Disclaimer: I do not own anything you recognize from Ms. Rowling's works. At most I own only the plot bunny that gnawed on the inside of my head until I finally got all the words out onto...er, electronic paper. No copyright infringement is intended.

~*/*\*~

The Consequences of Compassion

or

The Adventure That Ensues When You and Your Best Friend Both Have a Saving-People-Thing

~*/*\*~

"You will not go to him, Narcissa," the wizard forbade, his pale fingers tightening their hold on his cane. His grey eyes were steady and implacable, which meant he was expecting her to obey.

His wife's icy blue eyes narrowed to show him she would not be dissuaded. Her fingers, only slightly paler than her husband's, crushed the parchment in defiance of both him and the author of the note.

"I have done as you asked, Lucius. I have given you a month to solve this your way. How much longer will you wait before your pride gives way? Will you wait until our son is beaten? Tortured? Dead?"

"They will not harm him," Lucius rebutted confidently.

"Of course," she scoffed. "If it is their doing, then they will only turn him the moment we attempt to retrieve him."

"They are bluffing," he assured her. "Everyone knows that is impossible."

"And if it isn't? They are intelligent, despite their wilder traits. They are not to be underestimated. You have failed, as you have with everything else in recent years." He flinched, to her vicious satisfaction. "You have failed Draco too many times. I will stand idly by no longer. I will go to him, and I will obtain an alliance with him. He is the only one in whom I can place my trust. I can persuade him, and he will persuade his friend to help him."

She turned and strode to the fireplace, but her husband quickly followed, still trying to talk her out of it. Despite his skill at twisting words, her anger would not be mollified. She halted right before the floo powder pot and spun around on her heel.

"No, Lucius, I am not overreacting," she retorted coldly. "Need I remind you of the promises you made before? Every single one of those you have broken. You did not protect us. You did not gain the Dark Lord's favor. You did not do what was best for our family. I love you, and I will never regret having become your wife, but I refuse to let you place Draco in any more danger for your own selfish reasons. He is being used against us because of a deal you made, which was also broken. I will get him back, so go to your study and try your hand at waiting around for someone else to fix your problems."

Without giving him any time to reply, she grabbed a handful of green powder, threw it into the fireplace, loudly stated her destination, and stepped through.

~*/*\*~

A quick rap on his office door startled Harry out of his thoughts.

"Come in," he called.

His black eyebrows shot up to his hairline at the sight of Narcissa Malfoy entering his office, skillfully closing the door behind her without breaking stride. She cast several privacy charms on the door, which intrigued him even more. As stern as she was, they were on almost friendly terms after everything that had happened.

"Mister Potter, I require your assistance."

"What is it, Mrs. Malfoy?"

"My son is missing."

~*/*\*~

"Kidnapped?" Hermione gasped, her brown eyes widening comically.

Harry nodded grimly, pushing his glasses back up his nose.

"She thinks she knows who did it, but she won't tell me anything until the first official meeting. All she gave me was the note, as it's physical evidence that needs to be recorded."

"When is the meeting?"

"In a couple days. You'll come, won't you?"

Hermione gnawed on her lip. "You know I'm happy to help, but shouldn't this stay just between you and her?"

Harry shook his head. "She specifically asked for me to consult with you. Besides, you know Robards considers you an honorary Auror, anyway. I got his permission."

"She asked for me?"

"Yeah. She thinks very highly of you, actually."

Hermione frowned. "Since when have you two become so close?"

He shrugged. "She thinks that by sparing her family from prison and the Kiss I've paid back my life debt to her three times over. She insisted on giving me information. I owl her from time to time when I need it – she's a gossip, so she knows a lot about other pureblood families – and I've actually solved quite a few cases because of her help. She reads through the recordings of my interrogations and picks through them to give me clues about what the suspect is hiding. A lot of them have a tendency to brag in a very cunning way, so she connects the dots. After the first case I closed with her, I got permission for her to be an official consultant, just like you."

