Signum Vitalis (a dramione story)

In which there is a Newt

Hermione already had her purse packed with the essentials and was deciding if anything she had stored in her cupboards was worth bringing with them. She had stored food just in case anything happened or she was trapped in her home but most of it didn't seem like the things that Harry, Ron, or Draco (for that matter) would be willing to eat. Canned sardines, while nutritious, were not a high demand food staple.

As she stared at her shelves, she listened for the beginning of a scuffle out in the living room. Harry and Ron and changed their opinions about Draco very little and Draco, while definitely a better man than he had been, had already proved that he would not forego barbed insults if provoked. Harry seemed okay with just dark glares but Ron seemed to be unable to not say any of the mean-spirited things that popped into his head. As well, Draco seemed unable to not to point out the idiocy in Ron's statements. There had already been a couple exchanges of words that only had stopped short of physical violence because Hermione had stepped into the middle of it.

In fact, given how the night had been going, the silence was scaring Hermione a little. She gave up on the canned food and went out into the living room. Ron and Harry were there, organizing the equipment they had brought and abandoned once they had seen Draco there. Speaking of Draco, he was no where to be found. Hermione scanned the living room again, checking for his shoes sticking out from underneath the couches. Still nothing.

"Where is Draco?" she asked.

Ron and Harry looked at each other. Harry shook his head and muttered something under his breath.

"Well?" she asked, putting her hands on her hips.

"He went that way," Ron said, pointing down the hallway. "Hiding, probably. The coward."

Hermione pressed her lips together and followed the hallway down to Luna's room.

"Better to just leave him alone, Herms." Ron's voice echoed down the hallway.

She ignored him. It was unlikely that Draco went into Luna's room and, given the fact that Harry and Ron wouldn't have let Draco near Hermione's bedroom, that only left the spare bedroom. She knocked and then entered into the room always magicked to be dark.

Although she was transitioning from the poorly lit hallway, this room was even darker and Hermione was night blind for several seconds. She hadn't told Luna, but she hated this room for that exact reason. She had not come back since she had used the spell that made it so dark.

There was a shuffling off to her left.

"Draco?" she asked very quietly, hoping it was, indeed, Draco.

"Seems like this is the only room to get a little quiet here," he said.

"Just watch for the fish tanks on the floor."

"Yeah," Draco said dryly. "I, unfortunately, discovered that already."

"Oh dear." She couldn't quite hide the laughter in her voice. She was beginning to make out the edges of furniture and so moved towards Draco. "Did you both survive?"

"Everything but my shoe. I don't think it will ever be the same and we'll have to give it a funeral."

Hermione snorted.

"A very proper funeral for they have served me well and didn't deserve to meet their end in a dirty fish tank while I hid from my girlfriend's overprotective friends."

She sighed. "Sorry about them. I'm sure once they see how much you have changed they will come around. And it isn't dirty, it's just full of algae."