Aurors. Partners. Bonded. An intimacy of essences no one shares with Hermione, not even her husband. Yet, once your house is empty and the Golden Trio move together, it's harder not to realize it's not enough. Her magic calls to you, yours to her, even as you train her sister. While discerning, try not to miss this new menace whose source is so close to you. You might find clues, to all of that, in the flask she forgot she always carries in the secret pocket of her beaded bag.

Things you might want to know:

Yes, it is a harmione. And it will have a harmione happy ending. But I love slow burn, so there is a lot of angst before that.

I'm happy with the reception the story has had in the Spanish community, I hope you like it as well.

I'm dealing with the whole books including the epilogue (except for "the lost week" that no one is going to remember at the beginning). That means someone is married, and realistically she has to act as such (even if Hermione doesn't love Ron romantically, she cares about him as a friend, and she can't turn him down all the time. What you can't bear, just skip it. There isn't much).

There will be no adultery or divorce. If you must know, I'm going for nullity. It may seem like a technicality but some of us care. There will be a lot of poorly repressed feelings, a lot of sexual tension, escaping through the seams, it can qualify as emotional infidelity.

There will be no bashing.

Harry and Hermione are now Aurors, together. I don't know why I can't find similar harmione. The canon does not explore in depth the day to day of dark wizard hunters which gave me broadband to invent, for which PLAGIARISM WILL NOT BE TOLERATED but you can use it giving credit to the original idea. If you write a good fic about Harry and Hermione being Aurors together, let me know, I would love to read and comment.

Prologue:

Empty nest

His scalp tickled at the brush of a female hand. Harry closed his eyes. There was betrayal everywhere except in that hand. Until she left, as they all did.

Tears of fear, chilling cheeks.

Lips trembled, warm and dry, under his. Surprised. One last flash of bright gold in the candlelight, blurred through the tears, before he closed his eyes again. He didn't want to hear of consequences.

"Trust me, Harry." He knew that voice. He trusted.

Light brushing of lips. Life bursting through the seams of winter. Hang on. The rough brush of a tongue. Madness, and the smell of corpse disappearing into the taste of pumpkin and leather, and treacle tart.

"I'm so tired of nightmares…"

Harry snaps awake, and sits up with difficulty, one hand supporting him as he runs the fingers of the other through his sweat-soaked hair. Anguish has taken his breath away. It's a bit like when he lost Sirius, or Dumbledore: lurid, disorienting, steeped in denial and the urge to go back and change everything. It has a bit of nostalgia. He's not surprised he doesn't remember anything. As usual.
His sixth sense extended to check on his partner, a few kilometers away. Fortunately, it didn't wake her up; Harry remembered to set the barrier between their magic centers before bed, and it still works. The contact with Hermione's spirit soothes him, fills part of the void that the dream has left in him. He imagines her face down, facing the window, one hand next to her chin, like a child; a vision under the moonlight.

The wizard's hand slides from his hair and over his face and finds wetness. He looks at the streaks of silver in his palm as if he didn't know what they are.

Hermione would guess it's the date.

Sighing, he sets his bare feet on the carpet, buries his head in his hands, then clasps them together and just stares at the emptiness before him.

Hermione peeped over the bunch of files she was working on, to find Harry, feather almost hanging from an inert hand, gaze lost beyond the parchment.

"Go home already" she suggested.

That earned her an intensely green gaze through lightly crooked glasses, and the lioness felt that void in her stomach. Familiar.

"But there's still work to do" Harry commented, confuse.

"Honestly…" the witch huffed and her eyes rolled dramatically, she even crossed her arms behind the file cabinet, but she was smiling. "You are of no use like this. And someone must stay with the kids, right? Go."

"You should go" the wizard muttered, standing up and stretching. "You keep being Al's favorite"

"Don't be silly" the witch said, but Harry could feel a smug smile hiding inside his partner.

Brown curls caught the light as she woman stood. Harry followed, dazzled, as she guided him through the labyrinth towards the elevator, which stopped in front of them, its singing voice informing of the level to those inside. They ignored it as he asked.

