The Heiress

Even before Warren had stopped talking, I started thinking about our options. He hadn't said that Harry was one of the Aurors down there, so it seemed pretty clear what choice was the best one. I grabbed Hermione's arm with one hand, my wand with the other and -

"Weasley, don't do it!" Warren leaped and banged into my shoulder. "The goblins have already put the Anti-Apparition wards in place on the Minister's order!"

That bit of news staggered me more than Warren's elbow had. Whenever there was a suspected pilfering of the vaults or another fairly large problem in the bank, the goblins activated Anti-Apparition wards to keep everyone inside. If someone was stupid enough - or desperate enough - to try to make a break for it, he'd get splinched and have a slim chance of being put together again.

Still, I thought being splinched was probably a better bet than turning Hermione over to a group of Aurors without Harry around to make sure she was treated all right.

"Ron, we shouldn't run off. It will only look as if I have something to hide." Hermione shook off my hand. "I'm not afraid to face them."

"Have you gone barmy?" I hooked her arm again. "The Auror Division's been waiting 10 years to be able to get hold of you, and you're just going to skip down to them like they're offering free Cauldron Cakes without even knowing what they want?"

"They do all seem to have a bag on, sure enough. It doesn't look good and it sounds even worse," said Warren. "I was earwigging a little. Once I heard Ms. Granger's name mentioned I didn't want to look conspicuous."

He lowered his voice. "I do know that they say they've evidence that an Unforgivable was cast on someone. A dead someone, but I didn't hear anything more than that."

Hermione's eyes opened so wide that she looked a bit like something I saw in that big Muggle aquarium over at County Hall. But she didn't say anything. Neither did Warren, who had a frightened look on his face as if he was the one the Aurors were after. I didn't have time to say anything even if I could've thought of something useful. The idea of escape was breathing down my neck like an Acromantula looking for a light snack.

"There's got to be another way out of here," I said, my eyes bouncing around the room. There was a door that I knew led to one of the counting rooms, though I didn't think we could hide out there until the Aurors had gone. I wasn't sure how they'd even know to look for her here and I didn't have time to figure it out. I glanced at the Floo and stopped there. There was a little cloud of Floo powder at the bottom that was still settling. It had been used recently, and that made me remember something else about Gringotts' security measures to keep everyone inside.

"They've not taken the bank off the Floo Network yet have they?"

A queer look passed over Warren's face, and then he smiled wide. "No, they've probably just gotten the order written down. It'll probably be another ten minutes before the Department of Magical Transportation shuts us down."

"Brilliant."

I half-dragged Hermione over to the Floo, thanking Merlin that things hadn't changed much since I'd been in the Auror Division. The Departments of Magical Transportation and Law Enforcement were only a few levels apart, but they might've been in different countries for all the paperwork and coordinating and investigating and related bilge that it took to get a Floo shut down - especially when it was a huge business like Gringotts. I grabbed the Floo Powder off the shelf, trying to settle on where to go. Harry's Floo was closed to outsiders, there was nothing in my flat but a closet to hide in, and not even a big one at that, the Burrow was -

"Ron, I am not going anywhere." She pulled away from me. "If they want to arrest me, let them do it! I've done nothing wrong and certainly nothing illegal."

Over her shoulder, I could see Warren with his ear pressed to the door. He looked curious, not terrified, so I reckoned he wasn't hearing anything upsetting on the other side. After a minute, he whispered to us that he was going to see what was going on and swiftly left the room.

"If they wish to see what I put in that Pensieve, they're welcome to it," she said as soon as the door closed. "My memories will exonerate me. And you saw it, too. I could barely hold my wand at the end."

"D'you think any of that'll do any good? They'll try to say you did something to the memory. They might even say you did something to me to make me think that I was seeing what I think I saw. What's in that Pensieve isn't worth a half-chewed canary cream to that lot, not when it comes to you."

Not a muscle of her face moved, but I could see something in her eyes crumple, and it had the same effect as if someone had taken a pestle and bashed her right in the nose.

"I ... I swear to you, that's what happened. You have to believe me. I never used my wand -"

"I do believe you - but that's not the bloody point! They have every reason not to believe you. Whetwistle was alive at the end. There's something missing between the part where he gets up and you get up and find him dead - and they'll find that suspicious. If the person who came in at the end used your wand to kill him, then you're finished."

"What do you mean?" She looked curious. "What person? Did you see her?"

I hurriedly told her about the shadow I'd seen outside Whetwistle's shop and again after he'd picked himself up off the floor. She looked thoughtful, but went back to insisting that her wand couldn't have been used, it was right where she'd dropped it, and there was so much blood that Avada Kedavra couldn't be the cause.

"I have nothing to hide and nothing to be ashamed of. The best thing is to turn myself in and hope for the best. You go and tell Harry what's happened, and I'm sure I'll be perfectly fine." There was a hopeful lift to her voice, and she started walking briskly toward the door. "Besides, the last thing the Aurors would want to do is bring suspicion on themselves by doing something awful to me. They know their duty."

