A Sponsor & A Gentleman

Part V

Part V:

Term passed much as it had beforehand. Only Draco's affections for Hermione grew more outward. He held her hand and kissed her cheek. She was surprised by confectionaries some days and others it would be a necklace or a flower. Her suite was overtook with the lavish attentions that came from the Malfoy family.

He managed to make every day a reminder that she was loved.

As was their daughter.

The little witch was not born, yet she was possibly the most spoiled child to have been thought of. The Malfoy family wealth was endless, as was Draco's need to lavish her with gifts. It came to a point where she had to ask him to stop before she needed three trunks to return home.

Their bond strengthened daily. The shared responsibilities of being Prefects and students with top marks subtly pulled them closer and closer together, as if it'd been possible to do so. Draco and Hermione's lives became all about one another.

Potions class became a race. They each went through the instructions as quickly as they could to try to beat the other. Herbology went much the same way, only with deadly plants.

Quidditch was the only relief in each other's company. Draco was the Slytherin house Seeker. It was a duty that was important and skilled. Professor Snape refused any special treatment for him as a player, so he was expected to every practice, no matter how long they practiced. More than once, Draco had practice into the late evening, only a spot of a meal, before he had to study before curfew, then patrol half the night.

Hermione knew that his commitment to his obligations was paramount, otherwise she would have asked Draco to quit. It was a pace impossible to keep. And what of, when their daughter was born? Would be ever be present?

Late one night when Draco was on patrol, Hermione studied in her suite when something happened. Something big and unexpected. It was unlike the movement she felt for the month prior. It was stronger. She felt it move the back of the textbook perched atop her belly.

She stopped writing. Her hands fumbled with the layers of clothing until they were wretched up at her waist with the naked expanse of her impregnated belly in full view. The sensation started again. Small bumps rose up through the pale flesh. She watched the elbows and knees of her daughter brush the surface of the skin and shifted her stomach ever so slight.

It was enough to send her to her feet.

"Draco!" She exclaimed.

It was a force of habit. Even when she knew he wasn't there, her lips cried out for him.

The baby's movements were not the first she felt, but if she could see them, it meant that Draco might be able to feel it, too. He'd been manic for weeks trying to feel the movements ever since they reached the stage in which it was possible.

Hermione pulled on her fluffy slippers and took off through the castle. She knew how to find him. Draco was a creature of habit, trekking the same course every night as he patrolled the corridors for wayward students, and that made it easy for her to locate him in an enormous castle. The light at the end of his wand was the only light through the darkness of a stretching hall. It swung back and forth as a spotlight.

She excitedly jogged forward. The sound of her slippers shuffling alerted a change in Draco's search. He spun around with a wand thrust ahead.

"Who's there?" He projected firmly.

Her arm shielded her eyes. She stopped.

"Hermione? What are you doing out of bed? Is something wrong? Is it the baby?"