A/n: Wait, guys… I messed up. I needed to write that Harry was supposed to be the Gryffindor prefect along with Hermione, but as my last chapter was a bit rushed, I forgot. And I didn't know how to introduce it in the coming chapters before it was too long, so I am just telling you, just pretend it was mentioned somewhere in the previous chapter.

Warning: There are mentions of sexual assault in this chapter, nothing graphic, but I would advise you to read that bit with caution, and if someone is uncomfortable with the idea, you can just skip over that part. Also, this chapter is a bit on the darker side.

Well, OOOOOONNN WIIIIIITH THHHHHEEEE SHHHHOOOWWWWWW… :)

Chapter 11

Cecilia woke up the next day to find Hermione's bed empty. With her morning '5:30' face, she slid out of her bed and made her way to the washroom. Cleaning up a bit and washing the sleep off of her eyes, she got herself into her workout shorts and shirt, discreetly shoving the map Harry had given to her for 'temporary' use in her back pocket. She silently slid out of the dorm to find Hermione, in the common room, alone, near the dying fire, with almost a dozen books fanned around her.

She made her presence known so as to not startle the little bundle of hoodies and sweaters with a little cough, and slowly reached to where Hermione was on the floor. She looked up, only to look back down at her books.

To be honest, in all the 3 months that she had seen or known here, this, right here, is where she looked the most comfortable, she was in her element. Harry was right, she could live in those books.

"Did you not do your vacation work, or whatever you call it here?", Cecilia said as she bent down to pick up a textbook.

Hermione looked at her, with a look in her eyes that almost said, 'How dare you!'

Instead, she said, "No! I am behind in my studies."

"For what? NEWTs? Honestly, you look exhausted, and the school hasn't even started yet.", she scoffed at the little bundle of comfy pants on the floor. When she didn't reply back, Cecilia continued, "Well, I am going for a jog, you wanna come with?"

Hermione just shook her head. With a light chuckle, she slipped out of the warm common room, only to be hit in the face with a swish of the cold September air. She shooed her goosebumps away and made a light jog for the quidditch field.

XXX

"Hey, Cece, you should sign up for quidditch, I mean the trials are coming up," Harry said as he continued to stuff his face with sausages, "And I bet the captain will love you." He added, but this time looking at Ron.

Ron shoved him once, "Yeah, we get it, you're the captain. No need to bring it up every second of the day." Instead, he just gave him a smirk.

Cecilia looked at their continued banter with a look of fondness. When Harry looked at her expectantly, she swallowed the remains of the unchewed oats down her throat, "Yeah, I mean, I will, definitely." It lacked the confidence and the surety she possessed in her speech. Her eyes continued to roam the hall, almost as if seeking somebody.

When Harry couldn't get her attention, he shook her by the arm, "Hey, something wrong?" His face morphed into worry when Cecilia was a bit hesitant to talk.

Cecilia was contemplating not telling them. Reading the air, Ron leaned in a bit and rested his hand on her other arm too, "You can tell us, right? What happened?"

She looked around once, specifically at the Slytherin table, once, and turned back to them, "Alright, I'll tell you, but you have to promise me not to do anything brash or stupid." Her palms were sweating, and she was having a hard time keeping her breath under control.

Murder passed by Harry's eyes, his calm and worried face wasn't anything to go by, "Who was it?"

Ron seemed confused, but the brunette just shook her head, "It's nothing like that, but, what happened…"

***6:30 AM***

Cecilia slowed her pace from a jog and settled into a light trod. The dungeons were, as Harry mentioned, uncannily dark and gloomy but they did have certain dark academia aesthetic to them. The absence of windows kept the corridors slightly dark, but the shadows made by the fire was a certain beauty of their own. She was enjoying the silent beauty that was Hogwarts, and the silence in the dungeons, when, she thought she heard a muffled cry.

Looking around, she didn't saw anyone, obviously, and she quickly took the Marauders' Map out of her pocket. Following the dot labelled by her name, she scanned the perimeter. What confused her were the three extra dots of footsteps just a few feet left to her. She was in a wide corridor, but the only thing left to her was the statue of a gargoyle. Remembering that Harry told her that there were a lot of secret passages in Hogwarts, she alerted herself, silently shoving the map back in her pocket, she took out her wand from her leg holster and cautiously moved towards the gargoyle.

She heard another muffled cry followed by a loud slap. Danger senses heightened, she gripped the wand tighter and with a hand in mid-air, moved towards the gargoyle. She let her fingertips roam the smooth stone, in hope of coming across some sort of trigger. When she felt a brick slightly rougher than the others, Cecilia pushed it in, hard.

Caught off guard, the occupants of the room looked wide-eyed at their intruder.

Cecilia, wand at the ready, primed to blow someone's balls off, faltered slightly in her movement. But not a second later, regained her composure, shot two hexes at the tall burly boys in the corner, disarming them and then held them in a full-body bind, during the expanse of a single eye blink.

The pantless guys in the corner of the room were now the least of her concerns. She held the tiny crying girl in her arms, unable to control her own tears, she let them flow and tried to cover the girl as fast as possible. The girl, maybe 13, perhaps 14, held onto Cecilia for dear life, less did she know Cecilia was trying not to lose control herself.

The growing lump in Harry's throat prevented him to speak, or scream was more like it. Hermione, who had joined them enough through Cecilia' encounter, also sat silently. Ron, alien to Cecilia's recent past sat wordlessly, eyeing his plate, appetite long gone.

After a long thick silence, Harry, trying to choke back tears, moved his hand up to Cecilia's arm, "C, I, I am so sorry." When Cecilia too just sat wordlessly, he raised his head to glance once at the Slytherin table and then at the head's table, except Professor Sprout and Professor Flitwick, no other teacher was present.

