Harvest Moon

Voracious Reader: As always, your deductive reasoning is truly impressive. Are you sure you don’t want my job?

Taz: Love ya. *dangles more plot* Or at very least some insight into what Lucius is thinking.

Heidi191976: Glad you’re still reading and reviewing. Happy that you’re sticking with me when most seem to have gotten bored with the story.

Zets: Truly an honor that someone who is such a wonderful writer as yourself enjoys my little stories. Your reviews keep me going when I’m flailing on plot and running low on overall enthusiasm. Thank you.

***



Hermione stared at her partner for a moment. “You think the mask and cloak will be gone when we get there, don’t you.”



“It’s what I’m most afraid of and most hopeful for. I don’t want to believe my father is murdering these women and then taking them apart,” Draco said. “But it’s where all the evidence points even though it’s circumstantial.”



“Malfoy, your father was a Deatheater, do you honestly think, for even a moment, that he would be this stupid?”



“No. I don’t. But you know as well as I do that people lie, evidence doesn’t. The Wizengamot has convicted and sent people to Azkaban on far less evidence.”



“True enough. However, I really don’t believe your father committed this or any of the other murders,” Hermione said thoughtfully. “First, the murders have been too blatant. We both know no one is capable of operating in the shadows quite like Lucius is. If he had done this we wouldn’t have found out about it for decades at least. He most certainly wouldn’t have posed either Dawn’s body or this new one out in the open for all to see.”



Draco’s lips twitched upward. “You almost sound like you’re proud of him for that, Granger.”



She glowered at him and waved the comment away but let it settle in the back of her head for later diagnosis. “Second, your father was under surveillance in the time frame this particular murder took place. He also has solid alibis for when Dawn was murdered. The circumstantial evidence may point to him but there isn’t anything solid to tie him to the murders other than his connection with these women from the Gilded Lily.”



“So, what does it leave us with?”



“A great many puzzle pieces that don’t fit just yet. Unless . . .”



“What is it, Granger?”



“Just an idea. Can you go talk to Tazura? Find out if there was anyone who was there consistently when your father was with the murdered women at the Gilded Lily. I’ll handle going to the Malfoy vault with Lucius and meet you back at the office when we’ve both finished.”



“Fine. But why . . . ah, to see if someone could have been watching him and who he was with.”



“Exactly. Floo Lucius and ask him to wait for me. I’m going home for a bit to shower and change,” she said, looking down at the clothing she’d slept in and wrinkling her nose in distaste. “It’s a good thing I didn’t sleep in my dress.”



Draco blinked and stared at her for a moment. “Will you be wearing it again?”



“Of course I will. It’s a beautiful dress. Plus it cost a small fortune. Why would you ask such an odd question?”



Draco shrugged. “My mother would have worn it once and shoved it into the back of the closet never to be unearthed again.”



Hermione shook her head in mild disgust. “Purebloods.”



“Yes, well, I happen to be one of those and you see the state of my home,” Draco said, waving a hand around the small stone cottage.



“Exactly what possessed you to buy this place?”



“It’s comfortable and I like it. Do I need any other reason?”



“Of course not.”



“Plus there is the added advantage of not needing to walk three miles to get something I’m looking for.”



“I can see that. We’ll figure this out, Malfoy,” Hermione said, patting him on the arm.



“I know. My father thinks it’s his brother. Though how someone can come back from the dead is beyond me. But if what he and Arabella said is true about the keeper of the dead telling them my uncle’s soul never came to her . . . that changes things a great deal.”



Hermione nodded. “Indeed it does,” she said, apparating back to her flat while Draco Flooed Lucius to tell him to wait for her. She walked over and smoothed the dress she’d draped over the overstuffed chair in her living room. Shame really she hadn’t gotten to wear it long. Who knew when there would be other opportunities to wear such attire?



She sighed and made her way through the flat to her bedroom where she brushed the tangles from her hair and gathered clothing. She stood for a good ten minutes in front of her closet debating what to wear, something she never did. She puzzled over that for a moment before discarding what whispered through her mind like a restless ghost. Why on Earth would she want to look good for Lucius Malfoy? The very thought was ludicrous and yet there it was. She shook her head again and headed to the shower, refusing to think of anything but the case while there. Thinking about the case, however, brought her back around to thinking of Lucius and that was cyclical thinking she could ill afford at the moment.



Coming back into her bedroom she noticed that Draco had been there while she was in the shower and had left a note for her spell-o taped to the mirror. It said that he’d spoken to Lucius and the elder Malfoy wanted her to meet him in the library at the manor. She sighed, having the feeling this was going to be a long day already.



***



Lucius wandered aimlessly through the stacks in his library musing on how odd of a turn his life had taken the last month or so. Not only in the fact that his sexual liaisons were being murdered but in the sudden interest he had in Ms. Hermione Granger. If he was being completely honest with himself it was hardly sudden, the initial spark had been there for him but she had been far too young and innocent for anything to come of it a decade ago. At the time, he was also just another dark wizard to be punished and locked away in Azkaban to her. She had the envious pleasure of seeing her convictions and beliefs in simple black and white then.



But now it was a wholly different thing. She was a woman in the fullest sense of the word, not a child. She knew that the world did not operate in black and white but in varied shades of grey. She had seen vast amounts of death and destruction in the past ten years and that had changed her a great deal. The core elements were still very much present but even they had been tempered by the things she’d witnessed and endured. She was stronger now than she ever had been and Lucius found himself drawn to her more and more each time they met. But he had no idea if she would be interested in him in return. He wasn’t quite certain how to discern what her feelings toward him were. Were it any other woman he would have simply charged in at full speed but he hardly thought that would work with her.



One hand traced along the spines of the books and without thinking he grasped one and pulled it from the shelf. He let it fall open in his hand and looked down at the words written there. “It is not enough to conquer, one must know how to seduce.” He laughed a little. “Only Voltaire could manage to put the solution to my quandary into the proper words.”



***Mad Ramblings aka Author’s Notes***



The quote used in this chapter is from Voltaire’s Merope.