'God harden me against myself,
This coward with pathetic voice
Who craves for ease and rest and joys:
Myself, arch-traitor to myself;
My hollowest friend, my deadliest foe,
My clog whatever road I go.' – Christina Rossetti, Who Shall Deliver Me?
Pain, noun – physical suffering or distress, as due to injury, illness, etc; a distressing sensation in a particular part of the body; mental or emotional suffering or torment.
Where is he?
I pull my knees up to my chin, huddling in on myself.
I'm shaking. My teeth clatter together with the force of my fear.
I almost wish he'd done what he has to do straight away, rather than just leaving me here to wonder.
He didn't tell me when he'll be back. He didn't even look at me as he dragged me back to my cell. He just slammed the door on me when I dared to ask what's going to happen when he comes back.
It seems like hours have passed since then.
He's probably doing this on purpose. I wouldn't put it past him; prolonging the agony by giving me time to wonder about what he may or may not be about to do to me.
What is he going to do to me?
That's a pretty stupid question. Of course I know what he's going to do… only I don't know the specific details, which is worse, in a way. I don't know what to prepare myself for.
Well at least it won't be Voldemort torturing me this time. I suppose I should be grateful for that, at least. If I ever see that dreadful face again it will be a million years too soon.
At least Lucius is… I don't know…
Human. Flesh and blood. Real.
Maybe he won't hurt me. He could just use Veriteserum, and have done with it. I don't see why he wouldn't… it would certainly be a quicker, cleaner method, wouldn't it? Just a quick drink and it'll all be over.
But I shouldn't be hoping that he'll take that route. At least if he tortures me, I have the option of holding out against the pain. I'd rather go through all sorts of agonies than give them the information they want… right?
I never realized until now that intense fear can actually physically hurt.
Maybe I could lie to him. Maybe that will be a way out for me. I could pretend to relent under the pain, but feed him false information. I'll have to make sure that my lies can't cause anyone any harm, but if I pull it off then I might be able to get through this without betraying anybody.
But then… when they've got the information they want off of me, they're going to… to…
My heart sinks down to my toes, weighed down by absolute and hopeless terror.
I'm only seventeen. I don't want to die.
I used to lie awake at night, sometimes, wondering about death. About what might come afterwards. And I'd find it hard to breathe when I inevitably started to contemplate the notion of oblivion, or infinity…
I won't think about it, I won't.
But how can I not think about it?
No. I've got to focus. I can't let them get what they want.
My stomach rumbles painfully. I haven't had anything to eat or drink since when I had my dinner, a few hours before he turned up in my bedroom. If I'd have known that was to be my last supper, as it were, I might have appreciated it a bit more. Grilled chicken and vegetables would never have tasted better.
Actually, I'm more thirsty than hungry. My throat is so dry it's almost painful. The walls of it stick together as I swallow.
I allow myself to fall onto my back, and I stare up at the ceiling without really seeing it. My mind is full, so full that it's about to explode, surely to god.
How the hell am I going to make it through this without giving them what they want?
The door clicks.
I scramble up to my feet as quickly as I can. I'm not going to let him begin with an advantage over me.
Lucius steps silently into the room. He quietly shuts the door behind him, and flicks his wand at it to lock it. He's not smiling, or sneering, or frowning. His face is a blank mask, showing no emotion at all.
I won't be afraid of him, I won't.
He's alone. He probably thinks that I'll be such a pushover that he won't need any help in making me talk.
'Now, Miss Granger, you will answer my questions,' he drawls. 'You will answer them promptly, and you will answer them correctly. Do I make myself clear?'
Breathe. The in. The out. 'You'll have to kill me before I tell you anything.'
He gives me a condescending smile. 'Let's put that to the test, shall we?'
I'm hot. The room is warm and suffocating and my deep, rhythmic breathing is lost, as suddenly I can't seem to fill my lungs with air quick enough.
He brings a small drinking flask out of his robes and hands it to me.
'May I offer you a drink?'
I instinctively reach greedily for the flask, almost snatching it off of him. I bring it to my mouth quickly, and I feel the beautiful moisture on my lips-
Oh god, what am I doing?
I push the flask back into his hands, absolutely furious at my own stupidity. He breathes a small laugh as he takes it off of me.
'You think I'm trying to trick you? You believe that I'm so simple as to just slip you something in your drink? Something that might loosen your tongue?' He sneers at the idea. 'You offend me, Miss Granger. Believe it or not, I was making an attempt at hospitality.'
