.23.
The day of Professor Flitwick's funeral was truly devastating for everyone who attended. There were so many people there – Hogwarts students and staff, past students, a handful of senior officials from the Ministry of Magic, goblins from Gringotts bank, and all of the interdimensional students. All there to honour a man who meant so much to so many people. Professor Flitwick may not have been as popular or as well known as the late Professor Dumbledore had been, but he had been just as well liked by all those who knew him.
The funeral service was long and draining, as everyone's favourite Charms Professor was buried in the cemetery in the Hogwarts grounds, alongside all those who had fallen in the Battle of Hogwarts. The cemetery was a small, pretty one by the Black Lake – the same one where Professor Dumbledore had been buried in a year and a half ago. The same cemetery where all those who had died in the final battle at Hogwarts had been buried.
Needless to say, it was an extremely difficult day for a lot of people. Aelin spent almost the entire service crying into Rowan's arms, her cousin Aedion faithfully by her side. In contrast, Nesryn Faliq, who had grown quite close to Professor Flitwick over the last year was stony faced.
And for the second time that year, Lucien grew concerned about Nesryn's state of mind. It had been months since Nesryn had last been so withdrawn and distant. Months since Professor Flitwick had been able to cajole and bully her out of her depression. But with Professor Flitwick's passing, he feared that it was going to be near impossible to deal with Nesryn's complete and utter negativity.
It wasn't that Lucien was romantically interested in Nesryn. He wasn't. In fact his relationship with Elain was going better than he had ever expected it to while in Prythian. He could only pray that it would last once the school year was over and they were back in Prythian.
But that didn't mean that Lucien didn't care. Over the past year he had come to care about many of the people he had met. And one of the people he had become close to was Nesryn, almost against his better judgement. He had originally thought that Nesryn Faliq was a stone cold woman, who didn't care about anything or anyone. But over time he had come to see that was not true, that it was simply the walls that the woman had put up to hide her emotions. Ever since Professor Flitwick's death, the walls had been higher than ever, which was a fact that more than worried him. Even after all this time, Lucien didn't like this world and the feeling of being able to control his surroundings in a hostile environment such as this one comforted him. Right now Nesryn's fragile mental health unsettled him, and he sure as hell didn't like the feeling.
"What are you thinking about?" a soft voice asked him suddenly. Lucien literally jumped a foot in the air in surprise before turning around to see Elain standing behind him. Lucien quietly swore to himself. He'd been so damn distracted by grief and worry that he hadn't even noticed her sneak up on him.
Elain just glared at him. "You know how I feel about language like that! So why don't you just shut up and tell me what you were thinking about? I was trying to get you attention for absolutely ages, but you didn't even notice just like the stupid idiot that you are!"
Lucien chuckled humourlessly. Then he sobered up and began to tell her about his worries about Nesryn's mental health. However to his eternal shock and surprise, Elain wasn't quite as concerned about it as he was.
"Why are you so worried about Nesryn for?" Elain moaned, almost whining now. "Sometimes it feels like you are more worried about her than you are about me!"
Lucien stiffened in shock. He hadn't realised how his obsessiveness must look to her. Of course it would look like he didn't care about her. But he did. He truly did. But looking at it now, from her perspective, he finally saw how it must have looked. How it must have felt. He had been so focused on his own crusade that he had forgotten about those around him. He had forgotten about Elain – his own mate. He had been so focused on his own problems and issues that he had forgotten all about Elain. Instead he had hurt her. Badly. By putting his concerns for a woman who was he was hardly friends with ahead of his mate, he had miscalculated, Lucien realised that now.
"I wasn't trying to hurt you Elain, I swear by the Cauldron," Lucien whispered. "I swear that I wasn't trying to hurt you. That was never my intention."
"I know that you only care about her cause you're a good person," Elain sniffed, trying not to show how close she was to crying, "but did you ever think about how it would affect me?"
By now Lucien was feeling like absolute shit. How on earth had worrying about other people, caring about them landed him is this situation? Logically, Lucien knew that he couldn't blame Elain – she was a gentle soul, and in some ways she was far too naïve for her own good. There was no way in hell he could blame her for jumping to conclusions or for being hurt.
"No," Lucien found himself admitting. "I wasn't thinking about anything at all. I was far too wrapped up in my own problems to think about anything else. I was a selfish idiot."
"You could hardly be called selfish, Lucien," Elain said sadly. "And I realise that I probably shouldn't be so sensitive sometimes, but it's just—"
"Hard," Lucien finished for her. "I know. And I should have thought about how my behaviour would affect you. I know how your mind works."
