Remember, Remember the 5th of November.
Running. That's all I could remember of that moment. Running from the pain, the warm arms trying to embrace me, the pity and sadness in their eyes. I just ran from it all.
I had never lost anyone close to me before. Let alone my Mother. Let alone my Father. Let alone my baby sister. I had never lost anyone and in an instant had lost everything.
So I ran. As fast as my legs could carry me. Which was quite fast. I've always been a good runner, Mum tells everyone I would have made the track team had I went to a muggle school. Well, she used to. That was all over now. No more morning kisses, no more cuddles from Daddy – who always told me no matter how big I got I was always his little girl. No more bed time stories with my little Persephone, the sibling I had always craved, the little girl that I adored. She was only 18 months old.
I slowed as I neared the building I had been running towards. The shrieking shack. For a long time believed haunted – spooking children and adults alike – was home to Remus Lupin during his transformation from man to beast. Now, it was used by the 7th year slytherins, illegally of course, but what didn't they get away with because of Snape.
The door was slightly ajar, as if inviting me into their lair. As if they were expecting me. They probably were. The death eaters had just killed my family, I was quite certain the trainees would be in full knowledge of this. But what they did not know, was that they were going to die.
I pushed open the door, not taking any care to hide the slam as it hit the wall. Or my boots as they clanked along the hardwood floors.
"Well check it out you oaf" Malfoy demanded from a room down to corridor. And sure enough. Like a good dog. Goyle emerged. Swiftly I pushed the base of my palm forcefully against his nose, breaking it. Painfully at that. Before kicking him up the side of the head and knocking him out. I stopped to look at him for a moment. Fat, pathetic Lap dog of a creature that he was. Did he really deserve to die? Was it his fault that he was born into a family of death? Probably not. But that would be decided upon later. He was useless. Meaningless. I wanted to hurt the deatheaters and old Voldie the way they had hurt me. And I wasn't going to get that by murdering some pathetic bit on the side. No, I needed the king pins. The evil twins. The princes of Darkness. Malfoy and Zabini.
I moved for the stairs. Quietly this time. My auror training doing me well.
"Goyle? Goyle? Where the bloody hell are you?" Malfoy yelled. Ever the lazy git too proud to get off his high horse. "Go find him will you?" he barked again.
Slowly, surely I made my way to the door. Timing was everything. I saw Crabbe's shadow approach and stepped out before him. A look of utter confusion crossed his pudgy face. Well, before I booted him in it. The boy flew back into the room and hit the wall on the other side. Before steeling himself and coming back at me.
"Crabbe what are you doing" Zabini laughed. Stopping when I walked in to room and proceeded to kick the living shit out of his pet. Three smacks to the face and a broken knee later Crabbe lay on the ground crying for his mummy. Pansy Parkinson was screaming at the boys to kill me.
"No, its me whose doing the killing now" I said in loathing as I approached the girl. She moved to run, so I just kicked her in the stomach. It wasn't a fatal blow. But the fact that It sent her through a second storey window may have proved otherwise. It didn't interest me though, it wasn't her I was after.
"Holey Fuck Granger, what drugs are you on?" Zabini laughed. Not fazed in the slightest. So they were expecting me.
"Look whatever your problem is Granger , you'd wanna get over it pretty quick cause that shit wont work with us. And your pretty hot but you're a mudblood so there'll be no hanky panky, or kinky stuff that your so obviously into." Malfoy said making the darker haired boy smirk. I stopped in my tracks. Tilted my head to the side while I surveyed them. Malfoy the slytherin love god. Pffft. Whatever! And Zabini. The dark horse no one really knew anything about. Other than he was evil.
"Would it be wrong of me to enjoy killing you after everything you've done?" I asked honestly looking at them. Blaise and Draco looked at each other as I unsheathed my hunters knife that I always have in my boot. (desperate times call for drastic measures)
Before looking at me once again.
"Ah ok Granger. Jokes over" Zabini said, as if the knife suddenly made the seriousness of the situation apparent.
"Whose Joking?" I said in a deadly serious voice. "And im still waiting for your answer to my question…Would it be wrong of me to enjoy killing you after everything you've done?"
"You're a nutjob" Malfoy said hatefully.
