Chapter Eight

Hermione sat very still. The edge of the hard, clinical hospital chair dug into her thigh, but she ignored the discomfort. All she was focused on were the tiny faded blue veins in her fathers withered, pale hand. She held the hand in her own, while tracing the lines on his with her other forefinger. How strong had these hands seemed when she was younger. How many people had he helped with these hands, through all their dental woes? How often had they held her close when she was scared or in pain? And now they lay still, the only movement coming from the pressure of her own finger delicately stroking in time with the reassuring beeping of the nearby heart rate monitor.

She had dropped everything to pack an overnight bag and travel to the hospital near Port Phillip Bay. Draco had stood back, watching her helplessly, unsure if he could assist. In the end though, he did. Hermione realised heartbreakingly that she couldn't just appear at the hospital immediately after the nurse had called – her mother would have told them she was in the city, which was a good two hours away. Draco had offered to find a car and drive them down, to make it seem much more realistic. Hermione had kept the window down as Draco drove (and vaguely wondered how it was he knew how to drive). She let the cool wind wash over her to keep her awake and alert; the noise of the breeze halting any possible conversation. She was grateful to not have to talk; she was so afraid that she would end up crying if she thought of what they were driving towards. Draco seemed to instinctively understand and ended up playing the local Triple J radio station on low volume to fill in the windy silence.

Hermione wasn't sure where Draco went after he had dropped her off at the Emergency entrance, whether he was nearby or had apparated back to the city. They didn't have to worry about alerting the ADSS training group of their absence, as it was a scheduled day off for everyone to recoup and recover before their next stage of training begun. She had met her mother in the lobby, who quickly filled her in on the situation. It was a sudden attack; he was at home and was just about ready to hop into bed when he fell to the ground. The ambulance had thankfully arrived quickly. Her mother shook as she recounted the panic she felt trying to conduct CPR on her unconscious husband.

Wendell looked like a shell of himself with his eyes lightly closed, lying expressionless in the hospital bed with various tubes attached to him. He needed surgery to clear one of his arteries as soon as an operating theatre was open. The wait was torture.

"Hermione?" Her mother's voice reached her, and she turned in her seat without releasing Wendell's hand. "Why don't you go and get yourself a coffee, love? I would like to sit with him for a bit."

Monica had been crying. Her eyes were red and puffy, the stain of tear streaks still visible on her ageing cheeks. Hermione nodded and stood up, carefully placing her fathers' hand gently down by his side. She touched her mother's shoulder briefly as she passed her and headed for the door.

She walked towards the vending machine in the waiting room, figuring that maybe some snacks would help. When she reached it, as she surveyed the selection, she felt the lightest touch on her forearm and jumped. Draco looked down at her sympathetically, holding out a takeaway paper cup that featured golden arches.

"Hospital coffee is terrible," he said in way of greeting. "I went down to McDonald's and picked you up a coffee from there. Vanilla latté with extra foam and one sugar, just how you like it."

Hermione was touched that he went out of his way for her and took the heated beverage gratefully. "Thank you, Draco."

"How is he doing?" he asked quietly. "Any change?"

"No," she shook her head, sipping on her coffee and closing her eyes in pleasure as the warm brew hit her tastebuds. "We're waiting for a theatre room to open up."

"This is where I get really annoyed at the International Statute of Secrecy," Draco growled and folded his arms. "If your father was a wizard, all it would take would be a quick visit to Mackillop Centre of Magical Healing in Sydney and bam, all of his health problems would be sorted. Heart attacks are rarely an issue in the magical world."

Hermione stiffened suddenly at his words and he could see a glint forming in her eyes.

"No." He said firmly. "You can't even think about it."

"And why not?" she snapped, a little harsher than she intended to. "This is my father we're talking about. Why can't I find the right spell and use it on him?"

"For starters, you'll be thrown in prison."

"Only if they catch me," Hermione rebutted.

