Why We Fight

Severus bit his bottom lip and looked at Hermione nervously. "T--thanks," he stammered.

"It's the truth, Severus, Narcissa isn't good enough for you," she stated.

The bell rang, Snape hurried to his first class of the day; he was obviously still unnerved by her affectionate back rubs...truth be told, so was Hermione. I wonder what he's going to think in the future... she mused. Maybe he'll stop taking so many points from Gryffindor -- or at least me -- because I remind him of, well, me.

With a shake, Hermione brought herself back and realized that she needed her schedule...and, egads, the password to the Slytherin dungeons. She noticed Draco had already asked Remus Lupin about the Gryffindor password.

She searched the Great Hall for any straggling prefects and her eyes widened as she finally noticed a dark-haired Slytherin prefect with cold gray eyes and a long face. "Oh, hi, what's our password?" the girl asked.

His dark eyes slid down her body speculatively, a smirk playing at his lips. Hermione shivered and wrapped her arms around herself. "Sinister," he murmured.

"Oh, well...that's--that's a very Slytherin password," Hermione murmured. "I'm Hermione de Lioncourt. Sixth year." She held out her hand in greeting.

His lips brushed her knuckles and Hermione jerked her hand away. She suddenly felt dirty. She didn't trust this guy. "Welcome to Slytherin, Hermione. It's certainly the best House. I'm Antonin Dolohov," he stated. "Seventh year."

A shiver danced its cold fingers down her spine as she examined the man that had attacked her at the Ministry of Magic's Department of Mysteries. "I--It was nice to meet you, Antonin," she stammered. By the time her conversation with him was over, most of the Slytherins and Gryffindors had left the Great Hall.

"I suppose you need to find the Slytherin House then?" he asked.

"N--no, I'll manage on my own," she stated. Antonin nodded and exited the Great Hall. Draco Malfoy had obviously told his fellow Gryffindors that he could manage on his own as well. She walked across the Great Hall to the blonde. "Need some help?"

"What? Oh, it's you," the boy drawled. "Of course not."

"So...where's your House located?" Or for that matter, where my House is located, she added mentally. "You know, where our schedule is."

"It's...it's..." Draco stammered.

"Need some help?" the brunette repeated.

"Fine," the blonde scowled. She led him from the Great Hall and up several flights of stairs. On the seventh floor, they finally found the Fat Lady's portrait.

"Password?" the woman asked.

"Valor," Draco sniffed. The portrait swung open and the two entered the Gryffindor common room. Draco immediately noticed how warm and comfortable the room seemed especially when compared to the Slytherin common room. They walked to the posting board where the Gryffindor schedule was. "Advanced Potions first period. It doesn't say anything about Slytherins."

"We have the exact same classes, remember?" Hermione said.

The bell rang signaling the start of the first period. They were late on their first day of school -- well, their first full day of school -- in the past. The two raced through the halls of Hogwarts to the dungeons. The class was already assembled and Professor Flaherty, the balding, gray-haired professor in olive-green robes with hard blue eyes, looked over his wire-rimmed glasses at the two. "Miss de Lioncourt, Mr. Aquilus...they may tolerate tardiness at Agnitio," he sniffed the name as if it was a vile curse word, "but not here at Hogwarts. Twenty points from Gryffindor, twenty from Slytherin."

Right bastard, that one, Draco thought. Even Snape wouldn't take points from Slytherin! He made a disgusted face as he remembered the sappy, puppy-dog look that Snape had given his mother over breakfast. Oh, bloody hell...Snape and my mother...that's just...disgusting.

Hermione's eyes widened as she sunk onto the bench behind the last empty table, Draco slipping beside her. The double Advanced Potions was the longest Potions class Hermione had ever had. Professor Flaherty, the Muggle-born learned, on a good day was worse than Snape had been toward Neville after Neville's boggart combined with Professor Umbridge. If that didn't stir anyone into a right bit of panic, nothing would.

Hermione longed to talk to Draco but after the last disaster in Potions, the two silently checked, double-checked and triple-checked everything to make sure it was right. "So what's the story with you and Snape?" Draco asked.

"There's no story, we were talking about potions," Hermione stated. "Maybe he can help us get back."

Draco smirked. "You looked...awfully close," he said.

"Snape and me? Did you forget the past five years?" she asked. "He made my life miserable even though I was the best--"

"Second best," Draco stated.

"Second best?" Hermione demanded.

"You were the second best student in Potions," he answered. "Remember, I was first?" Hermione opened her mouth to counter his accusation when the beady-eyed professor's thunderous voice boomed out.

"Aquilus, de Lioncourt! Enough with the lover's quarrel, another fifty points from Slytherin and Gryffindor...apiece," Flaherty said.

Hermione eyes widened and she caught her fellow Slytherins (including Narcissa) -- Fellow Slytherins? Hermione wondered -- glare at her. She clenched her hands, blunt nails digging into her palms, to keep from throttling the short man with his bulbous nose. Draco was also fighting his baser homicidal urges toward the professor. Draco only managed to keep himself calm by a slow mantra of breathe in, breathe out.

By the time the class was over, Draco's need to kill the professor had dulled to an almost-bearable niggle in the back of his mind. Forget killing Voldemort, let's kill this shit, Draco thought as he and Hermione turned in their potion. The professor scowled at them and Hermione shivered. As soon as they were out of Flaherty's hearing range, Hurricane Hermione went off. "I CAN'T BELIEVE THAT MAN!" she cried. "He thought you and I were having a lover's quarrel?! Honestly, you're a pure-blooded Slytherin snob and I'm just little old Muggle-born Gryffindor me!"

Draco's eyes danced with amusement as he watched her cheeks flush with anger. She was almost...attractive. "I lost seventy points! Seventy points! On my first day, it's a good thing that I'm staying with Lily or the Slytherins would murder me in my sleep!" Hermione raged. "Ooh, I can't wait until I get home and the first thing I'm going to do is give Snape a hug and tell him what a wonderful job he's doing."

"I'm sure you will," Draco stated.

"You're sure I will what?" Hermione asked, confusion marring her brow.

"I'm sure you'll give him a great big hug and a wet, sloppy kiss," Draco smirked.

"You bastard!" Hermione gasped, her hand shooting out and smacking his cheek with a resounding smack. His head was pushed to the side from the force, a scarlet handprint flaming on his cheek; his usually impassive gray eyes stormed with anger.

He grabbed her wrists and shoved her roughly against the nearest stone wall. His grip was bruising on her delicately-boned wrists and he pushed his body against hers. "You got your free shot in third year, Mudblood, you never get another one," he growled.

Hermione's eyes widened in terror, her heart pounding violently. His lips were curled up in an evil sneer and were mere millimeters from her own lips. "Let me go," Hermione whimpered.

There was the echo of footsteps. Students were going through the dungeons to Professor Flaherty's classroom and Draco realized how this would look. So he did the only thing he could think of, he placed his lips to Hermione's. She gasped and Draco took this moment to push his tongue past her lips.

Her blood turned to lava and her nerves danced with electricity. The kiss was brief but it left both parties breathless and applause filled the hallway. Hermione's cheeks flamed as she noticed the collection of Slytherin and Gryffindor first years applauding and cat-calling. She was going to kill Draco Malfoy.

Her eyes scanned the crowd, trying to look anywhere but at the man who had just kissed her so thoroughly. Her cheeks blazed and it was a while before she finally realized that Draco had let her go. She pulled away from him, making her way through the first years and racing to the Transfiguration classroom. Draco watched her go, a look of shock plastered to his face before he too went to the Transfiguration classroom.