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ashleyfanficTitle: Cold
Word Count: 2,666
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Draco/Hermione
Phrase: "I'm so cold"
For:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
vashka_kat
Summary: Draco and Hermione in a cold cabin together...
A/N: This fic lends itself to the possibility of a bit of smut, but I'm just not in the mood to write it, so use your imaginations on that part. Also, this was only supposed to be between 100-1,000 words, and I topped it by over 1,600. It just wouldn't write any faster than that.
He knew it was near, he just simply couldn’t find it. The snow falling, blurring his vision, made traipsing through the knee high powder nearly impossible, and carrying the form of the unconscious Gryffindor only that much harder. He would have apparated them out of there in a second, had his wand not been broken in the scuffle. And he had no idea what had happened to hers.
Coming into the fray nearly too late had left him at a disadvantage. When he learned that the trio was trying to break onto Malfoy grounds in order to get to his psychotic aunt and the Dark Lord, he was astonished. But as soon as he realized that they had been found and a battle was ensuing, he couldn’t stop himself from trying to assist. Potter and Weasley had done their job, only they hadn’t realized that their dear Granger had taken a tumble and was unconscious before they left.
He hoisted her higher, trying to find the small cottage he knew sat near where they were. The only problem was the snow and darkness. He was growing increasingly frustrated. He continued walking in, what he assumed was, the right direction and winced was he kicked a step and nearly went head first into the snow, Granger’s motionless form in his arms.
He realized that he had found what he was looking for and opened the door. There wasn’t much in the way of furniture, one very small bed, a rocking chair, small stove, and a fireplace. He was thankful to see that there was firewood beside the hearth. One less trip into the snow, the better, in his mind. He figured they could ride out the night in the small cabin and then go their separate ways in the morning.
He placed Hermione on the bed, the frame creaking as she sank onto the mattress. She didn’t move and he turned from her to the fireplace. He looked around for anything that could be used to light it. He finally found a book of matches, wondering who had been using the cabin, and went about laying the wood onto the fire and lighting it. He found a trunk in the corner of the room and opened it to find several large furs, obviously used as blankets.
He moved over to Hermione and placed several of them over her, trying to keep her warm in the abysmal cold. He pulled the rocking chair close to the fire and hugged himself, trying to hold whatever warmth he could. He didn’t know how much time had passed before she moved on the bed and slowly sat up, clearly shivering. The room was still not warm, but there wasn’t much he could do about it. She seemed to be taking in her surroundings and looked startled as she laid eyes on him.
“Malfoy?” she said softly. “What’s…what’s going on?” she asked as her body was wracked with a shiver.
“I saved your life. You can thank me later,” he said softly before he stood and added another log to the fire.
She violently shivered again. “I’m…so cold.” He moved over to sit beside her on the bed and added another fur, to which she shook her head. “It…It won’t work. As…as lon-g as I’m…wet I’ll be cold.”
He sighed and removed his broken wand. “I can’t fix it. Where’s yours?”
She searched beneath the furs for her wand and frowned when she realized she didn’t have it. “I don’t…know,” she said as her teeth chattered.
He frowned. “We’re just going to stick this out until morning then head to the manor…”
“But…”
“Only my mother is there. You and your friends succeeded with your plans to eliminate your targets,” he said softly, finally thinking about his father who had fallen as he took a curse meant for him from Weasley’s father, which made it even more complicated. He forced the thoughts back as he realized that he wanted to hurt Weasley.
Hermione removed her coat followed by her jumper. He turned his eyes away. “What are you doing?”
“My clothes are wet. I can’t stay in them,” she said matter-of-factly. She reached beneath the furs and shifted and suddenly shoes, socks, and jeans fells out from beneath the furs. She wrapped one of the furs around her shoulders and gave a violent shiver. “Can you hang my clothes in front of the fire?” Draco turned from the sight of her wrapped in furs, nearly naked, and hung her clothes on the hooks in front of the fire. She looked around, and noticed that Draco was wet as well. “You should do the same. If you stay in them, you could get hypothermia.”
He looked at her after he hung her jumper on the last hook. “I’m fine.”
