Chapter One - Another Book Was Opened
That there should be some fire even after this life is not incredible, and it can be inquired into and either be discovered or left hidden whether some of the faithful may be saved - St Augustine of Hippo
Department of Mysteries, 31st October 2001.
In all of the noise and the chaos, she never saw the jet of light that hit her.
Hermione woke with a vicious pain in her head, a dry mouth that tasted horrible, and, on carefully cracking open one crusted eyelid, then the other, the dawning realisation that she did not recognise the opulent green bed hangings above her head.
This wasn't her bed.
She squeezed her eyes shut, counting slowly to three before opening them again, hopefully.
Fuck.
This definitely wasn't her own bed.
She was also, she realised, wriggling under the weight of silky sheets and heavy damask coverlet, completely and utterly naked.
Fuck.
Okay. okay. Hermione rubbed at her sore head as she desperately tried to recall the events of the previous evening. A few memory lapses after a heavy session weren't completely unheard of - see last New Years Eve and the missing sequence of events that led to her snogging Charlie Weasley in the downstairs loo at Harry and Ginny's party - but an entire night? Hermione's tummy squirmed as she gazed anxiously up at the weak sunlight filtering through the green hangings. A distinctly Slytherin green. That was ominous. She was quite sure she was not going to be happy to see the owner of those hangings, but she really needed to figure out where the hell she was, what the hell had happened last night and how to extricate herself immediately from what she was sure was going to be an exquisitely awful situation.
Hermione held her breath and gingerly turned her head, trying her best not to rustle the sheets, to see that the other pillow was -
Oh, thank Merlin, empty.
She sat up and drew her knees to her chest under the covers. She wasn't a saint, by any means, she was a normal twenty-two year old woman with normal, healthy appetites, but she'd never found herself in quite this position before, unlike some of her friends and colleagues. Last month, Ron had woken next to one of the Patil twins, admitting when he arrived home, dishevelled and hungover, that he couldn't quite remember which one.
Harry's victory over Voldemort a couple of years ago had not brought the clear end to the war they'd hoped for. His remaining supporters - the ones wno'd managed to slip through the net after the Battle of Hogwarts, had gone underground, and while mass-murder was thankfully no longer their MO the remaining Death Eaters had split into cells, successfully gaining control of the criminal underworld, involved in everything from illegal potions supply and the trade in Dark Objects to kidnapping, assassination and murder.
Harry and Ron had accepted invitations to join the Aurory immediately, working hard to prove themselves as more than poster boys and building up an excellent reputation as investigators. Harry's recklessness had been restrained by the rigorous training and growing understanding that he needed to work as part of a team to be successful and Ron's strategic mind had truly come into its own. Hermione had returned to study for a short while, completing her NEWTs and some independent study before accepting a role in an intriguingly new, small team in the DMLE, who studied Magical and Muggle law as well as a criminal psychology, to support the Aurory in their cases against the remaining Death Eaters and linked criminal groups.
Heavy losses in the DMLE due to the war on Voldemort - injury and deaths in action as well as those convicted of collaboration meant the department had a large number of young, war-hardened staff, who worked hard and partied harder.
Hermione sighed. She might not be the first to get rat-arsed drunk and wake up nude in a strange bed but it definitely wasn't like her, and, as she racked her brain for any memories of the night before all she could recall was shouting and sizzling cracks of light. Her stomach churned again, sickeningly. Had she been attacked? Had someone brought her here against her will?
Thankfully she didn't feel sore anywhere, except for the pain in her head. Hermione pushed back the sheets still feeling a vague sense of wrongness. She needed to get dressed and find her way out of here - wherever she was, she felt uncomfortably like it was somewhere she'd really rather not be - and get safely home, she could figure out the rest afterwards. She tugged back the hangings and stood, finding herself in a luxurious, almost offensively opulent room. The panelled walls and furniture were made of a dark wood, with drapes hangings in rich green damask and an empty fireplace she could probably stand in at one end. There was, however, no sign of any of her clothing - which added to her prickling sense of unease - or, more frighteningly, her wand.
She spied a silver-gilt mirror over an ornate dresser, and padded over. Her hair was a disaster and her eyes red-rimmed, but it could have been worse. She yanked open the dresser drawer to find a jumble of silk and lace. Whoever lived here was a big fan of peach lingerie, it seemed. The wardrobe to the left was filled with outdated looking robes. Hermione paused, then shrugged. Needs must and judging by the outdated styles of the clothes she'd found, it didn't seem likely anyone would really miss them. She pulled a soft, pale blue robe off its hanger. It was more like a long, tiered, bell-sleeved dress, really, than the modern open robes she herself wore over jeans or a skirt. She yanked it over her head, deciding she could forgo a bra. She glanced back at the dresser, shuddering slightly at the thought of wearing an unknown woman's knickers, before plucking out the least offensive pair of peach undies she could see and pulling them on under her robe.
As she dressed, she had more brief flashes of memory. Of her previous day visiting an expert in the Department of Mysteries. Of Harry yelling something incoherent, lights flashing around him. It could have been a busy nightclub. It could have been a battle. It was unnerving, whatever it was. She really, really needed to find out what had gone on.
She rummaged back in the bottom of the wardrobe for shoes. Discarding several impractical pairs of satiny, bejewelled kitten heels, she managed to find a pair of flat tan boots that looked like they might fit. She sat back on the bed to tug them on before rummaging under the sheets and pillows in the hope her wand was there. No such luck.
Hermione had dabbled in wandless magic but it really only worked for simple spells. She attempted a wandless, 'accio wand', not really expecting it to be successful, when a small unnoticed drawer in the dresser popped open and a wand - definitely not her own - shot out into her hand. How - worryingly convenient.
She inspected it quickly, swishing it through the air to make sparks. It didn't feel like her own, but it felt friendly enough in her hand that she decided she was prepared to try and get out. Despite working in law enforcement, Hermione had always had a rather flexible view on stealing when she thought it necessary. Anyway, once she found out where she was and what had happened last night, she could return anything she had borrowed, including the wand.
The heavy bedroom door was locked but a quick alohomora with the borrowed wand thankfully worked and Hermione crept out of the room. Faint morning light illuminated her path as she padded carefully along the corridor. It opened out onto a wide landing with ornate, sweeping staircases, leading down to a tiled floor and, thank Merlin, what was definitely a glass-panelled front door. As she crept down the stairs she glanced down at the borrowed wand in her hand, wondering if it would work well enough for her to apparate without splinching off half her extremities.
Hermione felt slightly more confident on the ground floor near her planned escape route, enough to peer carefully through the open door to her left. She drew in a quick, panicked breath when she saw - bodies -draped on the floor and over the furniture, before she spotted empty wine bottles littering the floor and heard a slight, rumbling snore. A party, then, and it looked like some bender, judging by the smell of stale drink and smoke and the fact that several of the slumped bodies were very underdressed - however, the empty potion-vials she spied jumbled in with smeared champagne glasses indicated it was definitely not the kind of party an up-and-coming member of the DMLE should be spotted at. She didn't recognise any of the faces, so she resumed her journey to the front door. It opened out onto a elegant, columned stone terrace leading to perfect lawns. As she turned and craned her head to get a proper look at the house she'd mysteriously woken in, before attempting to Apparate out of there, she felt the sudden, unmistakeable pressure of a wand-point at the back of her neck, a faint tingle of magic and a gruff, cigarette-scented whisper in her ear.
'You, my darlin', are fucking nicked'.