Time Will Tell
Chapter 1
New Year, Old Grudges
Hermione quickly stepped of the Hogwarts Express. Her somewhat frizzy brown hair flew into her eyes, and she brushed it back with her long delicate fingers. Her eyes-were also a brown color. She narrowed her eyes against the sudden gust of wind that hit them. She felt sorry for the first years who would have to row across the lake, which at that moment reflected the slate gray color of the sky.
She heard Hagrids Booming voice cry, "First years over here," and laughed at the frightened look on the tiny first years. It was hard to believe that only five years ago, she was one of them, apprehensive and curious. Now she was a sixth year, she walked quickly towards the carriages that she now knew were pulled by threshals.
She glanced across at her best friend, Ron Weasley, he had grown alot since they meant. She didn't just mean his personality either, he was lanky and had to be atleast 6'3". The physical aspect of him that everyone remembers is his fiery red hair, which was like his personality, fiery and quick to anger.
Hermione looked past him, at her other best friend, Harry Potter, he had a haunting end of term. His godfather Sirius- the closest thing he ever had to a father- was killed by his own cousin Bellatrix Lestrange had cast the curse that ended Sirius' life so cruelly. Whenever anyone asked how he was doing, he'd answer with a short, 'Fine'. Everyone knew he was far from it. If a shadow ever crossed his face Ron and herself knew that he was thinking about his godfather.
They hopped into the carriage, being joined by Dean Thomas, Ginny, and Seamus Finnigan- who was as-of-late Ginny's boyfriend- something that Ron chose to deny.
Dean grinned and spoke to them all, "Hey can't wait for another uneventful year at Hogwarts." They- with the exception of Hermione- got into a long conversation about Quiditch.
After what seemed like forever- atleast to Hermione- the carriage pulled to a stop. They all hopped out and started to walk up to the castle. The castle looked like it came strait out of a fairy tale. It was marble-colored and was so tall that Hermione had to tilt her head up to see the tops of the towers. The gate was made out of a dark wood with etchings in an ancient language up it's edge. It read: Permissum totus quisnam sedeo hic exsisto tutis quod doctus vetus mores of veneficus. They stepped into the great hall, even though she had seen it for the past 5 years, the ceiling- which reflected the sky outside- still awed her. The hovering candles also gave a amazing effect. She sat down at the Gryfindor table between Harry and Ron, and sighed with relief, everything felt right at the moment. She was with her best friends who she would die for and they would do the same for her.
As he passed by her she heard a cold voice say, "Mudblood". She quickly turned around and found herself face to face with Draco Malfoy.
"What do to you want?" she hissed scathingly, what he saw was cinnamen brown eyes glaring up at him.
"I'm just reminding you of your place mudblood," he said giving her his trademark sneer. "That you're inferior to pure bloods and always will be." At this Hermione rolled her eyes and was about to give him a less then polite retort, when Dumbledore stood up and spoke.
"Welcome students new and old, to the beginning of term at Hogwarts now the sorting hat will sort the first years into their respective houses. I hope you all remember that though we might be in different houses we are all the same and need to work together." All of the Trio thought of 'working together' with the Slytherins and only Hermione held make a snort. "Now without further ado the sorting had will start the sorting."
The hats song was similar to past years, saying how they had to combing their strengths and work together in these dark times. Hermione felt this was true, despite her dislike of Slytherins- especially one particular one- she had to agree that Hogwarts was stronger together, then divided.
Then the sorting began, starting with Arielle Aaron, who was sorted into "Hufflepuff". She could tell by the growling sound and the look on Ron's face, that he couldn't wait to eat. After what seemed like forever, but was more like 20 minutes, the final person, Merrela Zacharias, was sorted into "Ravenclaw". Dumbledore stood up again, but as usual he was brief.
"In your hunger, my speech would fall an deaf ears, so dig in!" He raised his hands and suddenly in front of them there were platers of delectable foods. She saw pheasant, thick soups, and other delicious and somewhat hardy entrees. Finally the dinner disappeared and on the table there were desserts, like Baklava, Baked Alaska, and simple desserts like vanilla ice cream. When they were all stuffed and done eating, with the exception of Crabbe and Goyle who were like bottomless pits, Dumbledore stood up and the foods disappeared as suddenly as they had appeared.
"Welcome again students to Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry," Dumbledore cried a twinkle in his eyes, which looked filled youthful glee, yet with wisdom past his years- which were many. "You all are ofcoarse aware of the rise of Lord Voldemort," At this there was a collective cringe from the crowd before him. "You must arm yourself and study hard to ready yourself for the dark and difficult times that are before us. Now on a different subject..." Dumbledore them began telling them about the rules like avoiding the Forbidden Forest- which was obvious hence the forbidden part- and bans by Filtch, including Weasley Wizarding Weezes products. After he finished, he dismissed them by saying, "Now, first years, follow your prefects to your common room
All of the little 11 year olds followed Hermione as she walked them to the portrait of the Fat Lady. When they finally got there- they had to stop because a kid got caught in one of the vanishing steps- she stepped up to the Large woman in the pink dress. The Fat Lady was chatting with her friend Violet and when they arrived, Hermione had to practically yell to get her attention.
Finally she stopped gossiping about the knight on the first floor falling for the damsel on the second floor corridor. No one cares, Hermione thought and wanted to say.
"The password is 'Break a Leg'," she stated, which was a very odd choice for the password, but who can really judge her about that.
