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I sat on the ground, and stared at where I knew the protective spells were concealing the three run-away teens. I would wait for as long as it took. I didn't know how long they had been here, but I knew they wouldn't stay in one place for too long. They would leave, and I would see her. I would talk to her, and get my answers.

It took two full days before there was anything changing in the woods around me. I heard the protective spells start to disengage again, and jumped to my feet. If they were getting ready to leave, they could do it quickly, before I could get close enough to stop them.

I walked forward to where the spells were being reduced, and when they finally cleared, I saw what I had been waiting for so long to see. Hermione.

Here she was, standing right in front of me, but she wasn't smiling. She didn't seem happy at all to see me. She looked more annoyed than anything. Had I really misread the signs that much? How could I have thought that she cared about me so much, if really all I was was a nuisance? She pushed me out of the way, and stepped through the cleared wall of enchantments, only to turn around and replace them.

I stood back, and waited for her. When she turned to face me, I opened my mouth to speak, but she raised her hand to stop me, and started constructing a much smaller sphere of concealment charms around the two of us.

When she was finished, I asked, "What did you do that for?"

She didn't say anything back to me, but just stared at me. She moved slightly closer, searching my eyes. "Who are you?" she whispered.

I looked at her, confused. "What do you mean? It's me, Draco." We had only spent a year together at Hogwarts, that's all.

She shook her head, looking down at the ground. "No."

"What do you mean, 'no'?"

"What are you doing here, Draco. It's not safe for us. It's not safe for you," She looked back up into my eyes; her's were brimming with tears.

I stepped closer to her, putting my hands on her shoulders, staring deep into her eyes. "Hermione," I whispered, she whimpered slightly. "What's happened? I've come to help you."

She looked down again, her whole body shaking with her sobs. "You can't help. No one can help."

I pulled her close to me. I knew that she just needed to get it all out. I pulled her down, so that we were sitting on the ground. I rocked her back and forth, rubbing her back, and singing softly, trying to calm her down. When her sobs turned into hiccups, I pulled back slightly, so that I could see her red, puffy face. "What's happened, Hermione? What's happened?"

"I didn't think I'd ever see you again. It's been a hard month, it has," she whispered, snuggling her head into the crook of my neck. "I'm so happy to see you,"

I smiled. Finally, things were going back to normal. I squeezed her, letting her know that I felt the same way. "It's been too long."

I felt her nod. We were silent for a moment. "Why are you really here?"

I sighed. I knew somewhere deep inside that she would know there was a reason. There was no way I would be allowed to go out and find her on my own, there must be something wrong. "I've been sent on a mission," her body stiffened. It was never a good thing when the Dark Lord sent you on a mission. "I'm not really going to follow along with it,"

"What are you supposed to do?"

"I'm supposed to find you guys, and take you back to him," I closed my eyes. I couldn't even imagine actually following through with the mission.

"How did you find us?"

"I wasn't actually looking for you yet… I just kind of, ran into your protective spells,"

She looked up at me, shocked. "But if you could find us without even trying, who's to say some other death eater won't be able to?"

"The death eaters are stupid, I think I was thinking about you too much, and I just kind of… found you,"

Hermione finally relaxed back against my chest. I missed so terribly the feel of her body against mine. Nothing else mattered just now.

After a few moments of silence, I started some of my own questions. "Why didn't you come to me when I first arrived?"

She sighed, and didn't answer right away. "I haven't told them yet. Although, they kind of knew that something happened at school. When Ron saw you, he made sure he told Harry quietly, so that I wouldn't hear, and Harry came out here to take care of it…"

"But I yelled out for you, you didn't even come out of the tent,"

"Draco, I didn't know what to do. I've been so confused lately. Dumbldore left us with so many things to take care of; we don't have time to waste on anything. I wasn't sure what you needed, or if it was even you. Harry and Ron thought it might have been someone using polyjuice potion, and they wouldn't let me out of their sights,"

"How did you get out here today, then?"

"We were packing up, and I told them if they didn't leave me alone to see if it was really you, I would leave, and they would have to take care of themselves. I had to remind them that I'm a big girl, and can take care of myself, even against an evil pratt like Draco Malfoy." She giggled.

I could only smile a little bit. It was hard for me to imagine. She had known that I was out here for two days. She had known that I had found her for two days, and only when they were about to move on did she come out to see me. How could she have waited so long? I was itching to be with her from the time we said good-bye at Hogwarts.

"I'm sorry, Draco. I really am," she said, almost as if she could read my mind. "I've been really distracted lately. So much has happened to us, I'm still trying to process it all." She paused. "I don't know how I'm going to explain to them what you're doing here. I'll have to tell them the whole story, I suppose," she said more to herself than to me. "Are you going to come with us?" she looked up at me, hopeful.

I looked into her eyes, I almost got lost in them, my thoughts being absorbed by all of our happy memories together. I leaned down, and brushed my lips against hers. I had waited so long to kiss her again; I never wanted it to end. When we pulled apart, I leaned my forehead against hers. "I would do anything for you, my love."

She smiled wide, and kissed me again, quickly. "I knew you would always be there for me,"

I smiled back at her. "Always."

We sat in silence once more before Hermione decided we should get to telling Potter and Weasly that I would now be accompanying them on their journey.

Hermione took away all of the spells she had placed around us, and set to work on making a small doorway through the larger dome that the three had been previously sharing. I followed her in, and she started to place the spells back up. I stayed close to her, knowing that Potter and Weasly would not like the sudden addition to their intimate group.

"You guys," Hermione called out, getting the two grumpy teenagers attention. They had been lounging around the entrance to their tent, trying to make it seem like they weren't staring pointedly at the two of us. "We need to talk for a minute,"

A minute turned into over an hour of yelling from Potter and Weasly, with a few comments from Hermione or me, trying to calm them down. When they finally did, Hermione and I glanced at each other for a moment before starting.

"Draco is going to be accompanying us for the rest of our trip," Hermione said point blank. Before either two boys could start to argue, she glared at them and said, "I don't care what you say, you need me, and he can be of much more help than you can even fathom. He's coming, and that's that. If you'd like for us to explain anything further, or if you have any questions, that's fine, but I want you to get along, and you two need to try and be nice. I'm not going to tolerate you three fighting all of the time, and if any of you care about me, you'll put your differences behind you,"

All three of us just kind of stared at her. This was new, she wasn't usually so forceful. I liked it. I smiled at her, and grabbed her hand.

"Well what's that about?" Weasly asked, horrified.

"Oh, well. We're in love," Hermione smiled.

"Oh, well. We're in love."

It was rattling around in my head. It was so simple. It was the answer to everything. I couldn't help but smile, and the look on the two boys sitting across from me was just too great.

"Is anyone hungry?" I asked, after the pair of them didn't say anything else. "I have plenty of food, and I know the duplication spell, so we'll have plenty," I grabbed my bag off of the ground, and pulled out a loaf of bread. "I could whip up some sandwiches if you'd like,"