scanned his face. He was certain his own had been doing the exact same thing. 

Often, her face held looks of vague contempt. He was certain that others hadn’t noticed - but he had. The nuanced shift over the years from annoyance to frustration to contempt. 

It was subtle. Only a true master of the sneer would be able to decipher the nanoscopic changes in her features.

Mostly she wore that face when her friends or teachers ignored her questions. It was the mask she wore when she was dissatisfied by their lackluster responses. 

Her interest in vanishing things fascinated him. His own interest in understanding magic had been beaten out of him at a young age, only for him to be required at the tender age of 16 to understand a magic many adults could not. 

He’d laboured at the task of fixing that vanishing cabinet for months. He shivered as the thoughts of shrivelled apples and dead canaries ran across the forefront of his mind. Granger’s logic made sense. Magic did come from somewhere, from something and for the most part it was understood that it was drained from their cores and released, only to be reabsorbed later. 

If the vanished things went somewhere, which he strongly suspected they did, then maybe vanishing cabinets were simply closely connected doors that made a sort of wormhole through that place. Unfortunately he wouldn’t be able to test this theory since both counterparts he’d worked on were destroyed. One to Fiendfyre and one to ministry rage. 

Still, he was intrigued by the idea. 

His silent vigil lasted nearly an hour, before he heard the headmistress's voice down the corridor. He quietly removed the charm over her sleeping form, but remained where he was - curious to discover the purpose of her visit to McGonagall.

“Miss Granger?”. The headmistress asked. “Are you quite alright?”

Hermione blinked rapidly as she stirred. He wondered briefly if that was the kind of expression she’d make every morning when she woke up. He was shocked out of his seeing-Granger-in-the-morning daydream  by hearing her ask for the most Granger-y thing anyone could ask for - a day pass to visit a library.

To his surprise, McGonagall agreed. As Granger ascended the stairs, the Headmistress appeared from behind the Gargoyle and cleared her throat. 

Loudly. 

Purposefully.

Draco removed his notice-me-not and blushed at his discovery. 

“That was very kind of you, Mr. Malfoy.” 

He swallowed, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

“Was there something you also wanted, or did you stay simply to watch over Miss Granger?”

“No Headmistress.”

She raised an appraising eyebrow in his direction, but said nothing. She simply pursed her lips and dismissed him.  

He found her the next evening, passed out across a desk in a dark corner of the library with a book peeking out from under one arm.

Draco gently slid the book from beneath her elbow. It was relatively thin, bright yellow with a thick black band across the top and white text that proudly proclaimed the book's title; ‘Quantum Physics for Dummies.’

Hermione Granger was not a dummy. What an odd choice of book for the brightest witch of their age to select from a muggle library. He ran his finger along the text of the first page, reading a slew of unfamiliar words.

What was a Heisenberg? A Schrodinger? A Hamiltonian? Eigenvectors? Square wells? Why would anyone make a square well, never mind one that was infinitely deep.

Muggles. He shook his head and continued to thumb through the pages. There were some small yellow squares of paper stuck to a few pages toward the back. 

Quantum entanglement.

Draco sank quietly into the seat on the opposite side of the table, careful not to bump the table and disturb the sleeping witch. He skimmed the text, his brain hurting as he tried to grasp the concepts described on the page in front of him. Granger’s scrawl seemed to indicate some sort of link between mirrors - that magic mirrors were akin to tangled particles, but on a much larger scale than individual electrons or photons.  He’d have to ask Granger what they were, but he thought they must have been fairly small based on the descriptions of what was being done.

A quiet snore escaped Granger’s nose and he smirked to himself. She’d have a fit when she woke up and found him there. He wondered again how tired she must be. How exhausted to let sleep claim her such vulnerable positions. 

It was the monotonous demands of Madam Pince which finally woke her. She startled awake, curls flying around her face, eyes wide and unfocused. He watched quietly as the realisation that she wasn’t alone slowly dawned on her.

“You’ve got my book, Malfoy.”

“Indeed. Planning to entangle some eigenvectors were you, Granger?”

She scoffed. “I take it you’re not far into the book if you think you can entangle eigenvectors. That would be like casting a crystal ball.” 

Draco was shocked. He knew that she had little to no respect for divination, but her haphazard alignment of words indicated not only disrespect, but a severe lack of understanding. “You can’t cast a crystal ball, Granger. Do you even understand how divination works?”

“No. I don’t. Because it doesn’t” she huffed and made a move for the book. “I need that book, Malfoy.”

“Come and get it then.”

Draco pushed back his seat and began a quick march toward the library doors. He could feel the heat of Granger’s gaze on his back as she scampered to catch up.

“Why are you harassing me, Malfoy? Finding me in the Trophy Room. Following me from Hogsmeade. Accosting me in the Library while I sleep. What gives?” 

He ignored her words and paid for with the sting of her palm against his shoulder. He spun around.

“Resorting to violence, are we?” He smirked at her, eyes flicking across her face. 

She was flushed, her skin couldn’t have been that red from the few dozen steps toward the library door, even at their increased pace. She hadn’t been flushed when she’d awoken. Dazed, but not flushed. 

She glared at him and that look on her face, directed at him, did funny things to his tummy. Again.

“Out!” Madam Pince demanded from behind them.

Draco clutched the book to his chest, spun on his hell and strode out the double doors.

Her frustration delighted him. First it was the way she glared at him, as if staring at him for long enough could will the dummy book back into her possession. Secondly it was the way she gnawed maliciously at the jam on toast in her left hand. Third, and most entertaining, was the way she snapped at her friends every time they spoke to her.

Draco watched as the school owl descended, dropping his letter onto her plate, covering it with crumbs and jam. Idiot bird. He’d rather have used his own eagle-owl, Copernicus, but he was too conspicuous and he really wasn’t interested in fuelling the Hogwarts rumour mill.

He watched, horrified, as she brushed her fingers on her skirt and then opened the letter. Her eyes scanned the writing then snapped upwards to meet his. 

Draco cocked his head to the side, eyebrows raised. A silent question - would she accept his offer?

She nodded tersely, tucked the letter into her pocket and returned to her breakfast.

He could have sworn he saw the faintest trace of a smile on her lips.

Chapter Text

Hermione paced the 7th floor corridor, concentrating on what she required from the room. 

‘I need the room of hidden things.’

‘ I need the room where things are hidden.’

“I need a magic mirror in the room of hidden things.’

She hadn’t been surprised by Draco’s suggestion. No, she wasn’t struck with surprise. 

She was struck with awe.

His neat script detailed an extremely convincing argument. His thoughtful analysis of the problem, suggestions and possible courses of action had set her toes wriggling with an invigoration she’d never felt before. Harry and Ron had been her study buddies for so many years, and they listened well enough, but she’d  never really had anyone who would bounce ideas around with her.

Hermione couldn’t help but wonder if Draco had always been this academic, this intelligent and inquisitive; and she’d just missed it - blinded by institutionalised disdain for the Slytherin.  

The door appeared. She stood at a threshold, both physical and mental. Crossing it would be making a choice she couldn’t turn back from. It would mean accepting his help, in whatever capacity he offered it. It would mean hours alone with him, in a room where no-one knew where they were.

She really should have told someone where she was going. She cast a quick Patronus charm - sending her otter to let Harry know that she was in the room of requirement and would be back later that night. Satisfied she’d done her due diligence in keeping her friend informed of her whereabouts she looked at the door again.

Crossing through would be an enormous leap of faith.

She opened the door and stepped inside. 

Hermione had expected to see piles of ash, or the charred remains of the discarded objects that had filled the room when Crabbe released the curse. The vicious fiendfyre that had led to his own premature demise. She’d expected the acrid smell of smoke to linger, or a haze to permeate the once-musty air - anything which would indicate that cursed fire had decimated the contents of the room.

But there was nothing.

Nothing at all to indicate that anything had changed since the last time she had entered the room. It was untouched. The same shrine of hidden and forgotten things. It was as if only hours had passed since she, Harry and Ron had stepped inside to search for Ravenclaw’s Diadem. Towers of objects were stacked row upon row, higher than she could possibly see.

“Uncanny, isn’t it?” Malfoy asked from beside her. He’d been waiting inside the room, must have required it to allow her in. 

“I expected it to be,” she paused, struggling to explain why the unaltered appearance of the room caused her such disquiet.  “Burned, or damaged. Something. I expected something.”

“Yeah, well I’m glad it’s like this. Didn’t fancy coming across the charred remains of an old school friend.” Malfoy’s tone was clipped.

She looked at him. Really looked. His face bore a pained expression, his posture ever so slightly slumped. 

“I’m sorry.” she said. “For Crabbe; that we couldn’t save him, too.”

“Don’t be.” He huffed on his exhale. “He was a fool to cast that curse. Couldn’t control it. He signed his own death warrant when the words left his lips.” His expression was grim. Jaw clenched tight and eyes as cold as his words.

“Still. He was a friend.”

Malfoy ignored her comment, deliberately redirecting the path of their conversation “Tell me more about the mirror that Potter used last year.”

His message was loud and clear. He didn’t want to talk about what happened the last time they were both in this room. She wondered if it was a distraction tactic - avoidance of a topic that hurt him in a way he wasn’t ready to deal with -  or if simply held so little regard for his friend. She brushed the thoughts and answered him.

“It was just a shard of a mirror, actually. Originally, it was part of a pair. Your cousin Sirius had the other one and he and Harry used them to communicate with each other.”

