A/N: Do you know what I can't understand. How people can look at their children, biological or otherwise, and not put them above everything else in their lives. Above your drug addictions, boyfriends, girlfriends, your drama, your work, I just don't understand.

Delores Umbridge was happy, if she was happy that meant something was going her way and was about to go horribly wrong for someone else. From half past two until a quarter till she had been smiling rather gaily at her large ornate coo-coo clock waiting for it to strike the next hour.

A lower staff member had dropped by with a message from his department around two forty but he had not given her the memo. Why? Because he knew if Delores Umbridge was smiling that widely she was out for blood and had already selected her victim. The little man in the old newspaper hat had not wanted to add to her euphoric feeling so the second he saw the wide smile on her face he had promptly shut the office door and returned to his own floor, where he told his boss she was not in and he was going home he didn't feel quite well.

No one had disturbed her since. She shuffled papers on her desk as she thought of the questions she had to ask the informant she was meeting at half past three. It had taken her quite a while to find the man; she had used nearly all of her sources, something that greatly irritated her because as soon as they came up empty she had to obliviated them. It wouldn't do for any of her plan to be traced back to her, she was being extremely cautious but obliviating the minds of so many informants would eventually come back to bite her in the ass. She knew this, so when Dungus told her he knew a fellow who he had given some very rare, very illegal, books to, books on raw magic, she was finally able to breathe a little easier.

The man she was meeting, in a muggle pub of all the places, was supposed to be a prodigal genius in the black market channels when it came to raw magic and such. She had no idea what kind of insight he could provide other wizards but she knew what she needed from him. She needed a way to destroy that silly bond and if he could give her the answers, or at least point her in the direction she needed to get a good start, she could obliviated him and be done with the lower class entirely. She despised using informants, having to associate with lower classes always left her in need of a good scrubbing afterwards.

The moment her clock struck three she was out of her chair and collecting her things. She said goodbye to her coworkers in an overly cheerful tone, which frankly scared the hell out of half of them, and headed to the floo. Where she would first floo home and then apparate to the muggle town just outside of London where the man had sent word he'd meet her.

Normally she'd never set foot on a muggle street, much less enter one of their pubs, but it was the best place for the kind of answers she needed. It wouldn't do for a wizard or witch to over hear their conversations and it definitely wouldn't do for Fudge to catch wind of her plan.

She had entered his office not long after meeting Black and Granger at St. Mungos to discuss how best to handle the little problem with Black and Granger bonding, but the poor man had turned so pale, drawn the curtains and shut and locked the door. He'd expressly forbidden her from getting involved in the matter. He feared Black's wrath and he had told her she would be wise to fear it as well. Best they not get involved, as the matter wasn't a threat to the ministry he believed the matter to be closed.

But he didn't understand what Delores did, it was a threat to the ministry. She couldn't let it carry on, if it got out that purebloods could be bonded with non-magical creatures, which was what she considered mudblood, and sometimes half-bloods depending on her moods, she just knew the bleeding hearts, led by the crack Albus Dumbledore, would jump at the chance to pair up every mudblood and pure-blood they could get their hands on. She wasn't about to leave her fellow supremacists vulnerable. She was going to devise a way to counter act the damning curse. Even if Granger had to die in the process, nothing was ever accomplished without first making some sacrifices.

~H~ ~H~ ~H~

She apparated into a dingy little alley beside the pub, she nearly gave the homeless muggle camped there a heart attack, but she paid him no mind. He was unimportant to her, not even worthy of a memory wipe.

She hadn't had high hopes for the place but her nose scrunched up as she opened the squeaky door and walked into the squalor. Just to have something to blend in with, her pink suit and fuzzy pink hat made her stand out like a sore thumb; she ordered a beer and carried it to the cleanest table she could find. She waved off the bartender with an air of superiority as he tried to offer her the change, not because she was being kind but because once he'd touched it she wanted nothing else to do with it. His hands were filthy from actual hard work and she felt insulted simply by being in his presence, she honestly thought muggles should cower and worship their betters, it always irked her patience when they didn't notice superiority when it was staring them in the face.

He thanked her and headed back to the bar. She idly watched the muggle sport as she waited for her contact to show up. Half past three rolled around and she was getting more frustrated by the minute. Punctuality was a pet p of hers; she definitely couldn't abide by anyone being late to a meeting with herself. Her time was especially precious after all.

By the time the wizard did drag himself in her untouched beer was warm and she had developed an intense dislike for the muggle sport called football. It seemed to be a giant knock off of Quidditch only they kicked the ball with the feet and they had a net and some string instead of a proper hoop. She found it ridiculous.

The wizard was not at all what she expected he was severely unkempt and in desperate need of a shave, and a bath from the looks of him. He wore a pair of dirty muggle jeans and a ratty coat and baseball hat. He had long hair for a man, at his shoulders, and it too looked filthy to her,greasy and dirty blond. She wouldn't have pegged him for a wizard if it hadn't been for the thin wand sticking out from his jean pocket. She definitely wouldn't have pegged him for the leading researcher of raw and untamed magic; he looked no older than thirty despite his haggard appearance.

He apparently had no problem recognizing her as a witch because he pulled out a chair, flopped into it and rudely pulled her warm beer to his side of the table where he took long drafts of it, apparently he didn't mind warm beer if it was free.

She scoffed at him but he ignored her until he finished her beer, at which point he leaned nonchalantly back in his chair and rocked it on two feet as he watched her through hooded green eyes. When he finally acknowledges her his voice was rough and smoky, as if he had just woken up or smoked too many cigarettes in his life. "So, what can I do for the mighty ministry official?"