vices | D.M. + H.G.

three: bad karma

A/N: Infinite amounts of beta love to AlmondMilkTeaDoubleBoba, LeilahMoon, and lost_poetx.

Major thanks are in order for 10k already! I'm honored and so happy you're loving this as much as I am. Hope y'all like this one.

xoxo, carm

-

Sitting in the warm, nearly empty Gryffindor common room, Hermione found herself staring at a blank piece of parchment. Her quill was tapping restlessly against the side of the desk, and she was chasing her mind around in circles.

Coming up with honest, legitimate qualities that she liked about Malfoy – that weren't incredibly superficial or halfhearted – was harder than she'd ever anticipated. If she'd known, she probably would have refused the bloody bet in the first place.

Finally deciding to give up for the time being, she tossed her useless quill across the table, shoved her head into her hands, and sighed. Loudly.

How on earth was she ever supposed to do this? Curse her utter inability to back down from a challenge. Judging by the way he'd looked at her when he'd issued it, he had bloody well known that she would accept his bait with fervor and indignance.

She hated that he knew that about her. It gave him ammunition to use against her. Hermione wondered if he would do it again – he'd already done it once, what was to stop him from exploiting her diehard Gryffindor nature a second time?

Ginny slid quietly into the seat next to her, interrupting Hermione's inner turmoil with an easy, "What's up?"

Hermione nearly jumped out of her skin at the surprise. "Merlin, Ginny, you scared me," she said breathlessly, with a hand pressed up against her heart.

"Sorry," she said with a chuckle. "But really, what's going on? I haven't seen you look this stressed out since you were forcing Harry and Ron to proofread their Potions essays," she said, rolling her eyes.

Huffing out a reluctant sigh, Hermione caved. "Malfoy and I made this... bet."

Red eyebrows shot up. "Oh? What about?"

Hermione knew that tone – Ginny sounded hesitant, yet entirely intrigued. It was a tone she hadn't heard in eons – since Hermione had told her that she'd lost her virginity to Viktor and not Ron, like everyone had thought.

She still couldn't believe that she'd never told Ginny about that when it'd happened. It hadn't even come up until after the war when they were trying to find normal topics of conversation that didn't revolve around sadness, tragedy, or loss. Hermione had been grasping at straws, trying to think of something about her that Ginny didn't already know that would lighten their conversation or alleviate the awkwardness of learning how to talk to each other again.

For whatever reason, that had been the first thing to come to mind, and she still recalled Ginny's shocked expression with near-perfect clarity.

"It's... pointless. He wants me to do chores with magic – don't fight me, I like doing them the Muggle way, you know that – and I don't. So, he came up with this – idea that we have to make a list of seven genuinely nice things about the other," she said.

Looking thoughtful, Ginny replied, "And what do you get if you win?"

"If he wins, I'll do chores with magic for the rest of the year," she humphed. "But if I win," her eyes glittered, "I get unlimited access to his library."

"Of course that's what you picked," Ginny snickered.

"Hey, the Malfoy library is widely renowned for how extensive and large it is," she retorted.