Claiming Hermione

“This doesn’t change anything, Granger. We’re not friends.” Draco said.

“I know.”

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The dark forest was not particularly dark in the area where Hermione nimbly stepped over fallen branches and around rocks. In fact, the late summer Sunday sun was dappling cheerfully through the canopy and the air was thick with beams of light making little flying insects glow red and yellow as they flitted in and out of the rays. Hermione was musing with a light heart about how easy it had been to get Hagrid to give away the location of the large cropping of puffpinks she needed for the extra credit potion she intended to brew for Potions. Snape always took every opportunity to deduct points from Gryffindor and from her. She was also certain that being Head Girl would only encourage him to look for excuses. Though it was still early in the term, she intended to get the top marks in the class. Her paper bag was full now and clutched loosely in her hand as she made her way back towards the castle.

In her peripheral vision, a sudden movement on the ground caught her eye and had her whipping out her wand and standing stock still, breath stuck in her throat.

She could see a sliver of black among the maze of tree trunks. It stood out in the green forest as something unnatural that didn’t belong. No sound gave away any information and she carefully peered around the trees to get a better look. Wand trained in front of her, Moody’s cries of “Constant vigilance!” repeating in the back of her head, she nearly dropped her bag and her wand when the scene was fully revealed.

Draco Malfoy was sitting on the ground against a tree, head folded down onto his knees, his inky black robes speckled with a few dead leaves picked up from the forest floor. And he was…. crying?

Her first thought was that it was a trap. Her head turned left and right, even above, scanning the area for Death Eaters waiting in the shadows. Finding nothing, she looked back to Draco. His shoulders were shaking rather violently and he seemed totally unaware of her presence. The lack of sound suggested that he’d put up a silencing charm and suddenly she remembered. She was ashamed with herself that she could have put it out of her mind so easily and quickly. It was that morning, for crying out loud! The headline of that morning’s Daily Prophet bellowed in large black letters, “MALFOYS DEAD”. She’d shared a heavy glance with Ron and Harry, and none of them said anything. They may hate the Malfoy heir from his precious hair right down to his cultured drawl, but none of them was heartless enough to wish a fellow student’s parents dead. She’d scanned the article quickly, not willing to spend much of her energy on the Head Boy. Lucius had escaped from Azkaban two nights prior and returned to Malfoy Manor in the early evening. He had taken Narcissa, forcibly it seemed, from the mess found by aurors the next day, to Voldemort. A study of her body indicated that she had been killed with repeated exposure to the Cruciatus curse. A study of Lucius’s wand suggested that it had been at his hand. An Avada Kedavra had killed him within the following hour. No sign of an Imperious curse was evident on the senior Malfoy. Both bodies had been returned to Malfoy Manor.

She remembered looking over to the Slytherin table seeking out the Head Boy, but he was no where to be seen and upon further searching, she saw that Snape and Dumbledore were also missing. “Good,” she’d thought, “they must be talking to him.” With that, she’d dismissed the whole situation entirely, glad to not think about Malfoy. The only downside to being Head Girl was having to work with him, but she had been prepared for it for months and, as it was so early in the new year, they’d hardly interacted at all.

Now here she was, standing in front of a crying Malfoy, not really sure how to proceed. She should probably just leave. She was sure that Malfoy would not want to be discovered like this. In fact, he would probably be merciless in his retribution if he knew that she'd seen him. But her instincts were overridding her rational mind. Mortal enemy he may be, but he was obviously extremely upset and she just couldn’t put her heart aside, no matter what he had called her or done to her. She stepped closer to him, inside the circle of his silencing charm. His sobs bouncing loudly off the trees were gut wrenching. Any hesitation she’d had was gone instantly. He looked up at her then, and the look on his face was so filled with anguish that Hermione took a loud inward breath. His normally pale porcelain face was a harsh, blotchy red right up to the roots of his white blonde hair and down to his neck, and his eyes were so puffy and bloodshot the silver of his irises almost glowed though they were barely visible. However, the runny nose he was ignoring was all the evidence needed to show that he was completely distraught. They faced each other, both frozen in their own embarrasment.

He would lash out at her, yell at her to leave, maybe try to hex her, and who knows what else, at least that’s what she was waiting for. But she knew she wouldn’t leave. She would take it and hope it helped him feel a little bit better.

