Hermione stormed out of the Great Hall, fuming at what Ron had said to her about their Divination class. Upset because I'm not good at something, she scoffed to herself. No one in their right mind would want to be good at Divination. Honestly, reading tea leaves of all things!

She was so lost in her anger it took her moment to realize she was no longer alone. Because there, gliding alongside her in silence, was Perseus.

"Perseus." His name fell from her lips like a breath of air. His presence filled her with a lightness, sweeping all her anger aside, replacing it with the joy and contentment she always felt with him.

He looked down at her, his violet eyes devouring her face, the same way she knew hers did to him. She had not seen him in months, and it amazed her how much he could change in such a short span of time.

His jawline was sharper, and his cheekbones grew more defined. His black locks still fell in twisting tendrils, sometimes obscuring his face. His violet eyes peered at her from thick, dark lashes that shuttered them. Her eyes widened as butterflies twisted in her stomach. Oh no. Perseus had always been attractive, from the very first moment she met him. But when she'd met Perseus their first year, he'd been pretty, for lack of a better term, with his soft, delicate features and long curly hair. But now with his features growing more prominent, the boy had quickly, and without me noticing, turned from pretty to incredibly handsome.

"Hello, Hermione," he said. "Where are we going?"

Hermione released a puff of air. His quiet, raspy voice soothed her. This was still the same Perseus she knew, the same Perseus that was her best friend.

His question brought her up short. She stopped and looked around, Perseus stopping with her. "I don't quite know, actually." She turned to look at him. "How long have you been following me?"

"You make it sound as if I were stalking you," he said, lips twisting in amusement.

She huffed, her face heating up. "You know what I meant."

"I saw you were upset, leaving the Great Hall, and I followed you. It didn't take me long to catch up."

"Yes, can you believe it? Professor Trelawney predicted Harry's death, and he swears he saw a Grim over the summer—so now he and Ron are—"

She stopped herself, sucking in a deep breath, the way her father had taught her as a child. Perseus watched her the entire time, his gaze fond. She turned away from him to hide the blush she could feel spreading across her face. "Anyway," she said as conversationally as she could. "I think I agree with Professor McGonagall. Divination is a wooly art, full of unsubstantiated fear mongering and guesswork."

She looked over her shoulder at Perseus, finding him as calm and impassive as ever. "Well? Don't you have anything to say?"

He shrugged. "Seeing has never been a talent in the Black family, I don't take divination."

Her brow furrowed. "That's it? No one in your family has ever had it, so you just don't take the class?"

"For what purpose? Seeing isn't a talent you can learn, and gazing at tea leaves a bit too much up to speculation for my liking."

"So you agree that Divination is a bunch of nonsense?"

He shook his head. "The class? Almost certainly. Divination however, has a long and powerful history in the Wizarding World."

"But surely you see that they are just made up stories?"

He shrugged again. "Who am I to say? My family has never followed the practice closely. We believe our destiny to be our own making. I quite like that belief, whether it's true or not."

Hermione smiled. She quite liked it too.

"Did you say Potter thought he saw a Grim?" He looked perplexed, his brows pinched and his mouth firm.

Didn't he just say looking into tea leaves was speculative at best? "Yes, Harry said he saw one leaving his Aunt's house over the summer. A bunch of nonsense, obviously."

His expression didn't clear up, if anything he looked even more troubled.

"Why?"

He cast her a glance out of the side of his eye. "Just something I remembered about my father, is all."

His father? Hermione's mind raced rapidly, trying to find whatever connection he had found. Her eyes widened. His father!

"Your father escaped from Azka-"

"Would you like to see something?"

She closed her mouth, following Perseus' gaze to the suit of armor that occupied the hall.

"What?" She followed him as he stepped closer, his wand sliding into his hand from inside the sleeve of his robe. I'd really like one of those.

"A few hundred years ago, an ancestor of mine was Headmaster here—Phineas Nigellus Black."

It was so easy to forget how intertwined Perseus' family was with wizarding Britain. In Hogwarts alone the name Black could be found all over the trophy room.

"During his tenure as Headmaster, he discovered and documented every secret he could find, and created some for himself, and our family." He glanced at her. "I'm not meant to share them with anyone who isn't family but…" He trailed off with a shrug.

Warmth spread to her toes. She knew how Perseus was when it came to tradition; that he would break it for her meant a lot.

