Author's Note: Been on an organization kick lately, and found this bad boy in my documents. Based on a prompt.
Warning: This is dark, and with noncon/dubcon elements. Read with caution.
Heart Shaped Box
Hermione laughed as she leaned against Ron, the sound bright and merry and too loud. Her head swooned with the drinks she had with dinner, her limbs heavy and warm. Funny, how wine could make someone feel so light and free while weighing them down, turning their legs to lead so that she stomped too harshly on the heels of her shoes, her arms smacking Ron as if of their own volition.
Her laughing stilted, and she tried to look properly apologetic, but he simply laughed, wrapping an arm around her shoulder and pulling her against him.
"You're such a lightweight, 'Mione." He chuckled good-naturally, the sound tapering off as his smile slipped, color pooling his cheeks in sudden embarrassment. He slowed his steps until they came to a halt, standing beside a looming tree, branches and wispy leaves curling over the path they walked on like fingers reaching for them, trying to pluck them from where they stood. He cleared his throat. "I've got one more present for you-"
"Oh, Ronald," she sighed, smiling slyly. "You've already done so much. The flowers and chocolates-" She drifted off, gaze swimming until she stared up at the night sky. It was a clear night, the sky a soft, velvety black, the stars hot pinpricks of light that twinkled in and out of existence. The moon was still settled low in the horizon, a slim crescent cutting into the blackness.
"But I wanted to get you a real gift this time," he said, and she winced, thankful her face was tipped upward. They had been together for four years now, and she knew his insecurities regarding wealth was always a sore spot for him. No matter how much she assured him- they were still so young and building their careers, and she didn't need or want to be plied with gifts- she knew nothing would ever quite abate the covetous way he regarded others with more.
"Ronald, really, you shouldn't have, I didn't get you anything- you should return it-"
But he ignored her, pulling a box from the inner pocket of his worn cloak, his gloved hands moving awkwardly through the motions.
It was a sizable box- far too large to be a ring box, a small voice within her head noted, relief sobering her. She loved Ron, she truly did. But they were young and there was still so much for her to do to be tied down with an engagement.
The box was awkward because of its shape, the red satin wrapped over a heart shaped box, and he was thrusting it forward, urging it into her hands before she could remember her protests only seconds earlier.
"Go on, open it," he urged, chewing his lip in the nervous manner she found endearing, his eyes bright with wine and excitement.
She did, holding the box in one hand as the other reached out to touch the locket that sat upon the velvet cushion. The finish was a tarnished gold, as if it had gone neglected for too long, forgotten at the bottom of a jewelry box. The locket itself was a smooth oval, and brilliant, lustrous gems winked up at her as she twisted and turned it in her grasp, the emeralds catching the light offered by the street lamps. They curled on the face of a locket, locking almost serpentine, and forming an 'S'.
"It's not really your style, and I know the 'S' doesn't make sense, but...I don't know, it just sort of called to me. And I couldn't stop thinking about it, or you in it for weeks after seeing it and thankfully it was still in the shop when I finally caved and-"
He was mumbling, a stream of consciousness as he shrugged anxiously, averting his gaze and slumping so that his tall and lanky frame shrunk before her.
She leaned up, silencing him with a press of her lips to his. The kiss was chaste and simple, but he was grinning widely all the same when she pulled back. "I love it, thank you. Even if the 'S' doesn't make sense," she said with a laugh.
"It can stand for 'smart'. Or 'sexy,'" he said, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively at her, the gesture exaggerated and comical. She laughed again, swatting at him playfully as she pulled the locket from the box. "Let me."
She handed it off to him, turning around and pulling her curls away from her neck as he reached around her. He clasped the necklace together, dropping it so that the locket fell against her skin, resting just between her breasts. She recoiled, expecting the metal to be chilled from the bitter February night, but it wasn't.
It was warm, and felt more like a palm coming to rest below her collar bone than jewelry.
