"We got nothing either."
The five of them sit, dejected, at the table, picking absently at their food.
"They went and booked the Quidditch pitch and held their tryouts. Man, they're going to have a lousy team this year."
"Don't rejoice just yet, Prongs, we still have four slots to fill on our team."
"Did you just call Potter Prongs?"
James blinks at her. "Yeah, so what of it?"
Lily giggles. "Do you even know what prongs are?"
Sirius glares at her, not appreciating the nickname being mocked. "We're using it in a more metaphorical sense, Evans."
Lily keeps laughing. "Uh huh, sure you are." Beside her, Hermione sees Remus trying to hide a half-smile.
"Guy! Come on, focus," Hermione intervenes before Sirius can lose his temper or they start debating the etymology of the word and if it's an appropriate nickname or not.
"Sorry, Granger," James elbows Sirius in the arm and thankfully Sirius seems to relent, for now. "We'll double our efforts tonight." James smiles at her and Hermione feels something inside her liquefy. She quickly nods and stares down at her food.
She doesn't know what to make of James blasted Potter. He was so angry when she refused to hold his hand at Hogsmeade, and yet after avoiding her for a few days he suddenly reappeared, acting like nothing had happened. Now, in class, he'll turn around to ask her some bogus question she knows he knows the answer to and then he'll wink at her like she's saving him from certain failure before turning around.
"Oh, yeah," Lily is saying as Hermione's mind races on about James. "So what's the plan, then? You'll just sneak into the common room and hang out trying to look inconspicuous? I'm sure you'll blend right in." Her voice is laced with bitter sarcasm but Hermione can't blame her. She doesn't know Sirius can turn into a dog or Peter into a rat, the perfect spy form. If she had been oblivious to these facts Hermione may have been skeptical as well. That or she would have assumed Sirius was brewing up a batch of Polyjuice potion on the side, hiding it to save face about pretending not to have needed it in the first place.
As it is, Sirius just glares at Lily. "We have our ways, Evans."
Lily is about to make a snapping retort when Dumbledore stands and everyone falls silent. He tells them that the afternoon classes will take place as normal but that "should anyone start feeling nauseous or woozy, to immediately head to the infirmary or the nearest professor."
"Woozy?" Hermione hears a younger Gryffindor girl whisper to her friend.
Hermione and Lily leave the Great Hall first. They have an elective class together that none of the other boys chose and Hermione is glad to get away from the tense atmosphere between James, Sirius and Lily.
"You should turn yourself in," Hermione says as they walk to their class. She's been thinking about this on and off since the chaos of the other night. "You could be putting yourself in danger, for all we know."
Lily is still in a bad mood from her confrontation with Sirius, though, and she sends Hermione a withering look. "No one can even figure out what's wrong with us. What good will being locked up in a room with blubbering students do me? If it was you, would you turn yourself in and sit twiddling your thumbs uselessly?"
"No," Hermione admits, though reluctantly. "No, I wouldn't."
"Good. Then it's settled."
That evening, Remus heads off to his Prefect duties while Lily and Hermione head up to the library. Hermione had asked Madam Pince not to put away her pile of books and she's pleased to see them untouched.
"You know, there's a spell that I use to transform the chairs into poufs when I'm doing research."
"Really?" Hermione is surprised at the subtle but genius idea. She has never thought of that, herself. She waits patiently for Lily to perform the spell on the two chairs before she remembers. "If you want to show me how it's done, I can do the spell. For the time being."
Lily smiles, though it's a sad smile, Hermione thinks, and shows Hermione the hand gesture and tells her the incantation.
Hermione concentrates and transforms both chairs. The two wooden and highly uncomfortable chairs morph into two large purple and squishy poufs before their very eyes. Hermione is marveled. "I shall always use this spell now! Where did you find it? I've never come across it and I've read every transfiguration textbook there is!" Of course, that's not entirely true, there being thousands of books in the library. But Hermione has certainly read the most important ones, as well as the dictionary of spells, at least once.
Lily blushes. "Actually, I invented it. In third year, I think? My bum was really getting sore from sitting on those chairs all day and I always had to stand up and go to the loo to massage my butt to get the blood flowing again."
"That's so awesome." That's all Hermione has to say. Hermione remembers the first spell she ever invented in her first years at Hogwarts; but Lily's spell is useful beyond words. When she returns to her timeline, Hermione swears to herself that she will honor Lily's memory and make this amazing spell known to all.
They settle down in their respective poufs and dig into their books.
A few breaks and hours later, Lily slams her book shut in frustration. "Nothing!"
