The Fact Is

WHAM! : Thud: "OW!"

Hermione Granger had to remind herself that she was sitting (through no fault of her own) in the middle of Main Street in Hogsmeade and, therefore, could not rub her bruised derriere. And speaking of landing hard on her rump on a cobblestone street...

She looked up and met a pair of slate grey eyes. Well, of course, the boy, who had barreled into her and was now also sitting rather uncomfortably on his behind, would be none other than Draco Malfoy: Slytherin bigot, arrogant prat, elitist snob...and lately...decidedly odd.

"Granger," he said...purred...as he pushed his platinum hair out of his eyes. "A little too eager to jump my bones?"

"Malfoy," she retorted. "A little too much time inhaling the vapours in the Potions classroom?"

"Come, Granger," he chuckled, getting to his feet in one fluid motion that quite belied his earlier discomfort in the dirt. "Denial never helped anyone." He held out a hand to help her up.

"Neither did delusional tendencies," she said, batting his hand away and getting up on her own, albeit a little less gracefully than he had. As she picked up the packages that were littered on the ground, she could feel him looking at her, infuriatingly...amused.

"Need any help?" he asked, stepping closer.

"Did that fall knock something loose?" she said, looking at him warily.

"Tsk," he said, looking down at her and allowing one corner of his mouth to quirk up. "Such hostility from one so young."

"You should know," she snorted. "You were the master of hostility until you started playing this stupid game."

"Game, Granger?" Malfoy stepped forward and was amused to see her take a step back.

Hermione glared at him, ignoring the treacherous whispers in her mind that pointed out his hooded eyes, his tall frame, and, oh Lord, his lips.

"Game," she said firmly. "Whatever you think you'll accomplish by flirting with me the way you have been for the past few months."

Again, he noted, one step forward and one step back. "What makes you think it's a game, Granger?" he asked in a low voice. "How do you know I'm not actually flirting with you? Valentine's Day is coming up in a few days, you know."

Hermione let loose another derisive snort, not caring how unladylike it sounded. "I doubt Valentine's Day for you means hearts and flowers and kiss-shaped candies, Malfoy. You seem the more ritual-virgin-sacrifice kind." She paused for a moment. "Oh, God, that's why you're doing this. You're going to sacrifice me!"

He laughed. Hermione barely had time to register the absurdity of that act before he reached out a hand and gently tugged at one of her auburn curls. "You're paranoid, Granger." So saying, he turned and walked off down the street.

Hermione was about to walk away herself when he called over his shoulder. "Virgin, huh?"

Oh, God, she thought in mortification as half the street turned to stare at her.

***

Ginny Weasley watched as her brother Ron mercilessly thrashed his best friend Harry Potter. Chess pieces were littered all around the table they were at, and every so often a cheer from Ron or a curse from Harry would puncture the silence of the Gryffindor Common Room. She was wondering idly where the third Musketeer was when she remembered that Hermione had taken advantage of the Hogsmeade weekend to stock up on parchment, quills and potions supplies.

Well, think of the devil... Ginny mused as the portrait hole swung open and Hermione climbed in.

"Hey, 'Mione!" the boys chorused, looking up as she approached them.

Hermione shook her head, as if snapping out of a trance, and looked at them as if seeing them for the first time. "Oh! Yes...well..." she said, sounding flustered. "Quills for you, Harry...Chocolate Frogs for you, Ron...Pepper Imps for you, Ginny...um...I think that's it." Without waiting for a word from anyone, she whirled and ran up the stairs to the girls' dormitories.

Ginny stared after her. "Ron, Harry," she said. "Don't you think Hermione was being a bit...odd?"

"No more than usual," Ron said cheerfully, spraying Harry with bits of half-chewed chocolate.

"Harry?" Ginny turned to him, ignoring her blissfully chocolate-addicted brother.

Harry shrugged. "Maybe it's her time of month, Gin, I don't know."

Ron shook his head sagely. "Not for another two weeks, mate."

Ginny threw up her hands in disgust. "Nevermind! The whole lot of you are odd!"

***

The copse of trees behind the lake was intermittently spliced with silver moonlight and ebony shadow. The fragrant grass beneath her feet, soaked with dew, made no sound as she walked further and further among the trees. Her heart thumped: not in fear, she knew...no, it was anticipation. She felt someone watching her, but it exhilarated her; sent the adrenaline pumping through her veins and made her feel gloriously, giddily alive.