"Oh," she replied, shocked at the elder witch's actions. She could count the number of times she'd interacted with Narcissa Malfoy on half a hand and every one of those times had been unpleasant due to a fundamental conflict of deep-seated beliefs on both sides. But if Harry had built a civil relationship with her, then Hermione supposed she could be civil as well.

"Well…alright then. What do we know so far?"

"Here's the note that was left for Lucius," Harry stated, handing it to her.

Your son will not be harmed, so long as you come peacefully. Should you come with other intentions, we will wait no longer for your blessing.

~*/*\*~

"Alright, Narcissa. What do you know?" Harry started after the three of them had settled down in the meeting room.

"I did not witness Draco's kidnapping, but the note proves my suspicion of who took him."

"Who?"

"The veela clan."

He frowned. "Sorry?"

Hermione's eyebrows shot up. "What veela clan?"

"There is a clan in the northeast of Scotland, I know not the exact location. Lucius may know, but I would not be surprised if even he didn't. Like most clans they are very wary of outsiders, especially wizards, and keep to themselves in the woods and mountains.

"To this day Lucius has still not confided in me the entire story, but what I understand is that he came across a full-blood veela while traveling with his parents the summer before his seventh year. She had attempted to seduce him, but he refused and she grew confused and angry. He explained that he has veela blood in him, so he is resistant to veela charms. This particular veela took that as a challenge and pursued him all summer. Because of his loyalty to me, he resisted, and eventually convinced a friend to drink Polyjuice Potion and satisfy her. The veela, having enjoyed the experience, pursued him once again. He refused again, so she went to her clan and claimed he had defiled her. The clan found him and imprisoned him until he promised to marry her. He agreed but then escaped during the night. He rejoined his parents and persuaded them to move elsewhere for the rest of the vacation, so he never heard from them again.

"He made a promise to a veela clan and broke it. I fear they have been watching us all these years and waited for the perfect time to steal our son."

"What is their intention with Draco? Leverage?" Harry asked.

"I believe they intend to make him a full-blooded veela."

"That's impossible." Hermione responded at once. "There's no such thing as a full-blooded male veela."

"You are correct, Miss Granger, in that there is no such creature as a naturally born full-blooded male veela."

"How could they 'turn' him into one?" the brunette asked, picking up on the distinction.

"How do you think they procreate, if there are no male veela to mate with?" Narcissa countered.

Hermione remained pensively silent.

"Veela are too secretive for their wild mating habits to be documented. The only ones we know of are those of a veela and a wizard, whose offspring is only half-veela, not full-blooded. With the lack of a full-blooded male, I believe veela perform a ritual in preparation of mating in order to create full-blood offspring."

"So they'll cast a spell on Draco and mate with him as payment for Lucius' rejection?" Harry clarified.

Narcissa nodded. "Precisely."

Hermione's eyes widened in horror.

"Now you understand my predicament. Lucius believes they will not harm him no matter what we do, but I only believe that in the physical sense. For right now, I believe it is safe to assume they are waiting for us to decide, but if we declare that we do not agree to the marriage, I fear they will force him."

"So your choices are to give the marriage your blessing or not, but either way it will happen?" Harry summarized.

"Yes. I cannot abide either choice, as I know Draco does not want this, but I do not see another option."

"That's no choice at all!" Hermione burst out. "Of course Draco doesn't want this, because he has absolutely no say in it! It's totally barbaric!"

"Could you bribe them?" Harry suggested uncertainly.

The blonde shook her head once. "Lucius has tried all the usual tactics, but as they live in their own society, they have no use for money or material items we deem valuable."

"Could we substitute someone else in his place?"

"Harry!" Hermione admonished.

Narcissa shook her head again. "If I am correct, they need a wizard who has veela blood in him. I believe this is because the ritual uses that blood as a catalyst."

"But we don't know that for sure?" Harry pushed.

"No," Narcissa admitted, "but it would explain why the veela had wanted Lucius to marry her once he had admitted his heritage, so he could become part of the clan."

"Well, I'm fresh out. Any brilliant ideas, Hermione?" her friend asked.

