36 – Clear Vision

Hermione looked away from Shacklebolt, who was in the process of sketching something on a large piece of parchment laid on the table. Their meeting was effectively on hold until he finished. Arthur and Bill Weasley had their heads close together and were quietly chatting. Harry and Ron were both just fidgeting, Harry rolling and unrolling a piece of parchment, Ron had transfigured a quill into a mini-snitch which he was idly flying around.

Watching even that small movement made Hermione's head hurt more. She squeezed the bridge of her nose firmly with her thumb and middle finger trying to squeeze the thoughts out of her brain. If that failed, which it apparently had, maybe she could just focus on the pain. She pushed her fingers against her own face harder.

She had to stop thinking about Draco, about Malfoy, about the world's most hideous monster, the best liar she'd ever encountered, an unbelievable violent creep who could, somehow, be impossibly gentle when he kissed her.

This wasn't working.

How could she have let him get to her so much? There wasn't time for this. The war was coming to a head and she could hardly function because of she'd let herself fall for some ridiculous, romantic bad guy gone good thing. Of course, he hadn't.

She could feel each heartbeat pounding in her temples. Her eyes felt like she'd rubbed them with sandpaper. She couldn't force them to focus on whatever Kingsley was doing. Her stomach couldn't even handle the thought of food without clenching and threatening another round of dry heaves.

How could she be this weak?

She had to get her head in the game. This Gringotts thing was important. The first thing she did was to cast a silent "visio manifesta." Her vision cleared immediately. Too many late nights studying had taught her the importance of taking care of her eyes. It was usually enough to get rid of the tired, draggy feeling. Maybe it helped this time, but today she was just too exhausted, body and soul, for the solution to be that simple.

She needed to focus on something. Gringotts would work for that. There was plenty that needed her attention. They had to get everything right. This was their chance to lay a trap for Old Ugly, to finally trick him into a confrontation with Harry. All they had to do was to get the pieces into Draco's hands.

Why did it have to be Malfoy?

And somehow she believed, even after all she'd seen, that he was going to help them.

Whatever lies he had told her . . . had he even lied to her? Obviously, she'd never asked him about whether he'd hurt Pansy. He had acted like he cared where Pansy was, what was happening to her, so that was kind of a lie, wasn't it? She shouldn't waste her time thinking about him. Although – it was very important to know whether they could still trust him to work against Old Ugly.

Harry was right. Her emotions were too high right now. Unless she remembered some blatant lie, some way in which he had worked against them, betrayed the Order in any way, she'd have to trust the others to see things more rationally than she could. That was just being sensible, wasn't it?

Her attention was drawn to Harry. He was nudging Ron. He set down the parchment, then leaned over and whispered to him. Harry looked awful, completely exhausted, just like she felt. More than that, he'd been incredibly fidgety the whole meeting, messing with that scroll, hardly paying any attention.

Ron gave him a nod, then stood and pulled out his wand. Kingsley was so engrossed he didn't seem to notice. Bill and Arthur Weasley both looked on. Bill looked amused. Arthur seemed as puzzled as she was. What was Ron doing? He was going to cast a spell on Harry? Hermione caught Harry's eye and with a quirk of her eyebrow asked him what was going on. Harry held up a finger.

Ron murmured something she didn't catch and began the strangest wand waving pattern she'd ever seen. It seemed to be a series of distinct moves, disjointed and robotic. Some of that might be Ron's style, but whatever that was, it was never going to work.

Then Harry grinned, his face now vibrant.

Clearly, she was wrong.

"What was that?" she hissed at both of them.

Ron looked smug. "Vigorato," he whispered, as though she should know what that was. He laughed, then leaned forward to explain. "It's the spell version of an invigoration draught. Luna's been showing me how to convert them. So far I have to do separate motions for each of the main ingredients, but it works. Doesn't it, Harry?"

"Absolutely."

"Is that what you kids have been doing at Andromeda's?" Arthur asked.

Ron nodded.

"Do one for Hermione," Harry prompted. "Hurry. He's almost done." He picked the scroll back up and began writing on it, seemingly adding notes.

