A/N: Sorry for being late with this chapter, I had a hard time writing "The talk." and I wanted to do it justice. Did I do well?

Enjoy!


Sins of the Past

Chapter 4


The two witches stared at one another for a seemingly endless moment, both seizing up the other's mood and mentally preparing themselves for what they knew was going to be a difficult conversation. Hermione decided that the level of difficulty was hinged on how Minerva saw their past week and the few interactions they had.

Wave upon wave of emotions swirled around in the rich green eyes of the visiting animagus, betraying how out of her element she was. The normally proud Gryffindor, the stoic 'Headmistress McGonagall' was replaced by a woman humbled by her own mistakes, who, despite the mortification she felt over her actions, found within herself the strength to face the consequences.

Hermione's chocolate brown eyes shone with unshed tears, moved by how much vulnerability Minerva was willing to reveal despite her reserved nature, but feelings of resentment also bubbled up inside her at the injustice of Minerva's recent behaviour. She had never given the older woman reason to be distrustful and the hurtful way she acted out at such a precious moment in their lives was not something she could overlook without at least an exceptionally good reason.

"Good morning, Hermione. May I come in?" Minerva broke the silence. She fidgeted awkwardly with the flowers in her hand, concentrating on maintaining sombre facial expressions. Despite the seriousness of their impending conversation and the depth of her shame, she was so happy to see the younger woman that she had to fight herself to avoid grinning like an idiot drunk on amortentia.

The younger witch had yet to find her voice, so she invited the woman inside by way of stepping to the side and opening the door wider. Her other hand let go of her wand long ago, trusting the animagus implicitly. Even if they were going to fight it was beyond the shadow of a doubt that Minerva would never raise her wand against her.

The Scottish witch stood in the middle of the familiar living room clutching the flowers to her chest and despite knowing every nook and cranny of the flat she had a decidedly lost look on her face.

"I brought you flowers." She continued the hitherto one-sided conversation, slightly raising the bouquet a bit higher in her hands.

"Thanks." Hermione said finally, her voice raw and hoarse from the sheer amount of control she had to exercise upon herself. The younger witch was very much conflicted, not knowing whether crying, shouting, laughing, or just simply hugging her lover would be the better choice. 'Or all of the above...in this order...' she thought, mentally rolling her eyes at her own indecision.

As she moved closer to take the flowers her eyes remained fastened on the dark haired woman who brought them. While normally she was uncannily perceptive she would not have been able to name a single flower in the bouquet at that moment because her eyes were only for the animagus that came with them. In a moment of weakness she allowed her eyes to trace her lover's features from those stunning emerald eyes across high cheekbones to pale lips that were currently pressed together tightly.

The older witch had a closely guarded look Hermione knew well. It either meant that she was trying to refrain from doing something because she thought it would be inappropriate or she was trying to control her temper. 'Gosh, I hope its the former. I can deal with inappropriate behaviour but the last thing I need now is her temper flaring...'

The brunette's heart sped up as her hands reached around the stems, anticipating the moment when their bodies would touch, for which she could barely mask the need radiating from her every gesture. The back of her fingers brushed against the material of Minerva's muggle sweater, causing Hermione's breath to hitch much louder than she would have liked. While she hadn't planned on being unreasonably hard on the woman she hadn't wanted to start their conversation from such a weak position either. 'Damn...all she has to do is look at me to drive me to the edge of my sanity.'

"Have a seat?" She suggested before she unceremoniously fled to the kitchen. While she could have conjured a vase with water in it wandlessly she preferred to do it the muggle way. The brunette witch didn't even bother to justify it, she just needed to preoccupy herself for a moment to gather her wits. It was all she could do to not throw Minerva's gift to the side and tackle the woman.

As she dwadled around with the flowers she noticed how peculiar they were. None of them were the cliché 'I'm sorry I was an asshole' flowers. 'I think the smaller ones are maybe daisies?' She wondered silently but she had no clue about the big blue flowers. 'And what's with the ivy?'

After a few minutes she decided that she'd been hiding for long enough and emerged from the kitchen. The first thing she noted was that Beo had flown from his perch and landed on the coffee table in front of Minerva, who looked at the bird thoroughly surprised. To Hermione's slight annoyance, the bird gave her what she interpreted as a pointed look after delivering the message, and then flew back to his resting place without a sound. 'Hmpf, cheeky bird. I'll need to ask Minerva if she knows how Beo knew she was coming...after our conversation.'

The other thing Hermione noticed was that Minerva chose to sit on the sofa facing the fireplace. She could also have taken either of the arm chairs but apparently decided to give Hermione the opportunity to decide if she wanted to sit within reaching distance.

