At war with ourselves

Sage

The sky is ink. Whatever higher being resided in the fold of the clouds must have spilt it, lost as its eyes
were on what played out below.

A tragedy; crawling through the treaded grass and lingering in the smokey air. Hiding in the depths of the
light spell someone had cast, making the world look like dusk when outside of the field it was all midnight.

As Draco fights, a part of him hopes he will not have to be the one to make the choice. Yet, he also longs to
see the end result before moving on from it. Decisions are always there, waiting to be made at every
opportunity and every shift of life. It is those decisions that define the rest of your life, however long that
will last.

In this, he knew, decisions were made every few seconds. To turn or face forward, to stand or to walk, to
counter or to strike. Battle was a stock of decisions.

He also thought of it as a bit of a game. Like a game of cards, of poker or Snap. It mattered how well you
used what you were given, but it always came down to the cards you were dealt. Luck. Three quarters luck
and one quarter skill, and it was all yours to lose or win. Cry victor or cry failure. Three quarters luck, and
that odd was a shitty one.

War was a lot like that. Skill was required, of course, or -- no matter the best of hands -- you would always
lose. But it was luck too. A lot of luck, that all played into those same decisions. But this wasn't poker. You
wouldn't be losing your shirt inside the Slytherin common room. No. This was your life, and this war was
the most dangerous game to play of all.

So, do you turn left or right? The silhouette could be your best friend, so do you attack or try and play with
time and wait for the smoke to clear enough? A million decisions in the span of a minute, and what will you
decide? For standing still is death, but so could be moving.

And when someone calls out your name, do you turn or shrink back into the smoke?

Draco scanned, and then turned. Because most weren't admirable enough to curse you from the
front...especially his own side. And wasn't that a bitch in war? When the smoke rose and there was nothing
but moving black blobs to define everyone, you became a one man army. Because nothing could protect
you from someone else's fear. From someone else's will to live, no matter the cost it would take to draw
another breath.

So he scanned, and that was the right decision. But turning might not have been.

x.
His mouth was hot, his tongue burning a trail as it swiped the sweat from her shoulder. His cock slammed
into her, some uneven tempo that was his basic sexual instinct when his mind was too busy thinking so
close, so close, so close to pay attention to the rhythm of his body against hers.

He shifted her, her legs tightening around his hips and the fingernails of her left hand digging into the top of
his arm. She reached down, driven to come before it was over, and flicked her clit two, three, four times.

She was hardly aware of her head jerking back to whack against the tree, of her eyes closing and her toes
curling as she cried out something nonsensical into the bitter winter night. She didn't even care when he bit
into her shoulder, feeling the skin break around his teeth as he shuddered against her.

The scrapes and scratches on her back were fully healed when she saw him again, but she was afraid her
common sense had been broken beyond repair.

x.

Draco couldn't help wondering why she had even bothered calling his name. As if she couldn't just walk
away, because it would be breaking some moral code inside her dirty little heart. He supposed she had
reached that breaking limit with him already. Perhaps he should have waited until now to use it up at all.

Lady luck has officially left this part of the battleground. Decision stayed behind to help mourn the loss.

His opponent stood directly opposite him, two and a half yards of forbidden memories and war zone
stretched between them. Her eyes were calm, her expression cool and collected, her stance tense and
rigid.

It was her body that gave away what she was feeling. It was her body that always gave it away to him.
Everything could be completely blank and emotionless, but then her back would arch and her lips would
part, and he would know.

"Granger."

x.

They didn't make love. They didn't screw, have sex. They didn't even shag.

They fucked.

It was stripped down. All bare and real, with absolutely no fluff or romanticized notions. It was unforgiving,
the way they pulled and scratched, twisted and bit. It was always rough, always angry, always unwanted
but needed.

He happened to know that Hermione Granger said the most naughty things when he had her on all fours
with his balls slapping against her ass. She also knew that Draco Malfoy had a fetish for watching her play
with herself, all spread eagle before him as he jerked off onto her thighs.

