Disclaimer—I don't own JK Rowling's characters.
Thanks to everyone who has reviewed and put this story on alert!
Sorry for the delay. Marriage problems + a three year old daughter = no time to work on story!
Warning for violence. Rated M for a reason.
Chapter Seven
The Chamber
Hermione and Draco appeared at the cottage by the sea. They had materialized in a foyer, but the room was dark. She impatiently waited for her vision to adjust.
The sound of the ocean waves would normally have soothed her, but something to the atmosphere of the memory put her on edge. Draco seemed to agree. He was too stiff, and his hands were fisted at his sides.
Shadows shifted, and Lucius crept by, close enough she could have touched him. He paused, wand poised, and squared his shoulders as if steeling himself for a blow. The door opened, seemingly of its own volition, and he hesitated before crossing the threshold.
The Dark Lord stood near a cliff edge, his gaunt form silhouetted against the ocean. Even in a memory he radiated an aura of raw, Dark power.
Claudia floated beside him. Curled into a tight ball, she reminded Hermione of a fetus drifting within its mother's womb. She was content, her lips curled midst a blissful dream, with no idea her bliss was about to shatter into jagged shards.
This is probably the last time Claudia ever felt content, Hermione thought. Though she had guessed the Dark Lord might catch the lovers, dread mushroomed inside her. This memory would not have a happy ending.
"I found your mudblood pet," said the Dark Lord. "Did you think you could hide her from me?"
Lucius said nothing, but his face twisted with a mixture of fear and anger before settling into unreadable coldness.
The Dark Lord gestured, and Claudia plunged to the ground. The impact roused her, for her lids fluttered open. She saw Lucius and smiled dreamily, but when she saw the Dark Lord she froze.
"You know what you must do, Lucius. You must kill the mudblood."
"Lucius?" she asked, and glanced between the two wizards in confusion. She didn't seem to understand that the situation was real. Perhaps she believed her blissful dreams had taken a dark turn.
The seconds ticked, and still Lucius had not raised his wand. A breeze stirred, and his long, platinum hair flew back from his cheeks.
"I see," said the Dark Lord. "You can not bring yourself to kill the mudblood."
Silence from Lucius. His wand would have snapped if he gripped it any tighter.
The Dark Lord tsked in disappointment but did not seem surprised. "Killing her should be like squashing an insect."
Claudia's initial shock had faded, and she tried to stand but could not budge. The Dark Lord must have cast a sticking charm, or a similar spell, upon the witch. She searched for her wand, but each time her fingers plunged into a robe pocket they reemerged empty. Her eyes widened. "Lucius...please-"
Lucius had finally raised his wand, but it shook in his trembling hands. He sucked in a breath, stiffened his spine, and the wand no longer trembled.
Green light strobed, temporarily brightening the night like a bolt of lightning. Only the curse went wide, streaking harmlessly over the cliff edge.
"You disappoint me," said the Dark Lord. "What good are you if you can't bring yourself to kill a mudblood? I've been too lenient. Now I must teach you what it truly means to be a Death Eater."
The memory wavered and blurred, and when it popped into sharp relief Hermione and Draco had been transported to a new setting. Flaming torches illuminated a stone chamber.
Lucius was in chains. The chains were bolted to the wall at his back and were connected to metal cuffs at his wrists. He writhed as a fat man Crucio'd him.
Hermione recognized the fat man. He was Cygnus Carrow, an uncle to Amycus and Alecto Carrow, the siblings who had taken such pleasure in brutalizing Hogwarts students during Hermione's seventh year. Apparently they had inherited their uncle's torture fetish. He grinned maniacally as Lucius seized.
Claudia was shackled in a similar fashion, but she was positioned along the opposite wall. She shouted her lover's name and begged Cygnus to stop. At first she was ignored, but Cygnus tired of the ruckus and muted her with a quick Silencio.
His task accomplished, he focused on Lucius again. "The Dark Lord said not to permanently damage your pretty face, but everything else..."
Lucius had gone limp; without the chains holding him aloft he would have collapsed. He managed to lift his head. The glare he aimed at his torturer made every hair on the nape of Hermione's neck stand on end. She knew that look. It said, I will kill you when I have the chance.
Cygnus must have understood the look as well. Red coursed from his wand.
Lucius's bare chest was slashed and shredded until it was a mess of blood and raw meat. It must have been excruciating, but he hardly made any noise. This was deliberate, Hermione knew, a way for Lucius to defy his torturer. He would not give Cygnus the satisfaction of hearing him scream.
Some of the lesions were so deep she saw glimpses of organ or bone, and he had lost a copious amount of blood—too much, in fact. Much more of this and he would die.