"Isn't there anything else they could want in payment? What do they need?" Hermione queried.

"As far as we know, nothing. They survive only on nature, as they have for centuries."

"There must be something else. No civilization is so self-sufficient as to not desire anything," the brunette insisted. "Would a parlay be possible?"

"It might."

"Then that is what I suggest. Start a dialogue and see if some other payment can be agreed upon. As primitive as they seem, they haven't harmed Draco yet, which means there is hope for them to be reasonable. It sounds as if they merely want some form of compensation for the broken promise, not bloodshed."

"Then that is what we will do," Narcissa decided, "provided you come with me."

Hermione frowned. "Me? Why do you need me?"

The elder witch smirked. "I may have a plan."

~*/*\*~

Hermione sighed, realizing that this situation right here was proof that Harry was not the only one with a Saving-People-Thing. She hadn't protested nearly as much as she should have.

She couldn't believe she was actually doing this. Firstly, she'd never thought she'd ever willingly travel with Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy, especially since the former still didn't seem too keen on her existence, despite the latter's apparent fondness of her. Secondly, she was travelling with them on a mission to yet again deceive a clan of veela who could easily set them all on fire at any given moment. Thirdly, she was risking life and limb for the sake of freeing Draco Malfoy, yet another person her past self would have deemed her present self completely mental for aiding in any fashion. It was turning out to be a very strange situation, and she just knew it was going to get worse. Then again, as long as she didn't have to ride on the back of a dragon to escape, she could handle whatever happened.

"This is your plan, Narcissa?" Lucius drawled with a hint of disgust. "Wander around aimlessly until they find us and capture us like common trespassers?"

"Do you want your son back or not?" Narcissa snapped as she surveyed their surroundings. "At least I have a plan that has a chance of working, which is more than you can say."

The silver lining about traveling with these two was that she got a fascinating insight into two people she had once loathed beyond almost anyone. Lucius Malfoy was not quite so scary when he cowered in the face of his angry wife, who could put him in his place with a few choice words. She was actually sort of enjoying listening to them bicker like any normal married couple.

Lucius gave no answer save a scowl that could have been a disgruntled pout, which made Hermione all the more amused.

A sudden rustle in the nearby trees set all three of them on alert.

A woman wearing a dress made out of layered leaves approached them. The covering left almost none of her form to the imagination, but her beauty made it look anything but indecent. Her silvery blond hair flowed almost down to her knees and it looked as silky as if it had been washed and combed to perfection. Her blue eyes shone with mischief and she smiled at them, beckoning them with one hand.

"Come," she said with a musical voice. "We have been expecting you."

She led them through the densest part of the forest and into a mountain valley. On the other side was a smaller forest overlooking the sea. This forest, apparently, was the veela's home.

The trio was shown to the apparent clan leader, a regal-looking veela who had the same silver hair and blue eyes. She bore a crown made out of white flowers and green leaves that was held in place by an elegant braid of her own hair. She wore various colored flowers mixed in with her leaf dress. Her throne sat atop a small hill flanked by two ancient trees. The throne itself was formed by the roots, which the veela had decorated with more leaves, moss, and flowers.

As Hermione and the Malfoys approached, the other veela gathered around them but remained silent.

"Welcome again to our home, Lucius Malfoy," the elder veela called in the most enchanting voice Hermione had ever heard. "I hope you are here with much more honest intentions than you were before."

Narcissa nudged her husband, who didn't look at all pleased to be back. He cleared his throat.

"We appreciate your hospitality, Sielle," he replied in his usual silky tone. "Before we speak on this matter, allow me to witness that my son is as you have promised, alive and unharmed in any manner."

Sielle smiled and nodded. Three of the veela behind them scampered off and returned a few minutes later with Draco Malfoy held between them. He was walking on his own, but their hands on his back and shoulders were clearly meant to keep him from trying to escape. His platinum blond hair, the same shade as his parents', was mussed and his usually immaculate robes dirty and torn, but he looked healthy, especially wearing his trademarked expression of arrogant aloofness.

"Draco, darling, are you well?" Narcissa asked immediately.

