A slight knock on the door startled Ron from his work, as he pored over the worktable in one of the small workrooms along the servants' corridor. The rag hovered in his hand rather than lather the now-affixed leg of the chaise longue with wood polish.
"Come in!" A small, round face peeked meekly from behind the slightly-ajar door. "Cathy! What's going on?"
"Mr. Gramsley wants you."
"Gramsley?" What could the butler possibly want with him? "I'm sure it's a mistake," he shrugged, and turned slightly from Cathy to keep working on the chair leg.
"He specifically asked for you," Cathy insisted. "He said— I'll tell you what he said to me, he said, 'Cathy, go fetch the handyman and tell him I need to see him in my office right away.' And so then I reacted just like you and said 'I'm sorry, sir?' and he said 'Mr. Weasley? The redhead?' and I said—"
But Ron needed to hear no more: yes, it was clearly him Gramsley wanted. He left the rag by the overturned chaise and pushed his workbench back. "Thank you, Cathy," he cut her off. "I'll be right over."
Cathy smiled at him uncertainly and ducked out of sight and back into the main corridor. Ron dusted off his hands on his heavy-duty trousers and hoped he looked presentable enough for the snobbish old butler. Perhaps something needed fixing in his office, he thought to himself as he exited the workroom and headed toward Gramsley's office. He knocked on the neat white door twice and waited for the low voice of the butler to beckon him in.
"Ah, Mr. Weasley," Gramsley said, looking up from the papers on his desk when Ron let himself in. The butler was a tall man with a thin complexion, with beady eyes and fine features sagged by incipient wrinkles. He looked permanently nervous, an impression his voice —low and steady— broke entirely every time he spoke. "Thank you for coming so quickly."
"Cathy said you wanted to see me, sir?"
"Yes," Gramsley said, and gestured toward one of the two chairs in front of his desk. Ron took the hint and sat down, taking care to sit primly and keep his back straight out of the respect the butler's position commanded. "As I am sure you know, Rosebury House is expecting some very important guests, arriving later today."
The memory of Hermione telling him he needed a dress for guests stirred in his mind— and with it, all the other memories of that day, which he'd rather not think about when addressed by the butler. He tried to clear his mind and pay full attention to the man before him. "Yes, sir. I heard something of it."
"Rosebury House is welcoming the Earl of Glencarrion and his family all the way from Scotland. Such a visit is daunting not because of the quantity of guests —it will just be Lord and Lady McLaggen and their son—, but because of their standing. So I'm sure you understand when I tell you we must take care to conduct ourselves with the utmost propriety— what we do, after all, reflects on the image of the Granger family."
"Of course, sir. Forgive me for asking, but I'm still not understanding what this has to do with me."
The butler raised his eyebrows and Ron internally winced at his irreverence. He tried to make up for it by straightening his back and sitting a few inches taller. Gramsley surveyed him for a moment, then sighed and continued speaking. "We have just received word from Glencarrion this morning that the young Master McLaggen's valet will be unable to come with him, for reasons unspecified. The message requested Rosebury have a valet on hand to attend to him. As you know, this house permanently employs no valets other than those of Lord Granger and Master Orlando, and I already have my two footmen doubling as temporary valets for the Lord Black and his godson. I understand you have had some training as a valet?"
Ron's training had, in fact, been thoroughly informal. He had trained for a footman before being told that he was too tall for it, and his experience with being a valet was reduced to helping Percy with his clothes one time he'd visited him at Oxford and Percy had been too nervous about a function that night to even insert his cufflinks without his hand trembling. Nonetheless, it was better not to displease Gramsley, especially when it was becoming exceedingly clear where this was leading. "Yes, sir. To a very minimal degree, but I know my way around a suit."
"Excellent. Then you are leaps and bounds ahead of the hall boys," Gramsley scrunched his nose at the last two words, and Ron realized that Gramsley must truly be desperate to find a valet if he had even entertained the hall boys as a second option. "You will serve as valet to Master McLaggen, then, Mr. Weasley."
"I would be honored to, sir."
"Good, good. Your current clothes, of course, will not do," Gramsley said, sweeping Ron's work trousers and undershirt with a disapproving eye. Ron squirmed in his chair under the butler's gaze. "There should be a simple suit in the footmen's closet. Ask one of the footmen to help you find it. It might also be good to ask Mr. Crenshaw to give you a few pointers." Mr. Crenshaw was valet to Lord Granger, but he was uptight and deeply jealous of his job. Ron made a mental note to seek instead Mr. Blake, Orlando's valet, who was much kinder and besides would have more experience with attending to a younger lord.
"I will, sir."
"This, of course, means that you will be somewhat relieved of your occupations as handyman for the duration of the McLaggens' stay. You will, of course, receive full pay and an added benefit for your help as valet."
"My mother will like hearing that, Mr. Gramsley," Ron smiled. His mum would be proud that he'd finally done an 'indoor job,' as she called it, at Rosebury, and he thought about what a nice surprise he'd give her when he came home with a bit more money under his arm.
"Yes, well, I'm sure she will. You start now, Mr. Weasley. The McLaggens arrive in about three hours and you must be ready to tend to the young master by then."
"Right away, sir," Ron said, rising from his chair and giving the butler a polite nod before exiting his office.
Back in the servants' corridor, Ron was unsure of where he might go about finding a footman to show him to the livery closet, as the two of them would be busy serving luncheon to the family upstairs. He spied a slight figure walking toward the kitchen and thought it might be the solution to his problem. "Psst! Cathy!"
