Hermione was nervous as Draco apparated them all to Hogsmeade, not because she didn't know exactly where they were going, but because salons made her nervous. The hairdressers always tried to cut in layers, or thin her hair, or Merlin forbid, trying to blow it out. The whole place would smell like caustics and potions, someone would inevitably bury their hands in her hair without invitation, get stuck, and then ask if she had a boyfriend while trying to untangle themselves.
It was then she realized that while she was leaning heavily on her cane after landing, Blaise was holding onto his knees as though he might be ill.
"Blaise, if apparating bothers you, we should just take the Floo to the Leaky when we're done here." She put her hand on his shoulder, and he jolted momentarily at the unexpected contact. He gave a slight shiver when she moved her hand to his forehead, knowing her permanently cool fingers would feel better than a nauseous flush. When Blaise sighed and his posture eased, she pulled her hands away,
"Better?"
...
Draco watched her reaching for his lover and felt a fresh river of staticky, electrical, buzzing itching ripple under his skin when her hand landed on Blaise's shoulder, which seemed to melt and cool as soon as she pressed delicate hand to brunneous forehead. He found himself giving a top-to-bottom shudder at the change.
...
Blaise stood to shake off the sensation of her cool fingers. They'd felt as comforting as a hot bath after a difficult game of Quidditch, or hugging his mother. The hellish sensation of marching ants under his skin disappeared. The impatience and snappishness he'd woken up with seemed to melt away to nothing. He needed to get her hands off of him as much as he wanted them to stay put.
It pained him to think it, because as much as he might have found her to be a balm in this moment, she was unlikely to be Draco's bride, and by proxy, his as well. She would be wed to some bookish Ravenclaw who had worked up the bollocks to fight for the Order during to the war, and it wouldn't matter that he found her attractive and comforting. In another lifetime perhaps, he would have approached her, apologized for his complicity in the behavior of Slytherin House during school, asked her out on a date. She'd probably have said no, but then, she would be well within her rights to do so.
Blaise led them to the salon from the alley they'd Apparated into, chatting up Granger, whose face was already set in a half-sneer that would have made Draco proud. She clearly wasn't looking forward to this, although he couldn't comprehend why. So he talked about neem conditioning washes and hot oil under silk wraps instead.
Draco's body heat against his other arm kept him calm underneath, regardless of his outward appearance. He could count on Draco to shout the tactless thing he wanted to explode about, but couldn't say. He could count on Draco to keep up a cutting stream of criticisms at Ministry events and distract him from his own nervous insecurities. He loved that man, in all his porcelain pointiness, but that did not mean that Blaise had ever deluded himself about their relationship. The rest of the world viewed them as best mates, and didn't care to know about anything else. He found himself wondering what she would think of it, found himself pinning Draco with a Significant Look.
...
Draco saw the expression, knew what it meant. He nodded and pointed subtly to the village green across the street, a quiet bench by a small duckpond.
...
Hermione didn't notice that she had been steered until they had crossed the street and Blaise was helping her ease herself onto a park bench, the wood worn glassy and smooth by decades of people's bottoms. Draco and Blaise were standing over her, swapping glances that must have meaning to them, when Blaise set down the birdcage and knelt down in front of her to speak, his deep voice holding more tremor than she'd ever heard before,
"It's potentially stupid of me to share this Granger, but we're all about to be married off to potential strangers, which isn't a huge change from what I expected, but it is happening much sooner than I'd planned, and—" She cut him off,
"What's going on? Is one of you dying or something, because you're entirely too nervous and serious for my liking."
She found herself splaying a hand against her own breastbone, like her Grann if she clutched at her pearls, and the other hand landed back on Blaise's shoulder. He relaxed again, but this time, she noticed that Draco did too, and after a beat of silence, Draco snorted. Then chuckled, and finally let out an entirely uncouth and delightfully loud guffaw. Blaise looked less than impressed for a moment before he added his own booming laughter to the whole affair, while she sat looking back and forth between them.
