This one-shot was brought to you by Razamataz22.
Disclaimer: Neither myself, nor anybody affiliated with Team Dragon Star, owns Harry Potter
...
Halloween.
For the Muggle population, it was a time where children ran through the streets dressed in 'horrifying' outfits and receiving candy from the local neighbourhood. Very few of them actually knew what the original purpose of Halloween was but were perfectly content with the current situation. The only potential downside were the dental bills that came with excessive candy consumption.
For wizards, it sadly was more or less the same. Only a handful of mature witches and wizards still practised the rituals of their predecessors, and even fewer managed to do so correctly. Most of this was based on the fact that the Wizengamot had outlawed the use of rituals several centuries earlier, fearing the repercussions of such group activities.
This in turn had resulted in a Civil War of sorts, many at the time fearing that their way of life was going to be torn apart. Those who chose to oppose the ruling were swiftly and harshly dealt with, their prone broken bodies left in stocks in Diagon Alley for several hours at a time as a notice to any of those who decided that they too didn't like the decision of the Wizengamot. As extra insurance their body would be branded with runes that would activate if they ever attempted a ritual again or tried to write down the instructions. None of them wished to discover what the consequences would be if they triggered the runes.
Such history however was burned from the records and erased from the minds of all those who knew about these events. By the time the following Halloween had come around, a handful of select individuals toasted to the success of wiping the idea of rituals from human minds.
Or so they thought.
Even though they had destroyed every written article that involved such horrid activities, it didn't mean that the rituals were not passed on some other way. Mothers had directly injected the ritual teachings into the minds of their daughters, then the teachings passed on to them would be passed along again for generation after generation until…
"Are you sure about this Daphne?"
"Sure I'm sure."
"But don't we need another person?"
"Just the two of us will be fine. Before you say anything else, Tracey, remember we are two of the only people in this castle who know how to do this and if we ask the wrong person then we're in all sorts of trouble. Can you imagine what would happen if someone was to walk through that door right now?"
Of course it was at that moment when the door to the room was pushed open slowly, revealing the female Gryffindor Prefect standing there. Having been doing her patrols through the corridors, she was drawn in to the sound of the argument the two witches had been having with one another and felt it was her duty to do something.
Unlike most Prefect patrols where they went in pairs, she had opted to leave her partner behind. Their mutual friend was having a tough time this year so far with the Daily Prophet doing it's best to ruin his reputation and their appointed professor for the Defence Against the Dark Arts post seemed to be here only to make his life worse. At the end of the day however it was Halloween, and as such she had decided that it would be best for her to do the patrol herself and allow the boys just to have some time to themselves.
"What's going on here?" asked Hermione as she entered the room to see the two Slytherin witches in an unused classroom.
"Nothing," said Tracey Davies all too quickly.
"Really?" said Hermione looking towards the bed that sat in the middle of the room with a glowing circle surrounding it. "Then what's that?"
"It was like that when we got here," said Tracey, her voice full of confidence despite how easy it was to see through her lie.
"You're not really doing us any favours here, Trace," said Daphne in defeat.
"No way, she was totally believing it," said Tracey.
"No I wasn't," said Hermione crossing her arms over her chest.
"You're lying!" accused Tracey before her friend cast a Silencing Charm over her. She didn't seem to notice as she continued into a rant, clearly hearing the words in her own head while Daphne and Hermione watched on in a mixture of confusion and entertainment.
"So would you like to tell me what's going on?" asked Hermione pointing her question towards Daphne, a look of distraught coming over Tracey's face, not liking how she was being ignored.
Daphne Greengrass bit at the inside of her lip as she considered her options. Despite Hermione's reputation for being a teacher's pet who took pleasure in obeying the laws put in place by the school, very few actually seemed to recall the fact that she, Harry Potter and Ron Weasley managed to get into trouble at least once a month. They were no strangers to breaking the rules, especially since half of the stupid rules that had been implemented by Dolores Umbridge (the worst Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher they had had by far) seemed to be targeted directly at the three Gryffindor students.
Daphne wasn't much of a risk taker but with the situation in front of her being as it was, she decided to take a chance.
"Hermione, what do you know of rituals?" asked Daphne.
