Tis but the Living

Tis But the Living

Chapter One

"Okay, you can look now," announced Ginny with a proud tone in her voice. Hermione turned to face the full-length, gold-framed mirror in the corner of her private room in the top of Gryffindor Tower. Hermione's brown eyes, lined in a shimmery, silver-white eyeshadow, widened as she noted that most of her outfit for the masquerade that served as the farewell ball for the seventh years showed quite a bit more skin than Hermione Granger was used to. The dress was made of white silk, fell knee-length, and was sleeveless. The straps were of a decent thickness, at least, but the neckline plunged, a gold rope lining it and crossing beneath her breasts, accentuating them, and the remainder wrapped around her waist and tied in a knot, the remaining length of the golden plait falling to the hem of the Grecian dress. She wore sandals painted gold, the laces of which crisscrossed up her calves, ending at her knees. Her hair had been piled on top of her head, allowing free curls to fall down her shoulders elegantly, and affixed in the front of that pile was a simple gold tiara.

"Hermione, don't have that look. It's not going to kill you to wear more than your plain robes for one day," Ginny huffed, a mischievous glitter in her eyes. "And you wonder why boys never paid you any attention, other than Viktor."

"I never said that I didn't mind boys not paying attention to me," Hermione retorted, grabbing her white mask and pulling it on, careful not to mess up the makeup Ginny had so meticulously - yet excitedly - applied. The mask itself was a work of art, covering her face just to her nose, the eyeholes slanted in an Egyptian sort of fashion, and tiny gold beads lining the edges. "As if I'd have time for boys with school to think of. My future is more important than boyfriends."

"Okay, I get it," Ginny rolled her eyes, still with a grin, for she'd heard this reasoning many times from the older girl. She knew that Hermione had once had a crush on Ron, not unexpected, but had recently thought of the redhead as a brotherly type, and that had quickly turned her back to her schoolwork. As for whom Hermione might fancy now, Ginny had no clue, nor did she want to particularly ask, for Hermione got rather touchy as of late over the smallest things.

"Anyway, you look fantastic, so you shouldn't worry. You'll get dances tonight, I swear it."

"I'm not that -"

"Oh shut up, you haven't had fun since your fourth year at the Yule Ball and even then, you were worried about Ron the entire time. Let loose, tonight's your last night at the school." Hermione sighed.

"You're right, Gin," she replied, turning to her friend. "I'll get a dance, I promise. And I won't stick around just Harry and Ron."

"That's the spirit." Ginny quickly hugged her, then handed her the small white purse she'd carry with her. "Go. Have fun, and don't do anything I wouldn't." After a wink from the sixth year, Hermione headed down to the Great Hall. The teachers had really outdone themselves for this event; gold and silver orbs hung suspended in the air near the ceiling, adding to the celestial effect of said ceiling, and blue, red, green, and yellow silk cloths hung on the walls. There was another appearance by the Weird Sisters for this ball, and the crowd was just a plethora of costumes. As expected, Hermione recognized Harry and Ron right away from the way they walked; however, she didn't approach them. Holding true to her promise that she wouldn't hang around her two best friends and would actually mingle. It's not as though many people would associate her appearance with the studious, bushy-haired bookworm (though her hair was still quite bushy).

"Let me guess," a deep voice in Hermione's ear cut through the music, "a Greek goddess." The proximity of the stranger caused her heart to thud heavily in her chest, and an unfamiliar scent of a spicy kind of cologne mixed with a scent that she knew belonged to only him invaded her senses. She knew she didn't recognize him, and still wouldn't if she turned around, but his voice held a faint accent of some foreign language that she couldn't place at the moment. Turning around, she found herself face-to-face with a man dressed in a costume that resembled the time period hers was a reference to. The knee-length deep blue pleated tunic he wore was fastened at his broad shoulders with gold clasps, and covered with a gold breastplate fastened with string to a backplate. The lower half of the tunic was decorated with strips of black leather that must have served as armor. His shapely legs were adorned with greaves, black leather with gold trimming. His sandals were black.

