Chapter One

"Remind us why you aren't coming with us for the holidays again 'Mione," Ron asked for what was the seventeenth time that day. Hermione shook her head at him, smiling softly to herself.

"Oh Ronald," she sighed, shutting his trunk and sitting down on top of it, exasperated "we've been through this time and time again. I'm not going to give up such an amazing opportunity." He frowned at her, but said nothing more. He knew that there was no changing Hermione's mind once it had been set. She was as stubborn as a mule. Ron sat down next to her on the small trunk and gave her a sideways hug.

"We'll miss you, you know."

"I know."

"Hermione," Harry called out from beneath his bed. He had been crawled under there trying to find his invisibility cloak for the past ten minutes. "If you've got some free time when you're uh," he began, popping out from beneath the four poster, "not doing whatever it is interns do," Harry paused, slithering out, cloak in hand, "you should try and do some more research about the horcruxes. We haven't been able to find anything yet, and I'm starting to get a little worried."

"I'll try Harry, but healing isn't as easy as you would think. I'm probably not going to have much free time."

"I still can't believe you're going to be hanging out with Madame Pomfrey for Christmas," Ron grimaced. Hermione had managed to get an internship under the school's healer for the Christmas holidays, and she was absolutely thrilled. Just the past year, Hermione had finally decided what she wanted to do with her life after much deliberation. Healing was perfect. It was challenging and noble. It was about saving lives, and it wasn't an easy career path. The Gryffindor was extremely proud of herself for having a plan. Harry and Ron were still clueless. They vaguely toyed with the idea of being aurors.

Hermione shook her head at the boys. "Hurry up you two, the train leaves in an hour and we still have to eat lunch."

"Yeah, yeah mum..." Ron grumbled, getting up and gathering the last of his things, an array of snacks that he had bought during the last visit to Hogsmeade, and shoving them into the various pockets in his pants. Harry tucked his cloak in his trunk, snapped it shut and the three friends make their way down to the Great Hall just in time for lunch.

It was a lunch almost like any other, having started as such. Harry and Ron had loaded their plates and stomachs while Hermione had watched in amusement, eating her fill. The Gryffindors all were joking about one last time before they all had to leave. Parvati and Lavender were sharing Christmas plans. Neville was staring off in the direction of the Ravenclaw table. Ginny Weasley was late. Hermione looked up to see the redhead running into the hall and taking her spot next to Dean. She pressed a quick kiss onto his lips, before settling in to have her lunch.

The peace lasted until about three quarters of the way through when Hermione's eyes roamed over to the Slytherin table. It had become a sort of habit for the sixth year to watch the Slytherins, their expressions stony, their table often silent, ever since Harry began to speak of his distrust of Malfoy. Hermione didn't particularly believe him. Malfoy was cruel, but he was too young to be a death eater. The war had made the Gryffindors ache for a deeper closeness and it had made the Slytherins far colder with each other, that was all. They stuck to themselves and rarely ever spoke amongst each other. Aside from that, nothing much had changed in them. Malfoy though had been undergoing a series of changes, a subject of perusal for Hermione all year long. She had watched him grow sallow, watched the bags to form under his eyes, the color disappear from his skin. Draco Malfoy looked exhausted.

Hermione thought he deserved it.

Draco Malfoy had barely touched his food. He didn't particularly have much of an appetite that day, not that he had much of an appetite any day before that. Using his fork, he had pretended to push around the food, swirling colors to paint a picture on the plate, his eyes never leaving it, as though mushed food was the world's most fascinating sight. Draco was feeling rather queasy about heading home for the holidays, not particularly looking forward to sitting down to dinner with Lord Voldemort each night, and especially not looking forward to having that stupid reptile of his slithering about in the Manor. There was nothing he could do about it though. He would have to silently weather the storm, and if there was anything Draco Malfoy did know how to do, it was that. Sighing, the Slytherin reached to pour himself a glass of the eggnog that was being passed around. It was going to be a long holiday. Malfoy took a sip of the eggnog. It tasted wonderful, more so than it had any time before. He lifted his goblet to his lips again and downed the drink in one go.

Nobody knew quite what had happened, but one second Draco Malfoy was another stony face amongst a sea of green, and the next he was collapsed onto the floor and Pansy Parkinson was shrieking like a banshee. Even Hermione couldn't figure it out. She had seem him take a long drink of the spiked eggnog that was circulating around the hall. She herself had avoided the drink, having overheard some of the Gryffindors planning the prank in the common room a few days ago. Draco had replaced his goblet, taken a few bites of food and promptly collapsed. She had a sneaking suspicion that it had something to do with that eggnog. She hadn't thought much of it at the time. Malfoy was rushed out to the Hospital Wing, where he would undeservingly be well taken care of and then he would be on his merry little way. It was nothing to fuss over . Malfoy was nothing to fuss over.

Lunch had ended shortly after Malfoy was levitated to the Hospital Wing and the students returning to their homes gathered their things in order to make the train back. Pansy Parkinson wailed to any listening Slytherin about how unfair it was that she would be heading home and "her poor Draco" would be stuck at school. She was, for a whole fifteen minutes, adamant about staying with him, until Blaise Zabini conveniently reminded her that Malfoy was most likely going to be detained a day and would arrive at Malfoy Manor the following evening. He convinced Pansy that it was best if she just went home on her own. Hermione shook her head in amusement, having heard most of the conversation, as she waited for the boys to levitate their trunks. Ronald still had trouble with that spell sometimes. Honestly, you would think that in six years he could have figured at least that out!