Hermione wanted to be with her friends, but Harry wouldn't be here for a while because he was talking to Hagrid. Ron had disappeared mysteriously after dinner, Harry and Hermione had both presumed he was meeting someone. Over the summer he would zone out and when they asked what he was thinking about he would get all flustered and change the subject.
Anyway, since they were no where to be found, she decided to get a good night sleep and went up to her dormitory.
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In the morning all of the students sat at their respective tables, this time, Hermione was sitting by Ginny and Ron. That morning she had asked him where he was, but when Hemione asked him he turned bright red and refused to say anything. Professor McGonagall handed out their schedules and Hermione saw that History of Magic was first for her. She ate her meal of eggs and bacon and then stood up to walk to the History of Magic classroom. No other Gryffindors had gotten to NEWT level History of Magic, it was only her, four Ravenclaws, and, to her great disappointment, Malfoy. How he got into that class she didn't know, his father bribed them or something as equally distasteful.
Hermione quickly sat down at her desk got out a blank scroll, her quill, and ink. After this was finished she sat down and admired the classroom. The room was to gloomy for her taste, but it had incredible tapestries on the wall that depicted many battles and expeditions done by Wizards and many magical creatures. She was admiring one on the 1st Goblin Rebellion, which depicted their surrender, when Professor Binns spoke to them.
"Good morning students," he said in his monotonous and usually sleep inducing voice. "Our project for this new year will be on one century and what life was like for both wizard and muggles at that time." Hermione grinned, imagining Malfoy scrawling down information about muggles of any time period. "Now pair up," he ordered them. She felt dread growing in the pit of her stomach, because all of the Ravenclaws had paired up and were at the moment were giving her looks of great pity. She turned and looked at him and Malfoy said the same thought that was going through her mind.
"I'm not working with her," Malfoy insisted his eyes glaring at here coldly like it was her fault they were stuck together. Binns gave them a fatherly look and glided to them.
"Sorry students," he said his eyes almost completely closed with weariness, can ghosts even get tired? Hermione wondered. "I know that relationships can be confusing, but you kids need to work you problems out together." Across the room one of the room, a short petite girl named Maria snorted at the obliviousness of their teacher, I mean Hermione and Draco and . It was frankly rather sad.
"Like I would ever like an egotistic, prejudiced, jerk like Draco Malfoy!" she demanded glaring at Malfoy. Immediately Hermione was overcome with shock, she had never been so rude to a teacher.
"Yeah and Grangers too much of a know-it-all," Malfoy would have said mudblood as well, but he had enough common sense not to say that around a teacher who was loyal to Dumbledore.
"You'll have to deal with that, because my decision is final," Binns said, everyone was rather shocked because he hadn't been this enthusiastic since Hermione had asked about the Chamber of secrets in the 2nd year. "Now, get together and decide on your era. You projects are due in a month." He pointed at the board and the information about the project appeared there.
Hermione walked as slowly as possible to where Malfoy was sitting, she wanted the time she spent in his presence to be as short as possible.
"What era do you want to do it on?" Malfoy asked his usual smirk plastered on his face.
"How about the Renaissance," Hermione suggested trying to pretend this was just a normal school project and wasn't going to be the longest month of her life.
"That'll do," Malfoy said with a sigh, making it sound like it was a sacrifice. Though, in reality that was what he was going to suggest, but he couldn't agree with her.
"When will we meet," she said, suddenly her tone seemed business like. She might not be happy about the arrangement, but this was schoolwork, her specialty.
"During lunch so no one will see us together," this was more like an order that a request, think think of what it would do to his image.
"Fine," Hermione said after a few seconds of consideration, "I'll meet you in the library, after I drop off my stuff in the common room." Shortly after that, class ended, and Hermione rushed up to the common room, told the Fat Lady the password and dropped off her heavy book bag there. She went down to the Library and searched around for someone with white blond hair. She hated to say it, but he was F.I.N.E. Why oh why must a complete jackass be good looking? He had to be 6 feet tall, with a figure with lean muscle, much like Harry's, which made her presume it was a seeker thing.
He finally arrived, after her being disturbed by the fact she thought he was good looking for 5 minutes.
"Let's get to work" the coldness in his voice made her remember, once again why she strongly disliked him.
"Fine," Hermione said stiffly, "Tell me the minute you find something that might be useful." After saying that, they both started to search the shelves, Hermione in the Muggle History section and Malfoy in the wizard one. Finally, after what must have been 20 minutes of silent searching, Malfoy call her name.
"What?" Hermione asked impatiently, because she had yet to find anything useful.
"Would this book fit your standards?" Malfoy asked, handing her the book he had gotten of a nearby shelf. The title read, A First Hand Account of What Life was like in the Renaissance Era. The title made it obvious that it was going to be useful reference.
Hermione sat down at one of the many tables meant for studying. Though she never looked behind her, she could tell that Malfoy was behind her, planning on reading over her shoulder. She didn't say anything, though it bugged her quite abit because she was trying to avoid a fight which would use up the time they could be getting this work over with. She propped the book open, but before she could read a single word, what looked like a whirlwind came out of the book, except this one was the color of well-cared-for grass. She felt it sucking her towards it. She finally could hold on for no longer, she fell into the full force of it. She spun around and felt like she was on one of those muggle rides and was going to get sick. All of the sudden, the spinning stopped and she felt her self falling, if asked she could no more tell you the amount of time she spent falling, then tell you the meaning of life. When she did hit the ground, everything went black.