One: The Problem

Anti-Litigation Charm: It all belongs to JKR; I play for non-profit amusement.

Author's Notes: Neither HBP nor DH compliant.

Conversation in Italics signifies MindSpeech.

Reviews make me smile. ^_^

The Problem with Purity

Chapter One: The Problem

Most of the Order members had already left Grimmauld Place and those remaining, now seated around the sturdy wooden kitchen table, made up what Ron had termed...accurately, if unoriginally...Harry's group: as many Weasleys as were able at a given time, Albus Dumbledore, Minerva McGonagall, Remus Lupin, Severus Snape, Nymphadora Tonks, and Kingsley Shacklebolt.

Harry might not like them all, per se, but he interacted with them on a regular basis and trusted them with his life, having been taught, trained, rescued, or befriended by each of them...or in most cases, some combination of the four.

The curtains had been drawn against the darkness outside and candles lit so that the kitchen, still easily the cheeriest room in the house, seemed warm and welcoming, even at ten o'clock at night. They'd all been served fresh tea, and now that Albus had discussed everything on his agenda, he had opened the floor to other concerns.

"There is one last issue that I need to bring to the Order's attention," Kingsley declared in his deep voice, although his tone suggested that he was reluctant to bring up the topic in question. It sounded as though he was doing his duty rather than following an inclination.

Everyone's attention went to him following this announcement, but rather than continuing, Kingsley's eyes cut to Arthur, who was across the table and down one seat from the Auror. The eldest Weasley looked doubtful, blue eyes troubled as his gaze strayed to his wife on his left, who managed to glower simultaneously at the two Ministry men despite their seating positions before casting a baleful look at the other end of the table where the three newest members of the Order of the Phoenix sat: Hermione Granger, Ron Weasley, and Harry Potter.

On August 31, 1997, the date of this meeting, Hermione Granger was indisputably seventeen years old; she had legally celebrated her seventeenth birthday on the nineteenth of September of the previous year. Ron had been seventeen since March of the current year, and even Harry had joined the mass of wizarding adults a month ago.

He had promptly left the Dursleys forever and joined her at Grimmauld Place. Ron had made sure to shift his belongings from the Burrow to the Most Ancient House of Black soon after, and since that time, the three of them had been a conspicuous and insistent presence at Order meetings because no one had a legal leg to stand on when they mentioned that nonsense about children.

What none of the other Order members knew was that Hermione had been privy to the contents of these meetings since the summer following her fifth year. Counting the same months everyone else had experienced only once, she was sixteen years and nine months old at the end of June in 1996.

As far as well-meaning but overly mothering members like Molly Weasley were concerned, that might as well have been three years shy of the necessary age. Albus, too, had maintained his stance that admittance was only at seventeen for very good reason, despite the fact that the three of them were right in the middle of this war.

The fact of the matter, however, was that Hermione had been an adult for longer than most of them understood. For in the ten months of her third year at Hogwarts, she had been the clandestine owner of a Time-Turner. Despite what Harry and Ron suspected by the end of the year, she had not doubled up on her days. She had, in fact, tripled up on an average of sixteen hours of the day, six days out of seven. This had been necessary to keep up with all her school work, study groups, and bizarre extracurriculars, like helping Hagrid with Buckbeak, saving Sirius, and watching her friendship with Ron fall apart. She didn't think that either Minerva or Albus was aware of the extent of her usage.

This extra time of hers didn't seem like so much at first, but it worked out to 192 extra hours per week and therefore 7680 extra hours in the school year, or 320 days. Even subtracting the twenty-two days she had been Petrified in her second year (and most people didn't consider being incapacitated in real time as a detriment to counting it towards one's total age), that left her 298 days older than everyone thought. As far as her physical and mental development was concerned, she was thus actually seventeen and seven months old at the end of June in 1996.

Her use of the Time-Turner was not common knowledge, however, and she knew it was not meant to be shared even with all the members of the Order. One look at Molly and Albus had made it clear to her that they were going to be intractable. Having just come out of a battle that had lost them Sirius and nearly killed her, Harry, Ron, Ginny, Neville, and Luna, she even understood their point of view, to a certain degree. But now more than ever, she also understood Harry's need to know what was going on.

