A/N: We have rather picked up the pace, haven't we?

Eternal Gratitude to Katmom and a happy birthday greeting to Daughters A & B. Remind them that their Crazy Aunt LJ hasn't forgotten how to use her spork. :)

Now take a deep breath. . .

Chapter Ten

28 July 2002, Gringotts

"Ragnok!" Bogrod all but exploded into Ragnok's Gringotts office, his gray hair in lightning-spikes up around his head. "A wizard and witch! Portkey! Secure Chamber!"

"May your wife cleave your skull in two, Bogrod, if you don't speak plain!" With a growl, Ragnok stomped around his desk to confront the underling. "Which Secure Chamber?" he demanded when Bogrod just stared at him as if he had grown another head.

"Vault Three, Ragnok!" Bogrod nodded his head frantically.

Ragnok felt his lower jaw drop. That was on the lowest, most secure level of Gringotts. And the only way one got into that vault was via Portkey unless the goblin requesting entrance was Senior Account Manager or above. And there was only one Portkey currently released for Vault Three. His stomach lurched in a sickening manner. "Let us go. We'll need Senior Manager Nimrod to access it. Send for one of our Healers, as well," he instructed with a raspy voice.

"Ragnok, who is down there?"

"The only one that could be: the human Curse-Breaker William Weasley."

Bogrod nodded abruptly. "He was doing something secret."

"He was, yes. But I am aware of his assignment, as is Senior Manager Nimrod. I'll meet him at the Vault." Ragnok offered silent, business-like greetings to his fellow bankers as he hurried from his office to the carts that went to the deepest levels of Gringotts. His shoes made soft echoes in the marble halls until he went through the final set of doors that led to the carts. Then, it was as if he'd stepped into his ancestral true-home and he inhaled with deep satisfaction. Oh, Gringotts did good business, working with the wizards, but nothing satisfied a true goblin but his true-home. A cavern that hid treasure.

He jumped into the nearest cart, focused on holding on tight during the long ride down. Cool, damp air blew by his head and he grinned into each precariously balanced turn of the track. A dragon was guarding a corridor there, but Ragnok didn't heed it. He was going so far down that dragon-wards weren't required. He wondered if Nimrod would have arrived already.

It was possible. The Senior Managers did contrive to get around more quickly than the average goblin.

His eyes adjusted to the deepening dark, so he blinked when he saw the torch. It was magical, alerting anyone down here that yes, someone was in Vault Three. So if the runes failed, then a simple flame might do the job of notifying the bank. And, in the shadow of the torch was none other than Senior Manager Nimrod.

Ragnok pulled on the brake with a huge effort, nearly flying from the cart after he did so. He landed on his feet, however, and bowed to Nimrod's superior rank. "May your enemies convulse in fear in your presence, Senior Manager."

"May your vaults never empty," Nimrod said in reply. "I heard you believed Weasley's in Three." The older goblin lifted one bushy brow and rocked back on his booted feet. "You are familiar with his mission?" Ragnok nodded. "Good." Nimrod touched the access panel to the right of the vault's door and it opened with creaky sluggishness.

"Stop right there. Who are you and where are we?" A young witch with gold-streaked brown hair stood over the body of Bill Weasley and Ragnok felt his heart squeeze in sorrow. "I'm Hermione Dagworth, from the Yavapai Coven in Arizona. Curse-Breaker Weasley was bitten by a snake and needs a healer immediately."

Ragnok stepped in so he could catch the brunt of the brunette's hex, if the witch so decided. "I'm Ragnok. I've worked with Bill Weasley before. This is Senior Manager Nimrod. You're in the most secure vault of Gringotts, young Miss Dagworth. You're quite safe."

"A healer!" she repeated, dropping to her knees to retrieve a dragonhide bag as well as to check Weasley's pulse. "No! No! Bill, no!"

Nimrod sighed heavily and stepped close to Bill Weasley's body, checking for signs of life. "I'm most sorry, Miss Dagworth." He waited until the witch met his gaze, though her own was filled with tears. "Did you bring what he sought?"

"Yes," she whispered. "He said it could be destroyed here."

"Can you cast Fiendfyre?"

