Hello all!

First off, I'd like to say I have adored all of your wonderful comments over the last few weeks! Thankyou so much for all the reviews, they make me so happy and you should know what I really do read every one. :)
On that note, I'd like to get 3 for this chapter if possible to get it to 50! :D

Secondly, I am really sorry about the wait, but last weekend when I planned to do most of my writing there was a local tragedy and I didn't feel like doing much of anything so I apologise for that.

Thirdly, there has been no editing to this, so it could be really terrible! XD

Anyway, thankyou for reading, I love you all x

Disclaimer - I wish I was billionaire JK Rowling, truly. I could buy all the books I wanted.

...

Eleven

The year eight students were dismissed and left the hall bursting with excited chatter about the tournaments coming up in the winter months.
Tracey seemed extremely excited about the whole thing, and was gushing to Dean about how he would certainly make the team, though she doubted Theo would.

Hermione meanwhile was lagging behind a little, hoping to be ignored by Blaise and avoid the embarrassing conversation he would surely want to have.

The brunette just knew that her beau (being the chivalrous and kind person he was) would be incredibly eager to help train her up so that she could claim a spot on the team and whatever the elusive prize happened to be, but she just wanted to try out, fail and get the whole ordeal over with.

"In fact, I bet you and Hermione get in, wouldn't that be great? Hermione? HERMIONE!" Tracey was calling to her from up ahead, where a rather bashful Dean was blushing at her compliments.

Hermione rolled her eyes and jogged a little to catch up.
"I sincerely doubt that I'll manage to even get on a broom Tracey, let alone win a spot on the team. But thanks for the moral support."

The fiery blonde simply rolled her eyes and punched Hermione lightly on the shoulder.
"You're just being modest, we all know you're talented at everything." Before Hermione could interrupt and protest, Tracey spotted Blaise making his way towards them and shoved the former Gryffindor towards him.
"There he is! Now why don't you two go and have some fun!" she said cheerily as Hermione blushed dark red and Blaise grinned.

"It's not fun! We're taking care of important, heads… business." Hermione spluttered but was interrupted as a tall lean figure strode past them.

"Oh please Granger, cut the crap. We all know you and Zabini have been shagging in that office for weeks." Draco Malfoy offered with a sigh, before smirking, winking at her and carrying on towards the dungeons.

He left four completely gobsmacked Slytherins in his wake, it was enough that he'd actually contributed to the conversation at all, but the fact that he'd been almost civil to Hermione was enough to shock all of them into silence.

"Well," Blaise said with a small smirk as he pulled Hermione to his side and took her hand. "I guess now that's all out in the open we may as well be brazen with it. Hermione, let's go shag on our desk."

X X X

"I honestly can't believe you said that in the middle of the corridor, I mean I understand being a little more honest with our friends but there were still other houses walking about, we'll be the talk of the school before long." Hermione babbled and Blaise released his lips from her neck and glanced up at her.

"Seriously Hermione if you want me to stop I will and we can talk it out." He said with only a hint of sarcasm in his tone.
Hermione rolled her eyes but couldn't deny the fact that she loved what he was doing.

"Alright Blaise I get the message, you can carry on interrupted."

"Good." Blaise growled before whipping her around and sliding her gracefully onto the desk beneath him. "I rather like this position more."

Hermione giggled and raised her head a little to kiss him, feeling his obvious bulge against her thigh.

"Ready to go then?" She asked huskily, blushing at her terrible attempt at bedroom talk.
However it seemed to work for Blaise, as he smirked at her once more and went to unzip his trousers.

"OH MY GODRIC, can't you two keep it in your pants for one day?" Theo exclaimed from the doorway, throwing an arm over his eyes as Blaise's trousers were quickly pulled up.
He peeked through not so secretly as Hermione hastily did up the buttons of her blouse.

"Theo I have genuinely never hated you more than I do at this moment." Blaise groaned, taking a seat on the small armchair in the corner and pulling a cushion over his lap.

The last few times Theo had accidentally walked in on their activities, Hermione had been embarrassed but had quickly laughed it off and forgiven their friend.
However at this point, it was becoming tiresome.