"You sure it's all right?"

"Sure"

The empathic connection between partners echoed it. Hermione closed her eyes, enjoying the warmth, so alike to drinking hot chocolate in Hogwarts' winters. The warmth focused on her front as Harry placed his lips there, in a distracted, routine kiss that conveyed no less love because of it.

"Call me if something happens. And please, don't linger here for too long"

She turns, ducking to avoid a curse, and other reaches her. Blood spills from her forehead. She barely groans as she deviates another and casts her own, two, three in rapid succession, as fast as she can spell them.

Other Aurors fight, but not beside her, not anymore; they have managed to separate them.

Yet, Hermione, in the center, gets most of the attention. Her whole body is enlightened by curses despite it being the darkest hour, before sunrise. Her dragonhide vest has saved her life over three times tonight; she has seen death coming, with no time but to think of Hugo, who today will ride the Hogwarts express for the first time. But her wand strikes and slices with the superb efficacy of the best trained Auror, and the enemies fall, one by one. One of them, barely a teen, hypnotized by her movements, gets stricken by a stray Avada, hers being the last reflection in his eyes.

A high pitched laugh reaches Hermione's ears, and she turns just for a moment, but she can't let the Parkinson b–witch distract her.

"Arrest me?" she says between laughs. "You can't even reach me!"

"Five" Hermione cries intermittently between spells. "Soon… you'll have… no men… to hide behind."

The black–haired witch counts swiftly, and her smile falters, but when she steps forward, it's to cast a curse that Hermione avoids easily. Then, she hears Max's cries. She nearly turns around, and it would have been her death. She avoids narrowly another light, but she has managed to see her colleague's tortured, twisted body.

"You traitor!" the word sounds cursed ––being, as it does, behind whore and irresponsible in her list of worst epithets.

The laugh, again, and another rush of spells. She bends and tries to breathe through the fears, the sorrows.

"Me, a traitor?" Parkinson whispers seductively. "What about you? You –ah, so loyal– Gryffindor. You have a pureblood for a husband, and still took the scarred thing as your partner. No Slytherin cheat a spouse like that. Not even an ally. Potter has guts after all. And the cuckold goes and wears the robe of Minister!"

"Don't speak of them like that!" Hermione can't stop herself from yelling.

There is a scream, and Hermione stops for a second, stricken by the possibility of it being Harry; another curse cuts through her right shoulder as she remembers he isn't here, but she's actually relieved. She clenches her teeth as she smells the blood. She didn't recognize the voice. Maybe it wasn't one of hers.

"How is it?" Parkinson gaspes, genuinely interested. "Sex? They say it's amazing, feeling what the other's feeling and all…"

The lioness stumbles, and curses fly over her head as she rolls and stands again, never stopping casting herself. Another man falls to her wand. His last jinx is repelled by her bracelet –typical Harry, protecting her even without actually being here.

Somewhere Parkinson's voice still shrieks but Hermione tries her best to ignore her. If the witch is speaking, she isn't casting. Another enemy falls with a soft thump.

Then, Parkinson's tone changes dramatically.

"Or are you still is denial?"

The auror stares at her briefly, something cold filling her stomach even before she understands. The Slytherin's eyes are wide open, her mouth slightly so, an expression of amazement and glee the Gryffindor instinctively despises.

"You are, aren't you? Pretending Potter is a friend… pretending…"

"He is my friend, you…"

The laugh fills the darkness, and Hermione has forgotten to count enemies, and suddenly something is burning her right flank, making her cry out, more from surprise than from actual pain.

"Oh, you Gryffindors are so much fun! And what is to happen if you fail? If… No, when… you acknowledge it? That you're yearning for him, aching for him, dreaming…"

Green light almost reach the Slytherin, and her smile just pales for a moment, before growing wider.

