Her Gryffindor Sunrise

A/N: I've read fanfiction for over 5 years now and this is my first attempt at writing it. One of my favorite types of story is one that's not often written. Where we throw the conventional story line of HP out the window and try to picture what Rowling's world would look like if the Dark conquered the Light. Story will eventually be HG/SS. Rated R for later chapters. Please read, enjoy and review!

Hermione sat uncomfortably on the unpadded seats of the carriage. If it could even be considered that. The transportation's floors were a depressing gray, the interior paint peeling and the upholstery was torn asunder. It was certainly not what she'd thought of a carriage as when she'd dreamed of prince charming and happily ever after as a child.

But life in the wizarding world had affected her perspective on many a thing. Least of all these things could be carriages.

She tried not to look at her companions much. All young women dressed in the same shabby dress that one was accustomed to seeing on a house elf. Some cried, some slept, some whispered amongst themselves. No, instead Hermione preferred to stare out the window into what she was sure might be her last sunset. And a gloriously beautiful sunset it was. She gave a small smile as she saw the red and golden hues dominate the sky. They could hate her and her House and all that she stood for but she wouldn't succumb to madness as long as she lived on. She grimaced, 'For however long that might last'.

There would be no execution at sunrise but she might have preferred it that way.

She took a moment to wallow in the self pity that kept threatening to drown her. 'How could this have happened?' she thought miserably, 'We were supposed to win! There was no Plan B or contingency. There was no "if" Harry…' her thoughts trailed off, still unable to grasp the concept.

But that was part of the problem. She had never allowed herself to consider the possibility that the Light wouldn't win; that Dark would prevail. Hermione was a woman of logic. Or so she thought. She now saw that even her method of logic had been naïve. Why hadn't she created a contingency plan? Why hadn't Dumbledore?

She knew the answer. Because living in a world where the Dark had won meant that Harry Potter was dead. And Hermione, like her peers and presumably, The Order members, could never imagine that world.

And now she was living it.

Steeling herself, she watched out the window as the wrought iron gates opened up to let the carriage through. She shivered as she watched the thesterals pull them up the long dirt road that looked as though it had been left to disarray many years ago. She watched some of the other girls gasp as they saw the thesterals for the first time.

After the final battle, they could all see them.

Hermione closed her eyes and she couldn't help but see the carnage as she'd seen it two months ago.

She ran, wand in hand and stared in disbelief at the site she saw as she stepped out of the Gryffindor Portrait hole, deafened by the amount of noise. She'd taken the wrong time to put up anti disturbance and anti noise charms as she studied for her NEWTs. She saw school children of every Hogwart's House running and crying. It took her a moment to realize that many of them had injuries. And then sound returned to her and she couldn't get it to stop. She turned to the nearest shrieking and found a group of her fellow Gryffindors huddling over…

'Oh sweet jesus, no.' she thought, though she knew it to be true before she moved others so she could see what had happened. 'Hannah Abbott. She was always so friendly,' and then she stumbled past the body and down the stairs towards the noise and the Great Hall dizzily.

'It's happening. This is it. Where are Harry and Ron? And why didn't they find me first? Where ARE they? I don't know if I can do this! I'm not prepared! We still have so much training left to do!'

And suddenly, she stopped. 'What the hell is wrong with me?', she mentally berated herself. She took a deep breath and continued down the stairs, wand at the ready and a determined fire in her eyes.

As she neared the first floor of the castle, she began casting shield charms and mild hexes and curses to those who would do her harm. Many of the curses directed at her came from the children of suspected Death Eaters. She spotted a red head and a shorter male with dark hair in the middle of the Great Hall. She doubled her speed and made progress towards them.

Hermione was struck by the sheer destruction that had been laid to her castle, her home. Hogwarts could never again seem safe as she gazed up and saw the enchanted ceiling that usually reflected the night sky blown apart. The sky was bright with the reflection of various colored spells from underneath it. She could not see the stars but for the colors.

She continued to make her way towards the center of it all and sent a bat boogey hex towards a masked man who blocked it. As he turned around and sneered at her, "This is no game little girl. I'd stop playing with fire before you get burned," she realized that it was Avery. She'd fought him once before in the Department of Mysteries at the Ministry. He seemed to realize the previous fight at the same moment he did and growled, "Crucio!" Hermione managed to dodge the curse the first time but not the second. And then she felt nothing but pain for what seemed like an eternity. The pores of her skin burned and she could feel blood underneath her fingernails. At last, when she would have begun to weep for death before the insanity took her, he relented and with a knowing eye, began to cast, "Avada Keda--!" but before he could finish he was hit with a jet of green light thrown from Kingsley Shacklebolt. He didn't do more than nod at her as he ran on to combat more of the silver masked men and women.

She stared down at the lifeless and cruel body of Avery, 'That could have been me. That was going to be me.'

And then she realized that it was true. Avery was right. This wasn't a game.

She charged further into the battle and saw that she was nearing the real battle. For the first time, she could clearly see that many of the people from both sides were simply watching the three battles in front of them. Harry was locked into a terrifyingly deadly duel with Voldermort. Ron was attempting to keep his own fighting Lucius Malfoy near them. And last but certainly not least, Dumbledore was fending off Bellatrix Lestrange. The horror of what was happening began to slowly sink in for Hermione. In an attempt to catch her offguard, a Death Eater sent a curse whizzing by her ear. Full of a hatred and loathing that she'd never possessed before, Hermione began to engage in magical blows with the Death Eaters who was still both cloaked and masked. And then there were four battles raging across the Great Hall.

