Once-Endangered
Part One

“The winter days bring sorrows all:
The once-endangered then shall fall;
The beast tries, as he said, to own,
And half-succeeds—but not alone.”

Once-Endangered (Part One)

Ron was looking at Hermione.

That, in itself, was rather uneventful as it was his favorite pastime and something he had been doing for a very long time…not that he would ever admit it to anyone else, least of all her.

The Pride was seated at the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall.  Over them, steel gray clouds covered the ceiling, white snowflakes falling down slowly until they vanished ten feet above their heads.  Draco, Harry, and Ginny on the opposite end were grumping about having to practice in this weather as soon as dinner was over—Ron would have joined them if it meant he didn't have to take his eyes off his girlfriend.  Neville and Meghan, meanwhile, were being awfully quiet and whispering to themselves about something, and even Luna was preoccupied rearranging the food on her plate to resemble a face.

Hermione, however, wasn't talking.  She was sitting in between Ginny and Lavender Brown today, and when Ron could wrench his eyes from Hermione (which wasn't often), he looked over at Lavender.

The first time he did this, he was surprised to find her glaring at him.  When she wasn't doing that, she was shooting daggers at Hermione.  It took Ron a while to figure out why Lavender would be mad at her after everything that happened to Neenie over Christmas break, but then he pieced it together.

Lavender was jealous.  And Ron found he really couldn't care less.   

It really wasn't hard to compare them—his old girlfriend and his new one.  Hermione was so much prettier than Lavender, without even trying.  The latter had taken to wearing heaps of make-up on her face, covering her eyelashes with gunk and making her lips and cheeks bright colors.  At first, Ron thought that made her look pretty, but now…next to Hermione's soft features and gunk-free face, he saw how beautiful his new girlfriend was without all that stuff and he hoped she never wanted it on.  Maybe a small bit he could handle, but not the copious amounts Lavender applied.

And it wasn't just the face—it was the hair.  The past month, Lavender had taken to spending hours in the bathroom, fixing it up so it was just right.  Not a hair out of place, all of it lavishly curled in big rollers, sleeked down to make it extra bouncy when she walked, topped with a different bow every day.  But next to Hermione's own natural ringlets that twisted every which way and curled on its own and gave her a sort of halo about her head, Lavender's were nothing.

It was no wonder Ron couldn't stop staring at Hermione, which made Lavender none too happy in the least.  She kept folding her arms crossly and scowling which, of course, made her look ten times worse.  Ron loved it when Hermione scowled…that is, when it wasn't aimed at him.

Hermione's scowls always started the same way.  Her nose would twitch adorably, her eyes would narrow, and her eyebrows arched perfectly.  Then she would do one of three things: fold her arms slowly, her right arm under her left, and tip her head up; place her hands on her hips and put all her weight on one leg; or her fingers would tighten their hold on her books so that her knuckles were white, and she'd cast one more withering glare before stalking away.

However, when those scowls were aimed at him, as cute as they were, he always wished himself somewhere else.

It was when she was about to kiss him, he decided, that she looked her best.  She would tilt her head to the side; her hazel eyes would sparkle, her gorgeous lips slowly spreading across her face, making him want to kiss them.  So he would, and when they pulled apart, they'd look even better, red and glistening.  Which meant that he would have to kiss them again, but longer, and this always made her cheeks turn that rosy shade of pink they looked best in.  So he would have to kiss them too.

It was all of these thoughts that coursed through him day after day since they started going together, and he hoped they would never stop.  It was a never-ending cycle, he knew, and one he was all too glad to get lost in.  He wondered idly what he had ever done without it…without her…in the past seven years he'd known her.

And why…why…it had taken him the threat of her being kidnapped, endangered, and attacked, for him to finally notice it….

It had taken her a while to come back to Hogwarts after it happened—and even when she had, she wasn't herself.  Everyone could see that.

She avoided big crowds when she could, just as she avoided being alone.  The Pride always made sure one or more of them was with her—particularly the girls, since she still acted uneasy with Harry, Draco, and Neville.  Ron was by her side constantly, only ever leaving it when she had to use the loo or went up the girls’ dormitory to bed.

Nights, too, had become especially horrible.  Almost every single night for a week the entire tower would hear her screams as she came awake, sobbing, in the middle of the night from a nightmare.  She hadn't been doing this when she was still back at the Den—but something had changed when she came to Hogwarts and Ron didn't know what.  She was supposed to be taking a dreamless sleep potion every night, but for some reason she refused to.

