Disclaimer: I don't own it. I own the plot and I own certain characters that are not in the books.

A/N: This is my last real chapter. I will be posting an epilogue for those who want to know what happens after all of this, but I will not be making a sequel no matter how many people beg me (I'm serious, I won't). I'm sorry, but I've been writing this for eight months (To the day) and I want to write something new. If you like this story then I also have some co-written stories with my friend Amber, the name is ShiverBoo, please go and read those.

Before you read I really want to thank a specific few people. Elli, Emma, Naty, Alyssium, gary loves sporks, dana, Jondy13, Ink, Kitty-Skittlez, SlytherinBeauty, Dee, sexyslytherin27, dracosgirl2515 and superuki. I know there are so many more of you that review and I don't think I have enough space to thank you all, but know that you have not been looked over, every single review is like a second of happiness in my day (unless it's really long, then it's a few more seconds). Thank you so much for the motivation to get through!

Enjoy!

Chapter 51
Quintessence

"Escaped?" Lucius asked in an angry voice.

"Yes, sir," the elf squeaked.

"Ron?" Hermione asked in a frightened voice. She was scared of him, no matter how much she said that she wasn't.

Draco's arms wrapped around her. "We'll find him, luv, no worries."

"How did this happen?" Lucius asked the frightened elf.

"Sir, I don't know, I was down to feed him, his door open, he gone."

"Maybe he tricked another elf," Draco said.

"Not Mimsy, she wouldn't do something like that," Hermione said.

"No, I think it was the new one," Draco said.

"See, this is the reason that it's bad to own house elves!" Hermione scolded. Draco just broke into a grin that killed the harshness in the statement.

"Come on, Mina, I think you're getting too excited by all of this," Draco said. "You need to take a nap."

"A nap!" she yelled. "You want me to rest? How can I do that when Ron is loose?" she sat down on the floor and started crying.

"He's right, Hermione," Velvet said. "You need a rest, a good long one."

Hermione just sat on the floor and cried harder. She still had nightmares almost every night because of what he had done to her. She didn't want to rest until they found him and put him back away. Damn it all, she was afraid of him. Before she knew what was happening, she was picked up into her husband's strong arms. She unconsciously wrapped her arms around his neck as he took her silently to their bedroom.

When they arrived he set her in the centre of the bed, then leaned down and quickly kissed her. "Just get some rest, Mina. You need it."

Hermione turned on her side and sobbed softly into the duvet. Draco moved towards the door. "You're leaving me here?" she asked.

"I'm going to try to find him," Draco said.

"But what if he comes in here?" she asked, peeking her eyes over the fabric.

"I'll lock the door, and if he somehow manages to get through all the spells," he said, walking back over to her. "I'm sure the greatest witch in the world will be able to handle him." He lifted her chin towards him for another kiss and was rewarded with a soft sigh from her. When their kiss was broken, Hermione buried herself into the soft textile.

Draco left quietly and Hermione heard the many spells he used to close it. She thought about closing the window, since she was getting a chill from it, but just covered herself more and fell into a light sleep with dreams of her husband bravely killing the redhead.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

He would finally have his revenge. Revenge on the tart who had ruined his life. He had been in a dungeon, eating stale bread and gruel for who knows how long and it was all because of her.

He moved the heavy velvet drapes from his face and looked over on the bed where she was sleeping.

That bitch!

They knew that he had escaped so he didn't have much time. But he vowed that this would all end here.

Now.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

Hermione awoke to the sound of heavy breathing. She looked up and saw the face of the one person that she didn't want to see.

"Get up," Ron said, pointing her own wand in her face.

She backed away from him across the bed. She meant to find shelter on the other side, but he wouldn't let her. "Over here, luv," he said with an evil smirk.

Oh gods, he's going to kill me, this is the end, Hermione thought. He was finally going to kill her like he had wanted to all along. She slowly went to her doom, moving closer to him. He had her wand. She stepped off the side of the bed and stood before him, a head shorter and at arms length away--her wand just out of reach.

"Now get on your knees," he said. "Beg me to just use Avada on you and not Cruciatus."

Hermione trembled. She looked up into his eyes that were full of malice. She wished that someone would come to save her. Someone would help her. She didn't want to die. She thought of running for the door but remembered all the spells that Draco had put on it.

Draco! She would never see him again.

"On your knees!" Ron yelled and Hermione dropped down so hard that she felt it like a jolt through her body. "Good girl," he praised maliciously.

Hermione just looked down. Draco, she would never get to hug him again, kiss him, tell him that she loved him so very much, have his child. Oh Merlin, she was pregnant with his child, he would be devastated if both her and his baby were taken from him.

I might see him soon then, Hermione thought selfishly.

"Beg, damn it!" Ron screamed.

"Please," she said with no emotion. She didn't want to die because her death would hurt Draco. She didn't want him hurt.

"Crucio," Ron said and Hermione was immersed in pain. "Do you see what I had to go through because of you?" Ron screamed through her cries of pain. He finally released the curse a few minutes later, watching as she shuddered and moaned in pain on the floor.

"Please..." she said hoarsely."Draco..."

"Gods! Not him again!" Ron said. "He's the one who started all this, you know. We might have actually been happy if you hadn't of gone off and snogged him."

Hermione started crying. Yes, if she hadn't gone and kissed Draco then she would have to live with this wrath. Ron was nice in public and around Harry most of the time, but when they were going out, something had happened. Hermione almost told Draco once before, in potions class, but that was before she knew the real him.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

"Hermione," Ron called out.

