Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. The characters and settings belong to J. K. Rowling although I have added some of my own.
The Inquisition
When Hermione walked with Harry and Ron through the gate she spotted her parents next to Mr. and Mrs. Weasley. In a considerable distance the Dursleys stood waiting for Harry. "Well, I guess I better be going. My uncle hates to be kept waiting." Harry smiled apologetically.
"We will see us this summer, Harry. Mum wants you to stay with us."
"Don't worry, we will write." Hermione said.
Together she and Ron went to their parents while Harry waved a last time before disappearing with the Dursleys.
The car was filled with conversations on their drive home. Hermione talked about her fifth year at Hogwarts, her studies and grades, described the ghosts and the castle again but did not mention the fight at the ministry of magic or her injury from the curse from Dolohov. Instead she rather explained her subjects, especially arithmancy which intrigued her mother.
Her parents in return informed her what had happened in her absence. Apparently, their dental surgery went well and every family member seemed to be healthy.
Her mother turned in her seat and smiled: "Honey, I hope this time you will stay with us for some time before you are off with your friends again."
"Mum, I wrote to you that..."
"I know, I know. But what Mrs. Weasley told us was a bit... unsettling and your father and me would like to keep you for a while."
Alarmed Hermione looked at her mother. "What did she tell you?"
"Well, she mentioned that hard times were coming. Something about a Lord Voldemort and his group of followers who were attacking. They seemed really worried. You have nothing to do with this conflict, do you, my dear?"
"Mum, I told you Hogwarts is the safest place with Professor Dumbledore and the Weasleys are a wizard family who can look after themselves."
This was as much as her mother would get of the truth. Hermione did not want to lie to her mother about the upcoming war but also did not want to upset her because of it. Not really having the heart to tell her parents that at home with them she was in more danger than in Hogwarts or at the Weasley family and that it was most likely that Lord Voldemort and his Death Eater had taken a great interest in her since she was one of Harry Potter's best friends she was rather relieved when she spotted her home.
When Hermione and her parents stepped into their house they did not spot anything unusual. But shortly Hermione was made aware of the danger when a shriek from her mother alarmed her.
She and her father ran into the living-room where her mother was held captive. Hermione's first thought was that it could only be Death Eaters.
But upon entering she saw a man in a white cloak and with a white mask hiding his face who was threatening her mother with his wand. Severely others, similarly dressed, were seated on the coach or leaned against the walls.
"No, definitely no Death-Eater. But who then?"
"Careful, darling, or would you want your mother to suffer?" The man who held her mother captive spoke.
Hermione already prepared to fight lowered her wand when she realized she did not stand a chance. Her father right behind her was now held by two men who cast a full body-binding curse on him and let him crash on the ground.
The man who first spoke up grinned: "Now drop your wand, sweety, and will not take your parents with us."
"Who are you? Why are you here?" Hermione asked in rapid succession while thinking how to contact the order secretly.
"Now or do you rather want your mother to suffer for your defiance?"
Hermione slowly dropped her wand knowing with it she dropped her only means of defense and her only possibility to ask for help.
"That's a good girl.", he praised and nodded to the man who stood next to her father. The man immediately drew his wand and casted: "Avada Kedavra!"
A green light flashed and reflected in the eyes of her father before he lie still with open unseeing eyes on the ground.
"No, no..." Hermione cried while her mother stared shocked at her husband, tears starting to fall from her eyes. "Why did you kill him you promised.."
"I promised I would only take you with me not your parents. They are of no use to us."
Hermione cried while trying to struggle out of the arms of the man who pressed his wand against his cheek. "Stop that"; he hissed.
But Hermione was passed caring. "Why are you doing that? We have done nothing wrong!" she shouted.
"You know why we are here, dark witch. Don't think you can foul us. We know of your crimes!" The first man spoke looking furiously at her. "But perhaps we need to remind you who we are and what we are doing. Crucio!"
Hermione watched in horror when her mother crashed to the ground screaming at the tops of her lungs and squirming.
"No, stop it, please. Please!"
The man grinned. "As you wish. Avada Kedavra!"
Again a green light flashed through the air and struck her mother in the chest. The screaming and squirming stopped at once. She was dead.
Time seemed to stand still for Hermione. "NO, no... Oh God, please..." she cried while staring utterly defeated at the corpse of her mother. The pain she felt, let her forget the men who were still in the living-room and threatened her with their wands.
Instead she tried to rush to her mother but was prevented from it by arms which tightened around her. The man behind her angrily hissed: "Stand still, dark witch."
"Again, dark witch" Hermione thought but was too confused to keep that thought.
The man who killed her mother and now stared at her spoke to the man behind her:"We will take her with us. She will be dealt with in our dungeon. Make her unconscious so that we can leave this place."
Hermione heard his words but did not understand them. She could only stare at her mother until a curse hit her from behind and the world darkened around her.
Time seemed to have lost any meaning it once possessed in the darkness. She did not know how much time has passed since she awoke in her prison cell nor did she care. She just sat there staring at the wall, arms clasped around her knees and thought nothing, only feeling the overwhelming grief over the loss of her parents.
At first she was quiet but then tears started to run over her cheeks and she began to cry, to scream to ease the pain, to suffer less. But nothing could soothe her soul. Not the darkness, not the endlessness of time which did not appear to pass. She was alone with her pain in the dark. Nobody was near who could hear her or did care that her soul wanted to shatter under the wounds inflicted upon it. She was truly alone.
She did not know how long she has seat alone in the darkness when suddenly the door to her prison cell was opened and two men clad in white with white masks stepped in. One of them spoke up: "Stand up. We will bring you to your trial."
