Hermione and Charlie had stocked up big time. Potions galore to use if they needed –ones for attacking, defending, and ones for pain in case one of them got hurt. As was mentioned during the meeting Chelf Press was still operational. They printed everything from books to newspaper articles. The articles (as with any newspaper) were monitored closely so that no negative remarks or propaganda against Voldemort could be printed. Instead they often headlined resistance members who've evaded capture thus far. Going there, in essence, was dangerous.

Both Hermione and Charlie altered their appearances appropriately before going and soon found themselves in Lennoxtown. It was a mixed district which worked to their advantage. Less people would be concerned with their visit. The tactic was simple, albeit it was always easier said than done. Wizard Uni was a few towns over, and they were to be students with an inquisitive mind. Despite war, life, however abysmal, still went on. It wouldn't be such an odd request. They only hoped that something good would come out of this risky adventure.

They had apparated a few blocks away from their destination, and so they walked calmly towards it. It was in this way that Hermione could really think on the matter that had transpired this morning and this inkling that couldn't escape her. Something, she didn't know what and she didn't know how, but something had gone on between Charlie and Draco without her knowing it. The way they looked at each other. Those heated glances and the crisp comments. Even now there was a hesitance in Charlie and it wasn't coming from the daunting exercise they were embarking on. From the moment he had offered himself to go on this trip with her, she had expected at least one awkward conversation to follow. And here it was.

"Hermione," Charlie said hesitantly. "Can I ask you something?"

Hermione kept in her sigh. "Sure, Charlie. What is it?"

"Well, what I'm about to ask may sound a bit ludicrous, but humor me anyway, okay?" He took a deep breath. "There's... There's nothing going on between you and Malfoy, is there?"

Yes, there goes the awkward.

But what could she say? Hermione liked Draco. She did. She hadn't felt such a connection with…well, with anyone in quite some time. But what was going on between them was a mystery in itself what with their non-relationship relationship. If she couldn't explain it to herself then how could she explain it to someone else?

Hermione nervously ran a hand up and down her arm. "We've been through a lot together as of late." She said carefully. "I do care about him."

"Oh," was Charlie's only reply. They were silent for a bit, but not nearly long enough. "But you don't like him like him, do you?"

"Would it matter if I did?" Hermione asked exasperatedly. "I'm a grown woman, Charlie, and I can see whomever I want."

"I know that. Don't think that I don't know that for a second. But it's Malfoy! He's a Deatheater and it matters very much in this case."

"Defected Deatheater,"

Charlie groaned. "Hermione,"

"Who would be better for me then?" Hermione challenged. "Ron, I suppose you would say. Or," she paused. "You, perhaps."

Charlie immediately began to look flustered. "I... Well, I..." He cheated his throat. "That's not fair, Hermione. You know how I felt about you."

"I know how you still feel about me. That's why I said it."

More silence. More awkwardness.

"We had decided not to pursue anything." Hermione said quietly.

"No. You had decided. I went along with it because that's what you wanted."

She supposed that was true. She had been sixteen at the time, he twenty-three, and Charlie had been... Well, he'd been Charlie. He'd been pleasant to be around when she'd met him at fourteen and more so when she was sixteen. Overall he'd been an attractive, intelligent, and energetic person and, needless to say, it'd been a very interesting Christmas holiday that year. But with him in Romania and her in school, Hermione had thought nothing could ever come of it. Not to mention she had felt incredibly guilty having been de-flowered by one of Ron's brothers when her own feelings towards the youngest brother had been up in the air at the time. She would always have a soft spot for Charlie, but nothing like he had for her. Apparently that holiday break had been enough to seal the deal for him.

"Malfoy's only going to hurt you."

"I didn't say that I was dating him."

"You might not have, but he certainly did." Charlie grumbled. "Going about, parading you around like he owns you-"

Hermione sputtered. "Owns me? Parading me around? Charlie, when has he ever-?"

"We're here."

She stopped suddenly at his words and looked up. They were in front of Chelf Press, a two-level building with busy workers that could be seen from the outside. Their conversation would have to be halted for now and they both put on their business faces as they entered the publisher's office.

Pass the front doors there was a gentle ringing of a bell to signal their arrival, but barely anyone had noticed. A possible glance up from their desks, but nothing more than that. Floating pieces of parchment zipped through the air. Some had photographs of resistance members on them -all of whom were hiding out in the same base.

"Can I help you?" A stocky witch with oversized glasses asked. Hermione cleared her throat and nodded.

"Yes. My friend and I both attend Smellerbee and we're working on a year-long project on a collection of books that were all published here. We were hoping to talk to whoever runs this place if that's alright?"

