Assuming someone does follow this story, I probably won't post again until after finals. It turns out, I spend more time doing this than my homework. Enjoy!
Indeed, Lord Daniel Granger and Madame Azalea Greengrass were married after a short courting period in which Hermione learned that: a) Daphne and Astoria were selfish, self-centered brats, b) Madame Greengrass was no better, c) her opinion no longer mattered, and d) nothing was as it seemed. As promised, her father talked to-at, really-Hermione about his relationship with the Black Widow, as Hermione liked to call her. When she expressed her concerns, her father was uncharacteristically unwilling to hear her. Instead he called her "obstinate," "ungrateful," and best of all, a "foolhardy, hard-headed child not worth his attention."
After Hermione got over the sting of his words, she thought long and hard over their very one sided conversation. It was not in her father's nature to be so mean, or vocal. It was not in his nature to make decisions like marriage so quickly either. As far as Hermione was concerned, one woman was behind it and behind her, two little henchwomen.
What also bewildered Hermione was the fact that her father could not see that the Greengrasses were obviously blood supremacists. Daphne and Astoria sneered and snarked whenever Hermione did anything that involved them, however distant. They often whispered "mudblood" when they hugged in front of their parents. When father invited them for dinner or tea, anything, the Greengrasses did not want a maid to look after them, they wanted Hermione to get it. At first Hermione thought they just wanted her out of the picture because he might listen to her or the sour look on her face might ruin their flirtatious mood. She was partially right; they did want her out of the picture, but not because of influence, simply because they believed that she had no right to be part of a primarily pureblood family. Hermione knew then that they were not really in love, not even in lust. She didn't know what they were-yet. She did know that the Greengrass women were in it for the money.
All of that left Hermione here-behind Astoria, Daphne and their escorts, standing with her own (who was a curse in himself), in matching pale green gowns, waiting for her turn to walk down the aisle in her pinched shoes at her father's and soon-to-be evil stepmother's wedding. She could cry.
Finally the music started playing and the heavy wooden doors to the garden swung open slowly. Daphne and her escort, Theodore Nott, were the first to make their way down the aisle gracefully, smiling demurely, somehow making her short gown train trail over the grass like water. Then Astoria and her escort, Adrian Pucey, doing the same thing. Hermione readied herself, holding her head high, her shoulders back, a small smile on her face, on the border of quiet joy and repressed sadness, depending on who you asked.
As Hermione and her escort walked slowly, Hermione took in the wedding venue. They decided to have in the magnolia grove, which was still in full bloom. Fitting, Hermione thought. Many lesser people were here, making up the majority of the three hundred head count. Marquis Black sat somewhere in the second row with a grimace on his face, Duke Malfoy on the other side, looking a bit more self-satisfied. He looked at Hermione, smirking and nodding, then his gaze flicked to the man beside her, his son. There was no doubt in Hermione's mind that Malfoy bribed Madame Greengrass to let his son, Draco Malfoy walk the aisle with Hermione. That woman would do anything as long as she got paid.
Speaking of the devil, Hermione and her escort finally reached the parting point and the wedding march truly began. Madame Greengrass came down the aisle, a vision in white. She should be wearing black, Hermione snarked mentally. Her father, whom Hermione just realized hadn't looked at her yet, couldn't take his eyes off the Black Widow. Adoration filled every feature of his face; the crowd would assume it came with deep love, but Hermione knew-she just knew-it had to be something else. What has she done to my father?
Hermione couldn't bear to actually watch and listen to the ceremony, so instead, she gave a mental running commentary on everything she saw, heard or smelled. Astoria had a terrible flatulence problem, and Hermione was at the butt end-pun very much intended-of it the entire time. She knew that they both smelled it for their little petite noses wrinkled every time. There were dark clouds on the horizon, a storm moving in. She hoped for thunder and lightning to strike down the Greengrass women, or maybe herself. Either choice would suit her just fine. Many women wore large overly decorated hats. Probably to hide bald spots. They decided to have in the magnolia grove, which was still in full bloom. Fitting, Hermione thought. My misery seems to culminate here often.
When time came for Lord Granger and Madame Greengrass-Lady Granger now-to kiss. Hermione looked blindly at one of the trees directly opposite of her, refusing to cry. There was sighing and cooing and once the band struck up a livelier wedding march to send the couple out. The crowd followed them to the rose garden, which had been turned into a reception pavilion, complete with hundreds of tables, a dance floor and raised stage for the bride, groom and their families. Again however, something was wrong. There were five seats at the table, every one of them already filled.
Astoria, smiled evilly and waved her little fingers. She pointed at the floor beside her and mouthed, "Pillow?" She cackled and got her sister's attention at the other end of the table. Together they tittered and mocked until Hermione stalked away. Someone grabbed her arm and pulled her-Why are people always pulling me?-to a table, not very far from the new family's table. Hermione looked up at her snatcher and glared at the man.
