The Trouble with Wanting

Posted originally on the Archive of Our Own at http://archiveofourown.org/works/30791558.

Rating: Mature
Archive Warning: Underage
Category: F/M
Fandom: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Fred Weasley, Sirius Black/Remus Lupin, Angelina
Johnson/George Weasley, Remus Lupin/Nymphadora Tonks, Harry
Potter/Ginny Weasley, Fleur Delacour/Bill Weasley
Characters: Fred Weasley, Hermione Granger, George Weasley, Angelina Johnson,
Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, Katie Bell, Alicia Spinnet, Ginny Weasley,
Minerva McGonagall, Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, Fleur Delacour,
Arthur Weasley, Molly Weasley, Nymphadora Tonks, Charlie Weasley,
Oliver Wood, Severus Snape
Additional Tags: Alternate Canon, Fix-It of Sorts, Stolen Moments, I Wrote This Instead
of Sleeping, no beta we die like men, Harry Potter Epilogue What
Epilogue | EWE, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Humor, Fred Weasley
Lives, Eventual Smut, Ficlet Collection, Buckle up, SPEW | Society for
the Promotion of Elvish Welfare, Slow Burn, Flirting, Angst and Feels,
Groping, Smut, Oral Sex, Sex, Secret Relationship, Molly Weasley
Bashing, Ron Weasley Bashing, Memory Alteration, Dubious Morality,
Depression, Non-Consensual Touching, Implied/Referenced Sexual
Assault, aftermath of sexual violence, Angst and Humor, Hurt/Comfort,
Anal Play, Light BDSM
Language: English
Collections: Fremione Supremacy, Harry potter mix, ♕ Brightest Witch of Her Age
♕
Stats: Published: 2021-04-20 Updated: 2024-05-14 Words: 188,351 Chapters:
77/?
 The Trouble with Wanting
by WrathOfMacy

Summary

This story started as a series of drabbles, ficlets, and could-have-been-canon scenes

beginning in June of 1995 wherein Fred and Hermione slowly become more than friendly
acquaintances. Similarly, this fic itself has gradually morphed into much more than that, and
certainly more than I had ever intended it to be.

It’s now 150k+ words of my explaining by example all of the ways that these two could -
SHOULD - have been canon, and what that might have looked like if it ran alongside the
events of the original books (or most of them, anyway).

That said, these are significantly darker than canon, and they touch on some of the trauma
that was previously brushed over, as well as injecting some where it makes sense to have
occurred. There’s plenty of humor and joy, but there’s also a lot of pain that, within the
context of the story, has good reason to be felt.

Regarding the Underage tag, the characters are ages sixteen and eighteen at the first
occurrence. If this upsets your sensibilities, this is not the story for you. Especially triggering
content will be called out in chapter notes.

*TAGS AND CHARACTERS WILL BE CONTINUALLY UPDATED AS NEEDED

UNTIL THIS IS COMPLETE*
 PART ONE — Lavender with a hint of guilt
Chapter Notes

There were only about five hours between me coming up with this idea and drafting it
on here, so let's please be gentle, yeah?

I wasn't sure if I wanted to post this as a collection or a multi-chapter and I ultimately

decided multi-chapter, purely for the sake of it being easier to add to this way.

This is going to be a series of drabbles, ficlets and one-shots following our dear Fred
and Hermione from June of 1995 (shortly before the third task of the Triwizard
Tournament) to an as-of-yet undetermined point post-war.

If you're concerned about Fred dying, don't be. Also, read the tags.

Unlike my previous works, this will not have a set update schedule. That said, you can
rest assured that I have a compulsive personality and barely the ghost of a social life at
this point, so it will most likely be updated at least once or twice a month. Subscribe if
you want email notifications for that.

I'm pretty much approaching canon as a buffet from which I can pick and choose scenes
(or lack thereof) to play with. If you have a recommendation or event that you would
desperately like to see, comment or email me at wrathofmacy@gmail.com.

This is going to be chronological, so bear that in mind and don't request a scene from
GoF when we're halfway through HBP.

If you're still reading at this point, fabulous! Please keep your hands, arms, and legs
inside the vehicle at all times, and enjoy the ride.

See the end of the chapter for more notes

8 June 1995

To say that Fred Weasley was perplexed would be a gross understatement.

He had just left potions, the only NEWT-level class that he didn’t have with his twin, and he
was clutching a piece of parchment like a drowning man might clutch a life-preserver,
completely and utterly transfixed. At the top of that parchment were four words, scrawled in
his own messy handwriting: leather, lavender, rain and coffee.

Engrossed as he was, he didn’t notice when his girlfriend sidled up beside him in the corridor.

“Hey you! Katie told me it was Amorentia day in potions,” Angie said, pushing onto her
tiptoes to kiss his cheek with a smile.

“Uh, yeah,” Fred said awkwardly, hastily making to tuck the parchment into his bag and out
of her sight.

“Is that what it smelled like for you?” she asked excitedly, eyes bright and voice teasing as
she spotted the paper. “Well, what are you waiting for? Give it here!”
Fred made to step back, but Angie was too fast, snatching the page from his grip before he
even fully realized she was lunging for it. It was like watching a bludger on a collision
course.

“Ang, wait – “ he said hurriedly, trying to grab it back, but it was too late.

She stepped away, laughing, and turned a bit so it was out of his reach. He watched her
profile in the dimly lit dungeons helplessly as the easy smile melted away from her face like
an ice-cream cone on the pavement in July. Her gaze reached the bottom of the list and
shifted back to the top, reading through one more time.

“It doesn’t mean anything,” Fred said quietly, cringing and desperately wishing it were
possible to spontaneously combust. Guilt wasn’t something he succumbed to often, pranking
would be far less fun if it were, but in that moment he felt it in spades. Angie tipped her head
and gave him a sad, knowing smile, turning and handing the parchment back to him.

“Fred, I don’t drink coffee, and I’m allergic to lavender. It makes me break out in hives.”

“Still,” he said, reaching for her hand with his empty one. She let him take it, but left her grip
slack. “We have loads of fun together, and you know you’d be lying if you said I wasn’t the
best snog you’ve ever had.”

Angelina gave a half-hearted laugh and looked up at him, troubled expression pulling the
corners of her mouth down and creating a small crease between her brows. “I’m going to go
back to the common room for a bit. I’ll meet up with you later, okay?”

“Angie, I’m really sorry,” Fred tried to apologize, but she was already backing away and
shaking her head at him.

“Please don’t apologize, really. It’s not like you’ve any say in the matter. I’ll see you later
Fred.”

Deflated, Fred stuffed the incriminating piece of parchment in his bag none too gently and
made for the stairs, eventually stopping in an empty corridor beside an open window and
leaning against the wall, feeling about as lowly as a flobberworm.

Had he pictured Angelina and him staying together forever? No. What had started out as a
friendly date to the ball in December had turned into something of a fling, and a fun one at
that. She was always willing to discuss quidditch, or listen to him and George debate the
merits of dung bombs versus stink pellets, and she never told him off for getting in trouble or
pranking their housemates. He had a great time with Angie. He liked Angie.

And he felt terrible that, however inadvertently, he’d hurt her.

“Hey Fred, is everything okay?”

He opened his eyes, not realizing he’d closed them, to see that Hermione had appeared in
front of him. Her hair was down, dark caramel in the sunlight, and she, like many of them
 outside of class time, had foregone the heavy school robes for a lighter grey cardigan that
hugged her shoulders.

“Oh, hey Hermione. Yeah, just a long day.”

“Wanna talk about it?” she asked, shifting the massive stack of books she was carrying from
one hip to the other.

“Not particularly,” he replied truthfully. “Need a hand with those?”

Hermione shook her head. “No, it’s okay. I’m meeting Padma at the library to compare
arithmancy notes.” She busied herself with one-handedly rearranging her bag on her shoulder
before glancing past him. “Oh, there she is now. I’d better go. I hope your day gets better!”

She offered a friendly smile and stepped around him, passing the open window.

At that precise moment, whether it was fate or karma or pure dumb luck, a warm spring
breeze gusted down the passageway, tousling the ends of her curls and smacking him square
in the face with the faint, yet undeniable, scent of lavender.

“Oh,” Fred said lamely, eyes wide and mouth slightly agape as he watched her back get
further and further away. She stopped in front of Padma and they began passing books and
pages of notes back and forth, utterly oblivious to the existential crisis unfolding all of thirty
feet away from them.

“There you are Forge,” George exclaimed, turning the corner and slinging an arm around his
twin’s shoulder. When he didn’t respond, George leaned forward inquisitively and took in the
gob-smacked expression on Fred’s face with unconcealed curiosity. “I passed Angie in the
hall, who seemed none too pleased about something by the by, and you look like you’ve been
confunded. Everything okay?” When he still didn’t say anything, George traced his gaze
down the corridor. “Why are we staring at Hermione?”

Fred swallowed hard and watched as the witch in question disappeared into the library and
out of sight.

“Gred, I think I’m in trouble.”

Chapter End Notes

I am aware neither of the twins took NEWT level potions. It is simply advantageous to
my plot if that weren't the case.
 Coffee or tea?
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

8 June 1995

“What do you mean you’ve never noticed?” Fred asked his brother, who was seated on the
bed beside his own in their dormitory. There was a desperate, if slightly unhinged, edge to his
voice.

“I mean,” George said with a huff, “I’ve never paid attention to whether or not Hermione
drinks coffee or tea.”

“Well, that’s just… just… it’s unacceptable!” Fred declared indignantly.

“Oh, I’m sorry. With my busy schedule, I completely forgot to stalk my kid brother’s friend
who, for the record, scares me to my core every now and again. String me up in the
dungeons, why don’t you?”
Fred whipped a pillow across the room, which landed with an anticlimactic “fwup” against
George’s chest.

After Fred’s epiphany that afternoon, and consequent confession, the two had been heatedly
debating whether or not there was even any merit to the items written on the list, which was
now crumpled up beside Fred on the mattress.

“A lot of witches use hair stuff that smells like lavender,” George reasoned, not for the first
time. “What about the other items again?”

Fred, who’d sunk sideways on the bed at that point and was staring at the canopy overhead
like a man on death row, groaned and scrubbed his hands over his face before answering.

“Leather. That one is a no-brainer; she’s always lugging around enormous old books that are
bound with the stuff.”

“Okay, what about rain?” George coaxed, still trying to figure out what exactly rain smelled
like.

“I’ve no idea. I can’t remember a time we’ve ever interacted when it was raining.”

“So, it has to come down to the coffee then… do they even serve coffee with breakfast? I
don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone drinking it.”

“I’ve no idea, I’ve never even tried the stuff,” Fred sighed. “I only know what it smells like
because Charlie has it when he visits.”

“Well, there’s only one way to find out then,” George said resolutely. Fred turned and looked
at him expectantly, brows raised. “We’ll just have to beat her to breakfast tomorrow.”

9 June 1995

As it turned out, beating Hermione Granger to breakfast was no small feat. They’d never
actually seen her come down the stairs in the morning, she’d always been planted at the table
in The Great Hall and surrounded by books and scrolls of parchment by the time they’d
arrived, if she hadn’t already departed for the library.

Breakfast was served at seven, two hours before the start of class, so for the first time in his
life Fred Weasley set an alarm for a time starting with the number six. The next morning,
when it went off, he dearly regretted having done so.

“Wasgoinon,” Lee mumbled groggily, sitting up and looking around their room with eyes that
were still fully shut.

“Nothing, go back to sleep,” George soothed, clutching in the dark at the clock that sat
between his and Fred’s bed to silence it. Once he’d done so, he glanced back to find that Lee
was already prone once more and drooling.
In the dark grey light, he turned and saw that Fred was sitting up against the pillows with an
expression somewhere between anticipation and nausea. He opened his mouth and closed it
twice before speaking in a quiet flurry of words.

“You know what, let’s just go back to bed.”

He made to close the curtain around his mattress and roll over, but George leapt to his feet
and ripped the fabric back. “Oh no you don’t, I’m already awake. Up you get.”

After no small amount of hemming and hawing, the two stumbled down the stairs to the
common room, blinking against the sconces mounted along the walls. They’d never seemed
quite that bright at night, but now it was like looking into the sun.

“Fucking hell,” George muttered, tripping over a chair someone had left pulled out from one
of the study tables. “If she’s your soulmate you’re going to have to have a serious
conversation about the hours humans were meant to be awake and functioning.”

The pair made it to The Great Hall before any other students, thoroughly shocking Professor
Sprout at the head table, who nearly dropped her morning paper and then immediately fixed
them with an uneasy, suspicious stare.

They raised their hands innocently, palms forward, and took a seat at the Gryffindor table, a
little further down than they normally would have in favor of a decent vantage point. The
food hadn’t even appeared yet and they went about extracting several items from their bags
that might look like homework to any passersby.

One by one, students began to trickle into the hall, Ravenclaws accounting for a
disproportionate number of them. George at least made a show of pretending to study, though
he was far more likely to fall back to sleep sitting up, but Fred just stared unblinking at the
enormous oak doors as if they might explode inward at any given moment. Every so often his
right eye would twitch.

Finally, at exactly seven o’clock, Hermione materialized, as did the food. It would be a
generous assessment to say that the twins looked like death warmed over, rumpled and
propped across from one another on the benches, but she appeared the same as she always
did. Her curls were tamed into a bun on top of her head, a few already having sprung free,
and her white collar was crisp and freshly pressed.

Similarly to Sprout, her eyebrows quirked disbelievingly when she saw the twins, particularly
the one that was gaping at her, but she seemed to brush it aside with a small, if slightly self-
conscious, wave before settling at her usual spot. She then promptly began removing books
from her bag, muttering something unintelligible under her breath.

George kicked Fred beneath the table in an attempt to curtail his gawking, but it did
absolutely nothing to deter him.

Once she was settled, Hermione reached for a slice of wheat toast and marmalade, making
that up and setting it on her plate. Then, in one fluid, practiced motion, she plucked a small
carafe of black coffee off the table from beside the tea service and poured it into her mug
 until it was threatening to overflow. She added a bit of milk and then raised it, held the cup
just below her nose with two hands, and inhaled deeply with her eyes shut.

George had been watching the series of events closely, captivated, until he heard a dull thud
and the fork beside his plate jumped and clattered. Tearing his eyes away, he refocused them
on his brother, who’d slumped forward in defeat and dropped his head heavily onto the table.

Chapter End Notes

The next chapter is one of my favorites, so stay tuned.

 The death of S.P.E.W.

16 June 1995

It was a Friday night, one of the last of the school year, and Hermione was sitting alone in the
common room, legs tucked beneath her and head propped on her knuckles. Ron and Harry
were elsewhere, supposedly practicing for the final Triwizard event the following week, and
the room was quiet. Her only company was a pair of first years, who were terrifying one
another with increasingly absurd stories about their upcoming exams, from second years that
seemed to have taken some liberties in their recounting.

Beyond them, those that hadn’t studied all term were in the library, desperately trying to
catch up, and those that had, or didn’t care to, were out socializing and enjoying the bout of
warm weather.

To be fair, she didn’t count herself a complete recluse. She’d had dinner with Viktor that
evening, who had been hinting none too subtly at her possibly visiting him in Bulgaria that
summer. It wasn’t that Hermione was unhappy with the idea, quite the contrary actually, but
she found herself a bit despondent, nonetheless.
Perhaps it was just the time of year; it was always a bizarre experience, the reckoning of
leaving her magical life behind to return to her muggle one. Like she’d have to spend the next
several months not being entirely herself. Plus, there hadn’t been a spring term yet where at
least one of her friends didn’t nearly die, so she was a bit anxious to boot.

The firelight caught the edge of the badge in front of her, suspended in the air and spinning
over the table, and she admitted internally that it was conceivable that her dour disposition
was a bit self-inflicted as well.

The portrait suddenly swung open, and Fred, George and Lee bounded in, the latter two
hurdling up the stairs in a flurry of pounding feet, clearly hell-bent on retrieving something
from their room. In the four years they’d shared a living space, she’d learned better than to
ask.

Fred, however, skidded to a halt behind the armchair that was mostly blocking her from view.
Breathing hard and a little red in the face, he placed his hands on his hips and looked around
the room for a moment. Finally, he turned to face her.

“All right, Hermione?”

She glanced up to meet his gaze and gave a half-hearted smile and a nod, reaching a finger
out to nudge the bottom of the badge, which had stopped revolving, and set it spinning again.

Fred glanced toward the stairs, Lee and George still nowhere in sight, and stepped around the
chair to perch catty-corner to her, elbows braced on his knees.

“C’mon, out with it,” he prodded, noticing that she was obviously distressed about
something.

“It’s nothing. How are you? I heard you and Angie broke things off.”

“We did, I’m fine, and you’re trying to change the subject.”

“Really, it’s nothing,” she sighed. He waited expectantly and, within a few seconds, she went
on to explain in spite of herself. “Just the end of the year. Exams. The last task. Viktor.” She
reached out and plucked the badge from the air, running her thumb over its face thoughtfully
before frowning. “Plus, I think I should take a hint and declare time of death on spew.”

“I think you mean S.P.E.W.” Fred corrected solemnly. She huffed a cynical little laugh and
tipped her head. “Why though? You’ve been so… passionate about it all year.”

“Yes, well, fat lot of good it’s done me. I’ve amassed exactly four members, the secretary
insists on referring to it as spug, which is short for The Society for the Protection of Ugly
Goblins if you didn’t know, and I just discovered yesterday that the only elf I’ve managed to
free with my knitting is Dobby, who, for the record, has been free for a number of years
already and has been tasked with cleaning our common room entirely on his own because of
me.” She rolled her eyes at herself and tossed the badge callously onto the coffee table
between them. “You said it yourself; the elves are happy here. I’m wasting my time and
making myself look really, very silly while I do it.”
Fred, having gone silent, seemed incredibly troubled by the expression of abject defeat on her
face.

“Well don’t listen to me,” he finally said, brows furrowed and shaking his head vehemently.
“I’m an enormous prat. The worst, really.”

Hermione gave him another weak smile, looking up from the badge in confusion when she
noticed him inelegantly contorting himself in the chair and digging in his pocket.

He finally sat straight again, placing the contents of said pocket in a pile on the table and
examining it in the firelight. From where Hermione sat, it appeared to amount to a sickle,
several knuts, two Droobles wrappers, a button, a small rock, and a bit of lint. He separated
the coins and neatly pushed them toward her across the tabletop, redepositing the rest on his
person.

Fred then looked up at her and, for a split second, she found herself positively bewildered by
the intensity of his gaze, eyes shining deep blue in the dim lighting. She wasn’t accustomed
to him wearing a serious expression and her mouth suddenly felt inexplicably dry.

“Five members, if you’ll extend me a bit of credit on dues,” he corrected with a wry smile.
Approaching footfalls in the stairwell alerted them to George and Lee’s imminent
reemergence and he, brushing his hands on his thighs, got up to join them. He paused on his
way to the portrait hole and turned back to see her still staring at the money with a thoroughly
shocked look on her face. “And Hermione? I’d never call you silly.”
 Lies I told my parents
Chapter Notes

Quick note, I added the "Slow Burn" tag this week. Honestly, that one should have been
on there from the beginning. Oops.

See the end of the chapter for more notes

2 July 1995

It was the evening of the end-of-term feast and Hermione was walking up from the lake after
having exchanged valedictions with Viktor. She'd promised to see him off the next day along
with everybody else, but he had wanted something a bit more private for their real good-bye.

Viktor had been disappointed when she’d informed him that she wouldn’t be visiting him that
summer, though more than understanding given the circumstances. She was on the fence
about it the week prior when he’d hinted, but had fallen solidly on the side of staying with
her friends in the wake of the last task.

And her family… well, that was a whole other issue desperately in need of addressing.

She was rounding the bend by an old beech tree, the sun just beginning to set over the lake,
when she spotted a familiar red head settled beneath it. It only took her a second to discern
that it was Fred.

“Hey,” she said, approaching slowly in case he wasn’t interested in company. It had been a
long week for everyone, and she knew the twins were friendly with Cedric. He had a piece of
parchment propped on his knee in front of him which, from the brief glimpse she got, was
covered in varying combinations and designs comprised of three interlocking Ws. Though he
didn’t look at all put out by her presence, he did hastily tuck it into a folder and out of sight.
“Where’s George?”

“How do you know that I’m not George?” he posed in a challenging tone, reclining on his
hands and tipping his head at the vacant swath of grass beside him.

She only paused for a moment before settling on it, wrapping her arms around her knees and
leaving a few inches of space between them.

“Because you’re not,” she said, elusive but certain. Fred wore a bemused expression but
simply shook his head.

“Wish Viktor farewell?” he asked. “I saw him heading back to the ship.

She nodded and plucked a clover from between her feet, twirling it so the leaves blurred
together and it looked like a tiny green umbrella.

“He invited me to visit him in Bulgaria this summer, at his parent’s estate near Sofia.”

“Estate,” Fred mouthed slowly, dramatically arching an eyebrow at her and smirking.
Hermione rolled her eyes and shrugged. “Are you going to go?”

She thought she detected a trace of sharpness to his voice but pushed the idea away. It was
Ron that had an issue with Viktor, after all. She was just projecting.

“No,” she shook her head. “After everything last week… I think it's best that I remain here.”

They were silent for a moment, listening to the crickets begin to chirp in earnest as the sun
continued in its descent.

“So will you be staying with us again this summer?” Fred finally asked, his tone casual but
genuinely curious.

“If your mum will have me,” she replied, thinking back to the ill-fated issue of Witch Weekly
and resulting Easter egg slight. “I have to go home for at least a few weeks first, though.”
She was plagued again with the matter of her parents and dropped the clover to grind the
heels of her palms into her eye sockets in suppressed frustration.

“Is that a bad thing?” Fred asked uncertainly, clearly not knowing how to interpret her
reaction.

“No," she sighed heavily. “Or maybe yes? I'm not sure. I just wish that I could have one year,
just one, where I didn’t have to come up with an elaborate web of lies about what goes on in
my life while I’m away from them.”

“You lie to your parents?” he blurted, sounding sincerely surprised. She dropped her hands,
eyes a bit red, and looked at him in the dusky light as if he might be daft.

“Did you think that I didn’t? Merlin’s beard, they’d probably have pulled me out of school
after my first year, and definitely after my second. It was all I could do to convince Professor
McGonagall not to tell them I’d spent the better part of that spring term petrified in a hospital
bed.”

Fred appeared deep in thought, if perhaps a little repentant as well.

“Don’t feel bad for not thinking about it,” she placated quickly. “Harry and Ron never have.
Your parents already know everything that goes on, and Harry’s guardians don’t care, so I
don’t think it’s ever even occurred to them.”

“Still…” Fred started, a crease between his brows. “I’m really sorry you have to do that. Lie
to them, I mean. It can’t be easy.”

“It’s not,” she admitted, realizing with a start that this was something she hadn’t ever really
talked to anybody about. Feeling a little self-conscious, she kept her gaze fixed on the grass
between her feet as she spoke. “I don’t want them to be afraid of magic. They’re aware
there’s a dark side to all of it, we even have a class devoted to defending against it for pity’s
sake, but it’s all conceptual for them right now. If they were to see the effects of it, actually
understand what it’s capable of, know how close I’ve come to it myself, I think… I think that
they would be afraid of it. And if they’re afraid of magic, and I’m magic, then it stands to
reason…”

Fred just nodded in her periphery, clearly not needing it spelled out.

“Anyway, I have to decide what to tell them – if anything.”

They lapsed into silence once more, the sun perhaps halfway set behind the water at that
point. She glanced up at the building behind them, seeing several other students making their
way inside from the grounds.

“We should probably get back in there, the feast will be starting soon.”

Fred, uncharacteristically silent, nodded and got to his feet, folder tucked against one side
and the opposite hand extended to help her up. She reached out and grasped it, his warm
fingers sliding against her own. The insides of his knuckles had the ghosts of calluses in a
 few places, likely from years of gripping a broom and a beater’s bat and a wand, but all in all
she was surprised by how soft they were.

“If there’s ever anything I can do to help with your parents, let me know. Okay?”

She blinked in surprised and then nodded. They paused and stood across from one another as
the water quietly lapped at the lakeshore, the contact between them lingering a second longer
than strictly necessary. He lightly ran the pad of his thumb in a half-circle along the back of
her hand before releasing it and she had to consciously stop her eyes from dropping shut.
Instead, she let out what she hoped was a silent, albeit unsteady, breath as she followed him
up the hill toward The Great Hall.

The whole walk back Hermione mentally grappled with her reaction to that simple, fleeting
grip on her hand. Because, in all the months of snogging, she was certain that Viktor had
never done anything that made her feel like that.

Chapter End Notes

If you haven't already, go check out the new Fremione one shot, "Not Bad at All," on my
Works page.

It's around 8k words, post-war, steamy, and just a whole lot of fun.
 On the platform

3 July 1995

Hermione watched as Harry walked toward the parking lot with that odious man, one Vernon
Dursley, and tried her best to ignite his ugly brown jumper through sheer power of will. She
truly hated watching her friend’s demeanor change when they came to pick him up each year,
and after everything that had happened this go-round, it was even harder not to say anything.

“Sickle for your thoughts?” Fred drew up beside her in one long stride while Mrs. Weasley
was still busy intermingling with her other children, despite having just seen them.
Hermione’s parents hadn’t yet arrived.

“Given that there’s a small fortune in your pocket at present, I suppose you could afford it.”

She felt a triumphant little rush at the flabbergasted look on his face. “How did you –?“

“Oh, please. After you explained about Ludo being a two-timing sleazeball, I could
practically see the wheels turning in Harry’s head. It doesn’t take a genius.”
“Promise to keep it a secret?” he asked, tone surprisingly earnest. “I really don’t want mum
to find out – or Ron, for that matter.”

The image of a beetle with horn-rimmed glasses ensconced in a jar flashed briefly through
her mind and she nodded once.

“I think you’d be surprised at just how well I can keep a secret.”

He gave her a curious look, but she didn’t have time to dwell on it. Hermione’s parents had
arrived and were beginning to make small talk with Mr. and Mrs. Weasley.

“I’d better get going before they find out something they shouldn’t,” she sighed after a
moment, grabbing the cart with her luggage and turning it toward them. “Nice horn-tongue
hex, by the way. Should be fairly unpleasant for Crabbe when he wakes up.”

“I still don’t understand how you always know that I’m me and not George,” Fred lamented,
shaking his head and looking as though he were saddled with deciphering one of the greatest
mysteries of the modern world. “My own mum can’t tell the difference half the time.”

Hermione smiled blithely and gave a playful shrug, not revealing anything as she backed
away from him. “I guess you’ll just have to ask me again in a few weeks. Have a good start
to your summer, Fred.”
 Hello again
Chapter Notes

Another shorter one, but I promise I'll make it up to you next chapter!

28 July 1995

“Thanks Mrs. Weasley!” Hermione repeated again in the direction of the kitchen as she
headed up the stairs of Grimmauld Place, very carefully stepping around the curtained
portrait of Mrs. Black. The Weasley matriarch had just listed, in detail, all of the many
objects and pieces of furniture within the house that she shouldn’t touch.

Given that the list was fairly exhaustive, Hermione vowed to simply not touch anything she
hadn’t brought herself.
Trudging up the stairs with her trunk in tow, she wondered at the quiet in the creaky old
house, so unlike The Burrow. Mrs. Weasley, who had retrieved her from her parent’s home,
had said Ron and Ginny were helping Arthur collect a few more things from their house as
they’d all be spending the rest of the summer at headquarters in Islington. Percy wasn’t there,
though she got rather emotional when Hermione asked after him, and the twins were
presumably rattling around somewhere.

In addition to her cautionary notes about the house, she had also thoroughly warned
Hermione against accepting any sort of edible item from the two of them. It had apparently
been a busy few weeks for research and development.

Hermione couldn’t quite put her finger on the flutter in her stomach at the prospect of seeing
Fred again, but flutter it did, nonetheless. She wouldn’t admit it to anyone, but their
conversation by the lake at the end of the year had replayed on a loop in her head over and
over after she’d returned to her parent’s home and crafted her story about the school year.

Although that wasn’t exactly the part that she was reticent to confess; no, that had far more to
do with her dwelling on the sensation of his hand on hers. Shivering to herself even now, she
opened the door that she thought was meant to be her room and ran smack into the man in
question.

Hermione swore that she nearly swallowed her tongue because not only had she just walked
in on Fred unannounced, she had done so while he was wearing nothing but a towel and
standing at the washroom sink, holding a razor with half of his face soaped.

“Oh my – sorry!” she blurted loudly, directing her gaze first at the floor, then at the wall, and
finally at the ceiling in rapid secession. “I thought your mum said second on the left.”

Fred, good-humored as he was, simply laughed. “Well, hello to you too.”

Between her periphery and the glimpse she’d gotten, it stood to reason that he wouldn’t be in
any hurry to cover up. There certainly wasn’t anything to be ashamed of.

Towel slung low around his hips, he had the faintest dusting of hair across his chest and
another that started below his navel and continued down. And down. And then down some
more, before disappearing beneath the light blue terry cloth. He was also sporting the lean
musculature that teenage boys seemed to favor, and it was doing bizarre things to both her
body and her brain.

“Why don’t you – I’m just going to – we can catch up later,” she stuttered in a flurry of
words, backing out of the room with her eyes still cast upward and practically tripping over
her luggage in the process. “This one then?”

Hermione gestured vaguely in the direction of the room that was second on the right and saw
him nod his head in confirmation, a cat-like grin still plastered on his face. She turned and
half-ran through the indicated doorway, nearly dislocating her shoulder as she yanked her
trunk in behind her. She then slammed the door shut and sank backward against it, hands
clapped over her mouth and cheeks positively on fire.
 oOoOoOo

“Was that Hermione I heard?” George asked from the bed as his brother stepped into their
room, hair still wet from his shower. He was busily making notes on the formula for Canary
Creams but looked up when he didn’t get a response to see that Fred had a stupid smile on his
face. “All right there, Freddie?”

“Oh, I’ve never been better,” he finally said, voice a little dreamy as he dug a pair of shorts
out of their recently de-doxified wardrobe. “Georgie, old boy, I think it’s going to be a very
interesting year.”
 A brief moment of commiseration

28 July 1995

Hermione heard a knock at the door of her bedroom and looked up from her book. Given the
sharp, playful cadence of the rapping, she was fairly certain she knew who it was. Her
suspicions were confirmed when she bid them enter and Fred poked his head into the room
slowly.

“See?” he said, one brow arched and a grin on his face as he stepped around the door. “That’s
how you’re meant to enter a room with a closed door, lest you see something you shouldn’t.”

“Ha ha,” Hermione intoned sarcastically.

Fred left the door half open, which for whatever reason seemed like a good idea, and settled
on the edge of the mattress across from where she was seated. He’d changed into a pair of
jeans and a striped t-shirt, both of which were much more conducive to her maintaining
regular breathing and thinking patterns.
“How’ve you been, Granger?”

Hermione clipped the scrap of parchment she used as a bookmark in her novel and turned it
sideways in her lap, fingers idly tracing the spine.

“Not bad; it’s always nice to visit with my parents, even if it is a bit… well, complicated.
How about you? Your mum said you’ve all been here a couple weeks already.”

“It’s been a little weird,” Fred admitted. “Not the homiest of places, you know?”

“You don’t say?” Hermione laughed, looking around the drab room. “My first impression
involved being screamed at and called ‘mudblood scum,’ so I’ll admit it’s not quite as
welcoming as The Burrow.”

Though her tone was flippant, Fred looked a bit bothered by the remark. His face quickly
cleared though, as he began to fill her in on the comings and goings of The Order members,
as well as Sirius’ ever-growing frustration at being parted from his Godson.

“I know, Dumbledore came to my house two days after I got back. He played it off to my
parents as a routine visit to explain to them the importance of OWL exams this year, which
they thankfully bought, but he took me aside and made me swear that I wouldn’t write to
Harry.”

“Yeah, he did the same to us, only without the ruse,” Fred added. “Bit messed up, isn’t it?
After everything that happened with Cedric and the graveyard.”

“I can only imagine how alone he must be feeling,” Hermione said, apprehensively chewing
her lip. “Do you ever –? Never mind.”

She bit the thought back, it being one she’d kept close to her chest for several years at that
point. It had just been more at the forefront of her mind as of late.

“What?” Fred asked curiously, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees. He noted the
way her eyes flickered to the half-open door and pulled his wand from his pocket, muttering
a silencing charm.

“Oh, right, I forgot you can do that now,” she said, sheepishly. Fred raised his eyebrows at
her, and she voiced the thing she hadn’t dared say to Harry. “Do you ever think that
Dumbledore is sort of… manipulating us?”

“Oh, absolutely,” Fred said, nodding. She was a little taken aback by how readily he agreed.

“Right? I understand that he obviously has loads of important responsibilities that we don’t
know anything about, but keeping Harry isolated, a lot of what happened last year with the
tournament… even Sirius before that.”

Fred nodded again. “I certainly don’t think he’s as grandfatherly and genial as he lets on.
That said, I also don’t know that he’s necessarily bad.”
“No, no not bad. Just… calculating.” They drifted into silence for a moment before Hermione
spoke again, tone even more tentative than it had been during her controversial remark about
Dumbledore. “Fred, what happened with Percy?”

His normally pale face went chalk white, throwing his freckles into stark relief, and she saw a
muscle in his jaw twitch.

“Did mum tell you anything?” he asked, voice tight and lips pressed into a line.

Hermione shook her head. “She started to, but…”

“Right, yeah. The crying.” He got to his feet and roughly ran a hand through his hair, setting
it to stand on end.

“You don’t have to tell me. I understand if it’s a family issue.”

“No, no, it’s…” he sighed and turned back to her. “Percy and dad had a row a couple weeks
ago. It was bad. Really bad. The man’s raised seven kids, George and I included, and I’ve
never seen him that angry before.”

“Over what?” Hermione asked, trying and failing to picture Arthur Weasley truly cross about
anything. The closest he’d come was a brief fistfight with Lucius Malfoy a couple years
prior, and she knew from personal experience that the Malfoy men elicited that sort of
response.

“I’m sure you’ve seen the headlines that The Ministry has been pumping out, right?” She
nodded. “Well, Fudge made it clear that anyone that opposed them, or supported Harry,
rather, might as well hand in their resignation.”

“And he didn’t?”

“He didn’t just not take Harry’s side, our side, he fucking used it to get promoted,
Hermione.”

“Oh,” she replied lamely. She collected her thoughts before continuing. “I mean, that’s
terrible, but I don’t know that it’s –“

“That wasn’t all,” he cut her off with a dark look. “It was just sort of the jumping-off point.
Percy then went on to explain in vivid detail all the ways in which our family has wronged
him.”

“What do you mean?” Hermione asked slowly, acid bubbling in her stomach.

Fred’s gaze dropped to the floor and fixed there before he clarified in an uncharacteristically
cold, taut voice, “Well, he started with how much of an embarrassment dad is, continued on
to explain that he’s the reason we’ve never been particularly well-off financially, and then
rounded it all out by calling us traitors and leaving.”

“Oh God,” she breathed, shocked. “That’s outrageous. That’s – how could he say something
like that?”
“With his stupid, fucking nasally voice, that’s how,” Fred said bitterly, shaking his head. He
was still standing and appeared to be biting the inside of his cheek. She could see his chest
rising and falling quicker than usual, angry red splotches having worked their way up his
neck.

Hermione carefully got up from the chair, set her book on the seat behind her, and crossed the
room. He looked down at her, a hint of something stormy and troubled in his eyes; adrift. It
wasn’t an expression she’d ever seen on him before, and it certainly wasn’t one she wanted to
see again.

That was perchance what prompted her next movement.

She took two more small steps, closing the gap between them, and wound her arms tightly
around his middle, the fabric of his shirt soft against her cheek. He froze for a second, as still
as a statue, before bringing his own arms up to wrap firmly around her shoulders. She let out
a little sigh as she felt his chin come to rest on top of her head. He was warm and solid, and
she folded into him with terrifying ease.

As she stood there, holding him, or perhaps being held by him, it was as if he melted. The
tension slowly leached out of his shoulders and his back, and he released his own held breath
in return.

“I missed you,” he admitted quietly, so quietly that it was barely audible. He sounded as
though the words were a surprise to him as well, and her pulse fluttered wildly.

Just then, they heard George half-shout from downstairs, “Oh, hello Ron! You are back! Yes,
I do think Hermione is here! Maybe she is upstairs!”

They hurriedly stepped apart and Hermione returned to her chair. Fred cleared his throat,
shaking himself, and released the silencing charm on the room. He casually resettled on the
bed just before Ron entered.
 The problem in the parcel
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

31 August 1995

Fred and George had just apparated back into their room, still chortling amongst themselves
about ickle-Ronniekins and his shiny new prefect badge, when Hermione blew in and
descended upon them like an angry chimera.

Retrospectively, they probably should have thought to lock the door.

“What the hell was that?” she demanded in a furious whisper, storming toward them while
still clutching her own letter and badge.

“Just a bit of lighthearted teasing,” Fred replied flippantly with his hands up, not even
attempting to defuse the situation.
 “Lighthearted teasing?! Ron has enough of an inferiority complex without the two of you
purposely digging at it. Circe’s tits, talk about low-hanging fruit… Pick something else to
tease him about, if you must; he doesn’t make it particularly difficult.”

George started to laugh at her comment, but it died with a guttural choking sound when her
head snapped suddenly in his direction.

Fred took a different, if much less wise, approach, cheeks flushing and aggravation flickering
in his eyes. “Oi! Don’t tell me what I can and can’t say to my brother! I put up with the prat
for eleven years before you came along. Besides, like you were much better? ‘Me too, Harry,
me too! Oh, what? Are you sure it’s Ron?’”

He may not have realised it, heated as he was, but Fred’s mocking, girlish impression of her
crossed a line and George had the good sense to take cover near his headboard, placing a
pillow strategically between himself and the witch.

“Unbelievable. Just when I start to think…” Hermione’s eyes were wide in shock and she
paused to shake her head, sucking in a deep breath. When she opened her mouth again to
speak, rather than the angry, shrill pitch it held earlier, her tone was low and frigid,
completely calm. It was far more frightening. “If you thought my comment downstairs was a
joke, I strongly encourage you to think again. Ron isn’t the only new prefect, after all.
Perhaps you really had better watch your step.”

They stood glowering at one another for a long moment before she turned on her heel and
stalked out, badge catching the light and winking at him contemptuously as she went.

Fred was breathing hard and shaking his head, trying to comprehend how someone so small
could be so exceptionally vexing.

“Well, you were right,” George eventually said, looking between his brother and the still-ajar
door. “I definitely think it’s going to be an interesting year.”

Chapter End Notes

Surely not all of you forgot that these two bickered a considerable amount this year, did
you?
 Pomona's afternoon tea

18 September 1995

Just as Pomona Sprout was pouring her afternoon tea, reveling in the fact that Dolores
Umbridge had apparently found elsewhere to cast her small, toadlike shadow that lunch hour,
her brief moment of peace was interrupted.

Watching with some amusement, she saw Hermione Granger stomp into The Great Hall,
brandishing what looked to be a signup sheet of some sort and making a beeline for Lee
Jordan and the Weasley twins, parked in their usual place along the bench. George, at least
she thought it was George from the conversation they'd been having, half-rose in his seat, as
if he might physically run away from her, but Fred reached a hand up and tugged him back
down by his sleeve just as she descended upon them.

From where she was sitting at the staff table, Pomona could only make out bits and pieces of
what was being said, but she began mentally taking notes for when she and the other heads
inevitably had to address whatever the twins had done later.
“I told you to stop – of all the bloody stupid – said he found it in the boy’s lavatory – wring
your necks –“

The majority of Gryffindor house was watching them at that point, expressions ranging from
entertained to genuinely fearful, and not a small number of staff members as well.

Lee and George were wise enough to sink in their seats and look chagrined, but Fred met her
gaze, his expression a bit dazed, but defensive nonetheless.

“ – anything to say for yourselves?”

“You can hardly blame me for being a capitalist –“ Fred started to say, palms offered forth
innocently.

“A capitalist?!” Hermione shrieked.

“Minerva isn’t here yet. Do you think that you should intervene?” Poppy asked quietly over
the din, leaning sideways in her seat toward Pomona. Filius had also not yet appeared, and
Severus would likely revel in watching them kill one another and then use it as an excuse to
expel whoever was left standing. Despite the near-violent display, Poppy’s hands were
wrapped calmly around her own cuppa; working with adolescents for decades on end had that
effect on a person.

“I trust that Miss Granger has her reasons,” Pomona rationalized, deftly slipping her wand
from her robes, nonetheless.

“Pomona, really – if our dear Senior Undersecretary were to walk in,” Poppy chastised,
pressing her lips into a line to keep from laughing.

They watched as the pair traded barbs for another moment.

“Poppy,” Pomona implored thoughtfully, observing as the scene played out, “tell me, do
those two remind you of anyone?”

The mediwitch tipped her head and squinted her eyes in contemplation, watching as
Hermione flicked her wand in a zig-zag motion at Fred, as if she’d been about to hex him.
The redhead deftly leaned to the side beneath the tabletop, popping back up with a smug look
on his face, mistakenly believing that she’d cast at him and missed. George and Lee had fled
further down the bench by that point.

“Well, I’ll be!” Poppy suddenly gasped, eyes wide and raising a hand to cover her mouth.
Pomona chortled quietly under her breath as Hermione stalked off. Frustration was still
radiating off of her, but there was a satisfied smirk plainly visible on her face before she
schooled it away.

“Lily was a dab hand at transfiguration too,” Poppy noted, sipping her tea and shaking her
head, bemused.

Pomona smiled wistfully as she watched Fred, whose hair, unbeknownst to him, had been
turned a vibrant shade of pink when he was busy dodging the non-existent stinging jinx he
thought she’d hurled at him. He kept his eyes locked on the witch’s back all the way out the
doors.

“Mmhm,” she hummed in agreement. “But James wasn’t nearly as good at hiding how he felt
about her.”
 Pristinum Revertatur

18 September 1995

Thus far, Fred Weasley’s seventh and final year at Hogwarts was truly, emphatically, not
going to plan.

Ever since Hermione had dressed him down about the prefect badges while they were still at
Grimmauld Place, the two of them had done absolutely nothing but bicker. Admittedly, they
seemed to connect best when they were alone, and there hadn’t been much opportunity for
that since arriving back at school.

“Is it fixed yet?” Fred asked George. His brother had just attempted yet another charm to
restore his hair, which was still a brilliant hue of hot pink, to its former state.

George simply shook his head, regarding his counterpart with pursed lips. “I told you she’d
find out we were still advertising the product testing program.”
“How in the bloody hell did she – gah!” Fred yelped as whatever spell his twin had just
endeavored caused an unpleasant stabbing sensation all over his scalp. He clutched his head
and swore under his breath.

“You can just apologise and ask her how to undo it,” George sighed, lowering his wand.

“I will not apologise,” Fred snapped, eyes a little wild as he marched into the bathroom and
regarded his reflection with dismay. “Did it get brighter? It looks like it’s glowing.”

George sighed again and layed back on the bed, anticipating a long night.

“Are you still going to give her the thing?”

“No,” Fred retorted adamantly. “She can take her sodding birthday and shove it –“

Just then Lee walked in, who’d been present at lunch that afternoon but hadn’t shared any
classes after that with the twins. He took one look at Fred, who strongly resembled a very
angry exotic bird, and burst out laughing.

“Still haven’t fixed it yet, mate?” he finally managed to wheeze, dabbing at his eyes with the
cuff of his robes.

Fred shook his head irritably.

“I tried to warn him,” George lamented dismally from his position between them on the bed.
“It’s not a good idea to piss off Hermione.”

oOoOoOo

Fred hadn’t been planning to give Hermione the birthday gift he’d made for her the next day;
truly, he hadn’t. At least, he hadn’t until he observed that absolutely nobody on the bleeding
planet seemed to acknowledge the event at all.

He watched as Harry and Ron sat at the table across from her, eating breakfast and discussing
a charms essay that they were struggling with, not paying any attention whatsoever.

He watched as Ginny idly asked her to pass the plate of bacon, for which she received a smile
but no more.

He watched as the post came in and deposited absolutely nothing in front of her besides the
morning paper.

And he watched as she acted like it was normal.

It occurred to him that he’d had to ask six different people, including his younger brother
who hadn’t known, when Hermione’s birthday even was before Neville had finally said he
was fairly certain that it was 19 September.

He was still too upset with her over the hair incident the day prior, as well as nearly two
weeks of squabbling over his and George’s merchandise development efforts, to give her the
gift directly. So instead, he marched to the owlery with the small package in hand after
dinner, fastened it to a plain brown barn owl’s leg, and told the thing to wait and deliver it to
Gryffindor tower in about two hours, when she’d likely be back from the library. He
incentivised the bird with treats and left when he was fairly certain it understood its mission.

Muttering under his breath, he made his way back to the common room, set up in the corner
with the numerous product formulas and budget projections that they were still slaving over,
and waited.

oOoOoOo

Hermione had just returned from the library and took a seat at her favorite study table near
the window, spreading the enormous book she’d retrieved on arithmantic principles of the
17th century in front of her. The room was fairly empty by that point in the evening; Harry
had already gone off to bed, sullen as ever, and Ron was leafing through a back issue of
Seeker Weekly on the couch in front of the fire, utterly oblivious to the world.

She had wondered if they might do something for her birthday that year, sixteen was a fairly
important one after all, but she really should have known better. They never had before, and
to be fair there was a lot going on. Though it seemed there was always a lot going on.

That said, Ginny had wished her a happy birthday that morning when they’d passed on the
stairs to the girl’s dormitory, and Neville did the same on the way to herbology, but that had
been the extent of it. Other than those two brief interactions and the letter she’d received from
her parents the evening prior, the event had passed utterly unnoticed. Just as well, she’d told
herself.

A flicker of pink in the corner caught her eye and she saw Fred bent over another worktable
across the room, deeply concentrated on whatever was on the parchment in front of him. She
felt a flash of guilt that he still resembled a flamingo but stuffed it down.

Hermione didn’t like being mad at Fred. In fact, it made her feel vaguely ill, but the man had
the ability to aggravate her like no other. Furthermore, she found that in addition to her usual
annoyance at his schemes, every time she caught him doing something that warranted
reprimanding lately, particularly those involving the dubious consent of younger students to
become test subjects, she also felt a flicker of disappointment.

She tried to tell herself it was just because she was a prefect now, but the fact of the matter
was that she simply wanted him not to take part in things that she was obliged by both moral
compass and positional responsibilities to admonish.

Her reverie was broken by a sharp tapping on the window beside her where a plain looking
barn owl was perched on the sill. He had a small brown paper package fastened to his leg,
which he obediently extended for her upon being admitted.

Bewildered, she collected the item and watched as he promptly departed after, disappearing
back into the night. She flipped the box over to see her name written in enigmatic block
letters on the other side. After the incident with the bubotuber puss the year prior, Hermione
had become a bit more discerning in how she opened her mail, but after casting a couple of
detection charms and them coming up clear, she set her wand on the table and went about
unwrapping the parcel.

Inside the slim box that lay beneath the paper sat a bookmark. A truly, beautiful, leather
bookmark. It was dark tan, perhaps six inches long, and had a brass eyelet fastened near the
top with a small, knotted tassel looped through it. She let out a little huff of wonder and ran
her fingertips lightly over the initials HJG, which were set vertically along the center of it in
beautiful calligraphic lettering.

She flipped it over to find that the back had a design as well; a sprig of lavender, delicately
and painstakingly etched into the leather. It was one of the most stunning and thoughtful gifts
she had ever received, and she knew beyond a shadow of a doubt who it had come from. And
she suddenly felt enormously guilty.

Hermione looked across the room just in time to see Fred look away, dropping his gaze back
to the table in front of him while the tips of his ears turned nearly as pink as his hair. She
reached over the book she’d been reading and grabbed the scrap of parchment that had been
holding her place, replaced it with the new bookmark, and then began writing on it, stopping
twice to clear the ink and start over.

Finally satisfied, she set it aside, finished her notes, and then packed up to go to her dorm.
Bag on her shoulder and paper in hand, she took a circuitous route around the common room,
slowing by Fred’s table just long enough to deposit the scrap in front of him and then quickly
heading upstairs.

oOoOoOo

Pristinum Revertatur

Thank you, I love it.

 A fish called Hermione
Chapter Notes

Hello lovelies! I haven't left an author's note in a hot second, but I hope you're all having
as much fun with this series as I am. You'll (hopefully) be pleased to know that, though I
am still deep in the editing phase, I have the next SIXTEEN chapters more or less
completed. Bully for me.

That's not important though. What is important is that you get your first song this
chapter!! Go listen to "Geronimo" by Sheppard if you want the vibes.

25 September 1995
It was nearing two in the morning and Hermione was sitting in the common room by herself,
studying material that she already knew, for exams she wouldn’t be taking for a number of
months.

After finishing one particularly dry passage regarding the many uses of lacewing flies, she
got to her feet and stretched, fingers interlocked over her head and shifting her weight back
and forth between her stiff hips. She turned slightly to her right when she heard a quiet
squeak and saw a glimmer of silver magic out of the corner of her eye, moving like a wraith
between the dormitory stairs and the portrait hole.

“Hold it,” she said, leaning over to grab her wand from the coffee table. “Revelio.”

The disillusionment dropped like a shimmering curtain to reveal Fred, George and Lee,
hunched over in a row and frozen like deer in headlights.

“Just where do you think you’re going at this hour?” she asked, lips pursed and hand on hip.

“I told you she was going to see us,” Fred muttered, receiving a swift elbow in the ribs from
his twin and letting out a small “oof.”

“Just out for a midnight stroll,” George hedged. “Lovely night for it.”

“Uh huh,” she intoned, unimpressed. “It’s well after curfew. You couldn’t honestly have
thought that I was going to let you go, did you? Umbridge has been on a war path all week.”

“Precisely,” Fred piped up. Lee was still standing frozen, as if not moving would somehow
render him invisible. “We thought it an ideal opportunity to exact some karmic revenge, you
see.”

“And what exactly do you mean by ‘karmic revenge?’”

The three boys looked between one another, nodded, and Lee straightened and extracted a
surprisingly large satchel from the inner pocket of his robes. Fred took it, opened it, and with
two fingers removed what appeared to be a great rotting fish, making as little contact with the
thing as possible.

“Oh, bloody hell!” Hermione gasped, horrified and stepping back in revulsion. The thing’s
eye unceremoniously fell out of its head and dropped to the floor where they all stared at it
for a second.

“Yeah, I’m not going to take the stasis charm off,” Fred said, replacing it and re-cinching the
top of the bag. “Trust me, you don’t want to smell it.”

“What exactly were you going to do with it?” Hermione asked, allowing her curiosity to get
the better of her. She vanished the eye, which was still looking up at them, with a muttered
spell and swish of her wand.

“Fix it to the underside of Umbridge’s desk with a permanent sticking charm,” Lee admitted,
having returned the bag to his pocket.
Hermione gaped and then slowly raised a hand to her mouth, nibbling at the edge of her
thumb nail while she considered their plan.

“What are you –“ George started.

“Hush, I’m thinking,” she bit out, waving him off.

On one hand, it was past curfew, she was a prefect, and she’d knowingly be allowing them to
break at least fifteen different school rules and risk expulsion. On the other, she really, really
loathed Dolores Umbridge. The image of Harry’s carved hand soaking in murtlap essence
floated through her mind and she stood up a bit straighter, resolved, and released her fingertip
from between her teeth.

“Stay right there. If you move so much as an inch, I’ll sic Filch on you so fast that it’ll make
your heads spin.”

She left the boys looking thoroughly baffled and dashed up the stairs to her dorm. Thankfully,
Parvati was sleeping soundly, and Lavender was snoring like a mountain troll. She bent at the
foot of her bed, opening her trunk and extracting a jumper and her trainers. Her prefect badge
twinkled at her from the night table beside the bed and she withered a bit under its stare.

“Must be out of my mind…” she muttered to herself, stuffing it in her pocket and then tying
her shoes and heading back down to the common room.

Fred, George and Lee were standing exactly where she’d left them. George was the first to
notice she’d changed and opened his mouth to speak, but she held up a finger.

“If any of you breathes a word of this to anyone, it will be the last thing you ever do. And if
we get caught, I’m saying that I happened across you while on a late night round after
someone tipped me off that there might be trouble. Is all of that clear?”

It didn’t appear to be. In fact, all three looked profoundly confused.

“What do you mean, ‘if we get caught?’” Lee finally asked.

In answer, Hermione brandished her wand at all of their feet and muttered, “Silencio.”

“Your left shoe has a bit of a squeak to it,” she explained, looking at Fred accusingly.
“Honestly, it’s a miracle you get away with anything.”

“You’re coming with us?!” George blurted, having finally caught up.

“I mean…” she drew in a heavy breath and sighed, neither willing nor able to justify her
actions. “Let’s just get on with it.”

George’s eyes were so wide they threatened to pop out and roll across the carpet, much as the
fish’s had, Lee appeared as though he might faint, and Fred looked like he’d just found out it
was Christmas and his birthday all rolled into one.
She rolled her eyes and stepped past them, silenced feet not making a sound, then slowly
pushed the portrait hole open. Looking either way, she found the corridor empty and
motioned for them to follow. They all paused to disillusion themselves, the boys looking
mildly impressed that she knew a seventh-year spell, before proceeding onward.

Their party made it all the way to the stairs without being noticed, at which point they were
forced to stop and wait for the staircase to swing across.

Though she couldn’t see him, Hermione could feel Fred standing behind her left shoulder.
His jumper brushed against her and she smelled a rather heady combination of warm spices;
cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves.

“Do this sort of thing often, Granger?” he asked in a whisper.

Hermione allowed herself a secret smile. “If you knew half the things Harry, your brother and
I had gotten up to over the years, this wouldn’t be all that surprising.”

True, she’d always justified her rule breaking as being for one greater good or another, but
given the intended target of this particular caper, she’d decided to let her moral compass
waver ever so slightly. Really, tormenting Dolores Umbridge must serve some sort of higher
purpose.

The stairs swung over, and they headed down to the next landing. Hermione made to turn
left, toward Umbridge’s office, but the boys moved in the opposite direction, toward the steps
that continued downward.

“What are you doing?” Hermione hissed.

“She’s started warding her office door,” George explained, “we have to float it in through the
window.”

“Oh, right,” she nodded, though they couldn’t see her. Hermione suddenly felt much less sure
of the plan, though she supposed breaking into a professor’s private quarters from the inside
was no better than doing so from the outside. She followed them downstairs, past the
entrance to the dungeons and through a lesser-used side passage onto the moonlit grounds.

Stepping into the cool autumn night, Hermione pulled her jumper tight around her shoulders.
Another thought occurred to her as they skirted the edge of the building, staying concealed in
the shadows.

“I get that you’re going to float it into her window, but how exactly are you going to stick it
to her desk? Her office is on the third floor.”

She had her answer a moment later when they arrived in front of the storage shed that housed
the quidditch teams’ brooms.

“Oh no,” she said obstinately, jerking to a halt so quickly that she rocked in place like a
bowling pin set to topple.
“C’mon Granger, where’s your sense of adventure?” Fred asked, while the glimmer of magic
around the other two disappeared into the outbuilding.

“I don’t fly,” she said, vehemently shaking her head. “I’ll just stay on the ground and play
lookout.”

She couldn’t really see him, but she could feel his eyes fixed on where she stood.

“You’ve come all this way and you’re going to miss the best part?” Fred asked dubiously.

“I hardly think smelling that thing will be the best part,” she reasoned acerbically.

Lee and George reemerged, their disillusionments slightly distorted by the brooms they were
now carrying.

“I got her Ron’s Cleansweep,” George relayed to his brother.

“You can go ahead and put it back,” Hermione cut in. “I’m more likely to crash into the
building than I am to get it off the ground properly, anyway.”

She could feel a hint of disappointment sweep over the boys, but George graciously returned
to the shed without comment and deposited the broom, shutting the door behind him.

Their assemblage returned to the base of the towering stone edifice and followed it around
until they were nearly below where Umbridge’s window would be. It was on the far west side
of the school overlooking the forest and angled away from the rest of the building and any
potential prying eyes.

George and Lee wasted no time mounting their brooms and pushing off the ground, floating
into the night sky, but Fred dithered.

“Go on, then,” she shooed him, looking nervously over her shoulder toward the direction
they’d come. She suddenly felt a warm hand fumble and then close around her forearm.
“What are you –?“

“Come here,” he said, tugging her toward him. She glanced up and saw Lee and George
floating overhead, the shimmering silver of their concealment charm barely visible against
the stars.

“Fred, really, I – “

“This may be the only proper prank you ever allow yourself to take part in. Do you really
want to remember that you stayed on the ground and played lookout?”

Her chest tightened with anxiety at the thought of floating fifty feet above the earth with
nothing but a charmed branch and some twigs to hold her up, and the weight of Fred’s gentle
grip on her arm wasn’t doing anything to help matters.

“What if I fall off?” she finally asked quietly, apprehension colouring her tone.
“I won’t let you fall,” he replied simply, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
And, nervous though she might be, she knew for certain that he wouldn’t.

Seconds later, she found herself swinging a leg over the broom with Fred at her back,
gripping the handle so tightly that the small bones in her hands ached in protest. Fred kept a
polite distance as they mounted, wrapping a long arm around her to steady the broom, but the
moment he pushed off the ground and angled them upward, she slid back against him and he
let out a soft grunt.

Had silence not been absolutely crucial, she’s fairly certain she would have screamed as they
rose, but instead she just let out a pathetic whimper and nearly bit a hole in her lip.

“Breathe, Hermione,” he instructed her softly, his mouth much closer to her ear than she
expected it to be. She instinctively inhaled and let out a shaky breath, doing this twice more
before she nodded, and he propelled them forward to where George and Lee were hovering
outside the window.

“We have a problem,” Lee explained as George muttered a string of expletives under his
breath, apparently brandishing his wand at the glass pane that was still conspicuously shut.
“It’s locked.”

“Damn,” Fred breathed. “She must have gotten wise after the dung bombs last week.”

Hermione could overhear George attempting a variety of common unlocking charms, as well
as a couple that she’d never heard of. The window stayed adamantly closed each time he tried
it.

“May I?” she asked when he started saying spells that were more likely to break the glass
than open the window, which would be far too conspicuous should it work.

George made a startled sound upon realising she was up there with them, but backed up while
Fred shifted so they were floating beside the sill. Hermione went to grab her wand but found
she couldn’t make herself loosen her grip on the broom handle to do it.

Sighing in frustration, she turned back to Fred and said very quietly, “Put your arm around
my waist.”

“What?” he asked sharply, surprise evident in his whispered tone.

“Put your arm around my waist,” she repeated. “My stupid brain won’t let me take my hand
off the broom.”

Fred hesitated for a moment and then she felt him loop an arm around her midsection and
tighten it like a seat belt beneath her ribs until she was firmly secured against both him and
the broom. She suppressed a shiver, trying to ignore the way her stomach flipped at the
contact. Though there were several layers of fabric between them, she could feel his warm
chest sturdy and solid against her back. She shuffled her hips forward from between his
thighs just a bit in an effort to save them both from a potentially embarrassing experience.
Pyjama pants weren’t terribly thick, after all.
She then released her right hand from the broom handle, wiggled her stiff fingers, and
extracted her wand from her pocket. Raising it, she tried, “Aberto.” The window stayed
stubbornly shut.

Chewing her lip, she re-angled her wrist and attempted a much older variation of the spell.
“Portaberto.”

Rather than unlocking the window, this charm was intended to splinter the inner mechanism
of the lock itself, which is precisely what it did. The pane swung outward with a quiet squeak
and the boys broke into the quietest celebration she’d ever heard; it sounded like the rushing
noise when you place a seashell over your ear.

Awash in a flash of triumph, she forgot to hold herself away from Fred and sank back against
his chest, laughing quietly at the absurdity of the whole ordeal. He skillfully floated them
backward and George and Lee went about the unpleasant business of levitating the fish into
the window and fastening it to the desk.

Fred hadn’t removed his arm from around her waist and, rather than doing so, proceeded to
lean forward and rest his chin on her shoulder.

“You really are remarkable,” he breathed softly right beside her ear, a hint of wonder in his
tone. She let out another shaky exhale, this one having nothing to do with the height. In that
moment, pressed against him, she was incredibly grateful that nobody could see her face.

Their reverie was broken when George released the stasis charm and the smell of rotten fish
assaulted all of them.

“Oh God, let’s get out of here,” she said quickly, clapping a hand over her nose as they shut
the window and repaired the lock. Fred didn’t dally, guiding the broom in its slow decent
until their feet were planted on the ground once more.

They returned to the shed and replaced the brooms without incident. Hermione shuffled her
feet a bit more than necessary, as if she were confirming that the earth was still where it was
meant to be.

In fact, they made it all the way back to the second-floor landing without any threat of being
caught. It was there, however, as they were rounding the bend to the stairs that they spotted a
lit wand tip about to emerge from around the corner.

Hermione’s breath caught in her throat, but the boys didn’t hesitate.

“Run!” Lee whispered. Rather than continuing to the staircase, which would leave them
completely exposed, they all four turned and sprinted down a side passage. Her heart
pounding, she counted herself exceedingly thankful for the silencing charm she’d placed on
their feet, otherwise their escape would have been an extremely noisy affair, akin to a
stampede.

Just when she thought they’d evaded whatever teacher they’d almost come face to face with,
there was a whistling sound carrying down the corridor from in front of them. They all
skidded to a halt.

“Oh great, Peeves,” Fred groaned. “Split up.”

Despite the vague directive, George and Lee promptly ran off in one direction and Fred
grabbed Hermione’s hand and tugged her in another. Unfortunately, the way they went
seemed to be Peeves’ chosen path as well, the whistling following them down the hall and
gaining on them.

Realising they couldn’t outrun him, and not seeing a single door in the vicinity behind which
to take cover, they slowed. Hermione panicked, her plan to sell the boys up the river should
they be caught long forgotten. After all, she was no longer just an accomplice; she was a
perpetrator herself.

While they were mostly invisible unless one knew what to look for, the poltergeist was
always too observant for anyone’s good, centuries of harassing students in the halls having
honed his senses. There was no way he wouldn’t notice them.

“What are we going to –“

But before she had time to finish her sentence, she was abruptly pulled back and to the right,
into a small alcove behind a tapestry and a suit of armor.

The space was barely large enough to fit one person, let alone two, and Hermione was
acutely aware of how tightly she was pressed against Fred’s body, both of them breathing
hard from the running and the adrenaline. She couldn’t see him, but she knew for a fact that
her own cheeks were flushed.

Facing one another this time, lean muscle that she’d only ever seen once on accident was
discernable beneath the fabric of his shirt. She tried to pull her shoulders in to limit the
contact between them but was met with a cold wall at her back. He shifted slightly as well,
and their hips bumped together in a rather intimate way; Fred let out a soft huff and tipped his
head up to look up at the ceiling while she squeezed her eyes shut.

They both stilled, not even daring to breathe as Peeves floated past, still whistling to himself
and throwing what sounded like clumps of sodden toilet paper at the walls and floor. It wasn’t
until he had completely disappeared from earshot that they dared to exhale again.

Hermione was so on edge that she was mere seconds from a major coronary event, but she
pressed pause on her anxiety attack when she noticed Fred’s shoulders shaking. It took her a
second to realise he was trying not to laugh.

“Have you lost your mind?!” She breathed, flabbergasted. “That was almost a complete
disaster!”

“I know,” he wheezed. “Wasn’t it fun?”

Apparently desperate to see the look on her face, and still hidden in the alcove, Fred lifted his
wand and dropped their disillusionments, nearly falling over as he took in the expression of
horrified astonishment in the dim light that was filtering through the tapestry.

“You’re barking mad,” she declared, shaking her head and searching his mien in the near-
black darkness for any semblance of sanity. Finding nothing but childish mirth and
exuberance, she choked out a disbelieving laugh in spite of herself. Never in her life had she
met someone so utterly unbothered.

Fred shifted his weight a little and their chests brushed together again. The laughter slowly
faded from both of them and she saw his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed. She tentatively
placed a hand on his rib cage, just above his still-racing heart, and felt him shudder beneath
it.

“I, uh,” she started, pausing to inhale, “I think we’re probably safe to –“

The thought evaporated when Fred leaned forward. The motion was infinitesimal, barely
visible to the naked eye, but his gaze was locked on hers and the intention behind the
movement might as well have been glowing in giant neon letters over their heads.

“Safe to what?” he breathed, still grinning at her and placing a knuckle gently under her chin
to tip it up. Without thinking consciously about why she was doing it, she looked from his
eyes to his mouth, fixating on the swell of his bottom lip. Then she pondered inwardly, for
the briefest of seconds, what it might be like to run her tongue across it.

Just then, there was an urgent whisper from somewhere outside the tapestry. Their feet still
silenced, Lee and George had approached unnoticed and were standing maybe ten feet away
on the other side of the fabric.

Fred jerked back like he’d been burned, and Hermione shook her head ardently in an attempt
to clear it. He raised his wand, recasting the disillusionment on both of them, and stepped out
of their hiding spot with her in tow.

“There you are,” George exclaimed in whispered relief when he saw the hint of magic
shimmering in the air. “We thought you’d been caught.”

“Nope,” Fred said, still sounding a little out of breath. “Nearly though. Let’s get back to the
tower.”

They trooped up the stairs silently, not encountering anyone else along the way. Lee woke the
Fat Lady, who was none too pleased, and just like that they were back in the entrance of the
common room where the affair had started perhaps an hour earlier.

“Best get to bed,” Hermione said, dropping the concealment charm on her person and
breaking off to retrieve her books, still strewn about the table where she’d left them.

She followed the boys to the base of the stairs.

“Granger,” George said in parting, nodding at her with newfound respect. Lee gave a salute,
still looking as though he couldn’t believe she’d actually taken part in their crime.
“Goodnight,” she said. It was directed at all of them, but she was looking at Fred when she
said it.

“Goodnight,” he replied, an admiring smile playing at the corners of his mouth. He then
turned and followed his brother up the stairs and out of sight.

oOoOoOo

The next morning Hermione was settled across from Harry and Ron in The Great Hall,
clutching her coffee and trying desperately to keep her eyes open. She stole a glance down
the table to see that Lee and the twins weren’t much better off.

“Why are you so tired?” Ron asked over a mouthful of beans on toast. Harry looked a bit
concerned as well.

“Up late studying,” she muttered; it wasn’t actually a lie. Not the least bit shocked, because it
was perhaps the most predictable thing that she could do, both boys shrugged and went back
to their breakfast.

Not five minutes later the faintest echo of a furious scream carried down the grand staircase
from the third floor and Hermione snorted into her mug.
 Biscuits and the inquisition

5 October 1995

Angelina was sitting crowded among the other recruits in The Hog’s Head when she noticed
she began feeling a bit itchy.

Perhaps ten minutes later, she stood up and sneezed, her eyes starting to water a little.

“Are you okay, Ang?” Katie asked, looking sideways at her in concern.

“Yeah, just my stupid allergies,” she replied, shaking her head. “It’s really stuffy in here.”

She took a deep breath in an attempt to clear her sinuses and, over the general stale scent of
liquor lingering in the pub, she detected the faintest hint of something floral. Considering she
was in between Katie and Alicia, who she knew for a fact didn’t use any flowery scented
products, she found herself leaning forward ever so slightly to try and subtly sniff the witch
standing in front of her.
“Oh,” she puffed in surprise, pressing her lips together when she determined that was most
definitely the source.

“Pardon?” Hermione asked, turning around to look at her.

“Nothing,” Angelina said, adding quickly, “I just think I might be allergic to your shampoo.
Is it lavender?”

“Yes,” Hermione replied, looking immediately apologetic. “Oh, I’m so sorry! Here, let me go
stand somewhere else.”

Angelina watched her cross the small, cramped space before she glanced around the room,
seeking a familiar ginger head. Sure enough, when she found it, his eyes were already
completely locked-in on a wild mane of allergy-inducing curls.

“Well, I’ll be damned,” Angelina murmured.

oOoOoOo

They’d just left The Hog’s Head and stepped back into the brisk autumn air when Angelina
spotted Fred, George and Lee walking in a row ahead of her on the path. She waved at Katie
and Alicia, who were likely off to find a secluded spot in which to spend the rest of their
visit, and then sped up and suddenly linked her arm through George’s, whose hands were
tucked in his coat pockets.

“Buy me a cup of tea?” she propositioned with her best attempt at a coy smile.

George stopped and looked down at her, bewildered, while Fred and Lee shrugged and kept
walking.

“Uh, sure,” he said, obviously a little puzzled. He turned and steered them toward Madam
Pudifoot’s, the only tearoom in the village.

Angie found that she rather liked the way her arm fit snuggly in his; though she and Fred had
had their short-lived affair the previous year, which ended as quickly as it had begun, she’d
always carried a bit of a torch for the marginally demurer half of the Weasley twins.

They reached the locale and ducked inside, placing an order and then sliding into a table.
George looked a little uneasy.

“I’m not going to bite you,” she assured him, shrugging out of her jacket.

“I know,” he replied defensively, mirroring her.

They began to chat idly about classes before the Madam herself appeared, placing a tea
service and a small plate of biscuits on the table between them.

“So, how’s business going?” Angelina asked, lowering a lump of sugar into her cup.

“Fine,” George replied, narrowing his eyes a bit.

“Orders still rolling in?”

“Roughly twenty this week.”

“And how’s the hunt for a brick-and-mortar shop coming?”

“There are a few prospects.”

“Have you seen any of them?”

“We’re meant to go over the winter holiday.”

“And how long has Fred fancied Hermione?”

“I – what?” George asked sharply, choking on the bite of biscuit he’d just taken. She gave
him a minute to regain his composure, his eyes watering and face red. Finally, he repeated in
a wheezing sort of voice, “What did you just say?”

“How long has Fred fancied Hermione?” she inquired again more slowly, hands wrapped
serenely around her own mug.

“Uhh –“ George seemed to contemplate, clearly uncertain about how to proceed.

“I already know that he does, so don’t bother lying. She uses lavender shampoo and I caught
him staring at her half a dozen times during the meeting.”

“Well… I expect since about the time the two of you broke up,” George said sheepishly. He
hastily added, “Though I don’t think that was the reason.”

She nodded, agreeing. “We weren’t serious, you know. It was really just a bit of friendly
carrying-on after the ball.” They sat in silence for a second. “Does she know?” Angelina
asked curiously, grabbing the teapot and topping off her cup and then his.

“I’m not sure,” George said, shrugging. “They argue nearly as often as they’re civil with one
another; I don’t pretend to understand it. Is that the only reason you asked me here?”

Angelina noted the slightly crestfallen look in his eyes and shook her head with a soft smile.
“No. In fact, I think you’re rather fit yourself.”
 Shattered
Chapter Notes

This story officially has a playlist! If I did it right it should be on Spotify as "Fred &
Hermione (TTWW)."

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6yY4PnH1fjgvW7oHqetib0?
si=KTMW_GM6TPi7KJY8Lf1pEQ&fbclid=IwAR1R4DmFj7lwJXOcV2vWUlJQ6bitE
rUyhlFWZotbTVnsjARlhQTjgFK7kZU&nd=1

I'll still note when there's a song that speaks to/inspires a particular chapter, but they are
all on there along with a bunch of others.

2 November 1995
“What on earth is going on down there?” Hermione heard Parvati ask Lavender, who was
leaning over the railing to look down at the quidditch pitch. Hermione had been speaking to
Padma, who was seated beside her sister, but at Lavender’s remark her head snapped back in
the direction of the field.

It had been a dreadfully ugly match with Slytherin’s taunting and Ron’s utter failure, and she
had a knot in her stomach over the ordeal. Just as she shot forward to look down herself,
inadvertently sending a first year tumbling backward between the rows of benches, she heard
Lavender say back, “Looks like a fight.”

“Oh no,” Hermione breathed, spotting two red heads and one messy black one across from an
easily identifiable platinum blonde in emerald robes. She took off running down the stairs but
after two flights she stopped to lean over the railing and determined she was far too late.

“Harry! HARRY! NO!” Angelina shouted, having dismounted her own broom.

Given that Hermione was several hundred meters away and they were turned so their
numbers weren’t visible, she couldn’t tell which twin was which, just that one of them was
restrained while the other was running alongside Harry directly toward Malfoy.

“No!” she screamed, just as Malfoy was brutally tackled to the ground.

oOoOoOo

Hermione was pacing the corridor outside of Professor McGonagall’s office, having finally
chewed her thumb nail past the point of bleeding. Angelina, Alicia, Katie and Ginny were
lined up along the wall beside her, displaying their own anxious ticks, all of which had been
amplified ten-fold when Umbridge waddled past them moments before.

“It’s bad, it’s going to be really bad,” Katie muttered for the third time to nobody in
particular, her voice hollow. “They had to take Malfoy to the hospital wing.”

“Shut up, Katie,” Alicia snapped, running a hand through her already disheveled hair, which
had long since escaped from its elastic.

Whatever had happened they were about to find out, because the door opened and Umbridge
walked out. She paused to wrinkle her nose at the assemblage before turning with a little
“hmph” and striding down the corridor. It’s a good thing she didn’t look back because Ginny
made an exceptionally vulgar gesture in her direction.

They had a better idea of just how bad it was when they heard Professor McGonagall say
quietly from within, “I’m sorry boys, you brought this on yourselves.” She strode out a
moment later with all three of them tailing her, looks of shock on their faces.

“What happened?” Alicia asked immediately, stepping forward.

Professor McGonagall just shook her head solemnly and walked toward the stairs. Harry
muttered, “I need to find Ron,” and followed her.
George was the one that finally opened his mouth to explain, though he looked like he was
about to vomit on his shoes.

“Banned. All three of us.”

“Banned? What do you mean banned? Like suspended? How many games?” Angelina asked
in rapid secession.

“She used the words, ‘lifetime ban,’” George elaborated, his voice dull and detached.
Angelina’s legs gave out and she sank to the floor like she’d been shot. Ginny swore
colorfully, as did Alicia, and Katie burst into tears.

Hermione’s eyes were on Fred though; he’d been absolutely silent since they’d emerged from
the office. Suddenly, he turned on his heel and took off down the corridor. She only thought
about it for a second before she followed him. Nobody was paying the least bit of attention to
her anyway.

She thought he might head back to the locker rooms in the stadium, or perhaps Gryffindor
tower, but he took an abrupt left into what she knew to be a vacant classroom beside the
entrance to the dungeons.

The door was still swinging shut when she put a hand out and caught it, slipping inside
behind him. Fred was standing perhaps twenty feet away near a window that faced the
quidditch pitch, the stands of which were still emptying. His head was in his hands, and it
only took her a second to ascertain that he was crying.

“Fred?” she entreated quietly, sliding her bag off her shoulder and letting it fall to the floor
beside her.

He didn’t react to her presence other than to squeeze his eyes tightly shut.

“Fred, are you…?” she trailed off, because finishing that sentence with the words “all right”
or “okay” seemed monumentally stupid.

“Please leave,” he requested after a moment, tone uneven and thick.

“I just wanted to –“

“Hermione, leave.”

She shoved down a flash of righteous indignation that threatened to bubble to the surface and
stepped toward him, reaching out to place a hand on his shoulder. His eyes flickered open and
he pulled away from her. She felt like she’d been slapped.

“I was worried about you,” she attempted, her voice so tentative that it hardly sounded like
her voice at all. Her hand fell back to her side, dangling limp and useless.

“Worried about me,” he scoffed vindictively, licking his lips.

“Yes, worried about you,” she shot back, a little of her anger at the situation beginning to
seep through.

“That’s great. So, you’ve decided that rather than yelling at me today, you’re going to take
my side?”

“How could you – I am always on your side, Fred!”

“It sure doesn’t feel like it! Half the time I see you you’re smiling at me, and the other half
you’re telling me off! You just did it yesterday!”

“I only tell you off when you’re breaking the rules and being a stupid git!” she yelled back,
matching his volume and balling her fists at her sides.

“Oh, lovely. That’s really charming. Will you please just give me two bleeding moments of
peace!?”

“No!” she declared, knowing even as she said the word that it was a non-sensical response.
His face was red, and his eyes were puffed, and he looked like he was on the verge of
completely losing it. Fred made to step around her toward the door and she turned,
dexterously slipping her wand from her pocket and slamming it shut, putting locking and
silencing charms on it for good measure. The last thing they needed was to draw Umbridge
back.

“Have you lost your bloody mind?!” Fred shouted, rounding on her with an outraged
expression.

“Maybe!” she countered. “I came here to make sure you were okay because I know how
much you love quidditch and you attacked me.”

“It’s not about the quidditch, Hermione!”

“Then what the hell is it about?!”

“Everything!” His voice cracked and he turned suddenly, kicking a chair and sending it
sailing into a nearby wall. One of the legs broke off with a loud snap and clattered against the
stone floor. “It’s about fucking everything. This year, Percy, the ministry, the Prophet, that
frog-faced bitch! I am furious about everything, all the time, and there’s nothing that I can do
about any of it!”

His chest was rising and falling rapidly, breathing ragged and cheeks flushed. She opened her
mouth to speak but bit her tongue sharply when he carried on.

“I just wanted one year, one more year to be reckless and play quidditch and plan stupid
pranks, because you know what’s waiting for me out there? A fucking war! Having to
constantly check over my shoulder, constantly worry if someone I love is going to be
murdered or tortured or go missing, and I’m not going to get it. I’m not going to get any of it.
It’s unfair and terrifying and I just – I just – FUCK.”
He screwed his eyes shut and wrapped his hands around the back of his neck, interlocking his
fingers and angling his head harshly toward the ground.

She considered what he’d said and realised that, though they shared many of the same
concerns, their situations were simply different. Hermione had two more years of school, two
more years until she would be expected to truly take part in the war. Two more years of
studying and going to quidditch matches and being concerned over who liked who, and who
was dating who. Fred didn’t, he had months. Months until he was meant to be an adult and
join The Order alongside his parents and his brothers.

It painted his being banned from quidditch, the pranks even, in an entirely different light. A
much harsher, far less forgiving light.

Hermione debated doing as he’d asked. Unlocking the door and leaving him to brood on his
own, but the fact of the matter was that she was angry too. She was angry for him and for
George and for Harry and for herself. She was angry for every single one of them that had
lost their childhoods, if not the people they cared about, because of a snake-faced
megalomaniac on a power trip. Because their world was a merciless, unjust place.

And in that moment, Hermione was struck with the overwhelming urge to break something.

Fred’s eyes were still closed, so he didn’t see her conjure the heavy glass orb, roughly the
size of a small apple. She’d whispered the spell, so he didn’t hear it either, but he certainly
heard it when she threw it as hard as she could at the expanse of grey stone wall across the
room.

His eyes flew open, pupils blown wide and lips parted in shock, just in time to see her
conjure another and repeat the process, showering the floor with thousands of tiny jagged
shards.

“What the hell are you –?“

“Here,” she said tersely, conjuring another and shoving it roughly toward him. She then made
herself one and whipped it so that it smashed just beside a window. She paused, chest
heaving, and turned to him expectantly. “Well?” she demanded.

He looked between her and the sphere in his hand twice before stepping forward suddenly
and hurling it at the wall so hard that the pieces almost flew all the way back to where they
were standing.

She had another ready to go for each of them by the time he turned around. This went on for
some time until finally they were both sweating and out of breath, and the floor on the other
half of the room was so heavily covered in broken glass, there was hardly any actual floor
visible.

The only sound was their panting until she turned to him rather than making another,
swallowed the emotions that had bubbled in her throat, and said what she should have said at
the beginning, voice no longer hesitant. “I’m sorry.”
Fred turned and looked at her, the frustration and anger on his face having mostly
disappeared; she supposed it was shattered on the ground along with everything else.

“I’m sorry,” she repeated, pulling in a breath and ignoring the sharp twinge of a stitch
blossoming in between her ribs. “I’m sorry about quidditch and about Umbridge and about
Percy and about how fucked up everything in our lives is. And I’m sorry if you ever feel like
I’m not on your side, because I am. I swear that I am.”

“I’m sorry too,” he said hastily, shaking his head and looking contrite. “That wasn’t fair of
me. You treat me the same way that you treat everybody else.”

“But you’re not everybody else.”

His eyebrows hitched up in surprise and the words hung heavily between them, suspended in
the air until she broke away, not at all in the right frame of mind to psychoanalyse that
particular confession. She crossed the room, crunching glass beneath her shoes, and then
breathed in, focused, and vanished every last piece until it looked like it had never been there.
She repaired the leg on the chair for good measure as well, levitating it back to where it
belonged.

Then she spun and sank down with her back against the wall, facing Fred and the door. He
hesitated only for a moment before joining her, close enough that their knees bumped
together. Hermione sighed heavily and let her head fall sideways onto his shoulder, which
was still clad in his dirty, grass-stained quidditch uniform. She was emotionally and
physically drained, and she reckoned she wasn’t the only one.

Despite all of that though, despite everything that had transpired, she felt her tension ease
when a large, warm hand wrapped around her own, fingers lacing together and thumb gently
circling along the back of her hand.

“Well,” Fred finally said, breaking the silence and blowing out an enormous exhale. He
paused before continuing. “I’ll admit that I’ve had better games.”
 Tickled purple
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

18 December 1995

“Let’s move on to stunning and shielding again,” Harry instructed from the front of the room.
They’d just finished working on impediments, something Hermione was rather proud of her
skill in.

Ron made to walk toward her but was quickly intercepted by George, who threw an arm
around his younger brother’s shoulder and dragged him toward the far wall.

Hermione was looking around the room for someone else to partner with, seeing as Harry had
started to work with Neville again, when a familiar voice said quietly from behind her left
shoulder, “Looking for me?”
Hermione smiled before she even turned around. Sure enough, standing there with a lopsided
grin and his hands in his pockets was Fred. His tie was hanging loosely around his neck and
his shirt sleeves were rolled up just below his elbows. The effect it had on her was…
significant.

“I’m sure you’d like to think so,” she replied cheekily. Against all odds, relations had
significantly improved between them since they’d had it out in the empty classroom that day.
They still squabbled on occasion, but he seemed to be making more of an effort not to do
things she’d be forced to reprimand, or at least not to do them in front of her, and she in turn
was trying to learn to let his more juvenile antics, and even the antics of others, roll off of her
back a bit more.

He nodded to an open space not far away near the fireplace and they split off, facing one
another with wands raised. Despite several attempts, they hadn’t managed to practice
together at any of the previous meetings thus far. Hermione was often monopolized by Ron,
Neville or Ginny, and Fred in turn just ended up with George or Lee.

She was surprised to find that she was a little anxious about it; Fred was much faster at
offensive casting than she was, and was able to do so silently to boot, but Hermione could put
up a shield charm quicker than anyone else in their assemblage, even Harry. It would make
for an interesting exhibition to be sure.

“Ladies first,” Fred said, giving a sweeping half-bow with a sparkle of mischief in his eye.
She was grateful he’d offered; her sluggishness in stunning would give him a false sense of
security for when they switched roles.

“If you insist,” she responded. She raised her wand and muttered the charm as quietly as
possible, flicking her wrist at the last second, but his shield was already up and waiting, so
the spell glanced harmlessly. They did this thrice more before she had to stop and pull off her
jumper. The first one after that landed, catching him in the shoulder just before he dropped
unconscious onto the large cushion behind him.

She crossed the room with a bit of a lilt in her step and crouched to rennervate him and offer
a hand. As soon as he blinked his eyes open, he was chuckling to himself and shaking his
head.

“What’s so funny?” she asked, searching his face for any indication, but he just shook his
head again and they resumed their positions. She tried twice more, failing both times, before
Harry called out for them to switch.

Hermione changed her stance a bit and adjusted the grip on her wand. She then dipped
dramatically into the same bow he’d offered her, and he let out huff of laughter that made
Luna, who was standing nearby, look over curiously at them for a second.

Fred spoke the first two stunners aloud, likely in an attempt to put them on an even playing
field, but she deflected them both with ease and arched an eyebrow at him challengingly. He
nodded his ascent and threw the next one at her lightening quick and completely silently. She
just barely managed to put her shield up in time.
 They repeated this over and over, Hermione successfully repelling his attempts each time.
Though his expression held a hint of frustration, the overwhelming emotion was something
akin to admiration and she found herself trying not to flush under his gaze.

They were nearly out of time when he caught her completely off guard, throwing a bolt of
purple light rather than the red she’d been waiting for and she hesitated for just a second too
long; the tickling hex clipped her in the hip.

Hermione burst out laughing without any ability to stop herself, doubling over and clutching
her ribs until she was gasping for air and crying. The sensation finally ceased with a quick
“finite” from Fred, and she looked up to find him laughing almost as hard as she’d been.
Dabbing at her eyes and straightening, she was a little embarrassed to discover that the whole
room was turned and looking at them.

Harry awkwardly chimed into the silence after a pregnant pause, “Right… let’s try and keep
to the given exercise, alright?”

Fred and Hermione both intoned their apologies, she a bit more self-consciously than him,
and Harry reclaimed the class’ attention. Things quickly wrapped up as he wished them a
happy holiday and promised they would begin working on Patronuses when they returned
after the break.

Fred and George left shortly after that while Ron and Hermione stayed to help clean up, as
they usually did. Finally, it was just the two of them other than Harry and Cho, and once
Hermione noticed she dragged Ron from the room, despite his mumbled confusion as to why
they weren’t waiting for Harry.

Chapter End Notes

This night isn't quite over yet.

Also, I have a smutty Wolfstar one shot that just dropped on my Works page if you want
to check that out.
 Merry Christmas, Darling

Fred knew Hermione had a book to exchange, he’d heard her mention that she needed to grab
it before the meeting, so when he and George left the Room of Requirement, rather than
returning to the common room he went to loiter outside the library. Not for the first time did
he find himself wishing that he had the Marauder’s Map back.

So, loiter he did until Hermione finally appeared around the corner perhaps forty minutes
before curfew.

“Don’t tell me you needed something from the library?” she asked in exaggerated disbelief,
spotting him as she approached.

“I’ve been known to crack a book,” he countered, feigning insult. “Not well known, sure, but
known.”

And then she smiled, that easy, unbelievably beautiful smile that crinkled her nose and lit up
her eyes. “I need to swap out a transfiguration text really quickly – wait for me?”
He nodded, finding it ironic that he’d been doing exactly that since she’d said hello to him in
that very corridor six months prior.

She was in and out in a flash, having apparently developed a sort of shorthand with Madam
Pince, and then they were walking beside one another, dawdling and looking at the Christmas
decorations as they went.

“Can I show you something?” he asked, having finally worked up the courage to do so as
they neared the staircases.

“Sure,” she said, a hint of both curiosity and uncertainty colouring her voice.

He made an abrupt right turn and navigated until they were outside the same classroom
they’d argued in after his ill-fated quidditch match. This was mostly out of convenience
because that part of the castle was fairly deserted in the evening and he knew the room wasn’t
in use.

She stepped forward to twist the door handle when he stopped her with a hand on her wrist.

“Do you trust me?” he asked, searching her slightly startled expression.

“Not with that look on your face,” she laughed. He gave her his best attempt at a withering
glare, modeled after her own, and she replied more seriously, “Yes, Fred. Against the better
judgement and sage advice of most everyone that has met you, I trust you.”

He took the victory and raised his wand, conjuring a blindfold to appear over her eyes. He
then reached out and gently clasped her hand in his, opened the door behind him, and steered
her through.

oOoOoOo

Hermione thought she might faint when the black fabric appeared over her eyes and she felt
his light grip on her hand. Her head was spinning, and her stomach was churning from
nerves, but she didn’t have much time to dwell on it because, before she knew it, she was
being pulled into the empty classroom.

The first thing she noticed was the smell; the castle tended to take on an aroma around the
holidays, like evergreen and ginger biscuits. That was present, but the overwhelming scent
was the one she’d learned to associate with Fred himself. Warm spices – nutmeg, cinnamon
and cloves. Lately there’d been the faintest trace of gunpowder as well, which she was
concerned to even contemplate in terms of what he and George might be creating for the
shop.

As she stepped carefully through, trusting him not to run her into anything, she also noted
Christmas music playing faintly in the background. Also not uncommon this time of year, but
after another couple of seconds she determined that it was muggle Christmas music.

“What on earth –?“

“Shh, just one more minute.”

She pressed her lips together to keep from protesting, as was her natural inclination, and
allowed him to pull her into the center of the room. He then let her hand fall to her side and
stepped away.

A second later Fred said, from a bit further away,“Okay, you can take off the blindfold.”

Hermione brought her hands up to her face and slipped the thick band of cloth over her head,
blinking against the sudden brightness as her eyes adjusted.

As beautiful as Hogwarts was around the Christmas holiday, she oftentimes found herself
longing for some of the muggle traditions she’d grown up with. She had them when she
visited her parents of course but, as conflicted as she might be about the sentiment, Hogwarts
had become more her home than their house was. It was the place that she didn’t need to
filter or hide, she could just be herself.

It was for this reason that her lips parted in shock as she looked around. Electronics didn’t
work on the school grounds, but Fred had managed an astoundingly similar approximation to
muggle Christmas lights. Floating around the ceiling of the room in a draping pattern were
tiny spheres roughly the size of her thumb nail that were glowing warmly in the otherwise
dark space. There were hundreds of them and, knowing that they had to be individually
conjured, she was torn between being dazzled by the composite effect and thoroughly
impressed by the magic behind it.

“Oh my God,” Hermione murmured quietly, turning in place to see the lights ringed the entire
room.

In the corner on one of the desks sat an old hand-cranked turntable with a vinyl record
spinning on it. The song playing was an instrumental version of “Have Yourself a Merry
Little Christmas.”

Then finally, standing perhaps five feet across from her in the middle of the room, was Fred.
He had his hands behind his back and an uncharacteristically nervous expression on his face.

“I heard you trying to explain muggle decorations to Ginny a couple weeks ago and Lee’s
dad is a muggle, so he helped me figure out a conjuration spell that looked the most like the
lights you were talking about and then the record I had to have mailed here, which actually
took longer than I’d expected, but -“

“Fred?”

She stopped his anxious explanation with a small smile and took a step toward him.

“Yes?” he said uncertainly, staring at her as though he were afraid she might hex him.

“It’s absolutely perfect.” A look of relief washed over him, and his shoulders dropped several
inches from where they’d been tensely coiled near his ears. “Thank you. I can’t even begin…
This must have taken hours, why would you go to the trouble?”
She looked around again, awed smile still in place, estimating perhaps three or four hundred
of the tiny lights twinkling and glowing all around them. It’s no wonder the room smelled
like him, he must have spent the better part of a day in there.

“To see that look on your face.”

She turned back to him and felt as though the air had been wrung from her lungs like a
sponge. “Oh.”

Before she could say anything more though, he extracted a small package from behind his
back, wrapped neatly in red Christmas paper.

“I know I won’t see you on Christmas but I wanted to give you your gift so you could take it
with you.”

She shrugged her shoulder and let her bag lower onto the ground before crossing the room
and accepting the parcel. It was perhaps eight inches long and four wide, roughly the size of a
small book.

“Thank you, it’ll be the first one I open,” she promised. “I have yours in my trunk, but I can
give it to you tomorrow.” She looked up to find his eyes already on her – something that had
been happening more and more frequently.

Hermione wasn’t sure when the shift had occurred, but over the past several weeks she found
that every time she entered the common room, every morning when she ate breakfast in The
Great Hall, every instance in which they passed one another in the corridor between classes,
Fred was looking at her. And she knew that because she’d been looking at him too.
Regardless of what they were doing or who was around, his face had become the one that she
sought out from the crowd.

His ginger hair shone dark copper in the dim lighting, and she was close enough to count the
freckles across his nose. And his eyes… if she had to pick one color to see for the rest of her
life, if the entire world faded to black and white and grey, the color she’d pick would be the
blue of Fred Weasley’s eyes.

They were only perhaps six inches apart at that point and before she had time to process what
was happening, Fred ducked his head and placed a chaste kiss on her left cheek, lingering for
a just a second before drawing back to gauge her reaction. His skin was warm against hers,
and she felt his breath tickle a curl near her ear. Bewildered though she was, she smiled and
released a little half-sigh, allowing it to mingle with a breathless laugh.

He nodded once, like that was the response he’d been hoping for, before swallowing hard,
heaving a sigh and looking about the room. The ten-minute warning chimed throughout the
castle, reminding them it was nearly curfew.

“I suppose I’d best get this cleared up – wouldn’t want a prefect to catch me wandering the
halls after hours.”
He gave her a cheeky smirk and made to walk toward the turntable in the corner, which was
now crooning “White Christmas.”

Her left hand was holding the gift he’d given her, but her right was free, and, in a moment of
sheer Gryffindor nerve, she used it to reach out and catch the end of his tie, hauling him back
around to face her. And then, without debating the ramifications, or worrying what anybody
might say, or even thinking much at all, Hermione finally managed to get out of her own head
and do the thing she’d been wanting to do for months.

Gripping his tie firmly in her fist she saw a glimpse of shock on his face right before she
tugged it, pulled his head back down to hers, and kissed him soundly on the mouth.

Fred made a little sound of disbelief in his throat and froze as though he’d been petrified.
Bravery rapidly depleting in light of his complete lack of response, Hermione was just about
to pull away and flee the room, or perhaps the continent, when he fished an arm around her
waist, dragged her a step closer to him, and kissed her back.

His lips slid against hers in an overwhelming cocktail of contradictions. Firm and yet
somehow still soft. Confident but earnest. Wanting more but happily accepting what was
being offered. It was unlike any other kiss she’d ever experienced in her life.

After a few seconds, or some other utterly indeterminate amount of time, he tore his mouth
away and let his forehead rest against hers, both of them struggling to catch their breath. She
finally let go of his tie and lifted her hand, which she was proud to see was only shaking a
little bit, and placed it against his cheek, running her thumb lightly across the curve of his
bottom lip. She was rewarded by the shiver that rolled through him in response.

He took the hand not on her lower back and raised it to cover hers before turning his head and
pressing another warm kiss into the center of her palm.

Only then did he open his eyes to look at her again, astonishment on his face, and breathed
out the only word that could even begin to explain her own feelings in that moment.

“Wow.”

oOoOoOo

The next morning Hermione went down to breakfast with a lilt in her step. After their kiss,
Fred had quickly cleaned up the classroom and then accompanied her back to the common
room, hand-in-hand. They separated just as they got to the portrait hole, apparently in
agreement that they wanted to keep whatever it was between them just between them for the
time being. She was entirely fine with that.

Once they were inside, she joined Harry and Ron in front of the fire, and he headed up to bed,
looking back for just a second to shoot her a grin and a wink. It was all she could do to keep
from smiling back like a maniac while Harry told her about his own damp encounter with
Cho.
She settled at the table and poured herself a cup of coffee, not bothering to extract her books
from her bag as she usually would. Her nerves wouldn’t allow her to focus anyway.

Instead, Hermione simply sipped her drink and waited.

And waited.

And waited.

Over the span of an hour, nerves slowly turned to unease because not only had Fred not
appeared, neither had Harry. Or Ron. Or George. Or Ginny.

She’d just spotted Neville walking into the hall and started to stand so she could ask him if
he’d seen the boys when she felt a hand on her shoulder. Turning to look up, she saw who it
was and her stomach began to free-fall.

“Miss Granger,” Headmaster Dumbledore said solemnly, “will you please come with me?”
 Return to Grimmauld Place
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

20 December 1995

Fred and George had just finished eating lunch in the kitchen at Grimmauld Place, discussing
moving around the tour they had set up for a storefront the next day so they could visit their
father again instead, when there was a knock at the front door. Fred looked sideways at
George, who shrugged.

He debated extracting his wand from his pocket, because whoever it was should have been
able to unlock it magically, but anybody that was able to even see the door in the first place
was somebody that had been there in the past and was privy to the secret. So, instead he just
crossed the foyer and turned the handle.

Before it was even fully open, something barreled straight through the entryway and into his
chest in a blur of motion. Startled, he stumbled back a step, nearly tripping over the garish
umbrella holder in the process.

It wasn’t until the smell of lavender hit him that he realised the something currently wrapped
around his midsection wasn’t a something at all. It was a someone.

“Hermione,” he breathed in recognition. Before he could remotely begin to comprehend how

she was there, he wrapped his arms around her waist and practically crushed her much
smaller frame to him. She let out a tiny squeak as the air was forced from her lungs, but
honestly it was all he could do not to grip her even tighter.

“I tried to get here sooner,” she said shakily, muffled against his jumper, “but Dumbledore
wouldn’t let me leave.”

He just nodded into her shoulder, not at all trusting his voice not to crack should he attempt to
speak. And he didn’t loosen his hold on her either, reveling a little in the fact that she was
clinging to him just as forcefully. The past thirty-six hours had been an actual living hell; he
was exhausted and scared and emotionally sapped. Because, for as incredible as kissing her
had been, as much as it had surpassed every fantasy he’d had about it, and there had been
many, everything after that had gone completely ass-over-teakettle.

Fred pulled away when he heard a heavy thud, but even then it was only slightly. Looking up,
he saw George dutifully heaving Hermione’s trunk over the threshold and closing the door,
pointedly not looking at the two of them.

“Where do your parents think you are?” he finally managed to ask, albeit a little hoarsely,
searching her face. She looked like she was about ready to cry and he instinctively pushed an
errant curl off her cheek, as if he’d done it a hundred times.

“School. I made Dumbledore contact them and lie; say that I decided to stay over the holiday
to study after all.”

“You made Dumbledore contact them?”

She nodded and looked a little abashed. “It was the only thing he could do to stop me from
shouting after he said I had to wait for term to officially end to come here.”

Fred, who’d been on the receiving end of Hermione’s wrath many times, surprised himself
and laughed at the idea of her turning it on Albus Dumbledore. He brushed his lips to her
forehead just beneath the brim of her knit hat.

“He said your father's okay? Stable, at least.”

Fred drew back again and nodded. “We saw him yesterday; they’re still trying to figure out
how to close the wound, but –“

“Have they tried Boom Berry? That has coagulating properties… Or maybe Chizpurfle fang!
I read an article in Brewer’s Weekly where a paste made from powdered Chizpurfle fang was
used to counteract the venom from an Inland Taipan. Maybe if it were mixed with –“
 Whatever else she’d been about to say was abruptly cut off by Fred’s lips sealing against
hers, swallowing the words. He had a hand on either side of her head, cupping her jaw and
holding her to him. The kiss only lasted a second before he broke away, but he felt her relax a
bit in his arms, and his own tension eased a little in response.

It wasn’t like their first kiss; that had been exciting and new and long-awaited. Kissing her
there, in the foyer of Grimmauld Place, amid all of the fear and concern and relief that was
swirling between them was natural, as easy as breathing. Like she was an extension of him,
holding a piece of his heart that he hadn’t fully realised until that moment that he’d given to
her.

Before either of them could say anything else though, George loudly cleared his throat.

“Sounds like Ron and Ginny are on their way down,” he observed, still examining a stretch
of wallpaper on the other side of the foyer.

Fred looked back to Hermione and, reluctant though they both were, understanding passed
and they stepped apart. She’d just made it back beside her trunk when Ron and Ginny hit the
landing.

Chapter End Notes

The next two are Christmas chapters, so put your holiday hats on and make some cocoa!
 A very caffeinated Christmas

25 December 1995

“Son of a –“ Fred placed his actively blistering fingertip between his lips and swore
colourfully around it.

“What exactly are you doing? And why in the name of Merlin’s saggy left tit are you doing it
in my kitchen at six in the morning?”

Sirius strode into the room clad in a dark red dressing gown, eyes squinted against the light
overhead and bedsheet creases still faintly visible on his face.

“Sorry mate, didn’t mean to wake you.” Fred shot a rueful look at what appeared to be a
brand-new percolator sitting on the stovetop before sighing, grabbing it, and dumping the
contents down the drain to start over again.

“You didn’t, and that doesn’t answer my question.”

“I am attempting to make coffee. Thus far the closest that I’ve gotten is a sort of sludgy
brown goo.” He placed the scoop back in the small tin and began to measure.

“You are aware that you’re British, correct?”

Fred offered a withering glare and didn’t say anything.

Sirius, taking pity on his visibly defeated demeanor, sighed and stepped around the table.
“Budge over.”

He grabbed the small silver pot and twisted the top off.

“Here – you’re meant to put the grounds in this little basket, then the water underneath it.”

“They should really include that in the directions.”

Sirius arched a brown and grabbed the small, folded piece of paper beside the box that the
thing had come in. Flipping it over he revealed not only detailed instructions, but a measuring
chart and an illustrated guide.

Looking more than a little humbled, Fred sank into the nearest seat and asked, “How do you
know how to make coffee?”

“Moony favored it when we were younger,” Sirius explained, shrugging. Having set the
percolator to rights, he placed it back on the burner and took a seat as well. “Never liked it
much myself, but the smell is rather nice.”

Fred huffed a laugh, an indecipherable and slightly hysterical expression flickering across his
face before he schooled it away.

“I take it you aren’t making it for yourself?”

“Erm… no.” The young man didn’t elaborate and Sirius didn’t press, though he did take note
of a subtle flush of rosey colour around Fred’s ears.

They sat in a silent, early morning stupor while the coffee brewed. When it was done, he
summoned a mug and showed Fred how to remove the basket. Once the grounds had been
discarded and the coffee had had a moment to settle, Fred filled the cup, placed a stasis charm
on it, and quickly disappeared upstairs.

Sirius leaned against the counter, arms crossed and looking at the doorway thoughtfully until
Remus made his entrance a few minutes later.

“I was wondering where you’d gone – holy hell, is that coffee?”

“Mmhmm,” Sirius nodded, distracted. “You’ll have to make a new batch though.”

Not deterred at all, Remus stepped up to the counter and began to measure grounds like an
addict that had just tumbled off the wagon. He glanced sideways and noticed Sirius’
expression.
“What’s eating you, Pads?”

“Am I crazy,” Sirius started slowly, “Or is there something going on between Fred and
Hermione?”

Seeing as Fred was related to everyone else in the house but Harry, who thus far had not
shown any inclinations of that nature, that seemed the most logical conclusion to draw.
Remus looked a little surprised but nodded.

“Yeah, absolutely. I don’t think they’re shagging or anything, but I noticed their scents get
wrapped up together sometimes, and the poor bloke’s heart-rate just about doubles when she
walks into the room.”

“Huh. Bit of an odd pairing, isn’t it?”

“No more peculiar than Prongs and Lily. Do you suppose it’s meant to be a secret, then?”

“Yeah, I think so.” Sirius shot a grin sideways. “Care to have a bit of fun with them?”

oOoOoOo

When Hermione awoke on Christmas morning, the very first thing she became aware of was
the smell of freshly brewed coffee.

“This had better not be a dream,” she muttered drowsily.

“On the contrary, I’ve been referred to as dreamy many a time.”

Her face split into a smile and she lifted her head from the pillow, squinting one eye open to
find Fred crouched at the side of the bed. He was still in his pyjamas and had apparently been
wafting a mug of steaming coffee in her direction.

“Happy Christmas,” she whispered, sitting up and stretching. She was thankful she’d elected
to go to bed in a matching flannel set of sleepwear rather than the oversized t-shirt with a
bleach stain that she sometimes favored.

“Happy Christmas,” Fred replied in an equally hushed tone, surrendering the mug and
receiving a heartfelt thank-you. Hermione scooted to the side with her back to the wall and
tipped her head for him to take a seat next her amid the rumpled sheets. Ginny was still
snoring loudly across the room, both an exceptionally sound sleeper and not in any way an
early riser.

Hermione looked to the right and saw a small stack of presents on the wardrobe near the foot
of her bed.

Fred tracked her gaze and shook his head admonishingly. “Now just hold on – I believe I was
promised that my gift would be opened first, no?”

“Oh, alright,” Hermione relented. “Hold this.”

She handed Fred the cup of coffee again and rocked forward to root in her trunk beside the
bed. After a long moment she popped back up, bright red package in hand.

“It’s probably best that I’m here when you open it anyway,” Fred admitted. “It requires a bit
of explanation.”

Quirking her eyebrows, Hermione slowly began to peel the wrapping back. There was a card
on top that he waved off before she could read it, presumably holding whatever clarification
he was now to offer in person.

“Oh! It’s beautiful,” she breathed. It was a book, as she’d suspected, bound in the same color
of leather as her bookmark. In the top right corner of the cover was yet another small sprig of
lavender. “Is it a journal?”

She couldn’t fathom what about that would require explanation. Fred shook his head.

“Here, switch.”

He handed her mug back, which she took an enormous sip from upon receiving, and he
seized the book. Flipping to the front page, Fred revealed a small, numbered list in his own
slanted handwriting. Squinting a little in the dim light, she discerned that they were book
titles. More specifically muggle book titles, all of which she had read in the past several
months.

1. Pride and Prejudice

2. To the Lighthouse
3. The Mill on the Floss
4. Crime and Punishment

“Okay,” she said, shaking her head. “You’re right, I’m going to need some clarification.”

Fred smiled, took his index finger, placed it over the top title and muttered, “Ostende Mihi.”
She didn’t think anything had happened until he flipped to the next page.

“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune,
must be in want of a wife…”

“Oh my God!” Hermione exclaimed, clapping a hand over her mouth. They both looked
nervously at Ginny, but she remained fast asleep. She quickly set her now-empty mug on the
bedside table and grabbed the book from Fred’s lap with wide eyes.

“Oh my God!” she hissed again, much more quietly as she flipped through to find the entire
book was in fact there. “This is - how on earth did you - ?”

He looked a little sheepish, running a hand over the back of his head. “Modified protean
charm and a conditional extension on the pages; unfortunately you have to already have the
book that you want to enter so that you can link them, but it’s meant to be convenient. You
know, for traveling or when –“
“You have to patent this,” Hermione said abruptly, still examining the pages with an
awestruck expression. “Sorry, I don’t mean to cut you off. But you need to patent this.
Immediately.”

“I’m not sure our clientele will be particularly interested,” Fred replied uncertainly, appearing
thoroughly surprised by the suggestion.

She shook her head and finally looked up at him. “No, not for the shop. Create the patent and
then sell the rights and collect royalties. Flourish and Blott’s alone would give you a mint, it’s
essentially a portable library.”

The idea didn’t seem to have occurred to him.

“That’s – do you really think so?”

“I know so! Fred, this is brilliant. You’re brilliant. My gift is going to look like absolute
rubbish now.”

She’d felt pretty good about it until he sprang this, but couldn’t muster up even a trace of
annoyance. Fred laughed and they grinned at each other for a moment. He just started to lean
in when there was an abrupt thud from downstairs.

“That’ll be your mum,” she sighed, looking down at the floorboards a little reproachfully.
Ginny stirred across the room.

“I need to get back anyway, haven’t opened your gift yet. See you at breakfast?”

She nodded and Fred got up from the bed and started to make his way toward the door. He
was just about to turn the handle when she grabbed his arm and rolled onto her tiptoes to
place a quick kiss on his cheek.

“Happy Christmas,” she said again, quietly. He tweaked the tip of her nose impishly with his
knuckle and then stepped into the hall, heading up the stairs.

“Wasgoinon,” Ginny muttered, half-awake and beginning to sit up behind her.

“Nothing,” Hermione said, glancing down at the book still in her hands, running her
fingertips lightly across the cover. She shook herself and smiled. “Look, you have presents to
open.”
 A minor miscalculation

25 December 1995

The residents of Grimmauld Place, both permanent and non, were gathered around the dining
table after having returned from St. Mungo’s on Christmas Day. They were just eating the
roast that was left over from lunch, which had been an admittedly lavish affair, but Mrs.
Weasley had also constructed a positively delicious looking trifle for pudding that was
chilling in the icebox.

“Don’t you get up Molly, I’ve got it!” Sirius proclaimed, removing his napkin from his lap
and quickly making to stand. Mrs. Weasley, who’d had a rather harrowing day arguing with
her husband over the barbarity of needlework as a restorative treatment, sank in her seat and
smiled gratefully.

Hermione had just excused herself to the restroom as Sirius made his way into the kitchen,
shooting Remus a subtle hand signal as he went; this was one of several variables that they
had planned for. He hastened to the icebox, removed the glass trifle bowl, uncovered it,
grabbed a stack of plates, and then hovered near the counter, lying in wait.
A moment later he heard the toilet in the loo flush down the corridor and called out, “George,
can you give me a hand making tea?”

This was the most suspicious bit of their plan by far, because anyone could have come to his
aid, but it was the only way to guarantee that the person that got up wasn’t Fred.
Furthermore, he thought putting either of the younger boys in this position might be a step
too far.

“Uh, sure…” came the confused reply, shouted across the hall and through the kitchen door.
Sirius held his breath as the bathroom door clicked opened and, sure enough, a second later
he heard Hermione’s puzzled voice.

“Why can’t I move?”

Mentally patting himself on the back, Sirius schooled the mirth from his face and poked his
head out of the kitchen. Just as they’d planned, Hermione and George were standing face to
face in the doorway of the dining room.

“What on earth -?” Remus started, playing his part expertly and looking around in
bafflement. “Sirius?”

“Oh gosh, I’m so sorry kids! I forgot that I charmed a few of those to float around earlier
when Dung and Moody were here. I thought I got them all, but I must have missed one.”

Everyone seemed confused but, in perfect synchronicity, Hermione and George looked up to
see a small sprig of mistletoe hovering over their heads. Their faces immediately stretched
into identical expressions of horror.

Sirius was gritting his teeth so hard to stop from laughing, his jaw was beginning to ache.

“And, uh, why exactly can’t we move?” George asked, though his desolate tone implied that
he already knew.

“The mistletoe gods must be sated,” Sirius said, shaking his head and doing his best to look
somber.

Ron, Ginny and Harry were cackling, Mrs. Weasley made a tired, though mildly amused
tutting noise, and Fred looked ill.

“Uh, right.” George ducked down and placed a grandmotherly peck on Hermione’s cheek
while she kept her eyes fixed on the ceiling. No luck. They both made to move again and just
rocked in place.

“You’re going to have to do better than that,” Sirius coaxed, a hint of tongue-in-cheek teasing
colouring his tone.

“Oh, honestly,” Molly chided. Sirius leaned languidly against the doorway to the kitchen
across from them, hand wrapped around the base of the trifle bowl and stack of plates resting
on his hip.
“Just get it over with,” Hermione instructed resignedly, her cheeks deepening to a scarlet.

A muscle in George’s neck flexed and he took a deep breath, gave Hermione an apologetic
look, and then started to lean in.

Mere seconds before their lips made contact, the mistletoe overhead rather spectacularly burst
into bright orange and yellow flames.

“Gah!” Hermione yelped, no longer frozen in place and careening back into the safety of the
dining room while George hugged the doorframe like a cat stuck in a tree.

Sirius’ jaw dropped, not having anticipated that response in any way. Everyone looked at
where the mistletoe had been in bewilderment while the fire burned out as quickly as it had
started, a few forlorn wisps of ash floating to the ground.

Fred only seemed to realize what he’d done after the fact, silently and wandlessly to boot,
and his eyes widened comically. Remus looked over at him and, a second too late for it to be
wholly believable, scrambled to his feet and raised his hand in the direction of the now-
destroyed mistletoe as if he’d been the one responsible.

“C’mon Pads,” he said with a forced laugh, as everyone turned to him. “It was funny, but
leave the kids be.”

Harry, Ginny, Ron and Molly bought it easily, none of them having been paying any attention
to Remus. Fred looked equal parts relieved and homicidal, and Hermione and George quickly
returned to their seats, eyes pointedly directed anywhere but at one another.

Sirius set the trifle bowl and plates on the table, looking once more at where the mistletoe had
been. It seemed he had misjudged the situation a wee bit, seeing as he could feel Fred’s gaze
burning a hole in the side of his face.

“Still need help with the tea?” Remus asked gamely, having remained on his feet.

Sirius nodded and they quickly disappeared into the kitchen as Molly began discussing plans
for the remainder of the holiday.

It was dead silent for a moment after the door swung shut behind them.

“I did not expect that,” Sirius finally said, setting the kettle on the stove.

“Nuh-uh,” Remus intoned, looking a little shell-shocked as he retrieved the tea-tin off a shelf.
“But we should add extra wards to the bedroom door tonight.”

oOoOoOo

It was nearing eleven and everyone was sitting in the den, surrounding the Christmas tree and
fireplace as Celestina Warbeck’s voice drifted through the radio in the corner.

Molly had gone to bed, Hermione was curled in an armchair and contentedly reading from a
small, leather-bound book, and the boys and Ginny were seated on the hearth, ogling the
holiday issue of Seeker Weekly and debating the merits of the new Cleansweep versus the
new Comet.

Sirius glanced sideways at Remus on the sofa beside the tree and, for the briefest of seconds,
he was seventeen years in the past. It wasn’t Harry and Ron and Hermione in front of him. It
was James and Lily and Marlene.

“Harry,” Sirius interrupted, “have I ever told you about how your father proposed to your
mother?”

Harry looked up from across the table and shook his head. Remus chuckled under his breath,
having been there himself. Hermione closed her book, and they all turned their attention in
his direction.

“Well, he did it on Christmas, you see. He’d been torturing himself over asking her for
weeks, going back and forth, convincing himself they were too young and that it wasn’t the
right time, then backtracking in the opposite direction. He was so distracted, I think Lily was
afraid he was about to break things off. I take credit for talking him into it, though.”

“What did you say?” Harry asked eagerly. He always looked so enraptured any time he and
Moony talked about James and Lily, and it made Sirius’ chest ache a little. He made a note to
tell him more stories that coming summer, perhaps try to find a few photographs.

“Let me think,” Sirius recalled, “we were out at the pub and I told him that he needed to
make a decision and stop tormenting all of us. By all of us, I mostly mean Moony and
myself. Things were… well, not all that different than they are now, honestly. Dark.
Foreboding. Death Eater attacks were becoming a common occurrence and even the muggles
were taking notice. Everything felt impermanent, like it could slip away at any moment, but
the two of them… Lily and James had this way of reassuring one another, I guess you could
say. She balanced him, and he grounded her. Anyway, I told him how ridiculously rare that
was and how completely daft he’d be to risk losing it. That he needed to decide if he was
going to commit or carry on as they had been. If he was in or out.”

“I mean, clearly he decided he was in, right?” Hermione asked, obviously absorbed with her
chin propped on her fist.

Remus leaned forward and set his glass on the table, smiling nostalgically and nodding. “The
next day he dragged us with him to Gringotts to get his mother’s ring out of the vault, then he
popped the question that week after Christmas dinner.”

He continued telling the story. Told how, given her habit of hexing him, Lily had been
disarmed for James’ safety that night, but Sirius glanced over at the boys instead, gauging
their reactions. Harry was grinning. Ron didn’t look terribly interested, having returned his
attention to the tabloid. George, being a little older and perhaps a smidge wiser, seemed to
appreciate the tale. And Fred… Fred was staring thoughtfully at Hermione.
 Midnight
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

31 December 1995

It was New Year’s Eve and Hermione was sitting on the sofa at the edge of their small party,
making a list of the books she wanted to add to her brand-new portable library when she
arrived back at school.

Tonks and Remus had shown up, as well as Kingsley and Moody. They were all talking to
Arthur, who’d been newly released from the hospital and was in surprisingly good spirits.
Harry and Sirius, on the other hand, were both sulking a bit with the end of the winter holiday
in sight and Snape’s occlumency tutelage looming.

