Disclaimer: J.K. Rowling is awesome - I don't own anything.

Chapter Nine

"What's happened then?" asked Hermione as she emerged from the fireplace.

"Well- ah, they're already with you, I see. That's fortunate." Anaxos gestured at the twins, who had followed Hermione through the floo and were busy transfiguring their clothes into sturdy hospital robes. "Another failed shrinking sweet, girl this time – different modification as well. It seems that only her heart has been shrunk. She's unable to circulate blood independently and I've got a team of mediwizarsd keeping her bloodflow going artificially with spells, but we need a way to-"

"Resize her heart, yes. You've not tried any charms yet?"

"No. Given that we now know a bit more about how the Weasley's design their products, I thought it best to hold off for fear of causing an adverse reaction. Besides, the sweet is potions-based, so I would presume-"

"That reversing its effects with another potion is our best bet. Any idea what the modification to the original recipe might have been?"

"We're not sure. We-"

"Probably fresh harpygrass instead of dried, or even-"

"Substituting in waxgrass for the harpygrass altogether."

Hermione and Anzxos halted, staring at the twins. "How is it that you just happen to know that off the top of your heads?" demanded Anaxos.

"When your only available test subject for experimental potions is yourself, you tend to read up on all the ways it can go badly wrong." Fred gave a wry smile.

"It was hard enough concealing all the explosions from our mum, a dead body might have made her suspicious."

"Yes, well," Anaxos twitched his mustache in what might have been disapproval at this insight into Fred and George's haphazard product development techniques, "Hermione, you're our best brewer on staff – do you agree with their assessment?"

Hermione appraised the twins. On the one hand, she hated brewing on the fly without conducting a full series of diagnostic tests. On the other, time was not on their side, and realistically any tests she might do would only be to definitely confirm the twins' hypothesis. Besides, if she wished to consult any experts in brewing an antidote, who better to ask than the original inventors? "Yes, I agree with their reasoning. I'll get started right away. It will probably take a few hours, I can't say for certain how many."

Anaxos waved his hand in acknowledgement. "We'll keep the girl stable for you, just keep me updated as and when. Misters Weasley, thank you for your assistance. One of the healer apprentices can show you out."

"We'll stay, actually."

"We can help Hermione brew and answer any questions she might have about the original recipe."

Hermione grimaced, she didn't like brewing collaboratively, other people just seemed to get in her way and too much time was wasted in explaining her thought processes. It was partway through her healer training that she had developed a profound sympathy for Professor Snape's lack of patience during classes, though she still disapproved of his blatant favouritism, justified though the behaviour might have been.

Anaxos considered the twins for a full minute before nodding. "Very well, your assistance may indeed prove invaluable. Remember though that Healer Granger is in charge and when you are in her desmene her word is law. We are here to save a young girl's life, just you keep that in mind." So saying, her strode off briskly, nodding this time to Hermione as he went, and she flashed him a grateful smile for explicitly reminding the twins of her authority. Fortunately, the Weasley men looked serious, intent on the task ahead. She crooked her head at them to follow, and they fell in step behind, flanking her all the way to the brewing room.

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Had the situation been less dire, Fred would have been having fun. Brewing with George was routine experience – they'd been working together since their first successfully exploded cauldron in their first ever potions class at Hogwarts. It had led to the second howler they'd ever received from their mother. After their first week in which she'd sent eight, she'd starting sending just one a week, saving up grievances as they'd reached her, usually through Percy, and then enumerating them in a Monday morning howler. By their second year she'd given up altogether.

Brewing with Hermione and George together was an entirely different experience. It took a while, but after the first five minutes (during which he and George had proved that yes, they had listened to her entirely unnecessary but strangely endearing speech about best practices for brewing safely) something clicked, and they began to flow around one another in an intricate dance, all three alternating seamlessly between preparing ingredients, scribbling brewing steps on a large piece of parchment, and stirring the two bubbling cauldrons.