"Let me go Malfoy!" Hermione snapped, wrenching her arm out of the younger Malfoy's grasp. He glanced back at her, pulled out a chair and sat down in the one next to it.
"This is our table," he said, spreading a pale green and white striped napkin over his lap. When he looked up again, Hermione was still standing, looking back at the table, namely her father.
Lord Granger was engrossed in in his new wife, kissing her fingers, smiling indulgently, looking as if he didn't have a care in the world. Hermione felt as if her mother had just died again. Her father was in a completely different world again, where she didn't exist. This time however, there would be no father-daughter moment to make everything better, if only for a short while. This time she wouldn't cry.
"Aren't you going to sit down, Miss Granger?" Malfoy asked her. Hermione sat in the seat he pulled out for her. People who were in the wedding train, but unimportant, were seated at this table. Shameful. Hermione nodded to them in greeting. She'd been forced to spend time with them, practicing for this glorious wedding, but they rarely spoke.
"So how'd you end up here, Miss Granger?" Theodore Nott asked. "Shouldn't you be up there with the happy new family?"
Hermione glared hotly, but ignored his question otherwise, settling her napkin on her lap. Pucey leaned back stretching his arms above his head. "Well, the Black Widow strikes again," he said chuckling.
Hermione smiled, only for a moment. I thought I was the only one with that name for her. She looked around at her tablemates. Malfoy and Nott were the sons of dukes; Pucey was a marquis. They all had the aristocratic features of royals, all very handsome. Her only problem with them was that they would gladly call her a mudblood and would always assume she was an idiot.
Unbeknownst to Hermione, while she was observing her acquaintances, Draco Malfoy was observing her. Is this the chit father was talking about? He wondered. Yeah she's something to look at but-the thought trailed off. He looked at the Greengrass sisters on top of the dais, enjoying their new family. She was not at their level. They were downright gorgeous. Pureblooded beauties with no title. Granger was a mudblood, which posed a problem. They didn't disgust him, like they did his father, but they were not his favorites. She was pretty though: chocolate hair, big almond-shaped honey eyes, breast larger than the Greengrass sisters, hips and waist wider than theirs, but everything evened out by height. She really was a beauty, but she didn't seem to have anything that set her apart.
Hermione felt eyes on her; Draco Malfoy was staring intently at her. "Did you need something, Malfoy?" Hermione asked. She couldn't help but hate him thanks to his father. "I'm sure your father can bribe whatever it is you want out of someone. It shouldn't be too, hard."
To say Draco was surprised would have been an understatement. What did I do? Draco wondered bewilderedly. "I don't need anything from you Miss Granger."
"The kitten can scratch!" Pucey laughed. Hermione glared at him.
"Don't call me that, Pucey!" Why am I so angry? Hermione wondered. She took a deep breath and put her hands on the table. "Look, I don't particularly like you and you all don't like me. We don't have to be friends, but I'd like to be civil."
"You're the one that started this, kitten," Adrian pointed out. Hermione glared hard at him.
"Stop calling me that, Pucey!" Hermione growled. Pucey simply smiled at her. She huffed and stared at the food that appeared on her plate: blackened salmon on a bed of rice with asparagus drizzled in orange sauce. She began to eat and everyone else followed her suit in silence.
Hermione's only blessing all throughout dinner was a deliciously decadent chocolate soufflé. It was perfect in every way, the outside nice and crusty sprinkled with powdered sugar, raspberry syrup checkered across the top. She nearly cried when two strawberries appeared on the plate. The chocolate provided a well appreciated respite from the wedding and Hermione tucked into it with gusto. She even went so far as to wipe the left over chocolate ooze from the plate and suck it off her finger.
Again she was oblivious to someone's hot stare. Theodore Nott couldn't take his eyes off her. He wanted her; he'd have her.
When most people were finished with their desserts, and the cake had been cut and passed out, the band struck up a slow song for the first dance as husband and wife. Soon other couples joined them on the floor. Hermione watched in annoyance as her father held her stepmother close. Nott and Pucey stood and went to the table together, inviting the sisters they escorted to dance. Two songs passed with the band playing, raucous laughter, and Hermione's bad mood. It had been lightened by the chocolate, but her heart ached when she looked at her father.
Draco pushing back his chair with a loud screech startled her out of her bleak reverie. He held his hand out to her. "May I have this dance, Miss Granger?" Hermione stared at the hand offered to her then up at the owner of the hand. Just beyond him, Duke Malfoy smirked knowingly. Nothing left echoed in Hermione's head. She took it.
Malfoy was a superb dancer, smooth and graceful a considerate dancer. Together, they waltzed around other couples, gliding as if on air. Hermione saw Madame Greengrass-Lady Granger (she must remember to call her Lady Greengrass) watching their progress with a glint in her eye. Hermione wondered what she was thinking.