"Come on, Granger. You know it. You know you can't hold it back. It's a matter of time. I can't imagine you leaving your precious partner unprotected. So you can just move forward. Whether you like it or not, you are already on the path of… well, betrayal…"

Suddenly, sounds of apparition, and shadows approaching. The auror doesn't turn, still dulled by Parkinson's absurd thread of thinking. On auto-pilot –duck, cast, watch out-, the witch dances with death another three times or so, until her wit comes back, just slightly ahead of the shadows. Just in time to realize that their identity don't matter anyway. If they are enemies, she's as good as dead. In that second of not knowing, she thinks 'Oh, Harry will kill me this time'; the dropping of her spirits deny any humor in the joke. Lily is riding the Hogwarts Express today, and he will be left completely alone in that enormous, dark house where he widowed less than two years ago. A house also sheltering memories of his lost godfather. 'He'll have Ron' she reasons and stops thinking of anything other than the curses still striking her enemy's shield. But her soul still aches with a sorrowful yearning, an echo of a thought she doesn't dare express, even to herself: 'I thought he'd be there, at my death. I thought his would be the last face I'd see'.

And then, Parkinson drops the wand, and she hears Luna's chanting voice, and almost faints with hope.

"Parkinson, you have a right to remain silent…"

Dawn has just stretched its rosy fingers through the sky.

When Luna's team has taken care of the rest, and they are back in the headquarters, and the healer has patched her up as well as he can, the blond woman lies a hand on her shoulder and Hermione nearly drops from exhaustion and the light weight of the hand that was meant to reassure.

"Nargles told me it was a trap" the blonde woman whispers dreamily.

"How many casualties…?" Hermione's throat tightens.

"Incredibly, none" Sparkie joins the talk, an unmistakable spark of admiration in his voice. "Max is pretty shaken, but will recover. It's you who is badly hurt."

The lioness' eyes wander around, fixing in the no-so-magical devices she managed to integrate into the Auror force. Only those things that would work in a place so charged with magic.

"What I am is exhausted. And leaving" Hermione whispers as she stands. "My kids are waiting for me since yesterday. I hope they have packed."

But as she walks into the empty hall guiding to the headquarters, it all reaches her at once. The waves. The warmth. The awakening. She suddenly realizes her bracelet has been burning for a while –just another discomfort, mixed with the pain and the fatigue, barely noticeable under the circumstances-. Now she notices. Now she shivers violently, and pants without fully recognizing why.

Harry is there.

Black cloak. Black pants. Black vest. Pale skin under the burning scar. The only touch of color is his eyes –his electric green eyes, almost dark also, tormented-. His smell reaches the witch –summer grass and spearmint-, and she breathes it as if it were oxygen, as his arms come to surround her, holding her so tightly that they actually shake. And when he forces himself to put an appropriate distance between them -holding first her cheeks, then her shoulders, shaking her a bit before the pain in her right one gets to him both by her cry and their bond-, his magic still clings to her –to all of her- feeling her body almost sensuously. She knows she is being checked for injuries, she knows his magic is reinforcing hers in a healing balm, and yet, in her fatigue, her self-control slips enough for her to feel it. Heat seems to engulf her until he speaks.

"You went alone" he spits, violence barely masking a fear that surpasses it. "Merlin, Hermione. Why did you go without me? What if I had lost you?"

"The kids…?"

"They are hardly toddlers! Why didn't you call for me?"

"We didn't know…"

"You fought…!"

"Please let me talk, Harry! I can't explain if you don't listen!"

He holds back his words, holding her gaze in a way that nearly makes her dizzy. What was she speaking about…? Oh! The lack of sleep must be affecting her most than she thought.

"It was supposed to be easy" she lectures quietly, and a bit apologetically. "Routine. Apparate and read her rights. You were with your kids, Harry; they have no one else to help them in a day like this…"

"I don't care!" his vehemence quiets her at once.

They look into each other eyes, and a full chorus of angels pass by as their gazes convey what words cannot. Gazes don't carry the sound of his voice, though, and she is grateful when he speaks.

