Resolving

Ten

In Flagrante Delicto

The future... What a scary thing - if you can call it that. Our lives are filled with choices, each leading down a different path. Once chosen, you cannot go back. Looking into the future is a difficult thing. Generally, you get a blinding slideshow of the many possibilities but, sometimes, in extremely rare cases... you only get one.

The night he'd looked into Loren's crystal ball, Blaise had only gotten one future: his daughter's. Her future was a dark one, one that he would not be able to help her with. He was pondering this as he sat in his office with a cup of hot, steaming tea. A soft knock was heard and he muttered his standard, "Come in," and was surprised to see Hermione.

"Hello, Blaise," she said. Her eyes were dark, and he could tell she was tired.

"Hi, Hermione." He flicked his hand at a chair. "Please, sit down. You look tired."

She sat and rubbed her eyes. "I am tired." There was silence for a few moments, and then she looked him straight in the eye. "Why?"

Blaise blinked. He pushed his spoon around in the teacup for a few moments of quick thinking. "Why what?"

"You know very well, Blaise Zabini. Now is not the time to be joking with me." Her expression took on a harder edge. "Why did you leave? Why did you come back? Why then? Why now? Why?"

He sighed and an errant swish of his spoon sloshed some tea over the edge of the china cup onto the saucer. A stray thought noted that it was very fine bone china with a delicate vine pattern on it and did not deserve to be so cavalierly treated. "Hermione, I thought I explained this..."

"Not to me. You didn't tell me anything. Not one blessed thing. Nothing! And you come back, and I don't even get the courtesy of a word of explanation when I was hoping, all those years, praying... While I, I..." She broke off and waved away his offer of a handkerchief. After she'd collected herself, she went on. "While I was here, waiting and loving you. Yes. I love you."

He'd been chewing his lip and, after her last words, he accidentally bit down hard and split it. The tangy blood spilt into his mouth, and he sucked the wound and stared at her. "You love me?"

Color flooded her face. She gulped so loudly he could hear it over his pounding heart. "No. No! I love Draco. I didn't say-"

His voice was hoarse. "You love me. You said it."

"No. No, I don't. I'm engaged! I love Draco!" She was gripping the table so tightly her hands were white.

He stood up and was moving around the table towards her. She stood and backed away so fast she knocked over a chair and was tangled it in when he reached her. "You love me." He stretched out a hand and touched her cheek lightly, trailing his index finger along her jaw. Leaning closer he whispered it again, almost against her lips. "You love me."

She licked her lips. He remembered she had a habit of doing that when she was nervous. And because of their close proximity, her tongue caught his lips as well. He inhaled sharply, and as she quickly pulled her tongue inside the safety of her own mouth, he closed the distance and kissed her.

He heard a muffled gasp from her, but he ignored it as he gently pushed her to the wall and wrapped his hand around the base of her skull, tilting her head up so he could kiss her with more ease.

Hermione pulled back, and he looked into her eyes, which were no longer tired; they were bright and alive; they were how he remembered them from before the War. "Blaise. I can't. I'm engaged."

He brushed the hair back from her face. "So send the ring back. No more engagement."

She stared at him. "I don't know where you've been these past five years, Blaise, but Draco's been here. Here. With me. Being my friend, my confidant."

He shoved himself away from her and said harshly over his shoulder, "Your lover?"

"That's not fair, Blaise," she said quietly.

"How is it not fair?" he asked, not looking at her.

"Because it's not true." The truth behind her carefully-uttered statement made him turn. "And I just came for answers, Blaise. That's all I want."

"Answers."

"Yes. I just want you to give me answers."

He looked at her and fingered his bitten lip. "What kind of answers?"

"Well..." she said, taking her chair again. "Where've you been?"

"Every continent but Antarctica... No, I lie. I was on Antarctica for a few days on my trek from Wellington to Buenos Aires. Besides that, in different cities for different months at a time. Long enough for people to find me, or for me to find people."

