She blinked at her five fingers against the wood. A heartbeat later, she jerked out of her chair.

"What—"

"I destroyed the cup with a basilisk fang in the Chamber of Secrets." Blood raced through her veins as she spun to him. "Draco, I think it's still down there. One of the fangs."

He gaped at her. "Don't you think he would have found it?"

"No. The rest were attached to the skeleton, so he wouldn't have looked far." She could hear the words as though Harry was speaking them— "His arrogance makes him careless."

"Granger—"

"I dropped a fang into the water. I remember it clearly now." She stepped into him, grasping his arms. "There's a basilisk fang still in the Chamber of Secrets, Draco. That's how we'll destroy this Horcrux."

His eyes flickered as they searched hers. "Granger, you can't be positive that you dropped it in the water."

"I can." A smile broke across her lips.

She released him and rushed to the locked cabinet. The silver lock fell open at her touch, and the doors swung open, revealing the Pensieve inside. Lucius's memories swirled at the disturbance.

Hermione glanced back over her shoulder. "I'll show you."

Draco stared at her before nodding, like snapping out of a trance. He moved next to her, scooped the jumbled memories into a vial, and offered her his wand. Hermione tapped it to her temple, summoning thoughts of the Battle of Hogwarts and Helga Hufflepuff's cup. Tugging the thread from her mind felt like a snake's tongue in her ear, but soon enough she had the silver memory dangling from the tip. She dropped it in the Pensieve, and her eyes met Draco's as she took his hand.

They dropped on solid ground together. But a vice locked around her heart the instant her vision cleared.

Ron.

Her stomach swooped violently. She watched with shallow breath as he crouched to place the cup on the wet stone floor in front of her past self. His blue eyes lifted to hers, and she watched herself stare up at him as he stood.

He was even taller than she'd remembered.

The basilisk fang gleamed in his open palm, speckled with blood and dirt. "Go ahead," he said.

His voice. It had been a year since she'd heard it. She'd forgotten how it had deepened to resonate in his chest.

She watched her younger self refuse, insisting that he should be the one to do it. Her face was pale and grim.

"This one's yours," Ron said. "I did the locket. You should do one."

Ron stepped closer, and Hermione watched herself take the fang with shaking fingers. He smiled at her, tentative and encouraging, and she felt it wash over her like sunlight.

There was a hollowness inside her, but the sight of Ron seemed to ease it. His freckles and his hair — the little details she'd tucked away so she wouldn't feel the loss of them.

Something shifted near her elbow, and she glanced to see Draco at her side. His face was unreadable as he watched the figures in the memory. He'd let go of her hand, she realized.