Hermione glanced at Kingsley's drawing. He was now labelling things.

"Yeah? Hermione?"

"Okay."

She sat still, working to neither laugh nor frown at Ron's jerky motions, then it hit her, like a cool refreshing shower.

"Wow." She tried not to act too surprised. Ron would hate that. "I feel amazing."

"Told you," Ron said, "and it doesn't have the terrible taste of the draught."

He was right about that. Even a well brewed invigoration draught smelt absolutely foul, like a mixture of dirt and licorice, with some spoilt egg added for good measure and tasted worse than that. Why couldn't the most useful potions taste like a strawberry milk shake? Somehow they never did.

Shacklebolt stood to his full height and looked at them.

"All done. Here, let me show you." The tall wizard waved his wand and the diagram he'd been drawing stretched and levitated so that it was hovering in front of them all. "Is that large enough? Can everyone see?" Everyone in the small group settled back into their chairs and turned so that they would see Shacklebolt's work. "This is what the mocked up vault will look like. Now we need to discuss what should go where."

The parchment showed a roughly oblong room, with a massive door in the middle of one of the longer sides, various rectangles that must have been tables scattered throughout.

"Excuse me, Sir?" Harry stood and Hermione turned in her chair to frown at him. What was going on with him? "Do you need me for this part? I have something . . . something I need to do soon."

What was he talking about? Hermione looked at Ron, wondering if there was something she'd missed as she'd been gone nearly all last night, mixing potions at the Summers Estate, and . . . she didn't want to think about the rest. Ron looked as puzzled as she felt.

Kingsley had already dismissed Harry. He was nearly out of the door when she remembered. "Harry! Wait. We need to make a copy of your glasses."

"Oh, yeah." He slipped his glasses off and handed them to Hermione.

She set them on the table and waved her wand over them. "Gemino." An exact copy of Harry's glasses appeared. She made sure to pick up the original pair and handed them back to Harry.

"Don't you need more than one?" he asked.

She nodded. "Yes, but we can do that later."

"I'll talk to you when I get back," he said, and then he was gone.

Their plan for the Gringotts visit was pretty much set. Now all they had to do was make the vault convincing. Bill Weasley had seen enough pureblood vaults to know what it should look like.

Hermione and Ron were going to do the actual set up. As soon as they had the general layout established, Hermione was going with the Weasleys to the Burrow to pick up some things there that either were old and valuable or could be made to look so with some charm work. Bill was going to add some dark charms, and maybe some curses, on to some of the items to make them convincing. Unfortunately, he couldn't come with them into the fake vault itself. Only three of the goblins were aware of their plan, but Bill had a trace on him that would notify any goblins working where he was. They weren't a very trusting lot and they'd required it of him before he could work at Gringotts.

Harry had a trace too, although his was different. Apparently, anyone who had a vault in Gringotts would be traced if they went into someone else's vault. It was a new security measure. Hermione couldn't help but wonder whether it was connected to their break-in. Probably. That was the reason that it hadn't mattered if Harry left. There wasn't much more he could do.

Ron seemed sure that the two of them could handle the set up, but Hermione couldn't help feeling nervous about going back into Gringotts. The goblins hated her and Ron. They'd broken into the bank, stolen an artifact and set their security dragon free. Bill assured them that the three goblins they were working with hated Old Ugly so much that they were enthusiastic about assisting, but she wasn't sure. Mr. Weasley would go with them, but he'd have to stand guard upstairs. He had the same trace as Harry. Still, she'd feel better with him there. He was certainly competent. She hoped that was enough.

It was getting late when they got to Gringotts. They'd grabbed dinner at the Burrow, although Hermione's stomach had been too unsettled for her to eat much. Ron had done the Vigorato again, and, once again, the effect was amazing. One thing she was looking forward to was finding out more about Luna's method for creating spells from potions. Hermione had done Abolesco olere and erased both of their scents. She pointed out to Ron that he didn't need it, but he just asked "why should I be the smelly one?" She couldn't argue with that.