He pressed his wand to a spot in the stone wall. Hermione stared, waiting for something to happen, but the wall never changed. She moved forward to get a closer look. Perseus never messed up a spell. Something had to have changed.

Perseus held out a hand, his open palm and slender fingers beckoning her. She didn't hesitate. His hand closed firmly around her own, his skin soft and dry. Their eyes met, and her butterflies returned in full force.

She opened her mouth to speak, to say something—anything to break the dense silence that had fallen over them, to distract her far too observant friend before he caught on to the way his violet eyes caused her breath to hitch in her throat.

He looked away from her, focusing now on the wall. "What are you…" her voice trailed off. Perseus stepped forward, past the suit of armor and into the wall. She squeezed his hand tightly, waiting for his face to meet the stone. His body slid through the wall like water, and she was pulled along with him.

He released her hand and cast a spell, too quietly for her to hear. Orbs of light shot out of his wand, and sped away from them, stopping incrementally in the air. It was like her Bluebell Flames Charm, but better.

She whipped her head around, only to find Perseus' smirking face.

"The Illumination Charm; incantation is Lucidus. The wand movement is a simple flick."

She repeated the information in her head twice; all that was needed to memorize it. Perseus knew so many spells it was almost frustrating. She was sure she knew as many or more than everyone in her year, and still she had yet to use a spell Perseus couldn't perform.

She looked around. They were in a large, round room, with a dome shaped ceiling. It was furnished like a lounge, with leather couches and recliners. The floors were decorated with thick, fluffy rugs, and there was a large desk off to the side. In front of the couches was a grand fireplace, with a shining gold mantle that displayed the same crest that saw on the stamps Perseus used for his letters. The crest of House Black. But what really caught Hermione's eye was bookcase after bookcase of tomes.

"What is this place?" She whispered. She made her way towards the bookcases, looking around in wonder. Torches and candles lit as soon as she crossed the threshold, and the orbs of light Perseus had produced vanished.

It was some private study, or library. Phineas Nigellus Black's if Perseus was correct. She ran her fingers along the couch as she passed. The leather was warm, smooth and supple.

"How did you know this was here?" She asked. "I've never seen it before, not even on Harry's map."

She had finally reached the bookcase, and her eyes widened in horror at the collection of books in front of her.

Magick Moste Evile, Secrets of the Darkest Arts, Flesh and Blood. Some of the titles were outright grotesque(50 Ways to Skin a Witch or Wizard) and left no speculation as to what knowledge lay inside. Why on earth would anyone have these books? And in a school?

"Potter has a map of the school?"

She jumped, whirling around and stifling a shriek. The room was eerie, and Perseus' raspy whisper certainly fit right in.

"I'm sorry, what?"

He looked over her shoulder at the books, and then back to her, paying them no mind. "Potter — you said he has a map?"

"Yes, he has a map of the school made by his father and friends. It shows the entire school, and the locations of everyone…in…"

Oh no. Oh no. Oh no. He knew! Harry knew! There was no way he possibly didn't know. Harry carried the map with him more often than not, and he checked it occasionally when they were together to find Ron. There was certainly a very high chance of probability that he also used it sometimes to find her. And if he checked the map with any regularity, he had probably seen her and Perseus' names side by side any number of times. Why hasn't he said anything?

"How ingenious," Perseus muttered, his eyes distant. "No one student—it must've taken at least 15 charms. A Homonculous Charm to chart the people, a protean charm to transfer all the information-"

As interesting as his ramblings were, now was not the time. "Perseus!"

His eyes sharpened, a look of concern entering them as they fell to meet her own. "Yes?"

"Harry has seen us together! He must have! The map charts everyone at all times as they move about the castle; surely he has seen us together at least a single time!"

The boy did not so much as raise a brow. In fact, he did nothing more than shrug, as if the matter was entirely unimportant.

How could he be so nonchalant? It had been him that insisted on privacy to begin with! "Don't you see? He'll have told Ron and oh god-" She began pacing, tugging on the ends of her bushy hair. This was bad—it was really bad. Already she had to keep the Time Turner she wore around her neck a secret, would they even forgive her for keeping another secret from them? Would they be more angry that she hid it, or at the fact that her secret friendship was with one of their bitter rivals, a Slytherin?

Her pacing stopped so suddenly it seemed as though she were in slow motion, even her rapid thoughts came to a stuttering halt.

When everything sped back up, her vision was filled entirely with Perseus.

