Chapter 25: Pained
The Hogsmeade trip was just one day away. Harry knew he had to act quickly. No one else seemed to share his concern, but he knew that Voldemort was after Hermione and what that meant. No one else knew how Voldemort thought. The Dark Wizard had been in his head, fueled his anger and rage. He had felt the desire to hurt the people he cared about because Voldemort wanted to hurt them. Hermione was already on the cusp, and all Voldemort had to do was offer and she would be lost. The bustling village would be an ideal place to contact her or even to kidnap her. Dumbledore had assured them that she would be guarded, but if Hermione wanted to go no one would be able to stop her.
He hurried from the tower but did not enter the Great Hall. He sat in the entrance hall under his invisibility cloak, watching as Hermione walked past with Ginny tailing her. It was worrying enough that she had broken up with Sirius, but she had also stopped speaking to all her friends. Ginny tried and failed to initiate countless conversations on everything from Muggle make-up to advanced Transfiguration, but nothing worked.
As he knit his brow in concern, he heard the voice he wanted. Pansy Parkinson's shrill laughter came into the entrance hall well before she did, giving Harry ample time to stow his cloak and make it look as if he were rushing into the Great Hall. He stumbled into the door frame and a letter fell from his pocket.
Pansy glanced at the letter and saw the name on it:
'Hermione Granger'
She snatched it from the floor and tore into it, eager for anything that would give her revenge for the scars still marring her body. As Hermione had wanted, the girl was now as ugly outside as she was in. Her skin was mottled and no longer smooth from the magical burns Hermione had scalded her with weeks ago. She had been back in classes for almost a week and had noticed a decidedly cold air surrounding the Gryffindor prefect. Something had happened while she was in hospital and she wanted to know what.
A malicious grin pulled at her disfigured lips as she read the letter from Sirius.
'Hermione,
I'm sorry to have to do this through a letter, but your coldness has left me with no alternative. I thought we could work. You are brilliant and beautiful, but I need more than that. You have no passion, no impulse. I can't be with someone who only cares about books and rules.
Your indifference has made it clear that you don't love me, and I'm happy to say that I don't love you either. I never promised you love or commitment, so please don't start acting passionate now just to try to win me back. It won't happen.
Friendship seems the best path for us, I'm sorry.
Sirius.'
"I knew it," Pansy smirked. She fanned herself with the letter as she strolled into the Great Hall and perched herself on the Gryffindor bench beside Hermione. "Pity."
"Pardon?" Hermione said, her voice as detached and cold as it had been to everyone lately.
"I said 'pity'," Pansy smiled. She threw the letter onto the table in front of Hermione. "Pity you couldn't muster enough passion to keep someone for more than a month. I'm not surprised, though."
Hermione took the letter and scanned it, glancing up at Pansy then at Sirius.
"A shame you didn't try a Slytherin first," she smirked at Sirius. "We're a passionate bunch."
Sirius sneered but stayed silent.
"See, he won't even defend you!" Pansy shrieked in delight. "That is how much you inspired him. I can only imagine what a date with you must have been like, all 'what have you been reading?' and prim kisses. You're going to die a virgin."
Hermione glared, the hard, narrow eyed stare that had made the dog whimper, and even Pansy seemed to retract a bit. She recovered quickly when a spark of satisfaction flashed in Hermione's eyes. "I can't believe I lowered myself to sitting beside a Mudblood," she commented. "I feel as if I've been tainted."
Again the anger flared in Hermione's eyes.
"It's no wonder he couldn't bring himself to touch something so filthy," Pansy sneered.
"The only filth here is you," Sirius growled. "She's more that you'll ever hope to be. Smarter, more passionate and certainly more beautiful."
Pansy just scoffed. "If that's true, then why aren't you with her anymore?"
"I'm bored with this conversation," Hermione said. "Leave."
"No," the scarred Slytherin's face contorted in a nasty grin.
"Leave," Hermione repeated, low and threatening. It wasn't like Hermione to threaten at all. When provoked and publically humiliated, she was far more likely to run away with tears in her eyes or hex her opponent. It was frightening just how calm she was; everyone within earshot was inching away from her, afraid of what she might do.
Pansy, having missed the girl's startling confrontation with Professor Snape, leaned closer to say more, but didn't get the chance.
"Frawas!" Hermione said and Pansy was jerked from the bench and thrown across the Great Hall. She landed with a sharp slap against the far wall. The Slytherins were on her in a heartbeat, making sure she was still breathing after so jarring an impact on the solid stones. The teachers split their attention, McGonagall rushed to the Gryffindor table with Flitwick and Snape to his house table with Sinistra in tow.
"What is the meaning of this?" McGonagall demanded.
