Completed: 3/14/05 10:47 PM
Posted: 3/14/05 10:54 PM


A/N: I'm terribly sorry for the delay, but as you know my computer was dead for a good week. But it's okay now! Unfortunately I'm going to be in Cozumel, Mexico the 16th-24th. It's probably not fair that it's been a week since I last updated and now it'll be another week before another one, but it's not my fault. Trust me, there will be heaps and heaps of updates the day or so after I return, once I get everything onto I will be bringing the laptop with me so there won't be any delays for typing up. So anyways, here it is:


"JAMES!" Sirius shouted, tripping over the portrait doorway in his haste to share his revelation. "James, James, James, James, JAAAAMES!"

"What the bloody hell has gotten into you, Padfoot?" James exclaimed, appearing over the back of the couch. He looked bewildered as to what had caused the sudden surge of franticness in his friend.

"Everybody to the roof, let's go!" He demanded, making wild rushing motions with his hands. "Come on, come on, come on!"

James, Lily in hand, warily started walking towards the painting of Godric Gryffindor, but was spurred on by a careening Remus who'd been shoved that way by Sirius,

"Let's go!" said shover hissed, following up the train with his hands constantly pushing at Remus' back. James barely got the portrait open before they were all frantically pushed up the stairs.

They made it to the roof of Gryffindor Tower with a fair share more bruises than they'd started with, and in much fouler moods from the scene outside Hermione's bedroom. They circled up in front of Sirius, shivering in the cool autumnal air and scowling at him.

"What did you do to Hermione?" was the first thing out of Lily's mouth. "Did you hurt her?" was the second.

Sirius, for a moment, forgot his excitement. His anger answered the accusation.

"I would never!" he roared.

"We all know how you get, Sirius!" Lily yelled back, finding herself easily swept into the high tension of the moment. "She didn't do anything wrong!"

"And neither did I!"

"Pads, Lily – please, stop this!" James pleaded. Stepping in front of his girlfriend he held a stopping hand out to Sirius.

Remus cleared his throat; loud enough to get their attention, but still delivered with subtlety. "Hermione is fine, Lily," he assured her quietly. "He's telling the truth, but more than that...I know Sirius." Here his eyes darkened a bit and Lily tasted the bitter tang of...jealousy? "You need not worry for Hermione's safety where he is concerned."

"Right..." James exclaimed, a bit breathlessly. "Now that that's, er, settled – why in blue blazes did you kidnap us up here?"

Sirius covered up his chagrin at forgetting by crossing his broad arms over his chest. "Hermione's not gonna send us back."

Remus turned his head away in disbelief, Lily looked down at her feet, and James groaned. "We don't have much of a choice in the matter, mate," The shaggy haired boy reminded him, trying not to initiate another shouting match.

"No, I mean – she's not going to send us back; she never planned to." Sirius threw up his hands in 'hallelujah', finding an unrecognizable semblance of sense in his own ranting.

"Were you listening to the same Hermione we were?" Remus asked, sounding skeptical of his friend's mental soundness.

"We're useless, remember?" James bit back his bitterness.

"It's all for show," Sirius insisted. "Really, you guys!"

Lily made clear her unbelieving stance. "So...it's like...a game." She spoke slowly so Sirius might realize how truly stupid he sounded.

"I talked to her Lily," Sirius said, flinging his arms out to her. "She said we 'couldn't prove ourselves'."

"This isn't funny, Sirius," Remus exclaimed. He spun away from the circle to stalk to the edge of the tower's balcony.

Sirius growled ferally in frustration and ran both hands through his hair. "You guys have to believe me," he insisted. "If you had heard the way she said it..."

James, feeling as though he had to stand up for his best mate in some fashion, stuffed his hands in the front pockets of his jeans and decided to throw Sirius a rope.

"And how did she say it?"

Sirius waved his hands around, eyes looking up as he tried to sort out Hermione's words. "Wait...I think...yeah, her exact words were...'nothing you or anyone could say to make me change my mind. Not even if you trained from dawn 'til dusk...or did something equally ridiculous to try and prove yourselves'."

And Sirius had apparently chosen to take James' graciously donated rope and strangle himself with it...

"Ya know it's a good thing you've cleared this whole thing up, or otherwise I might be wanting to hex you right now," Lily told him with dark sarcasm. Sirius looked down quickly in surprise and found that he couldn't see one of Lily's hands. And that worried him; he'd been on the receiving end of the redhead's quickdraw enough times to know that he'd like to avoid encores.

"Lily...Lils," Sirius held his arms out to her beseechingly. "Hermione repeated the same thing twice...I just know she was telling me something. And that something was that I don't think Hermione wants to send us back."

