Chapter 14
The Father/Son Meeting
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters only the story line and any of the story that I borrowed I will give due credit at that time. The Uncle thing came from Slytherin Girl's 'I Wont Walk Away'. Any songs I use are not mine.
~*~*~*~*~
They followed Snape's advice and just went on with life as normal. Nobody suspected anything about Snape being Hermione' uncle or that Hermione was even adopted in the first place, and they intended to keep it that way.
Hermione and Draco finally went on their first date on December 11. Draco took her to dinner at a fancy place in Hogsmeade and they just spent the entire night talking.
Dumbledore finally approached them about getting either a portrait that connected their common rooms or just getting rid of the two common rooms all together and just giving them one with six rooms attached. The only reason this took place was that they had spent every night since the meeting in Snape's office in the Heads common room, with just the three beds, not wanting to be to far from each other.
Christmas came and went and classes had started up again. Justin, Hermione, Padma, Draco and Blaise continued to hold the top five spots in their year, as did Ginny in hers.
They found that the work was starting to get even heavier though as NEWT's drew nearer. They took the work with amazing grace though, and made sure to help each other and anyone else in their year that were having trouble with something.
Finally, it was nearing the end of January. They had decided to stick with their first idea. They were going to start the whole we hate each other thing tomorrow morning. They decided that the story they would tell would be that Draco and Blaise had been caught talking in the common room about how they were going to sucker the mudbloods (I believe that just is muggle born) and the pathetic excuses for purebloods into believing that they were truly friends. They would say that this whole friendship had been a fake. The other four had supposedly gone in there and a big fight broke out, causing the divide of the six.
The genius that they saw behind this was that they would still have the two sides of the group, so that no one would be without one of the six at any time, except for during classes for Ginny of course. Also they still would remain friends but it would just be under the table. Like in the common room kind of thing. Snape also knew about all this and had gone back to "favoring" the Slytherins, being mean and evil to the Gryffindors and in the middle to the other two houses.
Finally, Blaise and Draco got the signal from Snape that their fathers had arrived. Justin, Ginny, Hermione and Padma wished them good luck and said that they would see them tonight.
Draco noticed when he caught Hermione's eye as they were leaving that the wall was there again. It was like she was afraid that if she let it down again when something like this happened that someone would see a weakness in her.
He wanted to stay and ask her if she was going to be okay and to comfort her. But he knew what his father was like when you were late. He had been taught that "lesson" many times and seeing how his father was already upset with him to some degree, Draco decided that he better not do anything to make it worse.
He and Blaise made their way to the Slytherin common room. When there they said the password, Serpents Lair, and entered, going through a door on the left hand side of the common room that had been made for meetings. The room was about half the size of their common room and there were three men standing in the middle, waiting for them.
Lucious saw his son and an evil grin formed on his face. Just from this Draco knew that there was absolutely no way that he would be getting out of here unharmed. Nikolas had the similar reaction of Lucious when he saw Blaise. A smirk formed across his features and he cracked his knuckles. Blaise knew right then and there that he was in for a major fight tonight and would be lucky if he came out of it conscious. Snape had his old expressionless face back and when the boys looked to him for help he just shook his head slightly, indicating there was nothing that he could do.
'Thank you Severus, I believe that is all that you were required for tonight" Nikolas said waving the teacher out of the room.
Snape, though reluctantly, left the boys with their fathers. He would be back as soon as he was sure that the fathers were long gone and he would help them back to their common room.
As soon as the door closed, a silencing charm was placed on the room. Lucious and Nikolas turned to their sons again.
"Well, how are you two doing this evening?" Lucious asked, the evil grin widening.
"Cut the crap, father" Draco sneered.
"I have no idea what you mean. I only came here to check up on my only son"
"You honestly think I would fall for that? I was raised with you remember. I know what's coming to me tonight, so can we just get it over with and fast, I have a test in Ancient Ruin's tomorrow" Draco said, in a tone that sounded like he was totally and completely bored.
Normally, you would think that he would have been even slightly embarrassed to have one of his best friends standing there next to him when he was about to be beaten to a bloody pulp, but he and Blaise had one through this together several times before.
"What I would like to know is what the hell did we do this time?" Blaise put in, glaring at his father.