She glanced across the crowded room to see Fred speaking in hushed tones to George, heads
together and standing near the fireplace. They’d spent the week after Christmas touring
storefronts and meeting with suppliers, and she hadn’t seen much of him as a result. Though
he had taken the time to thank her for the business cards she’d had made as his Christmas gift
from her, commenting that they’d come in especially handy during their professional
dealings.

As if he could feel her eyes on him, Fred turned his head and looked over at where she was
sitting.

He smiled, but there was something else in his expression that she couldn’t quite decipher.
Something a little bit more weighted than usual, though certainly not negative in disposition.

“Alright, alright, it’s nearly midnight!” Arthur called out, glancing at the clock on the mantel
and interrupting her pondering.

Hermione set her parchment aside and stood, accepting a small glass of champagne from
Mrs. Weasley. They began the countdown and, in a matter of seconds, 1995 turned to 1996.

Hermione hugged Harry, Ron and Ginny, and laughed as the twins dashed to their mother’s
side, smooching her loudly and dramatically on either cheek before she had a chance to kiss
her husband.

A few moments passed as everyone chatted and ruminated on their resolutions and the year
to come. Harry and Sirius were the first to go to bed, with Mad-Eye taking his leave shortly
after. After they left, Hermione settled back into her corner, sipping from her glass and
reveling in the moment, however fleeting it might be.

She’d always been fond of New Year’s; she knew it was arbitrary really, just a random point
at which they collectively changed the final number or two when writing the date, but still it
held a sort of nebulous sense of promise. A time for new beginnings.

Fred and George excused themselves to bed and, as Fred walked past her toward the stairs, a
small scrap of parchment drifted into her lap. Glancing around, she saw nobody had noticed
and, practically vibrating with curiosity, she picked it up and unfolded it.

Scrawled in his now-familiar handwriting was a brief note, just two lines:

Second floor drawing room

Are you in or out?

oOoOoOo

Having grown up in a family that was, for lack of a better term, poor, Fred Weasley learned
early on not to ask for the things that he wanted. He’d come to understand, as had most of his
siblings, that doing so didn’t mean getting those things. It just meant seeing a heartbroken
look on his mum’s face, or a flash of guilt on his father’s.

He went so far as to pride himself on his ability to purposefully not desire things that he
couldn’t attain or create himself.
That said, when Hermione stepped into the room, the moonlight from the window casting
pale shadows across her face, he wanted her in a way that he’d never wanted anything in his
life. He’d give every galleon he had to his name, every patent and product idea he’d slaved
over, the very shirt off his back, just to see her look at him the way that she was looking at
him then. She’d be worth all of it.

Hell, she was worth more.

He swallowed hard as the door clicked shut behind her, drowning out the sound of voices
drifting up from below.

“Sorry, it took me a minute to sneak away,” she said, nervously shuffling perhaps ten feet
across the room from him. She was wearing a deep blue jumper and her hair was half-pulled
onto her head, exposing a stretch of pale skin below her throat that made his breath catch.

“S’okay,” he managed.

She took a breath and seemed to steady herself before crossing the space. In five paces, she
was in front of him, close enough that she had to angle her head up to see his face. But he
didn’t reach out yet, didn’t touch her. A part of him was afraid that the whole scene might
disappear if he did, vanish in a puff of smoke.

“I’m in,” she finally said, a small crinkle appearing between her brows. Her voice was firm
though, certain. “I know that the timing isn’t ideal and you’re busy trying to get the shop off
the ground and I have OWLs and it seems like the whole bloody world is determined to burn
around us, but I want to give it a shot. I want to give us a shot. Because Fred, for whatever
reason when I’m with you, all the screwed-up things in our lives don’t seem quite so
screwed-up.”

He let out a heavy sigh and finally reached forward, twining his fingers with hers and
slipping them into the gaps between his knuckles that, by all accounts, may as well have been
made for them. She glanced down at their hands and a smile pulled up the corner of her
mouth, smoothed the nervous crease on her forehead. He circled his thumb lightly on the
back of her palm and was rewarded with a quiet hum of contentment.

“Hermione, right now I don’t much care what happens to the rest of the world. Let it burn.”

She started to laugh before he darted forward and captured the sound with a kiss, leaning
down and pressing his lips steadfastly to hers. That was the third time that Fred kissed
Hermione, and the last that they’d manage to keep track of.

The first had been built on weeks, months, of watching and wanting her. The equivalent of a
dam breaking.

The second was something they’d both needed, clung to, because, as she’d so astutely put it,
their lives were in fact pretty screwed up.

This kiss, though… this one was different from both of those. This one was eager and happy
and hopeful, far more concerned with the possibilities of the future than the innumerable
threats and problems in their present.

For the first time, her lips parted against his and she breathed a sigh into his mouth that had
him hoping she couldn’t feel quite how much that particular sensation affected him. But it
was the tentative brush of her tongue against his, that made him conclude inwardly that if he
were to die on the spot, drop dead right at that moment, he would do so a happy man.

She pulled her hand from his grip and brought her arms up to loop around his neck, holding
him to her and rolling onto her tiptoes. One small fist wound tightly into the hair on the back
of his head, and he couldn’t help but groan, grinning against her lips when she quietly gasped
at the sound. His arms wrapped securely around her waist in turn, not in any rush to pull
away himself.

Then the two of them well and truly snogged, like the smitten, reckless teenagers that they
should have been.

Until their lips were swollen, and they were both out of breath.

Until the taste of her had nearly driven him to madness.

Until the zipper on his trousers became distinctly uncomfortable.

Finally they broke apart, instead leaning into one another so her cheek rested against his chest
and his chin brushed the curls on the top of her head. One of his hands lay on her hip while
the other trailed lightly up and down her spine, along the small of her back. She exhaled a
quiet whimper as he held her that nearly made him combust.

“I do have one request,” she finally said after a moment, still a little out of breath.

Anything. She could have anything. She could have the still-beating heart from his chest,
he’d just need a moment to grab a knife.

“What’s that?” he asked.

Hermione pulled back and looked up at him, searching his face. She suddenly seemed
anxious.

“I don’t want to tell anyone. Not yet. Not… I’m not embarrassed or anything like that, not in
the slightest, but right now this is ours. Just ours. The minute everyone else knows, it won’t
be ours anymore; there will be opinions and jokes and pre-conceived notions, and your mum
might not be keen on us staying here together, and I just… I just want a little time for us,
before all of that.”

“That’s fine,” he said quickly, a little relieved himself. The year prior he’d seen her change
the way she carried herself when she knew everyone thought she was with Harry, when she
was with Viktor. Though she acted like the attention hadn’t gotten to her, and perhaps it truly
hadn’t, it was impossible not to let that sort of thing shape your perception, your actions, even
just a little bit.

If she wanted time to explore them outside of all of that, he’d happily give it to her.
 She rolled onto her toes to kiss him again until he started chuckling against her lips, at which
point she drew back and looked up at him with her head cocked.

“What’s so funny?” she asked, searching his face.

“I was just wondering which of us was going to obliviate George.”

Chapter End Notes

And that concludes Part One of our tale!

The next chapter will have a few important disclaimers and author's notes, so make sure
that you check those out.
 PART TWO — Pure bliss
Chapter Notes

Welcome back, and welcome to part TWO of The Trouble with Wanting! (That’s right,
this random one shot that I came up with is now a multi-chapter, multi-part story.) I
mentioned at the end of the last chapter that there would be a couple of important notes
on this one, and I won’t be making a liar of myself yet.

Very important note number one: We are going to be altering the structure of this fic a
little bit. While there will still be a number of chapters that can be read as standalone
one shots or drabbles, the majority will be following a more continuous, ongoing plot as
we progress. Given the feedback that I've received thus far, most of you should be cool
with this.

Very important note number two: If you're paying exceptionally close attention, you
might have noticed that I added an archive warning this week. Relax, it isn't MCD. It's
regarding depictions of underage sexual activity that will be appearing in this story in
the not-too-distant future.

Hermione is sixteen-and-a-half years old and Fred is seventeen, soon to be eighteen.

They are going to be doing things that sixteen-and-a-half-year-olds and seventeen-soon-
to-be-eighteen-year-olds do. If that doesn’t vibe with you, please feel free to pretend that
this fic ended with part one and exit the ride to my left. Please DO NOT leave hateful
comments on this story because I am giving you ample warning. Also, I moderate my
comments so it will bother me for about .6 seconds before I delete it and move on with
my life.

Get it? Got it? Good.

Now, let’s get this show on the road.

Located in the heart of the Scottish Highlands, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry
boasts seven stories, one-hundred-and-forty-two staircases, eleven towers, eight greenhouses,
four courtyards, four common rooms, a library, a quidditch pitch, a boathouse, a dungeon,
and several hundred acres of rolling grounds.

Bearing that in mind, it stands to reason that such a sprawling edifice would feature an
incalculable number of dark corners, deserted passageways, empty classrooms, and vacant
broom cupboards into which a person, or perhaps two people, might slip unnoticed.

In the weeks following the commencement of the year 1996, Fred Weasley and Hermione
Granger found every single one of them.

oOoOoOo

5 March 1996

One rainy Tuesday evening near the end of winter saw Harry and Ron sitting at a table in the
common room, playing gobstones for sweets. Ron had just won a pumpkin pastie, which he
wasted no time in consuming, while Harry looked around curiously at their assembled
housemates.

“Where do you suppose Hermione is?” he asked, not spotting her among the OWL and
NEWT students hunched over their textbooks on the other side of the room.

“Dunno,” Ron said through a mouthful of pastry cream and shrugging. “Library?”

“Yeah, probably,” Harry sighed as he idly peeled the wrapper off of a sugar quill. He sucked
on it for a moment before asking, “Has she been acting a little strange lately?”

“I mean, yeah, more and more as the term gets on. Figured it’s just exams though, right?”

“I guess so,” Harry agreed again, though he didn’t seem entirely convinced. “I just worry
she’s running herself into the ground with all of the revision schedules and study tables.”

“I know,” Ron said, before adding thoughtfully, “You don’t suppose she’s got another time-
turner, do you?”

“No. No, she’d tell us.”

“Just as well; Sirius and Buckbeak aside, I think that thing did more harm than good. Though
the other night she got back to the common room five whole minutes after curfew. Her face
was all red, and it looked like she’d been pulling her hair by the roots.” He began setting the
gobstones up again, shaking his head pityingly as he did so. “Poor lamb, OWLs might just
kill her.”

oOoOoOo

“I have to go,” Hermione laughed, Fred’s nose brushing a sensitive swath of skin below her
ear and making her shiver. She tried, admittedly half-heartedly, to extract herself from their
embrace for the second time that evening. “I’m meant to meet Hannah for prefect rounds in a
half hour, and I have to go back to the common room first!”

“Mmhmm, rounds, very important…” he muttered distractedly, clearly not invested in the
safety and sanctity of Hogwarts’ corridors. His teeth grazed her earlobe and she made a
sound that had her grateful for the silencing charm they’d placed on the vacant classroom.

Despite her protests, she shifted her hands to wrap in the fabric of his robes near his collar
and pulled him away from the wicked things he was doing to her throat and back up to her
mouth.

They were both rumpled and flushed, hands wandering over hips and shoulders, knotting in
hair and grappling in a futile attempt to get closer together – a feat that, by all means, was not
possible. At least, not in their current state of dress.

“I – I have to –“ she stuttered against his lips, to no avail. He bent and wrapped a hand
around the back of her knee before suddenly hitching it up and onto his hip, and the thought
completely vanished.
Things hadn’t progressed much beyond some rather impassioned snogging in the two-odd
months they’d been seeing one another, perhaps a bit of light groping on occasion as well.
But there, pressed against her lower stomach, was incontrovertible evidence that Fred was
more than ready to… progress.

After completing a short stint of mental acrobatics, she decided that if he wouldn’t let her
leave, again, not that she was trying all that hard, then she would indulge her curiosity a bit.
As his tongue traced the curve of her bottom lip, Hermione took the hand that was still coiled
in the collar of his unbuttoned robes and raked her nails slowly down his chest, then across
his abdomen, and finally over the buckle on his belt.

In her time with Viktor there had been some inadvertent bumping, and she had a thorough
understanding of male anatomy in a theoretical application, but she’d never done anything
quite so brasen or practical.

Fred, distracted with her mouth, hadn’t fully realised where her hand had ended up, but when
she steeled herself and very lightly trailed her fingertips over the erection straining against his
trousers, he inhaled sharply.

“Bloody hell,” he gasped – or perhaps “yelped” was a better verb. His hips jerked forward,
pushing him more fully into her hand for a brief second, and she had the sudden urge to reach
her other hand between her own thighs to relieve the building tension there. Not a new
compulsion by any means, but one she’d only ever seen to privately.

No such luck, though; Fred immediately stepped back and let her leg fall away from where it
was hooked around him. Hermione leaned into the wall she’d been pressed against, breathing
hard and feeling more than a little satisfied with herself. It wasn’t often that one surprised
Fred Weasley, after all.

“Okay, maybe… maybe we should take a time out.”

She just nodded, completely distracted by how he’d felt in her hand — warm and impossibly
firm. Though she lacked much of a point of reference, he seemed rather sizeable by her
estimation.

Fred extracted his wand from the pocket of his robes and skillfully conjured a familiar tan
sofa, the very same they’d used several dozen times in such sequestered settings. He sat
down and, after just a second, Hermione joined him. Rather than sit beside him, hip-to-hip,
she settled with her back against the arm and draped her legs across his lap.

Not every stolen encounter was spent scrabbling at one another, as enjoyable as that was, and
this was a position they’d taken to when they were both otherwise occupied with reading or
studying.

He started tentatively, his Adam’s apple bobbing around a nervous swallow. “We should
probably discuss, uh, physical stuff, yeah?”

“Yes, that would undoubtedly be for the best,” Hermione agreed quickly. Despite being a
little intimidated about crossing that line with someone, she trusted Fred implicitly.
Furthermore, she heard her mother in the back of her head, saying to her two years prior
when she was home for summer: If you’re thinking about doing it, you should at least be able
to talk about it.

“Are you a…? That is to say, have you ever…?”

“Had sex?” Hermione mercifully finished for him, arching a brow and twisting one side of
her mouth up into a smirk. Fred let out a slightly embarrassed laugh, but nodded, clearly
grateful that the proverbial ice had been broken. He relaxed a bit against the back of the sofa
and ran his hand along her calf familiarly. “No. Honestly I haven’t done much beyond what
we’ve done. Have you?”

Fred shook his head and she realised that, though she’d been expecting him to say yes, she
was inordinately grateful that he hadn’t. Not because she resented his abstract sexual history,
that would be juvenile and prudish, but purely because it put them on more level footing.

“No.” His cheeks flushed a bit further than they already had, but he gamely held her gaze.
The vulnerability of it rattled her a little, but it also gave her a bizarre sense of privilege. Fred
admittedly had a bit of a swaggering public persona, a confidence about him. He was just shy
of notorious for it around the school, and in this sort of openly honest moment, she felt as
though she’d been gifted a backstage pass to the most incredible circus on earth. “I’ve done
more than what we’ve done, other stuff, but I’ve never had sex.”

“Oh. Okay, brilliant. That’s… that’s good to know.”

He must have interpreted her thoughtfulness as something that it wasn’t, because he quickly
expounded, “I’m not opposed though. I just… I mean, I realised nearly a year ago that you
were the one that… Anyway, there wasn’t anybody serious before, and there definitely hasn’t
been anyone else since.”

She smiled at the sentiment of the statement, disjointedly expressed as it might have been,
and nodded in what she hoped was a reassuring way.

“I’m not opposed either, but maybe we could try some of that ‘other stuff’ first?”

Fred nodded in return and offered an easy, reassured grin, tinted with just a little anticipation.
There was a beat of silence and then his eyebrows suddenly and dramatically dropped. He
looked back at her with a flicker of alarm.

“Did you – you didn’t mean now, right?”

Hermione snorted inelegantly and straightened up, removing her legs from his lap.

“No, I did not mean now.” She got off the sofa and cast a smoothing charm on her robes,
praying that her hair wasn’t too mussed. “I have rounds, and you’re ten minutes from being
out past curfew.”

She crossed back, slinging her bag across her shoulder, and leaned over him with one hand
braced beside him on the back of the sofa. He craned his neck slightly, capturing her lips in a
parting kiss. Rather than pull away after though, she dithered, smirking against his mouth,
and said quietly, “For the time being, I’ll leave you in what I’m sure are your own very
capable hands.”
 A clandestine revision date
Chapter Notes

Dribble-drabble...

20 March 1996

“You don’t happen to know anything about delaying the effects of a potion, do you?”

Hermione and Fred were set up at a table in the furthest reaches of the library, sitting across
from one another and, until that moment, working in silent company on their individual
projects. These evenings had come to be some of her favorite; the Hogwarts library had
always been a haven to Hermione, the place she could go when she needed to solve a
problem, or even just to be somewhere familiar and comforting. And she realised the first
time he met her there to study that Fred gave her that same sort of feeling.

She absently held up a finger, finishing the translation on a line of Elder Futhark she was
pouring over, before looking up. “What was that?”

Fred smiled warmly at her. He patiently repeated his question and she put her hands out and
wiggled her fingers, motioning for him to give her his notes.

She scanned his somewhat messy scrawl for several minutes. It looked like they were trying
to find a way to delay the effects of their Snackbox products so that, rather than
spontaneously vomiting or bleeding from the nose, one could take it before class instead.
Much less conspicuous that way. While she didn’t approve of the intention, the complexity of
the magic behind it was rather striking.

“Mmm,” she hummed victoriously when she finally figured it out. Fred made a disbelieving
noise.

“No,” he said, shaking his head with a mildly dismayed expression. “No way! I’ve been
staring at that piece of parchment for two days. You can’t possibly have figured out the
problem in less than five minutes!”

“Okay, fine. I didn’t figure out the problem.”

“Really?”

“No, of course I figured out the problem.” Hermione grabbed the product formula and came
around to his side of the table, putting it in front of him and leaning over his shoulder. “See
here how you’re using fresh jewelweed? That serves as the catalyst for the other active
ingredients to take effect. If you were to use stewed jewelweed, it should theoretically delay
that reaction. You’ll have to toy with the quantity though, so it doesn’t affect the potency.
And you should stew it yourself, so you have more control over the finished product. Jarred
jewelweed is rubbish anyway.”

She glanced down to find Fred staring at her with an indecipherable expression, eyes
squinted.

“What?”

“You’re really quite clever, you know that?”

Hermione grinned, having heard variations of that sentiment for pretty much her whole life.

“So I’ve been told,” she laughed, dipping her head to kiss him while her hair fell in a curtain
around them. “Do you have any other projects in need of my astonishing intellect?”

“Weren’t you working on ancient runes?” Fred asked uncertainly, eyeing her notes across
from them. Understandable as she had a history of responding poorly when interrupted.
“Elder Futhark has been around for over 1,200 years, it’ll be just as tedious to translate an
hour from now.”

Fred hesitated for a moment. “Oh, alright here.”

He reached into his bag and grabbed a folder with several other merchandise plans in it and
laid them in front of her. “These are all unfinished. Some of them have been wasting away in
here since summer.”

Hermione absentmindedly sank onto the very edge of his chair, eyes already locked in and
flying across the pages. Fred shuffled over a bit, looping an arm securely around her waist.

“Okay, so with this one, you’re using a variant of the levitation charm, but what if you did
more of a directed propulsion…”
 Run for it!

1 April 1996

“WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR? RUN!”

Oh God, Umbridge knew. She knew about the D.A. They were all done for.

There was a split second of absolute deafening silence following Harry’s command, like the
ringing in your ears after an explosion, and then complete chaos ensued. Hermione had been
next to Ron and Ginny, but as they rushed the door she lost them in the fray.

“Harry, come on!” she turned to scream, only to see him attempting to talk to Dobby, who
was still partaking in various forms of self-harm. All of a sudden someone clipped her
shoulder and she sprawled toward the base of the wall beside the door, throwing her hands
out just in time to catch herself and feeling the skin of her palms scrape and rip open against
the rough stone.
She started to clumsily push herself to her feet when an arm wrapped firmly around her waist
and hauled her upright.

“Up you get,” Fred said from just beside her ear. His tone was surprisingly calm despite the
bedlam. She gripped his hand, wincing a little as her palm stung, and they went tearing after
everyone else down the corridor. As they hit the stairwell where the hall branched off, they
all began to thin and scatter in different directions.

She still didn’t see Ron or Ginny, but Luna and Neville were running together off to the right,
and Seamus and Dean were headed up the stairs and back toward the tower along with a
handful of other Gryffindors. A couple people ducked into an empty classroom nearby.

“Here,” she said, spotting a door a little way down on the left. All she knew was that it wasn’t
a classroom that was in use — at least, not one she’d ever been in.

Fred grabbed the knob with his free hand and pulled it open, tugging her inside and shutting
it quickly behind them. Hermione promptly tripped backward onto her ass, the first in a flight
of steps hitting the back of her calf in the dark. Admittedly, she only fell a couple feet onto
the stairs.

“Fucking hell,” she hissed, being pulled back to standing for the second time in scarcely two
minutes.

Fred muttered a silencing charm and a notice-me-not at the door before lighting his wand.

“Are you okay?” he asked. He looked pale and tense as he released her hand to see her palm,
and consequently his own, coated in blood.

“Yeah, it’s just a scrape. Sorry I bled all over you.”

“I think I’ll make it,” he joked dryly, placing his lit wand between his teeth and looking over
both of her hands to check the damage.

“What do you suppose is up there?” she asked, glancing over her shoulder at the dark spiral
staircase.

“Only one way to find out,” Fred shrugged, taking his wand back in his hand and leading the
way.

They wound around perhaps two flights of stairs before hitting a landing that led to another
door. Hermione pushed it open, and they found themselves suddenly outside on a small
balcony overlooking the mountains and the northernmost edge of the lake. Being on the
highest floor aside from the towers, they were completely secluded and out of sight from any
windows.

“Oh,” she intoned lamely, glancing around the space. It was maybe eight feet long and five
deep; not large at all, with a thick stone balustrade around it.

“Do you think we should wait before going back down?” Fred asked, looking back
uncertainly the way they’d come.
Hermione nodded and extracted her own wand from her robes, casting a warming charm
around them and then conjuring a jar with her signature bluebell flames crackling inside. It
was relatively warm for Scotland in April, but still plenty cold enough at night to see her
breath.

“I’m sure Umbridge will have Malfoy and his toadies scouring the halls for a little while,”
she said, sinking to sit across from the door. Fred joined her, long legs sprawled in front of
him.

They were both quiet for a moment, comprehending what had just happened.

“Well, that was bloody awful,” Fred finally summed up, letting his head fall back to look up
at the stars that were peering out from between the clouds.

Hermione snorted lightly and nodded. “I think Ron and Ginny got away. What about George
and Lee?”

“Long gone,” Fred assured her. “I doubled back when I saw that MacMillan ponce trample
you.”

“Thanks for that,” she said, smiling weakly. She leaned forward toward the jar and looked at
her hands in the pale blue light. The heels of her palms had shallow, jagged scratches across
them, covered in a layer of sticky, half-dried blood.

“Here, give me those,” Fred instructed, turning sideways and reaching for her hands again.
He laid them palm-up on top of his thigh and used his wand to conjure a rag and then wet it.
“Did you see Harry get out?”

He very gently began to dab the cloth across the wounds, blotting the blood off little by little.

Hermione shook her head fervently. “No, I didn’t… he was behind us.” There was a pit in her
stomach as she thought back to the image of him trying to get Dobby out instead of running,
and she fought back tears as the gravity of the situation started to set in.

“I’m sure he’s fine,” Fred said in an attempt to soothe her, but his expression was fraught
with uncertainty. Some people might prefer shallow placations in times of crisis, but he knew
her better than that. He wouldn’t lie or say it was going to be okay when all evidence and
logic pointed toward the contrary. Hermione bit her lip and jerked her chin back and forth.

“I don’t think he is, Fred. He was too far back, trying to make sure Dobby got out. Oh God,
he’s going to be expelled.”

She pulled her hands back, now freshly clean and mostly past the point of bleeding, and let
her head fall into them, squeezing her eyes shut.

“Hermione, love, breathe.”

She hadn’t realised she’d begun hyperventilating. Focusing inward, she made a conscious
effort to slow her breaths, trying to match them to Fred’s and picturing a balloon in her chest
slowly expanding and contracting.
After a few moments she looked up to find Fred watching her carefully. When their eyes met,
he gave her a small, affectionate smile, lifting his hand to push her hair off of her face and
swiping away an errant tear that had breached the corner of her eye with his thumb.

“Thank you,” she said, leaning into the hand still laid on her cheek.

“Don’t sweat it,” he replied with a shrug. “Comforting one another in the wake of tragedy is
sort of our thing.”

She released a light, cynical laugh in agreement.

“Who do you think turned us in?” Fred asked, clearly trying to keep her mind off of Harry’s
fate. She was appreciative of the effort.

“Trust me, you’ll know when you see them.”

Fred’s eyes went a bit wide as he took in her dark expression. He pondered for a moment
before realisation dawned.

“The signup sheet?”

“Uh-huh.”

Hermione was admittedly a bit vengeful by nature, and at that moment her only regret was
not making the penalty for selling them out more severe.

“You really are brilliant, you know that?” Fred said, shaking his head at her with a faraway
look.

“Hardly. I just used a little arithmancy and a bit of invisible ink with some runes on the
parchment to modify a basic snitch’s jinx.”

“Wait, you created a new spell?” Fred asked sharply, now gaping at her with unconcealed
surprise.

“I mean… yes, sort of, but don’t make such a fuss about it.”

She turned so her back was against the railing again, letting out a light “oof” when Fred
instead pulled her toward him, so her head rested on his shoulder. As she inspected the stars
above them and nestled into the crook between his arm and his chest, she noted that were the
circumstances not so exceptionally grim, it would be a dreadfully amorous setting.

“You know, if OWLs don’t work out, you’re more than welcome to join our research and
development team.”

Hermione laughed lightly. “It would certainly be more interesting than whatever tedious
ministry job I’m destined for.”

Fred turned to look down on her, a bit awkward given the angle, and quirked an eyebrow.
“You’re aware that nobody is making you work at the ministry, correct? You won’t be held at
wand-point if you elect to do something else.”

“I know, I just…” she wiggled a little to face him more directly. “What else am I going to
do?”

“Whatever you want,” he said seriously, shaking his head a little like it should be obvious.
“I’ve never in my life met someone that could really, truly succeed at quite literally anything
they put their mind to.”

“You’ve never seen me try to fly a broom,” she quipped self-deprecatingly.

“Granted,” he admitted, smiling at her fondly and lifting a hand to cup her jaw. “Look, if you
want to wear sensible shoes and push paper from nine to five, you’ll have my full,
unconditional support. Hell, you’d have that if you decided to drop out and go on a murder
spree. But whatever you do, do it because it’s what you want to do, Hermione. Not because
you don’t think you can do anything else.”

She smiled back at him, at the casual allusion to them still being together when she finished
school, and leaned forward to press her lips to his. The act in itself was practiced by then,
warm and familiar, but it still set her heart racing; made her feel like every nerve in her body
was alive and humming.

Because Hermione had no doubt that as long as Fred was a part of it, she would never live a
life of mediocrity. In fact, she was certain that a life spent with the two of them together
would be nothing short of remarkable.

So, she sank into him. Let him pull her against his chest, slipped her tongue between his lips
and felt a hand tangle in the hair at the nape of her neck. Then, rather than fall victim to the
fear and uncertainty of the evening, they got lost in one another and waited for the storm to
pass.
 Girl talk
Chapter Notes

So, I was originally going to post chapters 23 and 24 several days apart, like I have all of
the others, however I've decided I'm not feeling quite that cruel. Thus, you get these two
at the same time. You'll understand why I made this decision shortly.

See the end of the chapter for more notes

4 April 1996

“Hey, can I get in there? I just need to brush my teeth right quick.”

Hermione heard Parvati through the door of their dorm’s lavatory and shuffled to the side,
unlocking it as she went and bidding entry. She was standing in front of the mirror in a
dressing gown, nervously blotting a bit of rouge across her cheeks.
Parvati stepped in and grabbed her toothbrush from the stand atop the counter. “Thanks,” she
said gratefully around a mouthful of minty foam. “They served pasta at dinner and there was
enough garlic in it to keep a starving hoard of vampires at bay.”

Smiling blithely, Hermione put down the makeup and began negotiating with her unruly curls
again, attempting to tuck and pin them back in a way that complimented her face rather than
drew attention to its roundness. As she did so, she firmly regretted not taking an interest in
such things for the past 16 years.

The other girl finished her ablutions and made to turn and leave when she halted suddenly.
Having apparently not been paying attention, her eyes widened as she took in Hermione’s
appearance in the mirror.

“Well, hold on just a bloody moment! Where are you off to this evening?”

“Nowhere,” Hermione replied quickly, self-consciously tucking the meager collection of

cosmetics back into her bag. She felt her cheeks flush beneath the artificial colour she’d
applied a moment ago.

“Nowhere my ass,” Parvati laughed. She craned her neck and her eyes zeroed in on
Hermione’s shoulder where her dressing gown was drooping a little. “Ah-ha! Lav, get in
here!”

She called the last through the half-open doorway into the bedroom and Hermione wondered
if it might be possible to spontaneously apparate through sheer force of will. She put her back
to the wall of the loo, as if faced with a firing squad rather than her dormmates.

“What?” Lavender asked, drifting through the doorway in just an oversized t-shirt and a pair
of minuscule shorts with her dark hair bobbing in a sloppy bun atop her head. Parvati
wordlessly looked at Hermione and then back, and Lavender’s eyes glimmered as she
realized “what.”

“Hermione Granger! Is that a red bra!?”

Hermione tugged the shoulder of her dressing gown up too late, not having realised that’s
what they were fixated on. “No – I mean, uh, yes, but it’s – it’s just a bra.”

“Just a bra, she says,” Lavender commented to Parvati, arching a brow. “Parv, do you have
any red lingerie?”

“Indeed, I do,” Parvati replied, nodding.

“And when exactly do you wear red lingerie?”

“When I mean for it to be seen. Also if I haven’t done the wash in a while… but mostly the
first reason.”

Hermione’s heart was in her throat, and she felt vaguely like she might vomit. She’d never
been particularly close to Lavender or Parvati, the pair reminding her too much of the girls
that used to tease her in primary school. Here, being confronted by them when she was
already feeling exceptionally shaky and vulnerable, was one of the most nightmarish social
exchanges she could imagine finding herself in.

Her throat tightened and her fight or flight kicked in. She dropped her eyes to the ground and
hastily collected her things.

“I’m just – I’m just going to change. It was stupid.”

“Wait!” Parvati said, placing a hand on Hermione’s arm to stop her crossing into the
bedroom. All hint of joking was gone from both her face and her tone, and she looked deeply
apologetic. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable.”

Lavender nodded vehemently in her periphery and Hermione looked over to see a similar
expression of repentance mirrored in her other roommate.

“We were just taking the piss,” Lavender tacked on. “You just don’t really dress up, is all.”

“Well, beside the ball last year, but everyone was done up for that.”

Parvati turned and guided Hermione back into the bedroom, perching on the edge of her
mattress and patting the space beside her, motioning for her to do the same. Lavender
followed them in and settled cross-legged near her own headboard a couple feet away.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Lavender asked gently.

Did she? Hermione hadn’t really had the opportunity to speak to anyone about her
relationship with Fred. Her best friends were boys, her closest female friend was his sibling,
and her mum was not only painfully out of touch with her life, but she was also leagues away.

“I mean… I don’t want to tell you who it is,” Hermione replied, nervously chewing her lip.

“That’s okay!” Parvati said hurriedly, smiling. “I know everyone calls us gossips, but you’d
be surprised at just how many secrets we keep to the chest.”

Lavender barked out a laugh and tipped her head in agreement. “You would at that. So, is it a
bloke then?”

“Or a girl?” Parvati added judiciously with a bit of side-eye.

Hermione relaxed incrementally and nodded. “Yeah. A boy, that is. I’m meant to meet him in
about an hour.”

“And I take it he’ll be the one seeing the red lingerie?” Lavender coaxed.

“With any luck,” Hermione confirmed timidly, shrugging.

The other two girls giggled. Really, truly giggled. God, was this what this was meant to be
like?
“Would it be okay if I touch up your eye makeup a bit? You’re a tad lopsided.” Lavender
asked the question uncertainly, squinting her eyes and examining Hermione’s face. It didn’t
seem like a dig, rather a genuine offer of assistance.

Bearing that in mind, she nodded and Lavender got off the bed, ducking into her trunk and
extracting an enormous black box with a handle on top.

“Is that all cosmetics?” Hermione asked, wide-eyed and slack-jawed.

Parvati laughed. “Terrifying, isn’t it? She could make over every girl in school twice without
even coming close to running out.”

“Hush, you!” Lavender stuck her tongue out and heaved the box onto Parvati’s bed. “Now
budge over.” The other two girls shuffled.

“May I?” Parvati summoned a small bag from her nightstand and opened it to reveal a
collection of hair pins.

“Uh, sure,” Hermione said, distracted by the small brush that Lavender was brandishing at
her eyelid.

Within moments the girls settled into a rhythm, Lavender all out removing the makeup from
her eyes and reapplying warm tones, dabbing just a hint of shimmering copper at the edges.

“So, is it your first time then?” Parvati asked, all business as she pinned and adjusted the
curls framing Hermione’s face.

“First time – oh! No, no, not that.” Hermione flushed and Lavender laughed a little, moving
on to sweep something dark through her eyebrows. Encouraged by the unfamiliar
camaraderie, she clarified, “But it’s a bit of an occasion and I was thinking we could possibly
do some… other sorts of things.”

“Are you going to suck him off?” Lavender asked offhandedly, as if she were inquiring about
the weather and not oral sex.

“Lav!” Parvati chastised, “Not everyone is as slaggish as you, you know!”

“It’s just a question!” She defended, rooting in her veritable briefcase for something called
setting powder.

Hermione must have given more away than she’d planned in the expression on her face
because the pair apparently took her silence as confirmation. Embarrassed as she might be, it
would be nice to have a bit of guidance stemming from practical experience on her side.

“Well, don’t look at me for advice,” Parvati said firmly, quickly dispelling that idea. She
tipped Hermione’s head toward her a bit and refastened a pin over her ear. “Unless you’re
planning to switch teams or do a little creative transfiguration on the chap, I’m not going to
be much help.”

Hermione’s eyebrows shot up at that bit of insight.

 “Uh-huh,” Lavender confirmed, catching Hermione’s surprise. “When I told her about the
first time I saw a cock, she nearly retched.”

“They look like giant flobberworms!” Parvati cried as the other two girls doubled in laughter.

“And I suppose some French girl’s hairy muff is better?” Lavender jabbed in return.

“Gianna was Italian, and you know it!”

“Alright, alright,” Lavender finally said, waving a hand and hushing the pair of them. She
turned to Hermione with all the wisdom of a sensei. “So, here’s what you want to do…”

Chapter End Notes

The author-that-must-not-be-named is seemingly incapable of writing female characters

supporting one another, but we don't vibe with that here. Hence the personality
transplants that just took place.

Go on. Go click to the next chapter. You know you want to.
 Back to the balcony
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

4 April 1996

Fred didn’t know what to expect as he ascended the stairs to the balcony he and Hermione
had discovered the week prior. Her note had been incredibly vague, really just a time and
place, but the manner in which she’d relayed it to him held a cryptic sort of gravitas that their
normal rendezvouses lacked.

He knew she’d been a little on edge since the conversation about their physical relationship,
and even more so following the DA debacle, but he really hoped this wasn’t her way of
breaking things off with him. Though he hadn’t really gotten that impression. And even so, if
being with her meant taking a vow of celibacy, he’d do it in a heartbeat. Admittedly he’d be a
little crestfallen, but he’d still do it.
Reaching the landing and swinging the door open, he was equally unnerved and comforted to
find that this clearly wasn’t a break-up at all. Or, if it was, it was the most romantic one he’d
ever heard of in his life.

The balcony had been rather lavishly bedecked in pillows and blankets, the entire surface
area obscured, and warming charms wrapped around it to form a barrier against the chilled
April air. Then, floating in perhaps a dozen small glass jars, there were small bursts of
bluebell flames encircling it, adding to the warmth and casting soft, flickering light over the
entire affair.

None of that was the thing he saw first, though. As they were want to do, Fred’s eyes
immediately fell on Hermione, standing in the center of it all and leaning against the railing,
facing away from him and looking up at the dark silhouette of the mountains. She knew he
was there because she glanced backward over her shoulder and smiled.

Fred shrugged his outer robes off and kicked them into a heap beside the door, rolling up his
cuffs as he crossed to stand beside her.

“Hello darling,” he said, wrapping his arms around her waist from behind. She tipped her
head to the side and he pressed his lips in a trail from the base of her neck up to her ear. He
noticed her hair was pinned back rather elaborately and she was wearing something around
her eyes that glittered and caught the light dancing around them. The effect was rather pretty,
but then Fred always thought she looked stunning. He was the very definition of a partial
party.

“Mmm,” Hermione hummed in greeting, leaning back against his chest. “You’re late.”

“Only a couple minutes; I didn’t want to lug my bag up here. You look breathtaking by the
way,” he relayed, pulling away to better take in her face, which was tipped up to him.
“What’s the occasion?”

“Do I need an occasion to look nice?” She asked, arching a brow.

“Nope,” he said, popping his lips a little on the P as he grinned at her. “Believe it or not, I’ll
take just about any opportunity to snog my beautiful, clandestine girlfriend in such a
profligate and secluded setting. Sure beats the broom cupboard on the third floor; I think I
still have a knot on the back of my head from that shelf the other day.”

She laughed and turned around to face him. He expected her to snake her arms around his
neck, as she had a number of times in the past, but instead she placed her hands on his chest
and pushed him away a step. He looked at her in question, but before he could get a word out,
she lifted her hands slowly, pointedly, to the top button of her robes and he fell utterly and
completely mute.

“I was actually thinking,” Hermione said, leisurely beginning to unhook the buttons, “that,
since my plans for your birthday last week ended up spoiled,” another button, “this might be
an ideal time to make it up to you,” another, “and try some of that ‘other stuff’ that you
mentioned a while back.”
His breath came more quickly when, four buttons down, the expected white of her blouse,
which she normally wore beneath her robes, didn’t appeared. All he could see was an endless
expanse of smooth skin, starting at her throat and continuing onward.

Moving her hands down, she unfastened one, then another, over and over again until they
were all undone and the garment hung open just a sliver. It wasn’t until the last one that he
noticed her hands were trembling a little.

Fred wanted to say something about it, make sure that she was sure about whatever it was she
was planning for them to do, but he was ashamed to admit that any sound, reasonable thought
flew from his mind when she pulled her robes fully open and let them fall to the ground and
pool around her feet.

oOoOoOo

No number of warming charms could protect against the gooseflesh that broke out across
Hermione’s body when she dropped her robes. Not because they were poorly executed, nor
because it was particularly frigid outside, but because they had nothing to do with her
environment. They did, however, have everything to do with the look on Fred’s face as his
eyes raked over her body, as well as the nerves that were making her hands shake and her
stomach flip-flop.

She’d worn the red bra that Parvati and Lavender had wholeheartedly approved of, pairing it
with knickers of the same dark ruby colour and black stockings. Her hair was pinned back
and her makeup, she had to admit, had been expertly executed by Lavender. She didn’t feel
entirely like herself, though.

Just be confident. The sexiest thing in the world is when a woman is completely confident.

Viciously stuffing down the tensions that were swooping back and forth in her head,
Hermione rotated slowly on the spot and, though she heard what sounded like a sort of
wheezing sound, Fred remained wide-eyed and silent.

When she’d completely revolved to face him again, she paused for a second and then
exclaimed, a little bit frazzled, “Well?”

He jumped like he’d been stuck with a straight pin.

“Bleeding – holy – Hermione, you look – and you’re wearing –“

“Keep going, I’m sure there’s a full sentence in there somewhere.”

He let out a half-groan, half-laugh and ran his hand through his hair, setting it to stand on end
a bit.

“What on earth was the original plan if this is the backup?”

“I’d had Dobby set up a picnic on the astronomy tower after the DA meeting last week,
which obviously turned into a complete disaster.”
“I can’t believe you’re making me say this, but I kind of feel like I owe Umbridge now.”

Hermione laughed and the knot in her stomach loosened the smallest amount.

Fred took a step closer. She thought he’d be more fixated on her body, adorned and displayed
as it was, but his eyes, for the most part, stayed on her face after his initial inspection.

“Can I – I mean, is it alright if I touch you?”

“Kind of the point, isn’t it?”

He brought a hand up and slid it along the bare skin of her waist, warm and gentle. His thumb
circled lightly, the same as it always did on the back of her hand, and she shivered.

“Are you cold?” he asked, concerned.

She shook her head. “No.”

Confidence. Okay, she could do this.

She raised her own hands to the knot on his tie and loosened it until just the tail of the short
end was sticking out and then slipped it out from beneath his collar and over his head. Then
she went to work unbuttoning his shirt, sliding the little ivory disks through the fabric one by
one until it hung open over a plain, white undershirt.

He assisted her in divesting himself of it, removing his hand from her waist briefly in order to
shrug it off and add it to the ground with her robes. She stepped back and her bum hit the
wide balcony railing. It was a bit chilled, but within seconds she was otherwise occupied and
couldn’t have cared less.

Fred wrapped an arm around her waist and another around the back of her thigh and easily
hoisted her so she was perched on the edge with him standing between her parted knees. She
was taller this way, almost eye level and he ducked down, placing a searing kiss on her lips.
She sighed, tightening her legs around his middle and pulling him in closer.

After a moment he shifted away from her mouth and instead tracked along her jaw, down her
throat, and across her collarbone. He paused briefly before lowering further and beginning to
place feather-light kisses across the tops of her breasts, spilling over the confines of her bra.
And, just like that, they were officially in unexplored territory.

As if on instinct, she placed one hand on the back of his head, nails raking lightly through his
copper hair, and he groaned into her cleavage. Emboldened, she reached down and tugged at
the hem of his shirt. The odds of her successfully removing it on her own in their current
position were slim to none, but he caught on and stepped back, stretching a hand over his
shoulder to tug it off.

He’d filled out a bit more since she’d seen him over the summer and, unlike on that occasion,
she didn’t shy from ogling at all. Quite the opposite.
“Wow,” she huffed, chewing the edge of her lip and feeling a tad inadequate. He laughed, a
little self-consciously it seemed, but stepped back to her.

“Want to move this down there?”

Hermione nodded, preparing to clamor off the railing, but he scooped her up before she
could. His hips had been a little below hers in their previous position but now, with her legs
wrapped around his waist, she could feel against her inner thigh that her lingerie had had the
intended effect.

He slowly knelt among the blankets she’d conjured before carefully laying her backward onto
a small pile of pillows while he hovered over her.

Her nerves flared again, but she did her best to ignore them.

“Can we switch? This is your birthday celebration after all.”

Her question appeared to catch him a little off guard, but he nodded and climbed off of her,
laying on the pillow beside her for a second before she rolled on top so she was straddling his
thighs.

She lowered herself and placed a kiss beneath his jaw, near his ear, and was rewarded with a
shiver and a quiet noise in the back of his throat.

All she could think about was skin. There was so much exposed skin. Pale and freckled and
impossibly warm where it made contact with her own. She couldn’t wrap her mind around it.

Trailing her own mouth in half-open kisses, she traced down his chest slowly, sweeping back
and forth in a lazy non-pattern. When she reached his ribs, which were rising and falling
rapidly, she slid down a little further and propped on one forearm beside his stomach while
her other hand came to rest on his belt buckle. She started to pull at it.

She could do this.

It was just a belt buckle.

She’d undone her own belt buckle loads of times.

She could do this.

She could do this.

She could – could –

She couldn’t do this.

The further along she got the more her hands shook and the less assured she felt. It wasn’t
Fred, it wasn’t anything to do with Fred at all, it was her. She felt like a fraud.
His eyes had been shut, but the second her breathing started to waiver they flicked open, and
he quickly sat up. She was rapidly approaching panic mode and he could tell, lust having
entirely drained from his face and been replaced with alarm.

She continued to fumble with the waist of his trousers while her vision blurred.

“Whoa, Hermione, stop. Stop, stop, stop, stop, stop.” He reached to the side and grabbed a
small fleece, threw it around her shoulders, and then tipped her face toward him. She was still
sitting astride his knees and he took her hands in his, moving them gently backward. “Hey,
look at me. Look at me, right here. Breathe. Just breathe. You’re alright.”

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I – it’s not –“ her eyes stung and her cheeks felt like they were on
fire. A swell of shame and embarrassment and insecurity washed over her like a tidal wave,
tugging her out to sea.

“Okay, take a few deep breaths, and then tell me what’s wrong.”

She latched onto the calm timbre of his voice like it was a life preserver that had been thrown
to her and shut her eyes. A moment passed and in it, Fred stayed entirely silent; he’d begun
running his thumb in familiar, soothing circles along the back of her palm.

Hermione finally looked at him again, pulling the blanket around her shoulders a little tighter.
He raised his eyebrows in question and, in a flurry of words, she tried to explain the tangle of
thoughts and doubts in her head.

“It’s not you. Not at all. I really want to – I’m more than ready to – take that step, but I
can’t… like this… this isn’t me.” She looked haplessly down at the red bra and gestured
vaguely to her hair and her face. “I’m not some skilled seductress that wears red lingerie and
elaborate updos and smoky eyes. I’m awkward and my hair is unruly and I’m so stuck in my
own head sometimes that it’s really, just truly pathetic.”

He looked like he was going to interject but she put her hand up and plowed onward.

“And I’m not accustomed to being out of my depth; I research everything and learn
everything before I do anything, but I don’t know how to do this. I don’t know how to be this.
And I want to learn but I also wanted to make this special because it’s your sort-of birthday
and I love you and you deserve the world and –“

She immediately stopped talking when she realised what she’d said, pressing her fingertips to
her lips. Fred’s eyes went wide and his mouth dropped open with a comical pop. If someone
were to ask a caricature artist to draw his interpretation of the word ‘surprised,’ it would be
the expression on display in front of her at that moment.

Rather than questioning, though, Fred swatted the shocked sentiment back at her and started
laughing. It began as a quiet chuckle and escalated until his shoulders were shaking and he
had to wipe a tear from the corner of his eye.

“You’re – you’re laughing at me!” she accused indignantly, in disbelief.

“No,” he clarified, apparently trying to suppress his amusement in light of her response. He
wasn’t doing a very good job of it. “I’m laughing at the sheer absurdity of the situation we’ve
somehow landed in.”

“Oh, brilliant. I’m only absurd, that’s loads better.” With that, she moved past indignant to
insulted. He shook his head rapidly.

“No. Not in the slightest. Bugger, this isn’t coming out right… Look, I just don’t need this,
Hermione. I don’t need any of this.” He gestured to the surrounding area and the stupid
lingerie, now partially obscured by the blanket. “You could have come here wearing a burlap
sack with ink-stains on your fingers and quill tucked into your hair and you’d have been just
as sexy to me. More, even.”

She laughed and sniffled a little. Burlap sack notwithstanding, that was how she spent most
of her time.

“I just wanted it to be special,” she repeated, a little less self-conscious this time and more
annoyed with the mess she’d managed to build up in her mind. He shook his head again and
reached for her, pulling her forward into a warm, if logistically awkward hug. Her cheek
rested against the side of his neck and she wrapped the blanket around his shoulders as well
as her own in a cocoon that encased the both of them.

He finally leaned back, and she dropped her forehead against his.

“It’s special no matter what,” he reassured quietly. “Every single moment that we spend
together is unbelievably special to me. You are the most beautiful, neurotic, intelligent,
frustrating, funny, fearless witch that I have ever met in my life. I am hopelessly in love with
you, and nothing you can do or wear is going to change that. Confidence, experience, all the
rest of that will just come with practice and time.”

She’d hardly heard that last bit, her heart having leapt into her throat. “You love me?” she
blurted. Now she was the one with astonishment etched on her face.

He nodded like it should have been obvious, and his eyebrows drew together. “Did you think
I didn’t? Hermione, I’ve been in love with you for ages. You can ask George, if you don’t
believe me. He’s so tired of hearing about it, he’s ready to smother me in my sleep.”

The look on his face was warm enough to melt a glacier. He meant it. He really meant it.
Even after she’d managed to cock everything up. She bit her lip and thought hard for a
moment. It was still well over an hour until curfew.

“Help me with these,” she abruptly entreated, reaching up and beginning to extract the pins
from her hair. Fred paused for a moment before he started to nimbly remove them from the
curls on the left side of her head while she did the right. One by one the ringlets sprang
forward, as if annoyed they’d been suppressed in the first place.

When the last one was tossed to the side near their discarded clothing, she lunged and
grabbed the wand from her robes, sitting back on Fred’s legs while he reclined on his hands
and watched her curiously. Recalling the pronunciation Parvati had explained earlier, she
muttered “mundet” and made a circle around her face.

She hadn’t realized how different the makeup had made her skin feel until it wasn’t there
anymore.

Fred smiled at her then and reached a hand out, playfully tussling her curls a bit.

“Okay, now shut your eyes.”

“Yes ma’am,” he teased, doing as she said.

Hermione climbed off his lap and went to the pile of clothing near the railing. Glancing back
to make sure he wasn’t peeking she unhooked her bra and tossed it to the side, snatching his
rumpled oxford and donning it, leaving the top few buttons undone. She stripped off the
stockings as well. The knickers stayed, though they were covered by the hem of the shirt
anyway.

She returned and sat next to him. “Alright, you can look again.”

Fred blinked his eyes open and his amused expression split into a full-out grin upon seeing
her, crinkling the corners of his eyes. “There’s my girl.”

She smiled back and relaxed completely.

Confidence, she heard again in her head and inwardly scoffed. Well, it was certainly easier to
be confident when her boobs weren’t hoisted up to her ears and she wasn’t terrified to touch
her own face.

“Can we start over?”

He nodded and she crawled back into his lap, dipping her head so that her hair swung to one
side and kissing him gently on the lips. Earlier he’d been nervous to touch her, like she might
break, but it seemed that apprehension was gone too.

One hand traced along her thigh, cupping her bum, while the other looped around her waist
and held her to him. Her hands explored too, skimming the muscles of his back and tracing
the contours of his exposed biceps.

She pressed lightly on his shoulders and he leaned back, stuffing a pillow under his head as
he did it. Rather than jumping straight for his trousers as she had before, she shifted to lay
propped along his side, her breath hitching when the hand that had been on her thigh slid
beneath the hem of the shirt, skimming across her lower abdomen.

Fred paused and she nodded in encouragement. His hand moved up a bit more and his
fingertips brushed the underside of her naked breast. Something inside her clenched and she
pressed her thighs together in a futile attempt to relieve the pressure.

He moved from kissing her mouth to her throat and, glancing down, she saw the front of his
trousers were stretched outward. Without even thinking about it, she placed her hand over
him and lightly squeezed.

A hiss slipped from between his teeth as he palmed her chest.

Hermione shifted to lean over him once again and, with more conviction than she’d felt all
night, undid the buttons on his shirt for the second time until it hung open and fell over her
shoulders. Her nipples were hard, and Fred shook his head a little as he took her in.

“I can’t believe you’re mine,” he muttered disbelievingly, swallowing hard. She smiled and
reached for his belt buckle, unhooking it and pulling it loose with relative ease this time. He
sat up and shoved his trousers down, kicking off his shoes as well so he was laying in just a
pair of noticeably tented blue checkered shorts.

She climbed to straddle him and rocked forward, thighs bracketing his hips, then dropped
down to kiss below his ear at the same time she fished a hand between them to touch him
through the last bit of remaining fabric.

“I am, you know,” she whispered. She pulled back and looked at him, into those impossibly
blue eyes. “Yours.”

Something flashed across his face, but she didn’t have time to dwell. He rolled to the side so
she was under him. The unbuttoned shirt hanging open, more an accessory at that point, as
his lips closed around her nipple and her hips pitched forward.

“Fred,” she whimpered wantonly, feeling his tongue flick over her. Her exclamation only
fueled him. One arm was still tucked beneath her neck, but the other hand reached down
between her thighs and applied the slightest pressure in just the place she’d been longing to
feel it.

“Fuck, you’re wet,” he breathed, tearing his mouth away from her chest with a shocked
expression and she snickered. He wasn’t wrong; the scrap of cotton set in the lace underwear
was practically sodden.

She reached down and took his hand, lifting it up to the band of her knickers, and slipped just
the tips of his fingers beneath the fabric. He wavered for a second and then slid his hand
down, through the neatly trimmed thatch of dark curls, to trace along her center.

He ducked back to her breasts, the other one this time, and wrapped his lips around its peak
just as he dipped a finger into her. He groaned and she laughed, though she quieted with a
gasp when he dragged that finger back up and circled it around her clit.

Her hips bucked up again and her nails dug into his shoulder.

Perhaps it was recency bias, but somehow his fingers felt better than her own. A little clumsy,
and obviously not as familiar with the terrain, but the sheer vulnerability of letting him be the
one to touch her, to make her feel that way, had her practically wheezing.

She tried to focus enough to stroke him, but the angle wasn’t right, and he was so captivated
by the sounds she was making she couldn’t tell if it was having any effect. Finally, he pushed
two fingers into her, using the heel of his palm to continue rubbing, and she gave up with a
frustrated sigh.

Fred chuckled, teeth grazing her nipple.

“You first,” he said with a wry smile. He wouldn’t have to wait long – she was coiling like a
spring.

“Down a bit,” she instructed without thinking, lost in a fog of adolescent hedonism. He
obliged, clearly not above taking direction, and shifted his hand. Within a couple minutes she
tipped over the edge. Thankful that she’d added a silencing charm to those keeping them
warm, she cried out and spasmed around his fingers, rolling her hips up and arching her back
off the ground.

When she came back down, still shivering a bit, she opened her eyes to find Fred with his
hand still in her knickers, staring at her like she’d just hung the moon.

“Never mind,” he said, shaking his head vigorously. “Forget about me, I want to do that
again.”

“Nuh uh,” she said, laughing and wiggling out from under him. “Your turn.”

She was still nervous, but it was a different sort of nervous than it had been earlier. Excited
rather than anxious.

He rolled over onto his back and Hermione propped on one elbow again. She wrapped her
hand around him through his shorts and his breath faltered. A couple light strokes and he was
flushed, rocking against her ever so slightly.

She hesitated for a moment before asking, “Would you be willing to take them off?”

He met her gaze, assessing for a split second, and nodded. She leaned back as he hooked his
thumbs through the elastic and lifted his hips, pushing his boxer shorts down past his thighs
and kicking them toward his already-discarded trousers.

Parvati was clearly suffering from some sort of lesbian partiality, because seeing him
stretched out naked under her was just about the most arousing thing she could imagine.

The copper hair that began at his navel continued downward into a shock of dark ginger curls
surrounding his erection. Which, though sizable, wasn’t actually very intimidating at all, and
certainly the furthest thing from repulsive. Flobberworms be damned.

She must have stared a second too long because he shifted a little nervously. Looking back up
at his face she saw traces of the same vulnerability she’d felt herself not fifteen minutes
earlier and her heart ached a little. Hermione didn’t know the exact details of his sexual
history, only that he was a virgin, but she knew this was his first time doing this with her and,
like he’d said, that made it special by default.

She shifted up and caught his mouth in a searing kiss, parting his lips and sliding her tongue
against his. The tension in his shoulders eased a bit and she took the opportunity to place a
hand on him.

The skin was smooth and warm, softer than she’d imagined, but she applied the lightest
pressure and felt a contradictory hardness beneath it. He groaned deep in his throat and she
pulled back. She didn’t move her hand on him yet, but she didn’t take it away either.

He quirked his brows at her in question and she licked her lips.

“Teach me,” she intreated quietly. He realised what she meant immediately and let out a
sharp exhale, clearly not having ever received such a request. She looked pointedly at his left
hand, resting on her side, and then back to her right where it was still wrapped around him.
“Teach me.”

Slowly, Fred removed his hand from her hip and placed it over hers, large enough that it was
almost completely covered. And then he moved it, gliding his hand, and hers beneath it,
down and back up the length of his shaft. Her mind was momentarily commandeered with the
image of him doing this in the shower, or in his bed with the curtains drawn and, if it were
even possible, she became more aroused at the thought. It wasn’t the time though; she’d had
her turn and Hermione was nothing if not equitable.

She leaned down to kiss him and, as she did so, he repeated the motion.

“Like this?” She tried the movement on her own, his hand resting lightly on top, guiding
rather than driving.

“Yes,” he breathed shakily, before adding hesitantly, “Maybe a little tighter?” She adjusted
and did it again to a sound of approval. “Just like that.” Settling into what she hoped was an
appropriate rhythm, he took his hand off and used it to gently caress her breast instead.

Keeping her attention on what she was doing, she eventually saw a translucent bead of
moisture escape from the tip and paused. Curiously, she stopped, collected it on her finger
and placed it between her lips, depositing it on her tongue.

Fred was staring at her apprehensively, frozen in place like he’d been petrified. It was salty,
and perhaps a bit bitter, but certainly not unpleasant.

“Can I try something?” she asked, turning to look at him in question. It didn’t seem as though
it needed to be explicitly stated what she wanted to try.

“Sure,” he croaked, dropping his head back onto the pillow and looking up at the stars. The
muscles in his neck flexed. “But, um, to be honest, I – I don’t know how much longer I’m
going to last here.”

“I just want to see what it’s like,” she explained matter-of-factly, shuffling down his body to
kneel between his thighs.

“Afraid I can’t give you any pointers about that,” he joked weakly, propping on his elbows to
look at her. “I’ll, uh, let you know if I’m going to…”
She nodded and smiled in what she hoped was a reassuring way, and he relaxed backward
again, muttering something under his breath about Merlin and his infinite wisdom. She put
her hand back where it had been, stroking twice the way he’d demonstrated, before she
leaned down and tentatively ran her tongue across the tip of him. A shudder rolled through
him.

Emboldened, she ducked her head, curls falling to the side, and pressed her tongue to a flat
expanse of skin at the base and dragged it slowly upward, mimicking the motion and pressure
that she’d made with her hand.

His fingers clenched into fists around the blankets at his sides.

“Hermione,” Fred groaned helplessly.

Well, she thought, here goes nothing. When she reached the tip again, she opened her mouth
and took him inside it. She was careful of her teeth, but she kept her lips tight and dragged
her tongue slowly back and forth along the underside of him.

She couldn’t fit it all, not by a long shot, but her hand was still wrapped beneath where her
mouth stopped, and she hoped that it worked as a suitable supplement.

Rather naively, she expected it to taste different than the rest of him, but it really didn’t. Other
than the faintest trace of salty bitterness that she’d discerned earlier, it wasn’t any different
than the skin on his throat or his chest.

She pulled up, moving her hand as well, and then slid back down, careful not to go too far
and choke herself. She did it again. Then again.

Fred was panting at that point, the muscles in his abdomen visibly tightening and his hips
rocking with her, despite ostensible attempts to stay still.

“Fuck – I’m – I can’t – I’m going to –“

She got the message and released him from her mouth. Though the idea of swallowing was
intriguing, and more than a little arousing, this had already been a big night for firsts.

She kept working her hand over him, easier now that a fair amount of saliva had been added
to the mix, and she crawled back up beside him just in time to feel the first warm spurt on her
fist, landing on his upper abdomen.

The sounds he made would be seared in her memory for the rest of time, but she was utterly
torn about where to look. Watching him come was one thing, sexy and sinful, but the
expression on his face as he did so, eyes shut and lips parted, was just short of extraordinary.

As he finished, twitching in her palm, she leaned down and kissed him again, collecting an
exhausted, spent sigh.

She then flopped onto her back next to him and reached for her discarded wand, conjuring a
towel and wiping her hand on it before extending it to him. He accepted it gratefully and
went to work cleaning up his stomach and chest while she relaxed onto the pillows behind
 them. When he was finished, she vanished it and he grabbed a blanket, tugging it over them
and slipping an arm beneath her waist to pull her against his chest.

“Is it… is it always like that?” She asked after a pause, turning to look up at him. He was
examining the sky above them in apparent thought, but he shook his head sharply.

“In my very limited experience? No. Not even close.”

Feeling more than a little gratified, she nodded. There were a few beats of silence.

“So, what was it that you said about practicing?”

Chapter End Notes

Because this was a two-for-one post, the next chapter won't be up until 8/10.

If you haven't done so already, go take the extra time to read one of my other fics. 🖤
(Or have a glass of wine and watch the Olympics. Idk, I'm not your keeper.)
 Occupied
Chapter Notes

You can thank imgur for this chapter being posted on time.

(Because Flickr apparently suffered some sort of psychotic break since my last upload
and was trying to compress all of my visual media into grainy muck for no reason
whatsoever.)

Anyway, rant over. Read on.

10 April 1996

“I think it was just up here,” Hermione mused aloud, towing Fred behind her. They were in
the wing of the castle that housed the arithmancy and ancient runes classrooms, so the odds
of Ron or Harry seeing them together were exceedingly low. Plus, it was nearly time for
dinner and most everyone was either in their common room or headed to The Great Hall.

“Is this the one with the shelf?” Fred asked with faux dread, following merrily along with
both her bag and his slung over his shoulder.

“No, that was the third floor,” she laughed. “This is the one that’s sort of shaped like an L. I
don’t think Filch has even been near it in the past decade.

They arrived at the door of a broom cupboard and she turned the handle, looking both ways
to make sure the corridor was deserted, before opening it. Fred didn’t waste any time driving
her backward with his hands on her hips, until her bum hit the wall across from the door,
which shut with a click behind them.

“We have to be quick,” Fred said, dropping their bags and pulling his outer robes off while
Hermione did the same with hers. He then went to work unbuttoning her blouse. “I’m
supposed to meet Lee at dinner.”

“I think you can manage quick,” she teased, reaching for his belt and using it to tug him
toward her.

“Oh, I’m going to make you pay for that,” he vowed playfully, voice muffled by her cleavage
as he peppered the tops of her breasts with hurried kisses.

“Please don’t,” came a third voice from down the long side of the proverbial L.

Hermione yelped and quickly pulled her shirt closed across her front.

“What the hell?!” Fred exclaimed, crouching and fumbling for his wand among their
discarded robes.

With a muttered lumos, he turned and extended it in the direction the voice had come from to
reveal Angelina and George in a similar state of undress and dishevelment near the wall
opposite them.

“Fred?”

“George?”

“Hermione?”

“Angie?”

All four stood stock-still in the dim wandlight. Angelina was in just her skirt and a purple
bra, blouse having apparently been discarded, and Fred turned his gaze respectfully toward a
cobweb in the corner of the ceiling.

Nobody seemed to know precisely what to say until Angelina suddenly sneezed and broke
the silence.
“Well, umm,” Fred started slowly, eyes still cast devoutly upward, “We’re – we’re going to
go.”

He gestured vaguely in the direction of the door, as if the other couple might have forgotten
where the exit was.

“Yeah, that’s – that’s probably a good idea,” George agreed. His hair was sticking up on one
side like a cockatoo and the zip on his trousers was half-down.

Everyone was flushed for one reason or another and Hermione re-buttoned her shirt as
quickly as possible while Fred tried to discern whose robes were whose in the dim light.
When they were both fully dressed again, he snatched their bags from the ground and they
tumbled through the door, back into the hallway.

“See you at dinner!” Angelina called after them as it fell closed once more.

oOoOoOo

George arrived in their bedroom after having finished eating, which, for him at least, had
been a truly harrowing affair. Angelina and Hermione had broken into spontaneous laughing
fits twice upon making eye contact, much to the confusion of those around them, while Fred
and George, on the other hand, had adamantly avoided looking at one another.

Lee sat between them all quietly, like a child whose parents were having a row.

When George stepped around the door to toss his bag on his bed, he saw Fred was already
reclined on it, waiting for him.

“Freddie,” he greeted apprehensively, toeing his shoes off near the wardrobe.

“Georgie,” Fred replied, nodding. There was a beat of silence. “So, you and Angie?”

George flushed. “I’m sorry, I was going to tell you,” he said guiltily. This seemed to confuse
Fred, his eyebrows pulling together a little.

“Why are you sorry?”

“I just meant – well, the two of you –“

“Nuh-uh,” Fred said, cutting him off. “I’m sure Angelina already said this, but we weren’t
serious. Not remotely to the point of you needing to disclose anything to me.”

The knot in his stomach eased a little. “She did, it just still felt a little wrong.”

Fred sat up and waved a hand as if he could physically push the concern to the side. “If the
two of you make each other happy, go and shag it out in every broom cupboard in the castle.
Just make sure to put a bloody locking charm on the door first, for the love of Merlin.”

“Agreed,” George said, sighing in relief before adding, “As long as you and Hermione check
to make sure the room isn’t occupied before you start undressing one another.”
Fred grinned, not the least bit ashamed, and like that the topic was closed. He got up and
stepped back to his own bed, bending to dig his pyjamas from his trunk.

“I heard back from the property owner on 93,” George informed him, tossing an envelope
onto the duvet. Fred took it and extracted a piece of parchment, eyes scanning and then
widening in surprise.

“He came down on asking?”

George nodded. “If we agree, he’ll meet us in Hogsmeade the day after tomorrow to sign
paperwork. We’ll have to sneak out, but then we can take possession right before Easter.”

He watched as the exact same emotions he’d experience himself flickered across Fred’s face.

Excitement, apprehension, and finally a sort of bittersweet misery.

“Yeah, I know,” George huffed sympathetically.

They finished getting ready for bed in silence.

 The Key

14 April 1996

“You’re leaving.”

It was nearing one in the morning and Hermione had just come downstairs to find Fred and
George, the only two people in the common room, seated in front of the fire and talking to
one another in low voices. When she spoke, standing a couple feet away and watching them
over the back of the sofa, Fred’s head snapped up.

It wasn’t a question because she didn’t need to ask. It was a statement. A fact. A sword that
she could look up and see dangling over her head, clear as day.

She’d felt it for weeks, like a tide rolling back before a devastating storm. A little when the
DA dissolved, then again after the incident with Montague and the vanishing cabinet, and
now every time a new educational decree was posted. Furthermore, he and George weren’t
even feigning revising for their NEWTs any longer.
And it wasn’t that Fred was pulling away from her; quite the opposite, in fact. Every kiss
lasted a little longer, every touch lingered, every time she said goodnight, he requested just
one more minute.

He didn’t say anything, and it served as all the confirmation she needed. George looked
nervously between them before unfolding himself from the armchair he was in and heading
toward the dormitory. He paused as he passed her and reached a hand out, squeezing her arm
lightly and offering a sad smile.

Whether it was meant to serve as a comfort to her or a plea not to murder his brother, she
couldn’t be sure.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw two second-year boys descending the stairs, the one in
front giggling and holding a pack of exploding snap cards, but George promptly snatched
them by their pyjama collars and hauled them back around toward their bedroom.

“Not tonight, lads,” he said quietly, nudging them on their way amidst protests. All three
disappeared and then it was silent save for the fire hissing and crackling in the hearth.

“Were you going to tell me, or was I meant to parse it out on my own?”

“Figured you’d notice eventually,” Fred joked half-heartedly. Hermione didn’t laugh, and he
got up to stand in front of her.

“When?”

“After the spring holiday.”

Her stomach lurched. Within weeks, then.

“How long have you known?”

“Hermione, I –“

“How long?” she snapped, her voice tight.

“We signed the paperwork for the shop on Wednesday. Snuck down to Hogsmeade, but we…
we’ve been talking about it for a while.”

She bit her lip sharply and closed her eyes. She wanted to be mad at him. Wanted to throw
things and shout, but anger was only a fraction of what she was feeling. The smallest fraction
of her emotions in that moment. Mostly, she was just sad and hurt.

“Good. That’s good. I mean, there’s nothing keeping you here, right?”

She opened her eyes just in time to see him step back like she’d slapped him.

“That’s not fair,” he said, tone taking a hard edge. “This is my dream. This was the plan all
along, and you knew that. All we’re doing is pushing the timeline up a couple of months.”
“I didn’t know ‘the plan’ meant you leaving me here while everything is falling apart and the
school is operating like a bloody military state!”

Hermione felt the first traitorous tears breach her eyelids to roll down her cheeks and she
stepped around him to stand in front of the fire, watching the coals in the bottom glow and
then fade in hues of white and pale orange. He stayed where he was and remained silent.
When she spoke again, her voice was uneven and heavy with emotion.

“If I asked you to stay, would you?”

“Yes.”

Fred said the word instantly, firmly and without a trace of hesitation. She knew that it was
true, and she knew what it meant for him to say it. The depth behind those three little letters.
So, she nodded, took a deep, shuddering breath, and started to cry. Her shoulders shook and
her vision dissolved into a watery blur.

“I’ll miss you,” Hermione choked, barely audible.

He was on her in the blink of an eye, and she buried her head in his chest, his arms locking
around her shoulders and holding her to him. They stood like that until she finally managed
to get ahold of herself, at which point she sniffled, swiped the tears from her cheeks and did
her best to conjure a smile.

“I’m really proud of you, you know. It’s going to be amazing.”

She truly meant it. As much as it pained her, his leaving, she couldn’t wait to watch him
positively light the world on fire. Wizarding Britain didn’t know what was coming.

It could have been a trick of light, a simple reflection of the fire dancing in the hearth, but she
swore his eyes were sparkling a bit too as he leaned down and gently kissed her. It was the
first time they’d ever done that in the common room, and now it would almost certainly be
the last.

He drew back and gave her a look that she couldn’t quite read. “Just a second.”

Releasing her, Fred stepped around the table in front of the fire and rooted around in his bag
for something. Apparently having found it, he straightened again and crossed back to her.

“Here.” In his open palm was a small, silver key with 93 Diagon Alley engraved along the
side. She picked it up and felt a little buzz of magic coursing through it. “I want you to have
this one, I can make a copy of George’s. There will still be security wards and everything, but
I can adjust those too.”

The gravity of what he was saying started to sink in.

“What are you -?”

“Nothing like that,” he clarified quickly with a nervous laugh, rubbing a hand sheepishly over
the back of his neck. “I just… I don’t want to live somewhere that you can’t come and go as
you’d please. That opens the shop as well as the flat upstairs.”

For once, Hermione Granger couldn’t even begin to think of what to say. She turned it over in
her hand and looked up at him to find an earnest smile on his face and, hopelessly besotted as
she was, she couldn’t do anything but smile back, even if it was through tears.

He curled her fingers closed around the key and then leaned down, pressed another kiss to her
forehead, and whispered softly, “The shop isn’t my only dream.”
 Go out with a bang
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

21 April 1996

“I reckon we should be able to guarantee you, what, twenty minutes?” Fred asked George.
Harry and Ron both looked a little awestruck and Hermione had to resist the urge to clunk
their heads together like the nitwits they were.

“Easy,” George replied, nodding.

“What sort of diversion is it?” Ron inquired, clearly dying to be in on the plan.

“You’ll see little bro,” said Fred as he and George got up to leave. “At least, you will if you
trot along to Gregory the Smarmy’s corridor around five o’clock tomorrow.”

oOoOoOo
“Tomorrow, then?”

Hermione had just shut the door on the balcony, which she’d ironically begun to think of as
their balcony just a little bit too late, to see Fred leaning against the railing waiting for her.
He’d apparently already placed their usual warming charms and, it being late in the evening,
they’d both forgone their school robes in favor of more casual attire.

“Yeah,” he sighed, bobbing his head and looking just a little grim before shaking it off.
“Figured we might as well help Harry out if we can. Any idea what he so direly needs to
speak to Sirius about?”

“Not a clue, but he’s rattled about something,” Hermione said, walking across the space to
prop beside him. He dropped a kiss affectionately on the top of her head. “And I think he’s
lying to me.”

“Perhaps we aren’t the best people to pass judgement about that particular offense,” he
commented judiciously.

Though she’d been upset over the realisation that he was leaving, and they lost even more
time when she visited her parents for the Easter holiday rather than staying with The
Weasleys, she’d decided to try and take the mature approach. As bitter a taste as that left.

It was quiet for a moment, the soft ambience of nighttime humming around them.

“Speaking of which,” Hermione started, pulling in a deep breath and breaking the silence. “I
want to tell everybody.”

“Really?” Fred asked, a hint of surprise in his voice.

“Yes,” she confirmed. “After OWLs though, when I get to The Burrow this summer. You’ll
be staying at your flat anyway, so I reckon your mum won’t be too uncomfortable with it.
And Ron and Harry should have sufficient time to recover from the shock before fall term.”

Rather than replying, Fred turned suddenly, scooped his arms around her waist, and began to
spin them around.

“Fred!” She squealed, clinging to his shoulders while her legs flailed helplessly. “Put me
down!”

After another second, he acquiesced only to kiss her firmly on the mouth, both of them
tottering and dizzy.

“Mmm,” she groaned, pressing into him. They snogged for a moment before she pulled back.
“If I’d known how much you wanted to tell people, I’d have suggested it sooner.”

“It’s not that, really,” he said, shaking his head. “Honestly, the sneaking about has been pretty
fun. I just… it sort of feels like the next logical step, doesn’t it?”

“And here I was thinking that saying I love you and getting a key to your home were
sufficiently large steps,” she teased. “Silly me.”
He tweaked her on the nose, and she laughed again before scowling a little. “Okay, do you
want the bad news now?”

“I’d say ‘save it for tomorrow,’ but all things considered…”

She stepped back to lean against the railing and bit her lip before saying, “I don’t think we
should write for the rest of term.”

“Oh,” Fred replied, clearly not expecting that. “I mean, that’s alright I suppose. Why though?
I’ve never known you to have an aversion to a quill and inkwell.”

“I’m fairly certain that Umbridge is screening our mail, and the idea of her reading something
that I’m saying to you in confidence makes me want to literally crawl out of my skin. But, I
also don’t fancy filtering our conversations down to idle talk about the weather and
schoolwork.”

He looked vaguely ill at the idea himself. “Fair enough. After tomorrow she may expel you
simply for cavorting with the likes of me anyway.”

Hermione arched a trepidatious brow. “Do I want to know what the two of you have
planned?”

“No, absolutely not. Plus, it’ll be more fun for you to see it in person. Just keep a safe
distance and watch your shoes.”

“Oh Merlin,” she winced, laughing and shaking her head. “You’ll give me grey hair before
I’ve finished my NEWTs at this rate.”

Fred looked sideways at her and picked up a curl, eyeing it incredulously. “I think you’d be
incredibly fit with grey hair, actually.”

“Yeah? You really think so?” She pushed him backward until he was against the wall. “Are
you certain you don’t just have a thing for older women?”

“Definitely not,” Fred said solemnly, shaking his head. “In fact, you have five years tops
before I trade you in for a younger model.”

“Ugh!” She feigned affront as he placed his hand on her thigh and started to slowly lift her
skirt. “You wouldn’t dare.”

“You clearly don’t know me at all, darling.” He shook his head morosely. “I dare. I always,”
his hand slipped beneath her knickers, “dare.”

Her head fell backwards as he began to trail a finger in maddening circles. If their first night
together in this way had been mind-boggling, which it most certainly had, the tête-à-têtes that
followed had only become increasingly satisfying.

For all the joking about practice, there really was something to learning one another. What
made him groan and sweat and beg her to keep going? What made her tremble and clench
and dig her nails into his shoulders? Despite his OWL scores, Fred was just as quick a study
as she was when he applied himself. And he most definitely applied himself.

“Given that it’s my last night here before braving the cold, cruel world,” Fred entreated,
lightly biting where her neck met her shoulder, “Do you think that I’m entitled to a request?”

“Are you joking? No way! I’m the one that has to – oh God – stay here with Umbridge and
her pack of goons.”

Fred chuckled and then stepped back anyway, drawing his wand from his pocket. He
muttered a conjuration charm and the small tan sofa he’d all but perfected sprang into
existence in the corner of the balcony.

He tipped his head toward it and started to slowly roll up his sleeves. They hadn’t explicitly
talked about it, but he seemed to have noted that Hermione, though infuriated by it when
done casually, rather liked taking direction in these more intimate circumstances.

She went and sat down while Fred pulled at his tie, leaving it hanging loosely around his
neck. Expecting him to join her, she felt a flicker of confusion when he walked across the
veranda and stopped directly in front of her instead.

“What are you –?”

And then he dropped to his knees.

Oh.

Oh.

She must have looked surprised because he grinned triumphantly and placed his hands on the
tops of her thighs.

“You tell me if you’re not comfortable or if you want me to stop, okay?”

Breathless and at a loss for words, she simply nodded. He’d tasted her before, licked her off
his fingers, but they hadn’t done this yet. It wasn’t for any unwillingness on his part, rather a
vein of lingering self-consciousness on hers.

Slipping his hands beneath her skirt again, he tucked it up around her waist, so she was in just
a pair of dark blue knickers. He then looped his fingers through the band and tugged them
down a little.

“Lift your hips for me, love.”

Heart in her throat, she did as he’d instructed, kicking her shoes off in the process. He moved
her legs to one side and slipped the scrap of fabric over her feet, hooking her socks as well.
Then she was naked from the waist-down. Completely exposed.

Self-possessed demeanor dropping for a second, he gave her a reassuring smile, a Fred smile,
and, mustering all the courage she was capable of, she parted her legs for him.
Maintaining eye contact, he turned his head and kissed the inside of her right knee. Then he
moved up and did it again. Then again. All the while, ocean eyes boring into her and
stripping her bare.

She let out a whimper but bit her lip, stifling it. Fred made a tutting sound under his breath
and she felt his teeth lightly graze her inner thigh as he shook his head disapprovingly.

“None of that. I want to hear every pretty sound you make.”

Already feeling as though lightning were coursing through her veins, she gasped when he put
his hands firmly on her waist and tugged her closer to him, so she was seated almost hanging
off the edge and his mouth was mere inches from the apex of her thighs.

Then, in one smooth motion, he closed the gap and she saw stars. She was stiff at first, but he
lightly circled his thumb on the skin of her outer hip, coaxing her to unwind, and she relaxed
a little. Then a little more.

She wasn’t certain what to do with her legs but eventually she settled on bending her knees,
so her left heel was braced on the edge of the sofa and the other calf came to rest lightly on
Fred’s shoulder. Given that he was wholeheartedly preoccupied, he didn’t seem to mind.

His tongue began to circle in the same way his fingers had, the way he knew she liked, and
she released a moan she was fairly certain she’d never produced before. The warmth, the
pressure, all of it had her struggling to catch her breath.

Just when she thought it couldn’t possibly feel better, he took his hand off her leg and pushed
one finger inside of her, then closed his lips around her clit and lightly sucked.

She cried out and, without conscious thought, reached forward and knotted one hand in the
back of his hair, holding him there. Responding exceptionally enthusiastically to this, Fred
groaned in soft vibrations against her, the hand not already indisposed gripping her waist
almost painfully.

“Don’t stop,” she all but begged. “Please don’t stop.”

He didn’t stop and instead pushed a second finger into her. She tensed around it, arching her
back and grinding her hips toward him. Whether this went on for seconds or minutes or
hours, she couldn’t be sure. Couldn’t be bothered to care, either.

She was winding up, coiling, feeling as though she were about to tear apart at the seams.

And then she was in freefall.

She tried not to squeeze her thighs together too tightly for fear of strangling him, but frankly
she’d never been less in control of her actions in her life. Fred just kept licking and sucking
and curling his fingers inside of her until she was finally finished, panting and with a thin
sheen of sweat over her entire body.

Extracting his hand, he kissed the inside of her leg again and then sat back on his heels.
His hair was standing on end, lips slicked and shining, but he looked both triumphant and
amused; elated. Meanwhile, Hermione felt like she’d just run up every staircase in Hogwarts
twice with all the books she owned strapped to her back.

“Alright there?” He asked, grinning at her like the cocky bastard he was as he dragged the
back of his hand across his chin.

“If I can ever move again,” she wheezed, “I’m going to get you back for that.”

“Oh, I’m counting on it.”

He grabbed her knickers and handed them to her before disentangling himself from her legs.
She, with some effort, slipped them on and tucked her skirt back down.

Fred crawled up beside her and eased her into his lap with his back to the arm of the sofa.
She craned her neck to kiss him, the musty scent of her clinging to his mouth and the taste
still heavy on his tongue.

“Do you have prefect rounds tonight?” Fred asked, cradling her to his chest. She curled in
and looped her arms around his waist.

“Nuh-uh,” she said, shaking her head.

“Opposed to staying out past curfew?”

Normally she would say yes but, given the circumstances, she shook her head again.

“Good, that’s good,” he mused, nodding. “Because I plan to make you do that at least twice
more before the sun comes up.”

oOoOoOo

“George, I think we’ve outgrown full time education,” Fred supposed, playing to their
audience a little.

“Yeah, I’ve been feeling that way myself,” George replied with a sideways grin. Someone
that didn’t know the twins might think it was scripted, but she knew it wasn’t.

Umbridge was in front of them, slowly turning a deep shade of violet in her thoroughly
incensed state.

Hermione, on the other hand, was near the back of the crowd, arms crossed and leaning
against the wall while she watched the spectacle. She laughed quietly under her breath and
shook her head. Harry had just appeared across the corridor, so at least she no longer had to
worry about him getting caught.

This man, the one captivating the entire school, delighting in torturing its psychotic
headmistress, had been on his knees in front of her mere hours ago. He knelt for her. It was a
little heady, that knowledge that she kept tucked to her chest. And he’d been right, of course;
the swamp, though horrifying to her rule-abiding sensibilities, was extremely impressive.
 Her throat tightened as the boys mounted their brooms, which were still wrapped in chains,
and pushed off the ground. Then, with a salute from Peeves and a subtle wink in Hermione’s
direction, Fred and George Weasley flew off into the sunset.

The students were riotous, completely beyond containment, but as Hermione looked around,
she quickly found the only other face that mirrored her own. Proud, entertained, but mostly
sad.

As the crowd ran after the boys, watching as their silhouettes shrank against the ochre sky,
she shuffled to her right, reached out, and gave Angelina’s hand a light squeeze.

Chapter End Notes

Go listen to "Could Have Been Me" by The Struts if you're so inclined; I've always
associated this song with the twins leaving Hogwarts. Plus it's just really good.
 Off to the ministry

20 June 1996

“We all ready, then?” Harry asked, glancing around at their assembled party. Hermione
tightened her knees around her invisible steed, keeping a death-grip on its mane in front of
her. It was mad. What they were doing was completely and utterly mad.

Harry told the thestrals where to go and, with little more than a brush of wings on either side
of her, they launched into the sky. For as much as she wanted to, she didn’t scream. Instead,
she shut her eyes tightly and pretended she was on a broom rather than a thestral. That it was
October rather than June. That, instead of nothing but cool air at her back, there was a warm,
familiar chest.

She reached for that memory and gripped it tightly; kept it close to her and prayed that the
sinking feeling she had was nothing more than paranoia. That they weren’t heading into a
trap that was fated to end in disaster.

“Breathe, Hermione,” Fred said softly in her head. “Just breathe.”

 oOoOoOo

“So, you think the first of August will give us enough time?” George asked, bent over one of
the worktables in their storeroom and attempting to coax the Canary Creams into packaging
themselves.

“Yeah, I reckon so,” Fred replied, a few feet away and working on a stack of invoices for
ingredients they’d had, or would soon have, delivered. “Then we’ll get a full month of back-
to-school sales in.”

“Any chance a certain curly-haired prefect will be hanging about to help with the opening?”

Fred shrugged but couldn’t completely hold back a smile. “We talked about it a bit before
you and I left, but nothing is set in stone yet. She has to go visit her parents for a week or two
first.”

He knew he would miss Hermione as soon as he and George started to make plans to leave
prior to term ending, but the sheer weight of it now that he was actually gone was still
somehow unexpected. Despite their attempts to keep their relationship under wraps, it had
been surprisingly easy to find time for one another during the spring term.

Ron and Harry weren’t the most observant, and the only two people that really kept tabs on
him were George, who already knew about them, and Lee, who after six years still regularly
mixed him up with his brother.

It was true, much of that time together had been spent working in silence; she revising for
OWLs, he trying to glean everything pertinent from his classes while also scheming things
for the shop, but in those four-odd months, Hermione had become a constant.

And, for as exciting as the change was, as exhilarating as it might be to see their dreams
slowly become reality, he longed for that constancy so much that it made him ache down to
the bone if he dwelled on it for too long. That said, time to dwell wasn’t a luxury they had
most days.

“Alright, what’s next?” George asked, dusting his hands on his thighs after having finally set
the Canary Creams to rights.

“Bed?” Fred proposed, glancing up at the clock on the wall. Evening had slipped into night,
which was now rapidly transitioning into morning again.

“Probably a good idea,” George agreed, stretching. “We have that meeting with the
apothecary tomorrow at ten.”

Fred finished the form in front of him and then shuffled it to the side to join the stack before
getting to his feet. George had just raised his wand to extinguish the lamp in the corner when,
without even a hint of preamble, a weasel shaped Patronus burst through the wall and came
to a halt between them.
“Fred, George, there’s been an incident at the ministry. Sirius is dead. Ron, Hermione and
Tonks are injured. Your mother and I are on our way to St. Mungo’s; we’ll send word when
we know more.”

The silver apparition disappeared, and everything stopped. His heartbeat. His breathing.
Every thought in his brain. It all came crashing to an abrupt, jarring halt.

George was frozen in front of him, arm still extended with his wand held aloft, staring with
wide eyes at the place the weasel had been a second ago.

Had it really only been a second ago?

He thought he heard his brother say his name, but he couldn’t be sure. It was distant, slow
and garbled. His ears were ringing like they’d just borne witness to a detonation rather than a
succinct missive from their mild-mannered father.

“Fred? Fred, can you hear me?”

He could. He could hear him. But he didn’t have a way to convey that. He couldn’t move.
Couldn’t think.

Ron, Hermione and Tonks are injured.

Ron. Hermione. Injured.

Hermione.

Injured.

His legs buckled, he stumbled backward toward the table, and time started again.
 In the hospital wing
Chapter Notes

The past week has been long and harrowing for a lot of people, for a lot of different
reasons, so here is your not-so-subtle reminder from a stranger on the internet:

Take care of yourselves.

Drink your water. Take your meds. Pet a dog. Go outside and touch some grass.

Slow down.

Ask for help if you need it, and don't be afraid to unplug for a little while if it gets to be
too much. We can't pour from an empty cup; give yourselves the same compassion and
understanding that you give others, because you deserve it.

Chins up, lovelies.

Now, go and read.

21 June 1996

“You’re certainly eating like someone that’s just escaped death, little brother,” George
observed, reclining languidly on the vacant bed opposite Ron’s in the Hogwarts hospital
wing. He and Fred had just arrived to find half of Gryffindor house was visiting, along with
Luna and a few others from Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw.

Ron, who was actively shoveling a plateful of roast and mash into his mouth for lunch, made
a face. “Sod off, I’ve earned it; I have battle scars,” he said proudly, gesturing to the white,
ropelike marks wrapping around the length of his arms. They were still tinged a raw, angry
pink color on the edges.

Fred was happy George was steering the conversation because he hadn’t been able to speak
since they’d walked into the room. He was also thankful that it wasn’t just Harry and Ron
because nobody was paying much attention to him in particular. George glanced to the left
and seemed to take note of his twin’s expression.

“So, how is Hermione doing?” He asked innocuously.

Harry’s face flickered with guilt, and even Ron’s demeanor changed a little. “She’s okay,”
Ron said slowly, shrugging. “The potions make her sleep a lot, and it seems like it still hurts
some, but she’s… she’s okay.”

“Who was it that cursed her?” Fred inquired, breaking his taciturnity and surprising himself a
little. He didn’t realise how much he wanted to know until he’d asked.

“Dolohov,” Neville supplied darkly. “Nobody could figure out what he used, though.”

“Even Mungo’s couldn’t identify the spell, but it was some kind of purple fire,” Harry
expanded, looking a little ill. “They… they said if she hadn’t managed to silence him when
she did, weakened it, it would have killed her.”

Fred’s heart stuttered in its rhythm, and it felt like the walls of the room were beginning to
close in, dark spots blooming around the edges of his vision. When they’d arrived at the
school, he’d considered just being out with it, sod anyone’s reaction, but now he was barely
keeping it together.

He looked again toward the curtained-off bed on the other side of the hospital wing. George,
intuitive saint that he was, hopped up and strode around the foot of Ron’s bed, launching into
an animated story about a crate of fireworks that had inadvertently ignited in the shop’s
storeroom the other day.

Eager to hear about the goings on at Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes, and bask in the levity that
came with the change of topic, all eyes fixed on his counterpart and Fred backed slowly
toward Hermione’s bed, knowing George would come up with an excuse should anyone ask
where he’d gotten off to.

He made it to the edge of the curtain before he felt eyes on him. It wasn’t any of the visitors,
though. As he looked around, he finally saw Madam Pomfrey watching from her desk, the
door of her office half-opened. She held eye contact with him for a lengthy second overtop
her reading glasses before offering a single, subtle nod and turning back to the paperwork in
front of her.

Fred slipped behind the partition and drew his wand, muttering a silencing charm to both give
them privacy and quiet the noise across the room. Then he turned and saw her, and his
stomach dropped.

Hermione looked small, fragile and pallid. She was in the standard-issue blue pyjamas that
everyone in the hospital wing wore, and her hair was braided to the side, laying on her right
shoulder. She didn’t wear it like that normally, so he assumed either his mother or the school
matron had done it for her. There was a small apothecary of potions on the table beside her,
ranging from Dreamless Sleep to extremely potent pain relievers.

He crossed the curtained-off area on unsteady legs before sinking into a chair next to her bed.
Glancing down, he saw a small leather-bound book tucked tightly beside her in the blankets;
her library. For whatever reason, that sight, more than anything, made his throat tighten.
Reaching out, he gently grabbed her hand. It was limp, coaxed into that state by whatever
treatments she was receiving, but it was warm, and he could feel the thrum of a pulse in her
wrist. Alive. She was alive. He realised that was what he’d needed.

He needed to verify that she was okay, even if she was unconscious. It was one thing to hear
it from his father or his brother, but another to actually feel her hand in his, watch her chest
rise and fall in its steady, familiar rhythm.

Fred hated so much that after two months apart, this was their reunion. That it wasn’t dinner
at The Burrow, or him whisking her away to the shop to show her everything they’d
accomplished. The place was admittedly still in a state of chaos, but it was beginning to take
shape and he wanted to share that with her. He wanted to share everything with her.

He drew his thumb in a light circle on the back of her hand and she made a quiet noise,
rolling to the side but remaining deeply asleep. The button-front on her pajamas shifted a
little and he saw a thick band of sterile white cloth encircling her chest, coming up high over
her sternum.

… some kind of purple fire…

… seems like it still hurts…

… would have killed her.

Would have killed her.

He’d almost lost her. Everything he wanted for them, everything she was going to become,
all of it had almost vanished, been ripped away in a blink.

Fred released a shuddering breath, the corners of his eyes prickling, and leaned forward. He
kept a grip on her hand but laid his forearms side by side on the edge of the mattress and
lowered his head to rest on them. Then he focused entirely on the feel of her and let it ground
him, keep him tethered and sane.

This was the same hand he’d grabbed a year prior, as just a friend beside the lake. The hand
that had gripped a broom handle and trusted him, even though she’d been terrified. The hand
that had comforted him when he was the one that was scared, when he was the one that was
hurting.

Fred vowed in that moment that he would do anything, everything, that he could to protect
her. That he would sell his fucking soul to never have to be in this position again.

And he also vowed that, should he ever be given the opportunity, he would be the end of
Antonin Dolohov.
 Broken

3 July 1996

Broken.

Hermione was good with languages, guessing etymology when she didn’t know it outright,
but she’d never understood the depth of that word before, broken. It was from the thirteenth
or fourteenth century, Old English. The original was probably something like brocen or
broccen before it was adapted with the introduction of the Grecian K.

It was an adjective, and it meant to be violently separated into parts. Fragmented. Left in
pieces.

To no longer function as intended.

As she stood staring at her naked body in the mirror behind her wardrobe door, she decided
that, more than anything, it was apt.
It wasn’t just her body that was broken, though. The stark purple line reaching from breast to
hip was more a symptom of a larger problem than anything else, a physical indication of the
discontent that was roiling and bubbling beneath her skin.

It had been over two weeks since the attack at the ministry, and for the most recent two days
of that time, she‘d been at home.

Well, at her parents’ house.

She hadn’t seen Fred. Hadn’t spoken to him. Hadn’t written. Hadn’t even allowed herself to
look at the little silver key, tucked into her bag, tucked into her trunk, tucked into her
wardrobe, tucked… away, far out of sight, like the smallest in a set of Russian nesting dolls.

The key was from before, she was from before, they were from before, and this, now… this
was after.

She reached her hand up and lightly prodded the edge of the welt with her fingertips. It stung
and she sucked in a pained gasp before sinking her teeth viciously into her bottom lip, stifling
it despite the fact that there was nobody around to hear. Her parents had just left for dinner,
Hermione requesting to stay home on account of a headache that she was not actually
suffering from.

Any concern they had in regard to her demeanor was easily explained away by her supposed
anxiety over test scores. It was astounding, really, how effortlessly they bought that pretty lie.
That their studious, bookish daughter was simply concerned she’d checked the wrong boxes
on a sheet of parchment.

But they couldn’t see the brand on her chest, the physical representation of her brokenness.
Thanks to the expert spellwork of Madam Pomfrey, the only people that could see it were
those that already knew it was there. A clever, notice-me-not type of glamour. If she were
capable of such a thing at the time, she would have admired the ingenuity.

Hermione pulled her dressing gown on and crossed the hall to the bathroom she had to
herself. She opened the glass door to the shower and turned the handle on the faucet.

She’d always loved hot showers, borderline scalding, but she wasn’t able to take hot showers
anymore. Not for a long while, anyway. Even if the pain wasn’t unbearable, the memory that
it brought would be. The memory of lying on the floor of the Department of Mysteries,
burning and alone.

Alone.

Middle English, adjective; meaning separated from others. Or, in this case, other. Non-plural.

Yes, Neville had been there, doing his level best to take care of her and Ron, but he wasn’t
who she’d wanted. Who she’d needed. As she teetered on the razor-thin brink of agony and
nothingness, his gentle hazel eyes weren’t the ones that she longed to see one more time.

No, those eyes were blue. And they hadn’t been there.
Hermione pulled in a breath that night and held it, and now it was like she was still holding it.
Even though her lungs were on fire, screaming in protest for any form of relief, she couldn’t
exhale. Couldn’t move forward, but also couldn’t go back. She was stuck.

She stepped under the contemptuously tepid spray, trying to remember why she was
bothering at all. Why she’d even bothered getting out of bed in the first place.

And the thing about those blue eyes was that, for as much as she craved them, as much as she
wanted them with her before, terrified she would never see them again, she couldn’t stand the
thought of them seeing her now. Seeing the pieces. The fragments. The brokenness.

Seeing her after.

Because what if the parts of her that he loved weren’t there anymore? What if they’d been
left behind, forgotten on the floor that night?

Taken in combination with everything else that had gone wrong since they’d last seen one
another, that horrific possibility was too much to bear.

So, she closed her eyes, dipped her face beneath the water, and continued to hold her breath.
 Pulling away
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

14 July 1996

Fred was going out of his mind. It had been almost three full months since he’d spoken to
Hermione. Since he’d kissed her. Since he’d made her laugh. Since he’d done anything
beyond holding her unconscious hand while she laid in a cold, sterile hospital bed.

He’d seen her though. Confirmed that she was alive, breathing, walking about. He’d been by
The Burrow nigh on a dozen times in the week she’d been staying there. Excuses ranged
from Sunday roast to asking his mum how best to repair a rip in a pair of trousers.

And every single time, she’d been attached at the hip to Ron or Ginny. Never attempted to
sneak away, never tilted her head toward an empty room or slipped him a note or even really
looked in his direction beyond a passing glance. A year ago it would have been depressing,
sure, but not really of note. Now though… now it was the definition of agony.
Her smiles were different too. Not just with him, but with everyone. They weren’t warm or
genuine in the way that they used to be. They didn’t light up her eyes or crinkle her nose. It
was nothing more than a compulsory rearranging of muscles.

And when something funny happened, she didn’t laugh. She just offered that hollow,
imposter of a smile, and everyone believed it. Nobody questioned it. Not one sodding person
noticed that something was really, very wrong.

oOoOoOo

George walked into the living room of their flat to see his brother hovering over his favorite
grey jumper with a small bottle of dark blue ink.

“Oi!” He shouted, summoning it from Fred’s hand just as it began to tip. “What the hell do
you think you’re doing?”

“I need an excuse to go to The Burrow,” Fred said hollowly. He looked terrible. They were
meant to open in a little over two weeks and his twin had become scarcely more than a shell
of a man since visiting the hospital wing after The Ministry incident. It looked like he hadn’t
shaved in that time either, and his shirt was rumpled and misbuttoned.

“No, you don’t,” George replied patiently, walking over to grab the stopper to the inkwell and
replacing it.

“What if – what if she’s ready to talk and I’m not there?”

Fred said it quietly, voice tight and eyes focused somewhere distant, and George desperately
wished that he had some sort of sage advice to offer. Some words of wisdom or, lacking that,
comfort. But the fact of the matter was that he didn’t. He didn’t have any more experience
than Fred did with this sort of thing.

Few people their age did.

No person their age should.

It reminded him of when they were little, perhaps five or six, and their mum let them bring a
small rabbit into the house whose mother had been killed by a fox. The other babies had
already died, but there was one left that survived. They tried to nurse it with goats’ milk and a
dropper, keep it warm, but ultimately it perished within a day or two, still too young to be
without its mother.

Both of the twins had been devastated, but George distinctly remembered wanting more than
anything to know how to make Fred feel better, even though he didn’t yet know how to feel
better himself.

“Mate, it’s Hermione,” he said slowly, gently. “When she’s ready to talk she’ll figure out a
way to tell you.”

Fred sank into one of the seats around the dining table, propping his elbows and letting his
head fall into his hands. He squeezed his eyes shut, pulling and accentuating the dark circles
beneath them.

“I just want to help. She… we have this sort of running joke, that we console each other
when something bad happens. But I can’t do that if she won’t let me in.”

“This is different though, Freddie. None of those other things happened to her. Cedric, Percy,
Dad’s attack, Sirius… adjacent to her, to the people she cares about, but not to her. You heard
what Ron said, she was really hurt. She almost died. Hell, she probably would have died if
she were anybody else. Hermione’s tough as nails, but that’s… that’s bound to take some
time to work through, even for her.”

George didn’t know if it was the right thing to say, but Fred nodded anyway and pulled in a
shaky breath. It was quiet for a long moment before he sighed and got to his feet. “Did that
shipment come in from Peru this morning?”

oOoOoOo

It was another three days before George’s prediction came true.

Fred was sitting in the garden behind the house after dinner, watching a few gnomes in the
distance chasing one another. He’d always been entertained by the little buggers, ferocious as
they might be. Crookshanks was weaving around the legs of the bench he was sitting on and
he reached down to give him a scratch behind the ears only to look up a second later and see
Hermione had come outside and was standing over them.

He glanced around to find that they were finally, blessedly alone. Ron and Harry had been
outside a moment ago, but they’d since disappeared.

“Hi,” he said, a bit of surprise colouring his tone.

“Hi,” she replied, offering a ghost of that hollow smile before taking a seat next to him, dusk
slowly fading into night around them.

He wasn’t going to speak first; if she was ready to talk, he’d allow her space to do just that.
Several seconds passed in which bugs chirped and various critters rustled in the foliage
nearby.

“Did you know that – that when you’re drowning, you don’t actually inhale until right before
you black out?”

“What?”

“It’s called voluntary apnea,” she pressed on, hands balled tightly in her lap and eyes focused
forward. Her voice was detached, like she was hardly speaking to him at all. “It’s like, no
matter how panicked you are, how much pain you’re in, the instinct to not let the water in, to
survive, is so strong that you won’t open your mouth, won’t inhale, until it feels like your
head is about to burst and your lungs are collapsing. Then, when you finally do let it in, that’s
when it stops hurting. Stops being scary. Just… stops. I suppose it’s probably kind of
peaceful.”
Now Fred wasn’t sure that he could speak, fairly certain that if he opened his mouth, he was
going to be sick. This wasn’t how the conversation was supposed to go. This wasn’t how she
spoke to him. This wasn’t how she spoke, period.

She sounded like a stranger, and he tried to wake himself, certain that it was a bad dream. He
was convinced that if he just pinched hard enough, they would be back on their balcony and
she’d be in his arms again. Before the ministry, before Sirius, before Dolohov, before… this.

“Hermione -” he croaked, weakly.

“I was right there.” She finally turned her head to look at him. Her eyes weren’t wet, as might
be expected given what she was saying. But they were tired and maybe a little broken. It was
like something in them, that spark that he loved, was gone, snuffed out, and he couldn’t get
through the barriers she’d created to do anything about it. “I was ready to inhale. It hurt so
much, I just… just wanted it to stop hurting. Even if that meant giving up. I didn’t though. I
never took that breath. I still haven’t.”

She turned away again, but this time she looked at the ground rather than the horizon. “I’m
fine. I’m really, I’m… I’m fine.”

There was a bang from inside, followed by someone laughing loudly, and she flinched and
squeezed her eyes shut. It was quiet for another few beats and Fred could hear the blood
rushing in his ears, cold sweat blooming in his palms.

“Please don’t do this…”

It was coming, he knew it was coming, but it was like a train wreck. Two locomotives on
intersecting tracks, about to crash. He couldn’t prevent it, couldn’t intervene. All he could do
was watch.

“I love you, Fred. I love you so, so much. But I… I need to figure out how to breathe again.”

The words left her mouth and hung in the air, steeped with implications.

Before he could stop her, before he could even comprehend what she’d said enough to form a
sentence, she got off the bench and turned to quickly head back into the house.

He just stared.

He didn’t say anything.

It was like he was numb, everything was dull and fuzzy.

And then he snapped out of it. Because this wasn’t how they ended. This wasn’t how this
went. If he needed to fight for them, for her, because she couldn’t, he would do that.

Fred had just gotten to his feet, intent to follow her, when a glint caught his eye and, as he
looked down, he felt like a bucket of cold water had been dumped over his head.

There, on the bench beside where she’d been, was a small silver key.
 oOoOoOo

“You two finally talk things out?” George asked Hermione, smiling and shaking his head.
He’d just walked into the kitchen to refill his glass. Everyone else was still in the living
room, chattering and laughing loudly.

She’d stepped through the back door while he was at the counter and, when a second passed
and he didn’t get a response, he looked up.

When he saw the look on her face the glass in his hand slipped, hitting the bottom of the sink
and shattering.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, instantly alert and looking through the kitchen window to see
Fred standing beside the garden bench. He appeared to be staring at his hand.

“T-take care of him,” Hermione entreated, voice barely above a whisper before she clapped a
hand over her mouth and ran from the room, straight upstairs. He heard the door to the loo
slam shut and looked between the direction she’d gone and the direction she’d come from.

Suddenly, a crack sounded outside, and Fred disappeared.

Chapter End Notes

Trust me.
 Breathe again
Chapter Notes

If you're into a little spicy lady-love, I have a Pansy/Ginny one shot that dropped on my
Works page this week.

28 July 1996

“Are you sure you want to go over there?” George asked Fred, staring at him as he made
notes on an inventory clipboard. This marked the fifth time he’d posed that question in the
past 24 hours.

“Yes,” Fred replied tiredly, “it’s really fine.”

“Lee said you can stay at his place, even with him being gone on holiday.”
“I know what Lee said, he said it to me, and I’m saying that it’s fine. She didn’t break up with
me, we’re just… I don’t know what we are.”

Since that night at The Burrow, nearly two weeks prior, Fred had managed to get himself
black-out drunk, spent nearly two days with a hangover that no potion could remedy, and
then he’d thrown himself headlong into getting the shop ready to open.

Into the dream that was still solidly in front of him and begging for attention rather than
pushing him away.

“Angie said she doesn’t mind going out –“

“George,” Fred sighed, “I’m going to hex your bollocks off if you don’t drop it.”

His counterpart finally relented and went back to packaging on the worktable across the
room.

It was just one night. One night at The Burrow so George and Angelina could have the flat to
themselves for her birthday.

He could handle one night.

oOoOoOo

He could not handle one night.

For nearly a year, he’d become accustomed to Hermione looking up when he entered a room.
To searching for her face, her reaction, when something happened, or someone made a joke.
Not having that now was like a ladder being pulled from beneath him just as he hit the top
rung, left floundering fifty feet in the air before plummeting to the ground.

He’d found out from his mum over dinner that she’d received ten OWLs. Ten. And all she’d
done was shrug and thank him when he congratulated her.

Fred rolled over before finally sitting up and looking at the clock beside the bed. It was
nearly one in the morning. He stood and pulled a shirt on before leaving his and George’s old
bedroom to go downstairs and make a cup of tea.

Just as he hit the second-floor landing to descend into the kitchen, he heard a faint whining
sound. He thought it might be Crookshanks, but as he listened more closely, he determined it
was distinctly un-catlike and it was coming from the same direction as Ginny’s deafening
snoring.

His heart dropped as he stepped toward the girls’ bedroom door, slowly turning the handle
and opening it just a crack. Ginny was, predictably, asleep and dead to the world on the far
side of the room.

But nearest to him was the second bed. The one that held Hermione.
She was wearing cotton shorts and a vest, her limbs tangled in the sheets, and she’d left the
lamp beside her dimly lit. She must have been reading because a book had fallen to the
ground, still open.

Legs jerking, she whimpered again, and Fred was, unsurprisingly, powerless to do anything
but go to her side. He shut the door behind himself quietly and put up several layers of
silencing charms around the bed to both prevent waking Ginny and quiet her snuffling.

First, he bent down and picked up the book, smoothing a crumpled page before placing the
bookmark in it, the one he’d given her, and putting it on the night table.

Then he dropped to his knees beside the bed and looked at her. Really, truly looked at her.

Her hair was matted to her forehead with sweat and there were dried tear-tracks on her
cheeks, eyes red-rimmed. Her breathing was unsteady, coming in arhythmic starts and stops,
punctuated by the occasional soft sob.

But he looked past that, looked past all of it, to stare in abject dismay at her chest. Perhaps
two inches above where her shirt began, just over her right breast, there was a thick, raised
purple welt, slashing downward at an angle and disappearing beneath the fabric.

He shut his eyes and tried to take a deep breath, but it was like the air had been sucked from
the room. His hands were shaking and he balled them into tight fists, nails digging painfully
into his palms. After a second, he steeled himself and opened them again, reaching out to
gently push her hair off her face.

“Hermione, wake up. You’re having a nightmare.”

“No, don’t,” she mumbled, lurching away from his touch. He tried to swallow but his mouth
was too dry.

“Love, wake up. It’s just a dream.”

He repeated variations of this twice more before she finally jolted awake and blinked her eyes
open, squinting against the light and into his face.

“F-Fred?”

He nodded, ignoring the swooping in his stomach at hearing her say his name again. “I
heard… I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

She nodded shakily, disoriented and looking around the room.

Not sure what else to do, he was preparing to stand and take his leave when out of nowhere
Hermione suddenly, violently began to cry. It was the most gut-wrenching, broken weeping
he’d ever heard in his life, worse than even his mother when Percy left.

Her hands braced on the mattress and her shoulders caved inward, shuddering and shaking.
“Fred,” Hermione repeated again, barely audible this time. And then she reached for him,
closed her hand around his wrist like a vice and held on hard enough to bruise.

Knowing that it was a gamble in more ways than one and not caring a wink, Fred moved to
sit beside her and carefully pulled Hermione into his lap, cradling her quaking frame to his
chest. She was noticeably lighter than she’d been the last time he’d done this, the last time
he’d held her.

She balled her hands in the fabric of his shirt and buried her face in his shoulder, muffling the
sobs.

“You’re okay,” he whispered, running his hand in a soothing circle between her shoulder
blades. “You’re safe.”

He let his head fall backward against the wall and held her as tightly as he could, as if his
arms alone might somehow be enough to put the pieces back together.

Perhaps a minute passed, and then Hermione choked out the three words that would haunt
him for nights to come. The three words that he hadn’t admitted to himself consciously. The
three words that had made him crawl into a bottle of firewhiskey and get so drunk, George
had found him attempting to burn the shop to the ground.

And they would haunt him because they were true.

“You left me.”

For one fleeting second, he thought that she was talking about the dream, but reality came
and ripped that theory away, taking a small piece of him with it.

“I thought – I thought that I was going to die, and you weren’t there,” she whispered,
hiccoughing around the words. The shoulder of his faded Gryffindor t-shirt was thoroughly
soaked through with tears by that point.

She didn’t say it maliciously. It wasn’t an accusation meant to hurt him, but if he’d thought
her not speaking to him was agony, this was an anguish like he’d never felt before.

And what made it so excruciating was that he couldn’t deny it. He had left her, and he wasn’t
able to pretend that it wasn’t the case, because it was. Even if she’d told him it was okay,
even if she’d smiled as he flew off, kissed him goodbye and wished him well, it was still his
decision to make. And, ultimately, he’d decided wrong.

If Fred and George hadn’t departed Hogwarts when they did, if they’d stayed to finish out the
year, they almost certainly would have been at The Ministry with Ron and Ginny. With Harry
and Neville and Luna. With Hermione.

With two more wands on their side, skilled wands no less, she might not have gotten hurt.
Might not have almost died. Hell, they could have apparated straight to Grimmauld Place that
night and prevented the whole thing. And it was the “might” of it all that plagued him.
“I know,” he said unevenly, not realising until that moment that he’d begun crying too. He
pulled in a shuddering breath and released it again, raising a hand to cup her damp cheek. “I
know. I’m sorry, Hermione. I’m so fucking sorry.”

He felt her nod and he leaned forward, burying his face in lavender-scented curls and
clinging to a silent absolution that he wasn’t sure he deserved.

oOoOoOo

Hermione woke the next morning to find her eyes red and swollen. Fred must have left
sometime in the night because she was carefully tucked beneath the blankets, and he was
nowhere to be found.

She hadn’t cried since The Ministry, not one time. Not from the pain or the emotional trauma
or the penetrating, directionless anger. But upon seeing Fred leaning over her, concerned and
clearly hurting himself, it all came out at once. Like a dam breaking, messy and utterly
overpowering, but inevitable.

Despite what the darkest corners of her mind tried to whisper to her, she didn’t blame him.
She knew logically that the twins being there might not have changed anything. Hell, things
could have gone even worse, and they might have lost more than Sirius.

As she sat up, noting Ginny was still asleep, she realised she felt more herself than she had in
weeks. Her head was a little foggy, and she was most definitely dehydrated, but it was like
the cracks, all the little broken pieces of her, had started to find their way back together; to
seal again.

And she also realised that she could finally breathe.

It was still hard, still terrifying, really. And she couldn’t help but wonder if some small part
of her had died that night in the Department of Mysteries; the girl that she’d been, left lying
on the floor while the other harder, more durable fragments of her were whisked away to be
glued back together. But even without that part, she was still her. Still Hermione. And if last
night proved anything, it was that Fred was still Fred.

Now all she could do was hope everything else wasn’t beyond repair.

oOoOoOo

Hermione came down to breakfast late, the same time as Harry and Ron. Fred was leaning
against the counter with his teacup, idly talking to his mum about the store opening while she
fried bacon and pretended she hadn’t spent the previous two years trying to quash his dreams.

He’d stayed in Hermione’s bed with her until dawn, holding her while she cried, dissolving
into tears himself more than once, and then continuing to hold her after she fell asleep. For
hours and hours, he just sat and held her. Now, the next morning, his back was sore, he was
completely knackered, and he had no idea what to expect.

Until he heard her laugh.

It wasn’t quite there yet, didn’t sound exactly the same as it had before, and perhaps it never
would, but she laughed nonetheless, and Fred closed his eyes and reveled in that pure, simple
sound.

His mum turned to do something at the sink and Fred took the opportunity to head for the
breakfast table. He stopped short and leaned against the wall beside the clock, silently
watching.

Ron and Harry were facing away from him, piling food on their plates like they were victims
of a hunger crisis. But Hermione… her cheeks were still a little puffed, but something had
shifted in her demeanor.

It was her eyes. They weren’t hollow anymore. There, shining back at him, was that spark.
Subdued, tucked away, but irrefutably present.

She looked up to see him staring and offered a tentative smile, a real smile. She glanced at
the boys, who weren’t paying attention, then back to him and slowly mouthed the words,
“Thank you.”

Fred swallowed hard and dropped his gaze for a second. Then he looked up again. He twisted
one side of his mouth into a smirk, inclined his head, and raised his cup, dipping into the
subtlest of bows.

Her gaze lingered on him for second before she turned her attention back to her breakfast,
rolling her eyes at something Ron said and interjecting about their trip to Diagon Alley the
following week.

She smacked his brother’s hand when he tried to grab a sausage from her plate and Fred had
to stifle a chuckle.

He turned back toward the kitchen and said quietly, under his breath, “There’s my girl.”
 Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

3 August 1996

“What time is it?” Fred asked, handing a bag full of products to the pack of prepubescent
boys in front of him. George had just levitated a crate of Skiving Snackboxes out of the
storeroom door behind him.

“Well,” his twin replied, setting down the merchandise, “seeing as it was 1:40 when you
asked me two minutes ago, I would wager it’s probably in the neighborhood of 1:42.”

“And what time are they meant to be coming?”

“Mum’s owl said around 2 o’clock, but they had other stops to make. Why don’t you go walk
around the floor, yeah? Lee should be back from lunch any minute, he can help me up here.
And you’re making me nervous.”
Fred nodded absently and stepped out from behind the till, into the fray. He hadn’t seen
Hermione since that morning at The Burrow. Granted it had only been five or so days, and
he’d been so busy with the opening that he wasn’t sure which direction was up anymore.

In that time, he’d held that smile in the back of his mind, the feeling of hearing her laugh
again. He clung to it in part because he didn’t know exactly where they stood now. And
frankly, he was afraid to guess one way or the other.

Being held at a distance by her before, by hollow smiles and shrugs was one thing, but if she
did it now, when he’d finally seen that fire in her eyes again… he wasn’t sure if he could bear
that.

So, he busied himself with setting the rubber wand display to rights and pretended he wasn’t
a hairsbreadth away from a full-blown panic attack.

oOoOoOo

When Hermione walked through the doors of Weasleys’ Wizard Wheezes, she couldn’t recall
a time in her life that she had ever been prouder. Not when she’d received her prefect badge,
or her OWL scores. Not the first time she’d ridden a bike or made the dean’s list or even
when she got her Hogwarts letter.

The unmitigated joy of seeing Fred’s dream become a reality, of walking in and standing in
the middle of his and George’s accomplishment, was unlike anything she’d experienced
before. She ogled for a moment, in between a wide-eyed Ron and Harry, and then quickly
broke off.

Everything was bright and colorful and full of life. The twins were trading in levity and
laughter in a time when such things were difficult to come by. It was what Fred was to her,
simply multiplied and blown up to a massive scale.

It only took a minute of walking among the shelves and looking over heads before she saw
him, facing away from her in front of a barrel labeled “Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder.”