After receiving a series of painful curses, Hermione finally got the upper hand and had the Death Eater wandless, on his back. She was frantic to get to the others and lend her assistance. The man reached up and took off his mask. Percy Weasley. He pleaded with her, "Hermione, don't do this. We've known each other for years. We're practically family." She tilted her head and asked him, "Have you fought against any of your family members tonight? Have you killed any of them yet?" Percy's face got paler as he attempted to deny it, "No! You don't understand! I'm a spy for The Order!"

After another moment of pleading, during which Hermione thought that perhaps, perhaps he was telling the truth, Percy seemed to think that he was arguing a losing battle. He sneered, "You're nothing but filthy mudblood scum anyway! Your curses could never truly harm me! You and my family! Blood traitors! Bowing down to inferiority!" She didn't blink but calmly cast the Killing Curse and watched the life fade out of Percy's eyes. 'No, not Percy', she thought. Just another Death Eater. An enemy.

She was started out of her thoughts as she heard Bellatrix howl a last pitiful scream before her body fell and her soul wandered into the unknown. Dumbledore had defeated her. 'How long have we been fighting?', she thought as she ran towards Dumbledore.

Two things happened simultaneously that she never could have predicted. Not if she'd studied under Trewlawny and studied Divination for a hundred years.

It was as if she was in a strange dream that Hermione watched as Lucius Malfoy disarmed Ronald Billius Weasley, the love of her young life and struck him down with a jet of green light.
Harry Potter watched as his best friend's body fell lifeless upon the ground, like a marionette who's strings had been cut.
Voldermort saw his opportunity to strike the boy down but had another plan in mind. He raised his wand towards Harry and as Dumbledore moved forward to protect him, he changed his target and caught the older man surprised. And so Albus Dumbledore fell as well.

Hermione was incapable of registering all that had happened in a matter of seconds. It couldn't possibly be real.

Harry's rage began to control his wandwork. He began to cast curses and hexes he'd barely begun to understand, having read them in Dark Arts books to prepare himself for this battle. Voldermort began to move onto the defensive, all the while keeping himself protected from young Potter. The walls of the great Hogwart's castle began to shake with the force of their spells. What was left of the enchanted ceiling began to crash around them. In an almost cartoonish moment, Voldermort stumbled over one of the pieces of rubble behind him and his shield faltered for a moment. Harry Potter, savior of the wizarding world, had just cast an obscure spell 'Vindellixi' towards the Dark Lord. And it struck. The entire room seemed to take a collective breath.

As Voldermort fell, his last curse left his lips. And the boy who lived knew no more of this world.

The room was at a standstill. Could they even ask which side had won? As each side rushed to check on their respective leaders, Lucius Malfoy shouted with triumph, "He's alive! The Dark Lord lives on! Round up the mudbloods and traitors alike!" He paused to survey the room and spoke, "Your hero is dead. You will either join him in death or… join your new place in this world under Lord Voldermort's rule."

And so she had. Joined her place in the new world, that is. Initially, not for fear of death but out of shock—she hadn't known what to do. When she had been held captive and tortured daily for two months, she had finally understood that she would have no rescue, that the world had become a desolate, friendless place for mudbloods like Hermione Granger.

And so she had understood her own weakness. She should have died with the others. So many others. Harry, Ron, Dumbledore, Minerva McGonagall, Madame Pomfrey, Pavarti Patil, Hannah Abbott, Jason Samuels, Ponoma Sprout, Eloise Midge, Cormac McLaggen… And those were just the ones she'd seen. She hadn't talked much to the other prisoners about the death's they'd seen yet. Prisoners, for that's what they were. Slaves. That was their position in this new world. Or so they thought.

The carriage came to a stop. An ugly man unlocked and opened the carriage door. Hermione's hand itched for the wand that would never again occupy her hand. Behind the man stood a strikingly beautiful woman who looked at the girls and sneered at them, "Merlin, not much more attractive than the last group. Alright, get out and line up single file. I'll personally crucio anyone who," she smiled winningly, "decides they don't understand obedience."

Hermione tried not to let the confusion show on her face. Attractiveness? What would that have to do with slavery? 'Oh but of course, the purebloods want the prettiest slaves to be running their households,' she thought and attempted not to snort. The girls were herded like cattle towards a coldly beautiful mansion. With a start, Hermione read the sign that was hanging above the doorway. 'No, not this. They can't really expect…' she began to tremble. But of course they'd expect it. She was vermin.

And now, a whore.

The ugly man cackled and pointed to the sign that read, 'The Petite Bourgeoisie Brothel'. "You'll be enjoying your life here. You'll have all the pleasures you, I mean, we, could ever dream of!" As he laughed manically, many of the girls began to sob as they understood their fate.

'We're like cows for the slaughter', Hermione thought grimly. They were shepherded inside and as they stepped into the foyer, a man approached each girl and whispered, 'Imperio.' Each young woman was immobilized and lost the look of intelligence across their faces. At this point, panic was beyond Hermione. Her last thought that was her own was not a plea or resigned acceptance of her position.

The last thought that crossed her mind was an absurd one at the moment but would become important as time went on.

'What in the blazes ever happened to Snape?'