Hogwarts after the holidays reminded Hermione a bit of All Quiet on the Western Front. No new Educational Decrees confronted them that first day, yet tension loomed like the heavy snow clouds outside, dark and brooding, and Hermione's attention was divided among several things.

First, there was Lucy Diggory's painting. Almost as soon as she returned, Hermione made a detour past it in the Entrance Hall. Yet the painting's glade stood empty. Cedric had said the god would be born on the 21st of December -- over the holidays -- but if so, there were no signs of it. In fact, not a single animal could be seen at first, although they gradually crept back, and by Monday evening she could spot badgers and herons, a red fox, and the eagle in the sky overhead.

Second, there was the matter of Harry's new Occlumency lessons with Snape, which he found just short of torture. A bit impatient with his whining, Hermione reminded him, "At least Snape's on our side," when Harry joined her and Ron where they were studying in the library, after his first lesson.

"That's not saying much," Ron retorted. Matters between the three of them had been uncomfortable ever since their Christmas blow-up over Cedric.

"Listen," Harry said, leaning over the table. "I've just realized something. That corridor I've been dreaming of? The one where Ron's dad was attacked doing something for the Order? It leads to the Department of Mysteries, and Voldemort wants something that's inside there. I recognized it during my lesson with Snape."

"So," Ron whispered as Madam Pince stalked past, "So, are you saying that the weapon -- the thing You Know Who is after -- is in the Ministry of Magic?"

"In the Department of Mysteries, it's got to be," Harry replied. "I saw the door when your dad took me down to the courtrooms for my hearing and it's definitely the same one he was guarding when the snake bit him."

And at that moment, Hermione had an epiphany of her own. "Of course!" she said.

"Of course what?" Ron asked, voice still sharp.

"Ron, think about it . . . Sturgis Podmore was trying to get through a door at the Ministry of Magic . . . It must have been that one, it's too much of a coincidence!"

"How come Sturgis was trying to break in when he's on our side?" Ron demanded.

"Well, I don't know," she admitted. "That is a bit odd . . . " She'd have to talk to Cedric about it.

"So what's in the Department of Mysteries," Harry asked Ron. "Has your dad ever mentioned anything about it?"

"I know they call the people who work there 'Unspeakables' because no one really seems to know what they do in there . . . Weird place to have a weapon . . . "

"It's not weird at all," Hermione said, recalling what little she knew of the Muggle military. "It makes perfect sense. It will be something top secret that the Ministry has been developing, I expect." She was distracted when Harry reached up abruptly to run the heels of his hands over his forehead. "Harry, are you all right?"

"Yes, fine. I just feel a bit . . . I don't like Occlumency much."

A bit guilty now for her earlier impatience, she said, "I expect anybody would feel shaky if they'd had their mind attacked over and over again. Let's get back to the common room, we'll be a bit more comfortable there." Really, she worried he might have another attack like the one he'd suffered before Christmas, and didn't want it to happen in a place where Dolores Umbridge could burst in and do heaven only knew what with Harry.

Once they were back in the tower, which was quite busy for a Monday evening, Harry asked her, "How was Christmas at the Diggorys?"

"It was fine."

"And New Year's?"

"It was fine, Harry. Rather quiet."

"What does Cedric think of Muggle life?" Ron asked, trying to sound offhand as he sprawled across a red sofa.

"He liked it, actually. He wants a computer. Or really, he wants one with a printer."

"Don't we all," Harry muttered, pulling out parchment and ink to work on his Charms essay.

"How do you fit a printer in your house?" Ron asked her, surprised. "Aren't those a bit, well, big?"

She sighed. "It's not a printing press, Ronald. It's a printer. There's a difference. It's about the size of two of your textbooks, all right?" Unaccountably, she felt her temper rise again. "Cedric likes computers, he likes pizza, and he likes television. And he doesn't ask stupid questions."

Without sitting down, she retreated up the stairs to her dorm where she could study in peace. Ginny appeared not long after and Hermione nearly threw up her hands. "What?" she demanded.

Shaking her head, Ginny plopped onto Hermione's bed. "You certainly are grumpy."

"I'm not grumpy. Everyone else is nosy."

Ginny's smile was impish. "Of course we are. Why shouldn't we be? I mean, you took each other home for the holidays! I haven't even met Michael's parents yet, and I've been seeing him longer than you've been seeing Cedric. The two of you sound rather serious, yeah?"

Hermione sighed and looked over at her friend. No one else was in the room to overhear or tease. "All right, yeah, it's a bit serious."

Rolling from her back onto her stomach, chin in hands, Ginny grinned up at Hermione. "You're in love with him?"

Hermione breathed out and looked down. "I -- Yes. Yes, I am." She looked up again, expecting to find Ginny laughing, but the other girl wasn't at all, so Hermione added, "And he feels the same."

"I think you're good for each other," Ginny declared, then sat up and bent forward, speaking more quietly. "Have you, you know, done it?"

Hermione pulled in her chin. "Ginny!"

"Well, have you?"

"No!" Although that wasn't entirely honest.

"What have you done?"

"That's none of your business!"

Ginny grinned again. "So you've done something. I thought so."

"What on earth made you think so?"

"It's the way you touch now," Ginny said solemnly. "I saw you put your hand on his thigh under the table at Christmas dinner and he just looked over to see what you wanted -- didn't jump or anything. It was so casual, it was pretty obvious you'd put a hand somewhere more intimate than his thigh."

