The Serpent's Egg

The Hogs Head

'13th January 1998'

The temperature in Hogsmeade had dropped to well below freezing long before three young wizards Apparated to the outskirts of the magical village. The forest offered no shelter from the weather, and after seven months spent in the south, the trio found the bitterness of the highland winter a shock. The whole country had settled into winter, but heavy cloud cover had kept it unusually mild in the south and they had perhaps forgotten just how cold it got here.

Within a few steps Ron Weasley was tapping the toe of his boots hard against each heel in an effort to dislodge the snow and ice from the tread. The boots, like most of Ron’s attire, had seen better days, but they were the newest of his possessions and were in better condition than Harry’s footwear. He’d noticed this earlier in the week when Harry was taping his shoes up with black insulating tape purchased from a Muggle petrol station. Hermione had offered to try and fix them, but it was one of the very rare moments when her magic had just not been effective enough. Ron had dispatched a letter to his mother requesting new boots for Harry the next time he saw her, and he was secretly hoping that it would be in Hogsmeade.

As he pulled his coat tighter around himself, he thought that it was very possible that they all needed new clothes. They were looking more than a little threadbare.

As they approached the road, Ron instinctively turned back and reached his hand to Hermione who was behind him. She took it with a grateful smile, and she felt a little heavy, as though she were leaning her weight on him. It was a sure sign that she was tired, and he didn’t blame her. He was tired himself. It had been a long day, and it was already dark in Hogsmeade. The darkness only added to his mood, and he wished that they could just rest. It was a wish that would be fulfilled imminently. It had been a month since any of them had slept in an actual bed, but tonight they were expected by Aberforth Dumbledore who, had promised to put them up for the night.

“Don’t worry,” Ron said with unconvincing certainty, “it’ll be warm at the Hog's Head.”

She seemed to visibly shake before him, and he rubbed his gloved hands over hers in some vain hope of warming her. She looked as though she desperately wanted to believe that he was right and that she shouldn’t worry. But worry and fear and stress had become a way of life; it was too late to stop doing it now.

Ahead of them Harry was walking along the stone path to the pub. It amazed Ron that he never fell over. Harry seemed as sure footed as a mountain goat, and he never once looked back to see where they were. His gaze was fixed on the dark shape of the Hog's Head. There was no light to signify that the place was open, but that was not so unusual. Many businesses kept their curtains closed tight and the noise down; there was not much merriment to be had these days.

Looming over the village was the dark and foreboding presence of the school that had dominated not only the township, but the lives of the three who now walked in its shadow but did not draw near. They each missed it for their own reasons, but for the moment they said nothing. Ron knew that Hermione would ask to go there before they left the next day; he also knew that Harry would say no. Harry was avoiding Hogwarts as though his life depended on it, and Ron had put it down to too many bad memories. It wasn’t until recently that he’d realised that Ginny was at the school and Harry was convinced that if he went there she would be in danger.

As if on cue Hermione called to Harry, her hand still firmly placed in Ron’s.

“Are we going up to the school?”

“No,” Harry called back. Distracted by a sound, he squinted in the darkness.

“Why not?” Hermione forced her own legs to move in the cold, and she approached him. “It seems ridiculous to come all this way and stay at the Hog's Head when we’d be safer at Hogwarts!”

Harry, who did not see Hogwarts as even remotely safe, marched towards her, his face a mask of grim determination. “If I go there,” he said in a harsh whisper, “he’ll think I’ve gone to see Ginny, and if he thinks I’ve gone to see Ginny, he’ll think that I care about her, and that’s the fastest way I know to ensure someone gets killed.” He looked around, as though thoroughly expecting a Death Eater to jump out from behind a tree. “I’m not risking her,” he hissed. “At the moment there is nothing at Hogwarts to interest him, let’s keep it that way shall we?”

‘He’ was Voldemort, and Harry was right. Hermione closed her mouth and bowed her head, refusing to meet Ron’s eye. He squeezed her hand reassuringly, and they silently followed Harry to the pub.

