I don't own any of the Harry Potter characters, they all belong to JK Rowling. I also don't own some lines - some are quotes from the funny people at Angel, Buffy, Scrubs and people such as Dan Miller and Tom DeLonge :)
Chapter One – Bad Dreams Make Restless Nights
Hermione had never felt so exhausted. Every part of her body seemed to ache, right from her head down to the tips of her toes. She felt like crawling into a hole and never coming out again. All she wanted to do was go to sleep, but it felt as not even sleep could cure her tiredness.
Maybe I'm working too hard?
But it was stupid to think that. It was almost the summer holidays; their sixth year at Hogwarts would be ending in a matter of days. Hermione didn't think they'd done as less work at the end of the previous years, so she shook off the thought and sat back in the large armchair infront of the fire with a sigh. She knew Harry and Ron were exchanging frowns over her, but she couldn't even bring herself to open an eye. Let them worry about her for once, it would make a change.
Harry watched as she drifted off. Not sure if she was entirely asleep yet, he nudged Ron and whispered, "What's up with her?"
Ron looked up from the chess pieces he was setting up, "I dunno. She's been like it loads lately. Always wanting to sit down and go to sleep. I even saw her drifting off in Potions the other day! Oh! You know that book she got from the library the other day for some 'light' reading, well it was about 200 pages shorter than the one before and -"
"Ron!" Harry, knowing how his friend liked to ramble on subjects such as Hermione, cut him off before it was too late, "is she ill?"
"Are there illnesses that make you want to sleep a lot?"
Harry shrugged, "There seems to be an illness for everything else."
"Well has she said anything?" Ron asked. Harry saw he wore a concerned look.
"To me?" Harry said, "of course not. You know how she is, always putting everyone else first. She probably wouldn't even come and tell us if she was dying, she'd be more concerned that I wasn't going to get killed by some un-known thing."
Ron sighed, "I think something's wrong with her."
Harry turned back to look at Hermione, sleeping peacefully in the armchair, her head resting on her hands, "She looks okay when she's sleeping."
"Everyone looks like that when they're sleeping." Ron replied, also looking at their friend.
Harry shook his head, "I mean that sometimes when you're ill, you get restless when you sleep. Toss around and stuff, y'know?"
Ron looked bemused, "I have no clue what you're talking about."
Harry ran a hand threw his hair and shrugged, "We can talk to her in the morning. Tell her go to Madam Pomfrey."
"Yeah," Ron said. He glanced down at the chess board infront of them, "whites first."
~*~*~
Everything was dark. All she could see were flashes of light now and then, whirring past her as if she was stood in a funfair. Then there was noise. All around her. A deep rasping sound. Someone's breath. Someone was near her. But spinning round, she could see no one. All there was was that breath.
She stepped forwards, her feet crunching on the gravel below. She had a big urge to make as less sound as possible, but she didn't know why. All she knew was that the sound was getting louder, beating in her ears as if it was inside her.
A whir of silver. What was that? It was someone infront, a complete blur stood a few yards away. It was saying something, but she couldn't make it out. It was if she was underwater, the voice was so muffled. She put her arms out, but didn't feel any water. Where was she? The voice kept asking her something, but she didn't know what. She was going deaf, everything fading apart from the sound of that breath.
Another flash of colour. Green, bubbling to the right. It was so bright it hurt her eyes. Then the breath sounded. Again and again. Pounding, getting closer. There was nothing she could do. She was drowning. Drowning in nothing, but it was so loud…
Hermione woke with a start, sitting up in bed and panting hard. The hoarse breath sound echoed in her ears and she felt so dizzy. She closed her eyes for a second, trying to control her air supply. Once her breath was steady, she wiped her forehead, surprised to see her hand came away covered in sweat.
Hermione looked around her. She couldn't even recollect going up to the dormitory that night and was shocked to see she was in her own bed. Everyone else was asleep; she could hear their breathing and no one had seemed to stir when she'd woken up.
Hermione kicked off the scarlet duvet that layed crumpled on her bed, cursing when her foot got caught in the heavy covers. She reached over for the water on her bedside table, enjoying the coldness from pressing the glass onto her forehead.
Why am I so worked up? It's just a dream, a stupid dream that didn't make any sense, for God's sake!
What was her dream about? It was complete darkness except for the two colours. She tried to think of where they could've come from. Silver and green. The first thing that sprang to mind was Slytherin, but the green had been a bright, luminous green and not the dark one usually associated with that House.
Then there was that breath. It was like nothing she'd ever heard before. Hermione clamped her hands over her ears, still hearing the hoarse noise in her head.
What does it all mean? Well it doesn't mean anything, does it, I'm just being stupid. People have strange dreams all the time. Like Harry, he's always having them. But this dream seemed different. She didn't know why, but it seemed like there was something more to all of this.
Hermione replaced the glass and lay back down, trying to forget all about the dream. But it seemed easier said than done, as the breath carried on hammering through her head.
~*~*~
"Hermione!"
"Mmmph."
"Hermione!"
Hermione scrunched up her eyes before slowly opening one. Someone was stood over her. She opened the other eye, letting everything come into focus, "Lavender?"