The situation was not ideal; if it could have been put to a vote, all of them would no doubt have agreed to have peace and childhoods. The war against Voldemort was happening whether they liked it or not, however, and they were an inextricable part of it, as they had proven for five years running. It did no one any good to pretend that Harry was not at the war's centre.

Fortunately, Albus had a familiar. Fawkes was not human, and he was not constrained by human understanding, failings, or foibles. The phoenix appeared to be entirely certain that she was of age, and he was, as it turned out, rather irritated by the stubborn stance of the humans in the face of what he saw as a simple fact. He couldn't overrule Albus, per se, but he could and did include her in the meetings in his own way.

This was her first introduction to MindSpeech; up until that time, the closest she had come to Fawkes had been through his interaction with Harry. The phoenix had been invaluable to Harry and had demonstrated amazing abilities, but he had remained, for all that, decidedly bird-like. The summer before sixth year, however, Hermione had discovered that Fawkes was only as avian as he wished to be.

With her, at least, he was entirely capable not just of singing, but of speaking right inside her head. Gifted with this communication, the Gryffindor girl found that she was the recipient of the information discussed in the meetings nearly in real time, or even better, the bird would share his senses with her so that she was actually seeing and hearing the meeting as it was unfolding.

The researcher in her baulked at how little she understood this phenomenon, but Fawkes had not wished to discuss it, and after a short but ferocious argument with herself, she had had the sense to respect his wishes. What little documented research had been available in the Hogwarts Library...in the Restricted Section, of course...suggested that this was a gift that could be bestowed between familiars and their humans; she had come across no reason why the ability should have been extended to her.

Whatever the reason, the benefits were readily apparent. Despite the fact that her body was dutifully in bed up the stairs and separated from the Order meeting by various spells and wards, most of Hermione's mind seemed to be visiting Fawkes's and watching the meeting through bird eyes and hearing it through bird ears. After that first meeting, she even got the hang of not trying to speak in response to what was going on around her.

Knowing how badly Harry had taken it after fourth year, Hermione had made no attempt to hide the information from him. She had only two requirements: he was not to ask how she got the information and he was to learn how to properly Occlude his mind. Given the disastrous events in the Department of Mysteries, he desired this last already, but he dreaded the possibility of resuming lessons with Professor Snape.

Since he now both wanted to learn and was willing to speak to her of the difficulties he'd been having previously, he found the entirety of the Hogwarts and Black libraries and all the information that could be gleaned from them about Occlumency, Legilimency, meditation, mental shields, and MindMagic at his fingertips in the condensed Hermione version.

Ever since Occlumency and Legilimency had come to her attention in fifth year, Hermione had been determined to learn everything she could. Her mind was her greatest asset, and she wanted it as fortified and protected as it could possibly be. They didn't have an accomplished Legilimens to test it with yet, but by the time Hermione was done with him, Harry was never without mental shields, crucial thoughts and memories locked deep inside his mind, and mind clear as glass before he went to sleep at night.

It was in one of her initial forays at Legilimency, when he was still completely hopeless at any sort of shield, that she had stumbled across his memory of the prophecy. The glimpse that she had got had been enough for him to confess the whole truth. It had only made her more determined to protect his mind from outside forces and to see him through this daft war so that he could live his own life.

In this, at least, both she and Ron had been unwavering in their support, and Harry had been quietly relieved and pleased. As Ron had put it at the time, they hadn't had it spelled out in prophecy form before now, but it had been pretty clear that You Know Who was always after Harry and that Harry was always going to stop the bloody wanker.

Hermione thus felt that she had been doing her part in this war in myriad ways, and once she legally turned seventeen, she had insisted that she be allowed to instantly join the Order, and she'd watched with glee as their arguments worked against Molly and Albus. Upon reaching the age of majority, which was eighteen in the Muggle world, she could vote, legally drink, live on her own, and be tried as an adult in a court of law. The wizarding world took coming of age even more seriously, with certain societal customs remaining rather formal and old-fashioned. At seventeen, she had become an adult witch, and adult witches and wizards could therefore accept her as their peer.

