Hermione watched Harry disappear into the maze — all she could do now was pray.

The following two hours were the longest of her life, having no clue what was going on in the maze before her. Fifteen minutes after Bagman first blew his whistle to start Harry and Cedric, she saw Mad-Eye apparate out of the maze carrying Fleur to the medical tent, despite having seen no red sparks sent up. Looking back on the night later on, she supposed she should have realized then that something odd was going on, but at the time she merely brushed it off as either she hadn't been paying attention when Fleur sent them up, or else some part of the magic of the maze made it so that only the patrollers could see the sparks.

But twenty minutes or so later disproved that theory, even though she didn't consciously think of it at the time, as she did see red sparks coming up from out of the maze, and less than a minute later saw Professor Flitwick appear levitating Krum, who looked like he'd been stupefied. Hermione briefly wondered if a certain section of the maze shot spells at the contestants who went through that section, and was thankful she'd taught and perfected the shield charm with Harry, so he would be able to deflect any such spells the maze tried throwing at him.

But after that, there was nothing.

Finally, after what felt like hours and hours, though in reality was only about an hour and a half later, there appeared a blue light at the edge of the maze close to where Hermione was sitting in the stands, and two figures suddenly slammed into the ground. The person clutching onto the TriWizard Cup with one hand and onto the other person with their other hand had landed face first against the ground, while the other person lay spread-eagle on his back, just looking wrong.

Sheer panic filled Hermione for a split second, as she had no clue who the two people were, whether one of them was Harry or not, and whether her boyfriend was alive and well and safe, or missing, kidnapped, injured, or even dead. But then she recognized the shaggy mane of raven hair that he'd insisted on letting grow out into a mess that year as the person laying face first on the grass, and a second later that the figure on his back looking completely wrong was Cedric Diggory, and half of her panic disappeared as she at least knew where Harry was, even if she didn't yet know how he was.

Instantly upon recognizing Harry, she without thought hurdled over the railing down onto the pitch, and ran towards him, her heart pounding. Given the fact he was holding onto the TriWizard Cup and Cedric's arm she thought he was at least alive, but something was definitely still wrong. Despite holding the TriWizard Cup, he certainly didn't look like he'd just won, or even lost, and why was Dumbledore and the other professors running towards Harry nearly as fast as she was?

Collapsing to her knees next to her boyfriend, she was completely oblivious to the gasp, and then deafening noise the crowd made behind her, barely even conscious of the fact Dumbledore had arrived at the same moment she had, and was also crouching over him.

But as her hand landed on Harry's back, she let out a small sigh of relief — he was at least breathing, she could feel his back rising and falling slightly with each heavy breath he took.

~HP~

The world came crashing back around him, and he struggled to hold on.

He'd landed somewhere on grass, because his face was pressed flat against it, and he still had the TriWizard Cup and Cedric's body because he could feel his hands clutching both, but that was all he knew. The ground beneath him felt like it was tossing and rolling like the deck of a ship, so he clutched a little tighter to the two objects he was holding onto to try to keep himself steady, and from passing out from the darkness trying to push in at the edges of his mind.

He vaguely recognized loud noises and screams and footsteps all around him, but was too exhausted and in too great a state of shock at the moment to try to figure out what they meant or where they were coming from. All he knew was that everything around him seemed like a nightmare.

The only relief he had, the only thing that kept him from completely losing his tenuous grip he still had on reality, was that the quiet, logical part of his brain, that sounded most similar to a certain bushy-haired girl he knew, reassured him that he was finally safe. He didn't know how he knew it, how the part of his brain that had sounded like his now girlfriend for years knew it, but he somehow knew he was no longer in danger from Voldemort and his Death Eaters, and was somewhere that could more or less be considered safe, somewhere where he had at least a temporary reprieve from trying to be killed.