*****

Hermione felt clean for the first time in a month or more. Opportunities to bathe had become horribly restricted to public toilets in Muggle towns. They were quick, perfunctory affairs that offered no pleasure and scarcely did the job. She had been dubious of the bathrooms at the Hog's Head pub, but was relieved when she found the modest little group of rooms, and indeed the bathroom was neat and clean - possibly due to the fact that Molly Weasley had gone through and cleaned everything when she had discovered that they would be staying there. The three bedchambers were in a part of the hotel hidden from the public and had housed Professor Dumbledore when he had taken flight from Hogwarts more than two years before. Dumbledore’s brother, Aberforth, was skilled in making places unplottable as it turned out, and Hermione found that she was breathing easy and feeling far safer than she had anticipated.

It was Aberforth who had informed them that Molly Weasley had been there. Not only had she cleaned, but she had also left a small pile of fresh clothes on each of their beds. With Ron’s clothes she had also left a letter asking them to have lunch with the family the following day. Ron hadn’t read the letter aloud. He wanted to keep the contents to himself for a little longer and pretend that Harry might agree to the plan.

Hermione idly looked through the clothes on her bed and smiled when she saw a pair of flannel pyjamas. She glanced longingly at the narrow bed with its multicoloured quilts and wondered how long it had been since she had been able to sleep for more than an hour at a time. It shocked her to realise that once again she was forced to think in terms of months rather than days. The thought that she might well get a full night's sleep that night filled her with a warm pleasure she could never remember experiencing, and her body seemed to instantly lag with fatigue at the anticipation.

A quiet knock at the door caused her to jump and brought back to her just how on edge she really was. When the door opened instantly, without waiting for her to call ‘enter’, the shock was replaced with a mild irritation at the loss of boundaries they had with each other. She was thankful that she hadn’t removed the threadbare dressing gown that she had dragged all over Britain. But it was Harry, not Ron, who slipped into the room; she asked where Ron was.

“He’s having a bath,” Harry said. He needed one himself, and Hermione felt a pang of guilt at having taken so long in there. Harry idly lifted the corner of a set of green velvet robes folded beneath the flannel pyjamas and chuckled softly. “Mrs Weasley should be given sainthood,” he said.

“I know,” Hermione agreed readily. “If she were here, I’d kiss her.”

“I’m thinking I’ll keep watch tonight,” Harry said, still looking at the clothes. “You guys need some sleep.”

“Harry…” She looked at him and felt an intense sadness. He had decided long ago that it was his job to protect them, and he always kept watch, even when it was someone else’s turn. How long had it been since Harry had shut his eyes? They were safe in these rooms; it was one of the few things of which she was certain. “No one knows we’re here, no one can get to us. Just sleep, Harry. You need to get some sleep.”

And the truth was that they all did.

“Aberforth is bringing some food up,” he said as though he hadn’t heard her at all. “I said we’d eat in my room.”

He got up and left then, and she was sure he was going to needlessly check the wards on the rooms. She wanted to tell him to stop. She wanted to tell him not to worry because these rooms were unplottable and no one was going to hurt them.

She wanted to tell him, but she didn’t because deep inside she knew that his vigilance made her feel safe.

*******

Dinner was a quiet and tense affair. Hermione and Ron all but forced Harry to have a bath and had hoped that he would relax enough to enjoy it. He lasted less than ten minutes in the bathroom but returned to them thankfully clean and smelling fresher than he had in months. He’d put on clean clothes with them both sitting in the room, though Hermione had turned her face away to give him the privacy that he seemed not to need. Then they ate the dinner that Aberforth Dumbledore brought to them in silence.

“I got a letter from Mum,” Ron said, coughing a little as he said it as though hoping to cough out any fear of a reaction from Harry. “She wants to know if we can go to The Burrow soon. The Order will send an envoy to protect us…”

“She’s over the fact that we didn’t get to the wedding then?” Hermione asked.

“Probably not,” Ron replied reluctantly, “but we did miss Christmas. And I think she understands why we couldn’t go to the wedding now.”

“We can’t go,” Harry mumbled through a mouthful of food. “It’s too dangerous.”

“Hence the envoy to protect us,” Hermione said.

“For God's sake, Harry, we’ll have the Order crawling all over the place!”

“We had the Order and Aurors all over Hogwarts and they didn’t stop Death Eaters getting in, and they didn’t stop Dumbledore being killed. The Burrow would be nothing for them.”

