.

.

.:.

The dream itself was not unusual: her house ablaze beneath a great ghostly skull-and-snake, her parents' screams becoming Harry's as he struggled against the ropes that bound him to that bloody chair and flames devoured his legs— her parents seizing her before she could reach him and dragging her away, puppets on strings tugged by the looming likeness of Alastor Moody— Aurors waiting outside with cuffs and chains and an iron muzzle—

Anything you say will be misconstrued, everything you are will be held against you in court— Dementors closing in—

Vivid, yes.

Horrid, obviously.

But unusual? Not so much.

The atypical part was her awakening— the gentle voice, the soft touch on her arm, and her own half-conscious flailing of a handful of fire at the figure looming over her.

Later, she would thank G-d for her poor aim; in the moment, there was only bleary panic as the figure ducked aside— and confusion as the firelight revealed a startled, human face.

"Sorry!" It— she leaned backed away, aura rippling like a pond disturbed.

What Hermione's panicked, half-conscious brain had mistaken for a hood was in fact dark hair, framing that face.

"Hey, hey. You're alright."

Her breath came in quick, shallow gasps, heart pounding in her chest, legs tangled in—

Oh.

Blankets.

The hand that grasped hers was warm and dry— alive.

"Can you take some deep breaths for me?"

The aura that settled over her like was like a cool breeze.

"Parv," she breathed. Relief stole the strength from her arm, and she slumped back onto the rumpled bedding.

"That's right." Parvati sat by her knee, holding her hand properly now, with one leg tucked beneath her and the other dangling off the bed. "It's just the two of us. You're alright."

"I'm so sorry—" Hermione gasped. "I didn't—"

"I know. You didn't mean to."

"But I— I could've—"

"But you didn't." Another hand-squeeze, firm and grounding. "See? No harm done."

Hermione's eyes searched for burns; they'd be obvious on Parvati's ghostly-pale dressing gown— and on the smooth, moonlit skin peeking out from beneath.

She saw none.

"Now breathe with me."

Right. Yes. She could do that. Especially with Parv setting the rhythm.

In, two, three, four…

Hold, two, three, four, five, six, seven…

Out, two, three, four, five, six, seven…

It took Hermione several very long moments to meet that rhythm, but Parvati's example did help. So did her presence, both physical and magical. Her thumb, rubbing slow arcs across Hermione's knuckles.

Breath by shaky breath, Hermione's heart began to slow. The panic began to fade. The alertness remained, sharp and tense.

"There." Parvati's smile stretched the pillow-lines on her cheek. "That's better, isn't it?"

A number of short, silky little hairs had slipped out of her sleek black braid, and almost seemed to float around her forehead. Her dressing gown was rumpled and lopsided, one side slipping down the slender curve of her shoulder.

Merde.

"I'm sorry," said Hermione. "I didn't meant to…"

Hold on. The door had privacy charms— and she didn't feel as if she'd been screaming or anything…

"…wake you?"

"Technically," said Parv, "Vrushti did that."

One of Madam Patil's snakes, blue-black with… white stripes, yes— Bengal Krait, Bungarus caeruleus, primarily nocturnal—

"She overheard your nightmare…"

—shows agitation by coiling up and hiding its head, jerky movements; reluctant to bite but will hold on to inject more—

"…and, since she doesn't know what nightmares are, assumed you were under attack."

—paralytic venom.

Hermione's gaze snapped to the floorboards, abruptly very aware of every little shadow.

"You had one of the world's deadliest vipers guarding my door?"

(It was… sort of sweet, in a way? Mostly alarming, of course, but…)

Parvati had the decency to cringe. "Padma had her guarding your door. And she was hanging from a sconce, where no one could've stepped on her."

Ah.

No more midnight restroom trips, then.

(The Manor was grand. The Patils were lovely hosts. The security system took a little getting used to.)

"You want to see the antidote cabinet again?"

"No," Hermione rasped. She waved her bandaged hand at the bedside table, and the water bottle atop it. "D'you mind…"

"Oh! Of course." Parvati shimmied towards the edge of the bed… and paused. Bit her lip. Reached out with her free hand, several arm's lengths from the table. As her fingers curled, her aura flared and expanded, faint shimmers slowly flowing forth to wind around the bottle…

"Don't encircle," said Hermione. "Engulf."

"What?"

"Your hands are just the conduit, not the shape your magic has to take. It's more flexible than that. The only limit is your—"

"Imagination." Parvati took a meditative breath and relaxed her fingers, no longer grasping, but swirling as if to stir something— and sure enough, the reaching tendril of her will flowed around and over the bottle like the ghost of some liquid.

