CHAPTER NINE:

Prewett Lodge was just as beautiful in the summer as the winter and she had barely seen any of it, Hermione decided the morning after Harry and Neville's party. The Crawley Clan (as Draco had taken to referring to the Granger/Potter households) had flooed over from Harry's house after helping clean up the party a bit along with Draco, Fred, and George, who stayed to help seeing as they were all going the same place. Whereas she had seen very little the night before when they arrived after dark and were pretty much sent straight to bed, the view from her window showed the previously snow-covered grounds dotted with wild flowers and colorful thistle and a beautifully maintained path lined by lanterns down to what she assumed was the lake the twins had both gone on about while cleaning up last night.

She gathered up her toiletries and a change of clothes to head to the bathroom a couple doors down. Over Christmas, she had stayed in a guest wing, and there was a bathroom in the room she had shared with Harry. Seeing as the twins were there until school started and Harry, Draco, and herself would only take two rooms, they were staying in the staff wing with Gideon and Cassie. Liam had opted to share a room with the Prewett twins when the two had begged their father to let their friend 'sleep over' with them instead of with the older kids. Her room was smaller and less elegantly furnished than the guest suites she had stayed in before, but it was comfortable, had a great view of the grounds, and on the end of the three rooms the kids were using, so if she walked a couple doors down, she didn't have to share a bathroom with four boys. Knowing she'd probably not be staying there often anyway, it was more than enough for her visit.

After a quick shower and a futile attempt to get a brush through her hair, she returned her things to her room and headed down to the kitchen with a cup of tea and maybe some breakfast in mind. Gideon was just leaving as she entered, starting a bit at seeing one of the kids up before ten. Apparently there had been some issue with the presses at the publishing facility he ran, so he was heading in for a few hours to see what could be done. Hermione had about a million questions about a magical publishing company and another million or two about magical printing presses, but let him head off once he promised to take her in one day while she was staying with them so she could see everything herself.

Cassie was the only one in the kitchen when she got there. Hermione accepted a cup of tea from her and set to helping her make muffins for breakfast. She wasn't sure what to think of Fred's aunt. On one hand, her magic seemed drawn to her, leaving a certain comfort of it's own as well as the familiarity of the one she shared with people like the twins or Professor McGonagall, if not as strong. On the other hand, there was something strangely familiar that leant her an almost constant feeling of deja vu with the woman she couldn't shake and slightly unnerved her. Not that Hermione would ever say anything to her about it. Judging by the way she seemed to be constantly searching for something in Hermione's face, she didn't think she'd like any answers Cassie would offer on the subject.

"Here, sit down and let me help you with your hair," Cassie offered when they put the muffin tins into the oven.

"You don't have to, it's really unmanageable. I'm pretty used to it by now," Hermione protested, but sat nonetheless.

"Maybe by muggle means it is," the older woman smiled, walking behind her chair and waving her wand around Hermione's head a bit.

"I wouldn't be able to do spells myself in the summer," she reminded the older woman, who chuckled in response. "But I suppose if you can figure something out, it'd be nice to not have my hair fight me through the school year. If you'd be willing to teach me, that is."

"If I can figure something out," Cassie agreed, cringing a bit at her hair that was now dry, detangled, and straightened, but poofier than Hermione had ever saw it. "We'll try something else tomorrow. Here, I'll get it braided up so it won't stand a foot off your head. Have you considered a different cut, maybe? If you took off some of the weight, it stands to reason it would at least lay nicer."

"My mum said something similar, but I told her I didn't want to waste my time preening," Hermione admitted, flushing slightly as the older woman french braided her hair into submission. "I suppose I should consider it if everyone thinks it would help."

"Only if that's what you want to do. Just because everyone else thinks it's a good idea doesn't mean you have to. It's your hair, after all. No one gets to make your decisions but you," she insisted, tying off the braid and conjuring a mirror for Hermione to see it instead of relying on the reflection from the window.

"That's a real sore point for you, isn't it?" Hermione asked, after thanking her for taming her hair, despite it not being the original plan. "Other people making your decisions?"

"Yes. It's...you're muggleborn, so I'm sure you already find a lot of pureblood practices archaic and distasteful," Cassie started with a sigh. "I'm less critical of them than most muggleborns, despite having been victim to a lot of the more oppressive...traditions, I suppose.