Her son cleared his throat as if not used to speaking. "As well as can be expected, Mother," he replied roughly. "I can attest to the fact that they have neither harmed nor intended to harm me during my captivity. We have merely been waiting." He shot a glare at his father on the last word, as if knowing that the delay had been all his fault.

"As you see," Sielle broke in, "we have kept our promise. Now it is time for you to keep yours. Draco shall remain here and be bonded to Arbri," she gestured to one of the veela near her, who smiled, "and we shall consider your promise kept."

"Ah," Lucius objected. "You see, that puts us in a very difficult position."

Hermione took a deep breath as her heart rate increased. This was it. Hopefully she wouldn't have to say much, as she knew she wasn't a gifted actress, but she might be able to scrape by just with the fear of what would happen if she failed. It also helped that she felt immense compassion for Draco at the moment, considering none of this was even remotely his fault.

"Does it?" Sielle asked in amusement. "And what is the problem with fulfilling your oath to us?"

"Oh no, I have no issue with fulfilling my oath to you. The issue is that Draco already has a betrothed, and if I allow him to wed Arbri, then he would break his oath to Hermione Granger, which would cause yet another messy situation."

Sielle finally turned to Hermione, and the brunette stared back as confidently as she could manage under such severe stress. She knew what she was likely going to have to do to prove her fake betrothal to Draco, and she was not looking forward to it.

"Is this true, Hermione Granger? Are you promised to Draco Malfoy?"

"Yes." She gave herself a mental pat on the back for not letting her voice crack at those suspicious eyes drilling into hers. She didn't dare look at Draco, however, because she knew she'd crack like a dropped egg if she did.

"Then why have you not looked at him once?" Sielle asked slyly.

"Because the last time we spoke, we argued." Not a lie. "I'm…ashamed of how I treated him in our last moments together. I'm afraid he's terribly angry with me." Also not a lie. She didn't imagine he'd be thrilled at all to have to fake a betrothal to her of all witches.

"And you, Draco Malfoy?" Sielle turned her gaze to him. "Have you promised yourself to Hermione Granger?"

Hermione held her breath. Draco's answer would either save them or cause their painful, fiery deaths. She prayed he had caught on to the out they were giving him, and that his dislike of her didn't outweigh his sense of self-preservation.

"I have," he confirmed, and Hermione's breath rushed out of her in relief. She chanced looking at him through the corner of her eye.

Sielle narrowed her eyes slightly at him. "And yet you have not protested before?"

Draco stared her down. "When was I able to protest? When I was struck and captured from behind? When I was locked in a room by myself for weeks? To whom should I have protested?"

The leader relaxed and nodded. "We kept you apart from us to keep you safe from the most ambitious of us. In light of this, I must ask your forgiveness, Draco Malfoy."

"He was struck from behind?" Lucius repeated coldly.

Sielle turned her eyes toward him. "Your son was not captured as easily as we had expected."

"And what of your promise not to harm him, oathbreaker?" The elder Malfoy fired back.

"We healed the wound. His overall health was not harmed."

"But his head was wounded at all, and by that fact you have broken your oath to me."

Hermione almost smiled at the anger beginning to show on Sielle's face. For the first time in her life, she was rooting for Lucius.

"Very well," Sielle replied at last. "We have both broken our oaths. Let the past remain in the past and we shall start anew, provided that Draco Malfoy and Hermione Granger are truly promised to the other."

"And why should that affect our agreement now?" Lucius replied haughtily.

"If you have broken two oaths by lying to me, then we are not even in the eyes of the Great Mother."

That was her cue. Hermione knew what she had to do, and she had to do it now or she'd lose her nerve and they'd all be doomed.

"May I?" she spoke quickly to Sielle, who turned her luminous eyes to the brunette.

The veela queen nodded. Instantly, the three veela guarding Draco stepped away, sulking.

Without giving herself any time to think on it further, Hermione whipped around and ran full tilt to her 'betrothed'. She launched herself at him, wrapping her arms around his neck and hugging him like he were Harry or Ron after they had just escaped yet another near-death experience. She trembled with nerves and adrenaline, praying that he would follow her lead, terrified that he wouldn't.

