DISCLAIMER: IT'S NOT MINE. Well anything Harry Potter related that is.
A/N: You're all going to kill me with this chapter, but I promise, it is a Blaise/Hermione, and it will get better! MORE A/N AT END!
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Chapter Nine – A Safe House For Good and Evil.
Hermione shut her eyes tightly, hoping that what she was seeing was simply her imagination on overdrive. She was wrong. So much for stress free break she thought, groaning slightly. She was surprised however to see Bree roll her eyes, before looking down at the nails on her right hand with a very unpleasant look on her face.
"Come one, Hermione, lets go" Bree said, glaring down at the two blondes now approaching the house. Hermione looked over at Blaise who was watching her intently. When he realized she was looking he turned away, and with some effort plastered a half decent smile on his face, gracefully alighting the stairs to greet Draco Malfoy with a hand shake.
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"What in Merlin's name is he doing here?" asked Hermione, slightly hysterical, as they sat in the bright library, with the same floor to ceiling windows that looked out over the ocean, and down on the small group assembled on the law. Bree cast a dark look down on the group.
"From what mother has said, he needs protecting too. Narcissa sent him and his sister Sasha here. I do think, however that it is more protection from their father than it is Voldermort." Hermione was curious as to why Bree disliked the Malfoy's so much. From what Mrs. Zabini had said, the two families had grown up together, so Hermione had assumed that therefore they would have all been friends, considering that Blaise and Draco seemed close at Hogwarts. Not that Hermione paid all that much attention. Up until now, she had never really noticed Blaise. Apart from the parties Slughorn had thrown in their 6th year Hermione had had nothing to do with the one they called "the silent Slytherin".
"So why do you hate Malfoy?" Asked Hermione, watching the group move inside the house. Bree laughed in an odd empty kind of way.
"Which one? Because I despise of them both. Draco, because he insists that we are 'destined' and Sasha because she's completely smitten with Blaise, and I can't stand that. He's too good for her." Hermione understood that Bree felt just as protective as Blaise did of her, and Hermione knew enough twins to know that they shared they're sacred bonds.
"So does Blaise like her?" Hermione asked, trying to sound simply curious, and very casual, but something told her that there was something more to this question, but Bree did not notice.
"You know, I think he might. That was one of the things that I never could understand about Blaise. Girls, that is" she said at the look of incomprehension she received from the brunette sitting across from her. " mean, Blaise has never had that many girlfriends, and no serious ones, but he and Sasha have known one another for as long as he's known Alexis, and while I always knew nothing would happen between Alexis and Blaise, I could never quite work out how he felt about Sasha. I guess he's being very male when it comes to her."
Hermione knew what Bree meant by this. Sasha was very beautiful. Veela like, almost. She had white blonde hair like her brothers, but it was terribly long and hung like a watery sheet of shimmery golden silk. She was quite tall, and she had the odd appearance of being very elongated, and very slim. She also had her brother's icy blue eyes and had seemed to inherit her mothers upturned nose. She had the air of someone terribly important, with not a lot of time for the 'little people'. For Blaise however, she had all of eternity, it would seem. For when the two girls came down stairs to the drawing room where the group were all now seated, Sasha had draped herself over the arm of the large chair Blaise sat in, fawning over him, running her delicate long fingers through his hair, questioning him about this and that.
Hermione felt sick. And judging by the disgusted look on Bree's face, so did she. But Blaise seemed to have not noticed as the girls had entered the room. He seemed to have eyes only for Sasha, with whom he was currently laughing with. About what, only Merlin knew. When lunch was announced minutes later, he ignored Hermione and Bree and led Sasha out of the drawing room and into the dining room.
Malfoy, however, never missed a chance to torment Hermione, whom he brushed past forcefully, smirking broadly before winking at Bree, who glared at the back of his head as he left the room.
"I don't know if I could sit through a whole meal with him or my brother" said Bree with a sigh as she dropped into the armchair that Blaise had occupied only moments before. Hermione, who was staring at the floor with a confused look on her face, glanced up at Bree. She shook her head slightly
"No, neither could I" Bree nodded in what seemed to be an understanding way, but Hermione was not quite sure what she understood. Bree jumped up suddenly.
"Lets eat outside then, and save ourselves from what would surly be a lunch worth gagging over" and with that she left the room, with Hermione in tow.
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Bree had had a house elf bring out a platter of food for the two who had seated themselves at the end of the jetty. Hermione had not been back out here since her fist night on the Island. It held a memory she had no wished to reminisce on.
