There is one part of the Battle of Hogwarts that Hermione, despite her best efforts, never seems to be able to share with anyone else or make sense of herself.
Just after Harry disappears, hoping to sacrifice himself to Voldemort and thereby save his friends and supporters that are still alive, Hermione wanders the almost deserted corridors of Hogwarts, picking her way through the horrifying numbers of corpses spread across the cold and broken stone floors. It sickens her to do so, but she knows that someone must look for the wounded that still wait for help, and Ron and his family are too consumed with mourning Fred to even note her absence. Hermione searches each room carefully, closing the eyes of those that have already passed and finding no survivors, no matter how diligently she searches. It is only upon reaching the seventh floor of the castle that she finally comes across someone living, and she halts completely when she realizes that Draco Malfoy stands in front of the Fat Lady's portrait or, more precisely, the painting she normally resides in; the woman is nowhere to be seen.
Shock and fear course through Hermione; she assumed, apparently incorrectly, that Voldemort's Death Eaters were all together in the Forbidden Forest or some other location, hiding until the hour of temporary peace ends. The thought crosses Hermione's mind that, perhaps, the Death Eaters have returned because Harry is dead, a victim of Voldemort, and they now possess the castle. She blocks out that possibility immediately after considering it, too terrified to imagine what could result.
Instead, she stands in the shadows cast off from the dark staircase, observing Draco Malfoy. He appears to be guarding the entrance to the Gryffindor common room, and Hermione wonders what could possibly be in there that needs protecting when, suddenly, the entrance swings open and a singed and bruised Goyle steps into the dim hallway.
"No one in there, as far as I could tell," he mutters to Draco, who nods without deigning a verbal response. "Probably best if we go check Ravenclaw next."
The light blond head rotates left to right and back again before Draco says, "No. We need to check the other rooms as well, Goyle; you head down the corridor, and I'll begin on this end. Seems unlikely anyone will stumble upon us up here."
Hermione is just considering how wrong Malfoy is, his underling disappearing into the room furthest down the hall, when he whips around to face her direction, hissing into the space, "Whoever you are, show yourself. Now."
She almost falls down the staircase attempting to move away, but Draco stalks forward towards her so quickly that Hermione feels her muscles and joints lock into place, paralysis nearly as strong as a basilisk's reflection holding her frozen in place. She has no wand besides the one she took from Bellatrix, and though she has battled so many Death Eaters already today, facing Malfoy alone, without Ron and Harry to support her, seems absolutely impossible in the echoes of the battered castle.
Draco is a hand's breadth from her face in the black dank of the stairs when, suddenly, Goyle's voice resounds once again, somewhere down the length of the hall.
"Draco, where'd ya go?" he asks, perfectly in unison with Malfoy's muffled "Granger?"
"Draco?" Goyle calls again, his voice closer and more anxious. Hermione waits under the gaze of Malfoy, sure that at any moment he will yell that he's discovered her and either kill her on the spot or take her to the other Death Eaters for further torture. She can be their mudblood plaything.
But suddenly he's whispering, "Consider us even now, Granger," and Hermione just hears him mutter something that sounds suspiciously like "Obscuro!" before Goyle wails in fright.
"I can't see! Draco, where are you?"
Draco doesn't respond, too busy watching her with a faint hint of disgust. Hermione still doesn't understand what's going on; what sort of game is Malfoy playing with her? But then he leans forward and says, "I'm saving your life, Granger; now RUN."
She stumbles backward and has just begun sprinting down the stairs when she hears Draco say, "Calm down, Goyle; you must have set off a trap of some sort. This floor is clear, by the way; we'll go search for any other survivors further down once I save you from your ridiculously incompetent self."
Hermione runs until she reaches the doors to the Great Hall, and even then she still feels her heart racing.