Hermione blushed. She hadn't even realized she'd done such a thing, and wondered who else had noticed. "Ginny, I don't kiss and tell. I'd be upset if he did that to me" -- which, of course, made her wonder if he had. Did his friends harass him too? What had he told them? Boys talked, she'd heard. She found herself worrying more about that than about Harry's mysterious weapon in the Department of Mysteries -- at least until morning when Ron caught her before breakfast.

"Harry had another attack last night. I came up to the dorm and found him passed out. He said something's happened and You Know Who is really happy."

They stared at each other for a moment. Whatever their irritations or awkwardness, concern for Harry trumped everything. "How is he now?" she asked.

"All right. I made sure he got to bed -- watched a while after he fell asleep. He seemed okay."

She squeezed Ron's forearm in both thanks and support. "We'll have to keep our eyes open -- see if we can figure out whatever it was that pleased Voldemort."

They didn't have to wait long, nor look any further than the front page of Hermione's Daily Prophet the next morning:

Mass Breakout From Azkaban
Ministry Fears Black Is "Rallying Point"
for Old Death Eaters

"Black!" Harry snorted when he read it. "Not -- !"

"Shhh!" said Cedric, standing right behind Harry, Peter in tow bearing a copy of the Prophet too. Both the older boys slid in beside Harry, Cedric across from her. Almost absently, he reached over to cover her hands with one of his, squeeze once, then let go. Hermione wondered if they should have come over here, but Cedric shared breakfast with her at one of their tables often enough for it to be unremarkable.

"There you are, Harry," Ron was saying, "That's why he was happy last night . . . "

"I don't believe this," Harry snarled, practically flinging Hermione's paper back at her. "Fudge is blaming the breakout on Sirius?"

"What option does he have?" Cedric asked. "He can hardly admit that Dumbledore warned him about this at your trial. He's invested too much in convincing everybody you, me and Dumbledore are liars." Hermione picked up the paper and opened it to scan for other related stories while Cedric continued, "And what's this about last night?"

"I had another, well -- I don't know -- 'vision,' for lack of a better term. Voldemort was really happy. Happier than he's been since the war ended."

"Why didn't you call for me?" Cedric snapped, bending to look Harry in the face, but Harry glared.

"It was late. You were asleep probably."

"I don't care. Harry, I'm serious about what I said over break. You need to tell us if you have more of these dreams, or whatever they are."

"I told Ron," Harry replied defensively, and Ron nodded -- a bit belligerent. Hermione paused in reading in case she needed to intervene, but Cedric seemed to have picked up on the problem.

"That's good," he said, to diffuse tension. Hermione went back to the paper, giving the conversation only half her attention. "But if it's really serious," Cedric went on, "tell me, too, all right? I don't care if it's two in the morning. Come and get me."

"All right," Harry said, sounding torn between reluctance and relief. Hermione thought him grateful to have Cedric around to lean on as well, but just then, another article caught her eye:

Tragic Demise of
Ministry of Magic Worker

She read a little and muttered, "Oh, my -- it's . . . horrible." The boys all looked around at her.

"What now?" Harry asked. She just handed over her paper so he and Cedric could read it, Ron and Peter looking on as best they could. Meanwhile, she glanced around at other tables but the students seemed at ease, even cheerful. They had no idea. The staff table was another matter. Dumbledore and McGonagall, Sprout, Flitwick . . . everybody there appeared quite solemn. Even Umbridge wasn't happy. Then again, she was hardly on Voldemort's side, even if she wasn't on Dumbledore's. The breakout was a disaster for the Ministry's PR.

"Bode . . . Bode." Ron was saying. "It rings a bell . . . "

"We saw him," Harry replied, looking up from the article, "in St. Mungo's, remember?" He glanced at Hermione. "Christmas day, when we went to see Ron's dad. "But we didn't realize . . . He was in the bed opposite Lockart's, just lying there, staring at the ceiling. And we saw the Devil's Snare arrive. She -- the Healer -- said it was a Christmas present . . . "

"How come you didn't recognize Devil's Snare?" Hermione asked. "We've seen it before." They could have stopped this from happening -- but she didn't add that. Harry had enough guilt to bear.

"Who'd expect Devil's Snare to turn up in St. Mungo's disguised as a potted plant?" Peter asked, speaking for the first time. "It's not anybody's fault but the idiot bloke's who sent it to that poor fellow. How could anybody be that dim, not to check what they were buying?"

"It wasn't an accident," Cedric told Peter, then met Hermione's eyes again. "It was murder. Clever murder, too. How could it be traced?"

"But why murder Bode?" Hermione asked.

"I met Bode," Harry said suddenly. "I saw him at the Ministry the day of my trial . . . "

"He works in the Ministry," Ron said abruptly, "I've heard Dad talk about him at home --"

"-- he's an Unspeakable," Ron and Cedric said almost at the same time, heads turned to look at each other. "He works in the Department of the Mysteries," Ron added.

"And that's where Voldemort is trying to get into," Harry finished, which, Hermione noticed, got Cedric's attention. Harry explained that part of it to Cedric even as Hermione pulled the paper towards her, an idea blooming in her head.

She began shoving things into her book bag. "Where are you going?" Cedric asked, interrupting Harry.

"To send a letter," she replied, not ready yet to explain further. "It . . . well, I don't know whether . . . but it's worth trying . . . and I'm the only one who can . . . " She swung her bag onto her shoulder and headed off, leaving the boys to stare after her.

If this worked . . .

Cedric spent the rest of the week worrying about Death Eaters and whatever Voldemort wanted from the Department of Mysteries as the news of the Azkaban escape gradually spread and student morale plummeted. Whatever the paper had said, few seemed to believe it as an explanation and some of the more daring asked him to repeat what he'd told everyone about Voldemort the previous autumn. By the next morning, Umbridge had issued another Educational Decree in a futile attempt to corral gossip. Decree Number 26 forbade teachers "from giving students any information that is not strictly related to the subjects they are paid to teach."

