BONE DEEP

To the bones

Hermione was standing by the entrance to the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, biting anxiously at the skin around her thumb.

Since taking over as deputy head of the department she'd been involved with- and played a key role in the resolution of- the many various crises that emerged throughout each week. She was, however, not an Auror. She did not work on cases, she merely ensured that they were worked on. She did not make arrests, she merely ensured that the reports were filled and filed. She kept the department in line, she kept the Aurors in line, she kept the paperwork orderly, and the case notes accessible.

Except for today, when Harry and Ron had burst through her office door without even knocking, squabbling about whose theory made the most sense. The Thornsgill case, which had plagued them for nearly three months now, was finally coming to a head. All they needed to do was find him- the finding, however, was proving to be a real problem.

They'd come to her, much like they had back at school, to seek her input. She'd burst from the chair with such vivacity that she'd spilt her coffee all over her lap. Thirty minutes, two summoned books, and three boxes of case notes emptied all over the floor later, she'd narrowed their field down to the ribbon lake of Windermere, where they suspected he was hiding his cluster of illegal fighting Pygmy Krakens. She'd not even managed to begin formulating a plan before they thanked her and ran out of the room, and now she was here, waiting on their safe return, gnawing at her thumb.

Her heart was beating hard, her foot tapping against the tiled floor. It wasn't any more dangerous than the other arrests they had been on over the years, in fact, she could name at least five off the top of her head that were significantly more life-threatening than this. But she hadn't been involved with those ones, she'd not been the one to give them the answer that sent them flying out the door.

When they were younger, at school, and during the war, her answers would lead all three of them into danger. Where one went, the other two followed. That was their way, that was how they operated, up until the exact moment they didn't. Once the war ended and life began, they had paired off and continued their brush with danger here in the DMLE, while Hermione had settled herself in the floors below. Even now that they shared an office floor, her days were distinctly separate. She could easily bury her head in paperwork and forget that each time she waved them off, she risked losing them forever.

She couldn't handle losing anyone else right now.

It was not the time to think about it, and she really did try not to, but it had been a week since that night she'd spent in Malfoy's sheets- under his body- and he'd barely said a word to her since. Two owls, both to apologise for his busy schedule, and not a single face-to-face conversation. His floo had been closed all week, and he'd told her it was only because he'd been away with work, but the seed of doubt grew larger every day that it remained closed.

We're us , he'd said, but she'd failed to adequately ascertain what exactly they were.

What she really needed, more than anything else in the world, was the company and comfort of her two oldest friends. And so, she paced the entrance again, summoning a cup of lukewarm coffee from a nearby desk, not even bothering to ask who it belonged to before she drank it in one go. It had been two hours since they left, and she'd barely managed to sit down for thirty minutes.

When the sound of those familiar voices finally reached her ear, it was like someone removing their boot from her chest.

"Hermione!" Harry called, his grin wide and unabashed, his clothes completely drenched in swampy water. "You were bloody right!"

Ron was beside him, equally soaked and hobbling with a slight limp; the pain of it not strong enough to keep his oversized smile from taking over his freckled face. "He was hiding at the bottom of that fucking lake, just like you said, the git caught the back of my knee but- oft!"