"Looks even better than I thought it would on you," Ron said, pulling her flush against him and snaking his arms around her waist. "In fact, remember that scene from that muggle film you showed me? The one with the boat?"
"Ronald!" she hissed scandalously, but her laughter bubbled traitorously, the alcohol making it impossible to even pretend to be mad or prudish. She felt not just warm, but hot now, her skin burning paradoxically against the biting wind that wound around her.
Perhaps she shouldn't have drank as much as she did, her head beginning to swoon in a way that was less light and delightful and more dangerous, like she was careening over a canyon.
"Happy Valentine's day," Ron said, the words tangible things as he bent forward and captured her mouth in his.
~x~
"It's beautiful, I just can't ever seem to get it open. Even magic doesn't work," Hermione said with a frown, twirling the locket in her fingers.
Ginny sat back in her chair with a thoughtful frown, drumming her fingers against the surface of Hermione's desk. "Maybe you should tell Ron, and he can bring it back to the shop. They might be able to fix it. And if not, maybe they'll let him get something else. Something a little more..well, you," she said with a shrug.
Hermione shook her head, her thumb idly pulling at where she knew the clasp was. It had been two weeks since Ron had gifted her the necklace, and she still had yet to get it open. It was frustrating, a curiosity that came and went over the days. "No, I can't. He'll feel awful if there's anything wrong with it, and besides, it's not terribly important. It's still pretty. It's not something I would normally get but its grown on me. And he was so excited, Ginny!"
She huffed, flicking her red hair over her shoulder as she leaned forward, reaching out. "Still, it's a bit concerning even magic won't open it. Let me try-"
Her fingers brushed against the emerald gems before snapping back, hissing sharply. She curled her fingers into her palm, pulled her hand against her chest as her back straightened. "It shocked me," she said, her words heavy and laden with something that irritated Hermione, even as she widened her eyes in concern.
"Are you alright?" she asked, though the words sounded flat, even to her.
Ginny scowled, eyes narrowing into slits. "Maybe you should bring the necklace down to the auror department. There's something wrong with it."
Perhaps it was the accusatory tone, or the condescending words that were nestled within it, but the interaction thrummed at her, pulling at the fraying ends of her nerves. It felt as if her patience was being chipped at, chiseled into.
"It's got some standard protection and anti-theft charms on it, but nothing malicious. I would never wear something daily without investigating. Do you think me stupid? Or incompetent?" she snapped, the words poison that she savored like wine, a satisfying feeling burning within her.
Ginny reeled, a moment of shock pulling at her features that was soon eclipsed by something else. Anger.
"I was just trying to help-"
"I don't need it."
Ginny snorted derisively, her chair screeching painfully across the floorboards as she pushed it back and stood up. "Not help that I can offer, clearly."
The comment was muttered below her breath, but Hermione still heard it, and something coiled uncomfortably within her. Like the serpent that curled over the pendant to the very necklace in question. She wanted to grab hold of the first thing before her- a book, a mug of tea, a weighted device used to detect curses that primarily operated as a paperweight- and toss it through the air. Wanted to hear the gratifying clunk of something smacking into the head of orange hair.
But the impulse died nearly as quick as it came, and though Hermione flexed the muscles in her hand-the tendons popping grotesquely against her skin- the fingers remained curled around the locket. Protective.
The door to her office slammed shut, shaking in its frame as Ginny left her alone.
~x~
Waves crashed along a jagged shore, like the roar of a dragon, heavy and foreboding. The air was thick with the smell of salt, damp as though a storm were on her heels, approaching the cavern that she sat within. The rocks were slick, treacherous beneath her bare soles, her blood mixing with the water that pooled on the floor of the cave in pockets, stale and stagnant, dead bugs floating over the surface. The rocks cut against her feet, but she paid it no mine, unbothered as she moved further into the cave, deeper. The smell of saltwater vanished, replaced by the smell of the cave. Damp and cold, dead in the way things were when humans abandoned them, frozen in a moment of time that did not exist on a linear spectrum.
