AN: I know it's been a while since I updated any of my stories. My computer had issues, had to get a new one, and spent a while reconstruction files. But I'm good now. I hope you enjoy the chapter.

Draco excused himself from the game and no one said anything to stop him. It was understandable, seeing as he had almost fallen to his death. But Hermione…how had she done that? Were her reflexes that good? No wonder she'd received the internship at the ministry. But something had caught his attention. When she'd saved him, she'd looked shaken. The red she'd gained from the brisk cold had faded until she looked paler than one of the Hogwarts ghosts. She looked as if it had been her who had almost died and she'd run off pretty quickly. There were so many questions he had. But the biggest was 'who was Hermione Granger'? He left the arena and saw Hermione walking toward the castle. Her movement was slow and unsteady. He watched her cross the grounds and into the castle. Who was she?

•••

Hermione looked over the notes and paperwork her parents had sent for the genealogy project. Mother had been thrilled to learn her daughter had an interest in her heritage and had sent over everything she had on their family. There was more on the Mortimers, Mother's family, than the Grangers. Apparently Grandma Mortimer was a big genealogy buff and had traced the family back to the 10th century. Hermione had spent the last three hours in the common room, going over the hand written notes of marriages, births, and deaths since her class had been turned into a free study period, leaving her free of classes until dinner. Now and then, she'd find a small 'W' put next to a name. Hermione wasn't sure what purpose it served, but it appeared every couple of generations. Then there were the 'S's that were written next to only three names through the genealogy.

"Hey," Gene said, sitting down at the table as Fargo sat down across from him. "Find anything interesting?"

Hermione shrugged. "A few notes that I'm sure Grandma knew what they meant, but I'm clueless. I think I'll have to drop her an owl to know what she does."

"You think if we ask nice, she could write the reports for us?" Gene asked, pulling a piece of paper toward him.

Hermione laughed for a moment. "That's a new one," she said. "Having your grandma do your homework."

Gene smiled. "What can I say? I'm original," he said. He looked over the paper in front of him. "What does this 'W' mean?"

"I don't really know," Hermione said. "They show up by a few names. You have any ideas?"

Fargo shrugged. "Maybe they mean 'weirdo'. That would explain why it's next to all of our names."

"Huh?" Hermione asked, looking up. Gene put the paper in front of her and pointed to the top where the Granger siblings' names were written out. A 'W' was put next to each name. "That's weird," she said.

"Which makes you a weirdo," Gene said, smiling proudly.

Hermione rolled her eyes and walked over to the fireplace. "Why don't we just call Grandma and ask her?" she said, grabbing a handful of Floo powder.

"That takes the fun out of it," Gene said.

Hermione tossed the powder into the fire and told the flames Grandma's address before sticking her head in. Everything was red for a moment before it cleared to show Grandma and Grandpa's living room. Grandpa Mortimer was sitting his usual easy chair, being such a cliché with the morning newspaper in his hands while Grandma knitted in a rocking chair. She liked to joke that she enjoyed being a cliché for her grandkids.

"Hey, Grandma," Hermione said.

Grandma jumped and looked around before she found Hermione. "Dear lord, girl," she said. "It's a bit disconcerting to see your granddaughter's head in the fire place."

"Even if it wasn't talking," Grandpa said.

"What can I do for you, honey?" Grandma asked. It had taken a while to get use to the Floo system, but by the time Colin had been going to Hogwarts, the grandparents had gotten use to their family showing up randomly via Floo.

Hermione looked up at her Grandma. "I've been going over your notes about the Mortimer family tree. I have a question about the 'W's written by some names," Hermione said.

"Oh, those," Grandma said, continuing with her rocking and knitting. "They mean witch and wizard."

Hermione blinked at the blunt explanation. "Wait, you mean you knew about the magical blood in our family?"

"When Andrew started school, I looked over our family history with new eyes. Those are the ones that I found had magic abilities. I even looked at the Granger side, but it seems to be just the Mortimers. The Grangers are…what do you call non magic people, dear?"

"Muggles."

"Right. Muggles. Anyway, I wrote a 'W' next to each person that I had evidence that they were a witch or wizard."

"What about the ones with an 'S' next to it?"

"Oh, those. I found only four people that had the ability to see the future. Seers, I guess you would call them."

"Four? But there are only three 'S's."

"Because I didn't get the chance to put one next to your name. I'm surprised to not see as many Seers as we should have."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, our family is descendant of one of the Pythia."

Hermione blinked. "Wait, we're descendant from a Delphic Oracle? How come you never told us?"