She nodded slowly. "But I don't know if I can control it."

"Good enough."

Hermione was nearly panting. Too much had happened in too short a time, but she had no choice but to follow the path that her feet were on at present.

She was in Wizarding Britain. In Gringotts, no less! Bill had been overcome by the serpent's venom. Molly would be devastated. Bill's body had been taken up by Ragnok, a colleague of the Curse-Breaker's, and the Senior Manager was staying behind to secure the vault once Hermione had done a very dangerous thing.

She had to cast for Fiendfyre. "Bill Weasley cast it here before, Miss Dagworth. He cast it and I sealed the vault whilst the thing burned the . . . burned what our Curse-Breaker had retrieved. I can do the same for you. Then, we must go to my office. The Weasley family will want to thank you for bringing their Scion home."

Her heart thudded painfully and her throat went dry, but Hermione merely nodded. "Wait for me at the door, then, Senior Manager."

The goblin bowed formally to her, leaving her alone in the rocky vault. No drawers containing treasure here. No piles of Galleons or jewels. This was clearly a vault built for no other purpose than containment. It made her shiver. Still, she carried Bill Weasley's dragonhide bag to the center of the area and hurried to get as close to the edge of the vault, near the door, as she could. Focus, Hermione! she admonished herself. She held her wand aloft, took a breath, and called, "Ignem Diaboli!"

Fire, like the fire from a chemical explosion, spouted from the tip of her wand. She flipped the wand and the fire left it, assuming the form of a dragon.

"Ho ho!" the goblin shouted. "Come! Now!"

The dragon-shaped Fiendfyre dove to the dragonhide bag as Hermione's own bag thumped on her back when she turned and fled the vault. The goblin pushed the vault's door shut behind her, locking it with a touch to a rectangle next to the door. She held his gaze with her own as they heard the roaring fire on the other side of the heavy door. The torch above them seemed to flicker in response to the Fiendfyre's activity, but it settled before too long.

"It's finished," Nimrod said with a soft sort of reverence. "Well done, Miss Dagworth."

"Yeah, about that…"

"Come to the Senior Lift, Miss Dagworth, and we can talk business." His smile was subdued, but Hermione sensed that it was entirely sincere. For a goblin, business was life. And, though she mourned Bill and dreaded seeing the Weasleys again, Hermione knew that the matter of her identity was paramount. "What is troubling you?"

She fell to an old Muggle line from Mark Twain. "The reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated."

They boarded the lift and all conversation ceased. It was all Hermione could do to stay on her feet. She judged that the goblin handled the sudden increase in gravitational pull due to his smaller stature. Hermione just grit her teeth and braced herself against the brass wall paneling as the lift shot up through who knew how many feet of rock tunnels. Soon, but not nearly soon enough, the lift jolted to a stop and the doors opened.

And Hermione remembered that she was hardly dressed for a London summer, never mind being dressed formally enough for a bank. She tugged roughly on her desert-dweller top and shorts, brushed sand from the tops of her trainers, and wandlessly performed a smoothing charm on her hair as it fell down her back after all her exertions. "I'm sorry for my lack of decorum, Senior Manager," she said stiffly.

"It can't be helped. Come. My office is this way."

The corridor was narrow, but the ceilings high as Nimrod led her to his office. "Ah, see that stone, there? Glowing red? That means I have visitors."

She swallowed over the pounding of her heart. "Weasleys?"

Nimrod looked up at her with kind eyes under the bushy gray brows. "Likely. Back straight, Miss Dagworth. You've performed credibly, returning our assets as best you could, and keeping the Curse-Breaker from mutilation." He sighed as he touched the square doorknob. "Humans are often so distressed by that."

With a quick breath, Hermione followed the goblin into his office.

28 July 2002, Ministry of Magic

"So that's what happened," Harry said, concluding his report to Alastor Moody, who was serving as Head Auror in their troubled time. "I still think that going in with the old D.A. was a better call than bringing in your Aurors. I know that none of them had any ties to the Death Eaters, which cannot be said for the entire Ministry."