"Has either of them said anything?"

She blinked at him in disbelief. "Did you just hit me with an Immobulus?"

"Have they said anything?"

She hesitated before shaking her head. "Well no—but maybe they're keeping it to themselves, waiting for the perfect moment!"

He chuckled. "You give your friends far too much credit, Hermione. They are far too…Gryffindorish for anything as clever as that."

Hermione had to admit the idea was a bit far fetched. Finding out she was friends with Perseus would make Ronald so angry she was sure the entire school would know before an hour passed.

She bit her lip. "Why are you being so nonchalant? This was your idea."

He shrugged once more, his eyes scanning the shelves over her head. "I'm not afraid anymore."

"Afraid of what?"

"The older Slytherins."

His answer surprised her. He feared his own Housemates? The way Perseus talked about his fellow Slytherins sometimes, it was as if they were dangerous. Don't follow me into the Dungeons, he had said to her at the end of their first year. What is going on in Slytherin house?

"You were — why? Did they do something to you?"

He shook his head. "No, but they might. And if they were to find out we were friends, they would certainly try."

"Perseus, we should tell somebody — Professor McGonagall or even the Headmaster!"

His lips twisted into an odd smile. "It's Dumbledore," he said. "Do you really think he doesn't know?"

"Surely he doesn't! He wouldn't allow them to continue studying here if he did. They'd be expelled." She followed him as he went and sat in a leather recliner, running his fingers along the seams. The torch light reflected in his gaze, and gave his ivory skin a warm glow.

"It's not so simple," he said with a sigh. "While Dumbledore can expel them, the family could petition the Board of Governors to overrule his decision."

This was something she knew. She'd read it in a book she'd found on the Hogwarts Charter and Bylaws. "And what's the problem with that? They want dangerous individuals out of the castle as well, I'd imagine. Surely the majority would vote to uphold the decision?"

"The majority would vote to overturn it just to spite Dumbledore."

As far as she knew, Dumbledore was a well respected figure, an idol even. And to allow dangerous students to remain in the castle for something as petty as a personal dislike for the Headmaster? She refused to believe it. She crossed her arms, staring down at him. "That can't possibly be true."

Perseus leaned back in the chair, his hair partially obscuring his face. He shrugged and rubbed briefly at his throat. "Believe what you wish."

He stood up from the chair and brushed by her. The combination of the sweet, woody smell of wand polish and something vanilla filled her nose; it was a pleasant if unusual smell, one that she associated only with Perseus.

She followed him again; he picked up one of the books that had worried her earlier. "Perseus, you really shouldn't be reading that! I'll have to tell Professor McGonagall, books like this can't just be left around in a school."

His gaze was so sharp and cold it caused Hermione's breath to freeze in her chest. "You would have the belongings of my ancestor confiscated?"

"Can't you see? Secrets of the Darkest Arts, Magicks Moste Evile — these books must be illegal, or at the very least banned from the school!"

He frowned heavily at her now. "And what about this map of Potter's?" He shot back. "Are you going to tell McGonagall about that?"

She sputtered, coming up short. She'd always had an inkling that Harry's map wasn't exactly allowed, but it had belonged to his father, and he had so little of them she couldn't bear to see it taken away. Besides, while it was a bit invasive, it was relatively harmless.

"Besides, no one can get into this room without me. Not even you."

She sighed. She had betrayed his trust once, she wouldn't do so again. "Promise me you won't read them? They must be incredibly dangerous. Look at that one," she pointed at Magick Moste Evile, "it looks like it's made from human skin!"

He glanced at the book. "I've read them already."

She stared at him, at a loss for words. "You…you've what?" Her voice was shrill, even to her own ears.

"I've read them all — studied them, practiced the magic in them. Some of it, anyway." he said, sliding the book back onto the shelf. "My aunt was very thorough in her teaching."

Hermione grabbed the edge of a chair, her stomach rolling. The thought that anyone could force a child to read the things in those books was abhorrent. That Perseus could know such things—it was nearly unbearable. And to her own disgust, it was horribly fascinating. It was dangerous, forbidden magic, and it excited her far more than it had any right to.

"What's it like?"

The ice was gone from his glare, replaced by a look she knew well; he was analyzing her.

"What's what like?"

Her face was on fire, and she ducked her head, biting her lip. "The Dark Arts." Just whispering the words sent a thrill through her, one she only felt when doing something bad with Harry and Ron.