"I believe that it's my turn to explain, is it not Lucious?"
"I do believe that it is, Nikolas"
"Thank you, now these are the reasons that have forced us to come here tonight: You befriended muggles and purebloods that we do not approve of You befriended and are dating two Gryffindors, both of who are strongly against the Dark Lord and are very close to Harry Potter.
Excuse me, but for starters, we just had a major fight with them and it isn't very likely that we'll be getting along again soon and they are NOT close to Harry Potter. Obviously, your source isn't overly reliable this year or you would've already known both these things" Blaise interrupted, even though he knew that it would just bring him further trouble.
"Just so you know, we know that that fight was just set up to make us less suspicious. We also know that you still all wear those chains that you gave the mudblood for her birthday, Draco. We also know that they will probably all run back to Potter once they find out that at the end of this year you will receive the Dark Mark and anyone who gets in the way of that will meet an untimely death" Lucious informed Draco and Blaise.
"Wait.since when are we getting the Dark Mark at the end of this year. I have no recollection whatsoever of agreeing to that. In fact I remember distinctly telling you that there was no way in the seven hells that I would ever join you or the Dark Lord" Draco retorted.
"And I remember very distinctly telling you that you could burn in hell along with your lovely master before I ever got the Mark" Blaise told his father with fire in his eyes.
They were both met with a slap across the face. Lucious and Nikolas both saw that this obviously was not enough as the boys were still standing, defiant looks on their faces. They punched them in the stomach, landing enough force to send them to the ground.
"And I do believe that this will change your minds" Nikolas started, landing a kick to Blaise's ribs between each word. "If you don't accept it, you'll find at the end of the year that your little girlfriends show up dead"
The fathers continued beating their sons, never getting a single whimper or yelp of pain. It lasted about an hour and a half, and finally they were satisfied with their work. They left their sons on the floor, both just holding on to consciousness.
Snape came in about five minutes later and levitated the boys out of the room and into the common room. Luckily there was no one in there that hadn't seen this or hadn't gone through to know not to ask any questions. He took them through the portrait leading to Draco's room and took them down to the common room where the others were waiting.
Normally, Snape would've healed them best he could then just let the rest heal naturally or let them heal themselves the rest of the way. However, now that Hermione was around, he knew that he could just take them to her. Healing was one of her many gifts and she could already do spells that not even some full-grown Medi-Witches could do yet.
Although Hermione was extremely shocked to see the state that her friends were in she set right to work, knowing that the next little while would be crucial. First she repaired where Blaise's head had split open and both of the boys had broken noses. She healed the concussions and Draco's broken jaw.
Next, she checked the middle. She found the Blaise had four broken ribs and had broken his right arm in two places and his left in one. Draco had five broken ribs, a punctured lung and his right arm was broken in 3 places. Each had broken their left ankle and they were covered from head to toe with black-and-blue bruises as well as small scratches.
She performed a final spell to make sure she had gotten all injuries and that there hadn't been any hiding. She breathed a small sigh of relief when she found none and then turned to her Uncle and sent him off to get some Dreamless sleep potion so that the boys could each have a restful night.
~*~*~*~*~
When Draco woke the next morning he found that he was in his bed dressed in his pajamas. When he went to move he found that he was extremely stiff and sore. Although he found that his ribs didn't hurt as much as he remembered them hurting last night, they still hurt like hell.
He decided to get up, though, no matter how much his body protested to it. He had gotten up to way worse than this before. When he looked in the mirror, he found that he was totally bruise and scratch-less.
He was very thankful that Dumbledore had insisted on letting he and Hermione have their own bathroom to share, and the prefects got to keep a bathroom to share.
He turned the hot water on full blast and shed his boxers and climbed into the shower. He let the water cascade down his back and felt his muscles start to relax. He started to remember things that Nikolas and Lucious had said to them yesterday.
The most disturbing of all was the fact that they could lose Hermione and Ginny if the refused the Dark Mark. He didn't know what in the hell he was going to do but he knew that there was no way that he would tell Hermione. He and Blaise had come to an agreement that they wouldn't tell the others what had happened to them when they were with their fathers. They would just say that they didn't want to talk about it and truthfully; Draco really didn't want to talk about it.
