Hermione got to breakfast early (considering she'd been up before dawn), and to her surprise, Blaise was already there, along with a scattering of other Slytherins and Ravenclaws. He leapt to his feet, his eyes flicking over to see Viktor nearby as they came in.

"Hermione," he said. "Come with me? I need to talk to you."

His tone seemed tense, urgent, and Hermione found herself almost alarmed.

"Yes, of course," she said. She glanced at Viktor. "Be right back."

Viktor waved her off, giving her a knowing, mischievous grin, and Hermione rolled her eyes but smirked, quickly following Blaise out of the Great Hall. He pulled her aside to sit on a bench, his eyes meeting hers.

"Fleur Delacour asked me to the ball this morning," Blaise told her, direct and to the point. "She was waiting outside the Slytherin dorms this morning."

"Oh!" Hermione felt a small thrill at the idea of Fleur waiting there for her, before it was immediately replaced with a soft sadness of that impossibility and the knowledge that she'd been there for Blaise. "Well, that's nice. Did you say yes?"

Blaise looked her over, examining, and Hermione just looked back. She didn't know what he seemed to be looking for.

"I asked if I could get back to her," he said finally. "If she would wait a bit for an answer."

Hermione made a face. "That's not very nice, to leave her hanging like that."

"I wanted to talk to you, first," Blaise told her pointedly. "Would you be okay with me going with her?"

"You don't need my permission to date, Blaise," Hermione said, frowning. "You've never asked before—"

"She's your girlfriend," Blaise said impatiently, giving her a sharp look. "And even if you couldn't go with her, seeing her go with me is its own pit of pythons."

Hermione sighed.

"I can't go with her," she admitted. "She and I—we talked about this before, the chances with Madame Maxime… she told me she wanted to ask you – you don't fall prey to her allure somehow…"

"And you would be okay with that?" Blaise asked, searching her eyes. "If I went with her instead?"

"Instead of me? Yes, of course," Hermione said, puzzled. "I just said that – I can't go with her—"

Blaise sighed.

"Not with her," he said. "Instead of me going with you."

Hermione blinked, biting her lip.

"I—I'm already going with someone," she said. "Viktor—"

"Yes, I guessed as much," Blaise said wryly. "But—if you and Fleur discussed this beforehand, her asking me, you'd know she was going to ask me, so you wouldn't have really considered me as an option."

Hermione raised her eyebrows. "And…?"

"And if she didn't," Blaise said. "If she wanted to ask someone else – Roger Davies, I don't know, anyone – would you have gone with me?"

Blaise's eyes held hers steadily. It felt like Hermione was holding her breath, though she wasn't – an odd tension tightening her chest, one she didn't like.

"As a friend?" Hermione asked quietly. "Or as more?"

Blaise raised an eyebrow.

"Does it matter?" he murmured. "Does the label we put on it matter so much to you?"

Her heart thumped traitorously.

"Maybe it does," she said. "Maybe I don't want to ruin the friendship we have."

"Ruin it?" He looked genuinely puzzled. "Hermione, how would—"

"Like if we started dating and we broke up," Hermione said, all in a rush. "It would make things weird, then. And—I don't want that. I don't."

Blaise's eyes widened, but Hermione rushed on.

"I don't know what it would be like after, and I can't think about it," she said, not looking at him. "Things would be weird between us, and I'd find myself not telling you everything anymore, trying to be careful of your feelings or just out of awkwardness. And then our friendship would end up strained, and we'd drift apart, and then—then—I mean, even if you'd still be in the Shadows, you wouldn't be—you'd probably move away from Official Advisor or whatever, and I—"

"You don't want to lose me as a friend," Blaise finished, his voice quiet. "You're worried I'd leave, even though I promised to always be by your side."

"Right," Hermione said, looking down. "I—I can't risk that, Blaise. You mean too much to me. You're one of my best friends."

"You realize," Blaise drawled, a note of humor in his voice, "the solution to all this would simply be to never break up?"

"Blaise!" Hermione said, shoving him a bit. "I'm fifteen! You're fourteen!"

Blaise laughed. He shook his head ruefully, his intensity from the moment before dissipating.

"Fair enough," he said amicably. He stood up, offering her his hand. "So you're okay if I take Fleur to the ball?"

"So long as you promise to be a good date and show her a good time," Hermione told him seriously, taking his hand and standing, and Blaise grinned.

"I think I can manage that."


The differences between the different Houses were highlighted that day, when Professor McGonagall, almost as an afterthought, told the fourth year Gryffindors about the Ball at the end of Transfiguration, snapping at Harry and Ron to pay attention before telling the class, "I have something to say to you all." Hermione had been asked no less than three times by that point (Viktor, Draco, and Anthony), and Tracey had been formally asked by Adrian too. Daphne had quickly been secured as a date by Cassius Warrington (whom Daphne wouldn't shut up about at breakfast), and even Pansy had been asked by a sixth year, though she turned him down.

From Harry's panicked look, he genuinely hadn't known there was a ball, or it'd entirely slipped his mind.

"I have to get a date," Harry bemoaned to Hermione after class. Professor McGonagall had held him back to give him more details, while Hermione waited near the door. "The champions have to open the dancing with their partners, which means I need a partner—"

"You'll be fine," Hermione assured him. "You just beat a dragon."

