Unofficial Portkey Archive

The Way of Hermione Granger Chapter 1

Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

Summary: When Hermione stumbles into a crisis and disappears, Harry goes on a quest to find his girl and bring her back. And all he has on his side is a deranged Frenchwoman, a tattered copy of a book that no-one should want to read, and the knowledge that night-time is the best time to wash your hair.

Author's Notes: A big thanks to the loffly Nitya for beta-ing this...whatever it is. You girl rock!

It was only the beginning of October, and Harry Potter was already convinced that by the end of his seventh school year, his best friend Hermione Granger would be dead. It wasn't one of those hunches that some people had from time to time that one of their beloved ones would snuff it - no. It was plain obvious. She was clearly overworking herself, and Harry was more than slightly worried. He knew that this year's N.E.W.T.s were very important, probably one of the most important trials that he and his classmates had ever encountered in their young lives - or well, his classmates minus a precious few who had already faced Lord Voldemort with him.

She had been a studious person as long as he knew her, but she'd never been in as bad a state as she was now. A blind and deaf man would know about her stress by smelling it through a garlic field ten miles against the wind. Even Ron had commented on it once.

At the moment, they were both - Hermione and Harry, that is - sitting snuggled into a comfortable armchair in front of the Gryffindor common room fireplace, and much to Harry's silent disappointment, it was not one and the same armchair. She had a down comforter that she had dragged down from her dorm room apparently and at least three books on Arithmancy on her lap, and was obviously trying to read all of them at the same time while scribbling on a piece of parchment with the wrong end of her quill.

Harry tried to alert her of this, but when she didn't answer his third "Hermione," he simply plucked it out of her hand and shoved it back into her hand after turning it the right way. She didn't even take notice of this. No "oh," no "thanks," no "huh?".

Sighing, Harry got up and bid her good night, another thing that she obviously did not notice. He really was at his wits' end. He hadn't tried talking to her about it yet because he was somehow afraid of the outcome of such a conversation. He had a hunch that she would not be happy with him and blow a scene. Harry had briefly considered asking Ron to talk to her because he was used to being at the wrong end of her temper but couldn't bring himself to. It was something that required some sensibility even mid-argument, something he knew Ron had never had. Also, he wanted to do it himself.

Over the summer Harry had realized something that had turned his world upside down for a few months, and if he was completely honest with himself, it was something that still did. Sometimes his life seemed more than just a little strange and surreal to him now that he had started to digest the epiphany that had hit him out of the blue a couple of months ago. He wanted Hermione one of his two very best friends to be more than just that. Back there in the seclusion of his room at the Durleys' he had thought that he had the nerve to tell her, but when he'd seen her again for the first time after the light bulb had gone on, he had actually felt that hiding behind Ron was the best plan of action. Unfortunately he'd have to inform Ron of this beforehand, and of his reasons, which he had not wanted to do, so he had had to act like a man and face her.

It had been in the entrance hall of his late Godfather's house at Grimmauld Place, and even though the setting could have been a lot more romantic - for Mrs. Black's portrait was making the usual ruckus, and it was rather dark and gloomy all around, as the house still had the feeling of being a tomb more than anything - Hermione had looked like the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen in his life at that moment. In his mind he had not greeted her with the mumbled "hello," but with some silver-tongued declaration of eternal love and roses and some other very romantic things. Of course Harry knew that Hermione was not the most beautiful woman in the world, probably, as her hair was a tad too bushy and she had a small scar next to her left eye. There were probably many more things about her that were not perfect, but Harry didn't care.

And even though he still thought her beautiful, Harry could not help but notice that after a month of school she already looked faded and bone-weary. She was tired, and you needn't watch her study 24/7 to notice, probably. Her usually bushy hair had turned to being frizzy and doing what it wanted, and her cheeks were getting hollow, which Harry reckoned was caused by her eating less than normal. Her fingers were always blotchy with ink stains which was nothing out of the ordinary, but you could see that her skin was sore and callused underneath from writing far too much.

He couldn't swear this was the case but Harry had a feeling she was putting the Time-Turner to use again, because it seemed like something she would do if she thought she had too little time, which was clearly the case.

He thought about all this as he trudged up the stairs to his dorm, and while getting ready for bed. When he finally closed the curtains around his bed, Harry lay down on his pillow vowing to himself that he would talk to her the next day and fell into a troubled sleep, dreaming of everything under the sun from Voldemort to underwear to Hermione to Hermione in underwear to Voldemort in underwear holding Hermione captive.

