Hermione had never faced a problem, big or small, for which she could not find the answer in a book. Or so she told herself as she bent forward, trying to decipher the minute script of the dusty old tome lying open in front of her. There was a pile of discarded books to her left and several sheets of parchment to her right.
Every time she added a new tome to the tower of books, the structural integrity of the thing came a little closer to ruin, but so far it hadn't stopped her from adding yet another volume whose usefulness had proved limited. The parchment was covered with hurriedly scribbled notes, but despite her industrious efforts, being buried under a literary avalanche might well be the most exciting thing to happen yet.
She sighed, aggravated. She had no time for any of this. She had miles of homework from all of her classes, to say nothing of all the extra studying required at NEWT level. And try as she might, she could not find anything useful, which was hardly surprising. How could she find an answer if she didn't know the question?
It didn't deter her, however, and not just because she could not stand a puzzle with no solution.
Hermione was no stranger to fear. No one could go to Hogwarts for five years and live through the things she had without getting reasonably acquainted with the feeling. But nothing had ever prepared her for the sheer terror of a mind turned to sand and water, a brain that refused to obey or even respond, and thoughts scrambled and jumbled until even breathing took effort.
She could still feel it echoing inside her head every time she closed her eyes, even so many weeks later. And sometimes during the day, a word or a gesture would trigger something inside her, as if her mind was trying to piece together associations that simply were not there.
Sometimes she saw images, as she had that first night, crying alone in the empty corridor. There were flashes of light, like spells in the dark, and stone halls where steps echoed. Sometimes there were sounds: the frantic sobs of a child, a whisper she couldn't quite make out, and happy laughter she couldn't place. And other times she could feel the soft brush of skin against skin and the breath of someone standing too close.
There were times when she could feel straps biting into her wrists and arms, and she had to get up to shake it off.
She learnt that trying to follow the memories was only good to give herself a panic attack, so she didn't. She waited it out, hoping that the next episode would not find her in the middle of a class, or at lunch in the Great Hall, and hoping that if it did, no one would be any the wiser. She learnt that pretending everything was as it should be was tiring, but not so tiring as waiting for the next time it happened. And there was always a next time. Random, unpredictable, with no triggers she could identify.
Hermione was no fool. She might not know what it was or what had caused it, but she knew enough to know something was wrong. Her theories were many and varied, ranging from the possible, to the unlikely, to the positively ridiculous. Not knowing, everything was fair game. She knew enough to know that the line that separated reasonable from ludicrous was constantly moving.
Remembering Ginny's account of her time under Tom Riddle's influence, Hermione took great pains to go over everything that had happened to her since the beginning of the year, trying to ascertain whether there was any time she could not account for. When that produced no results, she wondered whether it might be something akin to the link between Harry and Voldemort the year before. But she was lacking in the evil nemesis department, so that particular theory went under the "Extremely unlikely scenarios" column.
But even if Voldemort wasn't personally out to get her, these were dangerous times, and she remembered all too well what had happened to Katie Bell.
A Memory Charm was also a possibility, and she could not help but shudder at the thought of Gilderoy Lockhart wandering the halls of St Mungo's with a foolish grin and a mind that would never be whole again. Hermione could not think of any reason why anyone would like to Obliviate her of all people, but she supposed that if anyone had, she would most certainly not recall the reason. This made her move "Memory Charm" from the "Somewhat unlikely" to the "Possible" column.
She had refused to add insanity to the list. There was no family history of mental illness and she was only seventeen, making it extremely unlikely. In her more honest moments, Hermione was forced to admit that the list included several items far more far-fetched than madness, but none of those kept her up at night, and she refused to humour the part of her that felt terrified by the possibility. She recognised it as a fear based more on paranoia than a sound logical basis, and she was too much her mother's daughter to wish to indulge in flights of fancy.
"The library is closing in five minutes," warned Madam Pince. "You better make sure all of those are put back in their correct places, young lady."
"Yes, ma'am," Hermione said. It's not as if she had found anything useful, anyway. She set aside The Mind Thief to check out, and set out to put the other volumes back to their original place in the shelves.
