Hermione felt Harry's eyes on her the moment he entered the room. It was something she'd learned to get used to over the years. She didn't stop noticing it, loving it, feeling that he was safe and near, but she'd learned not to visibly react to it.
If she had, it would have made their professional lives very uncomfortable. They - mostly Harry - were already considered living legends, if anybody outside of their most trusted circle of confidants knew what they truly were to each other they would never get a moment's peace.
So, she paused for ten purposeful beats before she looked up. Her stupid husband subtly smirked at her. Ron, feeling no such circumspection, made a face at her. And like the calm, mature, Head of Magical Law Enforcement that she was, she stuck her tongue out at him. Pretty much the entire room laughed, having gotten used to the dynamic between the trio. Despite herself, she met Harry's eyes and he winked. And, as if it hadn't been more than twenty years, her hopeless heart melted.
She forced herself to put an annoyed expression on her face. "Aurors Potter and Weasley, how kind of you to join us. Please have a seat so that we can begin our meeting."
1999
Hermione sat straight up in bed, screaming and clawing at her chest, which was unfortunately not an unusual occurrence these days. But this was different. This was no simple nightmare.
Harry was injured, he needed her. Her logical mind didn't raise even a token protest that she was being irrational. She vaulted out of bed and only paused long enough to throw on a robe and a pair of slippers before sprinting to the headmistress' office. She demanded that the gargoyle contact McGonagall for her. And no, she didn't care that it was the middle of the night, thank you very much.
The professor was so startled that she barely argued with Hermione before allowing her access to her Floo to travel to St. Mungo's. Hermione was arguing, screaming at, the witch at the reception desk when Ron appeared, accompanied by the Minister for Magic.
She threw herself at Ron. "It's okay. He's okay," he soothed
"Are you sure? It hurts so much."
When she looked back on it she would realize how telling it was that he didn't question her about that strange statement but simply said: "Would I lie to you about that? I'll take you to him."
She took a step back and tried to catch her breath and then she rounded on Kingsley. "And you! You said they would be safe, you said the first two years were just training!"
Kingsley looked slightly guilty. "He volunteered and he was our best chance to get their attention."
"What? WHAT! Are you standing here telling me you let him use himself as BAIT?!" She poked Kingsley viciously in the chest and then Ron's arms were around her, pulling her away from him and all but dragging her down the corridor.
"Merlin 'Mione, you can't assault the Minister for Magic, especially not in the middle of St. Mungo's!"
"Fine," she huffed, "I'll just make sure he pays for this quietly later."
"Bloody hell you're scary, I almost feel sorry for Harry."
"I'm not going to hurt Harry," she scoffed, straightening herself out once he released her with a wary look.
Ron just shook his head but as he took her in, his eyes went wide. "What are you wearing, did you jump straight out of bed to come here?"
"Basically," she shrugged. "Now are you going to take me to Harry or am I going to have to force his location out of that useless mediwitch."
He shook his head again but removed his cloak and draped it around her, then he took her arm and led her along. Stopping in front of the door to one room, he held up his hand to stop her from opening it.
"Ron!"
"No, look, just give me a minute, this is important." He ran a hand through his hair, it had gotten long, but it suited him. She felt a surge of affection for him, even if she did wish he would get on with it so she could see Harry. "If you never listen to anything else I ever say to you, please listen to this." His expression was so earnest.
"This is about Harry?"
He smiled slightly, but it seemed a little sad, and nodded.
"Okay," she crossed her arms over her chest. "I'm listening."
"I know that you hate — what do you call Divination? Wooly?"
She nodded.
He took a deep breath. "I know that you hate the more wooly aspects of magic, the things you can't necessarily predict. Part of it might be because you didn't grow up with magic, but I know it's mostly because you're so logical. Which is great," he was quick to interject, "gotten us out of more scrapes than I can count, eh?" He grinned crookedly at her.
She just nodded again, knowing he meant no offense. Flattered even, in the most peculiar way.
"Okay, but that doesn't mean that those magicks don't exist. I mean, think about it. You thought The Tale of the Three Brothers was just a fairytale. But the Hallows turned out to be real. And our best friend survived a killing curse when he was just a baby through the magic of love. And I can't explain either of those things, can you? Or how about the fact that you just came here tonight, that you knew Harry was hurt without anybody contacting you?"
Out of habit she kind of wanted to argue with him. But her heart understood exactly what he was saying. "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy," she mused, mostly to herself.
"Sorry?" Ron asked.
"It's just a quote from a play. It basically just means that human knowledge is limited." She smiled up at him. "And you're right, if I can't acknowledge that I don't know everything, then I'm not really as smart as I'd like to think am I, right?"
"Well, I don't know about that. But that first part sounds like what I was trying to say."
"Okay. What does this have to do with Harry?"
"I made him promise me that if you came here tonight, if you'd realized he was injured that he would tell you something, something I've been trying to get him to talk to about for months. He agreed because I don't think the moody bloke thought for a second that you would show up."
"Why on earth wouldn't I come?"
"I never doubted that you would, but he doesn't think he deserves what's between you, so he refuses to believe it."
"I don't understand. What's between us?"
Ron shook his head. "He needs to be the one to tell you, but I want you to promise me that you won't leave that room until he's explained it to you. And when he does, you'll hear him out."
"I can do that, you've certainly intrigued me." She shot him a small smile, hoping for one in return, he just looked so serious, so unlike Ron.
