A Girl Named Hermione Granger: Year Four
Chapter Ten: A Mystery Fit For An Only Child?
Disclaimer: I don't own...and I bet you're all pretty pissed at the wait by now.
The platform was trilling with more noise than Hermione could be bothered to attempt to identify. Harry and Ron were standing on either side of her, looking nearly as morose as she felt.
"I can't believe it's time to go back already," she muttered under her breath, blankly allowing her eyes to fall on her school trunk and Archie's cage. The summer had seemed to last forever, and the last few days themselves had seemed like a month all on their own.
"Yeah, let's go find a compartment before they're all full. Otherwise we won't be able to talk." Harry was the first to push his trolley of school items forward, and his movements jarred Hermione and Ron from the depths of their thoughts to follow.
Once they were seated, belongings stowed away above them, Hermione pulled two papers out of her purse and spread them on the seat beside herself. One was a regular muggle newspaper, from Spinner's End, and the other was a two-day old copy of the daily profit.
"Mysterious disappearance," she licked her dry lips as they let their eyes fall to the muggle paper, "At twelve oh-five am, police were called to number 16 Spinner's End, after a small explosion rocked the neighbourhood. The house in question was demolished by – a gas leak, that's what father made them believe – and the sole occupant of the home was found to be missing."
This had been the night of the riot at the cup.
Harry and Ron sat, tense, on the bench seat across from the distraught dark-eyed girl. The news of this incident had been waiting for them when they had returned to the Burrow, and Hermione had been inconsolable since.
"This is why he wasn't there to meet us, he was dealing with the police all night." Hermione switched her gaze to the daily profit and scowled, "And there's not a word about it in the Profit, of course. Julie was in hiding from the magical community, practically no one knows who she is or where she was. But father's quite certain she was taken."
"What are the odds it could have been a muggle criminal?" Harry asked, though he had a feeling he already knew the answer.
"Not likely. Father charmed the house quite well. Despite how he seems," she shot a knowing look at the boys, whom seemed to disagree with her, "he was sort of looking forward to the baby." It would have been his real chance to be a father – a fresh start with a fresh child that would not harbour even the slightest dislike for its father. She wished she could have proven enough to keep her father's interest, but she knew that there would always be a gaping space between them.
"I'd put my money on the death eaters, but I wouldn't rule out inside involvement," Ron muttered, earning a sharp glare from the dark eyed girl. "Don't be ridiculous, Ron, the only inside people are the same ones trusted with my existence. And I'm still here, aren't I?" Never mind the fact that several attempts had been made on her life, and her secret was already known to the very person it was meant to have been hidden from.
"I'm just saying," the red head persisted, "Your family is tight with some of the worst of you-know-who's followers."
The great hall echoed with the booming thunder storm, and the excited rumbling of the students as they relaxed at their house tables.
The feast had been just as extravagant as ever, or so Hermione surmised, watching Harry and Ron eat through at least three helpings while her stomach threatened to revolt. She hadn't felt up to eating most meals since the world cup; her fear and worry for her older sister had seen to that quite thoroughly.
"Quite down, now, if I may, I have a few announcements to make." Dumbledore's voice effectively silenced the chatter, though the thunder boomed on merrily from the enchanted ceiling.
"Thank you; first, I would like to –" The double doors of the great hall clattered open, cutting off whatever the headmaster had intended to say. Every set of eyes in the room turned to fall upon the grizzly man, drenched to the bone from the rain, with a gnarled, wooden foot poking out the bottom of his shaggy black cloak.
It was nigh impossible to try and decipher the age of the man, as he began to limp forward with a steady thump echoing every time his wooden foot connected with the stone flooring. His face was a mess of scars, a small chunk of the tip of his nose missing, and his scraggly hair plastered over his forehead and shoulders. As he passed by the seat Hermione had taken, she found her gaze drawn to his left eye – it was electric blue, and whizzing around in its socket, until it landed on her and stayed a moment before moving onto Harry.
A shudder ran down her spine as the grizzly man finally reached the podium, where Dumbledore still stood, with a smile adorning his old lips. "Ah, Professor Moody, I was wondering where you had gotten off to." Murmurs broke out among the students immediately.
