A/N: Bellamione Hercules AU! I took many-a creative liberty with the general plotline of the Disney movie Hercules and created this monstrosity. Note: You DO NOT need to know the story of Hercules to read and understand this fic- I pretty much butchered the original plot beyond recognization. Where Hercules is largely centered on the personal journey of Hercules as a hero and his relationship with Meg is just a part of that story, this fic will mostly focus on Hermione and Bellatix's relationship. Thank you to poa93 on tumblr for letting me use their amazing prompt. I don't own this storyline nor do I own the characters, as should go without saying. ;) Sorry for the long author's note. I'll shush now.
Different.
It was a word she'd grown to hate.
She'd been different ever since she was a young girl. Sometimes, strange things would happen when she was around. Windows would shatter. Vases of flowers would topple to the ground. Pieces of fruit would explode into colorful showers of sparks for no reason at all. One time, she even made a little boy cry because she had gotten mad at him for stealing a ball from her, then the ball had grown teeth and bitten his hand.
That had been funny until she was forbidden to play with the other children.
She'd noticed that things often happened whenever her emotions got out of hand- whenever she was especially angry or frustrated. It was usually a negative emotion that triggered the inexplicable happenings that seemed to follow her everywhere she went. But not sadness. Never sadness. Sadness didn't make anything happen.
Loneliness, she noted, didn't make anything happen either.
She was lonely a lot.
She saw everything.
The whispers, the pointed fingers behind her back, the ushering away of children when she got too close for comfort. She's different. She's weird. Don't talk to her. Stay away from her.
She supposed it wasn't their fault. All that time on her own had made her rather wise beyond her years, and even as an eight-year-old girl who couldn't seem to control what happened when she was around, she knew that people always hated what they couldn't understand. It was human nature. Still...sometimes it hurt not having anyone to talk to.
She buried herself in her studies, surrounded herself with books and parchment rolls and papers. Miss Finch, the wrinkly old lady who came to her family's tiny little cottage twice a week, seemed to be the only person other than her parents who didn't mind being in the same room as her for more than a few minutes. She devoured every text she was given. She soon became far brighter than was normal for a child of her age- not that she was aware of this, having seldom spoken to another person, let alone a child who was her age. She threw herself into her studies, determined to forget all about being lonely. I'm not lonely, she would tell herself.
I'm far too busy for friends, anyway.
Try as she might, she could not immerse herself in her heavy, ancient textbooks deep enough to stifle the hollow ache for companionship that often felt as if it would swallow her up whole. Sometimes at night, when her candle had gone out and it was too dark to read, she let her mind stray to those thoughts that she never quite allowed herself to linger on but were always there, tucked away in the deepest, dustiest corners of her mind. She wondered what it would be like if she had a friend to talk to. She thought about what it might be like to meet someone who would truly accept her just as she was, without secretly judging her or spreading rumors about her behind her back.
She appreciated her parents' efforts to console her, she really did, but she just couldn't help feeling out of place. Although she tried not to dwell on it too long, although she tried to deny it with every fibre of her being…
She knew they were right. She was different.
And she hated it.
Contrary to what so many fairy-tales and books said, things hadn't magically righted themselves when she grew older.
She still found herself gazing longingly out of the window at the people talking and laughing outside. She still had no friends. She still wasn't allowed to be around other people.
Normal people, more like. She sighed, pushing the bitter thought away as she returned to her work. She was steadily making her way through the 38th volume of A Complete History of Britain, a musty old book which even she didn't find to be all too interesting, when her mother's voice broke through her thoughts like a ray of sun through a cloud, clearing all evidence that it had ever been there in the first place.
"Hermione?" She looked up quickly, startled. It was a few seconds of silence before she realized that her mum was waiting for a response. "Coming, mum," she called in reply before pushing the heavy book off of her lap and rising from her bed. She walked the short distance from her room to the slightly larger room where her family cooked and ate meals, taking the chance to stretch her legs as she did so.
She entered the room with a forced smile on her face, one which she often wore when she was around her parents in an attempt to discourage them feeling sorry for her.
The smile was short-lived. Both her parents wore pained expressions, and it was clear from her mum's red eyes and nose that she had been crying quite a lot recently. She came to sit opposite them at their rickety old table, brow creasing with concern.
"Hermione," her father began, his voice cracking. "We...there's something you must know. We thought it best to tell you now, rather than have you find out later." He cleared his throat. Her heart began to pound faster.
"We...you...oh, pumpkin, please don't hate us," her mother pleaded in a broken-sounding voice. This proved too worrying to complain about her mum's overused pet name for her. Hermione's eyes widened even as she reached across the table-top to place her hand on top of her mum's weathered one. "What? What is it?" she asked in a hushed tone, alarm beginning to make its way into her voice.
Her father cleared his throat again. "We...well, you see- we aren't your parents." His voice, too, had gone soft, yet Hermione felt as though the words had struck her like a blow to the stomach. She jerked her hand back from where it had rested on top of her mum's, clutching it with her other hand as though she'd been burned. She was distantly aware that her mother had begun to cry, but she couldn't quite focus on anything.
