As promised - another chapter. We're halfway now, since the whole story's split in eigth chapters (did I spoil?) so hang in there guys, you're almost done with my abominable time-keeping skills ;)
Enjoy!
XXVIII.
Having translated the inscription on the front entrance, the team started to dig out the rest, slowly freeing side portals, a part of a wall and a watch-tower. Hermione queasily looked on.
In the mornings, she woke up to Bill's suppressed noises as he stroke himself and, try as she might, she could not deny just how hot it made her. Seconds after he'd fled their tent, she would usually copy his actions and relieve herself – Bill did not know, he did not need to know, not as of yet.
The red-haired curse-breaker was dead set on entering the Village Hidden In Stone, no matter if any of them met the actual requirements or not. He had meant to leave her behind, she knew – she'd quickly told him to stuff it.
"It's not that I don't trust you-"
"Then why leave me behind? Because I am a woman?"
She'd known then that she'd cornered him, because, honestly, what could he tell her that would not sound like an insult? It's not because you're a woman but you're new and don't know your way around such things? Well that was bollocks, so he didn't even try it. Because we need someone at the camp? Instead he had just sighed.
"No… because I don't want you anywhere near danger, but hey, you're Hermione Granger, and you wouldn't be if you weren't stubborn. If you promise me that you team with me…?"
It was a question rather than a demand – she had agreed. She hadn't told him that they'd need her.
XXIX.
He had expected more of a conundrum if he was being frank. Wards and Charms of this magnitude rarely lost their strength over the ages and yet, as they entered the Village, nothing happened. The stone wards at the entrance did not move as they had suspected them to, no Devil's Roots to tear them apart – in fact as they descended into the mountain, nearing the village, no ill befell them.
It wasn't until they reached the temple in the midst of the city that he finally realized why.
XXX.
"Who dareth to disrupt mine slumber?"
Her breath stopped in her wind-pipe for only a millisecond, as the statue, having been seated on a throne of stone in the middle of the temple, rose from its seat to near them.
"Wanderers." Aaron replied – she had noticed that he had a knack for poetry, and for talking, and especially for talking poetry and talking people out of what they really intended – if he so wished.
"And what do you desire, wanderers?"
"Our desire is to revive the city thought dead and buried." Aaron answered, Bill surreptitiously grabbed his wand. Hermione knew that if they wanted to get out of there alive with the village intact, she needed to act, soon.
"You cannot revive what went to stillness of its own volition. Except… can you fulfil my wish?"
His wish. Hermione looked at the man. This was Burdun, then, The Flying Eagle King – and Burdun had had one wish only, his entire life. Cleanse his soul from all the evils he had committed during the war to free his people. It was said that no woman would touch him afterwards, scared of the myths, scared he would kill them – Burdun, in all essence wished for only a superficial crumb of affection, the blood of a virgin.
The men around her slid into an offensive stance, Hermione did not react. And then everything slowed down.
Knowing that her offering needed to be convincing, she could not do this the usual, Gryffindor way. Burdun had been a Warrior King, he had fought whole tribes with only five of his friends, freeing, bit by bit, what had been enslaved of his father's tribe, gaining reputation. He would know a strategy when he saw it and would not leave in peace, but a sacrifice, made in the spur of the moment, for the love of not hurting him, it would be the first time in his life that he would be offered such a thing.
It was Carlos who shot the first hex, a version of the Petrificus, strengthened and tweaked – but it had little effect on the stone statue. Yes, it stopped for a second, before, rising to its total height, it broke down into six smaller statues – Burdun and his army, the Warrior King at the peak.
It was then that Hermione sprung into action – charging over a crouched Constantine, she leapt, ignoring Bill's futile grab for her and made a mad dash, almost impossible – her mind tried to reason – to shield the King from the slicing hex thrown by Palco.
And like that, silence settled.
Her arm burnt like a bitch, the blood dripping in a steady rhythm to the ground, Burdun behind her, Bill in front of her. Taking a deep breath, she glared at the curse-breaker and turned towards the King, offering her arm.
"Is it…"
"It is."
A stony finger traced the cut where she had taken the hit for the Warrior – a frisson spread through him, she could see it, and a small smile spread on his face as he carefully reached forth to smear the blood that was on his thumb in a vertical motion over her forehead.
"Then it is done."
And the statues vanished in a hurricane of sand.
Oh so heroic Hermione :P
Hope you liked it!