The figure stopped and turned toward him. He took that as his sign to approach her. "Cathy, d'you know how I might go about finding a footman right now?"
"They're busy with luncheon. They won't be down for a while," Cathy said, kneading her apron in her hands. "Why?"
"I'll be acting valet and I need to find a suit in the livery closet."
Cathy brightened up at that. "I know where it is. I can show you to it."
"That would be terrific, thank you so much," Ron said.
Cathy gave him a grin and scurried down the hallway toward its darker far end, with Ron following not too far behind. She opened the door to a small, dim room with a big wardrobe lining the entirety of one of the walls. Ron entered and wrinkled his nose at the musk that invaded it. The humidity did not make the prospect of wearing a suit long-stuffed in a wardrobe particularly appealing.
Cathy lit the sole lightbulb in the center of the ceiling by yanking on its rusty chain. The murky room became awash in a very faint light. Cathy stepped up to the wardrobe and opened its doors: inside, rows of jackets that looked (and smelled) like they had been long abandoned hung from a rack. "Do you know what you're looking for?"
"Not really, no," Ron admitted. Cathy moved him slightly aside and began rifling through the contents of the wardrobe.
"My da' was a valet," she said as she looked. "Much shorter than you, of course, but one nonetheless. I remember well what his suit looked like, and it hasn't changed much since he wore one."
Ron listened politely but said nothing, watching Cathy as her hands sorted through the hanging jackets. At last they closed around a sleeve, and Cathy pulled some other suits back so she could take a proper look at this one and determine whether it was the right one. Deciding it was, she stood on her tiptoes and pulled it down from the rack by its hanger.
"There," she said triumphantly, holding it out to Ron. "This should do it."
Ron eyed the suit gingerly: it looked large enough to fit him, though he was sure the trousers would ride up a few inches above his ankles (too tall to be a footman, after all, might extend to too tall to be a valet). The suit had been black once, but had now worn into a faded dark gray, and the white shirt's collar looked like it had seen years since it had last been starched. Still, it was better than anything he'd anticipated by the smell of mothballs in this room, though he made a mental note to shake the suit to expel any spiders that might be lazing around in it.
Ron took the suit. "Thank you so much, Cathy."
"Don't mention it," Cathy said brightly. "Do you need help with anything else?"
"Not really, no. I think I can button a shirt and tie a tie well on my own." Cathy giggled. "I'll just be changing now," he said.
"Of course," Cathy said, but she didn't budge, still swaying a bit on the tips of her feet by the door and looking at him with wide eyes.
Ron cleared his throat. "Cathy, I'll just be changing now," he repeated.
This time around, Cathy seemed to catch the hint. "Oh! Oh, absolutely," she said hurriedly, and scuttled out into the hallway, closing the door behind her.
Ron sighed, chuckled to himself, and then set the suit on a small table in front of the wardrobe to begin undoing the buttons on the limp white shirt.
The murmur in the foyer made Hermione look up from the book in her lap. Sounds like a hand clapping fraternally on a back, the small steps of the hall boys carrying in luggage, and the animated buzz of idle chatter could only lead to one conclusion: the guests had arrived. Hermione bit her tongue and closed her eyes for an instant, resigning herself to the inevitable: she would have to go out there and say hello of her own volition before her mother called her out.
She closed her book and set it aside, hiding it under a small cushion on the red couch to make sure it wouldn't be placed back on the bookshelf, where books that had been out as of lately had been relocated from their usual spots and she'd been unable to find them (she suspected her mother and her opinion on Hermione's reading). She rose from the comfortable couch and exited the library directly into the lobby.
She had been correct: the lobby held a host of people, milling about in the business of welcoming. There were Lords Black and Malfoy, Harry and Draco, Hermione's own parents, and three other people who she didn't immediately recognize. The first face to come back to her was that of the tall, huge lord with the mop of blond hair and the crinkles born of smiling that framed his gentle blue eyes. The second was that of his wife, a chestnut-haired woman with a slight frame and elfish features.
"Lord and Lady McLaggen, what a pleasure it is to welcome you into our home," she said through a smile, crossing the foyer to go shake their hand.
"Hermione, darling!" Aileen exclaimed, pulling her into a hug. She broke it quickly and held Hermione by the shoulders at arm's length, as if to take a proper look at her. "Your mother was just telling us how much you've grown!"
Hermione shot a look at Lady Amelia, who stood unassumingly in the corner, and contained a frown. "Has she, now?" It was unlike her mother to speak too much about her daughter without some ulterior motive, which Hermione had no doubt she had.
Paying no mind, Lady Aileen led Hermione to another part of the room. "Have you met my son Cormac?" she said, steering Hermione toward the third person that she hadn't recognized.
He was tall, not as much as his father, but powerfully built. His features, crowned by a head of sandy hair, were steady and set confidently in his face, giving him an air of rugged handsomeness that was only offset by how cold and indifferent his eyes looked. They lit up, however, when he spotted Hermione being shown toward him.
"Cormac, this is Lady Hermione Granger," Aileen said, gesturing to Hermione.
Cormac sent a hand forth with all the calculating slowness of a predator, taking Hermione's in his and lifting it to his lips. "Enchanté," he said. Hermione yanked her hand away as soon as his fingers somewhat loosened their grip on it.
"The pleasure is all mine," she said through gritted teeth.
"I don't believe we had met?"
"No, I don't believe we had."
