Chapter 17 – The rest of Summer
Hermione arrived early for breakfast, it turned out professor Snape was not a morning person and seemed near silent before he had had at least two cups of coffee.
As he stood up, she followed him entering the brewing lab.
"Miss Granger, it is your choice in which order you brew them, but the recipes are in a pile over there. It would be wise to read them all first. I will be brewing over here, do not disturb me unless there is an emergency." Hermione's face fell just slightly, she thought she had hidden it, but Snape caught it.
"I will be brewing some dangerous potions; it is for your safety."
"Yes, professor." They both walked over to their respective lab benches, Hermione sat down to see what potions she was going to be in charge of. Some of them would require two batches, like pepper up, that had a long shelf life so it seemed she needed quite a lot of them.
She started with the small batch ones, boil cure it was.
She got her cauldron out as well as all the ingredients, she prepared them ahead of time and got to work. This one was one of the shortest ones on the list. So, she quickly bottled them, she realized that along with the bottles, there were no labels, she decanted the 20 potions and then got to work writing the labels, potion, date brewed, and expiry. Hermione then with a wave of her wand stuck the label to the bottle and then did the whole process over again.
She placed the brewed potions at the front of the desk, not wanting to disturb and got the next recipe she was going to do. That day she finished the contraceptive potion and the antidote for common poisons. She had a feeling she may have been responsible for finishing that one.
The next day she did a small batch of the antidote for uncommon poisons, another one she felt responsible, as well as both burns and bruise paste. The next day was just for blood replenishers and the day after that for just calming draft. Oculus was a tricky one, and she did have taken two goes at that one before she got it right. The next day was the pain relief potion, which was quite fiddly with the preparation, she was glad when she was first learning that's what Snape focusses on. At the end of every day once she had finished brewing Snape would inspect every batch to insure, they were satisfactory before sending her through the floo, to the infirmary placing them in the absent madame Pomphrey's storeroom, as the weeks went on, she was pleased to see the near empty shelves were looking quite full.
She had just finished her last one the wound cleansing potion. Placing it on the front desk, the last sheet of paper hen Snape put a stasis on his potion and looked up.
"I've finished, I've brewed all of the potions you gave me."
"Thank you Miss Granger; you are free to go and occupy yourself for the rest of the week."
Hermione left the potions lab and went to the room of requirements, looking forward to testing out some of the spells Bill and the other curse breakers had taught her. She practised some of the offensive ones first, the fire against the inferni, the blinding of the manticore, then moving onto the utility. Produce air, water very useful, air purification, as well as the bubblehead charm. Bill told her extremely useful when gasses were in play. By the time she had done that it was dinner time and she walked back down to the great hall.
o0o0o0o
Professor Snape didn't say goodbye, she came down from breakfast to find professor Flitwick and McGonagall sitting instead.
"Miss Granger how nice to see you," Flitwick said on her arrival.
"How was your summer?" McGonagall asked.
"Good, I went to Egypt for a bit which was fun."
She spent most of breakfast telling them a bit of what happened, including being caved in, Flitwick was impressed with the charm work. Minerva was appalled by the implications.
As they finished breakfast off, the conversation turned to something else.
"Miss Granger we are expecting some very important guests, this year and Hogwarts and as such we have been sent early to prepare quarters for them to live. If you are willing, would you like to join us in setting them up, and building them?" her head of house asked.
"Of course, I wouldn't mind." They left the great hall, Hermione following them.
"We've got two sets of quarters to build, she said, one we're going to place outside of the courtyard, and the other overlooking the lake. Which would you like to start with?" Flitwick asked her.
"Let's start with the courtyard," Hermione said. They made their way over to an area Hermione saw had already been cleared.
"We're going to start by building the walls, we've already dealt with the stone, I'll show you the spell and then we'll show you the plan and we'll get started," Flitwick said.
It turned out to be quite easy but all in the imagination, she pointed her wand at the pile of bricks, moving it over to where she wanted the wall, and what she wanted it to look like. In a flash, the bricks all moved over, sticking together and forming a perfect wall.
