A/N: Thank you for your patience. I'm still not where I want to be but at least I have something to show for the gap. We're getting new desks tomorrow so that will help. If you could see me now, you would see why this is more difficult.

And just in case anyone cares, I share Hermione's affliction for hot drinks. Why does this country not make anything hot enough? Sigh.

-0-

A proper cup of tea was found in a small shop selling all manner of knick-knacks near the shoreline in the tiny tiny town below the cemetery. They each picked a cup for their tea and a scone to nibble on to stave off their hunger before they retreated to the back corner to wait for it.

"I feel like I had so much to tell you when we set off that I could not think straight and now we are here," Minerva sighed. "I can think of none of it."

"I think that's alright," Hermione smiled easily. "Sometimes those details don't matter."

"They were undoubtedly important," Minerva muttered as their tea arrived at the table.

"I'm sure if they were that important, those thoughts will come back."

Hermione let it sit while they poured their tea and took a sip. The sighs they both released were audible and they stared at each other over the steaming pot.

"Silence never used to feel like this," Minerva muttered, tracing a crack in the linoleum tablecloth. "It used to be easier."

"We have evolved," Hermione nodded. "Changed. We can't deny it. We just have to learn this new thing."

Minerva snorted and rolled her eyes.

"You are right. You were right," she groaned. "I am not good at change."

"You are doing just fine," Hermione said as she took a bracing sip. "Of all the people in the world, Min, those that love you are the ones that can forgive that."

"But -"

"If you could have dinner with three people from history, who would it be?"

Minerva blinked and looked up at her.

"What?"

"If you could have dinner with three people from history," Hermione chuckled. "Who would you pick?"

"I -" Minerva physically shook herself. "I was trying to -"

"I know," Hermione mused. "And I'm stopping you from doing that. It's unnecessary to just rehash it all the time."

"So you're distracting me with small talk?"

"We did say we were going to get to know each other better," Hermione shrugged.

Minerva scrutinised her for a while then shook her head.

"Fine," she muttered. "Three people?" Hermione nodded and drained her tea cup and poured another. Nothing seemed hot enough any more. "It is a surprisingly difficult question," Minerva finally said as she picked at the crumbs. They'd polished off the scones in no time at all and Minerva was gripping her cup like a lifeline. "I realise that the object is to pick notable people from history that you admire, etc."

Hermione studied her as she sighed.

"It wasn't supposed to make you sad, Min," Hermione said regretfully.

"Och, no," Minerva shook her head. "I was just thinking that if I had to choose, I perhaps might like to talk to Merlin, Robert De Bruce, Tolkein." Hermione smiled.

"Want to walk?"

"Oh," Minerva muttered, looking down at their empty cups and plates. "Yes please."

"Good," Hermione smiled.

They exited the little shop. Minerva pulled Hermione's coat around her chest a little tighter and Hermione merely smiled when she was given a dark look. They walked quietly for a while before Minerva hooked her arm in Hermione's and sighed.

"Madam Curie?" Hermione's eyebrows showed her surprise. "I am not oblivious, my -" She paused as Hermione's step faltered. She turned and Hermione was forced to as well as Minerva cupped her cheek. "My darling." Hermione's mouth twitched and then broke into a beaming smile, which made Minerva smile as well. "Anyhow. Truly, though they would make for good conversation, I think I would prefer to have dinner, one last time, with my Gran, my Da and my little brother."

Hermione nodded and wrapped her arm around Minerva's middle.

"I think that's an excellent choice."

"You?"

"Um, would you believe me if I told you I'd been thinking this whole time and I'm yet to come up with someone," Hermione chuckled. "My ancestor, for one," she deadpanned. Minerva laughed and Hermione's heart beat quicker. "That would be very helpful. Perhaps," she shrugged. "I don't even know. Merlin was a good one. It's cliched but perhaps Sappho?"

Minerva's eyes widened and they stopped on a small, windswept path along the shore. Hermione couldn't help but notice that Minerva's eyes stormed with the seas.

"Come to me now thus, Goddess, and release me, From distress and pain." They fell silent again as Minerva sighed. "How apt."

"Min," Hermione soothed as they started walking again. "Don't, really. It's okay and the more we dwell on it, the more it hurts."

"Well, who else then," she asked, doing as Hermione suggested.

"Your grandmother," Hermione teased. "So that I can see where you got your wicked sense of humour because from what you've told me so far it could only be her."

"Ha!" Minerva laughed. "You cannae be wrong, I suppose."