Ron asked her about it after a week of nightmares, but she just shook her head.

“We've already tried it—it doesn't work.  Moony thinks it's because of the curse.  Most of its effects were driven away by him and Danger after…it happened, but the ones that weren't have become twice as worse because they're repressed.  But during the night, I can't keep repressing them and they come out,” she said.

He furrowed his brow, confused.  “But…what does that have to do with the potion?”

“A dreamless sleep potion only affects the mind, Ron.  It can't do anything about the soul, and that's where the curse is.”

It was the next day when McGonagall drew her aside to inform her that she'd spoken with the Pack-parents and they were in agreement—if Hermione's nightmares kept on and her occasional fits of terror didn't stop, she would have to go back to the Den.

As much as Ron hated this, he had to agree with them.  He didn't think she was ready to come back, and those things proved that since she couldn't control them, she wasn't ready.

And so it was that she had come up with an answer to end her nightmares—though not one that anyone would have expected.

Ron had been on the verge of falling asleep in the boys’ dorm when he felt something else besides him on the bed.  It crept its way up to his chest and put something cold on his neck—and he shot up with a yell.

At once, the other boys were awake, Harry and Draco wrenching apart their hangings, wands out.  It wasn't until they saw Neenie the cat rubbing herself against Ron's arm that they relaxed—although Ron didn't think the raised eyebrows and suggestive looks they were giving him were much better.

“Where'd you get the cat?” Dean yawned.  “Is it real?”

“Make me a girl to snog, too,” mumbled Seamus, already asleep again.

Harry threw a pillow at him, but even if the other boy was awake he wouldn't have known how right he was.

Hermione didn't re-transform to snog Ron, though.  In fact, she stayed a cat for the entire night, sleeping under the crook of his arm and snuggled against his chest.

It was the first night since she'd come back to Hogwarts that she'd spent nightmare-less, and it became a regular thing.  Ginny tried to tell Ron that he shouldn't let her do that—it was cheating, in a way, and unhealthy.

 “How is it unhealthy?” he complained.  “She's not having nightmares anymore, is she?”

 “That's not the point!  Once you start sleeping together, you're never going to stop.  She'll get so addicted to having you there with her every night that she's never going to feel safe without you!  Sure that's not a problem now, but what about spring holidays?  What about when you're in the Burrow and she's in the Den?  Are you going to fly out of your window and into hers just to sleep with her?”

Ron spluttered.

“Oh, for Merlin's sake, stop that,” Ginny snapped.  “Get your filthy mind out of your pants—you know I'm not talking about you and Hermione having sex, you great prat!”

Which only made Ron turn more red.  

After a while, Hermione started getting noticeably better.  She would be the first to raise her hand in class again, she started eating out with the others in the Great Hall during the actual mealtimes, and hanging out more in the common room which she had avoided before.  Everyone was relieved for the change and hoped she was getting better.

And to all appearances, she was.

There were a few times that something would go wrong—a boy sitting down too close to her in the common room, or one of the Slytherins hissing something in her ear as they walked past—and she would go rigid, then scream at people to get away from her or begin to draw further into herself with a haunted look in her eyes as she recounted memories.

Ron hated those times the most.  He hated her whispering “No…no, please don't…” as she started to hug herself and sink to the ground, rocking back and forth.  It was when she was like this that it was the hardest to coax her back, since no matter what anyone did, she would just get worse.

There was one particular time she had done this in the middle of Potions, after being partners with Pansy Parkinson.  She got so upset over something Pansy told her that she knocked the cauldron over, pouring her slow-acting acid potion on the floor, and started to sink down into the puddle, clutching herself and sobbing, saying it wasn't true.

Snape grabbed her before the acid could eat through her clothes, shoving her into Ron and demanding he take her up to the hospital wing.

“And don't bring her back to this class again until she can learn to control herself and not be a menace!” he hissed.

“What?  She's not a menace!” Ron shouted back, unable to stop himself.

“Or she wouldn't be, if you'd let us partner with her!”  Harry threw in before Snape could react. 

Thus it was that Ron and Harry got to scrub the acid off the floor, Muggle-style.  If they could have used their wands, it would have taken a mere minute to remove it.  As it was, the acid kept eating away at the scrubbing brushes in their hands, which made it take nearly two hours.

As he threw away the eleventh brush they'd borrowed from Filch to clean up the mess, Ron said furiously, “Trust Hermione to actually finish the potion before knocking it to the floor.”

