Hermione's Stay in the Hospital Wing (Part One)

At Saturday breakfast, one person was missing from the Gryffindor table.

Ron stuffed the last piece of bacon into his mouth, his cheeks bulging like a hamster's. "Where's Hermione? Still not down?" he asked through a mouthful of food. Harry shook his head. Hermione's seat had been empty since last night. Even her copy of Advanced Potion-Making, which was always spread open on the table, was gone.

Something was wrong. Hermione never missed a meal, and she certainly didn't sleep in on weekends. Her routine was more reliable than the Hogwarts clocks.

"Maybe she went to the library," Harry said, though he didn't believe it himself.

The library wasn't open yet.

After breakfast, they went looking for her. The library was closed, with no one outside. A few younger students were finishing breakfast in the Great Hall, but none of them had seen Hermione.

In the kitchen behind the dining hall, the House-Elves shook their heads. Miss Granger had come by yesterday for a cup of hot tea, they said, but they hadn't seen her since.

By the Black Lake, several giant squid basked in the sun while a few Hufflepuff girls fed the waterbirds. No one had seen anyone with bushy brown hair.

"Where else could she be?" Ron stood by the lake, shading his eyes as he looked around. His expression shifted from confusion to worry. "What if something's happened to her?" Harry said nothing, but his mind had already turned to those voices, the hissing behind the walls, the strange sounds whose source he could never find.

His hand tightened around the wand in his robe pocket.

They trudged back. Their footsteps echoed through the empty corridors. Now and then, students ran past, laughing loudly, but neither Ron nor Harry felt like talking. By the time they