Hospitality?
He takes a large, slow sip from the bottle, before lowering it from his lips and smiling at me again. 'Yes, I was attempting to be polite. I imagine that hours without water might make one rather... uncomfortable. But seeing as you don't want anything to drink…'
He turns the bottle upside down and allows the content to splash on to the floor. I watch the clear liquid run along the black paving stones, falling into the cracks between them, all going to waste.
He puts the flask back in his pocket, and removes a quill and some parchment from his robes. He magically levitates the parchment horizontally in front of him, and then balances the quill on top of it, just like that Skeeter woman used to. But this quill isn't acid green, like hers was; it's blood red, and very small. He lets go of it, but it remains upright on the parchment. He turns his face to me, and notices my curiosity.
'This is a special quill,' he remarks. 'If you tell the truth, the ink will run black; but if you lie, it will run red.' He smiles at me. 'Just a precaution, you understand. I do trust you to be truthful.'
Damn. Alright, so lying isn't an option. But I still have an alternative; I still have the option of keeping my mouth shut.
He takes a step back from the levitated quill and parchment, and speaks over them in a loud, clear voice;
'Lucius Malfoy interviewing the Mudblood Granger in cell fifteen.'
The Mudblood Granger? Is 'Hermione' too much to ask?
The quill scrawls across the parchment in black ink. Lucius nods in apparent satisfaction before turning back to me with a small smile.
'Are you ready?'
I smile right back at him, pulling my lips back with difficulty. 'Of course.'
He raises his eyebrows at my defiance, but continues to smile, enjoying this game of his own making. He pulls his wand out of his robes. 'Then we'll begin.'
I stand up straight. I'm not afraid of him.
What a stupid lie.
'To start us off, Miss Granger,' he says, almost politely, 'as a warm-up, if you will, I want you to tell me the names of Harry Potter's friends.'
I glare at him. 'I might be mistaken, but didn't your son go to school with us?' I ask. 'Wouldn't it be easier for you just to get this information off of him? I know he's not too bright, but surely he could see who Harry was friends with at Hogwarts.'
I feel a stinging slap across my face, although he has not touched me. I swallow sharply.
He's not smiling anymore.
'I did not ask for you to insult my son, Mudblood. Or for you to display that infuriating know-it-all attitude of yours. What I asked, I believe, was for you to tell me who Potter's friends are.'
'You know who his friends are. You must have some idea, anyway, otherwise why have you brought me here to answer your questions?'
That sharp sting on my cheek again, but I'm ready for it this time.
'You seem slow to learn that I'm not here for your conversation, scintillating though it may be,' he says quietly. 'I want you to tell me what I need to know. The reason I have not asked Draco to provide me with this information is that he only ever saw you in Hogwarts. He could not tell me who Potter was friends with outside of school, could he? But you can. So if you wish to do things the easy way, then I suggest you name every friend he has. You don't need to tell me about yourself or Arthur Weasley's worthless son, however. If we did not already know that the three of you were as close as you are then you would not be here.'
I hate him for calling Ron worthless. I hate him for that more than anything else.
He's tapping his foot, waiting for an answer.
'You want the names of Harry's friends?' I say, trying to keep my voice as calm as possible. 'I'll tell you.'
'Well, thank you for making my life a little easier. It seems that you do have some common sense, after all-'
'Do you want these names or not?'
He pauses. 'Please.'
He's going to hurt me. My god is he going to hurt me.
'Their names are Donald Duck, Mickey Mouse, Kermit the Frog-'
He doesn't recognise the names I'm rolling off; they're Muggle inventions, after all. But he knows that they're nonsense, without having to check the parchment to see what colour the ink is.
'Bashful, Sleepy, Dopey, Rumplestiltskin,'
I look at the quill. It's running across the paper, scribbling down every ridiculous word I say. I start to laugh. I can't help it, and I know I should stop, and it's not funny but I really, really start to laugh. I laugh so much I can barely get my words out…
The pain stops it dead.
I gasp and look down at my hand. My fingers are… bending… backwards…
'I'm glad that you find yourself amusing,' Lucius says, his voice dripping with sarcasm. 'After all, if we cannot laugh at ourselves, what can we laugh at?'
My fingers are bent back almost to a right angle. Horrified, I try use my other hand to hold them in place, but it's no use, as they continue to be forced backwards no matter what I do. Back, and back, and back.