"Yes?" she asked happily. They were studying in the common room late one night.

"What is Quintessence?" he asked. They had an entire section on it and he didn't understand what it was.

"Quintessence," Hermione said. "Think about it, Ron."

"What?"

"Okay, break it apart," she tried to explain.

"Quint? Essence?" Ron asked.

"Exactly!" Hermione said.

"Okay, but what does that mean?"

"Quint, like when a woman has quintuplets. How many is that?"

Ron shrugged his shoulders.

"Five," Hermione said, near exasperation. It would have been easier for her to just tell him, but for him to find out slowly made it all the more fun.

"I give up, Hermione, can you just tell me. I sort of want to go to bed."

"No, Essence is what?"

"Something on earth."

"All right, now put them together!"

"Five sometings on earth," he said slowly.

"No."

"Five essences?" he asked.

"Warmer."

"I don't know, Hermione!" he yelled, throwing his head down against the table.

"The Fifth Element," she said softly.

"Like that helps, what the bloody hell is the fifth element?"

"Love, you dolt!" Hermione cried.

"Well, why couldn't you have just told me that from the beginning?"

"I wanted you to figure it out," she said.

"I didn't want to figure it out, I wanted you to tell me like you always do," he said, still a little angry at going through the game.

"Maybe I'm sick of always telling you the answers when you should figure it out on your own!"

"I can't figure it out on my own," he said.

"I know," Hermione said.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Ron asked, his temper rising.

"I mean...nothing, it's just too..."

"Too what?"

"Complicated," Hermione said.

"Complicated? What, too complicated for my tiny brain to process?"

"That's not what I meant," Hermione said.

"Yes, it is, you don't think I'm smart, but I can see right through you. You need us, Hermione. Without Harry and I, you wouldn't have any friends."

That hurt her but she couldn't help but correct his grammar through her tears. "'Harry and me'," she said.

"You're doing it again!"

"You know, if I wasn't your friend then you would have never even made it this far in school. You would've failed a long time ago!"

That broke him. He smacked her across the face. "I'm not stupid, Hermione."

Hermione looked up at him with tears running down her cheeks. She ran up to her room and cried into her pillow until her tears were gone. That night she dreamt of Draco and thought that he would never do something like that.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0

The next morning Ron had been completely normal so Hermione thought that he had forgiven her for what she had said and thought that she should forgive him as well. Life went on.

She looked up at him again, saw his lips move but didn't here anything. She felt the pain though; the pain of another Cruciatus coursing through her body.

Quintessence.

Love.

At lease she experienced some while her wretched little life was wasting away to this moment.

Ron broke the curse for the second time and Hermione felt strangely rejuvenated. Love, it wasn't what ruined her life. It was the reason her life had been and she was glad that she had found someone to love.

Her head cleared and she looked at the wizard standing above her but she no longer felt small. She wiped the tears from her eyes and stood up.

"What are you doing?" she heard him ask.

"What I should have done a long time ago," she said and smacked him across the face. He was stunned for a second until he yelled Crucio again and Hermione once more fell to the floor in pain. He left it on her a lot longer than the last two times. When she finally was released she looked up at him. She knew what she had to do. She reached her hands out towards him as if accepting her fate and he lowered the wand a little. She closed her eyes, smiled and turned her palms to face him.

Stupefy! she thought. Wandless, nonverbal magic was something Rudolphus had just taught them, but it worked.

Ron was thrown across the room and out the open window. Hermione heard the thump of his body against the grass outside and breathed out. Her wand was on the floor where he had dropped it. She picked it up and then crossed to the window.

She smiled. Draco was down there. He was looking into the cage that Ron had fallen into. Draco had decided on Care of Magical Creatures and his Phroupoeyz had just arrived from Russia. Ron was lying in the middle of the circle of six Phroupoeyz, he reached to touch the painful lump on his head and then looked around into the faces of the creatures. Their sharp beaks, their black mowhawks, they looked dangerous.

Hermione turned around. She didn't want to know what they were going to do to him. She heard his screams a moment later. She closed her eyes and a silent tear fell down her face. That was all that she would give him.

She moved to the bed and lay down. She started at the ceiling for a good ten minutes before she heard someone outside the door, taking off the charms that he had put so carefully into place.

The doors opened in a hurry and Draco rushed over to her, crawling across the large bed to her and finally cradling her in his arms. He looked at the bruises, the scrapes and the cuts. "I'm sorry," he kept repeating with every new abrasion he discovered.

"It's not your fault," is all she kept telling him.

He finally finished his examination and kissed her soundly.

"All I kept thinking about," Hermione started. "Was you."

Draco smiled warmly and kissed her again. "I love you, Mina. I'm so happy that you're all right. I hope the baby is too."

"I love you, too," Hermione said softly, another tear slid down her cheek.

"What's wrong?" Draco asked.

"Do you know what Quintessence is?" Hermione asked.

"Love," he said and Hermione just smiled.

"Yes," she said softly, grabbing his face and kissing him again. "It is."

A/N: There you have it. I really hope you all liked the end. If you don't, I'm sorry. If you do, then tell me so!

Lots and lots and lots of Lemons to all those who have stuck with me this long, what a grueling eight months it has been.

Brittany, BooBack, Booberdudes, Sunflower, Sexy, Cricket or any other name you would like to call me (that are not inappropriate to say in front of your grandmother).