Contradictus Totalus

Contradictus Totalus - Chapter Nine

Draco climbs up a mountain. It's not night, but the sky is a stormy black and grey. Giant clots of snow fly into his face. He tries to smirk even in the midst of the storm, but cannot: his half-formed smirk quickly drops into a horrible scowl, with his lips trembling, teeth chattering.

Draco's chest feels frozen, as if there is something gripping him tightly. As he climbs higher, the air becomes thinner and thinner, and his chest feels tighter and tighter. Despite the fact that he is now gasping for breath, he cannot stop. His legs are being controlled by someone else.

Draco slaps his arms against his legs. He yanks his hands back in shock - his hands just passed right through his legs! He begins to feel a chill that has nothing to do with the biting wind and snow. He looks down, and sees nothing in the darkness. He strains his eyes and stares harder and he - sweet Merlin, his legs are gone! They've disappeared, as if they were blown away by the shrieking wind. In place of his legs, there is ... nothing. Inky blackness. Smoke. A mist. Simply ... nothing.

His eyes are wide with fear. This isn't possible. It isn't fucking possible. He is ascending the mountain on little stumps of legs. Draco swivels his head frantically, looking for an exit. Some way out of this hellish tundra. All he can see is a blank white canvas splattered with ominous shades of grey. He looks back. He has left no footprints in the snow behind him. This scares him more than he can imagine. In a place where no one can hear him scream above the wind, Draco Malfoy still squeezes his eyes shut, grits his teeth, and persists in trying to gulp down a sob.

He tries taking a deep breath - but he can't. Draco cannot breathe. His lungs feel as if they contain only ice. He is taken further up the mountain. The air here is thin, the wind is violent, and the sky resembles liquid that is spilling out of a shattered Pensieve. He goes higher and higher, and his chest is squeezed tighter and tighter ... He takes one more step -

- and then he is falling. He braces himself for the rough landing -

- that does not come.

Opening eyes that he has unconsciously squeezed shut, he realizes he is lying next to a blazing fire.

And then suddenly, Draco feels little tendrils of heat shoot through his body. He feels the telltale prickles in his fingers that signal the return of blood to them. He looks down, and sees with utter relief his legs splayed out in front of him. But most importantly of all, he feels a burning heat in his chest. He gasps, and is amazed to feel the air entering inside him. It's sweet, and as simple as the scent of vanilla drifting in the wind.

But the surge of heat spread does not stop there. It shoots up through his chest, heading towards his face, and Draco knows, somehow, he knows, that it will converge on his lips. He feels an intense heat on his lips ...

* * * * *

Malfoy opened his eyes.

Hermione couldn't help jerking back and giving an involuntary squeak of surprise as the eyelashes that she had been staring at suddenly shot upwards. They were only inches away from brushing against hers. She found herself staring at a pair of very familiar, very moody-looking eyes, eyes that she had not expected she'd see again.

But before she could do or say anything more, she felt a strong force push her backwards. She teetered over, windmilling her arms frantically. Just when she thought she would be safe from falling backwards into the mud, she felt another shove. She landed flat on her back onto the ground, slightly stunned.

What was going on? Was the squid back? She opened her mouth to speak, all the while struggling to get up again. 'Mal-'

Before she could finish, Malfoy grabbed her wrists and pinned her down. Her mind blank, Hermione looked up and saw him staring down at her wildly. He straddled her body and leaned towards her. She stared into his almost panicky-looking eyes positioned only inches away. She knew what to expect when she looked into his eyes: she had nearly memorized the pattern of the irises after catching so many glimpses of them in the last twelve hours or so. She'd see eternity, feel the strange warping of time, caught in the fusion of colour.

'What the hell, Granger!' Malfoy yelled out, between bouts of coughing. Time began to pass normally again, and even though she lost the real image of Malfoy's eye, Hermione still saw the surrealistic swirls of neon imprinted on the underside of the lids of her eyes when she blinked.

When she opened her eyes again, her head had cleared up, enough for her to comprehend what was happening. Her relief at Malfoy's return from the dead was short-lived. The jubilation that she had just a moment ago - Malfoy was alive! - had evaporated and had been replaced with fear. Who knew what Malfoy would do? Who knew what he was capable of? Hermione tried hard not to think of Ron's words, about how Malfoy would hurt her, especially when she wasn't expecting it. She felt a shiver of fear run down her back.

