A/N: Hello, welcome to my seventh fan fiction. If you are not familiar with me or my fiction stories, I'd like to say a few things. I appreciate constructive criticism in the reviews and ideas are welcome, I will credit you if I use an idea you've approached me with. If I don't, please let me know because it was probably a mistake. Enjoy!

Draco Malfoy a Gryffindor, Weaslys Slytherins?

Hermione stared out of her second story window. Where were they? They were supposed to be in here room over twenty minutes ago.

"Harry!" she quietly whispered under her breath, unlatching her window lock and quietly opening her window. If her parents found out about this…

She didn't want to think about that. They were muggles and they wouldn't understand.

On the other hand, if she explained the situation quickly and desperately maybe they would just be ignorant about it and let her get away with it.

She heard a whooshing sound and her attention snapped back to the darkened abyss just outside of her window.

An involuntary shiver coursed through her body. What if he had been seen? Or worse yet, caught? She didn't approve of this plan; it was very dangerous and just downright reckless. But in the end even she had agreed it was the best and the only thing to do.

She slowly made her way to her bed and slipped under the covers, shivering again.

What else is there to do Hermione? Ron's voice rang through her head.

Harry's aunt and uncle aren't taking any of the precautions Dumbledore gave them and he can't stay at my house because… at that point his voice had trailed off and his eyes had become downcast, Well, you know…

Hermione had bitten her nails and had tried to come up with another safer, solution. But this time she hadn't won the argument.

Hermione rolled over in her bed and pulled the covers closer to her so that she might get comfortable. But she knew comfort wouldn't come until Harry and Ron were safely in her bedroom. Even then, she was sure there still wouldn't be any comfort. Always living in this tense, fearful environment. It just wasn't for her.

Just as she was dozing off, thinking of the many things that could have happened to them, she heard two soft thuds. She couldn't imagine what could have possibly made that kind of sound, but soon realized it must have been Crookshanks jumping off of his scratching post.

She felt her eyes snap open as she realized she had left Crookshanks outside. At the same time she heard someone…something moving across the floor closer to her bed. Was it a dementor? No, the environment was too warm for that. A death eater? She felt her breath catch in her throat as a realization came to her. It couldn't be…there was no way…was it…

Voldemort?

Hermione screamed and pulled out her wand as she felt somebody lay a hand on her shoulder.

She wouldn't let him kill her without a fight.

She screamed again as a red-headed boy and a bespectacled boy came into focus.

"Holy crickets, Hermione! You're going to wake your parents!" whispered Ron, covering her mouth.

Hermione's heart leapt for joy as she hugged each of the boys tightly in turn.

"I was waiting up for you!" she breathlessly replied, sitting on her bed again, "And when you didn't show up I thought…maybe…maybe you'd been…you know…" she let her sentence trail as she loosened her grip on her wand.

"Come on Hermione, you know us!" replied Harry, giving her a reassuring smile, "Even if we did get caught we would've gotten out of it somehow."

Hermione slightly smiled, trying to slow her racing heart.

"Hermione?" a voice sounded in the hallway as the lights came on. She felt her eyes grow wider and quickly opened the closet doors. Ron and Harry hastened in and she quickly shut them. She was halfway to her bed when her mother opened her bedroom door.

"Is everything alright, love?" she asked, peering around the darkened room.

"I…I'm fine," she said, struggling to sound tired and scared at the same time, "I just had a horrid dream, and then I fell out of my bed. I'm sorry, mum, I didn't mean to wake you."

Mrs. Granger curiously looked at her daughter, "Are you sure that's all that happened?" she asked.

Hermione gave her a confident smile, "I'm sure mum. Now go to sleep. You and father have a long day ahead of you tomorrow."

Her mother gently closed the door and a few moments later Ron and Harry emerged from their hiding place.

Hermione fell onto her bed as the two boys joined her.

"How are we going to pull this off?" Harry urgently asked.

Hermione hesitated, then quietly said, "I don't know."

"Well, maybe Harry and I should go back to my place," Ron said.

"No!" Hermione quickly exclaimed, sitting up, "You can't go back to the Burrow. Not until we're sure Voldemort isn't controlling your family, Ron. We couldn't risk Harry being there…"

Hermione stopped at the revolted look on Ron's face.