Cedric snorted after reading that. Fortunately, he wasn't a teacher. So when people asked, he talked. "Yes, Voldemort's back." "Yes, it was likely Voldemort who engineered the escapes." "Yes, Voldemort can control dementors. He sent them after Harry last summer."

What he said scared people, but they listened. And they asked more questions -- and not just of him or Harry. Students who'd had relatives killed by the escapees found themselves the focal points of new interest. "How do you stand this?" Susan Bones asked Cedric at dinner one night when she'd sat down beside Ed. Ed had been running interference, attempting to shield her from prurient curiosity as she'd lost a number of family members, all killed by Death Eaters.

"It's a war," Cedric told her. "In a war, you don't get to choose whether you want to participate. Just tell the truth," he advised her with a nod at Ed, who nodded back. Ed would look after Susan.

Despite these new concerns, despite the gossip, the homework burying him and his Head Boy duties, despite even the increased intensity of Harry's D.A. lessons, Cedric found himself disturbingly preoccupied with thoughts of Hermione. Or more precisely, what he wanted to do with Hermione. One would think more serious threats and lack of easy opportunity would put a damper on desire, but it just made it worse, especially now that they'd finally got to something more than kisses. For a week or so, he'd had the best of both worlds -- the girl he loved to meet his physical needs with. If they hadn't gone as far or done it as often as he might have liked, he hadn't been left frustrated, and she'd seemed all right with what they had done -- not rushed -- so it was a compromise he could live with comfortably. The rest would come.

At Hogwarts, everything took ten steps backwards, and if he and Hermione did their best to be well-behaved, too much touch left him dizzy and mad with need. They spent a lot of time in the company of others, orbiting each other until the gravity of lust slammed them together again, only to have the fear of discovery drive them apart. It wasn't just frustrating, it was plain annoying because it left him unable to think. Some days he just wanted to get off with her so he could have his brain back. He needed the mental clarity as much as he needed the physical relief.

On the last day of January, a stolen moment in the library left him practically begging. "Can't stand this. Need to touch you again. I know places, but they all require standing up, or I'm not allowed there now, like the Hufflepuff locker rooms."

"The Room of Requirement," she said, breathless from his mouth on the pulse point below her ear.

"That's . . . " He pulled away, frowning. "It seems odd to use it for that -- wrong." He couldn't say why, but it did. The Room of Requirement was connected to D.A. lessons and other such serious matters. It didn't seem right to use it for their personal wants.

Hermione was more pragmatic. "And it's less so to use the locker rooms?"

"Students have used the locker rooms for ages."

"And I'll bet they've used the Room of Requirement too, if they knew about it." She pulled away to eye him, amused. "There are no portraits in there, or Peeves, that we have to worry about."

"All right," he said finally. "When?"

"Now."

And he laughed softly, pressing his forehead to hers. "So it's not just me feeling desperate?"

"No, it's not just you." Her voice was warm. "I'll meet you up there in a few minutes."

"What do I tell the wall? It wouldn't do much good if we wind up in different versions of the room."

"That we need a place to be alone together." And turning, she left him. He waited what he thought was an appropriate length of time, but when he emerged from the stacks, he found her still at the table they'd been sharing to study.

"I thought you --"

"Map," she told him. "I waited to tell you so you didn't wonder. Go on up; I'll be there."

He just nodded. He'd been too lust-crazed to remember they needed Harry's map in order to avoid being caught when they left, and it made him wonder what Hermione intended to tell Harry -- which in turn made him wonder what Harry and Ron would do to him if they knew what he and Hermione were up to. Vivisection -- with a dull knife -- might be the least of it. But he wouldn't hurt her, not willingly.

Reaching the seventh-floor hallway where the room was located, he glanced around before pulling out his wheelchair to expand it. It was faster to use that in order to go back and forth, whispering, "Hermione and Cedric need a place to be alone together." On the third pass, the door appeared.

Inside, he stopped to gape. Dozens of candles gleamed in niches and on ledges, all illumining a huge bed with violently red sheets in the room's center. "This is ridiculous," he muttered. The candles might be a nice touch but the sheets made him think of murder, not love, and he wondered who'd first dreamed up this scenario, or if it worked like that. (He wasn't harboring unacknowledged fantasies of Hermione stretched out pale and naked on crimson satin, was he? Then again, now that the image had entered his head, he couldn't seem to dislodge it.)

She arrived shortly, and he looked up from where he'd settled on the edge of the bed. Her expression was as shocked as his must have been. "The room's idea, not mine," he said and she snorted as she crossed to join him, unfastening her school robes as she moved. He pulled her down and finished undressing her, and this time, they didn't stop at trousers. Those came off too, although her knickers and his underpants stayed put -- a final barrier which he thought he probably needed. His heart and body were at all-out war.

After nearly a month-long fast, it didn't take them long and afterwards, they lay together, legs intertwined, breathing heavily. "We'll do this again," she said in a low voice. Troubled, he didn't reply. "You know we will."

"I know. Can't seem to be a good boy and keep my hands off you, can I?"

"You're rather good with them on me." Then she blushed at what she'd said, but he laughed softly.

"I like it when you aren't such a lily-white swot. Makes me feel less like a lecher."

Looking annoyed, she sat up to run fingers through her hair, but he wasn't looking at her hair. He admired the way the candlelight painted her skin gold and ivory and shadowed the swell of her breasts. He reached out to touch one but she slapped his hand away, not entirely playfully. "I'm not a child, Cedric. And as I recall, I was the one who suggested this."

