Year Seven:Blindsided

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the other original characters and or places in the Potterverse, which was created by the wonderful JK Rowling. I believe that they are owned by Warner Brothers. However, the plot, new characters and or places are mine, mine, and mine! And are subject to copyright by ME


Chapter 21- Anaticula, Draconigena Commissura


Draco wrapped himself in calm before he left the common room; his arrogant mask was now becoming just that, a mask. He was amazed at how much he’d changed in the months since he’d been with Hermione. He no longer had to keep the façade of ice on at all times. Now that he thought of it he hadn’t really changed all that much, it was more like he now had the freedom to express himself and his feelings. She was the first person he’d ever met who allowed him to be himself. He smothered a smile as he entered the Great Hall, that was not an expression that was appropriate for a Malfoy.


He threw what appeared to be a disgusted look at Hermione. He was glad that she had friends who accepted her without a second thought. If only he had the same luxury. It was possible to waste one’s life wondering what if, so he thought of it no more. He took his place at the Slytherin table and proceeded to fall into his typical snarky character. He started in on Crabbe, who was wearing more of his breakfast than he’d managed to get into his mouth. “I hope you aren’t planning on going to class like that. I’m sure you could find a more effective way of smuggling a snack into class, Crabbe.”


The large beefy boy looked up at Draco with an expression that clearly said that he didn’t understand the criticism that Draco was making. “Whot d’you sayin’ ‘Raco?” he asked around a mouth overfull with food.


“You really don’t know do you?” Draco could not contain his revulsion at Crabbe’s gluttony. The rest of his attitude was fake, but he was genuinely appalled by Crabbe’s slovenly table manners. If the future ranks of the Death Eaters were to be composed of creatures such as the one that sat before him, then Voldemort’s cause was certainly doomed. That was something Draco did not want to think about, his father would certainly be visiting him soon to begin his investiture into the afore mentioned clandestine group, without regard to his personal reservations. He shivered at the very idea of being Voldemort’s pawn; he couldn’t understand why his father would submit to such a lowly position.


“What’s the matter Draco?” asked Pansy, her voice cutting into his thoughts like the blade of a knife.


“I just got a full on shot of Granger,” he drawled. Maybe she knew about his relationship with Hermione, but that didn’t mean that everyone else had to as well. Besides, if he could repeatedly discredit her no one would believe her if she did decide to spill the beans, so to speak.


Draco had apparently done an excellent job of convincing his housemates that he was indeed revolted by the mere sight of Hermione. No one seemed to think it strange when he left the Great Hall early, complaining of stomach pains. He slipped from the prying eyes of the other students and into the library; he had to know more about the Polyjuice Potion. The librarian, Madam Pince, didn’t even look up as Draco entered the library and greeted her politely, “Good morning Madam Pince.”


“Good morning Master Malfoy.”


He walked to the back of the enormous room where the Restricted Section sat and gathered more dust than the weight of the total number of its visitors in a year. He unhooked the velvet rope that separated these volumes from the rest and stepped gingerly into the heart of the section that contained the volumes pertaining to potion making. The first book he selected was of no help at all, as it contained mostly revenge potions. For some reason as he held that book in his hand it felt oddly familiar to him, but he could not have said why. It was not often that Draco’s memory failed him and when it did the lapse usually came back to haunt him. He shook off this unpleasant feeling and tried to set his mind back to the task of finding the Polyjuice Potion.


After what seemed to Draco to have been hours of fruitless searching, he finally found the proper book, Moste Potent Potions, the pages were badly stained with what he could only assume was bits of potion splatter. He looked up at the grandfather clock to see that he’d only been at his search for a little less than half an hour. He sighed in relief. He had to leave now lest he be late for class.


Hermione ate the remainder of her breakfast feeling more at home in the presence of her housemates than she had all year. She’d somehow managed to put the horrible memories of her visions away for long enough to enjoy the company of her friends.


