The Heiress

"Have a seat, Ronald." Her lips peeled back into what couldn't be properly called a smile. "It's been quite a while."

I rubbed the back of my neck. "A few years, yeah?"

"At least. I think I saw you in Hogsmeade a bit before your wedding. You know, I still have some of your things at my flat. A toothbrush, I think, and a pair of undershorts. They have Quaffles embroidered on the bum. Birthday present?"

"Christmas," I mumbled, feeling my scalp start to sizzle. I remembered those shorts, and I remembered the last time I'd seen them. Susan had been taking them off me - with her teeth. She didn't really look it, but Susan had been a real pepperpot between the sheets. It really was always the quiet ones.

"I wish I'd known you were coming." Her lips twitched again. "I would've brought the lot with me."

I looked helplessly over at McLaggen, who looked torn between wanting to laugh and wanting to pretend none of this was happening. I was with him there - at least on the pretending part. To me, there wasn't anything the least bit funny about the situation. Having to face a bird you'd run out on without a word of warning wasn't exactly how I wanted to spend my evening

I'd never given much thought to Susan Bones during our time in Hogwarts, save for when her Aunt Amelia had died, and here and there during the final battle. She'd been in my Auror training class along with Harry. We'd never gone out on missions together, but from what I'd heard and seen of her in training, she was a capable Auror who seemed ripe to pick up where her aunt had left off.

Then I'd been drummed out of the Corps and didn't see her again until Neville Longbottom's wedding to Hannah Abbott. I was wasting away in Gringotts by then and Susan had been promoted to head of the Division. We'd spent the wedding talking and the next two or three months doing a little more than that. It had been quite nice, actually. My parents had liked her, having known her and her family so well for so many years. She was smart, funny, and the shagging had been almost brilliant at times. If I wasn't perfectly happy, I was damn near.

Until one morning after we'd had dinner and a tumble. I'd woken, dressed - forgetting my Quaffle shorts, apparently - and just wanted to leave. I never really knew what it was that had set me off, but when I'd gotten up that morning, I'd known somehow that something had changed. That it was over. I knew I might regret it, but I knew I didn't really have a choice. If I stayed, I'd hurt her, and she didn't deserve that. So I'd gotten dressed quickly and quietly, kissed her cheek softly, and skipped out.

I didn't hear from Susan after that and figured I never would again. Ginny had given me hell, going on about how Susan was a sweet girl and I was a heartless tosser. She was right. I didn't have a heart; it was somewhere across the ocean in some Muggle town I'd never heard of in the possession of someone I had spent years trying to forget. I'd known that being with Susan wouldn't bring my heart back to me, and I always fancied that she'd never tried to get in touch because she'd known it, too.

Done reading McLaggen's parchment, Susan focused her attention on him. "Cormac, I've gotten word that there was some row up in the Division. Is everything all right?"

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw McLaggen staring straight ahead, not even so much as breathing in my direction.

"Yes, Deputy Minister. Just the lads getting a bit out of pocket. Nothing serious. Zacharias Smith got injured. He may be out of action for a few days."

"There's a loss." Her voice dripped sarcasm. "Lend him to Magical Creatures: He can work at his desk re-sorting reports on the hippogriff relocation program."

"Shame we can't lend him to the Centaur Liaison Office," said McLaggen with a snort. "Permanently."

Susan's eyes found mine for a second and the little smirk she gave me was like a smack upside the head. She turned back to McLaggen.

"Your report seems in order, Cormac, but there is one thing I find a bit puzzling."

"Yes, ma'am?"

She consulted the parchment. "It says here that Hermione Granger tossed water on Ronald, and in the confusion, she Disapparated to parts unknown."

"That's right, Deputy Minister. Got him right in the face."

Susan eyed me with that same hard smile. "Is that so, Ron?"

I squirmed a bit, feeling pinned by her gaze. "It's all there in the report. Something wrong?"

"Well ... you were in Dumbledore's Army back in Hogwarts," she said. "You also left our Auror class with top marks in wandsmanship and defensive spellcasting. So I find it a little strange that you'd be disarmed by a glass of water."

"I ..." I swallowed hard, and tried again. The story I'd spun out for McLaggen was sticking in my throat. I could almost taste the Veritaserum running down my gullet. "She ..."