"You mean the way Kingsley and the others knew theirs?"

She didn't take another step. Hermione turned slowly, and for the first time since we'd been in the room, her gaze floated over to the Floo.

"You think they'd ... hurt me?"

"D'you want to take the chance that they wouldn't?"

I felt sick at the thought of it and a little guilty, because I knew that no one was likely to try anything really bad while Harry was around. But I needed to get her to understand that she couldn't just think of things as if she were just Hermione Jane Granger, normal witch. She wasn't - and in the eyes of the MLE, hadn't been for years. If whatever Aurors got their hands on her didn't hurt her physically, they might try something even worse to get her to break. I was willing to bet that more than a few of them would enjoy every bleeding minute of it.

Her eyes wandered to the Floo again just as Warren burst in again, breathless about how many more Aurors were in the building now and how they were going to be interviewing everyone in the building and the order to take Gringotts off the Floo Network had been sent to the Ministry ten minutes ago.

Hermione craned her neck around Warren and tried to look out the slightly open door. I couldn't hear anything, but I could see that she was a step or two farther away from me than she had been a few seconds ago, and she was starting to move toward the door.

All thoughts of being gentle and coaxing and persuasive went off. I reviewed the choices, took a breath, pointed my wand, and promised I'd apologise to her first chance I got.

"Stupefy!"

Hermione had been turning to say something to me when the spell caught her. She looked more annoyed than stunned at first, like I'd just interrupted her in the middle of a lecture on why mincing instead of chopping an ingredient for a potion wasn't just some petty detail.

And then she started to fold. I caught her before she got to the floor.

"Weasley, what the bloody hell ...?" Warren looked amazed. "What do you think you're doing?"

"Leaving," I grunted, hoisting her up and holding her close. "How much time do you think we have?"

"You're all right if you try it right now. There'll be a light on in this office when the Floos are off the network."

Warren looked back at the door for a second. "Look ... I ... it's none of my business, but I think that you know that when the Aurors talk to me, I may have to tell them the truth - that Ms. Granger was here and you helped her escape."

I gulped down the lump in my throat and nodded my understanding. He glanced at the door again.

"Is she worth it?" he asked, taking us in with a small frown. "No offense, Weasley, but just being accused of doing Avada Kedavra is serious business. She nearly got you put in Azkaban once. If you leave this building with her and they catch you, I don't think you'll be so lucky this time."

I wasn't sure if Warren was being serious or if he was just giving himself an out so that he could tell the Aurors - truthfully - that he'd tried to talk me out of it. It didn't matter anyway. I knew that there was a better than even chance that if I let Hermione walk out the door, she'd be gone forever. If keeping her from experiencing any more horror than had been heaped on her to this point cost me my freedom or something even greater - so be it. That's the way always had been. No use pretending otherwise now, not even for show.

Besides, we weren't going to get caught. Not if I had anything to say about it.

"You're a good mate, Warren," I said, shifting Hermione's weight so that I could support her more evenly. "Take care of yourself."

"You, too, Ron." There was a shadow of a smile on his face. "And for what it's worth, good luck."

As soon as he was gone again, I managed to grab a handful of Floo Powder from the can and tossed it in. I thought about Hermione's wanting to see Amsterdam and that train ticket in my pocket. The start of a plan started spinning around in my head, and pretty soon, Hermione and I were spinning along with it.

~*~

"Just hot chocolate, sir? I could bring a tea service up if you like."

I arranged the covers around Hermione's still form, made sure the pillow under her head was good and fluffy. Satisfied that everything was as right as it could be, under the circumstances, I turned around and resumed lying off my arse to Ethan, Hermione's young admirer at the Muggle inn - the Gainsvert.

"No. She, uh ... hot chocolate always peps her up when she's been ... you know." I made a motion like I was tippling from a bottle. "Throw in some Mostly Melting Marshmallows, too. The sweetness'll help her head better than a Hangover Potion."

He peered at me, startled for a moment, but grinned. Mostly Melting Marshmallows were the most brilliant things - they melted in hot liquids, but not all the way, so that as long as you had your drink, you'd get a steady stream of added sugar. They were pretty hard to come by lately, so I wasn't hopeful that they'd have any, but I wanted the young bloke to know that I knew just what he was and what this place was about.

"Mum always keeps a supply of 'em. She keeps Peppermint Toads, too, though after we made a mistake and put them in the sauce for our plum pudding, she started rethinking stocking magical sweets." Ethan bobbed his head. "I'll, uh, pop back in a bit."

He Disapparated almost immediately, which surprised me a moment since I hadn't seen his wand. I prodded the spot where he'd been and was satisfied that he had used magic and there wasn't some invisible lift in the room.

