Chapter 11

For Hermione sleep was as elusive as the mouse that flees the cat. She tossed and turned for what seemed like hours. When her alarm beckoned to her from her world of monster in the closet she felt as if she had only just closed her eyes. She looked outside through blurry eyes to the sight of sunshine dancing through the trees and birds singing merrily.

"Well at least something is energetic this morning." Hermione grumbled before heading off to meet everybody. Luckily for her, she could go through her classes in her sleep. With a few nudges from her partners in class she managed to do an uncharacteristic bare minimum of work.

Were she back home that would've set off alarm bells in Harry's and Ron's head but because she wasn't home she was left to go through the day without any suspicious or prying questions. When Hermione was able to return to her dorms she went straight to bed. She was asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow.

Hermione was walking down a dusty corridor that looked as if it hadn't seen a house elf in decades. Torches dimly lit the hall for as far as she could see until they disappeared around a corner. Portraits lined the wall on either side of her. Hermione was sure she had never been in this part of the castle before. She had a weird feeling about the hall but she just couldn't put her finger on what was wrong.

Hermione drew her wand and set off looking for a door to lead her back to one of the main hallways. As she watched the walls she idly glanced at the portraits to her left and did a double take. She walked closer to the picture, her eyes clouded with disbelief and confusion.

The portrait had two occupants, neither of which was moving. Now Hermione could figure out what was wrong with this hall. All of the portraits were muggle paintings. The portrait immediately in front of her was a picture of her and Remus snuggling with each other on a couch in what she presumed was her common room.

The next painting of was her with all of the Marauders and Lily laughing at some secret joke. Hermione turned around to look at the other wall and saw pictures of her, Ron, and Harry. A small tear slipped down her cheek. Studying the next few pictures Hermione determined that one wall showed her life with Harry and Ron and the other showed her life with the Marauders and Lily.

Hermione knew she had to return to her own time, back to her friends and family. But she had to wonder that if she were given the choice would she really want to leave?

"Of course I would." She quickly admonished herself.

Sure, everything would be different when she got back, but she couldn't give up her life. Lily, James, and Sirius would all be dead and Peter would be a minion of the Dark Lord. Then there was Remus. Remus would be a lot older than her and had always taken on the role as a mentor in her life. It would be so very different.

With that in mind Hermione knew she had to start distancing herself from everyone. With the riddle that was her emotions solved, Hermione started walking with determination. A couple portraits later a door appeared in the middle of the hall. Hermione approached the door with trepidation. She hoped that this hall was like the room of requirement and provided what she needed. She opened the door with her wand out in a ready position and all she saw was red.

It took Hermione's eyes a moment to adjust to the overpowering color. It took yet another moment before it registered that she was crouching on her four poster bed with her wand out in front of her. She turned and looked at the clock and realized that if she wanted a decent amount of time to eat her breakfast she would have to get out of her room quickly.

That day was spent as aloof as possible from all of her friends, especially Remus. She covertly watched Remus throughout the day and saw him become increasingly agitated. She prayed that she wasn't the reason for his discomfort. As Hermione was checking her calendar full realization hit her and she felt stupid for not noticing it sooner. The full moon was that night.

Hermione got caught up in her studies and before she knew it Remus was up and preparing to leave. Hermione gave him a quick hug and kiss before he made his escape. What a great way to start distancing yourself, stupid prat! Hermione chided herself.

Just before sunset Hermione watched as the remaining Marauders traded what they thought were insignificant looks. One by one they slowly started trickling out of the room giving flimsy excuses until finally Sirius was the last to leave. As he passed by Hermione she grabbed his arm.

"Be careful." She whispered

He searched to find out what she knew.

"If you're going to go running about the castle near curfew I just don't want you to get caught and lose us points."

Accepting her explanation he nodded at her and quickly left. Hermione sighed and went over to her window. If it had been any other night she doubted that Sirius would've accepted her lie. Hermione shivered as she heard a howl in the distance. When she checked out her window the full moon was gloriously bright in the night sky and a black blur that she assumed was Sirius was running across the grounds.

Knowing she would need to relax before she went to bed Hermione decided to make a trip down to the kitchen to get some hot chocolate. After being accosted by the house elves that tried to serve her everything they had in the kitchen Hermione headed back towards Gryffindor tower walking warily through the castle. It would not do to be caught out after curfew.

As Hermione neared the hall adjacent to the entrance to the castle she heard a voice. She snuck closer and listened hard. The rule breaker turned out to be Snape and it sounded as if he was headed outside. Hermione debated stopping him, but she knew that this had to happen otherwise she would be changing history. James wouldn't save Snape from Remus and it would change so many things.

As Hermione was about to continue on her way she heard other voices. She cautiously peeked around the corner and saw that Snape was with Malfoy and that both of them were reaching the doors. Hermione had to think fast. As long as there were two of them she couldn't allow this to happen. She would've heard about it if they had actually gone outside which meant something had stopped them.

Snape and Malfoy opened the doors and Hermione's moment to think was gone. She changed into her animagus form and raced after the boys. She narrowly slipped out the fast closing doors and used her heightened senses to lead her to the Slytherins. She knew that the Marauders sometimes roamed through the Forbidden Forest and that if Remus caught their scent there would be big trouble.