He washed his hair turned the water off. He reached out of the shower for a towel. He wrapped the towel around his waist and walked back to his room. When he looked at his clock he saw that it was only 6:30am and that he had a while before breakfast.
He grabbed a book from his nightstand and headed down the stairs. He was surprised to see that everyone else was already up and talking downstairs. No one even noticed him coming down the stairs.
"Hey, aren't you missing someone?" he asked, a stupid grin on his face. "I do believe that there are six in this friendship and I can only see five on the couch, so what.did you kick me out or something? I mean if you didn't like me anymore all you had to do was say." But he was cut off by Hermione's lips.
"Well, I guessed you missed me" Draco grinned. "May I ask how long you've all been up?" he questioned, as he and Hermione walked over to one of the couches and sat down, Hermione refusing to let go of him.
"Well, Padma, Mia, Ginny and I have been up since about five and Blaise came down like 3 minutes before you did" Justin told him.
"How are you feeling today, man?" Blaise inquired.
"Woken up worse, what about you?"
"Same, what exactly did you guys do to us last night? I mean the only thing I woke with this morning was sore muscles and my ribs were slightly sore, and I know for a fact that I had several broken bones. I also know that Snape couldn't heal all that because he's tried before but it's never worked"
"Well, WE didn't do anything and I can assure Snape didn't do anything but Mia on the other hand, well.lets just say that its thanks to her that your able to walk at all today" Ginny filled them in.
"Since when does Mia heal, exactly? Last time I checked she didn't know a whole lot about it" Draco raised an eyebrow.
Hermione blushed. "Not only can she heal, but she knows spells that not even full-grown, fully trained Medi-Witches know. I mean she had you guys fully healed in like 45 minutes, where as if you had been healed by Snape or Pomfrey it probably would've taken all night" Padma said, causing Hermione's blush to deepen.
"Come on guys, that's not true and you know it. I'm not that good and I'm positive that at least Pomfrey knows the spells I do," she told them modestly. They weren't used to this side of Hermione that was for sure. They were used to the one that said she was better, if she was and basically spoke the all out truth no matter what that may be.
"Then why did it take you exactly 2 minutes to heal all three breaks in Draco's arm in like 3 minutes, while it takes Pomfrey like ten. Also, I know for a fact that she uses a completely different spell as I have broken my arm like that more than once" Justin informed them.
"Anyway, now that we all know that I can heal and seeing as it's like 6:45 AM and I don't feeling like arguing that point, how did last night go for you guys? Well obviously we know how it went but as far as talking went what did they have to say? What was the whole point of them coming?"
"Ummmm.." Blaise looked at Draco for help, not knowing how much he should tell them
"Well, it was basically what we thought. We got lectured for befriending muggle-borns and, as they put, poor excuses for purebloods, then we got in trouble for daring to date Gryffindors and than we got defiant, told that they could go to heel, and then they punched us in the gut and.well, you saw the result of the next about two hours," Draco finished off, while pulling Hermione closer to him. He had never been more grateful for anything his father had taught him. He had been taught from a young age that you had to hide all emotions and how to lie without changing a single facial expression.
The girls seemed to bite and when he looked at Blaise, he saw the same resolve in his features. He had been raised the same as Draco and been taught the same lessons the same way. However, when he looked at Justin, he saw that his friends seemed to not take the bait. It looked like he knew that there was more to the story but decided to just leave it alone.for now anyway.
They steered away from that topic, deciding that it would be better to leave it in the past for now and let the two boys just have a relaxing morning. They all left for breakfast together, deciding that they didn't want to hide the friendship that they shared.
Each of the guys had their arms around the waist of their girl, as if protecting them. Justin wasn't positive why he felt Padma needed protecting, but he knew that it had something to do with Blaise and Draco's meeting with their fathers last night.
They walked into the Great hall together and went to the Hufflepuff Table as they had finally come up with a system on how to decide where to sit everyday. They sat at one on Sunday, than worked their way down the tables than went back to the first after they were done and so on. Thus, there was no more morning fight over where to sit and it all worked out even in the end.
Little did they know that they were under the very watchful eye of someone. The eye that could determine each of their futures.
~*~*~*~*~
Was this better that Chapter 13?? Please let me know
Thanks to: Beyond-Artemis, wackofromva and ElenSileLumenn for the great reviews.
