Disclaimer: I don't own any thing Harry Potter, nope, all belongs to J.K.Rowling.
Hermoine woke up early that morning with the memories from the previous night flooding back to her. She looked around at her surroundings surprised to find that she was in her own bed, with most of her clothes off except for her shirt and skirt, and not on the floor of the Owlery. Looking at the clock she knew she only had a few minutes until she would completely miss breakfast. She moved to get up in order to change but was thrown back to the bed as pain coursed through her body from the tender areas from her beating. As she slowly got up and moved around the room, Hermoine realized she would probably miss breakfast that morning.
After 15 minutes, Hermoine had carefully dressed and packed her bag with books for the day. She started to make her way to her first class , which happened to be Potions, so she didn't want to be late. Hermoine arrived down in the dungeons just as everyone else started down. Harry and Ron came up on either side of her.
"Hey Hermoine, where were you at breakfast today?" Ron questioned.
"I overslept," she explained truthfully, just not explaining why.
Harry glanced over at Hermoine noticing her cut lip and wondering how it came to be. He made a note to mention it later to her when they were alone.
Ron slung his arm over her shoulders and she winced, trying to hold back tears from the pain. Lucky for her Malfoy was standing at the door to the dungeons as the trio approached.
"What's the matter Granger, it looks like your going to cry. Did your Golden Boy boyfriend Potter dump you? Or was it Weasley? Or did you just realized how much of a filthy mudblood you really are."
"That's it Malfoy," Ron threatened, taking his arm off of Hermoine and reaching for his wand. He pointed it directly at Malfoy's chest and watched as he just stood there amused at his attempt to defend his friend.
"You know what Weasley? Why don't you let Granger stand up for herself. She's a big girl isn't she?" Malfoy pulled out his wand and pointed it at Hermoine. "What do you say mudblood. How about a little pre-class duel."
"I'm not going to bring myself to your level Malfoy. I don't need to fight to know that I'm a better at magic then you'll ever be."
Malfoy's ears turned a bright shade of red and steam literally almost came out of his ears. Every which way people backed away afraid of what might happen when he exploded. With lightening fast speed Malfoy had yelled a curse at Hermoine and she was on the floor, doubled over in pain. Gryffindors around circled her as Snape made his way through the corridor .
"What is going on out here?" He said in his sinister voice.
"Allow me to explain Professor," Malfoy said as nicely as he possibly could manage. "Granger challenged me to a duel. I didn't want to but when she went to curse me, I had no choice but to defend myself. Honest sir."
"That's not what happened!"
"Quiet Potter," Snape said as he turned to face the crowd around Hermoine. "That's 20 points from Gryffindor for fighting and 5 more for Mr. Potter's lip. Now everyone, get inside, class has started and I don't need to take anymore points for tardiness." With a loud groan everyone started to make their way inside to the classroom.
"Hermoine, what happened?" Harry asked. "The spell Malfoy used was only a simple one, it shouldn't have effected you like that."
"Nothing happened Harry. It must have just caught me off guard."
"But Hermoine, you knew something was coming, didn't you. And besides it looked like you we in a lot of pain when you on the ground. I'm sure he didn't just catch you off guard. What's wrong?"
"Nothing is wrong Ron! Now let's go to class before Snape takes even more points from us." Hermoine led the two inside while they gave each other worried yet questioning looks.
Harry wanted to talk to Hermoine more about what had happened, but Snape being like he is, separated everyone up into partners to work on a potion. Harry had been stuck with Pansy Parkinson, Ron with Lavender Brown, and Hermoine with none other then Malfoy. He decided that it would have to wait until they were alone.
Hermoine sat at a desk making a sleeping potion with Malfoy. Neither had made an attempt to speak to each other since the incident outside. Both cut away at the pieces of root that they needed for the potion pretending that they had not been partnered together.
"Hurt you much mudblood?" Malfoy whispered as he leaned in towards her.
"No," she replied filling disgusted that he was getting closer to her then she would ever want.
"You know what? I'm not completely sure I believe you. I mean I know it was only a simple spell that I used, but, what? With the beating you took last night, I'm surprised you weren't in more pain then you were."