Hermione listened attentively as Harry talked about Quidditch practice and how much he longed to win the Quidditch Cup this year. Harry had been the natural choice for captain because of his years of experience on the field; no other player in the whole school could boast six and a half seasons of playing on a house team. He’d been even more manic in this quest than Wood had been his seventh year at Hogwarts. Which was saying something, of course none of the current players had any notion of how Wood had behaved. And if speculation were to be believed, Harry had multiple personalities: the laid back carefree Harry in classes, and the crazed tyrant that prowled the Quidditch pitch.


It relaxed Hermione that everyone seemed to delight in the small things that Hogwarts had to offer. Ginny and Neville were discussing which was better pumpkin juice or red tea. Seamus and Ron were playing a game of Wizard’s Chess, which Ron would undoubtedly win. After his tirade Harry and Dean were discussing Harry’s latest romantic conquest. Hermione moved next to Ron and Seamus to get a better view of the game.


“Hey Ron?” Hermione asked when he looked up at her and smiled.


“Yes, Hermione?”


“Could I play you at lunch?”


“Absolutely!” Ron’s smile increased in size, the expression he wore was now positively ridiculous. “You have a taste for losing Hermione, but I can’t complain about that.”


Hermione smirked at him and said, “We shall see, Ronald, we shall see.” With that she left the Great Hall for McGonagall’s advanced class, Animagi: Theory and Transformation. She still hadn’t decided if she wanted to become an animagus or not. Maybe her visions could be useful for something other than depressing her. The next time she had one she resolved to take a moment to poke around in the thoughts and memories of her future self.


Satisfied with this idea she skipped to the classroom that Professor McGonagall used for this class. It was much more isolated than the room she used for her other classes, as the nature of this class was far more sensitive than more conventional forms of Transfiguration. If a neophyte were to attempt the level of magic needed to make the transformation from human to animal said individual might be irrevocably harmed; needless to say that would be too much of a liability for the school to take a chance on. The result was that the class had to held in the Astronomy Tower, which would be deserted during daylight hours.


The hike to the Astronomy Tower still had Hermione panting with exertion, even after six and a half years of traversing the serpentine corridors of Hogwarts Castle. She was, as usual, the first to have reached the classroom, but she was surprised when Draco strolled up behind her only a minute after her, he was not at all fatigued by his leisurely stroll to the tower. She eyed the form of the blond wizard skeptically, “What is the password Malfoy?”


He did not seem at all perturbed by her brusque tone; it was good to see that she was keeping up her end of the ruse. “You know very well that we didn’t change the password yet Granger.” His tone was equally harsh, but the smile on his face that was reflected in his magnificent blue eyes took the sting out of the words.


“We really shouldn’t put off something so important Dragon.”


“Alright, I’ll ask to go to the library once class is underway and I’ll change it. What is a good password?”


“Humm, it should be something obscure and personal to us.”


“Maybe the Latin for Duck and Dragon?”


“That is perfect! Duckling translates to ‘anaticula’ and dragon translates to well, ‘draco’, but ‘draconigena’ translates to dragon-born or born of a dragon. That would be harder to figure out.”


“My God Hermione, how do you know all that? Have you got a book shoved up your robes?”


“No. Before I knew that I was a witch my parents sent me to a school for academically gifted Muggles and my favorite class was Latin. It’s helped me a lot since I came here.”


She never ceased to amaze Draco. At that moment it occurred to him that Hermione would have been a great success at anything she set herself to accomplish. He felt awash in pride for her, she was extraordinary and he was lucky to have her. “I think we should also include the word for ‘and’ in the new password as well.”


“Well, there is no direct English correlation to ‘and’, well there is ‘et’, but that isn’t right for this. How about ‘together’?”


“Sounds good.”


“That is, ‘commissura’.”


“So it should be ‘Anaticula, Draconigena Commissura’”


“You catch on pretty quickly Dragon.” She smiled at him and he shook his head at her.


Pansy decided at breakfast that morning that she would have to take advantage of the narrow window of opportunity afforded by their schedule of classes to gather dirt on Hermione and also something with which she could blackmail Draco. In spite of the fact that she knew that both the Head boy and girl were currently in Transfiguration she crept to their common room as surreptitiously as she was able. It would be just like one of them to show up and spoil her “fun”.