So Harry continued to watch her work like her life depended on it until mid November, which was when he finally got the resolve to talk to her one cold evening when she was the last one up in front of the common room fire again. His worry had increased tenfold by them, as her condition had taken several turns for the worse. She'd developed a rash on her neck that Harry was sure was psychosomatically related to all the stress she was putting herself in somehow. Hermione had also stopped knitting hats or socks or whatever they were supposed to be for the house elves (which the latter were rather grateful for) and had taken to leave her homework on the table for Harry and Ron to copy as she wanted to spare herself the time it took arguing with them - Ron, in particular - about it. She was acting entirely unlike herself within being totally Hermionelike, and it drove Harry mad to see her like this.

That was probably how he worked up the courage to sink into one of the armchairs across from hers gracelessly and approach one of the two matters he'd shamefully avoided until then. If he thought about it, they hadn't talked in ages, at least not really. The daily routine was at least still there, which was about everything that was left at this point. "Good morning," and stuff like that were the only thing that left her mouth in their presence, apart from the academic riff-raff.

"Hey, Hermione," Harry quietly said and nudged her elbow gently. He was lucky this evening, as she noticed.

"Huh?" came her distracted reply, and Harry felt a knot form in his stomach when she didn't even bother to look up at him. This was getting ridiculous.

"Put those books away for a minute, will you?" he asked her, trying to sound as patient as he could, although Harry was anything but patient at the moment. He was furious with himself for letting this continue right under his nose until now, livid with Ron because he didn't seem even half as worried as he was, angry with himself because he knew that he'd never really tried talking about it to Ron in ages either, and raving mad with Hermione for being so insensible and irresponsible. She was clearly endangering her own health and doing nothing about it, after all. Most of all he was angry with the overall situation, because it was generally the easiest thing to be angry at. It could not talk back and as everything happening under the sun could be described as the overall situation, one never ran out of reasons for being angry with it.

"I can't right now, Harry, I still need to read eleven chapters in this book, and six in that one, and I need to complete that potions assignment, and -" she started droning all the work she still needed to do down until Harry ineloquently interrupted her with a loud scoff.

"No, you don't," he said while jumping up, his eyes ablaze, "That potions assignment isn't due until next Tuesday, that book is not even in your curriculum and the other one is Hogwarts: A History which you have already read about a million times, in case you hadn't noticed." Taking a steadying breath that he hoped would have a calming effect on him, Harry sat down again and drew Hermione's hand into his own, quelching the butterflies that were starting to flutter in his stomach at the endearing contact.

Hermione was meanwhile staring at him with big, not quite understanding eyes, obviously surprised with his outburst.

"You need to stop this nonsense Hermione, can't you see you're completely overworking yourself?" Harry pleaded. "Have you stopped looking at the mirror in the morning? Is that why you can't see what you're doing to yourself? You look like a ghost, Hermione, and I'm not being rude when I say that - it's the truth. The skin on your throat and neck is starting to peel off, and you're not talking to us anymore." Harry paused. Somewhere during his speech he had missed Hermione's expression getting darker and darker.

"Harry James Potter, I am going to say this once and only once - that has to suffice to get this into your thick head. This is our seventh year at Hogwarts, which means it's our last. We have N.E.W.Ts this year, and we're not prepared even half as good as we should be, and if you're not going to get your lazy arse to do some work soon, you and Ron and all the others will fail, because part of those tests is to show that we're able to do some work on our own. I do not have anything on my neck but my head, and you should get your eyes checked again if you think so. Good night, Harry," she finished and stalked up to her dorm.

"Wow," a familiar voice behind him breathed, "she's right livid, she is."

"Hey, Ron," Harry said and sighed, running a hand through his hair tiredly.

"At least you got her to go to bed," Ron said as he slouched down on the seat Hermione had vacated seconds ago. Harry only nodded and stared into the fire bleakly.

"You know, I always thought she was way too much into schoolwork all those years and I used to make fun of her because of it, but I take it back now. She was a lazy bugger all these years. A rebel who didn't even do half as much as she should," Ron said half-jokingly.

Harry smiled. "Yeah, and full of mischief. A master of pranks," he added, thinking about all the times he and Ron and Hermione had wandered the hallways of their school at night, doing lord knows what with lord knows who.