"Something on your mind?" asked Bree knowingly, who had an eerie way of tapping into peoples minds. Then, Hermione assumed that Bree would be an accomplished Occulemens. Hermione had decided not to hide things from Bree, and know, she realized that keeping something from her best friend about her brother was probably not the wisest thing, particularly if Bree could read minds.
"This is where… Blaise kissed me" she said quietly, directing the question at the water, rather than at the girl sitting next to her. Bree nearly fell off the jetty, and she choked on the strawberry she had been eating.
"You and Blaise?" she asked in absolute surprise, at which Hermione nodded meekly. "But I never thought you liked my brother like that. If I had known, I'd be in there right now setting the two of you up and getting that evil Sasha out of the picture, instead of dreading their horrible wedding"
Hermione couldn't help but laugh, but then the last thing Bree said grabbed her curiosity. "What do you mean, wedding?" Bree looked at her curiously.
"Blaise and Sasha. They're arranged to be married in Sasha's 21st year, if Blaise and/or Sasha have not entered into long term relations before then." Bree looked absolutely disgusted, tossing her half eaten strawberry out to sea, as far as possible. Hermione felt her stomach clench painfully, and she felt sick again. But for a moment she also felt a surge of desperate sadness, before it was washed away. The two sat in silence staring out at the water, before Bree spoke again.
"So, why is nothing going on between you and Blaise? I mean, now I understand why he used to talk about you all the time. I suppose it should have been obvious then that he had a thing for you, but I guess it never really clicked. Sasha was always in the background and having never met you I just figured you were a friend from school." Bree laughed at this, for Hermione had told her some weeks earlier that she had never met Blaise until her 6th year and she had hated him. 'He can come off as a little obnoxious' Bree had said when Hermione had told her this.
Hermione shrugged at Bree's first question. "Well do you like him?" pushed Bree. Hermione did not consider this "yes, I mean, no. No, I don't… I don't even know him" she said pathetically. Hermione was saved from anymore awkward questioning on behalf of Bree, however, when little Samara came running down the jetty and told her big sister that their mother requested the two join the family in the living room.
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The day had been long, boring and very irritating thanks largely to Malfoy who was being a prat, and Sasha and Blaise whom had been in much the same position as they had been in the Drawing room. At 8pm, just as the sun was almost completely set, and the group had gone their separate ways for the night, Hermione decided that she wanted some alone time, and decided to take a walk before retiring.
Dinner had been an absolute fiasco. When Draco wasn't busy trying to woo and very hostile Bree, he was hissing insults at Hermione out the side of his mouth which got all too much for Hermione who had pulled out her wand under the table, and was considering the best non verbal hex to use, but before she had decided on one, Draco's chair had gone mysteriously flying across the room and crashed into the wall, dislodging Draco firm his seat and sent his flying across the floor, landing in a tangled heap near Hermione. She quickly stashed her wand away, while Blaise laughed heartily at his friend lying sprawled out on the floor.
Then their had been Sasha and Blaise whom reminded Hermione strongly of the last summer that she had spent at the burrow, watching Fleur and Bill Weasly as the fawned over one another. Positively disgusted by the twos behavior, Hermione had stared determinately at her plate all night. Had she looked up, she would have noticed a slightly sad looking Blaise watching her intently, but as she continued to ignore him, he gave his attention back to Sasha.
Now as she walked down the familiar path to the jetty, she thought about Blaise, and the conversation she had had with Bree that afternoon. Did she actually harbor feelings for Blaise? Could it be possible that he perhaps had liked her for a while? Lost in her thoughts, Hermione paid little attention to where she was going and before she knew it was walking down the wooden stairs of the jetty. But halfway down the jetty she suddenly stopped. Their standing at the end, illuminated by the deepest orange the swam on the horizon, was Blaise and Sasha, locked in the deepest of embraces, kissing one another, with the setting sun as their back drop. Hermione felt hot tears well up in her eyes, and she turned on heel and ran back down the jetty, up the stairs and towards the manor. She didn't notice Draco who stood at the iron gates of the jetty, smirking again as he watched her streak past.
Blaise noticed nothing however, blissfully unaware that the girl whom he had been deeply attracted to for the past 4 years had just caught him with the girl he was going to end up marrying if Hermione wouldn't have him.
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A/N: Finally, some Hermione/Blaise romance. Don't kill me for this chapter! IM sorry! That why I made it all happen kind of sudden, so I didn't have to drag out this horrible Sasha/Blaise romance. But what will happen? Will Hermione demand to leave the island? Will Draco do something to stop Hermione and Blaise discovering their true feelings? Has the war begun or is it about to end? So Many Possibilities.
Thank you so much to all my reviewers. I would write you all a personal thank you but ive run out of time and it's very late, so I promise one next chapter! Hope you're all enjoying it.
