Chapter
4
Strangenesses
/ Black Rose Petals
By the time
Draco arrived in the servants’ quarters, Hermione had fallen asleep from
her
previous yelling
and crying. Her face pale and gaunt and her breath shallow, she lay on
her
side in a
corner, sleeping at least somewhat peacefully. Draco reached out and gently
traced
the outline
of her jaw, and then suddenly drew his hand back as though he’d touched
something
forbidden.
“Damn it...”
he muttered. For what seemed like hours he sat there watching Hermione
sleep,
half-convincing
himself that she was nothing more than a ‘filthy mudblood’. Finally, with
a
sigh, he got
up and left. As his heavy footsteps faded away, Hermione cautiously opened
her
eyes. Oh gods,
she thought, what in Merlin’s name is going on?
*
Early the next
morning, Draco looked at his appearance in the mirror by his lavishly
decorated
bed.
“Morning Lordship.” Yawned the mirror.
“Shut up and tell me how I look.”
“Dashing as
always. The black of your clothes really brings out your...eyes. So nicely
steely
they are,
and er...”
Draco grinned at his reflection and ran a hand through his silky ice blonde hair.
“I know I’m gorgeous, you don’t have to tell me.” He chuckled and walked towards the door.
“And yet so arrogant.” The mirror muttered half-heartedly. Unfortunately Draco heard.
Calmly, his
hand reached for an very expensive and very heavy metal and glass ornament
nearby. Like
a viper striking, Draco hurled it at the mirror. With a tinkle and a high-pitched
scream, the
mirror shattered, and shards of glass fell to the floor.
“Mirror mirror
on the wall, shame you had to take a fall.” Draco laughed idiotically at
his own
joke. He shook
his head, resumed a grim and hateful expression, and left for the main
hall.
*
“Damn it.”
Hermione muttered, wincing as the knife blade nicked her finger. Living
like a
muggle was
one thing. Peeling potatoes as a slave for the Dark Lord was another. Especially
when the Dark
Lord was Draco Malfoy, and he was playing mind games with you. Hermione
closed her
eyes, and saw his face clearly, like it was imprinted at the back of her
mind.
Scowling,
she returned to the boring task before her.
“Thinking of
me are we Princess?” Malfoy’s voice sounded like frozen poisonous honey,
dripping with
an artificial sweetness but filled with a genuine venomous sarcasm.
“Not likely.”
Not bothering to be at all polite or menial, she roughly threw a potato
into the
metal bucket
and kept peeling. She found herself then looking at a black rose he held
up in
front of her.
“Poor suicidal
Hermione. Really, you don’t have to be so vicious. I’ve brought a little
present
for you.”
He looked pointedly at the rose. The way he’d said her name made her blood
turn
cold.
“I don’t want anything from you.” She glared back with an intense anger.
“Oh really...”
He smirked, almost tenderly taking her hand in his. Bringing it up to his
lips,
he kissed
her pale knuckles with a seeming gentleness. “Take it.” He whispered, placing
the
flower in
her hand. Hermione drew in a ragged breath, now completely unsure of the
situation.
Suddenly, Draco had quickly dragged the rose’s stem across the skin of
her palm.
With a pained
gasp, Hermione realised a sharp thorn on the stem had cut deeply into
her flesh.
Draco grinned slightly, a strange glint in his eye, as a small line of
blood appeared
across Hermione’s
cut. Leaving her to the pain, Draco quickly strided away from her,
pausing at
the door.
“Have a nice
day...Hermione.”
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