And then someone...he...grabbed her hand and pulled her towards him: so swiftly, so suddenly, that there was nothing for her to do but slam into his chest, and willingly comply when his lips silenced her "Oh" of surprise. Not that she was complaining, of course, when he held her almost criminally tight, and did things with his lips that he should most certainly be locked away in Azkaban for, and made her moan and mew deep in her throat and cling to his shoulders and grasp his platinum hair...

Platinum hair?

She pushed him away, panting heavily, and knew, even before she could bring her lust-addled brain to function properly, that she would see him: slate eyes, smirk and all.

And sure enough, not three inches away from her, gloriously disheveled and breathtakingly flushed and decidedly displeased at being pushed away, stood Draco Malfoy.

"AAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!" Hermione shrieked in unholy terror as she jerked up in bed and threw the covers off.

"What? What?" she could hear her dorm mates question in alarm, and the next thing she knew, the hangings on her four-poster bed had been wrenched back and wand-light flooded the room as Lavender and Parvati peered anxiously at her.

"Hermione?" Parvati said tremulously. "What was it? A boggart? A basilisk?"

"A Death Eater?" Lavender continued in mounting fear. "Y-y-...You-Know-Who?"

Hermione wiped the perspiration from her forehead and took in the state of the sheets tangled about her body that was shaking with something suspiciously unlike fear and conspicuously like...nevermind.

She looked up at their horror-struck faces and said grimly: "Worse."

***

In between three not-so-innocent meetings by the lake, one steamy encounter in the Prefect's bathroom and one gloriously explicit...incident...in the Potions Classroom that would have put the Kama Sutra to shame, Hermione managed about half an hour of sleep that night. And thanks to her conglomeration of gasps, moans, yelps and screams, Lavender and Parvati managed even less. As a result, the posse that trudged out of the Sixth-year girl's dorms the next morning was disgruntled, snappish and dangerous to the power of infinity.

"Out of my way!" the normally chirpy Parvati snarled to her bewildered boyfriend, Dean Thomas, when he leaned in for his usual good morning kiss.

"Oh, go kiss Dean!" Lavender snapped at Seamus Finnigan when he approached her.

Both the aforementioned boys beat a hasty retreat behind the house's resident heroes, ergo: Harry and Ron. Not for nothing, though, were the two proclaimed heroes, for they knew when to battle, and knew when to retreat. And one look at the storm clouds gathering on Hermione's normally pleasant face compelled them to grab Seamus and Dean and hasten out of the portrait hole before there were four warty toads hopping around the Common Room.

***

"Today, we prepare the Intima Revelare Potion," said Snape, glaring around the stifling dungeon at the classroom full of Sixth-year Gryffindor and Slytherin. "The instructions," he flicked his wand and a list appeared on the blackboard behind him, "Are rather complicated, and even the slightest lapse in concentration will result in dire," he looked at a squeaking Neville Longbottom, "Consequences."

"The potion, as the name implies, reveals an individual's true feelings," Snape continued. "Now, I know it is futile to hope for much from a bunch of dunderheads such as yourselves, but I suggest you get to work before the sound of the bell causes any knowledge whatsoever to flee from your brains. Begin!"

Harry went forward to collect ingredients from the teacher's table as Ron and Hermione set up the cauldron and other apparatus.

"Mione," Ron whispered. "Mione!"

"Hmm?" she said irritably. "What, Ron?"

"Lavender said you woke up screaming last night," he said in a concerned tone. "Harry and I think that maybe You-Know-Who is trying to connect with you." He began stirring the contents of the cauldron as Harry nodded and added Oil of St. John's Wort.

"Good grief, Ron," Hermione said, "The only reason he can connect with Harry is because of the scar on his forehead!" She stepped close to Ron, who looked increasingly nervous, and pulled her hair away from her face. "See? No scar! Absolutely clear!"

"Except for that pimple on your cheek," Malfoy said off-handedly as he walked past.

Hermione whirled around, almost growling in frustration. "I-have-no-pimple!" she said in a measured voice.

"My mistake," he shrugged. "It's just your face."

"Ah, from seduction to insults," Hermione crowed. "At least you're back to normal. Whatever your normal is."

"Wouldn't you like to know?" He looked down at her with a leer. The moment she looked at his eyes, she was hit with...what? A dream? A fragment of memory?

Her fingers running through fair hair, grey eyes raking her body...a moonlit glade, then...Oh, Lord.

She looked over at Snape's desk and turned crimson as another image hit her. Oh, Lord. She glanced back up at Malfoy, and from the smirk he gave her, she was sure he knew.

She felt her blood boil with outrage, certain that he was somehow behind the sacrilegious nightmares she had been cursed with, and before she even had time to think, she pointed her wand at him and roared, "Confundus!"

