A/N: Alrighty. Note the title. A few of you will have a few of your questions answered here. Not all of them, cos that's silly, but some of them...that doesn't mean you should stop asking though ;)

Massive love to all the non-English speakers who are following along. I apologise that Spin and I are so very English sometimes that we write things that make it very hard for you to figure out. Ask me, if we do. I'll do my best to explain :)

Also - to the wonderful reviewer who reviewed that this isn't moving fast enough (I think that's what they said - it was in French of which I speak, like, six words).
I'm sorry that you think that {don't hate on them, I welcome and cherish all opinions} But I'm also going to use that review as an example to say the following:
Have patience, my darling readers.
We will get where we are going when we get there. You gotta build love, real love. You can't just plonk it down on top of people - that's lame, even though a lot of people do that - Fanfiction is nothing if not convenient. But real love is built and protected and moulded with soft and gentle hands. It takes time. I promise you I won't leave you hanging. I know I've said that before but I do truly have about 54 chapters written completely and maybe six or seven to write. I'm not disappearing again. I gotchu.

Also, after all this work and ten years of dabbling, Spin would actually kill me if I disappeared. So. Thank you to you, thank you to Spin. Spare a thought for her. Yesterday I think I was pretending to be a door salesperson with how many doors I had in the chapter. Today, it is beds. I do what I can, but Spin makes me great.

For disclaimer, please see Ch2.

*Trigger Warning: Small flashback to physical abuse of a child, with allusions to domestic abuse*
[Again, nothing very graphic. I have placed the memory in italics so if you wish to scoot past it you can]

-0-

Minerva moved quietly through the empty common room and up to the Sixth Year dormitory. She paused by the door, glancing at Miss Brown's bed, taking in the makeup and discarded clothing and shaking her head at some of the selections strewn about the floor. She moved to Hermione's four-poster and started gathering her things. With a wave of her wand, everything that belonged to Hermione popped itself neatly onto the spotless bed and she quickly and efficiently loaded the trunk. She sat on the mattress, suddenly tired of everything. Crookshanks weaved between her legs and she smiled, leaning down to give him a scratch.

"She will be in my room for the foreseeable future, my lad," she said, watching as he flicked his tail at her and stalked away, slipping out of the room. Absently, she could see why he and Hermione were suited to one another. They were both extraordinary outliers in a sea of normality.

Taking a deep breath, she knelt before the wall, wincing as her body protested. She ran her hand over the wall and felt the brick that Hermione had removed. Her heart was beating painfully against her ribs as she felt along the edges. There was no conceivable way that Hermione should have been able to side-step the castle's wards. Hogwarts wards were, secretly, semi-sentient. Albus had explained as much of it as was possible to her once; that it was a merging of their magic, the castle and the Headmaster, that created the wards, rather than an overlay as usual wards were. It was why, on occasion, he could do something similar to apparition within these walls. She could not, however, not for the life of her, work out how Hermione could have breached them, in order to get into the wall itself.

She could feel it, as she traced around the brick. It felt like Albus, but also not - she wondered if that was Hogwarts, or Hermione. She had felt Albus' magic many times in her life. Everything from duelling together to making love together meant their magic had often entwined. It was not common knowledge that magic could be consciously felt anyway. As far as they could deduce, only the most powerful of them could do it. After so long, the feeling of Albus' magic was second nature to her, and Albus said as much about hers as well. She put her hand back on the brick, and as if sensing what she wanted, she felt it shift just a touch. She pulled it out of its space and reached in. It was like reaching through a curtain, and she hoped desperately that Hermione hadn't damaged the wards in general by opening up a spot in Hogwarts' otherwise solid armour.

She pulled forward the Transfiguration textbook and then felt something else. She reached in a little further and Hermione's diary followed as well. A tiny part of her wanted to read it, but after today's revelations, Minerva wasn't sure what enchantments lay on it, so she placed it gently into the trunk and looked down at her old book.

She was transported back to a time when it was brand new. She remembered writing in it. How hateful she'd been, how self-absorbed, how angry.

She was powerless to stop a memory from appearing in her mind.

She watched from the doorway as her father, a respectable clergyman supposedly, had punished her mother for Robert's accidental magic. As if it was her mother's fault that her children were special. She watched the memory as a bystander, as the girl of fourteen fought back in defence of her mother. And how William had applied bruise paste against her cheek some time later. She remembered how her mother had said and done nothing.

