She stood, still as stone, in between the chaos. She saw the action around her in slow motion. "Duck!" Ron shouted at her and she instinctively did. Spinning around she saw the death eater Antonin Dolohov come behind her. Quickly she shot out "Confringo" at him, catching him right at his chest. The moment she saw him double over she started moving, searching for Harry; she had to get him, cover his back while he searched and fought Voldemort. That was the plan.
She ran between Aurors, death eaters, sixth and seventh year's students. She dodged curses and shot a few of them too, but she couldn't find him. She stopped for a second, her eyes looking everywhere as she caught her breath and finally saw Bellatrix 'Crucio' Neville. Hermione immediately petrified her and made her way towards them. She gave him her hand and pulled him up, wrapping her hand around his waist as tremors ran through him. "Give it some time and breathe through it," she said to him whilst she tied up Bellatrix. Slowly after some minutes he nodded and stepped away from her. "You okay?" she asked.
"Yeah, thanks for that," he said, nodding at the petrified death eater at their feet.
"Never mind that, but Neville what are you going to do with her? Do you want to kill her?" she asked him right on the point.
"You know I always thought I would kill her when I got the chance, but now it seems… weak," he said, looking down at the bound Bellatrix. Hermione nodded, she understood what he meant. "But you know what-" he paused and pointed his wand towards her and said, "Defodio." They both watched in silence as gouges appeared over her face. "That's enough." He smiled at her and ran into the battle head on, quickly vanishing from her view.
It took some time but she found him; she found him with Luna in his arms. Her heartbeat quickened as she hurried to them, kneeling down she asked what happened.
"I don't know – I just found her here."
"Is she alive?" she asked, looking at him, her voice a hushed whisper.
"Yeah, she's weak but there." His voice shook with relief.
She nodded and said, "Let's get her out of harm's way." Harry nodded and picked her up, walking behind Hermione until they reached a clearing behind some bushes and rubbles. "Now, give me your robe," she said to him as she ran her wand over her. She bundled up his robe and placed it under her head. "Scourgify," she muttered followed by a mumbled long versus whilst she kept running her wand all over Luna. She sagged and bowed her head and said "I've put her into deep sleep so her system can recover and start healing on its own. I can't do anything more here."
"Someone should take her to the infirmary," Harry said as he saw her smoothing her hair out.
"Someone meaning you, because there is no way I am going to leave you again, I'm not going unless you come with me," she said in a tone which held no argument.
"Damn it Hermione! We can't just leave her here," he said roughly.
"She will be fine, this place is out of the way and I'll put up some wards around her." Harry took a deep breath and reluctantly nodded. He pressed a kiss on her forehead and Hermione whispered, "We will come back." With that they left.
Hermione woke with a jolt and then sagged over her pillows. She could still see Luna when she closed her eyes. She had scourgified her, but her clothes were torn, faded and dirty; her hair had come loose of her braid and was singed in places. There was a bruise forming on her cheek and a scrape on her forehead. They had returned unsuccessful in ending Voldemort's life, but it was too late. Harry had carried her in his arms, bruised and bloodied. Madame Pomfrey told them that the internal bleeding was too much, she had bled out. She could never forgive herself for leaving her there and she suspected that neither would Harry.
"Tempus," she whispered and saw it was only five in the morning. She snuggled into the pillow and wished she could go back to sleep. She was over exhausted and knew very well that she should take Dreamless potion to help herself, but she stopped herself, her gut feeling was telling her to hold off the potion for a while and she always listened to it.
Finally giving up on sleep, she left her bed and saw all the other bed curtains were closed. She made her way to her trunk and took out her washed and ironed uniform before heading to the bathroom. "Maybe a cold shower will make me feel alive and stop my eyes from burning so much," she thought, stepping into the shower.
"Hey," James said to her as he slipped next to her in Potions. Remus and Sirius took the seats behind them. Hermione blinked slowly before smiling at them sleepily.
"Rough night?" Remus asked her, sympathetically looking at the dark circles under her eyes.
"Yeah, couldn't sleep. Anyway, good morning to you all," she said smiling at them. She looked at his crooked tie, it reminded her so much of Harry that her hand immediately went to it and straightened it. She suddenly remembered the situation and withdrew, linking her fingers together on her lap. She bit her lip and mumbled an apology.
"It's okay," he said shrugging.
"No, you don't understand – I'm not flirting. Not even for you and Lily. So -" James cut her off.
"It's okay I understand and anyway I never thought you were flirting with me."
She smiled in return, relieved just as Slughorn came into the class. He had asked her to stay behind after class and invited her to join The Slug Club. Though she wanted to refuse she really couldn't without being rude to him, so she smiled and nodded and agreed to attend.
"Hey," Sirius said to her as she stepped out of the class and started making her way to Charms.
"Oh! Hey, what are you doing here?" she asked, as he started walking beside her.
"I was waiting for you; I wanted to tell you something," Sirius said.
"And what's that?" she asked him, a little interested now.
"You don't have to worry about James ever thinking of you in a romantic sense," he said, but realising how it sounded he quickly said "Not that you aren't beautiful, you are and you're smart..." he stopped when Hermione chuckled.
