There, now. This should make people happy.

Just a reminder - or three - this is in fact HG/SS. I know some people have expressed the wish that it be otherwise, so I'm sorry to disappoint. But I thought it was kind of obvious by the end of the first chapter that it would be. Also, this story is rated M, and for a damn good reason, though it will be a while before we get there. Also, I'm deliberately screwing with the timelines of these two series; from my calculations, HP7 takes place roughly ten or eleven years before Twilight. Obviously here they take place at the same time. My story, people.

That being said, yes, my story, but not my characters. Nobody belongs to me except the rainforest tribe from Ch. 1. All the other people and places belong to either Ms. Rowling or Ms. Meyer.

Chapter Two

~To Forks~

The next morning found them back in the same clearing he'd first seen her yesterday. No longer in the tribal clothing from the bonfire last night, she was back in something similar to what she'd worn when he first saw her with the women. Now wore a dove-gray tank top over a navy blue cotton skirt that fell just below her knees, but this time her feet were no longer bare. Now she wore what looked like a pair of sturdy leather sandals. He was trying not to look too closely at her in that tank top, but it didn't help that the way she held her gift from the women of the tribe, a brightly colored, striped blanket, folded close to her body pushed her breasts together a bit.

"Ready?" she asked, looking up at him. "If we Side-Along, I can Apparate us to a spot in the woods I remember near my uncle's house, out of sight of him or any Muggles. Then we can circle back around to the road in front of his house and knock on the door."

He raised his eyebrows. "And what do you intend to tell him when he sees no car and asks how we got there?"

She met his gaze. "The truth," she replied simply.

He frowned and opened his mouth, but she cut him off. "No, listen. He and Bella are the only family I have left, and I can't stand the thought of alienating them with lies any more about who I am. And if I'm going to be able to save her from whatever illness she has using magic, I'm not going to Obliviate her afterwards. I'm not just going to walk back into their lives after at least two years of not seeing them, fix their problems, remove their memories of what I did, and walk right back out. I did that to my parents and it damn near killed me, all right?" She took a deep breath, calming herself down.

He considered her words, but finally had to agree, knowing she had a point. Her uncle and cousin were all that remained of her ties to the world she'd been born into, the world she'd begun to leave behind when she'd gotten her Hogwarts letter. It was clear she did not want to leave that world behind completely, so why should she have to?

He nodded. "Very well, then. I see your point, and I will not try to stop you from revealing yourself to him, if you will allow me to ward his house at the time so that no one can overhear."

She nodded in return. "Okay, I can do that. Well then, shall we go?"

In response, he offered her his arm, which she took with a small half-smile, perhaps in amusement at the display of such gentlemanly manners in the middle of a rainforest. She looked back in the direction of the village, her small half-smile turning into a full one that seemed both sad and happy at the same time. It was a smile full of memory, similar to one he'd seen when she was in the company of her two Gryffindor friends listening to them chatter. He found himself caught in the beauty of her smile, and almost missed her turning back to look at him and say, "All right, let's go."

He took her arm securely in his, and then she was spinning them away, the forest around them disappearing with a nearly silent pop.

When they reappeared, he was almost convinced they'd never left; they were back in a forest, just as green and just as wet. He was momentarily disoriented, not from the Apparition but from having expected more of a difference. But then, as he looked around, he realized there was a difference after all.

This forest was not quite as dense or as noisy, and the air here, though still humid, was not quite as heavy. He could breathe better here. And it wasn't nearly so bloody hot here.

"Come on, this way," Hermione said, releasing his arm but grasping his hand. Though he allowed her to pull him along, he felt everything in him seem to freeze at the fact that someone was willingly holding his hand for what seemed like the first time in more than twenty years. Of course, he knew that was nonsense, people had shaken his hand many times in the past, but it seemed like this was the first time in so long that someone was holding his hand without letting go after a moment.

He followed her, and within a few moments they had emerged onto a paved road winding through the forest. It seemed that on the other side of the paved road, the trees seemed to thin a little, and a short distance to the right another road branched off, perpendicular to this one, and he supposed from the slight thinning of the trees in that direction that it led to a town.

Just a short ways past the perpendicular road sat a two-story house that looked as if it had been built in the early part of the twentieth century. In the driveway sat a police cruiser.

