17 – Answers

"These are amazing." Hermione set down the book Draco had handed her – "Toiling with Blood, Sweat and Tears" – and reached up to the shelf toward another of the antique books, this one a bit battered, with its spine completely missing. She opened it carefully, then her eyes snapped up at him.

"You! How did you get these?" Draco stepped back without thinking, then threw his hands out in front of himself to make it into a joke. Just a moment before she'd seemed thrilled to see his personal library.

"So you know whose books these were?" He'd known she'd figure it out, but he'd thought he'd get to tease her for a bit before she put it all together.

"Yes, Professor Snape's." There was accusation in her eyes. "You were watching us."

"I was watching his rooms, not you. If you hadn't been in there pilfering his stuff I wouldn't have seen you." He crossed his arms and enjoyed her reaction to his words.

"We weren't pilfering. As far as we knew it didn't belong to anyone."

"You were wrong. I'm his heir. His things belong to me."

"Just what you needed – more stuff. How did you come to be his heir? You don't look like him." She gave him a smirk. Was he already wearing off on her?

"I'm his godson," he replied with an eye roll, suggesting that was completely obvious. "Here, let me show you . . . ." He picked up the book she had set down and quickly turned to the chapter on the storage of tears. "All you need to do is write the date on the bottle and save it. You might want to make some notes on the emotions you were feeling at the time . . . ."

"Emotions? I was crying. I was sad, obviously."

"No, not obviously. There are different kinds of sad, different kinds of tears. Here. You're the bookworm. Read it."

Hermione frowned. Draco could tell that this was not the sort of thing she expected him to know about, especially not to know more than she did. Just then he was distracted by a loud harrumphing noise. They both turned, although Draco already knew who'd made that noise – Hyacinth.

Sure enough, she was staring out of her portrait at them with an icy glare.

Draco gave Hermione a look, trying to convey to her to let him handle this. She gave him a barely detectable nod. He strode over to the portrait.

"Miss Black, my apologies. We have been incredibly remiss."

"I should say so. I have been worried out of my frame about you. The last I spoke to either of you Nappy was suddenly delivering messages and ever since then I have been completely out of . . . ."

Draco held his hand out to her, a purple flower that he had just transfigured out of his hankerchief in his hand. "Please, accept this in amends for my . . . our carelessness." He said with a bow. He heard a noise from Hermione which sounded like a stifled laugh, but he didn't turn to look at her.

Hyacinth bowed her head and gave Draco a wry smile. "Thank you ever so much, Mr. Malfoy. I'm sure you are aware that I cannot accept it."

"Yes, but I shall leave it in a vase here where you can appreciate its beauty." He summoned a tea cup from the kitchen, transformed it into a vase, then deposited the flower in it.

"Am I to assume you will no longer be needing my assistance? You've obviously been introduced to each other now." Draco had to stop to think about that. Hermione stepped up to the portrait.

"Miss Black, I can't tell you how grateful we are for your help. We were able to save an entire orphanage full of children thanks to you. We are communicating directly now, but we may need your help from time to time."

"I'm glad I could be of service." She turned from them, back to her usual pose, although Draco was pretty sure that she seemed glum about her lessened role.

By the time he'd turned back to the books, Hermione was already perusing another one. "This is amazing. This book has Snape's notes on how to make . . . ." She paused, distracted as she ran her finger down the index. Draco leaned back against a high-backed chair, laughing to himself to see how thrilled she was about a bunch of books, excited enough that she hadn't even remembered to call Snape "Professor." "It's here!"

At her exclamation, he had to move closer to see what could possibly have gotten that reaction. She looked up at him briefly, her eyes alit, her face alive with excitement. Was she always this pretty or was it the fact that she was filled with joy that made her glow? When was the last time he'd seen anyone sparkle with innocent happiness like that?

She flipped the book open to the page she was seeking. It was obvious this was a potion recipe that had been used frequently. The notes in the margins were copious, and they included several places where Severus had crossed out his own notes and made changes. The pages were also spotted with drops of . . . something. Draco didn't want to think about what might have been splashed on that book.

Hermione leaned back, and looked off into space as she asked "How am I supposed to do that?" She seemed to have completely forgotten that he was there. He reached over and pulled the book out of her hands, then skimmed through the notes in the margin.

"That explains a lot," he said.

"What?" Hermione's head snapped toward him.

