hp_bunintheoven

Title: Sherbet Lemons
Author/Artist:
Pairing(s): Hermione Granger / Draco Malfoy / Blaise Zabini
Prompt: # O2
Summary: When Hermione approaches her two Slytherin lovers with a proposition to help her become a mum, she didn’t expect they’d counter with a proposition of their own.
Word Count: 2926
Rating: Mature
Warnings/Contains: Light fluff, polyamory, triad
Notes: Thanks to my beta and also to Flynn for running the fest!
Disclaimer: Harry Potter characters are the property of J.K. Rowling and Bloomsbury/Scholastic. No profit is being made, and no copyright infringement is intended.

Sherbet Lemons

Present Day

It had been a long day in the lab, but Draco knew that Blaise would have been home hours ago. The foyer of the Manor was quiet when he walked through the Floo, and he wandered upstairs and towards their drawing room. Sure enough, he could hear quiet voices talking behind the closed door, and he pushed open the door to let himself in.

Hermione and Blaise were curled up on the sofa together, the fire roaring before them. Blaise was leaning against the arm, Hermione tucked into his side with her long legs flung over his lap. He had one arm around her, and she was smiling up at him. Her hands cradled a steaming cup of peppermint tea, balancing the cup on her beautiful big belly as Blaise drew lazy circles on it with his fingers. For a moment Draco just watched the two of them, his heart bursting with love, when Blaise looked up and saw him standing there. His eyes were warm as he smiled up at him.

‘Come over here, love,’ Blaise said, nodding towards the space on the sofa next to Hermione. She looked up as well, and her smile widened when she saw him.

‘Draco! I’ve missed you,’ she said, holding out a hand for him.

Draco walked over to them, dropping a kiss on the top of Blaise’s head and then sitting next to Hermione, nuzzling her neck and kissing the spot just below her ear.

‘How are you feeling, sweetheart?’ Draco asked softly, dropping his hand on top of Blaise’s, both of them resting on her swollen stomach. ‘Do you need anything?’

She looked up at him with those big brown eyes, chewing on her lip. He smiled and leaned down to kiss her.

‘There is something, isn’t there? I know that look,’ he teased.

‘I really fancy some Sherbet Lemons,’ she said sheepishly.

Draco and Blaise both laughed at that, and then Blaise gently pushed Hermione’s legs off his lap and pushed himself off the sofa.

‘I’ll jump in the Floo to Hogsmeade,’ Blaise said, summoning his coat and scarf. ‘You two haven’t seen each other all day. I won’t be long.’

Hermione beamed at him and curled herself into Draco’s side.

‘Bring me some Sour Apple Bites, babe?’ Draco called over to Blaise’s retreating form.

Blaise smirked back at Draco as he got to the door.

‘Only because I love you,’ he threw over his shoulder as he left, leaving Draco and Hermione to laugh together.

Draco turned back to Hermione, pulling her closer and breathing in the familiar scent of jasmine in her hair. He wrapped his arms around her and gently laid his hands on her belly.

Their baby was due in two weeks’ time, on Christmas Eve. He still sometimes found it hard to believe they’d made it to this point, the three of them. Merlin knew it had taken some time getting there…

Five Years Ago

It had started in their last year at Hogwarts. Draco, Blaise and Hermione had all returned after the war to take their N.E.W.T.s.

One evening after their exams had finished, under the influence of a bottle of firewhisky and the elation of having survived their final year… well, they’d made their way to the boy’s dormitory in the Slytherin dungeons and things between the three of them had gone somewhere none of them had ever expected…

Four Years Ago

They avoided each other like the plague after it had happened. It had been fairly easy, until a year or so after graduation when they had all been at the Leaky Cauldron to celebrate Luna’s birthday.

After some studious ignoring of each other, eventually Draco had slid into a booth next to Hermione as she sat alone, a peace offering of firewhisky in his hands. Reluctantly she had taken it, and Blaise soon joined them, sitting on Hermione’s other side.