"Theo this is the third time this has happened in the last week." Hermione said through gritted teeth as she waited for her blush to die down. She really needed to stop acting so reckless, even if she was nearly 19.

"Well, yes… about that, Draco wanted to know if," Nott stuttered and Blaise's eyes narrowed.

"Interesting how for the third time this week its Draco who makes you come and interrupt us. Would you know any reason for that?"
At this Theo turned bright red and began mumbling something about coincidence while Hermione raised an eyebrow.

"Yes, it's almost as if he wants us to stop seeing each other, isn't it Nott?" She growled, and the poor boy looked like he was about to fry his brain.

Hermione sighed and waved for Theo to go,
"Tell Malfoy we'll be down in a minute." She said before grabbing up her satchel and making her way to the door.
She felt slightly conflicted about this seeming interference from the Slytherin Prince.
On the one hand, it felt great to know that she was annoying him by being with Blaise.
But on the other, she knew that he and Zabini had been friends almost since birth, and if he as that upset about his best friend dating a muggle born maybe it was time to rethink their relationship.

With another sigh Hermione shook this conflicting thought from her mind, gave Blaise a quick goodbye kiss as he was still trying to find his tie and began the journey back to Slytherin common room.

"Granger!" Draco said almost immediately as Hermione stepped into the common room, causing at least ten other students to look up at her and scowl.
She blushed furiously and glared at Draco before quick marching towards him.

"What do you want?" She hissed, trying to keep her voice low for fear of the other Slytherins who still weren't entirely fond of her listening in.

"To help you, interestingly enough." He said with a smirk, and then gestured for her to follow him in to the dormitories.
He went to open their room and hissed as the door handle reacted to his touch and burnt red hot.

"Please can you open the blasted thing so I can actually get in?" He growled, and Hermione folded her arms and raised an eyebrow.

"What makes you think I want you in my room?"

Draco turned to her and his infuriating smirk once again contorted his features.
"What, you think I haven't seen it before? Pansy and I have had many a sleepover, in fact I'm pretty sure I visited Tracey once actually."
Hermione held up and quickly before he decided to divulge any details and scowled.

"Fine, but don't go near my bed." She muttered and opened the door for him, stepping in first and almost shoving him out of the way, much to his annoyance.

"So, please tell me why you're here, and then you can leave." She snapped and Draco sniffed.

"That's a little hurtful Granger, but ok. Firstly, there'll be a party in the Slytherin common room in two weeks or so, I'm not inviting you per se, just letting you know." He added hastily, because obviously he didn't want her to come.
Obviously.

Hermione frowned.
"But we only had one a few weeks ago?" She commented and Draco looked at her incredulously.

"Gryffindors may have only held two parties a year, but Slytherins do things very differently, besides it'll be Halloween, we have to celebrate. Point two, I'm going to teach you how to fly."

Hermione's jaw dropped and Draco smirked once again at the reaction he'd totally expected.

"What, wha, I mean, why?!" The girl stuttered, twiddling with her hair nervously at the mere mention of flying.

Draco shrugged.
"Don't think I'm doing this for you, it's just Blaise is pretty busy with duties and he's also organising the Halloween bash so I figured someone else had to do it." He explained, before grinning annoyingly. "Also, everyone knows I'm the best player in this house."

Hermione was still a little gobsmacked, and so barely noticed as Draco quickly handed her a schedule.

"Here, show up to practice or I'll be really pissed off, with any luck you'll be able to get on the team and then Blaise won't be all mopey about you missing opportunities or some shit." He muttered, before smirking at her one final time and leaving the room swiftly.

"…Er…Mione?" Someone mumbled from the bed in the far corner of the room.
Hermione nearly jumped out of her skin, and then began to laugh as she realised Pansy had been asleep the entire day.

"Yes Pansy? Finally decided to grace us with your appearance?" She teased as the raven haired girl groaned and rubbed her eyes drowsily.

"What time is it?" She muttered and Hermione once again had to hold back a laugh.