"They will," Draco said calmly. "They have wards up, especially at muggle hospitals, to see if magic is performed. They'd be here within minutes. Secondly, you don't want to mess with medical magic – especially when it relates to someone's heart. And thirdly, I would be obligated by law to report you, then you would lose your candidacy with ADSS and I wouldn't be able to see you ever again, so I'm not okay with you breaking the law."

Tears welled in her eyes before she could stop them. "But this my father's life that we are talking about."

Draco sighed heavily. "You can't talk like that. Stay positive, okay? We don't know how he'll turn out."

"But what if the surgery fails? What if he dies on the table?" she whispered angrily. "I would have to live with the knowledge that he died when I could have tried to save him but didn't because of a stupid law."

"I agree with you, Hermione," Draco said, reaching out to her but she shrunk back, clutching her coffee to her chest tighter. "I would do it for you if I could, but it's just too risky."

"We perform spells on muggles all the time, memory charms and the like. Why can't we perform healing magic?"

"Besides it being illegal? It could get noticed by the medical community as a miraculous recovery, which could risk the wizarding kind being exposed on a mass scale. We wouldn't be able to obliviate the whole world at once. They would hunt us, experiment on us, make us do their will. That isn't just my pureblood background speaking, there has been repeated moments in history over and over again where the mob mentality takes over and they forget that you're also a person. All they see is the magic."

Hermione knew in her gut that he was right and hated herself for it. If she were another person, looking at this situation, she would be saying the same things that Draco was to her. But because it affected her directly, because this was her Daddy of all people, she couldn't think straight.

"I'm sorry, Draco. I'm not angry at you, it's just..." She pinched the bridge of her nose with her forefingers of her free hand. "It's not right."

Draco shook his head, "No. There's definitely a lack of moral code in the statute."

"I guess this is good practice for compartmentalising. Chief was talking about how you need to hide and bury your emotions on missions. I just need to treat this like a mission." She let go of her nose, straightened her shoulders and clenched her jaw. "I think I can do that."

Draco frowned. "Don't do that to yourself. Trust me, I tried. If you treat every part of your life as a mission, you eventually forget how to feel anything at all."

Hermione considered this. "I feel like there's a story behind that comment."

"There's many stories behind many comments...but now is not the time."

"No, of course not." She inclined her head towards the waiting area. "I'm going to go sit down, will you head home now?"

"I'm staying with you until you kick me out, and even then, I might not leave." Draco took a step forward and this time successfully touched her elbow. He led her to the chairs. "I take this best friend business very seriously; I'll have you know."

Hermione gently placed her coffee cup down on a near table before launching herself into Draco's arms. He was momentarily taken back but encircled her in his embrace and held her tightly to his chest. Her hair was loose and unruly after being blown about in the windy conditions of the car ride down and he buried his face in it. He could feel her nose brush his shirt lightly, almost in a nuzzling fashion and swallowed thickly. He had never really felt sympathetic pain before and was not comfortable with the feeling. Knowing that she was hurting, that she was worried and stressed about her father, caused himself pain. It was his inability to help that really annoyed him though. He wanted to be the hero and do the right thing and save the day, something that he had never felt before – but the bureaucracy of the matter terrified him. Was he willing to lose everything he had fought for to help ease her?

She pulled back and gave him a weak smile. "I might try to sleep for a bit. These chairs don't look very comfortable, but if I managed to sleep during that solitary confinement challenge Chief set last week, I'm sure I'll be fine."

"Thatta girl," Draco crinkled his eyes at her. "You sleep, I'll wake you up if anything changes, okay?"

Hermione nodded tiredly and sat down next to her coffee. She figured she may as well finish her drink first.

She wasn't sure if it was minutes later, or hours, but she woke up with a sudden start as someone roughly shook her.

"What...mum?" Hermione asked groggily. It wasn't her mother, or even Draco, who woke her. It was someone she had never met before...but so very clearly a wizard, going by their ensemble of mismatched clothing. "Yes? Can I help you?"

