When Draco had missed one meeting, no one had thought much of it. After all, life did come up sometimes, and nearly all of them had missed one meeting or another. Even Gwendolyn had not worried, though he had not contacted her.

By the time he missed the second meeting Gwendolyn was extremely worried. He had not called her, sent her post, nothing. Every day she vowed to make a house call, just to see if he was alright, and every day she instead went home and snuck ice cream out of the freezer. Gwendolyn was ready with a speech by the time Friday tea rolled around, but he was not there.

Half an hour in, Hermione's trembling hand went to Severus's arm. "Where's Draco? I'm worried about him."

Harry shrugged. "Come on, 'Mione. He probably just had a date scheduled." Gwendolyn's stomach did a flip at Harry's comment, but it was hidden behind her resolved expression.

Hermione hands fisted, the first aggressive thing Gwendolyn had seen her do since she had remembered the incident. "He isn't that much of a bloody bastard, Harry. He hasn't come in to work since last Wednesday."

Gwendolyn blanched. "And you haven't checked on him?"

Severus replied softly. "He often works from the Manor, and the ledgers have always been in on time."

Hermione's eyes began to shine with unshed tears. "What if something has happened to him?"

Gwendolyn knew she appeared completely calm, but her thoughts were storming inside of her. After a couple of moments, Gwendolyn stood up. "I'm going to make a house call. Severus, if you don't hear from me in an hour, I'll probably need assistance." With that, Gwendolyn stepped out of the room.

Concealing her worry with anger, Gwendolyn waved her wand at the doorbell from halfway down the path. It would take at least that long for him to answer the door, supposing he would. Gwendolyn had reached the door, and was three minutes away from blasting the thing off of its hinges when a shirtless Draco answered. Determined to not check out his body, Gwendolyn kept her eyes level with his and began her speech. "Draco, you've had everyone worried. If you don't" Gwendolyn did not have a chance to finish her thought, because Draco yanked her into the Manor by her arm, pushed her against the wall, and clamped his mouth over hers. Surprised and angry as she was, Gwendolyn got caught up in the kiss, hands searching for support as her knees went weak. Her right hand encountered a paper that burned her fingers on contact.

Gwendolyn forcefully pushed Draco off of her, reaching for the cursed paper. "What is that?" Though Draco tried to stop her, Gwendolyn read the note. "Did this come in an envelope?"

Draco shook his head. "No, it didn't."

Gwendolyn sent a glare his way. "You let us all think awful things because of a stupid note? I thought . . ." Gwendolyn cleared her throat. "Hermione started crying, and all because you heed the threats of that bastard."

Draco looked like he had been punched in the gut. "Hermione cried?"

"She isn't quite healed yet, and then you had to pull a stunt like this. We need to have a talk with your house elves."

Draco's hand went to Gwendolyn's shoulder. "What did you think?" He asked softly.

Gwendolyn's answer was delivered in a whisper. "I thought you were a mindless cad and that I had ruined our Friday teas by letting you make out with me." Gwendolyn swallowed. "Now, we need to explain to the house elves that what Lucius is doing is not for the good of your family, and he'll have no access to the Manor."

The next Friday, Gwendolyn went into the teashop with a completely different approach in mind. Remaining standing, she waited until everyone had arrived before closing the door. "Harry, bring us up to speed on what the Aurors have found for your case."

Everyone stared at Gwendolyn, seeing her in a new light. Harry responded quickly. "They've stopped looking, really. They don't say it, but they have."

Gwendolyn frowned. She had expected no less, but it did not make her feel any better. "What we need to do is hand-feed the Aurors every bit of information we can get, and we need to do it while the bastards are still in Britain. So, this will hurt. This will not be fun, but we are going to go over every minute detail you can remember until we can go to the Aurors and give them their case wrapped up in a nice little bow."

Ginny piped up. "But the Aurors have already questioned us."

