1 March 1997

"So, all in all, not one of Ron's better birthdays," Fred joked halfheartedly, pulling Hermione tight against his side and dropping a kiss on the top of her head. He and George had just walked into the hospital wing to find Ginny, Harry and her huddled around Ron's unconscious form.

Her eyes were a bit red, like she'd been rubbing at them, and he knew without needing to ask that she was feeling guilty. For not being present when the incident occurred, for Ron being a prat the past several weeks, for not somehow guessing by sheer force of will that his brother would be arbitrarily poisoned; you name it and his beautiful, stubborn witch would find a way to blame herself for it.

"This isn't exactly how we imagined handing over our present," George said grimly, setting their gift on the bedside cabinet and taking a seat next to Ginny. "We were in Hogsmeade and were going to come up after the game –"

"What were you doing in Hogsmeade?" Ginny asked, cutting in and turning to look at her brother.

"We were actually thinking of buying Zonko's," Fred explained with a touch of dry humor, seeing as that had been his fabricated excuse for being present when Katie had been cursed. Hermione remained silent, already aware of this, and Fred conjured a chair, took a seat, and pulled her onto his lap before she could protest. Madam Pomfrey shot him a look from nearby but remained silent, and neither Harry nor Ginny batted an eye. Hermione curled into his side almost instantly and he breathed her in like a drug. She smelled like lavender and home.

He shook himself and cleared his throat. "Although we've concluded that that isn't a sensible acquisition if nobody from the castle is allowed to visit."

There was muttered agreement and then silence for a moment before George asked the question that Fred had been wondering as well: "How exactly did it happen, Harry?"

As Harry began to recount the tail, a half-listening Fred pushed a curl away from Hermione's cheek and said under his breath, "Hello, love."

"Hi," Hermione replied, voice thick like she was suffering a cold.

"It wasn't your fault," he said evenly.

She sniffled softly and let her head drop to rest on his shoulder. "I know. Of course I know that, there's no way that I could have possibly… but we hadn't spoken in over a week, Fred. And even that wasn't a kind exchange, not at all. If he'd — if Harry hadn't —"

"But he didn't, and Harry did," Fred said, shaking his head at her. He'd already reckoned with the what-ifs of the situation; they didn't live in a world where it boded to dwell anymore. "There's no reason to hang yourself over it, and falling victim to a freak attack doesn't excuse his behavior toward you."

Hermione nodded. "I missed you," she whispered.

"I missed you too," he said quietly, thumb circling lightly where his hand rested on her shoulder. Even through layers of robes, she was warm and soft.

"Do mum and dad know?" George asked Harry as he concluded his story.

"Yeah, they're in Dumbledore's office now."

"But they'll be back soon," Ginny added with a pointed, slightly apologetic look at Fred and Hermione.

Hermione, who caught the implication as well, nodded and made to get up, swiping at her eyes and straightening her rumpled blouse. Every bone in his body shouted at Fred to pull her back to him, but he sincerely doubted his mum would take the news well if she walked into the hospital wing just then, with Ronniekins unconscious and all. So, he released his grip and dragged a frustrated hand through his hair.

"Then the mead itself was poisoned, yeah?"

"Right," Harry confirmed, reaching over and squeezing Hermine's hand when she took an empty seat beside him on the other side of the bed. "Slughorn gave it to him."

"Would he have been able to slip something into Ron's glass without you seeing?"

"Maybe, but what would be the point in that?"

"Could be that it was intended for you."

That grim notion hung in the air for a long moment and Harry silently paled a shade or two.

"Do you think Slughorn could be a Deatheater?" Ginny asked quietly. Madam Pomfrey was back near her office, busily writing something in a large, yellowed book.

"It's not impossible," Fred said darkly, thinking back to when he'd inferred exactly that in his letters to Hermione last month. If the first war served as any indicator, it seemed there were very few people not susceptible to coercion or intimidation under the right circumstances.

