Between Us - Dramione/Blinny

Ch. 3

After the last of the prefects had joined the group in the Great Hall, Hermione gathered everyone's attention and announced, "Thank you all for meeting us here. I'm sure most of you are aware that we need to do rounds every night to make sure no students are out of bed. Professor McGonagall has graciously allowed us to decide who will be paired with who for rounds, and we have decided that it would be easiest for each of you to patrol with your housemate in the same year."

There was an excited muttering until Draco cleared his throat and everyone fell silent again. Hermione nodded and went on: "Please do not abuse this power, as we don't want to have to enforce more strict rules for patrols."

The group of prefects nodded and Hermione dismissed all of them after giving them their assigned patrol routes and then she cast a quick glance up at Draco. "Well, let's get going."

He nodded and quietly followed her out of the Great Hall, his hands in his pockets. They had taken to patrolling the Transfiguration corridor on the ground floor, and Hermione had hoped it would go by quickly.

They had just passed through the courtyard when she heard Draco clear his throat. "So, Granger...have any plans after graduating?"

She raised an eyebrow but looked forward as she answered, "I'm not sure yet."

"I would've thought you'd have that planned by now," He laughed.

His laugh somewhat surprised her, since she usually only heard it when he would make fun of her in the past. It was a nice change though, and she couldn't help but smile slightly. "I know, but I haven't really had time to think about it."

"I'm sure this year you'll be able to figure it out," He said.

She nodded and there was silence for a few moments as they entered the Transfiguration corridor, lighting their wands so they could see in the darkness. She took a quiet breath and then asked, "What about you? Do you know what you're going to be doing?"

She saw him shrug out of the corner of her eye and he answered quietly, "I'm not sure yet either. I might take over the family business, might go work in the Ministry. Who knows?"

"Family business?" She asked, surprising herself with her own curiosity. It was no secret that the Malfoys were extremely wealthy, and independently so. But she never actually knew where their wealth came from.

"Yes, the Malfoy Apothecary," He nodded as his nose crinkled. "I'll be changing the name though. Always hated it, especially since we mainly deal in vineyards."

"That's an odd thing to deal in," She commented.

He shrugged and sighed slightly. "My family owns vineyards in almost every country that produces wine. France, Italy, Spain, Argentina, Chile...the list goes on."

"So why did they call it the Malfoy Apothecary, then?" She asked curiously.

"I think back in the sixteen-hundreds, we actually did distribute medicine and the likes," He answered. "But over time, we switched to wine."

"Well, that's a very lucrative business to be in," She said, peering down a corridor as they passed by it.

He grinned slightly. "Yes, considering most of our wine sells for a large amount of galleons, it's been very lucrative."

"Are you wanting to stay in the wine business?" She asked as they turned a corner.

He shrugged. "I might branch out to other things, but for right now I don't think I should make any large changes."

"Why not?" She asked. "If you're taking it over, you can make any changes that you want."

"Well, I'd really only be taking it over in name," He explained. "While yes, we have the ability to make any changes we want, those changes have to go through a board of executives that can approve or deny the changes."