Moody sighed and scratched at his jaw while he eyed the Pensieve on his desk. Harry eyed it as well before gesturing that he'd like his memories returned. Moody waved his wand in assent but didn't speak. Harry spun the silvery string of his memory from the Piccadilly Battle back into his mind. "Anything else?" he asked, his whole body feeling heavy and achy. "I just—I need to go home."

"No, we're good here, lad. You did well, you know. If you want to apply for a position here, when—when this is over?"

Harry snorted and scrubbed both hands through his hair. "Thanks. One war at a time, Moody."

"Ha! If you're lucky, lad. All right, away wi' ya. I'll come up to Farecliffe if I need anything more."

Nodding, Harry left the old Auror's office and maneuvered with heavy steps through the late-afternoon shift change within the Ministry. "Hey, Harry," he heard from time to time, from people familiar enough so that he nodded to them, but didn't stop.

Just as he reached the Floos, though, he heard, "Hey! Harry!"

Ron's call did stop him. "Merlin, man, you're hard to find," his friend said, breathless and pale.

Fear grabbed Harry's gut. "What is it?"

"Bill. He's at Gringotts."

The fear left him to be replaced by worry. "Did he, er, say what he was doing there?"

"No, mate. I just got a Patronus from Dad. Honest, Harry? I'm guessing he was injured and Portkeyed straight to Gringotts."

"He had a Portkey for Farecliffe as well," Harry muttered. "Still, he'd know best. All right. Let's go."

Ron clapped him on the shoulder with one broad hand. "You all right there, Harry? I know today was...blimey. Awful. Bloody awful."

"Just tired, Ron. I, I need to climb under a rock for tonight or something."

"I hear that. Let's get to Gringotts and see what's going on." With a slight change of plans, the men took the Floo from the Ministry and straight to Weasley's Wizard Wheezes.

It was open, but only barely, as—Verity informed them with a sad smile—Fred and George had run out minutes before. "They were heading to Gringotts," she said. Then, she smiled a little more at Ron. "Hope everything's all right with your brother."

"So do I. Thanks, Verity."

Harry and Ron decided to follow the twins' example and jog down Diagon Alley, dodging late shoppers and waving off any attempts at conversation. Upon reaching the imposing steps to the bank, they continued running right up the steps. They were met by a goblin standing in front of the heavy, iron-hinged doors.

"Ah! Lord Potter-Black. Mister Weasley. We've been expecting you. Come, come."

"Lord Potter-Black! How are you? I heard it was terrible in Piccadilly today!"

"Lord Potter-Black, where's your father? I had hoped to talk to him about my business proposal."

"Lord Potter-Black, is it true that you're betrothed to Luna Lovegood of the Quibbler?"

At that point, Ron stepped between the impertinent banking customer and Harry, for which Harry was quite grateful. Though no slouch himself, really, Harry had always acknowledged that Ron was his superior in terms of sheer physical size. "Enough. Harry's already fought off Death Eaters today. He doesn't need to fight off you lot, as well."

"I just wanted to offer—"

Ron took one long stride to put himself very much within an arm's reach of the persistent questioner. "I said that was enough. No. Harry and Luna hadn't made any formal arrangement, but she was our friend. Just like the others who, who gave everything to keep people safe. Enough." Stepping back, he took Harry's bicep in one hand and tugged him gently through the crazy, end-of-day banking madness that prevailed in Gringotts. "Where are we going?"

Harry let Ron drag him past the tellers, but then he shrugged off the helping hand. "I'm good, mate. Thanks. Bogrod, thank you for your escort today. Where are we going?"

It turned out to be a large office at the end of a long marble corridor. Dark wood accented the portals to the varying offices, and there were gems and torches around each opening. Bogrod paused with his hand on the door. "Mister Weasley, your parents are already here."

"Good, good. Thank you."

Harry sensed something was off and he settled his hand between Ron's shoulder blades as they entered the Senior Manager's office. The scene before him was heartbreaking.

"I'm so sorry," a female with an American accent was saying, all wrapped up in Molly Weasley's shaking embrace. "He was amazing, you know. Just amazing."