Instead he took her into his arms and kissed her forehead. "I know now why we didn't work out. And that sucks for me because I'll probably never find another witch as great as you, but I would never take this from Harry because he does deserve it."
And then he opened the hospital room door and practically shoved her inside. She almost turned around to ask him what the hell that was supposed to mean. But then she caught sight of Harry and all of the tension she'd felt in her chest since she'd woken up dissolved. She automatically rubbed her sternum and let out a sigh of relief.
"So you felt it," he said in greeting.
"Harry! How are you?" She walked up to the bed, doing a mental inventory of his appearance. He looked tired, slightly disheveled, and his normally bright eyes were a little glassy, but he seemed healthy enough.
"I'm fine," he assured her, holding up his hands as if that was proof, "it was a reductor to the chest, but I was wearing armour. The damage was superficial but they're making me rest," he rolled his eyes, "they've actually put a ward around the bed to keep me from getting up."
She couldn't help it, she laughed. "Your reputation precedes you Mr. Potter."
He smiled, but quickly grew serious again. "I'm just sorry it hurt you too."
"I- Harry, what does that mean? Ron was very insistent that we talk." She rounded the bed and removed Ron's cloak, laying it on the chair next to the bed and then seating herself.
"Mione," something about the tone of his voice had her immediately looking up. He was swallowing convulsively, looking at her with an expression that almost seemed...hungry. "Is that my quidditch jersey?"
The weight of Ron's cloak on her shoulders had pulled her robe open exposing her pajamas: his quidditch jersey and a pair of flannel pants. She blushed. She still had a lot of his belongings that they'd simply never bothered to sort through after the war, it's not like she'd taken it without his knowledge. But actually wearing it was different, it was something witches did for their wizards.
"Damn it," he muttered.
"I'm sorry," she felt compelled to say.
"No, don't apologize, love. It looks perfect on you." He reached out a hand for her, she immediately took it and stood to perch herself on the edge of the mattress. "You're just so much more than I ever could have hoped for."
"Harry? What?" She was beginning to feel foolish, but oddly felt no irritation with him.
He let out a little laugh and caressed her palm with his thumb, she leaned into his body automatically. "Well Ron says that in exchange for fate putting so much on my plate she also sent me a partner to help me through it. And I don't know how to say this without sounding completely sappy, but that I'd also been gifted with true love. My parents, specifically my father, were more blunt. They told me to get my head out of my arse."
Hermione's hand clenched in Harry's. "True love? Your parents?"
"Just —" he licked his lips, "let me get this out before you yell at me."
Why did everybody seem to think that whatever he had to tell her was going to upset her? She had been upset before she'd seen that he was safe, now she just wanted to finish talking so that she could curl herself around him the way they sometimes had in the tent.
"Okay, go on."
"I went back to Hogwarts the week after the final battle and I tracked down the Resurrection Stone. Once I acknowledged that I was the Master of the Hallows, well it isn't hard for me to locate any of them. Which I know probably upsets you, but I promise I'll only ever use the cloak from now on."
Hermione was equally fascinated and horrified.
He looked into her eyes, his own were shining with sincerity. "I swear to you Hermione, I just wanted to talk to my parents once. Once when I didn't think I was about to die. I just wanted that closure." It was a dangerous but understandable thought. But then he smiled in a way she'd never seen before, and she was certain that it had been the right thing for him to do.
"Tell me what they said," she couldn't help but ask, eager to share in his obvious joy at getting to talk to his parents.
"They said they were proud of me."
"Well of course they did, how could they not be?"
His smile widened and he brought her hand to his lips and kissed her knuckles, then he turned it over and kissed her palm. Hermione's breath caught. She was seeing an entirely different side of Harry tonight and it was a lot to absorb.
"Yeah, they also said you'd say something like that." He snorted. "Ready for the really intense part? They told me that we're soul mates. I'm sorry. I had no idea. Every time you were injured while we were friends you were close to me, I chalked up my reaction to those injuries as just a result of being worried for you. I didn't really think that me getting injured would physically impact you too, or that you would feel it hundreds of kilometres away."
Hermione Hermoine just stared at him while she absorbed this. How was it that she wasn't even a little bit surprised? "But Ron knew?"
"Yeah, I had a little too much to drink one night and I started going on about how much I missed you, and he tricked me into spilling the whole story. He's apparently suspected for some time."
"But how?"
"It's kind of a myth in wizarding families. A soul mate is like the ultimate gift. Kids are taught to recognize the signs."
"Were we that obvious?"
"Well, it's not like our friendship with Ron is exactly normal. He got a much closer view than anybody else —- wait. Does that mean that you believe it's true?"
Her heart clenched at the sight of him gazing at her like she was too good to be true. She'd seen that look before;: when she did something he considered brilliant, when she stuck by his side through the hard times, sometimes when she just smiled at him.
"Oh Harry," she sighed, "It's the truest thing I've ever heard. The truest thing I've ever felt," she pressed her free palm to her sternum.
He struggled to sit up and pulled her into a fierce kiss. When he pulled away he was grinning. "Ron is going to be insufferable."
She burst out laughing.
Author's Note: Thanks to Weestarmeegie for beta reading. Also, this is actually part of a great collection of works on Ao3. Message me if you'd like more details because this site literally won't let me post the link. Stay safe, thanks for reading!