Project 137.43.M.D.

XL. | NULLA POENA SINE CULPA

XL.
NULLA POENA SINE CULPA
(no punishment without fault)

Damn, she was still here.

Draco hadn't thought anything of it when he hadn't heard the front door slam shut after retiring to the bedroom. He had just assumed she had been trying to be quiet. Or that, in case of doubt, he had simply fallen asleep quickly. But as he now realized, pretty annoyed, neither was true.

Granger was sitting on the floor in the middle of his living room. She had clearly cleaned up, and instead of his previous mess, she had laid out a whole heap of parchments in neat piles on the floorboards in front of her. Her legs were drawn up and she was scribbling in a small notebook that was resting on her knees with a concentrated expression on her face. Meanwhile, she was frowning and biting her bottom lip.

If Draco didn't harbor such unbridled anger, it might have occurred to him that she looked gorgeous sitting on his floor like that. Her curls were pinned up in a careless bun on top of her head and she wore a long, dark green sundress that played seductively around her body. Her shoulders were exposed and the position she was in gave him an unexpected glimpse of her slender neck.

He cleared his throat and Granger flinched. Then she turned her head to look at him and blinked in obvious relief. He had slept for quite a while. It was already dusk outside, and he was surprised that she had waited so long for him to come back to life. Now he was freshly showered and actually felt recovered. It was all the more annoying that he now had to deal with the question why the Hippogriff she was still here.

„Didn't I tell you-"

„-to fuck off? Yes, you did."

Rolling her eyes, she stood and stretched a little, and Draco heard her bones crack. It elicited a small groan from her, which was no surprise. It must have been terribly uncomfortable sitting on the floor for so long, but that wasn't his bloody problem.

He just stared at her for a few seconds, and once more he had to find that he liked it when she talked back to him. He snorted quietly. The thought immediately brought him back to what was probably his biggest problem at the moment.

„Listen, I know you don't want to hear it-"

"Then shut up."

"I can't!"

Splendid. Now she was getting grouchy too. And, annoyingly, Draco secretly loved it when she was grouchy. Which, of course, he would never admit. He tried to look indifferent and crossed his arms over his chest dismissively. Granger took a deep breath and seemed to gather herself.

"You don't want to hear it, but we need to talk about how you ended up in Azkaban. I don't want to lie to you anymore, Malfoy." She squirmed a little. He looked at her blankly. "During the Rehabilitation Phase, I requested access to your file. I guess I don't need to explain why working with you initially freaked me out, do I?"

Draco felt a slight pang in his chest. He remembered their conversations about her war trauma and the scar on her forearm that, as he now knew again, had been caused by his own aunt while he had been forced to watch.

In hindsight, Granger's odd behavior at the beginning of her mentorship made perfect sense. Draco had already mulled over each and every situation in detail after Potter had restored his memory. So yeah, she really didn't have to explain it to him. However, that didn't change the fact that he was fuming at her betrayal.

"Anyway, I thought it would help me to know why exactly you were imprisoned at the time. So I also looked at the memory of the crime you were convicted of." He stiffened. Granger looked like she was going to be sick. "I know what you did, Malfoy, and I'm awfully sorry. I don't know what else to say about that."