“I thought Black was responsible for Potter’s parents' deaths? Didn’t he give away their location - the reason The Dark Lord found their home? Why would Potter want to communicate with him?” Hermione didn’t miss the faint hitch in his voice as he was still hesitant to even mention Voldemort.

She shook her head. “He was Harry’s Godfather. It was Peter Pettigrew who betrayed them. After his escape in third year, Sirius gave Harry the mirror so they could stay in touch. After what happened in the Ministry at the end of fifth year, well, Harry tried to contact him. So many times.” Her heart still broke a little every time she thought about those moments

Hermione had been unconscious when Bellatrix’s curse had sent Sirius stumbling through the veil, but she could piece together what happened - even without Harry telling her. The screams as he’d relieved that nightmare had woken her more than once during their shared time on the run.

She knew the sound of Harry’s screams as his heart broke.  She knew the look on his face when he woke and blamed himself, again, for his God-father’s death. The way he blamed himself for losing another small piece of what was left of his parents - their closest friend.

She glanced over at Malfoy. His eyes were fixed on her, hanging on her every word. She looked away, unable to meet Malfoys gaze as hot tears spilled traitorously down her cheeks. His warm hand grazed the back of hers, and soft fabric fluttered against her knuckles. She took the black silken square, gently dabbing at her eyes in a vain attempt to erase the salty evidence of her repressed trauma.

Malfoy stood nearby. He didn’t reach out to touch her. Didn’t invade her space, but his presence was calming - soothing for a reason she couldn’t explain. The smell of his cologne, the warmth of the heat radiating off his body. It brought a quiet peace. She dabbed at her eyes again, thankful it was a day where Lavender hadn’t convinced her to wear mascara.

He waited, as quiet and patient as ancient stone.

“So what happened to the mirror?” Malfoy asked gently.

“Harry was so angry. So sad. So… He was just this empty, angry shell. Living, again, when someone he loved died. For him. The family he grew up with, those muggles; they were terrible to him. He was weeks from having a life with someone who cared about him, someone who loved him. When he finally accepted what happened - that he’d never see or talk to Sirius again - he smashed the mirror.”

Malfoy continued his quiet vigil. Continued to wait silently - giving her space and time. It was a side of him she hadn’t experienced - not that there were many sides to him that she had. The bully. The pureblood git. The whimpering victim. The scared teenager. The quidditch player. She wondered if this version of him was closer to his true identity than any amalgamation of the others she’d witnessed.

His voice was low and gentle, like the voice you’d use with a scared child. “And the pieces?”

“We kept a piece of it. Every now and then we’d glimpse these shocking blue eyes and white hair. We thought it was Dumbledore,” she huffed a small laugh. “It was a Dumbledore, just not the one we thought.”

“His brother?” Draco asked.  “The barman from the Hogshead?”

Hermione nodded. “Dumbledore gave it to Aberforth; asked him to keep an eye on Harry.” 

“But you don’t have it now? That’s what you were trying to find in there.” He waved at the satchel bag slung across her torso. “It’s not in there.”

“It is not.”

“So now, after reading the dummy book.”

“Quantum Physics for Dummies.” she interjected.

“As I said. So you read the dummy book.” She scowled at him and he continued, unswayed by her expression. “And I read the dummy book.”

She couldn’t help it. She laughed. Hermione laughed at something Draco Malfoy said. She wasn’t sure if it had been intentional - a deliberate ploy to pull her back from her misery - but he had. 

“You read the dummy book too,” she accused.

“I did. And I think we’ve come to the same conclusion; that magically duplicating a mirror entangles them at a quantum level, even though they’re macroscopic and the process should only work with the smallest particles.”

There was something enticing in hearing Draco so eloquently explain muggle science. She’d never heard the words quantum, macroscopic or particles spoken in a way that made her tummy flutter. It was almost sacrilegious the way his pureblood tongue wrapped around the syllables; the way he strung those words together and loosed them from his lips.

“Granger, are you listening?”

She shook her head. “Sorry, yeah. It shouldn’t work on something so big, but well…magic.”

“Magic,” he agreed with a small smile, his brilliant blue eyes sparkling with excitement.

“So if we duplicate a mirror, we should be able to vanish it and peer into the place where the vanished things go?” She looked at him, hoping he’d come to the same conclusion

“I think so,” he said. His eyebrows began to knit together, the way they did when he was concentrating - like when he’d been focusing on casting the lumos variant. “But I think it should be a mirror without any other magic. Something crafted by hand, not by a machine. We don’t want other spells or charms interfering.”

“I agree, best to keep it as simple as possible. Shall we search together?” She didn’t want to admit it, least of all to him  - but being alone in here left her uneasy. There were too many bad memories of the night. His companionship - even in quietude, would be better than walking the narrow walkways on her own.

“Sure. I actually have an idea of where we might find one, if it’s still there.” He inclined his head toward a large stack of broken chairs that marked the end of one of the rows of hidden things. “Let’s go.”

He led her quietly through the stacks, pointing out things he found amusing along the way. She appreciated the effort he was making. To distract her. To bring her back from the dark place where the tears threatened to drown her. 

It was probably for him too. As much as he’d brushed off her comments about Crabbe, he must have felt something at the loss of his friend. Maybe he was feeling the same way as her in this place. Did the phantom cracking of wooden furniture catching fire echo in his ears? Did the scent of burning clothing and books drift linger under the ever present musk of the dusty room?

In some ways she hoped it did, if it meant she wasn’t alone in feeling this. She shivered. Hopefully they’d find the mirror quickly and they could be rid of this room.

“That’s one of Lovegood’s contraptions,” Malfoy noted - pointing to what appeared to be an enormous necklace made of desiccated plant roots. “She’s probably still looking for it.”

Hermione hummed her agreement.  “Oh yes, she’s probably plagued by Blatherwackies without it.”

“It’s Blatherspurts, Granger.” 

“Blatherblobbers.”

“Botherwhoosits?”

“Boobywhatsits?”

Malfoy wiggled his eyebrows suggestively. “Boobies hmm?”

She tutted. “Mind out of the gutter, Malfoy.”

“What’s a…” Before he could finish the question, Hermione pushed past him. 

“What about this one?”

She traced her fingers along the ornate carvings of an aged mirror. Its surface was untarnished, though the frame bore the markings of a long life. 

Malfoy moved close to her and picked up the mirror. It was around a meter tall, maybe half that in width. 

“I can’t feel any magic. Do you know any detection spells?”

Hermione knew quite a few. She ran her wand over the frame, over the silvered pane, around the back. Nothing. Not a trace of magic - not even the remnants of a sticking charm on the back panel.

“It’s clear,” she declared.

Draco nodded, his expression contemplative. “If we want to bind them, we’ll need to duplicate this, then cast a stasis charm over the new one to stop any decay.”

“I wasn’t sure whether the stasis charm would prevent them from acting the way we want it to. If one of them is under stasis, does that mean the image on it when the spell is cast is all that will be seen?”

Draco ran his long fingers through the strands of his hair, his features furrowed in concentration. “I honestly don’t know. But if it doesn’t work, we can think of something else.”

She wondered what her education could have been like if she’d had someone like him to challenge her throughout. Someone willing to challenge their understanding of magic. Someone eager to learn more. To do more.

“Get on with it then.” He smirked again.

Hermione waved her wand carefully, duplicating an exact replica of the mirror in front of them. In tandem, she and Malfoy stepped forward to inspect the mirrors. It was some of her best spell work. The knots in the wood of the first frame were identical to those on the second. The same place, size, orientation, discolouration. It was a perfect, identical replica. 

Malfoy cast a stasis charm over the new mirror.

“Which one should we send?” Hermione asked.

“The replica. That way if something goes wrong we can try again with the original mirror.”

Hermione mentally kicked herself for not thinking of that. Of course they’d need the mirror without a magical signature if they needed to repeat their experiment.  

“Alright then.” Before Malfoy could say anything else she cast a quick Evanesco on the second mirror. 

“Granger, NO!” Malfoy yelled. His large hands pushed against her shoulders, shoving her sideways. She lost her balance and flung out her hands to slow her fall. Time slowed as she focused on what she’d done.

Malfoy was close - his breath hot against her neck. His hands pressed hard into the tendons of her shoulders. She could see the faintest hint of terror in his eyes as they hung in the moments in between.

Her last emotion before the spell hit them wasn’t fear. It wasn’t even shock - which it probably should have been.

No. Her last emotion was one she was intimately familiar with.

Pride.

Chapter Text

Time slowed as Draco realised what was about to happen, and that he was nearly powerless to prevent it.

He watched her raise her wand arm, calm, controlled, and completely insane. The spell flew from the tip of her wand, colliding with the intended mirror but he knew. Merlin, he knew what would happen, and he was powerless to prevent it.

“Granger, no.” He yelled. Too late to stop the casting.

He didn’t know how he knew, it was more of a gut feeling. But this witch - this brilliant, but stupid witch - hadn’t thought through her actions.

The mirrors were connected. Entangled. Exactly as she’d hoped they were. 

He lunged toward her, too slow. The spell was ricocheting off the mirror by way of the second mirror, shooting out the gilded frame. Too quickly. 

His hands pressed firmly against her shoulders, trying desperately to push her out of the way of the oncoming spell. He pushed hard enough that she began to fall - flinging her arms out to the side. Draco watched her wand fall slowly to the ground.

He grabbed at her, his hands digging into the tendons across her shoulders and their eyes locked. Her beautiful golden eyes met his. This witch.