"Oh yes. The mistress of the map," Ron continued, and they both looked at each other silently for a few seconds before bursting out laughing. If there was one thing they would never entrust Hermione with, it was a map. Whenever they would give her the Marauder's Map and tell her to tell them where to go they would end up somewhere completely else, as she had difficulties telling the stories apart, or probably something else that was incomprehensible to both Harry and Ron. It was probably that she didn't have much sense of direction and only found her way around Hogwarts by having enchanted an Exploding Snap card to point the way for her in their first year, something that Ron and Harry had only found out about recently, and Hermione was probably still embarrassed about that.

"Those were the times," Harry said, still staring into the fire, this time with a longing, forlorn look, though.

"I'm worried about her," Ron said after a long pause of regarding the flames licking at the dying embers too.

"No duh," Harry answered, instantly apologizing for his rudeness though.

"It's okay, I understand. I'm not in the best of moods at the moment either." Ron rubbed his eyes with his knuckles as if trying to rub all his sorrows out.

"Do you think we should go to Dumbledore?" Harry suggested.

"I don't think he would be able to talk sense into her either. That's what's so frustrating, you know? Not being able to do anything about all this. She'd never listen to anybody but herself in this matter, and she still needs to realize what's going on, which I fear is never gonna happen."

Harry nodded. He had known this was the case even before he'd talked to her but hadn't wanted to acknowledge his helplessness.

"At least Christmas is approaching. She can take a break over the holidays," Ron said hopefully, although he looked like he doubted it as much as Harry did.

"Christmas isn't for more than a month anyway," Harry interjected.

"Yeah, I know. It was just a thought."

"Let's go to bed and think about this some more, shall we?" Harry suggested and got up, stretching his aching back. He felt like he was in dire need of a massage, and he knew exactly what his dreams that night were going to be about when he realized this.

Ron followed him up to their dorm and they went to bed in silence, each contemplating the events of the evening.

When they got to breakfast the next day, everything was the same that it had been for the past two and a half months, and that was more than enough incentive to sink into a momentary depression, which Harry felt was a good idea at that point, so he spent the day sulking, being angry at everybody and everything and the overall situation, which seemed to happening a lot to him at the moment.

His mood did not really brighten until finally, the twentieth of December approached, which was their last day of school. It had been arranged for Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny to spend Ron's beloved "Crimbo Hols" at Grimmauld Place along with Molly and Arthur Weasley alone, which was where Harry and Ron were peacefully playing a game of chess while Hermione was studying and Ginny was playing with Crookshanks when the living room door was kicked open and in stepped a snowman bellowing "Happy Christmas" at the top of his lungs.

At closer inspection, that snowman turned out to be none other than Bill Weasley who had stopped by for a surprise visit as he'd gotten the weekend off free and decided to visit his family to drop off his presents personally.

"Where's mum and dad?" Ron's older brother asked as he hugged Ginny, who had lunged at him earlier back.

"They're off doing some the-weekend-is-approaching-there-might-be-a-hurricane-and-the-third-world-war-might-start-so-we-could-be-stuck-here-for three-years-shopping," Ron said, rolling his eyes.

Bill guffawed and gave his younger brother a very manly hug, as everybody knew that Ron was having a slightly homophobic phase at the moment, and it was important to tread carefully when showing him one's affection lately.

He then shook hands with a distracted Hermione and gave Harry a pat on the back. "How's it going, pal?" he asked, smiling.

Harry blinked confusedly. Somehow Bill was talking rather strange, rather very strange indeed, so he just nodded.

Ron had apparently noticed his friend's confusion and rolled his eyes again. "He's working with many Americans down in Egypt, and picking up on their mannerisms and accent," he explained, drawing a rather comical face that showed that he thought Bill talked like a half-moron.

"Another comment like that and I'm not gonna give you your present, young man," Bill scolded, although it was clear from the twinkle in his eye that he was only joking, something that Ron conveniently missed and so he started whining.

"Ah, shut up you big baby," Bill finally said and took four small parcels out of his pocket, using his wand to deshrink them again.

Harry was surprised when he tossed each of them one, as he hadn't expected to be getting presents from Ron's older brother. Clearly Hermione, who squeaked when her parcel hit her in the stomach was equally surprised, as she stared at Bill open-mouthedly. The older man simply grinned and nodded at them and then turned around to greet his parents that he had heard entering the hall.

