"Take one dose each night before bed and another each morning."
Hermione laid the basket containing herbal medicine down on the old woman's bedside beside a vase of faded flowers, old and limp with age. Augusta Longbottom watched indifferently from the head of her bed, her long grey hair sitting unruly and disheveled around her shoulders.
"I'll give Neville the same information too," Hermione added, mouth pursed. She didn't particularly like Neville's grandmother any more than her father did.
With hardly even a sound to dismiss her, the old woman shut her eyes to resume the midday nap Hermione must have interrupted. It was on par to her typical behaviour.
Holding back a sigh, Hermione's fingers idly brushed against the flowers sitting in the vase. Imperceptibly, pigments of colour slowly began to seep back into the pale petals. If it wasn't for the knowledge that Augusta would never notice the prolonged life of her flowers - she didn't care to notice most things - Hermione would have never done it.
Leaving the room and shutting the door behind her, Hermione descended the creaky steps of the Longbottom home. It was one of the finer, older houses in town. Not too long ago, Hannah Abbott had been employed to keep it neat and tidy while the Longbottom grandson cobbled shoes for a living by day.
What had Abbott done to bring Augusta's rage down on her? She had been Augusta's longtime caretaker even before she had become bed-bound, and yet it had been Augusta who levelled the accusations of witchcraft against the girl, citing an unholy pact with the devil as the cause of her increasingly failing health. And stranger still, Hermione had not seen either Longbottom at the witch-burning of a few days ago. Augusta was bedridden, but Neville had been fond of the girl.
Already there was dust accumulating in the empty spaces, on the railing, in the corners, and on the furniture. The Longbottoms were a highly esteemed family with old wealth and despite their recent decline after the deaths of Frank and Alice Longbottom, Augusta had thoroughly demonstrated the weight her late husband's name still carried in the town with the charges and conviction of Hannah Abbott.
Neville was in the sitting room, not sitting, his broad shoulders slumped against the wall. He blinked quickly at the sight of her, becoming alert. "Hey." He left his slouch across the wall to walk over to her.
"I left the medicine to supplement the bloodletting on the table in your grandmother's room. Expect my father in about three days; he'll want to check your grandmother's progress." Hermione's voice was gentle, slow, her hand resting on the wooden knob at the end of the staircase railing.
"Thank you, Hermione." Neville managed a small smile. Growing up, Hermione had never been as close to Neville the way she was to the two youngest Weasley children, or like she had grown to be to Harry in her adolescence, but Hermione had always considered Neville a loyal friend despite his timid nature. And he had grown to be a good man who's quiet and modest character was often overshadowed by bolder and more domineering figures.
There had been many past instances where she and her friends had had to interfere when the mayor's son and his cronies had started giving Neville trouble, or when Harry's cousin and his childhood gang had made Neville one of their targets. The orphan boy had endured it all, never voicing a single complaint to his grandmother. Augusta was already fiercely protective as it was.
"Ron says you haven't come over for a game of chess in quite a while," Hermione ventured. When Neville doesn't offer a word, mouth twitching anxiously, she continued. A sorry smile had grown on her face. "We all miss having you around, Neville."
"Huh," Neville rubbed the knuckle of his hand over his right brow. "Well recently, it's been tough with my grandmother, how she is, you know. I haven't had much time for leisure lately."
It sounded like an excuse. Augusta had been bedridden and frail for years. But it was true that Abbott was no longer around to ease the burden.
"But I'll definitely come by soon," Neville promised cautiously. "Tell Ron and his family I'm grateful for their concern." A polite smile reappearing on his mouth, he began walking towards the door, opening it quickly. "Do you need me to walk you home, Hermione?"
"No, that's not necessary," Hermione stepped down from the final step of the staircase. "But thank you, Neville." She tried to find his eyes, but he seemed to be looking anywhere but directly back.
Silently waving a hand in goodbye, Hermione stepped outside the house, and the door quickly closed behind her. Only sparing the closed door another pursed-mouth glance, Hermione began the walk home. It was not a very far walk to warrant an escort and it cut through the marketplace, but she wasn't much in the mood for socialising. Although, Hermione had the grace to spare a smile for Seamus Finnigan when the cheerful boy passed her on the dirt path.
She continued to walk undisturbed until a new voice called out behind her. "Hermione!" It was Cormac McLaggen. She knew immediately. She feigned oblivion, but loud footsteps sounded behind her, and suddenly his heavy hand had settled over her shoulder. He physically turned her around to face him, a broad smile on his face as he peered imposingly down at her. "You didn't hear me calling your name?"
