She woke in the same position, curled on her side, Draco's arm fitting around her waist, his fingers brushing her back. To have another person in her bed was foreign, but she knew she'd never be able to tolerate that cold room Kreacher had prepared now. Not if this was an option.

It must have been early morning, but she didn't realise how early until she opened her eyes and saw the muted light coming through the window. Just past dawn, she surmised. She'd always been an early riser, even when her body desperately needed rest, like now.

She blinked a few times, shifting, and Draco's arm slid off her. She saw his eyebrows draw together; she couldn't stop staring at him, asleep, so close, and with no-one to stop her.

"Why are you awake?" he grumbled into the mattress.

"It's morning," she answered simply.

"Doesn't mean you have to be awake." His voice was muffled by the bed and thick with sleep.

Hermione smiled stupidly at him, though he hadn't opened his eyes, and regretfully pushed herself to sit up.

"Where are you going?" he whined.

"I — I should go back to my room." What would Harry or Ron do if they saw her coming from Draco's bedroom? She couldn't imagine anything more mortifying. Or dangerous.

Draco grumbled incoherently, blindly reaching for her. She caught his hand, laughing softly, and bent over to kiss his cheek. He made sounds of outrage, protesting her unsportsmanlike use of bribery to get her way, but she extracted herself from the bed — and his questing hand — easily.

She listened at the door before she opened it, waiting for some sign that Harry and Ron were standing outside it, wands raised, but she heard nothing. With one last regretful glance at Draco lying face down on the bed, she slipped out the room.

Hermione scampered down the hall as swiftly and quietly as she could and got dressed in the same manner. She didn't want to be alone in this miserable room a moment longer than necessary; she would pass her time in the library until the rest of the house woke up. Yesterday, they'd unequivocally decided that identifying R.A.B. and — hopefully — the real locket was a top priority. They didn't exactly have any other leads to work with at the moment. Just like how she hadn't a clue how they would destroy the Horcruxes if they found them.

When they found them.

The Black library was just as dusty and unnerving as the rest of the house, its shelves populated by ominous titles on using human parts in potions or harvesting the malicious power of nightmares to torture your enemies from afar. The latter reminded Hermione of Voldemort, so, despite the gooseflesh on her skin and the nauseating dread it inspired, she pulled the book from the shelf and began to read.

It was just as disturbing as the title promised, but Hermione couldn't help but feel frustrated by the lack of useful information. This book instructed the reader how to send the mental equivalent of a Boggart and, not unlike Polyjuice Potion, required a piece of the person in question. While she knew Voldemort had some of Harry's blood mixed with his own (something she tried not to think about too often), none of it matched what she knew of Harry's experience. There was nothing about Occlumency assisting the victim; or repeated, inexplicable images of the attackers' fixations, like Voldemort and the Department of Mysteries.

If it were this magic at play, then by all accounts Harry should be dreaming of Dementors.

So it must be something else.

CRACK!

Hermione jumped so violently she dropped the book. She'd been staring into space, a space where Kreacher now stood, looking sour. He picked up the book before she could and shot her a nasty glare as he patted its cover and reshelved it. "Master wishes to let Miss Mudblood know breakfast is happening."

Hermione felt a sting at the slur. She wasn't ready to give up on Kreacher, but she wasn't entirely willing to endure much more of this. She wasn't a martyr.

"Thank you, Kreacher. I'll go to the kitchen, then."

He growled and disappeared. The light coming through the windows was clearer; she must have been reading for hours. Not once had he appeared to ask her if she'd like tea or toast before the rest of the house came down.

She heard the sounds of breakfast before she opened the kitchen door, the tell-tale clinking of knives in marmalade jars and spoons in porridge bowls. The three of them stopped momentarily to greet her when she came in; they were sitting in the same spots as the day before. It seemed a habit had been formed.

Hermione pulled out her chair and sat, trying to rid herself of gloomy thoughts of malicious nightmares and bitter house-elves. "Good morning."

