If thou must love me
If thou must love me, let it be for nought
Except for love's sake only.
Marriage-Law fic-let narrating the beginnings of something rare, but certainly not any less sought after. FredxHermionexGeorge
Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction using characters from the Harry Potter world, which is owned and trademarked by J.K. Rowling. This isn't canonical and is entirely a work of my imagination.
FxHxG
Hermione stared at the heavy, golden package weighing her hands down with utter distaste. She could hear the mingled cries and voices surrounding her, but her weary mind had taken the spotlight and everything else had faded into the background.
She slowly peeled open the flap, and with a small bit of self-assurance, tore the damned thing open.
A card fell out. She turned it over with unsteady hands, her insides roiling with fear. This very bloody card could change the rest of her life as she knew it, and nobody, especially indignant Hermione, could change that.
Fred Weasley.
She felt a sudden rush of vertigo as her mind was flooded with various memories. Stunning twins that had helped carry her books from the library when they saw her quaver beneath the weight of all their seven years' education combined. Brilliant boys that got her so riled up and who overwhelmed her with intelligent conversation. Boys with chestnut eyes who were the only ones that didn't make her feel like an utter swot when they clutched their sides and cried tears of mirth after a terrible retelling of an odd joke she'd heard somewhere once. Tall, strong and broad-shouldered lads who were serenading their beautiful girlfriend Angelina, with a horrid and cheesy rhyme that they'd writ just for her, taking no notice of a teary-eyed Hermione who'd learned what heartbreak really meant. Dinners at The Burrow, sitting across Fred, George and Angelina, observing their familiarity and ease of conversation with intensifying sadness.
She heard two gasps across her, drawing her out of another stale memory. She looked up and felt a shiver go down her spine when she felt two, complicated, mature pairs of eyes meeting her own.
"Fred?" Molly Weasley inquired.
Fred stayed unmoving, as if nobody had spoken.
"Oh, Fred, what is it?" Molly bustled and nudged her way to the twins, knocking over an embracing Ginny and Harry in the process.
"Hermione," He spoke softly. Molly's spine straightened, but nobody else had paid heed to what was happening in their troubled bunch. They were all too busy rejoicing at their good fortune. Ron, especially, seemed to think that he'd hit the jackpot with Draco, his long-time boyfriend.
"George?" Molly turned to him, in wonder. "Who is it?"
"Hermione," He muttered.
Now it was Hermione's turn to gasp, loud enough to draw all attention towards her. She turned to her package and shook it once more, and watched in horror, as another card fell out.
George Weasley.
"Oh, bloody hell" She murmured in abject terror.
She looked up and saw that the twins were talking without words, their meaning unclear, but their distress was obvious. Hermione couldn't think of a single thing to say and was about to blurt out an apology when a crack broke the silence that had settled around the table.
Hermione saw all that happened next with determined muteness. She watched as a frazzled Angelina appeared in the middle of the living room. She watched as the brunette scrambled towards the twins, her ex-boyfriends, and now Hermione's fiancés without a care in the world. She watched them draw her into a crushing hug. She watched as Fred stroked her hair while she sobbed into George's chest. Hermione watched and watched and watched, unblinkingly, until her vision became blurry. Hermione watched until Angelina's breathing had slowed down and the twins' arms hung loosely around her. Hermione watched until that intensifying pain pooling in her belly, strong enough to overthrow all other reasoning, made her stand up. Now, the twins watched Hermione, their eyes full of apology, anger and some other indiscernible emotion, as she turned on the spot and vanished into oblivion. With a few crass words from Fred, The Burrow erupted into chaos.
FxHxG
Hermione's legs could withhold her slim frame, and even her huge brain. But it couldn't withhold the burden that the day's happenings had brought with it. She collapsed on top of the golden barley. She let herself melt into the earth and even worse, let herself pretend. She let herself pretend that she wasn't hurt. That her impending marriage was inconveniencing her as much as it was inconveniencing her husbands-to-be. She let herself pretend that she didn't want anything to do with the dynamic duo who never took much notice of her and who, hence, didn't deserve her time of day. She let herself get so lost in all these lies that the sound of someone apparating nearby caused her to shriek loud enough to wake hibernating bears.
"Hermione!" She heard a familiar cry ring out unobstructed in the field.
She wiped the few stray tears that had unwittingly escaped and rose, slowly and wearily.
"Yes," she sniffed. "Do you need something?"
Fred's eyes widened, and he snorted humourlessly.
"Do I need something? None of us had a clue as to where you'd gotten off to Hermione! You could have disappeared to bloody Knockturn Alley to do yourself in for all we knew!" He panted.
She pondered these words and asked, "How'd you find me?"
"Merlin," Fred breathed. "I think I'd have it easier teaching Crookshanks to Avada me."
"Listen, Fred," Hermione was starting to get annoyed now. "Angelina seemed a little burdened when I left. She may need what little moral support you can oblige."
Fred's eyebrows disappeared above his hairline, well into his silky, red tresses.
"So I suggest you do that, while I find a way to revoke this law. I'll get you both out of it, don't worry. And I don't mind if the three of you carry on as you were while I do this." She said, resigned to a lonely fate.
"So, you mean you don't mind if we carry on as friends? How kind of you, sweet Hermione." Fred drawled.
"What?" Hermione stuttered.
"Hermione," Fred ran a hand through his hair impatiently. "We all broke it off nearly 5 months ago. Did nobody tell you?"