“What about Grimmauld Place?” Hermione asked, attempting some kind of compromise. “It’s still unplottable, and the Secret Keeper is pretty secure…”

“Seeing as he’s dead,” Harry growled.

Hermione winced but pressed on. “We could all go there. Ron needs to see his family, and I think we need to see them too.”

“You go,” Harry told her. He prodded at his stew as though it was unpalatable, and perhaps his mood had made it so. “It would be better if you went without me anyway.”

A suggestion that Ron and Hermione would simply never accept; they knew Harry too well to expect him to wait for them.

“We could all go,” Hermione reasoned, “Grimmauld Place is safe! We have rearranged the wards to keep Snape out. We’d be safe going there.”

And as Harry happened to have three pieces of Voldemort's soul rattling around in his backpack, he turned to glare at her. “I’m not safe anywhere,” he hissed. “I’m getting these books from Aberforth, and then I’m going back to Derbyshire to work out where the next Horcrux is.”

He made it sound so simple, though they all knew that it wasn’t. Finding Horcruxes was hard work, and it had been luck that had seen them find and retrieve three. They had put themselves through ordeals that had caused Harry to realise that it was probable that he wasn’t going to survive what was to come, and the darkness of this realisation had threatened to consume him. After a Death Eater attack on a safe house, he had become obsessed with the idea that they were not safe anywhere and that an enemy was lurking around every corner. If he had his wish, Ron and Hermione would not be here with him now. But then, they were his best friends, and if he was concerned for Ginny’s safety, he was doubly so for them. At least if they were with him, he could protect them, as well as he could protect anyone.

Then there was the fact that he probably needed Hermione’s brain. Finding and collecting the Horcruxes was one thing. As yet they had not managed to actually destroy one. Indeed, the locket they had located at Grimmauld Place had managed to blow three of Ron’s fingers off and left him in St Mungo’s for a week while they were grown back. It had taught them to be more careful. It had also taught them not to attempt to open one until they’d found out more about them. Harry was hoping that the books left in Aberforth Dumbledore’s care would not only give them some clues as to the location of the last Horcruxes, but also some indication on how to break them.

Hermione wanted to tell him to relax. She wanted to tell him that they were safe here, that they could sleep, that they could see friends and family without fear, but she doubted he would listen to her and so she kept the thought to herself. She watched him return to his food, placing forkful after forkful into his mouth so mechanically that she doubted he could even taste it.

“Harry?”

They all jumped. They were there in secret and no one should have access to these rooms. Harry was up and had his wand out so fast that the intruder threw her arms up in an ineffectual attempt to shield herself from whatever he was about to hex her with.

“Harry, wait!” Hermione cried

Harry looked as though he would not stop, but his hand finally stayed itself and the visitor lowered her arms, still shaking from the shock of almost being attacked. Ginny peered out at them from within the hood of her cloak, pale from the fright. “I’m sorry,” she breathed, still shaken. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

Ron was up. Having not seen any member of his family in months, he was suddenly hugging her as though he would never let her go. Harry, on the other hand, was less pleased. He watched the reunion, the blood gone from his face.

“Mum said you were coming here, and I had to come and see you,” she said, still holding onto her brother. “Aberforth has already checked to make sure it’s really me.”

“How did you get here?” Harry demanded with no joy at all. “What the fuck is McGonagall doing letting you run around the village at night?”

The smile faded from Ginny’s lips, and she took a step back, releasing her grip on Ron’s arm. It was possible that she hadn’t heard Harry really swear before; Ron and Hermione were less fortunate, not that their own language had been any better of late.

Ginny blinked. She had obviously thought that Harry would be more pleased to see her. “I…” she stopped and swallowed and looked uncertainly between the three of them. “Professor McGonagall doesn’t know I’m here,” she said, “I took the one-eyed witch passage to Honeydukes…”

“Then you’re a fucking fool!” Harry cried. “We have been living in ditches! We have been doing everything to avoid coming near you, eating out of fucking Muggle dustbins and holding our fucking clothes together with tape so that no one we knew could be put in any danger, and you risk everything so that you could get some kind of thrill out of sneaking down here? Have you gone fucking insane?”

