Chapter note: TW self harm.

Hermione blinked. Professor Flitwick was in front of her, unconscious; Luna sat to her side, her normally Buddha-like face showing a slight sign of tension.

She jumped to her feet, scratching her arms to try and shock herself completely awake. "Luna?" she whispered. "What's happening here?"

Luna frowned at her. "What?" She saw Hermione's scratching and her eyes widened. "Are you fee-"

"What's going on? What are we doing here?"

Luna blinked. "We're looking after Professor Flitwick like Professor Snape asked, remember?" she said.

The room spun, and Hermione grabbed Luna's shoulder. "Where's Snape?"

Luna looked clearly worried now. "Why don't you remember? Have you been cursed? What's wrong, Hermione…"

Hermione pulled off her bangle.

I'm sorry. I had to.

"We need to go now," she said, slamming her bangle back over her hand. "I-I feel like – I think you're right, Luna," she said suddenly, seizing on Luna's convenient excuse. "I think Snape cursed me. We need to go."

"What?" Luna looked very confused. "But I don't think he cursed me? Why would he only curse you?"

"I don't know, Luna – we need to go! Come on!"

She ran for the door and Luna followed quickly behind.

"Do you know where he went?" she yelled at Luna as they ran up the stairs.

"No, I don't know where the fight is," Luna said. The fight?! But she could hardly ask, or it would make Luna even more suspicious…Hermione decided to head for the Great Hall, surely there would be some clue there where to go.

The scene was like a dream. It was the middle of the night, a few students in pyjamas and dressing gowns, peering around; and the doors to the castle wide open, showing the black night sky…

Hermione ran out the door and into –

"Professor! McGonagall" she yelled. "Where –"

But Professor McGonagall's mouth had never looked so thin, and Hermione could see the adrenaline of battle fading from her like steam off a boiled kettle. She knew before the Professor said anything and felt a hot rush of anger wash through her body.

"Granger, Lovegood – to the hospital wing."

"Where are -"

"It is over, Granger," the professor said. "The Death Eaters have left. We are debriefing in the hospital wing in a few minutes."

She walked away into the inky dark, leaving Hermione with an incoherent, consuming rage that was closing in on her vision and chest. Hermione turned to the stone wall of the castle and punched it as hard as she could. She felt the bones in her thumb and one finger snap, and the pain shooting up her arm made it possible to breathe.

"Hermione?" Luna's voice sounded small but close to her. Luna gently took hold of her other hand, and Hermione started to shake.

"Let's go to the hospital wing, Hermione," she said, pulling her along, and Hermione focused on putting one foot in front of the other, staring at her feet and Luna's hand holding hers.

They entered the ward; Hermione could see a small group of people gathered around a bed at the end of it, but near the front, with his eyes closed, was Neville –

Hermione and Luna ran to him, letting go of each other's hands to touch him – but he was warm, and sleeping. Hermione sighed shakily, and her attention switched back to the group of people near the end of the ward. Ron was there and she felt some of the horror in her heart lift; she ran to him and he wrapped an arm around her. She looked under his arm and –

She breathed in harshly; she couldn't help it. Hermione couldn't even tell who it was, their face was so destroyed –

"Fenrir got Bill," Ron said, voice unusually high. "But it's ok, Lupin thinks he'll survive."

Ron's brother. How many Weasleys was Malfoy –

She stopped the thought, and looked to Lupin for confirmation. But neither him nor Tonks acknowledged her; they stared at Bill as though transfixed, like their gaze could turn back time.

"Is –"

The doors opened again, and Harry entered with Ginny. Hermione ran to him and hugged him; he asked about Bill, looking at him past her, his face full of a sadness that made Hermione's heart thump uneasily.

"Can't you fix them with a charm or something?" Harry asked. Lupin finally gave his diagnosis; he did not think Bill would be a full werewolf.

"Dumbledore might know something that would work, though," Ron said, and Hermione's stomach flipped. "Where is he? Bill fought those maniacs on Dumbledore's orders, he owes him –"

"Ron – Dumbledore's dead," Ginny said.