"And you, a Greek hoplite," she smiled, feeling drawn to the stranger by the hypnotic bearing of his eyes.

"If a man has brown eyes, it shows he has a deep soul," Lavender Brown giggled one evening. "They can trap you with their eyes." Though at the time Hermione'd thought Lavender foolish, she was beginning to believe the blonde.

"You're correct," he leaned closer so his lips were but a few centimetres from her ear, his breath tickling her skin, "as always." How did he know? No, perhaps he was just flirting. That must be it. Ginny said herself...well, don't worry about it. "Do you care for a dance? We'd make a pair, don't you agree?"

"I do, and I will dance with you." She set her purse down on the table reserved for such, and, slipping her hand in his, let him lead her onto the dance floor. He took a traditional position for dancing, his right hand on her left hip, her right hand in his left, her left hand on his right shoulder. They waltzed, and though she'd never taken formal dancing lessons, she knew enough about the dance from her childhood days of weddings of the many friends her parents knew, and rather self-taught herself over the years. She tried to place the hair covering his head, the shape of his mouth, both of which vaguely triggered the fact that she had seen them before, but it was hard to tell details that would discern his true identity from any other boy in the crowd with a black mask covering his face.

"Which goddess exactly are you? If you don't mind giving away your visage," he said, a small smile tugging at the corners of his lips.

"Selene¹," she answered calmly, though her heart was still racing at the way his hand on her waist was drawing her closer and closer to him, "goddess of the moon when it is not held by Hecate. I assume you know your basic mythology?"

"You assume correctly, though I thought you might be one of the forms of Artemis from the silver crescent moons on your cheeks." She smiled, feeling the heat spread to her cheeks. For some reason the stranger's words caused her skin to tingle. "You look as though you've appeared from the pages of a Homerian hymn themselves." She laughed.

"I wish. I've always been fascinated with the Greeks' mythology, not unexpected of a child hearing the great tales at such a young age, but as other children might have grown tired of the stories, they never seemed less magical to me." She shook her head, laughing quietly. "Sorry, I'm sure I'm boring you with my silly-sounding stories."

"Not at all," he replied, and she believed him. "I'm Greek as well as Italian, so I love anything to do with the ancient cultures, including poetry." Then he began to recite:

"The isles of Greece! The isles of Greece!

Where burning Sappho loved and sung,

Where grew the arts of war and peace, --

Where Delos rose and Phoebus sprung!

Eternal summer gilds them yet,

But all, except their sun, is set."

Hermione then continued:

"The Scian and the Teian muse,

The hero's harp, the lover's lute,

Have found the fame your shores refuse;

Their place of birth alone is mute

To sounds which echo further west

Than your sires' 'Islands of the Blest.'"

"I'm incredibly impressed," said the stranger, a smile tugging at his lips.

"Well, anybody who can quote Lord Byron° is worth getting to know," she replied with another smile.

The waltz they were dancing to then ended, and she felt somewhat saddened to let go of the nice Mediterranean boy she'd been talking to all this time. He brought her hand to his lips, but instead of drawing back, he stepped closer, lowered her hand and pressed a soft but fleeting kiss to her lips. "Mia dea², mou thea³, I hope to see you again tonight. For now, I promised a friend a dance and I have to find her. Goodnight, for now." With that, he disappeared into the crowd.

Hermione made her way to the refreshments table, at which she poured a goblet of iced pumpkin juice, drinking it slowly, trying to regain some type of logic and reason about her. For that brief moment that their lips touched, she felt in her an overwhelming desire for more, something that quite scared her. Viktor had kissed her, but every time he did, she wasn't really sure if she liked it, and had never gotten the feelings she had before.