'Ah… ow!'
'Is it painful, Miss Granger?'
I feel the skin on my palm being stretched to tearing point. The bones in my fingers are popping and cracking as they give way under the pressure. I grit my teeth but, although I try to stop myself, I begin to shout meaningless nonsense in pain.
'Does that hurt you, little Mudblood?' He has to raise his voice to make sure that I can hear him over my cries. 'Can you feel your fingers breaking, screaming out for mercy? Is concealing the information I want worth this agony? You could stop it, you know; right now, if you wanted to. Just tell me what I want to know.'
They're bent back as far as they can go, but still the force goes on, relentlessly pushing them back, and back, and there's tearing and cracking and unbearable pressure, and I can't help it. I start to scream.
'STOP IT!' I bawl, and as I do there's a huge, wrenching pain right in the joints and I scream in absolute agony as tears roll down my face, and the pressure…
Stops.
But the pain remains.
I look down at my hand. The fingers are wonky and disjointed. I can't move them, no matter how hard I try.
'You… they're bloody broken-' I choke on a sob.
'Full marks, Miss Granger.'
I cradle my ruined hand to my chest, and I fall back against the wall, leaning all of my weight on it in a desperate effort to stay on my feet. I turn my head, hiding my face from him.
His footsteps move across the room, stopping when they reach me.
'I think we'd better start again,' he says, his voice perfectly calm. No emotion, no remorse, no pity.
'I want you to name Harry Potter's friends for me.'
I raise my head and stare at him through the tears which are burning my eyes. 'You cruel… you evil…'
'Oh please, I've heard it all before,' he drawls. 'Any comments you wish to make on my character will, I'm sure, not be new to me.'
He doesn't care. He doesn't care-
I can't look at him. I let my gaze fall to the floor.
'Now,' he continues, his voice low, 'tell me what I want to know, and I'll mend your hand for you in a heartbeat.'
No. This is nonsensical. No-one could do this to another human being, surely…
Would it be so terrible just to tell him?
YES!
Why?
'My patience is not limitless, Mudblood. I would advise you not to make things worse for yourself.'
I hate him. I hate him so much that I want him to die.
'Why do you need to know this so much?' I ask, furious at how my voice is cracking. 'Why do you need to know who Harry's friends are? Is it so crucial a bit of information that it is worth torturing another human being in order to acquire it?'
I clutch my poor destroyed fingers to my chest, my entire body shaking uncontrollably. There's a long silence, punctured only by my heavy breathing.
'This information is important, believe me. Do you think I would be asking you to provide it if it were not?' His voice is quiet again. I won't look at him as he speaks to me. 'And I resent your laying the blame at my door. You could end this in a moment, but you don't have the basic common-sense to save your own skin. One could say that you have brought this pain upon yourself, with your own stubborn wilfulness.'
He grips me by the chin and forces me to look into his face. His expression remains entirely unreadable. 'Now, will you help yourself by helping me? Or do you need a little more… persuasion?'
Although I know what I have to say, I still feel like I have to force the words out of me; 'I'll never help you, you bastard!'
He lets go of my chin, before brutally wrenching my injured hand away from my chest, heedless of my broken bones.
'Haven't you done enough?'
He meets my gaze with a look as cold as stone. 'Evidently not.'
He presses the tip of his wand to the middle of my hand, and mutters an incantation I can't hear.
That's when my hand begins to burn.
At first it just tingles, almost like a nettle sting. But it swiftly develops, growing hotter and hotter, becoming a full blown, merciless agony. It leaps all the way down the nerves in my arm, electric shocks of white heat. An iron is being pressed to my bare skin, and I scream and scream, falling to my knees while he keeps hold of my hand, continuing to press his wand into it.
I can feel my skin bubbling!
I claw at his leg with my free hand, bawling at his feet. 'My god, ohmygod, please-'
And then he draws his wand away from my skin, and lets my hand go. I collapse onto my hands and knees, letting my injured hand fall to the floor. I look at it, sprawled across the black stone. Crooked, purple-red, broken twigs of fingers, and burnt flesh, swelling and blistering and bubbling before my eyes.
Oh god.
'I have many more distasteful tricks up my sleeve, Mudblood, should you continue to defy me,' he says, his voice perfectly controlled.
I look up at him, sobbing so hard that I feel dizzy with it. 'Piss off!' I scream at him.