Hermione had never seen a man cry, and very few boys at that. Even Harry had always held back his tears. When Sirius died, she had never witnessed him break down. Draco was seventeen and no longer the boy she’d started school with six years ago. Watching the most controlled and masculine, albeit arrogant, man she knew, break down made her feel awkward and a little frightened. It seemed much, much, much worse than when a woman cried.

She steeled herself internally for the onslaught and was surprised (and relieved) when he let out another guttural sob and dropped his head back down. She dropped to her knees beside him and tentatively put her hand on his back. This only seemed to make him sob harder, but he didn’t remove her hand. After a couple minutes he lifted his head again and looked sideways at her. He didn’t wipe at the snot running dangerously close to his red, wind burned-looking mouth, nor did he rub his tear stained cheeks or eyes. Hermione reached into her shoulder bag and pulled out a white square of fabric, handing it to him. He took it, wiped his nose and crumpled the fabric in his fist. He looked raw.

An unspoken understanding passed between them then. For right now, all bets were off. Just for now, the past has never happened and they were just two people. “My father tortured my mother…to death. He fucking killed my mother.” His voice was raspy and broken and his expression pained and pleading. Hermione’s face reflected his, eyebrows furrowed in sorrow, empathy etched into her warm amber eyes. I’m so sorry, she said with her eyes, unable to speak past the lump lodged in her throat.

Draco’s jaw tensed as he searched her eyes as if there was some answer there. Hermione watched his lips press into a hard line and his chin quiver as he tried to hold back more tears. She shifted to sitting cross-legged, a little closer to him, and slowly began to move her hand in a circle on his back. The dam broke and he dropped his head again, cradling his face in the cup of his hands. She murmured quiet shhhh shhhh’s to him and gently pulled him towards her a little. He followed without thought and let his heavy, tense body fall against her, head in her lap, and lay curled on the forest floor shaking and sobbing. Hermione smoothed her left hand through his soft hair, sweeping it away from his burning face and continued the circle on his back while she rocked slightly.

Draco's thoughts were stuck in a loop, “He killed her. He killed her. He killed her.” He was glad his father had been killed also, it saved him the trouble, though it did deprive him of the chance to inflict his revenge. All he was left with was the emptiness and sorrow of having his mother taken from him forever. His mother was the only person in the world he loved, and more, the only person he’d ever felt loved him. He’d feared his father, admired him when he was younger. He wanted to be like him. Strong, powerful, and master of his domain. But things had changed when his father had been captured and sent to Azkaban. He’d thought he would be livid, or at least feel dishonored, but instead he found that he felt free for the first time in his life. It had been a startling revelation and he spent many hours in contemplation over it. He even wrote to his mother about it. They had always shared a closeness that Lucius couldn’t even come close to. Not that he’d tried. His mother wrote him long letters and confessed that she too felt released. When she had married Lucius, she was young and she had been impressed by his commanding presence. He appealed to her aristocratic, well-bred, high-society upbringing, but when he aligned himself with the Dark Lord, he’d done so against her wishes and she knew there was nothing she could do. As he gained favor in that murky world, he became consumed with the pursuit of power. In her case though, Narcissa’s bright, fiery spirit gave way to her fear and she retreated within herself. So she lived for her son and secretly prayed that she would find a way to save him from his father. She doted on him during his father’s frequent trips, laughing with him and letting him know, in every way she could, that she loved him. She wanted to do more, to try to infuse her values in him, even if she had to do it covertly, but her young dragon idealized his father and she feared Draco would - unknowingly - inform Lucius of her betrayal. She knew Lucius would be merciless in his punishment and all her efforts with Draco would be lost. All she could do was love him and make sure he knew it.

When Lucius was captured at the Ministry of Magic, her very soul seemed to sigh with relief. She wrote to Draco and began to let her true thoughts and feelings slip into her letters. Slowly at first, but after Draco wrote to her about his own doubts and confusion, she let it all out. She had always held Draco closely, but now their bond was cemented. Every ounce of suffering she had endured as the wife of a cruel Death Eater had been worth it when Draco told her, in no uncertain terms, that he would never take the Mark.

Draco thought about the stack of letters from his mother, written on fine parchment and secreted in a beautiful walnut box in his trunk, and a fresh bout of anguish gripped him as he realized he’d never receive another one. He currently owned every precious letter that he ever would. And it wasn’t enough.