It was dirty, it was raw and it was completely unstoppable.

x.

He never actually thought he would see her in battle. Even before they started their traitorous activities. He
just didn't think it would happen. But he prepared himself for it anyway. Thought about the look on her
face right before the curse hit her, or the way she would go down all brave -- all stupid for having not run
from him in the first place.

Then he stopped thinking about it after awhile. Because what was the point of thinking about something
that wouldn't happen anyway? He had bigger things to do in. Like Weasley.

So it wasn't that he was unprepared, because Draco was seldom, if ever, unprepared. Surprised didn't seem
to fit either. Perhaps just...slightly affected. He hadn't really wanted to have to kill her. I mean, Harry Potter
was out wandering somewhere, and who wanted to kill her when you could claim you brought down
Potter? He was gold. Like a fucking trophy.

...and her. She was brown. Brown like her eyes, her hair, her freckles, the odd heart shaped birthmark on
her right pelvic bone. Brown like the dirt, the mud, and her blood. Brown like filth. Anyone who had any
brain cells, let alone someone of Draco's intellect, knew that gold outweighed brown.

So, he wanted gold. He didn't want to kill Hermione fucking Granger.

x.

One hand held down her shoulder, effectively pinning her to the bed. The other was grasping her hip as he
watched her tits bounce in time with his thrusting.

It was like vomit, when it came out of his mouth. He still isn't sure why he said it.

"Filthy mudbloods don't belong in war." Silver met boring brown as they narrowed.

Her lips pursed and he winced when her nails sunk in and clawed down his back. He pounded harder into her
as a reply, his eyebrow arching in challenge as the hand on her shoulder reached down to violently twist her
nipple.

Draco had no idea the wench had enough strength to shove him off her in such a fashion. He blamed it on
her taking him by surprise. After all, they had been fucking for six months now and she had never once
stopped him before he came.

"...the fuck." Draco snapped, his dick protesting more fiercely than he was as she sprang from the bed.
"In case you haven't noticed, you bastard, the whole reason our side is fighting is for muggle-borns." She
was all jerky movements as she collected her clothes.

"Your side. Not mine, wench." Draco rose himself from the bed, his boy bits now softening, though the
sexual frustration was still welled up inside his bones.

"I don't need that stated for me, you dick. It is quite obvious from where this 'mudblood' stands."

"I don't need your dirty blood stated for me, either. I can smell your bloody filth from here."

She froze as her head popped out of the neck of her shirt, her one hand clutching the hem and the other
hovering over the button of her jeans. Her hair was wild, her face flushed, her lips swollen. Draco would
think she looked well fucked if he had actually fucked her longer than two bloody minutes.

"And could you smell it when your prick was hilt deep a minute ago? Or when your head was between my
thighs right before that? Could you smell my filth then?"

"No. I suppose I was too busy thinking about how you were tearing my trousers off before I even shut the
door, nearly mad for the taste of my spang down your fucking throat."

x.

"Pleasure seeing you here." He was rolling his wand between his fingers, still at his side.

She hadn't raised hers yet, so he figured he still had a bit of time to decide. It was either very stupid of him,
or very smart. But whether it was or not, it was a decision only she could judge with her own actions.

He hadn't seen her in a month. She looked like shit, standing there across from him. He decided not to tell
her this.

"Is it?"

"Well, I'm sure you feel the same way. Seeing as how you decided to make your presence known and such."

She paused, and he wasn't sure how she did since she wasn't moving in the first place, but she did. She just
suddenly developed a statue look about her. When she spoke, her voice was soft, and he didn't know how
he could hear with all the screams in the background and the wind in his ear.

"It had to happen some time, Draco."

The wand stopped moving between his fingers, and he felt his left eyebrow raise high on his forehead. He
slowly cocked his head to the side, studying the newly formed emotion on her face.

"Did it?"
x.

After they were finished, it was always a rush that followed. It killed the afterglow rather quickly, and
always left the both of them with a dull pang of emptiness. It was only a few short seconds that they
enjoyed the daze of post orgasm before one of them decided they were done.