Her chest tightened at the thought, until she reminded herself this was a memory. Lucius was very much alive. She glanced at Draco, who stood next to her, unmoving and silent. What was he feeling? He hated Lucius, but seeing his father suffer must have distressed him. On impulse she stretched out an arm to touch him, to offer comfort...but he slid out of reach.
"You have your pride, Pretty Boy," said Cygnus. "But your pride won't save you. The body can only withstand so much pain before the mind cracks. I'll break you, and when I do, I will hear you scream. Everyone eventually breaks."
True to his word, Cygnus sliced and burned and stabbed Lucius with an arsenal of Dark spells. Whenever Lucius blacked out from the pain, Cygnus revived him. Whenever he hovered near death, Cygnus healed him. This occurred over and over and over again.
Hermione soon understood that Cygnus was experimenting. He noted what happened if he applied certain spells to certain body parts. He monitored Lucius's reaction to varying forms of stimuli and was usually delighted by his victim's responses.
She had to look away on several occasions. Draco, however, was determine to watch. He had yet to avert his gaze.
She had witnessed torture many times in the memories she'd collected, and though it was never pretty she had learned how to observe with as little feeling as possible. But when Lucius yowled in such agony he sounded like a wounded animal, a torrent of emotions burgeoned. This was a sound no human should ever be forced to make.
Her first instinct was a protective one. Wrath boiled within her, and if Cygnus hadn't been a figment she would have cursed him without a smidgen of remorse.
The desire was foolish for a few reasons. For one, this had occurred years ago—it was already over and done with. For another, Lucius had been in Cygnus's place more than once; he had tortured others as well. In that case, didn't he deserve it?
No, said an inner voice. No one deserves this. Not even Lucius Malfoy.
Besides, the voice went on. In this memory he is still young. He has not tortured or murdered yet, so he is basically an innocent. This is why my first instinct was to protect him.
Her second instinct, on the heels of the first, had been to hold him, to ease his pain. She shied away from analyzing why.
It was clear what finally caused Lucius to scream. Cygnus had begun to peel the skin from Lucius's chest in long, bloody strips. Only the thinnest layer of flesh remained, and patches of it were slightly translucent, revealing the viscera and rib cage beneath. Bile coated the back of Hermione's throat, and her wrath boiled all the more.
Cygnus leered as he methodically ripped flesh from bone. Lucius cried out in that wounded animal way, and the chains clinked and jangled and swung.
Hermione's eye was attracted to the motion of the chains, and she saw the bolts securing them to the wall had loosened. If more pressure was applied the bolts might slide out of position. They even bounced a bit each time Lucius pulled at the chains. Cygnus did not seem to notice; he was too thrilled by the screams his ministrations were eliciting.
Once more the pain was too much for Lucius to bear. Head lolling, he slumped forward and lost consciousness. Before Cygnus could revive him, the Dark Lord swept into the chamber. His brisk demeanor announced he had too many things to do and not enough time to do them. He seemed to have penciled in the torture as an expected part of his busy schedule. "Wake him, you imbecile. And heal him before he dies."
Cygnus obliged. Lucius jolted, then sagged against the chains, fighting to remain on his feet.
"You are too important to our cause to lose," said the Dark Lord, as Cygnus repaired Lucius's mutilated tissue. "I will not have you killed, but the torture will continue until you obey, even it takes days for you to do so. Kill the mudblood and I will reward you. Obey me and your pain will end."
Lucius's gaze shot to Claudia, who had begun to sob. "I..." He cleared his throat, as the word was a croak. When he spoke again it was with more strength, though his voice shook. "I can not..."
"You mean you will not," said the Dark Lord. "You have made your choice, then." He waved a hand at Cygnus as he left. "Proceed."
Cygnus particularly enjoyed breaking bones. Hermione remembered the pain of the bone-breaking curse and winced as Lucius's limbs were bent and snapped, one after another.
"You're so beautiful when you scream for me," Cygnus said, and in such a lusty fashion Hermione shivered. For some sadists, inflicting pain was akin to a sexual experience. A minority even climaxed as they tortured their victims.
Lucius was battered, bloody, and maimed, but he did not break. At any time he could have escaped his torment by agreeing to kill Claudia, but he did not. Sometimes he screamed until his voice cracked. Sometimes he growled or snarled as if a primitive side of him had been awakened by the pain. But he never, ever asked for it to stop, because doing so meant he would have to kill the woman he loved.
The memory blurred and wavered, and when a new one emerged the situation had not changed. Hours must have passed. Lucius had a slight sprouting of facial hair—he couldn't exactly shave under the circumstances-and the Dark Lord had donned a different robe. "You are not as soft as I once believed," he said. His voice was silky, seductive, almost hypnotic. "But I mean to make you stronger, Lucius. To mold you into a wizard I will be proud to call my own. Kill the mudblood and you will be freed. Let her be your first."
