A Bad Beginning
Hermione Granger, Unspeakable Class 7, Department 3, was having a Bad Day.
Not only was she in a strange land traveling with a companion who, on principle, detested, but she was also tired, sticky from the humidity, and experiencing the worst hair day she's had in months due to the aforementioned humidity. It certainly didn't seem to be looking up either. On top of everything else, she found herself surrounded by a large crowd of wealthy people shouting insults at her. Yet, she mused, the cherry on top of this Bad Day, was that her contemptible companion was clearly having the time of his life at her expense. She rolled her eyes at him, of course he looked picture perfect. A time capsule of beauty. Not one hair on his head was frizzed from the heat. No, his hair laid flat and smooth gathered at the nape of his neck by a single hair tie. The only flaw seemed to be the light smear of mud on the bottom of his traveling cloak. So of course the crowd ignored him when they had an easy target like her.
Draco, in response to her eyeroll, grinned meanly and made a gesture with his hands meant to mimic the world's smallest violin. Hermione sniffed, this whole situation with the crowd was his fault. Sticks and stones and all that, she told herself as the crowd uniformly raised their voices. The insults became more personal but not more imaginative.
"Witch!", they chanted, "Your hair is no better than a rat's nest!"
Hermione blew a strand of hair out of her eyes; she'd heard worse.
"Witch!", they shouted, "Your clothes are frumpy and unbecoming!"
She sighed and her eyes slid over to Draco, half expecting him to be leading the cry. He raised his brow at her as if to say 'See? I told you so.' She refused to react.
"Witch!", one voice screamed above the rest, "Your teeth are clearly crooked!"
At that, Hermione's mouth dropped open as she simultaneously found her voice and lost her temper. "Excuse me?" she shrilly replied, "Are you blind? My teeth are perfect! My parent's are dentists!"
The crowd paused and consulted one another, what the hell was a dentist? Draco broke the silence by laughing loudly at her defense of her teeth. It did little to cool her temper. Hermione brandished her finger like a weapon and approached each person.
"MY hair is bad?" She jabbed her finger into one unfortunate soul who paled at the contact, "At least I HAVE hair! And not what looks like a dead animal perched on the top of my head!"
She spun on her heel and pointed to another with a blob of mustard on his shirt, "You! At least MY clothes are clean!"
Hermione moved down the line, "You! When is the last time you even washed?"
In the background, Draco wiped tears of mirth from cheeks. Between guffaws, he wondered if Hermione would eventually abandon words and start physically attacking. Unfortunately for him, it looked as though Hermione's anger was losing steam faster than he would have anticipated. He huffed. How unfair. Whenever he said something slightly off-colour her anger would gather like great storm clouds and berate him for what would feel like hours. He picked at some imaginary lint and thought that a whole town-square of hecklers deserved a little more ire and he a little less. After all, this whole situation was her fault. Not his. A quick glance showed him that Hermione was glaring at the crowd. He stepped forward before some idiot opened their mouth, as fun as all this was- they were here on business.
"Good people of Berima." Draco frowned, "Are you sure it's a wise course of action to insult a witch?"
Hermione shuffled a little closer to Draco and said in an undertone, "What are you doing?"
Draco made a shushing motion with his hand, "We need to understand why they are trying to get cursed. Doesn't that seem really strange to you?"
"Of course it does. But it's not really our priority. We should just obliviate them and move on."
"But if we did that, the paperwork we'd have to fill out would double."
Hermione scoffed softly but Draco interjected before she could speak, "I hate to do this so early, but I am a higher rank than you and I don't want them obliviated. Got it?"
She gritted her teeth and nooded. It was true. Draco was a Class 9 and was the commanding officer here whether Hermione liked it or not. Both, embroiled in their aside, missed that most of the town had been having a hushed conversation of their own until one bejeweled man cleared his throat. "We had hoped... That is, we were hoping..."
He cleared his throat once more and stood a little straighter before saying in a rush,"The truest, fastest way to tell if you were a real witch would have been if you cursed one of us." He addressed the ground, "We really need a witch right now."
Hermione worked her jaw open and shut for a couple of seconds, as if trying to figure out how to say what she wanted to delicately, but the right sentence wouldn't form. She settled on a simple, "Why?"
The bejeweled man lifted his head, met Hermione's gaze and smiled, "We want you to curse our dear Princess, of course!"
All around her the nobles nodded enthusiastically. Draco shared an incredulous look with Hermione that clearly communicated, "What?".