‘Maybe we should talk about what happened,’ Blaise had said quietly as the three of them sat awkwardly together.

‘Maybe we should just drink,’ said Hermione in a higher-pitched voice than usual, and Draco leaned forward to clink her tumbler with his.

‘Listen to Granger, Blaise,’ he said with a twinkle in his eye. ‘She’s always been the brightest.’

So they had drunk, and talked about nonsense, and it had happened again. And again, and again, and then it wasn’t always the three of them, but Draco and Hermione, and Hermione and Blaise, and Blaise and Draco. They carried on doing what they were doing, unable to keep away from each other.

Three Years Ago

The sex continued to be great, whether in pairs or the three of them together, but while Draco and Blaise had dated and settled into a committed relationship, between the three of them they’d never done anything more. Never dated, or gone home to each other’s parents, or bought each other Valentine’s presents.

Blaise and Draco spoke, often when they were in bed, sated and spent and curled around each other. About them and Hermione, how it felt so perfect. How it felt right when they were together. And how they could get her to see the same thing.

‘Imagine if we could convince her, though,’ Blaise had groaned, hooking his leg over Draco’s and running his hand up his chest. Draco smiled lazily and grabbed Blaise’s hand, holding it up to his mouth and kissing his palm.

‘Imagine if we could be together, all three of us, properly. Move in together, get married, have kids…’ Blaise’s voice trailed off and he dipped his head against Draco’s chest. Draco wrapped his arms around him, pulling him closer.

‘We should talk to her, sweetheart,’ he murmured against Blaise. ‘She needs to know how we really feel.’

‘We will,’ Blaise promised, kissing Draco and biting his lower lip for good measure. ‘Then we can have a brood of adorable Slytherdor babies,’ he said with a grin.

‘Slytherdor?’ Draco replied with a smirk and a raised eyebrow.

‘It’s a thing, okay,’ Blaise protested.

‘Sure, Zabini, whatever you say. Anyway, on the subject of babies with Granger, you do realise if that happens then they’ll be coming out with blond hair and grey eyes.’

Blaise scoffed and pushed away Draco’s smirking face. ‘Please, I’ll have you know that the Zabini bloodline is very… tenacious. I think you’ll find you’ll be running after some rather adorable dark-haired children when the time comes.’

‘There’s only one way to settle which of us is the most virile, Blaise,’ Draco said with a glint in his eye.

‘We need to talk to her,’ Blaise agreed, and they fell silent in the darkness, lost in their own thoughts.

Two Years Ago

As it turned out, they hadn’t been the ones to first broach the subject. A while later, Hermione had asked to speak to both of them, and they’d met up at Malfoy Manor, in Draco’s drawing room on the second floor, Hermione sitting stiffly in the wingback chair by the fire, a glass of wine in her hand, looking incredibly uncomfortable. Draco and Blaise sat on the sofa, equally nonplussed, as they watched and waited for her to speak.

Hermione swirled the wine around in her glass, studiously ignoring their eyes, until Draco couldn’t take the tension anymore. Blaise was wound tighter than a unicorn’s horn sitting next to him, and Draco knew he was thinking the same thing: that just as they’d admitted to themselves how they felt about her, she was here to break up with them.

Draco leaned forward in his seat, putting his hand out to cover Hermione’s and stop her fidgeting.

‘Granger,’ he said, his voice low and tinged with a hint of worry. ‘Just spit it out. What’s this about?’

She looked up at him with those big brown eyes, and darted her gaze over to Blaise and back to Draco. He raised an eyebrow at her, refusing to release her hand.

‘Granger,’ he said again, a hint of warning in his voice.

‘I want a baby,’ Hermione blurted out, and then her eyes widened and she pulled her hand away from Draco. He and Blaise froze, watching her in silence. Whatever they had expected, this hadn’t been it. She didn’t elaborate, and Draco cleared his throat, taking Blaise’s hand in his own and holding it tight.

‘We’re going to need a little more than that, Granger,’ he said softly.

