Post by Tathrin on Mar 15, 2012 16:54:52 GMT -8
Title: Hart's Reflection
Changing Canon Challenge[/b]
Summary: When Harry looked into the Mirror of Erised, he saw his parents standing behind him. But in this world, that is no mere reflection...
Rating: PG-13 (language, some violence)
Word Count: 3466
Back to Part One
Draco Malfoy gave a last wave out the window, trying to ignore the embarrassingly undignified way his parents were beaming and simpering back at him, then turned away to look for a good place to sit. He pulled his levitating trunk along behind him, hoping that the spell his father had put on it wouldn’t wear off before he found a compartment. He didn’t fancy dragging the heavy thing along like some common Muggle.
He peered into the thin windows of the compartments he passed, but all of them were occupied already, and he didn’t like the looks of any of the students within. He didn’t want to end up sitting with someone horrid or, worse, pathetic, so he wasn’t about to risk intruding on strangers without some indication that they were worthy of his presence. Unfortunately the train was already crowded, and he was halfway to the end of it and had yet to spot any compartments that were empty. If only mother hadn’t kept him on the platform so long, but she’d been weepy and sentimental, and reluctant to let him leave.
Now he wasn’t going to find anywhere good to sit, and the trunk floating at his side wobbled slightly as its charm started to dissipate. The caged eagle owl balanced on top hooted anxiously. Draco swore, a rather mild imprecation, but one that would have horrified his mother nonetheless—and gotten his father scolded, no doubt, for inadvertently teaching it to him.
Draco tried to walk faster, but the hallway was as crowded as the compartments lining it and the small, pale eleven-year-old couldn’t make much headway against the press of students. His trunk buckled and began to droop, annoying the owl despite how securely its cage was fastened to the trunk on which it rested. Draco scowled and heaved the heavy burden along, but it thudded into the floor, catching his heels and making him stumble. He swore again, which earned an appreciative snort from a stocky, short-haired boy in the compartment next to Draco. He was just heaving his own trunk up into the overhead luggage rack, a task which appeared almost easy for larger boy. His current solitude in the compartment led Draco to assume that he was probably another first year, despite his bulk.
He didn’t appear to be a particularly bright individual, but that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, Draco mused. A bit of dimness might actually come in handy, he decided, so long as the other boy was clever enough to recognize Draco’s own innate superiority, and thus defer to his judgment. And he did look impressive physically, which could certainly be useful, and not just for the moment—although at this moment, certainly, it would be.
“You, come give me a hand with this,” Draco beckoned.
The other boy frowned at him, nonplussed. “Why should I?” he asked dully.
“Because I asked nicely?” Draco suggested, his tone haughty.
“And who are you?”
“Draco Malfoy,” he replied, with a smug smirk.
Surprise flickered across the other boy’s thick face. “Malfoy, you said?” he asked. He started forward.
“Yes,” Draco answered, still smiling. Clearly the other had recognized his name—as Draco had expected him to—which meant that he was no Muggle-born. Draco’s family was careful never to evince any sort of public dislike of those wizards or witches born to Muggles, but that did not mean that Draco was ignorant of their inferiority, so he was pleased to hear the other boy demonstrate some awareness of the wizarding world, and particularly of Draco’s family’s place in it.
After all, who could fail to know the name of Lucius Malfoy, the heroic wizard who had saved all of them from the tyrannical malevolence of that Dark Lord who must never be named?
“I know who your dad is,” the other boy said, just as Draco had surmised. “He’s the reason mine’s in prison,” the boy continued harshly, dislike twisting his solid features, which wiped away Draco’s smile.
“What?” he said, edging backwards.
The taller boy jerked a thumb at his broad chest. “Vincent Crabbe,” he growled, “and my dad was a Death Eater, same as yours, only mine never went rotten and turned traitor to lick the Ministry’s boots.”
Draco’s pointed face went white. “Don’t you talk about my father that way,” he snarled.