"Good," said Hermione. "Now…"

Slow and steady, Parv pulled, slowly curling her fingers, and her magic reacted accordingly, shrinking back towards her body with the bottle still engulfed in an iridescent halo of intent. Clearly, she'd paid close attention to Hermione's technique (and made it look far more poised and elegant to boot).

Then Parvati's hand closed around the bottle.

"Surprise!" She offered it with a triumphant smile. "I've been practicing in the mornings. Wasn't entirely sure I could do it until just now, though."

"I have found that an audience can help," said Hermione.

Parvati's smile shrank and… sort of softened?

"Of course you have," she said fondly.

"What? What's that supposed to mean?"

"Drink your water, Kājavā."

"What does that mean?"

"Hydrate and I'll tell you."

There was something both irksome and gratifying about someone using a word you'd taught them to boss you around. Hermione took a few determined gulps of water, intent on answers— until Parv's hand settled on her blanket-covered thigh, at which point all but a few thoughts abruptly vanished from her mind. A few distinctly unhelpful thoughts.

"Maïa…" Parvati had turned to face her fully, dark eyes wide and beseeching. "How often has this been happening?"

Hermione, to her shame, briefly considered a lie of omission— but her hesitation was answer enough.

"Wake me next time," Parv pleaded. "If— if you think company will help, that is."

And Hermione, seeking a change of subject, asked: "Just you?"

The twins shared a room, after all. They shared a soul. It seemed an odd distinction to make, and a fairly simple question to ask.

Parvati's sudden, silent stillness suggested otherwise. So did the withdrawal of her hand from Hermione's leg, and the way she averted her eyes.

"I— well, no— it's up to you. Obviously."

Hermione was afflicted by the uncomfortably familiar sensation of having blundered right past some sort of social cue.

"Right," she replied. "Of course. Thank you."

"Of course." Parvati got up off the bed and straightened her dressing gown so that her collarbones were mostly concealed, which was not something platonic friends paid close attention to.

It was Hermione who averted her eyes, this time.

"You— did very well," she said. "With the bottle, I mean. It took me a while to work up to intentionally, wandlessly, reliably summoning things. So… well done."

"It was, wasn't it?" There was a smile in Parvati's voice. It gave Hermione the courage to look at her again— and find her hesitating, half-turned towards the door.

Stay, she stopped herself from asking.

She'd been more than enough of a bother already; Parv had come to help, not to be nearly burned and leered at by a trusted friend— in the sanctuary of her own home, no less—

"Do you…" Parvati fidgeted with the sleeve of her gown. "You can have my bed, for the night."

"What?"

(Hermione filed away whatever it was her heart had just done for later contemplation.)

"If you don't want to be alone, I mean." Parv shrugged. "I know I wouldn't, after a nightmare like that. And I can share with Padma. It's no bother, really."

Oh.

Apparently it was possible to feel relief and disappointment at the same time. Who knew?

.

.

.:.

"Right," Padma closed her book. "This cannot go on."

Parvati tore her gaze away from the Lycra-clad beauty jogging the grounds outside the window to peer across the nook at her twin. "Hm?"

(She was very glad that Hermione had found an alternative, healer-approved outlet for her frustrations. That said outlet happened to leave her flushed and breathless, chest heaving as sweat trickled down—)

"How's the book?" Asked Padma.

Angharad al-Shafīq's Curse Trauma through the Triple Lens Volume VI lay in Parvati's lap… open to the fourth page of its first chapter. She hadn't read far enough to confirm their mother's claim that it built upon the eponymous Shafīq's synthesis of Ayurveda, Wuxing, and Corporeal Leyline Theory by sneakily incorporating postwar muggle medical knowledge (supposedly easier than it sounded, given how much muggles had learned about the nervous system recently)— which should have been more than enough to hold her interest. She wanted to learn about it.

And yet.

"…dense," she replied. "And definitely meant for professionals— I don't know even half of the bloody terminology..."

This Padma greeted with an unimpressed look— and then a sigh. "Could you be any more obvious?"

Parvati did not dignify that with a response. Every feeling was obvious when your souls were as good as conjoined; Hermione had no such insight.

"You know how she is with social cues," said Padma. "Especially when her mind's on research."

Well yes… but what if she had noticed, and was just feigning obliviousness to avoid—

"Oh, honestly. We've seen her around Veela."

…true, but that only suggested general preference, not—

"Where's your Gryffindor courage?"

Parvati shot her a dirty look, which went entirely ignored.

"Fine," said her twin. "If you're so afraid of making this simple, then we'll just have to draw any hidden interest to the surface. She's got no mask to speak of, after all."

Parv crossed her arms over the flutter of hope in her chest. "What do you want me to do, flounce around in a bathrobe?"

