poison ✞ dramione

part two

_
they hadn't even made it to the feast before the trouble started up.

hermione stood flanking ginny' left side, harry on his redheaded girlfriends right, when they heard the argument behind them. they had been waiting for a carriage and they had kindly let the other years go first.

"you shouldn't be here!" an irish accent all but shouted. "you're a filthy death eater."

"mmm, okay. i don't care," drawled a familiar aristocratic voice. hermione turned around and watched the scene unfold.

seamus stood, all red-faced and clenched fists, glaring at malfoy with such hatred. however malfoy just leaned against a lamppost inspecting his perfect nails for imaginary dirt, not even paying the short irish man any sort of attention in the slightest. she frowned.

seamus turned purple. "you shouldn't be here," he sneered, pointing at malfoy's chest. "you should be rotting in azkaban!"

malfoy shrugged carelessly. "then by all means, chain me up and take me to the ministry. tell them to their faces that they made a mistake. go ahead—no ones stopping you, little man."

dean grabbed seamus' elbow. "he's not worth it, seamus. let's go."

seamus glared harshly at malfoy but he let dean drag him away. malfoy just watched seamus leave with a tiny smirk and a raised eyebrow. hermione knew that look—it was one of the many he made at his trial. he didn't care at all what people thought of him.

"okay," ginny muttered, turning away from malfoy. "he's creeping me the hell out. let's hop onto this carriage."

hermione nodded. harry jumped onto it, ginny following close after then hermione at last. all three ignored the thestral pulling the carriage and instead talked about the 'new' lesson all of the seventh and eighth years were supposed to take. not much was mentioned besides that it was an absolute must and you couldn't move on if you hadn't passed it.

"it's got to be some sort of defence class," harry argued.

"we already have dada!" ginny exclaimed. "i think it has something to do with charms. there are so many that one teacher can't possible teach us the necessary ones!"

"i personally think it has something to do with life after hogwarts," hermione said, flicking through the textbook. "but i could be wrong."

harry huffed and leaned back. "when are you ever wrong, hermione?"

she smiled at that.

_
when the three of them walked in, she tensed up.

but she didn't have to considering nothing changed—no one quieted down, no one turned to whisper about them, no one seemed to care. and she was grateful for that.

the three joined neville at the gryffindor table, dean and seamus sitting opposite. harry squeezed in between seamus and dean, giving both of them a cheerful smile. "hello, boys. long time no see!"

seamus grinned at harry, clapping him in the back. "we saw each other—when?"

"i think it was at the beginning of the summer?" dean supplied, shooting ginny and hermione a quick smile. "i'm not sure."

neville grinned widely at all of them. "this year is going to be great, i can already tell. say, why didn't ron return?"

ginny answered. "he wanted to stay back with the family—with george. someone had to be with him and mum nor dad were in the right state of mind."

"he's helping out in the joke shop," hermione also supplied, patiently waiting for mcgonagall to start her speech. "and then he said he might join the auror department."