A/N: Wow! So many reviews so quickly! Welcome marauderbabe289 and Tiarwen! I'm glad you are enjoying the story! Thank you always Erin,LadySnake Starinthenight, Elizabeth Lien, Red and Gold, and robin777! You guys have been wonderful about reading the story and keeping me going:) I am quite inspired to get so many reviews so quickly, but also to see the new reviewers! It's so cool and makes me feel so good!
A/N: I do not own the characters except for Josephine Baker:)
After singing frogs waking her up at 2 am, ferries chasing her in the garden (and into the pond), and all of the furniture in her room being spontaneously moved during the day, night and while she was on top of them – Josephine was close to a screaming fit. She had only been at Draco's estate one day and nothing had gone as planned. After she found her room – right next to Draco's – she fixed it up to just her liking; she changed the dull yellow colour of the room to a brilliant purple and opened a passage in the wall between her room and the next. The next day however, she discovered that Draco was not in the room next to hers! She went around the estate again, looking to put her room next to his. Finally, she found it and again transformed everything to her liking – including the passage between rooms.
Something went wrong though. When she moved through the passage, she did not end up in Draco's room; she stepped out of the passage and right into a pile of horse manure! She was in the stables! Josephine didn't understand what went wrong – she was a very smart witch with her spells, but something must not have worked. Perhaps Draco has a spell around his room, she thought.
After yelling at the local stable elves, Josephine walked to the nearest bench to sit and clean her boots. After stating the spell, she put her foot down – only to find another horse manure patty! Josephine's face twisted at the smell and her disgust at the situation. Taking a claming breath, she cleaned her boots again and looked around to make sure there was no more manure before putting her foot down again. She then apparated back to the main hall to find Draco.
As she walked into the hall, she found Draco, Blaise, Hermione and Ginny talking. As soon as they saw her, all four stopped talking and stared at her. Their shocked faces immediately made Josephine suspicious. Ginny's mouth was open and her eyes wide as she stared at Josephine's head. Hermione raised an eyebrow and frowned. Blaise started laughing, while Draco didn't look surprised at all.
"What?" she asked, her hand immediately flying to her hair. It felt smooth and silky, like normal. Draco walked over to her, with a mirror.
"Look."
Josephine looked in the mirror and screamed. Her beautiful blonde hair was now bright orange with purple dots. As she watched, the purple dots moved to become green stripes, then blue bugs. Josephine began to pant and then looked over at Hermione, who was watching with some amusement.
"You horrible witch!" she screamed at Hermione as she flew at her in a rage. Hermione's eyes opened wide in surprise and then she fell back as Josephine's body came into full contact with hers. Thankfully, Josephine was only able to slap her once before she froze in mid-slap. Hermione looked around her to find Draco with his wand out and pointed at Josephine. With a flick, Josephine's body floated over to Draco. He moved her so that she was standing in front of him, but could not speak or move.
"Josephine," he said very quietly. "If you ever touch Hermione Granger again in anger, I will make sure that you have much more to worry about than just your hair." Josephine's eyes widened in horror. Draco continued, "Furthermore, none of us said any spell to change your hair. I would guess however that you apparated from somewhere in the estate, right? If so, I would strongly recommend against doing it again. This estate does not take kindly to apparitions by anyone other than me. The next time you apparate, you may find that you have changed in much more ways than just your hair. Do I make myself clear?" he asked, releasing her from the spell. Josephine stumbled as her body worked again. She looked up at Draco with wide eyes and nodded.
"I will change your hair back to normal, but only if you apologize to Hermione." Josephine began to protest, but thought better of it. She turned to Hermione, who was now standing with Ginny, nursing her bruised check.
"I'm sorry for falsely accusing you, Hermione." She said stiffly. She turned back to Draco, expectantly. Draco glared at her, but mumbled a quick spell to change her hair back to blonde waves. Josephine quickly looked at her self in the mirror and touched her head, lovingly. She looked back up at Draco with a wide smile. Draco glared back at her until Josephine's smile disappeared. She looked over to Hermione, Ginny and Blaise, who were all glaring at her. Quietly, she walked up to her room.
"Well, that was interesting." Draco stated. He walked over to Hermione and cupped her head in his hand to look at the bruise that was quickly healing, thanks to Ginny. "Are you ok?"
"I'm fine, Draco." Hermione stated. She looked over to the stairs, causing Draco to jerk back his hand. "Where do you think she went to?"
"I don't care." Draco turned and walked into his office. The door slammed shut behind him. Hermione looked over to Blaise.
"Did I say something wrong?"
"Nah," Blaise replied. "He's probably just pissed off that Josephine reacted like that. I wouldn't be surprised if he put a spell over her so that she can't come with a few feet of you." Blaise winked. Hermione shrugged.
"Ok, so what do we want to do now?"
"Oh! I told the Manicols that I would stop by today. Their cows have been acting strange lately and she wanted me to see if there was a virus going around. That would be horrible – we don't need anymore viruses to hit the cow/sheep population!" Ginny replied.
"Ok, can I go with you?" Blaise asked.
"Of course! I would love for you to see what I do. I hope you don't mind getting dirty though."
"Not at all. Mud wrestling is a favourite pastime of mine."
