Alfie looked at her, the faint crease between her eyes that showed she was just as worried about his answer. He could tell that she didn't want to let this moment go either. "I want all of you, Hermione," he said, after a beat of silence. "And I dare anyone to tell me I can't have you."
"Even your father?" she asked, nervous.
"Even my father," he agreed. He was no longer a little boy, who craved approval from his father. He was a grown man, who made his own choices. He could see the person Cantankerous was, more focused on his papers to see what was right in front of him. In fact, he welcomed his father trying to tell him what to do. Alfie wasn't afraid to actually use his magic to throw a punch.
"Even your friends?" she asked, her tongue darting out to wet her lip.
"Even my friends," Alfie confirmed, his large hand sliding along her cheek to delve into her hair, to hold onto her curls.
"Even... even Tom?" she asked, her eyelids already drooping shut.
Alfie stilled for a second, but he already knew the answer. Yes, they had looked to Tom to lead them for so many years now, but if Tom tried to stop him from seeing Hermione at this point, he wouldn't hesitate to tell him where to shove it.
"Even Tom," he whispered, before slanting his lips against hers, finally kissing her again. Hermione made a noise of pure desire, opening her lips to deepen the kiss immediately, her tongue gliding against his in a sensuous, almost indolent motion.
Hermione laughed despite herself. That did sound rather like the wizard. She could just imagine him in his decrepit old house carving each and every one of these. "It's impressive. Very spooky," she said, looking over her shoulder when she heard a branch snap.
Just as she had almost convinced herself that she was overreacting, something darted out of the trees at her. Hermione screamed as she saw the tall, black figure with a jack-o-lantern head stalk towards her, grabbing her around the waist. Her heart was pounding out of her chest, but she reacted without thinking. She had her wand out in the blink of an eye, jinxing the creature far away from her.
Her blood was surging in her ears, but slowly the sounds of the forest filtered back in. And...laughter?
The creature sat up, pulling the pumpkin off of its neck to reveal a laughing Alfie. "Salazar, Hermione, where did you learn to duel?" he asked, standing up, obviously quite pleased with his prank. "I didn't even see you draw your wand."
"Alfie, you thrice-damned son of a bogart!" she growled, pressing a hand to her chest to slow her heart. A grin grew on her face when he took a step closer to her and threw an arm around her waist again. "You're lucky that it was only a Flipendo!"
One Point Perspective — Marcus x Hermione | Complete
Think Twice — Marcus x Hermione | Complete
Sleeper — Theo x Hermione | 9/31
Undercovers — Fenrir x Hermione. Modern AU multi-chapter, expansion on earlier one-shot. It had been an easy decision to join up with the financial crimes division, investigating money laundering and the like. But, she was meant to be kept tucked behind a desk, not trying to infiltrate a notorious gang to help them launder their money. Hermione goes undercover in Fenrir Greyback's gang to catch him doing something illegal, not to catch feelings. | 3/25
Go Away — Lucius x Hermione. Grammar review and move to AO3. Hoping for a December-ish timeframe.
Informants — Fenrir x Hermione. Expansion of one shot and sequel to Undercovers. Ditto as above, hoping for January.
All Too Soon — Salazar x Hermione. My poor neglected WIP. I've recently updated this one, but I have no regular update schedule planned. However, I do now have a better sense of the chapters and so I am hoping updates will be more frequent. I think this one will end up being around nine chapters in total. | 3/x
Tribulations — Alfred Nott x Hermione. AU one-shot set in the Trials Universe where Tom sends Alfie to deal with Hermione, instead of himself.
Pretend to be Nice — Cassius Warrington x Hermione. One-shot where Ministry workers Cassius and Hermione have to interface with one another.
Untitled — Rabastan x Hermione. Time travel AU multi-chapter. Still plotting, but guessing this would come out after Informants.
Arms Full of Lullabies — Theo x Hermione. A little epistolary story that I am mostly mentioning because I miss the pairing. Possibly February?? Maybe when I finish Informants?
I’d love to hear if you have any of these you are really looking forward to 💕 Or, are there any pairings that you have been missing?
“Expelliarmus!” she shouted again, before taking a defensive posture.
