From Dreams to Reality

From Dreams to Reality

By Fiery Punk Princess

Chapter 1_______________________________________________________________

Lucius Malfoy stood there in a clearing of a dark, drafty forest, looking at his son Draco with a look of pure malice on his pale face. Draco looked frightened, as though he knew what was to come. Lucius raised his wand and Draco braced himself for pain; deadly pain.

"Crucio!" Lucius yelled. Excruciating agony swept through Draco's whole body and he couldn't help but scream because of it. Lucius gave a cold, cruel laugh and stopped, before swiftly approaching Draco, who was now on the ground, gasping in pain. "You are going to regret your choice after I'm through with you, boy. You are disowning the family name."

Draco didn't have time to prepare himself before he felt a hard kick in his stomach followed by one in his groin. Pain was flooding through his throbbing veins and he didn't have much time to think before his vision was blinded and he fell into a heap on the dusty ground, unconsciousness taking him over instantly...

*

By the time Draco regained consciousness, dawn was engulfing the previous darkness. He was still lying in the grim forest, his whole body feeling as though he had been run over by the Knight Bus more than once. He painfully sat up and looked around, only to find that he was alone in the silent, still forest.

He slowly and carefully stood up and ran his fingers through his sliver-blonde hair, only to feel a great amount of pain. Taking his hand away, he looked at it, and saw that his fingers had a small amount of blood on them. He felt tears well up in his grey eyes and he realised that his father had hurt him a lot more than he ever had previously. He lent against the closest tree and wiped away the tears, knowing that he would have to do something and get away from the forest, but he wasn't going to head home, he was going to get as far away from home as he could.

Working up some strength, Draco started heading in the direction of east, towards the rising sun, wondering exactly how far he would have to walk until he reached a town or village...

Hermione Granger woke with a start and sat up in her bed, her breathing ragged and harsh. She had had another nightmare. She was getting quite used to them now. Ever since near the beginning of her fifth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry she had been having them and they were almost always the same. This one however, had been different and quite ... strange, yet remotely real and not quite as frightening.

The ones she usually had always had the frightening figure of Lord Voldemort standing in the middle of a circle of hooded, masked Death Eaters, with a dead body sprawled out on the grassy ground amongst ancient tombstones in a graveyard. This one had been in a forest, with no Voldemort and only one Death Eater, who was with his son, both of whom she was familiar with.

Draco Malfoy had been her worst enemy since their first year and now, about to begin their seventh, it seemed quite ironic that she would have a dream about him, especially like that one.

She looked over at her window and could tell that, behind the curtains, the sun had risen in the east and was sitting in the blue sky and setting warmth down to the Earth, showing the beginning of what was to be quite a warm summer day.

She glanced over at her alarm clock on her bedside table to find that the hour was approaching nine o'clock AM. Sighing, she threw the covers off of her and climbed off the bed. She headed to her window and opened the curtains to let more light into the small bedroom and looked out at the edge of a small forest that her house sat near.

She stood there for several minutes and watched the still trees as the unseen sun shone on them, casting weary shadows behind them. She always enjoyed the sight for some reason. She felt that it was almost as nice as a sunset, as strange as that might sound. Ever since she was little she had been fond of the forest, yet she had never entered it. In the winter, you often saw people enter the trees and make snowmen and sometimes even go in there to get a good Christmas tree. She just liked the sight.

Her mind was in another world and she almost didn't notice a rather tall, staggering figure of a blonde male exit the trees, looking as though he'd been in a severe accident. She recognised the person instantly as the teenage boy that had haunted her most recent dream.

"Malfoy?" She gasped out quietly. She didn't even think before she ran out of her room to the front door, ignoring her father's curious questioning. She opened the door and ran out and across her front garden, just in time to catch Draco as he staggered passed, looking as though he was ready to pass out cold at any moment.

"Granger?" he said, looking down at her unclearly as she stood there in a summer nightgown, holding his bruised arm.

"Malfoy, are you - are you alright?" Right now, she couldn't care less that they were enemies. He didn't look very well at all and she wanted to help him. Them being enemies didn't matter.

She only just had time to hear her mother's gasp and running before he passed out, falling into her arms. Hermione clenched her teeth and gasped several times as she tried to hold his limp weight up.

"Mum, we have to get him inside," she said between gasps. Her mother nodded fervently and hurried to help her daughter as they carried him inside and lay him on the couch.

