"She couldn't have gotten married, right?" Ginny swivelled around to look at Hermione, turning away from the all too serene sloping grounds around the Borrow, just outside her window.
"She's almost twenty, I don't think she would get married." Hermione held on to hope that sense would prevail. "I should have told you guys everything I found out about him."
Hermione let guilt wrack through her and only looked up from her palms when Ginny's hand touched her shoulder. She hadn't realised she was crying, but Ginny's face was swimming and she dug the heels of her palms into her eyes to smear the tears away.
"Gabrielle is of age, and Teddy is a scumbag and right asshole. I'm sure they'll find her before anything stupid happens." Ginny sank into the bed beside her and Hermione put her arm around her shoulder, Ginny dropped her temple to her shoulder and they sighed.
The front door banged open and Ron's angry voice, followed by a flurry of French and Bill's voice, whose Hermione had never heard angry, all echoed up to Ginny's bedroom. They both started and ran to the landing to stare into the foyer where the door remained open and Ron was red in the face.
"I'm gonna kill that vile, bloody, twisted-" Ron spewed, his wand sparking in his palm as Bill yelled at him, his words getting lost in the flurry of words being ejected from Fleur's mouth in French.
Bill slammed Ron into the chair at the dining table as Ginny and Hermione made it down.
"Are you daft?" Bill was wringing his collar. "You could have ruined any chance we had at properly sending him to Azkaban!"
"William," Fleur was coaxing her husband with a delicate stroke of her hand on his shoulders, his body lose its tension and he looked at his wife. "Ronald stopped me before I would have done ze same."
"What happened?" Ginny asked. Hermione noticed blood spotted on the front of Ron's shirt and Ron's eyes met hers, glanced down, and he brushed his fingertips to the spots.
"We found her." Ron looked up again, still absentmindedly stroking the spots with his fingertips. Ginny raised her eyebrows, wanting more than just that. Bill cleared his throat when he realised he was in the presence of his sister and Hermione, almost ashamed of how he was acting a moment ago before them.
"She was in Amsterdam." Bill shook his head as if in disbelief. "She seems safe, she's at St Mungo's getting a once over."
Fluer began to shake, silent sobs seized control of her body. "Why would she do zis?"
"Nott is a master at deception." Hermione's voice felt lost, all used up on apologies. "You can't blame her, Fleur. Nott, he's been a bastard this entire time, but nobody could pin him."
"We've got him now." Bill stroked Fleurs shoulders as her sobs were punctuated by hiccups. "If Ron's assault isn't held against him, and we can keep the story straight, plus get Gabby to say she was definitely influenced, we got him. He's going away for a long time."
"I hope so." Hermione's eyes prickled again and suddenly she was pulled into a hug and a familiar warmth enveloped her, smelling of a freshly mown lawn and minty. Ron was hugging her and rocking her, shushing into her hair and she allowed her arms to wrap around him and sobbed into his chest.
Relief that Gabrielle was okay, that Theo was caught, that the nightmare was over. She would have to make it up to the Weasley's somehow, for missing such a massive warning and allowing this man into their circle, even if it were just a toe.
When her sobs shuddered to a stop and she extricated herself from Ron's towering frame, she smiled up at him wetly and kissed his cheek.
"When's Gabrielle coming back?" Ginny asked from her position next to Fleur whose back she was stroking as Bill combed his fingers through his wife's hair.
"Tonight, we'll have dinner wiz you all before Bill and I go back to France wiz her. She will be safe zere." Fleur's eyebrows were pinched slightly and wrinkled the perfection that was her skin.
"That sounds like a good plan." Hermione stared at her palms. There would be no reason to keep her safe if she had just bloody talked about Theo and hadn't gotten so caught up in her spiralling feelings.
Her logic had taken leave and she needed to find it back.
When Gabrielle walked through the door, flanked by her willowy, blonde mother and stocky father, tailed by Molly and Arthur, the room went silent. Fleur ran to her sister and yanked her into a hug then immediately spewed French so fast, Hermione couldn't even decipher syllables.
They settled around the table and Ron explained what he and Ginny had made for dinner as everyone dug in. Hermione suspected it was to fill the silence. Before long, the clattering of the cutlery and the filling of stomachs allowed for some merriment to seep its way back into the family and everyone had begun to chatter.
Hermione got to her feet and began clearing the table, when she entered the kitchen, in a small corridor that had a window where moonlight peeked through, she found Gabrielle looking up. She was just as beautiful as her sister, and Hermione could see she was a young woman. She tore her eyes away from the picturesque image and settled the dishes and empty cups into the sink, starting the magic to have them clean themselves the way Molly liked it.
"I'm not supposed to say zis." Gabrielle's voice stopped Hermione's retreat. She looked back at Gabrielle, her eyes fixed on Hermione and a sorry look on her face. As sorry as Hermione felt.
"If it's anything that Nott told you to tell me-" Hermione lifted her palm, spoke the words softly and carefully, unsure how Gabrielle genuinely felt for the scammer.
"Non, non." Gabrielle shook her beautiful hair, the moonlight sifting through it and tossing light everywhere. "It was Mr Malfoy who found us." Gabrielle tucked some hair behind her hair, strands fell loose anyway.
"Malfoy?" Hermione felt her breath hitch. She knew he had gone to look, but the fact that he had found them was still shocking.
"He told me not to tell anyone about him, then he explained to me what Theo had done in ze past." Hermione noted her english was better than Fleurs, or she was speaking slowly enough that Hermione understood her. "He had told my brothers and sister where to find me, but he wanted to make sure Theo couldn't escape."
Hermione looked at her even as her eyes glazed over, lost in memory. "So Mr Malfoy restrained him, told me to say I did it when everyone found me, and told me I was okay, it wasn't my fault."