She swallowed dryly and then half-shouted over the din, “This is quite a place you’ve got
here.”

Fred spun around so quickly, it was borderline comical. He didn’t say anything at first, and
she figured that was fair if he was even half as on-edge as she was.

“The shop, it’s… I can’t put into words how amazing it is, Fred.”

When he still didn’t say anything, she started to get the urge to squirm. Hermione knew she’d
been wrong to treat him the way she had, even if it had been born out of a sort of twisted
attempt at emotional self-preservation, but the least he could do was throw her a line.

“What did you —?”

“What happened to your eye?” he cut in, seeming to shake himself before finally speaking.
“My eye?” she asked, confused. She raised a hand and, upon making contact with the skin on
the right side of her face, flinched. In her eagerness to see him she’d entirely forgotten about
the bruise.

He nodded, expression wracked with concern, and stepped closer to her as a procession of
customers made their way behind his back. He placed a knuckle beneath Hermione’s chin and
tipped her face up to better examine the discoloration. If she’d had any doubts about feeling
the same way for him, about their connection being intact, they rapidly disappeared. The
instant he made contact with her, it felt like her skin was buzzing.

Luna passed by in her periphery, but if she thought anything peculiar about their intimate
posing, she didn’t voice it. Just blithely smiled and waved before floating behind another
shelf and out of sight again.

“Someone left a box of defunct punching telescopes in their bedroom,” she explained, arching
a brow and wincing a little. “This person also didn’t see fit to label said box.”

“You’re kidding,” Fred said, expression turning to one of disbelieving dismay. “This was my
doing?” His thumb slid up and along her jaw and she shivered. He seemed to realise, rather
suddenly, that they weren’t alone and stepped away, clearing his throat. “Um, I have some
bruise balm upstairs if you want.”

She nodded, knowing this was both a genuine offer and an invitation to talk privately.

Following him through the throng, they passed George and Lee behind the counter, both of
whom were preoccupied with a collection of customers in front of the till. He opened one of
several doors and she followed him into a small alcove that led to a flight of stairs.

When they reached the top, he opened another door and then she was standing in the living
room of his and George’s flat. It was modest, and a little sparse in furnishing, but homey. A
pair of burgundy sofas flanked a fireplace that had been enlarged to allow for floo travel, the
warm tones reminding her of the common room without being too on the nose. Behind that
was a small, dark wood dining table with four chairs, one end laden with paperwork.

There were other things too; mismatched lamps and rugs, a half-full bookcase, a desk piled
with more paperwork. She felt a flash of guilt, knowing that she should have seen it sooner.
Should have written and come over right after term ended like she’d planned months ago, but
she hadn’t.

“It’s not much,” Fred said self-consciously, hastening to the dining table and shuffling the
paperwork atop into neater stacks. She realised abruptly that he was waiting for her reaction,
and nervously at that.

Hermione smiled and shook her head. “It’s brilliant,” she assured him.

He took her through the other rooms, pointing things out along the way; a decent sized
kitchen, George’s bedroom, a small office being used for storage, and a bathroom with a
large, copper clawfoot tub. She raised an eyebrow at this, and he shrugged, retrieving the
bruise balm from a cabinet and handing it to her. “Dunno, it was there when we moved in.”
But it was when they stepped into his bedroom that the air changed. The questions in her
head about the state of their relationship tripled and hummed, petitioning for attention. It
smelled like him.

She looked at the large bed in the center of the far wall and she had a rather obstinate urge to
crawl under the blankets and bury herself in it. Keeping up the appearance of a sane person,
at least for the time being, she refrained.

“Can I show you my favorite part?” he asked, grinning at her. He seemed particularly excited,
and her stomach fluttered as she nodded.

Fred stepped around the bed to the wall with several windows, tugging the drapes to the side
to reveal a door. He then moved back and tipped his head at it, intimating that she should
open it. Curiously she gripped the handle, turned it, and exhaled in surprise.

The flat had a balcony.

It wasn’t as big as theirs had been, nor as private, but still, it was there. There were two
garden chairs with comfortable looking pillows on them and a small table in between,
holding a forgotten teacup and a small stack of books and parchment.

“I spend a lot of time out here,” he explained, waving his wand and sending the dishware
floating back inside, presumably to the kitchen. “Had to fight George for the room.”

She took a few steps out and leaned over the iron railing, looking down at the street perhaps
thirty feet below. He followed her, placing a hand beside hers just close enough to brush their
pinkies together.

Hermione took a deep breath, let it out, and then said what she’d planned for days to say.

“I’m not the same as I was when you left, Fred. The ministry — it changed things. I hate it,
but it did. And I know that we have to talk about that. About what happened and how it
affected me and how it affects us and what comes next and… and everything. There are
things to work through, and healing to be done, and it’s a long, important process.”

It looked like a weight settled on his shoulders, and a small crease formed between his
eyebrows, but he nodded, staring out at the stone building across the way. The wind ruffled
his hair ever so slightly, and sunlight flickered through the pale grey clouds, painting his
freckles in stark relief.

The air was heavy with the clean, fresh scent that preceded a summer rain storm and a silent
moment passed before she spoke again.

“And can we please skip it? Can you just kiss me?”

His head snapped toward her, eyes wide and eyebrows raised. She barely had time to take a
breath before he lunged forward and molded his lips firmly to hers, connecting and then
gently parting in a familiar rhythm. It felt like coming home after a long holiday; reaching
out and blindly flipping a light switch in the dark because you know exactly where it is.
 One of his hands coiled in her curls while the other came rest on her waist, holding her to him
while she looped her arms up and around her neck. They stayed like that for a long while,
though still not long enough, before he finally broke away and rested his forehead against
hers, breathing hard and keeping her tightly against his chest.

“I missed you,” she whispered, lowering a hand from around his shoulders to rest lightly on
his cheek. Her voice was thick with emotion. “And I’m so sorry.”

“I love you,” he replied simply, sparkling azure eyes searching hers. A soft smile lit his face,
and she returned it. Those three words said everything else that there was to say, and she
rolled onto her toes to kiss him again.

“Oh, thank Merlin!” They didn’t step apart, but both turned to look at the door of the balcony.
George was sticking his head out, countenance one of outright relief. “Sorry to interrupt.
Hermione, Harry and Ron are looking for you, something about Malfoy acting dodgy. And
Fred, we need more Wild-fire Whizbangs from storage. Finish up and get a move on!”

Chapter End Notes

Enjoy my lizard-brain vision of Fred's room.

 According to plan
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

14 August 1996

“Are you sure you don’t want me to come in, dear?” Mrs. Weasley entreated, placing a hand
on Hermione’s shoulder to steady her after the jarring and uncomfortable experience of side-
along apparition.

“Oh no, it’s quite alright,” Hermione assured, stuffing down a small wave of nausea. “My
parents are likely finishing up at the practice anyway, they’re probably not even home yet.”

“Alright, if you’re sure. I’ll have Arthur come back and pick you up tomorrow. Did you say
noon?”

“Noon will be perfect. Thank you, Mrs. Weasley – I’m so grateful to you and Mr. Weasley
for letting me stay with you as often as you do, but I can’t wait to see my mum’s face when
she gets back. It is their anniversary, after all.”

Mrs. Weasley smiled at her once more before stepping back into the cover of the hedge that
lined the back garden and apparating away with a quiet pop. For a moment Hermione was
nearly overcome with the guilt she felt at lying to the woman, but her excitement quickly
outpaced it ten to one.

She glanced at her watch to note that it was nearly six. Any minute now –

“Is it actually your parents’ anniversary?” George asked curiously, dropping his
disillusionment and emerging from behind the garden shed. He was carrying two brown
paper takeaway bags.

“Yes, they’re just celebrating it in France. How long have you been there?”

“Just a minute. You’re lucky mum and I didn’t apparate in at the same time. Would have been
a mite awkward.”

“I know, we were supposed to get here earlier but I was running behind.” She pulled the
small overnight bag more squarely on her shoulder in preparation to apparate yet again. “Did
you get it?”

George shifted the takeaway to his other arm and dug in his pocket for a moment before
extending his hand to her. “Yep, just had to nick it from his bedside table.”

She took the small silver key in her palm and made a solemn vow not to part with it again.

George left his arm out for her to grab, but Hermione hesitated for a second, rocking in place.
“George, I just wanted to thank you for helping me orchestrate this. And I wanted to
apologise for… for what I did earlier this summer. What I said in the kitchen, and the
position that I put you in.”

He huffed a small laugh and tipped his head. “I won’t lie – when you came into the house that
night, I just about had a heart attack, seeing the look on your face. I thought maybe you’d
killed him, you seemed so distraught. But I understand, really. I know Fred has said as much
already, but for what it’s worth, I am truly sorry that we weren’t there with you.”

Hermione nodded and smiled. Every day she felt a little bit better, a little bit more whole.
Perhaps the pieces weren’t exactly where they had been before, but she was coming to terms
with that too. And this day in particular was one she’d been looking forward to for nearly two
weeks since she’d had the idea.

“What are we having for supper, anyway?” Hermione asked, finally stepping up to take his
arm and eying the takeaway.

“Chinese; Angie and Lee have been versing us in the wonders of ethnic takeaway, and we’ve
been trying different places around the city. Is chow mein alright?”

“It’s perfect.”
 oOoOoOo

Fred had just gotten out of the shower and put on a fresh pair of jeans and a faded black
Weird Sisters t-shirt. Lee and Verity, their newest hire, were closing up downstairs while
George had gone out to pick up dinner, and he was fully prepared to enjoy his first true
evening off since their opening.

He ran a towel over his head roughly before throwing it onto the back of the chair in his room
and padding barefoot into the main living area. He leaned over the write-up for their latest
patent, which was currently spread on the dining table, and began to agonize over the
wording for the umpteenth time. A few minutes passed before he heard a key jiggle in the
lock beside the fireplace.

“Took you long enough, Georgie. Did you go all the way to China to get the bloody food?”

“I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but it’s not quite that authentic.”

At the sound of her voice, Fred looked up in shock to see not his brother in the doorway, but
Hermione. She was in a dark blue t-shirt with some indecipherable writing on it and a pair of
denim shorts that were living up to their name. Her hair was down and wild, his favourite of
the ways she wore it, and she was holding a paper takeaway bag in one hand and an
unmistakable key in the other.

“Hermione, wh –?” he trailed off stupidly, completely caught off guard and gaping like a fish.
He was suddenly very aware that the shirt he’d put on had a hole in the back.

“The key works,” she said with a wry smile. “I hope you don’t mind, I took the liberty of
having it stollen back.” She casually shut the door behind her and locked it before stepping
beside the fireplace and toeing off her trainers.

“I definitely don’t mind,” Fred said slowly, looking uncertainly around the room and then
back at her. This had to be a dream, but he didn’t recall having gone to sleep. “But I’m going
to need you to explain exactly what is happening right now. Small words, please.”

“Well,” she said deliberately, a smug grin spreading across her face then, “Your mum thinks
I’m having dinner with my parents for their anniversary and then sleeping at their house. My
parents are on holiday and think that I’m still staying with your family. George will be at
Lee’s this evening – whose father apparently gifted him a television set and the complete
works of The Three Stooges. I am currently in your living room with Chinese takeaway and,
the way that I understand it, you have a much-deserved night off. Does all of that sound
accurate?”

Fred started to smile back, thoroughly bemused and realising with a flicker of pride what
she’d managed to execute. “Yeah. Yeah, I suppose I’d say that’s the shape of it.”

“Perfect. Then why don’t you get us something to drink while I set up the food?”

Chapter End Notes

This may or may not be inspired by my personal adolescent exploits.
 Scars and confessions

14 August 1996

“So, you actually put – “

“Uh-huh, cat fur,” Hermione affirmed, laughing and reaching up to accept the bottle of
butterbeer Fred was handing her over the back of the sofa. They’d long since finished dinner,
takeaway containers still strewn on the dining table, and had migrated to sit in front of the
fireplace.

“I can’t believe Ron hasn’t told us that story,” he mused, resuming his seat and placing her
feet back in his lap.

“I made a number of threats to both his and Harry’s person should anyone besides the two of
them find out. I suppose he took me seriously.”

“Alright, so that means it’s my turn then…” Fred pondered aloud, staring at the ceiling
thoughtfully. “Well, you were there for the incident with the age line sixth year.”
Hermione snorted into her drink mid-sip and sputtered, vividly remembering said event. “I
was, and I don’t think I’ll be forgetting about it in a hurry. No offense darling, but an
enormous white beard might not be the best look on you.”

He chuckled in agreement. “Oh! Okay, so when I was maybe six, we went to my Aunt
Muriel’s for Easter dinner and afterward I got into her rather extensive stash of sweets.”

“Oh no,” Hermione said with wide eyes, seeing instantly where this was headed.

“Oh yes. I ate no less than six whole packs of Bertie Bott’s Every Flavor Beans and then
proceeded to vomit both every flavor and every colour all over her very lavish, very beige
sitting room.”

“That’s not embarrassing, it’s just gross!” Hermione chastised, wrinkling her nose and
giggling.

“I beg to differ!” Fred retorted, feigning affront. “I was really, very mortified. I still haven’t
been invited back to her house.”

They both laughed quietly for a moment.

“Okay, your turn to come up with a question,” Hermione finally said, poking him lightly in
the ribs with her toes as he took a drink.

Fred swallowed and turned to look at her, free hand tracing the line of her calf. “How is it
that you’ve always been able to tell George and I apart?”

“Mmm,” Hermione hummed, leaning to the side and setting her bottle on the table beside
them. “I was waiting for you to ask me that one again.”

“In all the months we’ve been together, you’ve never told me.”

“Oh, I’ll tell you, but at this point I’m afraid you’re going to be disappointed in my answer.
There really isn’t any sort of complex trick to it.” Fred raised his eyebrows expectantly and
she pressed on. “Well, as you know I took quite a bit of pleasure in knowing everything about
everything when I was younger.”

“When you were younger, huh?” Fred teased.

“Hey, if you don’t want me to tell you –“

“Sorry, sorry, go ahead.”

“Anyway, it bothered me to no end that I couldn’t figure it out at first. Like a riddle niggling
at the back of my brain. So, I started to pay attention, really close attention, and I eventually
noticed that despite being identical, you and George have different freckles.”

“Fair enough,” Fred considered, nodding. “I could see how that would work up close. But
you’ve positively identified me at twenty paces before.”
“I have,” Hermione confirmed, cringing at herself a little. “And that’s the rather lame part, I
suppose? You see, once I started watching the two of you, figured out who was who, I
realised that your effect on me was the thing that varied. You always made me sort nervous
and on edge. I never felt that with George, and I didn’t actually realise why that was until last
spring.”

By the time she finished, she was biting the edge of her lip and her cheeks were on fire. Fred
was staring at her with an indecipherable expression, as though it were the last thing he’d
expected her to say.

She swallowed hard and added quietly, “I’m fairly certain that at this point I could be placed
in a room with a hundred polyjuiced versions of you and still know which was the real you.”

The mood went from light, humorous, to charged. Hermione knew when she made these
plans that her spending the night came with a sort of implication; she wasn’t about to sleep on
the sofa, after all. But in the same respect she didn’t want to push things.

Other than the day on the balcony two weeks prior, and a couple of quick, stolen kisses
around The Burrow, they hadn’t been together in any sort of physical sense since he was still
at school. Since before.

“Want another drink?” Fred asked, jerking his chin toward the mostly empty bottle beside
her. He seemed to have sensed the shift as well.

“No,” she said, slowly shaking her head and smirking.

“More food?”

“All set.”

“I think I have a gobstone set around here som-“

“We could go to bed,” she suggested, holding her breath.

“It’s hardly ten,” he replied, squinting at her a little.

“I didn’t say we had to sleep.”

Well, if there was a question before there wasn’t now.

“Right,” he breathed in a huff, “Erm, give me a few minutes to straighten up?”

“Of course, I’ll help.”

They cleared away the butterbeer bottles and dirty plates, and then packaged the leftover
takeaway up and put it in the fridge. It was all exceptionally domestic, but Hermione found
that she didn’t mind that. At least, she didn’t mind it with Fred.

He’d just set the dishes to wash themselves in the sink and seemed a little unsure of exactly
how to proceed now that the cleaning was accounted for.
“Do you want to…” he trailed off as Hermione stepped across the small kitchen to stand in
front of him, close enough that their chests were nearly touching. She tipped her head back to
look up at him.

“Do I want what?” she asked quietly, searching his face.

“I, umm… I don’t remember.”

He leaned down and captured her lips in a sudden, burning kiss, the taste of butterbeer still on
his tongue. Hermione sighed, one hand gripping his shoulder and the other reaching around
to clutch his back above the waistband of his jeans.

One of his hands wrapped around the back of her neck while the other cupped her bum. He
carefully walked them backward into the hallway until they hit the wall, then turned and
proceeded to guide her toward his bedroom.

After a little stumbling, and a little laughing as well, they arrived at the foot of his bed. He
dipped to kiss along her throat below her jaw and she saw that the room was dimly lit by the
streetlights outside filtering through the windows. As if reading her mind, Fred waved his
hand and, silently and without looking, ignited the lamps on either side of his bed so the
room was washed with warm, muted light. That was new, and it was both impressive and
incredibly sexy.

That said, when he brought that same hand back to her waist and gripped the hem of her shirt,
she firmly pumped on the brakes.

“Wait,” she said quickly, jerking backward and out of his arms. Fred’s expression
immediately changed to one of concern and she flashed back to their first night on the
balcony. This was different though.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, brows tugging together.

Hermione swallowed hard and pulled in an uneven breath. She wasn’t sure how much he’d
seen that night two weeks prior at The Burrow and she felt it needed a little preamble because
even just looking in the mirror still surprised her sometimes.

“It, umm…” she started. She trailed off, took another breath and closed her eyes before trying
again. “It starts here,” she said, pointing to her chest, just above her right breast. “And it ends
here.”

She trailed her finger over the raised mark, spanning nearly all the way down to her left hip.

When she opened her eyes again, Fred’s expression had shifted from one of concern to one of
thoughtfulness. It was gentle and open, and she couldn’t imagine being this vulnerable with
anyone else. Handing herself, scars and all, to another person.

“Does it hurt?”

“No, not anymore.”

He stepped slowly toward her and reached again for the hem of her shirt. Once he had it in
his grip though, he stopped and waited. Watched her. And after one breathless, daunting
moment, she nodded and raised her arms. He pulled the t-shirt smoothly over her head and
discarded it on the floor.

Fred didn’t look at her chest yet. He placed his hands on either side of her face and kissed her
slowly, thumbs brushing along her cheekbones. Hermione had never thought a kiss in itself
could be reassuring, but this one was. It absolutely was. As she sank into it, into him, he
reached around her back and unhooked her bra.

“First try,” he muttered, grinning against her lips and she laughed lightly in spite of her
nerves. She shrugged her shoulders one at a time and let the bra join her shirt on the ground.

He stepped back and reached over his shoulder to tug his own shirt off. Then, and only then,
did Fred look at her. Merlin, the way he looked at her… The expression on his face wasn’t
pitying or repulsed or any of the things she’d told herself in those darkest moments it would
be. It was just Fred. Warm and considerate and, most importantly, hers.

She shivered and he stepped toward her again. Then he dipped his head and trailed his mouth
over the topmost edge of her scar.

It was sensitive and unexpected and so absurdly intimate, she stopped breathing entirely for a
second. He slid his hands up the sides of her waist and kissed in a slow, steady track, over her
sternum, between her breasts, and finally, when he reached the top of her stomach, he
dropped to his knees.

Hermione trailed her fingertips through the hair on either side of his head, brushed over his
temples, raking her nails lightly along his scalp and smiling when he shuddered. A warm
exhale washed over her left hip. And then they both stopped moving for a moment. Paused.
Froze.

He was still kneeling in front of her, forehead resting against her ribs while she cradled his
head to her, and the rest of the world just sort of fell away. It wasn’t as if the past several
months hadn’t happened, pretending that was the case would be a disservice in more ways
than one, but it was like they had come out on the other side of a storm. Older, maybe a little
bit worse for wear in some ways, but together nonetheless.

Eventually he sighed and shook his head, getting to his feet.

“I just don’t understand it,” he muttered, brow furrowed in incredulity, standing in front of
her again with his arms looped around her waist.

“Understand what?” she asked, tilting her chin.

“How it’s possible. How I can look at you and just feel… everything.”

Hermione smiled and leaned up to kiss him before drawing back again. Then she deliberated
for a moment. She hadn’t been sure when she’d gotten there what she wanted to do, how far
she wanted things to go, but standing in front of him, feeling safer and more loved than she’d
ever felt in her life, she did know. With absolute certainty.

“Make love to me,” she entreated, quietly but clearly. “If you’re… if you want to, that is.”

It wasn’t surprise that flashed across his face, not entirely at least, but more a sense of
responsibility.

“Are you sure?” he asked. “Because we could stop right now and I’d be completely happy
with that, Hermione. More than happy with it. You’ve been through a lot and I don’t want
you to feel any sort of pressure to-“

“Fred, my heart’s already yours. I want to give you the rest of me too.”

He offered her a nervous smile and nodded. She stepped back and unbuttoned her shorts,
pushing them down past her hips along with her knickers. There wasn’t any point in dancing
around it.

“Bloody hell,” Fred groaned, wiping a hand over his face and covering his mouth when he
finally saw her completely naked, standing in his bedroom.

“That bad, huh?” She laughed, glancing down at herself. Barring the scar and The Great Red-
lingerie crisis, she’d never been particularly self-conscious. She knew she wasn’t supermodel
skinny; she had a little belly and her hips dipped in on the sides, and her thighs had a few
dimples up near her butt. But her body, flawed though it might be to an outside party, had
seen her through a hell of a lot, and she loved it for that. And moreover, she knew Fred did
too.

“I’m just thinking that I must have been a saint in my former life,” Fred clarified, shaking his
head.

She rolled her eyes and then looked pointedly at the jeans that were still on his body.

“Off with them, Weasley.”

Still looking bemused, he unbuttoned his trousers, pulled the zip down, and then shoved them
to the floor along with his boxer shorts and stepped out.

She blew out a hefty sigh, lips buzzing together a little as she took him in.

“That bad, huh?” He asked, a mischievous glint in his eye.

“Hardly,” she said skeptically, gaze sweeping over his body and dawdling briefly between his
hips with a newfound consideration for what they were about to do. “I’m just a little
concerned I may have overestimated the logistics of this.”

He shook his head and laughed. “Go lay down before you inflate my ego so much that I float
away.”
Hermione took a few steps to the side and settled on the edge of the half-made bed before
scooting up to the pillows and lying back. It was just as comfortable as she’d imagined it
would be the first time she’d been there.

Fred climbed on as well, kneeling between her parted legs.

“What are you doing?” she asked in surprise when he shuffled back and lowered his mouth to
her left hip, where he’d left off earlier.

“Well,” he murmured, kissing the top of her thigh, “I want to do everything I can to make this
good for you. And to be perfectly honest, it’s been a while since… and we’ve never… I just
mean, this may be over more quickly than might be ideal.”

The self-consciousness in his eyes somehow smoothed the frayed edges of her own nerves.
She propped herself on her elbows and looked down at him.

“Hey,” she said quietly. Fred glanced back up. “It’s us. Anything that happens or doesn’t
happen is okay. And besides, we’re very good at practicing.”

His shoulders relaxed a little, he nodded, and then in one fell swoop he dropped his mouth
over her, and she fell back onto the pillows again. Given that he had only done this once
before, it went astoundingly quickly. She gave some credit to the circumstances themselves
as well. The knowledge that she was in his bed, surrounded by the familiar smell of him, the
complete privacy and time that they’d never really had before.

Fred eased one finger into her, then two, seeming to make more of an effort to move them
and stretch her than he had in the past. She certainly wasn’t complaining. All the while his
tongue flicked and circled and sucked in a dizzying array of sensations.

“Don’t stop,” she eventually gasped, rolling her hips off the bed. He followed her command
with pleasure before finally shoving her tumbling over the precipice. The muscles in her
abdomen clenched and she turned her head, cry muffled by the pillow.

Finally, after, she relaxed, panting and coming to the realisation that her own fingers, when
compared to that, were slightly inadequate.

“Problem?” Fred asked curiously, spying the slightly irritated expression on her face and
looking amused.

“I think you’ve ruined masturbating for me,” she lamented, still breathing heavily and feeling
a little miffed. Fred absolutely guffawed.

“More’s the pity, darling,” he finally said, not looking remotely apologetic as he crawled up
to lay next to her. “More’s the pity.”

She caught her breath for a second.

“Alright, contraception charm,” she said. “I don’t fancy the Improper Use of Magic Office
bursting in here, so I’ll leave it to you.”
Fred, once again surprising her, put his hand out and muttered, “Accio.” His wand flew from
the pocket of his discarded jeans on the ground and landed squarely in his palm.

She made a note to ask him about the wandless magic later.

He leaned up, directed the wand to point over her abdomen, and repeated the charm that
Madam Pomfrey was responsible for disseminating to every Hogwarts student in their fourth
year. Her lower stomach glowed dimly for a second before the light dissipated.

“Huh,” Fred mused, thoughtfully. “Did that feel like anything?”

She shook her head. “Not really… maybe a little tingly.”

He considered this for a moment before seeming to remember what they were casting the
charm for in the first place.

“Okay, how do you want to go about this?” Fred asked gamely.

“Would it be okay if I’m on top? I just think I might be a little more comfortable directing
things this go-round.”

Fred nodded and smiled again, adding a little self-deprecatingly, “Hermione, I’m about to
have sex for the first time. There’s very little you could suggest right now that I wouldn’t be
okay with.”

He laid on his back and shifted to the middle of the bed. She eyed him thoughtfully for a
second before suddenly ducking her head and taking him in her mouth as far as she could,
holding her hair to one side.

“Holy – love, that’s – blokes don’t work like that,” he stuttered, hips bucking upward.

She laved her tongue over him for just a minute, before pulling back again to see a slightly
strangled expression on his face.

“Lubrication,” she explained matter-of-factly, and he made a weak sound in the back of his
throat.

She crawled up, leaning over him on all fours with her knees on either side of his stomach.

“If it hurts or doesn’t feel right –“

“I know,” she assured him, dipping down to place a slow kiss on his lips. Not wanting to
waste the additional moisture she’d introduced to the situation, she rocked her hips back and
felt him slide along her center, warm and wet. They both shuddered.

Seeing as her arms were busy supporting her body, Fred reached down and positioned
himself at her entrance. His other hand rested lightly on her hip; his thumb circled lightly, and
she took a deep breath, releasing it slowly as she eased him inside of her.
It didn’t hurt, not really. There wasn’t any dramatic tearing or bleeding. It was more of a
fullness, a pressure, than anything else. When he was perhaps halfway, she stopped and took
another breath, adjusting to the sensation that was simultaneously familiar and completely
new.

“A-are you okay?” She asked, taking note of the strained expression on his face below her.

“Yeah, just… just a second.” Fred closed his eyes and she stayed completely still while he
pulled in a few deep breaths of his own. “Okay, go ahead.”

She leaned back further, letting his hand on her hip guide her, until finally he was seated
entirely inside of her, her inner thighs coming to rest on his hips. She pushed off her arms and
carefully sat back.

“Oof,” she huffed. She wasn’t sure she’d be able to climax this way at first, but her clit
bumped against him where they were connected and her opinion on the matter very quickly
changed.

“Holy fuck,” Fred groaned. His hands were on either side of her waist and his fingers flexed
and gripped her. “You feel… holy fuck, Hermione.”

She started to laugh, which apparently had a bit of a tightening effect because she abruptly
cut off and they both gasped. She wasn’t hellbent on coming this way, not their first time at
least, but seeing as they were already there, it was worth a shot.

Balancing on her knees, she experimentally rocked up and forward until he was almost
completely out of her and then she sat back again.

Fred was breathing as though he was nearing the last leg of a marathon, his face and chest
flushed. It felt good, really good, but she remembered that brief moment of friction and,
making eye contact with him as she did it, she brought her hand to the apex of her thighs and
began to touch herself with him inside of her. Now that felt great.

His eyes widened at first but, realising what she was hoping to achieve, his hold on her waist
tightened a little and he rocked back into the mattress and then pushed up into her. He did it
slowly once and then again, falling into a controlled rhythm while she flicked her fingers
over herself.

It was an impossible cocktail of feelings, and a thin sheen of sweat broke out across her body.
As he brought his hips up to meet hers, she rolled forward and tipped her head back, letting
her hair cascade over her shoulders and planting the hand that wasn’t busy on his chest to
steady herself. She could feel his heart pounding like a battering ram beneath it.

A few minutes passed before Fred groaned and bit out through his teeth, “Love, I don’t know
if I can – bloody hell, I’m not sure how much longer I can hold out here.”

“I’m close,” she gasped, rocking and grinding against him in what she could only describe as
a lust-fueled fervor by that point. She fell forward completely, bracing and supporting herself
on her left arm beside his shoulder while the fingers on her right hand kept circling and
flicking, frantically, desperately, until – “Oh God, I’m going to come. Fred, I – I – “

She cried out incoherently, clenching around him while her hand balled into a fist, gripping
the sheets. Her forehead dropped to rest against his shoulder and her eyes squeezed shut. As
she rode the shockwaves of her orgasm, Fred suddenly locked one arm behind her lower back
and the other across her shoulders, squeezing her against him like a vice.

He thrust up and into her hard twice before stilling and coming with a positively raw, throaty
groan beside her ear. It was unbearably arousing; to not only hear and see him completely and
totally unravel, but to feel it too. To actually feel his hips stutter and jerk, his hand cup her ass
and pull her against him in a futile attempt to get deeper, closer.

Having recovered a little, she rolled her hips as he finished, tightening around him and
eliciting a truly vibrant string of curse words that made her smile. Finally, he stilled and
quieted, and the only sound in the room was their loud, labored panting.

“You didn’t give yourself enough credit,” she huffed, flopped forward and boneless with her
cheek resting against his shoulder and their chests pressed together. Despite the fact that they
were both roughly the temperature of the sun, Fred’s arms were still around her back, holding
her to him.

“I have never in my life tried so hard to not do something,” he replied, sounding a little shell-
shocked.

Apparently sex had an impact on her short term memory because she laughed again and they
both hissed at the resulting effect.

“Alright, I need to go and clean myself up,” she finally said. It didn’t seem like there was any
point in mincing words considering he was actively dripping out of her, and they were both
presumably aware of that fact.

He nodded and assisted in easing her up and off of him. She had George’s solemn word that
he wouldn’t be returning that evening so, after hesitating briefly, she made a nude dash to the
loo a few feet down the hall.

Hermione quickly concluded that cleaning up after sex was significantly less erotic than
having sex. She took her time, going to the bathroom and then splashing a little cool water on
her neck and face.

She then hastened back to the bedroom and shut the door behind her with a quiet click. Fred
was still in bed, though she assumed he had cleaned up as well, the covers now pulled up to
his waist. She debated retrieving the pyjamas she’d brought, but she spotted the Weird Sisters
t-shirt he’d discarded earlier on the ground and snatched that instead.

Once that was on, baggy and just barely brushing the tops of her thighs, Fred pulled the edge
of the blanket back and she slipped in beside him. He’d apparently cast a charm to cool and
refresh the sheets and if she didn’t love him before, she would have purely for that.
He slid closer to her and she rolled over, feeling him immediately spoon himself around her.
It felt like he’d put his boxer shorts back on as well.

“So, what’s the verdict?” he asked, sounding completely satisfied and not just a little tired.
He’d turned off the lights and the room was composed of dark shades of grey from the
streetlights outside.

She grinned. “I mean, it wasn’t bad –”

He reached down and pinched her bum and she laughed, trying and failing to wiggle away.
Fred nuzzled his head into the crook of her shoulder, dropping light, lazy kisses beneath her
ear and across the back of her neck.

“It was amazing,” she said sincerely, reflecting on the experience. “Honestly, I thought
people were exaggerating a little.”

Fred chuckled and nodded. “I knew it’d be good, especially with you, but that…”

It was quiet for a moment, even the city outside beginning to drift into unconsciousness.

“Thank you for being my first.”

Hermione felt sleep quickly approaching and she sank backward into him, giving into it
without a fight.

The last thing she heard as she began to drift was, “With any luck, I’ll be your last.”
 Aurum silence

Never was an early riser

Used to be an up-all-nighter

Never saw the morning light quite like I do now

Never said no to a party

Never started saving money

Everything is different since you've been around

It's the way you're smiling at me

 It's in the way you hold my hand

It's the way I've watched you change me

From a boy into a man

It's a million things about you

And I don't know what it is

I have never known a love like this

Love Like This , Ben Rector

15 August 1996

Hermione blinked her eyes open to see the first traces of morning light peeking around the
curtains in Fred’s bedroom. She yawned and looked over to find that he was still sound
asleep, sprawled next to her across the pillow.

Spending the night in bed with another person wasn’t exactly as glamorous as movies and
television made it look, but after some minor readjustments they’d both found positions that
more or less suited them. And after five years of bunking with Lavender and Ginny,
Hermione was just thrilled that he didn’t snore.

She laid quietly then, just watching him for a little while; his face was usually so animated
and expressive, but in that moment, that stolen moment, it was lax, calm. Like a portrait of
the word tranquility.

Knowing that it would probably still be a fair amount of time before he was up, Hermione
brushed a feather-light kiss on his cheek and then carefully slipped out of bed without waking
him. After hunting across the dark floor, she uncovered and pulled her knickers on beneath
his tshirt. It was barely seven and the shop didn’t open until ten, so, after brushing her teeth
and finger-combing her curls, Hermione walked down the hallway, crossed the living room,
and opened the door that led to the stairs and down into the shop.

The contrast between how it had been the other day, loud and vibrant and full of people
bustling about, and how it was when she stepped out from behind the counter was jarring. It
was completely silent, the other businesses in the alley not yet open either, save for perhaps
the owl post.

Hermione appreciated the quiet because it gave her a chance to actually look around without
being jostled or shouted over.

She started at the back where the standby products were; the ones that people were going to
come in and buy regardless of whether or not they had an enormous display. These included
Dungbombs, Fanged Frisbees, Snackboxes and their various fireworks merchandise.
Ducking down the first aisle, she trailed a finger along the middle shelf as she read; trick
wands, Comb-a-Chameleon, Sticky Trainers, Headless Hats, Extendable Ears, Nose-biting
Teacups… she happened upon a collection of Smart Answer quills on an endcap and pursed
her lips disapprovingly.

As she continued to explore, she was struck with that same sense of pride, and the fact of the
matter was that she wasn’t just proud of him as the man she’d spent the night with, the one
still sleeping upstairs.

She found that she was also indelibly proud of the schoolboy from over a year ago, sitting by
the edge of the lake and doodling logos before he had even one galleon toward making that
dream a reality. The one that had fractured a little bit when his brother left. The one that had
cried in a dusty old classroom, terrified of what the world had in store. And the one that had
delved into the fray knowing the risks and forged a path forward anyway.

It was hard to wrap her mind around how much had happened in the past year, but there she
was, standing in the middle of a testament to all of it. And it was stunning.

oOoOoOo

Fred rolled over and reached out for Hermione only to find her gone. He glanced at the clock
and saw that it read 7:30, then felt the bed where she’d been to find it was still a bit warm. He
cocked an ear but he didn’t hear the sink or the shower.

The previous night had been, without a doubt, the best of his life. Even if they hadn’t had sex
that would have still been true. The casual way that she strode into his apartment, kicked her
shoes off like she belonged there – which she did. Talking for hours about nothing and
everything. Seeing the trust in her eyes when she showed him all the pieces of herself, the
parts nobody else had seen; the parts that he knew she still struggled to fully accept.

Falling asleep with her in his arms, tucked to his chest, after all of that had been the closest
thing to perfection that he could imagine.

Marginally less so when she rolled over and accidentally kneed him in the middle of the
night, but such was life.

Fred stretched and grabbed a fresh t-shirt from the wardrobe before ducking into the hall and,
confirming that the bathroom was vacant, going about his usual morning routine. He knew
Hermione was an early riser, and he wasn’t concerned she’d found a way to occupy herself
while he was still sleeping.

However, when he stepped into the living room and peeked into the kitchen to find both of
those empty as well, he started to get a little curious. Then he noticed that the door to the
stairs was slightly ajar and grinned. He cast a silencing charm on his socks and crept down.
Sure enough, walking between the shelves and tracing her finger beneath the product names,
was Hermione.

The sun had just peeked over the building across the alley from them and it was streaming in
the upper windows around the various advertisements in hues of vibrant gold. There were
dust motes hovering and sparkling in the air, catching the light, and for a little while Fred just
stood there watching her, eyes roving and dark caramel curls swaying a little as she walked.
He’d admit he ogled a little too; her legs looked absolutely fantastic sticking out from
beneath his t-shirt, after all.

And he watched curiously as she rounded the end of an aisle, stood in the very center of the
store, and turned deliberately in place.

It struck him because it was the same thing he had done when they got the keys to the place.
George had gone to the back room, eager to explore, but Fred had just stood for a second,
taking it in. It was empty then, and significantly shabbier, but it was his. Or half his, in any
event.

He was shaken from his reverie when Hermione rotated toward the light and he caught a
glimpse of tears glittering on her cheeks. Fred removed the charm on his feet and strode in,
making sure to shuffle a little, and leaned on the counter beside the till.

Hermione slowly turned in his direction and smiled, and he had to wonder if she’d known he
was there the whole time. He didn’t say anything though, didn’t want to break that tranquil
silence; he just smiled back.

After a long moment she swallowed and said quietly, voice tight and expression a little
pained, “I’m sorry I wasn’t here.”

Ah. So, that’s what the tears were about.

Fred stepped from behind the counter and crossed to her, still in just boxer shorts and a t-shirt
himself.

“You’re here now,” he pointed out easily, tipping her chin up and sweeping the tears on her
cheeks away.

“I know, I just… I wish I hadn’t missed it.” He leaned down and pressed a kiss to her
forehead, smoothing the worried crease between her eyebrows.

“Most of the heavy lifting was done before you even took your OWLs; by the time term was
over with, it was just a lot of tedious packaging and production, coordinating shipments and
the like. You’d have been dreadfully bored.”

She nodded, sniffled, and then shook her head a little, like she was trying to clear away the
thought. Always with the stiff upper lip, his witch.

“Do you want coffee?” Fred asked, baiting her with a grin. He’d kept the percolator from
Grimmauld, and Remus had established a rather hefty collection of grounds that he
shamelessly pilfered from when cleaning out the house with the other Order members.

“Yes,” Hermione bit her lip and smiled back, gaze narrowing. “But there’s something I’d like
just a bit more first.”
“Is there now?” he asked slowly, taking note of the wicked glint in her eye. “Mmm, I think I
have a package of bacon...”

She shook her head.

“Pancakes, then?”

“Nuh-uh.”

“Oh, I know; toast and jam.”

“Wrong again,” she lamented, teasing her fingertips along the front of his shorts.

“Ah,” he said, nodding sagely. “Sausage it is.”

She pulled her hand back and smacked him.

oOoOoOo

“Everyone clothed?” George’s voice called, having cracked the door of the flat open just a
little.

“Nope, starkers and shagging on the sofa!” Hermione shouted back, legs tucked under her as
she turned the page on her book. Fred snorted, seated at the dining table all of ten feet away
and bent over some paperwork he’d meant to catch up on the night prior. It was silent for a
moment, as if George wasn’t sure if he should take her seriously, before the door swung open
and Angelina stepped in around him.

“I told you she was joking,” Angie said, rolling her eyes and plopping unceremoniously onto
the couch beside Hermione. “Hey Hermione.”

“Hi Angie,” she greeted. They weren’t particularly close, but Hermione had come to find that
there was a certain solidarity in dating a Weasley twin. “Is my hair going to bother you?”

“Nah, George mentioned you’d be here, so I took a Benadryl. My allergies always pester me
in the summertime anyway.”

“How terribly muggle of you,” Hermione laughed, knowing full well that neither of the boys
had any idea what Benadryl was.

George shut the door behind him, kicking his shoes off.

“Hermione,” he said in greeting. An impish grin split his face. “Sleep okay?”

Fred lobbed a balled-up piece of parchment in his direction without looking up, which
George easily sidestepped.

“Just fine, thanks,” she replied haughtily, not giving anything away. “How were The
Stooges?”
“Brilliant,” he said, all traces of joking fading from his face as he shook his head reverently.
“Absolutely bloody brilliant.”

“Please, he’s been saying ‘nyuk, nyuk, nyuk,’ all morning,” Angelina sighed tiredly, much to
Hermione’s amusement. “Are you staying the day?”

Hermione shook her head, glancing at the clock on the mantle that read a quarter past eleven.
“Afraid not, I’m meant to be back at The Burrow at noon.”

“Speaking of which,” Fred said, having finished whatever he’d been working on and set it
aside, “we should get going.”

Hermione nodded, this having been her suggestion. She’d done her best to power through the
day prior, but back-to-back side-along apparition was distinctly unpleasant, and she didn’t
fancy vomiting on Mr. Weasley’s shoes. Recovery time was deemed a necessity this go-
round.

“I told Lee you’d take over at one,” George said, passing Fred on his way to the kitchen. Fred
nodded.

“I’ll go grab my things,” Hermione sighed, unfolding from the sofa and heading for the
bedroom. Fred followed her, laying crossways on the bed while she sorted through the
articles of clothing that had been strewn about the room.

“Oh, almost stole this one,” she remarked, separating his Weird Sisters t-shirt from the
clothes she’d worn the previous night.

“Keep it,” Fred suggested. “Looks better on you anyway.”

She smiled, rather liking the idea of sleeping in his shirt, and stuffed it into her bag.

It only took a moment to make sure everything else was accounted for.

“I wish I was staying longer,” she sighed, looking around a little dejectedly. Going back to
The Burrow, to preparing for a fall term without him, felt like leaving a very safe, very
comfortable bubble.

“We’ll just have to do it again,” Fred said easily, ever the optimist. But she looked more
closely and could tell he was a little sad too.

“Well, no point in putting it off.”

“We’ll have to go to the apparition point downstairs – wards.”

Fred grabbed her small rucksack and slung it over his shoulder, taking her hand and pulling
her back into the living room.

“See you later, Hermione!” George called as they passed the kitchen, in the process of
constructing a sandwich.
“Thanks again, George,” she replied, genuinely grateful for his help. He waved her off and
they went to the door of the living room. Angelina was still on the couch and Hermione felt a
small pang of jealousy before deciding that was petty. It wasn’t Angelina’s fault that she was
older and already done with school.

“Bye Angelina,” Hermione said as she tied her trainers.

“Have a good year,” Angie responded kindly. “Take care of yourself this term. I’m sure I’ll
see you around the holidays.”

It was an offhanded comment, clearly made without much thought, but it warmed something
in Hermione’s somewhat melancholy disposition. There was a sort of implied permanence
and she glanced over to find that Fred looked similarly pleased. Angelina wasn’t even paying
attention by the time Hermione straightened up and opened the door, descending the stairs.

“Do you care if Lee knows you were here?” Fred asked when they reached the bottom. “He’s
not going to tell anyone, the only people he talks to are George, Angie, Verity and I.”

Hermione shook her head. “No, that’s fine with me.”

They hadn’t discussed the idea of telling people since that last night he was at school. It felt
like playing catch with something fragile, but she was falling into the stance of, rather than
making a big announcement, just letting people figure it out. This was as good a time as any
to test that method.

Fred opened the door that led into the store.

“Hey Lee,” Fred said, casually walking past him. It looked like Verity was out on the floor,
but they hadn’t quite hit the afternoon rush yet.

“Hey Fred,” Lee replied, counting out change for the middle-aged witch in front of him.

“Hi Lee,” Hermione added nonchalantly, stepping in behind him with a smirk tugging at the
corners of her mouth.

“Hi Hermione,” Lee said, glancing up and then back to what he was doing. He handed the
woman her change and pushed a bag across the counter before writing something on a pad of
paper beside the till. He nodded to himself, customer-service smile still on his face.

Hermione looked at Fred questioningly, wondering if he’d already told Lee about them. Fred
shook his head and held up one finger in a “wait for it” motion while the other hand came to
rest familiarly on her hip.

Hermione leaned against the wall behind the counter and, sure enough, a second later Lee
spun around with a gob-smacked expression.

“Hermione?!”

Fred snorted and Hermione outright laughed.

Lee glanced between them rapidly, looking like a confused cartoon character before rounding
on Fred, jabbing a finger and half-shouting, “I KNEW IT!”

“You did not!” Fred shot back, straightening up and looking affronted.

“Well… I knew there was something I didn’t know!” Lee retorted obstinately.

Hermione put her hands on Fred’s shoulder and shoved him toward the back door that led
into the alley, sensing a full-blown debate brewing.

“Nice seeing you, Lee!” she called over her shoulder, still chuckling.
 Differences in upbringing

15 August 1996

“Are you going to be alright?” Fred asked, taking note of the pale green hue underlying
Hermione’s cheeks as they stepped out of the bushes in the back garden. He deliberated,
trying to judge whether or not he should be holding her hair away from her face. He also felt
a little guilty, knowing his side-along abilities were probably still a bit lack-luster.

“Yeah, just a second,” she said tightly, closing her eyes and bracing an arm on the garden
wall beside them.

Fred nodded and gave her some room to breathe, taking advantage of the opportunity and
looking around curiously.

“This is your house?” he asked a second later, eyes wide.

Hermione cracked a lid open to look up at him. Her color was already a little better.
“Yes,” she said slowly. “Be a bit odd to randomly apparate into a stranger’s garden, no?”

“Yeah, it’s just…” Nice. It was really nice. “I mean, I didn’t know you were…”

She arched a brow, clearly not following him.

“Just a bit bigger than I was expecting,” he finally finished lamely, rubbing a hand over the
back of his neck.

“Oh.” Hermione looked at the building like she hadn’t noticed it, the last in a row of looming
Victorian townhouses. “We still have a bit of time before your dad gets here… do you want
to see inside? I think I have my house key.”

He considered before giving in to his curiosity and nodding.

Hermione dug in the pocket of her bag and produced a small brass key, contrasting the one
he’d given her to the shop. She then proceeded to the door that led inside from the garden and
turned it in the lock.

Fred followed her in and confirmed that the inside was just as nice as the outside implied it
would be. They crossed a small mudroom into a kitchen twice the size of The Burrow’s,
polished and practically sparkling. There were a number of trinkets and items that he didn’t
recognise on top of the counters, pushed beneath the cupboards.

“Mum isn’t much of a cook,” Hermione explained, “but she’s a complete nutter about
keeping everything tidy.”

She led the way through to the living room, a large fireplace flanked by sofas with what he
identified as a television set in one corner and a grand piano in the other. “I took lessons
when I was younger,” she said, gesturing to it.

They continued on in this way, Hermione pointing at various things and Fred nodding but
remaining silent. He could tell it was setting her on edge, but he hadn’t quite figured out how
to respond yet; what to say.

Finally, they went upstairs and she opened the door to her bedroom. As one might have
predicted, one whole wall was comprised of bookcases, each packed and stuffed to the brim.
There was another fireplace, light stone with a dark mantle, and a four-poster bed with gauzy
white linen hanging from the canopy. The furniture was all a rich, dark cherry color.

Hermione leaned on the edge of the mattress and watched him look around. He saw a scrap
of parchment tucked between two books on her desk with his own writing from New Year’s
Eve earlier that year.

He paced along the shelves, eyes catching on titles that he’d heard her mention before, or
seen her toting around. There were hundreds of them.

“I don’t understand,” Fred finally said, turning to face her. He was standing beside one of the
massive windows that looked down into the garden.
“Don’t understand what?” Hermione coaxed patiently.

“Why do you spend so much time at The Burrow?”

He didn’t mean for it to be offensive at all; it was a genuine question. Fred was eighteen,
grown and out of the house. He didn’t have any lingering illusions about his family’s
financial status, and he was having a difficult time wrapping his head around why Hermione
would opt to share a tiny room with his sister every holiday, wait in a queue for an hour to
take a shower, when this was an option.

“Is that what’s bothering you?” She looked a bit relieved as she strode across the room to
stand beside him.

“I just… Harry staying with us makes sense. I helped break him out of the Dursley’s once, so
I know how terrible it is there. But you clearly don’t need to.”

Hermione nodded, not seeming outwardly upset. “Well, I suppose it goes without saying that
my parents live rather comfortably.” She went and leaned against the bed again, looking
around the room and squinting, like she was trying to see it from his perspective. “Despite
what people might assume in seeing this place, I didn’t have the best childhood, Fred. My
mum and dad are lovely people, really, but I think they always knew that I was different.
Things happened around me, as they do with all magical children. Objects would disappear
and then reappear. They’d put me to bed only to come downstairs and find me waiting for
them in the kitchen a moment later, asking for another bedtime story. And I don’t blame them
for keeping me at arms-length as a result; they didn’t understand what was happening, and
I’m sure it was distinctly unnerving. Then by the time we knew that I was a witch and not an
alien or demonically possessed, it was like the opportunity to bond had sort of… passed. At
this point they’re more like flatmates that occasionally ask me to sweep up or take the
rubbish bins out.”

Fred went to sit beside her, watching her distant expression and feeling a bit bad for bringing
it up, however unknowingly.

A tiny part of him also wondered why a rubbish bin would need to travel, but he elected not
to give it a voice.

“Anyway, that’s not to even mention the kids at school. Between my hair, my teeth and my
proclivity to lug enormous books around, they weren’t exactly kind. But the first time I went
to your house, back during the summer before fourth year… I don’t know. It was like getting
a glimpse of what my life could have been like, growing up with magic – siblings too. Not
feeling like an outcast or needing to censor myself. Everything about it, about your family,
was warm and welcoming; George cracked a joke at my expense and your mum offered me
breakfast before I was even fully in the door.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable,” Fred backtracked, reaching out to take
her hand.

“You didn’t. I didn’t even think about it, honestly. It hadn’t occurred to me that you’ve never
seen where I grew up.” She glanced sideways at him and a sly grin appeared. “If it had, I
would have recommended we get here with a bit more time to spare.”

“Is that so?” Fred asked. He was suddenly very aware that they were sitting on a very empty
bed, in a very empty house.

“Mmhmm,” Hermione hummed. She turned more fully toward him, rose onto her knees, and
slung a leg over the tops of his thighs, straddling him. Despite having already performed
valiantly no fewer than three times in the past 12 hours, his cock twitched to attention as she
dipped her head and pressed her lips to his throat, just over his pulse. “I spent a fair few
nights in here pining after you last summer, you know.”

“Well, while you were busy pining, I was picturing your ass and having a wank,” Fred teased,
allowing his head to drop back. Hermione snorted inelegantly, grinding her hips lightly
against his. His fingers flexed, one hand on the top of her thigh and the other reached around
to squeeze her aforementioned ass.

“If we’re quick, maybe –“ She was abruptly cut off by a knock at the back door. They both
made disappointed sounds and she climbed off, straightening her shirt and running a hand
through her hair with a sigh. “Right. See you at dinner next weekend?”
 Evidence
Chapter Notes

Sorry kids, this week was eaten by work and wedding planning. I promise I didn't forget
about you.

*If you like the shirt in the chapter art, I pulled part of the design from KrisKenshin over
on RedBubble. You should check out their store.*

17 August 1996

“Hurry up, Gin!” Ron called impatiently as his sister bounded upstairs to change her shirt for
a bit of quidditch practice in the grove beside the house.

“I’ll be down in a second, keep your knickers on!” She shouted back.
Ron, Harry, Hermione and Luna were already outside, the latter two content to sit on a
blanket in the shade and watch. Ginny ducked into her bedroom, reaching over her shoulder
to tug her shirt off before quickly donning the new one. She spun in search of a hair elastic
and her hip caught a book Hermione had left on the corner of her night table, sending it
tumbling to the floor with a heavy thud.

“Ugh,” Ginny groaned, bending down to grab it. It had fallen beside her roommate’s trunk
and her overnight bag from the visit to her parents the weekend prior. Ginny was just about to
turn and head back downstairs when she caught a glimpse, through the open zip on said bag,
of a familiar green and white design.

She froze and turned back, glancing at the door and wavering in place before she reached in
and grabbed the t-shirt that was stuffed in with several other pieces of laundry.

“No fucking way,” she breathed, examining the article more closely. She quickly flipped it
over, looking along the bottom hem for – there. There was a distinct hole burned into the
fabric. And Ginny knew that there was a hole in the fabric because she’d laughed her ass off
when Fred had put it there when they were living at Grimmauld Place after accidentally
igniting the tip of his wand when it was in his back pocket.

Ginny lowered the shirt and looked out the window in disbelief.

“Hermione Granger, you absolute minx.”

oOoOoOo

Hermione finished brushing her teeth and then turned, grabbing her small bag of toiletries off
the sink and traipsing back across the hall to the room she shared with Ginny.

The other girl had been uncharacteristically quiet all afternoon, nearly knocking Ron off his
broom twice while they were practising, and that seemed to be a theme that was destined to
carry into the evening.

“Alright, Gin?” Hermione asked cautiously, tossing the clothes she’d worn that day in the
hamper beside the door.

“Mmhmm, just fab,” Ginny said, tight lipped and refusing to look at her.

“Are you sure?” Hermione prodded, brows pulling together. She and Ginny weren’t exactly
the best of friends, but she’d always thought they’d got on fairly well, and this behavior was
most definitely out of character. “Did I do something wrong?”

“No, no, nothing wrong. Nothing wrong at all.”

Hermione sighed. This was why her friendships with other girls never lasted; she had zero
patience for this sort of thing. She crossed the room to sit cross-legged in front of Ginny, who
was obviously feigning reading the latest issue of The Quibbler, hand-delivered by Luna
earlier that day. She licked the tip of her finger and flipped a page so roughly that it tore a bit.

“Ginny,” Hermione said impatiently. “Out with it.”

“Oh, I see,” Ginny huffed, setting the magazine in her lap and straightening up, “Now you
want to talk.”

“Did I not want to talk previously?” Hermione asked, confused and searching her recent
memory for whatever slight Ginny was referring to.

“Must not have,” Ginny shrugged, slowly turning to grab something from behind her pillow,
“seeing as you’ve been shagging my brother and you didn’t see fit to tell me!”

She thrust a damning black t-shirt into Hermione’s lap and crossed her arms tightly across her
chest, waiting for a response. She looked unnervingly like her mother when she did that.

Hermione quickly debated the options available to her and, panicking, chose the wrong one.

“Ginny, I just found this in the twins’ bedroom when I was looking for something to sleep in
the other night.”

“Hermione, that is a load of Hippogriff shit! I know for a fact that Fred took that shirt with
him when he moved out, it’s one of his favorites.”

Hermione, aware enough to recognise when she’d lost, sighed in defeat and sank back against
the footboard behind her. “Fine. Yes. I am seeing your brother.”

“For how long?!”

Guilt washed over her. “Eight months,” she mumbled. “Give or take a few weeks.”

“Eight mon — I can’t believe you,” Ginny said, sounding genuinely hurt. “I’m assuming
Harry and Ron know?”

“No,” Hermione assured her quickly, shaking her head. “No, nobody knows outside of
George and Angelina.”

And Lee as of two days ago, but it seemed like this fire was burning perfectly fine on its own
without throwing petrol on it.

Ginny seemed somewhat placated by this information. She brooded silently for a moment
before retorting, “I still think it’s rotten that you didn’t tell me. We’ve only lived together
every summer for three years...”

“I know, I’m sorry. There was – it’s just been an odd couple of months since the ministry.” It
was quiet for a moment, Hermione running her fingers over the soft, worn article in her lap
and finding it difficult to feel too guilty. Finally, she extended her foot, nudging Ginny in the
leg and offering a timid smile. “Do you want to hear about it?”

Ginny looked like she desperately wanted to say yes, but ultimately she heaved an enormous
sigh and rolled her eyes. “Oh alright, if you must. But keep the naughty bits to yourself, I still
need to be able to sleep tonight.”
Hermione grinned then, unexpectedly excited to have someone to talk to about all of this.
Someone that knew her as more than just an acquaintance.

“Well, we decided to give it a go on New Year’s Eve, but really it all started last spring…”
 Goodbyes
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

31 August 1996

“So business is going well, then?” Mr. Weasley asked, passing a basket of rolls down the line.

“Better than we projected,” Fred affirmed.

They were all sitting around a long table, arranged in the garden both because the weather
was nice and, though it went unsaid, because it would be rather cramped were they all to eat
inside. In addition to Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, Ron, Harry, Hermione and Ginny, they were
joined by both Weasley twins and Luna, who had walked over from her own home.

“With the current proceeds, we should make it through winter just fine,” George said.
“There’s already a fair amount of interest coming in for mail orders as well, which will only
pick up once everyone is back at school.”
“That should make my job nice and easy,” Hermione huffed from a few chairs down.

“Oh, don’t be so boring, ‘Mione,” Ron scoffed, rolling his eyes. “The world won’t end if you
turn a blind eye to a prank here or there.”

Fred coughed, sputtering into the top of his water glass, and Hermione pursed her lips but
otherwise remained silent.

“So,” Ginny said a moment later, over the sound of forks scraping on plates, “How is Verity
settling in?”

“Fine,” George shrugged. “She’s been training with Lee mostly, so we can focus on product
development and inventory and such.”

“She’s quite pretty, isn’t she?” Mrs. Weasley asked leadingly, looking between her sons.

George made a face. “Angelina will turn me inside out if I even think about answering that
question. Nobody is pretty enough for that.”

Everyone chuckled and Hermione relaxed, thinking they’d dodged a bullet.

“And Fred? How are you getting along with Verity?” Ginny inquired innocently, tossing her
hair over her shoulder as she rounded on her brother. Hermione, who was sitting beside her,
reached beneath the table and dug her nails ruthlessly into the top of Ginny’s bare thigh.
Ginny, to her credit, didn’t flinch.

“Alright,” Fred replied, narrowing his eyes at this sister. “Like George said, she’s mostly
been working with Lee.”

“You know,” Mr. Weasley said, clearing his throat, “Wilkins at work has a daughter that
graduated last year, a Hufflepuff I think. She just moved to London a few weeks ago – maybe
you could show her around the city, Fred?”

Fred seemed to realise then that he wasn’t getting up from the dinner table without offering
some sort of insight into his romantic affairs, and Hermione wasn’t sure what she wanted him
to say; if they outed themselves like this it would feel like they did it because they were
cornered, not because they wanted to. Plus, she was already rather emotional about leaving to
go back to school, so she waited with bated breath, the same as everybody else.

“Actually,” Fred sighed with all the enthusiasm of a man faced with a firing squad, “I’ve
recently started seeing someone.”

Hermione thought inwardly that eight months might be stretching the definition of ‘recently.’

“Who?” Mrs. Weasley asked eagerly, forgetting her plate entirely and leaning forward, elbow
nearly toppling her wine glass.

“Just a friend,” Fred said evasively. “Someone from school.”

Luna giggled, staring directly at Hermione while she squashed her roll into what looked like
a duck with her fingertips, but nobody paid it any mind. She had a tendency to do that sort of
thing, unnerving though it might be.

“Oh, you kids,” Mrs. Weasley tutted, looking a little put-out and turning back to her food.
“Casual shagging with a friend is not the same thing as a relationship.”

“I suppose you’re right, mum,” Fred admitted in mock-defeat, raising his waterglass in her
direction and tipping his head. “But either way, you can inform Wilkins that I’m not
available.”

oOoOoOo

“Casual shagging, huh?” Hermione asked, meeting Fred in the orchard after everyone had
gone to bed. The moon was creeping across the sky, painting everything in pale blues and
greys.

“Wait, is it more than that?!” Fred conjured an expression of horror and she rolled her eyes,
pressing onto her tiptoes to kiss him. He leaned back against a tree and Hermione stepped
between his feet. “So, I take it Ginny knows?”

“Mmhmm,” Hermione confirmed. “And she’s covering for me now as retribution.”

“And Luna?”

“I guess?” She shook her head. “I mean, I didn’t tell her, but I’m not surprised.”

He nodded understandingly and then pecked her on the nose. “How long do you have?”

“A couple hours. I do need to get some sleep; I have prefect duties on the train tomorrow, so I
won’t be able to nap.”

Fred nodded again, taking her hand and leading her through the trees to a small clearing. In it
there was a grey, fleece blanket set on the ground at the base of one of the larger apple trees
and a small ring of glass jars with bluebell flames in them. Fred sat down, putting his back to
the trunk and Hermione settled between his thighs, reclining her head on his chest.

They looked at the stars overhead, peeking and flickering through the gaps in the trees, and
listened to the crickets chirping in the tall grass.

“I’m really going to miss you this year,” Hermione finally sighed, breaking the silence. She
was bound and determined not to cry, but her throat was still tight.

“I know,” Fred agreed, dipping to rest his chin in the crook of her neck. “But we can write
now that old frog-face isn’t running things, and you’ll tell me as soon as you hear when the
first Hogsmeade weekend is.”

“I will,” she promised. “I was also thinking – barring our semi-annual catastrophe – I’m
planning to spend Christmas with my family this winter since I missed last year. Maybe the
week after Boxing Day I could stay at the flat? Spend New Year’s together?”
When he didn’t say anything, she leaned to the side, turning her head to look back at him and
finding a dazed, distant expression.

“Fred?”

He shook himself lightly before he looked down at her with a wicked grin.

“Sorry, just thinking about all the trouble we could get into with a whole week at our
disposal.”

She rolled her eyes and nestled down before remembering she’d come bearing gifts.

“Oh, hang on a tick.” She wiggled out of his grip and stuffed her hand into her pocket,
rooting around. Finally, she grabbed it and straightened again, sitting cross-legged across
from him. “Here.”

Hermione handed Fred a dark brown leather cord with a small metal plate fastened in the
middle of it. He turned it over to see that the plate was blank and gave her an incredulous
look.

“I’m going to need a bit of explanation, love.”

She smiled, thrilled that she was the one getting to do this for once.

“Stick out your wrist,” she instructed. He obediently extended his right arm. She took the
ends of the leather cords and tied them, fastening a tight knot.

“Alright, that explains what it is,” Fred said, examining it with a mildly entertained
expression. “What does it do?”

“Nothing yet. You see, after the ministry… or, after after the ministry, I agonised for a long
time about how I didn’t have a way to contact you when things started to go downhill. I
wasn’t able to put the charm on them yet, obviously, but I figured if we can link these like I
did the galleons for the DA, we’d have a way to get in touch quickly if something happens.”

She pushed up the sleeve of her own jumper to reveal a matching one on her right wrist. Fred
was already digging his wand out of his pocket.

“Protean charm, right?”

She nodded, watching as he began to mutter the incantation, wand in his left hand and their
wrists laid together side-by-side in his lap. Once that was done, he added protective charms
as well; one to make sure it didn’t come untied and another to keep it from being damaged by
the elements.

“Hermione Granger has the best ass in all of Britain,” Fred said clearly, tapping his new
jewelry with his wand. Her wrist warmed and, sure enough, the matching silver plate held his
rather bawdy missive.
 “I’m taking it off the first time you do that while I’m in class,” Hermione forewarned,
chuckling at his self-satisfied expression despite herself. “I’ll take my chances with whatever
danger is afoot.”

The mood slowly turned serious at that because, offhanded as it might have been, she was in
very real danger. They all were.

“Thank you. I hope we don’t have to use them, but all things considered…”

“Yeah, I know. Probably have until spring term, though. Historically speaking.”

Fred snorted ruefully. “If something goes wrong, or even feels off, you tell me. Don’t wait.
I’d rather explain to Dumbledore why I’m traipsing around the school in the middle of the
night than risk something happening to you. I can’t do this without you, Hermione. You’re –
please just be careful.”

His voice held a sort of desperate edge and the tension returned to her throat with a
vengeance as she leaned forward, resting her forehead against his. She raised a hand to wrap
around the back of his neck and traced her thumb in light, slow circles beneath his ear as she
met his gaze.

“I promise,” she vowed softly, like a prayer. “Keep my heart safe, okay? I’m leaving it here.”

Fred pushed a wayward curl off of her cheek and nodded, bluebell flames casting shadows on
his face and making him look far older than his eighteen years. It was silent for a moment,
the calm before a storm whose magnitude remained unknown.

And then she broke that silence, because this wasn’t a night for wallowing; it was a night for
goodbyes, and there wasn’t any rule that said goodbyes needed to be sad.

“You know," Hermione began, dipping her head to kiss his throat, "I did say we have a
couple hours…”

Chapter End Notes

Alright kids, this marks the end of Part 2. Congratulations on making it this far!

If this is the future and you're reading this whole thing in one go, stop here. Get a drink,
stretch your legs, blink a few times, then come back.

If you're reading this as I'm posting, we are going on a short hiatus for the rest of
November through December, returning to kick off Part 3 in January 2022. I know, I
know, but never fret!

I'll have another Fremione holiday piece dropping in December, as well as an extra-
spicy Charlie/Hermione, and I can assure you there will be no shortage of content for
our favorite pair thanks to the Fremione Fanatics Yule Fest (hint hint, nudge nudge).

In the meantime, subscribe, check out the other works on my page, and have a safe and
happy holiday season!
 PART THREE — Cinnamon with a trace of longing
Chapter Notes

Oh shit, we're back! Sorry for the delay, guys, gals and non-binary pals. I was planning
to get this posted last week, but Miss Rona came a knockin'.

Just a bite-sized chapter to ease us back in, but I have a couple whoppers planned in the
nearish future to make up for it.

For the sake of transparency: I recently got a big-girl promotion at work, complete with
a little more demand for my time and a lot more responsibility. That in mind, I will need
to space updates out just a *touch* more going forward, but I swear that barring death or
dismemberment, I will never abandon you lovely people.

Let's keep the bar on the floor this January and just say that I hope everyone had a not
completely awful holiday season!
2 September 1996

“C’mon, Harry, let’s go sit down.” Ron shot Ernie MacMillan a look of unconcealed distaste
as they found their seats in the Potions classroom. He’d been pontificating about the DA and
Hermione herself had been resisting the urge to tell him off. The bloody DA… The DA was
done. The DA had very nearly gotten her killed. The DA was in the past and she’d very much
like for it to stay there.

As they unpacked their belongings, she noticed Ron looking sideways at her and the
annoyance in her gut turned to churning unease.

The fact of the matter was that Ron had been looking at her a lot since they’d returned to
school. A lot, a lot. And she was beginning to think that her telling him and Harry about her
relationship with Fred was going to be a more…. complicated conversation than originally
planned.

Oblivious to their adolescent angsts, Professor Slughorn, a portly man with a rotund belly,
instructed Harry and Ron to retrieve second-hand books from the storage cupboard and then
began the lesson. Hermione, paying her usual rapt attention to the cauldrons around the room,
listened with interest.

He walked toward the first one and motioned for the congregated students to stand and join
him.

“Now, can anyone tell me what this brew is?” He asked. It took Hermione hardly a fraction of
a second to identify the potion, which looked and smelled like plain, boiling water.

“It’s Veritaserum,” she answered easily. “A colorless, odorless potion that forces the drinker
to tell the truth.”

“Very good, very good!” He chortled, moving along and removing the stasis charm from the
next one.

“That one is Polyjuice Potion, sir,” Hermione replied when called upon again, looking a bit
spitefully at the slow-bubbling, mudlike goop. Unlikely to ever forget it, the consistency of
that particular draught would haunt her until the end times.

“Excellent, excellent, now this one here…” Slughorn walked to the table at the front of the
room, which held the next cauldron. He raised his wand and intoned, “Finite.”

All at once, Hermione was hit with a barrage of heady scents.

“Oh,” she breathed quietly. Then a soft, breathless smile tugged the corners of her lips
upward as, one by one, she began to recognise them. It was said that one’s sense of smell was
the strongest scent associated with memory, something about olfactory signals and the limbic
system, and Godric help her if she wasn’t getting lost in those memories now.

“Miss Granger?” Slughorn turned, appearing entertained by her streak thus far. “Care to
wager a guess?”

“Uh – well I —” Hermione started to speak but, finding her throat a bit tight, she finally
offered a blithe smile and said, for the very first time in a classroom setting, “No. No, thank
you.”

Slughorn shrugged and moved on, Michael Corner piping up to answer the question while
Ron and Harry both turn and gaped at her, jaws unhinged and brows pulled together like two
pairs of caterpillars.

“Since when do you not know the answer to a question?” Ron demanded under his breath,
like he was insulted on her behalf.

Hermione pressed her lips into a thin line. “Since now,” she hissed. “Pay attention.”

She shooed the boys back toward the action and, ever-so-subtly, edged closer to the cauldron,
pale pink steam curling above it in perfect, shimmering spirals. Checking to make sure
nobody was looking, she leaned in as near as she dared and took another slow, deep breath.
Warm spices hit her first; cinnamon and nutmeg and the barest trace of cloves. It reminded
her of chai tea and crisp autumn nights tucked beneath a blanket under the stars.

She stifled a laugh, picking out the next scent and identifying it with ease. Only someone
irrevocably in love with Fred Weasley would find the smell of gunpowder agreeable.

It took her longer to place the next fragrance. Hermione had always found the smell of rain,
fresh and clean, to be pleasant, but not necessarily attractive. Then she recalled an afternoon
months ago, on a balcony at 93 Diagon Alley. A conversation and a recommitment. The sky
had opened up moments later and all at once she remembered the scent distinctly.

Finally, there was the smell of… books. Aged parchment and worn leather and, gross though
it may be, dust. It was nondescript, Hermione recalling any number of a thousand moments
and events that had happened while reading or sitting in a library, but it was a calming and
familiar aroma, nevertheless. Homey.

Something deep in her chest ached and smarted but, unable to do anything to ease that feeling
short of hijacking a floo and traveling to London, she closed her eyes, took another deep
breath, and pictured copper hair, a freckled nose, and eyes that were her very favorite shade
of blue.
 Yours always

"We are all fools in love."

- Jane Austen

19 September 1996

“So, you’re meeting him in Hogsmeade next month, then?” Ginny asked, walking beside
Hermione to dinner.

“Yes, out by the Shrieking Shack.”

“See, if it wasn’t my brother this would be the perfect junction at which to make a joke about
shrieking.” Hermione snorted, lunging over the trick step. “Do you need me to cover for
you?”

“No, I reckon I should be able to slip away for a little while.”

“Just let me know,” Ginny reinforced, nodding eagerly. The youngest and only female among
her siblings, Ginny had been routinely excluded by her brothers from a number of
surreptitious plots over the course of her sixteen years, and she seemed rather thrilled to be in
on this particular secret.

“What about you? Planning to sneak off with Dean? I have a veritable encyclopedia of
secluded places in the castle that I can tip you off to.”

Ginny just shrugged, looking a little apathetic. “Maybe. I dunno… it hasn’t exactly been
fireworks, you know?” She made little starburst motions with her hands and then let them fall
limply back to her sides.

Hermione, who was intimately familiar with fireworks, did know.

“That’s alright though,” she reasoned aloud, trying to be chipper for her friend’s sake. “It’s
not like you’re in imminent danger of becoming a spinster, after all.”

They finally stepped into The Great Hall, spotting Harry and Ron along the bench and taking
a seat near them. Hermione had been a little crestfallen when nothing came in the morning
mail save for a letter from her parents and a couple new books, but her heart leapt when an
unfamiliar owl swooped down from the vaulted ceilings directly for her.

It deposited a large, brown paper package on the setting in front of her and she had to
suppress a laugh that Fred elected to use the same enigmatic block letters that he had last year
to spell her name out. Though this time, they served to conceal his identity from everyone
else rather than attempt to hide if from her.

“What’s that?” Ron inquired as the owl took flight again, jabbing his fork in the direction of
the parcel.

“I’d wager it’s a box, Ronald, but one can’t be too sure,” she replied dryly, quickly stuffing it
in her bag to open privately later.

Ginny choked on the bite of sandwich she’d just taken, hurriedly grabbing a goblet of
pumpkin juice and drinking deeply.

“What are you getting mail for?”

Hermione was about to open her mouth when Ginny, still watery-eyed, interjected testily,
“It’s her birthday, you bloody half-wit.”

Harry’s head snapped up then, eyes wide and expression thoroughly alarmed.

“No, no,” Ron shook his head, as if he knew better than Hermione when she’d been born.
“No, Hermione’s birthday is… uh… well, it’s…”

“Bugger,” Harry concluded for him, voice wracked with guilt. His glasses were a little
lopsided as he poured over his raggedy second-hand potions book. “It is today, isn’t it?
We’ve forgotten.”
“To be fair,” Hermione hedged, “I’m not sure you can forget something you’ve never actually
recognised in the first place.”

He drooped further in his seat, and Hermione had to resist the urge to kick Ginny beneath the
table.

“We really are shit friends,” Ron said, going so far as to set down his fork. For him, that was
pretty much the epitome of emotional upheaval.

“It’s not a big deal,” Hermione assured them.

“No,” Harry shook his head adamantly. “First Hogsmeade visit, I’m taking you to
Scrivenshaft’s and you can pick out any quill you’d like.”

“And I’ll buy a round of Butterbeer,” Ron offered, his means being a little more limited.

Hermione shot a look at Ginny, who seemed to conclude she’d made an error, and then
smiled at the boys.

“I can’t wait.”

oOoOoOo

Later that evening, after classes, Hermione returned to her dormitory. Lavender and Parvati
were nowhere to be found, so she slipped off her shoes, climbed onto the bed, and drew the
curtains shut, silencing them for good measure and dragging the lamp in so she could see.
Then she reached into her bag and removed the parcel with her name on it.

She slipped a finger under the edge of the paper and tore to reveal a wooden box beneath,
dark stain with etching on the top. It was beautiful, but as far as she could tell there wasn’t a
particular design, just abstract swirls and starbursts. It actually reminded her a bit of
fireworks.

There was a small brass latch on the front and when she flicked it open and threw the lid
back, she resolved that it was a good idea she’d waited. Had she opened this in The Great
Hall, a good deal of explanation would have been required of her.

A plume of red rose petals rose straight upward from the box and then swirled around her as
if carried on an invisible breeze, a tiny, gentle tornado that lifted and played with the ends of
her curls. A breathless laugh slipped past her lips as she watched the petals dance and drift
within the confines of her bed, fresh, sweet perfume permeating the small space.

After a moment they dispersed and then suspended in the air, floating around her like the
slowest drifting snow. Hermione finally turned back to the box and saw that Fred had created
a care-package of sorts. She began to sift through the contents with a pleased smile; a coffee-
scented candle, a small package of chocolate truffles, a bottle of lavender-scented lotion, a
phial of high-quality onyx ink that shimmered just a little bit, and… a book.

Hermione reached in and pulled it out, only to discern that it was a copy of Pride and
Prejudice. It was one of her absolute favorites, which Fred most definitely knew, but she
already had her own, in addition to having it available within her portable library.
Furthermore, this one was clearly second-hand and not in the best condition.

Brow furrowing with curiosity, she rested it on her knees and flipped the cover open.

Hermione – I’ve had some rather unwelcome free time on my hands since you left, and I
thought I’d put it to good use. Or, at least, what you would consider good use.

I hope this isn’t too sacrilegious. Happy Birthday, love.

Yours always,
Fred

Now even more intrigued, she thumbed several pages further into the first chapter. The
curious smile already on her face split into a full grin upon realising what he’d meant by
sacrilege. This copy of the book was annotated. Personally, thoroughly, meticulously
annotated. Familiar, messy scrawl lined the margins in dark blue ink and every so often there
was a passage underlined or circled.

Without thinking, she delved deeper into the novel with rapt attention, laughing and shaking
her head as she read; as one might expect, Fred’s observations were not only insightful, but
humorous. She could practically hear his voice in her head when he made several
comparisons between his mother and Mrs. Bennet that, upon noticing, were frighteningly
obvious, and his frustration with the general snobbery of the upper-class characters was
particularly entertaining.

Why is everyone so bloody pretentious?! — he’d jotted near one specifically garish example
involving Caroline Bingley.

Evening slipped into night which slipped into later night as Hermione read along, gradually,
almost subconsciously, settling back against the pillows near her headboard. Slowly the
charm on the rose petals wore off, and they gently drifted down on to the mattress. She hardly
noticed save for occasionally sweeping one off the page in front of her when it obscured her
vision.

She knew whole sections of the novel by heart, so she skimmed the text itself, reading only
for the sake of making sense of Fred’s observations. It took her a little while to figure out
why this gift was so meaningful, why her eyes pricked and her throat went tight when she
saw that he’d underlined one of her personal favorite quotes, noted the whirls of his
fingerprint where he’d accidentally smudged the corner of the page.

Then she finally put it together.

He’d taken time, painstaking interest, in doing something that he knew was important to her.
Something that he almost certainly wouldn’t do otherwise, something thoroughly and wholly
outside of his area of comfort.

This was Fred's rotten fish.

There was a bizarre sense of symmetry to it; her running around after curfew involved
throwing caution to the wind and taking a leap, while his doing this for her meant ceasing
moving for once, losing himself in the pages the way that she did. It mirrored them, the ways
in which they complimented one another.

Her eyelids finally began failing in their valiant attempts to stay open sometime after
midnight, and the tattered paperback dropped open against her chest, her fingers still gripping
the binding and the smell of aged paper tickling her nose.

And as she thought sleepily of regency-era gowns and dramatic declarations made by
dashing, aloof heroes, she loved him all the more for it.
 Rendezvous

12 October 1996

“Let’s go to the Three Broomstick’s,” Harry said as they left Honeyduke’s. “It’ll at least be
warm.”

Ron made a sound of agreement, muffled by his scarf, but Hermione dithered and fell a few
steps behind them.

“You know, I’ll meet you there. I need to stop over at Gladrag’s.”

“What for?” Harry asked, confused.

Between Scrivenshaft’s and Honeyduke’s, this seemed to be the best opportunity for her to
sneak away.

“It’s the strangest thing,” she explained, “but I keep sending socks down to wash and then not
getting them back. I think maybe the elves are still trying to get back at me for SPEW.”
“Serves you right,” Ron muttered, to which she glared.

“Anyway, I’m going to go buy a few new pairs. Order me a drink!”

She darted toward Gladrag’s, head bent low against the wind while the boys hastened in the
opposite direction. Once they were out of sight, she ducked down the alley before the
clothing shop and started to make her way toward the Shrieking Shack.

It was completely deserted, the usual spectators warded off by the dismal weather. Hermione
stepped behind a tree, disillusioned herself, and then strode up the path, using her wand to
blow the snow behind her and conceal her footprints. It only took a second to get the door
open.

The instant that she stepped in and shut it behind her, warm, familiar arms grabbed her about
the waist and spun her around.

Fred made to kiss her but, still being disillusioned, he missed and landed on her frigid nose.
Giggling she dropped her concealment charm and then locked and silenced the door behind
her before pocketing her wand.

“Well hello to you too,” Hermione laughed, leaning forward onto her toes and snogging him
properly. She drew back and saw his hair was a big shaggier, and he was clad in a dark
jumper with a heavy wool coat overtop. It was an exceptionally fetching combination.

“You look fantastic,” Fred said, removing his mouth from hers for the briefest of seconds
before putting it back.

“I don’t have long,” she explained mournfully as their kisses grew markedly more heated,
lips parting and tongues tangling together in a rapid dance.

He groaned against her lips. “Bleeding hell, why do you taste like sugar quills?”

She laughed breathlessly, twining her arms around his neck.

Hermione decided that she’d kept him up to date enough in their letters and that she was
perfectly content with this visit being more physical in nature than verbal, seeing as that was
the novelty for them just then. She quickly undid the buttons on his coat and shucked it off
his shoulders while he did the same with hers.

Glancing around while he dipped his head to her throat, newly liberated from beneath her
scarf, she saw he’d straightened up the dreary room a bit. There were clearly a number of
warming charms placed on the space as well as several candles lit and positioned
sporadically, warding off the dull grey tones seeping in from outside.

“Godric, I missed you,” she whispered as he unbuttoned her jeans and shoved them down her
thighs, toward the ground. She stepped out of them, kicking her boots off in the process.
“Thank you so much for the birthday gifts.”

“I missed you too,” Fred replied genuinely, tracing his thumb lightly across her jaw and
brushing his lips over her forehead. Then he pulled back and a wolfish grin split his face.
“And I’m glad you liked your presents, truly. Now turn around.”

“Wha —?”

Hermione cut off abruptly when he placed his hands on her hips and, none-too-gently, spun
her away from him. She reached out and pressed her hands into the wall beside the door to
keep from stumbling, inhaling sharply and feeling the coarse wood grain beneath her
fingertips.

Fred stepped close behind her, newly bare chest at her back. The hand on the left side of her
waist slipped up beneath her blouse, the only article of clothing that she was still wearing
save for her bra and knickers. He roughly shoved the cup of said bra up, palming her breast
beneath and giving her nipple a firm pinch between his thumb and forefinger.

She gasped at this just as his other hand slid from her right hip, skimming across her stomach
before plunging under the elastic waistband of her underwear.

He pressed forward against her and she felt his erection through the thick fabric of his jeans,
hard and warm along the swell of her ass. A finger dipped into her and then drew upward,
circling her clit.

She tried to speak but it came out as more of an incoherent whimper.

“Hermione?” Fred asked, voice a labored pant beside her ear.

“Yes?” She managed in reply, trying to drown herself in the sensation of him this close to her
again. Amorentia didn't hold a candle to this.

“I love you, and I respect you more than anything. You know that, yeah?”

“’Course,” she mumbled, letting her head tip back against his shoulder while his fingers
continued to work over her, dipping languidly into her center and then drawing back up to her
clit in a maddeningly perfect pattern.

He chuckled, lips unbelievably warm right beside her ear, and breathed softly, “Good.
Because I’m going to fuck you like I don’t.”

Hermione gathered her scattered wits one last time before giving in to the pleasure building
in her chest, taking over her brain, and managed to whimper out a single word: “Please.”

Fred had never been rough with her before, not like this, but it made her heart stutter and her
legs go weak. There was something borderline primal about it. The urgency, the undeniable
need to have him touching her, feel him inside of her, after weeks of being separated.

They’d spent time apart before and, while she’d missed him dearly, it hadn’t been like this,
frantic and frenzied. It was as if they’d broken some sort of seal, having sex over the summer
as they had. Now she was like an addict, and one long overdue for a hit.

His right hand pulled out of her knickers, which extracted a groan of frustration from her, but
his left continued to play over her breasts beneath her jumper. He must have drawn his wand
because he muttered the contraception charm, and she felt a familiar tingle in her abdomen. A
second later she heard a zipper, then he reached back between her bare thighs, dragging and
coating his cock with her. The blunt head pressed firm against her clit and she gasped.

“Bend over for me; feet apart and ass up,” he directed, a hint of something desperate edging
his voice. She spread her legs wider and bowed at the waist, bracing her hands more firmly
on the wall in front of her, mostly focused on trying not to faint by that point. Fred made a
satisfied sound in his throat and ran a hand lightly up her outer thigh before giving her
bottom a firm squeeze. “Just like that. Good girl.”

Whatever the intended effect, that had her rocking her hips mindlessly back toward him in
search of relief and, interestingly enough, Hermione didn’t give a damn how pathetically
desperate she was for it. Eager and begging for him to fuck her was far from the worst state
Fred had seen her in.

He lowered himself a little, pinning her knickers fully to the side and running the warm, slick
length of his cock along her entrance again before finally, blessedly, pushing inside of her in
one measured thrust.

Hermione cried out, turning her head toward her shoulder and squeezing her eyes shut for a
second. Her fingers curled, nails digging into the wood at the same time that Fred’s tightened
their grip almost painfully on her hips. She’d likely have bruises and she didn’t find that she
was wholly opposed to that idea either.

He took his hand away from her chest and placed it on the other side of her waist, drawing
backward until he was almost out of her and then shoving forward again, hard and with a
pornographic slapping sound that she might giggle at under different circumstances.

“You feel so good,” she moaned, grinding her hips a little, tightening around him and
reveling in the way his body responded to her. The headiness of knowing how he would
respond to her, and the lack of inhibition that came with it. “I think about you every night. In
my bed, with the curtains drawn and silenced.”

“Oh, bloody hell,” he groaned breathlessly, rocking into her in a steady rhythm.

She grinned and, encouraged, continued, toeing the edges of her comfort zone. “When I slide
my fingers under my knickers, between my thighs. Dip them inside my hot, w-wet cunt and
rub them back and forth over my clit. All the while thinking about how you feel. How you
smell. How you taste.”

“Hermione –“ Fred leaned forward over her, planting a hand above hers on the wall while the
other stayed on her hip. A shudder rolled through him and she could see his bicep flexed and
tight in her periphery. “I need you to touch yourself now. Can you do that for me, love?”

There was an urgency to his voice that implied he was nearing his own release.

She nodded, already painfully close as she brought her hand back between her legs and
flicked her fingertips in a flurried, familiar back and forth motion while he fucked her from
behind.
They were both breathing hard, sweat slicked along her lower back, dampening the curls at
the nape of her neck.

“Hermione,” Fred begged, a frantic sharpness to his voice, but she was already gone. Her
knees buckled but the hand on her hip quickly disappeared, arm looping securely under her
waist and supporting her while she trembled and clenched tightly around him, a veritable
scream ringing through the room.

She was still in the throes when Fred ceased his movement as well, pressed flush against her
ass and buried in her. He tipped forward, chest rising and falling against her back, hissing and
groaning between his teeth in a manner not entirely dignified, but far sexier than anything
she’d dreamed up alone in her bed. A few seconds passed as they both came back down,
breathing labored.

“So,” Fred huffed, leaning a bit more to the right and gently pushing her hair back over her
shoulder to see her better. A lazy, satisfied smile stretched his face. “How’s the rest of your
week going, darling?”

Hermione grinned back and, still trying to catch her breath, leaned forward to give him a
quick kiss.

“Better now.”

He carefully pulled out of her, and they took a moment to clean up and redress.

“How long do you have?” he asked, conjuring their sofa and sinking onto it, pulling her into
his lap.

“Just a few more minutes. Your sister very helpfully pointed out that Harry and Ron have
pretty much managed to ignore every birthday I’ve had since knowing them, so they’ve taken
it upon themselves to make it up to me in one particularly dreary Hogsmeade visit.”

Fred laughed and wrapped his arms around her tightly as she nuzzled into his shoulder. “I
love that she becomes ‘my sister’ rather than ‘your friend’ when she’s done something
wrong.”

“Hush, those are the rules,” Hermione said matter-of-factly, closing her eyes and pretending
they had all day. “Everything alright with work? George and Angie?”

“Going swimmingly,” he assured her, thumb circling beneath her jumper along her hip bone.
“Surely you’ve seen evidence of our success throughout those hallowed halls that you so
dutifully patrol?”

“Don’t remind me,” she huffed in exasperation. “If I have to vanish one more puddle of
vomit, I’m going to fly to London and smother the both of you in your sleep.”

They chatted for a little longer about nothing and everything until she spotted the edge of his
watch, sticking out beneath the sleeve of his jumper and grabbed his wrist, examining it with
a sigh.
“Time to go?” he asked with a gloomy expression, tightening his hold on her for a split-
second like he might not let her go.

She nodded and sighed, climbing off his lap to put her shoes back on.

He walked her to the door and then placed one hand on either side of her head, bending to
kiss her softly, fingers woven in the loose curls at the nape of her neck. It was such a stark
contrast to the rough way he’d handled her earlier, and she positively loved that.

“’How lucky am I to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard?’” She recited,
leaning back to look in his eyes, a perfect reflection of her own melancholy gleaming back at
her.

“I’d venture to say you’re pretty damn lucky,” he grinned, tweaking her nose. Then they
pulled apart and, with one last longing look backward, she walked through the door and back
into the cold.

oOoOoOo

“Shall we call it a day and go back to school, then?” Harry proposed, his butterbeer now all
but empty. Apparently Hermione’s absence had been overshadowed by him and Ron running
into Mundungus and Tonks, which they’d just animatedly filled her in on.

She and Ron nodded, draining the dredges from their own glasses before cocooning once
more in coats and scarves. All things considered it had been a rather dismal visit outside of
her clandestine rendezvous, which they obviously didn’t know about, and her new quill from
Harry. The shop owner at Scrivenshaft’s said that it was from a Nicobar Pigeon, and it looked
almost iridescent in the light.

Hermione spotted Katie ahead of them on the path as they left the village. She, much like
Hermione, had been left behind when Alicia graduated, and Hermione had felt a sort of
subsequent kinship with the girl, despite not knowing each other very well. So, when she
heard her start to shout in a callous, hollow approximation of her usually kind voice,
Hermione’s metaphorical hackles immediately raised.

In a blink, Katie dropped whatever she’d been carrying, rising perhaps ten feet into the air
like a spector and releasing an eerie, bone-chilling scream that would echo in Hermione’s
mind for nights to follow. The boys were completely frozen, but she didn’t hesitate, pulling
her wand and wrenching the sleeve of her coat up to reveal a bracelet with a little silver plate.

“Get to the path between Hogsmeade and the school, now,” she hissed urgently, hearing the
blood rushing in her ears nearly as loudly as the screaming.

Perhaps three seconds passed, Katie still suspended in the air, before there was a loud crack
about 15 feet behind them and Fred slid to a halt in the sleet between Ron and her, eyes wide
as he took in the scene. He must not have gone straight home after their assignation because
he was still clad in outerwear.
“Get her down, now!” Fred yelled over the pandemonium, rushing forward with Leann, who
Katie had been walking with, as well as the trio. Ron and Harry didn’t even have the presence
of mind to question his being there. Not yet, anyway.

Just as they made to tug on Katie’s legs, she went limp and dropped, landing more or less in
Fred’s arms and sending both him and Harry sprawling backward into the snow.

“What the hell happened?!” Fred shouted over Katie’s continued screaming. She started to
jerk and seize in his arms, eyes rolling back so they looked solid white.

“I don’t know, she was carrying – “ Hermione started frantically, cutting off as her gaze
focused in. She’d knelt beside him and started to crawl toward the discarded brown paper
package, now sopping with melted snow.

“Don’t touch it!” She cried at Ron, also crouched near the thing. There was an ornate silver
and opal necklace peeking out beneath the wrapping. Harry was back on his feet beside
Leann, who had descended fully into hysterics.

“We need to get her to the school,” Fred directed with an authoritative tone. He shifted Katie
carefully off his lap and Hermione cast mobilicorpus, suspending her twitching frame several
inches off the ground as he got to his feet.

They shared a weighted look and a nod before he turned away. She only dithered for a second
as he started to hasten up the path with Katie floating beside him, hearing Harry mention
Malfoy’s name as he tried to speak to a distraught Leann.

“Knock it off with the half-baked theories about Malfoy and get that thing to Dumbledore or
McGonagall, now!” She snapped coarsely, gesturing at the necklace. Her socks were damp,
she was terrified, and more than anything in that moment she was beyond frustrated with his
juvenile theorising. Harry made to protest but she didn’t listen, turning and following Fred
and Katie up the path at a sprint.

“Are you alright?” he huffed curtly as they jogged together toward the school, leaving the
other three behind and hearing traces of Hagrid’s booming voice as he arrived on the scene.

“Fine,” she replied just as brusquely, beads of condensation hanging in the frigid air as they
spoke like a cloud. It was a lie and they both knew it, but it was one that would have to be
addressed later. They proceeded in silence, save for Katie’s whimpering and their heavy
breathing, right through the doors to the castle and up the stairs. A few people remarked on
Fred’s presence as well as Katie’s state as they passed, but they both completely ignored it.

They arrived in the hospital wing a second later and descended upon an unsuspecting Madam
Pomfrey, who’d just finished administering a Pepper-Up Potion to a young student with a red
nose and chapped lips. The child went wide-eyed upon seeing Katie and took off from the
room like a shot, white as a ghost and without even a glance back. Poor thing was going to
have nightmares.

“What on earth —?” Madam Pomfrey started, nearly dropping the glass she was holding.
“She was cursed,” Hermione gasped, breathing hard and pressing a hand tight against the
stitch stabbing between her ribs. “Necklace. Don’t know what was on it. Harry and Ron are
bringing it up to the school.”

“How long has she been like this?” The matron asked, suddenly all business as she levitated
Katie onto the nearest bed. She immediately began casting diagnostics, examining the various
readings and colors suspended over the body that meant very little to someone not trained to
understand them.

“Not long,” Fred said, shaking his head. “She was floating when Hermione called for me.
Then she fell, and it was only a few seconds before we made to bring her here.”

“Did she hit her head?”

“No, I caught her.”

Madam Pomfrey nodded and then began to work, summoning potions and supplies from
nearby cupboards, all the while muttering under her breath and moving her hand and wand
together in synchronicity.

Adrenaline fading, Hermione’s hands began to shake and she stumbled backward to a chair
just in time for her knees to give out. Fred took one last look at Katie before turning to crouch
in front of her.

“Breathe, love,” he instructed calmly, though his own voice was strained and his face ashen.
He pulled his glove off and laid a warm hand against her flushed, frozen cheek.

“She – she was arguing with Leann before it happened, but she didn’t sound like herself.”

“Imperious curse?” Fred asked, brow furrowing.

“I – I don’t – “ Hermione felt tears breech her eyelids as she shook her head. She tried to
swallow around the lump in her throat, thinking back and attempting to recall the details of
the girl’s behavior right before everything went to hell. “M-Maybe. Probably.”

“Okay, alright, don’t worry about it right now.” He removed his other glove, throwing it
callously aside and cupping her face, thumbing the tears on her cheeks away with tender,
practiced movements. Dark blue eyes searched her face. “Just breathe. Look at me, focus on
me, and breathe.”

“There’s calming draught in that cabinet,” Madam Pomfrey said quickly but gently, glancing
over her shoulder at the two of them while she continued to work. She motioned across the
room and then turned back to the bed. It struck Hermione in a detached sort of way that she
didn’t seem remotely surprised by Fred’s intimacy with her.

Fred got up and opened the door to the cupboard, extracting a purple phial labeled in neat
writing and returning to Hermione. He conjured a small glass and decanted a bit into it,
handing it to her before bringing the flask to his own lips and taking a swig directly from it.
Hermione drained what she was given, the shaking in her hands ceasing almost immediately,
heart rate slowing as well.

“How is she, Poppy?” Professor McGonagall had arrived, sweeping in with Professors
Dumbledore and Snape close behind her. The necklace, now fully exposed from its wrapping,
was levitating beside them, encased in a light blue shield charm roughly the size of a quaffle.

“I have her stable enough to move, but she’ll need to get to Saint Mungo’s immediately,”
Madam Pomfrey said, lowering her wand and not looking at all satisfied with her patient’s
state. Katie had stopped twitching and quieted, laid prone and unmoving on the cot, but she
was paler than Sir Nicholas and sweat beaded over her cheeks and along her hairline.

“Severus?” Dumbledore entreated, and Snape wordlessly nodded. Madam Pomfrey readied
the girl for travel, shrouding her in a heavy blanket, and then the two of them levitated her off
the bed and toward the door to Madam Pomfrey’s quarters, which presumably housed a
fireplace and floo.

“Mr. Weasley, your brother mentioned that you were the one to happen upon them when the
incident occurred,” McGonagall said, turning to Fred, who was standing beside the chair
Hermione was still occupying. His hand was on her shoulder, but he didn’t make any move to
pull it away. In fact, she thought he might have gripped her a little tighter.

“Yes,” Fred confirmed, not bothering to clarify that it was a bit more than happenstance. “I
got there just before she fell. Is that the thing she touched?”

He tipped his head, examining the necklace through the shield charm encasing it.

“Yes, Mr. Potter wrapped it in a scarf and carried it up to the school. He told me he’d seen it
before, at –“

“Borgin and Burke’s,” Hermione cut in, setting her glass on the table and looking at the
necklace more closely, realising then that she too recognised it. Her throat was still tight, but
she felt far more composed than she had when they’d arrived. She reached up to give Fred’s
hand a quick squeeze as she got to her feet. “We saw it at Borgin and Burke’s over the
summer.”

“What were you doing in Knockturn Alley?” Fred asked sharply, looking at her sideways
with surprised, troubled eyes.

“Remember when George said Malfoy was acting dodgy? When we were out on the balcony?
We followed him after, and that’s where he went. I didn’t think to mentioned it to you
because nothing really came of it.”

Dumbledore, who’d remained silent, looked curiously between them for a second.

“Mr. Potter mentioned as much,” Professor McGonagall said, seeming to brush aside any
personal inquisitiveness in regard to their more than friendly dynamic. “Did you see Mr.
Malfoy actually leave the shop with the necklace?”
“No,” Hermione shook her head. “But he said something to Borgin about holding it for him.”

“I see…” she trailed off. “Mr. Potter seemed to think –“

“That Malfoy is the root of all evil?” Hermione finished tiredly, arching a brow with the
barest hint of a cynical smile tugging at her cheeks. “I know. But hundreds of people come
and go from Knockturn Alley every week, and Malfoy wasn’t at the pub today.”

“No, he wasn’t. In fact, he was serving detention with me until a few moments ago.”

They lapsed into a pensive silence before Professor Dumbledore spoke. “Mr. Weasley, could
you please inform the other Order members of this incident? Miss Spinnet as well; I’m to
understand she and Miss Bell are involved, no?”

“Yes, I’ll tell everyone,” Fred said, nodding and squaring his shoulders a bit. Hermione was
briefly struck by how very adult he seemed, then.

“I’m going to have Fillius take a look at this and then get it to Saint Mungo’s,” McGonagall
said. “Perhaps they can use it to counteract whatever happened to the girl.” She took her
leave without further comment, crossing the wing at a clip.

“Very good. Miss Granger, I trust you can accompany Mr. Weasley down to the gates? Seeing
as he is technically a guest at our school.”

“Yes, of course, sir,” Hermione said, her cheeks heating a little. She was unnerved by the
knowing twinkle in his eye.

All three of them departed the hospital wing, Dumbledore heading in the direction of his
office and Hermione and Fred back out onto the grounds.

“Well, that wasn’t quite as pleasant an afternoon as I’d hoped it would be,” Fred said grimly.
“I was just about to pick up lunch when I got your message.” He paused for a moment before
adding thoughtfully. “Do you think Dumbledore uses a charm for the eye-sparkle thing?”

Hermione huffed a laugh at his weak attempt at humor and nodded tiredly, leaning heavily
into his side a little as they walked into the cold wind. She didn’t much care who saw them at
that point, and there were certainly a couple curious looks.

The trip was mostly silent, Fred’s arm wrapped securely about her shoulders while they
trekked through the snow.

“I’ll write and tell you how Katie is as soon as I know more,” Fred promised when they
reached the edge of the wards. He offered a proud, if melancholy smile. “For what it’s worth,
you did really well today.”

“Mmm. If only there were a NEWT for life and death situations, I’d be a shoo-in for an O.”
Fred snorted quietly, gripping her hand like he didn’t ever want to let it go. They stayed like
that for a long moment and Hermione blinked back tears, the rollercoaster of emotions they’d
gone through in the past two hours finally catching up with her.
“Okay, get a move on,” she finally sniffled, swatting him lightly toward the gate. “I need to
go deal with Harry and your brother.”

“Trying to get rid of me?”

She smiled but shook her head, throat tight. “No. In fact I’d keep you here forever if I could.
But… if I were Alicia, I’d want to know what happened sooner than later.”

He nodded grimly, swallowing hard and dropping his forehead to rest against hers. Neither of
them said it, neither of them needed to, but they both thought it.

Not long ago he had been Alicia.

“I love you,” he said softly.

“I love you too,” she replied, screwing her eyes shut. “Please be careful.”

Hermione took a moment to herself after he left, casting a charm to reduce the puffiness
around her eyes, and then headed back to the common room. Harry and Ron were camped on
the sofa in front of the fireplace with Neville and Ginny, motioning her over.

She moved to join them, slowing as she passed the bulletin board and heaving a defeated sigh
when she saw its newest posting, front and center.

In the interest of keeping Hogwarts’ staff and students safe, as well as its grounds secure, the
remaining Hogsmeade visits for the 1996-1997 school year have been cancelled.
 Fight club

18 October 1996

“From Hermione?” George asked, walking into the flat and unwinding the scarf from around
his neck as he toed off his boots.

Fred nodded, perched on the arm of the couch by the fire and reading her newest missive
with a troubled but unsurprised expression. “Yeah. Hogsmeade trips are cancelled for the rest
of the year.”

George grimaced sympathetically. “Sorry, mate.”

“’S’alright. As much as I love seeing her, I’d rather she be safe – or, at least as safe as anyone
at Hogwarts ever is.” He got up with a sigh, tossing the letter on the low table in front of the
hearth and following his twin into the kitchen. “How’s Angie?”

“She’s holding up. Wants to stay with Alicia for another few nights, though.”
Though they’d received confirmation several days prior that Katie was going to be okay, she
was being held in a magically-induced coma and it was taking a heavy toll on her girlfriend.
“Mum wrote earlier and said that she made a casserole to take over. I can pick it up
tomorrow.”

George chuckled. “Mum seems determined that the cure to all the world’s ailments involves a
roasted chicken and a few potatoes.”

The Order had tightened up security even more if possible that week. Between Amelia and
Emmeline over the summer, the uptick in dementor activity, and now the attack on Katie, it
was clear the Death Eaters were mobilising in service of some sort of plan, it just wasn’t clear
what the plan was yet.

“So, I’ve been thinking – “

“Dangerous, that,” George cut in, grinning overtop the door of the icebox. Fred pinned him
with a glare and George wilted a bit, declaring with an unsettled look, “Blimey, you look like
your witch when you do that.”

“Good,” Fred replied dryly. “As I was saying, I’ve been thinking about last year. About Harry
and the DA.”

“Have the sudden urge to go back for your NEWTs, do you?”

“Hardly. But there are enough of us finished with school and kicking around London… why
not start up again?”

“What, like a dueling club?”

“Why not? We could clear out part of the basement storeroom, put up a few wards so nothing
blows up. Figured it wouldn’t hurt to stay sharp so we don’t immediately die when faced with
conflict; last a few minutes, at least.”

George leaned against the counter and tossed a grape into the air, catching it in his mouth and
chewing thoughtfully.

“Not a half-bad idea, twin-o-mine,” he finally declared. “Who all were you thinking?”

“Alicia, Angie, Lee, Verity… I heard Ollie’s back in the city too, with the leagues on hiatus.”

“Could see if Tonks and Kingsley want to drop in, share some of that almighty Auror
knowledge.”

“Bill and Fleur, too, now that they’re just out on the coast. Reckon he could show us a thing
or two, lolling around Egypt all that time.”

They nodded thoughtfully at each other for a moment. As much time as they all spent lolling
about and worrying about what might happen next, it felt good, planning to actually do
something proactive rather than reactive.
“Right, good,” George said, backing slowly out of the room and nodding enthusiastically.
“So, you see to dinner, I’ll start making floo calls.”

“Oi! Why do I have to make dinner?”

“Because I said it first!” George called over his shoulder, skidding into the hall and taking off
toward the fireplace like a shot.

Fred shook his head, turning to the cupboard to dig out a box of dry pasta and muttering, “I
should have absorbed you in the womb when I had the chance.”

oOoOoOo

“Alright, how many unforgiveable curses are there?” Kingsley asked their assemblage a week
and a half after Fred had proposed the idea.

“Circe’s tits, Kings, I wouldn’t have asked you to come if I knew you’d be quizzing us on
OWL-level theory,” George remarked from his position near the front of the room, arms
crossed and grinning.

The basement of 93 Diagon Alley stretched nearly the entire length and width of the building.
Fred and George had constructed a veritable maze of shelves and crates leading back to a
large clearing that ran the length of the room. They wrapped the area tightly in wards so
bystanders that weren’t actively dueling wouldn’t get hurt, in addition to protecting their
merchandise.

“All of you, save for Fleur and Verity, have had an education in defence that is patchy at best
and non-existent at worst. Now, how many are there?” Kingsley repeated, leveling a firm
stare around the room that brokered no further objection.

“Three,” everyone present intoned in a chorus, including Tonks, who was standing near the
back and looking somewhat amused despite her otherwise subdued appearance.

“Good,” Kingsley said, bobbing his head. “And how many spells can kill someone?”

“One,” Lee declared confidently from his position near the front, turning around with a
dumbfound expression when he was the only one to wager a guess.

“I appreciate the enthusiasm, Lee, but that is incorrect. Anyone else?”

“Well, zere are ‘undreds, no?” Fleur posed when nobody else spoke, earning an affectionate
smile from Bill. Fred felt a dim flicker of jealousy toward the sheer coupley-ness of them
before quashing it.

“That there are,” Kingsley affirmed. “Ten points to Beauxbatons. The killing curse, while
efficient in that it is incapable of being shielded by magical means, is merely one of many
ways to end a life, should a duel escalate to that extreme. Examples?”

“Blasting spell,” Oliver volunteered.

“Severing charm,” Angelina chimed in.

“Reductor curse,” Fred added, cringing a little internally at the idea of what that spell might
do to a living thing.

“Levitation charm?” Lee offered hesitantly. Kingsley arched a dark brow at him, and he
added quickly, “You know, drop something heavy and squash them...”

Everyone laughed and Kingsley shrugged and nodded in an ‘I guess’ sort of way.

They chattered for a few minutes, becoming increasingly creative in their methods of
extermination until Kingsley finally raised his voice and regained control of the room.

“Now, this is not my way of saying that you should immediately jump to lethal methods of
defending yourself, but the fact of the matter is that in the not too distant future, you may
very well find yourselves in a position where you do not have an alternative.” The demeanor
of the room changed a little then. Became weightier, more serious as they remembered that
this wasn’t recreational. “Death Eaters generally do not take captives unless they have a
vested interest in doing so, and even then, you’ll very likely end up wishing that you had
died. Unfortunately, this is especially true for you witches present. As repellent as it is to
consider, there are several among their ranks that would like nothing more than a muggleborn
or half-blood witch unconscious and bound at their feet.”

Fred glanced sideways and saw Alicia and Angelina both had fierce expressions on their
faces, and he couldn’t help but think about Hermione and Ginny.

“As an auror I have had to see and do many things that I later wished I hadn’t. But when it
comes to saving your own life, or protecting the life of someone you care about, be it friend,
family or partner, you’ll find it doesn’t matter as much as you think it will in the moment.”
Tonks made a sound of agreement. “Bearing that in mind, I’m going to pair you off and we’ll
see just how much you managed to retain.”

“To be clear, we aren’t supposed to kill one another now, correct?” George asked, smiling a
little nervously when he was unwittingly matched with his girlfriend, who was twirling her
wand between her knuckles and looking rather eager.

“To be clear, yes,” Kingsley replied. “Please refrain from doing anything that we can’t easy
heal or reverse. I’d like to avoid a trip to St. Mungo’s if it can be avoided.”

Other couplings included Alicia with Lee, Oliver with Fleur, and Verity with Bill. Tonks
finally approached Fred as the odd man out.

“I’ll take it easy on you,” she remarked. She smiled, but it didn’t seem terribly genuine. And
he noted with a troubled expression that her hair was still a dull, mousy brown rather than
one of its customarily vibrant shades. In truth, her demeanor reminded him a little of
Hermione that past summer, which, given the cause behind that, was more troubling than he
cared to think about.
The actual dueling went about as well as could be expected. Out of practice though he was,
he managed to catch Tonks with a stunner as well as a full-body bind, the latter a result of
him transfiguring the floor and tripping her first.

George and Angie were relatively well-matched, as were Verity and Bill to everyone’s
surprise; Verity, who’d attended Ilvermorny in the U.S., had been something of a dark horse.
Alicia, on the other hand, put Lee on his ass repeatedly, and Oliver, in another shocker,
overcame a rather frustrated Fleur with relative ease, though she put up a truly impressive
fight.

“I do not understand,” Fleur hissed at Bill when they regrouped, rubbing her arm where a
stinging hex had landed a moment prior. “My alure ‘ad no effect on ‘im!”

Fred had been vaguely aware of her powers, but, to his relief, it wasn’t anything he wasn’t
able to block out. George seemed to respond similarly, but Fred suspected Alicia had beaten
Lee as badly as she had because he was directly beside to the part-veela during his trial.

Kingsely gave them each feedback and things to work on; in Fred’s case it was defensive
charms, which was none too shocking. While Hermione had quite the knack for them, shields
had never been his forte. They broke up shortly after that, Kingsley departing and most
everyone else going up to the flat to have a drink. Fred planned to join them a bit later, citing
that he wanted to get a start on inventory instead of waking up early the next day to do it.

Tonks went upstairs to use the loo but came back down while he was still behind the counter.
The shop was quiet and dark then, save for a few lamps speckled about the cavernous
showroom.

“Hey, Tonks, do you have a second?” Fred blurted after considering for a beat.

She turned around in surprise, having been headed for the back door and the apparition point
after waving goodbye. “What, not bruised up enough? Fancy another round?”

Fred smiled but shook his head, uncertain about how to lead off. He delayed for a moment,
fiddling with the quill he was holding. “Look, we aren’t that close, and I don’t know how to
ask this without it seemingly completely rude or intrusive or what have you, so I’m just going
to ask and you can tell me to sod off if you want, okay?”

“Okay…”

“Are you – are you doing alright?”

“What do you mean? I’m fine,” she said quickly, shrugging unconvincingly and snorting like
it was absurd he’d even ask.

“Are you sure? Because you don’t… seem fine. Like yourself, I mean.”

Tonks started to wave him off again but then, as if a switch flipped, she sighed heavily and
scuffed the toe of her boot spitefully at the floor. “All you of bloody Weasleys, too perceptive
for anyone’s good. Redheaded blight on Wizarding Britain…”
He assumed she was referring to Charlie, one of her best friends from school. Or perhaps
their mum.

“Have you ever been in love?” Tonks asked abruptly, leaning against the wall with her arms
crossed tight across her chest, eyes fixed at a distant point behind one of the shelves. He
couldn’t tell if she was lost in thought or simply uncomfortable with the subject matter.

“Yeah,” Fred said without hesitating. “I have.”

“And did they love you back?”

“Yes. She does.” He knew it as certainly as he knew his own name.

Tonks smiled softly at his use of present tense and nodded, but didn’t pry. She was quiet for
another long moment before speaking in choppy starts and stops, like the words themselves
pained her.

“Then you can imagine what it might be like to have that inside of you, to feel all of those
things, and to have the other person turn you away. Make you feel foolish, even.”

He could. He’d had the barest hint of it in those seemingly endless weeks earlier that year.
And it had been torture.

“This isn’t about Charlie, is it?” he asked, suddenly struck by that horrifying possibility.

She barked a laugh and shook her head. “No. Good Godric, no. You know as well as I do that
your brother finds me about as attractive as a tea cosy.”

He sighed in relief, enormously glad that he didn’t have to tiptoe around outing his sibling.

“Is it worth asking who?”

Tonks pondered for a moment, glancing up the stairs as if to make sure they were still alone,
and then whispered, “Expecto patronum.”

From the end of her wand burst an enormous silver wolf.

“Oh,” Fred puffed in surprise, eyebrows hitching up before he could think to school his
expression. The room immediately felt a little warmer.

“Yeah,” Tonks said miserably, a grim smile twisting her features. She held her hand out, the
wolf approaching to nuzzle against it before disappearing a second later. She stared at where
it had been with a vacant expression. “He doesn’t love me, he’s made that much crystal clear.
Frankly I’m not even sure he’s capable of love after losing… well, everyone really. It doesn’t
matter, though; my pitiful little heart belongs to him anyway. Bloody stupid is what it is.”

Fred thought back to New Year’s Eve, nearly a year prior, and he knew that had Hermione
said no, had she never entered the drawing room, had she simply thrown the note away and
gone to bed, it wouldn’t have changed a thing for him. He’d have kept his distance, respected
her wishes, even watch her love someone else if he had to, but there wasn’t any getting over
something like that. Not really.

“I’m really sorry,” Fred said quietly. He wavered before adding, “I don’t think you should
give up, though. Don’t press, but don’t give up. Nothing in our lives is certain, especially
now. Wounds heal. People change their minds.”

Tonks nodded and grew silent before making a sort of disgusted noise in her throat and
sniffing loudly. “Ugh, Circe’s tits, aren’t you supposed to be one of the funny ones? I’m
ready to string myself up with my fucking bootstraps over here.”

Fred grinned and dipped his head, feeling a little pleased with himself. “I’d venture to say
I’ve gained a bit of depth lately.”

“Yeah, well, knock it off,” Tonks said, rolling eyes that were just a little bloodshot. She
started to head for the door again before pausing and turning to look at him, eyes considering
and fingers flexing around the knob. “You’re lucky, you know; that she loves you back. Don’t
take it for granted.”

He nodded, picking up the inventory sheet again and smiling in spite of himself as he started
back down the list. “Trust me, I know. I think about it every single day.”
 The weight of the world
Chapter Notes

So, this story just cracked 1k kudos and 500 subscriptions this past week and all I have
to say is: What the fuck, guys?

You can't go letting my ego inflate like this. My head will get so big, it’ll be
cataclysmic. World-ending. When the fate of the human race goes up in flames, you'll do
well to remember that I warned you and that you have only yourselves to blame.

For real though, I'm immensely grateful and you're all just insanely amazing. Keep on
keeping on.

And if you're a fan of literary blue-balls, I did put up a few chapters of a WIP for Evil
Author Day over on my works page (Solivagant).
2 November 1996

“You go!” Hermione snapped at Harry, blinking rapidly and hating the squeezing sensation in
the back of her throat, tight and hot. “I’m sick of Ron at the moment. I’m sick of him being –
I’m… I’ll just see you later.”

She felt eyes on the back of her head as she left Harry near the quidditch teams’ locker-room.
But as she weaved through the crowd of their boisterous peers, still bedecked in their various
house-pride attire and periodically breaking into a chorus of Weasley is Our King, she
couldn’t quite bring herself to care.

It was stupid. The whole Felix Felicis ordeal was so bloody stupid and juvenile and
unnecessarily risky that it made her want to scream. Were things simply going too smoothly
for them? Did they just need to tempt fate for the thrill of it? Because while Dumbledore may
give Harry the run of the school, using illegal potions in a sporting event was an offence that
transcended even him, and the ministry en masse wasn’t exactly their friend.

It was as though Harry and Ron had no sense at all about the actual dangers facing them.
Like they hadn’t seen Cedric’s corpse, or watched Sirius fall through the veil, or stood by as
Katie was nearly hexed to death mere weeks before. As if they needed to manufacture drama
to stir things up.

And for as much as Ron was her friend, as much as she cared for him, lately she’d found that
every time she looked at him, she ended up wishing that he was someone else. Someone with
broader shoulders and bluer eyes and freckles in different places. And frankly, she hated that
too.

It wasn’t his fault; he was the same as he’d always been, and so was Harry. She was the one
that had changed when nobody was looking. The one that had grown up in an irreversible
way. And all at once she felt suddenly, deeply, ardently alone in that.

Hermione stepped through the entry hall of the castle, shaking snow off her robes and starting
to trek upstairs. She didn’t fully realise where she was going until she stopped in front of a
door instead of a portrait.

As she made her way up the spiral staircase and opened the second door onto the balcony for
the first time in the better part of a year, their balcony, she decided that for just a few stolen
moments, she’d stop being strong. She’d stop being the brightest witch of their age, the
rational one, the killjoy prefect. The one that needed to have the answers because nobody else
cared to find them.

She’d stop being all of those things and be what she felt the most in that moment; a young
woman that desperately missed the man that she loved. One that was scared and sad and
lonely.