"Well, we'll see a lot of one another during my stay," Cormac said with a leer. Something about the way he said it —not as a flirty wish, but as an assertive statement— sent a shiver of disgust running up Hermione's spine.
She was saved from having to say much else to him by Orlando's entry. She hadn't seen her brother in days, but the fact that he had chosen to make his entrance right at the exact moment only made her chest swell larger with affection.
"Sorry, sorry," Orlando said hurriedly as he covered the distance between door and foyer center in a few strides of his long legs. "The clasp on my suitcase undid as I was hiking it down from the car and I was helping Artie shove everything back in."
Hermione saw the disconcert on her mother's face and almost laughed at it— of course she would be confused, seeing as she did not interact enough with the hall boys to know who exactly Artie was.
"No matter, my dear," she pushed through nonetheless, emerging from the throng of guests to place a kiss to her uncomfortable son's cheek.
Lord Philip clapped his hands together and announced: "Well, now that we're all here, we can all go up and start getting changed for supper!"
"Oh, excellent. I'm starving," Lord Angus grunted his affirmation, already beginning the trek upstairs. Gramsley scurried up after him, evidently to show him the way to his and his wife's guestroom.
Cormac hung back, reluctant to follow his parents, for an instant. Hermione felt his gaze bore into her and almost cowered under it. Cormac held the look for a moment before tearing away and following his parents upstairs.
Meanwhile, Orlando had disentangled himself from his mother and had made his way to Hermione's side. He didn't even give her a chance to say hello before he hissed, "Did you get my letter?"
Hermione looked at him obliviously. "Letter?" she said, a bit louder than he'd have liked her response to be. "What letter?"
Orlando opened his mouth to explained, but Lady Amelia had turned toward him as soon as she'd heard mention of a letter. She gave Orlando a hawkish stare— and just like that, he knew who had intercepted it against all his prayers.
"Forget it," he forced a smile, and as he pulled Hermione into an embrace, he cursed internally and wondered how he was going to warn her about Cormac now.
On the other end of the foyer, Lady Amelia, her face expressionless, merely observed her children hug.
Ron had scarcely spent fifteen minutes in the company of Master McLaggen and was already regretting having agreed to stepping in as his valet. The young heir was pompous to a fault, deeply obnoxious, and rude to Ron even as he dressed him. Think of the extra pay, Ron thought every time McLaggen made him grimace. Just think of the pay.
"Hm," McLaggen said as he examined himself in the mirror after Ron had finished doing his cufflinks. "This sleeve looks longer than the other. Do it again."
Ron wanted to cry out in frustration: how did a cufflink at all affect the length of the sleeve? He was about to just walk out of the room for good, but the thought of his mum's face next time he came home kept him where he was.
"Yes, sir," he mumbled, and undid the clasp on the sapphire-studded cufflinks to start again.
McLaggen remained impassive as Ron worked, seeming to take a smug pleasure in making Ron bend over backwards to cater to his whims. This was exactly the type of aristocrat that Ron despised: he was well aware of his standing and unreluctant to abuse it, even reveling in the authority he exerted over those he perceived to be inferior to him. He's nothing like Hermione, a part of him was surprised to think. She'd never be like this.
It seemed as though McLaggen had read his thoughts, because when Ron finished the cufflinks and stepped back to help McLaggen into his dinner jacket, McLaggen said, "What can you tell me about the Lady Granger?"
"Lady Amelia, sir?" Ron said, sliding the right sleeve over McLaggen's arm.
"No, the younger. Her daughter— Hermione, is it?"
Ron slid the other sleeve over and felt his stomach twist. "Yes, sir. That would be her." He went around McLaggen and in front of him to begin doing up the buttons of the jacket.
"Pretty, isn't she?" McLaggen said. "Granted, she's not exactly a beauty, but she cleans up well, doesn't she?"
Ron's frustration almost turned into fury. Through gritted teeth, he said, "I don't believe I'm at liberty to opine on that matter, sir."
"Oh, you're right," McLaggen said. Ron finished the buttons and stepped aside to let McLaggen observe himself in the mirror. "Good, good," he muttered as he shifted slightly to catch a view of himself from several different angles. He then turned sharply to Ron and swept him up and down with a piercing gaze. "You say you don't usually valet?"
"No, sir."
"What do you do?"
"I'm the handyman."
"What is that?"
Ron felt scrutinized, and the tip of his ears went hot with unwarranted embarrassment. "I... fix things, sir. Around the house. When they break." He felt dumb even as he said it.
McLaggen merely shrugged and returned to his reflection. "I think I'm ready to go down to dinner now. Finish the unpacking for me— shirts in the bottom drawer, socks and undergarments in the middle one, ties and accessories in the top one, and jackets, trousers, and shoes in the closet."
He didn't even wait for Ron's response before he exited the room and started down the corridor toward the stairs. Ron stood, dumbfoundedly rooted to the spot, for a few seconds before his indignation sprang him back into action.
"Yes, sir, right away, sir," he grumbled under his breath even as he set about transferring McLaggen's items from his suitcases to where he had asked for them to go. 'Finish the unpacking,' he'd said, but he hadn't even started. Ron bustled around the guestroom, trying to place everything where it went with propriety to save himself from a rebuke from McLaggen later on. The pay, the pay, the pay, he repeated like a mantra as he did it, finding that he otherwise had little motivation to do it.
When everything was stowed away, Ron took the three leather suitcases McLaggen had brought and lifted them over his head to place them atop the closet, where they would be safely out of the way —and relatively out of sight— in McLaggen's guestroom. With that done, his chest heaved out as he let out a breath of exertion and then left the room, making sure to turn off the light and close the door behind him, to go downstairs.