Crabbe moved closer, cracking his knuckles threateningly. Draco stumbled backwards, knocking into his trunk. The owl screeched. Draco barely managed to keep his balance, gasping, then he yelped when Vincent Crabbe reached out for him.
Draco flinched away, but Crabbe closed a meaty paw around the collar of Draco’s robes, and tugged the smaller boy into the empty compartment behind him. He slid the door shut with his free hand, the other holding his captive up on tip-toe. Crabbe tossed Draco into the cushioned seat as easily as if he were slinging around a sack of clothes. The air whooshed out of Draco’s lungs at the impact, and he scrabbled backwards breathlessly until he ran into the side of the train, and stopped.
Crabbe raised a thick fist and Draco threw his arms up over his head, but a noise from behind him caused Crabbe to spin around, his punch un-thrown.
Draco breathed a sigh of relief and peered around the other boy’s bulk to see what had interrupted his pummeling: it was another boy, only slightly shorter than Crabbe, with bristly hair and a dumbfounded expression on his face. He didn’t look a thing like Crabbe—except in basic bulk—but there was something about his expression that mirrored Crabbe’s so perfectly that they nearly gave the impression of being twins. Draco hesitated, torn between signaling for help and not wanting to admit that he required any sort of assistance.
“Someone’s left their trunk and owl out here,” the intruder said. “It yours?”
“No,” Crabbe replied surlily, “it belongs to him.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder at Draco and continued, giving the other boy his name: “Draco Malfoy.”
The interloper’s small eyes went wide and his mouth dropped into a comical “o” of surprise. Then his face drew up in a frown, and his large hands clenched into fists. “He a friend of yours?” he demanded.
“No,” Crabbe said quickly, “I’m gonna beat him up, for my dad.”
The other nodded. “Good plan,” he said. He turned and shut the door behind him, then faced Crabbe again and held out a thick hand. “Gregory Goyle,” he introduced himself. “His dad got mine thrown into Azkaban.”
Crabbe shook the proffered hand gleefully, saying, “mine too.”
They turned as one to face Draco, who drew back against the warm wall of the train. “Now, you l-listen,” he stammered, “I’m w-warning you, you don’t want to do this. You’re going to regret—”
He didn’t finish his desperate admonishment, because Crabbe’s fist connected hard with his jaw. White pain exploded in front of Draco’s eyes, and his mouth filled with blood. He blinked away stars and tears, gasping as much from shock as from the agony flickering across his face. He had never, ever been hit before, and it hurt quite a bit more than he had expected it to.
Goyle’s hand fastened itself in Draco’s collar, and he hauled the smaller boy to his feet, and then off of them. Draco clung to the other boy’s thick arm, gasping for breath as his own robes near-strangled him. His toes barely brushed the floor, and all his weight dangled from Goyle’s meaty hand.
“P-please,” Draco whimpered, his plea coming out so breathless and quiet that even he could barely hear the word.
Goyle drew back his free hand, the thick fist clenched like a boulder, his face twisted in a ferocious scowl. Crabbe peered over his shoulder, grinning at Draco.
Then, for the second time, the compartment door slid open, and both of Draco’s attackers turned to look, although Goyle did not release his asphyxiating grip on Draco's robes.
“What is going on in here?” a shrill voice demanded.
Through the tears swimming across his vision, Draco saw Crabbe and Goyle look at each other blankly. Clearly their talents lay in destruction, not dissembling, and they were at a loss for how to explain their actions. A distant, dispassionate part of Draco—a part of him that was not, apparently, concerned with his imminent strangulation—coolly made note of this deficiency, and just as coolly observed that he probably could have talked his way out of trouble, had the participants in the situation been somehow reversed.
Crabbe and Goyle, however, could manage no more answer than a dull shrug.
“Well stop it!” came the commanding response.
Draco blinked and brought the newcomer into focus: it was a girl, perhaps Draco’s height, maybe a little shorter. It was hard to gauge her height because she was completely dwarfed by the large, bushy brown mane of hair that sprouted from her head. She was dressed in a plain, rather drab skirt and jumper, and her dark blue socks were pulled nearly up to her knees. She had thick eyebrows that were drawn together in a rather dangerous frown, and her pert mouth was pursed in an even more dangerous expression of displeasure. She looked, Draco thought, like the sort of person that one ought to be wary of crossing, despite her slim frame and skinny ankles.