"Yeah, we there won't be much of that." Blaise's face fell in disappointment. Ginny laughed. "Not on the job anyways." She turned to Hermione. "Do you want to come, Hermione?"
"No, I think I'll stay here today. I can do some research for a project I'm working on. I think Draco has a large library." Hermione replied.
"Ok, we'll see you later then!"
Late that night, Hermione was reading in her room as she suddenly got very hungry. Sighing, she put down her book. She was all dressed for bed, but she couldn't take the hunger pains anymore. She knew that anyone of the house elves would be happy to bring her a meal, but Hermione didn't want to bother them. She was able to allow house elves to work if it made them happy, but she wasn't about to give them any extra work to do. Putting on a silk robe and slippers, Hermione opened the door to her room and peaked out. Rauma looked up as the door opened and smiled at Hermione.
"Don't you ever sleep?" Hermione asked. Rauma just smiled at Hermione and shook her head. Hermione shrugged and looked down the hall. It was dark and there was no sign of anyone. Hermione opened the door and lit her wand, "Iluminous." Closing the door behind her, Hermione started down the hall, carrying her book. After a few twists and turns and stairs, Hermione found herself at the door of the kitchen. Gently, she opened the door. The large kitchen was lightly lit by moonlight coming through an open window. Hermione was so glad that it was summer. It made the nights much more pleasant.
Quickly making a tuna sandwich, Hermione sat down at a table under the window. Opening the book, she read and ate quite peacefully until the door opened and someone crept into the room. Hermione looked up at the visitor, who was quietly making a turkey sandwich.
"Hello?" The visitor turned around, surprised and with their wand drawn. Hermione quickly put out her hand. "It's just me!"
"Hermione!" Draco lowered his wand and sighed. "I'm glad it's you. I think Josephine has a camera outside my room to watch when I leave. I was afraid that she followed me here."
Hermione looked around. "She's coming this way?"
"Not unless she knows about my secret passage." Draco came to sit across from Hermione. "What are you reading?"
"Oh, nothing. Just a book about portkeys and the different ways they can be used." Draco lifted an eyebrow.
"Any reason why you are reading that particular book?
"An on-going project of mine." Hermione replied back. She shifted his gaze to his sandwich. "I'm surprised to see you down here, getting your own sandwich."
Draco leaned back and took a bite. "Yeah, well, I like to do things for myself every now and then. Besides," he leaned forward again with a gleam in his eye, "If I know Josephine, she should be trying to sneak into my room about now."
"So?-" Hermione started to say when a scream interrupted her. Her head turned towards the sound reactively, but turned again to Draco rolling in laughter. "What!"
"I –" Draco continued to laugh. He was laughing so hard that Hermione started to laugh too. Soon, tears were flowing from Draco's eyes for laughing so hard. He was doubled over and practically on the floor.
"What did you do to her?"
"Whew!" Draco started to calm down a bit and sat up a bit. "I knew that she would try to sneak into my room, right?" Hermione nodded. "Well, I left and came here, but before I did, I – " Draco started to laugh again, "I asked one of the house elves to sleep in the bed! Josephine probably came into my room and climbed into bed to seduce a house elf!" Draco laughed uproariously again. Hermione couldn't believe it. Josephine was going to be furious, especially depending on what she did before she saw who was in bed. She started to giggle, thinking of Josephine's face and then laughed loudly with Draco. Soon they were both gasping for breath as they finished with giggles.
"That's too bad, Draco." Hermione giggled.
"But it's better than her climbing into bed with me." Draco pointed out.
"True." Hermione got up and took their plates. "Do you want anything else?"
"Tea, if you know how to make it."
"No problem." Hermione quickly put the dishes on the counter and got out the tea pot. Soon she came back to the table with two cups of tea, milk and sugar.
"Hermione, do you like the Carney estate?"
"Yes, it's beautiful. And very interesting."
"I'm glad." Draco sipped his tea. "I really want you to like this home." Hermione smiled, but didn't say anything. It seemed like an odd topic. "I think it is a nice place. Plus, it allows for privacy that you would not normally get."
"Well, I'm not sure how that would be with your mom in town!" Hermione laughed, thinking of her mom.
"True." The couple finished their tea. "Shall we head back to bed?"
"Yes, I feel better now." Draco put their dishes on the counter, where they disappeared. He lit his wand as they began to walk down the corridor. They both walked quietly. Hermione figured they both didn't want to alert Josephine as to where Draco was in the mansion. Finally, they made it to Hermione's room. Hermione turned to face Draco, who looked rather reluctant to leave her.
"Are you ok?" Hermione smiled at Draco. He looked surprise and nodded. "You know, if you don't want to see Josephine, you can always hang out here a bit longer." Draco looked relived.
"That would be great." He laughed. "I didn't think about it until now, but I wonder if she decided to camp out in my room until I came back!" He shook his head. "I wouldn't put it past her."
"It's no problem." Hermione opened the door. "Come on in." They walked into the room together and closed the door behind them. Rauma smiled at the door and moved quietly from her painting, down the hall.
A/N: Ok, I hope you like this chapter! Please let me know how quickly you would like to get rid of Josephine and if you want me to move quicker with Hermione and Draco. They are spending the night together and more about that will come in the next chapter:)