Кассандра Клэр: Draco Veritas

Being Head Girl, Hermione had been given her own room this year. Being Hermione, she hadn´t spent much time decorating it. There was the bed with a flowered coverlet, three full bookshelves, a writing desk, and a vanity table with a mirror attached; pictures of Harry, Ron and other friends were stuck into the frame. There was another picture of Harry and Hermione together on the bedside table. There were no pictures of Draco.

Perhaps, Ginny thought uncharitably, he didn´t show up on film.

"Well, I think," said Ginny, resting her chin on her hand, "that it might be time for Desperate Measures."

Hermione, who was wearily moving around the books on her dresser, looked alarmed. "Desperate measures?" she faltered. They had been discussing the Harry Problem, and she had been growing increasingly more tense.

"Yes," said Ginny, assuming a serious expression. "Short skirt. Tight top.

That sort of thing."

Hermione looked even more alarmed. "You think the problem is that heś not attracted to me?"

"No!" Ginny protested. "No, of course not." She got up and went to stand next to her friend. "I just think heś distracted and worried, and so itś harder getting his attention now than it might normally be. And you, you´re busy too, you´re Head Girl, and taking who knows how many extra classes, and when was the last time you and Harry did anything together just for fun?"

Hermione shut her eyes. The lids were tinged with blue. Ginny felt a stab of worry; Hermione really must be unhappy about this. The circles under her eyes were dark, too, and Ginny guessed that Hermione was more tired than she was letting on. "October," she said finally, hesitantly. "We went to the museum at Stonehenge together."

"So itś been a while," said Ginny quietly. Hermione just nodded, looking miserable. She was dressed today as she often was when out of her robes: in a pale blue cashmere sweater, a pleated blue-and-gray skirt, with her hair swept up into a ponytail. Despite the modernity of her dress, however, something about her reminded Ginny of the portraits of Rowena Ravenclaw in her History of the Founders book. There was a translucent beauty to Hermione that had nothing to do with the shape of her face or the regularity of her features. Her beauty was in the light and intelligence that showed through everything she did. That Harry appreciated it and loved her because of it, Ginny thought, said good things about him. Of course, Draco had been in love with Hermione too.

But she would not think about Draco.

"You really think…" Hermione said, looking down at her sensible lace-up shoes and gray tights, "I should…dress up?"

Ginny shrugged. "Well, he is a boy."

Hermione smiled wanly. "Itś just that — well — heś Harry."

"I know," said Ginny, "and heś the hero of the wizarding world, and heś your best friend, and blah blah, but heś also a boy, and I think he´d like it if you wore this," and she pulled something out of Hermioneś top drawer and tossed it to her.

Hermione nearly fell off the bed. "I am not wearing that!"

"He´d probably like that even better."

"Itś a nightgown!"

"Oh. I thought it was a dress."

"Ginny! Be helpful!"

"Okay, okay."

Ginny eventually found a low-necked black sweater and a black pencil skirt in Hermioneś trunk that passed her inspection, especially after she´d used several Shortening Charms on the skirt.

"I feel silly," said Hermione gloomily, surveying her outfit. "This so isn´t me."

"You look adorable." Ginny got up off the bed and gave Hermione a quick hug. Outside the window, snow had begun to fall in thick white flakes.

"Everything will be fine. Harry loves you."

"I know," said Hermione. Her voice was quiet. "But lately it seems like heś gone away somewhere and I can´t follow him. He can be very…remote sometimes."

Ginny said nothing. She knew what Hermione meant. Sometimes Harry was just Harry, and then sometimes he seemed like something else again, something distant and powerful and frightening. She remembered waking up in the Chamber of Secrets to see Harry standing over her, drenched in blood, holding the ruby-studded silver sword in his right hand, scarlet to the hilt. And he had only been twelve then. Of course Harry was a hero, and heroes weren´t like everyone else.

"Ginny," Hermione said softly. She was leaning against the wall next to the window; now she turned her head to look through the glass, and the gray winter light caught the edges of her hair. Without looking at Ginny, she said, "Did you… love Draco?"

Taken aback, Ginny was silent for a moment. Then she reached for her bookbag, which was propped against the trunk. "I have to go," she said.

"I´m supposed to meet Elizabeth in the library."

Hermione turned her head. Behind her, the snow continued to fall, silently, covering the windowpane with a white icing. "Ginny — "

"Good luck," Ginny said, hoisting her bookbag over her shoulder. "It´ll be fine, you´ll see."

Hermione nodded, and was silent for a long moment. "I just feel so guilty," she said at last, so quietly that Ginny almost didn´t catch the words. When she did, she stared at her friend in incomprehension.

"What on earth about?"

Hermione looked weary. "Nothing. Never mind."

There was no one else in the Slytherin common room; everyone was at dinner. Draco, not feeling hungry, had stayed behind, although the common area was hardly one of his favorite places. The long, low, underground room never seemed warm, not even in when there was a fire blazing in the ornate marble fireplace, as there was now. The low-hanging greenish lamps cast a sickly sort of pallor over everything. Draco slumped deep into the forest-green velvet armchair he had pulled up to the fire, lost in thought.

He was still disturbed by the vision of his father he had had earlier that day during Potions class. He was almost entirely sure it had not been an ordinary dream — he recalled the pain that had shot through his hand upon waking, and remembered Harry telling him of the prophetic dreams he had dreamed about Voldemort, how Harry had woken up with pains in his scar. And he himself had dreamed bits of Slytherinś life, and sometimes still did. Ordinary dreams were one thing; this was something else. It had looked so real, as well. He tried to imagine where his father and the Dark Lord might be, but there had been nothing specifically identifiable about the stone room. It could have been anywhere.

And his fatherś voice had been so familiar. The careless drawl that he had inherited. The boy is unreliable, Master. Draco tipped his head back and looked at the ceiling, which was carved out of alternating strips of marble and green malachite. Keep your head down, Draco, and let the Heir of Slytherin get on with it, his father had said to him during his second year. That school of yours needs ridding of its Mudblood filth.

Of course he must have known that I was the Heir of Slytherin, Draco thought. He was just using that story as a convenient cover-up for what was really going on. He stretched and looked down at the Transfiguration book in his lap. They were learning how to transform various elements into each other. Aqua ad pulvis transmuta. Saxum ad viscerum. Turn water to dust, stone to flesh. But he was too tired to concentrate, and the words danced on the page.

He heard the sound of footsteps in the corridor then, and the dungeon door swung open as students began to stream in, returning from dinner.

He tensed, before remembering that Blaise had a study date with Pansy Parkinson in the library. He wasn´t up to dealing with her right now.