Goyle slowly lowered Draco to the floor and he sucked gratefully at the air so long denied him.
“He’s Draco Malfoy,” Crabbe explained dully.
“I don’t care who he is,” the girl replied waspishly, “you shouldn’t hit him!”
“But his dad—”
“I certainly don’t care who his dad is!” snapped the girl. And, for the first time in his life, Draco was glad of that.
She stepped forward, brushing past the much larger figures of Crabbe and Goyle with a fearlessness that did a lot more than just border on reckless, and grabbed Draco’s hand. She tugged the bewildered boy out of the compartment behind her, turned around to treat Crabbe and Goyle to one last fierce glare, snapped that they were going to get in awful trouble, and slammed the compartment door shut.
Draco gaped at her.
“You’re bleeding,” the girl pointed out calmly.
Draco dabbed at his split, blood-slicked lips, and winced.
His rescuer reached into the simple blue bag slung over her shoulder and pulled out a paper tissue. Draco took it with a murmur of thanks that made him wince again, and held it to his mouth.
“I assume that’s your trunk?” the girl asked.
Draco nodded.
“Right,” she said, her own head jerking in a sharp, answering gesture. “Well, if you haven’t anywhere to sit, you can come in with me,” she offered smartly. “I’m just in here, and there’s plenty of room.”
Draco glanced over his shoulder at the thin sliver of window behind which Crabbe and Goyle lay, no doubt murderously plotting revenge, and wished that she had gestured to a compartment much farther away—but then again, he was probably better off with her than he was alone, no matter where he sat.
“Thanks,” he muttered, and gave his trunk a one-handed tug. It hardly budged, its levitation charm now entirely defunct. The owl hooted crossly, unamused by Draco’s failed efforts.
The bushy-haired girl leaned down and took the trunk’s other handle, helping him drag the heavy thing into the compartment she had indicated.
She had somehow managed to get her own squat, leather-edged trunk up into the luggage rack—possibly some gallant soul had given her a hand, or maybe she was simply stronger than she looked—but with his lip still bleeding and the rest of him shaking, now that the adrenaline of the attack was wearing off, Draco didn’t even try to mimic that feat, or bother to solicit her assistance in doing so, but left his things sitting on the floor.
The train gave a final whistle, and a lurch, and pulled out of the platform. Draco glanced out the window, but the compartment the girl had chosen was on the far side of the train, and he couldn’t see the crowded platform they were leaving behind them, or his parents who were no doubt still standing on it, waving and hoping for a last glimpse of their precious only son.
“I’m Hermione Granger, by the way,” the girl introduced herself, thrusting her hand into his face.
Draco switched the bloody tissue to his other hand so that he could shake hers politely. Before he could steel himself to speak through his split lip and likewise introduce himself, she continued, “and you’re Draco Malfoy, aren’t you?”
Relieved that all he had to do was nod, he did so earnestly.
“Yes, I thought that’s what they said,” she nodded. “Well, it was rather awful of them to attack you for that, it’s not as if you can help it,” Hermione said, sniffing disdainfully. “Besides, I’ve read all about your father, and he sounds like quite the hero. I don’t see why on earth they should want to hurt you because of him.”
“Their fathers were Death Eaters,” Draco said, somewhat thickly, through the tissue. “They went to prison when my father killed the Dark Lord.”
“Ah,” Hermione nodded, “well then, I’m sure they deserved whatever happened to them, if they were foolish enough to follow You-Know-Who in the first place. And it’s certainly no reason to take it out on you, anyway.”
Draco shrugged.
“Besides,” Hermione said, with another disapproving sniff, “they shouldn’t have been brawling on the school train, no matter what silly excuse they thought they had. They’ll be in awful trouble, when we get to Hogwarts.”
“Don’t tell anyone!” Draco squawked quickly.