"What exactly is so funny that you're both laughing at me? Because I can assure you, regardless of being in public, I can hex you both aaany second now if you don't explain." Draco re-cooped his senses the fastest, schooling his face as best he could, a tiny dimple of amusement still embedded in one cheek, as he sat on her left,
"Not laughing at you, Granger, I promise. Blaise and I have something to share that the majority of the wizarding world doesn't know, and we've guarded carefully for some time, but I think Blaise wants to express it to someone who might understand and sympathize. Preferably before I get shackled to some woman I've never met, who will likely despise me on principle. And, as he and I consider you a friend, I think the particular urgency of his nerves also has to do with the fact that you're also likely to get bound to some priggish Hufflepuff—" at this Hermione gave an unladylike snort and Draco paused, considering the thought,
"—No, you're right, Granger, some Ravenclaw then, as you'd absolutely trample a 'Puff into the dirt."
She gave a curt nod in approval of the statement. Blaise rose from his knee to sit to her right, their bodies like antithetical bookends around her, and he rubbed one thumb into his opposing palm, and stared at his hands when he began speaking.
...
"This land-binding, and the marriage law that's supposed to keep us from all going 'round the bend by speeding up the process, it's brought some things into stark relief for me, and for Draco."
She didn't speak, but she gestured with rolling hands that he should go on and explain, but this really was the crux of his nerves. What if she reacted badly?—Well, she was too righteous to be disgusted by their relationship—but she might potentially be disgusted by the fact that any woman bound to Draco would be his as well. He had no awareness of how long he'd been silently working up the nerve, but clearly too long, if her wide eyes were any indication.
"Merlin's bollocks. I'm just going to say it, and if you think it's vile, well then, I'll just never speak to you again." She gave a somewhat sad smile, and he felt his spine straightening with confidence as she spoke, her words warming his chest,
"Blaise, I highly doubt that anything you could say or do would disgust me, unless you have committed genocide or rape lately. I helped bring down Voldemort, and I lived through nearly eight years of watching Ron Weasley eat. I can handle it." Draco smirked at her comment, then gave him an encouraging nod from her other side, so he plunged in,
"In the beginning of fifth year, Draco and I began seeing each other romantically."
She nodded, gave another small warm smile. He blinked at her.
"Is that all?" she asked. Draco interjected,
"I told you she wouldn't be bothered with that part."
Blaise spoke up again, looking at her, knowing that Draco didn't want to be looked at for this part anyway,
"Before Draco was marked, we made a blood oath. We're bound. We both wanted to keep the other as safe as possible, and in the event that one of us didn't survive, well, it was as close to marriage to each other as we were going to get, what with our familial obligations and all." There was that sad smile again, she understood. Blaise very quickly decided he detested that smile.
"We split for a while in seventh year, but got back together when we all went back to repeat the year and graduate. We're still bound, so what Draco feels from the land-binding, I feel too even though I'm not a proper citizen. Instead of being married off to separate women, we're both going to potentially be driven mad by wanting the same woman, and if she can't handle that we're lovers, or that we're both going to end up being bound to her when she marries Draco—well—" he pulled in air gustily, trying again,
"And if she's disgusted and rejects Draco because of me, and he needs an heir more than I do, and I don't want to go mad, or see him hurt because the land strapped him with some wife who doesn't love him."
Granger's eyes had gone all misty. Oh Merlin, Blaise knew if she cried, Draco would flinch and close himself off. Blaise would get choked up, and he hated doing that in public, and there was some absolute frump of a woman walking what appeared to be a mangy dog coming their way—
...
Hermione watched Blaise work himself into a bit of a panic, something about his robust frame pulling into itself, half out of defensiveness, half discomfort at her, and possibly, his own, rising emotionality. It just would not do. She took a deep breath and blinked her eyes clear.
"Are either of you even interested in women? You shouldn't be forced—" Draco cut in, as Blaise was still composing himself,
"Granger, we both like witches, and we've both had relationships with witches outside our relationship with each other. We both expected to be married off eventually. The difference, and the reason for Blaise's nerves, is that we've never..."