She twisted a loose fringe on her robe. "Why did you leave?"

"Because it was the only way I could protect anyone I love - or loved - and no, I'm not going to say why."

"That's not a reason."

He picked at a loose chip of varnish on his desk. "It is. And I don't feel like going into it, thank you."

The varnish on the desk had formed a swirling pattern. He found it mesmerizing to look at, given the alternative of looking into Hermione's angry - or worse, hurt - eyes. He heard her feet shuffling and glanced up to see her rising from her chair.

"I can't do this, Blaise," she said. "I really can't continue to play this game with you. It was all right when we were in school, with you being hot one minute and cold the next, but not now. Now I have responsibilities. And so do you - you've got a daughter now. So no more. I'm engaged and I'm staying engaged to be married. I love Draco. And he doesn't play games."

There should've been a crash. Something should've exploded, something dramatic should have occurred. Thunder and lightning should have struck the clock tower. Something should have happened. Something to mark the shattering of his heart. He thought he'd kept it so guarded, all these years, that he had a fortress around it and those who were inside would always stay there, but she had smashed down the wall and stormed out of it... and the only sound to mark it was the quiet clicking of the door closing behind her.

~*~

He sat there, and he remembered the day he killed his sister. It wasn't something he really thought about often, or on purpose: sometimes it just popped up into his brain. He and Lilithe had never gotten along. He had never known why, when he was younger. But then he learned that people don't always hear whisperings around them; that normal people can't just sit down and concentrate to hear their parents thinking, or their sisters, or uncle, or-- well, you name it.

Lilithe hated him for it. Once, when he was ten, he saw into her mind and could see the white-hot hatred. He'd never known real hatred, never really hated someone from the core of his being. But that was how his sister felt about him. Later he would find it more and more ironic that she used him - unwittingly - as her power storage unit. Like he was one of those Muggle storage places - go in, pay your 35 dollars or whatever and then put your spare things in there. He was that. Except for the fact that he wasn't paid.

He'd known, that day, the day that Hogwarts was attacked by the Death Eaters, he'd known. He'd known that she was coming for him. And he knew that she would kill him.

Oh, yes. Lilithe would kill him. She was the only one who could. It wasn't an epic struggle, one to be told and retold for the ages, like Harry Potter's famous story. No, it wasn't anything glorious and bright and golden. It was sordid and muck-filled and something he'd toss in the midden, if it were a physical thing.

He'd told himself these past five years that she was dead. Her body was burned. He'd buried the ashes in a pit that he'd dug in a jungle in South Africa. But could she be dead? Could she possibly be existing as Voldemort had for years? He didn't know.

~*~

The next morning, Blaise was exhausted. He'd gone to bed late only to be woken up by Eve crying around three in the morning to be fed. It took him another hour to feed her and get her back to sleep, and a half hour after that to get to sleep himself. So, consequentially, when he went down to the Great Hall for breakfast, he could barely keep his eyes open.

Needless to say, when he saw the small - but growing - crowd that had formed by the doors to the Hall, he was extremely annoyed. There he was, holding a newborn, starving, and in desperate need of a very large mug of coffee and a large block of students blocking his way. He considered taking points from them before he just gave in and asked the nearest student what was causing all the ruckus.

The nearest student turned out to be one of the seventh years from his class, Vivian Thorne. He clapped a hand down on her shoulder and said, in a tone that told her if she didn't answer quickly and truthfully, there would be trouble, "Vivian! What in the world is going on?"

Vivian, who was a very bright girl and knew that tone, smiled slightly nervously and twisted a lock of her red hair tightly. "Well, sir, it's the new arrival. Everyone's so excited."

Blaise raised an eyebrow. "New arrival? Who is it?"

