A/N: Thank you so much for your reviews, favorites and follows after last chapter! Huge thanks to lanamarymack for alpha/beta reading this chapter, too :) You can find me on tumblr (nauticalparamour) where I post sneak peeks, story updates and answer questions.
Please let me know what you thought of chapter twenty-one and be on the lookout for chapter twenty-two soon!
Spring arrived and thawed the Hogwarts grounds faster than Hermione anticipated. She felt like she'd barely blinked her eyes and, yet, she'd nearly been living in the past for a whole year. She felt a pang in her chest when she thought about the friends that she'd left behind. Merlin, she missed Harry and Ron so much.
She was pleased with how things had settled, though much of it was unexpected. Regulus was invaluable as her brother and friend. He'd done such a good job of taking her under his wing, when he really didn't have to. She was so pleased that she had him as she was sure she would have found herself hopeless adrift without his counsel. The girls in Slytherin were lovely friends as well, most notably Mallory and Elvira. And even some of Regulus's friends were sweet to her, too — Ansel, Angus, and of course, Rabastan.
Rabastan...
Sighing, she looked up at the wizard who made her feel more conflicted than anyone she'd ever known. He was nothing like she would have expected him to be like. The wizard she'd known in her proper time, who was haggard from Azkaban, with a cruel smirk and a dangerous wand. The Rabastan that she'd come to know was smart and witty and yes, she could even admit, attractive.
She wondered what had happened to him that could have made him so evil? After all, you'd have to be evil to do something like use the Cruciatus Curse on someone — an Auror no less — until they were driven past the brink of insanity. To listen to their screams and cries and keep going, keep hurting them.
Hermione wished that she knew more about the circumstances of what happened to Neville's parents. It had always been a taboo subject, even though Neville was her friend, and she had never bothered to look into it too deeply. She knew that Rodolphus and Bellatrix were there and Barty Crouch, Jr, too. The event was only a few years off in the future. Rabastan would barely be older than twenty.
She speculated that maybe he had just gotten caught up in something that he wasn't expecting. He must have become a Death Eater at a young age, like Regulus, before he really understood what it was that he was committing himself to. Maybe he felt the weight of familial pressure and caved, following in his brother's footsteps. She could supply a hundred maybes, anything to give some plausible reason for why Reabastan would do something so horrid. A hundred maybes to ignore what was the most likely reason of all. That he believed the shite that Voldemort was preaching.
She couldn't be naive. All of the Slytherins had a casual sort of relationship with dark magic. There was no hand wringing about using dangerous hexes or curses — as she'd seen with Regulus and Bernard's duel. It was something that their families actively taught, they didn't see it as a big deal. So, why would they be bothered about the kinds of depravities that Voldemort was into, so long as they were getting something useful out of it in the end? If it meant purebloods enjoyed an elevated social status?
Unbidden, her eyes found Rabastan from across the greenhouse, laughing with Angus. It was still early spring, but the greenhouses were always warm, with the sunlight streaming in the glass, and Rabastan had ditched his cloak and rolled up the sleeves of his uniform shirt up past his elbows. Now that they were in NEWT level Herbology, they were able to work with tricky Devil's Snare and Professor Sprout had them replanting cuttings of the dangerous plant.
Their work long since completed, Rabastan and Angus were toying with their plant. Hermione felt her mouth go a bit dry as she watched Rabastan offer up his finger, letting the leaves tangle around it, before using a lumos to be released from the meager grip. She couldn't say that it was the first time that she'd been distracted by Rabastan's hands — and the assorted questions that they inspired — but it was the first time that she'd been caught.
Maybe he was able to feel her gaze boring a hole into him, but Rabastan turned to look in her direction and caught her eye. Hermione immediately felt her cheeks go pink, embarrassed that she'd been gawking so obviously. She didn't even want to consider what the odd flip-flop her stomach made meant when he gave her a crooked smile.
He whispered something to Angus and wiped his dirty hands down the sides of his trousers and then he was crossing the greenhouse so that he could come and speak with her. Hermione felt her heart skip a beat and tried desperately to return her attention to her own pot in front of her. She had not completed her work yet, having gotten too distracted in her daydreams.
Rabastan came to stand beside her, his height blocking out the sun and depriving her of its warmth. It was a welcome change — she already felt like the sun had gone to her head. "Hermione," he said, in greeting. "Are you doing alright? You look flushed."
Hermione knew that her blush only deepened and she felt a twist of embarrassment that he'd caught her staring. And now he was here to tease her for it, apparently. "Just... too much sun," she said, patting down the dirt in her pot. "Thank you for asking."
"'Course," Rabastan answered, leaning back against her work bench. He looked her over, with a hint of a smirk on his face and she could not tell if it was malicious or well meaning. "Do you want any help with your Devil's Snare? It's a shame we can't all have Angus for a partner. I swear, he's got the greenest thumb I've ever known."
She was not sure what to say, biting her lower lip. Hermione was very used to being the best in most of her classes, but she was having trouble focusing on that particular day. Maybe a helping hand would be welcome. "Sure," she agreed. "I actually had a friend once who might give Angus a run for his money. Neville." She smiled, thinking about her good friend and she was overcome with a pang of melancholy, remembering how much she missed him. All of them.
"Boyfriend?" Rabastan asked, curiously.