“No time to be stubborn, Malfoy,” she said irritably. “You saved my life and I’m not going to let you die simply because you’re being difficult.”
He rolled his eyes. “I’m fine, Granger.”
She frowned. “Honestly, is your pride going to allow you to freeze to death?”
He glared at her. “It’s not about pride,” he snapped.
She seemed taken aback by his tone and frowned. “Then what is it?”
He shook his head, figuring that arguing with her was no use. She was going to see and there was nothing he could do about it. He removed his coat and hung it over the chair, not realizing until the cold air hit him how wet he actually was. Falling into the snow, repeatedly, while trying to stay alive, was not conducive to staying dry. He sat on the edge of the bed and removed his boots but left on his socks. The thick leather of the boots and the wool socks had thankfully kept his feet warm and dry. He slipped his slacks off, finding that this was probably incredibly stupid, as he couldn’t imagine how being half-naked could keep him any warmer than wet clothes. He sat on the edge of the bed and was even more reluctant to remove his jumper and reveal the true horror of what he’d been living through.
“I can’t believe you’re being so modest,” she said with a roll of her eyes. He knew she would regret it after she saw, and he hoped that it shocked her into silence the rest of the evening. He removed his jumper and the gasp that filled the room let him know that it really was as bad as he thought. His back, arms, and chest were covered with welts, scratches, and gashes; punishment for his family’s failure. He suffered for everything because he was the one thing that his father, mother, and aunt valued above any other. He tossed the jumper onto the chair and grabbed a fur to wrap around his body. He leaned against the wall and shivered a bit.
He didn’t look at her, afraid of seeing the pity on her face. He didn’t want her to pity him. He just wanted life to be normal again, and if she pitied him then it never would.
“Malfoy…Draco,” she said as she shifted on the bed. “What happened?”
He glared at her. “Take a guess.”
She frowned. “How often?”
He sighed, surprised at how much he wanted to open up to her. He wasn’t allowed to talk about it, his parent’s fear that it would be worse should he say anything. “Daily,” he said softly.
She moved closer to him, keeping the makeshift blanket around her body, allowing him to see that her bra was obviously a nice powder blue color. She gently touched one of the newer welts and he hissed as she moved her finger over. “Granger, that hurts,” he said as he pulled away.
She frowned. “Is this why you saved me? Why you helped us?” she asked as she sat beside him.
He reached for a few more furs and pulled them around her. “I just…I wanted it all to stop.”
She sighed and nodded. “I think it will, now that he’s gone.”
He frowned. “I hope so.”
She looked up at him and slowly laid her head on his shoulder and took his left wrist in her hand to look at the dark mark on his arm and noticed that it was stationary and faded. She gave a small smile and looked up at him. “It seems to be over.”
He looked down at her and shook his head. “Don’t.”
“Don’t what?” she asked softly.
“You know what,” he said softly. “Don’t make me out to be some sort of…saint.”
She raised an eyebrow at that. “Of all the words I would use to describe you that would never enter my vocabulary.” She sighed and rested her head against his shoulder again. “All this just made me realize that everyone has their demons.”
He said nothing as he felt her move a little closer to him, and found the warmth of her body comforting. “I’m so tired,” he said as he yawned.
She shook her head. “We can’t go to sleep.”
He looked at her. “Why not?”
“Because, if we happen to have hypothermia, then we could die in our sleep,” she supplied.
He shook his head. “If I want to go to sleep, you can’t stop me.”
“I certainly can,” she tilted her head up at him. He wanted to kiss her, was dying to kiss her, but he felt that if he did, then he surely would die in the morning when her friends eventually realized that she wasn’t with them and came looking for her. She shivered once before she pressed her lips to his.
*~*
A hand suddenly slapped him in the middle of his bare chest and he sat up, startled out of his dream. He looked over at the blond baby with ringlet curls laughing at him. “Dada!”
Hermione laughed from beside him. “Dante was tired of waiting on you,” she said as she ruffled the boy’s fine hair.