Gwendolyn finally sat, pouring herself a cup of tea. "Aurors and Mind Healers are trained to ask very different questions. That, and should questions not work, I have a couple of Healing spells that have interesting effects of memory."

Severus laughed softly. "You're of the old traditions, then?"

Gwendolyn raised an eyebrow at him. "I don't use the old magic lightly."

Harry leaned forward, puzzled. "Like what my mum used?"

Severus smiled. "Protection is the strongest aspect of the old magic, healing the second strongest. But only three cultures still teach it. So, tell us, who taught you?"

Gwendolyn shook her head. "You're good. I did my specialization classes under a druid, and my apprenticeship in the Amazon."

"So that mark on your back is your Healing sigil?" Severus motioned to Gwendolyn's bare right shoulder, where a curl of green ink could just be seen.

"That's what the tattoo is?" Draco exclaimed.

Gwendolyn rolled her eyes. "Nice try, Severus, but I still need to talk to everyone."

"Perhaps individual sessions would be more appropriate?"

Gwendolyn went through her questions with everyone but Hermione on the weekday nights between that meeting and the next. Hermione was a little more difficult to get a hold of, and Gwendolyn knew precisely why.

When Gwendolyn showed up at Severus's shop at six-thirty Saturday morning, she walked directly up the stairs to knock on the door of the flat upstairs. Severus opened the door with his shirt half-buttoned. "It is early, Gwendolyn."

"I'm here to talk with Hermione."

Severus started working on the rest of his buttons. "Shouldn't you be at Hermione's, then?"

"When I told her to stay with someone, she decided to stay with you."

There was some light swearing from further within the apartment, verifying Gwendolyn's assessment. "Not even Draco knows. And you cannot question her."

Gwendolyn pushed lightly on the door. "I'm a Mind Healer, the signs were fairly evident. And, like hell I can't."

Severus replied in a harsh whisper. "She's fragile enough, Gwendolyn. I will not let you push her farther."

"She will never feel safe again if I don't."

"She will never be sane again if you do."

Gwendolyn huffed. "I'll do the Memory Walk with her. I should probably have done it ages ago, anyway."

Hermione appeared by Severus's shoulder. "Memory Walk? I haven't read about that since I went on the Aztecan manuscript binge, and it was less than detailed." Hermione pushed Severus aside and led Gwendolyn into the small kitchen. "How does it work?"

"I haven't agreed to this."

Both women turned to Severus. Hermione cocked her head at him. "That's funny, neither have I. Now, how do we Memory Walk?"

Gwendolyn explained how it was a like a surgery of thought. Gwendolyn would see the memory with Hermione, and the healing magic would remove all personal ties to it until it was as if it were a story rather than a memory. "It's an approved procedure by the International Healer's Guild."

Hermione nearly laughed. The Guild had yet to approve Pepper-Up potions. It was quite a rigorous process to get a treatment approved. "Will it work with Veritaserum as truth?"

Gwendolyn smiled. "Yes. It was a well-used spell by Mind Healers for centuries. It doesn't affect how you perceive the truth, rather severs most of the emotional associations."

Hermione looked relieved at the thought. "We should do it, then."

Severus thundered angrily. "This is a dangerous proposition."

Gwendolyn rose from her chair, her gold eyes glinting dangerously. "You would let her recover on her own, rather than undergo a time-tested treatment?"

"You could do untold damage to her mind!"

Gwendolyn was nearly shouting. "This is not standard Legilimancy. It is the first old magic that a Mind Healer learns. The worst that could happen is that she loses the memory entirely, and no one has managed that since Nimue!"

Hermione disappeared into the bedroom to wait out the storm.

A/N: Sorry this one is a bit late . . . I forgot about posting it until I started nodding off in bed. That is also why it was not as well read-through as the other chapters. Old magic is one of my big things. In one version, I even considered letting Hermione and Severus deal with it a bit. Which reminds me, Severus and Gwendolyn keep telling me that the point of including this argument is to show their different approaches to being overprotective. Yeah, that's not entirely what I got out of it.