She shook her head. 'It's not the same.'
'Why not?' snapped Draco irritably, as she yanked off his shoes.
'Because she doesn't love you back,' said Fleur, and yanked off the other shoe.
'Thank you for that observation,' he said, wryly. 'Would you like to take a knife and stick it in my chest and twist it around a bit?
Because I don't think you've quote reached your sadism quota for the evening.'
In answer, Fleur put her hand on his chest and pushed him down, hard. Drawing back the hood of her cloak, she crawled on top of him, letting her long silvery hair fall down around them like a cage of shimmering strands. 'You should not be depressed,' she said, poking him in the ribs with her finger. 'You are a Malfoy. You are rich and you are famous and when you grow up a bit you will be very good-looking. You have powers most people only dream of, and you are part-veela, which is a very good thing to be. You have nothing to be depressed about.'
'What do you mean when I grow up a bit? I'm good-looking now!' he protested, propping himself up on his elbows.
Fleur giggled. Because of the way she was sitting, with her hands on his chest, he actually felt the giggle vibrate through his ribcage.
'And you've no idea what I'm depressed about,' he added. 'No idea.'
'So tell me.'
And, rather to his utter amazement, he did, starting with the flight to find Hermione, continuing on through the love potion and winding up with his visit to his father that afternoon. When he was done he felt ever so slightly, although not entirely, better. 'And there you have it,' he finished. 'My father's a maniac and I'm some kind of spawn of the Dark Lord and now I should probably kill you before you can go to the Ministry, but frankly, I'm too tired.'
'You wouldn't hurt me,' said Fleur, curving her lips into a mysterious smile. 'Unless I wanted you to.'
'That's optimistic of you. Did you miss the part of the story where I'm evil?'
'Oh, evil,' said Fleur, making a dismissive gesture with her hand.
'There is no such thing.' She leaned forward and started to run her finger meditatively up and down his sternum. 'Things are not so black and white as you make them out to be.'
'Oh great, a lecture on moral relativism, just what I don't need. My father says I'm evil and he is the expert in that department, so I think I'm perfectly justified in being worried and okay people usually ask before they do that, what are you doing? Stop!' He grabbed her hand. 'Didn't you hear any part of anything that I just told you?'
She crossed her arms over her chest and stared down at him, biting her lip in what looked like either thoughtfulness or vexation, he wasn't sure. She was extremely pretty; probably, in fact, the most beautiful girl he'd ever seen. Beautiful in an entirely different way than Hermione, who was beautiful in the bright flashes of her personality and intelligence that showed through everything she did.
'Are you telling me no?' she said.
He narrowed his eyes. 'I'm telling you-' he began, and then broke off. He had a strange urge to laugh, but repressed it. 'Sod it. It's not like I've got a lot of virtue to protect. If you want to kiss me, kiss me.'
'All right,' she said, and leaned forward.
At first, the kiss landed rather awkwardly on the side of his mouth, so he reached up to take hold of her shoulders to pull her into a better position. He sat forward a little, leaning into the kiss, sliding his hands up into her spun-silk hair — her mouth was cool, and tasted of lemons — and was just beginning to enjoy it when a thunderous, explosive noise split the clearing.
He jerked away from Fleur, who, unbalanced, fell to the side, landing on her knees. 'Ooof,' she said, irritably. 'What's wrong with you?'
But Draco was staring past her, towards the dragon-shaped bridge that arched over the now-dry pond. A large chunk of the iron railing had, for no apparent reason, torn itself free and collapsed sideways, landing in a clump of twisted metal on the muddy dirt. That was the noise that he had heard. 'What..?' he began.
'Oh,' said Fleur, following his gaze. 'Yes, that's because we're both Magids, you know? When emotions are generated between us like that — ' She made a very expressive, very French gesture with her hands — 'Boom!'
'Boom?' said Draco, staring at her in disbelief. 'My kissing you sets off some sort of — death ray — and all you can say is Boom?'
She giggled. 'It's also because we're both part-veela. It's a very unusual combination, you know. I just think we should make the most of it.' She winked at him. 'It could be really, really fun.'
'Fleur,' he said, feeling suddenly annoyed, 'when I think about myself doing something really, really fun, it doesn't usually end up with me getting myself really, really killed. Which I think is what's going to happen here, so I'm sorry, but I'm just going to have to keep on owing you a favor.'
She smiled sidelong. 'Not necessarily,' she said.
He looked at her. 'What do you mean?'
'There is,' she said, 'Something else you could give me…'
When Lupin walked into the library, he found Ron and Hermione sitting at the desk, up to their ears in books. Hermione had delegated to Ron the task of researching Salazar Slytherin's history.
His red head poked up above a stack of books with titles like Slytherins through the Ages, Evil Dark Wizards and the Bad Stuff they Did, the Handbook for Evil Overlords, and Really Cunning Plans: An Overview, by Salazar Slytherin himself.
Hermione herself was surrounded by books with titles like Counterspells: A Commentary; Love Potions: Legend or Reality, and Swift Spell Reversals: When You've Really Buggered Up and Need A Quick Fix.
Hermione was glancing wearily over at Ron. 'Found anything?'
