A Capacity for Love

CHAPTER 5

First Day Back

Hermione pulled on her black stockings underneath her Hogwarts uniform. They were woollen and they itched, but the castle was drafty and cold, and she had double Potions down in the dungeons today. It was Monday, her first day back in classes since Halloween. She had actually only missed the one day, but she had butterflies in her stomach like she had back on her first day at Hogwarts. Would anyone notice anything different?

Her roommates had been satisfied with the 'flu story, and hadn't enquired further, but Hermione nonetheless avoided being in the room with them as much as possible over the weekend. She waited that morning until they had already gone down to breakfast before getting up. She didn't have much of an appetite, anyway.

She had spent the weekend basically holed up in her room, or hiding out in the library, ostensibly catching up on the work she'd missed on Friday. She didn't have any outward bruises, but she felt that there had been a change wrought in her, and that it was somehow visible. She'd flown over Harry's skimpy notes (Ron's had been simply illegible), mentally correcting his spelling and generally tutting at their poor quality. Honestly, if it weren't for her, they would never have passed any of their classes.

Except for Defense Against the Dark Arts, Hermione allowed. There, Harry obviously excelled, and his notes showed this. Whereas in his other classes, he had clearly not really been paying attention and had simply copied down entire sentences that he'd heard, regardless of their import (Today we shall be discusing charms efecting the temperture, I hope you will find that a welcome exercice on such a cold day...Needles can be particulerly tricky as can any small metal objects you must ??? end up with cold and silver), his notes from DADA were different: short, concise, succinct (albeit still riddled with spelling and grammar errors; grrr). 'Defence strategies with no wand: Wandless magic (not many can do it) -- Help from others (look for unlikely alleys) -- Tricks (pride and honour dont matter only surviveing)' Although she puzzled for a bit over the 'alleys', she found the ideas, in the end, interesting, and wondered whether everything was directly from Snape's lesson, or whether Harry had embellished with a bit of his own material.

Would any of that had helped her on Halloween? Hermione couldn't help wonder. Attempting to skirt the actual events in her mind, she considered: Wandless magic...although Madam Pomfrey was convinced she'd done it, Hermione knew, deep down, that that simply had not been the case. She could cast non-verbal spells, but her magic was still consummately bound to her wand. It was still, of course, within the realm of possibility that she could have unconsciously conjured some sort of protection, but she didn't think so.

What about help from others? Maybe, if she had called out to the other girls, if they had been able to join forces...with all those Death Eaters standing their sibilant vigil? she considered dubiously; they wouldn't have gotten far. The other Death Eaters... Suddenly, something occurred to Hermione. Who had the other Death Eaters been, those who hadn't actually participated? Maybe Draco, or Snape, had been among those cloaked figures ringing the room. But if so, why hadn't they come to the girls' aid? Would they have done anything if she had called out to them by name? It was too late, now, of course, but if she were ever in such a situation again... Unlikely allies, indeed they would have been.

And what about tricks? Fighting dirty? Oonagh had scratched and bitten like a wildcat. A wild Gryffindor. She at least could hold her head high and display her wounds with pride. What had Hermione done? She had lain there and let him... She felt the now all-too-familiar unpleasant queasy feeling gripping her gut and put her hands over her ears as, as if she could somehow press the memory down, contain it, keep it from spreading its cancerous tendrils throughout her body. Shoving Harry's notes away, she pulled over her Arithmancy textbook and tried to concentrate on the numbers. Sterile, unemotional numbers. They always made sense.

She hadn't had much trouble keeping out of Harry and Ron's way over the past few days, as wrapped up as they were with Quidditch practice, and Harry now with his new obsession with Malfoy. Ron had sat next to her at dinner on Saturday, but she'd been all too aware of his body next to hers, and had ended up being gruff and curt to cover her discomfort, and he'd retreated to the opposite bench the following day.

She felt so bad for him (for him! when she was the one who had been violated!), since she couldn't even tell him why she was being so standoffish, and she could tell that he was disappointed and confused by her behaviour. It was just something she'd have to get over herself, she supposed.

Sandy had also returned to her dorm over the weekend; the 'flu was her excuse as well, since she also didn't have any physical marks. Hermione had seen her at meals, sitting in a huddle of Hufflepuffs, who seemed to be very concerned about her. She had still looked puffy-eyed, but she had smiled a couple of times with her friends and even caught Hermione's eye once and given her a shy smile.