But an invisible lift was about the only thing the room didn't have. It was an elegant bit of business, all frills and soft things with sweet-smelling satchels in the oddest places - like under the bed, for example. There were large paintings of solemn-looking Muggle women wearing dresses that made them look like overgrown meringues. Slim, golden-stemmed lamps rested daintily on complicatedly carved tables on either side of the bed. That bed was something else again - it was piled so high with mattresses and blankets and pillows that you had to step on a stool and then hoist yourself up the rest of the way.

It was all nice, but I couldn't imagine how anyone could get much sleep in such a place. It seemed to me that a person would be too busy looking around at all the pretty things. Plus, everything was rather impractical and inconvenient: the bed, having to flick on three switches for the lamps, and the heavy velvet curtains that flowed over the windows and dragged along the floor when you tried to close them. About the only things that didn't take much to time to figure out were the things in the loo. Everything in there seemed pretty standard.

I climbed up the bed as quietly as I could. Sitting on the edge, I looked into Hermione's slack face. I'd done a few Healing Charms for her cuts and bruises. She was starting to look normal again, but her neck was still discoloured and a little swollen. Visions of Whetwistle's hands around her throat nipped at the edges of my memory, and I pulled the blankets up to her chin hoping to blot them out. It didn't help much, so I gave my brain something else to do by planning the next move.

On the whole, I thought it was a pretty good choice coming back to the Gainsvert. I guessed that Hermione had started staying there again since her falling out with Harry, and I turned out to be right about that. When I'd come in carrying Hermione and had spun some story about a party where the mulled wine had been too much for her, Ethan had just nodded and showed me to her room. It was rather brilliant in a way - Knightsbridge was probably the last place anyone would imagine Hermione to be. At least, it would be, if the plan I had in mind worked out.

But I had to be prepared on what to do if things didn't work out as I hoped. It'd only be a matter of time before the Ministry stepped up its efforts to get her and started putting up posters and sending out bulletins over the Wireless. And whoever killed Whetwistle was still out there, and Merlin knew what he'd do next. Whetwistle's death meant that the Galleons were going to stay where they were for the time being. I wasn't sure what that meant for Whetwistle's daughters. I had an idea about that, but I needed to work out one or two other things first.

"Here we are. Two hot chocolates with two Mostly Melting Marshmallows apiece."

I did a double-take. Ethan was in the same spot, but with a tray in his hands. He flashed a cheeky grin, but I was too knackered to want to knock the piss out of him right then. Plus, the chocolate smelled pretty good.

"I threw in some blueberry biccies, fresh from the oven. They're really good." He ducked his colourless head. "I wanted to give you something extra as an apology."

"Apology? For what?"

"For the other night." He set the tray down on one of the spindly tables and looked cautiously sideways at me. "I was pretty rude. You see, I didn't realise that it was you until much later. Though I should have figured it out before then. I mean, red hair, tall, with Ms. Granger ... my sister nearly took my head off when I told her that Ron Weasley had been two feet in front of me and I hadn't noticed."

"Well, your eyes looked like they were a little busy."

I jumped down from the bed, wincing when my feet didn't take to kindly to it. I smirked and took a biscuit. He was right; they were good.

"Yeah, I'm sorry if I was, er, disrespectful." He was blushing. "She's gorgeous, but I don't fancy stepping on any toes. Especially yours, Mr. Weasley. It's a true honour to have one of the war's biggest heroes here at the Gainsvert. Well, two, counting Ms. Granger, of course."

"Oh. Yeah, well, thanks." I wondered if we could've gotten free scones and sandwiches if Harry had been around to complete the set.

"I can't tell you how much I admire what you all did in the war." Ethan beamed at me and wiped his hair out of his eyes. "That's why I'm curious to hear your explanation as to why Ms. Granger is Stupefied, and why you've lied about it."

I started to cough, spewing bits of biscuit all over the place. Ethan just took a quiet step backward and waited for me to get it all out of my system.

"W-whuh ..." I wheezed, waving away the glass of water he held out to me. "What are you talking about?"

"I was in the Dueling Club at Hogwarts," he said offhandedly, rocking on his heels in a way that reminded me of Lupin. "I know the effects of a Stunning Charm when I see it. Pale, clammy skin, shallow breathing ... if Ms Granger were pickled like you said, she'd be puffing like a winded hippocampus, and she'd not smell like daisies and spice. Or at least not much."

He was polite and his eyes had the hero-worshipping glint to them that I tended to see turned Harry's way. I was flattered, but got over it when I saw that he'd taken a subtle defensive stand, legs bending just slightly at the knees. Now I could see his wand. He held it in a firm grip, pointing at me as almost an afterthought.

"You were in the Dueling Club? What was your favourite opening combination?"

Ethan smiled proudly and relaxed just a bit. My throat went a little dry, but I forced my eyes to stay on his face.

