Yes.

Nothing — just the ambient sounds of the castle, distant and indistinct. No footsteps nearby. No voices.

Hermione dropped her left arm and used that hand to ease the door open a crack. A sliver of empty corridor. She looked both ways.

Clear.

She slipped through, pulled the door shut behind her, left arm back across her chest — and moved.

Servant staircase. Second floor. Myrtle's bathroom.

The corridor was quiet, the torches burning low at this hour. Hermione moved at a brisk pace, staying close to the wall, eyes tracking ahead and behind. The third floor felt emptier than the floors below had — fewer reasons for students to be here in the evening, fewer classrooms in regular use. She passed the landmarks she recognised and kept moving, one hand still pressed firmly against herself, the other arm doing double duty across her breasts.

The walking did help. Not much, but enough to notice. The urgency was there, constant and demanding, but the rhythm of movement gave her something to focus on besides it.

Then voices ahead. She ducked behind a suit of armor without hesitating, pressed flat against the wall behind it, and waited. Two students passed — she heard them clearly, something about dinner and a card game — and then they were gone. She waited a beat, stepped out, kept moving.

The servant staircase door was ahead. She reached it, listened, opened it and slipped inside.

________________________________________

The stairwell was narrow and cold. Hermione paused for a moment with her back against the closed door, alone in the dark enclosed space. Nobody could see her here. She dropped her left arm from her breasts, let it hang free. There was no point in covering herself in an empty stairwell. What mattered was the descent.

She began going down.

Each step jarred. Each jostle made the urgency spike briefly before settling back — higher than before, she noted. The stairs were taking their toll. She pressed harder with her right hand, compensating, and moved carefully, trying to minimize the jarring.

By the time the second floor landing came into view, she was breathing deliberately — slow, controlled breaths that kept her focused and held the urgency at bay. Still in control. Still managing. But the margin was thinner than it had been.

She stopped at the door.

________________________________________

She pressed her ear to the wood and listened.

Voices. Multiple voices, and movement — doors opening and closing, footsteps, the particular noise of a corridor full of people dispersing. The tutoring sessions were ending. Students were spilling out into the hallway, gathering themselves, lingering in that unhurried way students did when there was nowhere urgent to be.

Hermione cracked the door open and looked.

The corridor was full. Not packed, but busy — students emerging from doorways, stopping to talk, drifting in groups toward the main staircases. The path she needed was blocked. She couldn't step out without being seen immediately.

She pulled the door shut.

Wait. Just wait. They'll move on.

She settled back against the wall of the landing, her left arm hanging free at her side. No one could see her here. She crossed her legs at the ankle, pressing her thighs tightly together, and leaned her shoulders against the stone. Her right hand stayed pressed firmly against herself. The pelvic floor tension she'd been maintaining since the closet continued its slow, wearing work.

Time passed. She could hear the students through the door — voices, laughter, footsteps going in different directions. They were dispersing, but slowly. Too slowly.

She shifted her weight, uncrossed her ankles and recrossed them the other way, adjusting the counter-pressure. The urgency was building now in a way that was harder to hold against passively. She bent forward a few degrees at the waist — an instinctive adjustment — and pressed harder. Better. Marginally.

Come on, she thought. Just go. Go to bed. Go wherever you're going.

The voices in the corridor were thinning. She could tell from the sound — fewer distinct conversations, more individual footsteps moving away.

She cracked the door and looked.

Still a few students visible. Not many, but enough.

She waited. The urgency pressed on, relentless. Her thighs were clenched hard now, doing real work, the muscles beginning to tire from the sustained effort. She could feel the strain of it in her legs. Her right hand pressed harder still, and it wasn't quite enough on its own anymore.

Her left hand came down from where it had been hanging free.

She brought it low, joining her right, both hands pressing firmly against herself. Her breasts were bare, exposed to the cool air of the landing. The urgency had narrowed her focus entirely. Bent forward at the waist, thighs clamped together, both hands pressed — she held herself there and breathed, and watched the corridor through the gap, and waited for it to clear.

A few more students moved away. Then a few more.

She cracked the door one more time.

Empty.

Hermione shifted her right hand just long enough to ease the door open a few inches — immediately back, pressed hard — and turned her body sideways, angling through the gap. The door swung shut behind her as she began to run.