Jekyll and Hyde or Beauty and the Beast

A/N: Finally finished chapter three and I can breathe a sigh of relief. Its a bit longer than the rest of the chapters, and has a good bit of mildly plotty filler, but it was needed I assure you fro some of this will be coming into play later on. Please read and review!



Chapter 3: We Never Change



Professor Ingrid Gregory sat at the piano and picked at the keys softly, a soft and harmonious melody floated through the air, the notes dancing along the air, the portraits and the skin of Hermione Granger. Her eyes were closed and her voice was raised in song, this was by far one of the most difficult classes that she had ever taken. Not only had she been challenged to sing in front of someone, but she was being taught musical theory and scale, how to sing harmony and melody to herself, and the hardest part, to write a song to someone.



The lessons to this point had been hard enough, but the song had been the toughest part; mainly because she had been able to write nothing but sadness until a very long talk with Professor Gregory. The tall violet eyed blonde had been very understanding, listening nodding and quite a few times even hugging Hermione while she cried. She had divulged every single thing about her relationship with Draco, starting from the beginning and moving through the bitterness to the suicidal incident.



Are you that stupid Hermione?! Honestly, you should know that it isn\'t an option for a bright witch like you, there help out there and I have the feeling that this class will be just what you need!



Hermione smiled to herself as she sang, the woman was becoming very much a mentor to Hermione in the three weeks that she had been in the class. Finishing the song Professor Gregory grinned at Hermione and embellished the ending before standing and bowing to an invisible audience, which made Hermione giggle.



"Your mood seems to have improved a great deal in the past few weeks Hermione that makes me quite pleased. It seems that you have found a release at last for your feelings, although as a woman who has had her issues with love, I only wish you would have found it sooner. We have finished for the day, but I still need your song that you have been working on by the end of the day. I\'m not rushing you because I know it takes time, but you are the last student to turn it in. If I am to work on the music for it, I will need the lyrics soon. Halloween is coming soon and while you have the different ones that you show me I need the final version."



Hermione nodded softly and tucked a stray curl back from her face, Professor Gregory smiled and pointed her wand to the door and it swung slowly open. Grabbing her things Hermione walked to the door before stopping and looking back at the woman. "I have an idea that I have been battling with a little, I had planned on playing with it some after my Charms exam. When I finish should I bring it by your classroom or should I just drop it by your office?"



Ingrid stopped for a moment and tapped her lips. "I might have a student; a few have scheduled extra classes in some of my free periods. If you finish, bring it by and we can go over it when I finish with them. They shouldn\'t mind, If they are practicing though just come in and have a seat. I don\'t want to interrupt them." She smiled softly at Hermione and turned back to gathering her papers from the piano, sighing softly Hermione left the room and made her way to Black Lake.



It seemed that the Black Lake was the only place as of late that she was able to relax, she had found a little haven just around the bend of the lake. There was a large rock that had a shelf that Hermione used almost as a desk. Her parchment, ink and quills would be spread across it in some great mass. It had enough cover from the trees to be sunny just at the right part of the day, it was her escape, her haven, and she felt that she belonged there more than she did anywhere else at the moment.



Sitting down in front of the large stone Hermione pulled out her music sheets and sighed. She didn\'t know what to write, she had filled a notebook with words, but nothing had seemed to work. All of her emotions still felt muddled, she still felt so alone and she didn\'t know what to do, the consuming almost constant pain had faded; in its place was numb feeling that she was grateful for. Biting her lip Hermione thought of Draco and pulled out a quill and began to write.



Hermione\'s remaining classes had come and gone, and unfortunately she was not able to take her finished project to Professor Gregory after her exam, as she had been called away to the sixth floor corridor to assist in breaking up a clash between a few Slytherin fifth years who had been picking on a third year Ravenclaw. Much to the Hermione\'s dismay, when she arrived, the younger boy had the Slytherins hanging by their underwear from extinguished torches. At first she fought the urge to laugh, covering her mouth with her hand, biting her lip and stifling the laugh gently, after a moment she recovered her faculties, shaking her head she knew she would have to wait for a professor to come and assist, thinking that this would have been a great time for the galleons that they used in her forth year for the DA.



Sighing softly Hermione summoned her Patronus, rolling her eyes at the laughter of the Ravenclaw boy; the silver animal ran across the corridor, around the corner and was gone. Letting out an audible groan Hermione turned to look at both all the boys, speaking to the third year boy first.



"I don\'t know your name, and while your spell was impressive for one in your year you will have to be punished for this I hope you are aware. You will serve three days detention with Mr. Filch and fifty points will be taken from Ravenclaw for this. I am curious though, what spell did you use?"



