The Winterscapes

The Winterscapes - Chapter Two

Hermione lay in her four-poster and stared up at the canopy. The curtains were not drawn around the bed; Hermione had enough privacy in her private Head Girl's dormitory. Pale greenish silver moonlight streamed in through two narrow arched windows, illuminating the outline of the canopy above her. She knew it was crimson, but in the light she could not see the color. Just that it was dark.

She sighed. She could not fall asleep. She could probably have made herself fall asleep, if she wanted to--she had developed an intense concentration and could use it to think of nothing as well as to focus--but she didn't want to. There was so much to think about. Harry and Ron ... classes ... what would happen after Hogwarts ... More study? Auror training? ... Draco Malfoy ... Draco Malfoy. Hermione didn't know what his problem was. She understood why he felt the way he did about Muggle-borns. It was about supremacy, mostly. People like to think they're better than other people because better means something, at least. It was probably also learnt from his parents, who learnt it from their parents, who learnt it from their parents ... Maybe sometime, with someone, it had its roots in logic. Wizards marrying Muggles and Muggle-borns meant higher rates of squib births, Hermione knew enough about the Muggle science of genetics to realize that, but wouldn't wizards have died out altogether if they hadn't started marrying Muggles and training Muggle-borns? That's what Mr. Weasley had said, anyway. And didn't Muggle-borns deserve to be a part of the wizarding world? They had a right, a birthright, just as much as someone like Draco Malfoy did, because they were born with magic. Hadn't she proved that she was just as good as a pureblood, that she deserved being magical just as much?

She swung her legs over the side of the bed, stood up, and lit two of the torches on the wall with two flicks of her wand. Her timetable was the only piece of parchment on her desk; the rest was neatly filed away in drawers. She picked it up and read it for the thousandth time. Tomorrow, Monday, she had Double Potions, Defense Against the Dark Arts, Herbology, Ancient Runes, and Arithmancy. She couldn't wait to start the term. She had fresh quills and parchment, new robes, and was fresh back from a summer spent reading her new textbooks. In the same spirit, she liked reading her timetable, even though she already knew what it said. She hoped this year would be different than the rest of her existence at Hogwarts. Years one through four were rife with danger and unwanted excitement, and years five and six with secrecy and whispered plans, which involved Harry more than they involved her and Ron. That irked her, and she wished Harry would tell her more about whatever it was that troubled him. Of course, she knew that this year would not be the idyllic year of peaceful learning she had hoped to experience since she first received her Hogwarts letter at the age of twelve. And she did know the kinds of things Harry worried about. It really wasn't fair.

When she felt her brain had ordered itself enough to go to sleep, she snuggled back up under her covers and drifted off.

<><><><><>

Hermione shivered. It was colder in the dungeons than in the rest of the school, but she hadn't thought to bring a sweater. Oh well. It always warmed up when the fires under all the cauldrons were lit. Though considering my luck, Snape's probably just lecturing today. Harry and Ron shared a table, so she sat next to Neville, who was also without a partner. Sitting next to Neville was marginally better than sitting next to one of the Slytherins, and he usually needed her help to avoid a disaster anyway.

When everyone was seated and quiet, which happened quickly in Snape's classroom, he swept dramatically to the front of the room, turned around, and surveyed the students with disgust.

"So," he said, "the seventh years. The brilliant seventh years. Or at least you think you're brilliant," he let his gaze linger on Hermione. She didn't flinch; she was used to Snape's blatant insults. "The truth is, however, that I have one last year to cram into your thick skulls everything you ought to know about potions brewing. This will no doubt be an immensely difficult task. It will not be made more difficult by allowing the more skilled brewers among you to be held back by those of you who cannot tell the difference between an infusion and a simple extract." He was pacing around the room now, and he stopped in front of Lavender Brown and Parvati Patil and sneered, "Or by letting you gossip with your friends."

Hermione looked at Neville and was the tiniest bit relieved.