He almost went down the main steps, his thinking muddled by his exasperation with McLaggen; only when he heard the chatter bubbling up from the foyer did he come to his senses and veer toward the servants' steps. If Gramsley spotted him coming down the main stairwell and into the lobby where the family and their guests were, that would surely be the end of his employment at Rosebury altogether, and he had not just put up with an hour of Cormac McLaggen to walk out empty-handed and with his tail between his legs.
He went down the servants' steps, the secondary stairwell that led all the way downstairs to the servants' quarters. He was on the main landing and ready to go back to the servants' level when a change in the sound of the foyer made him stop in his tracks. The chatter had quieted down into a near-silence, dissolving into mutters, and something about the almost-silence piqued Ron's curiosity.
He peered out of the door that shielded the secondary stairwells from view, and his gaze immediately fell on the sight that had made everyone stop their talking. Because across from him, on the other side of the lobby and coming down the main stairwell, was Hermione.
She was wearing the champagne-pink dress she had commissioned from Madam Malkin: it was loose and draped off her body in a way that accentuated her fine waist and delicate collarbones, the bead-finished skirt slim and ending in a slight trail that swept the stairs behind her. The sleeves were long and spacious, reaching her elbow, and the front of the dress boasted none of the bead finishing of the rest, being instead simple satin that sagged forward with the weight of a tassel. Her hair was done up in a loose updo with her hair bunched back in a bun that still showed all of her curls.
Ron was breathless: the last time he'd properly seen her, her hair had been sopping wet and clinging to her face, and her clothes had been unrecognizable under a layer of grime and rainwater. She looked totally different when not doused in mud, and still she looked just as beautiful.
She looked almost sheepish coming down the stairs, as if she was abashed at having interrupted everyone's chatter, but Ron couldn't blame him: his tongue felt thick in his mouth and he doubted he could've gotten a word out right now, just looking at her. He felt a murmur of longing ripple through him: he wished it could be him clad in McLaggen's suit, awaiting her descent, knowing he could take her by the gloved hand and take a closer look at her. For an instant, the vision hung in the air, and he had to hold himself back to keep himself from bounding across the lobby and making it real. Hermione wouldn't mind, would she? In fact, she might be happy to see him...
When she reached the lobby and her father took her by the hand, the spell was broken. The princess remained a princess and the handyman turned back into the handyman. Contenting himself with one last gaze from afar, Ron took in the sight of Hermione and ingrained it in his heart, to quell the envy he felt for the dinner guests at the moment— the first time he had ever felt outright jealousy for any member of the nobility. He watched the party, now complete, disappear into the dining room.
He exhaled his yearning in a sigh and turned slowly to head back downstairs.
This dinner arrangement was reminding Hermione all-too-awfully of that dinner, now seeming so long ago, that her mother had hosted for the Diggorys. Except this time the dinner guest to her right was nowhere near as pleasant as Cedric had been.
Cormac McLaggen had monopolized her attention throughout the entirety of dinner, boasting about practically every aspect of his personal life and achievements. He hadn't asked her a single question about herself, and whenever she had tried to offer up some small detail about her, he had quickly overriden her with yet another anecdote about him. Hermione found herself longing for Cedric's intelligent conversation, for his references to Freud and his kindness, and instead found herself running up against a wall that wouldn't budge because it could not entertain the idea that some things might not be about itself.
So halfway through the dinner, she had decided to stay silent and just not talk anymore, letting Cormac tire himself out with tales about him and just giving him a doe-eyed smile she knew he would mistake for adoration. It wouldn't have been all that bad had it not been for the touching: after the tenth instance, Hermione had lost track of just how many times she'd had to peel his hand off her thigh.
Though she had largely succeeded in tuning out Cormac, a string in his talk now caught her attention: "...which is why I believe if one takes Darwin's theories, the explanation is quite simple: men are superior to women quite simply because they are stronger, and that is the natural order of things."
Hermione broke her silence in indignation: "I'm sorry, but I cannot begin to tell you just how incorrect that is."
"Excuse me?" Cormac said, the smugness in his eyes hardening into hostility.
"Have you actually read On the Origin of Species? Because that is not, at all, what the theory of evolution posits—"
"And why have you read it?" Cormac said accusatorially, and Hermione remarked that he had evaded her question (which almost surely meant he hadn't read it after all). "I would've thought it improper of a lady of your standing."
Hermione was fed up: "I'm sure you just don't meet too many ladies, of my standing or otherwise, who actually engage with the nonsense you say and don't just giggle adoringly at you—"
Lady Amelia had picked up on the tension on the other end of the table and now her voice rose shrilly to break it. "Cormac, has your stay been enjoyable thus far?"
Cormac tore his irate eyes from Hermione and softened his gaze to return Lady Amelia's. "Oh, most certainly, Lady Amelia. It is lovely to be welcomed so hospitably."
"Have you found everything to your taste? I understand your valet couldn't come— has the replacement valet been up to standard?"
"Oh, he's been alright. I can tell he's not usually a valet —he messed up the cufflinks once or twice and he's a bit too tall for his trousers—, but he was acceptable."
"This is why I always bring my valet with me," Lucius Malfoy chimed in. "I find that to use guest or replacement valets always makes for a disappointing experience. It is so tedious to be dressed by a man who is unfamiliar with you and your wardrobe."