A goblin, Algoroth, met them at the doors. They waited patiently while he performed a long series of incantations before they could enter. Then he pointed a knobbly finger with a distended yellow nail directly at them. Bill had warned them about this part, but it was still unnerving. The spell was in Gobbledegook. It sounded as though he was using some sort of foul curse words and his disgusted scowl only intensified the impression. Algoroth's finger jerked and waved. It was almost as though it were a wand.

Hagrid could hide a wand in an umbrella. Was it possible that the long goblin nails concealed wands? Or could they merely channel magic like a wand?

Luna would probably have a theory on that. If this war ever ended they could discuss it.

Bill had told them that they'd have a short term trace put on them, as well as some conditional hexes which would only operate if they took anything, anything at all, out of the bank. The goblins were willing to work with them, but not willing to be burgled again. As Bill had warned the goblin magic felt odd. Hermione's skin felt irritated, like a mild rash. It wasn't too bad as long as it didn't get any worse than that. At least they would only last for 24 hours.

Algoroth hardly looked eager to work with them. In fact, he glared with loathing so intense that it was almost tangible and never stopped pointing his yellowed nail at them. Whether or not it was magically powerful, it was definitely disgusting and intimidating.

Then Algoroth hurried them behind the teller's desks and up a narrow, winding, iron staircase. He tapped his fingernails against the door in a quick pattern and it opened with a loud scrape. This was apparently his office. There was another goblin there.

Algoroth snapped, "they are here. Are you ready, Hardstone?"

Hardstone was the head of security. Hermione knew that from their briefing that afternoon, but why couldn't the goblin be civilized enough to introduce them?

"Set your things down," said Hardstone. "Everything. Wands too. "

"What is this?" Hermione asked, not wanting anyone to tamper with her wand.

"Remember?" Ron said, a comforting hand on her arm. "Bill mentioned that they'd mark the things we are bringing in so that we are allowed to take them out again."

Hermione flushed, embarrassed that she'd forgotten. She and Ron did as requested, carefully emptying their pockets as well. Once their things were piled together, a fairly small pile since everything had been shrunken and put into bags with undetectable extension charms, the goblin cast another spell, again in his own language, which caused everything to briefly glow with a vivid green, which then seemed to sink into the items.

Hardstone nodded at Algoroth. Without another word the senior goblin headed out of the office. Ron and Hermione hurried to retrieve their belongings and chased after him, heading out and down to the deeper parts of the bank.

When the heavy doors to the faked vault shut behind them, Hermione felt her shoulders relax. Algoroth had reminded them that they had exactly an hour, not a second more, not a second less. That should be plenty of time. Hermione frowned. If they only had an hour what was the point of having the trace and hexes last for 24 hours? The goblins were certainly not easy to work with. How did Bill do it day after day?

Hermione dropped the charmed knapsack she'd been carrying and jumped at its disproportionately loud clunk, followed by the noise of several metallic objects crashing into each other. Ron's bag followed just after, making an even greater din. He grinned at her and, while she couldn't yet bring herself to smile, she did feel a bit lighter. This was basically a puzzle and they were a good team on such things.

They each pulled out the gloves they'd tucked into their pockets and enlarged them until they looked like a cross between metallic gauntlets and gardening gloves. Bill had warned them that summoning charms wouldn't work properly within the vault, so the only way to safely handle the various magical objects was with curse breakers' gloves. Since there were actual curses on some of the items so they'd need to be careful.

They worked in silence for a while, concentrating on removing and enlarging the various items they'd brought without damaging them, and without touching anything in case it damaged them. Ron had remembered to throw in some old tables to use to set up things. It soon became evident that they'd need more space, so Hermione copied some of the tables.

At last everything was unpacked. Hermione hung Shacklebolt's diagram in mid-air with a floating charm and they began the arranging.

Hermione was in charge of the books, of course. She was feeling so off that she was hardly tempted to read them. They'd mostly been borrowed from Hogwarts, a few from the Weasleys'. She could peruse them later. She made sure that the creepiest looking one, "Magick Most Darke and Fowle," was prominently placed, and that "Amulets and Talismans" was next to it. The theory was that the first would attract a Death Eater's notice and then they might notice the amulet book and the conspicuous feathered bookmark in it. If that didn't work, Malfoy could purposefully draw their attention to it, but it would be less suspicious if someone else noticed it first. Too bad they still had no idea who would be with Malfoy.