"Morning."

"What time did you get up?" asked Harry.

"Oh — I don't know. Six, seven, maybe? I was in the library."

Harry and Ron rolled their eyes at each other. "Find anything good?" asked Ron.

"No… not really…" Hermione poured herself a cup of coffee and dished a scoop of orange marmalade onto her plate. "How's your back?" she asked Draco without looking at him. She feared that if their eyes met, she'd blush and give it all away.

"Bit better," he answered. "Are you going to torture me with more tape today?"

Ron snorted.

"Probably," Hermione said in good humour. Company was clearing the melancholy cloud around her head.

"Hey, Hermione, I was thinking," began Harry in between bites of toast, "I think we should try and evaluate the lo— the you-know-what again. There might be another clue, and maybe not being at Hogwarts will affect it somehow."

As he spoke, his eyes flickered to Draco, who rolled his eyes. "Potter, rest assured I have no idea what the fuck you're talking about."

"Excellent."

"Harry — m-maybe he should."

Ron and Harry stared at her with matching expressions of shocked betrayal. "What?!"

"He might know who R.A.B. is!"

"R.A.B.?" repeated Draco.

"Yeah." Ron turned to him with a stern look. "Ring any bells?"

Draco blinked. "No, actually. Should it?"

"Apparently not." Harry sat back in his seat. "Happy, Hermione?"

"It was worth a try," she insisted.

Kreacher appeared, then, to personally refill Draco's goblet. When he was finished, Draco went to wave him off, but glanced nervously at Hermione and instead said, "Thanks."

Kreacher seemed momentarily struck; it was several seconds before he remembered to disappear again.

"Fucking mental, that one." Ron shook his head.

Breakfast eventually concluded, at which point Hermione insisted on checking Draco's bandages again whilst Kreacher cleaned up and Harry went to fetch the locket. They were still taped securely, and no blood had soaked through. She patted his back gently and decided she wouldn't replace them until evening.

Harry came into the kitchen, locket swinging from his fist, then stopped short when he saw Draco was still there. "Fuck."

"Oh, for Merlin's sake, Potter. Whatever that is, I've already seen it, and I still have no idea what the fuck you're doing with it."

"Yeah, but you might —"

"Might what? Take your necklace and run off to the Dark Lord so I can get killed on the spot?" His voice wavered. "I'm good, thanks."

Harry set his jaw unhappily.

Draco rolled his eyes. "Let me at least finish my pumpkin juice before you banish me from the kitchen."

"Fine." Harry returned to his spot opposite Hermione and dropped the locket on the table in front of her.

With a sigh, she opened it and pulled out the slip of parchment. It all looked the same, though the ink had become a little smudged from their handling it so much. Harry watched keenly as she examined it all, then pulled out her wand and began the same incantations she'd tried at school, to test for invisible ink or some sort of charm waiting to be triggered.

She got the same result: Nothing.

She carried on for a little while, poking and prodding at it whilst Harry and Ron watched her, their eagerness fading with each failed attempt. Hermione tried to keep her own desperation under control; they needed a clue, and Harry could get unbearable if he was restless for too long.

Hermione suspected Draco had finished his pumpkin juice ages ago. He was sitting back in his chair, eyes closed, perhaps pretending to rest. Did he just not want to be alone? The thought warmed her.

With a frustrated sigh, she held up the locket by its chain until it hung in front of her face, as though the light might catch a new angle and reveal something. It swung in front of her, like a hypnosis pendulum, and as she looked at its metal finishing, she wondered if the real thing would be just as ugly.

She sighed again and raised her wand, ready to try another round of revealing charms when there was a loud crack, the smashing of dropped china, and a deafening screech.

"THE MUDBLOOD HAS STOLEN MASTER REGULUS'S LOCKET!"

And then Kreacher launched himself at her the same moment Draco jumped from his seat to her side and Harry grabbed Kreacher out of the air, pinning him to the ground as the elf wailed, all three boys roaring at once, "DON'T CALL HER THAT!"