He retaliates by stepping on my hand, my broken hand. I scream myself hoarse as he grinds his foot down onto the broken fingers and the burnt skin.
'I grow tired of asking you this, and so let this be the last time.' He has to yell to make himself heard over my wailing. 'Who are Harry Potter's friends?'
My burned skin rips and my broken bones grind under his boot. The pain is above and beyond my comprehension. It is no longer something I feel, but something I am.
Just do it, Hermione. Nothing's worse than this.
I have to. I just can't go on. I can't take anymore. It has to end, I can stop it…
'Me,' I begin to whimper, 'And Ron. We're… we're his best-'
-grind,crunch,screamofpain-
'I know that.' His voice is raised in impatience. 'I want the names of his other friends, those whom I do not know about.'
I can't tell him, I can't.
Boot presses down harder, harder, Oh, nooooo…
'Neville Longbottom,' I stumble on. 'Luna Lovegood, Rubeus Hagrid, ohpleaseplease… Ginny Weasley…'
I stop, horrified at what I've done, but there's a twist, a ripping twist, no no nonono!
'Anyone else?' he asks, ignoring my screams of pain.
Who else is there? Who else, anyone else-
'Dean Thomas and Seamus Finnigan, he shares a room with them. Remus Lupin, Nymphadora Tonks. Mad-Eye… I can't think – nono, please don't, no pleasepleasedon't… Mr and Mrs Weasley. Fred and George Weasley. Fleur Delacour. Ernie Macmillan. Justin Finch Fletchley. Colin Creevy.' I stop, gulping heavily. 'I can't think of any more-'
'Try, Mudblood.'
Polished boot grinds broken fingers into stone-
'PLEASE… I'm telling you the truth, I can't think of any more, I swear, I SWEAR!'
He lifts his foot off of my hand.
I curl up in a ball, shaking in sheer agony, weeping to myself in pain and self-disgust.
What have I done?
I can still see him through my tears. He walks over to the levitated parchment and inspects it. When he sees the colour of the ink, he turns to me with the smallest of satisfied smiles.
I can't look at him anymore, not after what he's done to me. I close my eyes.
'You see, Miss Granger: we can work well together, if only you choose to apply yourself.'
What can I say in reply? I've given him what he wants.
I've helped him.
The thought is unbearable.
He picks up my hand again. His touch sends new spasms of pain through my arm.
'Oh no, leave it alone!' I wail, without looking up at him. I press my face to the floor, feeling the cold stone on my skull.
He presses his wand to my skin. A huge rush of warmth runs through my hand, right to the tips of my fingers. And there's no pain.
I lift my head up slowly, not quite sure whether to believe it.
It's healed. It must be healed. I can move my fingers again, and the burn has sealed up, leaving only a red, shiny scar in its place. The bruises around my fingers are still there, but the digits themselves don't hurt as I flex them in his grasp. I gulp as the tears in my eyes dry up.
He lets go of my hand, but still I look at it, mesmerised by how easily it has healed, and how quickly such pain can vanish.
'What made you think you would be any different from the others, Mudblood?' he asks quietly. 'All of you, every person I've ever had to deal with, you have all believed that you can hold out against the pain. But none of you ever can. I have told you already; when I want something, I make sure that I get it.'
'But at what price?' I ask, my throat sore due to my screams. 'How far can you go to get what you want, until you start to hate yourself for it?'
His face is still unreadable. 'The end justifies the means. Not that I would expect you to understand that. As a schoolgirl, you may not yet be aware of the complexities of adult morality.'
'I'll tell you what I don't understand,' I say furiously. 'Why do you have to torture people for the information you want? Why don't you just use Veriteserum on them? It would make things easier for you, surely?'
I stop myself before I can say any more.
Don't pretend that you don't want him to use it. A free ticket out of this agony and guilt…
'Oh, no, I don't think so.' He crouches down next to me, and runs his wand slowly down my cheek. 'This method is so much more… interesting, don't you think? Your insolence and disobedience is infuriating, indeed. But there's something so… satisfying about watching you eventually giving in to the inevitable, finally enacting some willing obedience, without the aid of potions or mind-control.'
Anger hits me so hard that I feel sick with it. 'What is wrong with you?' I scream, pulling myself to my feet. 'He told you that you could use any method necessary to get the information he wants, I heard him. Why do you have to torture me for it? You don't have to! You could use the Imperius curse on me, or you could use truth serum. But you won't. You choose the option that will cause me the most suffering, even though it makes everything much more difficult for you. Why do you want to hurt me? I haven't done anything to you. Why do you hate me so much?'