It was true, and in just a month she'd come a long way from the shy girl who'd been worried what he'd think of her that evening in his old attic bedroom. His first and chief thought that night had been relief -- relief that she was ready for more, relief that she'd trusted him to make her feel good too, and relief that she didn't think badly of him for wanting her so much he couldn't see straight.

Now, he pulled her down again and wrapped her up. "We have to be very, very careful," he said, although that was rather stating the obvious. "Can't afford to get caught."

"Then we won't be." Smiling, she tapped his forehead. "Cleverest boy and girl at Hogwarts -- I think we can manage to avoid getting caught."

"Don't get cocky on me, Granger. I'm serious."

"So am I." She stroked his face. "We'll be very careful. But I'm going to go spare if I have to spend the rest of the year like we spent the last month. The holidays spoiled me."

"Me too," he replied, leaning in to kiss her but she pulled away to sit up once more, smoothing a palm over his belly almost absently, her sweet face thoughtful. He lay on his back watching her, one arm bent behind his head. "What are you plotting, Granger? World dominion?"

"Not quite. But before we got distracted and came in here, I was going to ask -- What would you say to an interview?"

"An interview?"

"Yes -- you and Harry. An interview to tell exactly what happened in the graveyard last summer."

"Who's interviewing -- you? And who'd print it? No one believes us."

She raised her eyes. "The Quibbler would."

He sat up too, mouth open slightly. "The Quibbler? Are you joking?"

"Not at all."

"Nobody in his right mind believes half that stuff."

"But that's just it, Ced. I don't think they necessarily believe The Daily Prophet anymore, either. Too many odd things are happening; people are nervous. Give them the truth, even if it's frightening, and some of them will believe. Not all of them. Maybe not even most. But some."

He narrowed his eyes, thinking about it. "If I agreed, and Harry agreed . . . do you think Umbridge would let an interview with us out of here by post?"

"She can't stop you if you do it in Hogsmeade, can she? We have a Saturday coming up in a little over two weeks."

Abruptly, he grinned. "You're getting better at devious, Miss Granger."

"I have a very good teacher, Mr. Diggory."

Despite Hermione's rebuke to Ginny about not discussing what she did with Cedric in private, there were times she wished for someone to talk to about it all. She felt at sea, unsure if her intense desire were normal, or whether they were moving too fast. The books she'd read didn't answer those questions; it was all so hypothetical and vague there. She was glad now that she'd bitten the bullet and let Tonks teach her birth-control spells, but wished she'd had more courage to ask Tonks about the emotional side of it too.

Maybe, just maybe, she should talk to Cedric about it. After all, he was her best friend, and it did involve him, but she worried he might use the conversation to convince her to do what he wanted. Then again, she either believed he really loved her like he said he did, or she believed he was a callous manipulator. It couldn't be both at once.

She avoided thinking about it by focusing on other things. As their next Hogsmeade weekend approached, she grew increasingly anxious with each morning owl post, but received no reply to her query and proposal. If it didn't come soon, her plans would fall apart and she hated when that happened.

She also noticed that since Cedric's pre-holiday gating, attendance had once more fallen off in his Common Room. Blaise Zabini and his myrmidons hadn't been back, and once again, the main occupants wore ties of crimson and gold or yellow and black. One Sunday afternoon, she sat down at a table with Ernie, Hannah and Susan who were studying diligently while Justin snored on a sofa behind them.

"Where's Ced?' Ernie asked her.

"Flying," she replied. It was one activity they didn't share, although she knew he'd brought his broom back with him in some vain hope she'd change her mind. "He's got to bring the Cup here to the Common Room," she said now, eyeing his Housemates. "Attendance has fallen off again. I've told him to use the Cup, but he keeps putting me off."

"The cup?" Susan asked, bemused, then, "Oh! The Triwizard Cup! You think people would come to see it?"

"Yes, I do. I also know he thinks he'd be showing off if he set it up in the trophy room."

"That's Ced for you," Ernie said, tone half-admiring, half-exasperated. "First Hufflepuff ever to win the Cup and what does he do? Hides it under his socks!"

That made her grin. "Actually, it's sitting on his desk, but you're right in the essentials. I was thinking perhaps if I weren't the only one to suggest it to him . . . ?"

"I'll talk to him," Ernie promised, but Hermione was looking at Susan. Ernie was only likely to annoy Cedric.

Susan seemed to catch her meaning and gave a little smile, looking down at the table. "Ed and I will say something to him."

"Ed and you . . . " Hannah said, laughing at her friend and poking a quill at her. "Ed and you . . . "

Susan flushed bright red under her dark braid even as Zacharias Smith sauntered up. "Where's Diggory?" he asked, looking at Hermione.

"Flying," she replied, then added as she hadn't with Ernie, "Believe it or not, we're not attached at the hip." She couldn't say why Smith annoyed her so, but he did. He'd made it clear that he didn't think her good enough for Cedric and she didn't know if that were because she wasn't a Hufflepuff, or she wasn't a Quidditch player, or she wasn't as popular as Cedric.

Smith just held up his hands as if in surrender, then pulled over a fifth chair to flop into it. "Finch-Fletchly is studying hard," he quipped, which got grins as all of them looked to the sleeping boy. "So if Diggory's out flying, why are you here, Granger?"

Hermione rolled her eyes but Hannah snapped back, "Because she's concerned that attendance in the Common Room is down again. She thinks Cedric should bring the Triwizard Cup here."