As they were all still children inside, even though they did not want to admit it, Harry, Ron and Ginny started tearing into their presents immediately, and Hermione reluctantly followed suit when she noticed that she was the only one intent on waiting for Christmas day.

Ginny squeaked in delight and when she opened her present and when the others looked up to see what she had gotten, they laughed as the girl put the cap with kitten ears Bill had given her on. She looked positively ridiculous, but still the sight was entertaining and funny.

Harry frowned when he read the card that was attached to his own present - "May it help keeping Snape away. Merry Christmas, - Bill." He then removed the last piece of wrapping and a necklace of sorts fell into his hands.

"An Egyptian penchant," Bill, who had just entered the room again, explained, while Harry raised the leather cord to get a good look at the stone bird that was dangling on it.

"Is it supposed to keep bad spirits away?" Harry asked with a grin, waving the card lazily.

Bill merely grinned.

Harry put it on smilingly, which caused Ron, who had just celebrated his new keeper's gloves with a joyous "Oioioioioibiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiilllllllllllll," to cease his screaming and blanch dramatically. "But Harry, that's jewelry," he said, inching away from his best friend carefully.

"Oh, come off it Ron," Harry sighed while turning to Hermione, looking at her expectantly. "Well?" he asked. "What did you get?"

The girl raised an eyebrow and finished neatly folding up the wrapping of her present that she'd carefully unwrapped. "A book," she then answered, and while Ron made a sound of un-surprise, Harry scooped the book that was lying in her lap up and read the title.

And then he read it again.

"The Way of Chu-Fui-Txe?"he asked unbelievingly. "What's that supposed to be?"

Bill grinned from his corner of the room and flopped down onto a near couch. "Somebody I know quite well swears on its message," he told them, which caused Harry to frown even more.

"Well, thank you Bill, it's quite a lovely present," Hermione said, plucking the book out of Harry's hands again and got up. "I'm afraid I have to do my Potions assignment now," she then added and left the room before anyone could stop her.

"The message?" Ginny said doubtfully. "What does it say?"

"Well, as I understand it, it is about the important things in life and how to find them," her older brother explained. "Although the wrapping might be a little strange, I have a feeling that perhaps she might see reason after reading it," he then added.

"See reason?" Harry asked confusedly.

"I told him about how she's almost ruining herself with all the studying she's doing," Ron cleared the matter up.

"You mean the book says that academic accomplishments are not everything in life? Because it sounds like a pile of rubbish to me," Harry asked hopefully.

"I'm not sure. We'll see," Bill answered truthfully.

And see they would.

As could have been expected, Hermione started tearing into her new book immediately that evening according to Ginny who she was sharing a room with - because rubbish or no, it was a book, strings of words trying their best to make some sense. And books were there for being read. She probably also thought that not reading it would be rude, as it was a gift after all.

What Harry - and clearly everybody else - had not expected her to do was to read the entire thing in one single night with "an expression of rapt attention and fascination on her face that looked like someone had presented her with the answer to all the questions she'd ever had and would ever have" - quoting the one Ms. Ginevra Weasley who had bought herself a book on creative writing in September.

"You mean she read it? I mean, all of it?" Ron asked the next morning over a half-eaten bowl of porridge, his spoon frozen in mid-air, bits of breakfast dripping down rather comically.

Ginny sighed and glared at her entirely unpoetically inclined brother before nodding.

"What exactly is that book about again?" Harry asked, furrowing his brows while gesticulating with his own spoon. "It must contain something else than the title and Bill suggested, surely," he mused while twirling his cutlery in a way that made his homophobic best friend cringe and look at the necklace that was peeping out at Harry's collar suspiciously.

"The Way of Chu-Fui-Txe," Ron recited the title theatrically before they all three fell into peels of hysterical laughter.

"What exactly is so funny about that, and that's pronounced 'che,' Ron," a sharp voice from the kitchen door cut off their laughter rather effectively. "It is a very interesting book and any of you would only profit from reading it. Like Chu-Fui was prone to say: 'Thou that judgeth should think not talk'."

"Errr..." was how Ginny felt about this particular statement.

"Very enlightening" was what Harry certainly didn't think it was.

"I don't see the connection. Morning Hermione, take some porridge," was what Ron who didn't see the connection said.