"Shared," Blaise interjected, "and what if she rejects both of us because she thinks it's perverse, or rejects Draco flat out because of the past?"
Granger seemed to consider this, her brow furrowing like a lioness, and they could practically watch her hackles go up,
"She'd be an idiot to reject either of you—" Another nanosecond of thought, and a curt nod of confirmation,
"—yup, she'd have to be an absolutely vacuous, fatuous, and supercilious shrew. You both can send this hypothetical woman to me should she even begin to react that way. I would be more than happy to tell her to get bent, and where she ought to shove any 'disgust' she may be feeling." She felt herself snarling and tried to reign in her temper,
"Now, Blaise, you've extended my itinerary, so I demand that you take me to this salon, and then we're all going back to mine for tea."
She liked to think that her tone brooked no argument, but something about Blaise's facial expression made her think he thought her stern voice was cute—how irritating.
Upon entering the salon across from Honeydukes, she was shocked to discover that the 'Angelina' Blaise had referred to, was in fact Angelina Weasley, née Johnson, who apparently owned the salon with Alicia Spinnet. Angelina gave Blaise a big hug, calling him her favorite customer. She wondered if the earth had swapped its magnetic poles while she hadn't been looking.
...
Draco watched Granger cycle through confusion, irritation, and finally resigned boredom as Blaise explained to Angelina about Granger's hair. That he hadn't known she was 'mixed', at Hogwarts, which apparently Angelina hadn't known either, if her surprised face was any indication. They then began nattering about hair types and methods, so Draco tuned them out and spoke to Granger instead, while gesturing at the covered cage where her new familiar was occasionally rustling his wings,
"What are you going to name him?"
She blinked a few times and when she registered his question, she chewed her bottom lip in thought. Draco gave a shiver, which got Blaise to turn away from his conversation for the briefest moment. As Blaise helped her up and into a squashy barber's chair, Draco realized that she hadn't touched him, ever if you didn't count third year, and it lit an odd fire in his chest. Like watching Potter with the Snitch in his fist back in school, it was jealousy, and it struck him as odd. The sensation threw him so far within his own mind that he nearly missed her answer to his question,
"...Harpy eagle's natural range covers much of what used to be Aztec territory, so I think I'll call him 'Ehecatl'. It means 'wind' in Nahuatl, and the Aztec god of the same name was sometimes depicted with black plumage. I think it suits."
...
The mani pedi she'd gotten had made her giddy, happier than anyone touching her hair had ever pleased her, until she'd seen the results. Hermione stared at herself in the mirror when Angelina had finished; stuck predominantly speechless by her own hair. No longer a towering frizzy cloud—but riotous curls like whizzy ribbons on Christmas gifts, or cake decorations made of shaved chocolate—a lion's mane. They still sprang out in every conceivable direction, but each ringlet held together now instead of exploding into fluff. She should have been paying more attention to the instructions Angelina had given, but she was uncomfortable in the salon, as swamped with beautiful women as it was, and the only men were Malfoy and Blaise, which didn't help.
Suddenly she didn't feel quite so much like she shouldn't have been in the room. Suddenly she looked a great deal like old photos of Grann. It felt feminine, yes, but also powerful, to finally be in a room full of people who not only could get her mane to behave, but valued it. Angelina had raved about Hermione's hair for some time, asking how she'd grown it so long and what protective styles did she use,
"I don't know what that means" Angelina was awed, but then grinned very much like Fred,
"We'll make you another appointment for next month and we can experiment."
"Next month I might be getting ready for my wedding...that doesn't sound like a good time to experiment..."
Angelina had agreed, and scheduled her for two appointments over the next four weeks, saying she should look her best during whatever courtship was coming her way. It was a reminder she hadn't needed in that moment, so she'd been more chipper than she felt when she asked Malfoy and Blaise if they were ready to go and have tea. Just her luck, they clearly noticed.