'Do I?' The younger woman wondered for a brief moment before dismissing the resentful side of her that said sitting in the arm chair would show the other woman who was the boss. 'Yeah, it'd more likely show her whose the more childish...'

The animagus turned towards Hermione, directing the brunette witch's attention to the letter in her hand with a delicate movement of her wrist. "We are so much alike... you decided to answer my letters the day I found the courage to seek you out in person." It was more of a statement than a question. She fiddled with the seal on the envelope for a moment, tracing her fingers over the imprint in the wax. It was a simple HG styled in elegant cursive, left by the signet ring she had gifted to Hermione upon her entry into magical law enforcement.

Hermione sensed the woman's anxiety which let her know that she was probably mentally preparing herself to discuss the Hippogriff in the room. She scooted to the edge of the sofa and busied herself with the flowers, pretending to be arranging and adjusting them. She decided that she'd let Minerva make the first move. 'I'd done enough talking last week... it's her turn.'

The animagus in question silently followed her movements, taking in everything, noting how nervous her lover was. She'd likely be upset if she knew how many tells she had but the older woman wasn't about to point them out at present. She was almost giddy with delight when Hermione chose to sit next to her on the sofa rather than in one of the arm chairs. 'Maybe I wasn't imagining the longing in her eyes earlier...'

"Care to listen to what I have to say for myself before I read your letter?" Minerva asked in what seemed to be an uncharacteristically submissive manner. Usually she knew exactly what to say and needed no one's permission to speak her mind, choosing her words with cutting precision to befit whatever was under discussion. 'But then again... sometimes the best course of action is to let the other person decide.'

When Hermione nodded the ebony haired witch took a deep breath to collect her thoughts. "There's not much to say, to be honest." She said, her voice clear and steady. "I have neither an excuse nor an explanation for my behaviour. I was abysmally foolish to have doubted you when you've never given me reason to do so..." The animagus continued, her accent growing thicker and her voice slightly more unsteady as she was swept off her feet by the whirlwind of emotions swirling inside her. "I'm unspeakably sorry, Hermione. I'm a foolish old woman who doesn't even deserve to be looked at by you after betraying you like this..." She said, her voice breaking over the last few words. Tears she vowed she wouldn't let fall shined in her eyes treacherously. 'Dammit, I didn't want to cry...I don't want to manipulate her into forgiving me like this...'

"When you came into my office the other day and basically told me to shove my attitude wherever I wanted it...Merlin, Hermione, I wanted to drop down on my knees and beg for your forgiveness right then and there...and little Rosie... Gahd.. I missed her first week..." Minerva said, stumbling over the words as she fought to finish her much rehearsed apology. Her eyes were opened unnaturally wide because she was afraid to blink lest the tears would start falling.

Finally, when a mental imagine of the one and only time she had seen her daughter assaulted her mind and she realized that she'd not even held her baby girl in her arms yet, her emotions won. Her defensive walls crumbled under the siege and with a strangled groan the proud animagus started crying uncontrollably, face hidden behind her hands.


It took Hermione the better part of a half an hour to help Minerva calm down. Once the older woman broke down she couldn't stop the years of pent up frustration and, what she believed was a well-hidden, insecurity from bubbling up inside her. She poured her heart out to Hermione, speaking of a fear of dying alone, both the wonder and terror that the young woman brought into Minerva's life. The promise of a future and the unimaginable pressure the animagus felt to not fail her own and her family's expectations. When Hermione found the courage to ask her out it had been nearly two decades since Minerva had any companionship and she was not sure if she still knew how to be in a relationship with anyone. That and the fact that her maternal grandparents' portraits were incessant in pestering their grandchild about continuing the Ross line.

'I guess that would sort of explain why Rosie's hair colour hit such a nerve with Minerva...' Hermione thought as she listened to her lover's rant. She was aware that this revelation should not make the older woman's behaviour acceptable but she couldn't help but wonder exactly how much pressure they were putting on her. She knew that the Rosses used to be a pure blood family until Minerva's mother eloped with a muggle minister so it wasn't hard to imagine what kind of expectations they might have.

"Mind you, I don't expect any of this rubbish to lessen the severity of my misbehaviour in your eyes, dearest." Minerva said between two sniffs. "I know I'd been a right fiend this past week..."

"Oh stop it, Minerva!" Hermione suddenly said, quite exasperated with the woman who constantly berated herself. "Seriously. You are your own worst enemy." She continued in a softer tone as she reached out to squeeze the startled woman's hand. "You wouldn't have half as many doubts if stopped kicking yourself over the slightest things." The brunette witch said kindly. "And yes, you were an arsehole of epic proportions." She suddenly continued in a firmer tone. "But the fact is that I love you and need you in my life. And so does Rose."

"Where is she anyway?" Minerva asked suddenly, interrupting Hermione's lecture.

