Looking back now, she can clearly pinpoint the moment the Darkling came for Malfoy. It had been before their sixth year, because he’d come back from the summer holidays completely changed. Walking the corridors as if he owned them, smirking and ignoring Harry and his attempts to fight like he’d never done before, as if he knew something no else did, his magic growing and growing, and Hermione had been the only one who seemed to notice, who saw the way he shifted his focus from revenge to incessant research, eyeing the restricted section with growing hunger.