To Die For

To Die For

The black ball shot straight toward Hermione and curved away an inch from her stomach. Hermione gasped with relief and looked around to see what it was and where it had ended up. Something caught her eye at the end of the bed and she snorted in laughter at her stupidness; she had only been scared of a little wheezing, furry-feathered owl, carrying a small square of paper. She reached for the cute little thing and picked it up. A little squeak protruded from it, causing her to nearly drop it. She petted it softly as she untied the letter from its leg. It wasn't that easy, and it took her a little while to get the task done. As soon as she had it off the owl zipped away as fast as it had come. She unfolded and laid it out on her bed, running her hand over it to unwrinkle it. She stared down in shock at the large lettering, all in capitals.

DO NOT TRY TO STOP US, WE WILL SUCCEED.

Hermione had an eerie feeling about this and wondered what she had done to receive this letter. She didn't think she had done anything wrong lately, and what would she be trying to stop? And who would succeed at what? Hermione remembered the hatred letters from Rita Skeeter in 4^th year and wondered if this had anything to do with that. It most likely didn't, though. Hermione and Rita had come in absolutely no contact since Hermione had taken revenge, and there had been no more fraud articles that she knew of.

Something up in the corner of the paper caught Hermione's eye. The initials L.A.M. were printed there. It must've been personal writing paper. So whoever wrote it wasn't trying to stay undercover. She had no clue who owned those initials. She could think of nobody with them. But then why did they sound so familiar? She was having a very confusing day. Why did everything have to happen to her? Well, not as bad as things could've been. Harry had many more problems, with Voldemort, then she would ever have. Though, she was proud of last year when she had helped Harry out of Voldemort's clutches. She was too tired at the moment to think of it in detail.

Hermione hopped up off the bed and threw the letter onto her bed table. Glancing at herself in the mirror, on her dresser, she locked a tendril of hair behind her ear. She smiled when she saw the small school picture of the messy haired little boy in the corner of her mirror. Her little brother always cheered her up, even by thought.

She was ready to call it a night, so she reached down and opened the door where her pjs were. She pulled out her favorite pair. A cute, spaghetti strap top, and shorts outfit. It was a light blue color covered with a pattern of innocent pandas in a variety of positions. She slipped on her fluffy blue slippers and walked out of the room to the bathroom which she and Draco shared.

It didn't take long to finish her usual nighttime bathroom routine. Face, hair, etc. When she finished she wrung out her washcloth and hung it on the rack. After cleaning up the rest of her stuff she left the bathroom. Draco was sitting in front of the spitting fire and cautiously looked around, carefully avoiding her eyes.

Hermione mustered up her courage and said, "Draco?"

She saw his jaw muscles tighten and clench his fists. He turned his head sharply and snapped, "Leave me alone mudblood, I don't feel like talking to dirt like you. And don't call me Draco. Get the picture?"

Hermione felt tears spring to her eyes at the comment and hastily ran into her room, flinging the door shut behind her. Emotions raged inside of her. She couldn't believe that she had actually thought that a Malfoy could be nice. How could he be so mean, though, after everything that had happened that day? Hermione wished that none of the things that had happened earlier that day had ever happened. The she wouldn't have this annoying jumble of thoughts flying throughout her brain. Everything could go back to normal and she wouldn't have to worry about it.

Hermione pulled down the covers on her bed, revealing the red and yellow spotted sheets that always seemed to make her laugh. She wondered who had picked them out and a picture of Dumbledore came into her mind. She wandered over to her bookcase and took out Green Rider, an awesome book by Kristin Britain, the book she was currently reading. (A/n-this is an awesome fantasy book. Read it!) She thought about the main character in the book and realized that they both had similar situations; neither of them knew what to do with their problem.

Hermione cringed when she remembered that she and Draco, wait, Malfoy, as Head girl and boy, would have to share a lot of time together planning events and going to meetings. Would they actually ever get anything done? Probably not, she concluded. Or else they would do everything separately. She hoped she wouldn't end up with all the work. Even though she visited the library a lot, still, and liked to get her homework done as soon as possible, and maybe do a little extra, it was only because she wanted to do good in school. She also enjoyed getting good grades and was proud of herself that she was head girl.