Grandma shrugged. "Never seemed like an issue. Really, dear, it's not something to pass around outside the family."

"So…Father has no magic blood in him?"

"Not a drop," Grandma said. She sounded a bit proud of that fact.

Hermione bit her lip. It was no secret that the Mortimers weren't too happy with her mother's marriage to her father, but it had made their little girl happy, so they'd kept quiet. Not that that stopped them from being honest with their grandchildren.

"Alright," Hermione said. "Are there any other surprises about our family I should know?"

Grandma looked at Grandpa for a moment before shaking her head. "Not that I can think of," she said. "If I do think of something, I'll give you a call, dear."

"Okay. Love you."

"Love you, too, dear."

Hermione pulled back from the fire and waited for a moment as the room stopped spinning, as it usually did after that kind of visit. She looked over her shoulder at Gene, who had been looking at some of the papers. "Guess what I learned," she said.

"You're related to Big Foot?" Fargo said.

"Funny," Hermione said, standing up. "No. Apparently, we're related to a Delphi Oracle. That's where our Seer powers come from."

"You mean those women dressed in sheer silks that told the future for Greek kings?" Gene asked.

"Nice," Fargo said, smiling wide and chuckling.

Hermione sank into her chair and leaned back in the frame. "Yeah. Our however 'great' grandma use to tell fortunes in almost nothing while getting high from gases in the mountain. That'll look great on a report."

"The original sex and drugs scene?" Gene said. "We Grangers are hard core."

"Not the Grangers," Hermione said. "Grandma said the Granger line has no magic in their blood. All of our abilities come from the Mortimer clan."

"Then what do we get from the Grangers?" Gene asked.

"Our ability to lie," Fargo said.

"Hence why we're good at poker," Hermione said. She blew out a breath of air and said, "It's been a while since I played." The last time she'd played had been with Draco a few days before their wedding to blow off steam. They'd played on their bed. Draco wore his boxers and she'd worn an undershirt and comfortable pajama shorts. The game had done its job. She'd been wining the last hand and Draco had dropped his cards, wrapped his arms around her, and pulled her close. Hermione brought herself out of her memories and shook her head. "Well, we have an interesting family history," she said. "Should have enough for a report."

"Should only take an hour or so," Gene said. He looked at his brother. "We're going to do homework, Fargo. You in?"

"No way," Fargo said, standing up. "I followed you because I thought you might do something fun. If you're going to spend your free afternoon doing homework, I'm going to find Greg and go over some pranks."

"You'll work on pranks that require complex spell work, but you don't want to sit down and write a simple paper?" Hermione asked, giving her brother an amused look.

"See, you get it," Fargo said, sliding his bag onto his shoulder. "See ya." He waved as he left the common room.

"Seems he's over the whole-"

"Don't say it," Hermione said. "You'll jinx it. Just focus on your work."

Gene chuckled and turned to the papers. They worked in silence for a while until a pecking at the window brought their attention from their work. Hermione stood up and walked over to the window and opened it to let a hawk perch on the window ledge. It held a letter in its beak. Hermione took the letter and ran a hand over the bird's head. It raised its head into her.

"Who's it for?" Gene asked. Sometimes, when a letter was delivered, the person it was for wasn't around. The Gryffindors had made it a courtesy rule to accept the letters and leave it in the person's room or on the table to be collected later.

Hermione turned the letter over and said, "It's for me." She ran her finger under the flap and opened the envelope. She pulled out the parchment and read the letter. "Vladimir's asking when a good time would be to come and teach me how to duel with wands."

"Wow. Usually people don't talk to each other once their engagement is broken."

Hermione chuckled. "Vladimir was all too happy to have our engagement broken. He's much happier with Alyona. Besides, it'll be good to have the skills for my internship."

"Think you're going to bag a bad guy on your first day?" Gene joked.

Hermione rolled her eyes at her brother but she knew that the dueling would be a good asset when she went up against Bellatrix and the others. She walked over to the desk and grabbed a scrap of paper. She wrote out a reply to Vladimir, accepting his offer of lessons and telling him to come some day during Christmas break. She folded the parchment and walked it over to the hawk. The bird took it and flew off.

"Alright," Hermione said, returning to the table. "Let's get this paper done. Then I don't want to learn anything new about our family for a while." Gene chuckled and they dug into the paperwork. After a few hours of work, they had their essays done, having left out the Seer part of their family lineage.

"Hey, Herm," Gene said as they made their way down to dinner.

"Yeah?" she asked, stretching her arms above her head.

"You planning on going home for Christmas break?"