"What are you suggesting?" She snorted. "We train all day long, sneak down to the library at night to read up on defense, and by doing all of this convince Hermione, whom, I might remind you, is as foolable as Professor McGonagall, to let us stay!"

"...what do we have to lose?"


Hermione was already awake when the knock came on her door. She moved to wave it open, blouse raggedly untucked over her skirt, then stopped a moment. Her hand was even partially outstretched.

For more complicated spells, she'd found that the physical act of hand gestures helped to channel her power and manifest it in the way she wished. So, for this spell which she hadn't used since her wand was broken, she raised a hand and made a swiping motion across the air like rubbing the molecules out of her line of vision. The solid tan coloring of her door smeared with each motion. Ron and Harry's faces were visible in the translucent oblong shape that had appeared in the middle of the door leading to the Gryffindor common room.

"Hermione – what the devil are you doing?" Harry exclaimed, looking right at her.

She cursed and snapped her fingers; returning the wood to its natural opaqueness and swinging the portrait open. "You weren't supposed to see me," she grumbled as they walked in on her tucking the tails of her blouse under the waistband of her skirt.

"Well then, your mirrow-window spell needs a little work," Ron criticized.

"Oh, shut up," Hermione quipped. "What do you guys need? Breakfast is over in a few minutes."

"You didn't wake us up this morning..." Ron commented, sitting on her vanity chair with a bed pillow in his arms.

"I figured I wouldn't be that welcome," she said simply as she leaned over the redhead to pin back the sides of her hair in the mirror.

"Didn't stop you before," Ron said in a sing-song voice.

Breath hissed above him and a hand went to the side of Hermione's head. She'd scraped herself with the sharp edge of her barrette.

"Let's just drop it, Ron," Harry said firmly. His eyes darted to Hermione's, but she was, stubbornly as ever, looking down. "We thought you should know they – I mean, the boys at least – didn't come back to the dorm last night."

"This morning?" Hermione asked, turning around and leaning back against the vanity table.

Harry shook his head. "Their beds weren't even slept in."

She nodded her understanding of the situation. "Here's what's going to happen: if Lily wasn't with them, there's a good chance she's down at breakfast right now. You two will go down to eat and if she's there she's there. I've got an idea of where the boys are, so I'll go and check there first before I come and meet up with you."

"Nice battle plan, general," Ron said with a teasing smirk. He was twirling Hermione's brush over in his hands. "And if you don't make it in time for the food?"

"Then I'll meet you in Potions." Hermione dropped her satchel over her shoulder and Harry and Ron were shocked to find that she'd finished getting ready without their realization.

"Let's go."


Hermione stepped into the Library as if stepping into her own bedroom. The musty smells were all familiar, the towering repetitive shelves like old friends. Her robe was off because it was rather warm in the school, and from prior experience knew it would be doubly so in the library. A warm smile and short nod was exchanged with Madame Pince in the manner of true library-goers, before Hermione moved on into the deeper bowels of the cavernous room.

She found them, as expected, in the farthest corner behind the stacks. They looked an odd mess, Harry's invisibility cloak tangled up around them and obscuring random body parts. It was a good thing Hermione had found them first. Lily was missing most of her body below the shoulder line and both James and Sirius had sacrificed arms and hands. Remus' Roman nose looked as though it had rather savagely been cut off, taking a good piece of his cheek with it.

They were all asleep.


"Black! What have you gone and done now?" Molly Weasley bellowed.

Up on the landing fifteen and fourteen year old, Hermione and Ginny, respectively, stifled their giggles behind their hands as two Sirius' loped into the kitchen. The matriarch of the Weasley family had long since banished them to their beds for the night, but the prospect of gleaning information from the Order had emboldened them to creep down the stairs in their nightclothes and slippers.

"Oy!" They heard Fred exclaim. "He thinks he's as cool as us."

"Poor show, old man," George tutted.

The two Siriuses grinned, and proceeded to stalk the flustered Mrs. Weasley around the kitchen.

"Which one's the fake?" Ron demanded. If Hermione lay diagonally down the staircase she could see Harry and him prodding the clones in the shoulders and testing the lean muscles in their arms for inconsistency.

Before Hermione could stop her, Ginny called loudly down the stairs. "Sirius, shouldn't you be sleeping?"

The wizard closest to them turned around, and found a face hanging down off the landing that didn't match the voice. Hermione giggling churlishly with the younger girl blushed red and disappeared back out of sight. "A hero knows no bedtime!" He boomed jutting his elbows out and resting his fists on his bony hips.

