Past Present

Hermione couldn't sleep. It may have been the bright moonlight spilling in through the sheer drapes, the strange room, the absolute quiet, the anticipation she felt about the next day, or all of these, but she felt as though her eyes were propped with toothpicks. Maybe Viktor was still up. Maybe they could talk. Take a walk, even. Sneak down to the kitchen. Sit together. Hang upside down from the banister by their heels like vampire bats. Anything would be better than lying here staring at the canopy, beautiful as it was. She scooted out of bed and pulled her dressing gown over her pyjamas. She crept to the heavy door and opened it. She would light her wand when she got past Harry and Ron's doors, to avoid waking them. Nothing short of a search light would wake them when you wanted to rouse them, but knowing her luck, better not to risk it. The torches in high holders along the wall would cast enough light to get to Viktor's door. He slept so lightly, she could wake him without disturbing the rest.

She was rather startled when her foot and knee bumped into something quite solid in the dark, in her doorway, where there should be nothing solid. She half swallowed a short, strangled scream, not getting much volume. She was just about to catch her breath and really shriek when she felt a hand curl on her calf, but then Viktor's voice came sharp but soft in the darkness, "Hermione!" It seemed to be coming from roughly in front of her, and below her. Just about where she had nudged her foot into whatever that was in the dark.

"Lumos!" she whispered, lighting her wind. Viktor sat at her feet, twisted around to look up at her, hand steadied against her leg. "What are you doing there?" she hissed at him.

"What are you doing out of bed?" he asked her anxiously.

"I couldn't sleep. I wanted to come get you. I thought we could talk or something. Now answer me, what are you doing there?" she asked a little more kindly.

"Nothing is wrong? You are not hurt? Sick? Scared?" he insisted.

"Scared? Not before I bumped you. That took ten years off my life. I'm fine. I just couldn't sleep. Nerves about tomorrow night, I think. And it's a lot quieter in there than in the dorms. The silence is deafening. Now what are you doing there?" she asked a third time, then answered her own question. "You were sleeping there, guarding the door, weren't you?" she said as it dawned on her. He had seemed so intent on her safety and well-being just now. He couldn't be surprised that she had yelped when she bumped into an unexpected body in the hall, could he? Of course. He had been guarding her door.

"No."

"Okay, so you were sitting there. Wide awake, then, guarding the door," she replied, catching the minor loophole in her question. Liesl had been right about one thing. He was a pitifully bad liar. He might as well wave a sign. His answer had been utterly unconvincing, even if he was technically telling the truth.

"Yes."

She sighed and sat down next to him, hip to hip, leaning into the crook of his arm when he resituated himself with his back against the door frame. Her head fell against his shoulder, and she realized with a start that he was still wearing his clothes from earlier in the evening, boots and all. His wand was in his hand. She peered up at him questioningly. "I promised," he said simply.

"It didn't mean you had to do this. Sit on a stone floor all night. You set protection charms when I came in to go to bed," she scolded. "I can hear, Viktor, and I do a fair bit of reading. I recognized the words and your voice. You asked the favor. I don't know what the Guardian's children look like, but I suspect that big shaggy thing with wings patrolling outside my window earlier wasn't an owl. It was nearly the size of a...a... a... St. Bernard," she said softly.

"I promised," he said again in that same stubborn tone, and tightened his arm around her. She knew it was no use arguing, so she just settled into the position more comfortably, breathed in the scent of him, listened to his heart beat under her repositioned ear, and felt the even rise and fall of his chest. She knew he wouldn't sleep at all tonight. He had a promise to keep. And Viktor Krum, she had learned, was nothing if not an honorable man. After her scare, she felt all wrung out. She didn't have the energy to protest much.

It didn't take long for her breathing to fall into rhythm with his own, for all her muscles to go slack and drift off into sleep with the rest of her as she relaxed into him. He was still quite wide eyed, having prepared for tonight by sleeping late that morning, resting up as much as possible. Not that he couldn't have done it without preparation, since he had gotten by on far less sleep than this each night for years. For what seemed like forever. But he might as well come out of it as rested as possible. It was to his advantage to be alert in case something should happen. It just had to be until the dawn started coming, then he could rest safely. Evil men love the darkness.... where had he read that? And something about night or the dark hiding the wickedness that men do as well, and possibly 'be ye therefore children of the light'...? It must have been Paul ... must it not? It sounded like him.

