sugar & spice

chapter twenty six

It took her a moment to figure out what woke her. Draco's room was dark, save for the warm glow emanating from the embers dying in the fireplace, so it wasn't sunlight, the break of day. No, in fact, her mind was fuzzy, her eyes blurry as if she hadn't fallen asleep all that long ago, maybe a couple hours max.

"Stop it! No! Not her! Please, not her!" Draco's head thrashed against his pillow as he mumbled in his sleep. His words grew increasingly urgent, frenzied, as he desperately begged someone to stop. "I'll do anything, just stop hurting her."

He was having a nightmare and it didn't require being the brightest witch of their age to wager what it was he dreaming about. Then again, he'd told her once, hadn't he?

I dream about it you know. That day. I hear Aunt Bellatrix cackling and all I can see is you bleeding on the carpet screaming and each time it happens, I swear I'll do something, something different, stop her or light the whole bloody place on fire, but I never do. I just stand there. Like a coward. And waking up is no reprieve because nothing changes. I'm still a coward.

Her stomach hardened, bile burning her esophagus. Hand trembling, she reached out for him but paused. Was that the best thing to do, wake him up? Ron had once woken Harry up from a nightmare, back when they were all staying at the Burrow, and consequently caught a flying fist to the face. An accident, and nothing a little bruise paste couldn't fix, but she didn't want the same thing to happen.

Twisting, she shook Theo's arm. "Theo, wake up."

He grumbled. "What time is it?"

"Draco's having a nightmare," she whispered.

He inhaled sharply through his nose and lurched forward. "Fuck."

Theo scrambled across her body, narrowly avoiding squashing her as crawled to Draco and he knelt over his squirming form. Draco's words had turned incoherent, his pleas melting into sobs that made her eyes sting and her chest throb.

"Draco, wake up." She couldn't see, not in the dark, and accosting them with the light of her wand didn't sound like a bright idea, so she was left to imagine what Theo was doing. From the way he shifted, she imagined him to be holding Draco's arms, a good idea if only to avoid his thrashing or the possibility of an accidental swipe. "Come on, love, wake up."

Draco gasped and tried to sit up, but Theo held him down, pinning him against the bed. "She's-she's-Hermione's-"

"She's right here, Draco, right here and she's fine. It was just a nightmare," Theo's voice managed to be both soothing and leave no room for dispute. "See, she's right here. Tell him you're perfectly fine, Hermione."

She shuffled closer. Her eyes had adjusted enough to see Theo practically sitting on top of Draco whose body was full of tension, ready to spring from the bed. She rested her hand on Draco's bare arm and swallowed. "I'm fine, Draco. Theo's right; you were dreaming."

Theo let up on his hold so that Draco could reach for her. He performed a quick, nervous pat-down of her, searching for anything amiss, fingers stroking her face, her arms, knotting in her hair. "You're okay?"

She bit the inside of her cheek to keep from crying and croaked. "I'm fine, I promise."

A distressed whimper came from the back of his throat as he tugged her closer, struggling to pull her close enough for his apparent likes with Theo sitting on him. Catching on, Theo rolled off to Draco's other side so that Draco was now in the middle, sandwiched on either side.

"Same dream?" Theo asked.

Draco nodded, his chin nudging the top of her head. He'd cradled her so close that she was halfway on top of him, her head resting high on his still-heaving chest. "Same dream."