She bit her lip. She hadn't actually confirmed that Malfoy had deciphered the clues she gave him. He was smart though. He'd see that the glasses were important in every memory, wouldn't he? With any luck it would be Old Ugly who put together the clues.

As she finished with the books, she looked over at Ron. He'd finished setting up of his family's old silver service, which actually was slightly dangerous thanks to Aunt Muriel's bizarre sense of humor. Around that he'd arranged several random pieces, including a cursed Egyptian ritual vessel with a jackal's head. They had to be careful with that one. Not only did it carry an ancient curse, but it was a sentimental favorite of Bill's since it was the object that had led to his current career.

Finally, they set out the bait, several copies of Harry's glasses. Ron had pointed out that leaving them in the open would make it look like they weren't important, so they put them in an old jewelry box of Molly's to which they had added several elaborate locks.

"Don't you think it will be suspicious if they just open with alohomora?" Hermione asked.

"Naw. The box is in a vault at Gringotts. It doesn't really need locks at all." He stepped back to look at the overall effect. "What do you think? Do they look like they've been gathering dust in here for decades?"

"Almost." Hermione bit her lip. "Do you know any spells that will cover them all in dust?"

"No, but I know one that repels dust. That'll explain why nothing is covered with it."

"That'll work," she admitted.

"It's harder than I thought, making everything look like it was thrown in here ages ago."

Hermione nodded. "The funny thing is that Harry's actual vault wouldn't be convincing at all."

"What? What do you mean?"

"I haven't seen it, but Harry says it's just a pile of galleons."

"A huge pile of galleons," Ron said agreeing. "Bill said he'd never seen a vault like it. Most are stuffed with stuff, family treasures and trinkets. Some are worth a lot. Some just mean something to somebody."

"It's kind of sad that Harry doesn't have anything like that, something to remember his parents by. There has to be more than just coins." Hermione realized too late that Ron might take offense to that. He'd never thought of Harry's wealth as just coins.

But he seemed to understand, shaking his head slightly. "Yeah. He does have that old photo album Hagrid put together."

"There is the invisibility cloak. That is something." Hermione paused as her mind drifted back to so many memories of Hogwarts.

"And his mother managed to make him immune to Old Ugly's worst, at least for a while."

Hermione started, then shook her head to clear the nostalgia.

"Wait." She turned to Ron, searching her mind for a particular memory. "What did Harry say that Dumbledore said about that?" She had a light feeling in her stomach. A fog was about to lift.

"What do you mean?"

"What did Dumbledore say? What did Harry's mom do?"

"She was willing to die for him. He said something like that kind of love gave him protection or something."

"That's it." Hermione felt as though a door had been opened, filling a previously dark room with light. "That's why his spells aren't working right."

"Who's spells? Harry's? They are working okay."

"No. Snake Nose. His spells wouldn't work against Harry because his mother had been willing to die for him, and now they won't work against us because Harry was willing to die for us."

"Is that it? Are you sure?"

"I think so. We'll have to check with the others, but we were all there that night, during the battle at Hogwarts. He died for us. That has given us protection."

They stared at each other, each checking through their own memories, trying to see if Hermione's theory worked.

Suddenly, Ron moved towards her. Before she knew what he was doing he had grabbed her in a bear hug and was spinning her around.

"You're brilliant! That's it."

Hermione blushed. "Ron, careful. There isn't much space here."

He set her down, slightly subdued, but still grinning.

"Let's finish this up, so we can go tell Harry."

But when they got back to Grimmauld Place Harry wasn't there. Ron had to head back to the Burrow since he needed to report back to his mother that everything had been carefully placed and everything had gone well. Hermione told him she'd wait up for Harry.

