Truth or Dare

Chapter 7: Horizon Alley

However, Blaise was just as reticent as she had been on the train after that night. She talked to Hermione's parents when they asked questions, but when they offered to take her to their office or to one of the closer shopping centers or to the cinema, Blaise rejected each proposal and went instead to her room and switched on the television. Mr. and Mrs. Granger both agreed she was more polite and agreeable than they had expected, but she still appeared pale and listless, hardly healthy.

But although she would be civil to Hermione's parents, after that first night, she would not even look at Hermione, much less talk or listen.

Finally, Mrs. Granger had to coax Blaise into the living room.

"We know you don't exactly enjoy living in an unfamiliar and probably dull environment," Mrs. Granger said. "So Mr. Granger and I have discussed it, and we've decided that we can go Christmas shopping sometime while you and Hermione can go to Diagon Alley. It may not be much, but besides that and Platform 9 3/4, we have no means to go anywhere else magical."

Blaise smiled slightly. "But that would not be in accord with the 'agreement' we made, would it, Hermione?" Then she turned and ran upstairs again.

Mrs. Granger huffed. "This cannot continue! Hermione, go talk to her."

"But, Mum..."

"Go! You got her into this; I deem it your responsibility."

"But you don't understand the circumstances..."

"I said go!"

You don't understand that by the end of the year, your little girl isn't going to be a virgin anymore, Hermione thought, the unwelcome idea reminding her of her task. She was surprised that she had not had any more symptoms of her own Dare with her recent obvious denial. She suddenly felt very much like crying, which started her hyperventilating again.

She hurried to her own room and started counting her breaths. She was still counting after one thousand four hundred and three, tears pouring down her face, when Blaise stuck her head out the doorway of the bathroom they shared.

"Hermione--"

"Shut up!" Hermione snapped. "Do you know what I wanted to make you do for the Dare? I wanted you to sign up for Muggle Studies and flirt with the Professor. That was my first idea. Then I thought maybe you should play five games of strip poker with five other Slytherins in the trophy room. Then my mind drifted to making you recite the most embarrassing things about yourself from the top of the Astronomy Tower so everyone could hear you. Then I thought, no, all of those are too cruel. Let's make things feasible."

Hermione wiped the tears from her eyes, blew her nose, and glared at Blaise. "So I did. Now the Dare was positively mild; you had a credible excuse that Ron made up, my parents are not ogres, and they're offering you a chance to spend at least a little time in wizard company. I didn't bring you here to torture you. I brought you here to see what it's really like. And this is how you show your gratitude?" Hermione turned away and curled up into a ball on her bed.

"And--for Io's sake--I have to sleep with a teacher. I tried to get his attention two weeks ago. I actually tried to capture my professor's sexual attention! But I couldn't; I couldn't bring myself to do it, and I have to do it by the end of the year, and I have no clue where to even start, and..."

"I can help you," offered Blaise in a low voice.

"Oh, please, like you've had to seduce your professor before. Tell me, does he prefer to lecture during sex, or would he rather I lecture him? Does it turn him on?" During this, Blaise went back to her room, then returned with a pile of magazines. She dropped the magazines onto Hermione's bed.

All of them had the same title: Enchantress; they all more or less had half-dressed women or almost naked men on the front. They had articles like: How to Snag and Shag Your Boss; Sleeping Your Way to the Top; Top Ten Sex Hexes; Enchantments that Enchant Him.

Hermione looked up, divided between laughter and indignance. "Where did you get these?"

"Erotica Alley, in one of the tamer shops," Blaise said with a mischievous grin. "It's right up Knockturn Alley, and it's a branch off Horizon Alley. And Horizon Alley just happens to be a place that might help prepare you for the... consummation of your Dare."

Hermione's lip curled in disgust. "I'm not going anywhere named Erotica Alley."

"Don't worry," Blaise assured her, "you're not. I'm talking Horizon Alley. It's a bit trendier, less for whores, more for mistresses, which isn't the same thing. And you won't be the only teenage girl there."

"I'm not allowed to use potions or charms to help me," Hermione said less forcefully.

"He meant--believe me--to get him to have sex with you. You don't even have to seduce him with them, just make yourself more desirable. You might even turn other heads besides his. There is more than one way to snare a man. Your parents won't be there. There are men there who will be more than willing to give their opinion, and I'll be there to help...."

