Disclaimer: everything but the plot belongs to J.K. Rowling.

Chapter 2 – How Tonks and Lupin Disappeared

Hermione left Malfoy Manor feeling rather aggravated. Once outside the gates she apparated straight to the lawn of the Burrow, where she would have to break it to Mrs Weasley that no, Cassie could not stay with them until Tonks and Lupin were found. Squaring her shoulders, she marched to the front door and let herself in after muttering a password.

"Hermione!" someone called as soon as she entered the front hall. Ginny came striding quickly towards Hermione and dragged her into the kitchen where Mrs Weasley busily chopped vegetables, pans and pots stirring themselves on the stove. Glancing at the famous Weasley clock, Hermione saw that Fred and George were at their shop, Bill was at Gringotts, Mr Weasley was shopping, and Ron was at the ministry.

"Hermione," Mrs Weasley greeted her, smiling warmly over her shoulder at the young woman. "How'd it go?"

"Here, drink this," Ginny said, shoving a cup of hot chocolate at Hermione as though she had just returned from a traumatizing experience and was badly in need of some chocolate therapy. Actually, thought Hermione, that wasn't too far off.

"It only confirmed my thoughts that Malfoy is the last person we should be leaving Cassie with," Hermione said. Her forehead crinkled in anxiety. "He didn't care one whit that the poor baby girl's parents are gone. The only reason he's agreed to look after her is because it's the law. And because he can just hire a nanny, he doesn't have to do anything himself."

"What else could we expect from Malfoy?" Ginny sighed. "The guy's a reclusive evil son of a death eater."

"I don't know about evil," Hermione mused as she settled back comfortably in the kitchen chair, sipping hot chocolate. Some of her anxiety was already starting to dissipate. She loved the Burrow - it truly was her second home. "I think evil fit Malfoy during our Hogwarts days, yes... but now he just seems cold and indifferent."

"Either way," Mrs Weasley said, "I will be extremely worried about the baby. What kind of environment is that for her to grow up in?"

"Mum!" Ginny said. "It's not like... it's not like Tonks and Lupin are... you know..."

"We don't know that!" Mrs Weasley exclaimed. Her back was turned to the two girls as she chopped the vegetables, but they could hear the fear in her voice. "If they are, we can't have Cassie growing up at Malfoy Manor, for goodness's sake. She'd turn out to be a deprivated, neglected child, starved of love! And on top of that, she is the daughter of a metamorphmagus and a werewolf. She is bound to be different from the average witch when she gets older – her hair colour already changes! - and she'll have special needs, she'll need someone to explain to her why she is the way she is. She'll need someone to teach her how to control her special powers."

"You're right, you're right," Hermione hurriedly said before Mrs Weasley got the chance to launch into a full out rant. "That's why I'll be checking in at Malfoy Manor every chance I get, to spend time with the baby and make sure she's okay. It's also an ample opportunity to do some snooping..."

Ginny laughed. "Hermione, ever the resourceful one," she grinned. "I'd like to come along sometime, too," she said. "Two aurors are better than one, especially at the Malfoy's."

"Oh, I don't know," Hermione grinned slyly. "I thought you'd be too busy attending to your auror duties with Harry."

Ginny didn't even blush, returning Hermione's sly grin instead. "Ah, well... gotta take a break every now and then, don't I? Don't want to get too tired of him-"

"Ginny, darling, could you please talk about that elsewhere?" Mrs Weasley groaned. Hermione and Ginny laughed and, getting up, headed upstairs to check on the baby.

They found out Lupin and Tonks were missing precisely five days ago.

Hermione, Harry, Ron, Ginny, Kingsley, and Arthur Weasley had all been in the aurors' office, which was divided up into cubicles. Hermione had been taking a break from her teetering pile of paperwork and was sipping a cup of tea while reading The Daily Prophet when there was a commotion somewhere around Harry's cubicle. Putting down her cup of tea, Hermione peered over the wall of her cubicle just in time to see Harry, looking worried, come out and say in a commanding tone,

"All aurors to the board room immediately! Mr Weasley, please join us, as well."