"Things like culture and traditions are important, I'm sure you can agree with that. But the way some families run things leave children and women regarded similarly to possessions. Sometimes valuable, sometimes worthless," she paused with a cringe. "A female child from a family with enough wealth and standing would be one of the more valuable possessions. If they're attractive and well mannered, even more so. Look at your friend Draco's mother. Narcissa was very well sought after even when she was very young. She's always been beautiful and poised, even as a child, and though she's from a secondary branch, was still born a Black."

"So you would have been considered a valuable asset to your father?" Hermione questioned, filling in what she already knew.

"Yes. I was considered sweet, gentle, and pretty. Some very good adjectives for advancing the family. I understood that even as a small child and even accepted it. But because I was younger and not as attractive as Narcissa or her sisters, I would have been second string, so to speak, and normally wouldn't have been made offers until families were certain they weren't getting part of the Black fortune and status.

"Orion Black was terribly bigoted and very pleased with his head of house status, especially being head of an ancient and noble house, but was also a Slytherin to the core and very intelligent to boot. He was married to his first cousin and Sirius and his brother Regulus were the only surviving children amongst several horrifically terrible pregnancies that ended in miscarriages or stillborn children. His brother was married to a Rosier, who fared much better with her pregnancies, but still only produced females. The House of Black was whittling down to nothing and Sirius was looking to end up a huge disappointment.

"Orion Black then made it his mission to ensure his house would survive and did something the Blacks hadn't done in generations - he sought to marry outside of the immediate family for the entire generation, hoping to rejuvenate the gene pool. When Andi ran from her marriage contract, that was then given to Bellatrix, he put almost all his money on Narcissa. It was clear Bellatrix wasn't right in the head, and neither was her husband. Orion had hoped to temper Rudolphus Lestrange with Andi's even head and charm. What he ended up with was a disaster waiting to happen and he knew it. And so Narcissa was written up a contract with the Malfoy family, who was not terribly entwined in the pureblood family trees in Britain. Orion hoped she would produce at least two attractive heirs - one for the Malfoys and one for the Blacks if need be.

"His last wager was to make a contract with my father. My father owed him something, I'm not entirely sure what. Favors, money, I never found out. My father was also desperate. He saw my attachment to the Prewett boys and refused to let me marry into a family that didn't stringently hold up all the old ways. Orion thought I was sweet and gentle enough to tempt his wayward son into behaving himself. I wasn't exactly your ideal match, considered too delicate for most dark families like ours, but Orion Black thought it would be just the thing to attract the protective, chivalrous Gryffindor side of his son, perhaps using me as a prize for good behavior or something."

"So you were basically a prize to be sold and won for following the family's wishes? That's awful!" Hermione fumed. "No wonder Fred was furious when he thought my special treatment for the New Year's gala was a precursor to a betrothal agreement with Draco," she mused.

"That may have been part of it - my nephew's unusually fond of you, I've noticed. Talks about you all the time," she mentioned with a slight smirk.

"Yes...well...he's my best friend and all," Hermione sputtered, turning bright red as she usually did when it came to Fred anymore. "But you didn't marry Sirius. Did you get out of your contract like Andi did?"

"No," Cassie replied flatly, humor disappearing from her face. "I mentioned how Orion Black was terribly intelligent, yeah? Well, he wouldn't make the same mistake twice. If Andi's contract was archaic, mine was paleolithic. It was more about trapping Sirius and my father, mind you, I wasn't really taken into account at all. It probably would have been worse if I had been, my father was quite aware of my infatuation with Gideon and would have gone to any measures to ensure I was kept from him had it occurred to him at the time. He was just concerned with making Orion happy and Orion only cared about getting whatever my father owed him and keeping Sirius in line.

"Had Sirius been the one to break it against the terms, he would have been automatically and magically disowned and I would be married off to Regulus, the new heir to the House of Black. That part appeased my father plenty - I'd be the Lady Black regardless as far as he saw it. But there were...barbaric consequences if I didn't fall in line. Narcissa, who was better at reading between the lines at those things after having helped Andi and understood her Uncle better than me, spent a very good deal of time going through a stolen copy of my contract with me once it was finalized. I didn't want to be Lady Black. I didn't want to marry Sirius. Gideon aside, Sirius and I didn't exactly get on our first few years at Hogwarts. He was an arrogant prat, quite frankly, and a bully to boot. Nothing that appeals to a young Hufflepuff with more than half a brain.

"There were two ways out of it. Once Sirius came of age, he could release me from the betrothal himself without being disowned, so long as he was still in good standing with his family and acting scion of the house. The other way was to completely shatter my end of the agreement and hope I survived the curses and then returning to my father if I did."