Alfie again batted her spell aside and it very nearly rebounded back on her. “Hermione? What’s wrong?” he demanded, taking another step into the cottage.
“Impedimentia!” Hermione said, hoping to stop him from getting any closer, but again, Alfie batted her spell away like it was a gnat. She could feel her knees going weak, her resolve even weaker, seeing the concerned look on his face.
“I just want to help you,” he insisted. “I’ve been worried about you. Did something happen?”
She needed to overwhelm him, she decided. “Petrificus totalus! Expelliarmus! Rictusempra!” she called in quick succession. That got a little bit harder for him to handle. “Silencio!”
Finally, a spell actually hit, and a look of annoyance flashed over his face, but he quickly canceled the spell, like it was nothing. “Hermione!” he repeated, exasperated.
But then, she kept up her barrage of spell and finally it seemed like Alfie had to engage in their duel. He was using mostly defensive spells, nothing that could actually hurt her, all aimed at ending the fight as quickly as he could. Spells zinged through her cottage, hitting various furniture, but Hermione couldn’t help but realize that she was losing this fight. Hot tears welled in her eyes as she worried what was going to happen to her.
“Piertotum Locomotor!” she cried, pleased to see her armchair stand up, ready to wrap Alfie up and protect her. “Avis!” she added, pleased to see a dozen conjured birds head in his direction and start pecking at him.
“Enough!” Alfie roared, sweeping his wand around the room and banishing both her chair and the birds. “What is wrong with you? Trying to duel me and using all these childish charms? If you are going to try to fight me, at least respect me and use the dark spells that you know!”
Ugh, I am down to the last section of Tribulations Chapter 6 (Ostara) -- just like 2,000 words left at this point, so it should be out this week, finally. This was a massive, weighty chapter, with lots of moving parts to line up. Here is another sneak peek to tide you by while you wait:
Hermione shrugged her shoulders. “I am not afraid of a little sacrifice, especially when the outcome can be so rewarding,” she said. “I’ve learned that over the past months. Why even just at Imbolc—” She stopped speaking abruptly, realizing that she’d misspoke.
But Tom was intrigued. Too intrigued, perhaps. “Go on,” he insisted. “What did you see at Imbolc?”
She bit her lower lip, hoping that she wasn’t overplaying her hand. “I saw many things,” she explained, before meeting his eyes. “I saw you.”
“Me?” he asked, hanging on her every word.
“Yes,” Hermione continued. “I saw a future where you are powerful and everyone fears to speak your name.”
Hermione felt like she couldn’t breath for the millisecond that she waited for Tom to react. He was obviously practiced at hiding his true feelings from others, but sometimes there were feelings he couldn’t hide. And, he certainly couldn’t hide the raw, aching hope that he felt.
“Was this a prophecy? Some premonition of what is to come?” he asked, his voice dropping lower. He took a step closer to her and took her hand in his, squeezing it tightly.
Pulling her hand from his grasp, Hermione took a step back. “I don’t know, Tom. I’ve never been the biggest fan of Divination,” she insisted. “But I suspect there is some path that you could walk that would lead you to that end.”
“How? Which path do I take?” he demanded, his eyes looking wild and dangerous. He looked at her like she held the answer to all of his problems.
“I couldn’t say,” she said harshly. “Everything happened so fast. I found Imbolc very overwhelming. Perhaps if I had been permitted to celebrate with the rest of you, I might have been able to discover an answer for you.”
“You are trying to punish me — withholding vital information,” he insisted. “When I didn’t have anything to do with the choice to leave you out. It was held at Orion’s home. He was the one who argued against you.”
Hermione sneered at him. “And Abraxas as well, I would imagine,” she countered. “Don’t think me so naive that I don’t know that nothing happens in this little group without your approval, Tom Riddle. If you hadn’t agreed with Orion or Abraxas or whoever it might have been, they wouldn’t have gone against you."
“That sounds... permanent,” she said, her heart rate increasing, thinking about what this meant.
“It is supposed to be permanent,” he said, his blue-green eyes boring into her, willing her to understand what he was trying to share. “You would find it easy to remove if I broke my oath, or... or else you would enjoy the ring’s protection until the day that my heart stops beating.”
