Tangled Cravings

Prologue

The sky was a dull, endless gray, hanging low over London like an oppressive blanket. Rain drizzled lazily, the drops barely making a sound as they struck the cracked cobblestones of Knockturn Alley. The narrow street was quiet—forgotten, almost—except for the occasional shadow of a hooded figure disappearing into the gloom.

Draco Malfoy stood still, staring into the grimy, half-broken window of a shop. His reflection looked back at him: pale, gaunt, and unfamiliar. His platinum hair, once impeccably styled, now fell messily into his eyes. His skin was sallow, stretched thin over sharp cheekbones, and the shadows under his eyes told the story of sleepless nights, the nights when all the potions in the world couldn't drown out the nightmares.

It had been two years.

Two years since he'd checked into St. Mungo's rehabilitation program—a place no one in his family had ever spoken about aloud, as if even the mention of it might taint the bloodline. Two years since he'd reached the point where the numbness no longer worked, where the potions had stopped making him forget. When the memories of the war, the choices he had made—ones that had haunted him every waking moment—became impossible to outrun.

He closed his eyes, inhaling deeply. The rain was coming down harder now, soaking through his thin coat, but he didn't care. He was free, or so the healers had said. Free from addiction. Free from the poison that had once filled his veins. They called it recovery. Draco wasn't so sure.

Recovery. The word felt like a lie. He wasn't better. He had simply learned to exist without the crutch. And even that felt tenuous, as if one wrong move would send him tumbling back into the abyss he had just barely escaped.

But he wasn't allowed to think that. No one wanted to hear the truth: that recovery was a life sentence, not a cure. That every day was a battle. That the cravings, though dulled, never truly left.

Draco opened his eyes and stared back at the reflection. He could still see it in his own eyes, the hunger, the aching need for something to quiet the storm inside. But he had promised himself—no more.

He turned away from the window, pulling his hood tighter against the rain. The city stretched out before him, full of people who had moved on from the war, who lived their lives without the weight of past sins hanging over them. Draco had tried to reenter this world—this world of normalcy—but everywhere he went, he was met with the ghosts of his own past. The whispers behind his back, the stares, the pointed fingers.

"That's Draco Malfoy."

The son of a Death Eater. A coward. A traitor.

He kept walking, ignoring the cold seeping into his bones, trying to silence the voices in his head. Blaise had insisted this was the right move—return to the city, find a fresh start. But Draco wasn't sure if there was such a thing as starting over. Not for people like him.

---

Across the city, Hermione Granger was standing in front of her bathroom mirror, gripping the edge of the sink so tightly her knuckles turned white. Her reflection stared back at her, eyes bloodshot, skin pale, and her once-wild hair hanging in limp, tangled waves around her face.

She glanced down at the half-empty bottle of Firewhisky perched on the edge of the sink. It had been full just hours ago. The glass beside it still had a thin layer of amber liquid at the bottom, and her lips ached with the urge to finish it off, to let the warmth flood her veins and quiet the noise in her head.

She wasn't supposed to be this person. She was supposed to be *better* than this.

Hermione took a shaky breath, closing her eyes, but the images behind her eyelids were worse than what she saw in the mirror. She could still see them—Harry, Ron, the battlefield. The screams, the smell of death, the weight of the world that had rested on her shoulders for so long. And now, there was nothing to hold it up.

They had called her a war heroine, a survivor, but none of them knew what it had cost her. After the war, she had thrown herself into rebuilding, believing that if she kept moving, if she kept working, she wouldn't have to confront the gaping hole left in her life. But the cracks had shown eventually, and when they did, she had turned to the only thing that made the noise stop.

The first drink had been at a Ministry function, a toast to peace. She remembered the burn as it slid down her throat, and the fleeting moment of silence that followed, like a warm blanket over her mind. That silence became addictive. So she drank more. And then more.

It had started slowly, a drink at night to help her sleep, a few sips during the day to take the edge off. But before long, it wasn't just Firewhisky. She had started experimenting with potions—sleeping draughts, calming elixirs. Anything that would quiet her racing thoughts and soothe the guilt that gnawed at her every waking moment.

Harry and Ron had noticed, of course. They always did. But they didn't understand. The Golden Trio had fallen apart after the war, and not in the ways anyone had expected. They had drifted. They had left her behind, or maybe she had pushed them away. It didn't matter anymore. All that remained were memories, fragments of the people they used to be.

The door to the bathroom creaked open, and Theo Nott's voice echoed from the other side. "Hermione, are you in there? We've got to head to the shop soon. You know Pansy'll murder me if we're late again."

Hermione flinched but didn't respond. Her hand reached for the bottle again, but she stopped herself, pulling back at the last second. She couldn't do this right now. Not yet.

She opened her eyes, staring at herself once more. She hated what she saw. The dark circles under her eyes, the hollow look in her cheeks. She hadn't slept properly in months, and the drinks, the potions—nothing lasted long enough to give her real peace.

"Hermione, seriously—" Theo's voice came again, sharper this time.

"I'm coming," she muttered, wiping at her face and forcing herself to move. She left the bottle on the sink and stepped into the hallway, where Theo stood waiting, his brows furrowed in mild concern.

"Rough night?" he asked, though it was more a statement than a question.

"You could say that," Hermione replied, pulling on a jacket as they made their way toward the front door.

They walked together in silence, the rain beginning to fall as they stepped outside. Hermione shoved her hands into her pockets, trying to focus on the sound of the raindrops hitting the pavement, anything to drown out the cravings still gnawing at her mind.

---

Draco stood in front of *The Spell & Ink*, the rain still drizzling down his face as he debated whether or not to go inside. The place was as much of a misfit as the people it served—part bookstore, part tattoo parlor. Theo had promised him it would be a refuge, a place where no one asked questions and no one expected answers. Draco wasn't sure if that was what he needed.

But he couldn't stand in the rain forever.

With a heavy sigh, he opened the door and stepped inside, shaking the rain from his coat. The smell of parchment and fresh ink hit him immediately, comforting in a way that surprised him. The low murmur of conversation drifted from the back, but the shop itself was quiet, almost peaceful.

And then, he saw her.

Hermione Granger.

She sat behind the counter, her face partially hidden behind a stack of books, but even from across the room, Draco could see the exhaustion etched into her features. Her hair was the same wild mess it had always been, but there was something different about her—a heaviness, a weariness that hadn't been there before.

For a moment, Draco froze. He hadn't seen her in years. Not since the war, not since the Golden Trio had gone their separate ways. They had all changed, of course, but seeing her now—so different from the girl he had known—hit him harder than he'd expected.

Hermione glanced up, her eyes meeting his, and for a moment, they simply stared at each other. The weight of their shared past—the war, the scars they both carried—hung between them like a thick fog.

And in that brief, silent exchange, Draco saw it. The same thing he saw in himself. The same struggle. The same pain.

The same demons.