The corners of his lips twitched. "Why Miss Granger, you couldn't possibly be tempted by the forbidden Dark Arts, could you?"

"N-no! Of course not," she stammered, feeling flustered under his heavy stare. How could she just come out and admit something like that? The truth was, she was fascinated by magic, and the fact that there was an entire branch that was just forbidden made it all the more enticing.

"Don't worry," Perseus said, no doubt seeing her internal struggle, perceptive as he was. "Your secret is safe with me. Besides, who would I tell? I'm a Black; I know more Dark Magic than everyone in this castle besides Professor Snape and the Headmaster."

She swallowed, looking at Perseus in a new light. Was this why his family was so feared? Or why Perseus' own housemates treated him with distant politeness? Because he could do Dark Magic? She was far from stupid. She saw the looks he received; only the younger students seemed to view him in any positive light, and his two other maybe-friends, Daphne Greengrass and Blaise Zabini. They weren't exactly bastions of light themselves, as far as she knew. She'd even seen the Headmaster gazing at Perseus unnaturally long at times, his eyes missing their signature sparkle.

He finally looked away from her and pulled out his pocket watch to look at the time. "Well, it appears we spent more time here than I thought." He pocketed the watch, closed the gap between them in a single step, and engulfed her in a hug. It took her completely by surprise. Perseus had never, ever, initiated a hug before.

Once more the butterflies exploded in her stomach, and her face was so hot she was sure she was going to explode. Pushing all that aside, she returned the hug, burying her head in his chest. She had worked hard to get him so receptive to physical touch, and she didn't know what the catalyst was for this hug, but she wasn't about to make him doubt himself over her own silly feelings.

Ignoring the ebb and flow of warmth and tingles from her stomach to her extremities, she separated herself from him. "What was that for?"

"It's my first time seeing you in months, and who knows when we'll see each other like this again. Surely that warrants a hug?"

Hermione nodded, but something in his face—the way his eyes were slightly distant, the way his mouth was set in a smile that was not completely natural. There were small changes, so minute as to be unrecognizable, but they were there. There was more to that hug than she knew, and more than Perseus was ready to tell, it seemed.

She pushed the voice in her head that was screaming and kicking and demanding answers, to the back of her mind. Usually she gave in to herself, but not this time. Perseus deserved better than that.

"It's time I headed to the infirmary for my lessons with Madame Pomphrey," he said, stepping around her and heading for the entrance. "Feel free to stay and have a read. I wouldn't pick up any of the more…intense books, if I were you. I left one that I strongly recommend you read first, before doing anything else."

She glanced over at the desk, spotting a large, thick book but not quite being able to make out the name in the dim light.

"And if Potter's map worries you so, bring it to me, and I'll see what I can do. In the meantime, I'll find out how you can make it up to me for threatening to expose my inheritance to the Headmaster." With his parting words, he was gone, slipping through the wall as though it were nothing more than coalesced smoke.

She let out a shuddering breath, a sudden chill filling her all the way to the bone now that she was alone in the room.

He wanted her to steal Harry's map? She couldn't tell if he really wanted the map to soothe her worry, or if he just wanted the chance to examine such a complex piece of magic. Both scenarios were equally as likely, and were probably both true. He was sly in that way. His final words confused her, however. Make it up to him? What could he possibly want?

Looking back at the selection of books, she shook her head. Perseus had expertly avoided her question about the nature of the Dark Arts. She'd be sure to ask him again, her curiosity demanded no less.

She put the thought out of her mind, and headed to find the book Perseus left for her. She picked up the book and moved to the more casual area of the room, the plush leather couch seated in front of the fireplace. It was thick and weighty, the leather of the covers smooth and cool against her skin.

Pointing her wand at the fireplace, she cast, "Incendio." She wrestled for control for half a moment, before finally taking it. Cutting off her spell, she admired her work. The fire crackled, giving the ominous room a much warmer glow, the heat seeping into her skin battling against the unnatural cold she was feeling. It had taken her some time to gain a good level of control with the fire charm, elemental magic being naturally difficult to call on, but even more so to control and maintain. And it was the easiest of the elemental spells to cast and control. She shuddered to imagine the effort required to control anything more difficult.

Sitting down on the couch, she curled her legs up under her and picked up the book, finally reading the cover. A Beginner's Guide to the Mind Arts: Occlumency. She stared at it in interest. What on Earth are the Mind Arts?