She didn't dare open the book, too afraid of what other memories would pop up again. She sighed, realising she'd spent too long on the ground and put the book in her pocket to deal with later.

She banished the trunk to her rooms and smiled sadly, running her hand over the pillow Hermione had been sleeping on for most of the year. She didn't want to think of how long exactly, in case her mind decided to remind her how long she had left with Albus.

They'd never had children, something she was both happy and sad about, depending on the day. As she had buried other people's children, she couldn't help but imagine just how much more difficult their lives would have been. Her association with Albus had been well-known even though very few knew of their actual marriage, but had they added a child to the mix? She sighed. The persecution they had faced was bad enough, without having to worry about that as well. But, in those dark moments of solitude, she sometimes wished she'd had something - or someone - to cling to while Albus was off saving the world. And now, to comfort her while he was on his way to death.

Deciding to put that melancholy away, she descended down the stairs. She ran her hand along the wall, remembering a time when she was a child in the same tower. Her breath wobbled as everything seemed to hit her at once.

"Professor?"

Her eyes flew open and she found herself staring at Ginny Weasley, looking guiltily up at her.

"What on earth are you doing up here?"

"Well," Ginny sighed. "It's really cold downstairs and most of us didn't take our cloaks. I figured I'd get everyone's, seeing as," she winced. "Well, it was better for me to come and get everything than someone else doing it."

"I -" Minerva shook her head. "Did Professor Dumbledore not speak with you yet?"

"He said he would, just that he had something else to do first. Said it wouldn't take long, then we could go back to lessons."

Thinking about it, Minerva realised that he must still be checking the wards while everyone was in one place.

"Miss Weasley, what happened? Truly?"

Ginny looked shocked, but Minerva didn't have it in her to care.

"She didn't tell you?"

"She has been with Al -" she swallowed. "Professor Dumbledore. But, I am asking you."

"You know," Ginny said hesitantly. "I know, about you and Dumbledore I mean. And it's okay, I would never betray your trust or anything. I just," she shrugged lamely. "Wanted to let you know, that I know, I mean."

"Thank you, Miss Weasley," Minerva frowned, wondering if they really were that transparent. "Ginny."

Ginny smiled at the use of her first name and asked silently if she could sit. Minerva nodded and joined her, sitting on the sofa across from the armchair.

"Lavender was being a bitch," Ginny frowned. "Like, beyond normal. Has been all year," Ginny glanced at her. "But you knew that."

"I did. Hermione insisted she could handle it. Is Miss Brown, is she usually," Minerva tried hard to find the right word. "Unpleasant?"

"Always," Ginny revealed, surprising Minerva somewhat. "She has this knack for figuring out your biggest affliction and then she needles you with it, endlessly, until you snap. If she suddenly decides she hates you, there's no stopping her."

"And Miss Granger? Her parents?" She sighed, giving up the subterfuge. "Albus said something about her parents. A memory charm?"

"She changed their memories to protect them from You-Know-Who. They no longer think they have a daughter," Ginny whispered, a tear rolling slowly down her cheek. Minerva's heart beat loudly in her ears. "She expected to go to Azkaban for it." Ginny wiped the tear away angrily. "Was prepared to, even sold her house!" She shook her head. "Well, anyway, that was one part of it. I really don't know how Lavender knew that. I didn't even know it until just before Christmas. I caught her coming out of her trunk."

"I'm sorry?"

"She's figured out how to put this expandable floor in her trunk. All their stuff is in a chamber underneath."

Minerva's eyes bugged. That explained the limitations on it.

"But yeah that was one thing, and then 'Mione got mad at Ron cos he's going out with Lavender." She met Minerva's shocked eyes. "Not because 'Mione wants to go out with Ron or anything, I'm pretty sure she thinks he's a moron," Ginny smiled. "Not wrong sometimes, but she was mad because he's selling himself short, you know? He's in it for the -"

"I will take your word for it," Minerva said quickly. She made a mental note to discuss it with Poppy later. "But, what caused her to snap like that? What could have made her so angry that she could do nothing but," Minerva swallowed."Well, what she did."

"As I said, her parents were a big part of it, but it was more than that. Lavender didn't hold back. She -" Ginny blushed, and couldn't meet Minerva's eyes.

"Ah," Minerva said sagely. Sitting back tiredly. "Me."

