𝑮𝑬𝑵𝑬𝑻𝑰𝑪 𝑶𝑩𝑺𝑬𝑺𝑺𝑰𝑶𝑵 || 𝗦𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘂𝘀 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗛𝗲𝗿𝗺𝗶𝗼𝗻𝗲

𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝟎𝟑.

Harry left them to walk to the other side of the hotel alone. If Hermione Granger and Severus Snape were in danger from walking the halls of a hotel, things were a lot worse than he thought.

Not for the first time, he sincerely wished that he could have played Quidditch for a living. Being the head of the Auror office was too much work, too many hours, and too many headaches...and that was just the paperwork. He'd quit, if he trusted anyone else to do the job.

Kingsley Shagbolt's nephew Julius was already in the suite that they'd turned into temporary headquarters when the conference started. There were notable witches and wizards from all over the world attending, and he wanted everything to be flawless...a heart in a box and his best friend in some sort of danger was not what he had in mind.

He used a charm to activate the auror's badges, so they'd know he was holding a meeting. A few had orders to remain at their posts so only the 'rovers' would show up. They filed into the room quickly as Harry put the tiny box back on the table.

"Hermione got another one."

Dwarvish peeked into the box. "Pixie." He looked at Harry. "You've checked it for spells?"

Harry nodded. "Snape did, can't ask for anything more than that."

After removing the heart a tiny scroll was found in a false bottom of the box.

"My darling Hermione will never touch this heart Potter, so I know who will read this. She's mine. If you want the next heart I send to be your wife's then please continue to thwart my efforts to woo my maiden..."

Harry hissed and immediately sent a patronus to Ginny. "Bastard."

Shagbolt's nephew tittered. "I don't think this is anyone who's actually met Hermione; who the hell calls the brightest witch of the age a 'maiden'? They couldn't be anyone who has seen her spell work..."

Another Auror, Henson, laughed. "Or been on the wrong end of it. I didn't announce my presence clearly enough the first time Potter sent me out to her place to pick up a heart...I was in a full body-bind quicker than you could say Dumbledore."

Harry nodded. "She's nothing to be trifled with, and I have Snape watching her for the moment."

Martin Greengrass frowned. "That playboy who is always in Witch Weekly?"

Greengrass must be younger than Harry had thought.

"Snape's powerful and ruthless, with a bag of tricks that kept him alive in a battle against Voldemort himself."

Martin shrugged. "I thought that was mostly him sneaking around."

Potter's voice cooled considerably. "Without him 'sneaking around' as you put it, we'd probably all be working for Voldemort. Or some of you would, I'd be dead." Harry's face, normally so pleasant, was ice cold.

He glared until the younger man looked down. "Hermione is safe so we can focus on finding this person. Shagbolt, I want you to take the box to the Ministry and have them run every bloody test they can think of on it. Bring in the Unspeakables if you need to. Henson, take Rodgers and Davis and check out the room. I want to know how the hell someone got past her spells. Neither Snape nor I found any evidence of forced entry...that bothers me."

Henson nodded. "Did you move her to a new room then?"

Harry smirked to himself as he pictured mentioning all of this to Professor McGonagall at the next Order meeting. He knew he'd better be out of range of their spell work when he did, but it was going to be brilliant. "She's safe for the moment. No need to share her exact location until we have to. Ok people. Get to work!" His staff fled. Harry wasn't above assigning stragglers to dirty jobs...a trick he'd picked up from his years with the redoubtable Professor Snape in fact....