The Family Jewels

Chapter 13
Party Foul

Draco was indeed waiting for Hermione outside of Dumbledore’s office. He was leaning against the wall, flipping through the pages of the diary, catching words here and there, but overall, just making himself angry that he couldn’t read it.

She studied his profile as she walked toward him. His hair was longer than it had been when they were children, and now she knew that it was whisper soft and silky. When she reached him, she took the book and closed it. “Are you okay with what just happened up there?” she asked softly, searching his face.

“Why shouldn’t I be? Just because I have proof that, at the age of 17, my father refused the jewels that would have tied him to my mother for life. Their marriage was arranged from when they were small children, you know. A merger of the Malfoy and Black Pureblood families,” he spat.

She moved closer to him slowly, not wanting to do anything to increase his anger. He looked up and saw the slight fear in her eyes, and was instantly contrite. He held his arms out to her and hugged her to him. ‘She’s so small,’ he thought, ‘why don’t you notice her size unless you’re right up against her?’

Surreptitiously, Hermione checked her watch, 8:10. “Let’s go leave this book in our dorms, I thought you might want to walk out by the lake to finish our ‘talk’,” she said smiling.

That got Draco’s attention, “Forget the book, I’ll just put it in my pocket.” He took her hand and tried to lead her to the staircase to the first floor.

“Draco, that is an irreplaceable part of your family history, and you’ve finally got it in your hands, now you want to shove it in your pocket?” she asked from underneath her lashes.

“Fine, fine, we’ll drop it off, but let’s hurry,” Draco said, still holding her hand but turning in the other direction and walking quickly to their rooms. He gave the password, and then started to climb through the portrait hole.

“SURPRISE!!” was yelled at him by at least 40 people. Most were Slytherins, but there were quite a few people from the other houses, mostly 7th Years. Blaise was leaning against the wall smiling, outside of the crush of people, but Draco’s eyes found his anyway. An almost imperceptible nod was given by Draco and returned by Blaise, followed by a wide smile.

Hermione climbed through as well, trying to stay in the background. She went and stood next to Blaise, but wasn’t sure if she should touch him at all. Harry and Ron knew about them, but she wasn’t sure if anyone in Slytherin did. He smiled at her and gave her fingers a quick squeeze. “I think shots are in order,” he said loudly, walking to a table and picking up a tray of small paper cups. Hermione noticed that there were two trays, one with pink shots, and the other with blue. “Can you get the other tray, Hermione,” indicating the tray of pink shots. Blaise said quietly, “Make sure all the girls take one, it’s a powerful contraceptive, thank Merlin alcohol doesn’t render it ineffective.”

For a moment she was stunned, thinking back to this afternoon. She didn’t remember Blaise casting the contraceptive charm. “It will cover you for about 24 hours before and about 48 after,” he whispered in her ear, seeing that she had gotten white as a sheet. “I was joking about you having my first born child, remember?”

“Do you always think of everything?” Hermione wanted to know.

“It’s not my first time.”

“Yes, that much was quite obvious.” He just raised his eyebrows at that.

“So, what’s in the blue shots, then?” Hermione asked.

“Wouldn’t you like to know,” Blaise said with a wicked smirk.

The Slytherin girls all quickly took a shot cup, and in an obviously rehearsed move, held their cups up to make a toast. They said together, “Here’s to the men we love. Here’s to the men who love us. But the men we love don’t love us, so fuck the men and here’s to us.”

The Slytherin boys took their blue shots from Blaise, raised their cups and said, “Here’s to being single, sleeping double, and seeing triple.” They all downed their shots.

Blaise whispered into Draco’s ear, “Maybe we should change that to seeing double and sleeping triple.” Both Draco and Blaise turned to study Hermione, who was passing the tray around the party to all the girls. “Now that would be a birthday present to remember,” Draco said.

Harry, Ron and Ginny were all holding their small cups dubiously, when Blaise walked up to them. “I didn’t poison those you know.” They looked a little sheepish, and then drained the contents of their cups. “I know it must be kind of strange for you, being at a Slytherin party, but I can assure you, you are welcome here.”

Harry looked Blaise in the eye, “Thanks. You’re not such a bad guy…for a Slytherin.”

“Thanks. I think,” Blaise laughed before moving on to check on the food. Blaise looked over the items on the large table pushed against one wall. There was the magnificent Weekend Cake, as well as trays of antipasto and at least five different cheeses and thin slices of grilled bread to go with them. There was a small bar set up in the corner, and he could see that Theo Nott and Miles Bletchley were playing bartender. ‘That’s just so they can talk to all the girls who want drinks,’ Blaise thought.

Blaise was watching everyone, was quite good at judging what was happening around him actually. He noticed that quite a few girls were kissing Draco on the mouth, ‘just birthday kisses,’ thought Blaise with a shrug, but it was making Hermione look rather hurt. Blaise was fairly certain that she had never been to a party like this one before. She would have no way of knowing that she was lucky that everyone was still fully clothed. He knew Draco thought nothing of accepting kisses from the girls at the party. He had shagged most of them sometime in the past. In Slytherin, anything could occur during a party, and that it was only who you left with that counted. He highly doubted these same rules applied in Gryffindor. ‘Maybe I should go shower attention on her,’ Blaise thought.

He walked up to where she was talking to Michael Corner from Ravenclaw, and very subtly let his hand rest in the small of her back. Hermione didn’t do anything but smile and move a little closer to him. That was all it took. Blaise had made sure that both Parvati Patil and Lavender Brown had seen his gesture, and Hermione’s reaction.

