Author's Note: Thank you to J. K. Rowling for inventing the world of Harry Potter, and for allowing me to borrow her characters for this story. Though the characters—besides the baby-- belong to her, the plot is entirely mine.
Chapter 1: The Sweet Smell of Revenge
Presently my life is nothing but a torture. My life is used only to break me, to kill me.
I, Hermione Jane Granger, was once what you people would call a Bookworm. My favorite pastime once included sitting by the fire with a warm mug of tea, and a good book, hoping to get lost in the realms of another world. Words are what once brought smiles to my face; sentences brought me laughter; paragraphs brought tears of joy; pages, giddiness; chapters brought me to life; but books, oh books brought me to heaven. But that's no longer true.
Without books, my life is incomplete. I have nothing to do but sit around and think of what once was, what could have been, and what I did to disserve this. And I can not stand it any longer. This is torture, in the worst form.
Though, of course, my life hasn't always been so torturous, no; it was once great, I was once great, being considered a hero was once great. In my teenage years, I was the brains behind all the operations. I was a genius, and I was treated as one. But alas, barely a year later, I now sit at home, and think of the past. No more adventures. No more giant chess sets, or terrible teachers. No more basilisks attacking students. No longer any dementors to repel, or escaped prisoners to save from awful deaths. Sadly, there are no more dragons, or people returning from the dead. No more attacks on the Ministry of Magic. No more Death Eater attacks at Hogwarts. No more Horcruxes to search for. No more awaiting Lord Voldemort. No more waiting to die. No more watching Harry fight, or Ron trying to protect me. No more anything.
My life is nothing. I am dead inside, though I breathe, eat and sleep. My heart has broken, my mind has been destroyed, and my soul is in pain. But over all, I'm fine. I'm alive, with my memories still intact, and that is enough for me.
Thoughts of my red-headed first-love wound my heart, conversations we once had come rushing back constantly. When I wake each morning, I expect my current situation to be a dream. I hope that seconds later I'll roll over, and there will be my Ron, warm with sleep, and breathing deep, with rumpled hair. But, no; there is no overly freckled face, or the tanned and slightly muscled torso of the boy I've always loved. No, there is no ring on my finger either. The other side of my bed is cold, and there is no impression on the pillow opposite mine. No, my lovely red-head is gone. Truly gone, probably watching me from heaven with his best friend beside him, nudging him, and telling him that I'm alright.
My heart aches, as does my body. All I wanted was to say goodbye, and to tell Ron that I loved him. I wish I had time to mention the baby before he and Harry left that night. Merlin, I wish I had told him, that we had discussed names.
I wish I told him I was pregnant, and that I didn't want him to leave me. I wish I demanded that he shouldn't have left me, that he had to stay with me, and my baby, our baby.
I hate him for leaving me, but I hate myself more for being cowardice enough not to tell him the truth, the real reason I hadn't been feeling well when he and Harry left for the so-called Final Battle.
I wish Harry had won, that he and Ron had made it home that night; that I wasn't found the next day by Bellatrix Lestrange. I wish, that I hadn't been made one of Lucius Malfoy's favorite toy, that his son didn't favor me over his fathers other whores, that Voldemort had killed me and my child.
I never wanted to bring my little boy into a world like this. I wish I was unable to, that when Lucius discovered my pregnancy, that he would terminate it, and then me. But he didn't, sadly.
No, he wanted me to suffer, and suffer I have. I've lived with this mistreatment for a little over a year. I've watched Narcissa Malfoy raise my baby as her own; his dark red curls the only truth to his true parentage. I've waited too long to hold my child, to kiss away his tears, to hold him at night, to sing him to sleep, and to feed him once more. I've waited for too long to watch my one chance at gaining revenge slink into the shadows and slither away.
My suffering is over, tomorrow, when Severus Snape scowls at me again, I will do my best to seduce him. Tomorrow, when the sun rises, my suffering will be over. Tomorrow, when the sun rises, a new dawn will begin, and my life will take a turn for the better.
Revenge will be mine.
And dear, sweet, Lucius won't know what hit him.