There's a long pause.
'I do not hate you,' he says eventually. 'I despise you; there's a difference between the two. I despise you because you're a Mudblood. And that is why I choose to torture you instead of using any of the cleaner methods. Any Death Eater would do the same thing; I am not unusual in that respect. Because any opportunity to teach one of you a lesson should not be wasted.'
'What lesson? What do I need to be taught?'
'Your place, girl, your place!' His voice is rising in anger. 'None of you muggle-borns know your place. You masquerade as wizards and witches, acting as if you belong in our world. And you; you are the worst sort of your kind. You, with your know-it-all attitude and intellectual snobbery. You set yourself up as equal, if not better than, your pure-blood peers, when you are really just a freak of nature. That is why I want to hurt you. And that is why I despise you.'
He turns away from me and walks over to the other side of the room. He stops by the cell door, and runs a gloved hand over the back of his sleek blonde head, taking a deep breath.
I watch him collect himself, and when he turns back to me his face is emotionless once more.
'Thus far we appear to be making progress,' he says, as if the last few minutes have never happened. 'Not without struggle, I grant you, but your common sense seemed to prevail over your so-called 'ideals'. I thank you for your eventual generosity in naming as many names as you did.'
I bite down on my tongue, hard.
'Yes, young Harry seems quite popular,' he continues. 'But then, why wouldn't he be? The Boy Who Lived was always destined for hero worship.'
He's building up to something.
Don't crack this time. Try and stay strong.
'The thing about heroes is they always have a huge female following,' he says idly.
Oh God, no!
'I want you to give me the names of every girl he's ever had a little, ah… romance with,' he says with a sneer.
'Why?' I ask.
An invisible fist punches me in the stomach again. I bend double, coughing violently as I try to get my breath back, holding my stomach to try and get rid of the pain – dull, pounding pain.
'You will not question me, Mudblood. I thought I had made that clear.'
I look back up at him. He has his wand readily positioned to curse me.
But the pain of my broken, burned hand suddenly seems so far away.
I can face it again. I have to.
I stand up straight, ignoring the aching twinges in my ribs.
'And I thought that I had made it clear that you will have to force any information you want out of me.'
He rolls his eyes. 'How tedious,' he says with a sigh. 'You know, there is only so much of this sort of behaviour that I am prepared to put up with. Why won't you just make things easier for us both?'
I raise my eyebrows, trying to think of a suitable reply.
'I guess I'm just a difficult girl.'
For I second, his mouth twitches up into what might be a smile. At least I think it does… but the next second it's gone again.
He raises his wand and pauses for a moment, frowning in concentration.
'Now, what would be the most… persuasive method I could use?'
I wait for ages while he keeps this charade of indecision going.
'I could use the cruciatus curse, of course,' he's saying this quietly, as if he's musing to himself. But I can hear every word, as he means me to. 'But where's the fun, the variety in that? It's so… obvious, don't you think?'
I don't give him an answer. Not that he expects one.
He flicks his wand down.
I feel…
Nothing
Just emptiness.
My brain has left my head.
Oh, it's lovely.
All the pain, the agony of thinking…
gone.
Just warmpinkhappysleepy and there is no pain or thought or being…
A knife. In a pale hand.
I take it.
'Cut your leg.'
Don't…
Doubt wiped away by the warm, comforting voice with a weight heavier than God.
'Cut your leg. It won't hurt, I promise you.'
He's right.
Nothing can hurt me, nothing will hurt me. Not in this tightcozysnug warmth that I'm wrapped in.
I do all that I know.
I sink the knife into my leg-
ARRRGHHHH!
'You're not hurting, not really. Pull the knife down your thigh.'
HurtshurtsSOMUCH!
'No, it doesn't. Pull the knife down through your flesh….'
'And again…'
'And again…'
And then the voice leaves.
Oh my God, my LEG!
I'm left with nothing but agony. It crashes down on me so quickly that I scream and shout with it. I fall to the floor in pain and shock.
Jesus Christ!
My jeans are in shreds, and my thigh has deep, bloody trenches running down it. Mud and blood and flaps of skin, but the knife's disappeared, and ohmygodohmygodohmygod! So much warm, sticky, dark blood, oozing out of the wounds, trickling down off of my leg and on to the floor, drying in clumps.
