Chapter 12-Trouble In the Library

A special thanks to Hermione Girl, my tenth reviewer and also close friend ;)

Disclaimer: I only own the plot

Hermione was too anxious to go back to sleep that night. She was reading through books in the Prefects library in hopes that she would find a spell that would somehow show her who the other heirs were, but to no avail. There was barely anything anywhere that would even remotely touch on the four founder's heirs. She was getting frustrated. She could find everything from the wizards alphabet (A is for Alohomora, the unlocking spell, B is for Bat's eyes, a potions ingredient.) to how to remove a wart in two simple spells to how to talk to unicorns, but no spell on how to find the heirs. She had an idea. She ran out of the library and up Draco's stairs to his room. She shuffled through his belongings, searching for his Invisibility Cloak. At last she found it, it was in a secret compartment in the lid.

"Hermione, I don't think there is anything here, but where else-" His voice softened as a mischievous look entered his eyes at the sight of her swinging his Invisibility Cloak over her arm "-could we look," He finished. "Get over here you," He picked her up and swung her in a circle. She wrapped her legs around him and he held her back. Draco kissed Hermione tenderly on the nose, "How in the world did you get sorted into Gryffindor, you bad girl, come on, let's go."

They threw the cloak over themselves and put silencing spells on their shoes (in Hermione's case, pink socks with little blue clouds) so they wouldn't make any noise. They made their way without incident except a run- in with Mrs. Norris, who sniffed suspiciously in their general area, but finding nothing, left. Hermione broke the locking spell on the door and they stepped into the library. "Lumos," they said in unison. "Let's get looking," Hermione said, and Draco nodded.

They searched the library for two hours, which stretched to three, and then four. Hermione was getting tired. All of a sudden she felt a hand on her shoulder. She whipped around, and standing behind her was.no one, the row she was working in was empty. She shrugged off the feeling that she was being paranoid until she felt someone breathing on the back of her neck. Once again she whipped around, only to find nothing, once again. Now she was getting scared, she knew that the breathing was real, not her imagination. "Draco?" She yelled, only to feel a hand cover her mouth.

"Silencio," an icy voice said behind her. She turned again; she could feel her captor's hand on her shoulder, but couldn't see anyone. The Invisibility Cloak, Draco and she had left it on the table in the front of the library. She was quick; she readied herself and suddenly swung her leg around where her captor's legs would be. There was a dull thump and the head of a startled Lucious Malfoy appeared. Hermione ran to find Draco. She heard footsteps at her back, but this only made her run faster, she was getting frantic, Draco shouldn't have been too far from her. She saw him in a row, and slipped on the floor trying to get to him. She didn't see her nor notice her cut knee heal itself.

Draco's POV

He heard Hermione yell, "Draco?" but he thought he had found something. He pulled the book out and laid it on the floor where he would find it and looked up in time to see a frenzied Hermione slide past his row, he saw the skin of her knee split and then.repair itself? He didn't have time to think this over though, because Hermione had grabbed his arm and was looking panicked. She tried to talk, but her mouth just opened and closed. Draco, on a whim, said the counter-spell to the silencing spell and Hermione said, "Your father.Invisibility Cloak.grabbed me." Then she collapsed to her knees, panting.

Draco's face hardened, why would his father want to hurt the one he loved, oh yeah, he had forgotten about who her cousin was. She stood up then and he backed her against the nearest shelf and put his arms on either side of her (A/N Draco is facing the row, Hermione is facing the row too, but Draco is in front of her and so she is looking at his back), his father would never get her. Hermione was still holding her wand, as was Draco. Draco was looking up and down the row suspiciously, looking for any sign of his father. They were stuck there, his father would follow them to the Prefects common room and hear them say the password, and they couldn't go anywhere else, because they may be caught out of bed after-hours. He had been lost in his thoughts and wasn't prepared when a wand came out of nowhere and caught him with a stunning spell.

Hermone's POV

Draco went down. She could get him later, Lucious wanted her, and chances were that he would just leave Draco. Ducking and weaving in and out of the rows upon rows of books she stopped next to the one where Draco had fallen, good, he was still there, but Hermione couldn't stop for long, it was dangerous for her. Her heart was screaming, 'go help him, go help him,' but her mind was saying otherwise, with it's reasonable, 'keep ducking and weaving, you can get him in a few minutes, but you can't stay still for long.' Normally she would have listened to her heart, but her mind was speaking more reasonably, so she did as her mind said. She did another round of ducking and weaving, then slid into a darkened corner and waited for Lucious to pass by.

Hermione heard Lucious curse, then took careful aim. She compounded a spreading spell and a stunning spell so that her stunning spell would hit anything that was in the row she was pointing at. She uttered the compound spell softly, so that she wouldn't give herself away if it didn't work. She had never tried to create her own compound spell before, but she had read about how to do it properly, and so had guessed that her spell would work. She heard a soft thud in the row. Gathering her courage she looked down the row and saw a stray foot lying on the floor. It had worked. She walked down the row and pulled the Invisibility cloak from Draco's father. He stirred; a spread spell would wear off quickly, even if the original spell wouldn't. "Nighty night," Hermione said sarcastically before hitting him with a full stunning spell.

Draco's POV

Hermione's anxious face looked down on him. Then he realized who had hit him with the spell. His father was levitating a few feet away. Draco stood up, feeling disgusted that he hadn't been able to protect Hermione as well as he should have. "I'm sorry," Draco said, looking and feeling ashamed.

Hermione looked up at Draco, "I don't want your apologies Draco, I can protect myself as well as you can, there was no reason to try to protect me and only me. If you didn't notice, your father didn't hesitate much in hurting you as well. Maybe we can try a back to back formation next time, or not going to deserted places at odd times in the night, or rather, morning. Let's go get him to Dumbledore, I haven't a clue of what to do with him."

Draco nodded as she led the way to Dumbledore for the second time that night.