Blaise and Hermione didn't go back to the party after they embraced. Instead, they went back to their dorm, agreeing that the party wasn't quite the atmosphere for them, and went about with their usual routine of reading by the fire.
Things had shifted between them. As the weeks passed, they opened up to each other even more than before. Hermione had decided that Blaise knew almost as much about her as Harry did. Somehow, Blaise Zabini had managed to fill the void that Harry and Ron had left in her heart. It was an unlikely pairing. If someone had told her years ago that she would be best friends with Blaise, she would have laughed at them. Yes, she did regard him as her best friend and had told him as much. He replied that he had the same sentiment.
Despite this, she still missed Harry and was actually hurt that he hadn't written her back. After everything they had been through and he couldn't even be bothered to write a short letter...
She hadn't written Ron back yet either. It was too soon to confront him, even with Blaise. It was very comforting to know that he was willing to go with her when it was time.
Today Hermione decided to do something bold: she was going to sit at the Slytherin table. Luna and Neville had become a couple the previous week, and they were of course obsessing over each other. Although they made polite chit chat with her during means, she couldn't help but feel like an unwanted third wheel. Other than them, she didn't have anyone to talk to in Gryffindor on a regular basis. Besides, this is what McGonagall wanted anyway.
Blaise had already gone down to breakfast before her, so she slowly tried to calm her nerves as she entered the great hall. She spared a glance at the Gryffindor table to see that nothing had changed. Ginny was still sitting with Dean, and Luna and Neville and Luna were sitting huddled together, Luna's head resting on his shoulder. The rest of the Gryffindor students didn't even glance at her. It's better this way, she reasoned to herself.
People started staring at her as she walked past her usual sitting place and marched directly to the end of the Slytherin table. She plopped herself down next to Blaise and across from Malfoy and piled her plate with food as if it were the most normal thing in the world, ignoring all the whispers and the not-so-subtle incredulous looks she was getting from the rest of the Slytherins.
"Morning, Granger," Malfoy drawled. His usual arrogance had started coming back in small bits here and there, but he still wasn't at all like his old self.
Blaise raised an eyebrow at her questioningly, but evidently amused. "Something wrong, Hermione?"
She plastered a smile on her face. "Everything is wonderful! Just wanted to sit with my best friends in the whole world of course," she said with as much sarcasm as she could muster and rolled her eyes with the last bit.
Blaise just laughed and Malfoy bit back a small smirk. She glanced towards the teacher's table at the front of the room to see McGonagall beaming with pride and the other teachers looking on approvingly.
"Didn't feel like sitting with the two lovebirds over there?" Blaise asked, referring to Luna and Neville. She huffed in response, shoving a piece of toast in her mouth. "Can't blame you there. It's almost gross the way they drool over each other."
Draco looked over his shoulder at the couple who had taken no notice of all the commotion she had caused by sitting at a different house table.
"Looney Lovegood and Longbottom. Who would have thought?" He remarked before taking a sip of his tea.
The three of them continued to eat their breakfast, chatting about their latest potions assignment when the mail delivery came.
In the confusion of owls, Draco looked down to see a small folded piece of paper land in his lap.
Tonight 6pm. –T
He grimaced and quickly shoved the note into his pocket, hoping that Granger and Zabini hadn't seen it. To his relief, they were now talking to each other about the prefect rounds.
Over the past few weeks Draco, Pansy, and Theo had stolen a handful of items for this potion they were apparently going to brew. He didn't even know why Pansy was in on this whole task anyway since it was his father and Theo's that they were breaking out of Azkaban. Pansy's parents had remained out of Azkaban since they weren't death eaters, and retained all of their wealth. Perhaps she just wanted to get in Theo's pants.
They had stolen Moonflower leaves from Slughorn's potions lab, unicorn hair from Luna Lovegood's diary (how Pansy had managed that he would never know), a vial of centaur blood from the hospital wing, and now they needed werewolf blood. Apparently their fathers would only send Theo the needed ingredients for the potion one at a time for secrecy reasons. If they stole everything at once it would look suspicious. Theo would let Draco look at his mother in the mirror now whenever he asked.
