Hermione strolled to the library and sat down at her usual table. Madam Pince barely looked up at her, and Hermione was grateful for how often she frequented the place. It's where she loved to go to do homework anyway, so being here to research extracurriculars wouldn't seem suspicious. Then again, she thought, this was nowhere near the first time that her use of the library hadn't been for academic purposes. There was all of her research on Nicholas Flamel two years previously, the book she borrowed for the Polyjuice Potion recipe, the book on Basilisks that she had torn in excitement of figuring out what was wrong. She sighed. Only a third year and already most of her time in the library was for research to help her break school rules. Her friends had far too much of an influence on her, and she could barely recognize herself from the way she was as a first-year.
But maybe that wasn't all bad. After all, she followed all the rules at her comprehensive before coming to Hogwarts, and hadn't made a single friend. They could be a bit of a pain sometimes, but Hermione was fairly certain that she would rather spend every night in detention for the rest of her time at Hogwarts than lose Ron and Harry as her friends. And it was for Harry that she was in the library tonight.
It would be nearly impossible to believe that someone would be out to kill one of her best friends if it weren't for everything they'd been through the last two years. Yes, he was Harry Potter, but having an escaped prisoner after him- especially a prisoner who was supposed to be his godfather- was hard to believe. So Hermione was here to look through Azkaban records and find out as much as she could about Sirius Black.
She gathered several books and newspaper articles detailing the prisoners of Azkaban and began to sort through them, exhausted and slightly overwhelmed by the amount of information. How many people could have been sentenced there anyway? The answer turned out to be in the hundreds, and every place Hermione checked had the same dull information about Sirius Black. Friend of the Potters, believed to have betrayed them to Voldemort, killed Peter Pettigrew and several Muggles in broad daylight. More recent newspaper articles included the information about his escape from Azkaban, but it was all pointless. How could she help protect Harry if she couldn't get more information for him? They couldn't prepare to fight back if they didn't know anything new.
Despite her effort to remain on track, Hermione became distracted by a short book containing all the prisoners (as of 1988) in Azkaban, a biography, and why they ended up there. The information on Sirius was, of course, useless, but Hermione couldn't help but be curious as to what crimes would land you in Azkaban. She knew it said nothing of her talent, but being a Muggle-born could be inconvenient when it came to understanding the intricacies of the wizarding world.
She read through the article detailing how the Lestranges and Barty Crouch Jr. ended up in Azkaban and made a note to be as kind to Neville as possible. She couldn't believe that people were capable of doing that to others and was glad those four were now surrounded by Dementors. However, the stories of Death Eaters were only mildly interesting compared to criminals she'd heard nothing about. There were murderers unrelated to Voldemort's cause, a deranged Squib accused of attempting to steal the payphone leading to the Ministry of Magic, and, most interesting to her, a group of wizards and witches accused of repeatedly violating the International Statute of Secrecy.
The ones she could find the most information on were named Aaron and Persephone Puckle, a married couple claimed themselves followers of some old European wizard named Grindelwald. The more she read about the couple, the more intrigued she became, and by the end of the night, she gathered every book and newspaper that mentioned them and went to Madam Pince to check them out.
She arrived in the Gryffindor Common Room awhile later, exhausted from the climb with so many books. Harry and Ron were in their typical chairs by the fire and, peeking above the stack in her arms, she could see them hastily pick up their quills and pretend to write.
"How are your essays going?" she said, sitting down on a sofa nearby.
"Not bad," Ron replied. "Only I don't see how we're supposed to have six inches on transfiguring rats into bats. Unless I write really big."
Hermione shook her head. "You know McGonagall would never let you get away with that. Honestly, Ron, have you paid any attention in class for the last two years?"
"No, not really. That's what you're for, isn't it?"
She didn't think it was worth it to answer them and instead opened up one of the old newspapers she borrowed from the library. Harry looked up from his own essay, seeming to notice her for the first time. "What have you got with you, anyway? Please don't tell me that's your idea of light reading."
Hermione carefully folded the paper and added back to the top of her pile. "Well, sort of. See, I was in the library trying to look up information on Sirius Black."
"Did you find any?" Harry asked, dropping his quill onto his parchment and leaving a rather nasty ink blot in the process. He didn't seem to notice.
"Nothing we don't already know."
"Then what's all this you brought back with you?"
Hermione sighed. Harry probably wouldn't understand anyway, but she tried. "Well, as I was going through, I found an index that listed everyone in Azkaban as of 1988, and the reasons they were there intrigued me. I found this couple who were in for violating the International Statute of Secrecy, and something about their story stuck with me. I wanted to find out as much as I could, so I borrowed everything the library had about the Puckles. I thought it might be fun to piece together their background."
Ron looked up. "You have a strange idea of fun, Hermione. You know that? You don't like Quidditch or Exploding Snap, but here you are with books on people who've been in prison for years and that's what you plan on doing with your free time."
"Yes, it is," she said, trying to sound confident. Maybe she was a bit abnormal for what she considered fun, but hearing that from one of her two best friends was enough to send her across the room to cry, but she would hate to resort to that. Instead, she picked the newspaper back up and buried her nose in it, looking for any mention of the strange couple.
