A/N: Not my sandbox, just my sand castle. I don't own anything from Harry Potter. Additionally, no one has permission to bind and sell my works, fandom or otherwise. Shame on you for exploiting other people's works!

One deviation from canon is that at this point in the hunt, they have Slytherin's Locket AND Hufflepuff's Cup. Anyway, hope you enjoy! There are no 'pairings' for this (yet), just friends helping friends.

Thanks to Queenie, Sky, Bea, and Dora for the Beta!

Summary: Hermione and Harry seek comfort in each other after Ron left them on the hunt; canon divergence

Triggers/Warnings: N/A

Word Count: 1467

Prompts:

QLFC Beater 2 Prompt: Atar 'God of Fire' [Persian]: Write about someone providing some type of comfort.

Additional Prompts:

2. [trope] huddling for warmth

8. [object] golden chalice

9. [setting] starry night

15. [color] merlot

Hogwarts School Of Witchcraft and Wizardry

Assignment 5

Task 1 - Hammer and Nails: Write about trying to keep something/one from falling apart

[March Monthly] Time to Rhyme - (Dogs and Frogs)

Dogs: French Bulldog - (Character) Harry Potter

Ongoing Challenge: Gather Your Party!

Monk: Kensei: Trope: Huddled together for warmth

"Seeking Comfort"

The cold permeated the tent, seeping past their well-crafted warming charms to chill Hermione's exposed toes as she huddled under a blanket on her camp bed. She shifted to draw her feet back under her little blanket mound, unable to shiver enough to heat it up. Her mind felt thick and scratchy, her face swollen from crying, and her head pounded with the oncoming headache she usually got after having a good cry.

Except this hadn't been a good cry. This had been a bad cry, over a boy who tried to make her choose between him and their other best friend, between him and her duty to the Wizarding World. Inwardly, she cursed herself for being taken in by Ron's charm, but she couldn't help it. He could be the best friend ever when he wanted to be, and she had inflated every ounce of the crumbs of friendship he had offered her that she had fancied herself in love with him.

It looked like he didn't feel the same…or if he did, she wasn't worth staying for. And did she really want that in a relationship?

Harry puttered around the tent, recasting the warming charms and zipping shut the tent door leading to the outside world. It had been snowing earlier, when Ron left. In her mind, she knew that he wouldn't be able to find them again once he ventured past the wards keeping them safe, but in her heart, she hoped he would come back. They had always been a trio! But now…now it was just Harry and her.

"Here." His voice was soft as Harry held out a steaming mug of something. She took it, looking inside to only find water. Hermione sipped slowly, letting the heat leech into her hands, the hot liquid slipping down her throat, causing warmth to blossom in her chest.

"Thank you," she croaked out, raising a freezing hand to dash away a fresh bout of tears. She paused for a moment, pressing her cold hand against her face.

It felt good on her burning face, and helped clear some of the cobwebs.

"Bunch up there," Harry suddenly said, and her camp bed dipped with his weight as he climbed on.

"Harry, what–" Hermione asked, confused, as her best friend slid under the blanket she huddled underneath. He reached out and pulled his merlot-colored blanket over them, grabbed from his own bed. The added weight of his dark red blanket lent her comfort, and once Harry had settled himself next to her, she leaned against him, resting her head on his shoulder, cradling the slowly cooling hot water to her chest.

Harry's arm came up to drape across her shoulders to draw her closer, placing a gentle kiss to her hair.

"Ron's an idiot…but he's our idiot. He'll come back," Harry murmured into her hair. Fresh tears streamed down her face.

"I just…don't understand!" she cried out.

"It's because of that thing," Harry replied quietly. Hermione looked to see Harry's gaze locked onto the cloth wrapped cup on the table. A strip of the fabric–taken from Harry's merlot-colored blanket–had shifted, showing the gleaming gold chalice underneath, and Hermione felt anger surge up inside of her. It was all because of this thing. Voldemort had defiled this relic, and now they struggled to destroy this piece of history.

That was probably his plan.

