Lust, War, and... Love?

Chapter 4: Morning After

      Hermione stared at her plate. A few more seconds and she'd fall asleep with her face right in the middle of her porridge... Each time Hermione drifted into slumber in her warm and soft bed, torrid sex fantasies assaulted her mind. They involved Malfoy heavily and made for a near lack of sleep on her part.

Hermione went to Professor Slughorn's office first thing in the morning but, to her utter despair, the teacher wasn't in. Neither was he present at the breakfast in the Great Hall. Harry, as usual, was preoccupied with his cursed Potions textbook. Would he ever comprehend the grave danger lurking behind the hand-scribbled notes in it? Apparently not, unless someone force-fed him Amortentia in a dark corridor at night. Ron devoted himself part to tucking into his kipper, part to ogling Lavender, which was only marginally better than perusing illicit potion recipes and curses. Hermione sneaked a glance at the bleary-eyed Malfoy at the Slytherin table.

Crabbe and Goyle's faces kept twitching and wincing so often, it even started to annoy Draco. But he was determined to let them suffer the misery of highly uncomfortable magic-induced boils on their ample bottoms. Pansy was a pain in the neck too. She had made several bathroom trips to vomit the potion out of her system, and now she kept harping into his ear about her lost beauty sleep. Draco barked at her to shut up. He needed his space in order to extricate himself from the predicament the two goons landed him in.

Of course, he wouldn't mind a few very colorful and reasonably exciting images of Granger in his dreams. But the rate, at which those uninvited fantasies spiraled into his mind, was far from being conductive to a healthy and restorative sleep. That had to be fixed, and the sooner, the better.

First, he had to make sure Granger wouldn't squeak to a teacher before he'd get the antidote. Second, he had to find this particular remedy before he screwed up his engagement to Pansy and landed in Azkaban for raping the Gryffindor prefect. Although it might be sweet to see his Dad there...

He must talk to Granger. Walking over to the Gryffindor table was out of question since Potty and Weasel would hex him before he'd have time to say anything. Maybe not Weasel - the redhead disaster of a wizard definitely looked the other way today morning. But how would his fellow Slytherins take Draco's highly unusual act? Following Granger in the corridors after the breakfast was a dubious idea too. What if she got scared and hexed him?

Draco tore off a piece of parchment. Pansy had already stalked off, leaving most of her breakfast on her plate. Crabbe and Goyle were too busy wincing and twitching to pay attention to Malfoy's actions. Draco quickly scribbled a few words and folded the parchment into a crane. A small flick of his wand, and it started gliding over to the Gryffindor table.

Eeek! Hermione fished a now soaked crane out of her porridge. She unfolded it and read the sprawling handwriting:

Granger, we must talk before we get screwed up. See you in the library immediately after the breakfast. DM

P.S. You're one sexy babe

The Great Hall suddenly became too hot for Hermione. Harry tore away from his book and attempted to peek at the note in her hand.

"What's that?" was his perfectly natural question. "Did it come from the Slytherin table just now?"

"Oh, just another insult from Malfoy... I reprimanded him for wandering at night yesterday."

"What did he write? I'm going to hex his guts out of him," Harry was quick to react.

"Let's ignore it, Harry. He's only trying to provoke us. The more hell-raising, the better for him."

"Where was he wandering?"

"Seventh floor corridor."

"What was he doing there?" Harry closed his Potions book.

"I'm not sure... He was just walking past." Hermione was not ready to come forth with the potion incident yet. Her dreams were too embarrassing...

Hermione crumpled the crane in her hand and set off for the library. Once there, she barricaded herself with references on love magic and potions behind shelves in the farthest corner . Here it was, Amortentia, The Ancient Potion of Fatal Love Obsession. Hermione's heart sunk even more. Why did Professor Slughorn have to demonstrate it in the class?

