Chapter Twenty-Five – Prefect Rounds
Today had been a nightmare!. Hermione was currently sat by herself in a dark corridor crying quietly to herself. It had started like any other day, she had got up and was ready for her classes, which for the first time since Ernie had received detention included Defence Against The Dark Arts, she had taken Ronald Weasley's advice and decided not to take the matter further as she knew it was unlikely to change anything, the politics of it all left a bitter feeling in her when she thought about it. The class had started well until Terry and Lisa had been talking, Hermione told them it was best to be quite in case they were given detention – and Umbridge gave her detention for talking!. She had never been so mortified, in five years she had never had one detention, and now she had!, what if they decided not to give her Head Girlship because her record was tainted, she only had herself to blame, she shouldn't have talked in lesson, but she did feel it was slightly unfair, she was helping keep the peace in the classroom so people could learn. The rest of the day she was naturally distressed and when it was over she had to go to Umbridge's office where she was told she was to do lines, writing down "I Will Not Tell Lies", she knew the real reason Umbridge was doing this was because she had somehow found out she had reported her, Hermione didn't know how though, she didn't tell anyone else and she knew that Ronald would never tell Umbridge about it – but still she knew, and Hermione knew she was now getting punished for it. Though she suspected it would happen, nothing could have prepared her for the pain that came with writing with her own blood, she felt the tears building up but she refused to cry in front of Umbridge. It went on for what went like hours and finally Umbridge stopped her, peering cruelly at her hand to see if the job had done she gave Hermione a large smile and let her leave.
She didn't go back to Ravenclaw tower.
Sat in the corridor she was letting out all the tears that threatened to spill inside the office of the teacher she once defended when other people criticized her, she thought teachers were kind, respectable, but Umbridge was the opposite, how could they let her become a teacher!, she wasn't fit to call herself a member of staff at Hogwarts with what she was putting her students through.
"Hermione?" a voice spoke from nearby and she quickly turned and hid her hand in her sleeve but she didn't bother when she saw it was Ronald Weasley, he would know why she was crying anyway, she could tell by how his eyes darted to his hand and back, a look of realisation and pity on his face.
"How was detention?" he asked somewhat awkwardly and Hermione just stuck her nose into the air
"How'd you know I had detention?" she replied stiffly
"Padma told Parvarti, who told Lavender, who told everyone" he replied smiling slightly but Hermione wasn't impressed, so the whole school knew she had detention, her reputation was ruined!, she felt like she could start crying all over again
"How's the hand?" he said and she was surprised when he sat next to her on the bench in which she sat, his face was half hidden in shadows, half basked in moonlight as he turned to look at her, Hermione just raised her hand and shown it him, he seemed somewhat unimpressed but Hermione was sure she had mistook his expression.
"don't worry, it'll heal the first time" he smiled, raising his own hand which though seemed uninjured she noticed that there was faint letters written in scars that spelt out the sentence "I Will Rethink My Loyalties"
"This is after five – maybe six times" he chuckled and Hermione couldn't help but give a small smile, but then she remembered something "did you tell anyone I had reported Umbridge, because I'm confident that she knows" but even before she finished the sentence Ronald had started shaking his head "Someone must have told her – my guess, it was a stinking Slytherin"
Hermione was about abolish him for jumping to conclusions when suddenly something hit her and she asked "why are you here?" she asked and Ron's eyebrows shot up and she thought he looked slightly hurt and she realised how that had sounded and quickly continued "I mean – why are you not in your common rooms, its past hours" and Ron burst out laughter
"I'm doing prefect rounds, Pavarti is too busy discussing your detention, so I'm flying solo, what's your excuse"
Hermione suddenly realised above everything she had now been caught out off bounds after hours – she knew she was blushing, she had been caught breaking the rules!, this was so embarrassing!. Ron quickly jumped to his feet
"Come on"
Hermione just looked at him and she knew her facial expression showed just how confused she was, Ron just chuckled "I'm a prefect, you are out of bounds, I'm afraid I must escort you to your living quarters" he said in what she was sure the most regal voice he could speak, the corners of his mouth twitching as he tried desperately to hide a smile. Hermione slowly got to her feet, eying him with a glare that in no uncertain terms told him not to try and make a fool off her, she was not in the mood!.
They walked in silence for awhile as they made their way to the Ravenclaw common room, Hermione didn't even know what to say and then she remembered something which she had been wondering for the past few days
"Do you know what happened to Professor Hagrid?" she asked, the Care for Magical Creatures professor had returned just days ago and last time she saw him he looked awful, his face full of bruises and cuts she couldn't imagine what could have done it, he was half giant after all and more than capable of defending himself. Ron just chuckled and shook his head
"No idea, probably something mental" he said and she noticed he shuddered when he said it - as if he was remembering something awful. He must have noticed she had noticed because he continued "long story, don't want to talk about it" he smiled and Hermione smiled back as he shivered once more, she thought she heard him mutter "bloody mental spiders" under his breath.
They walked the rest of the way in silence and it wasn't until they approached the common room that they spoke again
"I'll leave you here, not allowed to know the password am I" he smiled and Hermione just rolled her eyes, no-one seemed to know that Ravenclaw didn't actually have passwords
"we don't have passwords, you have to answer a question to gain access." she told him and watched as his eyebrows skyrocketed into his hair in surprise "what if you get it wrong?"
"you wait for someone to get it right"
"it's the middle of the bloody night"
"well that's just - you know you're language is terrible" she said, changing her sentence half way, must he say "bloody" every time he spoke?, she was sure he would never use such language in front of his mother, so he shouldn't do so when she was not around. Ron just looked at her as if she was crazy and Hermione couldn't help but feel slightly awkward.
"Anyway, I better get this patrol done, still got to do the essay on the something century yet another goblin rebellion"
"you mean the 14th century's 2nd goblin rebellion"
"yeah that one, you'd think they'd just get the message and stop rebelling"
"maybe their right, maybe they should be treated better" she said, the injustice building up inside her, why couldn't people see that the way creatures such as House-Elfs and Goblins were treated was wrong. Ron just stared at her, once again with his eyebrows in his hair as if she had surprised him again, she realised that she was staring at him and looked away quickly feeling herself blush slightly which annoyed her - she was not the type of girl to blush!
"Anyway, I best do these rounds" Ron said suddenly and Hermione found herself agreeing with him "I'll see you later" he smiled before turning around and walking in the other direction, Hermione turned away from him and correctly answered the question to gain access to the common room and went directly to bed and sleep.
A/N - There you go, - suffered somewhat writers block during writing this so I hope you liked it, would love your feedback in your lovely reviews. Next chapter will be up sometime in two weeks - I'll be too busy from now to Monday after next to update.