Tomione Samhain Prompt

*Author's Note: this piece contains violence, murder, self-harm & death.

Samhain

i: There, in the center of the woods, stood an archway made of stone. Hermione cautiously approached it, and upon further inspection, find that there was an oddly bent tree on the other side, forming a new arch to some other place. Hermione instinctively touched the stone of the arch and was surprised to find it hot and pulsating under her palm. She inched closer at closer towards the shadows on the other side of the arch, feeling as she was under a spell. "Best not to go in there, little one," a cold baritone voice warned. The spell broken, Hermione whipped her head around, but was unable to identify the speaker.

"Who said that?"

"A friend . . . or a foe. It depends upon how you look at it." The voice seemed to be coming from the stone itself – but that wasn't possible. "What's a little girl like you doing out on Samhain at dusk?"

"I was playing with my cousins, but I got lost," she mumbled.

"Well, you better find them before an Aos Sí catches you." Aos Sís, her cousin Cedric had informed her, are fairies or spirits of the Otherworld – like Olympus and Hades rolled into one.

"Where does the arch lead to?" she asked.

"Ah, plucky thing, I see; not easily frightened away at the notion of the Aos Sí," the voice mused. "This arch leads to my home, the Other World."

"So magic is real then?" Hermione asked in a rush of excitement.

The voice chuckled, "Yes, little one. Magic is real."

"Are you an Aos Sí?"

The voice didn't respond for a while, but when it did, it sounded stern. ". . . don't ask for questions you don't want the answer to. Remember, not all magic is good and fairies aren't nice by nature."

"Well, you've helped me, so doesn't that make you a nice Aos Sí?"

"Oh, wee one. . ." The voice had grown cold and clinical, and a weathered vine near her on the stone reached out and wrapped itself around her wrist. "There's no such thing." The vine tightened around her wrist.

Hermione bolted awake, hands clutching the sheets for dear life. It was the same nightmare she'd had since she had visited her cousins in Scotland when she was eight. For ten years, the vines had wrapped themselves around her as the arch sucked her into the Otherworld. Of course, she rationed with herself, fairies and magic and the Otherworld aren't real. It's not logical. But that didn't stop the nightmare from terrifying her. Now unable to sleep, she went to the kitchen to make herself some tea and read Wikipedia articles on insomnia and delusions.

oOoOoOo

ii: Cedric ran to her across the courtyard, sweat covering his forehead and his clothes askew. She removed herself from the conversation she was having with Harry to privately talk with her favorite cousin.

"Cedric, what's wrong?" He swayed a little, and she gripped his shoulders to steady him.

"I saw her last night!" Tears began to mix with the sweat on his face.

"Who, Ced? Who did you see?"

"The bean nighe," he whimpered. The bean nighe, as Hermione recalled, was the Scottish version of the banshee –the wailing washer woman who foretold future deaths.

"I was following a boat down the river when I heard singing. It sounded French, I don't know. But I followed the voice, and I saw a young blonde woman washing some clothes in the river. I got a little closer – and that's when the singing stopped," Cedric paused. There was a look of haunted terror in his eyes, as if he had just witnessed his mother's murder.

"And then I saw what she was washing - my house football jersey, soaked in blood."

"How do you know it was yours?"

"It had my name and number on the back."

"It could be someone else just wearing your shirt," she started.

"No! No, I know it's me! When the bean nighe began to scream-the people on the boat paid no mind. Only I could hear it." His breathing became raspy and faint. "I don't want to die, 'Mione." He covered his face in his hands and wept. Hermione pulled him into a tight hug and rubbed small, comforting circles into his back.

When Cedric died later in the school year in the exact t-shirt he mentioned from his nightmare, Hermione knew there has to be some connection to his murder and the Aos Sí.

She doesn't go out during the fall any more, for fear of her own nightmare coming true.

oOoOoOo

iii: "There's no such thing." The vine tightened around her wrist. From the other side of the archway, a figure darted towards Hermione.

Hermione was startled; she had never progressed so far in the nightmare before.

"Let her go!" It was a boy, maybe a year or two older than Hermione. "She's with me," the boy commanded. The vines immediately released her from their grip, hissing as they slithered away. They slithered to the other side of the arch before clumping together and forming a face.

"You win this time, my Lord," the vines mocked before vanishing in a poof of blue smoke.

"Thank you for saving me," Hermione sighed in relief.

"Don't thank me yet," he warned, "now you owe me a boon." Looking closer, Hermione could see that this boy was obviously a fairy of some sort – the arched cheekbones and pointed ears made that clear. But there was something else that unsettled her; his sciera (the white part of the eye) was entirely black, and his irises were white.

"What do you want?" Hermione asked, cautiously trying to back away as slowly as possible.