"My name is Auror Clive, I work for the Ministry in the Department of Muggle Affairs. Someone tripped the wards here at the hospital, so I am going to have to ask you a few questions, since you are the only witch that my tracker has picked up in the area so far."

Hermione sat up straight, now wide awake. "Tripped the wards? You mean someone healed a muggle magically?"

Auror Clive reminded her strongly of Harry. He had dark, messy hair that fell into his eyes and while thin, was well built with fairly broad shoulders. His eyes were brown, however, and looked very serious. He nodded at her questions sagely and flipped open a notepad. He didn't have a pen, but Hermione knew that the words would appear on the pad as she spoke them if he had done the dictation charm correctly. "What is your name?"

"Hermione Granger."

He paused briefly and looked up from his notepad to squint at her. "Really? The Hermione Granger?"

"I don't know," she replied honestly. "There's a very good chance there is more than one in this world."

He briefly pulled a face. "And why are you here?"

"I'm a muggle born. My father had a heart attack last night. I'm waiting to hear on if he will be admitted into surgery."

Auror Clive's cheeks tinged pink. "I'm very sorry to hear that. I hope he recovers quickly."

"Thank you," Hermione said quietly. "Do you know which muggle had a spell cast on them?"

"No, there isn't any way we can track that down. There's just too many of them here." He examined his notepad again. "And did you come here alone?"

"No, I was here with D-" she stopped herself. Where was Draco? She looked around the room. He was definitely not with her anymore. Suspicion suddenly ate her insides and she had a feeling she knew what happened. At the same time, a small flame of hope ignited in her chest. "With my Mum. She is sitting with my Dad at the moment."

"May I see your wand?" He held his hand out expectantly.

"What?" she looked around the waiting room. It was almost empty, but there were at least three security cameras that she could see. "Here?"

"Yes, here," he said impatiently. "We've looped the feed on the cameras magically. They have no idea I'm here."

"Okay..." Her voice trailed off as she dug into her jeans pocket and brought out her wand, made of vine wood.

Sebastian pointed his own wand at it. "Prior Incantato."

Her wand gave a small shudder and began to recount the magic she had used in the last few hours. Mostly it was spells used to fold and pack her suitcase. Just before it could expose her secret invisibility spell, they were interrupted.

"Clive," a deep voice cracked through the quiet room. "Where is your warrant to examine this witch's wand?"

Hermione jumped out of startlement, when she realised the voice belonged to Draco. He strolled in, holding his chin high and confidently. He looked very much like his old self. He had changed his clothes, now wearing an official ADSS black robe. His face was tense, and he didn't acknowledge her questioning glance at all.

"Damien Thorne? What are you doing here? This is a routine investigation." Clive's face pursed into a puzzled expression. "And why are the ADSS interested in an Auror case?"

"Our analysts had a tip off that this had something to do with Exodus." Draco pulled out a document from his sleeve and handed it to him. The power of the word Exodus had their desired effect on the Auror, who visibly jumped at its mention. "They have given me official leave to take the lead on the investigation as I was in the area on patrol."

"I...I see." Clive examined the document and handed it back to him. He handed Hermione her wand back as well. "Everything seems to be of order here. Damien Thorne, this is Hermione Granger, she is the only witch in the hospital from what I can pick up, but her wand is clean. No unusual spell work, no medical magic used. That was the extent of the questioning I did before you arrived. I will let you take over from here. Have a good night...and good luck with the search."

He nodded his head once at each of them and then spun on the spot and disapparated with a small crack. Hermione saw Draco's shoulders ease dramatically, his face falling into a neutral expression.

"Thank Merlin that worked." He sat down next to her and sighed heavily. "You ok?"

"I...I think so." She swallowed thickly. "Any idea what that was all about?"

Draco shook his head in the negative, attempting to look innocent, but the small quirk in the corner of his mouth gave him away. "I haven't got a clue."

