Where I Belong
Prologue
Disclaimer:
Harry Potter and all related characters belong to JK Rowling.
All plots and other characters belong to me.
Harry and Hermione belong to each other.
He studies the woman. She is a lamb. In life, there are only two types of people: wolves and lambs.
- Patricia Cornwell, A Scarpetta Novel
The blackness of the night sky made little difference to him. In fact, he preferred the darkness to the warming light of the sun.
And the night in the dimply light area of Godric's Hollow reminded him only of what he came here to do.
'Lumos,' he whispered into the night. The light simmered around him like a fairy tale, casting dark and dangerous shadows around him and his beautiful prisoner.
Her eyes, opened wide, showed the panic in her graceful features and shimmered against the gentle light of his wand.
In the sun, her eyes were actually a bold, quite beautiful colour of blue – but the thick darkness and inescapable terror that overwhelmed her caused her to look weak and fragile. She violently shut her eyes in attempt to block out the reality in front of her. At one time, this might have excited him. Now it left him feeling angry and empty.
He had tied her up using his own two hands, which any more than able wizard might have found odd, even questionable. But this was the only thing that kept him alive anymore, and he wouldn't let that be destroyed too.
'Don't struggle, you hear me?' he whispered angrily, as the tears fell from her eyes onto the dirty ground she was laying on. She had come to Godric's Hollow everyday of her adult life, and she had never known about the clearing in the forest she now lay trapped in.
Her chest rose and fell wildly while her heart beat frantically in her chest. Her tears began to flow faster as she realized he was never going to let her go.
The man bent down and caressed her cheek with his hand. She was as cold as ice.
'Now listen to me – listen to me!' he screamed, but in a quiet, threatening way. 'I want you to take a deep breath. Do not faint.' It was an order.
She inhaled shakily, still crying silent, fierce tears.
'Good, good. I'm going to take my silencing charm off of you now. Don't scream, you hear me? Because I will kill you. I'm not afraid to.'
He was serious, and she believed him.
She turned to face him, fear filling every fragment of her body. She struggled to speak. He could hear her tongue sticking to the roof of her mouth.
'What do you want with me?' And she said it in such a way that made him laugh in anguish.
'Listen to me, I said, and don't ask questions.'
'Please, I –'
'Shut your goddamn mouth, do you hear me?'
She nodded, tears falling down her dirt-streaked face onto her ripped white blouse.
He laughed his unbearable cold laugh again and stood over her trembling body. 'I saw you come out of that house tonight.' He motioned through the trees to a tall brick house. 'Who lives there?'
He watched her fight to lick her dry lips.
'Harry Potter.'
He stepped over her body, thinking hard. This confirmed it; everything he thought, everything he believed was true.
He kneeled beside her, his eyes flashing madly in the quiet light. 'I've been watching you, you know. You go there every night, don't you?'
She started breathing faster. 'Please…'
'Yes or no.' He said it in a way that made her silent.
'Yes.'
He chuckled and wiped a tear off of her face with his calloused finger. 'There you go, you see? I'm really not that bad of a person.' And he truly believed it. He was kind, even polite when he bound her with rope. He could have put her under the Imperius curse, could have even tortured her. But he didn't; he was too much of a gentleman for that.
Again he laughed before he started to pace the forest clearing.
'He really hasn't been well, has he? Not since the Dark Lord fell.' He smiled in a terrifying way. 'Not since she left him?'
He could see her pulse beat crazily in her throat. She swallowed hard. 'How do you know all of this?'
He paid no attention to her pleas or her tears. He kneeled again quickly and wrenched her face towards his. He could feel the warm breath on his hand. She whimpered as her breathing became even heavier.
'He still loves her doesn't he?' he asked in a low, strong baritone voice.
A tear ran down off her cheek onto his hand. 'Yes.'
'Where is she?'
'I d-don't know –'
He violently kicked her shoulder. 'Bullshit!'
'N-no, please… I don't know... Harry doesn't even know…'
At this confirmation he turned away from her so she could not see his frustration and lack of control. But the woman was not stupid, and knew what she had just admitted to him. She began to cry in earnest.
Hearing her whimpering made him grow even more furious. He stared at the woman in front of him, wondering where on earth his more wanted victim could be. She hadn't told anyone where she was?
He wished she could be the one in front now, crying – begging for her release. But he shook his head.
If she was here, she wouldn't be crying or begging… she was smarter than that.
She wasn't weak.
At this the anger inside him erupted in a violent storm. 'Where is your wand?' he asked, as if this was a perfectly normal conversation.
She quickly glanced over at the spot she had foolishly dropped her wand, no less than an hour ago when he had caught her leaving Harry Potter's house.
The man was smart and able, and had thought this through. He was not going to Azkaban. Not until his master was avenged. He bent to pick up her wand, and then walked towards her again.
The man saw the glimpse of hope in her eyes – the hope that he could give her back her wand and release her.
So unwise. If she had been laying there, the woman he needed most to get to, the woman he needed to find… she would not have had such optimism in her eyes at all.
He looked into the anticipating woman's hopeful eyes and he only laughed.
'Avada Kedavra.'
And suddenly her struggling stopped and her ragged breathing no longer filled the air. Her tension and trembling were gone, though the terrified look was still in her lovely blue eyes.
He left her limp body in Godric's Hollow and Apparated away – for now he knew. He was sure, and one very foolish woman's life was no price to pay. He knew now what he must do.
He had to find her – the woman who wasn't weak. The woman who wouldn't cry when he killed her.
And how he wished he knew what he did not: that Hermione Granger lay thousands of miles away on a comfortable bed, in a warm house, sleeping without a worry or a care.
A/N: Whew. So here it is! Okayokay, I know it seems more... suspense than romance right now. But it really is romance, I promise. Just give me a chance to prove it. Read and review andI'll post the next chapter ASAP. Teaser?
But that didn't mean she loved him. Just because she memorized his laugh and thought about how his hair never really laid flat at the back didn't mean she loved him. Just because she imagined he was here so she would never be lonely didn't mean she loved him. Just because she saw his face when she kissed Hugh didn't mean she loved him.
No. Hermione Granger refused to give into something as delicate as love. Especially now.
Oohlala. Till next time, hunnayyys. H/Hr for always.