AN: I had a lot of trouble with writing this chapter. I knew exactly what I wanted to happen, but I had a lot of trouble writing it in a way that flowed how I liked. I think action just isn't my strong suit rlly.

I hope you like this chapter!

DISCLAIMER: Don't own anything!

Chapter Twenty-Eight: Precipice

Sirius and Hermione were on some kind of precipice.

Neither of them were ready to tip the balance, so they remained in this odd place where they told everyone they were friends but showed affection like they were two people that weren't exactly friends.

Sirius had taken to coming to Hermione's room late at night to insist she follow through with her promise and teach him Occlumency. Their birthdays came and went and more Quidditch matches passed, and before they knew it, the last Hogsmeade weekend before holidays was upon them.

They were sitting cross legged on Hermione's bed in the middle of the night a few days before it, and Hermione had her wand pointed between his eyes when he said something that made her drop it completely.

"Go to Hogsmeade with me."

The wand landed in her comforter, and she stared at him wide eyed. "What?" She asked stupidly.

He was staring at her with that annoying smug look he got when he knew he had someone cornered. The image of the cliffside that was their relationship popped into her mind. It felt like Sirius had just pushed her over the edge with no warning. When she continued to stare at his chin with that blank look on her face Sirius started to back peddle.

"With James, Peter, and Remus, of course."

She shook herself and blew a curl out of her face. "Oh yes, of course."

Sirius frowned. She sounded an odd mixture of disappointed and relieved.

She picked her wand back up and asked again, "Are you ready?"

He shook his arms out and cleared his mind. She hadn't even used legilimency on him yet. They worked on it maybe once or twice a week, and so far all she had taught him was theory. He thought he would explode if he heard the world compartmentalize come out of her perfect, rosy lips one more time.

"Ready, kitten."

Hermione wasn't a very skilled legilimens. She didn't have the heart for it.

She took a deep breath and stilled her wand.

"Don't forget what I taught you, Sirius."

He smiled cheekily, "I would never."

"Legilimens."

Hermione entered his mind gently.

Sirius tried to block her at first. He imagined building a wall, and focused on locking away the memories that he never wanted her to see.

Images of Walburga Black crucioing him for the first time for talking to the muggle girl from across the street. Images of her screaming about how he was a stain on the house of Black.

He was so focused on these memories that they popped to the front of his mind without his permission. He could feel Hermione's presence in his mind as the crucio memory began to play like a film in the muggle cinema. He tried to push her out, but all of the theory that she had taught him disappeared.

Right as his mother screamed the curse, Hermione pulled out and sat there gasping with her hand over her heart.

Sirius jumped to his feet and backed away from her until his back hit the wall. He squeezed his eyes shut and said unnecessarily, "You weren't supposed to see that."

Hermione didn't know what he needed in that moment. The image of the hatred in Walburga's eyes would be burned into her memory forever. Hatred for her own son.

She pulled her knees to her chest and said quietly, "Use Legilimency on me."

He opened his eyes and slowly took a step towards her. "Why?"

She stared into his eyes and said strongly, "Just do it."

Remus wouldn't have done it. Remus would've told her he didn't need to see, but Sirius wasn't Remus and before she knew it Sirius's wand was pointed at her and curiosity was burning in his eyes.

"Legilimens!"

As soon as she felt him invading her mind, she opened one of her carefully shut boxes and pulled a memory out.

Sirius watched as she ran through the woods. It was Hermione maybe two years ago. She was skinny, but not like when she came to them. She was sprinting and curses were flying all around her and then the next thing he knew she was in the arms of a snatcher.

"Well, if it isn't Undesirable number two!"

A man with long greasy hair and a snarled face stood in front of her. He was holding some kind of magical flyer with Hermione's face on it. Sirius wanted to study the flyer, but then his focus was turned back to her. Sirius watched as Hermione bucked and fought against the man holding her, but it was no use. She was so small, and he had her wand.

"I think we have to take this lot to the big guys."

"Lot?"