"No," she said. In her last life, she hadn't gone home because there wasn't anything at home. Didn't seem to make any sense for her to go back this time. "I don't think I could handle being around Father and listening to whatever he felt like lecturing me about." Gene snorted and nodded in agreement.

The Great Hall was already filled with students but the two managed to find spots near their friends and brothers. Hermione sat down and quickly grabbed the last biscuit from the plate before Ron could. He gave her a sharp look, but she only smiled and pointed at the refilled plate. He grabbed a biscuit and bit into it. Hermione filled her plate up and reached across Ginny and Harry for the jug of pumpkin juice.

"You could just ask," Ginny said.

"Nah," Hermione said jokingly as she poured the liquid into her goblet. "Too much work."

"Finish your paper?" Fargo asked.

"Yeah," Hermione said, slicing up her roast beef. "Which means I can focus on my internship."

"Didn't you get the owl?" Pansy asked. She was passing their group on her way to her seat at the Slytherin table, but had stopped to look at Hermione.

"What owl?" Hermione asked.

"Maybe it's up in your room, but the Ministry just sent out a mass owl to the interns. Instead of starting next week, they're going to wait until after Christmas break to have Orientation and get everyone settled in their posts."

"Really?" Pansy nodded. "Alright. I can wait a few weeks."

"Eager to start, were you?" Pansy asked, smiling a bit.

"Yeah." Hermione was eager to access the Archives and figure out how to stop Bellatrix. She shrugged nonchalantly and stabbed a piece of broccoli with her fork. "But I can wait a week to take down the bad guys."

"Little you going to take down a big bad?" Blaise asked, joining their conversation.

Hermione flipped her hair over her shoulder and gave him a smirk. "You think you're the only one who can do good?"

Blaise leaned on the table and gave her a smooth grin. "You have no idea how good I can be, Hermione."

She raised an eyebrow. "Did you pull that line out of a two cent joke book?"

Blaise blinked. "What is a 'cent'?" he asked.

The triplets erupted into laughter and even Hermione felt it hard to keep a straight face. "It's a monetary value term used by muggles," she said, resting her chin on her propped up hand. "You expect to be a Field Agent and you don't even know what a 'cent' is? What would Barcus say?"

Blaise paused. "Am I suppose to know that?" he asked.

"A Field Agent knows a little of everything," Hermione said. "You might want to brush up on your knowledge if you plan on lasting an internship with my brothers."

Blaise was quiet for a moment and then mumbled an excuse as he walked away. Pansy jabbed her thumb at his back and gave Hermione an impressed smile before she walked over to her spot at the Slytherin table.

"Silencing the Silver Tongue," Ginny said. She nudged Hermione's shoulder. "Good going."

Hermione smiled and ate her broccoli. Blaise was playing and she knew it. The greatest thing he'd probably ever feel toward her would be as a friend and she was glad. She would never be able to love anyone like she did Draco and she didn't want to even try. She might put up a nice show of being OK, but she still had a huge part of her heart missing. It had died with her Draco.

"You're staring off into space," Greg said, tapping the back of her hand. "You ok?"

She blinked and shook her head, clearing her depressing thoughts. "Sorry. My mind wandered for a moment. What were you saying?"

"Well, a lot of people will be gone for Christmas break and over New Years, so we were wondering how the Grangers were going to celebrate here at school," Gene said.

"Oh, let me guess. Gene's going to be going over some study stuff, Fargo's going to find a girl he hasn't messed around with, and Greg's going to be in the library. That sound about right?"

The triplets exchanged looks before turning back to her. "Pretty much," they said.

"Was there something you wanted to do all together?" Greg asked.

Hermione shrugged. "Maybe."

"So, you want to do something during break, but you don't know yet, but you just want to have a time open just in case?" Gene asked.

Hermione thought it over and nodded. "Pretty much."

"Dude, don't question women thinking," Fargo said. "I've dated a ton and I still don't get them."

"Correction," Hermione said. "You've-" She was silenced by Fargo clamping a hand over her mouth. Since he was on the over side of the table and had to lean over it to quiet his sister, he got a few strange looks from other students.

"I do not need to hear that coming out of my baby sister's mouth," he said.

Hermione pushed his hand away. "I'm one year younger than you."

"But you are younger," Gene said. "Which means we, as big brothers, will protect you. It also means we don't want to hear things like that coming from your mouth."

Hermione gave Greg a look that told him what she thought of the other brothers' opinion. He shrugged. "It's true, Herm."

She rolled her eyes and shook her head. "Don't worry," Ginny said. "I get the same thing from my brothers."

"So they don't want to hear about you and Ha-" Hermione was once again silenced, but by Ginny's hand.