Hermione suddenly felt like she was hearing them talk in a silenced, wide space; with grief on one side of her brain and relief, quite separate, on another. Lupin shouted quietly; Tonks' mouth moved but she could not hear her. Hermione focused on Harry.

"Snape killed him," he said, and Hermione blinked. But he refused his help –

She squeezed her broken fingers again to pull her out of the train of thought.

"…the Mark was…Dumbledore was ill, he was weak, but I think he released it was a trap. He immobilised me, I couldn't do anything –"

A rush of empathy spiked in her heart; Harry had also been trapped –

"– and then Malfoy came through the door and disarmed him –"

She clapped her hands to her mouth to stop any noise escaping, wishing she could hide her entire face, it was surely full of her guilt –

"– more Death Eaters arrived, and then Snape – he did it. The Avada Kedavra.". Hermione could see Harry's voice leave him, and Professor Dumbledore's phoenix started to sing. The birdsong swallowed them all up in a strange, communal grief.

He couldn't do it. Hermione knew he couldn't. Was this what Draco had hidden from her? That he had finally relented and Snape was about to kill Dumbledore? But that didn't seem right; hadn't they already talked about that? She remembered a wretched Malfoy, almost sick that he had poisoned someone he so thoroughly loathed, and telling him maybe you should let him help you, seeing you are so incompetent.

Hermione closed her eyes. Had this happened because of what she said?

The noise of the doors opening made her turn; Professor McGonagall entered.

"Molly and Arthur are on their way." She stopped in front of Harry. "What happened? Hagrid said you were with Professor Dumbledore when – when it happened, and Professor Snape was in-"

"Snape killed Dumbledore," Harry said. He said it louder this time; it felt like a hammer on Hermione's chest, splitting it in two. The Professor's knees gave way and Madam Pomfrey helped her sit down.

"Snape," McGonagall repeated dumbly. "We all wondered…but he trusted…"

Hermione squeezed her broken hand again. She decided she was never going to heal it.

"Snape was a highly accomplished Occlumens," Lupin spat.

"But Dumbledore swore!" Tonks whispered. "I always thought Dumbledore must know something about Snape that we didn't –"

Like I did, Hermione thought, remembering how Malfoy had barely whispered the truth after Ron almost wanted to rip her broken thumb bones out of her hand.

"I know," Harry said, and his expression was uglier than Hermione had ever seen. "Snape passed Voldemort the information that made Voldemort hunt down my mum and dad. Then Snape told Dumbledore he hadn't realised what he was doing, he was really sorry they were dead."

This didn't gel with what Hermione knew about Snape, and Lupin similarly started hissing that Snape hated Harry's father. Harry said Snape had called his mother a mudblood and for the first time, the word felt hurtful.

"This is my fault," Professor McGonagall said. "I sent Filius to fetch Snape tonight! If I hadn't alerted Snape, he might have never joined the Death Eaters, I don't think he knew they were coming."

He did, Hermione thought, but there was no way to comfort McGonagall. Lupin tried to dissuade her instead.

"I don't know how it happened…it was all so confusing," the Professor said, and the slice of rational brain she had left traitorously whispered good. "Dumbledore told us he would be leaving the school for a few hours and we were to patrol the corridors in case. Remus, Bill and Nymphadora were to join us…it all seemed quiet. I don't know how they could have entered –"

"I do," Harry said, and Hermione froze. "There's a broken Vanishing Cabinet in the Room of Requirement. It has a twin in Borgin and Burkes. Malfoy has been trying to fix it all year. And tonight he finally did. So they got in through the Room of Requirement."

Hermione could suddenly feel where a hole in her memory was; it was confronting how physical it felt. She closed her eyes and focused on it – Draco pulling her in front of an ugly cabinet, and she opened her mouth and said "ah" –

She flicked her broken fingers as hard as she could to try and stop the recollection. I can't do this now. Hermione opened her eyes and saw Harry looking at her, making her heart tense up and shatter.

