Over lunch, rumors were running wild. Pansy still hadn't returned from Madam Pomfrey's, and the gossip was flying.
"I'm telling you, she's a vampire!" Tracey insisted, her eyes wide. "Blood that's alive isn't that color – only dead blood is!"
"Dead blood?" Millie said skeptically, and Tracey blushed.
"I- I've gotten my cycle," she said. "The blood that comes out then is darker, and dead. Pansy's blood looked like that."
Tracey had gotten her period, Hermione noted absently. She still had to look into that – and probably should do it soon. If she did the math, and it turned out the optimal time to start her own had already passed…
"It's pretty clear that Pansy's part troll," Blaise said, his eyes sparkling. "Green and red would make a really dark color – they're opposites. Part green for troll, part red for human."
Hermione didn't participate in the conversation, choosing instead to focus on her food and on not letting a smile slip across her lips as she eavesdropped.
"…so of course she wouldn't tell anyone that her grandmother was actually-"
"My grandmother was a what, Zabini?"
Pansy's voice cracked across the table like a whip, and the gossip stopped, everyone turning to look at Pansy.
Pansy had a large bandage over her arm, but otherwise seemed fine. Her hands were on her hips, and she was glaring. Tracey cowered slightly behind Hermione.
Blaise, to his credit, didn't flinch.
"A troll, Pansy," he told her. "We were theorizing that your grandmother was a troll."
Pansy sniffed and pushed her way onto the bench in her usual seat next to Draco.
"That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard in my life," she dismissed. "Everyone knows my grandmother."
"Your alleged grandmother," Blaise baited. "It's entirely possible that your grandmother was infertile, your grandfather sired a child on a troll, and then they claimed the baby as the Parkinson heir."
Pansy shot him a nasty look, and Blaise looked triumphant.
"There is nothing wrong with my blood," Pansy snapped. "After Madame Pomfrey helped me out, my blood was the normal color again."
The matron must have cast a Finite Incantatum, Hermione mused. It made sense – best not to start healing spells without making sure you were dealing with a clean slate.
"Whatever weird sap was on that plant must have caused my blood to look weird, is all," Pansy sniffed.
"You cut yourself with the trimmers though, didn't you Pansy?" Hermione said quietly. "Your cut wasn't from the plant."
The table fell silent, their classmates looking between the two.
Pansy sneered at Hermione. "There must have been sap on the trimmers, then."
"How interesting," Hermione mused. She turned to Goyle. "I believe you got cut with your trimmers as well during class."
Goyle looked at her stupidly, before comprehending and nodding.
"Yeah," he agreed. "Twice."
"And what color was your blood…?"
Goyle looked at Pansy, then looked back to Hermione.
"Normal," he grunted. "Bright red. Human."
Hermione let her eyes drift back over to Pansy, who was flushed with anger.
"We'll test it right now, then," Pansy challenged. "We'll both cut ourselves, Granger. We'll see who has the normal blood."
"A brave proposal," Hermione said. "However…"
She let the word linger on the air, and her classmates leaned closer.
"…you've been gone for quite a while, haven't you?" Hermione suggested. "Who's to say you haven't found some illusion to make your blood look normal?"
Pansy's face went an unflattering shade of mottled red with rage.
"It's only when it's truly unexpected that we can see the truth of what something is," Hermione continued. "That's why the Ministry does random audits, random inspections. And when your blood was randomly tested, it came up… lacking."
"I do not have dirty blood!" Pansy yelled.
The rest of the Slytherin table fell silent, even the 7th years looking down the table to see Pansy kneeling on her seat, glaring at Hermione.
Hermione raised her eyebrows.
"Dear me, Pansy," she said, her voice slightly mocking. "I don't believe I said a word about your blood being dirty. I just said it was different." She paused, tilting her head. "I wonder why you were thinking we thought your blood was dirty…? Guilty conscience, perhaps...?"
Pansy glared at her, before grabbing her things and angrily storming off from the lunch table. Hermione allowed a small smirk to curl at the sides of her lips – that was a forfeit in a battle of wits if there ever was one.
After Pansy left, conversation gradually returned. Theo and Blaise were discussing Pansy quietly, as were Millie, Tracey, and even Daphne. Hermione contented herself with eavesdropping and enjoying her lunch. The food tasted richer today, for some reason – sweeter, better.
As she looked up to claim a roll, her eyes met Draco's, and she paused.
Draco's eyes were boring into her. He'd clearly waited for her to look up to make eye contact. She waited, before Draco finally raised a questioning eyebrow.
Hermione raised her own eyebrow in return, allowing a small smirk to curl around her lips. Let him make of that what he would.
Draco's own eyes widened, before he jerked his head, nodding once, decisively, and returning to his own lunch and interrupting Goyle to correct him on some trivial matter.
Hermione wondered if she'd just confirmed Draco's suspicions, somehow, or if he just thought her mean. It was well known that she and Pansy didn't get along – of course Hermione would take advantage of Pansy's accident in such a way.
Still, though. Hermione got the feeling that somehow, Draco knew she was to blame for Pansy's odd blood appearance, though there was absolutely no way he could know how it had been done.