Hermione Granger and the Secret Fire

AN: Thanks for the reviews! You guys ROCK! I am so happy to see that people are reading and enjoying this! I mean, I love it, but I am biased!!!!

Chapter 6-Anger burning bright

Hermione was walking down an abandoned hallway on one of the top floors of Hogwarts. She had heard a noise and curious to find out whom was responsible for the clatter.

She walked into a very dark classroom and said, “Lumos.” Nothing happened. She tried again, “Lumos!” Again, nothing happened.

Hermione pulled on the sleeve of her robe and felt for her wand. She realized, belatedly, that it wasn’t there! After searching her body for the missing wand, she realized with dread that it was not with her in the pitch-black classroom.

“Looking for something, Hermione?” a male voice called out from somewhere in the middle of the room.

“Who’s there?” she said with fear and trepidation ringing in her voice. “Why are you sitting in the dark?”

The voice chuckled and said, “Would you prefer to have the room lit? You know how to light a room, don’t you?”

“I…I tried. It didn’t work,” she replied.

“Well, I like the darkness; it suits me. Why do you think your spell failed to work??” the voice said.

Hermione thought about it and couldn’t come up with a logical answer. “Light a candle, please. I can’t see you.”

“Hermione, when you can light it, it will be lit. You know, you didn’t answer my question. Why didn’t your spell work?”

“I don’t know. I can’t find my wand,” she admitted. She immediately regretted announcing that she was unarmed. She used a trick she had heard from Harry to make the attacker forget your moment of stupidity and asked, “Why didn’t it work?”

The voice laughed out loud. “Good thinking, Hermione. I figured you wouldn’t ask that question, but as usual, you proved me wrong. I can’t tell you why it didn’t work, you must find the answer yourself.”

Hermione found that she was feeling frustrated as well as fearful and apprehensive. The phantom male was not giving her any information whilst confusing the things she already knew to be true.

As Hermione sighed out loud, she felt the man grab her arm and yank her into the room, slamming the door behind them. Immediately her frustration turned to pure terror.

“What…what are you doing? Light a candle so I can see you,” she commanded trying to sound fierce. But nothing was lit and Hermione felt the man’s arms encircling her waist.

“You are such a dumb witch. There is no way you are the smartest in your class. In fact, I think I saw that you were slipping in the ranks,” the man whispered in her ear.

“Let me go,” she cried as he forced her onto the ground. She could feel the man pulling on her robes. “Let me go. Please, let me go!”

“LET ME GO,” she screamed as she slapped the man, hoping to force him off of her before he said a spell to make her silent.

As sudden as it began, it ended. Hermione woke up from her nightmare, sweating and crying.

She took deep breaths trying to get control of her emotions. When she looked up, she saw a face in front of her that she was sure was a live version of her nightmare!

“Oh my Gods, what are you doing in my room?” she screamed, terrified. She once again reached out and slapped the man in front of her.

“Owwww. Knock it off, Hermione!” Malfoy said as he rubbed his cheek on the spot where she had slapped him, twice.

Hermione stared in shock at the man standing next to her bed, “What are you doing in here?”

Malfoy looked at her with an insulted expression and said, “I came in here because you were screaming. You started yelling ‘Let me go’ and then you slapped me! Is that the thanks I get for waking you? Fine, I’ll leave you to your nightmare.”

He began to walk back toward her door when she stopped him.

“No, I mean what are you doing in here? You are supposed to be at home for some emergency. And my room is warded!” Hermione explained searching for an answer that would make sense.

Malfoy looked at Hermione as if she was a child and walked toward her. In a placating tone, he said, “I am Draco Malfoy. I come from a long line of pure-blood wizards.”

“Is there a point to this line of rubbish?” Hermione interrupted, her fear turning into anger at Malfoy’s little monologue.

“I COME FROM A LINE of pure blooded wizards,” Draco said, practically yelling the first part. “We are not held off by a few minor wards. I would not be a jewel in my ancestry crown unless I knew how to get past a few basic wards.”

Hermione stared at him in disbelief, “How often have you been in my room?”

“Please! I would not, and have not, been in your room when you are not here.”

Seeing the look on Hermione’s face, he added, “And before you ask, no, I haven’t been in here spying on you or anything. The only time I have been in here, other than right now, was when we first moved in. You unceremoniously threw me out that night, if I remember correctly.”

Hermione had finally started to catch her breath. She realized that she was sitting up in her bed in a satin nightdress. The sheet covering her was only draped over her legs, leaving her breasts unsupported and partially exposed. She grabbed for the sheet and covered her chest.

Malfoy snorted and said, “It’s too late to be modest.” Hermione noticed that his eyes scanned her body and returned to her face.