"I mean…"

Despite herself, she imagined it— and, abruptly feeling a bit overwarm, hissed: "Absolutely not."

Padma's mental smirk was much louder than her physical one. "Alternatives, then?"

Right. Clearly no going around the conversation, this time.

Parvati gnawed her lip. "…well, first she'll have to not be thinking about research. Focused on the moment."

Padma nodded. "A special activity of some sort…"

"But not one she could dismiss as frivolous."

"Hm. A special occasion?"

Yes— "With clear importance to us, so that it would be rude to give it anything short of her full attention— but not too much importance, or she'll tie herself up in knots about it."

"Special yet casual."

"Exactly, but…"

Oh.

Oh!

"Oh?" Said Padma.

Parvati's excitement bloomed into a grin, plans already writing themselves bold and clear in her mind…

"She deserves a proper send-off, don't you think?"

.

.

.:.

August 7th , 1995

It wasn't that Hermione was against some sort of going-away gathering, per se. She very much wanted to get all her friends in one place, both to make further plans and to spend time with them while she still could. It was the party aspect that felt wrong— like a celebration of her failure. Of the results of her failure.

She knew Crouch's success was ultimately the fault of Dumbledore and McGonagall for not looking past than the polyjuiced facade. Of Crouch Senior, for abusing his authority to get his murderous spawn out of the very hellhole to which he'd condemned innocents sans procès— and of the Ministry at large, for being corrupt enough for him to do any of it in the first place.

None of which changed the fact that she had turned a blind eye to glaring signs of the impostor's true identity because she found those very signs educational. That with just a few words to the right people, she could have prevented the death of one schoolmate, the torture of another, and every atrocity Riddle's cult surely go on to commit.

That she had defended the salopard who ruined her wand hand.

It simmered under her skin and churned in her stomach as she waited in the Patils' floo chamber.

(She saw the prudence of putting in an outlying, single-doored room instead of one as central as the parlor, but it was clearly also a status thing.)

"Are you sure you don't want some wine?" Her mother asked from a nearby settee.

Hermione shook her head. This would be awkward enough without her faculties impaired.

"Words, mon chou."

"No thank you, mum."

"Ah," said Mr. Patil. "There are my girls!"

Hermione turned eagerly towards the distraction— and promptly lost the ability to do anything but stare.

Her ballgown might as well have been a rumpled school uniform compared to the sight of the Twins in full dress. They were wrapped and draped in nine-yard sarees, all lustrous silk and exquisite embroidery. Parvati's was rich red and gold, while Padma wore dark blue and silver. Short-sleeved cholis left their arms bare from bicep to forearm, and from beneath their gleaming bangles to their fingers stretched dark, intricate mehndi.

They looked like they were off to another ball. Or a festival. Or a wedding.

They'd dressed up like that for her.

Hermione wasn't certain what exactly she was feeling just then, but she suspected a blend of multiple simpler emotions— which was, of course, interesting in and of itself, but she really could've done without the blushing, breathlessness, and slight urge to cry.

Parvati clasped her hands in front of her as she approached, red lips curved in a nervous smile, brown eyes somehow rendered both softer and sharper by the kohl that lined them. Hermione forced herself to look away— which ended up meaning at Padma, who looked… sort of smug? Hermione supposed she'd feel that way too, if she looked like an actual bloody princess. She certainly had at the Yule Ball.

Padma's smile turned to more of a smirk as Hermione— stared. Silently.

"Wow," she blurted, struggling desperately to keep her gaze at eye-level, "You look— both of you look… wow."

Outstanding.

"Not half bad yourself, Granger," Padma smoothly replied. "No wonder Krum and Delacour couldn't stay away."

What.

"Your hair is is gorgeous," said Parvati, stepping close for a better look. "I don't think I've ever seen it done quite like this."

"Yes, well." Hermione ducked her head. "It involves extensions, which my dad is…"

"Philosophically opposed to!" He called across the room.

("Shhh!" Joëlle slapped his arm. "Don't interrupt!")

"—so I had to go to a salon for these, down in Southwark. That's where I was all day."

"Well." Parvati's throat bobbed. "Works of art take time. What do you call the style?"

"Goddess braids," said Hermione.

"Fitting," Parv replied.

Which should not have caused such a thrill. There was no way Parv meant it like— like that, and it would be a hot day in Azkaban before Hermione let wishful thinking distort her perception of a friend's behavior.

Thankfully the hearth flared green before she could further embarrass herself— and out of the flames stepped a lanky, pink-haired figure, clad in a leather jacket and strategically-ripped denims.

"'Ello, luv." Tonks' smile wasn't quite as bright as usual (which was hardly a surprise after their last conversation, but—). "How's the arm?"

