Aide

26 August 1997

Hermione shifted uncomfortably and leaned back on the cool glass door. She put her hands back into her raincoat and tucked her hood. It had started raining again, dark grey clouds covered the sky, very much complimenting the state of her mind. It had been twenty-six days since the ministry had fallen, thirty-three days since she had left her parents home and sent them to Australia. They had been on the run since then. Currently, they were hiding at Number Twelve Grimmauld Place.

She turned and looked through the glass door of the phone-booth. Sirius was trying to call his 'contact' and was failing miserably in finding the right channel of Wizarding Telecommunications Network. He dropped another coin and dialed. He waited again and Hermione turned away from the door. She was supposed to be the look-out today. With nothing to do, she took her silver necklace and started fumbling with the pendant.

"Hello," She heard Sirius say that for the fourteenth time.

"Album Aut Nigrum," She heard him say the same words for the fourteenth time.

"Cinericius," She heard the other side say and shot her head up and turned around to see that Sirius was smiling hopefully.

"Thank Merlin, you are there!" He said,

"Why did you call?" The speaker on the other side said in a business like tone.

"Can you meet me?" Sirius asked hopefully,

"When and Where?"

"Tomorrow at two, at Phoenix,"

"We will be there," and the phone was cut.

Sirius stepped out and grinned at Hermione,"They will be here tomorrow," he said.

"Who are they?" Hermione asked as they began walking towards the Grimmauld place,

"Friends." He smirked.

27 August 1997

It was afternoon and it was still raining rather harshly in London. Hermione was sitting at the dinning table with parchment and ink, trying to decipher the runes of The Tales Of Beedle The Bard, Harry was reading the Prophet which was now publishing Voldemort's Propaganda, Ron was still sleeping on the sofa from his watch at night and Sirius was pacing impatiently around the gates and was occasionally glancing out of the window. For most of the time, they were silent. The only sounds were Kreacher's chores, the crackling of the fire, and the pitter-patter of the rain.

"Your friend won't come earlier if you will keep pacing like that," Harry said in a bored voice.

Sirius sighed and came to sit down at the table beside Harry.

"You have been reading that rubish for the past two hours, Harry." He said.

Harry threw the paper on the table and then glanced at his godfather,"I really don't have anything else to do and since you won't let us go to the ministry and seek help from that 'friend', I am reading this rubbish."

"Well, you can do many things, look at your friends, Hermione is doing something interesting, unless you like Runes and Ronald is sleeping, hey, that's something even you can do," He said and Harry crossed his arms like a child. This caused Hermione and Sirius to laugh.

"It was not that funny," Harry huffed," and when are your friends coming anyway?" he asked.

"They said it will be till two, its a minute from that," Hermione said thoughtfully and that was followed by a sharp knock on the door.

Their heads shot up towards the door and Sirius stood up with his wand. Harry and Hermione following the cue.

"Who is it?" Sirius asked,

"The fulcrum you broke," came a muffled and raspy voice from the door. Sirius crossed the distance with two long strides and opened the door. As it opened, a tall, slender, definately male figure with a wet cloak and a brown scarf with a black hooded jacket walked in. Sirus extended his arms and made to hug the man but he pushed him away by a gloved hand.

"We are not there yet," He said through his scarf, "And affections are definitely not the reason why you called me."

"Uhh, right, Hermione if you would?" Sirius said in a rather embarrassed tone, The man darted his sharp grey eyes toward her which sent chills through her body. The eyes were oddly familiar with Draco's. She shook those hurtfull memories away from her mind looked ahead into them.

"Do you know Dolores Umbridge?" She said in a meek voice.

"The one at MRC? Yes," He said in a bored voice.

"She has something that belongs to us," Harry said, he picked up the paper cutting from the paper which showed Umbridge walking to the ministry with Thicknesse."The locket, actually," He added.

The man took the paper and studied the image, and with eyebrows raised in ammusement, he regarded them again,

"Slytherin's locket?" He asked calmly, and they flinched at the tone. He handed the paper back and straightened up, now looking at Sirius, "My people are planning on raiding MRC before September, the first batch of executions is set on fourth, when I will get my hands on Umbridge, I will take it," He then looked back at Harry, "It might get broken on the way, would you mind?"

"Uhh, no." Hermione said and he nodded towards her and then Harry and Sirius, he was about to leave, when Hermione blurted out, "What executions?"

He turned back at her, "Yes?" he said calmly,

"You said they have scheduled executions, what kind of executions?" She said, biting her bottom lip,

"Executions of those who wouldn't be able to prove their wizarding heritage. Anything else?" He asked.

Hermione shuddered at the thought, "No, thank you." she replied looking at her toes. The man nodded once and with a loud crack, he disapparated.

30 August 1997

Hermione woke up early that morning and made her way down to the hall. She walked to the kitchen and made herself a cup of coffee, something still new to Sirius and Ron, and walked back into the hall. She picked up the book she was reading last night and started reading again. She was turning the pages when she saw a small cardboard box lying at the door with the newspaper.

She carefully took her wand out of her pocket and treaded carefully towards them. She carefully lavitated the paper up and unfolded it. She gasped in shock. She wasn't happy but she didn't want to cry either.

"HARRY, RON, SIRIUS!" She yelled, and looked back at the headline,

DOLORES UMBRIDGE FOUND DEAD, SEVERAL M.R.C. PRISONERS ON ESCAPE.

MINISTRY RAIDED.

With trembling hands, she picked up the box. And opened the box slowly. It had small green emerald and metal pieces with a golden chain lying lazily and black liquid damping the edges of the box.

Harry, Ron, and Sirius came down, wands in hand. Ron picked up the paper and then handed it over to Harry and Sirius.

"What is that?" Ron asked, looking at the box.

"The locket," Hermione answered.