"Oh," Hermione disguised a grimace with a tight smile. "I'm sorry I must have been daydreaming again." She spied a freshly hunted rabbit in his free hand. The brown creature hung limply from its hind legs in his loose grasp. It was a surprisingly clean kill.
"You can't live with your head in the clouds, Hermione," Cormac laughed, the rumbling sound deep from his throat. "You're going to miss all of the important things going on right before your eyes."
"Right." She was looking for the point of this conversation.
Cormac must have at least sensed her growing impatience because he quickly lifted the rabbit. "I caught this fresh in a trap this morning." He tried to push it into her hands. "I thought your family might like it. It's a big one, fat on spring grass."
"I really couldn't."
"Oh c'mon, you'd be doing me a favour. I'm sick of rabbit anyway." Cormac laughed again.
She was still shaking her head when a new voice suddenly joined their dialogue, smooth and confident. "That's from the forest?" Tom appeared beside Hermione. He did not look even briefly at the rabbit but directly at Cormac.
"Yeah." It wasn't very subtle when Cormac's shoulders suddenly straightened out and his chest seemed to puff out, reminiscent of a preening bird. "I hunted it."
"You go into the forest often?" Again, Tom didn't seem to have noticed Hermione, despite the fact that their shoulders were nearly brushing. The near physical contact had her shifting a step away.
"Often enough. Why?" Cormac smiled, but there was a mocking quality to the turn of his mouth. He didn't seem like the kind of man who subscribed to the notion of there being "no such thing as a silly question".
"Oh, I'm just curious," Tom shrugged nonchalantly. "I've explored much of the town but I haven't looked into the forest yet."
"Well, it's not really the place for sightseeing." Cormac's face grew pink. Tom's lack of fear for the forest - a trait typical of most of the townspeople - was unappreciated. Cormac's frequent ventures into the forest were his most popular pub stories. Even Ron liked to listen in, despite how often he labelled Cormac a 'prat' out of earshot. "A boy died up there a few years ago. I was there, I saw it."
"Well, that's not true," Hermione interrupted suddenly, drawing surprised looks from both men. Even Cormac must have forgotten she was there, as incensed as he was with Tom's intrusion. It also probably didn't help that Tom's effortless popularity with the female population was already well-known. "His body was never found."
"I don't need to see the body to know that he's a goner," Cormac scoffed, looking confused and red. "It'd have taken a miracle for him to have survived something like that. Besides, he really had no business in coming with us - it was his first time even holding a spear."
She had tried her best to come off as detached and purely informative (for the sake of setting the record straight), but Cormac's insistence stirred up an old anger in Hermione. "Then maybe you shouldn't have left him behind to die," she snapped coldly. Ignoring Tom, she gave Cormac one last withering look before storming off.
"Hermione - "
"Don't."
She didn't look back once as she stalked off, but Hermione could hear the slightest footsteps starting to trail after her. She knew she only had more angry words and possibly a slap or two so she ignored her shadow.
A few minutes had passed when he had grown tired of the silent game. "Hermione." The voice wasn't Cormac's.
It was enough of a start to give her pause, and that gave him the opportunity to languidly catch up to her and pass her, turning around to face her. "Hey." An apologetic look had softened Tom's handsome features. "I hate what happened back there. I'm sorry."
"Why?" She stared at him in disbelief. It was between her and Cormac. "You don't have to take responsibility. You had no part in that."
"Oh, but I feel like I should." There was such a look of guilt written into his furrowed brows. "I hadn't wanted to see you get upset."
"It's really not that big of a deal." Hermione shook her head, still uneasy. "But thanks." She felt obligated to say that at least.
His face broke into a winning smile; he was just as handsome smiling as when he looked sorry. "That's a relief." White teeth biting attractively at his lips - he seemed to be unaware of the powerful effect of such a gesture on him - Tom looked around them. His face lit up with an idea. "Hey, there's a vendor selling some books right there. Why don't you pick out a book? On me?"
"I really couldn't."
"Oh, come on, Hermione." Maybe it was in the familiar way he said her name. Or maybe she really did just want that free book. Because without much further prompting, Hermione dazedly found herself trailing after the dark-haired man, who was still really just a stranger whose name she just happened to know and one who had happened to have found out hers and the fact that she likes books. She would hate to admit it aloud or privately to even herself, but the sudden attention was flattering when he had barely batted an eye at her during their first meeting and the first half of their second.
The process of printing books was still a relatively new technology, and books were generally rare and pricey, luxury items for the middle and upper classes. The merchant only had three books in his inventory: Malleus Maleficarum, the traditional Christian bible (printed in Latin) and The Canterbury Tales.
