Vox Corpis [Harmione]

Chapter 56

Hermione was in the place that most people would naturally expect her to be, the library. After waking that morning (to Ron's chagrin when he found that Hermione had snuck into their room last night to bunk up with Harry), Ron had cajoled Harry into coming down to the Quidditch pitch after breakfast for a bit of flying. Not that Harry was kicking and screaming the whole way. Hermione was invited to watch; she was invited to join them, but it was mostly courtesy as Ron and Harry both knew Hermione wasn't about to get on a broom unless it was a matter of necessity, and even then assuming she hadn't thought of a way to circumvent the need. Had Ginny consented to share the stands with her while the boys played, Hermione might have given in. As it was, Ginny planned to spend her morning writing a letter back to Seamus. Rather than sit alone and cold in the pitch stands, Hermione begged off to spend her morning in the library.

She was glad Harry was getting a chance to have some fun. After the Christmas day he'd had, he deserved to blow off some steam and get the cobwebs out of his head. Flying did that nicely for him, and she would not have dreamed of dissuading Harry from going outside. The winter weather had let up and it was a bright, clear day outside. The kind of day that called to Harry.

It gave Hermione a chance to work ahead in her classes for next term, since Ron would be apt to have an epileptic fit if he saw her working on class material. It was best done out of his sight, and if he was out flying with Harry it gave her a comfortable window of time to do as she pleased, and it pleased her to do homework. She had the library to herself, which was a special treat for someone like Hermione. After a few hours reading ahead in her class textbooks, she got up and wandered the stacks, reading titles and pulling out any books that looked interesting. It seemed Hogwarts had no end of books that Hermione would like to read someday. She decided to take a few back to her room with her.

She confessed to herself that she may have gotten a bit carried away as she looked at the pile of books she ended up with on the table next to her bag that she intended to take back to her dorm room. She regarded the stack critically a moment and briefly considered shrinking them to fit easily in her bag... but Hermione had a strange aversion to tampering with books. She knew, intellectually, that reducing then restoring their size didn't damage the books in any way, but a fixed muggle part of her clung to the heavy, solid mass of a book. Books were a comfort for their heavy store of knowledge, their unyielding form as a source of information. She magicked books when she had to, but given the choice Hermione didn't care for it. Not with books.

She put back a few books she decided she wouldn't have time to get to reading anyway, and the stack that remained she deemed manageable enough for her to carry the old-fashioned muggle way.

With her bag weighted down and her arms full of books, Hermione left the library and started back toward Gryffindor tower. The corridors were even barer of students than yesterday, given the lovely winter weather outside. Hermione would not have been surprised to find out she was the only student still indoors. In any place but Hogwarts, the complete emptiness and sense of solitude in the deserted grand hallways might have been disconcerting, but Hermione didn't think about anything of that nature as she walked at an easy pace back toward her room.

It was hard to imagine a life away from Hogwarts; it had been so fundamental in her world for years that it seemed almost a part of her. She'd become so accustomed to the halls and routines and every corner and custom of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, she could only imagine the mixed exultation and anxiety when it came time to leave the school behind. She suspected it would be much the same for Harry, though for different reasons. It had been the first place he'd ever felt comfortable calling home in his life. He had really came into his own at Hogwarts; before that he'd only been an unwanted freak tucked away in the cupboard of his aunt and uncle's house.