Prologue.

"You can't have children"

Mary Granger stifled the sob that threatened to escape her. She felt numb and yet completely devastated. How could it be? Ever since she was a little girl all she had ever dreamed about was having a little baby that she could call her own.

Mary knew she had a wonderful life, she was ahead in her career, she had a beautiful home, and she had married the man of her dreams. But it was all hollow, deep inside she knew she wanted a family. She wanted to chase after a mischievous little lot who giggled and cooed at her. She wanted to soothe bruised knees and read bedtime stories and love her little one unconditionally.

Now, it was nothing more than a pipe dream.

"You can't have children"

Mary walked dazedly out of the hospital, viciously swiping at the errant tears that streamed down her flushed cheeks. She held tight to the large masculine hand encasing her own small feminine one.

Richard.

She knew her husband was just as devastated by this news as she was, they had been trying to conceive for the last 2 years, with no results, of course they now knew why. It was a cruel twist of fate, but Mary Granger was barren.

As the couple made their way out onto the hospital front lawn Richard pulled his still sobbing wife into his arms. "There is always adoption sweetheart, the child would be no less ours, we'd still love it as if it were our own."

Mary nodded her head knowing that he was right, regardless of whether a child had her DNA she would still love it as if she had carried it for 9 months.

"I know." She whispered her voice heavily laced with tears.

"Come on let's get home, tomorrow we can look into adoption proceedings" Richard said leading his wife toward their BMW.

The devastated couple were unaware of the brown eyes following them. At first glance the eyes seemed cold and calculating, and they were, but other emotions warred within the dark depths, compassion, regret and sorrow.

The owner of the eyes stood in the shadows, silent but watching, making no move, until finally they nodded their head and disappeared into thin air.

#

It had been a month since Mary had received the news that changed her life. She had slowly but surely come out of the deep dark recess of her grief, tempted by the idea of adoption.

True to his word Richard had started gathering information about the adoption process the next day. He had contacted their lawyer who had in turn pointed them in the right direction to contacting agencies, and it was going dare she say it…well.

She knew that the process had to be intense in order to make sure that the children were truly placed in the right care, but some things were just wholly intrusive, not to mention lengthy.

Mary knew that rationally there would be a delay whilst they did background checks and the likes but it had been over a week since they had heard anything from the agency, it was starting to make Mary edgy, she couldn't face it if they were denied.

A knock at the door had Mary breaking from her thoughts. Making her way towards the door, she was shocked to hear the cries of a baby coming from the other side of her front door. Surely they wouldn't just turn up on her doorstep with a child, would they? Her heart pounding Mary slowly opened the door, her heart clenching painfully upon realising that the person standing before her was a stranger, not the assigned social worker she was hoping for.

The woman before her remained quiet as each took the other in. Mary had to say that the young woman before her was quite beautiful, yet there was something about her that made Mary slightly uncomfortable. It was the crying infant that caused Mary to snap out of her perusal of the other woman.

"May I help you?" she asked softly, not wanting to scare the slightly skittish looking woman.

"I'd like to talk to you and your husband, is he in?" she asked rather straight forward.

Mary felt Richard at her back, obviously having heard their rather unexpected guest's question.

"What can we do for you Ms…?" He asked enquiring as to the woman's name.

"My name need not matter." She said abruptly. "I have something that you both want." She said nodding toward the now quiet infant in her arms.

Mary gasped in shock.

"I think you had better come in madam." Richard said, indicating for the woman to come inside.

The trio sat in silence for several moments until the strange woman began to speak.

"I understand this is a shock for you, but I have the best intentions at heart. This child needs a safe loving home."

"Safe from what?" Richard enquired.

"There are many things that you do not understand about this world. Your Legends and myths aren't all they're cracked up to be. This child is special, she needs love and a home. She'll never be found here, therefore she will be safe."

The couple nodded mutely.

"As much as I would love to accept, we're already in proceedings for adoption." Mary said, he eyes not once leaving the sleeping baby wrapped up in a pink blanket. She was inexplicably drawn to the bundle.

The woman nodded. "It has already been taken care off, as far as the adoption agency is concerned no one by the name of Granger has enquired about adopting."

"How?" Richard stated.

The woman shook her head.

"I'm afraid that there are just some things that I cannot tell you. However I have taken the liberty of contacting your lawyer who is under the impression that you have been successful in adopting a child. All the paper work has been sorted no questions asked." She said pulling a stack of papers out of her strange looking coat.

The Grangers sat there in silence as they took in this news. However unorthodox it was they had for all intents and purpose a child.

The woman stood slowly, the baby held close to her chest.

"Look after her." She said finally as she handed the baby to a dumbfounded Richard, who could only nod his head.

The woman made her way to the door only to be stopped by Mary Grangers voice, the woman turned around to observe the new family.

"What is her name?" Mary enquired, her eyes trained firmly on the sweet little baby's face, she couldn't have been any older than a few hours, it should have caused red flags to appear but it didn't.

"Hermione Elizabeth." The woman replied quietly, then she was gone.

A.N: This is my first time writing I hope you like it, obviously this fic is AU, please let me know what you think. Evanna.