Chapter 2
Draco's eyebrows shot up and he quickly glanced over at Hermione before looking back at the road. She was confused but he knew that it was only a matter of seconds before realization would hit her.
The girl was not only a witch but also a seer, if what she said was true.
Hermione's brows were deeply furrowed in contemplation. The thought of Eliza being a psychic had just crossed her mind among many other things. If Eliza was indeed a psychic then there were going to be more complications. She didn't even know that she was a witch yet.
Ms. Beck had given the two a thin file on the girl and the partners hadn't yet paged through it.
On Draco's part, he hadn't wanted to appear too eager to delve into the girl's past.
"Have you eaten dinner yet?" questioned the older witch.
"That gruel should never be considered dinner. No, I didn't eat," Eliza muttered.
"Excellent. Draco, take us to Potter's Watch."
Draco rolled his eyes in faux annoyance.
"As long as you're paying."
Hermione looked over at him and grinned, "Oh, the meal should be on the house."
About ten minutes later Draco had the car parked on the side of an old cobbled street.
The three climbed out of the car. Draco set a time for the car to later be magically transported back to his estate by muttering a simple spell under his breath. Eliza was looking every which-way, taking in the sites all around her as if she'd never been off of the orphanage's grounds. She probably hadn't.
They were still in Muggle London and if these simple sites were amazing to her, then the wizarding world was going to overwhelm her.
Draco had the file on Eliza tucked securely beneath his arm for he fully intended to read it. He had hopes of there being a sort of trail left by her biological parents to follow.
The trio walked, Hermione in the lead, to a corner shop that had very bright lights emanating from it.
In they walked. It was a quaint little shop full of odds and ends, most likely a consignment shop. Hermione smiled widely at the lady behind the counter.
This consignment shop was sometimes used by witches and wizards to get into Diagon Alley. It was owned by a lonely witch who enjoyed the constant company of passersby.
"Hello, Lady," Hermione smiled. The witch named Lady smiled in return and gestured toward a doorway behind a thick curtain of beads.
"I assume that you two are on the job so go right on through!" Lady said excitedly.
"Thanks!" was Hermione's response while Draco just nodded. The three walked through and to Eliza's surprise they emerged into a completely different location.
It was a restaurant that appeared to be very homely. The tables were set nicely with simple decoration yet nothing was overly stiff like the restaurants that Eliza had seen in magazines.
Odd looking people were dining around them and most were speaking amicably to their waiters and their company.
They had arrived at Potter's Watch.
The partners looked over at Eliza to gauge her reaction. She was stunned; her eyes were open to their widest point.
"Eliza, let's sit. We'll explain to you, just what's going on," Hermione offered kindly. She placed her hand in the small of the girl's back and led her to a table in the corner that offered a bit of seclusion leaving Hermione's partner to follow.
"Hermione!" they all heard once they were seated.
Draco brought his hand up to pinch the bridge of his nose.
"Hey there, Teddy."
It had been about eight years since The Second Wizarding War and Teddy Lupin had grown to be a healthy, lanky boy under the supervision of Harry Potter and his family. His hair was currently the color of turquoise, his personal favorite, as it were.
"Do you want the normal? Is she a new one?" the little boy questioned as he innocently pointed his finger at Eliza.
Hermione and Draco nodded curtly and Teddy smiled widely at his cousin before turning to Eliza. He gazed at her curiously.
"Teddy, do us a favor and get Eliza here, a glass of pumpkin juice and whatever special Ginny has set," Hermione added quickly before the boy could prance away as he often seemed to do.
"You're going to love being a witch!" the turquoise-haired boy stated all too excitedly to Eliza before he ran off towards the kitchens, in a prance.
Hermione's eyes widened. Usually they-they being she- liked to inform Muggleborns in a calm manner while her ever so helpful partner grimaced at mere specks of dirt beneath his fingernails.
The two turned to Eliza hoping that she wasn't in the process of freaking out. She wasn't.
Instead she looked as if she was in deep thought.
"Well," Eliza spoke up after few seconds, "That explains everything."
"It doesn't explain your precognitive abilities," Draco said, no longer able to keep passive about the entire situation.
He started to flip open the file but he was hindered by Hermione's hand. He glanced up at her, slightly aggravated.
"Well Eliza, what Draco means to say is, yes, you are a witch and you seem to be a seer of sorts. Often, seers are able to trace their bloodlines. Usually they're wizards or they're Muggleborns who have distant ancestors who were wizards."
"So...I'm a Muggleborn? Can you explain to me what that means?" Eliza inquired, her curiosity peeked.
" A Muggleborn is someone who is born to a non-wizarding family and possesses magical abilities. I am Muggleborn, myself."
Hermione spoke so proudly that Draco had to snort. His snort was cut short by a pinch from Hermione on his hand. He was surprised to realize that her hand didn't need to travel far in order to pinch him, for it had remained on top of his from the woman's successful endeavor to halt his study of the file.
He only noticed this when there became an absence of warmth set by the removal of her hand. Draco couldn't help but to feel a bit disappointed by the lack of comfort associated with such an action.
"Oh, so my parents did not have magic?"
"That's just it. We do not know. According to your old caretaker, your parents died when you were four?"