I have to tell him, I have to.
'Look, I'll tell you what you need to know! Just please, please heal my leg!'
'You tell me the names of the girls first,' he says with absolutely no emotion whatsoever. 'Then, perhaps, I will consider your proposal.'
'Please, I'm begging you-'
'No. First you will tell me what I want to know.'
'Why won't you help me?'
No answer.
I've got to stop this bleeding.
My t-shirt. Perhaps – yes.
'Ginny!' I scream, pulling my t-shirt up over my head and frantically pressing it to my wounds, using it to stem the blood flow. 'He was with Ginny, but they broke up a few weeks ago…'
'Ginny?' I don't look at him as he speaks. 'Not Ginny Weasley? Arthur Weasley's daughter?'
'Yes!' I don't even register what I'm saying anymore. I just know that I need to stop this pain before it kills me. My t-shirt soaks up the blood, but still I bleed. Nothing can stop it, nothing…
'Anyone else?'
'Please, my leg…'
'I want the rest of the names first, Mudblood. Your leg can wait. You needn't worry – I'm not going to let you die yet.'
'But it hurts-'
'Yes, I know. That's kind of the point, isn't it?'
Bastard. Sadist. Sick, evil, twisted-
I groan in agony.
'In our fifth year he dated a girl called Cho Chang,' I say desperately. 'But there's no-one else.'
'Are you sure?'
'NO-ONE, I SWEAR!'
He walks over to the levitated parchment to see whether I am telling the truth.
'Only two,' he says, a small chuckle in his voice. 'The most famous seventeen year old in the wizarding world, and you have only two names to give me. Good God, how pathetic, and yet somehow very unsurprising.'
I'm so dizzy…
'Oh, please forgive me. I forgot about your little accident.'
He points his wand at my leg, and that wonderful, familiar warmth spreads along it. The wound heals up, the skin sealing itself over the mud, trapping it in my leg.
He doesn't get rid of the blood, though.
'Get dressed, girl,' he snaps.
I blink, and then I remember.
I pull my drenched t-shirt over my head. The soaking, warm material clings to my body. I feel my blood seep out of the cotton, onto my skin.
He nods at me.
'Well, it seems you can follow orders, after all. How compliant you can be when you put your mind to it! The information you have provided so far shall, I am sure, be put to good use.'
I clench my hands into fists, digging my nails into my palms.
'Yes I am sure that these two girls with prove to be most useful to our cause.'
Tears begin to fall down my cheeks. My throat is thick with suppressed sobs. I clench my jaw to keep myself silent, but I can't get away from the giant darkness pushing its way into my body - the enormity of what I've done.
'Ginny Weasley!' he goes on, with relish in his voice, 'I remember her at eleven years old, with her father in Flourish and Blotts. So young, and so innocent. I knew that she would be an ideal person to be taken in by the diary. She would be naïve enough to let it into her mind; I could see that in her. That she was a Weasley only made the situation even more delicious.'
'Too cowardly to do your own work, weren't you?' I say before I can stop myself, my voice rising and cracking with emotion. I get up from the floor. 'You could have given Draco that diary, and taught him how to use it. You didn't have to use an eleven year old girl to do your dirty work. But you'd rather ruin an innocent girl's life than allow yourself to be associated with any wrong doing. Oh, you cared about getting the Muggle-borns out of Hogwarts, but you cared more about your own reputation, didn't you?'
His face is loosing what little colour it has. 'Don't talk about what you don't understand-'
'I understand all too well!' I scream, unable to control myself. 'I understand you! You're a coward!'
His face is a mask of rage. 'What did you call me?'
'YOU HEARD WHAT I SAID! If you had any bravery, an honour in you, you might have at least stayed true to your master after his fall. But you didn't – you renounced him rather than go to Azkaban and face up to what you'd done.'
'SHUT YOUR FILTHY MOUTH!' he roars.
'NO, I WON'T! You were a coward when you snapped my wand in half. You wouldn't even give me a chance to fight against my capture. Does it make you feel like a big man, torturing a helpless teenager when they have no way to fight back? You coward, you coward, you COWARD-'
His fist slams into my jaw. Small lights burst behind my eyes, and the iron taste of blood fills my mouth. I lose my balance, the blow is so strong, and I fall. Almost as soon as I hit the ground he kicks me hard in the stomach. Once, twice, three times. I scream-
And then there is silence. I watch him as he turns around and walks to the other side of the room, and stands for a few moments with his back to me.