Directly following was silent air, a rush for clothes and a rush out the door...or out of the general vicinity of
the bench/tree/alley/whatever. Not a word said, and usually not even a glance in the general direction.

Neither one was sure exactly when that had stopped.

Conversation started first somewhere, and it had been awkward and stiff until time slowly passed. They held
onto one another a little longer. He started to make a routine of always kissing her right under her ear
whenever they pulled away.

It had been such a slow progression that neither one was really aware that it was happening. Sure, they had
both wondered why they were bothering to even talk the first few times. And Draco wondered like hell why
he kissed her after, and Hermione was thrown for a loop the first time. But if they were to ever think how
they got from point A to point B, they never would have known the answer.

Progress. What a bitch. Because when you start to progress, it just turns into a downhill ride where you
really can't stop it and it just happens.

Just like how two enemies could come together and have raunchy sex for months on end, not stopping even
though they both knew it would be the end of them if anyone ever found out.

It just happens.

x.

She doesn't say anything in reply, and he feels irritation prickle up his spine. Shit, if she didn't want to
speak, act, do something, then she very well should have kept treading on in a different direction.

This was war, and this was the battle she had created here, between these two people. She called it out
when it could have been ignored. The choice was in her court, and she was just standing there. Looking for
all the world like the saddest girl at the ball.

"We can't exist together, you and I," she finally says.

He snorts at her response. "I believe we existed together quite well before."

He watches her brow furrow, thinking that it might not be best to poke a caged lion. To provoke a girl when
sex and odd emotions had floated off into oblivion, leaving them behind with this last moment.
"Don't bring that rubbish up here, Malfoy."

"Why ever not, Granger? It's not like I'm lying. I'm just pointing out the obvious. Or would you rather me
talk about the fact that you've made the choice that either you or I are walking away from this, and not
both of us, and not ever again?"

"This is war." She says, and he knows that.

He's always known that.

"So it is."

"The last battle, Malfoy. We're going to win, and you'll end up dead or in Azkaban."

"According to whom?"

She raises her wand, and he follows.

x.

"They're growing suspicious."

Draco turns, watching her as she stops in front of him. "Who?"

"Harry, Ron, Ginny. Everyone. They wonder why I'm so tired but I leave instead of sleeping. They wonder
where it is I go, what I do. They're going to start following me soon, Draco. I thought they would tonight."

He's silent, studying her as she reaches out and runs her finger along the hem of his shirt. Her face is tired,
her eyes dazed. Her appearance has grown progressively worse, and part of him thinks she'll crumble to
dust soon.

"We'll figure something out."

She opens her mouth to say something, her vocal chords jarring over the words. Her eyes slowly lift to meet
his, and Merlin, she's falling apart. He knows the words lodged in her throat. Knew them from all the times
he thought of saying them.

We can't do this anymore. We have to stop, it's getting too dangerous. It's over.

But she can't bring herself to say it, and he never could either.

"Come on." He mutters, taking her hand from his shirt.

But his hand doesn't leave hers, his fingers wrapping around her cold digits. He pulls her after him as he
leads her from their meeting place.

"Where are we going?" Her fingers squeeze around his as she struggles to keep up with his long strides.

He slows down, glancing over his shoulder at her worn face. "To sleep."

She pauses in her step, but he doesn't notice and so he nearly jerks her arm out of the socket. "Sleep?"

"Yes. I'm too tired to start in on any activities. I need an hour or two of rest."

"Then why didn't you get an hour or two before I came here?"

"Oh, I was yearning to hold you while I slept, just to ease this lonely heart." His face was pitiful, his freehand
over his heart as if he had been wounded.

A faint smile lit her face and she shoved him roughly. He took a step back from the force and smirked.

"Like hell. It's because you wear me out, Granger. Now hurry the hell up before I change my mind."

