I hope you enjoy this story, please leave any notes, criticism or grammar corrections in the comments!

Please let me know if anything anywhere doesn't make sense.

I don't own anything but the plot, everything else belongs to the great jkR

NOTE

And please let me know if its difficult to tell who's talking or thinking what. I had first written this chapter from Hermione's point of view and I have rewritten it to match the rest of the book in third person, please comment and let me know if an 'I' or 'my' escaped my purge!

Thank you so much for reading, please enjoy!

Four years after the events of the last book, Harry, Ron and Hermione all work at the Ministry. What will happen when Draco Malfoy enters their lives again asking for a favor, and a new threat stands just around the corner. A tale of friendship, bravery, adventure and romance.

THE DEPARTMENT OF MYSTERIES

Hermione leaned forward excitedly, tongue between her teeth, her wand extended in front of her pointing at what looked like a large floating marble. Upon closer inspection one could discern that the 'marble' was black at the center and emitting a faint blue light, not unlike that of a Patronus.

"Reale." Hermione said under her breath, a bright gold light shot from her wand towards the floating orb and ricocheted off of it bouncing off the wall ceiling and desk before Hermione had a chance to aim and stop it with a quick, "Protego!"

Damn she thought to herself, she really had been hoping that would work. There was a knock on her door and Hermione looked up, calling out a quick, "Come in!" before scribbling down the effects of her attempt on a piece of parchment.

"Cassie," she greeted with a smile when she looked up from her notes at the short, blonde woman who had graduated just a year ago from Hogwarts, "how are you?"

"Great," Cassie replied, "I just thought I'd stop by and let you know that I was heading out for the day.

"Already?" Hermione asked, surprised, it couldn't be later than- she glanced at the clock, "7:22!" she exclaimed. She had promised Ginny she would be over for dinner by 7.

"Lost track of time?" Cassie asked with a small smile at her boss, who looked frazzled as she used her wand to move a strange glowing orb into a heavy looking black box and snapping the lid shut.

"Yeaah... haha" Hermione replied, mentally cursing herself for not setting an alarm, before remembering the ministry wouldn't let her bring a phone this far into the Department of Mysteries.

Cassie looked at her boss as she shoved notes into an impossibly small beaded bag and cleared her desk with a wave of her wand, it really was an honor she thought to herself, to to be able to work in the Department of Mysteries only a year out of Hogwarts and alongside Hermione Granger at that!

Cassie stepped back and held the door open for Hermione while filling her in on her own experiences that day with a mysterious horn-like object that had been recovered off the coast of the Isle of Man.

Hermione nodded along, occasionally pointing out a flaw in Cassie's logic, or asking for more information about a specific experiment that had been done in an attempt to classify and understand the object, smiling when she sensed how excited her protege was.

Gin is going to kill me, she thought to herself as she bid Cassie goodbye and used the floo network to get to her apartment. After a quick shower and change of clothes Hermione stepped into her fireplace with a handful of floo powder and called out, "Number 12 Grimmauld Place!"

NUMBER 12 GRIMMAULD PLACE, LONDON

"Harry! Ginny!" Hermione called, stepping out of the grate on the other side, "I'm here! I'm so sorry I'm laa-"

"Hermione!" She was cut off as Ron came around the corner into the kitchen.

"Ron!" She started, surprised to see her best friend, "I thought you were on duty tonight." She said as she gave him a quick hug and moved to hang her cloak up.

"I was," he responded, "but Blaise offered to cover for me, I've had a lot of late nights this week and he thought I could use the rest."

Blaise was another Auror that worked cases with Harry and Ron.

"Shouldn't you be using the time to actually rest and not hang out with old school friends?" Hermione asked him with a light smile, accepting the glass of wine he handed her.

Ron and Hermione had tried dating the summer after the battle of Hogwarts but every time things had got too intimate it just got really awkward for the both of them. They were best friends, they had been since we were 11 and it had just seemed like they were messing with a good thing, so after that they decided they'd just stay best friends. Harry had seemed oddly relieved by that, he had spent that whole summer tip toeing around the two of them.

Laughing to herself at the memory she followed Ron into the dining room, not fully catching his response.

After a few more minutes of pleasantries, including Ginny telling Hermione off for being late, Hermione finally got to ask her how her Quidditch tryouts had gone earlier that day. Ginny had been recruited by the Hollyhead Harpies a few months after the four of them had graduated from Hogwarts, three years ago, and she had been training really hard, hoping to play Quidditch for England at the next world cup, but a fellow chaser had been injured and the team had held tryouts today to fill the position.

"Oh it was great Hermione," Ginny gushed, going on about how well her and this new player named Carina Michaels got on. "It was amazing 'Mione, we just seemed to click, you know? Like nothing could stop us, we were basically reading each others minds!" She finished excitedly.