Lucius's wand appeared in his hand. It nearly slipped from his grasp, but his fingers curled around it.
"Please me and your suffering will end," said the Dark Lord. "Obey me and you will have peace."
Claudia's lips worked, but she was still silenced and no sound issued. Frantically, she mouthed, "No, no, no..."
Lucius swung the wand in her direction. When that familiar coldness overcame him, Hermione thought he would strike...but instead his arm drooped, and the wand clattered to the floor.
"She is an abomination. Her Muggle blood taints her, and yet you can not end her life." The Dark Lord shook his head, as if Lucius was a disgrace. "You have not learned your lesson yet."
Lucius's wand vanished when the Dark Lord strode out of the chamber. The cadence of his footsteps diminished until they were no more.
The memory dissolved and was replaced by another. It was impossible to tell how much time had elapsed, but Hermione suspected it had been several more hours.
Now Lucius's face was so distended and blackened he was barely recognizable. There were bloody, gaping holes where his teeth should have been. And his eyes...mere slits as they were nearly swollen shut.
Hadn't Cygnus mentioned he was not allowed to damage Lucius's face? After reflecting on his statement, she recalled he said he was not to permanently damage it. Whatever injuries he'd inflicted, he was confident he could heal them so well there wouldn't be a mark left behind.
Ironically, the most effective torturers were also the best healers. Their victims were toys who had only one purpose: to amuse them. Breaking their toys too quickly would spoil their fun, so they learned how to repair them in order to play with them longer.
"You are a fool," said Cygnus. "Sacrificing yourself for a mudblood. Eventually you will break and kill her—that is inevitable. You should have killed her two days ago and spared yourself the pain. If you had you would already be far away from here."
Hermione gasped. Lucius had been tortured for two days? She was amazed he could still function. Cygnus had healed him along the way, but his body and mind had suffered a tremendous amount of strain. Many wizards would have fallen into madness after experiencing that level of torture.
Lucius did not comment. His knees buckled, but he hoisted himself back up. He did not need to speak to make his point; his sheer stubbornness made the point for him.
Cygnus clucked disapprovingly, but was pleased he could continue. And each time Lucius tugged at the chains, Hermione watched the bolts. They had slipped out of the wall even further...
"She is lovely for a mudblood," said Cygnus a bit later. The fat man had just forced a blood replenishing potion down Lucius's mouth. Because the potion would take a few minutes to work, Cygnus had a brief waiting period before he could begin again. "I'm not to harm her, but our master did not forbid me from touching her..."
Claudia peered at the floor without blinking, and was motionless as Cygnus squeezed her breast. She had lapsed into a semi-catatonia. Watching her lover tortured for hours on end had been too much for her mind to process, and as a result it had shut down.
The instant Cygnus pawed her, Lucius growled low in his throat and thrashed against the chains more vigorously than ever before. The bolts gave, bursting from the wall in a shower of dust and stone fragments. Cygnus barely had time to turn in surprise before Lucius pounced, wrapping the chain around his neck in one fluid motion. He jerked the chain backward, his arm muscles bulging from the exertion.
Cygnus had dropped his wand when the chain coiled around him, and he had no means of defending himself. He gasped for oxygen and clawed at his throat. He bucked back and forth in a panic, and his eyes bugged until it seemed they might pop from his head. The more Cygnus struggled, the harder Lucius throttled him.
At last, Cygnus wilted, sliding to the ground in a heap.
For a moment Lucius stared at his torturer, his face alit with triumph and hate. Then, ever so slowly, he limped toward Claudia. The unexpected turn of events had not woken her from her daze. She didn't move, not even when Lucius retrieved Cygnus's wand and Vanished their shackles. He enfolded her in his arms and slung her over one shoulder so his wand hand was free. His tenderness was startling after the brutal murder he had committed.
After Disillusioning them both, he pushed the door open. He sneaked out of the chamber, invisible except for a faint quivering of air...
The memory faded to black, and Hermione yanked her head from the pensieve. There was always a brief disorientation after being immersed in a lengthy memory, especially one that was charged with emotion.
Draco looked ill. She had no idea what to say to him, but that didn't matter. He rushed out before she could think of anything.
Hermione didn't blame him for running. She couldn't imagine what it would be like to witness her father tortured, or kill someone with his bare hands. But it wasn't Draco that plagued her thoughts. It was Lucius.
She envisioned herself in that chamber, with someone she loved in chains. Would she have broken and killed her lover? Or would she have been as strong as Lucius and refused? She would like to think she had his strength, but there was no predicting what a person would do after days of excruciating pain.
Cygnus was right about one thing. Eventually everyone breaks.