"That's Mad-eye Moody, the one dad rushed off to see this morning." Ron whispered excitedly, earning two curious looks from his friends, "Who?" Harry asked, cocking his head to the side as Ron stared back expectantly, before his face fell with disappointment. "You know, Mad-eye Moody, ex-auror, possibly the most crazy man who ever lived to kick ass!" There was a pause before Ron sighed and hung his head. "Oi, don't you two know anything at all? Mad-eye is dead famous. He's the one who post of those death eaters in Azkaban."
Understanding dawned upon Harry and Hermione – this was common wizard knowledge among the purebloods, and half-bloods; and though they were each technically half-bloods themselves, they had been raised fully by muggles. Where Ron idolized Mad-eye, they knew Sherlock Holmes.
"Harry and I were raised by muggles, Ron. We don't know every single person of note – don't you laugh, even I don't know everything." Hermione glowered at Ron as he fought to contain his enjoyment over the fact that he, for once, knew something that she didn't – that turned out to be important.
"Settle down, now, may I introduce your new Defence Against the Dark Arts Professor, Professor Alastor Moody. He has kindly come out of retirement for the year, in order to take up the teaching post."
The silence that followed Dumbledore's introduction was broken only by a soft rumble of thunder.
"I have one more announcement to make," a glimmer of amusement flickered across the old wizards face as his lips turned up further at the corners, "this year, there will be no Quidditch cup –"
A cry of outrage echoed from each of the four tables, particularly from those students on their house teams. All protests were cut short as Dumbledore raised his hands for silence once more.
"There will be no Quidditch because Hogwarts will be playing host to the Tri Wizard Tournament. In October, we will be having guests from other wizarding school arrive, and a champion from each school will compete in three dangerous tasks for the glorious title of Tri-Wizard Champion, and a thousand Galleons in prize money."
Hermione froze as she reached the doors of the great hall, "I need to have a word with our Professor, you guys go on ahead." The great hall was nearly empty at this point, and neither Harry nor Ron was feeling in the mood to protest with her strange request, so they bid Hermione good night and followed the last of the straggling students towards the Gryffindor tower.
A few minutes later, her father and McGonagall made their way to where the fourteen year old was waiting, shifting her weight from foot to foot. "I need to speak with you, Professor," She gave her father an innocent, yet pointed look as she spoke, and received no acknowledgement for her effort, as he strode past her out the doors without even casting a glance back at her.
"Come to my office, miss Granger," McGonagall sighed, placing her hand on the girl's shoulder as they left the great hall.
The corridor was eerily silent, and darker than usual as the stormy clouds blocked the moons light from illuminating the stone walls and floor. "Do you know about what happened?" Hermione ventured to ask as she climbed a wide staircase beside her head of house.
A tired sigh was her reply. "I do, as a matter of fact. But we will discuss this in my office."
A cheery fire and plate of tea and biscuits was already waiting for them when they stepped into McGonagall's office. Hermione kept her silence as she was seated and the door was shut and secured, and a cup of warm, soothing tea was placed in her hands.
The middle-aged Transfiguration Professor stirred her own tea for a moment, lost in thought, before she turned her attention to Hermione. "I have heard about your sister's disappearance, both from your father and Albus." She placed her tea down gently after taking a sip.
"At this point, not much is known. In fact, had your father not been intending to leave his own home, we might not have discovered Julie's absence until at least the next day. The house was destroyed, and our only clue was this," McGonagall picked up a photograph from her desk and handed it over to Hermione.
"That's his mark," Hermione whimpered, eyes roving over the mark burnt into the wall of the main sitting room. "She's dead, isn't she?"
Minerva winced at the bold question and placed her elbows on the desk to rest her face in her hands. "There is no way of knowing. All we can do is hope that whatever the reason they took her for, they need her to be alive to execute. Dumbledore has several people scouring around for any sign of Julie."
