The Girl with the Green Tail

Chapter Sixteen: Hermione's Past With Ariel

Hermione had been dwelling upon the name that rang a bell to her. "Ariel..." she said often, when she had spare time to think. "Ariel..."
Suddenly, the very same day Ariel had struck the deal with Ursula, it came to her.
She was sitting in Potions class when it happened. Professor Snape was talking about how to make a new potion, when Hermione realized what the connection between her and Ariel was. She gasped loudly and dramatically, and she had to be sent outside ("Ten points from Gryffindor," said Snape, "for being an insufferable drama queen.")
It happened like this:
When Hermione was a first year student at Hogwarts, (before Ron and Harry saved her from being attacked by a troll in the girl's bathroom) she had no friends. She sat isolated from the other Gryffindors in the Great Hall during meals, she chose to stay up late at night in the Gryffindor common room to catch up on studying, and her exceeding intelligence acted as a repellant to many who did not want someone as "stuck up as Hermione Granger".
Most of her spare days in the first year, she spent outside near the lake. She felt that the lake was the quietest place she knew aside from the library, but also a place that provided nature's beauty (and a place where no wizard or witch was likely to disturb her).
It was on one particular day, one which was to repeat itself in her second year, that she was called a "mudblood". Being a muggleborn witch, the term took offense to her, because it meant she had "filthy blood" and basically labeled her as "good-for-nothing". In the first year, however, it was Lavender Brown who had made this sneer remark to Hermione. Whereas in her second year, Draco Malfoy, a pureblood wizard, had called her a mudblood.
In the first year, Parvati Patil invited Hermione over to sit with them at their small group in the Great Hall during lunch on a cloudy Saturday afternoon.
"Oh, thanks," Hermione responded, "but I do have a lot of studying to catch up on."
As Hermione turned to walk away, Lavender Brown said in a rather loud voice, "Told you she wouldn't sit with us," she said to Parvati. "She wants to be isolated like a Muggle from a wizard. Nothing but a filthy mudblood, she is!"
Hermione turned around at this comment, both hatred and tears filling her eyes. She ran out of the Great Hall, as everyone became silent.
"What happened?" many Hufflepuffs whispered to each other.
A Ravenclaw poked his head into the group of Hufflepuffs. "Lavender just called the Granger girl a mudblood."
The Great Hall soon became an uproar. Loud laughter came from the Slytherins and half the Gryffindors. Gasps and remarks of both pity on Hermione and shame on Lavender erupted from the Hufflepuff table. Ravenclaws burst into full arguments about whether Hermione deserved it or if she didn't.
All the while, Hermione sat under a tree, just about 20 feet from the lake, and she was crying. She threw rocks into the lake, shouting, "Who needs them?!" She then shouted, "Who needs friends?! Who needs someone with them at all times?!" She took another rock, and a single tear ran down her face and fell onto the rock, as she whispered ruefully, "I need a friend..."
She put her face into her hands, and began to cry again.
The clouds began to get grayer. A light rumble of thunder came to Hermione's ears, but she did not mind. My soul is as dark as the clouds, she thought. If only my cry for friendship was as loud and easily heard as the thunder.
Suddenly, a light splash came from the lake, barely audible between Hermione's sobs and the thunder rolls. A mass of bright, thick red hair came along the surface. Hermione looked up. She saw a young woman, only perhaps about twelve years of age, with eyes shimmering with the color of a Patronus charm, and hair as red as the sparks from a fire.
"Who..." Hermione said, catching her breath, and wiping her eyes, "who are you?"
The young girl looked up at Hermione and motioned with her hands for her to come closer. Hermione stood up and walked to the girl in curiosity.
She looked at the girl closely, examining every aspect of her face. She looked like a human, but something about her emergence from the water, seeming to breathe underwater, that made her less humanlike.
"Who are you?" Hermione asked again.
The girl looked behind her with a worried glance, but then looked back at Hermione and her faced turned to pure joy. "My daddy won't like me being here, but it sure is well worth it!"
"But, who are you?" asked Hermione, getting slightly annoyed.
