A/N: My newest novel which is just something a bit more light-hearted and fun than the likes of Prey. It's my take on the tried and true cliché, the marriage!fic. Let me know what you think!

It was D-Day, as they say. Also to be referred to, from here on out, as the day one Hermione Granger committed herself to the grandest of follies on behalf of one of her many causes. With Draco Malfoy. At the end of a long aisle. Surrounded by white, and an equal amount of ignorant smiles and expressions of perplexed astonishment.

It was at the end of this aisle, having blessedly walked without tripping in her very fussy high heeled shoes, that the victim of said folly – or perhaps the perpetrator, depending on whose perspective one sought - tried valiantly to recall just why marrying the very blond, very wealthy and very frustrating man before her had seemed like such a great plan.

It had all started with a vow, rather different to the one she was now about to take, and certainly with more dire consequences should it be broken. It had started with his deviousness and her determination to better a world that apparently didn't want to be bettered.

As Hermione stood, wobbly-legged, deprived of oxygen from the very tightly bound undergarments beneath her ivory dress, and desperately hungry, she looked to the future. It stood tall before her: all incisive and mocking grey eyes, unnaturally fair complexion and eyelashes too pretty to belong to a male, all of which had been swathed in the most luxurious and expensive fabric to have ever been created by the hands of cruelly enslaved elves.

It, meaning he, the exploiter of elves and harasser of innocent bystanders, her husband-to-be, looked excessively bored by the proceedings. Then again, in her experience, Draco Malfoy looked excessively bored always.

"Granger." Her internal diatribe against the man before her, whose mouth had started moving, came to a swift halt. "Terribly sorry to drag you away from whatever thrilling analyses you're pondering… but the Minister has coughed enough times to warrant a stay at St Mungo's and all for your attention. Care to, oh I don't know… indulge him?"

She slid a sidelong look toward him, watching his expression for the slightest of seconds before she spotted it. The Sneer. Precisely the expression a young girl always dreamed of seeing upon the face of her dearly beloved right before he said I do. He wasn't her dearly beloved; he wasn't even her we'll-rub-along-alright companion. And as for The Sneer, well it was the primary arrangement of his facial features and so she supposed she had best get used to it, in spite of the way it made her want to throw pointy implements at him.

A cough sounded nearby and, feeling rather guilty, Hermione turned from The Sneer to cast an apologetic look toward the Minister appointed to their marriage ceremony.

"I'm… er, ready."

"I'm not," was the muttered response that came from the groom, something she pointedly ignored.

"-in love and in honour," continued the wizened old man before her. While waxing poetic, he was interrupted by the softest of sounds, likely unheard by the congregated people or the celebrant but certainly by her. Even during their vows, Malfoy couldn't refrain from demonstrating his disdain for the occasion.

"I do." It was his voice, succinct. She tuned back in then, casting him a glance to show her shock at him actually going through with the preposterous arrangement.

"And do you, Hermione Granger, take thee…" She honestly tried not to narrow her eyes at the way the saliva seemed to collect in the old man's mouth, and spray in a wide circumference as he said her name. Perhaps if he had been in control of all his faculties, she might not have missed her cue. As it was the silence around her was deafening, and the cough and glare directed at her from her would-be husband made her jump.

"I… well, I suppose… I do?" There was a definite squeak to her inflection there, and she noted the raised brow that her cohort sent her, which she tried again to ignore.

Her attention was called away now, by the sudden influx of fear and horror at what came next. While Hermione had never been one of those little girls that played with her dolls and imagined wonderful weddings with hypothetical Prince Charmings, she had always thought the man she kissed at her wedding would be someone she actually wanted to kiss.

Not that, she surmised, Draco Malfoy was un-kissable in the strictest sense. It was simply the matter of who he was, and how much it would cost her to know her mouth had pressed against his own. It was too intimate an act, even for such circumstances as these.

Even for her almost-husband. Actual husband now, she corrected.

She swallowed. The sound could probably be heard in the back row, such was the silence and expectation that hummed amongst their guests. This was the moment the gossip mongers had been waiting for. She turned toward him and his look was controlled, as ever.

"Try to look like you're not at a funeral. I saw the last Weasley wedding photos… surely this is a step up…"

"You-" She was just about to give him a piece of her mind, onlookers be dammed, when she felt his firm fingers catch her chin. His warm mouth was on hers before she could blink away the cobwebs. It was strange how one moment could be both entirely fuzzy to recall, and yet at the same time have occupied such heightened awareness of her senses.

When she pulled back after an appropriately long amount of time to make the kiss look romantic, she tried not to focus on the strange tingling of her mouth. Or the unfamiliar, but well-remembered imprint of his own.

It was not all that difficult to focus on her dislike of him, rather than the softness of his lips, because the familiar and most hated expression was beginning to linger about his features once more. She suspected few people would recognise the very subtle shifting of expressions to convey his utmost disdain. But as a regular recipient of that particular look, she knew it well.

The raised brow and slight curve to his mouth sang of smug amusement, so loud that one might have thought he'd screamed it from the roof tops. Hateful man, she thought.

"You know, I don't-"

"I'm sure," he said in that smug tone which irked her. He wasn't that great a kisser. She just had incredibly low standards.

She turned a wobbly smile toward the crowd, who were cheering, now apparently convinced that the whole extravaganza was not a prank. Amongst the blur of faces, she managed to pick out those of her friends, some proud and excited, others woefully bemused.

She also caught the narrow eyed look of the fair-haired Malfoy matriarch, who was no doubt recounting the many ways Hermione had messed up both the ceremony and her beloved son's life. She felt quite confident that she would hear all about her many foibles – in eloquent and colourful language – at some point during the evening.

Hermione was loath to admit to fear of anyone or anything, but in truth, Narcissa Malfoy's supercilious stare made her want to blend in with the many 17th century sculptures of men in loin cloths that lined the rose garden behind her.

"Come little wife, we'd best start heading to the hall to celebrate this momentous occasion." He cast his mercurial gaze toward her, The Sneer lingering in its depths. He raised a hand to take her own, and when she hesitated he said, "I won't bite. Well... not you, in any case."

She cast her own version of the Malfoy stare of utmost disdain at him; she'd always been rather good at it, but she couldn't deny that time in their company had refined it to an art. "You really are the most obnoxious individual I've ever had the misfortune to encounter... let alone marry."

"Make a habit of marrying only partially obnoxious individuals do you, Granger? I suppose I should be grateful then, that you deigned to marry me." It was a commonly known truth that there was no one person on the planet, Ronald Weasley included, who had quite the same knack for aggravating her as this man.

She raised her chin and ignored the comment, before taking his hand to let him guide her to the vast hall in the South Wing of the Malfoy Manor. She was simply going to rise above provocation, hold her head high for the duration of this marriage and pray to every deity that her new husband would fall fatally into a ditch somewhere.

She wasn't a naturally violent person, but the prospect of freedom from him and his family was entirely too desirable.

"Now, Granger, though I suppose you're actually a Malfoy now... frightful to think, really. Do be sure to gaze at me adoringly whilst we're dancing... and whisper my name breathlessly at every possible opportunity." He paused to smirk down at her. "After all, you did just marry far out of your league... so you'd best be convincing in your moment of triumph."

Oh how indeed, she wondered, had life conspired to place her in this most odious situation? She was quite sure that if one stopped to recount how the whole mess had come to be, they would agree it was entirely the fault of Draco Malfoy.