Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or any version of Beauty and the Beast. If I did I would not be testing my writing skills on fanfiction.
Seven years after the end of the war, Hermione Granger stood at the top of the hill as dawn's first light hit the tops of the small stores and cottages of the Knotting Lane, the small village nearby the Burrow. The tiny village, although unknown to the non-magical world, was a far cry from the craziness of London and the Ministry of Magic, particularly with the aftermath of Voldemort's demise.
At first, Hermione had welcomed her quiet life in the odd town. She had spent almost all of her adolescence on a quest to stop Voldemort, and she was more than happy to follow the love of her life, Ron Weasley, back to the place he had grown up. She took up residency in a few small rooms for rent at the back of the village inn, and let herself unwind. She did free-lance research for the ministry and a few other magical organizations when she felt like it. Otherwise she spent her time wandering the country-side, reading books, and spending time with Ron and his family. Harry came and went as often as he could, though he spent a majority of his time at the ministry in his position as head of the Auror department.
For seven years she had let herself relax and languish in Ron's kind affection. She remembered their first real date, his bad jokes, and, of course, the night that he had popped the question two years ago. He wanted to get married in the chapel in the village – the same place that his parents had gotten married in. She had no objections, and even didn't mind when she realized that the waiting list was two years long.
That should have been her first sign that something was not quite right.
She stared down at the quiet village. Everyone here knew her and Ron, and absolutely everything about them. If she was honest, they still all seemed to blend together in her mind. They were all very predictable. Every day was almost always exactly like the one before.
She smiled at the baker who was carrying the same large wooden tray with the same bread and rolls to sell to the same people. She would swear on her life that he had not made a single new item since the morning that she first arrived.
"Good morning Miss Granger, where are you off to today?" He smiled at her without seeming to really see her.
She smiled back, glad that he was making the effort at conversation. She was under the impression most of the villagers didn't like her very much. "The bookshop! I just finished the most wonderful story about a beanstalk and an ogre –"
"Marie!" He turned away from her, not really listening, to yell for his wife.
She sighed and shook her head to continue walking. No matter how long she had been here, she was still not part of any crowd. She just could not bring herself to gossip about boys and clothes all day. Not when there was so much of the world to see. They all thought her strange; she spent a majority of her time in the bookshop after all. Half the people here were still under the misconception that it was somehow wrong for a woman to read.
The bell on the door clanged as she pushed it open gently. "Good morning sir! I have come to return the book I borrowed."
"Finished already?" The kind old man turned around, carefully getting off the ladder he had been standing on.
"Well, I couldn't put it down. Have you got anything new?"
"Not since yesterday!"
"That's alright. I will borrow - this one."
"That one! But you've read it twice!"
"But it's my favorite!" Hermione's face lit up. "Far off places, daring swordfights, magic spells, and a prince in disguise!"
"If you love it that much, it is yours."
"But sir!"
"I insist."
"Thank you! Thank you very much!" Hermione was thrilled with her luck. She was happy enough to be allowed to use the bookstore as her own personal library – the village was too small to have one. Somehow, however, she had managed to read every book in the quaint store over the last seven years. She was back to rereading her favorites – the adventure stories.
She threw herself down on a bench, flipping through the book to find her favorite parts. Here's where she meets Prince Charming but she won't discover that it's him till chapter three.
She never noticed the village girls walking past her laughing quietly behind their hands. She was not the laughingstock of the town, exactly, but she was not respected either. Most of the villagers just thought she was quite odd. None of the girls had any idea what Ron Weasley saw in her, whether she was a past war hero or not.
Hermione slammed shut the cover of the book and found herself wandering to the very edge of town. On the outskirts of the forest that touched the edge of the village was a cliff with the most amazing view of the valley far below. She stood on a rock near its edge and felt herself longing for something she hadn't tasted in a while.
What happened to you? A small voice she believed to have been long gone spoke in her head. You were amazing – the brightest witch of your generation. You had the world at your fingertips. Where is the girl who fought off the darkest wizard in history? Where is the girl that did not crack through searing pain when Bellatrix scarred her flesh? Where is the lioness – the woman who planned to make the world magnificent?
She stared at all of the land before her – the endless valleys and hills and trees and waterways. There was so much out there to see and do and explore and learn. She did not have to give up on adventure just because Lord Voldemort was dead. She craved it; she wanted that feeling of solving an impossible puzzle; that feeling that she could die at any second; that feeling of the utter unknown.
She looked back and glanced at her future. In less than twenty-four hours she would no longer be Miss Hermione Granger, but she would become Mrs. Ronald Weasley.
And in that second she realized that maybe – just maybe – she was not ready yet.
Just one more day of adventure. Just one more day of feeling alive again. She was twenty-four years old damn it, and Ron was ready for her to settle down and start her own Weasley broad. She needed one more taste of it – one more taste of the world. At least for a little while.
She pulled off her diamond engagement ring and hid it underneath a tiny rock beside the one she was standing on. She didn't want to be attached to Ron or the village that made up her life today. She would go back to London, maybe Hogsmeade, hell, maybe even Paris or Cairo or any of those places she had always wanted to go and had never been – she would see as much as she can as an independent women. She would breathe it all in one more time.
She closed her eyes and felt her body start to twist in that awful way that meant she was apparating. Rather than focusing on London, however, her mind kept wandering over a few simple words: "It might be grand, to have someone understand, I want so much more than they've got planned..."
