Chapter 30: Bullis fuerunt
If it were even possible, Hermione left Gringotts with even more fear in her heart than when she had arrived.
Innumerable questions filled her head so much so that she barely remembered the journey back to Hogwarts.
Hermione lifted the Imperius curse on the goblin just as she and Dumbledore were exiting the doors of the bank. It allowed them to leave without causing too much of a fuss. As they had not been detected by any of the protective enchantments, there had been no kerfuffle to clean up.
For the second time in her life, Hermione had broken into Gringotts. Not only had she broken in twice, she had done so successfully and without consequence.
However, in her own mind, Hermione had achieved very little. Hufflepuff’s cup was still out there as a horcrux. She would not feel safe in her bed at night until it was destroyed, once and for all.
When the pair had apparated back to the Headmaster’s study in Hogwarts, Hermione did not retreat to her dormitory. Without waiting to be invited, she dropped herself down into the nearest chair, brooding on her thoughts.
Out of the corner of her eye she noticed that Dumbledore did the same. It was a long time before either of them spoke.
After what felt like a million years, Hermione could not suppress her questions any longer, and she spewed forth a great deal of her dread and apprehension.
Why is the Cup not there?
What if we can’t find it?
Where are all the places that it could be?
Has it been created yet?
Has it been destroyed yet?
If Harry were here, would he be able to feel it and then find it?
“WHAT IF WE CAN’T FIND IT?” she finally yelled out at the end.
“Miss Potter, we will find it. Do you know of any places that the Cup or Tim Riddle could be connected to? Any place at all?”
He spoke with such vehemence that Hermione prompted her mind to move into areas of her memory that she did not even know existed before today. She thought for several minutes, in silence, running a list of potential places in her head.
“The Gringotts vault of Hepzibah Smith, she owned the Cup before Tom Riddle did. But she is already dead, so we know that the Cup is definitely a horcrux.”
Dumbledore made a mental note of the list as she progressed.
“The Black family vaults at Gringotts. If Bellatrix is or was in the possession of the Cup, it could still be with her family’s possessions.”
With a jolt Hermione remembered something that Harry had once told her. It would be a long shot, and difficult to track, but it was a possibility
“Borgin and Burke, from Knockturn Alley. They were willing to buy the Cup before Tom Riddle got to Hepzibah Smith....those are all the places that I can think of.”
Dumbledore nodded, and once mores slumped back into his chair, appearing as though he was thoroughly depleted of energy.
Hermione wondered what she looked like. It could not be good after the madness of today – the waterfall, the charms and the Gringotts carts.
It also struck her at that moment that she was very hungry. It had been quite an amount of time since she had last eaten.
Hermione had not needed to deal with real hunger for some time, courtesy of Hogwarts kitchens and Ma P, however, she could acutely remember what it felt like to be cold, ravenously hungry and alone. She remembered how helpless and exposed she felt when she could not even ensure the basic necessities for life. If everything went to plan, Harry and Ron and all her friends would be born in just a few more years, and she would make sure that they would never want for anything.
But this could not stop her from remembering the argument from when they were camping in Wales.
‘My mother,’ said Ron one night, as they sat down in the tent on a riverbank in Wales, ‘can make good food appear out of thin air.’
He prodded moodily at the lumps of charred, grey fish on his plate. Harry glanced automatically at Ron’s neck and saw, as he expected, the golden chain of the Horcrux glinting there. He managed to fight down the impulse to swear at Ron, whose attention would, he knew, improve slightly when it came time to take off the locket.
‘Your mother can’t produce food out of thin air,’ said Hermione. ‘No one can. Food is the first of the five Principal Exceptions to Gamps Law of Elemental Transfigur-‘
‘Oh, speak English, can’t you?’ Ron said, prising a fishbone out from between his teeth.
‘it’s impossible to make good food out of nothing! You can summon it if you know where it is, you can transform it, you can increase the quantity if you’ve already got some-‘
‘-well don’t bother increasing this, it’s disgusting,’ said Ron.
‘Harry caught the fish and I did my best with it! I notice I’m always the one who ends up sorting out the food; because I’m a girl, I suppose!’
‘No, it’s because you’re supposed to be the best at magic!’ shot back Ron.
Hermione jumped up and bits of roast pike slid off her tin plate on to the floor.
That was the night that they had discovered the sword of Gryffindor was a fake. It was also the night that Ron had abandoned them.
Deciding that there was nothing more that they could achieve that night, Hermione bid her headmaster a good evening. He did not look up from the point at which he was aimlessly staring on his desk.