Whether she felt equal to the headmaster or his deputy was not at issue; if they wished to, they could acknowledge her as such, as this came in the form of an invitation to address them by their given name. Since she was still in a school setting and this invitation was by no means extended to all of the seventeen-year-old students, she had to use her regular allotment of common sense, but the consideration meant a lot to her.

Throughout her sixth year, as she was asking an extra question or ran into one of her professors in the hallway, each extended the invitation, which she had reciprocated. Even Severus, evidently in a fit of insanity, had done so, although he had waited until the summer. He frequently seemed to regret his decision, though, his expression making plain that referring to him as Severus, even in the presence of just Harry and Ron, was strongly inadvisable. Rescinding the invitation was considered extremely rude, however, and even the snarky bat of the dungeons seemed to hesitate before doing that to her.

A similar invitation had not been offered to either Harry or Ron.

The Order members were stuck, then, when she'd come of age. Legally, she was as adult as any of them. She'd had no trouble shooting down the argument that she would tell her friends, since none of the elder Weasleys were barred from joining despite having younger family members who weren't of age, wished to join, and would do their best to ferret information out of them. She had the phoenix of the Order of on her side, so she wasn't terribly concerned about any accusation they could throw at her.

She suspected that Albus was not the only one to suspect that she told Harry and Ron virtually everything, but so long as no one made an official complaint, she wasn't going to worry because she could argue semantics with the best of them; when asked, she had very carefully told them that she knew how to keep a secret, especially from those two boys, not that she intended to do so.

Since she had already effectively been to several months of the meetings and knew perfectly well what they tended to be like, who sided with whom, who listened to whom, and how the youngest and most inexperienced members were treated, she had worked this advantage to its fullest, along with any extra tidbits which Fawkes had been kind enough to share. As a result, she hadn't seemed like a rookie and had caught several members out in attempts to goad her into an ill-considered reaction.

Given that she had made it through the protections on the Philosopher's Stone, survived an encounter with a Basilisk, lived through a night with Peter Pettigrew, a werewolf, and a dozen or so Dementors, and kept a crucial prophecy away from Voldemort with the help of five other school children, her curriculum vitae was hardly empty, either.

Once Harry knew how to Occlude, he was much better at hiding his emotions and quite able to prevent others from knowing what he did or didn't know. Hermione coached Ron ruthlessly so that he could join calmly for the Easter meeting in sixth year, to the surprise of his family. All she and Ron had needed to do was ignore the twins' suggestions about Ron's "whipped" state. Ron still remained one of the least even-keeled members of the Order, but by the time he displayed a show of temper in a meeting, it was accepted as a Weasley trait rather than one of youth and inexperience.

By the time Harry joined, even Molly had welcomed him with relatively genuine acceptance, and the three of them had agreed that there was nothing to be gained from bringing up old grievances. By the same token, however, there was no way that they were going to allow themselves to be run out of the room now that they were members. Harry crossed his arms and glared back at Molly, and after sharing an amused glance, Hermione and Ron did the same, presenting a united front.

"What did you need to tell us, Kingsley?" Albus asked, his familiar perched, ever watchful, on a cabinet behind his head. Molly opened her mouth, and Albus cast a stern glance at her from his position at the head of the table. "Now, now, Molly, everyone here is a full Order member."

She didn't look happy, but given that it was the headmaster speaking, she subsided without subjecting them to the impassioned but misguided plea that they had known was imminent. Ron let out an audible sigh of relief...he was only two seats away from his mother...and Harry's lips tipped up slightly as his stance relaxed to wary rather than adversarial.

Kingsley did not stand, but he projected forcefully from his seat so that they could all hear him clearly: "A week ago, on a visit to the Auror Department, the Head of Magical Law Enforcement encountered the wizard in charge of correspondence and paperwork for the Department, Andrew Stebbins. I was out of sight but stopped at Scrimgeour's tone. He demanded to know what Stebbins was doing with a particular parchment and dragged him away as he was about to reveal what the parchment was rather than staying for his meeting with me.

"Curious at this suspect behaviour, I took the opportunity to duck into Stebbins's office and copy as much of his records as I could; the man is meticulous about noting every single piece of parchment that he receives, and I knew that whatever had caught Scrimgeour's attention had to be there.