She did not react. In fact she barely recognized the presence of the two intruders. Instead she remained in her own thoughts of pain and loss although she did no longer have any tears left to cry.
The man lost his patience. "Fine. You will get your lesson if you ask for it. Crucio!"
Pain, unimaginable pain cursed through her veins and engulfed her whole body. She opened her mouth in shock and started screaming, her voice still sour from her crying earlier. Her body whithered on the dirty floor trying to escape the pain. But there was no escape. Scream after scream left her lips until the man had enough and ended the curse.
"Now stand up or do I need to repeat the lesson before you understand it?"
Hermione tried immediately to stand up. But her feet did not want to carry her after she sat so long and had endured the Cruciatus Curse. She fell to her knees, trying again to stand up, this time succeeding albeit shakily.
The men took her arms and half following, half being dragged they left her cell and went along the corridor between her and other cells, a few of them occupied by other witches and wizards.
She could see some of them through the bars. They were thin as if they would be starving and all had an hopeless expression on their face as though their death sentences were already spoken and it would only be a matter of time before someone carried it out. Hermione did not realize how close to the truth this thought was.
She was brought into a court room or to be more precisely into a room that had a great similarity with a court room. The men dragged her to a chair which stood alone in the middle of the room. Shackles immediately bound her arms and feet so that she was unable to move. The two men stepped back.
In front of her on a dais was a large table behind which five men claded in white with white mask were seated. The one who sat at the left end of the table had a quill in his right hand. He was obviously the clerk.
Everyone had stopped talking upon her entering. She could feel their eyes on her when she was forced to take her seat. After she was shackled to the chair the man in the middle knocked with a gavel on the table.
"The trial against Hermione Jean Granger is opened. The claim will be read."
He nodded to his right companion who started: "Hermione Jean Granger you are called in front of the Inquisition to answer to your crimes as a dark witch. You are guilty to belong to a family of dark wizards and to practice the dark arts yourself."
The man in the middle spoke again. "Guilty or not guilty, what do you claim?", he asked.
"I.."
"Guilty or not guilty?", he roared.
"Not guilty.", Hermione whispered.
"So do you deny that you belong to a family of dark wizards?"
"I am a muggleborn witch. My parents were muggles and..."
"So you do deny it. Do you also deny that you have a great-aunt, Ms. Meliflua? Her sister was the mother of your mother. Both were squibs so the high council could not judge them. Your father is from the Peverell line. He is as well a squib and as well we could not judge him. But you are a pureblood witch who is descended from to known dark wizards family lines. Do you deny that?"
"I didn't know that I have a great-aunt. My parents never mentioned neither her nor that they were squibs."
Hermione was desperate. The mentioning of her parents brought back the pain which she had shortly forgotten about in order to watch in growing fear and anger her so called "trial" by the Inquisition.
She had never heard of such a group. She remembered just a mentioning in "Fight against the dark arts" which described the fight against dark witches and wizards throughout history. In this book they were described as a group of light wizards who had formed the Inquisition in the seventeenth century.
They had nothing to do with the Spanish Inquisition but their name which originated from the idea that like the Spanish Inquisition they would hunt down witches and wizards who harmed society.
The author of the book had praised their fight against dark wizards through the centuries as brave and generous. But she had always the impression of a group of fanatical wizards who just extinguished whole families on mere accusations and ministry approved. Now her first impression all the years back in Hogwarts was proved right.
"So you never were aware that you are pureblood? You never played the muggleborn witch in order to befriend with Harry Potter, the boy-who-lived?"
"No, I..."
"The accused refused to confess."
"But, I..."
"SILENCE! You will only speak when spoken to! Do you deny that you have used the dark arts?"
"Yes, I deny that. I just practice what is taught at Hogwarts!"
"Again the accused refuses to confess."
The man at the left who had written during her interrogation now looked up and smiled at her. It was a nasty smile. The man next to him stood up, wand drawn, and looked to his companion who had spoken so far.
The man in the middle spoke: "Now we will ask the accused again under torture and see whether she is then willing to speak the truth.", before he nodded to him.
"Crucio!"
Hermione started to scream again and to twist in her shackles but the chains let her no room to move. This was far worse than the brief pain in her cell. It continued and continued with no end in sight. She could not escape it, could not move to relieve it. It was hell.
Suddenly the curse was ended.
The man asked again: "Do you deny that you are a dark witch and practice the dark arts?"
Hermione looked up at him. It felt surreal. This should not be happening.
Apparently her continued silence in which she tried to sort her thoughts was seen as defiance. The man nodded to his companion.
"Crucio!"
Before she could utter a word the pain was back. She screamed and tried to twist. Anything to escape the pain, anything to make it end. This time it seemed to continue even longer, was even more painful. She felt as if she could break any moment. The pain stopped.
"Do you confess?"
"Yes, yes I confess!" Anything to end the pain, to end the torture.
Hermione knew she did not have a chance against them. If she did not confess her mind would break as the minds of Neville's parents had broken under the torture of the Death Eater.
It was ridiculous. She had fought for the light side against the Death Eater. If anything she had expected to be tortured by them and not because of being accused to be a dark witch.
This was insane. But yet there was nothing she could do.
"After the confession of the accused the high council will now speak its sentence. The penalty for being a dark witch and practicing the dark arts is death. Who does agree?" All of the five men raised their hand.
"Good. Hermione Jean Granger, we sentence you to death for being a dark witch and practicing the dark arts." The gavel knocked a last time.