The three of them had uncovered Hufflepuff's cup in Grimmauld Place, moments before Kreacher had told them about a second Horcrux that had been in the house before Mundungus Fletcher had stripped it of most things of value. Their subsequent break-in at the Ministry had compromised their security at Grimmauld Place. That had been months ago, and while Slytherin's locket had been easy to cover up and then shoved deep into the depths of Hermione's beaded bag, the gold chalice now mocking them on the table proved to be a different story. Every time it had disappeared into her bag, it would reappear on the kitchen table in their tent, mocking them with how futile their search for the rest had been.

Just having two Horcruxes in their possession was a great boon to their quest, but having them in close proximity to each other seemed to amplify their negative qualities.

And then everything had blown up in their faces this morning.

"I wish they would all just go away," Hermione whispered bitterly, burying her face back into Harry's shoulder after finishing off her mug of hot water. It warmed her, but didn't have the same comfort as hot chocolate would have.

"That would be nice, wouldn't it?" Harry replied, drawing the blankets closer around them. "Imagine, some spell we could use on them to get rid of the monster, without great risk of life and limb to us!" Harry laughed, and Hermione couldn't help it. She laughed too. "Warming up at all?"

Hermione took a moment to take stock of her body and realized that he had been sharing his body heat with her as he comforted her over Ron's departure, which warmed her heart and made her appreciate him all the more.

"Harry, thank you," she replied, sighing lightly as Harry bussed a kiss onto her forehead.

"Always, Hermione…always."

Bundled up tightly, layers of warming charms over both of them and replicas of their camp bed blankets thrown over their shoulders–merlot red for Harry and navy blue for Hermione–the two of them stood before the broken down tent as she stashed it back into her beaded bag. The golden chalice that was Hufflepuff's cup haunted them, and had appeared on the ground behind them when she had put it in her bag for the move. For now, it was in a silk bag that Hermione had transfigured out of a couple of leaves that had gotten into the tent before the first snowfall had come.

Surprisingly, the silk bag seemed to be enough to contain the ill effects of the Horcrux. For the first time since they fled Grimmauld Place, Hermione felt like she could think again, could breathe again, almost as if the cup had been trying to suffocate them with its ill intent. Safely stashed away in her beaded bag, neither the locket nor the cup affected them as much as the past few months on the run.

"Have there always been so many stars?" Harry breathed out in surprise at her side. Hermione looked up to see the storm from earlier had blown over, leaving cloudless starry skies dotting the heavens between the thick branches of the trees they had camped near.

"Yes. But London is so thick with smog and light, it's usually hard to see them. And the wards at Hogwarts show enough, but never as clearly as now." Hermione paused before reaching out to grab Harry's hand. He gripped her hand tightly as if she was going to disappear too. "I'm with you to the end, Harry. We can do this," she whispered. Harry chanced a look at her, and Hermione saw the fear buried in his green eyes. "Everything will be alright."

He nodded at her before looking back up into the endless sky of stars above them. "Let's get going," he whispered, squeezing her hand tightly before letting go.

"Okay." Hermione took down their wards silently, letting Harry stand stock still in the center. It was much colder now than earlier. Hermione was hoping to move somewhere more south, at least for the night. When she was done, she rejoined Harry and he focused his gaze on her. Reaching out, he pulled Hermione into a tight hug, one of his rare Harry-initiated ones, one he held for a moment longer than he normally felt comfortable with.

"Let's go."

Nodding against him, Hermione returned his tight grasp and turned on her heel, Apparating them out of the forest and appearing in a snow-covered field. Already, it was warmer, and Hermione was glad she got her coordinates right.

"More stars out here," Harry murmured, releasing her and staring up at the sky again.

"The clouds are coming in though. I think the storm from this morning is headed this way," Hermione pointed out. She moved away from him to start putting up their protective wards, her heart hurting at the thought that Ron wouldn't be able to find them anymore. Harry suddenly appeared at her side, his wand out to help her.

"Let's hurry and get inside, then," he replied.

They finished quickly and set up the tent, and when they both returned to her bed to cuddle for comfort and warmth as the snowstorm slowly rolled in, Hermione knew they would be able to get through this. They had to. What they were doing was for the Greater Good, whether Wizarding Britain wanted it or not.