"I was provoked," Hermione said without apology.
"That is no excuse for a Prefect of Hogwarts!" she hissed. "Fifty points from Gryffindor, detention for a month and you are not to leave this castle for any reason that is not academic. No Hogsmeade visits, Miss Granger."
Hermione held the old witch's eyes as she stood. Harry could see the woman's hand gripping her wand firmly, readying herself for an attack, but Hermione simply brushed past her and went on her way. The woman's eye turned to her other students. "What happened?"
"Pansy came to make fun of her," Ginny insisted. "She wouldn't go when Hermione told her to. She was provoked, Professor."
"Very well, but the punishment still stands." She marched over to help quell the chaos at the Slytherin table.
"That was a bit harsh, Potter," James muttered.
Harry shrugged. He had no sympathy for Pansy Parkinson, the girl had always been horrible to Hermione and in a way he was happy that Hermione could finally get some revenge for all the mistreatment she had received. It did worry him that she was so willing to harm the girl physically, though; that spell could easily have snapped her neck if she hit the wall wrong. "I don't want her going to Hogsmeade."
"What are you, her father?"
"More like a pain in the arse younger brother," he smiled grimly. "And if that's what it takes to keep her from getting kidnapped by Death Eaters, then that's what I'll do."
"Why did you have to drag me into it?" Sirius growled. "That letter was so far from accurate."
"I wasn't aiming for accuracy," Harry said as if it should be obvious. "I was aiming to give Pansy a reason to insult Hermione."
"You are definitely my kid," James grinned despite the frightening scene they had just watch play out. "We're short a Marauder, you know. You want to join up?"
"I thought I was in by default," Harry said fighting the smirk.
"I cannot believe you two," Lily muttered, which only made them laugh as they pushed off from the table and found their way to class.
Their initial joviality was short lived when they came upon Hermione in the classroom. She was reading the letter Harry had written pretending to be Sirius. The penmanship was a perfect forgery of his Godfather's, the signature exact down to the last stroke of the quill. There was no way she would know who really wrote it.
She glanced up when they came to sit by her in their normal seats, her eyes locked onto Sirius who was trying very hard to keep his façade in place. It wasn't easy, especially after he had defended her publically. The letter was offensive. He would never break up with anyone in a letter; he had far too much pride and courage to do something so cowardly. The words were worse. He knew just how passionate Hermione really was, about everything, even books but especially about him.
Her gaze was seeking the cracks in the mask and finding them easily. His eyes betrayed him, his mouth twitched and even his posture looked too rehearsed. She could see through it all, but if she recognized the truth, she didn't respond, which only created more fissures for her to peer through.
Whatever she saw made her deep eyes narrow and she stiffened when he sat in his usual seat beside her.
Her reaction did nothing for Sirius's false front. The comely Gryffindor could barely focus during Transfiguration, McGonagall's words floated over his head and he practiced the spells she described mechanically, not really knowing what he was doing or saying. Luckily, McGonagall was too concerned with Hermione to be bothered noticing that he wasn't paying her any real attention or that Neville had managed to accidentally transfigure his own shirt into an alarming shade of pink.
The effort of holding onto his mask was too much and Sirius had to skip lunch. He was too exhausted to keep up appearances after so long a morning. He fell onto his bed and tried hard to fall asleep. Sleep was the closest he could come to nonexistence, which was something he had been striving for over the past few days. He wasn't suicidal; he just didn't want to feel anything for a while.
No one seemed to care much what Sirius wanted, or perhaps his mask was so good that even cracked it could fool nearly everyone. The sixth years Gryffindors kept pestering him about everything. Seamus continued asking about what it was like as a relative of Harry's; Neville asked him for help on homework; Ron consoled him over losing Hermione, though it was clearly an act as the git hated the idea of them being together. James and Harry were the only ones with enough sense to leave him alone, for which he loved them both dearly.
After dinner, which Sirius skipped, Harry threw a napkin filled with chicken and rolls at him. "Eat something."
"Thanks," he muttered and sniffed the roll with a suspicious glance at his Godson and friend.
"We didn't spike your food, you prat," James sent him a rude gesture.
He nodded and started eating.
"Sirius," Seamus said eagerly. "Wh—"
"Hey, Seamus," Harry interrupted, his face arranged into perfect innocence, which made his father extremely proud. "Is it true you've never lost a Wizard Chess match?"
"Yeah," the boy grinned smugly.
"Rubbish!" Ron said. "I beat you first year!"
"You cheated first year, so it doesn't count."
"Bollocks!" Ron threw a pillow at him. "I don't have to cheat."
"I think I smell a rematch," James said in a conspiratorial stage whisper to Harry.