'What were you doing just now! Answer me!'

As he gave her wrists another brusque shake, Hermione felt the first sparks of anger surge into her. How dare he! How dare that arrogant, pompous prat treat her like a poor little house-elf, grabbing and handling her so callously, pinning her down like he had every right to, howling at her when she had just saved his life, as if she was supposed to risk her life for bratty, selfish, self-absorbed wizards who wouldn't give her the time of day! She was not some poor little house elf of his. She was not bound to him, obliged to rescue him from hungry giant squids.

'What was I doing? Saving your ruddy life!' Hermione retorted.

The grip on her wrist slackened enormously, and there was an out-of-place pause in Malfoy's coughing as Hermione's retort hung in the air between them.

'Let go of me, Malfoy!' Hermione took the opportunity to promptly tear her wrists out of his grasp. She ignored the heavy weight of his body, feeling only a great deal of anger at his self-centeredness. She had saved his life, only to be attacked by him and pinned to the ground! She pushed herself up with her elbows with as much dignity as possible. 'And for heaven's sake, stop coughing up water on me!'

Malfoy stood up abruptly, leaving Granger staring at him on the ground. He felt a strange confusion within. The little waterproof fire that glowed between them illuminated the whole tableau, and Malfoy knew that his face - no doubt looking ridiculously confused - was exposed in the light. The two of them were dripping wet, with their hair plastered to their faces. She had water rolling down the sides of her robes, a steady trickle pattering onto the ground. His eyes followed the rivulets of water trailing down her robes, through her hair, down her face ...

'What were you doing just now, Granger?' Malfoy repeated, a bit more quietly, though his words carried the same amount of weight. He hacked a few more times to finally clear his throat of water. Did she just say that she had ... saved his life?

He had felt such warmth spreading through his whole body, had felt oxygen enter his lungs again. He had opened his eyes ... only to see Granger's brown ones inches away from his, lips poised only a fraction of an inch away from his. She had saved his life? Surely not! She couldn't and wouldn't do anything of that sort. Who did she think she was fooling? Transparent Gryffindor idiot.

He stared at her. Despite the distance between them, he still thought he could see the individual drops of rain clinging to her eyelashes and - he deliberately averted his eyes, and caught sight of his wand right next to her feet. What was she doing with his wand? What had just occurred? She had obviously used his wand ...

Malfoy gritted his teeth. First he had woken up to find her mouth a hair's-width away from his, and now, even worse, she'd been messing around with his wand. Why the fuck was she so angry at him? It was his prerogative to know what in the name of Merlin she was just doing! Granger would give him the explanation he rightfully deserved, and he wanted it right now, damn it!

'That's my wand, Granger. What were you doing with it? Why were your filthy -' Malfoy's chin jutted out aggressively, even as he stooped to reclaim his wand, never taking his eyes away from hers.

'Fine, Malfoy!' Hermione spat out angrily. 'The next time you get abducted by a giant squid, I won't risk my life to try to rescue yours! In fact, I have no idea why I was at all worried - it's obvious that your ego's too big for anything to swallow anyway!'

Malfoy froze in the midst of getting up again. She really had saved him. From a giant squid, no worse. He felt his vision go slightly blurry as a barrage of images bombarded his mind. Granger with a look of pure horror on her face. Slime oozing up between his fingers as he clutched a rubbery tentacle. Granger biting her bottom lip in frustration as she tried to think of an insult. The teeth of the squid shining a dim white in the darkness. Granger being pulled away from him in the water by the giant squid, taking his wand. The maw of the giant squid getting closer and closer, his view of it getting larger and larger, as he was dropped from the grip of the tentacle, heading headfirst into the creature's jaws. Granger slamming into him in midair. Their arms wrapped around each other. Her body curled up snugly into his.

Hermione watched Malfoy's still figure, still kneeling next to her. The wand he had just been holding possessively towards his body dropped out of his hand and fell soundlessly into the mud. His eyes were unseeing, his mouth slightly open. (Really, those brief moments of confusion on Draco's face were quite interesting to observe. He looked so unguarded during those lapses in control. So different ...) Then, he focussed directly on her. Hermione's eyes widened as she looked into his grey eyes, and saw something more than only her reflection. She saw a flash of ... recognition? Relief? She had seen the look countless times displayed openly in Harry and Ron's eyes. It was amazing to see it in Draco's.