It was a stark contrast, the air within the cave so different from the air outside of it. No whipping wind, made painful by the salt that grated against her cheek and eyes. No storm threatening to overwhelm her, drag her down into the waves below. It was still, quiet in here- a moment of seclusion carved within the face of the hill.
"Hello?" she called, her voice echoing through the cave, bouncing between the stalactites and stalagmites.
Silence was the only answer that met her, punctuated by the occasional drip of water as it fell from above, the sound of water sloshing around as she waded though the puddles.
Drip.
Slosh.
Drip.
Slosh.
The rhythm was broken suddenly by a loud and blaring sound, a siren that flared around her, vibrating in her skull. She shouted, raising her palms to her ear but it offered no relief, as if it was alarming within her brain, nestled within the folds. Screaming erupted, and she fell to the side just as two children ran passed her. A boy and a girl, nearly drowned out by the wailing of the siren, were racing to the mouth of the cave. The girl slipped, her screams turning to cries of anguish as she fell to the uneven floor, hands catching on sharpened stone. Like teeth, fangs erupting through the earth. Blood spilled from her palms, bright and red before diluting into the puddles.
The boy continued without her, disappearing as his own screams became distant, buried by the siren.
She pulled herself up, following after him.
The siren came to an abrupt stop, jarring Hermione with the silence, the nothingness that existed. Her ears rang, a mimicry of the siren, an echo. And she blinked in confusion, looking around the once more silent cave.
"Hello?"
"Hello."
She jumped, turned in the direction of the sound.
A little boy stood before her, his face more serious than she had ever seen on a child, save only from the photos of herself at such a young age. Dark hair bled into the shadows of the cave, as though he were a part of the cave, dissolving into it. He said nothing, lips curving into a small, tilted smile, and her gaze fell to his feet, where a large snake sat wound around his ankles.
And then she was drowning, pulled underneath the surface of the ground that had now become a deep, bottomless lake. Water compressed her, suffocated her, spilled into her open mouth and filled her lungs. She was being pulled under, pulled by hundreds of hands that grabbed at her, tugged at her clothes, pulled her head back so that she was contorted beneath the water.
Hands gripped at her, grabbing at her shoulders and shaking her. She awoke to screaming and the shouting of her own name, a symphony of noises that ratcheted around her skull, startled her from her dreams. Her heart hammered in her ribs, uneven and unsteady like her lungs that struggled to expand with air.
She choked on her own breath as she sat upright in bed, blankets wound like a rope around her ankles and legs. Sweat slicked her skin, fevered and flushed.
Ron held onto her shoulders, but she shirked away from his grasp- his touch felt like oppression, like the waves that beat against the cavern, the water that drowned her, consumed her. Her chest rose and fell in a quick, unsteady rhythm; the fear and panic of her dream bleeding into reality, bleeding into the sanctity of her bedroom and the safety found within it. She leaned over the side of the bed, letting her feet touch the floor. It was cold, unpleasant. And in its unpleasantness it was grounding, an anchor she could hold herself to as her breath evened out, as she hunched forward with the memory of her fear and certain death became nebulous.
She was alright, she wasn't drowning. She was alive.
A palm fell onto her back, slowly rubbing soothing circles.
"Are you okay?" Ron asked, voice warm with sleep and worry.
After a moment, she nodded. "Yes. It was just a dream. I'm sorry."
The bed creaked, mattress shifting with Ron's weight. She heard the rustling of the covers and knew that he stood up even before he came around the bed, leaning down to meet her eye level. His hair was a mess- he needed a cut. Ginger strands sticking up at every angle, brushing over his eyes, narrowed in concern. "I'll go make you some tea, yeah?" he said after a moment, smiling a tilted smile. As if tea would be the cure all, vanish the thought of death and the uneasy feeling that made her swoon.
She swallowed thickly, nodding. "Some tea would be lovely, thank you."
