Chapter Text
A woman stood in a small bedroom: mid to late twenties, hair silver blonde, beauty approaching ethereal, clothing a blend of muggle and wizarding attire. Her face was gaunt, cheekbones cast in sharp relief. There was a tenseness to her body, as if everything were wound up tight, on the verge of exploding, while eyes, blue as the deep ocean, stared intently at the other woman in the room. The other woman, in her early twenties, stood with her side facing the blonde, unable to take her in all at once. Her own dark hair, black with hints of brown, fell in waves and curls around her face, further obscuring her from view. An arm crossed her chest to clasp the other at the bicep, fingers clenching tight enough that the brown skin paled around the knuckles. Neither woman glanced at the disheveled bed in the corner, its mussed sheets bathed in weak sunlight, as the sound of ocean waves greeting the sand murmured in the background.
“If I love you, is that a fact or a weapon?” the blonde asked, poised to move closer to the younger woman.
Then suddenly her posture slumped, and she gazed away from her co-star to look beyond the wizarding cameras to complain to the room at large. “What in the world does that even mean?”
“Cut!” Hermione dropped her head into her hands and groaned. She heard muffled echoes from the crew throughout the stage as the sound of waves cut out and the previously dim room was lit up. She cast a quick tempus and sighed. “Everyone, take ten. Not you, Delacour.”
Hermione waited until the crew filtered off the sound stage, muttering and complaining as they went, before she strode over to the star of the movie, wizarding world’s hottest commodity at the moment, and growled, “What the bloody hell was that?”
Blonde hair flipped effortlessly over a shoulder as arms crossed defiantly. “That line is ridiculous. It is overly dramatic. A veela wouldn’t say that.” More quietly, Fleur insisted, “A veela wouldn’t let her go.”
Hermione took a slow breath in, held it, then slowly released it. Everything about this film was a disaster, the effects crew had muddled their spells on multiple occasions, the recording spells she had pioneered had so far been challenging to adapt for something this large causing schedule and budget overruns, and the star was a pain in her ass. She’d decided to direct this film amid a sea of doubts; it was her first big commercial venture—she was best known for award-winning documentaries and short films. But the opportunity to shoot a film using wizarding and muggle technology, targeted for both audiences, and address the lingering classism and blood purity beliefs in their society (even if it was fictionalized) was too big to pass up.
It wasn’t supposed to be a gossip magnet for every international wizarding tabloid. They’d kicked Rita Skeeter off set three times and had to employ extra security to keep an obscuring shield up at all times to prevent leaks and illegal recordings. All because Fleur Delacour attached herself to the film, draining every bit of good and fun from a job Hermione loved to do.
Fleur was standoffish and rarely mingled with the crew, which was all fine, except when she had concerns about the script. Those she voiced with a timing aimed to cause maximum disruption. As co-adapter of the screenplay, Hermione was beginning to feel a little defensive about the whole thing. Through lots of trial and error, she found the only way to move forward was to talk through Fleur’s concerns, right then, right there.
“Explain it to me,” Hermione said, forcing herself to sound non-judgmental.
“Priya and Belle…” Fleur grimaced when she said her character's name; she had complained about it nonstop during the first week of filming. (“Veela do not need to state the obvious,” she’d said with a gesture to herself. “There is more to us than just that.” Her accent, normally little more than an inflection, was thick with anger.) “… they are mates, non? This realization gets seared into Belle’s soul in the middle of the war when her soon-to-be lover arrives at the safe house after being battered, tortured, and near broken. She would never let Priya leave to finish this quest with her friends. As a veela, she would be incapable of it.”
Although Lily and Hermione had consulted with multiple Veela during script development, the magical creatures were notoriously close-lipped about their culture and abilities. Hermione stepped onto the set, thinking about Fleur’s words and her own interpretation of the text. Perhaps they got it wrong.
