Well this is my next chapter, and it's in a new programmer because my other programmer that came with this computer is stupid... a very good programmer but it was a damn trail! So now I have to deal with a programmer I don't know and probably don't like... I hope it works out ok...
-0-
Hermione's eyes flew open once again before the sun's rays could even touch the peeks of the mountains. The dark house was consumed with silence as her alarm clock blinked 5 am. When would she sleep a night through again? When she was dead? Yet she knew she would not utter a complaint at her exhaustion because it was her fault, she didn't deserve to ever sleep a night without nightmares again for she had brought this terror on them all. How stupid could she have been, how idiotic? Even Ron would have known better, if only he was here now, him and Harry would have helped her get it all together but she knew that they had to go into hiding lest he find them and all hope be lost forever.
Throwing off the quilts she stood up determined to get to work it was only a matter of time before the spell would take full hold and what she had done would be irreversible. What had went wrong? She had been experimenting for months and her work was all in order even Severus had found nothing wrong with it but when, when she'd cast the spell in the final battle Voldemort had turned into a nightmare, he had reverted back into his youthful demeanor yet he still held all his powers and more it seemed. How could this have happened? If only she hadn't tried to be a know-it-all, perhaps then they would all still be there by her side instead of off hiding somewhere in the world. Perhaps if she'd just let it all well alone like Fred had told her to...
Fred, another reason for her nightmares every night. Even as her eyes drifted to sleep she could see his face and hear his voice telling her over and over it was her fault and she could not argue because for once someone else was right. She was responsible for it all, Voldemort's power, Fred's death, dashing the hopes of all muggle borns, and now the death of Tonks and capture of Remus. She had no right to live and yet she had to trudge on and fix all this before she would allow herself to fade into memory. Perhaps in death she could have peace, when she undid this evil, maybe she would be allowed some peace as a reward.
For undoing what she'd done originally, she thought bitterly.
Pouring water into the kettle and settling it on the stove whilst readying two cups for coffee she thought about the new spell and potion her and Severus were working on the past months. It had yielding some impressive results as of late and had finally given her a bit of hope as to the remedy of the situation yet she still could not sleep more then 4 or 5 hours a night at most. She doubted that she wanted to get more sleep anyway; with the nightmares it was just better to stay awake.
"Ah Miss Granger your awake." Severus Snape's voice carried through the kitchen as it bit through the silence for his voice was tainted with the slightest inclination of dislike and yet Hermione grinned. This was something she could count on Severus Snape's snaky, sarcastic, dislike towards her, something that had annoyed her to no end while she attending school now gave her comfort. Turning she looked at Snape who regarded her smile with surprise as she handed him a cup of freshly made coffee.
"What's gotten you in such a good mood this morning?" Although he had tried to sound blankly conversational he failed to hide the surprise that laced through. Hermione just shook her head grinning to herself until her thoughts turned to the project at hand and why Severus was actually in the kitchen at 6 in the morning.
"It was nothing Severus, and how many times do I have to tell you to call me Hermione. You are no longer my Professor and I no longer your student. At least don't use Miss in front of my last name." Hermione commented wearily knowing fully well that it was a lost cause asking him to call her Hermione, she had asked him for the past several months they'd worked together and not one time had he complied. At least it made the conversation seem familiar, somewhat similar to home, home reminding her of her parents... Blinking back tears that were fighting their way to her eyes she turned from him and after making sure her voice was steady asked, "Would you like some breakfast?"
"No I'm not taken to eating so early in the morning Granger." She whipped around to see a snarkish smirk flutter in place across his lips and nearly laughed out load when she realized that Severus Snape was trying to make her feel better. It was absurd when you thought about it, so much had happened during the war, so much had changed. If someone had told her in her first year that she would be standing in a kitchen with her Potions Professor as he tried to make her smile, she would have laughed until she'd most likely died, yet now it was oddly comforting. What a word to describe Snape's relationship to her, comforting, if only Harry and Ron could be here now.
