"Do you—care?"

Draco froze, and stared at Granger. She was curled up in his lap, his cock buried inside her, and she was studying him with a baffled expression on her face.

Yes. Yes, he cared.

She was his. His scent was in her pores. He had memorized every inch of her body under his fingers and tongue. He knew exactly how to touch her to make her keen and come apart. She slept in his arms every night. When he dreamed, he heard her voice in his ear saying "Yours. I'm yours."

His entire life revolved around her as though she were the sun.

Yes. He fucking cared.

He doubted she had any idea how hard it was not to bite her every time he fucked her. How very close he occasionally came to doing it.

Because he wanted her forever.

He opened his mouth. As he was about to speak, he saw her eyes grow guarded, as though she were bracing herself. The words died on his lips.

"Just—temporarily, while I try to figure out a long term solution."

"It wouldn't be dating."

"It would just be physical, like, um, friends with benefits—Well, not necessarily friends—"

Not a relationship.

Not even friends.

Just casual.

She was letting him touch her as a temporary solution. Until she found a better one.

Longbottom was single again. And Theo had apparently decided it was time to insert himself.

If she thought he was going to complicate things by getting invested, she'd probably end it immediately. Because she had better options now.

He didn't know what he'd do if she cut him off. If she turned to someone else, and he had to smell them on her. Knowing they were touching her and taking her; knowing what kinds of sounds she'd make for them.

If having Theo sitting next to her was enough of a trigger that he dragged her into a broom closet, trying to deal with her moving on to someone else would probably make him snap and bite her accidentally or kill someone.

He should have said no when she first asked him to scent-mark on her. He had no idea how he was possibly going to let her go, or move on.

No witch was ever going to so much as register compared to the thrill of just being near Granger. He met her eyes and felt undone; as though she held his heart in her hands.

He pressed his lips together and pulled her off of him. His cock was still rigid and it hurt like holy fuck to shove it inside his trousers, however the discomfort helped him ground himself slightly as he stood next to Granger. Her clothing was pulled open and he could see marks on her neck from where he'd sucked on her glands. His seed was sliding down her legs. He wanted to push his come back inside her, resheath himself in her cunt and hold himself there while he kissed across her face and neck, over her shoulders and down her arms to her wrists.

"No," he told her, and he stared at her left ear as he said it, because he wasn't sure he could lie if he looked her in the eye just then. "The biology just caught me off guard, I think."

"Oh," was all she said.

Oh.

Hermione Granger who couldn't stop reciting textbooks even when Snape was docking points for it, said 'oh' and nothing else. Draco hadn't a clue what it meant. Did 'oh' mean that she didn't believe him? Or that she did? Or that she was relieved? Disappointed?

He had no idea. He didn't know how to read her. He didn't even know how to look at her without wanting to touch her, kiss her, and promise her the whole world.

The only time he felt even remotely in control of himself was when she was nearly going to pieces. When she lost herself in her Omega instincts or grew emotional, he grew steadying. The rest of the time he wanted to crawl for her. It took an obscene amount of effort to stay away from her for most of the day.

Don't stop needing me, he wanted to beg her. Because it was the only time life felt manageable.

The axis of his mind revolved around her; keeping an eye on her; wanting to please her; waiting for her to need him.

There was nothing better than pleasing her. Feeling her come for him; feeling her want him. Watching her face and listening to when her breath caught, where she shivered. He wanted to spend his whole life holding her in his arms. 

Even talking about Arithmancy with her was a delight; and he didn't even particularly like Arithmancy. When she admitted she'd read more than thirty supplemental textbooks for their class, he'd asked which ones and they'd compared notes. She'd been practically bouncing in her seat when it turned out they'd both read the newly translated Nagnok's Guide to Goblin Arithmancy. She'd been so excited to have someone to talk to about the concepts with, Draco had to literally bite his tongue to prevent himself from asking if she wanted to start a book club with him.

When he wasn't with her, he spent most of the day trying not to trail after her in the halls. It was a relief that she spent so much time studying. If Granger were more social, he probably would be failing all his classes.

She was the most non-conventional Omega he had ever heard of. She treated being an Omega as though it were a form of lycanthropy; some mostly latent aspect of herself to be managed with potions and frantic sex so she could do her damnedest to completely separate and ignore it the rest of the time. He had no idea how she did it. None of the books he'd read made any reference to Omegas being like that.