This brilliant,infuriating, witch. There wasn’t an ounce of fear in her eyes. No, what he saw when he looked into her wide eyes wasn’t fear, or concern or any emotion you might expect from a person on the brink of falling into the unknown.

Plastered across her face was a look of pure pride.

Draco pulled her body against his and rolled them as they landed, using what little sideways momentum they had to lessen the impact. They tumbled over each other twice before coming to a stop on a cool, smooth surface.

His left arm was under her neck, his wand still tightly gripped in his hand. 

Their faces mere centimetres apart, he glared at her.

“What were you thinking, Granger? What have you done?”

She grinned. Salazar help him, she grinned at him.

“Exactly what I meant to do. I found it, Malfoy. I knew it existed, look.”

Her command pulled his gaze from hers, but he kept her close, covering her body as he took in his surroundings.

“Can you get off, Malfoy?” She asked.

He couldn’t help the first thought that ran through his head - ‘From this position, yes, quite easily’ -  not that he’d speak it aloud. Instead he grunted and extricated his arm from beneath her neck. He rolled over and pushed himself to his feet. Granger followed, accepting his offered hand.

The air was warm, far warmer than it had been in the room of hidden things, and now that the adrenaline from their fall was wearing off he could feel it. A cloying, humid heat that clung to his skin.

A blue light permeated the space, casting an eerie glow over endless piles of vanished items. 

“Why is there a clear section?” Granger asked, likely to herself.

“Really, Granger, that’s your first question. Not, ‘how are we going to get out of here’  but ‘why is there a clear section’. Is that really how your brain works?”

A delightful blush bloomed on her cheeks. “Obviously we’ll need to get out of here at some point, but Malfoy.” She reached and grabbed his hand. “This is amazing. As far as anyone knows this place doesn’t even exist. Everyone told me they just cease to be and yet here we are - with all these things. This is the opportunity of a lifetime, we’re going to change how the vanishing charm is understood. We’re…”

Granger didn’t finish her sentence. A stream of liquid appeared in the air to their left. Far enough away they wouldn’t get splashed but close enough to cause alarm. Was that how vanished things arrived? Did they just fall from the sky? 

He didn’t ponder what the liquid might be, he’d vanished enough to know that none of them would be welcome on his person. Maybe firewhiskey. But that was about the only liquid he recall vanishing that he’d ever want on his body.

“I need to make notes.” Granger pulled a small notebook from her skirt pocket. “Dammit, I don’t have a quill. Do you have one, Malfoy?”  

“Do I have a..? Granger, is this really your priority now?”

“Yes, I need to record what we see. Oh, nevermind, I’ll just conjure..” She trailed off as the realisation hit her. He’d seen the wand fall from her hand when she’d flung her arms out to brace for the fall. A poor reflex, but understandable. “Can you see my wand anywhere? I dropped it.”

Draco simply nodded. “It’s in the room of hidden things, you dropped it before the spell hit us.”

He watched the way her whole body tensed. It was one thing to unknowingly be without your wand in a strange place, but to know that you had nothing to use to defend yourself in a place that no-one even thought existed. He would be terrified. 

“It’s okay Granger, I have mine. We’ll be okay.”

She glared at him some more. The expression had no right to be so enthralling. 

“I’ll conjure one.” He offered and began to conjure a quill.

Or at least he attempted to conjure a quill. His wand felt heavy and almost sluggish in his hand, and the expected quill did not appear. He tried again, straining against the weight of the wand, which seemed to increase with his concentration.

Granger raised a sardonic brow at him. “Performance issues, Malfoy?” 

“No.” He sniped. “The wand is fighting it.”

She moved closer to him, keenly observing his casting. “Could you try summoning one?” 

It was a valid suggestion. The wand fought less against his mumbled accio , though there was still resistance.  Within a few seconds a large, white, eagle-feathered quill came zooming towards them. Draco snatched it out of the air.

“It's broken.” There was a clear bend near the nib, where the feather had been broken. 

“Try repairing it.” Granger was pressed close to him, her arm brushing against the one holding the quill. She paid no attention to the slight hitch of his breath at her proximity, her warmth. Grateful for her lack of perception, Draco cast a reparo .

To his surprise it worked with little resistance from his wand. 

“Can you charm it to be self-inking?” 

He snorted. “Do you think I know every charm there is, Granger? No, I can’t charm it to be self-inking. There is a reason people purchase those types of quills, it is incredibly complex charmwork”

“Oh. Sorry, I thought you might. You’ve always been excellent at charms. Could you summon some ink?”

Draco tried to deny the stirrings in his stomach which accompanied her compliment. He was unfamiliar with compliments on his achievement. Compliments on his appearance were common, and he accepted those with the grace he’d been taught. Beautiful witches pressing against him in bars and fluttering their eyelashes as they waxed lyrical about his ‘gorgeous eyes’ and ‘manly build’ had elicited not a single hint of what he currently felt.

He didn’t bother responding to her compliment.

“I’ll try.” 

Summoning the ink, it turned out, was a bloody terrible idea. Had he been less impatient to get the witch what she needed, he would have thought about how often he’d vanished ink after it had spilled from a pot. 

After it had formed a puddle. 

At first he thought that the spell hadn’t worked. He was quickly relieved of this incorrect notion when a splat of ink connected, loudly and painfully, with his back.

“Fucking Salazar’s saggy, stinky, sodding ballsack.”

He heard a small snort from Granger, who had her lips tucked tightly between her teeth and an expression that bordered on manic as she tried to refrain from outright laughter.

“You really didn’t think that through did you?” She asked, between quiet chuckles.

His patience cracked. He’d tried to save her from ending up here - tried to push her out of the way. Had helped her when she needed to find a mirror, protected her when she fell asleep in corridors and she was accusing him of not thinking things through. How dare she.

He snapped. “I didn’t think this through? I didn’t! You know what, find your own bloody ink, Granger. I was trying to help you. Trying to get ink for your stupid quill and your stupid notebook so you can write down stupid bloody notes about this stupid place.”

There were too many ‘stupid’’s in one sentence and he knew it. Her barely contained chuckles turned to a laugh. 

“I’m.. Sorry.. “ she exclaimed between heaving breaths. “This whole thing… It’s stupid.. We shouldn’t be here.. I didn’t think… I’m sorry…”

And before his eyes, her heaving breaths and chuckles were replaced by quiet sobs as the reality of their situation seemed to hit her.  His frustration turned quickly to concern.

“Don’t cry, Granger. You figured out how to get here, I’m sure you can’t figure out how to get us out.” He tried to sound confident. He was, mostly, sure that she would get them out of here. 

His soothing words did not have the calming effect he intended. He reached out gingerly to apply a light, comforting pat to her back and she fell forward against his chest. The top of her hair tickled his chin and she sobbed quietly against his shirt.

“Granger, listen to me. What you’ve done today is amazing. You’re going to write textbooks about this place. We’re not stuck here. We’re exploring. Let’s figure out what magic works and go from there, yeah?”

As he spoke he felt her breath slowing, her body shaking less. 

“I am sorry, Malfoy. You’re right.”

“I often am.”

She slapped his chest, then pushed herself away. Despite the heat and humidity of the place, Draco missed the feeling of her body next to his. 

“I was reckless and I didn’t think this through and now we’re both here and you had no say in it and I’m demanding things of you. I’m sorry.”

“Apology accepted, Hogwarts was getting a bit boring and this is far more exciting and far better company. So, which way should we go?” He asked, turning to look at the path behind him.

He heard a small ‘oh’ from behind him and realised that Granger had spotted the ink on his back. It was starting to soak through his shirt and onto his skin, he could feel it pooling between his shoulder blades and running in a cool rivulet down his back.

“Your shirt, Malfoy. Do you want me to try and vanish it?”

“Do you think that will work?”

“I can try, but I’ll need to use your wand.”

His breath caught in his throat. He’d never let anyone use his wand before. Well, except for Potter. He’d never willingly handed his wand over to anybody else. The thought filled him with a strange sense of dread. It felt like relinquishing control, giving away a part of himself. 

“I don’t have to, I’m sure we could find you another shirt…” Her voice trailed off. 

“No, it’s okay.  I’vejust never willingly let anyone use my wand before. It’s…” He couldn’t articulate it. This wand had been used to do terrible things. It had been used on her, by him. It had cast two of the three unforgivable curses. It didn’t feel right to let someone like her touch it. Someone so good.

“You can trust me. I won’t hurt you.”

Draco huffed out a small laugh. “That wasn’t what I was worried about. This wand has done terrible things, and someone like you shouldn’t have to touch something so tainted.”

“I’ve done terrible things too.” Her words were whisper quiet. 

He turned and met her eyes. It had been easier to be open and honest when they weren’t facing each other. Easier to pretend he was talking to himself, to a spectre, rather than to someone who had every reason to hate him and didn’t. 

She wore a small, kind smile. He slowly raised his arm, offering her the wand. Her pinky brushed his forefinger as she wrapped her hand around the dark wood of his wand and a small cascade of emerald and gold sparks erupted from its tip.

Chapter Text

The spark reminded her of cold days with blustering winds, woolly jumpers and girlish shrieks as she opened the car door.

It felt like a tiny jolt of electricity running through her hand. 

She’d experienced something magically similar before, on the day she’d purchased her wand in Olivander’s shop. That had been a long time ago, and she’d touched many other wands since then and not a single one of them had done anything like this. Not Harry’s or Ron’s wands.

Definitely not Bellatrix’s.

Malfoy seemed as surprised as she was. 

