Number 445, Lily Street, Stone District, Manchester.
Hermione woke early as always, and after helping her mother finish making breakfast, she went back to her room to read on her own.
Underage wizards weren't allowed to use magic outside school, so she couldn't even practice the spells Katherine had taught her. There was nothing to do each day but read.
She could swear this was the dullest holiday she'd spent since starting at Hogwarts.
If only Kate were here…
The words on the page in front of her gradually shifted into that face she thought about day and night. Hermione snapped back to herself and shook her head hard.
Letting her mind wander while reading — that was absolutely intolerable!
Just as she was about to push all such thoughts aside and lose herself in the book, a call drifted up from below her window.
"Hermione, open the door!"
That voice was—
Hermione shot up from her chair. Without even stopping to pick up the beloved book that had slipped to the floor, she rushed downstairs and pulled open the front door.
"Kate!"
The longing she'd been holding back spilled over, and she threw her arms around the girl, half afraid that this sudden apparition might be an illusion.
Caught in the embrace, Kate tensed and opened her arms, not sure where to put them.
After more than a month cut off from the world, she realized she'd missed the girl in her arms more than she'd ever expected to.
"He— Hermione," she said, wetting her lips awkwardly, resting a hand lightly on the other girl's back, "why don't we go inside first?"
That brought Hermione to her senses. A flush rose to her face, and she pulled back at once, touching her own cheek without thinking. "Um… come in, then."
Kate nodded, a little dazed, obediently changed into a pair of slippers, and came in to sit down in the living room.
"Mum and Dad are both at work, so it's just me at home right now," Hermione said, carrying drinks in from the kitchen. "Want something to drink?"
That seemed… like rather a lot.
Eyeing the cola, orange juice, coffee, and other drinks she couldn't even name, Kate's face twitched a little. She took a bottle of cola for herself and gulped down a few mouthfuls.
Ahh!
A blazing summer day — you had to have a fizzy drink!.
The joy of the reunion cooled by degrees in the air-conditioned room. As Hermione's flushed head finally settled, she remembered what Kate had told her at the station, and the worry crept back in.
"How did you get out? Did you run into any danger? Where are Professor Katherine and Mr. Rand? Why aren't they with you?"
Kate scratched her cheek, unsure for a moment which question to answer first.
"Er…" It didn't take long for Hermione to realize she'd asked rather a lot all at once. She stood up, flustered. "Are you hungry? Let me get you some snacks!"
Somehow, even though they'd only been apart a month, she felt so at a loss that even her voice had turned stiff and unfamiliar.
Kate caught her hand and shook her head, half joking. "No need — I'm afraid you'll bring so much I won't be able to finish it."
"I wouldn't…" Hermione mumbled, then her gaze fell on the drinks crowding the table, and her face reddened all over again as it dawned on her.
It really was rather a lot, wasn't it.
Kate gave a small smile and pulled her down to sit beside her, then began answering her questions one by one.
"Auntie brought me here. The alert's been lifted, so I can go out whenever I like now — there's no more danger. And—"
She paused, looking earnestly into Hermione's shimmering eyes. "The moment I got out, I came straight here. I wanted to see how you were doing."
Would just saying "I missed you" come across as too sappy?
Kate had been turning this over the whole way here, so by the time the words reached her lips they'd come out a touch more roundabout.
Still, judging by the way Hermione's cheeks had gone scarlet, the message had probably gotten across well enough.
She cleared her throat. "Right — do you have any recent newspapers? I've been shut off from the world for a month and don't know a thing."
"I'll go get them!" Hermione jumped up and trotted off into the study, coming back with several issues of the Daily Prophet at once.
Kate skimmed through them roughly, her gaze finally settling on the front page of the most recent one.
"You wouldn't know yet — Ron's family won a big prize!" Hermione said happily, following her gaze. "They should still be travelling around Egypt right now!"
"…Mm, that's wonderful news."
Kate's eyes lingered for a while on the rat Scabbers in the photo, and then she closed the paper.