But then McLaggen, bless him, sailed in. "Begging your pardon, Deputy Minister, but it all seems on the level to me. You don't have to throw hexes around if you catch a wizard looking the wrong way. When Granger gets her back up, she can really catch you off your guard. I've been there myself with her."

Susan and I both just looked at him. Other than that Christmas 'do in the "Slug Club" all those years ago, I couldn't think of when McLaggen would've been close enough to have been anywhere with Hermione enough to make that determination.

"Well then, I guess that answers that." She was still looking at me and I was still squirming. "Thank you, Cormac. Lovely job by you and your team. You can return to your post now."

"Thank you, Deputy Minister." McLaggen turned to go, resting a hand on my shoulder briefly. "Take care of yourself there, Weasley."

"You, too ... old mate."

He chuckled as he walked out of the room, shutting the door behind him. As soon as the locking charm engaged, silence thundered in like a hinkypunk coming in out of the rain.

"Well. A bit awkward, this is," she said after a moment, and laughed lightly.

"A bit."

It went quiet again. We found other places in the room to look at until that got old and then we just sat staring at each other. I felt sweat collecting under my chin. This was almost worse than interrogation, and I gained a little insight on why Charlie limited himself to one-offs with anonymous girls in Muggle villages.

"You know, for weeks, I wondered what I'd done to run you off," she said coolly. "Was I a troll? Was I awful in bed? Did you hate my cooking ..."

The drops of sweat were turning into rivers. "Er, no -"

"But then it came to me; it wasn't any of that." Her smile dropped away completely. "It was rather a relief to realise that you were just a gormless prat."

I swallowed hard. Right. I was going to prison.

"I wasn't certain at first, but when I'd heard you were marrying Daphne Greengrass, it became rather obvious. Quite a shame, really." She raised her shoulders. "I'd always thought you were a bit more clever than others gave you credit for and certainly one of the more clever Aurors the Ministry had ever had. But you really weren't more clever, Ronald. You were just taller."

I cringed under the impact of her words. I didn't want to hear it, but Susan was right: I had been a gormless git. Probably worse than that, actually. It was funny, too, to know that I'd punched Smith in part because I remember what he'd done before the final battle, and I'd done no better in Apparating out of Susan's life without a thought as to her feelings. If I'd known then that in a few years, she'd have the power to throw me into a dungeon for the rest of my days with just a wave of her wand and a smile, I would've been a lot more sensitive.

"Susan, I'm sorry. I ... I don't have any excuse." I spoke quickly, seeing my life flash before my eyes. "It was never you, I just ... I was a git, that's all, like you said. A bloody fuckwit. A tossing pisspot. A buggering -"

She laughed suddenly, her hair whipping around her shoulders in that long braid she still wore.

"Oh, that's lovely! I've been itching to say that to you for years, and I never thought I'd get the chance. Your apology just makes it all even more brilliant."

I felt the air seep out of me, leaving me feeling incredibly like a ... well, I'd already gone down the list.

"Glad I could help," I almost growled the words, but then I caught myself. Barely.

"Oh, do get that look off your face, Ron. You've earned a bollicking and you know it," she said loftily. "But it's all right. I've gotten over it. It just took a bit of time ... and a little more than a bit of Roger Davies."

My eyes darted to her hand and took in the golden band on her finger I'd somehow missed.

"Congratulations. Davies is a lucky man. He might fancy those Quaffle shorts, you know."

"He might, but then I'd have to explain the bite marks, now wouldn't I?"

I almost smiled. Yeah, Davies was a lucky little blighter.

"Now ... as much as I'd love to rub your nose in what you missed out on, I don't have very much time, and there are important things to discuss." Susan leaned forward, her expression turning very serious. "Where is she?"

I sat up straight. "What? Who?"

She gave me that hard-edged smile again. "Hermione Granger, of course."

"I don't know." I heard the waver in my voice and hated it. "Like I said in the report -"

"This report? Is total chuff." She waved it at me. "A glass of water, Ron?"

"Listen: I don't know where she is!"

"Ron, if there are more Death Eaters other than this Whetwistle, she might be in great danger. And you've wasted everyone's time with this nonsense."