“What was that?” The surprise on his face was accompanied by the faintest hint of awe in his question. 

She shook her head. “I don’t know. I’ve never had something like that with a wand before. Have you?”

Long blonde locks fell across his forehead as he, too, shook his head. Slowly. His face, a picture of disbelief.

“Only once.”

“Olivander’s?”

This time he nodded.

She wondered whether it was something unique to this place they’d found themselves occupying, this realm of unknown magics.

“See if it works for you.”

Hermione looked up, meeting his eyes and noting the slight furrow between his silvery brows.

“Do you think evanseco will work here?”

“Try it and find out.” He reached into a pile of debris and pulled a piece of fabric from within. He held it with disgust, as if it pained him to even hold it in his pristine hands.

Hermione couldn’t help the giggle that escaped. Malfoy held in his hands a pair of plain, white knickers. At least they would have once been white, they were covered in grime. The look of disgust on his face deepened and he dropped them to the ground at her feet.

Wand buzzing with magic, she carefully cast the evanesco charm on the innocuous undergarments. 

Nothing happened. 

“Not surprising.” Malfoy drawled, “Where would they go if they’re already in the place that vanished things go. Try a cleaning spell.”

Hermione obliged. Her wiping spell effectively siphoned the grime from the undergarments. She directed the muck back into the pile from which the knickers had come. 

“Well, at least we know some magic works down here. Turn around, I’ll get the ink off your shirt.”

He began to turn, then spun back around.

“Wait. You want the ink, so you’ll need somewhere to put it. Find something you can transfigure into an inkpot.”

She toed apprehensively at the sparkling bright knickers on the floor. 

He scrunched his nose at her suggestion. Hermione sighed and stepped towards the pile he’d found the knickers in. A quick scan of the pile revealed nothing close to what they wanted in shape, size or material. Eventually she settled on a small porcelain egg-cup.

Malfoy smirked at her offering. The expression faded when she managed to successfully transfigure it into a small inkpot.

“No lid?” Malfoy quipped.

He smirked.

She reciprocated the expression while summoning a small rock, then transfigured it into a stopper for the ink pot and pressed it against the opening.

“Ta-dah” 

“Ta - what?” 

“It’s a muggle.. Nevermind. Take your shirt off so I can get the ink off it.”

“Keen to see me shirtless, Granger?” 

She rolled her eyes and shook her head. “Turn around then.”

The humidity of the place left his shirt clinging to the muscles of his back. Returning to quidditch and regular meals had helped Malfoy bounce back from his miserable sixth year form. He was fit. At least his back was. The thin fabric of his shirt settled over the valleys and hills of his muscles. A narrow groove ran down the centre of his spine. 

“What are you waiting for?”

Hermione quickly banished all thoughts of Malfoy’s physical appeal. Those lustful thoughts were unhelpful and there were much more pressing matters at hand. Not that she’d spoken it aloud, but as soon as they’d been unable to conjure her thoughts had immediately spiralled. 

She wouldn’t allow that to happen again. 

They would find another way to get clean drinking water.

She raised the wand and carefully siphoned the ink from the shirt and into the small inkpot. 

“Would you like me to… that is, rather, should I…”

“Out with it, Granger.”

“Shouldisiphonthesweat?” It came out as a tumbled blur of words she hoped he wouldn’t understand.

“Please do. The only time I tolerate a shirt plastered to my back with sweat is during quidditch.”

She quickly siphoned the sweat and sent it splashing to the ground a few metres away from them. 

“Thanks. Would you like me to do the same?”

Hermione nodded. 

She handed the wand to him and turned around. 

A small eternity passed while she waited for him. The cool relief she’d expected didn’t come.

Instead, she felt the feather-light touch of his fingers against her neck. He curled them under her hair, dragging his nails across her skin as he pulled the riotous curls over her shoulder.

Draco Malfoy was touching her hair.

Kindly.

Gently.

Almost reverently.

She wondered what she’d see on his face if she was able to see it. Certainly not disdain. Perhaps curiosity?

His charm left a coolness in its wake. Another involuntary shiver ran down her spine.  

“Thanks.” It was barely a whisper. 

She collected the paper and ink, sat down on the ground and began to write.

“I think we should look around.”

Malfoy stood in front of her, arms crossed. He’d been shuffling around while she jotted down her thoughts and ideas. She’d filled 5 pages

“Where?”

“Anywhere, Granger. I don’t want to just sit here. What are you even writing - it’s been what, half an hour, and you’ve filled half a dozen pages with your observations. We need to start looking around to see if there is a way out, or a way to communicate or, oh, I don’t know - something to eat.”

Of course. In the time she’d spent on the run with Ron and Harry she’d quickly learned that teenage boys had near insatiable appetites. While they hadn’t always had much to eat it hadn’t stopped them complaining. 

She smiled to herself and opened her satchel bag, digging around and producing a protein bar.

“Here you go, that should keep you full for a while.”

“What the bloody hell do you call this?” He sneered at it. 

“It’s a protein bar. It will help you feel full and give you energy.”

“And the muscle part? Will I grow muscles if I eat it?”

Hermione closed her eyes and carefully placed the quill down next to her. She would not blot her page, her frustration be damned.

“Building muscle requires protein, these are a muggle food for people who want to build muscle.”

He opened his mouth and she raised a finger, effectively cutting him off.

“They also are high in calories - which means they give you a lot of energy. They have a long shelf-life and are easy to shrink and carry.”

Malfoy turned the bar in his hand. She appeared to have given him a peanut one.

“You’re not allergic to peanuts, are you?”

“This has peanuts in it?”

“It has a list of what’s in it on the back.”

While he read through the ingredients she packed her quill, ink and notes away in the bag and stood.

Malfoy, she noticed, had quietly peeled the corner of the wrapper away and was sniffing at one corner of the bar.

“It won’t kill you.”

“It very well might."

“At least then it would be quiet here.”

Malfoy clutched at his chest, the motion reminiscent of third year. “You wound me, Granger.”

“Will you just eat the damn thing?"

His eyes narrowed. “You’re not trying to poison me?”

“For Salazar’s sake, Malfoy.” Hermione reached out, grabbed his wrist and brought the bar to her mouth. She bit down on the corner, chewed and swallowed it. 

Her eyes never left his and she saw the visible bobbing of his throat as he watched her. She released his wrist.

“Not poison. Will you eat it now?” 

His eyes were wide and darting between her mouth and the end of the bar.

“Fine.”

Malfoy led them through the maze of things for close to an hour before her legs grew weary. In that time they’d both been intrigued and amazed by the things they passed.

She’d vanished her fair share of objects and messes over the years, and yet around every bend she found something that caught her interest.

An old blue car that reminded her of Mr Weasley's old Ford Anglia, its windows smashed and wheels nowhere to be seen.

A trio of amphorae, decorated with battle scenes and creatures lay cracked or in pieces on the ground. She studied the paintings, marvelling at the intricacy of the ancient designs. One in particular caught her attention with its depiction of a number of magical creatures. Some extinct - like the sphinxes and hydra - and others she knew to exist.

There were several items, or groups of items, that appeared fairly consistently along their winding path.

Food in various states of decay. Undergarments - whole, torn, sliced or otherwise - were also abundant. Dinnerware, rugs and clothing were also common.

She tried not to dwell on the puddles they narrowly avoided or, unfortunately, stepped in. They could be rain water, she’d certainly vanished puddles of water aftering running through the rain…

Their scent indicated that wasn’t always the case. 

She could deal with vanished urine. That made sense. Vanished vomit, even faeces. Goodness, even semen. It was perfectly logical to vanish something unwanted and unneeded. To rid oneself and the world of a thing with no further use.

But there were many items here that did have further use. And there was one, in particular, that truly upset her. Objects whose presence unsettled her so deeply she felt physically ill.

Puddles of blood and the foot they’d come across (Malfoy had kicked it summarily off the path as soon as it was spotted) held but a tiny candle to the flame that was her disgust each time she spied something that should never have been sent to this place.

She tried not to let the anger fill her when she found yet another book, its worn corner poking out from beneath the bent end of a broken broomstick.

Malfoy, of course, thought it quite hilarious that she would be so upset at the presence of discarded books. He thought little of the countless tomes with knowledge that would never be shared again. Many of them were thrown away for naught but a small inkblot, or a torn cover. A ripped spine. All perfectly fixable if the discarder had even tried to mend them.

“Granger.” 

She stopped her inspection of the book and looked to where Malfoy was standing.

“Do you think that maybe we should have left a marker where we started?”

Chapter Text

He probably should have said something sooner. It would have been wise of him to say something much sooner. The problem was, he’d been rather distracted.

They’d landed here with their bodies pressed together. Her scent was intoxicating. He’d caught a whiff of it in the trophy room, but their closer proximity as they transitioned to this place had the scent flooding his nostrils. White musk. Mandarin. A trace of cedarwood. It was sinful how good she smelled.

Their banter. Her admission. The way his wand sparked when she touched it. Her delicate hand around his wrist as she made unrelenting eye contact and nibbled the muggle nutrition bar.

Needless to say his mind had been in overdrive examining dozens of microinteractions, and he’d allowed his thoughts to wander along with his feet.

The vanished things made a rather revolting hedge-maze. A maze he and Granger had inadvertently gotten lost within.

Granger, who had been inspecting another discarded book, did something he could not in a million years have ever predicted. She dropped the book.