She wondered why it was a struggle to swallow the words she almost said. Hold herself back from clawing at him, bubbling over with rage. Why she had to hold herself back from hurting him.
~x~
Hermione laid her head down on her desk, groaning and running her fingers through her curls, disheveling her hair even more. She felt awful, her head heavy and aching, pulsing at every creak and groan that broke the silence. Every sound seemed amplified, all the lights too bright.
Not even any of the tonics or elixirs worked to alleviate the ache, or abate the nausea twisting in her stomach. She needed to rest, sleep the day and the illness away.
Rising slowly from her desk, head bowed and settled into her palm as if it were splitting apart, her hand the only thing keeping her together. She weaved her way from the corner of her flat she used as an office, having to brace herself against the wall to not fall or run into anything, tracing the route to her bedroom from memory. She felt drunk, intoxicated on something foul and sour, something that slithered in her veins and corroded her from the inside out. Like she was full of venom but not immune to its effects, growing weaker and weaker as each pump of her heart ushered the venom further through her.
She kicked open the door, taking five wobbling steps before flopping onto her bed, groaning loudly. Even the mattress and pillows felt too hard, too unforgiving.
Her skin burned, tacky with sweat that made her clothes cling to her. With her eyes squeezed tight and with frantic, grasping motions, she pulled at her clothes, trying to undress with as little movements as she could. She shimmied her hips against the mattress, kicking her pajama pants off before sliding out of her top.
Cold air brushed against her skin, but the relief was short-lived. Her fever was all consuming, burning from within.
'I just need to sleep,' she thought, the only concise and clear thought she had within the fog. Sleep came upon her suddenly and without warning, and she settled into the bed like a weight.
~x~
Hermione sighed contentedly, arching her back to meet the touch, fingers tracing the delicate curve of her spine. The touch sent sparks through her, igniting and sparking her nerves. The sensation was foreign, unlike anything else she had ever experienced.
A fever dream, she thought, recalling the few moments in her life when she had been dreadfully ill and spent hours twisting with strange, hyper realistic dreams.
At least this one was pleasant.
The hand tugged at her curls, brushed over the curve of her shoulder. She was a canvas to brushstrokes, the hand painting soothing arches and swirls over her skin, cooling her and pulling her down from the painful, fevered high of her illness. It felt so real, so startlingly real, that for a moment she wondered if maybe this wasn't a dream. Maybe she slept all through the day and Ron came home and crawled into bed with her, draping his chest over her like a blanket that was calming and cooling instead of oppressive.
"Ron?" she mumbled, the words muffled by the pillows her face was buried in.
The hand stopped in its path, nails digging into the flesh of her shoulder. She hissed, twisting around to look around her. The room was shrouded in a thick, swirling fog, a dim, emerald glow bathing the white walls. But the mysterious fog was the least of her concerns, and she gasped, pulling herself up at the sight of snakes slithering across the room.
They were all green, the same color of the emerald snake settled on her locket. Some where small and thin, only recognizable by the hard glint of their scales as they twisted around her bedpost, slithered along the floor. Some were monstrous in size, the spear shaped head rising from the tightly coiled body that sat like a basket, their middles bulbous and twice the size of Hermione's forearm.
"Don't worry, they won't hurt you," a voice said, drawing her attention away from the snakes. A man was sitting just before her- on top of her, one long leg settled between her thighs, clad in simple slacks. He was handsome, but in a striking, terrifying way.
In the same way that the crack of lightning on earth was beautiful. In the same way an ocean that raged and pulled and crashed against the earth and threatened to pull you under, drag into the depths where sunlight was scarce and massive creatures loomed. He was beautiful in a dangerous way, with a face that was just shy of too sharp, perfectly carved cheekbones and a wide, chiseled jaw. His skin was smooth, the color of stone, and his hair was the color of ink, soft and polished curls that made hers look even more wild by comparison.