"Or you could learn to dress yourself," Sirius said unassumingly. "I mean, neither Harry nor I have valets back at Grimmauld Place. We're using valets here as a courtesy to Lord Philip, but I'm afraid we are rather disappointing to dress, considering that we do it all ourselves except the trickier parts of the waistcoat or the tie."
"Well, Lord Black, you have never been known as a man with much regard for propriety," Lucius said.
"Coming from you, that is a compliment."
Lord Philip, with the same canny instinct for rising tension as his wife had, interrupted with another direct address to Cormac: "Who's serving as your valet, lad?"
"The handyman, I think he said he was? Tall, redheaded chap? I dunno, really, I didn't ask his name," Cormac said, and something about the way he absently poked at his food irked Hermione into speaking again.
"Ron," she said firmly. "His name is Ron Weasley."
Lady Amelia gave Hermione a murderous stare.
"Well, now I shall know what to call him," Cormac said, and the rest of the table forced a smile before returning to their food and away from the discomfort of the moment.
Hermione seethed as she dug into her food, which somehow made it even easier to ignore Cormac as he returned to his self-appraising litany. He made, however, no attempt to lay his hands on her again— something which made the rest of dinner if not pleasant at least tolerable. She caught snippets of the table's conversation here and there: something about McLaggen's uncle Tiberius and his place in Parliament, a promise to take McLaggen hunting with Orlando and Harry one of these days, a few compliments about gowns interchanged among the women... She, however, made no effort to contribute to the conversation.
All through dinner, Orlando shot fleeting glances at Hermione, trying to catch her eye, but Hermione seemed hellbent on staring down at her plate. Orlando couldn't really blame her, though: after that episode with McLaggen, he too would be doing the most to avoid crossing looks with him. But he needed to catch her eye, desperately so, because if his letter hadn't reached her then he had to make sure its warning did. It didn't matter how late he was (he would've liked her to know, after all, before she even met McLaggen, but that was evidently not a possibility), but Hermione had to know.
So when dinner was over and the guests had risen from their seats to move to the drawing room, Orlando quickly made his way to his sister, taking her by the elbow as they walked out of the dining room.
"Oh, hello," she said pleasantly as he sidled up to her. "That dinner was absolutely ghastly."
"Poor you," Orlando laughed. "I was at Glencarrion for almost a fortnight and even then I don't think I reached the level of loathing evident on your face after just one dinner."
"Well, he didn't try to explain to you why women were naturally inferior to men," Hermione scowled. "Though I do suspect he also bored you to tears with anecdotes about every single better-than-mediocre thing he's done in his life."
"I did get a taste of the Cormac McLaggen Experience, but he did spend the majority of his time trying to introduce me to marriage prospects," Orlando winced. "And speaking of which, Hermione... Remember the letter?"
"What letter?"
"The one I mentioned earlier, and I asked you to forget?" Orlando sighed and brought a palm up to his forehead. "I suppose I'd better start over."
Hermione raised an eyebrow: "Yes, I suppose you should. You're not making much sense."
They arrived at the door to the drawing room, but Orlando refrained from going in with the rest of the party, choosing instead to linger with Hermione right outside the door. "While I was up in the Highlands, I wrote you a letter, but you never got it, because our mother intercepted it."
"Sure sounds like her," Hermione said, peering into the drawing room to shoot their mother a look. "What did it say, anyway, that she made sure I never got it?"
"Well, basically, while I was up there, it became clear to me why exactly Mother arranged for Cormac and his parents to visit us here at Rosebury. Hermione, she wants you to–" Orlando started.
He was, however, interrupted by Cormac, who suddenly appeared from within the drawing room and materialized right in front of Hermione and Orlando. "Did I hear my name?" he said through a smile, but his eyes were cold. Hermione caught a very palpable whiff of alcohol on his breath.
Orlando nearly cried out in frustration. Luckily, Hermione was there to step in: "We were just talking about how lovely it is to have guests," she said through a saccharine smile.
"What use is it to have guests if one does not spend time with them?" Cormac said, sidling up to Hermione and gripping her arm with a little too much force. "Come, Hermione, you're missed in here. And you too, Orlando, if you haven't grown bored of us McLaggens after your stay in Glencarrion."
Cormac began pulling Hermione into the room, and Orlando, knowing once again that his luck had run out, merely made eye contact with Hermione and hoped she could read the message in his glance: We must talk later. Hermione held his gaze for just long enough that he believed she'd understood, but almost immediately after McLaggen yanked her into the drawing room and broke their exchange.
Orlando contained the scream he wanted to release and merely externalized his frustration by banging his foot once against the wall— a bad idea, and one that almost immediately sent his foot flying up towards his hand with a throbbing pain in his toe. He cursed under his breath and collected himself before stepping into the drawing room and rejoining the party he most certainly did not want to be a part of, making a beeline for Harry as practically the only person he could stand right now.
Hermione was, after all, again monopolized by McLaggen. She had tried to disentangle herself numerous times from him, but every time she squeezed a smile through her lips and tried to scurry off to make conversation with someone else, Cormac would either shift right in front of her to block her way or grab her by the wrist to keep her from walking off toward someone else. No matter how many frenzied glances Hermione shot around the room, desperate to catch someone's eye to convince them to come to her rescue, none of them seemed to land: everybody had split off into cliques, and she was alone with McLaggen. She suspected her mother might have something to do with it: Lady Amelia was pushy about suitors, and Hermione wouldn't have put it past her to ensure that only Cormac talked to her that night.
