Chapter Text
She couldn’t just stay in the common room while Ginny and Harry went off to dispose of the evidence. What Harry had told her had happened was unthinkable. He had nearly killed Draco Malfoy. And before that, he’d walked in on Malfoy clearly indisposed, weak and vulnerable, in a prime position for someone to wheedle information out of him with just the slightest bit of tact, and Harry had started dueling him instead. She was practically twitching with outrage. Stupid BOYS.
She didn’t even think about it long. She’d fix this herself. And she was off through the portrait hole, stalking the corridors to the hospital wing before she had more of a plan than “talk to him.” When she slid into the room, walking lightly so she wouldn’t attract attention, her gut informed her immediately that she should have had a more thought out plan. Something like dread wrapped around her as she craned her head down the rows of beds and saw the one at the end with privacy partitions near it. She didn’t perceive any other visitor. She had expected to need to spend some time hiding out behind a curtain while she waited for Pansy Parkinson or Crabbe and Goyle to clear out. The emptiness of the room was unsettling.
Hermione walked cautiously in the direction of that bed, discomfort wrapping its fingers tighter around her lungs the closer she got. She could hear him before she saw him. Whimpering. Gasping. When he came into view, his eyes were closed but distress was so evident from his body positioning, he was near sobbing though it seemed every breath caused a new wince, a cycle of horrific pain. Where the hell was Madame Pomfry?
He seemed so deep in what was obviously a nightmare in physical form, he didn’t even notice her. She didn’t stay long, anger pulsing through her suddenly. She stalked towards Madame Pomfrey’s office, knocked as briskly as she dared and then helped herself in.
“Hermione,” Madame Pomfrey looked shocked to see her at this hour, her eyebrows knitting into disapproval before they smoothed. Perhaps remembering that Hermione was a prefect and was allowed to be out of bed.
“Madame Pomfrey, I came to see…” she trailed off as Pomfrey appraised her with confusion. “I couldn’t help but notice that Malfoy appears to be in quite a lot of pain. Can’t you do something about it?” The witch seemed to consider suddenly that her care was being criticized and the look of disapproval returned.
“He has been treated for pain, Miss Granger, and the spell can only be repeated every four hours. He’s got two left. He simply has to wait. I have already told him this.” She started turning away. “If your worry is for Harry, I assure you the injuries are no longer life threatening.” Anger flushed Hermione’s body again. Yes, she was certainly concerned for what would happen to Harry, but that was not why she had stormed Pomfrey’s office.
“A calming draught then,” Hermione offered sternly. Something seemed off about the mediwitch. She’d never seen her leave a student in such a state. Madame Pomfrey looked up, seeming to consider. She scowled.
“Fine.” She said. The witch stalked behind her to a store cupboard and drew potion into a goblet from her work table. “Take it to him if you wish,” she said. Hermione gazed at her in shock, but then accepted the cup, turning on her heel. She wondered if Madame Pomfrey knew about what they suspected. If she also believed that Malfoy was the one who had poisoned Ron, and cursed Katie, that he was trying to get to the headmaster. It would explain her lack of helpfulness. But still, mediwitches took oaths. It was her job to have compassion for the sick and injured. Hermione could not remember finding Malfoy to ever have been sympathetic before, and yet the sight of him suffering so intensely, perhaps coupled with the knowledge that Harry had caused this suffering, had nearly taken her breath. How could she feel that and Madame Pomfrey appear so callous?
She reached his bed quickly, and then slowed to approach his shuddering form. His body was still wracked with restrained sobs, his hair, normally so white and fine, shone dimly, damp with perspiration. He still didn’t see her. She didn’t want to startle him, but it seemed it couldn’t be helped.
“Malfoy,” she tried softly. No response. She sharpened her tone, added a bit more volume, and the effect was instantaneous. He silenced and stiffened. His eyes opened wide. He seemed to be straining with effort to keep himself still, but his face was still screwed up in pain.
“Come to finish the job, Granger?” he spit at her. That he was capable of sounding so vehement and disgusted given the state he was in was impressive. Hermione sighed, and extended the goblet.
“Calming draught,” she said.
He glanced at it suspiciously. “Like I would take a potion from your hands. It’s probably poisoned," his tone was clearly trying to stretch with his normal disdain, but faltering word by word. Hermione sighed heavily and brought the goblet to her own lips, taking a tiny sip. Warmth slid down her throat to her belly, and she felt a tightness about her shoulders drop away. He still looked at her suspiciously, but she could see his body beginning to shake again. He was losing his battle with appearing stoic for her benefit.