"Nearly 9. Pm."
Pansy looked moderately surprised, and then shrugged and sank back under the covers.
When Hermione began to laugh at her reaction, the other girl spoke grumpily from underneath her pile of blankets;

"What? It's practically bed time." And then, when Hermione's laughter got even louder, "Leave me alone!"

Tracey burst into the room suddenly, swinging her arms about happily as she hummed something under her breath.
"Oh ladies have you heard? Party in just under two weeks' time! Ah I'm so excited!" She squeaked, throwing herself onto her bed and then raising her head quizzically, still not registering the fact the Pansy was half asleep.
"Do you think Dean will go with me?" She asked suddenly and Hermione had to resist giving the hopeful looking girl a long hug.

"I don't think so Tracey, he's going out with Ginny Weasley remember?" Hermione pointed out, wincing slightly at the mention of her former best friend's name.
While she'd been thinking about talking to Ginny (not Ron yet, as he still hadn't approached her to apologise) the redhead was very pointedly avoiding her, and she had the feeling Ginny wouldn't appreciate any kind of apology or explanation just yet.

Tracey pouted sulkily and whumped her head back down onto her pillow.
"Oh you're so lucky to have Blaise." She groaned dramatically and Hermione looked down at the practise schedule and smiled slightly.

"Yes, I really am."
Tracey caught her looking and immediately leapt up and snatched the paper out of her grip.

"What on earth is this?" She asked in a perplexed tone and Hermione snatched it back.

"A quidditch schedule. Blaise organised for Malfoy to teach me to play." She said and couldn't help but beam. She was surprised however when Tracey shot her an even more confused glance.

"I'm pretty sure he didn't." The blonde said slowly, and it seemed that their conversation had even sparked Pansy's interest, as the other girl was sat up and listening intently. "I just spoke to Blaise, he was telling me how he wasn't sure how he could convince you to play, but he wanted to try and help."

Hermione's jaw dropped, realising the implications of this information, and Pansy slowly caught on as well.

"Wait, who did you say gave you the schedule?" The raven haired girl asked slowly while Tracey still just looked a little confused.

"Malfoy." Hermione said, her voice barely above a whisper.
Both other girls' eyes widened in surprise, and Tracey voiced what they were all thinking.

"So if Blaise didn't ask him to help, then it was just Malfoy helping you all on his own?" She paused and then raised her eyebrows at Hermione. "God that's weird."

"Not to mention out of character." Pansy chipped in, but Hermione couldn't stop staring down at the paper in shock.

Because yes, it bloody was Malfoy, and that bloody was weird.

X X X

Hermione Grange trudged miserably out onto the Quidditch field at 6am, a large Gryffindor jumper that she was pretty sure used to belong to Harry taking the edge off the late October frost.
Draco Malfoy was stood, arms crossed in the middle of the pitch holding two brooms and glaring at her as she made her way towards him.

"I'm certain I wrote 5 thirty on your timetable Granger." He snapped the moment she was within earshot, and the brunette merely shot him a sneer and folded her arms.

"Well, this is the best you're going to get Malfoy, I was up late last night,"
Malfoy held up a hand to cut her off and smirked the first one of the day.

"What you and Zabini get up to in the early hours of the morning is really none of my business, and I'd like to keep it that way."
Hermione looked as though she might protest, after all she'd just been doing the late night patrols, but she realised that the activities done afterward hardly qualified as work. So instead she blushed slightly and looked away.

"Great, she actually was fucking him. They're like bloody bunnies." He thought, and was then immediately surprised at how jealous and upset this realisation made him.
He just wanted his best friend back that was all.
Obviously.

"Alright, let's get started." He said brusquely, trying to push the odd thoughts from his mind that were currently forming. "We'll begin with the basics, this should take no longer than five minutes.
Summon your broom to you and mount it." He instructed coolly, and Hermione was surprised to hear no animosity in his tone.
Maybe he would be a decent teacher.

"Pathetic."
And then again maybe not.
Hermione thought miserably as she once again failed to get her broom higher than a foot of the ground, it really was rather embarrassing.