Vivian endeavored to look entirely emotionless. By this time, the entire school had learned of Hermione and Blaise's previous involvement - and how serious it had been, if "serious" was the right word - and this news would probably prove very volatile to their currently precarious friendship. "It's... er... Draco Malfoy, sir. The Auror." To this she added, "Professor Granger's fiancé."

Blaise could feel his face rearranging itself from its previous inquisitive expression to one of vaguely knowing. As his mind whirled, he barely heard himself say, "Oh yes. She mentioned something about Draco coming to visit." Which was such a lie. Hermione had definitely not mentioned 'dear' Draco coming to visit, either today or in the near future.

She might've said, he thought, as he cradled Eve close to himself and pushed through the crowd. In the distant background he heard Snape deducting points from several Houses in an effort to disperse the crowd. She had all the time in the world, last night.

A nasty little voice in the back of his head said, You mean when you were so busy seducing her? Perhaps if she'd said something, things wouldn't have stopped with that little kiss.

He stood still at that thought. If she had told him Draco was coming the next day, would he have stopped just at kissing her? Pressed her into something more? He didn't know. He didn't want to know.

However, he pulled himself together quickly. After all, he was standing completely stock still in the middle of the Great Hall, blocking students trying to get prime seats for the impending show between Draco and him. Because there was bound to be a show. Blaise never gave up with anything. He'd never given up on Hermione, not even when he left. Why stop now? A small smile curled his mouth and he practically strutted - in a most manly and attractive manner, of course, for he was a Zabini - up to the head table.

Blaise was not modest. He knew what he was, what his talents were, how he looked, how much he had of everything. He knew himself entirely. And, in this moment, looking at Draco, he knew that he could beat him. 'Beat' being entirely subjective; he wasn't looking to physically beat Draco - though the prospect was tempting, he'd admit - he just wanted Hermione to realize her mistake. And, damn it, he knew he was much more attractive than Draco.

Oh, sure, during their school days Draco had been the boy to sigh over, whatever House you'd been in. Even now, he was rather attractive: being an Auror had caused him to harden up; he'd acquired a few dangerous-looking scars in interesting places and he still had his white-blonde hair, no longer slicked back, but loosely tied back in a tail. His eyes were still sharp as ever, and still their singularly Malfoy-esque clear grey. He was, all in all, his father's son.

Of course, his father did end up dying by Blaise's hands in a nasty manner involving a rock, but Blaise wouldn't dwell on that.

Draco was attractive, yes. But if Draco was attractive in an obvious way, Blaise was more so in an equally noticeable but less ostentatious manner. His black hair was also long, slightly less wild than it had been upon his return from his travels and, at the moment, loose and hanging down to his shoulders. His eyes were their unmistakably vivid, ever-changing blue: a Zabini trait that had carried through generations. But he had an air about him, this aura of utmost confidence and control and something in him caused people to look twice and then stare on their third glance.

Blaise was nothing less than unforgettable, which had caused him endless trouble during all his travels, but that wasn't a concern now.

The concern now was that here he was, in his slightly rumpled, but very finely made, deep navy blue robes with their tiny amounts of silver trim on the collar and cuffs, holding a tiny baby, and there was Draco in his Auror gear - which was comprised of quite a lot of dragonhide, which was a very good look on Draco - and Hermione turned red at the sight of him.

The small smile that had curled his lips a few moments before became a full-on smile. One of his best, he reflected later. The kind that creased his cheek and made him look so very dashing. "Good morning, Hermione."

At his voice, she flushed even more and mumbled into her porridge, "Morning Blaise."

Draco couldn't - and didn't - fail to notice her reaction. He stiffened for a moment and then let himself relax before saying, "Hello, Blaise. Welcome back."

Blaise nodded as he went around the table. "I've been back for quite a while. But thanks all the same."

Draco made a noise of affirmation. "How was the world?"

"World-y. And not so big, either." Blaise poured himself his much-needed cup of coffee as Snape settled beside him without speaking a word to Hermione or Draco. "Saw your Dad."