Through the haze his mind was in at the moment, he felt a small and somehow familiar hand rest on his back, and then shortly after a different pair of hands, a strong, yet still somehow comforting pair of hands roughly flip him over, but he didn't fear that they were going to hurt him — or maybe he was just too exhausted to care anymore. He also felt the hand that had been on his back become two hands clutching at his arm, and he finally opened his eyes to find his girlfriend and Dumbledore staring down at him from the starry sky above. As soon as he recognized Hermione, his rock through everything he'd ever gone through since starting Hogwarts, he immediately dropped the TriWizard Cup he'd still been clinging onto with his life and grabbed her arm instead, clinging to her to keep him steady and safe once again. He used the strength that seemed to flow from Hermione through him to try to steady his scattered thoughts slightly, and tell Dumbledore what had happened.

~HP~

Clutching Harry was all she could do, as she felt a wave of terror pass through her as the reality of Diggory's dead body next to them finally hit her. Whatever had happened, it could have happened to Harry, and she could have lost him forever. But it hadn't, and she tried to remind herself of this as she clung to him like her life depended on it, just barely registering that he had grabbed hold of her as well.

As her boyfriend tried to explain to Dumbledore — and now Fudge and everyone else who was pushing and shoving around her — what had happened, and the crowds now surging around them became louder and more frantic and harried, she continued to just cling to him, unable to take in any of what he was saying to the Headmaster, but needing to reassure herself that he was still alive, still there — and hopefully doing the same for him.

But far too soon, Dumbledore had lifted Harry to his feet and out of her grasp, and someone else was pulling him away through the crowds, and she was left sitting there on her knees weeping silently alone, as the crowds continued to push and shove and gasp and shout all around her, paying her no attention.

~HP~

He felt someone dragging him off towards the castle, pushing their way through the crowds. He tried telling whoever it was that Dumbledore had told him to stay, but they paid no attention to him, and he was too weak to do anything but be pulled along with them. They slowly crossed the grounds back up to the castle together, but it wasn't until he heard the clunk of a wooden leg on the stone steps leading into the castle that he realized it was Mad-Eye.

Then Mad-Eye was asking him about what had happened, and he did his best to answer, to tell him about Voldemort's return, as the professor led him somewhere through the halls of Hogwarts.

~HP~

Soon after Harry had been taken away from her, she realized that Dumbledore, McGonagall, and Snape were hurrying away from the crowds towards the castle at a much more urgent pace than would be expected to simply check up on Harry in the hospital wing.

Trying to pull herself together, she followed after them at a run, slowing down to match their brisk walk when she'd almost caught up to them — she might have been Harry's boyfriend, but she doubted her presence would be much appreciated by the professors at the moment. But a dark sense of foreboding she couldn't explain told her she couldn't let them out of her sight.

Much to her surprise, when they got to the castle, instead of heading towards the hospital wing like she'd expected, the professors made for the third floor, where the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom and teacher's office were located.

Mad-Eye had just finished explaining his manipulations to Harry when the door was blasted into smithereens by three deafening Stupefy's, and Professors Dumbledore, McGonagall, and Snape burst in, Hermione right behind them. She rushed over to Harry, throwing her arms around him as tightly as she could, as the three adults leveled their wands at a now unconscious Mad-Eye, who'd been thrown backwards and onto the floor by the force of the spells.

Throughout Dumbledore's explanation of what had really been going on, and then Crouch Jr's own confession under the influence of Veritaserum, Hermione clung to Harry, and Harry clung back, too numb to feel anything. At the beginning Professor McGonagall had tried to pull Harry away from her to take him to the hospital wing, but she only clung tighter and Dumbledore thankfully insisted Harry stay, and no one had tried to move her or Harry after that.

Once Dumbledore had bound Crouch Jr and asked McGonagall to stand guard over him, he led Harry and Hermione up to his office, where they found a human Sirius waiting for them. As Harry and Hermione sat next to each other in front of Dumbledore's desk holding hands, Fawkes flew across the room and landed on Harry's knee. With his free hand, Harry stroked the beautiful gold-and-scarlet plumage of the remarkable bird, as Dumbledore told Sirius everything Crouch Jr had confessed to.

