She turned her head to look at him.
He was asleep, wrapped possessively around her as though he were keeping her from being stolen. His body was so warm against hers it was almost searing.
As she studied him in bewilderment, the full events of the night came back to her.
She flinched.
She shouldn't have come.
She shouldn't have come, and she shouldn't have stayed.
It had been a mistake.
He was like a dragon. The jealous way he hoarded the things he cared about — there was no moderation in it. He was possessive and deadly. He held her in his arms like she was his.
The temptation to give into it, to let him have her and to love him for it — it terrified her.
Her need to love people and the desperate desire for them to love her back — she had locked it away. Acceded its place to the coldness of logic, realism, and strategic decisions for the sake of the war. She'd shoved it down into a hole where she wouldn't feel it. Wouldn't miss it.
But Draco had dragged it up from the well where she'd hidden it, uncovered it, and set himself to picking the lock. She could almost feel his fingers turning the dial, listening to the drop of every tumbler. Lying in wait for a way in.
His own grief and loneliness, his attention and unwavering constance, and that way he looked at her, the way he touched her; it was slipping through her defenses and coiling around her heart as surely as she had wound around his.
She tried to slide out of the bed before he woke, but his eyes snapped open the instant she shifted. His hold on her tightened, and he pulled her back toward himself for a moment before his expression flickered, and he let her go.
She stilled and looked up at him.
The sense of terror he had inspired in her a year ago had faded entirely. The danger of him — it was still there, cast in even sharper relief now that she had seen how ruthlessly he could kill. But despite realising just how merciless he could be, it made her feel less frightened of him.
Now she knew how much he was holding back. Despite the heights to which he had vaulted himself within Voldemort's army, he was holding himself back. Wiping out an entire squadron of Death Eaters had barely required effort. He had arrived and killed nearly a hundred people in a matter of minutes.
She studied his face, and he stared back at her. His expression was shuttered. Whatever he might be feeling was carefully concealed. But his eyes—
The way he looked at her was enough to stop her heart.
“I shouldn't have come,” she finally said.
He didn't look hurt or surprised by the words.
“You needed someone. I just happened to be available. You don't need to worry, it's not going to complicate things for you,” he said, looking away from her, his fingers playing lightly along her wrist. “I didn't expect it to change anything.”
Hermione's breath caught and she swallowed nervously.
She couldn't tell him that that wasn't what she meant. He wasn't just someone. He was — to her he was—
That was the mistake of it.
It must have showed on her face because as he studied her, his eyes suddenly flashed with something that looked like triumph. Before she could draw away or bolt, he pulled her back to him, and his lips descended upon hers.
The moment his mouth was against hers, all her fears and guilt and resolution became lost to her.
All she could think of was how she wanted to be there, being touched by him. He was like fire. He wasn't lying in wait, he'd already burned his way in.
He had seen the cracks in her defenses, and in the same relentless manner he had driven through her occlumency walls, he was breaking his way into her heart.
He dragged her beneath himself. Searing her with his lips as his hands roamed over her body. She clung to him and kissed him back fiercely.
This wasn't like the previous night.
It wasn't comfort.
It was claiming.
His mouth was hot against her lips, along her jaw and her throat and over her shoulders. She tangled her fingers in his hair and held him as she tried not to cry from how desperately she wanted him and how grateful she was that he wasn't going to force her to ask.
His possessive hands trailed over her body, pulling her closer and closer until she was crushed against him. Then he aligned himself and sank inside her with a sharp thrust.
As he moved inside her, he memorised her body under his hands and kissed her until she was gasping for breath. He drove deep inside her.
His hold on her — his touch — she would never forget it.
He was exacting. Determined to prove what they were to her. Ensure she couldn't deny what he made her feel.
He made her come apart under his hands, under his body, twice before he let go. When he surged into her, his control slipped away leaving his expression open for a moment. There wasn't heartbreak on his face now, it was possession—
— and triumph.
“You're mine. You swore yourself to me,” he said in her ear, as he slipped out of her and dragged her tightly against himself. “Now. And after the war. You promised it. I'm going to take care of you. I'm not going to let anyone hurt you. You don't have to be lonely. Because you're mine.”
She should go.
But she had lost herself there. She was locked in the dangerous embrace of Draco Malfoy, and it felt like home.
She slept in his arms, nearly dead to the world. She couldn't remember the last time she had slept for more than four hours without Dreamless Sleep potion. She roused briefly to the sensation of his hand sliding along her shoulder. She looked up and found him studying her. She arched into his touch and pressed a kiss over his heart before falling asleep again.
When she woke next, it was nearly evening. Draco was sitting next to her, playing with her fingers.
“How are you here?” she asked, staring up at him bewildered.
He quirked an eyebrow. “This is my suite.”
She rolled her eyes. “How are you in the Muggle world? And how are you able to spend a whole day in bed with me? Aren't you a General?”
He tangled a hand in her hair and pulled her mouth against his, rolling on top of her and kissing her for several minutes before drawing his head back and staring at her. “I'm usually in the Muggle world when I'm not working. Unless I'm polyjuiced, there's no — what I am, and what I've done—” he looked away, “—everyone knows who I am. So — when I'm not on duty, I come into the Muggle world. No one knows me. If anything requires my presence, the Dark Lord can summon me himself or send someone to the Manor. I know if anyone tries to enter the gates.”
“You don't live at your manor?” she asked. His hand slid possessively down her throat, and she felt his thumb ghost across her collarbone.
“I don't. Not unless I'm required to host something. I—,” he withdrew his hand and sat up abruptly. “—it — it—” his head dropped for a second, and he drew a sharp breath. “Everything is tainted there. Every time I'm there, I hear my mother — screaming. It's like the house is haunted. The cage she was kept in; it was built into the floor of the drawing room using magic from the estate's ley lines. I can't remove it.”
The bitterness in his tone reminded Hermione of how private his grief was. How carefully he'd carried it. All alone. Year after year.
“I'm so sorry,” she said, resting her hand on his cheek and catching strands of his hair with her fingertips. He dropped his head against her palm and closed his eyes for a moment.
“Anyway,”—his voice was tense and uncomfortable—“it would raise questions if I were seen living elsewhere. Somehow I ended up in the Muggle world.” He gave a faint incredulous laugh. “I wandered around trying to figure out how it all works here. The concierge is useful; no matter how idiotic the questions I ask or bizarre the request, they find a way to accommodate it. And they never ask questions, no matter how much I bleed on their towels.”