Draco had seen what Blaise had done as well. He knew they needed to take baby steps, but it hurt that Blaise could be so open about being with her, and he had to pretend that he was just nice to her because they were the Head students this year and needed to be an example to the rest of the school.

He needed another drink, fast. Pansy came up to him and slid her hands into his back pockets, underneath his robe, pushing her chest against his. “So did you get what you wanted for your birthday?” she purred at him.

“Not yet,” he said, not realizing she was going to take that as an open invitation. Draco had been drinking fairly heavily, and was planning on getting quite drunk, if the way he felt right now was an indicator.

Blaise stepped into Draco’s path right after he saw him start over to the bar for another drink. “Draco, can I give you my present before we sing and cut the cake? In your room, perhaps, so we have a bit of privacy?”

Draco knew what a huge amount of trouble Blaise had gone to; no one had ever thrown him a surprise party before. “Sure, Blaise, this was all so great of you, and Hermione, too.” They walked up the stairs to Draco’s room, and Zabini put up his usual locking and silencing spells. Hermione felt a wave of magic hit her, and she thought, ‘This can’t be good. What’s wrong?’

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Blaise leaned against the Draco’s door and looked at his best friend, who had flung himself down on the bed as if the world was crashing down around him. “Draco, I thought this party would make you happy. I can throw everyone out, if that’s what you want. Is this about the meeting you had in Dumbledore’s office? What did your Grandfather leave you?”

“You’re just full of questions, tonight, aren’t you Zabini? This has nothing to do with that meeting or what my Grandfather left me. You touched her, Blaise, in front of everyone.” Blaise could hear the pain in his friend’s voice, so he didn’t explode the way he wanted to.

“I put my arm around Hermione; I didn’t shag her into the carpet. What’s really wrong?”

“That’s just it, you weren’t trying to put the moves on her, you were claiming her. The way I want to. I guess I’m just frustrated at the situation. I didn’t know it would be so hard.” Draco sounded defeated.

Blaise was trying to understand. So he did what he always did, he asked questions until the situation was clear to them both. “Why can’t you claim Hermione?”

“You mean beside the fact that you just did? That would ruin her reputation in a heartbeat. Not only is she Slytherin property, she’s being passed around to any Slytherin who wants some, just get in line,” Draco said bitterly.

“The only reason I did that was because I saw the hurt and jealousy on her face when just about every female out there kissed you on the mouth to wish you a happy birthday. I know it didn’t mean anything. You know. She doesn’t.”

This brought Draco upright. “Merlin, Blaise, did I fuck up with her again? Twice in the same day, that must be a record, even for me.”

“No, I think you have some leeway. But have you even talked to her since you walked in here? If we’re going to ease people into seeing us together, there’s no time like the present. Glaring at her across the room isn’t helping.” Blaise held his hand out to Draco and pulled him off the bed. “Now get out there, give no one any reason to think you’re not the most charming mother fucker on the face of the earth, keep your lips and your hands to yourself, cut down on the alcohol and flirt with the witch you are in love with. And for Merlin’s sake, keep away from Pansy before she crawls up to you and starts sucking your cock.”

“Is that an order?” Draco couldn’t resist smirking.

“Yes, it’s an order,” Blaise said, “Or I won’t be getting any tonight either.”

“Okay then,” Draco said releasing the wards and opening the door, “Let’s go enjoy my party.”

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Hermione had her heart on her sleeve when Draco and Blaise walked out of the bedroom, looking much more relaxed than they had when they walked in. Both of them caught her eye and gave her almost identical winks. She had to laugh, and both of them came over to talk to her.

Blaise stayed until both Hermione and Draco were involved in conversation, and then left to play host. He went over to a group of people sitting around a low table and started a game of Rochester. Almost all of the Quidditch players at the party were sitting there, and he asked several more of the girls to play the dice game until there were no more seats. He (very easily) persuaded quite a few of the guys to offer their laps so that more people could play. He matched up already established couples, and then matched up people he thought would be good together. Pansy was deposited on the lap of Ron Weasley, and neither actually seemed that unhappy about it, Michael Corner with Lavender Brown, Miles Bletchley with Parvati Patil. ‘Well that will keep them drunk and happy for a while,’ he thought, moving on to the next group.

Blaise moved around the room, getting people more drinks, keeping an eye on Draco and Hermione, who were playing ‘Head Girl and Boy throw a party’. He found himself being amused, when he probably should have been jealous. There seemed to be quite a bit of badly disguised groping and whispering going on at the Rochester game.

Finally, Blaise judged that it was time for cake. He caught Draco’s eye, cut the music and snatched up the dice. He did drink for the party foul, but then he asked if everyone could gather at the table to sing and then have cake.

Blaise lit the candles with a wave of his wand, and they all sang ‘Happy Birthday’ to Draco. He actually looked happy as he blew out the candles in one breath. Draco turned and looked into the eyes of the petite witch next to him, and Blaise was certain what he had wished for.

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A/N – Please refer to previous author note, I am a tease.

Raquedan- Women who say they are not attracted to inappropriate men are just fooling themselves.

Morgana – No M. Positive.

Fallenrose – Thank you for your kind words. I have been reading your story for some time. It’s wonderful.

Dreamweaver – I would have noticed if you spelled it wrong, I think.