Oonagh's facial bruises had faded (Hermione wondered about the scars on her body), but she seemed to have borne them with a certain pride. Hermione heard what she had told the others in the common room, and it was the closest to the truth of anything: she said she'd been attacked by a cloaked figure late at night on her way back to the dorms, and that she'd had to fight him off without her wand. Speculation was running high among the other Gryffindors as to the identity of the attacker, with the hottest contender being Grubb, an asocial seventh-year Slytherin; Filch, oddly, was a close second, perhaps due to Oonagh's description of the man's smell and her denigrating comments as to his physical prowess. It seemed, however, that in Oonagh's version, she had escaped with her defenses unbreached, so to speak, so it appeared that even she was not willing to publicly expose herself.

Lisa was still in the infirmary; Hermione promised herself that she'd go and visit her later in the afternoon. Maybe she could get Oonagh or Sandy to come, too.

Hermione hadn't heard anything further from the Headmaster about a possible investigation, and she supposed, realistically, that she wouldn't. The Aurors already knew that there were Death Eaters at large, and that they were committing crimes. She and the other girls couldn't possibly identify any of them, nor could they say where they had been held. At best, a file had been opened, or, more likely, just a one-line note added to an already burgeoning load of unsolved Death Eater cases.

Hermione shouldered her school-bag and paused; here, in her room, was where it had all begun, where she had seen the first Death Eater. There had actually been a Death Eater, here, in her dorm, standing next to her bed. The reality of it hit her for the first time. She got a panicky feeling in her chest and burst out of the dorm onto the stairs, nearly tripping over her own feet in her rush to get to the common room. A second- or third-year boy was there, trying to finish a homework assignment before the first period, and he looked up, startled, as the Gryffindor prefect ran past, her frizzy, untamed hair flying behind her.

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When she arrived at the classroom, Harry and Ron were already there. Harry had his parchment out and his quill ready, but his head was bowed and he didn't look up when Hermione slid into her seat on the other side of Ron.

"Hi, Ron," she whispered, hurriedly pulling out her book and note-taking materials. Her heart was still pounding rapidly. She tried not to breathe so hard, so as not to draw attention to herself. She glanced at the front of the classroom, where Snape was, hands clasped before him, but he was mercifully frowning at Ernie Macmillan, who had managed to spill his ink all over the floor.

"Feeling better?" Ron asked undertone.

"I'm fine," Hermione said quickly. "What's with him?" She indicated Harry, who was staring absent-mindedly at the desk.

Ron shrugged and said, "Quidditch," as if that explained everything.

Hermione rolled her eyes and turned her attention to Snape, nervousness knotting her stomach. Her first class back would have to be with him, she thought. And Malfoy as well. Two potential Death Eaters. Two potential witnesses to her pain. Snape was regarding the incoming students coolly, as usual, but hadn't yet looked in her direction. She sneaked a glance over her shoulder, where Draco sat ensconced among Slytherins in the back row. He was looking right at her, his face contorted in disgust, whispering something to Pansy, who smirked knowingly. Hermione looked away quickly, her face growing hot. But of course he was probably saying something about Harry, she chided herself. Draco hadn't been there on Halloween. He wasn't a Death Eater. She had to avoid thinking that everyone was talking about her. No one could see what had happened, she reassured herself firmly.

The Potions master glared at Dean and Seamus as they dashed in seconds before the bell rang, indicating the start of the lesson. "Today," he began immediately, staring at a spot on the back wall, "we shall be discussing non-physical forms of attack." His eyes whipped down to Neville, who was hunched over his desk. "Longbottom, I wasn't aware that you had an eidetic memory."

Neville raised his head slightly to look at the professor. "S- sorry, sir?" he squeaked.

"It means a photographic memory," Hermione hissed out of the corner of her mouth, then cringed in anticipation of the deduction of points.

But Snape must not have heard her, since he didn't even glance in her direction, but continued speaking to Neville, carefully enunciating every word. "Why aren't you writing this down?"

"Yes, sir," Neville gulped, and started scratching away furiously on his parchment with his quill. Everyone else did likewise.

Snape raised one eyebrow at the flurry of scribblings, and then continued. "Non-physical attacks may not even be recognized as being aggressive until it is too late. Examples?" he barked.

Hermione's hand shot into the air, closely followed by Harry's and Malfoy's.

