The Dueling Room at Malfoy Manor was quite an interesting space. Abraxas had converted it from an unused drawing-room into an open area with a couch in a corner and a cabinet full of healing and restorative potions. It was a large, spartan room with a few objects for transfiguration if needed during a duel.
Layers of enchantments covered the walls, the ceiling, and the ground. The room was essentially impenetrable. The walls were matte black and illuminated by the light from a large window, which was enchanted to be unbreakable.
Blasting curses against the walls will only temporarily damage it before it magically reformed itself. Fire will scorch the finish, but it won't catch on fire. The only exception, of course, would be Fiendfyre, which will mercilessly destroy anything in its path, fueled by the hungry dark creatures dancing within its flames.
Voldemort stood in front of the rainy window as he waited for Hermione. In the center of the room was a very large wooden box.
"That was fast," Voldemort said, turning away from the rain when Hermione entered the room. She was now dressed in thick black robes with an elegantly high neckline. Her hair was no longer drenched and hung in heavy waves down her back instead of her usual bouncy curls.
"I just dried myself and transfigured a few things," Hermione said, her ears still tipped pink with embarrassment.
"That's a shame. Red looks good on you." He beckoned her to come closer as he marveled at how another blush appeared across her elegant cheekbones. She was so easily embarrassed. They were just undergarments. Very attractive lacy ones that he's never seen before, not even on the French, but surely such a forward-thinking, independent witch wouldn't mind that temporary loss of decency this much.
He decided to spare her. "Hermione, I've observed your dueling technique against Gavin. You have very good form, speed, and precision. But you were holding back. I wonder what you're like if you duel with your best effort."
"It was a friendly duel, and it was clear Mr. Rosier wanted to start slow for our first," Hermione said.
"Yes, both of you were playing it safe. I'm quite familiar with Gavin's usual strategies. Now, you and I are not going to duel today. We're going to go straight into learning spellwork. You can work on perfecting that, and then incorporate it into your dueling. There's no use wasting our time going over what you already know."
Without taking her guarded eyes off him even once since walking into the room, Hermione nodded and gestured for him to begin.
Voldemort suddenly had the inexplicable urge to watch her suffer for him — to see the lengths she would be willing to go to for knowledge only he could share with her. But he couldn't scare her away, not yet.
"Let's start with a spell of deception, one of the most powerful ones yet," he said, as he lifted his wand and pointed it at her. "You've read the book on the distortion of reality, but you haven't experienced it yourself — very few have. This arcane spell is complex and only depicted in long-lost grimoires."
Hermione's posture was stiff with trepidation, yet surprisingly confident as she met his eyes straight on. She also had her wand drawn defensively.
He continued, "There's no need for that. This is just a little demonstration of what you could accomplish with me. I may teach you this spell once I've established a baseline of your capabilities. If you can learn this spell, I imagine most things will come easily to you, if you keep an open mind."
"How difficult is it to learn this spell?" Her whole face lit up, which told him that she was eager for the chance to see something she's never seen before.
"It's complex. It requires a certain understanding of particular emotions to influence your opponent. The caster is unable to see exactly what is going on in their opponent's mind, unless they use Legilimency, which isn't recommended while casting this spell. But it's a spell that brings forth certain emotions. In response, the mind will automatically conjure up images based on preexisting fears and desires," he said.
Before Hermione could fully process the implications of that and respond, Voldemort's dangerously mischievous eyes dissolved like smoke. In its place, smiling, vivid green eyes looked back at her. She blinked a few times rapidly in bewilderment as she backed away from the familiar figure. Harry Potter, her best friend, was standing before her.
It wasn't until this moment that she realized Voldemort and his future nemesis were of similar height and build. Of course, Harry's hair was straight and unruly, and his complexion was wonderfully healthy.
"Hermione, we have some incredible news to share with you and Ron. We wanted to let you two know before anyone else," the hallucination said.
She glanced to her side as Ron appeared beside her and smiled reassuringly at her with his lopsided grin. She looked to the side of Harry as Ginny Potter appeared from behind him, a hand over her belly.
"We're expecting! We aren't sure of the gender yet, but Harry thinks it will be a boy," Ginny said, smiling.
"We were so afraid to let anyone know. With all the Death Eater attacks still going on, I didn't want Ginny to become even more of a target. So, it'll be kept a secret for a while longer until it's impossible to hide from the papers. We're just so excited to let you know. We...we would be honored if you could be his godmother, Hermione."
She choked as her response, yes, of course nearly made it out of her mouth. She couldn't respond. She shouldn't respond. It was the most vivid and realistic memory she'd ever experienced. So much more than Legilimency. So much more than viewing a memory from a Pensieve.
It was like she could reach out and touch them. Their familiar voices were crisp and soothing. The experience felt so real, she could even smell Ron's familiar scent of broomstick polish and grass as he placed a friendly arm around her shoulders.
"About time!" Ron laughed. She was sure she could feel the rumble of his laughter vibrate through her being.
Her eyes seared hotly as her vision of Harry and Ginny began to blur.
