A/N:
**Many points to Cassie Claire, who started me writing this story in the first place. Love her stuff!!! Thank you, Cassie, for getting DV 11 to us so quickly! You just made my month!
**Points to D for proofreading and pointing out my subtle plot-flaws and showing me the inconsistencies that I'd overlooked. Read her stories: she writes as DracoDew17.
**THANKS TO: Hermione18, maxziod, DracoDew17 (always and several times), Sila-Chan, f0xyness39, Ashby, and heavengurl899. ::squeals:: I LOVE reviews
A special loving hug goes to: maxziod, f0xyness39, and OF COURSE, DracoDew17, for their multiple reviews
**To all readers: enjoy!! This is the chapter of reaffirmation and the calm before the storm. We also get into Draco's head (hehehehe) Many points to all who review with constructive criticism… (hint hint wink wink nudge nudge)
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Anna Begins: Part 1
****************
Wrap her up in a package of lies…
Because if you don't want to talk about it
Then it isn't love
And I guess I'm going to live with that
But I'm sure there's
Something in a shade of grey,
Or something in between
And I can always change my name,
If that's what you mean…
-Counting Crows
**************
The letter fluttered from her hand.
"Hermione!"
And Draco caught her as she fell.
************
Hermione woke up ten minutes later to a very worried crowd (Ginny, Harry, and Draco) hovering over her.
"Hermione?" Harry waved a hand in front of her face. "Can you hear me, Hermione?" He was practically shouting.
"She fainted, you prat," said a cold voice scathingly, "It's not like she lost her hearing along with her consciousness."
Hermione smiled. Only Draco. She struggled to sit up; Draco grabbed her elbow and forced her to stand.
"Helps the blood to circulate," he said, inventing on the spot. He really was quite worried her; Hermione wasn't a girl that often fainted.
The letter remained on the floor. Ginny picked it up while the boys fussed over Hermione. She folded it without reading it and waited.
Finally the two boys, declaring her fine but in need of a bit more dinner, pushed her onto the couch. Harry turned his attention back to his red-haired girlfriend (although he wasn't quite used to thinking of her as such.) That was when he saw the parchment in her hand and fell silent.
Draco perched neatly next to Hermione, who, having remembered why she fainted, was looking pale again. She slouched back into the cushions. Draco leaned a bit farther back as well, much as he hated his skin to touch anything Gryffindor.
Ginny, elbowed by Harry, took a step forward and handed Hermione the parchment in her hand.
Hermione refused to take it. Draco silently accepted the letter and looked the question at Hermione. She nodded.
Draco unfolded the parchment and began to read.
"Dear Ms. Granger,
I know that this will seem a very odd thing to read," Draco paused, reading ahead silently, and then raised his eyebrows. He resumed his diction. "But I'm afraid you have to be told. My name is Pierce Oculin, and I am the Head of the Department of Unsolved and Utterly Hopeless Cases. We took on a kidnapping case about seventeen years ago that involved the four-month daughter of one of the wizarding world's most prominent families: the Spencers. Their child was mysteriously and seemingly untraceably taken from them. We were anonymously tipped off that you may have a connection with this case, and after considerable backtracking, it is highly possible that you, Ms. Granger, are the child abducted from the Spencers seventeen years ago. I apologize to you for having to deliver this information in such a manner. Ms. Granger, I know that this comes as a great shock to you, but we here at the Ministry need your help to determine if you are, indeed, the Spencers' daughter. If you can be present at our Official Inquest, January 3rd, we shall be able to sort this out properly. I have written to Mr. and Mrs. Granger and your Headmaster concerning this. Thank you for your assistance, Ms. Granger, and again, I apologize.
Sincerely, Pierce Oculin, Head of the Department of Unsolved and Utterly Hopeless Cases."
The room was dead silent. Even the snow beating gently at the window seemed, to Hermione, to be lost in the pounding of her heart. How can this be? I'm adopted? I'm—I'm a pureblood? I'm NOT Hermione Anne Granger?