"There are two more boys."

Sirius watched with dread as the man stepped up to her and ran a dirty finger along her cheek.

"Who are your friends, sweetie?"

Hermione spat at him, and the man erupted in anger. He growled and held his wand out.

"You'll pay for that!"

Right as the curse left his mouth, Hermione pushed Sirius out.

They stood there staring at each other, breathing heavily.

"Tit for tat," Hermione whispered.

Sirius quirked a twisted sort of smile at her. "I guess we're even now?"

"Everyone's mind looks different, Sirius." He sighed.

"Back to theory, are we?"

Hermione ignored his exhausted comment and said, "We may have different minds, but we all have dark corners. Memories that can be exploited. Feelings… fears. Voldemort is the most skilled Legilimens alive. He breaks down walls like they're nothing. He exploits your deepest fears, finds your deepest secrets. He drives prisoners to madness by creating visions based on what he finds. It's a form of magical psychological warfare. " Sirius was staring at her with narrowed eyes.

"Did he do that to you, Hermione?"

She ignored him again and said, "But he can't do that to you if you learn Occlumency." She looked slightly frantic when she added, "You understand?"

Sirius suddenly looked more determined than he had since they had started.

He sat up straight and looked her directly in the eyes when he said, "Let's go again."

Hermione was wearing a pink jumper and denims as they made their way down to Hogsmeade. It was uncharacteristically warm for November, and she had somehow convinced Lily to tag along with her and the boys.

Lily actually seemed to be having a good time with them. Hermione laughed as Lily bodily shoved James away from them, but her laughter slowly faded when something caught her eye in an alley next to the parchment shop.

"Hey, I'll be right back," she said quietly to Lily. The witch nodded absentmindedly before going back to screaming at James. Hermione slipped away and walked towards the alley as calmly as she could manage. She could've sworn she saw…

"Regulus!" She exclaimed when a hand grabbed her by the elbow, and the younger Black brother was marching her purposely further down the alley until they rounded a corner so that they were hidden from prying eyes.

He was in long, black robes and was holding something out of her view.

"Regulus?" She asked nervously.

He looked frantic and his eyes were open wide.

"He's angry, Hermione."

"Okay?"

"He wants to send a message."

"Regulus, be a dear, and try not to speak cryptically."

He scowled at her and grabbed her with both hands to shake her shoulders. "He's coming, Hermione!" Her eyes darted down to his hands when she felt something pressing into her skin there. The terrible silvery mask gleamed back at her, and she gasped.

"I have to go! I have to get them out!" She pulled away from Regulus. He tried to latch onto her, but she slipped out from under his fingers.

"No, Hermione! That's not it!"

But she was already gone, disappearing around the corner.

"Shite!" He yelled as he kicked at the bricks of the wall. Before he could do anything, his wrist started burning.

Hermione came darting around the corner and her friends all gaped at her when there was an explosion of rubble across the street and the black smoke of death eaters started to pop in all around them.

In half a second, she was in front of them.

She yelled, "Protego Maxima!"

A dome like shield emanated from her wand and Hermione spun on her friends. The shield drew attention, and she could feel the curses hitting and creating ripples. Their expressions ranged from confused to terrified.

"Get everyone inside. Take the students through the tunnel in Honeydukes."

She ignored their panicked expressions and turned again.

"Expecto Patronum!"

Her dragon burst forth and she could vaguely hear her friends exclamations of surprise.

"Go to the Order. Attack in Hogsmeade!"

Once her dragon disappeared she turned back.

"Go! I'm about to drop the shield. Don't draw attention."

Right before she could turn again Remus yanked on her hand.

"Hermione! I'm coming with you."

She pulled away from him. "I don't have time for this, Remus! You're a prefect. Take care of the students." Before she could drop the shield Mad-eye apparated right on top of them and slammed his hand on her shoulder.

"Let's go, Pup! The rest are coming. Constant Vigilance!"