Smith looked up from his books, his expression thoughtful. "Might work," he said. "Just requires kicking Ced in the arse to get him to trot it out."

Hermione was impressed that he not only saw the value of the ploy so quickly, but also recognized the intrinsic problem. "I said I'd talk to him," Ernie said.

Smith appeared horrified. "Shit, no! You want to be sure he'll never bring it? I'll talk to him -- maybe get Adamson and Summers to help. We'll just bully him till he gives in."

The girls laughed, Ernie appeared affronted, and Zacharias turned to his homework as if the matter were settled. Hermione left not long after, meandering along hallways in idle boredom. Ron and Ginny were at Quidditch practice, Cedric was flying, and she had no idea where Harry was until she stumbled across him in the library with Cho Chang. Maybe that shouldn't surprise her. She knew he was taking Cho to Hogsmeade, and she also knew he was terrified about it. At the last D.A. meeting, Hermione had overheard Cedric encouraging Harry to spend time with Cho before the date. "Find neutral ground," he'd advised. "No pressure that way, but you can still talk to her."

Now, Harry looked up with a welcoming smile, but Cho frowned and Harry only belatedly realized that his girlfriend and his best friend weren't terribly fond of each other. Hermione smiled a bit sadly and disappeared to the table she now thought of as hers and Cedric's beneath the Butterfly Woman. They rarely needed it for trysting these days but did study there together, and he found her at work when he showed up a little after sunset, looking alight with happiness. It was an expression he often wore when he returned from flying, as if he were still aloft and free in the sky. "Hullo, poppet." He unslung his book bag from the back of his wheelchair and dropped it on the table.

"Did you see Cho and Harry?" she asked.

He glanced up. "No, were they in here?"

"Earlier, yes."

He just nodded and kicked his foot rests aside so he could move himself from his chair to a seat at the table. She set down her quill. "If they start dating," she said, "really dating, not just circling, it's going to be awkward." He nodded again. "That doesn't bother you?"

"Harry's happy, Cho's happy, and I think I've pretty much forfeited any right to comment on what Cho does. So it doesn't matter whether it bothers me."

She watched him pull out a book. "I understand why she's angry with us -- I completely, totally understand. I'd be the same, in her shoes. But Harry's my friend, and if they start hanging out together like you and I do . . . well, it's pretty clear she doesn't want me around. At least you and Harry get along."

He looked up at her, smile wry. "Harry and I may -- but Ron isn't any too fond of me." Surprised, she just blinked. "Oh, come on, Granger. Surely you've figured out by now that he has -- or at least had -- a crush on you. I didn't realize at first how he felt, and by the time I did, I was head over heels for you, and not inclined to wait around in case he worked up the nerve to ask you out. Still, it's not that different in dynamics. He thinks he was there first, and I'm the interloper."

She realized her mouth was hanging open. "He . . . but . . . Viktor . . . " She stopped finally, aware she must sound like a fool. Cedric wore that lopsided grin of his. "I'm not some sort of attraction that people queue up for, or an object in an auction," she said finally, focusing on that because the enormity of what he'd just told her overwhelmed. "If he'd really wanted me, he might have tried asking me to the Yule Ball last year."

Still grinning, Cedric looked back down at his book. "Doesn't have to be logical to be true. Although I'm rather glad he didn't ask you or we might not be sitting here."

And that raised a different sort of question, one which she had to turn over in her mind and poke at from different angles. After perhaps fifteen minutes, she said, "Yes, I think we would be." He looked up at her, expression soft and mildly surprised. "I'd have fallen in love with you no matter what, and maybe it's kinder that he didn't ask me then."

He studied her face. "You make it sound like we're a foregone conclusion, Granger."

Blushing, she looked away towards the window, wondering if she'd just scared him off. "You're the right one for me, that's all."

He was still looking at her, mouth turned up slightly at the corners -- she could see as much in her peripheral vision. "I hope you still think so in ten years."

It was, she thought, an understated acknowledgment. They'd been together only five months, but all her thinking about the future these days seemed to include him as a matter of course. Perhaps his now included her too, and she realized he'd left himself a bit open with that last comment. He was trying to act nonchalant but had glanced up at her twice while she thought about it and his knuckles were white on his quill. "Unless you undergo a massive personality transplant," she told him finally, "then yes, I think I'll feel the same in ten years."

He snorted, but his hand relaxed.

After that evening, their conversations sometimes included talk of the coming summer and even the year to follow, and if she realized the future was never certain -- and they were still very young -- their acknowledged intention to stay together gave her a sense of stability that she hadn't realized she'd needed until she had it. The next time they met in the Room of Requirement two days before Hogsmeade, she had no qualms about ditching not only her top and jeans, but her knickers too, once they were under red satin. Then she peeled him out of his. "Are you sure?" he asked her softly.

In answer, she took hold of his prick, touching him for the first time with nothing in between. He gasped and let his eyes flutter shut, a look of utter bliss on his face as he gave himself into her hands. It made her smile, delighted, then concentrate on what she held. If she'd known erections were hard, the velvet softness of the skin itself startled her, as did its blood-warmth. He moaned as she moved her hand up and down, feeling bumpy veins and wiry pubic hair at the base. The tip was slick from pre-ejaculate and when she drew fingers over it, he shuddered. "Like that?" she asked. He laughed a little breathlessly in reply, and she licked the corner of his mouth and his jaw and his ear while she worked him, whispering after a while, "Come for me, sweetheart." He did, spasming in her hand and shooting semen in four ropey spurts all over his belly and her fingers.