Hermione dropped the picture on a stack of parchment and allowed herself to slump back in her chair. "Father must be quite upset, he was looking forward to having the baby." As much as she loathed to admit, if only to herself, Hermione felt a horrific little twinge of relief bubbling up in the darkest corner of her mind – she would have no sibling, no contest for her father's love. Though she would rather that there had been no suffering over the matter. She loved Julie dearly, and to no longer have her around would kill her surely.
"He is. You'll have to do your best to be there for him in the coming months. Severus has always been surprisingly delicate, when it came down to matters of family. When his mother died, he was a wreck, not to mention how devastated he had already been by Lily's death."
Hermione shifted uncomfortably in her seat; she knew precious little about her father's younger days, and even less about his friendship with Harry's mother, though she had her doubts if Julie – or even herself – matched to the level of attachment he'd felt towards his childhood friend.
Breakfast was a noisy affair the next morning, not that Hermione was surprised. There was still a lot of excitement surrounding the late entrance of Professor Moody, and of the announcement Dumbledore had made. Even she had to admit – the glory – it was like an unattainable dream. And oh, how she wanted to attain it. It would be a distraction, from the facts she did not want to face.
When Harry and Ron sat opposite her, piling their plates with bacon and eggs, she squashed everything down as far as it would go. "You never came back to the dorms, did you 'mione?" Harry asked between helpings of hash browns, peering across the table at the would-be-Slytherin girl.
"I did, I just had an extended talk with Professor McGonagall," She didn't dare utter much more than that, for fear of slipping out something that ought not to be said. For the most part, the boys didn't respond, though whether out of respect for privacy, or their mouthfuls of bacon, she couldn't say.
By the time they had retrieved their timetables and discovered that they would now have to run from the great hall to Gryffindor tower, and then back out to the green houses, Hermione found herself wishing for her time-turner. She hadn't slept well, after talking to McGonagall. Her head had been filled with nightmares and visions of the future – too dark for her to want to believe.
"Damn, we'll be late for sure." Ron practically cheered, as the trio followed the spattering of student returning to the tower for their books. "Oh, I doubt that Ron. Professor Sprout will likely postpone starting for five minutes, at least. Everyone has to fetch their books, you know."
Ron shot her a furtive look of distaste, "I know that, can't a bloke dream though?" He grouched, slumping ahead a few paces to block her from giving any reply.
"Watch it you two, it's far too early to bicker. I don't want a headache before double Divination this afternoon." Harry said in an attempt to end the feud before it could start, only to earn a snort of laughter from Hermione.
"You should have dropped it, like me. What a rubbish class – Arithmancy is much more fascinating. It's like my advanced Arithmetic classes from primary, only less about numbers, and more about their powers. You'd probably do quite well in it, Harry. You're familiar with Arithmetic, aren't you?"
The dark haired boy turned to her with a look of horror etched on his face, echoed by Ron whom had stopped pouting long enough to be horrified, and she burst into a fit of giggles at the sight. Of course she'd added that last bit to try and get a reaction from them. And boy had it been worth it.
Hello all…. Try not to be too upset about the terrible wait; I've actually had a job for the past couple weeks – though it was just temporary.
Anywho, prepare for the weird shit, yeah? I haven't really cracked open the fourth book too much as I've been writing, and things aren't going to be quite so straight forward.
Also, I have a comment addressed to my last (or one of the last,) reviewer; Don't worry, I know exactly where you're coming from. It was a weird twist for me too, and I hadn't actually intended for it to go so far. It's about to be cleared though. This is an idea I'd toyed with for a bit, I was wondering how to settle the details for it, but a rather wicked idea has come to me. It'll dismantle a little of the preconceived story from the books, but thankfully shouldn't do too much to my previous chapters, seeing as things focus more on Hermione.
No, what I've done has not been designed just to appease a reviewer, so nobody get too mixed up about it. The base of this idea was always going to happen. It just wasn't going to be quite so dark; but that can't be helped. The whole universe was going to tilt no matter what, and I actually wish this idea had come to me sooner, because then the buildup would have had you all raving and ranting, waiting on baited breath. I'll just have to make do, though.
And, for anyone who slightly cares, I got slipped a clean bill of health – well, basically. And even though I'm still sick – I'm nowhere near as sick as I was to be so incapacitated for so long again.