Cormac didn't seem to mind: "So, Lady Hermione," he said as nonchalantly as if her discomfort wasn't evident to him, "if you do not mind me asking, how fare your marital prospects?"
Hermione did, in fact, mind him asking, but after the outburst in the dining room, she didn't want to be outright rude with McLaggen, feeling he didn't deserve a shred of the mental effort it took to be angry at him. "I believe you've had a bit too much to drink, Master Cormac. And besides, that's rather a question for my mother, actually."
"You speak as if you believed your mother hadn't talked to me about this already," Cormac said. All at once, what Orlando had meant to say to her became exceedingly clear, and her stomach sank in dread. Not for the first time, she felt a sting of loathing toward her mother. Cormac seemed to take her silence as an invitation, and all of a sudden he was leaning toward Hermione far too close for comfort. She felt his leg press against her own and felt the sweetly thickness of his breath tickle her cheek. "I'm interested in seeing what you have to say about it."
"I have not much to say," Hermione laughed nervously, trying to squirm away from him. "It is not exactly a pressing matter in my mind at the moment."
"And whyever not?" Cormac said. He grabbed her wrist and pinned it against the wall behind Hermione, his other hand placing itself on her waist. "Though I suppose it works all the better for me, as it puts me at freedom to convince you otherwise..."
His face now hovered just a few inches away from hers, and Hermione drew in a breath as it came even closer. The prospect of their lips brushing, as Cormac no doubt intended them to, his tipsiness having cast away all semblance of propriety, was enough to summon strength back to Hermione, and she wrestled out of his clutches in a couple of swift movements.
"Excuse me, but I have to visit the powder room urgently!" she declared shrilly, and didn't give him a chance to respond as she whisked herself away and out of the drawing room. She left Cormac swaying dully in place, probably disconcerted at the speed with which she'd disentangled herself from him, but she didn't even turn back: all she knew was that she had to get away from McLaggen, though where she could go was not exactly clear to her either.
She had gotten as far as the middle of the foyer when it came to her: the passageway. Ron had ushered her through it what seemed like an eternity ago, and back then it had done the trick to help her escape from her mother. Now, with another escape to make, it seemed like the only right answer.
She crossed the lobby in brisk steps until she had reached the secondary stairwell. Once there, she looked around quickly to make sure no servants were coming up and down the stairs; once certain, she scanned the floorboards until her eyes fixed on the gaps that outlined the trapdoor. Carefully, making sure it didn't creak too much so as to not attract attention, she lifted the trapdoor and let herself in slowly, paying attention that her gown would not snag on anything. She lowered herself down into the cool stone passageway and shut the trapdoor over her. Everything went dark.
Hermione steadied her breath and began the walk toward the other end of the passage in total darkness. Though she dearly missed Ron's oil lamp right now, she remembered the passageway had no bends, leading in a straight line between both of its ends. All she had to do was keep walking forward and hope nothing would leap at her out of the dark. She drew in deep breaths and wrinkled her nose at the musty, humid air of the stone passageway that made its way into her nostrils with every breath she took. No matter, she told herself. It's still better than the drunken stench of McLaggen's breath. And it was.
She kept walking in silence with her hands held out in front of her until, to her relief, she saw a faint square outline of light just ahead of her. That was the corresponding trapdoor, and what little light came through it and into the cavern let her know she'd reached the end of her trek.
She precariously reached upward, pushing with her fingertips so that the trapdoor began to creak open. She stepped onto the first stone step that led upward and pushed with a little more force, climbing upward and pushing until the trapdoor was fully open and she had emerged from below the ground. She recognized her surroundings and breathed a sigh of relief. The stony walls of the cottage were slightly coated in a faint light, and somewhere in another room, a clock ticked audibly.
"Hello?" she called, not entirely sure whether she should expect an answer. She finished climbing out of the trapdoor and closed it after her, keeping the hinges from making too much noise. Slowly, she walked toward a neighboring room she could only presume was the source of the light.
The sight that met her eyes provoked a gasp that was loud enough to make a shirtless Ron, obliviously facing the other way (obviously not expecting any guests to crawl into the cottage via the secret passage tonight), jump slightly and turn around in fright.
"Jesus Christ, Hermione," he exhaled forcefully, his arms crossing over his bare chest to shield himself a little bit.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," Hermione said, trying to look away to make Ron less embarrassed, "I didn't know you'd be in here!"
"Why wouldn't I be in here? This is my house!" Ron said angrily.
"This is your house?" Hermione said dully, her gaze turning back to Ron.
"Yes, it is! Blimey, Hermione, did you think I'd broken into somebody else's cottage just to use their secret passage?" Ron said in the same loud voice, teetering around to try to find his discarded shirt somewhere close by.
"I wouldn't put it past you," Hermione muttered.
As Ron tried to find something to cover up with, Hermione looked around the cottage, which she hadn't gotten a chance to do back when Ron had hurriedly shoved her into the trapdoor. The cottage was scarcely furnished, with this room in particular only holding a worktable with a stool nearby and a couch on the other end. On the worktable sat an oil lantern not unlike the one Ron had used to show her through the passage that first time. It cast shadows around the room that had been visible from the passage's end, the same shadows that danced across Ron's freckled back as he bent over in vain pursuit of a coverup. Hermione caught herself trailing his movements before she hastily looked away, her cheeks flushed hot.
Realizing there was nothing around, Ron finally gave up and turned back to Hermione, his arms hanging on either side of his body. With it in full view, Hermione couldn't help but notice the traces that outlined Ron's muscular torso, and gawked for an instant before the embarrassment returned and she once again made herself look away.
