Atonement

When I was put back in my room, it was to several familiar faces. Susan, Luna, Malfoy, Snape, and Potter were sitting awkwardly in the courtesy chairs.

"Hello," I said, then began to cry.

Snape was by my side in a second. "Are you all right? Where does it hurt?"

"I'm just so . . . so . . . h-happy!" I hiccuped.

"Who are you and what have you done to Hermione Granger?"

"I'm going to live, Snape. I''m going to live."

"That's great! How long? An extra year? Two?"

"A lifetime," I whispered. I could see his surprised face through my tears.

"Are - are you saying -"

"I'm completely cancer-free now. Professor . . . I have a lifetime." Tears were still dripping down my face, but I couldn't make myself care enough to stop. I found myself suddenly in a rib-cracking hug.

More people piled on either side of me, and I found myself welcoming the contact.

Maybe there was hope for me, after all.

Or maybe not.

"Erm . . . Hermione . . . can we talk for a minute?" The healer had walked in without me realizing it.

"Sure. What's up?" I was smiling so much my face hurt.

"Can we have a moment alone?" she asked my friends - to hell with it, my family.

"Sure," Snape said after a moment. "Come on, give them some privacy." He chivvied them all out the door, not bothering to give Potter a look of disdain.

The healer sat on the edge of the bed and motioned me to sit next to her. After a second's hesitation, I approached. "What's up?" I asked. My mood was still so buoyant I felt like I should be floating.

"I have some bad news," she said slowly. "We found another tumor."

I sat with a thump on the floor. "Where this time?"

"It's in your lungs." She studied me, then added carefully, "And in your kidneys."

"Will it ever end?" I whispered. I was far from happy now.

"I don't know. Come on, Hermione, let's get you back into bed."

"Jesus," I whispered, standing up numbly. "God, when will it end?"

***

I returned to Hogwarts amidst rumors about me and Krum. We had had a spat and I had had broken his heart. He had found me too stupid and left in disgust. I had made up him raping me to make him leave - this had been started by the students from Durmstrang, and I wanted to rip Karkaroff's head off of his body.

At the beginning of February, Cedric found me in the library. "Have you figured out the clue yet?" he asked eagerly.

"What clue?" I asked.

"For the second task, of course!" he said, chuckling slightly.

"Again. What clue?"

"Hermione, are you feeling all right?"

"Yes." I neglected to mention the headaches and pains I had been getting recently. "Why?"

"The clue in the eggs, remember? From the first task?"

"Cedric, my egg melted in the dragonfire."

"And no one told you anything about it?" His brilliant smile slipped a few degrees.

"Where and when?" I asked, swallowing what little pride I had left.

"February twenty-fourth, at the lake."

"What do we have to do?"

He dropped his bag and sat across form me. "This isn't really cheating . . ." he murmured to himself as he scribbled on a scrap piece of parchment he had pulled form his pocket. He handed me a poem.

Come seek us where our voices sound,
We cannot sing above the ground.
An hour long you'll have to look
And to recover what we took.
And while you're searching, ponder this:
We've taken what you'll sorely miss.
But past an hour, the prospect's black,
Too late, it's gone, it won't come back.

"So," I said, eyes lingering on the loopy G's and spiky A's. "We have to go into the lake, find something, and get out in an hour?"

"You're missing who took it," he told me, tapping the first two lines.

"Who?"

"I have no idea," he admitted. "I was rather hoping you could help me with that."

I stood up, swinging my bag over my shoulder. "I have an idea, but I need to see the egg."

"Come with me, then." He stood up as well, and I followed him out of the library, down the stairs, and past a painting of a bowl of fruit. I frowned at it; that must have been the only still-life in the castle.

We reached a painting of a rather pompous-looking pseudo-knight. "Dragon's egg," Cedric said, glancing at me. I hid a smile as his mouth twitched.

We walked in, and all conversation died down. They started back up a moment later, people shrugging and turning back to their friends.

I looked at Cedric, mouth open. "Have they always been this accepting of me?" I breathed.

A passing boy heard. "Not always," he answered with a shrug. "But, I mean, you faced a dragon. You can't help what House you're in."

"Thanks," I said, taken aback and actually touched.

The boy shrugged again. "No problem. Besides, we figure, you haven't done anything to us. Why should we do anything to you?"

I looked at him in a new light. "Would I that everyone was as accepting as you," I whispered.

He turned away to join his friends.

"So," Cedric said, "if you're done drooling all over Tommy . . ."

"That's his name?" I asked, startled and not knowing why.

"Yeah," he said. "Anyway, come up to my room and we'll work on the egg."

"Okay." I followed him to the staircases. I got a few strange looks, but nobody tried to stop me following him to his dorm.

"Here we go," he said with a grunt, hoisting the egg out of his trunk and handing it to me. I accepted it, pressing my fingers on the joints, smoothing my palms along the velvet-smooth gold.

I glanced at him through my bangs when he stifled a laugh. "This is my first chance to look at it, remember," I told him. He nodded, lips pressed tightly together, his hazel eyes dancing wickedly.

I pried the gold apart, and it fell into two beautifully-shaped pieces in my hands. The wailing was unimportant; what gained my attention were Cedric's hands. They had flickered with something.

"Do that again," I said sharply, and he stared.

"What?"

"Just - do that thing with your hands again." I was scarcely breathing. Was it possible?

He brought his hands together and, with a quick twist, a small ball of water appeared.

"Jesus, Mary, mother of God," I whispered. "Not another one. Why is this happening? How can it be happening? Is this it?"

"Hermione, is what it? Why is what happening?"

I held up a finger as I gathered my thoughts. I stared in blank horror at the walls.

There could not be another elemental at Hogwarts.