But then he blinked, and when his eyes opened again, the stony, disdainful look Hermione had seen all too well on his face had returned. Cold and impassive again, the brief crack in the granite wall completely mended and dismissed, Malfoy was already bending down to pick up his twice-dropped wand.

'So, you - er, you pulled me out of the water, did you,' Malfoy said stiffly, from his crouched position on the ground.

Hermione gingerly lowered herself to the ground as well, and scooted a bit closer to the fire. She looked outside their shelter and was amazed to see that the squid had disappeared. The lake was calm, and there was no indication of what had just transpired. Also, the rain had stopped at some point without her knowing. The only sound that penetrated their cocoon under the fallen tree was the occasional drop of rain from a leaf into a puddle.

Malfoy tried not to stare at the witch who was trying not to stare at him. Of all the stupid, clumsy replies he had to give! In reality, it was a strategic space-holder. A rhetorical, redundant remark that gave himself a bit more time to think. But why oh why couldn't he have chosen a remark a little bit more eloquent, a little less inane? A comment that would not give Granger the impression that he was some doddering fool begging for a few Knuts on the street.

'Yes,' Granger replied awkwardly, as if not knowing how else to respond.

That one-syllable, three-letter long word seemed to echo in the confines of the fallen tree. It was a nail in Malfoy's coffin that resonated several times, a hammer that struck the burning steel that was his pride, taking a chip out of it. He had been saved by Granger. Hermione Granger, Merlin's beard! He had needed her help. He had screamed out Granger's name to the sky in that time of need, for Merlin's sake!

He thought of his vow to himself earlier, following his close encounter with the carnivorous mushrooms. The bloody Horklumps that had spared his fingers, but savaged his pride. He had promised himself that if a situation like this would ever arise again, he would not let his pride take a beating again. Well, this counted, didn't it? Granger had hopped to his rescue again. This time, it had been a sodding squid instead of a fucking fungus, but that didn't make any damn difference at all! He was still looking like a bloody, bumbling berk in front of her. But what was he supposed to do? He had promised himself that he wouldn't let her off so easily this time. But how? In all of his ruminations after the incident with the Horklumps, he had never thought of how. He had only told himself, to be honest, had consoled himself, with the vow that he wouldn't let it happen again. After all, he was a Malfoy, and he had more self-control and determination than any wizard. Hah! It turned out that the vow he'd made to himself was as empty a Weasley's vault at Gringotts. His jaw clenched.

Granger continued speaking. 'I, er - You weren't breathing. I had to give you artificial respiration.' She looked down, seemingly happy to sit in silence by the fire. Her face was neutral, and she spoke without any sign of smugness, disgust, or contempt that Malfoy could detect, but he still wasn't satisfied in the least.

He simply didn't know how to respond to her. He was caught in some weird time warp exclusive to his brain. How was it that his brain seemed to create links and arguments and thoughts so quickly, yet, in a strange twist of fate, when all of those thoughts zooming around his head at light-speed added up, he still could not come to a single decision? The only thing he could do was sit there and allow the anger to build up inside him. And build up it did. At record speed, in fact, clocking in at the same speed his thoughts flew.

Artificial respiration. It had gone that far. Bloody hell. He had promised himself that he would salvage his pride the next time something like this happened, but how does one salvage this?

As all of his pride, his fucking pride, burned itself smaller and smaller into a heap of grey ashes, the anger inside him was still building (at an exponential rate, if his rage could be measured), gathering momentum, becoming an unstoppable force like a forest fire raging on in spite of a thunderstorm. Malfoy didn't want to stop it, because it felt like such a bloody good thing. On the contrary, he wracked his brain to find more fuel to add to the inferno.

Granger's mouth was on his. Her mouth. His mouth. Touching. He should shudder. He should sneer. He should say something utterly humiliating, perhaps about how he would have to cast a Disinfecting Charm every day for a year on his lips to completely erase all of the Mudblood filth. It would be what Lucius would do.