Hermione laughed for a while and they fell into another silence but this one felt different. This one felt gentle, almost. They wandered a little further until Hermione determined that it was time to go. As they rounded the bend into a small alley, Minerva stopped and looked at her quizzically.

"What is it?"

"You didn't ask," Minerva said after a little while. Hermione looked at her sideways. "About my mother."

Hermione shrugged, in two minds about playing dumb or letting it out there. She chose the latter.

"I figured that eventually, you might tell me, otherwise it would be fine if you didn't."

"You are too noble," Minerva harrumphed. Hermione laughed. "My mother and I." She sighed. "Well, I take after her in many of my worst moments." Her face fell. "My stubbornness is hers." She stopped and was giving off such sorrow that Hermione couldn't help but wrap her arms around her. "Even from the grave, she continues to hurt me." She looked up and cupped Hermione's cheek. "And by extension, those I care for." Hermione tightened her arms as the desolation settled in. "I have tried all my life not to be my mother and it turns out that I'm just like her."

"Min," Hermione said quietly. "I didn't know her, obviously, but I doubt you're very like her. I couldn't love someone who wasn't good, underneath it all. And Poppy clearly has kept you around for this long. Being stubborn isn't necessarily a terrible thing. I mean," she chuckled. "Not that I dealt with it well, but that's on me."

"Ha," Minerva laughed. "Don't you dare take that on. You have been more patient with me than I have ever deserved."

"Min -"

"No, listen," Minerva said. She stepped back but kept hold of Hermione's hands. "You have allowed me the latitude to work through this often to your own detriment and I cannot express to you how much that means to me. I will need to repay it for an eternity."

"I would wait that long for you, Min," Hermione whispered.

Minerva chose not to acknowledge that and Hermione wasn't concerned that she did. Instead of returning on such a note, they turned back the way they came and walked arm in arm once more down to the end of the shore and finally came to the natural end of their time together.

"I'm less than enthused about going back," Minerva mused as they readied themselves.

"Why," Hermione asked. "Hogwarts is our home."

"It is where we are confined to our roles." Minerva winced. "Where those roles are the antithesis of this," she swallowed. "These feelings."

Hermione acknowledged that quietly but with a smile and sighed as she looked out over the coastline.

"Only on the outside."

"But the outside is what matters!" Minerva protested.

"Oh Minerva," Hermione groaned. "You are so stubborn," she laughed. "You're backwards. And I know this isn't easy to hear but you're wrong."

"Hermione!"

"You are," Hermione laughed. "It's not the outside that matters!"

"But -"

"It's here," Hermione said, pressing her hand on Minerva's chest. "This is what matters. We can show whatever we want to those outside of our family, and we can pretend whatever we like, but in here?" She smiled. "Is all that matters."

Minerva closed her eyes and Hermione let her hide for a while before she ran her thumb along Minerva's jaw.

"Come on," she smiled. "I need to get you home."

"Hermione," Minerva protested. "I am not a bairn."

"No," Hermione chuckled. "But you are on duty tonight and," she paused dramatically until she felt Minerva's interest pique. "I had planned on asking Albus if I could borrow you on Wednesday."

"What is Wednesday?" Minerva blinked.

"Your lightest day?"

"Hermione -"

"It is also my lightest day and I wondered if I might steal you to go to one of the libraries that were on our list."

Minerva's head shot up and she met Hermione's eyes.

"Sorry?"

"I need to go to the libraries," Hermione chuckled. "The big ones with all the history in them. I can't imagine there will be much there about dragon people, but it will not be a wasted effort," she grinned. "It's a suggestion I intend to follow up on regardless because when else am I going to have an opportunity to go and wander those stacks."

"Oh," Minerva swallowed. Hermione bit her lip as the wave of excitement threatened to engulf them both. "Well."

"I can feel that," Hermione whispered in her ear. She resisted the urge to kiss that soft skin beneath her ear but nuzzled her nose against it before she withdrew. Minerva's cheeks were pink, though she continued to pretend she was not as excited as she was.

"Then," she muttered. "I suppose I must accompany you."

Hermione threw her head back and laughed. It didn't take long for Minerva to join in.

"Come on then, Trouble," Minerva said as she continued to chuckle. "We must return before we get into our own trouble."

"Albus is a teddy bear," Hermione grinned. "He wouldn't say a word."

"Filius might," Minerva muttered.

"You can talk to him, you know," Hermione said quietly as they went back to the small alleyway they had arrived in. "Don't stand on ceremony for me. Obviously whatever you decide is fine but please don't on my account."