Hermione frowned. “Whyever not?” she demanded. “They were breaking the rules—and hurting you,” she added.
“Because—because that will only make things worse, I’m sure,” Draco pleaded. He dabbed at the fresh trail of blood that slid down his chin as he spoke, stretching the split. He didn’t want anyone to know that he had needed help to handle two such obvious dunderheads as Crabbe and Goyle, and he certainly didn’t want his father to find out that Draco hadn’t been able to hold his own on his very first day of school—before the first day of school, even, when the train hadn’t even yet pulled out of the station!
“Well...” Hermione said reluctantly, “I suppose it might...”
“And we aren’t technically at school yet,” Draco pointed out. “Things will be different there, I’m sure. They wouldn’t dare cause more trouble, not with teachers around.”
Hermione nodded slowly. “Yeah,” she said, “that’s true...but if they do try it again...”
“Oh, I’ll report them immediately to the nearest professor for their due punishment,” Draco promised blithely.
Hermione sat back, apparently assuaged by his evident reliance upon proper procedure. “Well, that’s all right then,” she said primly. “Now, you know all about magic, right?” she asked. “I mean, your father is Lucius Malfoy, you’ve known you were a wizard your whole life, I’m sure.”
Draco nodded. “Of course,” he said, wincing as his smirk tugged painfully at his bleeding lip.
“Brilliant,” said Hermione, leaning forward. “My parents are dentists, so they aren’t really much help, and I was wondering, everything I’ve read about the flame-freezing spell in our Charms book seems to indicate that proper wand movement is crucial, but the diagram is a bit vague, so...”
Draco studied the young witch in front of him, barely listening to her words. So Hermione Granger was a Muggle-born, was she? Still, she sounded intelligent, despite that, and certainly she had helped him out of a tight spot...and he knew that it was very important that they toe the current Ministry line of blood-acceptance, or at least appear to do so...
Draco Malfoy nodded, more to himself than to her, and gave the tiniest of smiles around his bloodied tissue. Mudblood or not, this Hermione Granger seemed like she might turn out to be a useful friend to have after all.
Changing Canon Challenge[/b]
Summary: When Harry looked into the Mirror of Erised, he saw his parents standing behind him. But in this world, that is no mere reflection...
Rating: PG-13 (language, some violence)
Word Count: 3466
Back to Part One
Draco Malfoy gave a last wave out the window, trying to ignore the embarrassingly undignified way his parents were beaming and simpering back at him, then turned away to look for a good place to sit. He pulled his levitating trunk along behind him, hoping that the spell his father had put on it wouldn’t wear off before he found a compartment. He didn’t fancy dragging the heavy thing along like some common Muggle.
He peered into the thin windows of the compartments he passed, but all of them were occupied already, and he didn’t like the looks of any of the students within. He didn’t want to end up sitting with someone horrid or, worse, pathetic, so he wasn’t about to risk intruding on strangers without some indication that they were worthy of his presence. Unfortunately the train was already crowded, and he was halfway to the end of it and had yet to spot any compartments that were empty. If only mother hadn’t kept him on the platform so long, but she’d been weepy and sentimental, and reluctant to let him leave.
Now he wasn’t going to find anywhere good to sit, and the trunk floating at his side wobbled slightly as its charm started to dissipate. The caged eagle owl balanced on top hooted anxiously. Draco swore, a rather mild imprecation, but one that would have horrified his mother nonetheless—and gotten his father scolded, no doubt, for inadvertently teaching it to him.
Draco tried to walk faster, but the hallway was as crowded as the compartments lining it and the small, pale eleven-year-old couldn’t make much headway against the press of students. His trunk buckled and began to droop, annoying the owl despite how securely its cage was fastened to the trunk on which it rested. Draco scowled and heaved the heavy burden along, but it thudded into the floor, catching his heels and making him stumble. He swore again, which earned an appreciative snort from a stocky, short-haired boy in the compartment next to Draco. He was just heaving his own trunk up into the overhead luggage rack, a task which appeared almost easy for larger boy. His current solitude in the compartment led Draco to assume that he was probably another first year, despite his bulk.
