Hi, Thank you for reading, and a massive thank you to my beta ddcruz1998

Forbidden.

Hermione was sat in the library, writing a letter. She had decided the only way she was going to get help about Quirrell was to go above the school's head. Literally. She was currently composing a letter to the Auror department at the ministry, who she had learned may be the perfect people to deal with this. She was also looking over a book containing all the laws about the Auror department and how they operated, they looked perfect.

In the letter, she explained she was a student at Hogwarts, and that she could see magic. She went on to then explain the predicament she found herself in. None of the teachers believed her, how the dark cloud was getting bigger and bigger, how she could now see the tendrils of darkness sinking in deeper to her professor and how she wasn't sure what to do about it.

As she was doing this in peace, she heard a familiar voice.

"How are we meant to find what we are looking for in here?" One asked.

"All we need is one name, who thought it would be so difficult"

"I still don't know where to start looking. We have no idea who Nicholas Flamel even is!"

Nicholas Flamel? Why would they be interested in alchemy? She didn't peg them as researching for fun so what did they want with that information. Ignoring the whole thing was a better idea she thought. Going back to the letter, she realised, she could also write to the Wizengamot since they may be able to help too.

After compiling the two letters, she put them in their envelopes and addressed and set off to the owlery. She didn't quite know how this worked, so she simply waved her letters in the air. Two birds flew down a smallish brown owl and a barn owl. Both held out their legs and she attached the letters asking them to be delivered to the ministry of magic.

o0o0o0o0o

Hermione was getting impatient now; she had waited nearly two weeks for a reply from both places. But so far, she had received nothing. Not even a letter telling her she was wrong. It was so infuriating! It was then that a Gryffindor prefect came up to her. He was, if she was being honest with herself, a complete and utter prick, and to top it off, he was also a Weasley.

"Headmaster Dumbledore would like to see you in his office," he said pompously, before walking off.

Nice to see you too, Hermione thought. She carefully packed all her books away and headed out of the library. Once she had managed to find the gargoyle guarding the steps, she just looked at it with one eyebrow raised.

The gargoyle stayed still. Well, how was she meant to get in? Wait, what did Professor McGonagall do?

"Sherbet lemons…?" she said hesitantly, and at that, the gargoyle rotated out the way and she went spiralling up towards the headmaster.

Once she had reached the top, she left the staircase and knocked determinedly on the door.

"Enter."

Hermione walked into the headmaster's office, sighing, she had had enough of this. How many times was she going to be summoned here in one year, she thought to herself as she entered.

"Headmaster, you wanted to see me?" Hermione said as she stood in front of the desk, the chair seemingly absent.

"Yes, I'm afraid it's about a rather serious matter. You see I have had reports you have been harassing the Wizengamot and the Auror department. Luckily for you, both parties decided to come to me first before everything got out of hand."

Hermione almost sighed, but her mask of indifference shielded her.

"I see." Was all she said in response.

"If it occurs again, I will be forced to punish you more severely, but for now, for wasting the time of the Ministry and the Aurors, you have detention. Filch will be waiting at the main entrance at 7 pm tomorrow evening."

Hemione nodded, wanting to be as far away as she could be right now, and knowing that arguing would be futile.

"Good. And Miss Granger? Never again."

Hermione walked out of his office seething, the magic crawling across her skin as she let it crackle along her hair. Thankfully, nobody noticed as she made her way to her room and allowed the magic to consume her rage ,before falling asleep looking at the starry sky above her.

o0o0o0o0o

Hermione waited by the door for Filch to arrive., Damn Dumbledore for managing to ignore the whole problem and diverting attention away from him and onto her, she thought.

Filch came shuffling down the corridor along with…, Hermione sighed, Neville Longbottom and Harry Potter. Could this get any worse? And then Draco Malfoy walked round the corner. "Damn my big mouth," Hermione muttered.

"You'll be doing your detention with Hagrid."

Of course, they would, Hermione thought.

Harry and Neville looked pleased. Until Filch said, "I wouldn't look too happy; you're going into the forest tonight."

Harry, Neville and Malfoy all stopped in their tracks. Hermione, however, was not fazed. What did they expect they were going to do on the grounds in the dark?