“Draco, stop being ridiculous,” she said, channeling the motherly scold of Molly Weasley, trying his first name on for effect. It did seem to shock him a bit, the trembling abated again just briefly, but he didn’t reach for the goblet, even as she extended it again. She would try logic, then. “If your condition took a turn for the worse, Harry would be the one punished for it. It would make no sense for me to harm you.” She braced herself for the shot he must be about to take, that he couldn’t touch that goblet now that it had touched her Mudblood lips. But the insult didn’t come. He lifted his eyes to hers, and she forced herself to keep his gaze, to let him see that she wasn’t trying to hurt him. She wanted to help. Maybe her motives for coming here had been more for the greater good than to help him specifically, but no one else was here, and he clearly needed help. She felt a lump in her throat as she resisted the urge to look around again, wondering again why no one was there with him. Not even his mother was there. The hippogriff incident from third year had been grossly exaggerated, and still she recalled the adult Malfoys around the castle that day, sending shivers up her spine, threatening Hagrid and Buckbeak. Now, something actually serious had happened, and nothing? Draco seemed to come to a decision, and reached for the goblet with a shaking hand, his knuckles turning white on its base as he lifted it to his lips and drained it. When he lowered it to his lap, he stayed looking at it, breathing in and out heavily for a few moments.
“Why are you here?” he asked slowly, still looking into the goblet’s empty depths.
“I thought…” she wondered briefly. She had ulterior motives certainly, and she shouldn’t tell him those, but there was some truth in a simpler reason, even if it was one he might not believe. Not the whole truth, but not a lie now. She felt a twinging in her stomach at the thought of him here. How he would have been alone if she hadn’t come. “I thought you might need a friend.” He looked up then, and she thought for a moment he was going to unleash his vitriol again, no longer distracted by his own heaving breaths.
“We’re not friends,” he said. It was just a statement, flat, baldly stated. “And your friend,” some venom behind that word, “is the reason I am here.” He gestured to himself. She rose, perhaps predictably, to Harry’s defense.
“Harry didn’t know what that spell did. He would never have done this on purpose.”
“I see, so that excuses it, does it?" He sneered.
“No, of course it doesn’t,” she practically squeaked. “That isn’t,” she started. “I shouldn’t have said that. I didn’t come here to say that,” she said. She felt her face clouding as she took in his appearance, still soaked with sweat, shirtless under open robes, bandages covering most of his chest. Harry had told her that Malfoy had been in the bathroom crying before the confrontation had begun. That he seemed to have befriended Moaning Myrtle because she had apparently found him in various bathrooms all year in a state of similar misery. She knew that if what Harry had suspected was true, Malfoy had been tasked with something monstrous. From the evidence of the scene Harry had interrupted in the bathroom, and the fact that Malfoy had been turning thinner and paler every day the school year advanced, he was not filled with glee at the prospect. Some of her thoughts must have played across her face.
“I don’t need your pity either, Granger,” he scowled.
She shook her head, sighed a “fine” and turned to leave.
“Wait, don’t go!” she paused mid-stride, and turned around slowly. The look on his face was one of abject mortification, as though he could not have been the one who had spoken. “I…. uh… oh… god…” he clapped a hand over his mouth. She wasn’t sure why he had not wanted her to go, but despite the war that he seemed to be having with himself, she returned, closer to his bedside, and took a seat on the edge near the foot. Eyes wide, he readjusted himself in the bed slightly amongst the propped pillows, seemingly to avoid his legs from touching her, and she saw pain flash across his features again. Pain seemed to distract him from whatever self-flaggelation had been happening in his head, and she saw him close his eyes, and do nothing but breathe again. He furrowed his eyebrows. For an already almost albino colored young man, he looked impossibly paler. Hermione’s heart twinged, and she reached out her hand tentatively and brought it down to rest on his knee. He froze under her touch, she could feel his muscles tensing, but just as she considered pulling back, he relaxed, letting a long stream of air come out of his mouth and sinking into the pillows.
“I thought you hated me,” he said softly, eyes still closed, still taking deep breaths.
“I…” Hermione thought for a moment. Certainly she participated when Harry and Ron bashed him. Certainly he had always done something worthy of bashing. But hate? No, she didn’t think she did. It was him who seemed to hate her, really. Slurs rolled off his tongue easily in her direction. Uncomfortably, she knew the feelings she associated with him were more frustration, and a desperate need to be liked, to win the approval of someone who clearly thought she was worthless. It wasn’t specific to him, those feelings, she just hated the idea of anyone hating her, especially for something as stupid as her parentage. She wanted to prove them all wrong. She wanted acceptance from wizards as a whole, and that seemed to apply even to the blonde Slytherin in front of her. She wasn’t going to share all of that though. “No, I don’t hate you.”