He didn’t appear to be a particularly bright individual, but that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, Draco mused. A bit of dimness might actually come in handy, he decided, so long as the other boy was clever enough to recognize Draco’s own innate superiority, and thus defer to his judgment. And he did look impressive physically, which could certainly be useful, and not just for the moment—although at this moment, certainly, it would be.
“You, come give me a hand with this,” Draco beckoned.
The other boy frowned at him, nonplussed. “Why should I?” he asked dully.
“Because I asked nicely?” Draco suggested, his tone haughty.
“And who are you?”
“Draco Malfoy,” he replied, with a smug smirk.
Surprise flickered across the other boy’s thick face. “Malfoy, you said?” he asked. He started forward.
“Yes,” Draco answered, still smiling. Clearly the other had recognized his name—as Draco had expected him to—which meant that he was no Muggle-born. Draco’s family was careful never to evince any sort of public dislike of those wizards or witches born to Muggles, but that did not mean that Draco was ignorant of their inferiority, so he was pleased to hear the other boy demonstrate some awareness of the wizarding world, and particularly of Draco’s family’s place in it.
After all, who could fail to know the name of Lucius Malfoy, the heroic wizard who had saved all of them from the tyrannical malevolence of that Dark Lord who must never be named?
“I know who your dad is,” the other boy said, just as Draco had surmised. “He’s the reason mine’s in prison,” the boy continued harshly, dislike twisting his solid features, which wiped away Draco’s smile.
“What?” he said, edging backwards.
The taller boy jerked a thumb at his broad chest. “Vincent Crabbe,” he growled, “and my dad was a Death Eater, same as yours, only mine never went rotten and turned traitor to lick the Ministry’s boots.”
Draco’s pointed face went white. “Don’t you talk about my father that way,” he snarled.
Crabbe moved closer, cracking his knuckles threateningly. Draco stumbled backwards, knocking into his trunk. The owl screeched. Draco barely managed to keep his balance, gasping, then he yelped when Vincent Crabbe reached out for him.
Draco flinched away, but Crabbe closed a meaty paw around the collar of Draco’s robes, and tugged the smaller boy into the empty compartment behind him. He slid the door shut with his free hand, the other holding his captive up on tip-toe. Crabbe tossed Draco into the cushioned seat as easily as if he were slinging around a sack of clothes. The air whooshed out of Draco’s lungs at the impact, and he scrabbled backwards breathlessly until he ran into the side of the train, and stopped.
Crabbe raised a thick fist and Draco threw his arms up over his head, but a noise from behind him caused Crabbe to spin around, his punch un-thrown.
Draco breathed a sigh of relief and peered around the other boy’s bulk to see what had interrupted his pummeling: it was another boy, only slightly shorter than Crabbe, with bristly hair and a dumbfounded expression on his face. He didn’t look a thing like Crabbe—except in basic bulk—but there was something about his expression that mirrored Crabbe’s so perfectly that they nearly gave the impression of being twins. Draco hesitated, torn between signaling for help and not wanting to admit that he required any sort of assistance.
“Someone’s left their trunk and owl out here,” the intruder said. “It yours?”
“No,” Crabbe replied surlily, “it belongs to him.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder at Draco and continued, giving the other boy his name: “Draco Malfoy.”
The interloper’s small eyes went wide and his mouth dropped into a comical “o” of surprise. Then his face drew up in a frown, and his large hands clenched into fists. “He a friend of yours?” he demanded.
“No,” Crabbe said quickly, “I’m gonna beat him up, for my dad.”
The other nodded. “Good plan,” he said. He turned and shut the door behind him, then faced Crabbe again and held out a thick hand. “Gregory Goyle,” he introduced himself. “His dad got mine thrown into Azkaban.”
Crabbe shook the proffered hand gleefully, saying, “mine too.”