"My name's Ariel," she said. "And you?"
"I'm Hermione Granger," said Hermione. Suddenly, her curiosity drove her to ask the question that's been eating away at her. "How are you able to breathe underwater?"
Ariel looked at Hermione confused. "Me?" she asked, surprised. "Well, I thought everyone was able to breathe underwater."
"Oh," Hermione said. "Well, that's really not how it works. Are you some kind of...different kind of human? That can breathe underwater? I've never read about humans who could-"
"A human?" Ariel asked. "Oh, I'm not human. But, boy, I'd sure like to try that sometime!" A wide smile swept across her face.
Hermione's eyes widened in confusion. "So... You're not...human?"
Ariel's smile was wiped from her face almost as quickly as it appeared. "No," she sighed. "I'm a mermaid, you see..." Just then, Hermione saw a green/turquoise colored tail where Ariel's legs would've been, if she was human.
Hermione gasped. "I've read about mermaids...and the pictures I've seen in my books are not nearly as beautiful as you!"
Ariel's smile returned to her face, but not one of joyous imagination and fantasy, but rather one of which you'd have on your own face after receiving such a kind compliment from a stranger. "You're beautiful, too, Hermione. Is that how hair on land looks all the time?" Now, Hermione had a bushy brown mane of hair, curly and somewhat tangled, and frizzy, and rumored to have a family of birds living inside of it.
Hermione's hands tried to flatten her hair down just as Ariel said this. "No," Hermione said fixing her hair. "I just choose to let my hair do this. Not really the type to go through so much trouble to look good." She continued to struggle with her hair, then finally just gave up and let her mane become bushy again.
"From what I am seeing, you don't have to go through so much trouble to look good."
Hermione looked at Ariel, and this compliment moved Hermione deeply. "That's the nicest thing anyone's ever said to me!" she said. "Especially today..." Hermione said in a low whisper.
"Why?" Ariel asked. "What happened today?"
Hermione sighed. "Well... I guess they don't know any better... We're only eleven years old... But, this girl at lunch... She called me a mudblood."
"What's a mudblood?"
Hermione looked down at the water, afraid she might burst into tears again if she looked Ariel in the eyes. "It means 'dirty blood'. Mudblood is a very foul name for someone who is muggleborn, someone with nonmagic parents... Someone like me..." A tear dropped from her eyes, slipped down her cheek, and caused ripples in the lake.
A hand lifted Hermione's face up, and she was forced to look Ariel in the eyes. "Look at me, Hermione," said Ariel with glossy eyes, showing that she had begun to tear up. Her eyes were not creased with sadness, however, but with anger and determination. "Listen. You're eleven. I'm twelve. Tell me. And be honest. Who called you a mudblood? Tell me, and I'll make sure that they never insult you again."
Hermione smiled. "Thank you, Ariel, but-"
"No," Ariel said. "No 'buts'. Tell me who did this to you. I may have no friends, but I live with six sisters. And when one of us suffers, we don't just deal with it. We band together to find the reason why she suffers, and we take it down. Once and for all. If a woman cut off your fin, you'd want them to see how it felt swimming without a fin, wouldn't you? Sisters forever, fight together, waver never is our motto. You and I, well, we're sisters now. Sisters forever. Fight together. Waver never."
Hermione looked into Ariel's eyes. Her eyes, despite being a mermaid, were filled with fire. "Alright," said Hermione. Ariel leaned in closer to Hermione to listen. "Her name is Lavender. Lavender Brown."
"Lavender..." Ariel repeated softly. "You're a witch, correct?"
Hermione nodded.
"Use one of those little spells you have. If I want to help you get revenge on this Lavender girl, I'll need to become human."
Hermione thought. "I'll need to find a spell that can do that. Perhaps it's in one of my Transfiguration books. Or in the Restricted Section."
"You go find that," Ariel said, "and come back either tonight or tomorrow night. Revenge is better when the person knows what they did. Best not to wait until they forget all about it."
"Alright," said Hermione. "I guess I'll see you later!" And with that, Hermione walked off, bushy brown mane bouncing with every step she took.