The witch eyed them both suspiciously, but really, how harmful could two Uni students be? She huffed and told them to wait where they were while she went to the boss. As it appeared, his office was towards the back and up a rickety winding set of stairs. It almost reminded Hermione of the burrow (long since destroyed), and by the look on Charlie's face it seemed to have brought back memories for him too.

From the top of those stairs a man who might have been about sixty stood by the railing next to the witch who had fetched him. He looked down at the two people who were requesting a meeting with him and gave them a nod to come up. Hermione and Charlie gave brief glances to each other before heading up to greet the man.

"Heather Peachly," Hermione introduced herself.

"Todd Warner," Charlie named himself.

"Michael Price," the Editor-in-Chief replied. "Come, have a seat. Natalie says that you're from the nearby Uni?"

"That's right." Charlie nodded. "We're in our final year and finishing up a project we've been doing on literature and-"

"Literature?" Mr. Price repeated, then he scoffed. "Not to be rude, but in our present times something akin to an Auror or anything with government would be best wouldn't you think?"

That surprised the pair. Charlie shrugged and cupped his hands in his lap.

"What good what it do?"

Mr. Price smiled. "You'd be amazed at what little steps you can do to help. But anyway, since you came to discuss books, let's talk about books. What is it that you want to know?"

"Well," Hermione began. "Our topic is on the nature of fairytales. More specifically, how that, although children stories, they present a bigger picture that may be missed yet somehow still internalized."

"Hmm… Quite a deep topic for something so innocuous."

"Yes, but 'little steps' and all that."

"Of course. Go on."

"Right, so, we have a few books -well, stories that we want to focus on. Like the Tale of the Three Brothers and Paul's Rock, for example."

Mr. Price's smile started falling the moment Hermione had mentioned the Three Brothers. It hadn't been lost on the resistance members, and they immediately went on their guard.

"Something wrong, Mr. Price?" Charlie asked.

"Wrong?" He chuckled. "No, no, nothing's wrong. May I ask why you chose those fairytales in particular for your project?"

"It's like I said." Hermione shrugged casually. "The bigger picture. There's...something more to these stories than meets the eye and we want to know more about them. To maybe find-"

"Well, as audacious as your efforts are, I'm afraid that I can't help you. All I do is publish. You should talk to the authors."

"We can't. There's no address, no way to contact them-"

"Then it seems that you're quite out of luck, aren't you!" Mr. Price raised his voice as he stood. Charlie stood with him, his fingers grazing the handle of his wand.

"I'll ask again, Mr. Price. Is there something wrong?"

"Who are you?" He demanded. "You're not from the Uni. You can't be."

Hermione stood, pointed her wand at the door, locked it and silenced the room. "You're right, we're not. I think you know what those stories are about which is why you're reluctant -not to mention jittery."

Mr. Price whipped out his wand quickly and aimed it at Hermione, but Charlie disarmed him before letting tight ropes bind around him.

"Let me out of this!"

"No." Charlie said as he pocketed the man's wand. "You're going to answer our questions."

"I refuse."

"Then you stay tied up." Hermione told him. "But, if you care so much about what we 'study' in Uni, then it's obvious that you want this war to end. If that's the case you will tell us everything you know."

"I can't. Those stories… They were written as a warning, nothing more. I didn't want-"

"You?" Hermione repeated in surprise. "Are you saying that you wrote them?"

Charlie stood rooted to the spot in disbelief. "That can't be possible. Those stories were written years ago. Decades upon decades. It couldn't have been you."

Mr. Price sighed. "When you're touched by magic, anything is possible."

"What do you mean 'touched by magic?'"

"I mean that once you use something so...dark and something that you can barely comprehend, that from a child up it stays with you no matter what you do. It's...a part of you."

Hermione's widened to size of saucers and she nearly dropped her wand. "Oh my Merlin… You're the boy! The one his father gave the cloak to! You...you're Ignotus Peverell's son!"

Charlie actually let his wand fall to the floor. "No… You? Is she right? Are...are you really?"

Mr. Price lowered his head and gave a pitiful nod. Hermione undid the binds and watched as he slumped to the floor.

"The Hallows have kept you alive all this time?"

"Yes," he said sadly. "An unnatural elixir of life. Funny then that it was given by Death."

"Then that's what it means, Hermione." Charlie said to her. "It's not just that having the Hallows make you harder to kill. You just...you live. You live longer than you could've ever imagined."

"And apparently you don't have to have them in your possession either." Hermione frowned with concern. Mr. Price nodded in confirmation.

"You only have to have used them once."