The boys were loaded into the train with their things faster than Hermione had imagined and after a couple tight hugs and promises to write, they were gone, leaving behind only the scent of the smoke that had billowed from the Hogwarts Express. Hermione stood there a moment, collecting her thoughts before heading back, slowly. Her mind was lost in thought and had been for quite some time. This horcrux business was strange indeed. She didn't like seeing Harry so worried about something that was so ridiculous. It shouldn't be impossible to find information on a particular subject. She was even supposed to good at that sort of thing. Hermione wasn't due to start her internship until the following day, so she decided that it was a perfect time to pay a visit to the library. Surely some book there would have what she was looking for. The Gryffindor had a hunch that she would find what she needed most likely in the restricted section, but as of yet, she had no way of getting into that section, so she would stick to rifling through the books she did have access to.

Madame Pince had been as helpful as possible, directing Hermione to some areas that had, as Hermione requested, the more obscure subjects in magic, but that still left her with whole shelves to work through. She had selected a few that looked worthwhile and settled into a table, getting comfortable. Hermione was just cracking the book open when a first year Gryffindor came up towards her shyly.

"Madame Pomfrey requires your presence, Miss Granger," he said promptly, if a bit quietly.

Hermione smiled at the poor kid. "It's Hermione. Did she say anything about what she wants?"

"No. Just that I was to tell you that she needs your help. It's urgent."

Frowning, Hermione set her book down and stood up. "Alright, thank you," she dismissed the boy. She quickly stuffed the books into her bag and swung it onto her shoulder. Waving at Madame Pince, she darted out of the library and made a dash for the Hospital Wing. So much for getting some research out of the way. Hermione stopped outside of the Hospital Wing to catch her breath a moment before going in.

"Madame Pomfrey?" she called out. The room was silent. Hermione walked further in, past the beds and called out again. There was still no response. Hermione quietly removed her bag and set it down on a nearby chair. "I don't understand why she would call me here only to up and disappear like that..." She hopped up onto a nearby desk and crossed her legs. The rows of hospital beds were all empty, the sheets tucked neatly under the mattresses, edges taut, pillows fluffed, and blankets folded over. All the beds were empty, except for the one which Hermione assumed Malfoy was currently inhabiting. A screen had been drawn out to surround the bed and hid whoever it was from sight.

Hermione knew she ought to have waited for Madame Pomfrey, she also knew it was disrespectful to Malfoy's privacy, but she couldn't help her curiosity as she hopped off the desk and approached the screen. She pulled it back a little bit, just enough so she could see through it. Malfoy looked distraught even in his comatose state. Something about the dark circles underneath his eyes, more prominent under the fluorescent lighting of the Hospital Wing, and the gauntness that had taken control of his features, that really got to her.

Before her, comatose on a hospital bed, was Draco Malfoy, a boy in her class, her age, sporting a face etched with hardship that shaved away at him. They were both struggling the same, teenagers thrust too quickly too much into adulthood, forced to mature too fast. It simply caught up to him faster than it did her or anyone else. It could be Harry on that bed next, and Ron right beside him. Hell, it might even be her.

"Oh good, you're here," Madame Pomfrey chirped, walking in with a large stack of books in her arms. "I was just down at the library. I must have just missed you."

"Yes, well, I'll admit, since my internship starts tomorrow I didn't really think I would be needed."

"I think your internship needs to be put on standby for now. I need you to look into these books for any information on comatose states, collapsing, whatever you can."

"Is this for Malfoy?" Hermione asked, taking the books from the older woman.

"Yes Miss Granger."

"What's his condition?"

Madame Pomfrey sighed, falling into a chair, and putting her head in her hands "I have not a clue."

"What does that mean?"

"It means that whatever happened to him is unprecedented. The tests I ran revealed nothing. Whatever is going on it's going to be hard to heal him if we can't lure him out of this coma. We need him somewhat alert and functioning, preferably coherent."

"So that's where I come in right? I'm supposed to find out how to get him there?"

"Yes." There was silence for a long moment. Madame Pomfrey stood up all of a sudden. "I'm going to send a missive to Mr. Malfoy alerting him that his son will not be returning home for the holidays." Hermione mentally groaned. She was glad to have an opportunity to work at an unprecedented problem, thrilled actually, but she didn't particularly want to deal with Malfoy when he woke up.

"He won't take that well," Hermione quipped. "What are the chances that Malfoy will be moved to Mungos?"

"I won't allow it. That boy could be further damaged if we shift him. I can't tell if he's got any head, neck, back trauma. There is a haze surrounding the bones that refuses to budge."

"You're going to have to fight Mr. Malfoy tooth and nail for that."

"It wouldn't be the first time..." Hermione watched as Madame Pomfrey disappeared into her office. Left alone by herself with nothing but an unresponsive Draco Malfoy and a pile of books, Hermione did what she did best. She pulled out a piece of parchment and a quill and opened the first book.