Eliza gave a curt nod, "In a fire is what I've been told. I was rescued from it apparently."
With his hands free to open the file, Draco did.
"It says here that your parents didn't carry around any type of recognition so it is unknown what their names are," Draco summarized.
"I remember faintly, my father calling my mother Desi," the orphan girl offered.
"That could be anything," said Draco as his steely grey eyes darted around the documents that he held.
"What he means to say is, that name could be a pet name or even something that your mind conjured…as memories tend to do such things," Hermione kindly explained.
"Granger, the fire could not be explained by Muggle authorities...no gasoline, no electrical faults, no other evidence of arson."
Hermione furrowed her brows in her typical way.
"Possibly magical?"
Her partner nodded before saying, "I will check the archives at the Ministry to see if there were any fires around the time that she was discovered."
"Food!" the boisterous voice of Teddy could be heard as he approached the table with a familiar redhead. She had her wand directed at a tray that was floating in front of her.
Afraid that this would in some way alarm the young ward, Hermione glanced over at the girl and was shocked to see that her face portrayed a sense of awe.
"You two on an assignment?" Ginny Potter questioned as she directed the plates of food to rest in front of their respective places.
"It's as obvious as your hair is red," Draco mumbled as he unrolled his napkin and draped it across his lap in his common nonchalant manner.
"As obvious as yours is blond," Ginny Potter mocked. It was usual for the two to carry on and casually bicker.
"Yes, Gin," Hermione smiled, "This is Eliza Malfoy."
Draco looked up having forgotten that the two had adopted the child and that she would evidently possess his surname.
"Nice to meet you, Eliza," spoke Ginny to the young lady who had her eyes downcast in thought, "So I assume that you had to adopt her from an orphanage?"
Hermione told Ginny pretty much everything that wasn't confidential so she knew that when they adopted a child with no last name from an orphanage, the surname of 'Granger' or 'Malfoy', or a hyphenated combination of the two, would be used. That is, until the Department had a family that wanted to adopt the child.
Hermione nodded in response.
"Well then, I suppose I'll let you all tuck in," Ginny stated as she turned around to walk away.
"Thanks Gin."
Suddenly, Eliza looked up, her eyes wide due to shock. Her pupils were dilated.
Many thoughts happened at once between Hermione and Draco upon noticing the girl's sudden movements. These thoughts ranged from choking on food to lesser concerns such as her needing to know where the toilet was.
Until they both thought of the reason why they found the girl so fascinating.
"Do you think we should slap her on the back?" Draco wondered aloud.
"Of course not!" Hermione exclaimed in a hushed whisper. Truthfully, she had no idea of what they were supposed to do.
She looked around hurriedly to make sure no one was watching. Luckily Eliza was seated with her back turned away from everyone else in Potter Watch.
She really needed a book explaining the 'how-tos' when it came to do with psychics.
Then, the green of Eliza's eyes could be seen again. She blinked rapidly before pushing her plate away, her movements slow.
"Sweetheart, are you okay?" Hermione offered, confused on how to react.
"I am. It just exhausts me...seeing things," Eliza muttered.
"Well, that was a tad anticlimactic," spoke Hermione's partner as he dabbed his lips with his napkin.
Hermione nearly smacked him on his back.
"Yeah, I saw a guy with glasses on...and an oddly shaped mark on his forehead..." Eliza started, her brows furrowed as she tried to recall the details of her vision, "he was sitting around a dinner table with that woman, Ginny, and they were laughing as they never had before. I could feel that it was the happiest moment of her life."
"Oh what a delight. She's empathetic toward Ginevra's-" Draco began. Unfortunately he wasn't able to finish for Hermione had interrupted him.
"An empath!" Hermione exclaimed in a hushed whisper as the gears in her mind spun rapidly, "You were able to pick up on Ginny's feelings which enabled you to have a peek into what caused those feelings."
"Is that what it is?" Eliza questioned.
"Well at least a part of it," Hermione grinned, "But let's discuss this later. Eat up."
-
"Granger, what are we going to do with her?" Draco asked tentatively after Teddy made his way over, again, and pulled Eliza away with him to play with some new gadget that George Weasley had given him.
"What do you mean? You surely can't expect us to throw her in with the other wards of the ministry, certainly not after finding out about her gifts! Someone would find out and exploit the hell out of her!" Hermione exclaimed harshly. Had she been standing, her hands would have been on her hips
"Untwist those knickers of yours Granger. I was going to suggest no such thing. I was merely trying to determine what we should say to the department head when we have to file the paperwork for the Ministry to adopt her as a ward," Draco said tiredly as he resisted the urge to pinch the bridge of his nose in aggravation.
That woman was always jumping to conclusions.
"Oh. Well I suppose we could just say that we want to keep her. I mean, it was bound to happen. Charla has adopted three orphaned Muggleborns," Hermione said offhandedly as she mentioned one of the other department employees.
"You're not understanding. We are not married. We are not getting married. She is not living with me. You can barely keep your cat alive. We have no parental experience."
Hermione opened her mouth to respond but it took her a moment to.
"What if we lived together?"
Xx
And there we have chapter two. Thanks for all of the alerts and for the few reviews that I did get. Please leave reviews. They help motivate me to write!