"Do you know this young man, Hermione?" her mother asked.

Hermione nodded. "Draco Malfoy. I go to school with him. We don't get along, though, but when I saw him exit the forest..." She trailed off. Her mother nodded in understanding.

"Do you know anyone who would want to hurt him like this?" her father asked.

Hermione went over the question in her head. There was really lots of people who would want to hurt him like this. Her two best friends Harry Potter and Ron Weasley for one, but they couldn't or wouldn't have possibly done this to him... Her thoughts traveled back to her dream and she looked over at Draco's limp, unconscious body. Realisation hit her and she stumbled backwards slightly in frightened shock.

"I had a strange dream last night," she said absently to her watching mother and father. "Malfoy - he was in it. His - His father was punishing him... Mum, I think my dream may have been ... real."

*

For many hours following, Hermione watched Draco sleep, with confused thoughts penetrating through her mind. It didn't seem possible that the events of her dream had actually been real. Sure, she was a witch, but she couldn't contain that sort of power, could she? She had never even believed there was such a power...

Hermione's thoughts had been so jumbled up and confused, she didn't notice Draco's eyes slowly open as he regained consciousness until she heard him let out a moan of pain. She looked over in his direction and watched, as he became aware of his surrounding. He sat up abruptly; ignoring the pain it caused and looked around. He stopped when he noticed Hermione sitting there with her deep brown eyes on him.

"Granger?" he said in disbelief. "Where am I?"

Hermione stood up and headed over to him. "Your at my house," she said simply, trying to make him lie down again.

"Oh, that's just wonderful," he said sarcastically. Hermione thought it amazing how he could still be sarcastic and arrogant when he was injured as badly as he was. "Why exactly am I here, anyway? Is this one of my father's sick jokes or just an extremely bad nightmare?"

"Look, Malfoy, you're here because - though I thought you would've noticed by now - you're badly hurt and injured for some unknown reason - I'm guessing your father. I just happened to see you coming out of the forest, looking as though you'd been run over by an eighteen-wheeler truck," Hermione said. She wasn't going to mention the dream - not to him.

Draco looked down at himself and absently bit his lower lip. "My father," he said quietly. "He was upset about me not wanting to become a Death Eater."

Hermione wasn't really surprised by this news. She knew Lucius Malfoy was a Death Eater and an evil one at that, but she had always thought, for the six years she'd known him, that he did everything his father wanted him to do. Yet, here he was, saying that he did not want to be a Death Eater at all.

"I think it would be best if you stayed here at my house for a while, Malfoy," Hermione said softly after a moment. "I've written a letter to Dumbledore and he should be arriving soon to talk to you. It wouldn't be safe for you to go home, not with your father being there."

"What did you say to Dumbledore in the letter?" Draco asked, curious.

"The truth. That I'd seen you exit the forest near here, that you were really injured and that my mum and me helped you into the house while you were unconscious," Hermione said. She hesitated before continuing. "I-I also told him about the dream I had last night..." She didn't want to go into any details.

"A dream, you told the headmaster of Hogwarts about a dream you had?" Draco smirked. Hermione scowled.

"It wasn't just any dream, Malfoy," she snapped. "I think it might have been the events of your father punishing you." Draco lifted an eyebrow. "Look, it freaked me out when I saw you exit that forest. The way you looked, the way you were walking... it all fitted in with the dream." Draco gave a light shrug and lay back down, looking around the neat and tidy room.

"Where are the Muggles, your parents I mean?" he asked.

"They've - they've gone to see my aunt in hospital. She's just had a baby," Hermione replied.

"Oh yay, another Muggle in the world," Draco said sarcastically. Hermione narrowed her eyes.

"You ought to be nicer to me, Malfoy, or I will send you back home so your Daddy Dearest can finish you off," Hermione said snappily.

Draco's eyes widened. "I wasn't directing that statement towards you," he said defensively. Hermione just ignored him and stood up.

"Would you like something to eat or drink?" she asked over her shoulder as she headed for the kitchen.

"Have you got any pumpkin juice?" Hermione stopped and turned around to look at him.

"Er... pumpkin juice isn't a very common drink in the Muggle world," she said with a tiny, guilty smile. "We have water and normal orange juice."

"A glass of water than," Draco said reluctantly. "Stupid Muggles," he cursed quietly, not wanting Hermione to hear.

He didn't feel his time at the Granger house was going to be enjoyable...