Despite the fact that Malfoy only saw his father over the holidays, he knew Lucius very well when it came to this area of expertise. Malfoy had come to learn over the years just what Lucius was capable of, and what actions would correspond with which consequences. The man was rarely predictable. Sitting among the weeds by the fire, Malfoy could predict exactly what Lucius would do and say if he was the third party here, standing - 'because Malfoys don't ever sit in the presence of such inferiors, son' - gingerly next to the fire, trying not to let mud splatter on his robes and succeeding in a fashion that only Lucius Malfoy could.

The shame of it all: getting plucked off the ground by a giant squid, and needing to be rescued by Hermione Granger. Malfoy could almost hear the comments, see the frown, and feel the disappointment that Lucius would have readily on hand. Lucius would bid his son to stand up, and although they were nearly of equal height (Malfoy still had some growing up to do), Lucius would still manage to stare down at him, perhaps shaking his head, or arching an eyebrow, or stroking his chin, as he surveyed his son, but always, there would be a tightening of the lips. The fine wrinkles at the sides of Lucius's lips would rearrange themselves to point towards a twisted frown. Disappointment. Then, the roadmap of wrinkles would rearrange itself again as Lucius would open his thin-lipped mouth. 'Do you not remember what I taught you while you were growing up, Draco? What are you playing at, needing a Mudblood to rescue you? You're a Malfoy, and we don't need to be rescued by anyone, least of all people inferior to us. Are you going to leave her be, and let that Mudblood delude herself into believing that she's equal to us? To you?'

Malfoy could picture everything clearly in his mind. (However, why was it that when he thought of Lucius - who had nothing to do with Granger or the situation at hand - the bonfire still grew? Why was Lucius just another log? When thrown into the mix, he caused the fire to grow even hotter and more violent, throwing sparks out everywhere.)

Malfoy knew Lucius had a point - he had to protect the reputation of his family. Now, Malfoy was worked up. He had the motive and the means. He had a perfectly good outlet for his rage. Granger was sitting by the fire, eyeing him warily but seeming to enjoy the brief silence that had passed since her last comment. Well, it would be silent no more. ('Artificial respiration, Granger? I'll have to cast a Disinfecting Charm every day for a year on his lips to completely erase all of this Mudblood filth that you've contaminated me with' seemed like a sufficiently biting comment under the circumstances.)

He opened his mouth to speak.

'Your father would be proud of you. Whatever you're about to say, I'm sure it would be what he'd have said too, if he was in your place,' Granger said casually.

'What are you talking about,' Malfoy said deadpan, trying to sound cool and not at all bothered by the fact that she seemed to know innately when he would open his mouth to insult her.

Granger cocked her head at him and raised an eyebrow. 'Did you know that a split second before you spout out an insult worthy of a Malfoy, your eyes always narrow and you curl your lips just a fraction?'

Malfoy cursed her silently. Who was she to even think that he was so transparent and predictable? That he even remotely resembled someone like her! What did she know? He'd show her.

Trying desperately to keep his face impassive, he drawled, 'I wasn't aware that you observe me so carefully, Granger. Trying to figure out what it takes to be human? You'll need a lot more than that to succeed. Sorry to crush your dreams and all.'

Hermione sighed. She should have known. Malfoy had no sense of decency. Of course he wouldn't have responded with gratitude. Really, she shouldn't have expected anything to come out of Malfoy. He was so hopelessly self-centered, and so bound by his narrow mind. Of course he wouldn't acknowledge that she had saved him.

'No,' Hermione said tiredly, 'I spend a lot of time trying to read Harry and Ron's expressions. I can tell when they try to keep things away from me deliberately.'

Potty and Weasel? The foolish, bumbling Gryffindors! Malfoy was nothing like them. The two idiots didn't know subtlety and cleverness if they were hit on the head by them! Speaking of which, Malfoy could not help congratulating himself silently as he took in Granger's weariness. He saw how she had winced. He saw how she had lowered her eyes momentarily. She thought he was easy to read, but look at her, wearing her heart on her sleeve. With someone like her, it was practically guaranteed that whatever she had to say about him, it would be complete rubbish. Yes, he would take pleasure in unmasking her sheer hypocrisy and proving how wrong she was to judge him. What else could he say to evoke a response from her?

