Love and Other Misfortunes

Chapter 20

The pop of apparition woke them late the next morning.

"Are you both decent up there?" Harry hollered up the stairs.

Hermione yelped and started looking around wildly for her clothes. Draco sat up more groggily and with a flick of his wrist conjured two robes, one of which he handed to Hermione. She pulled it on and looked down.

"Emerald green? Honestly, why don't we just hang a sign somewhere that says we're shagging?" She huffed as she tied it closed at her waist.

Draco pulled his on with a smirk.

"Sorry," he said, not looking even remotely apologetic. "It's the only colour I know how to make them."

She rolled her eyes and snickered as she shoved him off the bed.

"You can come up, Harry!" she called out the door, gathering up all the haphazardly discarded clothing and stuffing them under the mattress. She tried to smooth her hair so she wouldn't look quite so much like she'd had sex a half-dozen times since the previous afternoon.

Harry popped his head in and a smug smile crept across his face as he took in the bed which now filled most of the room before him.

"Morning, Hermione," he said, his eyes glittering. "You're looking better, are you feeling better?"

Hermione felt herself turning bright red.

"Yes!"

"That's great. Very glad to hear it. Did you sleep alright? I know there are still some magical creatures in this house, I hope none of them kept you up." Harry said with false innocence.

Hermione glared at him.

"Do you want details on my night?" she asked in a saccharine tone.

That wiped the smile off his face.

"Nope! I'm good. Just looking out for your general well-being—responsible friend of yours that I am."

Hermione continued to glare at him. Harry cleared his throat.

"I'm actually here on Ministry business. Given the current situation, I have been asked to come deliver the Wizengamot's sentencing rather than bring you both in to hear it. Which I'm sure gives you both a fairly good idea of what it is."

He pulled a large, official looking scroll out of his pocket and, unfurling it, read aloud.

"Draco Malfoy, the Wizengamot of the British Ministry of Magic has unanimously found you innocent; cleared of all suspicion in the attempted murder of Hermione Granger or of using coercive bonding or dark magic. Your house arrest is lifted and you are free."

Hermione smiled with relief but then Harry continued.

"However, the Wizengamot does find you guilty of breaching the Ministry Regulation article twelve, rule four: usage of an unauthorised memory charm on a Ministry employee. You are fined fifty galleons. In the event that charges are brought by the obliviated party, a trial may result in a sentence of up to two months in Azkaban."

Hermione shot Draco a look. Harry kept reading.

"And, for irreparably destroying magical wards in the Ministry of Magic, per clause twelve, subsection C of the British Wizarding law, Draco Malfoy is hereby banned from setting foot in the Ministry. In the event that he does so in a non-emergency it will be construed as an act of aggression toward the wizarding government and lethal force will be immediately authorised."

"What?" Hermione gasped in outrage.

Harry looked apologetic as he rolled up the scroll and stuck it on top of a dresser.