After a few weeks deliberation, Harry and the others had settled on a plan to hit back at Hermione. They had seriously discussed taking her out, but they were worried that such direct action would cause Voldemort to completely lose it and destroy them before they had the chance to fight back. They'd also decided that getting the dark to strike first didn't matter as things were personal now, and no matter what sort of reputation they gained, they were determined to end both Voldemort and his daughter. They'd decided that their best option was to take Voldemort out first, and to get him where they wanted, they were going to use Hermione.
They'd discussed several plans, before settling on the idea of snatching her from Hogwarts. They were then going to use her to force Voldemort into facing Harry in a duel. As the wizard prophesied to defeat Voldemort, they felt Harry had the best chance of defeating him. However, they didn't plan on playing by the rules, and once Voldemort was engaged in battling Harry, they were all going to join in the fray, and as dangerous as he was, even Voldemort couldn't defeat six wizards who had been practising their fighting skills for the last couple of months. And then once he was gone, they would take care of Hermione before facing whatever consequences would come their way. Even time in Azkaban wouldn't be so bad if they'd gained their revenge and freed the wizarding world from Voldemort and Hermione's dark clutches.
With a plan set, a time-frame was decided upon. Even though they figured their best bet was to take Hermione from Hogwarts, they'd decided to arrive in Hogsmeade, where they would hole up in the Shrieking Shack, on a Hogsmeade weekend, just in case it proved easier to take her from the wizarding village right next to the castle.
On the Friday in question, bags of supplies were packed and people travelled to Hogsmeade in pairs. Bill and Charlie went first, followed by Sirius and Harry, and then finally Remus and Ron arrived. Ginny had wanted to join them, but no-one had wanted to leave Molly alone in her fragile state, so the youngest Weasley had drawn the short straw and had been tasked with looking after their mother. Of course, Ginny was convinced it was because she was a girl and she wasn't happy with staying behind, but none of her brothers were willing to switch places and stay tucked up at Grimmauld Place. They all wanted a piece of the action.
When they arrived at the Shrieking Shack, Harry set up the map on an overturned crate and they took turns in checking it, just to make sure that it was working correctly and that they could find Hermione whenever they wanted.
"Hey," Ron cried, about an hour after they arrived, as he was checking the map. "Hermione's gone."
"What do you mean, gone?" Harry asked with a frown, wandering over to his friend. "She was there five minutes ago, I saw her."
"I can't find her," Ron said, his eyes scouring the map.
Crowding around the map, everyone began the search for Hermione. It was also noted that Draco was missing as well. But then out of nowhere, Bill suddenly spotted the pair wandering the halls in the dungeons.
"Where have they been?" Harry muttered with a frown. "They were not in the dungeons two minutes ago."
"They might have been," Sirius admitted. "To be honest, the dungeons are the only area of the map where we might have missed something. We didn't spend a lot of time down in the dungeons, and even though we tried our best to cover the entire school when we were making the map, we might have missed something."
"I thought that was a complete map of the school," Bill muttered with a frown. "This could change everything if there's parts of the dungeons unmapped."
"At the most it will be a hidden room," Remus argued. "And if we watch closely, we might be able to see if the room is used again and get an idea of it's location."
"Or more than likely, it'll not make a difference," Sirius said. "Where are they now, Harry?"
"They seem to be back in the Slytherin common room," Harry said, squinting at the map. Between his failing eyesight and the crowds of names in what was clearly the Slytherin rooms, it was hard to make out the individual tags for Hermione and her scumbag boyfriend.
"Let's just keep an eye on them, and try not to worry about a potential blind spot," Charlie suggested. Like Bill, he wasn't too happy with the idea they didn't have the complete view of the castle as they'd been led to believe, but with any luck it would be good enough to get the job done.
For the next couple of hours, a very close eye was kept on the map, but at no time did Hermione disappear. Over the course of the evening the names in the common room thinned out as people went to bed, and finally Hermione's label moved from the common room up into the girls dorms. Less than half an hour later the common room was empty and all the Slytherins were in their respective beds.
"Maybe we should go in now," Ron suggested, checking the other common rooms and finding that all over the castle the students were in bed.
"Now? Why now?" Bill asked his brother.