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters only the story line and any of the story that I borrowed I will give due credit at that time. The Uncle thing came from Slytherin Girl's 'I Wont Walk Away'. Any songs I use are not mine.
~*~*~*~*~
They followed Snape's advice and just went on with life as normal. Nobody suspected anything about Snape being Hermione' uncle or that Hermione was even adopted in the first place, and they intended to keep it that way.
Hermione and Draco finally went on their first date on December 11. Draco took her to dinner at a fancy place in Hogsmeade and they just spent the entire night talking.
Dumbledore finally approached them about getting either a portrait that connected their common rooms or just getting rid of the two common rooms all together and just giving them one with six rooms attached. The only reason this took place was that they had spent every night since the meeting in Snape's office in the Heads common room, with just the three beds, not wanting to be to far from each other.
Christmas came and went and classes had started up again. Justin, Hermione, Padma, Draco and Blaise continued to hold the top five spots in their year, as did Ginny in hers.
They found that the work was starting to get even heavier though as NEWT's drew nearer. They took the work with amazing grace though, and made sure to help each other and anyone else in their year that were having trouble with something.
Finally, it was nearing the end of January. They had decided to stick with their first idea. They were going to start the whole we hate each other thing tomorrow morning. They decided that the story they would tell would be that Draco and Blaise had been caught talking in the common room about how they were going to sucker the mudbloods (I believe that just is muggle born) and the pathetic excuses for purebloods into believing that they were truly friends. They would say that this whole friendship had been a fake. The other four had supposedly gone in there and a big fight broke out, causing the divide of the six.
The genius that they saw behind this was that they would still have the two sides of the group, so that no one would be without one of the six at any time, except for during classes for Ginny of course. Also they still would remain friends but it would just be under the table. Like in the common room kind of thing. Snape also knew about all this and had gone back to "favoring" the Slytherins, being mean and evil to the Gryffindors and in the middle to the other two houses.
Finally, Blaise and Draco got the signal from Snape that their fathers had arrived. Justin, Ginny, Hermione and Padma wished them good luck and said that they would see them tonight.
Draco noticed when he caught Hermione's eye as they were leaving that the wall was there again. It was like she was afraid that if she let it down again when something like this happened that someone would see a weakness in her.
He wanted to stay and ask her if she was going to be okay and to comfort her. But he knew what his father was like when you were late. He had been taught that "lesson" many times and seeing how his father was already upset with him to some degree, Draco decided that he better not do anything to make it worse.
He and Blaise made their way to the Slytherin common room. When there they said the password, Serpents Lair, and entered, going through a door on the left hand side of the common room that had been made for meetings. The room was about half the size of their common room and there were three men standing in the middle, waiting for them.
Lucious saw his son and an evil grin formed on his face. Just from this Draco knew that there was absolutely no way that he would be getting out of here unharmed. Nikolas had the similar reaction of Lucious when he saw Blaise. A smirk formed across his features and he cracked his knuckles. Blaise knew right then and there that he was in for a major fight tonight and would be lucky if he came out of it conscious. Snape had his old expressionless face back and when the boys looked to him for help he just shook his head slightly, indicating there was nothing that he could do.
'Thank you Severus, I believe that is all that you were required for tonight" Nikolas said waving the teacher out of the room.
Snape, though reluctantly, left the boys with their fathers. He would be back as soon as he was sure that the fathers were long gone and he would help them back to their common room.
As soon as the door closed, a silencing charm was placed on the room. Lucious and Nikolas turned to their sons again.
"Well, how are you two doing this evening?" Lucious asked, the evil grin widening.
"Cut the crap, father" Draco sneered.
"I have no idea what you mean. I only came here to check up on my only son"
"You honestly think I would fall for that? I was raised with you remember. I know what's coming to me tonight, so can we just get it over with and fast, I have a test in Ancient Ruin's tomorrow" Draco said, in a tone that sounded like he was totally and completely bored.
Normally, you would think that he would have been even slightly embarrassed to have one of his best friends standing there next to him when he was about to be beaten to a bloody pulp, but he and Blaise had one through this together several times before.
"What I would like to know is what the hell did we do this time?" Blaise put in, glaring at his father.
"I believe that it's my turn to explain, is it not Lucious?"