He couldn't tell where she was being held, but he could make out an old brick wall with some broken wood on the floor. It wasn't enough to go on. He wanted to tell the aurors, or even McGonagall. But who would believe him? Draco Malfoy, former death eater needs help to rescue his pureblood mother. No one would trust him, and he couldn't even blame them. He wouldn't trust that story if he had been on their side during the war either.
Blaise watched Draco expression darken as he looked at a small piece of paper under the table. Something was definitely going on. Ever since he first talked to Draco by the lake, he had suspected something wasn't right with him. Hermione didn't seem to notice as she was engrossed in a book.
"What's that?" He asked Draco, pointing to the note.
"Nothing," Draco replied a little too quickly as he shoved the note in his pocket. "Just a note from my mother."
"Really?" Blaise replied with a disbelieving tone. "Is that why Theo and Pansy keep looking at you?"
Hermione glanced over at Pansy and Theo, closing her book and giving them a glare. They simply sniggered and looked away.
"What's going on, Malfoy?" She asked demandingly. Anything that Nott and Parkinson were involved with was ever good. And if Malfoy was in league with them, perhaps she had been right about her suspicions all along.
"Nothing," he repeated firmly. "I'm not hungry anymore. See you later," he said, pushing his plate away and marching out of the great hall.
Blaise looked at Hermione questioningly. "What do you think that was about? I've seen them doing that before."
Hermione shrugged. "I don't know, but he seemed pretty sensitive about it. Maybe he just needs some time?"
Yeah…maybe." The two of them went back to their textbooks, ignoring the stares they were receiving from everyone still.
It was a few days later that McGonagall called Hermione to her office. After giving the portrait the password, she cautiously entered the beautiful room that once belonged to Albus Dumbledoor. McGonagall had redecorated it of course, but it still held the same powerful aura of magic and wonder.
"Miss Granger, please have a seat," she said, pouring a cup of tea for Hermione.
Hermione smiled and took a sip of the tea. "Thank you, Headmistress. What did you want to talk to me about?"
McGonagall sat back in her chair, absentmindedly swirling the contents of her cup with her finger. "I'm very pleased with the progress of inter-house unity. Over the past few months, I believe a lot of this progress has to do with your public friendship with Mr. Zabini. And for that, I'd like to thank you."
"Thank you, headmistress."
"But, this visit isn't just to express my thanks. I've been watching you, and I've noticed that when you're not with Mr. Zabini you're alone."
Hermione tilted her head, not knowing where this was going. "Am I doing something wrong?"
McGonagall lifted her hand up. "Absolutely not. At least, not that I know of. I just wanted to know if everything is okay?"
Hermione was still confused. "I'm not sure what you mean."
"Ever since Mr. Potter and Mr. Weasley rescued you from that troll during your first year, they have been by your side. I know how much their friendship means to you. I've also noticed that you aren't receiving owls at meals. I can't help but wonder why," she explained.
Hermione shifted uncomfortably in her chair and took a long sip of tea. "Well, Ron and I had a falling out over the summer. Harry is just busy with auror training as I'm sure you can imagine."
McGonagall frowned. "Yes but how are you, Hermione? I've known you for most of your life and I care very much about you. I want to know if you're truly happy to be back at Hogwarts…alone."
"Thank you so much, headmistress." Hermione said, giving her a small smile. "I admit, I was very lonely at first…but Blaise has helped me a great deal. And as much as I hate to admit it, Malfoy's company isn't as irritating as it used to be. Things are different, but they're okay. I'm okay."
The older witch studied her for a few moments before gently smiling back. "Alright. But just know that you can talk to me about anything if you need to."
Hermione nodded and walked over to the door.
"Miss Granger," McGonagall called out to her. "I'm glad that you're friends with Mr. Zabini. You're good for each other."
