Bonded to her

Chapter 18

I expected the holidays to go by slowly staying at the castle, but they flew by so rapidly I barely had time to catch my breath before school started back up. Mainly it was trying to find ways to destroy the diadem and pocket watch, but I also spent quite a bit of time just relaxing with Harry and Draco.

The first day back was a Monday so not only did I have potions, but I had my training afterwards. I hadn't made any progress really trying to create my own spells. It was as if my magic was so used to following the rules that it just refused to disobey them.

I was dreading yet another day of failed spell making, but I tried to keep that out of my head as I got dressed for the day. Ginny was going through my trunk under my bed trying to get a clean shirt out since she had forgotten to wash hers and I was the same size.

"You are the only person I know that organizes their trunk. Just really! Your socks are actually matched! What kind of voodoo is that?" She asked jokingly, distracted from her original intention and just going through my things now.

"Well, not all of us can be as disorganized as you." I said playfully brushing out my hair. Since I had started to use hair straightening potion in my hair, it looked so much nicer. It still fell in curls around my face, but manageable loose curls.

"Luckily Neville's family is rich so I will be able to hire a maid to do my housework." Ginny said only slightly teasing. I knew she would do it in a second.

"Yes, well we can't all marry rich." I said feeling slightly guilty about the ring around my neck. I didn't want to divulge the scandalous relationship to her just yet.

"What's this?" Ginny said distractedly looking under my bed now. I felt my heart stop seeing the glint of metal under my bed realizing a split second too late what I forgot. She picked it up and I knew she could feel the dark magic that radiated off of it. Her expression darkened and she dropped it as if burned standing up angrily.

"What is this? Why would you have something cursed under your bed?" She asked, horrified. I knew the memories of the diary must have come back to her.

"I forgot it was there really." I said lamely.

"Why do you have it?" The silence stretched on longer than what was comfortable. She looked at me with utter contempt.

"I see. Are you not able to feel that it was cursed by Voldemort, or do you just not care? How on earth would you find a missing diadem anyways? Did you want even more knowledge? Is this how you've been passing all your classes?" She ranted hotly, her normally pale cheeks red with fury.

"I knew it was cursed, it's a bit of a research project on the Dark Lord. Draco helped me find the diadem, but I haven't been wearing it. I wanted to destroy it actually." I insisted putting the diadem in my luggage and locking it before someone else stumbled on it. Ginny's eyes widened even further.

"Do you ever hear yourself? The Dark Lord? What, are you joining his side or something? Ron was right about you all this time." She said disgustedly. I hadn't even noticed my slip. Apparently I was really spending too much time with Snape. She turned on her heels and stomped off before I could stop her.

I sighed deeply, the day having taken a bad turn before it could even really start. By the time I had gotten to breakfast she had evidently told Ron who was glaring at me again, and Harry who seemed more concerned than angry. I didn't even bother sitting down, I grabbed a roll and left for my first class which was Herbology.

My mind wandered during my classes and I barely managed to take decent notes on the topics we covered. Even defense against the dark arts struggled to keep my attention. It wasn't like we were learning anything useful anyways, should learning how to destroy dark objects be somewhere in our syllabus? No. It was nowhere to be found.

"Hermione!" The name woke me out of my trance and I realized Professor Lupin had been calling my name for some time. He sighed dramatically.

"Finally. I thought you had gone mad or something. I was asking if you would be so kind as to do a duel with me? I wanted to show the proper defense against the confundus charm. If you will?" He said not leaving much room for argument, waving for me to stand up. I swallowed thickly hating how everyone's attention had shifted to me.

I reluctantly got up and took out my wand facing him, all eyes on us. He gave me an encouraging smile, but my anxiety had never been worse. The last time I was in a real duel was in the ministry of magic. I tried not to think about it, but the quick powered spells being thrown everywhere trying to kill me came back to mind.

"On the count of three." Professor Lupin said kindly, his own wand drawn.

"One." My mind flashed back to Sirius going through the veil.

"Two." The curse that Antonin had cast on me leapt to the front of my mind, the purple streak across my chest causing a blinding pain.

"Three. Confundus!" The room seemed to lose air in an instant. It was like a vacuum had been started and every ounce of oxygen had been sucked out with the flip of a switch. The spell had been heading towards me, but the magic vanished with a wisp of gold color extinguished by some unknown source.

The only time I had ever felt anything similar was when the dementors had come on the train. Everyone in the room looked around at each other confused and I realized then that they felt it too.

"I think we're done for the day. Class dismissed." Professor Lupin said staring at me as if I somehow was the reason the air was so thin. His brow was furrowed and he put away his wand absently staring at me.

"Aren't we going to practice deflecting?" I asked confused as the class hurriedly filed out of the classroom talking in hushed whispered.

"No. Go to your next class." Professor Lupin said leaving no room for discussion. I sighed heavily feeling like the air was going back to normal finally. It had to be all in my mind. The air couldn't become thinner randomly, and there were no dementors here. Maybe everyone was staring because Professor Lupin's magic had vanished. It was quite peculiar actually. I had never seen someone's magic dissipate ever. Deflect, yes, but not dissipate.

I packed up my things to head to lunch over the day already, and the worst was yet to come still. I had to deal with Snape from two until it was almost time for bed, and he had ignored my existence for the last week after giving me my Christmas present, so I didn't expect that to go good. Life couldn't get worse.