Draco sat up in bed and rubbed his eyes as Hermione pulled the baby into her lap. Draco reached for her and pulled her in front of him. He placed a kiss on her shoulder then the juncture of her neck and jaw. She leaned up and kissed his jaw, and pulled back with a wince. “You need to shave,” she said as she snuggled against him. “I’m so cold,” she said as she pulled his arms around her.
He smiled against her temple. “You’re beautiful,” he said softly.
She smiled. “Flatterer.”
He shrugged and watched as his son drifted to sleep. “How long has he been awake?”
“Since about six thirty.”
“What time is it?”
“Nine-thirty.”
He nodded. “So, while he’s asleep, would you like to join me for a bit of a lie in?”
She grinned. “Love to,” she said as she climbed off the bed with Dante and carried him out of the room. He drifted back into his memory of when his entire world had changed. He’d spent the entire night making love to Hermione, only for her friends to find her in the morning, luckily right as they were planning to go back to the manor and not sooner.
It was months before he saw her again, and in the most unexpected place. He had been brought up on charges of attempted murder and assault on Katie Bell and Madam Rosemerta. She and Potter had been called as witnesses to testify not only about the distress that Draco had been under due to the threat against his family, but also about his assisting the light when it mattered most, and without him, they all probably would have died. Hermione for sure.
He tried to talk to her after he was released only she had disappeared before he got the opportunity. No one knew what had happened to the trio and Draco went about putting his life back together. His mother had been admitted to St. Mungo’s psychological ward, as she had gone crazy after the war, and nearly burned their home down.
It was at St. Mungo’s where he’d found her. She worked as a Healer on one of the other floors and he was thrilled to finally see her. He had thanked her for what she’d done for him, all while she didn’t look at him. She informed him that she couldn’t see him ever again as her friends would kill him after they found out what happened at the cabin, and it had been by her swearing to have nothing to do with him any longer that Potter had testified for him. He was livid and told her as much.
He saw her in passing at the hospital, but kept away from her, as all he really wanted was for her to be happy. But he could tell that she wasn’t happy. In fact, she looked decidedly miserable. He finally told her that it wouldn’t do to have them both miserable when what they really wanted to do was be together. She told him, once again, that she couldn’t because she promised her friends. He managed to convince her, somehow, to go out with him, and they’d keep it secret from everyone.
Months went by as their relationship progressed, her friends suspicious of her new found happiness and her absence from certain events. Their happiness was short lived, however, as they were caught in Hermione’s home one Sunday morning. Draco remembered it all too well. Her friends came over to invite her to the Weasley’s for lunch only to walk into her bedroom, without knocking, and found Draco and Hermione sleeping together. Neither talked to her for over a year, and while she was terribly upset about it, she didn’t let it keep her from Draco. He was thankful that she had given them the chance to get to know one another, and he found that his life without her was empty. He loved her. She loved him.
He found that he didn’t want to live without her, and so he made plans to propose. It wasn’t anything special, just them sitting in her living room, watching a movie. He told her he loved her, she said it back, and he asked her. She knocked the wind out of him when she pounced on him to accept.
He wanted to make it right between her and her friends, however. A part of her would always be unhappy about the fact that her friends disapproved. He found them at Weasley’s Wheezes, where George nearly had some of his fireworks set him on fire. He told them that he was going to marry Hermione, and if they were really her friends, then they could be supportive of her the same way she had been of them. He was sure that his arguments for Hermione had fallen on deaf ears until she came to see him that evening and shagged him where he stood as a thank you for giving her back her friends.
Their wedding had come and gone in a flash of white and as a surprise for her he had fixed the dilapidated cabin where they had spent their first night together. They still used it as an escape whenever they just needed to get away. It was nearly a year later, after living very happily as newlyweds that Hermione found out she was pregnant and informed a terrified Draco. Nearly two years later, Draco found that he was happy, truly happy, and had he not decided to finally take a stand for his family, he may not have the best thing that ever happened to him.
She entered the room once more and climbed onto the bed with Draco and snuggled beneath the covers. He lay back against the pillows and she rested her head over his heart.
“Still cold?” he asked as he pulled the blankets tighter around her.
She shook her head and smiled up at him. “Very warm,” she said as she moved forward and kissed him.