‘I want to be a mum,’ Hermione said, her eyes softening. ‘And I don’t want to wait. I’m not asking either of you to be involved after… you know, or for a proper relationship or anything, I just… I really like both of you, and would prefer it if I actually knew the father of my child rather than just pick a random donor…’

Blaise held up his hand, interrupting her flow of words. ‘Wait a minute, Hermione,’ he said. ‘First of all, I don’t think I want to know how a donor works, but more importantly, why don’t you want us to be involved if we did this?’

A pink flush tinged Hermione’s cheekbones.

‘Well, I know you two don’t want anything serious… with me, I mean. I understand, and I wouldn’t want to get in the way of your relationship. I can raise a child alone, you wouldn’t have to worry.’

Blaise gave Draco an incredulous look that he was sure he returned. Was it possible that Hermione really thought she was just a bit of fun for them? That she considered herself an outsider in their relationship?

Blaise’s raised eyebrow suggested he was thinking the same thing, and Draco gave him a smile and a small nod. Blaise broke out into a delighted grin, and stroked his fingers along Draco’s thigh briefly before turning back to Hermione.

‘We’re in, Hermione,’ Blaise said, reaching forward to take her hand. ‘But on one condition.’

She nodded, her eyes wide. ‘Anything.’

Blaise smirked. ‘Marry us.’

Hermione paled, her hand twitching in Blaise’s. ‘Wh-what?’

‘Marry us, Hermione. Let’s start a family together.’

Hermione looked from Blaise to Draco, as if this might be a trick. Draco reached out to take her other hand.

‘What Blaise is trying to say, Granger, is that we’re in love with you and have been for quite a while now. We do want babies with you, but we want more as well.’

‘More?’ she breathed.

‘We want everything,’ Blaise agreed. ‘Your heart, in exchange for ours.’

Draco threw a warm smile at Blaise. He always had been the romantic one.

‘I don’t… I mean, I didn’t think… I thought I was just a bit of fun for you both,’ Hermione finally admitted in a small voice.

‘Granger, for being one of the most scarily intelligent witches I’ve ever met, you can be incredibly dense sometimes,’ Draco said, the affection in his voice tempering his words. ‘We’re in love with you. Please, marry us.’

She gulped and finally a smile broke out on her face. ‘Of course I’ll marry you both,’ she breathed, and in the next moment she was gathered up in two pairs of arms and covered in kisses.

Nine Months Ago

‘Draco!’ Hermione’s voice was high-pitched with shock as Draco crept up behind her and let his hands slide up her bare thighs and under her skirt. She dropped her arm from where she was reaching for a book on the top shelf and spun around, Draco placing his hands on either side of her head on the stacks, caging her in. ‘You two are insatiable,’ she teased, reaching up to kiss him.

‘D’you want a baby or not, Granger,’ he growled against her neck, one of his hands dropping to stroke the skin at her collarbone. ‘How many times has Blaise fucked you this weekend?’

She started to go red and Draco dropped his mouth to her neck, gently nipping her skin and then sucking a lovebite into her flesh until she moaned and let her head fall back.

‘It’s Zabini-Malfoy now, and you know it,’ she chided him with a small smile. ‘And three times so far.’

It was late Saturday afternoon. She was in her fertile window, and so far Blaise and Draco had been more than happy to oblige, both together and separately.

Draco pulled away and his eyes glinted with promise as he looked at her. ‘So, we’re even so far. Are you too sore? I could just make you come on my tongue if you needed a break.’

‘Why don’t you do that anyway, and then we can see how I’m feeling,’ she said cheekily, running a hand through his hair.

‘My pleasure, Granger,’ Draco smiled, dropping to his knees before her.

Present Day

Hermione sucked on a Sherbet Lemon with Draco and Blaise on either side of her, Blaise rubbing her feet. Draco kissed her neck and rubbed her shoulders, making her groan happily and lean back against him.

‘Not long to go, Granger,’ he murmured, and she laughed at the use of her old surname.

She had been a Zabini-Malfoy for over a year now, but Draco still insisted on calling her Granger. He smiled fondly at her and his hand settled on her belly again.