Draco saw the tears begin to form in Hermione's amber-coloured eyes and he leaned across the hated couch to take her into his arms. Harry didn't even flinch. Ginny sank slowly to the floor, sitting with her legs crossed. She rubbed her forehead in a tired fashion.
"What does this mean, Hermione?" she asked.
Hermione lifted her head off of Draco's very muscular shoulder. "I really don't know, Gin."
************
Christmas came and went that year, much more quickly than any of them expected. Draco, having spent countless hours consoling Hermione, now felt that it was his responsibility to look after her, a sentiment that sent Ron into spasms of rage every time he thought about it.
Harry, for the most part, recognized that Draco wanted to help Hermione, that he needed to help her. And Harry was right. Draco had never helped another living thing in life. He had never felt this protective concern for anything ever, not even his mother. Although that wasn't a surprise to anyone who knew the snivelling, simpering wretch.
Draco Lucius Malfoy was changing. He knew he was changing the day he arrived in America. When he fought their prejudices and overcome them, winning the American wizards approval, he knew it. When he realised that his opinions were actually in his father's words, he knew he was changing. When the Americans forced him to have his own thoughts, he knew it. When he looked at Muggles and did not feel repulsed by them, he knew it. When he came to realise that he hated never really made his own decisions while he had been at home, he knew he was changing. When he saw how much freedom he lost by coming back to Britain, he knew it. And when he saw the Hermione that day in shop, he knew that he would never be the same.
For instead of being annoyed by her, he was charmed. He wanted to be around her. He wanted her to want to be around him. That was what drove him to approach her in the Great Hall that night, what made him accept her dinner invitation, and what drove him to even set foot in the Gryffindor Tower. After seeing the sheer need for comfort on her face the night she received the letter, Draco knew that not only was he forever changed, he was happy about it. Happy about it. What Malfoy was ever happy? Draco genuinely wanted to help her, be with her. And Harry saw this.
Harry James, The Boy Who Lived, knew the need to help and in turn be helped for it, because he had felt that every day of his life for the Weasleys. He so desperately wanted to help them. But he had always restrained himself for the sake of their pride, which, as he knew quite well, was important to them. The knowledge that he and Draco were in a relatively similar predicament made Harry be able to relate much more to him.
Harry also saw something in Draco that not even Draco had acknowledged. Hermione saw it too, and saved the thought for her mental review of the day, but said nothing. Harry, unfortunately, was none so prudent.
"You love her." His tone was unaccusatory, but the words themselves told Draco that Harry spoke with a finality that came from absolute knowledge. And though Draco had not addressed this growing problem, he saw that Harry had, and wanted to deal with it now.
Lavendar and Parvati, who had been snuggled on the couch that Draco so despised, quietly slipped off, leaving the boys the entire Common Room to hash it out.
Draco stood. He had been waiting for Hermione to come down for lunch. Harry had walked in to find the Slytherin lounging lazily in his favourite armchair and though he'd been very good about tolerating Draco in the Common Room, the sight that met his eyes was enough to incite Harry to settle this matter right now.
Draco did not respond to Harry's statement.
Harry nodded, knowingly. "I knew it. You do love her. You love my Hermione."
That made Draco sit up, suddenly. It still surprised Harry how gracefully Draco moved. In a flash, the blond boy was on his feet, glaring at Harry.
"Your Hermione?" Draco spat. "A bit selfish, aren't you, Potter? No one else can even look at any of your friends, Hermione, that little Weasley girl, even, and not that I'd want to, Weasley's brother, what's-his-name."
"Ron," growled Harry.
"Whatever," Draco said flippantly. "What I'm saying, Potter, is that you have no right to call her 'yours' and furthermore, you've no right to tell me how I feel about her."
Harry took a few deep, calming breaths. He promised Hermione that he would not fight with Draco, and he intended to keep that promise. "She's my best friend, Malfoy," he said, "And I love her as such. I don't want to see her hurt. That's all I meant."
Draco looked distrustfully at the raven-haired boy.
"And as to your feelings or intentions towards Hermione, Malfoy," Harry paused, unsure. "I—I want you to know that I believed you when you said that you would never hurt her—."
