A/N: This story started as a stream of conciousness, which is normally how they begin for me anyway, while I was working on future chapters for The Shadow and The Soul. It's a three-part piece with alternating perspectives (Hermione is the next chapter) and entirely written (hallelujah!) so it won't interfere with updates for the aforementioned story or WTSID.

Title is from the song 'Elephants' by Rachael Yamagata.

Present

Her eyes are fierce on his skin. Her breath a panted force pushed and pulled from her body. He watches the heave, feels the weight of it linger in his bones. He wants to shake her, tear at the very centre part of her – the part that dictates her behaviour. She burns, a light so hungry and consuming it scorches the blackness from behind his eyelids.

She's aflame, and he yearns. He hates her for it, but he yearns.

They're vultures, swooping in circles, ever watchful for weakness. Sharp words, barbs aimed to hurt. Tainted with a poison and aimed at the soft white underbelly of one another. He wants to move in and taste the salt of her tears on his tongue, wants to pull at the fabric of her, watch her unravel like so much wool upon the floor.

This is the real vision of her, the one he can incite, he knows. She hides this side of her away, caged in a dress of her own making, society's making. One that cinches ever tighter each day so that the truth of her, the fire, is ready to scratch and claw and bite to get out.

He craves the hatred that lights her gaze when his words find their mark. The smoulder that lingers in its depths when his hands are on her. They're physical, an ephemeral bruise that taints the film of one another. He is deep purple on her milky skin. He is a mark she can't ignore, though she wants to.

He won't let her. He wants to seep in her blood like a toxin. Eat her inside then out, consume her so that she can't think of other things. Because he can't. She did that, this self-righteous wraith of spit-fire and kindness.

She ruined him, broke his bones in all the places that ensure they can't fit back together the way they should. The way they once did. He's accepted that now, her presence, the agony and the jarring sensation of not owning his body and the shape of it in his own life. But if she thinks she can pretend that she's any different, that she still fits into the cushioned box of a life she's made for herself, she's wrong.

Past – Hour Zero

Draco stares at the wood beneath the flatness of his palms. He is seated at a rough-hewn table that once belonged to a farmer, or some other uncivilised hermit. The person who owned this cabin before he took up residence, before the world tilted and he lost his footing.

She drums fingers along the same wood, a metre away. Her stare is a stain upon his features, spreading insidiously as she watches him.

"Malfoy," she says, and he can hear the way her jaw is clenched, her eyes narrowed, in the bite of her tone.

He takes a seething breath and pushes back his shoulders, lifting his gaze to take her in. He won't indulge her – her – of all people. Why her? She seems to read this question in his expression. She doesn't want to be here either, he knows, yet she's here all the same. Cleaning up messes and burrowing her way into places she has no cause to be.

"My agreement was with Shacklebolt. With Snape. Why. Are. You. Here." His tone bites the words into short sharp pricks that bounce off her shield.

She shrugs, as if to say that she has been left with the job no one wanted. She tells him that forthrightly.

"We're fighting a war, and you and your safety," a frown lingers in the corners of her mouth as she speaks, "is just one of many concerns. If you're unhappy with my being your liaison then by all means…" She gestures for the door, mere feet from where they are seated.

Her message is clear. He tastes bitterness on his tongue as his eyes hold hers firm. It's a war. But this is a separate one. She represents them, people on the other side of a line he can't see but can feel with every part of him. And even though he has done the unthinkable, betrayed all he's ever known, he'll always feel that line, that barrier standing like a wall between him and them. Because they are self-righteous. Because they are winning.

And maybe he is weak, but a man can only be punished for so long for the crimes of naiveté and the childish venom of youth.

He says nothing and she seems to read acquiescence, reluctant or not, in his stillness.

"I'll meet you here once or twice a week, when I can, to touch base and bring you more food and supplied. There will be no one else – nobody can know. Snape gave his life to save yours, a choice I question, but then it was his decision. I don't look on that lightly. And while… others… disagree with the Order protecting you, the information you provided, and Snape vouching for you, is enough. For me, for Shacklebolt. That is why I'm here. No one else would."