"No," Hermione answered, scrunching up her nose. Maybe she could have ended up with Neville if she'd remained in the future, but at the time, she'd been too concerned with Ron Weasley. Now, that crush felt childish and silly and she wondered how she'd been so enamored with him in the first place. It wasn't that she didn't miss Ron, too, just... it felt so obvious now that they were ill suited to one another.
"He must have been special. You almost never talk about anything... anything before you came to Hogwarts," he said, keeping his own eyes focused on the task in front of him, though Hermione could see the set of his jaw.
She laughed. "I don't like talking about it," she explained, even though she knew that it wasn't the explanation that he probably wanted. "Not a lot of happy memories before I came to Hogwarts, I'm afraid." That wasn't exactly true. It wasn't as if she didn't have any happy memories from before, just that they were too painful to think about, when all of her friends were so hopelessly out of reach.
Rabastan turned to look at her, a soft look in his blue-green eyes. Really, a wizard such as him should not be allowed to have such beautiful eyes, she thought to herself. "Sorry, I didn't mean to upset you," he said, in a rush. "I guess, you just make me curious."
"Curious?" Hermione repeated, drawing her eyebrows together in surprise.
"Yeah," he agreed, giving her another smile. "Like, where did you learn to duel like that?"
"Um, I'm not really sure what you are talking about," she demurred. It wasn't like she had done anything special. She'd just used the basic spells that they all learned in Defense Against the Dark Arts.
"When you fought with Bernie," Rabastan said, pointedly.
Hermione immediately hushed him, looking around to make sure that no one had overheard him. The last thing that she wanted was for one of the Professors or a student in another class to figure things out and report her. She didn't want to face Headmaster Dumbledore. And, she didn't want to think of what Orion and Walburga would make of it either. "Don't talk about that so loud," she scolded him.
Rabastan smirked at her. "Don't worry," he said, leaning in closer to her, his voice dropping an octave. "No one is paying attention to us."
She looked around and saw that he was right. Everyone was so focused on their own plants and Professor Sprout was trying to help one of the Hufflepuffs who'd managed to get more fully snared by his plant. She let herself relax a little.
"So, are you going to tell me?" he repeated. "How you learned to duel like that?"
"Oh, it's nothing... I just pay attention a lot in Defense," she lied. If he thought that her dueling was good, then he would probably be blown away by Harry, who'd face Voldemort multiple times as a teenager.
He chuckled and shook his head. "No, I've never seen anyone duel like that in Defense. It was impressive — almost instinctual," he continued. "You even cast wordlessly, once. I haven't seen any of our classmates do that in a non-academic setting."
"It wasn't that special," Hermione promised, though she could feel a grin threatening on her face. She bit her lip to keep from smiling at his praise. She always loved to be recognized. "I just... didn't think about it."
"You must have practiced somewhere in your past," he said. "But, I understand... you are trying to keep it to yourself. Trying to keep yourself mysterious and interesting."
"Rabastan!" she said, somewhat amused at the accusation. "I promise I'm not that interesting, I just... I don't really want to talk about it." There was no way that she could tell him the truth and she didn't fancy trying to come up with some sort of lie to tell him either. Then, she would have to keep track of it and there was always the worry that she said something wrong — something that the Blacks wouldn't be happy with.
"Unhappy memories," he said, nodding, realizing that he needed to back off. "I guess I shouldn't be too surprised, considering your family. All the witches in your family are very formidable. Bellatrix is as quick on the draw as you are, but not half as graceful."
"Please don't compare me to Bellatrix," she whined, wondering if he spent much time with her cousin. Perhaps considering that she would be his future sister-in-law, it shouldn't be too much of a surprise if he did. Maybe she was the whole reason he became a Death Eater in the first place. Or could it be his family?
"I'm just trying to pay you a compliment, Hermione," he said, sounding halfway between exasperated and amused. "Can't you just say 'thank you, Rabastan,' you stubborn witch?"
Hermione gasped, but then laughed. Yes, she supposed he was being unusually sweet. Even in all the time that they spent in the library together, he didn't usually hand out compliments. They were well matched in academics, though she was better. But, it wasn't like spending time with Harry and Ron either. "Thank you, Rabastan," she said, giving him a fond smile.
And, she felt her breath catch in her throat when she realized that she had grown fond of the wizard over the months that she'd known him. Maybe that's why knowing what future awaited him hurt so much. Because surely, at some point, there would be a time when she could no longer tolerate him if he really did become a Death Eater. And she didn't want to give up Rabastan Lestrange.
Angus was joining them moments later, snapping her out of the strange way she was feeling about her classmate. Pleased to be done with her Devil's Snare, Hermione labeled her pot and left it on the table, grabbing her bag from under the bench so they could walk back to the castle together.
"Hermione, wait," Rabastan said, pulling her back around to face him. He was staring down at her, his eyes roving back and forth. He brought a hand up to cup the side of her face. Hermione could feel her heart hammering away in her chest and she wondered what he was doing. Was he going to try to kiss her? Her eyelids fluttered shut and she wasn't sure what she was even thinking.
But the press of his lips never came to hers. Instead, his thumb gently swiped across the bridge of her nose. "Sorry, you just had a little dirt on your nose," he said. Her eyes snapped back open. He looked sheepish and unsure and he dropped his hand from her face, as though she had burned him, before he strode purposefully away after Angus, leaving her behind.
A blush blossomed on her cheeks and the hot sting of embarrassment twisted in her stomach. What the hell had she been thinking?