Hermione puts her book aside and rubs her eyes. She's getting tired and the library will be closing soon. "This is useless," she agrees. "We need books on Dark Magic, not generic magical illnesses."
Lily shakes her head. "There's no way. We'd need to get special permission for the Restricted Section and even then Madam Pince documents which books we consult. We'd get caught before even opening the cover."
Hermione chews the inside of her cheek. To her, the answer is quite clear. "We'll have to break in."
When Lily doesn't reply, Hermione looks over at her and is surprised to see Lily staring at her, slack-jawed. Hermione blushes. She's not used to such a reaction. Harry and Ron sure have been bad influences, Hermione thinks, relatively amused.
"No way. No way!" Lily sputters out when she finally regains brain functionality. "Do you realize how much trouble we'd get into? And I'm a Prefect; I can't be enabling this sort of behavior."
Hermione thinks of her own Prefect badge that she'd buried at the bottom of her trunk.
"Where are you going?" Lily asks when Hermione puts her unfinished book back on the table.
"As far as you know, to bed."
Hermione finds James in the common room. He has his chair tilted back so that the two front legs are off the ground and the back rests against the wall, his feet on the table ahead of him. Hermione can't help but think that not only is this a very precarious position to be sitting in, it also looks highly uncomfortable.
He's reading a Quidditch magazine. Hermione sees the white letters "Puddlemere United's Unexpected Comeback!" dancing on the cover, and a wizard proudly holding a flapping Golden Snitch that he's showcasing to the audience or whoever took the photograph.
James sees Hermione coming and he immediately tilts the chair down so that his feet are on the floor and he tosses the magazine on the table.
"Your field recon looks very tiring," Hermione quips playfully. She feels rather awkward being alone with James. The common room is fully packed at this time of night, but Sirius and Remus as conspicuously absent.
James grins up at her. "I work in mysterious ways, Granger."
Hermione rolls her eyes. Poor James, she thinks. It's not like a stag is the most subtle spying disguise inside the castle. Still, she wonders why he didn't tag along under the invisibility cloak.
"Well, I need you," Hermione says and then blushes furiously when James stares at her in disbelief and the words register in her brain. "I mean, I need your help. Your help! And your invisibility cloak." She lowers her voice. "We need to get into the Restricted Section to look up books on Dark Magic."
Hermione expects James to jump up, enthusiastic about the promise of breaking more school rules, but instead he stays down and he's frowning. "How do you know about my invisibility cloak?"
Hermione falters. Shit. "Remus. He, um, mentioned it while we were studying, earlier. I don't know, it just came up," she gives him a weak and totally unconvincing smile.
"Right," James says slowly, and Hermione thinks he's going to call her bluff – state, quite rightly, that Remus would never give up that information to someone he barely knows. But, instead, James grins again, easily, like all suspicions have been appeased. "You're quite the little rebel, aren't you?" His voice sounds much too fond by half and Hermione rolls her eyes. After the Hogsmeade incident Hermione's senses have been on high alert around James and she hears every intonation and sees every shifting muscle in his expressions.
"Are you going to help me, or not?"
"Of course, I'm your man." He jumps up but Hermione waves him down.
"Not now. The common room's packed and besides, the library isn't even closed yet. Meet back down here at midnight?"
"It's a date," James grins.
"No, it's not," Hermione replies, right away, red flags waving around in her mind. "It's a research mission."
"Semantics." It's James' turn to roll his eyes. "Meet you back here in a few then, Granger. Don't be late."
James is late.
"Sorry, sorry!" he hisses when he finally joins Hermione in the common room and sees how annoyed she is. "I totally forgot I'd lent the cloak to Peter for, well, a personal project, and you wouldn't believe what a mess his trunk is. It was carelessly stuffed between his dirty socks and a jar of jam with the lid barely even screwed on. I am never letting him borrow my cloak again, the bugger."
Hermione sighs impatiently and grabs the cloak from James' hands. She's tense and James' rambling isn't helping. She may have become used to violating school rules but that doesn't mean she enjoys doing so. Add that to having to press up against James as they walk under the invisibility cloak, and well, her nerves are even more in overdrive than they usually are. Every creak of the old school makes her paranoia soar. They pass Professor Flitwick and the Hufflepuff Head Girl on the way, and Hermione is terrified they'll hear her breathing through her mouth and bust them.
James' presence is both a reassurance and a torment. On the one hand, she's glad not to be alone, but on the other she can feel his body next to hers and every time she startles he places the tips of his fingers against the small of her back. Hermione hates that this actually calms her down every single time.
Finally, they make it to the library, thankfully undetected, and slip past the rope sectioning off the Restricted Section.