At least she wasn't in uniform.

"See for yourself." Gauze rasped against tulle as Hermione held out her bandaged hand. Even hours after soaking them in the healing potions Pomfrey had prescribed, she could still see a faint blue-green glow.

Tonks drew her wand with a wrist-flick and cast some sort of cleansing charm on her own hand before carefully grasping Hermione's. Hermione gave the best feeble imitation of a squeeze she could, which didn't even involve all her fingers, but was at least more than she'd been capable of a month prior. Tonks' smile shrank; anger flickered through her aura. Then she stepped aside for her parents, who came bearing wine and festively-wrapped gifts.

Next to arrive were the Chasers, visibly awed and discomfited by the manor's splendor (relatively understated though it apparently was, by British pureblood standards). They were fussing over her in their usual jocular, jockish manner when the fire flared green again. Hermione's heart leapt— but the figure that spun out did so far too gracefully to be Harry. Also, ginger.

"Ginny?" Hermione asked. "I didn't think you'd make it!"

Crashing that Order meeting (and in the process revealing both her her clandestine association with Sirius and her connection to the admittedly bellicose spirit of his House) had been… detrimental to Mrs. Weasley's opinion of her.

"Neither did I." Her smile didn't match the dark bags under her eyes. "Least not 'til this one got mum t'actually listen."

'This one' had stepped out of the flames just in time to overhear.

"Miss Granger." He smiled, and gave one of the little half-bows she'd seen some of the stuffier purebloods exchange at school— albeit without any of the usual arrogance. "Good to see you on the mend. Mister and Missus Patil, thank you for having us; your home is truly lovely."

After weeks of near-constant proximity to the Patil Twins, Hermione had begun to wonder if she was entirely of the sapphic persuasion, and her interest in Viktor had merely been an expression of subconscious yearning for social conformity rather than true attraction. Bill Weasley —with his long, floo-tousled hair, strong jaw, and very well-fitting jumper— was a compelling counterpoint to that theory.

"Gin told me," he said once the pleasantries were done with, "what you did with the Chamber. You're alright in my book, just for that."

Clearly she'd neglected to mention the spider-hunt.

"Mum insisted I chaperone her," he went on, "so if anyone asks I spent the whole evening eyeing you suspiciously, yeah?"

"Honestly," Ginny groused. "You'd think you were the Blackheart's long-lost daughter or something, way she goes on about you recently."

"To be fair," said Hermione, "I did curse her son's mouth off."

"Only for a few minutes!" Ginny rolled her eyes. "And you would not believe how he whined about it."

She probably would, but—

"The real sticking point," said Bill, "was your… how did she put it?"

"'Unsupervised meetings with an unwashed, half-mad ruffian'," Ginny supplied.

"Aye." He nodded, and turned back to Hermione. "That and the hematurgy you've apparently been up to."

Ah. Yes. That.

"So." He smiled apologetically. "Remind me t'ask how you accidentally linked yourself to the Black magic, at some point. Call it professional curiosity."

Right— curse-breaker. Hermione had wanted to send him a list of questions, when Ronald first mentioned it. That excitement seemed so distant, now.

"Gin's been a bit scant with the details."

Ginny crossed her arms, scowling. "You try talking magical theory with Mum breathing down your neck."

"It's good practice," said Bill.

"For what, gobl—"

The hearth flared green again; out of it came Remus Lupin, tired eyes already darting from face to face to doors before he ever-so-subtly relaxed and stepped aside— and behind him, stumbling like a drunk, came Harry.

Ginny got to him first, and somehow managed to make a punch to to the shoulder look bashful and cute. Hermione reached him second, but cut her own hug short to scrutinize him for signs of unwellness— hair even messier than usual, bags beneath the eyes, smile slightly forced…

So… pretty much as expected, really.

It was those signs that stopped her from immediately enumerating her strategies for the upcoming farce of a hearing. (Well, that and her suspicion that the whole thing was a rather blatant frame-job by some Ministry stooge; she wanted to help him, not ruin his day.) She had not, unfortunately, prepared an alternative to her usual consolatory strategy of offering up potentially useful information, which left her somewhat at a loss.

Padma hissed to the rescue, quite literally. Harry looked as stunned by the Twins as Hermione had felt.

Hopefully she hadn't been half as obvious about it.

Parvati linked their arms en route to the dining room, skin on skin... and let go only to choose the seat directly opposite from her. The way she looked in the chandelier-light was— distracting.

Hermione had wine with dinner.

If anyone asked, she could blame her blush on the alcohol.