The boy mused for a moment before answering. "Oh, I want many things. But what I want from you . . . well, I'll have to wait for that." He smiled like a cat that had trapped a mouse, and it sent shivers up her spine. "When I have want of you, I'll find you. Until then – scram." The boy picked up a rock from his side of the Otherworld and chucked it at her head. It nicked her forehead and hit the forest floor with a soft "thud". With that, Hermione ran away as quickly as she could, and she didn't stop until she found herself on the paved road that led to her aunt's home.

When she woke up that morning, her room is painted in gray light. The sun seemed incapable of penetrating through the October gloom. While fumbling to turn on her lamp, she knocks a cold object to the floor. Hermione scooped it up from the floor, and had to suppress a scream when she saw what it was.

It was the rock that had been chucked at her in the nightmare, and it still had fresh blood on it. Her fingers flew to her head, and they came back tinged with viscous drops of blood.

oOoOoOo

iv: She was walking from the parking lot to the Professor's Lupin's office later that morning when she heard a faint voice. It seemed to be floating on the wind, and the trees gave rustled ominously. She began walking a little faster, mentally attempting to ignore the high-pitched hum, but it soon grew louder. Hermione, now panicked, sprint the rest of the way to Lupin's office, and didn't stop until she was safe inside his cozy office.

But there was no cease to the voices. They seemed to be banging on the glass, asking to be let in. And when she entered the office, Lupin himself seemed to be humming their melody. He stared out of the window, watching the wind howling outside.

"Waltz on their graves/ and trample the flowers. / You are the bride/ dead in white feathers. / The November moon/ is calling to greet you. /These rings do two bind us/ gold never fades. / Don't feel too easy/ my mask is your doom

"Professor Lupin?"

"Hmm?" He snapped out of his trance. "Oh, hello Hermione. What is it you wanted to discuss?" His voice was unusually scratchy and low-pitched. Was he sick?

"My thesis paper, sir."

"Ah, yes. It was a lovely paper, Hermione," he noted absent-mindedly while digging through the piles of papers and books on his desk. "Here we go!" he crowed. "The Evolution of Gaelic Mythology."

"Sir, that's not my paper. I wrote my thesis about the rise of queens in Europe since 500 common era." He stared at her blankly.

"What do you teach again?"

"Myths and Legends." False, Lupin is my political science teacher. Trelawney teaches that class. Curious, she continued her line of inquiry. "Professor, I seem to have forgotten, what year did you get married to your wife?" Lupin tilted his head but said nothing in response. It's as if it's not really him, she noted. "What's your son's name?"

This Lupin, whoever it was, snarled at her and gripped the desk. Lupin's skin split, and a creature emerged from it. Its skin was dark grey, its nose and ears became animal-like, and long, spiraling horns sprouted off the sides of its head. The hands were long and narrow, with sharp claws at the ends. She stumbled back, pressing herself against the door.

"Hello . . .Hermione." It grinned, showing off its electric-blue, shark-like teeth. The thing hopped on top of the desk and hissed at her. Instinctively, she grabbed her pocket-knife from her person and flipped it open with the speed of a person who has been paranoid for too long.

"You think a little knife can hurt me?" It cooed.

"No, but it will certainly hurt." With exact precision, she threw the knife at his thigh, silently thanking Cedric for making her take self-defense (and later offense) classes. The creature howled in pain, lunging out her. Hermione could spot the historic bayonet Lupin kept in a glass case on the wall, and she darted for it, breaking the glass with her elbow. But it was almost on her, trying to corner her by the window. Using the wooden desk as a launching pad, she jumped up stabbed the creature in the head. Both fell to the floor as it began to scream.

"He'll make you pay for this!" Hermione didn't need ask whom the creature spoke of; she knew it was the boy from her dream, the Lord who shall not be named.

At that moment, the real professor Lupin dashed into his office. "Dear God! Hermione, what's going on? I heard the most monstrous screaming just now."

"I –uh…" she was still trying to catch her breath.

"Why do you have the Lupin family bayonet?"

"I was fighting…" but she looked down and saw that whatever it was that she had been fighting had vanished, leaving only gray dust and bright blue blood. "But it was just…where did it…" It didn't make any sense!

"Listen, Hermione. I know you're cousin's death was traumatic for you, but that's no reason to pursue self-harm." Self-harm? That's what he thinks this is?

"Professor, I'm not trying to hurt myself?"

"Then why all of the scratches, Hermione? The cuts?" She looked down at her arms and saw the creature had left deep welts in her arms from their tumble to the floor. Hermione began to protest, but Lupin stopped her. "It's alright Hermione, I won't judge. Why don't we just clean this up, huh? No one will have to know. But I do want you to go see Dr. Pomfrey after this, those cuts look pretty bad."

oOoOoOo

v: "The ram fairy could have been a leader of the Sluagh," Luna remarked.