"He could have been under the Imperius Curse, like Katie," Hermione reasoned aloud. Something in Fred's chest uncoiled and relaxed a little – though she still looked upset, the fact that Hermione was theorising with them was a good sign. She caught his eye over the bed and offered a wan, but marginally heartening smile. He nodded in reply.

"Or he could be entirely innocent and the bottle was poisoned before he got it," Ginny said, throwing her hands up in the air with a huff. "The man was in hiding after all, it stands to reason th— wait. Didn't Slughorn say that he was planning to give the mead to Dumbledore for Christmas?"

She turned to look at Harry, who blushed a little around the collar under her gaze but nodded. Fred snorted softly and then covered it with a cough. The poor sod; anyone that reacted like that to his sister would have their cut work out for them.

"If the bottle was meant for Dumbledore, then whoever planted it doesn't know Slughorn very well at all," Hermione said skeptically. "The odds of something like that leaving his possession untouched were slim to none."

Ron, who'd been stirring and muttering on and off, chose that time to say the first intelligible word since George and Fred had arrived – a word that effectively silenced everyone present. Quite possibly silenced the whole of Wizarding Britain, though there wasn't any way to verify that.

"Her-my-nee."

You could have heard a bloody pin drop.

Fred's eyes snapped to his girlfriend, who looked like she'd just had a bucket of cold water dumped over her head. George's brows shot up so high that they nearly disappeared, and Harry began examining the lamp on the bedside table as if it might suddenly grow legs and begin to salsa. Even Madam Pomfrey, who'd been approaching with several glass phials floating in front of her, abruptly cut to the left toward her workbench.

They stayed frozen in those positions of mingled surprise and horror until Ginny finally broke the silence with a humorless chuckle.

"Well," she said, looking around at all of them and rubbing her palms together, "That's really fucking awkward, isn't it?"

Ron promptly began snoring again and, before anyone could say anything else, Hagrid burst into the room.

oOoOoOo

A short time after that Mr. and Mrs. Weasley returned as well, at which point Madam Pomfrey gently, but sternly, reminded them that only six visitors were allowed at a time.

"We need to get back to the shop, anyway," George said, grabbing his cloak from the empty bed beside Ron's and handing Fred his own before bending to give his mum a peck on the cheek.

"We'll walk you out," Harry offered, tipping his chin at Hermione, who was already getting to her feet to join them. Hagrid made to depart as well.

As Hermione passed Mr. Weasley, he reached out and gave her shoulder a gentle squeeze, pointedly looking between her and Fred, who was just to her left. His expression was tremendously kind, and for whatever reason that was the thing that made Hermione choke up again. She reached up and placed her hand on top of his, warm and a little rough, squeezing back before stepping away and continuing toward the doors. Nobody else seemed to notice the exchange save for Fred, who nodded at his father as they passed.

"It's terrible," Hagrid growled to nobody in particular as they made their way to the staircase. "All this new security, an' kids are still getting' hurt… Dumbledore's worried sick — he don' say much, but I can tell."

"He hasn't said anything to the staff, Hagrid?" Hermione asked.

"I 'spect he's got hundreds of ideas, brain like his, but he doesn't know who sent that necklace or who poisoned the wine – they'd have been caught if so, wouldn' they?" Hermione wasn't entirely certain that was the case, and she knew Fred shared those doubts, but both remained silent. Blaspheming Albus Dumbledore in Hagrid's presence, let alone Harry's, wasn't remotely worth the fallout. "Wha' worries me is how long the school can stay open with kids bein' attacked like this. Chamber of Secrets all over again, isn' it? Nex' thing yeh know the board o' governors'll be talkin' about shuttin' up for good."

"Surely not," Harry said, faltering as they descended the last flight of stairs to the entrance hall.

"Think about it from their perspective," Fred interjected. "A school like this has always presented some amount of liability, but what happened to Katie and Ron is a far cry from a misplaced hex or a potion gone wrong."

