Wanderer

Pawns

Chapter Nineteen- Pawns

Meet me outside.

Bold of you to assume I'm not otherwise preoccupied.

Don't be a smart arse Malfoy. Are you really that engrossed in Haml

His reply cut her off before she'd even finished writing:

I'll be there.

He didn't look particularly pleased to see her, blond hair as cold and white as the winter sun, black coat buttoned up to his chin, green scarf wrapped tightly around his neck. He grimaced when he got close to her. "What do you want?"

Hermione pursed her lips together and glared. "Aren't you in a good mood today."

"Shakespeare's tragedies don't tend to cheer me up," replied Draco. He paused. "In fact, I think there would have to be something very wrong with me if they did."

Despite herself, Hermione laughed. She couldn't keep the softness out of her gaze when she looked at him and she knew he noticed by the way a crease nestled between his eyebrows.

He cleared his throat. "What did you want anyway?"

Hermione blinked. "Oh," she said. "Yes. That. I need you to wear the Cloak again."

Draco raised an eyebrow.

"Oh? And where exactly do you plan on taking me?"

"Somewhere that will do you some good," she replied, adding almost as an afterthought, "Whether you like it or not."

Draco's frown deepened but he followed her inside the castle to a little alcove where she could retrieve the Cloak from her bag and pass it to him. Hermione memorised his face before he disappeared; it always unnerved her when she couldn't see him.

He cleared his throat when he was fully concealed.

"Let's go then," she said.

They walked in silence, though Hermione wasn't too put off by it. Seeing Draco after her meeting with Harry and Ron had been strange. She noticed things she hadn't before; the colour of his eyes, more like ice than Ron's sky-blue, the point of his cheekbones and chin, the faintness of his eyebrows, the fineness of his hair compared to Harry's thick curls. He was about as tall as Ron, though he was slender where Ron was gangly, composed where Ron might be clumsy. Hermione also noticed the way he looked at her, not softly like Harry, not with the crinkles by his eyes like Ron, but steadily, like she was a jigsaw puzzle he enjoyed working out.

"You're not kidnapping me, are you, Granger?" asked Draco, and Hermione jumped, turning to look at him, before realising she couldn't see him.

She scoffed, shoving her hair from her face. The wind was just as ferocious as it had been that morning which was lucky for them; their words were swallowed by the wind. "Somehow, I don't think that would put either one of us in good stead for your trial."

He fell quiet again at that and Hermione reached out blindly for him. Draco took her hand and she squeezed it.

They made their way into Hogsmeade fairly quickly and despite the cold, Hermione felt a blush stain her cheeks and neck when she remembered the last time they'd been here. She wished they could've stayed in that moment forever. Her conversation with Harry and Ron just an hour ago made her feel, more profoundly than ever, like time was counting down to Draco's day of reckoning. She could only recite a hurried string of prayers in her head that he would be willing to let Harry and Ron help. She couldn't have him lose what little will to live he'd salvaged.