It was a very different space from his and George's brewing room in the shop, which didn't even begin to approach organized chaos, and more closely resembled barely contained apocalypse. The St Mungo's brewing chamber was a sterile and clinical white, quite the contrast to Snape's dungeon classroom. The walls were bedecked with posters of smiling witches and wizards cheerily reminding brewers to prepare ingredients safely, avoid cross-contamination, and warning about the dangers of sloppy stirring and the benefits of wearing protective gloves, robes, and shoes. There were six long immaculate stone tables parallel to one another in the centre or the room, with enough space between them for the long hearths running the length of the floor. One wall was covered in shelves from floor to ceiling, and one shelf held a rather alarming collection of charred wands, clearly designed to frighten brewers into better habits. In a far corner hung a great quantity of drying racks with multiple dried plants dangling in small bunches. Against another was stacked row upon row of cauldrons in every possible permutation of size and material. The ingredients storeroom was properly its own separate wing, and seemed to be stocked with every known potion ingredient, many of which Fred had never even heard of. They were stored by magical property and then alphabetically, which meant that controlled ingredients were stored under heavy wards right next to their more innocuous unwarded counterparts. When they had first entered the room, Hermione had given him and George a look and said it would be safest if only she accessed the storeroom. Initially Fred had thought it was because she didn't trust them to not cause mischief, but on further reflection he wondered if maybe she'd meant exactly what she'd said.

"Right," Hermione said, "it's stable for now and just needs to simmer for thirty minutes," She pushed away a few strands of curly hair that were stuck damply to her forehead. "I'm going to visit the child and double check that what we've brewed will actually be efficacious." She fixed a stern glare on both the twins, which was undermined by her somewhat frazzled appearance. "Don't touch anything, don't go anywhere, don't cause mischief, and no unsupervised brewing!"

He and George exchanged a wink. "Who, us? Wouldn't dream of it," they chorused. She didn't look convinced, but hurried off anyway.

"You think she looks..."

"Amazingly sexy when she glares? Merlin, yes."

Fred frowned in thought for a moment. "Is it okay to talk about her when she's not around?"

"You don't mean normal talking, do you?"

"No, not stuff we'd say in front of mum. More like, the things you think but wouldn't say out loud about a lass. Like-"

"-how you're dead grateful that Hermione wears those muggle jeans that show off her gorgeous arse-"

"-or how she flushes when she's been kissed, and you want to take her clothes off right then just to see how far down it goes?" The twins briefly shared a wistful look before flushing themselves and turning awkwardly to look at opposite corners of the room.

"I don't know," ventured George. "We'll theoretically both be seeing her, so it's not the same as sharing something private with a mate, which would be out of line – if we talk to each other it's still being kept in the relationship, right?"

"Yeah, I suppose, but it's still weird."

"Yeah." They remained silent for a few moments. "Ginny would probably tell us that we should just ask Hermione."

"Nah, that just sounds boring and responsible, like something Bill would do."

"Yes, but Billy-boy went and shacked up with a Veela. He can't really afford to get on Fleur's bad side."

"Very true," Fred nodded. They paused again, listening to the softly bubbling cauldrons.

"What about talking about what she likes?"

"Hermione? What about it? Even Hermione can't object to us chatting about that. How are we supposed to plan dates for her if I don't tell you where we've already been."

"Not that! I mean, what she likes."

Oh, you mean-"

"Yes."

"Because we might find out stuff if either of us is with her alone and things get-"

"Yes!"

Fred felt the now familiar tendril of unease unfurling in his stomach at the thought of George and Hermione... and not him. What if she preferred George? What if he mucked it all up? Again. What if she decides she doesn't like me and only wants to date him and...

He wasn't aware he'd started pacing until he felt George's hand on his arm, bringing him to a halt.

"Mate, you said you were okay with all of this. That's why we offered to Hermione. I wouldn't have agreed if you hadn't said you'd be okay. Merlin, Fred, we can't mess Hermione about!"

