It was a snowy night when Harry Potter came up with his plan to find a horcrux.

"Hermione!" He called as he re-entered their tent. "Hermione!"

"What is it Harry?" Hermione asked.

"I think I may know how to find another horcrux."

"Great! What is it?" Hermione asked.

"Well… It's kind of risky-"

"That's never stopped us before."

"Exactly. I don't have all of the details worked out but I thought that You Know Who is probably at the Malfoy's a lot right? Isn't that like the Death Eater's meeting place or something?" Hermione nodded, although she looked a little confused. "Well what if there was a way that we could get into the Malfoy's and be at one of the meetings?"

Hermione was silent for a moment before she spoke, "Harry are you mad? What exactly is your plan? Are we just going to knock on their front door and ask to sit in on a Death Eater meeting?"

"Not exactly… How much polyjuice potion do you have left Hermione?" Harry asked.

"This is mad Harry," Hermione muttered as she searched through her beaded bag. As she was rustling around, she spoke: "So what if I do have polyjuice potion, Harry?"

"Well, then maybe we would be able to impersonate Death Eaters."

Finally, Hermione pulled out a container and said, "There's hardly enough for one person."

The two thought in silence for a moment.

"Well that's it then," Harry said in defeat.

"Why? You may have been on to something with that insane plan of yours."

"We can't do it with one person. It would be suicide with one person."

Hermione muttered quietly, "That's brilliant Harry." She began to walk towards the table, grabbing Harry's rudsack on the way. "Two would be too obvious but one is perfect!"

"Wait, what?" Harry said, shocked at the very thought of what Hermione was suggesting. "What are you doing?" He added as she began looking through his bag.

"Looking for this!" She said as she pulled out the Marauder's Map.

"Why do we need that?" Harry asked. "It only shows Hogwarts, we need to see Malfoy Manor."

Hermione acted as though she hadn't heard him and muttered, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good."

"Hermione, what are you looking for?"

"There!" She finally said, pointing to the Slytherin Common Room.

"Malfoy?" Harry asked.

"Yes! If he's at Hogwarts this year that means that he'll probably be on the Hogwarts Express to go home for Christmas break. We could be at King's Cross with polyjuice potion and kidnap him! One of us will watch him and one of us will go home with his parents as him!" She explained.

Harry considered Hermione's plan.

"It is a brilliant plan Hermione…" Harry began, "But what would you do with Malfoy while I'm pretending to be him? You can't very well bring him back here."

"Well first of all Harry, you won't be the one impersonating Malfoy," Hermione stated. "If you get caught they'll kill you right away- you're the chosen one Harry, you can't die. The entire wizarding world is depending on you, I'm going to do it."

"There is no way in hell that is happening. Do you honestly think that I'm going to let you walk into a room of Death Eater's alone?" Harry said. "You know what, you were right. This plan is mad and we shouldn't do it." Harry stood and began to walk to the door of the tent.

"Harry, please, we can do this-"

"No! It's done Hermione. I'm finishing my watch. You should get some sleep." With that, Harry went outside the tent to watch for any signs of danger as Hermione went to bed, although she didn't fall asleep for hours.

HPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHP

"Hermione," She heard as she stared into those beautiful ocean blue eyes.

"Ron, I miss you," She whispered as he placed his soft hand on the side of her face. "I love you."

He showed her his gorgeous crooked grin and he said, "Hermione, wake up."

"Hermione, please wake up!" She moaned as she realized Harry was the one speaking to her. "Hermione!"

"M'awake," She mumbled against her pillow.

"I made us breakfast and tea," Harry said, pulling Hermione out of bed and towards the table. Harry had made tea from herbs found in the woods outside their tent and he had caught fish in the river and cooked them for breakfast.

"I just wanted to apologize for last night," Harry said as they sat down and began to eat. "It was a stupid idea and it wasn't worth fighting over."

"I think you were on to something Harry," Hermione said. "There's no point in sitting in this tent everyday taking guesses at where another horcrux is- this could be our one shot at finding a horcrux or maybe even the sword of Gryffindor."

"Hermione, even if we do do this- which I don't think we should- we wouldn't have enough time to plan it. The Hogwarts Express goes to Kings Cross in two days."

"What's to plan? We can do this! Please, Harry? I really think that we could pull this off."

"Okay, I will agree to this ridiculous plan on one condition… I drink the polyjuice- not you."

After what seemed like an hour, Harry finally convinced Hermione to let him impersonate Malfoy.

"But I still don't understand why I can't go," Hermione huffed. "I'll take the first watch… Sexist prick," She added under her breath.

It wasn't a sexist thing. Harry hated the thought of having anyone risk their life for him but to think of Hermione Granger doing it, was absolutely unbearable. Hermione truly was his little sister. He loved her like family, and he would not see his family get hurt. 'Plus,' Harry thought, 'Ron would make my death slow and painful if I let her into a dangerous situation.' He smiled a little thinking about his best friends and their oh-so-obvious love for one another. For a moment Harry felt happy thinking about his friends. That is, until he realized that the trio he had belonged to had recently turned into a duo. He felt a pang of anger in his chest when Harry thought of his best friend, Ron. Ron was funny. He brought light to even the worst situations. Ron was kind. He cared for his friends and would never hurt them. That is what Harry used to think of Ron Weasley. Harry was wrong. Ron left. And their friendship left with him.

Harry had lost one friend, he would not lose another.