The Long Lost Zabini

Chapter 7

In eighth year, Hermione had decided to take Alchemy and Arithmancy as her electives, along with the regular mandatory courses of Transfiguration, Charms, Potions, Defence Against the Dark Arts, Astronomy, and Flying Lessons. Herbology and History of Magic were mandatory classes too, but since it was their eighth year, they were excused from whatever classes they wanted to be excused from. This time, she decided to be very wise about her classes and not take every single elective class available, as that had been too much of a hassle for her in third year.

Divination had been a waste of time. Muggle Studies was, too, considering she had grown up a muggle. Back then, Hermione had thought it would be interesting to learn about Muggles through the wizards' perspective. Looking back, all it had done was give her more homework without teaching her anything she didn't already know. She would have taken Care of Magical Creatures, but to be honest, Hagrid was not the best teacher, as learned from third to fifth year. That was why she hadn't taken the class in sixth year either. She adored Hagrid, but teaching was not his strong suit. And she already knew everything from History of Magic and Herbology from reading books, so what was the point?

Alchemy was a class only available to students in their sixth, seventh, and eighth years, and Hermione had ignored the opportunity in sixth. She would not do so again.

She had, for the most part, mastered Ancient Runes and Arithmancy already, but decided that they would still be better electives than the other three options. As she was deciding between Runes and Arithmancy, Hermione was reminded that Runes wouldn't be extremely practical in the future compared to Arithmancy. Therefore, she chose Arithmancy and Alchemy as her two electives.

Draco was looking over both of their schedules to see which classes they had together. As they were both in Slytherin, all their mandatory classes were together. They weren't mandatory anymore in eighth year, but they were all NEWT classes and quite beneficial. Hermione had been surprised to see that they also had Arithmancy together. Draco said that he agreed with her on a practicality standpoint. It opened up many more job opportunities than without it. "Also, my mum wanted me to take it. She's been through so much already that I couldn't disappoint her. I love her, even if you'll never catch me admitting it."

Hermione looked at him and saw his now-softened expression. 'That's so sweet,' she thought.

"What?"

"I didn't say anything."

"Yes you did. You said 'that's so sweet'."

"Oh, I didn't realize I'd said it aloud. But yes, I do think it's really sweet and mature the way you take care of your mum." She reached up on her tip-toes and kissed his cheek.

"Oh. I... um, thank you, I suppose." He looked away. 'Was it something I did? Should I not have kissed him? Oh, I'm so stupid. Ginny was wrong, there really isn't anything between us.'

Meanwhile, Draco was having completely opposite thoughts. 'She kissed me! Does that mean she likes me? Or is it like a sisterly kiss? Is there something between us?' Draco had kissed her in her nightmare, but that was just to break the illusion of the nightmare. It hadn't meant anything. 'But did this mean something?'

"So, let's get to class," they both rushed to say. Hermione giggled. 'What is wrong with me? I never giggle!'

They walked to their first class together, Potions. The eighth year Slytherins had Potions and Defense Against the Dark Arts with the eighth year Gryffindors. They had Transfiguration and Charms with the Ravenclaws, and they had Herbology and History of Magic with the Hufflepuffs. Flying Lessons and Astronomy were all done together this year because the eighth year was so small in numbers that everyone was able to fit onto the large field and into large Astronomy tower.