After what seemed like five minutes, but was probably only five seconds, Draco wrapped his arms around her shaking body and hugged her back. Five points to Slytherin for being quick on the uptake.

But if she should have remembered one thing about Draco Malfoy, it was that he never wasted an opportunity to one-up her. Pretending to be her fiancé, even if only momentarily, was just another excuse to prove he was better than her at something. He pulled back a little, moved one finger under her chin, and gently tilted it up toward his face. His lips descended on hers and her body immediately stopped shaking from sheer shock.

The competitive nature of it was familiar territory, though, so Hermione boldly kissed him back and attempted to deepen it by running her tongue along his lips. He stiffened for a moment, which caused her to smile, but then he tightened his arms around her possessively, flattening her body against his, and allowed her tongue inside so he could lightly suck on it. She bit his lip in retaliation, reaching up with her hands to grip his soft locks, and he slid his hands down past her waist to cup her bum.

Someone loudly cleared their throat, probably Lucius, which startled the two out of their Chicken contest. Hermione jumped back out of Draco's embrace, blushing madly, but Draco wore an unashamedly triumphant smirk, the clear victor of this competition.

Hermione stared at the ground in utter mortification at what she had just done, in front of his parents, no less. Yes, Narcissa had told her to make it convincing, but that had gone just a tad too far. Even worse than that, Hermione realized she had had no intention of stopping until Lucius had called them back to their senses.

"Do you still doubt the strength of their affection?" Narcissa asked the clan leader with amusement.

"No," the veela answered. "I have not witnessed such true passion in a very long time. You may all leave unharried."

The four wasted no time in doing so, bidding the clan a formal but hasty goodbye.

~*/*\*~

Once they were back in London, Hermione cited the first excuse that came to mind, which was that Harry had to be informed of their success. She apparated directly to the Ministry entrance and spent about two hours in her own office, processing, hyperventilating, and gaping at her own audacity.

She eventually decided that, once she'd had enough time to get used to the idea that snogging Draco Malfoy turned her into a common hussy, she would be able to put the whole thing behind her and simply avoid Draco for the rest of their natural lives. That wouldn't be so hard to accomplish. The last time they had spoken had been a spectacular row on their last day as students before they mutually agreed to ignore each other and the other's friends as much as possible. They could easily go another five or six years without speaking a word to the other.

Despite feeling somewhat more together, a sudden knock on her office door violently startled her. She quickly shoved the brown paper bag she had been using into a desk drawer and closed it.

"Come in," she called, clasping her hands together atop her desk.

"Imagine my surprise," a freshly cleaned and changed Draco drawled as he closed the door behind him and leaned against it while crossing his arms, "when I went to Potter's office to answer his indubitably long list of questions about my kidnapping - for the paperwork, you know - and he near toppled out of his chair at the shock of seeing me. Now, it has been two hours and eight minutes since you told my parents and me that you were going to inform Potter about our success. Care to explain exactly what you have been doing in the meantime, since you clearly haven't been to see Potter?"

Hermione panicked. He was right, she was caught, all because she'd been obsessing about kissing her ex-enemy, and even worse, about how she had thoroughly enjoyed it. She'd even spent an entire ten minutes thinking of ways to persuade him to do it again before she'd realized what an immensely idiotic idea that was.

But then, thankfully, she remembered that it was none of his bloody business what she'd been doing, and she told him so.

Draco raised an eyebrow. "Is it?" he queried. "I happen to think it is my business what caused you to be so negligent, considering that Potter had nearly hexed me, thinking I was someone else who had drunk Polyjuice Potion for some nefarious purpose."

"Well, it's not," Hermione retorted stubbornly. "Now, if that is all, I have work to do."

Instead of leaving, of course, Draco walked over and leaned his palms onto her desk.

"I don't think you understand, Granger, the repercussions of Potter attacking me unprovoked on Ministry premises," he threatened softly.