It seemed she still had time to arrange a meeting with Sirius.
But she wasn't about to face a man who'd spent more than a decade in Azkaban all on her own — that was far too dangerous.
She wasn't his godson Harry, after all; who knew whether he might attack her before she'd even finished speaking.
Before meeting him in person and gauging his attitude, she needed to be fully prepared.
So… she'd have to find a reliable partner to come along with her.
She glanced at Hermione, still beside her, and set those calculations aside for the moment. "Right — didn't Harry ask us to call him earlier? Have you rung him yet?"
The moment it came up, Hermione's face fell. "Don't even mention it. Ron rang him once before — the moment he got through and said he was looking for Harry Potter, Harry's uncle roared at him and slammed the phone down."
Kate found this rather amusing. "So you didn't dare call him after that?"
"Who knows what he might do to Harry over a call from us!" Hermione said, frowning.
Fair enough — after all, the man had a "hostage" in his grip.
Kate shook her head. "Actually, as long as we go about it the right way, we can still get a call through."
She led Hermione out to a public phone box, dialed the number Harry had given them, and pressed a finger to her lips at Hermione for quiet.
The call connected quickly, and a thick, muffled boy's voice came from the other end. "Hello, this is the Dursleys' house!"
"Good afternoon, this is the new supermarket that's just opened in Little Whinging. As part of our grand-opening sale, everything in the store — snacks and toys included — is up to seventy percent off. Might you be interested?"
The voice on the other end perked up at once, and even asked in detail whether she had snacks imported from particular countries and the trendiest toys.
Kate answered every question, gave out the address, and then hung up.
"That's it?" Hermione watched, dumbfounded.
Kate shrugged. "Not yet."
Sure enough, before long the phone in the box rang again.
Kate picked it up. This time the voice belonged to a middle-aged woman, who demanded in shrill tones whether the newly opened supermarket had any other special offers.
"Of course, madam," she said, sounding exactly like a salesperson, "all fresh food and kitchenware are up to seventy percent off as well — but only between two and five o'clock this afternoon."
Then, with a sharp click, the line went dead.
Kate set the phone back and led Hermione at a leisurely pace toward home. "It's a weekday, so it should just be Harry's cousin and aunt at home."
"Name the things they're most interested in, and you can lure them out. Call again in a little while, and Harry's most likely the only one left to pick up."
But Hermione was still puzzled. "But there isn't any supermarket at that address. If they go tearing off there and find out they've been tricked, won't they guess it was one of Harry's schoolmates?"
"That won't happen." Kate spread her hands, perfectly calm. "Because there really is a new supermarket opening at that spot — and it just happens to be mine."
Hermione froze. "Wait a moment, you mean…"
"I saw this coming a month ago, so before heading home I asked Grandpa Rand to spend a little money buying up a few supermarkets and shops."
Kate raised an eyebrow with the look of someone whose plan had come together perfectly.
The truth was she'd led Harry on pretty badly last year; if a little money was all it took to make him happy, why not?
"Come on. It'll only take about ten minutes for the two of them, mother and son, to head out. Then we'll see whether they leave Harry at home or drag him along as a pack mule."
If they left him at home, she'd simply call him. If they hauled him off to carry their bags, then she could go to the supermarket herself and use whatever tricks she needed to keep the mother and son occupied for a while.
Either way, she had a backup plan.
Hermione walked beside her, watching her with a mix of astonishment and disbelief. "I never knew you had this kind of talent."
The old Kate — even if you wouldn't have called her a withdrawn child, was at the very least poor at socializing, even a little socially anxious.
But the Kate she saw today was silver-tongued, each step linked neatly to the next, luring people effortlessly into traps she'd laid out in advance.
She had never seen this side of Kate before.
"It's because when people are pushed hard enough, they always end up doing things that surprise even themselves."
Kate stopped, standing there at the door of Hermione's house, and looked at her intently. "Because I can't rely on the people around me forever."
Whether it was the old butler or Katherine, they could shield her from the wind and rain now — but in time, the one doing the protecting would have to be her.