“Fuck.” She sank onto the grimy ground and sat with her back against a chesterfield that looked as if it had seen many better days. He tried to focus on the poor lounger, it appeared to have suffered its demise at the claws of several aggressive cats. His attempt at distracting himself from the witch was remarkably unsuccessful, all he could do was stare at her mouth. The expletive erupting from her mouth wasn’t supposed to be so damned erotic.

Her head tipped back and her eyes closed, features shifting into an expression Draco hadn't ever seen her wear. Not at school. Not at the battle, during the brief glimpses he'd caught of her.

Even laying tortured and scarred on his drawing room floor he hadn't seen her like this. 

It wasn't something he'd ever expected to see on Granger's face.

Defeat. 

It didn’t linger. Frustration banishing the last traces as her face set to a scowl.

 “You couldn’t have said something sooner? Maybe an hour ago? Even half an hour ago? Honestly, at any point where we’d have the faintest bloody chance of finding our way back?” Her verbal tirade ended with a glare that fixed him in place. He bit.

“Oh, I didn’t realise that was my job. Maybe if you spent less time writing, or sighing over discarded wads of paper, then you’d have thought about it too.”

“I am taking important notes. People don’t even know this place exists. They should know.” 

He scoffed. “Well that’s all well and good, isn’t it? But nobody is ever going to read them if we don’t find a way out of here!” He could feel his anger rising as he returned her glare. Their self directed wade into the abyss had been a mutual activity. 

“You’re the one who sent us here without thinking through your brilliant idea, so maybe instead of making notes you can use that big brain of yours to find us a way out.”

Her mouth opened and closed several times before she pinched her lips together and frowned. She pulled her knees to her chest, wrapped her arms around them and buried her head in the cocoon they made. 

Was she..? Surely not. 

A fragile sniffle escaped the sound barrier of curls - confirming his suspicions.

Draco sighed. Sinking onto the ground, he rested his back against the chesterfield and let his right arm brush against hers. The slight shudders of her quiet sobs bore further confirmation. Granger was upset.

Obviously.

But what could have tipped her so far over the edge? His remarks weren't unfounded - it was entirely her fault they'd ended up her and she should be spending her time getting them out rather than acting like an overexcited archaeologist.

She continued to cry. 

Over the years he'd become familiar with the bouts of melancholoy that overcame witches, particularly at certain times of the month. Daphne and Millie, occasionally even Pansy, -most of his female friends shed tears with intermittent frequency.

But their cries had been loud, heaving sobs, with tears that flowed quick and wet upon their cheeks. 

They were nothing like the wearied hiccoughs of the witch beside him. This wasn’t the cry of a heart-broken for the first time by teenage love. Nor was it the inescapable despair that came with losing a loved one. It was something deeper. A visceral pain. Too much to be the result of a simple magical mishap.

“I'm sorry, alright. I’m sure you’ll get us out of here. You, Granger, will not be bested by a trash heap.” He nudged her with his elbow. “Brightest witch of her age definitely beats trash heap every day of the week.”

His words did not have the desired effect. Her arms wrapped even tighter around her legs.

Draco sat as still as a statue, truly unsure of what to say or do to calm the witch beside him. Threats of vengeance had worked well for Pansy, and chocolate was always a sure fix for Millie and Daph but they didn't seem appropriate responses for whatever led to Grangers spiral. Whiskey helped him, but was, unfortunately, unavailbable.

If vengeance was required he was not at all certain against whom he should release untold wrath. Probably a Weasley.

Out of options for physical objects with which he might comfort her, he did the only other thing he could think of.

He lifted his arm and wrapped it around her shoulders, pulling her body against his. Despite the heat of this place she felt cool to his touch. The expected flinch or shrug to push him away never came. not that Draco had ever thought about it, but if he had... Well he probably would have thought that having his arm wrapped around Granger would be awkward. Uncomfortable. They weren't friends after all.

This was neither - It felt as natural as breathing. LIke her body was made to fit in that sweet spot between his arm and his chest. 

Unfamiliar feellings blossomed in his chest. Giving into them, he leaned down and whispered ‘Shhss’ and ‘it’s okay’s’ against her curls. 

Eventually her body stilled. He could feel a warm pool of wetness against his shirt.

He hoped it was tears.

She stayed tucked tightly against him, her hands gripping at the fabric of his shirt.  Her breathing evened out and her breathe whispered against his chest. 

A confession.

“I did it again, Draco. I acted without thinking things through and I’ve fucked it right up, I couldn’t fix it before. What if I can’t fix it now?”

“I’m sure you can. You can fix anything.” It wasn't placation, he truly believed she could fix anything. She was brilliant. 

She shook her against his chest; curls tickling under his nose and catching on his chin.

“No, I can’t. I can’t fix everything. I’ve tried.”

Her body shook again - silent grief overpowering her. Minutes passed with only incoherent sobs and his quite breaths to serenade them in the hazy blue light. 

He’d lost nearly all feeling in his bum and legs - the hard ground an unforgiving seat for such a lengthy period. When her sobs waned again he moved them to the lounge. 

She still didn’t speak. She just sat there with her body pressed against his. Her pain, for reason's he couldnt't name, filled him with anguish. Understanding it didn't seem to be prerequisite for his chest to ache.

This was different to her screaming and crying on the floor of his drawing room. That memory of her still haunted his dreams - left him with many sleepless nights. The way her eyes had pleaded for him to help and he’d turned away. The shame of that moment still haunted him. 

He wouldn’t ever forget that night. He’d never second guessed that moment, his decision not to act. Her pain then had meant little to him when his heart ached at the thought of what would happen to his mother if he intervened.

Yet somehow this pain - knowing he’d contributed to it. 

This hurt him. 

A visceral stab through his heart with each sob wracked her body. A slice across his chest when she heaved in a breath. An ache in his side with each sniffle.

He couldn’t bear it any longer. 

“Talk to me, Granger. Tell me what I can do to help. I know we’ll get out of here. Just tell me what I can do.”

“It’s not that, Draco.” Her voice was soft, pained. His name on her lips, a plea.

“Then tell me. Tell me how I can help. Hermione, please.” He spoke the words against her hair, felt them tickle against his stubble. 

“I couldn’t undo it. I couldn’t - I couldn’t fix it. Fuck, Draco, I couldn’t fix it. I can’t fix it. I thought I could. I thought I could do what hadn't been done before. I thought I was saving them. But I did it too well. And. and -” Her words escaped in a rush, running together and barely coherent. 

Before she could finish explaining she was crying again. Loud and heart wrenching.

He thought of his friends - the only role models he’d had in learning to comfort another human being. Draco tightened his grip and pulled her into his lap, hoping that mimicking Theo’s way of calming Astoria would work with Granger as well. He wrapped her tightly in his arms and ran soothing circles across her back with one hand. More soothing nonsense left his lips and wove its way through her hair. His other hand kept her tight against his body. 

Eventually, she stilled.

“Thank you” Her quiet words cut through the silence.

“Sure, Granger.” 

Cool air pressed against his shirt as she pulled away from his hold. She stayed on his lap, her torso angled perpendicular to his.

Her sad, butterscotch eyes met his gaze. Draco could tell she was considering her words - her mouth was twitching - evidence of a mental battle.

“I sometimes do things without thinking them through.” Her words were a quiet admission. “I’ve been told that I can be… impulsive.” 

Draco raised an eyebrow, but wisely kept his mouth closed. 

“During the war - before… “  Furrowed brows betrayed her calm, composed voice. 

“You don’t have to tell me anything. If it's what I said, then I'm sorry.”

Her curls whacked his face as her head shook emphatically.  “You don’t need to be, Draco. You were right. I’m just - having a hard time. A bit of a break down, I guess. I’m glad you believe I can fix this…” her voice trailed off to barely a whisper. Head turned, she kept her eyes anywhere but on him when she spoke again. “Because I’m not sure I can.”

Gripping tighter around her shoulder, he brought Granger’s attention back to him. He would not allow her to wallow and dwell on whatever memories left her quaking on the floor. Whatever permeated into her heart, so deeply it left her feeling like she wasn't enough.

“You know, Granger. It’s actually a good thing you got stuck here with me”

She huffed out a disbelieving laugh and rolled her eyes.

“Oh please, feel free to expand on your outrageous declaration.”

He smirked. Her snarky tone was a good sign.

Before he could expand on his - perfectly reasonable - declaration, they were interrupted by the arrival of something wholly unexpected.

“You hungry, Granger?” Draco asked. Snatching a croissant from mid air. He felt himself smile as he tossed the pastry in her direction, and was pleased to see a the faintest trace of a matching smile on her lips.

Chapter Text

Buttery goodness melted on her tongue as she bit into the fluffy pastry. There was no doubt in her mind that it was a Hogwarts weekend breakfast croissant.

Hermione savoured the familiar taste of her favourite part of Sunday morning breakfast. Normally she’d have sliced it, then slathered whichever fresh jam the Hogwarts house elves had provided on both halves. Her favourite was strawberry, though mulberry was a close second. She had fond memories of making her own jam; of raiding the neighbours trees for ripe fruit and returning home with her fingers stained. Her mother would…

Shaking her head, she brushed the thought aside. There was no point dwelling.

She must have closed her eyes, lost in sensation and memory. She must have closed them, because when she opened them she caught Malfoy staring at her.

She could have sworn his eyes traced the movement of her tongue as she retrieved a flake of pastry from her lower lip.

While she’d enjoyed a moment of breakfast bliss, he’d captured an assortment of foods - a small mound forming between his right forearm and chest.

“A little help, whenever you’re ready.” He asked cheekily.

