Chapter Text
The duel was raging in the centre of the Great Hall, Lord Voldemort as Tom Riddle liked to style himself was being battled to a standstill by the Boy-who-lived, the Chosen One, or Harry, as he much preferred to be known. Around the perimeter of the room, the rest of the combatants had stopped, and stood watching.
The two wands locked on each other, and the spells met in the middle forming a glowing, spitting, ball between the two wizards. Hermione was worrying, Harry was using Draco Malfoy’s wand. He had been protected by the shared cores in Little Hangleton, this time there was no such symmetry. Her knuckles were white as she gripped her own wand tighter and tighter. Harry had to win, life without Harry was unimaginable.
Riddle was taunting Harry, “Potter, why do you fight the inevitable, why do you resist, I am too much for you.” his sibilant speech grated on Hermione’s already fraught nerves. “Surrender to the inevitable, join your mudblood mother, I will send you your mudblood girlfriend to join you soon enough, no need to sully the world with your progeny.”
Hermione saw the flicker in Harry. Insulting his mother, or her usually made him angry, spoiling for a fight, this time she saw something diminish. Harry fought, but it was as if he had no interest in winning, as if he really no longer cared to live. The ball of magic started towards Harry. “Fight him Harry, fight for us, fight for freedom,” Hermione shouted across the hall. He appeared to rally at her words, the ball shifted towards Voldemort.
“Listen Potter, the mudblood is begging for you.” he laughed but the ball inched toward Riddle.
“Come on Harry,” Ron shouted, “Fight, fight for our future, fight for our children.” Harry visibly gritted his teeth.
“Yes, Potter, fight for the blood traitor, so he can reproduce like the vermin he is.” Voldemort sneered. Harry’s spell stuttered for a fraction of a second, but it was enough and the green curse hammered into his chest. He fell. Simply collapsing like a marionette that had lost its strings.
Silence covered the room like a thick fog. For an age in a moment no one spoke, no one moved. Everyone stared at the body of Harry Potter laying inert on the floor. Voldemort strode over the body, “I will be sure this time,” he hit the body point blank with a bombardier hex and Harry Potter’s skull was dashed open across the floor of the Great Hall.
Hermione’s world spun, she heard the cheer start from the ranks of the Death Eaters and Snatchers, a keening groaning from the defenders. A hand touched her elbow. “Flee Granger. He will let most live, but you he will make an example of. You will beg for death in the end, save yourself, leave the country.” She looked into the face of Draco Malfoy, he had thrown his lot in with Harry at the last minute. He had gambled and lost.
She turned back to the visage of Riddle glorying in his defeat, in a blur of movement he cast a killing curse directly at her, even as she moved to dodge, Malfoy moved into its path, “Fix this.” Were his last words as he died. In absolute fury she step apparated into Voldemort’s face and stabbed him through the eye with her wand, the merest thought caused his head to explode like a melon hit with a twelve-bore.
She was already apparating away. She had nothing to fight for. The man she wanted was gone, and she did not trust the rest to risk remaining to see the end. She landed in her grandmother’s cottage garden. Looking around, at the overgrown garden, the dirty windows, no one had been here since her parents had left the year before. Hermione sucked in a breath, fighting the tears, that threatened to overwhelm her.
She would spend half an hour, wash, get some clothes, collect her passport and be on a train out of Ashford for Paris before the world understood what had happened. It took closer to an hour. Her hair needed shampooing and rinsing several times before the water ran clean. She dressed in some of her mother’s old clothes. The fit was decent and it had the effect of making her look older. She transfigured her beaded bag into a shoulder bag for a business lady, and apparated to Ashford International station.
She went straight from the Gare-du-Nord in Paris to Charles de Gaulle airport and used her credit card to purchase a seat on a flight to New York. A few hours later she stared at the window as the Air France 747 climbed above Paris and turned North on the polar route to America. She pulled the sleep mask out of her bag, and attempted to sleep.
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