Harry understandably shifted a bit uncomfortably, hearing his girlfriend go on for the better part of ten minutes about how well she had got on with someone else was a little awkward but Ginny seemed really happy. Hermione suddenly wondered if legilimency was allowed in Quidditch and tucked the question away, reminding herself to ask Harry or Ron later, before slipping back into the conversation

After she had finally eaten enough for Ginny's liking, Hermione found herself alone on one end of the table with Harry. Ron and Ginny had moved to the other end of the table and were animatedly discussing a Quidditch tactic that Ron thought would've helped the Chudley Cannons in their game against the Appleby Arrows last week. From where she and Harry sat, it seemed as though Ginny thought the Cannons would have lost with or without Ron's maneuver.

"So..." Harry began, somewhat awkwardly.

Hermione sighed, she knew where this was going. She had thought that he and Ron had learned their lesson from the numerous times she had rebuffed them, she was an unspeakable now, and couldn't talk to them about her work.

"Yeah?" She asked quietly, the last thing she needed was Ron and Ginny joining this conversation.

"I know, I know you can't talk about it 'Mione but it's all I've got lef-" Harry let out in a tumbling rush of words.

"-Don't" she cut him off, "don't do that Harry, that's not true and you know it, we're here for you, Ron, Ginny and I, and Mr. and Mrs. Weasley and McGonagall and," Harry cut her off when she took a breath, which was a good idea considering she had just been about to list every single one of their friends that had survived the war.

"Hermione." he pleaded, "Please."

"No, Harry," She said back in what she hoped came across as a kind tone, "I can't, I really can't, you shouldn't even know what you do, Harry, I can't. I'm sorry."

A few weeks earlier Hermione had stumbled upon some information that made her question Harry's original explanation regarding his mother's protective sacrifice. And after her search for an explanation for the discrepancy hadn't yielded any answers she decided to pick Harry's brain. To see if he knew any more than he had originally shared.

And well it wasn't a very easy thing for Harry to talk about, and Hermione felt awfully guilty for putting her friend through that (asking him to relive the night his parents died through Voldemort's eyes couldn't have been fun) so when he asked her one simple question, "Why do you want to know?" She had answered him. Reluctantly explaining her theory that like the piece of Voldemort's soul that had lived in Harry for all those years, a little bit of Lily Potter's magic did too.

He had filled Ron in on what had happened and since then both of them had been trying to get more information out of her about why she was looking into this. And since then she had managed to remain tight lipped about the project.

Harry slumped back in his chair dejectedly and Hermione froze - ohh fuck the rules - she thought, this is my best friend ,"I don't think I'll be able to tell you anything," she started hesitantly, he looks up suddenly, her apprehensive demeanor making him smile hopefully, "but I might be able to answer a question."

That ought to be alright, it's not like I'd be breaking any rules, I'd be answering a question my best friend asked me, so what if it happens to be about something that may or may not exist in the Department of Mysteries. Hermione thought to herself as she leaned back in her chair, her stomach sinking at the thought of answering Harry's questions.

Before he had a chance to ask it though she felt rather than saw someone sink into the chair on her left.

"Gin went up to bed, said she was tired after the practice today." Ron supplied as he joined their conversation.

Harry looked at Hermione questioningly and she nodded quickly, letting him know it was alright to continue with Ron here, hoping that getting this over with quickly would get rid of the sick feeling in her stomach.

"What's going on?" Ron asked looking between his two best friends uncertainly.

Hermione kept my eyes down letting Harry explain, what was wrong with hershe wondered, she was no stranger to breaking the rules, my time at Hogwarts proved that, so then why was the prospect of bending them ever so slightly making her this queasy?

"So you'll answer one question?" Ron asked excitedly, his eyes lighting up, Hermione could see him thinking, trying to come up with the one question that would blow a hole in his and Harry's understanding so far.

"N-" she started, she had meant to answer as many questions as they had, but maybe this misunderstanding was for the best, maybe it could get her out of this trouble that she had brought upon herself, "-yes" she finished hurriedly, "Yeah, just the one, because I really shouldn't, you know?" she added apologetically.

Her apologetic smile widened into a real one when she made eye contact with him, some things never change she thought, Ron had that same gleam he had in his eye when he played chess, when he was 7 steps ahead of you and was ready to win.

It killed her, it really did, keeping this many secrets from her two best friends in the whole world, the two people she shared nearly everything with for the past 10 years of my life. But she loved what she did, and she knew that her head of department was aware of how she felt about the Ministry keeping certain secrets, about restricting knowledge. Hopefully that was a change she could make happen, make the Department of Mysteries a little less mysterious. She smiled to herself at the misnomer while Harry and Ron discussed what they would ask me.

She waited with bated breath as the boys came to a decision, worry clouding her mind as Harry opened his mouth-

-What if I get fired for this?

What if someone finds out?

What would happen to Harry and Ron, they work at the Ministry?

What abou-

She was interrupted mid thought by Harry who finally asked,

"Could it bring her back?"