Moments later she’d transfigured a handkerchief from her satchel into a small picnic mat. They sat, in opposite corners, with the pile of leftovers between them.

It was definitely a breakfast buffet, but that meant that it must have been well over 10 hours since they’d left the room of requirement, and it certainly didn’t feel like that long had passed. If it had, she’d have been awake for close to 26 hours. Her eyes ached from crying, but they weren’t pulsing. Her eyelids didn’t droop, didn’t slip closed without her consent, too exhausted to remain open and allow her to skim one more page . 

No, it wasn’t possible that she had experienced more than a day of time passing since she’d awoken yesterday morning. Regardless, she was fast approaching one of her longest periods of wakefulness. 

If she ignored her third year, which didn’t count. 

She had, on occasion, used the time turner provided to her for things other than attending classes. Once, so she could sneak into the prefect’s bathroom and countless other times where she’d missed meals and rewound herself so she had time to eat something. 

She’d never thought to calculate exactly how long her days were during that time. It was possible they’d been over a full 24 hours, but didn’t seem likely, maybe 20 at most. Still, hindsight provided further justification of her overall opinion of what teachers allowed students to get away with.

It was ridiculously irresponsible for Dumbledore to provide a 14 year old with an object deemed so dangerous, that the majority of its kind were kept locked in a special room in the Ministry of Magic. Yet he’d thought it appropriate for her to be allowed one; to run around, unsupervised, just so she could take all the classes she wanted. The boggart spell wasn’t the only ridiculous thing that year.

She pulled her thoughts back to the present and began to assess what she knew. Time was passing differently here, but by how much? They needed a way to measure time. Her thoughts briefly drifted toward a box on her dresser, a dainty gold-banded wristwatch with words engraved...

Hermione shook her head violently. She had to stop letting her thoughts wander. It did her no good. Particularly now.  They needed to know the time.

“Can you cast a tempus ?” She asked Draco abruptly. 

Despite the pile of food in the centre of the mat, he still cradled half a dozen croissants in the crook of his arm, holding them there as delicately as a newborn baby. 

He stared at her, wide-eyed and caught in a delicate position, his mouth rather occupied with the other half of the green apple he held in his left hand. His head dipped slightly in confirmation.

Once he’d done masticating the apple, and swallowing it (she definitely didn’t pay attention to the bob of his throat with that motion), he cast the incantation.

Glowing numbers appeared in the air, bright and clear against the dreary background. 

9:34am. 4 minutes after the conclusion of weekend breakfast.  Yet surely only a handful of hours had passed since they’d stumbled into this mess.

“Do you know anything about time dilation?” She asked. Malfoy shook his head, his mouth now occupied with devouring a crumpet.

“It hasn’t been 11 hours for us down here. It’s been, maybe 3?”

He raised an eyebrow and continued to chew, and made no move to correct her.

“That means time isn’t flowing here the way it does in the real world. What feels like maybe an hour for us is close to 3 hours for them.”

Malfoy’s pureblood education shone through as he finished his food and wiped his mouth before speaking.  “So?” He asked.

“So. Relativity says that can only happen if we’re moving really fast, like, close to the speed of light fast”.

“Doesn’t feel like we’re moving.” He stated, quite bluntly.

“Did it feel like you were moving when you laid in bed at Hogwarts?”

A dimple appeared on Malfoy’s cheek, moments before a wicked grin. “Thinking of me in bed, Granger?”

He followed the question with another bite of apple, maintaining unnecessary eye contact as he licked a trail of juice that threatened to escape his lips.

Heat flooded her cheeks as she tried not to think about Malfoy in his bed. What he might sleep in. What his hair would - .

She scoffed. “Answer the question, Malfoy.”

He tipped his head to the left and continued to crunch on the apple. 

Eventually, “No. Of course not. I’m just laying there.”

“But you’re not,” she stated. 

“I’m pretty sure I’d know if I was moving. I’ve certainly experienced moving in my—”

“ Malfoy! ” This conversational tangent needed to end.

“What I’m trying to point out here, is that even when you’re lying in bed - you’re moving. The Earth spins. It also revolves around the sun. Even the sun is moving, our whole solar system with it. But we don’t see it, because we’re inside the system.”

“Huh. So you think whatever this place is, it’s moving faster than where we came from. I guess that’s possible, but don’t see how it explains the difference in time.”

“It’s called time dilation, part of Einstein’s special theory of relativity. There’s heaps of evidence to back it up. Muons and atomic clocks.”

“Aren’t all clocks made of atoms, Granger?”

She huffed. “My point remains, even if you don’t understand, surely you can accept that time is moving differently here?”

He nodded, accepting her argument. “So, what you’re saying is that we need a way to measure timer here against an outside event whose time we know. Lunch finishes at one, that’s three and a half hours after breakfast finishes”

She couldn’t help the grin that spread on her face. “If we can measure time down here, and there, I can calculate the relative… oh. shit.”

“It should be the other way around.” She rolled aggresively off the mat and stood, dusting crumbs onto the floor. “We can’t tell we’re moving. So the real world must be moving, but then time should pass slower for them and at a regular speed for us. So our 12 hours would be their 3 hours.”

She’d hated special relativity. Her father thought it was fascinating, which is why she’d spent so much time reading about it. She thought it was clever that they had to adjust the time on the satellites for communications, but the concept itself was maddeningly counterintuitive. She turned to leave when Draco’s voice rang out from behind her. 

“Granger, let’s try anyway. Regardless of which is moving, it will help us keep track of time if we know how long is passing,” he gestured to the foggy blue emptiness above them, “up there. In the ‘real world’ as you put it.”

“Well, maybe it’s not the ‘real world’! Who knows, maybe this is the real world?” She gestured to the piles of debris around them. “It certainly feels real”.

Draco stood slowly, carefully wrapping the remainder of the food in the transfigured mat they’d sat on and shrinking it. He shrugged “It does feel real. Maybe we should give this place a name, you’ll need one for the book you eventually write, yeah? What would you call it?” 

“‘The underworld’, makes the most sense”

He chuckled. “If we find a river, I’ll allow it.”

They set off, trying to navigate their way through the maze, trying to find their way back to the starting point - to where they’d fallen in. 

Draco laughed when Hermione explained the trail of muffin crumbs she left behind. They perspired in the humid air and before too long Hermione felt the telltale signs of dehydration; the beginnings of a headache, a swollen tongue.

She’d realised hours ago that they would need water, but had held off mentioning it. The moment she’d been unable to vanish the knickers with Draco’s wand she’d had a suspicion that magic of a similar vein wouldn’t work here either.  

She’d been reluctant to mention it. 

Reluctant to draw attention to another problem for which she didn’t have a solution.

She let her mind wander, listening to the dulcet thwacking noises that accompanied the arrival of vanished things. She’d stopped looking to see what they were - most of the time they landed too far away, and most of what came here was junk.

They reached a small alcove, similar to the one they’d sat in for their ‘breakfast’ and Draco turned to face her.  

He gestured toward her satchel. “Don’t suppose you’ve got anything to drink in there? I’m parched.”

Hermione blinked rapidly, willing the tears not to come. She shook her head, not meeting his eyes. She’d never kept water in there. Never imagined a time where she wouldn’t have access to a wand with which to cast an aguamenti, or at the very least a stream and fire, or a tap.  

“Thought as much. Well, you’ll be pleased to know - I have an idea.”

They sat on the faux picnic mat again, Hermione using Draco’s wand to summon every empty glass vial in her bag.  While she collected them, he explained how they could use the environment to their advantage and she, internally, berated herself for not having thought of it sooner.

“I loved the greenhouses when I was a child.” He told her as he cast chilling charms on the bottles and sat them inside a giant metal tub he’d scourgified.

“I think because it was my mother’s favourite place. I enjoyed the serenity of it, the smell of the air and the feel of the air on my skin. But there was one thing I absolutely abhorred - when a drop of water would drip from the ceiling and mess with my hair.”

Hermione laughed. She could picture him, sitting quietly and listening as his mother spoke about the history of the many varieties of roses they kept. And the glower that would spread on his face as a tiny bead of water struck his head, dissolving some of the gel and leaving the hair less perfect than he intended. 

“Laugh all you like Granger, you can’t see what the humidity is doing to your hair.”

She blushed, but knew he was right. Her frizzy curls expanded exponentially in the humidity.

“Mother explained to me that the moisture in the air would condense into water when it touched something cold, like the glass ceiling.” He gestured to the assortment of glassware in the bowl he’d procured. “This should do the same thing. If we make the glasses cold enough, the water in the air will stick to the outside and then run down into the tub.”

Hermione was staring at him. She couldn’t help it. He was brilliant. Brilliant in a way she knew theoretically, but had rarely witnessed. 

He cast chilling charms on the glassware and, almost immediately, beads of water coalesced on the surface. Soon rivulets of water were running down the outside, tiny rivers making their way to the small ocean beneath the glassware.

As the tub filled, Draco levitated the glassware - making space. When it was completely full, Draco summoned the vials and bottles and set them on the ground. He used his wand to siphon the water from the bowl, filling their containers.

Her eyes ran over the vessels, cataloguing volumes, calculating consumption rates. Rationing.

“Don’t.” He said it simply, like he knew exactly what she was doing. His eyes were fixed on hers as he shook his head. “Don’t count it. I’ll do it again when we need to, just drink.”

He tilted his head and swallowed the contents of one of the medium sized bottles. His throat bobbed as he swallowed mouthful after mouthful until none remained.

