A/N:This chapter hopefully marks the return of my muse and the end of my busy schedule for a while. I appreciate all the reviews and comments you guys so please keep them up, especially with this are all so wonderful. Thank you to my wonderful beta RedGardenGnome.
Disclaimer: I just play in the sandbox, I don't own the sand.
The start of term feast in the Great Hall held a lot less people than the eighth years were accustomed to seeing. Many students had stayed home with their families, but more couldn't face the reality of coming back. It hadn't been long since the battle, and though Hogwarts had been returned to its former glory, people's lives had not been that simple.
The number of first years was more than the older students expected; their hope and excited energy was almost contagious…almost. They were the first generation of Hogwarts' students having not to worry about growing up too fast; the older students, meanwhile, looked a bit worse for wear. However, no one inside Hogwarts was spared the tragedy of someone they knew.
As the first years lined up near the front of the hall, Headmistress McGonagall started speaking, "Welcome, everyone, to another year at Hogwarts! The castle is here to welcome you home and to be your home for the upcoming term. No matter the house you are sorted in, no matter what type of family a student comes from, and no matter whom you call a friend, remember that we are all family. Now without further ado, the Sorting Hat."
The sorting hat was then brought on stage and began its song, though it was drastically different this year than it had been years previous:
In the dawn of a new era,
In Hogwarts living breath,
The founders' very wishes,
Have now become regrets.
The rebuilding of the castle walls,
The uniting of a cause,
The original plan to teach all,
The safe space of Hogwarts halls.
A place for the young to learn,
A place for those with nowhere to turn,
The houses that were once divided,
Learned in war to be united.
As times change
We aim to bring light,
To the dawn of a new time,
No worries or fright
As I show you where to go
Don't worry, don't fight
I see your hearts true desires,
And a hat has no reason to lie
Whether smart and studious,
Brave and bold,
Caring and comforting,
Cunning and Calculating,
There is a place for all of you,
Forever united.
When the song finished the hall was quiet for a moment, then came thunderous applause from every house and even a few cheers; Harry swore he could see McGonagall crying. It was a new leaf, and for a moment it dawned on him that this was truly the start of a new era.
After the first years were sorted into their respective houses, a wide variety of foods appeared while Harry chanced a look up at the staff table. McGonagall had taken the spot that Dumbledore had sat on numerous occasions, while Madam Hooch had taken McGonagall's spot, and Slughorn had taken Snape's. There was a different feeling at the start of term feast, a drastically different atmosphere that seemed rather alien to Harry.
Hermione appeared to be reading his mind as she said, "It's all so weird, isn't it? Everything has changed and we have changed…I thought I would be scared to come back, and I suppose I am a bit, but I'm also quite excited."
Harry smiled and nodded, resting his hand on top of hers under the table; he brushed the pad of his thumb over her knuckles and then started to eat the massive spread in front of him.
Hermione felt her hand tingle where he had had his hand only moments before. She internally groaned; 'He is dating Ginny!,' she reminded herself, and because of that she would never try anything, especially something that would interfere with his happiness. She couldn't afford to lose him over something so trivial; 'Yes, trivial,' she thought forcefully hoping she could convince herself. 'But was it trivial?' a voice in the back of her head asked. She was in trouble. She had never felt this way about anyone, not Krum, and definitely not Ron, so she pushed the thought away as now was not the time to dwell upon it.
She started to eat what was on her plate, slowly and purposefully. She surveyed the table and noticed Neville swiveling his head up and down from his plate to none other than Ginny. Hermione also noticed though that every time Neville glanced up her, she'd scoot closer to Harry.
Hermione continued to pick at her food, looking over at Neville every so often who had since taken to study his potatoes set upon his plate. She hadn't spoken to him much, she thought ruefully, but she had always liked him. He had killed Nagani, pulled the sword of Gryffindor from the Sorting Hat during the battle. He had become a good man, and she knew what had happened to his parents. She resolved to get to know him more this year, to become true friends with him.
Hermione's train of thought was broken as she then looked up and saw the food had vanished from her plate, and desert had appeared on the table. She grabbed a treacle tart, and began to slowly eat it.
Sometime after she heard McGonagall's voice carrying through the vast hall, "First years, please follow your prefects to your house dormitories; eighth years, please stay behind."
The hall filled with loud chatter, which then dissipated as it started to clear. Ginny made a show of getting up and kissing Harry hard on the mouth; he pulled away rather quickly, but Ginny's actions reminded her of Lavender Brown's in their sixth year.
"Eighth years, there are only a few of you, I have decided that since you are all adults, you will all have your own rooms this year, and you will share a common room with each other, no matter your house."
