The first time Hermione knows she's pregnant, it lasts three months.

When she finds out, she and Ron are overjoyed. They've waited for this, tried for this, for so long that Hermione cries before she has the chance to tell him and he guesses from her smiling face and tears. For a while, they sit together, his arms around her, and they talk about names and what to do for the room for the baby, and, of course, how to tell the family.

Ginny is fairly far along with her and Harry's first child when Ron and Hermione tell the family, one Sunday night at the traditional Weasley dinner. Everyone runs to congratulate then, clapping Ron on the back and hugging Hermione. But Fleur and Hermione exchange a look: they both know what could happen, but not a word is said.

At two months along, Hermione wakes up, sick to her stomach, and knows its really true. Ron sweeps the hair back from her face and tries his best to be tactful and helpful. As usual, he fails quite miserably, but Hermione knows that he is coming to her aide with good intent, so she holds his hand and lets him comfort her.

Time flies by, and soon, its time for Ginny to have her and Harry's first child. Hermione sees the pain etched across her sister-in-law's, or, best friend's wife, or...perhaps best friend who is a girl would be a better description. And in the pain she also senses the overwhelming joy that Ginny feels as she holds James Sirius in her arms.

"Do you want to hold him?" Ginny asks Hermione, her voice quieter than normal and also slightly broken from the ordeal. "You'll need to practice; you'll have your own soon."

Hermione nods, and takes the baby from her. "He's adorable," she says and she knows her face shows how much she longs for a child of her own.

Ron and Hermione go home, and that night, sleeping in Ron's arms she dreams, not her usual nightmares from the war, but a lovely dream of her and Ron and a baby. A baby whose face she cannot see, nor gender can she tell, but she is happy, she can tell that, so she snuggles in closer to Ron and continues her sleep uninterrupted.

It's later on, two weeks after James's birth that Ron comes to Hermione, later than normal and says, "I've got to go out and do a mission... Auror stuff, you know... I...I'm sorry 'Mione..."

She gets angry at him, and yells, and he just...he just takes it, at the end, when she's said her fill and curled up in a ball on the couch, her eyes full of tears, he says "We both knew it would happen again, I couldn't ask to be taken off the task force. 'Mione, they need Harry and I, we're some of the best trained they've got. I asked Kinsley if there was any way...I did...I'm sorry."

The tears do fall down her face, but she doesn't push him away when he comes close to her and holds her in his arms. He kisses her softly on each cheek, drying away the tears, and finally, he kisses her lips, slowly, and they continue on the dance they know do well now and make love.

He leaves in the morning, early, but she wakes anyway, her morning sickness not over yet, and there is still some anger between them.

"You come home to me," she says as she kisses him goodbye."

"I always will," Ron replies. And he apparates off.

She is alone for the first extended period of time since she found out that she was pregnant, and she finds the solitude disconcerting. Getting back from the Ministry and having no one else at home scares her. She hasn't liked to be alone since the end of the war, at least not for too long a period of time. But she tries to find some food she thinks she can stomach - her morning sickness does not just stay in the morning, whoever named it was an idiot, she thinks to herself - and curls up in the corner of her and Ron's bed, pulling his robe around her for warmth.

She wakes up, confused for a moment before her head spins and her stomach churns and all she can think of is running to the toilet and throwing up. Groaning, she drags herself up when she has finished, and looks at the clock. It's half past six, so she cleans herself up the best she can and heads to the Ministry for another long day at work.

By the next day, the routine has been ingrained in her, and she curls up in the same spot again and reads until she falls asleep.

She wakes up in pain.

Unimaginable pain. Which is quite a feat since she still vividly remembers being tortured by Bellatrix Lestrange in 1998. She knows without needing to check, what has happened. She's bleeding, and not a spot or two, but more blood than she normally has during a monthly. Bellatrix did this to her, and rage, at the unjustness that even though the battle had been fought and won, she would carry those scars forever.

She doesn't go to work that day, but instead, cleans herself up and cries. She just can't stop crying. There's so many tears, and so much pain.

It's a quarter past twelve when there's a knock on the door, but then the knob turns because someone has put in a key and Hermione doesn't move. She doesn't reach for her wand, because she just... Just can't care enough anymore, doesn't have the energy to care.