"Mr. Malfoy?" Snape drawled, clearly taking pleasure in ignoring the Gryffindors.

"Imperius," Draco tossed out with an authoritative tone.

Snape appeared to consider this, then nodded grudgingly. "Under certain circumstances, yes. Elaborate."

"The Imperius can be used to plant an order before the start of hostilities, in order to gain an advantage or initiate a surprise attack, or to control a weak opponent over a longer period of time without the enemy suspecting." Draco smirked.

"Five points to Slytherin," Snape acknowledged. "However, I remind you that we are here to learn about defending ourselves against Dark magic, not how to employ it. The Imperius might indeed be used against one of our allies--" He placed particular emphasis on the word while narrowing his eyes at Malfoy. "--in which case we should be aware of changes in behaviour or habits, so that we may identify a potential problem early and nip it in the bud."

Draco rolled his eyes and tapped the feather of his quill impatiently against his parchment.

Seamus grinned and whispered, "Constant vigilance," in a remarkably apt imitation of their fourth-year teacher, 'Professor Moody'.

"Did you have something to add, Mr. Finnigan?" Snape asked, snapping his head around to glare at the Gryffindor.

Seamus immediately put on a straight face. "Oh, erm, yeah, I was just saying we've got to be constantly vigilant. For Dark magic. Like you said." It looked like he was biting the inside of his cheek so as to avoid laughing.

"You won't find it so funny when you are on the wrong end of a wand pointed at your pathetic excuse for a brain," Snape snarled. "Five points from Gryffindor."

Seamus grimaced and bowed his head to his notes again.

Snape turned away from the Gryffindor side of the room and continued. "In addition to the Imperius, there are of course other spells to control the mind. Such as...?"

Once again, Hermione's hand was the first one up. Harry considered a moment, and then raised his hand as well. Malfoy languidly perked one finger up.

"Mr. Malfoy?" Snape inquired.

"Obliviate, Sleep, Confound, Depress, Demoralize, Mania, Hypnos, and Id Extraction," Draco reeled off in quick succession.

Snape nodded, obviously favorable impressed this time. "Ten points to Slytherin." He immediately rounded on Harry. "Mr. Potter?"

Not fazed in the least by the sudden call to speak, Harry responded, "Depress and Demoralize don't actually give any degree of control over the mind and are easily countered by Cheer or Exhort. And you forgot Nightmare, Hallucinate, and Suggest."

"I didn't forget, Potter," Draco spat venomously. "I was leaving some for the rest of you slobs."

Hermione waved her hand insistently, both hoping to deflect attention from Harry and now slightly annoyed that she was being overlooked, but Snape seemed intent on ignoring her. Instead, he said, "Very thoughtful of you, Mr. Malfoy, but on your N.E.W.T., you will not receive points for leaving some answers for the others. Be as thorough and precise as possible."

"Yes, sir," Draco grumbled.

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"Hey, Hermione, wait up!" Ron and Harry dashed down the hall after their friend, who had just set a Hogwarts record for quickest departure from a classroom.

Harry pulled on the sleeve of her robe to get her attention and slow her down. Torn between a desire to flee human contact and a need to vent her frustration, the frustration won out.

"Ooh, he makes me so mad!" she fumed, stepping aside to let the other students pass.

"Who; Malfoy?" Harry asked.

Hermione frowned and shook her head. "No, silly; Snape!" She stomped her foot. "He purposely ignored me all lesson!"

"You should be grateful," Ron said. "You're the only Gryffindor he didn't take any points from."

"He was just trying to give his own House more points," Harry reasoned with her. "He knew if he called on you, you'd have the right answer."

"That's right," Ron agreed. "Dirty cheat. He didn't even give Harry any points for his answers, but he was practically tripping over himself to give Slytherin points."

"Yes, but I'm sure he was ignoring me on purpose!" Hermione insisted. "It's like I wasn't even there!"

"Looking for attention from Snape now, are we?" Ron asked suspiciously. "Geez, Hermione, wanting to be top of the class is one thing, but..." He trailed off, giving her a skeptical eye.

"Oh, never mind!" Hermione stormed off.

Ron raised his eyebrows and looked at Harry. "Touchy," he commented.

Harry shrugged. "Girls."