"I'd rather you not say the rest of that sentence in such a public area," Ginny said. She didn't sound mad. She sounded more amused than anything else. Hermione smiled behind her friend's hand before she licked the palm. Ginny pulled it back. "Ew."

"You really didn't see that coming?" Hermione asked.

Ginny gave her a playful look before wiping her palm on Hermione's shoulder. Hermione mock cringed. "You really didn't see that coming?" Ginny asked with a smile.

Hermione laughed with the others and finished off her last bite of food. "Who's up for a poker tournament?"

"Poker?" Ron asked. "You?"

"Why not?"

"I just thought you were going to do homework or something."

She leaned forward, crossing her arms on the table. "If you want, Ron, we could all go back to the Common room and you can start in on all that homework we have due."

"Poker it is," Ron said. He stood up and grabbed a biscuit from the plate. Harry, Ginny, and the triplets all stood up with Hermione. They made their way to the doors, debating what they would be playing for.

"Favors," Gene said.

"Homework," Ron said.

"Money," Greg said.

Hermione rolled her eyes. She wasn't too concerned about what they were playing for; she just wanted some fun. She stepped through the doors and into the hallway.

"Let's play for kisses," Ginny said.

"But there's only two girls," Ron said.

"Not if we invite Lavender and some other girls to join in," Hermione said.

"How would we decide who kissed who?" Harry asked. He turned to Ginny. "I don't think you'd like me to kiss another girl."

"No, but you might like me kissing Hermione," Ginny said. The look on Harry and Ron's faces gave the girls a good laugh.

"Now, I'd like to join in on that game," Blaise said behind them.

Hermione turned to face him. He was smirking and she gave him one back. "I'm sure you would, Zabini. But it's only for Gryffindors."

"I'd change my colors for you, baby."

"And make you give up your silver tongue," Hermione said, sounding astonished. "How could I do that to the other women who laugh at your attempts to pick them up?"

Pansy, who'd followed Blaise out, chuckled. "Careful, Hermione, or you'll deflate his ego."

"Give me a little time and I'll deflate something else," Hermione said.

"Woah!" Fargo said, wrapping an arm around his sister's waist as he appeared next to her. "No. No. No. And no. Not in a million years."

Hermione rolled her eyes. "Chill, Fargo. I'm only teasing. I'm allowed to tease a friend."

"You should rethink your friends."

Hermione shook her head and gave Pansy and Blaise a slight wave. "See you later, guys. My brother has to let some steam out of his head."

"What does that even mean?" Fargo asked, following her up the stairs.

"Again, you need to start learning about girls and not just sleep with them," Hermione said.

"Hey, guys," Gene called down to them from the high landing. "You coming or not? We're playing for talents."

"Talents?" Hermione called up, not caring that anyone around could hear them.

"Things we're good at," Greg said. "We can bet pranks, you can bet tutoring, so on and so forth."

"Really? Who says 'so on and so forth'?" Gene asked.

"Says the studious one," Fargo said as he and Hermione joined their little group.

Hermione smiled at her brothers' bickering. Ah, normal sibling actions. She looked down at the first floor and saw Blaise and Pansy talking to Draco. She paused a moment, taking in his stance and the light bouncing off his blond hair. His profile was arrogant. He'd looked like that before she'd opened his eyes to the cards. He'd changed, but not in this timeline. Didn't stop her heart from skipping a beat and fluttering at the same time. It hurt that he'd never look at her the way he use to.

"Hermione," the triplets called. She looked up at them. They waved her over. She smiled and hurried over, missing Draco looking up as he heard her name.

The little group of friends made it to the Common room and started in on their game. A few of them cheated and others tried to cheat, but it was laughs all around when they found out the cards had been spelled to cheat automatically. It turned out that the cheating cards made the cheaters play a fair game. Soon after this discovery, the game ended and everyone went off to his or her warm beds.

Hermione found a letter on her pillow and the indentation of claw marks. Someone had let in an owl. She picked it up and recognized the Ministry's stationary and seal. She opened it, expecting it to read what Pansy had told her; that internships were pushed back until after Christmas break. Instead, she found something different.

Granger,

I know you may have heard by now that interns should show up until after Christmas. Keep up the belief this applies to you, but show up at the Ministry tomorrow. I'll meet you at the fountain at 8 sharp. Tell no one. We have much to talk about.

Moody

Hermione slowly folded the letter and put it in her desk drawer, silently spelling the drawer locked. Moody was a very cautious man, but he had reason to be, given his occupation. So it seemed she was taking a trip to the Ministry tomorrow.