Hermoine glanced at Malfoy alarmed and wide-eyed. But before she could say anything else, Snape announced that that was it for the day and to pack up the potions carefully and that they would be working on the same potion for the next couple of lessons.
As Hermoine got up to leave after everything had been cleaned up, Malfoy grabbed her arm and pulled her towards him.
"Remember, stay out of business that isn't your own, or you'll regret you ever lived."
"Is that a threat Malfoy?"
"Actually it is."
Hermoine ripped her arm free with much force regretting she had been so rough when pain shot through her body. She walked over to where Harry and Ron had just finished packing up and the three of them left, making their way to their next class, Care of Magical Creatures, where Harry hoped to get a word in with Hermoine.
To Harry's displeasure the class Hagrid had planned for the day had involved a lot of work, mostly physical, in which everyone was separated and worked alone. The lesson involved cleaning and taking care of Slugnuts. Harry found them to be quite hideous. Their dog like features were the most attractive feature they had. The scales and wings on it's back we a deep ugly shade of greenish brown. It had talons on each, so to say paw, that dug into you every time you tried to give it a bath. It's fangs were said to be filed down as to not hurt anyone in case bitten but Harry wasn't sure that would stop them from puncturing the skin.
Every once in a while Harry would take a glance away, careful not to look too long incase his Slugnut got any ideas, to look at Hermoine. He noticed her struggling with her Slugnut, not able to perform the task of the day, to bath and groom their own Slugnut. She kept having to stop for a few minutes holding her side as if she was in pain. Harry wasn't the only one who noticed something wrong with Hermoine. He had seen Hagrid walk over to Hermoine and ask her what was wrong, that he had never seen her have as much trouble as she was having today. Hermoine's answer was a quite clear and loud "Nothing!"
After the lesson, the trio made their way up to the castle for lunch. After they had eaten, everyone went their separate ways, Hermoine to Ancient Runes, and Harry and Ron to Divination. Dinner was uneventful as everyone chatted about their day, the current news, and Quidditch tryouts coming up. Hermoine left early to get a head start on some homework. Truth be told, Hermoine just needed sometime alone to think about recent events.
When the others arrived at the common room, Hermoine was sitting on a ledge looking out at the Dark Forest through a window. She heard Ron challenge Harry to a game of wizard's chess and Harry responded saying that he would be there in a few minutes. He approached Hermoine and sat down on the other side of the ledge.
"They're actually quite interesting creatures, thestrals. They're kind of scary, but beautiful at the same time," Hermoine inquired. "What'd you want to talk about Harry?"
"I just…I'm just…we're just worried about you Hermoine. We know something is wrong, but you won't tell us. We want you to try to open up to us. We're your best friends and we want you to know we're there for you, all the time. I don't want you to be afraid to talk to us."
"I know I can talk to you but I just can't right now."
"But Hermoine, you need to. Something doesn't feel right and I need to know your okay, and you telling me so isn't going to do it. I need you to prove it to me. Besides I noticed your lip earlier and I know something happened."
Hermoine finally turned her attention from the window to Harry, looking him right in the eyes with a disbelieving look. She started to become agitated with Harry's persistence and her anger started to grow.
"And how do you want me to prove it to you Harry? How am I going to prove to you that I'm okay? I can't believe you don't trust me," she said exasperated, turning her attention back to the window.
"It's not that I don't trust you Hermoine. It's just that I know something is wrong, you just won't tell me what it is," Harry pleaded.
"If you trust me Harry then when I say I'm okay and nothing's wrong you should just leave it at that and drop it." With that Hermoine got up from her spot and ran up to her room leaving Harry even more worried and desperate to find out what's going on with her.
A/N: I know that the first three chapters kind of, no Really with a capital R, sucked, but I'm hoping that this chapter will make up for that. My writing wasn't great at first but now that I'm not distracted as much I'm hoping it's better. Thanks to everyone that's reading, I should be updating more, I hope, and more often. Thank you Arabella Minerva for the review. I hope this is long enough, lol, I like to write more but haven't had the time. I really do love your story, if you update more then so will I, lol. P.S. If anyone thinks this story is any good I have another story, Secrets , that you may enjoy, who knows it might be better then this one.