She was returning Unforgivables: A History to the Restricted Section when her gaze fell upon another book. The Wizarding Cookbook was two parts cheap sensationalism and one part misguided illusions of grandeur, and would have been a dangerous book if any of its recipes actually worked. Mostly, however, it interested no one but rebellious twelve-year-olds who didn't know any better.
The book felt familiar in her hands, and Hermione flipped through some of the pages. She struggled to remember why it was important. It felt important. She knew there was something to remember, but she couldn't quite put her finger on it.
Draco Malfoy is a very naughty boy.
The book fell with a bang, as Hermione turned around trying to find the source of the disembodied voice. There was no one there, however, save for books and spiders, and the approaching footsteps of Madam Pince.
"What is the meaning of this?" the librarian asked infuriated. "Pick up that book at once. I would not have expected this of you, Miss Granger. Hurry now. And out of the Restricted Section. If you don't have the maturity to handle books in a responsible fashion, you have no business being in here."
Hermione mumbled her apologies and hurried out of the library red-faced. Her heart was drumming in her chest and there was a knot in her throat, but outrage had mostly replaced fear. Her mind was her playground and she refuse to let anyone or anything have a bigger say in the running of it than she did. She would get to the bottom of this if was the last thing she did.
She must still have looked upset when she entered the common room, however, because Harry got up to meet her right as she was about to reach the entrance to the dormitories.
"Come sit with us," he asked, motioning to where Seamus and Neville were sitting. "Don't let it bother you." It was Harry's awkwardness that clued her in as to what he meant.
Hermione glanced to the corner where Ron and Lavender were drooling all over each other and found that she lacked the energy to care. There were more important things to think about than Ron's appalling taste in women.
"It doesn't bother me, Harry," she said truthfully, though it was clear from his expression that he did not believe her. "But I am tired and I still have things to do before bed."
She didn't give him time to object before making her escape to the relative safety of her room. She appreciated that he was trying to make her feel better, but a brain too full of alien voices made her crave solitude. Sometimes she thought she ought to confide in Harry. He was her friend; he would be there for her even if it did turn out she was one step away from losing her marbles. But he was so worked up over everything that was going on that she didn't want to be yet another thing for him to worry about.
There were still a couple of hours to go before Lavender and Parvati were likely to turn in, and Hermione fully intended to put the time to good use. She fished The Mind Thief out of her bag and opened her trunk, looking for the set of Self-Writing Quills Fred and George had given her for Christmas. She thought she had taken one of the quills with her to the library, but that had turned out to be only a regular quill — a mistake both embarrassing and inconvenient.
Half the contents of her trunk were haphazardly piled around her by the time she found the quills. She had received them only a few weeks before and it was beyond her how they had managed to get that far down in the trunk. As often happens, putting her worldly possessions back in their proper place took twice the time it had taken her to get them out, though mostly because she kept hearing her great aunt Catherine's directions as to the best method of packing. She was almost done when she noticed Crookshanks was sitting on top of one of her purses.
"Other cats help, you know?" she teased, reaching for the purple purse. The shameless feline caught her index finger between his teeth. It was not much of a bite, and she retaliated only by poking him with the uninjured finger by way of retribution. "Silly goose." She stole the purse away from the unimpressed cat, who jumped into the trunk after it.
"Crookshanks, down! Will you stop being silly? It's just an old purse. I don't even remember where I…" She paused before picking up the discarded item again, and turning it between her hands. She did not remember where she had got it, but was that so very strange? She was sure she could not pinpoint the origin of every single thing she owned.
It took only a few minutes of examining the bag for her to realise it was enchanted with an Undetectable Extension Charm. She would most certainly have remembered that. Instead of spending time trying to locate whatever items may be inside it, she turned the purse upside down and shook it.
There were only a few things in it, and most of them held little interest. There was a tissue package, a few pounds in lose change, and a copy of Jane Eyre that she thought she had lost.
And then there was a ticket for her hometown's cinema, marked 22nd of December 1995, for a film she did not recall seeing.
Had she gone home for Christmas the year before? She was supposed to go to Grimmauld Place, to be with the Weasleys because Mr Weasley had been attacked right before Christmas, but she didn't remember going. No. Now that she thought about it, she must have gone to her parents' house.
She tried to recall specific events from that winter break, but her brain was full of cotton and the harder she tried, the more she could focus only on the fact that she just couldn't remember. Blinking back tears, Hermione gave up trying to piece together the events of the year before, and picked up the last item.