At that moment, Monica came running into the waiting room. "Oh Hermione, oh darling! It's a miracle! Your father just woke up! The doctors were checking him, getting him ready to go into surgery and he woke up and his artery is clear. Your father is alright! The doctors have no idea what happened. Come quick, he's asking for you."

Just as quickly as she arrived, Monica disappeared down the hallway again. Hermione sat stunned, unable to process the news her mother just gave her. Draco gave her a nudge.

"That's great news! Go see him."

Hermione looked at him, her eyes round with expectation. "Draco...what..."

He placed a hand over hers. "Hermione, it can wait. Go see your Dad."

She couldn't help the tears of happiness well in her eyes and she leant over and kissed Draco's cheek lightly, before standing and walking slowly down the hall. His skin tingled where her lips had touched it and he mindlessly rubbed his thumb over it. In that moment, he knew that something inside him had changed forever. He knew that she was worth every risk taken.

By breakfast, Wendell was a picture of perfect health again. Hermione was overjoyed to see her parents clutching each other lovingly, and the fear and panic that she had felt since she had received that phone call had completely left her.

Draco had waited patiently out in the hall for hours, and was quietly snoozing in a plastic chair, his head dropped backwards and leaning against the wall, when Hermione popped out to check on him. He looked years younger when he was asleep, and she resisted the urge to brush his fringe back off his forehead. He looked peaceful and statuesque, like he was carved out of marble and not a real being.

She placed a gentle hand on his shoulder and whispered, "Morning sunshine."

Draco started awake and when he blinked groggily up at her, smiled sleepily. "Ahh, my dreams came true."

Hermione snorted with mirth. "Wake up, Draco. My Dad wants a word."

These words brought him to attention and his smile dropped into a concerned frown. "Uh..why?"

"I don't know, he didn't say." She looked at him and tilted her head considering him. "They're just my parents, they're not scary or anything."

Despite her reassurance, he looked petrified at the thought of entering the room. She wondered if it was because they were muggles, because it was a hospital room, or because it was her parents.

"I'm...not good at this sort of thing."

She shrugged lightly, "you don't have to if you don't want to."

He thought about it, looking at her face and realising that it was important to her. He nodded slowly.

Wendell was sitting up in bed when he walked in, his breakfast tray finished with and pushed to the side of the wheeled table. The sun was shining through the blinds, illuminating the clinical room with an ethereal glow. Monica gave her husband a knowing look and took Hermione by the hand, leading her out of the room with a squawk of protest. Draco looked at her retreating back and then back to Wendell. His grey hair was skewed, his glasses perched on the edge of his nose. His eyes were Hermione's eyes and they stared at him from over his thickly framed lenses.

"So, you're Damien, are you?"

Draco felt his chest tighten momentarily at this. She hadn't told her parents his real name. He gave a curt nod and flashed him a smile. He could become Damien easily and adjusted his posture to suit a more laidback persona.

"Hermione says you work at the Ministry here, by the looks of you, I'm guessing it's not a desk job."

"No, Sir," Draco replied, shoving his hands in his pockets, and then removing them again uncomfortably, remembering that it could look rude. He didn't know what to do with them, so ended up leaning awkwardly against the doorframe.

"Is it dangerous?"

Draco thought about lying for a moment but didn't want to give Wendell the wrong idea. He gave him an apologetic glance. "Sometimes."

"And my daughter is training to do the same as you do?"

"Not exactly," Draco said. "I can't go into specifics about what I do, but there are desk jobs within my department."

Wendell looked pensive. "Hermione isn't suited well to a desk job, she has too much life flowing through her. She craves adventure, challenges and the chance to prove herself."

Draco laughed. "Yes, that I've picked up on."

Wendell looked at him, analysing his features. "You know, you look very familiar."

"Do I?" He couldn't help but twitch nervously under Wendell's gaze.

