Moonlight is silvering the corridor, heightening the sense of cold. Hermione is never patient when she wants desperately to be in bed with a book and when her toes, nose and fingers are chilled and the rest of her is hot from walking. “Ten points from Slytherin.”
“Whatever for, Granger?”
She takes a swallow of the frigid air in surprise and outrage as he strides over to join them.
“Don’t question me, Malfoy. But to enlighten you, this girl called me a Mudblood. And I only asked why she was out of bed at this hour.”
“Astoria, go to bed.”
“But Draco--”
“I’ll take care of her.”
With a last glare at Hermione, the Slytherin girl-- Astoria-- turns on her heel and stomps away, chin thrust into the air.
“Wait,” says Draco. “Come back here!” The girl obeys with annoying alacrity. Draco taps his wand on her head and Astoria disappears.
“Just how many Slytherins are currently walking out of bounds Disillusioned? And you’ll take care of me?” Hermione bursts out, indignant and furious and wanting to slap him. He has insulted her authority, not to mention dismissed the very real insult his housemate has done her and even treated the matter as if it’s Hermione at fault.
“Think that much of yourself, do you?” he replies. “I meant Daphne, Astoria’s older sister. Daphne’s the only other girl in our year aside from you who came back. To look after Ria.”
“She doesn’t need looking after,” said Hermione acerbically. She’s having a hard time reining in her temper. Especially with the way he’s looking at her. She can’t understand this arrogant sod. Only yesterday on the train, he has been so pleasant. And now, Hermione can almost hear the snarl of ‘filthy little Mudblood’ in the air. “You haven’t answered my question. And don’t you ever do that again, Malfoy.”
“Do what again? Slytherins look out for their own because no one else would. You have the nerve to deduct ten points from Ria for calling you a Mudblood when Slytherins are being called worse everyday. The teachers seem to never catch anyone, or maybe they’re turning a blind eye. You and the Head Boy are neither of you Slytherins and when the Slytherin prefects dole out detention, everyone else retaliates. It’s a vicious cycle. So if little Ria or anyone else decides to take it out on you at night with nothing more than a word and you swell like a self-righteous toad, yes, I’ll challenge you again, Granger. And to enlighten you, Ria’s out here because Daphne happens to be in detention with Professor McGonagall. From before the holidays, no Slytherin out alone at night has ever made it back to the dungeons untouched. Whoever Disillusioned Astoria simply messed up. She and the others in her rotation were supposed to be hidden and finally catch who’s been maltreating us. Yes, gasp and sputter all you want. It’s the truth. Not that I care if you believe it or not, Mudblood.”
There it is. She’s been expecting it, hasn’t she? But the unfamiliar anguish that has suddenly come with the epithet, she hasn’t. So she stands there stunned as he whirls around and leaves her without another word.
“Besides that big row you obviously had that made you not only split up but also split us up like we’re a bunch of bananas, did you two always fight?” said Lia.
Hermione laughed. Draco didn’t.
“Actually, we didn’t, did we?” he said.
“We didn’t?” she said.
Callie and Lia twisted their heads right and left to follow the volley of conversation.
“Except when I’m in a snit. Or you’re in a snit. Or that time you really scared the sh-- life out of me by threatening to squeal about my less than fanatical love for the Dark Lord. All those years, it’s been your dogs I always baited, not you.”
“My dogs, as you insist on calling them, you great sod, weren’t there during my seventh year at Hogwarts.”
“Oh, that time. I was in a snit. And you took care to heap flaming coals on my head, remember?”
“What happened?” asked Callie.
At that moment, a tinkling of bells interrupted the racket of the birds outside and the lulling sound of the surf. All four people lounging on the bed jumped in surprise. The chime had come from downstairs.
“Merlin’s dentures, I thought they’re gone,” said Draco. “That’s Pietro and Pierra’s dinner bell. Breakfast is ready. And if we aren’t downstairs in ten minutes at most, they’ll replace the food with boiled socks. Take my word for it.”
Lia dragged Callie off the bed and they ran out the door and downstairs as if chased by irate bowtruckles. All four of them had slept soundly for six hours. It was now past lunch time in England. They were all starving.
