Hermione sighed, smiling and looked around the room her stomach fluttering with excitement. She walked towards one of the potion cabinets and tentatively held up the pendant again. The glass door opened, revealing a mixture of carefully labeled bottles and jars, ones just bearing one letter and some with nothing on them at all. She picked some of them up, studying them carefully and reading the labeled ones out loud to herself. She made several shrewd guesses at to what the unlabeled ones could be. After good long while of browsing the cabinets she became inspired and decided to knock up a quick potion. She was going to make a claming balm, that would help both her self and her friends get through the exams, without getting so stressed out.
Gathering all the ingredients together she found a cauldron and conjured up a magical fire, then proceeded to make the potion as carefully and as meticulously as Severus him self would have done. Once finished she bottled the glistening green potion and cleaned up. Sliding the bottle into her bag, she took one last look around to check she had left everything the way she had found it. She sighed sadly at the vacant chair in front of the dark mahogany desk, staring for a while, trying to picture Severus in it. Then pulling herself together, she looked away and opened the door, walking out into the corridor once more.
A group of people were hanging around, talking and laughing loudly down the hall, Hermione recognised Malfoy as one of them straight away. Malfoy looked in her direction and not wanting another confrontation, she walked quickly, back towards the magical stairway's area. She had intended to go back to the common room, suddenly she changed her mind. She didn't feel like she wanted to be with anyone just now, she really just wanted to be alone with her thoughts. She wandered slowly thinking where she could go, then she remembered the lake and how lovely it was to sit beside it at this time of year and headed determinedly, towards the outer doors.
Once out in the fresh air Hermione breathed in deeply, holding her head back and closing her eyes, feeling the still hot sunshine on her face and a light breeze blowing her hair gently. Then, bringing her head forwards again and opening her eyes, she began to walk down towards the lake.
When she got there though, she found to her dismay, that many other people had already got the same idea and were sitting in groups or on their own, eating, drinking, talking or working. She decided to walk along the shore a bit, to find somewhere quieter. The going got a bit rougher further along, all gorse bushes and thorny weeds, but soon she spotted a beach in the distance, which looked perfect. It took her around ten minutes to reach it, which wouldn't leave her much time to relax, as dinner would be served in about an hours time, but she kept on going anyway.
Once she reached her destination, she smiled, it had been worth it. This beach captured the full afternoon sun and was covered in soft grey sand, she took off her shoes, it felt wonderful on her bare feet. She sat down, her legs bent up in front of her and leaning forward, put her arms around then, her chin resting on her knees. Now she was alone, she allowed thoughts of Severus to flow unabated through her head, letting her tears fall freely. She tried to sort out how she truly felt about him, she didn't know if they had a future but they most definitely had a great now. She had never seen him smile for, or at, anyone before she had come into his life, now every time they had been together he had smiled even if only briefly. So she must make him happy, it was worth them being together just for that. Now all she needed was for him to come home, so they could sort it out.
She sighed sadly again, but felt that a lie in the sun for a while might make her feel better. Putting her wand down by the side of her, which had been tucked into the waistband of her skirt, she began to unbutton her shirt. Then, looking around and making sure no one else could see, which she saw they couldn't, slid the shirt off her shoulders, so she was just in her bra. The warm sun on the now bare skin of her arms and shoulders felt wonderful, but she didn't quite have the courage to take off her skirt as well. She carefully lifted the rather heavy pendant off from round her neck and tucked it into her bag safely and after transfiguring her shirt into a towel, she lay back with her legs bent up, allowing her knee length skirt to slide back towards her thighs a little. Soon she began to drift off into a daydream about what it would be like between her and Severus once he returned, which she felt certain he would; he would declare his undying love for her and tell her what a fool he had been and would never leave her again. She sent out a message into the void, asking for her lover to be sent home soon, preferably unscathed and for whatever was keeping him from doing so, to cease immediately.
She had lain there for an indeterminate length of time, snoozing, when she shivered, she felt cold suddenly which roused her from her sleep. Thinking the sun had just gone in behind some clouds and that maybe now was the time to make a move anyway, she opened her eyes. Instead of clouds, though, she saw the grinning faces of Malfoy and his gang. Wham! the shock of seeing them hit her, her stomach leapt into her mouth and her hand instinctively reached for her wand. Malfoy grinned as her hand found nothing but sand, it was then she began to panic.
"Where's my wand?" she asked, in a little higher pitch than she intended
"Don't you worry about that, we're keeping it safe for you" Malfoy answered, in a sarcastic impression of a comforting tone; his friends laughed.