‘How are you feeling, sweetheart?’

‘I’m looking forward to it being over, to be honest,’ she said. ‘I’d like to be able to see my own toes again. And I’m really excited about meeting our baby.’

‘Me too,’ Blaise agreed, resting his hand next to Draco’s. ‘I wonder if it’s going to be a girl or a boy.’

Hermione sighed then, and her mouth turned down slightly as her eyes looked down at the two hands on her stomach.

‘Granger?’ Draco asked gently, always the first to pick up on her change of moods. ‘What is it?’

‘I know this baby is going to be all three of ours,’ she began with a sigh. ‘But you know magical pregnancies are exhausting, and lots of witches only have one. What happens if we don’t have any more children, and whoever isn’t the biological father feels…’

‘Hermione, love,’ Blaise said firmly, nuzzling her hair affectionately. ‘We’ve spoken about this already.’

‘I know, but…’

‘Granger,’ Draco’s voice was stern, but his eyes were fiery with passion. ‘I love you. I love Blaise. In fact, I adore both of you. Can you imagine if the baby is his, that I wouldn’t love and adore it just as much as I do the two of you?’

‘Of course not,’ she said, joining her hands to theirs.

‘And no matter how many blond-haired terrors you might have, I’m going to love and treat them all as my children, because they will be my children,’ Blaise added.

‘Not to mention that my mother and Blaise’s have already claimed this baby as equally their own,’ Draco said, remembering the extravagant baby shower that Narcissa Malfoy and Esmeralda Zabini had held only a few weeks ago.

Hermione smiled at them both. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said quietly. ‘Blame the hormones. I’ve been feeling a bit neurotic lately.’

‘We’re in this together, Hermione,’ Draco said. ‘Our marriage, our family. It’s always going to be the three of us together.’

Hermione smiled and then grimaced and hissed in pain.

‘You alright, love?’ Blaise asked, frowning in concern.

‘Mhmm,’ she replied, her lips pressed together.

‘Hermione, darling,’ Draco pressed her. ‘Is it time?’

Hermione nodded. ‘I think so.’

Blaise and Draco looked at each other, eyes sparkling.

‘Let’s get our baby born, Draco,’ Blaise said.

Eleven Years Later

Of course they went on to have more children. When Scorpius Zabini-Malfoy was eleven and the family head to King’s Cross to send him on his way to Hogwarts for the first time, Draco and Blaise held hands tightly as Hermione knelt down to give the blond boy a hug, looking into his silver-grey eyes and telling him that she loved him.

The twins were nearby, nine-year-old Juliet and Tomas, with their high cheekbones and brown eyes and curly black hair, teasing their little sister, seven-year-old Cassiopeia, with matching curls but of platinum blond instead of raven black.

Cass started to cry as Scorpius hugged her goodbye, and Blaise let go of Draco’s hand and stooped down to pick his daughter up and hoist her onto his hip, even though she’d been too big to be carried like that for about three years now. She snuggled up in her father’s arms, giving him a dazzling smile when he looked down at her brown eyes that were so like her mother’s.

The twins wrapped Scorpius up in a bear hug, ruffling his hair and kissing his cheek noisily, before finally letting him go. A final kiss from his fathers and then his mother once more, and Scorpius turned and got on the train with his friend Albus Potter, who was also starting his first year.

Juliet, always the sensitive one, reached forward and curled her hand into her mother’s, and Hermione smiled and dropped a kiss in her daughter’s hair.

Tomas pinched Cass’s leg affectionately and then wrapped his arms around Draco’s waist, leaning into his father’s side as the whole family watched the scarlet engine slowly pull out of the station in a puff of smoke.

Hermione and Juliet turned away from the platform, and Hermione smiled as Blaise and Draco gave each other a loving look over the heads of their children, their hands reaching for one another again.

‘Come on,’ she said to Juliet as they walked towards Draco, Blaise, Tomas and Cass. ‘Let’s go home.’