Draco, Hermione and Snape's heads snapped up and looked at him as he continued to butter a piece of toast. "You did?" Draco sounded a bit hoarse. "How is he?"

"Er. Well. When I left him, he was dead, as a matter of fact." Hermione's eyes grew to the size of plates as he said this and took a bite of toast. "Mmm. Needs more butter."

"Dead?" Hermione squeaked. "Did you catch the killer?"

Blaise coughed and managed to keep himself from coloring. It was a very hard struggle. It was not helped by the fact that Snape snorted into his mug of pumpkin juice. "Oh... er... no. He'd... um... gotten quite away. I don't believe they ever did find the... er... killer."

Draco's face had taken a sharper edge to it. "Oh, no? How was he murdered?"

"I don't believe it was murder," Blaise said, endeavoring to keep his tone light. "I heard tales of self-defense, and I believe his head was bashed in. Rather thoroughly, as I recall."

Hermione's tiny "Oh my" almost made him feel bad for what he was doing to Draco. Almost. As far as he was concerned, he could feel no sympathy for people who loved Lucius Malfoy. If he had had a parent that drenched in evil, he would feel relief for their death.

Of course, he had had a sister like that, but he had been the one who had killed her, so it was entirely different.

Draco's stiff-sounding voice broke into his reverie, "Well, whatever he got I'm sure he deserved it."

Snape, who had had enough of this nonsense, gave everyone a glare for good measure and said, "Of course he did. Pass the marmalade," and the discussion was ended.

After a long period of silence, Draco remarked, "Is that your daughter?"

Something that could pass for a mushy smile grew on Blaise's face. "Yes. Eve."

"I heard her mother died in childbirth." Draco's tone was entirely bland, but Blaise could see a tiny spark in his eyes.

One of Blaise's eyebrows lifted - entirely of its own accord, he protested later when his sister wrote him after receiving an account of the incident from a friend's younger sibling - and he said, "She did. It was tragic, I suppose."

"You suppose?"

"Louise wasn't to be involved with Eve's life that much anyway - she didn't want a child and I didn't want to be married to her. It was really rather convenient." Blaise sipped his coffee.

Hermione gasped and said, "How perfectly heartless!"

He gave her a startled look. "What?"

"Saying that the death of your wife - however impermanent that would be - and mother of your child was convenient!"

"Well, it was," he protested. "Though I suppose that was heartless. I apologize."

She eyed him sharply for a moment and then subsided, sipping her glass of milk. She always did have milk, he remembered. Something about not getting - what was it? - osteoporosis in her old age. "Very well," she said. "Apology accepted. Just don't let me catch you saying that sort of thing to the baby when she's older."

His mouth stretched into a grin and as he took a drink from his mug he said, quite out of habit, "Yes, love."

However inadvertent that little slip was, it was entirely worth it, as Draco choked on something he'd just swallowed. It took several slaps on the back from Hagrid before he was quite normal again, and he was very white as he stared at Blaise and Hermione. "Is that what's been going on, then?" he said, his voice raspy. "All this time? You two have been carrying on here, restarting your secret, stupid little romance?"

Blaise flicked a glance at the now very interested students who were all watching this little show as Hermione murmured to Draco, "Not now, Draco, for heaven's sake."

"Yes, now, Hermione!" he yelled. Several seventh year girls were whispering to each other now, looking fascinated. "You two have always been fascinated with each other and I suppose you've finally decided to throw away everything for him! Five years, Hermione! He was gone for five years! And I was here, with you!" He might've gone on, if Hermione hadn't stopped him.

"Draco!" The face that she had was what Blaise clearly remembered as her 'very angry' face. "Blaise and I are friends. He has a child. He was married. You and I are getting married. You are being, once again, incredibly insecure. I love you, you idiot!" All of this, while as forcefully stated as Draco's statements had been, was said in a much quieter tone of voice, though an admittedly angrier tone of voice.