“Trust Hermione to brew a perfect potion after everything that's happened,” replied Harry grimly.  

But it was after that episode nearing the end of January that Hermione started improving.  As Draco stated it—half in admiration and half in exasperation—“Only Hermione could be pushed back into normalcy after facing possible bad Potions credits on her O.W.L.s.”

Maybe it was the thought of the O.W.L.s that helped to bring her back, after all.  She did spend most of her time studying in the library and, with the enormous amount of time she was spending there and the fact that she'd never had an episode there, whoever was watching her felt quite content to leave her to it.

No one could quite account for the relative peace of the library.  Maybe it was because everyone had too many years of practice in what happened to those who disturbed Hermione Granger-Lupin while she was in there studying.  She was never approached by anyone except for the Pride, and even then, she seemed too preoccupied by her schoolwork to notice.

“Or maybe it's because she likes the library too much to want to start screaming in there?” Meghan suggested one day after checking in on her.  “Every time I go in the library I want to shout as loud as I can because it's so quiet it makes my voice itch.”

“Voices don't itch, Pearl,” Neville said, tugging at her braid a little.  “It's your voice-box or your throat that itches, not your voice.”

Meghan hmphed.  “Mine does.”

When Hermione was with the Pride, she seemed at ease.  She laughed when the occasion called for it and chided when it didn't.  Everyone else was so relieved that she was back to normal that they hardly suspected a thing.

Even Ron had thought she was mostly over it.  He wanted her to be over it.  He loved being with her when she was happy, kissing her when she kissed him back, cuddling with her when she felt content.  So in love with being in love and helping her to feel safe, at first he failed to notice that when she wasn't with him, she didn't feel safe. 

When he did start realizing it, he began to hang back and watch how she was with the rest of the Gryffindors or students without her knowing he was there.  It worried him to see how uncomfortable she was with even the Pride.  It was mostly unnoticeable—a furtive edging away from Luna, or a scared look at Draco when no one was looking.  But Ron saw it, and it hurt him to see her act like that with her best friends—let alone her brothers.

He could only take a few minutes of watching it before he joined them, slipping his arm around her shoulders and sitting next to her.  Then her entire demeanor would change; her muscles loosened from their stiff positions, her body relaxed into his, her head fell onto his shoulder to feel his heart beating, her face contentedly drew into a small smile.  It was after this that Ron had made sure he was always with her.

But he was starting to realize that he couldn't always be.

“Potter, Black, Weasley, and Weasley, let's go!” called Angelina Johnson.  “We only have an hour of daylight before it gets dark, then I want us to keep practicing—”

“What for?” Draco demanded.

She looked at him like it was obvious.  “We have one more match before the weather warms up.  Cold weather means earlier nights, which means this next match is all the more likely to keep going till after dark.  We need to be trained to keep doing our best if that happens.”

“But if we can't see, we can't play,” said Ron grumpily, thinking about a Quaffle speeding towards him at fifty miles an hour and not being able to see it until it was a foot from his face.

“Are you a wizard, Ron?  Do you know how to use a wand?  Are you at this school to do magic, or are you here as Filch's assistant to sweep the chimneys and mop the floors?” Angelina asked irritably.  “There's a spell to enhance human night vision and I'm going to teach it to you.  Now stop wasting your breaths, the lot of you, and come on.”

They grumbled as they got up and followed her out of the Great Hall.  Ron hung back, and waited until Angelina wasn't looking before kissing Hermione on the cheek.

“You'll be careful?” she asked.

He tried to give her a cheeky grin, but his heart wasn't in it.  “I was going to ask you the same thing actually.  I won't be here to…”

“I'll be fine, Ron, honestly.  My little sister will be here to baby-sit me the entire time,” she said, a trace bitterly.  “You'd better go before Angelina uses your broom to make your coffin.”

“She'd have to catch me first,” he said, giving her a real grin this time before giving her a kiss on the mouth and jogging off after them.

He barely heard Luna's calling after him, “You should hurry back, you know.”

_________________________________________________________________________________________

True to her word, Meghan stuck by Hermione like a sore thumb until they got to the common room.  Hermione, becoming increasingly annoyed by her incessant chatter, thought of the perfect way to draw her off.

“Oh, Pearl?” she said sweetly.  “I was going to work on my Potions essay, but I just remembered I don't have the right book to look up the Mandragora draught.  Would you like to come with me while I work on it in the library, or would you rather stay here?”

“Here!” Meghan said immediately, plopping down beside Natalie.