“Don’t yell at her!” Ron said, and he pushed Ginny behind him without really knowing why. Harry would never hurt her, but Ron wanted to shield her, perhaps from the bitter man that Harry was fast becoming. “She wanted to see you,” he said hotly. “For some stupid reason she cares about you!”

“If she cared about me, she would have stayed at the school where she belongs!”

“Oh right, like you didn’t use your Invisibility Cloak to sneak out of school when they thought Sirius was out to kill you? What makes you so very different?”

“Sirius Black was hardly Voldemort! And she should know better than me at fucking thirteen!” He rounded on her. “What were you thinking? What kind of fucking idiotic thought made you do this?”

“Harry, stop it!” Hermione grabbed his arm, but he jerked it out of her grasp.

“No!” Harry yelled. “Anyone could have followed her! It’s not just her own life she’s risking!”

Ginny ran. She turned and fled before anyone could think to stop her, and time seemed to stand still as the three of them stared in shock at the space that she had occupied. And then Harry took off after her, leaving Ron and Hermione alone to wonder just what had happened.

Ron swore but did not follow. Harry would find her and say sorry and ensure that she got back to Hogwarts safely. If they didn’t meet with Ron’s family the following day, he wouldn’t see her again for Merlin only knew how long. He sank heavily into a chair. “I hate this,” he muttered bitterly.

“I know,” Hermione said softly, “I hate it too.”

“Sometimes…” He looked at her and his blue eyes seemed glassy. “I’m so bloody weak,” he said, sounding defeated for a moment. “Sometimes I want to do what he says. Sometimes I just want to leave him and go back to school and let all this crap happen around me… and hope that we win.”

“Sometimes standing on the sidelines is harder,” Hermione told him. “Waiting for something to happen can make you feel helpless.”

“I already feel helpless,” Ron replied, and he slowly shook his head in despair.

***************

The pyjamas that Molly Weasley had sent were warm and wonderfully clean, and Hermione relished the feel of them against her skin. It astonished her that something as simple as clean pyjamas would feel like a luxury. Things she had once taken for granted felt so much like monumental acts of kindness that she could have cried. Clean skin, warm pyjamas and fresh sheets on a soft bed.

Ron had gone to his own room, desperate for sleep. They had kissed for a short time as they had taken to doing when they were alone. Then he had left, surprising her by not asking for sex as she had expected. Perhaps he realised that she would not say yes; or perhaps he just needed to be alone. Harry had been right when he’d said that they had been sleeping in ditches. They had huddled together for warmth and the feel of their bodies and limbs around her had become familiar things.

But it was good to be alone now, and she was sure that Ron felt the same way.

She was in the bathroom brushing her teeth when she heard Harry return with Ginny. She hadn’t expected that. She, like Ron, had thought he would take Ginny back to the school.

“How long has it been since you slept?” she heard Ginny ask, but Harry’s answer became muffled as they went into his room and closed the door.

Hermione returned to her own room and took stock of all the things that she held in high enough regard to carry around with her. A tattered bundle of photographs held together with string, a quick medicinal potions kit. A blanket with more than a few holes and a purse with an all too small amount of Muggle money inside. They had found themselves scavenging food from a skip behind a Muggle restaurant and, repulsed by the situation, they had resorted to stealing a handful of notes from the cash register of a bookshop. They had felt guilty about the theft, but it had kept them in cheap meals from grubby little cafes for a month and had even afforded them a couple of nights in a hostel. The few coins in the purse were all that they had left, and Hermione knew that they would steal more from another Muggle shop rather than risk detection by applying to Gringotts to change Galleons into Muggle money.

They had found safety by hiding in Muggle areas. Death Eaters could not fathom the idea of three powerful wizards willingly living amongst Muggles. That three of the wizard world's golden children would sleep huddled in back alleys amongst the Muggle homeless would never once be considered.

They had purchased a Time-Turner from a stall in the depths of Knockturn Alley just days after Harry had turned seventeen and Death Eaters had stormed their way into Privet Drive to kill him. That the Dursleys were currently living at Grimmauld Place under the protection of the Order of the Phoenix had amused them for weeks after. Hermione still occasionally caught a glimpse of Harry chuckling softly to himself when he remembered that fact. They had bought the Time-Turner on a whim, and it had thus far served them well.

