A/N: Short chapter alert! Sorry. I've been making some good headway on this story though and I have the skeleton of it pretty much laid out in my head which is good so hopefully I'll have the rest of it written soon along with the Next Gen story. I leave town tomorrow so I may not get to update again this week considering my grandparents don't have wifi but if I find a way to update, I will. Thanks for all the love guys. Have a good week!

Tallyho!


Chapter 3:

The trials were going well but there hadn't been enough success yet to release the potion to the public or try it on extreme cases. Hermione was starting to regret taking time off work while her team stayed and worked their butts off trying to strengthen the potion but her boss insisted that she go. Some time off might be just what she needed to get a clearer idea of how to perfect the potion. So with a distracted mind, she packed a suitcase and grabbed Benji and went to Colmar, France.

Hermione had read that Colmar was a city that was a mix of wizard and muggle life and that it was a great place to vacation if you wanted to get away but also wanted to stay close to what you knew and were comfortable with, which sounded exactly like what she needed. She had also read that Colmar was sometimes called Little Venice and as soon as she arrived in the city, she understood why. There was a small canal in the middle of the city with small gondolas traveling up and down the water way, similar to Venice. The city was surrounded with colorful buildings, brick streets, street vendors everywhere you looked, and the smell of authentic French food and wine filled the air. With one look around, Hermione could feel herself come back to life and knew that a vacation really was what she needed.

She rented a cozy two-story condo five minutes from the city center, from a sweet elderly witch named Matilda, who owned many of the wizard housing in the city. The exterior of the condo was a bright yellow color while the interior was much more subdued. The walls were painted a dark gray-blue color with beige couches in the living room and a small coffee table sitting in between the two couches. There was a large fireplace with a small bag of floo powder next to it as well, allowing Hermione to make a call if she needed. The dining room and the kitchen were combined into a small space but for one person and a dog, it was perfect. There was even a doggy door that led to a small backyard for Benji to use for his own purposes. There was a small powder room downstairs as well as a coat closet. Upstairs, were two bedrooms: a small guest room and a medium sized master with a large king sized four poster bed, a dressing table, a small closet, a dresser, an en suite, and two large french doors that led to a private balcony that faced the street. The balcony even had a couple of chairs and a small coffee table where she would be able to read the paper and drink her coffee in the morning.

As she looked at her beautiful view (which consisted of a view of the city and the beautiful mountain range), she could tell that this trip would have it's benefits for her.

Little did she know just what those benefits would be.


A few days later, Hermione was walking with Benji through the farmer's market in the center of the city, smiling and conversing with the locals in their native language. After the war, Hermione needed something to keep her mind off of everything that she had seen, so she distracted herself by learning a new language: French. It quickly became her sanctuary and by the time she had become fluent in the language, the nightmares had subsided and she had been able to sleep through the night again.

Now, she was extremely grateful for that time she studied French because it came in very handy when speaking to the locals about the history of the city and of the buildings. The locals also seemed to love Benji who, in turn, loved all the attention he was getting. Spoiled dog, Hermione thought to herself as she smiled at her fluffy companion. Waving goodbye to the clerk she had been talking to, Hermione continued to walk down the street, lost in thought, when she accidentally collided with another person, dropping the book she had been holding.

"Oh, I'm so sorry!" she ushered out. "I wasn't watching where I was going and-" she stopped mid-sentence as she looked at the person she had bumped into. She'd know those grey eyes anywhere. "Malfoy?"