"I didn't mean Harry! I meant me!" he yelled.

"Ron keep it down!" she quietly scolded him, "Besides," she continued, "You said, 'Harry and I'."

Harry nodded in agreement as an owl flew in through the open window.

It was a beautiful owl, a familiar owl. One she associated with…

"Is that…is that…?" said Ron.

"Malfoy's owl," Harry finished, taking the note from it and giving the innocent looking bird a suspicious look.

Hermione and Ron gathered closer to Harry so they could all read the letter.

"Harry, Ron and Hermione, I know you all must be together at one place by now given recent events. I know, I am a Malfoy, a Slytherin, but it's like I've woken from a deep sleep. I don't remember anything that went on between us, but my father told me and it sounds horrible.

My intent of this letter was to ask if I could reside with you three until the school year has started again. I am really, really desperate, please help me.

Keep in mind I fell you three are admirable people.

Sincerely, Draco Malfoy."

"It's a trick. A trick," said Ron, his voice having gone up three octaves.

Hermione wanted to believe it was a trick, and she would have normally thought exactly that. But there was something about it…the urgency that rang through it, the messy writing as if it were written at the spur of the moment.

She glanced at Harry and saw he was thinking along the same lines.

"No!" Ron choked out, quickly glancing from one of his friends to the other, then quickly stood up and shook Hermione by her shoulders.

"Ronald!" she said, appalled that he would do anything of the sort.

"Can't you see?" he desperately asked, "His father wants to get to Harry! He thinks we'll give into it!"

"No," Harry said, looking at the letter.

"What?" squeaked Ron, turning to Harry.

He quickly looked at Ron, "I think Malfoy really is in trouble and I think we have to help him."

"What?"

"Ron, he sounds scared," started Hermione.

"Sounds scared? Sounds scared? How can you know that he sounds scared?"

"It's all in his writing, Ronald. It's sloppy as if he were trying to write it and send it before he got caught."

Ron stared at her for a moment.

I really don't want to fight with him again, she thought.

"You want…to keep a…a Slytherin, much less Draco Malfoy…in your closet all summer? What, have you gone nutters?"

"We don't have a choice," said Harry.

"No, we don't," continued Hermione, "We can't just sit here knowing he's being hurt. What if he dies? That'll be our fault!"

"Yeah," he retorted, "but it'll be our fault if Harry dies too! Quite frankly I think Malfoy deserves what he gets."

"Harry," said Hermione, turning to him and handing him the letter, "Write on the back that we'll gladly take up his offer and ask him where he is now."

"NO!" exclaimed Ron as Hermione watched Harry scribble it down, tie it to the bird's leg, and watched the bird fly away.

"Can't you see what you've done!" he exclaimed, gesturing to the now non-existent bird.

"He needed help!" Hermione begged with him. She really didn't feel like fighting with him.

"How do I know you guys aren't under the Imperius Curse now?" he asked.

"I think we've got more incentive to think that of you than vica-verca," Harry quietly cut in.

Hermione could tell he was getting impatient.

"I mean, the rest of your family is under it, so why shouldn't you be?"

"I…am…not!" Ron snapped.

"How do I know Voldemort isn't commanding you to say that?" asked Harry, almost yelling.

She could see it coming; Harry and Ron in another row. They couldn't afford this, not now. And besides, Harry was making a fair point that Hermione didn't want to think about much less hear.

"Okay you two!" she softly scolded, "You're going to wake my parents again with your rowing!"

Both boys looked at her.

"Now please," she said, looking from one to the other, "let's leave this until another time,"

Or let it drop period, she hopelessly thought.

"We've got other issues to discuss like," she began.

"Malfoy," interrupted Ron.

"Yes, exactly," she said, looking at him. But she found he wasn't looking at her. Instead he was looking at the window.

She turned to see what he was looking at and came face to face with a pale, frightened face. In fact, Draco Malfoy's face was paler than usual.

"Help me!" he whispered, grabbing her arms.

"Hey!" Ron angrily yelled, "Hands off!"