"I know how your mind works," Elain quoted, almost sarcastically, making Lucien blink in surprise. "Wow, talk about romantic. Not."
Lucien blinked again. Romantic? Elain was talking about romance with him? Was this… Did this mean – that she was interested in accepting the mating bond between them? Was she even considering accepting it? Lucien shook his head, reluctantly making himself concentrate on the conversation at hand. Elain was still talking. The least he could was listen to her, especially after he had hurt her so badly by ignoring her.
"I'm going to tell you one thing about Nesryn Faliq," Elain was saying calmly. "And it's the same exact thing that Feyre told me when I was worried about Nesta. When she wants your help, she'll come to you. Before we can help her, she first needs to admit to herself that she needs our help. And only then well we be able to help her. It's been hard for me, the past few months, what with Nesta completely shutting me and Feyre out of her life, but at least we still have each other."
"Maybe you're right," Lucien said, sighing deeply. "I have to hope that when Nesryn's ready, she'll come forward and talk to someone. And for all I know, she's already spoken to one of her own friends from her own world about it already. Who knows?"
And on that note, the pair of them started walking slowly back up to the castle together, hand in hand.
Life didn't get much easier after Professor Flitwick's funeral. Somehow news of Hermione's true identity had found its way to the ears of the press and some reporter called Rita Skeeter had been since published an extremely long and mercilessly cruel article about it in all the major newspapers.
Needless to say, the world at large was not pleased to find out that they had been lied to for so long. Were extremely angry that to find that one of their most famous war heroes had turned out to be the daughter of the enemy. From the outcry, you would have thought that Astrid "Hermione" Malfoy, as she was now widely known, was the daughter of Lord Voldemort, not the daughter of Lucius Malfoy.
Contrary to what "Hermione" had stated to Harry and Ginny before the funeral of Professor Flitwick, old Mr Malfoy had not been aware that she was his long lost daughter. At first there was no comment from the former Death Eater, as though the entire situation would disappear if he ignored it. When that tactic didn't work, Mr Malfoy came storming up to the school for a "conference" with both his children and Headmistress McGonagall.
On the day of Mr Malfoy's so called "conference" deafening screaming could be heard from the Headmistress's office for hours on end. Rumour had it that Mr Malfoy was apparently unhappy about being kept from his daughter for nearly twenty years. The school gossips also put it about that Mr Malfoy had attempted to persuade (i.e. bribe) Headmistress McGonagall into overturning his daughter's expulsion. Upon failing that, he again attempted to "persuade" the Headmistress into letting her graduate along with the rest of her class.
Once again, Headmistress McGonagall refused, not willing to open the school or staff to the whims and bribes of such a well known dark wizard. She constantly backed up her decisions to him, referencing his daughter's vicious attack on an innocent student, not to mention a guest in their world. Upon mention of the attack Mr Malfoy congratulated his daughter on her spell work, saying that at least she knew that she ought not to share breathing space with such aliens who shouldn't even be allowed to enter such an ancient and venerable educational establishment such as Hogwarts. At which Headmistress McGonagall made some thinly veiled comments about "like father like daughter." "And two little Death Eater peas in a pod." Not to mention the comments about "not being able to trust slimy little snaky spies." Comments that sounded vaguely sounded like threats – quite unusual indeed for the typically mild-mannered Headmistress.
After Lucius Malfoy tried and failed to get his daughter re-enrolled as a student at Hogwarts, the bitter old man ordered her to take part in an exclusive interview and proclaimed a fancy pureblood ball in order to re-introduce her "the upper echelons of wizarding society." Much to the surprise of the entire student body, she agreed instantly. Perhaps Hermione thought that it would soften and gentle peoples opinion of her, perhaps she thought that putting her side of the story out in the world, would make her friends look at her again, speak to her again, after ignoring her for days on end.
But it was not to be. The hate mail that she received in the days immediately following the article's publication was – for the complete lack of a better term – unrelenting and utterly ruthless. The outpouring of vitriol was completely and utterly astounding.
In a way, though, it was hardly a surprise to any of the interdimensional students at this stage. By now enough of them had learned that it didn't matter what happened, someone would still find something to hate. They were accepted by many, but not accepted by all. And so for them, as for Hermione, this treatment would one day come to pass as well. And if her friends could not bring themselves to accept her for who she truly was, then they were not truly her friends after all. But at the same time, it was still a bitter pill to swallow.