Finally sitting down at his desk, Dumbledore leaned forward and looked directly at Harry.

Knowing before Dumbledore even asked, that he was about to question him about everything that had taken place in the graveyard, Harry tried to summon up what little strength he had left to answer. As Hermione squeezed his hand encouragingly, the phoenix let out a soft, quavering note which filled Harry with an unexpected resolve, and he began telling Dumbledore everything, from the moment he'd been yanked from the maze by the portkey. Sometime in the middle of his recounting, he realized that Hermione had laid her head on his shoulder, silently reassuring him that she was there, and that everything he had experienced that night was over with for the time being. Harry finally finished his tale, feeling much lighter than he had before he'd begun, as if retelling everything had allowed all the pain and heartache to flow out of him.

When he had finished, he watched as Fawkes fluttered from his knee down to the floor next to his injured leg, and let a few pearly white tears leak out of its eyes onto the broken skin to heal it from the spider, the same way it had in the Chamber of Secrets two years prior after the basilisk.

As the phoenix flew back up to its perch a few moments later, Harry could hear Dumbledore praising his bravery through the whole ordeal he'd suffered, but Harry was hardly paying attention. All he could focus on was Hermione sitting next to him, his hand still clasped tightly in hers and her gripping it like she was afraid if she ever let go he would disappear from her again and not be so fortunate this time. He squeezed back as well as he could through his exhaustion, more than anything just wanting some time alone with her to do nothing but simply be.

But that wasn't to happen, as Dumbledore insisted they go back down to the hospital wing for Harry to spend the night there, which from more than his fair share of experience with the hospital wing over the four years he'd attended Hogwarts, he knew would be anything other than peace and time alone with his girlfriend.

Hermione also knew this would mean having to deal with a mollycoddling Mrs Weasley as well, as there was no way the Matriarch wasn't already lying in wait for them in the hospital wing, as that was doubtlessly where she immediately went once she'd seen Harry had been taken away from the stadium. And just as she'd expected, when the four of them entered the hospital wing five minutes later, they found Mrs Weasley pestering a harassed-looking Madam Pomfrey, who was insisting for doubtlessly the dozenth time that she didn't have a clue where Harry was, but that he certainly wasn't there.

Fortunately, as they entered and Mrs Weasley spotted Harry, Dumbledore headed her off. As Harry and Hermione hurried to slip behind the curtain of the bed Madam Pomfrey ushered him to, they heard Dumbledore tell the Weasleys not to question Harry until he was ready to talk on his own, and certainly not that night.

At which point Mrs Weasley immediately rounded on the twins and Ginny — who hadn't made any move towards Harry when he entered, instead waiting for him to come to them — and hissed, as though they were the ones attempting to be nosy and not her, "Did you hear? He needs quiet!"

Rolling her eyes, Hermione stepped with Harry behind the curtain and helped him change from his robes into his pajamas without falling asleep standing up, and then helped him into the bed.

Before moving the curtain back again to allow the Weasleys to visit him, Madam Pomfrey quickly waved her wand over Harry to make sure there weren't any injuries that needed taken care of. Content that he was as in as good a condition as could be expected given the unknown circumstances he'd clearly been through, as no one had thought it important enough to tell her, the doctor, what had actually happened to her patient, she removed the privacy curtain and headed to her office to get him a sleeping potion.

As Mrs Weasley descended on Harry's bed at an almost unnatural speed and the other four followed at a more reasonable pace, Hermione deliberately crawled up onto the bed next to Harry and lay down beside him, wrapping an arm protectively around his waist. Almost to Hermione's surprise, Mrs Weasley did obey Dumbledore's order not to question Harry about anything that had happened, and at Hermione's own glares refrained from trying to mess with his bed-covers.