Hermione was about to make a smart comment, but she realized for the first time that Malfoy was in her bedroom in his underwear and an open school robe! Only his silk black boxers, that left very little to the imagination, covered his bottom half. Hermione found her pulse increasing as her teenage hormones took over and she thought about what else was under that robe. She then recognized that it was once again hard to breathe.

“Um. Thanks Malfoy. I appreciate you coming in here to wake me from the nightmare,” she said.

Hermione was finding it very difficult not to focus in on Malfoy’s covered, and uncovered, body. She realized with alarm that Misten had been correct. His body was quite attractive!

Malfoy scowled at her and he sat down on the bed. “Yeah, whatever. Look, do you want to talk about it? You yelled a lot before you slapped me.”

Hermione’s face grimaced and she whispered, “I am sorry about hitting you. Why are you being nice to me?”

“Don’t get used to it. And I am not being nice. I don’t even know why I am in here. I am just trying to return the favor. You listened to me, so I’ll listen to you. This is a one time deal, though,” Draco said with a snarl.

Hermione noticed that Malfoy was trying hard to look and sound menacing. ‘Is it just an act?’ she thought. ‘Is Misten right? Has he really changed?’

Hermione sighed before saying, “No, Malfoy. I don’t want to talk about it. It was just a stupid nightmare.”

“Okay. But don’t worry about hitting me. I have been slugged harder,” Malfoy said trying to lighten the mood by joking.

“How long have you been back? Is everything okay at home?” Hermione asked, realizing she hadn’t heard him come back from his emergency trip home.

Malfoy’s open expression closed quickly at her question. “It doesn’t matter, but not too long. You were in the bath when I came in, so I hung around in the common room until I was sure you were finished. I was getting ready for sleep in the lavatory when I heard you scream. Your wards were more difficult to break than I expected, so it took me a few extra seconds to get in here.”

Hermione smiled thinking that she was glad she had created wards that were stronger than most.

“Are you sure you’re okay now?” Malfoy asked. Hermione thought she saw him trying to be civil, but brushed it off to her lack of sleep. She then realized that it was quite late and he probably wanted to go to bed. “Yeah, I’m fine. Do you mind if I ask you a question before you go, though?”

Malfoy seemed to weigh the idea before answering, “Okay. But I may not answer you.”

“Why did you call me ‘Hermione’ last week in the common room and then again tonight when you woke me?”

Again, Malfoy seemed to consider his answer before speaking. “I called you ‘Hermione’? I didn’t notice. That is your name isn’t it?”

Hermione knew he was being cheeky, so she waited for him to continue.

With a deep sigh, he continued, “I guess I just think of you as more than ‘Mud…’ that name now. You have been pretty nice to me on rare occasions, and now that I have been talking to someone who is trying to get me to see why my ‘evil ways’ are so bad, I suppose I am just trying to get along with my suite-mate.”

“You’ve been talking to Misten, right?” Hermione asked in an attempt to keep him talking and in her room.

Malfoy’s face clouded over with a look that Hermione guessed was disappointment before admitting, “Yeah, but I thought she and I had agreed to keep our friendship quiet.”

Hermione immediately realized her mistake and broken promise to Misten to keep their relationship a secret. “Don’t be mad that she told me. I was having some difficulty with what you had said that day in the common room and she let it slip that you two had talked before. Are you two close? I mean do you like her?”

Malfoy chuckled and said, “Misten? Just as a friend. She’s a nice girl and all, but she’s from America and I don’t think she gets our cultural differences.”

Hermione let a breath go and was surprised to realize that she didn’t even realize she was holding it. ‘Do I care if he likes Misten as more than a friend? Why would I? It’s Malfoy, for Gods sake!’ she thought internally but snorted externally.

“Nice snort, Granger!” Malfoy said accentuating the last name.

Hermione found herself reddening and asked, “Does this mean I get to call you by your first name?”

Malfoy thought it through before saying, “Whatever. I don’t care what you call me.”

But his words were negated by his next sentence. “You can call me ‘Draco’ only if you do not say it in front of Potty and the Weasel, okay? I cant stand the idea of them thinking of me by any other name than Malfoy.”

Hermione giggled and admitted, “I am pretty sure that is not the only name they have for you.”

Draco smiled and said, “Yeah well, we’re even then.” He got up and started walking toward the door that led back into their shared lavatory. He reached up and used his arm to push open the door, letting the sleeve of the robe fall toward his shoulder. The pose, with him leaning against the door, was quite sexy to Hermione.

“Good night, Draco. Sweet dreams,” Hermione said wishing she could think of a way to get him to stay in her room and continue talking to her.

“Goodnight, Hermione. Get some sleep,” he whispered with a sweet smile. He turned his back to her as he walked through the door and Hermione caught a glimpse of his forearm. There, in a horrible mixed shade of black and blue and red, was the Dark Mark.