She looked around the room pleased to hear no opposition. She indicated for the students to follow her. They stayed on the main floor but went all the way towards the back of the castle, which was very quiet.
"While this decision was made to promote house unity and respect among the older students to set as an example for the younger ones, it is also to give you all the space you need to adjust to being back." McGonagall's face showed her sorrow but she continued, "There are four washrooms inside to share, and nameplates on the doors already. Your things have been moved in and your timetables will be on your bed. The password will change once every month, and to start off the term the password is 'era.'" She looked around to see if anyone had any questions, and when she was greeted with silence, she let the portrait swing open, allowing the students to file into their new living quarters.
The common room was large and filled with couches, armchairs, and love seats; a big fireplace warmed the whole room and added a glowing light. The space was decorated in neutral colors, while tables occupied a corner in which to complete homework.
Hermione recognized Theodore Nott, Blaise Zabini, and Pansy Parkinson were the only Slytherins to come back aside from Draco. Most of the returning eighth years she recognized, mostly from studying for hours on end in the library.
There was a buzz of excitement as everyone went to find their individual rooms. Hermione, wanting to avoid her thoughts from earlier, slipped away as quietly as possible to find her room. She found it and noted to herself that she was in between Draco and Callum's room.
Draco walked up next to her and paled into a very unnatural shade of white and said, "Grang-Hermione, I can ask McGonagall to move me. I don't want to make you uncomfortable."
Hermione smiled kindly, thinking this was definitely a first of Draco being considerate; she never thought she would see the day.
"It's fine Malfoy, sorry, Draco," she offered gently. "We're neighbors, it doesn't mean we are going to be best friends and sing songs together." Her smile grew thinking about the absurdity of the situation.
He nodded and as Hermione opened her door, he took a half a step closer to make his point, but not close enough to crowd her and replied, "I really am sorry for everything; for all the names I called you, for how I treated you and Po-Harry, sorry for what happened at the manor, and sorry for pushing the damned pureblood ideology even though you showed me how wrong it was and how wrong I was. I should have done the right thing sooner."
"I appreciate the apology, truly. I understand why you did what you did. We were kids forced to make adult decisions, and the decision you made was to save your mother's life and your own. I know you tried to save us back at the manor, Draco. I'm not angry with you, at least not anymore. Forgiveness will take time, but it isn't off the table." She walked most of the way into her room before turning around, "You can't change the past, and we all have to try to push forward."
"I don't deserve it," he muttered but Hermione didn't hear him; she was already inside.
X
Her room was small, piece together by a bookshelf, a desk, a four-poster bed, a window, and a nightstand. Hermione didn't think she ever loved a room so much before. It wasn't much, certainly notlavish by any stretch of the imagination, but it was hers. Hermione hadn't had anything that was exclusively hers since the summer before her fifth year.
Her eyes watered as she lay on the bed still dressed in her robes. No one to worry about keeping awake, no fighting the cold, and no one constantly in her space. She let out a long breath; this year would be good, she resolved, the best year so far, she would make sure of it. She then fell asleep.
X
Harry had not seen Hermione since they got to the common room. When he went to look for her, he found her door was already closed. It would be nice having his own room and something to call his own. He was grateful for the space from everyone else, with no questions about the war, no special treatment, and he particularly had a sense of freedom away from Ginny.
While he felt guilty for wanting some distance between he and his girlfriend, he hardly had a moment without her in four months and it was getting tiresome. She loved being on his arm, loved being the girlfriend of 'the boy-who-lived-twice' or whatever rubbish they were calling him now.
The other problem is when she kissed him at dinner, he hadn't felt a thing. He blamed the lack of feeling when they kissed the first time on him being in shock, and the next few on his grieving, but in four months he hadn't felt anything, not even comforted by their snogging.
He flopped onto his bed, as this thoughts traveled over to Hermione. He wanted to be next to her again, as she always made him feel better and was always there for him. Alarm bells went off in his head at this, making him groan for he did not want to deal with these strange feelings tonight. He rolled over and tried, unsuccessfully, to fall asleep.
X
Draco hadn't slept well since the battle. It was one o' clock in the morning, and even books weren't helping him relax; he was fidgety and for the first time since he had gotten the offer, he wondered whether coming back was a good choice. The nightmares were bad enough at the manor; he assumed they would be worse here…if he ever found sleep.
Suddenly, a noise roused him from his thoughts, akin to a faint whimpering, and he recognized it, but couldn't place it. He stood up quickly looking around his room, and that's when it clicked; the sound that haunted his dreams so many times was once again live and in person: the cry was coming from Hermione Granger. He assumed Potter would know what to do, but he didn't know how much time it would take to find his room. So Draco set off quickly to find Harry's room.