Word Count: 2,666
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Draco/Hermione
Phrase: "I'm so cold"
For:
vashka_katSummary: Draco and Hermione in a cold cabin together...
A/N: This fic lends itself to the possibility of a bit of smut, but I'm just not in the mood to write it, so use your imaginations on that part. Also, this was only supposed to be between 100-1,000 words, and I topped it by over 1,600. It just wouldn't write any faster than that.
He knew it was near, he just simply couldn’t find it. The snow falling, blurring his vision, made traipsing through the knee high powder nearly impossible, and carrying the form of the unconscious Gryffindor only that much harder. He would have apparated them out of there in a second, had his wand not been broken in the scuffle. And he had no idea what had happened to hers.
Coming into the fray nearly too late had left him at a disadvantage. When he learned that the trio was trying to break onto Malfoy grounds in order to get to his psychotic aunt and the Dark Lord, he was astonished. But as soon as he realized that they had been found and a battle was ensuing, he couldn’t stop himself from trying to assist. Potter and Weasley had done their job, only they hadn’t realized that their dear Granger had taken a tumble and was unconscious before they left.
He hoisted her higher, trying to find the small cottage he knew sat near where they were. The only problem was the snow and darkness. He was growing increasingly frustrated. He continued walking in, what he assumed was, the right direction and winced was he kicked a step and nearly went head first into the snow, Granger’s motionless form in his arms.
He realized that he had found what he was looking for and opened the door. There wasn’t much in the way of furniture, one very small bed, a rocking chair, small stove, and a fireplace. He was thankful to see that there was firewood beside the hearth. One less trip into the snow, the better, in his mind. He figured they could ride out the night in the small cabin and then go their separate ways in the morning.
He placed Hermione on the bed, the frame creaking as she sank onto the mattress. She didn’t move and he turned from her to the fireplace. He looked around for anything that could be used to light it. He finally found a book of matches, wondering who had been using the cabin, and went about laying the wood onto the fire and lighting it. He found a trunk in the corner of the room and opened it to find several large furs, obviously used as blankets.
He moved over to Hermione and placed several of them over her, trying to keep her warm in the abysmal cold. He pulled the rocking chair close to the fire and hugged himself, trying to hold whatever warmth he could. He didn’t know how much time had passed before she moved on the bed and slowly sat up, clearly shivering. The room was still not warm, but there wasn’t much he could do about it. She seemed to be taking in her surroundings and looked startled as she laid eyes on him.
“Malfoy?” she said softly. “What’s…what’s going on?” she asked as her body was wracked with a shiver.
“I saved your life. You can thank me later,” he said softly before he stood and added another log to the fire.
She violently shivered again. “I’m…so cold.” He moved over to sit beside her on the bed and added another fur, to which she shook her head. “It…It won’t work. As…as lon-g as I’m…wet I’ll be cold.”
He sighed and removed his broken wand. “I can’t fix it. Where’s yours?”
She searched beneath the furs for her wand and frowned when she realized she didn’t have it. “I don’t…know,” she said as her teeth chattered.
He frowned. “We’re just going to stick this out until morning then head to the manor…”
“But…”
“Only my mother is there. You and your friends succeeded with your plans to eliminate your targets,” he said softly, finally thinking about his father who had fallen as he took a curse meant for him from Weasley’s father, which made it even more complicated. He forced the thoughts back as he realized that he wanted to hurt Weasley.
Hermione removed her coat followed by her jumper. He turned his eyes away. “What are you doing?”
“My clothes are wet. I can’t stay in them,” she said matter-of-factly. She reached beneath the furs and shifted and suddenly shoes, socks, and jeans fells out from beneath the furs. She wrapped one of the furs around her shoulders and gave a violent shiver. “Can you hang my clothes in front of the fire?” Draco turned from the sight of her wrapped in furs, nearly naked, and hung her clothes on the hooks in front of the fire. She looked around, and noticed that Draco was wet as well. “You should do the same. If you stay in them, you could get hypothermia.”
He looked at her after he hung her jumper on the last hook. “I’m fine.”
