Chapter 26
Hermione kept the task of doing the hospital laundry. There wasn't anyone else to do it and she for some reason liked watching Malfoy work. Her little infatuation with him hadn't exactly worked itself through yet. But she did still have her pride, so she didn't hang around longer than necessary after finishing the laundry work.
He pulled her aside one morning and checked her wound. She was embarrassed but not quite sure why when he rolled up her leg and checked her healing skin. His hand was warm and her skin much too sensitive to it. She had to get this out of her system, it was embarrassing. She would never live it down if anyone found out.
But then he stopped coming. The injured were healing and the remaining people in the hospital wing were being cared for by Neville. She felt a great deal of disappointment when she turned up one day and he wasn't there.
"Now, I have an announcement." Lupin said. "I am sure you have all noticed, but some of the older persons residing in this castle have left already, and it is time for this school to be a school again. Hence all those who are not still engaging in studies, it is time for you to set forth into the world and rebuild our society."
"What?" Hermione said. "We're being kicked out?" There was a murmur across the entire hall.
"Most of you have family property and family businesses to return to. There are a few positions going with pay, and we have a few field labouring positions here ourselves for anyone who wants such a role. Gringotts has limited operation now under the care of Mr. Blaise Zabini, so you can access your family accounts. It is important to get the economy going again. A market has been set up in Diagon Alley each Tuesday morning for produce, but I stress the importance of restoration of your kitchen gardens. All excess harvest is welcome at the market." Lupin said.
"Mr. Justin Finch-Fletchley's family business worked in estate sales and he has agreed to handle any sale of property or business for those of you interested in purchasing or selling. Now, I expect all of you who are no longer in studies to be taking your place in society by the end of the week. I wish you all a good evening and the very best of luck."
Lupin left the stage and a wall of chatter hit the room.
"We're going tomorrow." Ginny said taking Harry's hand.
"Going where?" Hermione asked, still gobsmacked that the world had just changed in a second.
"To Grimmauld Place, of course. Its Harry's home." Ginny said with a laugh.
"You're moving in with him?" Hermione was astounded.
"Yeah." Ginny said questioningly. "We're getting married, besides, I couldn't live with Ron and Pansy at the Burrow, that would just be creepy."
"Ron and Pansy are going to the Burrow?"
"What is the matter with you?" Ginny said. "Why is this a surprise?"
"I… it just is. Its so bizarre. I just didn't expect us to be asked to leave that's all." She said. "I didn't expect it. I have nowhere to go and I haven't got any money to draw out of Gringotts to buy food. I am pretty sure my parent's bank account is inaccessible, plus I doubt I'd get a knut for a pound from anyone."
"What do you mean you don't have any money," Seamus said. "You're Mrs. Malfoy, you have more money than all of us put together."
Hermione's jaw dropped from the fact that people saw her as Malfoy's wife when she had practically forgotten that fact herself. "That isn't real, Seamus."
"What do you mean it isn't real, you married the bloke and you're having his kid. I'm not sure it gets much more real than that." Seamus said and stood up.
"Why is he angry?" Hermione said as Seamus stormed off.
"Romilda Vane turned him down, taken up with a Slytherin sixth year." Ginny said.
Another issue Hermione was completely clueless about. Why was there all this stuff happening that she didn't even see coming.
"You can always move in with us." Harry said. Ginny smiled, but it was clear that she wasn't wild about the idea.
She thanked Harry for the offer and loved him for it, but she was not going to step on Ginny's toes. Well maybe, if nothing else worked out.
She sought out Lupin in his office to see if she could stay on at Hogwarts as a teacher.
"I know you would make a great teacher one day, Hermione, but you are going to be a mother before long. Child rearing is an arduous task and there is none more important. Your husband is more than well provisioned to take care of you. I realise that this marriage is not one you would see as ideal and that you perhaps have no intention of staying in it in the longer term, but with a nursing child, you will need your husband."
Hermione felt like she was being lectured and she hated it. She murmured something about having to go and left. It fully hit her how vulnerable a woman with child was, particularly one without means. She never realised that going down this path meant limiting her options, and now it was looking like she had very few.
She just wanted to shake people and say, I can't move in with him, can't you see, I'm in love with him. Ok, that would sound weird, but when she explained that he was not the kind of person you could fall in love with, it would all make sense.
