Awakening || Harry & Hermione

Chapter 10.3

When Harry appeared outside the maze, collapsing to the ground and not moving, the blood in Hermione's veins felt like they had frozen, as if her heart itself had stopped beating.

She shot up from her seat in the stands and elbowed her way through the throng of people, struggling to keep an eye on him the whole time.

Someone's hat blocked her view and when she could see again, he was gone from the spot. Panic grew in her chest. "Harry!"

Then she saw him being carried like a sack by Mad Eye Moody, away from the Quidditch Pitch. Where was he taking him? If Harry was injured, the healer's tent was the opposite way—

"Harry!" she shouted, louder now, running towards him.

By the time she reached him, she was confronted with a wild eyed Harry standing above the unconscious form of Moody. Other people had come forward too, encircling Moody and buzzing with noise. And Harry, his wand was still raised towards the crowd, his eyes shifting nervously between everyone, his back hunched in a defensive posture. He reminded Hermione of a trapped animal, bearing its teeth.

She broke through the circle, not caring that she had just shoved aside the Minister of Magic, and watched as Harry's whole being seemed to relax when she appeared. He swayed towards the ground and Hermione caught him before he could truly fall, taking him into her arms.

When Moody was discovered to be Crouch and questioned, she felt Harry tremble and was stunned at the pure fury she saw in his eyes.

When Harry cut off Crouch's arm containing the Dark Mark, everyone screamed, but Hermione was quiet. Numb. She wondered if she was the only one who had seen the helplessness in Harry's face, the vulnerability.

He didn't look like a "vicious brute!" as Fudge later claimed.

He looked like a boy, lost, and with nothing left to lose.

_____

"Will he be okay?" Hermione asked anxiously, after Madam Pomfrey was finally done with healing Harry. "Why is he still not waking up?"

"I've fixed all the external wounds I could, but the mental trauma he's suffered tonight will not be as easy. He's been tortured with the cruciatus—more times than I can identify. His body has also been overworked beyond what it can handle." She looked worriedly at the infirmary bed where Harry lay, twitching and murmuring in his sleep. "I expect that he will wake several times throughout the next few hours, but he might not be in his right mind. If you can't handle that Miss Granger—"

"I'm not leaving him!" Hermione said fiercely.

Madam Pomfrey gave her the first smile of that evening and replied, "I had expected as much."

The first time Harry woke up, he shot up in bed, looking wildly around at the white curtains surrounding the bed as if he expected something to jump out of them.

"Harry," Hermione said softly, careful not to startle him.

"Hermione," he grasped her hand as if reaching for a lifeline. "Hermione, he's dead."

"Who is?"

"Wormtail. Peter Pettigrew. I killed him, Hermione."

Hermione went still, but showed no change in her outward expression.

"I didn't mean it, not really. He was in the way—I was trying to escape and get to the cup—and he was going to try and stop me. So I used the bubblehead charm—the new one that I experimented with—and I left him behind. I think I assumed that he would break free of it quickly like Flitwick had, but when I looked back he was burning. Melting." Harry was babbling. "And do you know the worst part? I didn't even feel sorry. I was glad—glad that he died. Glad that it was painful."