What Dreams May Come
Dreaming permits each and every one of us to be quietly and safely insane every night of our lives. William Dement
Harry had come in from detention with Snape to find Hermione curled up in a chair in the common room and sleeping soundly. She had a gigantic tome sitting on her lap and her head was resting on her hand on the large armchair.
Harry gave a wry smile at the familiar sight of his bookish friend spending another night sleeping on her favourite chair beside the dying fire. At first Harry had been worried that she had been using a time-turner again but something was telling him that it was unlikely she would be travelling into the past any time soon. It seemed, he thought as he pulled out a large orange blanket from the storage box, she had been waiting for him to come back.
Harry wasn't unobservant enough to notice that since school had started both of his two best friends had been keeping an extra close watch on him after the events of last year when he had lost someone dear to his heart. Hermione in particular was seen on various occasions denying vehemently that she was keeping a vice-like tab on him.
Harry smiled quietly at his friend who was snoring gently. He quietly lifted the book from her lap and pulled the giant orange blanket around her, planting a soft good-night kiss on his friend's head.
To his surprise she smiled in her sleep and gave a low noise that could only be described as a moan. She stretched out on the chair and had an eerie smile on her face. Harry had a slight inkling about what kind of dream his friend was having and it freaked him immensely to think of Hermione in that context. Especially knowing what his own dreams about that subject were like.
"Although I do wonder who it is about" he gave a mischievous smile to no-one in particular and bent down to the level of Hermione's ear.
"Hermione" he chanted, she stirred slightly with the same sexual smile on her face. Harry, flushed with the success of his experiment, whispered her name a few times until she finally stopped grinning manically.
Harry was disappointed with his lack of blackmail information but still respected his friend's privacy enough to leave her to her normal teenage girl fantasies. Harry lifted the book from the table and set it with her other books and pieces of parchment that she had spread throughout the common room.
He turned to walk to the boy's dormitory when he heard a loud roar coming from Hermione. Her back was arched and the orange blanket was lying discarded on the floor.
She breathed heavily the words that made the blood in Harry's veins turn to liquid nitrogen.
A slight thump was heard as Harry Potter, the boy-who-lived-and-lived-again, fainted.
Hermione woke suddenly to find herself in the Gryffindor Common room in the middle of night. She opened her eyes sleepily until she found the huge orange blanket that she had become so familiar with during the late nights of studying and waiting for Harry. Pulling the blanket so that it covered her she curled into a comfortable position and tried to fall back into the deep sleep she loved.
Her mind was suddenly filled with images of snakes, padlocks and the familiar touch of the man she had been visited by nearly every night since school had started two months ago. Tonight he told her his name and tonight she screamed it as if her life depended on it.
"Voldemort!" she had moaned loudly "My Lord!"
Hermione woke suddenly, filled with the images of what she had done with Lord Voldemort. She felt as if every nerve in her body had been alerted to this fact and so had the world.
Hermione Granger and Lord Voldemort, two sides of the same coin, had been "at it like bunnies", as Lavender would say.
Oh Lord No.
Hermione Granger promptly fainted.
Harry Potter woke to a very unusual perspective of the world. Lying flat on his back and staring at the strangely confused face of his other best friend, Ron Weasley.
"Uh Harry?" the redhead gestured bewilderedly "Why are you sleeping on the floor of the common room?"
Very good question, Harry thought, why am I on the floor of the common room?
"It's something to do with Voldemort" Harry said with determination but without certainty "I know it has something to do with Voldemort"
"Was he in your mind again?" Ron pulled Harry to his feet. Harry glared disjointedly at his blurry friend. "Oh your glasses fell off, here take them"
Ron handed Harry the round glasses and Harry put them on wordlessly. With the clarity of his sight Harry regained the clarity of his mind.
He gulped slightly and strode to where Hermione was still sleeping. She was still curled up in a ball that made her look like the little girl that she pretended to not be. Cute and vulnerable.
He gently shook her awake. She blinked at him blearily and smiled.
"Morning Harry" she yawned "What time is it?"
