Azael's Chains

Promises

Draco was brooding, bruise-eyed and huffing as much as he ever did their sixth year. At first Hermione had put it up to being under Voldemort's thumb, only he hadn't been as much a wanker since her stay at Malfoy Manor. At times he was friendly, even kind.

Hermione suppressed her usual humming whimsy that overcame while she worked categorizing and shelving and carding, sweeping it out of sight as her eyes kept flicking to the boy with an aura of darkness coating him sticky as tar. There was something Antonin had said a while back that niggled at her and the cogs started wheeling into place as she fought the tug to talk to Draco. Antonin had asked after Narcissa and the elder Malfoy had reacted as though slighted.

The moment had been overshadowed by her nerves when faced with her future ally, so she'd forgotten to ask.

There was always something.

Narcissa had been kind to her while Hermione was in her home. What happened to the doting mother? She had a chance to ease the current of her curiosity now, but it would be cruel to ask the boy who was clearly wrestling demons whether his mother had been killed. And she wasn't sure she could handle the stony weight of another death over the cracking shell of her heart too recently broken.

Still, the Slytherin was so despondent it tore at her soul. Hermione wanted to do something. And she was British enough the words popped out almost on their own.

"Would you care for tea?"

The blond head snapped up, eyes startling pale in their deepening sockets. "Sorry?"

"Er, Winky!"

The house elf popped into being and Malfoy's gaze transferred to her. She had been particularly decrepit after the battle, at least when Hermione had called her the first time. Winky was the only house elf she knew at Hogwarts now. But her uniform was consistently clean these days and the scent of Butterbeer wasn't overwhelming.

She bowed, lanky hair falling forward around her slim shoulders. "What can Winky do for Miss?"

"We would like to take tea, Winky. Cups for Mister Malfoy and I, please. I'll take chamomile. And Malfoy will have..." Hermione trailed off to look pointedly at him, Winky following suit.

"Orange pekoe, if you please." The neat words rolled off his tongue, smooth and at odds with his haggard state. The elf bowed again and popped away. "Tea, Granger?" His pale brows rose with the mocking in his voice.

Hermione brushed her skirt and sat in her usual chair near the entrance, the one she occupied when she took refreshment with Antonin. "There is never an occasion that does not call for tea," she said evenly as she crossed her ankles.

"And what is this occasion exactly?" That arched brow of his, while pale as his mother's, was so distinctly his father that it raised the hairs on the back of her neck. Did she have moments like that, when she so perfectly channeled one parent that it was eerie?

A pang tightened her hollow chest; she'd never have anyone to tell her.

"I could use a cuppa myself." His eyes narrowed a fraction, but his lips remained shut.

Triangle sandwiches and biscuits accompanied tea, a pleasant addition considering Hermione rarely remembered dinner unless whoever her keeper was brought it up. She'd get back home and suddenly find herself too light, like a feather balanced on its quill, ready to tip at the slightest breath.

Librarian's work was hungrier than she'd imagined; it was easy, especially for someone like her, to lose oneself in the quiet weight of the stacks. Hermione would pace up and down the shelves, memorizing the positions of every book she slid into place, creating a map of the bindings in her mind. It was like bailing her mind free of the ocean it had become. And her feet were sore with all the walking nearly as much as they'd been on the run.