Please read this note! Shorter chapter this time, but there is a reason. This chapter does not have a cliff hanger. It originally did have one, however, and I've left part of that in the end notes so you have the option to see it if you'd like. I thought it was worth giving a bit of breathing room with everything I've put you through. Lol.

One more chapter, much longer than this one, and I'll upload it as soon as it's ready! Love to dreamsofdramione and mcal for all they've done for this project.


Draco's fingers slid around the nape of her neck—warm and solid—and he kissed her forehead. He pulled their son into a tight hug, whispering, "It's okay. It's okay."

With a murmured finite, Hermione's cloud of confusion cleared, but she couldn't pull herself off the floor. Scorpius hugged her again for good measure, and whispered, "Mummy," until she thought she might be sick. A floorboard near them creaked, and he whispered Clara's name.

"I think it says something that you got here before I did and you were in a different country at the time." Clara stood in the throng of people that had poured into her home, offering them a smile. "Would you like me to take Scorpius for a bit?"

No, not particularly. Hermione wanted to keep him wrapped in her arms where she knew he was safe, but she glanced at the wand in Clara's hand. "Just for a short while. Stay inside?"

"We'll just go upstairs for a minute. Scorpius?"

He hesitated. "I'll be right back."

Hermione kissed his temple. "Of course you will. Behave for her, and I'll be up when I can."

Clara tucked her wand into the sleeve of her dress, and offered her hand to Scorpius before they disappeared up the stairs.

Draco pulled her up and crushed her to his chest. "I've never been more terrified in my life."

"I don't want it to sound like I'm unhappy to see you because I'm very grateful to see you, but you shouldn't have Apparated from outside the country. It looks like the portkey would have only delayed you by a couple of minutes." Hermione hadn't looked around her yet. Her stomach turned over on itself.

If she looked around, she would probably see faces from photographs that she'd seen in the albums.

"You think I'm going to waste any time? Unlikely."

She could hear her heartbeat loudly in her ears, and she tightened her grip on his shirt. "Take me into the kitchen, please. I don't want to be around all these people. I can't breathe."


Hermione had a headache. By that point, it was nothing new to her. She spent several minutes insisting it was just a result of the blunt trauma, and not because the curse was acting up again. That part was over. However, with it gone, it made way for a new slew of problems. Someone wanted to get rid of her, and that want was still just as valid as it had been in 1998.

"You're not safe here." Draco gripped the bottle of whisky she handed him by the neck. "We shouldn't be drinking."

She snatched it back from him and took a greedy swallow. "Please let me have something to dull my nerves. We'll take a potion before we see Scorpius." The Aurors had vacated her home, but it was still a fucking mess. Everything had been overturned in the sitting room when her attackers had stormed in. "I know I'm not safe here. That was clear when someone grabbed Scorpius."

She'd run him through the scenario multiple times, and each time, Draco managed to pull information out of her that Hermione hadn't thought to say before. "You're very good at talking to victims," she murmured.

"Don't call yourself that."

Hermione rolled her eyes. "It's true. I don't understand why they left without taking one of us. Could they have known you had been alerted already?"

He shrugged and took a long drink. "It's possible. Perhaps their employer has ties to the Ministry. Not only was I alerted, but Robards knew within an instant. He was prepared."

When she attempted to hop onto the counter, Draco slid his arm around her waist and lifted her. He rested in the cradle of her thighs as Hermione slid her finger across his lips.

"I hate that someone has made me feel threatened in my own home. I brought Scorpius home for the first time here. He took his first steps here. He said his first words here, and now someone has taken our sense of safety from us."

Draco drained the last of the bottle and dumped it into the trash. "Live with me." He gripped her thighs as he rasped the word. "I know you don't want to come back to England right now, but at the very least, live with me. You're not safe here, and I realise it may feel too fast—"

She wrapped her legs around his waist and pulled his closer. "Oh, Draco. I've loved you since I was eighteen. I've had your son." Hermione kissed him weakly. "If anything, we're just late in doing this too."