Malfoy barely had time to register a moment of shock before instinct took over and he yelled, "Deflecto!" The beam of light from her wand glanced away from him and hit Ron instead.

Just as he was adding Iguana liver to the potion.

A resounding :: BOOM :: echoed around the room as the contents of the cauldron exploded and drenched everyone in the classroom, with the exception of Snape. He watched in resignation as all the student immediately transformed into the scaly green lizards, their robes falling away as they dashed around the room in panic.

"I should have known," he muttered darkly. "I just presumed it would be Longbottom."

The door to the dungeon creaked open and Filch the caretaker peered in. "All well, Professor?"

"Shut the door, you fool!" he shouted, knowing already that it was too late as all the Iguana made a mad bid for freedom. Filch howled and jumped out of the way, and his decrepit cat Mrs. Norris hissed and spat at the river of green that ran by her, careful not to get too close.

"What was that?" Filch questioned, lamp-like eyes wide.

Snape sagged against his desk and moaned. "The perfect excuse for Minerva McGonagall to hex me senseless."

***

Three hours later (two of which comprised of various insults, accusations and dodged curses from Professor McGonagall for daring to disfigure her beloved Gryffindors: "It was an improvement, Minerva, honestly!" had not gone down well as an attempt to appease her), the two Professors stood in the dungeon classroom with every Iguana they had "Accio"-ed from the nooks and crannies of the vast school.

"Right, now here's what we'll do," Snape said briskly. "Minerva, you run down to Madam Pomfrey for some Growth Elixir, and I'll send Filch to Professor Sprout for some Tentacula spores, and we can have Ronan send up some Mallowsweet, and then I shall prepare the Renewal Draught that will take precisely 27 days from the new moon..."

"Or we could just end it by saying Finite Incantatem," McGonagall pointed out.

"Well, yes, I suppose," Snape said sulkily.

"On the count of three, then?" she asked.

"One."

"Two."

"Er...hang on...does 'on the count of three' mean after we say three, or in place of three?"

"SEVERUS! I WANT MY STUDENTS BACK, NOW!"

"And you won't get them back by bursting my eardrums."

After approximately thirty seconds or so of glaring, Head-of-House instincts took over and they aimed their wands at the jumble of lizards on the floor and intoned: "Finite Incantatem!"

Instantaneously, the effects of the botched potion were overridden, and standing in the classroom were sixteen teenagers.

Sixteen naked teenagers.

Sixteen screaming naked teenagers.

And all McGonagall could do was look down at Neville Longbottom, say: "Oh, my!" and

promptly faint.

"I always knew that boy was trouble," Snape muttered.

***

Hermione found, much to her displeasure, that after word got out about the Potions debacle, several men were interested in propositioning her. And the invitations ranged from the transparent: "Why don't you help me out with my homework in the Astronomy Tower, around midnight?" to the nauseating: "Why don't you give me a peek at what the Gryffindors are blessed with everyday?" Really, in just one moment, had everyone forgotten that she had a :gasp: brain? Honestly, even Ron and Harry found it difficult to talk to her face instead of her chest. Granted, she had to wrench her gaze away from their um...well, nevermind, that was different!

And to make matters worse, she had detention! Snape had the audacity to give her detention for dueling with Draco Malfoy in class! And, to add the rotten cherry to the bitter ice cream that concocted her sundae of doom, she had to serve her detention with Malfoy!

She sat in a cushy armchair in the Common Room, glaring moodily at the fire, when she heard Ron's voice somewhere behind her.

"And Pansy Parkinson...yeah, Harry, I know she has nice ones, but try and stay on track here...she was saying that it's some plot to drive her batty!"

"Hmph. All this while I thought he was out to drive me insane." Harry sounded distinctly put out, and hearing the tones of both boys' voices, Hermione couldn't resist eavesdropping.

"And from the sound of it," Ron went on, blatantly ignoring Harry's I'm-the-hero-the-world-should-revolve-around-me sulk, "The next part of the plan is supposed to go into action during their detention."

Harry's voice sounded like it usually did when he was concocting some mad scheme that was bound to land them in detention, or Voldemort's clutches. "Then we'll just have to keep an eye on them, and if he tries anything, we run in and rescue her!"

At this, Hermione couldn't resist rolling her eyes. Those two just had to find a damsel to save, didn't they? She smiled fondly to herself, thinking of everything they had weathered together in the past few years.

"So now that that's taken care of," Ron said, his voice still serious, "On to more pressing matters."

