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In their eighth year, Draco and Hermione sat in a school-wide presentation about strengthening bloodlines. It was intended to show how muggleborns and half bloods wouldn’t actually weaken a pureblood’s magic after marriage.
Hermione had been fascinated early on in the course as they learned of the magical bonds that bound families together in wizarding marriages. Now, however, it was one week until finals and she had better things to do than sit in a presentation designed to help anyone holding onto prejudices from before the war. After all, Draco Malfoy was trailing his fingers up her wrist in a way that was anything but enemy-like.
Her boyfriend had pulled her to the last row when he saw a spotlight on the center cauldron, knowing that they’d be in the dark and he’d be able to get away with pulling her focus. He’d start with putting an arm around her, and she’d take it off, telling him to pay attention. Then, he pick up her left hand — leaving her right to take notes — and brush a quick kiss to her knuckles. He massaged the tendons in her palm until she pulled away again with a smile. After a pause, he’d return to her wrist below the table, tracing lazy up and down her forearm and eventually work his way over to her thigh.
“Don’t you dare,” Hermione whispered just before he could reach for her leg.
“It’s not like we’re being tested on this, Granger,” he whispered.
“Some of us would like to understand the magical traditions we’re supposed to take part in.”
Draco rolled his eyes. “When we get married, we can just do it the muggle way. They seem much more inebriated afterward.”
Hermione whipped her head in his direction to stare. “When?” she repeated.
Draco blinked. “You pissed off nearly everyone you love, were ostracized for several months during your final year at Hogwarts, endured endless gossip columns by Rita Skeeter and testified in front of the entire Wizengamot that you love me and believe me to be a good person worthy of being the first in line when the ministry announced the Dark Mark removal process. You’re right, it’s a fling. Probably won’t last a week after finals.”
She felt herself blush. This thing between them — their relationship — was serious; they both said as much. But saying they were committed is different than talking about marriage. She grabbed his hand and watched as Slughorn called on Seamus Finnegan to come to the front of the class.
“Now, back when arranged marriages were common, families did this often to see how their matches would affect the family magic,” Slughorn explained. “This thread is a visual representation of my magic.”
He summoned his “thread,” which Hermione thought looked more like a glowing noodle floating in front of his face.
She was distracted when she caught Pansy look back at Draco with a smirk. He seemed to smile back, a genuine smile.
“You and Pansy did this then?” she asked quietly. Of course they had. Their parents would’ve loved a marriage, and it was very disappointing to them all to learn that Pansy declared she wouldn’t marry a man at all.
“We were absurdly young, I don’t even think we could read yet,” he whispered. “We didn’t understand what we were looking at and our parents were trying to explain why it was so impressive. They said our match was strong, but we both thought it just looked like glowing pasta.”
He was clearly trying to hold in laughter as he explained, “So we said, ‘We make strong spaghetti.’ When we started primary school together, we would immediately pair up and say, ‘We make strong spaghetti.’”
Hermione smiled thinking of adorable, tiny Draco proudly declaring his pasta was the strongest and tried to focus as Seamus learned how to summon his own thread of magic. His was a burnt orange shade while Slughorn’s glowing noodle had a dark blue sheen.
“Now, if I was to have a daughter that married someone in Mr. Finnegan’s family, I would want to see how our magic combined, so we just add our threads, a firefly and some baneberry,” Slughorn said as he threw final ingredients in the cauldron.
After a popping sound and a small burst of smoke, the threads levitated out of the cauldron. The orange and brown threads were intertwined, braided together like a rope. It looked like they could easily fall apart given how much space there was between them, but they remained together.
“You can see that we have no bond. There is an emotional tie to magic, and the threads become much tighter when there is a friendship or love, even just shared values. This is how wizards used to see if their children could be a match. They thought if the intertwining is loose to begin with, they could move forward with a betrothal without any ill-effects on their family magic.”
Slughorn continued, “They incorrectly believed that a half-blood joining a marriage bond would weaken the family magic, but it’s quite clear that my thread is just as strong as before. I’m a pureblood while Mr. Finnegan is a half-blood, is that right, boy?”
Seamus nodded. “Aye, me dad’s a muggle.”
“And yet, it looks just fine, doesn’t it? Who else wold like to try?”
Several younger students participated — all forming mostly vertical, rope-like structures — before Slughorn turned his attention back to the older students, who were all quiet. The students who fought in the war were healing, but they still needed to be prodded. The intentional demonstrations like this one were often difficult for them to get through. Someone usually ended up arguing because the point was to highlight the differences and move past them.