Flitwick clapped, and McGonagall smiled. "Only 38, left." She said while Hermione laughed as they got to work. Hermione had a knack for the smaller more precise walls so she was left to section off the inside according to the plans, Flitwick was working on the floors, ceiling and roof, and McGonagall was on windows and exterior walls.
At lunchtime, a picnic appeared as they ate outside admiring their work, and by the end of day one, they had a shell of a building.
Hermione fell into bed exhausted, but enjoying learning new skills again, she did however wonder why she was building new quarters at all.
The next day they did the same overlooking the lake this time, as they were getting practice it went even quicker. Hermione could say with certainty she could build a wall.
Interiors came next, which was much fiddlier, they started in the bedrooms. Each section had about twenty bedrooms, so Hermione used her existing transfiguration to make the beds, cabinets and chest of draws, while the teachers made the bathrooms functional. It turned out connecting plumbing by transfiguration was much harder than it looked.
They used magic to paint the bedrooms and transfigured the floor into a nice carpet. That left the new common rooms, Hermione had fun creating a giant table for the centre of the room, and some cosy looking chairs, the teacher let her pick the colour scheme, not wanting to anger anyone, she picked purple for both that way no house would feel left out.
The gentle purple sofas and a lilac rug complemented the gold decoration. It looked suitably regal.
It took them most of the rest of the holiday to get it all ready, but at the end of it, the three were extremely pleased with their work. Hermione had tried to wheedle any information out of the pair of teachers, but she didn't get anything more than, "you'll have to wait and see".
o0o0o0o
One morning she was sitting at breakfast when an owl landed on her table, both teachers looked surprised, but not as surprised as Hermione. Attacked was a small parcel, wrapped in brown paper.
She opened it carefully, revealing at first a letter.
Dear Miss Granger,
Please find enclosed your compensation for the inconvenience of being detained in the tomb of treasure,
Treckhornth
Gringotts.
She raised her eyebrow as she unwrapped the brown paper revealing a necklace, it was a silver chain, along with a dark blue lapis like symbol on the chain, as she looked closer, she recognized it from the dig she attended, it was a lapis eye of Horus. She fastened it around her neck, smiling, he had a small piece of the first curse breaking missions that she had ever been on.
McGonagall told her she looked quite beautiful, she blushed a deep shade of red.
The teacher exchanged looks. "Hermione my dear, as a reward for all the help you have given us in getting the quarters ready, we have a surprise," McGonagall said handing her an envelope.
Inside were tickets for the quidditch world cup, Hermione thought it was a lovely thought.
"Thank you so much. When is it?"
"On Monday it starts, you'll have the rest of the week to yourself, and then Monday afternoon I'll accompany you to the arena, Albus thought it might be a nice surprise."
"I'll look forward to it."
o0o0o0o
Hermione had woken up very early that morning, she had spent quite a long time getting ready. professor McGonagall had told her to dress in something nice, so she put on her blue robes, cloak, her necklace and had trimmed her hair that night. She looked nice Hermione thought as she admired herself in the mirror. She spent the rest of the morning quickly reading up on what she needed to know to understand quidditch a hobby she hadn't ever indulged in.
She walked down to the entrance hall. "I'm afraid there's not floo, so I'll have to side along apparate us. It's going to be very busy, so if we get separated for any reason, just send me a Patronus."
"Yes, professor." She said as her body constricted and morphed, into a green grassy field. Her professor was right, it was extremely busy.
There were people everywhere, professor McGonagall tightly gripped her arm, not uncomfortably, more security as they made their way to the stadium, as they walked closer a great many people were selling merchandise.
"Professor, which team are you going to be supporting?" Hermione asked eyeing the red and green unsure as to which she should be buying.
"I'm going to be cheering for Ireland, which is the green merchandise." She said smiling, fully understanding why Hermione was asking.
Hermione walked up to one of the stands, purchasing a bright green rosette, pinning it to her cloak before following her teacher, who smiled approvingly.
It turned out, due to Albus Dumbledore getting them the seats, they had been placed in one of the very top boxes.
It took them quite a long time to get there, there were so many steps, Hermione at one point felt a stitch form.
As they wheezed into the box, Hermione could already see a few people in there.