"There were always rumors that Severus was seen leaving the astronomy tower late at night. Some thought he had secret trysts with Professor Sinistra." Draco waggled his eyebrows at her, and laughed as she scowled at him. "He must've been up there brewing . . . ." He looked up at the chapter heading. "He was brewing Wolfsbane Potion? But why?"

"He brewed it for Professor Lupin all through our third year."

"Severus hated Lupin. Why would he spend so much time experimenting, perfecting it for someone he hated?"

"I don't know. I never understood him at all, but he did perfect it. No one's been able to brew it anywhere close to as well as he did, although now that I've found this . . . . if we could only find more wolfsbane . . . ."

Draco sighed. He'd thought he knew Severus pretty well, in fact, he'd thought he was one of his closest, well . . . friends was too strong of a word, but at least there'd been no other students as close to the professor. Yet, he'd never suspected that he was a spy for the Order. Maybe he hadn't known him at all.

"No one knew he was a spy, you know." Hermione's voice was soft. "No one but Dumbledore."

"You knew."

"Not until the night he died." She bit her lip. "We were there, watching from under Harry's cloak, when he was killed."

"You mean during the battle?"

"No. Snake Eyes killed him, well, he had Nagini kill him. It was horrible." She turned away from him and he immediately suspected that there was more she wasn't telling him.

"What?" He wasn't about to let her leave him hanging like that.

"Maybe . . . maybe you should see it, although . . . ."

"He was my godfather. I have a right to know."

"I think you do and for more reasons than that, but it would be best if it came from Harry's memory. You said you have a pensieve?"

"I can't take it out of my father's office. Taking you to the Manor would be insanely dangerous."

"Maybe we can use the one at Hogwarts. Let me ask."

Draco paused. He couldn't believe how easily she'd agreed to that. "Thanks. By the way . . . did you say you needed some wolfsbane?"

"Yes, oh my gosh, do you have some? You have no idea . . . ."

"Calm down. Yes, I have quite a bit, here at the cottage in fact, and some more stores back at the Manor, but if this is right . . . if the potion is best when you brew it directly under a full moon, I may know a place where you could do that. I'd have to ask . . . ." He didn't want to say who he'd have to ask, but he'd been wanting to talk to Blaise anyway. "Look, I have a couple of things I need to do today . . . ."

"Wait, before you leave, we need to talk about the raid tonight. Do you think there's any way you can get it delayed?"

"No, he wants to go tonight, before anyone knows Jones is dead. Now we know why he thinks they won't notice, but how long can this imposter pull off being an Auror?"

"I don't know. Do you think whoever it is could have gotten into Hestia's mind and seen some of the passwords and such so they could fool the others?"

"Maybe. I don't know what happened to her earlier. Anyway, we're going in tonight. What difference would a delay make?"

"It's just . . . I had a bit of an idea, but we don't have time to set it up." Draco raised his eyebrows at her, suggesting she should go on. "I was trying to think of how to handle this, how to keep it from being obvious that the raid is expected. If we had time . . . it would be great to let the raid go on, uninterrupted, or maybe just show up at the very end so they don't think the Ministry is completely unprotected. We could go in earlier, clean out the sensitive information and leave some . . . some faked up information, misinformation. It's just I have no idea what we'd want that to say, what kind of misinformation we'd want to give Old Beady Eyes. That'd take time to work through."

"That's a great idea, but you're right. It'd take some serious planning. If we could do it, we could lure him out, lure him into some situation where Potter could get to him, set up an ambush, something. God, I wish we could do that. I'm so sick of him hiding out in his secret cave."

"He did come out for the St. Mungo's raid."

"But that went so badly that I bet he won't do it again for a long time. By the way, do you know what happened at St. Mungo's?"

"Not really. All I know is that they were sealed in, I couldn't even get a patronus to them. Neville thought they were dead and then he said that it all fell apart and they fled."

"Look, you're going to have to just tell Shacklebolt about the raid," he paused, noticing Hermione's frown. "Don't tell me you don't trust Shacklebolt."

"I do . . . it's just this thing with Hestia has me worried about everyone. If we have one imposter, how do we know there aren't more?"

"So, be careful. Quiz him a bit before you talk to him. It probably is a good idea to get the most sensitive stuff out of the office before we go in."

"But won't that be suspicious? Will he punish you if you don't find anything good?"