"Say it again."

"I love you," Hermione choked. "I never forgot, not really. You just had to remind me."


"Absolutely fucking not." they had just laid Scorpius down. It had taken quite a bit longer to get him to sleep, and Hermione worried Draco's volume would wake him. "I'm not going to do it."

She threw her hands up. Hermione turned away from him and made her way down the stairs.

He followed. "Do you hear yourself? It's too much of a risk."

Gnawing her lower lip, she counted to ten to find something she could say without regretting it later. "Is it worth risking them coming back? Make no mistake, someone will come for us again!" Hermione shouted.

Draco raised his wand and cast a silencing charm as her voice shot up. "I'll be here."

"That's not enough. You'll be called away again. That man dragged my son around by his hair. Scorpius watched as I was slammed into the bloody floor. He had a magical outburst on a scale that I've never even heard of before."

His throat bobbed as he swallowed. "I'm not willing to risk losing you by performing Legilimency. It might cause a lapse—"

"The risk doesn't outweigh the reward." Hermione scowled.

Draco dragged his hand across his face. "I'd forgotten what it was like to argue with you. You're so fucking stubborn you won't even stop to listen to me."

There was a delicate clearing of someone's throat from the edge of the room. "Pardon me, I didn't know you were having a row when I arrived through the Floo." Narcissa's features were pinched. "Hermione, I've retrieved what you asked for." She glided across the floor and extended her hand.

His brows knitted together in confusion. "Mother?"

Hermione opened the box and drew her wand from the velvet lining. It reacted to her instantly with a low pulse. "Thank you, Narcissa. I appreciate this."

Narcissa nodded. "I'm only sorry I couldn't get it to you sooner. I heard what happened."

"They've already reported it to the masses then?" Hermione raised her wand and brought it down in a cutting arc.

Draco's eyes widened. It was slight, barely there, but she knew him as intimately as she knew herself.

"I'm afraid so." Narcissa kissed Draco's cheek. "I'm going to leave, and let you two resume your… bonding." He coughed and Narcissa swatted him on the back. "Careful, dear. You don't want to choke."

"Wait! Mother, perhaps you might be able to mediate this discussion?"

"Mmm, no." Narcissa laughed quietly. "Whatever this was about, I'm going to go ahead and agree with Hermione."

Hermione smirked. "Even your mother agrees with me."

"My mother doesn't even know what we're talking about."

Narcissa exited the room while their bickering resumed.


After their argument, Hermione didn't attempt to change his mind immediately. Eventually, it would have to be done, but first Draco would need to be convinced, and that was a task in itself.

It was tremendously bittersweet when she quit her job. It was flighty and not at all like her to resign over the phone but that it hadn't been possible for her to do so in person.

Scorpius enjoyed coming downstairs in the mornings to find Draco sitting on the sofa with a cup of tea in hand. They spent that private time together, and Hermione always crept around the corner to see them as the sun broke against the horizon. Scorpius asked questions about magic, about her, and Draco somehow always had the correct answers.

"Mum says she can do magic better than you can."

"She's right." Draco laughed, and there were barely there wrinkles at his eyes as he head tipped back. "Mum can kick my arse any day of the week."

"Better make sure you take out the garbage then."

Draco wheezed. "Yeah, you're right."

She reveled in those moments up until they made her sick again. Years of this had been taken from them. Draco had been robbed of a series of firsts, and she hated that there was no way to get that time back.

Later he found her sitting in the middle of the bed. "Granger?"

Her locket was a barely there weight in her palm. "I took a photograph of us from the albums. Scorpius hasn't seen it since it's from the war. There's only a handful of those pictures, but I'm not ready for him to ask questions yet."

He joined her, wrapping his arm around her shoulders. "That's a good photo. Not as good as the one I have though."

"What do you mean?"