"That's it, Uncle Charlie's house," Hermione said, tugging him along.

They walked along the road, turning into first the driveway and then the walk branching off it that led to the front door.

Instead of knocking straight away, however, Hermione simply stared at the knocker on the door, a small furrow between her brows. She seemed to shake it off however, and took a deep breath before knocking with the hand that wasn't holding onto Severus's with a death grip.

In fact, she was holding on so tight, he had to speak up. "Easy, witch," he told her soothingly. "Calm. There's no need to crush my fingers. I rather need them, you know."

She blushed and eased her grip, though she didn't let him go. "Sorry," she muttered as the door opened.

The mustached man before them frowned and blinked as if trying to clear his vision. Apparently having made certain he wasn't seeing things, he asked, somewhat incredulous, "Hermione?"

"Hello, Uncle Charlie," she said, her voice quavering a little. "I know this is rather sudden, but please, may we come in?"

The man, still surprised, nodded and stepped aside for them to enter the house. As they entered, Severus surreptitiously took out his wand and silently began casting privacy wards to settle about the perimeters of the house.

But it seemed Charlie was in fact related to Hermione, because he had the same keen eye as his niece. "What's that you got there?" he asked Severus sharply, eyeing his hand.

For all his years as a spy, for the first time in his life, Severus could not come up with a single convincing lie.

Fortunately, Hermione saved him. "Please, Uncle Charlie, we'll explain everything. First, may we have something to drink? We're both rather parched," she requested.

He blinked again, then shook himself and said, "Yeah, of course. Go ahead, help yourself, Mia." But before she could turn to go to the kitchen, he seemed to remember something, and swept her into a hug. "God, I didn't even realize how much I missed you, Mia. My baby sister's baby girl." He released her, and she went into the kitchen, reappearing moments later carrying three glasses of water balanced in her small hands. Severus took one from her hands, while Charlie took a second and she kept the third. They all sat in the living room, Severus and Hermione sitting beside each other while Charlie sat in his armchair.

"First, I want to tell you that I'm so sorry you haven't heard from any of us, me or my parents, in so long. I hope you forgive me, especially after you hear everything I'm going to tell you. That being said, I have a lot to tell you, and it won't be easy, either for me to tell or for you to hear. Most of it's going to sound crazy and unbelievable, so all I ask is that you listen. For now, though, let me introduce you to Severus Snape. He was one of my teachers at school." She indicated Severus sitting beside her, and the two men reached across to each other and shook hands.

"Pleasure, Chief Swan," Severus said briefly. He considered the man before him and reflected that it seemed that no matter whether they were Aurors or Muggle policemen, law enforcement officers always had a certain hardness to them. He wondered what kinds of things Police Chief Swan had seen to give him that hardness here in this tiny, quiet town.

"Good to meet you," Charlie greeted, his brown eyes assessing. He was pleased to note the dark man's firm handshake, as well as the fact that he had the rough palms of a man who worked with his hands. He wasn't certain, however, what to make of the shadows he could see in the man's eyes. Police Chief Swan knew a troubled soul when he saw one, and Severus Snape seemed world-weary.

He also was uncertain of what to make of the way the man interacted with his niece. Hermione had said the man had been her teacher at school, but the way the man seemed to gravitate toward her reminded Charlie a little uncomfortably of the way his daughter's boyfr – er, husband – had once done with Bella. He wasn't completely sure, though, that this man was really aware of how he was behaving.

He turned his attention back to his niece and felt a pang in his chest when he met the eyes she shared with her cousin, his daughter. "The other thing I want to say before I tell you our story, Uncle, is that I got your message from last week about Bella's illness. And I promise, if you're willing to hear me out and trust me, Severus and I can help Bella, whatever's wrong with her." Her voice was grave, but her face was pleading with him to trust her.

He had a bad feeling he wasn't going to like what she had to say one bit, but she'd never given him cause not to trust her. She and her cousin had more in common than just their eyes; just like Bella, she had a very steadfast, loyal soul, and she never broke a promise. So he decided he'd listen to her and do his damnedest to believe what she had to say.

He nodded, and she breathed a sigh of relief. Then, she seemed to take another deep breath, as if steeling herself, and pulled a thin wooden stick from what was apparently a very deep, hidden pocket in her skirt. Then she looked at the man next to her and said quietly, "Will you draw the drapes?"