Hermione scoffed and turned on her heels, mumbling something about blind, unseeing fools.

The three remaining occupants of the room shared a look in uneasy silence.

"Do you think she's going to be like that from now on?" Ron finally asked, rubbing the back of his head in a gesture of uncomfortable helplessness.

"Ah, no, Hermione's a clever girl. She wouldn't succumb to such charlatanry, right?" spoke Ginny the optimist.

Harry coughed into his hand discreetly. "You see, Ginny, despite being brighter than a neon bulb," - both Ron and Ginny looked confused at his muggle reference - "Hermione is sometimes quite susceptible to - well, idiots." He was really not happy with having to speak like this about his best friend and current love interest.

"Yeah, think of how she used to worship Lockhart," Ron added.

Ginny nodded vigorously. "Yes, and how she sticks to you two," she then added, which earned her a glare from her older brother and a snicker from Harry, who could take such jokes a lot better than his best friend.

"She's not really anymore, though," Ron, who had finally stopped glaring, stated.

"Not really what?" Ginny asked confusedly while helping herself to another load of porridge.

"Not really sticking to us," Harry answered her question.

"Oh, that," she said distractedly. "So, is she going to be like this for the rest of the holidays?" she asked impatiently, apparently uneasy at the thought of having to share her room with a lunatic.

"Nah, I don't think so," Ron said confidently, and tore into his breakfast once again.

As it turned out, what Ron thought didn't really matter, because Ron was not Hermione. And Hermione thought that the book was interesting. So interesting indeed that she started to change over the holidays, in a way that no one had expected, but also in a way that one would have ever hoped for.

Bill had long since left again, therefore it was out of the question of killing the messenger in this case, so Harry, Ron and Ginny had to stick to comforting each other in daily sessions of group-despairing around the fireplace.

There wasn't many people around at that time, and even Ron's parents were busy with sorting out things for the Order, so the four adolescents were pretty much the only people around.

"I can't take it anymore," Ginny groaned on the last evening of their holidays. "I'm so glad that we're going back to school tomorrow," she added.

Harry slightly envied her, as she got to be around Hermione the most, but he also pitied the poor girl - she suffered the worst under the other girl's strange change of character, after all.

"Night-time is the best time to wash thy hair, for the light of the moon is the purest and clearest," the red-haired girl recited, and, judging by the dark circles under her eyes, Harry got the impression that lately, Hermione thought that nighttime was the best time to do many things that made lots of noise.

"Where is she now?" Ron asked anxiously.

"In our room," Ginny replied while dropping into Ron's lap, hugging him.

"I know that you two are closer to her, but she's still my friend, and this is worrying," she finally mumbled into his neck.

Ron grunted in agreement, and Harry nodded.

"Did you hear her tell mum not to stir the soup counterclockwise as that tells that the cook is a child of the dark powers in the world?" Ron asked, and even though both Harry and Ginny shook their heads, none of them were surprised. They had no idea what was going on with Hermione, but had already agreed to talk to the one person who had guided huge amounts of students through their lives and might know what was going on there - Dumbledore.

And that was what they did when they arrived back at school. Even though she thought that it was mostly their affair, they had convinced a very reluctant Ginny to come along, as she might prove to be able to tell Dumbledore more about Hermione's strange behaviour.

"Hello Mr. Weasley, Mr. Potter and Miss Weasley," the Headmaster greeted them, smiling warmly. "I trust you had a wonderful Christmas with your family and friends?" he inquired politely.

"Yeah, about that..." Ginny began.

"We're a little worried about Hermione, Headmaster," Ron added.

And as they started to tell the wise old man about how she had been obsessed with studying at first, about Christmas, about the present, her radical change in behaviour and some of her rasher actions.

"...and then she burned all her books!" Ron finished in a scandalized tone of voice, something that, taken out of context, would have made everybody think that he had gone crazy. Ron Weasley was known to talk about his wish to burn his books almost daily.

"What's wrong with her?" Harry asked, almost pleadingly, as if to make Dumbledore say that everything was okay, and that she would be back to normal as soon as they returned to their common room.

"She also has a spot on her nose, and one on her chin now!" Ginny piped up. At the strange glances that Harry and Ron sent her upon this comment she quickly added, "She's never had a single spot. Ever. Parvati and Lavender always envy her complexion."