They had discovered that collecting Horcruxes was a difficult business, often requiring more than one attempt, and they had gone back multiple times, breaking all rules of time travel in order to get them. The Turner was old, however, and they had been abusing their use of it. It had seen better days and was now in desperate need of repair. Hermione often wondered just what Professor McGonagall would think of their abuse of the device. She could hear McGonagall’s voice in her head every time they pushed the boundaries of time and distance. “Terrible things happen to wizards who meddle with time.” She was sure that they did. They had gone back days and weeks in order to correct their mistakes, and their bodies had started to rebel.

Hermione had decided that the human body was not designed to withstand the pressures of time travel. After their last journey, pushed back three weeks, they had found themselves ill from the strain of it. Their bodies felt stretched and thin, their innards strangely liquid. Ron had even coughed up blood, which had sent them all into a panic, but it had righted itself soon enough. Now the Time-Turner was broken. The pin that had held the hourglass in line with the dateline and charm had come loose, and no amount of tightening would keep the thing in place. She had taken to squeezing the whole device together between her thumb and forefinger to hold the tension on the pin. It made the travel awkward and slightly out of alignment, but it still worked.

She hoped to take it to Hogwarts and have someone look at it. It was not something that they could just drop into any shop and have repaired, and if Voldemort discovered what they were doing, he would no doubt use it to his own advantage. She stroked the metal in a loving way. She had become quite attached to it, and somehow the fact that she was the only one who could keep it going made it even more special to her.

She yawned. She needed to sleep, and once again she found herself staring at the inviting bed. She extinguished the light and finally allowed herself to sink into the comfort that she knew awaited her. She could not sleep, however. She found herself lying in the dark, wishing that the mythical sandman would come and throw dust in her eyes. She listened to the sounds of the night. From downstairs came the unmistakeable sounds of a busy pub; outside she heard an animal howl from the Forest. In the room next to hers, Harry and Ginny were talking. She could not make out the words, but Harry was at least no longer shouting.

And then Ginny cried out. Loud enough that Hermione sat bolt upright in her bed, ears straining for the sounds of a scuffle. She reached for the wand under her pillow, her mind whirling through the possibility that they may have been found, that they could all be in danger, that Harry and Ginny had been attacked.

And then Ginny cried out again, softer this time, a sound less fearsome and more intimate.

The realisation that Harry and Ginny were making love struck her hard, and she sat painfully still in the bed. She didn’t know why, but a sudden wave of nausea rushed through her and her stomach began to churn painfully. She was not in love with Harry. She was not jealous of them. But it was as though this final loss of innocence signified that the last shreds of his childhood were being thrown off and left behind. And as the childhood passed away, the man emerged, and as a man he was one step closer to his death.

Hermione buried her face in her hands and cried.

*********************************

Hermione woke later than she meant to. After struggling to get to sleep, she found that once there her body demanded that she stay there. When she finally emerged from her room, freshly dressed in the robes Molly Weasley left for her and hoping that Harry didn’t demand she change back into her old jeans and jumper, she found Harry and Ron at breakfast in the little sitting room. The fire burning in the grate had made the room comfortably warm, so much so that Hermione instantly felt relaxed and could easily be lulled back to the sleep she had so enjoyed.

The warmth of the fire bore no resemblance to the atmosphere in the room however, and she soon found herself seated between two silent men more intent on pushing food around their plates than conversing with each other. Ginny was gone, escorted back to Hogwarts by a furious McGonagall and two Aurors. Harry and Ron were sitting across from each other, refusing to meet each other's eye.

Harry did, in fact, look troubled. Not exactly the expression Hermione had expected given that he had apparently lost his virginity the previous night. He jabbed at his eggs, lost in his own thoughts and looking very much as though he had done the unforgivable. A feeling no doubt encouraged by the fact that Ron was glaring at him as though he had indeed done the unforgivable. Hermione had to wonder if Ron was angry because Harry had had sex with his sister, or because Harry had lost his virginity first.

Ron gave her a resentful look that swung her opinion to the latter and she sat down at the table, determined to have some breakfast herself.