"I do believe that it is, Nikolas"
"Thank you, now these are the reasons that have forced us to come here tonight: You befriended muggles and purebloods that we do not approve of You befriended and are dating two Gryffindors, both of who are strongly against the Dark Lord and are very close to Harry Potter.
Excuse me, but for starters, we just had a major fight with them and it isn't very likely that we'll be getting along again soon and they are NOT close to Harry Potter. Obviously, your source isn't overly reliable this year or you would've already known both these things" Blaise interrupted, even though he knew that it would just bring him further trouble.
"Just so you know, we know that that fight was just set up to make us less suspicious. We also know that you still all wear those chains that you gave the mudblood for her birthday, Draco. We also know that they will probably all run back to Potter once they find out that at the end of this year you will receive the Dark Mark and anyone who gets in the way of that will meet an untimely death" Lucious informed Draco and Blaise.
"Wait.since when are we getting the Dark Mark at the end of this year. I have no recollection whatsoever of agreeing to that. In fact I remember distinctly telling you that there was no way in the seven hells that I would ever join you or the Dark Lord" Draco retorted.
"And I remember very distinctly telling you that you could burn in hell along with your lovely master before I ever got the Mark" Blaise told his father with fire in his eyes.
They were both met with a slap across the face. Lucious and Nikolas both saw that this obviously was not enough as the boys were still standing, defiant looks on their faces. They punched them in the stomach, landing enough force to send them to the ground.
"And I do believe that this will change your minds" Nikolas started, landing a kick to Blaise's ribs between each word. "If you don't accept it, you'll find at the end of the year that your little girlfriends show up dead"
The fathers continued beating their sons, never getting a single whimper or yelp of pain. It lasted about an hour and a half, and finally they were satisfied with their work. They left their sons on the floor, both just holding on to consciousness.
Snape came in about five minutes later and levitated the boys out of the room and into the common room. Luckily there was no one in there that hadn't seen this or hadn't gone through to know not to ask any questions. He took them through the portrait leading to Draco's room and took them down to the common room where the others were waiting.
Normally, Snape would've healed them best he could then just let the rest heal naturally or let them heal themselves the rest of the way. However, now that Hermione was around, he knew that he could just take them to her. Healing was one of her many gifts and she could already do spells that not even some full-grown Medi-Witches could do yet.
Although Hermione was extremely shocked to see the state that her friends were in she set right to work, knowing that the next little while would be crucial. First she repaired where Blaise's head had split open and both of the boys had broken noses. She healed the concussions and Draco's broken jaw.
Next, she checked the middle. She found the Blaise had four broken ribs and had broken his right arm in two places and his left in one. Draco had five broken ribs, a punctured lung and his right arm was broken in 3 places. Each had broken their left ankle and they were covered from head to toe with black-and-blue bruises as well as small scratches.
She performed a final spell to make sure she had gotten all injuries and that there hadn't been any hiding. She breathed a small sigh of relief when she found none and then turned to her Uncle and sent him off to get some Dreamless sleep potion so that the boys could each have a restful night.
~*~*~*~*~
When Draco woke the next morning he found that he was in his bed dressed in his pajamas. When he went to move he found that he was extremely stiff and sore. Although he found that his ribs didn't hurt as much as he remembered them hurting last night, they still hurt like hell.
He decided to get up, though, no matter how much his body protested to it. He had gotten up to way worse than this before. When he looked in the mirror, he found that he was totally bruise and scratch-less.
He was very thankful that Dumbledore had insisted on letting he and Hermione have their own bathroom to share, and the prefects got to keep a bathroom to share.
He turned the hot water on full blast and shed his boxers and climbed into the shower. He let the water cascade down his back and felt his muscles start to relax. He started to remember things that Nikolas and Lucious had said to them yesterday.
The most disturbing of all was the fact that they could lose Hermione and Ginny if the refused the Dark Mark. He didn't know what in the hell he was going to do but he knew that there was no way that he would tell Hermione. He and Blaise had come to an agreement that they wouldn't tell the others what had happened to them when they were with their fathers. They would just say that they didn't want to talk about it and truthfully; Draco really didn't want to talk about it.