Hermione waited with bated breath for him to continue, and she could hear Harry lean forward at the urgency in Ron's tone.

"Do you think Parvati uses an Engorgio Charm?" Ron asked.

Boys! Hermione huffed, and resumed glaring at the fire.

***

It took every ounce of Hermione's rapidly fading self-control to keep from flinging her dirty rag at Malfoy's face.

They were in the dungeon, serving their detention. Snape, being ever the professional torturer, had assigned them to scrub the classroom...by hand. Which meant no magic. Which meant no wands. Which meant she couldn't disfigure Malfoy's staring face with a brutal hex. Damn it all.

"Stop it, Malfoy," she finally snapped.

"Stop what?" he asked with would-be innocence.

"Staring."

"Why?" he asked, arching an eyebrow. "Does it bother you?"

"Your very existence bothers me, Malfoy," she said.

"No need to get personal, Granger," he said, trying to sound wounded. She looked up at him, and found his eyes twinkling...with malice, no doubt, she thought to herself. Probably thinking about what she looked like naked...well, of course, that led to thoughts of what he looked like naked...alright...dip rag in cold, blissfully cold water, and scrub. The table, that is.

She snorted derisively. "Oh, of course, just like it was never personal when you called me Mudblood."

Now he even looked wounded. Not that she was paying particular attention to his looks. Of course not. "Are you going to hold that against me forever, Granger?"

"I don't intend to hold anything against you, Malfoy."

"Pity," he drawled.

Hermione almost stumbled at the sound of his voice, but told her rampaging hormones that she'd give them headway when she was at her sexual peak at the age of thirty-five or so, if they'd just shut up now.

"If you can't say anything that doesn't come tagged with an 'R' rating, Malfoy, might I suggest you say, oh...nothing at all?"

Again, he lifted a corner of that infernal mouth in a slight smirk, and said, "A woman who likes to work in silence, I see. I rather had you for a screamer."

"See, that's where you should have said nothing at all," Hermione pointed out.

"But then I wouldn't have gotten to see that adorable flush on your cheeks," Malfoy replied, flicking his rag at her lightly.

She spun away from him and looked at him as if he'd just proclaimed himself the new President of the Harry Potter Fan Club. "Are you on something, Malfoy?"

"Not yet, at any rate," he murmured, looking at her meaningfully. "But after what I saw that day..."

"I meant drugs!" she shook her head and went back to scrubbing the tabletop with renewed fury, ignoring the flashes of the dream that hit her vividly. "Honestly, it's impossible to have a civilized conversation with you, ever! If you're not insulting my bloodlines or my virtue or my taste in friends, you're making some half-hearted attempt to get into my pants!"

"Well, I suppose after six years of being flanked by those lummoxes, you must be aching for a civilized conversation."

She looked at him incredulously. "Were you just talking to a mirror? Because I know you couldn't have had the most scintillating intellectual debates with Crabbe and Goyle!"

"As bizarre as it may sound, it would appear that I have to agree with you," he said.

"And the world stops spinning on its axis as you say those words," Hermione said wryly.

"Hmm... I always knew I had traffic-stopping good looks...but the world?" Malfoy looked positively smug. "Why, Granger, I do believe you're more attracted to me than you let on."

No, there were no treacherous tingles running down her spine, and there was no blood rushing to her cheeks to tinge it with a blush. And if there was, she'd bloody well have to ignore it. "Of course, Malfoy. You keep telling yourself that if it makes you feel better. But I really think you ought to start taking your medication before they lock you up in the Mental Ward at St. Mungo's."

She wrung out the wet rag she had been using on the tabletop and turned to dip it into the bucket next to her. Little problem with that, though. Malfoy was standing right there.

"You think I'm mad?" he asked her in a hoarse voice, looking down at her. Really, when had he gotten so tall?

"Stark, raving loony," she replied firmly. Damn, that was a tremor in her voice.

"Why?" he asked, stepping closer. Honestly, had there been that much distance between them?

"Why?" she echoed, her voice shattering the decibel level towards the end of the word. "You blow hot, blow cold...call me Mudblood one second, and then act like Don Juan de Marco..."

"A most noble wizard," Malfoy interjected.

"...You hex my friends, then try to chat me up..."

"You hexed me!"

"...And I'm not entirely sure that you're not a Legilimens..."

"Good Lord, why?"

"...And that's another thing...which Lord..."

"It's an expression, Granger."

"...And quite frankly, I think that you're batty, and you're taking me into that hellhole of madness and depravity and insanity and lunacy..."