"Depended on my mood. If I wanted to be showy, I'd start with a Blasting Curse and Petrificus Totalus. Though that nearly got me disqualified during one competition. Usually I went with something less labour-intensive like Incarcerous or Locomotor Mortis, and that would usually be the end of it. I was quite good - gave Hufflepuff a pretty good reputation for having decent duelers. When you were in Hogwarts, did you duel, Mr Weas-"

I saw my chance. " Expelliarmus!"

The wand sailed out of his hand. Ethan's head spun around, his hair going in one direction and his nose another, as he watched his wand bounce off a wall and roll to my feet.

"Yep. I dueled a little." I bent and grabbed his wand. "Never did get around to doing really fancy spells until the war."

His wand was flexible, good cut, looked like birch. I didn't have any doubt that Ethan was pretty handy with a wand. But lucky for me, he was also pretty young. I remembered how often I'd gotten my arse handed to me when Harry, Hermione and I trained with what was left of the Order before we went into the final battle. Moody especially used to give us hell with combinations of Stunning Charms and Leg-locking Jinxes that would leave us all shaking and sore at the end.

"You know ... every time I lost a duel, it was because of that bleeding spell." Ethan sounded thoughtful and surprisingly calm for someone whose wand was in his opponent's hand. "I almost never used it. It just seemed so ... boring."

"Sometimes those are the best ones to use." I thought about being in Dumbledore's Army long ago and how Harry shut up that nesh git Boot when he told him how Expelliaramus had saved him from Voldemort.

"I suppose." Ethan laughed softly and held his hands up. "But my question still stands, sir. And I'd think twice about doing anything like Obliviating me or tying me up or anything like that. See, before I came back up with your chocolate, I left a scroll with my sister at the front desk. If I'm not back there in five minutes, that note will go off like a Howler, spelling out your name and telling her to go for help because you've done something to me."

My smile disappeared. They'd never taught us that trick in the Dueling Club.

"Sorry, Mr Weasley." He looked at his watch and brought out a thin smile. "I'm sure you have a really good explanation. I just want to make sure you're not doing anything to purposely harm Ms. Granger."

It occurred to me that Ethan might have already sent for Aurors or something and was keeping me talking until they got there. Beyond that, he could've been doing the wide-eyed innocent act in hopes of getting me to say something that would land Hermione and me in trouble for sure. Or he might've slipped a Dreamless Sleep draught in the chocolate: This time tomorrow, I might be waking up on the floor of a cell in Azkaban with ribbons of dried marshmallow fluff down my chin.

My mind went all off the road for a second before I caught up to it. Ethan was cocky and short-sighted maybe, but not an idiot. He could've just kept me in the dark and gone on letting me think that he'd believed my story about Hermione being pissed, and I wouldn't have known what hit me when the Aurors came pouring in. I decided that I had to take him at face value, and when I saw him look at his watch again, I further decided that I had to be pretty fast about it.

"I've not done anything to hurt her. What happened was -"

He waved a hand. "Right. Okay, then, enjoy your hot chocolate. If you want anything else, just tap your wand on the left table three times and someone'll be up in a flash. Dinner's available until nine. Breakfast starts at six -"

"Wait a minute!" I gaped at his retreating back. I still had his wand, but I didn't let my guard down. "I thought you said you wanted to know -"

"You just said that you're not doing anything to hurt Ms. Granger." He turned and shrugged. "You're Ron Weasley, so that's good enough for me. And I think if you wanted to do something bad to her, you would've already done it, or you would've broken my wand or something and taken your chances on footing it before my sister could get my message."

I wasn't sure how to respond. While I was thinking, I flipped him his wand. He didn't seem to feel one way or another about having it back.

He gazed up at the bed. "Are you going to revive her soon?

"Er, yeah." I followed his eyes. "That's why I wanted the hot chocolate. Hopefully it'll ease things when she comes back round."

"Wow, I never knew chocolate helped lessen the effects of a Stunning Charm."

"It doesn't that I know of. She loves hot chocolate. It's my own peace offering for Stupefying her," I grumbled. "If you find a great oily spot on the floor with a little red hair floating around, you'll know it didn't work."

"You used a Stunning Charm on her? Er, was it an accident?"

"Not ... exactly."

"Then I'd forget the chocolate if I were you and concentrate on putting up a good defense when she comes to," he said, looking pained. "When I was a Second Year, I accidentally cast Densaugeo on a girl I wanted to snog. Some tosser in Ravenclaw had told me it was a breath-freshening charm. She was in a flood over it, then she kneed me in the bollocks and never spoke to me again. Girls don't take kindly to being hexed, even if it's for their own good."

"You tried to cast a breath-freshening charm on a girl you were about to snog?"

"She really needed it," he said grimly. "Anyway, I'd better get back before my sister starts screaming her head off. If you need anything else ..."