The young boy blushed heavily and looked at his shoes. "it was just a simple levitation spell, Miss." He looked up at her shyly.



"Did you put them up there all at one time or individually?" She asked curiously.



"It was all at one time, but I didn\'t mean to do it, they just made me so angry. I\'m tired of being made fun of for being smart and they just pushed me over the edge. I couldn\'t help but laugh, but once they were up there I couldn\'t figure out how to get them down. I tried to levitate them down but I didn\'t want to be doing it when someone came along, and I couldn\'t leave them here alone, so I waited."



Hermione smiled kindly. "Well, it seems that you tapped into some power that you didn\'t know that you had didn\'t you-" She realized that she didn\'t know his name still. "What is your name?"



The boy sighed and lowered his head. "It\'s Benjamin Paul." He said blushing slightly. "I don\'t really have a last name; it sounds more like two first names." When the boy looked up his eyes seemed to be full of fire. "It\'s one of the things I get made fun of about."



Hermione turned to the still quiet Slytherin boys, her eyes full of anger. "How dare you bully him for being smart and for being different? Being a bully is nothing better than what we fought during the war. You are no better than-" Letting out a breath she collected herself and began again. "I fought a war to stop hatred against those who are different, and here you are, just a younger generation doing the exact same thing. You think you are so much better because you are rich, or you are a pureblood, or because you are Slytherin, but you aren\'t. You also will receive three days detention, but I think you can serve yours with Hagrid. Fifty pointy from Slytherin, for each of you, and If it happens again, I will make sure that Professor McGonagall sends a letter to each of your parents. Understood?"



Pointing her wand at the Slytherin boys she lowered them and got their names just as Professor McGonagall came around the corner.



"I see you have everything taken care of Miss Granger. Have you handed out the proper punishments?" She asked, her accent thick, more than likely with sleep than with anger.



Hermione nodded softly and quickly gave her a recap of the events and what she had been told. Professor McGonagall agreed with Hermione\'s punishments, took notes of their names and escorted the Ravenclaw boy away for a talk with Professor Flitwick, leaving Hermione to take the Slytherin boy\'s to Professor Slughorn\'s office.



It didn\'t take long to get to his office, but of course the wizard was not there. He was found, however, in the potion\'s lab; unfortunately for Hermione she saw him pocketing expensive potion\'s ingredients. This meant, of course, that what Harry had told them during their sixth year was true, that Slughorn had indeed developed a need to steal ingredients. She made a mental note to inform the Headmistress but quickly went to doing her duties and left the boys with their Head of House.



By the time that Hermione was able to go back to Professor Gregory\'s class room it was almost sunset; the large orb that was the sun was almost fully hidden behind the Scottish mountains, it cast light across the Scottish skies. Deep blues, purples, reds even darker pinks were cast, making the clouds look like fields of cotton candy just ready to be picked.



Twilight was Hermione\'s favorite time of day, it was when people were settling down finally, the crazy hubbub of the day finally subsiding. Students were in their common rooms doing homework or in the Great Hall talking with friends and waiting for dinner to start.



Usually Hermione would find herself amongst those in the Great Hall, as it was part of her duties to patrol it, but tonight she found herself walking through the cool corridor that lead to Professor Gregory\'s class room. Hermione had finished her project, but didn\'t like what she had written, it was sad, no more than that, it was depressing. Hermione had taken her time after her Potion\'s class had let out early to have another go at it. Thanks to a Ginny sneezing, Luna had dropped a very large vial of Boomslang skin into the Cauldron, which filled the room with a noxious gas. The class had ended abruptly, and all classes were cancelled until Mr. Filch and Professor Slughorn were able to get it fixed.



So it was with her parchment in hand that Hermione knocked softly on the door to the classroom and opened it. She had heard the music from the other side of the door and assumed that Professor Gregory had been practicing her guitar, but as the door shut softly behind her, nothing could have prepared her for what she saw and her.



Draco Malfoy was sitting on a stool and strumming a rather handsome guitar, the melody of the music was calm and soothing, yet underneath there was a slight hint of heartbreaking emptiness. He didn\'t even notice that Hermione had walked into the room, in fact Draco didn\'t seem to notice anything around him at all, he was lost in the music, in the song, you could see it as he played.



Swiftly turning she reached for the handle of the door, but as a voice was raised in song her hand fell away, and she made her way robotically to a chair near the door as Draco began to sing.



I wanna live life, never be cruel,

I wanna live life, be good to you.

I wanna fly, never come down,

And live my life, And have friends around.