Perhaps it was a bit longer than a moment.

Though she cast warming charms on the balcony the way they always did, it still felt colder
than it used to with Fred there. She sat with her back to the wall, watching over the railing as
the sun slowly dipped and finally disappeared behind the mountains, periodically whisking
tears off her cheeks and sniffling dolefully to herself.

When she drew her wand to renew the warming charm, she also conjured a few little yellow
birds as well, a small smile tugging at her lips when they chirped and fluttered around her
shoulders. She held out a finger and one landed on it, tilting its head and blinking tiny, dark
eyes at her.

“So, this is what’s up here.”

Hermione’s head whipped toward the door where, without making a sound, Harry had
appeared. The bird on her finger immediately took flight again, joining its friends still
flapping around her.

“Oh, Harry, I was just… practicing,” Hermione finished lamely, quickly swiping at her face
and thanking the powers-that-be for the dim lighting. She probably looked a fright.

“I can see that,” he said blithely, gesturing at the birds with a crooked smirk. “They’re really
good.”

He gave her a long, contemplative look before slowly shutting the door and making to sit
beside her, lanky legs in too-short trousers sprawled across the gray stone.

“How did you find me up here?” Hermione asked, though she’d already guessed the answer.
He confirmed it when he pulled a familiar yellowed piece of parchment from his pocket.

“It’s on the map, but I didn’t know it was a balcony. I always figured it was a storage
cupboard or something. Couldn’t be arsed to check, honestly.”

Hermione, whose fingers had been idly tracing the length of her wand, froze.

“Always figured?”

“Yeah. I spend hours staring at this thing, you know. The Room of Requirement is just down
the corridor.” She relaxed as he continued, “Plus, you and Fred were always sneaking up
here.”

Hermione’s lips opened with a pop, then rearranged themselves several times as if to speak,
but no sound came out. Not a whisper or even a breath. Harry didn’t say anything, just let her
work through her aneurism for a moment with a calm, unreadable expression on his face.

“How long have you known?” She finally croaked, doing her best not to let the guilt
currently swirling in her gut overtake her.

He nodded like she’d merely confirmed it and then huffed a breath, face scrunching in
thought. “Around Christmas, maybe? Dunno, I guess last year when we were at Grimmauld
Place, for sure.”
Suddenly her eyes were clouding for an entirely different reason.

“I’m so sorry Harry – I – we were going to keep it quiet just until summer, finish out the year,
but then he left and everything at The Ministry happened…”

Harry nodded again as she tapered off, eyebrows pulled together while he examined the
railing across from them pensively. Hermione didn’t know what to do, what she could
possibly say to make it better, so she elected not to say anything at all.

“I’m sorry that I wasn’t there for you,” Harry finally said quietly, breaking the silence.
“After… after what happened with Dolohov. I knew you were struggling, I could see that
much, but I was just trying to keep myself together. Everyone moved on so bloody fast, like it
didn’t even happen.”

Shame stabbed at her. “You know that you could have talked to me – “

“Hermione, I could hardly look at you.” She drew back at that, stung, but Harry quickly
explained, a grim, self-deprecating smile twisting his lips. “Any time I saw that hollow look
in your eyes, or the scars on Ron’s arms … I can’t remotely explain how sorry I am. How
responsible I feel for what happened that night. Sirius died, we nearly lost you and Ron and
Ginny and Tonks, because I didn’t think things through. Again. Because I reacted exactly the
way Voldemort knew that I would. Again. You’d have thought I’d learn my lesson after
Cedric, right?”

A hot tear slipped down her cheek. “You didn’t know. You couldn’t have known.”

“But I should have,” Harry said fiercely, turning to look at her, emerald eyes burning. “I’m
the one that’s supposed to know. Don’t tell me that you haven’t replayed that night over and
over in your head, all of the things that we could have done differently. Done better.”

“Of course I have,” she half-whispered, raising a hand and tracing her fingertips over the
ridged scar beneath her jumper. “Every time I closed my eyes for weeks after that, I thought
about it. Hell, I very nearly gave in to it, but we can’t change anything that happened Harry.
We can’t resurrect anyone, or go back to who we were before. All we can do is mourn for
them, for ourselves, and learn from it. Do better next time.”

“I know.” Harry nodded solemnly and swallowed hard, turning his head to nonchalantly
brush his cheek against his shoulder. He slumped back against the wall. “I know.”

It occurred to Hermione then, as she studied his profile, that perhaps she wasn’t alone in her
sense of obligation after all, careless though Harry may act at times. Because as the dusky
light highlighted the pain and loss etched across her childhood friend’s face, he looked like he
had the weight of the whole world on his shoulders.

The silence that followed that realisation was longer; heavier, but simultaneously eased of the
things they’d spent months not saying to one another. More than anything, it was a relief.

“How did you know about Fred and I?” Hermione finally asked, in response to which he
simply shrugged.
“When you grow up like I did, without an abundance of affection, you notice things.
Especially something like that.” Harry shot her a smug, self-satisfied look. “You also weren’t
as sly as you thought. Neville parsed it out too, and I know Ginny knows. She prances around
like she’s protecting a sodding state secret.”

Hermione snorted at that before a nervous feeling passed over her. “Ron?”

Harry’s smile withered and he looked a little like he’d just bitten into a lemon. “No. At least,
I don’t think so. He bought the story about Fred checking out Zonko’s old storefront when
Katie was cursed, which really speaks to the power of willful ignorance if you ask me. You
need to tell him, though.”

“I know,” Hermione sighed, rubbing her temple and feeling exhausted at the mere prospect.

Harry went from looking uncomfortable to mildly nauseous as he added, “You know that –
about you, he —”

“I know,” she said again, more quickly. Harry just nodded and looked thankful that he didn’t
need to spell it out.

“Well, you probably have a bit of time given that he’s rather preoccupied violently snogging
Lavender in the common room as we speak.”

“Oh God, Lavender?” Hermione blurted, shocked laughter bubbling from her lips. She made
a mental note to ask her roommate about it later.

“Uh-huh,” Harry chuckled. “Trust me, they made quite the spectacle of it.”

“I can imagine – though frankly, I’d really rather not.”

Harry squirmed in place again, like he wasn’t sure if he should say something.

“What?” Hermione asked, concerned there was something else with regards to Ron that
might further complicate things.

“Fred… he takes care of you, yeah? He’s good, I mean. As a, erm, boyfriend-type-thing. He’s
way better at dueling than I am, but I could probably get a decent hex or two in before he
transfigures me into a paper bag.”

She smiled affectionately at his palpable awkwardness, as well as his unnecessary offer to
defend her honor. Hermione didn’t grow up with siblings, but she imagined it’s what an
especially thoughtful brother might say if she had one. “He does. You mentioned this
summer… I tried to end things with him when it got really bad. I didn’t think I was going to
be okay again, that I was good for him anymore. Too broken, you know? But he didn’t give
up on me, not for a moment. And when I was ready to move on and heal, he was there for
that too. Every step. I love him. Sort of a stupid amount, really.”

“It makes sense,” Harry said, bobbing his head as though it were the most normal thing for
her to admit, despite this being the first they’d spoken about it. “The two of you, I mean. Our
lives are so bloody crazy most of the time, I’m just glad that you have someone.”
“I have more than one someone,” she said firmly, reaching over to take his hand and giving it
a firm squeeze. “And you do too.”

Harry squeezed back and swallowed hard. “Love you, ‘Mione,” he said quickly. She
suddenly felt like crying again.

“I love you too, Harry.”

The warming charm was once more beginning to fade, and a strong gust of frigid wind blew
across the balcony that made her shiver.

“Let’s get back,” Harry said, getting to his feet and pulling her up along with him. “No more
wallowing alone out here, okay?”

“Okay,” Hermione agreed. “I’ll make sure to invite you along for all future wallowing.”

“You’d better.”

Harry grinned and gave her hand one last squeeze before dropping it and turning to open the
door, leading the way down the staircase with his wand lit and held aloft in front of them.

“I’ll do your charms homework for a month if you tell Ron about Fred and I,” she offered
half-heartedly as they neared the bottom.

“Ha! Not a chance,” he threw over his shoulder with a chuckle.

“Hmmm,” Hermione pondered aloud before another thought struck her and a wicked smile
curved her lips. “Alright, then. What if I tell Ginny that you fancy her?”

Harry tripped down the last two steps.

 Contentment

27 December 1996

Hermione teetered for a moment upon stepping off of the Knight Bus, her sense of direction
having been completely turned on its head no less than three times during the short journey
from Hampstead.

“Thanks, Ernie!” She called over her shoulder to the elderly driver as the doors shut behind
her and the vehicle took off once again, like a shot. Given that she was spending the
remainder of her vacation at the twins’ flat, she was toting not only her school trunk,
burdensome as it was, but also a rather incensed Crookshanks.

Not wanting to dawdle outside, she flicked her wand and levitated both behind her, the latter
grumbling in his carrier none-too quietly. The bell jingled overhead as the door swung open,
and Hermione was thrust into a slightly more subdued version of the shop than that of her
initial visit.
There were still plenty of people milling about, holiday money heavy in their pockets, but it
was slow enough that she didn’t have any trouble making it to the till with Crookshanks and
her luggage in tow.

“Hermione!” George exclaimed upon seeing her, rushing around the counter to sweep her
into a crushing hug. “I thought you weren’t coming until later.”

“Change of plans,” she laughed, feet dangling an inch or two above the ground before he
lowered her again. “My mum had something come up at the practice, so I figured I might as
well head over.”

“Wait,” he said, suddenly serious and pushing her backward by the shoulders. “What did I go
watch at Lee’s over the summer when you came over here to seduce my poor, unsuspecting
brother?”

“The Three Stooges, ya porcupine,” she replied, amused and pantomiming smacking him on
top of his head with her fist. “I appreciate the diligence, but I don’t think anyone would be
crazy enough to replicate or kidnap Crookshanks to pull off this ruse.”

George and Hermione both peered at him in his carrier and, as if on cue, the half-kneazle
hissed, bottle-brush tail flicking sullenly back and forth behind him.

“Right,” George said slowly, suddenly seeming a bit less keen on their feline houseguest.
“Well, Fred is downstairs if you want to go frighten the life out of him. He still thinks he’s
meant to side-along you later.”

Hermione grinned and quickly made for the storeroom door, depositing Crookshanks and her
belongings behind the counter as she went.

“No funny business!” She heard George warn as she started down the stairs. “I still need him
until Lee comes on at four!”

Reaching the landing at the bottom, Hermione was surprised to see that the boys had
constructed a veritable labyrinth of crates and shelves, composed of both ingredients and
finished products.

“What on earth…” she muttered, delving into the nearest opening and peeking around stacks
as she went. She heard a quiet rustling and paused to listen. Then there was humming, a
Weird Sisters tune she’d heard more than once on the wireless.

After picking a path around and doubling back twice, Hermione finally arrived at the end of
an aisle and saw Fred. He was crouched low, deep in thought and selecting what looked like
pieces of Valarian root from a larger crate and moving them into one that, given its mixed
contents, appeared destined for the workroom upstairs.

His hair was shorter than it had been the last time she’d seen him, and he was clad in a dark
turtleneck with tan trousers and dragonskin boots, indicating that he was brewing that day.
For a second she just stared, overwhelmed by the sheer magnitude of how much she’d missed
him. The visceral pull that being near him again brought.

It wasn’t like it had been in the shack the last time she’d seen him, all fervor and heat, and it
took her a moment to put her finger on why precisely that was. When she saw Fred this time,
puttering about the storeroom of the shop in a moment of completely routine normality, not
even aware he was being watched, Hermione felt a profound sense of belonging. Certainly
more than she felt at her parents’ house, and more even than at The Burrow or Hogwarts.

Not a flame burning in her chest, bright and scorching, but an ember. White-hot coals,
glowing and fading steadily without any threat of being extinguished. The sort that turn water
to steam before it even makes contact, and keep you warm for hours on end. A hearth. A
home.

Unfortunately, or rather fortunately, this reverie was interrupted when Fred glanced down the
aisle where she was standing, still half-concealed by a stack of crates. He looked back at what
he was doing for a split-second before his eyes went wide and his head snapped back in her
direction.

Hermione grinned, raised her hand, and wiggled her fingers in a wave. He was in front of her
so quickly, she might have guessed he’d apparated if it wasn’t for the wards on the building
disallowing such things. He didn’t say anything, didn’t even kiss her; he just wrapped his
arms around her waist, pulled her against his chest, and held her tightly to him.

“Hello, love,” Hermione said softly, breathing in and reveling in the familiar feel of him as
she smoothed her hands over the lines of his back and shoulders.

“Hermione,” Fred sighed, cheek resting atop her head. Finally, he leaned away, looking her
up and down. She realized she was still clad in full outerwear, complete with a cap and
gloves. “How did you get here? I thought I wasn’t coming to get you until five.”

“I have my ways,” she replied cryptically, taking her mittens off and stowing them in the
pocket of her coat.

Fred didn’t seem interested in questioning it, ducking down and kissing her instead. She
groaned quietly; perhaps it was superficial, but she’d missed the feel of his mouth on hers
nearly as much as she’d missed him.

He tugged down the zip on her coat and fished his arms beneath it, wrapping them around her
waist before one hand dropped and gave her bum a light squeeze.

Hermione giggled and backed up a step to put him at arm’s length. “None of that!” She
chided, “I promised George that my being here wouldn’t distract you.”

Fred made a discouraged sound, like a child that had just had his favorite toy revoked. “Fat
chance of that,” he commented sullenly, turning toward the forgotten crate he’d been filling.
“He’s right, though. I still have four different potions to brew before Lee comes in.”

“Can I help?” Hermione asked eagerly.

Thus, they found themselves upstairs several hours later, toiling away in quiet
companionship. Hermione had braided her hair back, the humidity created from several
steaming cauldrons taking no prisoners with her curls, and Fred had traded in his jumper for a
dark purple t-shirt with the WWW logo on it.

Upon emerging from the basement Hermione had quickly gone upstairs to say hi to Angelina,
deposit her bags, and unleash Crookshanks. Taking care to ward the flat so he couldn’t
wander too far, she and Angie watched, amused, as he darted from his carrier and promptly
disappeared beneath the sofa.

She’d just set a cauldron of pimple-vanisher to simmer when George ducked his head into the
workroom.

“Can one of you watch the till? I need to run upstairs and use the loo.”

“I’ve got it,” Hermione volunteered, wiping her hands on a rag and stepping away from the
table. Fred just smiled and nodded, carefully counting drop number seventeen of the thirty
drops of castor oil that needed to be added to the potion bubbling in front of him.

Hermione followed George out behind the counter, and he nodded gratefully before turning
to disappear upstairs. She finished checking out a middle-aged woman with what seemed to
be the entire collection of Wonder Witch products when a small blonde girl of perhaps twelve
stepped up to the counter.

“Is this all for you?” Hermione asked distractedly, busily totaling the cost of the products.
She gestured to several packages of miniature fireworks. “You know, these are four for ten if
you want to go grab another.”

When no reply came, Hermione looked up to find the girl staring at her with what appeared
to be recognition, as well as something else that wasn’t overly friendly. In fact, it was
borderline hostile. Hermione concluded inwardly that she was most likely a younger student
from another house and brushed it off. Regardless, the little girl shook her head and
Hermione shrugged, bagging the products and accepting the money that she pushed across
the counter, making change and handing it back.

“Have a good day!” Hermione called after her, but the girl was already halfway to the exit,
bag swinging at her side. Hermione made sure the till was organized before shutting the
drawer, muttering under her breath. “That was odd…”

“What was odd?” George asked, swinging around the doorway that led to the stairs.

“That little girl. She just… I don’t know, she was staring at me strangely.”

“What’d she buy?” George inquired further, not sounding exceedingly concerned as he rooted
through a box of miscellaneous products that needed to be replaced on the shelves. Hermione
grabbed the receipt and looked it over.

“Two trick wands, a Fanged Frisbee, three Whizz Poppers, a package of Canary creams, and
two satchels of Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder.”
 oOoOoOo

“It’s been a while, are you sure you want to do this? No warm-up? Perhaps a bit of
stretching?”

“It’s not my first time, Fred. You know that I’m more than capable of handling you.”

“And if it’s too much? I don’t want to hurt you.”

Hermione made a scoffing sound, but Fred pursed his lips insistently at her.

“Alright, fine. Yes. I’ll tell you if I need a break.” He looked like he was weighing if she was
being honest before nodding.

He stepped across open area in the basement, cracking his knuckles and she felt a sudden
rush of anticipation, rolling her wand between her fingers.

“Okay, ground rules: Nothing we can’t easily heal, no unforgivables, and nothing with
prolonged or delayed effects.”

She arched a brow as she fastened her hair elastic more securely and Fred explained there’d
been an incident the month prior with Lee, Angelina, and a persistent case of boils.

“Ready?” he finally asked, to which she nodded. They both bowed dramatically and, not
wasting even a second upon straightening, Hermione fired a leg-locking curse that Fred just
barely sidestepped. There was a pause, weighted with adrenaline and excitement, and then
they were both shielding and trading spells, rapid-fire.

Though Fred had been practicing seriously two or three times a month with their makeshift
dueling club, Hermione actually had a competent DADA professor that term, so they were
more evenly matched than one might have expected.

About five minutes in, Fred suddenly conjured several spheres of water, pelting them at her
in quick succession. Hermione silently raised a shield, something she had a knack for, but not
before the first hit her square in the chest, soaking her t-shirt and pasting it lewdly to her
middle. He grinned, examining his handiwork, and she took advantage, firing a stinging
charm at his thigh that made him yelp.

He stumbled and she barked out a disarming spell between labored breaths, watching
victoriously as his wand skittered out of his hand and across the floor. Hermione walked over
to collect it, taking her eyes off of him as she did so, and was thus completely caught off-
guard then she was hit with a tripping jinx, sprawling suddenly across the cellar ground with
an inelegant, “Oof.”

Her wand, and Fred’s, were summoned from her surprised, lax grip a split-second later,
leaving her disarmed and more than a little beguiled.

Hermione rolled onto her back to see Fred standing over her with a victorious, if slightly
sympathetic, expression.
“You almost had me,” he admitted, offering a hand to help her up.

“I did have you,” she remarked sullenly as she took it, though it was lacking any true vitriol.
The only thing damaged was her pride. “I disarmed you.”

“No, you took my wand,” he corrected judiciously, brushing dirt off her shoulder and tucking
a curl behind her ear.

She sighed and accepted the length of vinewood he’d extended to her, looking at it
contemplatively for a moment.

“How do you do wandless magic?” she finally asked. She’d wanted to bring it up over the
summer but hadn’t gotten around to it.

Fred’s brows raised and then drew together. “Well, its — I guess I just — umm, I’m not
sure.” She just blinked at him expectantly and he tipped his head to a couple chairs that were
pushed against the wall, running a hand over the back of his neck.

“I started to toy around with it over the summer while… well, when I needed something to
keep busy with.”

“I’ve been trying,” she said, sinking into the chair, “but I can’t seem to make it work. It’s like
trying to move through molasses.”

“You’re probably overthinking it,” Fred explained thoughtfully as he sat down. “It should
feel natural. Magic is much older than wands are, and a lot of cultures still don’t use them.”

She nodded, well aware of this, and watched as he conjured a small, smooth rock and
dropped it into her palm. He placed his hand under hers and, a second later, the rock floated a
few inches into the air, rotating slowly as they both watched.

Hermione felt a subtle hum of magic where his fingers brushed her knuckles and released a
shuddering breath. The sheer proximity to that small expression of power and control was
both incredibly intimate and borderline erotic. Not the magic itself, but the calm surety with
which he wielded it.

“You try,” he prompted, releasing the spell and letting the rock fall back into her hand,
completely unaware of the effect he’d had on her. “Say the incantation if you need to; silent
and wandless is a tall order.”

She nodded, grateful when he kept his hand beneath hers. Fred watched patiently, not even
the barest hint of judgement in his expression. Just encouragement, and perhaps a little
curiosty.

Nonverbal magic wasn’t particularly difficult for her, so she didn’t think that saying it aloud
would help, but after several minutes of trying both verbally and non-verbally, and absolutely
nothing happening, she began to grow frustrated and speak aloud.

“I can’t get it,” she finally sighed, discouraged and annoyed with herself. She could feel the
magic, reach out and touch it, but it was like she couldn’t quite make it bend to her will. She
looked up to find Fred was no longer watching her, but was rather glancing around them
slowly with an amused, if slightly stunned expression.

“I think you’re closer than you think, love.”

She followed his gaze and realized with a start that everything in their immediate vicinity —
chairs, boxes, shelves — was hovering several inches above the ground.

“Oh.”

It all dropped at once with a chorus of quiet thuds and Fred, chuckling, shook his head at her.

“I guess I’ll keep practicing,” Hermione muttered sheepishly, cheeks heating as he reached
out and tweaked her nose.

A second later, George’s voice rang out from around the corner of a nearby shelf. “Everyone
clothed?”

“Oh, for Merlin’s sake, George, it was one time!” Hermione called back, rolling her eyes
when he appeared with a waggish grin.

“One can never be too cautious when one’s brother’s bare ass is concerned,” he reasoned
sagaciously. “Ancient Chinese proverb. Any who! Alicia and Katie came bearing pizza and
butterbeer, it’s up in the flat.”

Fred got up and extended a hand again, the three of them heading toward the stairs with
Hermione’s fingers twined in his. As they began to climb, George glanced back over his
shoulder with an inquisitive brow raised.

“Do I want to know why Hermione is all wet?”

 Be my forever
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

29 December 1996

“You missed a parenthesis on the second equation, that’s why it isn’t balancing out.”

Fred appeared from seemingly nowhere, bent and peering over her shoulder.

“What?” Hermione asked, startling a little. She raked her eyes over the parchment in front of
her, covered in the partial solution for an arithmancy problem that had her ready to rip her
hair out. “No, I couldn’t possibly have – “

And then she saw that he was absolutely correct. She was set up on the balcony of the flat,
wrapped in warming charms with a steaming cup of tea on the small table beside her and he’d
just gotten out of the shower after being relieved by Verity in the shop below.
“Bugger,” Hermione sighed, vanishing most of the writing on the page and going back to
rework the second equation. “Since when are you an arithmancy prodigy?”

Fred grinned and shrugged, hair still damp and a bit darker than usual. “George and I had to
alter a transfiguration charm with similar spell theory for the portable swamps.”

He settled into the chair beside her, and Hermione traded her notebook for the tea, vowing to
finish the exercise later that evening. It was silent for a few moments, the sounds of the city a
dull hum in the background.

“So, I wanted to show you something,” Fred began slowly, extracting a folded envelope from
his back pocket. He handed it over to Hermione, who accepted it curiously and set her mug
back down. He seemed… anxious?

She opened the flap and extracted a letter, tri-folded and covered in neat lines of curling black
script. At least, she thought it was a letter until she began to read. Then she surmised that it
was actually a business proposition.

“Holy cricket, is this for the portable library?” Flourish and Blotts’ letterhead was at the top,
and there was a proposal with a monetary figure in the middle of the page that had her eyes
bulging a bit.

“You were right,” Fred said, smile widening further. “I mean, of course you were right.
Apparently they were very interested in not only the patent for the portable library, but in
purchasing exclusive rights to it.”

“Fred, that’s amazing! Congratulations.”

Hermione half-rose and leaned over the table between them to give him a quick kiss,
laughing elatedly against his lips as she did so. Then she leaned back and finished reading the
contract summary. It seemed plenty fair considering the recent, sharp economic downturn.

“In that vein, there’s something else that I wanted to give you as well.”

Fred extracted yet another envelope and handed it over to her.

“Good Godric, you’re like an owl today,” Hermione chuckled, but her smile froze in place
when she opened this one and saw not a letter, nor a business agreement, but a cheque. For
nearly two-thousand galleons. Addressed to her. She blinked several times, as if the
punctuation on the number might shift to a more reasonable position. It didn’t. “What is
this?”

Fred stirred nervously in his seat, eyes locked on her face. “Half of the proceeds from the sale
of the patent, as well as twenty percent of the profits for each product that you helped come
up with or gave advice on when we were in school.”

She was already shaking her head, replacing the cheque in the envelope and shoving it back
toward him. “Absolutely not, no. I can’t accept this.”

“Hermione – “
“Fred, that’s not why I helped with those things!” she cried, interrupting him. “I didn’t want –
that’s your money, yours and George’s. Well-deserved and hard-earned and having absolutely
nothing to do with me.”

“I wouldn’t have even come up with the idea without you, let alone thought to patent it. Plus,
I’ve already talked to George, and he agrees that the rest is plenty fair - hell, he recommended
thirty percent. I’ve kept track of the sales since opening and this is your share.”

Fred stubbornly stuffed his hands beneath his thighs and shook his head, refusing to accept
the envelope being jabbed into his midsection.

“Come now, be serious – this is absurd!”

“No, what’s absurd is –“ Fred didn’t finish though. He cut off and his eyebrows drew
together. Meanwhile, she slumped against the back of the chair and let the envelope settle in
her lap, waiting impatiently for him to see reason. He drew in a deep breath before speaking
again. “What’s absurd is how much you’ve done for me. And I know, I know that’s not one-
sided, but I wouldn’t be where I am, hell, who I am, without you. George is my brother, he’s
my partner in all things crime and chaos, but you… you’re my partner in everything else,
Hermione. You have been for a while. And yes, you do also assist with the crime and chaos
from time to time. Hence the cheque.”

He added the last as an apparent afterthought, along with a cheeky smirk, and Hermione
huffed a weak laugh before turning back to the piece of paper in her lap. She was gnawing
the inside of her bottom lip so hard, it was a miracle it wasn’t bleeding.

“If this is just twenty percent of some of the products, you must be doing better than you let
on over the summer.” Fred shrugged again, but she didn’t miss the self-satisfied expression
that flickered across his face. “You really won’t take it back, will you?”

“Nope,” Fred affirmed, popping his lips. “And don’t bother trying to get rid of it. We live less
than a block from the bank, I can just get another one.”

Hermione heaved a defeated sigh and got up to perch on top of his thighs crossways, twining
her arms around his neck. She shook her head in defeat. “You’re horrifically stubborn, you
know that?”

“Cauldron, kettle,” Fred said, pointing at her and then at himself and she rolled her eyes,
leaning down to kiss him again, this time much more thoroughly.

“Hermione!” A voice rang out from inside a moment later, interrupting them. It only took a
second to recognise that it belonged to Angelina.

“On the balcony!” she called back, not bothering to shift out of Fred’s lap.

A second later Angelina’s head poked around the half-opened door, ponytail swinging like a
pendulum behind her. “There you are – can I have a quick word?”

“Of course,” Hermione said, straightening up as her interest was piqued.

“Alone,” Angelina added, looking pointedly at Fred with a raised brow. He sighed and
pressed a kiss to Hermione’s temple, then got to his feet as she climbed off of him.

“Sure, I’ll just… go be somewhere else that isn’t my bedroom.”

Once he departed, Hermione took the spot Fred had occupied and Angelina settled in the
other chair.

“What’s that?” She asked, gesturing to the envelope still in Hermione’s hand.

“Backpay, apparently,” Hermione said, shaking her head as she tucked it into her notebook on
the table. Angelina shrugged and brushed past it.

“Okay, so do the two of you have any plans tomorrow night?”

“As in, Fred and I? I don’t think so, just the party on Wednesday. Why?”

“What do you say we treat the two of them to a good, old-fashioned muggle double-date?”

oOoOoOo

“One of us has to change,” Fred said adamantly, scowling at his brother. He’d just walked
into the living room to find that they were wearing the exact same suit jacket in the exact
same shade of dark green. “I’m fourteen minutes older, so I’m demanding that it be you.”

“Precisely,” George countered. He’d just finished tying his shoes and straightened up,
looking unperturbed. “You’re older, thus you had fourteen extra minutes to get dressed. I was
out here first.”

They stood in front of the fireplace, staring at one another like two desperados standing off in
an old western.

“Oh, honestly,” Angelina scoffed, striding in and rolling her eyes.

“Like children,” Hermione agreed long-sufferingly, following her.

The boys turned and Fred suddenly didn’t care one single lick what he was wearing. In fact,
were his brother and Angie not present, he’d be rather content to not wear anything at all.

“Bloody –“

“ – hell.”

He saw Angelina in his periphery, clad in something a deep grey colour with a slit up the leg,
but Hermione pulled his attention in her direction and his jaw all but hit the floor. Her dress
was a pale blue and it looked as though it had been painted on, hugging her waist and her
hips before cutting just below her knees. It had two miniscule straps holding it up but, other
than that, her upper chest and shoulders were completely bare. He could even see the very top
edge of her scar.
“Well?” She asked, spinning to reveal that part of the back was cut away as well, and then
turning to face him again.

Fred wasn’t a pious man by any stretch of the imagination, but he felt a sudden urge to thank
any and all deities for this witch.

He stepped forward, running his thumb over her cheek and then along her jaw. Her hair was
down and wild, and she was wearing a bit of makeup, eyes smoky and lips a slightly darker
pink than usual.

“Positively breathtaking,” he remarked with a soft groan, just loud enough for her to hear.

She smiled and thanked him before she took in what he was wearing and squinted her eyes,
tipping her head to the side thoughtfully.

“Maybe just…” she raised her hand, muttered something under her breath, and suddenly his
suit jacket was dark blue instead of green, offsetting the lighter tone of her outfit.

“Did you just do that wandlessly?” He blurted and she grinned, nodding.

“Practice.”

He felt a sudden flash of pride and tugged her against his chest, wrapping his arms tight
around her shoulders and kissing the top of her head repeatedly when she squeaked in
surprise.

“All right, you two,” Angelina interjected, trying and failing to keep George’s hands from
wandering past her hips. “We need to get a move on, reservations are at seven.”

“Shall we?” Fred asked, extending his arm to Hermione once they’d all donned heavy
outerwear, complete with charmed scarves and gloves.

She reached out and hooked her hand around his elbow. “We shall.”

oOoOoOo

“Muggles really have fine dining figured out,” George said appreciatively as they left the
restaurant, a posh new place overlooking the Thames. Angelina’s father, a rather wealthy art
curator, had managed to turn his and his wife’s two-person reservation into a party of four
upon the both of them falling ill the day prior and being unable to fulfill it themselves.

“Definitely,” Fred agreed. “I was stuffed by the time they brought out the actual meals.”

“That’s because the two of you ate nearly a whole baguette during the salad course,”
Hermione laughed, leading the way to a path along the river. “And regardless, you didn’t
seem to have any issue finishing your dinners.”

It was a brisk night, but the sky was relatively clear and the snow blanketing the ground
caught the streetlights and lingering Christmas decorations, sparkling.
“So, where are we off to now?” George asked, rubbing his hands together in anticipation.

“Well, since Angie so graciously arranged dinner,” Hermione started, as Angelina took a
sweeping bow and nearly lost her hat in the process, “I came up with our activity for the
evening. Just a couple blocks this way.”

She and Angelina had preemptively spelled their shoes not to hurt their feet, and their whole
party was wrapped in various warming charms in addition to their outerwear. George and
Angelina fell behind a little and Hermione looped her arm more securely through Fred’s,
leaning her head sideways against his shoulder as they strolled.

“Having a good time?” She asked quietly.

“Absolutely,” he affirmed. “Pretty posh as far as first dates go, though. You’d better be
careful or I’ll get used to it.”

“First – oh my gosh, it is, isn’t it?” Hermione nearly tripped over herself upon realising that
he was correct. Then she turned and swatted him firmly on the shoulder. “You prat! How did
you manage to go a full year without taking me on a proper date?”

“To be fair,” Fred defended, chuckling at her pitiful blow, “the wizarding world has been a
militarised zone for pretty much the whole duration of our relationship.”

“Still...” she muttered before laughing at the absurdity of the conversation. It was odd, taking
him into her world. Fred and George had had some exposure to muggle culture in her
absence, at the hands of both Angelina and Lee, but the sheer normalcy of walking down the
street without keeping a hand on her wand the whole time was staggering.

“So where are we going, anyway?”

“There,” Hermione pointed to the massive structure plopped along the edge of the river, now
fully in view as they rounded a bend. There were enormous multi-coloured spotlights aimed
up at the building, casting shadows and adding to the grandeur. “It’s called Somerset House.”

“Bleeding hell,” Fred breathed, eyes flickering across the edifice. “Must be one rich bloke
that lives there.”

Hermione grinned and shook her head. Glancing over her shoulder she saw George and
Angelina had fallen even further behind and were now kissing rather passionately against a
lamppost. Fred glanced back as well and, after a second, they both shrugged before
continuing on. Angie knew where they were going, after all.

“The estate hasn’t been used as a residence in a very long time. It was originally built in 1547
by the Duke of Somerset, Edward Seymour, but after he was executed via beheading,
ownership fell to the crown.”

Fred tugged the scarf away from his neck, expression a little uneasy. “What on earth did he
do to deserve that?”
“Treason supposedly, but at that time ‘treason’ was really just code for holding any sort of
opinion that contradicted the people in power. His wife was arrested as well, for conspiring
with him.” They came to a halt near the wrought-iron gate that blocked off the side of the
building. “Once the royal family took possession of it, Queen Elizabeth I lived there for a
time before it was renamed Denmark House following the Treaty of London’s signing. It
managed to survive the fires in 1666 but was ultimately demolished and rebuilt in the late
eighteenth century – an absolute pity, really. The General Registrar’s Office was established
there once the remodel was complete, though it isn’t there anymore, and – and I’m being
really, tragically boring, aren’t I?”

She trailed off haplessly and looked over at Fred to find him smiling affectionately at her in
spite of the impromptu lecture.

“Not in the slightest. Although, you could have read the menu at the restaurant earlier and it
would have held my attention.”

Hermione relaxed a bit and started to lead him around the edge of the building toward the
courtyard where hundreds of people were laughing and milling about. “Well, long story short,
it’s now mostly an art museum, though there are talks of partitioning other parts of it off for
public use.”

“What are all these people doing here, then?”

“Well, there’s another public event that they started doing in the winter a couple years ago.”
Hermione stepped through a gap along the railing and looked at Fred with an anticipatory
smile. “Tell me, have you ever heard of ice-skating?”

oOoOoOo

As it turned out, Fred and George hadn’t heard of ice-skating, but they approached it the
same way that they approached all things: with an unwavering sense of humor.

Angelina, on the other hand, had apparently ice-skated in her youth, skillfully twirling around
them upon entering the rink while George kept his legs bowed stiffly, barely moving forward,
and Fred clung to the railing like a cat dangling over open water.

Once they’d been lapped a few times by children that were barely school-age, they began to
get the hang of it. Hermione glided along, not terrible herself, though already sporting a few
bruises on her hips and bum.

She and Fred laughed uproariously when Angelina zipped past suddenly and grabbed
George’s arm, towing him forward and away from them at break-neck speed with a terrified,
not at all manly, shriek.

They disappeared and Hermione reached a hand out, which Fred eyed incredulously.

“Don’t worry,” she assured him, “You’re safe. I’m barely staying upright myself.”
He took it and they tottered forward, leaning on one another and landing on their asses more
than once.

They’d circled the rink a couple more times before taking a break to sit and people-watch,
Hermione citing sore feet. There were hundreds of people milling about, but Hermione
caught sight of an elderly couple a way down along the railing, clutching cups of cocoa and
cheering enthusiastically each time their presumable grandchildren passed them.

She watched as the man took his glove off and raised a trembling hand to straighten his
wife’s hat and pull it down to better cover her ears. She smiled and leaned forward, kissing
him lightly on the mouth.

“I wonder how long they’ve been together,” Fred mused, having followed her gaze and
watching as well.

“Seems like forever,” Hermione commented, watching as they turned back to the ice.

“Forever…” Fred said, trailing off thoughtfully. She looked sideways at him curiously, the
cogs whirling in his head before he came to whatever conclusion he’d been pursuing and
nodded. “Yeah, I think we could probably manage that.”

She grinned and leaned forward to kiss him. His lips were warm and soft, serving in stark
contrast to the crisp winter air surrounding them. She pulled back and said softly, “Forever
sounds like a good place to start.”

It was like the people around them faded to white noise and Hermione basked in that
moment, the twinkling lights and the laughter and the smell of hot cocoa at the nearby stand.
It was peaceful, stolen and perfect.

Or, it was until Angelina and George sidled up near them, the latter more or less crashing.

“Oi, lovebirds!” George interrupted, gripping the rail, “What do you say we get out of here?
My ass hurts and I could use a drink.”

They ended up at the flat a short time later, sitting in front of the fire and passing a bottle of
firewhiskey among them. Hermione and Angelina had removed their heels and the boys their
jackets.

They were chatting idly about the upcoming New Year’s party when Angelina was overcome
by a sneezing fit, her allergy remedy apparently having worn off.

“I’m so sorry, Angie,” Hermione said apologetically as the other witch summoned a bottle
from her bag. “I’ll go buy a new shampoo tomorrow. Is it only lavender that you’re allergic
to?”

She jumped in surprise, nearly spilling her drink when all three of them immediately and
forcefully shouted, “No!”

Hermione's eyes were wide as she raised her hands slowly in baffled surrender. “Alright, fine.
I’ll keep the lavender.”
Chapter End Notes

Technically seasonal ice skating didn't begin at Somerset House until 1999, but we're
going to pretend that's not the case.

Enjoy the fluff while you can!

 Midnight (again)
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

31 December 1996

Hermione sidled up beside the makeshift bar in the corner, tipping just a touch more
firewhiskey into her glass and then turning to survey the room. Fred’s promise that the party
would remain small turned out to be more or less true.

There were all the members of their makeshift dueling club as well as Charlie, Tonks,
Verity’s muggle sister Samantha, who was visiting from university in The States, and Katie,
newly released from the hospital and propped in one of the cushy armchairs with a glass of
fizzy water.

The snow was drifting lazily outside the large window overlooking the street and there was
music playing beneath the buzz of chatter and laughter. She missed Ron and Harry, who were
safely tucked away at The Burrow, but she also felt somehow vindicated that she had made a
life for herself outside of them. A world beyond being the brains of the famed trio.

And it helped knowing that Harry didn’t resent that of her. Ron… well, this wasn’t the time
to think about it.

Lee stepped into her periphery, topping off his own glass and giving her a friendly, if slightly
intoxicated, nudge in the ribs with his elbow.

“Keeping up alright, ducks?”

“Just fine, thanks,” she smiled, glancing at the clock that the twins had enlarged and set on
the mantle; it was just a little over two minutes to midnight. She then traced Lee’s stare and
smirked. “Verity is looking rather fetching tonight, isn’t she?”

“Thinking of changing teams? Poor Freddie is going to be crushed.”

“Hardly. You, on the other hand, just about drool any time she glances in your direction.”

“Yeah – well – I – mind your business, nosy witch.” Lee all but stuck his tongue out and
Hermione put her hands up, taking a sip from her glass. “What’s your plan for midnight
anyway?”

“Oh,” Hermione said stupidly, brows drawing together. “I just — I mean, Fred said we could
sneak away after the countdown if I wanted.”

“In the name of Merlin’s pale, wrinkly balls, haven’t you two had more than enough sneaking
about? Bleeding hell, I’m not even the one doing it and I’m positively exhausted by the
whole affair.”

“Mind your business,” Hermione retorted curtly, narrowing her eyes at Lee before turning her
gaze back to Fred.

He was standing near the fireplace with George, getting everyone ready for the countdown.
Taking note of her watching, he shot her an easy wink, and it warmed something in her chest
that firewhiskey couldn’t ever come close to.

This man.

This funny, brilliant, protective, dreamer of a man that she called hers was there, literally
standing right in front of her. Smiling and laughing, in a rare moment that the two of them
weren’t burdened with worry or doubt. That they didn’t have to fret after the other’s
wellbeing or plot out when they might be able to see each other again.

He was right bloody there. She realised that Lee, while most decidedly drunk, had a point;
what on earth were they still doing hiding?

“Okay, okay, shut it, all of you!” George called out, a bright purple hat propped haphazardly
on his head as he pulled Angelina against his side, who tottered tipsily and giggled. And then
the whole room began to count.
“Ten!”

Hermione sucked in a deep breath and squared her shoulders.

“Nine!”

She glanced sideways at Lee, who arched a challenging brow.

“Eight!”

She rolled her eyes, threw back the rest of her drink and then shoved the empty glass in his
direction. He took it, grinning and shaking his head.

“Seven!”

She pushed away from the bar.

“Six!”

She slipped between Charlie and Tonks.

“Five!”

She navigated around the edge of the sofa.

“Four!”

She caught Fred’s eye a couple feet across from her, surprise and curiosity playing behind his
gaze, but still so full of affection for her that it almost hurt to look at. Like looking into the
sun.

“Three!”

She stepped up onto the coffee table between them with socked feet, feeling every eye in the
room fix on her. A few surprised laughs intermingled as they continued.

“Two!”

She grabbed Fred by the collar and tugged him to her, a few inches taller for once. He smiled
and gamely stepped forward, eyes sparkling with a question that asked, ‘Are we really doing
this?’

“One!”

And, as the clock struck midnight, she threw her arms around his shoulders and kissed him
with complete abandon.

Everyone went wild, whooping and whistling, but the room might as well have been empty.
Her curls formed a sort of veil around them and Fred looped his arms around her, one across
the tops of her thighs and the other around her waist. He pulled her off the coffee table, tight
against him, and spun them around, her feet miles from the ground. She felt a little like she’d
float away, even if he wasn’t holding her.

They only kissed for a moment, the taste of alcohol and warm spices still lingering on his
tongue, and hers for that matter, before she drew back, beaming at him through the shadows.

“Happy New Year,” she whispered.

“Happy New Year,” he breathed, shaking his head at her and smiling back.

“Alright, alright, get a room you two!” She thought it might have been Oliver from the
brogue, and Fred carefully set her down, both of them laughing and Hermione blushing
furiously.

Angelina and George, accustomed to their antics, were oblivious and snogging sloppily
beside the fireplace; Alicia was curled around Katie on the chair, head tucked into her
shoulder while her girlfriend lightly stroked her hair; Tonks and Charlie were snickering, the
later scrubbing her purple lipstick off of his face; Bill and Fleur were looking at one another
tenderly, her hand resting on his chest; and Lee was receiving a chaste kiss on the cheek from
Verity and acting as though he’d just won the lottery.

There was quiet music playing on a turntable in the corner, the sound of laughter in the air,
and Hermione felt Fred’s arms wrap around her waist from behind. She leaned into him,
taking a mental photograph and hoping against hope that 1997 might not be as bleak as she
feared.

oOoOoOo

The next morning Hermione and Fred were awake before anyone else. While George and
Angelina had stayed up well into the night, entertaining until everyone flooed home, the two
of them had opted for a more private celebration shortly after their very public kiss.

“Coffee?” Fred asked, in response to which Hermione simply shot him a look and then
continued to set the bread to toast. He was in just a pair of low-slung pyjama pants, copper
hair deliciously ruffled and eyes a little bleary. She crossed her arms across her chest, leaning
a hip on the counter and watching as he went about making her morning brew as though he’d
done it a thousand times and would a thousand more.

“What’s that look?” Fred asked when he noticed her staring, glancing up and smiling back
inquiringly as he poured water into the French press.

“I just love you a lot,” Hermione replied nonchalantly, shrugging and turning to collect
supplies so she could start to scramble eggs.

“Oh, is that right?”

“Yep.”

“I mean, I am extremely lovable, so I suppose it makes sense…”

“Alright Weasley, don’t push your lu – ahh!”

All at once, she was being picked up and carried away from the bowl she’d retrieved, slung
over Fred’shoulder.

“Fred!” Hermione quietly shrieked, laughing and desperately clinging to his upper back. All
she was wearing were her knickers and his pyjama shirt, the former on full display as he
transported her across the room. “What on earth are you doing? Put me down!”

“I’m pushing my luck,” Fred replied, a grin splitting his face as he set her on the edge of the
dining table. “Lay back.”

“Have you gone completely mad?!” She hissed, even as he reached under the shirt and
expertly removed her underwear. She didn’t stop him, but she stayed propped on her elbows,
staring at him incredulously. “Someone could walk in!”

“That’s a very good point. You’d best be quiet, then,” he chastised mischievously, a split-
second before he dropped to his knees and dragged his tongue slowly over her sex. His lips
closed gently around her clit, tongue flicking out, and her fingers flexed against the cool
wood of the table, seeking purchase.

Then it didn’t matter one bit who might walk in, let a bloody parade come marching through.
Fred worked her body the same way that he made her morning coffee: with effortlessness and
familiarity. He’d become fluent in Hermione Granger; the way she liked to be touched, the
way she liked to be kissed.

He eased one finger into her, then two, until a matter of moments later she was breathing hard
and rocking her hips up toward him. Then, just as she was nearing her climax, it all
disappeared at once.

She was going to sit up and ask why he’d stopped when a familiar tingling coursed through
her stomach right before the familiar press of Fred’s cock at her center, fingertips picking up
to circle her clit in the same way his tongue had been. He was leaning over her with the other
hand braced on the tabletop.

This was happening.

This was really, truly happening.

It was the very first morning of the new year and Hermione was about to have an orgasm
beside the butter dish.

She sat up and gripped his shoulders so her legs wrapped tight around his waist, pulling him
deeper so just her ass was perched on the very edge of the table.

“Fuck,” Fred chuckled with a soft groan, dropping his forehead into the crook of her neck for
a second before he started moving again. The table creaked softly with each thrust of his hips.

“I’m close,” she gasped a moment later. “Fred, I’m –“ she cut off, eyes squeezing shut as her
orgasm took her, toes literally curling while he kept a steady pace, one hand working her clit
 and the other gripping her thigh and holding her to him. She sank her teeth into the thick
muscle of his shoulder, which only served to spur him on, and then gave herself a little
mental pat on the back for remaining fairly silent.

He waited until she stopped clenching around him and then eased her back to lay down again,
which she happily obliged, her whole body relaxed and boneless. Then Fred picked just her
hips up, dragged her a bit closer, and fucked her

Hermione arched her back, giving him as much access as she could and reveling in the
feeling of him. Not long after, his motions stuttered and then stopped, fingers biting
deliciously into the sides of her stomach as he ground out her name.

“I love you too,” Fred murmured back quietly as he carefully set her lower body down and
then dipped to kiss her sternum, in between the open buttons of his too-large shirt. He drew
out of her and then conjured a rag for them to clean up while she retrieved her knickers.

Fred’s front was to her, which meant his back was to the hallway, blocking her view. It also
meant that Hermione heard George before she saw him.

“Hey, if the two of you are awake – bloody fucking hell!”

Fred cringed, tugging his pants back up his thighs as Hermione hastily crossed her legs and
made sure the buttons on her shirt were done. At least she’d had time to put her underwear
back on.

“Sorry, George!” She shouted, leaning around Fred. Hermione winced as her boyfriend’s twin
stumbled back toward the hall with an arm flung over his eyes, tripping and nearly knocking
over a lamp as he went. She tried and failed to keep the laughter from her voice as she
apologised again, clapping a hand over her mouth.

Fred, on the other hand, was openly snickering and not even attempting to say sorry as he
retied the drawstring on his pyjamas.

“Twice!” George yelled back furiously, right before his bedroom door slammed shut behind
him. “That’s twice!”

Chapter End Notes

Hello, darlings!

Just a quick note, I'll have a new oneshot posting this week over on my works page. It's
part of the Fremione Fanatics Birthday Bash fest and you should definitely check it out.
The reveal is on 4/1 and the fic is entitled "Tell me tomorrow."

If you need more motivation, tags include, but are not limited to: "Thigh-riding," "Horny
Hermione Granger," and "Truth or dare"
Make sure to give the other fest fics some love, too!
 Correspondence

9 January 1997

Dear Fred,

I know it’s only been a few days, but already my heart feels heavier without you.
Furthermore, it’s beginning to seem like our time together over the holidays might just be the
peak of this whole bloody year.

As soon as I arrived back at school, Harry started up again with his theorising about Malfoy,
and now he’s convinced that Snape is involved too. It feels like our first year all over again.

Honestly, I don’t know if he’s right or not, but if I give him any sort of indication that I agree,
I don’t know how much bolder he might get about the whole ordeal; he’s already taking too
many risks as it is. I’ve reasoned away his notions so far, but the evidence is admittedly
starting to stack up, and I’m not sure what to do or who to trust.
Could subtly you ask some of the Order members about it? They’ve been around longer,
maybe they have a better understanding of the dynamics at play. I know Snape’s relationship
with Dumbledore is complex, but I just can’t see him as truly evil. Cold? Cruel? Potentially
unwashed? Yes, absolutely, but not a villain. Not in the way that Harry thinks, at least.

It seems there’s also a werewolf in the mix too, Fenrir Greyback. Malfoy said something
about him at Borgin and Burke’s over the summer and, according to Harry, Fenrir is the wolf
that infected Remus when he was little. I found some old Prophet articles about him in the
library and he was aligned with You-know-who’s forces during the last war. Harry thinks it’s
evidence that Malfoy has actually turned, taken the mark and all.

Fred, I feel like I’m going mad; like all the pieces of the puzzle are right in front of my face,
but I can’t for the life of me figure out how to put them together. And I can’t shake the feeling
that if I get it wrong, or if I don’t do it in time, something terrible is going to happen.

Sorry, I really didn’t mean for this letter to be as gloomy as it’s turning out.

Tell me how things are at home. Did you talk to your parents about us? You mentioned that
you were thinking about it. I don’t mind either way, though I’ll admit that I’m a little worried
about your mum’s reaction.

I’ve gotten the sense that after my relationship with Viktor she thinks that I’m some sort of
gold-digging slag, and the fact that she’s only finding out that I’m in a relationship with you
after you’ve become wealthy and successful probably isn’t going to reflect all that well.
Anyway, let me know how it goes if you do.

On the topic of parents, I was thinking that I’d maybe like to bring you home to meet mine.
We’d have to get a few stories straight ahead of time, but it feels like something two people in
a committed relationship might do, doesn’t it? Anyway, let me know what you think.

Apparation lessons start next month, so your days of side-alonging me are almost at an end.
Such a shame that I won’t feel the urge to vomit on your shoes every time we go to lunch.

I miss you terribly. Say hi to everyone, and stay safe.

Yours,

Hermione

20 January 1997

Dear Hermione,

Heavier is putting it lightly; I hate waking up every day without you – the first morning you
were gone, I started making coffee before I realised that there isn’t anybody in the flat to
drink it now.

Love, you’re putting too much pressure on yourself again. There are dozens of witches and
wizards in the Order that have all the same information that you have, and none of them are
calling for Malfoy or Snape’s execution.

I asked around and Tonks and Kingsley both said that Dumbledore has reiterated over and
over to them that he trusts Snape. If he’s playing up anything contradictory to Malfoy, it’s
probably a ploy to get information from him (which I’m sure you already guessed). Or maybe
Dumbledore is playing another game altogether.

Malfoy might be dangerous, but, as much as I hate to think about it, so could any of the
students and teachers that you walk past every day. Look what happened to Katie.

It’s not just your puzzle to parse out, it’s mine too. And George’s. And Harry’s. And the
Order’s. Whatever comes of it, we’ll handle it together. You’re not alone, Hermione.

Now, on to less dire topics!

I’d be happy to meet your parents over Easter; Angelina and Lee have even offered to step up
my at-home muggle studies so I don’t accidentally say something horrifically out of turn. I
know your relationship with them is complicated, but it seems that I have an intrinsic impulse
to try and get them to like me anyway. Is that stupid? It’s probably stupid.

Speaking of complicated relationships, I did not get a chance to talk to my mum, but I did
speak with my dad when he stopped into the shop the other day. I’m beginning to think we
aren’t as clever as we thought, because he wasn’t the least bit surprised to hear that I’m
hopelessly besotted with you. Although he admittedly has a habit of feigning ignorance when
it suits him – don’t tell Harry, but he knows what a rubber duck is. Has for years.

Anyway, he’s happy for us. Just said to be safe and to treat you well. Fairly certain I’ve done
both, but I trust you’ll tell me rather quickly if I’m falling short.

He did say that mum doesn’t know, and that I might want to wait until we’re both present to
tell her. I think that’s probably for the best, too; she’ll hopefully be less inclined to blurt out
something thoughtless. Besides, she’s preoccupied with Bill and Fleur right now, anyway.

I know that I haven’t ever said it outright to you, or really to anyone but George, but things
have been… strained with her, especially in the last few years. My mum, I mean. You know
that she wasn’t encouraging of the shop at all, but it went further than that. She’d say that we
were throwing our lives away, cried about wasted potential and all that tosh.

It bothered me then, despite all of the joking, but what bothered me more was that when the
shop started doing well over the summer, she suddenly became supportive. It’s definitely not
for a handout, mum and dad would never ask any of us for money, but she talks us up now.
Brags to her family and all.

You said you were concerned that she’d judge you because it might seem like you waited until
I was successful to show an interest in me, but that’s the furthest thing from the truth. You
were the one that knew about the money from Harry and didn’t tell anyone; you were the one
that talked me off a ledge countless times when we were in product development last year and
I was ready to rip all of my hair out; you were the one that told me to leave school with
George, even though I know how much it hurt you to do it.
I’ve never once felt like you didn’t support me, Hermione, or like you didn’t believe in me.

And, while it makes me really sad, I can’t say the same about my mum.

So, if she has a problem with you or with us, if she even implies that I’m anything short of the
luckiest man alive to call you mine, she can sod off until she sees reason.

I’m sure you’ll be as brilliant at apparating as you are with everything else you attempt. And
no, I can admit that I won’t miss the dry-heaving (charming as it is).

George says hullo — so do Angie, Alicia, Lee and Verity. It's like a bloody halfway house
over here.

Yours truly,

Fred

1 February 1997

Dear Fred,

How do you feel about being down a brother? Just the one – you have four to spare, after all.
You probably wouldn’t even notice, save for maybe around Christmas.

In all seriousness, I’m not currently speaking to Ron (or Won-Won, as he’s now colloquially
known). I think he suspects that there’s something Harry knows that he doesn’t, and he’s
taking the approach of being horribly insufferable in just about every way that he can
manage in order to spite me.

I mentioned it to Lavender and she said she was going to try and speak with him – I also told
her that if she doesn’t cool it with the nicknames, I’m going to have no choice but to smother
her in her sleep. I think she took me seriously because I caught her warding the curtains
around her bed last night.

Anyway, the first day of apparition instruction went really well – the last few times I got this
really tingly sensation all over, and a pressure in my ears like they were going to pop. That’s
probably a silly thing to be excited over in the grand scheme of things, I suppose. Harry
doesn’t care all that much because he reckons that he can just fly everywhere, but I
personally find that a much less agreeable mode of transportation. (At least when there isn’t
a dashing delinquent at my back.)

Your dad is a very sweet man, and it makes me happy to know that he’s okay with us. And yes,
I did parse out some time ago that the Head of the Misuse of Magical Artefacts Office might
not be totally oblivious to topics related to muggles and their artefacts. But it was incredibly
kind of him to pretend for mine and Harry’s sake.

I didn’t mean to strike a nerve about your mum. I knew there was probably more to it than the
obvious, but I didn’t realise that it bothered you so much. If you’d like, we can speak to her
over Easter as well. Or it can wait until summer – like you said, she’s engrossed with Bill and
Fleur for the time being.

Maybe we can tell her and Ron at the same time and then jump a portkey to Jamaica until
things die down. You, me, a bikini and a bottle of rum on the beach. Angie can help at the
shop, right?

Speaking of Easter, I checked the dates and we’re off from 24 March through 5 April. I’ll
have to ask my mum, but maybe you could come over for dinner the week before the holiday?
Or perhaps lunch would be better…

To be honest, this is such a normal occurrence that I’m struggling a little with the logistics.
How does one plan a relationship milestone without the threat of mortal peril looming
overhead? I mean, I guess that's still technically present, but still.

Sorry, this is a short (and slightly rambling) letter, but I promise to write more next week; I
have a charms essay to finish, and I want to spend a little extra time on potions. Class has
been a bit more competitive this year and, though I recognise that it’s juvenile, I will not have
my class standing usurped by a vandalised old book.

Love you!

Yours always,

Hermione

P.S. I meant to ask this in my last letter and forgot; it’s extremely confidential for the time
being, so don’t go probing The Order about it (or anyone else, for that matter).

Have you ever heard of something called a horcrux?

 Unhappy birthday

1 March 1997

“So, all in all, not one of Ron’s better birthdays,” Fred joked halfheartedly, pulling Hermione
tight against his side and dropping a kiss on the top of her head. He and George had just
walked into the hospital wing to find Ginny, Harry and her huddled around Ron’s
unconscious form.

Her eyes were a bit red, like she’d been rubbing at them, and he knew without needing to ask
that she was feeling guilty. For not being present when the incident occurred, for Ron being a
prat the past several weeks, for not somehow guessing by sheer force of will that his brother
would be arbitrarily poisoned; you name it and his beautiful, stubborn witch would find a
way to blame herself for it.

“This isn’t exactly how we imagined handing over our present,” George said grimly, setting
their gift on the bedside cabinet and taking a seat next to Ginny. “We were in Hogsmeade and
were going to come up after the game –“
“What were you doing in Hogsmeade?” Ginny asked, cutting in and turning to look at her
brother.

“We were actually thinking of buying Zonko’s,” Fred explained with a touch of dry humor,
seeing as that had been his fabricated excuse for being present when Katie had been cursed.
Hermione remained silent, already aware of this, and Fred conjured a chair, took a seat, and
pulled her onto his lap before she could protest. Madam Pomfrey shot him a look from
nearby but remained silent, and neither Harry nor Ginny batted an eye. Hermione curled into
his side almost instantly and he breathed her in like a drug. She smelled like lavender and
home.

He shook himself and cleared his throat. “Although we’ve concluded that that isn’t a sensible
acquisition if nobody from the castle is allowed to visit.”

There was muttered agreement and then silence for a moment before George asked the
question that Fred had been wondering as well: “How exactly did it happen, Harry?”

As Harry began to recount the tail, a half-listening Fred pushed a curl away from Hermione’s
cheek and said under his breath, “Hello, love.”

“Hi,” Hermione replied, voice thick like she was suffering a cold.

“It wasn’t your fault,” he said evenly.

She sniffled softly and let her head drop to rest on his shoulder. “I know. Of course I know
that, there’s no way that I could have possibly… but we hadn’t spoken in over a week, Fred.
And even that wasn’t a kind exchange, not at all. If he’d — if Harry hadn’t —”

“But he didn’t, and Harry did,” Fred said, shaking his head at her. He’d already reckoned
with the what-ifs of the situation; they didn’t live in a world where it boded to dwell
anymore. “There’s no reason to hang yourself over it, and falling victim to a freak attack
doesn’t excuse his behavior toward you.”

Hermione nodded. “I missed you,” she whispered.

“I missed you too,” he said quietly, thumb circling lightly where his hand rested on her
shoulder. Even through layers of robes, she was warm and soft.

“Do mum and dad know?” George asked Harry as he concluded his story.

“Yeah, they’re in Dumbledore’s office now.”

“But they’ll be back soon,” Ginny added with a pointed, slightly apologetic look at Fred and
Hermione.

Hermione, who caught the implication as well, nodded and made to get up, swiping at her
eyes and straightening her rumpled blouse. Every bone in his body shouted at Fred to pull her
back to him, but he sincerely doubted his mum would take the news well if she walked into
the hospital wing just then, with Ronniekins unconscious and all. So, he released his grip and
dragged a frustrated hand through his hair.
“Then the mead itself was poisoned, yeah?”

“Right,” Harry confirmed, reaching over and squeezing Hermine’s hand when she took an
empty seat beside him on the other side of the bed. “Slughorn gave it to him.”

“Would he have been able to slip something into Ron’s glass without you seeing?”

“Maybe, but what would be the point in that?”

“Could be that it was intended for you.”

That grim notion hung in the air for a long moment and Harry silently paled a shade or two.

“Do you think Slughorn could be a Deatheater?” Ginny asked quietly. Madam Pomfrey was
back near her office, busily writing something in a large, yellowed book.

“It’s not impossible,” Fred said darkly, thinking back to when he’d inferred exactly that in his
letters to Hermione last month. If the first war served as any indicator, it seemed there were
very few people not susceptible to coercion or intimidation under the right circumstances.

“He could have been under the Imperius Curse, like Katie,” Hermione reasoned aloud.
Something in Fred’s chest uncoiled and relaxed a little – though she still looked upset, the
fact that Hermione was theorising with them was a good sign. She caught his eye over the
bed and offered a wan, but marginally heartening smile. He nodded in reply.

“Or he could be entirely innocent and the bottle was poisoned before he got it,” Ginny said,
throwing her hands up in the air with a huff. “The man was in hiding after all, it stands to
reason th— wait. Didn’t Slughorn say that he was planning to give the mead to Dumbledore
for Christmas?”

She turned to look at Harry, who blushed a little around the collar under her gaze but nodded.
Fred snorted softly and then covered it with a cough. The poor sod; anyone that reacted like
that to his sister would have their cut work out for them.

“If the bottle was meant for Dumbledore, then whoever planted it doesn’t know Slughorn
very well at all,” Hermione said skeptically. “The odds of something like that leaving his
possession untouched were slim to none.”

Ron, who’d been stirring and muttering on and off, chose that time to say the first intelligible
word since George and Fred had arrived – a word that effectively silenced everyone present.
Quite possibly silenced the whole of Wizarding Britain, though there wasn’t any way to
verify that.

“Her-my-nee.”

You could have heard a bloody pin drop.

Fred’s eyes snapped to his girlfriend, who looked like she’d just had a bucket of cold water
dumped over her head. George’s brows shot up so high that they nearly disappeared, and
Harry began examining the lamp on the bedside table as if it might suddenly grow legs and
begin to salsa. Even Madam Pomfrey, who’d been approaching with several glass phials
floating in front of her, abruptly cut to the left toward her workbench.

They stayed frozen in those positions of mingled surprise and horror until Ginny finally
broke the silence with a humorless chuckle.

“Well,” she said, looking around at all of them and rubbing her palms together, “That’s really
fucking awkward, isn’t it?”

Ron promptly began snoring again and, before anyone could say anything else, Hagrid burst
into the room.

oOoOoOo

A short time after that Mr. and Mrs. Weasley returned as well, at which point Madam
Pomfrey gently, but sternly, reminded them that only six visitors were allowed at a time.

“We need to get back to the shop, anyway,” George said, grabbing his cloak from the empty
bed beside Ron’s and handing Fred his own before bending to give his mum a peck on the
cheek.

“We’ll walk you out,” Harry offered, tipping his chin at Hermione, who was already getting
to her feet to join them. Hagrid made to depart as well.

As Hermione passed Mr. Weasley, he reached out and gave her shoulder a gentle squeeze,
pointedly looking between her and Fred, who was just to her left. His expression was
tremendously kind, and for whatever reason that was the thing that made Hermione choke up
again. She reached up and placed her hand on top of his, warm and a little rough, squeezing
back before stepping away and continuing toward the doors. Nobody else seemed to notice
the exchange save for Fred, who nodded at his father as they passed.

“It’s terrible,” Hagrid growled to nobody in particular as they made their way to the staircase.
“All this new security, an’ kids are still getting’ hurt… Dumbledore’s worried sick — he don’
say much, but I can tell.”

“He hasn’t said anything to the staff, Hagrid?” Hermione asked.

“I ‘spect he’s got hundreds of ideas, brain like his, but he doesn’t know who sent that
necklace or who poisoned the wine – they’d have been caught if so, wouldn’ they?”
Hermione wasn’t entirely certain that was the case, and she knew Fred shared those doubts,
but both remained silent. Blaspheming Albus Dumbledore in Hagrid’s presence, let alone
Harry’s, wasn’t remotely worth the fallout. “Wha’ worries me is how long the school can stay
open with kids bein’ attacked like this. Chamber of Secrets all over again, isn’ it? Nex’ thing
yeh know the board o’ governors’ll be talkin’ about shuttin’ up for good.”

“Surely not,” Harry said, faltering as they descended the last flight of stairs to the entrance
hall.
“Think about it from their perspective,” Fred interjected. “A school like this has always
presented some amount of liability, but what happened to Katie and Ron is a far cry from a
misplaced hex or a potion gone wrong.”

“Don’t worry, Harry,” Hermione said under her breath, bumping her shoulder into his. “You
won’t be at any loss for places to stay if the school shuts down.”

She silently thought that, as long as she could finish her NEWT coursework by
correspondence, this would be far from the worst-case scenario. The look on Harry’s face,
however, implied that he staunchly disagreed.

Hagrid continued Fred’s train of thought and went on to add, “Thas’ right, attempted murder
is completely diff’rent. S’no wonder Dumbledore’s angry with Sn—“

His eyes went comically wide and his jaw snapped shut with an audible click, the
quintessential expression of Hagrid realising he’d said something he shouldn’t have.

“Dumbledore is angry with Snape?” Harry asked quickly, latching onto the comment with all
the enthusiasm of a starving leach.

Fred and George shot Hermione identical looks, as if to say ‘gee, you weren’t kidding,’ while
Hagrid went on to explain that he’d overheard some sort of quarrel between the two. Though
Hermione was a cynic, she had to admit it was odd.

Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, Filch appeared from around the corner at exactly that
moment, glee in his eyes at the prospect of having found rule-breaking students out after
curfew.

Hagrid hurriedly shooed Harry and her toward the tower, snarling something at Filch about
being a teacher, and, with few options at her disposal, Hermione shared one last longing look
with Fred before hastily making her way around the corner and back up the staircase.

She held the image of those blue eyes in her mind greedily the whole way.

When she finally arrived back in her dorm, exhausted and more than a little gloomy,
Hermione found Lavender still awake. Parvati was apparently asleep, curtains drawn around
her bed, but her other roommate was sitting up near the pillows with her arms wrapped
around her knees.

Her blonde braid was half unraveled, as if she’d been tugging on it, and her face was
uncharacteristically pale with dark circles blotted beneath her eyes.

“Hey,” Hermione said quietly, kicking off her trainers and going to sit on the bed beside her.
“I figured you’d be asleep.”

Lavender shook her head and swallowed thickly. When she spoke it came out as more of a
croak. “Ron, is he —?”

“He’s fine,” Hermione said quickly, watching as the other girls’ shoulders noticeably relaxed.
“He needs to stay in the hospital wing for the rest of the week, but he’s going to be alright.
Didn’t… didn’t anyone come and tell you?”

Lavender shook her head, blinking rapidly, but her emotions quickly got the better of her. She
made a soft choking sound and clapped a hand over her mouth as tears formed and spilled
down her cheeks.

“I was so scared,” she said, voice muffled and quavering. “I - I tried to go to the hospital
wing when I heard, but Professor McGonagall wouldn’t let anyone since you and Harry and
Ginny were already there.”

“Oh, Lavender, I’m so sorry – I would have found you, I just assumed that someone…”

She trailed off, realising with a flicker of indignation that she shouldn’t have assumed
anything. All this time Lavender had been up here, wondering if her boyfriend was alive or
dead; Hermione ought to have taken a few minutes to come back and check.

Her boyfriend who, not an hour before, had been muttering Hermione’s name in his sleep.

Struck by a sudden but vicious protective urge, Hermione budged forward and wrapped her
arms around Lavender’s shaking shoulders. The other girl stiffened for just a second before
returning the hug, fingers clinging and curling into the knit fabric of Hermione’s jumper.

Though Hermione had been here many times before, in this scared, uncertain place that came
with the fear of losing the people you love, many of her classmates hadn’t. Not yet.

“He’s okay,” Hermione repeated again; in as comforting a voice as she could manage. She
tightened her arms and let her chin rest gently on Lavender’s bowed head. Her mind drifted
beyond Ron then, to all of the other people that she cared about; all of the people that were
standing alongside her, directly in the line of fire. Because, at the end of the day, there was no
such thing as a war without casualties – if there was, they would call it something else.

“Everyone is okay,” she murmured, perhaps to herself that time.

And as Lavender sobbed into her shoulder, Hermione stared out the dark window beside the
bed and silently wondered for how much longer that would be true.
 An inevitable outcome
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

9 March 1997

“Bleeding hell, the two of you should just have your own beds at this point. They can make
you little plaques.”

Fred walked into the hospital wing, for the second time that month, with snow melting in his
hair and a care-package from his mother in tow. This time, Ron was the one seated beside
Harry’s bed, though he was also clad in blue pajamas and still technically a patient himself.

Madam Pomfrey grunted something in quiet agreement before disappearing into her private
quarters. Fred chuckled, setting the basket of goodies on the side table. Ron didn’t waste any
time on pleasantries and grabbed it, riffling through and immediately digging in.
“Hey Fred,” Harry said, head still heavily bandaged over his left ear. A wry smiled flickered
across his face. “Shopping for local real estate again?”

“Nah, just a messenger this time. Dad was called into work and mum is busy slowly chipping
away at Fleur’s will to live.” He rounded the foot of the bed and flopped into the seat on
Harry’s other side. “Heard the game was a right bust.”

“Yeah, you heard right,” Harry sighed. “Cormac clipped me with a bludger and we lost to
Hufflepuff; 320 to 60.”

“A bludger? How did that happen? I thought McLaggen was a keeper.”

“Yeah, go and tell him that.”

“Brutal,” Fred said, shaking his head sympathetically. “So when are the two of you getting
out of here anyway?”

“We’re both supposed to be released tomorrow,” Ron chimed in through a mouthful of mince
pie. “Dunno how a cracked skull is an overnight affair while I’ve been stuck here all week.”

“Hermione’s been making him keep up on his schoolwork,” Harry explained with barely
suppressed amusement as a sullen expression fell over Ron’s face. Fred took a little dark
pleasure in that himself. “She just ran to the library to exchange a couple books, but she
should be back soon.”

“Why should he care where Hermione is?” Ron asked, snorting derisively.

Harry’s face went completely blank, like he’d been stunned, but Fred just leaned back and
nonchalantly propped his feet on the edge of the bed. He also reminded himself not to rely on
the Boy Who Lived when it came to the art of deception.

“You’ll find that after you finish school you’ll need hobbies to keep the mind sharp, little
brother.” Fred tapped his temple. “I’ve decided that mine is knowing where people are —
Harry was just indulging me.”

Ron rolled his eyes and went back to eating. “Well, she can take her bloody time. Pain in the
ass witch; she keeps trying to make me talk to Lavender.”

Fred momentarily gritted his teeth, but he exhaled and let it go. “As in your girlfriend
Lavender? Wow, yeah; can’t imagine why you’d speak to her.”

“Right? The nosy swot. She never knows when to mind her own business —”

“Ron,” Harry said sharply, glancing nervously at Fred.

“— if she got her own life maybe she wouldn’t feel the need —“

“Ron, shut up.”

“— honestly, it’s just pathetic. I mean —”

“RON!”

“Alright.” Fred got to his feet and stepped around the foot of the bed. In one swift motion he
ripped the half-eaten pastry out of Ron’s hand, tossed it onto the floor, and grabbed his
brother tightly about the collar. Wide, startled eyes stared up at him and a crumb fell off
Ron’s upper-lip. “Watch your fucking mouth, yeah?”

“What the hell? Gerroffme!” Ron tried to shove him away, but all he managed to do was tip
the chair back onto two legs so that Fred’s grip became the only thing keeping him upright.
“What the fuck has gotten into you? Hermione used to drive you and George batty, why are
you defending her all of a sudden?”

Fred opened his mouth to reply, cursing his temper and trying to figure out a way to walk
back the conversation that didn’t involve obliviating his brother, but before he could speak a
voice said levelly from the doorway: “Because we’re dating.”

All three boys turned to look in the direction that it came from and saw Hermione standing
there, clutching a large, leatherbound book to her chest with a resigned, fraught expression on
her face.

She looked around, examining the scene with a cautious eye, and then took a step closer and
said slowly, “Fred and I, we’re seeing one another. We have been for a while.”

Fred carefully pulled Ron and his chair back to a vertical position and released his hold,
stepping away and sucking in a deep breath that did exceptionally little to ease the lingering
anger that he was feeling. His hands were shaking a bit and he balled them into fists at his
sides.

“What? No way, you’re taking the mick. You couldn’t possibly be –“ Ron began shaking his
head, like the very notion was absurd, until he caught sight of Harry’s viscerally
uncomfortable expression and fell mute.

“I’m sorry, love,” Fred said ruefully, looking over at Hermione, but she was shaking her
head.

“It’s alright.” She offered a tense smile, took a few more steps forward until she was next to
Fred, and set her book down on Ron’s vacant bed. Then she turned to look at its missing
occupant with head high and shoulders squared. There was an indomitable expression on her
face and, if it were possible, he loved her a little more for it. “I’m sorry it came out like this.
I’ve been wanting to tell you for a while, but we haven’t really been speaking this term. I
love Fred, I’m in love with him that is, and I know that it’s – it’s probably a surprise, but I
hope that with time you’ll come to understand why I —”

“Why you started shagging my brother, or why you felt the need to lie to me about it?”

It was eerily quiet for a moment and Fred bristled, but before he could interject Hermione
fired back, eyes flashing and her tone suddenly glacial, “I never lied to you. You’d have to
take smallest modicum of interest in my life to necessitate that. Choosing not to tell you
something because I think you’ll respond with the emotional maturity of a toddler isn’t
lying.”

Ron scoffed and turned his attention to Fred instead, probably thinking he’d be more likely to
get a rise out of him. Unfortunately, he was correct in this assessment. “I suppose I
understand why you’d want to keep it a secret, probably ashamed that —”

He cut off with an indignant choking sound, eyes gone wide, and Fred realised with a sort of
vague awareness that he’d drawn his wand. He rolled it deftly between his fingers, feeling the
familiar ridges of the handle, and then, not breaking eye contact for even a second, he said in
a low voice, “Go on, Ronniekins. Finish the sentence.”

It didn’t matter what Ron said. The thought – the very notion – that Fred would have any
cause at all to be ashamed of Hermine, of his relationship with her, had him ready to hex his
brother into a puddle and send him home to their mum in a jar.

As it stood, Ron didn’t speak, and the silence in the room was overwrought, crackling with
anger and anticipation.

Harry leaned forward from his pillows, wincing a little as he did so, and put his hands out
with palms forward, as if speaking to an incensed animal. He glanced between the Weasleys
before looking to his friend, standing both physically and metaphorically in between the two.

“Hermione,” he said in a tight voice, “I think that you and Fred should leave.”

“Harry, your head —” Hermione started, looking worried, but Harry offered her a weak smile
that Fred thought might be intended as reassuring. Given his greyish complexion, the
resulting effect was far from it.

“I’m okay, really. Go on.”

She lingered for a second longer, seemingly caught in some internal war, and then nodded
and picked up her book again. Ron remained silent, still obviously livid as Fred stowed his
wand and made to follow her. He didn’t turn around as they left, recognising that if he did,
he’d very likely say or do something that he couldn’t take back.

In fact, neither he nor Hermione spoke at all until they’d made it a little way down the
corridor and into a side passage, sufficiently out of earshot. Fred stopped and leaned against
the wall while Hermione pulled her bag off of her shoulder and tucked her book in it,
movements mechanical and stiff.

“I’m sorry,” he said again, running a hand through his hair. He knew that it was a pathetic
apology given that they’d just potentially decimated one of her longest friendships, especially
given that she’d now be left to deal with the fallout alone, but it was all he could think to say.

“It’s alright, really,” she sighed, dropping her bag onto the floor and grinding her palms into
her eye sockets for a second before lowering them. She wasn’t crying, which was a small
relief. She just looked exceptionally weary. And tremendously disheartened. “Believe it or
not, that went about as well as I expected.”
“Really?” Fred asked, genuinely a little taken aback. “Wow. He must have been behaving
worse than you let on.”

She tipped her head in silent confirmation and stepped between his feet, arms twining up
around his shoulders and cheek coming to rest against his chest. He wrapped an arm around
her waist.

“There was a good reason that I was putting off telling him; I don’t know that the exact
timing or circumstance would have made much difference.” She leaned back and looked up
at him in question. “I am curious about what he said to set you off, though.”

Fred cringed. “He was just going on about you trying to get him to speak to Lavender.”

“That seems fairly innocuous…”

“It was more in the way that he said it,” Fred hedged, disinclined to repeat any of what had
actually transpired. He was still angry enough about the situation.

She searched his face and then nodded with a sad, shrewd smile. “I see. Well, if it was
anything like the things he says when I am around, I suppose I can understand your reaction.”

They lapsed silent once again. Despite all of the drama, despite his brother being a royal pain
in the ass, Fred couldn’t help but be a little selfish in that stolen moment. He tightened his
arms around Hermione and tucked her tight against his chest again, below his chin.

It also occurred to him that, despite the tumultuousness of the situation, he never had even a
split-second of doubt in their relationship, nor their ability to weather it. Even then, in the
aftermath, he didn’t feel anything but love and support from this woman. This fiercely
protective, inexorably loyal woman.

That, more than anything, quietened him.

“So, what now?” He asked, tracing a hand down the familiar slope of her back.

“Mmmm… we stay like this for a little while. You hold me and tell me that it’ll all be okay,
which I objectively know that it very likely will be, and then I’ll walk you to the apparition
point and go to dinner.”

“I’m on board for all but that last part.”

She smiled fondly, rolling onto her tiptoes to brush her lips against his.

“You object to my eating dinner?”

“I object to letting you out of my sight for a single bloody moment. Cursed jewelry, poisoned
drinks, rogue quidditch players, my brother acting like an absolute twat… it’s a veritable
deathtrap around here.”

“You’re not entirely wrong,” Hermione admitted. “But I can handle myself. I’ve made it this
far, haven’t I?”
“I know,” Fred sighed, nodding. “But I still reserve the right to worry about you.”

“Likewise, darling,” she murmured as his forehead came to rest against hers. She lifted a
hand and traced her fingertips along his jaw before leaning in to kiss him once more.
“Likewise.”

oOoOoOo

After Hermione walked Fred down to the gates, settling their plans for Easter before he
departed, she decided that rather than go to dinner she would try and talk to Ron again.

If she could answer a few questions, explain the how and the when of it, perhaps he would
understand. Or, at the very least, begin to come to terms with things.

Hell, if nothing else she’d burn off a little lingering tension shouting at him for being a tosser.

She rounded the corner to the hospital wing when, hearing voices, she slowed and then
stopped just outside the open door. Ron and Harry were the only two occupants at the
moment, and it certainly wasn’t Madam Pomfrey speaking.

“ – understand how she could lie to me.”

“She didn’t lie to you,” a tired voice said back, one that sounded precisely like Harry’s. It
also sounded like it wasn’t the first time it had been said. “And really? After today, you can’t
possibly imagine why she might have been reluctant to tell you? Not a single guess?”

“What about Fred, then? He should have fessed up, he’s my bloody brother.”

“Yeah, and he cares about her. A lot. Enough not to force her into an ultimatum.” There was a
pause before he added, somewhat hesitantly, “She didn’t exactly have the easiest time of it
last year, Ron. I think that he was right not to push her.”

Ron muttered something sullenly that Hermione didn’t quite catch, but what Harry said next
came through loud and clear.

“I know that, and I’m not trying to be insensitive about it. Neither are they. But you need to
figure out a way to be okay with this, and fast. Because I can tell you with absolute certainty
that they aren’t going to break things off to spare your feelings.”

“You really think my own brother would pick Hermione over me?”

“Honestly?” Harry quieted for another moment before answering. “Yeah, I do.”

“What about you, then?” Ron asked, his tone turning bitter and resentful in a way that made
her stomach churn. “Would you choose her over me too?”

“Don’t ask me that,” Harry shot back instantly, in a voice she’d hardly ever heard him use. It
was the same that he’d employed in the Ministry that past spring; forceful and unwavering.
“Don’t you ever ask me that.”
 “Why? Because you’d pick her?”

Hermione waited with bated breath, straining to listen, but a reply never came. And it was the
single loudest silence she’d ever heard in her life.

Chapter End Notes

Hey all! Taking a quick break, we’ll be back in July.

 Growing pains
Chapter Notes

Sorry about the unexpected hiatus, besties - I was planning to take a break later this
summer, but my existential dread spiral came knocking a little early (courtesy of
SCOTUS).

In all seriousness, shit's pretty bleak across the board right now and if any of you ever
want someone to talk to, or more accurately if you want a void where you can throw
your thoughts with the chance of a reply because I don't check my inbox that often,
you're welcomed to email me at wrathofmacy@gmail.com.

Take care of yourself, take care of each other, and come here to disassociate as often as
you'd like.

Now, back to our regularly scheduled programming!

28 March 1997

“Are you sure you don’t want me to say that I do something else? I don’t mind – Lee’s father
is an automobile salesman. I can tell your mum and dad that I do that; it seems impressive,
and he has a rather posh flat.”

Fred was reclined on Hermione’s childhood bed, arms behind his head and socked feet nearly
dangling off the end while she eyed him speculatively from an armchair in the corner.

“Alright, fine. You can say that if you can name the make and model for literally any vehicle
–“

“I —”

“— other than a Ford Anglia.”

Fred hesitated for a moment and then shut his mouth, squinting at her.

“Why do you want to lie about what you do?” Hermione asked sincerely, getting to her feet.
She set the book she’d been reading on the seat and strode across the room, crawling onto the
bed beside him and resting on her heels. “I think wildly successful inventor and entrepreneur
below the age of twenty is rather impressive in its own right, no?”

“I suppose,” Fred grumbled. He rolled onto his side and reached an arm out, snaring her
around the waist and pulling her down and backward so she was spooned into his chest. “I
just… I’ve never done this before, Hermione. I want to do it properly, and I know it’s going
to be an uphill climb to begin with.”

He wasn’t wrong about that part, but if her parents were going to acknowledge someone
magical as a suitor for her, there wasn’t a wizard in Britain more charismatic or disarming.
Hermione wiggled so she could look over her shoulder and see his face, earnest as it was,
pawing a few wayward curls out of the way with a flicker of exasperation.

“No, no supposing. I don’t walk around feeling stupidly proud of you all hours of the day just
to go and tell my parents that you’re an automobile salesman. They already know you’re not
a muggle, so I’m going to brag and you’re going to learn to cope with it.”

Fred chuckled in spite of himself as the grandfather clock downstairs tolled twelve. After
dinner that evening Hermione had quickly retired to her room and tweaked the wards so Fred
could apparate in and finalise prep for their lunch the next day.

Opportunistic and rational as the two for them were, they quickly concluded that it would be
a wretched shame for him to go back to the flat and sleep all alone when she was just a few
measly kilometers away.

“Fine, fine. I surrender – shower me with praise if you must. Now run through off-limits
topics one more time.”

Hermione raised her hands and began ticking them off on her fingers one-by-one. “Blood
prejudice, any and all of Hagrid’s pets, The Chamber of Secrets, my being petrified,
Werewolves and the fact that we’re friends with one, all of the dangerous aspects of The
Triwizard Tournament, the rampant corruption in our government, The Order of the Phoenix,
my nearly being hexed to death, and the ever-present threat of dark wizards taking over
Britain and killing everyone that we know and love.”

“That all?” Fred asked blithely, propped on an elbow and looking down at her with an arched
brow.

“Mmm… no. Don’t mention Liverpool, my dad is a Manchester fan.”

“If I cock this up, I’m blaming it on you. It was an even ten until you threw that last one on
top.”

She snorted and then the smile on her face wilted a little. “I also – I also told them that we
wouldn’t do magic. Not that we were planning to, but I figured I should mention it just in
case.”

“What? Why would you promise something like that?”

“It just makes them a little uncomfortable,” she explained awkwardly, feeling a rare flicker of
embarrassment and trying not to squirm.

She saw that Fred wanted to argue, the defensive inclination bubbling up beneath the surface,
but after a long second, he bit it back and nodded. “Alright, but if I’m made to hand-wash
dishes, I’ll be charging an hourly retainer.”

Hermione grinned and rolled over to face him, exhaling in relief as she did so. Despite the
stipulations and undeniably treacherous footing before them, she was a little surprised at how
excited she was for Fred to meet her family; while their general disposition toward her life in
the magical world was decidedly lackluster, increasingly so in recent years, they’d responded
willingly enough to her proposing they have lunch with her boyfriend.

She supposed it might be in part because they wouldn’t need to filter that event when they
talked about it to their friends and colleagues, but she told herself that it was only a small
part.

“Ron was nearly back to normal last week,” Hermione said, offering a change of topic and
temporarily tabling her apprehension. They hadn’t had time to exchange but one letter before
she left Hogwarts for the Easter holiday and all she’d relayed in that had been the
conversation she’d overheard with Harry. “He brushed me off for a little while after they got
out of the hospital wing, but he seems like he’s trying. He talked to Lavender too.”

Fred looked a little skeptical, but he shrugged and nodded. “What about those two crazy
kids? Are they going to work things out?”

Hermione thought for a moment and then shook her head. “No, I don’t think so. They haven’t
broken up yet, but I think he’s realising relationships actually take some amount of effort, and
she’s realising that she can do better. No offence.”

“None taken, I’ve no doubt that she can. How about Ginny and Dean?”

“I sense a split on the horizon there, too. Ginny was never all that invested, and apparently
they had a nasty row a few weeks ago.”

“What was the row about?”

“No idea, but Harry seemed rather pleased to hear of it.”

“I’m sure he was,” Fred snorted. “Does he have any idea at all what he’s getting himself into
there?”

“I sincerely doubt it,” Hermione laughed, “But, as with everything else, he’ll figure it out as
he goes along. After all, the boy has fought dragons; your sister is only moderately scarier.”

Fred’s hand, which had been resting on her hip, slipped under the hem of her shirt and fanned
just below her ribs.

“This part is fun,” he mused into the nape of her neck.

“Which part?” Hermione asked, a shiver rolling through her at the warmth of him behind her.

“The part where we get to lay about and judge everybody else’s relationships. They should
advertise that more.”

“Who? The Bureau of Relationships?”

“Mmhmm,” he hummed distractedly.

Sensing that the conversational portion of their time together was coming to an end, or at
least succumbing to a very long pause, Hermione turned to look at Fred with a coy smile.

“So, do you want your birthday present early?”

oOoOoOo

Heart hammering in his throat and a cold sweat blooming on the back of his neck, Fred
tugged at the lapels of his jacket one last time and then, before he lost his nerve, raised a hand
and knocked on the front door of the Granger home.

All morning he’d had an unshakeable sense of unease, but Hermione had been practically
bouncing off the wall with nerves and he hadn’t wanted to make it any worse, so he’d
swallowed it. Now he was choking a little bit.

It was silent for what felt like an eternity. He briefly debated apparating back to bed, where
he’d been safely tucked away only a few hours earlier, when the door began to swing inward.

He could do this.

No dark wizards, no mortal peril, no crooked government officials, no underground

resistance, no psychotic professors. It’d be easy in comparison to the rest of their lives, a
regular stroll in the park. And there was still plenty left to talk about. Like… the weather.
Yeah, the weather was good. Lee said that muggles like to talk about the weather.

Fred shook himself as a short, slender woman came into view. Her hair was the same caramel
color as Hermione’s but patently less voluminous and distinctly more coiffed.

“Hello,” she greeted with a smile that was bright white and straight as could be, though not
remotely as warm as her daughter’s. Her appearance could be summarised by the word
‘manicured,’ and Fred concluded he’d be hard-pressed to find even a single stitch out of
place. “You must be Fred.”

“Right you are,” Fred replied, remembering himself with a small jolt. “You must be
Hermione’s... sister?”

“Well, aren’t you a charmer,” she tittered, stepping aside and gesturing for him to come in.
“Please, call me Emma. Are those for me?”

She pointed at the small bouquet of flowers hanging forgotten by his side.
“Uh, yes, sorry.” Fred thrust his arm forward, nearly smacking her in the chin as she quickly
took them with another, slightly less sure, smile. His cheeks heated as she shut the door
behind him.

“Richard?” Emma called up the stairs. “Company!”

“Yes, yes, I’m coming,” a voice called gruffly back, sounding a bit annoyed and none too
eager. When he failed to appear though, Hermione’s mum looked at him a little sheepishly
and tipped her chin in the opposite direction.

“Hermione was just finishing setting the table, let’s head in there.”

Emma led Fred past the portraits on the mantle that, little did she know, he was already
familiar with. He still found it distinctly unnerving that they didn’t move, just stared outward
from their frames for all eternity, but he thought better than to voice that.

It was also of bothersome note that not a single photo showed Hermione over the age of
twelve.

They rounded the corner into the kitchen, which in turn looked into the dining room, and the
tension in Fred’s shoulders eased some as Hermione came into view. She looked… well, still
really nervous, but she mustered a stalwart smile anyway.

“Hi,” she greeted brightly, coming to his side as her mum went to get a vase from the
cupboard beside the sink. He noticed Hermione rub her palms on her trousers and resisted the
urge to wrap his arms around her.

“Hello, love,” Fred replied, dipping to drop an exceptionally chaste kiss on her cheek. Emma
glanced over surreptitiously and made a quiet sound of approval as she began to clip the
stems on the pink and purple tulips.

“These are just lovely,” she mused aloud, tracing a finger lightly over a vibrant petal. “They
must have been difficult to find so early in the season; mine won’t be in bloom for another
month, at least.”

“They’re actually from my mum’s garden,” Fred explained. “A few well-placed charms keep
away the frost.”

Hermione stiffened a little at his side, but he stayed focused on the older woman in front of
him. Merely talking about magic hadn’t been proscribed.

“Is that so?” She asked, brows arching in surprise.

“I could do a bit of spellwork on your garden, mum,” Hermione interjected. There was a
hopeful edge on her voice, like she hadn’t had the opportunity or nerve to offer in the past.
Either way, it made his chest ache a little. “If you’d like, I mean. Maybe not so dramatic as
blooming a month early, though. The neighbors might take notice.”

“I thought you couldn’t do that outside of school,” Emma said, taken aback.
“That was just until I was seventeen,” Hermione clarified good-naturedly, but Fred’s brows
drew together in confusion before he schooled them again. Sure, he’d agreed to no magic that
day, but how could her mum not know something like that? Had Hermione not done any
magic in front of them over the winter holidays, or since she’d been back the past week?

Emma glanced uncertainly between them and the flowers before nodding in a sharp
movement and plastering another blinding smile on. “Right, of course. Well, we can certainly
discuss it. Why don’t you go and get your father, sweetheart? He’s up in his office and I’m
sure he’ll stay there all day if we let him.”

Hermione gave Fred’s hand a squeeze as she passed him, heading back to the front parlor
and, by the sound of it, up the stairs.

“Can I help with anything?” Fred asked after a long beat, standing self-consciously beside
counter.

“No, I’ve got it in hand. Have a seat.” Hermione’s mum gestured at a stool that Fred hadn’t
noticed, and he gratefully took it while she fixed a tray of drinks nearby. “So, I know your
father works for the government, and you and your brother own a business. What is it that
your mother does?”

“She uh, mostly keeps house,” Fred said a little sheepishly. “Seven children and all, there’s
plenty of house to keep.”

“I thought Hermione said your youngest sister was nearly the same age as her. Are there
grandchildren in the mix?”

“No, not just yet,” Fred said, knowing what she was getting at. In reality Molly Weasley did
quite a bit of organising and relaying information for the Order of the Phoenix, but that was
on the list of prohibited topics. Thus, he tiptoed and tried not to be insulted on his mother’s
behalf. “There’s still plenty to do, though. Gardening and washing and cooking, and she
frequents my great-aunt Muriel’s to help with the same.”

“Well, isn’t that… quaint. I think I’d go a little batty if it weren’t for my work.”

The disapproving edge on her tone reignited the sense of discomfort that had been tugging at
him earlier.

There was a pregnant pause and Fred glanced toward the stairs, as if he might be able to will
Hermione back down them. When that didn’t work though, he cleared his throat and turned
back to Emma, who looked up expectantly.

“So, odd weather we’re having.”

oOoOoOo

“Did your friend leave?” Emma Granger asked as her daughter walked back into the kitchen.

“Yes,” Hermione replied tightly, her jaw sore from nearly two hours of clenching. She’d just
watched a dejected Fred apparate out of the back garden and she felt as if her blood was near
boiling point. “And you’re well aware that friend isn’t even a remotely apt description of our
relationship, so I don’t know why you insist upon trying to use it to demean me.”

With Fred gone – though he might very well be waiting upstairs – and Hermione’s father
once again ensconced in his office, far from any remote chance of needing to speak to her,
there were no holds barred between Hermione and her mother.

She and Emma had become gradually more volatile in the rare occurrences where they did
interact just the two of them, and that day was no exception. For a long time she’d chalked it
up to mere adolescent conflict, normal mother-daughter arguing, but that very obviously
wasn’t the case here. Hermione was livid.

It hadn’t matter how hard she’d tried; how impressive Fred’s success, how respectful his
tone, how complimentary his commentary on their meal.

Of course things had started off well enough but, despite her initial optimism about the lunch,
Hermione had swiftly realised that her parents accepting Fred was a pipe dream, and a
childish one at that. Because accepting Fred would mean accepting her, which it was
becoming clear wasn’t likely either. And she had only herself to blame for not only leading
him to believe that to be possible but setting ridiculous stipulations around the whole affair in
the first place.

“I’ll not have you speak to me that way,” her mother replied in a terse tone, scrubbing the
dish in front of her vigorously without looking up. “You know how we feel about… that sort
of behavior.”

“Say it.”

“I thought you said you would speak with him before coming over here —"

“Say the bloody word, mum.”

“We don’t ask much of you –“

“Say it!”

“Fine, magic!” Emma snapped, hissing it like an offense and rounding on her daughter. “You
said that neither of you would do magic here. Your father -”

“It was one spell!” Hermione half-shouted, hating the way her fingers trembled and her eyes
stung around the edges. “One, sodding, stupid spell! All Fred did was fix a broken glass. You
knocked it over, and it broke, and he fixed it. He’s probably done it a thousand times. The
proper response is traditionally thank-you, not treating him like he did it as a personal
affront.”

“We simply aren’t comfortable –“

“What about my comfort, mum? It’s still my house too. Do I not deserve to be comfortable
here?”
“Of course, don’t be absurd, Hermione. He seems like a nice boy, but –“

“Wizard.”

“I don’t know why you insist –“

“Because it’s what we are! Fred is a wizard, and I am a witch.”

“You’re our daughter –“

“I’m a witch!”

With only a moment’s thought, Hermione flicked her hand out and the dish her mother had
been holding over the soapy water was suddenly clean and dry. Emma gasped as she looked
down, dropping the plate on the edge of the sink where it shattered.

This time Hermione didn’t make any move to fix it, and the shards of China made little
pinging sounds as they hit the floor, leaving a resounding silence in their wake.

And as she looked in her mother’s eyes, shocked but still so like her own it was almost eerie,
she reckoned with the facts before her in a way she hadn’t before. That her parents, these
goliaths that were supposed to know everything, that were supposed to love her and accept
her no matter what, were devastatingly imperfect. And that sometimes love, no matter how
much you wish it not to be, is conditional.

It was different, seeing it all through Fred’s eyes that afternoon rather than the warped scope
she’d become accustomed to. The role she’d learned to play, the lines she toed; the ways in
which she made herself small.

She wasn’t sure if it was fear or resentment or disappointment, or a combination of all three.
At this point she wasn’t entirely sure her parents had wanted children at all, let alone a
magical one. But it didn’t matter; she was done trying to be the daughter that they wanted. It
was time to be the woman — the witch — that she was.

“I’m going to stay with the Weasleys until school resumes,” Hermione said, her voice hollow
and tired even to her own ears. Exhausted from six years of trying to please people that
would never be satisfied.

She didn’t specify which Weasleys, and her mother didn’t ask.

“We’re having Easter dinner with the Michaelsons on Sunday. You’re expected to be there, I
RSVP’d weeks ago.”

Hermione breathed a heavy sigh and shook her head, snorting in disbelief. She ground her
palms into her eye sockets for a moment before relenting and lowering her hands. “Fine.”

When she looked up, her mother wouldn’t meet her eyes. They were fixed, unmoving on the
tulips Fred had brought, arranged meticulously in a crystal vase on the counter.
“I love you,” her mother said abruptly, with an almost frantic edge on her voice as Hermione
turned to leave the room. “I do. I just… I just wish that I understood you.”

Hermione turned back with a sad smile on her face and a lump in her throat. “That makes two
of us, mum.”

She began to walk and then stopped again. She took a deep breath and whispered, pointing in
the direction of the broken plate, “Reparo.” The plate made a quiet scraping sound as it fixed
itself.

Perhaps if they’d met in another life as equals, discussing Shakespeare and sharing a love of
French wine and old music, things might be different. Her father wouldn’t withdraw and her
mother wouldn’t put on airs and they’d make for happy companions.

But here, in this life, there was too much history, far too many lies, and too much damage to
repair.

Fred wasn’t waiting upstairs when she got to her room, but it didn’t take long to pack her
things; Crookshanks had stayed at the school, content to traipse about the grounds for a few
days now that the weather had broken, so she had only her trunk and knapsack in tow.

As she walked past her father’s office door, which was shut, she paused. There was a photo
outside of it, on the opposite wall, of Hermione sitting in the dentist chair at their office. She
was maybe four or five, smiling, all gangly limbs and buck teeth while her dad looked on
from behind her.

She raised a tentative hand and knocked.

“Come in.”

Hermione reached out and turned the knob, stepping into the room. Richard Granger was in
his chair in the corner, a large book open in his lap and a glass of what appeared to be scotch
beside him. The walls were lined with shelves that looked ready to burst and the overcast sky
outside shone a grey hue across the scene.

“I’m leaving to stay with my friends for the rest of the holiday,” she said without preamble.

Richard looked up, surprise flickering briefly in his eyes before he nodded. While her mother
had a temper that rivaled her own, even if she did bury it under a carefully manufactured
façade, her father responded to conflict by acting as though it hadn’t happened.

“I see,” he said evenly. “Well, have a good time, then.”

“Thanks, I will.” Hermione stood motionless and looked at him for a moment. His hair,
nearly as curly as hers, was more salt than pepper these days, and the frown that had been
commonplace in her youth now seemed perpetual, with heavy lines framing his mouth. She
realised with a start that her father looked old. “Hey, dad?”

“Hmm?”
A million different responses rushed through her head as he looked up at her again. All of the
things she wanted to say, needed to say in that moment. Words of anger and of grief and of
accusation. Words meant to wound him in the same way his slow withdrawl from her life had
wounded her.

She wanted to tell him about what a wonderful person Fred is. How happy he makes her
happy, and how brilliant he can be, and how he tried so hard to impress them despite knowing
it would be difficult. How they didn’t deserve to know him.

But when she opened her mouth to speak, none of that passed her lips.

She just cleared her throat instead. “You should read Rosemary Ashton’s new biography on
George Elliot; I think you’d like it.”

Richard blinked owlishly behind his spectacles and then nodded. “Right. Thank you, I’ll do
that.”

Hermione took a deep breath, nodded back, and then turned to head down the stairs, shutting
the door behind her without looking back.

When she got to the kitchen her mother was nowhere in sight, and their car, that was
normally parked in front of the house, was gone. Hermione went into the back garden,
tugging her coat tight across her chest and pulling up her sleeve to prod her bracelet with her
wand.

“Can you come and get me?” she asked it, watching as the tiny words etched themselves in
the metal and then disappeared.

A moment later an underdressed George popped into the garden a few feet in front of her,
nearly landing in a birdbath.

“Where’s Fred?” she asked, concern immediately flooding her.

“At home,” George assured her quickly, rubbing his hands together to warm them. “He’s
worked himself into a bit of a state and I didn’t want him to splinch himself. Or you.”

Hermione sighed and dragged her trunk over to grab his elbow without further comment.
They apparated into the alley behind the shop, which was closing early that day and the next
for the holiday, and Hermione led the way inside and up the stairs.

When she entered the flat, George chivalrously lugging her trunk behind them, she
immediately spotted Fred seated on the sofa with his head in his hands and an open bottle of
firewhiskey on the table in front of him. Despite the dreary atmosphere, something in her
relaxed at being back. She might have left her house, but this was her home.

He looked up as she kicked her shoes off with twin thuds beside the fireplace. He opened his
mouth and started to say something, but she just shook her head to silence him and crossed
the room.
Dithering for second, she snatched the bottle of firewhiskey and took a hearty swig, hissing
as it burned her throat on the way down. Then she leaned forward, grabbed Fred’s chin and
forced him to meet her gaze, their noses nearly touching.

“I don’t want to talk about it right now,” she said evenly. “But the short version is this: I love
you, you didn’t do anything wrong, my parents are inherently unhappy people, and I’m
staying here until school resumes, save for dinner on Sunday. Alright?”

Fred swallowed, his throat bobbing and his mien still concerned. But after a second of
searching her eyes, he nodded. “Alright.”

Hermione leaned down and pressed her lips soundly to his before drawing back, turning, and
plopping onto the sofa. She took another sip of whiskey and then handed the bottle to the
right so he could do the same as he reclined beside her.

George still stood in front of them with his arms crossed, having watched the whole dramatic
scene with a single raised brow. He simply stared for a second longer before heading past
them for the back hall and calling in front of him, “Angie, company!”
 Breached
Chapter Notes

Did I mean to post this chapter earlier in the week? Yes.

Did I get distracted reading a 100k Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson fic? I mean... also
yes.

30 June 1997

“What did he want?” Hermione asked, sitting up straight and putting the half-written letter
she’d been working on aside. Harry had just arrived back in the common room after meeting
with Dumbledore, breathing hard and with a sheen of sweat on his brow that immediately put
her on alert. “Harry, are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” he said in a clipped tone, sidestepping both literally and figuratively to race up the
dormitory steps. Hermione shot Ron a glance on the sofa across from her, but he just
shrugged. Harry was only gone a minute, returning with a jumper, the Marauder’s Map, and a
pair of old socks in his hands.

Then he explained what was happening. With Dumbledore, and the horcrux, and their plans
to leave the school that night. To leave the school in a few moments, in fact.

“You need to watch Malfoy,” Harry pleaded as he shoved the map into her lap. “Snape too.”

“Harry, I don’t –“ she started, only to be cut off.

“I know. I know, you don’t fully believe that Malfoy is a threat, but I have a feeling and I
need you to trust me. Please.”

Hermione looked up at him, the expression of ardent concern twisting his features, and rather
than arguing she bit her tongue and nodded. Harry took another brief moment to explain
about the Felix Felicis wrapped in his socks, then he gave her a quick hug and was gone. The
portrait-hole swung shut behind him with a soft, yet definitive, thud.

“Bloody hell,” Ron breathed after a beat of silence, sitting back against the sofa and
anxiously running a hand over the back of his neck. “What do we do now? Who else do we
tell?”

Hermione leaned forward and pressed her palms into her closed eyes for a second, thinking
hard and running through the different scenarios in her head.

No, she wasn’t entirely sold on Harry’s theory, but she wasn’t as credulous as he seemed to
think, and there was something off about the suddenness of the evening. Something not right,
humming in the air and prickling at her skin. Dumbledore was leaving the school unprotected
with very little notice, and he was taking her best friend with him.

The dread coiling in her stomach was quickly overshadowed by a sense of resolve, the
mistakes of the last year rising to the forefront of her mind and, at her former self’s behest,
taking over.

“If something goes wrong, or even feels off, you tell me. Don’t wait.”

“Everyone,” Hermione said, sitting up sharply and opening her eyes again, pinning Ron with
a stare. “We tell everyone that we can trust.”

Ron, though a skilled strategist, was not a natural leader. Quite frankly Hermione wasn’t one
either, she didn’t relish it in the way that Harry did, but somebody needed to come up with a
plan that went beyond ‘Drink this temperamental luck potion and hope for the best.’

“Alright,” Ron said, gamely squaring his shoulders. For as much tension as there had been
between them in past months, she was glad to have him there with her just then. It wasn’t
their first time walking through fire together, and, by all indications, it wouldn’t be their last.
“Okay, then what’s the plan?”
“I’m going to go get Ginny and put out the word on the DA coins. You find Neville – and
Ron, watch the map. Don’t let Malfoy out of your sight.”

She deposited the parchment into Ron’s waiting hands and turned to head up the stairs to the
girls dorms, tugging up the sleeve of her jumper as she went and pointing her wand at her
wrist.

oOoOoOo

“Miss Granger, Miss Lovegood, Professor Flitwick has been overpowered and is in need of
assistance in his office,” Professor Snape barked in a clipped tone, descending upon them
outside of his office door like a specter from the shadows. He looked… not worried, not in
the way that she was, but wan. A bit off-kilter. “The Dark Lord’s followers have entered the
grounds; I am going upstairs to convene with Professors McGonagall and Sprout to head
them off.”

Ron, Neville and Ginny were outside of the Room of Requirement, where Malfoy had
disappeared, and Hermione and Luna had taken up position in the dungeons while the other
DA members roamed the perimeter of the castle. If the message that flashed on her wrist
moments ago was any indication, the twins should also be at the school with reinforcements
soon, but they had to apparate to the edge of the wards before they could enter the grounds.

Furthermore, Ron still had the map, and she had no way of verifying that anything they’d just
been told was true.

“You need to watch Malfoy, Snape too.”

“Luna, go find Lavender and Parvati,” Hermione said over her shoulder, not taking her eyes
off of the man in front of them. “They should be somewhere near the library. Take them to
check on Professor Flitwick.”

If Luna questioned her decision to stay, she didn’t voice it. In fact, her normally wistful
expression took on a sharp glint in Hermione’s periphery as she nodded and ran in the
direction of the stairs without further comment, platinum blond braids swinging behind her.

“Miss Granger, I explicitly told you to –“

“The others know just as many healing charms and counter-curses as I do,” Hermione
reasoned aloud, ignoring the slick sweat on her palms and thinking that she was relying a
little heavily on that luck potion just then. He could kill her, and easily; she’d just ordered
away her only would-be witness. Hermione half-circled him, her wand drawn but lax at her
side. “And besides, I’m the better duelist.”

“These are not your schoolyard friends, girl,” he sneered sharply. “They won’t be casting
tickling jinxes. They will kill you and they will torture you and they will take pleasure in
doing so. Now go.”

“I know perfectly well what they’re capable of,” Hermione snapped back, her voice
unintentionally rising in volume. She swore she saw a single dark brow twitch up before
flattening again.

Snape silently assessed her for another long moment and then made a vaguely disgusted
sound, turning away with robes billowing behind him while he ascended the stairs. She
stayed tight on his heels the whole way. As they emerged in a side-passage near the entry
hall, spellfire and shouting could be heard coming from the upper floors and Hermione’s
heart leapt into her throat.

He hadn’t been lying. This wasn’t a drill or a false alarm; there would be no pinching her
awake this time. Hogwarts had been breached.

The professor slowed abruptly and turned again when she made for the bottom landing of the
Grand Staircase, almost causing her stumble into him. Dark eyes, nearly black, fixed on her
intently with a sort of despondency simmering in their depth. In the improved light she could
see that it was the gaze of a man facing the gallows, and it was far and away the most human
he’d ever looked — save for perhaps the night Remus had transformed in front of them third
year.

“Miss Granger, are you familiar with the fabulist, Phaedrus?”

“I - what?” Hermione blurted, fully taken aback. She glanced toward the stairs where
shouting could be heard, the urge to push him aside and run up them nearly overpowering,
but then she stopped and thought for a moment of the dusty tomes lining her father’s study.
The ones she’d devoured so voraciously in her youth. Then she nodded. “Yes. Yes, I know a
little. He was an Athenian aristocrat, a friend of Socrates.”

Professor Snape nodded curtly and she half-expected him to award her house points, but
instead there was a sudden flash of red light between them, and everything went black.

oOoOoOo

“In the name of Merlin’s left tit, Fred, relax. She was just stunned.” Hermione heard voices
drifting overhead, returning to consciousness an indeterminate amount of time later with the
cold floor hard against her back.

She slowly blinked her eyes open to see her boyfriend crouched on her left and Angelina on
her right, with George hovering behind the pair of them. His wand was raised and his head
was swiveling, left and then right again like a sentry. He paused for just a brief second to
shoot her a wink.

They appeared to have just come in a side entrance from outside, the hems of their jeans
visibly damp, and Fred was so pale she was afraid he was going to pass out.

“What happened?” Hermione asked, sitting up quickly and glancing around. “Where did
Snape go?”

“Snape?” Fred asked, surprised. He was regaining some color, but was still clearly uneasy.
He looked to Angelina, who shook her head and shrugged. “We didn’t see him. We came in
from the grounds a minute ago and nearly tripped over you. Was Snape the one that stunned
you?”

She nodded, allowing herself to be pulled to her feet and squeezing Fred’s cold hands before
releasing them. Quickly assessing her state, she was surprised to find that not only did she not
have any of the soreness that typically came with crumpling unconscious onto a stone floor,
but her wand was stowed back in her jumper pocket rather than being discarded on the
ground or removed from her person. She was certain she’d been holding it.

“It’s – it’s not important now,” she said distractedly, removing the length of vinewood again
and rolling it between her fingertips. Something told her that it was in fact very important,
but there wasn’t any time to dwell. The sounds of fighting hadn’t ceased upstairs. In fact it
had grown louder, so she couldn’t have been unconscious long. “We need to get up there.”

Hermione conjured an elastic and tied her hair back as they all four began to jog up the stairs,
like the most depressing double-date ever recorded.

“Miss me?” Fred asked quietly beside her ear, as they waited for a staircase to rotate fully to
the next landing. She smiled a little in spite of the circumstances.

“Always,” she replied, turning to kiss him quickly on the cheek. They shared a look upon
parting again, noses nearly touching. Just one second of calm before the proverbial storm.

It said, ‘Hello.’

It said, ‘I love you.’

It said, ‘Please don’t die.’

Then they took the last two flights, arriving on the seventh floor and stepping straight into
bedlam.

“Fuck me!” George exclaimed, barely dodging a bright yellow curse that flew out of the
pitch-black darkness in front of them. He stumbled, skidded to a halt, and then shouted,
utterly outraged, “Is that our product?!”

“Uh-huh,” Fred confirmed, nodding grimly as he took in the scene. It was without a doubt
Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder; the light from the spell hadn’t even been visible until it
emerged from the cloud and nearly struck them.

“What’s the counter?” Angelina asked, skillfully casting a wide shield in front of their party
for good measure. She looked around expectantly. “C’mon, the two of you don’t sell anything
you don’t know how to counteract. How do we see through it?”

“We don’t,” Hermione answered her candidly, before either of the twins could.

“Correct,” Fred said, the corner of his mouth twitching upward as he nodded. “Do explain
why, dear.”
“It works by suspending the powder in the air and not allowing any light to refract through it.
So, while it can’t be counteracted –“

“- it can be vanished,” Fred finished simply. Angie kept her shield up while the other three
raised their wands and chorused, Evanesco. The dense, black cloud slowly began to disappear
and thin.

Just as the last of the powder was siphoned away, a bone-chilling scream split the air.

“Bill,” Fred gasped, spotting him a little way down the wide corridor, near the astronomy
tower stairs. George swore under his breath and pressed a fist to his mouth.

Their eldest brother was lying face down and there was dark blood actively pooling outward
from his head.

There was a lot of blood.

The scream had come from Ginny, who was nearest him and the first to see what had
happened once visibility was restored. She crouched protectively over the body – over Bill -
while two Death Eaters that Hermione recognised vaguely as the Carrow siblings advanced
on her, blood-thirsty expressions on their faces.

Hermione distantly registered other duels happening around them – Ron and Neville facing
off against Jugson, Tonks trading spells with Rowle, but they were background noise in the
wake of that scream.

Fred and George were still frozen in apparent shock, staring at Bill’s limp form, but Angelina
and Hermione snapped to attention just as the Carrows raised their wands against Ginny,
who, though she held her own in her hand, wasn’t in any state to defend herself.

“Reducto!”

“Incendio!”

The hex left Hermione’s wand in a brilliant flash of cerulean while flames licked outward
from Angie’s, both deflected at the last moment as the Carrows realised they were being
attacked from multiple sides and turned.

“Go,” Hermione commanded over her shoulder at the twins. The rest of the unspoken
sentence was, ‘Go see if your brother is dead,’ but Hermione couldn’t bring herself to say
that part. Fred met her eyes for a split second, his own wide and openly scared; he looked
younger than he had in a long while. She wanted to touch him, to tell him it would be okay,
but there wasn’t time and she couldn’t guarantee that it would be, so instead she just nodded
at him once and prepared to clear the way. “I’m alright. Go.”

oOoOoOo

Fred heard the iron-clad edge on Hermione’s voice, the fiercely protective determination, and
before he knew it, he was halfway down the passageway, defying every instinct that he had
and running away from her with George at his side.
Ginny, having been forgotten by the Carrows in light of new opponents, had dropped to her
knees beside their eldest brother, white as a sheet and noticeably shaking.

Fred and George skidded to a halt when they reached them, pausing only to deflect a stray
stunner that ricocheted their way.

“Don’t be dead, don’t be dead, don’t be dead,” Ginny was murmuring hysterically under her
breath, tears silently tracking through the grime on her cheeks.

“Ginny, is he –“ George choked before he could finish the sentence.

“I don’t know! I can’t – he isn’t – we need to roll him over,” she said. Her shaking hands were
stained crimson and pressing ineffectively against Bill’s broad shoulder. Fred knelt on his
other side and helped to move him as carefully as possible, stomach lurching and threatening
to vacate when Bill’s face turned toward the torchlight and he saw where exactly the blood
was coming from.

Ginny dropped her head, sobbing, but Fred reached a trembling hand out, pressing two
fingers beneath Bill’s jaw and holding his breath. He could hear the blood rushing in his ears,
which seemed ironic given the sheer volume that was currently on the floor, soaking through
the knees of his trousers.

It felt like an eternity before he felt it, but there it was nonetheless: a pulse. Weak and far too
fast, but still present and fighting.

“He’s alive,” Fred announced aloud, as much in reassurance to himself as his siblings.

“We need to get him to the hospital wing,” George said, having stepped around Bill’s other
side to Ginny. He gently pulled her to her feet and back toward the wall.

Fred chanced a glance back to Hermione. He didn’t know how they’d gotten that way, but
she and Angelina were nearly back-to-back, each in fierce combat with one of the Carrow
siblings.

“She won’t die,” Ginny cut-in, having had a second to compose herself as George levitated
their brother off the ground, hastily layering on bandages and preparing to move him to the
hospital wing.

“What?” Fred asked sharply, looking at his sister before directing his attention back to the
fight.

“Hermione,” Ginny said hoarsely, reaching out to touch his forearm. Her frightened
expression eased a little as it read the worry that he knew was clearly etched on his face. “She
drank liquid luck. So did I. Watch.”

Fred scrutinised the duel itself more closely as a bright orange spell that, for all intents and
purposes, should have collided with her shoulder went wide and struck the wall instead.
Amycus Carrow, who’d cast it, bared his teeth in a sort of feral display of frustration.
Angelina on the other hand had no such advantage, and she wasn’t faring as well, having
transitioned to mostly defensive magic. George had noticed this too. He’d taken a few steps
down the passageway and then stopped, clearly torn between Bill and Angie in the same way
that Fred was with Hermione.

Not for the first time in his life, Fred acted before he thought.

“Oi!” He yelled as he lurched to his feet, wand raised and not yet entirely sure what he was
doing yet. “You bleeding ugly bint, over here!”