Draco reached into his trouser pocket and pulled out his wallet. "Whenever Potter and I arrived in a new city on a mission, I would inevitably show this photo to anyone that would talk to me. I showed it to an innkeeper not far from here when I first arrived. He pointed me this way because he thought he'd seen you. Potter pointed out that I had heard it all before, but I had a tendency to follow every lead." His fingers brushed hers as she took it from him.

"Oh, my God," Hermione breathed, covering her mouth. "I forgot all about this." She ran her thumb over the words: Order Safehouse '98, Granger. "You kept this all this time?"

"Of course I did."

"You never gave up on me." She knew that, but for the first time, just what he'd gone through to get to this point truly sank in. "We lost so much time."

Draco rested his chin on top of her head. "When all this is over, we'll make it up to each other, okay? Potter and Weasley are working on this right now."

"You want to be there, don't you? Helping them?"

"Of course I do, but I know that if I got my hands on who did this… I might not come back. It's not a risk I can take again." Draco rubbed her back. "If I knew who kept you from me, I doubt I could control myself."

Hermione looked at the photo again, running her thumb over her face.

It felt like it was her and someone she didn't entirely know all at the same time.


When Ron and Harry returned to France, Hermione had known days in advance that they were coming. It wasn't that she was nervous—she was—she was—fuck.

She was nervous.

From the bedroom, Hermione could hear them arrive and the laughter that followed. Reassuring herself that it wasn't as terrifying as her mind made it out to be, Hermione slowly went down the stairs. She wrapped her arms around her middle, her fingers digging into her jumper.

Scorpius chatted animatedly with Ron and she saw Ron's bewilderment. "Blimey, you look just like a mini Malfoy!"

Hermione cut in before the conversation could go any further. She didn't actually say anything at first, though she meant to, and three sets of eyes settled on her. "Hello."

"Mum," he tugged on the hem of her top. "They were in the albums. Do you know them?"

Nostalgia turned her stomach. "I do know them. They're my best friends. Do you remember their names?"

Scorpius pointed to each of them and named them. He drummed his fingers against his chin, which was more like Draco than any other mannerisms he had. "Ron hates Crookshanks."

"No, no," Ron said quickly. "I thought Crooks ate my pet rat so I didn't like him."

"Who would want a pet rat?" Scorpius asked, his nose twitching in disgust. "Crooks eats those."

Ron snorted. "See? I wasn't so far off base then either!"

"You were definitely wrong." Hermione's shoulders relaxed. "But how were we to know it was Pettigrew?"

Her son tucked himself behind her leg, suddenly shy, and Hermione smoothed his hair down. "Neither of us"—she nodded to Draco as he entered the room—"were able to introduce you after…"

Scorpius' fingers tightened on her leg, and she opted not to refer to it as an attack at all.

"This is Scorpius. He's not shy, so don't let him fool you, but he's not the biggest fan of strangers right now."

Harry crouched down, his heavy boots creaking against the floorboards. "How are you holding up?"

Her son peeked up at her.

"You can talk to him, sweetheart. There's no need to ask me for permission."

He slid out from behind her. "Are they going to come back? And don't lie."

"They might try," Harry admitted. "But we're not going to let them touch you ever again. Your dad will be right there and your mum. They'd never let anything happen to you."

Scorpius crossed his arms. "I don't want them to hurt Mum. I tried to help, but I don't know how to do it again."

From across the room, Draco growled a muted curse under his breath and rested his knuckles against the wall. "I'm not leaving again."

"You promise?" Scorpius countered before turning back to Harry. "Why did they hurt us?"

Harry faltered. "I think that's something your mum and dad have to explain to you. But for the record, you were very brave the way you protected your mum. I bet that guy won't walk straight for a week."

Normally, it would have earned a laugh, but Scorpius didn't even smile. "Good."

"Scorpius, why don't we go outside?" Draco ushered him out of the room. "We'll just give you some time, alright?"

She nodded.

And then they were alone.