Blaise supposed that, if it were any other woman saying this, he would have to be worried for his case. But, since it was Hermione, he didn't bother to let it get him down. After all, last night she'd said she loved Draco. It hadn't stopped her from kissing him, though. And it certainly wouldn't stop her again.

He was just about ready to intervene in this little lovers' quarrel - and possibly make it a teeny bit worse by giving Draco something (besides what he didn't know) to be insecure about - when McGonagall entered the Hall and ordered Draco and Hermione most emphatically out, and with Draco a special emphasis was placed on it. With a glare at his old House rival's Head, he told Hermione he'd be back that night and left, presumably to Hogsmeade to Apparate back to wherever it was Aurors went. Hermione fled the Great Hall to a destination unsaid, though Blaise had a very good idea as to where it was.

McGonagall glared at him too, when they were gone and he very quickly said, "I didn't do anything!"

"I was not born yesterday, my boy," she said, in her sternest tones. "You, out too. Go do something productive, I beg of you." While her tone was still stern and disciplinarian, he could detect a tiny twinkle in her eyes. He suddenly remembered she'd never liked Malfoy.

He gave her as cheeky a glare as he supposed would be appropriate and nodded before leaving the Great Hall. He thanked Merlin that he tended to eat early in the morning, not only for the time he would have with Hermione while straightening this out, but for the fact that not many students were up and eating at six forty-five in the morning. This little episode would be around the school by ten, but for now it was confined to the hundred or so students who had been eating and whoever trickled down as time wore on.

His feet took him on a familiar path and soon he was in front of the painting that had marked his quarters during seventh year - the Founders. He smiled at them and Godric Gryffindor gave him a wink as the painting swung open for him. He heard a crash from inside as he went through the passageway and smiled dreamily. That's my Hermione, throwing things whenever she's angry.

He ducked right as he came out, for a large metallic object hit the wall behind where his shoulder had been moment before. "Hermione, honestly! Isn't this getting a little old? Not to mention cliché?"

"I don't care!" she yelled at him, from the other side of the room. "Oppugno!"

A cloud of angry birds flew out of her wand and directly at him. He waited for a few seconds before flicking his wand in the most careless manner he could, canceling the spell.

This made her even more angry. "I hate you. You confuse everything! You ruin everything! And you do it on purpose! When it comes to you, everything is about you! Everything must be done your way! You have to have what you want, when you want it! I hate you!" She stamped her foot in a way very reminiscent of a memory he had of his younger sister when she was five. On June, it had been annoying. On Hermione, it was cute and oddly even more endearing.

By the time she stomped her foot, he'd made his way around the couch, set Eve down securely between a few pillows, making sure she wouldn't suffocate, and looked at her, in what he hoped was his sweetest way: eyes crinkled at the edges, mouth quirked up on one side and a look in his eyes of the years ago when they had lived together in these very rooms. He held out his hands, plaintively. "Slytherin, remember?"

If she had been expecting something in the way of an apology, this definitely was not enough of an excuse to warrant him not apologizing. "Oh, you..." She paused as she thought of a suitable insult. She couldn't think of something. "You, you, you..." She stomped her foot again and settled on an adjective. "You insufferable man!"

He smiled. "I am not. You, as I remember, adored suffering me. I was very sufferable. Enjoyably sufferable, as I recall." She glared at him. "Hermione..."

"No!" she said. "You do not get to 'Hermione' me and make everything all right, Blaise Zabini! We are not seventeen anymore!"

He stepped closer to her and fingered a strand of her less-bushy hair and murmured, "No, we're not."

Hermione grew quiet and one of her hands involuntarily reached up to hesitatingly run itself through his hair. "No, we're not..." He moved closer to her and she jerked away again and said, "Blaise, you... you have a daughter and I- I'm engaged. Engaged! To Draco. Who I love," she added, as if reminding herself.