She crumpled the parchment in her hand and tossed it in the wastebasket. "I could arrest you for giving a false statement to a Ministry official. Or for aiding and abetting a witch of interest in an investigation. Or for just being a complete idiot!"

I sat back again. "Well, one out of three isn't bad, I suppose."

"And which one would it be?" Susan studied me for a long moment. "You really don't know where she is?"

I looked at the small clock that hung over the desk and considered how true that was. It was nine-thirty. I clenched my teeth and tried not to think about it.

"No."

"And even if you did, you wouldn't tell me, would you?"

I didn't hesitate. "No."

"Then what is it you wanted to tell Rufus?"

"That Hermione didn't kill Whetwistle."

"And you know this because ...?"

"Because I ..." My voice was going; my throat was dry. Bloody brilliant. The moment of truth, and I sounded like a constipated toad. "I ..."

"You ...?" She made a motion with her hand for me to hurry it along.

"It was me." I cleared my throat. In for a Galleon, in for a Knut. I raised my chin and spoke up. "I did it. I killed him."

"You." Her voice was flat. "You killed him?"

"That's what I said." I cleared my throat again. "Hermione didn't have anything to do with it. She didn't know what I was about - er, shouldn't you be writing this down?"

"Not until I hear the whole story." She folded her arms. "All right. So it was you. How?"

I was surprised that she was taking it all so calmly. She seemed almost bored, to tell the truth. I'd expected that after that little statement, she'd have McLaggen running back in there trying to break my other arm.

"How?"

"Yes, Ronald. How did you kill him exactly? You see, I have to ask these questions, since none of this is in Cormac's report."

I thought about what I'd seen in the Pensieve, Whetwistle getting up after Hermione'd hit him. The door opening and that shadow ... Something was familiar about that shadow. It was on the edge of my mind, but I couldn't draw it out of me. Susan made an impatient noise, and I snapped back to it.

"How else? The Killing Curse."

"I see." She pressed her fingers together and rested her chin on them. Reminded me a bit of McGonagall. "Did you suspect he was a Death Eater?"

"No. He'd been telling us all he was a Squib. I've never heard of a wizard, and a Pureblood at that, pretending to be a Squib before. It seemed to all check out. We never thought anything of it."

"Yes, well, we've never heard of him either. His father was someone of importance in the wizarding world. His brother, too, but for vastly different reasons. But there's nothing in the Ministy's records that shows Edward Whetwistle even had a second son," she said, twirling her quill around her finger. "So then how is it you came to ... cause his death?"

"McLaggen says you've heard about what he was about, how he ties into what happened at Gringotts and all."

"I was there when Harry Potter debriefed the Minister." She pressed her lips together. "Finally."

"Harry really got his arse warmed over by Scrimgeour? He didn't mean anything by it. He only wanted to help Hermione - and Whetwistle's family, come to that."

"The Minister was beside himself that Harry withheld such crucial information, but it's Harry. He'll be all right. Now what's that to do with the killing?"

"Well, Hermione was going to marry this Whetwistle -"

"This was supposed to release hex on the gold, from what I read in Harry's report?"

"Right, but I ... didn't fancy her doing that. There was always something about Whetwistle that seemed off to me, even though I never thought it would turn out to be as bad as it was. I didn't think she should go through with it."

"Did you tell her that?"

I thought about that morning in my old flat, the two of us screaming at each other. Hermione in just a towel. My mind lingered a little over that last image before I was able to get on with it.

"In a manner of speaking, yeah."

"Meaning you rowed and she told you to get stuffed?" She smiled faintly at my little grunt. "Hogwarts wasn't that long ago, you know. Go on."

"I followed Hermione. I knew she was going to see Whetwistle before the wedding. She went to his shop in Muggle London -"

"Followed her? Did she see you?"

"I was pretty good at concealment when I was an Auror," I knew I sounded a little grumpy, but it was a bit of a pill to remember how good I'd been at a job I'd never be able to do again. "Nobody saw me. Anyway, she got to his shop and went in -"

"And you ... what? Transfigured yourself into a flobberworm so that you could get under the doorway?"

I hesitated. "No ... I ... you know, Apparated inside the shop after she'd gone in."

"In broad daylight. In a Muggle area." Susan raised a disapproving eyebrow. "Well done, Ron."

"This place was completely empty. No one saw me; I looked around to make sure."