No she could not think of them now, not now when so much depended on her concentrating.
"Right then Severus I suppose there is no use delaying the inevitable, everything is upstairs in... In the twin's old room," Hermione choked out the last bit as she forced her emotion down once more. Why was she losing control today? What was wrong with her?
"Of course Granger might as well get this over with." Severus made his way up the stairs of the burrow knowing fully well he would be spending the whole day stuffed up in the room with Hermione and yet he didn't care one bit, and he actually looked forward to it.
"I would like to continue from last time I think we might be on to something," Hermione muttered as she set up the cauldron over the burner and the ingredients as Snape inwardly sighed at how many times she'd said the exact same sentence over the course of the few months they'd worked together.
"Indeed." Hermione whipped around to retort with a sarcastic mark but heard him mutter quietly under his breath her name, not Miss Granger nor Granger but Hermione and at that she smiled and snapped her mouth shut. "Well get on with it and stop grinning at me like Weasley."
-0-
Thirteen days left, he had thirteen days until the moonlight took away his thoughts once more as he was deprived of humanity for the first time in years since he started taking the wolf bane potion. His transformation would be even worse this time around because of the injuries he would sustain prior to the inevitable. They had not come to torture him yet but they knew that they would, it was only a matter of Lucious Malfoy or another death eater becoming bored and he would be left with more then one broken bone.
As if on cue Bellatrix sauntered in looking more insane then usual which was terribly frightening but Remus forced his face into an impassable stonewall. Gleefully she opened the door as she removed the wards her eyes resembling that of a predator, much like a T Rex Hermione had once told him. Smiling inwardly he scoffed at her, they might have taken him from his friends, family and freedom but they would never take his memories, his heart nor his soul no matter how many times they used an unforgivable.
"Well look who we've got here. My Lord has been most generous to me this time, first I kill off fickle Sirius and now I get a shot at his best friend. Too bad I couldn't kill you like I did him!" Bellatrix danced into the room her high-pitched voice bouncing off the walls making Remus cringe inwardly as his sharp ears picked up the sound. "Oh well drawing it out will be so much more fun!"
Remus had yet to say anything and this seemed to irk the crazed witch into action as her smile quickly rearranged into a scowl of hatred. If anything she would do him a favor, as long as he had the physical pain to think about he did not need to think of the emotional.
"I've waited so long, too bad Sirius isn't here to watch. Crucio." Bellatrix hissed the curse out as Remus automatically fell to the ground biting his lip as to keep the howl of pain from escaping his lips. He would not allow her the pleasure of hearing his cries of pain as she had heard so many, even if it meant enduring more then usual. White bursts of pain shot through his body like electricity and he faintly wondered how it was someone survived this curse long enough to speak of it.
Bellatrix regarded Remus with both admiration for not howling out in pain as most people did, and hatred for not bending to her will. He would learn quickly that she was not a witch to displease, when she wanted something she got it, and right now she wanted him to scream. "CRUCIO!"
This time Remus let out a growl as bolts of lightening shot through his body attacking every nerve and cell ensuring ultimate torture. With the taste of coppery blood on his lips he allowed himself to gaze up at Bellatrix holding her gaze as she continued to maneuver the unforgivable daring him to defy her the pleasure of hearing his screams. He knew she wouldn't stop until he succumbed to the pain either by screaming or passing out completely.
In the end it was the latter, which occurred after several broken ribs, and a fractured arm he had no more courage or strength to fight to keep consciousness. Luckily at that moment Bellatrix was summoned away and replaced with an apprehensive looking Severus whose eyes flashed of annoyance as if his Christmas present had been taken away.
-0-
"Perhaps you should get a few hours of sleep, after all it does no good to work like this. With out a fresh mind you are useless to us all." Severus had stated when she'd nearly tipped over the cauldron with her lack of co ordinance.