Hermione felt extremely worried; how the hell did he creep up on me like that, without me knowing? she thought, not realising that she had been asleep. Then she wondered what he was going to do, she guessed, by the now triumphantly malevolent look on his face, that it wasn't going to be pleasant, whatever it was. She was beginning to regret coming to such an out of the way place, realising now how vulnerable it had left her.
Well I wouldn't have been vulnerable if I had had the good sense to keep my wand in my hand, instead of putting it down just anywhere! She berated her self bitterly.
"What do you want ferret boy?" Hermione said trying to sound as if his presence wasn't worrying her in the least. She began sitting up, trying to cover up her chest as best she could with her arms."Oooh!" Malfoy said, laughing, looking around at his friends, "That's not very nice is it? But isn't that just getting a little old Granger?"
"No!" came her simple reply
His smile disappeared and he pursed his lips slightly, his eyes narrowed.
"Well boys, I think we'll have to teach her a lesson in politeness don't you? We need to show her that she ought to be much more respectful towards her superiors!"
Before Hermione could scoff at that statement and after a nod from Malfoy all four boys knelt down beside her.
"You lot hold her arms and legs, she can be a vicious little bitch with those fists.
Hermiones eyes widened in alarm and her heart felt as if it was beating out of her chest. Was he going to do what she thought he was going to do? Surely not even slimy Malfoy would stoop that low! Then she remembered his father and realised that maybe he would. She tried to get away, but still groggy from sleep, she didn't move quickly enough and Malfoy's friend's easily grabbed hold of her wrists and ankles tightly, pressing them into the ground.
She squealed as Malfoy placed himself, kneeling, between her legs, after pushing them aside; his friends straining a little, with the effort it took to hold on to her struggling limbs.
"After our little conversation a few weeks ago, I owled my father and I told him what you said, I wanted to know if there was any truth in it" Malfoy told her leaning forward so that he looked directly into her eyes. "He owl'd me straight back, he told me all about his little interlude with you in Professor Snape's office and how protective Snape was of you. So, now I know that all those dirty rumours about you are true, you have been seeing him!" he sneered, "He also said, that if I wanted to finish what he started, he knew a really good spell to help me'. A nice little memory charm, that makes you go to sleep for a while, then you wake up thinking you've just had a bad dream! It means I can do whatever I want and not worry about the consequences. You're always telling me how weak I am Granger, so who's the weak one now?" He sniggered, stroking his hands over her breasts, then squeezing them
"You're sick Malfoy, your whole family is sick! What sort of father is he? That tells his son he can do whatever he likes to people, just because they're not pure bred! He's not right in the head!" Hermione retorted
"Don't you dare talk like that about my father, Mudblood!" Draco snarled, "I'll show you how to have more respect, I'll show you the only thing girls like you are good for!"
Hermione tried to scream, but Malfoy was too quick for her, putting one hand over her mouth and pointing his wand at her neck with the other. He uttered a spell, "Silentium!" Feeling a tightening in her throat, she now knew it was hopeless to try and call for help, as her voice box had been disabled. She thought desperately for something she could do, but could think of nothing, she couldn't do wand-less magic like Harry, that she knew of and wasn't strong enough to take on four large fully grown boys alone. She felt helpless and humiliated.
Malfoy seeing her distress began grinning again, looking around at his friends
"Go on Draco, do her!" one of them goaded him
"Yeah! Do her Draco!" said another, then the last of the three goons, started up a chant, the others joined in with
"Do her! Do her!"
This chant seemed to be the final catalyst, that gave Malfoy the courage to do what he'd most likely, previously only boasted to them he could do. He slid his hands up her thighs and under her skirt, Hermione panicking at this intimate touch, bucked wildly against the restraining grip of the other boy's hands, making a last ditch attempt at escape, to no avail. He gripped both sides of her underwear and pulled them roughly off down her legs, throwing them behind him, then lay over the top of her so she could feel his erection bulging under his trousers, pushing against her pubic bone. She couldn't help it, even though she had tried very hard not to, she began to cry, the silent tears falling down each side of her face into her hair.
Malfoy noticed this
"Ohh..don't cry darling!" he said to her, as if talking to a baby, "this will hurt you a lot more than it hurts me!" then he laughed cruelly
She felt him reaching down to undo his trousers and opened her mouth in a scream, even though she knew no sound would come out. She hoped against hope that the spell would wear off quickly and that if she could just keep on screaming she might get a sound out before they could put the silencing spell back on her again.