"So leave us something good, or something that seems like it could be . . . wait a minute, . . . what if you left something, something encoded, but leave it so it looks like it is very important."

"We could do that, and what? . . . Just have it be nonsense, something useless for you all to spend your time trying to decode?"

"Yeah, or maybe . . . I could volunteer to work on the decoding, . . . we could figure out later what it should say, read an encoded message, set up our trap later."

"But how would we do that? How can we make a code say what we want it to say later? Changing the message would be too risky."

"No, but use a code, something that seems to be a stream of nonsense words. Then we'll make a key, somehow let the Death Eaters think they've found the key later."

"That'd work! That'd be great. You need to convince them not to take anything from the office, just take copies, don't leave any trace that you were there. Otherwise, someone would know the coded message had been intercepted."

"Yeah, I'll have to work on Aunt Bella. She loves to destroy things, but if we make like the Order has no idea we were ever there, . . . Do you have time to put together something, something that seems like nonsense?"

As Draco apparated in front of the gates to Mulciber's house he was feeling more optimistic than he had in a long time. Too optimistic. He needed to get his head out of the clouds and concentrate. It was a good idea, but there were still a thousand things that could go wrong. First of all, Hermione had to find Shacklebolt and convince him that their idea was worth trying.

Meanwhile, he needed to get a look into Mulciber's mind and there was a very significant chance that Mulciber was already dead. He pushed his memories of this morning back into his mind, behind the barrier once again, shook back his cape and went back into Death Eater mode. Somehow he'd found that putting memories behind his own barrier dimmed his emotions, made him less aware of the details of what had happened, although he hadn't forgotten it.

Luce opened the door, his face implacable as usual. Draco demanded to see his master then cut off any possible objections. "My Master does not like when his plans are delayed." Luce dutifully led the way to the front parlor. Mulciber lay in a heap on the floor in the center of the carpet. His house elf had certainly not gone to any effort to increase his comfort. It took Draco a moment to establish that he was, in fact, still breathing, then another couple of moments to steel himself against the stench in order to get close enough to make eye contact.

He didn't touch Mulciber, but used his wand to roll him onto his back. From that position he could see an ugly slash down the skin of his torso, just visible beyond the torn clothing. It didn't appear deep, in fact, with proper healing it wouldn't have been a terribly significant wound, but – like Draco's arm – it was infected and festering. The smell of rotting flesh made Draco take a step back. Then he had an idea. It took him a moment to remember it, but then he cast the spell - "Abolesco olere." He breathed in, carefully at first, then more deeply. All odor was gone, amazing.

Muliciber must have sensed the difference. His eyes flickered open. "Malfoy? What?"

Draco didn't waste any explanations on him, but delved immediately into his mind. He hurried past the most recent memories of thrashing, moaning, agony, and found his recollections of St. Mungo's. He didn't want to miss anything significant so he went all the way back to the cave, then as soon as Mulciber had portkeyed into St. Mungo's began siphoning off a copy of the memory. He didn't have time to examine it; he'd do that later. He just took it.

The whole process just took a few minutes, then he was out, back in Mulciber's parlour. Mulciber barely noticed him as he stood back up. The man was nearly gone.

Draco turned to leave, then "Malfoy, please." Mulciber's voice was barely audible. Draco turned back. "Please, make it stop. End it. Please." If Draco hadn't felt the exhausting effects of endless pain himself he wouldn't have believed that arrogant, brutal Mulciber could beg like that. He'd never seen the man do anything kind, anything merciful. Mulciber didn't deserve his help, but then again, did he deserve Hermione's help? Was there even anything he could do to help?

He couldn't heal him. His wand would be checked again for healing spells. Even the Avada Kedavra, which would probably be welcomed, wouldn't be allowed. If he could do it wandlessly, then maybe, but he still needed his wand for a spell of that power. He really had a very limited spectrum of spells he could do without a wand, although "stupefy" was definitely one of them. All it would do would be to knock Mulciber out until the end came, but at least it was something.

Draco looked around, making sure that Luce wasn't lurking nearby. He spoke as softly as he could – "stupefy," then quickly left the house.

Now to see Blaise. Once he was out of the front gate, he pulled his broom out of his pocket and enlarged it. Blaise's stepfather's estate wasn't too far and the broom ride would help clear his mind. Once again, he had a slight headache from the lurking presence of unexamined thoughts.