"No!" Ron shouted, darting past Molly and Arthur, past the goblins next to the enormous, dark desk off to one side, to land beside the twins, on his knees next to a pair of legs and feet encased in trainers. Unmoving legs. Familiar trainers. "Not Bill! The other ones didn't do this! What the bloody hell happened?"

Harry's focus shifted from Ron to Molly Weasley, who apparently gathered her composure as she wiped her eyes with a handkerchief. "Oh, Harry."

"What happened?" he demanded quietly.

"Bill Weasley got the Horcrux from a dark serpent, holding his attention while I beheaded it," the American woman said, stepping to encompass Molly Weasley in what looked to be a comforting embrace. Harry didn't really see what she looked like; he was focused on Bill and then Arthur. The woman sighed heavily. "I hoped to save his life by using his emergency Portkey to bring him here."

Grief over another loss that day had Harry weaving on his feet so that Arthur moved to stand next to him with one arm around his shoulders. "I'm guessing it didn't work." Arthur shook his head and blinked tear-filled eyes. "Bloody hell," Harry whispered in subconscious echo of Ron's protesting cry. It took a huge effort, but he shook himself loose of Arthur's support, straightened his spine, and took a step toward the American. "Thank you for bringing him home, Miss . . .?"

Why Molly started wailing again and why Ron swore loudly on the floor as he looked up at the American woman at first confused Harry. Until the woman slowly turned around and he was overcome with the notion that he knew her. But he'd not met an American in all his travels. At least not one that looked like her.

Long brown hair with corkscrew-like curls, shot through with a gold like sunshine. Skin tanned a golden brown that made him remember a question that had pestered him a very long time ago. Brown eyes flecked with gold, a small nose, wide mouth, curves that would have made his fingers twitch under other circumstances, legs that went on forever, and a wand in the hip pocket of her shorts.

No.

It was her words that finally, finally, let him know that yes, this woman was familiar. Her eyes were wary and sad when she said, still in that odd American accent, "Hello, Harry."

His heart stopped, he thought, and he went all light-headed. "Wait, what?"

"This is Hermione Dagworth, Lord Potter-Black," one of the goblins said. Harry didn't even look to see who.

The woman half-extended a hand to him. "I used to be Hermione Granger."

He shook his head, feeling his eyes burn fiercely. "Her—Hermione? But, but you're dead! They told me you were dead! Who are you and where did you—Did that rag put you up to this?"

Her mouth dropped open as her hand fell, untaken. "What?"

"Harry, no!"

"Did they do to you like they did to that poor sod who had to go around looking like me?"

"No, Harry, lad, no," Mrs. Weasley said, coming around the woman to take Harry's hand in both of hers. "It's her."

"No! They said she was dead! All these years, they said she was dead!"

The woman who had been introduced as his Hermione just stared at him, her eyes going flat and lifeless. "Senior Manager Nimrod? I'll need a Portkey home."

The goblin in the silver striped tie made some sort of disgusted sound but moved past Harry to the door. "Come then, Miss Dagworth. I'll see that you get one right away."

Somehow, it was watching the woman open the door and walk away that convinced Harry. The walk—he'd watched her grow up and knew how she moved and no one could imitate something so much a part of the girl that he'd loved. Uncaring of whatever speculations might result, he shouted her name and ran out the door to follow her.

"Hermione!"

A/N: The Mark Twain reference is a purposeful misquote. The actual quote is: "The report of my death was an exaggeration." However, it's been misquoted over the years so very often that this is the version most used, incorrect though it is. I figured it's also the version Hermione would have on the tip of her tongue, as she hasn't exactly had the time to look up the proper quotation.

And I am afraid I am leaving you on a cliff for a while. Because I'm heading off on vacation and the wi-fi is, again, uncertain. (And my extended family has no idea I write fanfic and they'd freak out. Siriusly.) So, what I *will* do is post a snippet before I go at my tumblr page (see my profile here) to tide you over.

I will catch up on all my authorial replies and so on when I get home, as well as bring you the next chapter and let you get off this cliff. :) But by the time you read this, I will likely be on the road! I have guest replies being moderated at this point, but I'll check my email when I can. If you review as a guest, there will be some delay in posting.

Be safe, be happy, and be careful around snakes. *nods* - LJ