“Belle is a quarter veela. My understanding is that for those quarter or less, the identifying of a mate is not a guaranteed occurrence, the strength of the pull may vary greatly. Is that accurate?” Hermione asked.
Fleur’s gaze flickered away and back, her back stiffening. “Oui, that is true. It can be very confusing and frustrating.”
Hermione nodded and drifted closer. Her fingers plucked at Fleur’s jumper, shifting her closer to where Priya would stand. “Let’s pretend for a moment that I’m Belle, quarter magical creature and you’re Priya, half-blood raised as a muggle, prophesied to kill Voldemort for as long as she can remember. Despite the fact we’ve always been at odds with each other over the years, I feel… something. But the war starts in earnest and you’re at the center of it, bearing the weight of the prophesy. Then you’re here, injured, needing a safe place and I find myself wanting to be that safe place for you. Does that mean we are mates? I’m not sure, but holding you in my arms feels so right, and I want it to be true. Do I burden you with these feelings? Will knowing them make it harder for you to do what you need to do? Is it something to look forward to or just something else to lose? That’s what I’m thinking about.”
Hermione spoke Belle’s opening lines of the scene and they walked through it together; she was only a little surprised to learn Fleur knew all of Priya’s lines. At the end, they were standing, forehead pressed to forehead, the moment close and intimate as if it were just the two of them, stage forgotten. Her eyes drifted closed as she enjoyed the warmth of Fleur’s hands in hers, cradled between their chests.
Clapping jerked them back to the present, making Hermione stumble back a step—the stage crew had returned and was watching them. The heat of a blush flooded her cheeks as she looked away and rubbed the back of her neck in embarrassment. It wasn’t the first time she’d run lines with the actors, but it was the first time with Fleur.
She shook herself, pushing away the annoyance at being interrupted, and chanced a glance back at Fleur. Those blue eyes were bigger than ever, big enough to drown in. With effort, she wet her lips, dredging up enough moisture to swallow through the sudden lump in her throat. “Did that help?”
Eyes hooded and expression undecipherable, Fleur nodded once.
“Last time then, please,” Hermione said, her voice projecting to encompass everyone on set.
A make-up artist swanned in, pushing her way between Hermione and Fleur. With a final exhale, Hermione turned and made her way back to the director’s chair, ignoring the odd flop in her stomach.
Harry, her assistant director, stood next to one of the muggle cameras, and gave her a shit-eating grin as she approached. “That looked cozy.”
After delivering a slap to his shoulder, she murmured, low enough so only he could hear, “I can’t wait to be done with this film.”
The sounds of everyone moving about, getting ready to shoot again, calmed her, even as she felt the weight of Fleur’s gaze still on her.
Since her agent’s office was a short walk away from Diagon Alley, Hermione opted to apparate there and finish the journey on foot. Breathing in fresh air and hearing the shouts of children and teenagers made her realize she’d been cooped up in the editing studio for too long without a break. The magical neighborhood was packed with students—it was August after all—going from shop to shop, getting all the things they’d need for their return to Hogwarts in September. The crowd was slow moving, but she rather enjoyed looking at all the young faces and the range of expressions she saw: excitement, awe, boredom, disappointment. Shopping for school supplies and books had been one of her favorite outings growing up, when everything hinted at the things she’d learn and master in the upcoming school year. Her journey was slowed even further whenever she spotted confused and lost looking muggles, taking the time to stop and help them however she could. The wizarding world was still woefully lacking when it came to welcoming non-magicals into its midst; as much as she’d loved discovering she was a witch, it had been a big adjustment for herself and her parents. Hopefully with this film, she’d finally be able to do something about that.
Past the shops, the crowd thinned and within minutes she arrived at her destination: a five story building made of blocks of rust-colored sandstone with large modern windows, charmed to perfectly reflect the outside environment. A pair of large gargoyles blocked the double wooden doors that led inside the building.
