When Hermione Fights

The Departure

The Departure

Hermione's POV

The next morning I awoke from a restful and dreamless, almost comatose sleep. I opened my eyes and was awake within seconds, figured that it was almost half past eight and that I hadn't slept so long in months. Unfortunately, the memories of yesterday hit me all at once and the realisation of what I had done came back to me. In hindsight it seemed like a bad, obscenely macabre horror movie to me. Did all this really happen or was it just my wanton imagination?

My hand travelled to my left side tentatively. I could feel the bandage, so it was not a nightmare, rather nightmarish reality! Great, really great. I had really walked through the city with a knife sticking out of me, and I owed the professor my life. Professor Severus Snape had saved my life! Oh Goddess, I had almost died the day before, damn it! If I hadn't been training for months, I wouldn't have survived yesterday's attack.

Arrrrrrrhh, this realisation, it was making me crazy. Stop, I had blocked out the other side:

I not only would have almost died, I had also killed yesterday. Taken a human life, and not in a particularly nice way either. It had been horrifying and dirty. With this revelation, I raised my hands to my face and looked at them in the glow of the summer sun shining into the room through the curtains of the window. These delicate little hands had actually murdered someone. They were still slim, long and white, but had been fully coated with dried, red blood yesterday. But now they were clean again. No one would see what I had done, what I was capable of. I had washed them, but in doing that, was I really clean again?

But just as my hands were tainted, I was now tainted too! I no longer had a clear conscience. I had done something that none of my friends would approve of, since it was said that you should not kill. But hell, if I hadn't, they could bury me now. In their preconceived notions of morality, would they really be so harsh with their judgment? Everything forbidden that I had done so far - stealing, breaking in, blackmailing, breaking the school rules - felt like a joke in comparison. But know I had done it, had broken the ultimate taboo, and how I had done it! So, how did I feel, now that I had to bear this guilt - justified or not - my whole life. Whilst reflecting on it, I breathed in deeply, closed my eyes and thought about it, went deeply inside my mind: I was a murderess!

No matter how this story ended, whether the light or the dark side won, I had already lost. Lost because I would never be pure or good again. Too much had happened, too many taboos had been broken. This occurred to me with brutal clarity. I had made a decision that could never be reversed again. As I said, a long time ago I was given the choice of how I wanted to be, how I wanted to go through life. Now to start doubting it or to fight with fate would be unfair, as I had made my choice with my eyes wide open.

I would learn to live with it!

I could imagine very well, what my friends would say if they knew. Firstly, they would never expect me to do something like this, secondly, they would be shocked, and finally, they would turn away from me in disgust, in their just-unjust hypocrisy. This would be another dark secret of the Hermione Granger that Harry, Ron and everyone else could never know. I had to turn my heart into a killer pit, an even deeper one than before. And my mind would be made into a fortress that couldn't be taken, for even Dumbledore shall never - under any circumstances - get suspicious. I progressed well in Occlumency, but I wasn't a master yet, I would continue to do this with high pressure. After the shock I had just received, these were my first stringent thoughts this morning.

I rubbed my abused throat. Ah, better, much better. The potions had done a good job. Swallowing didn't hurt anymore, the swelling had also reduced, but I knew that even magic couldn't make bruised skin disappear. I had to be patient until I was in the bathroom to see what a sight I offered.