Cause you see the world through blood shot eyes and you can't decide who's on you side."

-Unknown

Passion Burns Deep Chapter Ten

'How am I going to get through this? Malfoy's never going to cooperate with me, not that I want to get along with him either. How could McGonagall possibly think that I'm the perfect person for the job?'

Hermione's mind was spinning as she walked toward the room that she shared with the other girls. She hoped that they were still awake so she could talk to them about her newest problem.

'Why does it have to be me? He's not going to go along with this without putting up a fight first. I can already see it now, one of us will end up killing the other before it's all over. And knowing Malfoy, he'll make sure it's me that dies.'

Old floor boards creaked under foot as she made her way back down the long, dark hallway. A chill hung in the air, making it seem as if it weren't a summer's night. The whole house seemed quiet and unmoving, like something that had lost its will to live and was laying, waiting for death to overcome.

'I can't believe my first assignment as a new member to the Order is to run off with my mortal enemy! He loathes every part of me, not to mention the fact that I'm muggleborn.'

Finally reaching the door to their room, Hermione stopped and stood still, hand resting on the doorknob. How was she going to tell them? Breaking the news to her friends that she might be in mortal danger soon was something she found impossible to visualize. They would never let her go with Malfoy alone, but she had to. Realizing that she was going to have to face them sooner or later, she took a deep breath and turned her hand.

Opening the door quietly, she peeked around it and found not only Ginny and Luna in the room, but Harry was there also. Ginny was sitting on one of the beds twirling a piece of hair around hair finger nervously and Luna was staring off into space, her eyes unfocused and a mystified look on her face. Judging by the path wore in the dust on the floor; Harry had apparently been pacing back and forth.

They all turned to face her as she walked into the room. Hermione watched as relief spread over Harry's face and he stopped pacing. Ginny was still looking nervous, but Luna, her eyes back in focus, was looking at Hermione as if she could see right through her. It always sent chills down her spine when Luna did this, whether she was doing it to Hermione or someone else.

"Where were you at, Hermione? We thought you were coming up right behind us but you never showed up," Ginny said suspiciously.

"Ron never came back to our room either, so I come over here to see if he had stopped by to chat or something, then these two told me that you were missing, too. We were about to come looking for both of you".

"I'm fine," Hermione said hurriedly. "You mean Ron never came back at all?"

"No, he didn't. Hermione are you sure you're okay?" Ginny said standing up to walk over to Hermione. "You look pale".

Hermione put a hand on her forehead and swayed a little. Harry moved over to her quickly, catching hold of her by the waist before she collapsed to the floor.

"Hermione, come, sit down before you hurt yourself. What happened? Does Ron have something to do with this?" Harry helped her over to the bed and sat her down gently.

"I… um… wow," Hermione didn't know what to say. She felt too embarrassed to say anything.

She did feel violated, but she was worried of what the others might do if they found out what had really happened. Ron may have done those things, but she felt like she had brought them on herself and that was no reason to get Ron in trouble over something she had caused herself.

"Hermione, we can't help you if you don't tell us what's going on," Harry said laying a comforting hand on her shoulder tenderly.

"I don't know where Ron went to," Hermione finally said. "After we left the meeting, Lupin stopped me and told me that McGonagall wanted to see me".

Hey, it was the truth; even if she had left out the part about Ron.

"And what did she want?" Ginny asked.

"She wanted to tell me about the mission she was assigning for me to do".

"Wow, you already have a mission? That's amazing. What does she want you to do?" Ginny asked her.

Taking a deep breath, Hermione continued, "She told me that she believed I was the only one that could carry it out without messing anything up. She told me that I would be going on a long journey with someone and that I would have to keep hidden until further instruction".

"Who is 'someone'?" Harry and Ginny both asked simultaneously, it was evident that their earlier argument had been forgotten.

Hermione murmured something and all three, including Luna, leaned closer to hear what she had said.

"Pardon," Luna said.

"Oh, Harry, please don't get mad," she began to cry.

"Don't worry, Hermione. Just tell us who it is".

"She said I have to go into hiding with Malfoy".

"WHAT!" Harry jumped to his feet.

"She said that she believed that I would be the only one that could control him".

"Why would she think that?" Ginny gasped.

"I don't know, but it's no use arguing with her. We made a promise that we would do anything possible to help the Order out and if this is the best way for me to help out, that's what I'm going to do".

She had stopped crying now and was looking at the faces around her. Ginny nodded in agreement, knowing perfectly well that once she made her mind up about something, Hermione wasn't going to back down. Harry looked livid, he face screwed up in an effort to keep from yelling some more and Luna was just sitting there looking at her like she was even smarter than usual to be taking on this task.

Hermione didn't know why, but she had always felt like Luna knew more than she was letting on about. It even had crossed her mind a few times that it may be possible that Luna had some Seer blood in her. If that was true, was there something that Luna knew about all of this that she wasn't going to say? Did she perhaps know why McGonagall had picked her out of all the other Order members?

"When are you leaving?" Harry finally managed to ask through clenched teeth.

"As soon as Malfoy's strong enough. She said that he couldn't stay here for too long because it might cause problems, and she didn't want to take any chances of him hearing any important information. I have enough time to go get my things from my parent's house and say good-bye to all of you though".

"Where are you going to go?" Ginny asked her.

"I don't know yet," was all Hermione could answer.