“Mr. Longbottom, Miss Parkinson, how about you two next? I think the younger years have shown us enough best friends and couples.”
Pansy rolled her eyes and sauntered to cauldron while Longbottom seemed to hesitate. “Don’t worry, snake slayer, yours won’t be the first pureblood thread I’ve tangled with,” Pansy said. Hermione wondered how she managed to always make even basic facts sound intimidating.
They performed the ritual and Pansy produced a copper strand while Neville produced one that looked black but had a sheen to it — like iron. Hermione raised her hand. “Sir, do the colors have any meaning?” She asked.
Slughorn raised his eyebrows. “That’s a very good question, Miss Granger, unfortunately I can’t answer it. There was once a thought that any metallic colors indicated a pureblood, but that has been proven false. Others thought metallic might hint at great power. There isn’t enough research to confirm that, though.”
As Slughorn guided Pansy and Neville through the process, Draco leaned in to whisper, “My thread is platinum. Very strong. Very hard.”
She rolled her eyes. “Quiet, I’m interested in this.”
Draco sighed and leaned back. She knew he wanted to protect her from this, from the traditions that he worried would scare her away from him.
However, Hermione was clearly enthralled as Pansy and Neville’s threads came out intertwined but with an inch of space around them but slight curve.
“The curvature indicates that your magic works very well together, but the space is how we know that your magic doesn’t trust the other. Because there is no trust, there is no touching. Miss Parkinson, perhaps you could invite a Slytherin up to show how it changes with someone you do trust?”
Pansy looked at Draco, who sighed. “Yeah, alright,” he said as he rose from his chair.
Hermione watched intently as he conjured a platinum strand. “Now, if I recall, you two did this as children, correct?” He asked.
“We were four,” Pansy said.
Slughorn nodded. “Young enough that you immediately trusted each other. And what did your threads look like?”
“Same as yours and Finnegan’s, but more attractive, obviously.”
Slughorn ignored Draco. “So it presented itself in a vertical line, as most have today. And you’d say you’re closer now than you were at age four?”
Loaded question, which Slughorn didn’t realize but Hermione certainly did. Betrothed as children, trauma bonded by evil parents, lost their virginities together — they could’ve been a power couple if Pansy had any interest in men.
From what Hermione was told by Draco — and very recently verified with Pansy herself — Pansy turned to Draco immediately after she finally had an orgasm to thank him for his effort, all of which had been top-notch, and gave her no doubt that she was definitely a lesbian.
Winning over Pansy as Draco’s girlfriend had been one of the more difficult experiences of the last year. But she and Hermione were finally in a place where they tolerated each other, and that was probably the best they could hope for.
She didn’t expect both Draco and Pansy to look surprised when their threads came up. It didn’t look like Slughorn and Finnegan’s at all. They were completely intertwined and formed a U shape.
“We can see a much deeper relationship than when you were children. The threads are just barely touching and the curvature is impressive. Consider yourselves lucky to live in this era, children. Your parents would’ve never allowed you to consider other relationships 150 years ago.”
“Small victories,” Pansy said.
Draco leaned in to whisper to Pansy. Hermione couldn’t hear him, but the way Pansy was trying to suppress a laugh, she knew that Draco said, “And strong spaghetti.”
He was surprisingly good in a tense situation. She supposed it was because he had too much experience with them, but without the threat of Voldemort looming, she found that Draco was usually first to ease tension with a sarcastic remark or joke.
After spending so much time trying to make everyone feel comfortable around him earlier this year, he’d become quite smooth, easily charming people. He even had a reputation as being rather affable to those who spent the most time with him.
“Miss Granger,” Slughorn called. “Would you perhaps be willing to show us what your thread looks like with Mr. Malfoy’s?”
Hermione hesitated, and Draco whispered something in Slughorn’s ear. The professor suddenly backtracked. “Actually, I believe we should try Miss Abbott.”
Hannah and Draco formed a simple rope with no curve much like the others, and Draco returned to his seat, scooting his chair closer to Hermione and wrapping an arm around her shoulders. He pressed a quick kiss to her temple.
Hermione didn’t ask him why he stopped Slughorn. She didn’t want to know.
Five Years Later
“She doesn’t have anything to prove,” Draco said angrily as they sat at the dining room table. Draco sat at the head while Hermione and Narcissa sat on either side.
His mother sighed. “Darling, I know that. I can transfer the manor to just your name if you’d rather, but the magic won’t let me put Hermione’s name on the deed without the ritual.”