Then a howl echoed from the forest and Malfoy squealed, "You can't take us in there. There are werewolves and..."

Filch let out a manic cackle, "Then you should have thought about that before."

They reached Hagrid's hut to find him sniffing into a tissue. The half-giant looked at her and Malfoy in disgust.

"Come on 'en, gather round, what're doing tonight is dangerous and I don' want any risk-taking."

They made their way over to the edge of the forest and to a winding dirt path leading into the forest. Hagrid then pointed at an iridescent silver liquid trail in the underbrush.

" 'At is unicorn blood, one was hurt real bad and our job is to find it."

Hermione was shocked. What could hurt a unicorn? It was extremely fast, clever and powerful. Not even werewolves could catch them. This couldn't be anything good.

While Hermione was thinking Malfoy decided to kick up a fuss that was quickly dealt with by risk of expulsion from Hagrid.

"Right then" Hagrid's voice piped up "Neville 'n' Hermione you'll be following that trail", he said pointing to his left, "and Malfoy 'n' harry 'll be following this one with me."

Hermione looked at the quivering mass that was Neville. Great, she thought, this will be so much fun. Hermione beckoned Neville over in her direction,

"Come on then, better get this over," and she strode off following the silver trail.

The forest, Hermione mused, seemed even darker than the night. How this occurred, she didn't know, but it certainly earned its name. They must have been walking for at least an hour when Neville let out a loud and panicked scream. Hermione turned around and saw him attacking a branch that his cloak had been caught in. She came over and untangled him and looked him up and down. If this is what a branch did to the boy, God knows what would happen if he found a werewolf. At this moment Hagrid, Draco and Harry all came crashing through the undergrowth towards them.

"You alright?" Hagrid puffed.

"Fine, Neville had a confrontation with a branch." She dismissed; the others looked less convinced with her story.

"Well then, Neville you'd better stay here with me, and I don't trust Malfoy out of my sight so Harry will go with Hermione." Hagrid then proceeded to look Potter right in the eye.

"If you need any 'elp, send those red sparks in the air, right then let's get back to it"

Hermione walked off and saw Potter do a little run to catch up with her; they continued to walk in silence, simply following the splatters that lined the nearby tree trunks. They continued on in this way for around another half an hour when the forest began getting thicker and the path getting harder to follow.

As they walked into a clearing one of the most terrifying sights Hermione had ever seen came into view. The corpse of a dead unicorn was laid in the middle. Pure white with only silver droplets covering its skin. But it was the black ominous figure that Hermione was terrified of. It radiated death, like the mass surrounding Quirrell, but more intense. It was crouched over the unicorn's throat hiding the beasts head from view. Hermione knew then what it was doing; it was drinking its blood. The black-cloaked figure then rose off the unicorn and started to float towards them. She turned around to see Harry running off down the path; Well so much help there, she thought. She turned back around and then, without thinking, dipped into her magic and summoned a great wind; it rippled from her and into the black figure that appeared to try fighting against it with its cloak flapping even more in the wind. But before long, the figure simply flew off and left Hermione alone with the dead unicorn.

Hermione firstly summoned the red sparks that Hagrid had told them about but after waiting for quite some time, found no help was coming for her. She then went about trying to find the path she had followed on her way in but it was so dark, and she didn't want to draw attention to herself so she gave up.

She started wandering aimlessly, looking for any sign of the path, but in this light, it was near impossible. She could hardly see the next tree in front of her let alone a tiny dirt path. So, she started musing about the figure, it was so familiar. Her magic seemed to be screaming at her. It seemed to recognise it somehow. But how? The only other time she had felt such darkness and despair was with professor Quirrell and his... parasite.

Those who drink unicorn's blood will live a half-life, that's what it meant. Literally half of a person. The cloak used to be a real person who drank unicorn blood and found himself a host in Quirrell but who was it? That was the big question. This also changed everything., Quirrell was not some helpless curse victim or an unlucky diseased man, he was possessed, and Hermione knew that when it came to this type of possession, the whole share the whole body kind, you had to want it. It also explained why he wore the turban, to hide the monster behind it. So, how am I going to deal with a possessed teacher Hermione thought?

