"Draco!"
Hermione sat up in bed with a start, her boyfriend's name falling from her lips. A sharp pain pierced her side and Hermione let out a low moan as she clutched at her stomach. For the next few minutes she continued to feel pain in her torso and even her right shoulder began to throb. As it always was these days her bed was silenced so her moans of pain went unnoticed by her sleeping roommates. It didn't take Hermione long to figure out the hurt she was feeling wasn't actually hers, it was Draco's.
Once she figured out the pain was Draco's, Hermione shut her eyes and tried to concentrate. It had been three days since Draco had gone missing and despite the hours she'd spent trying to locate him, this was the first time she'd felt a connection. Obviously her persistence and the fact he was the only thing on her mind had worked and she'd somehow managed to connect with her boyfriend. While Hermione still couldn't see or hear anything that could help her find Draco, she sensed enough to know he was suffering. Wherever he was someone was hurting him and the thought of Draco suffering was making Hermione's blood boil.
Once the pain had subsided, Hermione jumped out of her bed and began getting dressed. It was still really early, but Hermione knew when her dorm mates woke up they wouldn't find it strange she wasn't around as she was no stranger to early mornings. Moving quietly she gathered her things and crept out of the bedroom and left Gryffindor Tower.
Dodging into a deserted classroom, Hermione pulled out her locket and thought of the Manor. Seconds later she was arriving in Lucius's study, where she found Lucius sitting at his desk. Despite the early hour Hermione wasn't surprised to find Draco's father up and about. Since Draco had gone missing she knew neither him nor Narcissa had gotten much rest.
"Hermione, what are you doing here?" Lucius asked, looking up when Hermione arrived in his study. "Is everything okay?"
"I think I've made the connection with Draco." Hermione said, explaining what she'd felt that morning.
"At least it's something." Lucius sighed. "But don't mention it to Narcissa. She's in a bad enough state as it is, without knowing he's suffering."
"I just wish I could get more information about where he is." Hermione replied sadly.
"Don't push yourself." Lucius warned. He'd spoken to Voldemort about the connection and knew how hard it was to even make a connection, let alone use it to locate someone. "I know you're doing all you can to find him."
"How are things going on your end?" Hermione asked. "Have you got any leads?"
Lucius was utilising the Death Eaters to help find both Draco and Marcus. A section of them had already been looking for Marcus, but with Draco missing even more people were helping.
"Not a thing." Lucius replied, frustration evident in his voice. "And the Aurors are bloody useless, they've found nothing at the school."
For the last couple of days the Aurors had been a massive presence in the school as they searched for Draco. The entire castle and grounds had been thoroughly searched and the search had now expanded into Hogsmeade. So far that wasn't proving any more fruitful in the hunt for Draco, it looked as though he had just disappeared into thin air. Hermione wasn't even having any luck if working out if the Order had Draco. The members of the Order in and around school seemed totally clueless as the blond's whereabouts. She was starting to lean towards the idea that if the Order did have Draco, only a select few knew about it, or it was someone acting alone. Lucius himself had even subtly looked into the Order, and he couldn't find any evidence that it was them holding his son.
"I need to be getting back." Hermione sighed. "I hate having to carry on as though I'm not worried about him."
"I know, but he wouldn't want you to blow your cover." Lucius told Hermione.
Hermione nodded once as she stood up. "I'll tell you one thing when I find whoever has taken him, I'm going to make them suffer. They will pay for what they're doing to Draco."
"Yes, they will." Lucius agreed, knowing Hermione wasn't going to let anyone get away with hurting Draco. He just hoped that they found Draco before anything too bad happened to his son.
After promising to return later on, Hermione headed back to school. She arrived back at Hogwarts in time to head down to the Great Hall for breakfast. As she was entering the Great Hall, she found herself entering behind her friends and a quick mention of a morning trip to the library pre-empted any questions they might have asked.
"What do you think is going on?" Harry asked as they entered the Great Hall to find the Minister of Magic standing in front of the Professor's table.
While the Minister and Aurors had been around the school and had conducted group interviews with the students, they normally avoided meal times. After the first afternoon of cancelled lessons school continued on as normal, well as normal as it could with the mystery of a missing student hanging over the school.
"Maybe they have news on Malfoy." Ginny suggested as they took their seats.
A minute or two later it seemed as though they were going to get an answer to their question as the Minister turned around and called for silence. Once he was sure he had everyone's attention he began to speak.
"First of all I would like to say that sadly we are still no closer to locating Mr Malfoy, but I promise we will find him." The Minister began, giving the students a minute to digest the lack of progress before he carried on talking. "Secondly I want to announce that Professor Minerva McGonagall has been relieved of her head duties and she will go back to teaching full time. The role of Headmaster will be filled by Professor Severus Snape, who will continue to teach Potions this year as well." There was a muttering amongst the students which the Minister ignored as he turned to Snape. "Professor Snape, would you like to say a few words?"
Snape nodded and the room fell silent as he stood up. "Things will be continuing on as they have been this year, despite the change in headship. I also want to call a prefect's meeting at lunchtime. I expect to see every prefect and the Head Girl in the prefect's room on the stroke of lunch."
With his announcement Snape sat back down and the Great Hall was awash with gossip and chattering. For the first time since Draco's disappearance smiles were to be seen on the faces of the Slytherins but almost every other student looked grim at the news Snape was the new Headmaster.
"I can't believe the Ministry have demoted McGonagall." Ron huffed. "And worse they've replaced her with blood Snape."
