Chapter 7

Disclaimer: I own nothing of Harry Potter wold.

A/N: Thanks to Thegraylady. Thanks to Lis and Shelly for beta read and to all of you who read and review.

The next morning Hermione woke up to something pulling on her robe. She sleepily shoved it away and drawled, "Crookshanks, get out."

"Eh, miss? Pinky is just wanting to ask miss if she wants to eat her breakfast now or later." The house elf said nervously as it watched a startled Hermione sit up right on her bed. She rubbed her eyes, looking around the room until her eyes rested on the house elf, which was standing, scraping it toe against the stone floor timidly. Then she remembered where she was and what had happened just yesterday. She took a deep breath determined to keep her emotions in control.

She smiled at Pinky and said softly, "Good morning Pinky. I'm sorry, I thought you were my friend, Crookshanks; he likes to do this to me in the morning."

Pinky's eyes lit up. It asked excitedly, "Is Crookshanks house elf? You is friend with house elf, miss?"

"No, he is not house elf." Hermione laughed heartily, "He is a cat; though I do have a friend who is a house elf, his name is Dobby. He works at Hogwarts."

"Oh! Miss has a house elf friend!" Pinky squealed in delight.

Hermione beamed; she thought about her S.P.E.W and wonder how Pinky would reach to the idea.

"Would miss like to take a bath before breakfast?" Asked Pinky after calming down.

"Yes, I think so and can I have it in here?" She added after a thought, she still didn't want to face Voldemort yet.

"Of course miss." Pinky replied eagerly then add, "Master said while he is away miss could go to the library or take a walk in the garden but miss must not go out or roaming the manor, he said it is dangerous." The house elf finished wearing a serious expression on its face.

Hermione frowned. She inquired thoughtfully, "You mean Voldemort is not here?"

"No miss, master went out since dawn. He told Pinky to take care of miss." The house elf said proudly.

Hermione nodded slowly, still deep in thought. She told Pinky to bring her breakfast up and slowly walked out of bed to the bathroom.

Lying in a bathtub filled with warm water, she relaxed her muscle and let her thoughts wander.

She was both glad and disappointed Voldemort was away. It was nice to not having to face him in a short period; she could take her time to sort things out before she made up her mind. On the other hand, she was frustrated as to what were his motives. As long as she didn't know what his motives were she couldn't think properly and feared that her decision would cause her to regret when she was back to her normal life- she snorted derisively at the idea- as if she would have her life back to normal. Well let's just say when she was back to Hogwart.

Hermione got out of the bathtub. She walked to a mirror, which was hanging on the bathroom wall, pleased that it was a muggle one she didn't want to deal with any comments in her current stat now.

She shook her head making her wet curly hair flying unruly on her bare shoulder. She looked at her reflection in the mirror, absentmindedly searching her face. Was there anything that resembled her to Voldemort? She could find nothing, but was the man she met yesterday was the one who with her mother? Harry had told her that Voldemort had used his blood, Warmtail's hand and Voldemort's own father's bone to reborn himself at the end of their fourth year, so it didn't leave much of him to remind himself of his former body.

Hermione sighed; she dried herself and put on a robe- a plain, dark green one. She had tried to find some jeans and a T-shirt or at least something less formal in the wardrobe but was fruitless. There were hundreds of dresses and robes in every fashion but none of them were of Hermione's liking. She finally chose the one she was now wearing which seem to look less fanciful. She didn't use a drying spell on her hair. She just wiped it with a towel and let it fell freely on her back.

When she returned to her bed room, there was already a tray of food and drink on her bed side table still steaming; Hermione suspected that Pinky had put a spell on it to make it warm to eat whenever you wanted.

After she finished her breakfast, Hermione made her way to the library. She was so excited to read all the books in there that she doubted even Hogwart's library had in possession.

Hermione searched through the library animatedly and discovered thousands of old books of many kinds of magic: the Dark arts, Potions, Transfiguration, Charms, magical creatures and plants, History and- surprised to see some of the books were of Muggle literature. Hermione stood still. She gazed at the books in awe, trying to decide which book should be read first. She ended up reading an old book with a thousand pages, which described how the first magic was discovered.



Severus Snape, the Potions Master of Hogwarts, was found sitting alone in his personal chamber after a hard day of digging up information from his deatheater peers.

He sat deliberately sipping his fire whiskey while he considered on the information he had gathered.

He had already reported his day to Dumbledore but it seemed that all the other deatheaters were as confused in Voldemort's actions as was Snape.

The potions master drained his glass and refilled it with another shot of fire whiskey. His thought started to wander off the matter at hand.

For almost twenty years he had been a teacher at Hogwarts (and a spy, he added in his thought wryly), he was not enjoying the teaching nor the children who were all seemed to be dunderheads.

Everyone who knew him could always tell that Severus Snape was a great potions master and also an academic man. Besides his obsession with the dark arts, Severus Snape had an immense devotion to potions. He knew the art of brewing a perfect potion and could brew almost every kind of potions that existed (he had even created some himself).

The problem that caused him to deeply hate his classes was that he always had to teach students who knew nothing of potions and considered it to be just liked cooking, in which you just mixed things up and stirred then wait for it to boiled or simmered and then tested it. The only difference that his students could think of was that testing potions could be grant you a life or death result; otherwise they didn't care.

The potion master looked at his glass, his thoughts were wandering deeper and deeper into his cold stone heart.

For the first time in almost twenty years, he had just met a student who seemed to challenge with his knowledge and knew the true art of potions brewing, but why did it have to be a Gryffindor know-it-all? Why did it have to be one of the bloody Harry boy-who-lives potter's friends? Why could it not be one of the pupils from his own house? Then he could challenge her with hard tasks and praise her when she successfully completed the tasks.

'Oh no need to feel sorry or jealous,' Said a voice that Snape knew too well belonged to his long-dead innocent spirit which sometimes tried to tease him with his stupid thoughts. The voice went on, 'The girl may be dead by now.'

"Shut up!" He shouted furiously.

He knew the voice might be right but he had to do some thing, he had to find a way to help the girl. She may be an annoying know-it-all, but she was a good student with a promising future in academic world. She was a friend of the bloody Harry Potter, true, but she was a brilliant mind who may held the wizarding future in her hand just like her other two friends.

'No, We can't lose her. She maybe the key, well, one of the keys. Consider her role in the golden trio- she is an important key to Voldemort's downfall in the near future.' Mused Snape as he made his decision to help the girl. Though, he didn't know how right he was when his left arm started burning agonizingly.

He grinded his teeth as he made his way to his bed chamber, grabbing his deatheater robe and mask he threw a hand full of Floo powder into the fireplace and said, "Head master office!"



A/N: How was it?