Snape walked back to his desk and lifted a roll of parchment out of a whole pile of rolls. Hermione wondered how he knew it was the right parchment, but apparently it was.

"Stand up and bring your bags with you to the front of the room. I will call two names at a time. Each pair will sit together and do partner assignments together for the rest of the year. Sit in the order I call out your names, starting with the front left-hand table and ending with the back right-hand table. That would be my left hand, Mr. Longbottom," Snape said.

He unrolled the parchment and began reading. "Seamus Finnigan and Ian Baddock, Lavender Brown and Neville Longbottom, Dean Thomas and Tracey Davis, Sally-Ann Perks and Gregory Goyle, Ronald Weasley and Madelyn Greengrass, Pansy Parkinson and Amanda Spinnet, Parvati Patil and Vincent Crabbe, Millicent Bulstrode and Emma Moon ..."

Hermione was a bit nervous. There weren't many names left, and she highly doubted Snape would pair her with Harry.

"Draco Malfoy and Hermione Granger, and finally, Blaise Zabini and Harry Potter. I realize many of you do not like your partners, and I do not care. If there are any pranks or sabotaged potions because you cannot force yourself to get along with your partner, I will force you to get along in detention, and believe me when I tell you it will be a great deal more unpleasant than any detention you have yet experienced." He began to lecture on the theory behind burn-healing paste.

Hermione walked to the back of the room to her table. Draco strolled lazily after her. She sat down and did her best to ignore him, though she remembered to put her book bag on the floor on the side away from him. She didn't think he was above stepping on it or slipping some sort of nasty potion ingredient in it.

<><><><><>

Hermione sat far back from the fire in the Gryffindor Common Room, and therefore away from the noise and laughter of her fellow students. She sat on a lumpy maroon sofa, with her books and parchments spread out on a low table in front of her. She was working on her first Arithmancy assignment of the year, and concentrating very intensely. It was a sort of state she slipped into--she didn't think about anything but the equations on the paper, the numbers she was manipulating, and how she was making the whole problem balance out. She loved it. Whenever she finished a set of problems and came out of her absorbed state, she didn't even know how much time had passed until she looked at her watch. This evening, however, she was brought out of it prematurely by an insistent tap on the shoulder. She was annoyed, but tried not to let it show.

"Ahh...Hi Ron"

"Hullo," he said, grinning. "What are you working on?" He pushed over a roll of parchment that was covered in neat, ordered columns of numbers, and sat down beside her.

"Arithmancy"

"Oh. Well do you want to play chess or something when you're finished?"

"Well ... I'll probably be working on this until supper, but maybe afterwards. Why don't you do some of your homework too?"

"I don't have any, except a Muggle Studies thing and that Potions reading. Sorry you got paired up with Malfoy in Potions, by the way. You'd think Snape just likes to make us miserable. Slimy bastard."

"Yeah, thanks," Hermione said. "What do you have to do for Muggle Studies?"

"Write an essay about a Muggle game or sport. I think I'm going to write it on football ... know enough about it thanks to Dean always going on about it."

"Oh, that sounds interesting. Why don't you get a quill and some parchment so you can work on it here while I finish my Arithmancy? Or you could borrow some of mine. I've just got to get this finished ..."

"Nah, that's okay." Ron shook his head. "I'll go find Harry and see if he wants to play chess. Sorry for bothering you."

"You're not bothering me," Hermione said automatically. "I just really want to finish this."

"Oh. There was just one thing." Ron paused.

"What?"

"Doyouwanttohaveabutterbeerwithme?"

"What?" she asked, even more bewildered this time.

"Do you want to have a butterbeer on the Hogsmeade trip?"

"Isn't it in three weeks?"

"Um ... yes."

"Well sure. You and Harry and I always have butterbeer when we go to Hogsmeade.

"Right. Well, bye."

"See you at supper," said Hermione as she went back to her Arithmancy assignment.