Halloween Mix-Up

Halloween Mix-Up

by: Tassana Burrfoot





Chapter Twenty-Six: Let Me Apologize...







Hermione continued wearing the ring while they packed and got ready to leave for Hogwarts. Once they were packed, she and Draco took turns showering and dressing. She decided to wear the cloak Lucius and Narcissa had given her for Christmas. Regardless of what Lucius had done, Hermione knew Narcissa could not be blamed.



Now, they were standing at the entrance to the manor. Lucius wasn\'t around, but Narcissa was giving her son a teary-eyed hug. "Oh, darling, couldn\'t you stay for dinner?" she nearly begged.



Draco shook his head. "I\'m sorry, Mother," he said, trying to carefully push her off of him without offending her. "Hermione and I both have things we need to finish at school and really cannot delay any longer."



The older woman sighed, "You will at least write to me?"



The boy smiled and nodded. "A flock of Hungarian Horntails couldn\'t stop me," he assured her.



"Thank you so much for the cloak, Mrs. Malfoy," Hermione added as she held her hand out for the woman to shake.



Narcissa didn\'t shake the girl\'s hand. Instead, she bent forward a bit and placed a side-kiss on each of Hermione\'s cheeks. "That is how we properly bid each other fare well," she told the girl. She glanced back at Draco. "Your father is in his study and I implore you to say goodbye to him."



Draco shook his head. "I\'d really rather not," he replied.



Hermione took a deep sigh. She really didn\'t want to either, but... "I\'ll tell him you said \'goodbye,\'" she said as she walked towards the study.



To her relief, neither Draco nor Narcissa followed her. She knew why Draco didn\'t. Draco knew this was something she had to do. One more obstacle she had to overcome. As for Narcissa? Well, as of right now, the woman thought Hermione was her soon-to-be daughter-in-law. Hermione rolled her eyes.



When she approached the study, she saw the door was open. However, out of precaution, she knocked anyway.



"You may enter, Miss Granger," his voice came from behind his desk.



He wasn\'t looking up at her from his paperwork, but she figured being the master of the house, he knew where pretty much everyone was at all times. She approached his desk, but said nothing to him. Instead, she waited for him to speak first.



He did not look at her as he began, "If you think I\'m going to apologize for last night, you are sadly mistaken. I very seldom apologize for anything."



"Which is how you got yourself locked away in Azkaban," she retorted.



That made him look up, though there was no malice in his eyes. There was amusement. "Quite the contrary," he told her. "I actually had apologized during my trial. Several times, in fact."



"Sometimes, it takes more than an apology to be forgiven," she bit.



He nodded as he stood up and walked around the desk. He did not miss her two steps back. "I will not do anything to you, Miss Granger," he assured her, leaning against the front of his desk. He crossed his legs at the ankles and folded his arms. "Of the four of us last night, three of us are adults. You and I both know this. At any given time, you could have pulled out, yet you didn\'t. Therefore, there is no need for me to apologize."



"Three of us? Oh, right. Draco\'s only sixteen," she commented. "So, that means that not only did you engage in incest, but you engaged in incest with a minor."



He raised an eyebrow. "Actually, I had no intention of doing anything with my son," he replied. "If you remember correctly, after you and I had sex, Severus and I had backed away. You and Draco approached us... Not that it matters. I did not engage in incest at all. Neither Draco nor I touched one another. The focus, for all three of us, was you."



Hermione felt her cheeks turn red and she quickly turned away. "I don\'t know what happened last night," she said, staring pointedly at the wall. "I wasn\'t myself. However, you were. The spell didn\'t affect you. You and I both know this. Yet, you acted as though it had."



Though she couldn\'t see him, she knew he had shrugged. "Perhaps," he said nonchalant. "Or, perhaps it had."



She wheeled on him. "You doubt what you and Narcissa share?" she questioned.



He looked thoughtful for a few minutes before answering. "No, I do not," he answered in length. "But, I do think there may be more to that spell than what that book says. I love Narcissa. I\'ve loved her since the moment I met her. But, I do feel a strong pull towards you. Whether it\'s the spell or my imaginings, I am not entirely sure. I suppose I thought that by having sex with you, I\'d be able to answer that question, but I was mistaken. I still feel that pull."



"It\'s your imaginings," she confirmed, though she wasn\'t entirely sure of that assumption. And she knew he knew.



"I take it you like that cloak?" he asked, suddenly changing the subject.



She looked down at the beautiful red cloak and nodded. "Though, by rights, I probably shouldn\'t accept it."



"Nonsense," he sneered. "It was a gift and to decline is to insult. Besides, my wife and I had bought that before last night\'s... incident. Not to mention, it would hurt Narcissa, considering how much time and effort we put in trying to find you the perfect gift."



She was both shocked and curious as she glanced up at him. "Why go through so much trouble for a Mudblood?" she asked.



Again, he shrugged. "We didn\'t know Draco\'s interest in you was due to a spell. Even now, I don\'t believe it. I know my son well. Whatever he is feeling now, while may be enhanced by the spell, the spell did not cause it. When he showed his mother the ring he had bought for you, we both knew he was serious. We may not like you, but, believe me, Miss Granger, we love our son. And we will do anything to make him happy. Even if it means accepting a... Muggle-born into the family."



That was where they had ended the conversation. Hermione had bid him farewell and met back up with Narcissa and Draco at the entrance.



