Hermione walked along the road to Hogsmeade, which was strangely deserted. The sky was overcast and rain threatened in a while. She wondered what she was doing out in such weather.
Belatedly, the chill hit her, and she realised she had forgotten to wear a heavy coat. But she needed to go to the bookstore; perhaps she would apparate back to the gates once she had the book she needed.
Hang on a tick… what book?
"Don't you remember? You were looking for a book of secrets."
"Ron?" He stood by the tree, in his old robes, pale and sickly.
"Ron! What happened to you? You look terrible!"
He didn't say a thing, but only looked somewhere beyond her head, into the distance, as if remembering something. It was as if he didn't hear her at all.
"She always wanted the book of secrets," he spoke as if she weren't there, "the secrets to everything. Doesn't she know? It's a secret because it was never meant to be known!"
"But Granger never learns, not the lessons that are important in life, she doesn't."
"Draco? What the hell?"
"She's a tough nut to crack, that one," he blew on his palm, and tiny sparkles fell from his fingers, "she never learns."
"That's not true! I have learned a lot!"
Hang on, what was he doing here? Even if it is a dream, what does it mean?
"It means, you silly know-it-all, that they have something to tell you."
That voice! She would never forget it as long as she lived, in a body or paint; it drove her to think strange thoughts.
"Professor Snape!"
"You with your steady stream of book knowledge, and all the learning power that you claim, still fail at this… simple task?"
There! Just off the road ahead, a desk and table, where he sat with a potion vial steaming in his hand, and a quivering younger self in front of him.
He was looking straight at her, with an intense gaze, and slight sneer. Hermione had some very, very strange thoughts indeed. She coloured, and his sneer turned into a wicked smile.
"See something you… like?"
"Erm…" Hermione would have run, but her feet had been rooted to the spot by his gaze.
"What are they saying?"
"I don't know! It's not true!"
"Dreams do not lie, Granger, or haven't you learned that from your silly book?"
"What book is that?"
"The book of secrets, fool! Read it!"
"I don't have the book!"
"Don't lie to me!"
"I'M NOT LYING! I DON'T HAVE THE BOOK OF SECRETS!"
He laughed, a rich deep laugh, like dark chocolate, like… someone she had heard before.
"I've never heard you laugh? Is that how you laugh?"
"How should I know? It's your dream."
"But I've heard it before!"
"Then why are you asking me?"
"Help me, please!"
"Only you can do that. I'm dead, remember?"
"Where do the dead go Hermione?"
"Professor Dumbledore! Albus! Snape is …" she paused to find he was gone.
"Professor Snape, Hermione."
"What is going on Professor? Help me."
"Read the book Hermione," he sat on the ground and played a game of gob stones.
Hermione sat down near him, not knowing what else to do. She picked up a stone… only to throw it down in horror.
"Professor! These are not stones, they're tiny heads!" and indeed, there were heads of everyone she knew, even her own!
"What are you doing?" She screamed and stood, backing away.
Dumbledore only twinkled and touched a few heads, and they disappeared with a pop. It was clear what she was dreaming, Dumbledore was playing his games, and it usually involved lives.
Hermione was sickened, Dumbledore only hummed, "All for the best, all for the greater good."
"You don't know that!"
"But of course I don't. I'm playing a game."
"He is, 'Mione"
"Harry!" She threw herself into his arms, "I'm so glad you're here. I'm scared Harry!"
"It's nothing to be scared of, Hermione," he hugged her, and she sobbed. "I can't wake up, Harry, help me."
"You can't wake up till you answer the question, Hermione."
"What question?" She asked into his shirt.
"What did Dumbledore ask you?"
"What?" she sniffed and pulled out of his embrace. Harry looked at her, and waited.
Hermione remembered, "He asked me where the dead went."
"Answer it."
"I don't know the answer. I want to wake up. Help me!"
"Read the book."
"Not you too! I don't have a book of secrets, please, tell me where I can find one?"
"There is no book of secrets. If there was, there wouldn't be secrets anymore, now would there?"
"Then why is everyone asking me to read it?"
"Because everyone is only a figment of your dream, Hermione, You are asking yourself to read the book of secrets, even when you don't have one."
"That doesn't make sense! Why would I want to try and read a book that doesn't even exist?"
"Because you don't know that it doesn't exist."
"What? Harry, this is really confusing!"
"I can't tell you any more." He faded a little, "walk on, Hermione."
"Wait!" But he was gone. "Wake up! Wake up!" she cried, but nothing happened, she was still on the road.
She walked on, as Harry told her to do, and she came to a giant mirror.
She expected to see her image in it, but she saw Jonathan's face.
"What?" she asked herself, "Why would I see him in a mirror? Do I see myself in him or him in myself?"
"Neither," it was Draco again. He stood behind her and looked in.
"I see my family, whole again. Father, Mother, Harry and Me."
Hermione understood. It was the mirror of Erised.
Draco desired that his family be whole again? That was incredibly sensitive of him.
"You see," he spoke in her ear, "not all mirrors show you what you expect to see."
She nodded, and reached out to touch it.
Draco caught her hand before she did, and Hermione turned slightly to see him smiling.
"Wait," he told her, and Hermione turned back to the mirror.
"What are we waiting for?" She whispered, and Draco pointed with both their hands.
"Watch."
The mirror spun and she saw that both sides were silvered. The other side had a faceless man.
As the mirror spun faster, and it dawned on her. The face of Jonathan soon was superimposed by the faceless entity, till all she could see was the smooth mask of the faceless. Even the hair changed from silver to grey to black and back again.
She saw that near the bottom of the mirror, a bird was born from an egg, and grew old and died, and went back to egg again, in a seemingly endless cycle.
"We saw that in the veil, at the Ministry," she whispered, and realised Draco was no longer holding her. She looked around, to find him walking away.
"See, don't only look," he threw over his shoulder, and disappeared, saying "Where do the dead go?"
"Where do the dead go?" she spoke out loud. No one came, and she was alone with the spinning mirror.
It came to her after a while. "The dead go into everything, and nothing, and since nothing is also a part of everything, they go into life, so they are reborn in everything that is being born, and die with everything that is dying. It's an endless cycle."
"The dead don't go anywhere because they never really die. They are reborn!"
"Clever little know-it-all," that dark voice said.
Hermione woke with a start. The dead were reborn, and Jonathan was reborn from somebody. She had a sneaking suspicion of whom.
She wrapped the sheet around herself and rushed to Hope's portrait.
"Professor Dumbledore!" she called out.
The man in question came to the portrait a few minutes later. "Ms. Granger, I have been expecting you. Granted, earlier than this, but you're here."
"I'm sure you have," she bit out, "Who is Jonathan Morshey Smithe?"
"I believe you know the answer already."
"That's impossible. I saw him die myself!"
Not waiting for a response, she threw in some Floo powder into the fire and repeated the procedure from earlier.
She stumbled into the living room, casting soot and ashes everywhere.
"Finally figured it out, have you?"
One very alive Severus Snape stood at the door. The last thing that Hermione remembered was looking into eyes as black as the night, before all went dark.