C O W A R D

by Gueneviere

VII

FINDING SOMETHING


"Love and cowardice are really the same thing."

Anonymous.


- - - -

Stifling a groan, Hermione resisted the urge to bang her head against the eighteenth-century ebony table. The book Kingsley had just slid to her was protected by several Dark spells and thus her translation charm wasn't working all that well.

And dammit, she wasn't fluent in Aramaic, thank you very much.

She sighed for what was very possibly the thousandth time in the last hour before sneaking a glance at Kingsley, who was taking notes very calmly, looking as serene and untroubled as ever.

She wanted nothing but to ask him how the hell he had read the goddamned thing, but she had already tried to break the ice once and didn't particularly feel like being ignored and glared at again.

Growling softly to herself, Hermione took a sip of the coffee Kingsley had conjured only to grimace in disgust and rapidly put the mug back on the table.

Ewww!

It was an old wives' tale that a conjured item's quality depended not only on the wizard's magical ability but also on his capacity to have produced said item the non-magical way.

Glaring at the blue mug that now laid on the table, Hermione decided that Kingsley was lucky he was such a powerful wizard and a brilliant Auror; he would never be able to keep a job at Starbucks.


"Kingsley, I think I found something!" Hermione cried eagerly, her dark brown hair falling out of her bun as she turned towards the wizard eagerly, clearly forgetting all about his silent treatment.

"Found what?" Kingsley asked gruffly, putting down his quill and speaking for the first time in hours.

"The Animus Exsilium potion!" The girl replied enthusiastically, shoving what seemed to be a small diary into his hands. "We should probably keep looking for alternatives, but I think this could actually work!"

Kingsley sighed and met her excited coffee-colored eyes before looking at the page Hermione was pointing at.

Reading the description of the potion, Kingsley realized this was going to be a long night and not only because a certain witch's happy grin was doing wonders for his low blood pressure. Supressing the urge to pull her into a forceful kiss, Kingsley gritted his jaw and muttered a brusque "that's great," before returning to his own book.

He missed the look of hurt and disappointment that flashed on the girl's face.


Hermione bit her abused lower lip, her writing slow and distracted as she kept on sneaking glances at the silent Auror that worked a few seats away from her.

The shy morning light came through the window and bathed the library as the silence was disturbed by the gongs of the old grandfather clock on the wall.

It was five in the morning, and it was going to be a beautiful day.

Hermione yawned tiredly. They had spent the whole night pouring over the numerous Dark Arts books the Blacks had owned. She had almost fallen asleep several times, but Kingsley kept conjuring more and more of his disgusting coffee.

Hermione didn't have the heart to tell him to stop so she had drunk every one of the awful concoctions.

Barely awake—for Kingsley's coffee seemed as ineffective as it was repulsive—Hermione was now dotting down ideas on how the hell they were going to acquire the many, many rare and expensive ingredients they would need to produce the soul-banishing potion they had decided to use.

The bloody list was interminable; she had never in her vast hours of reading encountered a potion that required so many ingredients. But then expelling a soul from the inanimate object it was trapped on couldn't be an easy thing to do, of course.

In Hermione's eyes, the only bright side of the sodding potion was that only a few drops would be needed to expel a piece of soul, and that it would maintain its magical properties for years.

The bad side? Not only was it amazingly complex, and Professor Snape wasn't available to prepare it for them, it also had to be made in large amounts even if a few drops were enough.

That meant a lot of money. Which they had. Or Harry which did, anyway.

But it also meant a lot of time which they most certainly didn't have.

Harry had been waking up in the middle of the night screaming bloody murder as of late, and she had seen him rubbing his scar more than once. Three days ago he had finally confessed to her that he thought Voldemort was planning another attack soon.

They had recently found the last Horcrux—Hufflepuff's cup—and Snape had already killed Nagini when he had fled from Voldemort, unknowingly solving a problem for the Trio. Nevertheless, if they didn't destroy the bloody things soon, Harry wouldn't stand a chance when Voldemort attacked, training or no training.

Hermione guessed that since the piece of Voldemort's soul had been merged with the Nagini's own, that Horcrux had been destroyed as soon as the snake had died. The rest of the Horcruxes weren't alive, though, so they couldn't repeat that small miracle.

And Harry had gotten lucky with Riddle's diary in second year; a live basilisk's poison could destroy anything magical, even a soul.