"Thank you Sirius for those kind, kind words."
"What I meant to say is that he is in love with Lily so he won't make a pass at you and also he knows we all know that your best friends were boys and it's obvious that you feel more comfortable with them too." Hermione smiled at that bowed her head in appreciation. "Also my tie is crooked and I don't mind if you feel the need to correct it."
"You goofball!" she said, rolling her eye, but she still straightened his tie and entered the class before they both could get detention.
The rest of the day passed pretty quickly. Hermione had the last hour off and she decided to spend it in the Room of Requirement exercising, burning off her excess energy. That night she ate her dinner in the Kitchens and made her way to the Common Room, well past curfew. She saw James, Sirius and Peter sitting on the sofas looking lost in their thoughts.
"What's wrong?" she immediately asked as she sat down next to Sirius, dropping her bag on the floor.
"Remus' parents were murdered," Peter said, clearing her throat when the both of them stayed silent.
"Oh," Hermione exclaimed and then asked softly, "Where is he?"
"He's in the dorm room – said he needed some time alone." James said his voice breaking slightly. Hermione shifted and held his hand and squeezing it softly.
"And when was this?" she asked him.
"Two hours ago," he said dropping her hand and pressing his fingers to his forehead.
She nibbled on her lip and stood up. "I'm going to check up on him," she said, nodding to herself. She ran up the stairs, holding her breath as she knocked on the door. When there was no answer she pushed the door open and stepped in. The room was freezing, the windows wide open; shivering she closed them and sat down next to him.
Remus was sitting on his bed, staring blankly ahead. She took his hands into her own and rubbed them warm. They sat together on the bed for a long time and then Remus spoke. "I wanted some time alone."
"No one wants to stay alone at times like this." She spoke softly to him. He kept quite so she spoke again, "They are worried about you, you know."
"They don't understand," he said angrily, dropping his head on his hands.
"No they don't, but they are trying to," she said, keeping her voice soft. "It's not something you can imagine; it has to happen to you to know."
"It doesn't feel real yet," Remus said, running his fingers through his hair.
"No, it takes a while, but when it hits it's good to have your friends with you."
"It's just…I miss them," he said, choking out the words, his shoulders shaking.
"I know." She wrapped her hands around him, resting her head on his shoulder.
"It's like someone has 'Reducto'd' me…blasted a piece out of me. I feel empty and alone."
"You are not alone; you have me and your friends who will do anything for you, okay? Don't ever think that you have no one."
"But what about the feeling, the emptiness?"
"That won't go away, ever," she told him. When he slumped down she continued. "My parents were murdered two years back and I still feel like the way you just described. But each and every day that feeling lessens a little bit, the pain eases a bit. You will be alright and it's not like you don't have anyone else; you have the Marauders," she said, rubbing his hand.
He shuddered and breathed in, nodding with agreement. "Thanks for telling me."
Hermione smiled back and said, "Let's go downstairs." She stood up and offered her hand. For a second she thought he would refuse it, but he reached out and took it and they both made their way downstairs.
The moment they stepped off the stairs, James and Sirius wrapped Remus in a hug. She had to pull them all to the sofa and separate them from Remus before they could overwhelm him. She sat in between Remus and Sirius with James on the carpet in front of the sofa, the fireplace warming his back. "Where's Peter?" she asked James, looking around suspicious.
"He went to the kitchens, said he was hungry." James answered. Hermione nodded and knew where he really was.
"You-Know-Who killed my parents," Remus said in disgust to the silent room, hands fisted in anger.
"Call him by his name, Voldemort," Hermione said, bluntly ignoring the flinches, "He won't appear in front of you if you do call his name, neither will you drop dead."
"That day Malfoy said that Grindelwald murdered your parents," Remus stated.
"Actually that was just after Dumbledore defeated him, so what had happened was that Grindelwald's followers had joined Voldemort, so I guess in a way you can say that Voldemort is responsible too."
"You sound so… okay about it," James said, looking at her.
"No, well, at least I don't feel okay about it. I'm so angry about it and I hate him so much. I'm just storing it all inside to use when I finally fight him."
"And how are you going to do that?" Sirius asked, leaning towards her now interested.
"Well I was just speaking to Dumbledore about it the other day and he said that he was going to form a group called 'The Order of Phoenix.' It's meant to fight dark lords and all sorts of evil, which right now as we all know is Voldemort and his Death eaters. The Order will work with the Ministry to oppose Voldemort and his followers and I told him to count me in."
"I want in too," Remus said with fire in his eyes.
"Us to," Sirius spoke indicating James and him.
"Okay. I'll talk to Dumbledore tomorrow, oh and one more thing; don't talk about The Order to anyone not with the girls, not even to Peter. Promise me?"
There was a small pause and then James said, "We promise." Hermione nodded and said, "We should all try and get some sleep." She dug into her bag and emptied half of the dreamless sleep potion and then gave it to Remus "Take this – you deserve it more than I." He nodded and gulped it down without any argument and made his way to his dormitory with James and Sirius behind him.