Ron rescued her. "I messed up, Harry," he said. "We did like you told us. We checked the Marauder's Map and we couldn't see Malfoy on it, so we thought he must be in the Room of Requirement, so me, Ginny, and Neville went to keep watch on it –"

The room started to turn.

"He came out of the room about an hour after we started," Ginny said. "He was on his own, clutching that awful shriveled arm…he must have been checking whether the coast was clear to let the Death Eaters out, because the moment he saw us he threw something into the air and it all went pitch-black-"

A sudden darkness, and an intoxicating scent as someone shoved her to the floor –

She screwed up her fingers.

"We tried everything. Lumos, Incendio – nothing worked," Ginny said. "We could hear people rushing past us, obviously Malfoy could see because of that hand and was guiding them, but we didn't dare use any curses or anything in case we hit each other, and by the time we'd reached a corridor that was light, they'd gone."

He hadn't hurt them. For the first time that night her right hand felt useful for more than just shooting distracting adrenaline into her bloodstream.

"Ron, Ginny and Neville ran into us almost immediately and said what happened," Lupin said. "We found the Death Eaters minutes later, heading towards the Astronomy Tower. Malfoy obviously hadn't expected more people to be on watch –"

Her lungs stopped working; the air stayed still and useless in her mouth.

"A fight broke out, they scattered and we gave chase. One of them, Gibbon, broke away and headed up the stairs –"

"To set off the Mark?" Harry asked.

"Yes, they must have arranged that before they left the Room of Requirement," Lupin said. "But I don't think Gibbon liked the idea of waiting up there alone for Dumbledore, because he came running back downstairs to re-join the fight and was hit by a Killing Curse that just missed me."

One down. Harry turned to Hermione and she crunched the broken bones in her hand.

"So if Ron was watching the Room of Requirement with Ginny and Neville, were you –"

"Outside Snape's office," Hermione whispered; she owed a huge debt to Professor McGonagall, Ron and Luna for giving her the context she needed to try and make it through this, her Imperiused brain still vague on recall. "With Luna. We hung around for ages and nothing happened…we didn't know what was going on upstairs. Ron had the map," she repeated, remembering the black night past the Great Hall doors. "It was nearly midnight when Professor Flitwick came sprinting down into the dungeons. He was shouting about Death Eaters in the castle, I don't think he registered that Luna and I were there at all."

Luna looked at her, eyes wide, but she did not say anything, and Hermione continued.

"He burst into Snape's office, and he said Snape had to help him…and then we heard a loud thump and Snape came out and – and –"

"What?" Harry said urgently.

She covered her face with her hands, trying to concentrate on lying and not on fleeting memories gathering behind her eyes. I could barely hold you together. "I was so stupid Harry!" she whispered, her voice high with guilt and fear as she tensed her broken fingers. "I-I think he cursed me…he said Professor Flitwick had collapsed, and we should take care of him while – while he helped fight the Death Eaters…and we went in to help him and he was unconscious…oh, it's so obvious Harry, we didn't realise, we didn't realise! We just let Snape go!" Her voice grew stronger as the hysteria gripped her. "I only snapped out of it after – after it was too late..."

Lupin tried to comfort her and Harry moved on, but Hermione kept her face hidden, terrified to look at Luna, wondering if she had remembered enough, repeated enough context clues, lied luckily enough not to trip her suspicion any further…Luna had not interrupted, but that did not mean she hadn't realised something was wrong with Hermione's story…would she discount it as Hermione being confused because she was cursed?

"He came upstairs…he found where you were all fighting…"

"We were in trouble, we were losing," Tonks cut in. "Gibbon was down, but the rest of the Death Eaters seemed ready to fight to the death –"

- a few Death Eaters to attack the largest school…I'm sure Dumbledore will kill us all –

Hermione used all her willpower to stay silent as half-fragments of memory returned to her; like birds, like the birds that she charmed when she was crying about Ron and Lavender until -

"…been savaged by Greyback…it was all dark…curses flying everywhere…The Malfoy boy had vanished, he must have slipped past –"

Every mention of his name was terrifying. But she could not think of him yet, she had to be still –

"- ran after him, but one of them blocked the stairs with some curse…Neville ran at it and got thrown up in the air –"

Hermione gritted her teeth.