“No time to be stubborn, Malfoy,” she said irritably. “You saved my life and I’m not going to let you die simply because you’re being difficult.”
He rolled his eyes. “I’m fine, Granger.”
She frowned. “Honestly, is your pride going to allow you to freeze to death?”
He glared at her. “It’s not about pride,” he snapped.
She seemed taken aback by his tone and frowned. “Then what is it?”
He shook his head, figuring that arguing with her was no use. She was going to see and there was nothing he could do about it. He removed his coat and hung it over the chair, not realizing until the cold air hit him how wet he actually was. Falling into the snow, repeatedly, while trying to stay alive, was not conducive to staying dry. He sat on the edge of the bed and removed his boots but left on his socks. The thick leather of the boots and the wool socks had thankfully kept his feet warm and dry. He slipped his slacks off, finding that this was probably incredibly stupid, as he couldn’t imagine how being half-naked could keep him any warmer than wet clothes. He sat on the edge of the bed and was even more reluctant to remove his jumper and reveal the true horror of what he’d been living through.
“I can’t believe you’re being so modest,” she said with a roll of her eyes. He knew she would regret it after she saw, and he hoped that it shocked her into silence the rest of the evening. He removed his jumper and the gasp that filled the room let him know that it really was as bad as he thought. His back, arms, and chest were covered with welts, scratches, and gashes; punishment for his family’s failure. He suffered for everything because he was the one thing that his father, mother, and aunt valued above any other. He tossed the jumper onto the chair and grabbed a fur to wrap around his body. He leaned against the wall and shivered a bit.
He didn’t look at her, afraid of seeing the pity on her face. He didn’t want her to pity him. He just wanted life to be normal again, and if she pitied him then it never would.
“Malfoy…Draco,” she said as she shifted on the bed. “What happened?”
He glared at her. “Take a guess.”
She frowned. “How often?”
He sighed, surprised at how much he wanted to open up to her. He wasn’t allowed to talk about it, his parent’s fear that it would be worse should he say anything. “Daily,” he said softly.
She moved closer to him, keeping the makeshift blanket around her body, allowing him to see that her bra was obviously a nice powder blue color. She gently touched one of the newer welts and he hissed as she moved her finger over. “Granger, that hurts,” he said as he pulled away.
She frowned. “Is this why you saved me? Why you helped us?” she asked as she sat beside him.
He reached for a few more furs and pulled them around her. “I just…I wanted it all to stop.”
She sighed and nodded. “I think it will, now that he’s gone.”
He frowned. “I hope so.”
She looked up at him and slowly laid her head on his shoulder and took his left wrist in her hand to look at the dark mark on his arm and noticed that it was stationary and faded. She gave a small smile and looked up at him. “It seems to be over.”
He looked down at her and shook his head. “Don’t.”
“Don’t what?” she asked softly.
“You know what,” he said softly. “Don’t make me out to be some sort of…saint.”
She raised an eyebrow at that. “Of all the words I would use to describe you that would never enter my vocabulary.” She sighed and rested her head against his shoulder again. “All this just made me realize that everyone has their demons.”
He said nothing as he felt her move a little closer to him, and found the warmth of her body comforting. “I’m so tired,” he said as he yawned.
She shook her head. “We can’t go to sleep.”
He looked at her. “Why not?”
“Because, if we happen to have hypothermia, then we could die in our sleep,” she supplied.
He shook his head. “If I want to go to sleep, you can’t stop me.”
“I certainly can,” she tilted her head up at him. He wanted to kiss her, was dying to kiss her, but he felt that if he did, then he surely would die in the morning when her friends eventually realized that she wasn’t with them and came looking for her. She shivered once before she pressed her lips to his.
*~*
A hand suddenly slapped him in the middle of his bare chest and he sat up, startled out of his dream. He looked over at the blond baby with ringlet curls laughing at him. “Dada!”
Hermione laughed from beside him. “Dante was tired of waiting on you,” she said as she ruffled the boy’s fine hair.