He nodded and stood, going over to the windows and pulling the curtains closed before turning back to watch from where he stood.

Hermione pointed her stick-thing at the magazines on the coffee table before them and said something Charlie didn't understand. Two seconds later, Charlie was rubbing his eyes in an effort to clear them, knowing he couldn't possibly have seen what he just did, but when he opened his eyes again, it was to see that the magazines were in fact floating in midair.

Mouth gaping, he looked from the magazines to his niece and back to the magazines, which then floated back to the surface of the table. When they landed with a soft fwump, he looked back at her, shutting his mouth. "What did you just do?" he asked incredulously.

She gave him an understanding half-smile. "Magic," she replied simply. "Uncle Charlie, I'm a witch, and Severus is a wizard. This," she told him, holding up the stick, "is my wand. It channels all the magic I have in me and helps with precision. We speak or think incantations and spells to produce specific results. Severus teaches Potions, which you could consider, to put it in simplified terms, a cross between cooking and chemistry." Her expression sobered. "Another branch of magic is healing. I have some skill in healing, and Severus has still more. And if neither of us can help Bella, we know people who can, who won't have any qualms about helping her even though she's not a witch."

Reassured after a demonstration, he suddenly felt more optimistic about Bella's recovery. "Can you find her? The Cullens won't let me visit or tell me where she is, and I'm losing both my mind and my hope."

Tears sprang to her eyes and she stood, moving over to him and embracing him. "We'll find her," she promised. "I swear, I won't rest until we do."

He hugged her back, his own face wet, either having forgotten that he was crying in front of another man or not caring.

After a moment, he released her, and said, "So what else can you do with this wand of yours? And what about him? Can he do the same things?" He nodded at Severus.

She smiled at him. "Yes, he can. In fact, he can do more. He's a teacher. He's got much more experience with magic than I do. And we can do so many things." Biting her lip, she thought for a moment, then pointed her wand somewhere off to one side and said, "Expecto Patronum," all the while concentrating on the thought of Charlie's joy when his daughter was reunited with him, safe and healthy.

To her immense surprise, her otter had been replaced. Her patronus was now a large spotted cat. She hadn't had a reason to cast this particular spell since before leaving to live in the rainforest, and she smiled to see it. The jaguar had been her first animal form while she learned to shape-shift with the rainforest natives.

"This is a spell that protects against a certain kind of creature called a dementor. They bring frost, and leech all the happiness out of you, leaving only your worst memories. For this spell to work you have to think of a powerful, happy thought. It keeps the dementor's darkness and despair at bay. Each form is different for every witch or wizard," she explained, not taking her eyes from her patronus as it faded.

She finally turned back to her uncle. "Sometimes we can shape-shift as well, turn into animals. Most witches or wizards only know how to access one animal form, but I spent eight months with a tribe in South America that has perfected shape-shifting. They can access any animal form they wish. The jaguar was my first form." So saying, she put her wand down and moved into the center of the room. Suddenly, her form dissolved rapidly, shifting into the form of the jaguar in an instant.

Severus watched the large cat stretch luxuriously, thinking that while the form might not have been what he might have suspected the Gryffindor bookworm's original animal form to be, it still curiously fit her.

He watched as the jaguar padded softly over to the amazed Charlie Swan, who'd sat down in his armchair with a soft thump at this last display of magic. The big cat rested her head in her uncle's lap, and her golden eyes closed in pleasure when Charlie hesitantly raised his hand and began to rub her head behind her ears. After a moment, a soft, rumbling purr began to sound with every breath she exhaled.

Severus found himself thinking about the magic of shape-shifting as he watched them. She'd said she'd learned how to access multiple animal forms during her stay in the rainforest; he wondered if she'd be able to teach him as well. He was already an animagus, though few people knew that; his form was a black hawk. He wondered if it would be easier for someone who already was an animagus to learn how to access other forms.

After a moment, Hermione pulled her head from her uncle's knee and returned to her human form, returning to her seat on the sofa; Severus sat beside her once more. "Does that help to understand us a bit better?" she asked her uncle.