Hermione isn't entirely sure how the Restricted Section is organized so they browse the first few shelves, but nothing stands out as Dark Magic. Many Ministerial records of Wizengamot transcripts are there, which makes Hermione extremely curious to know why they're in the Restricted Section but she pushes forward, knowing that now is not the time.
They're in the second aisle when a word catches her eye – Time-Travelling, the title reads. Hermione stops short. What in the world is a book on time-turners, of all things, doing in the Restricted Section?
James steps on her heel, not having expected her to stop. "Did you find a book?" He's whispering, but his mouth is so close to her ear that he sounds loud and the closeness of his lips tickles her ear, even though they're not even touching.
"I thought I did," she whispers back, forcing herself to look away from the book in case James suddenly follows her gaze. She needs to get her hands on that book!
She can't though, not with James here. He would ask questions and now is the most inappropriate time to start casually reading up on one's interests. "False alert," she says. She feels like she's practically yelling at herself to read the book in her mind and she's afraid James will be able to read her thoughts.
"These all look like autobiographies anyway. I think Dark Magic books are further back, like fourth or fifth row."
"That's awfully precise," Hermione mutters as she lets James lead the way.
"Got permission in fourth year. Remus and I were assigned a project in DADA and Remus could get an unlimited pass to this place if he wanted. Professors love him. Anyway, there's so much juicy stuff in here."
"What about the tracing spell Madam Pince puts on you when you get permission?"
James snorts. It sounds loud, like a gunshot and Hermione jabs him in ribs.
"Ow! Anyway, where did you hear that? Total rubbish! It's a rumor started by some ponce a hundred years back to scare students into obedience. If there was a tracing spell, you could bet your gorgeous ass there'd be one on the books themselves."
Hermione jabs James in the ribs again, harder this time, but realizes he's right. She remembers tricking Lockhart into signing the permission slip in second year when she needed to get her hands on that Polyjuice recipe.
They decide to take the invisibility cloak off when they reach the Dark Arts section. It's massive. Hermione's heart drops. There's no way they'll be able to read through everything in one visit. Heck, not even three whole days of doing nothing but reading through the books would make a dent in the selection! They'll have to pick their titles carefully.
Hermione pulls out the parchment and quill she brought for the assignment and is secretly thrilled when she sees that James thought to do the same. He may act like an immature prat half the time, but his heart and head seem to be in the right place, at least.
They work in total absorbed silence for a long while. A few times, Hermione feels herself drifting off while standing up. Words begin to blur and she finds herself trying to make sense of the same paragraph over and over again.
She does find some interesting books, though, and she jots down the title, author and reference page. Unfortunately, nothing fits all of the symptoms they're looking for. One book in particular highlights various potions which are particularly lethal to Muggle-borns. Unfortunately, magical loss is not one of the symptoms, and as far as Hermione knows none of the sick students have broken out in warts.
A hand on her shoulder jolts Hermione back to reality.
"What?" she gasps, opening her eyes and looking around. She looks over at James, who appears exhausted and not his usual upbeat self.
"You drifted off. You were just standing there and I thought were thinking, but you were swaying back and forth. I was terrified you were going to topple over into the bookshelf. We should get back."
Hermione rubs her eyes. She does feel exhausted. She looks down at her list. She did manage to get a few titles down for further research. She frowns and squints down at the last title. "Magi nd Powderedilllnee Use?" she reads, horrified. She must have been more out of it than she thought.
James chuckles when he leans over to read what she was looking at. "I think we both need some shuteye."
Feeling defeated and useless, Hermione nods. They got next to nothing done. Unless James hit a goldmine, her research gives them next to no lead. She had been hoping this would be the answer, but this has only been another dead end.
"Hey," James says softly, pulling Hermione into a hug, "don't worry, this isn't over. We'll come back and we'll bring Sirius and Remus, and hell, even Evans with us. We'll tear down the place, the five of us."
Hermione lets out a small laugh and lets herself be comforted by the hug. She wonders how James can read her so well, or if maybe her fatigue has just made her more emotional.
"We've covered good ground," James is still saying. "And we're doing more than most."
Hermione nods. Doing more than most is not enough for her. It's fairly standard in her daily routine, actually. Hermione needs to do more than most, do it efficiently and succeed at it.
James starts to pull back out of the hug but slowly, instead of straightening out, he stops when they're still half-embraced. He still has his arms around her waist and his head bent over hers. His bangs fall down, framing both of their faces.
"You're one heck of a person," he whispers and before Hermione's brain can properly assess the situation James has leaned down and pressed his lips to hers.