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A/N: sorry I haven't updated in a while, I've recently started university so have been busy with that.

Hermione felt lucky that her best friend was so accepting of all the changes in her life. The transition from being a muggleborn to technically a pureblood with squib parents who is going to marry Draco Malfoy.

She loved the fact she was actually related to Harry, he wasn't just like a brother to her now, he was actually her cousin which made it more special.

She couldn't believe how close she'd grown with Draco in just a few months, she'd initially been worried about having to marry him, they hated each other, but now she was less so. She was still apprehensive, purely because she was 14 years old, she didn't want to think about getting married.

Her parents seemed happier now they had shared the burden that they'd been carrying which must have been hard.

Snape seemed to be doing a better job of being headmaster than Dumbledore, if Harry didn't nearly die this year then it'd definitely be try because he'd nearly died 2 out of 2, which aren't good odds.

Dumbledore always seemed to have an alternative motive when it came to doing things, and he didn't necessarily have the greatest concern for student safety, he should have closed the school last year after the cat was petrified, yet how many people did he let be petrified.

So if Snape could make it through the year without Harry nearly dying then that'd be a win in her eyes.

She was worried about the dementors, Harry seemed to have a bad reaction whenever they were around, but Snape had offered to teach her, Draco and Harry the patronus charm when they returned to school after Christmas break as an extra precaution.

The train journey flew by, and soon they were going their separate ways, Hermione and Harry were off to the Gryffindor table, sitting just the two of them, away from Ron, and Draco and Daphne off to the Slytherin table, being sure to keep Draco away from Pansy because she was still trying to get her hooks into Draco even though she knew he and Hermione were dating.

The post-Christmas break feast was uneventful, however Professor Snape announced that he would no longer be teaching potions, with resulted in a cheer from the Gryffindor, Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff tables. His replacement was going to be Professor Slughorn, who used to teach at Hogwarts when Snape and Harry's parents were there, so he was coming back temporarily until a suitable replacement could be found.

Hermione knew from the day that Snape had come to Malfoy Manor that he loved the job of potions teacher, so wasn't about to let just anyone take over the role, he'd rather stretch himself thin rather than have someone underqualified to hold the role, however he'd reluctantly agreed to talk to Slughorn about taking over the role when Malfoy Senior recommended it.

Lucius recommended to the children to try and get close to Slughorn, as he has a 'Slug Club' that anyone he thought would be successful in life got invited so it was a way to make some influential friends. That wasn't particularly important to Hermione, but she did know it would be important to establish herself in Pureblood social circles, as it would make it easier to come forward and claim her family's name once she came of age, and whilst it was a few years away, it didn't hurt to start making friends in those social circles.

As her grandfather was a potioneer, she was sure that Slughorn would take a liking to her, she just had to make sure to impress him. Snape had told him to keep up with the interhouse unity project, so she was safe and would be able to continue working with Draco, they would however lose access to the classroom in the evenings, but they'd just have to come up with an alternative plan.

Slughorn actually seemed to be a good teacher, he shuffled a few pairings around, moving Harry and Daphne together, and hence Blaise and Neville, amongst a few others. He also announced that they'd be working on projects in groups of 4, so Hermione and Draco got paired with Harry and Daphne, allowing the 4 of them to spend time together without raising suspicion.

This group had now become Hermione's closest friends, she loved that she was so close with her cousin now, Daphne had never been mean to her before, she just stood quietly whilst the others were unkind, that didn't bother Hermione, she'd forgiven Draco, and he had treated her poorly, but that was in the past.

Even the older Slytherins had stopped being unkind to Hermione, showing just how much influence Draco had over his house, although she wasn't sure what he had done to get them to stop, but she definitely appreciated it.

Snape teaching them the patronus charm was fun, they had to pull their happiest memory to use that when they cast the charm. Hermione knew straight away what her happiest memory was. It was the ball on Christmas Eve. It was the first time she'd been able to celebrate in a big group and just be a normal teenager. At Hogwarts she'd always been too focused on her studies to make any more friends than Harry and Ron, and that friendship had happened by fluke because they saved her from the troll.

She'd been so determined to show that she could do magic and to get good grades, that making friends became a second though. Looking back she kind of regretted being like that. She could of easily missed out on a lot.

A/N: hope you enjoyed, please review and let me know what you thing :)