She opened her mouth, but again was wordless. He knew she was going to reply with something that would
indeed change his mind, but had decided against it. She was too tired to deny herself a few hours of sleep,
and that had been the whole point after all.

"And fair warning," Draco sent her a glare. "if you dare try to cuddle up to me, you will find yourself on the
floor before you even touched me."

She glared back. "I don't cuddle with bastards, Malfoy."

"No, dear. You only fuck them."

x.

War changed people, Draco had heard. But he had never really seen it.

Whose to say they wouldn't have started sleeping together if there had been no war at all? That was the
only real change he could see.

Because Hermione Granger was still an insufferable know-it-all, who was all strung out on honor and
loyalty. He supposed that was why she needed this so badly. Her secret betrayal could all be wiped away.
All she had to do was cleanse the past by killing her lover, and then it was over. As if she could wash away
the look Potter had on his face, or the way he had stopped talking to her. All would go back to normal if she
could just get rid of her mistake in the only way she knew how.

He, on the other hand, had changed. He did not put this to the war, but rather the years and steps into
maturity. However, he was still arrogant and pure. He was still a rich kid with a hatred towards all things
below him and above him. He was still Draco Malfoy.
War didn't change shit.

x.

"You're drunk."

Her observation wasn't completely off target, but Draco disagreed. "I am not drunk, you bint. I
am...peaked."

"Peaked?"

"Yes. And look at you, Granger. Stalking me now?"

"I was walking to the diner to meet H-- some friends, and I noticed you nearly stumble into a lamppost.
You're in the wrong part of town to be wandering around drunk and off guard, Malfoy."

"Harry? You were meeting Potter at the diner? The diner. Well. Isn't he classy?"

"Harry is one of them, yes, but he's not the only one. And we all like that diner, so that's why we go there.
It's nice and has good food, and it doesn't matter if it had chandeliers and candle lit tables."

"So, if you were to go out on a date, and someone took you to that diner, you wouldn't mind?" He gave her
an I-got-you-now look and she rolled her eyes.

"No, actually--"

"Lies."

"It is no--"

"Lies."

"Mal--"

"Lies."

She growled at him and he arched an eyebrow, swinging around to face her. "So that's another thing that
makes you growl."

"Excuse me?"

"I keep track. What I do to you, and your reaction. You also happen to growl when I--"

"Alright, enough. We weren't even talking about this." She was blushing, her head bent to hide her face.
"Oh yes. We were talking about your date with Potter." His voice was low, dangerous, a sneer curling his lip.

"Not that it's any of your business, Malfoy, but I am not going on a date with Harry. I--"

"Do you?"

She paused. "What?"

"Date? Hmm? Do you shag other blokes when you're not shagging me?"

Hermione bristled, her look indignant. "I don't need to tell you that!"

"I bet you do. I bet you--"

"Shut up! You have no right to know, and you have no right to accuse me of it either! Honestly, if you keep
on this way, I might just have to alert someone of your drunken presence--"

She couldn't breathe, with his body pressed hard against hers and his hand wrapped around her neck. "You
would do well, Granger," He snarled. "to remember who I am. Do not threaten me."

He released her neck just as quickly as he had gripped it, his fingertips brushing over the warm skin there.
She glared at him, slamming her palms against his chest and shoving him back.

"Don't you dare touch me like that again." She whispered, her finger out and her eyes narrowed to mere
slits.

"I don't take well to threats. In case you aren't as smart as they hail you, I'll tell you now -- if you try to
betray me, Granger, I will only return the courtesy."

They stood staring at one another for a while there, in the dull warmth of a spring night on a random street
in London. She moved first, and he followed, their anger slow to dissipate.

As they made their way through the maze of streets to a small flat Draco had rented for the purpose of a
hideout to sleep at while in London (coincidentally being the halfway mark between their homes), the
streets grew darker and her body drew closer to his. He didn't say a word, even when his arm swung up with
his step and swung back to be greeted with her hand. Even when she entwined their fingers and pressed her
side to his.

x.