When she reached the portrait hole she spoke the password to the sleepy eyed witch who was resting on the frame. Without bothering to check the identity of the person who wished to gain entrance into the common room the exhausted woman opened the doorway into the common room.


Pansy couldn’t believe her luck, “That could not possibly have gone more smoothly if I’d scripted it myself.” She slipped through the common room and into the door of Hermione’s room with the unsettling grace of a snake. Taking care to close the door behind her, Pansy prowled around the room trying desperately not to disturb anything without making a mental note to fix it on her way out.


She took off her shoes and tiptoed across the massive room to Hermione’s wardrobe. As silently as was possible she opened the aged door and was met with a most unpleasant discovery. She was consumed with fear, as the form of Draco loomed over her. “I’ll teach you to spy you insolent little tart. When I’m finished with you they won’t be large enough pieces to identify you by. I would let you defend yourself, but an honorable death is far more than you deserve.” He raised his wand and pushed a couple of unruly strands of his blond hair off of his forehead and suddenly he was no longer able to speak. He grasped at his throat in desperation, but by then it was clearly too late. His hair went as red as Ron Weasley’s and his arms grew to the length of those of a troll.


Pansy was consumed with fits of laughter as she shouted “Riddikulus!” one final time and “Draco” vanished in a puff of smoke with a cracking sound. She’d finally gotten her breathing back to a normal rate before she had time to realize what a close call that had been. Well one thing was quite clear, in the time since Hermione and Draco had left her bedchamber this morning a boggart had decided to take up residence in that very wardrobe. It was also clear that Pansy was most afraid of Draco’s temper if he were to catch her in the act of sabotaging his beloved Hermione.


She went back to work worming her way through all of Hermione’s possessions, trying desperately to find so much as a tiny indiscretion that might be used against that seemingly perfect little know-it-all. Just when she thought that she might have found something to suit her purpose, Hermione’s journal, a noise form the common room gave her a start and her heart leapt into her throat. There was someone in the common room and they were headed this way she had to hide, lest she be discovered. In a panic she threw herself under the ancient bed, not even wanting to risk a loud breath, she put her hand to her mouth and waited.


As she lay still and quiet under the bed she saw a pair of feet that were too large to be female, ‘They are even too big to belong to that disgusting she-oaf mudblood.’ He feet paced the length of the room several times. Whoever this was it was clear that he was searching for something. The feet turned to the bed and began walking toward the spot in which Pansy had cloistered herself. This was the end of her little quest surely she was done for. She held her breath and closed her eyes tight willing something, anything to interrupt his march toward her.


Her wish was granted with only an instant to spare. “DAMN IT ALL! That bloody floorboard is going to kill me someday,” said Draco. Knowing who was walking around in the rest of the room had the direct opposite effect on Pansy than she’d have desired. A chill ran up her spine and she swallowed rather harder than she meant to; under ordinary circumstances it should have been audible to anyone else in the room. This however was not the case. She was saved from discovery only by Draco’s continued cursing and flailing, which was kicking up dust.


She had to use both hands, one to keep quiet and the other to hold her nose so she would not sneeze. After a few moments in this incredibly uncomfortable position and her back began to spasm. She wanted Draco to leave now just so that she could escape! She belatedly realized that it was going to be far more difficult to destroy that mudblood than she’d ever dreamed.


Draco rose from the bed and crossed to the bureau where Hermione had her toiletries laid in neat little rows according to size and function. He smiled at her scrupulously neat system of organization; he’d have to remember to ask where she learned to be so attentive. As he turned for the door something caught his eye. It was not at all like Hermione to leave anything out of place, let alone something as private as her journal. It wasn’t that she didn’t trust him; it was just that everyone needs to be able to express even his or her most private thoughts without fear of criticism. Draco had to respect someone who respected them self, but those who didn’t were, in his opinion, fair game. He picked up the journal and placed it in the pouch he wore over his shoulder and exited the room.


Pansy crawled from underneath the bed like the bottom feeder that she was and made a beeline for the place were Hermione’s journal had been only moments earlier. “Damn, I should have nicked it when I had the chance.” She looked at herself in the mirror and cursed both Draco and her ill luck. She waited until she heard him leave through the portrait hole before she reentered the common room to make her escape.