Just until dawn. Then he could put her back into her bed and lie in his own for a few hours. The Guardian had obviously passed the word on already, judging from Hermione's comment earlier, and all the various Sentinels, the Guardian's children, would be keeping watch outside. According to Alexei this night watch of the passageway was unnecessary if the favor was granted, but past experience nagged Viktor otherwise. Never turn your back. The greatest dangers were often what was inside already, even the things or people you welcomed in with open arms, not something you had to keep out. That applied in all things. Besides, he had a promise to keep. He had committed, he had to see it through. Leaving it solely in other hands was out of the question. Do nothing halfheartedly. If you're going to drown, do not try it in shallow water. An old Bulgarian proverb Papa loved quoting.

Sitting here now, feeling her warm head on his chest, her soft body curled into his side, he was glad he hadn't let Alexei talk him out of it. It had been quiet and still, no sign of trouble, but he would not have rested in his own bed. It was worth a few hours sitting on the floor concealed in the dark just below the light line of the torches in exchange for the peace of mind. He didn't completely trust all the protection charms and security spells he could put on their rooms. Not when he could walk a few feet from his door and put himself, his eye and ears and wand, right there in addition to all those things. At this moment, a few hours on the floor seemed a small price to pay for the present company, unconscious and unresponsive though it might be. He wound a tendril of her hair loosely around a finger and examined it in the torchlight, picking up the highlights, feeling its softness. He caught the occasional scent of her shampoo, something light and sharp, something with a hint of citrus.

Craning his neck around the door frame, keeping his body as still as possible to avoid waking her, he took a look outside. The changing illumination behind the clouds out her window told him the dawn would be breaking soon, the moon was still just visible over the top of the rocks. A great hulking birdlike shape sat in a niche across the way, on the side of the mountain. Right where one of the Sentinels should be. Good. Its eyes, their eyes, alone would be quite good enough come dawn, and he could rest. He was sure there were others he couldn't see right now, in various spots on the grounds. As the first thin rays of light began to poke through the clouds nearly an hour later, he scooped her up as gently as possible, sliding his right arm slowly beneath her already tented knees, placed her back in the bed and closed her door. She never stirred. He took mental inventory and found he was only a little stiff, and tired, which was to be expected. In his room, he paused only to strip and drop his clothes and boots onto the floor with yesterday's clothes, tug on a pair of shorts. Normally he would have picked up after himself, but he had been quite busy with preparations these last two days. He would let the house elves do it this once, whenever they got to it. Crawling onto the bed without even pulling down the sheets, it seemed he could still feel her hair brushing his collarbone, the warmth of her cheek and her breath on his chest. He sprawled onto the pillow with a small smile playing on his lips and slept.

Hermione slept nearly an hour in her bed, then woke to the thin, misty gray light of early morning. It was past dawn, but still early, she figured, from the ethereal quality of the light, and the fog that hung heavy around the peaks and hadn't even started to burn off in the sun. She closed her eyes again, preparing to go back to sleep, but she started awake as she realized she was wearing her robe. Viktor. It hadn't been a dream. He had put her back, obviously. She slipped off the bed and went to her door. No Viktor. She glanced down the hall to his door, the passageway dim, still and undisturbed in the quiet, while everyone slept. She felt her way along the wall, her eyes slowly adjusting to the guttering torch light, and put a hand on the pewter door handle. She held her breath and turned, prayed it was unlocked, willed her heart to be quiet. If he was sleeping, she didn't want to wake him.

It took a few seconds for her eyes to readjust to the dawn light streaming in through the opening between his drapes and pick out his form on top of the bedcovers. The trail of his clothes spread out over a small patch of floor. His long limbs spread languidly over the bed, his bare skin ranged from tan to peach in the half light, the muscles well defined. She picked out his usual shorts riding low, a prominent hipbone jutting above the waistband, his slender frame, not so painfully skinny now, but still willowy, his face turned to the side and nearly buried into the pillow. His hair fell over his forehead, across the pillow in thick waves, brushed his lashes here, skimmed his cheekbone there. She fought the urge to brush it from his face. She could hear his breathing, deep and slow and untroubled. He had the barest trace of dark stubble along his jaw. She tried to stifle the cough that scratched at her throat, but it escaped, harsh against the stone walls and the cool air and the morning silence.

She held her breath once more, and waited for him to wake. Instead, he barely stirred, only burrowing more deeply into the pillow, then stilled. He was dead to the world at the moment. She felt a twinge of guilt. He was that exhausted because of her. Because of them. She crept back to the door, and shut it as gently as possible, then slipped back into her room and her bed.