Ron noticed: "It's no use— you might as well look. There's nothing nearby I can use to 'preserve my modesty' or whatever."
"I wouldn't want to look if you don't want me to," Hermione said, though in fact she find it quite hard to resist another glance. "What were you doing without a shirt on, anyway?"
"Like I need an excuse to wear no shirt around my own house?"
"I said I was sorry–"
"I'm just messing with you," Ron said, and Hermione looked up from her own two feet to see Ron's usual impish smile peeking through his mouth. The sight made her so relieved that she felt a smile pull at her own lips as well. "To tell you the truth, I was doing some fix-up work around here —on the doorframes, the windowsills, the floorboards, that kind of thing— and I was sweating a bit too much for comfort. And a wet shirt chafing against you when you're doing physical work is not necessarily comfortable."
Against her better judgement, Hermione dared another peek at Ron. She now noticed how his body glistened with sweat. "Any reason why you chose tonight to give everything in your cottage some maintenance?"
Ron winced and looked down. "Frustration, I guess. It helps me get it out."
"Because of McLaggen?"
"How did you know?"
"Valets came up during dinner," Hermione shrugged. "I do not envy you, having to be at Mr. God's-Gift-On-Earth's every beck and call."
"It's not exactly a promenade," Ron said, "but it'll hike up my pay for the month. My mum will be thrilled."
Hermione looked away embarrassedly yet again, and an uncomfortable silence hung between them before Ron spoke again.
"And what are you doing here tonight?"
"He got to me too," Hermione smiled weakly. "He had a bit too much to drink and got overly familiar. He's been clinging to me all night, and I just... I had to get away."
"I don't blame you," Ron said, but he left what he really wanted to know unasked: But why here? Why did you come here?
It was just as well, because Hermione wouldn't have known how to answer. Why she hadn't just gone up to her room and holed up there, instead of venturing down a trapdoor and through a secret passage to get here, she wouldn't have been able to explain.
"Are you going to kick me out?" she said. "I wouldn't want to inconvenience you, especially not if you're having an awful night as well."
"Lord, no," Ron said a bit too quickly. He paced his next words: "You're welcome to stay here and hide for as long as you need to."
"Thanks," Hermione gave him a smile again, and his heart flipped over in his chest. Her smile was fleeting, however, and soon replaced by a look of alarm. "Wait, Ron, if you're McLaggen's valet, shouldn't you be up in his guestroom waiting for him? Dinner's over, and the guests will be up soon, and if you're not there and Gramsley thinks to come looking for you—"
She didn't need to finish the sentence before Ron was on his feet and scrambling back toward the front room of the cottage, where he'd left his suit jacket, button-down, and tie that he'd brought back from the livery closet. He knew what it'd mean if Gramsley knocked on his door and found Hermione there: it'd be the end of his job and the permanent incarceration of Hermione, and neither of those things sounded particularly appealing to either of them.
He slid on the clothes at record speed without even bothering to slip on the sweaty undershirt and had one foot out the front door before a minute had elapsed. "Wait here and lay low," he instructed before exiting into the night toward the House and closing the door behind him.
Hermione obeyed and took a seat at the stool near the worktable, not daring to move anywhere else in the cottage. She let her gaze sweep over practically every inch of the room and the loft she now noticed hung over it (where she presumed Ron's bed might be), the ticking clock steadily keeping pace with the seconds as she waited for Ron to return. He came quicker than she'd expected: the door clicked open and there stood a smiling Ron.
"It seems the drink worked in our favor," he said as he shut the door behind him. "He was already passed out in his bed when I got there, shoes and jacket off. All I had to do was get him out of his trousers and fold them with the rest of his clothes. No nagging or pickiness, so it went much faster than I expected."
"You were hardly gone," said Hermione with some happiness, rising from the stool and walking toward him.
"I hurried to come back here." To you, he almost said. Truth be told, he had rushed through the valet job with the thought of Hermione waiting for him back at his cottage firmly at the forefront of his mind.
Hermione smiled at him and then, with a sigh, looked through the window that looked out toward Rosebury House. "I don't know how I'm going to get back in the house without being spotted. It would be much easier if I could just stay here."
"So do." Ron felt the words spill out of his mouth before he could properly process them. "You can take the bed and sneak back in in the early morning before the scullery maids do their rounds. No one will see you."
Hermione seemed to be seriously considering it. "Yes," she said quietly. "If anyone asks, I'll just say I wasn't feeling well and retired to my room early. It's not like they sent anyone up to check, anyway, if I know my mother like I do."
"So it's resolved, then," Ron said. "Take the bed— I'll sleep on the ground."
"Are you sure? I'm intruding in your house, as you've very well asserted by now, and I wouldn't want to abuse your hospitality on top of that."
"Oh, it's no matter," Ron said. "I couldn't have a lady sleeping on the floor if she's my guest. What would my mum say?"
"Somehow, I don't think you'll be telling your mum about this."
"No, I don't suppose I will," Ron smiled. He gestured toward the loft that hung above the workroom. "C'mon, let's go upstairs. We'll find you something more comfortable to sleep in."
Hermione started up the steps that led up to the loft, bunching up her skirt to keep it from tripping her over or catching on the rungs, Ron holding up the extra length of the dress's trail behind her with one hand and holding the oil lamp in the other. Hermione finally arrived at the landing and carefully pulled her skirt after her, stepping away to allow Ron to come up after her.
