Need [ dramione ]

Chapter 15

21 November 1998 - 2 Days After the New Moon

Draco needs answers - it's no longer a confusion, no longer a distraction, not even just a pesky nagging thing in the back of his mind. He needs answers. He has to have them. At this point... it's no longer just his own sanity on the line.

What if Granger had frozen to death out there? She, a werewolf, had been ice cold as she sat out in the early morning, ice on the ground, wearing nothing but her night clothes. What will happen next month, when it's colder, or worse, in January... what will happen to her when there's snow on the ground, and she stands in it for hours, lost in a haze, lost as the moon goes beyond her reach.

What will happen to him? What will happen to their connection?

How will he be able to live with himself?

This has to be stopped.

She's ignoring her very nature, all because she's scared of her intuition and what she can do, and in turn, it's making everything all the more difficult. He doesn't know many werewolves, but the way that Granger is struggling to come to terms with it, struggling to settle into herself..

Greyback had always been so sure of himself, half werewolf half wizard. He had been settled. He had blended the two together.

Granger is... falling apart.

Is this simply how it has to be? Two separate beings, fighting for control, both struggling, both lacking, both...

In a moment of horrifying clarity, Draco stops where he is, realizing... normally, on the New Moon, Granger would have been eating, trying to sustain herself. And then, the very next New Moon, after he had told her to listen to intuition, to do as her werewolf nature desired... she had sat out staring at the New Moon.

Is this all his fault? Surely, werewolves were not supposed to sit out staring at where the moon should have been, freezing to death.

They need... research. They need studies. They need... a source. Someone that knows more than them.

There has to be someone that knows more than them.

What he wouldn't give to sit down with his Aunt.

She has not written back, yet, but he's already planning to send another letter, this time asking if she could meet him for tea, in Hogsmeade. A sit down with a woman that had more knowledge than the rest... he considers writing to Bill Weasley as well. The only other person, really, that knows about Granger... the only other person with any experience about werewolves... Of course, he isn't one himself, but he knows more.

More than Draco does, at least.

Standing in the middle of the forest, Draco blinks, and realizes where he is. While he still has enough aconite for this month's brew, he's running low on other supplies... and, given the coming snow and ice, he wants to prepare as much aconite as he can. Drying takes time, but with a properly placed stasis charm at the right moment, he could keep it through winter.

Perhaps, one day, he'll be able to keep all of the potion ingredients required for Wolfsbane on the grounds at Malfoy Manor. It's not a terrible idea - there are greenhouses and house elves and his mother...

Then again, he doubts he'll ever see the Manor again. All of it, the estate, the vaults... it's all still in the hands of the ministry.

And besides, why is he even bothering to worry about Wolfsbane Potion eight months from then? The way Granger is functioning... she'll be lucky to make it to Yule.