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Ron, Harry, and Hermione were couped up in the library, roaming through one book or the other just as they had been for weeks. The second task was four days ahead and they had yet to find a way for Harry to survive underwater for an hour.
It was three days before the second task that Hermione noticed changes in Harry's behaviour. He talked even less than usual, basically stopped eating, and only pretended to do his. She would know, after three years of forcing her friends to do their schoolwork with both copying her essays by the end of it.
From one day to the next Harry seemed to have lost all his energy and the will to engage with their classes or anything to do with the tournament. The only plus side is that he stopped reacting to Malfoys taunts and ignored the glares sent his way.
The evening before the task the three of them were no closer to a solution. So, when she was called to Professor McGonagall's Office Hermione left the boys with reluctance. Mind still occupied with various charms and their possible application to underwater situations she didn't even question the odd summon or the late hour. Therefore, she was surprised when a tense Professor McGonagall walked her towards the third floor and the entry to Professor Dumbledore's Office.
As soon as they took the last corner, and the gargoyle came into view they heard the raised voices. The words were hard to make out, the door muffled the sound quite a bit. Professor McGonagall murmured the password and led them up the staircase.
"Have you forgotten we hate each other?" was the yelled question that greeted them as they entered the office and came to a halt. Hermione had never been to the headmaster’s office in all her years at Hogwarts and even though she wanted to inspect the strange instruments, Muggle and magical, Harry had told her about, her gaze was immediately caught by the explosive situation between the headmaster and a red-faced Draco Malfoy.
The room was filled with people, most of whom she knew and one she did not. Professor Snape stood next to his student, his facial expression showing more displeasure than the last time Neville blew up his cauldron and initiated a chain reaction involving not only Lavender, who had been working with him but the four tables to each side of them. Madame Maxime was holding hands with a young blond girl, so stunningly beautiful she had to be related to the part-Veela Beauxbatons champion. Cho Chang stood next to Professor Flitwick who appeared ready to stop the argument and send all of them into different corners. From what Hermione could see it probably wasn’t a bad idea.
The last person in the room was the Durmstrang headmaster, standing bored in a corner that should not exist in the round tower holding the office. Karkaroff was the only one to notice their arrival.
Going through the most likely explanations Hermione quickly determined the reason for this late meeting. We've taken what you'll sorely miss, the clue had said. Chastising herself for missing the obvious she tried to stay calm and composed. The three of them had been worried about important objects being taken. None of them had even thought about people being used as hostages.
On a surface level, it should be obvious which hostage was paired with each champion. Cho as his girlfriend was here for Cedric, the little girl growing more scared by the second was clearly related to Fleur, maybe a cousin or her little sister. And Hermione had been one of Harry's best friends since the incident with the mountain troll in 1st year. If it weren't for the way Karkaroff kept glaring at her and a livid Draco Malfoy shouting at Professor Dumbledore she would have assumed her place as the person Harry would miss most.
It took a while for Malfoy to calm down, and even longer for him to agree to stand in as Harry's hostage. In the end, Dumbledore assuaged all his misgivings and the still-shaking boy looked absolutely lost. The Slytherin's anger was always close to the surface, but for once the confusion and insecurity he hid away was visible. Hermione had presumed it was there but felt weirdly relieved to get visual proof, nonetheless.
Hermione tried hard, but she did not understand. Why did they choose Malfoy of all people? Only last week he and Harry had been throwing hexes at each other and afterwards, Harry had spent ages seething and complaining about that 'stupid, pointy git'. For the first time, she agreed with the Slytherin on anything outside academics. This didn't make any sense at all.
Before she closed her eyes in anticipation of the spell keeping her unconscious for the second task, Hermione promised herself to figure out how the cup had malfunctioned like that.
Hermione came to wet, cold and to another round of one-sided screaming. It was Malfoy, again. Viktor carried her towards the shore and into the champions tent, while she was straining to listen in on the conversation within. Apparently, Harry had been the first to find and rescue his hostage as Fleur and Cedric were nowhere to be found.
The scene inside was just as bewildering as the one in Dumbledore's Office the night before. Malfoy was facing off against Harry, still wet and shaking from the cold. He was shouting insults, calling him names, and questioning his sanity while Harry merely watched the outburst from his sitting position, covered with a thick Gryffindor blanket.
