The dueling sessions kept getting longer and longer.
Hermione pretended not to notice.
Several weeks later Malfoy pulled out a shielded cloak. She looked it over carefully.
“All my clothing is already shielded.” She held her cloak in front of herself and found that it was perfectly sized for her height.
“This is shielded with manticore blood.”
She looked over at him sharply. “Does that mean you killed it?”
“No. It's surprisingly difficult to come up with a good excuse for killing them. But it seems that mine is strangely lethargic, McNair cannot understand why,” he said with a smirk.
“You're bleeding it,” Hermione said, looking at the cloak again.
He nodded. “They don't do well in cold climates. Perhaps it will come to an unfortunate end this winter. If I'm lucky it will mature enough to produce venom before succumbing to the cold.”
“I hope you're not torturing it,” Hermione said, eyeing him. “It's sentient. And even if it weren't, every living thing should be treated humanely.”
“I am not torturing it. Although describing it as sentient just because it can speak is highly generous,” Draco said with a faint sneer. “All it does is croon about how it wants to eat me alive.”
“If you were keeping me prisoner and draining me of my magical abilities I'd croon similarly,” Hermione said.
Draco laughed mirthlessly.
“Thank you, for the cloak,” Hermione said after she looked it over carefully. It was beautifully made. It had temperature regulating charms woven into it so she could wear it all year round and it was lined with dozens of undetectably expanded pockets for her to stash things inside. The hem was charmed not to be tripped on. Even without the manticore blood protection, the cloak had to be worth a small fortune in craftsmanship.
“Consider it my thanks for healing my back,” he said without looking at her.
She looked over at him and he stared determinedly out the window. “Are they—,” she hesitated. “Did the scar tissue set properly? I — you — you never came — when I came to check on them.”
“They're fine,” he said in a stiff voice. “Physically, I can barely feel them. I had no need for further attention.”
His jaw was rolling slightly, rippling as he clenched it. Hermione stared at him for a moment before dropping her eyes back down to the cloak.
“Well, that's good,” she said. “I — hadn't ever done the procedure to that extent before. I was worried—”
“Don't be! I have no need for the concern of someone like you.”
Hermione stared at him wide-eyed. He balled his hands into fists as he stared at her.
“I just meant—,”she started.
“Just back off, Granger,” he said in hard voice. He wrenched a scroll out of his robes and dropped it onto the ground before vanishing.
Hermione picked up the scroll thoughtfully, tapping her chin after she stashed everything in her satchel.
She left the shack and walked toward the creek deep in thought.
What had he said about the influence of the runes?
“ They don't countermand my own behavior, but it's as though new elements have been written in. It's easier to be ruthless. Somewhat harder to dissuade myself from impulses. Not that I had much distracting me before, but now, everything else feels even less consequential.”
She had the runic vow memorised, she'd spent so many evenings staring at it. Unhesitating, cunning, unfailing, ruthless, and unyielding; driven to succeed….
But what he was driven to succeed in was unstated; left to his discretion.
He wanted her.
She was almost certain of it. He was currently torn between his determination to push her away and a desire to have her.
That was why he had been so enraged that she had been injured.
He couldn't dissuade himself to the point of not caring if she died, but he was determined not to give into wanting her and compromising himself. The Malfoys were possessive like dragons, Severus had said.
He knew what she was doing; what she had been sent to do. She could see it in the resentful way he stared at her. There was a vicious rage in his eyes that hadn't been there before.
But he'd become cornered by the realization that she would likely die if he didn't train her. The vampire attack had been remarkably good luck. If she'd tried to stage it it couldn't have come out better.
If she kept him near her, it was only a matter of time before he'd finally slip; he'd want her too much to keep holding back. The runes would assure it.
When that happened…
Hermione sighed.
When that happened she'd own him.
Unless he was so desperate to free himself of his obsession that he killed her.
In some moments, when she felt his eyes on her as they were dueling, it felt like a coin toss between the two. As though he were constantly weighing the options.
Confident as she had become in his attention, she wasn't confident enough to say whether she would survive it. There was so much about Draco Malfoy that she did not know or understand. When she looked at him, she could only wonder whether he was the type of person who destroyed the things he loved.
Whatever it was he wanted — his motive for spying — he'd killed countless people already to try obtaining it. If he thought she was in the way...she might be next.
Unhesitating, cunning, unfailing, ruthless, and unyielding; driven to succeed….
Hermione twisted the strap of her satchel as she stood thinking.
She needed to prioritise training Padma during any spare time she had.
Padma had a decent aptitude for healing, she stayed calm under pressure and had a good head for memorising all the spells and variations. She did have trouble with the precision needed in certain healing wand-work, and she tended to rely on rote memorisation rather than embracing the creativity necessary for inventing counter-curses. But Hermione hoped that, with Poppy's help, Padma would be able to replace Hermione sufficiently.
Hermione had started taking Padma foraging with her. Someone else needed to know how to gather the local potion supplies; with winter approaching they needed to try to stock up. But Hermione was careful not to let Draco know she had a foraging partner. If he found out, he'd probably stop training her.
She foraged with Padma on Thursday mornings. Tuesdays she still went alone, but more cautiously.
Hermione needed to have everything in place before she tried to progress things further with Draco.
She watched the water sliding beneath the bridge and wondered if she was stalling.
She didn't want to die.
The past few weeks she'd found herself thinking about dying almost as much as she thought about Draco.
After feeling the vampire's fangs sinking into her shoulder, she was abruptly confronted with the fact that on primal level she had an absolute determination not to die. She hadn't realised how overwhelming the drive was.
Rationally she had always regarded dying as something she could face. For a good reason, she would gladly die.
But the instant she felt the terror of hands pinning her to the ground and teeth sinking into her flesh, the instinct to fight her way free and kill anything that got in the way had swallowed her mind. She hadn't realised how her survival instinct would superseded everything.
She hadn't realised how much she didn't want to die.
But if it came down to her and Draco, she probably would die. He could kill her so easily. Another corpse for his body count. She'd probably bleed together with all the rest of his dead after a while.