"It's 11"
"Really?" Hermione looked surprised "I didn't realise it was so late! I had a brilliant sleep, relaxing for a change"
Harry winced. It seemed a little strange to tell her exactly why her sleep had been so relaxing. It may have been a one-off incident and now would be awfully embarrassing for both parties to have a discussion about who it is and isn't appropriate to have sexual dreams with, especially if it means bringing up the one about McGonagall and himself involved in some very extra-circular activities. She probably wouldn't remember the dream anyway, Harry concluded wisely.
"I found Harry this morning on the floor of the common room!" Ron burst out suddenly. Hermione looked instantly concerned and Harry groaned mentally.
"Oh Harry" she exclaimed "What happened?"
"I didn't want to disturb Ron when I was tramping into the dormitory and I didn't want to wake you up so I just thought the best thing to do was sleep on the floor" Harry lied quickly. He gave Hermione a reassuring smile "I promise I'll never do it again"
"But Harry" Ron started loudly with a frown "You said something about-"
Harry hand launched himself towards Ron and clamped his mouth shut with the palm of his hand. Hermione stared at both of them in wonder.
"I only slept in!" she groaned "Why does my world fall apart the moment I sleep an hour or two extra?"
Monday Morning
Hermione was sitting in potions when she got a rather vivid flashback of her dream. So vivid, in fact, she dropped the knife she was using to slice her hellebore into neat cubes.
Blushing furiously, she dropped down the floor and picked up her knife, ignoring Harry's whispered concern. Unfortunately, Snape chose this exact moment to swoop down on the pair.
"Miss Granger" he sneered. "How difficult is it to keep the knife in your hand without it being contaminated by the floor?"
Hermione's eyes went wide with the sudden realisation that Snape could quite easily have a poke around her mind and see the extremely graphic images of herself and the feared Dark Lord rolling around in ecstasy.
"I-I'm sorry Professor" she stammered, afraid of what he might say "It just slipped"
"It just slipped" He quoted in falsetto, his eyes mocking "Do avoid letting it 'Just slip' in future Miss Granger or I will 'Just slip' your crime of defacing school property and causing disruptions in class to your Head of house"
As he slinked off to another pair's work Hermione gave a sigh of relief and Harry began his customary Snape rant
"He was really over-reacting!" Harry exclaimed "All you did was drop your knife by accident"
"I could have hurt someone" Hermione replied absentmindedly. She was still thinking of the intimate dreams she had been having with Lord Voldemort. "I could have dropped it on their toes"
The writhing, the moaning, every single movement brought her closer and closer to her peak, his tongue over her body, her hands around his neck, the noises, the pleasure, the pain….
"…yeah, Hermione?" Hermione blinked from her fantasy to the startling green eyes of her friend. He was staring at her in a way that implied that he had finished ranting and wanted her opinion on something
"Sorry Harry, what was the question?" She asked him, her eyes finally focusing after three minutes of glazed over.
"Never mind" he muttered "Let's get this potion finished"
He glanced over to see her in a daydream again. Harry felt his world darken as he realised the only subject she would be that intense about would be the only one he was trying to not think about.
Harry decided that as a friend of Hermione's he should do his level best to get to the root of her problem.
Firstly, he had to establish whether or not Hermione's dream was a one-of or a regular occurrence. To do this he decided that he would follow a girl up to the dormitory, to stop the stairs from becoming a slide, and then spending the night camped out beside Hermione's bed in his invisibility cloak.
He was relieved to find the girls got changed in their bathroom because, unlike probably most of the male population, he did not count himself as a pervert and would have been uncomfortable with a seeing much more of his classmates without their consent.
Harry peeked open the curtains of his friend's bed when he was sure she was asleep and waited for the conformation of her dreams.
Harry spent his time thinking about how he would react to finding out this particular piece of knowledge. Would he tell Ron or Dumbledore? Confront Hermione? Scream down the castle? Forbid his friend from dreaming about him? Confront Voldemort himself?
Harry was suddenly faced by the image of Hermione wearing a beautiful, wedding dress beside a snake-like Voldemort wearing a suit and a grinning priest who resembled Snape. Then little snake-like children with brown, bushy hair and red eyes plagued his mind.
Harry winced and dismissed this image with a sigh. Perhaps he was over-exaggerating and she hadn't screamed out Voldemort's name in the throes of passion. Maybe it was Snape's name she called out?