Hermione was supposed to meet him later. She'd given him one of her charmed coins so that he could contact her easily. Maybe he should just let her do legilimency on him, watch Mulciber's memories with him in his own head. He frowned. Why was he so willing to let her into his mind again? Normally, he hated having legilimency done to him. It always felt like an invasion and, even though he could hide his thoughts, he always had a vague feeling of being dirty afterward, as though he'd been tainted by the presence of another in his mind. That feeling was acute after the Dark Lord's invasions, but he'd felt it even when Severus was first teaching him legilimency.

But not when Hermione did it. Bizarrely, having her read his thoughts had calmed him, felt soothing, almost as though sharing his memories, even painful ones, had taken away some of their sting. That was ridiculous. Not to mention that if she saw his memories uncut, she'd probably never be able to look at him again without her stomach turning. Even if she thought she knew what it meant to be a Death Eater it was a far different thing to see it. She claimed to be able to feel what he felt, too. He'd had feelings he never wanted her to experience.

Why did he feel like she was turning his life upside down? He'd been almost certain she was his contact in the Order, but now that they were working together, face to face, it was like she'd taken over a part of his mind; she was always there. Just now, with Mulciber, he couldn't help but think about what would she do? What would she want him to do? He hated Mulciber and his type, but Hermione wouldn't have understood if he'd just left him there to suffer.

The Summers estate was just over the next hill. Draco took a moment to just enjoy the wind in his face, the feeling of freedom when he flew. As far as Draco'd kept track, Lord Summers was Blaise's fourth step-father, out of about nine. At least a couple of them had died. He'd never asked Blaise why he has living at this particular step-father's house or where his step-father was. Was he still alive? Had he died and left the estate to Blaise? Or was he still living? Maybe he'd gone abroad. Those were just some of the many questions he and Blaise ignored when they got together to enjoy vintage fire whiskey, to pretend they were just normal friends, leading normal lives.

Before visiting Mulciber, Draco had stopped off at his cottage and asked Nappy to announce him to Blaise. That was partly to keep up the usual social niceties, but partly to make sure that Blaise knew he was coming. In the old days, one could drop in on a friend, and just knock on the door, or at least ring the bell at the gatehouse. Now, security was tight everywhere. Draco wasn't sure if Blaise would answer a knock or a ring, and if he did it would probably be with wand drawn at the very least. Nappy, however, would've notified the elderly house elf, Clytie, who would've tracked down Blaise and let him know of the impending visit.

Coming over the hill, Draco was surprised to see someone standing by the iron front gate. He drew his wand and circled carefully before deciding that it was Blaise and it was safe to land. He kept his wand out as he approached though.

"Afternoon, Draco," Blaise drawled as he leaned back on the giant gate. The large iron sunburst in the center had once been gilded, but now only specks of gold remained.

"Good day," Draco answered. "What did I say during my last visit when you broke out the really good firewhiskey?"

"It wasn't your last visit, it was the one before that, and you said 'finally, hanging out with your sorry arse is paying off.'"

Draco reached out to shake Blaise's hand. If the content of his statement hadn't been good enough, the breezy way he said it was classic Blaise. "Sorry, for the interrogation. I'm getting paranoid lately."

"No problem," he said as he walked through the gate, touching Draco's elbow lightly as he also passed through. "Was there something in particular you wanted to discuss or were you just thirsty for more firewhiskey?"

"Two things actually," Draco looked back over his shoulder. "Let's wait until we're inside." Blaise was wearing a cloak, that was unusual for him. "Did you just fly in from somewhere?"

"Despite what you might think, I don't spend all of my time hanging out waiting for my favorite Death Eater to drop by." Blaise's smile took the sting out of what he said, but it was the first time he'd acknowledged what Draco was out loud.

Draco decided to press him on it. He needed to discuss some serious things with Blaise today. "Some would say you're insane to meet with a Death Eater at all."

"True enough. From what I hear you're not just any old foot soldier either."

Draco sighed and followed Blaise up the front steps and through the massive front doors. "No, I'm not. That brings me to one of the things I need to tell you. I'm here to deliver a warning."

"Is this where the friendship ends and the threats begin?" Blaise stopped walking and turned to face Draco, one hand inside his cloak, no doubt on his wand.

"No. This is a real warning. I'm afraid I don't have much to give you either, but the Dark Lord mentioned your name last night." Blaise gave him an incredulous look, and waited for him to go on. "He thinks he now may be able to persuade you to join him, he's come across some sort of information, but he didn't say what. I really just want you to know, to be careful, to be on your guard."

