Without A Trace - Chapter 19: Labyrinth Posted yesterday!

Cover art by Slytherquills

If you like:

• A whip-smart but deeply traumatized Hermione POV with painfully realistic, sharply funny interiority
• A dazzlingly swoon-inducing, layered, and complicated Draco who would risk himself—again and again—just to bring back her fire
• A unique setting and premise: post–eighth year, set mostly in Brisbane, Australia. Hermione is drowning in grief and disconnection as she tries to rebuild things with her parents; Draco is a fugitive in hiding from the Ministry—and somehow seems startlingly stable
• Hurt/comfort where the hurt is existential and thematic, and the comfort is compassion, integrity, and the slow return of agency—not fluffy declarations or wish fulfillment
• Mutual pining so soul-deep it feels physically dangerous to them both
• Golden Trio friendship dynamics examined with nuance, maturity, and enormous empathy
• Prose written by an actual former comedy writer raised on Helen Fielding, Louise Rennison, and Meg Cabot

Then you might enjoy my little WIP, Without a Trace (19/? chapters, just under 100k words). Chapter 19 is probably my most ambitious to date—it kicks off a whole new act of the story. In it, you’ll find:

• !Crookshanks POV (!!) to start the arc—with prophetic yowling, violent feline intuition, and righteous castle-wide chaos. He is everything. We are all just Ken.!<

• !A slow-burning, devastating exploration of magical depletion and recovery, grounded in medical realism and canon-adjacent magical theory!<

• !Draco in full hot potioneer/healer mode. It’s competence kink. It’s acts of service as love language. It’s applied-skill-as-devotion. It is—frankly—ruinously hot.!<

• !Meanwhile, Hermione has had two highly inconvenient realizations: 1) she might be dying, and 2) she is in love with Draco Malfoy.!<

• !Granger parents who are three-dimensional, imperfect, and doing everything in their power to save the daughter they love—from something they don’t understand and can’t control!<

This project has brought me so much joy, and the support I’ve found in this fandom has been incredible. Thank you to everyone who’s been recommending, commenting, or leaving kudos—you’re the absolute best.

🧡 I hope you check it out!