Not that that image was particularly better. Harry cringed as the children suddenly had hooked-noses and were taking points of Gryffindor, maliciously laughing the entire time.
Suddenly Hermione gave a great moan and pushed her hands high above her head. Harry jumped and watched her, his heart thumping loudly in his chest. With a sensual smile playing across her lips she quietly muttered something and started giggling manically.
Harry looked at her sadly as she started calling out "Master! My Lord!" and breathed loudly as she did so.
Albus Dumbledore digested this news over a cup of tea in his study. Harry Potter had come to him first thing this morning rambling about Hermione, Voldemort and half-snake half-Hermione hybrids.
Dumbledore cheerfully sent Harry off for breakfast and told him not to worry too much. Truthfully, Dumbledore had thought that Miss Granger's sexual dreams were nothing to worry about, as many people over the years had fantasised about the most unlikely of people yet nothing had come of it.
And in any case he would rather have had his student's personal lives a secret unless it was hurting them or others around them.
Dumbledore gave a quick chuckle in his tea and proceeded to read his newspaper.
"Miss Granger!" he roared from the front of the classroom. The girl merely looked up at the furious teacher blankly and innocently. Snape strode towards her quickly and lifted the vial of dragons bile, she was about to pour into the bubbling cauldron, from her hand.
Stories had been flying around the Staff Room about the apparent lack of focus from Miss Granger and the results had been worse than Neville Longbottom's attempts at potion making. Professor McGonagall had complained loudly that instead of making her mouse turn blue she had made it explode, showering everyone in the vicinity with the innards of the mouse. Professor Flitwick had claimed her lack of concentration had broken two of his windows and destroyed his collection of feathers.
Professor Snape was not about to add "destroyed the school to a burning pile of rubble" to her colourful résumé.
She looked blankly up at him and he took the opportunity to cast Legimens to get to the core of this problem.
It was a blue room with no windows and only a heavy oak door. There was a long table in the middle made of a dark wood, mahogany. Around the table there were high-back seats, upholstered in silk.
There were two figures on the table busily panting and moaning. Their bodies combing and interlaced as two people became one person searching for the ultimate goal. The woman gave a cry that was unmistakable to the human ear. The man arched his back, his white face flushed with pleasure.
The woman's brown hair falls gently around her face and the man smiles an inhuman smile.
"You did well, little one" he whispers, kissing the woman ferociously.
Her brown eyes fill with mischief as she straddles the man and whispers "Ready for round two?"
Harry noticed that Snape's already pale face had began to have a green tinge to it.
"Miss Granger" Snape breathed slowly, gapping like a fish.
"Yes Professor?" Hermione asked, oblivious to what her Professor had just seen.
"Would you like to share with the class the reason why you almost blew them to smithereens?"
Hermione blinked owlishly at the bristling man. "I'm sorry sir, what?"
"Would you like to tell the rest of the class why you think that fantasising about bedding a Dark Lord is much more important than their lives?"
Hermione opened her mouth in shock and shut it again abruptly.
Harry had to restrain a livid Ron from leaping across the desk and beating Snape to death with whatever blunt objects he could fine.
"Your girlfriend hasn't told you Weasley?" Snape spun at the spitting redhead "She'd rather think about the Dark Lord in her bed than you"
"Shut it Snape" Harry snarled "You don't know what you're talking about?"
"She didn't even have him in her bed" Snape spat disgustedly "She had him on the middle of the conference table of the Dark Fortress, how does that make you feel?"
"She would never do that!" Ron roared "Never!"
"SHUT UP, EVERYONE!" Hermione shrieked before running from the dungeon in tears. Harry and Ron quickly followed.
"Get back to work, all of you!" Snape snapped at the stunned class "I want silence!"
"Hermione stop!" Harry called at her retreating back "Please, come back!"
Harry and Ron began to sprint quickly up to the sobbing girl. Glancing uneasily at each other, they put their arms around her in a comforting embrace.
"He… shouldn't…. do that… S'not right… Stupid man"
"Sssh Hermione" Harry cradled her gently, patting her head "its okay, its okay"
"S'not okay… S'rong… I'm… so… sorry" she sobbed hysterically.
Ron cuddled her closer "It's not true, he lied to hurt you Hermione"
"No... He…didn't"
Ron stopped and let go of her. Hermione peered at him through her teary eyes; his face had taken an ashen appearance and was staring at her in shock.