She spent most of the meal trying to keep her eyes off Parv— and, in the process, watching the interplay between everyone else. It was still sort of surreal, to see her humble dentist parents chat with girls she'd seen turn mice into matchboxes and fly on broomsticks. It felt like… like sneaking into the Chamber again. Like getting away with something.

Then her gaze strayed to Ted, and she couldn't help but wonder about other, older Tonkses. And Creeveys. And Thomases, Walkers, Clarkes…

Warrens.

How many of those families were ever welcomed among mages? How many of them were allowed any insight into the world they had to send their child off into?

How many never got that child back?

A chime rang through the room— silver spoon on crystal glass, held daintily in Parvati's hands.

"A toast," she stood, raising that glass, "to the woman who brought us all together."

What was she—?

Oh.

Oh dear.

"She sees what the rest of us were blind to, willfully or otherwise, and refuses to look away." Parvati smiled at her, warm and sad. "She helps us see. She refuses to bow her head or stand idly by in the face of injustice. And she's worked so hard to ensure our safety— granted, sometimes in exceedingly Gryffindorish ways…"

The students at the table chuckled. The adults were rather more reserved.

"…but better to have and not need than to need and not have, right?" She held Hermione's gaze across the table. "And I think I speak for all of us when I say that those efforts will be felt long after she's moved on to greener pastures."

Hermione took another gulp of wine.

It was impossible to not be aware, while living with the Patils, that the Twins were pureblood heiresses— but this time, caught between the urge to avert her eyes and the need to etch the sight of Parvati into her memory, no envy or resentment came.

Later, she would wonder how much she had in common with a much younger Theodore Tonks around the middle sister Black— but not yet. Not just then. Just then, she could only watch and want— to trace the shape of those fingers, those hands, to put her mouth to that slender neck and—

"To Hermione," said Parvati.

"To Hermione!" Said the others— and with their voices came awareness of their attention, almost tangible.

Hermione put down her wine glass, reached for her water, and spent the next several minutes trying very hard to appear calm and heterosexual. With no reliable metric by which to measure her success.

She might have been sweating just a little by the time they migrated into the sitting room for presents. Thankfully —mercifully— Parv gave her some space.

Tonks gave her a wand-holster, to replace the one that had burned. Hermione gave her a dubious look, because Tonks had seen her use the one on her left arm, and knew her right would be in no shape to strap anything to for months if not longer. Tonks just winked.

Angie, Katie, and Alicia gave her durability-charmed extra-strength hair bands, Quidditch/dueling gloves, and a book of sapphic poetry disguised as a history text. The efficacy of the disguise did nothing to reduce the heat in Hermione's cheeks— or stop her from snapping the bloody thing shut suspiciously quick.

Padma gave her a tin of scar-soothing cream she'd made under the careful supervision of her mother, due to the fact that its active ingredients included krait venom— an old family recipe.

Then Parvati handed her a bundle of soft linen. Inside were two knit bracelets and a sleeping bonnet (silk on the inside), each imbued with an aura of soft blue spellwork.

"Knitted them myself," she said, biting her lip— "Go on, try them."

Try…? Hermione slipped one of the bracelets onto her wrist— and sighed in relief as a subtle wave of magic washed up her arm, clear and calm and… soothing. Like sitting the perfect distance from the common room hearth in winter, or a cool breeze on a muggy day.

Like the girl who'd made them for her.

"To help you sleep," Parv said quietly. "Or at least… ease the bad dreams, a bit."

Hermione turned to her, wracking her brain for the right words, only to find Parv's lovely face blurred by sudden tears.

"Merde." She ducked her head to wipe her eyes. "Since when do you knit?"

"Well." Parvati shrugged one silk-draped shoulder. "I was going to make some runic bangles, but they wouldn't have been much fun to sleep in."

Hermione put the other bracelet on. It was soft around her bandaged wrist— and softer on her spirit.

"Thank you," she managed— but that wasn't enough.

With her good hand, she reached out and squeezed Parv's. Parv beamed (hello butterflies), and then… tried to stifle it for some reason.

"Right!" Ginny's clap cut through the moment (and almost certainly saved Hermione from doing something irrevocably obvious). "Mine next."

Inside the slightly smushed box she shoved at Hermione was…

Hm.

"Gin?"

"Yeah?"

"Where did you even find seven ritual knives?"

(What does one even do with seven knives of any sort?)

"Buried under the Burrow. 'Long with some old shields an'stuff."

"And you just… happened to go digging under your house because…?"

Ginny jerked her head towards Bill. "Thissun's been teaching me some cursebreaker tricks. Basic magic-sensing and whatnot."

"Imagine my surprise when she felt a distinct eddy in the family magic through the noise of the wards." He clapped her on the shoulder. "One even I'd missed."

