Midnight, Unmasked
A small gift for my followers: No warnings. Just masked strangers, bad decisions, and one unforgettable kiss. Dramione · One-shot · Masquerade AU · Post-war · Banter · Tension · Slow-burn (but fast-mistake)
The Ministry’s Annual Peace Gala was, in Hermione Granger’s professional opinion, a sanctimonious circus; a place where rich witches wore robes that cost more than the average employee’s yearly wage, and where she, a mid-level policy officer, smiled politely for the sake of future political capital.
She sipped champagne through a paper-thin smile and ignored the buzzing crowd. Glamour spells fluttered over everyone in the ballroom, hair color and style was altered, voices blurred, and elegant masks enchanted to conceal. No names were ever spoken. No politics occupied anyone's tongue. Just pure, anonymous civility.
Because this year’s theme was different, Masquerade. And whoever at the Events Committee came up with it deserved a bloody Order of Merlin. Because for once, the Golden Girl of the Golden Trio could disappear.
No press. No gawking interns. No whispered praise for surviving a war she never wanted to fight.
Just a beautiful silk dress, flowing champagne and a mask that let her breathe. It was almost a shame Harry and Ron were chasing a wand smuggler through half of Latin America. But only almost. Which meant, in theory, that she could escape for one night. In theory.
She ducked under a floating chandelier of starlight and crossed the ballroom, heels clicking like defiance. Her gown was deep red, almost black in the low light, and her mask shimmered like molten gold. She had charmed it herself, something about runes of anonymity felt safer than whatever lazy disguise spell the Ministry provided.
“Too regal for the crowd.”
A voice slid behind her shoulder; low, velvet-smooth, and with a faint drawl that raised every hair on the back of her neck.
She turned slowly.
The man before her was tall, in a sharply cut black coat that screamed vaults full of galleons and ancestral arrogance. His mask was silver and matte, shaped like the head of a raven. The glamour blurred most of his features, but not his posture: precise, practiced, and unmistakably upper-class.
His hair was black, falling in soft fringes over the edge of his mask. And he was unbelievably tall, tall enough that, for once, Hermione didn’t regret the heels she’d nearly left behind in favor of sensible kitten heels.
“Do you always just appear behind women?” she asked coolly.
“You’re the most stunning thing in this room,” he said simply, voice low and smooth, like dark velvet. He was leaning forward so she could hear his voice better.
Hermione blinked, unsure whether to scoff or blush. “You don’t waste time, do you?”
“Not when I see something worth it.” His eyes, shadowed behind the silver raven mask, lingered on her face. “Dance with me.”
She studied him, tall, composed, too well-dressed to be anything but old money. “You always walk up to strangers and ask for dances like you’re in a bloody fairytale?”
“No,” he said, offering his hand. “Only when they look like they’d rather hex the next person who tries.”
She arched a brow behind her mask. “And you can tell that despite my mask?”
He tilted his head, amused. “It’s in the posture. The tilt of your chin. The way you’re holding that glass like it personally offended you.”
She glanced at the untouched champagne flute in her hand, then back at him. “Maybe it did.”
“Then allow me to give you something better to do with your hands.”
Her lips twitched. “You’re very sure of yourself.”
“I have heard that before,” he said, a little softer now. “But I’m sure I want to dance with you.”
She surprised them both by placing her champagne on the tray of a passing waiter and slipping her hand into his.
“One dance,” she said, eyes narrowing through her mask. “If you keep your hands where they belong.”
His mouth curved. “Define belong.”
She let him lead her onto the floor without answering.
The waltz had just begun, something slow, haunting, threaded with cello and silver strings. He held her with elegant ease: one hand on her waist, the other at her shoulder blade, and a restraint that somehow made the contact more intimate.
“You’re very upright,” she murmured as they moved. “Stiff shoulders. Perfect frame.”
“That sounds like a compliment.”
“It’s not. It’s rich boy posture.”