Kreacher continued to scream and sob incoherently in Harry's hold. Hermione, who had curled in on herself out of defensive instinct, was still frozen in fight-or-flight. Ron went to help Harry put Kreacher back to rights; at her side, Draco's hand came onto her shoulder.

"Kreacher — I am ordering you — as your master" — Harry panted, Kreacher's big eyes looking up at him from the floor with fear — "that you are to never — ever — use that word — again. Or — I'll kill you — myself."

"Harry — don't —"

"Hermione, it's not about you," said Harry shortly. "Now, Kreacher. I'm going to let you go, and you're going to sit on that chair, and tell us everything you know about this locket. Do — you — understand?"

Kreacher nodded meekly and sniffled; Hermione realised he was crying. He did as he was told, though, and climbed onto the seat at the opposite head of the table from Draco's chair, which was still empty. Hermione wondered if Draco realised he was still holding her shoulders.

"Master Regulus… he told Kreacher to destroy the locket… but Kreacher failed…"

"Regulus?" asked Draco. "Regulus Black?"

"Regulus Black," Hermione repeated. "R.B. What was his middle name?"

"I don't remember… My mother only told me about him once or twice…"

"Did it start with an 'A?'"

"I — I think so…"

"Arcturus," moaned Kreacher. "Regulus Arcturus Black, the most finest master there ever was, and Kreacher was not worthy!" He tugged on his floppy ears.

Hermione was breathless. "R.A.B."

"Who was he? What happened to him?" Harry asked Kreacher, but it was Draco who answered.

"He was a Death Eater, but he defected really early on, practically as soon as he joined. He — You-Know-Who killed him. My parents told me about him, to sort of — make an example of him, I suppose. 'This is what happens to blood traitors' sort of thing. That it's what they deserve."

Kreacher was shaking his head. "Master Regulus… his blood was the purest of them all… he understood the privilege of being a Black, not like his brother, not like Sirius —"

"Regulus was Sirius's brother?" Harry looked outraged and hurt all at once. "He — he never told me that."

"Master Regulus was clever… cleverer than the rest… he knew the Dark Lord" — Kreacher sneered the title — "was not worthy… not worthy of him…" He began to weep. "He saw the Dark Lord use Kreacher to test his poison in the cave! When Kreacher was not strong enough to fight the bad dreams!"

"The cave? You mean —"

But Kreacher's blubbering wails had become incomprehensible. Hermione was too stunned to do anything but watch; she was still wildly trying to put these new pieces together and was desperate to fly off to the tapestry room, to find Regulus' name there, hidden in plain sight all this time.

"Kreacher!" Harry took the old elf by the shoulders. "Kreacher, we can talk about this later, but do you know where the real locket is?"

Kreacher eyed Harry suspiciously. "Maybe Kreacher knows."

"We want to finish what Regulus couldn't. That's why we have the fake, and the note. We want to destroy it, too."

With a sniffle and a growl, Kreacher got down from the chair and went to the kitchen sink, where he opened the cupboard below and crawled inside. Hermione spotted ragged tea towels and useless trinkets. It made her sad.

"Kreacher has kept it safe," he explained, "even when the stinky man came to steal it. Kreacher kept it safe…"

Then Kreacher emerged, hunched over as though protecting an infant, and there, in his arms, was an old-looking locket. Hermione's heart climbed into her throat: It appeared nearly identical to the decoy, but finer, more delicate, and this one was ancient, with a history far more fascinating than anything she could ever read in a book.

She looked at it, clutched carefully in Kreacher's tiny hands, and remembered the diadem. She hadn't known what it was when they'd unwittingly destroyed it. But now, she felt it again: that darkness nudging the edge of her periphery that raised gooseflesh on her arms and felt like another something slipping into her consciousness.

She looked at the Horcrux and swore it was looking back.