𝙻𝚒𝚟𝚎𝚜 𝙸𝚗𝚝𝚎𝚛𝚝𝚠𝚒𝚗𝚎𝚍 II SS/HG ✔️

Propositions

Hermione Granger ambled up the stairs until she reached the library of Grimmauld Place. She let the heavy stack of parchments fall from her arms and land with a smack on the table. She rather wished the owls couldn't find her here, since it was Secret Kept.

The young witch shook her curls out of her face as she sat behind the desk.

"This is absolutely mad," she mumbled, eyeing the mountain of Ministry-sealed scrolls. "Who could possibly want to marry me? Do I even know this many of-age wizards?"

All of these came in last night or this morning, owls pecking at every window to get to her. Hermione didn't want to open them and see someone worse than Draco Malfoy on the signatory line and had put it off.

She couldn't imagine marrying anybody, really. Well, Ron. Maybe Viktor.

That would be silly, she chided herself whenever she remembered the distance between London and Bulgaria. But a girl could dream.

She broke the first seal, annoyed she had to go through these instead of work on her Transfiguration report.

She gasped. Theodore Nott wanted to marry her? He had never said two words to her!

Hermione tossed his request to the side and grabbed another. Vincent L. Crabbe?

Hermione threw up in her mouth a little bit. She threw his request on top of Nott's and opened another.

Gregory Goyle, Jr.

"No—absolutely not!" she screeched, glad none of the others liked the library as much as she did. She was thankfully alone when she came to the horrible realization that all the requests were the same—it seemed that every eligible Death Eater wanted her. Every Death Eater and their sons.

Hermione clawed through the pile, hoping, praying, that she had missed one.

"Oh thank God!" The last request had been hidden under Travers III's parchment.

"Please let this one be the one to save me!" she begged as she cracked the wax seal. "Please don't be a Death Eater!"

Hermione's eyes scanned the page. She set the request down. Her face was as pale as the parchment. She couldn't even bring herself to feel sick. She had bypassed nausea and gone straight to shock. Her mind could not process, could not comprehend why he would petition for her.

Oh, come on, Hermione, her voice chastised, sounding a lot like Ron. You're young and not hideous—this is every old barmy's chance to snag a witch to put on his arm!

But—but he's so—so horrid! He's not a Death Eater, but he's no saint!

The Gryffindor shuddered. Marrying him would be worse than being Petrified by a basilisk for three months.

I'd rather be petrified for three years than marry Mundungus Fletcher, she thought, clutching his request in her hand. He's as old as my dad…

Her brown eyes filled with tears as she looked at the odious request crumpled in her fist. If only she could talk to her dad or her mum. It wouldn't do any good—in fact, they'd probably start talking about breaking her wand and running away from the wizarding world altogether. But now they were in Australia, thousands of miles away, unaware that they even had a daughter.

She sniffled a few times before straightening the mound of parchments. It was a hard task with each scroll still trying to roll itself up again. She froze when she heard the door open—she had nowhere to hide this massive stack of requests.

Speak of the Devil and he shall appear, Hermione thought. Her face fell into her Prefects-scowl; Mundungus Fletcher scuttled around the room, hunting for things to pilfer. He had not yet turned to her corner.