"Stupid dress," she laughed as he came near her, setting the lamp down. "It was tripping me over in the passageway as well. If I knew what an inconvenience it'd turn out to be, I'd have asked Madam Malkin to make the skirt a wee bit shorter."
"I think it came out just perfect," Ron said, stepping closer to her. "In fact, I think you look rather beautiful in it."
For the second time that night, Hermione all of a sudden became aware of just how close a man's face hung from hers— but, unlike the first time, she found she rather welcomed this one. Ron's body emanated warmth and smelled faintly of sweat and sawdust, and the few inches between their faces brought his startling blue eyes and his freckled cheeks closer to view than they had ever been. Her eyes combed over his features, lingering at his slightly-agape mouth, and she wondered, for an instant, what might happen if she let herself lean forward a bit and close the gap between their lips. Ron, his gaze having drifted down to Hermione's own pair, seemed to be wondering the same.
The crack of a branch against the roof of the house startled them both out of the spell. "It's windy outside," Ron said dully, not knowing what else to say.
"Yeah," Hermione echoed him with the same flat voice.
Ron shook off the remains of the moment they'd shared. "Anyway, we'd best find you something to sleep in. Wouldn't want to wrinkle the dress after all the trouble we went through to commission it."
The memory of their muddy outing elicited a laugh from Hermione. "Oh, no. That would be simply inadmissible."
Ron went over to the chest of drawers shoved by the bed against the wall of the loft, opening the top drawer to pull out an undershirt not unlike the one he'd left discarded downstairs. "I know it's men's clothing, but I hope you won't mind."
"I don't think I have the luxury of being choosy," Hermione said, "especially not the second time I find myself reliant on Weasley kindness."
"It's a dependable thing," Ron said, smiling.
"Help me get out of this?" Hermione said, giving him her back. She slid both sleeves off her shoulders and, with a shimmy, let the loose dress fall to the floor and pool around her feet. The sight of her shoulders shifting was enough to set Ron's heart racing again, but he quickly overcame it when he saw the corset he would, again, have to help her out of.
This time, his fingers worked nimbly for his own sanity, allowing themselves none of the lingering touches that he'd indulged in back at the Burrow.
"You're getting quite good at this," Hermione remarked, feeling the corset loosen around her ribcage as Ron undid it.
"Well, you keep giving me practice," Ron quipped, but quickly blushed at the insinuation of what he'd just said.
If Hermione caught it, she was gracious enough not to remark upon it. "Tonight has been absolutely plagued with déjà vu for me."
"In a good way, I hope?" Ron said.
"Yes," Hermione looked over her shoulder and gave him a smile. "Thanks to you, in a very good way."
Ron finished with the corset and this time helped Hermione peel it off, respectfully looking away when she bared her chest and pulled the undershirt he'd handed her over it.
"All done," she announced as she bent over to collect her clothes and fold them neatly, setting them on a rickety chair by the chest of drawers.
When she turned toward him, Ron faced a similar struggle as Hermione had when he'd seen him shirtless: he tried his hardest not to let his gaze trail down to her chest, which her dresses had accentuated but which had acquired a different kind of emphasis underneath the undershirt and nothing else. His decency overcoming his desire, he fixated his gaze on her own and found her looking expectantly up at him.
"Oh— the bed, of course," Ron said, beckoning her toward the single bed at the far end of the loft. "If you'd hand me one of the pillows, please, and I'll get a blanket from the drawer..."
He moved robotically toward the drawers and extracted a couple of the blankets he kept there for the winter chills, extending one on the ground right by the bed and grabbing the pillow Hermione held out to him to place it the foot of a phantom headboard created by the wall.
"Are you sure you'll be alright down there?" Hermione said, but even as she did she was pulling the blankets of the bed over herself.
"Oh, don't worry about me," Ron reassured her, taking off his clothes and stripping down to nothing but his pants. "I'm a village boy, I've had my share of worse than the floor of a Rosebury cottage," Ron said, walking over to where he'd set down the oil lamp.
"Still, I can't help but ache for your spine already." She thought briefly about inviting her up into the bed with her, but quickly waved it off. She wouldn't embarrass him more after she'd put him through quite enough that night. Besides, with Ron wearing next to nothing and after how hard it had been simply to stop looking at him...
"I'll be alright," Ron assured her, twisting the dial on the oil lamp to extinguish the flame. The cottage was submerged in darkness.
"I didn't know the cottages had no electricity," said Hermione quietly as she heard Ron's careful footsteps make her way toward the blanket he'd laid on the ground next to the bed. "You could fall off the loft like this."
"The loft is quite spacious," Ron's voice came back from just a few inches away. "I'd have to be a git to fall off it."
"Considering you've got our car stuck in the mud once before, against your better judgement, I'd still advise you to be careful."
"That's it, get off the bed," Ron said, receiving only a muffled giggle in response.
"No," Hermione said. "I'm up here already, and it's too cozy to get out. Besides, what would your mum say if she knew you'd made a lady sleep on the floor?"
"What would my mum say indeed," mumbled Ron.
He was startled by the brush of fingers against his bare forearm: Hermione had reached down from the bed to touch him.
"Thank you," she whispered.
He took her hand in his. "It's my pleasure," he whispered back. The things I'd do for you, Hermione Granger.
Hermione didn't withdraw his hand, and Ron found that he didn't quite want to let go, either. He held her hand until he heard her breath drop into a rhythmic pace that undoubtedly signaled she was asleep, and then gave himself the small luxury of following her into sleep without letting go of her hand.