~*~

‘NO, NO, NO!’ Hermione thought as she laid on her bed. ‘Just when I thought he might be changing!’ Hermione kept replaying the conversation in her head. She had thought he was good looking, for Gods sake!

“Sleep? Sleep? How, exactly, am I supposed to sleep after seeing that Malfoy has the Dark Mark?” Hermione asked Crookshanks several hours after he left.

Once again, Hermione felt like her safe haven was being breached by an irrepressible source. It seemed that Hogwarts was never going to provide the security it once had in her eyes.

‘What am I going to do? If I tell Ron and Harry, it’ll start some conflict between them again. This year has been so peaceful without the three of them squabbling every chance they get. I know Percy said that Voldemort would be enlisting students at Hogwarts for his battle. He must be using Malfoy to find his prospects! Maybe we should use that potion they found to see what Draco knows and what he may be hiding.

‘I could go to Misten because she seems to understand him better than anyone else has in all the time we’ve been here. Plus he trusts her and we may be able to convince him to turn himself in to Professor Dumbledore.’

Hermione could not sleep. Her mind kept racing with thoughts of Malfoy as a Death Eater, Malfoy as a name calling git, and Malfoy as a bully who initiated her earlier that year. But she also thought about the Malfoy that Misten talked about, the Malfoy who sat on the stairs listening quietly as Misten cried her eyes out, the Malfoy who had been in her room hours earlier concerned as she awoke from a nightmare and she found attractive and alluring.

As night became dawn, Hermione decided that there was only one course of action. She got dressed quickly, and left her suite to find the one person who she could tell the truth to and not worry about them being on her side. There was only one person she knew who seemed to know what to do in a crisis.

~*~

Hermione arrived at her destination and began climbing the stairs, hoping she was not arriving too early in the morning. As she knocked on the door and she held her breath that her confidant would not only be awake, but would be able to help her.

The door swung open and Hermione walked into a space where she felt comfortable and calm for the first time since Malfoy had left her room. She saw the one person she thought could be an excellent sounding board and was told to have a seat.

After being offered tea and pastries, she sat quietly thinking of how she could approach the subject.

“What can I do for you at this earlier hour, Ms. Granger?” Professor Dumbledore said looking at her through his half-moon glasses, “Perhaps there is something going on in your life that needs to be discussed in a safe and completely private atmosphere?”

Hermione looked at her Headmaster and smiled at the thought that she could relax and be completely honest for once. She was glad there was one person who she could talk to without having to worry about her conversational cohort going off on wild adventures or judging her for not being perfect at every aspect of her life.

Hermione looked at the man who had shown great love and respect to all of his students and who seemed to appreciate each individual as their own person. She found she didn’t know how to tell him that someone he had trusted had turned his back on them and was now working for the enemy.

Hermione looked at Professor Dumbledore and worried that, for once, he might not know how to handle the piece of news she was going to give him. Although he was a noble wizard and many years her senior, Hermione found herself wanting to protect him from the news that was sure to greatly disappoint him.

“Professor, I…I don’t know…” she broke off as the tears she had been valiantly trying to hold back started falling freely, “I am not sure… I don’t know how to…”

“Ms Granger, you have known me several years, no?” Professor Dumbledore said as he watched Hermione wrestle with her news.

“Um…yes,” she replied not sure where he was going with his line of questioning.

“And have you ever had difficulty telling me news before?”

“Yes,” she admitted.

“And have I disappointed you with how I have handled the news you struggled to give me?” His question surprised her.

“No, sir,” she stated plainly.

“Then trust, now, that this mystery will be met with the same gravity and reverence I have shown in the past,” he finished. And suddenly Hermione felt secure enough to share her story.

Hermione told Professor Dumbledore everything. She shared the story from when she literally ran into Draco on the train and he called her a name, to her fight with Ron and the treatment she received from Malfoy the night of the feast. She told him about catching Draco watching her and Misten in the common room and his ‘initiation’ of the girls the day after, that Professor Snape happened to walk in on two minutes too late.

Hermione also confessed Harry and Ron’s conversation with Percy (minus the brewing of the potion) and Misten’s new friendship with Draco. She explained what had happened in her common room before he had interrupted Professor Snape the previous weekend and finally admitted to her conversation with Draco earlier and her shock at what she saw when he left the room.

Throughout the entire conversation, Professor Dumbledore sat in his chair watching Hermione, reading her emotions and considering her reactions to the information she had decided to share. He didn’t say a word when he heard how Ron and Harry had interfered, once again, with a plan concerning Voldemort and even kept quiet after she exposed Draco’s secret and what she observed on his arm.

Hermione watched his face carefully and it never changed. She never saw surprise, anger, happiness or disappointment. All that she saw was a look that she could only describe as apathy. Even when she finished her entire story, Professor Dumbledore sat quietly looking at her. For the first time since deciding to come see him, she was concerned she had made a mistake.

