A/N: Just a quick note, the plan is to update on Sundays. I have a backlog of chapters so it's set for a while. Thanks for taking a look!

Summary: The tournament is over, Cedric's gone, and Voldemort is back. What happens when Riddle's first move is to target Harry's muggleborn best friend? Follow Harry, Hermione, and the rest as they tread the waters of a brewing war. Only one question remains – What happens when the Phoenix Burns?

When the Phoenix Burns

Chapter 1

It wasn't the time or hunger that pulled her from the book. The intricacies of the charm had her fully enraptured, leaving the two neglected replaced with knowledge gleaned from the page. Her room sat like it always did over the summer, patiently waiting for its owner's mother to interrupt her obsessive reading and take charge of her care.

No, time and hunger didn't distract Hermione Granger from her quest to understand an impossible world. It was the stinging smell of burnt food that pulled her from the book, up from her bed, and out into the hall. She followed it down the familiar stairs framing the foyer of her childhood home and through to the kitchen, her stomach waiting until its threshold to growl disapproval.

"Mom, are you trying to experiment with the cooking torch aga-." She froze at the sight. Harry had explained what he saw after the tournament to her and Ron. She believed him, of course she believed him, but actually seeing…

"Let them go," she said, the words forced through an uncooperative mouth. It was all she could do to keep a terrified squeak from her voice.

"Miss Granger," the monster in her kitchen hissed back, proving Harry's description entirely inaccurate. She'd imagined more scales. If not for the missing nose, Voldemort looked almost human as he ran a hand through her trembling mother's hair. "How kind of you to join us."

"Hermion-," her mother was cut off by a swift jerk of a tangled hand.

"Quiet muggle," he bit, voice seething in quiet rage. Hermione took a step forward to do… something, stopping when a masked Death Eater pressed a wand farther into her father's throat, silver hand gleaming in the low light. She recognized the plea in his eyes, turn, run, leave us. A sob lodged in her throat. Didn't he understand? It was too late.

A hand clasped her shoulder, holding tight when she tried to flinch away. Dread, held off by a levee of surprise, broke through the floodgates, the clock down the hall striking midnight, its chimes ringing through the house. The witching hour.

Her overactive brain could only muster one thought. What would Harry do?