"It isn't your fault." Hermione took a step toward her. She felt out of place, she was never close to Fleur let alone Gabrielle who she saw maybe once every two years. Here was this beautiful girl she hardly knew, young and naive to the world, looking to Hermione for something and telling her thoughts that otherwise would never be spoken.
"My sister has been trying to get pregnant." Gabrielle's head bowed as she studied her hands in the moonlight and she shrugged. "She brought me here to be closer to her, but, it only made her seem furzer away. When she was always wiz him, and only wiz me in her spare time. I'm not used to being her spare time filler."
"Oh Gabrielle, you're not anyone's spare time filler-" Hermione stepped toward her again and took her hand in her own, then gave it a tiny squeeze.
"Zen Theo came along. And he was zere, always just zere. So I used some of my Veelaness on him. I didn't do it lots, just, I liked how he looked at me." Gabrielle's eyes were brimming slightly, wet and glistening. Hermione shook her head.
"Don't you dare blame this on yourself." Hermione said firmly and squeezed Gabrielle's hands firmly again, the residual force shook her body too. Gabrielle's eyes opened in surprise.
"But if I hadn't used it to get him to like me-" Gabrielle's breath hitched in a sob.
"We all want to be loved Gabrielle. But he took you away from family and friends. He took all your safety away for the sake of money." Hermione pulled her into a hug and Gabrielle's violet scents enveloped them both. "That's on him and none of it is on you. You didn't know any better, but he did."
"It's not my fault?" Gabrielle said into Hermione's hair.
"It's not your fault." Hermione confirmed, holding her tightly and meaning every word of it. "Everyone is happy you're okay."
"He didn't touch me." Gabrielle whispered, a secret that sent relief flooding through Hermione. "He wanted to, but I told him not until I was married zat I would do zat."
"That's good, Gabrielle. You're safe now. He can't hurt you." Hermione released her hold and smiled at her. "If you need me to come to France, I'd be happy to."
"My family calls me Gabby." Gabrielle swiped at her eyes and smiled. "I'll write to you, in case Fleur murders me."
Hermione walked back to the dining room to a now rowdy table, relieved that Gabby was safe now inhibited everyone's faces, and there was only pure happiness.
Hermione reconstructed Draco rescuing Gabby in her mind and the fact that he hadn't wanted others to know it was him, despite all he would have to gain from catching a wanted criminal.
In the coming weeks before the trials were due to start, Hermione was given her first, then second assignments from Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes, and she had found that George was sourcing non-harmful pranks for her to focus on so they were in line with her anti-rule breaking moral. She was now the proud inventor of a hat that shrank the wearer's head (your head returned to normal upon removal; made for fantastic birthday gifts and laughter), and an organiser that squeaked when the user had an appointment. She admitted the latter wasn't a prank item, but somehow, it sold like hot cakes. Hermione found an owl or two heaving a bag of Galleons through her window weekly, her royalties.
Hermione was following the trial closely, and knew from Ginny that Gabby was due to return to London for the one trial date where she was to testify. Gabby hugged Hermione like a day had not passed.
"Do you want us to come with you?" Hermione offered, finding Gabby's violet scent intoxicating.
"He will not be in ze room." Gabby smiled and practically bounced. "It is just one day, a couple hours. Zen I will be back in France, safe, and he shall be in Azkaban."
Ginny and Hermione nodded satisfied that she would be fine.
"Plus, Fleur is coming wiz me." Gabby half-heartedly rolled her eyes. "She left Bill in France."
"She's been spending more time with you then?" Hermione smiled.
"Loads." Gabby smiled shyly. "I'll see you bose for dinner?"
"Yes. Of course." Hermione nodded. Hermione settled into Ginny's bedroom to spend the day and found the Prophet sprawled there, the morning's issue, and started reading.
Her mind went blank, then immediately buzzed with information as she read the words, a picture of Theodore Nott Jr with his arms in metal restraints, his eyes squinting at all the bright flashes from the cameras around him.
PROOF THAT THEODORE NOTT JR IS A CONNIVING, BOTTOM OF THE BARREL, THIEF
Thedore Nott Jr's trial is due to continue today in the Wizengamot. He is expected to be thrown into Azkaban for the enchantment, seduction, thievery, and several other heinous crimes of seven known witches.
A witch, whose identity is unreleased, is due to testify today and will be the most damning evidence against the scoundrel. She is rumoured to be the daughter of an important French family who has good international relations with the Ministry of Magic.
I can say I am not ashamed that I am one of the seven known women that was humiliated at the hands of this man- this boy- who used me for my money and used my lack of friends and significant others to weasel his way into my pocket.
I hope by writing this article, other people (and listen, this girl testifying today is young, so it is not 'women of my age' that fall for it) will be wary of men or women of these types. Protect yourself.
And watch on, as scammers can now see what will be done to them when they are caught!
Yours truly,
Rita Skeeter.
"She just put all her thoughts into this one huh." Hermione said to no one in particular. "The article barely made sense." Ginny laughed by blowing air through her nose. "I just mean for her, this sounds like she word vomited to the press."
"Well she seems pissed." Ginny shrugged.
"I would be too." Hermione shut the paper, folding it so she wouldn't see Theo's face. "I wonder how they knew to come together finally? To testify together."
"Who knows. Maybe the Aurors put out feelers." Ginny threw the Prophet into her bin and bumped Hermione's shoulder with her own. "Thank bloody fuck, because the Aurors said Ron's assult of a restrained man might have given Theo grounds to go free."
"Yea. Thank bloody fuck." Hermione repeated, as her mind roamed to Draco and wondered if he had done all of this for her.