"You know. You know I had been there at once. What do you think I feel sensing you hurt? What do you think it made to me when I heard…" he bit the last words, "when I heard that you had fought an entire squad, almost by yourself? That you were in danger? That I wasn't there? Knowing that it was because I left early, because I didn't come with you…"

Butterflies bat colorful wings against her skin, even as she whispers:

"I don't need…"

"You do! What is the bracelet for?" he pleads now, eyes shining. "Tell me, Hermione! We Vowed. We don't fight alone anymore!"

She indulges in the chaste exchange of warmth that nonetheless makes funny things to her stomach –as it always did-. His hands rest on her back, pressing her to him. And all of a sudden, this alarm goes on, as if something cried: "Too close". And as usual, there come the forbidden names that assure the world starts rolling again.

"Ron must be frantic" Harry says. "He must have received the report by now. He must know you were hurt."

When she apparates home, first thing she sees is Ron holding their daughter, his chin over her head as his hand brushes her back. He looks almost as exhausted as the woman. Something like guilt threaten to engulf Hermione. Rose has fallen asleep, partially supported on him. Not even his voice awakens the girl:

"Bloody hell, Hermione!" he whispers energetically. "Why did you have to go? Why you?!"

"I'm an auror" she replicates logically. "I signed up for this."

"Harry didn't go! And you have kids too…!"

"Don't lecture me, Ronald" she interrupts, rolling her eyes, but with no energy left to fight. "That's my line, not yours".

In truth she is moved. And guilty. And trying to masks both moods. Her gaze has flied to the girl, and she sits beside her carefully.

"Did she sleep at all?" Hermione asks.

Ron just reaches for her hand, anxiety showing in his face. She knows he would rather hold her -reassure himself that she's alive and well-, maybe shake her too. She lifts her other hand to the child's forehead, but her fingers are tainted with blood.

"Hugo is asleep" Ron whispers.

"I'll go take a shower."

She squeezes his hand, grateful, and leaves. She knows his fear. She knows how hard it would be for him to raise the kids alone. She sees it every day in Harry's eyes.

The cages and the owls inside are unusually quiet as Harry and James push them through the barrier and into the platform where the Hogwarts Express waits, as red and warm-looking as always. They are cold, though. Even if their breaths don't sparkle like two years before, and the morning is warm with the last shreds of summer, they are pale and chilled inside. Lily, the youngest, seems to have had a close encounter with a dementor, that empty she seems, despite being her first year in Hogwarts. Her mom is missing. And they miss her. Dearly.

Hermione stands near the barrier purposely. A second before seeing the first of them, her inner self welcomes him. A partner thing. Her soul recognizes his presence. If it was a sound, it would be the softest, the most magical humming. If it was a sight, it would be bright as a patronus, but colored as the sky. If it was a flavor, it would be bittersweet, and spicy. His magic stretches to reach her in waves of warmth. She can almost see the electric pattern that indicates that her partner is closeby.

Before her actual ears hear his pace, she is pushing Rose slightly. They already spoke about this, and for once, the teen girl hasn't even protested. She doesn't like Albus as she did as a child, but all the family is hurting too bad, and she has her mother's heart too.

Rose hugs Albus first.

Ron follows his girls.

"Isn't the dark cloud over them a little too excessive?" he whispers near his wife's ear. "That amount of mourning must be harmful for the kids."

He is taking care that no one else can hear; in recognition, she whispers her retort:

"Ron. For once. Not a single word."

They reach the barrier and she hugs each child. When she gets to Lily, Albus has already left to find Scorpius. Now they have something else in common. Harry doesn't protest. Ron stands beside him, uncomfortable.

"Lil…" the father whispers to his youngest.

The red-headed girl stares at him and he is stricken by the resemblance. Her mother, and his, as well. He stands mouth agape. Luckily, she seems to have prepared her own speech.

"I have heard… both… of you explaining everything to both of my brothers. Don't worry, dad. I'll do fine."

He swallows and nods.

Hermione has already asked Hugo to take care of the girl. They are both in the same year, both likely to get into Gryffindor.

The kids walk towards the train, seeming relieved as they approach the joyful atmosphere. Hermione sees Harry's attempts to control his expression. As usual, a ridiculous amount of people are watching him, despite the fact that his group is more or less protected by the barrier.