Something to remember me by.
The moment she touched the silver chain, her parents' living room flashed before her eyes. She couldn't see the Christmas tree, but there were lights reflected on the opposite wall, twinkling red, yellow and blue. She smiled at how pretty they looked, and wondered briefly whether he thought them pretty too. She knew better than to ask, however. He seemed content enough, his body warm beneath hers as he played with her hair.
The memory was gone in a moment and Hermione struggled to keep from trying to follow it, knowing by now how pointless that would be. Her hands were shaking, but she forced herself to focus on the physical immediacy of the necklace. It was a simple silver chain with a dark pendant. It wasn't something she would normally wear. She ran her fingers along the chain, trying to trigger another vision, but nothing came. She then turned her attention to the pendant, which was black except for the small shining dots.
No, not dots. Stars. It was a constellation.
Hermione gasped, dropping the necklace. It couldn't possibly be.
She got up and rushed to Parvati's bookcase, quickly scanning the titles and grabbing two astrology books. These proved useless, so she ran over to Lavender's equally meagre selection, searching for something that could help. Divination had never been a lucky subject for Hermione, however, and this time proved no exception.
The witch took a deep breath, trying to calm down. She didn't need to look it up. She knew she was right. It was the Draco constellation, she was sure of it. She picked up the necklace again. What had her mum said when she was home for Christmas? "How is Draco doing?" Why hadn't she thought that strange at the time? Why hadn't she noticed all the other times her parents had mentioned him in passing or sent him their love at the end of a letter?
She was not stupid. Surely her Muggle parents politely enquiring about Draco Malfoy's welfare should have merited at least a raised eyebrow. She glanced at the piece of parchment with her list of possibilities, scanning the "Possible" column. Stress, Imperius Curse, Confundus Charm, Memory Charm, False Memory Charm…
She stopped. Memory Charm and False Memory Charm both fit. Obliviated brains protected the reality as they saw it. She would have dismissed her parents comments without batting an eye.
A False Memory Charm was equally possible and twice as likely, though. There was no way she remembered Draco Malfoy being civil to her parents. There was even less of a chance that she could genuinely remember the way his body felt against hers as they lay together in the sofa on her parents' living room. She certainly did not remember his lips on her skin, or his hands… She blushed.
She would murder that conniving, foul, good-for-nothing ferret. Harry wouldn't have to worry about whether or not Malfoy really was part of Voldemort's grand new plan of recruiting sixteen-year-old Death Eaters, because Hermione Granger was going to kill that evil cockroach.
She shoved the necklace into her pocket and ran down the stairs. She headed straight for Harry, ignoring Lavender's indignant look when she bumped into her chair, and pulled her friend aside.
"I need to borrow the Marauder's Map."
"Now?" he asked surprised.
"Now."
"Whatever for?"
"That's my own business. Can you just go get it, please?" She tried to control her fidgeting by crossing her arms, but it was impossible to stand still and she kept transferring her weight from one leg to the other.
"Hermione, is everything okay?"
"Harry, will you please for once in your life just do what I'm asking and lend me the bloody map without an interrogation?"
Startled by her tone, Harry stopped arguing and hurried to the boys' dormitories, followed by the witch. He reached under his pillow and handed her the blank piece of parchment.
"You need to—"
"I know how it works, thanks."
"Hermione, wait."
But she had already ran out the door. As soon as she was outside the Gryffindor Common Room, she looked around to make sure she was alone, and quickly tapped the parchment with her wand.
"I solemnly swear that I'm up to no good." And perhaps for the first time ever, she meant it. She did not pause to consider that he was extremely unlikely to give up the plot simply because she confronted him. She didn't care if it was not the smartest way to go about doing it. She badly wanted to hurt the evil bastard.
The problem with Gryffindors is that you're all brawn and no brains.
She shook her head, trying to ignore the echoes that she knew were not real, and focused on the map instead. She looked at the Slytherin Common Room first, but he was not there. That was lucky, because in her current mood she'd have gone all the way to the dungeons, and even she couldn't see that ending well for her.