At this point, she noticed that the sun was beginning to rise. Hopefully, she thought, someone might come looking for her, but really who knew? It was certainly beginning to get lighter now so she started to look for the path in earnest to no avail. Wandering may have not been the best idea, she mused.

She had no idea even what direction she needed to travel. She thought it best not to stray too far from this point in case she lost herself deeper and deeper into the forest. She noticed how beautiful the forest was when she looked. Yes, its tall trees may have been foreboding but they offered a sense of safety, underfoot there were many mosses and small flowers each in a small patch of sunlight like a jewelled carpet. It truly was nature at her finest. As Hermione looked at the flowers, she noticed how some were rare ingredients in potions she had read about., Glad she had bought her bag with her and certainly not one for wasting an opportunity, she started to go round harvesting the ingredients she came across. She found a beautiful orchid she remembered made part of Veritaserum. She'd like to, one day, make a batch of that for herself. She then found herself at the brookside, and upon seeing it felt the water to see first of it was safe to drink, then dived a glass bottle into the stream and held it to her gasping lips.

After repeating the process a few more times she filled up as many bottles as she had and continued with her quest finding some gillyweed just a few steps from where she had stopped for her drink. Along the stream a little farther, lay a bramble thicket rich in blackberries. Rushing over, she started picking them rapidly, then savouring the sweet juice that trickled onto her lips, she carried on picking and storing them too in a spare tin, for latter. Around the corner, nestled into the bark of a rotting tree, she found a hoard of death cap mushrooms, perfect for the draught of living death and many other poisonous potions. And on she went. Never taking all of the resources from one place and carefully leaving anything too rare or protected but still finding enough to fill many of the vials she had bought will her in her bottomless bag.

But so consumed Hermione was she didn't realise that most of the light had faded from the sky and that darkness was almost upon them. She then looked up at the sky. It was a full moon, Hermione looked panicked if there were werewolves in this forest it would be tonight they would be the most dangerous, and as if by fate a loud and eerier howling echoed around her. This was not ideal, she had no idea how to get out, certainly no desire to become werewolf food or to become a werewolf herself so what was she going to do?

In the end, she did the only thing she had left. She turned to her magic. Reaching inward, she focused on her magical core not sure what she wanted and simply thought, I don't want to be here, I don't want to be here. She closed her eyes and continued repeating the phrase louder and louder in her head and soon she was practically screaming internally. Suddenly a loud crack of lightning startled her from her thoughts. When she recovered, the first thing she noticed without opening her eyes was the lack of howling, this was a definite improvement, and so tentatively she opened her eyes...

o0o0o0o0o

Snape was getting restless; he had been told that two of his students had been sent on detention with Hagrid to the forbidden forest, and that when it was over, he had to escort them back to the common room. So here he was, waiting outside at midnight in the cold. It was then that he saw a light about the size of foot on the ground; an obvious sign that the half-giant was approaching.

"Thank goodness you're here 'ressor", Hagrid sighed. "We found a dead unicorn alright 'nd Harry hear says someone was drinking its blood!"

It was only then that he looked down at the students surrounding the man, Neville whimpering, Malfoy looking pale and frightened and Potter looking slightly guilty and...

"Where is Miss Granger?" Snape said, stepping closer to Hagrid and raising himself up to his full height.

"Um you see, I thought it was best to get these students out of the forest, seeing as 'arry- er Mr Potter's here."

Snape's gaze darkened.

"You left a student in the forbidden forest at night alone?" Pinching the bridge of his nose and closing his eyes he had to concentrate to not curse the oaf on sight.

" 'ang on a minute 'arrys scar was hurting 'nd I didn't want to risk 'is safety!"

Snape turned swiftly on his heels and proceeded to go to the headmaster.

o0o0o0o0o

After a long and frustrating conversation, Severus nearly wanted to kill everyone in this school with a painful and slow-acting poison. The headmaster, what with his Potter obsession, had said that Hagrid had done "the right thing". The right thing? Leaving a student to die in the forest was not the right thing. But of course, it didn't matter. Bloody Potter was fine. And anyway, she's only a Slytherin, of course she didn't need saving.