"Honestly," Minerva muttered as they stood for a little while in the cold. "I may do so now. His advice was instrumental in my steps forward to accepting this.

"Then when I see him next, I will thank him," Hermione grinned.

"Och," Minerva muttered. "Trouble." Hermione shrugged innocently and Minerva shook her head. "Are you alright to Apparate back?"

"I am," Hermione smiled. "Meet you at the gates?"

Minerva nodded once and disappeared with a pop. Hermione took a little longer to get settled and tried to figure out whether she could simply step there as she'd done in Castle. She tried to recall the heat and the feelings she had felt when it had happened and though her hands were warm, they weren't as hot as when Ron had been poisoned and she groaned, and instead, turned and disappeared without a sound.

-0-

"Miss Granger!"

She swung her head around, almost comically, to greet Filius as he joined her in her walk to the Great Hall the next evening. After they had returned yesterday, she had dropped Minerva in front of Michael, took quite a bit of his gentle and well-meaning teasing and spent her Sunday catching up on her homework. Now though, she fell silently into step with the Charms professor as they went down to dinner. Though they were quiet, she very much felt like he'd like to change that.

"I wonder if I might enquire as to how you are?" he said quite stiffly.

"I -" Hermione frowned. "I'm fine, Professor?"

"Filius," he waved off the honorary. "Please."

"Even," she waved at their surroundings.

"Yes."

"Then yes, Filius, I am fine. How are you?"

"I am troubled."

She stopped walking then and turned to his shrewd face. She chuckled at his look and nodded into the classroom they'd just passed.

"I know you know quite a bit more than you let on to Albus," Hermione said, as soon as the door was closed. She put up a few spells to deter anyone who needed a disused classroom. "As I know you and Min spoke."

"Please don't think that I -"

"I don't think you are anything other than a good friend, Filius," she smiled. It put him at ease and she sat down. "You care about someone I love and that is enough for me."

"So you know -"

"Oh yes," she chuckled. "I know. Your conversation helped immensely, though she did not acknowledge it until later."

"Oh," he sighed. "Good."

She let it sit and waited for him to speak again.

"I wonder if I might -"

"You may ask me anything, Filius, but I may choose not to answer you."

"I have worked out a lot of it but I am stuck on two key things."

She indicated he should continue but she didn't speak.

"What is it that started all this and what are you doing in front of everyone's noses?"

Hermione regarded him for a long moment before she sat forward.

"Let me ask you a few questions, sir."

He opened his hands wide.

"How is it that you know all of this going on and why does it interest you so?"

"Hermione," he said quietly but intensely. "My parentage is not often talked about save for those unsavoury moments where it is inescapable but obvious, so please do not pretend that it is not a factor here."

"You mistake me," she said gently. "I am more in the dark than you at this point. Anything I know about this, I have worked out and guessed based on fleeting thoughts and feelings I get as they come. At this point, it is possible that you know more than I, even."

"You know you are -"

"A creature?" she said quietly. "Yes. And because we both know this, I will tell you what I am but I want you to consider something first. You have people to lose, Filius. I know Min would have told you the same and probably Albus too but I want you to hear me when I say this. They could use me and win this thing. I would die before they could do that but if they find out, they would be stupid to pass up the opportunity so if I tell you, you will already be in twice the danger from them as you were 10 minutes ago."

"I am ready -"

"Filius," she chastised gently. "You are not alone. You have a wife, a family. Children, grandchildren. People you love. I want you to think about that before you agree."

"I have thought about that," he insisted. "I know that by flinging them about the planet, I have protected them as much as possible, but this is still my home. These are my people. Minerva practically raised my children with us. I want to help."

"Then sir," she smiled as she drew her knife. "Take this for a moment and know that when you do a part of you will be bound to me. You will be under my protection but you will also be bound by my rules as," she shrugged. "All of them are."

"All -"

"Minerva, Albus, Harry, Ron and Ginny." She grinned. "So far."

He stood and held out his hand.

Hermione offered him the hilt and he withdrew for half a second before taking it with a sigh.

"I expected it to hurt."

"I would never hurt those I take into my care, Filius," she said quietly. "But now you are bound to me, I will tell you what I know. First," she held out her hand and retrieved her dagger.

"That is a beautiful piece, Hermione," he muttered. "It is not Goblin Steel."

"No?" she chuckled. "We did have that question," she mused. "No matter."

"It is better," he nodded, asking for it back with a gesture. She returned it readily.