"The castle is quiet, and everyone is in bed," Ron pointed out. "Plus we've got the cover of darkness to hide our movements."
"True, but we do have a supply of polyjuice potion so we can move freely in the daytime," Charlie pointed out.
"But she won't be expecting us on a night," Ron argued.
"She won't be expecting us full stop," Harry snorted. "We've got the element of surprise here. No-one knows were are here."
"I still think moving tonight could be good," Ron insisted. "We could take Hermione from her bed."
"It's a good idea, except for two things," Bill said. "Firstly, how would we gain access to the Slytherin common room? We don't have the password."
"We can guess the password," Ron interrupted. "Harry and I were down there in our second year, and the password was something like pure-blood. I bet their passwords are always something like that. And since it's the middle of the night, we'd have time to try and guess our way inside."
"Okay, that does actually sound workable," Bill conceded. "But even if we get inside, what do we do about the girls she's sharing dorms with? There's what, three or four other girls in there with her."
"Three," Harry supplied.
"What happens if one of them wakes up?" Bill continued. "What do we do, take her as well? Those other girls may be Slytherins, and they may be Hermione's friends, but we agreed we didn't want to involve anyone else. In a proper battle it's a different matter, but I for one won't be part of hurting someone simply because they happen to be in Slytherin."
"But, if you can think of a way to deal with Hermione's room-mates, your plan has merits, Ron," Charlie said, spotting the disappointment on his youngest brother's face and feeling as though he needed some reassurance.
"Definitely," Bill agreed with a nod. "In fact, let's all try and work out how to get around Hermione's room-mates. Because if we can find a way to get her out of the dorms without them noticing, Ron may have hit on the perfect way of snatching Hermione."
With everyone vowing to try and find a way to get Hermione out of the Slytherin dorms under the cover of darkness, they all settled down to sleep. Although even if no-one had come up with anything by morning, they still had their other ideas, and the next day would of course be Hogsmeade day. And the village might well turn out to be the best place to get at Hermione.
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The following morning, everyone was up early, and while Remus and Sirius rustled up breakfast, and Bill and Charlie checked no-one had stumbled across them in the night, Harry and Ron checked the map. They easily found Hermione, still tucked up in bed, and as they ate breakfast and watched the map, the saw the Slytherins begin to stir. While the other girls in Hermione's dorm headed down to the common room, Hermione stayed where she was and was quickly joined by Draco.
"What do you think they're doing?" Ron groaned half an hour later when Hermione and Draco's names were still in the girls dorms.
"I would have thought that was obvious given how close together their names are," Bill snorted, looking over his brother's shoulders. "They're practically on top of each other."
Ron wrinkled his nose at the idea of what the two Slytherins were up to, but a tiny part of him couldn't help but wonder what Hermione would be like in bed. Shaking his head at his traitorous thoughts, he glanced over to Harry, and judging by the way he was avoiding looking at the map and the annoyed expression on his face, he was thinking along the same lines as Ron. They may have both despised Hermione, but that didn't stop them from being aware of how attractive she was, especially now she'd embraced her sexuality.
Fortunately for Harry and Ron, the two Slytherins finally made their way down to the common room and into The Great Hall, where all their friends had been for a while now. As the Slytherins ate breakfast, the group discussed whether or not they should make a move in Hogsmeade, or keep working on the idea of taking Hermione from Hogwarts during the night. However, since no-one had come up with a plan to deal with the other girls she shared a room with, it was decided to see what the day held, and if it would provide any opportunity to get to Hermione.
"The Slytherins are on the move," Harry declared as the Slytherins on the map began to leave The Great Hall.
Everyone gathered around to watch as they halted in the main hallway, while a couple of them went back down to the dungeons. A few minutes later they were all together again, and they moved outside. Almost immediately Crabbe and Goyle started heading away from the castle along with Tracey and Millicent. The others stayed in front of the castle for a while longer before Blaise, Theo and Daphne began to move down the winding path that led to Hogsmeade, leaving Hermione and Draco at the castle.
"Maybe they're not going to Hogsmeade," Charlie suggested.
"Wait, Malfoy's moving," Ron cried, pointing at the map, even though their eyes were all watching the same spot.