Suddenly, through the sounds of Malfoy's friends sniggering and lewd comments, a voice could be heard shouting in the distance, the sound of that voice sent a wave of relief coursing through Hermione, making her stop struggling and strain to hear. Malfoy had also heard the voice and was looking up, holding his hand out, to quieten the other boys.
The voice shouted again, "Hermione? Hermione? Oh, where are you?" Hermione knew at once, it was Ginny
"Shit!" Malfoy said angrily, leaning up. "Quick! Let's get out of here!" he motioned his head at his friends and they all let go of Hermione and began to stand. They started for the cover of the trees, still dark under the canopies even in the bright sunshine. Malfoy lingered, a little longer, looking malevolently at Hermione. Now she was no longer restrained, she started to get up, but Draco had other ideas. He pulled back his hand and punched her in the face with such a ferocity it sent her flying.
"Now we're even!" he said, as he got up him self, then he looked in the direction where Ginny was now coming into view. He sprinted towards the cover of the trees to join his friends.
As soon as they had gone Hermione felt the silencing spell lift from her throat and though in great pain, her head spinning she managed to cry out hoarsely
"Accio wand!"
Her wand flew out from somewhere between the trees, making whoever had been holding it, give out a surprised cry. She heard shouts and rustling as the boys made off through the forest and tried to get up wanting to hex them within an inch of their lives, but finding that her legs were so weak and shaky they wouldn't carry her. So on all fours she pointed her wand in between the trees, in what she felt was the right direction and feeling that her voice was now fully back to normal, she shouted "Petrificus totalus!" then collapsed onto the sand.
Ginny had now reached her
"Hermione! What happened?" she asked, panic stricken at the sight of her friend in such a state, "Was that Malfoy I just saw running off?" she knelt down next to hermione, looking concerned and putting a comforting hand on her back. Hermione nodded
"How did you know I was here?" Hermione said weakly, as she turned from all fours to a sitting position, wincing from the pain.
After gasping at Hermiones fast swelling eye and touching it softly she explained "You didn't turn up for dinner and I was worried so I went to look for you. When I couldn't find you I thought that maybe you'd taken off to try and find professor Snape or something! Then I just asked around to see if anyone had seen you and someone said they'd seen you going round to the far end of the lake. So I thought maybe you'd fallen asleep in the sun or something! The boys weren't that far behind me, they should be here any minute. What happened?"
Hermione reached up to feel her now swollen cheek, it was sticky and she pulled her hand away to look at her fingers. They had blood on them, she surmised he had hit he with the hand he wore his silver Slytherin ring on and it had caught her skin cutting her.
Hermione's head was clearing but she had also begun shaking violently and as well as her face, her wrists and ankles ached where they had been gripped so hard.
"It was Malfoy and his gang, he was going to exact his revenge on me, in a way he knew would hurt me the most, if you hadn't turned up when you did!" she said bitterly, tears falling down her face.
Ginny looked at her friend, her eyes widened with shock.
"You mean he was going to..!" she started and Hermione nodded, getting her meaning
"Oh! By Merlin! I knew he was a slimy bastard and I'd heard a few rumours, about him being a bit pushy with girls, but I didn't know he was capable of that!" Ginny said, then she looked towards the forest and looked torn between staying with her friend and running into it to look for Malfoy
Seeing her friend looking, Hermione warned "They'll be long gone by now! Who knows where they've gone, hopefully something in there will get them and I hope that it's something really painful!" she said angrily
"We'd better go and tell Dumbledore' Ginny said helping her friend up
Hermione pointed her wand at the towel still on the ground and immediately changed it back into her school shirt again. She put it on and buttoned it up, also going to retrive her underwear, but thinking better of it.
"He's had his hands on them" she explained as the offending item went up in flames after a quick incendiary spell.
Then she turned as she heard the voices of Harry and Ron shouting her name.
"Hermione, are you okay? Harry said as he and Ron approached
"Who did that?" he asked angrily,on seeing her cut and bruised face
"Malfoy!" answered Ginny for her, "and that's not all, he was going to rape her too" she informed him
"WHAT!" both Harry and Ron bellowed together, they both went red
"I'm going kill him with my bare hands!" Harry said through gritted teeth
"Only after I've castrated him first!" said Ron, equally angrily
"You'll have to get in line boys! Ginny said, "but I think he's long gone, he went off into the forest, over there.
Harry and Ron both ran off in the direction that Ginny had indicated, anyway, oviously thinking they could still catch up with the Slytherin gang.
