Thomas Prest: A Simple Magician

Natasha led Hermione into a spacious and fully furnished room.

The second Hermione saw the room, she was astonished. It was a tidy, clean, well-lit, and overall very nice room. Even the furnishings looked quite expensive. There was a big bed, television, computer, and many other things.

Hermione teared up a bit and thanked her cousin in her heart. She didn't expect to be given so much as she was basically just freeloading on short notice.

Noticing Hermione's starstruck expression, Natasha gently ruffled the girl's hair with an amused smile, "It was my room but I haven't slept here in months. Many of the rooms in the house are not well-furnished so this one will do nicely to house you."

Hermione looked at Natasha with wide surprised eyes before she blushed and looked down, "I-... thank you."

Her first instinct was to refuse. She didn't want to steal Natasha's room but with the way she was smiling, the redhead seemed to not mind it at all. Hermione couldn't help but feel extremely grateful for this.

The silence that spread between them was almost suffocating for Hermione. Her feelings were definitely not helping the matter and Hermione needed some sort of distraction.

And the only distraction she could see was talking with the woman whose hand was still messing up with her hair.

"So..." Hermione uncertainly asked, only for Natasha to give her a questioning hum, "Should I call you Natalia?" Hermione inquisitively glanced at the redhead.

Natasha just smiled and corrected Hermione, "Natasha. I only let Tom call me Natalia."

Her given name was special to her. On one side, she didn't like it because that's what she was called in the Red Room. But on the other hand, ever since Tom started to use it instead of 'Natasha', she felt it was special. Her very own term of endearment.

She would not let anyone else call her that, though.

"Okay." Hermione instantly answered, straightening her back. Natasha might have been smiling but her eyes... they were definitely not. The cold glint that passed through them had Hermione feel cold sweat drenching her back.

And at that moment, she finally realized why.

She realized why she felt so uncomfortable with these eyes staring at her.

A sight of Basilisk's eyes reflected in the mirror briefly flashed through her mind, and Hermione realized the feeling those eyes gave her in that instant was the same as Natasha's cold eyes gave her.

It was as if her very magic was reeling, trying to alert her of danger. It was a feeling of primal fear of something dangerous and Hermione had to put a lot of effort not to freak out.

But from the way Natasha's gaze softened when her body stiffened, Hermione realized she didn't cover her fear well enough.

Oddly enough, she felt the primal fear only when Natasha's eyes went all cold and dangerous. When Natasha's eyes softened, Hermione relaxed. Other than this illogical feeling of fear her magic was giving her, the redhead was a very friendly person in Hermione's opinion. A friendly person that gave her creeps...

Embarrassed, Hermione looked away and Natasha chuckled. "I will leave you to acclimatize here. The diner will probably be finished in half an hour to an hour." She remarked before turning around.

The girl clearly needed some alone time. Really, Natasha had no idea why the little witch was so jumpy around her. She couldn't be that scary, could she? She was trying to be friendly, though...

With confused thoughts, Natasha walked out of the room, leaving Hermione alone.

Hermione watched as Natasha's back disappeared behind the closed door and sighed. She had no idea why she was so high-strung. Ever since the... accident, she could weirdly feel some different things and it was creepy as heck.

Like the fact that Tom meant well. That he didn't really have any ulterior motive with her but nor did he have any sort of interest in her as a person.

When he said he would take care of her because it would have made his mother happy, he was telling the complete truth. Hermione was certain of that, yet, she had no idea what gave her that kind of ironclad impression.

"I must be going crazy." She grumbled and threw herself onto the bed with a groan.

Unfortunately for her, the pillow was a bit harder than she expected and a small pang of pain erupted on the side of her head when it landed on it.

"Ugh..." Hermione groaned again, this time in annoyance and a bit of pain as she grabbed the pillow and raised it...

Only to find a handgun under it.

Hermione looked at it in utter bewilderment and shock, the fact that this was Natasha's room replaying in her mind again and again as with a rising dread she wondered what kind of people she was going to be living with.

...

An hour later, Hermione came down to the kitchen after hearing a shout from Tom.

Under the curious gazes of Natasha and Tom who were seated behind a table filled to the brim with various mouth-watering dishes, the girl walked towards Natasha and... awkwardly handed her the handgun.

"Er... I found this under the pillow." Hermione said in a quiet and shaky voice.

Natasha blinked and glanced at the gun, only for her expression to brighten in realization. "Oh. I might have forgotten to remove the weapons I hid all over the room. Hmm, good to know. I will do it after the diner." She nonchalantly remarked, causing Hermione's eyebrow to twitch.

'So the gun was not the only weapon in my new room?' She really had no idea what to think about her circumstances.

Honestly, she no longer even felt like asking questions. She just walked to the only empty chair behind the table and tiredly sat down, her eyes curiously browsing the available dishes with quiet anticipation.

"You hid weapons all over my house? Why would you bother?" Tom asked Natasha, raising his eyebrow at her.

With clever use of magic, mundane weapons... especially handguns and the like that didn't have much potential for destruction... were quite useless. He had no idea why she would waste her energy on something like that.

Natasha only rolled her eyes at him, "It was when I first came here. I didn't really have anything to defend myself with other than mundane means."

"Ah. Understandable." Tom nodded and turned back towards the food, no longer caring.

If it made her feel safer, she was free to hide weapons in his house. Who was he to laugh at her odd hobbies? He did plenty of odd things himself anyway.

"Well, let's dig in." Tom spoke and turned his eyes towards Hermione, "Pick whatever you want. Don't be shy." He told her with a small encouraging smile.

Hermione nodded, feeling hungry. The hospital food sucked so seeing such a feast in front of her was very enticing. The only reason why she held back was that this was not her house. But when she was told 'go on' by Tom, she could help but dig in.

Tom and Natasha expectantly watched as the brunette took her first bite...

And her eyes instantly turned into saucers as an instinctive moan escaped her lips, her expression melting into delight.

Hermione couldn't help but feel overwhelmed by the taste and her magic pulsed with satisfaction too as if encouraging her to eat more because it was beneficial to her in a way even Hogwarts's special food wasn't.

She really couldn't help herself.

"How is this so good!?" Hermione loudly exclaimed in surprise.