Hermione swiftly moved in front of Snape and Malfoy and let a low growl escape her throat. Malfoy had his wand pointed at her and would've cast a spell at her but she was faster. In a single lunge she grabbed both of the Slytherin's wands in her mouth. As soon as she landed she turned back towards both boys. She slowly started shepherding them back towards the school. As neither boy was inclined to run, because they thought she would chase after them, it was very slow moving. All the while Hermione was praying that the Marauders had kept to the shrieking shack that night.

As her luck would have it, there was a rustle in the bushes behind her. As soon as she turned to survey the bushes the boys raced back towards the castle. A werewolf stepped out from behind the bushes, his entourage nowhere to be seen. Hermione risked a glance back at the castle to see where the boys where at and noticed they were about 100 yards away from safety.

At that moment the werewolf lunged around her and ran for the boys. Hermione raced after, her strong short legs quickly catching her up to the werewolf. She pounced onto the werewolf's back causing the both to tumble. They both quickly recovered and started to fight. Hermione tried to warn him off by swiping at his face, hoping he would get the picture and leave.

Hermione's luck failed her for the third time that night as he jumped on her and bit her neck. As they were grappling a blur of black fur raced past her and slammed into the werewolf while a stag lowered its antlers to her, trying to get her to back off.

Hermione slowly got up and started to limp away she made it around Hagrid's hut before collapsing behind a pile of wood that served as her protection. For the first time that night it seemed that her luck was with her in that werewolf bites didn't affect wizards or witches while they are in their animagus forms.

Hermione tiredly cleaned her wounds that she could reach. Now that the adrenaline rush, that had aided her earlier, wore off she was left tired and it was all she could do to hope that she would make it through the night without another creature tracking her through the trail of blood she left behind.

When the sun finally appeared above the horizon Hermione carefully stretched her form out. As soon as she moved she felt a wave of dizziness envelope her. She lay back down for a minute waiting until the dizziness passed. As the pain coursed through her body Hermione lost her grip on her form and once again turned human.

When she looked up the black dog that was Sirius was sitting in front of her and she knew her cover was blown. She also knew that if she were to make it back to the castle before anyone woke up she would need his help.

"Sirius I know it's you. I can't make it back to the castle without your help." She whispered to him as she raised a hand to pet his shaggy head.

The black dog in front of her quickly transformed into Sirius. He must've realized the seriousness of the situation because he didn't ask any questions but silently helped her to stand and get her back to the castle. When they got inside Sirius made to take Hermione to the infirmary but she shook her head no.

When they got to the Gryffindor common room James and Peter were sitting on the couch looking as tired as Hermione felt. Their eye's widened at the state of Hermione's robes and the blood that had dried on her neck. Before anyone could ask any questions Sirius took Hermione to her rooms where she gave him instructions as to where her secret stash of potions where.

Hermione drank a healing draught that quickly mended all of her bites and scratches. Next came a Pepper up Potion that she supplied to all of the boys as she figured it would help them out better than a cup of coffee.

Hermione quickly showered and headed down to breakfast where the boys where waiting to question her.

"Why were you out there?"

"How did you know it was me?"

"How long have you been an animagus?"

"Whoa! You guys I can only answer one question at a time and for heaven's sake don't talk to loud. I was out there because I followed Snape and Malfoy and didn't want them to get hurt. I knew it was you, Sirius, because I am a seer. I've been an animagus since last year. One of my friends was very depressed when someone close to him died so we leaned how to be animagus to keep his mind from dwelling on it."

"Okay there are two things wrong with your story. 1) Why would you care about Malfoy and Snape and 2) Why didn't you ever tell us you were a seer?"

"I was more concerned about how Remus would feel if he knew he attacked a fellow student and I didn't tell you because I didn't want that information to get into the wrong hands."

"You know you can trust us!"

"Yes I know I can but if someone overheard us it could still have gotten around."
"Oh alright."

All the boys were looking at her in a new light but were also looking disappointed that she didn't tell them her secret in the first place.

"Listen, you guys if you're so upset about me not telling you, why didn't you tell me you were animagus."

"Well that's completely different" all the boys clamored to tell her what made their case so special.

Hermione stopped them with a hand "It's alright you guys, but I would really appreciate it if you didn't mention anything that happened to anyone."

"What about Remus?"

"Especially not Remus"

"So you want us to lie to our best friend?"

"No just avoid the subject. Promise me."

"Fine." They all grumbled.

"I'll be holding you to your word."

By the time supper ended that night the Pepper Up Potion had completely worn off leaving Hermione just as exhausted as she had been first thing that morning. Remus still wasn't due back until the next morning so she trudged through the halls from the library towards her rooms.

In her tired state Hermione didn't notice when a shadow detached itself from a nearby statue and started to follow her. When she passed by the next hallway the owner of the shadow reached out and grabbed her mouth before dragging her into a small niche in the wall. A simple Petrificus Totalus and Mobilicorpus later Hermione was floated down the hallways into a classroom where she was unceremoniously dumped onto the floor and the restricting spells undone.

Hermione sat up and used her hair as a shield to try and mask her movements of searching for her wand. A taunting voice from above her made her freeze.

"Looking for this?" Her wand wavered in front her face just out of reach.

Hermione refused to give in to her fears. Before she was able to look up into the face of her captor a strong hand roughly grabbed her chin and forced her to look up into the cold eyes of her tormentor.

A/N: Wow! Time really does slip away. Thanks to my reviewers. I've got over 50 reviews! I do have a one shot out that you can get to by my profile and I would appreciate it if you would read and review both stories! If there are any mistakes leave a review or email me and I'll get it fixed immediately. I promise my next update will be faster.