Hermione woke when her cell door was flung open and a guard threw something soft in her face. "Get up."

She groaned and picked up the fabric thing that he had hit her with. It was a clean black and white striped tunic and pair of trousers. She shook them out then put her nose close to the material. It didn't smell like soap or flowers, it smelled like absolutely nothing really, which, when she thought about it, was preferable to the alternative.

The guard came forward and snapped the iron manacles around her wrists and tugged her out of her cell.

"Come on. Shower time."

Shower time? Oh, that sounded lovely.

"Your lawyer's causing trouble," the guard said, eyeing her with a look that said he considered it to be entirely her fault. "Making lots of noise about things he shouldn't."

Way to go Zabini, she thought cheerfully.

The guard scowled at her faint smile. Prisoners in Azkaban Fortress were not supposed to smile. Ever.

He paused to unlock a door at the end of the corridor then led her into the shower room. There were two other female prisoners in there when they entered. Both of them continued cleaning themselves silently as though they were completely alone.

The guard removed Hermione's cuffs, then stood back and looked at her with his arms crossed over his broad chest. "Strip."

She blinked. "Excuse me?"

He sneered. "You heard me."

He was watching her with avid interest and it made her stomach roll a little at the eager look in his beetle brown eyes.

She instinctively fell back on something that had seen her through numerous hearings and an exhausting, heart-wrenching trial. It was the same thing that had carried her through the war, unphased by all of the blood, death, and carnage—much of it by her own hand. It was like flicking a switch inside her. Like shutting off a light. One minute everything seemed important, everything seemed to matter; the next, it just didn't.

She returned the guards gaze with one of her own and watched his leering expectation turn to confusion. She knew what he was seeing; she'd seen the same thing hundreds of times throughout the war whenever she looked in the mirror. It was this look that had distanced her from Ron, who, before the battles started to wear on her, had foolishly and innocently believed himself in love with her. It wasn't indifference so much as a simple lack of presence. She let her conscious mind slide back and observe the world around her at a distance. Things hurt less that way.

"Strip," the guard repeated. He was angry. She hadn't reacted the way he had wanted her to, or the way he had expected her to. "Now."

She did as he said and stood naked before him with her hands at her side. She didn't even flinch when he grabbed her arms and snapped the cuffs back on. He slapped a sliver of lye soap into her hand, then twined the chains through a metal ring on the wall and left her.

Hermione looked down at the soap held in her right hand—her wand hand—then slowly began to move the little thing back and forth in her palm to get a lather. She stood under the spray and washed her skin, rubbing her arms and legs and belly until they were bright pink and tender. There was no shampoo so she washed her hair as best she could with what was left of the soap. It would tangle horribly, she knew, but there was nothing for it. Her scalp felt oily and dirty, and when she scrubbed the soap into her hair, it felt so good.

She wondered how long it had been since she had last had a shower. She couldn't remember, which usually meant it had been a long time.

She was enjoying the feel of the hot water against her skin, when she heard someone whisper Ron's name and paused.

"Really? Are you sure?"

"Yes, I heard it from Cora Prescott, who heard it from Janet Terrence, who heard it from a guard."

"But how could she? She's so small."

"Yeah, but she did it. With a knife, you know."

"A knife?"

"Oh yes. She's a mudblood too, you know. A muggleborn."

"Oh. I guess that explains it."

"You know, they say they found her in bed with him. Rolling around in his blood like a vampire."

"No!"

"Yes, and she was still holding the knife.

"Do they say why she did it?"

"She says she can't remember."

"Oh really."

"Oh yes. Nobody believes her, of course."

"It could have been the Imperious Curse."

"Yeah, but then how come she can't remember? People under the Imperious Curse can still remember what they did."

"But why would she do it then?"

"I don't know. Most people think she's a bit mad, you know. From the war."

"She doesn't look mad to me."

"Crazy people don't have to look crazy."

"But weren't they friends back in school?"

"Yes, I know. That's why it's so strange, you see."

"Were they . . ."

"Some people think so. Seeing as how they found her in his bed with him."

"A crime of passion."

"Or a jealous rage."

Hermione didn't turn around. She rinsed her hair out, dried off with a towel by the door, put her new clothes on, and banged on the door for the guard to let her out. She wasn't angry. Not really. Nothing they had said was anything she had not heard before.

But she would still rather be in her cold, dark cell listening to the Mother Crier scream himself hoarse than have to listen to it again.