He threw one of the most obnoxious spells he knew, lighting up the corridor in glowing pink
and drawing the attention of nearly everyone for a beat, including his intended target, Alecto
Carrow. Angelina quickly put a shield around herself and stumbled back toward the wall,
breathing hard with a hand pressed tight over a nasty burn on her arm.

She cast him a grateful look that he saw for just a fraction of a moment before she quickly
ducked around the corner, back toward the stairs and out of sight. George and Ginny didn’t
delay once she was gone, levitating Bill and running in the opposite direction toward a side
passage that led back around to the stairs and, with any luck, an unobstructed path to the
hospital wing.

Alecto responded to his bone-breaking hex with a dark red cruciatus curse. Bit of a
disproportional response in Fred’s opinion, but then she was rather hacked off at the rotating
door of opponents. In any event, he dodged it and then pushed slowly forward, driving her
back and then circling with a practiced hand until he’d taken Angelina’s place with Hermione
and her opponent behind him.

“Nice of you to join me!” She called over her shoulder to him, in response to which he
chuckled and shielded a blood-boiling curse that missed him and almost clipped her. For as
unnerving as it was watching her duel, it was also a thing of beauty. She was casting almost
entirely non-verbally - not that it mattered with the din surrounding them, but he still felt a
flicker of pride at it. “Bill alright?”

“Still breathing,” Fred replied, struggling a little to do the same himself as the battle waged
on. He put a shield up on the left only to see a slicing hex fly in from the right. It nicked the
outer edge of his thigh, cutting through his trousers and leaving a shallow gash in his flesh
below.

“Alright?” Hermione asked, hearing him hiss through his teeth.

“Never better,” Fred replied, more annoyed at himself than anything. Alecto was a chaotic
sort of combatant, and it made her difficult - and irritating - to defend against. “But let’s wrap
this up anyway, yeah?”

“How exactly,” Hermione grunted and lunged to the left before righting herself again, “do
you suppose we do that?”

“On the count of three, you take mine and I’ll take yours.”
“You think that’ll work?” The skepticism in her voice was nearly insulting.

“Humor me!”

“Alright, one –“

“ – two –“

“ – three!”

In perfect synchronicity, Hermione ducked under his arm and stunned Alecto while he
pivoted in place and did the same to Amycus. It was a movement he and George had tried in
practice a few times and it worked like a charm, distracting their opponents just long enough
to give them the upper hand.

Hermione let out a disbelieving laugh, letting her head fall back and panting as both dark
forms crumpled to the ground. They were contorted around one another, pressed practically
chest to chest, and Fred hooked an arm out, grabbing Hermione around the waist. He looked
down at her, pupils the size of saucers and an exultant expression still on her face. Then he
kissed her hard on the mouth.

He could rightfully admit that the timing of it was wildly inappropriate. The school was
under siege and his brother was hurt and they might all be about to die – but he kissed her
anyway, fire and adrenaline thrumming a path through his veins. Both still clutching their
wands as they grappled with one another, he tasted a bit of coppery blood where her lip was
split and the musk of their sweat mingled with ash and dust, hanging heavy in the air.

She tore her mouth from his with a gasp when a window a few feet away suddenly exploded
inward. Fred pushed Hermione backward against the wall hard, knocking the wind out of her
and caging her in against his chest. He ducked his head into her neck as a few stray shards of
glass and rock struck his back.

Just as the air cleared, both of them dazed and looking around, they saw a familiar head of
dark, messy hair descend the spiral staircase and go sprinting down the corridor.

oOoOoOo

“Dumbledore would have been happier than anybody to think that there was a little more
love in the world,” Professor McGonagall said curtly in response to Tonks’ tearful confession
to Remus. Fred and Hermione had done their level best to seem surprised at the big reveal,
Fred having been told and Hermione parsing it out months ago when Ron and Harry saw
Tonks in Hogsmeade.

While eyes were focused across the room, Hermione reached out to take Fred’s hand.

“Right. Well, in that vein – “ he began in a vie for attention, but he was cut off by the
appearance of Hagrid, who announced he’d moved Dumbledore’s body and effectively stifled
the momentary air of hopefulness. A few minutes later, Harry departed with the new interim
headmistress, and Molly and Fleur had returned to fussing over Bill alongside Madam
Pomfrey.

She and Fred shared another look and he just shrugged, leaning down to whisper beside her
ear, “They’ll figure it out sometime between the wedding and our first kid.”

Hermione couldn’t help but snort, drawing the attention of Ron, who was seated in the corner
and staring at her and Fred, their hands still very publicly interlocked.

Something squirmed in her gut at his expression; it seemed that all was not resolved after all.

“I need to go check something,” Hermione muttered under her breath a little while later. Fred
looked down at her and then over at George, who had been entirely focused on applying a bit
of burn paste to Angelina’s arm. He stopped suddenly and looked up like he’d been called.
The twins shared a silent exchange and a nod, then Fred jerked his chin toward the hospital
wing doors, he and Hermione taking their leave.

“Where are we going?” He asked once they were out of earshot.

“Library,” she replied, slowing a little. She was beginning to crash, but this couldn’t wait.
Fred gave her a disbelieving look and then out and out laughed as they descended the stairs.

“Only you, darling. Only you.”

They made their way there to find it unguarded, Madam Pince not at her usual post.
Hermione stopped briefly at the reference desk, searching for a moment until she located the
correct stack. Fred watched curiously the whole time, but he didn’t interrupt.

She grabbed a lantern off the counter and led them all the way to a dusty section of muggle
texts, the spines of which held various names and dates.

“Penbygull, Petrarch, Petrizi – Phaedrus, here. Hold the lamp, would you?”

Fred took it as she extracted a relatively small book, brushing dust off the cover before her
eyes began rapidly scanning the table of content.

“Here, notable principles and wisdoms,” she grabbed a clump of pages and flipped toward
the back of the slim text. “‘Gentleness is the antidote for cruelty,’ that certainly wasn’t what
he was talking about.”

“Who?” Fred asked.

“Snape,” Hermione replied absently as she continued to read. “He said something to me
before he stunned me earlier. I’d forgotten about it, but after what Harry told us happened –
here.”

She turned the book toward him suddenly, exchanging it for the lantern and pointing at
several lines of tiny black text near the top of the page.

“An alliance with a powerful person is never truly safe.”

He arched a brow, but she nodded for him to continue and read further down as well.

“Things are not always as they seem; the first appearance deceives many. The
intelligence of a few perceives that which has been carefully hidden."

Fred chewed on that for a moment, obviously thinking the same things that she was.

About what Harry said had happened. About Snape stunning Hermione rather than simply
killing her. About a conversation the two of them had had nearly two years prior, in a dusty
bedroom at Grimmauld Place.

“Do you ever think that Dumbledore is sort of… manipulating us?”

“I certainly don’t think he’s as grandfatherly and genial as he lets on.”

“You don’t think Snape killed him,” Fred finally said softly. It felt blasphemous, like a crime
to admit aloud so soon in the wake of his supposed murder, even if Hermione was the only
one around to hear him.

“I didn’t say that,” she corrected hastily, taking the text and replacing it on its shelf. She cast
a spell to replace the dust and make it look as though the book hadn’t been disturbed at all. “I
believe that Harry saw what he said he saw, and I don’t doubt that the spell left Snape’s
wand. But I think there’s more going on than we know.”
 Sunsets and decisions
Chapter Notes

Okay, let's talk about the time jump in the previous chapter because I think a few of you
felt a little jostled.

The logic behind making the leap straight from Easter to The Battle of the Astronomy
Tower was threefold:

1.) The canon timeline for HBP is not only messy and riddled with enormous gaps, but
the '96/'97 school year ends almost a full month later than most of the other trio-era
spring terms.

2.) I would rather give you the story as it played out in my brain rather than shoehorn-in
a filler chapter just because I felt like I should.

3.) I have been writing this sucker for almost 17 months now and there are things I'm
eager to get to. What can I say? I'm human.
3 July 1997

In the evening following Albus Dumbledore’s funeral, Hermione Granger once again found
herself standing near the edge of The Black Lake, shoes hooked in one hand and toes nestled
in the clover beneath the beech tree. The castle was to her left, towering and grand as ever.

“I thought I might find you out here,” a familiar voice said before sidling up behind her and
wrapping his arms around her waist. She leaned back into Fred, listening to his heartbeat and
the quiet lapping of the water on the shore. “I had to get out of there, it was really very
depressing. Almost like a funeral.”

She snorted softly and closed her eyes, feeling the breeze gently lift and toy with the ends of
her curls while the leaves rustled softly overhead. Even if her own affections for Albus
Dumbledore had been minimal, dubious even, most of the people around her didn’t share that
sentiment. And there was a sort of bone-deep exhaustion that came with existing in close
proximity to that sort of grief for long spans of time. Harry, in particular, had been taking it
hard.

Fred lapsed silent at her back for a few moments, and then they just stood there, watching the
sun set slowly over the mountains in fiery shades of ochre and auburn. In more ways than
one, she was struck with a powerful sense of déjà vu, and she wondered if Fred felt it too;
like a chapter coming to an end.

“You’re leaving,” he finally said, breaking the stillness. It wasn’t a question, just as it hadn’t
been when she’d said it to him.

“Haven’t we done this already?” She mused, opening her eyes and rotating slightly to look up
at him. He didn’t look angry, not particularly, but there was a crease between his brows that
she had the impulse to reach out and smooth. “What gave me away?”

“Ginny,” Fred replied. “George ran into her and she was a right mess. She told him that Harry
had broken things off.”

“Mmm,” Hermione hummed and tipped her head, turning back to the lake. She’d had a
feeling he might try something like that, altruistic as he endeavored to be. “He’s a sweet boy,
but not always the brightest.”

“Then I take it that you… won’t be following his example?” Fred probed. His tone was
pointedly blithe, but there was an undercurrent of genuine concern that made her chest ache a
little. Ache because he was justified in thinking that she might push him away.

“No,” she reassured soundly, feeling his arms relax around her as she did. “I can’t do this
without you and, unlike Harry, I’m selfish enough not to bother trying. That said, I can’t
expect you to –“

“Shh,” he quieted immediately. “I’m not going anywhere. But what I haven’t quite parsed out
is whether or not I’ll be invited along on this adventure with you.”

She stilled. She’d thought about it; in truth, she’d thought about little else since she’d
determined that was indeed the path that she, Harry and Ron were on. But it wouldn’t –
couldn’t – be something that she asked him to do, not with what he would be risking. Not
with the people he’d be leaving behind.

“Well,” Hermione began slowly, taking a deep breath, “I suppose that’s up to you. But first,
there are things that I need to tell you, Fred. Things that you deserve to know, to weigh, if
you’re considering coming with us. Because I don’t know where we’re going or how long
we’ll be gone, and, if I’m being honest, I haven’t the faintest idea how this is all going to
end.”

Fred stepped back and firm hands gripped her shoulders, rotating her toward him. Then he
placed a single knuckle beneath her chin and tipped her head up, so she had no choice but to
look him directly in the eye. His sapphire gaze bore into hers, catching the late afternoon
light and adding a glowing intensity to his already solemn expression.

“Then tell me. Tell me everything.”

So, Hermione did. She began with the memories in the pensieve – Tom Riddle’s boyhood and
Horace Slughorn’s long-kept secrets. She filled in the gaps from their own years at Hogwarts;
Ginny and the diary that wasn’t really a diary, the true purpose of Harry’s abduction during
the Triwizard tournament, and the contents of the prophecy that had very nearly cost her own
life. Finally, she finished with her personal theories. About Nagini, and the relics from the
founders, and even the one speculation that she’d scarcely let herself consider. The one about
the scar on her best friend’s head.

Fred, as with most things, took it all in stride. Through the entire retelling, he interjected only
to ask an occasional question, and when she was finished, he sat in contemplative silence,
thumb stroking meditatively back and forth on her bare knee. The sun had finally disappeared
and given way to twilight, and they’d reoriented themselves to sit on his jacket, which had
been transfigured into a makeshift picnic blanket.

Hermione didn’t say anything; she’d had months to process what he’d just absorbed in the
span of about forty minutes, so she simply sat back and waited.

“Let me see if I have this right,” Fred finally began, turning to face her straight-on. “If I go
with you, we’re essentially going to be on the run, hunting objects that we can’t easily
identify, locate or destroy, and, if we’re captured or murdered, everyone that knows how to
kill old Moldy-shorts goes down in one fell swoop.”

“Correct.”

“And Dumbledore didn’t see fit to tell anyone else about this? McGonagall? Kingsley?
Remus?”

“Don’t get me started on that. Honestly, and try not to take offence at this, Harry will
probably be mad that I even told you.”

“Right. And if I stay behind, you still have to do all of that without my vast knowledge and
skillset at your disposal, but I then become a sort of Plan B should the aforementioned
transpire.”

“It sounds like you have the shape of it.”

“Then we need to come up with another failsafe, because there’s no way in hell that I’m
letting you go without me.”

Hermione exhaled in an enormous rush as that sank in. She’d told herself she wouldn’t leave
him out of this fight if he wanted in, and she wouldn’t question or hold his decision against
him, regardless of which way it fell. Because if he chose to stay, knowing everything he now
did, they’d both find a way to live, or quite possibly die, by that verdict. But if something
happened to her and he only stayed because she told him to? Because she refused to share
what she knew and put them on equal footing? He’d live the rest of his days resenting her,
and she’d quite frankly deserve it.

So, rather than argue or push or ask if he was certain, she simply nodded.

“Alright. Okay. Well, there’s a lot to prepare and not much time to do it.” Fred got up and
extended a hand, pulling her to her feet and bending to collect his jacket-cum-blanket. “We
haven’t discussed it yet, but I can’t imagine Harry is going to want to wait long once his trace
is off.”

“No, I’d wager not,” he agreed as they started to make their way back toward the school.
“What do you need from me?”

“Does your dad still have the tent from the World Cup a few years ago?”

“Yeah, I think it’s in the garden shed somewhere.”

“Brilliant,” she said, nodding. “We’ll be needing that. I also have to procure some pretty rare
potion ingredients –“

“Done. I’ve suppliers aplenty.”

"Of course. How are you at undetectable extension charms?”

“Dab hand, we had to use them when we developed Weather in a Bottle last year.”

“Good, good…” Hermione thought silently for a long moment as a small pit began to form in
her stomach. She took a breath and held it as she asked, “What about memory charms?”
 Home

15 July 1997

“You don’t have to do this,” Fred said for the millionth time, seated across from her in the
attic as they dug through their respective boxes of holiday knick-knacks and Granger family
memorabilia.

“I know,” Hermione replied without looking up, just as rehearsed. She paused, having nearly
flipped past a photo of her in front of the Christmas tree. Perhaps two or three, she was sitting
on her mother’s lap with an obnoxiously large velvet bow that was trying, and failing, to
contain her hair. Taciturn, she plucked it from the album and set it aside with the rest before
proceeding.

“I’m just saying – there are other, less permanent, options. With what you’re removing… you
most likely won’t be able to undo it.”

She sighed as she finished the book she was looking through and turned to face him. It was
rather warm in the attic of her parents’ home that afternoon and, though they were supposed
to be at the dental practice all day, she and Fred had been diligent about keeping the silencing
charms up just in case.

“Go on, let’s get it over with. Would you like me to dismiss them alphabetically or at random
this time?”

Fred offered her glib attitude a flat look before taking a deep breath and proceeding. “Placing
more wards and security charms on the house.”

“Not good enough. All the death eaters would have to do is camp in the garden until one of
them went to work. Then, presto change-o, I’m an orphan.”

“Asking the Order to organise security.”

“The Order is going to be stretched thin enough between the ministry, the school and their
own families. I’m not going to ask that of them.”

“Tell your parents what’s going on and convince them to leave on their own.”

“I might as well just obliviate them if I do that; they’ll still never speak to me again, but
they'll also have the burden of knowledge and hating-slash-fearing their only child.”

“What about —”

“Okay, that’s enough.” She got up and paced across the cramped space, ducking below the
rafters to look out a dusty window at the back garden. The very same back garden where
she’d built castles with blocks and blown bubbles with dish soap and read Walt Whitman
with her father for the first time.

“Hermione, I just want you to be sure –“

“Do you really think that I’m not sure?” She rounded on him, the heat of the attic suddenly
stifling. “I’m sorting through Christmas photos in July, for fuck’s sake. Do you think that I
don’t pray every single time that we have this conversation that one of us will have some
bright, previously unrealized epiphany that makes everybody happy? If you haven’t noticed,
I’m not happy about this, Fred. I’m pretty bloody far from it, in fact. But this is it. This is
how it needs to be.”

“And you really think that if you told them some version of the truth that they wouldn’t go?”

“There’s no middle ground! Either I tell them the whole truth and terrify them, which will
likely result in them pretending I don't exist anyway, or I cushion it so much that they don’t
take it seriously enough to go. There’s no fucking middle-ground. I dug this pit the moment I
started lying to them when I was twelve years old, and now I need to shut up, lie down in it,
and accept reality.”

“Maybe if you just alter their memories without taking everything-“

“They didn’t want this!” Hermione finally shouted, a lump rising in her throat and her breath
becoming sharp and uneven. She pulled her wand out of her pocket and threw it across the
room where it hit an old trunk and landed on the floor with a quiet, anticlimactic clatter.
“They didn’t ask for this to be their lives. They didn’t ask for me to be what I am, or for my
world to be what it is, or for my friends to be who they are, and I will be God-damned if I let
them die because of me and my choices. So please, please let this be the end of it this time.
Because I’m trying really hard to keep it together here and, as much as I love a good debate, I
need your support or I am going to fall apart.”

Her arms were crossed tight and her nails were digging so hard into her biceps that it felt like
they might break the skin. She refused to cry until this was all over and done with, and in that
moment the unshed tears were trying their absolute darndest to choke her. Fred finally
unfolded his legs and got to his feet, stopping to stand in front of her with an unreadable
expression. Then slowly, gently, he reached out and pulled her forward into an embrace.

She was stiff at first, but slowly, in the incremental easing of tense muscles and tenser
emotions, she gave in. The soft cotton of his t-shirt pressed against her cheek and she closed
her eyes, not caring anymore that it was sweltering.

“I was never not supporting you,” he murmured after a few beats of silence, chin resting on
top of her head. One hand was on her waist and the other cupped the back of her damp,
feverish neck – although he didn’t seem to notice.

“I know,” she said hoarsely, the sound a little muffled.

“I just don’t like seeing you in pain. It’s fucking killing me, actually.”

She sniffled and leaned back to look up at him. He hadn’t meant to push, deep down she
knew that. It was clear on his face and in the way that he held her; reverently, like she was the
most precious thing in the universe.

He just wanted there to be a solution when there wasn’t one, and that was a difficult thing for
someone like him to accept.

Someone that would do anything for the people they loved.

Someone that bent the world to their will every day with sheer ingenuity and charisma.

Someone truly magical.

“It’s a lot less pain than I’ll be in if we don’t do anything and they’re murdered in their beds
or… or worse, they end up like Neville’s parents, tortured to the point that they’re not aware
of who or where they are. I would never be able to live with myself if that happened, but I
can live with this. I can learn to live with this if it keeps them safe.”

Fred nodded and ducked down to place a kiss on her brow, once again disregarding her
general grubbiness.
“They’re going to be alright,” he said softly. “You’re going to be alright; I won't let you fall
apart.”

She nuzzled back into his chest before replying with a simple, yet all-encompassing,
“Thanks.”

Fred snorted softly, continuing to hold her for as long as she needed him to. “Any time.”

oOoOoOo

“Is that the last of it?” George asked, stepping through her parents’ back door with an
assortment of shrunken boxes stacked in his arms.

“Yeah, that should be everything,” Hermione confirmed with a truly pathetic attempt at
cheerfulness. He offered a weak smile in return and bumped her affectionately with his
shoulder as he passed by.

Fred suddenly apparated in on her right with a quiet pop, having just delivered her trunk to
the flat, and Angie was already waiting in the garden with Crookshanks’ carrier hooked over
her arm.

Had someone told Hermione a few years ago that popular, athletic, quidditch-captain
Angelina Johnson would not only be present for one of the most difficult days of her life, but
that she’d offer to take care of her cat while Hermione coped with the ensuing emotional
turmoil, she’d have call them crazy. But, as they say, life makes fools of us all.

The four of them swayed in an awkward circle for a second before George smacked his lips
loudly and bobbed his head once.

“Alright, then. We’ll see you at home.”

Angelina, whose arms were full, gave Hermione a peck on the cheek and then the other
couple apparated out before what George had said truly sank in.

Home.

A noun – where one resides permanently.

The place you hang your hat.

Where the heart is.

No place like it.

She looked to Fred, sudden, mind-numbing hysteria bubbling in her throat before she forced
it back down. Whatever the expression on her face in that moment, likely somewhere
between dread and sheer panic, he didn’t give in and coddle her, and he didn’t bring up any
of the stricken-down alternatives again.
He did exactly what she’d asked of him, what she needed him to do in that moment, steadfast
and steady like a lighthouse in a storm.

“My offer stands,” he said gently, reaching out to push a curl behind her ear. Her eyes were
burning and her vision was starting to blur, but she shook her head and blinked until it
cleared.

“No. No, I have to do it. It has to be me.”

He nodded once and then stepped aside, opening the path between her and the door. “I’ll be
right here after.”

Hermione couldn’t move for a moment, frozen in place, but eventually her limbs obeyed
until, one foot in front of the other, she was inside and climbing the stairs. Her bedroom, now
a barren guest room, was to the right, but when she got to the top landing, she turned left.

While she’d insisted that she be the one to alter her parents’ minds, Fred had placed a
sleeping charm for her while they moved everything out, assuring that they’d remain
unconscious for the duration. When she pushed the bedroom door open with a soft creak and
saw them there, resting peacefully side by side, she almost lost it.

But it would only take a few minutes - the most devastating things in life often did. Just a few
more minutes and, for both better and for worse, it would be done.

She crossed the room, pale grey in the morning light, and stopped beside her father first. His
glasses were resting on the bedside table beside his wristwatch and, with a deep breath, she
raised her wand.

“Do you know why it’s so important to learn how to read, Hermione?”

She was on the floor of her father’s study beside his desk, meticulously tracing letters on a
pad of paper while he watched. She looked up at him through dust-motes, dancing and
sparkling in the late afternoon sun.

“No daddy, why?”

" Because once you can read you can learn to do anything. Anything in the whole wide
world.”

" Mmm... can I learn to fly?”

" Uh-huh, you can learn to fly planes and helicopters and zeppelins. If you work very hard,
you can even learn how to fly all the way to the moon."

“Can I learn… how to play the piano? Like Nan used to do?”

" Of course – although I suppose you’ll have to learn how to read music, as well.”

" Mmm… what about how to be a princess? Can I learn that?”

He laughed and reached down, pulling her up into his lap. “You’re already a princess,
sweetheart.”

“Obliviate.”

With her wand at his temple, she watched as that memory, along with millions of others, left
his head forever. Richard Granger – now Wendell Wilkens – didn’t even stir.

With her jaw gritted so tightly it felt like all of her teeth were going to shatter, Hermione
rounded the foot of the bed to her mother.

"Mummy,” Hermione asked, plopping on the small stone bench beside the peonies while her
mother pulled weeds, “Do you think that I can get braces this year?”

"No, darling, you’re still too young. You have a few more baby teeth that need to fall out,
first.”

“Oh.” She’d kicked the toe of her trainer in the dirt thoughtfully. “Can’t you just – can’t you
pull those out?”

“Why do you want braces so badly? They’re dreadfully inconvenient, you know.”

“I know, it’s just... the other kids tease me. Today Mandy Willoughby asked me if there isn’t a
dam somewhere that I should be helping build. She meant – she meant that I look like a
beaver.”

Her mother’s lips had pressed into a tight line as she sat back on her heels and ran a dirt-
speckled forearm over her sweaty forehead.

“Mandy Willoughby is a vapid, vain little girl and you shouldn’t pay any mind to her.”

“But the other kids –“

“No buts, Hermione. You are strong and you’re smart and someday you’re going to be
somebody important, and the opinions of the Mandy Willoughbys of the world won’t be
anything but distant memories.”

“Do you promise?”

“I pr—”

“Obliviate.”

As soon as the spell was finished she backed out of the room and shut the door behind her
with a quiet click.

She didn’t look back.

She couldn’t look back.

Though she didn’t recall going downstairs, she closed the back door of the house a moment
later.

House.

Not home.

“Is it finished?” Fred asked when she stopped in front of him, looking her up and down as if
there might be some physical indication, a scarlet A for children violating their parents’
minds and magically disowning themselves. There wasn’t. But Hermione couldn’t speak,
physically couldn’t form words, so she just nodded.

He nodded back and, in slow, deliberate movements, he reached out and pulled her wand
carefully from her lax grip and stored it in his pocket beside his own. Then, in one swift
motion, he crouched and scooped her into his arms so her head was resting on his shoulder
and her legs were slung over his elbow. She instinctively angled her body and wrapped an
arm around him, tucking her face into his neck and, blessedly, out of sight from the world.

As he turned on the spot, she watched her childhood memories swirl and blur one last time in
the small space above his shoulder until they were gone and she was at the apparition point
behind the shop, looking at a brick wall. It was a testament to how awful she was already
feeling that she barely registered it.

They hadn’t opened yet for the day, so Fred took her straight inside, past the register and up
the stairs. He unlocked the door at the top of the landing with a little maneuvering, and then
they were stepping over the threshold.

George and Angelina weren’t anywhere in sight and, when they got inside, Fred kicked the
door shut behind him, locked it, and then proceeded to carry Hermione through the living
room and past the kitchen, all the way back to his bedroom.

When they got there, he gingerly set her down on the edge of the mattress and then knelt in
front of her. She’d just started to wonder what he was doing when he reached out and began
to untie her trainers, slipping them off one at a time. If it were anybody else undressing her,
seeing her weak and fragmented like this, she’d be embarrassed, mortified even, but not with
Fred. No, in that moment all she felt was a sort of overwhelming gratitude.

Getting up, he walked around the other side of the bed and, after the twin thumps of his own
shoes being kicked off, crawled on behind her. He gently tugged her down and rolled her
toward him so that she was laying with her head cushioned on his bicep and her eyes level
with his collarbone.

Then, with his hand making slow circles on her back, up and down her spine, Fred held her
tight to him and whispered over and over again that it was going to be okay. He told her that
her parents would be safe, and that she was strong, and he reminded her that, even if they
didn’t anymore, she would always have the memories of them.

Hermione wanted to say something back, assure him that she knew that she would be fine,
that she wasn’t a total nutter and she just needed a little time. She opened her mouth to say as
much, but the words still wouldn’t come, dying like ash on her tongue.

However, in the shelter of his arms, of this new home that he’d offered her without
reservation or hesitation, the tears finally did.
 Power play

23 July 1997

“Is it safe to come in?” Fred asked through the door of their workroom in the back of the
shop; Hermione, having commandeered two of their brewing stations the day before, had
been experimenting with some rather volatile ingredients. So the question, while seemingly
peculiar, was warranted.

“Yes, all clear!” She called back, placing another air-filtering charm over the simmering
cerulean potion, just in case. To her left there was another with a cloudy-grey concoction that,
despite having a burning-effect on one’s eyes if they stood near it for too long, seemed closer
to what she was trying to achieve.

Fred poked his head around the door, having been manning the till while Lee circulated the
floor during their afternoon rush. Or, rather, what constituted a rush in the current economic
climate. But the boys assured her, and anyone else they asked, that they were doing fine.
“That package of chizpurfle fangs that you ordered just came in,” Fred said, shutting the door
behind him and placing a small brown parcel on the edge of the table. Her eyes swept over
him in open appreciation; he was wearing dark jeans and a white WWW tshirt that hugged
his arms and, gosh, wasn’t she a lucky witch?

“Oh, perfect. I should be able to add that to this one…” she did a little mental math, looking
back at the grey potion and nibbling the corner of her lip, “… after eight this evening.”

“And the other?” Fred asked curiously, eyeing the second cauldron.

“I think that might be a lost cause,” she admitted, prodding the blue substance with a silver
stirring rod. It had become increasingly viscous in the last hour, and she was pretty sure that
if not for the filtering charms, the fumes would swiftly render the both of them unconscious.

“Are you sure I can’t do more to help?”

“You’re doing more than enough,” Hermione assured, shaking her head. He’d not only
literally put a roof over her head, but he’d provided her with virtually unlimited potion
ingredients and a quiet work space to boot. And, unlike when she stayed with Molly and
Arthur, those things didn’t come with excruciatingly obvious supervision or a list of
household chores. “I just need to keep toying with it.”

She took off the stained apron that had been tied around her waist and crossed the room,
wrapping her arms around Fred’s middle and burrowing into him. It had been nearly a week
since she’d left her parents’ house and, though the ache in her chest had eased substantially,
she found herself clinging to her partner a little more fiercely at times. He, by all accounts,
didn’t seem to mind.

“So,” Fred mused, pressing his lips lightly to the top of her head, “You’re declaring trial five
a failure, and trial four won’t be ready for another addition until after dinner. Which means
that right now, you’re doing…?”

Hermione grinned impishly and looked up at him. “Nothing.”

“Right, then.”

Before she pieced together what was happening, Hermione suddenly found herself with her
rear end in the air and a shoulder digging firmly into her midsection.

“Fred!” She shrieked with a disbelieving laugh, placing a hand on his lower back to steady
herself, “Put me down!”

“No,” he replied cheerily, reaching up to give her ass a firm smack before heading toward the
exit. One arm holding her behind the knees, he used his other hand to open the door back into
the shop.

“Fred, there you are. Do you know if we have any –?” Lee cut off abruptly upon turning
around, raising a speculative eyebrow. He was silent for a moment and then bent at the waist
and contorted his neck to look Hermione in the eye – a feat, given her face was level with
Fred’s belt loops. And obscured by her hair. And upside down. “Alright, Hermione?”

“Magnificent,” Hermione assured him with feigned ease, all too aware that they were starting
to draw some looks from the people browsing the store. “You?”

“Did you have a question?” Fred interrupted, as if nothing remotely out of the ordinary were
occurring.

“Nothing that can’t wait,” Lee assured, straightening up and pressing his lips together to keep
from laughing. It failed spectacularly.

“Great,” Fred said, on the move again toward the stairs to the flat, “Then I’m taking my
lunch. Verity should be in soon.”

A small collection of preteen boys in the corner began to hoot and clap as they disappeared
around the doorframe and, despite the wards preventing it, Hermione tried very hard to
apparate herself into the middle of the English Channel.

When they finally reached the flat, and subsequently entered it, Fred kicked the door shut
behind him and finally bent to place Hermione back on her feet.

She immediately started trying to straighten herself, running a hand through her hair, fallen
from its loose knot, and righting her shirt, which had ridden up nearly to her breasts. “What
the hell was that f—?”

But before she could finish her question, Fred had driven her backward against the door,
hands gripping her hips firmly and lips burning a track along the column of her throat. With a
surprised gasp, her hands fluttered helplessly in the air for a second before she wrapped her
arms around his neck and arched into him. The bra she was wearing didn’t have any padding
and her nipples brushed his chest with delicious friction.

“What’s all of this for?” she asked breathlessly against his lips a few minutes later, reaching a
hand down to place it on the erection that was suddenly straining the front of his trousers and
pressing into her lower stomach.

Fred braced a hand on the door beside her head and pulled back just enough to level her with
a gaze that, in and of itself, nearly made her melt.

“I don’t need a reason to want to fuck you, Hermione,” he said in a low, wry voice. Her pulse
was fluttering in her throat, and she felt like her veins were carrying fire through her body
instead of blood.

Without breaking eye contact, Fred snaked a hand between them and flicked the button of her
jeans open, tugging the zipper down and slipping a hand into her knickers.

Her breath hitched as he ran a finger along the seam of her pussy before dipping in languidly.

He smiled, glancing down quickly and then back at her. She knew that she was wet, and now
he did too. “What’s all of this for?”
Hermione licked her lips and stared right back, fighting to keep her eyes open as he pressed a
second finger into her and ground the heel of his palm against her clit.

“I don’t need a reason to want to fuck you.”

Fred chuckled and then ducked to kiss her again, working his fingers in and out of her in
rhythm that had her heart pounding and her nails digging into his shoulders for traction.

“Don’t stop,” she begged, tipping her head back against the door as he pushed her closer and
closer to the edge. She tried to spread her thighs open further but the taught fabric of her
jeans prevented it, drawing a growl of frustration from her and another laugh from him.
“Please don’t stop.”

Fred was supporting the bulk of her weight by that point, one arm wrapped around her lower
back while the other hand played over her like a damn concert pianist.

Hermione was panting, her abdomen tightening and stars blooming behind her eyelids. She
was going to come. She was going to come, standing up and fully clothed in the middle of the
bloody living room at two in the afternoon.

“Good,” Fred murmured into her ear as he continued to work her, “So good. Come for me,
just like that.”

With a cry, her orgasm overtook her and her legs nearly gave out, Fred pinning her tight to
the door as she shook and the wooden panel rattled in its frame.

“Fuck, Hermione,” he bit out through clenched teeth, chest rising and falling rapidly as she
became aware of her surroundings again. He slowly pulled his hand from her pants and
placed it on her bare hip, fingers still hot and slick against her skin. “I need to be inside of
you.”

A little blissed-out and dazed from her climax, Hermione rolled onto her toes and placed her
lips beside his ear, whispering teasingly, “Then what are you waiting for?”

Before he could respond she, without letting herself think about it too much, leaned forward
and bit his neck where it connected to his shoulder. It wasn’t hard enough to draw blood, but
it was close, and after just a second she let go and lapped at the mark with her tongue.

The string of expletives that followed was exquisite.

Though the logistics were a bit blurred, after a little stumbling she found herself sprawled on
their bed with her jeans and knickers being rather unceremoniously yanked from around her
ankles. Fred stripped in record time while she shucked her own shirt and bra, and then he was
on top of her, resting in the cradle of her hips with his cock prodding her entrance.

“Shit, the charm,” he groaned, starting to lean away, but she shook her head.

“I started the potion this week,” Hermione explained, reaching down and guiding him back
until the tip of his cock was just barely inside of her. He shuddered and nodded, then, in one
thrust, he was buried in her.
In that first moment as she felt him, truly felt him, the thrum of his pulse and the breath in his
chest and the way his blunt nails left little crescent marks where they dug into her skin, she
marveled at it. She’d assumed there’d be a falling-off point, that there would have to be.
After x number of days or months or years together, the heat and the want would fade, at least
a little bit, but it hadn’t. It might be naïve, but she was starting to think it never would.

She wrapped her legs tightly around him just as he started to move and Fred made a satisfied
sound in his throat that sent a thrill through her. It was primal and masculine and she loved it.

“Trust me?” Fred asked, breathing hard as he rocked his hips forward into her. It was a silly
question, really; he knew that she trusted him, absolutely, but she nodded anyway.

“Always.”

With a quiet grunt, Fred leaned back as far as he could without pulling out of her, then he
reached down and hooked an arm around her, tugging her up into a seated position on top of
his thighs with her knees bracketing his hips. Then he extended his legs behind her so he was
also sitting.

It was —

“Oh wow,” she breathed, sinking down onto him. It was deep. It was really, really deep,
almost uncomfortably so.

Fred kept one hand on her and placed the other behind them to keep the whole affair steady.
In this position, they were almost face to face with her seated just a little higher than him.

“Good?” Fred asked, looking up and searching her expression with eyes as hungry as they
were earnest.

“Fantastic,” Hermione affirmed with an unfettered moan, rocking forward a little and hissing
as he pressed into her g-spot.

Fred reached up and gripped her throat just below her jaw with his free hand, pulling her
mouth back to his as they started to move. It took a moment to find the right rhythm but, once
they did, it proved very, very effective.

“I’m never going to stop wanting you,” Fred vowed to her between labored breaths,
inadvertently echoing her own thought from earlier. The afternoon light reflecting in from the
open, double-hung windows made the blue of his eyes almost shimmer, like being under
water and looking up at the sun.

“Good,” Hermione replied, sweat slicking her lower back as she rode him. She traced her
fingertips over the pale bruise already forming where she’d bitten him. “Because you’re
mine.”

Dragging her nails with careful pressure up the back of his neck, she knotted a fist tightly into
his hair. Then she tipped his head back, a little forcefully, leaning forward to ghost her lips
over his. She didn’t let them touch though, just breathed him in. Fred’s eyes widened and his
mouth dropped open a little. “Hermione.”

She kept her lips there but pulled her hips up, then she rocked forward hard, leveraging on
his shoulders and taking him as deep as she could in a hard, measured movement. She was
getting close and she could tell that he was too, that she was pushing him to the edge, and it
made her feel like a fucking goddess.

“Every breath in your lungs,” she whispered with another thrust, “every hair on your head,”
thrust, “every time you take your cock in your hand and make yourself come without me,”
thrust, “it’s still all mine. Do you understand?”

“Yours,” Fred whispered, nodding and swallowing hard.

“Mine,” she said again levelly, with a small, satisfied smile. “Now, you’re going to come for
me, okay?”

“Yes,” he replied.

He looked a little vulnerable, and very clearly aware that, at least for that moment, the power
had shifted between them dramatically, in a way it hadn’t before. But he certainly didn’t seem
upset about it; in fact, there was a heated sort of curiosity in his expression that made her
stomach flutter.

“Yes, what?” she prompted, tightening her fingers in his hair so much that it had to be
painful.

“Yes,” he panted, his whole body shuddering, “I’m going to come for you.”

Hermione picked up the pace a little, not letting her grip on him go. Though his hand was still
on her waist, he wasn’t urging her forward anymore. She was in control, and he was letting
her be.

Everything felt good, and after some indeterminate amount of time that could have been
either seconds or decades, Fred started to stutter. “Fuck I’m – I’m going to –“

Only then did Hermione close the tiny gap between them and press her lips to his,
swallowing what he was going to say as well as the groan that followed it as he fell apart
under her.

She kept kissing him as her own orgasm struck, until she finally had no choice but to pull
away, gasping for breath and falling forward against his shoulder in a boneless, spent heap.

Fred carefully lowered them backward, so he was flat on the mattress with her draped over
his chest.

It was silent for long, quiet moments, as she listened to his heart slow in his chest and he
traced his fingertips over her spine.

“That was…” he started and then trailed off with a heavy exhale and a shake of his head.
“Did I hurt you?” she asked uncertainly, feeling substantially more self-conscious in the
aftermath than she had about it in the moment. She’d bitten him, for Merlin’s sake.

“A little,” Fred admitted, but he sounded rather chuffed. She wriggled to see his face and,
sure enough, there was a bemused, thoughtful smile on it.

“And?” she probed.

He raised a single copper brow consideringly and then met her gaze head-on. “And I might
just ask you to do it again.”

A thrill ran through her at that. Dominance and submission weren’t totally foreign concepts,
but, until today, she’d normally defaulted to the latter.

Hermione nodded and let her head fall back onto his chest.

“Where did you learn the position?” she asked curiously, idly circling her finger through a
smattering of ginger chest hair.

Fred grinned. “Verity left one of her muggle magazines in the storeroom and, would you
believe, they had a whole article on positions to shag in? Little diagrams and everything.”

Hermione laughed, all too familiar with such publications thanks to Lavender and Parvati.

“Well, remind me to thank Verity.”

oOoOoOo

“Are you coming?” Angelina asked, ducking into the workroom where Hermione had once
again taken up residence after dinner.

“Yes, just one more drop…” Hermione added a final drop of sunflower oil to the cauldron,
grinning when it developed an iridescent sheen. “Perfect, that’s what I was hoping would
happen.”

“What are you working on?” Angelina asked curiously as Hermione placed a stasis on the
cauldron and joined her, both of them heading swiftly through the vacant showroom and
toward the basement stairs. “Something for the shop?”

“No, it’s a personal project,” Hermione sidestepped vaguely as they hit the bottom landing
and started the trek through the shelves until they arrived in the clearing against the opposite
wall. Tonks was at the front of the space, already talking and demonstrating the motion for a
spell whose purpose Hermione hadn’t heard.

The girls quietly tucked in beside Fred and George near the back.

After a few more demonstrations and reminders, the whole ensemble broke into pairs to
practice dueling. Hermione started with Bill, who was ridiculously skilled, if a little too
hung-up on having perfect form and execution. She was sympathetic, because it was a
handicap that she suffered too, but that didn’t mean she wouldn’t exploit it.
“Bloody hell, Granger,” the eldest Weasley muttered, getting to his feet after she revived him
from a stunner she’d barely managed to land. It had taken conjuring a toy truck and tripping
him. “My brother is brave man; I’d hate to actually be on your bad side.”

“Your fiancé’s relatives grow wings and throw balls of fire when they’re angry,” Hermione
pointed out. “And your mum and sister are two of the most vicious people that I know. I think
maybe Weasley men just attract dangerous women.”

“You might be onto something,” Bill admitted, rubbing his elbow where he’d landed on it.

There was a sudden shout across the room; Lee had sent some sort of orange hex at Oliver
that went wide and bounced off of the perimeter ward. It was headed straight for Fred’s back,
who was engrossed in a duel with Katie and not paying attention.

It wasn’t anything too harmful, because they didn’t use those sorts of spells in practice, but it
didn’t matter. Instinct took over and before Hermione could even think about it, she raised
her hand and a blue-white shield wrapped around Fred and absorbed the spell a split-second
before it struck.

Everyone else stopped and, abruptly encased in bubble of magic, Fred finally realised
something had happened and looked around in confusion. His eyes finally met hers and
Hermione quickly lowered the shield, blushing a little.

She was just thinking of something to say to shift the attention off of her when Kingsley let
out a low whistle.

“You weren’t kidding, Fred,” he said, striding over from where he’d been talking with Tonks
in the corner. “She’s quick with a shield charm.”

“Oh, I’m – I’m not –“

“Wandless and nonverbal, too,” Fred confirmed, no small amount of pride in his tone as he
headed toward them. He looked down, having apparently pieced together what happened. “I
was about to get nailed with something, yeah?”

“Yes,” she admitted. “I just happened to look up at the right time.”

“Sorry!” Lee called from across the room and everyone chuckled.

“S’alright, mate!” Fred shouted back, then made a general shooing motion with his hands.
“Now everybody, get back to your knitting.”

Bill gave Hermione a pat on the shoulder and then went over to take Fred’s place with Katie
as they all started up again.

“You’d make a decent auror, Hermione,” Kingsley said appraisingly, though he laughed in his
deep baritone when she immediately wrinkled her nose at the notion. “Or… not?”

“No offense, Kingsley,” she said, “But if I survive this bloody war, I’m not going to be
signing up to fight more dark wizards. You can go ahead and take care of all that without
me.”

Fred snorted and slung an arm around her shoulders.

“Well, regardless of any future career decisions,” Kingsley said, “I’ll feel perfectly safe with
you covering my back Saturday night.”
 Way down we go
Chapter Notes

Sorry this one took a while, she's a little thicc.

Disclaimer: There are a few small bits of dialogue pulled directly from DH in this
chapter, so... now that's a thing that you know.

Also, if you're reading this on 11/8 and you live in the US, go vote. 🔪

26 July 1997

“Dad, are you out here?” Fred called, peering around the garden shed for any sign of his
father. It was a warm afternoon, but a slight breeze swept its way through the open doorway
and the loose boards that made up the walls, chasing away some of the waning July heat.
“Hullo? D—?”

“Yes! I’m – oof,” there was a loud bang as the worktable across the room jumped, along with
everything on it, followed by a soft groan and his father appearing overtop the table a second
later, glasses askew and rubbing the back of his head.

“Alright there?” Fred asked with a chuckle, crossing the room to sit on a rickety stool while
his dad placed the item he’d retrieved on top of the table. It looked like a television remote
that had been half-deconstructed.

“Oh, I’m just fine,” Arthur assured absently, rubbing his head again, nonetheless. “Is your
mother back yet?”

“No, Ginny said she was still at a fitting with Fleur and Madam Delacour.”

“Right, right…” Arthur muttered, drawing his wand to conjure another, much more stable
looking chair and taking a seat. “Alastor and Kingsley were here this morning; there’ve been
a few changes for tomorrow night.”

“What sort of changes?” Fred inquired.

“Apparently Alastor doesn’t trust Mundungus and, given that Angelina volunteered to fly
should we need additional people, he’s made the executive decision to exclude him.”

Fred wasn’t particularly surprised. Dung was good for a bit of intel out of Knockturn Alley
now and then, but he wasn’t exactly the sort you’d want covering your back in a duel. For
once Moody wasn’t being overly-paranoid. He was being appropriately paranoid.

“That’s fair enough,” Fred said, bobbing his head. “So how does that change the pairings?”

“Well, there are a few possible reconfigurations, which is what they called to discuss. The
first is simply putting Angelina with Alastor, however your brother has expressed a
preference to keep her with him, as has Remus with Nymphadora, given the option. You
haven’t said as much, but I would have to assume –“

“That I would prefer to have Hermione with me?” Fred finished, pulling in a deep breath and
exhaling it in a huff. He had thought about it, ad nauseum, but Hermione was set to fly with
Kingsley. Kingsley, who was an auror and a truly brilliant fighter. He couldn’t help but think
that asking that she be paired with him was a selfish, hubristic notion that could possibly put
her in undue danger. But in the same respect… “What do you think?”

His father’s eyebrows rose briefly before settling again. Then he took his glasses off and
slowly cleaned them on the hem of his shirt, squinting in thought at the earthen floor beneath
them.

“When you’re a parent, there are things that you want for your children. Things that protect
them, things that make them happy.”

“Dad, I —”
“Hush, let me finish. One of the things that you want is also one of the most frightening
things in the world: you want them to not need you anymore. You want them to go out on
their own and build their own lives. Their own families to protect and make happy.”

Whether his father realised it or not, he’d struck a chord with that word: family. Hermione
didn’t have hers anymore, not in the traditional sense. She’d given it up in perhaps the most
profound act of selflessness he’d ever witnessed. But she still had Harry and Ron and George
and Angie and… and him. She had him, every last little bit of him that there was to be had.

“You love her, yeah? Hermione, that is.” His father’s earnest question shook Fred from his
reverie, and he nodded without hesitation.

“After everything that we’ve… I don’t know what it is to be a man, to be me, and not love
her. She’s shaped me and changed me and I — I wouldn’t be who I am without her.”

A gentle smile touched Arthur’s face as he put his glasses back on.

“Not to in any way insinuate that Kingsley wouldn’t do a good job, but I’ve found that those
protecting someone out of love have far more motivation to succeed than those protecting
someone out of duty. So, for what it’s worth, I haven’t any doubt in your ability to keep
Hermione safe – nor in her ability to do the same in return, come to that.”

Fred thought for a long moment and started to nod before stopping. It occurred to him in a
rush that Hermione also had an opinion on the situation, likely a strong one if he knew his
witch, and he didn’t want to rob her of the opportunity to voice it.

“Can I talk to her about it and let you know?”

“Of course; I told Alastor I would speak to the both of you and get back to him by tonight.
He’s working with Bill on placing the last of the portkeys.”

“Right.” Fred got up, brushing his hands on his thighs and glancing toward the door,
wavering. “Thank you for asking. Given that George and Remus and Bill have already
committed, I feel like a bit of an ass for hesitating, but —”

“— but you want to keep her safe; it’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

Fred nodded. “Right. I’ll send a patronus once I talk with her.”

With a few more parting words, he made his way back to the house, waving at Ginny and
Ron across the garden as he went.

Upon stepping out of the floo and back into the living room of their flat, he found Hermione
on the sofa, freshly showered and pouring over a book of what appeared to be illustrations of
mushrooms.

“There you are,” she said, looking up and smiling in her way that was simultaneously casual
and breathtaking – though he doubted she saw it that way. “I was wondering where you got
off to.”
“Dad owled and asked me to come by,” he said, toeing his shoes off. “They’re finalising
everything for tomorrow night.”

“Oh.” Hermione marked her page and then set the book on the end table, her demeanor
immediately shifting to something just a little more solemn. “And?”

“And it seems there are a couple of potential deviations.” Fred stepped around the coffee
table and sat beside her on the sofa, running a hand through his hair. “Dung is out. Moody
doesn’t trust him, and I honestly can’t believe he even contemplated using him in the first
place.”

“Does that mean that Angie is flying?”

“Yes. But it presents an opportunity that I wanted to –“

“Can I fly with you?” Hermione asked abruptly, rotating in place to meet his surprised gaze.
“Sorry. I just thought that may be what you were getting at and, while Kingsley is lovely and
certainly more than capable, I would prefer –“

“You’d prefer to fly with me over Kingsley?” Fred asked incredulously. She gave him a
curious look and moved a little closer, placing her hand on top of his between them and
ghosting her fingertips between his knuckles.

“Did you contemplate saying no because you would rather be with someone else? With your
father or Alastor?”

“No,” he said baldly.

He hadn’t at all. His hesitance had stemmed purely from his apprehension for her wellbeing
and what she might want. Hermione fought the same way that she loved: fiercely and with
everything that she had. As far as he was concerned, there wasn’t anybody else that he would
rather have at his side or, in this case, his back.

“Exactly. Besides, if I’m with you, I’m not going to be worrying about you, nor you about
me. Not in the same way that we would be if we were with other people with no idea what
might be happening. If something goes wrong then a distraction like that, no matter how
much we tried to suppress the inclination, could put everyone at risk.”

Fred, a little dumbfounded, searched her face for any hint of hesitation or placation; though
he tried, he found none.

“Have I told you that I love you today?”

“Yes,” Hermione said, smiling again and inching closer. “But I don’t mind hearing it again.”

She shut her eyes and pressed a gentle kiss to his lips as he exhaled the anxiety coiled in his
chest and breathed her in instead.

“Thank you for trusting me,” Fred said quietly.

With your safety.

With your heart.

“Always,” Hermione replied, like it was the most natural thing in the world. She stayed in his
space for just a moment before crawling back to her book and opening it again.

Fred stood and headed toward the kitchen, throwing over his shoulder, “Besides, if all goes
according to plan it should be little more than a leisurely evening flight.”

oOoOoOo

“No!” Harry protested loudly the next night, standing in the kitchen of Number 4 Privet
Drive with his arms crossed. “No way, absolutely not.”

“I told them you’d take it like this,” Hermione said from beside him, sighing and leaning
against the counter. In truth, nobody looked all that surprised by Harry’s protests.

“If you think I’m going to let six people risk their lives —!”

“Right, because it’s the first time for all of us?” Ron asked with a snort. Harry pinned him
with a glare that would be far more intimidating were he allowed to use his wand.

“This is completely different. Pretending to be me —”

“Do you think we fancy the notion?” Fred piped in. “Imagine if something went wrong and
my girlfriend got stuck as a specky, scrawny git forever.”

Tonks made a choking sound that might have been a laugh, but Harry’s frown didn’t budge.

“You can’t do it if I don’t cooperate,” he argued petulantly. “You need me to give you some
hair.”

“Well, damn. I suppose that’s the end of that plan,” Angelina shook her head in faux defeat.
“Obviously there’s no chance at all of us getting a bit of your hair unless you cooperate.”

“Oh yeah,” George nodded solemnly. “Thirteen of us against one bloke who’s not allowed to
use magic. We don’t stand a chance.”

“That’s funny,” Harry said, sounding as though he thought the exact opposite. “That’s really
amusing, thanks for that.”

“If it has to come to force then so be it,” Alastor growled, visibly losing his patience.
“Everyone here is of-age Potter, and they’ve all agreed to take the risk.”

Harry looked around and saw the same thing that Hermione did, the same thing that she felt:
determination. Thirteen people, including a half-giant wearing motorbike goggles the size of
saucers, that would die to keep him safe and move their efforts even a hairsbreadth closer to
ending the conflict plaguing all of them.
“Now, let’s not have any more arguments,” Mr. Weasley, the perpetual peacekeeper, began.
“Time is wearing on and we need a few of your hairs.”

“But this is mad! There’s no need —”

“Harry!” Hermione finally snapped, turning and stepping in front of him. Whatever
expression was on her face, he took a small step back. “We talked through all of the potential
plans. All of them. If we’re lucky, Voldemort swallowed the fake bait that we planted about
moving you on the thirtieth, but he’d be mad not to have someone watching the house until
then.”

“It’s what I would do,” Kingsley added sincerely, his deep baritone lending a gravitas that she
lacked. Harry began to show signs of cracking when Ron stepped to Hermione’s side in front
of him.

“They might not be able to get at you right now because of your mum’s charm, but they
know where the house is. Snape has all of the school records. Our best option is to use
decoys.” Ron paused and shot them both a cheeky smirk. “After all, even You-Know-Who
can’t split himself into seven.”

Hermione pressed her lips together to suppress a bubble of wildly inappropriate laughter, and
she was thankful that nobody could see their faces because even Harry had a hard time not
smiling at that bit of dark humor. His shoulders slowly fell in resignation, like a balloon
deflating.

“If anything happens to any of you—”

“We’ll get patched up and hex you a few times if it makes you feel better,” Fred finished with
a sense of finality as he dove forward and grabbed a small chunk of Harry’s hair,
unceremoniously yanking a bit of it out.

Harry yelped and rubbed at the spot as the hairs were deposited into Moody’s waiting flask.

“Right then, fake Potters line up over here, please,” instructed Moody.

Hermione took her place along the wall between George and Ron. Angelina smiled smugly as
the former crossed the room; it had been a topic of much debate over dinner the previous
evening but ultimately it was agreed that Angelina was, by a very close margin, the more
skilled flier.

Fleur and Kingsley would also be taking the potion, but Tonks didn’t need it. They all
watched in fascination as, in a matter of seconds, her features shifted and morphed into an
exact replica of Harry. She was still perhaps an inch shorter, but a quick charm on the trainers
she’d be wearing fixed that.

The Polyjuice was distributed and, while Hermione wasn’t experiencing the exact same self-
consciousness that Fleur voiced, it was her first time transitioning to a non-female. Even in
all of her maturity, she could admit that it was a bit unnerving to know that, were she to
examine her body too closely in its current state, she’d know what her de facto brother
looked like naked.

When the transformation was complete she glanced up at Fred who, despite being extremely
blurry, appeared wildly entertained by the whole process.

After she’d changed, she went to stand beside him with the empty trunk and fake owl in tow.

“Good,” Moody affirmed, looking around at their assemblage. “The pairs will be as follows:
Hermione and Fred on broom, George and Angelina on broom, Fleur and Bill on thestral,
Remus and Tonks on broom, Arthur and Ronald on thestral, and Kingsely and myself on
broom.”

“An’ you’re with me, Harry,” Hagrid explained. Harry didn’t look at all put-out by the
declaration as he went to stand by Hagrid’s side, but Fred and Hermione shared a look.
Outside of Mundungus, who was no longer participating, it was the pairing that made the
least sense. Harry couldn’t use magic and, outside of a few simple charms, neither could
Hagrid.

That said, they’d be expecting Harry to be on a broom. Like the one Fred was carrying,
which she would be mounting in just a moment. That realisation sank in; in all of the
discussion and planning, it hadn’t truly hit her until that moment that she would be flying. In
the air. With nothing beneath her by a charmed branch and some twigs.

“You’re okay,” Fred murmured to her as they lined up in the back garden and he secured the
trunk and owl cage to the back of the broom. He climbed on and motioned for her to do the
same at his back. “Just breathe.”

“Right,” Hermione said, nodding as she got on the back of the broom. “I’m breathing.”

She didn’t care if it was strange for Fred given that she looked like Harry; she clung to his
waist as tightly as she could.

“Alright, then,” Alastor said, settled on his own steed with Kingsley. “Everyone ready,
please. I want us all to depart at exactly the same time, or the decoys are pointless.”

Hagrid kicked the bike to life and Hermione glanced toward Harry, huddled in the sidecar
with Hedwig’s cage between his knees. There was a buzz growing in the air and Hermione,
keeping one arm secure around Fred, drew her wand and rolled it between her fingers. It had
been glamored to look like Harry’s, the same as all of the decoys, but the familiar twist of
vinewood around the handle grounded her.

She could do this. They could do this.

“On the count of three!” Moody called. “One —”

“— two —” Fred followed quietly.

“— three.” Hermione whispered, but the sound was lost as wind rushed past her ears and they
shot up through the sky and straight into a maelstrom.
“Fuck,” Fred hissed, barrel-rolling them immediately to the left to avoid a purple hex and
nearly colliding with one of the wings on Bill and Fleur’s thestral. There was a scream in the
distance that sounded like Angelina, but Hermione couldn’t see or hear much of anything
past the vibrant flash of spells flying back and forth.

There were at least thirty hooded figures on brooms, floating in a circle overtop of the house,
waiting for them. Hermione, quickly swallowing her anxiety about flying in light of more
pressing perils, rotated as much as she could in place and cast a silent, but strong, shield
charm around the two of them.

The Death Eaters might believe that Harry would break the statute and use magic given the
circumstances, but Polyjuice didn’t transform your voice, so the minute any of them heard
her, their value as a decoy was lost.

“Hold on!” Fred called, and the two of them shot through a gap and into the night sky.
Hermione saw as other pairs began to get their bearings and do the same, but she couldn’t
focus on who went where. The only thing she could focus on was the four cloaked figures
that split off directly behind them.

A stunner ricocheted off of her shield, followed almost immediately by an orange hex that
threw sparks upon impact. Then they were hit by another spell. And another. And another.
She stopped trying to identify them.

There was a sheen of sweat on her brow as she held her arm steady; if she could maintain the
shield, they could make it to the safehouse outside of Reading and –

“Avada Kedavra!”

A green light streaked toward Fred and a terror she’d never felt before gripped her. He dove
them downward in a sharp maneuver that made her stomach lurch and the spell missed, but
the intention hadn’t. It had been aimed for him.

It was like a bucket of cold water had been dumped on her head; for all of Harry’s fear about
the Polyjuice, as long as she was disguised as Harry, she was safe from being shot out of the
sky. But Fred wasn’t.

Hermione dropped the shield and aimed up at the shadow that the killing curse had come
from. The image replayed in her mind, the flash of green missing Fred’s head by inches, and
a sudden calm washed over her. The cold air bit at her nose and her ears, but the height no
longer mattered. Nor did whatever reservations she had left about using lethal spells.

Sectumsempra.

A small flash of white light flew from the tip of her wand and into the night. Hermione
wasn’t sure if it had hit until warm droplets rained down on them and the screaming started.
A second later the dark figure plummeted toward the earth, already well behind them.

She couldn’t think about it then.

She dragged a sleeve over her face as sticky blood cooled on her skin, the slight metallic odor
burning in her nostrils.

She would think about it later.

There were three left, gaining on them, disappearing and reappearing through the clouds.
Hermione still had an arm wrapped around Fred’s middle and she could hear his heart
pounding beneath her wrist as he did everything that he could to get them to the safehouse
intact. Unfortunately, and unlike their adversaries, their broom was carrying two.

“It’s not much further,” Fred said after what felt like a lifetime of her deflecting and shielding
everything that was thrown at them with mechanical, textbook precision. She wasn’t sure if
he said it to her or to himself, but it didn’t matter. One of the Death Eaters finally pulled
ahead of them and stopped dead.

This proved a miscalculation on his part.

Fred Weasley, having grown up with five brothers and played the position of Gryffindor
beater for six years, didn’t have any misgivings when it came to knocking someone bodily off
of a broom. The Death Eater, however, realised this too late and Hermione braced herself as
they flew headlong, directly into the man.

The intention had clearly been to check him and keep moving, but whoever he was, he
managed to get a hand on Hermione and she felt herself jerked hard backward as she started
to slip off of the broom. She silently fought and clawed and pulled away, but he had a death-
grip on her jumper.

The ground loomed beneath them and her head spun, and just when she thought she was
going to fall, Fred swung his elbow out. With a sickening crunch, it connected with the man’s
face and he howled, finally letting her go. Hermione kicked blindly toward the figure, pain
shooting up her leg as her foot made solid contact with his broom handle and spun him away
from them. Still clutching at his face, they didn’t hang around long enough to see if he fell.

Hermione was breathing hard, the phantom feeling of hands still dragging her down before
she righted herself and reclaimed her hold on Fred. He didn’t ask if she was okay. He didn’t
speak at all. He pushed them with single-minded determination toward the farmhouse that
had barely come into view in the distance. Alastor told them that the wards started at the oak
tree. They just needed to get past the tree.

But as soon as she got the thought out, the last two Death Eaters materialised as if from thin
air directly behind her.

“Diffindo!”

Fred pulled up and pivoted the broom, pushing her to the side and nearly knocking her off as
the spell, intended for her, struck him instead. It had gone wide and been heading straight for
her throat, but it hit somewhere along his shoulder as he screamed out in pain.
“INCENDIO!” Hermione shrieked around him. Surprised eyes flashed in the glow of her
wand as massive plumes of orange and gold flames shot forward and engulfed both men. She
could smell it; burning hair, burning cloth, burning flesh, but she pushed down the bile rising
in her throat and ignored it, all of it, turning her back.

“Lumos,” Hermione hissed, raising her lit wand to see a deep gash along Fred’s bicep and a
glimpse of white bone. She pressed a hand over the wound, but blood flowed freely through
her fingers, rapidly soaking his sleeve. “Shit, shit. Fred, talk to me.”

“Almost there,” he said again, his words beginning to slur a little as they swayed in the air.
“Almost…”

Horror engulfed her when Fred suddenly slumped forward over the handle of the broom.
They were hovering nearly overtop the farmhouse, but they were still every bit of sixty feet
above the ground as they started to twist off center.

“No, no, no, no, no…” She tried to reach around him, stretched to the point of pain and
wanting to cry with frustration, but she couldn’t get a hold on the handle.

Then, like a marionette whose strings had been cut, Fred slipped off the broom. Without even
stopping to think, Hermione threw herself after him.

Fifty feet.

She was in free-fall.

Forty feet.

Her fingertips brushed his shirt.

Thirty feet.

She got hold of his uninjured arm.

Twenty feet.

She fumbled frantically with her wand.

Ten feet.

“Arresto momentum!”

Air cushioned them a split second before they struck the earth and Hermione let out a scream
that was half relief and half unfettered terror before she carefully lowered them the rest of the
way onto the grass.

“HELP!” She shouted in the direction of the house, crawling and rolling Fred over, pointing
her wand at his arm. “Ferula.”

White bandages sprang forward and wrapped tight, finally staunching the flow of blood.
“Did we make it?” Fred asked dazedly, breathing labored.

“Yes, yes, we made it, you unbelievable knob,” Hermione said, voice quivering and tears
streaking her face. All at once her vision went blurry and she realised she had transformed
back to herself. She ripped the glasses off and threw them aside. “Why did you do that? Why
the hell did you do that?”

“Family,” he muttered disjointedly. “Had to… keep… safe.”

Before Hermione could process what he meant, a shadow appeared over her shoulder and she
spun, crouching low over Fred and raising her wand.

“What time does the werewolf howl?” Hermione asked tersely, not sure if she had any
strength left to fight, but prepared to do so nonetheless.

“Just before dawn,” a low, melodic voice replied.

Hermione lowered her arm and released a tense breath as Hestia Jones conjured an orb of
pale yellow light, levitating it overhead and illuminating her face as well as the both of them
sprawled on the grass.

Hestia looked at Hermione as though seeking permission, which she received in the form of a
nod, before proceeding around to where Fred lay. Carefully, she unspooled the bandages and
examined the wound.

“Accio,” she commanded, raising her wand. Hermione caught the three small glass phials
that flew out of the house in shaking hands and gave them to her. Hestia unstopped one and
brought it to Fred’s lips. “Drink.”

Although groggy, he obeyed, and she repeated the process with the second one.

“Blood replenisher and invigoration draught,” she explained distractedly. Hermione nodded
and something in her eased when she saw color start to bloom in Fred’s cheeks again, his
gaze sharpening.

Then Hestia uncorked the third phial and gave Fred a warning look. “This one will hurt.”

Fred nodded and Hestia proximately poured a pale blue potion directly into the laceration.
Fred gripped Hermione’s hand tightly and she saw his jaw clench as muscle and skin began
to knit back together before, at last, the bleeding ebbed and smooth skin was left in its wake
beneath tattered, blood-soaked fabric.

Hestia sat back on her heels and dragged a forearm over her face.

“What the bloody hell happened up there?”

“Ambush,” Hermione said curtly. “How long until the portkey?”

She asked the question of Hestia, but her eyes were locked on Fred as he sat up. He reached
out and cupped the back of her neck, placing a quick kiss on her forehead.
“I’m okay,” he reassured quietly, warm breath ghosting over her skin. Her brain accepted it,
but her heart didn’t. So she nodded, but she also kept her vice-grip on his hand.

“You got here fast, you still have about ten minutes,” Hestia said, reaching out to help
Hermione to her feet before doing the same for Fred. Her eyes swept critically over them.
“And we need to use them to get you cleaned up, or Molly is going to have a heart attack.
Come along.”

They started to make their way into the farmhouse, briefly veering to the right to collect the
broom, which had plummeted to earth upon their dismounting it but was otherwise
unscathed.

“Never again,” Hermione muttered ruefully, eyeing the thing.

Despite the unbearable weight of the evening, and the fact that they had no idea what had
happened to the others, Fred snorted.

“Yeah, okay.”

They stepped up onto the porch and through the doorway, entering Hestia’s home. Hermione
and Fred both blinked against the light.

Hestia Jones, whom Hermione had only met once before, was a short, dark-skinned woman
in perhaps her early thirties.

“Loo is through there,” she said, gesturing to a door. “I’ll call you when the portkey is a
minute out.”

She turned and busied herself with something on the stove while Fred, still holding
Hermione’s hand, led them into the water closet.

He flipped the light on and Hermione cringed. Not only were her hands and lower arms
totally covered in blood, most of which was Fred’s, but her face was smeared and speckled
with it. Fred didn’t look much better, although most of the gore on him was localised to his
arm.

He stood behind her in the mirror with a similarly stricken expression and she met his gaze
overtop her reflection’s head.

“I killed three people,” she admitted quietly.

It felt like she was describing the actions of someone else. Some hardened, ferocious war-
heroine. Not her, not Hermione Granger. No, she was a good girl, bright and with a promising
future pushing paper at the ministry. She wouldn’t do something like that.

“I know,” Fred said levelly. He didn’t show any sign of distaste or judgment, nor did he move
to comfort her. He just held her stare, raw and open. “We’ll talk about it later, alright?”

She swallowed hard and nodded. “Alright.”

They took turns washing up and mending their clothing, nearly looking back to normal by the
time Hestia called them. Hermione certainly didn’t feel normal but, like Fred said, there
would be time for that later.

“Best of luck to you both,” Hestia said as Hermione and Fred both took hold of the broken
teacup she’d motioned to. “If Kingsley is still alive, tell him to come by tomorrow for tea.”

“Erm, of course,” Hermione said, unable to tell if she was joking. “Thank you.”

Hestia nodded her goodbye just as the portkey activated, tugging them through to the
Burrow’s back garden where, by some miracle, they both landed on their feet.

Fred had just opened his mouth to speak when Ginny rushed out of the house, her face pale
and panicked. They both turned.

“I-it’s George.”

If Hermione had thought time had slowed earlier during the fight, it was nothing compared to
that moment. She could hear her heartbeat, the pulse pushing blood through her veins and the
air leaving her lungs.

Fred looked to her. Before anything else, before they moved even an inch, he looked to her,
and she knew: she wouldn’t ever be able to forget the terror in his eyes.

Then they were running, and it felt like moving through molasses.

Bursting through the back door, around Ginny and past the kitchen, Hermione was hot on
Fred’s heels when they entered the den.

She took in everything at once.

George on the sofa, his head tipped back over the arm and crimson painting the side of his
face and his neck, pale as a sheet with a ragged mass of blood and flesh where his ear had
formerly been.

Mrs. Weasley and Alicia Spinnet, who was in her first year as a healer, bent over him and
rapidly passing potion bottles back and forth while they muttered spells far beyond
Hermione’s skill set.

Angelina, sitting on the ground near the fireplace with her head in her blood-coated hands,
rocking in place and sobbing while Katie tried to console her.

Every eye in the room save for those working on his twin turned to Fred, who seemed by all
accounts frozen in place.

“What happened?” Hermione croaked. Fred drifted closer to the sofa but stayed out of the
way, and Hermione tore herself from his side in the interest of understanding just how dire it
was. What they needed to prepare for.
Remus stepped away from the wall and placed a hand on her shoulder, steering her away
from the center of the room.

“Angelina said that it was Severus,” he explained in a low voice, as if speaking his name too
loudly might interrupt the healing that was taking place. A million thoughts and theories ran
through her head, but they were swallowed by other, more pressing emotions.

“Is he going to live?” She heard herself ask, too quietly for anyone else except maybe Tonks
to hear. Remus wasn’t a healer, but he’d survived the first war, and she trusted him not to lie
to her or fabric optimism where it wasn’t warranted.

He looked past her, quietly assessing before he nodded. “It’s dark magic. He’ll lose the ear,
but I think he’ll be okay.”

“Thank you,” Hermione just numbly nodded back. “What the hell happened tonight?”

“I don’t know how, but they knew. They knew that we were moving him. Our only saving
grace was that they didn’t seem to anticipate the decoys.”

Hermione looked around; all of the pairs were back except for –

“Where is everyone else?”

“Kingsley and Alastor missed the first portkey. And Harry –“

There was a commotion in the garden and, a second later, Harry appeared in the doorway
with Ginny behind him, and Hagrid ducked into the kitchen. Hermione turned from Remus
and threw her arms around Harry’s shoulders.

“Is George —?” He started to ask, his chest rising and falling against her like he’d run a
marathon.

“They’re working on it,” she said softly beside his ear. Ginny joined Arthur and Bill at Fred’s
side as Molly and Alicia continued their ministrations.

Harry nodded and then pulled back, searching her face. “Are you and Fred —?”

“We’re fine,” Hermione assured him.

He was quiet for a moment before tears suddenly appeared in his eyes.

“They killed Hedwig,” he admitted in a whisper, his voice cracking as he said her name. It
was like he didn’t think her death warranted mourning with human lives on the line, but the
visceral grief in his eyes was like a punch in the stomach.

So, she pulled him tight to her again and just held him for a moment while he mourned his
first real friend and they all just… waited.

Waited for George to wake up.

Waited for Kingsley and Moody to arrive.

Waited for comfort when there wasn’t any to be had.

Eventually Hermione turned Harry over to Ron and knelt by Angelina and Katie near the
fireplace.

“Scourgify,” Hermione whispered, wandlessly cleaning the dark, red-brown blood from
Angelina’s hands. Her sobs had turned to rapid, frantic breaths and Hermione shared a
concerned look with Katie over her head, who seemed to be at a loss for what to do.
Everyone’s attention was on George, and rightfully so, but Angelina appeared to be going
into acute shock.

“How long has she been like this?” Hermione asked.

“I’m not sure, everything moved so fast,” Katie said helplessly. “She started to explain what
happened and then when they started working on him she just went quiet.”

“Umm, g-get her a calming draught,” Hermione directed, which Katie immediately got up to
find. She took one of Angelina’s hands in hers and gently, but firmly, tilted her chin up.
“Angie, look at me. Can you hear me?”

Her hands were cool and damp with sweat, and her swollen eyes didn’t show any sign of
having heard anything at all. Hermione shifted two fingers down to her pulse, just below her
jaw, and felt a rapid flutter.

Katie reappeared, holding a small purple phial, and Hermione tried to coax Angelina to drink.
When this didn’t work, she carefully pinched her jaw open and decanted the potion into her
mouth. For a second she was afraid Angelina wasn’t going to swallow, but she finally did and
the effect was immediate. The shaking in her hands ebbed and her breathing slowed.

“Hermione?” Angelina said, blinking and looking around like she was coming out of a fog.
“Is – is George dead?”

Before she could answer there was a cry of relief across the room and Hermione got to her
feet, pulling Angelina behind her.

“Say something, sweetheart,” Molly encouraged as George’s eyelids fluttered.

He mumbled something unintelligible, and Fred stepped around his mum to kneel at his
brother’s side.

“Say it again?” he prompted, straining to hear.

“I feel saintlike,” George muttered a little louder, his voice sounding like gravel. “You see...
I'm holy. Holey, Fred, geddit?"

Fred barked a laugh, wiping a hand over his face and shaking his head. “Weak. Absolutely
pathetic. Of all the ear-related humor -”
There was a collective, albeit tense, murmur of laughter that swept the room at that.

“Go ahead.” Hermione nudged Angelina forward and she knelt beside the sofa next to Fred.
George’s eyes, increasing in alertness, left his twin and focused in on her.

“I th-thought I lost you,” Angelina choked, her head falling forward to rest on his chest as she
began crying again in earnest. All signs of joking gone, George brought a hand up and
carefully traced his fingertips along her damp cheek. Still too weak to move much beyond
that, he just closed his eyes and kept his hand on her.

“I’m not that easy to get rid of, witch.”

A few more people chuckled, but Fred stood abruptly and dashed back toward the kitchen
and out the back door. Bill started to follow him, but Arthur placed a hand on his shoulder
and shook his head. He nodded toward Hermione, who was already in motion. She stepped
outside just in time to see Fred brace his hands on his knees and be violently ill near the
rhododendrons.

Grimacing and minding her shoes, she placed a hand on his back and moved it in slow,
soothing circles while he retched. And when the retching turned to dry heaving and then to
ragged sobs that shook his frame, she vanished the sick and supported him as best she could
as he dropped to the grass, their legs tangling in the process.

“He’s okay,” Hermione said quietly, over and over like a prayer as he fisted the back of her
too-large jumper and buried his face in her shoulder. Hot, wet tears scorched her skin and she
brushed her hands over his neck and along his back as her own tears began to silently fall.
“He’s okay. George is okay.”

Facing the door, she watched over Fred’s back as a procession of concerned faces appeared
and then quickly disappeared, giving them privacy; giving her space to piece him back
together. Until one surprised pair of eyes connected with hers and lingered.

Silhouetted in the doorway with half of her face concealed by shadows, Molly Weasley
looked at them in apparent shock and Hermione bristled. Fred, lost in the reality of his own
worst nightmares coming to life, didn’t seem to notice the shift, but there was one. If Molly
said anything, did anything at all to cause him further pain in that moment, to try and take
him away from her, Hermione genuinely didn’t know what she would do.

They stayed like that for a long time, Fred in her arms and Molly staring with near palpable
astonishment. And then slowly, ever so slowly, she straightened up, squared her shoulders,
and nodded. Just once, and just to Hermione, but with that nod, crystalline understanding
passed between them.

Molly Weasley might have a complicated relationship with her children, and an even more
complicated relationship with the people that they loved, but when it came down to it, her
motivations were simple: she wanted them safe. And, whatever she saw as she stared at
Hermione and Fred in the dark garden that night, she seemed to trust that that was what
Hermione was doing. She was keeping her son safe.
When Molly finally disappeared, she shut the door behind her.

“He’s okay,” Hermione murmured again, her lips against the top of his head. For a second
they were back in that vacant classroom nearly two years in the past, scared teenagers
looking for solace and gazing out over a roiling sea of fear and broken glass. She tipped her
head back and stared up at the stars, blanketing them in a silent serenity that she couldn’t feel.
“George is okay.”
 Unravel
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

27 July 1997

The hours following the battle passed in a blur. There was a heaviness in the air that seemed
to sink into each of them and, despite everyone insisting that he not, Harry of course took it
upon himself to shoulder the responsibility in a despondent silence that radiated through the
house.

It was perhaps two or three in the morning when Kingsley’s patronus finally came, bursting
into the quiet den where they all sat vigil, clutching mugs of firewhiskey and tea. George,
under the influence of numerous pain potions, slept through it without stirring.

“Alastor was injured,” Kingsley’s deep voice resonated while they all squinted against the
sudden flash of silver-blue light. “He’s stable but unable to move. We will remain at
Caradoc’s tonight and send word in the morning.”
As the charm dissolved into a silver mist there was a collective sigh.

“We’re going to head up to bed,” Bill said, speaking first and pulling a half-asleep Fleur to
her feet beside him.

Tonks and Remus murmured their goodbyes and left for the apparition point with Hagrid in
tow.

“We should go to sleep,” Hermione said quietly from where she was tucked beside Fred in an
oversized armchair. She knew there wasn’t any way he’d want to go back to the flat that
night, so far from George, but he looked nearly ready to pass out.

Fred nodded, not having spoken much since they’d come inside, and helped her up.

Though Molly had glanced at them interestedly a couple times since the garden, she hadn’t
said anything yet and, as Hermione and Fred made their way to the stairs, she busied herself
with making up a bed for Angelina.

There didn’t seem to be any question about sleeping arrangements. Ginny parted with a
succinct goodnight and Fred led Hermione to his old bedroom while Harry and Ron
continued up to the next floor, the latter looking back with a troubled expression.

Frankly, Hermione couldn’t bring herself to care about it just then.

“Bathroom,” Fred murmured, depositing her at the door and heading for the loo. Through the
adrenaline crash and bone-deep exhaustion, unease still found the energy to niggle into her
head at the slope of his shoulders and weariness of his eyes.

Her things were in Ginny’s room but, rather than retrieve them, Hermione opened the dresser
against the wall and extracted an old t-shirt and a pair of long-forgotten shorts, quickly
pulling them on and finger-combing her hair before giving up and throwing it into a messy
plait. She’d just sat on the edge of the bed when Fred reappeared.

He shut the door with a quiet click and stood in front of the dresser, his back to her, and after
a moment she got to her feet again and stood behind him.

Wordlessly, she wrapped her arms around his middle and rested her cheek between his
shoulder blades. He smelled faintly like sweat and ash.

Eventually he turned in her arms and she pulled back a little, looking up into his face, but
when he opened his mouth to speak, she shook her head and hushed him.

“Tomorrow,” she entreated softly, slipping her fingertips beneath the hem of his shirt and
guiding it up and over his chest. Fred raised his arms, letting her pull the garment off. She
leaned forward and brushed her lips against his bicep, smooth and unmarred, letting the fear
from earlier claim her for just a second before pushing it away again.

For the time being, fear was in the past. And while Hermione had a feeling that the rising sun
might bring with it a different sort of heartache, it wasn’t morning yet.
“Tomorrow,” Fred echoed hoarsely as her hands went to the waist of his trousers, unfastening
and pushing them down so he could step out, still in his pants and socks. Then she took his
hand and led him to the bed across the room. It was far too small for the both of them but,
though either could have charmed it to be larger, neither seemed keen to let the other go.

They lay down and Fred pulled her into his chest. Hermione thought she might not be able to
sleep, but it only took moments before she drifted into wearied unconsciousness, cocooned
beneath blankets with the steady thrum of his heartbeat beneath her ear like a lullaby.

Or a ticking clock.

oOoOoOo

Fred woke first – woke being a generous term for someone that had slept only in fits and
starts through the wee hours of the morning. The sky outside the window told him the sun
hadn’t quite risen yet and Hermione’s breathing, steady and even, told him that she hadn’t
either.

She’d passed out promptly upon laying down and, if he were being honest, Fred felt some
relief at that. Between him and Harry and Angelina, she’d worn herself thin trying to hold
everyone else together. She hid her exhaustion well, she always did, but it showed in little
ways.

Gaze trained on the ceiling, he watched a spider slowly spin a web in the far corner of the
room while his own brain tangled and untangled a million thoughts before knitting them
together into a tapestry that he was a little afraid to look at too closely.

Hermione eventually stirred awake, moving away a little to stretch as best she could in the
cramped space between him and the wall. Huddling down into the blankets, she rolled back
onto her side to face him, and he did the same, their heads cushioned on opposite ends of the
pillow.

“We have to talk about it, don’t we?” she finally asked in a whisper. He nodded and she
sighed. “I killed three men last night.”

“Yeah, you did,” he said, reaching out to trace a thumb across her cheek. She shut her eyes
and leaned into his touch.

“I killed three men, and I’m – I’m not sorry about it.”

“You shouldn’t be. They would have done the same to us without a second though. They tried
to.”

“For every idealistic peacemaker willing to renounce his self-defence in favour of a weapons-
free world, there is at least one warmaker anxious to exploit the other’s good intentions.” Her
eyes opened and searched his face in the grey morning light of his childhood bedroom, like it
might hold some sort of answer to the existential query of killing in order to preserve life. “I
suppose it wasn’t very likely that I was going to walk away from this without blood on my
hands, was it?”
“I doubt that anyone will,” Fred said honestly. He wasn’t sure if he’d killed the man who’d
attacked her the night before, but he found he didn’t much care either way. That heart-
stopping moment where Hermione had started to slip off the broom behind him had assured
that.

After a night of lost sleep Fred had realised that there was regretting the act of killing, which
neither of them could seem to do given the circumstances, and then there was grieving the
raw, simple loss of life itself. That was the part that was more difficult to reason away.

It was quiet for a long while, just the sound of their breath in an otherwise silent house.

“After last night,” Fred started, the knot in his chest demanding to be addressed before it
strangled him, “After what happened with George… Hermione, I don’t know if I can –“

“You need to stay,” Hermione finished succinctly. He pulled back in surprise, but as Fred
searched her face, he saw that she wasn’t surprised, not at all. There was only a sort of sad
resignation and something else undiscernible, simmering just below the surface. It was the
same look she’d worn the night before, only now he was beginning to understand it.

“I’m not sure,” Fred admitted quietly, feeling like his emotions were being held together by a
sheet of cellophane, a spectacle for all to see. Except it wasn’t all, it was her. Just her. Always
her. “When we walked in and I saw him on the sofa, so fucking pale and with all of the
blood, I didn’t… I thought that he was dead, and it was like seeing a piece of myself. I don’t
know if I —”

“Fred?” Hermione interrupted his disjointed babbling again gently, reaching out to tip his
chin back up and look him in the eyes, something he hadn’t noticed he’d been avoiding as he
spoke. “I need you to stay.”

His confusion must have shown on his face because she immediately began to explain, that
same heaviness in her mien.

“Something became extremely clear to me last night. A few things, really, but chief among
them, I realised that I would do anything to protect you. Anything. Beg, borrow, steal, kill…
die. I knew that before, in a cerebral sense, but I hadn’t fully comprehended the depth of it
until I thought I was about to lose you and quite literally threw myself off of a broom.”

“I don’t understand why that changes anything,” Fred confessed. They were intense
declarations with even graver implications behind them, but he would be a fool to deny that
he didn’t return them. That he wouldn’t willingly lay down his life in exchange for hers.

“Under any other circumstances it wouldn’t,” Hermione said, her voice catching in her throat
as she choked out a cynical laugh that, for whatever reason, affected him more than anything
else thus far. “If our lives were remotely normal, it would be a given. It would be natural for
me to put you first. But as it is, with what we’re setting out to do…

“It’s not about me. I’m not so naïve as to think that I’m irreplaceable, that my role in this war
is as important as that. But if we ended up in a situation where I had to pick between saving
you or saving Harry? Fred… I’d pick you. Without a second thought, I wouldn’t be able to
stop myself. I would — I would let him die. And you would too.

"We don't understand the sodding prophecy, nobody does, but Harry is the key at the middle
of this. I can feel it. And for everybody’s sake, for George and Angie and your parents, for
the innocents in the crossfire who have no idea what’s coming for them and the people that
they love, that can’t happen. I can't risk that happening.”

As tears painted quiet tracks down her cheeks and over her nose, Fred finally understood
what that undiscernible thing was: it was guilt. Unwarranted and undeserved, but guilt
nonetheless.

He didn’t know if it was the confession about Harry or her asking of him the very thing that
she said she wouldn’t. It didn’t matter either way because the outcome was the same, and
their promises, however well-intentioned when they were made, were unraveling.

So, although it took everything, every scrap of faith that he had in her and in them, his voice
remained steady when he said, “Then you go. You go with Harry and Ron, and I’ll stay.”

His words stayed suspended in the air between them until Fred pushed them aside and pulled
her back to him as she cried and he felt like something in his chest, something vital,
splintered.

Cradling the back of Hermione’s head and rubbing a thumb along her neck, he stared at the
spiderweb in the corner again and tried not to let his own feelings in that moment pull him
under, that stifling cocktail of relief and fear and shame.

Because she wasn’t the only one going back on her word. After vowing not to, after swearing
to any and all deities that he wouldn’t, he was watching her walk into danger without him.
Again.

“What do we do now?” she asked in a small voice some time later, swallowing hard and
swiping futilely at her eyes.

He wanted to say that they stayed there, hidden under the covers from the world and the war
and the looming presence of yet another impending goodbye. But he didn’t.

Instead, Fred turned and reached over the side of the bed, pulling himself back up when he
found what he’d been looking for and pressed it into her hand.

“Only take the things that could put you in danger, okay? And promise me that someday,
when all of this is over, you’ll explain everything again.”

She was visibly confused at first, staring at the wand in her hand like she’d never seen it
before, but he saw the second she realised what he was telling her to do.

It looked like it killed her when she nodded, and he knew it fucking killed him to ask it of
her, but she was brave, his witch. And if she was, he could be too.

Even if that bravery had to live in the dark for a little while.
Hermione steadied herself and then leaned forward and pressed a gentle kiss to his lips, the
taste of sorrow on his tongue as she broke away just enough to exhale.

“Obliviate.”

oOoOoOo

The sun was barely beginning to creep over the hills behind the orchard when Hermione
finally made her way downstairs with puffy eyes and a heavy heart. Though the talk with
Fred burdened her beyond what should be humanly possible, there was a silver lining in
knowing that, while an impossibly difficult one, they had still made their choices together. He
would remember that much, if not the exact details of where she would be and why. She’d
been thorough for both of their sakes.

She peeked into the den to find George, still fast asleep on the sofa and snoring with his head
propped and heavily bandaged. Molly was in an armchair to the side, nodded off as well, but
the makeshift bed that Angelina had occupied near the fireplace was rumpled and vacant.
Hermione checked the loo and then the kitchen but couldn’t find her. It wasn’t until she
looked out over the garden that she saw a lone figure in the mist, seated in the grass with a
blanket wrapped around its shoulders.

Grabbing her own, dark green quilt off of the rocking chair, Hermione quietly crept to the
back door and let herself out. She didn’t know if the other witch wanted company or not, but
she decided that under the circumstances it was better to ask than wonder.

She didn’t say anything at first when she sat down beside Angie. Just tucked her knees to her
chest and wrapped the blanket around her shoulders, chasing away the early morning chill.

“Do you want to talk about it?”

Angelina glanced sideways at her, assessing, and then nodded, but she still didn’t speak for a
while. Somewhere in the distance songbirds began to sing in their morning chorus.

“We hadn’t even been in the air for a minute when the spell hit him,” she began. Hermione
recalled the scream she thought she’d heard through the chaos and nodded. “I thought – I
didn’t know if he was alive or dead. I had no way to know, it was dark and there was so much
blood… but we had to move. We couldn’t stay there.”

Hermione just reached out and took Angelina’s cold hand in her own, remaining silent and
listening with a genuine empathy that she was uniquely positioned to feel.

“There were… pieces hanging there that I tried to—to…” Tears began to track down Angie’s
cheeks, but she quickly brushed them away with her sleeve and took a deep, shuddering
breath, continuing with a stubborn set to her jaw. “I had to keep him on the broom, so I bound
us at the waist, cast a sticking charm, and kept a hand on him when I could, then I just…
flew. I flew as fast as I fucking could, I didn’t stop. Two of them followed us and I hit one of
their brooms with an exploding charm. I think the other one went after him because he
disappeared after that too.
“It was around then that I realised George was starting to go cold and we weren’t going to
make it all the way to the safehouse. So, when I was as sure as I could be that we weren’t
being followed anymore, I landed us in this empty field behind an abandoned petrol station
and apparated to the edge of the wards here. Bloody miracle that I didn’t splinch us both,
thinking back on it now. Then I bandaged him up as best I could and ran. Ginny met me at
the edge of the garden and then Alicia came out with Molly and Katie and I… I don’t
remember much after that.”

“You were in shock,” Hermione explained gently. “Anybody would have been. You did good,
Angie. You kept him alive.”

Angelina sniffed loudly and nodded. “Thanks for that, by the way. The calming draught and
everything last night.”

Hermione just shrugged. “It was far from my first traumatic event.”

“Who’s been through a traumatic event?” A new voice asked from behind them. Hermione
turned to see Ginny, wearing a faded Hogwarts jumper and clutching a steaming mug of tea
like her very life depended upon it.

“All of us,” Angelina said with a wry twist to her lips that contrasted the tears that were still
drying on her cheeks. Ginny snorted and flopped unceremoniously to the grass on
Hermione’s other side, predictably unflapped.

“Too right,” she agreed grimly, shivering and folding in on herself.

“So…” Hermione started, training her gaze on the horizon in front of them and fighting to
keep a straight face. “I could have sworn I heard a door across the hall last night. One might
wonder if you didn’t take advantage of having your room all to yourself.”

Ginny squinted sideways at her with a scowl. “Mind your business, nosy witch. I’m sure my
brother wasn’t lacking for company. Sleep in separate beds, did you? One foot on the ground
all night?”

Hermione smiled before her teasing tone dissipated. “He’s blaming himself, isn’t he?”

“Of course he is,” Ginny sighed wearily, swirling her tea. “He’s Harry. Self-flagellation is
what he does best. Well, that and disarming charms.”

“We didn’t lose anybody, though. Besides Hedwig, that is.”

“It’s partly mum and dad. They’ve always been really welcoming to him, with the Dursleys
being how they are. After what happened to Bill in the spring, and now George… he feels
like he’s repaying us by putting our family in danger. Little does he acknowledge that we’ve
done a fine job of that ourselves, notorious blood traitors and all. Hell, look at Fred and
George’s anti-war merchandise. They’re begging for trouble.”

“Don’t remind me,” Hermione grumbled, with regards to both the ever-present danger
hanging over them and the astoundingly immature series of products the boys had just
launched mocking Voldemort. Personally. By name. Angelina made a quiet sound of
agreement.

“Speaking of which,” she asked, cutting in and looking to Hermione, “Did Molly say
anything to you?”

“No, but I expect I’ll hear something about it sooner than later. There’s no way that goes
unaddressed for long.”

“That’s entirely on the two of you and your little self-spun web of secrets,” Ginny said
without even a hint of sympathy. She paused consideringly and then admitted, “Though I
don’t blame you. My mother can be a bit overbearing.”

“At least she doesn’t ‘ate you,” Fleur chimed in, floating over to them across the garden, far
too graceful to be entirely human. Her perfectly curled gold hair and silk dressing gown were
a truly absurd contrast against Ginny’s messy bun and rumpled joggers. “It’s better than ‘ow I
began my relationship with ‘er. Am I interrupting?”

“Actually —” Ginny started.

“Not at all,” Hermione interjected quickly, cutting Ginny off before she could think of
something rude to say and subtly elbowing her in the ribs for good measure.

“They were just making sure I wasn’t falling apart after last night,” Angelina clarified as
Fleur settled beside Ginny, completing their crescent moon arrangement and positioning her
skirt just-so on the grass.

“And are you?” Fleur paused and quirked a groomed brow. “Falling apart, that is.”

Angelina looked at Hermione and then Ginny and shook her head. “No. No, I think — I think
I’m going to be okay.”

“Good.” Fleur said, nodding crisply. “You are a strong witch. Give your pain its due respect,
but do not linger in it.”

“Uh… thank you?” Angelina looked at Hermione, who just shrugged.

Fleur narrowed her eyes briefly in thought before continuing.

“All of you were in ‘ouse Gryffindor at ‘ogwarts, no? Like ‘arry?”

“Yeah,” Ginny confirmed, obviously curious in spite of herself. “Like ‘arry. What of it?”

“They say that among lions it is the female that is dominant, not the male. They are the
protectors and the predators, the backbones of their prides.” Fleur glanced sideways at each
of them in turn, before shifting her gaze back to the slowly lightening sky. “They hunt in
groups, and they protect each other’s mates and cubs as if they were their own.”

“And?” Hermione prompted, intrigued as well. She thought it might be the most Fleur had
ever spoken to her.
Fleur smirked, looking down at her folded hands and then back up. “It seems more than
likely that I will call each of you my sister one day, and perhaps... perhaps there is something
to be learned from the lions.”

As she finished speaking, the sun fully crested over the far hill, painting them all in hues of
gold and sparkling through the mist, still tucked and lingering in the low points of the
orchard.

“Damnit,” Ginny groaned loudly, setting her tea haphazardly in the grass like she couldn’t
stomach finishing it. All three women looked at her in alarm at the outburst, but she was
staring directly at Fleur beside her with undisguised dismay. “I need to stop calling you
Phlegm now, don’t I?”

It was dead silent for a second until, the first to react, Angelina snorted loudly and clapped a
hand over her mouth, followed closely by Hermione and then Fleur herself, whose laughter
carried on the breeze like the tinkling of windchimes.

They laughed until they cried and then they laughed some more, because what else is there to
do when you’re standing in the eye of a hurricane? There isn’t a way out that doesn’t involve
delving back into the storm, so you take the reprieve, however fleeting it might be. And if
you’re lucky enough to have people that you can stand beside in the interim, all the better.

Their lives, like most lives Hermione supposed, were as painful as they were beautiful, and
they were messy. Horribly, excruciatingly, wonderfully messy.

What could possibly better encompass all of that than a bit of laughter through tears?

“Yes,” Fleur finally said, reaching out and putting an arm around Ginny, who was smiling
ever-so-slightly and shaking her head. “Yes, I think that would be best.”
 Submitted art by: K

(shared with permission)

Chapter End Notes

🖤
On a brief holiday hiatus! We’ll be back to our regularly scheduled programming in
January.
 Reckoning

30 July 1997

It had been nearly three days since the night they’d almost lost George. Three days of
wedding preparations and hushed conversations and shining silverware that was already so
pristine, it could likely be used to signal spacecrafts.

Three full days that she’d been staying at The Burrow, and Hermione hadn’t heard so much
as a peep from Molly Weasley outside of being told which linens to press or which bathroom
fixtures to scrub next.

She was beginning to think it wouldn’t ever come, the inevitable conversation and ensuing
uncomfortable questions. But, as these things had a tendency to go, Molly managed to strike
at precisely the time at which Hermione had started to think she never would.

“Hermione, could you come in here for a moment?”

She’d been curled in the den with a book when the summons rang out, enjoying a brief
reprieve from their various household chores and clandestine planning.

“Yes, Mrs. Weasley,” she called back.

Hermione placed her bookmark and got up, heading into the kitchen and mentally preparing
to peel five-hundred potatoes, or de-gnome the garden for the umpteenth time. What she
wasn’t expecting was a plate of biscuits and tea. Tea set for just two.

“Would you have a seat, please?”

Molly said it with her usual kind, matronly disposition, but it certainly didn’t feel like an
invitation that could be declined.

“Of course,” Hermione replied, pulling out a chair and doing precisely that.

Molly went about silently pouring their tea and offering the tray briming with jammy biscuits
across the table.

Hermione delicately placed one on the edge of her plate and stirred milk into her cup without
comment; if Molly was attempting subterfuge by way of waiting her out, they were going to
be there for a while. She’d been all but raised over tense meals and uncomfortable silences.

“Hermione,” Molly finally began after a pause that was far too long to be natural, “You know
that, as a mother and a homemaker, I take a great deal of pride in this house and in my
family.”

“I do.”

“Pride not just in keeping things running, but in understanding how and why they do so.
Staying attuned to the people in our lives. It’s not an easy thing to do when you have seven
children, not by any means, but I thought that I was managing well enough. That is, until two
nights ago.”

Hermione didn’t say anything, taking a measured sip of her tea and refusing to be the one to
blink first.

“Precisely how long have you been in a relationship with my son?” Molly asked, voice polite
but stern, and not overly saccharine. “I asked Arthur, given his noticeable lack of surprise at
the development, but he experienced a rather inconvenient lapse in memory.”

Hermione fought valiantly to keep a smirk from her lips. It seemed she owed Arthur a
muggle kitchen appliance of some sort.

Regardless, in her mental preparation for this discussion she had drawn metaphorical lines
around the things she would be willing to talk about and the things that she wouldn’t.
Innocuous questions about the length of their relationship fell into the former category.

“A little over a year and a half.”

Molly visibly blanched and Hermione was struck with a pang of guilt that wasn’t entirely
hers to bear.

“I see,” the older witch said unsteadily, her teacup clattering a little as she set it back on its
saucer and interlocked her hands on top of the table. Her lips pressed into a thin line and
Hermione noticed the edge of her thumb nail looked as though it had recently been bitten past
the point of bleeding.

“Mrs. Weasley, I’m not sure –“

“Oh, I think we’re well beyond formalities; you may call me Molly.”

“Molly, then. I’m not sure that I’m the person that you should be having this discussion
with.”

“I am well aware of that. For whatever reason I just thought — I thought that it might be
easier this way.”

Hermione raised a brow at that.

“If you’re under the impression that I’m the more malleable party, I regret to inform you that
is not the case.”

“Why didn’t he tell me, then? Why has it come to this in the first place?”

And there they were, edging toward that line.

“That’s a question for Fred, I won’t speak for him.”

Frustration was beginning to take the fore and another pang of sympathy struck.

“It seems you’ve already decided what you are and are not willing to say, so why don’t we
speed things along and you can just share your piece.”

“What I’m willing to say is that I love your son, Mrs. W — Molly. With everything that I am,
I love him. I would not ever do anything to hurt him, nor would I permit anyone else the
opportunity to do so if it were in my power to prevent it.”

“Are you implying that I’ve somehow harmed my child?” Molly’s eyes flashed in a way that
almost made Hermione reach for her wand.

“I’m not implying anything. I’m saying that Fred has his own reasons for not telling you
about us. I don’t know all of them, I won’t pretend that I do, and even if I did it wouldn’t be
my place to parrot them now.”

Molly held her gaze, unwavering as birds chirped in the garden and the tea on the table
between them, all but forgotten, slowly went cold. Then she sighed, as if the fight had gone
out of her in one massive blow as she sagged back into her chair, the aged wood creaking
softly in protest.
“It really shouldn’t be any surprise that the two of you gravitated toward one another, you’re
as bloody stubborn as he is.”

Hermione’s lips quirked up and she drew her wand, deftly refreshing their tea and adding a
bit of lemon to her own.

“You’re certainly not the first person to make that observation.”

Molly hesitated for a moment before picking her cup up and taking a sip.

“I can’t lose another one of my children, Hermione. If I came on – if I gave you the
impression that I am unhappy about my son’s choice in partner, I apologise. That’s not the
case. I’m just —”

“— troubled by the circumstances?” Hermione finished with a huffed laugh and Molly
nodded. “I can empathise with that. I find myself troubled by a great many circumstances
these days, almost none of which I have any control over whatsoever.”

“Is there anything you might be willing to tell me to better understand things before I do talk
to Fred? You’ve said you won’t speak for him, and I respect that, but surely you have your
own take on how things have played out.”

Hermione nodded slowly and leaned forward a bit.

“Fred and I began our relationship — formally, that is — not long before he left Hogwarts.
For that reason, and several others, we agreed to explore things without outside influence.”

“Outside influence being me?”

“Outside influence being a lot of things, Molly.” Hermione sighed, resisting the urge to rub
her temples as faces and memories flickered through her mind like a kaleidoscope. Ron.
Umbridge. Sirius. A hall of prophecies. A hospital bed. A key on a garden bench. “But yes,
also you. I can admit that things got away from us a bit; it was never supposed to stay a secret
as long as it did.”

“So it wasn’t because you were… ashamed? To be with him?”

Hermione, caught off-guard by the remark, dropped her near-empty cup on its saucer with a
rattle that made them both jump.

“Absolutely not,” she said sharply. “I couldn’t be prouder of him if I tried. Fred is… he’s
brilliant. Completely, utterly, mind-bogglingly brilliant. Far more than he’s ever received or
sought credit for. Hell, more than I think he even knows.”

For the first time in the course of their conversation, Molly nodded with what looked like
approval.

“Good. That’s good. My son is a very talented young man, he should be with someone that
appreciates that.”
At this, Hermione couldn’t help herself. “Have you ever said that to him?”

Molly’s brows drew tight together. “What do you mean?”

“To Fred – and George as well, I suppose. Did you ever tell them that you thought they were
talented? That their ideas were brilliant? Before the shop, I mean.”

“I – I’m certain that I did.”

Hermione remained silent, knowing that she’d crossed the metaphorical line but still hoping
it had been the right thing to do.

The fact of the matter was that this wasn’t a topic she had reason to be personally angry
about. If she’d ever felt any animosity toward Molly, at least with regards to Fred, it came
purely from a place of wanting to spare him any and all possible pain. But relationships, all
relationships, bore some amount of hurt. It was the price they all paid for loving, and the
deeper that well ran, so too did the potential for loss.

The look in Molly’s eyes said she knew this as well.

“Is that – is that why? He thinks I’m not proud of him? That I don’t —?”

“It’s not my place to say what Fred thinks,” Hermione said again, much more gently this
time. “But I have reason to believe that’s part of it, yes. You always seemed so intent on
traditional measures of success – OWLs and NEWTs and Prefect badges. And, despite their
cleverness and everything that they’ve done with it, the twins never fit into those boxes. It
took a while for me to appreciate, I can admit that, but I get it now.”

Looking thoroughly shaken, Molly refreshed their cups and they finished their tea in a
contemplative silence. Hermione’s mostly that of relief, if not a lingering measure of guilt,
and Molly’s… something she knew was likely unfathomable to her. She wasn’t a mother, and
her own perception of the role was admittedly distorted.

“Hermione?” Molly said, finally breaking the stupor when she’d made to get up and return to
the den.

“Yes?”

“Would you – would you take the rest of these biscuits over to the twins’ flat?”

Molly gestured to the still-full tray in between them, and Hermione drew back in surprise
before nodding. “Erm, of course. You don’t want to —?”

“No. No, not just yet I don’t think.”

“All right,” Hermione agreed, stifling her curiosity and swallowing the questions that danced
on the tip of her tongue. This was between Fred and his mother; she would mediate if
necessary, and listen always, but it wasn’t her place to intercede. Not without reason or
invitation.
Molly wrapped the tray and Hermione took it, heading toward the back door that led into the
garden and toward the apparition point at the edge of the wards. She summoned her beaded
bag from her room upstairs as she went, not keen to go anywhere without it as of late.

“I won’t expect it back tonight,” Molly said suddenly as Hermione made to step out. “The
tray, I mean.”

“Oh,” Hermione said, taken aback and wondering if Molly was implying what she thought
she was implying. “Right, okay. I’ll… bring it back tomorrow morning?”

“Tomorrow morning would be fine. I’ll need its help getting ready for Harry’s birthday
party.”

Hermione couldn’t help but smile at that, and her nerves were eased when Molly smiled
back, even if her eyes were still set somewhere far away.

“Thank you, Molly.”

“You’re welcome. Give my regards to the boys.”

Feeling as though she’d stumbled into a parallel universe, Hermione made her way down the
path and past the boundaries of The Burrow, pausing to collect herself before turning on the
spot and popping into the alley behind the shop.

Upon letting herself in, the warmth of the new wards recognising her, she saw Fred finishing
with a customer while Lee roamed the floor.

“Glad to see the place hasn’t fallen to pieces without me,” Hermione said with a smirk,
striding up behind Fred and setting down the tray of biscuits and her bag on the counter.

He spun, apparently not having heard the door, and looked at her with complete, yet
delighted, surprise.

“What on earth are you doing here?” He asked, not wasting any time in closing the gap and
planting a kiss soundly on her lips.

Hermione smiled, gripping his shoulders so she didn’t fall. It had been three days too many
since she’d seen him, and she tried hard not to think about how many days apart lie ahead of
them.

“I think I’m a – peace offering?”

His brows nearly disappeared into his hairline and she cringed a little at her own choice of
wording.

“Would you two get a bloody room? You’re nauseating the clientele,” Lee chided like an old
hen as he arrived back at the counter. He made a shooing motion and took up Fred’s place
behind the till.

Rolling his eyes, Fred took her hand and dragged her back into the workroom.
“Did you do what I asked?” Hermione inquired, distracted and going immediately to the
single cauldron that she’d left in the far-most corner.

“Two petals from the orchid that you left here at the stroke of midnight yesterday,” Fred
affirmed, leaning against the counter beside her as they peered in at the potion, now in stasis.
It was a deep emerald color that had an almost iridescent sheen when the light caught it.

“Then I suppose it’s done. At least, as done as it will be. It’s not as though we can compare or
test it.”

“Let’s hope you don’t have the opportunity to,” Fred said. He lightly gripped her chin
between his thumb and knuckle, physically pulling her attention from the cauldron and back
to him. “Now what on earth did you mean when you said that you’d been sent to me as a
peace offering?”

“Your mum gave me her blessing to stay here tonight,” Hermione clarified. “Or, at least, I
think she did? There was a lot of double-speak happening.”

“Did she confront you about the other night? I meant what I said Hermione, if she —”

“She was perfectly congenial,” Hermione placated, tracing her fingertips over the back of his
hand. “Honestly, I probably deserved a bit more venom than I got.”

“I’m glad,” Fred admitted. “Not that you thought you deserved to be treated poorly, but if she
has an issue with our relationship, she can take it up with me and leave you out of it.”

“It’s not our relationship that she has issue with, Fred. At least, she says it isn’t and I believe
her. It’s the fact that she didn’t know about it. Or, rather, that you didn’t tell her about it.
Although I suppose that part is my fault…”

“Don’t do that. You gave me carte blanche to tell her before you left last fall, it was my
decision not to.”

“Well, then I suppose you already know that’s the discussion at hand. I didn’t say anything,
just answered a few basic questions, drank some tea, and told her to take the rest up with
you.”

Fred nodded, a muscle in his jaw ticking. Hermione eyed her potion again for a long second
before looking back to him.

“Can I say something that I don’t know if you’ll want to hear?”

“Yeah.”

“Hear her out. As someone with a sudden and distinct lack of parents, I’ve found it’s a lot
easier to dwell on the things that I didn’t say as opposed to the ones that I did. Even the
unpleasant things. A wound that’s been left to fester sometimes needs to be opened again
before it can heal.”

“Hermione —”
“Just hear her out. I know there’s probably a lot of historical context that I’m not privy to, I
understand that, and I won’t ask for a detailed presentation explaining it all. Just listen to
what she has to say. Okay?”

“Okay,” Fred sighed, rubbing the back of his neck tiredly. She examined him more closely
then, noting the dark circles beneath his eyes.

“What else is bothering you?”

“Nothing,” he said evasively, straightening a bit. “Just a long day.”

Hermione peered up at him dubiously and then, lightning quick, she reached up and flicked
him directly between his eyebrows, over a crease he didn’t seem to know was giving him
away.

“Oi!” Fred said, drawing back with his mouth agape, rubbing at the spot on his forehead.
“What was that for?”

“You’re lying to me! Why are you lying to me?

“I’m not lying to you!”

“Fine then, evading.”

“Evading sounds nefarious.”

“Evading is nefarious.”

“Hermione —"

“Fred.”

He groaned and sighed again, far more long-sufferingly than the first time.

“It’s George.” He leaned against the table and drew her forward to stand between his feet,
rubbing surreptitiously between his brows once more before resting his hands on her waist.
“Ever since the other night, with his ear and all, he’s been… sulking. Angie and I have been
trying to get him to perk up, or talk about it at least, but he either cracks a joke or just shrugs
and mumbles some bollocks about not questioning a holy figure.”

Hermione’s gut twisted in worry. She glanced toward the door that led back into the shop and
in the direction of their flat. “Is he upstairs now?”

“Yeah, Angie just left a little bit ago. But I don’t think —“

“Do you trust me?” Hermione asked, looking up into his face. The unconcealed worry in his
blue eyes reflected back, but he still managed to roll them at what was, at this point, a
rhetorical question.

“Yeah, of course.”
“Good. I’ll be back down in a bit.”

She kissed him on the cheek then made for the door, fliting past Lee to grab the tray of
biscuits off the counter and then heading for the stairs. The entire time she began mentally
fortifying, preparing for the conversation she thought she might be about to have. Coming off
two days of relative quiet, there seemed to be quite a lot of heavy conversations happening at
the same time.

Upon reaching the top landing, Hermione entered the flat and proceeded into the kitchen. She
set the plate on the counter beside the sink and then turned back down the hall and stopped in
front of George’s door.

She raised a tentative hand and knocked, opening it when a voice responded with a flat,
“Come in.”

Hermione turned the knob and stepped past the threshold of George’s room to find him sitting
on the edge of a half-heartedly made bed, staring at the wall beside the window. Not out the
window, at the wall. Not a great start.

“Hey, your mum sent me over with some biscuits. I left them on the kitchen counter if you
want one.”

“Yeah, alright. Thanks.”

His tone was dismissive, but she lingered, lightly tapping her nails on the door frame.

“Is everything… okay?”

And there it was: the dreaded shrug.

She knew the shrug.

She’d lived the shrug.

“M’fine.”

Hermione dithered and then crossed the room to stand near the desk in the corner.

“Is this about your ear?” she asked candidly.

“What?” George looked up in surprise.

“This — the moping, is it about your ear? Fred is worried and, from what he said, Angie is
too.”

George looked frustrated at this news, shaking his head.

“Well, I’m tickled to be the topic of so many conversations, but I’m fine.”

“Bollocks.”
“C’mon Hermione, give me a little credit. I’m not that vain.”

“I never said that you were vain.”

“Then what exactly are you trying to say?”

“That something’s obviously wrong and you aren’t talking about it. With anyone.”

“Nothing is wro —“

“Bollocks. You were hurt, you almost died. Angie had to hold your head together while she
flew across Surrey, for fuck’s sake. And there are a lot of people that are trying to pretend
that everything is normal because of the wedding and because they don’t want to make Harry
feel bad. But if you say you’re fine to me one more time, I’m going to hex you into a pile of
red hair and goo and it won’t matter one bit what your ears look like.”

“Well, what exactly do you propose I say!?” George snapped, now looking openly irritated at
her. Irritation was better than nothing, though; it was the distant relative of anger, and she
could deal with anger. His eyes narrowed. “Should I go and berate Harry? Sulk about how
I’m damaged goods? How I’m not identical anymore? How in every fucking photo I see of
myself from now on will just be seeing – seeing what they did? It’ll go away. It’ll fade. I’m
fine.”

She looked at the slope of his shoulders, the defiant defensiveness in his face, and then
nodded.

Hermione’s hands went to the top button of her blouse, unfastening it before making quick
work of the rest. George, who’d been looking away from her again, didn’t notice until she got
to the bottom and shrugged out of her top, leaving her in just a thin undershirt and denim
shorts. His eyes went wide.

“Whoa, what the hell are you—?“

“Shut up.” She braced herself and gripped the hem of her vest before she lost her nerve,
tugging it over her head in one jerking motion and thanking the gods she’d worn a rather
modest grey bra that day.

“Seriously Hermione, I don’t think —“

George cut off again when she turned to face him, shoulders squared and chin high as he saw
in its near entirety what only one other person besides herself and a small army of healers had
seen.

Hermione didn’t need to look down; she’d spent more than enough time staring at it.

“This?” she said fiercely, gesturing to the thick, raised scar spanning her torso, “This does not
make me damaged goods. It doesn’t make me weak or broken, and it does not mean that I
failed. Katie, Ron, Harry, Bill, Alastor… none of their scars mean anything beyond the fact
that, against odds, they survived. And neither does that.”
She pointed to the twisted, puckered skin where his ear used to be. It was her first time seeing
it unwrapped and, despite still being an angry pink color, it didn’t look all that odd at all. But
the things people noticed about themselves, the things they agonised over, often don’t seem
that out of the ordinary to the people around them. Especially not to the people that care
about them.

George remained silent but his lips, which had initially parted in shock at her rather dramatic
display, pressed tight together and she saw his throat bob as he swallowed. She didn’t say
anything for a long moment, just let him look in the mid-afternoon light and resisted the urge
to cover herself. It wasn’t a lewd sort of stare in the slightest, just observant. Almost clinical.

“Angie doesn’t understand,” George finally said, a ragged edge on his voice. He looked
away, toward the wall beside the bed, but she didn’t miss the pained expression on his face.

“No. No, I imagine she probably doesn’t,” Hermione sighed as she pulled her vest back on.
She kept her blouse clutched in her hand and went to sit beside him on the edge of the bed.
“It doesn’t mean that she can’t still be there for you, though. Believe me when I tell you that
she lived her own hell that night.”

“It just… it feels so fucking self-indulgent and trivial, sitting around and pouting about a scar.
It’s a scar. I mean, we all knew the risks. We knew what might happen when we set out that
night; hell, a few inches lower and it would have been my throat.”

“If this stupid war has taught me anything it’s that knowing something and experiencing it
firsthand are two very different things. All considered, I think that this is a really well-
adjusted response.”

George bobbed his head and fiddled with his hands. Not wringing them, just sort of slowly,
compulsively sliding them against one another.

“How did you get over it?” He asked abruptly.

“I can’t say that I am over it,” she admitted with a shrug. “I’ve just made my peace.”

“Still, there had to be something that made it better, some kind of epiphany or nugget of
wisdom that you can share.”

“Fred didn’t tell you?”

He shook his head. “No, not really.”

Hermione smiled softly and tipped her head, thoughtful. “It was partly his doing, I suppose. I
can’t give him all the credit, though. I kept waiting to get better, to feel like myself again, but
I needed to acknowledge what happened first. Recognise that it affected me and that, for as
much as I wanted to be, I wasn’t the same after. That I wasn’t ever going to be the same
again. Until that happened it didn’t matter what anyone else said or did. It didn’t even really
matter what I did. I just had to let myself feel it.”
“You’re lucky you can hide yours,” George remarked, a rueful smirk twisting his lip as he
glanced sideways at her.

“Lucky was definitely not what I was thinking when it happened.” She snorted acerbically,
remembering the devastating self-doubt that she’d felt at the time as she idly traced a finger
over the topmost edge of the mark, still partly visible. “But now it’s just… a scar. A physical
representation of a time when I could have died but, rather obstinately, didn’t. It might sound
a little barmy, but I’m almost glad of it, you know? I didn’t go through what I did, survive
what I did, just to have it all neatly disappear like it never happened. It bloody well happened,
alright. And the healing was messy, and it was painful in more ways than one. That should
show.”

George was quiet for a long moment, examining the wall again.

“Wow, you’re right,” he finally said. “That’s pretty barmy.”

She grinned and threw her shoulder into his, jostling the bed, and he laughed for the first time
since she’d entered the room. It wasn’t much, still strained and tight, but much like his earlier
irritation, it was something. And in times like these, sometimes something was everything.

“Talk to Angie,” Hermione commanded in a tone that didn’t leave any room for argument as
she got to her feet. “Fred too. They love you, and they want to help. So, suck it up and let
them. Or I’ll come back in here and strip again, and you can explain to our significant others
why I’m half-naked in your bedroom. I imagine that will go over famously.”

“Yeah, alright.” George quickly swiped the back of his hand beneath his eyes while she
pretended not to notice, busied with shrugging her blouse back on and rebuttoning it.

Hermione turned toward the door then, intent on heading back downstairs and feeling a bit
satisfied with herself, when a hand caught her shoulder and spun her around. George had
gotten off the bed and, before she knew it, he had her wrapped in a tight hug.

She’d hugged him before in greeting and good-bye, but not quite like this. Her first thought
was that it was utterly bizarre how similar he was to Fred physically, but how completely
different he felt. Not bad or uncomfortable, just different. It reminded her of hugging Harry.

“Thank you,” he said quietly into the empty space over her head.

