Chapter Text
It was the same view she had seen every year since she was eleven – but it seemed different this time. The Scottish countryside flew by outside her window, and the sun was beating down on the rolling hills and vast fields as the train chugged along. The ride to Hogwarts was rife with nostalgia as Hermione leaned back in her seat. The giggling and conversation of students outside her compartment. The jostling movement of the car swaying on the tracks. The attendant asking if they’d ‘like anything from the trolley, dear’.
Nothing had really changed, and yet everything had. Or perhaps it was her that had changed.
Hermione was going back to finish her education at Hogwarts.
An “eighth-year”, since what should have been her seventh was spent being on the run, finding horcruxes, and ultimately fighting in a war that had taken her childhood away from her. In more ways than one.
She looked across at Harry. Then Ron. Caught Ginny’s eye and smiled. Neville gave her a nudge from where he sat beside her, and Luna was happily humming on the other side of him.
They had made it. Gods – she was so grateful for them.
That they were all here with her.
Nostalgia rose up, and Hermione blurted out the questions that had been plaguing her dreams.
“Remember getting your letter? Would you want to go back and start again? Now that it’s all over? Or keep moving on from here?”
There was a pause as everyone turned to look at her. Harry had been silently staring out at the landscape while holding Ginny’s hand and rubbing his thumb softly along the back of her fingers. Ron was leaning towards Ginny, a newspaper spread between them as they quietly whispered about the quidditch section. Neville was beside her, reading a book about Herbology, while Luna was using her wand to conjure a shower of rose petals, then vanishing them and beginning again.
Harry smiled, turning his head from the view and pushed his glasses up on his nose. “Wouldn’t mind it, if we could. Maybe have a bit of a childhood. Date Ginny properly.” He laughed when Ron made a retching sound, shaking his head. Ginny reached over and whacked Ron on the shoulder.
“The course work would be easier second time through, at least. Might enjoy doing some proper dating of my own,” Ron said, winking at Hermione as he rubbed his shoulder. Hermione tried to smile at him, but from his look she was certain it had come out more like a grimace.
“It’d be nice, I think, to see what Hogwarts could be like without Voldemort and a war,” Neville said drily, putting his book down on his lap.
“Isn’t that what this is though?” Ginny asked earnestly. “The chance to be there without all that? To just be…children…again?”
“It will be what the stars and spirits decide, I think. But what about you, Hermione?” Luna asked breathily. “What would you want to do?”
Shaking her head, Hermione let out a toneless laugh. “I’m not so sure. I was a very different witch back then. Would I want to lose who I’ve become? Who would I be without the war?”
The car went quiet. Ginny reached across and squeezed her knee gently. Neville bumped his foot against hers. Luna looked at her with sorrowful eyes while Harry nodded in agreement.
Ron let out a nasally scoff.
“We’d be bloody happy without all the bollocks the war put us through. Normal witches and wizards.”
Hermione nodded and looked back out the window, letting Ron rant about how he wanted this year to be normal. How things could finally go back to normal.
What was normal?
Certainly not going back for an ‘eighth year’ as older students after a bloody war.
She wasn’t sure this year would be anything more than a short reprieve. The wizarding world was still waiting for them. She had received owls from almost every division in the ministry offering her positions.
Both Harry and Ron had accepted offers of auror training positions with the DMLE and were planning to start their training this October.
But when a letter had arrived at the Burrow, informing them there was to be a mandatory “eighth-year” at Hogwarts, all plans had stopped. Ron had grumbled while Harry had shrugged it off, saying they had the rest of their lives to be aurors.
Hermione had simply felt relieved. It had been overwhelming, thinking about career choices and how to start living in the wizarding world.
In her eyes, this year was a gift, and she was going to use it to recover. No decisions needed to be made immediately. Perhaps she could try to enjoy Hogwarts like she should have been allowed to before everything.
Shopping for supplies at Diagon Alley had brought her to tears several times, and although she had dashed them away hurriedly before anyone became too concerned, it wasn’t just from being overwhelmed with the joy of being able to shop for school supplies once more.
Hermione knew after this she would need to get a job, find a flat, and start to live independently. And she wasn’t upset about that.
She was just relieved that it wasn’t happening right now.
When the train arrived and everyone piled into the carriages, Hermione tried to smile and appreciate it. The first years went off in the boats with Hagrid. She cheered and waved as they sailed off towards the castle. Forced herself to.
Even though it would be her last time in the carriage. Her last time seeing the first years off.
As she walked into the Great Hall, and saw Professor – no, it was Headmaster McGonagall now – standing at the lectern, she’d let a few tears fall.
She heard voices calling out across the hall. Students hugging – greeting each other as they found their spots at the tables. Hurrying to seat themselves as McGonagall announced the entry of the first years, and then the sorting hat ceremony commenced.
It was already going too fast. She felt like she was missing it while it was happening.
She wiped furiously at another tear that was tracking down her cheek as the Headmaster began to speak.
“Welcome back to Hogwarts, but most especially, to our returning eighth-year students. I am obligated to start my greeting this year by assuring you that safety and the well-being of all our students is the priority for this school year. There are many changes that are being implemented to account for the extreme circumstances of the war – many of which you will find out about in the coming days.”
McGonagall paused here and looked out at the students. Hermione smiled, not expecting the Headmaster to find her in the crowd, but she did. Her knowing look and nod as she continued speaking was enough to make Hermione shed yet another tear.
“For now – I would like to announce that all seventh and eighth years will be required to meet with a professor about your class choices before start of term next week. Check your common room for the schedule. The ministry, and all the staff here at Hogwarts, look forward to supporting you in this year unlike any other we have experienced in the history of this school. We will rebuild together. We will recover together. We will recreate a new Hogwarts together.”
When McGonagall raised her chalice, everyone in the hall followed suit. And when another tear came, Hermione wiped it away and decided right then and there, that it would be the last one.
Well, perhaps not the last one, but the last one she would cry out of nostalgia.
This year would be one she would embrace whole-heartedly. She would laugh. She would enjoy every class. She would cherish every moment in the library.
Because she was alive.
Because she was here.
As McGonagall gave other announcements about areas of the castle being restricted due to the reconstruction efforts, Hermione began to look around the Great Hall and tried her best to absorb it all. The students who were here. All the houses. Hufflepuff. Ravenclaw. Even the Slytherins. Hogwarts was bringing them all together again.
The Slytherin table however, looked strange. She glanced again and saw a defined line – a gap between two distinct groups. One was students she didn’t really know, while another seemed to…
Well, it seemed to be those who had supported Voldemort during the war. Goyle. Zabini. Nott. Parkinson.
Malfoy.
Godric – she knew the ministry had decreed a mandatory eighth year for students. And she did think it should include all students.
But it still shocked her to see him.
He looked hollow. Sunken. Sickly.
Despite that initial observation though, he still looked as smarmy as ever, and was surrounded by the same Slytherins.
Although Hermione believed in restitution and recovery after the war, perhaps some things hadn’t changed. Some witches and wizards hadn’t either, apparently.
With a resoluteness she had to force, she purposefully turned her gaze back to Professor McGonagall speech, and when it ended she lifted her chalice of pumpkin juice in a toast to the upcoming year.
Instead of letting her eyes wander back to study the Slytherins further, she focused instead on the story Neville was sharing of his adventures at a herbology camp in Switzerland he had been invited to over the summer hols. She refused to let anyone or anything ruin her first day back at Hogwarts.