Draco sat up in bed and rubbed his eyes as Hermione pulled the baby into her lap. Draco reached for her and pulled her in front of him. He placed a kiss on her shoulder then the juncture of her neck and jaw. She leaned up and kissed his jaw, and pulled back with a wince. “You need to shave,” she said as she snuggled against him. “I’m so cold,” she said as she pulled his arms around her.
He smiled against her temple. “You’re beautiful,” he said softly.
She smiled. “Flatterer.”
He shrugged and watched as his son drifted to sleep. “How long has he been awake?”
“Since about six thirty.”
“What time is it?”
“Nine-thirty.”
He nodded. “So, while he’s asleep, would you like to join me for a bit of a lie in?”
She grinned. “Love to,” she said as she climbed off the bed with Dante and carried him out of the room. He drifted back into his memory of when his entire world had changed. He’d spent the entire night making love to Hermione, only for her friends to find her in the morning, luckily right as they were planning to go back to the manor and not sooner.
It was months before he saw her again, and in the most unexpected place. He had been brought up on charges of attempted murder and assault on Katie Bell and Madam Rosemerta. She and Potter had been called as witnesses to testify not only about the distress that Draco had been under due to the threat against his family, but also about his assisting the light when it mattered most, and without him, they all probably would have died. Hermione for sure.
He tried to talk to her after he was released only she had disappeared before he got the opportunity. No one knew what had happened to the trio and Draco went about putting his life back together. His mother had been admitted to St. Mungo’s psychological ward, as she had gone crazy after the war, and nearly burned their home down.
It was at St. Mungo’s where he’d found her. She worked as a Healer on one of the other floors and he was thrilled to finally see her. He had thanked her for what she’d done for him, all while she didn’t look at him. She informed him that she couldn’t see him ever again as her friends would kill him after they found out what happened at the cabin, and it had been by her swearing to have nothing to do with him any longer that Potter had testified for him. He was livid and told her as much.
He saw her in passing at the hospital, but kept away from her, as all he really wanted was for her to be happy. But he could tell that she wasn’t happy. In fact, she looked decidedly miserable. He finally told her that it wouldn’t do to have them both miserable when what they really wanted to do was be together. She told him, once again, that she couldn’t because she promised her friends. He managed to convince her, somehow, to go out with him, and they’d keep it secret from everyone.
Months went by as their relationship progressed, her friends suspicious of her new found happiness and her absence from certain events. Their happiness was short lived, however, as they were caught in Hermione’s home one Sunday morning. Draco remembered it all too well. Her friends came over to invite her to the Weasley’s for lunch only to walk into her bedroom, without knocking, and found Draco and Hermione sleeping together. Neither talked to her for over a year, and while she was terribly upset about it, she didn’t let it keep her from Draco. He was thankful that she had given them the chance to get to know one another, and he found that his life without her was empty. He loved her. She loved him.
He found that he didn’t want to live without her, and so he made plans to propose. It wasn’t anything special, just them sitting in her living room, watching a movie. He told her he loved her, she said it back, and he asked her. She knocked the wind out of him when she pounced on him to accept.
He wanted to make it right between her and her friends, however. A part of her would always be unhappy about the fact that her friends disapproved. He found them at Weasley’s Wheezes, where George nearly had some of his fireworks set him on fire. He told them that he was going to marry Hermione, and if they were really her friends, then they could be supportive of her the same way she had been of them. He was sure that his arguments for Hermione had fallen on deaf ears until she came to see him that evening and shagged him where he stood as a thank you for giving her back her friends.
Their wedding had come and gone in a flash of white and as a surprise for her he had fixed the dilapidated cabin where they had spent their first night together. They still used it as an escape whenever they just needed to get away. It was nearly a year later, after living very happily as newlyweds that Hermione found out she was pregnant and informed a terrified Draco. Nearly two years later, Draco found that he was happy, truly happy, and had he not decided to finally take a stand for his family, he may not have the best thing that ever happened to him.
She entered the room once more and climbed onto the bed with Draco and snuggled beneath the covers. He lay back against the pillows and she rested her head over his heart.
“Still cold?” he asked as he pulled the blankets tighter around her.
She shook her head and smiled up at him. “Very warm,” she said as she moved forward and kissed him.