Diamonds

19. Point Our Fingers

Hermione almost jumped a foot in the air, caught off guard by the sudden crackling of flames. They were burning purple, shooting off sparks. It was better than the stench of a fallen troll, but not by far. She tightened her hold on her wand. "Snape's challenge," Harry was saying, "what do we have to do?"

Hermione didn't answer, holding her breath. She was struggling to keep her hand steady, suddenly aware of every bruise she had received from debris in the chess game and from the fall straight through the trapdoor, right on top of Draco. Devil's Snare. Clever trap, really, on the part of Professor Sprout. He'd saved her from the vines.

Now she just had to save herself.

"Hermione, what what are you doing?"

She almost smiled at the thrill that his panic sent down her spine, before she realised it wasn't a good thrill. Enjoying this made her more like the bullies she loathed, more like Ron Weasley. She didn't want to be like that - she wanted to be able to look back on her life and honestly believe that she had never done anything but the best thing she could have at the time. "I'm trying to stop something bad from happening."

"Should I be holding my hands over my head?" In spite of any fear he might have been feeling, he managed to sound sarcastic.

"Don't be silly, they're fine where they are. Just don't go for your wand, Harry, I'd hate to disarm you now."

"You have your wand pointed at my throat."

"I'm not going to cast anything, don't worry. Though if I wanted to, I'm sure you can guess how much trouble you'd be in."

"Yeah, I can guess. What do you want, Hermione?"

"I want you and Ron to leave Draco alone once we leave this place. I want you to swear that I will never again be twisted up in your clever little ideas, all these things that will end in who knows how many people losing their lives."

"What if I can't keep that promise?"

"The point is, and always will be, that you tried. But if you want a cost - I know more about magic than you. Of course I do, I read so much I probably know more than half the older students. I know spells that can cause you more pain than you've ever so much as imagined, spells that can literally melt your brain and every other part of your insides. You've seen the bluebell flames? Imagine them, running through your veins, burning away your blood. I know spells that can do exactly that."

"So you'll kill me?"

She stared at him, at his eyes. What was it people said? Just like his father, except for his eyes, the exact shape and shade of green as his mothers. Hermione didn't know if Lily Potter had ever looked at someone with the intensity Harry Potter was currently fixing on her, but she knew what was important to her: Slytherins. No matter how little sense it made to all the Gryffindors, or to all the people she shared classes with, that was what she cared about. The health of some random Slytherins and their ringleader, the boy who had literally picked her out of a crowd, picked her over everyone for the first time in her life. She hadn't understood what that meant at the time, of course, but she knew what it had meant for her when she saw the look in the eyes of people at Hogwarts, people who thought they knew all about the Malfoys and their legacy. She knew what pity was, and she knew the look that went along with it. But Draco Malfoy had never looked at her with that; he was the only person who hadn't, not once in the entire time she'd known him. He had picked her out of a crowd and for the first and only time in her life, it wasn't pity in the eyes of the person who saw her instead of everyone else. No, Draco Malfoy looked at her with curiosity and respect, and she owed it to him to earn it. In her mind, that was the price that made it worth the huge risk she was taking, bluffing like this.