"Mmm. All right." She didn't look very convinced. "Go ahead."

"He'd taken her to a little room at the back of his shop. He had tea ready, but he'd put something in it. She didn't realise that until later, though. He was fine for a minute and they talked, but he got hacked off when she told him she wanted him to sign a Writ of Dissolution so she wouldn't be stuck married to him after they got the gold. He went mad, said he'd been a Death Eater and showed her the old Dark Mark on his arm. Then ... then she couldn't fight him because of that ruddy tea, and he was forcing himself on her, and I ... I just did it."

I was breathing hard and I felt exhausted from the effort of speaking and having to remember it all. " He never saw it coming."

"And what was Hermione doing throughout all this?"

"Whatever he put in her tea knackered her. She managed to whomp him on the head, but he'd hit her. Torn her knickers off. Choked her ... scratched ... she had bites on her face ..."

"Oh, Merlin ..." Susan looked a little green, and it took her a minute to shake it away. "What did you do after casting Avada Kedavra?"

"Hermione was coming round. I picked her up and Apparated her back to my flat. She came to a little later. I wanted to take her to Harry, but she thought going to him meant having to come here, and she wasn't about to do that, knowing how many Aurors would be hanging about. The rest happened like I told McLaggen. I don't know where she is now." I tried not to look at the clock again. It was nine thirty-seven now, the hands of the clock marching relentlessly on.

"I didn't go there to kill him," I went on. "He would've forced himself on Hermione if I hadn't stopped him, and once he married her and got control of all that gold, he probably would've killed her, too."

And I did believe that. As much as he might've wanted her, I couldn't think that a Death-Eating Pureblood maniac would fancy being married to a Muggleborn. Whetwistle had stayed married to a woman he hated and who couldn't do magic just because she was a Pureblood, after all. He wouldn't've been the first wizard to do that, but it didn't make it any more right.

Susan gave me a minute to get myself together. "Anything else?

I shook my head. "That's all of it. I did what I needed to do to protect Hermione, and that's my statement."

"Very well then." She held out her hand. "Turn over your wand."

I paused, but took it out and pushed it across the desk. It was procedure, taking the wand of someone who'd cast an Unforgiveable. I'd known it would happen, and still, my head was spinning.

"If I'm going to be taken in, could I send an owl to my sister?" I said heavily, sitting back in the chair. "I don't fancy my parents finding out I've been arrested by picking up the Prophet tomorrow morning."

"Hmmm." She took her wand out and muttered something, waving it over mine. "Very interesting, this wand."

"Eh? Not really. Just a chestnut with a dragon heartstring. Though it was a Death Eater's once ... a Death Eater that was me and my brothers' pet rat for a bit."

I muttered that last bit. Even though it was almost a lifetime ago, I still hated thinking about all that.

"Thank you for that illuminating tidbit, Ron," she said dryly. "But actually, what I find even more interesting about this wand is that according to my trace charm, an Unforgivable hasn't been cast with it in a very long time. Years, in fact."

I almost swore. I'd forgotten about Priori Incantem. That was procedure, too.

"I ... didn't use my wand. Hermione had been made to drop hers. I saw it on the floor when I popped in. I wasn't thinking, I just grabbed it -"

"And did the Killing Curse." She rifled through a stack of parchment. "You're sure about that?"

"I've done the Killing Curse before, you know. Sort of unmistakable, that is."

"You're certain it hit him?"

"He's dead isn't he? Last I checked, Harry and the Bastard-Who-Still-Must-Not-Be-Named-But-Is-Dead-as-Doorknobs still are the only people to ever survive being hit by Avada Kedavra."

"True. And Mr. Whetwistle wouldn't've have beaten the odds ... if that's how he'd been killed." She stared hard at me. "Which it wasn't."

My breath rushed out of me. "What?"

"He didn't die from Avada Kedavra," she said, sliding a piece of parchment toward me. "This is the Healers' sutopsy report. It was Sectumsempra. Very well done, too. Tiny little cuts all over his body. Mr. Whetwistle went very slowly and very painfully, and there was a great deal of blood loss."

