her we are, the tenth chapter of Armione goodness! I am blown away by how many people have favourited and followed this story! If only all those people reviewed! REVIEW! And if you haven't reviewed the previous chapters, then GO BACK AND REVIEW! Honestly. Review's motivate me to update faster. Here's some armione, and a little info about Hermione's past.
Disclaimer: I don't own anything but the Armione goodness. AND EVERYONE KNOWS MERLIN AND HIS ADORABLE EARS BELONG TO ME.
It's one day when she's supposed to be chopping vegetables with Flora and Lena , and she knows Cook'll be mad and probably wack her on the hand with a spoon. But she'd take a red hand anyday to spend even a little time with Arthur alone, without Merlin around. She's pretty sure Arthur is supposed to be training with the Knights, but had Merlin cover for him. She makes a note to herself to thank Merlin later.
Maybe she'd made him some water cress soup. He nearly melted everytime she made it.
So they're greenspace by the wall that overlooks the lower town, leaning against the rough, warm stone. The sun shines down on them, and Arthur admire's Hermione. She may not be a stunning beauty, like Morgana; but she was beautiful. Curly brown hair was smooth at the part but fringed at the ends, perky nose scrunching when she laughed. Her warm chocolate eyes wandered around the sky happily, following the clouds and pointing out the occasional bird that flies overhead.
"Hermione?" he asks, twisting a weed in his fingers, pulling it from the grass.
She looks at him, waiting for the answer.
He looks at her chest, just above the neckline of the cream gown she's wearing the sees the tail of a thin string. When he looks back up, she's blushing slightly and he realizes how that may have looked. With red cheeks, he hurries to explain.
"What's that you wear around your neck? On the frayed string?" He asks, eyes on the string again.
Hermione seemed surprised at his question, and looked down at the string as if just remembering its presence. She reached thin fingers and pulled it out, dangling it between them.
On the end of the ring was a small, circular gold ring, with three small gems that glittered in the sunlight. Each gem was odd, a soft pink color, like the sky before sunset. Arthur stared at it curiously, it certainly wasn't the type of thing a peasant would own, it looked like some of the finer jewels possessed by Morgana. Hermione didn't seem like the type to steal, but how else could she get something like this? It would have taken years to save up a peasants extra earnings to buy that ring.
"Where did you get it?" He asked, and he must have sounded a bit suspicious. His tone immeadiately made Hermione feel defensive.
"From my parents," She said snappishly.
Arthur immeadiately felt ashamed, "Sorry. I hadn't meant to sound accusatory."
Hermione seemed to relax a little bit, and fingered the ring with the tips of her fingers. "It was my grandmothers. My grandfather had it made especially for her, saved up for close to ten years to afford it."
Arthur raised an eyebrow, "This is the first time you've spoken of your parents. What were they like?"
"They're dead." She said shortly, face going blank. She didnt feel like explaining things that Arthur couldn't know about. But apparently Arthur really wanted to know, because he wouldn't let it go.
"How did they die?" Arthur asked, leaning towards her a little bit.
Searching for an excuse that was plausible in this time, she blurted out the first answer she could think of, "Disease. They contracted an illness and died. I got it to, but I pulled through. We could only afford the medicine for one person, and my parents chose to save me."
"I'm sorry," Arthur seemed genuinely sad for her poor, dead parents and she instantly felt guilty about lying to him. But he seemed conflicted, as if hesitating with the words he wanted to say. She waited silently, knowing he needed time to sort it out.
"When I was born, my mother, she .. she died," He murmured finally.
She nodded, already knowing this. "I'm sorry."
"So am I. She died giving birth to me." He sounded so sad, that Hermione instinctively leaned into his shoulder and leaned her head on his shoulder. She did the same thing with Ron and Harry when either one of them was upset, but with Arthur it felt more ... intimate. "Sometimes I wonder what she was like. I wonder if the things I didn't get from my father, I got from her."
"What do you mean?"
"I love spring berries, but my father's never really enjoyed them. I often wonder if she liked them as much as I did?" He leaned his cheek on the top of her cushion of brown curls. "There's so much I don't know about her. So much that I never got the chance to know, things I can't ask my father about. Did she talk in her sleep? Did she like flowers? Did she sing in the mornings? Did she slant her 't's but not any other letters while scrawling cursive like me?"
"Can't you ask your father?" Hermione asked, settling into the side of Arthur's body.
"Nobody ever, ever, mentions my mother in front of him. He loses it."
"I'm sorry."
"Thanks," he whispered into her hair, ghosting his lips over the top of her head, not yet brave enough to dare it yet.
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