But none of it compared to his eyes, bridging a cap between human and bestial. The color was the most alarming; the iris a fractured kaleidoscope of reds, maroons and scarlets encompassing the pupil- not round necessarily, but the shape of a diamond with the edges smoothed, like a cat's eye. The eye shape was human, though the upward tilt of the outter corner was just too high to be natural, altered ever so slightly by a charm or spell.
Or curse.
"Who are you?" she asked, wondering why, even in a dream, this stranger might grace her. Surely, she would remember someone like this. Someone so beautiful in the most terrific of ways, like a storm or feat of nature so remarkable that ancient civilizations devised gods to explain them.
Her mind, no matter how plagued by sickness, could ever create someone like this.
"I've been with you for only a short time, Hermione, but I must admit, I've grown alarmingly fond of you," he spoke, his voice deep yet sibilant, just as unnatural in the slightest of ways as the rest of him. Like the edges of his words, the inflection at the end of them, was uttered by something inhuman.
She eyed the snakes from her periphery.
When she turned her gaze back to him, he was closer than she recalled, though she felt no shift in the mattress, even as he was now hovering over her, forcing her to shrink back against the pillows. But he made no move to harm her, and she made no move to protect herself, an odd sort of calm warming over her in his presence. The agitation and anger that trembled within her, dominated her for what seemed like an eternity was gone, replaced by a peace that felt foreign to her now.
How long had it been since she felt content?
When nightmares of mysterious crying children no longer plagued her nights? Nightmares of waves crashing against jagged stone, sirens crying through the air as soldiers marched down a street; white rabbits kicking frantically as they were hung from rafters, red ribbon tied around their brittle necks?
How strange, that she would finally find solace in the height of a dream wrought by a strange illness.
"I was going to consume you, drain you of everything until there was nothing left but a shell- rotting flesh falling of shattered bones. I was going to bring myself back to my former glory through you," he spoke, the 's' sound stretched out just half a second longer than all the others, an aborted hiss. "But I've grown rather attached to you-" he paused, chuckling as if he had made a clever joke.
Perhaps he had, and Hermione was simply not in on it.
"Who are you?" she asked again, wondering once more who this man was. This man who spoke of consuming her whole, this man who made something so threatening and illicit sound wonderful, like a thrill that ignited something within her. A warming within her that pooled at the apex of her thighs.
He smiled, the action making him look all the more beautiful, all the more feral.
"I'm everything you've ever wanted, every selfish desire you denied yourself for some noble or chivalrous reason. I'm the monster that lived inside your head, that survived on a steady diet of your fears and hate and avarice. So much like my own when stripped to their barest." He was moving on her, slinking like the many serpents that crowded her, slipping within her thighs that she hadn't even realized she spread for him, his hips fighting nicely between them. One hand roved over her side, feeling the bare skin that cooled comfortably at his touch, the other settling on on her neck, just below her jaw so that his thumb could trace small circles across her chin.
She should have been embarrassed by her nudity, wearing nothing but her knickers and the locket that seared between her breasts, pulsing as if alive and to the same steady beat of her heart. As if it were a pulse, as if it were just as much a part of her as her veins and her bones and the flesh that held it all together.
As if it had replaced her heart.
She should have been embarrassed about dreaming of someone so unlike the man she loved, the man she had devoted years to.
But it was just a dream, no more odd than the dreams of rabbits and soldiers and war sirens. And no one would ever know if she indulged the burning within her, if she extinguished the flame by drowning herself in everything this man would offer.
If he fed on her selfish desires, she would let him indulge in them.
She pushed forward, letting her lips touch his. It was soft at first, delicate. But he growled into her mouth, sending a ripple of sensations through her. And he pushed her down, the hand around her throat tight and constricting as he kissed her hard and reckless. Kissed her as if he still wished to consume her.
Perhaps he did.
His tongue slipped into her mouth, and she gasped, startled before realization dawned on her; this strange serpentine man with ruby eyes and a court of snakes had a forked tongue. It should have horrified her, repulsed her.
