A/N: First go at a scenario that had been playing through my head. Thoughts welcome :)

/

Hermione left McGonagall's office beaming with pride. She had finally been allowed to be placed in the seventh year's potions classes! As much as she loved being the best in the class by miles, she really felt like she wasn't learning much amongst the fourth years. She usually finished her potions in the first five minutes and spent the rest of the class watching Ron and Harry find new ways to irritate Snape.

She already had the seventh years' potions textbook, she had been reading it during her downtime to try and keep stretching her potions knowledge. It was in her bag right now as she happily sped through the halls of Hogwarts to the dungeons for her first class.

Hermione swept her bushy brunette hair away from her face as she picked up the pace. She was already a few minutes late. She loathed being late for class! It was a bad look for the teachers, and she might miss something!

Hermione finally made it to the dungeon, burst the door open and scurried over to a seat as fast as she could. Snape raised an eyebrow before turning back to the class. "As I was saying, with our visiting students from Durmstrang and Beauxbatons attending classes, we will be assigning potions partners for the remainder of the year…" Snape curled a lip in disgust before continuing "…for the purposes of mixing." Snape's voice sounded repulsed at the idea of an inter-school mixing element to his class. Hermione guessed this was probably more Dumbledore's idea.

"However, this class is not a teen dance, and I will not be allowing you to select your partners. The person you are sitting beside now is your partner for the rest of the year." Snape monotoned.

Hermione suddenly became aware that she had just grabbed a random seat in the room. She turned to see who she was sitting beside. She saw a mane of long silver-blonde hair, a sharp jawline and an icy blue eyed face looking back at her, unimpressed. Hermione sighed as the reality of being paired with the bitchy bombshell Champion from Beauxbatons settled in. 'She must be at least passable at potions to be selected as a Triwizard Champion,' Hermione thought, trying to see the bright side.

"Hi," Hermione said, forcing a friendly smile, "I'm Hermione Granger." Fleur just silently stared at her before looking away again. Hermione's smile dropped off her face. 'Its going to be a longgggg year of potions' she thought with dread.

The first lesson went better than Hermione thought it would. They got to try making a complex healing potion that she had read about before. While Fleur was an ice queen, she worked quite well with Hermione, preferring to divide up tasks than work on the same ones together. Hermione found that she could allow herself to get in her potions groove. She followed her set of instructions carefully, fist pumping when she finally managed to squeeze the seed out of a leathery pod. She was on a roll!

The only irritation was the constant interruptions. It seemed every five minutes another boy would approach their table to stare at Fleur or ask her out. Fleur would only let them get through half a sentence before cutting them off with a curt "non." Hermione figured that being a quarter Veela, Fleur probably had the routine down. It was funny, Hermione had always considered that Fleur's haughty pride had something to do with knowing she was attracting so many people, but Fleur just seemed irritated by it right now. She had tied up her white blonde hair and was biting her lip, focussed on the potion at hand.

Eventually the class wound up, Fleur and Hermione's potion resulting in the closest shade and consistency to the one Snape had used as an example. They poured it carefully into a beaker, which Snape swirled slowly before nodding his approval. Hermione was ecstatic. She had been worried that she would not be able to maintain her 'best in class' status when competing with seventh years. Even ice queen Fleur seemed pleased with their result. She flashed Hermione a slight smile before starting to pack up her books and equipment.

Fleur was just closing the buckles on her brown leather satchel bag when a tall, skinny, darkhaired Ravenclaw boy approached. Hermione looked up at him and saw a sheen of nervous sweat glistening on his forehead. His pale, spidery hands were twisting nervously together. "I, uh, I… Fleur, I really, really like you…" he began in a shaky voice. Fleur's head suddenly snapped up and she looked at the boy with narrowed eyes. She let out a cold laugh before simply saying "non."

The boy's face turned a dark red and he backed away from the table muttering an apology. Finally, Hermione blurted out what she had been thinking while watching the scene play out, "you could have been a bit nicer, you know, he was really putting himself out there!"

Fleur turned her icy blue eyes to face Hermione, "He is caught by ze thrall, nothing more." She snatched her bag up and swept out of the room.