Ginny tried and failed to hide a very proud smile. "'Nuff about me. Who's next?"

"Ah." Harry fiddled with the ribbon of the (book-shaped!) present in his lap, glanced around the room. "I— here."

Inside the crumpled wrapping was a thick sheaf of muggle paper (albeit the sturdy, high-end sort) bound into a booklet by enchanted twine— and labeled in elegant, efficient handwriting Hermione couldn't help but envy as Property of Lily Marie Evans.

"Harry, what—?"

He met her shocked look with a nervous smile. "Go on, take a look."

She did— carefully. Abbreviated instructions for a broad variety of indirect (and thus less traceable) hexes-verging-on-curses, annotated dueling poses, channeling efficiency calculations for a variety of materials, ritual arrays modified from forms both familiar and not, and notes on countless other things covered every page back and front.

"She left them with Missus Tonks," Harry said quietly. "And it's like know enough to even start making sense of most of it yet, so…"

Which. Was perfectly sensible— perfectly tempting, but— "Harry, this is… I couldn't possibly…"

"Say that like you mean it," Parv chimed in, a fond smirk on her lips.

"It's a copy," said Andromeda, "of a copy I made years ago, to translate from the cypher she used."

Oh. Well then.

"It's yours," said Harry. "Just… write me about any really useful stuff you find in it, yeah?"

And what could she say to that, except Of course?

Andromeda's gift came in a small jewelry box, the velvet soft in her uninjured hand. Inside sat an ornate silver hairpin, shaped like a tiny raven skull with hummingbird's beak, inscribed with even tinier runes that glowed faintly in her Sight— and brighter when her aura touched it. She had to look very closely to even recognize any of them, but recognize them she did: Old Futhorc interspersed with some glyphs she had only ever seen in the Grimmauld Library.

"A combined shield charm and distress beacon," said Andromeda.

Powered by both blood and ambient magic. A strong last-ditch defense for a cornered, wandless witch. Hermione wondered what would happen if you pricked the enemy with it, rather than yourself. By the look in Andromeda's eyes, she suspected such questions were expected.

(There was no shortage of raven iconography throughout Grimmauld Place. What other family heirlooms had Andromeda managed to escape with? And was it relief to be finally be rid of another reminder, or…)

"Thank you," Hermione managed— and then, on a nervous whim: "Aunt Andy."

Andromeda looked rather chuffed, at that. So did Harry, in his quieter, shyer way— and Parvati was practically glowing, but that wasn't exactly uncommon. It was harder than ever not to just… bask in it.

The mugs of masala chai Madame Patil brought floating in were a welcome distraction— as was sitting back to watch how the different pieces of her life fit together. Her father was questioning Bill about his work (with Ted serving as muggle-to-wizard interpreter), Andromeda had teamed up with Mémé Marion and Tante Lulu to dote on/interrogate Harry (who looked profoundly confused and slightly uncomfortable), which Remus kept an eye on while chatting with Mister Patil, the Patil Twins excused themselves for a moment, Ginny and the Chasers had inevitably started talking Quidditch, and Tonks—

"Alright there, 'Bug?"

—flopped down onto the couch beside her.

"Alright," said Hermione. "And you?"

"Glad t'be here." Her smile was rueful. "Glad t'be invited."

What? "Why on earth wouldn't I…"

Ah.

"I'm sorry," Hermione blurted. "For— going after you like that, at the—"

The Fidelius seemed to sort of… turn off the nerves of her tongue for a moment. Interesting.

"…you know," she managed, once the sensation had passed. "I… stand by the concerns I mentioned, but I'd meant to bring them up in private, not…"

"Go for the throat with an audience?"

She winced.

Tonks sighed, and scooted closer. "No harm done, 'Bug. Can't exactly blame you for snarling at anything Auror-shaped after what Proudfoot's lot pulled. Even Madam Bones looked ready to start hexing, when she found out."

Hermione… wasn't sure how to feel about that. It wasn't as if Madam Bones' supposed fairness had stopped her subordinates from waltzing into Hogwarts and—

"I talked to Lupin, y'know."

What?

"I knew werewolves had it hard, but…"

"Out of sight, out of mind?"

It was Tonks' turn to wince, now. "'Spose so."

Hermione didn't know what to say to that. She rarely thought about werewolves either, but she wasn't the one who might be ordered to evict them.

Or put them down like dogs.

"Shite," Tonks muttered. "This is supposed to be a party, and here I am—"

"No." Hermione laid her bandaged hand on the Auror's wrist, and suffered a dull twinge of pain for her trouble. "Better to have it out now. Speaking of which…"

"Uh oh."