Blaise swore under his breath, then turned and stomped down the hall. Once he'd reached their usual sitting room he conjured two glasses and poured fire whiskey into each. Without a word he held one out to Draco.

"I suppose I'd be wasting my breath to try to convince you to leave England."

Blaise took a slow drink from his glass, then looked at Draco and said "Yes, if I could go I would've already."

"But you can't?"

Blaise turned and sat in the large leather chair where he'd spent most of his time when they were together. "Have you ever been in love?"

Draco eyes widened. After his earlier confrontation he hadn't expected Blaise to confide in him. He sighed and sat in his usual chair, then remembered to answer the question. "No, never."

"That answer was slower to come than I expected." Blaise leaned forward and stared into his eyes.

"Maybe. I've never been in love, but lately . . . I can at least imagine what it might be like."

"Baby steps, Drake." Blaise smirked. He knew Draco hated it when he called him that.

"I can't think of anything more dangerous than being in love in this world. The Dark Lord . . . he uses things like that . . . uses them in the worst possible ways."

"I know. If I could take her away from all of this I would, but I can't." Draco almost begged him not to say any more, but Blaise was silent anyway. "You said there were two things."

"Yeah. I wanted to ask you a favor. Does this house still have the conservatory on top? The one with the potions laboratory set up in the corner?" Blaise nodded. "I have a friend . . . would you be willing to let someone use the lab?"

Blaise frowned. "Maybe, but . . . when would they need it?"

Draco had already checked the calendar. "Two nights from now."

"The full moon?"

Draco nodded.

"No. That's not possible." Blaise stood up, clearly dismissing Draco.

"Wait . . . no . . . is there anything I can do?"

"I need it that night. Any other night . . . ." Blaise was walking toward the door.

Draco paused, thinking of what that meant. He needed to handle this carefully.

"The person I'd be bringing here . . . is not only very good with potions, but has gotten Severus's notes. What if this person was willing to brew your potion for you as well?"

Blaise stopped. "Severus's notes?"

Draco nodded. Surely there was only one potion that was best brewed under the light of the full moon, but he understood why Blaise didn't want to say too much. They trusted each other, at least to some degree, but no one's thoughts were safe anymore. "Have you ever heard rumors that Severus had a particular expertise in . . . full moon potions?"

"What makes you think that your friend . . . notes or no notes . . . could brew the potion better than I can?"

Draco knew that if he told Blaise that Hermione was the one who wanted to use his laboratory, well, first of all, Blaise wouldn't believe him, however, once he believed him, he'd want her to brew the potion. Her skill as a witch was well known. Her name couldn't come into the discussion yet though. Her identity was her secret to keep, not his.

"If you'll give me a 'maybe' I'll see if I can let you know who it is. I'll try to be back tomorrow."

"Send Nappy again."

Draco shook Blaise's hand. This time he looked deep into his eyes. They were hiding things from each other, but it seemed they might both gain by working together.

Before Draco got back on his broom he paused outside the doors to send a message to Hermione, through the coin, letting her know he'd be back at the cottage soon and he had something he wanted to show her. It was time to take a look at Mulciber's memories.

Once he was in the air he couldn't help but wonder who Blaise was protecting. Could she have been infected by a werewolf? Maybe even be one herself? That might explain why she wouldn't leave England. At least with a pack she'd have some protection, some help during the full moon. Greyback had infected quite a few young witches and wizards. In fact, he was said to have formed quite a pack himself.

What if she were part of his pack, loyal to him? Was that possible? It would explain how word had gotten back to the Dark Lord that Blaise was vulnerable.

Then a thought hit Draco; it hit him so abruptly that he jerked his broom handle and had to take a moment to steady his flying. Being in love was dangerous in this world. However, if Blaise was in love, and his mere presence in England said that he was, then he'd do anything, anything at all to keep her safe. Being in love not only put Blaise in danger, but it made him a danger too. If he had to sell Draco out to save his girl, he would. If he had any information that the Dark Lord wanted, he'd give it to him if he had too.

There was no way Draco could let Blaise know it was Hermione who would be brewing the potion.

AN – Sorry this is late. Thanks so much for the wonderful reviews, and thanks, as always, to my lovely beta Hesaluti.