The witch surrounds him with her arms and hugs him tightly. After a moment, Ron joins, transforming it into a group embrace. It's nice for a moment, until he says:

"You must rebuild your life, mate…"

"Ron…" she warns him, without looking.

"It's true! I loved her too, she was my sister for Merlin's sake; but it has been nearly two years! And you still wear black. I'm actually wondering if it's for her. I'm voicing everyone's worries here…"

"Ronald!" she screams, but regains the whisper as she adds: "You are not at your office, nor giving a speech."

"That's not…!"

"I'm not sure if I want to live with both of you, even temporally" Harry cuts.

"Nonsense!" she exclaims, at her bossiest, even as she parts from the embrace. "We are helping you close your house today, and tomorrow you are coming with us…"

Then she notices that this was a pale attempt of joke; but could as well be true. She remembers how much Harry hated their fights.

"I'm sorry" she apologizes, anyway.

She keeps a hand behind Harry's back. A young girl gives her the strangest look before and after eyeing Harry and Ron. Somewhere, someone takes a picture.

"How is it going for the Minister of Magic?" Harry asks Ron after a moment. He, too, tries to be civil. It's also a most appreciated distraction.

"Well, Hermione thinks I haven't developed enough diplomatic skills…" nothing to comment to that "… but it's cool. Everyone listens, for a change" Ron lowers his voice before adding. "Hermione reviews every one of the speeches –and more than half writes them, to be fair…"

"You also help with our planning" Harry point out.

Ron's smile brightens, even as he keeps talking.

"In fact, since she's doing half of my work, I was wondering how she is really doing at her own… Something about another international dictator?"

"Oh, but that's not ours, Ron… I mean, whoever is trying to revive the British Empire, isn't causing much of a havoc here… It's more the domain of the Department of International Affairs… Aren't you getting their reports?"

She loses track of the chitchat, turning her attention to the necessary arrangements. Harry needs his friends under the same roof, for the first time since they left Hogwarts. Specially her and Ron. But also the rest; and as much as she hates parties, she has already decided to throw one, just to gather the friends he has lost touch with. She can't let him alone in this. That's what partners are for.

As they walk back through the barriers, someone approaches Ron, and he puts on the most confident of his smiles –only Harry and her would see through it- and shakes the man's hand. Only then, Harry's magic reaches for hers again.

"I'd say you are still hurt" he states.

He stands a step behind her, not touching her physically, but invisible hands are feeling her for extra wounds, brushing against her back, licking her arms until they find her shoulder. She shivers.

"OK, I confess, I really didn't have time for potions" she confesses quickly in a whisper, eyeing Ron as he appears to listen to the elector. "But you know how it is, Harry. First day. Kids to manage…"

"No, I guess you didn't" he admits. "But I want your promise that you won't go without me again. Never ever again."

"Oh, shut up, Harry. You know I can't…"

"What are you doing" Ron asks, distrusting.

The elector left without them noticing.

"Nothing" they both answer at once.

Ron grasps Hermione's hand and pulls her to him in a gesture a little too evident.

Her bracelet's heat has receded with Harry's anger. She risks eyeing him. He stares at Ron. They can only speak so much in front of him, especially of their empathy, before awakening his jealousy. Silence fills the minutes, and just much later, as Ron gets intercepted again, in a voice so low that he might be speaking to himself, Harry adds:

"Please. I can't lose you too."

Hermione wakes up with a drowned scream. She stares at Ron, snoring loudly beside her –his mouth open and dibbling– while breathing deeply. The magical tattoo he got because of that bet, barely moves; all chess pieces sleep entangled, as puppies, and to the moonlight she sees that the knight lying its head on the black tower, where the bishop supports its back. She tucks Ron in –a boy, really, despite his age- and slides out of the bed, taking a book before descending the foreign stairs to pour herself some water and maybe find a place near the fireplace where she could drown in the story instead of letting the fear engulf her.