Hermione swung her legs over the side of the bed and then paused. It was all very well last night with only Draco and the girls seeing her, but now with strangers in the house the matter of clothes became even more pressing. The problem with Transfiguring clothes was that it took a practiced eye to perform it well. You had to determine exactly which part of the material goes where, not to mention the laws of which fabric was expandable or Transfigurable to which other fabric. If it was so easy, Madam Malkin’s, Gladrags and other tailors and haberdashers would be out of business. And even if one could Transfigure clothes with expertise, the alteration was permanent and Hermione was very fond of this nightgown and she would regret turning it into a sensible--
A light cotton and silk kimono fell on her shoulders.
“You can borrow that to nip outside to the other bedroom. You can take your pick in my mother’s wardrobe.”
“Thank you, no.”
“I knew you’d say that,” said Draco, echoing her words from last night. “Well then, you can wear that robe or borrow one of my shirts and stay here while I shop for you and the girls after breakfast.” He chuckled. “Fancy all three of you running around here in your night clothes. I wonder what Pierra would say.”
Hermione stood up and belted the kimono securely around her waist. It was obviously Draco’s; the shoulders were far too big for her. “Are they husband and wife? And you said they’re Squibs?”
“Brother and sister,” he said as he opened a dresser and donned trousers. “As old as sea turtles. The Blacks have an estate in the mainland along the Belize River--”
“The mainland?” Hermione accepted the hairbrush he handed her and began to attack her hair. “You mean we’re in one of the cayes?”
“The Ambergris Caye. It’s beautiful. I suppose that’s why we’re here instead of the mainland even though the house there has house-elves. This one was a wedding present to my parents. Pietro and Pierra came with it. Everything has been tried to expel them because the Blacks were Blacks and preferred elves to people who challenged commands. We don’t even know for sure if Pietro and Pierra are Squibs. We only concluded that because they’re resistant to Muggle-repelling charms, they don’t bat an eye when we use our wands and there’s something magical in their cooking. You’ll see.”
He opened the door for them and followed her through.
Hermione caught her breath.
To her left, the door leading to the balcony facing the sea had been propped open. The surf and wind sang though it. In front and below her past the railing of the loft’s balcony, the living area was awash in light. The blinds had been rolled up from the picture windows and one panel of glass was slid to the side, so that the fronds of the potted palms swayed invitingly in the breeze coming in from the ocean. The terra cotta tiles gleamed. The rattan chairs, loveseats and sofas all matched in design but had varying plump cushions in complementing bright pastels.
It was all so pretty and irresistible. So restful. She couldn’t wait to go down and just curl up over one of the giant pillows on the bamboo rug and feast her eyes on the breathtaking view.
“I see you like it.”
She was so enchanted she just smiled at him in reply. And then her stomach voiced its opinion. Draco smirked and pulled her downstairs to the dining room and kitchen, which it turned out was at the back of the house, facing an endless green lawn bordered by tall palms and dotted here and there by clumps of bushes with large and showy flowers.
Hermione was subtly looking for them but Pietro and Pierra were nowhere to be seen. Callie and Lia were in the kitchen, seated at a small round table near the windows, a table laden with fruits, bangers, eggs, back bacon, mushrooms, black pudding, fried potatoes, grilled tomatoes, toast and a colourful selection of jam and marmalade. Hermione couldn’t stop the bewildered expression on her face and was glad their cooks weren’t present.
“Yeah, Mum, I thought we were in for a Belizean breakfast, too,” said Lia. “And these taste like something Uncles Fred and George rustled up.”
Apparently, Fred and George could cook breakfast quite well, judging by how Lia was shovelling in food. Callie looked only a little less enthusiastic. Hermione looked at Draco.
“I don’t know,” he said, offering her a seat. “Perhaps they wanted to assure you first that they could cook before presenting you with foreign fare.”
Hermione sat down and was struck momentarily mushy by the sight of her two girls together at a breakfast table, still in their sleep apparel, fighting over the pitcher of pulp-free orange juice. And with their father, too, who was bare-chested, for Merlin’s sake. Not that she could talk, because she was in a robe. It looked and felt so normal, so wonderful that its transience caused a twinge in her chest.
“...in the water?”
“What?”
