Golden Haze, Act Four, Scene Change One, Interlude
AN: Guys, guys guys guys guys. We've crowed 100,000 in hits! ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND HITS. HOLY SHIT. I have never written something that was this popular, or this well received before. You guys have done it for me, done everything. I am so glad that you guys like this story as much as you do. It means a TON to me.
About this chapter – I wanted to do an interlude from Hermione's POV, but directly seguing into the conversation with Fleur's mother seemed rather silly, as one might ask one's self – why change the point of view at all? It didn't make any sense to me, so I decided to do it this way; hopefully it works as well for you guys as it does for me.
Music of the story – None, I've been watching A Very Potter Musical so all I've been doing is laughing my ass off.
Well, that had been unexpected, to say the least. Hermione Granger shook soot from her hair and tried not to think about how colossally stupid she had just sounded while speaking to Fleur's mother – who did not speak English nearly as well as her daughter and therefore relied quite a bit on Fleur's quick translations of French phrases that were enough to make Hermione's hair stand up on end. (Not that it wasn't already).
She had come from the Gryffindor Common Room, where Ginny had found her with a letter that had arrived after she'd gone down to dinner. The packet was thick, and they'd sat on the sofa in front of the fire as Hermione read about her acceptance, pending NEWT scores naturally, to the Wizarding University of Cairo into their human and creature anthropology program. She was ecstatic, and as Ginny hugged her and Ron clapped her excitedly on the back, everything felt oddly normal once again. She and Fleur had talked about how Cairo would be perfect for both of their needs, as Fleur needed to go back into the field after her sabbatical from Gringotts and the bank certainly was not about to allow her to work at the central branch when she had once been married to one of their chief in-house curse breakers.
Goblins, Fleur had explained, do not like controversy and do not like workplace romance.
Hermione had told Fleur that she never intended to get a job at the bank, and that she did not think she'd have them after that nasty business during the war.
Still, she had been excited and had wanted to tell Fleur right away. She'd hurriedly told Harry the news when he came in from wherever it was that he'd gone after dinner and he'd hugged her tightly and told her that he'd miss her in auror training, provided he passed the test. Hermione had laughed at that, told him he already had a job at the ministry and had since potentially his fourth year, and he'd grinned right back at her.
Harry told her happy news, Hermione said her goodnights for the evening. It was something of a nightly tradition that had gotten started just after the Christmas Holidays. Ginny, as was now her habit, had given her an odd look as she left. She was still warming up to the relationship that Hermione had with Fleur, despite the fact that Bill was happier than Hermione had seen him in years and there was talk about him actually bringing his, as Fleur put it, 'mysterious Welshman' around for dinner to meet his family.
Some things, like her parents slow acceptance of so many aspects of her life, just take time.
From everything Ron and Ginny had told her about Bill, he'd always tried to be as open as possible about his sexuality with his parents, but his mother simply would not hear of it. Not from her firstborn, Ginny had said in a startlingly good impression of Mrs. Weasley, never from her firstborn. Hermione was fairly certain that it was a foregone conclusion at this point – and she and Fleur had already agreed that if Bill's heir problem had not been sorted out by the time they settled down to have a family, that they would name him the godfather of one of their children. Hermione liked to think that it was a very clever plan.
Hermione had bid Harry and Ron a good night and had taken her school bag with her on the way down to Fleur's rooms. She had now mastered a route that would let her avoid the prefect patrols as well as the solitary teacher patrols as curfew drew closer. She refused to abuse her prefect's badge to see Fleur, it hardly seemed proper considering what they got up to most nights.
Fleur was talking to someone over the floo when Hermione had come into her rooms. The door creaked loudly as she closed it and Hermione had to stifle a smile at the image of Fleur leaning forward into the flames, her body half-way gone to wherever it was that she was talking to. Hermione had closed the door behind her, and when Fleur's hand made a shooing motion out of the fire's field of view, she'd moved out of sight with a scowl on her face. She did not like being hidden.
Looking back on it, however, it probably would have been a far smarter idea to just remain hidden. Fleur's mother was a force of nature, half trying to convince Fleur to just come through the floo (despite their lack of the necessary permits) and properly introduce Hermione. She'd been intimidated, taken aback by the forwardness of Fleur's mother. Fleur's mother asked about complicated veela rituals that Hermione barely understood and many she had questions about Hermione herself that were far too invasive to actually be relevant and pertinent information that Fleur's mother actually needed to know.
She did not think that Fleur truly understood the questions on the veela rituals, but when Fleur's mother had seen the glint of the ice blue teardrops that Hermione had given Fleur at Christmas in Fleur's ears, she had smiled knowingly and had said nothing more about such rituals. Hermione had resolved to ask Fleur what that had meant when Fleur's mother had suddenly become far more approving of Hermione in general.
Hermione sighed; twisting to turn and fix Fleur with what she hoped was not too accusatory of a stare. "Your mother is rather intense," she confessed.
Fleur laughed, all the tension that had accumulated in her face since she pulled Hermione through the fireplace and into her mother's kitchen. She looked so much like her mother, Hermione realized, staring at Fleur. The veela heritage was even more evident in Fleur's mother, her features even more inhuman, more birdlike and breathtakingly beautiful. Fleur did not have her nose or lips, however. Hermione wondered what Fleur's father looked like.
"I am sorry for that," Fleur said, reaching out to gently touch Hermione's hair. "I 'ad not expected that to take so long. She 'as a way of keeping you talking…"
Hermione shook her head. "No, I'm glad that you're talking to her, Fleur."