When he was with her, it was like something inside her flipped on and she became an entirely different person. Most of the time it swallowed her until he got her off. Until she climaxed, she was a separate entity with an different tone of voice. She called him Alpha, and did things like try to convince him that they should skip class and have sex in the charms classroom. After she climaxed she was more Granger-like, more in control. She didn't get overwhelmed and fall apart so easily.

Once she fell asleep, it was over. In the mornings she'd pretend to be asleep until he left.

Granger wasn't an Omega so much as she had an Omega carefully caged inside her that she bribed into quietude with regular sex.

It was—irregular. And depressing for Draco.

The explanation he gave himself—which he based on what it had been like presenting as an Alpha—was that she'd been so opposed to presenting all that she'd tried to suppress it, and it caused her to manifest that way. Boxed the entire thing into something she could mostly dissociate from until it was triggered.

It hadn't meshed with her personality the way presenting as an Alpha had for him and everyone he knew. Draco was an Alpha. He was an Alpha every minute of every day. It was intrinsic to all his behavior and when he didn't exhibit it, it was because he was intentionally suppressing it. Losing control and giving into the instincts didn't negate that he meant it.

When he promised to take care of her and told her she was perfect, he meant it.

The fact that part of his attraction to Granger was a biological imperative was difficult to reconcile. It didn't feel like something he was doing primarily because of an instinctive impulse.

He tried to imagine if it were someone else. If Susan Bones smelled like Granger, would he feel the same way? The craving would be there. The instincts. But he couldn't imagine himself caring. If Susan Bones asked him if he personally wanted to snog her, the answer would be no. He wouldn't promise to always take care of her, or beg her to say she wanted him and belonged to him. If she ended up with someone else, as an Alpha he might feel jealous, but he didn't think he'd be emotionally devastated.

It wasn't as though any of the other Alphas seemed emotionally invested in Granger, despite all the posturing they engaged in.

But Granger didn't seem to mean of anything she did when she was with Draco. As though it wasn't even her. Her brain went away and left her Omega behind to whimper and keen and beg him to fuck her. She didn't mean the things she said. She didn't even want to be the way she was.

At least that was the way it seemed to Draco.

It was all hypothetical because there was almost no research about how Omegas presented. The process for Omegas was much more abrupt and internal, whereas for an Alpha it unfolded over the course of the month after their birthday, as they physically grew into it.

There was information on the physical aspects of Omega presentation; the glands, and the hormone surges, the heats, and heightened levels of magic. But he couldn't find anything about personality changes or whether they were similar to Alphas. The only thing he knew was that sex became highly emotional for Omegas and they needed an emotional connection to climax.

The books also failed to mention how hard her emotions would hit him, and how he would instinctively pour his emotions into her. He'd thought originally that the intensity had been because of her heat. But after he shagged her in the library, he discovered that it was simply the way it was with her. Having sex with her was like having their souls entwine, and walking away afterward was like ripping them apart again.

He would have thought that at least one book would bother to mention that.

He wasn't sure what it was like on Granger's end. He didn't know how she actually experienced it because they barely talked. He didn't know how to talk to her without the risk of coming across as clingy. Whenever she'd bring up what they were doing she'd refer to it as their "arrangement."

As though he were being kept by her.

If that was how she saw it—he couldn't even bring himself to think about it most of the time.

If he made things complicated by admitting attachment, or ever lost control and accidentally bit her, it would be over. They would be done and he would never get another chance.

He also might end up in Azkaban, which should have a bigger deal, but somehow was beginning to pale in comparison to chronic stress of being separated from her in any context.

Draco left the broom closet abruptly.

Standing around with her afterward, as her head cleared and her eyes grew guarded and doubtful, was always just—too difficult to handle.

He found an empty classroom and stayed there until his cock finally softened.

Hogwarts was becoming increasingly hazardous.

In addition to being the school's Death Eater punching bag, Charity Burbage had had a nephew in Hufflepuff who had made it his personal ambition to get Draco expelled. Cornelius Burbage was a seventh year with a posse of friends from various houses that eager to assist in whatever way they could.

