A/N: Hello! I must say that I wouldn't have been able to come up with this plot if it wasn't for my friend helping me go through ideas! I'm not quite used to writing, but I wanted to give it all a shot :) please let me know if there is any mistakes, I'll go ahead and fix them. Also, I would appreciate your input :)

This is intended to be a mature set of work (with violence, action, sex, the whole shebang) so please be wary of that as you read. I will be placing warnings before any raunchy scenes ;)

The characters and pairings are a bit out of context, but I always fancy different things with them. It keeps my love for Harry Potter alive!

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter... (I long to though) just this story :3

Enjoy! ^-^ and R&R while you're at it ;)

xoxo- SunflowerHikari

Chapter 1~

It was late in the evening and Hermione could feel her stomach start to fuss with hunger. She ignored the pains, since her eyes were glued on an ancient piece of parchment that the Ministry had her go over. Thanks to her rune deciphering and arithmancy talents, she was an excellent addition to the Mystery department. They had been longing for a brain like hers and she was able to prove it during the war.

She was sure the text was written more than seven centuries ago. Only a few pieces have been written in this type of writing, they clearly didn't have a given alphabet to go by, since symbols were thrown in there sporadically. The elegance of them all could pass as a picture, which was how the text was found. It was a long parchment, about a meter long. She had found herself frustrated with it for the past couple of days, almost as though she was trying to unscramble someone's complicated thoughts from centuries ago.

She had discovered that it was about a plant, a plant she has never heard of, a plant they referred to as a "fire within the earth". She noted that they wrote of the mind and how the plant can affect it through two different potions. Currently, she was trying to decipher what the two potions were. The complexity of them both made her mind begin to hum with frustration.

As Hermione ran her fingers across the text, she noticed the words underneath her ring finger purred and twisted from along the paper, a quizzical expression was marked on her face. The words and symbols for the first potion changed right in front of her to plain and simple English words. She slid her eyes over the paper as she read:

The Rejuvenation of Senses and Memory

After the constant use of the newly discovered Cruciato curse, my mother has invented a potion to renew my father's lost sense of mind. After 8 years of heartbreaking days with him not recognizing his own family and a face of a stranger, he awoke after taking the potion (which put him to sleep for a good 5 hours or so) with eyes that weren't at all empty. Tears coated all of our eyes, but not nearly enough as my mother's. Her smile returned and so did our dignity after the attack by dark wizards.

To continue her experiment concerning the potion, we tried it on a number of people also affected by the curse and backfired memory charms. After they slept, they all returned to their regular state of mind. Years after the potion was administered, they were still healthy and happy, with unwavering thoughts.

Hermione felt her heart thumping behind her chest, thinking of Neville and his parents and of course Gilderoy Lockhart. She read the complex ingredients and procedure of the potion, which contained the infamous plant.

"This could save them," she thought excitedly to herself. Needing to slow down her adrenaline, she took short break to calm her nerves and drank a cool glass of water. Before she told anyone, she knew she had to decipher the second potion.

Her fingers ran along the edge of the title, a shiver going up her arm and down her back. A terrible feeling went through her and chilled her bones. Suddenly, she felt a sharp pain at the tip of her middle finger and noticed as a drop of blood dripped on to the text.

Her worried lips started to utter a curse, but she found herself gasping instead. The blood was gone, and the harsh lines moved in a similar manner to the first potion. She clutched the seat and sat forward, reading the title:

The Absorption of Thoughts and Abilities

The success of our healing potion travelled far and wide, across many wizarding nations. We instantly came upon riches that we never dreamed of. To spread the potion making, we allowed others to begin growing our beloved plant, Ignem Terrae. Of course, it wasn't long until hands of the dark got ahold of it. Before we knew it, there was a second potion going around that contained the roots of the plant. The roots were considered to be the most potent part of the plant, and my mother chose to stay away from them. She only used the leaves, knowing fully well how hard it was to grow this rare breed of a plant.

The potion we heard of was being to manipulate others. A powerful wizard by the name of Paulo Noir was somehow gaining magical abilities he never possessed before. Other famous wizards and witches were found dead with the muscles of their bodies gone – leaving only the skin and bones. Their eyes would be gone, and their lips turned black. When you touched a corpse, your own skin would instantly begin to burn.

Paulo had developed a potion, full of dark magic, that would take down the boundaries of someone's abilities and thoughts and he transferred it to himself through an incantation that he had also invented. All he had to do was invite them to take a sip from a glass of wine containing the potion, and it began to burn their insides. As the flesh inside them crumbled away, he quickly transferred the contents of the person's mind and abilities (which usually came out in a vapor form from the victim's mouth) into a flask.

He kept the most important abilities and took them for himself and gained an army by promising his new followers the rest.

