Chapter One
Concerning Dreams
Hermione sat up in bed, sweating. She bit her lip and nervously glanced around the room, comforted by the sounds of the other girls sleeping, as slowly her breathing eased and she was able to lie back down.
She'd had one of those dreams again. She'd seen his pale, pointed face and haunting steel blue-gray eyes in her mind's eye every night for over three weeks now, and every night she woke up in precisely this fashion. The dreams were never exactly the same, but they never really changed.
Every night they were alone in the corridor just around the corner from Gryffindor tower. Every night she heard his voice whisper, "Hermione…I'm waiting…" and every night she went to him. Every night his face shone in the moonlight that had seeped in through the windows, and every night his piercing eyes were alight with an emotion she'd never seen in him. She'd never seen him show any emotions. Every night he did something to her heart, mind, and body that no one had ever done before. Every night she woke up in a cold sweat, fearing that it had actually happened and yet wanting to cry when she discovered nothing had. Every night she hated herself for having those dreams and those thoughts and wondered what Harry and Ron would say if they knew.
They couldn't know.
Hermione wiggled down underneath her blankets, deep in thought. She supposed it started on the day of the last Hogsmeade trip. Much to Harry and Ron's dismay, she'd stayed behind that day to catch up on some reading….
"Let's see," Hermione said to herself as she ran a finger down the line of books. "What did Madame Pince say? In section 10, row 18…well, I'm there. Hmm…she said it was a thick book with a red-and-brown cover."
She looked at all the books around her and sighed in frustration. "Now that won't be too hard to find, only every three books looks like that!" She checked a note in the pocket of her robe, which had the book's title on it: The Ultimate Advanced Guide to Transfiguration: Animagus Edition. She sighed again and resumed looking. She didn't exactly want to be an Animagus, even though technically she was eligible and it would be terribly fascinating. She just wanted to know how it was done.
She jumped, startled, when she heard someone cough loudly in the row behind hers, disrupting the peaceful silence. Peering around the corner, she came face to face with the last person she wanted to see: Draco Malfoy.
"What are you doing here?" she asked sourly.
He returned her glare with one just as icy. "I was looking for a book, half-wit, same as you," he snapped. Snatching a random book from the shelf in front of him, he added quickly, "but I've found it, so goodbye."
She crossed her arms. "You did not," she said. "I'm not stupid, you know." Seeing that he was about to make another snide comment, she hurried in with, "That was entirely rhetorical."
His eyes flashed. "Shut up, Mudblood, I'll say whatever I want," he said stoutly, sounding very much like a small child; one who hadn't gotten his way.
Hermione tensed. It was amazing to her that she could hate someone so much. She didn't understand how he could be so cold and virtually heartless, but after six years she was more or less used to it. She glanced up and the title of the book she was looking for jumped out at her. Figures, she thought.
Grabbing it, she smiled tight-lipped at Draco. "Well, Malfoy, I have found my book, and so I'll be going now. Have a nice day."
She threw her rucksack down on her favorite table towards the back of the library and sat down in a huff. He made her so tense, and that was the last thing she needed. With five weeks to Christmas and mid-terms coming up fast, Hermione was surprised she took it upon herself to spend even one day reading for pleasure, as she was doing then. How anyone could go to Hogsmeade with less than five weeks to examinations, she didn't know, but being as most people were gone, it made for a nice quiet atmosphere; something no one at Hogwarts got a lot of.
Opening the book and losing herself in the world of the written word, Hermione barely heard the boy who sat down at the table next to hers sigh. She didn't see that he looked a little lonely and disheartened, and she didn't know that when he thought he was alone was the only time he ever let his normally unfaltering guard down.
She did, however, look up when she heard him cough again. "What are you doing back here, Malfoy? I thought you'd left," she said grumpily.
"Well, I didn't," he said, his eyes never leaving his book. "I thought I was allowed to be back here too, or is there some 'Mudbloods Only' sign I happened to miss? If that's the case, I'll move at once, I don't want to submerge myself in any more filth than I have to."