"You're babbling, Granger."

Silence.

Then... "What do you want, Malfoy?" Hermione asked in a weary voice.

He kept looking at her, and she had a fleeting glimpse of a silver spark of humour in all the slate of his eyes, and she felt an indescribable pull in her stomach.

"What do I want?" he asked softly. "What do you think I want, Granger? Death to all Mudbloods? Instant access to the Dark Lord's Inner Circle? World domination? To view the world through a grain of sand? Is that what you think?"

"To view the world through a grain of sand?" she parroted. "What does that mean?"

He smiled then, and she had to resist the urge to simultaneously jump back from the abnormality of that act and to jump forward to see if there were things she could do to make his smile grow wider.

He leaned down towards her, and she found every rational grey cell in her brain at war with every irrational one...half telling her to bolt like a scared rabbit, the other half telling her to wet her lips and pucker up.

"Granger," Malfoy said huskily.

"Hmm?" she murmured.

His lips found her ear, and he whispered, "Figure it out."

Hermione jolted out of her daze in time to see him toss her a smirk and leave the room just as her knees gave out and she collapsed onto the table she had been backed up against. Her very nerve endings ached and she didn't know whether to scream or cry or growl.

WHAM! The dungeon door flew open and in came scrambling Harry and Ron, wands at the ready.

"Where is he?" Ron asked. "Did he try anything?"

"Yeah, Mione," Harry panted. "Shall we get him? Are we too late?"

And they wondered why Hermione burst into peals of hysterical laughter.

***

Ginny looked up from her seat by the fire as the portrait hole opened and Harry, Ron and Hermione trooped in. Hermione's face bore a look of intense concentration, while the boys looked completely mystified.

"Mione?" Ginny questioned.

The older girl looked up, smiled fleetingly and said, "To view the world through a grain of sand."

"Huh?"

"That's the fifth time she's said that," Harry told Ginny.

"In the last ten minutes!" Ron added, slumping into the chair beside his sister.

"I bet Malfoy cursed her in detention," Harry went on.

"Probably with a Babbling Hex," Ron nodded in agreement.

"Or a Brain-Addling Jinx," Ron supplied.

"Or a Confunding Curse," Harry said.

Ginny's head swiveled back and forth as she played spectator to the two, who continued to imagine the most ludicrous scenarios that could have occurred during detention. Honestly, this whole fighting-against-the-forces-of-evil had addled their brains. Or maybe it was just that Potions incident she had heard about...

She had seen this look on Hermione's face often enough. She was merely trying to solve a puzzle, decode a mystery, unlock a secret room.

She looked over at her friend and saw her caramel eyes glinting with firelight and determination and intelligence and...frustration?

Well. That warranted an investigation.

***

"Is it working?"

"I don't know..."

"I'll vouch for it...she's going more than a little barmy!"

"Thank you so very much for that input...it's not as though I want to drive her round the bend!"

"Well, it's rather inevitable isn't it...I mean, if she had to end up with you..."

"The point is to have her fall in love with me, not run shrieking in unadulterated terror from me."

"As I was saying about inevitability..."

"Oh, shut up."

"No, both of you shut up. Now, the point is not to make her fall in love with you, it's to have her realize that you might be acceptable in human society, and overall just about tolerable."

"Gryffindor prat."

"Hey, watch it with the insults! We're trying to help you here."

"Which, even though it goes against every fiber of my being, I must thank you two for."

"You're most welcome."

"Speak for yourself, mate. This was all your idea."

"C'mon. You know you want to see her happy as much as I do."

"Well, yeah, but with him?"

"Must you speak about me as if I'm not here?"

"It's my deepest desire to have you 'not here'."

"You know you love me."

"You're gay? I should have known...the hair's a dead give away! Right, then, the plan's scrapped."

"I most certainly am not gay!"

"Don't you think he's denying it a bit too vehemently?"

"Oh, what to do you expect when you question his sexuality?"

"Again with the speaking as though I'm not here."

"Yes, we've found that to be quite convenient."

"I can't believe I'm jumping into this pit with both eyes wide open."

"Oy! Was that a dirty joke?"

"Good God, I was just resigning myself to accepting this in bucketloads if she and I do get together!"

"Too right. And don't forget, we'll be Uncle Ron and Uncle Harry to the little ones."

"Mmhmm. That does it. I'm off."

"Where to, Malfoy?"

"Vasectomy."

***

"Bow hot. Blow cold. Insults. Then flirting. What is with him?" Hermione raged to her roommates.

Parvati and Lavender looked at her with ill-disguised amusement.