"What's going on?" Harry asked with a frown as Malfoy headed down the path to join up with Blaise, Theo and Daphne, while Hermione remained outside of the castle.
"She's going back inside," Sirius said with a confused frown.
Totally baffled as to what was going on, they watched as Hermione headed back down to the dungeons. However, she wasn't down there very long before she moved back into the main body of the castle and headed towards the library. Sure enough, she entered the library and settled herself in the far corner of the room.
"I don't get it," Harry muttered. "Why has she been left behind?"
"Maybe she's not feeling very well," Ron suggested. "Or maybe she just didn't want to go down to Hogsmeade."
"Then why didn't someone stay with her? Why did Malfoy leave her?" Harry asked.
"I don't know, but it seems like he did," Ron said. "His name is gone from the map. He must have passed beyond the boundary of what's on the map."
"Maybe we need to double check that Hermione's friends are really down in Hogsmeade," Charlie suggested. "Because if they are, this could be the perfect time to get to Hermione. She's all alone up at the castle."
"Not exactly all alone," Remus pointed out. "The staff are still up there, not to mention the younger students."
"There is not one student anywhere near the library," Bill pointed out. "And aside from Madam Pince, all the staff are elsewhere as well. This could be our opportunity. We could sneak into the grounds, snatch Hermione and be back here before her friends return from Hogsmeade."
"If that's where they are," Remus cautioned. "They might not have come all the way down to the village."
"Only one way to find out," Sirius remarked with a grin. "With Hermione not with them, they won't recognise my animagus form. I can take a quick run into the village and see what I can see."
With everyone agreed to Sirius's plan, he took off down to the village while they kept an eye on the map. Not only did Hermione remain in the library, quite likely tucked up there for the day, but none of the other Slytherins returned, meaning it was more than likely they'd ventured all the way down to Hogsmeade. Sure enough when Sirius burst back into the room, he confirmed that he'd seen Hermione's friends in the village.
"I counted five boys and three girls," he said. "And you'll be interested to know that young Draco is walking with a cane."
"A cane?" Ron scoffed. "Like his father?"
"It does actually look very similar to the one his father carries," Sirius admitted. "Only unlike Lucius, I don't think this is for show. He seemed to need to use it to help him walk."
"We must have crippled him more than we realised," Ron cackled.
"Serves the bastard right," Harry muttered. Given the fact he was going blind, it only seemed fair that their attack on Draco had led to some permanent damage to the blond wizard.
"So what do we do?" Sirius asked. "Do we move? Hermione's friends seemed set for a day in the village."
"Is Hermione still alone in the library?" Charlie asked.
"She hasn't moved a muscle," Ron confirmed. "And the only person anywhere near her is Madam Pince."
"We can find a way to get her out of the library when we get there," Bill decided. "But I think aside from Hermione, our other dangers are Snape and Bellatrix. Where are they?"
It only took a couple of minutes to locate each of the Professors. Even though he was headmaster, Snape was down in the dungeons, and from his positioning Harry and Ron were fairly sure he was in the large store cupboard where the potions supplies were kept. As for Bellatrix, she seemed to be flitting between her office and living space, which were attached to the Dark Arts classroom, which was on another floor and the other side of the castle to the library.
"I say we move," Bill declared. "She's on her own. We might not get another chance like this. If we're good, we can get her back here before anyone even notices she's gone. And then when they do realise she's not in the castle, they won't have a clue where to look for her."
A quick discussion decided that it would be best for all six of them to go into Hogwarts. Moving in such large numbers might be dangerous, but they all agreed that the greater danger was Hermione, and the more people they had to deal with her the better. Uncorking the polyjuice potion, everyone took a dose and once they all looked like other people, specifically teenagers so they would blend in at Hogwarts, they made their way to the passageway that would lead them up into the grounds of the castle.
As they entered the passageway, they were each filled with anticipation. Aside from Remus, who still wasn't convinced they were doing the right thing, they all felt as though fate was finally on their side. They were going after Hermione, and this time she wouldn't see them coming. She would be their prisoner before she could so anything about it, and best of all there would be no clues as to where she had gone or what had happened to her. Until he received word from them, Voldemort would be completely clueless as to what had happened to his precious daughter.