Beauty and the Beast

The Beast

Published: 02. July 2021

Hermione marched the entire day. She had an excellent memory and had no troubles staying on the right path. As the sun traveled across the sky, she made good progress and during the afternoon, reached the edge of the forest. Drenched in sweat, Hermione reached for her water bottle and gulped down several mouthfuls of the cool water. Then stowing the bottle away, she retied her boots and her hair and straightened up again to continue.

Then she paused.

Before her, a valley opened. It was surrounded on one side by the forest she was standing at and on the other sides by tall, towering mountains. The forest also covered a good deal of the land down in the valley, sparkling in the evening sun with lush, green leaves. In the center of the valley the ground was flat and free of trees or scrubs, as if something large used to be there. There was only grass. And a little to the left, the ground sloped slightly downwards and ended at the shore of a lake. Hermione cocked her head curiously.

Strange...the water looks black.

Hermione knew that her path would lead her to the right, along the edge of the forest. But she was curious about this odd landscape...perhaps a short look wouldn't hurt.

Her eyes flickered up to check the sky; she still had a few hours of sunlight left. And anyways, she was already very close to the tree and still had five days to make it. She could spare a few hours.

Excitement rushed through her at the thought of wandering into strange territory and she bit her lip to calm herself down.

You're just taking a look in the valley, she told herself. There's no reason to get all excited.

But Hermione could not help but feel excited as she started the trek into the valley. Lately, there hadn't been many exciting things in her life. She and Ron had split up quickly after the war and she had accepted a position as an assistant to a Potions Master in France with the name Bernard Jamuroux. But everyone just called the eighty-year old wizard Bernie.

She had kind of lost contact with Harry, Ron and Ginny, but had vowed to herself that after the two months in Scotland, she would visit them. The vacation she had told Bernie about had already been planned for weeks.

Hermione had kind of underestimated the distance down to the bottom of the valley. By the time she had made it halfway, the sun was already setting, casting its red glow through the mountains. Hermione frowned and turned around. She disliked setting up camp in the open. She had left the edge of the forest behind her because it had been easier to walk across the grass. But in retrospect, that had been stupid. She would have to turn around now if she wanted to make it back up before dark.

Hermione bit her lip and turned her head to look at the valley. Or she could carry on. The forest, after all, also partially covered the flat valley. She just had to cross the rest of the meadow and she would be in the forest in...

She cocked her head as she tried calculating the distance.

One hour.

Hermione groaned and threw her head back.
"Great", she muttered and shouldered her backpack. "Next time, better use your brain to check whether your adventures are a good a idea."

She reached into one of the many pockets of her overall and pulled out a red apple. Not having eaten much today, she might as well fill her stomach now before setting up camp.

Hermione quietly chewed on her apple as she wandered deeper into the valley. The sky darkened to a deep purple and the few streaks of sunlight that made it through the mountains started to fade.
She shivered nervously and got out her wand, while holding the apple in her other hand.