Hermione nodded silently. He seemed just like any other boy her age, frightened and alone, trapped in an awful situation because of his own mistakes and those of his parents. Trapped because of the awful lies his father had brought him up to believe in. It was suddenly quite clear to her, and her preconceptions were dealt a jarring blow, making her mind suddenly race with the thoughts her realisation had opened the door to. Malfoy had said the evening he’d arrived that it wasn’t his mother’s fault – that she had been brought up to believe the pureblood nonsense. That she had never had a chance. Well, Hermione thought dizzily, if that applied to Narcissa, then it certainly applied to Malfoy. Not, she added, that it absolved him of anything.