"The what?" Hermione asked.

"The Slugah," Lavender explained, "They're a group of homeless spirits that have been stripped of their faces. They are the Earth's rejects, and even some rulers of the Otherworld won't let them enter."

"But this one had a face-"

"That doesn't mean anything. The leaders have the power and can therefore wear masks or faces."

"So you're saying that he-who-shall-not-be-named has weaponized this group and has used them to gain power in the Otherworld?"

"Sounds like it."

Hermione knew that very few people would believe her about the thing that attacked her, except those in the mythology department. Hermione had contacted Luna and Lavender, Professor Trelawney's favorite students, to discuss her problem with the supernatural. They had already decided that her family had a deep connection with the fairies, and that Cedric's death and her being attacked were related.

"He may have been killed as a warning to you."

"That's when your nightmare evolved, right?" Hermione nodded. "Then it was definitely an omen. And the attack was may have been meant to be a kidnapping."

"Why?"

"Well, you owe the Lord a boon."

"And to pay that boon, you need to be in his presence," Luna explained.

"But why would he want me?"

Luna mused, "Perhaps he's lonely. . ." But Lavender cut her off.

"I think he's up to no good."

"So what do I do? I can't let him kidnap me or take over the world, but I do have to fulfil the boon."

Luna and Lavender glanced at each other.

"Survive."

oOoOoOo

Vi: Hermione stood at the edge of the small backyard her apartment unit shared. The forest loomed, tall elms, oaks, and pines swaying before her, and she very nearly chickened out. Courage, dear heart, she internally quoted. She fiddled with the long folds of her cloak – courtesy of Luna. If I'm going to the Otherworld, I might as well dress the part. Luna had also given her a number of protective charms on a necklace, and Lavender had done up her hair in apple tree twigs, acorns, and sprigs of blue forget-me-nots.

She could already hear the Halloween parties starting in the adjacent apartments, and it made her remember how she hadn't said goodbye to anyone. Not to Ron, Ginny, Neville, Harry… She knew the chances of her coming back were slim to none, but she couldn't bring herself to doing it.

Cedric had become a paranoid mess in the months leading up to his death, but the day before hand, he had been clear-headed and calm; the old Cedric. He must have known beforehand, she thought, that he was going to die. Must have sensed it. She remembered him sitting in her kitchen, laughing over a cup of tea. And before he left, he made a point of hugging her for a long time and saying goodbye. It had haunted her, that phantom kiss on her forehead – it made her feel helpless, like she couldn't help him in anyway.

Hermione began her long walk into the woods, and the growing chill in the air made her suspect the accompaniment of some fairies. As the sun set, the chill that had been followed her became a cloud of black rolling smoke trailing behind her before it transformed into a tall, cloaked figure without a face.

"I take it you're here to make sure I go to the Otherworld?" The cloaked fairy nodded its head. "Is it much further?" The creature gave no response. "Not much of a talker, I see," she muttered to herself. Suddenly, out of the mists, the stone arch from her dreams appeared, shimmering in the moonlight. The two figures approached quietly, only the leaves under their feet making crunching noises. Just in front of the portal, Hermione stopped, feeling her heart tremor. The cloaked figure held out its hand, and she took it. In her other hand, she was gripping the stone that had been thrown at her in the nightmares. The hand was ice cold and clear in the moonlight, acting as a transparent reflection of the objects around it. It gave a reassuring squeeze before pulling her into the Otherworld.

oOoOoOo

vii: They walked into the Otherworld and she was hit by waves of light and warmth. The hand that was holding hers was suddenly radiating heat and was a pale gold. She looked up at the fairy and saw a tall young man dressed in plain grey robes. Faint green wings flickered behind him, but they appeared torn – clipped.

Around her, Samhain in the Otherworld was in full effect. All the fairies seem to be gathered in a great outdoor pavilion and were feasting on the gifts they'd been offered. At the end of the long table lounged a blonde fairy with a crown that was too big for him head, and it was cocked over one eye. His legs were resting over the side of a throne, and he drank from his glass, unamused.

Based on her surroundings, she noted that her escort was dressed like a servant fairy. But he seems to regal. Look at how he carries himself; he practically glides across the floor.

"What's your name?" She asked him.

"I'm Marvolo." French for fairy – clever of him not to give me his name. They approached the table and Marvolo gave a little cough, awakening the attention of the grumpy teen fairy sitting on the throne.