"She's in the baby room, probably asleep." Hermione said automatically. "We'd know if she was awake."

"You are being astonishingly lenient with me, Hermione. Why?" Minerva asked, changing the subject back for another moment. She'd also almost said she didn't deserve the younger witch but she'd caught herself before doing so. She'd just been chastised for berating herself all the time, and seemed to be, as muggles liked to say, off the hook, so the least she could do was try harder.

"You really want to know why?" Hermione asked. Upon the animagus' nod she said, "Because I read your letters. And also because you came here and said all you did before opening that." She gestured towards the unopened letter that was left on the coffee table, almost forgotten. "So...yes, while I won't ever forget what happened, I'm quite willing to forgive you. But if you ever leave me like that again..." She didn't finish the sentence. There was no need for an actual threat to be verbalized.

Even though Minerva was overjoyed that she was forgiven, her brows knitted together, eyes slightly narrowing as she tried to comprehend the cryptic answer. Wondering what might be in the letter that would cause Hermione to say what she did, she pondered the possibilities for a moment and the obvious answer hit her soon enough. "The results of the muggle test?" She enquired gesturing at the still unopened letter. This time it was the younger witch's turn to answer with a simple nod of her head.

"Love... I hope you believe me when I say that I don't actually need to see the results to believe Rosie is my daughter but..." Minerva said, looking somewhat sheepish for just a second "I have to admit I've never seen such a thing in my life. Mind if I take a look? Out of curiosity?"

A surprised laugh burst from Hermione's lips upon the admission, the pure joy that her partner was so interested in muggle things lighting up the younger witch's face. Despite being an extremely accomplished witch she'd never stopped being part muggle and was happy that the animagus was interested, especially considering her youthful brush with the threat of living a forced muggle life.


After studying the piece of paper for a while, determined to figure it out, Minerva thought that she'd found the most important bit of writing on the paper but for the life of her she could not read it. 'Merlin, how do muggles manage to write in such an orderly manner and with so small letters? The...legged..alleged! And is that father? Am I the alleged father?' Peering over the rim of her glasses Minerva looked at Hermione who had an amused expression plastered all over her face as she watched her struggling with the report. "Help me, please?" Minerva finally admitted defeat, handing the paper over to Hermione who scooted closer with her characteristic Cheshire cat grin. "And how in the devil do muggles write in such script? I can't imagine how they curve these letters..."

Hermione had to suppress a giggle at her lover's antics. She had to keep reminding herself that when Minerva was last in a muggle environment the computers of today hadn't been invented yet. And, being the daughter of a rural minister, she probably hadn't even seen a muggle typewriter before. "They don't do it by hand, love. You know...I could read and write quite intelligibly by the time I arrived at Hogwarts. Muggles do learn handwriting but this was written with a computer. A machine that does all sorts of things much better and faster than humans can."

"Like writing?" Minerva asked sceptically.

"Well... it was originally designed to make very complex calculations possible within seconds...now that I think about it... maybe computers could be quite useful in Arithmancy..." Hermione trailed off, lost in thought for a moment. "Anyway, it kind of evolved and now people do almost everything on their computers. Including writing longer pieces, yes. Like articles, books, official things. Modern technology basically replaced traditional printing presses." She finished her explanation.

"So what does this say?" Minerva prompted, handing the piece of paper to Hermione. While she found muggle technology fascinating in general, she was more interested in the specific bit of paper in her hand.

"It says, 'The alleged father is not excluded as the biological father of the tested child. Based on testing results obtained from analyses of the DNA loci listed, the probability of paternity is 99,9998%. This probability of paternity is calculated by comparing to an untested, unrelated random individual of the Caucasian population'." Hermione read out the verbal summary of the numbers. "It basically means that they compared your DNA with Rose's and another random person's to see how alike or different they are and it shows that enough of your DNA matches to prove that you're the other mother."

"Speaking of motherhood..." Minerva said.


Even though Minerva had a wealth of experience in dealing with teenaged children she found that she was quite nervous when Hermione led her to Rose's room. All the furniture and bits and bobs were familiar as they did their shopping together. Hermione insisted that she wanted their child to have both muggle and wizarding things to which Minerva consented without a second thought. That essentially meant that she got dragged all over muggle London and had to acquaint herself with the massive selection of baby things these shops offered. Much to both witch's satisfaction, they deepened their bonding over their shared annoyance with the gender bias muggles exhibited. However, this also meant that they had a devil of a time buying toys.

They both peered over the railing of the muggle baby bed in which Rose was currently sleeping. Minerva had won that particular battle and they had agreed that they'd have a store bought muggle bed in Hermione's flat and would be using Minerva's ancestral baby bed when they spent time at Hogwarts or the Manor.