"I suppose my father has already spoken to you?" Draco asked lowly, his head bowed above her ear so no one else would hear. His voice made her shiver, not like his father's did however, neither like the cold. It was something else.
"Yes, he has," Hermione said shortly. 'I guess you are going to re-make the offer, correct?"
"It is obvious that neither of us are amenable to a marriage, but it mightn't be all that-"
"All that bad? Of course it will be! I don't know you at all! I most certainly don't want to sleep with you!
"That's just what an arranged marriage entails-"
"I don't care! I don't want to marry you!"
"Will you-!" he shouted, then lowered his voice. "Will you just listen for a moment? I understand that the thought of marriage may frighten you and that the way my father proposed it was not at all ideal, but maybe we could learn to like each other, mutual respect at the least."
"Why are you interested in a mudblood anyways?" Hermione interrupted him. "Doesn't it make you sick to hold me this close, much less marry me? Lay with me? Sire my children? Aren't you worried about sullying your bloodline? You all make me sick." Hermione glared up at him-My goodness he's tall-and dared him to defend himself. How could he defend himself?
Throughout her rant, Malfoy's hand tightened on her back and his lips tightened into a thin line. "I thought I would try and be nice and civil thinking you'd respond better to that than whatever cheap fear tactic my father use, but obviously I was wrong. You see your father now don't you? Besotted with that murderous whore, isn't he? He won't be here for much longer and I will soon be your only choice. Oh and let me clear this up for you Miss Granger: father is the supremacist. I may have been taught the ideals, but I am old enough to make my own way. My father's ideas are not mine."
He left Hermione at the edge of the dance floor and stalked away. "Oh," was all she could say. She had not expected him to react like that. She had expected him to agree with her coolly, sardonically and then continue on with his request. Instead he'd shown that he had more backbone than she thought. He could be cruel, too. Her back ached where he'd grasped her. Hermione watched him part the sea of party goers until he left the tent. Oddly enough, she felt a bit bad, not sorry, but something bad.
"Oh don't worry dear," Lady Granger's honeyed voice said beside her. "He'll be back." Hermione glanced at her, then glanced away. She had to be civil, but not kind.
"I trust you are doing well then, Lady Granger?" Hermione inquired evenly.
"Don't be so cold, Hermione dear!" she exclaimed mirthfully. "Give you new mummy a hug, won't you?" She held her arms out to Hermione who looked at her dolefully. Somehow the "come on" motion she made did not feel motherly to Hermione.
"I'm sorry, I don't want to wrinkle my dress," Hermione said declining. Lady Granger put her arms down.
"Well, I take it you don't like me, Hermione, but shouldn't we get along for your father's sake?"
"My father's sake? My father's sake! The only thing of my father's that you care for is his money!" Hermione started to walk away, trying to get away from the Black Widow, but she followed.
"Now that's not a fair assessment, Hermione, and you know that. I thought you were friends with those naïve altruistic Gryffindors. You should know something about fairness, correct?" Her voice turned taunting. "Come on Hermione, dear can't we play nice? I promise not to make your life too terrible!"
"Go away!" Hermione shouted. They were leaving the pavilion now going further into the garden.
Seeing as you're a mudblood and all I should make you a servant. A personal one maybe? But even in his drugged state, your father might not allow that."
"You drugged him?" Hermione asked, suddenly scared for her father. She turned on the spider of a woman. "You did do something to him! What did you give him?"
"Yes I drugged him, but all that won't matter soon. You can't trace it to me, can't prove it to anyone. Besides who will believe you, a mudblood? And still, that leaves me wondering: what do I do with you? The Malfoy boy seems to have his eye on you, but why? You are most definitely not worth their time, or their money-"
"Quit your idiotic rambling and tell me what you did to my father!" Hermione screamed, shoving the woman.
Quick as a flash, Lady Granger had her wand out silencing Hermione. "Merlin! Why any man would want to marry you I don't know! No civility and you talk somuch! Young Mr. Malfoy should be talking to my daughters. I'm sure Daphne can fulfill even his wildest dreams of what a witch should be. Much better than a mudblood." She paused and looked at Hermione, smiling cruelly. "Why don't you stay out here a while, Hermione? Let the fresh air ease your ailing head. My, my but you are a sickly child."
"Azalea!" her father yelled from the pavilion. "Azalea my dear! Where are you?"
"Your father's calling." She giggled and wiggled her fingers at Hermione. "Ta-ta for now. Yes Daniel love? I'm coming."
She may as well have skipped off, leaving Hermione silent and fuming. That bitch! That murdering whore! She ranted in her head. She was up to something, feeding her father some sort of strong untraceable love potion. People may not believe her, but Hermione was sure she would be able to prove her treachery beyond a doubt and get her punished for her crimes. Until then, Hermione would just have to wait and do something she did best: study. How many different love potions could there possibly be?