After wrestling with the idea for a second, I finally asked him to just keep his eyes and ears open, and to let me know right away if he heard anything about Hermione or if anyone came around looking for her. He looked intrigued, but told me that at the first word, he'd come up immediately to let me know. I wasn't sure how I felt about having to trust him, but I figured I could've done worse. As far as things concerning Hermione went, Ethan was still - as far as I could tell - thinking with one hand down his trousers, so in a strange way he was about the best ally I could've asked for.

"Er, if you and Ms. Granger ever become, um, well, busy or anything, you might want to tap your wand on the door twice before you, um, get too deep into it - conversation, that is, or, uh, anything else." His face darkened to a painful-looking red. "That'll put a marker on your door letting us know you don't want to be disturbed, and it'll keep us from being able to Apparate straight into your room."

I thought about telling him not to worry about me being deep in conversation or anything where Hermione was concerned, but he seemed to be enjoying the idea of it so much that I didn't want to ruin his fun.

"What about the Muggles you have working here? Will they be able to see it, too?"

"Muggle staff doesn't service the rooms back here. Me and my sister and our mum take care of all our magical guests. Fewer misunderstandings that way." He smiled dreamily and swished his wand. " Expelliarmus! I'm going to start trying that with my sister. She always gets the best of me in duels. Thanks for the tip, Mr. Weasley."

As soon as he was gone, I struggled back on to the bed and sat swinging my legs in the air, thinking until my head was sore. I wasn't sure if I handled things all right back at Gringotts. That could come back to bite me on the arse, especially since I had no idea what Warren would end up saying or not saying, and getting a message to him wasn't a smart move.

Then there was Harry to think about. He was likely in on the hunt, which meant going to him wasn't possible. He'd be honour-bound to report anything I said to the head of the Auror Division. He wouldn't want to, but it was his job, best mate or no. And if he tried to fight against telling what he knew, well ... I knew firsthand how that'd go. I hoped that what I had in mind worked, because it was about the only way I'd be able to let Harry in on things without putting us all in danger.

But first things first. I pulled the blankets down from Hermione's chin, gazed at her for awhile, and made sure certain parts of me were pretty well out of kicking distance.

"Rennervate," I said softly, and waited.

Her nose quivered. When she opened her eyes, I winced. She had the unblinking stare of someone who'd been out in the sun too long.

"Ron? Where ... are we?"

"In a bed."

"I gathered that." She levered herself up by holding on to me and the headboard at the same time. "In a bed where, exactly?"

I told her. She grimaced and put a hand to her head.

"What happened? We ... were able to get out of Gringotts, obviously, but how -"

She broke off with a sharp snatch of breath and a look that pretty much let me know I was about to die.

"You hexed me! Ron, how could you!"

"Um ... have a hot chocolate?" I pointed to the table. "Drink it. You'll feel better."

She cut me up a bit more with her eyes before glancing down. "Is it still warm?"

"Piping hot. There's a Warming Charm on it. Mostly Melting Marshmallows in it, too. And, uh, blueberry biccies, if you want."

"No thank you." She was still looking at the table. "Is that a mug of water? I'll take that instead, please."

"Er, right." I waved my wand, and up it came. She took it with a tight smile, looked in the cup for a minute, and with one fluid motion, tossed what was in it directly in my face.

"Hermione, bloody hell!"

"Now I feel much better," she said calmly, guiding the cup back to its place while I sat there sputtering. "I think I will have a biscuit now."

"Blimey, was that necessary?"

"Well, it was about as necessary as what you did!" Her curls started to twitch. "I've been through hell this evening, and you use a Stunning Charm on me! I could've gone into cardiac arrest! Weren't you paying any attention in Madam Pomfrey's Field Medicine lessons? Sixth Year - Dumbledore insisted, after what happened to Katie Bell during the fall -"

"You mean the ones Pomfrey had while I was busy trying not to die after being poisoned by Slughorn's mead?" I used the edge of my jumper to clear out the water in my nose. "Totally slipped my mind - sorry I didn't borrow your notes!"

She wavered a little, but the way her hair was standing on end, I knew I wasn't out of the woods yet.

"Well, it was dangerous. You should never hex someone who's already been weakened by magical means. It's common sense, really. And I was going to go with you; you didn't need to force the issue!"

" - And the Aurors were coming up, Warren said, and were going to look - wait. You were going to leave with me?"

"Yes! I thought that going with you was my best option. It was wrong of me, but ... I was afraid." She bent her head. "If Gregory really was alive after I hit him, and he wasn't later ... they really wouldn't take my word for it, would they?"

The pain in her voice cracked my heart a little. I thought about hugging her, but I didn't want to take the chance that she find a way to dump the chocolate straight into my lap.

"But you were moving toward the door. It looked like you were going to give it up."

"I was trying to see if I could hear anything, if maybe Harry had come after all," she said. "When I realised that we were running out of time, I was going to tell you that we should leave, but I suppose my mouth wasn't as fast as your wand."