They would corner Draco and try to provoke him into attacking them by shooting minor hexes at him and flinging every single possible insult regarding himself, his father, and mother.

Since Cornelius had realized Draco was not going to be cornered easily, he had ramped up his attacks. When Draco wasn't with Granger, he spent most of his time in empty classrooms or disillusioned.

He headed toward the Slytherin by the most indirect route he could, doubling back repeatedly in order to avoid being followed or cornered anywhere.

When he walked through the entrance to the Slytherin Common Room he stalked across the room, grabbed Theo by the front of his robes, and dragged him up the stairs to their dorm room.

"I think it should be noted that I have already predicted you're going to punch me. So if you do, you're being horribly unoriginal," Theo said, as he stumbled up the stairs behind Draco.

"Shut up," Draco snarled as he kicked the door open and flung Theo through the door. Theo was adept at being thrown—courtesy of a lifetime of experience with it. He rolled with the force, somersaulted, twisted and jumped back up on his feet across the room.

Blaise looked up from a book on Alchemy with the air of a martyr. "Do you have to do this in here?"

"Shut up, Blaise!" Draco snapped.

Blaise sighed and snapped his book shut. "I swear, Alphas are more dramatic than teenage girls. You do realize you're fighting over an Omega who isn't interested in either of you?"

"Shut up!" Draco and Theo said in unison.

Blaise rolled his eyes and sat up. "Don't say I didn't warn you when she starts dating Longbottom."

Draco's stomach clenched. "Fuck off, Blaise."

"I'm just saying—"

"Blaise," Draco spoke in an ice cold tone, "I am already having a fucking awful day. Burbage's goons tried a new hex on me today and nearly fractured my skull. I already heard about Longbottom from Granger. And now Theo has decided to add himself to my complicated life."

"I actually added myself to Hermione's life. You're mostly coincidental," Theo said, shoving his hair out of eyes and glaring at Draco.

"She's mine."

"Really...?" Theo crossed his arms and eyed Draco with a skeptical expression. "Does she know that? Because she was pretty quick to clarify that you two aren't in any kind of relationship when we were talking."

Draco balled his hands into fists and stared, seething, while Theo continued, "If you're actually dating her, I'll back off, but since you're obviously not, there's no reason I can't try to. You're clearly not making her happy. She looks depressed or traumatized half the time when she looks at you."

Draco swallowed hard. "Fine." His voice was hollow. "But if you hurt her I will not chrysalize you, I will fucking kill you."

Theo blinked and looked astonished. "Seriously? I have to admit I was expecting a slightly stronger reaction from you." He sniffed the air and then grimaced. "Although, you obviously were with her before coming here, so I'll just assume you've already dealt with most of your rage over my audacious decision to shake—"

Draco crossed the room in a split second. Theo jumped back and tried to dodge, but Draco had seeker reflexes. Draco caught Theo's tie out thin air, and used it to jerk Theo forward as Draco brought his up knee and drove it into Theo's diaphragm.

Draco let go as Theo dropped to the floor. "Don't talk about her like that," he snarled 

Theo lay gasping for several seconds before managing to speak.  "Like what? Commenting on how you actually treat her? Are you claiming it was slow and sweet in a bed somewhere? I can smell it on you. You took her in broom closet after class." Theo sneered up at Draco as he picked himself up off the floor and tried to catch his breath. "I've never said anything against her. You're the one who'd go on about how you wished she'd die and took the Dark Mark. I'm the one who told you to leave her alone. You're using her and you don't even deserve to breathe around her."

"I'm not using her," Draco's voice was vibrating with rage. "Neither of us owe you any explanation. Fuck off."

"I don't understand what's going on," Blaise volunteered from his bed.

"That makes two of us," Theo said, pressing his hand against his diaphragm. "I get it, Draco, your life is hard now. You're not popular. You're getting a crash course on what it's like to be bullied. Join the club of unpopularity. Sorry, you don't get Hermione Granger as a consolation prize. She's better than you."

Draco drew a sharp breath. "I'm not—I know. I don't see her as that."

"Sure. I'm sure all those "Mudblood" slurs just accidentally slipped out over the years because you were under the Imperius curse." Theo's eyes were glittering, and Draco realised his friend's fury was deeper than some newfound jealousy.

"How long have you liked her, Theo?"