She finally spotted him in one of the galleries on the fifth floor. There was no one else nearby, which was not surprising. While curfew was still a few hours away, the eastern side of the gallery was open to the outside, which in January meant it would be freezing up there.
"Mischief managed." Putting the map away, she tightened her grip on her wand and marched on.
The closer she got to her destination, the fewer people there were around and she hadn't seen anyone at all for at least five minutes before she finally reached the gallery. Malfoy was leaning over the railing, watching the forest below, but he looked up as she approached, alerted by her footsteps.
She barely had time to raise her wand before it flew out of her hand and into his.
"You shouldn't walk around with such a stormy face, Granger. People will think you're out to get them."
"Give it back, you horrid, despicable snake." She tried to grab her wand back, but Malfoy was faster and hid it in one of the pockets of his robes.
"When you look as if you're about to hex me halfway to the lake? I think not."
"What have you done to me?" She shoved him for lack of a better outlet for her anger.
"Get your filthy hands off me, Mudblood," he said.
"Or what, Malfoy?" She shoved him again. "I'm not scared of you."
He grabbed her hands and spun her around, slamming her against the railing and twisting her arms painfully behind her back.
"Maybe you should be, Granger," he snarled. She had barely a second to contemplate the drop from up there before he yanked her hair back, forcing her head up. "Potter should've kept his mouth shut. I have neither the time nor the inclination to humour his little delusions and I certainly don't have time for the likes of you."
"Let go of me!" she demanded, trying to release her hands, but he only tightened his grip.
You're going to hurt yourself like that.
She gasped, feeling the panic rising in her throat as the memory brushed against her mind. Not now, she thought desperately.
She could feel his breath against her ear when he spoke again. "You're a smart girl. Do the smart thing. Stay the hell away from me." He stepped away from her, letting go of her hands and hair. Fighting the urge to run out, Hermione turned to face him.
"My wand," she said, her voice sounding unusually high-pitched to her ears. She hated that he could see her shaking, but she wouldn't give him the satisfaction of running away.
Malfoy returned her wand, his cold grey eyes never leaving hers. Fear had replaced her anger, but there was a tiny gloating spot inside her, too. She hurried her steps as soon as she was out of the gallery. She only hoped Harry was still in the common room.
The moment he approached the door, Snape knew someone had tampered with his wards. The Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher carefully turned the knob and the door opened with a click. Everything inside was dark but for the fire burning in the corner. He glanced around, but everything seemed to be in its proper place, from the books stacked on his desk, to the locked cabinet.
With a wave of his wand, greenish orbs lit up around the room, casting wavering shadows on the walls and bookcases. He walked to the centre of the office, examining the contents of the shelves to make sure everything was where it should be. It was only when he turned to walk back to his seat that he realised there was someone sitting down on the ground, on the side of his desk, back against the dark wood and legs stretched towards the wall.
"Have you forgotten how chairs work?" he asked, sitting down on his own armchair. Draco did not move or speak, however. From where he was sitting, Snape could barely see his face, but he noticed the boy's extreme paleness and the way even balling up his hands into fists did not stop them from shaking.
Knowing all too well that pressing him to talk would have the opposite effect, Severus Snape devoted the time to preparing for his next lesson. For some minutes the only sound in the room was the soft scratching of the quill against parchment. When Draco finally spoke, his voice was raspy and strained.
"I scared her," he said. "I scared her off and I hurt her. Again."
Snape sighed. He had been trying to get Draco in his office to discuss the Dark Lord's assignment since the beginning of the year with no luck. But throw a girl in the mix, and suddenly he was left having to wonder how a sixteen-year-old had got past his wards.
"You did what you had to do," he said simply. "You know the part you have to play. She'll be safer away from you."
"No one will be safe."
"We all play the hand we're dealt, Draco," he said simply, because it had been true sixteen years ago and it was still true today.
"And if it's not a good one?"
Snape did not even have to think before replying, "Then you rig the game."
Draco's laughter at that was both joyless and bitter.
"Does it ever bother you that he's made monsters of us?" It only highlighted how young Draco really was that he'd utter something that treasonous to someone else. "He's a monster, and you're a monster, and I'm a monster, and everything we touch will eventually turn to dust and ashes."
Snape sneered. There were so many people vying for that particular distinction that a cornered sixteen-year-old did not even begin to rank.