"Well, I hope they do catch them! I'd hate to be Malfoy if they do!" Ginny said watching them go, then turning back to her friend, "Come on, lets go back to the school," but on seeing Hermione wince with pain and gingerly touch her face as she moved, she bit her lip wincing her self in sympathy.
"If you like, I can try to heal it for you. I've been practicing with Madame Pomfrey, she says I'm not bad!" Ginny offered. Lately she had been volunteering with the old medi-witch, as she herself wanted to train to be one on leaving school.
Hermione knew that her friends' intuitiveness and skill with her wand, would mean she would probably do a good job, so she nodded her agreement.
Ginny concentrated, saying several spells under her breath and waving her wand over the affected area. Very soon, the swelling around Hermione's eye had lessened so much, that she could now see out of it again and the pain was much more bearable. Ginny also healed the cut on her cheek, closing it up neatly.
Suddenly they saw the Harry and Ron reappear, they seemed to be struggling a little dragging something behind them. Whatever it was, was making strangled cries of pain. Somehow they'd managed to capture Malfoy.
Harry had obviously tired of dragging and with Ron's help lifted Malfoy high in the air. The two friends began walking him over to where the girls stood, pulling Draco along with them like a human kite.
They dumped him unceremoniously on the ground, at Ginny and Hermione's feet. He didn't look quite so cocky now, but he still curled his lips into a sullen snarl, when Hermione looked at him. She gave him a look of extreme disgust and hatred.
"We found him just over there, he hadn't got very far. Did one of you girls throw an impediment spell at him? The face on him when he saw us! Looked like he was going to wet his pants!" Harry said angrily
"Well all we have to decide now is what we're going to do with him!" Ginny said suggestively, looking in the direction of the still prone form of Malfoy
Hermione knew exactly what she was going to do. Before any of the others could decide, she walked right up to him, her wand out in front of her. Malfoy looked distinctly worried as he saw the look on her face and began to plead pathetically
"Hermione, what are you going to do? It was only a joke! I wasn't really going to do anything to you!"
Hermione snorted incredulously, "What about this?" she asked pointing to her face
"Oh that? My..my hand slipped, I was just going to help you up that's all!"
Hermione shook her head, the others just stood around watching, allowing Hermione her moment.
"You, Malfoy, are scum!" Tears were beginning to form in her eyes again, "but do you know? As angry as I am, I still can't attack you unarmed!" then she shouted "re-animate!" this broke the binding spell on Draco. He got up, grabbing his wand out of his pocket.
But before he could even utter a spell, Hermione pointed her wand at him and uttered, "Nudo!" Immediately Draco was left naked, his clothes lying all around him. He looked down at himself in shock, plunging his hand's down-wards to try and cover himself
The others looked at each other smirking, waiting to see what she would do next.
"I could do more, but I unlike you, only attack people when it is absolutely necessary and not just for the fun of it!" she snapped, looking directly into his cold grey eyes, "but I think it is you, not me, who needs a lesson in humility! Harry, Ron; tie his hands behind his back! I think it's time we took him to Dumbledore!"
Harry and Ron effortlessly pulled Draco's protesting hands behind his back, binding them together with a spell.
"Are you just going to leave him like that?" Ron asked, "I mean I know it's it doesn't bother us, but what if there was some of the younger girls watching? You don't want his bits flapping around in the wind in front of them do you?"
Hermione thought, "No, I suppose not, I had better cover him up a little," then she smirked and pointed her wand at the nearby trees. She called some leaves down and used a sticking charm to make a sort of sporran shape over his privates. "I think that will be adequate" she said maliciously, looking Draco in the eye again. Then as a finishing touch she transfigured a spare quill into a dog's lead from her bag and fastened it around his neck, holding onto the end "just in case you try and make a run for it!" she told him
So pushing and shoving, their prisoner, they made their way to Dumbledore, making as much noise as possible, in order to purposely draw attention to themselves. Everyone who saw them pointed and laughed and many came over to ask what they were doing. They merely told them that they had found him like that in the woods and couldn't unbind his wrists the spell was too strong, so they were taking him to dumbledore. Not one person however, offered to try to help him or to cover him up.
"Not very popular are you?" Hermione sneered at Draco, turning round
Draco stood still, to sneer back, but after a thump in the back from Ron he got moving again
Humiliating Draco, may have been petty and childish, but it certainly made her feel a whole lot better and Hermione held her head up steadfastly, even though she was still shaken by her ordeal, as they made their way up to the school.