Draco interrupted. "I won't." He looked irritated.
"I know," Harry snapped. "I believed you then, when it only pertained to friendship. And--."
Draco interrupted again. "I won't hurt her under any circumstances, Potter, why can't you understand that?"
"Why can't you let me finish my sentence, you insufferable prick?" Harry glowered at Draco.
Draco sneered back at him, the look that Harry, Hermione, and Ron had dubbed the "Signature Malfoy Look." Hermione, before their friendship, had told Draco more than once that his face would freeze that way if he wasn't careful.
"What I have been trying to say," Harry said, trying very hard to breathe deeply, "Is that regardless of your relationship with Hermione, I believe that you will take care of her, that you will never hurt her." He slowly extended his hand.
Draco looked perfectly shocked. After a few moments, he shook Harry's outstretched hand. "Thanks, Potter. It means a lot to Hermione." The unspoken agreement between the two was sealed. They would try to be friends, for their mutual care for Hermione was great enough to overcome the enmity between them. Forever.
Hermione came down the stairs to find Harry and Draco talking Quidditch in the middle of the Common Room. And she smiled for the first time in days.
************
New Year's Eve arrived and saw the Gryffindor Three with their respective dates of choice at Hogsmeade's Three Broomsticks. Harry and Ginny sat by themselves, sipping Butterbeer and giggling madly. Ron and his girlfriend of the week, Hannah, a Hufflepuff (most of Ron's girlfriends were Hufflepuffs; Draco remarked once that that was because the Hufflepuff girls were too stupid to realise just who they were dating, which earned him a few swinging fists,) were snogging in the corner, their bottles of Butterbeer long forgotten. Hermione and Draco finished their drinks, and now warm, went for a walk.
It was snowing lightly. There was an inch already down, and it crunched merrily under their boots. Draco, feeling, for the first time in life, truly content, reached over and took Hermione's hand. She smiled, but said nothing.
They walked down the street, hand in hand. There was a small, scenic walkway close to the end of Hogsmeade Drive, and Hermione and Draco turned onto it. Had it been daytime, the lane would have been shaded, for the trees hung over the two as they walked. Snow covered the treetops, Hermione noticed as she looked up. They came across a bench and Draco gallantly brushed the snow off of it so Hermione could sit down. She was touched. Draco was pampering her unlike anyone ever had before. No one, especially not Harry and Ron, had ever treated her as if she was this precious thing, something to cherish and treasure.
She sat on the bench and Draco slid in beside her. She sighed.
"What?" he whispered.
"I was just thinking…" she said, leaning into him.
He put his arm around her, resting it on the back of the bench.
"I was just thinking… about my family…," she said, hesitantly. She wasn't in the habit of pouring out her heart to people, but there was something about Draco that made her want to tell him everything.
"Which family?" he asked, quietly. "The Muggle parents you grew up with, or your real, pureblood parents?"
"Both," she admitted. "I've been thinking about Mum and Dad, the Grangers… about how they're feeling… I haven't talked to them since I got that letter. I don't know if they're even coming to the Inquest… that's only three days away, you know."
"Aren't you even the least bit upset with them about all of this, Hermione?" he said, looking at her strangely. "They never told you that you were adopted, after all."
"I don't blame them for what happened to me, if that's what you mean, Draco. But I am quite angry with them for not telling me that I was adopted. And for resenting my wizarding heritage. And for trying to make me, as they put it, 'Stop being a witch.'"
"Idiot Muggles," muttered Draco.
"They tried to make me hate the fact that I'm a witch. I don't think they realised that it was only pushing me more towards all things wizard, but they made me resent them. And they made me ashamed of them, for the way that they behave. I'd like to think that I can rely on them for support in this, but knowing them, and the fact that they hate the wizarding world, I know that it would be like hitting a brick wall. It would be nice to have parents who would be there for me at the Inquest, when I have to meet my birth parents, but I—I just think that I've always wanted caring and understanding parents. And I don't have them."
"You may, Hermione. For all you know, the Spencers might be exactly the parents you've always dreamed of. Although I doubt it," said Draco frankly.
