Potters (Hermione x Male Reader)

The Task Master

This is the longest chapter I've ever done, so grab your popcorn! Now that I'm going back through and editing, it's not nearly as long as some later chapters so perhaps just a nice beverage for this ;)

Y/N woke up in a cold sweat, he had a dream of the previous night. Voldemort had outstretched his hand and grabbed his neck, the pain in his head was overwhelming him, and yet, the only thing he could think about was protecting Hermione.

He looked across the dorm and saw his brother sat up in the same position as he was.

"Voldemort?" Y/N said.

"Voldemort." Harry agreed.

Harry tried to get some more sleep before tests began that next week.
Y/N, on the other hand, couldn't rest after a dream like that so he retreated down to the Gryffindor common room and sat in the armchair nearest to the fire reading a book.

Ten minutes later, Y/N was startled by a door opening behind him. It was Hermione and she came downstairs with her hair all over the place and bags under her eyes.

"Y/N?" she asked.

"Hey! What's wrong, it's only..." he looked at the clock on the wall of the common room. "Two in the morning."

"I need to ask you something. And before you say anything, I haven't slept at all last night, so don't judge. But, when we were... well, about to die, you were trying to tell me something. What was it?"

"Oh... well, I... I..." Y/N stuttered. "I was going to say that we... that me and Harry found a... a screaming book! A screaming book, that's what I was going to tell you," he lied. "Must be off now, see you in the morning... farewell, goodnight... ta ta?"

And with that awkward show he rushed off to his dorm without another word to her. She knew he was lying but she just didn't know why, but she was determined to find out. No matter how long it took for him to open up.

()()()()()

End of year tests came and went with no sign of a breach in the third floor corridor. Fluffy was still as happy as ever to see Y/N, a little less so for the rest of the quartet, but was still playful with them. Ron had taken it upon himself to rename the dogs, so as to refer to each head individually. For the left, it was Reagan, middle was  Rupert, and the right was Boris. Where he came up with these names, no one will ever know. Snape still seemed as sinister as ever, hair still greasy.

Y/N kept on waking up, bed drenched with sweat, and his breathing erratic. Harry and Y/N's dreams were still present and haunting them every night. Y/N considered telling Hermione, but then realised it would be an extra weight on her already weighted shoulders, and he didn't want to be a burden to her. The dreams had stayed mostly the same, only changing one small factor. The killer, Voldemort, was now a floating cloak with a wand protruding from within. Even though Harry had never saw the figure in the Forest, it was still clear in the dreams as to what it looked like.

The Potters' minds weren't full of answers to questions on tests, or whether or not they're in the right classroom, which was embarrassing for Y/N when he accidentally walked into a sixth year class of Charms. Their minds were focused on the Philosopher's Stone and how close Snape was to retrieving it for Voldemort.

Ron didn't seem to mind the thought of Voldemort being just outside of Hogwarts grounds, only Quidditch and food, like always. Hermione, unlike Ron, was trying to take her mind off of what she saw in the Forest by cramming information into her head. She was hardly ever seen outside of the library, and if she was, it was with a stack of books under her arms. Hermione was clearly more frightened from the events in the Forbidden Forest than she let on as she flinched whenever someone got too close to her, or her name was said in a quiet room, e.g the library. Y/N had a nasty shock when he had to duck a hex sent his way when he had approached her one day when she was scribbling down notes for Transfiguration.