A chorus of 'ah ha's echoed across the tiled room, much to Mrs. Weasley's dismay and she hurried to shush them all and keep the portrait of Mrs. Black from waking. The second Sirius groaned and slapped his forehead. "You idiot!" A female voice insulted, words thick with a distinct northern England accent. The clone's appearance shifted and shrank until it matched the slighter, feminine frame of Nymphadora Tonks.

"Ya blew it," she muttered. "What a doof I have for a cousin."

Sirius waggled his finger up at the two girls, knowing they could see him though he was hard pressed to keep his wide grin rueful. "Tricky girls..." He pouted and the two young schoolgirls, hands over their teeth-bitten lips, raced up the stairs and flung themselves onto their beds, giggling.


The sixteen year old Hermione tightened the knot of the afghan she'd flung around her shoulders to ward off the fading March chill. She'd forgone a shower that morning for fear of waking others in the house and so her inordinately frizzy hair was combed back into a ponytail that looked like a kneazle had perched on her head. But neither of these things were too bad, and she even managed to ward off some of the cold by standing in front of the running oven; it's warm air venting along the backs of her black tights..

She stirred fitfully at the bowl of frosting, spurred on by the chiming of the clock above the refrigerator and the snores of Ron and Harry passed out at the kitchen table; they'd been far from helpful. The loud maddening beeping off the timer cut through the silence and she jumped on it to silence the noise. Charming the wooden spoon to continue stirring the frosting, she levitated the two cake pans out of the oven and onto cooling racks. Blowing on them softly to ensure she wouldn't burn her fingers, Hermione popped both chocolate tiers out of their metal confines and deftly stacked one on top of the other. Wiping her hands on the back of her jean skirt she reached for the frosting bowl only to find that it had disappeared.

"Did you make this for me?" Came a warm voice over her shoulder.

"Professor!" Hermione cried in dismay. She turned around to find Remus Lupin leaning against the counter in a pair of slept-in jeans and yesterday's cardigan, scooping frosting right out of the bowl with his finger. "I tried not to wake you..."

He smiled warmly and gestured to the still-lit oven with chocolate covered digit. "I could smell something baking. It does smell delicious by the way."

"We wanted it to be a surprise," she complained, throwing her dishtowel down onto the counter with a huff.

"We?"

Hermione flushed as Ron gave a particularly loud snort from the dining area. "The boys were really excited about it, but the twins kept them up real late last night playing quidditch, and they've never really been morning people..." she trailed off.

He laughed, quietly. "Why don't you go and wake them and I'll finish frosting the cake. I can't think of a better way I'd like to start my birthday than to have chocolate for breakfast."

Hermione smiled and relinquished her reign over the small kitchen of Grimmauld and moved to do as he suggested, though unable to withhold one small tease. "And will any of that frosting actually make it on to the cake, Professor?"

The lined skin around his mouth crinkled into smile lines as he grinned almost impishly at her. He brandished the mixing spoon like a flag. "I can't make any promises."


"You know Miss Granger, when the time came for the staff and myself to choose which exemplary student would receive the honor of Head Girl there was no other candidate who met each criterion with above and beyond distinction as you did."

Hermione flushed, and duly so. It was a rare day indeed when a student received such high praise from the Headmaster of Hogwarts. "Thank you, sir. I have never felt prouder to be a member of this institution than I do today."

He smiled brightly, blue eyes twinkling. "And I have never felt prouder of this institution."

Hermione flushed again and looked down at her lap, feeling uncharacteristically abashed. Dumbledore chuckled, tucking his beard under the desk as he reached for a lemon drop in the dish at the desk's corner. "Minerva was a bit worried you know," he told the seventeen year old girl conversationally. "Despite how she may act, she is very fond of you Miss Granger and she was worried that we might have to pass you up for someone more...sociable."

Hermione's honey eyes were as wide as saucers as if she'd never even conceived the notion she might be looked over for the position. A weathered hand patted her own that gripped her tea cup.

"Don't worry child, you pulled through for Minerva. In fact, your growth these past two years reminds me so very much of two Heads I once had the pleasure of overseeing."

Hermione followed his gesture with curious eyes, but when her gaze landed on the picture of his warm admiration she felt sick to her stomach. She'd been with Harry enough, seen the poured over pictures so much that she knew those two faces as well as her own.

"The Potters, sir?" She choked out in her own disbelief.

"Oh yes, they were very into their own groups, just as you once were with their son. But then they met, despite their friends' better efforts" – he chuckled here at memories Hermione couldn't fathom – "and never were they more happier than the day I saw them married."