Malfoy sniped at her, 'No surprise why they'd do that. I suppose they've gotten tired of consorting with a dirty Mudblood who's as ugly as her hair's bushy.'

'That's brilliant, Malfoy, just brilliant,' Hermione said wearily. She blinked a few times, obviously because there was some grit in her eyes. 'You're telling me something about my hair that I've known since I was three.' She refused to let him bother her. She refused to allow any emotion to peek through. She had put up with his disgusting personality for over five years; it would not do to lose all of her self-control in one go. And yes, self-control was something she had lots of, unlike Malfoy. She could sit there and easily watch when Malfoy was losing control, when he was angry, confused, nervous, scared while in the tentacles of a giant squid, or else smug and triumphant while he was crowing yet another petty insult. What utter rubbish it was for him to think he was an untouchable, immutable statue! Every single time his eyes darkened and narrowed before he spat out an insult, she knew otherwise. She knew he was absolutely wrong about himself, in the same way she knew that she was capable of controlling her emotions ten times better than that self-satisfied prat. She knew that she was the one who was, of course, in control here.

'How long did it take you to think up of that one? What number is that on your list of insults to toss out at me?'

Malfoy wasn't fooled at all by her. God, how arrogant could that Gryffindor witch be exactly if she thought that he had missed the slight wobble in her voice! Or that he had missed the way her hands were grasping a twig so tightly her knuckles shone. He certainly hadn't missed the watery look in her eyes or how she had repeatedly blinked them a few times. Malfoy opened his mouth -

- but it was Hermione who cut him off before he began. She launched at him a barrage of questions. 'How angry was that pathetic line supposed to make me? Why are you trying to compensate for me saving you? Why can't you just accept that you aren't always in control -'

'First off, Granger, we are not playing a game of Twenty fucking Questions! Secondly, don't think even once that you are in a position to -'

'Oh really? Then who was it that jumped in to save you when you were screaming like a -'

'You - shut up about that, Granger! Don't interrupt me. Don't you fucking dare -'

'I can do whatever I want! You know, Malfoy, the world isn't divided only into -'

'We've gone into this before, Granger! I told you, I'm -'

'- power-hungry Malfoys and people who bow down to them!'

'Granger, just shut the bloody hell up, you -'

'No! You shut up, Malfoy, with your fucking Pureblood-mania which is just for your little Daddy's approval in the first place!'

There was a momentary pause after Hermione's curse. After all, this was a witch whose invectives had never entered the realm beyond "sodding", "ruddy", and possibly "bloody" throughout all her years at Hogwarts.

Malfoy knew this - he still remembered hearing Granger berate Weasel for calling him a "little shit" a few years ago - and in some strange, perverse way, he found it flattering to be that special person to take her over the edge into the Land of Four-letter Expletives.

But then he processed what she had said afterwards, and his eyes widened in outrage. That smug, complacent bitch! She was wrong, of course. Granger was more wrong than she could ever have been wrong. She was as wrong as she thought she was right. Right?

After all, Lucius had taught Malfoy all about the benefits of segregation. All about why it was that Muggles and Muggle-borns were inferior. And Malfoy had believed him whole-heartedly. It wasn't an act, or something he did for Lucius; it had made complete sense to him. Correction: even today, it still made sense. Muggle blood was dirty, tainted, impure, common, low-grade, diseased ... Malfoy rattled off every single adjective he could remember, and wished he had a thesaurus on hand to list a few more. Disgusting things happened because of the unintelligent, weak, mindless, little Mudbloods. Murder, torture, sickness, wars, thievery, corruption ... Nothing like that ever happened among Purebloods of course. Ever. Right?

However ... Malfoy could not help but allow Granger's words to sink into him. See, Creevey the Mudblood was pure, sycophantic Gryffindor slime, but he had been made a Prefect. The tall, black fellow was just as pathetic as Creevey in blood as well as house, but, as Malfoy noted when reviewing Quidditch statistics, was actually a top Chaser on the Gryffindor team. Most of all, Granger was as sickeningly Muggle-born as one could fear, yet she was at the top of her year, and saving the world along with Scarhead and Weasel every bloody term. He hadn't missed these little details. All these details meant that ...