A few seconds later Madam Pomfrey returned with the sleeping potion and handed it to Harry, and he began drinking it. He'd only taken a few gulps before he began drifting off, just registering in his hazy mind that Hermione had laid her head down on his chest before the blissfulness of sleep overtook him, and he thought no more.

~HP~

Unfortunately, his sleep wasn't going to last as long as he would have preferred.

When he awoke groggily some amount of time later, the only thing he noticed at first through the warmth and sleepiness and desire to drop right back off again was that Hermione no longer had her head resting on his chest. Instead, she was propped up next to him on her elbow, listening to something going on in the hallway outside the hospital wing. It was then that he finally heard the muffled shouts coming towards them that she, and the five Weasleys, who were still there as well, were listening to.

Then a second later Fudge, McGonagall, and Snape burst into the hospital wing yelling back and forth at each other about dementors, Crouch Jr, Dumbledore, and other things that his sleepy mind wasn't up for taking in at the moment. But he did register that Fudge stormed up to Mrs Weasley demanding to know where Dumbledore was, as if she would have any clue where the Headmaster had gotten off to — unless Hermione's vague theory that they were all in cahoots about controlling his life was true, and she really would know exactly where he was and what he was doing.

Then Dumbledore did burst in, and through the ensuing shouting match, Harry gleaned that Fudge had brought a dementor with him into the castle, and it had kissed Crouch Jr, which was a problem because Crouch Jr couldn't now give testimony to the fact Voldemort had been the one behind everything. Throughout the entire shouting match, Hermione diligently shielded Harry from the Minister's view, allowing him to pretend he was still asleep despite all the shouting going on, until Harry had felt it necessary that he try to tell the Minister the truth of what had happened that night.

Of course, that succeeded just as well as it had with Sirius the year before in that very same room, when he'd tried to explain then the truth of what had happened in the Shrieking Shack — as in, it didn't work at all. Fudge still didn't believe a word Harry said, still believed Harry was touched in the head (to put it politely), and still refused to listen to anything from any of them that went contrary to what he already wanted to believe.

After Fudge had finally stormed away making threats about trying to take over the school, Dumbledore began addressing all of the adults left in the room. Turning to Mrs Weasley and Bill, he asked, "Am I right in thinking that I can count on your family?"

At Mrs Weasley's agreement, he gave them their instructions, and sent them on their way to begin the process of recruiting allies. Mrs Weasley had wanted to stay with Harry, but at Hermione's glare and insistence that she was more than capable of taking care of her boyfriend by herself, and that it was far more important to start assembling for the war against Voldemort than it was to spend the night by Harry's bedside watching him sleep, the Matriarch had finally relented and left with her oldest son to go tell her husband what had happened and the upcoming assignments they needed to begin preparing for.

Then Dumbledore sent Professor McGonagall to go collect Hagrid and Madam Maxime and bring them to his office, for him to speak to shortly. Madam Pomfrey he sent to take Winky from the fake Professor Moody's office down to the kitchens for Dobby to take care of, leaving just Snape and Sirius in dog form still in the hospital wing with him and Harry and Hermione.

After having Sirius transform back into human form and forcing the two of them to shake hands, he sent Sirius off to alert several more allies, before turning to Snape. Their conversation was short and very cryptic, before Snape swept off looking even colder than normal, leaving Harry and Hermione wondering what it was Dumbledore had asked Snape to do.

Once Dumbledore had then bid Harry and Hermione goodnight to take care of his own part of the new war against Voldemort, the twins said, "We'll leave you two to yourselves, but we'll come by and visit sometime tomorrow," before dragging their sister out of the hospital wing with them so they could be alone.

After exchanging a soft kiss with him, Hermione handed Harry the goblet with the remaining sleeping potion. Drinking the remaining potion as Hermione lay down against his side again and wrapped her arm around his waist and lay her head on his chest, Harry was out like a light before his head even hit his pillow.