"Is that Mad-Eye Moody?" She turned and made eye-contact with Sirius. His eyes burned into her for a moment, and she could see in them that there was nothing she could do to stop him.

She dropped the shield and almost immediately Death Eaters were upon them.

She cast a smaller shield and started firing hexes as fast as she could think of them. She disarmed one of them and right after she caught the wand, she snapped it.

She saw Lily out of the corner of her eye ushering students out from an alley and to where James was standing at the entrance to Honeydukes.

She watched in horror as a cackling Bellatrix appeared out of nowhere right in front of Lily. Hermione didn't waste any time. She dropped the snapped wand and sprinted towards them. She could hear screams and see curses hurtling through the air. She sent an incarcerous at Bellatrix, but it was as if the witch could sense her. Her hex was blocked like it was simple child's play. Hermione tried not to pay attention to Lily's panicked expression behind Bellatrix and instead focused on the eldest Black sister. The mad witches curls bounced as she tilted her head to the side to study Hermione with a hungry look.

"What's this? Little girly wants to play?" Her voice grated and bile worked its way up her throat, but Hermione swallowed it down along with all of her memories of their past interactions. Hermione would play.

"Confringo!"

Bellatrix blocked it and laughed. "Oh! Girly has fire! I'm going to have fun with you!" Hermione saw Lily hold up her wand to start fighting, but if Lily fought, than Bellatrix's attention would turn towards all the students.

"Go!" Hermione yelled as she non-verbally blocked another curse.

Lily looked stunned, and Bellatrix cackled like she'd been talking to her.

Bellatrix shuffled and stood in front of the glass window of the shop.

Hermione's eyes darted towards it.

"Finistra!" The glass shattered and rained over Bellatrix who gave an enraged yell.

She'd made her angry, and an angry Bellatrix meant that the duel would become even more unfair. The witch played by a rule book only known to her.

The fight became more violent, and Hermione cried out when she dove to avoid a slicing hex and her left arm got sliced from the back of her elbow up to her shoulder. She was about to jump up when someone stepped over her body and blocked her view of Bellatrix.

"Hello, Cousin." Hermione almost cried out again at Sirius's voice.

She wanted to protest, but in her panic all she could manage was tangling her fingers into the fabric of his trouser leg.

He ignored her and watched as his cousin cackled in front of him. Bellatrix froze with her wand in the air, and she gave Sirius a delusioned smile.

"You're lucky, blood traitor. Master's calling!"

Then she disappeared.

Sirius was frozen and Hermione stood shakily. When she was finally standing, she saw Dolohov come out of an alley. She gasped and his mad eyes turned on her. She could see the recognition flicker in his eyes. As he twitched towards her and Sirius, Hermione did the first thing that she could think of and silenced him.

Dolohov raised his wand, and Hermione stepped in front of Sirius right as a purple curse came hurtling towards them.

Sirius's hands automatically reached out and held Hermione upright as her torso exploded in pain. It felt as though it was splitting in half, and she watched as Dolohov's smug face disaperated with his mask in hand.

Hermione fell bodily into Sirius.

"Kitten?" Hermione hated how scared he sounded.

She started gasping for breath.

"Sirius?"

"Hold on, Hermione! Hold on, I'm going to… I'm going to take you…" She had never heard his voice laced with as much terror as this.

With the worst timing imaginable, Remus, James, and Lily appeared out of the door to Honeydukes.

They all made it out right in time to see her collapse into Sirius's chest.

Blood was spreading across her pretty pink jumper.

"Hermione!"

James was the first to react, and he sprinted towards Sirius who was slowly lowering a gasping Hermione to the ground.

Sirius couldn't breathe. He couldn't tear his eyes away from the blood. So much blood. Remus felt like the metallic scent was trapped in his nose.

James collapsed on his knees right beside her.

"We have to get her to the hospital wing!"

Sirius watches as her eyes clouded over. He hated himself for thinking immediately that she wouldn't make it that far.

Lily started to sob.

Hermione let out a pained cry in between her gasps. It felt like her insides were on fire, and she was burning.