Where could the blasted girl be? Malfoy was extremely irritable after jogging a respectable distance around the bookshelves. He had just picked up the Treatise of Osburga from which he earlier obtained his potion recipe. Madame Pince failed to spot his neat trick of altering the date on his very stale permission note from Snape. Draco started leafing through the Treatise of Osburga as he walked down an aisle. His nose still in the book, Draco turned around a shelf and crashed into a table. A pile of books on it crumbled and spilled over the edge to the floor.

"Merlin's pants, what a cursed moron had put the t - tab- ," Draco started then stammered as he spotted the familiar bushy hair and amber eyes.

"Draco, are you sure it was Amortentia?" Her sweet lips beckoned him for a big, wet kiss. The skin on her neck looked oh so delicate... His already inflamed imagination attempted to sneak under her buttoned-up collar.

"The books say Amortentia has a distinctly minty taste. While the potion can feel warm to the touch, the taste has a strong cooling feel on the taste buds of the person drinking it. " Hermione kept talking as she was extremely conscious of the fact that Malfoy's stare was now firmly fixed on her chest. "The potion that I drank didn't taste minty, and neither it felt cool on my tongue."

A warm wave traveled from her lower body all the way up. Then a great sinking feeling below her navel addled her brains even worse. She reached with her hand and lightly stroke his fingers still locked in a grip on his book.

At her touch, Draco dropped his book on the table, and swiftly moved onto the bench next to her, her weak fingers now in his firm hold. His body pressed against her shoulder and she could feel his labored breathing on her flushed cheek

"Absolutely no kissing and groping in the library! It is not a dating club!" a shrill voice jerked them back to reality. The ever-alert Madame Pince was now swooping down the aisle on them.

"Get a grip, Malfoy!" Hermione hissed into his face and swung around to the other side of the table. "Sorry, Madame Pince, it won't happen again," she said as brightly as she could to the vulture-like librarian.

Draco's eyes followed Madame Pince as she disappeared in a passage between shelves.

"You started it, Granger! Touching me with your hand," he hissed back across the table. Could he get her to caress him more? The thought stirred his whole body.

"We are here to find out about the antidote and not to succumb to your filthy potion workings!" Granger reached for Draco's book and studied its cover.

Gold letters shone on the black leather: Treatise of Osburga, Volume I. Below the title Hermione read: Galdorcraft Peostre And Galdorcraft Ablicgan - Dark Magic And White Magic. Then in a smaller font: Twelfth Edition, Translated, Commentated and Annotated. Must be a heck of a book, Hermione thought.

"Is your potion in here?"

Draco shifted in his seat. His barely coherent brain made a feeble attempt to predict all possible reactions to his impending revelation. After heaving a sigh and giving up his efforts to control the situation even in the slightest, he said bluntly, "Go, look up Heorte Lustbaere, Granger."

Draco watched Granger in silence as her deft fingers flipped through the pages, her face solemn. Those fingers could do such a nice job caressing, and she had already proven it. Maybe they should not rush it with the remedy. They could take it slowly and experiment a little before reversing the things. It actually could be very enjoyable.

"This... this is the potion your goons poured into me?" Granger whispered in horror and lifted her tearful eyes from the pages. "It -it had your blood in it?"

"Regrettably, it is. And I added my blood to it. I prepared it precisely the way the book said."

"But the blood magic - it's one of the strongest Dark Arts ever known!" Granger looked thunderstruck now. "You sealed it that night too! Was that flask made of silver?"

"How did I seal it? We didn't even kiss!"

"It didn't have to be a kiss. It says the magic gets sealed when the parties perform a physical contact with their bare skin. Was your flask made of silver? It actually says that in the Middle Ages they used a silver object as a catalyst for the contact. For example, they put a silver dagger between their naked bodies when they locked themselves in an embrace. It did not have to be a dagger, of course. Anything could work - a spoon, trinket or jewelry."

"Where did you find that?" Draco unceremoniously grabbed the book.

"Look at the bottom of the page. It's in the small font there."

Draco's eyes scanned the text on the page:

...Silver, due to its embodiment of clarity and purity, is believed to be one of a few known powerful catalysts for Heorte Lustbaere.