Hermione's first week back at school passed smoothly and her positive outlook remained firmly in place. The first D.A meeting took place and Hermione decided to wait until after Easter before intervening with Umbridge, for now she would enjoy the extra practice and the opportunity to watch the people who she would one day be fighting against. And much to Hermione's delight Draco seemed to have permanently ended his relationship with Pansy, while she spotted them talking a few times there was no physical contact between them in any way.
On the Friday evening of her first week back, Hermione decided to forgo her usual study session in the library. Instead she went to the prefect's bathroom and had a long, relaxing soak in the massive bath. After her bath, Hermione had returned to Gryffindor Tower where she'd curled up on her bed to read.
An hour or so later Hermione had drawn the hangings on the bed so she failed to realise she wasn't alone in the room until the sound of giggling reached her ears. Hermione frowned at the giggling of her dorm mates, Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil. Lavender and Parvati were always giggling and gossiping and to be honest Hermione wasn't fond of either girl.
Hermione tried to block the gossiping duo out, but she was still aware of Parvati asking Lavender about her holidays. For nearly ten minutes Lavender gave what must have been a blow by blow account of her holidays, until she mentioned spending New Year with her cousins.
"I thought you always spent New Year with your parents." Parvati said.
"They were attending some big, fancy party." Lavender replied. "It was all to do with dad's work, but I wasn't allowed to go."
Hermione grinned, knowing exactly what fancy party Lavender's parents had attended. Over the summer Hermione had been totally shocked to discover Lavender's father was a Death Eater. She'd shared a room with her for years and had no idea about her family's allegiance to her father, but as she discovered at the New Year party Lavender had no idea about her father's ties to the dark. Like quite a few of the Death Eaters, Mr Brown's mark was hidden with a concealment charm, meaning Lavender had likely never seen it.
As Lavender and Parvati continued to talk about their holidays, Hermione thought about what a stir it would create if the identity of some of her father's followers were to leak out. Another surprising member of the Death Eaters was the father of Lee Jordan, who was best friend to the twins Fred and George Weasley. Former Gryffindor Quidditch captain, Oliver Wood's father was also another surprise follower of The Dark Lord.
Tearing her thoughts away from her father's Death Eaters, Hermione turned her attention back to Lavender and Parvati. They were now talking about their favourite subject, boys, and Hermione started to tune them out. Just as she did she heard Lavender mention Pansy, so she started listening again.
"Have you really not heard?" Lavender questioned Parvati, disbelief evident in her voice. "It's major news."
"How can anything with Parkinson be major news?" Parvati snorted.
"She's claiming to have slept with Malfoy." Lavender declared with glee.
Hermione felt sick at Lavender's words, but it got worse when she continued and revealed that according to Pansy the event had happened over Christmas and had gone on throughout the holidays.
"Lucky girl." Parvati sighed dreamily. "Malfoy's hot. An absolute git, but hot."
"He's quite good in bed as well, according to Pansy." Lavender said. "She's claiming that he's amazing."
"How does she know?" Parvati asked. "She hasn't exactly got anyone to compare him to. He might just be okay."
"Do you really think someone like Malfoy would just be okay in bed?" Lavender scoffed. "I bet he's dynamite in the sack."
Parvati giggled and the two girls started talking about what they thought Draco was like naked. Not wanting to hear any more Hermione silenced her bed and lay back down, staring blankly at the canopy above her. She knew she had no claim on Draco, after all they'd only shared one kiss, but she couldn't help the feelings of jealousy and hurt that threated to overwhelm her.
Yes Hermione was jealous that he'd bedded Pansy, but she was more hurt by the fact it had been going on throughout the holidays. For all she knew he could have been with Pansy just after kissing her. Hermione had thought the kiss meant something to them both and she was hurt that Draco could potentially have just dismissed her like she was nothing important.
At the thought that the kiss might have meant nothing to Draco, Hermione tried to convince herself otherwise. Despite telling herself that Draco really had felt something for her and wasn't using her, there was a little voice in her head that said he was capable of doing just that. Hermione knew that the blond was ruthless enough to use her if he thought it would get him closer to her father. She also knew he was clever enough to realise the dangers if he was just using her, so she actually dismissed the idea of him using her to gain favour with her father.
By the time she fell into a fretful sleep an hour or so later, Hermione was still hurt and confused by Draco's actions. She just didn't understand why he kissed her while he was sleeping with Pansy. While his relationship with Pansy may have fizzled out, at the time of the kiss it was still going strong and Hermione hated the thought of being the other woman.
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Over the course of the next week Hermione's hurt had turned into full on anger. While she managed to avoid unleashing the full blast of her fury on people she still strode about the castle in a bad mood. Harry and Ron had even taken to judging her moods before even daring to say hello to her on a morning.