The high-summer sunlight fell across the side of Kate's face, throwing the shadow on her other side into sharp relief. "Hermione, there's no one left in my family."
Her tone was light — as offhand as if she were remarking that the weather was nice today.
Yet for no reason she could name, as Hermione looked up at Kate's composed face, a sudden ache welled up inside her.
She remembered that last summer she'd asked Kate the same sort of thing — why she studied so desperately hard.
Back then, Kate had only said that one day her own portrait would hang on that wall lined with the ancestors of the Shafiq family.
At the time, Hermione hadn't understood what she meant.
But now, looking at this Kate, so different from before, she felt she was beginning to understand.
So from such a young age, Kate had been carrying the weight of an entire family on her shoulders…
Even to this day, Hermione still had no real way to grasp what a thousand-year-old family concretely meant as an idea.
But she did know that expectation, in itself, was a heavy thing.
Bearing the expectations of an entire family — Kate must have been exhausted all along, mustn't she?
She'd simply never shown it. And even when she did speak of it, it was only in this offhand tone, before throwing herself back into her books, soaking up knowledge, striving to make herself stronger.
Without thinking, Hermione's hand closed around that cool one. She was quiet for a moment, then broke into a smile. "Let's go home."
Kate blinked. She'd expected that showing even a little of her other side might make Hermione uneasy — she'd never thought the girl would adjust to it so quickly.
Truly a promising pupil.
She raised a faint smile of her own. "Mm."
The two of them went back inside together, and Hermione immediately pulled her over to the house phone and dialed Harry's number.
Soon a listless boy's voice answered. "They've already gone shopping, so you don't need to keep calling."
"Harry, it's us!" Hermione said, delighted. "Kate and I are both here!"
On the other end Harry started, his voice suddenly far more animated. "Hermione, Kate? Were those other two calls from you as well?"
"Of course — Kate's brilliant! She lured your aunt and cousin out without breaking a sweat!"
Hermione praised Kate to the skies, as though seeing her through a rose-tinted filter — enough that the subject herself grew a little embarrassed.
"Ahem!" Kate cleared her throat. "This month I'll have the supermarket run a discount sale every Thursday afternoon, and there'll be someone making these calls on those days."
"All you'll have to do is wait until they've left, then ring this number."
Harry asked in surprise, "A supermarket sale? Don't tell me the supermarket's yours too?"
Kate said nothing, because Hermione had already jumped in ahead of her and launched into another round of praise.
Too embarrassed by all the flattery, she could only wander off to the living room and take a sip of ice-cold cola.
Nothing beat this stuff for quenching a thirst.
The call ran a full half hour, and it was only when Harry said he was afraid that talking too long might tip his aunt off once she got back that he finally hung up himself.
Hermione set the phone down, still not ready to be done, and turned to find that Kate had already switched on the television and was watching the news.
"Why are you still interested in Muggle news?" she said, settling in beside Kate with an ease that had long since replaced her earlier stiffness.
As if the past month and more had never kept them apart.
"Because the television doesn't broadcast news from the magical world," Kate said, giving a deliberate shrug and a put-upon look that got Hermione laughing out loud.
She laughed along a few times too, though her attention stayed fixed on the news the whole while.
An hour of television passed with no report of Black's escape from prison — and the escape of such a "heinous" convict would surely be flagged in both the magical and Muggle worlds.
It seemed she'd have to wait a few more days.
"Hermione," she said, letting her head come to rest on Hermione's shoulder, "how about I stay at yours for a few days?"
The castle was fine and all, but after more than a month there alone, she really was getting a bit lonely.
Hermione's house was livelier — though not overwhelmingly so, the way the Weasleys' place was.
At those words, she felt Hermione's body give a slight shiver, her voice turning nervous. "S-sure, of course — do you want to share a room with me?"
Kate looked up, puzzled. "Does your house have a guest room?"
"No…"
"Then that settles it." She rested her head back down and made the decision, unruffled.
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