It was fascinating to watch the display of emotions rapidly change across her facial features as she thought.
The fact that he knew what she was thinking about did not take that away.

If she turned and walked away, he would let her go, and she knew this. But if she stayed and fought, he
would fight back. And wasn't it sort of ironic that the ones who were academically pitted against one
another in school, should now be standing here and pitted against one another again?

But that was life. A circle. And somehow you usually always ended up back in the beginning again.

He detects the movement the very second that she makes it. Her hand flies down to her pocket and her lips
fall in a gasp, her wide eyes on the ground. It's the perfect moment to attack. He watches it fade away, too
busy wondering what it is that just happened.

She mutters something to herself before suddenly grinning like an idiot. The smile lights up her dirt
streaked face for only a moment before it's gone and her eyes are back on him again.

She takes awhile to formulate her words, and from the look on her face, he's almost afraid she's about to
tell him that she loves him.

"I'm sorry, Draco."

"You really do need to stop being so melodramatic. I'm bloody bored standing here--"

She suddenly hisses something, and there's a jet of light moving towards him, and this is it. He doesn't even
have time to do anything, cursing himself in his final seconds for letting his defense down. He tenses and
watches the green little stream of light shoot over his shoulder. He sneers.

"Missed, love. Avada--" His face pulled tight in fury, his eyes ice cold against hers.

He would have gone through with it, without a doubt, and they both know it. But something slams into his
back and he stumbles forward, nearly falling on his face as the last word is shoved back down his throat.

"What in the bloody fuck are you doing?" He screams, and turns briefly to the man -- or woman -- face
down in the dirt.

"This is our fight."

"No. No, Hermione," His voice sounds exasperated as he aims his wand again. "This has always been your
fight. Always."

"Mine? Malfoy, people like you made this my fight. It was yours at the start, before I even knew what a
mudblood was. And it'll be yours now, at the end of it all."

"I'm not talking about the fucking war, Hermione! I'm talking about this! I'm talking about the fight you
drew when you called my name and aimed your fucking wand! Just fuck it! Let me deal with my aftermath,
and you deal with yours. That's it! Just because we don't shag anymore, doesn't mean that we have to kill
one another!" A chord in his neck was popping out with his screaming, an angry vein jutting across his
forehead.

"You're the epitome of this war to me," She spat. "If I had to put a face to racism, it would be yours that
lined the walls."
"Then why, in Merlins name, did you ever fuck me? Did you eve--"

"I don't know!" And she screamed so loud that he knew people would be coming this way soon.

Her voice had split on the end, like it wasn't strong enough to hold all that anger and hate behind it. Her
face was red and she sucked in a deep breath, a film of tears covering up her dirty, dirty eyes.

And Draco couldn't help but think that Hermione Granger had flown just a little off the deep end.

"I don't want to kill you, Draco. I have to."

"You don't have to do shit."

"It's all just a circle and it goes back to the beginning. But it has to end somewhere, Draco, isn't that what
you said? Di--"

"Don't throw my words back in my face!" She shook her head and hiccupped, but her eyes never left his.
"Don't you fucking dare. You. Fucking. Bitch."

"Harry had Voldemort. Neville has Bellatrix. Ron has your father. And I, Draco...I have you. And...and it all
just has to stop."

Had Voldemort? Harry had Voldemort?

She stared at him and he stared back. He would never pretend to know her reasoning, or the way her mind
worked. It was just what it was, and he couldn't see himself changing her mind or working any sense into it.

At her next words, he felt his body jerk towards her and then back, and he knew that she wouldn't be
turning away from this.

"You know I've always been a guilty person. And you...you never have been, Draco."

x.

"Do you remember Zabini?"

Hermione brushed her cheek against the skin of his chest, her index finger idly running over a scar to the
side of his navel. She hummed softly and nodded her head, her fingers splaying out across his stomach
before pulling in and scraping her nails gently on his skin. She watched the morning light coming in from the
bedroom window, closing her eyes briefly as his fingers reached up to idly play with her curls.

