Like Honey (Draco x Hermione x Theo)

Chapter 2

"Morning, Hermione. How'd you sleep?"

Hermione stifled a yawn, slumping into a seat at the table. Between her magic and the thorough scrubbing, the table looked good as new. As if a man had not been dying on top of it mere hours ago.

"Alright," she shrugged weakly. "We didn't finish until late. It was touch and go for a while."

"Ron," he paused with a forkful of eggs in his mouth. There was a nasty bruise beginning to purple around his eye that Hermione made a mental note to heal later. "Did you move me last night after I fell asleep?"

He swallowed his bite. "No, I feel asleep on the couch and by the time I got up, the table was clean and you were all gone. Why?"

Hermione bit the inside of her cheek. How strange.

"Nothing, no reason. I must have just been more exhausted than I thought."

Except that didnt fit. She had been staying in the same room at the Burrow since she was 12. She could navigate there blindfolded and deafened. So how had she ended up in Ron's room?

"You should eat something," Tonks gestured pointedly with her chin to the layout of foods on the table. "Your magic must be screaming at you."

Hermione flexed her hand, feeling the tingles of magic in her fingertips. Overexhaustion of her magic was not something she was unfamiliar with, but she needed to build up her stamina if she was to be useful.

"I'm fine, it wasn't all on me. Malfoy helped—"

"Bullshit!" Ron interjected, his mouth full of food.

Tonks hissed. "Language, Ronald."

"Sorry, Teddy," Ron rolled his eyes at the sleeping baby in his mother's arms. "But I mean, come off it. Malfoy? Malfoy wouldn't help a baby bird out of the road."

Hermione hummed, piling various foods onto a plate. She thought of Malfoy's face as he worked over his friend. Sweat over his brow and dedication in the set of his jaw, even as his own wound bled.

"Even so, I'm going to check on Nott. When I come back I want to hear what happened last night."

She gave a pointed look between Ron and Tonks as she finished loading the plate and ascended the stairs.

Balancing the plate and her wand in one hand, she jiggled the doorknob to find it locked.

She swore softly under her breath and pounded on the door with her free hand. "Malfoy, open up."

There was no answer.

"Malfoy," she pounded on the door again. "Let me in."

"Fuck off, Granger." Came a muffled voice from the other side of the door.

Hermione grumbled. In another circumstance, she would have used her wand to break down the door. But the magic in her fingertips thrummed weakly, still overexerted. She curled the hand into a first and banged again.

"I have to check his vitals--"

"I'll do it myself."

Hermione scoffed, a disbelieving sound she hoped he could hear through the door. "Do you even know how?"

There was only silence from the other side.

"That's what I thought. He's weak, Malfoy, too weak for you to be testing your healing abilities on him. Let me in so I can help."

The silence lasted a moment longer. Hermione ground her teeth. Had he walked away from the door? Was he pretending he didn't hear her now?

She started when the door swung open suddenly, Draco's large frame looming over her in the entryway. She had forgotten the scar that now twisted down his face, a feature that made his pointed, shadowed features more prominent and, perhaps to someone else, more menacing.