The Sortinghat's Mission

Chapter 1

Author's note:

Hi! So happy that you decided to read this fanfiction. Please take into consideration that this is my first attempt to write fan fiction, and that english is not my first language.

Hope you enjoy! Much love <3

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Drawing made by NinjaFairy86 (www.ninjafairy86.tumblr.com)

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I do not own any of JK Rowling's characters

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Hermione laid face down in the grass. Her heart was pounding in her ears. She couldn't remember why she was there, nor where she was or how she had ended up in the grass. She took a steady breath and heaved herself upwards. Immediately her head started pounding in step with her heart rate. She sat there, for how long she did not know, and waited for her body to calm down. It felt like she had had a panic attack.

After a few minutes, or maybe an hour, she opened her eyes. Hogwarts castle was before her, in all its grandeur. It looked... oddly much as it had always looked. She could not remember why she thought it was odd.

She looked around her, a Hogwarts trunk was beside her, with her initials. Even her cat, Crookshanks, was there in his cage. Staring at her with his yellow eyes. He meowed and rastled the lock of the cage, as to tell her that he was there for her.

Hermione blinked. Then it all came crashing down on her. The war. A terrible war. Deciding to search for horcruxes and not being able to even begin the hunt. A battle took place. Hogwarts in ruins, fires everywhere, her friends dead. All dead. And Voldemort alive, and well.

Hermione shuddered, tears pricking her eyes as she remembered.

But how had she ended up here? And why was the castle all of a sudden... not in ruins? It looked much as it had looked the first time she came there, in a boat crossing the black lake with Susan Bones and Seamus Finnigan. Both, she now remembered, were dead now. Killed in the battle by death eaters. Gruesomely killed as well. She had such a vivid picture of Susan flayed open, her intestines out in the air for everyone to see.

Hermione struggled to hold in a whimper. Her eyes became teary as she remembered everything. From Harry walking into the forbidden forest, to Voldemort bringing his limp body out, carried by Hagrid who looked horrific with blood everywhere. But the worst part was not his cuts and bruises, no, it had been his eyes. They were not filled with tears, nor were they filled with the warmth they usually had. Hagrids eyes were dead, there was no hope in them, no more warmth, not the tiniest flick of a glint. He did not even meet her eyes, she remembered. He just stood there, with Harry's limp body.

It had all happend to quickly, from beginning of 6th year to Dumbledore's death by the hand of fucking Draco Malfoy just a few months in of the term. And then, by Christmas, all hell had broken loose. Harry had said something about horcruxes and that they couldn't kill Voldemort without having destroyed them, but it had been too late. They hadn't even begun the hunt, nonetheless left Hogwarts, until death eaters were everywhere. And people were dead. They were all dead.

And she was... here? Where was here exactly?

That was how he found her, sitting on the grass with her arms flung around her and crying heavily.

"Excuse me Miss...? Er, may I be of service?"

Hermione looked up, dried her eyes a bit to get a good look on the person addressing her. She didn't dare say her name, given she was muggleborn and Voldemort had issued an anti muggleborn and halfblood campaign.