Hermione too soon spoke up, "Who was the girl?"

The other girl gave her a foreign look and finally, spoke up after the last of tears fell down her cheek, "I don't know. Hufflepuff."

"And the boys?"

With a dark look in her eyes, she bowed her head back down, "Slytherin."

XXX

That day, almost no class was held, students were getting curious as to the sudden postponing of the first class of the semester. There were words and rumours flying around, none of which even came close to the reality and the cruelty of the situation. In any other moment, Cecilia would have preferred being in the company of her best friend.

But he knew. He knew too much, and she didn't think she wanted that right now. The dorm was dark and empty, the fire long died, the only sound in the room was the soft sniffs and sometimes a dry sob from somewhere under the blankets.

Hermione wasn't surprised to see the girl hiding under the blankets. She wanted to say something, do something, but she had never been great at comforting someone. Before she could even take a step further, Cecilia was echoed through the darkroom, "You don't have to be here. I want to be alone anyway."

She could hear the pain and the tears in Cecilia's voice. Rather than saying anything, she just walked over to her bed and sat at the edge.

XXX

Harry didn't know what Hermione did, but he was grateful for it. As Cecilia descended down the stairs, with Hermione following, he gave her a sad smile, which she only returned.

Cecilia walked forward, along with Ron, and Harry waited for Hermione to reach the bottom of the stairs.

"Thank you. I knew she wouldn't have wanted to talk to me about something like private.", He took her hands in his and pulled them close to his chest.

"I know, it's okay. Dinner?"

He gave her a sad smile, "Yeah," and both left the common room, hand in hand.

XXX

Cecilia was weary of sitting in the common room, though it was impossible for anyone to know what happened, she still felt uncomfortable, it was like she was under someone's scrutinizing gaze. Feeling someone's eyes on herself, sh raised her head in the head's table direction, where that pink poof was studying her with intent. After a moment Umbridge looked away with a smug little smile on her face, which made Cecilia suspicious. She turned her gaze to the left to look at the Slytherin table.

When her gaze landed on the far left corner, she almost froze, her fork fell from her hand with a clang. Among the population of Hogwarts, nobody noticed, but the people sitting to her immediate left and right turned to her with sharp neck snaps.

She didn't say anything, and neither did they. With shaking legs and shaking fingers, she got off the long bench and ran as fast as her feet took her.

Nobody noticed of course, except a white-bearded man and the head of Gryffindor who was suddenly looking a hundred years old.

XXX

When Hermione started running behind Cecilia, this was the last place she would have thought that she would come to. She saw her round off the corner and with one last troubling breath, sped up behind the girl. By the time she had exited out of the huge gates of the castle, Cecilia had already reached the lake where she was leaning into the grass. Head in her hands, shaking with silent sobs.

Hermione slowly reached her, so as not to startle her. Once again at a loss of words, she joined her on the cold wet grass, and let her arm fall over the other girls' shoulder.

"May I ask what happened?", Hermione asked, not even sure if the words even left her lips, but Cecilia heard her. She was fighting herself over whether to tell her or not.

While she really did want to tell somebody, she was still holding back, scared that she, the girl, who was sitting beside her, who Cecilia was sure had hated her guts the moment she had stepped inside the Potter manor, would judge her. She let her arms fall lifelessly to her sides.

Cecilia gave out a humourless laugh, almost as she was going manic, and within a beat grew deadly silent.

She opened her mouth to say something but then shut it, unsure where to start, r maybe reconsidering to tell her or not.

"I…", She stopped short, almost out of breath, her tongue felt heavier in her mouth. She wanted to run away. For the first time in her life, she was shying away from something.

"I was, I was 10, about to turn 11, I remember getting my letter. I was so excited, a bit sad that I wasn't here, in London with my besties." It seemed like she was going to trail off, but Hermione kept quiet, instead with a sigh and a sniff she continued, "My mother was happier than me and insisted on taking me to school shopping, 3 months early. We were in Serene's Avenue, which is the equivalent of Diagon Alley in America.", she added as an afterthought.

"We were at the bookshop where I got separated from my mother, I thought I saw her get out of the shop and followed. It was a huge place, bigger than Diagon Alley. Excited and amazed, I, uh, wandered off, into a dark alleyway. I couldn't find my way out due to the darkness and ended up on the ground, crying. There were these two men, young, tall… scary. They said they could take me back to my mother. When I said no, they picked me up… and, and pushed me to the ground." Hot tears were pouring down her cheeks, Hermione put a hand on her arm to ask her to stop, instead, she just continued.

"I was crying, but the other man didn't move, he didn't let go of me. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see the other man lower his pants. I closed my eyes shut. I didn't even shout or make a sound, afraid of what they'll do to me. But then… I heard a loud thud, and the guy who was keeping me down was suddenly pulled off of me. I never saw her face, but she, a girl in white, picked me up and returned me to my mother. My mother never saw her face too, but she had this long white robe and covered face. I wish I could see who it was who saved my life."

After she finished, Hermione didn't dare say anything, she was too horrified to even utter a word.

When the silence was getting too overwhelming, Hermione said, "You were Lilith's 'girl in white'."

Cecilia turned to face Hermione, at a loss for words, she leapt at Hermione and just cried in her arms.

XXX

A/n:

I am sorry, I know, a lot of people were waiting for this, and this was very sad. Sorry again. Also apologies to MioneRanger, who I had promised to upload this chapter 2 days ago. Anyway, sorry again.

The next chapter will be much lighter, and hopefully a bit longer.

Love

Cece