"Why?" she said, looking at him suddenly. "Do you know them?"
"My parents are friends with them," he said slowly, "But not close friends. Mr. Spencer is very important in wizarding social circles… your family is the only one older than the Malfoys. Your grandfather was Minister of Magic before Fudge, and a damn good one at that, I hear. Your father wasn't old enough at the time of his father's death to take on the role of Minister of Magic, and Dumbledore declined it, so Fudge got the job. You father is set to be Minister after Fudge dies, which, with any luck, will be soon. Your parents weren't ever closer with mine than was socially necessary because your mum was the best of friends with Lily Evans, who my father despised."
Draco paused. "Do you know who Lily Evans was?"
Hermione shook her head.
"Potter's mother. Your mum and his were inseparable, I hear. That's because they grew up together; your mum's Muggle-born. My father has never much liked her either, because of that. But your father's family, like I said, is the very oldest of wizarding families, and so it wouldn't be prudent of my father to appear… less than fond of either of your parents. Your father is the only son in the family, you know, he has five sisters. In fact, your family lost your father's youngest sister to the Muggles a decade or two ago, her name was Diana. She was a Muggle princess."
He paused for breath. "Did you want to know more?" he asked. He only knew what was common knowledge, but he would tell her everything he'd ever heard about the Spencers if she so desired.
"Oh, yes, Draco, please!" she cried. Hermione hadn't thought she wanted to know, but now that he'd given her a taste of her family, she couldn't get enough.
He leaned over, and quite suddenly kissed her. It was a swift kiss, with his lips barely brushing hers, but she felt it.
"Then let's go back to Hogwarts," he said. "It's cold out here."
************
Hermione, for the first time in her life, flopped on a couch in the Slytherin Common Room. Draco, remembering that he was the only Slytherin who'd stayed for the holidays, had invited Hermione to celebrate the New Year with him there. Since Ginny and Harry were relishing in the last few days they had alone before Quidditch season and term started up and Ron and his Hannah were 'otherwise occupied', as Ginny put it, Hermione saw no reason to stay in Gryffindor Tower that night.
She settled (or tried to) into the Slytherin couch, which was black velvet and quite rigid. Draco lounged gracefully in an armchair by the fire. He'd poured them both Butterbeers that he'd smuggled out of Hogsmeade, and he held his lightly with two fingers, his wrist curved daintily. Hermione sipped hers in silence, waiting for Draco to continue with his story.
Draco looked up into her eyes and smiled at her encouragingly. She gave him a weak one of her own.
My grandfather was Minister of Magic, my father's set to be the next Minister? My mother and Harry's were best friends? My mother was muggle-born? These thoughts ran through Hermione's head as she waited.
Draco sensed that Hermione was anxious to learn more of her family, so he cleared his throat and continued.
"Your father's name is Charles. Charles Spencer. As I've said, he's poised to become Minister of Magic when Fudge kicks the bucket. Your mother's name is Rebecca. She was born a Muggle and raised in Surrey with Lily Evans, her childhood friend. They were both accepted into Hogwarts, where your parents met. Mind, love, that this is common knowledge in the wizarding community; your parents are quite high-profile, not… unlike my own." His lips twisted into a smirk, the Signature Malfoy Look, just toned down a bit. "They've got… an older daughter called Della, she graduated last year from Beauxbatons. I'm really not sure why she didn't go to Hogwarts, actually… Then they've got two younger girls. The only one I know is Izzy, because she's friends with my sister."
"Your sister?" said Hermione in surprise.
"Yes, my younger sister, Calabria (A/N: Don't hate me!!! I know Draco's a classic only-child, but I couldn't resist! It's pronounced Cuh-law-bree-uh, BTW.) She's 10, as is the little Spencer girl. Then there's another younger girl, but I don't really know much other than that," finished Draco. He took a sip of his Butterbeer.
Hermione sat, deep in thought, and Draco didn't say anything, respecting her need to sort it all out.