I started to say something, and she drew back her arm as if she were about to chuck a biscuit at me.

"Don't you even think about making any sort of silly joke!"

"Let up on me a bit, will you?" I glared at her through my dripping fringe. "They were coming up! Maybe I wasn't as smooth as I could've been, but we didn't have time to muck about. It might've been the wrong thing to do, but it's what I thought I had to."

Slowly, her brows unknit and she lowered her arm. "If they find out you helped me -"

"I know all that. It's the least of my worries at this point. I have a plan."

"Does this plan involve having to stay here?" She looked around, pulling the blankets to her shoulders. "And what about Harry? What are you going to tell him?"

"We may or may not have much of a choice where we go, whether it's here or somewhere else in London. And what I tell Harry depends on how well everything else I have in mind comes off."

"We?" Hermione slowly nibbled her biscuit. "You're going to stay with me?"

"Well, I'm about as much trouble as you are, I suppose, so I don't reckon I have much of a choice right now."

"Don't strain yourself getting so excited." Her voice was chilly.

"I need you to listen to me for a minute," I said, ignoring her shirtiness for the time being. "There's something that you may have to do, and it's really important."

"If I don't, will you hex me again?" She lowered her eyes when I started to grit my teeth. "All right, I'll leave it alone ...what is it?"

I hesitated. I was pretty sure that she wasn't going to like what I was going to ask, but we didn't have time to row about it. Every minute counted and there was more than a small chance that already it was too late.

"You have to promise me that you'll do what I tell you to."

"Well, what is it?"

"I need you to promise first," I said again. "Then I'll tell you."

"You want me to promise something without knowing what that something is?"

"You have to trust me - ow!" A biscuit caught me right in the forehead. "What was that for?"

"Ron Weasley, would I be here if I didn't trust you? If anyone else had tried to induce me to flee from the authorities, I would never have considered it, but you're ..." She sighed and picked at the covers. "I promise. Whatever it is, I'll do it."

"You can't go off on your own because you think of something 'better.' It has to be exactly as I -"

"I said yes!" Her eyes flashed. "Shall we take an Unbreakable Vow, or will you simply stop wasting time and tell me what needs to be done?"

"All right," I said, satisfied that I had her where I needed her. "I'm going to leave in a minute to go to the Auror Division. I think I have a way to get them chasing their tails for a bit, but it'll be tricky. They may not believe me, and if they do know that I helped you get away from them at Gringotts, then there's no way they'll let me go."

"Ron, you shouldn't -"

" - It's nearly eight o'clock," I hurried on, not wanting to lose what bit of confidence I had that everything would turn out all right. "I want you to wait here until about ten. Here's where the promise comes in."

I got my fringe out the way so that I could look her in the eyes. "If ten o'clock comes round and I'm not back, I want you to get out of here. Take this."

I fished my wallet out and handed over my train ticket to Amsterdam. "But whatever you do, don't get on this train. Do you understand? Don't get on it."

Hermione rifled through the pages of ticket. "Well, I couldn't get on it even if I wanted to. It left a half-hour ago."

"Right. But on the back, it says that you can get your money back if you miss the train. You just lose twenty pounds out of what you paid to start with. But don't go to Amsterdam. Do you have money?"

"Well, I don't have very much on me," she said slowly, "but I can withdraw from my American bank account."

"No, that's what you can't do. They might have some way of finding you that way. Someone stole from the twins' Muggle account and they were able to catch the prat all the way out in Cologne. There were even pictures of him doing it. Here." I took out the remainder of what I had cashed out of my Gringotts vault and pressed it into her hands. "It's not very much, but you'll be able to live on it for awhile if you need to."

"I can't take this -"

"You have to. If I don't get back, that means they've got me, and they'll make me tell what I know. You have to be gone by then, but remember - not Amsterdam, all right? If they give me Veritaserum, they'll find out I gave you a ticket to go there."

"But if they give you Veritaserum, they'll find out that you told me not to go there."

"True. But they won't know where you've really gone, because I won't know where you've gone. I'll just know that it wasn't Amsterdam."

Hermione was flipping through the ticket again, but she glanced up sharply when I said that. The uncertainty in her eyes had been replaced with something else, and I knew she'd caught on. I looked away from her stricken expression but forced myself to keep talking.

"You have to get the money from that ticket and use it to buy one somewhere else. I don't care where. It doesn't even have to be a train if you don't want. Just get as far away from London as quick as you can. Don't try to go back your place in America or over to your parents. Those'll be the first places they'll look."

"If you don't know where I am, then how will I know what happens to you? Or when it's safe to come back? Or if I even can?" Her voice shook. "I won't have any means of contacting you or ... anyone here?"

"No. Not for awhile." I faced her again, hating what I saw in her eyes. "Probably not until we find out who killed Whetwistle or are able to prove that it wasn't you in a way that no one would be able to doubt."