"This is Elven steel," he muttered. "Unbreakable, never dull. Goblin steel was a replica of the great blades from before. But they are not as this is. It is incredibly old."

"I will look into it," she said. She took it back again, her hand twitching to have it back.

"We got sidetracked," he muttered.

"Show me your right arm, above your wrist?"

He pulled up his sleeve and she nodded when she saw a small symbol but not a dragon.

"I can see that," he said quietly.

"You can?" she blinked. "None of the others can."

"They are not creatures, Hermione. You and I are."

On the face of it, that made sense and Hermione mulled over it for a time before she turned back to him.

"I am a dragon," she said quietly. "Or something like one. I cannot take the form of what we know to be a dragon but I have burned with little consequence, I have empathy and some sort of mind/emotional readings and these daggers appeared to me in Dervish and Bangs in a case that had been empty since before I was born."

His mouth was open in shock and he shook himself off quickly as he took in the information.

"That makes a lot of sense," he nodded. "Goblins do not show fealty to anything save those that will never be beneath them. I don't know if Minerva told you, but on occasion, I feel the urge to bow."

"Please don't ever feel that need," she said in earnest. "I would not ever want that. I am still the same Hermione."

"And yet -"

"Yeah."

They felt quiet again as Hermione was consumed with the thoughts from the weekend. Minerva's, Filius' and last week, Albus' bizarre reaction to their request. He had cooled significantly since then but she had not forgotten. Nor had Harry - his hurt ran deep.

"Minerva is your mate."

"Yes," she nodded, as he already knew. "It has not gone particularly well. Your words to her the other night were extremely helpful," she smiled. "So thank you."

"I can imagine how she would feel," Filius mused. "I was in a similar situation, of course, but my own thoughts were probably not dissimilar at times."

"Not all smooth sailing then?"

"No," he chuckled. "Not in the slightest. I wanted to save her the scorn and she loved me for me. No matter what I was or wasn't."

"I told her to talk to you if she wanted to. I told her it would be separate from me."

"And it will be," he nodded. "She is my friend first."

"Good," Hermione agreed. "She is in need of some."

"We're going to miss dinner at this rate," he muttered, looking at his watch. "You did not tell me what you are all doing?"

"No," she chuckled. "I did not."

"Fair enough," he nodded. "I suppose I have enough to go on with. Thank you for letting me in, Hermione. I genuinely appreciate it."

"I shall hold you to your oath, Filius," she muttered as he left.

She wasn't particularly hungry and though she had work to do upstairs, she stayed in that classroom until someone knocked quietly on the door. She disillusioned herself just before the door opened and someone walked in.

She reappeared with a smile.

"Hey, you."

"Oh!" Minerva chuckled. "I wondered if it was you."

"Filius and I had a chat. He knows everything."

Minerva's face dropped.

"Everything?"

"No," she clarified quickly. "Not about Harry etc, but about us. He took my dagger."

"Hermione!"

"He insisted."

"But they're -"

"They will never come to harm while I am here," Hermione soothed. "Just as you won't either."

"And what when you aren't here?"

"Then my mate is here to stand in for me."

Minerva's mouth dropped and Hermione chuckled when she saw it.

"Come here."

She pulled Minerva in and held her.

"Trust me," she whispered. "It will all be alright. Filius has knowledge that I do not. Perhaps not about me specifically but about creatures and our inheritance of them. He is good and kind and true. And it will be alright."

Minerva groaned into Hermione's shoulder.

"I do wish you would not go around doing things half-cocked. Although if it is done then it is."

"The upside is, you can chat to him whenever now." She grinned. Minerva shoved her shoulder gently and rubbed her cheek against Hermione's.

"This feels wrong."

"Does it?"

"No," Minerva muttered. "That's the part that feels wrong."

Hermione laughed and wrapped her arms around Minerva's middle. Her hands rested above Minerva's ass, on the swell of her hips but she did not care to move them.

"You're just making stuff up now."

Minerva didn't reply so Hermione held on.

"I don't want to be clandestine, but that helped, thank you."

"I am right here, whenever you need it," Hermione nodded. "Will you see Albus before me?" She nodded. "Then tell him we're going to the library on Wednesday. He'll have to take your morning class."

Minerva snorted and pressed a chase kiss to Hermione's cheek before leaving. Hermione was exhausted suddenly and instead of summoning some dinner in the hope that it would be better, she locked the classroom behind her and went straight upstairs to bed. The others would understand even if she hadn't seen them properly for three days, they would surely understand.