But it didn't. It intrigued her, fanned the flames of desire and evoked a groan as her own tongue pressed against his, experimentally prodding at the muscle that split in two. Her thoughts turned filthy, her natural curiosity piqued by the prospect of such a tongue and what it could do.
How it might undo her.
As if reading her salacious thoughts, he pulled away from her lips- swollen and bruised- and began dragging his tongue down her neck, pressing against the soft column of her throat, against where he knew her pulse point to be. A wet trail marked his descent, chilled from the air that brushed against it, and she hissed sharply when his lips clasped around a nipple. His tongue flicked rapidly over it, turning it erect and sending a sharp jolt of electricity that shot down her spine.
Her back arched as if she were a bow, trying to give him better access but pulling up and away from him as if the simple touch was overwhelming, the unique nature of his tongue encompassing the sensitive peak. She had never been so wanton to be with more than one person at a time- had never even slept with someone other than Ron- but she wondered if this was what it might feel like. A split tongue that settled around her, toyed at her from every angle.
She moaned, the sound guttural, as the hand that wasn't curled around her neck wrapped around her other breast, pinching the nipple between his thumb and forefinger. Too much, too much…
Yet not enough, her center dampening, aching in want. She wanted more than this.
"So needy," the man said, humor warming his words as he pulled his mouth away from her nipple, glossy from his attention. "How long have you waited for someone like me? Waiting for someone to come along and awaken you to your wants?"
The question needed no answer, as he was soon tracing his tongue down the soft curve of her belly, pulling his hand away from her neck to loop within the band of her knickers and pull them down. She raised herself up, her stomach fluttering at the feeling of the fabric slouching down her thighs, down her legs, until they were tossed aside and he was settling between her once more, a hand on either side of her hips. His thumbs pressed into the indent created by her hip bone, massaging over the skin slowly, sensuously, as he inched ever closer to the mound of wiry hair.
Her breathing hitched, and she was struck by how vivid this dream was. How the fog that swirled around her seemed to glint with opalescent swirls, how the touch of his fingertips created gooseflesh that prickled her skin.
How she keened and bucked her hips humiliatingly upward as he continued to ignore her center, smoothing his palms over the inside of her thigh.
It all felt so real.
"You could do so much more than you're doing, Hermione. Have so much more than you have. If you just let me slip into your heart, worm myself inside."
She thought of parasites; of bacteria and cancer and poltergeists that turned your own malevolent thoughts against you.
"I can free you from this prison you've made yourself," he purred, and before she could even wonder what he might have meant he bowed his head and dragged his tongue in one long, languid motion.
She inhaled sharply, her breaths turning into ragged pants as he lapped at her clit, either side of his tongue wrapping around her. Twirling in circles that made her moan, made her heart and the locket that mirrored it skip over a beat, pound faster and harder within her ribs. Her legs twitched, the muscles tensing painfully as she settled them over his shoulders, pushing herself closer to him, begging for more even if it was already becoming too much. Something winding within her, the pressure building and building.
She was so slicked with her arousal that she hardly noticed when he slipped a finger within her cunt, beckoning against her walls as if urging her toward the precipice. She twisted against him, hips bucking even as she tried to still them, a filthy, incomprehensible stream of words spilling from her lips as she cried out for release.
She found it when he pulled his fingers out, replaced it with his tongue.
She shouted as she hit the crest of her orgasm, a hand diving down to entwine in the man's hair, pulling too roughly as her muscles spasmed, constricting with the overwhelming pressure. Her eyes clamped tightly shut, an eruption of fireworks dazzling across the black canvas of her eyelids.
He continued to lick her even as she came, his tongue tasting the deepest parts of her, separating at the fork like two fingers.
A very, very vivid dream.
Her muscles felt heavy, her energy drained, and she panted, her legs slipping from his shoulders as he pulled himself up, tongue trailing an opposite path than it had earlier. He was moving up her now, dragging his teeth along her skin and biting sharply at her collarbone.