"And your going to be first" I replied making him scowl. Before moving as I approached him. Ready for the kill. For vengeance.
"Yes" Zabini said suddenly making me halt a foot away from Malfoy. I turned. He approached. Albeit hesitantly. He still approached. "It would be wrong to enjoy killing someone, because killing someone is wrong, let alone enjoying ending someone's life."
I stood there and looked at him for god knows how long. His brown eyes almost black, full of seriousness, no malice, no anger, no hate. He was a really good actor.
"You know Zabini, your such a good liar, that if your fucking death eater fathers and Voldemort hadn't just slaughtered my entire family, I might have believed you." I said with more venom then I thought I possessed.
"WHAT?" both boys said in unison. The look of utter shock on both their faces made me back away a step. The immediate pity in their eyes, even though we were enemies brought the reality of the situation home. They had no idea.
"You didn't know" I said in a whisper, looking at them just as shocked as they were at me.
"Of course we didn't know! How could we Granger?" Malfoy said like it was obvious.
"Your death eaters" I said simply. They just looked at me.
"Hermione we're not death eaters" Zabini said. Using my first name as comfort.
"official death eaters or not, your parents ARE, and you do nothing but stand aside and watch as they tear peoples lives to shreds. Following a stupid man that's not even human! Whose obsession is to kill a young boy!" i said now in hysterics. "Its all just a bit pathetic don't you think? Since the first day I arrived here, I have been called nothing but a blood traitor by your lot. I hook up with Harry and Ron, and all of a sudden, my life is in constant danger. There is some psycho out there trying to kill us."
"Look granger" Draco started to cut in.
"No YOU look here Draco! My MOTHER my FATHER and my beautiful little baby SISTER have been killed by your parents, because of ME, because I'm friends with Harry. Because they fearfully follow a man who is so powerful, he was defeated by a 1 year old!" I screamed as I pushed him against the wall. "This is a war, I get that. But it wasn't THEIR war! It wasn't their fight. They did nothing, they were innocent! Why would your father do that? How could your father do that? How could you let him?" I finished in a whisper. My eyes boring into his, betraying my utter heartbreak. My sadness. My loss.
"Im sorry" he whispered. If it wasn't for the context of our conversation, and had it not been at the fact that I had just lost my family, I would have laughed in his face, and then probably slapped him.
I stepped away again. I couldn't look at him, it turned and walked straight into Zabini's chest. He immediately enveloped me in his arms.
"What are you doing? Get off me" I cried as a struggled to move my arms. But he was much stronger than I, and he had my arms pinned to my side. Tears started to rise in my eyes at the comfort of contact in a time of such trauma. It was real. It had all really happened. My family were gone.
"I'm sorry" Zabini whispered as he put his head beside mine and pulled me tight. And that was it. I burst into tears. Uncontrollable tears of hurt, anger, loss and sorrow. I screamed like the wounded animal I was. Nothing would ever be the same again.
"I want them back, I want them back Blaise" I said as I now clutched to him. "She was only a baby Blaise, she was only 18 months old… how could someone do that?" I said now once again angry. "How? What purpose would it serve? What did she ever do to anyone?" I cried as I once again struggled to break free of his arms. "I'm going to kill them. Every last one of them. I don't care if their your parents. Their going to pay, they've taken everything from me, EVERYTHING!"
"WE KNOW!" Draco yelled at me. I stopped my struggling and just looked at him.
"Draco-" Blaise started but was cut off.
"Goddammit Granger your preaching to the bloody choir, ok? Its not our fucking fault their dead ok? We didn't do it!" Malfoy once again spoke. I walked right up to him and looked him in the face. Right before I slogged him in it.
"OW fuck Granger!" He said from where he was hunched over holding his nose. I moved for him again but was restrained by Blaise.
"What he means is, if there was anything we could have done we would have done it, even if it meant ratting them out." He said as he held me. "We're not the evil people you think we are Hermione, I hope you'll understand that one day." He finished before letting me go. I surveyed them both once again. Before turning to leave.
"That's it, run back to your precious Potter and Weasley, they'll save you" Malfoy said.
"Its too late. I can no longer be saved." I said without looking back as I walked out the door. And that was how I left them. On that day in November