“Are you sure?  I could use the company…”

“Nope, I'd much rather stay here.  You don't need looking after when you're in the library, Harry says.”

Hermione's eyes narrowed dangerously.  “Oh, does he?”

“If you're only going to the library, you won't need looking after,” Luna said mildly.  “But if you were going to go somewhere else, maybe Neville should go with you.”

Hermione huffed.  “Neville, am I allowed to go to the library by myself, or were you looking forward to tagging along?”

He turned pink.  “Er…you should be fine…”

“Thank you, your royal stewardship.  I am so glad I have your approval,” she snapped, before grabbing her things and stalking out of the portrait hole.

Behind her she heard Meghan whisper loudly, “She's really grouchy.”

“Don't mind her.  It's nearing the full moon,” Luna replied.

The portrait swung shut behind her and the Fat Lady tutted at her for slamming.

Maybe Luna was right, Hermione thought.  Maybe she was being moody because it was full moon tomorrow night.  The Pack-parents were going to be coming, which would help, but they couldn't get here till after Moony had already transformed.  Which meant the Pride would all tell stories and play games before they came and all slept together.  Right next to each other.  She wasn't sure if she was ready for that yet.  In their forms, it was one thing, but human…

Well, that settles it, then.  I'll just be in cat form and sleep next to Ron, and I'll be fine.  Or…better to sleep next to Moony.  That way, if anything happens…

She shivered.

This would be her first Den since it happened.  She really didn't know what the changes would be.  It would likely be her attitude and her mind that would alter, but what if some of that seeped into her body?  What if her mind tried to convince her that the Pride were her enemies…or worse, her prey?  What if she started attacking someone in her sleep?  With her human nails and teeth, she could only do so much harm, but in her cat form and with a werewolf's human-hating mind, she might be able to…

I won't.  It won't happen, it'll be okay.  I'll take the Wolfsbane just to make sure, and if they have to, Moony and Danger will stay in one of the rooms alone with me.  Everything will be under control.

She took in a deep breath and willed herself to relax.

By this time she had reached the library.  No one but Madam Pince appeared to be in there.  Hermione rummaged through her bag to make sure she had everything she needed, and suddenly found that she did not.  Her Potions essay had been left in the dungeon room this morning.  She had been in such a hurry to get out of there that she had left it in the ingredients cupboard.

“Damn it,” she whispered.

She started heading down the stairs to go retrieve it, but stopped.  Neville had said she could only go to the library, she really shouldn't be heading to the dungeons at this time of night….

Is Neville the boss of you?  Shouldn't you be the judge over what you'll throw a fit over next?  It'll take ten minutes to run down there, retrieve it, and come back up, and then you'll have plenty of time to work on it before it's due.

She sighed, then made up her mind and started down the stairs to the dungeons.

It was unnaturally dark down there.  She had half a mind to light her wand, but even though it was only nine, and not yet past curfew, she really didn't want to be caught by Filch or Snape and yelled at.  Quietly she crept along, hand clutching the straps of her bag.

It only took two minutes to reach the classroom and ease the door open.  She looked around to make sure Snape was nowhere around before proceeding towards the storage cupboard.  There was a steady drip…drip…drip in the corner but she paid it no mind.  She set down her bag to open the cupboard doors and started rummaging around.

“Looking for this?” said a voice behind her.

She gasped and spun around, her heart racing.

Leaning idly against one of the desks was a burly seventh-year Hermione knew vaguely as Thorgood Rowle.  He still had his school robes on, and the Slytherin crest on them was very visible.  Underneath the light hair and dark eyes, he wore a rather smug and dirty look that didn't promise anything good.  In his hand, he brandished her Potions essay.

“G-give it back,” she said, cursing the choke in her voice.  Her heart was pounding, and she could feel the blood leave her face, her breath come out in gasps, her hands start to tremble.  The smirk on the Slytherin's face grew wider.

Calm down, calm down, get a grip on yourself, don't let him see how scared you are.  It'll only spur him on, make him think he's winning, it's what he wants…don't give him what he wants, fight him…

She took in a deep breath and drew up anger to replace the fear.  The fear fought back, but she clenched her teeth and pushed harder.

Rowle chuckled, watching her struggle with herself.  “It seems the mudblood know-it-all isn't quite as courageous as everyone seems to think she is,” he sneered.  “Perhaps her little tryst around New Year's was enough to bring her down from her lofty throne.”