“Drink the water, Granger.” He repeated. Lifting a similar sized bottle to his and handing it to her. Their fingers grazed as she took the bottle from his warm hand. 

The cool water hit her tongue and she moaned. It was like drinking chilled water from the fridge on a hot summer’s day. She felt its cool presence on her tongue, down her throat and then filling her tummy. Her eyes fell closed as she savoured the sensations. 

She opened her eyes to find his gaze still fixed on her. 

Hermione raised herself onto her knees and leaned forward, closing the space between them. She lingered there, unsure. Unsteady.

He didn’t flinch away, but closed his eyes as she whispered an almost inaudible ‘thank you’, and pressed a kiss to his cheek.

Chapter Text

He tried not to think about the feel of her soft lips on his cheek. It was hard to not think about it. He’d imagined it, when he’d leaned close to her in the trophy room. His mask had been in place as he’d crowded her against the wall.

Being near her was intoxicating. He’d never found someone whose mind worked like his. So inquisitive. So driven.

Obviously he’d known for years that she was like that - but he never thought he’d have the chance to be close enough to engage with her in this way. It was incredibly refreshing - having someone challenge the way he thought, the way he perceived magic and how it was used.

There were cracks though. Vulnerabilities.

He could see the way she closed herself off. In any situation where she didn’t have the answers her walls came up and she shut down. There was something he was missing, something that made her feel like whatever she did wasn’t enough. Merlin, he knew that feeling well enough.

They didn’t stay long after she’d collected all the water. Choosing a direction at random they’d set off in silence, only the sounds of the shoes against the ground and their breath accompanying them. The occasional thunk heralded the arrival of another vanished object.

Despite it being daytime in the real world, by their assumption at least, their surroundings seemed to be growing darker. Gloomier. As they walked he’d lit the tip of his wand.  At first he’d cast a simple lumos, the same one he’d learned before even stepping foot in Hogwarts. He held his wand aloft, bathing the area in front of them in a bright white light. 

Granger winced beside him, throwing a hand over her eyes.

“For goodness sake, Malfoy. Use a red light down here.”

“Red light, blue light, white light. It’s all light Granger. Don’t see how it matters.”

“It does matter actually.” She turned away from his wandlight, one eye open and the other closed. “There’s different parts of your eye responsible for detecting the different frequencies, and some are more sensitive than others. You have to do Muggle Studies, don’t you?” She asked - her voice dripping with condescension. “Surely you’ve learned about cars - or at least seen a car?”

Draco nodded. Of course he knew about cars. He wasn’t an idiot. He actually had quite the appreciation for cars. One of his post-Hogwarts goals was to learn to drive one. A fast one. Maybe even a motorbike. His father was horrified by the possibility. But he couldn’t see why Granger would be asking about cars down here of all places.

“What colour are the lights on the back of the cars?” She snipped.

His answer was automatic - red.

“And why are they red?”

“Obviously to warn of danger. That’s what the textbook said.”

Granger rolled her eyes and scoffed loudly. “Of course it did. Bloody typical. It’s not because red means danger, Malfoy, it’s because red light has the least impact on night vision.”

“Muggles don’t have ‘night vision’.” 

“Yes, but they have the ability to detect light levels - to see shapes in the dark. The red light has the least impact on that vision - that’s why it’s used on car lights - so that at night when you’re driving behind someone, the red of their tail lights doesn’t mess with your vision.”

Draco was stunned. Learning that light was a wave had shocked him. He hadn’t really thought about what light was up until then - it was just light. Then he learned that the different colours were related to different wavelengths and frequencies. But to know that eyes detected them in different ways, and that muggles knew that and had adapted their technology to suit. Incredible. 

“You didn’t do muggle studies, so how do you know all this, Granger?”

“My parents.” she shrugged. “They weren’t fond of the idea of my education not including a solid understanding of basic science and maths. They were quite shocked it wasn’t included in the Hogwarts curriculum. I spent most of each summer learning Muggle Sciences; Biology, Chemistry, Physics. A little bit of Geology.”

“Sounds like they cared a lot about your education, learning all of that as well as beating everyone in every course at school. They must be proud of you.”

The comment snapped into his head and out of his mouth before he’d thought it through. He didn’t really know anything about muggles and couldn’t really imagine what it would be like for a pair of muggles to discover that their child was a witch. He tried to imagine what it would be like if he’d been sent to a Muggle School and expected to learn all the wizarding subjects in his summers. There was so much to learn, he was certain he wouldn’t have been able to learn everything he needed to - even with private tutors.

His parents would have been proud of him - if he’d spent his summers studying. Surely hers would be too?

“They were.”

The past tense hit him like a slap. Before he had time to put together any sort of apology or condolence, she’d walked away. 

He recast his lumos, slowing the motion and focusing on producing a longer wavelength of light. The tip of his wand glowed with an ethereal red light.  It did make it easier to see. He hurried to catch up to Granger.

***

“How long has it been?” Granger asked. She’d stopped and was leaning against a broken desk. 

Draco cast a tempus.  12:40pm. Three hours of overworld time had passed. It had definitely not been anywhere near that long for them. At most they’d been walking for perhaps an hour, though it was hard to tell without any markers to discern distance in the winding maze they traversed.

“Do you think that lunch will arrive where we are, or that we just happened to be in the right place the first time?”

She asked a good question. A great question, even. Another question that, again, probably should have been asked earlier. He shrugged his shoulders. There wasn’t much they could do except wait and find out. Granger pulled her notebook out and began scribbling with her transfigured pot and mended quill, her messy handwriting quickly filling the page.

He couldn’t help the smile that slipped onto his face. Classic, swotty, Granger. 

He settled onto the ground on the opposite side of the small clearing. His head flopped back against the wall of mess behind him. It hadn’t been as long down here as up there, but he was starting to feel the beginnings of exhaustion. They’d walked for hours. His body was tired. His eyes were tired. Draco’s eyes closed, his breathing began to slow. The sounds of Granger scribbling quieted his mind. He existed quietly in the liminal space between consciousness and sleep.

His meander into a peaceful slumber was abruptly interrupted by a loud crash from behind him. He sprang to his feet, instantly alert and turning to face whatever danger was coming for them.

Granger sprang off the desk, her eyes wide and darting back and forth over his shoulders, scanning the piles of rubbish for the source of the sound.

The cacophonous clamour came again. It wasn’t the dull thud they’d become accustomed to hearing - the one that reverberated when something particularly large arrived in the vanished place. It was louder. Sharper. Clangier. Like a great many things had been abruptly disturbed from their piles and were cascading onto the floor below.

The sound grew louder. Whatever the cause was, it wasn’t stationary, and it was definitely moving towards them.

Granger’s eyes grew wider, likely reaching the same conclusion he had. 

He turned and backed up until he stood right in front of her. Despite the obvious terror of their situation, her voice was calm. He imagined this was what it must have been like for Potter and Weasley, during their unconventional seventh-year. Her calm was contagious. It settled over him like a warm blanket. His breathing evened out - even while his heart continued to thunder in his chest.

“Is this a turn and run, or a stay and face it type situation?” She asked calmly. Neither were great options. They had only a single wand between them, which wouldn’t be very helpful if they needed to defend themselves. He was a decent duellist, but he didn’t even know if what was coming was human, creature or some other entity that roamed the underworld. Or if the spells he would usually cast would even work down here.

Neither of them knew where exactly they were, or where they were headed. Or which direction they should run if they needed to. Taking a stand seemed to be the best option. The only viable option.

“I say stay and face it, better to know what we’re dealing with than have it chasing us when we don’t even know where we are.” As he finished speaking she moved away from him. He spun at the loud cracking sound that followed her, only to see Granger with the desk on an angle and her foot pressed against one of the legs. A handful of quite distracting grunts and several extremely satisfying cracks later she stood beside him again, a table leg in each hand.

She shrugged in response to his raised eyebrow. “What? It’s better than no weapon.”

They turned in sync and faced the direction of the noise, which had grown even louder. A trio of chipped ceramic plates clattered down the wall of junk opposite them, rolling to a stop at their feet. A floral umbrella tumbled end over end and sprung open, flipping itself inside out as it hit the ground. Draco’s eyes followed the debris before darting back to the top of the pile.

Granger stiffened beside him, her breaths came faster but her aura of calm remained. They faced the threat together, side by side. Him with the raised wand and her with a pair of table legs.

A nose peaked over the type of the pile, darting back and forth and dislodging more rubbish from the pile.

No, not a nose. A bill.

A duck bill.

Attached to a pale face with tiny black eyes.

He laughed in relief. There unexpected guest was a niffler!  There was a bloody Niffler down here. He wondered how it could possibly have ended up here, and why they hadn’t heard from it earlier.

From what he’d learned from a quick read of his biting textbook in third year, the creatures were fond of shiny things and had the equivalent of an undetectable extension charm in their pouches. It was incredibly low on the list of creatures he’d ever expected to see. 

And something they would definitely not need to fight to survive. He grinned at Granger who appeared to be shaking with excitement.

She let out a noise that could best be described as a squeak. Her eyes were still wide and her lips pressed together in an expression he was entirely unfamiliar with. Her chocolate eyes shone and she looked positively ready to burst with excitement. The table legs fell to the floor with a clatter, barely missing her tapping toes. 

Granger leaned into him, squeezing his arm with her right hand.

“Oh. My. God.” Her voice was breathy, hushed and full of awe. “It’s soooo cute.”

Chapter Text

The niffler was the most adorable thing Hermione had ever seen. Its eyes were tiny black beads that shone with curiosity as it snuffled through the pile of garbage it crested. 