Harry and Ginny left the next day, as did Ron and Pansy. Neville was staying on as the new Herbology professor. They were all so excited about their new lives, about a world free of werewolves where they could work, shop, play. Apparently there were elections for Minister of Magic next month. Loads of people had asked Harry, but he'd said no.
Another day went by and the castle slowly changed character completely. Most of her friends were gone and everyone else she came across knew that she should be leaving.
She finally had face the fact that she didn't really have anywhere else to go, particularly nowhere where they wouldn't try to hide that her and her screaming baby was a huge imposition. She just didn't have it in her to force that on her friends. Apparently Sharon Jamieson was in the same position, but she had now organised a position at the Ministry of Magic, maintaining the floo network.
Hermione flooed over to Malfoy Manor later in the evening. She looked for Malfoy in his apartment, but it wasn't his apartment anymore, just his bedroom. He had the run of the house again, his Slytherin house guests must have all move on too. How in the world was she going to find him? She eventually found him in his study.
"I had to leave Hogwarts." She said. He looked up from whatever he was doing.
"Well, there are lots of bedrooms, pick one." He said and leaned back in the chair. "Unless you were planning on staying in mine. I have no right to deny you."
He was grinning and she fumed. He was all business in a crunch, but now'd it passed, he was back to being an arsehole.
"You don't have to make this harder than it is." She said.
"Are you're things here?"
"Yes."
"Then pick a room." He said.
"And for the record." She pointed out. "There is no concept of rights not to deny, just so we're understood."
"Technically…"
"I have no interest in hearing the rest of that statement." She cut him off. "You have no rights. Period."
"Some would say you're being unreasonable Miss Granger." He said, swivelling back and forth in the chair. He was teasing her. "Or should I say Mrs. Malfoy."
"Look, it would be an imposition for me to stay somewhere else, but I will if I have to." She warned.
"Don't worry Granger, I have no designs on you."
She turned to leave the room.
"Have you eaten?" He asked.
"I didn't have time." She said. "I'll get something."
"I'll have a plate for you here in half an hour." He said. "Seriously, do you eat if I don't make you?"
Hermione rolled her eyes and walked up the stairs. Of course she ate, mostly, when the nausea would allow. She levitated her truck up the stairs, walked in the oppose direction of his room and stepped into a door that looked like a bed room. The room was ridiculously big, but it would do. It was certainly big enough to have a crib in it later, as strange as that thought still was.
She felt a little miffed that he basically said he had no interest in her. She couldn't help wonder if he thought she was unattractive. He didn't seem to have a problem with her before, but maybe guys were just like that. Maybe they could do that with anything no matter how they felt or thought about them. She wondered if it was a huge mistake coming here, on top of the huge mistake of agreeing to this whole arrangement to begin with.
If she'd only had the means to purchase a property, which she didn't. Her parent's house, being in muggle London was basically out of bounds, and it was probably burnt to a shell now anyway. All those magical properties where no one now lived did belong to someone through relations, distant or otherwise. It might take some time to work it all out, but in was going to work out well for the old families. Couldn't they just hand things out fairly with people just taking an empty property as needed. It was unfair that they were going to insist on old inheritance rules, but the people without any inheritance were vastly outnumbered. She wondered how many properties Malfoy had. It was so unfair.
She returned downstairs to the study a little while later. She was hungry and slightly nauseous as the same time. But she did need to eat.
"You need to take better care of this baby." He said as she sat down in front of the plate.
"I am taking care of this baby just fine thank you." She said. "This is a natural process, the body just does it on its own, and the baby isn't going to be hurt if one of my meals is late. And I don't need to swan around making people carry things for me."
"You put yourself in harm's way."
Hermione sighed. They'd already made their thoughts on this topic known and she was too tired to fight with him.
"Fine. I promise that I won't go into battle again while I am pregnant. OK, happy now?" She said with a sting of sarcasm. "I promise I will cower in the corner, while the big strong men take care of it."
"This isn't just about you."
"Yeah, and it isn't just about you either." She said with heat.
"I just want you to try to take care of this baby while you are carrying him."
"I'm not an idiot and its my baby too." She said. "I am not going to harm this baby. I might not like you, but I am not going to take it out on my baby. This is my baby too. Really, what do you take me for? Don't answer that, I don't want to know. Now shut up, eating is hard enough without you harping on me." She said and took a bite. "And it could be a girl."
"You better hope not or you'll be spending more time in my bed."