Suddenly, bells rang out all over the castle. The deep, rich sound of the heavy bells and the light, airy sound of the smaller bells blended beautifully as "Auld Lange Sine" played throughout the castle.
Hermione rose from her seat, smiling. "Happy New Year, Draco," she said.
Draco rose as well, and smiled at her. "Happy New Year, Hermione."
He took her into his arms, and she went willingly.
He held her as she lay her head on his shoulder. It was oddly comforting just to be relaxed and comfortable in his arms.
She sighed contentedly, and hardly noticed when the two of them moved to the couch to cuddle their way into the New Year.
************
Hermione woke up the next morning, 1 January 1997, in someone else's bed. When she'd opened her eyes, the familiar red-gold drapes of her bed were nowhere to be seen. Instead, silver velvet drapes were pulled close around the bed, blocking out any sunlight. She could still see enough, however, to notice two very important things: that there was a green velvet dragon emblazoned on the drapes and that she was not alone in this strange bed.
Draco stirred beside her but didn't wake up. Then she remembered what had happened last night. She and Draco had been snuggling happily on the couch when she'd turned her face up to his and said, to his great surprise, "Draco, have you always been this wonderful? Even when you were a child, under all of that fear and hate, were you this sweet?"
Draco, in a typical fashion, had snorted. "Sweet? Me? Dear God, girl. What do you take me for? A good person?"
She'd smiled indulgently and waited for him to give her a straight answer.
"I've never in my life been wonderful. Although," he said, lifting his delicate nose, "I'm am not surprised in the slightest that you think so."
Hermione's lips twitched as she tried not to laugh at his silliness.
"But," he said, tapping her nose gently with one, long white finger, "Don't spread it around. I have a reputation to uphold."
"Oh, do you?" she said. She smirked at him, her eyes dancing. "What reputation might that be, Master Malfoy?"
"Ah, you know, dear… the whole seriously-evil-wizard thing… it's so me," he said, puffing out his chest with self-importance.
She laughed outright and poked him in the stomach.
He looked slightly wounded. "What?" he said, "Don't I look evil to you?"
Hermione laughed again, but more gently. She leaned up and kissed him softly.
He didn't let it go at one sweet kiss, but extended it. He slid a hand around the nape of her neck and caressed her jaw line with his thumb. Hermione, sitting on his lap, twisted so that she could slip her hands around his waist and pull them even closer to each other. The loving tenderness of his kiss ended after a few moments, and left Hermione breathless. She snuggled into the crook of his arm and lay her head on his chest. She twisted so that her legs fell across his lap. She-would-just-rest-like-this… she yawned. Just-rest-for-a-moment…
Draco realised that Hermione had drifted off into a peaceful and content sleep after a few minutes. He smiled to himself as he carried her to his bed and gently lay her down. He slid in beside her without undressing and pulled the covers over them both. He held her close to him, thinking, I'll never let her go… as long as she needs me, I'll be here for her.
A/N:
Ok, ok, I know I promised a death and Hermione's parents and sibs, and Lavendar's sister's name, and some plot unravelling… BUT I went back and read Chap 1 and realised that I started this fic as a Hermione/Draco and I was deviating a bit from the original idea. Now, I know that the drama factor is going to come in and stay for a while VERY SOON, but I wanted to get in a little more peace and love. Ergo, this: the beginning. What I'm planning is a three part chapter (1 January, 2 January, and then the climax, 3 January, when she meets her parents.)
Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated… if you think I need to play up something a little more or if you think somebody's OOC… just let me know.
**Also: I really like the title "Anna Begins" (you'll find out more about it later, just trust me, it's the perfect title.) And because we're already out of December and into January in the story, I'm thinking the title "A Long December" may not be working anymore. It would still remain the title of the first chapter, granted, but I don't think it fits for the overall story. ANYWAY, I'm thinking on changing the title of the story to "Anna Begins." Let me know what you think; if that would be too confusing and you'd never find the story again if I changed the title, or if ya'll all wouldn't mind too much.
THANKS SO MUCH TO EVERYBODY THAT'S REVIEWED FOR ME!!!!!! I LOVE YOU!!!