Charlie looked as if he were struggling to come to terms with what he'd just seen. He exhaled sharply after a moment, but then looked back at her and nodded. "It definitely makes it easier to take you seriously when you say you're a witch, that's for sure. But now of course I have a ton of questions. I guess some aren't that important, but one thing I have to know is why it's been almost two years since I last heard from you or your parents?" he asked.

Hermione took a deep breath. She'd known this would come up eventually. All she could do was pray he wouldn't hate her for what she'd done to his sister and brother-in-law, that he'd understand and forgive her. She didn't know what she'd do if he decided he couldn't handle knowing his own niece had done something like that.

"Well, you see, Uncle Charlie…" she began, trying to keep her voice from quivering. "It's an awfully long story. But it amounts to a magical war in which my best friend was the primary target of the enemy, and because I was so close to him, I was also in danger. And by extension, so were my parents. So I did what I thought was best for them and sent them away. It was the hardest thing I've ever done, the hardest spells I've ever cast and the hardest decision I've ever made, but in order to keep them alive, I erased their memories of my friend Harry, the war, the entire Wizarding World…and most importantly, of me. And I gave them new memories, new identities, and a new dream, and I sent them away to live in Australia. They have no idea there was a war, no idea there was ever a boy called Harry Potter, no idea their names are Jean and Richard Granger, and no idea they ever had a daughter who was a witch. I have already tried, and found that I can't reverse the spell. I've erased myself from their lives forever."

He looked stricken at her words, and she fought to keep control over her own emotions and keep from breaking down into a sobbing mess. She managed to keep from going into hysterics, but was unable to hold back her tears.

Hermione watched her uncle, her heart in her throat, as he frowned at his lap for a long moment before looking up and fixing her with a steely gaze. "I think you'd better tell me everything, from the beginning."

She nodded and launched into the story of the two wars against Voldemort, beginning with the Prophecy that caused Voldemort to target her best friend Harry as a baby and the magic that saved Harry's life and defeated Voldemort the first time around when his mother sacrificed herself for her son. The story then jumped to her and Harry's years at Hogwarts as students, and she gave her uncle a brief summary of the events of each year. When it seemed like her uncle was having difficulty understanding what it all had to do with her, Severus spoke up.

"Your niece was not only one of Harry Potter's best friends, which would have been reason enough for the enemy to want to target her, but she was also born to non-magical parents. The attitude of pureblood supremacists in the Wizarding World regarding Muggle-born witches and wizards is very similar to the attitude of the Nazis regarding Jews. The fact that she is Muggle-born alone would have meant that the potential outcome of the war would have affected her directly. But her heritage coupled with her closeness to the boy who was the primary and ultimate target of the most evil Wizard history has ever seen meant that she was perhaps the highest-profile Muggle-born witch in Britain during the war. Therefore, though the events at Hogwarts during that time centered around Potter, she was always affected directly."

Charlie listened intently to everything the witch and wizard were saying. He offered little in the way of questions or other interruptions, looking as if he were having a hard enough time simply coming to terms with everything.

When the story came to the end of Hermione and Harry's sixth year at Hogwarts, Charlie's shocked and accusing eyes flew to Severus, who then took over the story, explaining everything from his point of view, including a brief summary of his friendship with Lily and his subsequent guilt over her death. He spoke in greater detail about his years-long mission as a spy for Dumbledore and explained with quiet sorrow the promise he'd made, however reluctantly, to Dumbledore to kill him when the time came.

Hermione re-entered the explanation, and it was here that Charlie knew the story of what she'd done to her parents came into play. She told him of the plans she, Harry, and Ron had made to drop out of school and finish the task Dumbledore had set Harry, which was to find and destroy all the hidden, protected pieces of Voldemort's soul. She told him of all the planning and research she had done over the summer before they had embarked on their journey, and she told him of the precautions she and Ron had taken to protect their families. Her eyes filled with pain as she told him of how she'd removed all her parents' memories of her, how she'd had to dig deep within their minds and alter some of their memories even from before she'd been born in order to cement their new, false identities within their own heads, how she'd convinced them that their names were Wendell and Monica Wilkins and that they had always dreamed of moving to Australia, and how she'd finally sent them away. And she lost the battle with her tears as she explained how as far as she could tell, the magic was irreversible.

