Chapter Four
There was silence. Draco and Blaise watched with baited breath as it sunk into their minds.
Ginny Weasley was the first to look up, eyes wide. "A-are you serious?" She croaked.
Blaise nodded. "Very serious."
"Oh my god." She whispered. "Poor Hermione… is she alright?" She asked urgently, concern marring her pale face.
"She's here, in her own room." Blaise told them.
Finally, Ron spoke. "Who did it?" His nostrils were flared and a feral snarl was contorting his features. "I'll bloody kill him!" He stood, his face bright red, to match his hair.
"Ron," Harry said firmly. "Calm down, we can't do anything until we know who did it." He looked to the two Slytherins who had backed away slightly, not wanting to get in the way of an angry Ron Weasley.
"Sit down and I'll tell you." Draco said. Ron sat, seething with anger. "Last night, as I walked around Muggle London, I heard a woman scream. I ran toward it, and found them in an alley-way. He was standing over her, hand raised, and I just reacted instinctively. We got into a fight and Granger petrified him while we were fighting. That was when I got to her and saw the blood on her skirt. I saw who it was and the first place I came was here." He relayed.
All three were now even paler than before, and Ginny looked up to meet his eyes. He was scared. "Who did it?" She ground out.
Draco took another deep breath, hand on his wand. "Viktor Krum."
There was an uproar.
"I'll kill him!" Ron exclaimed. "I'll kill the bastard!" Harry joined in with his yelling and raging.
"Shut UP!" Ginny suddenly yelled. "Will you two be quiet?!"
Everyone turned to look at the female Weasley.
She took a calming breath. "We can't just go around murdering Viktor Krum. What we need to do is alert the ministry, and have him arrested."
"NO!" Came from behind the slightly closed doors of the sitting room. Hermione stepped into view. "No, you can't have him arrested." She stated.
"Hermione, are you alright? Oh gods, Hermione, I'm so glad you're alive!" Ginny flung herself at Hermione and she flinched, as they made contact.
"Don't touch me!" She snapped.
"Oh Merlin, I'm so sorry." She said, pulling away.
Hermione took a shuddering breath. "Y-you can't a-arrest Viktor." She said again. "He did n-nothing wrong."
Anger flared in Blaise and Draco, and they both stood with incredulous shouts of "WHAT?!"
"Are you INSANE?!" Draco shouted. "I saw it, Granger, I saw him ready to beat the crap out of you!"
She flinched back and looked away. "He did nothing wrong." She repeated. "He had every right to take my virginity; we're engaged."
Silence once again took over. Then came the shouts.
"YOU'RE WHAT?!"
"We're engaged. It was just a little fight between us, and we had just done it for the first time." She said calmly.
Blaise took a deep breath. "Hermione, I know you were beaten by him. I saw the blood, the head wound, my mother cleaned you up. We all know you did not give your permission for this."
"But I-"
"I swear if you tell me you love him, I'll jump off a cliff." Draco snapped. "I saw what happened, Granger. I know what he did. He-"
"SHUT UP!" She yelled. "NO, NO! HE DID NOTHING WRONG!" She screeched, before running from the room with her hands over her ears.
"Shit!" Draco put his head in his hands and sighed heavily. "Bloody girls and their 'love' this, and 'love' that." He muttered.
"Malfoy…?" Harry asked. "What the hell is going on?"
"Listen, what Draco said, was true. She was raped. But I had a talk with her this morning, and she's still in love with him. She said he loved her. She's lying to herself. So, until we can get her to admit to herself that he did hurt her, we're going to have to keep her here."
"And away from that scum." Draco spat.
"Can't we just arrest him?" Ron asked, even though he wanted to do so much more.
Harry thought for a minute. "Not really. We won't have a case without Hermione. He'd get let off, and there would be no chance of helping Hermione." He paused, looking to the two Slytherins. "I never thought I'd say this, but you're right. She has to stay here. It's for her own good."
Ginny stood up. "She doesn't want to be here, though. And how do we know we can trust you?" She asked them.
Blaise and Draco looked at one another. "Is there any reason you shouldn't trust us?"
"Only the fact that you were cruel to us in our seven years at Hogwarts." Ron said.
"They may have been bad boys back then, but you have absolutely no reason not to trust me." Mrs. Zabini flounced into the room, looking worried and frustrated. "That girl needs help; whether it's from us or someone else, it doesn't matter, but she has lost all manner of trust toward anyone but the bastard who did this to her in the first place."
"She has a point." Ginny piped in. "I mean… I couldn't even hug her."
Everyone went silent.
Harry cleared his throat, attempting to rid it of the lump that was forming in it. "We'll do whatever it takes." He said, determined now.
A sigh of relief was heard from Mrs. Zabini. "I'm so glad you agree." She told them, smiling grimly. "I'm going to go and talk to her, try to convince her to stay." She informed, leaving the rest of them to talk and called for a house elf. A small one popped up, bowing deeply. "I need you to locate Miss Granger."
The house elf bowed again and was gone with a crack, returning moments later with the news that she was out in the gardens, crying by the pond.
Maria made her way over to the pond, watching sadly as the girl sobbed into her arms. The Zabini mistress made sure to make her steps loud, alerting Hermione of her presence. She jumped, and quickly wiped away the tears with ferocity.