She has had a nightmare. Nothing new. This dream has the flavor of forest and snow, and the voice of Evil. She can't remember it. She rarely can. But it isn't that scary. Not like in her youth, where Evil walked unrestrained. Even when she walks forward to fight real dark magic, she has her training, and Harry beside her. She grasps her left arm, near her shoulder, where she can feel, instilled in her skin, the bracelet they both wear ever since graduation at the Auror Academy; the bracelet that makes them partners.

She doesn't know that, just before her waking, Harry took his hand to his forehead and scratched it, mildly upset.

When he sees the woman coming through the door, he gasps and half stands. There has been no woman in this house's nights since Ginny. For a split second, he thinks –against all odds- that it's her. Hermione notices. Her eyes fly from the papers forgotten on the table to his eyes, green hazes, still half lost. Hers meet them with sympathy. She literally feels his grief, as sobs against her skin.

"You need your sleep" the witch comments.

"I have some work to do" the wizard defends himself and avoids her gaze, not wanting to worry her.

She walks past him, takes some water for herself and some for him, and sits beside him, handling him his glass.

"I was having a nightmare, so I can't sleep" she says, trusting in half truths. "If you don't mind, I might stay… help you… or just talk?"

He smiles, relieved of having her without being pampered… at least, patently.

The book forgotten on the table, they talk quietly for hours, remembering their own first time taking the Hogwarts Express. He recalls Ginny as she was back then: a little red-headed girl hiding behind her mother; but there isn't much more to evoke of her from that year. They remember Trevor, of dear memory, thanks to whom they first met. They laugh a little and lie on the carpet.

"Sleep" she orders, transfiguring a cushion into a mattress, and making it lie on him. "Tomorrow will be another long day."

"I don't have that many things to move, Hermione. I won't stay at your place for that long."

"That too."

He stares at her inquisitively, and she rolls her eyes.

"Hogwarts' students aren't the only ones starting lessons."

"Trainees" he understands at last.

"Straight from pre-Auror" she nods, her cheek brushing against the carpet. "My sister will be there too."

She sounds sleepy. Her eyes are closed when he mutters a:

"Thank you, Hermione."

His left hand touch her bracelet, a pale imitation of the official greeting between partners that renovates the magic inside.

She smiles and touches his.

But when she hears his breathing deepen, and knows he's asleep, she opens her eyes and stares at him. Just stares. He forgot to take off his glasses, and looks funny despite the scars all around his face, and the wrinkles. And what she feels scare the hell out of her.

To be continued...

Preview:

He's aware of her slightly disheveled hair, her blushing cheeks and her panting, and of his own half-arousal - which he swiftly attributes to the adrenaline pumping through his veins-, before she stands and steps back, allowing him to breath. He doesn't wonder why he wasn't able to breath easily before, if she didn't put weight on his chest.

If you have spent half an hour of your life sharing this writing-reading with me, why not to spend some seconds telling me so? I'd lead to a better experience on your side and on mine.

English is not my mother tongue, but I'm far from a novice in it and I've even gotten some editor's praise. You can still spot mistakes and point them out to me. However, please be specific. There's a guest whose review was "over work your sentences with "big" words" and because it's a guest I can neither thank him properly nor ask for precisions. If anyone can provide them I'll be most thankful.

My own review? The Kings Cross' scene was obviously a tribute to Rowlings, but it wasn't strong enough to be an opening. That fighting scene, of course, is me showing her off ;D A kickarse auror, even if she'd rather have her partner with her, just for the company. We'll move to more harmione scenes as it goes on. Remember: This is just the prologue.

By the way, the first harmione scenes were born from hateful crítics, so thank you, whoever you are (they were guests), I adored the result. The rest of you, feel free to tell me what you feel, though I'd prefer it to be balanced: no much sense in complaining about a scene in the eight chapter without telling me why your reading got that far.

And thank you, steltek. The site itself had translated part of the text because I was publishing it from a Spanish-speaker's phone. I hope the problem is fixed now.

Meanwhile, imagine the empty square under these words is a hole in my heart and fill it.