Afterwards he kissed her for a while, the pads of his fingers soft on her cheek and neck and breast. She let him slide the fingers of his other hand between the lips of her vulva, massaging her gently, his mouth open in wonder as she mewled and bucked and finally squealed in orgasm.

It had been less than two months since they'd first moved past kisses, but she felt surprisingly relaxed about this. He planned to stay with her; this wasn't temporary. Still, her earlier questions nagged at her. "Are we going too fast, do you think?" she whispered as they lay together afterwards.

He frowned, looking concerned. "Are you feeling rushed? I'm not wanting --"

"No," she interrupted, "No, I don't feel rushed. I just wondered if maybe I should? I don't know. I've . . . well, I've never got this far before. I have no idea what's normal."

And he appeared thoughtful more than sly or worried. "I don't know if there is a 'normal,' Granger. I think it depends on a lot of things."

"Like?"

"Like how much you love the person, how much you trust them, how old you are -- and what you want out of it, too. Sometimes it's about love, but sometimes it's just about getting off, you know?"

Yet she didn't know, or at least had a hard time connecting with that as a motivation and wasn't sure she could let a boy touch her so intimately without love and trust. Maybe getting off just to get off was a boy thing, but she didn't say so because she might just be a prude too.

He tilted his head. "What made you ask if we're going too fast if you don't feel rushed?"

"I don't know," she confessed. "I suppose I'm just . . . not sure what's normal, like I said. This is all new to me. But you've done this before, I assume?"

It was probably a silly thing to ask, but he just shifted a little and asked in return, "Do you really want to know?"

She thought about it, then nodded. "Yes, I think I do. Not to be nosy, but yeah, I think maybe I should know."

He was silent a moment, then said, "All right, then yes, I've done this before. Done a bit more."

Mulling that over, she pressed kisses to his throat and the hollow between his clavicles; he raised his chin to grant her access. "Everything?' she asked.

She felt him chuckle against her lips. "Well, I can't confess to having been tied up and covered with whipped cream, no."

And that made her blush and laugh too. "No! I meant . . . you know, that everything."

"Are you trying to ask if I've had sex? Just use the word, poppet. Yes, I've had sex."

She was blushing harder now. "Well I suppose we've had sex. I meant have you had intercourse?"

Abruptly, he pulled back to look at her. "Granger, sex is intercourse. You do know that, right? You do know what intercourse is?"

She frowned. "Good God, I'm not that naïve, thank you. But we've, well, we've both made each other come. And we're lying here with no clothes on. I'd say that's sex."

He frowned slightly, gray eyes dark. "Still a ways from intercourse, poppet."

"And sex is always only intercourse? Sort of a narrow definition, don't you think? What do you call the rest of it?"

Her question seemed to throw him and he didn't reply at first, finally said, "I just meant intercourse feels . . . . Well, it's more intimate. Being inside . . . " He trailed off, blushing and running his palm up and down her arm. "It's pretty special -- doesn't feel like anything else."

She found his words at once fascinating and tender, and the fact he was willing to share that with her -- that was trust too. She wasn't the only one trusting here, and her natural curiosity made her ask, "It feels different coming that way than with my hand on you?"

He nodded, still blushing. "Definitely. Definitely different. I think it's a bit more complicated for girls," he admitted, "But for blokes -- yeah. We're pretty simple, when it comes down to it."

"Yes, you're right out there, aren't you?" she asked, laughing as she let her fingers walk down his abdomen to grip him again. He gasped, his penis soft at first, but not staying that way. "In the meantime," she told him, "we'll have sex this way."

"My stubborn Granger," he muttered, but didn't seem especially interested in continuing the quarrel past that single protest.

Halting his chair in front of Honeydukes, Cedric stared at the Ministry's Wanted sign in the window. It showed images of ten escaped Death Eaters; every shop in Hogsmeade had one in a bizarre sort of overkill. He felt Hermione's hand on his shoulder. "Do you find those as creepy as I do?"

"Yeah," she replied simply.

He'd thought about going inside to get homemade fudge -- which he loved -- but he wasn't interested any more. "Where do you want to go?" Hermione asked.

"Somewhere without the damn signs."

"The little park, maybe?"

The place in question was on the Hogwarts side of town, not far from the station and across from the Three Broomsticks, where they'd need to be at noon for Hermione's semi-mysterious interview. The little park -- so dubbed because it was really just a couple of benches amid oaks and ash -- wasn't as isolated as the real town park, where dangers might lurk, given the Azkaban breakout. Cedric had reiterated to his prefects the night before that he didn't want students to wander off alone and no one had argued, even if the Slytherins had appeared a bit smug.

Now, he and Hermione headed for the park, but had no sooner reached it than the gray clouds overhead opened to drizzle frigid rain on them. "Bloody hell," Cedric snarled, as they were forced to make for the Three Broomsticks early, along with a number of other people. Hermione found them a table on the west side where they ordered hot coffee, and cheese and chips because Cedric was hungry even if it wasn't yet lunchtime. He offered her a chip but she made a face, muttering, "Pub food."

Just then, Hagrid entered and Hermione waved to him but Hagrid didn't seem to notice. Cedric was (selfishly) glad, although Hagrid's physical state startled him. "What did he get into? A bar brawl?"

Hermione glanced over. "What?"

"Hagrid's face! He looks like he went three rounds with a troll."

"I know," Hermione replied. "He's looked like that since he got back, but won't tell us why. Fresh cuts as soon as the old ones close up."

"What d'you think he's hiding out in the Forbidden Forest this time?" Cedric asked her. She turned to stare at him. "Well he's got something dangerous out there, that's plain," Cedric said. "He didn't get those bruises at curling, poppet. Imagine something that can hurt Hagrid."

