Left Behind
Chapter Five
"The cruellest lies are often told in silence."
Robert Louis Stevenson
Room of Requirement, Saturday a week later
A week of nightly research was taking its toll on Hermione. She was tired, as a result cranky and she was frustrated by what she dreaded to admit was cabin – in this case, castle – fever. True, she often used this place to organise a self-managed duelling training regimen, which often lifted up her spirits and helped her feel freer, but right now, she was too tired to even contemplate practicing simple hexes.
Distraction wasn't an option and however much she wished, she couldn't burn the small portrait of herself, Ron and Harry now hidden in the locket she bought to Hogwarts. She did regularly threaten them however with turpentine when their conversations became too distracting. That and the memory of her nearly burning them, though unintentionally, among the confetti explosions during her birthday had kept them in the counterpart mini-portrait carried by the boys.
'Do not harm the messenger,' she thought. Well, she had brought it upon herself. A stroke of genius on her part, she did think, having come up with the idea during the summer at the Burrow. It had taken longer than expected for Harry and Ron to actually get a snapshot of themselves reproduced in a by a Wizarding portrait painter in a place far enough to evade notice by Voldemort, but wherever they had gone, at least it was here now. She was pleased that the boys had found a way to sent it to her – they had all anticipated that she'd be watched and she had to admit she was fairly impressed by them. The pang that they were out there without her was eased by the knowledge that they were still depending on her research and planning. She'd deal with her own hero-complexes or whatever she was feeling after it was all over.
She barely understood why the boys needed her to research trinkets or items of sentimental value to the founders. Explanations would come later, she presumed, when they would meet in a week's time because none of them could ascertain how secure using the portraits for communication was. They even made use of codes Hermione had designed before they had separated in case other portraits of unsavoury characters were lurking in the trio's picture.
She relied heavily on muggle nursery rhymes and fairy tales to help Harry should he forget and need to jog his memory for symbolism. In this case, "The witch met Hansel and Gretel a week after behind the Beanstalk an hour before Cinderella left the ball" meant a meeting among the three in a week at the Forbidden Forest near Hagrid's hut at eleven in the evening. Additionally, the boys could not Apparate; they were being tracked by the ministry that was now in Voldemort's control and only the luck of being under the invisibility cloak had spared them capture the first and last time the boys had attempted it.
It was times like these that Hermione was thankful for the Room of Requirement that allowed her to study and research in peace with reference books and snacks literally popping up when necessary. The latter, she attributed to over-enthusiastic Hogwarts house elves and caused the part of her that had initiated S.P.E.W. to cringe. She was more disgruntled, however, that the room which purportedly could be used for night time exploits of the more experimental kind by hormonal Seventh Year students would not give her copies of books in the Restricted Section. Instead she had to satisfy herself with speedier, late night access to the regular library tomes.
Glancing at the clock on the mantle, Hermione found it was half past twelve. She forced herself to stand, fully aware that a lack of sleep would only make her less efficient the following morning. After she packed and left, she bid the room good night (or an early good morning, if she had to be accurate.) A sentient room deserved that much, in her point of view.
Outside, the corridors were oddly iridescent, as if the stones came alive with the colours they did not display in the day. Hermione found the school especially beautiful at night, when the only light source was the moon and its rays bathed the castle walls; she presumed she'd appear a rather unearthly shade of white if she was not hidden under a Disillusionment Spell.
During her nightly traversing of the halls, she favoured taking off her shoes over casting a Silencing Spell over herself, hoping to bask in the real peace offered by the silence. At that exact moment, it was a decision she direly regretted because the distinct clicks of someone else's soles against the cold stone floor reverberated through the corridors like gunshots.
Hermione froze mid-step; her heart began to race. Much as she was truthfully not doing anything against the rules other than the obvious breaking of curfew, these days, detentions over petty matters were getting more and more frightening. The Carrows, it appeared had won over one Headmaster Snape in terms of applying torture, yet she also knew they frequently patrolled the more obvious places like the Rose gardens or the Astronomy Tower instead of the normally empty corridor she was standing in. Hermione often wondered what kept them from simply doping her with Veritaserum to discover where Harry was, but she remembered Professor Snape's warning them regarding the geas and thanked the heavens for that.
The pure rush, however, of all those thoughts compressed in a second of instinct convinced Hermione that the safest recourse would be to hide in an armour's shadow and wait until the professor, Filch, or whoever was passing by had left. She could barely contain her gasp, however, when out of the shadows came the Headmaster.
He was silvery gray when his black robes were awash in the moonlight, but she could easily imagine him again in red and black on a bus. Like that reincarnation of himself, this one spoke softly, the warning in his voice glittering like knives newly sharpened.
"Reveal yourself or I will do so for you and the consequences of the latter may be... unpleasant."
Integrity won out over self-preservation – and his threat did not bode well should she continue hiding. Hermione bit her lips and walked closer to him; not wanting to take her chances nor have him forcefully reveal her first, she dropped the spell.
"Miss Granger." Each word was enunciated fully, emphasized like threats. The Headmaster's eyes were slivers of coal in an incredibly calm face. He had not been sleeping well as the telltale dark circles around his eyes indicated. 'Probably too tired to maintain glamours,' she thought, 'They hadn't been visible during Potions class earlier.'
"I'm sorry, sir." Hermione instinctively looked down at her shoes. The training of six years in and out of the Potions laboratory had taught her, however, that this man had a subtle but discernable preference for those who accepted punishments head on. She raised her eyes to his as she layered memories upon memories of the library over her Occlumency shields. "I had lost track of time while revising at the Library." She prayed that he hadn't just been to the Library nor had Madame Pince revoked her permission for Hermione to stay at the library past closing.
She felt the gentle nudging of his mind against hers. It was a split-second decision, but she allowed him through the initial layers, flooding him instead with images of the day's Transfiguration and Potion's classes, snippets of Quidditch talk during dinner at the Great Hall, a couple of glances at the more attractive members of her batch at Ginny's insistence, and her daily ablutions. Anything mundane to defer detection of her shields because as Professor Snape had mentioned to them once in the Black House before his defection, underestimation lets one wield unknown power. That and having shields just proves you have something to hide, which was, Hermione decided, not a good plan when faced with one who has been a Legilimens for decades in the least.
A second's worth of seeking and he was out as swiftly as he had entered. 'Perhaps, he doesn't do it consciously anymore,' she thought, 'Headmaster Dumbledore never did seem to realise that he was probing.'
The present Headmaster nodded his head curtly. "Ten points from Gryffindor for breaking curfew and detention, Ms. Granger, with Professor McGonagall. A prefect should know better."
Hermione contemplated her shoes again. She was getting off this lightly considering all the horrid punishments she'd heard the Carrows mete out. Filch too was revelling in the opportunity to threaten students with dates with his manacles. She felt the Headmaster's robes swish near her shoes as he turned to leave.
She looked up to watch him glide across the corridor much like the ghosts did. It was the robes that did it, she was sure and if the situation hadn't given her an adrenalin rush from fear, she would have found a situation of herself contemplating the Headmaster's fashion choices positively ludicrous. Before she had even gone past a few paces, he was already at the hall's end and was looking over his shoulder back at her.
Dark brown eyes met deepest black. While his footsteps had been gunshots, his voice sliced through the air like the bladed weapon it was. "Another twenty points from Gryffindor, Ms. Granger. Don't ever lie to me."
And with another swish of his robes, he turned a corner and was gone.
AN: Yes, there's a line from the movie and I know it's grammatically incorrect to start a sentence with "and" but it seemed to fit so nicely up there so please forgive me :) Reviews? :)