Compared to Lily and James Potter? Hermione couldn't fathom how ever they would be on the same scale – Lily was so powerful; powerful enough to stop an unbeatable wizard without ever lifting a wand. And James, he was a leader through and through; inspiring hope and commanding respect in a way Harry could never amount to. With such histories, Hermione felt severely insignificant; scarcely holding up her end of the comparison.

"They would be proud to know that their son has a friend like you, Miss Granger." Hermione swallowed slowly, though she wondered how she was able her throat was so dry, and she thanked him.

As she left the Headmaster's office she swore to herself that she would make them proud, that she would never accept the absolute limit, and that she would find every way and use every last ounce of herself to see that the son they never got to see, that they died for...made it out of this war alive.


They were the memories she treasure most. Memories that, she told herself, weren't important, all the while knowing that they'd never leave the niche she'd created for them in her heart and in her soul.

But the people in those memories no longer existed. Two she'd seen die firsthand, the others she was glad she hadn't. But dead was dead, and her soul was a little less complete without them.

They weren't simply names, but faces she'd seen in photographs and standing across from her at Christmas parties. They were people; people with loves and interests and dreams and ends that had come before their time.

It was one of the few things that Hermione Granger just didn't understand. The people that surrounded her now had the same hopes and the same laughter; the same light. But the faces that sat beside her at breakfast, or partnered beside her in Charms – they didn't match the memories she treasured. And did that mean her love in them was misplaced?

She knew she cared deeply for them, but was it because of the people she'd know before? Or because of the people she knew now? And if it was the first – was that a wrong reason to care for someone? In matters of the heart she was substantially inept, and that was why she found it so much easier to just close it off entirely.

Hermione looked down at the lot of them and sighed; a melancholy sound. They would never understand...

She moved about quickly, closing books and collecting scattered notes and doodles. Her footsteps were quiet, her movements catlike, and she considerately banished the crumb-scattered dishes that should never have been near so many priceless books in the first place. She frowned at Lily who had chosen to use The Rise and Fall of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named as a substitutionary pillow and deftly removed the invisibility cloak from all of them, folding it up and tucking it into James' satchel. She wiped the comical drool form Sirius' mouth with her sleeve and brushed back the thick bangs from Remus' forehead.

Then she stole back away as quietly as she'd come.

Lily awoke to the sound of a female voice drifting back through the stacks. She lifted her head to the sound and the page of the book she'd been sleeping on stuck to her cheek.

"—pedia of the Old Ways come in yet?

"Yes, it's already on the shelf," Madame Pince replied. "You'll be the first—"

But Lily didn't hear the rest of the conversation.

"James!" She hissed, shaking the sleeping boys. "James, wake up!"

"Ungh...?" He groaned and looked up blearily. His bedraggled black air was smooshed all to one side. "Gnhk?"

Lily assumed this meant 'good morning Lily, how lovely to see you this morning. Whatever is the matter?' and answered appropriately.. "Hermione's here."

James was now wide awake and following Lily's finger with his eyes. Hermione was indeed standing at the front desk, conversing with the librarian in surprisingly above-whispering tones.

"I thought the plan was to be secretive," she jibbed. While James moved to wake the other two, Lily stuffed their stack of notes into her knapsack and began banishing books.

"What's Hermione doing here?" Remus whispered, keeping his voice low in its sleep-husky tone.

"What do you mean 'what's she doing here'," Sirius hissed. "You guys practically live here."

"Both of you shut up!" James hissed elbowing the two boys apart as they started to trade good-natured punches. "She's coming this way."

From their vantage point crouched behind the stacks they could see her curls touching her shoulders, the Head Girl badge that shared the same initials as her name. As she stepped aside and into one of the aisles, Sirius led them out of their hiding spot and they raced as silently as they could to the other side of the room. The quartet froze when Hermione cleared her throat.

They could see her face a moment before it disappeared. She'd magicked the library ladder over to her and was climbing up it to one of the topmost shelves. Pressed single file along the stone walls of the room, the Marauders held their breath as they moved down the way, praying all the while that they could reach cover before the brunette decided to look around from her perfect view spot.

The click-clack of her mary-janes as she descended might as well have been a screaming child yelling "run! run now!", for the four escapees took off running for the exit. They darted around the door, then reopened it a crack to see how close their potential discoverer had been.

She was walking slowly, head bent down over the now opened book that she had gone to such lengths to procure. Lily was the only one to see her close the book with an inaudible sigh, and after a pregnant pause tuck it under her arm.

The redhead's nose wrinkled in confusion and bewilderment at the signs she wasn't sure she was seeing. "She looks so...sad," she whispered, and then James was dragging her down the hall and to the relative safety of the Potions' classroom.