Bitterness slides down his throat, pooling in his gut in a cold river that causes his stomach to clench. He nods jerkily, refusing to be baited. She wants him to lash out, he knows; despite her words, she would like nothing more than for him to leave the confines of this cabin and her responsibility.

But Hermione Granger will learn soon enough that he's no fool, and he values his life and the promise of, one day, living it again.

Hour 106

He's pacing. Back and forth and back again. He listens to the sounds, the symphony of time passing slowly in this forgotten cabin in the middle of nowhere. At first he heard only silence, crushing and cloying – the kind of silence that stole his breath. But then, as hours shifted from one to the next and the light continued to change from grey to white and then to nothing, he began to recognise the nuances. Creaks and wind and wilderness.

He spends hours watching the crackle of flame on wood, the hearth a world of his making, the only thing alive in this cabin other than him.

He pauses now, mid step, his ears pricked, his tongue tasting the tang of change in the air. He's attuned to his senses now, with nothing else to hear or feel or taste beyond the shift in the air. His eyes flick to the door as she walks in.

Her lips are pursed as they take him in, a caged animal ready to pounce. "Still alive then," she says finally.

He says nothing as he watches her watching him. Her cheeks are pink, bitten from the relentless wind that rattles the windows, his bones, his very being. Her hair is a wild mess, but she looks poised. He wonders how long she spent preparing herself for this intrusion.

She clears her throat then and walks toward the kitchenette, pulling a small bag from her shoulder. She angles herself just so. She can reach the counter this way, with one eye still on him. He watches as she reaches into the bag, pulling packets and boxes and tinned cans from within.

"Supplies," she murmurs needlessly.

His gaze narrows, flicking from her to the strange collection of items. His lip curls.

Seeing his reaction, she sniffs. "It's not like you can afford to be picky. Unless you'd rather starve? We can't have a house elf popping in and out to cater to your whims, and I'm assuming you can't cook."

Her sharp gaze tracks the clenching of his jaw, a tick he can't control. Draco doesn't want to engage her, but he needs the food. So he nods. She glances away and reaches for something else within the bag. Her hand retrieves a book, and then another. Another.

She coughs, seemingly flustered now. Draco tilts his head to watch, noting the way her hands flutter about, straightening the small pile.

"To pass the time," she says, her gaze finding his once more, her resolve back in place.

He nods again, and then she's gone. Again. Small minutes in the lengthy fabric of his time here. He doesn't want her presence, a reminder of who he is and where he is and why. But that tiny stretch of seconds, in the big expanse, was a distraction.

He turns to gaze at the collection of supplies, and moves forward, hackles raised. His eyes sift over the packets and fall to the books. Distraction.

Hour 217

He sits on the old wooden bed in the back room of the cabin, etching a narrow line into the wood. It lies in a sea of others, more and more each day. He hears her then, his name a whisper that echoes in the other room. He stands, moving quickly to the door.

Her back is to him now, her gaze upon the rickety shelf, lined with three volumes. Her greedy fingers reach to curl around the edge of one.

"No," he says, his voice a rough mess of a sound. The tone grates; it's unfamiliar, unused.

She turns quickly to look at him, the surprise clear in her features. "I thought you'd decided not to talk to me," she says with an arched brow.

"Leave the books," he says by way of response, and she merely shrugs.

"Never would have taken you for much of a reader…" she mutters.

"You don't know me." His words are laced with venom. She looks as though she is about to retort with some sharp statement, but instead she nods her head brusquely and brushes her hands flat against her pant legs. His eyes watch the movement.

"I brought more," she says, and gestures to the table now lined with four extra books. He wonders at this, her bringing these books though she seemed surprised to see he read them. As though he would be too proud to take her scraps. Her scraps are all he has now.

His eyes flick back to her, watching her watching him. His own narrowed in suspicion. Hers are weary. She murmurs something he doesn't catch and moves toward the door.

"Parchment. Ink." His voice is faint, catching on invisible threads. "A quill."

She turns to look at him, suspicion now clear in her own gaze. "Who are you planning to write to? You know that no one—"

"No one can know. I'm aware. It's not for… that."

She watches him, her expression intent, her gaze raking over him, noting each tick he can't control, each hiss of frustration and discomfort. He feels stripped. Like a beggar, he's pleading for those scraps, and she just watches him like a predator calculating a next move. His lips curl in distaste. He wants to throw her out of the cabin, her books and food and words along with her.