“Well, what else could they be doing if they were all tangled up like that? They were eating each other.”
“What are you talking about?” said Hermione, thumping a coughing Draco on the back. “I didn’t catch that next to last bit.”
“Lia saw a couple making out in the water,” said Callie.
“You saw them first, priss,” said Lia.
“That beach is supposed to be private!” said Draco, outraged.
“That’s probably why they were making out there then,” said Lia.
“What was your question?” said Hermione.
“Can you do it in the water?”
It was so absurd Hermione tried not to laugh. Tried and failed.
“That’s right, ask your mother. She’s an expert. She used to read this book--”
“You don’t know what that book was, you ridiculous man!” Hermione felt like he’d thrown a steaming cup of tea on her face. Would he never let her live that down?
“What book, Mum?”
It was Draco’s turn to laugh.
“It’s nothing,” said Hermione. “And yes, of course, it can be done in the water. Eat your breakfast. By the way, do you girls remember what day it is?”
“Christmas,” said Callie promptly.
Draco exchanged a confused look with Hermione before addressing the twins. “You don’t regret being an ocean apart from your presents?”
“I beg your pardon, but there’s a pile of junk in the sala and can you kindly deal with it in a jiffy so I can clear it away?”
“There you are, Pierra,” said Draco. “Hello to you, too.”
Pierra pursed her lips and glared at Draco in greeting. She was a tiny thing, very spry, the kind who could be anywhere between forty and eighty. Her batik-print blouse and her olive green trousers were loose and floaty. She wore her hair in a long braid draped on her left shoulder. If it wasn’t for her cantankerous expression, she’d look quite sweet. She was probably quite a looker in her day, one of those Hispanic beauties with heavy-lidded grey eyes. If she had an accent, it was expertly hidden.
“Pleased to meet you, Pierra. I’m Hermione Granger. These are Lia and Callie.”
Pierra only nodded impatiently and gestured to the living area.
“We saw everything before we came here to your lovely breakfast and there was no junk there.”
“There is junk there, believe you me. And if none of you sees to it within the next ten seconds, every single thing in that pile goes straight to the trash.”
Hermione poured herself more tea. She didn’t wonder why the Blacks and the Malfoys had tried to expel this woman and her brother, Squib or not. “When we’re done eating breakfast. And that pile had better be untouched, thank you.”
Pierra looked taken aback, and then sniffed and went away.
Draco sniggered. “Miss Bossy doesn’t like bossy people.”
“It’s not that! She was rude.”
“I know. She must be feeling under the weather. Or she can probably tell she’s met her match in you. I’m surprised she didn’t give you a tongue-lashing.”
“Really? And you--and your parents-- take it?”
“To keep the peace. And to keep from being poisoned. I think my parents actually relish the novelty of being bullied. Not to mention Pietro and Pierra kept the Blacks from visiting here. Would you believe Aunt Bella couldn’t even look them in the eye? It won’t surprise me if those two actually came from quality.”
“Just what is the pile of junk in the sala anyway?” Hermione asked the girls.
They grinned, shovelled the last of their food into their mouths and stood up. “Presents!”
Once again, the two scrambled away. Once again, Hermione exchanged a petulant look with Draco.
“Maybe we should send them to Durmstrang. Students have a very spartan lifestyle there. Only emergency letters and parcels are allowed.”
“That’s not a bad idea. You said you were going shopping for us?”
“You can come with me, you know. The girls can gad about here and in the beach. Pierra will look after them. The outfits in my mother’s wardrobe are probably all new anyway. You can borrow one for--”
Hermione was already shaking her head. “I think I’ll spend time with the girls instead. Just don’t get me anything silly, please. I want to be able to gad about as much as anyone.”
They rose from the table. Draco swept her with his eyes from head to bare feet, lingering in places he had no business to linger.
“What are you doing?”
“Measuring.”
Smirking, he left her there to sputter and face Pietro, who looked every bit like Pierra, only with a neat moustache. He even had the same braid also draped on his shoulder. But unlike his sister, he seemed friendlier. He smiled at Hermione before proceeding to clear the table. Of course, Hermione learned quickly that the smile was meant as a dismissal, because when he returned from his trip to the sink to find Hermione still standing there, he scowled and then smiled again, this time with a lift of an eyebrow and a nod toward the living area.
