The Gloriana Set

Notorious

"She can't be pulling the leash very hard if he's shagging Lavender," Hermione pointed out.

Ginny was frowning. "I just can't see it, Malfoy and Lavender." She sighed. "I should have been here for you."

Hermione pulled the redhead into a hug. "No, no, none of this was your fault. How did your talk with Harry go yesterday?"

Ginny's face was downcast. "He met someone else, but you already know that."

"Yes."

"We took a walk around the lake and it was fucking awful. Harry was all mature and noble and understanding. When I mentioned Blaise ..." Ginny choked. "It was obvious I'd shagged him, I mean, my face was so hot. I couldn't even look at Harry, and when I finally did, his mouth was doing that thing ..."

Hermione nodded. She knew that look, when Harry folded his lips into a grim line, from an injury or hurt feelings, and was trying to hide it.

"Then he starts acting like my father." Her roommate eerily mimicked Harry's serious auror voice: 'People are not always what they seem, Ginny ...'"

Ginny sighed. "It's just ... I loved Harry for so long. I don't know how I feel now, but it doesn't matter, really." She looked at Hermione. "You're meeting him today, aren't you?"

Hermione nodded. "I'm leaving for Diagon Alley after breakfast."

"Now I just have Blaise," Ginny sighed. "And I have no clue how I feel about him. I feel like it could crash and burn just like you and Malfoy."

"There wasn't enough of us to crash and burn," Hermione said earnestly. "It's just not going to happen. I'm with Theo now. I like being with him. Even if Malfoy isn't engaged to Astoria and isn't shagging Lavender, it doesn't matter. The whole thing was ridiculous. He's a Malfoy. I'm a muggle-born. There's no future there. We could never be real. We are Potions partners and that's it."

***

The Daily Prophet's Sunday edition arrived at breakfast, with owls dropping thick wads of parchment on people's heads and plates. Hermione was still cleaning pumpkin juice off her smeared paper when Ginny nudged her.

"Hermione," she said, shoving another folded copy at her.

"MAGICAL VIRUS INFECTS AZKABAN," Hermione read. "Look, Ginny, there's a sickness running through the prison. It seems that many inmates are weak and vulnerable after years with Dementors ..."

"Not there." Ginny rolled her eyes. "The real news." She unfolded the top half. "Look."

Hermione bent her head over the parchment again. There on the front page, under the headline "WAR HEROINE IN LOVE TRYST WITH DEATH EATER'S SON" was a picture of Hermione and Theo at The Spangled Veil the night before. She sat in shock, watching the two of them kiss lightly over the table again and again. "Rita Skeeter," she murmured.

She read on: "During a lovely meal at Hogsmeade's hottest new restaurant, The Spangled Veil, this reporter was shocked to see war heroine Hermione Granger enter with none other than Theodore Nott, son of infamous Death Eater Ignatius Nott who was executed by the Wizengamot in August for murder, assault and conspiracy. (See SCANDAL, page 17.)"

Hermione riffled through the pages. "Granger, 19, right-hand woman to Harry Potter, The Boy Who Lived, and a major combatant in the Battle of Hogwarts, has returned to her alma mater to finish her education. Undoubtedly that is where she took up with Nott, 18, who spent the war overseas and only returned once the fighting was over.

"Granger is well-known for her generosity of spirit, and it looks like the handsome Slytherin's charms may have overcome the judgment of the Brightest Witch of Her Age. Only months ago we expected wedding bells between Granger and fellow war hero Ronald Weasley, and now she is seen canoodling with a rival House.