“I told you, she is my equal. I will not be my wife’s landlord. She owns everything I own,” Draco said, clenching his fists on the table.
Even though she loved how fiercely Draco was fighting for her to be his equal partner, Hermione was uncomfortable.
She and Narcissa had grown close over the years, especially after she’d moved into Malfoy Manor with them two years ago. Narcissa cried tears of happiness when Hermione and Draco said “I do” at a muggle wedding ceremony last month. She knew her mother-in-law really had researched as much as possible to get them out of any outdated and offensive traditions.
Hermione realized that this was why Draco hadn’t wanted her to be in their demonstration during their last year at Hogwarts. He didn't want to know if they weren't going to be considered equals by his ancestors or whatever magic was used to determine if the threads were strong enough to put an outsider's name on the deed.
“I’ve been able to disentangle the need for it from your trust fund, but the magic on the deed is bound to the house, Draco. It’s centuries old and was designed to be unbreakable.”
“Then we’ll move,” Draco said. “Buy a place that won’t bind us to stupid rules set forth by long-dead wizards."
“No,” Hermione said, putting her own hand over his fist. “This is my home. If the magic says I can’t own it, we’ll keep it in your name, and maybe we can fix the magic once it’s transferred entirely to you.”
Hermione had a lot of theories about why Narcissa couldn’t break the spell around the deed, but all of her possible solutions involved Lucius — and no one wanted to go to Azkaban to see him.
Draco released his fists, gently taking her hands in his and pressing a kiss to her knuckles. “I don’t want you to read a single thing into this. No matter what those threads look like, this is all puritanical bullshit about bloodlines, you understand? It doesn’t matter.”
Hermione leaned in kissed him. “Draco, I know. Let’s just get it done.”
Narcissa summoned a cauldron and the ingredients. Draco quickly brought forth his own platinum thread and then it was time for Hermione to summon her own.
She took a deep breath. It would be fine. Hermione pulled up a gleaming gold thread and threw in the firefly and baneberry and their threads combined.
“Oh my,” Narcissa said.
The two physical representations of their magic were wrapped around each other so tightly that it would’ve been hard to tell where one stopped and one ended without the color differentiation. It wasn’t the closeness that had Narcissa shocked. The threads curved into a complete circle, a gold and silver ring.
“Bloody hell, it was never about the bloodlines,” Draco said. "It was always about the strength of the magic.”
“Well, I wouldn’t have been stressed if I knew it was just about being a skilled witch,” Hermione smiled. Draco pressed a kiss to her lips, but they pulled apart when a thud sounded on the table.
Narcissa’s eyes were wide as she looked at stacks of papers. “That’s not just the manor,” she said.
They poured over the papers and discovered Hermione was officially the lady of the Malfoy estate — and as Narcissa said, that was not just the manor. Her name was listed alongside Draco’s on dozens of properties and bank accounts across the world. She paged through the deeds: a castle in Ireland, a vineyard in France, a ranch in America, a mountain with a ski resort in Canada, the pages went on and on.
“What is this?” Draco asked.
“This is…everything. The spell gave her — and you — ownership of everything that this family has. Most of it was just in your father’s name before. Merlin, I didn’t even know about some of these. But this is … well, you’ve continued to prove that you’re a better man, Draco. The house honored your wish to make Hermione your equal. She is truly the first Lady Malfoy.”
Hermione wasn’t sure if she should be concerned about replacing Narcissa, but the warm smile on her mother-in-law’s face made it clear that she was happy for them. She actually looked as though she might cry. “Congratulations dear,” Narcissa said. “I’ll leave you two to celebrate your acquisitions.”
Hermione couldn’t believe it. She was looking at a huge real estate portfolio and accounts for Circe knows what — there were so many zeroes. This was absurd.
Draco looked back to their threads, still levitating in a ring above the cauldron. He muttered a spell, making the threads glow brighter for a moment before Draco pulled them out of the levitation.
He made their threads into a ring. “What do you think I should do with this, Granger?” Draco asked as he inspected the ring with a playful glint in his eye.
“It’s Malfoy now, and I think that ring might be mine,” she said.
“You’re right, Mrs. Malfoy,” he said as he slid the right onto her right hand. “Everything I have is yours. Just as it should be.”
Hermione wrapped her arms around his neck. “All I ever wanted was you,” she said before pulling him down for a kiss.
Draco leaned his forehead against hers. “And all I wanted was to give you everything. Who’d have thought we’d both get exactly what we were looking for?”