"It's true?" he whispered, daring himself to believe it "You really have been fantasising about you-know-who!"
Even Harry's reflexes couldn't stop Ron from hitting the stricken Hermione around the face.
"You whore!" he spat at her disgustedly "I've liked you from fourth year and you haven't even given me a second thought! You'd rather fuck that monster in your dreams than so much as touch me in reality"
Hermione stared at him, stunned and red faced, she pulled herself to her feet quietly and strode toward Ron with what dignity she had left.
"At least he made me scream" she hissed into his ear maliciously "He might not be real but he could pleasure me twice as well as you could ever." Her face twisted into a faux-smile "He felt good"
Hermione's cold gaze never wavered from his angry face.
She'd be dammed before she'd let him get away with hitting her.
"Hermione, this is VOLDEMORT! You know, the evil nemesis of all that is good?" Harry pleaded to her turned back.
Harry was pleased to notice her flinching before she stormed away from the suffering face of Ron and his own mask.
That was the last time that they had seen her.
Dumbledore had many theories about how she'd gotten out of the grounds and away so quickly and each one was as unlikely as the last.
The news of Hermione's apparent "betrayal" had spread like wildfire from the potions class and was now so far from the truth. The general consensus was that Hermione had fallen in love with he-who-must-not-be-named, slept with him in every room of Hogwarts, punched Ron Weasley and stunned Harry Potter to get to her love.
Ron and Harry had refused to comment on the rumours and so they had increased. Instead, both had become avid students and on their respective ways to becoming the next generation of warriors.
One unremarkable night, almost a year from her disappearance, Harry Potter had a dream.
Lord Voldemort was sitting on a throne and talking animatedly with a brown-haired witch. Voldemort's red eyes narrowed carefully and met Harry's flaming green ones.
"Potter" his nemesis nodded a greeting "Don't you feel stupid letting her go?"
A sudden flash and Harry saw a four-poster bed with the curtains drawn round. The silhouette of man and woman shaking in ecstasy was visible by candle-light.
"She is wonderful, don't you know?"
Another flash and Harry saw a bedroom, lit only by moonlight. The giant windows were open and the blue curtains blew lazily. Voldemort was sitting upright on the bed and watching another figure move stealthily toward the bed.
Hermione was wearing a crimson negligee. It barely covered her and had an accompanying section that looked like a flowing robe. Her hair had been professionally straightened and she was wearing make-up.
"I've never met you before, but I really, really want you to take me to your bed and do things to me that my parents don't even want me to think about" she whispered, loud enough to only be heard over rustling noise of the curtains.
"She was beautiful and perfect. Also, so very intelligent"
He hissed to her in parseltongue and she moaned loudly in delight. Her eyes drifted over his exposed torso. She grinned appreciatively and muttered "Gods, you look sexier than I'd thought you'd be"
It was true, Harry noted, Voldemort's upper body was quite toned and muscular without being overly so. He wasn't as stark white as he had first imagined and his eyes were more of a light brown than a furious red.
They rolled around the bed, gasping and panting for breath. His hands drifted slowly down her body and she devoured him with her kisses. Slowly, they joined together and began a rhythmic pulse that could be felt throughout the castle. As the climaxed together Harry averted his eyes and when he had heard the end of the panting and glanced back.
Hermione's head was resting gently on Voldemort's torso, he gave her a loving caress and kissed her softly on the top of her head.
"I love her and she loves me"
Harry stared at the two before him in the room with the large thrones. Hermione had changed, he noted with a jolt, her eyes were darker and she looked older.
Harry nodded, understanding why he had been shown this.
He turned to walk from the throne room when he heard Hermione's voice calling him back.
"Yes?" he asked her, afraid of her question
She grinned mischievously, looking more like her old self. Hermione planted a gentle kick onto her lover's shins. Voldemort started and began gave a high-pitched laugh.
"Why did you do that?" Harry asked her confusedly.
"I'm fighting evil" she grinned. Hermione paused and her eyes went sombre "Tell everyone I'm sorry"
Harry woke with a start to find himself in the seventh form dormitory.
Smiling sadly he muttered "We're sorry too"