He was speaking, but his words were lost to her, drifting in and out like radio static, or the chirping of cicadas on a summer evening. "I'll be back for you...you belong to me now..." He settled between her thighs as he pushed into her, the intrusion making her breath hitch as her head lolled to the side. She was drained and weightless, a ship lost to the tumultuous waves of a dangerous sea. The same sea that crashed against the jagged rocks in her dreams.
"I have seen your mind at it's worst and most sinful, your heart at its coldest, and it is mine…I can make you more than you've ever imagined...if you just give in." His own words were broken apart by his breathing, growing louder and more strained with each thrust. She was drifting, caught between dreaming and consciousness, those last few moments of a dream where they lingered with reality, becoming faint and nebulous.
Something moved around her, a sensation beyond the body that pressed into her, pressed her deeper into the mattress. Beyond the teeth that nipped into her flesh between polished words and promises that seemed like a prayer to the wrong god.
Something was slithering around her, wrapping around her ankles, stretching across her breasts her and between the man that loomed over her. Curling around her limp thigh, cold scales chilling the sensitive flesh. Serpents twisted in her hair, lost within the wild curls strewn across her pillow. A halo of snakes.
She remembered the story of Medusa, with hair like snakes that turned men to stone.
She remembered that in the full story, Medusa had been attacked and tormented, had been given the gift of protection from her Goddess. The same gift that would have her hunted, used as a prop for eternity.
Warmth blossomed within her, the man draping his body over hers as his movements slowed before stilling entirely, his breath curling around her ear, tickling the small hairs on her earlobe. The world was fading, her senses dimming.
The last thing she heard before everything dissolved to nothing was the whispered word "mine", like a hiss splicing through the air.
~x~
"Hermione!"
She startled, sitting up from the bed, swaying as if inebriated. She raised a hand to her head, wincing as consciousness came upon her slowly, achingly. She didn't feel nearly as sick as she had before laying down for a rest, but her head still swooned.
"Hermione!"
The sound was louder this time, and she winced, annoyance flaring within her, the peace and contentedness of her dream forgotten. Her dream…
It existed in bits and pieces, small clips that were shrouded in a gossamer veil, almost entirely forgotten. She remembered the intensity of it, an overwhelming amount of sensation, a feeling of peace that had evaded her for too long. She remembered details- snakes covering her floor, crawling over her. The man…
She shuddered, embarrassed now in her awakened state as she recalled the scene that had played out before, the dirty and perverse things her mind had summoned for her. It had felt so real…
Someone knocked on the door. "Hermione? Are you in there? Feeling any better?"
She jumped up, not wanting to be caught in such a disheveled state. It had only been a dream, and yet her stomach twisted in guilt, and she felt…
Dirty. Coated in a thin layer of sweat, undressed from when she pulled her clothes off in a desperate attempt for relief. She was even still damp, the remnants of her dream clinging to her thighs and making them tacky.
She ran into the conjoined bathroom just as Ron entered their room, turning the shower on and letting it warm before stepping aside.
She cracked the door open just enough for her voice to carry through. "Sorry, Ron, I'm taking a shower and didn't hear you come in."
She could hear him shuffling through the room, the familiar clink of him setting his wand down on the bedside table.
"You feeling better? Mum knows you haven't been yourself lately, so she sent over some soup and cottage pie. She'll make something else though if it bothers your stomach, she said. I think she might be hoping to hear news of another grandchild," he rambled behind the door, ending on a chuckling that she knew meant he was nervous.
The quirk irritated her, wedging beneath her skin like a splinter.
"No grandchildren," she snapped back, unable to stop the vitriol from seeping into her words.
Steam was beginning to billow from the shower, encasing her in a fog that made her brain twinge uncomfortably. She shook her head, as if shaking the thoughts loose.