"What? Then who are you?" she demanded, horrified. Some obscure part of her screamed at her to run, to hide, to ready herself for a fight, although she pushed it down. She wasn't going to be attacked by these people, whoever they were. They may not have been her parents, but that didn't have to mean that their intentions were to harm her. That sort of thing only happened in movies and films…
Against all of her better judgement, she braced her hands against the table and tensed her legs, ready to jump up and run if she needed to.
Her mother took a deep, shuddering breath. "We aren't...well, I suppose that's not exactly right. We are who you think we are…Janice and Michael Pendleton. But...you aren't our real daughter. Not by birth, anyway," she finished awkwardly.
Hermione could only stare.
Her father gave her a weak smile. "It must have been...what, sixteen years ago now? We…," he exhaled slowly, rubbing his hand along his rapidly graying hairline. "We'd only just found out that we weren't going to be able to have children," he said quietly. "Then one night...it was raining, I remember, and we heard a baby crying from outside...Janice went to go look, and...there you were. On our doorstep. Wrapped in a thin blanket and nestled in a wicker basket."
Hermione's jaw had long since fallen open. "You got me off the streets?" she choked out, feeling tears burning at the backs of her eyes. She felt numb all over. She wanted nothing more than for this all to have been one giant, cruel joke.
But it wasn't, from the incredibly apologetic looks on her parents' faces. And that made the joke all the more crueler.
Her mother let out a ragged sob. "No, no, dear...it wasn't like that..." She lapsed into tears once again and was unable to say any more.
It was her father's turn to reach out and clasp Hermione's hand tightly in his. She fought back both her tears and the urge to pull away. He pulled a small, crumpled piece of parchment from his shirt pocket. "This was with you when we found you," he said, placing the paper in her open palm. She squinted down at the tiny slip in her hand to study it. Tears pooled in her eyes and spilled unchecked down her cheeks.
The paper had nothing on it except for two words and some sort of crest.
Hermione Granger, the paper read in messy, scribbled handwriting.
Below that, there was what appeared at first to be a large blot of ink. Upon closer inspection, Hermione was just able to make out a coat of arms split into four surrounded by intricate embellishments. Each quarter of the crest had a different blotchy shape, but time had left its mark and the lines were too smudged and faded to tell what the little figures were meant to be.
She met her parents' gazes once again, tears blurring her vision. "What's this symbol?" she asked, unable to suppress her curiosity even in circumstances like the ones she was facing now.
Her parents shared an uneasy look. Her mum bit her lip, and Hermione wasn't sure if it was an effort to stop crying or merely a nervous gesture.
Her father was the one to break the uncomfortable silence that had settled upon the family of three. "We asked around, but nobody seemed to know what it meant. Finally...do you know Mr. Nickels?"
Hermione gaped openly. "You don't mean that creepy old man who lives at the edge of town?"
Her father nodded grimly. "He told us that it's the crest of a wizarding school. A school for people who do...magic," he explained, clearly still not entirely accustomed to the idea.
At this, Hermione couldn't help but release a sharp and somewhat hysterical laugh. "Do you mean to tell me that you honestly believe that crazy old madman? He's bloody insane! This is bloody insane! Magic? Have you gone mad?" she yelled, growing more and more distressed until she found herself standing, towering above her parents- no, liars who said they were my parents, she corrected herself.
Her father stared at her, suddenly looking very old and frightened. "Hermione," he began in a trembling voice.
She didn't let him finish. A cold certainty had settled over her. Gone was the madness, the hysteria. She suddenly found herself able to think clearly. She turned on her heel and raced back to her room, grabbing the nearest sack and stuffing it with everything she owned that was important to her- not much. Clothes, a few small books, the tin that she kept her money in. She paused only when she came across a tarnished picture frame of her parents, both smiling. She stopped where she stood, gazing blankly down at the picture that had once been her most prized possession.
"Hermione!"
"Hermione, dear-!"
Her parents, she realized, had caught up to her. They now stood, distraught and disheveled, in the doorway of her bedroom. She made no sign of acknowledging their presence, keeping her eyes glued to the photograph in her hand. The picture no longer held any sentimental value to her. It didn't mean family anymore. It meant…
Betrayal.
Lies.
The room was closing in around her. The walls that had watched her grow up inside of them now felt like a prison. She was being forced into herself more and more with every second she spent inside that room.
Something exploded, deep inside of her. She threw the picture frame violently to the ground, relishing the smashing noise that it made. She met her parents' terrified stares at last with a cold fire in her eyes. Wordlessly, she pushed past them, out of her bedroom and out the splintered wooden door of her house, not even bothering to close it behind her.
"Hermione!" she heard from behind her- loud, desperate, anguished.
She felt nothing still.
A voice in her head told her that she was making a mistake. She had to go back now. The voice shrieked at her to turn back, and run into the loving arms of her parents, and go back to…
To what? Being whispered about? Being pointed at? Being different?
Being lonely?
Clenching her jaw like her life depended on it, she picked up her pace, walking briskly down the road of the tiny town where she'd spent her childhood being shunned by her peers.
Before she knew it, she'd come to the edge of town.
She knew it was her last chance to turn back and be forgiven for her outburst.
She continued on.
She did not look back.
Not once.