With a flick of her wrist, she freed her wand from its holster and placed its tip in the mouth of one of the stone guardians. “Hermione Granger, here to see Draco Black.” Its eyes glowed with a white light, then the two shuffled apart, leaving enough space for her to slip through to the doors.
The entryway was nondescript, walls an off-white color with mahogany wainscoting, and a bright red door with a burnished brass doorknob in front of her. When the outer doors closed behind her, there was the tug of a teleportation spell. Opening the red door, she found herself in the waiting area of Draco’s office.
No one was there, which was unusual. Althea, Draco’s assistant, wasn’t at her desk, chair pushed in tight and rolled parchments organized neatly next to a muggle phone and a desktop computer. A plush burgundy couch and armchair sat along one wall, they looked inviting but Hermione knew from experience that they were only comfortable for five minutes before one’s ass started to hurt. Draco didn’t want early arrivals or hangers-on. The opposite wall held the fireplace with a white stone mantle, stark in its simplicity. A few wizarding paintings hung the walls, a couple were portraits of past Black or Malfoy ancestors—Hermione was certain Draco had enchanted their frames so nothing they said was audible to those in the room—while the rest were landscapes: dragons flying against a backdrop of snowy mountains, the glint of merpeople tails frolicking in the sea, and Hogwarts with a looming Forbidden Forest in the background. It all declared Draco’s pureblood ancestry without being excessively obnoxious.
“Draco?” she called. The door to his office was cracked.
“Granger! Get in here,” came the muffled shout from the room.
She pushed open the door and stepped into the office. Windows dominated the far wall, giving a bird’s-eye view of the street and buildings across the way. The office was the same mix of non-magical and magical as the waiting room, but with a lighter color palette. Draco sat behind his desk, quill in hand, scowling at her.
“Are you late to everything or just meetings with me?” he asked.
Smiling, Hermione gave him a shrug and sat down in the chair. “Diagon Alley is full of school shoppers.”
Understanding eased the scowl into a slight frown, his normal look whenever they met. From the history books of the Wizarding War, she knew he took after his father a great deal. Lucius Malfoy was still serving out his life sentence in Azkaban, captured in the chaos following Voldemort’s death when Draco was barely one year old. At Hogwarts, Harry, Ron, Hermione and Draco had clashed numerous times while Draco struggled to find his place in his house with the other purebloods, a process complicated by his mum becoming romantically involved with a muggleborn, Harry’s mum no less. There was a lot of aggression and acting out, but they all emerged on the other side of it with a grudging friendship.
He stood up suddenly and came round his desk, choosing to sit next to her. “How’s the film coming?”
Easing back into the chair, Hermione crossed one leg over the other and gave him a suspicious glance. “We have two of the three points-of-view complete for the wizarding version. Only Priya’s is left, which, granted, is the most time consuming. For the non-magical version, Harry is heading up editing of that one, but he’s due to give me a preview in another two to three weeks. Why?”
Draco absently brushed his blond hair back from his forehead, then with a gesture closed the office door and cast a silencing charm around the room. “We might have a problem. Have you read the Daily Prophet or Witch Weekly in the past few days?”
She hadn’t. In fact, she’d barely been home in the last week, pouring herself into the editing effort and basically living at the studio, working with the rest of her team on wrapping up the largest and most expensive magical movie to date in the still developing magical film industry.
At the shake of her head, Draco sighed, then pulled several periodicals from his desk and held them out to her, each open to specific pages.
SET PLAGUED BY INJURY - DIRECTOR AT FAULT?
HIGH-STRUNG STAR PLUNGES SET INTO CHAOS
CAST AND CREW DEMORALIZED BY CRAZED DIRECTOR
“What fuckery is this?” Hermione asked in outrage as she glanced over blurry, moving images, but clear enough to see that they were from the film set and largely captured either Fleur or herself. At the core of each of those headlines was a kernel of truth blown totally out of proportion; vague details about the schedule overruns, the questioning of the script on set, and the mistakes made by the effects crew were laid bare.
