Chapter 1

Hermione's POV:

My knees hit the floor in slow motion. Tears ran down my cheeks and onto the slick, marble floor. The world around me became quiet, like a heavy fog had descended on me. It was just my shaking body and the three corpses. From then on my life became a blur of greys and muffled sobs. It felt like the whole world was crying with me. I think sat on my bed for a week not eating, drinking or speaking a word. During that dark time I do faintly remember hearing muffled sobs from across the dorm which I soon found out were Ginny's. After that solitary week I had to try to move on, but deep inside me I knew I never would.

People would stare and some would try to comfort me but there was nothing anybody could do. It felt like a piece of me had been ripped out, a piece I could never retrieve. When I lay in my bed and succumbed to the thoughts that plagued me a great flood of guilt would wash over me. Everytime I pictured Ron's stiff body or Harry's unblinking eyes I would think of our feud that had lasted for almost a month. It seemed so petty now and I knew I would regret it for all my days.

During that solemn month Ginny and I began to bound in a way we never had. We clung to each other like a raft in open ocean. Both our loved ones had been ripped away from us, a wound that would never heal. As the days went by my grades suffered, for I had lost all notion of schoolwork, a thing I had never done before. But I kept up my downward spiral losing every inch of resolve. When I walked the corridors I could feel the deaths of my two best friends haunting me, haunting everyone.

One day, about 3 weeks after their deaths Professor Dumbledor called me too his office. The note was given to me by a young third year who tried to smile and scurried away. I opened the note which told me to meet him in his office at 11:00, right after my first period. Thankfully, I didn't have to go through another interagation during breakfast like I had to for the first 2 weeks. All the sixth years would come and try to sit next to me if Ginny hadn't gotten there already. Then they would gently push for information but usually not getting much out of me. For, I didn't really know anything more than the rest of the gryfindors. That Ron, Harry and Professor Slughorn has been poisoned by a bottle of mead that Slughorn had planned on giving to Professor Dumbledore for Christmas. They had all drunken the mead at the same time, so none of them could save themselves. Ron and Harry had gone to Slughorn's to ask him for an antidote for a love potion that Ron had accidentally consumed. When I had first heard what had happened I couldn't believe it. I had sprinted through half the school and into Slughorn's office which was infested with teachers. Then most people knew the rest.

I dragged myself through my silent breakfast and into herbology. I tried to concentrate and remember the answers like I used to but they just never came. So I sat in silence until the class ended. Then I made my way to Professor Dumbledore's study. I repeated the password that was on the note and climbed up the stairs. I knocked on the door and it slowly wheezed open.