I let her know about Ethan, and told her that if he came up with news, even if it was before ten o'clock, she was to leave immediately. Hermione didn't answer, but she put the ticket in her purse and shut it without looking at it. The tenseness of the moment made her face look gray and tight, and I almost wished that they would just take me so that she could get away from everything - me included - and not look back and maybe have a chance of a moment's peace.

"All right, I'd better get going." I took my wallet back and got into my coat. "Another thing: don't go anywhere unless you have to. I don't want any of the other people staying here to see you around."

Out of the corner of her eye, I saw her shoulders slump, but she murmured that she'd stay put until the time came to move or until I returned.

"If I don't get back, you'll go, yeah? I have your word?"

"I'll go." Her voice was low. "I've said I will, haven't I?"

I swung around to face her. There something in her voice that didn't sit well with me. It was quiet and proper, but there was a mutinous edge to it that made my neck itch.

"I want to hear you say it again."

She bristled. "Ron!"

"It's just a couple of words." I watched her closely. "It'll make me feel better about things."

"Honestly -" she huffed, nearly blowing me off the bed. "All right, fine. Are you listening?"

I was, but she wasn't talking. She'd grabbed a handful of my shirt and pulled me in for a kiss that I felt in my toenails. I could smell the daisies and spice Ethan had mentioned - but I couldn't figure out how the bloody hell he'd been near enough to her to be able to smell anything - and her hair curled around my fingers. I didn't know when I get to be so close to her again. I didn't want to think about it. I didn't want to stop kissing her. I didn't want to leave. But I knew I didn't have any choice with those last two.

"Satisfied?" she murmured when we pulled apart. She still held me by the shirt, and her breath blew gently over my nose.

I swallowed back a "no." I wasn't satisfied by a long stretch - that'd take a lot more than just a snog - but I got myself to rights and lowered my eyes.

"Yeah, I ... think we understand each other."

Hermione shook her head when I jumped down from the bed and got ready to leave. I decided I wouldn't Apparate until I got outside the inn. That way, I could poke around to see if anyone suspicious was larking about, and I'd still be able to get to the Ministry without wasting a lot of time.

I stopped when I got to the door. I knew Hermione wasn't looking at me, but I turned round anyway, just in case I was wrong and she was waiting for me to say goodbye or good luck or something soft and useless like that.

And then my brain turned over.

"Her."

Hermione looked over at me. "What is it?"

"What's what?"

"Didn't you just call me?"

"What? No, I said her. Actually, you said her."

"Ron, what are you talking about?"

I stared ahead, my mind drawing me back into what I'd seen at Whetwistle's shop. "Back at Gringotts, when I said that someone had come in the room just as Whetwistle was getting up again, you asked me if I saw her. All I saw was a shadow. What made you think it was a her?"

"I have no earthly idea what you're ..." Hermione trailed off with a little shake of her shoulders. "Oh ... oh! Yes - when I ... woke up, the first thing I saw was Gregory on the floor in a pool of blood. I bent to check his pulse, and when I did, I heard a noise in the main room and someone calling out for him, asking if anything was wrong. It was a woman's voice. I ... I ... I lost my head and ran out the back door. I never saw who it was."

"Did you recognise the voice?"

"I thought I did," she said, rubbing her neck in a way that made me have to turn and face the door. "It sounded a bit like Katherine, his wife. But the more the woman talked, the less certain I was that it was her. The voice was too deep and there was a hint of a Scottish accent. When I was outside Gregory's shop, out of the corner of my eye, I could see someone in the doorway of the shop next door. It's a cheese shop run by two sisters from Glasgow. Gregory always talked about how hideous and fat one of them was, and how she always popped in with tea cakes and Camembert cheese, both of which he hates. I just assumed that if anyone came in at all, it would have been that woman popping in to check on him."

I thought about the squat shadow I'd seen in the doorway of that shop and later, in Whetwistle's little back room. There hadn't been any telltale, er, shapes that would've let me know if the shadow belonged to a woman, but there had been something interesting about that shadow that I couldn't quite put my finger on ...

But there hadn't been anyone yelling for Whetwistle before that shadow had come around - just the sound of Whetwistle moaning in pain after Hermione had hit him, and the creak of a door opening. I didn't know what to make of it, but I decided to keep it in mind just in case.

"All right, then, I'm off -"

"Ron?"

I turned around. Hermione was staring into the mug of water she'd thrown at me, trailing her finger around the rim. I took a nice, long look, knowing that if things shook out that I'd never see Hermione again, this was how I wanted to remember her - with her hair tumbling free about her face in a big fluffy bed, surrounded by beauty and comfort and soft things. She looked small and fragile surrounded by those mountains of pillows - like one of those women in the Muggle fairy tale books that my Mum used to read to Ginny when we were sprogs. But that sort always seemed to be wringing their hands, waiting for some bloke to climb up their hair or something stupid like that to rescue them. Hermione looked ready to pull a bloke's heart out through his nose if he tried to get too comfortable with her. I reckoned that if Ethan was planning on making a move once I was out of the way, he was going to need all his dueling expertise to keep Hermione from taking his head off.