"None of us could break through," Ron continued. "That massive Death Eater was still firing off jinxes all over the place, they were bouncing off the walls and barely missing us –"

"Snape was there," said Tonks, "but then he wasn't –"

"I saw him running," Ginny said. "He tried to hit me but I ducked…"

"I saw him run straight through the cursed barrier as though it weren't there," Lupin said. "And I tried to follow, but I got thrown back like Neville."

"He must have known a spell we didn't," McGonagall whispered, but Harry cut in with a more likely hypothesis – that you needed to be Marked to pass through. Hermione couldn't bear it anymore; she lifted her eyes and watched their faces as they all pulled the picture together.

"The big Death Eater caved the ceiling in, and we ran forward…and then Snape and the boy emerged out of the dust – obviously, none of us attacked –"

"We just let them pass," Tonks said. The flatness in her voice was Hermione's air; she breathed in slightly as the hope slid through her chest. "We thought they were being chased by the Death Eaters, and then, the other Death Eaters and Greyback were back and we were fighting again – and Snape shouted, but I don't know what –"

"He shouted, 'It's over,'" Harry said. "He'd done what he'd meant to do."

Hermione breathed slowly in the silence, relief washing over her entire brain and tensed shoulders and excruciating fingers. Draco was alive.

The doors slammed open again, and Mr and Mrs Weasley ran in with Fleur. Professor McGonagall jumped up, and Hermione, Luna, Tonks and Lupin backed away from Bill's bed to give them space. Luna reached for her unbroken hand again, and she held it gladly, watching the outpouring of emotion over poor Bill as Fleur raged over her brave husband…Fleur and Mrs Weasley were hugging and crying, and she looked to Ginny, who seemed just as surprised…Tonks started throttling Lupin in front of everyone, and Hagrid walked in with tears streaming down his face…

Hermione felt like she was going to faint. Luna kept hold of her hand.

Professor McGonagall called Harry away, and she whispered to Luna. "Can we go?"

Luna nodded. Hermione patted Ron on the back and left him with his family; Luna pressed some bizarre good luck charm into Neville's hand as he slept.

"We should go to bed," Luna whispered as the door shut behind them. The school was silent; her words felt like they echoed around the corridor.

"I don't want to go back to Gryffindor Tower," Hermione whispered back. She could not stand one moment of Parvati or Lavender's gaze. She wanted to leave Hogwarts and never come back. She wanted to stay forever and take Draco up on his offer to live out the rest of their lives in the Prefects' Bathroom.

Luna looked at her and Hermione buried her face in her hands. "Sorry. I'm just upset. I'm not being sensible." She looked up. "You're right, let's get some sleep."

Luna nodded and handed her something small. "Sleeping Potion from Madam Pomfrey. You should drink some water, too."

"That's a good idea," Hermione said. "Have you got a potion?"

"You were cursed, not me. You take it." Luna scanned her, and Hermione suddenly remembered she had checked her bangle right in front of her after Draco's Imperius lifted. "You should run your hand under some cool water. Maybe get it checked out by Madam Pomfrey tomorrow."

Hermione nodded. "I'll do that." She gave Luna a quick hug. "Thank you for helping me tonight, Luna."

She turned away and walked towards Gryffindor Tower. Hermione wasn't sure there was any emotion left in her body, she was so exhausted. But this was a naïve hope. When she doubled back and aimed her wand at Luna's back to remove several hours of her memory, Hermione had never felt more monstrous. She managed not to throw up until the charm was complete, collapsing on all fours and triggering poor, Obliviated Luna's attention as she passed out.

Chapter note: I love Luna lol.

I published a different Dramione story you might also enjoy if you like this one. It's called Five Broken Fingers, it's an AU set in fifth year with no Voldemort and an increasingly fascist Ministry. It's a one-shot but I'm rather taken with the idea, so I might publish a sequel.