How to phrase this…

"If you received information concerning someone who… was making people's lives… unpleasant, in such a manner that you were obligated as an Auror to report it, but not reporting it could potentially save lives later on… what would you do?"

Tonks blinked.

"That," she said, "is what we call a leading question, at work."

…fair.

"Don't 'spose you can tell me what this is about?"

"I'm… not sure I should," said Hermione.

"Then why're you asking me?"

"Because you're a member of the Order I know and trust."

"…Well, shite." Tonks cast a subtle anti-eavesdropping spell, and crossed her arms. "I need details to answer a question like that— and corroborating evidence. No one sees the full picture."

Hermione considered for a beat before answering: "Rita Skeeter is an unregistered Animagus. A beetle. I have photographic evidence, and had planned to use it as leverage to compel an honest interview with Harry about Riddle's return— but by the time he's free to meet with her, I'll be thousands of miles away. "

Tonks just stared at her for a moment. A very long moment. Then: "Photographic evidence."

"Yes. Which I will share if you promise to make that interview happen."

Tonks… continued to stare.

"You said it yourself," said Hermione. "There are Aurors that want to be doing more, that know Fudge is actively endangering people—"

"Shouldn't have told you that. Should not have told you that—"

"But you did, and it's helped me make a plan that might help the DMLE to actually do its job!"

"Oi, I resent that."

"Do you?"

Tonks huffed. Shook her head. "Merlin. Blackmail, 'Bug? You realize that's what this is."

"I did realize. And then I weighed it against the likely effects of the criminal negligence your Department is being forced into." Hermione crossed her arms, which was a very different sort of gesture when you had to treat one of arm like an osteoporotic kitten— "What's one corrupt gossip-monger compared to spying on the Ministry?"

Tonks reinforced the privacy charm with a glance around the room. "Go tell it on the mountain, why don't you?"

"Dora. Things are going to get worse before they get better. A lot worse, if Riddle is allowed to keep preparing in secret and the slander against Harry and Dumbledore goes unchallenged. The Order needs a popular journalist on their side. If that requires a bit of extra persuasion… so be it."

"Persuasion, she says."

Hermione could not help but think of how Skeeter had looked kneeling before her, terrified and furious and powerless to hurt her again.

She could not help but feel an echo of the thrill it gave her.

"You're lucky I saw the articles that bint wrote about you," Tonks grumbled. Raked fingers through her short pink hair. "Alright."

"Alright?"

"I'll do it. I'll… bloody sit on the evidence 'til we can figure out how to safely get Harry to an interview. And the— y'know. Do that. While still sitting on the bloody evidence."

Oh.

That was… easier than she'd thought it would be.

"Good," said Hermione. "I'll give it to you before you leave tonight."

Tonks nodded.

Hermione could have left it at that— should have, maybe, but…

"Dora," she ventured. "I know that you're… personally invested in the Ministry..."

—Tonks' eyebrows twitched upwards—

"…but I have been given no reasons to trust in its ability to protect me— or its desire to. If Fudge and his cronies continue to sabotage the DMLE, what's to stop Riddle's cult from infiltrating the Ministry again? What's to stop them from taking control of it?"

"I know," said Tonks.

"It's absolutely— what?"

"Moody's been on about all that for weeks now."

"Oh."

"Don't stop now, though— you're on a roll!"

"I— well." Hermione cleared her throat. "I… was going to say that I'm not asking you to agree with me— only to start preparing for the worst case scenario. I hope it doesn't happen but—"

I hoped a lot of things.

"—if it does, we'll—" She paused. Swallowed. "You. Will be at too great a disadvantage to fight fairly. And you're a fair-minded person— I suspect most of the Order is. That's what the Order is about, isn't it? Fairness instead of prejudice? Which means fighting dirty won't come naturally, which means you need to prepare."

Tonks was staring again. Much the same way she did when evaluating Hermione's dueling stances and wandwork— but not quite.

"Yeah," she said. "Moody's gonna be miffed he lost the chance to rec—"

The scratch of needle-on-vinyl drew her attention to the coffee table, where Parv and Padma had set up a gramophone. The Beatles sang out of its horn, cheerfully calling for help.

Hermione was peripherally aware of Tonks perking up next to her (she must have snuck her records in somehow, the Patil's most modern muggle music was Tchaikovsky)— but then Parvati met her gaze across the room and quickly glanced away, tucking back her sleek black braid to bare the swanning, sun-kissed ring of her neck aaand that was Sappho. That was a line of literal sapphic poetry that she'd inadvertently memorized, Circe's teats—

"Ooh!" Ginny sprang up off the armchair she'd claimed. "I've had nothing to listen to but the Weird Sisters and bloody Warbeck all summer—"

"Maia!" Padma called. "How exactly does one dance to this?"