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Draco was inconsolable. His hysterical sobs bounced off the tree trunks then hung in air just above their heads like an invisible blanket punched with holes. He cried out and sobbed and shook violently, “Oh God!” and “He killed her” and “Mum” mixed with deep gulping breaths. Hermione continued to run her fingers, over his smooth forehead and through his hair, raking his bangs away from his face and watching them fall into place once more. Always more at home in the world of intellect, she had never felt particularly maternal, but instinct seemed to take over and she knew exactly what to do. There was no question in her mind; enemy or not, she would stay with him as long as he needed her to. Her sense of disbelief – that she was sitting on the ground in the dark forest holding Malfoy in her lap and comforting him – was suspended for the time being, and she just concentrated on soothing this human being’s sorrow.

She shifted slightly a few times so her legs wouldn’t fall asleep, and wondered how long they’d been out there. It was two o’clock when she’d gone to Hagrid’s earlier and now the sun had begun it’s decent. Looking up through the canopy, Hermione guessed it was around five. Dinner would be in an hour. After the first hour or so, Draco’s shoulders had softened and he’d quieted a bit. Every once in a while, a new wave of tears would over take him, she guessed, with a new memory. Looking down at him now, she could see that his face was returning to its alabaster hue, cheeks stained with long dried streaks, though his eyelids were puffy and still red. His nose was bright red from being rubbed with the balled up, wet cloth. His breathing had become deep and slow and she thought that he might be sleeping. Hermione's stomach balled up strangely at the sight of her own golden brown fingers running through his silky light hair. She had never seem him this close up and it was unnerving. Her mind began to run through a jumbled series of memories of him. His cruelty, his hateful sneer, his haughty posture, his taunts and jibes, even the crafty way he’d managed to ignore her and still get their initial Head duties completed. And then there was his damn smirk. God, she hated that smirk. There was something about it that made her insides twist. She had once, a very long time ago, caught herself thinking that smirk was sexy as hell even though it had been intended to make her feel beaten, and she had never forgiven herself for thinking it.

What would happen now? She was not naïve enough to think everything between them was going to be sunshine and roses now that Draco Malfoy had cried in her lap. She certainly wasn't going to forget all the hate he'd thrown at her. He'd made her life hell for six years and, even if she was being nice to him for the moment, she had every intention of continuing hating him. She sighed deeply and tried to prepare for herself for the biting words he would probably spew at her the moment he regained his footing. His gargantuan ego would never allow him to be civil to her, especially now that she’d witnessed this naked emotion from him. She wondered if Draco Malfoy had ever cried in his entire life. Well, maybe, she thought wryly, when he didn’t get his way, he probably cried like a spoiled child. Which he was. Or, rather, had been.

She let out another sigh and a low groan floated out with it. Draco stirred and sat up slowly, pushing up on one arm and not looking at her. He took a deep breath and pulled his knees up so he sat the way she had found him, but now looking off unseeingly in to the trees in front of him. She unfolded her legs and stretched them out, unsure what to say and wondering if his worst self would come out now to rescue his pride.

His worst self, however, was too exhausted to do anything. His pride was beaten into the ground and practically vaporized. As far as he could remember, it was the first time in his life he had ever cried. And he hoped he never did it again. Not like that, especially. But, his thoughts were thick and muddled now as he tried to think of what to say, what to think about the fact that fucking Granger!, of all people, had found him like that, and worse, that he’d broken down and let himself be enclosed in and comforted by her warmth and soft caresses. What would she want from him now? How would he keep her silent? God, if she fucking told Potter… Would she use this against him? Probably not. She may hate him as much as he hated her, but her goody-two-shoes morals would have her taking the high road. Thank God for small mercies. But, would she expect him to be nice to her?

He groaned and broke the weird silence that seemed to be filling in between them. He stood up and snuck a glance at her sitting on the ground before turning away from her to leave. Her robes were rumpled and there was a dark spot on her thigh. He flushed with shame at a trail of shiny dried snot stretched over a small area near the spot he’d obviously wet with his tears. Looking towards the castle, he said in a low rasp, “This doesn’t change anything, Granger. We’re not friends.”

His hoarse voice sent a dull, slow ache through her. “I know.” She said quietly on a sigh and turned her head to look at the ground. He took one step and hesitated, then continued on back to the castle.

Hermione sat unmoving, listening to his retreating footfalls. She felt pretty certain that, in fact, it changed everything.

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