He laughed, warm and unbothered. “You say that like it’s an insult.”
“It is when it screams my ancestors owned half of England.”
He leaned in, lips brushing her earlobe as he replied, “You’re not wrong.”
She inhaled sharply.
“Let me guess,” she said, recovering. “You summered in France, wear tailored socks, and you were absolutely sorted into Slytherin.”
“Guilty on all counts.”
“You’re not part of the Sacred Twenty-Eight, are you?”
“And what if I was?”
“I’d ask what your family name was and if your father ever said… unpleasant things at the dinner table.”
He arched a brow. “You’re dangerously close to stereotyping, you know.”
“And you’re dangerously close to confirming it.”
The music wrapped around them, drawing them into a slow, effortless circle. Other couples spun nearby, blurred at the edges of her awareness, but to her, it felt like the ballroom had narrowed down to just the two of them. He turned her gently, one hand pressed at the small of her back. They moved closer.
His lips grazed the curve of her temple. She didn’t step away.
She could feel the heat of him, the subtle weight of his chest just a breath from hers and his cologne, gods, it was unfair. Spiced, dark, expensive.
And then his hand slid lower, splaying across her lower back as he pulled her into him.
Tighter. Closer. Her breath hitched.
“You’re not bad at this,” she admitted, breath catching.
“I’m very good at things when I’m motivated.”
“Oh? And what’s your motivation right now?”
His lips grazed her skin again, just below her ear this time. “Figuring out how far you’ll let me take this.”
She stiffened for half a heartbeat. But she didn’t stop dancing.
He smiled. Victory, or something like it.
The music shifted. A slower waltz. The kind that made the air feel heavier.
“You’re dangerous,” she said.
“You’re stunning,” he replied. “Which is inconvenient.”
“Why’s that?”
He exhaled, just once. “Because I’ve been trying not to look at you since you walked in. Because I don’t know who you are, and that should bother me, but it doesn’t.”
Her heart stuttered.
“I don’t usually chase strangers,” he added. “But you’re not just some stranger, are you?”
She arched a brow. “Is that your line?”
“No,” he said, honest and a little breathless. “It’s just… whatever this is...it’s sharp. And tense. And it’s driving me mad. I know you can feel it, too.”
There was a beat of silence between them. It was heavy, and waiting, and she felt that sweet tension in her stomach.
“I’d really, really like to kiss you,” he said.
She leaned in slightly, lips parted. “And what makes you think I’d let you?”
He smiled. “Nothing. But you haven’t hexed me yet.”
She let out a slow exhale. And gods, she hated how much she liked the tension hanging between them.
He leaned in, and whispered against her ear, “Tell me no.”
But she didn’t.
Another step. Another slow turn. And then, almost imperceptibly, he led her away from the center of the ballroom. They glided toward the edge, toward velvet curtains and marble columns and a darker, quieter space.
And when her back brushed against the wall, she didn’t stop him.
She didn’t back away when his fingers grazed her hip. Didn’t stop him when his other hand found hers, thumb tracing slow, lazy circles that made her skin prickle beneath her gloves.
There was a pause. One heartbeat or two.
And then he kissed her.
Slow at firs, like he was testing the waters, tasting her, giving her time to pull away. But she didn’t. She should have. It was the Ministry, for Merlin’s sake. Somewhere out there was a Deputy Minister sipping on wine and an intern trying to smuggle extra canapés.
But the masks made it easy to forget. The glamours made it easier.
It felt anonymous. Safe.
Thrilling.
His lips were warm, deliberate, unhurried as they moved against hers. Her breath caught, more from the fact that she was letting this happen than the kiss itself.
And yet…
Her hand slid up to cup his cheek, fingers brushing the edge of his mask. She tilted her head, inviting more. Letting him deepen it.
That was when he groaned, low and barely-there, and the sound made her stomach do that horrible, wonderful flip.