Ron pointed at him and nodded vigorously. "Yeah! Rematch! I'll prove I don't have to cheat."
"I would want witnesses, if it were me," Harry commented to his father.
Seamus agreed. "Witnesses, right. The whole common room-full." He grabbed his chess set from beneath his bed and marched out the door without bothering to ask if Ron was coming. Ron had his own chess set under his arm and was hurrying after him.
"Thanks," Sirius said again.
"I'll keep Neville from coming back," Harry said and left the room.
James teetered in the doorway for a moment, not sure if Sirius wanted his oldest friend as company or just to be left completely alone. Sirius wasn't looking at him. His grey eyes were unfocused in the general direction of Harry's night table, where a picture of Harry, Ron and Hermione sat. James could see the girl smiling in an open and friendly way, something he hadn't seem for three weeks. He cleared his throat to speak.
"Oh, piss off, Prongs," Sirius said, not angrily, but with enough force to let his friend know that he wasn't joking. James shoved his hands into his pockets and wandered down to the common room to see who was better at chess.
Sirius, while grateful to his friends, was ashamed that they were able to see through to his pain. He pushed himself off the bed and went to clean up, hoping a bath would clear his head if nothing else.
It didn't work. The bath set his mind to playing tricks on him. As he walked into his bedroom, he swore the room smelled of ink and vanilla. His eyes joined in, telling him that Hermione was on his bed. His ears took over, and he thought he heard her voice.
"Sirius," she said quietly. "I'm sorry, but you have to listen, please." He pushed the door closed and walked around her.
"You're not real," Sirius informed his hallucination and proceeded to pull his sleeping bottoms on under his dressing gown.
"I'm real," she insisted and wrapped her arms around him. She certainly felt real.
"If you were real, you would be glaring at me, not hugging me," he replied bitterly.
"That's not me, I swear."
He scoffed. "Yeah, and tomorrow, you'll be right as rain, I bet."
"I will if you help me," her voice took on a strange tone, low and practically seductive. Her hands released him and moved to her own body, pulling off her jumper and unbuttoning her shirt.
"Now I know you aren't really here," he said, though his voice was barely a whisper his mouth was so dry.
She smiled and shimmed out of her skirt. Her knickers and bra didn't match; he always assumed she was the compulsively organized type that made certain everything was paired, but his imagination thought otherwise, apparently. Her hands felt right, soft and cool and slightly nervous, as she pulled the dressing gown off his chest.
"Stop it!" he shouted and stepped back. It was meant to be a decisive break from her, but he was closer to the bed than he realized. It knocked his knees from under him and he landed on his mattress with a bewildered look on his face. Surely, his brain would have him as the ultimate in grace and charm, not a bumbling idiot.
"I need your help," she said again and pushed her practically naked body against him. "It has to be you."
"Why?"
"I saw," she smiled and kissed his face. "In class, I saw in your eyes. You love me." She brought her lips to his and kissed him as he had so eagerly kissed her weeks ago in the common room after their date. He hadn't forgotten how wonderful it felt or how lightheaded it made him feel, but it worried him that there was a different taste. She carried an acidic tang that she hadn't previously. He didn't like it, but it felt too good to stop.
While he was distracted, her hands moved down his chest, moving slowly but purposefully to his waist and below. He was on his back now and her hands could go where they liked, and they did. Plunging below his waistband and into his trousers to find him already warming to her attentions.
"Hermione!" Sirius pushed her away. "Stop this."
"No," she said. "I need—"
"My help, I heard you," he said.
"Then why are you stopping me?" she asked desperately. There were tears coming into her eyes. He hadn't seen her cry in weeks, not since he came to her bed as a dog.
"This isn't like you," he insisted. "If this isn't a dream, then it's the book doing this to you." He remembered all those raunchy books he had borrowed from Peter, where the good little girl gets touched by a curse and turns into a sex kitten. He had scoured the library for weeks trying to find a curse that would really do that, but he could never find it. Now, he had, and he didn't like it. It was wrong; Hermione was wrong.
The tears that threatened now fell from her eyes and she buried her head in her knees. She gasped and cried in strangled sobs.
"Hermione," he reached for her and touched her soft hair.
"Don't you lay a hand on me," she said and glared at him. It would have hurt less if she shouted the words at him, but her voice was back to the cold, metered tone she had been using for weeks. He was shocked and worried, too much so to move. Her nails dug into him, gripping his wrist and pulling it from her hair.
She didn't say another word to him as she stood and dressed. She didn't spare him a single glance as she left him sitting dumbfounded on his bed. She didn't realize that she had left proof that it had been real. Sirius gripped his bleeding wrist and smiled.