"Don't worry, Harry," Hermione said under her breath, bumping her shoulder into his. "You won't be at any loss for places to stay if the school shuts down."

She silently thought that, as long as she could finish her NEWT coursework by correspondence, this would be far from the worst-case scenario. The look on Harry's face, however, implied that he staunchly disagreed.

Hagrid continued Fred's train of thought and went on to add, "Thas' right, attempted murder is completely diff'rent. S'no wonder Dumbledore's angry with Sn—"

His eyes went comically wide and his jaw snapped shut with an audible click, the quintessential expression of Hagrid realising he'd said something he shouldn't have.

"Dumbledore is angry with Snape?" Harry asked quickly, latching onto the comment with all the enthusiasm of a starving leach.

Fred and George shot Hermione identical looks, as if to say 'gee, you weren't kidding,' while Hagrid went on to explain that he'd overheard some sort of quarrel between the two. Though Hermione was a cynic, she had to admit it was odd.

Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, Filch appeared from around the corner at exactly that moment, glee in his eyes at the prospect of having found rule-breaking students out after curfew.

Hagrid hurriedly shooed Harry and her toward the tower, snarling something at Filch about being a teacher, and, with few options at her disposal, Hermione shared one last longing look with Fred before hastily making her way around the corner and back up the staircase.

She held the image of those blue eyes in her mind greedily the whole way.

When she finally arrived back in her dorm, exhausted and more than a little gloomy, Hermione found Lavender still awake. Parvati was apparently asleep, curtains drawn around her bed, but her other roommate was sitting up near the pillows with her arms wrapped around her knees.

Her blonde braid was half unraveled, as if she'd been tugging on it, and her face was uncharacteristically pale with dark circles blotted beneath her eyes.

"Hey," Hermione said quietly, kicking off her trainers and going to sit on the bed beside her. "I figured you'd be asleep."

Lavender shook her head and swallowed thickly. When she spoke it came out as more of a croak. "Ron, is he —?"

"He's fine," Hermione said quickly, watching as the other girls' shoulders noticeably relaxed. "He needs to stay in the hospital wing for the rest of the week, but he's going to be alright. Didn't… didn't anyone come and tell you?"

Lavender shook her head, blinking rapidly, but her emotions quickly got the better of her. She made a soft choking sound and clapped a hand over her mouth as tears formed and spilled down her cheeks.

"I was so scared," she said, voice muffled and quavering. "I - I tried to go to the hospital wing when I heard, but Professor McGonagall wouldn't let anyone since you and Harry and Ginny were already there."

"Oh, Lavender, I'm so sorry – I would have found you, I just assumed that someone…"

She trailed off, realising with a flicker of indignation that she shouldn't have assumed anything. All this time Lavender had been up here, wondering if her boyfriend was alive or dead; Hermione ought to have taken a few minutes to come back and check.

Her boyfriend who, not an hour before, had been muttering Hermione's name in his sleep.

Struck by a sudden but vicious protective urge, Hermione budged forward and wrapped her arms around Lavender's shaking shoulders. The other girl stiffened for just a second before returning the hug, fingers clinging and curling into the knit fabric of Hermione's jumper.

Though Hermione had been here many times before, in this scared, uncertain place that came with the fear of losing the people you love, many of her classmates hadn't. Not yet.

"He's okay," Hermione repeated again; in as comforting a voice as she could manage. She tightened her arms and let her chin rest gently on Lavender's bowed head. Her mind drifted beyond Ron then, to all of the other people that she cared about; all of the people that were standing alongside her, directly in the line of fire. Because, at the end of the day, there was no such thing as a war without casualties – if there was, they would call it something else.

"Everyone is okay," she murmured, perhaps to herself that time.

And as Lavender sobbed into her shoulder, Hermione stared out the dark window beside the bed and silently wondered for how much longer that would be true.