“Quit talking to me like I'm not here and give me my paper!” she said angrily.  Her voice sounded harsh to her, but she didn't care.

“Now why would I want to do a thing like that?  It would take away my purpose of being here in the first place.  As entertaining as this is, I have far better things to do with my time than socialize with the likes of you.”

Hermione stared at him, eyes narrowed.  “Then tell me what you want to say and get out before I hex you out!” she snapped, but she knew it was bravado talking.  She didn't have her wand on her—it was down in her bag.  She couldn't stoop down to reach into it without him noticing, and it was burrowed too deep under her books to even try.

The smirk left his face, replaced by an ugly sneer that twisted his features.  He stood up and walked towards her, stopping just a foot from her and kicking her bag behind him.

“I'm here to warn you,” he said in a low voice, “that you're going to pay for what you did to Greyback.  I know you killed him.  My father was there…he watched you murder the half-breed like the lowly scum you are…”

Hermione shrank back against the cupboard, her calm vanishing as quickly as she tried to summon it back.  He was far too close…she could feel his cold breath on her face, see the pupils of his eyes dilate, fury filling them.  He terrified her, his presence made her want to scream…but what he'd said scared her far worse than he ever could.

“I…I didn't.  I didn't mean to…I didn't know…” she stammered.

He snorted.  “Not know that silver kills werewolves?  What kind of fool do you take me for?”

“But I didn't m-m-murder him!  I forgot that it was silv—”

“You would have me believe that you killed one of the Dark Lord's most feared instruments on accident?  Fenrir Greyback has turned more people werewolf than anyone in history.  When the Dark Lord wants something done to teach people a lesson, he sends him.  You have no idea the number of people he's killed and turned.  He's the greatest threat to your kind, apart from the Dark Lord himself, and you would have me believe…that he was brought down by a pathetic fifth year…on accident?” he asked in derision.

He took another step in, closing the gap between them.  Hermione pressed herself back against the wooden cabinet, feeling herself shaking.  Her pendants were hot against her skin— any minute she would start to see the smoke from the burns.

“I know better than that,” he hissed.  “You murdered him.  You know what that makes you, don't you?  You know what side takes people like you?“

“I wouldn't join Voldemort's side if it were the last thing on earth!” she snarled.

He cocked his head.  “Didn't I hear that Greyback bit you before he died?  You know that murderers and werewolves are prime candidates for His army?  How lucky for Him, then, to get you!”

“I wouldn't!” she screamed.  “Go away!”

“You know…I heard that once you kill someone, you can't stop.  Of course…when you're a werewolf as well, it's hard not to, isn't it?” he said nastily.

He leaned in closer, and Hermione thought for one terrified second that he was going to do something.  But the next second, he pulled back and stared down at her with an upturned lip.

“No real man would soil himself with a half-breed, mudblood bitch like you,” he said coldly.

Her essay, crumpled into a ball, fell to the floor at her feet as he left.

Hermione collapsed on the ground, her breath coming out in sobs.  She was shaking and she couldn't seem to stop.  Her mind played back how she had been transfixed by what he was saying, by how close he was moving to her, how she had felt frozen where she stood.

His words came back to her now, filling her thoughts, poisoning her mind.  She tried to shove them out, but they wouldn't go away.

“…my father was there…he watched you murder the half-breed like the lowly scum you are…”

“No!  I didn't murder him, I didn't mean to…I didn't…”

“…you murdered him.  You know what that makes you, don't you?”

“I'm not…I'm not, I'm not…”

“…I heard that once you kill someone, you can't stop.  Of course…when you're a werewolf as well, it's hard not to, isn't it?”

Hermione stumbled to her feet, fingers clutching at the cupboard to pull herself up.  The walls seemed to be closing in on her…it was too hot, too stifling, she had to get out.  She reached blindly for the door and shoved it open, forgetting about her bag and essay. 

She had to get away.  He was right…she wasn't safe.  She'd killed someone, and it would happen again.  She had to go somewhere people would be safe from her.  Somewhere her Pride couldn't find her, because if they did, she might hurt them.  Greyback was a monster…he had been driven to rage and murder by the curse that enveloped him, and that same curse now covered her too.  She had to get away before something happened.

Before she killed someone else too.

She started running away from the corridor that led to the Great Hall.  Down, down, deeper into the endless maze that housed the dungeons.  She was hardly aware that her body was getting closer to the ground, that her legs were becoming shorter and her face narrower.

If anyone had been watching, they would have seen a running girl become a calico cat, which streaked off into the darkness.