Lavender Brown was looking down at her, an impatient look on her face, "Get up. There are two annoying guys outside pestering me to hurry you up."
Hermione groaned, "Tell them I'll be down soon."
"Sorry, I have specific orders to get you up."
Hermione raised an eyebrow, "Since when do you take orders from Harry and Ron?"
Lavender shrugged, "Since they promised they'd finish that History of Magic essay for me."
Hermione was about to point out that leaving your homework for Harry and Ron to do wasn't such a good idea, but she was now having robes thrown at her from her roommate.
"Okay, okay, I'm, getting up!" Hermione cried. She swung her legs over the side of the bed and attempted to get up, but her legs felt like they'd give way and the room seemed to sway.
Lavender frowned in mid-throw, "You okay?"
Hermione nodded, managing to get to her feet, "Yeah, I'm fine. Just still half-awake."
"I suppose that's my fault," Lavender smiled apologetically, "you have two very persistent friends out there."
"One of their few faults." Hermione yawned. She quickly got dressed in the clothes that Lavender had thrown on to her bed, ran a brush through her hair, grabbed her wand, and stumbled out of the girl's dormitory.
Harry and Ron were waiting for her outside the door, looking like a mix of impatient and bored. Ron was sat on a step a few above, while Harry was leaning against the wall, his head back against the stone. Hermione had always thought her two best friends were amongst the best looking boys in their year, much to Lavender and Parvati's disagreement, and she found it quite amusing how they still managed to look good-looking aswell as worried.
But then, you can help looking worried.
"Finally!" Ron breathed, getting up from the floor, "how long does it take you to get ready in the morning?!"
"Not very long, but I wasn't expecting to be escorted down to the Great Hall this morning," Hermione looked from one boy to the other, "so what do I owe this great pleasure?"
"Er- we wanted to make sure you were okay…" Harry trailed off, obvious to how stupid his reply was.
Hermione raised her eyebrows, "And my well-being was so important that you were willing to take on extra homework?"
Ron sighed, "Oh come on, Herm. We just wanted to wait for you for once, is that such a crime?"
Hermione frowned. Why was she so uptight about this? Was it so bad that maybe they did just want to walk her down to breakfast? She echoed Ron's sigh, "Okay, I'm sorry. Let's go eat."
As they wandered slowly down to the Great Hall, Hermione was only slightly aware of Ron and Harry's conversation. Her mind kept going back to the previous nights dream.
"Hey, Hermione…"
Hermione shook her head, conscious that someone was saying something to her, "Huh?"
Ron was frowning, "Are you okay?"
She managed a laugh, "Of course I am. Why wouldn't I be?"
Harry seemed like he was touching on a sensitive topic, "Well… it was just that me and Ron…"
"Yeah…?"
"Well, we just thought you were acting a bit…"
"Strange." Ron finished for him.
"Strange?" Hermione repeated. They'd entered the Hall now, and made their way to the Gryffindor table as they talked.
"Yeah, strange. Y'know, you're always, I dunno, tired?" Harry replied as they took their seats amongst the morning chatter of the other Gryffindor's.
"I've had a lot on my mind, I'm just overworking." Hermione said.
Ron paused from piling his plate with bacon, "Hermione, we've hardly had to do that much work. How can you be overworking?"
"I don't know okay!" She covered her mouth, aware that she'd just snapped at Ron, who in-turn was looking at her with a shocked expression, "I'm just a little tired, that's all." She finished calmly before busying herself in her food, knowing full well that Harry and Ron were still looking at her with surprised faces.
Nothing more was said on the topic through breakfast. Harry and Ron chose to talk about what they'd be doing over the holidays along with Seamus Finnigan and Dean Thomas, leaving Hermione to sit back and listen, which she was quite content to do.
The first lesson of the day was Potions, much to everyone's dismay. Professor Snape was one of the few teachers who had had no mercy on the students towards the run-up of summer and had instead decided to pile them with extra work. Ron had already aired his views on Snape, saying he thought it should be illegal to give pupils so much work when the weather was so good, which Snape had unfortunately overheard and now took even more points off of Gryffindor each lesson, if that was at all possible.
"Weasley! You call that a thinly chopped piece of beetle?! Re-chop it, and five points off of Gryffindor for your obvious lack of knife control!"
Ron muttered something under his breath that would've probably caused Snape to take away all of Gryffindor's points, so it was lucky that the Professor had already walked away to insult Neville Longbottom.
"Just ignore him, Ron." Hermione advised as Ron hacked his new beetle into pieces worse than the last ones.
Hermione had already finished all the chopping and just needed to add the last of her beetle to her potion. She scooped it up in her hand and threw the last of it into the cauldron. The potion hissed and bubbled and the colour changed from a dark blue to a bright, fluorescent green. Hermione frowned. It looked so much like the colour she'd seen in her dream. She shook her head, it couldn't be.
"Hey, Hermione, can I borrow your pestle?"
Hermione looked up to see Draco Malfoy leaning over from the table infront. His silver-blond hair seemed to almost blind her.
"I-"
But then she was speechless. She could hear it. That hoarse, whispery breath from her dream. It sounded like it was inside her head, pounding against her brain. Her head ached so much.