It was a pity Harry had to kill it.

And apparently, Dumbledore had destroyed the ring using pure, raw, magical power, but when Ron had suggested they try it that way, Hermione had laughed in his face. Even with his immense capabilities, the Headmaster had gotten hurt. Albus Dumbledore had lost a hand, but they would probably lose their lives.

And thus, Harry and Ron had unanimously decided she should single-handedly come up with a viable way to destroy the Horcruxes.

She was, after all, the brains of the trio, they had argued.

Ah, well at least she had Kingsley's help, she thought, and glanced up to see the man in question wearing an adorable stunned expression. Neon pink liquid was rapidly spilling over his hands and notes.

Oh Merlin, they had already covered how to appropriately use highlighters, dammit!

As she watched Kingsley attempt to clean up the mess with sheets of parchment, Hermione sighed deeply.

"Oh, honestly," she finally muttered as she pointed her wand at the Auror who suddenly looked quite frightened. "Scourgify," she said and raised an eyebrow at the man.

Kingsley smiled sheepishly.

He really had a rather charming smile, Hermione decided.

As if remembering he was supposed to be ignoring her, Kingsley's smile slipped, and his face became serious once more. He nodded at her in a silent thank you and went back to his book.

Sighing resignedly once again, the young witch went back to the Animus Exsilium potion's interminable list of ingredients.

In the insufficient lighting that a couple of candles provided, Hermione missed the blush that tinged Kingsley's dark cheeks.


"Argh!" Hermione growled in frustration as she dotted down the twenty-something potion ingredient and realized she wasn't half-done.

Kingsley didn't even raise his head in acknowledgement.

Git. See if she ever helped him clean himself up again!

Okay, that sounded bad, but who cared? It was late and she was physically-tired, mentally-exhausted, emotionally-confused, sexually—er…

Anyway… mandrake roots…

Hermione frowned pensively and bit her lip as she continued to review the list. Getting some of this stuff wasn't going to be easy.

Elbows propped on the table, Kingsley stared at her and absentmindedly chewed on his quill.

He didn't realize it wasn't a candy one until it was too late.


Hermione trailed the potion ingredients' list with her index finger, doing her best to ignore Kingsley's sputtering sounds.

If the ungrateful git choked to death, then all the better for her.

… Okay, so belladonna was a standard ingredient in most potions. It was common enough.

Acromantula venom was attainable, though very expensive. Then again, if destroying a piece of Voldemort's soul wasn't worth the money, Hermione didn't know what was.

Plus, Harry was loaded, so whatever.

Hermione raised an eyebrow at potion ingredient number… what was it, again? She glanced at the number in the margin—oh, number thirty-two. Right.

Well, this was interesting. So soul-banishment was the secret thirteenth use of dragon blood. She wondered if Dumbledore had known this. He was, after all, the discoverer of the other twelve.

Carrying on…

Fluxweed

Common.

Frog Brain.

Disgusting, but common.

Helleborne

Not common, but any respectable Apothecary should sell it.

Re'em Blood.

Re'em Blood!? Where the hell were they going to get Re'em blood from? Re'ems were extremely rare and only found in North America and the Middle East; they would be lucky if they could get their hands on a half a pint, much less a liter!

All complaints on the availability of Re'em blood were forgotten, though, when Hermione read the thirty-eighth and last ingredient of the Anima Exsilium Potion…

'One personal item belonging to the soul being banished,' the page read in a neat, flowing print.

- - - -

TBC


A/N: Sorry for the delay! And thank you so much to all of my reviewers, we're over 100 reviews now! I can't believe it. I never thought my 'odd pairing' fic would turn out to be the most popular, but I'm glad you guys are liking Kingsley.

So, nowhow on earth is Hermione going to come up with something of Voldemort's?

You may or may not have noticed but I just added a significant amount of 'wood' to 'fuel' the plot. And yes, I'm aware that, my puns are awful, no need to comment on that.

But really, who would have thought this short little three-piece featuringwould actually become a long, chaptered fic?

… I certainly didn't…

By the way, 'Animus Exsilium' Potion means 'Soul Exiling' Potion.

Isn't that original.

Actually, I might even borrow this made-up method to destroy Horcruxes for A Black Secret, although I've thought up of another twist I could add to it.

Oh, and THANK YOU EuphoniumGurl0!

Please review and tell me what you think!

Cheers,

Alex.