She met his eyes and bristled at the blackmail attempt. "I don't think you understand, Malfoy, that I don't care. You don't scare me, and I would think that after I just saved your sorry arse from being forced into an unwanted marriage, that you'd be a tad more grateful. You're welcome, by the way."

He smirked, and Hermione had the distinct impression he'd been baiting her just so she would bring up that exact point.

"Yes, let's talk about that, shall we? Tell me, do you make it a habit to passionately snog former classmates?"

"No, I don't. In fact, the only reason I did it was as a favor to your mother, who was worried sick about you. Get your head out of your arse, Malfoy. I kissed you to save us all from a painful death by fireball, and that was all. I don't like you, so rest assured it will never happen again."

"Is that so?" he asked, eyeing her critically.

She stared back defiantly. "Yes." So long as her self-control and common sense had any say in it.

He sat down in her visitor's chair instead of leaving. "Pity. I've wondered for years what it would be like to shag you."

"I beg your pardon!" she gaped.

"Don't bother telling me you've never thought about it, Granger. I know you have."

"I haven't!" she lied in a panic. "And what makes you so supremely confident that I have?"

He leveled an intense but serious gaze at her and she was hard-pressed to look away.

"Because what we felt today is not common. I do not normally attempt to shag a witch standing up directly in front of my parents," he answered bluntly, causing her to blush profusely. "Clearly, you felt the same way, as you were not planning on stopping any time soon, if the intensity of your kiss was any indication. Hence, my question about kissing former classmates."

Bugger. She'd been hoping he hadn't noticed that.

"But that was today," she argued. "I hadn't known what kissing you was like before that."

His smirk was back. "Are you honestly telling me you never once wondered what would happen if we'd taken all of the energy we'd put into arguing and channeled it into something far more enjoyable for both of us?"

"Not once." Another bald-faced lie. Good lord, she was turning into a pathological liar all because of this stupid bloody family of them. The truth was, when she'd felt particularly stressed during school exams, she'd imagined Draco doing certain things with his tongue that had nothing to do with insulting her. The reason she'd never felt guilty about it was because she'd known he'd have never found out. It sort of blew her mind that he was basically telling her he had imagined her like that, too.

"Are you sure you want to ignore the opportunity to find out?" he asked.

It took her a few moments to mentally double-check that those words had, indeed, just come out of his mouth in that order. She was positive that she ought to ignore it, for her own sanity, but she definitely did want to know what it would be like. She wanted to know if he could be as talented with his tongue as she had imagined. She wanted to know if shagging him would be just as intense as arguing with him. She wanted to know if his kisses were just as drugging the second time around. She wanted to know if he was capable of distracting her long enough to stop her from overanalyzing sex for once in her life.

She bit her lip, her decision made. "Are you offering said opportunity?"

"Yes, I am."

She licked her lips, preparing her response. "Then yes," she replied, watching his smirk widen, "I am willing to ignore it."

His smirk dropped instantly and he raised an eyebrow. "Don't you goody-goody Gryffindors ever get tired of denying yourselves what you want?"

"No, especially when I know what I am denying myself is toxic. My good sense has kept me alive so far, and I'm not keen on that changing." It was like asking why a woman didn't give into the urge to buy all the chocolate in a candy store and eat it all in one sitting. It simply wasn't healthy.

That irritating smirk was back. "Ah, I see. You're afraid that once you start, you won't be able to stop."

Basically, yeah.

"You can tell yourself whatever makes you feel better, Malfoy," she replied instead. "It makes no difference to me. But if you could please nurse your bruised ego elsewhere, it'd be greatly appreciated."

His confidence didn't waver, however. He stood.

"Let me know when you change your mind," he said in a knowing tone before leaving.

She rolled her eyes as he shut the door behind him. As if she would ever have a good reason to kiss him again.

~*/*\*~

A/N: This started out as a one-shot but it got so long that I decided to break it up into a two-shot, with potential for more if there's enough interest and inspiration. Is there any interest in reading more? Let me know! Thanks for giving this a shot!