Exactly a week after finding out about Draco and Pansy, Hermione was sitting quietly eating her breakfast. Harry and Ron were sitting to her right talking about Quidditch, but they had both noticed that Hermione's mood was noticeably brighter that morning. After a week of being in a bad mood, Hermione had decided to forget all about Draco and concentrate on other matters. Sometime soon the breakout from Azkaban would happen and that was a good reason to be cheerful.
When the papers came Harry and Ron didn't even bother to look up as Hermione paid her owl and unattached the paper from its leg. After giving the bird a piece of her toast Hermione opened her paper and let out a loud gasp.
"What is it?" Harry asked, suddenly alert.
"There's been a breakout from Azkaban." Hermione replied. She was shocked her father hadn't told her the exact date of the break-out but she had to admit the surprise had made her reaction that bit more real.
"What?" Ron frowned, moving to sit on the other side of Hermione as Harry pressed closer into her right side. "That's impossible."
"See for yourself." Hermione said, laying the paper down on the table.
Together the trio stared down at the paper, the headline 'Mass Breakout from Azkaban' staring out at them. The main picture showed the cold, desolate prison that stood in the middle of the North Sea and there were several pictures of the escaped prisoners dotted around the article.
According to the article the breakout had happened the previous night and almost all the prisoners in Azkaban were freed. Several of them were high profile cases and the Minister of Magic, Cornelius Fudge, called them extremely dangerous to the wizarding world.
"This is awful." Ron said, his eyes scanning over the paper but not really taking in the details.
"How could this happen?" Harry asked.
"I don't know, but the Ministry doesn't have a clue." Hermione responded, pointing to a paragraph in the middle of the article. "Have you read this?"
"No, what does it say?" Ron asked, not wanting to read the small print.
"According to the Ministry they're working on the theory that the breakout had something to do with Sirius Black, the only person to ever break out of Azkaban before." Hermione read, paraphrasing the article for quickness. "Sirius's cousin, Bellatrix Lestrange, was amongst the escapees, giving the Ministry a solid connection to Sirius."
"As if Sirius would ever free her." Harry snorted.
"Who is she?" Hermione asked. She knew exactly who Bellatrix was, but she wanted to hear what Harry would say about her.
"A mad woman." Harry answered. "Sirius told me about her during the summer. She's actually Tonks' aunt, as well as Malfoy's. She's a big supporter of Voldemort, one of his most loyal followers apparently."
"What was she in Azkaban for?" Hermione asked. "Why didn't she avoid prison like a lot of Death Eaters?"
"She was sent to Azkaban for torturing Neville's parents." Ron whispered, not wanting to risk their friend overhearing them. "Her forte was the Cruciatius curse and she used is so much on Neville's parents they went mad. The poor things are in St. Mungo's, unlikely to ever get out."
Hermione felt a bubble of sympathy for Neville, but she squashed it be remembering his parents had opposed her father and were the enemy. As she did with Harry, Hermione felt sorry for Neville and his loss but she couldn't forget they were on opposite sides on the inevitable war that was growing more powerful every day.
"You know what I can't believe?" Harry suddenly asked, glaring down at the paper. "Even after this the Ministry still refuse to admit he's back."
"They'll not want to look like idiots." Hermione said. "Fudge made it very clear he doesn't believe you and Dumbledore, to go back on his word now and admit he was wrong will make him look stupid. Of course he will look even stupider when everyone discovers the truth and finds out he really is back."
"Do you really think that will happen?" Harry asked. "Do you think one day I'll be proven right?"
"Of course." Hermione nodded. "He's not going to remain underground forever. Sooner or later he's going to want to make a big splash and announce to the entire world that he's back."
"And when he does, you and Dumbledore will be proven right." Ron said to Harry. "Then you'll have a pile of people coming crawling to you and begging for your forgiveness."
As it turned out Ron was completely right about people coming begging for Harry's forgiveness. The only difference was they didn't have to wait until Voldemort announced his arrival on a more public scale. The breakout at Azkaban was enough to convince most people Harry had been right in the first place and he was overrun with people apologising and wanting to be part of Dumbledore's Army.
Hermione watched with amusement as all day Harry was inundated with people stopping him in the corridors and apologising. Like the good boy he was Harry accepted all the apologies and Hermione had to wonder if he harboured any lingering resentment towards those who hadn't believe him, she knew in his position she would be mad if she told the truth only to have people accuse her of lying. Hermione knew she wouldn't be able to just accept apologies the way Harry had, then again that was part of what made them so different and set them on different sides of the war. While Harry had a good, honourable, heroic streak in him, Hermione had a dark, vengeful, powerful streak in her.