"Oh, I know who it is," he finally said, his tone full of amusement. "A long time ago, Hermione took us to the wizarding place in London to get her schoolbooks. Absolutely blew our minds being there. You look just like a man that got into a fight with Arthur Weasley, that's Hermione's ex-boyfriends dad."

Draco couldn't help but smirk. He remembered that day. Wendell was recollecting the day they bumped into each other at Flourish and Blotts. The day that Gilderoy Lockhart was signing books. Wendell thought Draco looked like Lucius. He felt a small tug at his heart at the thought of his Father, but squashed it down.

Wendell cleared his throat. "You know, I've seen the way Hermione looks at you."

This snapped Draco's attention back, curiosity reflected on his face. "What...how does she look at me?"

"Like you're a puzzle she's trying to work out." Wendell said plainly. "Like she can't stop looking at you once she starts."

"I don't know if that's a good thing or not." Draco frowned; a bit confused by the metaphor.

"Let me tell you something about my daughter. Once she has decided you're 'hers', nothing will stand in her way from protecting you. She will do everything in her power to take care of the ones that she loves. She will always put everyone else first." He gave Draco a small smile. "It causes her to be blind sometimes. I can see that you're uncomfortable about being here talking to me, and from your accent I can tell you're not from Australia, which makes me think you're hiding something."

Draco went to say something but Wendell put his hand up to stop him. "It's alright, Laddie. I'm not going to interrogate you. I'm just asking that you make sure it's not something that can hurt Hermione."

"Mr Granger, I can guarantee that I will not do anything to purposely hurt your daughter."

Wendell seemed pleased by that. "Good. Keep an eye on her. I know she's only in training but you and I both know that she'll pass whatever test it is to do what you do. I don't want to get in her way of doing something that she wants to do, but it would make this old man feel better if you promised to watch her back."

Draco nodded solemnly. "Always."

"Good. There's one more thing," Wendell said, then stretched his neck to check that the door was clear. He beckoned Draco closer, then lowered his voice. "Please thank the nurse you sent to save me. I thought she was an angel at first, but she spoke to me about you. She was most thorough with her spellwork and I am so grateful for the extra years you have given me. I feel for sure that I would be dead by now if you didn't interfere."

Draco winked at him. "Mr Granger, I can honestly say I don't know what you're talking about."

"Please, call me Wendell," he replied, returning to his normal voice. "I'm not known by Granger around these parts. Now, I want you to go take my girl out today and make her have some fun, would you? She doesn't need to stay in this hospital."

After many reassurances that Wendell was fine and would be released within a day or so, Hermione finally conceded to hug her parent's goodbye and promised them she would be back the following weekend for dinner. Draco walked her out to the car and opened the passenger door for her when they reached it. She flashed him a smile and hopped in.

"So what did Dad talk to you about?" Hermione asked when Draco slid into the driver's seat and began to buckle his seatbelt in.

"Secret men's business," Draco replied cheekily. "Although he did comment that I reminded him of a man that got into a fight with Weasleys dad once."

Hermione looked over at him startled. "Goodness, that was fifteen years ago. Are you saying he compared you to your own father?"

Draco gave a small chuckle. "Yeah...the resemblance is a bit uncanny at times."

"No way," Hermione disagreed. "You are way better looking than your father. You smile for one."

He started the car and pulled a face at her. "Now I do. I didn't smile fifteen years ago."

They headed to the highway, but instead of heading back into the city like Hermione expected, Draco turned left and drove through the luscious countryside. Now that it was daytime, Hermione marvelled at the expanse of farmland, dotted with cattle and livestock. As they went around a bend, there was suddenly the ocean in front of them, a clear blue sea that stretched for miles.

"Where are you taking me?" Hermione asked, surprised. "This...this is the way to the Island."

"I know," Draco said, waggling his eyebrows at her. "Your Dad told me we had to go do something fun, so we're heading to the island."