She tangled her sticky fingers in James's shirt. He tried to lift her, but she shook her head.

"Sorry… I'm… sorry…"

Her hand twitched on his shirt. "Someone go get, Pomfrey!" He yelled.

He refused to let go of her even as Pomfrey appeared in Hogsmeade.

"I need you to let go of her, Mister Potter," the medi-witch said calmly.

"No!" James yelled.

It wasn't until Lily wrapped a hand around his elbow that he finally listened, and allowed her to pull him away.

Hermione was in so much pain, but all she could think was that she'd been so wrong. She'd thought she'd been ready to die for the cause. That it would be an honorable death, dying for her beliefs. But there was nothing honorable about this.

The truth was, Hermione didn't want to die. She wasn't ready. Remus and her weren't back to normal. She hadn't seen Lily finally let James take her on a date. She hadn't had that conversation with Sirius.

"I'm…"

"Hush child," Pomfrey tried to shush her, but she kept on like she was in some kind of trance.

"Not ready…"

Why had she only silenced him? Why hadn't she been better? More effective?

Pomfrey froze for half a second before continuing in whatever she was doing.

"You will not be dying today, Miss Granger."

Sirius backed away in a daze. He was covered in her blood, and he felt so numb. He watched as Pomfrey began to mutter healing spells and coax various potions down her throat. James latched onto his elbow, and Lily sobbed into James's shoulder. Remus was dry-heaving next to him.

Sirius wanted to scream at them.

She's not going to die!

Neither of them reacted when a shadow fell over them, and the infamous Mad-Eye Moody looked down at Hermione over their shoulders.

"Pup's not dead yet. She's a fighter that one. Can't kill her that easy." He sounded so cavalier about it that anger built up in Sirius.

"How do you know her?" Sirius's voice was choppy and harsh, and he had a threatening tone to his voice.

Moody slapped him on the back and scowled down at him.

"I know everyone, Sirius Black."

The next half hour passed in a blur. Hermione was levitated back to the castle and when Dorea and Charlus showed up, panicked and practically running down the corridor, all four teens were lined up on the ground outside of the Hospital Wing.

James and Sirius had Hermione's blood on their hands and clothes, and even smeared across James's face from where he'd pushed on his glasses.

Dorea started crying at the sight, and James didn't know if he was delivering bad news or relief when he said, "It's not ours."

Charlus was the one that went into the room.

James watched as his proper and societal mother slid to the ground next to them.

Nearly half an hour later, Charlus reappeared to tell them that she was stable, but that even the St. Mungo's healers that had flooed in couldn't identify the curse Dolohov had used on Hermione.

Sirius's face dropped to his hands, and he whispered, "It was meant for me."

"What?" Dorea gasped.

He jumped to his feet and kicked at the wall. "It was meant for me! She silenced him and jumped in front of me. It was meant for me!"

Sirius felt like ripping his hair out, and Dorea and Charlus looked like they were going to pass out.

What kind of nightmarish world was it where you were simultaneously thankful and devastated that one of the children you saw as your own, stood one step inside death's door, so the other could live? All because a grown wizard had tried to murder them in a dark and excrutiating way.

Charlus stepped up and latched onto Sirius's shoulders.

"You weren't holding the wand. And there was nothing you could've done to stop Hermione."

Sirius knew this in theory, but knowing it and accepting it were two vastly different things.

Sirius sucked in a deep breath and nodded his head jerkily.

Charlus stepped back and said, "There's something else."

James sighed. "What else could there possibly be?"

Charlus wasted no time in saying, "Dumbledore's dead."

"What?" Sirius asked in shock.

"The Hogsmeade attack was used as a diversion."

"A diversion that almost killed Hermione!" James screamed.

"Three other students died at Hogsmeade," Charlus said quietly. A new kind of silence took over the group. No one spoke up and asked who, and it all seemed like too much to take in. Charlus and Dorea forced all of them to walk towards Gryffindor tower with promises that they'd see Hermione as soon as she woke up.