"So?" Harry said. "Not like many girls put 'can defeat a dragon' on their list for 'ideal boyfriend'."

Hermione laughed.

"Well, if nothing else, the whole school saw you in your skivvies," she told him, smirking. "So girls at least know if they like that."

Harry's face turned a bright red, and he groaned.

"Will you come with me?" he asked her. "That'd be so much easier – we can just go together, and it won't be this whole big deal—"

"Nope, can't," Hermione said, popping the 'P'. "Already been asked. Sorry."

Harry seemed bewildered. "Really? By who?"

"Not your business," Hermione said, smirking. "But Harry, if you're worried about it being weird, just ask someone you know. Like Luna."

"Luna?" Harry blinked. "Why would Luna want to go with me?"

"Harry…" Hermione rolled her eyes, withholding a groan. "You need to work on your self-esteem. There are lots of girls who would enjoy your company and be happy to go with you." She sighed. "If nothing else, realize that Luna's a 3rd year. She won't get to go at all unless someone older asks her."

"Oh! That's a good point," Harry said, nodding. He looked thoughtful for a moment, his bright green eyes cutting over to Hermione abruptly. "Luna's very pretty. Do you think someone else might have asked her already?"

"I don't know," Hermione said patiently. "Maybe. If you want to ask her, you might want to hunt her down before lunch."

A determined expression crossed Harry's face and he nodded, and it was all Hermione had not to smirk or laugh outright as she bid him goodbye and made her way to Herbology.


By dinner, all the Shadows had dates.

"Harry's going with Luna, and Theo asked Susan to go with him," Tracey told Hermione, ticking people off on her fingers. "Draco asked Pansy, after you turned him down, and she said yes, so they're taken care of, and Millie's going with Geoffrey Hooper."

"The werewolf Gryffindor who got mauled?" Hermione asked, incredulous. "I thought she didn't want a date."

"She apparently heard him bemoaning to his friends that he'd never get a date, that girls didn't actually like cool scars, and she walked right up to him and asked him to go with her." Tracey snickered, smirking. "Daphne's scandalized, but who cares? And then I've got Adrian Pucey, with maybe Ron Weasley as a backup, so that's us all."

"Ron Weasley?" Hermione said, aghast. "Why would you go with Ron Weasley?"

"I dunno," Tracey said, shrugging. "I wouldn't. Harry mentioned Ron sort of fancied me but would probably never get up the nerve to ask me to go with him, so if things with Adrian fell through, he could probably be my backup date."

"Are things with Adrian going to fall through?" Hermione asked Tracey directly, curious, and Tracey bit her lip.

"Well," she said, shrugging. "I guess that remains to be seen."

Hermione looked sideways at Tracey, but Tracey clearly didn't want to discuss the matter any further, and she was all too happy to drop the topic entirely as the Durmstrang contingent arrived to join them for dinner to focus on flirting with one of the Russian boys instead.

"So? Was I right?" Viktor asked Hermione as he took a seat next to her.

Hermione blinked. "Right about what?"

"Many people asking you to ball today," Viktor told her, eyes sparkling. "How many people asked you?"

Hermione bit her lip, considering. Blaise didn't really count, as he'd only been posing hypotheticals, but Harry's pitying plea after Transfiguration probably did count…

"Including you? Five," she said, and Viktor grinned widely.

"See?" he told her, nudging her affectionately. "Every boy want to go with pretty witch."

"Well, how many times did you get asked?" Hermione asked pointedly, and Viktor's ears turned red.

"Twelve," he admitted. He scowled. "Girls I not know, even. They just want to go with famous Quidditch player."

"That certainly beats my five," Hermione commented, amused, and Viktor's melancholy vanished as he looked at Hermione, his eyes lightening.

"It does," he told her solemnly. "Is good I was prepared and asked you early this morning so I not say 'yes' to one of the twelve. You were not prepared, yes?"

"If you're asking if I was planning on asking you to the ball," Hermione said acidly, folding her arms as her cheeks turned pink, "that answer is 'no'."

"Ah," Viktor said, nodding wisely. "You are very bad at planning to date me, Hermione. You must to work on getting better."

Hermione laughed and pushed him playfully, and he grinned and shoved her back, before asking her to pass the bread rolls. Discussion moved away from the ball to what everyone else was planning on doing after classes were over. Viktor's answer of 'swimming lessons' got a few side-eyes, but it was Alexei's answer of 'ghost hunting' that drew the most conversation. Durmstrang didn't have ghosts haunting their school, and Alexei wanted to find the school ghosts and talk to them all. He seemed fascinated by the idea and was openly jealous of all the ghosts Hogwarts had, while Durmstrang had none.

Somehow, Hermione was unsurprised. The cold and cutthroat school didn't seem like a place anyone would want to stay after death.

"I want to go down to Exmoor at some point," Theo said, looking at Hermione. "Ideally with Longbottom, too. I want to check on how things are going, and I've got another idea I want to try."

"We can do that," Hermione said, nodded. "We could do that this Saturday, if you won't be busy preparing for exams?"

Theo gave Hermione a curt look, and Hermione grinned.

"Just asking," she said lightly. "We'll plan on leaving just after lunch."