"We were thinking James Sirius Potter if the baby's a boy and Lily Luna if it's a girl. We've thought about it for so long," not-Harry continued.
She was utterly frozen as tears started running down her cheeks. How did he do this? She had carefully tucked this memory safely away for a long time. It made her miss home. It made her weak.
"Stop! Stop this, now. This isn't real. Finite incantatem. Finite!" She squeezed her eyes shut and concentrated hard. "Voldemort! Thank you for the demonstration, but please, end this."
Her friends immediately froze in place as the uncanny tableau began to fade. Billowing jet-black smoke filled her vision. Voldemort, face pale and composed, manifested within the dissipating smoke.
"How curious, Hermione. I know I didn't cast the Cruciatus curse on you, but you look as if I did exactly that. What did you see?
"It was a beautiful memory. A happy memory," she whispered. "One of the happiest I have had recently. Please, just leave it alone," she murmured as she swallowed past the lump in her throat.
"A happy memory?" He looked highly skeptical as he searched her eyes for the truth.
Hermione could only stare. Why would Voldemort induce a happy memory? It seemed so unlike him to do so. Wasn't he all about torture and misery? Making her see her friends was torture, but he couldn't have known that.
He said that the spell required a certain understanding of emotion. How would Lord Voldemort, a wizard who grew up in a cruel muggle orphanage, who shunned and tortured those who respected him and would call him friend if he allowed it, understand happiness and the melancholy that accompanied missing the only wizarding family one has ever had? This nearly soulless dark wizard?
No, it couldn't be that simple. What was he playing at?
Voldemort stepped closer to her, crimson red eyes boring into hers. "Hermione, I chose loneliness and envy for you when I cast the spell," he murmured.
She jerked away from him, taking several steps back. What did he mean by that? She felt nothing but happiness for Harry and Ginny when they shared the exciting news that they were having James.
Voldemort smirked at her incredulous expression. "Why are you lying to yourself, Hermione?"
Was she lying to herself? She thought about how Harry would drop all communication with her for weeks because he was so frazzled as he took his role as a new father seriously. She thought about all those weekends she spent during her rare free time babysitting James so that Harry and Ginny could have a break and go out together. Harry and Ginny would sometimes meet up with Ron and his wife, a fellow Quidditch player. She was lovely, and they had so many things in common. Ron was so happy. He had children too — a boy and a girl.
Her best friends were happily married with beautiful children, and it was all they wanted to talk about — the trials of parenthood, during the rare occasion they managed to all get together.
During these occasions, she was always quiet as she numbly sipped her Butterbeer. Their strangely horrifying stories and the permanent shadows under their eyes only cemented her resolve to focus on her career and not settle down.
There was no way she could deal with having a child, at least not any time soon. Before she could even consider starting a family, she would need to find someone she wanted to start a family with, which was a whole other challenge she wanted to avoid. Plus, the world just wasn't safe. At least, not for someone like her — a muggle-born.
She couldn't relate to her friends anymore, and it somehow made her feel inadequate as she plastered on a smile for them when they jokingly laughed about how lucky she was to still be single. How she should enjoy her freedom while it lasted.
How could they be so happy? Didn't they know that the Death Eaters were plotting? Always plotting and killing? Even going out to the pub was dangerous, especially for the Golden Trio. Though she supposed they were Gryffindors after all — brash and fearless. Stupid, more like. She was convinced she was invited to serve as protective detail, in case there was an ambush.
No. She wasn't lonely. She wasn't envious. It could never be that simple. She loved them. She loved all of them.
Voldemort wouldn't understand the finer points of human sentiment. He had no true empathy or compassion. Of course, he would twist a happy, nostalgic memory into feelings of envy and loneliness. He chose that solitary existence for himself. She couldn't imagine he had many happy memories in his life involving friends and family.
She quickly gained her composure and stared back at him with determination. "I know how I felt. Perhaps you cast it wrong."
"Keep telling yourself that, Hermione, and you will never learn to separate yourself from those messy feelings of yours. Perhaps some introspection would benefit you before you accuse me of botching up a spell," he said patiently, with a slight edge in his voice. She was clear she was treading into dangerous territory now. "It takes courage to let go of the past. I can tell it's your weakness. For you, letting go is the only way to move forward."
"I'll...I'll consider your advice. But you should know that my past gives me strength," she said evenly. "Actually, do you know of a spell that could force your opponent into a reality of your choosing? One that could affect multiple opponents at once?"
"Well, aren't you a greedy one? It's good to be so hungry for knowledge, but let's see if you can cast this one first. Not today, however. We have a full schedule."
Hermione wasn't deterred. "So it exists, then. Can you cast a spell like that?"
"Wouldn't you like to know, little witch?"
"So how would I know if, at any given time, what I'm seeing is real?" she asked.
All he did was continue to smile benevolently at her. The artfully practiced expression was all wrong on his shadowed, handsome face. It may have worked once upon a time for the flawlessly pretty Tom Riddle, but now it was just unsettling. A bit sinister.