'That's not true at all. No. Whatever I do, it's for the benefit of myself, and not for my father, Granger, so you can stop trying to fucking psychoanalyze me. And stop rolling your eyes as well. It's not for my father that I ...'

'Face it, Malfoy, everything you do is for the benefit of Lucius. Don't you want to beat Harry and show your dear daddy how those Galleons he threw away buying brooms for the Slytherin team was really a good investment? Don't you want to top me every year, so you can try to convince yourself that Lucius's Muggle-born propaganda isn't complete rubbish? You have nothing of your own -'

'Y- no - shut up, you dirty mudblood! Lucius is ... isn't ...'

'It's sad, really, Malfoy. Lucius might be in Azkaban, but his spirit's still with you all the time. Censoring every single word coming out of your own mouth. Don't you ever stop and wonder where he stops and you begin? Has no one ever asked you this before? Am I really the first? Or maybe you've thought about it before, and that's why you're still open to listening to me. Maybe, well, maybe you just want to be -'

'You're wrong, Granger,' Malfoy tried to count to ten to control his temper, as Lucius taught him. He made it to 'two', before giving up and speaking. 'We are both Malfoys, my father and I. We have a sense of pride and honour that you can't even come close to, Granger. I do what I'm expected to do, ensuring that the Malfoy name will never sink to a status like yours. It's what my family expects of me. We have a reputation to uphold, and all that my father wishes for me is -'

Malfoy stopped speaking abruptly. Lucius could tell him about keeping the reputation of the Malfoy family intact (that is, when he was not in Azkaban), but would he have said the same if it had been he who was dangled above the jaws of a squid, like a worm on a hook, heart pounding out a furious staccato of beats, praying for a miracle? If it had been Lucius who'd felt that morbid anticipation as the bone-white teeth of the giant squid grew larger and larger as he fell towards them? If it had been Lucius who'd felt the sheer happiness of seeing a familiar face in all that darkness and despair, of grabbing onto a solid body, of hearing relief beat out in the same rhythm by two hearts in tandem?

Surely, if Lucius had felt the same broad scope of emotions that Malfoy had felt in the last few minutes, he would not respond the way he'd expect his son to. Like so many other incidents that had transpired throughout Malfoy's years at Hogwarts, he was sure that he would not have been scolded so severely for them if Lucius had experienced the same events. Surely he wouldn't look down at Malfoy with that imperious glare and tell him about upholding the reputation of the Malfoy family if he too had committed the same grievous errors. Right?

But what did this all mean? Malfoy stared at Granger, who was peering at him intently, waiting for him to finish.

'Malfoy ...'

'Sod off, Granger. I'm thinking.' He barely paid attention to Granger as she rolled her eyes again. Damn, despite everything, he didn't know if this made him feel better or worse. Being indebted to Granger put him in a shitty situation, but being dead and debt-free was even worse. For once, he was at a loss of what to say or do.

'Go to sleep, Granger,' he ordered.

'You can't order me around like a poor house elf,' she retorted.

'Go. To. Sleep,' he repeated. 'You have to, or else you'll be too tired for tomorrow, and we'll fail. All because of you.'

Hermione paused. She had to admit, he did have a point however tenuous. 'Fine, Malfoy, but you must wake me up sometime tonight to take your shift for you so you can sleep too.'

'What? You're not going to catch up on beauty sleep? Especially when you need it so badly?' Malfoy said to her, although perhaps a bit half-heartedly.

'No. We both have to sleep a bit before we set off again tomorrow morning, or else we'll just slow the other down,' she replied evenly, not rising to his bait. 'So wake me up at about one this morning, Malfoy.'

'Whatever. Just shut up so you can finally get some of that sleep you were talking about.'

'Wait, Malfoy, I ... I need to use your, erm, wand. Just for a moment though!'

'What? Oh, Granger. Really, you could at least try to use some more subtle tactics if you wanted to hex me.'

'Do you really believe that, Malfoy?'

'What do you want with it, Granger?'

'No, I didn't think so either.'

'Do you want my wand or not, Granger?'

'I just need to perform a Drying Spell.'

'Why?'

'Because I'm soaking wet, you prat! And if I spend a whole night like this, I'll come down with a case of pneumonia!'

'So what? Am I supposed to be particularly interested in your welfare, Granger?'