He washed his hair turned the water off. He reached out of the shower for a towel. He wrapped the towel around his waist and walked back to his room. When he looked at his clock he saw that it was only 6:30am and that he had a while before breakfast.
He grabbed a book from his nightstand and headed down the stairs. He was surprised to see that everyone else was already up and talking downstairs. No one even noticed him coming down the stairs.
"Hey, aren't you missing someone?" he asked, a stupid grin on his face. "I do believe that there are six in this friendship and I can only see five on the couch, so what.did you kick me out or something? I mean if you didn't like me anymore all you had to do was say." But he was cut off by Hermione's lips.
"Well, I guessed you missed me" Draco grinned. "May I ask how long you've all been up?" he questioned, as he and Hermione walked over to one of the couches and sat down, Hermione refusing to let go of him.
"Well, Padma, Mia, Ginny and I have been up since about five and Blaise came down like 3 minutes before you did" Justin told him.
"How are you feeling today, man?" Blaise inquired.
"Woken up worse, what about you?"
"Same, what exactly did you guys do to us last night? I mean the only thing I woke with this morning was sore muscles and my ribs were slightly sore, and I know for a fact that I had several broken bones. I also know that Snape couldn't heal all that because he's tried before but it's never worked"
"Well, WE didn't do anything and I can assure Snape didn't do anything but Mia on the other hand, well.lets just say that its thanks to her that your able to walk at all today" Ginny filled them in.
"Since when does Mia heal, exactly? Last time I checked she didn't know a whole lot about it" Draco raised an eyebrow.
Hermione blushed. "Not only can she heal, but she knows spells that not even full-grown, fully trained Medi-Witches know. I mean she had you guys fully healed in like 45 minutes, where as if you had been healed by Snape or Pomfrey it probably would've taken all night" Padma said, causing Hermione's blush to deepen.
"Come on guys, that's not true and you know it. I'm not that good and I'm positive that at least Pomfrey knows the spells I do," she told them modestly. They weren't used to this side of Hermione that was for sure. They were used to the one that said she was better, if she was and basically spoke the all out truth no matter what that may be.
"Then why did it take you exactly 2 minutes to heal all three breaks in Draco's arm in like 3 minutes, while it takes Pomfrey like ten. Also, I know for a fact that she uses a completely different spell as I have broken my arm like that more than once" Justin informed them.
"Anyway, now that we all know that I can heal and seeing as it's like 6:45 AM and I don't feeling like arguing that point, how did last night go for you guys? Well obviously we know how it went but as far as talking went what did they have to say? What was the whole point of them coming?"
"Ummmm.." Blaise looked at Draco for help, not knowing how much he should tell them
"Well, it was basically what we thought. We got lectured for befriending muggle-borns and, as they put, poor excuses for purebloods, then we got in trouble for daring to date Gryffindors and than we got defiant, told that they could go to heel, and then they punched us in the gut and.well, you saw the result of the next about two hours," Draco finished off, while pulling Hermione closer to him. He had never been more grateful for anything his father had taught him. He had been taught from a young age that you had to hide all emotions and how to lie without changing a single facial expression.
The girls seemed to bite and when he looked at Blaise, he saw the same resolve in his features. He had been raised the same as Draco and been taught the same lessons the same way. However, when he looked at Justin, he saw that his friends seemed to not take the bait. It looked like he knew that there was more to the story but decided to just leave it alone.for now anyway.
They steered away from that topic, deciding that it would be better to leave it in the past for now and let the two boys just have a relaxing morning. They all left for breakfast together, deciding that they didn't want to hide the friendship that they shared.
Each of the guys had their arms around the waist of their girl, as if protecting them. Justin wasn't positive why he felt Padma needed protecting, but he knew that it had something to do with Blaise and Draco's meeting with their fathers last night.
They walked into the Great hall together and went to the Hufflepuff Table as they had finally come up with a system on how to decide where to sit everyday. They sat at one on Sunday, than worked their way down the tables than went back to the first after they were done and so on. Thus, there was no more morning fight over where to sit and it all worked out even in the end.
Little did they know that they were under the very watchful eye of someone. The eye that could determine each of their futures.
~*~*~*~*~
Was this better that Chapter 13?? Please let me know
Thanks to: Beyond-Artemis, wackofromva and ElenSileLumenn for the great reviews.