“Well, I’ll go in a moment. I only wanted to introduce myself. I’m Hermione Granger. You must be Pietro. Thank you for the magnificent breakfast.”
The compliment earned her nothing more than a repeat of the scowl-smile-nod routine. Hermione went, arriving just in time to see Draco, now shirted, letting go of Callie, reaching for Lia and kissing her on the forehead. He looked up and sent her a smile that made her quiver all over, from eyelashes to toes. This was bad.
The villa was a stone’s throw away from San Pedro Town and San Pedro Beach. The land had been purchased long before the town was established and the town being established was probably the reason the Blacks so ‘generously’ disposed of the estate. Draco renewed the wards around his property. Muggles and other Wizarding folk could see it, but no one really dared trespass the beach. Not that anyone could even contemplate doing so, especially the Muggles. Draco couldn’t understand how there came to be a display of crass behaviour on his private beach. And right when his girls happened to be enjoying the view.
His girls.
With a smile, he Apparated to the mainland, specifically to a secret cellar of the Bel-Mer Winery. One then climbed the stairs to a door that opened to Belize’s little Wizarding business hub.
The cayes had been too thinly settled and too prone to pirates, so the Wizarding district was founded here, in the Belize District, easily accessible to the gentry who settled along the riverbanks.
Their territory being a tourist centre, shop owners only knew the local people and didn’t bother knowing transients. The task would be too tiring and impossible. Despite owning two estates in the country, Draco and his family were still among the latter set. The anonymity was soothing. Everyone was polite and affable. There were no curious stares. No one here knew he was Draco Malfoy, of the reviled and exiled Malfoys. He was simply a customer. A customer with British Galleons to spend. That he was buying clothes for himself, his ‘wife’ and two young daughters endeared him to the matron of the robe shop. She plied him with soursop ice cream (a Belizean delicacy that always made him thank the deities for their creativeness with fruit) while the two shop girls offered the best merchandise, the best including rather naughty lingerie over which Hermione would have his bollocks, if he bought them.
He did. She had to have her smalls, didn’t she?
The rest of the selections were nice and practical. Nice being the operative word. Madam Lucille had excellent taste. She knew they had to blend in with Muggles but blending in didn’t have to mean being mediocre. She and Draco got on quite splendidly, especially after she offered to imbue one of the nightgowns with certain charms. After all, Belize was one of the most romantic places in the Commonwealth.
What a capital woman.
Draco came home in time for lunch. There was no soul in the house (Did Pietro and Pierra have souls, those grumpy prunes?) and the table was not yet set so he deemed it safe to take his shopping upstairs and look for Hermione and the girls.
Now, Draco had grown up accustomed to beauty. Witness his parents, his grandparents, and even his absolutely batty aunt, who had been a diamond of the first water before her years in Azkaban laid her to waste. Even Pierra wasn’t ugly, to be fair. Purebloods were fastidious creatures and the families Draco came from happened to be among those who had not sacrificed beauty in their genes for the sake of flawless bloodlines. As such, Draco took beauty for granted and was only agitated when it wasn’t present.
She had always been an exception, though. Her beauty he noticed. Brown hair, brown eyes, common blood, and he still noticed. It had irritated him, especially as she insisted on being noticeable, making up for her common colouring with exceptional intellect, her common blood with extraordinary talent.
And now, as though to emphasize the point in Draco’s ruminations, she was wearing his shirt. It stopped a couple inches above her knees. Draco immediately regretted all the clothes he’d just bought for her. And had he really spent a decade and a year away from this... this exasperating goddess? How could he have? He couldn’t even tear his eyes away now, much less think about living an ocean away from her.
He sat down beside her in the sand.
“How was shopping?” she said airily, like she hadn’t just jumped as if one of the coconuts overhead had zipped down and cracked her skull.
“Where were you? It’s not like I was slithering while getting here.”
“Nowhere. Just remembering things.”
Was she already a little bit brown? Sitting in the shade only covered her head. Her legs were bare to the sun. He’d never seen such pretty feet. Not too narrow with an elegant arch. Her toes were all the right size and shape. And those legs. He dragged his eyes back to her face and grinned at her raised eyebrows at his shameless ogling. “What sort of things?”