"And he's around. A lot. As in, always. Did I mention that?"

"Not in the last thirty seconds," Parvati supplied helpfully.

"And the stalking. Isn't this stalking? Wouldn't this be legally defined as stalking?"

"In Wizard Law, or Muggle?" Lavender asked, attempting to paste a serious expression on her face.

Hermione ignored them as she ranted on. "And the smiles. And the looking. And the eyes. And the hands! Oooh, just not helping!"

Parvati and Lavender nodded.

She rounded on them, an almost manic glint in her eyes. "And to see the world through a grain of sand!"

"It hasn't made any sense since the four hundred and thirty-eighth time you've said it, Hermione," Parvati pointed out.

Neither one was surprised really, when she just growled and stomped off to the library. Whatever else could be said about Draco Malfoy, one thing was certain: he had certainly found the perfect way to ensure that love him, hate him; there was no way Hermione Granger could ignore him.

***

Blaise Zabini was not your average Slytherin. Of course, he had the devilish good looks (it was a prerequisite...Snape just happened to be the exception), he had the wealth, the pure blood, the class, the aristocracy and the brains (shame about Crabbe and Goyle, really. Brought the entire house down.).

But then, he had Ginny Weasley. So, of course, he had the wrath of the infamous Weasley temper to face on a daily basis.

Hmm. Then again, maybe he was like any other Slytherin.

On the other hand, what set him apart from the pack was that he currently had his beautiful girlfriend doing the most wonderful things with her lips to that particular spot next to his ear. Which only meant one thing.

"Gin," he choked out, trying to clear his throat...and his mind.

"Hmm?" she purred.

"Is there...anything you need to tell me?" Blaise swallowed with difficulty...oh, yes, right there.

Ginny pulled back a few inches to look at him squarely in the eyes, and he had to remind himself to breathe. "I could ask you the same question."

"Huh?" Truth be told, Blaise could not be blamed for the lack of eloquence in his answer, considering that the vast majority of his blood was flowing away from his brain at that particular moment.

Ginny sighed in exasperation and slid off his lap. Blaise decided to hang on to any remaining vestiges of dignity by firmly biting down on the groan about to issue from his lips.

"Point one: Hermione's been in a bit of a daze lately," she said, pacing up and down the front of the empty classroom they had been using.

"And we had to stop our extracurricular activities for that?" No, that was certainly not a whine; Slytherins did not whine.

"Point two," the beautiful, beautiful she -devil continued mercilessly, "Is that her odd behaviour coincides with the recent Jekyll-Hyde quirks of a certain dorm mate of yours."

"We're Slytherins," Blaise said defensively. "And teenagers to boot. I think we're entitled to the occasional bout of schizophrenia."

Ginny ignored him. "Point three: Ron and Harry overheard Pansy Parkinson talking about Malfoy's plan to dive 'Mione around the bend. And I overheard her talking about Malfoy, Ron and Harry plotting in the boys' loo. I don't know what's more bizarre...the three of them leaving each other alive, or her being in the boys' loo."

"Someone needs to stitch that woman's mouth shut...without magic," Blaise muttered. "And exactly when did you get so observant? I thought Gryffindors lived in la-la-land most of the time."

"All of this leads me to believe one thing." Ignoring his words, Ginny stopped pacing and fixed him with a gimlet gaze that had him squirming...and not with pleasure. "You know what's going on, Zabini."

"Me?" he attempted an innocent expression that didn't fool her for a minute. Somehow, innocent expressions just did not sit well on Slytherin faces.

"Blaise..." she drew out his name, each letter enunciated clearly and signaling the growing impatience in her voice.

"What do I get if I tell you?" he asked cockily, smirking at her.

"You should be more interested in what you won't get if you don't tell me," she replied, smirking back.

Uh oh. She meant business.

***

Breakfast on the morning of Valentine's Day was the same bustling affair it usually was. Owls delivered an assortment of packages, bouquets and cards (both singing and non-singing) to various recipients (normally in their porridge bowls), the Great Hall echoed with excited gasps and girlish giggles, and Snape scowled at McGonagall up at the Staff table. Hermione delighted at the unvarying routine; its unchanging nature provided her with a great sense of stability.

But, of course, the Fates had been plotting against her these days by testing her paper-thin sanity. So she really shouldn't have been shocked when a fluffy brown barn owl landed on her shoulder, carrying an envelope in its beak.

"Hermione, there's an owl on your shoulder," Ron pointed out through a mouthful of sausages.

"And it's got an envelope in its beak," Harry added.