"I sent the record I had made off to Arthur as a private memo and then made sure I was promptly elsewhere and occupied. I didn't see Stebbins until the next day, and by then, he had no memory of his meeting with the Head of M.L.E. or the parchment. His log had been expertly modified, and all traces of the parchment in question were gone.

"Comparing the copy I'd made to the original that had been doctored, I discovered what had caused such a strong reaction in Scrimgeour: two grade one, orange-proof scrolls declaring Pure Age of Majority."

From the awed but comprehending looks on most people's faces, this made more sense to the rest of them than it did to Hermione and Harry.

"I thought that was a myth!" Ron gasped, and Hermione saw that Arthur, Molly, and Tonks were nodding in agreement.

"Thought what was a myth?" Hermione demanded impatiently, glaring across the table at him.

The redhead's look of incredulity had faded to that annoyingly superior one he got whenever he knew something that she didn't.

"Wizards come of age at seventeen," Ron began.

"I am aware of that, Ronald." She stretched his name out into two long syllables, just the way she knew he hated. As though he had not just spouted off that totally commonplace fact, he had the nerve to shoot her a look of annoyance. Albus interceded.

"I believe what Ron was attempting to elucidate, Hermione, was that there are two seventeen-year-olds who have reached their majority and remain in a Pure state."

Hermione had gathered something of that nature from what Kingsley had said, and Albus's explanation was about as helpful as Ron's.

"Headmaster, they are hardly infants." Severus's sneering voice interrupted from his position at Albus's right hand, for which Hermione was grateful, as it meant she was about to get an unambiguous answer. "These two adult wizards are still virgins, Miss Granger."

On balance, this cleared the matter up rather less than she had hoped, and she noted sourly that she still hadn't managed to convince the man that an Order meeting was private enough for her given name.

"And why does this warrant the highest security, most indestructible scrolls that the wizarding world has to offer?" she asked when no more explanation was immediately forthcoming.

Albus smiled faintly. "You see, Hermione, not only is the age of majority different for wizards than for Muggles, there are more effects for wizards as well."

Hermione watched curiously as pink cheeks tinged the faces of the headmaster, the deputy headmistress, the Weasley parents, and Remus. Severus, although she thought he looked tired, had no outward reaction to Albus's words, but Hermione could see that Tonks...who'd smiled when she first saw the seventeen-year-old Hermione, recognized her as an adult, and told her she'd kill her if she called her Nymphadora...looked quite amused.

Albus resumed: "In the years leading up to a witch or wizard's majority, she or he will experience an increased ... libido, more so than a Muggle. Coupled with the regular hormones in any teenager, this generally results in the ... usual result."

Hermione's lip curled, and she noticed with amusement that Severus, on the other side of Kingsley and Tonks, wore an almost identical expression.

"Normally wizarding teenagers have sex before they reach their majority," she summarized.

Albus's slight expression of unease cleared. "Exactly so, Hermione. It has become a traditional part of a wizarding upbringing." This did begin to explain what had been, for the Muggle-born Hermione, the very bizarre sex-ed class they had had in third year. "Young people these days tend to take it as a matter of course. It's not as though wizards and Muggles assess what they are feeling and compare it to others' feelings. The last time that a Pure Adult was recorded, I was only a boy."

"So that's over a century ago, then?" Harry asked with a grin.

Severus glared the glare he seemed to reserve especially for Harry, but Albus only smiled.

"Quite right, Harry."

"And now we have two such cases occurring at the same time?" Hermione asked sceptically.

Kingsley took over. "The first scroll appeared in January, but we are not sure how long a delay there is between the attainment of Pure Adulthood and the arrival of the scroll."

"Why don't you ask whoever sent them?" Harry said.

Severus opened his mouth, scathing diatribe clearly imminent, and Hermione hastened to speak first, which earned her a glare of her own, but she just rolled her eyes at him.

"They're automatically generated scrolls, Harry, and from what Kingsley is saying, they were spelled to arrive at an interval after the magical occurrence that generated them. That prevents unscrupulous individuals from figuring out who the scroll pertains to by their birthday; obviously it was set up some time ago when somebody at the Ministry had morals."