They turned as one to face Draco, who drew back against the warm wall of the train. “Now, you l-listen,” he stammered, “I’m w-warning you, you don’t want to do this. You’re going to regret—”
He didn’t finish his desperate admonishment, because Crabbe’s fist connected hard with his jaw. White pain exploded in front of Draco’s eyes, and his mouth filled with blood. He blinked away stars and tears, gasping as much from shock as from the agony flickering across his face. He had never, ever been hit before, and it hurt quite a bit more than he had expected it to.
Goyle’s hand fastened itself in Draco’s collar, and he hauled the smaller boy to his feet, and then off of them. Draco clung to the other boy’s thick arm, gasping for breath as his own robes near-strangled him. His toes barely brushed the floor, and all his weight dangled from Goyle’s meaty hand.
“P-please,” Draco whimpered, his plea coming out so breathless and quiet that even he could barely hear the word.
Goyle drew back his free hand, the thick fist clenched like a boulder, his face twisted in a ferocious scowl. Crabbe peered over his shoulder, grinning at Draco.
Then, for the second time, the compartment door slid open, and both of Draco’s attackers turned to look, although Goyle did not release his asphyxiating grip on Draco's robes.
“What is going on in here?” a shrill voice demanded.
Through the tears swimming across his vision, Draco saw Crabbe and Goyle look at each other blankly. Clearly their talents lay in destruction, not dissembling, and they were at a loss for how to explain their actions. A distant, dispassionate part of Draco—a part of him that was not, apparently, concerned with his imminent strangulation—coolly made note of this deficiency, and just as coolly observed that he probably could have talked his way out of trouble, had the participants in the situation been somehow reversed.
Crabbe and Goyle, however, could manage no more answer than a dull shrug.
“Well stop it!” came the commanding response.
Draco blinked and brought the newcomer into focus: it was a girl, perhaps Draco’s height, maybe a little shorter. It was hard to gauge her height because she was completely dwarfed by the large, bushy brown mane of hair that sprouted from her head. She was dressed in a plain, rather drab skirt and jumper, and her dark blue socks were pulled nearly up to her knees. She had thick eyebrows that were drawn together in a rather dangerous frown, and her pert mouth was pursed in an even more dangerous expression of displeasure. She looked, Draco thought, like the sort of person that one ought to be wary of crossing, despite her slim frame and skinny ankles.
Goyle slowly lowered Draco to the floor and he sucked gratefully at the air so long denied him.
“He’s Draco Malfoy,” Crabbe explained dully.
“I don’t care who he is,” the girl replied waspishly, “you shouldn’t hit him!”
“But his dad—”
“I certainly don’t care who his dad is!” snapped the girl. And, for the first time in his life, Draco was glad of that.
She stepped forward, brushing past the much larger figures of Crabbe and Goyle with a fearlessness that did a lot more than just border on reckless, and grabbed Draco’s hand. She tugged the bewildered boy out of the compartment behind her, turned around to treat Crabbe and Goyle to one last fierce glare, snapped that they were going to get in awful trouble, and slammed the compartment door shut.
Draco gaped at her.
“You’re bleeding,” the girl pointed out calmly.
Draco dabbed at his split, blood-slicked lips, and winced.
His rescuer reached into the simple blue bag slung over her shoulder and pulled out a paper tissue. Draco took it with a murmur of thanks that made him wince again, and held it to his mouth.
“I assume that’s your trunk?” the girl asked.
Draco nodded.
“Right,” she said, her own head jerking in a sharp, answering gesture. “Well, if you haven’t anywhere to sit, you can come in with me,” she offered smartly. “I’m just in here, and there’s plenty of room.”
Draco glanced over his shoulder at the thin sliver of window behind which Crabbe and Goyle lay, no doubt murderously plotting revenge, and wished that she had gestured to a compartment much farther away—but then again, he was probably better off with her than he was alone, no matter where he sat.
“Thanks,” he muttered, and gave his trunk a one-handed tug. It hardly budged, its levitation charm now entirely defunct. The owl hooted crossly, unamused by Draco’s failed efforts.
The bushy-haired girl leaned down and took the trunk’s other handle, helping him drag the heavy thing into the compartment she had indicated.
