Chapter One

Healer Malfoy.

The plaque on the door had become so familiar to Hermione that she barely paused to read it as she knocked on the door, then entered without waiting for an answer. Draco, still as white-blonde and sharp-featured as ever, glanced up from his work as Hermione blew into his office.

"Come in," he quipped, setting his quill aside. "What can I do for you, Granger?"

Although Malfoy's use of her surname harkened back to harsher days, Hermione and Draco had managed, after five years of working together, to come to a sort of amicable, argumentative working relationship. St. Mungo's had paired them together, with Hermione working under Draco as an Assistant Healer, and although it had seemed a bad idea at the outset, Hermione and Draco had developed a surprisingly effective partnership.

"Just wondering why I've been so abruptly transferred," Hermione said, placing her hands on her hips. "I don't think I've done anything to offend you this week, so what on earth is the deal?"

Draco's face froze. He remained silent for a moment, and Hermione suddenly felt very nervous. One of her favorite things about working with Draco in the Emergency Ward was that he was always very cool about things. He never panicked if a wizard came in with serious spell damage, and he always kept his mind focused on the problem at hand, doing his best to solve it before moving onto the next thing. So anything that had Draco uneasy was sure to make Hermione's life hell in some way.

"Hermione," Draco said slowly, causing her more trepidation by switching to the use of her first name, "You're not going to like what I'm about to say."

Hermione sank into the chair in front of Draco's desk, trying to keep her cool. "I should think not," she managed, her voice forcedly light. Draco looked at her with something like pity fleeting through his steely eyes. "I mean, when I first came here, it was with the understanding that I'd never work with Closed Ward patients."

"I'm sure that, since you remember that, you understand that this is a case of a serious nature," Draco said. "I too am working this case, as the head Healer, and we've both been transferred indefinitely to the Closed Ward, specifically to this one case."

Hermione frowned. "What on earth - or rather, who on earth, I suppose - could possibly be important enough to warrant both of us being on staff when it's really the Emergency Ward that could use more…" Her voice trailed off as the pitying look returned again to Draco's eyes. Although she normally would have frowned and snarked at him about it, instead it seemed to pin her to her seat and drain her of energy.

"I was planning on calling you into my office this morning anyway, and if you hadn't come in so early, you would have arrived to a memo in your locker," Draco said, and for a moment he almost sounded sad. "I know you're wondering about this, and it's all very confusing for both of us. Trust me," he added, "in a way I'm as at sea as you are. I don't have much experience on the Closed Ward, and to be quite honest, when I looked in this morning to familiarize myself, it gave me the creeps. But this is our situation, Granger." The use of Hermione's last name, so familiar, was strangely comforting. "And we've got to make the best of it."

Hermione thought the whole thing over for a moment. It all seemed very abrupt; she had never worked anywhere but the Emergency Ward since she'd been promoted to Assistant Healer three years ago, and she hadn't even been on the Closed Ward since her accidental visit to Gilderoy Lockhart almost ten years ago. But if she were honest with herself, Draco had been such a good boss (and, very nearly, partner) over the years that she trusted him at least enough to believe that he wouldn't let anything unwanted happen to her without a good reason for it. Their days of school antagonism were over, and over the years they had formed what Hermione would, and even Draco might, call a great team. She sighed, and, forcing herself to fall back on the strong resolve she'd had since childhood, accepted her new station.

"Well," she said, and she could tell that Draco had at least followed the main machinations of her decision-making process, "at least tell me who the poor blighter is we'll be looking after. It might as well be the Minister himself for all the fuss that's been kicked up over it."

Draco's eyes clouded over slightly. There it was again, the pitying, half-sad look. Like she just wasn't quite grasping something he'd been making very obvious. Hermione frowned, and she felt her heartbeat slow and then quicken erratically. Draco reached for a folder on his desk and slid it across the surface so it rested on the side closest to Hermione. "All the information you'll need is in there," he said. "The incident description is at the top, patient information at the bottom."

Reaching for the folder and flipping it open, Hermione skimmed the incident report. Random phrases jumped out at her: Self-inflicted… Suspected recent tragedy/trauma… Memory loss…

"Poor guy," Hermione remarked with real sympathy. "A Memory Charm isn't typically the best way to fix a broken heart. Was it a wife or something like that?"

"Girlfriend left," Draco corrected briefly. "They'd been together for a long time; a bit on and off at first but toward the end they were inseparable. It's almost indeterminable if they had just gotten engaged or not."

"What a time for a memory malfunction," Hermione said, eyes returning to the page and scanning it to find the place she'd left off. "But it's nice that they moved us both there rather-"

Her voice cut off in her throat as if someone had reached inside her mouth and ripped her words out. The room seemed to be spinning, although she wasn't moving, and she felt the blood drain from her face. Dimly, she heard Draco's concerned voice, but he seemed to suddenly be far away from her, which was impossible, as the office seemed to have shrunk down around her. She couldn't focus her eyes, so instead just stared blankly through the paper she still grasped loosely in her suddenly-disconnected fingers. She'd spotted the name at the bottom of the paper.

Harry Potter.


AN: Rather ambitiously, I've decided to start a new project that I've had in mind for a while now. I'd like to dedicate this story, such as it may turn out to be, to my boyfriend, who got me back into fanfiction and into the genre I've always liked. You can decide whether you should thank him or not as the story progresses. ;)-TheGoldenAge