His tone was so serious that no questions were asked. Hermione rushed into the adjoining board room, exchanging an anxious glance with Ginny, before she and the rest of the aurors found a seat. Harry assumed position at the head of the table, as sub head of the auror department – the head, Moody, was away on business that day.

"As you know, Tonks was sent on a mission to northern Russia about a month ago," Harry said slowly. "To check up on Vladimir Tchekov and whether or not rumours that he sold dark weapons and objects to deatheaters during the war was true."

Heads around the table nodded.

"We decided it would be best to send Tonks alone, to give her as much discretion as possible, but her husband Lupin decided to accompany her. He wasn't happy about his wife going into such dangerous territory alone, even though that's part of her job. In the end, Tonks let him come with her."

Harry paused to look around at everyone to make sure they were listening. Hermione couldn't imagine why anyone wouldn't be listening.

"For the first week after they left, we received regular reports and feedback from Tonks and Lupin on the status of the mission. In the last three weeks we have not received anything from them, however," Harry said. "Of course, we assumed they were deeper into the mission now and unable to safely contact us. That's not an uncommon occurrence. We were just starting to get a little worried, but now we're really worried. We received a letter just moments ago from an unknown source."

Harry reached into the pocket of his robes and pulled out a piece of paper. He cleared his throat, then began to read the words written on it:

"Tonks and Lupin are in our hands now. You will do as I say if you wish to keep them alive."

Hermione stared at Harry, trying to let that information sink in. Ron was looking at Harry expectantly, thinking there was more to the letter.

"That's it," said Harry flatly. "That's all that was written. And it explains why they haven't contacted us for so long."

The table was silent for a moment. Then-

"Who would've taken Tonks and Lupin?"

The question came from Laura Waterwrench, a tall auror in her mid-thirties who was very athletic and could beat the crap out of anyone but Kingsley Shacklebolt in a wandless fight.

"I don't know," Harry said heavily in response to her question.

"You don't think Tchekov caught on to what they were up to, do you?" Mr Weasley asked. "I mean, Tonks could make herself look like a nasty deatheater to keep her cover. There shouldn't have been anything to make Tchekov get suspicious."

"But maybe someone else found out and told him," Ron interjected.

"What would Tchekov want from us, anyway?" Kingsley Shacklebolt said. "Besides money, I can't think of any other reason why a Russian would want to entangle himself with the British."

Harry smiled wryly at the comment.

"I think," Hermione said, speaking at last, "that we should remember the letter said 'Tonks and Lupin are in our hands,' which means this isn't just one person we're dealing with."

Discussion broke out all over the place for the next few minutes as everyone debated over whether or not Tonks and Lupin's covers were blown, how it could have happened, who was taking advantage of them, and what the captors wanted in return for keeping them alive.

Finally Harry roared, "Silence!" Chatter stopped immediately. "Listen. We don't know what the captors want from us in exchange for Lupin and Tonks's lives – I assume they'll send us another letter later about that. They're trying to scare us right now. What we need to do is get on this case. We are not going to let some criminal take advantage of our co worker and her husband, who is a friend to everyone in this room. I'm assigning this case to Hermione, Ginny, and Kingsley. No, Ron, we need you to take care of your other case right now."

He turned to look Hermione, Ginny, and Kingsley each in the eye. "I have full faith in you. You need to find out what's happened to those two as soon as possible. Get to work. Meeting dismissed."

Hermione stood up, suddenly feeling worn out. This was her first missing persons case on people she personally knew and loved. The desire to find them unharmed would be a major, driving force for her. As she left the board room to call a tracer – someone to figure out where the letter had come from – she felt someone catch her wrist.

"Hermione," Harry said. Hermione smiled weakly at him, and he slipped his fingers through her own to give her hand a reassuring squeeze. "Don't worry about it. We'll find them. But right now, I need to talk to you about Cassie. About who's care she will be under now that her parents are missing."

Cassie was fast asleep in her crib when Hermione and Ginny approached her room, but she woke up when they entered. Her eyes were a startling grey, her skin smooth and pale, and her hair – at the moment – was green. It tended to change randomly – her facial features occasionally did so, too, which Cassie's mother found very unnerving – but the baby had no control over these changes yet.