"Well, I think I know what might be going on with Miss Granger," the Headmaster said, smiling at his students once again while unwrapping a candy.

And then he dropped the bombshell.

"It seems like Miss Granger has hit puberty."

"...hit what?" Harry asked, unbelievingly.

"Eleven-year old girls hit puberty, and not seventeen-year-olds!" Ron screamed.

Ginny just looked confused.

"Well, Miss Granger hasn't. It's a magical thing, and I've heard of it happening before. It usually appears in very studious people, like Miss Granger is. I believe that, if the will is big enough, a witch - or a wizard - can procrastinate puberty because deep down they feel like it would interfere with their studies. I am not talking about the basic bodily things here, like, ah, growing in certain places. How can I explain? It is like cutting yourself with a knife but wishing for the cut to appear at a time when you think you might be able to live with it better than the actual moment," the old man explained.

The three students in front of him looked at him with blank stares.

"It doesn't look wished for or controlled to me," Harry said slowly, still trying to suggest the information.

"It isn't. It cannot be controlled forever," Dumbledore replied, his expression growing serious.

"So you're saying that, while her body grew, and her mind matured, there were only some things that she put off for later?" Ginny asked with big, round eyes.

Dumbledore nodded gravely.

"Wow, I wish I could have done that too," the girl breathed in awe.

"No, you don't," was the Headmaster's reply. "Just look at Miss Granger. Years of repressed psychology are breaking free at the moment. Just imagine all the boy trouble or however you might call it, the frustration, everything puberty-related you experienced over the last few years happening all at once."

They all swallowed, each thinking about their experiences with life.

"She really needs your support now," Dumbledore said. "Be as gentle and understanding as possible - I will ask Madam Pomfrey for advice. I suggest you go back to your common room now," he finished.

They said their good-byes and went back to Gryffindor Tower, each of them still too shocked to speak.

When they arrived there, the situation did not exactly brighten up. After stepping through the portrait hole they were greeted with a sight that they had not seen since... they had probably never witnessed anything such as this.

Harry hissed in pain and covered his ear because Parvati's shrieking to his right was getting to loud to be bearable. The rest of the Gryffindors weren't much better. Somehow, everybody was screaming at everyone, and it was hard to divine the reason as one could not single out words in the wobbly chorus of voices.

There was no need to, however. As soon as their appearance was noticed by their housemates, the common room grew eerily quiet.

Harry's stomach dropped to his knees in an uneasy feeling of apprehension and presentiment.

"Where's Hermione?" he finally asked after having scanned the crowd for her unsuccessfully.

He was met by deafening, colloquial silence.

After what seemed like an eternity, Neville Longbottom squeaked, "Gone."

"Gone?" Ron repeated angrily, the colour in his cheeks rising.

"I think she was drunk," Lavender said hesitantly.

"Drunk," Harry stated in low, dangerous tones. Hermione would never drink alcohol, and they all knew it, so why did the stupid bint have to diffamate her like that?

"She talked about lots of really weird stuff," Parvati defended her best friend and stepped up to the other girl, who looked miserable.

"Did you ask her whether she was drunk?" Ron asked through clenched teeth.

"Yes," the girls squeaked in unison.

"And then what?" Harry asked, willing himself to stay calm.

"And she stormed up to our dorm room, and I went to see whether she was alright. I saw her enter the room, but when I got there, she was gone. How is that possible?" Lavender rushed to say.

"Okay, everybody, go back to your dorms, do something, just go away," Ron finally commanded. "That includes you, Gin," he snapped at his little sister who'd remained at his side.

She scuttled away after shooting one last reproachful and nasty glance his way.

"So, what do we do?" Harry asked when they were finally alone.

" I don't know. The brains have left us, after all," Ron said and sank into one of the soft chairs that stood scattered around the fireplace.

"I have an idea," he finally said after a minute of silence.

Harry tried his best not to look surprised, and succeeded when he saw the serious look on his usually funny friend.

"You may not like it, though, and it needs to be set into action as fast as possible," Ron said gravely.

"Spill. Whatever it is, we need to find her," Harry said, meaning it. If it would have required him jumping out of the window, he would have done it.

As Ron laid the outline of his plan out to him, Harry found that he really did not like it much. But it was the only plan they had, and he'd go for it.

This was why they spent the next hour crawling around on the floor looking for the proverbial needle in the hay.