She offered the current head of the Auror Department an apologetic look, since she doubted the institution in general, not him personally.

Kingsley nodded, his slight smile indicating both his acceptance of the accurate words and the lack of personal attack in them. "Stebbins made a notation that the interval was random, so the two likely do not even have the same gap between real date and arrival in the Ministry."

"Okay, I get that they're rare and that we don't know who these two people are," Harry said with a nod to Hermione, "but what does that matter? Why does the Ministry care?"

"How you have managed to survive six years in the wizarding world, Mr. Potter, without a modicum of..."

"Severus." The tone was one of clear warning, and the Potions master subsided, although he looked disgruntled. Albus actually answered the question: "Upon a young witch or wizard's arrival into adulthood, her or his full power becomes available. This increase is noticeable but not extraordinary. In the case of Pure Adults, however, they not only receive this regular increase, but what could be considered a large bonus."

Fawkes trilled, and Hermione sensed both excitement at the mention, finally, of the Pure Adults and amusement at his familiar's delicacy.

You might have mentioned it earlier, she thought irritably.

And spoil the surprise? Certainly not, he replied smugly.

"So the Ministry wants to keep tabs on the wizards who get more power?" Harry asked.

"Not exactly, Harry. You see, this extra increase in power does not come about at the Age of Majority but when ...." Albus trailed off, looking to his right and his left as though for assistance.

With a long-suffering sigh, the Potions master took over, since Minerva looked nearly as uncomfortable as Albus. "The power increases during coitus, and the Ministry cares," Severus glared, "because whoever takes the Pure Adult's virginity experiences an increase in power as well."

"Severus!" Minerva protested from her position opposite the Potions master.

Hermione blinked, digesting this. "If that's true, why hasn't Voldemort incarcerated a horde of wizarding children until their seventeenth birthdays?"

Severus's piercing gaze met hers for a moment, and she made sure she was Occluding fully. The headmaster accorded her a nod for the question.

"As Ron here has proven, some considerable effort has been made to relegate the truth to myth for the vast majority of wizardkind. An attempt such as you suggest was made several centuries ago; all of the witches and wizards died before they reached their seventeenth birthdays."

"How?"

"It is not known," he answered slowly. "Given the wizard's increased obsession with keeping the children safe, it seems unlikely it could have been a traitor in his midst, nor were these final children in a fit state to accomplish the deed consciously."

"But you think their magic did it for them," she said flatly.

"Preventing the children from being horribly abused," Albus said with a gentle nod of his head. "I wouldn't say it was out of the question. But his actions decimated a generation, and thus the forced relegation to myth; the wizarding world, as a general rule, is very protective of its children."

Hermione thought she finally grasped the point. "But now that we have two people who are already seventeen, all such protections are gone, and they're available to the highest bidder."

"That is our fear," he agreed. "If Voldemort hears of this, he will wish to claim these two adults for his own. There is currently no data on the exact results of having relations with two Pure Adults, but the evidence strongly suggests that he would experience an exponential increase in power."

"Scrimgeour, too, is evidently eager to dictate this choice, whether or not he thinks he can get away with claiming the power for his own use," Severus was quick to point out, as if they hadn't grasped that both men were going to be ruthless about this. "He has been looking for ways to regain power for months now. If for no other reason, I'm sure he imagines he could ... engage your cooperation with the Ministry, Mr Potter, and that would be a coup indeed."

Wisely, Harry ignored this, perhaps recognizing that Severus hadn't actually suggested that Harry would succumb. Instead, Harry asked, "Can the scrolls be opened? I mean, there has to be a way to undo them, right, or what would be the point?"

Albus explained: "These particular scrolls will be keyed to the individual in question. The Ministry insisted that they needed to be aware of these occurrences because of the magical power generated. The Wizengamot ultimately ruled in favour of the notion but with the caveat that it would be the right of the individuals to reveal the specific information as they saw fit. Having great power, after all, does not automatically denote the misuse of it." His eyes seemed to linger on Harry for a moment. "The Ministry will thus be aware of the potential danger and can monitor for any particular outbursts, but there is no single person for them to pinpoint."

Minerva continued: "There is no record of such scrolls being broken by anyone other than the intended person."