“Did you sleep well?” she asked, thinking to perhaps start the fight for them and thus get it out of the way.

“Fine,” Ron muttered.

Harry said nothing, although Hermione thought she could distinguish a pink blush bloom on his pale cheek.

“Ginny got back to Hogwarts then?” she pressed on.

“Yes,” Harry whispered hoarsely, bowing his face a little closer to his plate, “McGonagall came and got her.”

Ron grunted and shuffled around in his chair indignantly.

“Aberforth gave me the books last night,” Harry said, steering the conversation away from the previous evening.

“Before or after you fucked my sister?” Ron demanded suddenly.

Harry swallowed; evidently the argument was not going to be avoided. “Before,” he said, his voice diminishing a little.

“I see. You shout at her, call her a ‘fucking fool’, and then you go after her, stopping long enough to get some books from Aberforth Dumbledore, and when you finally manage to catch up with her, you fuck her?”

Harry stared, cleared his throat, and drew a deep breath. “No. I shouted at her, went after her and talked to her, then when we came back I got the books off Aberforth and then I…” He looked uncomfortable. “And then I had sex with her.”


“How proud you must be,” Ron said bitterly, “belittling her and then taking advantage of her…”

“I did not take advantage of her!”

Ron looked away.

“I’m sorry,” Harry said with a sigh, “I’m sorry I didn’t ask your permission before…” He scowled. “No, actually I’m not. I didn’t plan it, it just happened – and it was… nice. It was just nice to be with someone who wasn’t trying to kill me or hurt me or even protect me. She just wanted to be with me, and I’m sorry if it pisses you off, but I’m not sorry it happened!”

“You should have said he gave you the books,” Ron replied, changing the subject, deciding to let it drop. “We could have been off earlier.”

“I thought we could use the rest,” Harry said quietly. “I thought you and Hermione could go and see your parents and catch me up later.”

“If we separate now, we won’t be able to find you again,” Ron muttered.

“That probably wouldn’t be a bad thing.”

They fell silent again, and the tension fast became palpable. Hermione could feel her heart begin to thump painfully behind her breast. He was going to tell them to leave. How could he tell them to leave?

“You’d be safer at Hogwarts,” Harry said carefully. “Your families would be happier knowing that you were safe.”

“My family would be happier if they knew I was helping to keep you safe,” Ron said getting up from the table and his breakfast and walking to the door.

For a moment Harry looked stricken at Ron’s anger, but then Ron looked back and glared at him fiercely.

“I’m not leaving you,” he said. For a moment he looked as though he might break down entirely, and his voice seemed to crack as he swallowed back a sob. “I’m not going to be someone who picks up the Daily Prophet and reads that they found your body in some canal…”

“And what? You’d rather be in the canal with me?”

Ron suddenly flashed a brilliant smile, but his voice was far from happy. “Don’t treat us like we’re Neville Longbottom and Luna Lovegood, desperate to come along for the ride. We love you. And it’s not some fleeting little fancy because you’re ‘Harry Potter: Hero.’ We have stuck with you through everything, so don’t belittle us by telling us to leave you. We gave up being safe when we helped you put a three-headed dog to sleep more than six years ago, and we’re not leaving you now. So stop telling us that we would be better off without you. You might be the one that they call a hero, but we have been there every step of the way. Don’t insult us by telling us we need to stay safe now… and yes, I’d rather be lying in the fucking ditch with you than be alive and trying to mourn you.”

“I’m sorry…”

Ron opened the door and turned back before leaving the room. “And stop saying sorry,” he said, and then he closed the door.

****************************

After breakfast, Harry had relented and agreed to go to the Three Broomsticks and see the Weasleys. His first instinct had been to induce them to go to the Hog's Head, but Arthur sent word back that it would be unusual in the extreme for the entire Weasley clan to tramp into the Hog's Head on a Wednesday afternoon. He seemed to share Harry’s concern for their safety and quickly organised a private room at the Three Broomsticks; he instructed the trio to arrive with their hoods up, something that was fortunately not unusual in Hogsmeade these days.