"Cassie," Ginny cooed, reaching into the crib to scoop her out. Cassie gurgled a bit, then grinned at Ginny. Hermione's stress melted away completely upon seeing the smile. How could anything in the world be wrong after seeing a baby smile? she thought. A baby's smile was completely pure, utterly devoid of any intention but pleasure at what it was seeing.

Ginny rocked Cassie, tickling her cheeks, while Hermione huffed and pretended to be jealous. "Oh, she likes you now," Hermione grinned, "but when she gets older and starts recognizing what scary features you have-"

Ginny covered Cassie's ears in mock anger. "How dare you taint her ears with such... such awful implications!" she cried. Hermione and Ginny looked at each other, then started to giggle. Ginny handed the baby over to Hermione, and then they sat on the bed to talk.

"How've you been?" Ginny asked seriously.

"I'm all right," Hermione replied, bouncing Cassie on her knee and reveling in the baby's gurgles of appreciation. "Worried about this little one's parents, of course, but otherwise I'm all right."

"It's the same for me," Ginny said. "But Harry's been stressed lately... it's a lot of work, filling in for Moody while he's gone."

"I don't know how Harry does it," Hermione murmured. "He has lived through things that many don't see in their entire lifetime, but he came out okay."

"And beat the evilest wizard to ever have walked the planet," Ginny added with a smile.

"Ginny, when are you two going to get married?" Hermione demanded rather suddenly. Ginny, taken aback, turned bright red.

"I don't know..." she said, obviously fighting to tone down her blush. "Harry'll probably be lousy at proposing, maybe that's why he hasn't proposed yet?"

Hermione grinned.

"I can just imagine it," she said. "You two chasing after some former deatheater, hexes and curses flying left and right, and Harry going – oh, by the way, Ginny, wanna marry me?"

Cassie wrapped her hand in some of Hermione's bounteous hair and tugged. Cassie's own hair then turned an interesting shade of purple.

Ginny laughed. "That'll be a story to tell my grandkids. But how's it going with Jake?"

"Jake," Hermione said, wrinkling her nose, "is last week's garbage. I'm finished with that useless lump of coal."

"Why-"

"He dated three girls behind my back! And the bloody bastard was such a sneak that I didn't have a clue until I walked in on him in his office doing unspeakable things with some stupid skinny blonde! So after I was done throwing the woman out of the room, Jake broke down and confessed he'd seen three women behind my back because I wasn't giving him what he needed."

"Er-" Ginny tried to cut in, concerned about Hermione ranting while holding the baby, but Hermione plowed on.

"So of course I told him he could go back to his cheap whores and that if he ever showed me his face again, I'd hex him into oblivion!"

Cassie burst into tears.

"Could you yell any louder, Hermione?" Ginny said, half-amused, half-exasperated. "You really needed to let that out – why didn't you tell me before instead of bursting and causing poor Cassie great amounts of distress?"

"Sorry, sweetie," Hermione cooed, holding her against her chest and rubbing her back. "And I'm sorry, Gin," she added with a lopsided grin once Cassie was calm again. "I didn't get the chance to tell you earlier."

"Ah, well," Ginny said. "I knew, anyway. The entire ministry could hear you yelling."

Hermione turned red.

"And you're pretty famous for how you treat a guy you like doing dirty things with another woman, too..."

Hermione laughed nervously, remembering what she'd done to Ron in sixth year after getting sick of seeing him making out with Lavender all over the place.

"Let's go get something to eat," Ginny suggested. "Looks like Cassie could do with some food, too."

"Deal," Hermione said, relieved at the change of topic, and they headed downstairs to the kitchen.

Sorry for the lack of Draco/Hermione action in this chapter. They should be meeting next chapter, though, since Hermione will soon be delivering Cassie into his cold, indifferent hands...

Thank you to all my reviewers! You guys make writing even more of a joy. And to Reanne1102, I do plan to let Draco see Hermione's motherly side. And we shall find out if Draco has a motherly side. Lol.

Happy reviewing,

Nabila :)