Severus added his own sardonic comment: "And wiser and better men than the likes of Scrimgeour and the Dark Lord have tried. They will, however, employ other methods."

"This is why I have brought the news to your attention," Kingsley took back the floor. "The two Pure Adults need to be found."

Hermione's voice was dry. "What a boon it would be for our side..."

"...to secure them."

For an instant, Hermione had a weird sense of what it must be like to be the Weasley twins, with someone else thinking what you were thinking and able to finish your sentences. Ron's entire side of the table looked upset, although Ron seemed to be focussed on the fact that she and Severus had expressed the same opinion, whereas Remus, Molly, and Arthur looked more upset by the idea itself.

"I'm sure we all agree that these people need to be protected, not exploited."

Interestingly, it was Harry who'd spoken, not Albus.

"No one will be forced to do anything against their will," the headmaster assured everyone.

Hermione couldn't seem to help her cynicism as she imagined what would no doubt be strongly encouraged for the good of the Light if they did find the two Pure Adults.

"I'm sure we can agree," the headmaster continued with a stern look at everyone, "that the witches or wizards in question would be far safer if found by us prior to being found by Voldemort."

That, Hermione conceded, was definitely true.

"How long before Voldemort knows?" Harry directed this question towards Severus, who didn't look pleased with this demand for information but responded nevertheless.

"The identity of all the Ministry moles is known only to the Dark Lord. I suspect, given some of the information to which we are privy, that there is someone high up in administration. One way or the other, crucial information like this tends to get out."

Harry, Ron, and Hermione shared a grin that probably seemed out of place to the others, but she was pretty sure they were all remembering the similar sentiment Dumbledore had expressed to Harry in their first year after he had battled Quirrell and Voldemort for the Philosopher's Stone.

"Okay, but theoretically," Ron pointed out with a good show of logic, "especially since we don't know how long a delay there was between the, er, occurrence and the scroll getting to the Ministry, isn't it possible that the two people in question aren't even students anymore? Or aren't at least, you know," he fumbled awkwardly, "Pure anymore?"

Severus smirked at Ron's embarrassment. "The scrolls will likely be spelled, either to disappear when their function is fulfilled, or to indicate the change in status in some way."

Kingsley nodded. "Stebbins's notes didn't indicate either way, meaning it wasn't readily apparent from his examination of the scrolls. Wherever they are now, I doubt we can get our hands on the originals. Your question is a valid one, Ron, but given Scrimgeour's reaction, it seems likely he, at least, has high hopes that the individuals in question will still be Pure when he finds them."

"From what I've read," Remus, next to Ron, spoke for the first time since the discussion had started, "it seems unlikely these two people would be able to resist their ... libido for too long. Certainly not for years."

No one attempted to gainsay this.

"Seventh-year students it is," Ron said cheerfully. "You want us to question our year-mates?"

"It would be useful if you could keep your eyes open for any unusual behaviour," Albus said diplomatically.

"Lest it be all over school in moments," Severus finished snidely but not, Hermione confessed to herself, inaccurately.

Ron bristled, but Harry laid a hand on his arm.

"We'll try to subtly suss out the virgins," he promised dutifully, his tone droll enough that Ron subsided and Severus looked riled at the flippancy.

Albus averted any possible argument. "I will have other Order members checking up on our graduate students just in case." Kingsley nodded. "As many of them have gone on to get married, I'm sure we will be able to make short work of the task. You three and Severus, Minerva, and myself will monitor the situation at the school. Severus will do his best to ascertain what Voldemort knows of the subject. If the news comes to the attention of the general public, we will formulate a plan of action at that time. Until then, we will all keep one another informed."

Knowing a dismissal when they heard one, the remaining Order members rose.

So, Hermione asked Fawkes as she pushed her chair in, has he admitted to knowing more than he's told us?

What good are you if you don't ferret out the information for me?

He gave her the mental equivalent of a stuck-out tongue, and she returned with a mental smile. Severus, Albus, and Minerva took their leave with Hermione only able to give them all a general farewell; they were the only ones returning immediately to Hogwarts, as everyone else would form part of the escort to King's Cross the next morning. Ginny, no doubt extremely irritated that she was only sixteen and would remain so until next August, was already upstairs.