She settled herself in on the sofa in the parlour, just in front of the floo fireplace, thinking she'd be sure to hear when Harry came in that way. She knew she needed to keep her mind busy, keep herself from thinking about . . . she wouldn't even start. She brought a book about charms, hoping it would have something on how they were created, maybe some clue about how the wand movements were determined. Why couldn't wizards use indexes?

Her eyes grew tired. Being so comfortable had reminded her how very long it had been since she'd had a good night's sleep. She closed the book. Maybe, someday, when this was all over, she could invent a spell that would create an index for any book that needed one.

She woke with a start. How long had she been asleep? Someone had covered her with a blanket. It had to have been Harry. She sighed. She could talk to him tomorrow. Should she go upstairs to bed? It seemed so far away. She rolled over, pulled the blanket tight and went back to sleep.

It was still dark when she woke again, her mind instantly busy. Which Death Eaters would be going with Draco? With Malfoy? Hopefully someone smart enough to pick up on the clues they'd left, but not so smart that they'd catch the deception? Surely, the goblins would help. As long as they were sincere with their assistance? What if it was all a trap? Who would they be trapping? If they'd wanted to catch Order members, last night would have been their chance.

No Order members would be there today. Bill would be at the bank, in his office, but he was going to do everything he could to follow his usual routine, to give no clue that there was anything out of the ordinary going on.

Was that wise? Would he know if Malfoy needed help? No, Malfoy didn't need their help. He probably wouldn't want it, except that he'd needed her help before, when he was punished for helping Ginny. He hadn't complained then. He'd actually seemed grateful. Was that all an act?

What sort of a game was he playing? How much had been faked? How could he have tortured his own mother? How could he be that evil, that cold, and then act so genuine, so kind? It didn't make any sense.

And there was the whole episode with Ginny. He could have handed her over to the Evil One. Harry would have been at his mercy then. He hadn't. Not only that, she'd seen his injuries, seen his pain. That wasn't faked. He'd almost died. He couldn't possibly forgive Snake Nose for that.

He seemed to be firmly against the Dark Lord, no matter what other horrible things he'd done. What was the saying? "The enemy of my enemy is my friend?" Something like that.

So why would he pretend to be more than that? More than a friend? Had he been toying with her? Why? Surely, he took all of this too seriously to mess with her just for fun in the middle of this war.

What if he hadn't been messing with her? Could the demon she'd seen in Pansy's memory possibly have changed, possibly be trusted? Could he have been under the imperio? When someone acted completely out of character, that was always a possibility. Although – how was she to know which of his two personalities was the faked one? Could he possibly have been under the imperio the whole time she'd worked with him? Who would do that? Why? She would have known. Wouldn't she?

One way or another the Draco Malfoy Pansy had shown her couldn't be reconciled with the one Hermione had thought she knew.

With one last yawn, she stood and then stretched, trying to work the soreness out of her muscles. Sleeping on the sofa had been a bad idea. She hadn't even managed to catch Harry. When had he come in? Sweet of him to cover her, but she should have left a note for him to wake her up. Would he still be asleep now? He might not have gotten much sleep. Maybe she could go put something together for breakfast.

In the early morning light she was even more sure that they were on to something about why Snake Eyes' spells weren't working on most of them. The only one that hadn't been able to shake off the petrification at St. Mungo's was Hestia Jones and she hadn't been at the Hogwarts fight. Of course, that might have been Pansy. Maybe they should ask her when she switched with Hestia. Either way, Pansy had been fighting on the wrong side at Hogwarts so she wouldn't have been protected either.

Maybe she should go wake up Harry. He would want to discuss this.

She was turning her head from side to side, stretching her tight neck, when the fireplace flamed green, Bill Weasley's face peeking through the flames.

"Hermione? Is that you? Can I come through?"

"Yeah, come on in." She frowned. What was he doing here? Didn't he have to be at work soon? "What time is it? Why are you here?" She was too out of it to be gracious.

"Sorry. Something came up." Bill wiped his hand over his face as he stood up, smearing black ash all over himself.

Hermione chuckled, then cast a quick cleaning charm on him.