"This one's long enough," Ron said, holding a single hair that he had picked up from a chair to the light.

"Nah, too blonde-ish. Probably Lavender's," Harry waved it away and held a hair up himself. "Definitely Ginny," he commented, wishing it was her who had disappeared, as it was much easier to spot a Weasley.

But then again, Ginny was not Hermione, and Harry did not dream about Ginny every single night, and he never wished to strangle and hug her at the same time, and he never felt like kissing her lips when she bit them - if she even bit them - like Hermione was prone to. And Harry was not sure whether he'd be as fanatic about Ron's hair-brained scheme if it were Ginny who was missing.

"How did she manage to leave the room anyway?" Ron murmured while examining a possible hit.

"A broom?" Harry offered. "Gee, Parvati is losing quite some hair," he mumbled to himself.

"Hermione? On a broom?" Ron snorted. It was probably really a ridiculous idea, however...

"Hermione? Sprouting esoteric nonsense about the balance of the body and the cereal?" Harry asked back.

Ron nodded. "So she took a broom. How'd she get one?"

Harry's movements stilled in mid-air. It couldn't be possible. Surely she hadn't... had she?

"Hey, I've got one!" Ron exclaimed excitedly while Harry was still frozen from shock.

"The broom shed, now," he finally commanded and started to run out of the common room, leaving a stunned Ron behind him.

When he finally arrived at the broom shed, panting and red-cheeked from the exercise he waited for his friend to catch up with him and used the time to catch his breath. After their eyes had adjusted to the glumness of the room Harry breathed the words "oh, no."

"Your broom is missing, Harry," Ron stated rather unnecessarily.

Harry just sighed. "She wanted to see it the other day, asked me how some things work and stuff," he said uncomfortably, rubbing the back of his head with his hand absentmindedly.

"Fine, we'll grab the potion and then we'll take -" here Ron stopped, and his expression darkened considerably "- some of the school's old Cleansweeps."

They both set out to the castle again, the building looming high before them in the dark.

Twenty minutes later they were hiding beneath Harry's invisibility cloak, tiptoeing through the doorway of Snape's classroom, pulling the cloak off when they'd entered safely. The plan was to get one of the locator potions that Snape had told them about recently and use it while the hair was still fresh enough to work, hoping to find Hermione before the potion wore off.

They had already crossed half of the classroom when two things happened at once: they heard footsteps, and Ron's left trouser leg got caught on a hook he hadn't seen.

"I can't get it off!" he said in a panicked whisper, pulling at the material that would not give. Harry pulled a little too.

"Someone's coming Ron," Harry hissed and gave Ron's trousers another yank. It was funny how clothes always ripped when you didn't need them to but when you could really use a rip, the garment in question would turn out to be unbreakable.

The footsteps had now stopped in front of the classroom.

"Go," Ron urged. "Go and find her, I'll stay here and take Snape's wrath. There's no time to argue. Good luck, mate."

Harry nodded. Ron really was a Gryffindor, heroic and brave, self-sacrificing for the greater good. So he took off with another last glance at his best friend, and hid in a corner of the room, behind the door, not a moment too late.

Said door opened merely seconds later, and through stepped none other than the man they had both expected and dreaded: Professor Snape in all his greasy-haired glory.

"Well, what have we here?" the slimy Professor drawled after a moment of surprise at seeing someone in his classroom. "A Gryffindor, out of bed, breaking into a teacher's classroom," he continued unpleasantly. "This is worth three months detention, Weasley."

Harry could see Ron blanch visibly from where he was standing, but he slipped out of the door behind Snape's back before he would get caught too and ran back to the broom shed, picking a random broom.

It was only then that he noticed the invisibility cloak still dangling from his arm. Harry groaned. He could have easily avoided Ron getting caught by covering them both with it. Where was Hermione when he needed her to remind him things such as this?

With one last glance at the castle he took off and flew into the night. He did not have the Locating Potion they had sought, but he had an idea where she was off to anyway. A very vague one that did not exactly consist of him knowing where she had gone to, but more like what had motivated her to.

And so he flew the entire night, trying to keep to uninhabited places, flying over forests and fields until he touched down again at dawn, sore from having ridden a broomstick that might have as well been a vacuum cleaner judging by its comfort, anxious because he needed to find somebody who was not calculateable at the moment, and frozen to the very core.

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