Hermione scowled. As much as she tried not to let him get to her, it was so hard sometimes. "Please just leave me alone, Malfoy."
"Huh, that's funny." He leaned back in his chair, smirking. "If I recall correctly, it was you who initiated this lovely conversation in the first place."
She blushed; he was right. "That doesn't matter," she said awkwardly. "Hey…where are Crabbe and Goyle? Shouldn't you be in Hogsmeade with the rest of the Prat Brigade, I mean your friends?"
Draco's faced darkened. "They're not my friends," he said sharply, and immediately looked as though he regretted what he'd just said.
Hermione raised an eyebrow. "Oh?" she said curiously. "But you're with them all the time. You're rarely seen without them, and vice versa. How can you say they're not your friends?"
"I hang out with them, yes," he replied, his usually cold eyes different somehow, "but they're not my friends. They don't know me, not really, and I don't want them to. I have no friends. I don't need friends." When Hermione opened her mouth to speak he snapped, "Don't dare press the matter, Granger. I'm not in the mood."
She nodded silently and went back to her book, but suddenly she couldn't stay focused. Every so often her eyes drifted over to where Malfoy sat, and she bit her lower lip thinking how sad and lonely he looked. It was so unlike him. Hermione couldn't believe that this forlorn, vulnerable-looking boy—man now, really, for at sixteen he'd certainly grown up—was Draco Malfoy, who was always so confident to the point of arrogance and cockiness, and who she'd hated since she was only eleven years old.
Neither of them spoke after that, not to each other or anyone else, and Hermione felt so odd and distracted that she had to leave. That was the night the dreams started.
Hermione sighed, no sleepier than she'd been before she started thinking about that day. Since then, she and Draco hadn't spoken to each other any more than was normal for them (i.e. in Gryffindor/Slytherin classes such as Potions he would call her a know-it-all or a Mudblood, and she would call him a prat and make him feel like an idiot), even though she caught herself looking at him when she wasn't supposed to, sometimes.
Then again, I'm not ever supposed to look at him, not really, she reminded herself.
With a jolt, she remembered that he'd been looking at her, too. Not exactly in the way she'd been looking at him, which she supposed to was in an ogling stupor unfortunately similar to the look Pansy Parkinson always gave him, but more curiously, as though he were terribly intrigued with her. He always looked away the moment Hermione caught him, but why wouldn't he? He did hate her, after all.
She leaned over and checked the time on her wristwatch. 5:42. Even if she could fall back to sleep, she'd never wake up in time for breakfast and classes, so she grabbed her book—Travels Through Time, which was incredibly enthralling even if the wizard who wrote it turned out to be insane and was currently locked up at St. Mungo's—and headed out to the common room.
Hermione looked around, thinking how peaceful everything was at that hour. A dim, cozy light was cast over the entire room, making it look all the more inviting. All that was left of the fire were glowing orange embers, and a light snow was falling outside.
She must have fallen asleep at one point, because the next thing she knew, two large figures were standing over her, one of which was shaking her awake.
"Hermione, come on, it's time for breakfast," the voice was saying. She cracked her eyes open; it was of course Harry and Ron, and Harry who had been doing the waking.
"What? Why am I…oh," Hermione said groggily, rubbing her eyes and sitting up. Lifting her arms over her head in a yawning stretch, she realized she was still in her pajamas and blushed…her top rose when she stretched, exposing her middle. She glanced up at Harry and Ron; Harry was looking everywhere but at Hermione and Ron was blushing so hard he looked like a flaming tomato. "I'll just…go change," she said quickly, hurrying up to her dormitory, deep in thought.
She, Harry, and Ron were still as close as ever, but since the beginning of the school year they'd been very conscious of the fact that they didn't look like children anymore.
Hermione couldn't honestly say that she was very attracted to either Harry or Ron, as much as she loved them. In some ways, she almost wanted to be, but she felt like she knew them too well. Either way, it had come as quite a shock to her when she saw them both at King's Cross for the first time since school had let out at the end of June.