When Hermione gasped awake it was the middle of the night. The Hospital Wing was silent, save drips coming from an open tap somewhere.

Hermione sucked in a breath and let out a noise that sounded close to a whimper.

That same pain from before was there, though slightly dulled, and her head was pounding. She went to sit up, but a gentle hand landed on her shoulder to hold her down.

She tried to focus her eyes, but everything was blurry.

"Who's there?" Her voice was raspy.

Someone mumbled something under their breath and then she heard a quiet, "Lumos," and Regulus Black's face was next to her bathed in the soft glow.

She squeezed her eyes against the light, and he immediately put it out again. Her fingers stretched on the bed next to her, and his hand found hers.

She twisted it around until she was holding it and then asked quietly, "Are we friends yet, Regulus?"

He sucked in a breath and said, "I don't have friends."

She let out a laugh, but it ended up hurting and turning into a soft cry. Her skin across her torso felt tight like if she moved too much it would rip open.

"She had to stitch you up the muggle way. The wound wasn't healing."

Hermione wanted to ask how he knew that, but she was too scared to move.

"Are you in pain? I will go get Pomfrey." Despite his words, he didn't move an inch. To anyone who didn't know him, he would sound clinical, almost uncaring, but Hermione liked to think she knew him. She liked to think that his voice was laced with concern. When she opened her eyes this time, she could just see the outline of his facial features.

"Does Pomfrey know you're here?"

She watched as his lips thinned.

"Then I'm not in pain," she said quietly. He didn't respond, but he did squeeze her hand again. After a few moments of silence she asked, "Is everyone else okay?"

"Dumbledore's dead."

She felt numb. Words got caught in her throat. Their were flashes in her mind. Regulus pulling her into an alley.

He's angry, Hermione.

"It was a diversion."

Regulus holding onto her shoulders.

Her pulling away before he could finish.

No, Hermione! That's not it!

"What do you mean?"

"First wave of Death Eaters was sent in to hit Hogsmeade. Second wave to kill Dumbledore."

"I told all of the Order to go to Hogsmeade," she said weakly.

"Dumbledore was unprotected at the castle."

Hermione shook and said, "You were trying to tell me."

He used his free hand to push down on her shoulder again. "Stop moving!" She shook against him again, "Merlin, you're so stubborn."

She opened her mouth to speak, but then there was light thud outside her curtains and someone cursed.

Regulus gave her a panicked look and whispered, "Got to go."

Before she could protest his hand ripped out of hers, and he disappeared.

Right as he did the privacy curtain opened and shut, but no one was there.

"Hullo?" She asked nervously.

There was an outtake of breath and Sirius's head appeared.

"Sirius?"

Her eyes widened, and she realized he still had the invisibility cloak wrapped around his shoulders.

"What are you doing up, kitten?"

She hesitated before whispering, "Couldn't sleep."

Hermione rolled onto her side, surprised that it didn't hurt, and Sirius didn't hesitate before dropping the cloak onto the chair next to her and climbing into bed next to her. He wrapped her gently in his arms like she was some fragile thing and pulled her so that her back was to his chest.

"You scared me, Hermione," Sirius whispered. She could feel his breath fanning out against her skin, and it left goosebumps trailing across the back of her neck.

"Can you stay?" She hated how weak and shaky her voice sounded.

He pressed a kiss to the back of her neck. "I won't leave you."

She remembered Remus making similar promises. He'd told her he wouldn't leave, and that he didn't care that she was fighting and then he'd broken up with her.

One of Hermione's hands followed Sirius's arm from where it lay against her ribs down to where his hand rested on the sheet in front of her. Her fingers shook as they tangled with his.

"You promise?"

His thumb pressed lightly against her knuckles and began to draw soft circles on the skin there. He could feel the gravity of her words. She needed to know he would be there. She needed to know he wouldn't leave.

"I promise, Hermione."

AN: Thanks as always for the follows, favorites, and reviews. Especially the reviews;)