He found the door and knocked, once he opened it was if a gate had opened, "I am very sorry, I wouldn't bother you but "Hermione sounds like she's having a nightmare and.. I don't know how to help."
Harry followed Draco as he turned to lead the way barely remembering to shut his door on the way out. He reached Hermione's door and knocked, and Draco stood in front of his, "Thank you." He nodded at him and then disappeared into the newly opened door.
It felt like hours but in reality was only minutes later when the whimpering subsided and he fell back into bed with his heart racing, and completely and totally exhausted. This is probably the most realistic reason why McGonagall let them have separate rooms; the reality of the war affected them all in their own ways. They needed space to heal, and to call their own when the horrid memories came flooding back in.
X
Harry's arms wrapped around Hermione the second she opened the door, she was still crying. He closed the door with his foot and moved her back to the bed letting her curl into his side. He tucked her hair behind her ear waiting for the crying to stop.
"How did you know? To come I mean?"
"Draco heard you crying he came to get me, he wanted to help."
Hermione sniffed her nose a bit pulling away to look at him. "I'm okay now, thank you for waking me up."
"Do you want to… you know…tell me about it?"
"Maybe another time, I have them every few nights, I haven't been getting enough sleep to have them all the time. I was reading in one of my books on memory." she moved on before he got the chance to realize what she had said, "Nightmares are normal after something like a war, they go away with time, and maybe occasionally talking about them." The smile didn't reach her eyes, but Harry nodded earnestly.
"We can talk about them you know, I was taking Dreamless Sleep for a while before you woke up, now I just, don't sleep." His tired smirk told her he was only half kidding.
"Well we can try to sleep peacefully tonight, we do have class tomorrow,"
He kissed the top of her head. "Night 'Mione."
Once he was gone she stuffed her face in her pillow, she was feeling altogether to many things, and she was not happy about any of it. She drifted in and out of sleep for the rest of the night.
X
Ginny woke up the next morning and trudged downstairs to the Great Hall for breakfast in a huff. She had awoken to hear that the eighth years now had their own common room. Now she wouldn't be able to sit with Harry every night; instead, he would be with Hermione.
When she arrived at the Gryffindor table, however, she found only Neville and Hermione and they were deep in their own conversation.
"Where's Harry?"
The duo looked up at her as Neville answered, "I'm not sure; I would guess he was still asleep."
"Why aren't you guys in the common room with him?" She was oblivious to the attention she was drawing. "And why do you guys even have your own common room?"
"Well, there aren't that many eighth years Ginny. Besides, we didn't decide, McGonagall did."
Harry, who had entered the hall soundlessly, had watched this whole exchange and resisted the urge to roll his eyes. He tapped Hermione on the shoulder and said, "Morning. I missed you last night."
"Sorry, once we found our rooms I unpacked and went to bed; it was a long day and all," she replied.
Ginny then grabbed Harry's hand and pulled him away, whispering angrily, "Why didn't you tell me you wouldn't be in Gryffindor Tower?"
"I just found out last night that we had our own rooms, and I knew I would see you this morning at breakfast. It's no different than me having my own room at the Burrow."
Ginny walked away even more frustrated then she had been at the start of the conversation; of course he was right, but it didn't mean she had to like it. Harry rolled his eyes and walked back to the table to sit next to Neville while Ginny sat next to Hermione, and the rest of their mealtime was filled with an uncomfortable silence.
X
After breakfast cleared away, they all got up to start their day; Gryffindor and Slytherin seventh and eighth years had double potions.
Harry meanwhile now had to deal with a pissed of Ginny both in class and outside of it. He trailed behind as Hermione seemed determined to get to class in a quick manner while Ginny kept up with her ranting about the new living arrangements.
Neville nudged him, "Hey."
They walked side by side out of earshot of the girls as Neville asked, "Is Hermione okay?"
"I think so- why?" He asked wondering what Neville knew.
"She seems awfully thin and looks very tired. I just was kind of hoping you and Ginny would help me make sure she eats more than a slice of toast."
Harry nodded, "She never got her appetite back when we came back from… being on the run. But you're right we will need to make sure she eats more."
Neville nodded and stated, "You know Harry, I have some extra dreamless sleep potion my gran gave me; if you want, you could use some of it. You look a bit tired yourself."
"Thanks, Neville," he returned, giving him a half-smile. "I'll let you know."
The door to the potions classroom then opened, revealing a grinning Professor Slughorn, one that spoke of mischievousness. Neville felt his stomach drop; nothing about that look paired with potions ever meant anything good for him.
A/N: Oh poor Neville. To inspire comments tell me if you liked the song. Much Love, Roselyn