Harry did not engage in any taunts or threats and when he finally reacted Hermione was unable to work out what part of Draco's speech had caught his attention. Her friend stayed impressively calm, so unlike his own emotional outburst in the past that all she could do was stare at him with her eyebrows up to her hairline.
“You are right, Malfoy,” he agreed, his slight hesitation unnoticed by all but his best friend. “There must have been a mistake. It should have been Ron or Hermione. The cup is faulty, or something. It should’ve never chosen a fourteen-year-old boy as a champion after all.”
Malfoys's mouth snapped shut and for a long moment, he seemed at a loss for words, clearly unused to this version of Harry. So was Hermione if she was being honest. Unfamiliar and unnerved.
“You will pay for this, Potter. Can’t have someone like you staining my reputation. Just you wait!” And with those parting words, the Slytherin turned around and left the tent with his head held high.
He did not see pained emerald eyes trailing his exiting figure. Hermione however did and stowed away yet another piece of a puzzle she was only starting to uncover.
Later that day, when Hermione stared up to the ceiling from her comfortable bed in the Gryffindor dormitories, she sorted through all the information available and was left with too many gaps.
One, Harry had not acted this calm last week. The fight that broke out between him and Malfoy as they had been waiting for Professor Snape to call them into the classroom was all the proof she needed.
Two, something had changed since then. Her observations of the past days gained quickly in relevance. What had happened between then and now?
Three, he did not seem surprised or bothered by Malfoy being chosen as the one he would sorely miss. Did he expect it? If he did, for what reason?
Four, Malfoy on the other side seemed both surprised and furious with the situation he had been thrown into. It took a certain amount of bravery she would have never thought the Slytherin capable of to stand up to the headmaster the way he did in the office.
Five, Harry was hurt by Malfoys reaction. And once again the question of why was taunting her.
She was no closer to an explanation than before.
Over the following weeks, Hermione came up with many hypotheses, all of which she had to rule out eventually. Fortunately, she gained new information as she closely observed her friend.
During their study time, Harry was still procrastinating until the very end, messing about with Ron, and annoying her to the point of distraction, but at the end of each session, he only pretended to copy her work and didn’t ask her to correct his mistakes. “You’ve got enough to do with Ron's scribble. I’m saving you time, Hermione,” he joked when she confronted him about it, earning himself a slap on the shoulder from Ron.
In both his classes and their training for the final task Harry had an easier time picking up spells than he used to and he deflected each time she complimented him on it. Whenever Ron was around, he held back on purpose which had caused Hermione great confusion until she overheard Ron complaining to Neville how they were the only ones struggling with their wand work. Idiots, the both of them, but she loved them anyway.
Outside of their defence against the dark arts lessons, Harry avoided Professor Moody at all costs. The fourth time he dragged Ron and her behind a tapestry after hearing the heavy clunk of Moody’s bad leg Ron laid into him, causing their first fight since the evening following the second task. That had been a bad one. Ron had screamed himself raw with accusations against Malfoy and slimy Slytherins in general while Harry had been strangely quiet and distracted. Minutes later had found the boys in a fierce hug, Harry reassuring his friend and telling him in no uncertain terms that he was and would always be his best friend, alongside Hermione of course.
Despite the threats he had made in the champions' tent, Malfoy was less aggressive in his continued harassment of Harry but no less persisting. He seemed to take Harry's nonreactions as a personal slight and doubled his efforts to get his attention. Hermione was most interested in Harry's secret amusement he only let show when he thought no one was watching. His smiles appeared almost fond, but they never reached his eyes.
And so, she continued to gather her clues and by the time the third task arrived she was convinced she would figure out Harry's secret any day now.
Hours later, as she sat at his hospital bed, she decided it was time to put those silly musings to rest. There were more important problems to solve, and they needed to be prepared. She listened to Harry’s story, starting with meeting Fleur, then Viktor and finally Cedric in the maze, taking the Hufflepuff up on his offer and touching the Cup on his own.
She cried as he recounted the awful scene he had stumbled into at the graveyard and missed how he kept everything vague concerning the duel between him and you-know-who. She wasn’t the only one oblivious to the holes in his tale. They all were, even the ever-observant Albus Dumbledore.
Harry Potter had learned to keep his secrets close and his mind clear. He had two decades to master it, after all.