"Couldn't've happened to a better bloke," I muttered, glancing at the page that detailed just how he'd gone off. Sectumsempra? Well, that would account for all the blood Hermione had said she'd seen. Whoever had killed him had wanted him to suffer, which didn't bring any tears to my eyes, but it made me wonder.Hermione had been lying there while whoever it was had killed Whetwistle bit by bit. For all that person knew, Hermione was just a little stunned and could come out of it at any time and catch 'em in the act. The Killing Curse would've been a lot surer and quicker, so it made me wonder if whoever had killed Whetwistle had known that Hermione would be out long enough for them to take their sweet time torturing Whetwistle to death.

And Hermione hadn't mentioned anything about blood. If nothing else, Sectumsempra was pretty ... messy, especially a fatal case of it. The place should've been covered in blood, and that's not a detail I could imagine Hermione leaving out, no matter how shaken up she might've been.

"So, let me see if I understand all this," said Susan in a pleasant sort of tone. "You followed Hermione - the cleverest witch of our day - without her ever being the wiser, to a shop in Muggle London. You Apparated inside the shop in full view of other Muggle businesses and then somehow managed to land in a spot where neither Hermione nor Whetwistle could see you. He attacked Hermione, and instead of pulling out your own perfectly usable wand - previously owned by your pet rat Death Eater - you picked up Hermione's wand, which would have cost you valuable seconds whilst she was being attacked, and then you cast Avada Kedavra, which somehow turned into Sectumsempra. You waited the full 30 minutes that the Healers say it took for him to die, then grabbed Hermione up, took her off, waited 'til she came round, after which she splashed water on you and popped off. Is that about right?"

The entire time she spoke, she looked at me as though she thought I might've been dropped on the head as a baby.

I was quiet a minute. "Did I mention that the size of the glass was about -"

"Ron, enough of this nonsense!" she flared, springing up half out of her chair. "Do you really take me for a moront?"

"Well, I -"

"Save it! I already have a headache. I know you didn't kill him." Susan sounded weary now. "And not just because that was an utterly ridiculous story from beginning to end."

I felt a little put out by that. If nothing else, I'd spent a little time putting together something believable. It wasn't as if I'd spun out the equivalent of The Warlock's Hairy Heart or anything.

"Look, what's so hard to believe? He was about to rape her!" I'd been avoiding that word all night, and now there it was, raw and ugly and out in the open. I was getting angry, and the office of the Deputy Minister of Magic wasn't the place to get angry. I didn't care. "I wasn't going to just stand about and let him do it. What do you take me for?"

"You really don't want me to answer that!" she shot back, then bit her lip as if she hadn't meant to get so shirty with me. When she spoke again, her voice was smoother and more controlled.

"I know that you didn't kill him because according to the Healers who examined the body, Whetwistle died around six in the evening."

"So?"

"So, I was in Newfield this evening," she said, quietly. "I went to put flowers on my Aunt Amelia and Uncle Edgar's graves. I go every week at this time and I saw you there. You were soaked to the skin from the rain. You could've done a Shield Charm, you know. Everyone else had one up."

I went pale. Bugger. Bugger, bugger, bugger.

"Unless you're able to be in two places at once, you couldn't have been anywhere near his shop when Mr. Whetwistle breathed his last," she said, glaring at me again. "I can only assume you know so much about what happened because you saw Hermione after her attack, and she told you."

I didn't know what to say. All this, then, had been for a good bit of nothing. I hadn't counted on there being evidence that I hadn't done it. I expected that the Ministry would nose around for awhile and decide I'd done it to save Hermione and let it go at that. Now, they knew something was off-colour and I'd just given them enough reason to go after Hermione even harder.

"I know what you're trying to do. It's lovely, in a completely arse-ended way. " Susan's expression softened just enough for me to notice it. "Hermione was - is - my friend. I don't want to see her hurt any more than you do, but she needs to come here. We need to talk to her. If she's truly innocent, she has nothing to fear. But it's her duty as a member of the magical community to help us. And it's your duty not to make it more difficult than it already will be!"

"If she did come in, she'd be safe here? You could guarantee that?"

Susan started to speak, but stopped. "What's that on your jumper?"

I looked down at the dark spots of Smith's blood that was staining the front of my shirt. When I looked up again, I stared straight into her eyes.

"Just a little something to remind me how safe it is here for people the Ministry considers enemies."