"Rituals? Not much that I can think of," said Hermione.
"Alright, let me give you a basic run down of the last few hundred years regarding rituals then," said Daphne. "First thing to know is that they were made illegal several centuries ago and all record of them was destroyed. Before you open your mouth to complain about how we're doing something illegal, let me explain."
Hermione, who had been about to have a go at them, decided to keep quiet for the moment; she would make her judgment on the situation afterwards. "While all written articles regarding rituals were destroyed that does not mean that there weren't other ways to pass the knowledge on," continued Daphne. "The thing you have to remember is that the Ministry's highest powers have always been male, all of the decisions have always been decided by men. Now when a bunch of women start doing something that the men become afraid of, their immediate reaction was to have everything banned. Participating in a ritual is still punishable by a hefty fine or time in Azkaban."
"And the two of you were trying to do this in a school?"
"The ritual we are about to perform is not harmful to anybody, yet was still banned," said Daphne. "The real reasons as to why we'll never know because the Ministry refuse to talk about such events. So now, we're trying to perform what our mothers performed before us and their mothers beforehand for generations. Would you deny us that right?"
Hermione weighed up her options here and while she had blatantly been told that such activities were deemed illegal in the eyes of the government, considering the amount of stuff that she had participated in over the past few years, she would deem herself a hypocrite if she were to call them out on it. "Very well, I will turn a blind eye in this regard," she said slowly.
"Like hell you will," said Tracey, having somehow dispelled the silencing charm on herself, much to Daphne's surprise.
"What?" said Hermione.
"You're joining in," said Tracey. "We need three people for this and we're not going to find someone else to fill in our vacancy."
"But…I don't…"
"No complaints, now shut up and strip," said Tracey as she disrobed herself, her clothes falling to the floor revealing all of her naked glory in only a matter of seconds.
Hermione, who had not been expecting such a thing in any way, shape or form, mentally collapsed for a few moments and only started functioning once more when Daphne began to disrobe in front of her.
"Don't make me hex your clothes to oblivion. Running back to your Common Room starkers may cost you that Prefect badge," threatened Tracey.
"Can I ask what this ritual will do?" asked Hermione doing her best to retain eye contact and not allow her gaze to wander.
"Fertility ritual," said Tracey as she got into position.
"Fertility?"
"Essentially it just helps our future children carry on magical genes and not become squibs," said Daphne. "Just follow our lead."
"…Okay," said Hermione after several moments before she started to disrobe.
"There's also some stuff about chanting, praising, urination and a touch of self fondling and masturbation," said Tracey incredibly fast in order to try and confuse Hermione. Unfortunately Hermione was easily able to decipher what Tracey had said.
"WHAT!"
…
"Hey, how was patrol?" asked Ron as Hermione returned to the Common Room, much of the colour drained from her face. "You alright? You don't look so good."
"I'm fine, Ronald," said Hermione as she made her way past him. "Just…saw some stuff I shouldn't have seen."
"Were Crabbe and Goyle making out or something?"
"If only," said Hermione off handedly as she made her way up to her room. Thankfully her roommates were out for the moment and as such she was able to collapse onto her bed with minimal dignity and not find herself on the receiving end of a verbal roast. Pulling her blinds over, she took her robes off and inspected her body, including the rope marks where Tracey had 'requested' she remain for two follow up rituals, the purpose of which she hadn't been told.
Putting her head on her pillow, she summarised that the experience wasn't terrible by any stretch of the imagination and probably didn't get close to her worst Halloween which was still nearly being clubbed to death by a troll in first year. Second worst was still when she dressed up as Albert Einstein as a child to go trick or treating. Ironically, it wasn't one of her smarter ideas.
Rubbing at her stomach, she broke down what she had gone through and figured that the ends outweighed the means considering it meant that her children would continue her magical line. Closing her eyes, she just hoped that her activities didn't have any unfortunate side effects.
…
"Hey Daph?"
"Yeah Trace?"
"During the second ritual, did Hermione say Garvilona or Garvilano?"
"…Might have been Garvilano."
"…Should we tell her to go see Madam Pomfrey?"
"She's a smart girl, she'll figure it out."
…
Hope you enjoyed. Happy Halloween and all that...stuff...I guess?