Hermione was in the library with Blaise working on another potions essay when she felt a tap on the shoulder. She turned to see Andy smiling eagerly at her with a silver goblet in his hand.
"Hi, Hermione!"
"Hello, Andy. How are you today?" She said with a smile.
"I'm great. I was wondering if you could help me with something?"
Hermione lifted her bag off the chair next to her to make room for him. "Sure. What do you need?"
He held the goblet out to her. "I was having trouble in Transfiguration today. McGonagall said I could take this for practice."
"I remember that lesson," Blaise chuckled beside her. "You were the first one to do it properly. I was the second."
"I didn't know you were in that class," she said.
"Because you were too busy helping those two dimwits figure out how to do it," he scoffed. "Plus I sat further behind you."
Andy looked up at Blaise with wide eyes, noticing him for the first time.
"Oh I didn't realize you were busy, Hermione. I'm sorry!" He said sheepishly, looking around as if he was about to leave.
"Nonsense. This is Blaise Zabini," she introduced them.
"Yeah, the head boy. I'm Andy," he said, shaking hands.
"You know," Hermione began. "Why don't you let Blaise help you? He's apparently almost as good as magic as I am." In the weeks she had befriended Blaise, she had never actually seen him do much magic other than a few basic wandless spells.
"I highly doubt that, but I can show you what I know." Blaise took the goblet from Andy and effortlessly transformed it into a rose. Andy watched in wonder.
"Wow! That was so cool!" Blaise then smoothly transfigured it back into the goblet.
Hermione watched the two in amusement as Blaise began to give him pointers on how to properly transfigure objects. After about thirty minutes, Andy had gotten the hang of it and happily went off to find his friends so that he could show off. She couldn't help but realize that one day Blaise would be a good father. He was patient explaining the steps to Andy and even gently adjusted the boy's grip on his wand.
"Any other secret magic tricks you're amazingly good at that I don't know about?" She half teased.
"Nothing secret about it at all. In case you didn't know I've always been at the top of my house academically."
"Really? I thought Malfoy was first," she replied, remembering all the times Malfoy had bragged about it in an attempt to appear smarter than her.
"Nah. He was actually behind me by a few points, but I let him run his mouth," he said with a casual wave of his hand.
"How generous of you," she said wryly. "What's your favorite subject?"
He leaned back, stretching his arms behind his head. "As ironic as it may seem, Defense Against the Dark Arts was always my favorite."
Hermione gaped. "Don't tell me you're somehow a master at dueling?" He simply grinned at her.
"Nothing wrong with knowing how to defend myself."
She scoffed. "I'll believe it when I see it…although hopefully I won't have to anytime soon."
Blaise nodded in agreement and turned back to his textbooks. Hermione couldn't help herself now.
"So…what's your patronus?" He looked back up at her questioningly.
"Actually, I've never been able to produce a strong enough patronus charm to fully see it," he admitted with a shrug. Although he hated to admit it, not being able to cast a patronus embarrassed him. It meant that he simply didn't have enough happy memories to fuel it for more than a few seconds, or at least he wasn't able to hold onto the feeling for very long.
Hermione remembered how easily casting a patronus came to Harry and how it made the other students extremely jealous.
"Mine is an otter," she said fondly.
Blaise laughed. "An otter? You know, it's actually kind of fitting."
"Harry taught us how to cast a patronus back in 5th year," she explained.
"Ah yes," he remembered. "Dumbledoor's army. Draco was quite intent on catching you all too. He was probably just jealous he wasn't invited."
At this, Hermione scoffed. "Don't give him that much credit to his character. We might get along now, but I know his motivations back then were still quite plain to see."
"Fair enough," he said with his hands up in surrender. "That reminds me…have you written Weasley back yet?"
She frowned. She had been putting it off as long as possible. "Not yet. I suppose I should though. It's been a few days now since I received his letter."
"Okay," he nodded. "Just let me know when you decide to meet." The two of them then turned back to their studies in a comfortable silence.
