For Grace. I, er, hope you like it. Happy birthday! :D
Disclaimer: I don't own any part of the Harry Potter universe.
Hermione sighed and shut her eyes briefly. She really should have known most of this by now. What had she been doing in Potions class? Oh, right. Trying to calm Harry down about the school's reaction to that stupid article by that Skeeter woman, and his being picked by the Goblet, while stubbornly repeating, to herself as much as to Harry, ignore them, ignore them, ignore them…
She had lost count of the number of times she had wished her best friends weren't being absolute idiots—although she could sort of understand Ron's jealousy and Harry's indignation—and were still on the same side, in those weeks. Ron knew how to keep Harry's mind off things a lot better than she did.
At least they'd gotten over that silly spat, now. Even though it had taken watching Harry nearly get killed by a dragon to convince Ron that Harry hadn't put his name in that Goblet. (She was so glad the next task was months away; she'd nearly destroyed her face with her nails; she didn't think she could handle seeing him nearly die again for a while.)
Hermione had the feeling that Harry was glad to spend less time at the library now that he and Ron were friends again.
She shook her head, grinning wryly, and flipped back to the start of her notes to memorise the recipe for the Antidote to Common Poisons.
Let's see…add a bezoar to the mortar, crush into very fine powder and add four measures to the cauldron. Add two measures of standard ingredient as well and heat to a medium temperature for five seconds—
High-pitched giggling interrupted her revision, and she looked up, not bothering to conceal her annoyance.
Here we go again. And this time I have no one to vent to.
Krum strode past her, surly as ever, and sat down at a table in front of her. He set a stack of books down beside him, and opened the topmost one—Hermione thought it might be a textbook (they were generally the only books in the library that were thick and well-read), although on what, she couldn't say from this distance.
Groups of his ever-present fangirls gathered in the shelves behind him, and to Hermione's irritation behind her. She could hear their whispers.
"I think I might actually ask for his autograph today; I've got a quill and everything—"
"I wonder what's so interesting about that mouldy old textbook—"
Frowning, she attempted to continue her study.
Add one unicorn horn to your cauldron and stir twice, clockwise—
"Oooh, he's got his wand out—" suddenly caught her attention.
"I wish he'd get his wand out," another whispered, amidst giggling. Hermione's face burned as she fought not to look up.
They fell silent after a few seconds, and she gave in and glanced up.
"Or…kid…us. Or…kid…yers," Krum was saying, waving his wand around vaguely.
Is he trying to say Orchideous? Why is he trying to conjure flowers? He's got the wrist movements all wrong.
Several purple sparks shot out the end of his wand.
The giggling resumed.
"I know another way to make things come out of his wand," someone whispered from behind her. Hermione's face was doing a fine impersonation of a tomato, now.
His pronunciation was getting more confident, at least, but he was still just stabbing randomly at the air.
Hermione was suddenly reminded of an eleven-year-old boy with red hair and freckles waving his arms like a windmill and shouting (mispronouncing), "Wingardium Leviosa!"
Then she remembered a wooden club flying out of a troll's hand to land on its head as a result of the same spell, and grinned. Nothing like the threat of a troll to help one learn a spell.
"Orkidyuss!" Krum continued to stab at the air and Hermione felt her own eleven-year-old self echo across the years.
It's orCHIDeous, making the "kid" nice and long…
But Krum wasn't a classmate she could help with spellwork (she knew Ron would phrase that differently; something along the lines of you can't embarrass Krum! He's a world-class Quidditch player, probably).
Sighing, she once again turned her eyes down to her notes.
Add two mistletoe berries and stir twice and anti-clockwise.
The giggling ceased. Hermione couldn't help herself—she looked up.
Krum was standing in front of her.
"Can you help me vith this spell?" He was holding the textbook in his hands and looked very frustrated with himself.
Hermione sat and gaped at him for a second.
"Er… me? Which spell? Orchideous?"
"Vell, yes, how did you know?" he asked, confused.
"Vel—well, you weren't that quiet over there…" Hermione muttered. She had long since passed the tomato impersonation stage and moved onto what she inwardly termed the "Ron" phase, which meant her face was a shade of deep maroon.
"Vell, yes. I cannot make the flowers like that Ollivander did with Fleur's vand."
"Oh. Er, okay. Well, you're saying it wrong, for starters. It's or-KID-ee-us. Try it again, without the wand?" she instructed.
"Or-kid-ee-us," he said slowly.
"Good. Now, without saying the incantation, sort of draw a circle in the air with your wand," Hermione said. Waving her wand clockwise, she added, "Like this, see?"
Smiling and nodding, Krum copied her perfectly.
"Is that good?" he asked.
"Yes. Now, say it faster, and draw a circle at the same time with your wand, picturing the type of flowers you want," she replied.