Charlie saw his niece's heartbreak and felt his own heart shatter. He stood and pulled her into his arms just as she broke down into sobs. Tears wetting his own face, he sat back down in his armchair, now cradling his niece in his lap as she wept into his chest.

He could feel the grief clawing at the inside of his chest at the knowledge that his little sister was no longer a part of his life, did not remember him, or even know who she really was. But he knew that however painful it was for him to think about, he knew his grief had nothing on Hermione. After all, she'd been the one to make the decision. She'd known ahead of time what the consequences of her actions would be, had thought them through as thoroughly as only she could, and had seen no other options. To her, a longer, happy life with no memory of her was better for them than a life filled with memories of their daughter but cut short by torture and murder at the hands of their daughter's enemies.

It was then, as he cradled in his arms his heartbroken, battle-worn, and soul-weary niece, whose innocence had been ripped away from her by war, that he decided that whatever happened with his own daughter, he would force himself to live through it and be there for his niece. She was lost and broken in a way he'd never seen in another person, not even in Bella when Edward had left her on her eighteenth birthday.

He held his niece for a long time as first her sobs quieted and then her breathing slowed; soon he realized her weeping had worn her out and she was asleep.

He looked up at the wizard still seated on the sofa; the man's black eyes were on Hermione, filled with sadness, and he did not look up until Charlie spoke. "I'll put her in Bella's room and then come back. I still have things I want to know, but she's had enough."

"Yes, she has," the man murmured in agreement, his tone soft but heavy with sorrow.

Charlie stood, gathering his niece into his arms, and made his way upstairs. His niece appeared to be in a state of exhaustion that was bone-deep, for she didn't stir a bit as he lowered her to the surface of the twin-sized bed in Bella's room and removed her shoes before drawing the quilt that lay over the comforter of Bella's bed over her body. He kissed her forehead and made his way back downstairs.

"Now tell me what else happened to make my niece the way she is now. I have a feeling what she went through with her parents isn't the worst of it," Charlie asked the other man as he returned to his seat.

Severus shook his head. "No, it wasn't. It was only the beginning of what would be the hardest year in almost anyone's life." He went on to explain everything he knew about Hermione's year on the run with her two friends as they hunted for Horcruxes, living out of a tent and moving from one location to another every couple of days while they thought and researched and waited for clues. He had heard the story already from Potter and Weasley, and then from her yesterday in the village after she'd shown him around and before the bonfire ceremony. He did his best to tell the story in a way that spared the other man as much pain as possible, but it couldn't always be helped, particularly when he reached the explanation of the trio's capture and Hermione's torture at Malfoy Manor at the hands of Bellatrix Lestrange.

Severus would have simply stated that Hermione had been tortured by Bellatrix Lestrange and then rescued by the boys and Dobby the house-elf and would have left it at that, but Charlie, his hard eyes glinting with fury, demanded to know what they had done to his niece. And when Severus reluctantly explained what Bellatrix had done, the words she'd carved into Hermione's arms, he thought Charlie would truly go mad. When the other man shot to his feet and began pacing, Severus stood and stopped the shorter man with a firm hand on his shoulder.

"Easy, Charlie. It's over. The war is done, and so is Hermione's year of suffering. She has been healing since the end of the war, and while her scars will never disappear and the memories will always be there, she has survived and become stronger for it," Severus told him, trying to calm the other man.

Charlie stopped pacing, but his gaze as he met Severus's was still angry as well as pleading, with a tinge of desperation. "Tell me they're dead and can't hurt her any more. Tell me none of them will ever hurt my baby sister's little girl!"

Oddly enough, it was the grim, slightly cruel smirk Severus gave him in response that reassured Charlie the most. "Most of them are, Charlie. Only one remains alive and on the loose, but I swear to you on behalf of Hermione and the little family she has left, that when we find him, I will leave him alive when I have finished with him, stripped of his magic so that he may not fight, and will hold him so that you may put a bullet in his gut. His death will not be quick, painless, or pretty."

Sorry about the less-than-happy ending to this chapter. But I wanted to get this update out and it's late and I'm sleepy and I need to go to bed before I start falling asleep at my computer and start typing nonsense in my weird state of half-consciousness where my body is trying to sleep but my mind is still trying to write.

So how was this chapter? Speak to me.