"Alright, well, I'll talk to you when you're done," Ron said. The statement was followed by the sound of his steps as he walked away, the bedroom door clicking in it's frame.
She sighed, sagging as she leaned against the door, closing it firmly. What was wrong with her? It was as if she were spinning out of control, the tenuous restraint of her emotions slipping further from her grasp. She was a rubber band that was pulled too taut, straining until it would snap. Her anger came to her swiftly, her frustrations mounting.
She was a disease, infecting everyone around her.
How long before Ron's patience wore out on her and he left her and her bitterness behind? Before he stopped being concerned about her sudden personality shift and resented her for it?
She should see a healer. Between how ill she had been all morning and her mood swings- perhaps Molly wasn't entirely wrong to assume grandchildren were within the near future.
The thought made her groan, and she closed her eyes and rubbed her head as it ached and throbbed against the confines of her skull. Sliding down the length of the door, she sat on the tiles- cold against her flesh- and crossed her legs, cradling her head in her hand. The air in the lavatory was quickly becoming hot and oppressive, and she wanted to leave but she felt disgusting. Coated in sweat and the arousal from her vivid dream, coming to her in choppy, distorted recollections, the few scenes she did remember making her blush. Her hair clung to her forehead and neck, frizzy and damp and suffocating, the strands like a noose tied loosely around her throat.
She took a deep, calming breath, trying to sort out any riotous thoughts and collect her bearings. She would shower, wash away the grime and filth that coated her like a film, and then she would hug Ron, apologize for her short temper lately, promise to see a mediwitch.
She opened her eyes, ready to stand on shaking legs when something stopped her, her palms pressed flat against the tiled floor. Bruises littered her inner thighs, small and purple splotches the size of a fingerprint, as if someone had grabbed her legs too roughly. Her right thigh was marred by several small indents that curved in a crescent shape, almost lost in the thin, silvery lines that trailed along the inner most part of her thigh.
Teeth marks.
She swallowed roughly, her breath turning erratic. They weren't there before, she was certain of that.
Panic filled her, making her lungs burn and constrict and contract quickly, yet they never seemed to fill. The air was too thin, too hot, and she couldn't breathe.
She was suffocating, tendrils of steam surrounding her, slipping within her and shriveling her. Her throat burned, a noose tightening, and her hand flew to wrap around it, pull away at whatever threatened to choke her.
There was nothing, just her pulse which trembled in an unsteady staccato beneath her skin. And the chain of her locket, the metal warm to the touch, the pendant settling in the dip between her collar bones.
Had it always been this short?
Her fingers curled around the chain, desperate for relief and for air so she could breathe and think rationally and surely there was a logical reason for the splotches that covered her legs and the half moon bite marks and she would find that reason once she could breathe-
She pulled on the chain, but it resisted, the dainty clasp stronger than she had ever anticipated. It burned, stung the palm of her hand as it sliced into her and she released her hold, fearing it would sever the fingers from her hand like a hot wire. She hissed at the pain, unfurling her fingers, sticky with the blood that smeared her palm.
Maybe she was still dreaming, she tried to tell herself, tried to make sense of the dread that filled her stomach like iron. She tried desperately to not panic, though her thoughts spiraled, turning faster and faster than she could stop them
Maybe she was still dreaming, or she had never been dreaming at all-
It felt so real. So vivid.
She was going to be sick, her stomach churning and bile burning the back of her throat. It was funny then, that in her nausea and fear and panic that she could recall the dream so suddenly. Each detail returning to her in picture perfect clarity.
The fine silver mist that crawled over her, the weight of the man sitting atop her, the feel of his lips on hers.
Of his tongue, the split muscle the enveloped and encompassed her more fully than she ever imagined. Snakes circling her, winding within her hair.
She pulled herself aside just in time to vomit, pulling the bin towards her and heaving, shoulders shaking.
A hand rested on her back, rubbing soft, soothing circles along her spine.
She felt the words rather than heard them, curling around her ear. "I told you...you're mine."