"I'm not messing!" Fred looked George in the eye, trying to convey his certainty. "I want to be okay with this, I do. I just can't help worry that I'll do something wrong, or that you'll... or she..." He trailed off, dropping his gaze. George appeared back in his view though, as his twin ducked down to catch Fred's eye again whilst giving a small smile.

"I swear, solemnly, that I will not leave you, and if this thing explodes in our faces I'll be right there with you while mum yells at us for bollocking it all up-"

"-along with Ginny, and Harry, and ickle Ronniekins."

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Hermione ran through the hallways of St Mungo's. She hadn't meant to let the time get away from her, but Harry's idiotic boss had insisted on detaining her and grilling her about the Spavin boy. Probably trying to score points in some sort of imaginary turf war, she thought. She'd eventually managed get it through his thick skull that if she didn't get back to the potion antidote the latest child to be brought in as the result of a botched shrinking sweet might not survive, but she dreaded it was too late and she'd have to start the potion again from scratch. Why didn't I leave Fred and George some instructions? They invent their own potions. I probably could have trusted them with some very simple, clearly detailed instructions!

Finally reaching the brewing room she burst through the door, chest heaving from the unaccustomed exertion, only to find a scene of whirling, efficient bustle, with two fiery red heads at its epicentre. The twins were brewing. After all the warnings she'd given them, when she'd specifically told them not to, they'd had the temerity, no, the audacity, to meddle with a vital St Mungo's experimental potion, her potion! She opened her mouth to give voice to her outrage, but even as she did so, her subconscious unhelpfully noted that the room smelled the way she expected it to, and the cauldron contents that Fred was correctly stirring was the appropriate shade of raspberry red. Only fractionally calmer, she began, "Did you-"

"-add the elderberry and toad's eyes? Yes," called George cheerily.

"The-"

"-hornback toad? Dried, not fresh eyeballs? Yes and yes." Fred, this time.

"And-"

"-then sprinkled in the pixie dust after two minutes? Yes."

"Are you-"

"-stirring three turns clockwise one turn widdershins ad infinitum. Yes, dear." Fred had the nerve to wink at her.

"Will you let-"

"-you finish your sentences?" and suddenly George was directly in front of her, eyes alight with mirth, and when did it get so hot in here? "Not when it makes you look so adorably flustered," he said, darting in to press a kiss to the top of her head before turning back to the ingredients he was preparing, correctly, Hermione noted with the bit of her brain that wasn't basking in the thought that George found her, Hermione Granger the know-it-all, adorable. She tried to scowl at them both, but their unrepentant grins made it very difficult.

"Alright, smartarses - you win. And thank you for stepping in. Restarting that brew would have taken time we can't afford to waste." She narrowed her eyes as a thought occurred to her. "Pixie dust is a controlled substance. Would either of you mind telling me exactly how you managed to get through the St Mungo's wards in order to obtain said ingredient?"

The twins didn't even bother glancing at one another. "Not a chance."

Well that just sounds like a challenge.

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"And Bill 'just gave it to you'? I find that hard to believe."

"Well if you define just leaving something lying around-"

"-in a drawer marked 'Fred and George: Keep Out', as just giving it to us, then yes-"

"-he practically handed the thing over as a Christmas present."

"And it neutralizes any ward?" It had takes several pizzas and ice creams to prise the secret from Fred and George, but Hermione had been fairly sure they'd want to show off their very cool toy to their new girlfriend. Girlfriend, am I now? And I suppose they are both my boyfriends. This is weird, so weird.