"You loved me first," he said, his tone completely frank. "Me first. Me always."

The look on her face confirmed what he thought. She did love him. She always had. She always would. "But engaged-- I can't, it's what everyone expects... You were married, you've probably had so many other people..." She stopped when he put his hand over her mouth.

"You're always talking," Blaise said quietly, gently, to her. "You never let me finish. You, Hermione Granger, have never been one to do what everyone expects just for the sake of everyone expecting it. I was married because of one stupid night of lots of some Muggle liquor. And I haven't had that many other people. Being on the run does that to you: you stop worrying about your 'carnal desires', as some would put it." She giggled for a second and he paused. "And you were always first, Hermione. You. First. I've loved you for so long; I can't remember not loving you. You, you, you, you, you..."

He would have gone on, but she shoved aside his hand and pulled his head down with her hand that was still entwined in his hair and kissed him forcefully. He was stunned for a moment before his hands acted in a long-forgotten manner and wrapped themselves around her waist and pulled her closer, holding her tightly against him.

Fumbling hands pushed off his outer robe, and he'd begun to take hers off when there was a sound. An eerily familiar voice spoke. They broke apart and turned.

Blaise was gaping - he was sure Hermione was too - there, pacing around the sofas and chairs was his seventeen-year-old self. Hermione's eighteen-year-old self was watching him. She was the one who had spoken, and she spoke again after a second. "In the Muggle world, people are usually only this serious when they tell their family they're dying from cancer or something." Eighteen-year-old Hermione's eyes widened. "You aren't dying, are you? Oh no, Blaise!" She sniffed, preparing to cry.

His seventeen-year-old self reassured the young Hermione and Blaise turned to his Hermione and said, rather hoarsely, "That-- That's us!"

If her eyes were as big as plates earlier that morning, there were bigger than platters now. "Yes, it is. That's from when you were worrying about Snape and your sister."

"I remember." He glanced around. "There aren't any enchantments in here that could've done this, are there?"

She shook her head. "No. I cleaned through this place after the War, looking for anything and everything useful I could. Nothing in here can do that."

He frowned. "Then what...?" He shook his head suddenly. "Oh, no." He moved away from Hermione and picked up Eve, quickly muttering a few words Hermione didn't catch. A groan emitted from him after a moment, when Eve looked to be shrouded in a glowing white mist.

Hermione came over to them and said, worriedly, "Blaise? What's wrong? Is something wrong with her?"

"Finite Incantatem," he said, moving Eve so he could cradle her with one arm and Hermione with the other. "She's just... odd." He looked down at his daughter.

Eve looked back up, her big blue eyes shining and a smile on her lips. She giggled. Her wispy red head stirred when a passing draft caught it. The spell he'd just cast confirmed it: his daughter had powers. He didn't know what, exactly, those powers were, but he would try to find out. For her sake. She would end up being a mind-reading, like him, to some extent. But Louise's genes must have caused some sort of addition to the trait. So who knew what oddities his daughter could do, besides raising ghosts of the past?

"She showed us, us," Hermione said. "Like priori incantatem, almost."

"She raised memories," Blaise said. "But right now, that's not important. Hermione, what--" Just then, the bell rang. He swore.

Hermione grabbed their outer robes and shoved his at him and quickly donned hers. "Hermione!" he said.

She turned. "Blaise. I- I don't know what this means," she admitted. "I don't. But I would like to find out."

He closed the distance between them. "So are you going to end it with Draco?"

Hermione bit her lip. "I will. I have to, don't I? It's not right, leading him on."

Blaise smiled. "No. No, it's not. It's not right leading me on, either."

She rolled her eyes. "We'd best both get going, if we're going to make it to class on time."

"Before they decide to come looking for us," he agreed. "Wouldn't that be fun, being found by our students in flagrante delicto." She blushed bright red and he grinned. "See you later, Hermione."