"No, it's not possible." And it wasn't. Hermione had just resigned herself to unrequited affection. Nothing had changed.
"Well, bully for you then." Fred huffed and plonked his bottom down on to the grass next to Hermione.
"I just saw the way you three embraced. Don't try and tell me it was platonic affection, because I wasn't born yesterday, you git." An emboldened Hermione felt her voice shrill as she released long-supressed emotion.
"It wasn't platonic." Fred now looked bemused. "It was familial. I admit that she hasn't accepted it yet. That's why her package stunned her so much. We don't love her like that, Hermione. George reckons we never did."
Hermione was confused by the preposterous load that Fred was spouting, so she voiced the most pressing thing on her mind.
"Where is that idiot, anyways?" Hermione looked about the meadow as if she were seeing it for the first time.
"He's getting Angie home. He should be here any mi-"
Crack.
"You two look as if Voldemort just had his wicked way with you."
Fred gagged.
George grinned as he strode towards them, every bit the confident, intimidating and beautiful twin that he was.
He plonked down ungracefully on Hermione's other side. Everything was quite for a while, till George disturbed it.
"So," He began uncertainly.
"Looks like we're getting hitched." George turned to Hermione with a chaff smile.
Hermione cleared her throat.
"It appears that we are." She said uncomfortably. "What do you think about that, then?" She asked bracingly.
The wind in the field was getting unpleasantly stronger and Hermione ended up chewing on stray locks of hair. She was about to spit it out when she felt rough fingers pull them out gently.
She turned around and was greeted with the sight of a full-blown Weasley twin smile, all teeth and dimples.
"Not sure we want a wife who can't close her mouth." Fred was still grinning, and she heard George's low chuckle next to her.
Hermione released a small smile and eased her painfully stiff posture just the bit.
"Not sure I want husbands who couldn't give an arse about privacy." She retaliated. "How did you find me?"
George leaned back on his elbows and looked up at her. Deciding to ignore her question, he said instead, "If you want us to leave, we will. And if you want us to stay here and shut our gobs, we'll do that as well."
Hermione wasn't sure of the feelings that were then coursing through her, but she knew that she didn't want to be alone, not really. Especially not when they were the ones offering to keep her company. But Hermione was too obstinate to voice that sentiment and instead said "You're grown men and you can do as you please."
Fred and George shared a look over Hermione and Fred leaned in a little closer, as if he was about to reveal a trans dimensional finding.
"Ah, see now, fair Hermione- that's where you're wrong. We can't just simply be 'grown men' and 'do as we please', because we're grown men tied to you." Fred finished with a slight nudge to her shoulder.
"And despite the circumstances that brought us all here, we'll do our very best to honour it." George said more seriously than Hermione could have ever expected of him. But naturally, it was too much to expect it to last.
"Whether that means rubbing your feet every morning"
"Or if it means bathing Crookshanks, which is definitely averse to our health."
"Even if it means we have to dress up as House Elves for Halloween and advocate elf rights to every unwilling ear we can find"
Hermione let out a small laugh, and she turned to see the twins now moved slightly in front of her. From where she was, she could observe each of their bright, grinning faces. She could observe their obvious smile lines brought about by strenuous smiling. She could observe the way their soft hair was cut, and the way it handsomely framed their faces. She could feel the warmth radiating from their beings and she closed her eyes, relishing it.
What she didn't realise was that they were doing a bit of observing themselves. They were tracing the gentle curve of her nose and the lines of her heart-shaped face. George was entranced by the way her once bushy hair, now cascaded down in gentle curls that caught the sunlight, making her look almost angelic. Fred wanted to reach out and touch her smooth skin, to see if it felt as soft and velvety as it looked.
She opened her eyes and Fred cleared his throat awkwardly.
"Should we head back? Getting warm isn't it?" He asked, tugging at the collar of his shirt.
Without thinking, Hermione leaned over and deftly unbuttoned his top two buttons. She felt Fred stiffen and realised, a little belatedly, what she had just done.
"Why, Hermione! Try waiting till our wedding night, won't you?" George said with a laugh.
"Sod off, you berks" Hermione's face was reddening at an alarming rate. She heard their gleeful laughter and considered burrowing a hole in the field and suffocating herself in it.
The twins suddenly stood up with a grace they hadn't demonstrated while sitting down and offered Hermione a hand each.
"Shall we?" George said, still smirking.
She knocked their hands aside with a scowl and pushed herself to her own feet, her bottom wobbling a bit in the air clumsily for a moment.
She felt hands unnecessarily steady her by grasping her waist, and even that touch sent a shiver down her spine.
Merlin, I'm done for she thought. If only she knew the truth of it.
The twins pushed her between them and they disapparated together.
FxHxG
A few days later
"You two are a terrible influence," Hermione grumbled.
"While you are an unusually quick learner, love" George ruffled her hair affectionately.
"I dunno, mate. I suspect she's fostering a true fondness for our profession, and therefore, making any adeptness inconsequential." Fred proclaimed with a large smile.
A similar smile spread across Hermione's own graceful features, replacing the missing ruggedness with a mischief that Fred and George had come to adore.
"For the sake of the wizarding world, then?" She laughed boldly.
"For magic!" They all declared as they chucked Hermione's beaded bag worth of Dungbombs into Percy's room, snorting at the outraged gasp they heard emitted from within.
FxHxG
A/N: Not sure if anybody even wants more of this, and so I've let if off here. This is a one-shot which could possibly become more.