She had somehow managed to get her own squat, leather-edged trunk up into the luggage rack—possibly some gallant soul had given her a hand, or maybe she was simply stronger than she looked—but with his lip still bleeding and the rest of him shaking, now that the adrenaline of the attack was wearing off, Draco didn’t even try to mimic that feat, or bother to solicit her assistance in doing so, but left his things sitting on the floor.
The train gave a final whistle, and a lurch, and pulled out of the platform. Draco glanced out the window, but the compartment the girl had chosen was on the far side of the train, and he couldn’t see the crowded platform they were leaving behind them, or his parents who were no doubt still standing on it, waving and hoping for a last glimpse of their precious only son.
“I’m Hermione Granger, by the way,” the girl introduced herself, thrusting her hand into his face.
Draco switched the bloody tissue to his other hand so that he could shake hers politely. Before he could steel himself to speak through his split lip and likewise introduce himself, she continued, “and you’re Draco Malfoy, aren’t you?”
Relieved that all he had to do was nod, he did so earnestly.
“Yes, I thought that’s what they said,” she nodded. “Well, it was rather awful of them to attack you for that, it’s not as if you can help it,” Hermione said, sniffing disdainfully. “Besides, I’ve read all about your father, and he sounds like quite the hero. I don’t see why on earth they should want to hurt you because of him.”
“Their fathers were Death Eaters,” Draco said, somewhat thickly, through the tissue. “They went to prison when my father killed the Dark Lord.”
“Ah,” Hermione nodded, “well then, I’m sure they deserved whatever happened to them, if they were foolish enough to follow You-Know-Who in the first place. And it’s certainly no reason to take it out on you, anyway.”
Draco shrugged.
“Besides,” Hermione said, with another disapproving sniff, “they shouldn’t have been brawling on the school train, no matter what silly excuse they thought they had. They’ll be in awful trouble, when we get to Hogwarts.”
“Don’t tell anyone!” Draco squawked quickly.
Hermione frowned. “Whyever not?” she demanded. “They were breaking the rules—and hurting you,” she added.
“Because—because that will only make things worse, I’m sure,” Draco pleaded. He dabbed at the fresh trail of blood that slid down his chin as he spoke, stretching the split. He didn’t want anyone to know that he had needed help to handle two such obvious dunderheads as Crabbe and Goyle, and he certainly didn’t want his father to find out that Draco hadn’t been able to hold his own on his very first day of school—before the first day of school, even, when the train hadn’t even yet pulled out of the station!
“Well...” Hermione said reluctantly, “I suppose it might...”
“And we aren’t technically at school yet,” Draco pointed out. “Things will be different there, I’m sure. They wouldn’t dare cause more trouble, not with teachers around.”
Hermione nodded slowly. “Yeah,” she said, “that’s true...but if they do try it again...”
“Oh, I’ll report them immediately to the nearest professor for their due punishment,” Draco promised blithely.
Hermione sat back, apparently assuaged by his evident reliance upon proper procedure. “Well, that’s all right then,” she said primly. “Now, you know all about magic, right?” she asked. “I mean, your father is Lucius Malfoy, you’ve known you were a wizard your whole life, I’m sure.”
Draco nodded. “Of course,” he said, wincing as his smirk tugged painfully at his bleeding lip.
“Brilliant,” said Hermione, leaning forward. “My parents are dentists, so they aren’t really much help, and I was wondering, everything I’ve read about the flame-freezing spell in our Charms book seems to indicate that proper wand movement is crucial, but the diagram is a bit vague, so...”
Draco studied the young witch in front of him, barely listening to her words. So Hermione Granger was a Muggle-born, was she? Still, she sounded intelligent, despite that, and certainly she had helped him out of a tight spot...and he knew that it was very important that they toe the current Ministry line of blood-acceptance, or at least appear to do so...
Draco Malfoy nodded, more to himself than to her, and gave the tiniest of smiles around his bloodied tissue. Mudblood or not, this Hermione Granger seemed like she might turn out to be a useful friend to have after all.