Oh no. This was bad.
She hadn’t kissed a stranger since New Year’s Eve at Harry and Ginny’s flat, and that had ended in a lot more tequila and a lot less magic. But this? This was....how should she put it?
She liked it.
She liked the taste of his lips. The way he towered over her. The feel of his fingers, splayed firm on her hip before slipping lower, bunching the fabric of her gown at her thigh like he wanted to memorize the curve of it.
Then, just as suddenly, he pulled back, breathless, stunned.
“That was…” He blinked at her. “Who are you?”
She stared up at him, dazed. “Why did it feel so good?” he asked again.
He gave a breathless laugh, still catching his breath.
She tilted her chin and said, wryly, “Let’s just say I’m definitely not Sacred Twenty-Eight.”
That made him chuckle, low and startled, like she’d punched through something in him.
“This is bad,” she murmured, “that was...”
“Insane,” he said, voice hoarse. “I don’t even know your name.”
“Exactly.” She laughed, dizzy with adrenaline and whatever spell he’d just laid on her mouth. “That’s the point, isn’t it? It’s a masquerade.”
They pulled apart slightly, his hand still on her hip.
“Let me guess,” he murmured, “you’ll disappear into the crowd, and I’ll spend the next year wondering who the hell you were?”
“You’ll live,” she said. “Probably.”
And then... “Ten…”
The countdown began. Every clock in the ballroom chimed in sync.
“Nine… eight…”
She froze.
“Seven…”
His hand was still on her thigh.
“Six…”
She realized her lipstick was probably smudged, and she didn’t even care.
“Five…”
He stepped back, just slightly, chest rising and falling.
“Four…”
They stared at each other.
“Three…”
No going back.
“Two…”
Oh, fuck.
“One.”
With a chime like crystal shattering, the spell broke. The entire ballroom glowed for a heartbeat then masks melted into mist, glamours peeled away, and reality slammed back into place.
Hermione blinked.
He blinked.
They froze.
She was staring at Draco Malfoy. He was staring at Hermione Granger.
She couldn't breathe.
His hands dropped from her like she’d burned him. Her lips parted in a silent, horrified “no.”
She pointed a finger at him, blood draining from her face. “You...”
“Granger?” he said, voice strangled.
“You kissed me...” she snapped, as if that somehow rewrote the part where she’d kissed him back.
“You let me!” he shot back.
“I didn’t know it was you, Malfoy!”
A ripple moved through the crowd. Someone near the refreshment table whispered, “Is that...?”
A witch near the orchestra dropped her champagne flute.
One of the Department Heads muttered, “Sweet Merlin, is that Hermione Granger and Draco Malfoy?”
Hundreds of eyes were suddenly on them.
A hush fell over the ballroom like a storm cloud, stunned, delicious, scandalous silence. Draco, still catching his breath, ran a hand through his now very-recognizable platinum hair.
Hermione’s face was a study in academic horror and moral crisis. Her lips, still kiss-bitten, twitched.
Then, under her breath: “Oh fuck me.”
Draco dragged a hand down his face slowly, like he could wipe the moment clean if he scrubbed hard enough. His silver eyes locked on hers, sharp and storm-struck, and he just stared at her.
Really stared.
“Right,” he muttered. “Let’s pretend this never happened.”
He let out a breath, bitter and stunned.
“For Salazar’s sake, we almost made the front page of The Daily Prophet.”
That thought alone seemed to break whatever spell still hung between them. He stepped back like he’d been burned, straightened his coat, and turned sharply away, putting space between them like it was the only thing keeping him sane.
“Agreed,” she said. “But if you breathe a word of this, I will personally rewrite your family tree starting with you.”
They took five steps in opposite directions.
Then paused.
Looked back.
Their eyes locked... wide, wild, wanting.
Because unfortunately…
…it had been a really good kiss. (image credit: It seems it is AI but, do let me know if there is an artist so I can tag them)