"Er—"

"It's your culture, I mean, and I would so hate to disrespect it…"

She really shouldn't have. The pain potion was already starting to wear off, and prancing around the sitting room wouldn't help— much less with so few people dancing, which meant more eyes on her...

Parvati met her gaze again, and held it this time. Then she arched one perfectly-sculpted eyebrow.

Hermione stood up.

("Huh," Tonks murmured.)

("Ten quid, bitch," said Angelina.

"Inconclusive," Katie hissed. "Shove off.")

Dora thankfully handled the task of demonstrating how one danced to muggle music, with gusto quickly matched by the Chasers. Ginny watched, learned, and mimicked with the same intense focus she devoted to Quidditch maneuvers. Hermione… made an attempt. Thankfully everyone was having too much fun to stare at her. She was on the verge of retreating to the couch when Parv caught her good hand, deftly led her through a spin, and everything else abruptly became very uninteresting.

Parvati's aura swirled around her like kaleidoscopic mist, rippling and flaring in sync with every graceful sway of her hips, bob of her shoulders, flip of her braid, and flourish of her henna-marked hands. Her cheeks were flushed; her lips were wine-stained. She bumped into Tonks, stumbled, and burst into giggles at the sight of a trained Auror arrhythmically wiggling.

Then the song changed, Ginny and Tonks and the Chasers faltered (while the Twins sort of— gracefully swayed into stillness), and Hermione was abruptly very aware of all her limbs again— especially the pins and needles creeping back into her bandaged arm. No sooner had she winced than Parvati was at her side.

"Is the potion—?"

"Wearing off, yeah."

"On it," said Parv, already sweeping out of the room like a princess on a mission.

Padma helped Hermione get the sling back on; Harry hovered guiltily as she made her way back to the couch. The first riff of Rebel Rebel blared out of the record player.

"Go on, don't let me stop the fun." She waved them off. "I'll be fine, I just need a moment."

By the time Harry had decided he wasn't committing some grievous sin by enjoying himself while she sat on the sidelines, Mr. Tonks had appeared with a glass of water. Only as she took her first sip did she realize how thirsty she was.

Ted sat quietly beside her as she drank, seemingly content to watch his daughter gleefully galumph around. He brought no pity, no fuss, and she couldn't help but wonder…

"Is this what you were hoping for?"

"I'm sorry?" He asked.

"For me to leave the country, I mean. Before I end up like—" She cut herself off, ears heating at her own tactlessness.

"Bit late for… some of that," he said, outwardly unruffled. "But yes. It is… something of a weight off my mind."

Hermione… wasn't sure what to think about that. What to feel.

Ted sighed, sliding his glasses off to clean the lenses with his jumper. "You could do great things here, Hermione— but I think that will be true wherever you are. And I think I speak for all of us when I say I'd rather you be safe than revolutionary."

Revolutionary.

She'd... never thought about herself in such terms before. It brought to mind mass marches and barricades, fire hoses and tear gas, bodies in the streets and heads rolling in front of jeering crowds…

But people were already dying.

People had been dying since long before she conjured her first sparks— frozen in school lavatories and starved in in medieval cells, cut down on family shopping trips and in their own bloody homes—

Revolution.

The last recourse of the desperate and downtrodden against a system that will not or cannot provide for them.

Were the institutions of Magical Britain not stagnant and corrupt?

Were they not doomed to metastasize if things didn't change— and change drastically?

And, most crucially, what real hope did a single unpopular mudblood have of gaining enough power within the system to reform it?

How naive had she been to imagine herself as Minister of Magic— or even as a Professor?

Hermione knew, academically, that revolutions were messy, brutal, inglorious affairs; hope and perseverance in the face of overwhelming, merciless force. She knew that for every hero and hallowed martyr there were a thousand desperate acts of sabotage and sacrifice, a thousand unmarked graves.

She'd been desperate since second year. Desperate to be safe again, for her family to be safe, even if it meant staining her hands… and all the bigoted little beasts that had tormented her from the first were only the youngest and most pathetic symptoms of the rot in wizarding Britain's heart.

Revolutionary.

It might as well have been written in flame right there in the sitting room.

She already intended to return someday— but in that moment, a plan began to take shape in her mind. The broad strokes of it painted themselves across the weeks, months, and years to come, and Hermione thought Yes.

This was not goodbye; it was a strategic retreat.

She was not fleeing the country, was not abandoning anyone— merely seizing the chance to rest, recover… and to prepare.

AN: Hermione probably would have gotten there eventually regardless; exactly how much Ted has sped things up here is anyone's guess.