Disclaimer: Although the plot of this fic is mine, the characters and (hopefully) the personalities that you recognize belong to JK Rowling.
Hermione Granger fixed all of her attention on the book, pausing only occasionally to take a sip of the strong tea that let her read through the night. The book in her lap now was a Latin Bible, and an English one she kept underneath for translation.
"I will get this," she assured herself. This was, of course, entirely plausible. A clever young woman with access to the palace library, the only thing that kept her back was her father's insistence that education was a waste on a woman, and that she could better spend her time attracting a wealthy husband so that he would no longer need to supply for her. So she stayed up late, sometimes until the palace clock struck 3:00 each night, teaching herself what she longed to know…history, mathematics, medicines, astronomy, and languages. French and English were her most fluent, but she knew a little Spanish, and her casual suitor Viktor was teaching her German. Latin was her newest project.
Viktor, famous with a blade, had begun to teach her some means of defense as well. When his blade had proved to be unsurprisingly too heavy, he'd insisted on buying her a strong, light sword, to which she'd protested only very weakly and thanked him profusely for. It hung loosely just under her outer skirt whenever she felt threatened, which was more often than she liked. She also kept a dagger in her boots whenever she wore them, and when all else failed, she had the carefully sheathed knife-edge hairpin.
Her eyes watered from lack of sleep and she blinked impatiently. Next to her lay blank pages of paper, and she exchanged the Latin book for the English one. Opening to the middle of the book, she proceeded, one line at a time, to translate the English into clumsy Latin, until her elegant writing had covered the front and back of ten pages. Then she carefully closed the book and restored it and the other to the shelf. Returning to the desk, she rolled up her parchment and blew out her candle, preferring to return to her apartments in the dark, more easily invisible.
It was because of the darkness that she discovered the three men in the corridor undetected. She hesitated around the corner, curious but fearful.
"No, you prat, we've already been this way. Three times actually. I tell you, we're supposed to be upstairs."
"Lower your voice Ron, unless you want to be caught and get extra duty for a month. And if you do, at least have the decency not to drag me into it."
"Come on. You can argue somewhere else…when – if - we get back to our rooms." Hermione relaxed at the sound of the third voice. Neville, a new page at the palace, was a boy she had met only days ago, but she had instantly been charmed by his aptitude for making large mistakes. The other two, she decided, couldn't be bad if they could look past his accident-prone awkwardness. She stepped out from behind the corner.
The three boys stopped. Neville was first to smile, then the other two – a tall, dark haired boy with spectacles and an even taller one with red hair and a face that was quicker to smile than frown – took in her appearance and relaxed. The dark haired boy dug into his purse and found out a coin.
"A coin for your silence and the way back to the pages' wing, maid," he offered.
She stiffened, forgetting their potential of being bearable people. She had meant to dress plainly, yes, but to be taken as a maid was a great insult. She saw Neville open his mouth to correct his friend, but she beat him to it, speaking to them as she longed to speak to the old men who came looking for a young wife and took an interest in her.
"I am neither a maid nor interested in your coin," she told him coldly. "I could not care less about any punishment you might receive, and would gladly report you, for it seems you know you are breaking the rules, but for Neville's sake I will tell you that your dormitories lie upstairs to the left. If I catch any of you out of bed again I will most certainly tell. Good night."
She turned and strode away, annoyed but slightly pleased with herself.
It was with some misgivings that Harry and Ron followed the snobbish girl's directions. Only with Neville's honest insistence that she was trustworthy did they bother to try at all, and it was with mild surprise that they shortly reached the dormitory that they shared together.
"How d'you know her, anyway?" Ron asked once were all lying in their bunks in the dark. The fourth bunk was supposed to belong to the page Draco Malfoy, but he had instead decided to keep his more extravagant rooms in the palace. This, according to Ron, was just like him; Harry and Neville had chosen not to mention that Ron had only met Draco when they had. The Weasly-Malfoy hatred was legendary.
"She asked why I kept returning to the library the other day," Neville said, grateful that the darkness hid his blush. "Then she helped me find the book that I needed for the chivalry essay. She was nice."
Ron spoke with smirk in his voice: "Ooh, Neville, sounds like you're sweet on her."
Harry, working on the chivalry essay by candlelight, paused his not-so-abundant concentration to defend Neville, who was blushing again. "Ron, she looked to be at least 16, and since none of us are yet 14 -".
"It's not unheard of," Ron protested.
"Thinking of Lady Angelina again, aren't you?" Neville shot at Ron; he didn't want to weaken his own defense by telling them that Hermione was actually only newly fifteen. His strategy worked, but only slightly, as he heard the thump of Ron jumping off the bunk and then something soft but suffocating hit him. The pillow fight only ended when Harry waded in, still holding a wet quill, to break up the fight. The only sound for the rest of the night was quill scratching paper.
The Earldoms of Weasly and Malfoy were the oldest houses in the land. Ironically, the founders of the houses had been brother and sister, but it was not infrequent that siblings should fight, and in their case it was constant. Calistilla Dumbledore was the earless of the Malfoy house, and after her death her bastard son had taken her place, with King Alector Dumbledore's blessing. The Malfoy house never ran low on money, this was something that only their peasants faced, but it was reasoned by the Malfoys that there was no earldom that lacked poor peasants.
Fritz Dumbledore had been the first of the Weasly house. The Weasly house had once been richer than even the Malfoys, but soon after the houses had been established, barbarians of the north had attacked the Weaslys' lands, leaving a four-year famine and a large, still unpaid debt of soldiers and money to the Malfoy house. After that, much as they had tried, the Weaslys had had little luck improving their fortune, and their hatred of the Malfoys was only increased by jealousy.
King Albus Dumbledore had found a problematic, yet possible solution – to join the houses. It was thus that the Earl Arthur's youngest child and only daughter, Ginevra, had been promised since birth to the Malfoys' only child, Draconis. Ginevra would be her father's heir and Draco his, and thus the feud would come to an end. Or so King Albus hoped. But King Albus had not met the two children in question. And only for the first time that day were they to meet each other…
Dun dun dun…I've decided not to base the plots on JK Rowling's books, but I'm trying to weave in most of the characters. Obviously Voldemort is still evil and a prob. and stuff…I'll be introducing him soon. If you review than I will smile at you, or at least at the computer screen. Unless I get a flame… : ) (raised unibrow)