Draco sighed exasperatedly and raised the broom for her himself.
"That exercise was clearly a complete waste of time, so we'll move on and come back to it." He looked at her sternly as though he could sense her fear. "Mount the broom."

Hermione timidly gripped the upper handle and slowly raised one leg and lifted it over, trying to imagine she was going horse riding.
She closed her eyes and allowed herself to settle ever so slightly onto the broom.

"Good, now kick off." Draco said bluntly, and Hermione's eyes flew open in shock.

"What?!" She whispered, completely aghast.
Her eyes narrowed when she noticed her tone had made him grin a little, and pursed her lips.

"You heard what I said Granger, just kick off." He repeated, folding his arms expectantly, an amused look on his lips.
It was almost as if he was waiting for her to fail, for her to call it quits and give up.

Hermione felt herself stiffen and she gripped the broom handle a little tighter.
She was Hermione Granger, she didn't give up. And certainly not in front of Draco Malfoy.

With a self-satisfied smirk of her own, Hermione pushed off hard from the ground and felt herself go soaring into the sky, the wind whipping past her at an alarmingly fast rate.

Her initial bravery, bravado and confidence began to slip once she realised she was climbing fast and really had no idea how to get down.

"Oh shit." She whispered, holding the broom so tight her knuckles when white, and then a soft purple as the air got colder with the higher altitude.

"Granger! Come down!" She faintly heard Draco barking from way below, he was just a small figure now, slowly morphing into a blurry dot.
There was impatience in his voice, probably, and she thought she'd detected a touch of concern but that could just be intense hallucinations due to her imminent death.

That was when time seemed to slow down for Hermione Granger.
It suddenly hit her that maybe it wouldn't be all that bad if she were to die.

She thought about everything that had happened in the past few years. She remembered her parents shouting at her, her dad stating that she'd gone beyond betraying them.
She remembered looking into Fred Weasley's glassy eyes and thinking, no knowing that she could have done more.

She thought about how she'd betrayed Ginny and led on Ron and hadn't done anything to solve the problem. She thought about the fact that, other than Harry and Blaise, no one would really care anymore whether she lived or died.

It was a very sudden and slightly surprising turn of thought for Hermione. She'd had these thoughts before in her school years of course, mostly in the times when it had felt like Harry and Ron were just using her and she'd thought she'd had no friends, but back then she'd had her family.
Back then she'd had Voldemort to live to fight against.

Now all she had was a secret fuck buddy and the boy who lived, who really had other issues on his mind.

Then, with startling clarity Hermione realised that from this height, all she'd feel was the exciting cold air whipping her hair back and then nothing, not even pain.
It would be instantaneous.

And Hermione Granger let go.

X X X

"Jesus Hermione fuck, what the fuck was that?!"

Hermione opened her eyes slowly, she remembered feeling the whoosh of the autumn air as she began to fall, she remembered thinking that her actions seemed a little over dramatic, and then she remembered deciding to close her eyes and get it over with.

"Hm? Malfoy!?" She spluttered, noticing all at once that she appeared to be on his lap, and on his broom.
They were still airborne but much closer to the ground, and Draco was flying at a relatively slow pace.

She looked up and noticed the blind panic in his eyes quickly being shrouded by contempt.
"I knew this was going to be a difficult case." He muttered, bringing them down much slower than he usually would so as not to startle her. "What on earth happened up there? You just shot off."

"I let go." Hermione said in a slightly bewildered tone, and then immediately wished she hadn't spoken at all when she noticed the surprise and concern flicker across his face.

"Why? Did you think you would die up there, or did you," His sentence trailed off as he helped her off the broom and looked at her sternly.
Hermione decided now was not the time to be sharing her emotional issues. It had just been a heat of the moment decision, racked with post-war nerves. She reasoned with herself, blatantly ignoring the flashing light in her brain telling her that it still mattered.
Because it didn't.
She was just faint from the altitude and had a spur of the moment idea.
That was all.

"I'll see you later, I'm going to go and see if Pansy's ok." She lied through her teeth, hoping it wasn't totally obvious.
Draco's eyes narrowed but he said nothing, and just watched her leave with a strange air of solemnity.

