He looked as if his father had dressed him — in fact, he looked very much his father's son. He wore elegant black clothes, a cloak over a suit, cut from heavy dark material that looked as if it had been imported from the nineteenth century specifically for Malfoy use. The cloak was made out of some weather-resistant enchanted cloth that the snow couldn't dampen or touch. His dress shirt was ferociously, spotlessly white, and the cold burn of his green cufflinks was the only color he wore. He had run a brush (her brush) through his hair before they left and Hermione had been forced to admit that it actually looked better now: the shorter cut suited the thin shape of his face, and in the wet weather, it curled damply against the nape of his neck in a way that -
'Are you thinking what I'm thinking?' Draco inquired, interrupting her thoughts.
Hopefully not, unless you're even more in love with yourself than you pretend you are, Hermione thought darkly, but all she said was, 'If it's
'How the hell did Harry wander in here', then yes.'
'That wasn't it,' said Draco, still staring at the doors with a bemused expression.
'Well, if you're hoping that they have a karaoke bar so you can sing a cover version of 'You Don't Own Me', then no,' said Hermione.
Now Draco did look at her. He smiled faintly. 'I was wondering how we were going to get back out,' he said. 'The place is a fortress.'
Hermione tapped the side pocket of her cloak. 'I brought one of the hotel's return Portkeys,' she said.
Now his smile was less faint. 'You think of everything,' he said.
She felt herself flush. 'I try.'
They went up the stairs together and Draco lifted the heavy bronze knocker and let it fall. The sound of the knock seemed to echo down some far corridor. When, a moment later, a small panel opened in the door, Hermione thought at first that there was no one there, only a faint, pale green light that seemed to emanate from within. A high-pitched voice trilled, 'Show your passes.'
Hermione, panicked, looked to Draco. Not looking nervous at all, he was sliding the black glove off his right hand. He raised the hand and indolently waved it front of the open panel. There was a look on his face she recognized. Contemptuous, arrogant. She knew he was playing a part but she did not like it. 'Recognize the ring?' he sneered, lowering his hand. 'You should. A hand that wears one like it pays your wages. Open the door.'
There was a silence. The panel sealed itself up. Abruptly, with the rattling sound of a dozen bolts sliding back, the door opened in front of them, revealing a long blue corridor that stretched away into the middle distance. Gold torches burned at intervals along the corridor walls. And hovering in front of Hermione and Draco, roughly at eye level, was a fairy.
Hermione blinked. It was definitely a fairy — a small green one with gold and violet wings. It was not at all like the pictures of fairies she had seen in books. Its green-silver carapace had an insectile sheen, and behind its narrow lips shone a row of razor teeth. They gleamed as it squeaked a question:
'You have been sent by the Malfoys?'
Draco's eyes narrowed. Hermione couldn't help but admire how completely he had transformed himself. All his tiredness had dropped away and you could no longer see that he looked weary, or ill, or that he had dark shadows beneath his gray eyes. He wore the overbearing egotism of his family as if it were a second expensive cloak. 'I am a Malfoy,' he spat.
'Then,' inquired the fairy, 'why didn't you use one of the official Portkeys, sir…?'
Draco looked furious. 'Because I was testing your security measures, you overgrown hornet!' he shouted.
The fairy's double-lidded eyes opened wide. 'I am a pixie,' it hissed. 'And if you continue to shout at me in that manner — '
'Be quiet,' Draco barked imperiously, and the fairy's mouth snapped shut. 'My father sent me here to inspect the facilities, and that's exactly what I intend to do. Now look here. You can either take me immediately to Mister Blackthorpe — he's still the manager here, isn't he? — right, then, you can either take me to his office, or I can come back with an industrial-sized flyswatter and repaint these walls in a stylish new shade called
'Pixie Guts Splattered All Over.' It's a long name, but I think the color would go well with the floor tiling.'
The fairy spluttered. Because it was so small, the splutter sounded rather like the buzzing of a bee. For a moment Hermione was afraid that the winged creature was going to fly at Draco and bite him.
'Very well,' it ground out, finally.'…Sir.'
The fairy darted off down the hall. Gathering her cloak around her, Hermione moved to follow, but Draco stilled her with a hand on her arm.
She tilted her head back. 'What?'
'Wait just a minute.'
He turned her to face him, and looked at her consideringly — a long slow look, up and down. Hermione felt a blush start at the open neckline of her sensible button-down cardigan, and spread up towards her face.
'Put you cloak back,' he said. When she didn't move, he hissed an exasperated breath through his teeth. 'Fine-I'll do it,' he said, and unbuckled the front of her cloak with a fluid movement, pushing the separated halves back over her shoulders. His hands went to her waist, pulling her cardigan out of the waistband of her skirt, fingers rucking up the material, cold on her skin. She shivered.
'Draco, what are you — '
His voice was low as he replied. 'Just trust me.' The word trust sounded strange in his mouth: an intimate threat. Hermione stood stock still as his fingers glided over her clothes, flipping the lower buttons out of their holes, tugging the cardigan up and tying it tightly under her breasts, leaving her stomach bare. He tackled her skirt next, folding the waistband over several times, shortening the skirt until the hem of it brushed the tops of her thighs. He straightened up and looked at her, the gleam of evaluation in his eyes.
Hermione struggled not to blush. 'If you think that I — '
'You said undercover,' he said, and tugged the barrettes from her hair, a swift but not ungentle gesture. Her hair — frizzing a bit at the ends from the damp outside — tumbled down over her shoulders, and he ran his fingers through it, quickly, tangling it. 'Better,' he said, and pressed the barrettes into her hand. 'Don't glare. This is a good look for you.'
She glared at him. 'What look is that? Underaged Prostitute?'
He ignored this. 'Just follow my lead and do whatever I say,' he said, and started off down the corridor. 'I know how to handle these people.
They're my kind.'
'I wouldn't be so proud of that,' she said sharply.
He glanced back at her over his shoulder but didn't stop walking. 'At least I'm not the one with visible knickers.'
'I hate you sometimes,' Hermione muttered under her breath, but he was already halfway down the corridor and couldn't hear her. Tugging ineffectually at the hem of her skirt, she followed.
Upon learning of his wife's betrayal, the wizard spent the next few days closeted in his tower, perfecting a number of spells. Then he dressed himself his finest robes and presented himself at his wife's chamber. She greeted him there as modestly and sweetly as she always had, taking his hands and drawing him to the bed, but he resisted her. All her beauty seemed to him now to have taken on a ghoulish aspect.
She sensed his mood and wished to know if anything was wrong.
'No,' he said. 'It is only that I shudder at your touch,' which was, after all, true enough. 'Now lie down upon the bed.'
And she did so, shrugging her robes to the floor and stretching herself out along the bed. She looked up at him through her hair as he drew a number of silk ribbons from his pockets, and held them up.
'You wish to bind me, Lord?' she asked.
'They will not hurt you,' he said. 'They are only ribbons.'
With a cat's smile, she held her wrists out to be bound, and he knelt over her and bound her wrists