“It’s just as cute as I remember.” Malfoy had responded, his lips quirking as he seemed to desperately try to hold in a wide smile. 

He failed, and it was truly beautiful to behold.

The way his eyes sparkled transformed his entire face.

He stepped forward, crouching down and making adorable kissy noises to attract it. Hermione tried not to notice the way his trousers pull tight around his glutes in his squatted position. 

Malfoy turned to look over his shoulder, grinning at her. “Can you get something from breakfast for her?” 

Hermione nodded and reached into her satchel, rummaging until her fingers brushed against something she was sure the creature would eat. Grinning, she pulled the apple from the bag and tossed it to Malfoy.

Well, she tried to toss it to Malfoy. Her throw was far from optimal and she watched as the apple veered sharply to the left and far too high, on a trajectory to sail well over his head. He launched himself upward, stretching on his tiptoes to neatly pluck the fruit from the air with ease. 

Damned seeker reflexes.

He turned to face her, a smirk on his face. “Really Granger?” He shook his head. “That was atrocious.”

“Oh shut up, Malfoy. I was distracted by it’s pure and utter cuteness” 

The smirk turned into a full-blown grin that spread across his face. Merlin help her; it was such a beautiful expression. He crouched again and offered the apple on the palm of his hand. 

The niffler’s nose twitched and it cocked its sweet little head to the side. It scampered forward and began to slide down the tower of debris before losing its balance, tumbling over and over until it came to an abrupt halt by rolling into Malfoy’s shiny shoes.

Malfoy chuckled affectionately at the little creature, but otherwise didn’t move. The niffler was brave and inquisitive, nuzzling into Malfoy’s hand. She laughed when it flung the apple to the side. Its focus was elsewhere.

Its tiny clawed hands reached for the shiny silver of the signet ring on Malfoy’s pinky finger. He growled as its claws dug into his skin, standing abruptly. 

“Little bugger.” He chastised. “That is the definition of biting the hand that tried to feed you. You cheeky thing.”

Hermione laughed. She was still too shocked to move, though. The lesson that Hagrid had delivered in fourth-year was one she was devastated to have missed. Ron had visited her in the hospital wing afterward, gushing about the cuteness of the little devils. She heard all about the way they’d sniffled through Hagrid’s garden, unearthing watches and leprechaun gold. 

Care of Magical Creatures had never been her favourite course, and it was one she’d not chosen to study for her N.E.W.T.s, but there were aspects of it that she missed. Engaging with sweet little creatures like this one sat high on that list. 

She took a step back when it approached her, inspecting the glint of red light off the eyelets on her shoes. 

“It’s alright, Granger. It won’t hurt you.” He held out his hand to her, flexing his fingers. “It's a little scratch, but it didn’t hurt. Here.” He pulled a shiny silver ring from his other hand. His right hand clasped around hers, turning it over and pressing the ring into her palm.

“Are you sure? Wouldn’t want it stealing away with a priceless Malfoy artefact. It’s probably worth hundreds of galleons and a century old.”

Malfoy shrugged. “Only four hundred and it’s barely two centuries old, there are dozens more like it just in my room at home.”

Hermione scoffed, rolling her eyes at the absolute insanity of his wealth and the ease with which he could give away what, to her, would be a priceless family heirloom. She was eager to see what the niffler would do with it.

Carefully, tentatively, she lowered herself until her knees met the cool ground. She opened her hand and the niffler shuffled over. Its deft hands collected the ring from her palm and deposited it swiftly inside its pouch.

Up close it was even sweeter than she could have imagined. Such an adorable sweet little thing all alone down here for goodness knows how long. She could feel tears pooling in her eyes as she beheld the creature in front of her. For it to be here, with them, someone had to have sent it here. She couldn’t imagine casting an evanesco on a creature, but someone obviously had thought to.  To send this poor, innocent, little creature down here.

It nuzzled closer to her feet and began pulling at her shoelaces. A sharp squeak escaped her lips. Malfoy reached down and carefully pulled the niffler into his arms, leaning down to whisper into its ear and stroking its soft fur with one hand.

Hermione picked up the discarded apple and stood, holding it closer until the niffler grasped it, pulled it into its mouth and swallowed it whole. 

“Must have been hungry then.” Malfoy said, his hands still running soothingly along the smooth dark fur. 

She nodded her agreement. A bright pink tongue darted out of the bill-shaped mouth and licked along Malfoy’s arm. 

“Oh stop. That tickles.” He shifted it into a position where it couldn’t reach his arm. Its response was to delve into his shirt, and from the shocked look on Malfoy’s face, repeat the tonguing of his skin on somewhere more sensitive than his forearm.

“The poor thing must be thirsty. Let’s set up the dew-traps again.”

A few minutes later their tub had been enlarged and the assortment of glassware was once again collecting condensation and channelling it for collection.

Hermione wanted to sit and relax, but the sound was just too much. She’d had her fill of water earlier and now, well, nature was calling.

She shifted uncomfortably on the ground where she sat, pressing her thighs together and wiggling her toes to distract her from the need that was very quickly turning to desperation.

“Are you alright, Granger?” 

“Mmhmm.” she’d replied, too distracted to respond with anything more coherent.

“Why are you so jiggly?”

“No reason.”

“Then stop. It’s annoying.”

She scowled in his direction, then closed her eyes and calmed herself - focusing on taking deep breaths in and out. She’d spent enough time camping with her parents, and then with Harry and Ron in seventh year, that her bladder control was fairly good. Between that and the pelvic floor exercises she’d started the moment she’d heard Fleur’s and Tonks’ post-pregnancy horror stories, she would have said she had exceptional bladder control.

She focused on drawing up her pelvic floor, holding for a count of ten and then releasing slowly. She repeated the pattern. In for five. Hold for ten. Out for seven.

The constant excruciatingly loud drip of the coalesced water was not helping. Her quick trip to the bathroom before meeting Malfoy at the room of requirement had been, by her own body clock, many hours ago. And she’d had a lot to drink since he first made dew traps to produce potable water for them.

Of course he had to interrupt her peace.

“What are you doing, Granger? I swear, you have to stop counting - it’s incredibly unnerving.”

“Well if that damned contraption wasn’t dripping so loudly I wouldn’t need to.”

“I don’t see how those two things are… oh.” His voice trailed off as realisation dawned. She opened her eyes in time to see the flush creeping up his neck as he turned away. 

“Exactly. And it’s not like there’s anywhere convenient, or any toilet paper, and as lovely as this is, getting to know you down here in the underworld, I’m really not sure that we’ve grown close enough that I’d be comfortable with you hearing me pee.” She’d gotten to that stage after months with Harry, but he was more like a brother than a friend. She’d never gotten there with Ron. 

“I don’t think that’s a stage I’d ever like to reach.” Malfoy deadpanned.

“Indeed.” Sighing, she pushed herself up off the ground and held out her hand. “I’m going to need your wand.”  His eyes opened wide and he began to shake his head.  She hadn’t used it since the shirt incident. Truth be told, she was eager to touch it again - to see if that spark came to life again. She stared at him, her hand steady and extended forward.

“Surely you don’t.” His cheeks coloured and his eyes were darting anywhere except at her face.

“I assure you, I do. While you might have a surefire way to ensure a minimal amount of splashback, I do not. I’ve not seen a toilet, nor anything that might possibly be a place I could pee that won’t splash back onto my shoes. Frankly, the last thing I want down here - where we can’t vanish the mess - is a puddle of urine. So yes. If I could borrow your wand so that I could siphon my urine away from the ground and maybe cast a quick cleansing charm while I’m at it, I’d be ever so appreciative.”

Malfoy’s mouth had dropped open. She’d just monologued on exactly why she needed his wand in more detail than was strictly necessary. The redness under his skin, having escaped his collar, had made its way to settle across his cheeks. He blinked and shook his head before wordlessly extending the wand to her.

It sparked again as he transferred it into her possession. 

She could feel the colour on her own cheeks and hastily made her way as far down one of the pathways she could before speaking.

“Malfoy, if you can hear me you’d better say something now or you’re going to hear more than just my voice.”

A second passed before he called out.

“Keep going, Granger.”

She returned feeling considerably more refreshed after casting cleansing charms on her teeth, armpits and the back of her neck as well as the more intimate parts of her body. The wand had felt warm in her hand, responsive. Vastly different to the feeling of his Aunt’s wand.Darkness had oozed through the very fibre of the wood. Holding it felt like picking up a teaspoon that had been left in a cup of tea long enough to become hot. It always burned, but never left a mark.

If the wand chose the wizard, then Bellatrix’s wand had been as true a representation of the witch as could be expected. The fact that Malfoy’s wand felt so different in her hand had her questioning an array of underlying beliefs. About him. His past. His present. 

His wand felt cool in her hand.

He’d sighed in relief, the same way any wizard would when reunited with their wand. Moments later he muttered something under his breath and departed their grotto in the opposite direction. 

Wise choice, she thought.

When he returned, his hair looking decidedly less ruffled, she requested he cast another tempus. 

2:15pm. 

They both frowned at the glowing numerals. It was well and truly past the end of lunch and they had not been showered in baked goods. However far they’d moved down here, it was far enough that they weren’t near the dining room. Or maybe even within the bounds of Hogwarts.

 “Glad you caught enough to last us a week then.” She’d quipped, patting her bag affectionately and thinking of the transfigured picnic mat wrapped around dozens of pastries, and the array of pears, apples and oranges she’d stuffed inside as well.