He stood again, strode to the drinks cabinet and prepared two glasses of firewhiskey on ice. One floated over to her while he slid back behind his desk, sipping at his drink. “This,” he said with a gesture to the newspapers, “is a few purebloods finally realizing you might be a threat to them. They’re trying to sink the film before it’s even released. And all the blame would be laid at the feet of the mudblood director and the half-breed star.”
“I hate how easily you can say those words,” she muttered before taking a gulp of alcohol.
“You only had to break my nose once and trounce me in all our classes before I finally got my head out of my ass. But you’re slumming in my end of the quidditch pitch now, Granger, and even though you never thought this might happen, I did.” He gave her a proud look, as if she should be pleased. “We need to get ahead of this before anyone hears about those early arguments between you and Ms. Delacour. Not the most professional look for either of you.”
Hermione blushed at the memory of losing her temper more than once and stomping away from Fleur before her mouth could get her in more trouble. The woman was just so infuriating. “So what do we do?”
“You date.”
“What?”
Draco had a smug shit-eating grin on his face that she wanted to smack off. Date who? Why?
“You and Ms. Delacour fell in love on set. All that passion for the work translated into passion off set.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“Beauty and the brains. Which honestly, both labels can apply to either of you.”
“No.”
Draco leaned forward, fingers laced together. “Look, the French press is being very unkind to Fleur as well. It’d only be from now until a month after the release. Then you say you couldn’t take the fame and the film will succeed or fail on its own merits. You do this while I figure out who’s responsible for this smear campaign.”
She bit her lip, turning over options in her head. How would she and Fleur even pull something like that off? All they did was argue. Her stomach flip-flopped at the memory of their foreheads pressed together on set. Anger blazed to the forefront, pushing the memory away; she shouldn’t have to do this.
“Fleur will never agree.”
Draco flashed that smile again. Fuck.
“Actually, her PR team and I thought of this together. She’s on board if you are.”
“What about Ron?” she asked. They’d been on and off for years, currently off, but there were tentative plans to catch up once she wrapped up this project.
“What about him?” Sarcasm laced Draco’s words. “Don’t tell him; he’s never been able to keep it a secret. Once it’s all over, you can let him in on it.” Draco might be friends with Harry, but he barely tolerated Ron and definitely thought Hermione could do better, which he told her every opportunity he got.
Hermione waved at the liquor cabinet and floated the decanter of firewhiskey over to Draco’s desk, then poured another two fingers worth into her glass. Her free hand rubbed at her temple in frustration.
“Draco, my personal life was never part of this deal.” She sat back in her seat, face settling into a stubborn frown.
For once, Draco dropped his smug demeanor. “I know, and it shouldn’t be this way. Why did you take this film in the first place?” He paused a moment, then answered for her. “Because it highlights toxic pureblood culture, and you negotiated a hefty portion of profits to go to your foundation.” He waited until she nodded in agreement, then added, “In any case, Fleur Delacour is hot, and I know you swing both ways. Enjoy it.”
Hermione rolled her eyes. He was still such a prat. With eyes covered by one hand, she murmured, “Fine. I’m taking any dating expenses out of your fee.”
“I’ll owl you with the ironed out details from her PR team. Now get out of here and finish editing that movie.” He pointed at her, gaze intent. “You can tell Harry, you’ll need help selling this, but do not tell Ron.”
The next day Hermione had been on the verge of leaving her apartment for the studio when Draco’s patronus arrived. “Someone from Fleur’s team will be arriving at your flat within the hour to coordinate. Harry’s on his way.”
Not five minutes later, Harry stepped out of the floo into her loft, his hair more bedraggled than normal, wearing a wrinkled rugby shirt and some jeans. It was fairly early on a Sunday morning and Hermione had the good grace to hand him a cup of strong tea as he joined her in the kitchen.