Her eyes widened when she remembered that she was supposed to have gotten a copy of the notes taken in today's DADA class. How could she have overlooked that? First forgetting the book, now this! What was becoming of her? She might even lose her role as head girl. She closed her eyes and took a long, deep breath, then let it out slowly. Looking down at her watch, she saw that it was already 11:30P.M. Harry and Ron would presumably still be up, probably playing wizard's chess in front of the fire, or debating about quidditch. However, if she went into her and Malfoy's common room, to get to the portrait that led to the Gryffindor common room, she would chance seeing Malfoy. Her fear over getting dumped as head girl quickly overruled her fear of seeing Malfoy. She slipped on her moon and stars bathrobe over her pjs and cautiously opened the door of her room. She exited, briskly turning around to face the portrait minus a man and dog.

"Oh, no!" she groaned. She had forgotten this might happen and had no clue what to do now that she couldn't get to the Gryffindor common room. She couldn't very well roam the hallways at this time of night. She walked over to the couch and slumped down on it, resting her head in her hands, without realizing that Malfoy was sitting in one of the chairs. She was notified of this, and looked up wearily, when he intently cleared his throat. Ugh! This had to be her worst day ever.

"Um, Dumbledore wanted me to inform you of the prefect and head boy and girl meeting on Thursday at four. He seems to be on some sort of muggle kick and wants to plan a dance every month, for some reason. And, er, he said that it's traditional or something that the head boy and girl, er, go to things like that together."

Hermione gaped at him. What was up with his mood swings!? He didn't seem to be being mean toward her at the moment. After that shocking meanness that he had had toward her earlier, she didn't expect this. He must've needed a lot of courage to talk to her after that. Wait, did he say go to the dances together? As in, like, dancing together? Granger-Malfoy, Malfoy-Granger. That just did not seem right.

"Uh, ok!" Hermione seemed to squeak.

"It's not that bad! It's not like I'm a death eater. And I certainly don't ever want to become one!" Then he muttered something under his breath that sounded something like, "like I have a choice, though."

Now that was random.

Hermione hadn't expected that and was baffled by what to think. Draco Malfoy admitting to something like that. Ooooo! She wondered what all the Slytherins would think if they knew that. But, she knew that she would never let herself tell anyone that. Draco was trusting her without even knowing if she was trustworthy.

"Is that why-," Hermione started.

Draco shook his head yes before Hermione got the chance to finish. So, she finally knew the answer to her question, but that really didn't help in this new situation.

"And I'm sorry that I was so vulgar to you before, and, well, all those other times, too."

Hermione had no doubt that he was being sincere. She could see it in his eyes and she knew that he would never do this as a joke. It would probably wreck his reputation. Although this seemed like a dream, it wasn't and she needed to say something.

Hermione hesitated, then questioned, "Have you always felt this way?"

Draco smiled wryly and replied, "Unfortunately, no. I was brought up to believe that all this evil about Voldemort was actually for the better and I was constantly being lectured on it. I never knew that it was really as horrible as it really is. There was no reason for me to assume otherwise. Then, just this summer, I met Voldemort."

Hermione gasped. "So, what did he do!?"

"He didn't physically do anything to me, but probably got to me emotionally. Well, he did get to me. See, at first Lucius and him were talking. It was as if I was just something to use as a weapon. I was just there for their purposes. And my father seemed to go right along with everything, he didn't seem to care about me in any way or form. And if I went against any of that evil it was clear that I would instantly be killed. I never realized that Lucius would actually do the deed of killing his own son even though he has abused me many times and threatened that he would kill me even more. Voldemort kept looking at me in the most frightening way. It suddenly came to me, after all these years, how wrong all of this was. I mostly regret that it took me that long to realize it." Draco put his hand to his head.

"But that means either you are killed or you become a death eater! So you have no choice!"

"Like I don't know that. That's why I was like that earlier; I was thinking about it. The only thing I could think of is to become a death eater, but be a spy for the good side."

"You'd be risking your life."

"Hello! I'd be killed if I didn't become a death eater. And I refuse to become one of them and lower myself down to their level."

Hermione smiled grimly. "Well, I guess that's better."

"Yea, and Hermione?"

"Mmmhmm?"

Draco grinned. "You know the old guy from the Gryffindor portrait? He's been in the Slytherin portrait the whole time."