“Any time,” she replied easily.

He let her go and stepped back. She was about to leave again but stopped when George
looked like he had something to add. He froze, opening and shutting his mouth a couple
times like a fish before saying uncertainly: “I’m glad that it was you.”

It was silent for a second and Hermione’s brows pulled together as she tried to understand
what he meant by that. That he was glad she’d come to talk with him? Giving up and shaking
her head, she asked, “Glad that what was me?”
George shifted his weight, still unmistakably hesitant. “For Fred. If you’d asked me who I
thought he might end up with, before the two of you got together, I mean, I never in a million
years would have guessed that it would be you. You’re not – you’re not who I would have
picked to be my family, Hermione. But that just goes to show how bloody stupid I can be,
because I’m really, really glad that it was you.”

The words and everything they carried with them sank in, and Hermione’s throat constricted,
the weight of both their conversation and the past several weeks hitting her at once. She tried
and failed to clear the lump choking her, the corners of her eyes stinging. Then she simply
nodded and stepped forward to hug him again, a little more fiercely this time.

“Promise me that you’ll be careful, okay?” She said hoarsely against George’s shoulder, just
below his good ear.

“I will,” he vowed, familiarly unfamiliar arms banded tight across her back. “You too, yeah?
If you go off and get yourself killed saving the world, there’ll be no living with him. It’ll be
terribly inconvenient for me.”

Hermione laughed wetly and pulled away, sniffling and nodding. “I promise.”
 Three Weasleys
Chapter Notes

Isn't it lovely that Lewis Capaldi wrote an absolutely gorgeous song specifically about
TTWW Fred and Hermione? Oh, he didn't? Huh. Then what the hell is "Pointless"
about?

-----

I bring her coffee in the morning

She brings me inner peace
I take her out to fancy restaurants
She takes the sadness out of me
I make her cards on her birthday
She makes me a better man
I take her water when she's thirsty
She takes me as I am

I love when she laughs for no reason

And her love's the reason I'm here
She knows when I'm hurt and I know when she's scared

I'll wait for you

I'll wait for you
You'll wait for me too

From all my airs and graces

To the little things I do
Everything is pointless without you
Of all the dreams I'm chasing
There's only one I choose
Everything is pointless without you
Everything is pointless without you
 31 July, 1997

Charlie

Charlie Weasley was having a truly lovely afternoon; the sun was shining, the birds were
chirping, and he’d just finished setting up the tent for his brother’s wedding.

Married – Bill was getting married tomorrow. It was as jarring to his sensibilities as it was
exciting and, while he didn’t fully understand the much-discussed allure of Fleur Delacour,
she was a genuinely kind person as far as he could tell, and fiercely, violently loyal. All things
considered, he couldn’t imagine a better addition to their clan.

He’d ducked into the kitchen with this thought in mind when he happened upon yet another
witch that he reckoned he’d be related to sooner than later.

His mum and Fleur were at a fitting, Harry and Ron had snuck off with Ginny to toss the
quaffle over the orchard, and nearly everyone else was arranging tables and chairs and every
other manner of décor or dinnerware outside. That’s why he was surprised to find Hermione
sitting at the table in his mum’s kitchen, totally by herself and surrounded by stacks of books
and parchment.

“Hullo, Hermione,” he greeted jovially, pouring himself a cold glass of water and watching
her over the counter.

“Hi Charlie,” she replied distractedly, lips pursed and scarcely looking up from the notes in
front of her.

“Who did you have to kill to get out of wedding preparations today?”

Ignoring her lack of invitation to do so, he pulled out a chair and settled at the table beside
her, carefully nudging a stack of books out of the way. Between Bill, Percy, and his father,
he’d grown up surrounded by bookish types. Most of the time they were sociable, but on
occasion they needed to be coaxed into eating a meal or taking part in human interaction, like
a feral kneazle.

“I umm – I was just – I was – “

His lips quirked. “Hermione, are you having an episode? Should I go fetch a healer?”

“What?” She finally straightened and looked up from the parchment in front of her, eyes wide
and alarmed. “Who needs a healer?”

Chuckling to himself, Charlie just shook his head and peered around her elbow, curious to see
what had been so very captivating. As he looked, he saw… nothing. As in, literally nothing.

“Erm, am I going selectively blind or were you just very diligently staring at a blank piece of
paper?”

Her cheeks flushed a little and she lifted her hands, going about untying and retying the
messy knot of curls on the back of her head.

“It’s not blank to me,” she explained with a tired sigh. “It’s just… proprietary information.”

“Proprietary, eh?”

“Of the need-to-know sort.”

“Ah. And I take it that I don’t need to know?”

“No, not at present.”

Charlie nodded slowly and finished his water, setting the heavy-bottomed glass on the worn
wooden table with a dull thud. He studied the crease betwixt her eyes and did his best to
breathe a hint of solemnity into his tone when he next spoke. Truth be told, it didn’t come
naturally.

“Look, I know that you, Ron and Harry are planning to leave after the wedding. If there’s
anything that I could potentially be of use for, I hope you know that you can talk to me about
it. I might not be an auror or a curse-breaker or a genius-inventor-extraordinaire, but really,
I’m no slouch.”

Hermione met his eyes then with a kind of incomprehensible weight in her gaze, and he
couldn’t help but wonder, worry, about what exactly it was that they were setting out to
accomplish. It only took a second for her to mask it again.

“I can’t express how much I appreciate that, Charlie, truly. But the things I’d need to tell you
to enlist any sort of useful assistance would put you at risk and I’m not – we’re not –
comfortable doing that.”

He was about to argue, but it was clearly something she’d already thought all the way
through and then back again. So, instead, he just cleared his throat.

“Do you have – and I mean this in the least macabre way possible – but do you have
contingencies in place? Because if things go tits-up and the only people who know how to
turn them tits-down again are six feet under, that’s going to be a problem for the rest of us.”

She sighed again and dropped her head into her hands, scrubbing and letting loose most of
the hair she’d just tamed. It was then that Charlie felt a sudden, sharp pang of resentment on
her behalf, toward Harry and his brother, no less. Flying over the orchard with Ginny while
she sat inside and clearly agonised over… well, whatever it was she was agonising over. All
he knew was that it clearly didn’t concern just her.

“I have some plans in place,” she admitted halfheartedly. “But nothing that I feel
overwhelmingly confident about.”

“Some plans are better than no plans,” he murmured thoughtfully. “Is it the legilimency that’s
vexing you? Fred mentioned as much when I stayed there the other night. I know they have a
few capable people among them, not counting old moldy-shorts himself.”

“Mmhmm. I’ve tried to configure the language to use an unbreakable vow to counteract it,
like a sort of magical cyanide capsule, but that just feels so... extreme. Rationally I know that
someone that’s been captured and questioned to that degree doesn’t have much hope of
surviving, but I just can’t reconcile facilitating it.”

“Well, I haven’t the foggiest idea what cy-a-nide is, but what about occlumency?”

A cynical, slightly hysterical, laugh slipped out of her. “Unless you know of a way to develop
impenetrable mental shields in the course of a few days, our only occlumens is a turncoat
murderer with a penchant for mutilating people that I’m fond of.”

“I mean, yeah, Snape was the only traditionally trained occlumens, but what about –“ Charlie
cut off sharply when Hermione jerked forward suddenly, her eyes wild and her hands
gripping the edges of the table so hard that her knuckles turned white. “Bleeding hell, what
did I say?”

“Charlie, finish that sentence right now.”

“I – I was just saying that from what I understand Snape was a trained occlumens; he studied
it, yeah? Practised at it for years.”

“Are you implying that there’s such a thing as an untrained occlumens? Someone naturally
inclined to it?”

At this, despite the frantic edge on her voice, Charlie brightened again. Because it seemed as
though he was going to be of some use to their cause after all.

“I’m saying,” he leaned forward, “That certain magical beings are predisposed to occlude.
Legilimancy is only intended for use on the human mind, so minds that aren’t entirely human
aren’t necessarily subject to entry, as it were.”

“Not entirely human, meaning – ?“

“Meaning werewolves, to name just one. Also, giants, goblins, vampires, house elves, veela...
you get the picture.”

Hermione’s jaw dropped and then almost immediately snapped shut again. She looked
around at the stacks of books and notes with unconcealed dismay, as if they’d personally
betrayed her.

“How in the bloody buggering fuck is that not in any of the books that I’ve read about mind
magics?!”

“Well for one, people that can naturally occlude don’t need to read or write books to know
how to do it. I’d reckon most go through their whole lives without ever knowing that they
have the ability. For another, the people writing those books are bigoted cunts that don’t
recognise sentient magical beings as valuable, let alone equal.”

Hermione looked about ready to hex something. “I swear to Merlin I’m going to find every
descendent of the sacred twenty-eight and castrate them if I hear one more thing about blood
purity, or lesser beings, or stupid, sodding, discriminatory –“

“Uh, Hermione?” Charlie interjected, grinning a little at the fire in her. It was a bit like sitting
beside a dragon. He liked dragons.

“What?”

“The Weasleys are part of the Sacred Twenty-Eight. Might want to consider skipping a
couple if you’re about to go on a willy-chopping rampage.”

Hermione’s cheeks coloured a deep crimson and then, after a long second of silence, she
snorted and clapped a hand over her mouth, failing to suppress a bout of fairly absurd
laughter.

“Oh, Christ… Yeah, I suppose I probably should. Attached to yours, are you?”

“Only a little,” Charlie tipped his chair back on two legs and gave her a raucous,
conspiratorial grin. “A certain Puddlemore United keeper would be rather irate with you as
well.”

Her ears perked at that. The thing about dragons, which Charlie knew very well, is that the
easiest way to tame one is to simply give them something to do that’s more interesting than
lighting everything around them, including you, on fire.

“Puddlemore – ?“ Hermione’s eyes widened with comprehension and then she grinned back.
“Really? When did that happen?”

“League is on hiatus, and I’ve been back and forth to the isles a bit more frequently as of late
for Order matters and wedding preparations.”

“Are you going to try and keep it up long distance, then? After the wedding?”

“Dunno, really. It’s one of those ‘don’t blink first’ sort of situations. I don’t want to be the
one to bring up moving beyond a casual affair, because what if he doesn’t want that, you
know?”

“Is it, though? Casual?”

Charlie dithered at this, tipping his head back and forth like the answer was a loose marble
that was rolling around and might slot into space given enough time. When this didn’t
happen, he shrugged.

“No fucking clue. I’ve been thinking about taking a break from work and hanging around
here for a while; if things really take a turn and they lock down the borders – “

“You don’t want to be stuck outside of them.” Hermione nodded with a wince. “I don’t like to
think about it, but it could happen; they already have a massive foothold in the ministry.
Likely far more than we have intel on.”

“There’s a little preserve in Wales that I have a connection at. Just a dozen dragons or so, but
I could maybe pick up some work there, keep busy for a few months.”

“There’s always muggle travel, you know. I’d bet anything that even if they shut the borders
to apparition and portkey travel that you could get on a plane without raising any alarms.
You’ll just need muggle identification and a passport.”

Charlie tried not to let his puzzlement at that stream of thought show.

“Planes are… how muggles fly, yeah?”

“Yeah, here… “ Hermione snatched a blank sheet of parchment and started scribbling
furiously before pushing it toward him. “This is everything you’d need to travel the muggle
way from Romania to Britain; the Muggle Government Liason’s office at the ministry or the
Romanian Consulate should be able to help you get them – although I wouldn’t wait long
with the way everything is going. And I’m sure Angie and Lee would be more than willing to
help walk you through the rest.”
“Thanks, Hermione,” Charlie said a little skeptically, folding the parchment and shoving it in
his pocket. “I appreciate it and all, but I’m not sure –“

“Hey,” she said, starting to get up and organising her notes into neat stacks. “Do it or don’t do
it, it’s up to you. I just wanted to make sure that you knew there were options if it comes to it.
Contingencies, right?”

“Right,” he exhaled heavily, getting to his feet and going to set his glass to wash in the sink.
“Contingencies.”

Fred

Fred Weasley was obsessed with the way his girlfriend tasted.

Odd? Perverse? Perhaps, but he wasn’t ashamed of it. He was too blissfully happy about it to
care much what anyone else might think.

Her tongue when it slipped between his lips and tangled with his.

Her pert, rosy nipples when they hardened to peaks under his touch.

Her cunt when she –

“Fuck!” Hermione cried out, gripping his hair and trying, to no avail, to press his mouth more
tightly to her as she rode out her orgasm.

He happily obliged, lapping away until she was little more than a trembling pile of limbs,
sprawled across his sheets. His cock twitched valiantly, but unless he resorted to apothecaric
intervention, that part of the night was decidedly over.

“Was that five?” He lifted his head and rested it on the soft, warm skin of her inner thigh,
dragging a thumb below his lower lip and then sucking it clean while he held her satisfied,
hooded gaze.

“Six, you absolute terror,” she corrected in an entertained, albeit gravelly, voice. “I’m not
going to be able to feel anything below the waist tomorrow, thank you very much.”

“That’s a shame,” he lamented, walking his fingertips along the gentle curve of her lower
stomach. “Here I had this image of us sneaking away at the reception. We’d find somewhere
quiet, and you’d pull up your skirt, and –“

“Enough!” She laughed and reached down, tugging at his arm until he shifted up to lie beside
her. The balcony doors were open and it was a warm night, the sheets all but forgotten in a
pile near their feet as the late July breeze drifted over them. That was fine by him; looking at
her naked had come to be one of the great joys of life.

It was quiet for a long moment, Fred going about conjuring a glass and filling it with water.
He offered it to her first and she nearly drained it before he refilled it and did the same. Then
he vanished it and settled alongside her again.
“So, Remus?”

“Yeah,” Hermione exhaled. “I’ll talk to him the morning after the wedding, before we leave.
I’d tell Bill and Fleur as well, but I don’t know if half-bloods count and I don’t have any way
to be sure.”

“What, not considering Hagrid?”

Hermione snorted, turning to rest her chin on his chest.

“I love Hagrid dearly, but he couldn’t keep a secret from three first-years. I’m not about to
wager everyone’s lives on his ability to do it under duress.”

Fred nodded. “Bit of luck that you thought to consult Charlie.”

“I didn’t, really. He just happened to catch me when I was reaching the upper limits of my
sanity. His being an expert in magical beings was pure coincidence.”

“Darling, I figured you’d learned by now not to doubt us Weasley men. We’re an
exceptionally capable lot.”

“Well if I wasn’t before, you can consider me a devotee now.”

Fred chuckled and then, with only a little bit of impending dread, exhaled. Here, alone in his
bed, it was easy to pretend that none of this was happening. That she wasn’t really leaving
and that they could stay like this forever, but every so often reality crept in. Every so often, it
needed to.

He studied the ceiling overtop his bed for a long moment.

“You know, in all this talk of contingencies, there’s something I’ve been meaning to discuss
with you. I was waiting for the proverbial ‘right time,’ but I don’t know if there is such a
thing. If there’s a right time for a conversation like this.”

Expression turned a little more solemn as she studied his face, Hermione nodded and reached
down, tugging the sheet up and pulling it over her breasts as she sat up. The way her curls
tumbled over her shoulders was a work of art that would put the masters to shame.

“Alright, what is it?”

Tearing his eyes away, he rolled over and opened the drawer of his bedside table, reaching in
and extracting a neat stack of parchment that had been tri-folded over itself. He thought about
reading it, explaining what it was first, but in the end, he just placed it in her outreached
hand.

He watched silently as she unfolded it and her eyes skimmed the first couple pages,
expression neutral.

“I ought to kill you for plying me with orgasms before you gave this to me,” she sighed,
lowing the parchment after finishing page three and giving him a look. “Forty-nine percent?”
He nodded. “George gets the other one percent, to maintain majority ownership.”

“I imagine there’s a similar arrangement in turn for him?”

“There is,” Fred confirmed, though he didn’t much like to think about that.

“And if something happens to the both of you?”

“Then you and Angie become fifty-fifty partners. George talked to her about all of this
yesterday.”

Fred tried not to smile at that because, despite the presumably gruesome circumstances
preceding it, he would give anything to see the two of them running the shop together. It
might end in bloodshed – hell, it would definitely end in bloodshed – but he was fairly certain
that Hermione and Angie could take over the world given enough time and resources.

In any event, he watched the emotions play out behind her eyes, reading them like a much-
cherished book; fear, grief, anxiety, and finally, uncertainty. Discomfit.

“You’re sure that you don’t want to keep it in the family? I hardly think –”

“No. We talked it all over pretty thoroughly after what happened to George; Bill and Charlie
have their own careers, Ginny is supportive but she has her own ambitions, and… well, Percy
and Ron can bugger off.”

Hermione snorted softly before her expression turned serious again.

“You know that the odds of my surviving this war are empirically much lower than yours,
correct? I might not be the best basket to put your eggs in.”

He mentally fought away even the notion of losing her, but he didn’t argue. For as much he
hated it, as much as it terrified him to his core, she wasn’t wrong. And they’d decided a long
time ago not to tell one another pretty lies.

“I know. And there are clauses in place involving my family if that does happen. But there
isn’t anybody I trust more, Hermione. This – the shop, the patents, all of it – it’s my legacy.”

She skimmed a little further, finding the aforementioned sections and nodding.

“Well, I suppose you’d be posthumously saving me from withering away behind a ministry
desk.”

He scoffed. “Oh, please. You weren’t going to do that, anyway.”

She raised a surprised brow and drew back. “And just what makes you say that? It’s still my
unofficial plan.”

“Bollocks it is.”

“It most certainly is! Where the hell do you get off –?!“
He rolled suddenly, pinning her beneath him and tossing the paperwork aside, securing her
wrists on either side of her shoulders. Her hair was fanned across the pillow and he took care
not to pull it.

“I get off right here,” he said slowly, placing a chaste kiss on her lips and watching with glee
as her expression transitioned to one of blistering indignation. “And here.” He brushed his
lips over the tops of her breasts, bared from beneath the sheets again. He continued down,
kissing her stomach and her hips and the apex of her thighs, still swollen and pink from his
earlier ministrations. He kissed her fingertips before offering a salacious smirk. “You’ll need
to turn over for me to get the last couple of places.”

“Fred!” Hermione shrieked, fighting back when he playfully made to flip her. He surrendered
after a second and crawled back up to hover over her, their noses nearly brushing.

“Presuming we survive this, I know you won’t end up behind a ministry desk because you’re
made to live a life of adventure, Hermione Granger. I wasn’t sure, when we talked about it on
that balcony ages ago, but I am now. I’ve seen it firsthand. I’ve seen your heart and the fire in
your belly, the way you absolutely light up when you try to solve a problem that otherwise
seems unsolvable. I don’t think you’ll be satisfied pushing parchment, not after all is said and
done, and I think you know it too. You need excitement and challenge; to do something that
makes a difference. I haven’t the foggiest idea what it’ll be, but you’ll figure it out. And, if
I’m really, terribly lucky, I’ll have the distinct honor of standing at your side when you do.”

Hermione swallowed hard and looked up at him, eyes shining with something he hadn’t seen
in a little while. Something like hope. “I’m going to make a difference, am I? Well, no
pressure, then.”

Fred smiled and shook his head, simultaneously bemused and frustrated that she couldn’t see
what he saw. “You already make a difference. Every bloody time you draw breath, you make
a difference.”

He could see her starting to question that, question herself, so he changed topics back to their
earlier discussion.

“What about you, anyway? Any last requests before you run off to save the world?”

“Well, I certainly didn’t have a solicitor draft anything,” she mused thoughtfully, clearly far
more comfortable discussing her own prospective demise than the vast uncertainty of what
came next if they lived through all of this. Lapsing silent for a moment, he studied her face in
the moonlight, wanting to capture the image and hold on to it.

“There is one thing,” she finally said, breaking the silence. “Check on my parents for me.
You don’t need to do anything, and certainly don’t try and restore their memories. Just make
sure that they’re happy and safe.”

“Alright,” Fred said immediately, thinking it’d be something he’d do even if she didn’t ask.
He knew exactly where they were; he’d worked with Hermione on the tracking charms she’d
placed on their wedding rings. “Anything else?”
“No, nothing that I can think of. I’ve made arrangements –“

“MEOW.”

As if on cue, Crookshanks sat up from his perch atop the armchair in the corner, eyeing them
sullenly and beginning to wash a paw. Hermione blanched.

“Oh! Crooks, darling, I didn’t forget about you. I just –“

“Just hadn’t had a chance to say it yet,” Fred assured loudly, not a little fearful of how bloody
perceptive his witch’s familiar was. They were about to be flatmates for an indeterminate
amount of time, and he wasn’t trying to start that on the wrong foot. Or paw.

“Right,” Hermione nodded enthusiastically. Crookshanks narrowed his gaze before curling in
on himself again and shutting his enormous yellow eyes.

“I’ll take care of the cat,” Fred assured quietly. “Or at least, I’ll supervise while Angie does;
he seems to have a bit of a distaste for blokes.”

“I know,” Hermione considered. “I used to think it was just Ron and Harry, but now I’m not
so sure.”

Growing increasingly distracted by the woman below him, and willfully pushing aside the
emotions associated with their various subjects of conversation, Fred playfully nipped at her
throat and drew her attention back.

One thing he did know was that they didn’t have many nights like this left, and he wasn’t
about to squander one on post-mortem logistics.

“Anything else?” He asked quietly below her ear, “Or can we put this to bed?”

“I think that’s everything,” Hermione assured, her breath catching a little when he traced his
tongue along her earlobe.

“Good,” he said. “Because I’ve decided six is a wretched, messy number.”

“Messy?”

“Mmhmm, it’s even and it has all of those rotten multiples.”

“Right,” she murmured, back arching off the mattress as he inched lower. “Multiples.”

“Do you know what a good, prime number is?”

“What?”

“Seven.”
Ginny

Ginny Weasley was waiting. Waiting until the sun sank over the hills and the crickets in the
garden began to chirp and the frivolity of Harry’s birthday dinner and anticipation for Bill’s
wedding the next day all quieted and ebbed to a soft, indigo slumber.

She waited until, somewhat arbitrarily, she decided that she’d waited long enough.

Then she got out of bed in just her pyjama shorts and vest. Ginny had the room to herself;
since receiving a blessing of sorts from her mother, Hermione had taken full advantage of her
freedom to come and go from the twins’ flat, and that night following Harry’s birthday party
was no exception. She didn’t fault Hermione, nor her brother for it. She wasn’t a hypocrite,
and Merlin knew that their remaining time together was borrowed at best.

Creeping across the room and then into the hall, she stepped carefully over the creakiest of
boards – fifth from the left and third nearest the bathroom door – until she reached the
bedroom diagonally across from hers. Then she reached out and lightly rapped her nails on
the wood, a staccato tapping that interrupted the otherwise silent mien of The Burrow. Gods
knew it wouldn’t wake Ron, and her parents were below them and across the house.

When this was done, she turned and went back to her room, leaving the door cracked, curling
into the pillows near her headboard, and waiting again. This was the time of night where she
questioned herself most of all; because wanting was human, but still wanting after having
been rather publicly rebuffed? Pitiful.

It needed to happen, she knew that. If the world thought that she was the cherished girlfriend
of the-boy-who-lived, she’d be taken and tortured and Godric knew what else. It didn’t mean
that it didn’t hurt, though. And she’d all but taken the broken pieces of her heart and handed
them right back with a, “Hold onto them anyway.”

Ginny was a little ashamed knowing that, if she saw another witch do the same, she might
think them weak or tell them they’d do better to have a little self-respect, but it wasn’t
another witch. It was her. And self-respect was for people who weren’t living every day with
a sword over their heads.

It’d hardly been five minutes before the bedroom door opened and a tall figure stepped in,
messy hair silhouetted and round glasses reflecting the blue-grey moonlight streaming
through the window. Harry turned and shut the door behind him with a quiet snick.

These rendezvouses were normally silent affairs; predominantly wordless couplings when
Hermione was kind enough to read in the den downstairs, or he’d meet her in the apple
orchard beneath the stars. But that wasn’t the case tonight.

“Silencio,” Harry breathed, his holly wand in his hand. And just like that, they were in a
bubble.

“I wasn’t sure you were going to come,” Ginny said, toying with a loose thread at the corner
of her duvet.
“I wasn’t sure I was going to either,” Harry replied, sounding a little weary.

Both of them were lying.

Harry placed his wand and his glasses on her bedside table and turned the lamp on as low as
it went, the soft light dancing and casting shadows. Then he crawled into bed beside her and
Ginny, pitiable wretch that she was, pulled the blanket back before flipping it over both of
them again and curling into his side like a puzzle piece slotting into place. His hand settled
over the jut of her hipbone and she nestled her head into the crook of his neck.

“You’re seventeen,” she said quietly, dragging her fingertips over the soft cotton of his t-shirt
in little, nonsensical whirls. Harry swallowed and his throat bobbed as he nodded.

“It doesn’t feel like it.” He angled his head down to look at her, and really, just damn him and
those eyes. “Feels like I’m still eleven years old with no idea what the fuck I’m doing.”

Ginny snorted softly at that. “Haven’t you parsed it out yet? Nobody knows what the fuck
they’re doing. The older we get the more obvious it becomes that everyone is just…
pretending. Reading their lines and doing the best they can with what they’ve got.”

“Well in that case, I wish we’d been given a little more to work with.”

They lapsed silent then and he turned his head, burying his nose in her hair.

“The day after the wedding,” he said quietly. “I talked with Hermione after dinner and we’re
leaving the day after the wedding.”

It hurt to think about, but it wasn’t unexpected; she’d assumed as much, it was just that
hearing him say it was different. It was real, and it made her glad that her face was hidden.

“Okay,” she said, proud of her voice for remaining steady. It felt a stupid response, but what
else was there to say?

Don’t go?

Stay with me?

Wizarding world be damned?

“Gin, I need to ask something of you.” Harry’s tone changed a little and it put her
immediately on edge. She didn’t say anything, and he eventually took that as a cue to keep
going. “If – if something happens to me –“

“No.” Ginny jerked out of his arms and got out of bed like a shot, every fiber of her being
screaming in protest and refusing to acknowledge what he was saying. “No, we aren’t doing
this.”

Harry got out of the bed and stood in front of her, towered over her, with eyes pleading.
“Ginny –“
“I am not having this conversation with you, Harry James Potter,” she said flatly, refusing to
look at him. They hadn’t done it yet, the goodbye without goodbye, not even when he’d
‘ended things’ at the school after Dumbledore died. And she’d be damned if she was doing it
tonight.

“Bloody hell, just let me talk, would you?” His temper flared to meet hers, combusting in the
way they often did. “I’m the one that’s probably about to go and get myself killed, you can
stand to listen to me talk about it for two minutes.”

She bit her lip and rocked on her heels, resisting the urge to physically hit him. It was a low,
dirty blow, and he knew it, but how could she argue with that? She’d sound like a petulant
child, trying to cover her eyes and pretend the sky wasn’t falling. It most certainly was. She
could scarcely remember a time that it hadn’t been.

“If something happens to me, I just have a couple things that I need you to do, okay? I don’t
– I don’t trust anyone else besides Ron and Hermione to see it through, and they’ll be with
me.”

They’ll be dead, too.

He took a deep breath and steadied himself. “Make sure that Dobby is taken care of. I think
he’s still at Hogwarts, but if – if things get really bad, just make sure he gets somewhere safe.
Buckbeak too; he’s staying with Hagrid, but just check on him if you can, yeah? Make sure
that Hagrid sets him loose if need be.”

She nodded once, in a bid to keep going. To get this eldritch nightmare of a conversation over
with.

“I also want you to look in on Dudley. Not Vernon and Petunia, I don’t really care what
happens to them, but Dudley… just make sure he’s okay. Dedalus and Hestia are with them,
so you should be able to send a Patronus. He never stood a bloody chance in that house, I can
see that now, and he apologised to me before I left. He’s not a bad person, and he doesn’t
deserve to die because of me.”

She nodded again, albeit a little less genuinely. Her feelings toward the Dursleys were less
then genial, but these were apparently Harry’s last wishes. Who was she to argue about them?

“I’d – I’d like to be buried near my parents.”

She sucked in a sharp breath and felt like she was going to be sick.

“Please, don’t –“

“I know my body likely won’t… but maybe just a marker or something? Something to keep
me near them. I’d like to be near them. I think they’d like it too.”

Seventeen. He’d turned seventeen that day. And he was telling her where to bury him.

Ginny stopped fighting and let the tears fall, pressing her knuckles to her lips. Harry closed
the distance between them and pulled her tight to his chest before she could push him away
again.

She wouldn’t even if she wanted to; Harry was her haven. For all the world, she presented a
valiant front, but this, there in his arms? It was the one place that she allowed herself to be
fragile. To break.

“I know. I know, and I’m so sorry,” he said, sounding as though he truly meant it. But she
barely heard him over the cacophony of emotions swirling in her head. “There’s just one last
thing.”

“You don’t think you’re asking enough?” She meant for it to sound angry, to cut and sound as
furious as she felt at the world and their lot in it, but really it just sounded… sad. Intensely,
profoundly, sad.

“I know I’m asking too much, and that I’m not being fair, Gin. I promise that I know that.
And I know that you deserve better.”

“I don’t want better,” she choked heatedly. “I want you. If you know anything, know that.
That all I’ve ever wanted, out of all of this, was you.”

He drew back and placed a knuckle under her chin, tipping her face up to his. He offered her
a sad, glassy-eyed smile that said he already did know that.

“You can’t fall apart. If I die, if everything that can possibly go wrong goes wrong, you can’t
give up. Even if you don’t want to, even if it feels like there’s nothing left worth fighting for,
you need to keep fighting anyway. Keep the others fighting. You’re strong Gin, stronger than
I’ve ever been. The sun is going to rise, and tomorrow is going to come with or without me. I
need you to fight for it, okay?”

She shut her eyes and took a deep, shuddering breath. Then she nodded, because, though he
didn’t seem to realise it, this was the easiest of his requests.

Would she do it for altruism’s sake, like Harry? For destiny? For the good of wizarding kind?
No. But if Tom Riddle took him from her, after everything else he’d taken from them, after
personally violating her mind and her will, she would see him dead. If it was the last thing
she did, even if she had to drag him to hell herself, she would watch the light leave his eyes.

“I love you,” she said softly, wishing desperately that it was enough and knowing that it very
well may not be.

Enough to save him.

Enough to keep him.

Harry tipped his head up to look at the ceiling and tightened his arms around her. Then he
brought his forehead back to rest on hers, breathing her in while she did the same to him.

“I love you too, Ginny Weasley. Always.”

 Domum
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

1 August 1997

“Hermione?” Fred’s voice asked from somewhere outside the half-open door of the loo.

“In here!” she called back, ducking her head over the sink and securing the back of her
earring.

“Hey, Ginny said you were –“

Fred drew up short as she straightened again, catching his eye in the mirror. The look he gave
her was pure heat and she reveled in it for just a second before taking in his appearance; then
she was the one gawking.
“Oh,” she breathed, eyes skimming the rich green dress robes that he wore overtop a black
muggle suit and trousers, the shoulders and breasts of which were intricately embroidered
and gilded with golden accents. All articles were perfectly tailored, of course, and he had a
gold watch chain hanging from his pocket.

“You’re mentally undressing me, aren’t you?” Fred teased, pulling her into him and placing a
quick kiss on the top of her head.

“Am not,” she said defensively, running her fingertips along the buttery-soft fabric of his
lapels. “You just look… dashing.”

“I always look dashing,” he scoffed. “You on the other hand… good Godric, witch. Wars
have been started over less. Is this new?”

“We went shopping with the Delacours a few weeks ago,” Hermione said, turning in his arms
and looking at herself in the mirror. She’d thought about wearing red, because it
complimented her own colouring rather well. Then she remembered she’d be on the arm of a
ginger and quickly altered course.

“Rather perfectly on the nose, isn’t it?”

“I’m not hiding,” Hermione shrugged, lifting her chin a little. The light caught the rich
champagne of her gown, a hue just shy of gold.

Fred nodded and skimmed his hands along the satin that hugged her waist before tracking
one up along the bodice and over the plunge of her neckline, resting it lightly on her bare
sternum. His thumb traced a slow circle just below the hollow of her throat.

“Fred –“ she exhaled, willing her eyes to stay open as their lids fluttered. They were fully
visible from the hallway, for Merlin’s sake.

“Relax,” he chuckled. “I just have a gift for you.”

He brought his other hand around her front and opened it to reveal a gold chain with -

“Is that a magpie?” Hermione asked, grinning in recognition as she examined it. There was a
little golden bird hanging in the center of the chain, clipping a clear gem in its beak as though
it’d just absconded with it. She hoped ardently that he hadn’t spent money on a diamond, but
it certainly looked as though he had.

“It is,” Fred affirmed. “Here, lift your hair.”

She did as he’d requested, grabbing her mane of loose curls and gathering them as best she
could so he was able to bring the chain around and clasp it at the back of her neck. The bird
nestled between the tops of her breasts and as soon as it made contact with her skin she
sucked in a sharp breath, faltering, nearly stumbling.

“What the bloody hell is on this?” she asked, resisting the urge to pull it away for fear of
insulting him. It wasn’t painful per say, but the thrum of magic that she felt was unexpected,
and certainly strong, vibrating nearly down to her bones.
“Sorry, I should have warned you,” Fred cringed sheepishly, turning her in his arms again.
“I’m used to touching it, I didn’t think.”

“Used to what, exactly?” It was bizarre, reminiscent of the hum of energy she’d felt around
the opal necklace that had cursed Katie with none of the malevolence. It felt… light. Pure.

“Figure it out,” Fred encouraged, nodding at her wand balanced on the counter beside the
sink.

She picked it up, casting revelio and a few other basic diagnostic charms under his watchful
eye. There was a ridiculous web of concealment spells and protective enchantments, all
meant to deter or dull the effects of dark magic. It was breathtakingly intricate, and she
peeled it back layer by layer until, at the center, she found the original intent of the artifact.

“It’s a portkey!” She gasped, ending the charms and bringing her fingertips up to skim the
delicate filigree of the chain in wonder. Fred simply nodded.

“I’ve been working on the thing for weeks,” he admitted, running a thumb over the impish
little bird. “If I’ve keyed it correctly, and I truly hope that I have, it should bring you straight
to the workroom at the shop, regardless of where you are.”

“Regardless of where I am? How is that possible?” she asked, mind whirring. Portkeys could
circumvent anti-apparation charms, and they were certainly subject to the talent and ingenuity
of the person that created them, but they weren’t foolproof.

“Do you remember the night my dad was attacked and Dumbledore sent us off to Grimmauld
Place?”

“Vividly,” Hermione replied with a flicker of dormant irritation at the memory of being left
behind.

“Well, he did it with a portkey he’d made, a burned up old tea kettle.”

“I assumed he’d used the floo,” she admitted, before quickly realising that was daft. The
ministry was already monitoring floo travel by then, and it would have been a massive risk to
send Harry through without knowing the depth and details of what had transpired that night.

“Well, in any event, I held on to it. I figured any portkey that can circumvent the wards
around Hogwarts can probably do the same from just about anywhere.”

“So you… copied it?”

“I tried to copy it. Bit like figuring out a recipe with only a small bite of the finished product
for reference; some components were obvious, others much less so. Old codger made the
thing in about two seconds, but I think I managed something similar. This one is activated by
a word rather than being set to leave at a particular time – spoken with clear intent, of
course.”

Hermione blinked, a million questions running through her mind about the mechanics, but
she only asked one. “What’s the word?”
“Domum,” Fred replied, lips quirking. “Sorry, couldn’t get the English to work.”

Hermione looked up sharply and met his eyes, intense and steady, concealing an ocean of
things they’d both said and not. Then she nodded slowly, because it was perhaps the most
appropriate application of a word that she’d ever encountered, spell or otherwise.

Home.

He leaned down to kiss her, a soft press of lips that, for once, cleared her head a little rather
than fogging it.

“C’mon,” Fred said, dragging her out of the bathroom as she snatched her wand and beaded
bag from the counter. “We have a party to attend.”

It was moments before the wedding was meant to begin and Hermione was milling about the
first couple rows with the Weasleys that didn’t have an active role in the ceremony, as well as
Angelina and a rather well-disguised Harry.

“She really said that to you?” Angie asked, tucked under George’s arm with her mouth agape.

“Uh huh,” Hermione confirmed, rolling her eyes and shooting a glance at Fred’s pinched-
faced Aunt Muriel a couple rows back. “She’d just been upstairs, giving Fleur the infamous
goblin-made tiara, and she looked me up and down and then frankly proclaimed, ‘Oh, this
must be the muggleborn. Bad posture and skinny ankles.’”

Fred, who was standing beside her with his hand resting lightly on the curve of her lower
back, made a low sound in his throat that was startlingly similar to a growl.

George, on the other hand, guffawed. “Bleeding hell. Well, if it makes you feel any better, she
told me over breakfast that my ears looked lopsided.”

He gestured to his one remaining ear which, admittedly, did appear rather lopsided when
paired with the one that was no longer there.

“You know, I could have sworn I had a Ton-Tongue Toffee in one of these pockets,” Fred
muttered, beginning to pat down his robes. “Bloody shame if she accidentally ate it, the
wretched old-“

“You look vunderful,” a gruff voice said suddenly from behind them, and Hermione turned,
coming face-to-face with Viktor Krum. At first she was happy to see him, but that sentiment
was immediately followed by a ripple of anxiety.

“Oh, Viktor! Hi!” She greeted, lurching forward to give him a quick hug. “I’m so glad that
you could make it.”

“I am as vell,” Viktor agreed, his accent a little lighter than it had been the last time she’d
seen him, over two years prior. “Fleur was kind enough to invite me.”

“Of course,” Hermione nodded before turning. “You remember some of Bill’s family, right?”
She looked at Ron first, standing across from her and acting as though he’d bitten into a
lemon. Harry, presently disguised as Barny, looked pleased to see Viktor despite not being
able to voice as much. George was obviously entertained, Angelina was starstruck, and
Fred… Hermione drew up short when she glanced up at him beside her.

Where she’d expected to find distaste, or at the very least tension, Fred looked utterly at ease,
save for perhaps a bit of lingering animosity toward his Aunt Muriel.

“Great to see you, mate,” he greeted gamely, reaching a hand around Hermione to grasp
Viktor’s in a firm shake.

Viktor’s eyes quickly scanned the assemblage of redheads and then he nodded, turning his
attention to Fred.

“You as vell. You are the inventor, no?”

“One of two,” Fred replied, gesturing to his counterpart and partaking in a bit of small talk
about the business and the international quidditch league.

While this transpired Hermione glanced between them, Fred and Viktor. Between the sweet,
shockingly awkward quidditch prodigy who’d claimed her heart for a few brief months, and
the brilliant, affectionate man at her side, who’d claimed everything down to her very soul
after that.

It was a bizarre collision of worlds.

“We should probably sit down, or we’re going to get run over,” George cut in a moment later,
interrupting her thoughts as well as the conversation. Everyone began to quickly find their
seats as the quartet in the corner of the tent transitioned to a softer, slower tune.

“It was lovely seeing all of you,” Viktor said in parting, nodding to Hermione in particular
and watching with an amused expression as Fred’s thumb traced lightly along her bare
shoulder; it wasn’t possessive, merely idle habit, but the message was received all the same.
His lips quirked up in a smile as his near-black eyes met her own, and in them was the same
thing she knew reflected back toward him; a gentle fondness and a hope that, though they
were not destined to find it together, she be happy.

When he was gone and they’d settled into their seats, Hermione and Angie in the middle with
the twins bracketing them, she leaned over to Fred.

“I’m impressed,” she said under her breath. “I was prepared to referee.”

Fred scoffed and leaned in, whispering back, “I don’t need to pound on my chest and
embarrass us both to prove something. Viktor treated you well from what you’ve said, I don’t
have any reason to dislike the bloke.”

“Still, it would be understandable if you were uncomfortable.”

“Hermione, you’re literally sitting next to one of my exes as we speak.”

Her head spun toward Angie, who gave her a smile and a slightly confused look, and pressed
her lips together to keep from laughing. It was easy to forget that she and Fred had dated,
however briefly. But he was right – for a whole host of reasons, she certainly wasn’t threated
by that history. Hell, Angie was one of her best friends.

“Alright, fair point.”

“Besides,” Fred said, leaning in and lowering his voice further, speaking so softly that it was
barely audible, “I’m the one you’re going home with tonight, not Krum. So the only thing
making me uneasy is the amount of time between now and when I get to take this dress off of
you with my teeth.”

“Luna is in rare form,” Fred chuckled as he led Hermione across the dance floor and past
their blonde friend, who appeared to be dancing with… well, nobody. She was obviously
having a grand time of it, though.

“She most certainly is,” Hermione replied, still clearly a little distracted following their
conversation about the symbol Luna’s father was wearing on a chain over his chest. The mark
of Gellert Grindlewald, according to Krum.

“You want to go consult your books, don’t you?” Fred teased.

“What? No!” Hermione exclaimed, her cheeks flushing and betraying her. “I was just trying
to remember where I’d seen it before, is all.”

“I’ll tell you what,” he hedged, deftly spinning her away from him and then back. “Two more
songs and we can sneak away to consult the books and….”

“And?”

“Oh yes, most certainly and.”

She giggled and he couldn’t help but smile at the sound. They danced in silence for a little
while longer, simply enjoying the evening and the ambience, watching Bill and Fleur hold
court near the head table as a never-ending procession of guests paraded by and wished them
well.

“So, what do you think?” He asked, ducking his head to speak just below her ear. “Want to
put on one of these someday?”

Hermione laughed again and then exhaled a heavy breath, glancing around at the milling
masses. “Maybe something just a bit smaller? We can cut the cousins that are more than once
removed, right?”

An image flashed in his head and an unexpected swell of emotion rocked him at the thought
of her in an ivory gown, him standing where Bill had stood that afternoon. He swallowed and
cleared his throat.
“We can probably manage that. Shame my long-lost cousin Barny won’t make the list,
though.”

They both glanced at Harry in the corner, who was in the midst of a conversation with
Elphias Doge and his wretched Aunt Muriel, of all people.

A warm breeze blew through the tent, the smell of jasmine and orange blossoms hanging in
the air like a heady fog. Fred looked down at Hermione, the curls that had only grown wilder
since they’d begun dancing, the rosy flush to her cheeks, and thought perhaps they could skip
those last two songs.

He was about to voice as much when, all at once, a massive ball of silver light crashed
through the canopy directly over them. Fred tugged Hermione hard forward and out of the
way, caging her against his chest as their eyes met in alarm and the music came to a
screeching halt.

The light quickly took form and a silver lynx began to speak, the deep baritone of Kingsley
Shacklebolt ringing through the tent and effectively freezing everyone in place.

“The ministry has fallen. Scrimgeour is dead. They are coming.”

For a split second, the barest fraction of a moment, everything went fuzzy and slow, like
blinking awake from a dream. Or, more accurately, from a nightmare. And then all at once it
pulled into sharp focus as the tent devolved into turmoil.

Hermione and Fred had their wands out before the Patronus had even fully disappeared.
Somebody out of sight screamed, but panic didn’t truly hit him until the first person near
them disapparated with a crack and a heavy pit sank in his stomach. If they could disapparate
that meant the wards around the burrow were down.

“I have to get to Harry!” Hermione shouted frantically over the din, gripping his arm tightly
to keep from toppling as someone knocked into her from behind. They’d lost sight of both
Harry and Ron in the crowd, but that problem was quickly overshadowed when a figure in a
dark cloak and silver mask popped into existence about ten feet away.

“Protego!” Hermione screamed, shielding them at the same time that Fred sent a silent
blasting curse into the man’s chest, throwing him backward and out of the tent to sprawl
across the grass.

He briefly wondered if he’d killed him.

He immediately decided that he didn’t care.

They saw Lupin and Tonks take a similar stance at the other end of the dance floor, his
mother and father dragging a struggling Ginny behind the cake table as more and more
cloaked figures apparated in.

“You need to get out of here!” Fred yelled at Hermione, despite every fiber of his being
screaming in defiance of that notion. Her hand was clammy and shaking in his, both of them
operating on pure adrenaline.

“I can’t yet, I need to find –“

“We’re here!” Ron and Harry burst through the fray with Angelina and George on their heels,
the former maintaining a shield charm over them as they crowded and backed into a corner.

Hermione looked at the boys and then back to Fred, wide-eyed panic and unabridged anguish
shimmering in her eyes as she came to the same realisation that he already had; they were not
going to have one more night.

The tear that streaked down her cheek may as well have been a knife in his chest.

But then as he looked at her, the chaos around them faded again and a devastating solemnity
washed over him.

“They need to go!” George shouted, but it was a slow, distant whisper as Fred took
Hermione’s face in his hands, cupping her jaw as his thumbs whisked the tears from her
cheeks and he placed a crushing, too-brief kiss to her lips.

“You come back to me,” he bade her fiercely, as if saying it, speaking it aloud, might
somehow make it so. His voice cracked, broke, but he didn't care. Their foreheads came to
rest against one another in that ghost of a moment, that breath before goodbye.

She didn’t have time to respond because as soon as he said it he carefully but firmly shoved
her backward into Ron and Harry, knowing that if he held on even a second longer that he
wouldn’t be able to let her go.

A fractured sob slipped from her as she gripped the boys’ arms and turned on the spot, then
he blinked, and she was gone.

Fred couldn’t fathom what his face must have looked like as George gripped his shoulder,
anchored him, but it didn’t matter. In rapid succession, Angelina’s shield behind them was
struck – once, twice, three times, and then it fell. Neither Fred nor George moved fast enough
to conjure a new one before a red stunner flew toward them and hit her directly in the chest.

“Angie!” George roared, catching her as she slumped to the ground in a heap of pale purple
tulle. Fred looked toward where it had come from, another unknown cloaked figure and silver
mask, when a booming, amplified voice rang from the centre of the dance floor.

“LOWER YOUR WANDS IMMEDIATELY, WE ARE ACTING ON OFFICIAL

MINISTRY BUSINESS.”

What few guests remained stilled and scattered as Corban Yaxley stepped forward, unmasked
and wand still raised to his own throat. He looked around at them, lip curling in a sneer.

“Doesn’t look very bloody official to me,” Oliver spat with Charlie at his side, neither
making any move to do as instructed.
Yaxley paused and cocked his head, like a predator scenting blood. Then he jerked his chin
and two Death Eaters – because that’s precisely what they were – stepped from the shadows
and grabbed Charlie by the shoulders, dragging him forward and forcing him to his knees in
the middle of the floor as several onlookers screamed in protest.

“Let him go!” Oliver bellowed, wildly lunging and then rocking to a halt when one of the
men pressed a wand hard against Charlie’s neck, forcing his head to the side. His brother’s
eyes blazed, chest heaving and his chin lifted in stalwart defiance.

Fred’s pulse racketed up, a sticky sweat breaking across his neck as he shoved his wand into
his pocket and listened to his mother begin to cry, nonsensical begging intermixed with her
sobs. George did not make any move to revive Angie, merely knelt at Fred’s side with her
unconscious form cradled in his lap. By all accounts he was doing her a kindness.

“I believe I told you to stand down,” Yaxley said again, his voice like ice as he looked at
Oliver’s ruddy face with a flat expression.

Ollie wavered for just a second longer, his frenzied, desperate eyes never leaving Charlie’s
back, before finally doing as he’d been told. The clatter of his wand hitting the dance-floor
was deafening.

Yaxley nodded again and the man holding the wand to Charlie’s throat lowered it only to step
forward a second later and throw a right hook, his fist making a sickening crunch as it
connected with Charlie’s nose and a spray of crimson blood flew in an arch across the floor.
There were more sounds of protest, but the other Death Eaters merely laughed as he sagged
forward with a pained grunt.

“'Zat is enough!” Fleur snarled, breaking from the crowd. She was wrath incarnate, her once
pristine gown dirty and singed at the hem, a shallow gash dripping blood above her brow.
Fred could have sworn he saw fire dance at her fingertips as Bill moved beside her like a
moon in orbit, ready and willing to throw himself in her path at the first sign of danger. “You
are with the ministry? Fine. What business do you 'ave ‘ere?”

Yaxley looked her over slowly with a lewd, lecherous gaze that made Fred want to gouge his
eyes out, before he reached into his cloak and extracted a roll of parchment sealed with bright
red wax, placing it in her outstretched hand.

Fleur visciously tore it open and began to read, her eyes widening incrementally before she
schooled her expression.

“We’ve received an anonymous tip that several persons of interest are in attendance of this…
event.” Yaxley strolled, circling the perimeter of the tent and passing by the faces of Fred’s
friends and family one by one. Fred was a little surprised to see that Krum had stayed, wand
stowed but expression absolutely murderous as he stood beside Fleur’s father, in front of
Gabrielle and Apolline. “If you’ve any knowledge as to the whereabouts of these individuals,
it would be in your best interest to share that information.”

“Who is it?” Fred heard himself ask, his voice hollow. He already knew the answer, but
something in him had to hear it anyway. “Who are you trying to find?”
 Yaxley just grinned at him as Fleur looked up, her already fair complexion paling further
when she saw him standing there in the corner, Angelina unconscious and Hermione nowhere
in sight. It was Bill who answered his question, though.

He took the parchment gently from his wife’s trembling hands and read aloud, “The persons
named below are wanted immediately for questioning by The Department of Magical Law
Enforcement; Harry Potter, Ronald Weasley, and Hermione Granger.”

Chapter End Notes

And thus we conclude Part Three of our tale!

 PART FOUR - Moral turpitudes
Chapter Notes

Okay friends, here's the dealio - as we delve into part four of this fic, I feel I must be
frank with all of you. While I disclosed at the beginning of our story that this would
certainly be a darker iteration of the events that occurred in canon, at this point I feel the
need to add a tag to reflect some of the morally grey actions that have and will occur
going forward.

I want you to know that this is not purely for entertainment or shock value, but because I
think it's reflective of what someone might genuinely do under the given circumstances.
In particular, you’re going to see a much more ruthless Hermione, with a lot more to
lose. If you disagree with this characterization, please feel free to keep that to yourself
and exit the ride on my left.

Furthermore, there will likely be triggering content in several future chapters. I will be
diligent in not only adding tags, but in specifically calling out where and when this will
occur so that, if you so choose, you can skip it.

I apologize for the delay in posting this one; someone I was very fond of died last week
and, as such, other things took priority.

Nevertheless, life goes on and so does our tale. Thank you for continuing to come back
and enjoy it with me.

P.S. One of you lovely things sent me some fan art for chapter 57, which I've posted at
the end of that chapter with the artist's permission. You should definitely go check it out.
1 August 1997

You come back to me.

“C’mon,” Fred grunted, helping Oliver guide Charlie, whose nose was still bleeding like a
faucet, through the narrow doorway and into the kitchen of The Burrow, every surface of
which was cluttered with wedding paraphernalia.

“Just up here,” his father said tightly from in front of them, guiding Yaxley and another man
that Fred couldn’t place toward the staircase and the profoundly transfigured ghoul in the
attic, his supposedly ailing youngest brother.

The way they peered around at his childhood home, noses wrinkled and eyes sparkling with
blatant disgust, made Fred’s blood boil, but he focused his energy on getting through the next
minute. For just that one minute, he would keep it together. And then, when that minute was
done, he would do it again. And again. And again, for as long as he needed to in order to
remain sane and not get himself, or anybody else, killed.
Their mother was still outside, seeing off those who’d stayed. Fred wouldn’t have left her
given that Death Eaters were still crawling all over the property, but Bill and Fleur were with
her, as well as Remus and Tonks. If things went poorly there was very little he could do that
they couldn’t.

“Sit down,” Oliver ordered, depositing Charlie into a chair beside the table. His fearful, tense
voice didn’t match the careful manner with which Oliver touched their brother, and Fred
wasn’t sure if anybody else noticed the way his hand brushed the nape of Charlie’s neck, or
how his brother kept hold of Oliver’s arm a second longer than strictly necessary.

George stepped through the door next, maneuvering carefully and heading to the den to lay a
still-unconscious Angelina on the sofa.

“Accio,” Fred muttered, once Yaxley and his father were sufficiently out of sight, footfalls
barely audible as they continued their ascent. Two blue, foil-wrapped candies came floating
down the stairs a second later and landed directly in his palm.

“’S that?” Charlie asked, looking up and wincing as he held an increasingly red flannel to his
nose.

“Antidote for Nosebleed Nougat,” Fred explained, tossing one to him. “It’s the old formula,
so your feet might tingle a bit.”

Charlie let out an anemic chuckle as he removed the wrapping and popped it into his mouth.

In the den Fred heard George revive Angie, immediately hushing her as he explained in a
hurried whisper the baren details of what had transpired since she’d been stunned. Fred
blocked it out, not needing to relive it. Not possessing the capacity to do so in their current
circumstance. Later. He would think about it later.

You come back to me.

Oliver was still clearing the blood from Charlie’s face when Ginny burst through the back
door, disheveled as they all were with eyes frantic and scanning until they landed on him.

“Fred! Did they -?”

Before she could say another word, another syllable, she was silenced, her mouth moving
rapidly without so much as a whisper coming out of it. Fred glanced around, not sure if he’d
unconsciously done it or if somebody else had beaten him to it.

While Oliver set and healed Charlie’s nose, Fred grabbed Ginny’s wrist and dragged her
toward him, glancing nervously at the ceiling above them as if Yaxley might be there, peering
and listening through the floorboards. Ginny looked irritated, and still utterly terrified, but
she followed without struggle.

“Yaxley is upstairs looking in on Ron,” he explained in a clear voice before ducking his head
to speak just beside her ear with hardly a whisper of a breath. “But they left. Our - our friends
left.”
Ginny pulled back enough to look up at him and he saw it for a second, like looking in a
mirror. That raw pain that was simmering in his own gut as he pictured Hermione’s
frightened face, that piece of him that had been torn away when he’d let her go.

You come back to me.

His sister’s lip quivered, and he saw the corners of her pale blue eyes fill with tears, but not a
single one fell. No, she took a shaking breath and then, as if by sheer force of will, she
blinked and they cleared. Then Ginny straightened, squaring her shoulders and lifting her
chin in the same way Charlie had whilst staring down Yaxley beneath the tent.

Fred nodded at her once, then he looked around the room at the faces already watching them,
at George and Angie in the doorway, Charlie and Oliver still sat at the table. He heard their
family and friends distantly through the still-open back door, all of those who, given the
choice and the opportunity, had not run. Who had stood at their side and borne witness to the
foundations of their society, of their world, crumbling.

And even though they were surrounded by enemies, even though his brother’s blood was still
sticky on the floorboards beneath their feet and there was a gaping, tattered hole in his chest
where lavender shampoo and lazy mornings lived, understanding passed and the embers of a
rebellion smoldered, dogged and unwavering despite all that had transpired that night.

They would not break.

This would not break them.

You come back to me.

It had to have been nearing dawn when Hermione heard Harry get up from his makeshift bed
in the living room of Grimmauld Place. Ron, still snoring beside him, didn’t even stir.

She watched in the bleak grey light peering through moth-eaten curtains to see her friend’s
silhouette don a jumper and then pad in the direction of the back garden. Having also been
awake for most of the night, it didn’t take long for her to gather herself and head after him.

Hermione found Harry on a worn stone bench beside a jungle of untamed weeds and
wildflowers, the varieties of which were both mundane and not.

“Couldn’t sleep?” she asked, wrapping her arms around herself and whispering a warming
charm to chase away the morning chill.

“Could you?” Harry challenged, shooting her a sidelong glance as she took a seat next to
him.

Hermione just shook her head, touching her fingertips to the small golden bird nestled against
her breast.

They were quiet for a long while, watching the few visible stars above them wink out one by
one as the sun began to crest over the neighboring homes.
“Hermione,” Harry started, keeping his eyes fixed somewhere distant as he toyed with a long
blade of grass that he’d plucked from the earth beside them. “I need to ask you something.
Earlier tonight, at the cafe, if Ron and I hadn’t been there, hadn’t been with you, that is…
would you have killed those men?”

Hermione stilled, unsure what startled her more, the sudden break in silence or the utterly
unprecedented topic of discussion. In any event, it took her a long moment to respond.

“Maybe,” she finally admitted, paltry an answer as it was for a subject as austere as life and
death. “Would it have bothered you if I did?”

She didn’t want to have this discussion – didn’t want to think about her various sins and
moral turpitudes at all, but Harry was risking his life right alongside her, and she was unlikely
to deny him much of anything that was within her means to provide.

“Of course it would bother me,” Harry said quietly, his brows drawing together.

Hermione bristled at that and wondered if he knew. If he understood just how much blood
had already been spilled, both on his behalf and by simple circumstance. If he knew how
much already stained her own hands.

“Wars aren’t won with only light and love, Harry,” she said tightly. “It’s important, and it
gives us something to fight for, but the battle can’t always end with a disarming charm. How
would you feel if one of the men we left in that cafe tonight goes on to murder Ginny? Or
torture Fred? Or do Merlin-knows-what to someone else’s Merlin-knows-who? Because they
could, and there would be nothing to stop them.”

As pallid as Harry had already looked in the waxing light, he seemed to pale further as he
turned in place to face her.

“That’s not what would bother me,” he explained, almost defensively. “I don’t – I understand
that you’ve all done and will do what you need to in order to survive. I get that, and I don’t
fault you it. I just… can’t. I mean, I can’t. I’m not capable of it.”

She searched his eyes, stringing together his disjointed stream of thought like the pieces of a
puzzle. Not that he resented or condemned them but that he himself couldn’t go to that
extreme. “Why not?”

Harry turned his gaze back to the blade of grass, the bright green darkening where he worried
it, creasing and uncreasing.

“This bond that I have with him, whatever it is, it feels like if I cross that line, I won’t be able
to come back over it. That day in the ministry after Sirius, when I tried to torture Bellatrix… I
could feel it, Hermione. Like it was dragging me away from myself and toward something
else, something darker. I think that if I let it take me too far, I won’t be able to find my way
back.”

Intemperate fear bubbled in her throat, so many theories about that unholy connection
dancing unbidden through her mind.
“Then don’t,” she said, quickly but with a certainty that she felt in her bones. “Protect
yourself, and protect us when you need to, but let that be it. Let me - let us handle the rest.”

Even as she said it, Hermione wondered how many lives was too many; at what point her
soul would be beyond salvaging, which death precisely would tip that scale. Because, for
better or for worse, she now had incontrovertible evidence that such a thing, that souls in
some form, existed. And she’d be lying through her teeth if she said that she believed hers
wasn’t already tarnished.

Harry let out a humorless snort. “I can’t ask you to do that –“

“That’s the point, though. You don’t need to ask me. You’ve never needed to ask me, Harry.
I’m in this with you to the end, wherever that might be and whatever it might mean.”

She thought of her younger self, then. Of giant chess pieces and flooded bathrooms and
racing through time with him beneath a full moon. No, he’d never once asked her to be there,
and yet there she’d been all the same. The stakes may be higher, the problems before them
more complex, but to her this was no different.

“I’ll get you back to him,” Harry said suddenly, interrupting her train of thought as he read
something on her face that she hadn’t realised she’d let slip. It was so earnest, the way that he
looked at her in that back garden. Like he knew what it meant for her to be there with him
rather than with the other half of her heart, the little pieces of her that it chipped away.

Hermione swallowed hard and sank her teeth ruthlessly into the inside of her bottom lip to
keep it from trembling. Unable to speak, she simply turned and let her head fall sideways to
rest on his shoulder. She didn’t nod, nor did she accept a promise that she knew neither of
them could keep. She just shut her eyes.

Time passed again and eventually songbirds began to sing.

“I’m going to go and put the kettle on,” Harry said after a while, gently rubbing her shoulder
as she sat up straight again and freed him.

“I’ll be in in a moment,” Hermione nodded with a halfhearted smile, watching as he left. As

soon as she was alone, she let the smile melt away and she fixed her eyes on the slowly rising
sun again, all the while lost in a tangled web of her own thoughts and transgressions. Of
those increasingly twisted lines that she trod, in between right and wrong. Good and evil.
Justifiable and… perhaps not.

“Erase their memories,” Harry had told her in the café that night, crouched on dingy tile
amidst broken glass in front of two men that would sooner cut their throats than offer them a
kind word. Two men that were a threat to not only them, but to the people they loved and had
left behind. To innocents that had no part in this wretched production and yet found
themselves in the crossfire regardless. Mothers and sons, lovers and friends. Strangers.
People that would inevitably be hurt if she simply let them walk away unscathed.

She hadn’t lied to Harry; had he not been there, she truly might have killed them. Even with
him watching over her shoulder she’d thought about it, let the tip of her wand linger for just a
second over that thick, pulsing artery in Rowle’s throat. But she didn’t, she moved it up and
to his temple.

“Erase their memories,” Harry had bid her, intent on concealing their tracks and moving
along. So, like any good soldier, Hermione did as ordered.

Severus Snape knelt low in his place at the Dark Lord’s side, his eyes cast unmoving on the
dark floorboards of the Malfoy drawing room.

“They were not there, my lord,” Yaxley said. He used the same tone of voice they all used
when addressing their master; reverent and submissive. Always so fucking submissive,
Severus thought desolately. Always submitting to somebody, bending and stooping and
bowing until his back ached, and oh, after so many years, it did ache. “The Weasley boy was
sequestered in the attic, ill with Dragonpox, but Granger and Potter were not with him, nor
were they recovered among the guests.”

The Dark Lord hummed quietly to himself, contemplative. Severus rationalised that the only
reason Corban wasn’t sprawled on the floor and writhing at present was because, despite their
inability to locate Potter, the overtaking of The Ministry had otherwise been an irrefutable
victory. The head of every major department and committee was either one of their own, or
thoroughly under their influence.

“And where are Rowle and Whitney?”

Severus dared a glance up through the dark curtain of his hair, fighting the urge to roll his
eyes at the dumbfound expression on Yaxley’s chalk-white, corpulent face.

“Th-they were not with our cohort, my lord.”

Before their master could respond, another figure stepped forward and knelt deferentially on
the makeshift dais. McNair, if Severus wasn’t mistaken.

“If I may, my lord, Rowle and Whitney responded to a break in the taboo at the same time
that Yaxley was raiding the Weasley property. We thought it prudent that they attend to it
rather than send the snatchers.”

“And?” the Dark Lord demanded sharply.

“And we just received word from St. Mungo’s that they were recovered in a sacked muggle
café on Tottenham Court Road in London.”

A quiet hiss slipped through the Dark Lord’s teeth and, despite having heard it dozens of
times, it sent a shiver up his spine.

“What exactly are they doing at St. Mungo’s?”

McNair wavered then, glancing anxiously around as if he regretted having been born, let
alone having spoken, and was looking for someone that might be willing to take his place.
When nobody miraculously stepped forward, because it would be unbelievably stupid to do
so, he reluctantly answered their Lord’s question.

“You see, m-my lord, it seems as though both of them suffered rather extensive memory
loss.”

Severus’ master grew still, and his head tilted ever so slightly, the air in the room tightening
to a thrum. He didn’t need to ask, simply stared at McNair with those slitted, crimson eyes
until the man continued, sounding for all the world like he’d rather be at the bottom of the
sea.

“The healers say that they… they do not know who they are, and they do not know magic.”
 Hello love

4 August 1997

Hermione was locked in a dance. A duel. An ongoing battle of both will and wit.

Or, in a far more likely turn of events, she was simply starting to go a little batty.

Nonetheless, every morning since that first day at Grimmauld Place, since she’d claimed a
room on the second floor, she would wake up, get out of bed, walk to the loo across the hall,
and make eye contact with a portrait.

Wake. Stand. Walk. Eye contact.

The Black family home had many enchanted likenesses, most of which would sneer or mutter
unkind things when she passed by, but this portrait stood out not only because it was silent,
but because she knew its inhabitant. And she knew where at least one other of its frames lie.

Wake. Stand. Walk. Eye contact.

It was after four days of this that she finally cracked, waited until the shower on the floor
above turned on and she heard Harry clattering in the kitchen below, that she stomped to it,
wearing a baggy t-shirt with her hair still in a nest atop her head, and drew her wand.

“Why haven’t you sold us out yet?” Hermione hissed at the portrait of one Phineas Nigellius
Black, whose only outward reaction was to slowly, and disdainfully, blink at her. She waited,
gave him ample time to respond, but he didn’t speak. “I know that you know who we are, and
as a former headmaster of Hogwarts, you not only have another frame in the headmaster’s
office, but you are beholden to serve the acting headmaster. So why is it that, in the days that
we’ve been camped here, Severus Snape hasn’t yet come knocking?”

Hermione counted to five, staring so hard and so intensely that his face ceased to be a face
and instead became a composite of small, drab brushstrokes.

“Alright,” she finally sighed with feigned resignation. “Have it your way. Do you know what
happens to an enchanted portrait when you burn it? I haven’t the foggiest, but I’m more than
willing to find out. Incen-”

“That’s enough,” Phineas Black growled at her, reaching a hand across the two-dimensional
plane as if he could stay her wand.

“Brilliant,” Hermione said, lowering it just a little and squinting sideways at him. “Are you
going to answer my questions, then?”

“No,” he replied scornfully, looking down his nose as best he could. “I’m going to leave.”

He turned and began to walk down the corridor behind his shoulder, half disappeared into the
shadows.

“Wait,” Hermione said, and this time it was she who raised an ineffective hand to stop him.
Phineas paused, his chin barely cheating over his shoulder as he glanced back toward her.
“He knows, right? He has to know that we’re here, guessed if you haven’t outright told him.”

He turned to face her and arched a thick, dark brow. “’He’ being -?”

“Snape,” Hermione snapped, her already thin patience fraying.

“Headmaster Snape –“

“He’s not my headmaster.“

“– has better things to do than make idle chit-chat with a portrait of someone long dead and
hanging on his wall beside a coat cupboard.”

“All the same,” she hedged, “He knows you’re part of the Black family, and he knows you
have a portrait in this house. The Death Eaters lingering across the street might be watching
the general area around the place, but the house itself is secret-kept, and Snape has been here
before.”

“Are you not supposed to be the intelligent one?”

Hermione huffed in annoyance. “What I’m saying is that – that if he were to decide to make
idle chit-chat, you might perhaps pass along a recommendation.”

Guilt coiled in her stomach like an asp, visions of a bloody, mangled ear dancing and
flickering through her head, but… it wasn’t conclusive. George had looked like Harry that
night, the same as she did. The spell that hit him was one of a thousand fired into the inky
sky. It could have simply been another line read in a seemingly endless script of deceptions
and double crossings.

“Tell him that Phaedrus is all well and good, but that he might enjoy something slightly more
contemporary. Churchill, perhaps; I always found his reluctant partnership with Roosevelt
fascinating.”

“Certainly more fascinating than this conversation,” Black clipped, turning back to the
corridor and disappearing without another word.

Hermione was still standing there, gnawing on her lip and contemplating if she’d just
doomed them, when, down the stairs and to her left, the front door suddenly opened and her
personal caterwauling charm went off. Fucking hell, Phineas worked fast. The cloaked figure
barely had time to step inside before she was half down the stairs, firing a silent stunning
spell and watching as the man crumpled to the floor in a heap.

Hermione kicked the door the rest of the way shut and silenced the alarm ringing and echoing
around the foyer.

Harry ran out of the kitchen with a spatula in one hand and his wand in the other, hair still
sticking up on one side from sleep. After a short delay, Hermione heard another set of
footsteps thundering down toward them just as Ron appeared at her back. She crouched and
shoved at the man’s shoulder, rolling him over and unceremoniously tugging back the hood
of his cloak.

“It’s Remus,” she exhaled unnecessarily, their former professor’s slack, scarred face staring
up at them.

“What in the bloody hell is he doing here?” Ron murmured, sodden hair dripping onto the
shoulders of his t-shirt.

Hermione glanced at Harry and saw the conflict shining in his eyes. The concern over what
was possibly important enough that he’d risk all of them to come here.

“Help me sit him up,” she ordered, grabbing Remus beneath the arm and, with Harry’s help,
pulling him into a slumped, seated position against the door. Then she reached into his pocket
and removed his wand.

The slightest tremor went through her hand as she pressed the tip of her own against his
throat, just beneath his jaw. Not hard, but enough that he would know it was there upon
waking.
“Is that necessary?” Ron asked uneasily, but Hermione ignored him, steeling herself for what
she’d need to do if this in fact wasn’t Remus at all.

“Ask him a question, Harry. Reneverate.”

Lupin started, hazel eyes flying open as he looked up at them. Though she’d already taken his
wand, he didn’t make any move toward his pocket.

“Erm… what flavor was my birthday cake this year?” Harry asked him, glancing at
Hermione. She didn’t look back, arm rigid and looking at him almost frantically, searching
for any hint of uncertainty or outside influence in Remus’ face.

“You didn’t have a birthday cake,” Remus answered levelly, gaze flicking to the three of
them in turn and then back to Harry. “You asked Molly to make a treacle tart instead.”

Hermione finally, slowly, lowered her wand.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, sitting back on her heels and pushing her hair away
from her face.

“I was hoping you could tell me that,” Remus said. A tired half-smile quirked his lips as he
took Harry’s extended hand and got to his feet, groaning a little. “Fred sent me.”

It was a short time later that they were seated in the kitchen. Harry and Ron were holding
cups of tea, but Hermione and Remus had steaming mugs of coffee in front of them, made
with the small, familiar coffee pot and tin of grounds that Remus had brought along with him.

It had taken everything in her not to start crying when he’d removed that, as well as an ivory
envelope with her name on it, from his robes and set it on the table.

They’d just finished exchanging their respective retellings of the events following the
wedding.

“And Charlie is okay?” Ron asked for the third time, making no effort at all to hide the
unease in his voice.

“Yes,” Remus confirmed again, endlessly patient. “He managed to get a portkey back to
Romania before the borders closed.”

Hermione silently mused, wondering if he’d take her advice about flying back via muggle
methods if the need arose, when Harry’s next query jolted her from her stupor.

“You said that Fred sent you?”

Ron, in a move that surprised as much as it heartened her, reached over and silently squeezed
her hand, the unread letter burning a hole in the tabletop between them.

“He did,” Remus nodded, once again looking curiously at Hermione. “He was rather
convinced that you had something important to tell me, though oddly enough he didn’t seem
to have any idea what it was.”

Understanding struck her all at once and a disbelieving laugh slipped through her lips. Her
contingencies, the conversation she’d planned to have with Remus after the wedding.

“He remembered,” she muttered, shaking her head. “Gods, of course he remembered.”

Harry and Ron both looked profoundly confused, so she turned to them and briefly explained.
“Remus is a werewolf and, as such, his mind isn’t susceptible to legilimancy. Right, Remus?”

She turned back toward her former professor who, though still obviously puzzled, nodded.
“That’s correct; came in handy a few times during the first war.”

Ron made a sound of understanding but, in her periphery, Harry’s expression silently
darkened.

“No,” he said adamantly after a pause, literally shaking his head at her. “No, we aren’t doing
this. We aren’t putting him at risk.”

She bristled. “Harry, his mind can’t be searched. The risk is minimal, as minimal as it could
possibly be.”

“Minimal isn’t nonexistent, Hermione,” he argued, hands curling into fists on the table.
“They could still – there are other ways to extract information.”

Hermione turned to Remus, who’d been watching the exchange silently, eyes darting back
and forth between them. “It’s your choice; I want to tell you everything. What the plan is,
where we’re going and what we’re hoping to do. If it goes wrong, if something happens,
somebody outside of the three of us should know. Someone has to know.”

“If Dumbledore wanted other people to know he would have told them,” Harry said,
interjecting before Remus could respond and half-standing from his seat. His chair made an
unpleasant scraping sound against the floorboards.

“Dumbledore isn’t here,” Hermione said sharply, rising to meet him and planting her hands
flat on the tabletop. “And I don’t much care what he did or didn’t want. He tasked us with
this gods-damned crusade, and I’m taking that as permission to use our discretion in how we
see it through.”

“He didn’t task us, he tasked me –“

“And what’s your plan, then? If we’re all murdered next week, what happens? We hope
someone else parses it out in the next decade or two? How many people die before then?”

The silence grew tight as Harry looked at her, anger casting a paper-thin veil over the real
reason he was arguing this so thoroughly. Over the fear simmering in his eyes because,
besides her and Ron, Remus remained one of the most important people in his life. A symbol
as much as a person, the last of the Marauders.
“Tell me,” Remus said, looking toward Harry and then back to her with resolution. “You’re
right. Somebody should know, and it makes sense that it should be me. James and Lily were
my best friends, Harry. I owe them that much and more.”

Harry just stood there, staring at them with a tortured expression, before he finally,
wordlessly, took his seat. It wasn’t agreement, but it was the closest they’d likely get.

Hermione took a deep, steadying breath and began.

“Last autumn, Dumbledore began to show Harry a series of memories about a boy, a boy
named Tom Riddle…”

When it was all done, Remus quietly got up and went about making another pot of coffee,
refilling her mug and then his.

“I’d heard mention of horcruxes before, theoretically speaking, but what he did… to make
seven of them…”

“Seven is just a guess,” Hermione admitted. “An educated guess, but a guess.”

“And we’re certain it wouldn’t be something innocuous? A pebble in the woods, or a seashell
that’s been chucked into the ocean?”

“That’s what I said!” Ron exclaimed, brandishing a hand in the air.

Hermione pressed her lips together in a suppressed smile, but she shook her head. “No, I
think Dumbledore was right about that much; he’s too vainglorious. Taking something from
each of the founders is purposeful, the ring and the diary were purposeful. He wouldn’t pick
something common, much less discard it like rubbish”

“Can it be something living?” Remus asked, directing the question to her. It took everything
in Hermione to keep her eyes forward and not look at Harry, who’d remained
uncharacteristically silent since his outburst.

“I don’t know,” she said slowly. “Nothing in the scarce literature I was able to find indicated
one way or the other. To do so seems like it would be foolish, irresponsible, but when there
are so many of them…”

“I don’t know about the other houses, but I can’t think of a significant artefact of Gryffindor’s
besides the sword.”

“Which we know isn’t a horcrux – in fact, it’s one of the only things we can use to destroy
the bloody things.”

“To that effect, I’ve also never cast fiendyre,” Remus admitted. “But Dora has put it out more
than once during her time with the aurors, same with Kingsley. It’s difficult, but not
impossible.”
“I’ve done a little reading,” Hermione offered half-heartedly, “But let’s keep that as a last
resort. It won’t do anyone any good if we’re all burned to a crisp because I try a spell that’s
out of my depth.”

They drifted silent again, each reckoning with everything they’d just discussed and the
monumental nature of it all.

“How’s Tonks?” Hermione asked, sitting forward and doing her best to take advantage of this
small window to the outside world. After all, she had no idea when they would get one again.
“Or does she go by Lupin now?”

Something in Remus’ expression shifted, lightened, and he smiled almost boyishly. “She’s
good. She’s – she’s pregnant, actually.”

Hermione’s mouth literally dropped open, and Harry sat forward sharply.

“What?” he blurted, eyes wide.

“I know, I could hardly believe it myself,” Remus admitted. “We aren’t telling people yet, it’s
still so early, but all things considered…”

“Remus, that’s brilliant,” Hermione laughed getting to her feet and rounding the edge of the
table to wrap her arms around his shoulders in a tight, and only slightly awkward, hug. He
reciprocated, chuckling as he did.

“Congratulations, mate,” Ron said, gamely shaking his hand and clapping him on the
shoulder after Hermione released him.

It was once he drew away that they collectively turned to Harry, who hadn’t moved or
spoken.

“She’s pregnant,” Harry said quietly and none-too-warmly, almost as though he were
speaking to himself. “Tonks is pregnant and you still – you still let us tell you everything?”

“Harry,” Hermione started, reaching a hand toward her friend as realisation dawned.

“No,” he said, jerking his shoulder away from her touch. “No, you’ve said more than
enough.”

“Harry, that’s not fair –“ Remus began to defend her, but before he could finish Harry was on
his feet again and walking out the door of the kitchen, headed toward the hall and the back
garden.

Hermione made to follow him, but Ron intercepted her. “I’ve got it. Go ahead and finish your
coffee, yeah?”

She stared for a long moment at where Harry had gone and then looked back at Ron as she
nodded, his face earnest. “Yeah, alright. Thanks.”
He squeezed her shoulder once and then also left the kitchen. Hermione turned and sank
slowly back into her seat.

“I didn’t think – it didn’t occur to me that he might not see it as good news,” Remus
murmured.

“Parallels,” Hermione replied, her mind racing. “It’s not that he’s not happy for you, Remus.
It’s just… newlyweds with a baby on the way in the midst of a burgeoning war? Bit close to
home.”

Remus swallowed hard and nodded. “I’m excited but –“

“- but terrified?”

Remus bobbed his head and then cast her a sidelong glance. “I’d probably feel that way with
or without the war, though.”

“Probably.” Hermione couldn’t help but smile a little, before it faded and she addressed the
other thing he’d had to have worried about. “Lyncanthropy isn’t genetic, you know. There
was a squib doctor years ago in The States that proved as much. I can probably find you the
article if I dig about a little.”

“I’ve already read it,” Remus admitted a bit sheepishly. “Now I just have to worry about all
of the perfectly human ways that I can be a bad parent.”

“You won’t be a bad parent,” Hermione told him with certainty. “You were one of my
favorite professors, you know.”

Remus just softly snorted and shook his head, his brief time teaching at Hogwarts feeling like
a dream within a dream that took place a lifetime ago. Hermione silently warmed her coffee
and took a drink.

“I can wait if you want to write him back,” Remus said after doing the same.

Hermione looked at the envelope beside her mug with a jolt, having nearly forgotten it in the
chaos and discourse.

“You don’t mind?”

“Of course not. Dora has been nearly bed-ridden with morning sickness this week, and I
think I should probably talk to Harry again before I leave, anyway.”

Hermione nodded and got to her feet, picking up the letter and making toward the door that
led back into the parlor and across to the drawing room, wanting for a bit of privacy.

“Hermione?” Remus said suddenly, giving her pause. “I’ll see what else I can find about
horcruxes, and about – about whether or not they can be living.”

She could have sworn that as he said it his eyes flickered toward the back door, where Harry
had disappeared, but she couldn’t bring herself to voice what they were both obviously
thinking.

“Thank you,” she said solemnly. “I trust that I don’t need to tell you to be careful. Fred can
get me a short message if there’s something dire to relay, but I don’t want him – that is to say,
I would prefer that he not – “

“I won’t tell him anything that might put him in danger,” Remus finished gently. Hermione, a
lump having risen rapidly in her throat, stood there for a second longer before she nodded
and left the room.

Yes, Remus would most certainly make a good father.

Hello love,

I hope this letter finds you… well, maybe not well, but as good as it possibly can. I also hope
you were still needing to speak to Remus and I didn’t send the poor bloke purely as my
personal owl.

He said he had an idea where you might be, but I tried not to dwell on it. Probably better not
to think about that sort of thing, yeah?

I know it’s only been a few days, but things are… different here. The ministry has announced
they’ll be instituting a commerce committee, responsible for the oversight and regulation of
magical businesses. No idea what it entails yet, but it’s a safe bet that it’ll be unpleasant and
inconvenient.

Don’t worry, though, George and I have it handled. He says hello, by the way. Same with
Angie – she’s waving rather vigorously from across the room as I write this, with your
exceptionally capricious cat sleeping in her lap.

I trust Remus filled you in on what happened after you left, so I suppose I’m mostly writing to
tell you that… I’m sorry.

I’m so bloody sorry that we didn’t get that last night together, darling. But I promise when
this is all said and done, I’ll make it up to you. Whisk you away for a couple weeks in France
or Italy – maybe Greece. There’s so much of the world that I haven’t seen, haven’t remotely
had the opportunity to see, and I’ve been thinking lately that I’d really like to see it all with
you.

It's easy to think that this war is going to last forever, that we’ll never have a chance to live
normal lives, but thinking that way makes it feel a little bit like we’re giving up, doesn’t it?
Like we’re letting them win without even putting up a fight. So, while you’re out there,
literally fighting and saving the world and raking in all of the fame and glory, I’ll be right
here, waiting for you and keeping the home fires burning.

And I am going to continue making plans for us, Hermione Granger.

 Grand gestures

20 August 1997

“Gabaldon,” Fred murmured, picking up two thick novels with a red, tartan pattern on the
covers. “Those’ll be before Gaiman, but after Fyleman…”

“Why are you doing this, again?” Angelina asked, partially concealed from view by more
books. He reached out and shoved a teetering stack aside with a grunt to find her laying with
her head hanging backwards off the arm of the small, tan sofa, skimming an upside-down
anatomy text. Crookshanks, who was roosting like a large chicken atop her stomach, let out
an irritated grumble.

“It’s a grand gesture,” Fred replied succinctly, turning back to the rather daunting task at
hand. Three days at this, give or take, and he was just now starting the Gs.

“We both know damn well that Hermione is immediately going to reorganise everything in
here anyway.”
“That very well may be,” Fred reasoned levelly, “But still, it’s the principle of the thing.”

“George never gestures,” Angelina mused aloud, making a sour face at whatever was on the
page of the book that she was leafing through. “And I like him just fine for it.”

“Yes, well. I’m not George. I’m Fred. And I gesture.”

Angelina shrugged and they lapsed back to a companionable silence, the radio in the corner
filling the gaps in conversation with fuzzy music and increasingly propagandic news
bulletins.

Perhaps a half hour passed when, much to Fred’s confusion, there was a knock on the half-
shut door behind him. Unfolding from the ground and navigating around mountains of books,
as well as their discarded and forgotten plates from lunch earlier, he stumbled toward the wall
and swung it open to reveal –

“Mum?” Fred asked, reeling backward slightly and then leaning around her to look down the
hall for any sign of his brother or Lee, who were working in the shop. “What are you doing
here?”

And indeed, there his mother was, barely reaching his shoulder.

“Mrs. Weasley,” Angelina half-exclaimed, sounding equally surprised as she scrambled to sit
up and ejected Crookshanks from his perch in the process. The kneazle arched his back,
hissed, and hastily fled the room.

Fred’s mother stepped back and watched him sprint past her ankles with a raised brow.

“Am I not allowed to pay my sons a visit?” She asked Fred, brushing a hand over her skirt.

“Erm,” Fred looked helplessly at Angie, who seemed for all the world like she was trying to
will herself straight through the wall behind her and down into the alley, before turning back
to his mum. “No, of course it’s fine. Why don’t we go to the living room, though? Bit of a
demilitarised zone in here.”

Angelina shared one last “better you than me” look with him before Fred stepped around his
mum and led her back down the hall and into the sitting area. It wasn’t messy, per say, but
he’d likely have done a bit of tidying up if he’d known she was coming.

“Can I get you something to drink?” Fred asked as they passed the kitchen. He was quietly
wrestling with how… stilted it was, having her in his flat, just the two of them. In fact, he
couldn’t remember the last time he’d been truly alone with his mother, without his dad or one
of his siblings - namely George - present.

“Water is fine,” she said, going to take a seat on the sofa and readjusting the haphazardly
placed throw pillows. Fred procured two glasses, filled them, chilled them, and gave the
bottle of firewhiskey tucked beneath the cupboard a longing look before following after her.

“What is it that you were working on back there?” His mum asked curiously as he handed her
one of the glasses.
“Oh, uh, just a project. Something for Hermione.”

He’d deduced that she would come up sooner or later, so there was no sense in attempting to
sidestep the topic. Furthermore, he didn’t have any desire to.

“Is she… living here, then?”

Fred bristled a little. “Not at present, which I’m sure you know. But if, when, this is all over,
then yeah; I reckon so. She’s welcome to, at least.”

His mother just nodded, though the look on her face was pensive.

“And does Angelina…?”

“You’d have to ask her or George,” Fred replied with a shrug, though he knew that Angie
hadn’t been back to the flat she supposedly shared with Alicia in weeks. “Did you come over
here simply to ask after our living conditions? Because it’s hardly Sodom and Gomorrah.
Most nights we get takeaway and play Exploding Snap with Lee.”

“No,” she said, sitting forward to set her untouched glass on the low table between them.
“And even if it were, I was young once, too, you know. In the sixties, no less.”

Fred immediately did everything he could to banish that comment and whatever she might
meant by it from his mind.

“No, I came because – well, you see, before she left, I actually had an interesting
conversation with Hermione.”

“I’ve found that most conversations with Hermione are interesting; she’s a rather intriguing
person.”

“So I’ve gleaned.”

“You’re talking about the day that you sent her here with the biscuits,” Fred guessed, noting
the hint of surprise on her face with just a touch of smugness. “She told me. We don’t keep
secrets, not about that sort of thing.”

Just about where she is, what she’s doing, and how likely she is to be killed at any given
moment. Semantics.

“I understand,” Molly said, before lapsing to a long, painful silence that seemed to slow time
itself. Fred fought the urge to check the clock on the mantle, fairly certain that the arms had
to be moving backward.

“So,” he started awkwardly, “Shop’s doing decently. Nothing like it was this time last year,
but mail-orders have been fairly steady, and we still get a bit of foot traffic. Seems the
students of Hogwarts are still wreaking havoc when and how they can. I mean, from the
volume of puking pastils we’ve been shipping out, I imagine the corridors are practically
overflowing with – “
“Why didn’t you tell me that you were seeing Hermione?” Molly interrupted him, and Fred
shut his mouth with a snap before slowly sinking back into his seat.

“I didn’t see the need,” he finally replied. “With the way our family gossips, I figured our
dalliance would come to light sooner than later.”

“Yes, but it’s not a dalliance, is it? You’ve been together… what, eighteen months? And
you’re talking about her living with you.”

“Twenty months,” Fred corrected, holding eye contact and refusing in the very marrow of his
bones to feel any sort of guilt about their evasion. Refusing to apologise, which she so clearly
wanted him to do.

The fact of the matter was that Molly Weasley, for all that she was his mother, she was, and
always had been, his biggest critic. And he would listen to it, try and tune it out the same as
he had when he was young. Whether it be about his schooling or his experiments or his
aspirations, lofty though they may be, that was all fair play. But there was one facet of his
life, one beautiful, bright, glowing piece of himself that he would hold fast to and absolutely
not allow to be disparaged. One part that was, for all intents and purposes, off limits.

And that was, and always would be, Hermione.

He sank into that resolve, arming himself and preparing to defend her and them at whatever
cost when his mother surprised him and turned the conversation on its head.

“She said that you think I’m not proud of you.”

Fred, at an utter loss for how to respond, said nothing.

“She didn’t say it outright,” his mother corrected hastily. “In fact, she was exceptionally
adamant about not speaking on your behalf, but it was… implied. Which lead me to spend
quite a bit of time thinking on it.”

“And?” Fred asked tightly, caught off guard by the surge of emotion that struck him.

Molly Weasley got up from the sofa and walked toward the windows on the other side of the
living room, the ones that overlooked what remained of Diagon Alley.

“I’ve told you some about my brothers, haven’t I? Fabion and Gideon.”

“I-I suppose,” Fred stuttered, once again capsised by the rapid change of topic. “They were
twins, we’re named after them.”

“Mmhmm,” she hummed in confirmation, glancing over her shoulder and then back out the
window. “You have a lot more in common than just your names, though.

“Fabion and Gideon were a great deal like you and George, eerily so. Always getting in
trouble, ignoring what people expected, constantly looking for the next great thing. And then
the last war began, in all its brutal glory and uncertainty… well, I suppose they thought that
was it. We tried to tell them to be careful, to think for a moment before offering themselves to
the front lines, murky as they were. But war is started by old men and fought by young men,
and they were just two names in the middle of a very long list of casualties.”

Molly’s voice grew thick and Fred’s spine rigid as, willingly or not, he hung on every word
she said.

“I remember I was making tea when Albus flooed and told me what had happened to them.
Ron was just a baby, and I was terribly pregnant with Ginny, and I remember thinking that…
that he was lying. Or mistaken, at least. That there was no way that my brighter-than-the-sun,
havoc-wreaking brothers, who’d defied death more times than I could count, could have
finally succumbed to it. It simply wasn’t conceivable.

“They were dead. Of course, they were. They’d been tracking two Death Eaters outside of
Manchester and walked right into an ambush. It was over quickly, as far as they could tell.
But perhaps Albus just said that in an attempt to spare me.”

Molly turned back to him then, whisking tears from beneath red-rimmed eyes as she
reclaimed her seat and leaned toward him.

“I see so much of them in you boys, I always have. And I cherish that, but it also scares the
absolute bloody hell out of me.”

Fred tried to swallow, but he found his mouth suddenly cotton-dry.

“I know that I made some mistakes raising you,” Molly said hoarsely. “And I didn’t support
you in the ways that you wanted me to. The ways that I see now that I should have. I’m sorry
for that, and I’m sorry for making you feel like you have to keep me at a distance. That you
have to keep parts of your life from me.”

Fred realised his hands were trembling and he clasped them tightly together, confused and
overwhelmed and wrestling with all the parts of him that, for years, had waited and wanted
so badly to hear these words from her. And when he was finished with that inner toiling the
emotion that won out, the one that bubbled to the surface and remained, wasn’t forgiveness or
contentment, nor was it satisfaction. It was anger.

He got to his feet and paced the length of the room, running a hand roughly through his hair
as he turned on his heel to face her.

“So you think that coming here and apologising after a decade of telling me that what I
wanted was wrong, that who I am wasn’t enough, makes it all okay? That I’m meant to hug
you and smile and say it’s alright? Tell you that I understand? Because I don’t. I really, truly
don't.

“I don’t understand how you could brag about Bill being head boy and Charlie being a
dragon-tamer, how you could champion Percy – perfect prefect Percy, who pretends he
doesn’t even know any of us – and then turn around and tell me that my dreams are rubbish.
That I should just give up on them and pursue something that you think worth my time.
“Well mum,” Fred said gesturing broadly and laughing a little hysterically, realising only then
that hot tears were stinging the corners of his eyes. He blinked rapidly, refusing to let them
fall. “You were wrong, they weren’t rubbish. And I am happy, and I am successful, and I
have a woman that I love more than the sun and all the bloody stars, and I am done seeking
approval from you, because I can see now that I was never going to get it.”

Chest heaving, he let his hands fall limply to his sides as he looked at his mother, the sad,
grief-stricken expression on her face. And it was then that he felt pity for her. Not because of
anything he’d said, and not because he didn’t mean it, but because there were clearly things
that she needed to work through, and they didn’t have anything to do with him.

“I’m sorry about your brothers, mum, I really am. I know it must have been hard to see so
much of them in us. But we aren’t them, and putting the weight of their ghosts on our
shoulders wasn’t fair of you.”

Molly swallowed hard and, once again, brushed the tears from her cheeks before she took her
handbag from the couch beside her and got to her feet.

She made for the door, stopping a few feet in front of him with an earnest look on her face.

“You’re mad at me, and you have every right to be. But I’m not going to stop trying, Fred.
And no matter what you might think, I love you. And I am so, so proud of you.”

Fred took a deep breath, gritted his teeth together, and nodded once at her before she turned
and made for the door. As she placed her hand on the knob, he finally spoke.

“Who was it that killed them? Fabion and Gideon.”

He didn’t know, and hadn’t ever thought to ask. His mother turned, a somewhat surprised
expression on her swollen, ruddy face. But she answered him.

“They weren’t sure precisely, but Albus told me that the ambush was led by Dolohov.
Antonin Dolohov.”

Fred was sitting on the sofa some time later, just staring at the rug between his feet and
processing the conversation. Everything his mother had told him, and everything he’d said to
her, when soft footsteps approached from behind and the cushion to his right sank.

“How much of that did you hear?” He asked after a spell, his voice gravelly.

“Enough,” Angelina said, shrugging in his periphery. “I tried to block it out, but my wand
was out here and the two of you didn’t bother to put up silencing charms.”

Fred silently bobbed his head and, in a true contradiction of character, Crookshanks emerged
from beneath the armchair across the room and came over to nudge his head against Fred’s
shin. Fred thought about reaching down and scratching behind his ears, but that seemed like
it might be pushing his luck.
“Your girlfriend has naughty books,” Angelina blurted suddenly and Fred, thoroughly startled
by the comment, turned to look at her with an incredulous expression. Angie just nodded
sagely, her eyes fixed somewhere distant. “All throbbing rods of velvet-wrapped steel and
rosy nipples and quivering quims. I’m not a blushing virgin, but that was some harrowing
shit.”

Fred just blinked at her. Once. Twice. And then he was laughing. It started as a snort and
descended into great guffaws that shook his shoulders and made his stomach ache. Then,
slowly, the laughing stopped, and his eyes were burning for an entirely different reason again.
And for the first time since Hermione had left, Fred began to cry.

Because he fucking missed her. He missed her smile and her laugh and the comfort of her
presence. He missed how she always knew exactly what to say to him, what to do to make it
better, even when it seemed like the very foundations of his world were crumbling. He
missed the peace she offered him, without expectation or reproach. He missed her.

Angelina didn’t say anything, didn't utter a single word. She just sat there quietly, her and
Crookshanks the sole witnesses to his inevitable, overdue unraveling. She simply reached
out, placed her hand lightly on his shoulder, and let him cry.
 Magic is might
Chapter Notes

Reminder:

Reg Cattermole = Ron Weasley

Mafalda Hopkins = Hermione Granger

Albert Runcorn = Harry Potter

You = Adorable

2 September 1997
“Magic is might,” Ron – currently disguised as one Reg Cattermole – murmured to himself
as he, with a similarly disguised Harry and Hermione, stood in front of the statue in the
atrium of the Ministry of Magic.

“Muggles,” Hermione whispered hollowly, eying the deformed, contorted bodies that made
the foundation of the monstrosity with something dangerously close to rage simmering in her
blood. She swallowed and lifted her chin, letting that anger freeze and set into something
harder. Something far more useful than simple hatred. “In their rightful place.”

Harry, stoic, gave her sleeve a light tug and the three of them waded into the flow of traffic,
away from the statue and toward the bustling lifts.

Hermione took a deep breath, in through her nose and out past pursed lips, like she was
blowing out the candles on a birthday cake. They could do this; all they had to do was locate
Umbridge, find out where the locket was, adjust her memory if necessary, and replace said
locket with a decoy.

It was a simple plan, but one they’d been working toward for weeks, lurking in the shadows
and watching. Waiting. They could do this.

She managed to convince herself of that right up until Corban Yaxley abruptly stepped in
front of them, blocking the entrance to the lift that they were waiting for.

“I requested somebody from Magical Maintenance to sort out my office, Cattermole. It’s still
raining in there.”

Hermione watched the color leech from Ron’s face as he began to visibly flounder, her mind
racing. Yaxley said something else, but she barely heard it.

Raining in his office.

Raining in his office.

Raining in his –

“Attend to it Cattermole,” Yaxley finished dismissively as he made to step into the lift they’d
been waiting for. “Or your wife’s blood status will be in even greater doubt than it is now. I
don’t have to remind you that her trial is scheduled for this morning.”

Ron had turned from pale to a sickly shade of green by the time the three of them were
ensconced in their own lift, blessedly and briefly alone.

“What am I going to do?” Ron asked, frantically looking from Harry to Hermione and then
back again. “If I don’t turn up, my wife – I mean, Cattermole’s wife – “

“We’ll come with you,” Harry reassured gamely, Ron bobbing his head in enthusiastic
agreement before Hermione cut in.

“No, we won’t,” she said sharply, shooting Harry a look. His penchant for altruism was not
going to ruin this. “There isn’t time for that. Ron, listen to me very closely. If the rain in
Yaxley’s office is what I think it is, the counterspell is Meteolojinx Recanto.”

“Wh - how could you possibly know that?” Harry asked, raising thick brows that didn’t
belong to him. “You can’t just know all of the spells, Hermione.”

She allowed herself a stolen, impish smirk. “I know it because I was there when George came
up with the product that it counteracts. I didn’t know they had it in production already,
though. Say it back to me now, Ron, quickly. We don’t have much time.”

He said it more or less correctly twice in a row just before the lift doors opened and a heavily
whiskered man stepped inside, pulling Harry into a conversation that he managed to follow
with a fair amount of success.

They nudged Ron off on level two a few minutes later and then, upon reaching level one,
they came face to face with a toadlike woman wearing a pink, velvet bow in her hair.
Hermione almost smiled.

Brilliant.

“Ah, Mafalda,” Dolores Umbridge greeted her. “Travers sent you, did he?”

Harry bristled, but Hermione didn’t miss a beat. “He did,” she replied in a compliant tone,
deferentially stepping aside.

“Good, good. You’ll do fine.” Umbridge stepped in and then turned to the man beside her,
and it took Hermione a moment to identify him as the shell who was supposedly their
Minister of Magic. Umbridge idly read names from a clipboard, people to be tried that
morning for various charges concerning ‘magical theft.’ Hermione noted that Ron’s – Reg’s –
wife was, indeed, among them.

“We’ll head straight down, Mafalda. Everything you’ll need is waiting for you in the
courtroom.” Umbridge turned to Harry as the lift doors opened again, looking at him
expectantly. “Aren’t you getting out, Albert?”

“Oh, right, of course,” he stammered, looking at Hermione with recklessly undisguised

anxiety. Umbridge thankfully didn’t see it, nose buried in her clipboard once more.

It was clear on his face that Harry thought she couldn’t handle this one her own, that she was
out of her depth. But this was precisely what they were there to do, and Umbridge, unwitting
though she was, had walked right in and given them an opening they’d have otherwise had to
search for. So, as the grate began to shut and the lift prepared to move, Hermione shot Harry
the barest flicker of a wink.

“Such a disgrace,” Umbridge tutted as they were rocked into motion once more. “The wife of
a ministry employee, one of our very own.”

“Oh, indeed, Madam,” Hermione agreed solemnly, her eyes fixed forward as the lift rocketed
through space. “Tragic, really.”
She began to play out her options, watching them on a reel in her mind. If the two men
behind them, still deep in conversation, got off on a different floor, she was fairly certain she
could stun Umbridge and the Minister and freeze the lift before they knew what was
happening. Timing, it would be all about timing. She let out a breath and wrapped her fingers
around the wand stowed in her pocket, tracing the familiar grooves along its hilt.

Umbridge continued prattling on until the lift doors finally opened and the two men behind
them did indeed step past and get off. Just as two more stepped on, wearing the same robes as
Umbridge and clearly headed to the same place that they were. Damnit.

“Parkman, Towers,” Dolores nodded at each in turn.

Subduing two unsuspecting people would be easy. Three would be pushing it. Four would be
reckless.

Hermione bit the inside of her cheek and resisted the urge to swear; she was going to need
another plan.

“If you struggle, you will be subjected to the Dementor’s Kiss,” Umbridge repeated for the
third time since they’d settled in the drafty, dank chamber that was serving as a courtroom.
Though to call the space a courtroom would imply it might be a place where something
resembling justice occurred, and that was most certainly not the case. In truth it was more
like a dungeon, dark and far more accustomed to suffering than integrity.

What was worse, Umbridge made the comment casually. As if she’d ordered it done before.
As if it weren’t one of the most abhorrent, unthinkable things that a human being could
endure.

The man being dragged from the room screamed in spite of the warning, begging his
innocence, and it rang in Hermione’s ears like a chorus with all of those who’d previously
occupied his space in the center of the chamber. All of those that would go on to occupy it
before this nightmare was through.

She’d listened to their stories, heard how agonisingly similar they were to her own. A
summertime visit from a peculiarly dressed professor; a trip to a wonderous place with owls
swooping overhead and racing broomsticks displayed in the shoppe windows; a wand coming
to life in their hands for the very first time.

A life that had chosen her as much as she had chosen it.

It wasn’t an idle threat, either. The horde of dark clouds swarming and twisting overhead,
outside a bubble of silver magic, made it all too real. Hermione had no choice but to allow
herself to think of things she wouldn’t otherwise, given the circumstances. Warm, familiar
thoughts that kept the darkness at bay and her mind clear.

Leather binding beneath her fingers.

A warm cup of coffee.

Boundless blue eyes watching her. Always, always watching her.

She blinked, pulling herself back to reality again. They were running out of time. She had no
idea what had become of Ron or Harry, but she knew that they would be fools to attempt this
same ruse again. There would not be a better chance.

Hermione’s eyes flicked to the gold chain around Umbridge’s neck, catching the dim light
and winking at her like it knew why she was there. She could feel it when she’d settled into
the bench beside Umbridge, and she knew Harry’s search of the woman’s office would be
fruitless. The thing they were looking for was right beside her, mere inches away.

“Next – Mary Cattermole,” called Umbridge, and Hermione watched as a slender, terrified
woman got to her feet. She passed the dementors guarding the door and Hermione could
practically see her heart pounding frantically in her chest.

It was behind Mrs. Cattermole, though, that Hermione caught the briefest flash of a shadow
near the base of the steps. Anyone else might disregard it, but she was not everybody else.
Harry was there, under his cloak.

Hermione’s spine stiffened and, as sympathetic as she was to Mrs. Cattermole’s plight, she
realised with a rush that she was out of time. Not because of the Polyjuice, though that was
certainly an increasingly critical factor, but because Harry would not be able to stop himself
from acting if he saw the things that she’d just spent the better part of an hour bearing witness
to.

The stomach-churning injustice. The obvious way that these people, these desperate, piteous
people, had already been condemned.

Besides the dementors, the biggest problem would be Corban Yaxley, the bookend opposite
her on Umbridge’s other side. He’d joined them shortly before the proceedings began, much
to her irritation. The other members of the court were hardly awake, and she was fairly
certain that their priorities began and ended with their own skins.

Hermione, still dutifully taking notes with her right hand, very slowly drew her wand from
her robes with her left, shifting to cross her legs, tucking it between the folds of her skirt, and
carefully angling behind Umbridge’s back until it was pointed at Yaxley’s hip.

It wasn’t the plan they had discussed, and it was crossing innumerable lines that Harry would
surely protest, but there were far greater things at stake than his opinion of her if they did not
get what they came for. So, Hermione took another deep breath and exhaled, concentrating in
a way she never had before and hoping she had the conviction to actually carry out what she
was planning to do.

Imperio.

The magic felt immediately and viscerally wrong, like grease that was slicked on her fingers
and refused to wash away. The tip of her quill trembled and black ink blotted messily on the
parchment, but Umbridge didn’t notice, her beady eyes fixed cruelly, eagerly, on the woman
unraveling before them. Pleading for her life and the lives of her children.
It wasn’t difficult to subdue Corban Yaxley’s mind – in fact, Hermione had long theorised
that very few of Voldemort’s followers would possess the self-actualisation to resist this sort
of magic. They were, after all, followers.

Cold sweat beaded at the nape of her neck and her stomach churned as she maneuvered
Yaxley like a marionette, her own force of will the sole driving force behind his actions.

Draw your wand.

He obeyed, keeping his glazed eyes fixed forward. The words echoed in her head, but nobody
else noticed. Nobody blinked. Nobody watched. They were too distracted by the woman
sobbing loudly in the center of the chamber.

Stand.

Yaxley got smoothly to his feet. He was not a large man, but he towered over Umbridge’s
squat, seated form, and it did not take long for her to stop speaking and look up at him in
confusion.

“Corban, what are you doing? Sit back down this instant.”

Hermione shut her eyes and, not for the first time that morning, wished that she was
somewhere else.

Kill her.

She expected the killing curse itself, prepared for the flash of green light, but it seemed that
whatever part of Yaxley’s mind she had in her grip favored other methods. Just as Umbridge
moved to grab her wand, realising too late that something was terribly wrong, Yaxley flicked
his wrist and cut her throat.

A warm, wet spray of metallic blood spattered Hermione’s face, and the stunned scream that
slipped from her lips was genuine. She dropped the imperious curse and Yaxley stumbled
back, dazed and looking around as the chamber in its entirety began to panic.

Harry, somewhere behind her, threw his cloak off in the confusion as people started to run for
the doors and the magical barrier between them and the dementors began to flicker, directly
tied to Umbridge’s waning magic.

Then Albert Runcorn, dutiful member of the ministry that he was, stunned Corban Yaxley
while Mafalda Hopkins, alarmed bystander, crouched beside Dolores Umbridge, who was
clutching her thick throat and gurgling her final breaths.

Mafalda made a show of checking the poor woman’s pulse with shaking hands, but tragically
there was nothing to be done. And if she reached down and unclasped the golden chain
around the dying woman’s neck, slipping the heavy locket into the inner pocket of her robes,
not a single person would have noticed.

Hermione paused then and looked into the witch’s eyes as the light slowly faded from them,
and she tried to feel remorse for taking this life. Truly, she did. But the man’s screams from
earlier and Mary Cattermole’s sobbing still echoed in her ears, and it was simply a little too
loud to hear her conscience.

Hermione straightened as Harry reached her side.

“What did you do?” He asked her, the look on his face stunned as he regarded her. Stunned,
and maybe a little something else. Maybe a little disturbed. Maybe even a little afraid. “W-
what did you do?”

Hermione stared right back, Umbridge’s blood still cooling on her skin and growing sticky on
her hands.

“I got the locket,” she replied simply, before stepping past him and heading quickly for the
doors. The chamber was empty by then, and she could feel the moment that Umbridge’s
lingering magic gave out. Like a veil dropping, the dementors began to advance on them and
ice nipped at her skin while a foul, rotting odor overpowered her senses.

Harry made his way to Mary Cattermole, forgotten in the center of the room and staring in
shock at Umbridge and Yaxley, prone behind the benches they’d been seated at.

“EXPECTO –“

“No!” Hemione lunged forward and pushed the tip of Harry’s wand toward the floor. He had
perhaps the most recognisable patronus in all of Wizarding Britain and, as of this moment,
they were nothing more than a pair of confused, shaken ministry employees. They needed to
stay that way for as long as they possibly could.

Hermione raised her own wand toward the onslaught of billowing black cloaks approaching
them.

Lips brushing the bare, scarred skin between her breasts.

The taste of firewhiskey as a clock struck midnight.

A silver key pressed into her palm.

“Expecto patronum,” Hermione said clearly, the otter bursting from the tip of her wand the
brightest and most clearly defined it had ever been. It dove forward, diverting the throng and
reestablishing a barrier as Harry grabbed Mary Cattermole’s forearm and began to tow her
along with them, out of the chamber and into the corridor.

Hermione glanced sideways at him, but he didn’t look at her. The only people remaining in
the hall, save for a couple pale-faced members of the court, were the muggleborns still
awaiting their own trials. They had stayed seated exactly as they were, obviously confused
about what was going on, but too scared to move for fear of what might happen to them.
What might happen to their families.

No, Hermione didn’t feel much remorse at all.

Her silver otter diligently kept the dementors contained while Harry, in an
uncharacteristically deep voice, addressed the crowd.

“It’s been decided that you should all go home and go into hiding with your families,” he
began and Hermione had to resist rubbing her temples. “Go abroad if you can. Just get well
away from the ministry. That’s the new – er – official position. Now, you can follow us to
exit through the Atrium.”

They got to their feet, looking even more confused than when they had emerged, and a few
shot Hermione nervous glances. She raised her wand and deftly cleared the blood from her
face, schooling it into a numb, frightened mien. Harry was just about to call a lift when one
clanged to a halt in front of them, depositing Ron.

Within seconds, he was nearly tackled by a hysterical Mary Cattermole.

“Reg! Oh Merlin, you’re alright. Yaxley just – just murdered Dolores Umbridge, right in the
middle of my trial. I don’t know what came over him, it was horrible. Runcorn told us to
leave the country. We should, we really should. Oh, Reg, let’s go home and fetch the children,
quickly. We can head down to Dover, to my parents, and wh–why are you wet?”

“Rain,” Ron said noncommittally, extracting himself from her embrace as best he could as he
looked over her head to Harry and Hermione with concern. “Murder?”

“Later,” Hermione replied tightly before Harry could speak. “Everything alright?”

“Yeah, the spell you gave me worked. Just took a while to find you after.”

“Good. Let’s get moving, it won’t be long before someone comes down here to see what’s
happening.”

Harry turned toward the silent assemblage waiting against the wall, opposite the lifts.

“Who has wands?”

About half raised their hands, some holding their wands forward as if he were asking so that
he could take them.

“Pair up,” he ordered, in the voice of someone better suited for leading than she. “Everyone
who doesn’t have a wand, stay close to someone that does.”

They did as ordered, and then everyone crammed into two lifts, Mary Cattermole still
whispering to her presumed husband about fleeing the country.

Hermione kept her eyes fixed on the brass gate, waiting for it to open and fingers flexing
around her wand. Harry didn’t notice it, but she also kept a hand wrapped in his robes. If the
place locked down before they could make it to the exit, they still had an out. The thin silver
chain around her neck burned warmly, a contrast to the repulsive weight of the locket in her
robes.

“Level eight,” the discorporate voice said coolly. “Atrium.”

Her pulse quickened as the doors of the lift opened and Hermione knew immediately that
they were in trouble. Ministry workers were running from fireplace to fireplace, shutting the
grates and sealing off the floo network.

“Bloody hell,” Ron murmured hollowly from beside her. “What are we going to do?”

Her mind was racing again, trying to come up with any alternative, any at all, that didn’t take
them to the shop via her portkey, but as each floo closed, it felt like another option
disappeared.

“STOP!” Harry thundered suddenly, Albert Runcorn stepping in front of her and addressing
those working on the floo network. He wiggled his fingers at his side and Hermione and Ron
followed him, shuffling and herding the muggleborns along like sheep.

“What’s going on, Albert?” A dark-skinned, balding wizard asked. He looked nervous.

“This lot need to leave before you seal the exits,” Harry said, gesturing toward the
assemblage behind him. The wizards who’d been working on the floos slowed and glanced
between themselves.

“Someone was killed, we’ve been told to seal all the exits and not let anyone –“

“Are you contradicting me?” Harry demanded and, for a second, she genuinely forgot that it
was him. He truly seemed the cold, unyielding man that he was pretending to be. “You know
what I did to Dirk Cresswell. Would you like me to have your family tree examined next?”

The man stepped back, eyes instantly fearful, and just like that, the muggleborns began to
flee through the last few open grates.

“Mary!” A voice called desperately from behind them, and Hermione turned in time to see
Reg Cattermole, the real Reg Cattermole, come running toward them from the lifts.

Mary looked between him and Ron, and Hermione swore aloud. It was at precisely that
moment that another lift arrived on the other side of the atrium, the gates opening to reveal a
horde of DMLE employees.

“SEAL THOSE LIFTS NOW!” the man at the front shouted at them as onlookers scattered
and pressed into the walls.

Harry moved quickly as the balding man began to raise his wand, punching him squarely in
the jaw and sending him to the ground, unconscious. The other employees finished shutting
every other grate, save for the one directly behind them, and then melted into the crowd.

“He was helping the muggleborns escape!” Ron shouted, gesturing at the unconscious man,
but it didn’t slow their approach. As they got closer, Hermione recognised the figure at the
front – it was Yaxley, already revived and looking positively furious.

He raised his wand, aiming it at Harry until Hermione stepped between them and directly into
its path.
“INCENDIO!”

A white-hot wall of flame erupted between them, carving an arch around the last open floo,
with the three of them and the Cattermoles on one side, and Yaxley and the DMLE on the
other.

“GO,” she ordered over her shoulder, backing toward the hearth and noting only as they
stepped in that Harry and Ron had stunned the Cattermoles and were dragging them along.

Hermione turned her head and met Yaxley’s eyes through the inferno, his arm raised to shield
himself from the searing heat. And she felt as her face began to shift back, features
rearranging and wild curls springing free from Mafalda Hopkin’s demure bun. The last thing
she saw before she blasted the floo into rubble behind them was his enraged, shocked face as
he realised precisely who he was letting escape.

They arrived back in the toilet cubicle in a crushing tangle of limbs, Harry and Hermione
supporting Mary Cattermole and Ron with the real Reg Cattermole draped over his shoulder.
They carefully dragged the two limp bodies into the corner of the lavatory, beside the rubbish
bin.

“We need to go,” Hermione panted, grabbing for the boys’ robes and intending to apparate on
the spot, but Harry leaned away from her grip.

“We should make sure they’re okay,” Harry said stubbornly.

“There’s no time,” she said, looking desperately to Ron for reinforcement. Before he could
answer there was a flushing sound and a bang, and the cubicle door beside them flew off the
hinges to reveal Yaxley.

“HARRY!” Hermione screamed, throwing herself into her friend as Yaxley lunged for them.
She felt Ron grab for her shoulder and she turned on the spot, once again pulled into
darkness.

It wasn’t until pain flared in her leg that she realised something was wrong. Beyond the usual
discomfort of apparating, a vice gripped her ankle so hard it felt like the bones were going to
crack. Everything went blurry, upside down and backwards as the world twisted around them
like a kaleidoscope. She felt Ron’s grip on her shoulder start to slip, knowing that she
couldn’t grab him without letting go of Harry. And she couldn’t let go of Harry.

Hermione couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t think. For the barest of seconds, the front door of
Grimmauld Place came into view, and she felt Harry pull toward it, but she tugged him back
hard.

In a blind panic, she kicked her free foot toward the pain in her ankle. It connected and there
was a grunt as the pressure disappeared and Hermione threw them backwards, away from
Grimmauld Place. The last thing she heard as they spun away and back into darkness was a
choked, agonised scream.
Hermione regained consciousness in a rush, twigs and rocks digging into her back while her
ankle and head brutally throbbed. She sat up so fast that the world spun again, searching
frantically until she saw Harry a few feet away, unconscious but otherwise intact.

On her other side, a little further away, was a crumpled form and a shock of ginger hair. The
canopy over them rustled in the unseasonably warm breeze and Hermione watched in
uncomprehending shock as the light caught on a dark shadow, creeping slowly outward from
around the body.

“Ron? RON!!” Hermione screamed, hands scrabbling in the blood-soaked dirt as she dove
forward and crawled toward him. With as much care as she could manage, she gripped his
shoulder and rolled him toward her and onto his back.

His complexation resembled chalk, and his lips were a greyish blue. She couldn’t see where
the blood was coming from, only that it was coming fast and from beneath his shirt.

Hermione reached into the pockets of her stollen robes and pulled out her small, beaded bag.
Yanking at the drawstring, she didn’t take the time to recover her wand, just reached her hand
out.

“Accio!” Three small phials obediently flew out of the bag and into her palm. With shaking
fingers, she unstopped one and pressed it to the swell of Ron’s lower lip, clumsily trying to
prop him on her knee. Her ankle screamed at the awkward angle as she pushed it into the
ground, but it was drowned out by the panic thrumming in her chest. Ron groaned, but
managed to drink most of it, briefly diminishing his chances of bleeding to death.

She put her hand out and summoned her wand to her, buried in the leaf litter some distance
away. As soon as she had it, she began cutting away Ron’s robes and his shirt until the
mangled, twisted skin of his shoulder came into view.

“Harry, wake up! WAKE UP!!” She screamed over her shoulder and her voice echoed
through the trees, beginning to unstop another phial and decant the shimmering liquid over
the worst of Ron’s wounds. His lips parted in a silent scream that came out as more of a gasp,
his whole body jerking and shuddering. “I know, I’m sorry,” she murmured, using what few
healing spells she’d mastered to begin closing the smaller lacerations. It was slow, tedious
work that she wasn’t at all accustomed to doing.

She was at it for a while before comprehending that the flickers of white that she could see as
she periodically cleared away the blood were bone. Every so often she would shout over her
shoulder to Harry, to no avail.

“W-what happened?” A shaking voice finally asked from behind her. Hermione finished the
spell she was casting before answering.