Brilliantly astute, weren't they?

Hermione reached up to pluck the letter from the owl's beak, and with a friendly hoot and a swish of soft wings, it flew off towards the Slytherin table to land on Draco Malfoy's outstretched arm. As she stared at him, wide-eyed, he inclined his head graciously and gave her a small smile.

Well, this day really did make people do funny things, didn't it?

"Did Malfoy send you that?" Harry asked curiously.

"Open up, let's see!" Ron implored.

"I'd have expected you two to have blown a few fuses by now," Hermione remarked calmly, although she was itching to read the letter. "Considering it's from Malfoy."

"The git's harmless," Ron waved a dismissive hand. "How else would we manage to transfigure him into an oversized slug at the end of every school year?"

"Yeah, now open the letter, 'Mione!" Harry was actually bouncing on his seat. Those two really needed girlfriends...

Hermione slit the envelope and a slip of parchment fell out. Picking it up, she read: "I promise, no virgin sacrifice."

She looked up, and sitting across from her, in between Harry and Ron, was Draco Malfoy. And all three were smirking.

"Why are you all looking at me like that?" she asked edgily.

"'Mione, love, there's more to life than books," Harry said, as if he were a benign uncle talking to a favourite niece.

"Everyone needs to have a little adventure," Ron added. "Fight a few battles, live on the edge a bit."

"I've done that," Hermione pointed out.

"Slay a few dragons," Ron continued. "And God knows you'd be doing wizardkind a huge favour by finishing off this one," he pointed at Malfoy.

"As touching as it is to have you on my side without the aid of a spell," Malfoy scowled, "I think I'd like to do the rest of the wooing myself."

The Great Hall was so silent that Hermione fancied if she strained her ears enough, she might be able to hear Muggle traffic miles and miles away.

"Wooing?" she echoed faintly.

"Surely you must have realized what this is all about, Granger," Malfoy said, and she could hear the glee in his voice. "If not, there's something screwy about you being the top witch at school for all these years."

Up at the Staff table, Snape opened his mouth to say something, but quickly shut it when McGonagall elbowed him sharply in the ribs.

"Good Lord," Hermione said in a tone of utter bemusement. "Has someone placed you under the Imperius Curse, Malfoy?"

"And the reason for that question would be..." he trailed off, waiting for her answer.

She quirked an eyebrow at him. "Do you realize that you're sitting at the Gryffindor table, in between two of your sworn enemies, consorting with them on how to woo a Mudblood?" On the emphasized words, her voice reached such a high pitch that the entire student body cringed and the glassware rattled on the tables. Malfoy, however, looked supremely unperturbed.

"You're wrong," he said simply.

"What?" she said stupidly.

"You said I'm consorting with two of my sworn enemies, when in fact, it's three," Draco pointed out. "The She-Weasley's in on this too."

Hermione snapped her head around to glare at Ginny, who sent back an unapologetic grin and wave.

"I feel like I'm stuck on a logic problem that magic can't get me out of," Hermione muttered, rubbing her temples. "Malfoy, if I 'Avada Kedavra'-ed you, would you disappear?"

"Permanently," he responded cheerfully. "Only, I'd like a shot at proclaiming my undying love for you first."

"Ah, we're still on that," Hermione said grimly. "Although, before anything else, Malfoy, you have to tell me...what the hell did you mean by 'To view the world through a grain of sand'?"

He rose to his feet in a single, lithe move and held out a hand to her. "I can show you."

She looked at his outstretched hand suspiciously and asked, "This isn't one of those things that's going to get us stripped of our Prefect badges and expelled, is it?"

"I make no promises," he said blandly, but she caught the twinkle in his eye and took his hand anyway.

The entire Great Hall expelled a collective sigh as they walked out the doors, and jumped in unison when Malfoy poked his head back in to say: "You lot really need lives."

***

They were walking down one of Hogwarts' numerous corridors, blissfully unaware of everything except each other and the fast whirring of the cogs in their brains as they kept up a steady flow of banter.

"So to prove you love me, you drive me batty; is that it?"

"That's such a plebeian way to put it, Granger. I was merely captivating your fancy by irking you now and then."

"Now and then?"

"Yes, well, alright, all the time. We Malfoys have never learnt the meaning of 'moderation'."

"If you lived in the Muggle world, I'd show you the meaning of 'restraining order'."

"Was that an invitation to your home over the summer holidays?"

"Of course not! You'd probably transfigure my family into llamas."

"Don't be ridiculous!"

"Oh? You wouldn't?"

"No. You know we're not allowed magic over the holidays."

