Hello everyone!

First of all, Happy New Year!

Then: are you ready for a crazy ride and a Werewolf!Hermione? Also, some trigger-warning beforehand: there will be blood (well, is), injuries, gruesome experiences and ocassionally torn body parts. If you can't coope with things like this, please don't even read this chapter! I'm not humouring you when I signed it as M rated! (Good thing this is just a story, otherwise, I would just land myself in jail)

Although, if you liked my other story, A tiny bit broken, you will like this one, too (hopefully). It's no suprise: Dramione story - angsty spiced with love and drama. Or that's the plan - but you can never know what's gonna pop up in the plot all so sudden.

Have fun!

She hated the smell of smoke. It was making her queasy.

Hermione ran faster in the shady woods that towered well above her, their tops ablaze and torching her path fast forward. She tried hard not to think about the fact that the smell of blood was coming from her shoulder and what the saliva of werewolves could cause to her body.

She felt small, desperate and scared all at the same time, but she continued on running and running, because there was no plan B. She need not to be captured and thus, ending the war in a pitiful defeat, even before the real catastrophe would fall on them.

Hell, she didn't even know how she managed to get away. Her brain didn't register the imagines or the memories. She was panicking with the enormous beast all over her, dangerously snapping jaws and troublesome claws ready to injure. It might have been a greatly timed kick or a nail landing in the beast's eyes, she just felt the weight disappear for a moment and she shot out, not even caring about her bleeding injury or the wildfire spreading around them as the flying ash scratched her wind pipe raw.

She knew the blood can leave a trace – so she covered it with her thick coat, holding it there while her feet moved forward.

Her sight blurred from the tears that collected at edge of her eyes as she continued on, the big trees seemingly remained the same, old and leafless, so high up towards the sky and seemingly shielding her, even though she knew she had next to no chance to escape from Greyback's pack. And entire pack of werewolves! She could hear their cries with the howling wind, but she didn't from which direction anymore. She just saw red from the blood and from the fire raging on behind her.

Merlin, how was she that big of an idiot! And back in Hogwarts they thought she was genius just because she had exceptional memory and she could use her abilities.

She mused and panted heavily simultaneously, as she tried not to focus on her body's aching and the change in her temperature – she was sure that the sudden raise that held back the frost in the air was not entirely because of her early exercise or the fire's heat surrounding her. She had a mild fever as either her blood accepted the werewolf genes or aforementioned genes slowly started killing her from the inside – there was no way to determine how her body would react just now.

Even though the process was quickened thanks to the blood that surged through her system with exceptional speed, it was essential that she continued. Her head felt like it was swimming from the blood loss but the adrenalin kept moving her feet. Hermione felt rolls of perspiration sticking her clothes to her skin, the dirty and mud tangling in her unruly hair while her imagination rushed and tricked her mind into believing in things that were not there anymore.

She had no other chance to escape, but this. She needed to go as far as she could.

Even after years, they didn't speak about the monsters of the war. Those things were conveniently swept under the rug – they didn't speak about what happened with Ron in the Malfoy Manor, what happened to Harry in the Forbidden Forest or what happened to Hermione while they were ambushed by an entire pack of werewolves.

Ron had been tortured and lost his left arm due to an infection, Harry died once more and Hermione was a werewolf – these were the secrets that everyone knew in their close circle of friends, but was so inconvenient of topic, that it never came up during the lazy Sunday brunches in the Burrow.

The Weasleys were nice people – they never blamed them for not sharing these stories, not even when little Victoire or Teddy asked why Ron had only one arm, why Harry never went to commemorations or why auntie Hermione ate her steak mostly raw.

It was entirely not the business of innocent ears even though the kids were no fools. Teddy was intelligent enough to not nag anymore after Adromeda shared the story of his brave parents with him. He may not have understood the meaning of war, the stress and the scars it left, but he knew enough to not pry anymore.

However, Victoire was the ever gossip-hungry buzzing bee – much like her own mother – with her curly, golden crown of hair and chirpy voice. She was unstoppable and curious by nature so she continued on with sticking her nose where she shouldn't and when she uncovered the story of uncle Ron's torture, she didn't sleep for two weeks to the chagrin of her parents. She kept dreaming about the noseless, red-eyed Voldemort creeping under her bed and ready to steal her plushies.