"No, I'm fine really Severus." Hermione insisted and then tried to lighten the mood with sarcasm, "I didn't know you cared." Thinking that she would receive one of his snarky replies she was surprise when she instead received a curt nod.
"I do, but I've also been summoned and I think it best that you get some rest while I'm gone lest you burn down the whole burrow with your lack of balance." Severus pointed out
"Of course Severus, right as usual and you say I'm the know it all?" Hermione was glad of the way they could joke when no one was around; it was the only time when she didn't feel the regret, remorse, guilt, and finality of it all. When she was working with Severus it was just them and work, nothing more, nothing less, for those hours they just co existed with no war to plague them.
"I will be back soon," Severus turned at the door way and added with a smirk upon his lips, "Oh and try not to destroy the burrow, Molly would be furious with me for leaving you alone." Hermione cocked her eyebrow as if asking why she couldn't be left alone but could say nothing else as Snape apparated on the spot leaving her huffing haughtily off to bed. The nerve of men! Trying her best to put that thought out of her mind she tried counting sheep until she was asleep but once again found herself in a nightmare.
-Flash back dream-
"This is it isn't it?" He'd whispered in her ear while she prepared a few essential things such as instant darkness powder and the like.
"What no jokes or pranks?" Hermione had asked as she turned to stare cautiously at the twin weasley that regarded her with a serious expression for the first time in his life and then something passed over his eyes but she couldn't make out what it had been, regret? Caring?
"Even I Hermione am not that careless in times like these. Perhaps I will be dead tomorrow." The thought struck her as odd, Fred dead? No it did not seem likely after all him and George were a pair, inseparable, they were the sunshine in the darkness, and damned by her if either would die.
"No Fred you are not going to die tomorrow." She'd said so blatantly that it must have been obvious to her from the beginning that there was no way he could die.
"Why not Hermione? Why not me? If not me then someone else." She understood what he was saying; they were in war anyone could die really but just not him. She didn't want it to be him. For as long as she could remember he had always brightened her day in good times and bad, when Ron and Harry were off playing Quidditch he would stick around and poke fun at her until she did something with him, when George dragged Alicia to that Puddlemere game he had begged her to go instead of Ron, Katie or anyone else for that matter. Now, now he was her light in a dark tunnel, her only relief from the death, no he wasn't going to die she just couldn't let it happen.
"Because."
"That is not really an answer. You know for someone who writes at least 10 inches over required length for essays you sure answered my question with lack of energy." Fred said teasing her but still she could see his eyebrows furrow together in concern and perhaps fear. A Weasely twin scared? What was the world coming to?
Voldemort, she'd thought darkly.
"You, well you just can't is all." Hermione had muttered unable to come up with an answer that would save her embarrassment and allow him to be satisfied at the same time. Fred had grabbed her hands and forced her to look up at him. This time she was not mistaken there it was plain and clear present in his eyes was love.
"Stop dancing around the question and answer it." He was serious; he wanted her to answer it.
"Fred don't make me, please, I just, you can't, I can't explain."
"Can't or won't?"
"Well, a little of both really." She'd tried to take her hands back but Fred was holding on rather tight and so she'd given up to study the floor rather interestingly. Fred removed one of his hands from hers in order to tip her head up at him hoping her eyes would follow.
"Hermione look at me." She did out of respect for the older boy whom she'd come to care about too much already. "Now tell me, I want to know now so that if I die tomorrow I won't die curious." His humor managed a small grin to appear on her lips as she habitually bit her lip thinking over the question once more, why couldn't he die?
"I just, I couldn't stand it if you died Fred. You've been the one whose kept me going through out all the bad times, whenever I was lonely or when I couldn't take much more from this war you were there to encourage me, to give me that little extra push I needed. I well; I couldn't picture not just having you there. Not waking up to one of your ridiculous pranks to scold you..." she didn't trust her voice to go on and so had stopped there.