Susan didn't say anything for a long time. "People here have long memories, Ron, but not all of us are like that."

"It doesn't have to be all of you. Just one's enough!" My hands gripped the arms of the chair. "Hermione didn't do anything, and everyone here still wants to get at her. But they don't see her as a victim. All they see is the 'bint who turned in the lads back then.' A Death Eater attacked her tonight. A smegging Death Eater, and Hermione's being treated like she's the criminal! Far as I'm concerned, whoever did take him off deserves an Order of Merlin!"

"I would agree - unless it's another Death Eater. And if it is, then neither you nor Hermione would have done anyone here any favours by not cooperating."

Susan stood up and glowered down at me. "You know, if you'd told this same story to Rufus, he would've been happy to take your statement, put you in Azkaban and throw away the key. And he'd still be interested in talking to Hermione."

"He'd have to find her first, though, now wouldn't he?" I stood, too, matching her frown for frown.

"Ron, you're out of your depth." Her voice was very low. "I know you're very used to being a hero, but this is a different time and place. This isn't a game."

I felt my expression change and saw Susan's cheeks burn red. "I reckon I knew that the minute I saw Hermione being choked to within an inch of her life."

Susan's breath caught, and her eyes glittered darkly. She held my look for a moment and her cheeks blazed even brighter. "I'm glad he's dead ... whoever might've done it," she said thickly, pure hate shining from her eyes. "I know you may have wished you had done it, Ron, and I couldn't blame you there."

I nodded, satisfied. That's all I needed to hear. Whatever else happened to me now, didn't matter. "Are you going to go to Scrimgeour now and tell him to draw up charges, or are you going to let me get a running start, y'know, for old time's sake?" I knew it probably wasn't a good idea to joke about it, but I figured that under the circumstances, Iwasn't going to do any more harm than I had already.

Her mouth twisted a little at the edges. "What I'm going to do is hope Hermione does the right thing and comes in of her own accord. As much piffle as you've thrown at me tonight, I do believe that you don't know where she is now. I have my theories on why you don't know, but that's not important. Fair warning: We're going to keep looking for her, Ron. As for this 'conversation' and this 'confession,' it never happened."

"You're going to let me go? Just like that?" I was happy, but a little stunned and a lot suspicious. "What about those charges? The 'abetting a witch of interest' and that ..."

"The only thing I could truly charge you for is being a horrible liar. More's the pity that's not a crime."

"If it were, then the only difference between Azkaban and the Ministry would be that the loos are better here."

She leaned her head to the side in a way that told me she was amused and trying not to show it too much. "You know, this is all rather sweet and Gryffindor of you, charging in and trying to take all the blame. If you'd thrown me over to go back to Hermione, I might've understood. But Daphne-bloody-Greengrass? Merlin's bum, Ronald, were you mad?"

"No, that came after I married her."

Susan laughed loudly, flipping back her braid of hair, and I grinned. She was still pretty and lively and clever. And I had been a tosser. It might've been good between is, if I'd let it. But considering the positions we were in now, maybe it had all worked out for the best.

"Goodnight, Ron." She leaned over and gave me a strong hug, which surprised me a little. I returned it, but kept an eye open to make sure her hands didn't wrap themselves around my neck.

She pulled back and gave me something of a real smile. "Have a care for those dangerous glasses of water in the future, all right?"

"No problem. Sticking to Firewhiskey from here on. Better kick to it."

Susan murmured something almost rude under her breath, but grinned as she crossed to open the door. Halfway there, she slowed down, as if she was remembering something.

"Wait, there is one thing in Cormac's report I wanted to ask about, and you mentioned it again in your 'confession.' You said he spiked her tea with something. We took all the evidence from the scene and tested it, but we didn't find anything of the sort. Are you sure it was the tea?"

"Yeah. He'd put something in it that made her have to do what he told her." I shuddered at the memory of her being controlled that way. "The more she tried to fight it, the more hurt she got, until she couldn't take it anymore."

"I've never heard of a poison like that ... or a hex either." She fiddled with her wand. "This sounds more and more like Dark Magic. Whoever this Whetwistle was, he was extremely, extremely dangerous."

" He told her that it was like the potion form of Imperio."

Susan's head snapped back and her eyes went dishy. "What was that?"