"Oh, she's her," he grumbled, slurping a final gulp of his drink before slamming the glass down on the table. "Listen up everyone," he commanded, bringing the room to silence. "Listen up! We have a human here who owes me a debt." Not to you, I didn't, she thought in frustration. Beside her, Marvolo snorted indignantly. He knews too.

"Normally, we'd eat you," he called down to her, "but we've already had a lot of food. Let's take a vote – those in favor of putting her through the tests, say 'I'". The pavilion erupted in shouts of 'I'. "And all those against say 'nay'" A few old fairies, ugly and hidden at the end of the table closest to her, hissed their 'nays', their tongues slithering like that of a snake.

"That settles it then – we'll put her through the tests!" The fairies cheered and soon the table had vanished and sea of clones of the pretender stood before her. The real pretender had vanished too, most likely standing amongst them.

The floors themselves spoke. "You're first task is to find our King, the one true Lord of the faes."

Hermione scanned the sea of identical faces before glancing over at Marvolo. His back was straight and his chin was upturned, looking out into the crowd with elite indifference. She took the wreath of forget-me-nots that sat on top of her crown and placed it on his head. "Found him." She began counting under her breath, waiting for it to happen. 1…

The clones shattered like glass and the pretender stood in the middle of the floor, stamping his feet like a child. "No, no, no! She shouldn't have found you!" 2….

"I told you she's clever. You should have found something at least challenging for her, Draco," Marvolo mused. His robes transitioned from gray to gold, and his wings grew sprung to life, strong emerald green feathers wrapping themselves around her. 3….

"How did you know?" Draco stormed over to her in a drunken rage. 4…

"No king would ever call for a vote. Besides, the crown didn't fit your head." Marvolo chuckled at this. 5...

"It's no crown at all – just a facade." 6… He waved his hand over the crown, and it crumpled into candle wax drippings. "You may go now," he addressed Draco. Draco, now embarrassed, covered his face and ran into the crowd. 7…

"I always knew you were worthy," he smiled down at her. 8… "Now about your boon…", he began, escorting her to his throne, forcing her to move by wrapping one wing around her and pulling her foreword. 9… "…we never fully discussed the conditions of it." 10… She pulled away from him as he suddenly cupped his head, trying to rip the crown off. Marvolo thrashed in pain and screamed, falling to his knees.

"Yes, the conditions," she chuckled, "I'll be setting them." The fairy court gasped in horror, backing away from her. "If you want to live, you'll let me go. You've saved my life – now I might save yours, making us even."

Harry and Ron had always chided her for minoring in chemistry, but she was glad of her knowledge of chemicals and poisons now. She had laced the flowers in poison, and they were now oozing into his hair.

Marvolo screeched in agony. "Tick tock, Marvolo. You don't have much time." Through clenched teeth and bloodshot eyes, he gave his answer.

"Yes." Taking two blue latex gloves from her jean pocket, she gingerly took off the crown and let it drop to the floor before crushing it with her boot. She dropped the gloves too and wiped her hands on her jeans.

"Well, I'll be going now. Happy Halloween." She began to walk away, but he stumbled after her and grabbed her arm.

"Wait!" She snapped her head around and was forced to look up and his elegant face. "I have a proposition for you."

"I don't make deals with fairies." She pulled her arm away from him and kept walking.

"Don't you feel more powerful here? More alive?" He chased after her, catching up to her in his long strides. "You're smart out there – the brightest student, right? But here, you're more than that."

"I'm happy being what I am."

"No you're not," he was standing in front of her now, blocking her path. "You hate feeling watched, hate feeling cooped up. Hate feeling alone." It sent a shiver up her spine.

"Let me pass."

"Just listen to me. If you stay here with me, you won't ever have to feel that way again."

"I've got friends and family out there, I can't just leave them."

"I can be your family!" He grabbed her shoulders. "You and I are bonded. Destined, even, to be together." She senses in her bones that he is right but shakes it off.

"You were horribly rude to me as a child."

"I'm a fairy, what do you expect? But I've grown up since then; we both have."

"So what, you just expect me to sit around in your little palace, letting you control me?"

"No, of course not."

She takes a step towards him so that they are now chest to chest. "Well then, make it worth my while."

He lifts her chin up and whispers into her ear, "No one could control you. You'd be my queen." That catches her attention, and he notices a flash of joyful shock in her eyes before she snaps back to her rational self.

"No. Thank you, but no. I really must get going." He moves aside and she walks away, but not without scanning her surroundings, breathing in the beauty of it all. With a wave goodbye, she exited the Otherworld, vanishing in a cloud of blue smoke.

The ram-fairy and Hermione's previous assaulter sidled up to Marvolo. "Want us to go grab her?"

"No," Marvolo turned around and began walking towards his throne. "She'll be back."

Fin.