"You-Know-Who's only been using the Elder Wand." Charlie said more to himself than the other people in the room before he stared at them both in a panic. "He can't get his hands on them all. That would be-"

"You said that it's a part of you." Hermione said to Mr. Price eagerly. "That when you use something so dark it's a part of you. Does that mean you can find the Hallows?"

Mr. Price began shaking his head vigorously as he picked himself off the floor. "No. No, absolutely not."

"'No' you can't or 'no' that you won't?"

"No, as in no one should ever lay their hands on them." Mr. Price said fiercely. "The cloak, that was harmless. It was the only reason I passed it down to my son and so forth. But the others? They're the most terrible things to ever have come into existence. I won't give another person the chance to find them!"

"By not helping us you are!" Hermione argued with him. "You-Know-Who is out there hunting them down! Would you want him to live as long as you have? Ruling over us? Killing us?" She sighed and used her wand to remove the alterations on her face. Mr. Price jumped back in surprise when he realized who she was. "We're the good guys here."

"I… I had heard rumors that you were still alive." Mr. Price said breathlessly. "I thought it was merely stories."

"Well, now you know they're not. We want the Hallows to stop that evil man, not to use them. Actually it's just one Hallow we're after. The invisibility cloak. Last we saw of it, it was with two of of our friends when our base got destroyed. Providing that they still have it, it could lead us to them.

'Besides," Hermione added. "Harry, your descendant, would want us to have it. The cloak was passed down through family and we were his family. If you don't buy into anything else that I've said, at the very least trust that."

Mr. Price swallowed and stared at the young witch with a conflicting heart. He had followed his family tree through the ages and yes, Harry Potter was one of his sons after many generations. It had amazed him, honestly, how long and how well the cloak had been cared for and still within family hands. And by the looks of this young woman, she had cared for him very much.

Mr. Price sighed. "Just the cloak?"

Hermione nodded. "Just the cloak."

"...Alright,"

Draco went to breakfast as early as possible because he wanted to avoid the awkward. He had realized (horribly so) that without Hermione here he had no one. Nobody outright hated him (to his face at least with exception of that dragon-loving fool…), but no one was going to outright befriend him either. The last thing that he had wanted was to walk into the room filled with people and have to wonder where he should sit –if there was even a place for him to do so.

And so he got there before anyone else had and sat down at one of the tables. He realized now that he was exhausted and put his head in his hands. After breakfast he wanted to sleep. He'd sleep until he was sure that Hermione was back. Although, it was quite possible that he wouldn't get a wink –too stressed and too worried, wondering if her little expedition had led to her death.

"What's wrong with you?"

Draco snapped his gaze up and found Ron at his side. He looked around, trying to find who was here with him but there was no one else aside from them.

"I'm surprised you're being so nice." Draco couldn't help but ask. "You wanted to bash my head in last night."

"That was before I knew you had defected." Ron said at a mumble, and then he surprised Draco further by sitting down next to him. "Why?"

Why indeed… He was tired of death. He was tired of war. He was tired of….well, everything. But he knew the biggest reason of all was a walking, talking female with bushy brown hair. But he couldn't exactly say that, now could he?

Draco sighed. "There's a time for everything, Weasley. This was it."

"Oh… Well, better late than never I guess."

"I suppose. But before we go skipping in solidarity and all that, I'm still an arse. Don't piss me off and I won't piss you off. Deal?"

Draco went as far as reaching out his hand for Ron to shake, but he couldn't have guessed what would happen next. Ron froze up. He actually froze where he sat, rigid as a board with a vacant expression on his face. The blond hadn't seen him like this since he was still classified as Voldemort's puppet. It was almost as though he was Imperiused again except Draco hadn't done anything.

And of course people would start trickling into the eating area to see the sight.

Damn it.

"What's wrong with him?" Bill immediately demanded once he saw his brother. He quickly stormed over and moved Draco out of the way to get to him. Draco didn't even mind the shove as he was still in disbelief at this rapid turn of events.

"What did you do, Malfoy?"

"Nothing!" Draco defended himself. "I didn't do anything, I just… I just put out my hand for him to shake."

"What are you shaking his hand for?" Dean accused from the background. Draco sneered at him.

"What? I need special permission?"

"Well, you did Imperius for two years. And that's exactly how he looks now! Bloody Imperiused!

"Malfoy," Seamus said as he pushed himself towards the crowd. "Exactly how did you go in to shake his hand?"

Draco furrowed his brow. "Sorry?"

"How'd you do it? Slow? Fast? Was your hand near your waist at all?"

"What the hell Finnegan? What does how I moved my hand got to do with anything?"