“Ron got splinched,” she said tightly. “I need you to get me another bottle of blood
replenisher from my bag, and then start putting up the wards. Now, Harry. We’re exposed out
here.”
Hermione was surprised at the level, sure direction that she gave him because she certainly
didn’t feel calm. She felt as if her skin was crawling, pure adrenaline combined with
something else. Something primal in her that responded to the sight of that much blood
coming from somebody that she cared about.

She didn’t know how long Harry was gone, only that he eventually came back and knelt
across from her. He didn’t say anything, nor did he offer to take over. He couldn’t if he
wanted to, he hadn’t studied the same healing spells that she had. He hadn’t thought it worth
the time.

Ron faded in and out of consciousness, sometimes responding and flinching at her
ministrations and other times ignoring them entirely.

Hermione felt herself begin to flag as she healed the last of the wounds that she felt
comfortable closing. There were others, but they cut into sinew and tendons that, if healed
improperly, could permanently inhibit his mobility. For better or worse, nature would need to
take its course on the rest.

She placed a barrier charm on what remained and wrapped it in clean gauze, binding his arm
tightly to his chest so he couldn’t move it upon waking. Then she administered one last blood
replenisher, followed by Wiggenweld and dreamless sleep, and sat back.

Lifting her hand to clear the hair and sweat from her brow, Hermione froze, seeing that it was
coated in rust-coloured blood and dirt. She raised the other one and looked at them both,
trembling.

And she realised that she didn’t even know precisely whose blood it was caked beneath her
nails and between her fingers, drying in the creases of her knuckles. It could be Ron’s or
Umbridge’s. Friend’s or foe’s. She stared and stared and stared at them until they swam in her
vision, the edges blurring and blending in with the leaves and branches littering the ground.

Harry had just begun to speak when, without warning, Hermione turned and managed to
crawl a couple feet away before vomiting the contents of her stomach onto the forest floor. It
had been hours since she’d eaten anything, and sour bile burned her throat. Her stomach
rolled and her eyes stung as cool, clumsy fingers scooped the curls away from her face.

Harry knelt behind her and cleared the sick away with a murmured spell when she finished.
Hermione couldn’t help it, she collapsed backward into his chest, tears of anger and fear and
pain spilling onto her cheeks, the latter both physical and yet also soul-deep.

“It’s okay,” Harry said quietly, hugging her to him, but he was wrong. He was so very, very
wrong. Nothing was okay. Ron was hurt beyond her ability to mend, Grimmauld Place was
lost to them, and in the span of an hour, she’d both taken a life and saved one.

In that moment, Hermione wondered if things would every truly be okay again. She
wondered at what point she’d become a god, with the right to make decisions about who
lived and who died.

She shifted her weight and her ankle flared, a shuddering gasp breaking through her sobs.
“What is it?” Harry asked, looking around them, immediately on alert.

“Just-just my ankle,” Hermione replied, swiping her sleeve over her face. She awkwardly
stuck her leg out in front of her and could immediately see that it was swollen. She took her
shoe off and carefully tore away the foot of her nylons, rolling them back until the mottled
purple skin of her ankle came into view.

“Bloody hell,” Harry swore, leaning forward for a closer look. “Are those -?”

“Fingers,” Hermione finished desolately, examining the darkest bruises, where Yaxley’s
fingers had wrapped around the joint and bitten into her skin. “Can you get the bruise balm
from my bag?”

Harry did as she asked and Hermione opened the small jar, beginning to smear the ointment
on her tender skin. The application was painful, but the relief was nearly immediate.

“What happened?” Harry asked.

“Yaxley got ahold of me,” Hermione said. “I tried to take us back to Grimmauld, but he saw,
Harry. He saw and we – we can’t go back there again. Not until all of this is over.”

She could see the argument on his lips, the desperate hope that perhaps that wasn’t the case
and she was wrong, but something on her face must have told him this was not the time to
start an argument.

“Can you get the tent set up?” Hermione asked quietly, crab-walking backward until her
shoulders hit the trunk of a large beech tree. She leaned back and propped against it,
uncomfortable but solid.

Harry examined her silently for a long moment and then nodded, getting up without further
comment and heading to retrieve it from her bag.

A bird chittered loudly overhead, and Hermione looked up just in time to see a flash of white
as a magpie on the branch above her took flight. She tipped her head back against the rough
bark of the tree trunk, shut her eyes, and tried very hard not to feel anything at all.
 Acts of rebellion
Chapter Notes

I don't know that this necessarily necessitates a trigger warning, but in erring on the side
of caution, there is some unwanted, unsolicited physical contact in this chapter. It's brief
and not inherently sexual, but decidedly uncomfy for the character involved.

If you want details and don't care about spoilers, skip to the end notes.

See the end of the chapter for more notes

18 September 1997

Hermione’s teeth skimmed along his jaw as she rode him, hips rocking up and then grinding
back down again in a painfully perfect pace.
“Touch me,” she exhaled softly beneath his ear, warm breath making him shiver. His fingers
dug into her hips, urging her forward as he pressed up into her again and again. “Please, Fred,
please touch me.”

He slipped a hand between them.

“Please.”

He moved his fingers back and forth, until she was squeezing so tightly around him that he
couldn’t think straight, couldn’t feel anything else.

“Please.”

She was so fucking close, he could taste her. Smell her. Everything was Hermione, if he could
just -

“Please!”

Fred quietly groaned his release as his hand flexed against the cold tile of the shower wall,
the other fisting his hard cock. Warm water ran in rivulets down his tensed back and steam
swirled, clouding the room.

Too quickly the image faded, and he was left feeling satisfied and yet wholly… not. He
flexed the stiff muscles of his forearm and then turned, ducking his head back beneath the
water and willing it to wash away the frustration. As anticipated, it did not work.

With a sigh, he finished up and turned off the tap. Once he was dry and dressed, he made his
way into the kitchen to find Lee, jovially munching on a bag of crisps and leafing through an
old tabloid.

“Ready?" he said, looking up as Fred entered. "I think everyone else is already down there.”

“Yeah, let’s go,” Fred replied, following Lee toward the door that led down to the shop. His
eyes caught on a copy of the Prophet laid across the dining table and he slowed. Every few
days they ran the same front page – the same two photos, with some variation of the same
headline.

“WANTED FOR QUESTIONING: UNDESIRABLE No. 1,” the paper declared, directly
above a picture of Harry. And right beside it, over a photo of the very witch he’d just been
fantasizing about, read the words, “UNDERSIRABLE No. 2.”

The date in the corner offered an unwelcome reminder that it was nearly her birthday.

It had been over two weeks since the incident at The Ministry. The Patronus had been an ill-
advised impulse, brought about by blind fear after receiving one from his father, explaining
the barest details of what had happened in the immediate aftermath.

It was too much, too achingly similar to that night the year prior. He’d been in the workroom
again, this time alone, and he couldn’t reconcile the unknown. He forgot about the bracelets,
he forgot all sound logic, and had simply sent it. To report back if she was okay. To see if she
was alive, if nothing else.

The thing about patronuses, even to those of particular skill, was that they weren’t terribly
forthcoming with details. So, when the silver magpie returned, offering a nod and nothing
more before vanishing, all it really did was give his mind leeway to think about all of the
other things that could have gone wrong.

Hermione’s short message a few hours later helped some. “You probably heard, we’re okay.
Love you.”

“I love you,” he sent back, murmuring aloud as he did so. And for the first time, in the dark
isolation of his bedroom, it didn’t feel like enough.

“Coming, mate?” Lee interrupted his train of thought and Fred looked up from the paper and
back to his friend, who wore a slightly concerned expression as he watched him.

“Yeah,” he said again, mentally shaking himself and following Lee through the vacant shop
and into the basement storeroom. They rounded the last corner of the labyrinth and the din of
dueling and conversation, backed by the ever-present radio broadcast, broke through the
silencing charms.

“Wotcher,” Tonks greeted, propped against the shelves and presiding over things in
Kingsley’s absence. She looked exhausted and had taken to sitting out the duels recently,
letting Remus take her place most nights – though he wasn’t present just then.

She claimed it was because of morning sickness, which was a legitimate issue that had been
spectacularly validated on more than one occasion, but Fred thought it had more to do with
her father’s departure the week prior.

After what happened at the Ministry, the persecution of known muggle-borns had grown
increasingly volatile, and Ted Tonks ultimately decided that he was putting his family in
more danger than necessary by remaining.

Bill and Fleur offered to take him in at Shell Cottage, one of the Order’s last remaining safe
houses, but he’d refused, citing the same rationality.

“You can pair up with Oliver,” Tonks directed, gesturing toward the far end of the room
where Ollie hugged the wall, watching Bill and Angelina go at it. Fred just nodded as Lee
joined Verity. He couldn’t be certain, but given the frequency with which it happened he was
starting to think that Tonks was playing matchmaker in an effort to distract herself.

“Fred,” Oliver greeted, clapping him on the shoulder. The wireless droned on in the corner
near them, detailing raids and supposed Ministry victories.

“Hey Ollie,” Fred replied, searching his childhood friend’s demeanor. It was much the same
as Tonks’ – as his own, he reckoned. Somnolent eyes, slightly slumped shoulders, and…
something else. Something more than physical, that spoke to sleepless nights and a weariness
that transcended blood and bone. It was a look that he saw more and more recently.
“D’you wanna start, or should I?”

“I’ll go first,” Fred offered, taking several long paces back while Oliver did the same. He was
jittery and distracted and frankly eager for the outlet. They gave one another a quick bow
and, without additional preamble, began.

It was a fairly even fight. Fred took the first two matches while Oliver overcame him in the
third, transfiguring a small divot in the ground and sending him sprawling.

“Do you want to take a break?” Oliver asked, extending a hand and pulling him up. The other
duels waged on around them and Fred shook his head.

“No, let’s go again.”

He felt bad for the edge of frustration in his voice because it wasn’t directed at Oliver, it
wasn’t really directed at anything in particular, save for circumstance. A tinny voice broke in
on the radio as Celestina Warbeck’s latest release came to an end.

Fred brushed his hands on his trousers, tugged his sleeves up to his elbows, and then cast
first, sending a bright blue stinging charm at Oliver.

“Six persons wanted for magical theft were apprehended outside of Dover this morning –“

Another spell left his wand.

“- still wanted for questioning following the murder of ministry official Dolores Umbridge –“

Another.

“- not be approached and should be considered dangerous –“

Another.

“- spotted outside of Wrexham two days ago -“

Another.

“ – Ministry feels confident that the suspects will be apprehended soon –“

Another.

“- and always remember, Magic is Might.”

Another.

Sweat beaded at his temple and he realised then that Oliver wasn’t casting back anymore,
only deflecting and shielding the barrage of spells being hurled at him in rapid, blinding
succession. He’d been forced backward, his heels nearly touching the earthen wall.

Fred hesitated, glancing around and recognising only then that the other duels had stopped as
well, all eyes turned toward the two of them.
Oliver, cheeks flushed and wand still raised, jerked his chin at Fred, bidding him to continue.
A flicker of red revealed a shallow cut on his bicep where his shirt had been sliced open.

“Go on,” Oliver said gamely, expression determined and jaw tight. He motioned for Fred to
continue but, chest heaving, Fred lowered his arm. That fire, whatever it was that had
possessed him, was entirely gone.

Then he just… stood there, a little forlorn. Perhaps a bit lost, like he wasn’t quite sure how
he’d ended up there.

“Lee, go turn off the radio,” Verity said quietly, nudging her own dueling partner.

Fred didn’t know how long they all remained, silent and unmoving, before he spoke.

“It’s not enough, is it?”

Fleur shook her head in his periphery, but it was Tonks who pushed off the shelf and joined
him, one hand resting protectively over her still-flat midsection.

“It’s all we can do,” she said evenly, looking up at him without needing clarification as to
what he meant. He’d resent the pity he saw in her face if he wasn’t feeling the same thing for
her.

“I can’t believe that,” Angelina chimed in with a huff. “Fred’s right; I can’t believe that there
isn’t something more we could be doing.”

“What, you’d like to go on raids?” Tonks asked, turning and rounding on her. “Hunt down
Death Eaters and beat them back in the name of light and righteousness? I’m sure you’ll
make lovely martyrs, but the thing about martyrs is that they’re bloody dead.”

All attention was on Tonks now, who, despite what she was saying, sounded as unsatisfied by
the answer as Fred felt. She shut her eyes and took a deep breath before continuing.

“We don’t have the intel. We don't have the people. We don’t have the resources. Hell, we
don’t even have somewhere to put the bastards if we did manage to capture them; most of our
safehouses have been raided and are being watched. Every single one of you is being
watched. We are outnumbered and entirely outmatched.”

“So we just stay here and do nothing?” Fred asked, resisting the urge to chuck his wand
across the room. “Order takeaway and play at dueling a few nights a week while she’s out
there – ?“

Fred caught his slip as he said it, and Tonks’ frustration melted back to compassion.

“It’s all we can do,” she said again firmly, and Fred’s shoulders sagged. He lifted his hands
and ground the heels of his palms into his eyes until all he saw were white starbursts.

“But… what if it’s not?” Lee murmured, seemingly to himself. He was still standing beside
the now-silent wireless, staring at it thoughtfully and lightly drumming a finger on the top.
Lee looked up after a long second, visibly shaken as he realised that he was now the center of
attention. “Er, that is to say, what if there was another way to fight back? One less likely to
result in our swift and collective demise.”

When nobody said anything, Tonks nodded at him and Lee, encouraged, continued.

“We know that Harry and Ron and – and Hermione are out there, doing whatever it is that
they’re doing to try and end all of this. We know that, the people in this room and a few
others, but nobody else does. All they know is that their friends and loved ones are being torn
from their homes and worse, while the Prophet and the Merlin-damned wireless drone on day
and night about how the war is already won. The only thing they ever hear about is that the
ministry has conquered all and having any hope to the contrary is futile.”

Fred met his brother’s eyes as understanding dawned and he gathered precisely what Lee was
saying. Not a war on person, but on propaganda.

“Alright,” he started, nodding. “Alright, then. Let’s give them something else to listen to.”

Hermione was sitting outside of the tent, the breeze rustling the increasingly sparse leaves
overhead. It seemed every day there were fewer of them, revealing more and more of the
near-constant grey blanket of clouds that filtered the sun and cast everything into drab
shadows.

To wit, they were further north than they had been in past weeks and the air, crisp as it was,
had started to veer toward frigid.

She drew her jumper tighter around her shoulders, refusing to resort to warming charms. It
was senseless, really, but she was loathe to allow herself any comfort that might dull her
senses when it was her turn to take watch. Anything that might make it easier to let down her
guard and pretend she was somewhere else.

A rustle to the right caught her attention and she glanced over in time to see a large hare
emerge from the brush, nosing about the ground unsuspectingly before swiftly disappearing
again. A few moments after that, another sound interrupted the silence, this time from behind
her. Hermione looked over her shoulders as the tent flap drew open, letting forth muted
sounds from inside before Ron closed it behind him, dropping the forest back to a stark,
immediate silence.

Hermione found herself wanting to smile at his unexpected presence. In their time on the run,
ever since that first morning at Grimmauld Place, Ron had seemed to warm toward her.
Whatever animosity that had plagued their friendship in the wake of him discovering her
relationship with Fred was ostensibly in the past, and she was terribly glad of it.

“Bloody cold out here,” Ron muttered, rapidly rubbing his hands together as he sank onto the
earth beside her. Unlike Hermione, he didn’t waste any time in drawing his wand and casting
a warming charm on their vicinity.

It was a little too warm for Hermione’s liking, in truth, but she was happy to have the
company and wasn’t about to gripe.
“Your shoulder looks much better,” she noted; he’d taken to removing the sling in the
morning and, though he certainly still moved it with some restraint, it was leagues away from
the days immediately following the injury.

“Feels better,” Ron agreed, bobbing his head. “Thanks again for that.”

“Don’t mention it.” Hermione glanced back toward the entrance of the tent. “What’s Harry
doing?”

“Listening to the wireless and staring at that shard of mirror again,” Ron replied with a shrug,
and Hermione simply nodded. Harry spent quite a lot of time doing that these days.
“Anything to report out here?”

“A few squirrels, a hare, and one particularly vocal grouse.”

Ron grinned at her, and they lapsed to a companionable silence.

“It’s your birthday tomorrow,” Ron finally broached, interrupting the quiet again.

“You remembered,” Hermione said, needing to force her smile that time. In truth, she’d been
trying her best to forget about it. By all accounts, they had precious little to celebrate.

“Of course,” Ron said, like it was a given. The previous year had proven that was not the
case, but she didn’t mention that. “I got something for you, before we left.”

He dug into his pocket and pulled out a rather poorly wrapped parcel.

“You didn’t have to do that,” Hermione admonished. “Do I have to wait to open it?” she
asked, reaching over to take it. Ron shook his head, and she went about peeling back the
parchment.

Once that was done, she removed the lid of the box to reveal –

“Oh, wow!” Hermione exclaimed with blatantly false enthusiasm, examining the contents.
“It’s a necklace.”

Nestled in the box was a thick silver rope with a large H hanging in the center, encrusted with
gems. Sparkling, pink gems. It was… completely and utterly garish.

“You wear that bird one all the time, so I figured you must like them, yeah?”

Ron pointed to the delicate gold chain peeking over the top of her jumper.

“I-I do,” Hermione affirmed, a bit taken aback.

“Want me to help you put it on?” Ron offered, and a wave of discomfort rolled over her. The
idea of wearing something so blatantly opposite her tastes was unpleasant, but the thought of
it replacing the magpie nestled between her breasts made her want to crawl out of her skin.
“Maybe later,” Hermione evaded with another manufactured smile as she hastily shoved the
lid back on the box and stowed it in her pocket, out of sight. “Thank you, Ron. That was
really thoughtful of you.”

Ron sat back against the large stump behind them, looking rather satisfied with himself.

“I just figured you might be a little down, being away for your birthday this year and all.”

She nodded and then shrugged. “Of course, but we knew that would be the case. And it’s not
like Harry’s wasn’t a bit overshadowed, either.”

“Yeah, I know,” Ron said, and Hermione was abruptly aware that he’d gone from looking out
at the forest in front of them to watching her. Staring intently at her face, more accurately. “I
just – I really wanted you to know that I was thinking about you.”

It was then that the air changed, like a switch flipped, and true unease set in. Not like there
was danger present per se, not alarm bells. But that slight roll in her belly, cold sweat kissing
the nape of her neck and her palms. The unsolicited warming charm suddenly felt all the
more stifling.

“Sure, thanks,” Hermione said a little more sharply, angling away ever so slightly and eager
to bring the topic to a close.

She was most certainly being paranoid. It couldn’t be that. Surely, surely, he wasn’t
attempting to –

But the thought was interrupted when Ron’s hand rose and then landed on her thigh. Not her
calf, not her knee, her thigh. It was large and far too hot, and his fingertips almost brushed the
inseam of her jeans.

Hermione froze as though she’d died on the spot and rigor mortis had set in. Perhaps that
would be preferable to the reality of her situation just then.

Because in that moment, in the blink of an eye, every kindness that Ron had done her in the
past weeks, every shared smile and reassurance, every interaction that she’d thought of as one
of friendship, of rekindled camaraderie, became immediately and thoroughly tainted.

She understood with a sickening clarity that it hadn’t been friendship at all, rather some sort
of long game, a premeditated strategy. The realisation made her want to cry.

“I know you’re probably feeling really lonely and I –“

“Take your hand off of me right now.”

Hermione’s voice cracked between them like a whip. Not loud, not remotely shouting, but as
deadly as any blade.

She didn’t look at Ron, she couldn’t tear her eyes away from the unwelcome, intrusive
pressure on her leg.
Each second dragged into an eternity, but in reality only a couple of them passed before Ron,
wisely, drew his hand back.

His voice when he spoke again was defensive, almost petulant. Like a child that’d been
scolded for testing a boundary. “I was just –“

“I know precisely what you were trying to do,” Hermione spoke over him, quickly moving
away and shifting to a crouch, like an animal who’d foolishly let itself be cornered. Stupid,
she’d been so ridiculously stupid to think he’d suddenly gotten over all of it.

Every inch of space she gained felt like a breath of fresh air.

She leveled her gaze at Ron and was surprised to find not guilt nor shame looking back at
her, but irritation. As if her response to his advances simply wasn’t to his liking.

Hermione also noted that he was wearing the damnable locket, but that wasn’t an excuse, and
it certainly didn’t do anything to soothe the anger and that sense of utter betrayal trying to
claw its way out of her.

She licked her lips and then spoke, every word crystalline and drenched in intentionality.

“Ron, I’m going to say this once and I need you to hear me. This, what we are trying to
accomplish here, is not your chance with me. You will not get a chance with me, not now, not
ever. And if you even think to lay a hand on me again with anything other than friendship in
mind, I swear to you that I will cut it off. Do you understand me? You just crossed a line. You
crossed a line, and we are not okay.”

She gave him a while to respond and when he didn’t, she got to her feet and headed around
him, back toward the tent. She didn’t know if she was going to cry or vomit, but she knew
that she didn’t want to do either with an audience.

“Are you going to tell Harry?”

Hermione stopped in her tracks a few feet away from the tent’s entrance and looked back at
him – looked down on him – in sheer, uncomprehending disbelief.

Because how dare he?

How dare he wait until Fred wasn’t around to try something so vile and underhanded?

How dare he purposely approach her when he thought she’d be at her most vulnerable?

And how dare he concern himself not with what it might do to her, not with how his actions
might wound her, but with the opinion of another man?

Something inside of her went cold and dark.

Hermione raised her chin a little as she stared back at Ron, reaching into her pocket and
tossing the box with the necklace callously into the dirt beside him. She almost laughed when
the thing tumbled out and dark earth crusted the pink gems – it felt appropriate.
 And then she let just a little bit of that lion, of that bloodthirsty creature slumbering beneath
her breast, peer out at him.

“If you think Harry is the one that you need to be afraid of, you haven’t been paying
attention.”

Ron paled, but Hermione didn’t wait for his reaction this time.

Chapter End Notes

Long story short, Ron makes a pass at Hermione. It reaches a climax when he puts his
hand on her thigh and she makes it extremely clear that it's not at all welcome.

I called it out not only for the depiction itself, but because it was a surprisingly sensitive
situation for me to write and I thought it might be the same for some of you to read.

Far too many of us have had that experience, that sinking feeling of realizing that a
friend, most often a male friend, isn't a friend at all, but just someone who was waiting
in the wings for an opportunity.

Take care of yourselves, lovelies.

—————————

P.S. Quick hiatus, be back in October!

 On the air
Chapter Notes

Sorry about the hiatus, folks! I had a few minor things to attend to - namely my
wedding.

P.S. The new Mr. WrathOfMacy says hello. 😘

4 October 1997

“Is it on?” George asked in a stage-whisper, seated crosslegged on the floor of the drafty
shack and looking at the sizeable assemblage of sound equipment on the conjured table in
front of them.
“How should I know?” Lee shot back, tinkering with the knobs on the large board in front of
him.

“You did the quidditch broadcasts when we were in school,” Angelina pointed out.

Lee pinned her with a flat look.

“This,” he gestured vaguely, “Is a bit more complicated than McGonagall handing me a
charmed microphone and telling me not to swear too much.”

“I like that she didn’t say ‘not at all,’” George mused aloud. “Just ‘not too much.’”

“I think you’re doing great, Lee,” Verity chimed in encouragingly, obviously eager to have
been invited along for their first broadcast. She adeptly cast another warming charm and
everyone’s tension seemed to ease a little.

“Thank you, Verity,” Lee replied graciously, giving a last pointed look to George and
Angelina, the latter of which rolled her eyes. “Fred, have you settled on your codename, yet?
We’re live in four minutes here, mate.”

“Yeah, I’ve got it,” Fred assured him, sitting forward and handing out the scripts he’d been
finalising. Tonight it would just be Lee, George, and him, but if all went well, Kingsley and
Tonks had agreed to join in the future, along with Bill and their father.

“And you’re sure they won’t be able to – I dunno, trace it?” Angie asked, looking around
them a little nervously. They were in a long-forgotten garden shed just outside the boundaries
of the old Prewett estate, a childhood hideaway that Fred and George had discovered during
dreadfully boring holiday parties with his mother’s family.

“Reasonably,” Lee said. “But we'll do each broadcast from a new place, and to even try and
locate us, they’d need to have the time, station and password first. Best we keep it short
anyway, though.”

“How many do you think will be tuning in?” Verity asked.

Lee looked to Fred because it had been his job to discreetly distribute the details.

“Well, we had everyone from the dueling club spread the word, not to mention The Order.
Even if each person only told one or two other people… fifty? Sixty?”

“Wow,” Verity said, brows raised. “That’s more than I thought you were going to say.”

“One minute,” Lee warned, setting a pocket watch on the table. He not so subtly wiped his
palms on his jeans. “Remember, when this here glows red, it means we’re on the air. Don’t
make any noise, and don’t say or do anything to identify yourselves or anyone else. Alright?”

They all nodded and watched as the clock ticked down. When it got to five seconds out, Lee
tapped the larger box with the dials on it and muttered the week’s password. Then he flipped
on two switches and motioned for them to do the same with the microphones in front of
them.
As the clock struck nine, Lee cleared his throat.

“Hello, and welcome to the inaugural broadcast of Potterwatch. I’m River, and I’ll be your
host…”

“I still can’t believe how well it went,” Verity mused the following morning, perched on a
stool behind the till and idly doodling on a scrap of parchment. Angelina nodded, leaning on
the counter beside her and more animated than he’d seen her in a while.

“Katie and Alicia said they had a listening party at their flat. Kenneth Towler was there – you
remember him, right Fred?”

Fred nodded, not looking up from his clipboard. Kenneth Towler was a bit of a tosser, but he
wasn’t a Death Eater sympathiser, so the more the merrier in this case.

“Well, his dad is a muggle historian, and he was telling them all about how they used to use
‘pirate’ radio broadcasts to send messages to one another in times of war and political unrest.
It’s fascinating how far the practice dates back, really…”

Fred tuned them out as he worked further down the stacks. Not for any malicious reason, he
was equally thrilled that the broadcast had gone well. But ever since he’d woken up that
morning, he’d had an uneasy feeling that something wasn’t right, like a prickling on the back
of his neck.

He’d almost used the bracelet to check on Hermione, but he’d ultimately talked himself out
of it. It was most likely just a flare in his ever-looming paranoia and not his having become a
seer overnight.

As he was jotting down the number of Loonar-Loop Luminators on the shelf on front of him,
he caught a dark robe in his periphery, just outside the shop window. Then a second one.

His heartbeat doubled in pace when he looked closer and saw who it was approaching.

“Damnit, damnit,” he cast a quick sticking charm on the front door and dashed back to the
counter.

“What? What’s going on?” Angie asked. She and Verity already had their wands drawn.

“They’re early,” he bit out, glancing over his shoulder toward the front window. They were
still mostly hidden behind the stacks, but if they crossed behind the counter to the back door
or either set of stairs, the ones that led up to the flat or down to the storeroom, they’d be in
full view of the alley.

Blood was rushing in his ears as he tried to think.

“Okay, alright, the two of you go into the workroom. Disillusion yourselves and don’t make a
sound until I say it’s safe to come out.”
He could see the argument in Angie’s eyes, the spark of indignation, but Verity was already
tugging her by the arm.

“C’mon,” she urged, crouching low. Once they were in the room, Fred quickly shut it behind
them.

The ‘random inspections’ didn’t normally start until later in the afternoon, at which point it
would just be George and him in the store like they’d planned. But it was only half-ten.

Furthermore, it wasn’t as though Angelina and Verity were fugitives, but they were half-
bloods and they needed to do everything they possibly could to stay out of the ministry’s line
of sight. If not for themselves, then at the very least for the sake of their muggleborn family
members.

And that was to say nothing of the other reports, reports of the things being done to
muggleborn and half-blood witches in particular.

Fred had just barely struck a casual pose behind the till when the bell at the front door
chimed. He couldn’t help but smirk a little as one of the men swore, needing to force it open
with his shoulder.

He then did his best impression of examining the inventory list that he’d been in the process
of compiling. In reality, the letters and numbers were swimming in his vision, and he didn’t
read a thing. He also didn’t look up until the two hulking, cloaked figures turned down the
main aisle and began to head straight toward him.

“Good morning gents,” he greeted, setting his quill down and lacing his fingers together in
front of him, proper as could be. “I see inspections are running ahead of schedule this week.
Glad to see our ministry doing everything they can to keep us lowly proprietors on the
straight and narrow.”

“Weasley,” Rodrick Selwyn sneered, face splitting into an unsettling smirk. “Looks like your
name came up on the list for random inspections again.”

“Funny how that keeps happening, isn’t it?” Fred replied with a dry, humorless smile in
return.

The other man turned around to reveal Marcus Flint, lopsided overbite and all.

Flint stared Fred down as he dragged his hand along a shelf, slowly knocking a row of nose-
biting teacups to the ground where they shattered, one by one. Fred’s teeth were gritted so
tightly together, it was a small wonder that they didn’t break apart as well.

“Oops,” Flint said with faux regret. “How clumsy of me.”

Fred just shrugged. “Don’t sweat it, mate. Cost of doing business.”

They continued to poke around, weaving in and out of the stacks, all the while watching him.
That was the purpose of this exercise, after all; to intimidate him. To remind him that they
knew who he was, they knew where he was, and they knew who his family was. To remind
him that the ‘Ministry’ was little more than another of Voldemort’s factions, and that they
could come and go as they please, not above the law but as the law.

None of it was new information.

Despite his heart racing, Fred kept his calm façade firmly in place until Marcus, ugly blighter
that he was, turned and started to make his way toward the till, eyeing the door behind Fred.
The door that lead into their workroom.

“Marcus,” Fred said, attempting to intercept him. “Nice to see you again. And just how are
you liking your position with the... CRAB, was it?”

“It’s the R.A.B.C., Weasley, Regulating Authority for Business and Commerce. And why?
Thinking of a change in careers?” Flint sneered at him, looking around at the shop, at Fred’s
livelihood, with complete and utter derision. “Can’t imagine what you think you’d have to
offer.”

He was behind the counter by that point, now heading directly for the one place that Fred
could not let him go. He tried to cast a silent tripping jinx beneath the counter, but Flint
unwittingly stepped around it.

Arm extended, he began to reach for the handle.

“No,” Fred said loudly, clearing his throat. “No, I was just wondering whose knob you had to
polish to be assigned to such a prestigious position. Seeing as you got Ts on every OWL and
NEWT you took, you daft pillock.”

Well, for better or worse, it served its purpose as a distraction. Flint dropped his hand and
turned back to Fred in disbelief, squaring his sloped shoulders. Selwyn emerged from an aisle
and propped against an endcap, watching the exchange with a vaguely entertained
expression.

Flint took a step toward Fred, rancid breath washing over his face.

“What the fuck did you say, you blood-traiter dog?”

In for a sickle…

“Tell me, does Minister Thickness live up to his name?”

Fred had just enough time to shut his eyes before Flint’s fist made solid contact with his jaw.
He stumbled back, catching himself on the counter and feeling warm blood begin to trickle
out of a gash on his cheek. The son of a bitch must have had a ring on.

Fred started to reach for his wand on instinct before he stopped.

He couldn’t draw it. He couldn’t fight back and Flint knew that, was banking on it. Because
once Fred openly crossed that line, they’d cart him off and he'd just be another name on a list
of those presumed dead. Hell, that was assuming they didn’t drag him into the street and set
an example right then and there.
That thought, the thought of what it would do to George, to his parents, to Hermione, was
enough to keep his hand from his pocket. He winced as the pain in his face radiated outward
and a drop of blood fell from his chin.

“Watch your mouth, you mudblood fucking pig,” Flint growled, staring with sadistic pleasure
at the sight of Fred bleeding. His tiny pea brain seemed to make some sort of connection
then, features contorting further into a grotesque bastardisation of a smile. “Say, don’t you
have a sister what’s still in school? Ginger, pretty young thing… be a shame if something
happened to her, wouldn’t it?”

Crimson flickered across Fred’s vision.

“You clearly don’t know my sister,” he hedged without any real surety behind it. “I’d feel bad
for any bloke stupid enough to try something with her.”

“Guess it’ll have to be a group effort, then,” Flint jeered. “Take turns, aye Selwyn?”

“Come on, Flint,” Selywn drawled in a bored voice. “I think we’ve concluded our business
here.”

Fred should have bitten his tongue, should have let them leave and been done with it. But he
was angry and hurting and feeling so unbelievably toothless, the words were out of his mouth
before he realised he’d said them.

“That's right, get a move on, Marcus. I’m sure there’s a desk somewhere that you should be
bending over.”

The second punch landed in his stomach.

The third knocked him onto his hands and knees.

And the kick that followed sent him flat to the floor.

White-hot pain shot through his side and he knew as Marcus drew his heavy boot back that
there were multiple ribs broken. He couldn’t help it, he curled protectively in on himself,
coughing hard and pressing his arm tightly across his middle.

“Now, Flint!” Selwyn barked, out of Fred’s line of sight.

Marcus crouched and grabbed a fistful of Fred’s hair, wrenching his head up and giving him
no choice but to look him in his flat, sharklike eyes.

“I’ll be seeing you soon, Weasley. Real soon.”

Then Flint drew back and spat on him, a warm glob of saliva landing directly on Fred’s face.
Selwyn called his name again and this time Flint listened and got to his feet.

A few seconds later Fred heard the bell on the front door chime. He tried to roll over, temple
pressed to the worn floorboards, but it sent him into another coughing fit. Another attempt
and he scarcely managed it, gasping as pain shot through his side again.
“You can – you can come out,” he wheezed, hoping it was loud enough for the girls to hear.

It was only a second before the storeroom door swung open and Angelina descended upon
him. Verity immediately aimed her wand at the front door, locking it and switching the
“OPEN” sign to “CLOSED.”

“Have you lost your fucking mind?!” The former hissed vicously, reaching out and trying to
tip his chin to better inspect the damage.

Fred jerked away from her and attempted to prop himself against the back of the counter,
only partly succeeding as his back pressed into the shelves. “Why does everybody always ask
me that?”

“Because you do things that no sane person would do,” Angie replied sharply. She turned to
look at Verity over her shoulder, the other witch’s expression wan and furious as she took in
the scene. “Verity, go upstairs and floo-call The Burrow, tell George to get back here now.”

“Don’t say what happened,” Fred interjected sharply, rasping and wincing. “Just tell him I
need a hand with a brew or something.”

Verity crossed the shop, disappearing through the door and up the stairs to the flat while
Angelina conjured a sterile linen cloth, wetting it and dabbing at the blood dripping down his
cheek. She stilled when she realised that some of it wasn’t blood.

Fred met her eye for a split second before he looked away, jaw ticking. He wasn’t sure if it
was shame or embarrassment or outright anger, but it was something deeply unpleasant that
he felt in that moment, laying – bleeding – on the floor of his own store with a Death Eater’s
spittle on his face.

With a gentler touch than before, Angelina whisked it away.

“This cut is really deep,” she murmured. “What was the bastard wearing, the philosopher’s
fucking stone? We need to get dittany on this or it’s going to scar.”

“Leave it,” Fred shook his head, pounding as it was. “Just… just leave it. I thought witches
were supposed to like scars, right? Look at Bill, bloke’s married to a veela.”

For a long time he’d had an aversion to scars because he didn’t want people to tell him apart
from his brother, but considering George was now very obviously lacking an ear, it didn’t
make much difference.

Angelina started to smile at his weak attempt at humor, but it quickly fell and she shook her
head, tilting his chin again to examine the bruise blossoming across his jaw beneath the gash
with a pained expression. She swallowed hard, but her voice came out tight anyway.

“I promised her, Fred. I promised Hermione that I would keep you in one piece while she was
gone. Please, please don’t make a liar out of me.”

Fred started to laugh at the irony of that and then stopped because it hurt too much.
“I’ve told George the same thing about you, you know. On a few occasions. And for as
unpleasant as this is,” he gestured to himself, expression sobering again, “It could have been
worse. You know that it could have been much, much worse, Ang.”

Angelina sighed and didn’t say anything after that, just sat there on the floor with him,
holding a bloody rag in her lap.

This silent contemplation, the imparting of mutual promises, was interrupted when George
practically flew down the stairs and swung around the doorframe behind the counter.

“What the hell happened?!” he demanded, taking in the scene with an appalled expression. “I
wasn’t even gone an hour!”
 Splintered
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

16 November 1997

“There’s nothing there,” Hermione repeated for the umpteenth time, rubbing her temples. She
wanted to look outside just to see if the sun had come up, because it felt as though they’d
been going at it for hours. “He hated the bloody place, he wouldn’t leave sock lint there, let
alone a piece of his sodding soul.”

“He left the ring at the Gaunt house,” Ron argued incessantly, a pronounced dent forming
between his ginger brows. “It’s just as likely he’d leave something at the orphanage.”

“It’s not!” Hermione snapped, smacking a hand on the table like it might somehow pound the
point into his thick skull. “It’s not ‘just as likely.’ The Gaunts were his tie to pureblood
society, tarnished and inbred as they were at the end, their names were still among the sacred
twenty-eight. The orphanage was a dark mark on his past, a reminder of his lowly muggle
upbringing. He’d have done everything he could to distance himself from it.”

Ron paced and seethed while she rolled her eyes, sitting back in her chair and picking up the
small hunting knife on the table in front of her to clean her nails.

There was no blaming the locket for Ron’s behavior this time; Harry had left it on the table
when he went out to take his turn at watch, and there it sat while they argued like kneazles
and krups around it. She could practically feel that greasy shard of pitch-black nothing
smiling at the maelstrom of discontent.

“What if we just go –“ Ron started again, that irritating, nagging edge on his voice, and
Hermione lost it.

“Oh, for the love of FUCK!” She sprang to her feet and plunged the knife into the worn
wooden table, sinking the tip perhaps a quarter of an inch. “Fine! If you want to go, then
bloody-well go. Send a postcard and buy a souvenir, have a wonderful time.”

Before Ron could retort, his face kaleidoscoping between about fifteen different shades of
red, the tent flap opened.

“I know we have silencing charms,” Harry said, his voice tired and eyes ringed by bruise-like
shadows, “But I’m really starting to question if they’re strong enough for the two of you.”

Hermione’s shoulders slumped and she ran a hand over her face.

“Blast it. Sorry, Harry, we’ll keep it down.”

“Are you talking about the orphanage again?” He asked, looking at the journals and notes
spread across the table in front of them.

“Yeah,” Ron cut in when Hermione opened her mouth to respond. “I still really think we
should go, mate. Just to rule it out.”

Hermione watched Harry’s face carefully and her stomach sank, because she knew him, and
she could tell that she was about to be overruled.

“There could be something to it, Hermione,” he started earnestly. “Dumbledore showed me

the memory of him there, maybe it was meant to be a clue or something.”

She wanted to scream.

“Dumbledore was –“ Hermione started through clenched teeth and then paused, taking a deep
breath in through her nose and then blowing out through pursed lips, because attacking
Harry’s hero was only going to hurt her argument. “You don’t think he would have looked
into it himself were that the case?”

“I think it’s worth checking out,” Harry said stubbornly.

Hermione made the mistake of glancing at Ron and seeing the smug look that he wore as he
realised he’d won. For a second, the barest fraction of a moment, she seriously contemplated
wrenching that knife out of the table and re-splinching his shoulder.

“Three days,” she said flatly, walking to the table and snatching the locket. As she fastened it
around her neck, she could practically feel the little golden magpie sleeping over her breast
shudder in aversion. “We’ll go the next time we move camp, in three days.”

Three days later, Hermione propped against a lamppost, Polyjuiced to look like a 40-
something woman with dark skin and short, curly hair. Fortunately the woman’s face, foreign
as it was to her, was still capable of conveying just how very vindicated she was feeling.

“Maybe there are tunnels?” Ron tried to reason weakly, he and Harry also disguised as they
looked up at the five-story, steel and glass office building set in the middle of Canon Street in
metropolitan London. What seemed like hundreds of muggles bustled by, dressed in work
attire and yammering on their cellulars.

“By all means,” Hermione invited, gesturing at the relatively new, unblemished concrete
beneath their feet. “Go ahead and get to digging. I certainly won’t stop you.”

She was still profoundly paranoid that they were in public, and in such a busy place no less,
but it was alleviated some by the evidence that Voldemort not only hadn’t used this as a
hiding place, but rather seemed to have disregarded its existence entirely.

Harry, currently in the liver-spotted skin of a seventy-year-old-man, placed a hand on Ron’s

arm and started to pull him back toward the dark alley they’d apparated into a little further
down the block. He seemed disheartened, certainly; she was a little, too, if she was being
honest. But it was nothing compared to the storm brewing in Ron’s eyes.

“I’ll get the wards set up,” Hermione volunteered as soon as they landed at their next
destination.

“I’ll do the tent,” Harry agreed, dark hair starting to sprout back beneath the gray it’d been
disguised under.

Ron had gone silent, and it felt like a tide dragging back.

She wondered if this would be the final straw between them.

She wondered if she cared about that at all anymore.

“Bathroom,” he muttered, unceremoniously trudging off.

Hermione acted on muscle memory, layering on familiar spell after familiar spell until a tight
bubble of magic encapsulated them once again.

“Try not to rub it in too much,” Harry entreated, breaking the silence as he staked the tent at
the corner nearest her. “He just wanted to check; it’s been a long time since we’ve made
progress.”

“I’m acutely aware of that,” Hermione bit back at him, instantly regretting her tone when she
saw the look on Harry’s face. “I – damnit, I’m sorry, Harry. I don’t know what’s gotten into
me lately.”

She did, actually, but he didn’t. Hermione sighed, following him into the tent and tossing her
bag onto the table, shucking her outwear.

“We just have to be careful. Limited resources aside, every venture we make into the world,
even the muggle world, poses a huge risk. We can’t afford to do it on a whim, or to soothe a
bruised ego.”

“I know,” Harry agreed quietly. She watched him prod the fire he’d ignited, a little more of
that desperation that she knew lay beneath the surface bubbling up. If it wasn’t clear before, it
was now that that was precisely what the trip had been. Going to the orphanage was an
attempt at peacekeeping, Harry had never really believed there was anything there, either.

Hermione crossed the tent to her friend and pulled him into a tight hug.

“We’ll figure it out,” she assured him, her voice muffled in the shoulder of the bulky coat he
was still wearing. “I am going to figure it out, I promise. If it’s the last bloody thing I do, I
will not be outsmarted by a noseless bigot.”

Harry chuckled beside her ear, giving her a quick squeeze before loosening his hold. “If
anyone can do it, it’s you.”

She’d just begun to pull away when there was a rustling behind her back.

“Well, this is real fucking cosy, isn’t it?”

Ron had walked into the tent and he was sneering at the both of them.

“What?” Harry asked, turning on the spot to face their friend. He looked between Ron and
Hermione with genuine confusion. “What are you talking about? We were just –“

“Careful, Harry. Before you know it, she’ll have a hand on your cock and the other on your
Gringott’s key. That’s how it works for you, isn’t it?”

Ron directed the question to her, and Hermione couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdity of it.
Harry, on the other hand, stilled.

There was only one time she’d actually seen him with an expression that could be called
murderous, running through the halls of the Ministry after Bellatrix Lestrange nearly two
years before. But “murderous” was the most apt description of his face in that moment.

“What did you just say?” Harry asked, narrowing his eyes like he’d misheard. Hermione
already knew he didn’t because she hadn’t; he’d been crystalline clear.
She also didn’t jump to defend herself because there wasn’t any point in doing so. The line
was already in the sand, it had been for a while. No, instead she approached Ron leisurely,
like a cat stalking through tall grass, dragging her fingertips over the table and the backs of
the chairs as she circled him.

“I think what Ron’s implying,” Hermione started matter-of-factly, stopping only when she
was in Ron’s face. “Is that I’m a whore.” Dark circles ringed his eyes and pale skin appeared
sallow and blotchy in the shadows. “That’s it, isn’t it? You’re insinuating that I only fuck men
that are successful and powerful and rich. Real pity for you, then.”

“Shut up,” Ron hissed at her.

He stepped even closer, trying his best to leverage his height and loom over her, but
Hermione didn’t flinch, she didn’t even blink, because Ron Weasley did not scare her.

“You see, Harry,” Hermione said over her shoulder without looking away, “Ronniekins here
has a nasty little inferiority complex, and he can’t stand that he was wrong about the
orphanage today. Or, more accurately, he can’t stand that I was right. So, he’s attacking me in
what is frankly a pretty pathetic attempt to make himself feel better.”

“Shut your mouth.”

“Is it working?” Hermione leaned forward and faux-whispered, letting all of the venom that
had built in her bleed out as she cut their last remaining ties carefully and precisely into little
ribbons. “Did somebody finally pick you?”

“I SAID SHUT UP!”

Several things happened at once.

Ron pushed her backward by the shoulder and she stumbled, just barely catching herself on
the corner of the table as he raised his hand like he was going to strike her.

Her pulse jumped, and she realised that, sick and twisted as it was, she wanted him to do it.
She wanted him to slap her so hard that her ears rang, so hard that her cheek burned and her
eyes watered. She wanted him to give physical form to the blows he’d already struck, to the
hurt and the fucking objectification she’d felt outside the tent those weeks ago because then
maybe, just maybe, she could start to heal from it. Maybe when she closed her eyes at night,
she wouldn’t feel that detestable pressure on her thigh, eyes the wrong shade of blue
watching her in all the worst ways.

Harry would never let something like that happen, though. No sooner had she taken a breath
as a white-blue jet of light flew past her shoulder and struck Ron square in the chest, sending
him soaring backward and out of the tent flaps, his wand flying from his pocket in the
process.

Hermione looked up to see Harry, standing there with a mask of both grief and horror
plastered onto his face as he stared at the place their friend had been. Slowly, he reached out a
cold, shaking hand and pulled her upright, leading her out of the tent without stowing his own
wand.

Freezing rain had begun to fall in earnest and Ron was getting up from the ground, mud
smeared on his trousers. Harry, consciously or not, stepped between him and Hermione.

“What in the hell is wrong with you?!” He shouted. Her heart hurt for him because he asked
like he genuinely wanted to know, like he wanted to understand how they could end up like
this. “Have you gone completely mad? That’s Hermione,” he said, pointing at her, “Our
Hermione! How could you talk to her like that?”

“Of course you’re on her side,” Ron scoffed, roughly pushing his soggy fringe from his eyes.
“Could have bet on that.”

“In what universe would I be on yours?!” Harry retorted. “I warned you, Ron. I warned you
ages ago not to hurt her, not to give me an ultimatum. I told you not to make me choose.”

“Well, I suppose you’ve made your choice, then.” Ron looked toward Hermione, partially
concealed behind Harry’s shoulder with something dangerously close to hate.

“No, mate. But you just did.” Harry’s tone had changed, cooled this time. He swallowed
hard, but Hermione could still hear his voice shake. “Get your shit and get out. I don’t want
to look at you anymore, and I certainly don’t need your help.”

“You know, I think I will,” Ron fired back haughtily, like he somehow still held the high
ground. He brushed past them into the tent, checking Harry’s shoulder in the process.
Hermione put out a hand to steady her friend.

It was only a moment before Ron reappeared, lumpy rucksack slung over his shoulder and
wand in his hand.

“I’m sure the two of you will enjoy your time alone together,” he said, insinuation dripping
off of the words.

Harry made to raise his wand again, but Hermione stayed his arm and stepped into Ron’s
path, blinking away the icy droplets of water clinging to her eyelashes.

“The locket,” she demanded tightly, extending her hand. Ron rolled his eyes and reached
beneath his collar to jerk the clasp open before dropping the vile thing into her palm. As she
took it, she leaned forward and whispered to him, too low for Harry to hear. “When you go to
sleep tonight, Ron Weasley, beneath whatever rock you slither under because you’re too
ashamed to go home to mummy, I want you to remember something: I want you to remember
that you are not now, nor will you ever be, half the man that your brother is.”

For a split second, Hermione thought she saw something in his eyes shift. Some remorse or
regret, but it was quickly eaten by dark rain and shadows, and Ron, without another word,
stomped to the edge of the wards and apparated with a crack.
The following morning came quickly, as it likely would going forward with only two of them
to trade watch and share chores. For hours after Ron left, they’d just sat in silence before
Harry insisted she get some rest while he took the night shift.

She protested at first, but in the end she was too emotionally wrought to really argue.

Hermione stretched on her cot, faded red and purple fabric draping to make the ceiling over
her partitioned corner of the tent. Her back ached a little, and her eyes were puffy, but she
felt a new sort of calm that hadn’t been there with Ron’s malcontent presence constantly
hovering.

Dressing quickly, she washed up and put on her outerwear before ducking outside. The tea
she’d left Harry the night before sat balanced atop a fallen log, still filled to the brim and now
with a thin layer of ice crusting the top. She was relieved that he’d at least used warming
charms as she got closer to where he sat.

“Morning,” she murmured, offering him a new mug that he actually took and clutching her
own to her chest whilst steam billowed from it. She plopped down beside him, staring out at
the grey morning light and pale mist twirling and dancing among the dark trees.

Harry nodded his greeting, his expression in her periphery somber and thoughtful.

“There was more going on with Ron, wasn’t there?” Harry started without preamble, still not
looking up. “All night I thought about the things he said, the horrible way that he looked at
you… And I realised there had to be more to it, something that I wasn’t seeing.”

Hermione dragged her thumb over a small chip in the brim of her mug. It was sharper than
she’d thought, and with a flicker of pain, a fat bead of blood formed on her fingertip. She
watched as it bloomed before losing surface tension and tracking down to her palm.

“Yeah. Yeah, there was more to it.”

“I’m really sorry, Hermione. I should have noticed.” He looked like he didn’t really want to
know the details, but Harry was a good friend and he asked anyway. “I’m not sure what I can
do now, but… do you want to talk about it?”

Hermione finally turned to look at him, resting her cheek in her shoulder and smiling sadly as
she let herself feel the full implications of the loss for just a moment. Not the loss of Ron
himself, that could hardly be classified as such. But the loss of an ally. The loss of a person
whom she could depend upon, if not to choose her, then to at least choose their cause.

“No, not really.”

Harry just bobbed his head.

“I want to leave,” he blurted out. “I know we just got here, but I don’t want to be where he
can find us if he decides to come back.”

Hermione didn’t disagree in the slightest, but she wanted to make sure he understood the
gravity of doing that.
 “Are you sure, Harry? We don’t know where he went, and once we leave, that’s it. He won’t
be able to find us again.”

Harry met her eyes, conviction clear in them once more.

“I know. That’s why I want to go.”

She nodded and drank deeply from her cup, hissing as hot tea burned her throat.

“I’ll get the wards?”

“I’ll do the tent.”

Chapter End Notes

Did Hermione go too far? Maybe.

Did I have fun writing it? Absolutely.

 Two instead of three
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

8 December 1997

“George, is that you?” Fred called from the kitchen, having heard the front door of their flat
open and shut. “You’re back quick, I just finished dinner.”

He poured water into his glass and then paused, listening. There wasn’t any sound from the
other room save for the quiet rustling of outerwear being shed and shoes kicked off.

“Georgie?”

He slowly set his cup on the counter, hand hovering over the pocket that held his wand, and
stepped out of the kitchen, moving slowly down the hallway and into the living room. George
was there, sitting on the edge of one of the armchairs with his elbows braced on his knees and
a grim expression on his face.
“What?” Fred asked, stomach dropping and dread immediately coiling in his chest. “What’s
happened?”

A different Fred in a different life would have jokingly asked who died, but that was all too
real a possibility.

George shook his head, as if he were trying to clear it or jiggle something into place.
“Nothing – nothing is wrong, everyone is okay. As far as I know, at least, everyone is okay.”

Fred breathed a small sigh of relief at that, but generally remained apprehensive because
something was very clearly off. “Merlin’s tits, don’t do that. What’s the matter with you,
then?”

George bulled in a deep breath and got up, running a haphazard hand through his hair before
navigating around the chair to stand in front of Fred. “I’ll tell you, but I need you to give me
your wand first.”

“What?” Fred asked sharply, half-smiling in disbelief with his hand still hanging near his
pocket. He’d question Polyjuice, but the wards on the upstairs were such that an imposter
wouldn’t be able to easily gain entry, not without making quite a ruckus in the process. “Why
do you need my wand?”

“Do you trust me?” George asked, hand remaining doggedly outstretched.

“What the hell kind of question is that?” Fred shot back, tense and increasingly unnerved as
he searched for signs of the imperius curse or some other sort of bewitchment. There wasn’t
anything to see, though; his twin’s eyes, so like his own, were worried but clear. “Of course I
trust you. That doesn’t explain why you need my wand.”

“Fred,” George said sharply. It wasn’t really a question, nor was it a command. A plea,
perhaps?

He wavered for another second before reached into his pocket and extracting the length of
cedarwood, flipping it dexterously and setting the handle in George’s outstretched palm. It
was tucked from sight almost immediately.

“Tell me what’s going on,” Fred outright demanded, “Now.”

“Any chance I could get you to sit down?” George tried half-heartedly. When Fred didn’t
move so much as an inch, he sighed one last time and then, outwardly bracing himself,
blurted, “Ron is at Shell Cottage.”

A swarm of emotions and reactions flickered through Fred’s head as he comprehended what
he’d just been told, but at the fore was simple confusion.

“Blimey, Gred, what are they doing there? Are they okay? Is Hermione – ?”

He cut off when he saw that George was shaking his head fervently, looking like he’d rather
be anywhere else in the world at that moment.
“It’s not them, Fred. It’s Ron. It’s just Ron.”

“I don’t – what do you mean it’s just Ron?” He felt stupid asking because it was a fairly
simple combination of words that, under any other circumstances, should make sense. They
simply didn’t.

“Harry and Hermione aren’t there, they aren’t at the cottage. It’s only Ron, he… he left
them.”

These words, on the other hand, made perfect, crystalline, horrifying sense. Fred heard them
resonating around the inside of his head for a moment, like the drawn-out toll of a gong.

He left them. Ron left them. Wherever they were, whatever they’d been doing, the trio was no
longer a trio. It was just Harry and Hermione, now. Four eyes instead of six. Two wands
instead of three. Zero Weasleys instead of one.

Fred pressed his lips together, feeling his teeth cut into soft flesh as he tried to maintain
composure.

“George, give me my wand back,” he commanded levelly, reaching forward. His fingertips
were shaking.

His brother shook his head, keeping a hand over the pocket where it was hidden and taking a
step back.

“George,” he repeated more forcefully, “Give me my wand, now.”

“I can’t do it, mate,” George replied grimly, a muscle in his jaw jumping as his whole body
tensed.

“Give me my fucking wand!” Fred demanded again, shouting it this time. George stepped
back further as Fred’s voice rang around the apartment and then, without a hint of sound
reasoning, Fred lunged forward.

“Fred, stop it! You’re not thinking!” George yelled over the crashing of a lamp being
capsized and a framed photograph falling to the floor and shattering. Fred caught a handful of
his brother’s jumper and, knocking forcefully into an end table, they both tumbled to the
ground.

“I’m thinking just fine,” Fred gritted out, grappling and trying to get a hand free. “I’m
thinking that I need to kill Ron!”

It might have been funny taken in the context of an innocuous sibling rivalry, but given that
his brother, who he’d trusted to stay with Harry, with Hermione, was apparently a gutless
traitor, the situation was distinctly lacking in humor. In fact, as Fred’s fist arched up and
made contact with George’s jaw, he thought it might be one of the singularly least-funny
moments of his life.

“Are you being serious right now?!” George bellowed, scarcely keeping Fred at bay with one
arm and cupping his face with the other hand. He threw a knee hard into Fred’s stomach, who
groaned in pain, and took the opportunity to shove his twin off of him, sprawling onto the
floor a couple feet away and dragging himself backward. “Get ahold of yourself! He’s our
bloody brother, Fred!”

“I don’t care that he’s my brother!” Fred shouted back. “She’s my everything! George, she’s
my – she’s – fuck!”

His voice cracked and Fred shifted until he was on all fours, coughing hard and trying to
catch his breath. He glanced up and saw George propped on his side with an expression that
was no longer grim, but rather sympathetic, if slightly pained. There was already a red mark
blooming along the side of his face where Fred had struck him, and it was silent for a long
moment.

“I know that,” George finally said, breathing hard. And he did. Furious as he was, betrayed as
he felt, Fred knew that he did. Because if it was Angie, George would be doing the exact
same thing. “I know. You aren’t the only one that loves her, Freddie. But it won’t do any
good, going over there. They apparate and move every couple days, and Ron has been
separated from them for weeks. He couldn’t find his way back if he tried.”

Fred chewed on this for a moment before he nodded, surprised to find his eyes stinging and
prickling at the corners. He swiped a frustrated arm over his face.

“Why? Why did he leave them?” His voice sounded hollow and foreign. There wasn’t a
reason in the universe that would be good enough, but he wanted to know anyway.

“Bill said he wouldn’t talk about it,” George replied, sitting up and dabbing at the blood
beading beneath a small split in his lip. “I didn’t even make it inside, he came out to tell me
when I got to the edge of the property. I was furious, too, you know. I wanted to go in, but
Ron doesn’t want anyone to know he’s there. If it’s any consolation, Bill said Fleur very
nearly ripped him apart when he showed up the other day.”

Of course he wouldn’t want anyone to know. Who would want to advertise that they deserted
their friends when things got too hard?

A new thought occurred to Fred as his breathing began to return to normal, one formerly
concealed by emotion.

“Give me my wand,” Fred said again, rolling his eyes when his twin twitched backward as if
preparing for another hit. “I’m not going to go anywhere, I swear, just hand it over. Please.”

George deliberated and then, with a look that screamed uncertainty, reached into his pocket
and extracted both of their wands, handing Fred his and keeping his own ready, just in case.

Fred ignored him, though, instead wrenching up the sleeve of his shirt.

“Are you okay?” he asked, pressing the tip of his wand to the small silver plate fastened
there. George tried to question what he was doing, but he waved him off and waited, holding
his breath.
 While he waited, he picked up the broken photograph on the floor beside him. It was from
that past New Year’s Eve, all of them standing in front of the fireplace. Hermione was tucked
beneath his arm, laughing and looking up at him like she didn’t have a care in the world.

Over her head was a spiderweb of shattered glass.

It was only a matter of seconds before the reply came, warm against his wrist, but it felt like a
small eternity.

I’m okay. We’re okay. I love you.

Chapter End Notes

I know things are a little heavy at the moment plot-wise, and that’s going to carry on a
while longer, but I wanted to take the opportunity to wish all off you a happy holiday
season and a wonderful new year.

And if you’re looking for a lighter palate cleanser, I just finished posting a 35k holiday

🖤
fic over on my Works page. Fremione, rom-com, post-war, fake-dating, and oodles of
fun. Check out “Merry for love”
 Stay with me
Chapter Notes

STOP - PAUSE - CEASE - DESIST - TIME OUT

Alright, let’s take a quick break and chat for a moment.

Early on in the writing of this story, I had a commenter ask me if I would be including
any themes related to sexual assault and, at the time, I didn’t answer because I didn’t
know.

I had admittedly given it some thought, and I gave it even more after receiving that
comment - particularly as I began to get into writing the war-era chapters. I decided in
my head that if I did end up going there, I wanted to do it in a very thoughtful and
intentional way because, while the story is fiction, sexual violence is very much not.

In any event, the answer to that question is ultimately yes. It occurs in this (very long)
chapter, and it does not directly involve Fred or Hermione.

Let me be perfectly clear in acknowledging that, while the depiction is fade-to-black and
fairly nondescript, I understand that this is not content that is safe for everyone to
consume and nothing I write will ever remotely be more important than your mental and
emotional well-being.

So if you aren’t sure, or you know for a fact that this part of the story isn’t for you, you
can bow out or skip to the notes at the end of the chapter for a brief summary. It will not
be a significant theme going forward.

See the end of the chapter for more notes

20 December 1997

“I hardly think gran will be impressed,” Neville snorted, shaking his head from across the
compartment and wincing at whatever pain he suffered as a result of the movement. Ginny
sat with Luna’s feet in her lap opposite him while Seamus reclined into the corner of the
bench beside Neville.

“She should be impressed,” Seamus said encouragingly, reaching over to give Neville a
sporting punch on the shoulder. “All semester we watched those bloody bastards stomp about
like they own the place. ‘Bout time someone took ‘em down a peg.”

“They do own the place,” Ginny grumbled, though she couldn’t help but smile a little at the
image of Neville beating the snot out of Crabbe and Goyle over the breakfast table. He’d paid
for it, as evidenced by the way he grimaced every time he took a breath, but if it came to
who’d walked away in better shape, he’d won in a landslide.

Luna made a soft humming noise of agreement, straightening as she looked out the window
at the approaching station.
“Why are there so many?” She asked, not clarifying what she meant, nor directing the
question to anybody in particular.

Everyone was up and out of their seats in a heartbeat, cramming around her to peer at the
approaching platform. While they had grown begrudgingly accustomed to the looming
presence of Voldemort’s Death Eaters, as well as his other various cronies and creatures,
Luna was right; there were a lot of them waiting at the train station.

“What do you think -?” Seamus started, but he cut off abruptly when the conductor’s voice
spoke from overhead.

“We will be making our arrival at King’s Cross Station momentarily. Due to a reported
security concern, members of the ministry’s Department of Magical Law Enforcement will be
sweeping the train. Please lend them your full cooperation and do not depart the train until
directed to do so. Thank you.”

Everybody went tense and silent as, seconds after his transmission ended, the train rocked to
a halt.

There was a loud bang in the distance, at the opposite end of the car they were in and, after
exchanging a look, everyone slowly shifted, drawing their wands but keeping them stowed
out of sight, tucked under thighs and up sleeves. Even Luna’s usually dreamy eyes seemed to
darken with concern.

More thudding could be heard in the distance, followed by cries of protest at what sounded
like luggage being thrown about. It took everything in Ginny not to get up and open the door
of their carriage to see what was going on, but she stayed where she was and kept her head
bowed.

So close – she was so close to being home for the holidays, and while it no doubt promised to
be a dreary affair, at least she wouldn’t be there anymore.

Ginny didn’t have the same appreciation for Hogwarts that some of her friends did – likely
because the place had nearly killed her within months of first stepping foot in it – but it’d still
been a magnificently magical place. Now it was like living in the belly of a rotted whale,
bloated and washed to shore; every step precarious and every breath tainted.

In that regard, she was grateful that Harry hadn’t returned to see what it had become. She
often wished she hadn’t. And while she knew that she objectively wasn’t much safer at The
Burrow, she’d happily cling to that illusion if it meant a decent night’s rest and not having to
look over her shoulder quite so often.

Finally, there was a thud close by and their carriage door was thrown open. She didn’t
immediately recognise any of the men that were revealed. The two with masks lingered in the
corridor of the train and the two without stepped in, one hulking brute with dark, snarled hair
and a scar over his brow, and the other -

Ginny averted her eyes, but not before she placed his face. Marcus Flint; not just any low-
level bloody purity zealot, but a recently marked member of Voldemort’s circle. Sweat
beaded at the nape of her neck and her stomach twisted, threatening to purge her meager
breakfast.

In her periphery, she saw Flint scan the cabin before he chuckled.

“Well, what a sad lot of blood traitors and nancies, you are.”

Neville replied, his voice tight and dripping with poorly concealed anger. “Our trunks are on
the racks overhead. Search them, take whatever you’d like.”

“You think you have anything that interests me, Longbottom? It’s no wonder your pathetic
fucking parents went soft in the head, must run in the family.”

“Don’t,” Seamus hissed, putting an arm in front of Neville as if he could hold him in place.
Taking a swing at Crabbe over a rasher of bacon was one thing, this was something entirely
different. Even now, she could hear who knew how many other Death Eaters rattling around
the adjacent compartments and carriages.

“If you don’t want to search our bags, then what do you want?” Seamus asked, turning his
attention to Flint while trying to keep a hand on Neville.

It was silent for a beat, some knowing glance shared among the assemblage before Flint
spoke again, a sickening smile contorting his mouth and colouring his voice.

“We want her.”

Ginny stopped breathing.

In and out and in and out and in and then nothing. Because Harry had been right, but he had
also been so very wrong. There would be a target on her for her association with him, and
there had been in small ways thus far, but the longer he existed as a loose end, an unknown,
the more desperate their enemies would become. It was only a matter of time before attention
turned back to her family, to her, and it seemed that time had finally run out.

At least it wasn’t Bill, or the twins, or her parents, she thought fleetingly. And if they were
going to attempt to torture answers out of her, not only would they not get anything of use,
but it also meant that Harry was still safely off the map. That hope was still alive, even if
she… even if she might not be.

Ginny squeezed her eyes shut tightly, still in the midst of deciding whether or not to put up a
fight, when an arm shot past and reached over her. Reached toward Luna.

Her eyes flew open again.

“NO!” Ginny screamed, frantically lunging forward to catch her friend’s other arm as Flint
pulled Luna stumbling off the bench toward him. Ginny’s wand rolled out from beneath her
leg, but she couldn’t let go long enough to get it. Luna’s pale blue eyes were wide and
terrified as she fumbled for her own wand, like a calf being dragged to slaughter.
“Let her go!” Neville roared, shooting up from his seat and raising his arm only to be met by
the other unmasked man, as well as the two cloaked figures still outside the compartment.
Seamus had his back pressed to the corner and his neck bent at an odd angle beneath the
luggage rack, wand also drawn.

Ginny fought like her own life depended upon it, planting her feet and trying desperately to
pull Luna back toward her, acting from blind fear and panic. Luna. What could they possibly
want with Luna?

Her wand, where had her fucking wand gone?

She didn’t have the chance to look. Flint’s hand, little more than a blur, backhanded her, the
sharp sting of knuckles splitting her lip and making her ears ring. Her head snapped
backward and, to her horror, she lost her grip on her friend.

He shoved a struggling Luna toward the masked men in the corridor, who’d since been joined
by two more that she could barely see through the frosted glass.

“Luna!” Ginny shouted after her, diving again and knowing that it was pointless as Flint
grabbed her wrist in a biting grip. They were already dragging Luna away, down the train and
toward the stairs that led onto the platform. The last thing she saw was a flash of platinum
blonde hair before it was engulfed in an endless ocean of black, but she had to make sure that
she knew. Luna had to know that they’d tried, that they’d fought for her. She screamed again,
her throat raw. “LUNA!”

Neville snapped, firing a slicing hex at the dark-haired man only to have it deflected and
three more spells returned, the last being something a sickly yellow color that struck his
shoulder and sent him to the floor with a pained grunt, dropping his wand. Seamus moved to
catch him, but then hands where there, grabbing both of the boys by their collars and
dragging them from the carriage, trunks and belongings levitated and lobbed haphazardly
after them.

Ginny made to follow, but Flint’s grip on her arm tightened further, holding her in place like
a vice. Her pulse jumped.

“Neville –“ Ginny started to call out, but this time it wasn’t an admonition, nor a reminder to
keep his head level. It was a cry for help, disjointed and trembling.

“Ginny,” Neville choked back, pushing onto his hands and knees and gasping in pain as he
tried to crawl toward her. He looked as terrified as she felt, a rabbit caught in a snare and
realising it had met its demise.

He’d nearly made it over the threshold and back into the cabin when the other unmasked
Death Eater turned and kicked Neville with his enormous boot, bowing his body upward in
an arch. Then he stepped around him and shut the door with a snap, shapes and shadows still
visible through the glass.

The quiet sound of the latch locking was like thunder in her ears.
“Let me go,” Ginny demanded in that same, shuddering voice, her free hand clutching
desperately behind her in an attempt to locate her wand, or even Luna’s. She felt only the
scratchy, worn upholstery of the seat.

Flint made a sound somewhere between a laugh and a snort. The hold on her wrist
disappeared for a split second, only to be replaced by one on her throat, the heel of his palm
pressing painfully into her windpipe. She jerked her knee up, aiming for his groin, but he
turned and she struck his hip instead. Then he leaned in, growling just below her ear as rancid
breath washed over her neck and jaw.

“Tell your brothers I said hello.”

He shoved her backward suddenly and her head cracked against the wooden ledge below the
window as she sprawled onto the bench. Her vision went blurry around the edges, stomach
lurching as something warm and wet bloomed over her scalp. She failed to muffle the gasp of
pain that slipped past her lips.

She tried to push to her feet but she couldn’t, everything swam in double, and she could hear
Seamus and Neville in the corridor, beating on the door, trying to get back inside while the
Death Eaters standing over them laughed. They might as well have been halfway around the
world.

“Please,” Ginny wheezed, her hands reaching up to claw ineffectively at the hand squeezing
her throat again as Flint hovered over her with a sadistic smile. “Please.”

“I’m going in,” Fred said, his already non-existent patience evaporating as he watched yet
another horde of Death Eaters climb off the train, interspersed with pale, frightened-looking
students practically running to their families.

Retrieving Ginny as a favor to his mother, he and Bill had been standing on the platform for
nearly 30 minutes, pointedly not discussing Bill’s prolonged houseguest and waiting for their
sister to emerge.

“Don’t,” Bill cautioned, a hand shooting out to grip his shoulder as he made to move forward.
“Give her another minute.”

Fred glanced sidelong at him and, though he didn’t look any calmer than Fred felt, he stopped
moving regardless.

Instead, he returned to bouncing in place, repeatedly touching the ridge of his wand, tucked
out of sight in his pocket.

Another few minutes passed and the crowds began to thin, Death Eaters apparating out
alongside parents and family, quick to get their children home and to the perceived safety it
held.

The thought almost made him laugh; there was no such thing as safety, not anymore. Just like
there was no bloody sign of Ginny.
Fred opened his mouth to speak again, insist that they board the train, when he saw Seamus
Finnigan leap off the steps a few cars down, sprinting toward them and clutching a large gash
on his upper arm that trailed messy splotches of crimson blood on the grey pavement.

Seamus yelled ahead of himself before he’d even made it halfway to them. “GINNY! It’s
Ginny!”

Bill looked Fred’s way and their little game of trying to remain calm came to an abrupt end.
Then they were running in the direction Seamus had come from, barely seeing him collapse
on the platform as two witches rushed to him with alarmed expressions.

Fred was on the train and up the stairs first, checking his hip on the railing as he passed. He
didn’t even feel it.

It’s Ginny.

It’s Ginny.

It’s Ginny.

They tore down the carriage, now vacant, until they’d nearly reached the end. There was
luggage strewn about the corridor, opened and with their contents trampled. But Fred’s heart
didn’t sink, didn’t truly understand what Seamus had meant, until they stepped around the
bags and peered into the compartment.

Neville was sprawled on the floor with Ginny’s limp body gathered haphazardly across the
tops of his legs. He was rocking forward and back with his head lowered, and there were
tears streaming down his cheeks when he looked up at them, clutching her tightly to him.

“I tried to get in,” he choked. “I tried – I tried to get in.”

The evidence of that much was obvious; the dark bruises already forming on his hands and
wrists, the odd angle his shoulder hung at.

“I tried,” Neville said again, turning his attention back to Ginny as Fred and Bill did the
same.

Fred’s heart simply… stopped.

His baby sister’s lip was split, dark blood crusted on her chin and staining the copper hair at
the crown of her head. As Neville rocked forward again, seemingly unaware he was doing so,
her face was dipped beneath the overhead compartment light, revealing a black eye that was
already beginning to mottle purple and swell shut.

But it was the front of her blouse, torn almost completely open and revealing a pale blue bra
beneath, that had Fred stumbling back into the corridor. His back hit the wood panel across
from the compartment as his legs gave out and his shaking hands braced on his knees.

It was in that moment that he knew. He knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that this was his
fault. He’d provoked this, he’d done this.
He turned back to the carriage in time to see Bill crouch down in front of Neville, carefully
lifting Ginny off of him and into his own much steadier arms, murmuring something quietly
as he did so.

Neville’s head dropped into his hands as he began to shake more violently, sobs racking his
broken, misshapen frame.

“We need to get them out of here,” Fred said hoarsely, both present and not. Comprehending
and yet utterly unwilling to put the pieces together. “Dad isn’t home, but mum –“

“No,” a quiet voice croaked. It took a moment to realise that it had come from Ginny. The eye
that wasn’t swollen shut blinked open and she turned her head just a little, looking up at them
and revealing a dark ring of bruises around her throat. “Not mum, not like this. Please.”

Fred and Bill shared a fleeting look.

“The flat,” Fred tried again, knowing full well that Bill’s cottage was one of their last true
safe houses and disinclined to compromise it further. “Take her to our flat; Lee and Angie are
in the shop with George.”

Bill nodded and stood, lifting Ginny like she didn’t weigh anything and quickly making his
way back toward the end of the train. Fred turned to Neville.

“Is your gran here?” he asked, but Neville just shook his head.

“I – I was just going to apparate home.”

Fred looked at him, still shuddering and with gods-knew-what wrong with his shoulder, and
shook his head.

“You’ll splinch yourself in half, mate. C’mon.” He reached a hand down and gripped
Neville’s good arm, pulling him to his feet and propping him against the doorjamb as he went
about quickly shrinking and gathering their remaining things, finding Ginny’s wand on the
floor of the compartment and pocketing it along with another that he didn’t recognise.

Fred focused wholeheartedly on the task at hand, adamantly refusing to let his mind wander.
Refusing to think too hard about what had just happened, because if he did he’d march into
the atrium of the ministry and get himself killed.

Once their belongings were accounted for, Fred braced an arm beneath Neville’s shoulder and
they slowly began to make their way toward the end of the carriage.

Seamus was just climbing the stairs back onto the train, his arm wrapped with thick layers of
gauze, when they stopped in front of him.

“Is she -?” he started to ask, searching Fred and Neville’s faces for any indication of what had
happened to Ginny.

“She’s somewhere safe,” Fred said vaguely, digging in his pockets for Seamus’ shrunken
belongings.
“We tried –“ Seamus started, the same as Neville had. With the same haunted, defeated voice.

“I know,” Fred nodded, knowing all too well what it was to feel helpless. “Was that your
family out there with you?”

“Yeah, my mum and my aunt.”

“Good; go find them and get the fuck out of here.”

Seamus nodded, sharing one last look before departing and seeming as though he wanted to
say something else without being entirely sure what. Because really, what was there to say?

Fred helped Neville down the stairs and onto the platform before tightening his grip on the
other man.

“Hold on,” he said in warning, just before turning on the spot. They arrived in the alley
behind the shop and, though Neville looked a bit peakier, he remained upright.

“You’re pretty good at side-along,” he said weakly. “Gran’s rubbish at it.”

“I’ve had a lot of practice,” Fred said, thinking of Hermione and then quickly banishing the
thought. He couldn’t think about her, not then. Not in the scope of what had just happened.
He knew his limits, and he knew he’d break if he invited his memories of her into this
waking nightmare.

He helped Neville through the back door of the shop, encountering a stone-faced Lee behind
the till. Fred looked around, but he didn’t see any sign of Angie or George.

“You shouldn’t be alone down here,” Fred said pointedly, glancing toward the singular
elderly man, browsing at the other end of the showroom. Probably a run of the mill customer,
but there wasn’t any way to be certain anymore.

“George’ll come back down once you get up there,” Lee explained, glancing at Neville and
offering a ghost of a smile and a nod. “Longbottom.”

Fred nodded, helping Neville along and cursing that they didn’t have an apparition point up
the stairs. It was slow going, but they eventually made it, entering the living room to find Bill
seated on the sofa beside an ashen George.

“What the hell took you so long?” George half-shouted, springing to his feet.

Fred made to answer, but Neville beat him to it.

“It was my fault,” he admitted, gesturing vaguely at what Fred was fairly certain was a
dislocated shoulder, several cracked ribs, and quite possibly a broken ankle if the limping was
any indication.

George just sighed, stepping forward to help Neville into the armchair beside the fireplace.
“Where’s Gin?” Fred asked Bill, looking around and then shooting a glance toward the
bedrooms down the hall.

“In with Angie and Fleur,” he said. He looked ten years older than he had that morning, and
the leather strap binding his hair had either been discarded or lost. “Katie and Alicia are on
shift at the hospital until later, but they’ll come by as soon as they’re off.”

George started to tend to Neville’s ankle, conjuring bandages to wrap and splint it, but he
explained that anything else would have to wait for their unofficial healers to arrive.

“I need to send word to my gran,” Neville said, hissing through his teeth at whatever George
was doing. “Is it alright if I – ?”

“You’re staying here tonight,” Fred said, the words out before the thought had fully caught
up. “Tell her you’ll be there in the morning.”

Neville just nodded and let his head fall onto the back of the chair, what little energy he had
left visibly leeching out of him.

It occurred to Fred that they were supposed to have Ginny back to The Burrow by now.

“We need to tell mum –“

“I already handled it,” Bill replied. “Just told her that King’s Cross was swarmed and Ginny
wanted to stay with Angie and the two of you for a few days. You can bring her over when
we go for Christmas Eve dinner.”

Fred nodded as George got back to his feet, clapping Neville on the shoulder and then
summoning a bottle of firewhisky and a couple glasses from the kitchen. He set them down
on the low table in front of the sofa with a thunk.

“I’m going back downstairs with Lee; I asked Verity to come in, but until then… just keep
me updated, yeah?”

“Yeah,” Bill said, nodding and pouring a couple fingers of whiskey into each of the glasses.
Fred threw his back without much thought; it would be hell on his empty stomach, but the
burn felt good.

At least he could still feel that much.

The first thing that Ginny became of aware of upon waking was pain. Radiating through her
head, from the back where she felt a lump to the swollen tissue around her eye, almost fully
obscuring her vision.

The second thing was hands, on her - touching her. She immediately sat up, ignoring the
resulting agony and tugging her arm away from the contact.

“S-sorry, sorry, sorry,” Angelina stammered quickly, raising her own hands palm-forward and
sitting back in the chair she was occupying. The light in the room was dim, the curtains
drawn, but Ginny could make out her wide eyes and apologetic expression.

“Where am I?” she asked, her throat like sandpaper as she looked around. Something moved
in the corner of her compromised vision and another figure stepped forward on the other side
of the bed.

“Safe at ze twins’ flat, in George’s bedroom I believe,” Fleur answered, holding a shallow
basin of water. Her expression was solemn as she set it carefully on the bedside table. “Ginny,
do you remember what ‘appened to you?”

Happened to her, as though she’d been a passive party.

Like she hadn’t fought, hadn’t screamed until her throat felt like it was going to bleed.

Ginny looked back and forth between the women on either side of her, the open concern in
Angelina’s eyes, the steadfast expression on Fleur’s striking face. And then all at once she
began to cry, hot tears sweltering and then tipping over the corners of her eyes to blaze trails
down her cheeks.

“Yes,” she gasped, pressing the back of her shaking hand to her mouth and wincing as it made
contact with her split lip. “Yes, I – I remember.”

Fleur just nodded and muttered something, a flannel floating from the dresser against the wall
and into her hand. She very carefully perched on the edge of the bed without making contact.

“Do I ‘ave your permission to touch your face?” she asked, dipping the rag in the basin and
wringing it out. Ginny glanced to Angie again, realised what she’d been doing when Ginny
had awoken and panicked. She held another cloth, covered in tiny red half-moons; cleaning
away the blood that was caked under Ginny’s blunt fingernails.

Ginny slowly reclined onto the pillows and took two slow, steadying breaths. Then she took
two more. Then she nodded.

“Yes.”

Fleur leaned forward and very deliberately brought the cotton rag to Ginny’s chin, blotting
and then wiping away the dried blood there, growing increasingly gentle the closer she got to
the broken skin. She’d stop every so often to dip it back into the basin, pink clouds swirling
in the water briefly before it replenished and cleared.

“Can I touch your hands?” Angelina asked tentatively, as Fleur finally exchanged the rag for
a small jar of dittany and began dabbing it over her lip.

“Yes.”

She gently lifted Ginny’s hand from the bed and continued cleaning beneath her nails.
Cleaning away blood that wasn’t hers, evidence that she had not gone quietly.

They continued on like this for what felt like hours, Angelina and Fleur not so much as
rearranging a lock of hair without her express permission to do so. And with each question
and answer, however repetitive and tedious it must have been, Ginny regained some
modicum of sovereignty over herself and her body.

Silently, she questioned how Fleur knew that she’d needed that.

Silently, she decided that perhaps she didn’t want to know.

Fleur gave her a pain potion and this made things both better and worse. Better because it
made her body hurt less, obviously, but worse because it freed her brain to think about
everything else. To think about what exactly had happened to her.

She was fine until Angelina asked to apply a balm to the dark ring of bruises around her
throat; she said yes, but the minute Angie’s probing fingers made contact with her skin she
jerked away again, knocking over a glass in the process and yelping as it shattered.

“Sorry,” she said immediately, embarrassed by her overreaction. “I’m sorry.”

Fleur simply took the small tin from Angelina’s hands and extended it to her.

“You do it.”

Ginny hesitated and then took it. Unfortunately, her applying it required them to conjure a
mirror. They kept it angled down so she couldn’t see the extent of her injuries, not yet, but it
was still more than she was ready for. The blue and purple impressions wrapping around her
neck stood in stark contrast to her alabaster skin.

As she looked closer, made out the individual finger marks, her breath came more quickly.
The tin shaking in her grasp and tears brimming her eyes again.

“Ginny, look at me,” Fleur said, pushing the reflection away and placing herself in Ginny’s
field of vision instead. Ginny stared forlornly at the discarded mirror for another long second
before obeying, Fleur’s fierce gaze burning away some of the fear. Some of the indignity.
“You survived. Whatever he did, whatever ‘appened to you, you survived. He cannot take
that from you. Nobody can take that from you.”

It took a few minutes, but Fleur didn’t look away and neither did Ginny, and eventually her
heartbeat slowed again. Her eyes cleared.

“I survived,” she said hoarsely, and Fleur nodded.

“You survived.”

“You survived,” Angelina echoed, leaning forward in her chair beside the bed.

Though her hands still shook, Ginny began to apply the salve to her throat.

When that was done, they helped her change, easing her torn shirt and bra over sore, aching
muscles. They didn’t ask about the bruises on her ribs and hips, and she didn’t comment on
them.
Once that was complete and she was wearing one of the boys’ old t-shirts, Angelina began to
brush her hair, working through the knots with gentle strokes. Fleur turned and then brought
over a glass of water and another potion, Wiggenweld this time, and Ginny dutifully drank it
down. When she made to hand it back, Fleur took it and then wavered.

“Do you need me to get you any other potions?”

Angelina’s hands stilled and it took a moment for Ginny to grasp her meaning, but when she
did, she shook her head.

“No,” she said, already feeling marginally better as the salves and balms and tonics began to
take effect and chase away the hurt. “He didn’t – he didn’t do that.”

Fleur nodded and Ginny let her eyes fall shut as Angelina started to brush her hair again, and
within minutes she began to drift.

It was a couple of hours before Fleur and Angelina emerged from George’s bedroom, their
faces solemn and steps slow, as though there was a tangible weight on top of them.

Neville sat up in the armchair he’d yet to move from, wincing as he did so.

“Is she -?” He began and then trailed off, thinking that it would be tremendously stupid to ask
if she was okay. He’d been there. He’d heard her. He knew she wasn’t.

“She is resting,” Fleur replied simply. “She will need to be woken on ze hour until Katie and
Alicia are able to examine ze contusion on her head.”

“I’ll take care of it,” Angelina assured, taking a seat on the sofa and picking up the bottle of
firewhiskey, disregarding the glasses and pulling a hefty swig directly from it.

Bill got up and went to his wife, placing a hand on her waist. Fleur shut her eyes and leaned
into him, some of that weariness slipping through her immaculate mask.

Fred, who had yet to sit down, spoke suddenly from beside the fireplace.

“That’s it? ‘She’s resting’?”

Fleur’s eyes opened again, and her gaze landed on Fred, sympathetic but stern.

“Yes, that is it. Anything you wish to know beyond that is not mine to tell.”

Fred, who’d had several glasses of firewhiskey by that point, looked like what Neville
imagined a frayed nerve personified might look like. As furious and helpless and abjectly
fucking sad as Neville felt but was too tired and raw to express.

In a blink, Fred picked up his empty glass from the mantle and hurled it at the opposite wall.
Neville flinched, but before it could make contact and shatter, it froze, suspended in midair.
Fleur’s rosewood wand, which Neville hadn’t even seen her draw, was pointed at it. The glass
slowly levitated to the table nearby and settled on the edge with a soft, anticlimactic clink.

The petite blonde woman stepped out of Bill’s grasp and crossed the room in measured steps,
stopping in front of Fred’s flushed face. She peered up at him with her slender shoulders
squared and chin raised.

“I know that you are angry about what ‘appened, that you want nothing more than to ‘unt
down and murder ze men that did this. I assure you that I feel much ze same. But your
feelings ‘ave no place in that room.” Fleur gestured to the hallway, to the shut door that she
and Angelina had emerged from. Her accent became more prominent the longer she spoke.
“She ‘as more than enough to come to terms with without ‘aving to manage your emotions,
‘owever warranted they may be. So shout and rail and be as furious as you would like, but
keep it out ‘ere and keep it away from ‘er. Do you understand me? Do you all understand
me?”

Fleur turned slowly, looking at him and then Bill, both of whom nodded, before looking back
to Fred.

The eldest Weasley twin’s chest heaved indignantly several times, but in a blink that anger on
his face melted and turned to something else entirely. Something far more difficult to name,
and even harder to witness. Neville looked away, back to the fire crackling in the hearth.

“She will be okay,” he heard Fleur murmur quietly, rocking onto her toes and wrapping her
arms around Fred’s shaking shoulders. Neville wondered idly if Ginny was the only ‘she’ that
Fleur was talking about.

He nodded off shortly after that, waking when Alicia Spinett and Katie Bell entered the flat
some hours later, bearing food and still wearing their healer robes.

“You look like hell, Longbottom,” Katie commented unceremoniously while Alicia silently
followed Angelina toward the bedroom where Ginny still presumably was.

“I feel like hell,” he groaned, sitting forward a little as she began to unknot the makeshift
sling that was holding his shoulder in place. They didn’t speak much beyond that as she
popped it back into the socket and then began the rather painful process of mending his ribs
and the bones in his ankle. The potions helped some, bitter as they were, but they didn’t dull
things entirely.

“Try and stay off of it for a day or two,” she cautioned, wrapping his ankle and then reaching
into her pocket and extracting what he realised was a tiny wooden crutch, casting an
enlargement charm on it and then propping it against the arm of the chair.

“Thanks, Katie,” he said, already feeling some relief from his properly-set shoulder.

She nodded, packing away her supplies and then heading into the kitchen where the twins
were quietly talking. Bill and Fleur had left, but George appeared a minute later with a pizza-
laden plate.
“Wasn’t sure if you were hungry,” he said with a shrug, setting both it and a glass of water
down on the table in front of Neville.

“Not really,” he replied truthfully. “But thanks anyway.”

George just nodded and swallowed, his throat bobbing.

“Fred told me what you did,” he finally said after a long pause. “I just – I wanted to say
thanks.”

Guilt slammed into Neville like a locomotive.

“I didn’t do anything,” he said quickly, feeling the weight and truth of those words in his
bones. He had tried, but in the end he’d failed. George just shook his head, though.

“Trust me, mate. You did.”

He got up again and went back to the kitchen before Neville could argue further.

A bit more time passed, the pizza going down like cold lead when Neville tried a few bites,
until Alicia and Angelina emerged from the hall. Alicia also disappeared into the kitchen, but
Angelina crossed the room to him.

“She – she’s asking for you,” Angelina said a little uncertainly, shooting a glance at the twins,
who’d poked their heads back into the room.

“Me?” Neville asked dumbly as he sat up.

“Yeah. Can you walk?” Angelina eyed the crutch beside him, and Neville nodded, though he
accepted her proffered hand to help him stand.

He felt eyes on him, gazes ranging from openly concerned to cautiously curious, but they
didn’t matter as he followed Angelina down the hall.

She deposited him in front of the door of a bedroom and then left, returning to the kitchen
with everyone else.

Neville took a deep breath before reaching out, twisting the knob, and pushing it open.

His eyes took a second to adjust to the light, dimmer than that of the living room, but once
they did, he could see her, sitting propped against a small mound of pillows near the
headboard.

He couldn’t help the palpable relief that he felt as he took in her face, contrasted it against the
horror and shock he’d felt when he’d seen her earlier. The swelling around her eye was
already receding some, her split lip knitting itself back together and the dark bruises around
her throat beginning to fade.

But Neville knew as well as anyone how deep invisible scars could run, so he didn’t
comment on those perceptible improvements, just limped to the chair beside the bed and sank
gingerly into it.

Ginny didn’t speak at first as she silently tracked him with her good eye, and he watched in
his periphery as snow began to slowly drift past the window.

“They took Luna,” she finally said, her voice soft and still a little raspy.

Neville jumped a bit, having been lost in his own treacherous thoughts.

“Yeah,” he replied, swallowing down a swell of emotion. Images of Luna’s frightened face as
she was dragged away from them danced in his head. “Yeah, they did. Your brothers said that
they didn’t even see her get off the train, they have no idea where she went.”

Ginny’s lip quivered and she squeezed her eyes shut.

“I should go, you need to rest –“

“I heard you trying to get to me.” Neville, who’d begun to sit forward with the intent of
pushing himself out of the chair, stilled. “Seamus too, but – but mostly you. You never
stopped. Even when he… I could still hear you on the other side of the door, telling me to
focus on your voice. To stay with you.”

Fleur’s words echoed in his head from earlier, about keeping his own feelings out of the room
and not placing any further burden on her, but try as he might, that wasn’t possible now that
he was actually there with her again. Tears pricked his eyes before he could stop them.

“I’m so sorry,” he said, cursing himself for how pathetic it sounded. How ridiculously
insufficient it was, drowned out by the memory of her screaming.

Ginny shook her head and made a shushing sound, and then her hand reached out, landing
lightly on his cheek and startling him a little before forcing him to look at her.

“Neville, you tried. I heard you try, heard them throw you backward again and again. It
wasn’t worth getting yourself killed over.”

“I should have,” he said without thinking. “I should have died rather than –”

Ginny just shook her head again, a pained, sad smile pulling up the corners of her lips.

“Don’t do that. Please don’t do that, I don’t need another bloody martyr.”

A half-laugh escaped him, and then, unable to stop himself, Neville began to cry in earnest.

“I tried so hard to get to you, Gin,” he croaked, her soft, warm hand still on his face, her
thumb swiping out to brush away a guilt-laden tear.

“I know,” Ginny replied evenly. Her hand dropped and he felt a pang at that loss, but when he
looked up, he saw her shuffling across the mattress and pulling the corner of the duvet back.
 She nodded pointedly at the open space beside her and he almost refused, almost made an
excuse about needing to clean up or eat, almost reminded himself that he’d be blurring a line
if he did this, but some selfish part of him needed to touch her; needed to know that she was
real, that she had made it out of that compartment. That they both had.

Neville stood with thinly veiled effort, toeing his shoes off and then carefully climbing into
the bed beside her.

“Is your shoulder alright?” Ginny asked, watching as he cautiously maneuvered his sling.
Neville nodded, letting his head fall to rest on the pillow but leaving the rest of his body
rigid.

Ginny moved slowly, like they were both wont to break, wedging herself into the crook of his
arm and letting her head come to rest on his undamaged shoulder. He wondered not for the
first time how someone so unbelievably enormous could be so small.

Her arm snaked out, landing first on his tender, newly healed ribs and then moving down
toward his hip a little when he winced. She buried her face in his chest as his arm came up to
cautiously wrap around her upper back, holding her to him like she was made of porcelain
and fitting their broken pieces together like a puzzle.

“Is this okay?” she asked quietly, her voice stifled as her cracked lips brushed the heavy knit
of his jumper.

He knew she was asking him if the touch was okay, and honestly he wasn’t sure about that
either, but he couldn’t help but let his mind wander beyond that. Was anything okay
anymore? Was it even possible for any of them to be okay?

Harry, Ron, Hermione, Dean – they were all gone. They’d lost Luna now, too.

Fred was unraveling in the living room while Angelina turned a bottle of firewhiskey upside
down.

He’d had to listen to Ginny be beaten and brutalised, while the monsters from his nightmares
stood by and laughed, stopped him with ease as he’d tried futilely to get to her.

The truth was that things were astoundingly far from being okay, and… yet. And yet, as
Ginny’s warmth seeped into him, as he felt her heart beat a steadfast, stubborn rhythm in
concert with his own, he thought maybe – just maybe – they might someday find their way
back to okay.

“Yeah,” Neville said, letting his cheek rest on the top of her head as he let out an exhausted
breath. He closed his eyes. “Yeah, this is okay.”

Chapter End Notes

SYNOPSIS:

In this chapter, Luna, Ginny, Neville and Seamus are riding home together on the train
for Christmas break. When the train arrives at King’s Cross, they are told to remain in
their cabins while “ministry officials” search the train.

Death Eaters board in large numbers and a group, including Marcus Flint, comes to their
compartment. They abduct Luna (per canon) and while Ginny and the others try to fight
back, they’re severely outmatched.

The boys are beaten and dragged into the corridor and Ginny is left alone with Marcus,
who then goes on to sexually assault her.

Meanwhile, Fred and Bill are outside waiting on the platform until Seamus gets them.
They rush in to find the Death Eaters gone and Ginny badly injured and barely-
conscious. She specifically asks not to be taken to The Burrow when they’re deciding
what to do, so instead the Weasleys, along with Neville, end up at the twins’ flat.

Fleur and Angelina take care of Ginny until Katie and Alicia (healers) are able to come
by later in the evening and tend to things properly. It is conveyed in this scene that
Ginny was not assaulted in a way that could result in pregnancy.

Neville, who overheard everything and tried his hardest to get to Ginny during the
assault, is also coping with the ensuing trauma. Ginny asks to see him when the healers
are done and tells him that she heard him trying to reach her and, despite his feeling
guilty for failing, she’s grateful to him.

The chapter ends with the two of them laying in bed together and falling asleep.
 Numb
Chapter Notes

TW: Brief depiction of self-harm

"And when you see what I've become, will you love me for who I am, not who I was?"

24 December 1997

“Please wake up,” Hermione begged, half-screaming as her hands roved over the
unconscious form of her best friend. She blinked her eyes in frustration, trying to clear them
again, maddened that they kept blurring and making it difficult to see. “Please, gods, please
wake up. Please wake up.”
Her fault.

Her fault.

Her fault.

It was all her fault. She’d agreed to visit Godric’s Hollow, she’d said yes despite knowing
better. Despite knowing that Harry would have accepted it if she’d said no, the same as he
always did. But she’d said yes.

She’d said yes, because she was desperate and tired and out of ideas. A well run dry, a blaze
burned to ash.

She’d said yes, and now his wand was broken.

She’d said yes, and now he might very well be dying.

She’d said yes, and now… now she was alone. She was all alone, and she didn’t know what
to do or how to help, and there was nobody there to tell her.

Hermione was kneeling beside Harry’s cot in their tent and as she clumsily peeled back his
outer layers, sweat shining on his pale brow in the flickering lamplight, her hand encountered
something not warm but hot. With a hiss, she recoiled and pressed her singed fingertips to her
chest. Stomach sinking, she tore straight through his collar and undershirt to see the locket
resting on his sternum with angry, blistering skin around it. It almost looked like it was
vibrating.

“What –?“ The smell hit her like a physical blow, sizzling flesh and burnt hair, and she
gagged before pulling in a couple slow breaths through her mouth. Without much hope that it
would work, she used his coat as a makeshift glove and tried to peel the locket away, but it
wouldn’t budge. It was like it was fused there, melting into his skin.

As she tugged on it a little harder, Harry quietly groaned and she let it go. The only
earsplitting, single-minded thought in her head in that moment was that she needed to get it
off and away from him.

Because like recognised like.

She looked around wildly before spying the paring knife on the table – it would be faster,
more precise than a dozen or more carefully-placed slicing spells. Further, she had no idea
what magic was occurring, and she didn’t want to know how it would react if she threw her
own into the mix.

Pulling in a couple shuddering breaths, Hermione got up, shucked her coat, steeled herself as
best she could, and grabbed the knife. It was already clean, but she cast a sterilising charm on
the blade anyway.

“Harry?” She tried one more time out of pure desperation. Maybe if he woke up, the locket
would stop and go dormant again. Maybe she wouldn’t have to do this.
It was useless, though. He remained in a restless, unreachable state of oblivion.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered to nobody. Doing what she could to keep her fingers from
touching the scorching metal directly, she carefully slid the blade beneath the shining, curved
edge of the locket. And when it met resistance, she grimaced and drew it slowly back and
forth.

There was a second’s pause before scarlet blood began to seep from beneath the necklace,
pooling in the small indent of Harry’s sternum before trickling across his chest. She worked
as quickly as she could, burning her fingers to blisters as she tried to do as little damage as
possible, Harry’s blood dribbling down the handle of the blade to her hand. It was hot and
slippery, and the tent smelled like copper and cooking flesh.

The closer she got to removing to locket the more freely he bled until, with a final incision,
the necklace came free. Not caring that it branded her palm, she yanked it over his head and
threw it across the tent.

She stared at it for a second before she turned back to Harry, to the jagged puzzle piece of
missing skin.

“Dittany,” she murmured a little manically, hands groping for her bag where she’d discarded
it nearby. “I need dittany. Just a little dittany.”

Through sheer force of will, she summoned the jar and snatched it as it floated into her hand.
Hermione twisted the top off and unceremoniously globbed some onto Harry’s chest. He
twitched but, as it began to take effect, his muscles eased some.

“Harry?” She tried to shake him awake again as she set the jar aside. He didn’t stir, nor did
his colour improve. A small, nefarious corner of her mind told her that, now stilled, he looked
very much dead. “Harry, wake up. It’s time to wake up.”

She was past begging at that point, all the while feeling her grip on her sanity slacken.
Feeling that careful control, that mask of knowing, fall like the curtain on a play that was best
left unseen.

“Harry, please,” she choked, hiccoughing as her head falling forward to rest on his motionless
shoulder. “I can’t do this alone, please wake up.”

Hermione waited there for a long while. Her tears dried on her cheeks and on Harry’s arm,
her sobs quieted. Finally, she got to her feet and dragged her sleeve across her face.

She looked at the table beside her. Her notes and quills and books; the books, who’d so long
been her friends and confidants, and who had done nothing to help her when she needed them
most. Who mocked her day in and day out as she stroked their pages and beseeched them for
anything resembling help. No, these books held no answers, they offered no solace. And as
she stared at them, something in her, something resilient, fractured a little.

Resentment burning in her stomach like acid, she took a few steps and swept her arm across
the tabletop, sending it all to the floor in a crash with a hoarse scream. She picked up a glass
and threw it at the wooden post in the middle of the room, then she threw the ceramic pitcher
after it. She kicked the chair beside her over and then she kicked it again, snapping the leg off
and not feeling the pain in her foot as she did so. She broke and tore and razed a path of
destruction because it was pointless. It was all so bloody, painfully, pathetically pointless, and
she was tired of pretending that it wasn’t, exhausted and heavy with it.

When there was little else left to break, chest heaving, she looked down at her palm, at the S
branded there. It should hurt, objectively she knew that it should hurt, but she couldn’t feel
that either. She couldn’t feel the burns or the sticky sensation of Harry blood drying between
her fingers. She couldn’t feel the gash in her brow from where she’d hit the banister in the
abandoned house, or the pain in her ankle from the way it had twisted as she’d lunged away
from the snake.

She knotted her hands in her hair and tugged, pulled as hard as she could, but she couldn’t
feel that either.

Nothing. She looked around and felt a consuming, terrifying nothingness pressing in and
swallowing her.

Slowly Hermione straightened and, with careful measured steps, she went to her beaded bag
and picked it up. Then she knelt beside the locket, near the other wooden post in the middle
of the tent, and opened the drawstrings, rummaging until her hand closed on a familiar frame.

Drawing out Phineas Nigellus’ portrait, she didn’t bother to turn it toward the tent wall. She
didn’t blindfold him or obscure her surroundings. She didn’t even attempt to wipe the blood
or grime off of herself. She just propped it against the beam, said his name in an echoing
facsimile of her voice, and waited.

It might have been a minute or an hour, but eventually he entered the picture looking tired
and annoyed.

“I do say, if you haven’t any sense of common courtesy, Miss Granger, you must surely
possess a clock somewhere in this hovel.”

His dark, brushstroke-eyes fixed on her and, if he were capable of it, something in them
showed the briefest flicker of concern.

“Miss Granger?”

With hands that felt as disconnected as a puppet’s whose strings had been cut, she reached to
the side and picked up the locket, laying it carefully at his feet like an offering and smoothing
out a kink in the chain. Harry’s burnt skin was still stuck to the back.

“If I’m not back by dawn, tell him the camp is three miles west of Bronaber,” she said evenly.
“Just to the south of a small lake with an inlet. There’s a big birch tree with a split in it at the
edge of the wards. He knows my magic, he’ll be able to tell.”

“Miss Granger –“
Phineas Nigellus began to protest, but his voice quieted to a soft hum as she got up, buzzing
until it blended with the roaring in her ears. She crossed to where Harry was and knelt again,
pressing a kiss to his brow, just above his scar. His skin was still clammy, and his eyes roved
ceaselessly behind shut lids.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered to him again, knowing it wasn’t enough for all the ways she’d
failed him. For the ways she’d failed herself.

Then Hermione left her bag and her coat and her books, taking only her wand through the
tent flap, all the while Phineas Nigellus shouting fruitlessly after her.

With deft movements, she cut down a few of the wards. Not all, but enough to be found if
someone knew precisely where to look. Then she crossed the barrier beside that birch tree,
turned on her heel, and apparated.

The clock on the mantle chimed quietly as Fred counted. Three times. Three tolls. Three
o’clock.

It was Christmas, it had been for a few hours, but it didn’t feel like it. There were no gifts,
there was no joy. What little celebration there’d been that night at his parents’ house had been
shrouded in the shadows behind Ginny’s eyes, only visible to those that knew to look for
them; in Bill and Fleur’s clear discomfort at the mention of Ron; at the pointed way they all
avoided saying Hermione’s name around him, save for Angie and George.

It was a shame, really, because he loved Hermione’s name. Had he ever told her that? He
should tell her that.

Head resting on the back of the sofa, he tipped the bottle of muggle whiskey upward, hissing
as it burned his throat. He’d had enough to dull it, that ever-present ache, but not so much
that he couldn’t feel it at all. He wasn’t sure if that’s what he was attempting to do. Frankly
he wasn’t sure that it was even possible.

George and Angelina were long asleep, gone to bed shortly after arriving home. Fred tried to
tell himself it wasn’t because of him that they fled to George’s bedroom, but he knew what he
was like to be around. He knew there was a cloud of gloom hovering, so thick that it made it
hard to breath, and he couldn’t blame them for needing a break from it. He often wished that
he could get a break from it.

Letting the bottle come to rest atop his thigh, he stared at the ceiling and let his mind wander.
Wonder.

He thought about what this Christmas was like in a different universe. Would Hermione be
staying there with him? Would she have helped with the holiday rush in the shop? Would
they have gone away somewhere? Visited Charlie, maybe?

Would he wake her Christmas morning with coffee and a kiss? Would she wake him with soft
skin and softer touches? Would they exchange gifts in bed with Crookshanks batting at the
ribbons? Would they laugh? Would they be happy? No, he didn’t need to wonder at that last
question. He knew they were. In every life, in every iteration of them, he knew that she made
him happy.

He blinked, and that tableau faded back to aging plaster and flickering firelight.

The shop below was still and silent and, after much heated arguing, it would be remaining
that way for the foreseeable future. At least, the storefront itself would. They were continuing
with mail orders and product development, but that consolation tasted a lot like defeat, bitter
and acrid.

With a sigh, Fred raised the whiskey to take another swig when, suddenly, his wrist grew
warm.

Startled, he nearly dropped the bottle.

It took a long second to realise what it was, but when he did, he jerked forward and set the
whiskey none-too-gently on the table in front of him. Jerking the sleeve of his jumper up, he
squinted at the bracelet on his wrist, twisting it toward the light.

Domum quae non est domum

Rubbing his eyes, Fred read it again as his half-drunk mind tried to piece together the
meaning.

Domum – home. Que non est… that isn’t?

Home that isn’t?

No, home that isn’t home.

Heart racing, Fred dug around the couch cushion beside him for his wand.

“Are you okay?” He asked, watching as the words flashed and then disappeared. It was only
a second before her response came.

No

Heart racing, he got to his feet. He looked to the back hallway where George and Angie slept,
and he thought about waking them. It could be a trap – the bracelets were charmed, but they
weren’t foolproof. And he wasn’t drunk, but he certainly wasn’t sober.

No, it was a profoundly bad idea to put on his shoes and go down the stairs without telling
anyone. To slip to the back door and into the alley where frozen rain was falling. To think
about the place that she might consider a home that wasn’t really her home at all.

That would all be distinctly ill-advised.

He did it anyway.
Blinking against the deluge, he landed teetering but intact among the shrubbery of
Hermione’s parents’ back garden. Or rather, what was left of it.

A pit in his stomach, he looked around the dark lot, wide eyes adjusting to the lack of light.
The Granger’s family home, that stately Victorian on the end of the row that had once seemed
so intimidating, was… gone.

All that was left in its place were sections of brick, charred and black, and rubble. Half of the
home next to it had been destroyed, too.

Immediately on guard, Fred gripped his wand tighter and carefully crossed the garden. The
embers were long since cooled, and the muggle authorities had taped around the perimeter of
the property, so it must have happened a while ago.

When he neared the edge of the foundation where the remnants of the back door were
leaning, he cast a few charms, trying to detect wards or alarms, anything that could present a
hazard or indicate that this was anything other than what it seemed. When those exposed
nothing, he murmured, “Hominum revelio.”

Looking around, he saw only one small form crouched behind a half-wall of debris where the
sitting room had once been. With his heart in his throat, he walked toward it, holes in the
ruined roof letting in icy rain in some places.

“Hermione?”

Her back was to him and she was kneeling in the ash, fingering the edges of a broken piece of
China. When he said her name, she stilled. Then she turned to look up at him, and it was like
nothing he’d ever felt before. He didn’t need a security question to know it was her, the same
as she’d always known he was him. He’d recognise her in utter darkness, blind, deaf and
dumb.

And this Hermione, staring up at him, looked… wrong. As he watched her, saw the streak of
blood on her brow and dark shadows beneath her eyes and wet tangled hair hanging lank
around her face, he knew something was really, really wrong.

“You came,” she said hollowly, staring at him like she didn’t believe he was real. Like he
might disappear if she blinked.

He tried to swallow around the lump in his throat, but he couldn’t, so he croaked in response.
“You called.”

They stayed there for a moment, the empty space like a piano wire, taut and ready to snap.

Finally, Fred took a step closer, then another, and knelt beside her. Slowly, moving as though
she were a wounded animal, he set his wand aside and examined her.

“What –?” Before he could finish his question, his gaze landed on her hands.

They were covered in dry blood and caked in grime, the nails either broken or bitten to the
quick on most fingers. And in one palm, the one not holding the shard of China, he could see
the edge of an angry, blistered burn.

She followed his gaze and a dark, dry chuckle that sounded nothing like her easy laugh,
bubbled from her lips as she raised them.

“I can’t feel them,” she pointed out acerbically. “Doesn’t matter, they’re useless anyway.
Can’t fix Harry. Can’t fix me. Can’t fix anything. They only make things worse.”

If he’d been concerned before, he didn’t know what he was now.

“Look at me, love. Right here. What happened?”

“It’s falling apart.” She leaned forward and said it in a whisper, giggling like they were
conspiring to sneak away after dinner to snog. “It’s all falling apart. And I can’t fix it, and I
can’t feel anything. I can’t feel anything.”

Before he could stop her, she squeezed the jagged fragment of China and it bit into her palm,
blood welling and dripping into the scorched earth.

“Hermione, no,” he said firmly, pulling it away from her with as much care as he could and
tossing it aside.

“I can’t feel anything, I can’t feel anything, I can’t feel anything…” She murmured it over
and over, rocking on her knees. Heedless of the blood, her hands came up to knot in the hair
at her temples.

Fred had no idea what to do. He’d thought of this reunion for months and there she was,
kneeling in the ashes of her childhood, unraveling in front of him, and he had no earthly idea
what to do or how to help her.

“Feel me,” he blurted suddenly. Reaching out and gripping her bleeding hand, he tugged it to
rest against his chest, trying to will some warmth, some strength, some lucidity through that
bare touch.

She just kept shaking her head until, in fear and frustration, he squeezed her hand as hard as
he could without risk of breaking it, hoping against hope that it might get through to her. It
killed him to do it, but if pain was all she’d known, perhaps pain was what she needed.

Hermione gasped, looking up to meet his gaze with wide, wild eyes.

“Feel me,” he said again, not loosening his grip. She whimpered softly, her fingers curling
into the thick knit of his jumper as she moved closer. She began to claw at it, like she was
trying to tear it away or burrow through it.

It was freezing in what remained of the house, but Fred reached his free arm behind his back
and grabbed a handful of his jumper and the shirt beneath, awkwardly tugging the damp
garments over his head without breaking contact with her. Tossing them away, he
repositioned her freezing hand to rest on his naked skin this time, just above the place his
heart was hammering. She might have been cold, but her blood was warm.
“Feel me.”

Hesitantly, Hermione inched forward a little more on her knees and pressed her other hand,
the one with the burn, to the other side of his chest. For a long time she just stared at the
places they touched, sometimes wiggling her fingers or digging her nails into his skin. He let
her, not wavering, not moving an inch, even when it hurt. He could hurt for her.

“Fred?” Her eyes lifted to connect with his and it was like she was waking up, blinking at
him dazedly. Where there hadn’t been anything but pain and despondence, there was
suddenly recognition.

“Hey, baby,” he said with a gentle smile as he continued to hold her hand to him, stroking his
thumb back and forth along her wrist.

She pulled in two gasping, hitching breaths, and then suddenly she lurched forward. Her arms
wrapped tightly around his neck and she buried her face in his shoulder. He felt hot tears
track across his skin as she began to shake.

Easing them backward, he pulled her between his legs and onto his lap. One arm banded
tightly around her while the other hand stroked over her hair.

“I’m right here,” he whispered, “I’ve got you. It’s okay. You’re okay.”

Eventually her jagged sobs began to ebb, her death-grip on him relaxing. Hermione
straightened, her forehead coming to rest against his. He didn’t know when he’d begun
crying nor when he’d stopped, but a gust of wind whistled through the house and froze the
remnants of tears that had streaked down his own cheeks.

“I-I got so lost,” Hermione said quietly, searching his face like she was trying to reacquaint
herself with it. “Everything was dark and it was all spinning around me and I didn’t know
what to do or where to go. I couldn’t go home, I didn’t want to risk it.”

She meant the flat, his home. Their home.

“I found you,” he replied, the side of his nose brushing against hers as he brought his hands
up to cup her face. “I promise I’ll always find you.”

Hermione closed the gap before he could, pressing her lips to his and then parting them with
a sigh. She tasted like salvation, a light in their never-ending barrage of darkness.

Gradually, her kisses grew more frantic, heated, and he knew that he should put a stop to it.
He needed to find out what had led to this, make sure Harry was okay, make sure she was
okay. Hell, acknowledge that they were currently ensconced in the wreckage of her parents’
former home.

But a more dominant, far more primal, part of his brain wanted only to touch her. Feel her.
Taste her. Take her.

He tried to listen to the part that told him to be gentle with her, but when he made to pull
backward and break away to say as much, Hermione knotted a hand tightly in his hair and bit
his lip so hard that he tasted blood.

A soft growl rumbled in his chest, and he felt her shiver. His grip on her waist tightened as he
grappled with his self-control. Hermione pulled away from his lips and ducked to drag her
tongue along the outer shell of his ear.

“You’re hurt,” he said, his voice gravely and strangled. “We shouldn’t – we need to –“

“I need you,” she breathed softly. “Please, Fred. I'm not going to run, I just need to feel you.”

What remained of his thin resolved snapped as he pushed her backward and flat onto the
uneven floor, hair fanning in the ash and dirt. His hands went to the buckle of his belt while
she tore at her own clothes, hastily shoving her damp jeans and knickers down past her
thighs.

He didn’t wait for her to undress, didn’t even take his own pants fully off. As soon as his
cock was free, he fell forward into the cradle of her hips and, positioned at her entrance,
sheathed himself in her in one swift movement.

She whimpered, nails raking over his back so hard that it felt like they broken skin, and that
was fine, too. If she wanted him to bleed for her, he would do it happily.

Hooking her knee up, he clutched her hip and pressed her open before driving forward again.

“I missed you,” he bit out disjointedly as he moved over her, in her. “I missed you so fucking
much.”

“Fred,” she groaned, wrapping herself around him and rolling her hips up to meet his. It was
a frantic, filthy, feral coupling.

He wasn’t gentle with her, nor she with him. With every thrust, he gave her his pain, his grief,
his longing, and with every gasping breath, every too-hard kiss, she took it and did the same
in return. It was as though they were punishing one another, for the foolish sin of ever
thinking that they could survive apart.

Hermione broke first, burying her cry in the crook of his neck as she clung to him. Her teeth
sank into the juncture where his throat met his shoulder and he swore viciously because it
hurt but it also didn’t. She was shaking and squeezing him so unimaginably tight that his
vision went momentarily white as, a second later, he followed her over that razor's edge.

Despite the cold, a thin sheen of sweat painted his back and the places their skin touched.
Still trembling, he lowered his head to rest between her breasts and her hands, which had
been gripping him to the point of pain, now stroked lightly over his cheeks and the back of
his head. Fred closed his eyes.

“Your hair is longer,” she noted softly, breaking the silence and gently tugging on a lock at
the nape of his neck. He almost began to laugh at the absurdly mundane nature of the
observation, but he couldn’t quite muster it.

Pressing up onto his forearms, he looked at her to find that she was already studying him.
“We need to talk,” he said. It wasn’t a question because he wasn’t going to allow her to
refuse. Hermione just slowly licked her lips and nodded.

“Yeah, we really do.”

 Try, try again

25 December 1997

Fred pulled his hastily dried jumper over his head and then looked around, finding Hermione
a few feet away, staring up at the far corner of the ruined house. He’d only been there a
handful of times, but he was fairly certain that it was where her bedroom had been.

“Any idea when it happened?” He asked, moving to stand beside her. Her damp hair was
twisted into a low bun and her hands were rinsed and bandaged with clean gauze, the best
they could do without any real provisions.

“No,” she replied after a pause, seeming to shake herself. “It was just like this when I got
here. I hadn’t been back since summer.”

“It could have been Halloween. There was a rash of attacks all over the city, they called them
‘revels.’”
Hermione nodded and swallowed hard. “I suppose I should feel some sense of vindication
that it wasn’t for nothing, sending them away.”

“Do you?” He studied her profile and she tipped her head consideringly.

“Yeah, I guess I do.”

With a heavy sigh, she went back to the small area of the house that they’d cleared out and
sat down. Despite every fiber of his being still screaming at him to be near her, Fred took a
seat a little ways away, facing her instead.

“You asked me what happened tonight,” she started, holding his gaze for a moment before
dropping it to her hands, playing with the edge of the gauze over her right palm. “What
happened is that I messed up. I made a bad call, and I took us somewhere that I shouldn’t
have, and Harry got hurt. I think – I hope – he’ll be okay. He should be okay, but he was still
unconscious when I... when I left.”