"Whetwistle. That's what he said." I didn't like the expression that had come over her. "He'd said something about his father being brilliant at potions and that whatever he'd given her was like the Imperius Curse in a bottle. But there's no such thing, yeah?"

"No." Her voice was small and she was avoiding my eyes suddenly. "Of course there isn't. How ridiculous. He must have cast Imperio and made it seem as if there was something in the tea."

I didn't say anything. Unlike that git Smith, my nose wasn't broken, and I could sniff out a lie a long way off. Susan knew something, and it made me want to tell a few more big ones just to keep her talking and have a chance of finding out what it was.

"You'd better go now. I've a status meeting, and I have to return to my office to get some other materials."

I looked around, confused. "This isn't your office?"

"No, this is sort of an annex. It was just standing empty, so I began using it as sort of a study so that I can get work done without someone barging in every two seconds. I also like it because there isn't a Listening Charm in here."

She gave me a pointed look, and I understood that I was getting off very, very lightly and probably shouldn't've done. I reckoned I must've done something right in those months she and I had been together.

"You have to leave now. There's another way up to the Atrium that will keep you from being seen. Put this on."

She was speaking quickly, handing me a thick green cloak that had seen better days. "Wrap up in it and keep your head down. It'd be nice to get you out of here in one piece."

I did as she told and tried not to sneeze. The thing was old, dusty and smelled of Floo powder. I felt strange suddenly being all bundled up and disguised, but didn't have much time to ponder it. She all but dragged me out into the dark corridor and down a short passage. At the very end of the hall was a small lift.

"Goodbye, Ron." Her eyes had a troubled cast to them, and she was worrying her lip between her teeth. Some of the freshness was gone from her face, and she suddenly looked a lot older than she really was. "I truly hope things work out for the best, but if you know what is good for you, you won't come here again."

She was gone even before I could respond, and the lift doors shut in my face with a conclusive snap. Slumping against the walls of the lift, I wiped the sweat off my forehead. I didn't dare think about going back to my old flat for the money. There wasn't a need to at the moment, anyway. It had taken a few detours, but my plan had come off about as well as I could've hoped. I wondered if Hermione had gotten any rest. I hoped she had, since I planned on hunting up Harry as soon as I got back to the inn, and I knew none of us were going to be able to sleep until we had some sort of idea of who'd killed Whetwistle and what we might be dealing with.

~*~

I took the stairs of the Gainsvert two at a time, barely nodding at the slightly less frozen git at the doorway who seemed surprised that I didn't have some naff remark for him. There wasn't any time for jokes. All the way, I'd thought about Susan Bones' face when I mentioned the potion didn't sit well with me, had my stomach in knots. I didn't have any doubt that she'd heard of the potion before. It scared her; that much was clear. But I couldn't work out what it meant and how it connected to Whetwistle. Maybe it had to do with Death Eater investigations in the past. It could be some sort of sign that there really was a nest of Death Eaters around and Whetwistle was just the beginning of something horrible. Maybe another rising. Another Volde...

I shuddered. I really didn't want to think about it.

As I approached Hermione's room, I knew there was something wrong. The door was opened a little; when I'd left, I'd closed it tight - I'd checked. Hermione wouldn't just leave it that way, knowing how important it was to stay out of sight. I took a shaky breath and pushed the door open.

Everything at first glance seemed as I left it - except Hermione wasn't anywhere to be seen. She wasn't in the bed, she wasn't in the loo. After that, I ran out of places to look.

The bed had been made and the tray with the cocoa and biscuits had been taken away. It was all as tidy and neat as if no one had ever been there.

I spotted something on the floor, a white square. When I bent to look, I saw it was a bit of paper, Muggle paper, the sort with the lines on it. There was dark writing on the other side and my stomach dropped when I flipped it over.

Ron, I'm sorry. I couldn't

That was all. The words tailed off in a huge blotch of ink as if Hermione had been writing in a great rush and hadn't even had time to form the letters properly. I didn't know if that was because she'd been running for her life or because someone had dragged her away.

I read the paper over and over until the words blurred in front of my eyes. My hand was shaking and I braced up against the bed, giving it a savage punch with the same fist I'd used on Smith. Behind me, somewhere beyond the door, I heard a noise. It was the old clock mournfully striking the hour. Ten o'clock.