"But Sirius ran away from home before he came of age," Hermione protested, knowing which option she had been forced to take from the grim set to her mouth.

"Yes, but was never officially disowned. That wouldn't have happened until he came of age, providing he was still estranged from his family and I didn't break the contract first. For a bit before that, he and I went along with the betrothal. Gideon had practically stopped speaking to me and kept his distance. I thought I had made up whatever was between us in my head, some kind of fairy tale. No one else dared come near me while I was betrothed to the Black Heir, and Sirius wasn't the worst my father could've come up with, so I made peace with the idea. Of course, once Sirius realized I had given up my fight for Gideon, he got complacent and forgot I existed," she chuckled wryly at that.

"There was a Yule Ball at Hogwarts - they do one every five to seven years. Gideon avoided me even more than usual after it was announced and even asked the first girl he saw as soon as it was so he'd have an excuse if I cornered him. I barely even saw him across the hall at meals. He went out of his way to avoid disrespecting my betrothal and I thought he'd never loved me after all. Heartbroken, I accepted Sirius' invitation, as if either of us really had a choice, and sent to my father for money for dress robes and jewelry befitting of the 'future Lady Black', I told him, and received a small fortune and owl addresses for exclusive designers as well as some of the family jewels. If Gideon didn't want me, fine. I was done fighting. But Narcissa insisted I make sure he knew what he gave up and I was determined to do just that."

"Did it work?" Hermione asked, drawn into the story as the timer for the muffins went off.

"Better than I had planned. Like I said, Sirius thought he had won, and really had as far as either of us knew, and got complacent. He practically ditched me three dances in to go flirt with other girls. It wasn't about me with him and never was. It was about getting what he was owed. Once he got it, he lost interest," she told her with a shrug, pulling the muffins out of the oven. "He'll say differently now, of course, but that's how he is. I was devastated and miserable. The man I loved wouldn't even look at me and the man I was betrothed to preferred flirting with anything in a skirt to being near me. I felt completely hopeless and was starting to resign myself a life of loneliness, trying my hardest not to cry at the table I was abandoned at and instead look collected and disinterested in Sirius' wandering attention.

"Then it happened," she looked out the window with a far off gaze and a smile. "Just as I was losing my battle with tears, he came up to me, wiped the couple tears that had escaped from my cheeks, and asked me to dance. Gideon and I danced until the music stopped and Professor McGonagall kicked us out of the hall. It was a really wonderful night by the end. I felt like I was in that muggle fairy tale Cinderella Lily used to read the kids - dressed to the nines in the highest of high fashion, practically dripping with the family jewels, and dancing with the love of my life. It's still one of the best nights of my life."

"So you used the more dangerous path to get out of the contract?" Hermione asked, shaking the images of a fairy tale ball with a redheaded prince from her mind.

"Didn't really have the choice. I was going to try and reason with Sirius, but he went and ran off from his family. When he came of age, he'd be disowned and I'd have to marry Regulus, who I knew and liked less than I had Sirius when the betrothal was first written. There were severe consequences involved. When I finally came clean to Gideon about what I planned to do about a week before he graduated, he broke things off with me, insisting he'd never be able to live with himself helping me get myself killed, that even if I survived breaking the contract, my father would murder me in cold blood for putting him further in debt to Orion Black," she paused, cocking her head to the side. "Almost happened that way too, come to that.

"Anyway, Sirius redoubled his efforts to win me back, but I was even less interested than before. Gideon loved me, he was just afraid for me. I couldn't stand the thought of marrying someone like Regulus or even Sirius knowing Gideon would've been properly courting me had I not been claimed already. No one was willing to help Sirius either, everyone had written me off as Regulus' betrothed at that point. I was determined to get out of it again. Gideon wouldn't respond to my owls and refused to see me, afraid he'd get me hurt. Guess he didn't count on me preferring death to marrying a death eater. I eventually told him if he wouldn't help me out of it, I'd find someone else who would and that worked."

"Someone else could have helped you break the contract?" Hermione was confused.

"Anyone else, really. I just really couldn't stand the thought of it being anyone but Gideon. The only way out past Sirius releasing me would be to break the purity clause. I was getting desperate, but not to the point where I wanted to do that with some random bloke I didn't care about," Cassie told her, a lot of dots starting to connect in Hermione's head.