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Snape retreated to his office before the last Hufflepuff had even finished packing up his schoolbag, so eager was he to get away from the images of Malfoy and Granger, the lingering auras of their presence in his classroom. And it was his classroom. Fifteen years he'd had to wait, wait for the job that should have been his from the start. All the others had been amateurs, poseurs. Gilderoy Lockhart: Good god, what had the old man been thinking. Only one who practiced the Dark Arts could truly understand them; only he, Severus Snape, was supremely qualfied for the position of teaching Defense Against the Dark Arts. Need a good locksmith? Find a thief.

Malfoy's impertinence had increased by leaps and bounds in the past week; whether that was a result of him getting a big head because of the Dark Lord's assignment, or whether it was because he had revised his view of his fellow Death Eater in light of his 'performance' on Halloween, Snape was not entirely sure. Either way, it had to end. The youth had obviously not taken their earlier conversation to heart. Snape had had to bite his tongue more than once in order not to deduct points from the Slytherin prefect. Perhaps he should do so after all, he considered; the Dark Lord did not lose followers by applying extreme punishments. On the contrary, the more often he Crucioed his Death Eaters, the more intimately he bound them to himself. But that was just one of Snape's problems.

The Granger girl was the other. He had avoided looking at her so hard that it felt like there was an after-image of her negative space burned into his brain. It had been a long time, perhaps too long, since he had been so closely and personally involved in the activities of the Death Eaters. The Dark Lord had been wise, in a twisted way, to insist on his participation. Repeated acts of violence deadened one's emotions. He was feeling something akin to...guilt? He shuddered. It was a nasty, unpleasant feeling.

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That afternoon, Hermione trekked down to the hospital wing on her own. She'd gone to the Hufflepuff dorms to see if Sandy would go with her, but one of the other Hufflepuffs had turned her away at the common room door, saying that Sandy wasn't feeling well. Oonagh had said she might drop in on her own after dinner. Hermione wasn't fooled. They didn't want to be confronted with Lisa right then; their own psychological wounds were too fresh. Not that Hermione's had scabbed over at all yet, either, but she also didn't feel right about abandoning Lisa like that.

There were a few other students in the infirmary when she entered: some Slytherins were visiting one of their housemates who had fallen victim to a hex gone awry and was currently sporting two chicken legs growing out of his forehead; a girl from the Ravenclaw Quidditch team was recovering from a fall suffered during practice earlier in the week; and in the quarantine zone back in the corner, a second-year was miserably sitting out a bout of the measles.

Lisa was sitting up in bed, a piece of parchment spread out on her lap, on which she would make a note from time to time. Hermione went over to her bed and sat down next to her.

"Hi," Hermione greeted her.

Lisa looked over at her out of the corner of her eye, but didn't say anything.

Hermione looked at the parchment on her lap. It looked like a grid with letters in it. "Is that a Wizard's Crossword?" Hermione asked with interest. "I like to do them, too, but I'm better with numbers," she said, smiling.

Lisa leaned forward so that her long blond hair formed a curtain between her and Hermione, and carefully filled something in on the parchment.

After a bit, Hermione asked, "How are you feeling?" When Lisa did not show any sign of having heard her, Hermione continued, "I bet you're sick of having people ask you that. Like you're going to say you're fine or anything," she added bitterly. Then, thinking that might sound rude, she corrected herself. "I mean, you look fine. Much better than you did then. Madam Pomfrey's a genius at fixing you up. I don't hurt at all anymore. Oonagh and Sandy look good, too." Not normally being one to babble, but deciding she would have to be the one to keep the conversation going, she plunged onward. "We all went back to classes today. I don't think anyone could tell. Did someone bring you your homework?"

She waited a moment, to give Lisa a chance to answer, and was just about to say something else when the other girl nodded her head slightly, once. Encouraged by this sign of communication, Hermione nevertheless didn't want to play it up too much. "Good," she said. "Do you want me to show you what we did in Transfiguration today?" she offered. "It's kind of fun, but it's hard to do if you don't see someone else do it first. The idea is also really clever. It looks like a Summoning charm, but actually what you're doing is transfiguring air into birds. Now, first of all, the air has to be moving, so you can only do it if it's windy, or you can blow really hard and then right away say the incantation before the air stops moving. It's kind of tricky. I was the only one who could do it," she couldn't resist adding. "Are you ready?"

