"Kevin? Where did you run off to?"
He was nearly at the castle. Hermione appeared from a side path, slightly out of breath, looking him over for damage.
He looked fine. She exhaled.
"You just vanished without a word. What were you doing?"
She had her hands on her hips, which was the specific posture of someone who had been genuinely worried and had converted it into irritation because irritation was more manageable.
"I know. I'm sorry — Barty moved so fast and I didn't have time to—" He took her hand, which usually helped. "It won't happen again."
Harry and Ron arrived behind her, slightly winded from their own chase.
"So?" Harry said. "What happened?"
"Nothing useful. He Apparated the second he cleared the grounds. Whatever he was up to, I lost him."
Kevin left the Moody encounter entirely out of it. That required its own conversation, in private, when he'd decided what to do with what he knew. For now, there was no action to take.
"Sirius mentioned the school was full of people with things to hide this year," Harry said, frowning at the treeline.
"He's not wrong. But nothing solid yet." Kevin turned them toward the castle. "Come on. We should be celebrating — you survived a lake full of grindylows and a Hungarian Horntail in the space of three months. That deserves recognition."
Harry accepted this reasoning and followed.
Life resumed its usual shape after the second task. The final task was a month out. Nobody knew what it was yet, so Harry threw himself at spell practice with an intensity Kevin privately thought was his best quality — he was most formidable when he stopped waiting for information and just started preparing.
Ron matched him, which was its own kind of development. Ron was most useful when he decided something mattered.
Draco, Ron reported with a specifically injured tone, had been spotted walking with a girl Ron didn't recognise. Apparently Draco had managed the Astoria question after all. Ron had thought that since Kevin and Harry were occupied, Draco would keep him company. This had not transpired.
Kevin's workshop had continued its gradual domestication. The right half — which had started as a bare sofa and a side table — was now something else entirely. Hermione had brought a blue checkered tablecloth one afternoon without commentary. Then a red and gold rug, thick enough to be worth sitting on. Two armchairs had been repositioned. Tall plants had appeared in two corners. And on the wall, framed: the hilltop photograph, Hogwarts Castle small and golden in the distance.
She'd said the walls felt empty. She'd dragged him back to the hill for a new photo and hung it herself while he was teaching.
Harry and Ron had stopped dropping by quite so frequently. Ron said it felt too much like visiting a couple's flat. Harry was more tactful about it but had conveyed the same general sentiment. Kevin didn't mind. There was something to be said for a space that was genuinely theirs.
One Wednesday, Hermione was lying on the sofa with her head in Kevin's lap.
"Kevin." She turned the bracelet on her wrist slowly. "Do you think it's because we've worn these so long? That we can feel each other even when they're off?"
They'd circled this question before, never quite landing. The bracelet had been confiscated before the task. He'd still found her.
"Has to be connected," Kevin said. "But these aren't standard enchantments. The craftsmanship is alchemical — different principles from charmwork. Someone who understood the deeper mechanics of the soul put these together."
"Who'd know enough for that?" Hermione asked.
"Nicolas Flamel." He said it without much hesitation.
She tilted her head. "He'd still be alive, if the Philosopher's Stone is real."
"It is. We've seen it." Kevin watched the window. "I'll ask Dumbledore sometime. The bracelets were my parents' — they left them for me. Whatever they are, they're not dangerous." He paused. "Probably."
She looked up from his lap. "You've been sitting on that for four years."
"I've been otherwise occupied."
She smiled and turned back to the ceiling.
"Maybe eventually we'll sense each other's thoughts," she said.
"Can you pick up mine right now?"
He patted her head.
She looked at his expression. "Those eyes? You're up to something."
"I just want to—"
"No."
She caught his head with both hands when he leaned down, laughing. He got one arm free, caught her wrists, pressed them lightly above her head. She stopped laughing at approximately the right moment.
On the windowsill, a beetle landed. Neither of them noticed.