Theo's fingers twitched. "Like I told her, it started in fourth year."

Draco dropped a hand over his eyes and tipped his head back. "I'm sorry. I didn't realize..."

"How did you not know? I thought the whole house knew." Blaise sounded incredulous.

Draco swallowed. He had no explanation that didn't make him out as an utter bastard. Which was apt, because it was why. He looked down at the floor. "I—thought it was a joke."

"Says a lot about you, doesn't it?" Theo's voice was tight.

Draco gave a faint nod and suddenly felt tired. "She doesn't want a relationship. Her goals for the year are academic." His tone was wooden.

Theo eyed Draco warily. "Are you falling for her?"

Draco felt a deep, freezing sensation in his chest. He shook his head. "I don't know what I feel for her. Being around her—I don't know. To be honest—" he sighed, "—I feel ruined by her half the time."

"That good, huh?" Blaise drawled.

Draco hexed him so hard Blaise flew off his bed and crashed into the wall.

"Don't talk about her. That's not what I meant."

Blaise pushed himself up off the floor and pounded his chest trying to get his breathe back. "She's got you so whipped you don't even realize it."

Draco fought against the temptation to hex Blaise again.  "It's doesn't matter." His voice was tight. "Like I said—she doesn't want a relationship."

"Wait. She's using youfor sex?" Theo looked incredulous.

Draco ran a hand through his hair. "No. She—Omegas aren't legally protected when they're unbound. Anything that happens to her would get dismissed in court as a biological imperative." He swallowed hard. "She can't do a thing about Goldstein even though he even told her he intended to rape her in the hallway. If she's scent-marked, it inoculates her against the rest of you. She's unaffected. And I'm—I'm a logical choice because if I ever—overstep—McGonagall has made it clear just how happy she'll be to expel me."

Blaise and Theo stared at him stunned.

"You dense motherfucker," Blaise finally muttered, shaking his head in disbelief.

"That's why you're sleeping with her?" Theo asked incredulously. "You agreed?"

Draco looked up sharply at Theo. "If you were me, and she came and asked, would you have said no?"

Theo flushed and looked away. "Touché."

"You Alphas are so dumb." Blaise straightened his robes and turned toward the door. "I can't take anymore of this. I'm going to go snog Daphne."

Draco glanced over at Blaise in confusion, momentarily forgetting Granger. "You and Daphne?"

Blaise shrugged. "Just casually. But, yeah. We started seeing each other over the summer. She wrote about getting to see my—" his eyebrows quirked faintly, "—library with Astoria. It was a good time, so I ended up inviting her back."

"Right..." Draco shook his head, bewildered. "Why is she still after me then?"

Blaise didn't look surprised or offended. He just shrugged. "Well, it's not like they're exactly the same. She's probably curious. I think she's mostly asking on Astoria's behalf anyway."

Draco swallowed uncomfortably. That only made it weirder, and worse. "Astoria is how old?"

Blaise stared up at the ceiling thoughtfully. "Sixteen," he said slowly, "I think. But her birthday is this month."

Well, Draco had been sleeping with Pansy occasionally since fifth year. He supposed sixteen wasn't that young, but still. "Why me? Why not someone from sixth year or seventh year?"

Blaise snorted. "Probably because yours is famous."

What? Draco stared at Blaise with disbelief 

Pansy...

Pansy and her little cadre of friends that had to share every detail with each other. If Pansy was running around telling stories about their past sex life, even flattering ones, he was going to have some fucking stern words for her.

"I have a fairly decent one too," Theo spoke in an aggrieved tone. "Even if it's not as 'famous' as Draco's. I showed it to them around noon and it was nearly midnight before they were done with it."

Draco did not want to have the current conversation. He did not want to hear the current conversation. If Blaise and Theo got into an argument about whose cock Daphne and Astoria Greengrass liked better, Draco was going to need to scourgify his brain.

"I'll leave you to argue since I'm apparently the only one who doesn't want the Greengrasses anywhere near my library," Draco said with a sneer as he stalked out of his dorm room.

He headed to the Hogwarts Library.

The cursed object he and Granger had been assigned was ending up a slight nightmare. They'd been stuck for the last week trying to find a formula for the final equation.