(II) (II)





The trip back to Hogwarts had been uneventful. Hermione read the book her parents had bought her while Draco flipped through a magazine about the Magpies. Once they reached the castle, they had gone to her apartment and unpacked their belongings.



A couple hours later, Hermione was lying on the sofa. It felt great to be back in familiar surroundings. Being at Malfoy Manor had unnerved her. Especially when they had seen Lucius there. It was all made worse by what had happened the night before.



Draco sat in one of the armchairs, sipping a butterbeer and looking into the fire. "So, what did my father say?" he finally asked.



She shrugged lazily. "He didn\'t apologize. And he said he wasn\'t going to. He didn\'t think apologizing was necessary since neither of us backed out of it. In his mind, he didn\'t force anything as long as we didn\'t say no."



"Hmm," Draco commented. "Well, I suppose he has a point. We didn\'t exactly tell him not to."



"It\'s over now," she sighed. "All we have to do is wait until Valentine\'s Day and then, perhaps, we can get back to some form of normalcy. I miss being the insufferable know-it-all."



He chuckled, "You still are the insufferable know-it-all, trust me. Only, this time, you\'re adored for it."



She snorted, "One; \'trust\' and \'Draco Malfoy\' should never go in the same sentence. And two; there are certain people I wish didn\'t adore me for it."



"Like who?"



"Snape, to begin with," she pointed out. "I mean, it\'s nice to not be picked on in class, but I miss the old Snape a bit. He was more challenging. More snarky. And then there\'s Blaise and that little group. You and I both know that, under normal circumstances, they never would have apologized for their actions."



Draco huffed as he sat up. "Goes to show what you know. Not all Slytherins are like the Dark Lord, Hermione. Some of us do know what remorse is."



"I didn\'t mean..."



"I know what you meant," he interrupted her. "I spent the first five years here at Hogwarts tormenting you and your friends. I spent this past summer wondering how in the world I was going to get you to forgive me so I could ask you out."



"You were going to ask me out?" she asked, sitting up and staring at him in surprise. "Draco Malfoy was going to ask out Hermione Granger… Not likely."



He pointed to her hand. "I bought that ring shortly before school started in Diagon Alley. If you don\'t believe me, look at the box. The jeweler is the most premier and most popular, but they do not have a store in Hogsmeade. Not to mention, you have to custom order the jewelry. After I had bought the ring, I went ahead and bought you the entire set from the same place."



She blinked several times. "Oh," was all she could say as she gazed down at the ring in a whole new light.



He had bought the ring before the spell? Before school? He was actually telling the truth. He had wanted to ask her out. Draco Malfoy had wanted to ask out Hermione Granger!



"What had changed your mind about me?" she asked after a short period of silence.



He tilted his head slightly as he thought about the question. "I think I just got tired of denying it. I\'d always felt something for you, but I always shrugged it off. You were Muggle-born and I was a pureblood. I couldn\'t get mixed with the likes of you. So, I hid behind this cover of disliking you."



"I think it\'s common for Slytherins to hide behind masks," she commented softly.



He shrugged. "I suppose it is," he agreed. "Our House mascot is a snake. We\'re cunning and clever. We rely on stealth and ambition to get what we want. It\'s sneaky, and not always a good thing, but we survive... for the most part."



She looked up at him, taking in his blonde hair and silver eyes. She had always known he was handsome, but had never allowed herself to admit it. This year, she was seeing an entirely different person from the boy she had known. While she had at first blamed it on the spell, now she wasn\'t so sure.



That\'s when she realized, she wasn\'t looking at a boy anymore. Somewhere between the end of last year and the beginning of this year, Draco Malfoy had become a man. Even though he was only sixteen, he carried no boyish immaturity. At least, not enough to still be considered a boy. He liked to have fun just like everyone else, but unlike most boys his age, Draco knew when to quit.



She remembered what her mother used to tell her about boys. "When boys are young and girls are icky, boys will poke fun at the girls they like. They\'ll call her names and pull her pigtails. They throw mud pies at her and make her cry. But, when a boy becomes a man, he realizes that the girl he\'s always taunted is really the woman he would rather spend the rest of his life with. He, then, makes it a point to spend the rest of his life trying to prove to her how much he loves her.



"Of course, we women, being the fairer of the sexes and more in tuned to emotions, already know the truth. It\'s an emotional bond we build with the boy from the moment we first lay eyes on him. You can always tell, even if you don\'t realize it."



Hermione\'s eyebrows furrowed. Was Draco, now turned man, the boy her mother had mentioned? Or was it someone else?



Hermione touch her hand to her head. She had a headache from all these revelations. And worse, she didn\'t know where to go with it all. "I think I\'m going to head off to bed. I\'m really tired and it\'s been a long day."



He nodded, but didn\'t comment. He watched her get up and bid her a goodnight. It wasn\'t for another three hours before he joined her. By then, she was already in pajamas and fast asleep.



Draco stripped down to his boxers and climbed into the bed next to her. Glancing down at her petite form, he smiled. As he wrapped his arms around her, he sent a silent prayer up to the gods: Please, let me be the one.

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Author\'s Note: Sorry for keeping ya\'ll waiting for so long for this chapter! I\'ve been sick for the past week and hardly able to do anything, much less write. I meant to make this chapter much longer, but I like the way it ended. Don\'t worry, I\'ll be bringing everything up to speed before Valentine\'s Day. I already know what I\'m writing and all of you are going to love it! But... I\'m not telling...



Lucius is such a dick, but he\'s sooooo much fun.