"Yeah, but Lavender was well out of line. I told her myself to shut up. 'Cos you know, Hermione's been protecting you all year," Ginny muttered. "So she was already on edge. And what Lavender said was," Ginny's eyes told her enough. "Awful."

"Sorry?" Minerva asked, leaning forward to make sure she'd heard correctly. "What do you mean protecting me?"

"Oh," Ginny blushed. "I thought you knew?"

Minerva shook her head.

"Um, well, she's been checking everyone's homework. Like," Ginny made sure Minerva saw the next words coming. "She even checked the Slytherins' homework. And because she's a Prefect, she's been handling most of the stuff that probably would have come to you from here. She's got Professors Flitwick, Sprout and Snape bringing her detention notices and stuff," Ginny shrugged. "There's less now that Fred and George aren't here, so she just dealt with it."

"She," Min gaped. Suddenly everything just clicked into place in her head. The unusually decent essays. The quiet classrooms, the general lack of malarky this year that she had put down to life without the twins. The extra time she got to spend with Albus. "She -"

"She loves you," Ginny smiled gently. "Like her parents, she wanted to support you in whatever capacity she could think of. She cares about you and it was the only way she could think to help that you'd accept." Ginny trailed off, but Minerva couldn't think beyond how much Hermione had taken on this year.

"But why?" Minerva worried her thumbnail. "And I don't understand why she wasn't arrested by the Ministry."

"Neither did she," Ginny shrugged. "Like I said, she was prepared to go to Azkaban. As in, she sat there for days, waiting for them to come."

"Hmm," Minerva muttered, thinking back to Hermione's insistence at going to Azkaban. "And why me?"

"You're her home away from home. You're the only teacher that truly pushes her to be better. And you're her constant, the same all the time. Except for this year, obviously, but it was more than warranted. And, well, they saw, didn't they?"

"Saw what?"

"Um, wow. Okay. Nobody told you that either," Ginny looked as though she didn't want to be delivering this piece of news and Minerva wasn't sure she wanted her to either. "When they had their Astronomy O.W.L. last year. Um, Hermione's class. Harry, Ron and the rest of their Year. But, I mean, the night you were attacked. She -" Ginny looked at her hands. "None of them were quite right afterwards, you know? Hermione, she," Ginny shivered. "I mean, we went to the Ministry the day after, I know you know that," she grimaced. "Not our finest hour, and everything, but," she stopped again and Minerva wanted to shake her. "She wasn't okay. I tried to help her. We talked as much as she would allow, but -"

"I had no idea that they saw that," Minerva whispered, her hand pressing against the scars on her chest.

"I think had we not gone to the Ministry and ballsed all that up, she would have busted out of here and come sat with you, exams be damned," Ginny attempted a grin. "Which is huge for Hermione."

They sat in not-uncomfortable silence until Ginny looked up.

"Is she okay? Hermione, I mean?"

"I had thought Albus," she paused, not meaning to be quite so informal, then decided she was too tired to care at that moment. "Would have seen you before now, so he will have more to say on the matter, but yes, Miss Brown will come through this with no lasting effects, and Hermione is under indefinite suspension," Minerva had a thought. "Which means she will also be stripped of her Prefecture. I think we will say that she has opted to join an advanced training program if people ask." She rolled her eyes at the nature of boarding schools. "And they no doubt will."

"But - Really?" Ginny's eyes widened, and Minerva was thankful that she was at least sensible enough not to celebrate further. "So she's not -"

"She is to remain in my spare room." Minerva figured that one of Hermione's best friends would know most things anyway. "Other than for her lessons, which she will attend as usual. She will no longer have any time in the main school population other than that. She will likewise not be attending dinner in the Great Hall."

Ginny grinned as she met Minerva's eye.

"What a tremendous punishment for you both," she quipped.

Minerva tried to bite back her grin, but she couldn't. She allowed herself a moment to laugh with the youngest Weasley, surprised to find her so level headed. She reminded Minerva of Molly's older brother Fabian.

"You had best get what you are here for, then get back to the Great Hall. Albus will catch up with you later, but not a word to anyone."

"I promise," Ginny nodded. "And, I'm glad Lavender is okay," Ginny said, pausing by Minerva's side. "But I'm really glad that Hermione is."

Minerva didn't know what bravery the youngest Weasley possessed, but she realised it was great as the girl took her hand and squeezed it.

"As am I," Minerva said, watching her run up the stairs. "As am I."