It seemed like the Weasley family had also been invited into the box along with the Malfoys.
Hermione spotted Bill and waved, he looked surprised to see her but waved back.
McGonagall waved her off to sit down as she talked to Arthur Weasley.
She took the empty seat next to the curse breaker.
"Hi, how have you been?" she said smiling.
"Well thank you, Hermione, I'd like to introduce my younger brother, this is Charlie, Hermione was the Gryffindor student who saved ginny a few years ago, she spent some time with the curse breaker team in Egypt."
"It's nice to meet you Hermione, sounds like you've been up to quite a lot."
Hermione laughed, "You could say that? It seems like adventure run's in your family, too, may I ask what you do?"
"I work out in Romania, I'm a dragon trainer."
Hermione smiled, "I'm right about the adventure then."
There was a polite laugh, as Mr Weasley glanced over in her direction.
"Oh, Miss Granger, nice to see you again."
"You too Mr Weasley," and with that, they went back to talking to the adults.
Ron, Harry and ginny kept giving her death glares and whispering.
Charlie looked towards them, "I'm sure you've noticed too, but it seemed, my brother, sister and Mr Potter are trying to kill you through gaze alone." He said curiously.
"We're in the same year in school, you see, and well, I am a bit of a pariah." She said confidently, maturely and above the level that the others could hope for.
"I see, I didn't realize you and Ron were in the same year." Bill said surprised, "God, I'm trying to imagine bringing Ron to work with me." he made a face then shook his head.
Hermione and the other Weasley's were talking when there was another entrance. McGonagall sat next to her, as three men walked in. One, she recognized as the minister of magic, the other two she was however unsure of their identity.
He walked over to Harry Potter and the other Weasleys first before making his way over to Professor McGonagall.
"Ah professor, it's lovely to see you again. Albus couldn't make it?" He said,
"No, I'm afraid he couldn't," she said.
"Shame that is, well this is the Bulgarian minister for magic and Mr ludo bagman." He gestured to the other men.
"Pleasure to meet you, may I introduce my ward, for the evening, Miss Hermione Granger." She said gesturing to her.
Hermione nodded her head politely. "Nice to meet you miss granger, a ward of Hogwarts hey, there hasn't been one of those for a very long time."
Hermione responded politely. "It was very kind of the staff to take me when I had very few options."
"Right, right, then we must be getting ready to start." As they continued to the middle seats.
Hermione was handed a program by McGonagall, who too had one, as she started looking through it curiously got to look and see what was going to happen as the evening progresses.
She was curious as to the nature of magical mascots.
As the lights dimmed and the small man introduced as bagman stood up casting a charm on his voice box, the commentary began.
The mascots were bought forwards, first the beautiful ladies whom Hermione knew to be vela. They were indeed beautiful, but Hermione watched as the men in the audience lost their minds, bill cleverly had his fingers in his ears, but some of the others in the box were past the point of no return. It looked like Harry Potter was trying to climb out of the box.
As the crowd went wild, as they left, the next mascot enters, with a green firework across the sky, leprechauns she noted. They formed into groups flying into patterns, shamrock, and then collecting together as the sky began to rain gold.
Bill leaned over to her a piece fell on her lap, examining it she looked surprised. "It's leprechaun gold, it'll vanish in a few hours."
Hermione laughed at that seeing quite a few people scrambling for it.
Once the mascots were gone the payers were released, and the game began. Hermione didn't know enough about quidditch to be fascinated, but the game was much more interesting than the Hogwarts one. Professor McGonagall spoke up a few times to explain something kindly or point something noteworthy out.
Halfway through a war between the now transformed vela's and leprechauns broke out which Hermione thought was a bit unprofessional but highly amusing.
Hermione felt bad when one of the seekers took quite a fall, and then one of the brooms tails caught fire, and then one of the balls hit him in the nose, which Hermione felt. But soon enough the game seemed to end.
The Bulgarian team caught the snitch, but Ireland won.
There was a consensus that victor Krum the seeker for the Bulgarian team, and the one hit on the nose, had acted with great sportsmanship.
"He was very brave." The Bulgarian minister said.