"Thanks. Look, I'm glad you're here. I . . . ." He paused. He was usually so unflappable, but now he looked strangely awkward, avoiding her eyes, looking randomly around the room. Something was wrong.

"Wait," she said. She silently summoned her wand, then pointed it at him. She needed a security question. "Why is Ron afraid of spiders?"

Bill held up his hands, and looked at her face for the first time. He still looked embarrassed and sheepish. "Because Fred and George transfigured his teddy bear into one when he was a kid."

She put her wand down. "I was just going to make tea. Do you . . . ."

"I haven't got time. I don't know how to tell you this, but there's a problem." Hermione turned. She had already started for the kitchen before she realized Bill's urgency. That explained why he was acting strangely.

"What's wrong?"

"It's Cutstone. He's the Gringott's vice chairman."

"I thought we had someone high up helping us. Is this Cutstone causing trouble?"

"Yeah. Well, Algoroth – you met him last night – he's the chairman. He's fine with everything, but Cutstone . . . you see, Cutstone is Algoroth's brother and they kind of hate each other." Bill blew out his breath. "Goblins tend to hold grudges. It's a long story, but what happened is that Cutstone came in this morning, early. It seems he was checking up on Algoroth. He went through the ward logs, saw that you and Ron had been let through after hours. The ward logs don't care about polyjuice or whatever. Cutstone kind of lost it. He used to be head of security, back when . . . well, you know."

Hermione had worried that their previous escapade would catch up with them. "He hates us," she summarized.

"Pretty much."

"Is he going to wreck things? Can the operation go forward?"

"I think so. Luckily it was just me, Algoroth and Hardstone this morning when he went on his rant. Cutstone actually hates Old Ugly as much as any of us. Their father was killed during the first war and, like I said, they hold grudges well. But he has a condition. He won't let the operation go forward unless . . . ."

Bill paused and looked up at her, his face so guilty that she knew whatever he had to say would be bad.

"What is it? Just tell me."

"He wants someone, well, . . . specifically, he wants you, to come stay in his office, just stay there the whole time the operation is happening. As soon as it is over then you can . . . ."

"He wants me as a hostage," she stated flatly.

"Um, the word he used was 'surety,' but yeah, kind of."

"What does he think we're doing? Just staging this whole thing to cover up a bank robbery?"

"I guess. I don't know. He didn't exactly calmly explain."

"What do you think? Is it safe?"

"Sure. Cutstone isn't bad, just has some family issues going on. I don't think he really thinks we're doing anything to harm Gringott's. He just wants to make his brother sweat."

Hermione straightened her shoulders. "Okay, then. How soon do I need to be there?"

Bill looked surprised. He must have expected her to put up more resistance. "Pretty soon, actually. The bank opens to the public at 8:00. Most of the goblins get in at 7:30. We need you in before that so none of them see you."

Hermione glanced at her watch. It was 6:55. "Can I have 10 minutes to freshen up and grab some breakfast?"

"Yeah. I can make the tea. You might want to grab something to read. You won't have much to do."

As they left the kitchen Hermione glanced up the stairs. There was no time to talk to Harry. Just before she and Bill left, she grabbed a quill and jotted out a quick note to Harry. "Went to Gringott's with Bill. Will explain later. Talk to Ron. We figured out something big last night. – H." She cast a quick paper airplane spell on the parchment and sent it upstairs to Harry's room.

"I brought some polyjuice," Bill said.

'What? Where did you . . . ?"

"Don't ask. Perk of working at Gringott's. Do you have more of the hair you used yesterday?"

Hermione nodded and retrieved some hair from her bag. At least this one didn't taste bad. After she'd taken it she did Abolesco olere, although she wasn't sure if she was getting rid of her scent or the scent of the muggle who's hair she'd used. Either way, it couldn't hurt. Then she followed Bill in to the floo.

One way or another, the Gringott's operation would be done before noon. They could talk then.

AN – So sorry for the horribly long wait. Summer got completely out of control – 5 kids home, basement flooded, major anniversary, much less writing time.

I'm back on it now. Hope the chapter was worth the wait. Hope you managed to remember where things had been (or were willing to reread to remember).