Can't breathe… hurts too much…
For what seems like ages I lie still, desperately rubbing my stomach in an attempt to get rid of the pain. He doesn't turn to face me.
Eventually I pull myself into a seating position, pressing my back into the wall. My stomach's killing me, my hand is pink, shiny and bruised and I'm covered with blood, blood which is now cool on my body.
After a few more minutes he turns around to face me again, his face struggling to keep calm. He looks down at his boots. I follow his gaze. They're shiny, and wet…
'I've got your filthy blood on my shoes,' he says. 'Wipe it off. Now.'
I look up at him, not believing my ears. 'Clean your own damn shoes.'
There's a small silence. A muscle is going in his jaw.
'Do you need yet another little lesson in obedience, girl?'
'SHUT UP!' I scream, completely losing it. 'Do you think I care about obedience? How can you stand there, ordering me to wipe my blood off of your shoes after what you have done to me today? Do you really think that forcing me to do that would make me accept that I'm below you? Well, it won't. Obedience is meaningless if it's forced; no matter what you do to me, you can't make me want to obey you.'
'I CAN DO WHAT I LIKE!' he shouts at me. 'You don't seem to understand: you are at my mercy! How dare you talk to me like that? You should be grovelling at my feet, completely willing to do whatever I tell you. Why do you continue with this insufferable insolence? Will nothing teach you of your inferiority? Do you think that I can't hurt you more?'
He points his wand at me.
Oh no, OH NO…
'CRUCIO!'
No! Nooooooooooo! I can't, oh God, I CAN'T! It burns, I'm burning! I scrabble at the floor, my body is being ripped apart by wild beasts, teeth, nails, claws, and why? Why won't it stop?
He lifts the curse, and I'm left shivering. I'm crouched at his feet, just as he wishes me to be. I look up at him through my tears.
'Why?' I ask, exhausted with pain. 'Why are you doing this to me?'
He's silent, his wand still pointed at me.
'Please, just… just stop.' I grab the front of his robes. 'You don't have to do this. It's not right, you know that it isn't. Would you want Draco hurt like this for what he believes in? He's the same age as me.'
His face doesn't even twitch at the mention of his son, but I don't stop; I have to get through to him.
'Please. You must have some kindness in you. You're not your master; you're not inhuman, Lucius.'
'How dare you use my name?'
I shake my head. 'You must have some compassion in you. You're a human being, you must do! Can you carry on like this? Will you sleep well tonight, or will you lie awake, remembering my screams?'
His eyes drop away from mine.
'Can you look me in the eye, after what you have done to me today?' I ask quietly.
For a moment, it looks like he can't.
'Please,' I carry on, my voice cracking. 'Please-.'
'Get off of me,' he says, brutally kicking me again in the ribs. I fall onto my side, and I look up at him. The look of pure loathing on his face freezes my blood. 'Am I supposed to be moved by your pathetic pleas? How dare you ask me to pity you? I detest you!'
He turns away from me, walking over to the levitating quill and parchment. He plucks them out of the air and puts both of them into his robes.
'We shall resume our interview tomorrow.' His lips barely move as he speaks, and he won't look at me. 'And I shall expect more co-operation from you when I return. In the meantime…'
He points his wand at the floor and a goblet of water and a tiny loaf of bread appear on the stone.
'You can believe whatever you like about me, Mudblood,' he says, opening my cell door with his wand. 'But you can never say that I do not have a sense of hospitality.'
He slams out of the door, locking it behind him.
For a few moments I stay still, curled up on the floor. I roll my head upwards and look blankly at the ceiling as silent tears roll out of the corners of my eyes.
I can't feel. Pain has anesthetized me.
But I can think…
I can't let myself think. If I think, I'll have to face up to what I've done.
But I have to face it. There's no escape from it. My head's going to explode with the knowledge of what I've done.
I roll over onto my front, and push myself onto all fours. I crawl heavily over to my bed. As I approach it, I see the inscription on the stone,
'Don't let them win'
I've failed.
I let myself collapse on my straw bed, grateful for the comparative softness and warmth. I curl up in a ball, pulling the blanket up to my chin, wanting to sink into endless darkness, where there is no more pain.
I start to sob. I can't help it. The tears roll down my cheeks and my nose runs. I cry and cry, long into the night, with no-one to hear me.