‘What is he thinking? Why hasn’t he said anything? Am I going to get in trouble for telling him all of this? What will happen to Draco? What will Misten do when she finds out what Draco really is?’ Hermione thought as her mind continued racing with all her uncertainties.

“Professor, I don’t know what else to say,” Hermione forced out as she watched him watching her.

“Do not misinterpret my silence as a delay for you to say more,” Dumbledore spoke slowly. “I am simply trying to decide what the best course of action will be in this situation.”

Hermione was shocked at his admission of ignorance.

“I had hoped that young Mr. Malfoy would be able to show better judgment,” he finally said.

Hermione felt comforted in her adviser’s agreement with her conclusion before she heard him add, “I did not expect you to find out this early in the school term.”

Hermione stared at Professor Dumbledore and wondered if she was still dreaming. ‘Surely he did not just declare that he knew about Draco’s secret and is contented with Malfoy’s decision!’

Professor Dumbledore stood up from his desk and walked over to a window on the east side of his office. Hermione watched him as he gazed at the sun start to rise over the lake.

“Miss Granger, I must ask that you return to your common room and wait there for further instructions,” Professor Dumbledore stated gravely, “I ask that you tell no one of this conversation, or of any thing that you may have seen. I also ask that you stay in your rooms until I send for you.”

‘This is not happening! How could he hear news like that and then send me back to my common room?’ Hermione thought staring at her Headmaster. “But…I think…”

Professor Dumbledore held a hand up and discharged Hermione’s feelings before hearing them.

“I will send for you soon,” he said in a dismissive manner.

Hermione got up and wandered back to her private room thinking a million thoughts.

‘Am I going to get in trouble now? Is he just so upset he can’t talk to me?’ Hermione had never seen the Headmaster at a loss for words or unclear on how to handle a situation. She didn’t understand how anything could happen that he could not manage!

She sat on her bed as she arrived in her room and began to cry. She didn’t think telling the Headmaster what she knew would cause him to think poorly of her. In her wildest dreams, she never expected him to watch her so solemnly and with such disenchantment in his eyes.

Soon, however, the sadness turned to anger. Hermione felt great rage at the so-called adults around her.

“This is ridiculous,” Hermione said aloud to no one in particular. “I am old enough and mature enough to be an adult in the wizarding world’s eyes in four days on my birthday. I am responsible enough to be given the position of Head Girl and I am bright enough to have a dozen choices with what I want to do with my life. However, the ‘adults’ who are responsible for my education do not think I am capable of handling any sort of news that will most likely affect my entire world?

“My best-friend is going to be the savior of our world but not before death and destruction unlike anything I’ve ever seen before, but I cannot deal with any serious matters because I obviously must be sheltered from it? I am beginning to see what Harry feels when he says that nobody tells him anything. I can certainly understand his frustration!”

Hermione’s ranting was reaching deafening levels. She was pacing around her bedroom and throwing books, clothing and anything else she could get her hands on all over the floor, making the room look like a war-zone.

“Then, I am not even allowed to go to breakfast this morning or talk to my friends! Obviously, I made the wrong choice by going to Dumbledore. Who would have thought that going to him would be a mistake? I should have gone to Misten, or even Harry! I can usually get him to listen and not overreact if I talk to him calmly and tell him that I need his help.”

Hermione decided that sitting in her room was outrageous and that Dumbledore could not just order her to ‘sit and stay’ like she was some dog. She grabbed her wand and walked out of her room, intent on going to breakfast and talking privately with Harry.

As she walked out of the portrait, she collided with Professor McGonagall.

“Oh, Miss Granger! Professor Dumbledore would like to meet with you in his office,” Professor McGonagall said, trying to right her balance.

Hermione genuinely wanted to say ‘No, I am going to breakfast. Professor Dumbledore will have to wait until I have more time.’ However, she knew she’d never say those words because they were disrespectful and irresponsible. Instead she nodded and followed her former head of house to the Headmaster’s office.

“You wanted to see me, sir?” she asked, walking into his office. Hermione looked around and realized that they were not alone. Inside the Headmaster’s office, against the western wall, Professor Snape was watching her carefully. Hermione also realized that none other than Draco Malfoy filled the seat closest to Professor Snape in front of the Headmaster’s desk.

“Hermione, have a seat next to Draco. I understand that many people in the Order would not agree with my choice, but I feel the time has come to let you in on something that must remain confidential,” the Headmaster said.

Hermione sat down and snuck a look at Draco. He was staring at the ground, blushing. He also looked very uncomfortable and Hermione felt a surge of pride in herself for turning him in to Professor Dumbledore.

‘Even if no one else thinks it was a good idea, I am glad he has been caught and won’t be able to recruit for Voldemort!’ she thought.

“Draco, I believe you have something to tell Miss Granger,” the Headmaster said encouraging him to speak.