Draco walked through the halls disillusioned until he reached the library, and then reappeared in an abandoned aisle. Granger was not anywhere nearby, which meant she was probably in the Gryffindor dorm.

He went to the charms aisle and started dragging his finger across the titles as he looked for something useful. Granger had him squarely beaten when it came to Arithmancy. She was a speed demon when it came to running numbers in her head, and she could pull out equations from memory as though her brain functioned as a sort of index file, or invent them on the spot if she couldn't think of one that suited her. It was almost unfair that anyone could interact so fluidly with numbers.

However Draco suspected that he was better at Charms. He'd always had a natural affinity for it, but his knowledge had grown dramatically due to spending an entire year repairing a Vanishing Cabinet. The spellwork was so complicated it made Draco's head hurt to think about it. Borgin's advice on repairing it had been mostly useless. Draco had to teach himself how to build the damn things in order to finally understand how the repairs were supposed to work. Charms theory was a subject he was intimately acquainted with.

Granger wasn't at all bad at Charms, but she simply wasn't as familiar with the variety when it came to charmed objects and how all the various elements interplayed. She sometimes didn't take those aspects fully into account when calculating, and it occasionally made her numbers differ from Draco's, which always forced them to comb over pages and pages of equations trying to find the differences and then determine who was right. Which had the upside of making their study sessions together run delightfully long.

However, Dawlish had been dismissive and condescending toward Granger during her presentation in class and Draco had been able to tell that it had upset her. When Draco hadn't been entertaining fantasies of Dawlish and Theo joining Goldstein in in the hospital ward, he had resolved to find some kind of breakthrough for the assignment.

He reached the section he was looking for and started browsing.

"Draco."

Draco cringed and bitterly wished he could disillusion himself, but it was clearly too late. He looked over at Daphne with a sickly smile.

"Draco, I was wondering if you'd changed your mind about the Christmas holidays by any chance." She sashayed down the aisle toward him, her voice lilting slightly 

"I'm afraid not," he said in a stiff voice.

Daphne's mouth twitched, her eyes narrowed, and she pouted slightly. "Why not?"

Draco rolled his jaw with irritation. "Is it that difficult for you to believe I'm just not interested?"

"Just think of it as a favour then." Daphne gave a shrug and moved closer to Draco. She ran a hand down his arm. "Really, Draco, it's not as though the Malfoy Family is winning any popularity contests this year. Don't try to pretend you have anyone else asking to visit during the holidays. Do this for Tori and I, and I'll start putting in a good word for you socially."

Draco clenched his hand in a fist and sneered down at her. "Really? You have the social capital to share with the disgraced Malfoy Family if I just—what? Let you and your sister help yourselves to whatever you want?"

Daphne stared up at him and blinked her cool green eyes slowly. "If you're that opposed, think of it as a compromise. The Malfoy Family is famousfor those. Were you planning to be a pariah for the rest of your life? You used to be so ambitious. I don't know why you aren't jumping at the opportunity. I'm hardly even asking for anything."

"The answer is still no."

Daphne's eyes glittered with irritation. "Why not?" she whined and moved closer.

Draco slid away from her. "Well, for one thing, my mother will be there. The entire reason I'm returning for the holidays is to be with her. Not to mention, Blaise and Theo both generally spend part of the holidays there. I think that would be a bit awkward, don't you?"

Daphne looked confused. "Why? I doubt they're going to take it personally that Astoria and I want a chance to see yours too. They could even join us, if you wanted."

Draco felt himself blush up to the roots of his hair. "What?"

"Do you have some specific objections to me or my sister? Because certainly seems like it's a free for all when it's Pansy and Blaise and Theo—" Daphne was getting annoyed and it was causing her volume to rise.

"Who told you that?" Draco demanded in an incredulous tone.

"Blaise. I asked him why you've been so resistant. He says he has no idea. One afternoon is all I want, and you're acting as as if I'm asking for your virginity. I'm well aware that you've got no objections when it's other people. Blaise said that you spent most of this past summer with him and Theo, and since you weren't with Pansy anymore, the three of you spent most of your time—"

"Excuse me, Greengrass, I have a suddenly urgent need to kill someone."

Draco beelined out of the Charms section and nearly ran into Ginny Weasley as he went around the corner.

"Pardon, Weasley," he muttered as he stormed out of the library and went to find Blaise.