Hearing the words leave his lips was heady and Hermione found herself almost agreeing then and there. This was insanity, even considering tying herself to Alfred Nott with blood magic, but there was something so...familiar about him that it almost wasn’t a question that she would agree. He felt like home. He felt like belonging. He felt like...a reflection of herself. Together, they were greater than the sum of their parts and now that she’d felt how far they could go together, she was loath to give it up.
Her eyelids fluttered shut as she dared to ask the question that was singing in her heart. “And what oaths are you making me? An oath of protection?”
“Protection, yes, but as I said before, I want to show you my total devotion to you,” he whispered, his eyes dark as he explained. “I cannot offer you romantic words or the promise of an easy life. I can promise you a place at my side — never to be parted from me. If anyone tries to come between us, I will destroy them.”
She whined low in her throat at the thought of such a promise. Godric, she wanted it. Desire was burning inside of her, but still she could not voice the words. How could Alfie suggest that he was not capable of romantic words, when his promise was perhaps the most romantic thing that she’d ever heard in her life?
Feeling his hand on her jaw, his thumb and forefinger spanning the distance easily, Hermione’s eyes fluttered open to look at him. The pad of his thumb rubbed along the soft skin of her neck, before settling on her pulse point. She was practically panting now, her breath shallow and quick.
Here is your sign to start reading Tribulations if you have been wanting to... sneak peek of chapter five. Hoping to have that out sometime next week :D
“Ah, you did not warrant an invitation to the Blacks’ party,” he mused. “Quite rude of my dear friend to leave his witch high and dry.”
“I can’t say that the invitation was missed,” Hermione said, tartly, though it was true. She didn’t exactly want to go to Orion Black’s house or whoever’s home it was at. “But, what has made you scorn the Blacks’ party?”
Tom gave her a conspiratorial look, before leaning towards her. “Well, I suppose there is no reason to lie to you,” he said, shrugging his shoulders and offering her his arm, so they could walk together. “I also did not receive an invitation to the party.”
“Why not?” she asked, confused as to why Orion would scorn his friend.
“Because I had the misfortune of knowing Orion’s lovely wife. She still thinks that I am a mudblood,” he explained, not even stumbling over the word. “You see, she met me when I was just an orphan growing up in the muggle world.”
Hermione could have almost faltered in her steps, had she not already known that Tom was a half-blood. Even though he tried to pretend like it didn’t bother him, she could sense the way that it rankled, that Walburga Black could think she was better than him. “I suppose you and I are the same then, in her eyes,” she mused, her head suddenly feeling buoyant at putting it together.
Tom turned on her so quickly, she stumbled into his arms a second time. “Not exactly. We know exactly where I get my magic from, but you…” he trailed off. Tom raised his hand and Hermione’s first instinct was to flinch, thinking that he meant to strike her. Instead, his fingertips teased their way along her collarbone, and down her chest to where her breast was concealed by the gossamer edge of her dress. “We have no idea where your magic comes from.”
“I know you aren’t stupid enough to believe that muggleborns steal magic,” she said defiantly, reaching up and catching his wrist in her hand, squeezing hard until he stopped touching her.
“Of course not, but it does make you wonder how a muggleborn spontaneously manifested such strong magic,” he said, a curious look on his face. “Powerful enough to have even Alfred Nott look the other way about your blood status.”
“I wish I could tell you,” she answered, releasing her grip on his wrist.
“It makes me wonder what other…secrets you might be hiding,” he said, taking another step closer to her, crowding her in tightly.
Hermione could barely think of some witty retort before she could feel him slip into her mind, his gentle caress along her memories making her feel like she was trying to fit her foot into a shoe that was too small. She couldn’t think of what he was expecting to find — she had no secret power that she was keeping from him — but she detested the unwanted intrusion.
She took a step back. “It’s rude to go around using Legilimency against someone without asking,” she said firmly, breaking his gaze. “Did you find what you were looking for this time, Tom?”
Finally started writing chapter five of Tribulations 💕💕 I’m excited for this one. The story has already diverged a lot from Trials but I think this is the one where it completely breaks.