Blowing on her second cup of coffee, she studied Hagrid's rather morose form, but they had no more opportunity for conversation as Luna Lovegood was suddenly standing in front of their table, blocking their view. "Hermione," she said, a bit stiffly, then broke into a grin at Cedric. "I'm so glad you agreed to do this!" she told him.

Before he could reply, a second figure appeared behind Luna, not looking nearly as cheerful.

"Rita Skeeter?" he asked in a burst of disgust.

No longer stylishly dressed or flirtatious, the ex-Daily Prophet reporter's spell-blonde hair hung lank about her face and the skin beneath her dark, beady eyes was puffy. Those eyes flashed between him and Hermione. "I see you haven't lost your taste for Triwizard Champions," she said to Hermione, sliding into a seat across from them. Luna joined her.

Cedric was astonished. Hermione intended Rita Skeeter to interview him and Harry? "No way in bleedin' hell I'm talking to her," he muttered.

Hermione ignored him. "Who I'm seeing is none of your business," she told Skeeter, "and not what you're here for."

"What am I here for?" Skeeter asked, her greedy eyes sliding over Cedric in his wheelchair. "How are you getting on, Cedric?" She reached for her crocodile-skin handbag as Madam Rosmerta approached the table.

"What can I get you?" Rosmerta asked, her nose wrinkling at Skeeter.

"Coffee," Luna said at the same time Rita said, "Firewhiskey. Granger is paying."

Cedric started to protest but Hermione waved a hand, her attention caught by something going on elsewhere in the pub. Rosmerta withdrew and Rita pulled out her green Quick-Quotes Quill. "What's life like on wheels?" she asked.

Hermione's attention returned to the table. "That's not what you're here for, either," she warned Rita.

"As you still haven't told me what I am here for, I suppose I'll have to improvise."

But Hermione turned away again and was waving. "Harry! Harry, over here!"

Harry approached the table, nodding to Cedric as he pulled up a fifth chair before turning to Skeeter with an expression that said he felt as doubtful about this as Cedric was. "What happened with Cho?" Cedric asked. "I didn't think you'd be here until noon?" But Harry just shook his head even as Skeeter's attention homed in on that.

"Cho?" Skeeter asked. "The same Cho Chang who went to the Yule Ball with Cedric last year?"

Skeeter had a good memory. "It's none of your business if Harry's been with a hundred girls," Hermione snapped, and she and Rita fell to sniping at each other even as Rosmerta arrived with the women's drinks.

". . . They've run plenty of horrible stories about Harry and Cedric this year without my help," Skeeter was saying, speaking of The Daily Prophet. "How has that made you feel? Betrayed? Distraught? Misunderstood?"

"How about pissed off?" Cedric returned.

"Of course they feel angry," Hermione said, "because they told the Minister of Magic the truth and the Minister's too much of an idiot to believe them."

"So you actually stick to it, do you, that He Who Must Not Be Named is back?" Skeeter glanced between Harry and Cedric. "All this garbage Dumbledore's been telling everybody about You Know Who returning and yourselves as the sole witnesses?"

"We weren't the sole witnesses," Harry snarled. "Dumbledore was there himself. And Professor McGonagall and Arthur Weasley. Oh, and a dozen-odd Death Eaters, as well. Want their names?"

"I'd love them," Skeeter said, reaching for her Quick-Quotes Quill again. "A great bold headline: 'Potter Accuses . . . ' with a subheading, 'Harry Potter Names Death Eaters Still Among Us.' And then beneath a nice big photograph of you: 'Disturbed teenage survivor of You Know Who attack, Harry Potter, 15, caused outrage yesterday by accusing respectable and prominent members of the Wizarding community of being Death Eaters . . . '

Abruptly she stopped fingering the quill. "But of course Little Miss Perfect wouldn't want that story out there, would she?"

"As a matter of fact," Hermione replied, smiling almost sweetly, "that's exactly what Little Miss Perfect does want -- with the correction, of course, that Cedric be included too. But then, you rather forgot about him last year as well, didn't you?"

Harry, Rita and Cedric all stared at her, although Cedric, at least, had been given some inkling of what this was about. Luna, as usual, appeared not the least fazed. "You want me to report what they say about He Who Must Not Be Named?" Skeeter asked Hermione softly.

"Yes, I do," Hermione replied. "The true story. All the facts. Exactly as Cedric and Harry report them. They'll give you all the details, tell you the names of the undiscovered Death Eaters they saw there, tell you what Voldemort looks like now -- oh, get a grip on yourself!" Hermione admonished when Skeeter leapt so badly that she spilled half her firewhiskey. Luna just handed her a napkin.

Skeeter blotted her raincoat. "The Prophet wouldn't print it," she said. "In case you haven't noticed, nobody believes their cock-and-bull story. Everybody thinks Harry's delusional and Cedric's a bit too potion-happy. Now, if you let me write the story from that angle . . . "

"We don't need another story of that type, thank you," Hermione said. "I want them given an opportunity to tell the truth."

"There's no market for a story like that."

"You mean the Prophet won't print it because Fudge won't let them," Cedric corrected her.

Skeeter glared at him. "All right, Fudge is leaning on the Prophet, but it comes to the same thing. They won't print a story that shows either of you in a good light." Skeeter's tone was no longer wheedling or coercive, simply businesslike. "Nobody wants to read it. This last Azkaban breakout has got people quite worried enough. People just don't want to believe You Know Who is back."

"So The Daily Prophet exists to tell people what they want to hear, does it?" Hermione asked, tone lofty with disdain.