A hand went to her mouth as she sat there in shock, never in all of their years of friendship and, well other things, had Hermione known that Draco could sing, nor would she have expected such words to come from him. Thinking it best to not make too much commotion she sat there quietly and listened to the soft song.



So I wanna live in a wooden house,

Making more friends would be easy.

Oh and I don\'t have a show to say,



Yes, and I sin every single day,

We never change, do we?

We never learned to leave.



So, I wanna live in a wooden house,

Making more friends would be easy,

I wanna live where the sun comes out.



As he finished the song Professor Gregory began to clap softly, a joyful smile on her face, obviously proud of her Slytherin student.



"That was lovely Draco! Absolutely beautiful, though might I enquire if a young woman was the inspiration of the song?" The reply was lost to Hermione, for she had run from the room so quickly she never even noticed that she left the parchment that held the deepest feelings of her heart so nonchalantly, someone did though, and upon reading the words that the innocent parchment held, grey eyes so very much like the sky clouded over as it began to suddenly pour.



Draco did his best to avoid Hermione Granger for the next few weeks; her sudden and most certainly unbidden intrusion into his private lesson with Professor Gregory had shown her him at his most vulnerable. Since the fall of the Dark Lord the Malfoy family had been through more than their share of hardships, although the most painful had been his father\'s arrest and subsequent life sentence, Draco had been able to pull their name out of the mud a great deal. Thankfully the Malfoy name held some weight in wizarding society and Draco was able to make sure that his mother was squared away, and that the family fortune was not a complete loss.



They were no longer lavishly rich, in fact they were far from it, but they were comfortable. Malfoy Manor was a complete loss, but after having the Dark Lord in residence, Draco knew it would be best for him and his mother to be done with it. So it had been sold off in pieces and the money put in the bank. Draco\'s new goal was to make sure that his mother was taken care of, as well as reconnecting with his aunt Andromeda and his new cousin Teddy.



It was just a few days until Halloween now and Draco was doing his patrols through the second floor corridor, making his way to the third and his dorm. Hermione had seemed to make it her purpose to ignore him, ignoring him at meals as well, and only speaking to Draco at the prefect meetings. It wasn\'t that Draco really cared, it just bothered him that she who had once been so loving, so caring, so warm to him was such a cold hearted cruel bitch.



She was no longer the Hermione Granger that he had fallen in love with; she was a very different being all together. She was no forced to step fully from the shadow of Potter and Weasley, and while Weasley\'s sacrifice was honorable, it had left quite the visible hole in Hermione. One that she had yet to heal, and it had caused her to almost kill herself.



She seemed to be doing better, he mused to himself quietly as turned the corner nearest the joint room he shared with Hermione, but looks can be deceiving, for Draco could still hear her dreams at night, hear her calling out to Weasley, and it cut to the very heart of him.



He stopped and leaned against the wall shaking his head, he couldn\'t do this anymore, he had to get her out of his head, and out of his heart. He had ended things to protect her, and keep her from being just another Mudblood dead to cause that his father had fought for, he had done it because he loved her. Draco loved Hermione, he had for a long time, but how could he tell her that when his father was who he was? For years Draco had worn the mask dutifully to please his father, and keep his family safe and alive. He wouldn\'t endanger Hermione any more than she already was endangered just by being Harry Potter\'s friend.



Telling Hermione this had been so very hard for him to do, his heart broke the moment that the words came from his lips and he saw the hurt look on her face. He knew that she had crumbled, but in true Gryffindor style Hermione had lifted her chin, defying his want of things to go easily, told him that she was surprised that it had lasted that long and left the Three Broomsticks, her brown curls bouncing in the autumn wind.



She had most certainly made it clear that she no longer wanted any form of a relationship with him, not that Draco could blame her, in all honesty why would she? After how he had treated her, it had been he who had saved her life, stopping his aunt from torturing her further, but he himself still held the scars as a punishment from his father for doing so. His heart still beat for Hermione only but that path was no closed to him, Hermione would never love him again.



"She doesn\'t love me anymore, so it\'s best I move on." He whispered to absolutely no one before pushing himself away from the wall and into the joint commons. Striding through the sitting room he didn\'t speak to Hermione, and she didn\'t look up to acknowledge his presence in the room.



He sat at his desk, withdrew a quill, ink, and parchment and wrote a short note to Pansy Parkinson, asking her to go to the Halloween Ball with him. While it was short notice, Draco had heard that very morning that she has been dumped so close to the ball. It would be chance for her to make her now ex-boyfriend jealous, and give Draco a chance to try and get Hermione off of his mind.



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A/N: The song Draco sings belongs to Coldplay, you can find it on Youtube, entitiled We Never Change.