The three of them were back in her flat sitting on her couch, exhausted from the five hours of brewing. They wouldn't be entirely sure if the potion was a success until the morning proper, but Anaxos had sent Hermione and the twins home, saying he'd floo if she was needed again. As it had been after one in the morning when they'd left St Mungo's, Hermione had suggested pizza, knowing that Weasley's never say no to food. Now they were sat together, close but not quite touching, and Hermione's nerves with thrumming with the effort to sense those liminal spaces where their body heat and hers intermingled. Brewing with them had been terrifyingly easy. Not once had she had to stop and explain herself, or correct them, and by the end of the five hours she even found herself trusting them to have started working on the next step without her supervision. It was eye opening to work with them. She'd known, theoretically, that they were clever. She'd trusted her life to some of their inventions, mostly during the war. But to know it in the abstract was a very different beast from witnessing them in action, and it had been exciting to finally work with people who could not only keep up but also work with her as equal partners. The three of them had moved so naturally together, as if they were all one interconnected organism rather than three separate people. It offered up the possibility of a whole different type of attraction and intimacy, and Hermione was slightly wary of allowing herself to be vulnerable to the lure of intellectual counterparts. Imagining the twins in bed with her was one thing; imagining them in her potions room on a more permanent basis was infinitely more dangerous.

"Not every ward," George answered, and it took Hermione a moment to return her focus to their ongoing conversation. "Ward's with language roots other than Latin – or blood wards, for that matter – are too much for it to handle. But the Ministry's standard set of wards for the Wizarding population of the United Kingdom? Works every time."

"Like a charm?" Hermione couldn't help herself.

"No, it's proper defense magic, nothing to do with charms." George gave her a funny look, confused by the non-magical saying.

Hermione giggled. "Nevermind. You say the Goblins created it?"

"Yeah, Bill said it was something to do with Goblins safely inspecting the items people put in their vault, or something."

"Let me guess, you stopped listening after you heard the words 'neutralize' and 'wards' in the same sentence?"

"Guilty as charged," said Fred, looking anything but.

"Well, I'll remember not to use Ministry-approved wards in future when I want to hide things from the pair of you," Hermione teased. Yawning, she stretched then cast a tempus charm. "Good grief, aren't you two meant to be working in the shop tomorrow? We should probably call it a night." She stood, and began clearing away cups and pizza boxes, mourning the loss of Fred and George's nearness. They stood as well and helped her restore order to her flat, after which all three of them faffed for at least ten minutes more, reluctant to say goodnight. At last, with rueful smile, Hermione insisted it was time for them to go. She led them to her fireplace, not trusting them to apparate safely after hours of brewing, and something in her chest tightened at the sight of them awkwardly shuffling their feet as they all three tried to figure out what the new protocol for departures was meant to be. "So," she smiled up at them both, "we're going to give this a go then?"

They both nodded, but George shot a quick glance at his twin. "We got to talking while you were checking in on the girl, and we both think that maybe for now we should do things as a group. Just so no one ends up feeling left out." It was left unspoken between all three that 'no one' meant Fred.

"That sounds like a good idea," she agreed. "We'll just have to take it slow, and keep talking." Fred was tugging at his collar and looking mortified so she took pity on him and went up on tiptoe to kiss him goodnight before turning to do the same with George.

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Author's Note: Just so we're clear, I know absolutely nothing about polyamorous relationships from direct experience – this story is just me imagining how these three characters might acknowledge and build upon multiple attractions. I wanted to explore what it might be like to untangle some of the pitfalls of having a relationship with more than two people, and have all three parties be navigating from the shared point A of no experience. There are many great stories on FF involving triads, but lots of them are about the steamy sex rather than creating a relationship from scratch for which relatively few templates exist. Which is fine, and this story will have its share of spicy intimate moments (I've had one scene in particular rolling around in my head for weeks, but I can't get to it until its proper place in the narrative arrives!), but I'm slightly more interested in exploring the emotional aspect of things. However, I am not at all writing from a point of authority or experience, and I feel like, um, maybe I should say that?

And that's why you don't write an essay without an outline, you lose track of what you were saying halfway through! Anyway, thank you to everyone who has been reading and reviewing – I'll hopefully be a bit faster on the next installment!