"Gideon was waiting at the Hogsmeade station the last day of term. I snuck off with him instead of taking the Express back to London. With Sirius about to be disowned, I was to spend the summer in the Black home getting to know Regulus. I'd return to Hogwarts married, well, if Regulus chose to permit me to return. Prewetts are as stubborn as the Weasleys, you know, and he was against doing anything that could possibly hurt me. However, knowing what fate he was leaving me to and knowing I'd do whatever I had to to escape it, he wasn't about to lose me to someone else a second time and knew if my father didn't manage to kill me, I'd be married off to whoever 'ruined me'.

"So he helped me run away. The curses from the agreement almost killed me. His father, Charles, hired on a mediwitch to help nurse me back to health and kept me hidden and protected. He didn't agree with our actions, par se, but disagreed with the way I was sold off to the Blacks and under what conditions even more. Plus, especially after their mother died just after Molly had started at Hogwarts, Charles Prewett was extremely dedicated to his children's happiness. Helping us in the aftermath of breaking the betrothal was one of the only things Gideon ever asked of him, so Charles put his all into making sure I lived to continue to make his son happy and even drew up a betrothal to present to my father where they declined a dowry and claimed all rights over me for my own protection," she insisted, watching Hermione's interest picque again. "I returned home once I recovered. It was late July by then. My father was livid and did try to kill me, but I had Gideon, Fabian, and Benjy backing me up. Once we completely obliterated him in the duel he started, he insisted they couldn't protect me from him forever. The only way he'd let this go is if I had another betrothal in place and he wasn't paying a cent in dowry for the injustice done to his name that he was sure they had helped me contrive because I was too good and too sweet of a girl to come up with it on my own. His last demand was for the name of the boy who ruined me and destroyed his contract with Orion Black, so he could ruin him.

"Gideon stepped forward immediately, told him that he had willingly helped me out of the contract and that my father would never see me again if he threatened me one more time. He reminded him I was now without a contract and could marry as I chose, being old enough to consent at the time. Moreso, he presented Charles' betrothal agreement and promised to take both my father and Orion Black to the Wizengamot for some of the more...questionable addendums to my original betrothal if he didn't agree to it and sign it. Some of the things in the original weren't exactly legal, but they'd never get convicted of anything. It'd just be tedious and put a shadow on the families making others hesitant to sign any kind of papers with them. My father didn't even read it through entirely before signing it and insisting I was the Prewett's problem now, so they could give me a place to live and pay for my schooling and all.

"That suited us just fine. We came back here for the rest of the summer and married the next after my final year at Hogwarts. A few months later, Charles was killed outside Diagon Alley and Gideon should have inherited the lodge and House Prewett. But with the injuries I sustained from breaking the betrothal, it was unlikely I'd have any children, and so Charles had it written out that Fabian was heir unless Gideon was to produce one of his own. If anything were to happen to Fabian and his children, Gideon would get the title back and adopt in one of Molly's kids as his heir. Probably Charlie or Percy, seeing as they're the next oldest to the Weasley heir," she finished as she started putting out some plates and fruit. It was close to nine now and people would be gathering soon. "It was supposed to be temporary on the off chance I managed to bear an heir, but there was already a lot of damage and scar tissue and then I was abducted and tortured for several weeks in the war for information and in revenge for turning in my brothers and father to the DMLE with concrete evidence of their crimes as death eaters or sympathizers to the Dark Lord's cause. Prolonged cruciatus exposure does terrible things to you internally."

"You still hold the traditions in esteem? After all that?" Hermione asked, uncomprehending.

"There's more to wizarding culture than treating women like possessions that muggleborns have issues coming to terms with. We should have a talk about house elves sometime, for instance. I just figured with a good backstory on why I should have Sirius' attitude towards pureblood traditions, it'd give you pause before writing me off as indoctrinated should I defend something you find abhorrent," Cassie told her, causing her to pause for a moment to consider that.

"It would be helpful to learn things from someone raised in a more traditional pureblood home than the Weasleys who's not...well, Draco. Things like betrothals and courting would be weird to talk about with him and he'd tell me what he'd insist someone would do to prove their worth to me, not what's expected and what means what," she agreed.

"You're a very reasonable and intelligent girl, Hermione. It would just take more than books and Draco for you to feel at home in a completely different culture. My experience and home are welcome to you at all times, you know," Cassie offered, sharing a smile with her as she thanked her and Harry shuffled into the kitchen in his pajamas, flopping down in the chair beside Hermione.