It was a fairly obvious choice. "Thanks." She held the Chaucer text in her hands, fingers rubbing against the hard spine of the book as she looked down at the front cover. She really couldn't help the gratified smile that tugged at her mouth.
"Of course." Tom paid the merchant the initial asking price. Haggling seemed beneath his dignity. As he reached out to pay, the black ring on his left hand caught her eye. Oddly enough, unlike the rest of him, Hermione found the ring rather ugly on Tom's fingers - the black stone reflected little light and the band of the ring, despite seeming to be gold, looked bulky and clumsily crafted. The coins released from his pale hand glittered from shimmering gold to duller colours and back again. The merchant happily accepted the payment all the same. She didn't comment on the visual oddity. In all the time she knew him, Tom had been incredibly generous to everyone he had came across. It felt a little too good to be true, even now.
They continued walking again, this time side by side. Tom had insisted on escorting her back to her house; it was on his way back to the inn. Hermione really couldn't refuse his gesture at this point.
At her prompting, they ended up discussing about his lengthy travels. As she had suspected, he had sent some short time abroad on the continent. Tom mentioned something about being orphaned at an early age and spending some time in an orphanage before being taken in by an uncle who also happened to be in the business of trade. He didn't give much additional details and Hermione didn't particularly care to ask for them either way.
"That boy you mentioned before - " Tom was putting his feelers out. " - what happened there exactly?"
Hermione held the new book close to her chest. He could hear the story from her, or Ginny would be just as happy to tell him just the same information.
"His name was Harry Potter," she recalled grimly. "He went hunting with Cormac McLaggen - you already know him - and the butcher's son, Dudley Dursley. I wasn't there, I don't really know all the details but what Dursley and McLaggen reported. But they were attacked by a beast. McLaggen thinks it was the wild boar they were tracking, but Dursley always claimed that it was something else - not any sort of creature we've ever seen or heard of. But no one knows for certain because they all scattered in the confusion. McLaggen and Dursley came home safely and that was that." There was a bitter edge in her voice and she made no effort to conceal it.
She wanted Tom, anyone, to understand the injustice and feel it as strongly as she did. Ginny hadn't even wept (although on principle, Ginny was never very teary to begin with), and even Ron's anger hadn't nearly matched hers adequately. Maybe it wasn't fair of her to judge how they grieved, but what had happened to Harry wasn't very fair either.
"No one looked for him?" Tom caught the bitter note.
"Not well enough." Not to her satisfaction. She hadn't been allowed to join the search party herself; her parents had forbidden her and some of the men had outrightly laughed at her and Ginny for even suggesting the idea. "Arthur Weasley went out with his sons and some other volunteers and formed a search party. Only McLaggen went with them - because Dursley's mother put her foot down - but there wasn't even so much as a speck of blood found." Anything could have happened. Death wasn't the only logical conclusion. Harry was a lot more capable than any of the townspeople had ever given him credit for. "They gave up shortly after that. They couldn't keep looking forever."
"That's very sad." It was simple and understated, but it was enough to satisfy Hermione and propel her further.
"And then, Harry's aunt, Mrs. Dursley, blamed him for the whole thing, of course." Hermione was eager to share her anger, her voice quick and sharp.
Ron had thought it was too dreary to speak of Harry 'forever and forever' - but Ron hadn't known Harry like she had known him. Although, it was also true that for several months after Harry's disappearance, it was all Hermione occupied herself with, all she talked and thought about. Coincidentally, it was around that same time that Ron became familiar with Ginny's friend, Lavender Brown. It was a natural development Hermione couldn't begrudge but nevertheless one that still retained a bit of old hurt.
The next time Hermione had ventured into the forest, Cormac had discovered her only a few feet in. He had been stubbornly insistent in escorting her home, directly to her parents by the arm. He might have thought he was protecting her, but the experience had only been demeaning and further hardened her opinion against him.
"And because Harry didn't have any real family to advocate for him, the whole incident was swept under the rug." She hoped that last line stuck with him. Someone else should care. And, in a way, Tom was an outsider like Harry too. Even if Tom didn't associate with witchcraft or other criminal activities, and was still relatively well-liked and popular with the townspeople, travelers like Tom would always be regarded with a degree of suspicion by the small town and the others like it throughout the British isles.
But Tom's face remained much the same: still expressively empathetic and still very handsome. But for whatever reason, Tom's perfect reactions and active listening now rubbed her the wrong way.
"Good night, Tom." She arrived at her doorstep.
"Good night, Hermione Granger."