"I knew it couldn't be out of any form of decency."

"Decency?"

"How is it you manage to make that sound like a dirty word, Malfoy?"

"It's just that we Malfoys never learnt that word either."

"Why am I not surprised? Any words you do know?"

"Apart from loot, pillage and plunder? Not really."

"I find it a little disturbing that you said that so cheerfully."

"Only a little? I must not be up to par today, then."

"Mentally, I doubt you're ever up to par, Malfoy."

"And yet, I managed to baffle you."

"Not baffle! Just...temporarily stump."

"Sugar coat it all you like, Granger, but I got you thinking."

"Yes, thinking of all the deliciously brutal ways I could murder you."

"A Slytherin at heart...I knew there had to be a reason I liked you."

"I'm still not entirely certain that can't be attributed to a spell gone wrong."

"I assure you, much to my own dismay, that it's quite genuine, Granger."

"And you could think of no better way to...er...woo me, than by driving me mad?"

"I'm a Slytherin. We don't do things the good way, or the easy way."

"No?"

"No, we do it the evil way."

"That accounts for the number of Dark wizards on the loose."

"To view the world through a grain of sand," Malfoy intoned.

"Are we back on tha--oh!" Hermione gave startled jump as a section of blank brick wall slid open with a hiss. She turned to give Malfoy a look of bewilderment mixed with fury. "All this while, I was wracking my brains and ripping apart books, and all I had to do was comb all the thousands of square feet of the Hogwarts' castle? It was a password?"

"Not just a password," Malfoy chuckled, stepping into the cozy nook. He beckoned her inside, and she looked at him warily.

"How do I know your goons aren't waiting in there to bludgeon me to death?"

"Because if I had to kill you, Granger," he drawled, "I'd do it with flair, subtlety, and the assurance that hundreds of witnesses hadn't seen me with you."

Ironic, really, how that was all it took to get her to step inside with him. She made no move to stop the wall as it slid shut, encapsuling the two of them in what was actually a tiny corner of the castle with a window overlooking the far edge of the grounds, and a superbly comfortable window seat.

She turned away from the spectacular view to face him, and was both amazed and dismayed to note that, more than anything else, it was he who made her breath catch in her throat.

Somewhere along the way, that translated into her IQ dropping by a hundred points. So all she managed to say was: "Tell me tell me tell me."

She could have bitten her tongue when he turned amused grey eyes to her. What was it that made her feel like such a gauche child around him?

"In simple English, Granger, if you had to try and understand it, how would you interpret that term?"

"That's easy. It would mean to have an extremely close-minded viewpoints about something...you see the world through a grain of sand, meaning everything follows that thin, narrow path that you see." She felt inordinately pleased that she was able to answer that. Some things never changed.

He smile a lazy, cat-like smile, and again, she felt that pull in her stomach that couldn't be translated into coherent words.

"Then you understood."

"What did I understand?"

"That that's not all there is to either you or me...the Pureblood and the Mudblood, the Slytherin and the Gryffindor, the bad and the good...that you were as guilty of stereotyping as I have been my whole life, that you classified me the way I classified you."

She stared at him in shock. "Malfoy...you just made sense."

He pulled her down on to the window seat with him, and held her awkwardly, because all love that stems from hate is bound, initially, to be awkward and fumbling and stumbling on the road to ecstasy.

"I told you before, Granger, I make no promises," he whispered, his lips brushing her ear and his breath stirring her hair. "And you may think what you like...spell gone wrong, temporary insanity, evil scheme, orders from the Dark Lord...but the fact, as much as it pains me to admit, is that I..."

"Please don't say it," Hermione murmured, and her actions contradicted her words as she burrowed into that warmth of his body. "Not now. Say it when we've had some time together, and it's not Valentine's Day when everyone acts crazy, and when I haven't just gotten through insulting you..."

"That day may never come," Malfoy said, and she could hear the smile in his voice.

"Prat."

"Gryffindor."

"Beanpole."

"I'm slender!"

"And I'm a supermodel."

"Not with those teeth."

"They got fixed!"

"Thanks to me."

"I should have my head examined."

"Also thanks to me."

"If this is how you treat the ones you love, I shudder to think how you treat your enemies."

"Who knows? Maybe we'll have a terrible break up, and you'll get to find out."

"Well, Malfoy, you certainly know how to woo a girl."

"I aim to please."

"Not."

"Are we going to get through this alive, Granger?" He looked at her, with her eyes bright and her mouth so pink and so close...

She smiled up at him mischievously. "I make no promises, Malfoy."