Written for the Hogwarts Life Challenge: Stage 2
Half-blood-The most common type of wizard, some of the most powerful witches and wizards of recent times have been half-bloods. Write about someone faced with a difficult situation.
a/n: title taken from lana del rey's children from the bad revolution. based on this post. enjoy.
nothing magic makes us free
She makes up her mind sometime between the summer of her fourth year. Acquiring the book is the easiest part; the teachers all love her, studious and clever Hermione Granger. Always doing more than expected of her. It doesn't take long for her to convince Professor Flitwick to sign away his permission granting her access to the Restricted Section.
The book is heavy and dusty and it tickles at her nose as she bends down again, reads the words again carefully.
"I have to do this Crookshanks," she says later, words and complicated spells weighing down on her mind, voice loud in the silence of her room, because she needs to tell someone, needs someone to understand. Crookshanks looks at her, unblinking, from his spot in her bed.
Hermione turns to her book again, eyes tracing the words she's spent reading for the past few months in the privacy of her dorm room, as if she's afraid she's missed something, her wand repeating the wand-motion she's nearly perfected
Somewhere downstairs, her mother laughs, followed by the muffled sound of her father's voice.
Her mum, in the kitchen, absentmindedly stirring a pot of broth as she hums quietly under her breath.
Hermione purses her lips, hands curled at her side as she watches her work, carefully tucks the memory into a corner of her mind because she knows she doesn't have much time, doesn't know when she'll be able to see her mother again, if she'll ever be able to.
"Hey, mum? How do you feel about Australia?"
Her mum shrugs, smiles as she tucks a strand of hair behind her ear, holds out the spoon for Hermione to try; the taste is bitter in her mouth and it burns her tongue.
"I dunno, never been. But I've heard it's lovely. Why? Is that where'd you'd like to go for your summer hols?"
She smiles and it feels foreign and wrong. "Yeah. Something like that."
Hermione has only been back for a day, but she already misses her something terrible.
The hardest part had been the how.
She'd known, of course, what had to be done-memory alterations, as she'd found out, were much more effective when the memories were completely erased rather than just modified; erased memories were harder to retrieve, easier to replace and she knew she'd have to do it before the end of the summer holidays and it would have to be done at home, somewhere familiar so that her parents wouldn't suspect a thing.
She knew the why-with Voldemort on the rise, it was almost certainly a given that Muggleborns and their Muggle families would be one of the first targeted-the events of the World Cup had been ample proof of that. She couldn't risk them, risk their lives, not for her, especially when she knew that her friendship with Harry would make them an even bigger target.
That had only left the how.
She'd come up with several different ideas, each more ridiculous and complicated than the last, analyzed them and tore them apart until she had picked out all their faults, tossing them aside into a corner of her mind, were they could be fixed up and patched up together and repackaged into a new, better plan.
The book had been the easiest part, yes, but the steps leading up to it had been the hardest part yet.
She sighs as she rests her wand against the book, rubbing her tired eyes. There's a soft knock at her door and then her father's face comes into view.
"Hermione, dinner's ready. Mum made your favourite," her father says, gentle eyes crinkling under his smile and Hermione's heart clenches because she knows her time is limited.
"I'll be down in a bit," Hermione says softly, throat clenching and eyes heavy as she absentmindedly closes a hand around her wand.
She doesn't have much time.
She had given herself a two weeks and the Saturday before she is due at the Weasley's rolls around faster than she would have liked.
Her heart clenches, asking her, begging her for more time but Hermione squares her shoulders, stands up straight as she packs the last of her belongings into her small beaded bag. Her room is bare, stripped of anything and everything that might lead back to her, no traces or signs that a young girl grew up there, doted on by two loving parents.
"Come Crookshanks," she says motions the large tabby cat off her bed as she turns away, eyes blinking back stubborn tears. "It's time."
She doesn't allow herself to think, feel, as she turns her back and closes the door to her room for one last time.
The walk downstairs is longer than she remembers yet it seems like it takes no time at all. She pauses, spreads the destination pamphlets she had gathered around the dining room table, the two plane tickets she had saved up for and bought with her own money, tucked carefully between them, two passports set on top.
She follows the sound of her parents' voices to the sitting room and stops for a moment, takes her time to take it all in, carefully commit every small detail into a secret corner of her mind. Her mum, sitting in the love chair that sits two, a shawl thrown over her legs as she knits; her dad, in his favorite arm chair, pretending to read as he throws small glances across the room at his wife, with the sole purpose of making her blush, smile.
Her mum is the first one to notice her and she smiles, holds out her hand as she pats the empty seat next to her.
"Come, poppet, you're just in time. The movie is about to start."
Hermione smiles, swallows the knot in her throat as she blinks back heavy tears. There are so many things she wants to say, needs to tell them: I love you. I'm going to miss you. I'm doing this for you. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, please forgive me.
Instead she says:
"I'll make tea."
She keeps herself composed long enough for her parents to smile at her, her father to remind her, milk, no sugar, please.
It's only when they both turn back, their attention directed toward the telly once more that she raises her wand, hand steady as she allows herself to repeat the now familiar motions, spells falling easily from her lips.
Her parents tense, almost comically as they sit up straight, a serene look on their faces as they stare at nothing and Hermione tries not to think about it, focuses instead on the memories she's supposed to be feeding them, a life she created, just for them, to keep them safe she reminds herself, from the horrors of a war they can never begin to understand.
It is the right thing to do, she thinks as she carefully shuts the door behind her for the last time, grabs onto the last of her Gryffindor bravery as she looks to the horizon, because this is a war that doesn't belong to them, a fight that isn't theirs to suffer through.
She doesn't allow herself to look back, doesn't allow herself to linger any more than she has to because while Susan and Robert Granger might not have found it strange to find their young teenage daughter standing on their front porch in the middle of the night, Monica and Wendell Wilkins would probably not take kindly to a stranger lingering about.
(("Sometimes it feels as if I'm forgetting something," Monica Wilkins says, accepting the glass of wine her husband is offering her. Australia was in the midst of autumn, bright and lovely and warm; a nice contrast to drab and grey England. Everything they'd ever wanted.
Her husband looks at her, cocking his head to the side in question. "Like what, dear?"
Monica gives him a bemused smile, before laughing, shaking her head. "I don't know. I'm sure it'll come to me." ))