They dressed in the cleanest clothes they owned, which were the robes that Molly Weasley had left for them, and threw their old travel clothes into Ron’s bag. None of them wanted Molly to fret that they weren’t taking care of themselves, and to arrive smelling like three months of stale sweat would no doubt cause her to faint dead away. They wanted to appear calm and well, as though they were in the middle of some kind of wonderful adventure and not a filthy war that would probably kill them. Their plan was set. After visiting with the Weasleys, they would return to what had become their normality. They would find the last of the Horcruxes, and then they would set about trying to destroy them. After that they would finally face their enemy, and despite their fear, they all agreed that having an enemy that was tangible was preferable to all of the hiding and searching they had been doing.

Their moods had lifted a little since breakfast but both Ron and Harry were still looking angry. Hermione had decided that the best thing she could do would be to attempt to placate them both, but she had never been particularly diplomatic and was more inclined to tell them both to get over it. She doubted such advice would help, however, and so her method of placation was to remain silent.

They left the Hog's Head by the path that skirted the Forest and would take them around to the Three Broomsticks by the back way. Frost had made the path from the pub slippery, and once again Hermione and Ron were clutching at each other's arms to steady themselves while Harry walked on ahead. Harry turned back for the briefest glance, ensuring that they were indeed still safe, and arched an eyebrow at the cautious way they were treading along the icy path. He realised too late that he really should be doing the same thing. He slipped and fell as he turned, surprising his companions almost as much as himself as he fell and landed heavily on his arse. He blinked at the sudden flare of pain and stupidly wanted to cry; instead he struggled to gain his feet, swore violently, and shrugged of their concerned offers of assistance.

He silently wished that one of them would fall too so that he would not feel like such a twit, and it was a bitter wish that was almost instantly rewarded as Ron slipped and fell, pulling Hermione down with him. Harry actually allowed himself a moment of vindictive pleasure before reaching out to help them up. Hermione’s bag had spilled open and her meagre possessions were spread around them, some had even rolled down into the little gully that bordered the path. Harry wondered why she was carrying so much junk around with her.

Ron was up easily enough, but Hermione gained her feet with a painful groan and she clutched at her left side. Harry’s inner smile faded as he realised that she was really hurt.

“Shit, Hermione,” Ron panted as he reached for her. “Harry, she’s hurt!”

“I’m alright,” Hermione protested, “I just landed the wrong way. I probably just bruised something.”

“And what if you’ve broken something?” Ron asked. He looked around at Harry. “She’s in pain!”

“Your mum is good at Healing spells,” Harry said a little dubiously. “She’ll know what to do.”

“We could take her up to Madam Pomfrey.”

Harry didn’t look convinced. “We’ll see what your mother says,” he replied.

Ron looked very much torn between his dedication to Harry and his caring for Hermione.

“Your mother will probably make us go to Madam Pomfrey anyway,” Harry reasoned.

Ron visibly relaxed and ignored Hermione’s protests that she was fine. They began retrieving her possessions from the ground, Harry and Ron throwing whatever they found into her bag. Hermione herself was a little more careful. Her purse and wand she quickly stuffed into the pocket of her robes. She quickly pushed tissues, scraps of parchment and a battered old quill into the same pocket before realising that down the embankment lay a box of tampons, her spare socks and a pair of knickers that were grubbier than she would like to admit to. She slipped down the embankment to collect them and found the abused Time-Turner lying on the frozen ground.

Up on the path Harry and Ron had picked up her journal and her secret supply of chocolate, which they promptly began sharing.

“Are you alright?” Harry called down the embankment. “You shouldn’t have gone down there; I would have done it…”

Pushing the dirty knickers into her overstuffed pocket, she was grateful that he hadn’t.

“Do you need help getting up?”

She grinned up at them. “No, I’m fine.” She reached for the Time-Turner.

“What’s that?”

“Time-Turner…” She bent to get the Turner and winced, berating her timing. Why did she have to injure herself just before they went to see Molly Weasley, who would no doubt have her bedridden for a week? She picked up the Turner and groaned.

None of them realised that it was turning until it was too late. Hermione thought she heard Harry call out her name; in fact she was sure of it. But it didn’t matter, by the time she realised what was happening, Harry and Ron were gone and the world around her began to spin.

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