Krum squeezed his eyes shut and his fist tightened around his wand.
"Orchideous!" he said, swishing his wand in a rather larger circle than Hermione had anticipated, but nonetheless, a beautiful red rose had appeared in the air in front of it. She caught it, and instantly regretted it. Thorns were no laughing matter.
"Merlin's PANTS!" she howled.
"No, no, no…Episkey! Episkey!" Krum said, his permanent scowl replaced with a look of utter panic, and he snatched the rose away. It was Hermione's turn to scowl. Gloves were helpful in that situation; why couldn't she have been wearing them? It had to be Krum she made a fool of herself in front of, the infuriatingly good-looking (wait, what?) Quidditch player, not to mention half of his fanbase.
"Thanks," she muttered shamefacedly.
"No, it is all my fault," he said, shaking his head.
"Are you alright? Let me see your hands," he continued nervously, and hastily snatched her hands and cradled them in his own, tilting them this way and that. Her hands were dwarfed by his surprisingly gentle, gloved, ones.
Then a dull flush spread through his cheeks and he dropped Hermione's hands abruptly.
"Yes, they're…fine, thank you. Do you have to heal a lot of injuries on the Quidditch field?" she asked, suddenly feeling shy.
"Yes. Bludgers, they make you say things like—how do you say?—Merlin's pans and worse," Krum answered.
Hermione snorted.
"Pants. Merlin's pants," she corrected, between laughs.
"And then vee Episkey each other and get on vith training," he went on.
"We have Madam Pomfrey for that here," Hermione said.
"But vhy vould you rely on her? Vhy not heal each other yourselves?" Krum asked, frowning.
"Because healings can go wrong, especially magical ones. Once, Harry broke his arm—playing Quidditch, of course—and a Professor tried to fix it and instead ended up removing his arm bones," she retorted, remembering with shame how she had still defended him. Krum's face darkened at the mention of Harry, and the idea of Harry with a boneless arm didn't seem to bother him.
"He sounds like a hopeless Professor," was all he managed to say.
"He was," she agreed wholeheartedly, and was almost glad she was already blushing, because Lockhart's memory made her want to bury her face in a pillow and groan at her past self's stupidity.
"Vos? Vos he fired after that?"
"Oh, er, long story. He wasn't fired for that, but he kind of…lost his memory after trying to Obliviate Ron and Harry and has been in St. Mungo's ever since," and good riddance, she refrained from adding.
"But vhy vould he vant to Obliviate your friends?"
"He…wrote a lot of books about what other people did and took credit for all of it, after Obliviating them, and after telling Ron and Harry he tried to do the same but he tried it with Ron's wand which was broken and it backfired," she rattled off, and then took a breath.
"Like I said, long story." She grinned wryly.
"Indeed." He leaned over and looked at her notes.
"Are you studying Potions, Hermy-own?"
"Trying to," and she couldn't help the tiniest bit of spite slipping out with those two words.
"My…admirers are bothering you," he murmured, eyes downcast.
"I can tell them to go avay if you vont?"
"Oh, well, that would be…a little rude."
Just then, Madam Pince turned up and solved the quandary for them.
"Shoo! You want to stay in here? Borrow a book and read it. Otherwise, OUT!" she advanced on Krum, but changed her mind when she saw Hermione, and turned back, surprise evident on her face.
"Vell that is settled then," Krum said, and the side of his mouth quirked upwards ever so slightly. It was the closest she'd ever seen him come to a smile.
There was an awkward pause in which he appeared to be debating with himself on a very important issue. His companion tilted her head and tried to decipher his expression, to no avail. She gave up and tried to refocus on her Potions notes.
"Vill you go to the ball vith me?" he burst out suddenly. His face was so hopeful, and sweet, Hermione felt awful for being too shocked to say anything.
"Is that why you Conjured a rose?" she blurted.
"Yes!" he exclaimed, and grabbed it and tried to hand it to her. Then his face fell.
"Wait, here, put this around it," she said, and passed him a fresh piece of parchment, which he wrapped carefully around the rose. He held it in one hand and rummaged in his bag, finally bringing out a long quill, which he tied around it with as much care.
"Now vill you go to the ball vith me?" he repeated, and thrust the now-safe rose towards her.
"But why me?" was all she asked, bewildered.
"Because I like talking vith you and you are very, ah, good-looking, you are smart and hardworking and please go to the ball vith me?"
Hermione felt dazed as she accepted his rose and stammered out an affirmative, but any guilt (in the form of Ron's face flashing behind her eyelids) vanished at Krum's expression.
He was smiling.
A/N: I may have unintentionally taken the very last sentence from Ranger's Apprentice: The Ruins of Gorlan, but hey. HOPE YOU ENJOYED and if you feel so inclined, review and/or favourite! :)