She didn't dance with the stranger again during the evening, though she spotted him many times. And once, had it not been for her wishful thinking, she would have sworn that he winked at her over the rim of his goblet. Ginny had fallen asleep in the common room awaiting Hermione's return, and Hermione decided to let her friend sleep on than disturb her. Besides, she didn't really feel like talking, and, as she lit the candles floating in her room, she felt a lingering sadness as she changed into her pajamas. Ginny had been right - Hermione wanted boys to notice her in a way they hadn't until tonight, for she'd danced with many boys who obviously liked the curves she'd drawn attention to through the dress. It felt odd to go back to the girl who stayed in library corners until late at night researching the extensive history of vampires and Advanced Arithmancy problems. Her days at Hogwarts were ending tomorrow, and she had to continue to remind herself not to get involved with thoughts of boys disturbing her.

Suddenly, as she picked up the silver brush from her vanity, a name came to her mind.

Blaise Zabini.

Hermione stared into the mirror, dragging the brush through her thick mane of curls, intrigued by the way the golden light of her candles brought out an ethereal sort of quality she wasn't aware she'd ever had about her. Perhaps she was just being silly, for believing one had certain flattering physical characteristics about themselves would, in her mind, lead to a Pansy Parkinson-esque snobbishness. She racked her brain for any mention of Blaise Zabini she'd heard over the years other than his name being called for the roster in class, and all that came to her mind were the talks Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil had often had late at night, perhaps when they thought Hermione was fast asleep.

They'd spoken of Zabini as though he were some kind of exalted god-like figure in their school, and all had to do with his looks; sure, the young man was quite handsome, with dark, olive skin, shining black curls, and a pair of dark, deep brown eyes that made it seem as though he were peering into your soul and reading your deepest secrets. However, looks didn't make a man, - or rather, adolescent - and Hermione wasn't sure if she was ready to accept that he was, in turn, for the Light side when he'd been a strong ally of Draco Malfoy all these years (for she'd heard a conversation between Professor Flitwick and Professor McGonagall one night while patrolling that Zabini had recently converted to spy for their side). Surely he hadn't recognized her at the masquerade tonight, for would he have acted as friendly if he found out she was a Muggle-born? Still, that thing he said - "You're correct. As always." On the Light or not, he was still a Slytherin, and though she knew all purebloods didn't agree with the discrimination of Muggle-borns, surely he'd been placed in that House for a reason pertaining to his family's beliefs and his.

"Mia dea, mou thea," he'd whispered, causing waves of emotion to ripple through her at those words; albeit she was Selene as her costume, but his words were laced with something that sent those shivers down her spine. She was seventeen after all, and though she threw herself fully into her schoolwork, she was no stranger to hormones and a longing that might have been purely physical rather than emotional.

Hermione shook herself mentally. Graduation was tomorrow, the threat of Voldemort looming closer than ever over their heads (for everyone was predicting that the day Harry Potter graduated from Hogwarts, his safe haven for the past seven years, would be the day of the Final Battle between the Dark Lord and Harry). Hermione didn't have time to worry about these trite little love affairs throughout the castle, in her bed or otherwise (or perhaps lack thereof completely), and she was determined to not allow the Slytherin boy's good looks and endearing charms clog her mind for tomorrow's speech as Head Girl.

No matter how much of Lord Byron's poetry he could quote.

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A/N: Thanks for reading, as always. Here are the footnotes that I so promised all you lovelies.

¹ - Selene ~ as Edith Hamilton states in her book Mythology: "She [Artemis] is 'the goddess with three forms,' Selene in the sky, Artemis on earth, Hecate in the lower world and in the world above when it is wrapped in darkness." Selene is also apparently the goddess of dreams, which I found out by researching on Google.

² - Mia dea ~ Italian for "my goddess." (I can't help it I'm obsessed with Italy...so shhh.)

³ - Mou thea ~ Greek for "my goddess." (So my mythology and my choice of Zabini's heritage comes from obsession...shhh again.)

° - Lord Byron ~ As you all should know (jesting, but I love you if you did know this), Lord George Gordon Byron was a Romantic writer who aided in the fight for Greek independence in the nineteenth century. He wrote a plethora of great works, and the poem that Blaise and Hermione exchange is "The Isles of Greece!"; one of my personal favorites. The copy that I used was obtained from this site - .

Title also comes from "The Isles of Greece!".