It was only when she was already back inside the castle that she realised he'd called her Hermione.

X X X

"So how was your first training session?" Tracey asked excitedly over her cereal at breakfast.
Hermione shrugged but caught the look Draco was shooting her.
To her horror, he scooted closer towards their group and, still staring at her all the while, actually joined in with the conversation.

"Yes Granger, how was it?" There wasn't a hint of cruelty in his tone, but Hermione knew he was pressing her to talk about what had happened, and she wasn't having any of it.

"It was a little traumatic in all honesty, but I can now sit on a broom." She said with a grin and a wink at Blaise, before turning around and raising her eyebrows ever so slightly at a moody looking Draco.

The rest of their group still looked a little startled at the fact that Draco had joined in with their conversation at all, but Hermione wasn't about to be dissuaded from friendly conversation, even if it killed her.

"But I'll be up and going in no time, I might even make the try outs, who knows." She commented with a bright smile, trying to ignore the fact that Tracey was still open mouthed and staring at Draco who was rather unabashedly staring at Hermione.

This was going to get uncomfortable fast.

"Hermione, I think it's about time we talk." A curt voice interrupted their awkward silence and Hermione almost groaned.
The situation had got even worse. She hadn't even thought that was possible.

She turned around and smiled brightly at Ginny Weasley, who looked about ready to slaughter someone, probably the brunette sat in front of her.

"Sure Ginny, we can step out for a bit if you'd like." But the youngest Weasley simple folded her arms and stood her ground. "You want to do this here? In front of all these people?!" Hermione's eyes widened and Ginny rolled hers.

"Sorry if you're afraid I'll embarrass you in front of your new friends Hermione, but it's now or never."
She insisted, and jutted out her chin expectantly.
The brunette nodded.

"Ok, why don't you go ahead?"
Ginny looked mildly taken aback that Hermione had actually agreed to it, but quickly shook her expression and resumed her stoic appearance.

"Fine. I just have to say that I see it as a betrayal on your part that you slept with my ex, probably while we were still going out if Ron's timeline was correct,"

"Whoa, whoa," Hermione interrupted furiously, holding up a hand to stop Ginny from going any further. She ignored the surprised gasps from her peers at the Slytherin table, and kept her gaze focused on Ginny. She felt like if she looked at Blaise at the point she would cry.
"You still believe that shit Harry spouted at the party?" She asked incredulously, and Ginny blushed slightly but shrugged and nodded.

"Ron said it was all true, and that when he left you when you were hunting for horcruxes, you and Harry were together."
Hermione heard the very quiet and very slight intake of breath from Blaise beside her, and reached out to grab his hand.
He didn't pull away but he didn't hold on to her as she laced their fingers together under the table.

"It was all bullshit, all complete and utter shit. Harry made it up because, well because he wanted to make you jealous." Hermione cried out, knowing she probably shouldn't have told Harry's secret so easily but she decided she wasn't going to sacrifice what she and Blaise had for his lies.

Ginny's eyes widened and she gawped for a good few seconds before smiling slightly like an excited child at Christmas.
"Are you serious?!" She squeaked, and Hermione rolled her eyes, smiling slightly as she felt Blaise finally responding to her touch.

"Yes, ask him yourself, please." She winked, and then jumped in surprise as Ginny flung her arms around her.

"Oh Hermione I've missed you so much and we really have to catch up but right now I have a boy to find and hit repeatedly because I love him, so later!" She spoke with barely a breath in the entire speech and then practically skipped off.

There was a long pause at the table as Hermione swivelled round to face her fellow Slytherins, before Tracey finally spoke up.

"Wait, does this mean Dean Thomas is available?"

...

Ah, I think Tracey's my favourite ;)

For anyone who might be worrying about Pansy - I can't just have her cured like that, as she had some really bad issues to work through but obviously things are getting better for her now people know what's going on. :)

I will develop all these new plot points in further instalments, so please don't be rude/pedantic about "oh, that's sudden" or whatever, if you don't like it don't read.

Thank you again to all my lovely reviewers, have a nice weekend! :D