To Love Your Enemy

Chapter 2: Meeting

She hears the sound of a crackling fire and she turns around only to be greeted with a sight she'd never forget. Shelves upon shelves stacked full with books, hundreds-no thousands of shelves seemed to be everywhere. They lined the room and as she looked she realized she couldn't see an end. This was unbelievable! This was definitely a pleasant surprise, she may have just found her new favorite room in the castle, originally it had been the library on the first floor but this...this was incredible!

It doesn't take her long to pick a book off the first shelf and sit down in one of the chairs by the fire and start reading.

Only 30 minutes later she was interrupted by the door creaking open.

It opened revealing a handsome young boy with blackish brown hair, pale skin, and angelic face, what threw her off though was his uniform. He was a Slytherin, and as soon as she realized that she knew she had to hide. She quickly darted behind one of the many shelves and stayed there in silence as she continued to watch the boy.

It didn't take long for him to notice her presence, after all she had left rather obvious clues.

Damn! She left her book over on the chair and all of her stuff.

"Show yourself!" The boy demanded as he whipped out his wand. "If you do not reveal yourself by the count of five things will become quite unpleasant for you." And with that he started counting down.

1 oh hell no, there was no way she was going over there. 2 Nope still not going. 3 well maybe he wouldn't find her, maybe he was just suspicious and when no one came out he'd assume no one had in fact been there and decide to go back to his book. 4 On the other hand he might actually follow through on that threat and it was worrying to have to deal with the problems this might cause. 5 Well it was now or never and she really didn't want to take any chances, something in her told her this child was dangerous and she really didn't want to find out if she was correct.

She walked out from behind the shelf and made her way to the front of the room with her head hung low in embarrassment. She almost jumped as she heard the boy speak again, this time he seemed to be angry. "Who are you girl?! How did you find this place?!" All good questions but unfortunately she wasn't even sure where 'here' was, as far as she knew this was just a random room in the castle she had happened to accidentally stumble upon.

She was really shy and didn't want to face him so she hid herself behind a chair, "I-I'm sorry, I didn't know anyone would be in here, I just needed a place to hide."

The boy looked confused for a moment "Why?"

She started to tear up as she remembered her disgraceful state and why she'd run in here, she was thankful he hadn't seen her well enough yet to see all the mud and everything.

"Because I have 'filthy blood' and am smarter than the others. They don't like that so they bully me, I was trying to get away and somehow ended up here..."

He suddenly had a pained expression but it was gone almost as quickly as it had appeared and was replaced by indifference. "I see, that sounds rather unpleasant."

She looked happy that he understood but then suddenly realized that she was intruding on his alone time. She didn't want to be a bother, she had definitely been surprised to see a Slytherin who wasn't prejudiced and was glad to know that at least one existed. She got up and turned to him, "Oh I'm probably bothering you aren't I? I'm sorry and thank you, it was really nice meeting you!" Then she quickly grabbed her stuff and headed for the door.

Suddenly he reached his hand out and grabbed hers as she passed by, "Wait!" Now he looked a little shy "You can stay if you want, I mean I wouldn't mind some proper company." She just looked at him in shock, he wanted her to stay?! But she was Hermione Granger, the only 'friends' she had were Ron Weasley and Harry Potter, but she was pretty sure they only hung around her to copy off her homework. This boy was reaching out to her, and she for some reason felt the need to reply, "I'd love that!"

Little did she know she had just made a horrible mistake that would ultimately end in tragedy for her and everyone around her.