/

In Hermione's second advanced potions class, she arrived early. Neatly setting up her equipment and textbook, she watched as students filtered into the class. Fleur glided in with three other Beauxbatons girls in their powder blue, form fitting uniforms and took her seat next to Hermione. Hermione smiled and said hello, but Fleur just flashed a slight smile before looking away.

Today's lesson was making a love potion. Fleur and Hermione divided up the tasks quickly, before getting down to business. They worked even more smoothly together this lesson than the last one. They were interrupted just as they were pouring the solution into a beaker for Snape's examination.

It was a short stocky boy called Jim, from Gryffindor. He had dark hair shaved closely to his wide head, resembling a helmet. He slicked a hand over his hair as he approached Fleur and smoothly placed a cup on the table in front of her. "Hot chocolate for you, Fleur. A hot drink for a hot girl." Jim said with a wink. Fleur rolled her eyes and moved the mug to one side.

"Non."

"Oh, come on! I know its your favourite drink on cold days! I asked around!" Jim said, outraged at the rejection.

"Non." Fleur repeated, more firmly, with a wave of her hand.

Jim stalked away grumpily. Fleur shook her head and reached for the cup to take a swig of the hot chocolate while glaring at Jim's back. She drew the liquid to her lips before recoiling and looking at the cup. It was the potion beaker. "'Ermione!" she gasped. Hermione looked over in horror.

"Are you okay?" Hermione asked. Fleur's face softened. "I'm fine, I don't think anything happened," she replied, "it barely touched my lips". Hermione watched her closely for a moment. She appeared normal… They both relaxed and turned back to their table to start tidying up their equipment. Hermione carefully tossed the leftover ingredients into their potions kit. She then picked up a knife, and then reached for a stirrer. As she reached for the stirrer, Fleur did too, and their hands brushed. Hermione looked up and saw Fleur looking at her face. She smiled slowly and looked at Hermione's lips. Hermione pulled the stirrer away and started placing it with the other utensils 'That was weird…Did I imagine that?' But Fleur appeared to act like her normal reserved self as they continued to clear the table and wipe it down.

Snape breezed around the room, observing the finished potions and swirling them in their beakers. He returned to the front of the classroom. "Now, I can see some common mistakes were made in the class…" Snape began, turning to the blackboard to scrawl some notes for the love potion lesson. Hermione opened her book and started taking notes dutifully. She made several annotations to the notes, making additions where Snape had been brief. If the potion hadn't affected Fleur, maybe they had made one of these common mistakes.

Fleur moved her chair closer to Hermione. She was so close that their legs were touching. She leaned over to Hermione, so close that her lips were brushing Hermione's ear. She could smell the intoxicating scent of flowers and vanilla. "'Ermione, would I be able to copy your notes? Zey look very thorough." Hermione felt a slight blush rise in her cheeks. But, she was relieved that Fleur was warming up to her and nodded. Fleur smiled and settled back into her seat. Hermione kept copying down from the blackboard. She looked over at Fleur. Fleur ran a hand through her long white-blonde hair and then stretched back in her chair. As she stretched back, her uniform tightened against her athletic stomach and the curve of her chest. Hermione blushed and turned back to the blackboard.

"…another common mistake is forgetting the rose thorns. These must be chopped up very finely…" Snape intoned, scratching another line onto the blackboard. Ah, chopping the rose thorns, Hermione had just cut them in half once and put them in. She started furiously recording the importance of finely chopping in her book.

Eventually Snape tapered off and the lesson came to a close. Hermione packed away her things and stood up. Fleur stood up at the same time. They were very close, almost pressing against each other. Fleur hadn't moved her chair back away from her before getting up. Hermione froze. "'Ermione, we should study together this week, we work well together." Fleur was staring deeply into Hermione's eyes. Hermione felt a twinge in her stomach and felt her hands go sweaty. Fleur smiled, almost knowingly, and stepped back, before gliding over to Snape to ask him some questions on the lesson.

'That was so weird…' Hermione thought, 'Was that Fleur being nice or was that a love potion working?' Regardless, she was suddenly beginning to understand why people were drawn to Fleur. When she wasn't being a total ice princess, she seemed almost… nice.