The red haired baby had been sound asleep since morning but she must have sensed her parents' presence because almost immediately she blinked her eyes open. Or perhaps she was simply awakened by the whispering voices of the witches as they affectionately cooed at her.

Hermione picked her up gently and attempted to deposit her in Minerva's arms but the older woman looked so startled by the prospect that she stopped mid-motion. "Don't you want to hold her?" She asked, her voice slightly confused and hurt by her partner's hesitancy.

The animagus realized that Hermione must have misinterpreted her nervousness and attempted to reassure her with a smile, even though she could feel that her facial expressions schooled themselves to mirror her embarrassment. "I do, love, but I have to admit I'm a bit nervous. What if I drop her? Or hold her the wrong way?"

Hermione stared at the older witch in surprise, her eyes comically wide. She had never expected that Minerva would not know how to handle small children. "But... didn't you have younger brothers? And I thought you used to have a close relationship with your niece and nephew?" She asked.

Memories of her long dead brothers assaulted Minerva's mind and her eyes suddenly became sad. While the McGonagall family was generally considered to be fortunate, all three siblings having survived Voldemort's first reign, she lost both of her brothers a few years later. Robert had succumbed to dragon pox and Malcolm died from injuries sustained in a nasty flying accident. Her niece and nephew still lived but as they grew older their visits became fewer and farther in between, especially after she moved back to Hogwarts after Elph's death. It had been years since they'd been in contact so she knew absolutely nothing about them.

"Sweetheart... you always seem to forget just how old I am. The last time I held an infant in my hands was a little more than three decades ago." Minerva said softly.

Hermione quickly did the math, realizing that the animagus' still living relatives, if she had any, were probably a few years older than her self. "Oh." She finally said. "Well, you needn't worry, it's not rocket science." She said but upon seeing the other woman's comically confused expression she added. "That's... never mind. It basically means it's not terribly hard to figure out. Here, I'll show you."

She stepped closer, guiding the squirming infant into her other mother's arms with one hand, using the other to wrap Minerva's arm securely around their daughter. "There. See? She's not that frightening." She said, smiling at the older woman who all but melted as she looked at the tiny human in her hands. Even though Rose was much too young for any sort of recognition she instinctively snuggled closer to her other mother, latching onto the warmth that radiated from her.

"She's perfect." Minerva reiterated the words she had spoken when she first set eyes on their child more than a week ago. She started singing her mother's Gaelic lullaby to Rose in a whisper which the tiny creature seemed to recognize because she seemed to try to focus on its source.

Hermione suddenly felt overwhelmed with emotion and she slipped an arm around Minerva's waist, making the first full physical contact with the woman in over a week. "Our child..." She responded. She knew these were her exact first words upon seeing Rose for the first time. 'Merlin knows I've re-watched that memory often enough...' She could feel happy tears silently sliding down her cheeks as she watched the love of her life cradling their child in her arms and softly singing to her.

Minerva was hyper-aware of Hermione's arm around her waist and she stumbled over the next few words but continued singing nonetheless. An overwhelming sensation of joy burst inside her chest as she took in the reality that she was standing in Hermione's flat, holding their child in her hands as Hermione held her. She was also aware that her love was crying but she knew they were happy tears, the blinding smile Hermione had plastered on her face was testimony to it.

As she finished her song she turned her head slightly, her eyes connecting with the warm brown orbs of the younger woman, and she felt everything, her entire life clicking, sliding into place. She was home. "I love you." She stated simply, moving closer to Hermione, moulding their sides together but not daring to return the half embrace. She was afraid that holding Rose with one hand would not be secure enough.

"And I love you." was Hermione heartfelt reply, her head instinctively moving closer, eyes flicking to the older woman's lips. "We haven't said hello properl..." She started to say, as a means of inviting Minerva for a kiss but she couldn't finish the sentence as the animagus inclined her head and brushed her lips to hers mid-sentence.

The kiss sent sparks of joy down their spines as lips gently reacquainted themselves, moving slowly but deliberately. Minerva's moan of approval broke their trance a minute later and Hermione broke the kiss with a love-sick smile on her face. "Welcome home, love."


TBC

A/N: I know, I know. I'm evil for dragging out the suspense for so long. But I promise to get on with unravelling the mystery in the next chapter. At this point I'm not even going to try to guess how many chapters it's going to take, I'll just roll with it.

I'd like to say thanks to Fastlight who's been sharing lovely ideas with me on possible solutions to the mystery. One of them was that Rose might be a Metamorphmagus which is just too good to pass up. I'm tempted to start a sequel once this is finished and make Hugo a Metamorphmagus, possibly writing a series of stand alone stories about their adventures growing up. How'd you all like that? (And yes, I do plan on continuing Save me from me but I guess I needed a bit of light hearted stuff in my writing.)