Soon followed a mass murder throughout Romania, as he tried to control power. After a decade of brutal crimes and broken souls, the wizards throughout the world joined forces against him and his army. The war ended after five torturous years. My mother is long gone at this point, and the Parasca family made a vow to guard this plant and its two outcomes.

The relinquishment of the good is necessary for the bad to be retained.

Hermione sank further into her chair. It was nearly morning and her mind was still buzzing. There were so many good things about finding this mysterious plant, yet the way it had been used for bad intentions made her recoil. She didn't want to experience what she had experienced five years ago. She knew that Hogwarts' reconstruction had just finished in the spring and the new students had started their first time at the beginning of this month. She had celebrated her 23rd birthday a week ago with Harry, Neville, Ginny, Luna, and Ronald.

Ronald

Her heart clutched against her chest as she thought of her dear friend. But, that's all he was to her, just a friend. Their relationship started out wonderful, full of repressed sexual tension between the two. After two long years, the fighting began. It got to the point where Hermione sat on the floor crying, her cheek bleeding from an object Ron threw, and him trying to comfort her.

She remembered his voice shaking and tears falling down her shoulder as he apologized over and over. It was in that moment, they decided that to save any type of connection between themselves, they shouldn't stay in a relationship. Hermione left their shared apartment and housed with Ginny for a short time soon after.

They remained friends, not as close as before, but at least it was civilized. Ron had recently started to date Daphne Greengrass and Hermione was...still single. She put her thoughts on her work and thought about Ignem Terrae. She wondered if there were any other texts that had any information on this...

Hermione stood up, with the most brilliant idea that just popped into her mind.

Neville!

"Hermiiooooone?" Neville unsuccessfully stifled his yawn. He currently faced her in the doorway of his apartment. She had heavy bags under her eyes, yet her eyes were full of excitement.

"Ignem Terrae, have you heard of it?"

"Hermione, it's 6 in the morning, do we really have to bloody talk abo-"

"Have. You. Heard. Of. It?" Hermione pressed him, her teeth clenched. She stepped forward and he resigned by letting her in. She walked past him into his living room, smelling the fresh flowers he had put out weekly on the coffee table. "What flowers are these?"

"It's a type of crocus. Beauty, isn't it?" he said, a smile breaking out on his face. Hermione was always making sure she knew about the flowers he put out on display. Not only did he have flowers, but also different types of herbs and plants that were scattered around the tiny apartment. He was in training to take over Professor Sprout's job at Hogwarts and was planning on finishing his training in the next two years. "So, how did you discover Ignem Terrae? It's quite rare, you know. I've only found about two passages on it out of the multiple collections of books and texts I've read on plants."

"The Ministry asked me to decipher this one text and it is focused on that very plant. In fact, it also contained two potions that seem to be unknown."

"Yes, now that you mention it, I think I may have heard of potions using this plant. But, rumor has it that the potions don't actually exist, some people even acknowledge it as a myth." Neville sat there looking at her curiously. His head turned thoughtfully towards his room and he held up a single finger indicating he needed a minute. She nodded and watched as he started to walk towards the back of the apartment towards his room. Hermione heard as he opened the door and close it. She sighed, and sat down in the velvet burgundy armchair that Harry and Ginny had given him for his birthday two years ago. She heard the door open again after five minutes and watched as Neville walked out from the hallway carrying a giant textbook.

"Come to the table with me." He motioned towards the kitchen with his head and she got to her feet to follow him. He laid the ancient book, designed with an array of spiraling vines and flowers, on the breakfast table and carefully flipped to a page towards the middle. "Ah, here it is. Ignem Terrae!" he exclaimed, as he pulled her towards the book. She found the words quickly and skimmed the small passage.

Ignem Terrae

Known as "the fire in the earth", it is a rare plant found somewhere in Romania. Only two potions are made using this plant, although no one is quite sure of what they are. They are infamously known as the Potions of Eradication and Creation, which have been rumored to affect the mind. The Parasca family, who has not released the information of the location of the plant for several centuries, heavily protects Ignem Terrae. It has been established that the two potions have been erased from history and only their rumored existence remains.

Hermione read the passage three times. She looked up at Neville, who was waiting patiently for her to reveal her findings.

"See, not much has been revealed about it."

"Neville, I want you to sit down." Hermione said, while placing her hand on his shoulder and pushing him back into a chair.

"What's wrong?" he asked, looking puzzled, a smile etched on his face.

She took in a breath, "Neville, this potion… The potion of creation… Or as it's called in the text I read as The Rejuvenation of Senses and Memory," she felt her nerves starting to act up with excitement, "well, Neville, I think it can help cure people who have been affected by the Cruciato curse."

She watched as Neville's smile disappeared immediately, along with the color of his face.

"Excuse me, I have to-" he pushed past her towards the sink and began to heave away last night's dinner.