Rocking back on her heels, Hermione wasn't sure what to say. She couldn't find the words, and it seemed that they didn't know either. "I, um—"

Ron spoke coherently first. "Can I hug you?' As soon as she nodded, he enveloped her in a tight hug, and picked her up off her feet. "Merlin, I thought I'd never see you again."

Hermione reached for Harry, sliding an arm around each of their necks. "I'm so happy to see you both." They set her down, and both of them sat across from her on the sofas. "I'm sorry if I'm not myself right now. Truly, I'm so glad you're here."

They talked for a long while, and she learned where they were at in their lives. Ron had married Susan Bones from their year, and they were quite happy, expecting their first child.

Harry had done the opposite, though Ron outed his mutually beneficial relationship with Ginny with an awkward pull of his collar. "Actually…" Harry cleared his throat with some difficulty. "I've met someone. Ginny's trying dating, and I think we're ready to go our separate ways."

Ron leaned back. "Who made that decision?"

"Ginny. There's always been some kind of love there, but it's not what it once was. I just needed someone to hold on to, and she's always been there for me." Harry's knee jumped up and down. "A lot has changed since you've been gone, Hermione. The people too."

Hermione tilted her head. "You're stalling. Spit it out and get it over with."

"I'm seeing Pansy."

Ron froze, his eyes comically wide. "Parkinson? You're spouting all this rot about how people have changed—"

"What are you yelling about?" Draco's drawl came from the corner of the room. Scorpius stood beside him, mimicking his stance with his arms folded across his chest.

"Harry's dating Pansy," Hermione informed him.

His mouth dropped open. "Well, that's—"

"Weird, right?" Ron asked.

"Interesting." Malfoy swallowed


Once Scorpius was dressed in his pyjamas, Hermione nodded to Draco. "We need to tell him the truth now. Ron almost let it slip earlier, and it would be best if he heard it from us."

Draco followed her up the stairs and into Scorpius' bedroom. His back was against the headboard and he raised his head.

"We have something we'd like to tell you," Draco said.

She sat on the bed beside Scorpius while Draco took the other side. "You know that Draco is your father, don't you?"

"Yeah, of course. It was my Christmas present."

Her eyes were already misty. "I've told you how I've remembered everything, but I haven't discussed who your father is with you. You've asked me that same question for years."

Scorpius picked at a frayed string. "I don't care about him. He left us."

"Draco is your father, in every aspect," Hermione blurted. As Draco pinned her with a stare, she realised it probably hadn't been the best way to say it, but dragging it out would have been useless. "Draco never knew about you. Due to some… events, I didn't get the chance to tell him I was pregnant."

Scorpius grabbed Draco's hand. "Then why did it take you so long to find us then?"

"A witch attacked your mum, and hid her away here. Anyone who was there—who knew Hermione—thought she'd been killed, but I kept searching. The day I saw you, I knew you were my son."

"Is the witch coming back?"

Hermione shook her head. "She's gone, but we don't know who helped her. It's likely that whoever it was is the same person who sent those men to our home."

Draco pulled Scorp into his lap and slid closer to Hermione. "I met your mum at Hogwarts, the same school I told you about."

If Scorpius noticed him change the subject—and surely he did—he didn't point it out. "Will you tell me about Hogwarts?"

She leaned her head on Draco's shoulders while they told him all about it.


One last chance to look away if you don't want to see this.

His lips pressed to hers, and Draco's wand brushed her temple as the whispered word unfurled across her skin. "Legilimens."

Hermione's fingernails dug into his thigh as he gently sifted through her memories. He was efficient, if a little slow—he heard that thought and hissed—until he arrived at the memory. She'd told him what they had done to her, to Scorpius, but to see it…

His anger rippled. Draco ripped away from her as if the memory burned, his chest falling with a stuttered breath. His features screwed up with rage and Hermione was certain that she had never seen him angrier than he was then.

"That fucking bastard," he growled.