Chapter 12

Draco shook his head and smirked at Blaise as he listened to his father tell another one of his not so funny jokes. To watch the stiff upper class try to tell a joke was actually more fun than the joke itself. The sad part is that everyone laughed with him anyway to placate him.

The joke was just one in the line of many and they only got worse and louder. They were a rowdy bunch for sure. If their fathers and uncle weren't telling exaggerated stories or bad jokes, their mothers filled them in on the latest gossip and scandals amongst the society. It didn't leave much room for anyone else to pitch in on the conversation, he and Blaise mostly commented once in a while as well as exchanging looks across the table. Aria, or Hermione, had not spoken much at all, but she had been awfully quiet now for a while.

He took a quick look around the table and noticed that the seat between Blaise and their uncle, that she had previously occupied, was now empty. How had he not noticed her getting up to leave?

Putting down his napkin on the table he quietly got up from his seat as well while uncle Cassio held everyone's attention with yet another story. He walked out of the dining room and tiered to suss out any sound that could indicate where she had gone off to. But the house was eerily quiet apart from the muffled sounds coming from the crowd in the dining hall. He had walked through almost the entire house when he arrived in the sunroom and noticed the patio door ajar. The doors lead out to his uncle Cassio's famous rose garden, figures that she would be drawn to it. She might try to deny it, but she really wasn't so different from other girls. She still enjoyed romance and what was more romantic than a garden filled with roses and magical fireflies.

The minute he walked through the arch of the garden he spotted her sitting on the bench next to one of the fountains, dressed in the red chiffon maxi dress she had changed into for the birthday dinner. She looked lost in her own thoughts and she was completely oblivious to his presence, and despite his better judgement he found himself stunned by the sight. During the past couple of weeks, he had really gotten to know the girl he had admired and cared for from a distance for a long time and the sparks between them had only grown stronger. Not only was she a really good person, she was also beautiful with or without the glamour charm. Normally he would have made a move at the first spark, but this wasn't just any girl. She was a part of their family and his best friend's sister, if things went wrong the consequences would be disastrous and awkward, and not only for the two of them. It wasn't a good idea, but since when had that ever stopped him?

"What are you doing out here on your own princess? The party is inside." he spoke as he took a seat next to her on the bench. She jumped slightly in her seat, but she quickly relaxed again when she saw who he was. The war was still with them all, it probably always would be.

"I just… I-" she blushed adorably and looked down at her lap.

"Needed some breathing space?" he bumped his shoulder with hers to get her to look at him again. He found himself wanting to look into her eyes.

"Yeah. It's just, a lot has happened today an I just need some time to process it all." she smiled apologetically.

"It's all well and good. For a while there Princess, I thought you were trying to hide from me again."

"If I were trying to hide from you, you would not be able to find me." she raised one of her eyebrows and smirked back at him. The confident and strong girl they all knew was back in full form.

"Oh I don't know… I always manage to find the pretty ones."

Draco could tell that he had taken her by surprise as she tried her hardest not to back down from his gaze and avert her eyes. Sure, he had flirted with her before, but never this openly or honestly and it took her a few seconds to get her bearings again.

"Pretty am I? Aren't there some kind of rule against flirting with your friend's sister?"

"Touché Granger! But it doesn't make it any less true though." she rolled her eyes and turned to stare out over the garden. She obviously wasn't going to be just as easily swayed when he didn't catch her off guard.

"Zabini." she corrected him. "Or I don't know. I never thought I would have two names and no idea what to call myself." she laughed bitterly and kept her eyes locked on the fireflies that floated around the garden.

Draco couldn't stand how torn up she sounded and took a hold of her hand that rested in her lap. He felt for her, he really did. This whole situation couldn't be easy. To go from having no parents and no family to suddenly having a family as large as theirs that have her two identities that people expected her to keep. If he was the one in her shoes, he would have locked himself up in his room for days and not talked to anyone. But then again, she is a lot stronger than him, she always has been. If something did not sit right with her, she did something about it and she never backed down from a fight. He was in awe of her and her strength.

"To us, you have always been Aria Zabini. It's all we have ever known. But Hermione Granger is all you have ever know and that has to count for something as well."

"I do kind of like it." she said with a smile and squeezed his hand. "It's very beautiful." that it was. Very fitting he thought.

"Uncle always told us how determined Bianca was to have a child name Aria. He was afraid she would have named Blaise Aria if you didn't come into the world as well." they both laughed at the thought of Blaise with a girl's name. It wasn't too hard to imagine, he did have a tendency to act like a little girl.

They fell into silence once again and Draco watched as Hermione tried to follow the same firefly with her eyes. He might have always known who the girl with the bushy hair at the front of the class was, but over the last couple of weeks he had really gotten to know what an amazing person she could be.

Sure, she might have a temper that could scare the toughest of grown men and her strife for knowledge and need to always be right could get annoying at times. But she had the biggest heart and was loyal to a fault, always putting other people first despite what she had going on herself. He really admired her and somewhere along the line he started to think of her as more than his best friend's sister.

As far as Draco knew, Blaise has no idea of his budding feelings for his sister and he wasn't sure how it would go down. But if he was honest, he didn't really care about it, it had gone that far.

Draco put the hand that wasn't holding Hermione's hand into the pocket of his dress pants and fingered the shrunken parcel. His parents had gotten her a present from the all that she had received at dinner, but Draco had wanted to get her something from just him. It had taken him a while but he thinks he finally got it right.

"Has it been a good birthday despite all the drama?" he inquired softly.

"Yeah." she smiled. "It has been nice. I didn't know that Professor Snape could be so laid back."

"You should probably get used to call him uncle or at least Severus, and a lot of weight has lifted from his shoulders the past couple of months. Getting you back has just been the icing on the cake, the man no longer has any secrets to keep quiet about." Draco had no idea how his uncle managed to keep his life up the way he did. To be a part of two sides and try to stay alive is one thing, but to on top of that try to keep two other persons safe as well was damn near impossible.

"True." she agreed and then grew quiet again. Really quiet. He could tell that something was bothering her.

"What is it?" he wondered in concern. She turned to look at him and her hold on his hand got stronger.

"They got a room for me here. Bianca showed it to me earlier, apparently, she has had it ready for years. There were even clothes in the closet. I just- what am I supposed to do with that?"

"You do know that you don't have to do anything, right? They don't expect anything, they just want to get to know you and they are willing to accept anything you are willing to give them." she smiled.

"You know, for a self-announced bad playboy you can be quite sweet."

"A moment of weakness, I assure you." he smirked and he cursed himself for feeling happy at making her laugh. He was turning soft, way too soft.

"Where did you guys go?!" Blaise's voice carried through the garden and Draco cursed him in his head, he still had yet to give Hermione her birthday gift. "It's time for cake, chop chop!" that was his best friend alright, nothing could stand between him and his cake.

"Coming!" he yelled back. "We better head back or he will never forgive us from depraving him from cake."

Once again, she laughed and he felt how the warmth and the feeling of satisfaction spread through his body. This was starting to get ridicules. Draco stood up from his seat but he kept a hold of her hand, forcing her to get up as well, and lead them back through the garden to the patio doors they had both used to escape the mansion.