She suddenly lifted her head and gave me long, heated look that felt a little like the snog we'd had earlier. My mouth burned and I bit down on my bottom lip to keep my face from catching fire.

"If you're not back by ten o'clock," she said, shaking the empty cup at me. "I may have to start hating you."

"Don't worry. If I don't make it back, I'll hate myself enough for the both of us," I mumbled, closing the door on her startled expression.

~*~

I spent a few minutes going around the inn - including that bloody garden - and didn't see anything suspicious. Ethan was outside with the frozen bloke at the front door, sweeping the snow off the steps. I took him aside, and he said he hadn't heard anything on the Wireless and there hadn't been any owl bulletins from the Ministry, either. Satisfied, I went in the direction he pointed in where he said no Muggles ever went and I'd be able to Apparate without being seen.

I went where he directed me and stood there out in the cold, my wand in the air. A thought had hit me like a dropped brick in the few minutes it took to the little secluded place, and that thought needed room to grow, so I gave it that. And then it needed a little exercise, so I gave it that - by turning around and walking to the tube station. The thought stretched out, happy and contented, as I got on the tube and wound away from Knightsbridge miles in the wrong direction.

The thought was something like this: If I wasn't caught out now, sooner or later, the lie would catch up to me. Warren would tell what he knew or Harry wouldn't be able to cover for us, or they might stumble on the Gainsvert and Ethan would have to talk. No matter how it shook out, the MLE would realise they'd gotten the wrong end of things, and I'd had both hands in it.

In that case, it wouldn't do much good for me to hang about, either, and since Hermione and I were mixed up in things together, why not stay mixed up in them and go off together? I thought about how the light had snapped into her eyes when she asked if I was staying with her, and then faded out when I'd been sort of a git about it.

Staying together was pretty practical - along with being pretty dangerous and probably a little stupid, but nothing was perfect. It made sense to me in one important way: Whoever killed Whetwistle was an even bigger danger to Hermione now that dear Gregory was dead. Now marriage was off the table, the only thing standing between whoever it was and that money was time. Three years. After that, the hex would be off the gold, and it'd be all clear for Hermione. But then all the threats and shady figures appearing and disappearing would start up again, except Hermione would be the target.

If she were on her own, this blighter would hang about to terrorize her the whole three years, turning her mind to mush, making her jump at every shadow, making her afraid to even breathe hard. It'd be a bloody miserable life, with the joy of it bled out bit by bit. But if I were around, the danger was cut in half. I could stay with her, keep her close, keep her moving from place to place. Frustrate the bloke until he gave up or slipped up. And then there was the MLE. It might send Aurors or Hit Wizards after her. Hermione was clever, but they could be even cleverer, especially when given a reason to be that had formed over the course of a decade.

But three years was a bloody long time to be on the run, especially when you were running from two separate lots. Hermione couldn't go back to America to her teaching post and I couldn't go to Harry's or the Burrow or anywhere else that made sense to go. We'd have to be on the jump all the time trying to stay ahead of the Auror Division and of whoever it was that had come into that little room and killed Whetwistle once Hermione had gone under. And to do that, we'd need money.

I had money - the money Daphne had given me. It could last the two of us a long time, if we weren't flashy about it. That was a good thing. There was just one problem: it was all back at my flat with my other bags and "our" picture. It wouldn't take much time to grab the money, leave, put everything under a Locking Charm and then go to the Ministry - but every minute I larked about was one I couldn't get back and might need later on. I wrestled with leaving it and just going on with the original plan, but the thought took over my head again and I reckoned I'd better chance it.

When I got off the tube, I slunk to a corner of the station where I had the best chance of Apparating without attracting attention. I waited in a little dark nook as Muggles hurried by to catch other trains. I was gone before the footsteps fell away.

The darkness shifted, but I didn't move. Light hit my eyes like a slap, and I had to rub them to get clear. When I was able to see, I blinked and rubbed my eyes again. Nothing changed; I wondered if somehow I'd gotten things so mixed up that I'd managed to bypass the telephone box and had Apparate straight to Level Two of the Ministry, because standing around me in sort of a loose circle were two or three Aurors blinking at me, wands drawn. We just stared at each other as a voice from inside my bedroom yelled that he'd found something "interesting." A short, thin bloke in trailing robes came marching out with a pair of Hermione's knickers.

When the prat held them up to eye level and started "examining" them, I took a step forward, ignoring the circle of wands pointing at my head.

"What the hell -"

An iron grip fell on my shoulder from behind, cutting into my words and a bone or two. While I tried not to faint from the pain, a familiar voice that was way too cheerful for the circumstances washed over my head.

"Ron Weasley! Just the man I'd hoped to see!"