"Oh." Fred muttered as he took in her words before making a decision that was set firm in his eyes.
"I told you I didn't want to say, sorry that you had to hear that." Hermione sighed as a blush rose to her cheeks realizing how close their proximity was, and the fact that no one was there at the moment to interrupt their little Coeur a Coeur.
"Au contraire my dear Hermione, I wish you'd told me sooner. It would have turned this dancing around to simple and less exhausting work. Lord I was sure you fancied Ron." Fred seemed to say the last bit to himself almost as Hermione realized with horror that Fred thought she fancied him, wait, did she fancy him? He made her smile for the whole day just by a simple hello, her heart would race irregularly, her thoughts were never quiet as coherent when he was around... a strange realization hit her, she did fancy him, more then that, over the past three months she was sure she had actually fallen for him. No matter how absurd the idea seemed, a prankster and a book worm, she had come to... love him.
"Fred, I may have had a little crush on Ronald but I assure you I got over that fast enough when I realized that I could never deal with his eating habits. Plus the fact that he seems to have been ogling Luna before he left with Harry. Those two would make a great couple if I do say so myself."
"He was a fool to let you go, my fiery whipper snapper. Why I think your right, I won't die tomorrow I just couldn't bare not getting caught in one of my newest pranks and spend an hour ogling you whilst you scold me trying to hid your own laughter from the lecture." Hermione was shocked to say the least, Fred Weasley and her? She'd never hear the end of it! Ronald would be positively fuming.
"And I would never been able to die knowing that without my guidance children everywhere would be prone to your pranks! The poor little dears!" Hermione faked fright as she held in a giggle, which turned into a snort.
"Oh and our children will be handsome little devils with the genius of both his parents and a disregard for the rules! Won't they be a handful, though mum will be so pleased." Fred chortled when he saw Hermione's expression, which must have been mixed with a hundred different emotions at the time since he had just admitted to fancying her and now he was talking about their children.
"Hermione, I care for you, I don't know what I'd do if you died tomorrow so promise me you won't act like the know it all you are and try something stupid."
"Come on Fred, I am after all the brightest witch of my age, I would never do anything stupid." At the time she had feigned hurt but Fred had stared at her completely serious. "Fine I won't... And Fred, I, I care for you too. A lot."
"I know love, after tomorrow it will all be alright. Everything will be ok I promise." Tipping her chin up to raise her eyes back to his he had lowered his head until his lips grazed hers.
At that moment she had no clue what possessed her but she wrapped her arms around his neck and pressed her lips fast to his as if she thought he would disappear. Fred had no objections as he passionately probed her mouth open to reveal the depth of a lover's kiss. For Hermione did love him and Fred did love her, but they had no chance when put against fate.
------
Fred stood there as green and red blasts flew everywhere his eyes searching for her, to make sure she was still ok, unfortunately his lack in judgment cost him dearly and just as Hermione's eyes turned to him in a reassuring smile a blast of green light hit him and then he was gone.
Hermione stood shocked for several moments before flying forward and launching herself at the dead body of Fred Weasley lying on the ground of Hogwarts. Her head reeled as tears burst forth and a sob racked her throat.
"YOU PROMISED! You promised... that everything would be ok..."
That was where Mrs. Weasley had found her, clutching Fred's body sobbing and screeching the promise over and over again until Arthur had managed to pull her away from the limp body of his son. He had patted her back and started words of consolation when Hermione burst from his arms rage evident on her face.
He'd broken one promise, so why couldn't she break one in turn.
What happened next was mostly a blur as her mistake that day took not only the life of Fred Weasley but of thousands more...
-0-END CHAPTER
I will explain about Riddle later of course! So now you understand Hermione's initial remorse and cause for rash action. I'm wondering who would you rather see as a Hermione pairing? Remus or Snape? Go to my profile I've got a poll up for it; Hope you enjoyed the chapter. Please do give me feedback; I'm unsure if I am doing a good job with this.