"The Prophet exists to sell itself, you silly girl," Skeeter informed her, which was, Cedric thought, absolutely true, and not terribly flattering.

"My dad thinks it's an awful paper," Luna burst in a bit unexpectedly. "He publishes important stories that he thinks the public needs to know. He doesn't care about making money."

That made Cedric smile, although Skeeter reacted with almost comical patronizing -- which turned even crueler when Luna admitted her father was the editor of The Quibbler. "The Quibbler!" Skeeter howled, "You think people will take them seriously if they're published in The Quibbler?"

Which had been, more or less, Cedric's reaction, but Hermione gave Skeeter the same answer she'd given him, pointing out the unsatisfactory nature of the Prophet's story, and Cedric had already seen how people had wanted to hear what he'd had to say in the wake of that. "She's got a point," he tacked onto the end of Hermione's defense. "Students have already been asking me questions."

Skeeter looked between the two of them, then took in Luna and Harry as well. "All right, let's say for a moment I'll do it. What kind of fee am I going to get?"

And a discussion of her pay -- or lack thereof -- followed, which amused Cedric until Hermione explained just what she had on Skeeter that made the other woman dance to her tune. "Otherwise, as you very well know, I'll inform the authorities that you are an unregistered Animagus."

Cedric nearly spit coffee out his nose. "What? She's a what?"

Skeeter narrowed her eyes at him. "Don't look so amazed, Mr. Diggory. Or do you assume I'm some untalented hack --"

"That's exactly what you are," Cedric replied, glaring at her. "But being an unregistered . . . " He turned to Hermione. "Granger, you have to report this."

She shook her head. "It's too useful."

"It's blackmail."

"Yes, it rather is."

And Cedric sat back in his chair. "Surprised to find Little Miss Perfect isn't so perfect?" Skeeter asked him, mouth curling. "She's a vicious know-it-all is what she is."

"You're not one to talk," Harry scolded as Cedric asked, "What do you become, anyway?"

"A bug," Hermione replied before Skeeter could. "A beetle."

Which made Cedric snort and Skeeter glare. "Don't laugh, boy. It's useful."

"I could eat you for lunch."

"Cedric becomes an eagle," Hermione explained to Skeeter, whose eyes widened as she studied Cedric with new interest. "So I'd be careful what you write about him, if I were you." Hermione grinned, then glanced between Harry and Cedric. "Okay, then? Ready to tell the public the truth?"

"I suppose," Harry said, looking to Cedric, who nodded. Rita Skeeter had set her Quick-Quotes Quill to parchment, waiting.

"Fire away then, Rita," Hermione said, taking a sip of coffee and leaning back to watch protectively.

After the interview, Rita departed and Cedric turned to Hermione. "You can't keep the fact she's an Animagus a secret. There's a reason we have to register."

But Hermione just shook her head. "She's useful, Cedric. You wait and see. We need someone like her." But there was something vicious in her face, and Cedric thought she enjoyed having Skeeter under her thumb. It was a side of Hermione he hadn't really seen before, and bothered him deeply. Harry, however, seemed to agree with Hermione, and Luna was untroubled. All Cedric could think was how he could get Hermione out of this mess before it came back to haunt her.

"It's wrong," he said now.

She glared at him. "You don't argue that Sirius should register."

"That's very different, Granger, and you know it. Don't play stupid."

Harry was starting to look sheepish, but Luna just continued to watch with interest while the two of them glared at each other as if they were characters in one of Hermione's Muggle television shows. "She's useful," Hermione said again, then added, "Your mother would agree."

"My mother would tell you you're playing with fire. If the Improper Use of Magic Office finds out not only that she's been hiding her status as an Animagus, but that you knew and didn't turn her in, you'll be found just as guilty." Then his voice changed as he came back to the heart of what upset him. "And it's wrong. It's just wrong."

Her face was finally showing hints of shame -- but anger too. "The rest of the world isn't playing fair at the moment, Cedric, why should we? I'm tired of seeing them go after you and Harry for telling the truth. Obviously the truth isn't good enough anymore. It's stopped being about right and wrong and become a matter of survival. And not just for us, but for the whole Wizarding World. People need to know Voldemort is back -- know and really believe it."

That, he thought, sounded like his mother. Nevertheless. "When this interview is published, I want you to cut her loose." Hermione's face showed surprise and she opened her mouth to protest but he put a hand over it. "You tell her that if she registers as a new Animagus, you won't reveal how long she's been one. And maybe it won't come out that you knew anything about it."

She frowned at him over the top of his hand and bit his fingers, but not hard. He dropped the hand. Harry was squirming in his chair. "Maybe Ced's right," he said to Hermione. "You could get in serious trouble."

She glared between them both and then shrugged, feigning a lack of concern. "Fine. We'll see how this goes. If she writes a fair article, maybe we'll call it even. But I'm still going to tell her that if she writes more trash about any of us, I'll tell them just how long she's kept her status as an Animagus a secret in order to find out the awful things she's printed about people. I'm pretty certain she has enough victims out there, she won't want that to become known."

Cedric refrained from pointing out that revealing any such thing would get her in as much trouble as Skeeter, and hoped Skeeter was as afraid of the people she'd written about as Hermione seemed to think she was. "The trick with blackmail," he told her, "is that you have to know how far you can push a person before they break. I fear you're dancing at the edge of Rita's tolerance, poppet."

She eyed him. "I thought you didn't approve?"

"I don't. Doesn't mean I don't understand the principles. Mother made me read Machiavelli, remember?"

"I'm going to have to borrow that book," she said, which rather alarmed Cedric.