“Why not?” he asked calmly. “I’ve been nothing but an ass.” It was such an understatement that she couldn’t help a laugh.
“That’s true.” He opened his eyes and met hers, some confusion mixed in with the way they glazed with the effects of the calming draught. He held her gaze, and she could feel his true question beating through her though he hadn’t asked again. Why? Why? Why? “Harry’s got it into his head that you became a Death Eater this summer, Malfoy,” she said finally. Shock coursed through his expression, and just as suddenly, she watched him control it back to careful neutrality, removing his eye contact from her own just a fraction, clearly trying to be subtle. “And that you’ve been asked to kill Professor Dumbledore.” A tremble seemed to push through the calming draught. “And that Ron, and Katie Bell have all been collateral damage in this mission.” She stopped, watching him keep himself vacant, but the subtle shake of his muscles had not abated after it had returned. She hadn’t meant to bring him back to the place of stress but… she also couldn’t let this opportunity pass. “I thought there was no way Voldemort,” Draco flinched, “would involve someone our age.” She took in his crumbling composure. His eyes were definitely averted now, teeth clenched. “As he certainly couldn’t expect an underaged wizard to kill someone he himself has never been able to best… unless he doesn’t expect you to succeed.” She added that last bit softly, and she felt her thoughts organizing themselves into a clear line of logic, working themselves out as she said them aloud.. “Your father failed at the Ministry,” her voice was low. “I think Voldemort is taking it out on you, and maybe you thought you had no choice.”
Draco’s eyes jumped back to hers, at that. She kept her expression open and tried to project an air free of judgement. She had to succeed where Harry had so spectacularly failed.
There was silence, and unblinking eye contact for what felt like too long, and then his eyes cast down, and she saw with horror that he his broad shoulders were shaking with sobs again, and he was again wincing as each one irritated his wounds, the cycle she had found him in when she arrived her beginning again. What should she do? She had told an enemy that she was here to be a friend, and now he was breaking down in front of her, laced as he was with potion that should have kept all but the most desperate causes of stress from touching him. She grasped for a way to salvage this.
What would she do if it were Harry or Ron there, crying? Something inside of her quailed. She knew. She would hug them. She would make sure they knew they were not alone, and hold them until they felt better, until they were refocused on solutions. That was what she should do now, if she was really going to get through to him. She tensed, imagining all the terrible things that could happen if she tried to hug Draco Malfoy. She tried to think of another option. Nothing came to mind.
Finally, the discomfort of sitting there helplessly while he sobbed and winced became worse than the prospect of touching him like that, and she stood, moved closer to him, and said sternly “make room,” placing her hips down near where his were and moving him further on the bed with her own body. He coughed in confusion, through a sob, and seemed to shudder in pain, but he readjusted himself slightly, and without thinking about it further she put her right arm around his shoulders and pulled his body into hers. The sobbing didn’t stop, on the contrary, it seemed to pick up, but he didn’t resist her. In fact, his arms started to twine around her with a desperate feeling of strength. She tucked his head under her chin and rubbed his back in slow circles.
“It’s ok, Draco. Just breathe. It’s going to be ok,” she whispered, she restated, she incanted the air around them, different iterations of kindness softly skimming over his ears. A first name for a momentary friend, and human touch were all she had to work with but it seemed enough. Slowly his sobs seemed to quiet. He stayed pressed to her.
“I don’t have a choice,” the words were barely audible when he choked them out. “He’s moved into my house. My parents are in the inner circle. What choice could I possibly have?” A few more sobs came, but quieted again quicker. It was a clear admission. What Harry suspected was true. She was surprised that he continued. “If I don’t kill Dumbledore, then he’s going to kill me. My mother too.” he shuddered. She squeezed him a bit, trying to offer more comfort, acknowledgement that she had heard him when she had no idea yet what to say, but regretted it when she heard his sharp intake of breath. She’d hurt him.
“Sorry,” she whispered. He didn’t acknowledge her.
“I know you Gryffindors would just refuse and let yourselves be murdered on principle but I…”
“No, Draco, being brave does not mean letting yourself be killed. None of us think you should do that.” She thought she felt a different kind of shudder through his body, and his breath came out in a gust. A laugh?
“Maybe you should take a poll of the other two in your trio before you make sweeping statements like that,” he sounded amused, almost.
“I don’t need a poll. I know them. And they would probably be your friends too if you could stop being such a twat all the time,” she said. A soft chuckle again. But then slow deep breaths returned, controlling himself again.