After about half an hour of silence and a few newspaper articles, Hermione spoke aloud. "Wow. But it must be coincidence. Certainly it is."
"What are you talking about, Hermione?" Harry asked.
"Well, it's just that these people seem so familiar. The strangest thing is that I found out that she was pregnant when they were sentenced to life in Azkaban."
"What did they do with the baby?"
"Best I can tell, they were allowed to stay out of prison on house arrest until the baby was born. The Ministry took her and gave her to a Muggle family to raise, one they thought were open-minded enough to handle having a witch one day."
Harry sat to ponder it for a moment. "Well, that was probably the best decision, as long as they were better Muggles than the ones I was raised with."
"They were." Her voice was confident, though she had to calm her nerves as she said it.
"What are you talking about, Hermione?"
"This baby was given up for adoption in September of 1979. That was strange enough, but then, this paper here has a picture of them."
Ron took the newspaper first. "They don't look crazy enough to be in Azkaban."
Hermione rolled her eyes. "Honestly Ron, can't you read?"
"'Course I can! 'Aaron and Persephone Puckle in March 1978.'" So what?
"This was before they went to Azkaban. And it's not like they're murderers. Why would they look deranged? Anyway, anything else stand out for you?"
"Not really," he said, passing the paper along for Harry's inspection.
"Oh," he said. "Persephone looks just like you."
"Technically, I look just like her," she said, "Seeing as she's my mother."
"Surely you're jumping to conclusions!" Ron said. "Isn't that a bit much to say just because of some witch that looks like you?"
"Some witch that looks like me, that happened to give birth the month that I was born, and was forced to give her daughter up for adoption to Muggle parents? It's too strange to be a coincidence."
"Well don't you have pictures from when your mum was pregnant or anything?"
"No. They always told me they hadn't bothered to buy a camera until after I was born."
"Oh." Ron paused for a moment. "What did you say they're in Azkaban for?"
"Violating the International Statute of Secrecy. They lived in a small village outside Oxford, and were trying to 'restore the natural order' by showing all the villagers their magic and trying to make them their subjects or something. It's disgusting, really. They weren't supporters of You-Know-Who but that's the only good thing I can say about them, based on what I've read at least."
"I think you should talk to Dumbledore about it."
"You're right. I probably should. He would know if it's true. Who knows? Maybe it isn't."
Harry let her know the password, and she was soon climbing the steps into Dumbledore's office. She barely had time to take in the wonder of the circular room when Dumbledore came through an archway on the opposite end and smiled kindly at her. "Hello, Miss Granger. Please, have a seat. What brings you here this evening?"
"Well I was in the library, trying to find out more about Sirius Black."
"A wise decision, one should always try to understand their enemies."
"Thank you, Professor Dumbledore, but I didn't find out anything we didn't already know. Instead, I got distracted by reading about the other criminals in Azkaban." She paused for a moment, and thought she saw a flicker of concern or doubt in his eyes, but it was gone before she started speaking again. "I was intrigued by a married couple in particular- the Puckles. It interested me that they were in Azkaban and still opposed to Voldemort and what he was doing. They apparently were following in the footsteps of an old wizard named Grindelwald and trying to make Muggles subject to wizards again and- well, I think they're my parents."
Dumbledore sighed and massaged his temples. "I always intended for you to find out, but not until you were much older. Thirteen seems far too young to learn about this on your own, and for that I'm sorry." Hermione thought about reminding him that she'd already had her fourteenth birthday, but thought better of it. "The Puckles were kind people, who happened to think a little too highly of the wizarding community and honestly thought they could make the world a better place if they were to rule it with open magic. It's really a shame they believed this way, as they have missed out on the privilege of raising a bright young woman."
"Thank you for the information, Professor," she said, rising to go and blushing at the compliment.
"Just one more thing, Miss Granger." She stopped moving and faced him again. "It is, of course, entirely up to you what you do with what you've learned. But it might be in the best interest of your classmates to continue thinking that the brightest witch of their age is a Muggle-born." He smiled warmly, clasped her hands, and turned to leave the room.
"Aaron and Persephone Puckle," she said to herself as she descended the spiral staircase. Back in the Common Room, she relayed the little more she'd learned from Dumbledore to Harry and Ron.
"What do you think about it all?" Harry asked her.
"I don't think the shock has quite hit me yet," she admitted, "But I think I'll be able to live with it. I suppose it will be hard to tell my parents- the ones who raised me, I mean- that I know. But it will be okay. In the meantime, I don't think it's something that needs told around school. Dumbledore thinks- and I agree with him- that it will be better for the school to think that I'm Muggle-born still."
With that, they left the topic alone and Hermione spent the evening adding heavy corrections to her friends' Transfiguration essays, and retiring to her room to sleep as if it had just been an ordinary day.
A/N: Written for Lady's Writing School Try-Outs, where I had to use the prompt that a thirteen-ish-year-old found out that she was adopted and her real parents were criminals. I'm surprised at the length I got out of it, and even so I feel like it could probably be longer. Oh well. By the way, I'm not JK Rowling and the characters belong to her.