"I bet you Lucius Malfoy had something to do with this." Harry muttered darkly as he watched Snape conversing with the Minister. "Everyone knows the Minister does whatever he wants."
"Can you really blame him for wanting rid of McGonagall?" Lavender asked. "She's in charge and she let a student be kidnapped. Any parent would demand action."
"Lavender's right." Ginny said. "McGonagall's pretty lucky she's still got a job. Lucius could have easily called for her to be sacked completely."
"I still don't like it." Ron grumbled. "Snape's going to be a dreadful Headmaster."
"Lucky for you, we've only got a few more months of school left." Hermione remarked. "You don't have to put up with him for too long."
"That's a relief." Harry remarked as Ron wholeheartedly agreed with him.
"What do you think the prefect meeting is about?" Ginny asked Hermione in an attempt to change the subject.
"I have no idea." Hermione shrugged. "It's the first I've heard of it."
"Maybe Snape wants to appoint a new Head Boy." Lavender suggested. "Until Malfoy comes back Hermione is the only one in charge and it's not really fair to make her do all the work."
"I guess that makes sense." Harry said. "I mean we don't even know if Malfoy is coming back, he might never be found."
Under the table Hermione clenched her fist and dug her nails into the palm of her hand. The glee in Harry's voice at the prospect of them never finding Draco was almost too much for her to handle. She hadn't let herself go anywhere near the dark thoughts like that were loitering in her head as she knew she wasn't ready to face that possibility. Just thinking of how he was suffering was painful enough but to think she might never see him again was just too agonising to contemplate.
"Hey, that means I'm in the running for the job." Ron remarked cheerfully, giving Hermione something to concentrate on other than Draco.
"How do you work that one out?" Ginny asked her brother.
"Well without Malfoy there's only three seventh year male prefects, so the way I see it I have a one in three chance at becoming Head Boy." Ron explained.
"Why don't we just wait and see what happens at lunchtime." Hermione suggested.
Ron agreed but all morning he kept up his remarks about possibly becoming Head Boy. By the time they arrived in the prefect's room at lunch he'd even roped the Ravenclaw prefect, Michael Corner, and the Hufflepuff prefect, Ernie Macmillan, into his theory. When Snape entered the room all three seventh years were discussing their merits as potential options to take over as Head Boy. The conversation soon ground to a halt when they realised Snape was present and even the confusing presence of Blaise Zabini with the Potions Professor didn't elicit any more talking.
"Let's make this quick." Snape called. "With Draco missing we're a prefect short, not to mention the fact he was also Head Boy. Blaise will be taking over as a temporary Slytherin prefect and he'll also fill the role of Head Boy."
"You can't do that." Ron blurted, forgetting himself.
"You will find, Weasley, that as Headmaster I may do whatever I wish." Snape snapped at the redhead, turning his deathly glare in his direction. "I suggest you stop your arguing before you lose your position as a prefect and I replace you with someone else."
Ron glared hatefully at the new Headmaster as he slumped back into his seat. Snape waited until he was sure no-one else was going to argue, before dismissing the prefects and keeping the two head students behind.
"I trust I'm not going to have any problems from you." Snape said to Hermione, almost daring her to argue so he could demote her from the position of Head Girl.
"No sir." Hermione replied. She was actually really thrilled with what had just happened as Snape had just made communicating with Draco's friends much easier.
"Good." Snape nodded, although his disappointment in not having to demote Hermione showed though. "Now show Mr Zabini what's what and tell him about his duties. I expect you to help your fellow student in this difficult time."
"Of course Professor." Hermione smiled sweetly at the Potions master, who sneered at her before sweeping out of the prefect's room.
"That was rather fortunate." Hermione remarked once Snape was gone and she'd locked and silenced the room.
"Yeah, I couldn't believe it when he approached me and offered me the job." Blaise said. "At least now we can meet up and talk if needs be."
"That's what I was thinking." Hermione said. "Anyway, how are things down in the dungeons? Do you have any new leads?"
She knew Blaise and his friends continued to search for Draco every day. Despite the Aurors supposedly scouring the place the Slytherins were openly scornful of their abilities and were looking for Draco in their spare time.
"Not a thing." Blaise sighed. "It's like he vanished into thin air. I just wish we'd stayed down at the Quidditch pitch with him."
"You weren't to know this was going to happen." Hermione reassured the wizard. "It's not the first time Draco put in an extra hour of practice and nothing happened, you weren't to know this time would be any different."
"I suppose." Blaise sighed, not sounding totally convinced. "What about you?" He asked, looking up at Hermione. "Are you having any luck finding him? Lucius mentioned you were trying to find him using his mark."
"I got a bit of something this morning." Hermione answered, telling Blaise about waking up in pain. "Hopefully when I try again properly I can get more."
"At least we know he's alive." Blaise said quietly.
"Yeah, he's alive, but he's clearly been tortured or something." Hermione replied, sitting down and dropping her head into her hands. "It hurt so much Blaise, and I was only getting echoes of his pain. He must have been in agony and it kills me that I can't save him."
Blaise looked at Hermione, unsure of what to do. He was used to her being the formidable Dark Lady, but right now she was hurting and needed someone to comfort her. Hoping he wasn't overstepping the line he sat down next to her and put his arm around her and drew her into his side.
"We will save him." He said soothingly. "Draco's strong, he'll hang on for us to get to him. I promise we will get to him, and when we do, heaven help the idiot who took him because The Dark Lady is going to kick their arse."
Hermione smiled softly at Blaise's words as she let herself believe them. They would find Draco and he would be fine. Losing him just wasn't an option and Hermione wasn't going to let that happen.
