AN: I'm back from Seattle! Now I'm plus a long-distance relationship that's been in the works for months actually confirmed so that pretty much made my trip. This is a short chapter because I've been working on school related stuff and attempting to figure out how to pay off the remaining balance on my tuition which is the exact opposite of fun.

Reviews are appreciated, as always.

Hermione

Kavieke is running along after her as she darts through the corridors. He's still a red-ruffed lemur and he's been trying a few other forms but keeps returning to this one. It makes Harry smile every time he sees her and that scares her just a little bit.

Speaking of…

"Harry!"

He turns and smiles at her – folding his arms behind his back and rocking on his heels. "Hello, Hermione. May I help you?"

"Can I talk to you?" She can't believe she's doing this but she can't think of anything else to do. "Please," she adds belatedly.

"I was going to breakfast," he says with a smile and gestures behind her with one hand. She'd run all the way from Gryffindor tower to the corridor most of the Slytherins used to get to the Hall. Thankfully, she had caught him before he'd gone and sat with the rest of his House. She was brave enough to talk to him but she certainly wasn't brave enough to talk to him at his table.

"I'll only take a minute!" Kavieke pipes up.

"Nothing is just a minute with Hermione Granger," Harry replies and she blushes even though she'd usually take that as an insult. From Harry, it's both complimentary and disturbing but she'll take it as a compliment to save the trouble of working herself up.

"It's nothing, really," she assures him and begins to think maybe this isn't the best idea. Kavieke leaps onto her shoulder and she brushes hair out of her face. "Well, not nothing but…"

She must've given something away in her tone because he stops abruptly and looks at her for a long moment. Those very green eyes are roving and his lips are relaxed in a blank expression that makes him look so much like a doll she wonders if he's breathing or not. Then he starts walking again as if nothing had happened and says, quite calmly, "Ailurus fulgens."

"What? Is that a spell?"

"No," he looks amused now which is better than the blank expression from before. "It's a breed."

"A breed of what?" Then, because he knew exactly what she wanted but she can't just say it out loud quite yet, "Why are you telling me?"

"You want to know what we think Kavieke will be," he replies. Tahmryis leers at her dæmon and the lemur shows his teeth warningly. "The answer is ailurus fulgens."

"What is that colloquially?"

"Now that would be overstepping social bounds," he says and Tahmryis winds his way through his boy's legs without causing a single misstep. "You'll figure it out."

She can't do much more than rush to the library – forgoing breakfast altogether. It's too interesting a challenge to ignore and exactly what she'd wanted to know besides. She ends up missing the fuss that happens after he leaves her and receives his mail that morning, but her morning is fruitful in ways more pertinent to her own life that she doesn't mind overmuch.

It takes her asking Madame Pince for help and consulting the horribly cramped writing of the index cards to find the book she needs. It makes Kavieke pace anxiously and grumble. "It was always obvious in primary," he complains once she's settled in at a desk with the massive muggle book of animals (slightly outdated) that's usually provided to every school.

"Witches and Wizards have a spell for when their dæmons Settle," she returns. "They don't really need the book."

She doesn't like the idea of the spell any more than her dæmon does, naturally. There's something fascinating and wondrous about realizing your dæmon has Settled and going in to measure and catalogue all the characteristics to help narrow your search. The search feels just as important as the Settling, to Hermione, and she doesn't think she'll go to Madame Pomfrey or Professor McGonagall until she's discovered herself if Kavieke has settled.

"Fulgens is clearly Latin," she says, "'glowing', maybe?"

"I think it's 'shining'," Kavieke says and curls beside her to peer at the book. They'd memorized plenty of Latin words in preparation for spell pronunciation and sometimes knowing the translation meant it was easier to remember it for the actual spell. "What about ailurus?"

"I'd thought it might be 'gold' like from the periodic table," she says and immediately knows she has to be wrong. If fulgens is 'shining', then ailurus isn't going to be another adjective – it'll have to be a noun. A noun representing the animal's appearance, likely. "I wish we had a dictionary," she says suddenly.

"He said we were close," Kavieke sounds reasonable. "He also likes this colour. So we have approximate size and colour right there – the technical name, too. It shouldn't be too hard."

They find Ailurus Fulgens (common name: Red Panda) after having gone through most of the Musteloidea superfamily for size comparisons. The pictures in the book don't move but she traces her fingers over the rounded face peering out at her from a black face-mask and can't help but smile. "This?"

"I've never seen one before," Kavieke says and peers at it. He sounds curious and the fur around his eyes darkens in a flicker before he pulls back to let her read the rest of the page. "That's what he thinks we'll be?"

"Apparently," she says. Shining-cat… only extant species of the genus Ailurus… territorial and solitary? "You should try it."

"What?" And now she has to tear herself away from the book because Kavieke is staring at her like she's gone insane and she can actually feel his anger thrumming hotly in her chest. "Just like that? Just try what he says?"

"Well why not?" She has to stare at the way Kavieke is furious and glaring and refusing to come closer to at least look at the book a little. "Kav…"

"No!" he snaps. "I'm not doing it."

"Just once!"

He hisses and turns his back to her. She tries to reach out and touch him because it hurts that he's so upset but he deliberately steps away and the pull is doubly painful when he's furious. She makes a small noise that startles her but he just sits there and refuses to look at her.

It isn't unusual for an argument to occur between human and dæmon. There's a sort of fundamental mentality that neither can shake; dæmons tend towards expressive emotions which would feel odd from a human. It isn't the first time they've quarrelled but it is the first time Kavieke has maintained a pull on their bond because of it. She shifts closer and he shifts away in turn.

She wants desperately to know if Harry Potter is right about them. She hates not knowing something – especially something so easily discovered if Kavieke would just change already. But her dæmon means more to her than knowledge so she sucks in a breath and manages to get a hoarse sort of sentence out.

"You don't have to. We won't. I promise."

"Don't ask me to ever again," Kavieke says sharply and turns his head to look at her seriously. "Never, Hermione."

"I won't," she says even though it kills her to say the words. "I swear."

end.