"Why?" Hermione challenged.

"Because the faster you get your Dare over with, the more pressure will be on Draco to perform," Blaise replied simply.

Hermione sighed and looked at another article title--Illicit Loves.

"Fine," she muttered, and she held back more tears until Blaise had left to tell Mr. and Mrs. Granger that their idea had been wonderful.

~888~

"We'll meet back here at five?" Mrs. Granger asked.

Hermione nodded in confirmation.

"Well, then, have a good time, Hermione, Blaise." Blaise acknowledged her with a small smile on her face.

When Hermione's parents had turned a corner, Blaise dragged Hermione through the Leaky Cauldron and into Diagon Alley before Hermione even had time to react.

"Wait," cried Hermione, "I'm not ready yet, and I need to buy my friends and family presents."

Blaise rolled her eyes. "You're never going to be ready. Do you know for sure what you're going to get them?"

"I don't know about my friends, but I always get each of my parents an economy-sized box of Tooth-Flossing Stringmints. Ever since the first sample I got them, they've told me that's the only gift they want from me."

Blaise grinned and said, "A touching dentist story, but I'm taking you there anyway; you can go gift-shopping later."

"I'm not putting Snape before my friends and family," Hermione snapped harshly.

"You're right. I am."

And Blaise took hold of Hermione's wrist tightly and pulled her into Knockturn Alley and straight to a dark arts menagerie that looked like you were not likely to leave with all pints of your blood in your veins.

"Ah, Miss Zabini, I remember you," said a rather respectable-looking manager from behind her counter. "Who did you bring to corrupt this time?"

Blaise shrugged indifferently. "Found her in the streets and thought she needed a little help, if you know what I mean. Can you let us through?"

The manager was still chuckling when she asked, "Is she over sixteen?"

Blaise nodded. Then manager bowed and opened the door behind her. Blaise then led Hermione through.

The Alley was canopied, and a pulsing red light that seemed to make its own seductive scent throbbed through the air and seemed to stroke Hermione in waves. She had to close her eyes at the ebb and flow of pleasure that swept through her with each throb.

"Just try not to think about it, and you won't notice it as much," Blaise advised. "Focus on something else. When my sisters first brought me here, I felt the same way. Don't look at anyone selling anything either. Watch my shoes and follow me."

Hermione obeyed, having little choice while concentrating on not melting and letting the sensuality overcome her. A few male hands reached out and caressed her; and she almost moaned at the pleasure of contact in the midst of everything else.

But then Hermione heard the tinkling of bells on a door handle, and she stepped into a room with normal lighting and no pulsing pleasure. She sighed in relief. She looked up and had to stifle a scream in shock.

The room was small, but there were rows of large, soft, plush couches and on each draped a naked man or woman, some who were very busy with a customer.

"Don't get your hopes up," said Blaise, looking as though she was having the time of her life watching Hermione's discomfort. "They're enticing, but they cost a small fortune."

"Not for a kiss," a man said from a sofa behind Blaise. "A kiss is free."

"Well, in that case..." Blaise sat on the couch next to the man and pressed her lips against his forcefully, much more insistently that Hermione would have expected from someone so mellow.

Hermione stared at her feet until Blaise had stood up.

"You want a taste, Hermione?" Blaise offered, gesturing toward the man. "He's really quite good."

"No, thank you," Hermione mumbled. She did not take her eyes off her feet, but continued to follow Blaise to the back. She squealed as she felt a hand pinch her bottom. Some people laughed as Hermione turned and glared at the man who Blaise had kissed. He smiled cheekily at her.

"They particularly love their modest virgins," said Blaise, still highly amused.

Hermione said, "And you're not? A virgin, I mean."

Blaise shook her head no. "For my sixteenth birthday, my sisters pooled their money and brought me here, to Erotica Alley, but it was at another, more private pleasure house than this."

"Oh," Hermione replied weakly.

Blaise was feeling along the back wall. "Now where is it?... There."

She pushed at a seemingly random spot on the perfectly white wall, and a tunnel appeared through which they had to crawl on their knees.