"Everything." Seamus said. "Look, my dad was a psychologist-"

"A psycho-what?"

"It doesn't matter. The point is that he'd help people who were...you know…a little wrong in the head."

Draco immediately felt his insides squirm.

"And I think you moving your hand –however way you did it –set him off."

Arthur stared between his clearly catatonic son and Seamus with worry engraved onto his face. "You really think so, Seamus?"

"I do. Think about it. Ron's seen Malfoy use his wand to Imperius him for two years. I think it's possible that just seeing him moving his wand or even his hand is a trigger and would make him believe that the Imperius was coming. His head's trained to react this way."

Draco frowned and looked back at Ron. Percy was by his side now trying to help Bill snap him out of his state. It wasn't working, and the blond felt guilty although he hadn't meant to do this on purpose.

"Do you…? Do you think if I moved my hand again that he'll come back?" Draco asked. Seamus shrugged sadly.

"I don't know. And to be honest? I wouldn't risk it. He came out of it on his own, so let's just hope that he does it again."

Adrian had been holding up a small vial with Blaise's blood in it to his eyes when he heard a knock on his door. He quickly slipped it into his pocket before asking who it was. He smiled once he realized that it was his favorite witch of the moment and told her to come in.

"Are you okay?" Daphne asked after shutting the door behind her.

"Yeah, fine. Just a little blood in the mouth is all."

Daphne frowned. "If that's your definition of 'fine' you need a better dictionary."

Adrian chuckled before sitting down in one of the armchairs his bedroom had to offer. Daphne walked over while anxiously wringing her hands.

"What did Blaise want?"

Adrian looked up at her. Daphne was a nice person. She didn't deserve to be lied to nor manipulated, but there was a bigger picture to think about here. If he told her the truth, it would only lead to more questions, and although her loyalty to Voldemort seemed shaky, there was no telling how strong she would hold up under scrutiny should she become suspected.

"I know something about him that he threatened me not to repeat to anyone. Particularly you."

Daphne tilted her head in surprise and took an unnoticeable step back. "Me? Why me?"

"Because…" Adrian sighed. "It… It involves Astoria."

Daphne's face hardened in a second and she stood perfectly erect. It was just the sort of reaction he had expected and was looking for. "What about my sister?"

"Daphne, I'm really sorry. But he's the reason why your sister is missing. He killed her."

Daphne's face was quite heartbreaking to see. Her eyes had grown wide and immediately watered. Tears slipped down her cheeks as though a switch had been flipped and they were now on autopilot.

"What? How? Why? Astoria's never done anything to anyone!"

"I know, and once again I'm sorry. Blaise and I were out drinking and he let it slip. Said he got rid of her in the middle of one of the streets in London. I thought he was drunk enough not to remember what he said, but it looks like I was wrong."

"But that still doesn't explain why?" Daphne said with more tears streaming down her face. Adrian looked away and rubbed his arm. She caught onto that quickly and she hiccupped. "Adrian, you know. I know you do. Now tell me why!"

"Daphne, I don't think-"

"Tell me why, damn it!"

Adrian sighed. "He… He said that she was a horrible Deatheater and no one would miss her anyway."

Daphne's tears quickly stopped when her anger kicked in. "No one would miss her? No one would miss her?! I would miss her! She was my sister for bloody sake! I'll murder him!"

Adrian's face flashed in alarm as Daphne whirled around to leave his bedroom. Although the prospect of having Blaise dead would thrill him, he was still needed. There'd be no way to know any pertinent information without him. Luckily for him, that's what kept him alive these days.

Adrian's hand latched onto her wrist to keep her from opening the door. "You can't kill him."

"Why not?!" She shouted at him. "He killed my sister!"

"And he killed my girlfriend." He reminded her and she calmed down –if only a smidgen. "I haven't killed him yet because there's no one who can deliver punishment like the Dark Lord. Wouldn't you agree?"

Daphne gasped. "You're going to turn him over to him?"

"That's the idea. However, you know as well as I do that you don't just go up to him with nothing solid. I have to wait. We have to wait."

"For how long?"

"Not too much longer, I hope. There's just something I need to check out first. I was going to handle all of this myself, but since you hate Blaise as much as I do right now...maybe you'll help too?"

"I'll do whatever you need me to." Daphne said eagerly.

Adrian smiled. "Thank you."

Author's note: One step closer to finding the Hallows –or at least one of them! Poor Ron :(. And Adrian…Oh Adrian! Dipping into that Slytherin side of you….

-WP

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Karlie: Well, it turns out that they did! More on Fiona with the next chapter!