Those who were staying trooped up the stairs until eventually the trio was on their own, marching up to the fifth floor where they resided alone. When Hermione had begun to live in the house during the summer after fifth year, she'd taken over the entire upper floor, refusing to continue living on the first floor with people frequently trooping above her to get to their rooms.

When Harry and Ron had joined her, it had seemed only logical to host them up there as well given the amount of time they spent in one another's company. Since several weeks of the arrangement had passed before anyone had become the wiser, it was allowed to stand.

"Two virgins, eh? Who do you reckon?" Ron asked gleefully.

"I hardly think that's a question to be answered here and now," Hermione said dryly.

Ron ignored her. "How about Susan Bones? When Seamus went out with her, he said she didn't put..."

Hermione stopped abruptly, causing Harry to nearly plough into her before he neatly sidestepped and left Ron to her mercy. Whirling around to face him, she glared at him, hands on her hips.

"Just because Susan had the good sense not to take up with that oversexed lout does not mean that she's a virgin. It suggests that she has some form of discrimination."

Ron made a face, clearly displeased with both her ire and her commentary. Like Harry, he finally ducked round her, and they continued down the hall.

"What about that Ravenclaw girl, then, what's her name, Mindy? Mandy?" Ron proposed, blind to her fury. "Or Bulstrode." He made a face. "Definitely her. Surely no one would..."

"Is there a particular reason only women are on your list?" Hermione asked coolly.

Ron looked at her as though she'd sprouted tentacles. "Are you batty, 'Mione? No bloke in his right mind would let himself be a virgin at seventeen."

Harry looked nearly as annoyed as she was at this point, but it was she who once again snapped at Ron. "I have more respect for a thoughtful boy who's a virgin at seventeen than for a boy who lost his virginity at fourteen to the first girl to twitch her hips at him."

Ron went red up to the tips of his ears, and she knew that he was about to blast her, first with anger, and then with awkward questions.

"But what about Crabbe, 'Mione?" Harry asked with seeming earnestness. "And Goyle? Do you really think someone was willing to shag them?"

The redhead's attention was instantly diverted. "Ooh, it's definitely them, I'm sure of it. We can totally trick them into admitting something tomorrow, I know we can...."

Shaking her head at the master strategist at work, Hermione bid the other two goodnight. Her room was at the head of the stairs with Harry's next and Ron's after that. Hers was the only room with a private bath on this floor, the two boys sharing the one at the end of the hall past Ron's room.

She changed into her pyjamas, flannel bottoms and a cotton camisole. Hermione wasn't certain if it was the aura of the house or if genuine spells had been cast, but even in the height of summer the house remained cool and gloomy despite the improvements which had been made since Sirius had first gifted it to the Order.

Not only was it now always clean, but Harry had finally removed Mrs Black's portrait, although he wouldn't say how, and it was she who had laid the elf heads to rest with an obscure potions formula she had found in one of the even more obscure books that was squirrelled away in the library.

She didn't think anyone else was aware of just how many of the books she had appropriated and tucked away in her room. At any rate, there had been tomes down there that she was pretty sure most of the Order would not want her, Harry, or Ron to get their hands on, and she had avoided that potential argument in the most expedient manner.

Finished with her nightly ablutions, she climbed into bed, the old wooden frame creaking slightly, but didn't bother to douse the lights. Sure enough, despite the fact that they had not made an official assignation, a few minutes later there was the barest of knocks on the door, which was opened immediately to reveal the messy, dark-haired head of the Saviour of the wizarding world. She motioned him in and patted the spot on the dark blue quilt next to her.

Soon they were seated side by side, shoulders and legs touching, backs against the cool outer wall. She was closer to the head of the bed and he to the foot, and they were facing the now-closed door that led into the hallway. Once she'd warded the room against interruption and eavesdropping, she turned to him with a smile.

"I think we had a lovely first time."

Author's Notes: I rather doubt that JKR intended for Hermione to use the Time-Turner as much as I'm suggesting. I don't think it's out of the realm of possibility for Hermione to have done so, however, and that's the line I took for this fic.

Chapter two, in which a plan is hatched, will be posted soon (admins and queue willing). ^_^