Hermione had spent a great deal of time imagining how the final battle would be. She liked to exhaust all avenues of possibility, even if it was just within the confines of her imagination. The final scenario would be Harry and Voldemort in the middle and the order and the death eaters surrounding them, trying to get closer and/or fend off people from reaching that center. When Hermione made it to the top of the knoll, the field between the lake and the castle came into view; she felt a small jolt of satisfaction somewhere deep within to see that she had, more or less, been right. Harry and Dumbledore stood side by side closest to Hogwarts. Harry was firing spells and Dumbledore just stood, waiting. He must have been casting some sort of shielding charm because no spell could touch him. She saw Severus moving toward them and the air around Harry and Dumbledore glimmered as Snape passed through.

Voldemort, upon seeing Snape, raised one hand and the death eaters ceased their movement. Dumbledore nodded and the order members did the same. Hermione had thought, however, that this would have happened not during the summer months but at school when Voldemort could hurt the most people but the only students were Harry, Hermione, Ron, and Ginny. She imagined, though, that Draco was in there somewhere, sneering behind his uniform silver mask.

"Severus, how you've disappointed me," Voldemort said into the early morning. There was still dew on the grass though the lake was beginning to steam with heat. This wouldn't be a pleasant day. "I knew you were working for both sides but I had such hopes that you would choose us in the end."

Snape merely nodded his head toward Dumbledore, as if to say the choice was obvious.

"I will take great delight in murdering you," Voldemort continued. Severus shrugged, uninterestedly.

"Tom, you are not here about Severus," Dumbledore said, resting his bony hands on Harry's shoulders. "You've come for Harry, have you not?"

Hermione could feel the tears rise in her throat as Dumbledore gave Harry up to his destiny. She moved silently down the hill toward the group.

"Potter's time will come soon enough," Voldemort said. His red eyes turned and focused on Hermione who was now only a few feet behind Severus, having woven herself between aurors to get to him. "Oh, Severus, is this the reason you betrayed me so? She's not even pretty, is she?" Harry glared and pushed up against the shielding charm.

"Let me out," he said, his voice deep. Dumbledore looked at him – they locked eyes for what seemed like long minutes. Finally, Dumbledore nodded and lowered the charm for Harry to exit. He stepped out, Hermione stepped in. Harry walked bravely up to Voldemort. The dark lord leaned down and said something softly, something only Harry could hear. Harry nodded, once, as if it pained him to agree with such a monster. They both raised their wands and disappeared. Hermione screamed.

"Miss Granger, this is not our fight to fight," Dumbledore said, resting his hand on her shoulder. His voice silenced her. "This is a battle, yes, but for two men, not an army." With that, the shield was dropped and he turned to walk inside. The death eaters, realizing that without Voldemort there was no fight, began to flee toward the forbidden forest. The aurors leapt to action and started stunning them. Hermione, still crying, let herself be led to safety by Snape who left her in the Great Hall to go to the headmaster's office.

oooo

Seven days passed before Harry returned and in those days was a heavy, dire silence. Whatever level of comfort Hermione had achieved for herself in the castled plummeted surly back to zero. She felt like a defeated first year, tiptoeing around corners, losing her way, forgetting to eat, losing herself in books so she didn't have to face reality alone like this. She did not go see Severus.

Though, Severus did not come to see her, either. In fact, no one went to see anyone really. It was as if everyone was holding their breath until Harry (or some part of him) returned. Everyone spoke in muted whispers; Hermione took her meals in her room. Madame Pomfrey had patched everyone up and those who had been cursed more severely were at St. Mungo's. The castle was unharmed. Hermione always imagined that there would be more to do afterwards, more pieces to pick up but no one really knew what had happened.

On the fifth day, Hermione in her old grey sweater again and a pair of running shorts – barefoot – was making her way toward the kitchens at nearly four in the morning from her rooms when she heard Snape's voice down the hall.

"Nothing yet, headmaster," he was saying. "I believe I will know if and when something fatal happens."

"They are still fighting, then," This was Dumbledore, sounding his age. Hermione had paused just around the corner and held her breath until she heard their footsteps receding. No longer hungry, she returned to her rooms.

oooo

Hermione went to breakfast on the seventh day. She received an owl from Professor McGonagall that stated, while not openly, that if she didn't start leaving her room, someone would come and drag her out. That was the gist, anyway. She put on the same clothes she'd been wearing for the last few days, a t-shirt that she'd spilled pumpkin juice on, the stain still visible, and her blue jeans with the holes in the knees, and her grey sweater which seriously needed a wash. She sprayed some lavender perfume over herself (a subtle fragrance, not like the eye-watering perfume Lavender herself wore) and found her shoes and went to the great hall for breakfast.

It was quiet. Generally, during holidays, there would be only one or two tables set up and the faculty and students would eat their meals together. However, the Great hall was set up as it would be during the school year and so Hermione nodded to the professors sitting at the high table and sat alone at the far end of the Gryffindor table. She ate a bowl of oatmeal and a corner of toast. The Daily Prophet came and so she set about doing the crossword puzzle (the letters fell off the page if she wrote the wrong word, it was rather convenient) while she finished her Pumpkin juice. Her hair was long enough to pull back now and so she had, but pieces of it still fell out of her tiny ponytail and obstructed her view.