“So, now what?” his voice was barely audible again. “You, my mortal enemies, come up with some brilliant plan to save me from my life-threatening idiocy?” She was tempted to laugh again, but his tone was so serious… hopeful? She sighed.
“I think that’s a bit out of our league,” she felt him stiffen beneath her arms, and for a moment he seemed like he was trying to extricate himself. She didn’t move, didn’t make it easy for him. “I think there’s only one person who can help.” This time he tried harder to escape her, and she let him. She wasn’t trying to hold him prisoner, and she didn’t want him to hurt himself further. He pulled back enough that she could see the abject terror on his face. Of course he had inferred who she meant. She’d never thought him dumb. His smarts were just less prominent in her presence compared to his juvenile petulance and bullying.
“I can’t,” he gasped. “If Dumbledore finds out what I’ve done, I’ll be expelled. Which means I’ll be sent right back home where he is right now! That’s not a solution!”
Hermione looked at him sadly, “I’m pretty sure, Draco, that he already knows.” His shock brought a little pink to his cheeks. It made him look healthier. His mouth was open, and she could see the protest forming. “You’re underaged. Dumbledore would not put you in harm’s way, regardless of what you’ve done. And he wouldn’t let your mother be harmed either.” She looked at him imploringly. “But you do need to come clean.” He still looked horrified. “Draco,” she said. “You are on a suicide mission. Accept some god damned help.” She felt her eyes blazing and made an effort to pin him with her gaze, making sure he saw how serious she was. How serious his situation was. Her arm was still around his back, and she returned to the circling scratching motion there as she waited for him to realize her correctness. He softened under her fingers.
“Ok,” he whispered, finally. His shoulders sagged and his eyes cast downwards. She tried to keep the utter triumph she felt off of her face.
“Now ok?” she asked, still hesitant. He could change his mind just as quickly as he had seemed to acquiesce. She would have to tell Dumbledore anyway, but she preferred to have Draco’s compliance. He nodded. Hermione wasted no time. She cast her patronus immediately, and asked the shimmering otter that appeared to find Dumbledore and ask him to come to the hospital wing. It swam off through the sky in a brilliant haze.
“I’ve never seen yours,” Draco said, gazing after it. “An otter?”
“Mmmhmmm,” she smiled softly. Then she glanced at him inquiringly, “Do you want me to go? While you talk with Dumbledore, I mean?”
“No,” he said rather quickly. But then he seemed to take in what Dumbledore would see if he walked in just then. She was still fairly wrapped around him. “But… um… maybe you could find a chair.” Hermione felt her cheeks heating, but she adopted a business air and untangled herself gingerly, trying not to jostle him too much. She was surprised at the sensation of loss she felt once the warmth of his body was no longer pressed against hers. She turned away quickly and looked for a chair, grabbing one from across the aisle of beds and dragging it back to Draco’s bedside. He sniffled, wiping his face and wincing. Anxiety poured off of him in waves.
“It really is going to be ok, now, Draco,” she reassured him. A shadow darkened the door to the hospital wing for just a moment before Dumbledore entered. Hermione reached out for Draco, and gave his hand a quick squeeze before folding her fingers neatly in her lap.
She was there for all of it. Draco held himself together mostly, and Dumbledore was everything Hermione expected. Calm. Quietly angry at the admission of how harm had come to his other students, but not surprised. And also, as she expected, quite willing to rescue Draco from his situation. When Dumbledore left the room, after agreements about preparations that would be made for him to disappear had been made, Draco slumped into the mattress. His face was still so pale, but his features seemed much more relaxed. After a moment, he frowned slightly and looked over at her again.
“Misson accomplished? Back to Potter and Weasel to spread the good news of my downfall?” he asked.
She thought she should deny it. But hadn’t this been her hope, when she started walking this way? And she didn’t think she could keep something of this magnitude from Harry and Ron. She stayed silent, focusing on her breaths for a moment. Finally she spoke, “For right now, I am here to be your friend, so my mission is not accomplished unless I’ve done what you need. I rather think that conversation with Dumbledore was in that vein, but I am here for whatever else,” she said.
He looked at her and she saw something in his silver eyes that she hadn’t seen before. He reached his hand in her direction. “Stay here with me tonight?” he asked. His eyes pled even while his body strained away, as if horrified again of the words that he had let slip out.
She scooted her chair in, and nodded, joining her hand to his. He relaxed back into the pillows and closed his eyes. She leaned forward to cushion her head against the bed near their clutched hands and closed hers too.