"Shhh, Ronald!" she whispered as Draco fell to the ground in a helpless lump.

"Oh great, now what do we do?" Ron complained.

"Keep your voice down! My parents will hear!" she whispered, now truly afraid they had woken her parents, "Let's try to get…Draco onto my bed so he doesn't wake up sore," she said.

"Oh, so now we're on first-name terms with hi, are we?" Ron asked, stooping to pick up Draco's shoulders while Harry carried his legs.

Hermione shrugged, "If we're going to help him we might as well be," she whispered.

"How are we going to stay here all summer without your parents finding out?" Harry asked.

All three of them were silent for a moment.

If only she could put a spell on them to stay invisible no matter what, or if they had more invisibility cloaks. If only she could find someone to do either or…someone…

"Dumbledore!" she loudly exclaimed, causing Harry and Ron to shush her.

"What?" Harry whispered.

"We can get Dumbledore over here to make you three invisible."

Ron slowly smiled, "Hey! That's brilliant!"

Just then Hedwig flew in through the window with a mouse in her beak.

"Yuck, go eat that outside," said Harry.

She clicked her beak at him, very annoyed and sat just outside the window.

"We have to send him a letter tonight!" said Hermione, quickly crossing her room to her desk, opening a drawer and grabbing a pen and a piece of lined notebook paper.

"What's that?" Ron asked as he and Harry stood over her.

There was silence for a moment as Hermione began to write.

"Uh…Ron…? That's a piece of paper and a pen. You know, you write with them?" said Harry.

"No, I didn't know that. How exactly do they work?"

"It's like a roll of parchment and a quill, that's all," he said.

"Oh…"

"Done," Hermione brightly replied, "Now, do either one of you know what happened to Draco's letter? I want to staple it on for Dumbledore's reference."

"I don't keep track of Malfoy's things!" retorted Ron, "Besides, we sent it off with a reply."

Harry suddenly moved toward a sleeping Draco, "Check his pockets. He may not have had time to write a reply. And if what he says is true he wouldn't have left it lying around his house for his father to find."

"Wait a minute," said Hermione, another realization coming to her, "How did he get here so quickly?" she asked.

"Simple, he apparated," said Harry.

"Okay," she slowly said, wondering why that sounded too odd, "But how do you explain how he knew where we were?" she asked, the answer frightening her.

Harry and Ron looked at each other, shrugged, and Harry continued looking for the note.

"Found it," he whispered, handing it to Hermione who unrolled the other letter, stapled them together, rolled them back up and attached it to Hedwig's leg.

"Alright," she said, giving the snowy owl nudge, "Go find Professor Dumbledore," and the bird took off.

"Well," said Ron, sitting in Hermione's office chair in front of her computer, "I suppose we are just going to have to sit here and wait."

Hermione slightly nodded and sat on the floor next to him.

"Dyou reckon we should at least wake him up?" Harry asked, crossing his arms.

"No," said Hermione, leaning back and supporting herself with her hands, "Let him sleep. I'm sure he's had a very long day."

That wasn't the real reason she wanted to let him sleep, but it was as good as any.

She quickly tilted her head back and shook her bushy hair out of her face as silence filled the room.

Hermione watched Harry pace by the window several times, but he was staring at the ground. She also sensed a few restless movements from Ron beside her for a few minutes, but soon he sat still.

After about ten minutes Hermione began to feel a tingling sensation course through her arms and just as she sat up straight and began to rub the feeling back into her arms Ron fell off of the chair and across her lap.

Hermione sat shocked and motionless for a moment as Ron's soft snores filled the room.

"Okay," said Harry, being the first one to recover from the shocked silence, "Ummm…" he quickly walked across the room and gently roll Ron off of her and onto the floor.

"I'll go get a sleeping bag," she said, not knowing what to make of the situation.

She quickly stood up and left her room. She walked down to the end of hall where the closet was and opened the doors, thankful this wasn't the end of the hall where her parents room was.

She grabbed a yellow sleeping bag for Ron and was about to close the door when she grabbed a red one for Harry and a silver one for Draco incase he ended up on the floor too.

Can't be too careful, she thought as she closed the closet doors and headed back down the hall toward her room.