Hermione's right leg lay mangled and bleeding. Compound fractures showed through the swollen, purple flesh from her shin to the middle of her thigh. Her bones were smashed to pieces, the leg now resembling roadkill more than a human limb. Fenrir's son had brought his mallet down onto her leg over and over, unceasingly, for what felt like hours.
She came to, for what must have been the hundredth time, having been caught in a loop of long torment and brief unconsciousness. The realization of her helplessness, and the physical agony, came more quickly each time. Her ragged sobs began anew, weak and raspy. Her vocal cords had become shreds from continual screaming.
"Well, that's unfortunate," the man said, sounding rather bored. Hermione had started when he spoke. She had somehow forgotten he was there. "I suppose your bones are beyond repair." He muttered a few incantations under his breath, and Hermione felt her skin, muscle, and tissues begin to repair themselves. Once finished, he muttered another incantation, and she felt the bones disappear, leaving an aching void within her leg.
"What- What did you do?" She gasped hoarsely through parched lips, choking on blood from her throat. Tears streamed down her face as white hot pain flashed through her leg.
"Drink this." He said in reply, his voice soft with what could have been compassion. His hand cupped the back of her neck, bringing her head gently forward, as he held a cup expectantly in front of her face.
Hermione weakly pursed her lips, and tried fruitlessly to jerk her head away from the cup.
"DRINK. We need to regrow those bones." He pushed the drink into her face with slightly more force.
Hermione instantly recognized the smell of Skelegro, but didn't wish to be healed. Let her die. Let her die, and let this agony be done with. He would only heal her to hurt her.
He dropped her head, and glared at her. After a long moment, he set the cup down and stared. Abruptly, he whipped his wand arm out, and spat: "Imperius!"
Hermione felt his consciousness boring into her own. She pushed her mental barriers towards him in an attempt to stave him off, but the hours of torture had worn her down, and her mental fortitude was next to nil. All she could feel was excruciating pain. All she could think about was the very same. It was a short lived battle before he overpowered her.
Instant calm filled her body. She was vaguely aware of him, unstrapping her from the table. Sit up. A voice whispered gently through her mind. Her body responded to its command. She sat up and looked around the room numbly. Drink. A cup was in her hand. How did that get there? The drink burned as it slid down her throat, though she did not react. Lie down.
Suddenly, as the last strap was pulled taut, he released her mind from the pressure of his will. She glared furiously at him. "Why not keep me Imperiused?" Her demand was hoarse and feeble. The man had invaded her, mind and body. The horror of that thought filled her with rage and disgust.
"That would be rather odious, don't you think?" He smirked to himself as he stood, fiddling with a drill. "Besides, I have no doubt that you would be able to throw off the Imperius curse once rested and healed. And I don't particularly enjoy being attacked in my sleep."
Hermione's answering scowl was more feeble than the first. Her neck could barely hold her head up enough to see him. Her lips bled tiny little streams from the deepest cracks. Her eyelids and fingers trembled.
"Well, there's no reason I cannot play with other parts of you, while your leg heals." He grinned, his eyes hungry.
Bile rose to Hermione's throat as she began to panic. "Please… PLEASE! What do you want?"
"Why… this." His grin grew wider. "There is nothing you could offer me, Miss Granger. Nothing you could do to entice me. This is all I want. You, right here with me, to play with until I am satiated."
He immobilized her, and levitated her across the room. Against the wall was a large wooden cross. He put her up against it and strapped her across the chest and both wrists, her ankles dangling. He then attached a collar around her neck that had long, thin spikes facing inward, before releasing her from the Petrificus Totalus. She did her best to hold perfectly still until he whirled around and stabbed her through the left forearm. She reflexively jerked, screaming, and impaled her neck on the side of the choker. The darkness once again took her.
Pain woke her as a dagger as long as her forearm was driven through her right shoulder. She wailed as a second dagger was pushed through her left shoulder. Her blood poured into the ground and she felt her shoulders dislocated as the straps that were holding her to the cross disappeared.
She hadn't noticed that he had retreated from her across the room to the table she had been previously strapped to. He stripped off his shirt and placed it on the table before pulling out another dagger, and walked over to her. He stopped, and stood so close their noses practically brushed. Her sobs were raspy, her voice completely wrecked. "Please…. Please…" She kept repeating, unable to say anything else, unable to even form a coherent thought through the pain.
His eyes gleamed. He lifted the dagger, and to her surprise, began making long, shallow cuts along his shoulders, mirroring where the daggers had been pierced through hers. His eyes closed, but his face beamed with… pleasure?
At that, something snapped in Hermione, her pleas turned into panic as she thrashed against the cross and screamed in hoarse silence. She could feel the damage, possibly irreparable, and knew that she was wrecking her body. But she didn't care.
"Stop! STOP!" He shouted at her.
She didn't care. She didn't feel anything but pain, and she couldn't think past stopping the pain. Life. Death. It didn't matter. Her mind snapped and she disappeared into a frenzy.
"STUPEFY!" He roared.
She blinked. She was… on a table? Strapped down. Her body ached, but when she lifted her head to look at herself, she was clean. Wearing nothing but her bra and panties, she could see new, pink skin stretched over various parts of herself. Her right leg throbbed something fierce.
"Back with me, are you?" A man said, sitting in the corner of the room in a wooden chair. "That was excessive Ms. Granger. I already told you. You do not get to decide when to die. Your life belongs to me."
She blinked again. "Who… Who are you?"