“Do you tan?”
Draco scowled at not having his question answered. And at her question. “No, Malfoys burn and peel and keep their patrician fairness.”
She rolled her eyes. “Well, you’re the last of your delicate breed. Neither of the girls seems to be turning into lobsters liable to molt. Will you please bellow and call them back?”
“I bellow?”
“What, is the size of your chest all fat instead of lung capacity?”
She blushed at her observation and Draco grinned again. “Did you have fun while I was shopping? Merlin, that’s supposed to be your line, isn’t it?”
“They had fun. I had fun watching. You were away.”
Right. Blast. There was something forlorn in her smile. He couldn’t stop himself from pressing a kiss to her temple. Then he bellowed Callie’s and Lia’s names. They were in the water, of all preposterous things. He doubted the water was warm enough (for people who weren’t making out). He bellowed some more. They splashed and trotted over in matching swimsuits, which were among the presents from their meddling paternal grandparents. Probably bespelled to keep them warm.
“You yelled, sir?” said Lia, and was kicked on the leg by her mother for her cheekiness.
“Lunch,” said Hermione. She stood up and the blessed, blessed shirt climbed several inches on her thighs. Draco tried not to look. Really tried.
Callie and Lia ran ahead, holding hands. Draco was just contemplating to scoop Hermione’s hand as well when Lia spoke over her shoulder. Draco pocketed his hand.
“If Christmas lunch is English food again--”
“You’ll eat it without protest, like a girl with a modicum of manners, thank you,” said Hermione.
“If it’s English food again, we’ll dine out,” said Draco.
“I thought you said you’re in mortal fear of Pietro and Pierra,” said Hermione, scowling at him for countermanding her.
“And they’re in mortal fear of you, so we’re safe.”
They were safer than even Draco had thought possible, it turned out. Pietro and Pierra had not made lunch at all, neither were the two housekeepers in the house.
“Well, it’s Christmas,” said Hermione. “We should be thankful they made us breakfast.”
“I’m not complaining, but this is odd,” said Draco. “Those two never take holidays. They get their holidays the rest of the year we’re not here, don’t they? All right, everyone get dressed. We’re spending the day out.”
The girls ran upstairs. When Hermione made to follow, Draco tossed caution to the wind and grabbed her hand. She didn’t pull away immediately. That was something.
“Where are you going?”
“To get dressed.”
“You look fine.” The smirk came out.
“I do? All right.” She sat down and appeared for all the world as if she was keen on going out and about Belize in nothing but a shirt. That was not on. If only Draco was the only man in Belize. But as it was-- the smirk disappeared.
“Er, no. Not all right.”
“No?” She was already laughing. Maddening woman. Since she still hadn’t relinquished her hand, it was so easy to do what he did. He pulled her back to her feet and flush against him and captured her laughter with a kiss. She quieted and sighed and he made a small pathetic noise meant to relieve the cramp in his chest that resulted from that delicious sigh.
“What is that?” she mumbled against his lips.
“Soursop ice cream,” he mumbled back.
He loved Belize.
Spring sunlight is gilding the corridor, burning his eyes and reflecting the flames eating up his insides at the moment. He recognises the feeling. He has been dosed with it on and off during the past three years. But there's also peace. And gladness. Things which fickle fate and circumstance have stolen from him, now restored. At least for the time being. Of course, fate and circumstance being what they are, he hasn't earned said peace and gladness. He owes them to someone.
She rounds the corner and”what with both of them marching like their shoes are on fire-- walks smack into him.
“I beg your pard-- Malfoy. Well, I don’t. Excuse me--”
Instead of letting her go, he tightens his grasp on her arms and pulls her to a window, the better to see her face. “Yes, of course you’re excused. You can’t seem to help yourself. It’s in your blood, isn’t it, this terrifying passion for what’s right? I just want details. All the Slytherins want details.”