Harry had shot up in height, suddenly towering over Hermione's five feet, five inches, and his muscles were hard from all his Quidditch training. He no longer looked messy and boyish, but sort of scruffy and rugged, and his already striking features seemed even more attractive.
Ron had also changed a lot over the summer. He'd filled out a little, and while he was still on the lanky side, he wasn't so skinny and gangly anymore. His face had grown up as well, and he now very closely resembled his handsome older brothers Fred and George.
However, Hermione's shock at seeing Harry and Ron as men for the first time was nothing compared to their surprise when they saw her. Neither of them could believe that the slender, shapely woman they met at King's Cross in September was really Hermione. Even so, aside from finally obtaining curves, she didn't think she'd changed as drastically as either of them. She still felt like her little-girl self in many ways. Her wavy hair was still a pain, and while compared to photographs of herself when she first started at Hogwarts she looked a lot older, nothing about her was really that different.
Or at least, she didn't think so. Behind her watch, however, boys all over school were taking notice of the beautiful woman Hermione had blossomed into.
Including Draco Malfoy.
*~*~*~*
"If you intend on staying at Hogwarts over the Christmas Holiday, you must inform the school as quickly as possible. There is a sheet in the Great Hall for anyone who is staying to sign, and we would like you to do so sooner rather than later," Professor Dumbledore said at the end of breakfast.
Hermione looked at her two best friends, who were still shoveling food into their mouths. "Honestly, boys," she said with mild disgust, "one day you both are going to explode…and probably expect me to fix it!"
Ron washed down his sausage with a gulp of pumpkin juice and said, "Well of course, you're the smart one. What else are you good for?"
Harry elbowed Ron in the ribs and shook his head. "I, for one, have every intention of staying whole. Although, exploding would get me out of summers with the Dursleys," he said brightly. "Ron, pass me another scone!"
Hermione rolled her eyes. "What about Christmas?" she said over their chewing. "Are either of you planning on staying?"
"Actually, Mum wants me and Ginny home for the holidays this year," Ron said. "Because everyone else is going to be home, and she said it would be odd with only me and Ginny missing."
Hermione nodded. "What about you, Harry?"
Harry looked up at her and grinned sheepishly. "Um…Cho invited me to spend Christmas with her and her family," he said. Hermione raised an eyebrow; Harry and Cho had been seeing each other seriously since the beginning of the school year, but she hadn't realized it was that serious.
Ron sputtered, spewing pumpkin juice all over the table ("RON! I've just had these robes cleaned!" Hermione yelled), and nudged Harry. "Way to go, mate," he said, winking.
Harry blushed. "It's not like that," he protested, but to no avail. Ron was already spouting out all the sullied versions of Christmas carols he could think of, most of which hinted at mistletoe, a fireplace, and a nice warm bed for two.
"What are your plans, Hermione?" Harry asked loudly, trying to block out Ron's singing (several people sitting around them were giving him odd looks, but he showed no signs of stopping).
"Well, I've stayed at school over the holidays almost every other year, and my parents figured this year would be no different, so they booked a trip to Greece," Hermione admitted. "So I sort of have to stay here."
Harry's face fell. "Oh…I don't want you staying here all alone," he said. "I'll tell Cho I can't make it."
"No!" Ron said quickly. "You can't do that!"
Harry frowned. "Yes, I can."
"Don't you dare, Harry," Hermione said sternly. "I'm a big girl; I can take care of myself. Besides, I won't be too lonely, there are always people who stay. Well, except for during our third year, but they had good reason not to then…the whole business with Sirius and everything."
He nodded skeptically. "I suppose so," he said, "And I do really want to go with Cho"—("I'll bet you do," Ron muttered)—"so…just as long as you'll be okay here without us."
"I will be fine," she assured him. She exasperatedly looked at Ron, who had begun to act out the racy carols. "Honestly, Ron, don't you have any dignity at all? People are staring, you know."