A/N: Hermione's home life sucks, to put it mildly. When Snape forces her to experience her worst nightmare, can he help her through it? HG/SS mentor fic, possibly turning into something more. A/U: Harry has been rescued from the Dursleys and is now living with the Weasleys. Voldemort is dead. Set during Hermione's fifth year.

Chapter One: Hermione at Home

Hermione closed her eyes and sniffled, curling around her pillow. She'd only been home from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and already she missed it. It was only for Christmas break, but it felt like a lifetime. Even though this was the middle of her fifth year, she still felt like a first-year student sometimes, wide-eyed with wonder that magic really did exist.

It certainly didn't at home. It hadn't since her mother fell ill. No one could say for sure what was wrong with her. She'd gone to specialist after specialist. Hermione had even surreptitiously scoured books full of healing charms and diagnostic spells, looking up every Muggle and magical disease she could think of. Nothing came close to her mother's symptoms. There might be more in the Restricted Section, but she didn't dare look there again. Not after the disaster with the Polyjuice Potion second year.

Stupid girl, she chastised herself, remembering that. A blush of shame colored her cheeks. She still couldn't believe she hadn't realized the hair she'd plucked off Millicent Bullstrode's robes was a cat hair. It's not like humans had fur. What had she been thinking?

Her bedroom door creaked open and she froze, her eyelids pressing tightly together in a desperate attempt to feign sleep.

"I know you're awake, baby girl," came her father's slurred whisper. Not tonight, she whispered to herself. Please, not again...

"Yes, Daddy," she admitted, knowing her punishment would be worse if she continued to just lie there. He stumbled across the room and landed heavily on her bed, crushing her legs beneath his weight. She bit back a surprised scream. If she woke up her mother, he would hurt her badly.

"Come on, sweetheart, let's get you out of that nightgown," he mumbled in her ear. Her blood froze. He pulled the blanket down, revealing her long, bare legs. Hermione had started filling out this year and she hated it. She hated the new fullness to her body, the way her hips and chest had started to swell and curve. She didn't particularly enjoy being a frizzy-haired stick, but it was far, far better than the alternative.

He pulled her underwear off. Her father refused to let her wear anything but childish underwear. Underwear patterned with Disney characters, or printed with flowers and butterflies. The implications of that creeped Hermione out, so she refused to think about it for long. It didn't matter, anyway. Nobody would care.

It was a harsh truth for a fifteen-year-old to face, but she knew it. Her own father had told her when she was just seven years old and he'd started touching her for the first time, that it didn't matter if she told anyone because it was normal. Nobody would come to her rescue. The knight riding up on a white horse? Purest fantasy. And now, even at Hogwarts, she knew that the important one was Harry. Hadn't Dumbledore believed him when he said the Dursleys were abusive and put him under the guardianship of the Weasleys? She bet he was happy now. The Dursleys hadn't deserved him, anyway. She'd seen them at the train station. Rotten people. The worst sort of Muggle-or witch or wizard, for that matter.

Hermione felt her father's fingers now, sliding roughly between her legs. It hurt in a vague sort of way. He wasn't particularly gentle. He never had been, even when she was a little girl.

Think of something else, think of something else, she chanted in her mind as he shoved her legs apart and settled between them. Her father had stolen her virginity when she was eleven. Right before she received her letter from Hogwarts, as a matter of fact. It had been the next day that an owl swooped in and changed her life.

Tears came involuntarily to Hermione's eyes, even locked away in her mind as she was. The pain always got to her. He was massive, stabbing into her weak, defenseless body. She dug her nails into her palms, drawing blood in half-moon shapes.

It won't be long now, she reminded herself as he came inside her with a grunt, collapsing to one side. Just two more weeks. Then I'll be back at Hogwarts. I'll be safe.

But Hermione wondered if she ever really could be safe again. She doubted it.