After that, the adults prohibited the Golden Trio to tell stories.

Harry didn't mind that at all, he had enough of the traumas during his childhood that he was glad to leave the past in the past, and Ron was happy to be spared from the memories of that place, even though he had his daily reminder when he woke up and saw himself in the mirror. But thankfully, he remembered nothing of the torture – just his arrival at the Manor, dragged there by Greyback himself, and about Dobby as he rescued Ron from the guaranteed death that awaited him in his cold cell.

They got it easier – Hermione remembered everything. She could recall the searing pain as she poured her melted jewellery on her wound so that the silver could erase the werewolf bacteria – she passed out from the pain. She remembered the as every cell in her body screamed in agony after her first transformation with her muscles molding and her bones cracking and re-arranging themselves of a wolf's.

For Hermione – it was terrible as the wolf used her skin as a shell, kept eating her away from the insides. She couldn't look into her own eyes in the mirror anymore. She saw her perfect shape, the nice curve of her hips and her breasts, the way her hair fell on her shoulders in wavy curls, the fake smile on her balmy lips, but her gaze never met with her eyes.

Not since her first night as a wolf.

The memory was always in her thoughts, vivid and colourful when she woke up that day – bare and humble, in the middle of the frozen forest floor with teeth clattering and her skin bruised, the snow's icy touch making her whimper. Before that night, she kept hoping that she was on time when she poured melted silver over the werewolf bite, that she could stop the inescapable and be done with the hellish nightmare that hadn't even truly started yet for her.

But now, it was worse than ever. She could feel the frost biting in her exposed skin with her sensitivity enhanced, it caused her real pain. Her toes, fingers and lips got bluer and bluer by every passing moment and she felt like she can't stand up, her body was worn out and used. Even through the veil of tears, she saw the destruction she had caused – in the mere of a single night, she hunted down three rabbits, ate a bird and killed a little child, destroying the corpse with animalistic rage. The boy's body was in pieces – she couldn't even see both legs in her surrounding.

She saw red tainted snow everywhere, felt the blood dry on her lips and she could smell the odor of fresh meat in the air, the chunks of torn muscles and the head of the young child scattered in front of her legs, with eyes opened in terror staring back at her.

Her sobs echoed in the forest that entire day.

She powdered her face and actually did a little make up just to look more professional a bit more eligible. It was all for the sake of doing something good to the world – she wouldn't be humiliated because of her looks, those times were long over.

Hermione was never one hundred percent sure of her doings, but she always managed to turn the events to her advantage… well, almost always. With her, being a werewolf, even though she was tempted to give up at the beginning, she now stood proud and invincible. She was determined to erase lycanthropy from existence.

She smacked her lips to evenly spread the nude lipstick and nodded to her reflection. Even if she still couldn't look into her own eyes in the mirror, she was confident enough to go forward and start her new project.

When she was in Hogwarts, she didn't entertain the thought of being a researcher of the wizarding world, just because that was a job for talented pureblooded who had enough money to invest. But after becoming werewolf – and with that, came the self-doubts and helplessness hand in hand – she decided to use that and turn it around to view that very fact in a different angle. After getting her own office in the Ministry with a well-equipped laboratory, working on three to eighty projects simultaneously, she could say she was content – and now, she was ready to take the first steps. She was so sure of herself right now!

But if she really looked deep into herself, she truly wasn't. Her main project was always put off, because of the lack of funds and now she was afraid to ask for the money. No one thought it was a good idea beside fellow werewolves and the Ministry didn't even give her a knut for this project. When she decided to bow her head and ask Harry for support, he blurted out that Ginny was expecting, so she left out that itty-bitty request she wanted to make from their weekly conversations in between congratulations.

So she now decided to take the first step to get started: a hopefully successful interview and she could get the money that would cover everything and soon, she could be out of the werewolf registry and help several other people who turned monsters at every full moon.

Thank you, Merlot – she hummed to herself. If she hadn't got drunk two weeks prior, she would have never sent the letter, asking for an interview.

With one final, firm nod to herself, she turned out of her bathroom, her red high-heels clicking on the parquet with confidence and dedication. In front of her fireplace she reached for the floo powder and ignoring her trembling fingers while praying to Merlin and all the gods out there, she cried out, "Malfoy Manor!"

So now: what do you REALLY think or expect?