That last part was so drenched with shame and guilt that it was almost a tangible thing. He
was glad he hadn’t sat next to her, because if he had he would be touching her again, wanting
nothing more than to tell her that it would all be okay. They didn’t lie like that, though.

“You did the right thing, you weren’t in any state to help anyone when I got here. You knew
it, too.”

A crease appeared between her brows, but she nodded.

“His wand is broken. It was an accident, I cast a blasting hex and it went wide, but he doesn’t
know yet. I don’t know how I’m going to tell him.”

“With words, I’d wager. He’ll understand.”

“Yes, but he shouldn’t have to,” she snapped, a barbed edge on her voice that he knew wasn’t
really directed at him. “He shouldn't have to understand because it shouldn’t have happened;
I should have done better. I should have known better.”

He waited for her to go on, but she just fell silent and Fred pondered the woman before him –
and she was a woman now, in every sense of the word. Complicated and strong and brilliant
beyond words, if perhaps a little bit bruised.

To love Hermione, to really know her, was to accept that she didn’t need to be saved. Even if
she thought she did, she didn’t. She never had. If he hadn’t come tonight, if they were not
them and he was not hers, he had every confidence that she would still find a way to carry on.
Yes, it would likely take more from her, but she would do it because that’s who she was.

What she needed in him was not a savior but a partner, an equal; someone that wasn’t afraid
to push her as much as they pulled her back when she drifted. Not to clear her path for her,
but to keep in step beside her while she traveled it.

So Fred jerked his chin forward expectantly.

“That all? Because I can wait. Are you sure that you don’t want to self-flagellate a little
more? Blame yourself for the sky being blue? Lunar cycle? Two plus two adding up to four?”

That got her attention, startled, incensed eyes flicking up. There was that spark, that tiny,
flickering flame that lived in her chest the same as it did in his.

“I’m not –“

“You are!” He accused with an incredulous chuckle, fanning the ember. “Remember last year
when my brother got himself poisoned while you were literally asleep, and you convinced
yourself it was your fault for not developing clairvoyance and predicting that it would
happen?”

“This is different,” she said obstinately. “This was my call, I’m the responsible party.”

“Alright, fine, grand. You’re responsible. Is that what you thought of Kingsley and Alastor
the night that George lost his ear, then? That it wouldn’t have happened if they’d done better,
planned better?”

Hermione drew up short, upended by that comparison.

“What? No, of course not. I didn’t –“

“Or at the Ministry the year before that. Did you blame Harry for that hex Dolohov cast on
you? Did you blame me for not being there to stop it?”

“It’s not the same!”

“Why not? Because it’s you calling the shots this time? C’mon, Hermione. It’s a shit part to
play but somebody has to play it and you’re better than most. That doesn’t mean you aren’t
going to make mistakes.”

She pulled her knees to her chest and pressed her palms into her eyes.

“I’m just so tired,” she groaned, like she was pleading with the universe itself for a reprieve.
“The stakes are so bloody monumental all the time and I didn’t know it was possible to feel
this unbelievably tired.”

“Well of course you’re tired, love. You’ve been through hell and back, and there’s still miles
left to go.” He leaned a bit closer. “So breathe, rest. Plan your next move and share the
burden for once, for fuck’s sake. But then you have to get up again. You have to get up, brush
yourself off, and finish what you started.”

“And what if I can’t, Fred?!” she exclaimed. “What if it’s all for nothing? What if we can’t
actually win this and I’m just spinning my wheels in a circle, killing myself for no reason at
all?”

“What if a giant meteor strikes the earth? What if we all die tomorrow? What if I turn into a
purple chimaera named Henry who plays the lute?” That drew the smallest huff of surprised,
exasperated laughter from her. “Go ahead, I can do this all night. But I’ll warn you, dwell on
the what-ifs too much and they’ll eat you alive. You know they will.”

“So that’s your brilliant advice?” she asked skeptically. “Get up and try, try again?”

Fred arched a brow and looked around. “I’m sorry, is there another option? I got the
impression it was a ‘succeed or perish’ sort of situation, but if we could have been on holiday
this whole time…” Though they had toed the edges of an actual argument, the tension in her
rigid shoulders had eased some. “Hermione, how long has it been since someone told you
that you were being stubborn and neurotic and irrationally hard on yourself?”

At first she looked a bit insulted, like she was going to argue that that was what she was
doing, but in the end she just sighed again. “When was Bill and Fleur’s wedding?”

“Right, that’s what I thought. Bloody good thing that I’m going back with you, or else Harry
would have to do it on occasion and I’m not sure the poor boy is ready for that.”

Hermione looked like she stopped breathing.

“You’re what?” Whether she’d meant to let it slip through or not, there was something in her
voice that sounded dangerously close to hope.

“I’m going back with you,” he informed her, that instigating tone melting to something just a
little softer. The minute his wrist had warmed earlier that evening, the second he’d laid eyes
on her again, his mind was made, the chips falling wherever they felt so inclined to land.

“N-no, we decided –“

“Yeah, I know what we decided. I was there when we decided it. All those pretty promises
about not getting distracted and keeping priorities straight? Well, I don’t know about you
darling, but for me it’s been a pretty spectacular fucking failure.”

“What about the shop? George?”

Fred cleared his throat, the answer to the former question still chaffing a bit. “George is fine
and we... we had to close the shop. Temporarily, at least.”

She looked so genuinely upset on his behalf as she absorbed that. As if, despite everything
else going on, his dreams were still something precious to her. “What happened?”

Ginny happened, but he didn’t have the stomach to talk to her about that just yet. Further, he
doubted that she was in the right state of mind to hear it - not that there really was such a
thing.

“It’s a lot to get into, but the bottom line is that it wasn’t worth the risk to keep things running
with the Ministry inserting themselves at every turn. We’ll continue mail orders and all, but
George and Angie can do that with Lee and Verity. They don’t need me, but you do.”

“I do,” she admitted, her voice tight. “Gods strike me, I really do. But you don’t know what
you’re getting into, Fred. We don’t know what we’re doing or where we’re going, and I
haven’t the slightest clue whether or not I’m cocking everything up at any given moment.
Most days we just read and talk through the same painfully short list of knowns and
unknowns until our heads hurt or we get hungry or both. It’s maddening.”

“You’re making a lot of assumptions about what I expect.”

“Because I need you to understand that it’s hard. It’s really fucking hard, and frankly I’m not
doing a great job of it.”

“Did Ron tell you that? That you’re not doing good enough?”

She rolled her eyes and snorted derisively. “Ron said a lot of things, but yes, that was
certainly among them.”

“What happened when he left?” Fred asked, because her expression shuttered at the mention
of his youngest brother in a way that made him deeply uneasy. In a way that meant there was
something she didn’t want him to know, which he found a disagreeable rarity.

“I don’t want to talk about that right now.” When he opened his mouth to protest, she put her
bandaged hand up. “I promise I will, I’ll tell you everything. Even the parts that are going to
drive you absolutely mental. But I don’t have the energy or presence of mind to be angry
about him at the moment. Truth be told, Ronald Weasley’s opinion of me is right near the
bottom as far as my list of priorities goes.”

“Okay,” he replied, accepting her answer with every intention of holding her to it. He
couldn’t argue anyway, not without being an enormous hypocrite. So he simply trusted her to
tell him what had happened when she was ready to do so.

There was a pregnant pause and then, with a soft groan, Hermione got on her hands and
knees and crawled until she was close enough to touch him.

“You’re absolutely sure? You’re in this with me?”

He pushed a loose curl from her face with a bittersweet smile. “Until the very end, Hermione
Granger. I’m with you.”

She blinked rapidly a few times before nodding once and leaning forward, capturing him in a
kiss that lit even the darkest, most wounded parts of him; those shadowed corners that she
alone could touch. And when she drew back, there was fresh resolve in her eyes.

“Alright, I have to get you caught up and I don’t have time to tell you everything again; it’s
nearly dawn as it is. So I’m just going to undo what I did, and then fill in the gaps later. It
should work. Probably. Most likely. Just… stay still.”

Before he could ask what in the seven hells she was talking about, Hermione had her wand
drawn and lightly pressed to his temple. A shiver chased down his spine at the vulnerability
of it as she closed her eyes and murmured.

“Restituto retentia.”
At first nothing happened, then there was an impossible pressure behind his eyes and it hit
him hard, all at once. Their conversation by the lake after Dumbledore died; the horcruxes,
Tom Riddle’s tale, Harry’s task. Harry’s scar. A ring. A diary. A locket. Campsites they’d
mapped, places to get food, books to bring along, supplies, potions, everything he’d helped
her plan and everything he’d then asked her to take away.

“Bloody, buggering, son of a –“ Fred gasped, grinding his teeth together and wincing. His
stomach lurched unhappily and a cold sweat kissed his palms. Collecting himself for a
moment, he blew out a slow breath. “Wow, that didn’t feel great.”

“I’m sorry,” Hermione said, grimacing sympathetically. “Did it work, though?”

“Yeah, I got it all.” He rubbed his head as she sat back on her heels again. A dark thought
occurred to him. “Hermione, if that’s what it felt like to get back a few weeks of memories,
your parents –“

“I know,” she said, with a sad smile. “I knew when I did it. It’s okay.”

Getting to her feet, she extended a hand and pulled him up.

“I have to get back and check on Harry,” she said, glancing up through a hole in the roof. The
sky had grown infinitesimally lighter. “Can you meet me back here at noon?”

“I can. Do you need me to bring anything besides my sleeping-bag and pyjamas?”

She exhaled thoughtfully as she picked a path back to the garden with him on her heels. “We
could use more blood replenisher and dittany.”

“Burn paste?”

“Wouldn’t hurt.”

“Bruise balm?”

“Can’t have too much.”

“How about I just bring everything we can spare?” He proposed, snaring her around the waist
and pulling her back to him.

“I’d say that’s a good plan,” she affirmed, steadying her hands on his shoulders.

They’d stopped at the edge of the property, still obscured by the hedge. The rain had finally
ceased.

“I suppose I’ll see you in a few hours,” Hermione said, a fragile lightness in her that mirrored
his own. She cleared her throat softly, the corners of her lips tugging up. “You can forgo the
sleeping bag, if you’d like. There’s plenty of room in mine.”

With a smirk, he pressed another, gentle kiss to her lips. “I may just take you up on that.”
“Give my best to Angie and George, alright?”

“I will,” Fred said, it just then occurring to him that he wasn’t only going back to get his
things. He was also going back to say goodbye.

She lingered before drawing away and walking a couple paces.

“Hermione?” Fred said, stopping her just as she was about to apparate.

“Hmm?”

Against all odds, he found himself fighting a smile. “Happy Christmas.”

Hermione blinked, like she’d completely forgotten that it was, in fact, Christmas morning. He
didn’t blame her, he nearly had, too. Then she smiled back. “Happy Christmas.”

Fred landed in a puddle when he apparated back into the alley behind the shop, but he wasn’t
the least bit bothered by it. He felt like he was floating leagues above the ground, like the past
few hours had been a fever-dream.

Because he had seen her, he had touched her. And he wasn’t going to let her go again.

Sore and exhausted and absolutely filthy, he let his mind wander all the way inside and to the
top of the stairs where he let himself into the flat.

Given the hour he hadn’t expected anyone to be awake yet, but when he opened the door and
stepped inside, he found Angelina perched on the arm of the sofa, hair still in a satin bonnet
as she hurriedly tied her trainer. When he shut the door, she jumped up and spun to face him.

“George, he’s back!” she called toward the hallway. His brother emerged a second later, also
dressed like he was getting ready to go out.

Fred, a little confused, looked more closely at the both of them. They looked stricken,
panicked, and his stomach sank.

“What’s wrong? What happened?”

Before he got the words fully out, Angelina descended upon him like a harpy, a flurry of
blows landing about his head and shoulders. With a yelp, he ducked and shielded himself
from the onslaught.

“What happened? What happened?!” she cried, furiously batting at him. “What happened is
that I get up early to make breakfast for Christmas morning to find the lights still on, a bottle
of whiskey overturned on the table, and your bed utterly fucking empty! Where the hell have
you been?!”

“Ang, c’mon, let him explain,” George said, stepping forward and forcibly prying her away.
Fred straightened up and, breathing hard, Angelina stared expectantly at him. He looked to
his brother behind her shoulder, also waiting for an explanation. And, just as the memories
had, it hit him in one swift blow.

“I was with Hermione,” he said, emotion strangling his voice as he scrubbed a hand over his
face and through his hair. He drew in a breath and then laughed, and it was a tight, raw,
relieved sound. “I fucking found her.”

Angie and George shared a surprised look. Whatever they’d expected him to say, it wasn’t
that.

“You -?” George started, but Angie broke free of his lax, stunned hold and barreled into
Fred’s chest with a bone-crushing hug around his middle.

“You found her?” she asked disbelievingly, her smile and voice both muffled.

“I found her,” he said again, still hardly believing it himself as he hugged her back. “She’s
okay.”

George stayed where he was and studied his twin carefully, consideringly. Then he smiled
too, although there was small, melancholy curve to it. “So do you need our help packing, or
what?”

He was accustomed to his brother reading his mind, but that assumption was uncanny, even
for them.

“Who said – OUCH!” He looked down at Angie in alarm, who was stepping away with a
closed fist containing a not insignificant amount of his hair. “What the hell was that for?”

“To keep up appearances while you’re gone,” she informed him primly. “Lee and I can take
turns with George in public a couple times a week. With the shop closed, I doubt anyone will
notice you missing.”

“No offence,” George added on her behalf.

Struck a bit dumb, he just looked between them for a moment.

“You planned for this?”

“I prayed for this,” Angelina clarified, already summoning an empty jar from the kitchen and
stuffing his ill-begotten hair into it. “Do you have any idea how much it’s absolutely killed us
to see you moping about for the past few months? Lee was ready to walk into the nearest
forest and just keep going until he ran into a ward.”

Fred looked to George, guilt gnawing at him. “I know I said I would stay after everything that
happened, but –“

“Don’t do that, Freddie. You know where you need to be and it’s not with me. Not this time.”
Angie, perceptive as ever, disappeared into the kitchen as his brother stepped closer,
expression a bit more apprehensive. “Is she really okay? Because you’re covered in ash and
what I can only assume is blood.”
Fred thought back to the night before, painful and cathartic as it had been. “I think so? As
okay as any of us are, at least.”

George snorted, leaning against the mantle. “Well blimey, that’s not saying much.”

“Are you sure you’re alright with this? I don’t know when I’ll be back.”

“I really am. And honestly, I think if you don’t go, Angie will. She’ll probably take Fleur
with her, too, and then we’ll all be fucking miserable.”

Fred nodded, considering that rather frightening scenario. “On the other hand, the war would
be over in a matter of weeks.”

“At what cost, though? At what cost…”

Fred slowly grinned and George mirrored him before throwing an arm around his shoulders.

“Come on, you need to get cleaned up and help me figure out what the hell I’m going to tell
mum.”

When Hermione arrived back at their camp, knowing that she would see Fred again in just a
few short hours, it was with a hope that she hadn’t felt in months. Yes, the task at hand was
still daunting, and yes, she was still more terrified of failing than she could put to words, but
she was standing. Despite everything, despite what it had felt like beside Harry’s cot that
night, the world hadn’t actually ended.

The sun was hiding just behind the horizon, and she was still standing.

It was a good thing that she had her wits about her when she crossed the wards and ducked
through the tent flap, too. Because while Harry was still asleep on the cot to her left, Severus
Snape was seated at the table in the middle of the room, leafing through her notes. And he
was very much awake.

Snape looked up and arched a dark brow as she entered. “Nice of you to join us, Miss
Granger.”
 Severus Snape
Chapter Notes

I've had a couple questions recently about how often I update this fic and, barring any
personal upheavals, the answer at present is every 2-3 weeks.

Furthermore, just as an additional note, my goal is to finish posting this story by the end
of the 2024 calendar year.

25 December, 1997

Hermione, although thrown, didn’t outwardly react to Snape’s presence. She didn’t greet him,
she didn’t even draw her wand; to do so would be to blink first. She just strode past him to
the alcove that held her cot, tugging her grimy jumper over her head and tossing it aside with
intents to dispose of it later.

Her long-sleeved undershirt was slightly less soiled, so she kept that and just shrugged a
jacket overtop. As she turned and zipped it, she eyed Phineas Nigellus, still propped where
she’d left him.

The tent, on the other hand, was transformed. Returned back to the way it’d been before
she’d lost all sense and destroyed it; every broken cup mended, every torn page rebound.
Even the blade, crusted in blood, had been cleaned and set back on the table.

“I said to tell him if I wasn’t back by dawn,” she noted flatly, directing her ire toward the
portrait. Phineas merely turned his nose up at her.

“If you’re quite done posturing,” Snape drawled, tossing the contemptible locket onto the
table near her, “Would you care to explain your uncharacteristically reckless actions last
night?”

Hermione eyed him carefully, clad in the same dark robes she’d seen him wear since first
stepping foot in his classroom more than six years prior. If she squinted, she could almost
imagine him behind his desk, disapprovingly looking over exams rather than sat inside of
their tent in the middle of nowhere.

He wasn’t behind his desk though, and she was no longer his student. Their footing here was,
by all accounts, level.

“Would you care to explain your lacky’s inability to follow simple instructions?” she retorted,
idly leaning against the post and pointing upward toward the draping, fabric ceiling of the
tent. “The sun isn’t up yet.”

“I see the intrepid Mr. Weasley has had an impact on your shining disposition.”

She didn’t know if he’d guessed that was where she’d been or if Phineas Nigellus had
gathered as much from past overheard conversations, but frankly it didn’t matter. If he was
aiming to threaten her, he’d have to try much harder. “Thank you.”

“It wasn’t a compliment.”

“And yet I’m flattered all the same.”

His smooth, icy tone, honed a cutting edge. “Have you no inkling of what’s at stake, girl? No
sense of responsibility or duty?”

“Do not talk to me about duty,” she hissed back at him, all sense of levity gone in a blink as
her fingers itched toward her wand. “I carved into my best friend like a Christmas goose last
night after nearly being eaten by a possessed python wearing an old woman’s flesh suit. Do
not dare speak to me of duty.”

Snape was silent for a tense moment, watching her with eyes so dark that they looked black.
Something in his mien was different from the last time they’d seen one another, in that
corridor the night Dumbledore died. Less resigned and now simply… heavy. Burdened in a
way that she could unfortunately relate to.

“Exhausting, isn’t it? Sullying your own hands to keep theirs clean.” When she didn’t say
anything, remiss to argue something so indisputably, if tactlessly, true, he went on. “The boy
had a reaction, did he not? When he, the locket, and the snake intersected.”

Hermione swallowed hard, glancing toward Harry’s cot and then back to the necklace in front
of her.

“He did,” she said tightly.

“I take it you understand what that means?”

It was harder this time to control her voice when she responded, but by some miracle she
managed it. “I do.”

Snape nodded and then shifted his cloak, revealing a sword propped against the back of the
chair behind him. She hadn’t seen it when she came in, but her eyes went wide, glinting like
the massive ruby imbedded in its hilt. And with that small flourish, dramatic as ever, Severus
Snape effectively rattled the board.

Even the locket quivered a little where it sat on the table.

“Oh my God, where did you –?“

“Albus,” Snape said, like the name itself was caustic. “All a part of his grand design, as you
can no doubt imagine.”

Hermione almost laughed at his unconcealed distaste for their dearly departed headmaster.
Quite frankly, after weeks with only Harry for company, it was a little refreshing.

“Bindings rankling, Severus?”

“An epidemic, it seems.”

She stepped around him, hefting the sword and examining the inscription on the blade. It was
far heavier than it looked and the tired muscles in her arm protested.

“How exactly am I meant to explain having acquired this?”

“That is not my concern,” Snape clipped, getting to his feet and smoothing the front of his
robes. “It is now in your possession and thus my task fulfilled. Tell Potter that you found it at
the bottom of a lake for all the difference it makes to me.”

Hermione snorted as she carefully set the sword back down and eyed him speculatively.

“The sword, the snake, the locket… not random allusions, to be sure. What precisely did
Dumbledore tell you we’d be doing?”
“Albus told me very little about very many things.”

“And how much have you surmised on your own?”

“Enough to paint a rather bleak picture of the task at hand.”

“That’s delightfully cryptic,” she muttered under her breath, glancing again toward the cot
where her best friend slept. “Has he woken at all?”

Though still unconscious, Harry looked far better than he did when she’d left him. The colour
had returned to his cheeks, and his body was relaxed, chest rising and falling evenly rather
than in those alarming, stilted stops and starts.

“Do you think we’d both be alive if he had?” Snape posited dryly. “He stirred, but I spelled
him to remain asleep until your return.”

“And what if I hadn’t returned?”

“Thankfully irrelevant.”

Hermione merely nodded, the silence between her and her unlikely ally a peculiar one.
Despite what he’d called ‘posturing,’ she was grateful to him for having come. For bringing
the sword and for watching over Harry when she wasn’t in any state to do it herself.

She also had a strong sense that saying as much wouldn’t win her any favor.

“Dumbledore charged you to do it, didn’t he? That night on the astronomy tower.” Snape
visibly bristled at her abrupt question, but after a pause he inclined his head in a single, stiff
nod. The dark curtain of his hair, greasy and lank, cast shadows on his face. “Surely it wasn’t
all for the sake of Draco Malfoy’s immortal soul?”

“He seemed to think it would solidify my role within the Dark Lord’s inner circle and
eliminate any lingering whispers of disloyalty.”

Though she tried, she simply couldn’t wrap her mind around that logic – or, in her less than
humble opinion, lack thereof.

“To what end? What good is it to have a man on the inside if they’ve no handler and no way
out?”

He gave her a look, as though the answer to that should be obvious. “I don’t believe my safe
extraction was of much import to him, particularly near the end. In truth, I questioned his
faculties those last months.”

“Alright, fair enough. But then why tell me if you agreed to it? It rather denotes the actions of
a man interested in living.”

The barest hint of humorless self-deprecation appeared and then vanished from his face.
“Stubborn habit.”
Hermione thought on that for a long moment, filing it away for further consideration as she
crossed her arms over her chest. “We’ll need to get into the school. Not yet, but eventually;
it’d be a hell of a lot easier if the headmaster bid us entry.”

“You overestimate my role.”

“Perhaps you underestimate it.”

Snape’s dark eyes flicked to Phineas Nigellus’ portrait behind her and she resisted the urge to
turn around and see what was being conveyed in that silent exchange.

“I’ll do what I can,” Severus finally said, still staring over her shoulder. “Until then, do not
call on me again. I will not come.”

He turned to leave, halfway to the tent flap when Hermione spoke, her voice still
paradoxically conversational.

“The night we moved Harry from the Dursley’s home, you maimed and very nearly killed
George Weasley.”

Snape slowed to a stop. “That was… not intentional.”

“For your sake I should hope not. But hurt my family again and, mishap or no, any
understanding that we have is through. If I have to do it myself, I’ll see you dead and buried
right alongside your ‘Dark Lord.’”

He turned and looked at her once more, appraising this time, as though she had finally said
something of interest to him. “You’re very different from the girl you were. Does that bother
you?”

“No,” Hermione replied, a little uncertain whether or not it was a lie; they tasted so very
similar now. “I sincerely doubt that she would have made it this far.”

Snape lingered, watching her for another drawn beat before he turned on his heel and left
without further comment. She heard the faintest pop of apparation and, almost immediately
after, a soft groan from behind her.

“Hermione?”

“Harry,” she exhaled in relief, nonchalantly wiping the sweat from her upper lip. “Thank
God, you’re awake.”

“What happened?” He asked, looking around groggily. His glasses were set on the trunk
beside him and Hermione handed them over, sitting on the edge of the bed as he put them on.
“Where’s my wand? And bloody hell, why does my chest hurt?”

“Should I be worried that you haven’t told me what we’re doing today?” Harry asked,
watching as she finished packing their tent.
“Call it a Christmas surprise,” Hermione replied, setting the shrunken bag of supplies at her
feet. Though Harry protested that he felt fine and could assist in packing, she wasn’t taking
chances. The memory of his state the night before was painfully fresh and, coupled with the
guilt of destroying his wand, more than enough motivation to go it alone.

“Frankly Hermione, I’m a little burnt out on surprises after the snake and all,” Harry said,
holding the sword of Gryffindor like it might spring from his grip and run away at any
moment. “I still can’t believe you got this; I thought it was only the sorting hat that could
summon the sword.”

“I did some reading while you were asleep and it’s… unclear. There aren’t many documented
accounts, after all. I guess proximity to the snake and the locket, and perhaps being in
Godric’s Hollow itself, was enough.”

“Guess there’s no disputing you’re a Gryffindor,” he said with a smile, nudging her as she
picked up the last of their bags and threw it over her shoulder. “Not that there was every any
doubt.”

Guilt pitted in her stomach, but she just gave him a blithe smile back and nodded. She
wondered, were she sorted again now, if the hat might say something very different.

“Ready?” she asked, extending her arm. Harry looped his own around it, holding the sword
fast with his other hand. She’d considered putting it in her bag, but decided she needed to
figure out a barrier spell or sheath of some sort first, lest it cut her books to confetti and their
spare clothes to ribbons.

She turned on the spot and in a blink they were in the back garden of her childhood home
again. Or, rather, what remained of it.

“You’re dangerously close to being tardy,” a voice said from behind them and, while Harry
spun to find it, Hermione just closed her eyes and smiled, let the sound of it wash over her.
Warm her.

“I haven’t been tardy a day in my life and you know it,” she finally said primly, turning to see
Harry staring dumbstruck at Fred. “It’s noon exactly.”

He was standing near the remnants of the garden wall, layered in dark outerwear and with his
own rucksack slung over his shoulder. He’d cleaned up since their encounter the night before,
though his hair, sticking out beneath a knit cap, was still shaggier than it’d been over the
summer.

Thinking back on the way her fingers had tangled in it, she decided that she rather liked it
that way.

“You said – I didn’t think – the surprise is Fred?” Harry sputtered.

“I’m a surprise?” Fred asked bemusedly, looking over Harry’s head to her and arching a
brow.
“You surprise me all the time,” Hermione shrugged, stepping around Harry to his side.

“I thought you’d agreed not to come,” Harry asked, looking at Hermione despite the question
ostensibly being for Fred.

Hermione looked up at the man beside her who, while she’d teetered on the precipice of utter
despair, had pulled her back with a gentle surety that she would never stop being thankful for.

“I needed help,” she said simply. The admission felt a little foreign, but not nearly as
shameful as her darkest thoughts had told her it would be.

“And I’m nothing if not helpful,” Fred said, plucking the bag from her shoulder and slinging
it alongside his own. “See? Helping already.”

She braced herself, waiting for a reenactment of Harry’s reaction to Lupin meeting them at
Grimmauld Place. But Harry, still obviously a bit baffled by the turn of events, let out a
surprised – surprising – laugh. “I just can’t believe you’re here. Would it be odd if I hugged
you?”

“Not at all, mate. Just watch where you point that thing.”

Harry, angling the sword carefully, stepped forward and clapped Fred on the shoulder.

“You holding up alright, Potter?” Fred asked Harry a little more seriously, glancing over him
with assessing eyes as he loosed his hold.

“Rough night,” Harry admitted, rubbing at the spot over his sternum that he said, while
mostly healed, still ached.

“So I heard,” Fred said. “Seems I have more to hear about, still.” He nodded at the sword
again before looking to Hermione. “One of those gaps you mentioned would need filling in?”

“Indeed,” she said, knowing full well that she’d be telling Fred much more than she’d told
Harry about its acquisition. “But not here, we need to move.”

“Where is here, anyway?” Harry looked around the ruins of her childhood home curiously, as
if just then seeing them beyond his surprise at Fred’s appearance.

Hermione felt his eyes on her as she answered Harry and took hold of both their hands.
“Nowhere in particular, really. Just an old house.”

Fred dragged his thumb lightly along the inside of her wrist and then squeezed as they turned
on the spot and vanished.
 Clean slate

27 December 1997

“Why are we collecting firewood?” Harry asked Fred, bending to grab another branch and
tossing it onto the pile levitating behind them. It floated along like a barely inflated balloon
being dragged on an invisible string. The morning was cold and grey, and his breath emerged
from between his chapped lips in an ethereal plume.

“I don’t know about you,” Fred said, grunting as he tossed a particularly large log on the
heap, “But I’m personally doing it so my bollocks don’t freeze and fall off.”

Harry snorted. “No, I understand that, but why are we doing it by hand? Hermione and I
normally just summon wood, or make do with magic flames.”

“Gets the blood pumping,” Fred said with a shrug, rubbing his hands together to keep them
warm, constantly flicking his gaze around them and through the trees, noting any remote
indication of movement. “And wood fires are cosier. They crackle. Merrily.”
Harry, though somewhat unsatisfied with that answer, tipped his head in reluctant agreement
and followed Fred into a dense copse. They quietly gathered fallen branches from the
underbrush for a few more minutes before Fred broke the silence.

“So, how’s it been, having me here and all? Did I upend the delicate equilibrium?”

Harry, breathing a little heavily, stood up straight and considered for a moment. “Honestly?”

“Honestly. No need to go sparing my feelings.”

“Well, in case you weren’t aware, I haven’t really got parents. Not living ones, at least. But if
I did, and I for some reason went camping in the middle of the wilderness with them for an
indefinite length of time, I imagine it would feel somewhat similar.”

Fred froze. “Are you saying that you see Hermione and I as your parents? Bloody hell,
Potter, I’ve barely got two years on you. I won’t survive if you start calling me dad.”

Harry laughed quietly at the exaggerated, horrorstruck expression on Fred’s face. “No, not
like that. Numpty. I just mean… I dunno. It’s like being a third beater, but in a sort of
pleasant way? Like… you make each other happy, and you operate so well together that it
sort of makes me happy by proxy. And I like you both, so it’s not awkward or exclusive.”

“Happy by proxy?”

“Yeah. Just keep up the silencing charms at night and we’ll get on fine.”

Fred chuckled at that and then sobered a bit. “Not that I’m not having a great time so far, but
how bad was it before if this is a marked improvement?”

“Pretty bad,” Harry admitted. “At least for me. Hermione was incredible, though. I don’t
know how she does it, but it’s like she’s unshakeable. No matter how bad it gets, or how
hopeless it seems, she just keeps going. I don’t know whether to be scared or impressed a lot
of the time.”

“I’ve found that a healthy combination of both is advisable,” Fred murmured.

There was a pause before he continued, his voice much sharper than it’d been a second ago.
So sharp that Harry’s head snapped up, initially thinking something was wrong. There was
nothing, though; just Fred watching him with an intensity he wasn’t sure he’d ever seen on
the man’s face before.

“She’s not. Hermione’s not unshakeable, and you can’t treat her like she is, because she’ll
take it. She’ll take it, and she’ll put it on her back, no matter how heavy, and she’ll carry it
until it kills her. She’ll lie and tell you she’s fine, and you won’t notice until it’s too late. You
have to notice, Harry. If something happens, if we get separated or if I’m not there, you have
to call her on it.”

“What? Hermione doesn’t lie –“

“She does,” Fred said, shaking his head and looking uncomfortably as if he were betraying a
secret. “I love her more than life itself and as far as I’m concerned, she is genuinely perfect.
But if she thinks she can spare you something, some hard truth or harsh reality, she’ll do it.
So, just promise me that you won’t let her, okay? And try your best not to hold it against her.”

Fred seemed like he wanted to say something else, but he stopped himself, and Harry
examined him quietly for a moment, trying and failing to read between the lines. He felt a
deep crease form between his brows before he nodded. “Alright. Okay, I promise.”

It was quiet again, as they began to loop back toward the camp, picking their way along a
meandering, half-frozen creek.

“Do you think she’s ready for today?” Harry asked, looking in the direction of the tent
upstream. “She was really quiet after breakfast.”

Fred blew out a heavy breath. “Why do you think we’re out here collecting firewood?”

Hermione sat on the edge of the cot in her and Fred’s recently expanded alcove, her elbows
resting on the worn knees of her jeans.

She held the locket in her hand, stroking her thumb over the raised S. The same S that was
finally fading from where it’d been branded into her palm.

The Sword of Gryffindor was propped against the bed beside her, and it felt like the locket
was keenly aware of that fact. That whatever sentience resided inside of it knew what they
were doing today.

Cowardly as it might have been, Hermione could admit that she’d had to make flimsy
excuses to wait even this long to destroy the thing. It was dangerous, really, and utterly
unthinkable how stupid she would feel if something happened and they lost either artefact
before the deed was done.

But Harry insisted that it was hers to end, given that the sword had supposedly come to her in
a moment of need. So, she begged off with the excuse of it being the holidays and, whether
they sensed that’s what it really was or not, Fred and Harry had let her. Until this morning.

She suddenly heard footsteps and quiet voices approaching as the boys crossed the boundary
of the wards and her skin prickled. It was only a few seconds before the tent flap pulled back
and Fred stepped in, dropping it shut behind him. He spied her across the room, his cheeks
rosy and flushed with cold.

“It’s time,” he said, not asking if she was ready; wisely not giving her an option to decline.
She nodded, but she didn’t move. Hermione didn’t know if it was apprehension, guilt, or fear
paralysing her. Probably all three.

Apprehension because she was, admittedly, a little worried about confronting whatever
insidious thing was inside the damned locket.
Guilt because Harry had no idea how the sword had actually come to be in their possession
and if he did, he’d be furious and almost certainly wouldn’t ask her to do this.

And fear because… well, after this they would truly be back to square one. No horcrux and
virtually no information to aid them in finding the next one. A clean slate on which to start
working through the next problem.

Fred crossed the tent and crouched down in front of her.

“You can do this,” he said evenly, without a hint of uncertainty. “You know you can. The
sword may not have ‘magically appeared to you’, but it’s here because of your actions. Your
maneuvering. Your planning. And Harry and I will be right there if anything goes wrong.”

She nodded once, then nodded again, before she reached out and took his hand. He stood and
pulled her to her feet, picking up the sword and carrying it out with them.

When they’d moved camp on Christmas, they’d purposely placed the wards to allow for a
small clearing, away from the tent and near a small brook. Harry was already waiting there,
looking somber but determined.

She placed the locket on a large rock that they’d moved into the middle of the open space and
took the sword from Fred, the hilt cool in her grip. Hermione nodded up at him as he stepped
away to stand beside Harry.

“Remember,” Harry said, “It’ll probably fight back. Just block it out and kill it, try not to
hesitate.”

“Right,” Hermione said, pushing her sleeves up despite the cold and cracking her stiff neck.

She could do this, this is what they’d been fighting for. This is what she’d worked for. Cried
for. Bled for. She approached slowly, steeling herself, and gestured to Harry before she could
change her mind.

His brow furrowed in concentration, and then he let out a strangled hissing sound. The locket
responded, vibrating violently in place on the rock, so much so that she worried it was going
to fall off. Instead, with a quiet snick, it popped opened.

A wall of grey mist burst forth, whipping around her and creating a funnel with her and the
locket on one side, and Fred and Harry on the other.

Hermione ignored it as planned, surging toward the open locket with the sword raised until a
dispassionate, serpentine voice slithered over her. She froze in place, watching as the
nebulous misty shape in front of her morphed into –

“… Fred?”

She glanced to the confused, blurred image of her partner on the other side of the mist and
then back at the… whatever the hell was taking shape in front of her. It almost looked like
Fred, but a disturbing, mannequin-esque version of him. The skin was too smooth without a
freckle in sight, its hair didn’t move with the breeze, and the eyes weren’t right. They were a
dull, flat blue that ate the light.

The sword fell a bit, curiosity rather than fear getting the best of her.

“I have seen your heart, Hermione Granger,” the demon hissed. “I know your fearsss. I
know your secretsss.”

She lifted a brow as the facsimile circled her. Yes, the thing felt a thousand different types of
evil, but it was a bit like being taunted by a ghost. Less than a ghost, even. She hadn’t given it
anything to cling to, no source of power to draw from.

“You’re nothing but a convenienccce. Pathetic. Desssperate for attention, the same as you’ve
alwaysss been. Practically begging to be taken advantage of, usssed and discarded. To think I
would sssully my bloodline with a mublood whore.”

The voice was admittedly the right tone and pitch, but it had a rasping hiss to it as it
continued. Hermione, growing angrier by the second, stopped listening. This thing – this
taunting, pathetic thing – had tormented them for months. Had kept her awake at night, had
caused unbelievable stress to her and Harry, and had, in some way, contributed to Ron’s
betrayal. Encouraged it, if nothing else.

And the best it could do was hurl a few insults that Draco Malfoy would’ve casually dropped
over the breakfast table at the age of fifteen? Furthermore, it’d had the audacity to appear as
Fred. As one of the few people in the world that she trusted implicitly.

Fred, who had already seen her in her weakest moments. Who had looked into the very
darkest parts of her soul, had kissed her scars, danced with her demons, washed the blood
from her hands, and had not run. Fred, who would sooner drown himself in the Black Lake
than call her a whore or comment on the purity of his bloodline.

There were things the horcrux could have shown her that would genuinely have given her
pause, but this? It wasn’t one of them. It was an odd, unexpected miscalculation.

“KILL IT!” One of the boys shouted from beyond the wall of mist. And though she could
barely hear them, it seemed like a wise enough course of action to follow. She’d seen
everything she needed to see.

Hermione stared up at the shape as it loomed over her, that impotent nightmare that sought
only pain and suffering, and she smirked, dipping her chin slightly.

“Goodbye, Tom.”

She caught the briefest flicker of rage on its face as she lunged, swinging the sword in an arc
over her head and straight through the specter, cleaving it in half and squarely striking the
locket and the stone beneath. She stumbled back as mist exploded in all directions, falling in
tiny droplets that clung to her hair and clothes. Blinding pain reverberated up her arm
because, of course, she’d just walloped a hunk of rock with a piece of metal. There was a
deep score in the stone where the enchanted blade had gouged into it before glancing off.
Hermione dropped the sword with a gasp and fell forward, pressing her palms into the earth
and trying to catch her breath. Then Fred was there, pulling her into him.

“I’m okay,” she assured him, as his hands roved over her, searching for any sign of damage.
When he found none, he pressed a kiss to her brow and sat back on his heels.

“That was brilliant. Did it turn into me? It was a little hard to see.” He paused, glancing
toward Harry before lowering his voice to a whisper. “Also, we need to talk about the image
of you wielding a sword because… fucking hell. That did something.”

He waggled his eyebrows and Hermione laughed aloud at the absurdity of the comment as
she elbowed him.

Over Fred’s shoulder, Harry picked up the sword and walked toward the locket, prodding it
with the tip of the blade. It just skittered back and forth on the rocks, lifeless and no longer a
danger to anyone.

He looked at Hermione like he couldn’t quite believe it was done. “Three down?”

She nodded as she got to her feet and wiped her palms on her thighs. “Three to go.”

It was later that same night and Harry was in the tent, asleep, while Hermione sat beside the
crackling, popping campfire, examining the open locket thoughtfully. Light flurries of snow
twirled and fell overhead before they melted against the warming charms and heat from the
blaze. Fred ducked out of the tent at her back, carrying two steaming mugs despite having
just finished his own watch while she’d napped.

“You are a gentleman and a scholar,” Hermione groaned, gratefully accepting the coffee he
was holding out to her. It was black, but that didn’t matter in the slightest; she had the late
watch and would need it. She looked at his own mug and noted there was dark tea rippling in
it as he took a seat beside her on the conjured sofa. “I thought you were going to get some
sleep.”

“I thought so too, but I’m not really tired yet.” He looked at the locket in her hand. “Bloody
ugly for all the trouble it caused. It seems that Salazar Slytherin was not a fashionable man.”

She snorted and tossed it to the ground near one of their packs, not yet accustomed to having
it out of sight. “That he was not. I’m fairly certain that our hunch was right, though. That
some of the remaining horcruxes are also from the founders.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Well, in my brief encounter with Tom Riddle’s unctuous soul today, two things were made
very clear. The first: he’s a bully. A charismatic one, perhaps, but a bully nonetheless.”

Fred nodded. “And the second?”

“He’s a profound narcissist, absolutely convinced that he and his plans are the end-all-be-all
of wizardkind. I figured that was the case before from what Harry’s said, but after seeing
what the horcrux tried with me? He thinks that everyone is as petty and egomaniacal as he is.
Furthermore, he doesn’t trust or love anyone; to think my faith in you would be shaken by a
few unpleasant comments was completely asinine. His hubris isn't just a personality trait, I
think it’s quite literally his fatal flaw.”

“Fatal hopefully being the opportune word, here.”

Hermione snorted in agreement but Fred grew silent and, though they generally found
comfort in quiet moments together, this one was charged with something she couldn’t quite
place.

“What’s on your mind?” she asked, leaning to the side and nudging him.

A smile flickered across his face at the humility of being read so easily. She knew how that
felt because he did it to her all the time.

“The new year starts in a couple days,” Fred mused, rotating the mug in his hands. “It’s
maybe a little foolish because it’s just symbolic and all, but there are things I’d like to talk
about before then. Wipe the slate clean.”

She thought it funny that those exact words had echoed in her own head earlier that day.

“This is what’s been bothering you, isn’t it? The thing you haven’t told me.”

“It is,” he admitted. Hermione straightened up and took a long drink, wishing it was
something a little stronger.

“So tell me,” she said, lowering her cup again and turning a little to face him. It wasn’t an
order so much as an earnest request. “Tell me, and I’ll tell you what happened with Ron.
Then we can lay it all to rest together.”

A wry, humorless smile twisted his lips. “I’ll show you mine, you show me yours?”

“Something like that.”

He nodded but didn’t begin right away. Instead, he turned to face her more fully and leaned
forward, his forehead coming to rest against her brow. She shut her eyes and just let herself
feel him, the warmth and heat from the fire kissing one side of their faces.

“Thank you,” he said, voice low and a little rough as his nose brushed with hers. His hand
rested lightly on the bare skin of her throat.

“For what?” she asked, watching his face as he pulled back.

“For always giving me a soft place to land,” he said simply. She didn’t say anything, just
inclined her head and pecked him on the nose.

“Alright,” Fred started like a man facing the gallows. “I told you about Luna when you said
you wanted to visit Xenophillius, and I filled you in on what I learned about The Hallows
after the wedding. I told you about how they came onto the train and took her a couple weeks
ago, before the holiday.” Hermione nodded for him to continue and, after a long pause, he
did. “That wasn’t the only thing that happened that day.”

And then he told her all of it. He told her about Ginny and Neville. About his own encounters
with Marcus in the weeks prior, and the threats he was convinced he’d provoked to action.
Not details, but enough that she could easily fill in the shadowed, excruciating blanks.

He told her everything, and in doing so he ripped open the barely-healed stitches of that
wound and bled freely from it for her and her alone to see. Hermione felt tears track down her
cheeks as she listened and occasionally asked a question, but she didn’t wipe them away.
Fred didn’t either.

“Harry can’t know,” he said in a hoarse voice as he finished. “Ginny was very specific about
that.”

Hermione glanced toward the tent, grateful they’d put up silencing spells in case he stirred.
“It feels like the list of things that Harry doesn’t know gets longer every day. Ginny’s right,
though; and even if she wasn’t, it’s her story to tell. I wouldn’t betray that.”

“That’s the same thing Fleur said.”

She nodded, but she didn’t tell him that there was a reason for that. That there was a sort of
tragic, shared understanding among women; a collective awareness and compassion that
would be there whether Ginny was her closest friend or an utter stranger.

Hermione set her empty mug down and stared at him until he turned to look at her, eyes red-
rimmed and haunted, and she wished so badly that she could take that pain away. That she
could ease the guilt rolling off of him in thundering, crashing waves. But even magic had
limits. Instead, slowly, she reached out and placed one hand on his cheek, fingertips ghosting
over his stubbled jaw and tipping his face toward hers.

“I’m going to say it. Not just because it’s true, although it is, but because I think you need to
hear it: Fred, it’s not your fault. It's not your fault. You aren’t responsible for what Marcus
did, and the horrific reality is that Ginny probably wasn’t his first. Terrible people do terrible
things, and they don’t need an excuse to justify their actions. And they certainly don’t need us
to claim credit for them.

“Ginny is strong, and she has a lot of people that love her. She’ll be okay. Maybe not today or
tomorrow or next week, but she’ll find her way. It’s something that happened to her, it’s not
who she is.”

Fred leaned into her hand and blew out a long breath, blinking rapidly. But he finally nodded,
and she hoped that even if he didn’t believe her now that someday, eventually, he would.
They quietly collected themselves for a little while, the night deepening to an inky black,
before he looked at her expectantly.

“My turn?” Hermione asked, far more anxious than she’d been before, and already a little
emotionally wrought. But if they were going to unpack baggage and bear scars, perhaps it
truly was best to do it all at once before picking the pieces up again.
“If you still want to,” Fred said gently.

“I really, really don’t,” Hermione admitted, knowing it wouldn’t just hurt him to hear, but it
would likely annihilate whatever remained of his relationship with his youngest brother.
Because Ron, whatever egregious sins he’d committed, was still his brother. “But I will
because you deserve to know.”

She watched as a massive log in the fire finally gave way to the flames and crumbled into
ash.

“It was in September, near my birthday. Things with the search were going… poorly, but we
hadn’t been at it too long, yet. Ron was frustrated, which the locket compounded, but
retrospectively there were indications that there was more to it. Indications that I – that I
missed. Or misinterpreted, at least. I thought he was just being friendly, that he’d accepted
that you and I were together and was extending an olive branch.”

Acid churned in her stomach and Fred went utterly and completely still beside her, listening
intently and hanging on every word.

“I promise I didn’t do anything to encourage it,” she whispered “I didn’t think he – I never
imagined that he would try something like that. But he found me alone and told me he’d
gotten me a birthday gift, some stupid necklace. And when he gave it to me, he – he sort of
propositioned me. Not aggressively, really, but he put a hand on me and his demeanor
changed, and I realised that it wasn’t really friendly at all, the way he’d been behaving. He
was offering himself as some sort of convenient alternative to you.

“I told him off immediately and made it clear how out of line it was, how thoroughly I was
disgusted by his behavior, and that was the end of it for a brief time. Harry didn’t know what
happened, but he knew something happened, and things devolved rather rapidly after that.
Ron left six or seven weeks later when it all came to a head over something unrelated, but on
the way out, I thought he might – he was so angry, there was a moment where I thought he
might hit me.”

She glanced at Fred then, and he was so motionless that it was unnerving. Like he’d been
petrified, or carved from marble. Any grief in his eyes from earlier had dried and given way
to a deep, unfathomable anger.

“Fred, I swear I didn’t –“

“Are you okay?”

His voice was like cold death, and she swallowed hard. “I am,” she assured him. “I was…
shaken, at the time. And then just furious. I’m still really, really furious, actually.”

“Come here,” Fred bid her suddenly, reaching over and grabbing her hand, tugging her
toward him. She went without resistance, letting him pull her into his lap because it was clear
that, in that moment, he needed to touch her as much as she needed to feel him touch her.
The very idea that Ron could offer her anything that even came close to the comfort and
contentment that she found in Fred was laughable. What they had was the result of years of
consciously choosing one another. Years of shared heartache and joy, years of learning and
growing together, years of baring themselves in ways that were as freeing as they were
deeply humbling.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, burying her face the crook of his neck and wrapping her arms
around his shoulders, folding into him with practiced ease.

“You have nothing to apologize for. He had no right – ”

“Not like that,” she corrected, squeezing him as tightly as she could. “I meant that I’m sorry
that he did that to you, too. It wasn’t only my trust that he broke.”

Fred’s large hands spanned her waist, holding onto her like she was the only thing stopping
him from doing something very rash.

“We said that we’d try to leave it in the past and move forward,” Fred said. “Clean slate.”

“We did.”

“I’ll do that. I promise that I’ll really try to do that. But Hermione, if and when I see my
brother again…“

Hermione pulled back enough to examine his face, a portrait of protective wrath and hurt so
all-consuming that something in her chest ached just to see it. She threaded her fingers
through the shaggy, copper hair brushing his collar.

“I know,” she said gravely. “I know. And I won’t try to stop you.”
 See me

4 January 1998

It was nearing midnight and Neville was curled on his side, reading from a fairly massive
herbology text by lamplight. Three of the curtains on his four-poster were pulled shut, and
Seamus was snoring softly across the room, similarly ensconced. With Dean, Harry and Ron
gone, they were the only remaining boys in their year and thus had the dormitory all to
themselves.

Sometimes it was nice.

Most of the time it was depressing.

It was the first night back after the winter holidays and, despite his sporting a new black eye
courtesy of Gregg Goyle, he couldn’t help but think that the day had gone as well as it
possibly could have.
Though it was most certainly unrelated to the events that occurred before their break, a
school-wide missive had arrived four days prior stating that, should students wish to return
via apparation into Hogsmeade, they would be permitted to do so either on their own or by
side-along with a guardian. And though he was relieved on his own behalf, he was far more
relieved on Ginny’s. Because the mere thought of stepping foot on that train again made it
hard to breathe.

They hadn’t spoken but for one exchanged letter between Christmas and the New Year, but it
was something. In fact, he was using her note as a bookmark that very evening; the
parchment was creased and the ink faded where he’d folded and unfolded it a couple
thousand times.

When he’d seen her earlier, Ginny seemed… he didn’t know how Ginny seemed, actually.
Resilient, he supposed. So impossibly, unbelievably, mind-shatteringly resilient. She’d said
her parents were preoccupied over the holiday and hadn’t realised anything was amiss, and
her brothers had kept their promises not to mention what happened.

But he wondered if perhaps that resilience wasn’t to her own detriment. If being so strong on
the outside wasn’t taking something from her on the inside, silent and invisible as it was.

Neville startled when there was a soft knocking at the door of the dormitory and sat up,
tucking the folded parchment into his book and snapping it shut. He hastily shoved it onto the
nightstand and almost knocked over a glass jar with a plant clipping in it, reaching to grab his
wand. Before he could though, the door softly creaked open to reveal Ginny, as if he’d
thought her presence into existence.

Neville lowered his hand, brows lifting in surprise.

He’d sat with her at dinner, but they hadn’t really spoken much. Any conversation within the
school was perilous now, but outside of Gryffindor Tower and the Room of Requirement
were the most so. She was wearing baggy, checkered pyjama bottoms and a long-sleeve t-
shirt with her hair in a low bun at the nape of her neck. He wasn’t sure if he was imagining it,
but she looked markedly more tired than she had a few hours ago. Almost wan.

“Hi,” she said quietly, glancing toward Seamus’ snoring and drawn curtains. Her socked feet
toed at a small gap in the floorboards.

“Hi,” Neville said, sitting up a little and suddenly very aware that he was laying in his bed.
He was wearing pyjamas and a t-shirt, but it was still a vulnerable position to be found in.

“I thought maybe you were awake since you said you read at night and – well, George sent
me back with a new jar of bruise balm. Figured you could probably use it after the exchange
with Goyle earlier and everything.”

Only then did he notice that she was, indeed, holding a small tin at her side.

“Oh, um, right. Thanks.”

He was about to get up and take it from her when, likely in response to the lack of movement
and stupid look on his face, she turned and shut the door behind her with a soft click before
padding across the room. Ginny perched on the edge of the bed, and he sat up a bit more
against the headboard.

He figured she would just leave the balm and be on her way, so he didn’t really know what to
do when she unscrewed the lid and dipped a finger in. The thick paste was pale green, and it
smelled like mint and eucalyptus.

“Come here,” she beckoned, raising her hand and gesturing him forward. Helpless to do
anything else, he leaned toward her. The first brush of her fingertip to the puffy skin around
his eye made him shiver, and he told himself it was just because the balm was cold.

“How was the rest of your holiday?” she asked, blotting the paste below his swollen brow
with a featherlight touch.

“Pants,” he answered honestly, and her lips twisted into an understanding, sympathetic smile.

“Did you at least get to visit your parents like you’d planned?”

He swallowed at the memory before answering her. “Yeah, it… wasn’t great. I guess the
healers are stretched pretty thin right now and the long-term patients are taking the brunt of
that.”

Neville thought about going on, but he stopped himself. He didn’t mention his mother’s
filthy, unkempt hair, or that his father appeared to have been wearing the same dressing gown
for some time. When asked about it, the single healer in the ward, an exhausted, frayed
woman, said they’d been especially ornery the past several mornings and there simply wasn’t
time to fight about it with so many other patients to tend.

These were unpleasant, harsh realities that generally made people outside of his
circumstances uncomfortable to think about because it was so far removed from their own
relationships with their parents. They couldn’t wrap their minds around it.

And when he had to do things like help bathe his father, or cut gum out of his mother’s hair
for the millionth time, he could admit that he envied those people their ignorance a little bit.

Bruise balm liberally applied and tingling, Ginny lowered her hand and just looked at him for
a moment.

“I’m really sorry that you have to deal with that,” she said sincerely, and from anyone else it
would have sounded like pity. From anyone else it would have made him uneasy, but not
from Ginny.

Because when she said it, it wasn’t an obligatory kindness; it was the simple act of seeing
him, exactly as he was.

Neville’d spent so much of his life standing just out of sight, hidden in the shadows of his
parents and his grandmother and Harry and Hermione and everyone around him that was
better suited to the attention than he was, and he was genuinely content with that. He wasn’t
like Ron or Seamus, he’d never resented his lot. He was a supporting character, perhaps the
occasional butt of a joke, but never someone to be heard. Certainly not someone to be seen.

“Is there anything that can be done?” Ginny probed gently, interrupting his train of thought.

He cleared his throat, realising he’d been staring lamely at her as his mind wandered. “Umm,
Gran is looking into moving them home and hiring private care, but it’s live-in and round-
the-clock and that’s not easy to find when things are normal, let alone now. It’s why we
moved them there in the first place.”

She nodded thoughtfully. “I can ask Alicia and Katie if they know of anyone that might be
interested in work outside of the hospital. Doubtful that anything will come of it, but it
couldn’t hurt to check. If that’s alright with you, I mean.”

Startled by the offer, Neville nodded before he could think better of it. “Yeah, I’d appreciate
that. Thank you.” His voice came out a little hoarser than he’d like. He was deeply
unaccustomed to even discussing his parents with people outside of his family, let alone
accepting help with them.

Ginny screwed the lid back on the balm and placed it on his bedside table, glancing curiously
at the parchment tucked into his book like she recognised it. His cheeks heated, but she didn’t
comment on it.

“You can ask,” she said after a pregnant pause, turning back to him. “I had answers prepared
for you and Seamus when I saw you today, but neither of you asked.”

Neville’s brows drew together, which hurt a little given the state of his eye. “Ask…?”

“How I’m doing. If I’m all pieced back together. If I’m liable to start screaming in the middle
of The Great Hall at the slightest provocation.”

“Oh… Well, are you? Going to start screaming, I mean.” He tried to read her expression and
came up blank.

A humorless chuckle slipped past her lips, and she tipped her head consideringly. “I feel like
it, sometimes; like I’m teetering on some sort of breaking point. And other times I can almost
convince myself that it never happened at all. Which, for whatever reason, is almost worse. It
was bloody impossible to act normal the past couple weeks because I don’t feel normal. Or
maybe I do, and I’m just not used to this version of normal.” She paused and snorted dryly,
shaking her head at herself. “The curated answer was, ‘I’m much better, thanks for asking!’”

Neville didn’t have words to respond to that, certainly not the right ones, so he just slowly
reached out and took her hand in his slightly larger one. Ginny looked at where they were
joined and swallowed.

“I’m just so angry,” she whispered, sounding suddenly livid. She tightened her grip on his
fingers to the point of pain, but he didn’t complain. He didn’t even flinch. She kept her gaze
cast downward, a tiny muscle along her jaw twitching. “I feel like I’m supposed to just get
over it and rise stronger from the ashes or whatever, but it’s not like that. I’m hurting and I’m
furious, and I don’t know what to do with all of this anger. I don’t know where to put it or
how to make it go away.

“And Merlin, I fucking doubt myself, now. After what happened my first year, I swore that I
wouldn't ever give someone that power over me again, and I kept it. Not once since then have
I questioned who I am or what I want or how I feel, but it’s like I can’t trust my own mind.
Like he poisoned it, planted this rotting seed of doubt, and I don’t really know where that
leaves me. What’s left if that’s gone.”

Neville just stared at Ginny because he didn’t know what else to do. She didn’t seem like she
wanted guidance or comfort, which was good. He couldn’t give her the prior, and genuine
comfort was a distant, unreachable dream for all of them. It was more like she was saying all
of the things that she hadn’t yet said aloud, and he was simply there to bear witness. To hold
space.

So instead of accidentally saying something stupid or interrupting her, Neville held her hand
and offered the only thing he could – the same thing she’d given him.

He saw her. He didn’t look away.

A long time passed before Ginny cleared her throat and swiped away the single, half-dried,
defiant tear that had escaped and slipped down her cheek. She licked her lips.

“Look, the bruise balm was a flimsy excuse,” she admitted with another humorless laugh. “I
came here because nights have been… difficult. I took sleeping draughts when I was home,
but I don’t want to make a habit of it, and I was just wondering if maybe – and please feel
free to tell me to bugger off – but I was wondering if it might be okay if I slept in here? With
you?”

By the time she finished he could barely hear her over the steady drum of his thundering
heart.

And as he considered her request, he couldn’t help but feel as though he were being handed
something extraordinarily valuable and fragile. Not Ginny herself – describing her as
anything other than a force of nature would be folly, no matter how she might see it – but her
trust. It was something that he really, really didn’t want to fumble with.

Neville’s bed wasn’t large, and he took up considerably more space than he once had, but he
shuffled backward as far as he reasonably could without falling off, peeling the blankets back
for her in silent invitation.

Ginny’s tense shoulders uncoiled as she crawled in beside him, stretching out. There was no
way for them not to touch, which he was trying to avoid until she purposely moved closer
and tucked her head into his shoulder, her face buried out of sight.

“I have nightmares sometimes,” she said into his shirt, like it was easier than saying it to his
face. “So I’m sorry if I wake you up, or –“
“I have them, too,” he admitted with a shrug.

The rise and fall of her chest paused before he felt her exhale and nod. He started to reach for
the bedside table when Ginny spoke again.

“I’m not broken,” she said abruptly, her voice firm. “He didn’t break me.”

Neville looked down to find her eyes open and watching him with a measured, guarded
expression. As though it was vitally important he understand that. He noted not for the first
time that they were the warm, earthy brown of fallen leaves and clay-rich soil.

“I know,” he said, holding her gaze. "I know. But... it's also okay not to be totally okay."

She was so close that he could feel her warm breath on his throat. Ginny finally nodded again
and tucked her face back into the pillow.

“You can keep reading,” she offered. “Hermione always keeps the light on to read, it doesn't
bother me.”

Neville wasn’t sure he could successfully read a Chocolate Frog card just then, let alone a
Mastery-level book about magical herbs of East Asia, so he just shook his head.

“It’s alright,” he said. “I just finished a chapter, anyway. Let me grab the curtain and light,
though.”

He adjusted her a little, and reached over again to the bedside table to grab his wand. It was at
this point that he noticed a distinct lack of snoring. Glancing to the bed across the room, he
saw a groggy Seamus had the curtain near his head pulled back a bit, bleary eyes watching
the two of them curiously. Neville tensed.

He and Seamus were on good terms, even more so in recent months, but this situation could
easily be perceived as something wrong. Something it wasn’t. However, after a tense
moment, Seamus just offered a small nod in what very much seemed like understanding. In
any event, he pulled the curtain back into place and disappeared again.

Neville grabbed his wand and used it to put out the light and pull the curtain shut, plunging
them into darkness and then tucking it beneath the pillow. As he shut his own eyes, Ginny's
breath already leveling out, Neville had the passing thought that in that exact moment, he
would do just about anything in his power to protect the witch lying beside him. Not just her
body, not just her mind, but her heart.

He would protect her peace.

 Fighting shape
Chapter Notes
See the end of the chapter for notes

5 February 1998

“Should I poke him?”

“What? No! Don’t poke him. Just – here, budge over. Harry, wake up.”

Hermione reached out and gently shook her friend’s shoulder.

“That’s clearly not effective. Let me poke him.”

“Fred –“

“I’m awake, you bloody psychopaths,” Harry groaned, opening his eyes to see Hermione and
Fred standing over his bed, already fully dressed. Hermione was staring flatly at her
boyfriend, who was reaching around her toward Harry with an arm raised. “Is it ten already?”
“A bit past, actually,” Hermione admitted, backing up and giving him space to roll out of bed.
He’d taken the overnight watch so he’d only gotten a few hours of sleep, but he’d insisted
that they start bright and early the next morning.

“Alright, just give me a minute to wash up and get dressed.”

She nodded, her and Fred departing the alcove as Harry pulled the curtain shut and did as
he’d said.

“Five galleons says I put him on his ass in the first 30 seconds,” Fred muttered to Hermione,
who’d gone back to pouring over his messy notes about The Hallows.

She glanced up at him disapprovingly. “That’s not a good thing, he’s supposed to be the
savior of the wizarding world.”

“Yeah, well, savior or not we need to keep him in fighting shape. I can’t believe the lot of you
hadn’t been practicing dueling.”

“We were busy surviving and staving off crippling despair,” Hermione quipped blithely.
“Besides, if we introduced dueling into the mix when Ron was still here, we almost certainly
would have killed each other.”

A dark look flickered across Fred’s face. “He wouldn’t have landed so much as a tickling jinx
on you.”

“No, he wouldn’t have,” she agreed. “And that would have hacked him off even more.”

Fred opened his mouth to retort when Harry emerged, zipping the front of his coat shut.

“Tea?” He asked, accepting a thermos that Fred had picked up and thrust toward him.

“Something like that,” Fred nodded merrily. He offered an unnerving smile as he turned
away, heading for the tent flap and leading the way without so much as a backward glance.

“What’s actually in this?” Harry asked Hermione in a hushed tone, looking at the thermos
with concern as they brought up the rear.

“It’s just tea with a bit of pepper-up mixed in,” she explained, rolling her eyes affectionately.

They’d moved camp the day prior, to a scenic locale bordering a lake. The shore was made of
small, jagged rocks, which Fred began layering with cushioning charms upon arrival. They
were a little way from the tent, but not so far as to be completely outside of the wards and
concealment charms.

“Alright, who’s up first?” Fred asked when he was done, gamely rubbing his hands together
as if to warm them.

“Let Harry drink his tea and finish waking up,” Hermione said, shrugging off her thick outer
coat and drawing her wand. She grinned. “He’ll need it when I put him on his ass.”
Fred laughed outright and Harry shook his head at them. “You know, you’re both pretty
confident about besting me. I was the one leading dueling sessions a couple years ago, if you
don’t remember.”

“Yeah, but then you stopped,” Fred pointed out. “We didn’t.”

“I did for a while,” Hermione amended. “But he’s right, Harry. We should have been doing
this all along – it’s on me for not prioritising it.”

Harry crossed his arms and watched as Fred and Hermione took up positions facing one
another, the lake on one side and Harry and the forest on the other.

“Nothing we can’t easily heal,” Fred said for Harry’s benefit.

“Nothing with prolonged effects,” Hermione finished.

“Greenlight charms?” Fred asked hesitantly after a brief pause.

“Oh! I forgot about those. Good idea, though.”

“What’s a greenlight charm?” Harry interjected from the sideline.

“Something Tonks showed us over the summer,” Hermione explained. “It’s a harmless spell
that looks almost identical to the killing curse.”

“There’s no way to magically shield against the killing curse,” Fred went on. “So if you see
it, you get the hell out of the way or put up a physical barrier. If it hits you or strikes a non-
tangible shield, duel’s done. The aurors apparently use it to practice.”

Hermione broke position to come to Harry’s side, exhibiting the swiping wand motion and
repeating the incantation a few times before demonstrating the spell.

“Viridilux,” she said clearly, dragging her wand diagonally through the air in Fred’s direction.
The bright green charm flew toward him, but he didn’t move out of the way, letting it
harmlessly strike him in the shoulder and dissipate.

When she looked back to Harry, his face had paled a little.

“It’s just light,” she reassured him, placing a hand on his shoulder and giving a squeeze.
“They used the real thing that night in the café, and again at the ministry. Riddle might want
you alive, but they won’t hesitate to kill the rest of us, and it’s not impossible that one of his
followers hit you by mistake.”

Harry nodded, throat bobbing on a swallow as she returned to her spot by the shore. Fred’s
demeanor had sobered a bit, as it tended to when she mentioned her own potential demise,
but he still swept into a deep bow, which she mirrored. Then they began.

Fred opened slowly enough with a few carefully placed stunners and jinxes, as if attempting
to warm her up, but Hermione escalated almost immediately, striking him with a hard wall of
air that flew directly past his pale blue shield, sending him stumbling backward and making
him lose his footing on the uneven ground.

In a real fight she’d have taken the opening and killed him, a fact that Fred was well aware
of, but instead she waited patiently for him to recover and straighten back up. He looked a bit
surprised, but she just arched a brow in silent challenge. Fred’s face split into an eager grin,
and then the actual dueling took place.

It was no holds barred, both of them casting silently and bodily throwing themselves out of
the way whenever that sickly green light appeared. As usual he favored offensive spells while
Hermione was more conservative, preferring shields and various means of deflection –
physical and otherwise.

The bout ended when Fred threw a greenlight charm at her and she transfigured the stones
beneath her feet up and into a barrier, successfully blocking the spell. But in the interim, Fred
had turned and directed a cold stream of water from the lake beside them, blasting it around
the makeshift wall, drenching and sending her to the cushioned ground in a sputtering,
freezing heap.

“Hermione!” Harry exclaimed in concern, rushing toward her, but he slowed when he
realised that, after she’d finished gasping like a fish out of water, she’d begun laughing. Fred
beat him to her side and extended a hand, tugging her to her feet.

“How is it that half of our duels end up with me soaking wet?” she bemoaned, reaching up to
ring out a sopping clump of hair as Fred began to dry her clothes for her.

“Coincidence?” He suggested innocently as his eyes drifted lower, appreciatively raking over
the shirt that was plastered to her chest.

“Coincidence my ass,” she muttered, smirking in spite of herself.

Harry cleared his throat and they both turned toward him. “Umm, is your practice dueling
always so… violent? I thought she was going to cut your arm off with that slicing hex.”

“Not quite,” Fred said, wincing a little as he rotated said arm to see the slash that had cut
through his heavy jumper, along the back of his bicep. There was a long, shallow scratch
beneath that was beading crimson.

“And if I had, he would have learned a valuable lesson about not dropping his shoulder
coming out of a stun,” Hermione chided as she pulled her beaded bag out of the inner pocket
of her jacket and summoned a small vial with a dropper, taking Fred’s arm and turning it at a
slightly awkward angle to drip dittany over the wound. Almost immediately the skin began to
knit back together, leaving a faint pink line. Satisfied, she mended his shirt and loosed her
grip.

Fred pecked her on the top of the head before he rolled his neck from side to side and looked
eagerly at Harry. “Alright! Your turn, Potter.”
“My whole body is sore,” Hermione whined as Fred curled around her, her back tucked
against his chest. They’d been napping after dinner so he could take the late watch, six days
and two moves after they’d begun practice dueling every morning. Hermione, as she’d been
wont to do lately, had joined him in his kip so they could spend a little time together by the
fire before she actually went to sleep later.

“Your whole body?” Fred asked leadingly, pushing the hair away from her throat and
dragging his lips over her thrumming pulse. She smiled dazedly, still waking up as she felt
his hand skim down her ribs and over her bare hip beneath the layers of blankets. Most of the
time she insisted that they sleep fully clothed, just in case something happened and they
needed to move quickly, but sometimes exceptions simply had to be made.

His hand dipped further still until it disappeared beneath the elastic of her knickers, the only
article of clothing she was wearing. Her breath quickened as his fingers began to strum over
her clit, and she raised her leg, hooking the knee backward over his thigh and granting him
easier access.

She hissed out a breath when he slipped two fingers languidly into her and rolled his hips
against her backside, hard cock nestling into the cleft of her ass.

“I want you inside of me,” she breathed, head tipping back and nuzzling beneath his chin.

“Here?” Fred asked in a throaty whisper, curling his fingers against that spot and stealing her
ability to speak. “Or here?” He drew them out, glossy with her arousal, and brought them to
her lips, which parted on instinct as he dragged the slick pads of his fingers over her tongue
and she tasted herself. He removed them from her mouth and placed them in his own, a groan
slipping around them, before he took them back out and moved lower on her body, back
between her thighs and down past her clit and her cunt until – “Or maybe… here?”

Her eyes shot open, pulse skyrocketed. “W-we’ve never done that before.”

She squirmed a little at the unfamiliar sensation as he dragged a finger over the entrance of
her ass. Squirmed but also shivered in curiosity at the notion.

“Do you want me here?” Fred asked. He continued what he was doing but also used his
thumb to put gentle pressure on her clit. Her response came out half-formed and
unintelligible. She felt his teeth skim below her jaw as he smiled into the crook of her neck.
“Use your words, Hermione.”

“Yes,” she managed, nails biting into his exposed forearm where it was banded around her. “I
think so, yes. But maybe not – maybe not fully?”

“Okay,” he replied thoughtfully, accepting her boundary and silently musing as he

contemplated alternatives. “How about I keep doing this while you ride my cock, love?”

He slipped the tip of his finger into her just a little, just enough to stretch the tight band of
muscles, and she nodded hastily.
“Yes,” she affirmed, already drawing away to reposition herself. Fred moved further up the
bed so he was more sitting than laying as she pulled her underwear off and straddled his lap.
Her breasts were nearly eye level to him and Fred dragged his tongue over the taut peak of
one, lightly pinching the other, before she reached down and positioned him, sliding down
inch by maddening inch until he was fully seated inside of her.

“You feel fucking incredible,” Fred sighed as she rocked her hips back up and then down
again. He reached to the side and grabbed his wand off the crate they were using as a
nightstand. Murmuring a spell that she didn’t quite catch, but would certainly need to learn,
he conjured a small, clear dollop of lubricant into his palm. He slicked two fingers and
Hermione repositioned her thigh so he could more easily reach around her, one knee coming
up almost level with his shoulder. There was a little trial and error before they got the angle
right.

“Tell me if you want me to stop,” Fred entreated softly as his fingers slid over that most
intimate part of her.

She nodded, letting her forehead drop against his as she continued to ride him in earnest. Her
heart felt like a battering ram trying to escape her chest as she lifted her hips and then
lowered them again, this time feeling Fred’s finger press into her ass on the descent, giving
her all of the control to pull up again and move away.

“Oh God,” she shuddered at the overwhelming tightness, the devastating sensation of being
filled beyond anything she’d never felt before. She adjusted for a second, chest heaving,
before pleading in a cracked voice, “More.”

“Hell, I can feel that,” Fred said in wonder, pressing his finger forward to the thin barrier
separating him from where his cock was.

She didn’t stop moving, rolling her hips and riding his hand. The movement stretched the
already-sore muscles of her inner thigh, but she didn’t care and it wasn’t long before he
pushed that second finger into her with minimal effort. Tears stung the corners of her eyes but
not because it hurt. On the contrary, it felt unbelievably good as the muscles in her abdomen
tightened and she clenched around him.

“I can tell you’re close, love,” Fred breathed, one hand gripping her hip tightly as the other
continued to move under her. “Touch yourself and come for me.”

Hermione’s hands had been anchored on his shoulders, using them to leverage herself, but at
his direction, one slipped down between them to swirl over her clit in exactly the way she
needed.

The other slid from his shoulder, tracing along his clavicle to the base of his neck where it
paused, almost as though she was asking a question. Fred froze for a long breath, and she
waited to gauge his reaction, to see if he wanted what she was hinting at.

She got her answer when he pointedly lifted his chin, swallowing hard just before her hand
closed around his throat. Hermione was careful not to put too much pressure on the center
and instead squeezed firmly on either side, her fingers barely reaching as his pulse throbbed
in a steady, urgent rhythm.

It was an effort to stay focused and balanced, but she managed as her breaths turned to
gasping, ragged things and Fred’s hips moved up and into her more erratically. Buried inside
of her he stroked his fingers and, between that and the gentle pressure on her clit, she crashed
over the edge of her climax with a soft scream, all the while thanking the gods for silencing
charms.

Her grip on him tightened instinctively, squeezing hard around Fred’s tense, corded neck and
digging her nails in. Hermione made to pull it away for fear she’d hurt him, but his free hand
shot up and clamped around her wrist, holding her there. His cheeks were exquisitely flushed,
head tipped back in bliss as every muscle in his body went rigid and he fell still beneath her.
A noise escaped him that sounded almost like a whimper before it eased into a groan, sending
shockwaves through her core and rumbling beneath her hand.

Only when he’d relaxed again did she draw it away, pausing to tenderly stroke the backs of
her knuckles along his jaw. Breathing hard, he carefully untangled their lax limbs and
snatched a clean towel from the stack near the foot of the bed, washing his hands in the basin
against the wall and then starting to clean up.

Hermione reached out to take the cloth when he got to the juncture of her thighs, but he just
rolled his eyes and knocked her knees apart, admiring his handiwork with possessive eyes.
He even had the audacity to drag a finger slowly through their mingled release, making her
twitch before he finally wiped away the remnants that she could feel there.

With a loud exhale, Fred fell back between the sheets and pulled her into his chest, ignoring
the mildly uncomfortable, sticky warmth of their bodies.

“Are you alright?” she asked, reaching up to trace her fingers over the crescent moons she’d
left on the side of his neck. They were already starting to fade but, if she were honest with
herself, she liked the look. She liked that she’d left a mark on him.

Hermione didn’t know exactly how Fred saw it when they explored boundaries like this. But
in her head, so much of what had happened to them, to their bodies and their minds, was
outside of their control; it felt good, almost defiant, to wrest just a little bit of that control
back. To decide precisely when and how pain and pleasure alike might be written into her
skin, and to do so with somebody that she trusted implicitly.

“Yes,” he laughed, shaking Hermione from her reverie as he looked down at her warmly, if a
little exasperatedly. “Gods yes, I’m more than okay. But leave it to you to make my head
practically explode when I’m attempting to be erotic and introduce something new. Are you
okay?”

“Oh, definitely,” Hermione said, nodding and self-assessing. “Might be a little sore, but it’s
the good sort of sore.”

“That’s perfect! It’ll match the rest of you,” Fred declared, laughing again when she swatted
lazily at him. It was in these stolen, intimate, unlikely moments that Hermione couldn't help
but feel a little guilty for finding pockets of true happiness and genuine peace in spite of
everything ostensibly unraveling around them.

They stayed like that for perhaps a half hour before getting up and dressing to go take over
for Harry. It was past nightfall and unseasonably warm as they stepped outside, a gap in the
trees giving a rare view of the stars overhead.

Hermione took note of the two wands on the ground in front of Harry, a third in his hand as
he levitated a small rock back and forth in front of him. Fred, practical as he was, had raided
the rubble at Olivander’s before he’d joined them and brought along a few options for Harry
to try. It was an impossible longshot that there would be a true match, but it was better than
passing Fred and Hermione’s wands back and forth constantly.

“Picked one yet?” Fred asked, taking a seat while Hermione did the same beside him. He ran
a hand through his hair, somehow mussing it further.

“The cherry is probably the best of the lot,” Harry admitted, letting the rock fall and eyeing
the wand he was holding, twisting it forward and then back again. It was a rich red colour
with deep, spiraling grooves in the handle. He didn’t sound particularly enthusiastic.

“I’m really –“ Hermione began, but Harry cut her off with a tired glare.

“Hermione if you apologise one more time for breaking my wand, I swear to Merlin I’m
going to throw myself into the fire. You’re the only reason it wasn’t my neck.”

She pressed her lips together, resisting the urge to apologise again anyway. Fred put a hand
on her knee and lightly squeezed.

“I’m going to get some sleep,” Harry sighed, shoving the cherry wand into his pocket and
tossing the other two into one of their bags just outside of the tent. They said goodnight and
then settled into the conjured sofa.

Hermione summoned a few books and got to reading while Fred kept alert, gaze periodically
flickering through the trees around them and then back to her. This went on for over an hour,
the two of them intermittently tossing theories back and forth about the Peverell family
lineage, and potential artefacts from the remaining school houses, before Hermione started to
doze with her feet in his lap and her head cushioned on the arm of the sofa.

She didn’t know how long she’d been out when she woke with a start to the sharp sound of a
branch snapping in the distance, much louder than the unobtrusive pop and crackle of the fire.
Her eyes flew open, Fred already making to stand as she did the same, wands drawn.

In perfect synchronicity, she silenced their feet while he disillusioned them. Fred’s
shimmering form nodded for her to circle wide toward where the noise had come from as he
took a more direct approach from their left, neither of them making a sound as they split apart
and crossed the barrier wards.

This wasn’t the first time they’d heard something move in the night, having stunned a few
wild animals on accident in past months, but it unsettled her all the same as she approached,
 stepping lightly and moving like a wraith between the trees.

Another branch snapped, closer this time, and she focused her mind, casting hominem revelio
now that she was closer and scanning around the forest. Two forms showed up; Fred,
crouched low and coming toward her from the opposite direction and another tall figure
between them, ambling along the brush, also in her direction and undeniably human.

In addition to muggles hiking and camping, snatchers and muggleborns alike had taken to
hiding in the wilderness, the same as them, so it could be a coincidence, but Hermione picked
up the pace anyway, cutting at a diagonal to get a straight shot around a dense thicket. The
man finally stepped into view, still heavily shadowed and facing away from her, but she
could see he was sort of glowing, a warm light emanating from his chest.

He started to turn toward her as if he sensed eyes on him and she didn’t falter, sending a
bright red stunner and striking him in the ribs. The man immediately dropped to the ground
and the strange light went dark. Not two seconds later, Fred appeared opposite her, barely a
shimmer in the dark. Without saying a word to one another they approached the figure.

A sinking feeling in her stomach, Hermione lit the tip of her wand and saw that the person
was tall and lanky, with familiar red hair tucked beneath a knit cap. None too gently, Fred
extended his foot and shoved at his shoulder, rolling him off his side and onto his back. He
swore under his breath and dropped the disillusionment on both of them.

“What the hell?” Hermione exhaled, staring in shock and more than a little dismay at the
slack, unconscious face of Ron Weasley.

Chapter End Notes

It seems we have a couple new friends joining us and reading along, so just as a
reminder:

New chapters go up every 1-3 weeks and are dependent entirely upon my personal life
and schedule. The easiest way to follow along is to hit the subscribe button and get
email notifications.

Or, as an alternative, periodically forget this story exists at all (because object

🖤
permanence is hard) and then come back to binge a dozen chapters at once. Both are
valid methods.
 Consequences
Chapter Notes

The song I listened to incessantly while writing the back half of this chapter was
Francesca (Hozier):

Do you think I'd give up

That this might've shook the love from me
Or that I was on the brink?
How could you think, darling, I'd scare so easily?

Now that it's done

There's not one thing that I would change
My life was a storm, since I was born
How could I fear any hurricane?

If someone asked me at the end

I'll tell them put me back in it
Darling, I would do it again
12 February 1998

“How much longer?” Hermione asked for what had to be the hundredth time, looking to Fred
for an answer.

“Still ten minutes, love,” he said evenly, glancing at his watch and channeling some sort of
inexplicable inner calm that she clearly didn’t share.

“Why don’t you sit down?” Harry suggested, also not for the first time, stone faced and doing
exactly that on their little sofa. He was still in his sleepwear, refusing to leave and get dressed
after they’d arrived back and summoned him nearly an hour ago.

“I’m fine,” Hermione snapped more harshly than she’d intended, taking another lap around
the fire and past Ron, who was bound to a tree and unconscious. His rucksack, which had
been thoroughly searched, was a few feet away and out of reach.

The knuckles wrapped around her wand were white and the corner of her lip was bleeding
where she’d worried it between her teeth.
“Why do we have to wait, again?” Harry asked, his knee bouncing impatiently. “I know you
said in case of Polyjuice, but we could just ask him questions.”

“There’s no reason to take the unnecessary risk,” Fred explained impassively. “He was at Bill
and Fleur’s through the holidays, but I don’t know about after that. We don’t know what
someone could have learned if they picked him up.”

Harry just nodded, and they fell silent again, waiting and occasionally trading uneasy
glances.

“That’s time,” Fred finally said, pushing off the tree that he was leaning against and coming
to stand beside her in front of Ron, who, for better or for worse, was still Ron. Harry mirrored
him and flanked her left. “Ready?”

“Wake him up,” Hermione said in answer, bobbing her head without looking away. They
were well within the warm embrace of the fire, but she felt only ice in her veins as Fred
aimed his wand at the man that had betrayed not only her, abandoned not only her, but the
people that she cared for the most.

With a murmured spell, Ron stirred before his eyes popped open. They landed on Hermione
first and, no surprise, narrowed slightly. Then they moved to Harry, lighting with something
like hope. Then she watched with a sort of cruel satisfaction as they ended on Fred, and that
hope swiftly died.

Giving a wiggle to test his bindings – which were secure, charmed, and tight enough to be
decidedly uncomfortable – Ron ignored her and his brother and turned to Harry on her left,
clearly deciding that was his most likely ally.

“Harry, I’m so glad –“

“Silencio,” Hermione bit out, watching as Ron’s mouth continued to move without sound.
Harry looked a little startled, but he didn’t say anything as she stepped to the side and put
herself between him and Ron, leaning forward and pinning the latter with hard eyes as he
tried to see around her. She made a point of following his line of sight.

“Why are you looking at him? Don’t look at him, look at me. He’s not going to help you.”
Fred snorted quietly and Hermione’s voice cooled further as she faced Ron again. “You don’t
get to grovel. You don’t get to plead your case. You don’t get to make one bloody, pathetic,
empty excuse, because I don’t want to hear it. The only thing I want to hear from your mouth
when I left this spell is a thorough explanation of how exactly you found us here. Do you
understand me?”

Ron looked up at her with eyes that burned like two flickering blue flames, but Hermione
didn’t so much as blink. She waited, all but yawning and picking at her cuticles. He tried to
look around her at Harry again and, failing the ability to do so, finally acquiesced and nodded
with a jerk of his chin.

Hermione dropped the silencing charm.

“I’m so sorry I left, Harry, I –“

Hermione silenced him again and glanced at Fred.

“Did that sound like an explanation to you?” She asked with exaggerated nonchalance, and
he shook his head, arms crossed tightly across his chest as he examined his brother like he
was a mildly interesting potion experiment that’d gone wrong.

“Not a bit,” Fred said. “Harry, what say you?”

Harry stepped around Hermione a little and shook his head, staring down at his former friend
on the ground. His face was solemn, and he didn’t share Fred and Hermione’s glib demeanor
when he spoke. “Please just tell them how you found us, Ron. Don’t make this harder than it
needs to be.”

Seething, Ron nodded again, and Hermione lifted the spell once more.

“It was the deluminator that Dumbledore gave me,” he spat out tightly. “It doesn’t just put
out the lights.”

“Go on,” Hermione commanded, walking to his rucksack and drawing the deluminator out.
It’d been in his pockets when they stunned him, but they’d emptied those and discarded the
contents with his bag.

She flipped it open and pressed her thumb down, a ball of pale yellow light flying out and
hovering over them before she pressed it again and the light returned to the innocuous silver
and green lighter.

“I was – I was regretting having left you, Harry,” Ron shot her a venomous look and
Hermione resisted the urge to roll her eyes, “And when I opened it, the light flew into me,
right into my chest, instead of just floating about like it usually does. I took a chance and
apparated, and it brought me to this snowy forest I hadn’t seen before. I waited there for a full
day before I heard your voice in the distance. I tried to follow it, but it disappeared too fast,
so I waited another couple days and apparated again, this time to some crags near the coast.”

“Would’ve been a couple weeks after the new year started,” Fred murmured, putting together
the places they’d been and answering her unasked question. It meant he’d been trailing them
for a while.

It meant he’d been trailing them for a while, and they hadn’t noticed.

Ron didn’t look at his brother, still focused on Harry, but he nodded again.

“I kept doing that, sometimes catching a bit of conversation or finding footprints if there was
snow, but I wasn’t ever able to actually find you. Not until tonight.”

“You didn’t ‘find us,’ we stunned you,” Fred corrected sharply, and Hermione could tell from
the way he rolled his shoulders that not only was he also unnerved by the idea of being
followed, but the grip on his self-control was wavering.
“Were you at Shell Cottage the whole time?” she asked, Fred’s presence explaining how she
knew he’d been there at all.

And as far as the deluminator, she was inclined to believe him only because she didn’t think
there was any other reasonable explanation. They used every protective enchantment and
ward in the book, save for having a secret-keeper – which was impossible given how
frequently they moved. Further, they’d only gone to locations he hadn’t helped scout since
he’d left. Short of them breaking the taboo, there shouldn’t be a way for them to be found by
anyone.

“No,” Ron bit out. “I got picked up by some snatchers first, but I got away. Lost two of my
fingernails getting splinched in the process, if you care.”

“I don’t,” Hermione replied flatly.

“Why did you want to come back?” Harry asked, slipping into the role of mediator as if he
felt the growing tension. Hermione didn’t fault him, but she also wasn’t ready to take any sort
of high road. Telling Fred everything had reopened wounds that hadn’t even healed yet, and
they still smarted.

“I realised I still wanted to help you,” Ron said, still only looking at Harry. “It was the locket,
it twisted everything up in my head. Dumbledore knew I’d come back, that’s why he gave me
the deluminator. I’m your friend, Harry, your best mate, I -”

He was clearly going to keep going, but Fred cut him off, any lingering composure
evaporating as his voice changed to something dark and angry that sent a tremor racing down
her spine.

“So that’s your excuse, then? Was it also the locket that made you take a pass at my
girlfriend?” Hermione winced and Harry went utterly still at her side. Fred stepped closer,
kneeling in front of Ron and grabbing him roughly by the collar. Ron, to his credit, had the
good sense to try and move away, finding only the unyielding tree trunk at his back. Fred
jerked him forward and then back again, so his head smacked against it loud enough to make
an audible thump. “Was it the locket that made you think you had the right to put your filthy
fucking hands where they didn’t belong?!”

Fred’s volume rose steadily as he spoke and Harry drifted closer, like he was listening raptly.
Like he was waiting to hear some sort of denial or explanation, but when none came after a
long moment, he turned to Hermione. “Is that – is that true?”

Despite the dark stubble on his jaw, her best friend looked impossibly young in that moment,
like he was hoping with all his heart that she would say no. But Hermione was keeping
enough secrets and Harry deserved to know this one, to understand why she and Fred were
reacting to Ron’s presence the way that they were. She didn’t blame Fred for slipping, and
she’d planned to tell Harry the full story eventually. Just not like this.

“It is,” she said, tears unexpectedly stinging the corners of her eyes, as she took in his face
and hated Ron a little more for putting them in this position. “I’m sorry that I didn’t say
anything, I didn’t – I wasn’t sure –”
She was going to go on, but Harry stepped forward and hugged her tightly to him. Hermione
took a moment to let herself hug him back, lost in a fog of churning emotions. When Harry
pulled away from her again, something unidentifiable in him had shifted.

“Harry, it wasn’t like that,” Ron pled, seeing any opportunity to sway Harry to his cause
fading. “They’re making it sound worse than it was, all I did –“

Harry was the one that silenced him this time and Hermione understood what it was in her
friend’s demeanor that had changed. When he’d first woken and come outside, saw Ron after
they’d hauled him back to the camp, there was still the smallest shred of hope in him. The
faintest trace of optimism that perhaps things between all of them could be mended and set
right.

She looked for it, searched hard, but it wasn’t there anymore.

“I don’t care what you do with him,” Harry said, turning to look at Fred and then Hermione
with that same wounded anger in his eyes that she’d seen in the mirror for weeks. He
sounded resigned, and Ron’s silent expression transformed from desperate into one of mild
panic. “I don’t care, but I don’t want him here.”

Then, despite Ron thrashing on the ground, attempting to get his attention and stop him,
Harry turned and walked into the tent without a backward glance, pulling the flap shut behind
him.

Hermione stared at where he’d disappeared for a long moment, assessing. She realised she
still held the deluminator and turned it over in her hand a couple times, cursing Albus
Dumbledore beyond the grave. Again.

“It’s your call,” Fred said quietly, shaking her back to the present. He was still crouched near
his brother, but he stood up to face her more fully. And while Harry had looked young, Fred
seemed far older than his years then, and twice as tired as she felt.

“I don’t want it to be,” Hermione admitted, walking back to his side and ignoring Ron, who
was staring up at them murderously and no longer attempting to speak.

“It needs to be, Hermione,” Fred said, swallowing hard and sounding excruciatingly guilty
about it. “I’m so sorry to ask that of you, truly I am, but if I act on the way I feel right now,
I’ll untie his hands and break every single bone in them while I do it.”

Ron lurched in alarm, but she ignored it. Instead she searched Fred’s eyes and found a
dizzying swirl of conflict there. And while she was fairly certain he wouldn’t actually take it
that far, he was right. She needed to be the one to exercise control if exercising control was
what they were going to do.

Hermione lifted a hand to brush over his cheek as she nodded and, face turned away from
Ron, she saw Fred’s expression crack for just a split second as he pulled in an unsteady
breath before smoothing again. More than anything she wanted to take that pain from him,
because that’s what it was. It wasn’t only the things she felt, but an added layer of hurt that
came from Ron being his family; his blood.
With squared shoulders, she knelt in front of Ron and held the deluminator at eye level,
twisting it back and forth in the light, making a show of examining it. She didn’t unsilence
him, and neither did Fred. He’d already said more than enough.

“Dumbledore didn’t give this to you because he knew you’d search your heart and want to
find your way back to us. He didn’t give this to you because you’re some sort of
underappreciated hero who needed a means by which to sweep in and save the day. He gave
this to you because even he knew that you’re a spineless, spiteful coward who can’t be
depended upon when things are difficult. So, bearing that in mind, I’m going to be keeping
it.”

Hermione tossed the deluminator in the air and caught it again before pocketing it out of
sight. She looked up at Fred, who was watching her curiously now.

“You can still break his hands if you’d like – I certainly won’t stop you – but I’d recommend
waiting. There’s no sense in going to the trouble if he isn’t going to remember how or why it
happened.”

Understanding lit Fred’s eyes and Hermione turned back to Ron, tipping her head like a cat
watching a mouse. She didn’t smile, because she wasn’t remotely happy to be doing this. But
that monster in her chest, the one that craved retribution, purred softly all the same.

“Because you never found us. You never got to give Harry your little apology speech.
Whatever guilt you’re feeling can rot you from the inside out for all I care. And if you ever
wonder how you lost the deluminator that night you woke up alone in the forest with an
aching head, if it occurs to you that maybe you did find us and something happened that you
can’t quite recall, if you’re unsettled by that notion, then all the better. Maybe then you’ll feel
some fraction of the doubt and distress and discomfort that you wrought.”

Something like genuine remorse did flicker over Ron’s face, then, but she didn’t give him the
time to contemplate it. He wouldn’t remember it, so there wasn’t any point; any reckonings
and reflections would have to wait.

Hermione swiftly stunned him again, and Ron’s tensed body went limp.

“Dammit,” Hermione exhaled in a huff, rolling backward on her heels until her ass hit the
cold ground. She dropped her wand and put her head in her hands.

“Hermione –“

“I’m okay,” she assured Fred, blowing out a shaky breath as he came to kneel beside her,
radiating alarm. She dropped her hands and nodded up at the sky, blinking rapidly and trying
to calm herself down a little now that they didn’t have an audience.

“It’s my fault, I shouldn’t have asked you to –“

She shook herself. “No, I’m okay. I just – I wasn’t expecting to see him again. Not now, not
like this.”
“I know,” Fred said solemnly, their time lazing together in bed feeling like it took place
weeks ago instead of hours. “Are you alright to remove the memories? I’m not as good as
you are, but I can try.”

“I can do it,” she said, chuckling morbidly, if a little hysterically. “I’m practically an expert at
this point, and it’ll only take a minute.”

“What do we do with him after?” Fred asked, looking over his shoulder at Ron.

“Nothing. We take him back to where we found him, wake him up, and leave before he sees
us. We’ll stay within the wards tonight and move camp first thing in the morning.”

Fred reached out and took her hand in his, not speaking. He simply sat with her until her
heart rate slowed and she stopped feeling like she was going to be sick.

“Let’s get this over with,” Hermione finally said, picking up her wand. She got to her feet and
reached down to pull Fred up before she turned to his youngest brother, locking down any
lingering emotions tightly as she did. She went to that cool, calm place in her mind, where
there was no anger or grief or resentment. There was only the task to be done and her role in
doing it; there would be time for the rest later. She leaned forward, placed the tip of her wand
against Ron’s temple and shut her eyes. “Obliviate.”

Her supposition that it would only take a minute was correct. Swiftly, she traced her way
through his memories and excised the last hour with detached precision, exactly as she’d said
she would. His last memory would be of a rustle in the underbrush before everything went
black.

And when it was done, she drew back to find Fred watching her. Not with judgement or fear,
though both would be reasonable responses, but with unconcealed concern.

“I’m okay,” she said again, though it sounded much less convincing than it had earlier. Her
voice broke and her hands were visibly trembling, sweat kissing her brow despite the cold.
“We need to move him.”

“I’ll take care of it,” Fred said, already making to pick up Ron’s rucksack.

“I can help–“

“Hermione, I said I’ll take care of it. Please don’t argue with me.” It wasn’t unkind or angry,
but it was firm. He looked her over with knowing eyes. “You need a minute, so go breathe
and take a minute.”

The urge to argue bubbled in her before she choked it down, because Fred was right. Her
seams were fraying, and he saw it more easily than she could; he always did. “Thank you.
I’m going to go and check on Harry – let me know when you’re back, okay?”

“I will,” Fred promised, vanishing the ropes that were holding his brother in place. Leaving
him to it, Hermione turned to walk back into the tent. Her hands were still shaking and, in the
wake of everything, that raw-nerve feeling slowly crept back to the forefront of her mind.
As she stepped inside, she expected to see Harry at the table, but he wasn’t there. Hermione
glanced toward his alcove and found the curtain pulled half- shut, so she shrugged out of her
coat and tossed it onto the back of the chair nearest her as she passed.

“Harry?” She waited for a response, but when none came, she pulled the curtain back a bit
further. He was sitting on the edge of the bed, elbows braced on his knees as he stared
blankly at the ground. When he looked up at her she saw that his green eyes were red-rimmed
and puffy behind his glasses. The lamp beside him wasn’t lit, so the only light was what
trickled in from the main living area behind her.

“Is Ron gone?”

Hermione nodded. “I removed his memories of tonight and Fred’s taking him back to where
we found him.”

He nodded. “The deluminator?”

She pulled it out of her pocket and set it on top of the trunk beside his bed with a soft thunk.
Harry picked it up, his small, warped reflection staring back at him.

“History really does repeat itself, doesn’t it?” Harry said suddenly, and Hermione’s eyebrows
pinched together as he looked back up at her. “He’s just like Pettigrew. Ron’s just like
Pettigrew, and I’m just like my bloody dad. Giving too many chances and putting my trust in
the wrong people.”

“Harry,” Hermione admonished gently, taking a seat on the bed beside him as he tried to
suppress a sob that shook his shoulders. There was so much more weight to his reaction than
she’d guessed, and that haunted look in his eyes outside made more sense now. “Harry, look
at me; Ron isn’t like Peter. He’s selfish, and what he tried with me was beyond out of line,
but I don’t honestly believe that even at his worst he would sell us out like that.”

“Really? Because I didn’t think he’d do what he did to you, but he did. He fucking did, and
I’m so sorry that I didn’t see it, Hermione. All of the arguing and the animosity in those last
weeks… I feel like an unbelievable idiot for missing it. I took his side half of the time, for
fuck’s sake!”

“You’re not an idiot, and Ron didn’t force himself on me,” she felt the need to clarify,
because Harry still didn’t have the full picture, and she wasn’t going to leave any uncertainty
around that fact. “He… presented himself as an option, and I made it clear that I wasn’t
interested.”

That bit of context did little to calm him down. “He ‘presented himself as an option’ knowing
full well that you and his brother are together, and then he treated you terribly for weeks,
months, after that. And he did it right in front of me. I genuinely thought that he was going to
hit you the night he left.”

Hermione didn’t have anything to say to refute that, nor was she particularly inclined to
defend Ron further in that moment, so she didn’t try. “You need to get some rest. It’s late, and
everything always seems worse when you’re tired.”
Harry was quiet for a long moment before he nodded wordlessly and ran a hand over his face.
“Stay for a few minutes?”

“Of course.”

Harry laid down and took his glasses off, setting them and the deluminator back beside the
bed. Hermione turned so she was sitting by his feet with her back against the footboard. She
rested her hand on his calf, near his ankle, as he shut his eyes.

Lost in thought, she didn’t know how long it was before there was a quiet rustling,
announcing Fred’s return. It was silent for a moment, likely while he was looking for them,
before he came over and peered around the curtain. He didn’t seem at all surprised to find her
there.

Nodding and making a ‘one minute’ sign, Hermione eased herself off the bed and grabbed
the rumpled blanket that was piled beside her, tossing it over Harry before she turned and
followed Fred out, closing the curtain behind them and silencing it.

“Is it done?” she asked, crossing her arms over her chest.

“Yeah,” Fred said.

“Did you…?” she trailed off, not sure how to phrase what she was wondering.

“Did I beat the living hell out of him?” Fred asked with a raised brow. “No. I thought about
it, a lot, but leaving him there was the right call.”

Hermione nodded and stepped forward into his arms, feeling his chin come to rest on top of
her head. She thought back to the first time he’d held her like this and, for a split second, she
was fifteen again. He was newly seventeen, and they were standing in her bedroom at
Grimmauld Place, still learning how very unforgiving the world could be and how important
it was to have people in your corner. Now she was eighteen going on eighty, and intimately
familiar with both of those things.

“I love you,” she offered softly.

“And I love you,” Fred echoed, his thumb stroking light circles on her back.

“Even when I’m scary and threatening people and plucking out memories like they’re
wayward weeds in a garden bed?” It was tucked behind the thinnest veil of humor, but it was
a real insecurity that she didn’t fully come to grips with until that evening. Until he’d
watched her purposely find and channel that callous, hollow place inside of herself.

Fred didn’t pull away or make her look at him, instead he surprised her and chuckled, the
sound rumbling through his chest as he nodded over her head.

“Yes, even then. There’s no part of you that I don’t love, Hermione Granger. No urge or
inclination that I won’t accept, nothing you could do or say that I wouldn’t forgive. I’d kill
for you, I’d die for you, and I’ll pull you back from the edge as many times as you need me
to; as many times as it takes.”
She swallowed because, while she felt that same devotion in the marrow of her bones, it was
different hearing it put so plainly.

“It’s still a little frightening, though,” she admitted in a small voice.

“It is,” Fred agreed, holding her to him just a little tighter. “But the only thing on this earth
that actually scares me anymore is the thought of losing you.”
 Ashes, ashes, it all falls down
Chapter Notes

Heads up - I'm going to be adding another chapter to this story sometime this week, only
it's not really a 'chapter,' it's more like an odd little ficlet that's been lurking in my brain
for a while.

Yes, it will be relevant to the plot later, so read it if you feel so inclined. Just don't expect
a normal 3k+ word, Fred/Hermione-centric passage when you get the update.

Cheers!

8 April 1997
In the weeks following Ron’s less-than-voluntary removal from the camp, Hermione and
Fred worked through their grief and anger together, and eventually found a new equilibrium.

They also celebrated Fred’s nineteenth birthday at Hermione’s steadfast insistence; she knew
it was the first one he’d spent apart from his brother and, despite having meager means
through which to do so, she tried to make it special.

This may or may not have included a bit of naughty lingerie and a very discrete trip to
Morrison’s to buy a cake.

Of course there were still sleepless nights, and Hermione woke up in a cold sweat more often
than not some weeks, but instead of staring at the tent ceiling or obsessively reading her notes
again, she either rolled over to have Fred pull her to him, or joined him beside the fire while
he was on watch. He never questioned her when she did the latter, merely moved over on
their small, conjured sofa and kissed the top of her head.

Sometimes she talked to him about the dreams and the dark thoughts, but most times she
didn’t. Regardless, he never pressured her or shied away.

Harry, on the other hand, wasn’t coping quite as well. Hermione tried talking to him, as did
Fred, but it was like his guilt about Ron had triggered something in him; a near-obsessive
fixation on the Deathly Hallows.

Hermione thought it was really more of a desperation to prove himself, prove that he could
defy what he perceived as history repeating itself, but she thought it silently.

Fred tried to help him at first, retelling variations of the Three Brothers story that he’d heard
in his childhood with the hope that it might reveal some discrepancy or detail that they’d
previously overlooked, but it quickly became clear that wasn’t the case. At least, it became
clear to Fred and Hermione.

“I don’t know what to do,” Hermione confessed quietly one evening. She and Fred were
sitting at the table in the middle of tent, Fred fiddling with the wireless radio while still
listening to her attentively. “Any time I try to refocus on leads to find the Ravenclaw and
Hufflepuff artefacts, he just tunes me out or starts talking about the things he’s seen in
Riddle’s head.”

Fred glanced up at her. “Is he still having the dreams, or just rehashing the old ones?”

“I don’t know, and when I ask, he plays it off because he knows I’m just going to tell him to
occlude and block it out.”

“Bit hard to keep mental walls up when you’re asleep, love,” Fred reasoned and, frustrated as
she was, Hermione conceded that point and nodded.

“I know that. It just – it scares me, Fred. Riddle’s manipulated that connection before, and we
lost Sirius in the crossfire. I’ve never blamed Harry for it, he couldn’t have known that’s what
was happening, but if he falls for the same trick twice…”
She drifted off, but the end of the sentence was crystal clear, nonetheless. Fred went on
meddling with the radio for a few more minutes, tapping it with his wand and muttering to
himself before he looked up at her again.

“Do you think he’s worried that Riddle finding the wand will serve as a sort of ‘point of no
return?’”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, the Deathstick is supposedly unbeatable. If Riddle finds it, even if we manage to
destroy the horcruxes in the interim, maybe Harry’s afraid we won’t be able to finish the job
after. That he won’t be able to finish the job after. Maybe, in his head, the wand decides the
war.”

“That’s absurd, and it’s putting a hell of a lot of stock in a flimsy theory and a child’s bedtime
tale,” Hermione said skeptically.

“Love, we’re talking about a man that survived the killing curse and had a literal prophecy
written about him, not to mention everything else that’s happened in the past half-decade. If
you put yourself in his shoes, it’s not the biggest reach.”

Hermione opened her mouth to retort when the tent flap pulled back and Harry stepped
inside.

“Did you get it?” Harry asked Fred, taking a seat beside him across from Hermione. All three
looked at the radio in the middle of the table.

“I think so – should be any minute.” Fred and Hermione shared a quick ‘we’ll finish this
conversation later’ glance as he spun the volume dial on the radio and the static grew louder.

The three of them sat quietly until, with a sharp crackle, Lee Jordan’s voice suddenly rang out
between them. Worries momentarily forgotten, Hermione couldn’t help the smile that spread
across her face, which Fred shared as he reached across the table and squeezed her hand.
Even Harry’s demeanor markedly lightened.

Fred had of course told them about the radio program but, save for tuning into one broadcast
shortly after joining them, the show had been briefly placed on hiatus with two potential
return dates and passwords for listeners to tune in, this being the latter of the two. Fred said
it’s what they’d agreed to do should any investigations start to get too close, the very idea of
which made Hermione’s stomach flip flop with anxiety.

“… apologise for our temporary absence from the airwaves, which was due to a number of
housecalls in our area by those oh-so-charming Death Eaters.”

The levity of hearing from their friends and family was short-lived because, no sooner had
‘River’ introduced himself, did he begin to announce the deaths.

Bathilda Bagshot obviously wasn’t a surprise to them.

The muggle family of five, however, made her throat tighten.

Dirk Cresswell, a man she’d met twice, set a sort of prickling unease over her skin.

But it was Ted Tonks’ name that knocked the air out of her.

“Tonks’ dad,” she whispered in confirmation when Harry looked to her in horror, like his
brain didn’t want to make the connection. She’d only spoken to Ted a handful of times, but
he was an unabashedly cheery sort, and eerily similar to Arthur in his devotion to his family.
He and Tonks’ mum, Andromeda, had shared a sort of profound respect and affection for one
another that was almost humbling to behold.

“He went on the run,” Fred said numbly. “When they started rounding up muggleborns back
in autumn, he left. He didn’t want to put Andy and Tonks in danger, especially not – not with
the baby on the way.”

Hermione shut her eyes and tried to focus on her breathing. Not on Tonks, whose child would
never meet its grandfather, and certainly not on Andromeda, who’d loved him so much that
she’d given up everything to have a life with Ted. Who’d just lost the other half of her heart.

They grew quiet again as Lee introduced Royal and Romulus – Kingsley and Remus.

Kingsley went into greater detail on some happenings in the muggle world, on the increasing
danger they faced. He went so far as to instruct people to cast protective enchantments over
their muggle neighbors and their homes, which surprised her in the best possible way.

Of course not many would do it, but if that call to action saved even one life, it was
something.

“Before I hand the microphone over to Romulus here,” Kingsley said at the end of his
segment, “I would like to report the recent deaths of two marked Death Eaters. The first is
Paul Ambor, son of Alicent Sellwyn; his body was found just this morning in his home
outside of Dover with no discernable markings or cause of death, suggestive of the killing
curse.

“The second is Marcus Flint; Flint’s body was recovered outside of Borgin and Burkes in
Knockturn Alley over a week ago. Unlike Ambor, reports say that the body was badly burned
and mutilated prior to his death. The Ministry claims they’re actively working to identify the
party or parties responsible, but a reliable source has relayed that they do not have any leads
at this time.”

“Good riddance,” Lee murmured darkly before Remus began speaking.

Hermione’s eyes went wide and her lips parted in shock as she looked to Fred, who by all
accounts was equally stunned.

“Did -?” She stopped herself and just about choked on Ginny’s name, keenly aware of
Harry’s curious eyes on her.

“I don’t know,” Fred said, rapidly shaking his head and looking more rattled than she’d seen
him in weeks. “I didn’t – before I left – I don’t know.”
“When is the spring term break?”

“It just started a couple days ago, it couldn’t have been…”

It couldn’t have been Ginny, she finished in her head.

From everything Fred and Phineas Nigelus had said, successfully sneaking in or out of the
school was incredibly unlikely now, and nye on impossible without Snape’s knowledge. He’d
caved in the existing passageways and, as headmaster, he had insights into the comings and
goings that reached far beyond normal detection spells.

“It had to have been someone else,” Hermione murmured, not sure if she was relieved or
disappointed by that prospect. Relieved, she decided almost immediately; personal vendettas
aside, Flint couldn’t hurt anyone else, now.

“What are you two –?” Harry started to ask, but he got distracted when Remus, who’d been
encouraging listeners to stay strong, began to address him directly.

Hermione had to get up. It was too much to just sit and take the barrage of life and death, too
difficult to grapple with the ensuing whiplash between emotions that were overwhelming
even to her undeniably jaded heart.

She half-listened, glad that what Remus was saying seemed to resonate with her friend at
least, as she got to her feet and began pacing across the tent. Fred eased back in his seat, his
lips pressed tightly together and eyes fixed somewhere leagues away, still as a statue.

The broadcast concluded with a little banter between George and Lee and, finally, Lee
reporting Voldemort’s most recent whereabouts. Dazed as she was, Hermione didn’t miss the
way that Harry hung on the mention of him being spotted abroad.

“… keep each other safe and keep faith. Good night.”

The dim light behind the tuning panel went dark as the broadcast ended and hissing static
filled the air once more.

“Did you hear that?” Harry asked after a long, silent moment.

“I did,” Hermione said measuredly, stopping to lean against one of the support beams with
her arms crossed over her chest. She didn’t have the mind for this argument at present and
Fred, despite being obviously caught in his own torrent of feelings about Ted and Flint and
Ginny, seemed to sense that as he sat forward again.

“He’s abroad, Hermione. He’s looking for the wand, I knew it!”

“Harry, mate,” Fred began in earnest, “There’s no saying that’s even true, let alone that that’s
what he’s doing. A lot of the broadcast is speculation, we’re just trying to keep people
hopeful.”

Harry’s dark brows drew together, as if their skepticism was the problem before the court and
not everything else they’d just heard.
“Come on! Why are the both of you so determined to deny it? Lee just said he’s looking for
something, Vol –“

“NO!” Hermione gasped, the steady thumping of her heart screeching to a halt.

It was too late.

“– demort’s clearly after the Elder wand!“

Out of his seat in a blink, Fred made to silence Harry before he could finish saying the name,
but, off-kilter and off-guard as he was after the broadcast, he wasn’t fast enough.

It was too late.

Time slowed as Hermione looked between them, eyes wide, and undiluted fear settling in the
pit of her stomach and the marrow of her bones. They were compromised.

It was too late.

Harry realised what he’d done a second after he did it. His eyes went wide as he opened his
mouth again, like he could swallow the name up and take it back, but whatever he was going
to say was drowned out as the sneakoscope on the table went berserk and a series of cracks
and pops sounded outside of the tent, well within where their wards had been.

It. Was. Too. Late.

Hermione felt the oppressive weight of anti-apparation charms that didn’t belong to them
press down on her and, shock dissipating, she began to move, one hand reaching for her
necklace and the other for her wand.

Unfortunately, whoever it was outside of the tent didn’t bother to give them a warning. She
was almost to Fred, who was a little nearer than Harry and extending an arm to her, when an
explosion struck between them, and the world cleaved in two.

All the breath left her lungs and Hermione gasped as heat seared her face and she was thrown
backward, shoulder striking something hard as she crumpled to the ground with a cry. There
were muted voices in a circle around them, unbothered and jeering, but she could barely hear
it over the ringing in her ears.

She could feel her pulse thrum and the blood rush in her head as she pushed unsteadily onto
her hands and knees to look around. There wasn’t much to see; the lanterns had broken, and
the torn canopy of the tent revealed sprawling branches and an inky sky overhead. Dim,
orange light flickered where the tattered edges of the off-white canvas where smoldering.

Staying low amidst the rubble, she looked around, desperately trying to find a shock of
copper or dark hair sticking up across the way. Whatever spell they’d cast had blown a path
of destruction between where she and the boys had been. The table they’d been sitting at was
little more than a heap of kindling and her notes and books, still spelled against prying eyes,
were either torn to shreds or quickly turning to ash.
Blinking rapidly and trying to orient herself, she finally spotted movement near the half-
collapsed alcove that Harry’s bed was in; the tent’s destruction must have broken whatever
enchantment was on it because now, inside and out, it was showing its true size.

Hermione couldn’t make out Fred or Harry through the darkness and smoke, but she readied
herself to cross the narrow expanse anyway. She just had to get ahold of them and they could
get out.

“Come out of there with your hands up!” A gravelly, rasping voice called through the pitch.
“We know you’re in there. We’ve half a dozen wands trained on you, and we don’t much care
who we hex.”

Tapping her wand on the top of her head, Hermione tried and failed to disillusion herself. She
watched and cursed silently as her legs flickered but ultimately remained visible, deterred by
whatever magic they’d put in place. Left with no other options and no time to think of
something better, she gripped her wand tightly and lunged into the open.

She’d barely stepped into the clearing when two stunners and a pale yellow curse lit the night
and flew her way. The lattermost barely missed her as she threw herself backward and out of
its path again, this time taking the brunt of the fall on her knee and hip.

Hermione realised that she wasn’t going to make it two feet, let alone all the way across.

Changing tactics, she took a breath and blew it out slowly as she jerked her sleeve up and
pressed her wand to her wrist.

“I’ll distract them, take him and run,” she breathed, watched as the words etched and then
disappeared. “I’ll find you.”

I promise I’ll always find you.

She didn’t wait for Fred’s response, just silently prayed that he saw it and would do as she’d
said. He knew she had the necklace and the bracelet; if he could get Harry past the
boundaries of the anti-apparation ward and get them out, it wouldn’t be hard to meet up
again.

A quick detection charm told her that there wasn’t time, anyway; they were beginning to pick
their way among the rubble and close in on her and the two shapes crouched beneath the
canvas, maybe 40 feet away.

Pain still radiating through her shoulder, Hermione was ready this time when she stepped out
of cover and into the clearing. The spells they’d cast earlier told her that their aim was to
capture, not to kill, so when they tried again to stun her, she had a pale blue shield charm
wrapped around herself and waiting to deflect it.

It seemed to catch them off guard, and doubly so when she then parried and sent a sweeping
arch of orange flames in a semi-circle, briefly blinding them and only sparing the direction
the boys needed to run – which, thank the gods, they did.
After a pause three other figures broke off after them while four remained, more visible now
that the surrounding area was briefly set alight. One of those four, however, was shrieking
and patting at his blazing robes, so he posed little threat. Her stomach churned at the smell of
burnt hair, and she suppressed a gag.

Hermione threw herself to the side behind a rock as a slicing hex hit a slender sapling behind
where she’d been standing, cutting it clean in two. The top half slid off backward with a
groan and a thud.

“You’ll pay for that, you bitch!”

Hermione had the passing thought that she’d perhaps finally lost her mind, because she was
struck with the sudden, inexplicable urge to laugh at that comment. She’d been called far
worse by far better, after all.

Her mind sobered when shouting and flashes of colour in the distance told her that Fred and
Harry weren’t clear yet. She feinted left and then twirled to her right around the small
boulder, using the split-second’s advantage to send one of the men flying backward into an
enormous pine tree, his body making a crunching sound as it connected and then slumped to
the ground.

The man who’d called her a bitch, a tall, gangly sort, apparently decided her value alive no
longer outweighed the hassle of capturing her, because this time when he aimed his wand, he
sent a killing curse directly for her chest. The last man, who she got the vague impression
was in charge, yelled something to reprimand him in that same rough voice as she easily
dodged out of the way.

Thought it felt like a small infinity, this all happened in a matter of seconds and, in the
meantime, the sounds in the distance quieted. That meant only one of two things and, though
Fred would surely disapprove, she needed to see which it was before she took the portkey
out.

Keeping low again and running in that direction, skirting and ducking spells all the way,
Hermione’s stomach dropped when, from her new cover behind a fallen log and some brush,
she saw two men, one of them limping, levitating two more agonizingly familiar,
unconscious figures behind them.

She only had a second to decide, because the men at her back were closing in fast, but in the
end, it wasn’t really much of a decision at all.

If she fought, it was four to one and not only was she waning, but she'd lost the element of
surprise.

If she left for reinforcements, she wouldn’t have any way to figure out where they were
taken, not quickly at least, and that wasn’t a risk she could accept. Losing them both wasn’t a
consequence that she could live with.

Though this random band of snatchers likely didn’t know it, they had her thoroughly
cornered.
Tears of fury and frustration burning her eyes, Hermione made sure her beaded bag was
tucked into the well-concealed inner pocket of her jacket and spelled her necklace and
bracelet with the strongest, fastest concealment charms that she could call to mind.

Then, heart pounding and chest heaving, she stepped into the clearing with her hands raised,
palm-forward.

Hermione had barely dropped to her knees in front of their captors when two bright red
stunners struck her at once, and everything went black.
Please drop by the Archive and comment to let the creator know if you enjoyed their work!