A voice calls through the house, familiar, but it isn't Ron's. "Hermione, where are you? Ron asked me to come check in if he wasn't home in a few days." But she makes no noise other than her muted crying, and she stays in the same spot.

The door to the bedroom opens, and George is standing there, his red hair messed up, though the hole in the side of his head, where his ear used to be is looking cleaner than ever. "Hermione, what's wrong?" He asks, but she makes no answer other than tears that keep falling down her face, and then, he understands, and she's not quite sure how, and he isn't either, but somehow the whole atmosphere had changed and he just knew.

Only then, after she knew he knew did words form on her tearstained lips, from her tearstained heart. "The baby, George...what am I going to tell Ron?" And she's lost. Because she doesn't know what to do. Doesn't know how to handle the knowledge that she has had for the past few hours.

He says nothing, because he, he of all people know what its like to have something that is part of you ripped from them. Instead of giving birth to words that are meaningless, helpless, he walks around the bed, to the side where she is curled up against the wall, and climbs up next to her. Putting his arms around her, he pulls her close, rocking her back and forth, gently. Eventually, her cries subside, and she falls asleep.

George waits there, his arms around her, holding her together the best he can, because he doesn't want her to be alone. He doesn't want het to have to deal with the loss, the agony, alone. He's done that...well...tried to do that, and knows it isn't the way to handle things. He can't let Hermione, his sister in law, who he has known for so long, that he knows has suffered so much, try to deal with this pain alone any longer than she must. And Ron. He knew his brother needed to get back, and soon, but there was no way to contact him, he knew that, so instead, he just sits there, holding her, praying his brother will soon return to his home.

He doesn't have to wait too long. Around six o'clock, the lock turns and Ron enters his home. The feel of the place immediately puts him off, and then George speaks, quietly, but nevertheless, his voice carries, "Ron, you'd better come here. Quick."

Ron comes in, dropping his bag as he walks over to the bed where George sat, holding Hermione in his arms. "No..." Ron's eyes begin to fill with tears and concern.

"She'll be alright, it'll take some time. But... Ron...she...the baby... She didn't really say anything, explain anything. I came in to check on her like you asked and she was crying, curled up alone, I couldn't leave her." He tries to justify himself, that he couldn't do anything, there was nothing for him to do. They stay silent for a while, the clock showing the time passing.

"We knew it could happen." Ron says finally. George looks at him, questioningly. "Bellatrix." He spit the name out like a curseword. "When she tortured Hermione...there was lasting damage, more than just the nightmares. Fleur told us that day, well, told me that day, when we brought her to Shell Cottage. She told Hermione later, she couldn't deal with more trauma. But Fleur said that it would be difficult, really difficult, for Hermione to get pregnant...and that if..." He paused, trying to hold back tears. "And even if she did, it'd be hard for her to carry the baby to full term, near impossible...that there was a great likelihood that she'd lose the baby." Ron said quietly, low, so Hermione didn't wake, and he just stood there, not moving except for his lips as he spoke.

"But you tried anyway?" George asked, unable to help himself.

"You know Hermione, she is stubborn as hell, and she wants kids so bad...and George...I want them too, it'd be beating it, you know, it'd be proof that we actually won, to get to have the family that we desire." There were tears down his face, but he didn't try to mask them, hide them, not from his brother.

Hermione stirred against George, and mumbled something. "She'll remember, when she wakes..." He said to Ron. "You'd better be the one... I did what I could. But she was scared of your reaction...be careful."

"I will," he replies, and he walks around to where his brother is sitting, and gently, they switch places, and it is Ron that is cradling Hermione in his arms when she walks, and in a sickening second, it is his arms that she grabs on to, clings to, as realization overcomes her once more.

"Ron... Ron... I didn't do anything that could hurt the baby... I was careful... I don't understand...I don't understand..." She cries, clinging to him.

"I know, 'Mione, I know," he soothes her, smoothing back her hair, and holding back his own tears. They threaten to fall from his blue eyes, but he doesn't let them. Hermione needs him now, and he will do whatever is necessary to help her, he always has. "We knew it could happen, we knew, remember, we always knew."

"But...it hurts...Ron...it hurts so much...so bad... It doesn't matter that we knew..." Her speech is broken, and full of tears, but Ron understands, and holds her close, whispering to her how much he loves her, how they've gotten through so much, how they can overcome this trial too.