And they entered into a rather normal-looking Alley, whose normalcy was marred only by the merchandise hanging in the windows. Blaise seemed in seventh heaven as she ran to a lingerie shop with some of the skimpiest negligees Hermione had ever seen draped over seductively moving mannequins.

"I am going to love dressing you up in all these," she gushed like a school girl. "My sisters all got to choose their younger sister's clothing for her first time, and Mum dressed my oldest sister, but I didn't get anyone. But with you I get to keep the tradition. Now," she said, adopting a stricter tone, "go to the dressing rooms , and I'll bring you your clothes."

"Blaise, you are not seeing me half-naked!" Hermione cried, turning red.

"Of course I'm not," Blaise dismissed. "You'll have a mirror commentary. Oh, and boys..." She beckoned to the side where three bare-chested men snapped to attention and obeyed her summons, for all the world as they had done this hundreds of times before--as they probably had.

"I can't do this," Hermione muttered under her breath. She felt like throwing a tantrum again, and she closed her eyes and counted breaths to thirty eight before she was composed enough to go to the back of the shop and hide in one of the dressing room stalls.

She hastily and guiltily undressed.

"First time, dearie?" asked a comforting, matronly voice from the mirror.

Hermione jumped and crossed her legs and folded her arms over her breasts.

"Oh, there's no reason to hide yourself. I'm just a mirror, and you're actually quite pretty. Very healthy. I hope he'll be good to you."

"So do I," Hermione whispered.

~888~

Blaise tossed her article after article of what could hardly be called clothing. She would show them to the mirror, and if the mirror did not like it, she'd throw it into an ever-growing pile of rejects. If the mirror voiced its approval, Hermione would have to hold her breath and leave the stall for an appraisal from the men. They would reveal their opinion by how far they stood from her. When they finally found some that suited her perfectly, they each embraced her. Before Hermione made her dubious purchases, the mirror wished her good luck. Hermione appreciated the gesture. She was nearly a nervous wreck again. If she was falling apart in front of people she'd never see again, how would she feel with someone with whom she would remain in contact?

Next, Blaise bustled her over to a cosmetician, who took one look at her, marveled graciously over Hermione's remarkably clear complexion, then retrieved bottle after bottle of potions she was to use to nourish and soften and bronze her skin. Then the woman--thin as a rail with bright red, obviously dyed curly hair--ran a hand through Hermione's unmanageable locks and tsked sharply.
"What do you use in it?" the cosmetician asked incredulously. "Hair like this doesn't just happen." When Hermione told her, the cosmetician tsked again and snagged even more bottles of hair care potions.

The cosmetician inquired, "Are you much of a potions brewer?"

Hermione answered in the affirmative.

The cosmetician glanced to the left, to the right, then whispered in Hermione's ear, "We're about to discontinue this particular potion, but I still find it perfect for your kind of hair. Here's the recipe." She slipped a piece of parchment into Hermione's hand. "One brewing gives you half a year's worth of potion."

"Thanks," Hermione said. She raised an eyebrow at Blaise, who just grinned contentedly.

Blaise paid for these. "A Christmas present," was the only explanation she would give. "Now we can go back to Diagon Alley."

"That means we have to go through Erotica Alley," Hermione said resignedly.

"We can hurry this time," Blaise offered unhelpfully.

Hermione shuddered, but once again took her place behind Blaise. It took all of her willpower to repress her desires in the crimson Alley, but counting helped. She owed a lot to Madam Pomfrey.

She felt ten times more at ease in Diagon Alley. She and Blaise split and shopped on their own. Hermione of course bought the Toothflossing String Mints for her parents. For Harry, she purchased a more in-tune Sneakoscope--though by no means Auror-ranked. For Ron, she bought a Broom-Servicing Kit and some strawberry-flavored fudge that she knew he loved.

For some reason, she felt compelled to buy Blaise something. She was at a loss until she came across a set of earplugs that magically turned invisible when you put them in your ears. For those times when Draco and Pansy get too loud, she put on the card with a sincere smile.

She hid her more illicit purchases underneath her gifts to avoid questioning.

So when Blaise and Hermione met up with Mr. and Mrs. Granger, Hermione was able to plaster a smile on her face and act as though she wasn't going to sneak behind every authority figure's back to seduce the more hated professor at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.