"Hermione?"
She could hear Draco saying her name, but she couldn't see him anymore. The dizziness set in and all she saw was black.
~*~*~
The breath had gone. The dizziness was still there, but that horrible breath seemed to have gone.
For the moment.
Hermione sighed; opening her eyes for what seemed the tenth time that day. She was lying in a bed in the infirmary.
"Good, you're awake." Madam Pomfrey was bustling around. She passed Hermione a steaming beaker, "drink it; it'll make you feel better."
Hermione knocked it back, feeling the liquid settle warmly in her stomach and making her feel instantly steady, "Where's Ron and Harry?"
Madam Pomfrey took the glass off of her, "They bought you up here during first lesson. Said you fainted. They wanted to stay with you, but I had to send them back to class," she tutted, "I've had to send them away everytime there's been a lesson break. No doubt they'll be back in a few minutes, last lesson just ended."
Sure enough, Ron and Harry burst through the infirmary door a few minutes later; looking like they'd just ran the whole way from Care of Magical Creatures.
"Hermione!" Ron cried, skidding to halt by her bed, "are you okay? What happened? Did Malfoy do something to you because if he did I'll –"
"I'm fine, Ron. I just fainted, that's all. And no, Draco didn't do anything to me."
Ron pulled a face at the mention of Malfoy's first name, muttering something about 'not trusting'.
Harry was looking down at her, as if he knew something was wrong, "Hermione. Tell us. What happened?"
Hermione only had to take one look at his pleading face and it was enough for everything to come spilling out, but she managed to control herself. She told him about the breaths, but left out the part about the dreams, still wanting to decide for herself what they meant.
"I knew it!" Ron cried triumphantly as she finished her explanation, "well, not in the sense of having the slightest idea, but I knew there was something I didn't know."
Harry was frowning, "You heard a voice?"
"No, it was a breath. It was weird. Like someone was there, although they weren't." Hermione tried to explain, but felt that it was no use.
"I didn't hear anything," Ron replied, "all I heard was Malfoy asking you something and then you were off your chair and on the floor."
"He asked to borrow my pestle."
"Hmmm." Ron said, clearly not convinced.
Hermione sighed, "Look Ron, nothing Draco could say would make me faint, okay?"
"Wait, hold on," Harry said, putting a hand out as if to stop them from talking, "can we go back to this voice thing?"
Hermione sighed, exasperated, "It wasn't a voice! It was someone breathing!"
Ron raised an eyebrow, "Herm, sorry to disappoint you, but it was probably yourself you heard breathing."
"I did not!" She sighed, "it wasn't a human breath. I've never heard anything like that. It didn't sound like anything anyone in the room could've made."
"Are you saying that you heard something that wasn't in the room?" Ron was now looking at her as if she'd gone crazy.
"No! Yes! I dunno. It was just… something." She finished lamely, biting her lip.
Ron rolled his eyes, "Gee, could you vauge that up a little?"
"I don't know what I heard! But I did hear something. You don't think I just go round throwing myself off chairs and fainting for no reason, do you?!"
Harry shrugged, "Well I thought it was something to do with Malfoy. Y'know, I actually saw someone faint the other day when he spoke to them! I mean, it was that painting on the fourth floor but-"
"It's nothing to do with Draco!" Hermione cried, but as she spoke his name she could see the flash of silver in her dream and then his bright silver hair all run through her head at the same time.
"Well what the hell was it then?!" cried Ron, looking at Harry with a dis-believing look.
"I've already told you!" Hermione replied. Sighing, she said, "maybe you should just go now. I'll be let out later; I'll come find you then."
"Are you sure?" Harry asked.
"Positive. I'll see you later."
There were two muttered goodbyes and the boys shuffled out of the room, looking rather like they'd been deflated. Hermione lay back down, closing her eyes and glad that it was all over. She hadn't known quite how to tell them, and maybe leaving out the dream part hadn't been such a good idea.
It wasn't important. It didn't mean anything. It's just that breath…
Hermione tried to shut out every last thought about her dream. Feeling drowsy from the potions side-effects, she slipped back into sleep.
~*~*~
It was coming. She could hear it. It was getting closer; the pounding in her ears getting louder with each step it took. She could see Harry and Ron up ahead, stood close together. Everything was so whirred, the contrasts of their hair merged together and they looked like one person. There was someone else up ahead too. She could just make out his faint outline.
Draco Malfoy.
He was watching her. She took a step towards him and the breath got louder. It was so close now. Draco looked scared. She'd never seen him look like that before. It was strange. She wondered what he was scared about. She wanted to know if she could hear what she could hear.
She stood still; closing her eyes for a second and just listening to the coarse sound as it came sailing closer. All of a sudden, there was a flash of colour out of the corner of her eye. Something was running past her, towards Draco. The breath rushed at her in a roar and she could hear someone scream so loudly…
Hermione was panicking. This was now the second time that day she'd been woken by a dream. Something was definitely wrong. Everything was running through her mind, mixing up her thoughts. From the first dream, to Potions class, to Harry and Ron, to the second dream. And now, to Draco Malfoy.