He won't.

Hour 354

He's outside when she arrives, listening to the crunch of his boots and the snap of twigs underfoot. He hears the door click shut, and his ears prick up at the sound. It's been longer than the last time, yet he's been waiting for the sound of her. She's walking out of his bedroom when he enters, standing in the doorway watching her wearily.

She doesn't appear embarrassed to be caught snooping. He has no secrets now anyway. Her and her people have scraped through his every thought, cataloguing moments and memories that aren't their own. She's cut him up and moved around his insides, leaving haphazard stitches behind and a fever in his blood. He doesn't fit back the same; he's not sure he ever will.

"Sorry," she mutters. "I couldn't find you."

He stares at her, watching her gaze flitter down to his over large Wellingtons, borrowed from his predecessor after a thorough scrubbing. He's never scrubbed anything before. And he knows he looks ridiculous.

He feels heat creep upon his cheeks and he hates her for it. "Fresh air," he finally says, before he walks into the room and snaps the door shut behind him.

His gaze falls on the kitchen bench, loaded with the usual offerings. His eyes sift over the items beside the food and books. Parchment, ink and a quill. Piles of copies of The Daily Prophet. His gaze whirls back to her, noting the way she shifts awkwardly before pushing her shoulders back.

"We're not trying to keep you completely secluded," she says, and he looks at her sharply.

It makes him uncomfortable to see this girl exhibiting any degree of pity or concern for him. It's wrong. It's not about him he knows. It's not that she cares. He's a project, he senses, and she's a nurturer. It's a contradiction, he thinks. She's a contradiction, because she still looks at him like something cold and dank underfoot.

He would never tell her how he has begun to count the hours – in small scratches upon wood – that pass between her visits. He doesn't like her; he finds her intolerable. But her presence, her breath mingling in the stale air of the cabin, flush with his own, is something he craves.

Life. Air. Contact.

He blinks away from her, his hand reaching out to brush the fine feather quill. Her breath catches and he glances up to see her staring at his fingers. Calloused and cracked. One of them is bleeding. His jaw sets as he holds her gaze, noting the suspicion blooming in the widened irises.

"What have you been doing?" her tone is whispered, but there's an edge.

He juts his chin toward the fire, the stack of poorly chopped wood piled high beside it. She is surprised, and he notes a strange hum of satisfaction pooling in his gut. Her eyes ask why, but he won't tell her that. She has enough of him, and he will share no more.

He has never used his hands to do a damned thing before now. But he ran out of wood for the hearth, and he can't tell her how he hates the silence and the chill its demise allows to settle in the cabin. His hands are rough, cut with wood and splinters, his shoulders aching.

But the fire dances on, its crackling harmony a balm to the rough edges of him.

She's silent for a beat as she stares at him, her thoughts flickering like pages of an open book, clear across her features. Finally she reaches for the small bag looped around her wrist, and gestures for his hand. Though he flinches at her touch, he thinks he can feel the thrum of blood pulsing between the fine pads of her fingers. That filthy thing, concern, lingers in her gaze before she drops the veil.

He stares at her hands, dipping fingers in the ointment she has fished out of the bag. They run in soothing circles over his, the dittany shedding pain and causing immediate relief. She coughs and straightens, placing the jar of ointment on the counter along with his supplies.

"Use it sparingly," she says, before she leaves again. He thinks he can still feel the warm pressure of her touch building to a burn. He'd rather cut of his hands than let her know.

It makes him angry, calls to the pit deep within him. He wants to claw at her, break through the shield that seems to sit on her skin. He wants to crack her shell and make her cry. Make her scream and break all the things in this accursed place. He wants the sounds of anger, of rage, to fill his ears. Anything but the softly, softly sound of silence and wood and wind.

He hates that lingering thing called kindness that seems to hover on the cusp. He wants to hurl her apparent good will and thoughtfulness back at her like the weapon it is. He doesn't want that, her kindness. He doesn't want her help. And yet he listens for the door, ears pricked, day in and day out as he scratches his thin carved lines in the old wooden bed head.