“Looks like someone had a rough night,” she said with a smirk.
After taking a sip and giving an appreciative groan, he waggled his eyebrows and said, “Oh yes, just me, meters of film, and Boris. I swear than man eats onions for every meal. Thank Merlin you taught me that fresh air spell.”
“You should talk to Fred and George. Last time I worked with Boris, I had them whip up some mints for me; they taste like onions but smell like spearmint. Boris seemed tickled that I thought of him.” Hermione flashed a grin, but her smile fell. “Sorry to drag you into this, Harry. Draco insisted.” She paused and blew out of a puff of air.
He cradled his mug of tea and said, “We all have a stake in this, Hermione. We employed the most squib and muggleborn wizards of any movie to date. The house elves who did the catering were all paid. And even though the story we’re telling is fictional and dramatic, you and I both know those pureblood sentiments in the film are more prevalent than not. Not to mention all the new skills the crew learned to adapt your spells. On a purely personal level, if this film tanks because of some small-minded pureblood, Mum will be devastated and I’ll have a hard time getting funding for the quidditch film I want to do.” His green gaze sharpened. “Let’s beat them at their own game.”
Hermione ducked her head, blushing at his praise. “Thanks, Harry. I feel like I’m going to need all the help I can get.”
“Because dating Fleur Delacour will be such a hardship,” he said while skipping out of range of the slap she aimed at his arm. “I saw you ‘Mione. Not many people get under your skin, but she does.”
“That’s precisely what I’m worried about.” She glowered at him, desperately trying to keep from snapping at him. “You’ll have to keep me from killing her.”
“She’s actually a nice person and smart enough to give you a run for your galleons. She won the tournament for a reason,” Harry said. “If you hadn’t gone off to Ilvermorny fourth year, you’d know that.”
“If I hadn’t gone off to Ilvermorny, you and I would be leading very different lives, probably working boring jobs at the Ministry.” She arched an eyebrow in challenge, fully ignoring the first part of what he said.
At the end of third year when Dumbledore announced the return of the Triwizard Tournament to Hogwarts, Hermione was determined to spend the year abroad rather than witness the resurrection of that death trap. It had been difficult to leave her friends, but she’d learned so much while away. She took her first class about filmmaking as part of Ilvermorny’s muggle curriculum, which started her on a journey that led to her first documentary years later. And the first girl she kissed was there. All in all, a very eventful year.
The buzzing of the intercom interrupted further discussion and Hermione walked over to the panel. “Hello?” she asked after pressing the button.
A flurry of French answered her, too fast and furious for her to catch even a single word.
After taking a calming breath, Hermione hit the button to unlock the front entrance, then opened the door to her loft and leaned against the frame, waiting for her visitors to arrive. The stomping of feet and intense conversation floated up the stairwell before Gabrielle Delacour and another woman came into view. Gaby had visited the set a few times while filming, charming everyone left and right. If her gut hadn’t started churning with nerves, Hermione would have been happy to see her.
“’Ello ‘Ermione!” Gaby greeted before brushing past her into the loft. “We brought breakfast. I’m starved.”
Hermione grunted in response, her gaze captured by the other blonde, who stopped in front of her, wearing sunglasses and a baseball cap. It was Fleur. Hermione blinked in surprise at her muggle disguise, absently noting it did little to obscure her beauty.
After removing the aviators with a flourish, Fleur leaned closer and asked, “Ready to act, director? I’m not sure you’re up to the task, but Monsieur Black insisted you were. I do hope you can keep up…” She paused to look Hermione up and down. “…your end of the deal.”
With a smirk on her lips, Fleur sauntered into the loft, calling out a warm hello to Harry. Jaw clenched, Hermione scoffed as she went past. She’d never had a problem keeping up with anyone, and she definitely wasn’t going to start now. With a brief prayer to Merlin, Morgana, and anyone else she could think of, Hermione shut the door and joined them in the kitchen.