She jumped when Hagrid burst into the Great hall and it took her valuable seconds to realize what he head in his arms.

"Harry!" she screamed, recognizing his form before her mind had even fully processed the situation. She stood and met Hagrid in the middle of the room. The professors rushed down.

"Is he alive?" asked Dumbledore, because it had to be asked. Hagrid just nodded, his face covered with tears. There was a flurry of activity and Hermione was pushed to the back of the crowd. They took him to the infirmary and Hermione just watched him disappear. Did it mean that Voldemort was defeated? Why hadn't Snape said anything? She looked up to his seat at the high table but he was already gone.

Harry wouldn't talk about what happened when he woke up. Not to Hermione or Dumbledore or even Ron, who gone home with his sister earlier in the week but came back when Hermione owled.

"Voldemort is gone, isn't that what you wanted?" Harry said to them, pushing his way out of the bed and pulling on his robe, angrily. "It's done." And so they'd left him alone.

After dinner, she went to his rooms and knocked. It took him awhile to come to the portrait but he answered looking tired and looking like he'd been crying.

"What is it, Hermione?" he asked.

"I know you've been through a lot Harry, but my parents are still in that house and you are the only one who can release the charm," she said, whispered, apologetically. It was late, and the days were getting shorter. The hall was lit by a few sporadic sconces but neither bothered to light their wand. Harry's eyes widened.

"Oy, I forgot!" he said, stepping back to let her in. "Sorry, Hermione!"

"It's okay," She said, and watched him write an address on a piece of paper.

"Here you go," he said. "Now that you know, you can floo there, too." She hugged him (rather impulsively because Hermione, an only child, had always been very protective of her personal space and always very respectful of the personal space of others) and he stiffly returned the hug.

"I'm glad you're alive, Harry," she said. He shrugged. It was a frank statement, but one she felt needed to be said. She was glad that he didn't die. She was glad that for their last year of Hogwarts, she and Harry and Ron would be together, just like the first. She wanted to come full circle.

In the morning, without telling anyone, she flooed to the safe house and then helped her parents floo home. The house was devastated and she wept as she helped them put it back together. Within a few days, her Hogwarts letter came but there was no mention of her absence at the castle. For that, she was grateful. Inside the letter, also, was her head girl badge and brief instructions of what she was to do on the train and what to do upon arriving to the Hogsmeade train station. She looked for any sign of something out of the ordinary, some sign of Severus but the only thing she could find was the title of his NEWT level potions text and that would have been there no matter what.

oooo

Platform nine and three quarters was filled with children and steam from the engine. She half heartedly herded frightened looking first years onto the train and made sure chaos didn't completely ensue. Word of Voldemort's defeat had spread quickly and everyone was in high spirits. Hermione wished she could be happy too. She wished she could sit in a compartment with Ron and Harry and maybe Ginny or Neville but Harry was not on the train and Ron, much like herself, had prefect duties and Ginny was, most probably, the most popular girl in her year and therefore never alone in a compartment.

The head boy was from Ravenclaw, Andrew, but she only knew him from Prefect meetings and from Ancient Runes class. They hadn't spoken much – he was quiet and she was always off doing some project for herself or for Harry. Hermione was never one to waste time socializing. Now, she shook his hand and introduced herself again. He looked at her strangely, and she realized that everyone knew who she was. They patrolled the cars together, speaking very little.

"Hermione?" Andrew asked, finally, when they had gone back to the prefects carriage to change into their school things.

"Yes?" she asked, opening her small bag. All of her things were already there, after all.

"I don't know why they made me head boy," he blurted out, finally, after she'd stared him out of his silence.

"What do you mean?" she asked. "You've been a good prefect, make the best marks, and reliable."

"Yes but, why didn't they make Harry head boy?" he asked.

"Andrew, Harry isn't even a prefect!" she laughed.

"Yes, but he…"

"You were the best choice, obviously. Harry had his life laid out for him from the time he was a baby. If I were you, I'd be grateful I didn't have to live my life like that," she snapped. He didn't ask anymore questions.

Everyone changed. The train slowed and stopped. Outside, it rained the first rain of the new season. She had decided that she didn't like Hogwarts in the summer time after all. She wanted to put the last year behind her – the cancer, the war, and maybe even the love affair. She missed Severus, missed him so much she felt as if she weren't getting enough air, but what could they do? They would have to wait and Hermione feared that in a year of waiting he would grow tired of her. Her hopes were not high.

Hagrid hugged her when he spotted her but he said nothing of her fleeing the castle. She stepped back and helped him point the first years to the boats waiting to take them across the tumultuous lake. When the last first year was in a boat, she looked toward the carriages already filling up with students. The carriages that had once been horseless. Now, the thestrals beat their hooves in the mud, anxious to get out of the rain. She climbed into the one in the back of the line that was beginning to move toward the castle and inside were a few second year Slytherins. They didn't look smug or superior; in fact, they looked uncomfortable at the sight of the head girl. Hermione decided to say nothing to them and she rode the bumpy, wet road to the castle staring out the window, steeling herself, preparing herself to see Severus at the high table, sneering down at her.