"Everyone says that he donates to the charities, goes and visits the sick and the casualties, all because he
wants to get a good name if the light side wins."
"Yeah."

"But it's a lie. Guilt is the pit of the human soul--"

"I thought you said selfishness was?" She asked, raising her head to look at him and only finding the
expanse of his neck.

She nuzzled against it for a moment as his hand closed around the one on his chest, her fingers being
interrupted of their pattern drawing.

"No, not the soul," He whispered, trailing her hand up his chest and pressing it over his heart, the beats slow
and comforting against her palm. "Selfishness is at the center of our hearts. But guilt...that's your soul.

They say that your soul holds all the wrong things you've done in your life. Some vessel to hold all the
evidence to judge you with. Supposedly. So wouldn't it make sense that what is at the core of our soul is not
the worst of our actions, but the guilt we feel for them. Isn't that how a damnable person becomes
redeemed?"

"I don't know, Draco." She rested her head on his shoulder, staring again at the light, trying to ignore it's
warning of too much time having been passed.

"Well Blaise has become overtaken with it. All consumed. He feels all the guilt of his actions. For taking the
path set before him just because it was what was expected of him, though now he feels it wasn't the right
choice. But he has no way out, and only the guilt that intensifies with every single person he's killed.

That's why he donates, and he visits, and he doesn't talk much anymore. That's why he lets the press
slander him. Blaise didn't wait for someone else to judge his actions -- he just judged his own. And the guilt
that was meant to redeem, is now the thing he lets damn his entire life. He's empty, anymore."

"Because of his guilt."

Draco nodded. "It does strange things to a person, Hermione. That is why I don't think about it, and that's
why I think you think far too much about it."

Silence ensued in the room as the light poured in, both of them beginning to drift asleep.

"Should I leave?" Hermione whispered, opening her drowsy eyes in fear she would sleep too long.

He turned himself, bending his head to kiss her mouth.

"Not just yet."

She waited a moment and then let out a soft laugh. "You're going to sleep?"

"Is it that obvious?" He murmured.

"If you're going to sleep then I should leave."

"No," His eyes remained closed as he brushed his lips against her temple.

"No?"

"Stay." He whispered.

Wrapping his arm around her waist, his fingertips skimmed the small of her back and he pulled her closer.

x.

He looked at her, and her wand stopped trembling and she drew a deep breath to steady herself.

It's the end to their risky play with time. It has run out, and now Decision blasts forth from the sidelines
with all the power of the sun finally giving up and exploding dead center in the space between them.

Game over.

She opens her mouth and so does he, a million different curses and spells running through his head. His
voice has decided on one before his mind even does, and when the words come, he is surprised to hear
they are not a curse.

He isn't sure at all of what he means to say, but he gets as far as, "Hermione--"

And then it's just the sound of the air rushing from his lungs and the surge of pain that briefly lights his
world.

Dying is not at all what he thought it would be.

There was no slow motion or the world becoming some strange color. No life that flashed before his eyes.

It was only her, and the tear that finally broke over the bottom of her eye. Then it was the sky, inky blue.
And then it was absolutely nothing at all.

x.

"I found a hole in my theory."

"What theory?"

"About the guilty being redeemed. They can't be."

"Why not?"
"Because even if some higher being redeems them for everything that they've done, the guilty person still
damns themselves."

"But they're still redeemed."

"In the eyes of someone else. It's themselves that count."

"But people who think only themselves count, they wouldn't feel the guilt."

He paused and lifted his head from her neck, helping her to take off his shirt. "And what if they did? What
does it matter if someone redeems you when you still feel damned?"

"Because...because maybe you'll get over the guilt, eventually, knowing that others can forgive you for what
you've done."

"And if you can't forgive yourself?"

"You do what you can to try."

"To what extent?"

She paused and laughed. "I don't know, Draco. Ask me when I get there."

"Ask you?"

"I've always been a guilty person."

"And I never have been."

"So...you're just always damned."

He kissed her, briefly, and breathed against her lips. "And so are you."