Carpathian

Sunday, 9:34 am

She stayed up too late.

Hermione awoke with a jolt when firm pounds echoed off her cabin door.

"Wake up, Granger!"

"I'm up, I'm up!"

The comforter piled on the ground as Hermione flung it off her body, stumbling slightly when her feet tangled in the sheets. She cast a few Self-Cleansing Charms and gathered her hair into a quick low ponytail. It would do.

Not three minutes passed before Hermione was dressed for the day and opened the door.

Draco stepped inside, eyebrow lifted. "What was the last thing I said to you?"

He stretched out a muffin and a banana, both cradled in his hand. No doubt, she had slept through breakfast. She seized the muffin, and Draco placed the banana in the dragonhide pouch attached to the utility belt fastened low around his hips.

"You should have known giving me three books wouldn't end well," she retorted before taking a bite.

"Forgive me for miscalculating your self-control," Draco said, no actual remorse in his tone. "But we're working on a limited timeline if I'm to take advantage of what few hours I have left of you being here."

"And what about my surprise?"

"No need to worry your over-saturated mind. I haven't forgotten." His eyebrow raised once more. "Any theories?"

A short huff flared her nostrils. "I thought you wanted me to focus on the books, not spend my night speculating about something I'd get the answer to in the morning regardless."

Amusement cracked his facade. "Doesn't mean I believed you to listen." He summoned the books and notebook off her nightstand and shrunk them into his pouch. "Eat fast. We've got a special dragon to tend to."

Hermione took a few more bites of the muffin while Draco levitated over the collection of protection gear he had brought with him. After consuming enough to hold her over til lunch, she set the partially-eaten pastry on the table then slipped on the protective chest piece. When she finished pulling the second glove halfway up her biceps, Draco extended his bent elbow.

"Ready?"

She paused. In her morning rush, it hadn't clicked with her that she would need to latch on to Draco in order for him to Apparate them to their destination. Something about letting her touch him— encouraging it —paralysed Hermione. Even if she was wearing gloves.

Her mind transported back to fourth year, when Draco had offered Hermione a 'Potter Stinks' badge—only for him to jeer that he didn't want her to get any of her 'Mudblood slime' on his hand. It was moments later that he and Harry had attempted to hex each other, with Draco missing and hitting Hermione and her teeth instead. The resulting humiliation had brought her to tears—Pansy's sniggering giggles, Snape's dismissive remarks, Draco's accomplished grin—yet it was the cut of those words whose pain had scarred the deepest.

It wasn't often that she let those memories back to the forefront. While several years had passed since they'd last seen each other, his cruel comments' sting had yet to fully fade. And despite being within his near-constant vicinity the past day and a half, those thoughts now amplified to an echoing roar in the neglected chambers of the better-off-forgotten parts of her mind.

Was this what it had felt like for Draco when he'd first seen her? What flashbacks had he been forced to relive that he had so blissfully blocked the past four years? Had compelled him to construct walls of defence and protect himself from the suppressed memories that resparked his synapses?