"No need to wipe the tears away, dear, it's only me." She cooed in a motherly fashion.
She sniffled, pulling her legs closer to her chest as she looked out over the gigantic pond.
"It's not your fault, you know." Maria said quietly, settling herself next to Hermione.
"What's not my fault?"
Maria sighed. "What he did… it was unforgivable. You shouldn't blame yourself for it, there is absolutely no way it was your fault."
Hermione said nothing for a while, and they sat in silence, until Mrs. Zabini got up to leave. "It's not the first time this has happened." Hermione said in a small voice, causing Maria to stop dead in her tracks. "It's the second."
Mrs. Zabini turned slowly to regard the young woman sitting by her pond. "He's raped you before?" She asked, anger flaring.
Hermione shook her head. "No, this is the first time he r-raped me, but he's beaten me. It was horrible. All I remember thinking was 'he's drunk, it's just the alcohol speaking. He really does love me'. But it wasn't true. He doesn't love me." She said, a sob escaping. "He couldn't love me. I'm nothing."
"Don't say that." Maria was instantly by her side, arms wrapped around her protectively. "You're not nothing. You're talented, and extremely beautiful. You used to make dear old Draco rant on for hours every summer." She laughed musically. "He was always so jealous."
Hermione smiled slightly at this.
"Hermione, you're not nothing, because if you weren't anything, Viktor Krum wouldn't have beaten you, or taken your virginity against your will. It's something he had force from you, which proves that you're moral and also subconsciously smart, not giving it away as soon as he had kissed you."
"That's just me being a prude, there." She interjected sadly.
"No, it's not. You wouldn't give up your dignity. That's something special, Hermione. You're special. I know some people who would strongly agree with me." She paused, allowing her words to sink in, as a small smile formed on the young woman's face. "You can't go back there. Not back to him. Please, Hermione, tell me you'll stay and report him to the authorities." Maria pleaded.
Hermione thought for a minute. "I'll stay. But I'm not reporting him. I-I just can't do it." She looked into Maria's dark blue eyes. "Don't ask me why – because I haven't a clue why – but I still… I still love him…" she admitted, looking away.
Maria's grip tightened, before she stood once again, pulling Hermione up with her. "Come on, you are in serious need of some retail therapy." She grinned at Hermione, successfully lightening the mood.
She began animatedly talking of places she would take Hermione to get some new clothes and a make-over, and before Hermione knew it, she was leaving a muggle shopping centre with bags and bags of new things, courtesy of Mrs. Maria Zabini.
When they entered the living room, they found Draco and Blaise playing wizard's chess, with Blaise winning, obviously.
"Boys, we're back!" Maria sang, plopping down on the couch.
Hermione entered behind her cautiously, sitting next to Maria with a small smile on her face. They had just been discussing the boys and their… habits on the way home, and Hermione was trying hard to keep a straight face. Though, when Blaise stood up to welcome them, she visibly flinched and shrank back, the smile falling from her face.
Maria's hand squeezed Hermione's reassuringly as her son pecked her on the cheek.
"Did you bring me anything?" He grinned.
Maria smiled at her son lovingly. "We might have bought you something." She answered vaguely. "You'll just have to find out."
"Oh, come on, mum!" He pleaded.
"You're such a spoilt brat." Mrs. Zabini remarked firmly, and she pulled a bag of honey-dukes sweets from her pocket. She threw them to him and pulled out another bag and threw it at Draco's head as he was staring at the chess board intently, almost burning a hole into it.
"Ouch! What was that for?" He asked, rubbing the side of his head, as he picked up the sweets and inspected them with a grin. "Why Maria, I hadn't realised you cared for me so much." He grinned and she chuckled.
All the while, Hermione was marvelling at how oddly happy they all were, having the pretence that they were stuck-up snobs.
"So, Granger, what'd you buy?" Draco asked casually, popping a Crackling Marshmallow in his mouth.
She looked at her bags shyly. "A lot. Mostly clothes, though."
Maria laughed her musical laugh. "We got dresses, skirts, tops, loads of things that looked absolutely brilliant on her, boys. Oh, and some hair and make-up products. You should see the shoes we got, and the jewellery. Of course, she kept putting things back, the sneaky little witch. But I just went and found them again." She gushed fondly, already becoming attached to Hermione.
"Never get in my mother's way when she takes you shopping. If she says something looks good, you'll be getting it, no doubt." Blaise said with experience.
"But you should have seen her, boys, Miss Granger, here has a great body. You should see her in green!" She told them excitedly. Hermione blushed and fiddled uncomfortably. "She's a bit shy, though. It took me a whole twenty minutes for her to come out of the dressing room when we were shopping for lingerie–" She stopped as Hermione reddened further.
The boys both looked uncomfortable at this, hearing about Blaise's mother lingerie shopping with a former rival, Hermione Granger.
"Oops, did I say the wrong thing?" She shrugged with another of her musical laughs. "Anyway, it's getting late; I think it's time for dinner. Come on, boys, Hermione, I'm sure dinner is awaiting us." With that, she exited the room, a smile on her face, leading two hungry boys and a not so hungry girl into the casual dining room.
Okay, everyone, I'm totally unsure of what to make the pairing. I'm thinking along the lines of Draco/Hermione, Blaise/Hermione, Theodore Nott/Hermione (been done already I know.), or anyone you can suggest. Please HELP!!!