He wandered outside to get some well-needed air. It was around 7 in the morning and there had been no sign of the girl. What was he going to do? Dumbledore had forbidden him from going into the forest after her, and with the unbreakable vow tying him to the headmaster, disobeying was not an option. He was told that Hagrid had been sent in after the girl, so as he was commanded, he taught his morning lessons. It was then, to his disgust, that he found Hagrid having lunch in the great hall.

"What are you doing here?" he icily asked.

Hagrid gulped and then replied, "I'm only getting food so that I can continue the search later."

At this, the rest of the head table went quiet and at last, it was Pomona Sprout, the noble Hufflepuff leader that asked the question.

"The search for whom?"

"Hermione Granger, whom Hagrid lost while in detention in the Forbidden forest" Snape replied, his voice full of malice. The rest of the staff all looked at Hagrid with the same look of disgust.

"You left a student in the forest? And right now, instead of searching for her, you're eating?" McGonagall asked, disbelief in her voice.

"Well...", before completing the thought, Hagrid stood up hastily and fled the hall.

All the staff then turned to Dumbledore, who at the change in target, quickly readdressed his staff.

"Hagrid is quite capable of finding one student in the forest; we would, not knowing the place, only hinder him in his search."

To this, Snape simply snorted and left the hall in a great flurry of robes.

o0o0o0o0o

Thankful that his afternoon lessons had finished without too many problems; he once more went to the grounds to find whether or not Miss Granger had been found. He strode up to Hagrid's hut and found him outside staring off into space.

"It's no use professor, I can't find her and it's a full moon tonight whatever am I going to do..." the half-giant, as if only realising what he had implied, then promptly burst into tears.

Snape had had enough. It was starting to get dark, so he began making his way back to the castle to find the headmaster. He would make the stupid senile fool change his mind if it killed him. However, when he reached the doors, he heard a loud crack as if lightning had stuck right behind him. He turned around quickly with his wand raised high above his head ready to attack, but instead of an enemy, he found Miss Granger before him with her eyes closed. He simply started. She had just apparated. A first-year apparating into the grounds of Hogwarts…

Did rules simply not apply to this girl?

o0o0o0o0o

Hermione looked at the figure before her, realising it was indeed Professor Snape. She relaxed slightly, sighing.

Snape seemed to be analysing her.

"What did you just do?" Snape asked.

Hermione gulped inwardly, just a bit. "I wanted to get out of the forest, and my magic was more than happy to comply."

It was then that a barrage of professors ran down the steps.

"We felt a disruption in the wards, what happened?" Dumbledore inquired of the potions professor.

Snape evaluated his options. "Miss Granger had just found her way back from the forest. I was assisting her."

Hermione narrowed her eyes at him. Why was he not revealing how. Maybe it was for her own good. She stayed quiet.

"Excellent. Professor, why don't you escort Miss Granger to Poppy. She should be checked on. Just in case." McGonagall said almost kindly.

Snape nodded as the army of professors dispersed and once again they both made their way to Poppy.

They entered the hospital wing, and an audible sigh filled the room.

"Why, Miss Granger, are you here now?"

Hermione almost grinned as the matron walked up to her looking worried.

"Well… I was in the Forbidden forest for detentions and sort of got left there… for a while."

Poppy's brow furrowed. "Left in the forbidden forest…"

"How long?"

Hermione looked at Professor Snape. "Around 23 hours."

Poppy looked like she had had a heart attack.

"On the bed then."

"I'm fine, honestly. I've survived worse"

"I certainly doubt that." Poppy admonished, giving her a stern look.

So, on the bed she got. Poppy drew the curtain cutting Professor Snape's view and waved her wand removing all the dirt from her robes and the twigs from her hair.

A few more minutes passed as Poppy waved her wand over her.

"No injuries, no dehydration and only a little malnourished. Seems you were right. You're all good, for once. Of course, magically drained. But with you, that is a normal occurrence.

Hermione nodded. "Thank you.

"Right then, let's get you back to bed."

When the curtains were drawn back, Professor Snape was gone. Exhausted, Hermione walked back to her room, looking forward to her nice comfy bed that she quickly realised she was starting to take advantage of.

She'd have to stop that, she thought as she got in happily, quickly falling asleep.

o0o0o0o0o

Hope you enjoyed this chapter, if so Fav, Follow and review. Another big thank you to my amazing Beta ddcruz1998.