She was extremely glad. Fleur's family was so core to her very being that to have her be without them since her wedding to Bill Weasley was something that deeply disturbed Hermione. She could not understand why they had shut her out, and had meant to demand an explanation from Fleur's mother, but had been silenced with a look.
"It is a good thing, yes," Fleur mused. She ran her hands through her hair, grey ash and soot falling from it and onto the hearthrug. "We 'ave not spoken in so long, sometimes I forget why it was we did not speak."
"There was a war on." Hermione pointed out. Among other things.
"Ah, oui, war." Fleur agreed. Hermione reached up and brushed a final fleck of ash off of Fleur's cheek, watching as its black soot trail vanished under the gentle touch of her fingers.
It was strange looking at Fleur after seeing her mother. Fleur was so normal looking, so completely and utterly human looking. She was still completely stunning, but decidedly human in appearance and it gave Hermione pause. "You look a lot like your mum," Hermione said after a minute of simply staring at her girlfriend. "But your features are more…" she trailed off trying to find a way to put it politely.
"They are more 'uman," Fleur finished for her.
Hermione nodded, afraid of what to say. Fleur could have that look, if she was upset or angry – if the haze took her. Hermione had seen that wild and avian look when Fleur had burst through the door of that empty house, saving Hermione from the horror of her mind. She had not thought about it much since then, but the stark comparison between Fleur and her mother made it almost impossible to ignore.
"That is the dilution of the blood," Fleur explained, she had stood up and had picked up the small wire-bristle broom that was sitting just off to the side of the fireplace and had begun to sweep the ash that they'd brushed off themselves back into the fireplace. "There are some things that the blood does not dilute -" she trailed off, staring into space, not really looking at Hermione or anything in particular.
"How you shift… the need for children…" Hermione said quietly. It had been bothered her ever since Fleur had explained how this was one of the key ways that her body and mind were different from that of a human. It was one of the most bizarre things that she had ever heard. Fleur explained to her how the drive to mate worked within a veela's mind.
Fleur nodded. It was a hard thing to wrap one's brain around, Hermione knew this. Fleur had tried her best to explain, really she had, but it was only through all the books the library had to offer as well as a few that Hermione had special ordered from various bookstores that she'd truly been able to start to understand.
There was no way around it. They would have to have a child, if not to save the social standing of Fleur's family within the veela community, then for Fleur's own sanity. Hermione was by no means perfect, and the thought of having children scared her like nothing else. She had seen death, she had seen families ripped apart by war, and she did not want to immediately go and start to repopulate the wizarding world for the next generation. To do so seemed oddly foolish. She'd told Fleur all of this and Fleur had laughed and said that doing it now would be foolish for both of their careers and lives, but in the future, it had to happen.
Hermione had decided that she was okay with that.
Hermione thought for a moment. She'd never asked Fleur this question, but it was one that she'd thought about herself several times, when her mind idled long enough to have a brief period of whimsy. "If we do, hypothetically, have a child Fleur… what would you name it?"
Fleur looked taken aback. She moved across the room to stand by the window, her eyes never meeting Hermione's curious gaze. Hermione longed to go to her, seeing her stand there and look so vulnerable brought a pain to her heart that she could not explain. Fleur was upset, Fleur was hurting. Hermione had to go to her.
"Victoire," Fleur said quietly. "Over so many things, it is fitting, non?"
Hermione crosses the room then and throws her arms around Fleur, kissing her and not caring that she still had soot all over her shoulders.
Fleur's lips were warm against her own, and there was a salty taste to Fleur's kiss that Hermione knew meant tears. Hermione pulled away, ever so slightly to whisper, "I will always love you."
Fleur kissed her then, pushing her against the cool of the window, her lips hot and urgent and it was a long time before Hermione was able to think about much of anything.
Later, their bodies twined together, naked and sweaty, Hermione asked Fleur the question that had been bothering her ever since her rather abrupt meeting with Fleur's mother. "Why was your mother so satisfied-looking when she saw the earrings I got you for Christmas?
Fleur looked up from where she had been toying with the curl of Hermione's hair, "It is said that when a veela's mate gives their veela jewelry, it is a sign of devotion and a symbol of fidelity."
"Oh." Hermione said quietly. She had not known that. It had certainly not been in any of the books that she had read over the past few months.
Fleur shifted so that she was in a more upright position, leaning on her elbow to examine Hermione critically. "It is a promise – like an engagement ring of sorts."
Now Hermione was officially confused, not to mention very taken aback. She hadn't intended to give Fleur something like that. Not with such a meaning. Not so soon. It was not as though she would not love to spend the rest of her life with this beautiful, thoughtful, and incredibly talented woman, it was more that she had never really thought about it in the finality that Fleur always spoke of. With a veela, all of her books had told her, there was no turning back. Their love was complete and absolute. There was no way to get around such burning devotion, and even fewer who wished it so.
"I don't want to get married right after school Fleur," Hermione sighed. It was a dumb thing to say, but necessary. "I want to go to Cairo, I want to travel, and I want to see this world that I help to save."
"I 'ad no intention of asking for a while," Fleur admitted. Her eyes were soft and her expression calm. "But the erm – o'zer issue is one that will not go away."
Hermione laughed, "I'm sure that we will. We're quite smart, the both of us."
Fleur grinned, "Oui, I believe we are."