Chapter 20: Silent Solace
Not for the first time since being spit back to the past, Hermione had no idea what she was doing.
She was ambling around the Room of Requirements for a diadem she had only momentarily seen. She wasn't Harry; she had no idea where it was. Even if she did manage to find it through the towers of items, what would she do? What would she do if she found any of them?
She could attempt to destroy the Horcruxes now, to get rid of them before she had to deal with them in the past. Yet if she did destroy them, it wouldn't match up with where she was truly from. Could she risk doing something that apparently had never happened, and would never happen, until she befriended a Horcrux himself?
Dumbledore wasn't helping much; he hadn't even called on her again. If he at least helped guide her, she could attempt to follow a path. Now she perfectly understood why Harry had been so exasperated with the Headmaster at times.
At times of great distress, Hermione always went to her fall-out: the library.
She sighed in comfort at the smell of dusty books and sight of hunched over, busily studying people. It was nearing the end of the term, with no more than a month left, before it would be Christmas. Maybe it was for that reason that the library was a little fuller than usual, and Hermione saw in slight dread that all the tables were full.
One table, though, only had a solitary person. As Hermione tapped the boy's shoulder and he turned around, she felt all her problems vanish from shock as a familiar, sneering face looked up at her.
"May I sit?" Hermione asked Snape.
The long-haired teenager scoped her out before voicing, "Fine."
Posted: 11.3.2011
Word Count: 300