Hermione quietly shut the door behind her and made her way down the staircase and through the corridors to Gryffindor tower.
She climbed the stairs to the boy’s dormitories, into the Maruader’s room. She tiptoed in, stomach doing flip-flops every time the floor creaked with her steps, not wanting to wake anyone as she glided over to James’ trunk.
She carefully rifled through his belongings until she came to the object that she was searching for: the Marauder’s Map.
Satisfied with her find, she carefully closed the lid and stood to leave. She stood still for a moment, wanting to check that the occupants of the room were still asleep. With the light of the moon she was able to make out Sirius in his bed. The burgundy covers were moving up and down with his chest, soundlessly as he lay sleeping on his back. His mouth was hanging slightly open as he breathed in and out of it.
Not wanting to be around if any one of them did wake up, she left the room and fast and as silently as possible. Once down in the common room below, she opened up the map and saw that the coast was clear.
She made her way down to the kitchens by the light of her wand, desperately hoping that the house elves were not asleep yet. She was ravenous after her little ‘sojourn’ up Diagon Alley this evening, and she did not think that she would be able to wait until breakfast the next morning.
It was strange to think that no matter what happened in your life, no matter what you were cast up against, you could always count on being hungry afterwards.
HPHPHPHPHPHP
The next few days passed in a haze for Hermione as her thoughts were continually consumed about the location of the horcrux.
The potential locations kept running through her head: Gringotts, Borgin and Burkes, even the home of Hepzibah Smith.
The situation got so desperate that Hermione even received more than a few strange glances when she had to ask professor McGonagall to repeat her question in class.
Hermione literally did not know what to do to find the horcrux, and for the second time in less than a few day, she was forced back into memories of her past. It was like being on the run with Harry and Ron. Mentally they were stuck in little bubbles, not knowing what to do or where to go. They had no direction, and yet goals to achieve. She was back to having no idea about what was going on with Voldemort and the horcruxs. She was not happy with this.
On one particularly troublesome day, Hermione was sitting on the banks of the Black Lake with her eyes closed. It was spring and the days were getting warmer. Hermione took this opportunity go outside and try to clear her head. The previous few weeks had really taken their toll on her physically and mentally.
This was one of the rare moments where her mind was at ease, and not consumed by Voldemort’s greed and rising power.
Suddenly she felt the warmth disappear for a few moments as someone stood next to where she was sitting. She reluctantly opened her eyes, to find Sirius staring at her from his towering height.
She was not impressed with this intrusion on her private time, even if it was Sirius.
“Yes,” said Hermione rather curtly.
“I was just wondering what you were doing out here alone. You always seem to be in some other world lately. What gives?”
“Nothing gives,” said Hermione, still with a curt voice, “I just want some peace and privacy.”
Hermione closed her eyes once more and ignored Sirius, however, Sirius was not one to give up that easily.
“I was thinking we could spend some time together, you’re never around anymore. I miss you.”
He moved his lips up against hers and she felt his fingers brush up against her clavicle.
She put her two hands firmly on his chest and pushed him away.
“Sirius, please, not now. I’m very tired and just not in the mood.”
A sour look settled on Sirius’ face. He was not used to being brushed off in this way. However, he had the sense not to go further. Somewhere in her life education, Hermione had learned to produce a particularly frightening Bat Bogey Hex, and quite frankly, Sirius was not in the mood to try and look up counter-curse for it.
“Fine,” said Sirius as if it hadn’t mattered anyway, but really it did matter. It mattered a lot. He loved Hermione, with all his hear, and he had done so for quite a while. The only problem was that he did not have the guts to tell her that yet.
After that little display, perhaps she did not reciprocate his feelings.
He was so afraid of being rejected. He had essentially been rejected from his own family because he was a Gryffindor and because he had the audacity to speak out against their beliefs.
His parents did not even know that he had a girlfriend. Regulus, being at Hogwarts, knew, but even he was not stupid enough to say anything about Hermione to them.
Hermione had trusted Sirius enough to tell him that she was technically a muggleborn. But this was made into a half-truth as she had tacked on a story at the end about growing up with a Wizarding foster family, in France, who had taught her about magic. Sirius had not cared a single ounce; however, he knew that his mother would care. He knew that much of the pureblood community would care.
He could only imagine what his mother would say when she found out that her eldest son, the heir of the ‘Most Noble and Ancient House of Black’ was in love with a muggleborn!
He tried to put it out of his mind, but he couldn’t help but spend the rest of the afternoon by Hermione’s side, not saying a word to her, wondering what would happen if he told Hermione the truth about how he felt about her.