Fudge looked shocked, "You could speak English, you've been letting me mine everything all day."
The other man's lip quirked, as Hermione had to bite her tongue to not laugh.
"It was funny." He said with no excuse.
Hermione then noticed that the teams had too entered their box, a cheer went up for the Bulgarians, and Hermione noticed that Krum looked a little worse for wear, with two black eyes, a broken nose, and blood everywhere.
The Ireland team were ecstatic, as they lifted the cup, and to the applause of the stadium.
The two teams took back to their brooms, as they lifted off into the sky, to do another lap, the crowd went wild and Hermione clapped, the atmosphere infectious. She cheered along with the others in the box as the game ended.
o0o0o0o
Professor McGonagall had taken them back to the apparition point and had got them both home to go to sleep in their beds, she had refused to stay the night, saying that camping and herself were arch enemies.
It was extremely late when they got it, gone past three in the morning. The queue was far too long to leave.
Hermione collapsed into her bed, pinning her green medal on the wall, and letting it remind her of the night before going to sleep.
o0o0o0o
Hermione had walked down to breakfast to see that once more the paper had taken the top topic of conversation.
"Good Morning." She said reaching for her copy.
It was filled with news from the quidditch world cup but not what she expected there had been an attack by a group of people, against a family of muggles. It talked of chaos and terror. Hermione had a feeling who might have caused this.
"Oh, thank merlin we left before all of this broke out," McGonagall said looking at her worriedly.
"It was rather lucky wasn't it." She said back, thinking of the implications of the event.
Professor McGonagall had said that for the rest of the week, it was up to her what she wanted to do if there was anywhere, she wanted to go that could be facilitated, or anything like that. She had asked of course to go to Diagon alley to pick a few things up, but apart from that, she was pretty good.
McGonagall nodded and said that if she wanted, she was plenty capable to go to Diagon Ally on her own, anytime if she wanted to use her floo.
Hermione nodded, thanking her before continuing to eat her breakfast.
That afternoon, she popped into the office, getting the go ahead from her head of house and popped into London.
Once again, the mood in Diagon alley was not of the brightest, people were whispering about the events of last night, they were the death eaters, Hermione found. The group that served Voldemort. Well, it was another start to a great year.
o0o0o0o
Hermione gathered her supplies quickly, not dawdling or stopping for anything other than her essentials, she got most of her supplies in the wizarding world now. Her life was so integrated that most of the things she used to reply on in the muggle world were not obsolete. The only things she did nip back for were a giant packet of ballpoint pens and as many notebooks as she could carry. Parchment was all well and good, but nothing beat a pen.
As she was walking back, she spotted a familiar flop of red hair.
"Hello." She said as he passed by.
"Oh, hello Hermione, I'm glad to see you're all right." The other Weasley she met last night, Charlie said.
"I'm glad to see you're good too, how is everyone?" she inquired.
"We were lucky, none of us got hurt, but the younger ones were a little freaked out by it all." Hermione nodded in understanding.
"Getting your school supplies?" Charlie questioned looking at her bags.
"Yeah, it's that time of year again." As there was a small chuckle from both of them.
"It was nice to see you, Charlie, are you heading back to Romania soon?" she asked.
"Not for a little while, you never know we may bump into each other again. It was nice seeing you too Hermione, have a good year."
"You too." She said as he walked away, Hermione was slightly confused by his closing statement, might bump into each other, which would mean he would have to be coming to Hogwarts.
That did pique her interest.
o0o0o0o
She spent the rest of her week practising in the room of requirements, her reflexes were better than ever, especially after the trip to Egypt, she had got a chance to see spells in action in the real world and it had only motivated her more.
She had found some spells that were extremely interesting, mostly ones that were a little bit darker, but nothing illegal. They were meant to be used when your life was in danger and seeing that for most of the time it was, it didn't feel too wrong to learn a few of them.
As she went to try a rather exciting new exploding spell, she realized that these were indeed much stronger, as she blew a rather large chunk of the wall off with it. Quickly repairing the damage, she closed the book and left it for another day. Maybe it would come in useful then.
o0o0o0o