'As a matter of fact, Malfoy, yes! If I get sick, we'll never finish this! Do you really want to spend the rest of your life in here with me living on acorns and mushrooms?' Her tone seemed to imply great exasperation. Malfoy idly wondered if this was how she spoke to Weasley and Potter too.

'Fine. I'll do it. You sit there. Don't move.' He crawled over to her.

'That's more work for you then. I thought Slytherins always prefer taking the easiest way out,' she said as she twisted herself into what looked like a very awkward position, and slowly shrugged off her wet, heavy outer robes. Her clothes clung to her body stubbornly. Finally, she raised her arms so Malfoy could reach every part of her body.

'Obviously to a degree, Granger. We're lazy yes, but given the choice, I'd rather do a spot of work than hand my wand over obligingly to an enemy.' Malfoy circled around her so that he crouched behind her.

'Are we really enemies?' Hermione spoke without turning her head to face him, but she knew he was right behind her. She could feel his breath lightly running over the ridge of her ear.

'Inaresco,' Malfoy said as his answer. He watched with some satisfaction as the dark, wet patches on Granger's robes became lighter and dryer. He moved to face her again, and repeated the spell a few more times.

'My outer robes too,' Granger pointed to them lying in a sad heap next to the fire.

'For someone who's against the inhumane treatment of house elves, you don't seem to have any qualms about ordering wizards to do work, Granger,' Malfoy grumbled.

'Consider it penance for your childhood filled with kicks aimed at poor, defenceless house elves,' she responded tartly without thinking. 'Oh, and my outer robes too please, Malfoy. I do have to wear them too, you know.'

'Granger, don't be so presumptuous. I never laid a finger on any house elves at the Manor. I merely showed them where the oven and all other heavy objects were, and let them do the rest.' Malfoy Summoned the sopping wet robes over, and held them by two fingers gingerly.

Honestly, why was it that boys were all the same? So arrogant in their belief that they were always right ... The nerve of Malfoy! He was just as bad as Ron! 'Malfoy, that's horrid! They've been conditioned that way! It's because of wizards like -'

'Granger, unless you want your robes to go into the fire as a way of drying them, spare me the spew pep talk.' He dangled the robes over the fire warningly. Droplets of water rolled down the fabric and fizzed as they fell into the flames.

'For your information, Malfoy, it's S.P.E.W.! Why on earth can't anyone ever -' Even in the dim light, Malfoy could see how Granger's eyes glowed and how her cheeks flushed with genuine passion over the subject.

'Granger. It's your robes or the plight of the poor house elves. Seeing as how you need your robes for tonight and tomorrow, I suggest you forget about the poor Hatties and Bitties and Dinkies and whatnots of the world. They can survive without your campaigning for tonight.'

'Malfoy, see, you've got so little respect for them! They've been conditioned to believe all of that rubbish everyone tells them! It's almost like you and your fa-'

An instant silence fell upon both of them.

'Granger, shut the hell up now. Go to sleep.'

Malfoy flicked his wand casually over her robes, muttered the incantation, and tossed them over to her. They flew right in her face. He didn't apologize, which was expected, but she didn't complain, which certainly was something new.

'Malfoy, just remember to wake me up for my shift then,' Hermione said one last time, before closing her eyes. Her mind flashed through the days events quickly. Sitting at the breakfast table, reading the Prophet. More chaos at the ministry about some Disapparating manticore. Ron sniping at her, warning her about Nepal. Or was it Tibet ...? Malfoy looking so frightened as he flew through the air with her away from the jaws of the giant squid. Malfoy ... sitting behind her as he performed a Drying Spell on her robes ... Hearing him breathe lightly behind her, his breath tickling her ear. Hearing him say the incantation ... was it Inaresco? Inarecsius? Or was it - But Hermione, warmed by the crackling fire and exhausted by the day's events, fell asleep before she manage to recall the incantation.

Malfoy listened to her breathe. Once he thought she was fast asleep, he relaxed. He began stripping off his clothes to dry them. As he repeated the incantation mechanically, he watched Granger, her face glowing in the firelight. Yes, she had reminded him repeatedly to wake her up sometime for her watch, but of course, Malfoy had no intention of doing following her silly orders.

It would be a long night.