“Do you.” She says that without inflection and without even shaking him off. She simply looks out at the grounds as if the twilight is far more worthy of her attention. It rankles, being dismissed, especially as he knows he deserves it. He’s been an absolute beast to her that night and has never apologised, pretending the incident hasn’t occurred, that he hasn’t betrayed the Slytherins’ affliction to a Gryffindor, of all people. That he has whinged to this particular mulish and bleeding heart Gryffindor is what made him even more beastly about it. He’s ignored her, glared at her, daring her to so much as look at him pityingly.
Of course, she hasn’t. She’s returned his snubbing with interest. It’s made him complacent and relieved, thinking she has tucked the matter beneath her mountainous notes for N.E.W.T.s. revisions.
A week after that fateful night, however, the whispers have begun.
A strange malady has descended on two prefects, something that refused to be eliminated by Madam Pomfrey’s repertoire of healing spells and unguents. Draco has long ago been stripped of his badge, so he has no idea what is happening.
Through the rest of winter, very single prefect has become spotty. The remarkable thing is the facial blisters excluded Slytherin prefects, making suspicion thick as black pudding.
Things have come to a head only this morning, when after several weeks of this strange pox, when spring is finally nudging away winter, the Head Boy arrived at the Great Hall as red and swollen as the sausages. What has happened next was quick and to the point.
“Those party to this prolonged antagonism,” the Headmistress has said, “please step forward and we will be lenient.”
“With all due respect, Professor,” says the Head Girl, rising from the Gryffindor table, “I think leniency is not effective. Hence, the pox.”
You can count on your fingers the number of times the Great Hall has been completely hushed. That morning is added to that small number. The Headmistress, whose eyes have been trained on the Slytherin table, swivelled around with no small surprise.
“Miss Granger, kindly explain yourself.”
“During the first prefects’ meeting after the Yule holidays, foremost in our agenda was the antagonism toward the Slytherins. It has come to my knowledge that Slytherins are being picked on and shunned. There was evidence in the Slytherin prefects’ absence in that very meeting. Either they haven’t been informed, or misinformed outright. Headmistress, each and every prefect in that meeting, including myself and the Head Boy, agreed to observe and improve matters. It seems they haven’t followed through.”
There’s been a collective intake of breath.
“Am I to understand that it’s you who have hexed your fellow students?”
“Well, everyone seems to be forgetting the pox of bigotry. It's no one’s place to persecute. And yet ‘Mudblood’ is being rivalled by new epithets toward the Slytherins. No wonder someone in their number always rises up to attempt genocide--”
“Miss Granger!”
“Never thought I’d see the day. The darling Miss Granger suspended from Head Girl-ship.” Draco slides his hands down her arms and winds his fingers into her palms. He is unconscious of this movement and starts as much as she does when she pulls away. She turns her body to the window, crosses her arms and glares at the deepening dusk. Draco is struck with the humorous idea that if the very air offended her, she will hex it. And if questioned, she will defend and rationalise her actions in a way that would absolve her, no matter how abrasive her methods.
He is also struck by the pertness of her nose, the curl of her lashes and the red in that lip she has so recently bitten. And she’s small. If he tilts his head and eyes straight, he’ll lose sight of her. Yet she stands there like she’s seven feet tall. It’s aggravating and-- and admirable, damn it all to Hades.
He really can adore this little Mudblood.
Who won’t? She has hexed one and all to make a point, a point that isn’t in her interest and has even stripped her of an honour she’s always aspired to. All day, the Slytherins have talked almost of nothing else. The only other thing they discussed is the sudden absence of friction, which is like one of Hagrid’s pumpkins, impossible to miss. Those afflicted with the pox have been healed by Hermione. But though the season of spots have been brought to an end, Hogwarts has been duly chastised.
“Look, Malfoy,” she says through gritted teeth, addressing the window. “Your demand for details will just have to keep. If you have nothing else to say to me, let me be on my way. I need to--”
“Thank you and forgive me and let me do this--”
His arms are already moving, seemingly independently. One moment, they’re where they should be, the next second, they’re around her waist and back and he can feel her chest rising and falling against him. He’s not a stranger to holding a girl, but that’s the first time it felt transporting. In that embrace as he inhaled her maddening inky scent, something is dislodged from him and something cleaves into him at the same time. He feels both buoyant and overwhelmed.
So he buries his face in her hair and holds her tighter.