She looked at Lisa to make sure she was watching; after all, it was a nice piece of work. Then she took a deep breath, exhaled in an upward plume, and with the last bit of air in her lungs, said, "Aera Avia!" Three yellow canaries materialized, seemingly out of nowhere, and started flying around the bed. Hermione grinned. "I always get canaries; I don't know why. Professor McGonagall did hummingbirds and chickadees and titmice. She says it has to do with the way you hold your wand, but I haven't quite got the hang of that part yet. Do you want to try?"

Lisa watched as a canary alighted on the bed frame and cocked its pretty head at her, then took off again to join its fellows. Hermione sighed. She had no idea how to get through to Lisa. She was no expert in these things.

"Hi, Hermione! Hi, Lisa!" a cheerful voice called out. Hermione looked up and was pleasantly surprised to see Oonagh walking down the ward.

"I thought I'd better come by now," the older Gryffindor said. "After dinner's our study group for N.E.W.T.s." She pulled up a chair on the other side of Lisa's bed. "How're you doing, Lisa? Doing crosswords, I see. Nice to keep the mind sharp." She smiled, waiting for a response, but Lisa did not even look at her.

Oonagh frowned. "She still doing that?" she asked Hermione somewhat impatiently.

Hermione nodded and shrugged helplessly.

"Oy, Lisa!" Oonagh snapped her fingers in front of Lisa's face a few times. Lisa flinched back.

"See, she is listening," Oonagh said to Hermione in a self-satisfied manner.

"Of course she'd listening," Hermione said, annoyed. "There's nothing wrong with her hearing, is there?"

Oonagh leaned over so that Lisa could not help but see her. "Hey! Lisa! Snap out of it!" she demanded. "You don't see me and Hermione wasting away in bed, do you? You're letting them win if you don't fight back!"

"Oonagh!" Hermione hissed, appalled at the other girl's lack of sympathy. "She was hurt worse than us!"

Oonagh eyed the Ravenclaw. "Got any good scars?" she asked suddenly. "Look, here's where the wanker burnt me." She unbuttoned her blouse and pulled it down to show a red line right across her right breast. Lisa stared at the mark as if transfixed. "That one hurt like hell. I've got another one down there, but I'll spare you." She replaced her blouse and leaned back and crossed her arms, looking grim.

"Oh, God, Oonagh, that's terrible," Hermione whispered, horrified.

Oonagh jabbed her chin at Hermione. "You got off easy, though, didn't you? I'll bet you haven't got a mark on you." Her tone of voice might have indicated either jealousy or condescension. Hermione squirmed.

"I-- No, I don't have any scars. Not like you do," she agreed.

Oonagh nodded, obviously satisfied that her assumption had been correct. "You know what I think," she mused. "I think you got an old guy, like over a hundred, who was too senile or too feeble to do anything. Either that or some social reject who was so happy to be getting some action he forgot everything else."

Hermione was devastated. "How can you say that," she managed to croak. "You make it sound like nothing happened, or-- or worse, like I was nothing better than a whore, just lying there, bored, waiting for it all to be over." Her voice cracked, and she raged, trying to keep her voice down, "I was raped, Oonagh! I begged him to torture me instead! Do you understand that? I literally begged him to hurt me in any other way, rather than do that to me! I don't know why he didn't, but I wish he had." The back of her throat burned, and her eyes and nose were running now. "And you're acting like you're some sort of heroine, showing everyone your scars and bruises, saying how you fought him off. But you aren't telling anyone what really happened--"

"I would, only I agreed with what you said that it was better not to tell everything!" Oonagh shot back. "I'd much rather say I survived a Death Eater attack than have everyone think Filch groped me!" she hissed, her dark eyes flashing angrily.

"That's not what I mean," Hermione said, sniffling deeply. "I mean you're making it sound like you weren't raped, too."

"If I told that part," Oonagh said in a patronizing manner, "there'd be calls for an investigation, and the school might be closed down, anyway. Ever thought of that? How many parents are going to want their kids going to a school where a rapist is wandering the halls?"

Grudgingly, Hermione granted the point. "Fine," she said, "but the only reason you and the rest of us survived is because they wanted us to. None of us did anything special, and none of us got special treatment. We all suffered." She held Oonagh's gaze steady and wiped the tears from her cheeks.

"And we're all heroes," the older girl replied adamantly. "Even Lisa here." She patted Lisa's hand, then squeezed it. "Aren't you, Lisa?"

Lisa closed her eyes, and a single tear squeezed out and ran down her cheek.

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