I hope our story has a happier ending

this is when it starts

It's weeks since the second task, and all of them are filled with pent up rage, for all different reasons.

Draco and Fleur are both still simmering over the endangering of non-champions—Fleur smiled sweetly and is pretending bygones are bygones, as women so often must.

(but really she's just waiting, biding her time until she can destroy them from within. They've let down their guard enough that it won't even be hard.)

And Hermione only grows more and more lethally angry with every morning paper.

They laughed about her apparent tryst with Harry, the love triangle of a power hungry fifteen year old—Viktor's best friend Sasha had framed the article after laughing for an hour straight, before adhering it above his best friend's bed with a long-term sticking charm.

(Not permanent, he'd assured Viktor—because otherwise how would he re-hang it in Viktor's flat after graduation?)

Which—the things that Rita writes are ridiculous, but they're also slander of minors, it's unacceptable on a moral level, and Hermione just knows there's something sketchy about it.

(She just has to figure out what that is.)

/

She's with Ginny in the library one day when Blaise stops over to say hi—upon seeing Ginny, though, he takes a seat, looks at her with concern.

"How are you doing?"

Ginny shifts in her seat, "Fine, thanks."

It's clearly a lie; Hermione knows her friend well enough to know something has been bothering her, but she's not sure what, and has been trying to give the redhead space for whenever she wants to talk about it.

But Blaise doesn't let it go—frowns when Ginny doesn't meet his eyes. "I can't imagine what you're feeling, right now—the second task, and them holding students hostage like it's a joke, after what you went through..." He swallows heavily. "It's fucked up. Disgusting of them. I—don't know the right words, but—I just wanted to mention it. Let you know I see it, and you."

Ginny's neck snaps upward, her eyes wide with surprise. "I—" she takes a deep breath, hope in her eyes. "God, yes, thank you. It's been killing me," she confesses in a whisper.

Hermione's heart breaks, because really, it hadn't even crossed her mind how parallel the situations were; how much it must hurt for the worst time of Ginny's life to be deemed acceptable entertainment.

"It's put me back a lot, in terms of—recovery. I just...merlin, it was hell. And they just—commodified it. Thought it was funny to kidnap an eleven year old girl and hold her down there for sport, for a test of champions when she wasn't even a part of it all..." Ginny shudders.

(It's an all too familiar story.)

"It's shitty of them to have done. Not that they've ever done anything right, especially considering everything that happened was on their watch, but—this is especially fucked up." Blaise gives a soft smile half-heartedly. "If you need anything, or—someone to talk to, or anything, I'm around."

"I—thanks." Ginny watches him carefully, expression pensive.

(There are bags under his eyes, his normally clean-shaven face covered in stubble—for someone usually so put together, he looks like he's having a rough time.)

After he leaves, Ginny leans her head on Hermione's shoulder with a sigh.

"Sorry you've been going through this alone." Hermione says the words so quietly they're nearly inaudible, reaching a hand to gently stroke the other girl's hair.