She knew that the Voldemort from her future had a connection with Harry that allowed him to influence Harry's dreams and make him see what he wanted, such as the recurring vision at the Department of Mysteries.
However, they learned that the connection was due to Harry being his accidental Horcrux. If Voldemort had the ability to conjure a reality at will for multiple people at once, then he would have been truly dangerous indeed.
No, he couldn't have been capable of a spell like that. She would have heard about it being used on a large scale in the First and Second Wizarding Wars. Perhaps the spell did exist, but he was never able to master it, for some reason or the other.
Excitement pulsed through her veins. Voldemort was right. There are no limits to magic. There was always something out there waiting to be discovered, or created.
Voldemort realized that he placed himself in an impossible situation; he found that it was difficult to show Hermione the dark arts the way he first imagined.
"Open the box, Hermione," he gestured to the object in the center of the room.
Without hesitation, Hermione pointed her wand at the box, and it sprung open. A figure jerkily unfolded itself and stood up, deathly still, waiting for a command from its master.
"This here is...well let's call him Jack. For today's lesson, we're going to incorporate the use of this practice dummy I've created for us. Gavin couldn't be here today. I sent him away on a mission, and Abraxas would hate it if we gave him a scar. We shouldn't offend our host," Voldemort said.
"That's no practice dummy. That's an Inferius. A greatly modified one," Hermione whispered in horror.
The Inferius had vacant, cloudy eyes and pale skin. Perhaps the most unsettling part was that it had moving features and limbs, but they were erratically animated and distorted. His magic could only animate stiffened muscles so much.
"Yes, well, he's newly dead, and greatly modified with enchantments. The blood and wounds, expressions, and sounds are fairly accurate, wouldn't you say? For the purposes of dueling, at least." He casually tossed multiple slicing curses at Jack.
"It seems you've mastered this bit of Necromancy. How is it even bleeding still?" Hermione watched as blood started to drip off the dummy as gashes opened all over its body. She was breathing shallowly now, as she stared at his masterpiece with revulsion.
"I can make it do what I need it to. I can force it to bleed. A perfect puppet. All you need to know is that it's not alive, has no soul, and was created entirely from my magic." With a wave of his hand, the gashes disappeared, and its skin was unblemished once more.
She avoided his eyes as she continued to watch Jack with cautious disdain. Hermione looked incredibly pained as she tried to form words. "It's…amazing. If only dark magic and murder weren't required to make it, practice dummies like this one would help in the DADA classroom. Though I suppose the students wouldn't need something as advanced as this. I don't suppose they will be throwing dark curses at it," she intoned.
Voldemort made a noncommittal sound. "My little professor, always thinking of her students. They would have no need for something like this, since they are only allowed to learn the stunning spell and the full body-bind curse these days under Dumbledore's rule."
"Who was Jack anyway? Is that even his name?" Hermione asked as she walked around his creation, inspecting it carefully.
"Just a muggle, you needn't concern yourself over his death," he said dismissively.
She bit out, "I...I'm not concerned. Of course, he was just a muggle. May I ask what he did to warrant such an undignified death?"
"Hermione, this pathetic creature here will serve a greater purpose dead than he ever did alive. What if I told you he was a predator? That he hung around muggle orphanages? Little girls disappeared all the time due to him. But what's one less unwanted mouth to feed in an overpopulated orphanage, anyway? I'd say by killing him, I did the muggles a favor, wouldn't you?"
"Is that true? This...thing in front of us being a predator."
"Of course, why would I lie to you?" he asked innocently.
"It's not like you wouldn't kill a perfectly innocent muggle. Don't pretend you were being a good person by killing this one just because he deserved to die."
He leaned down and murmured in her ear, low and deadly, "I never said I was a good person. Don't mistake my patience for something it's not, Hermione." He pulled back and watched her carefully. "I'm surprised. How did you know that I have no qualms about killing muggles? I think it's interesting that you presume to know anything about me at all. I thought we just met."
"Your contempt for muggles was obvious, and a dark wizard like yourself would never let a thing like murder stop you from obtaining what you want." Her voice was sharp with disapproval.
"Hermione, you act like you aren't a murderer yourself. Maybe you should stow away that righteous fury of yours and focus on our lesson now."
She whispered angrily, "That was self-defense."
"Whatever lets you sleep at night, Hermione," he said simply.
Doesn't she recognize what a marvel he's created? Inferi are difficult to create in the first place, but this one, in particular, was greatly enhanced by his magic. Its mind will react similarly to a living human's.
"Why are we even using practice dummies? Whatever happened to knowing how effective a curse is unless you experience it yourself?" Hermione asked.
"You'll still learn and experience the spells of deception, chronomancy, and field domination magic. I'd like to have Jack nearby because I would truly hate for this lovely skin to scar." He barely brushed a knuckle against her soft cheek before she jerked away in bewilderment. She blushed lightly as she seared him with a heavy glare.
He was amused. She was too easily riled. No artifice. She would surely have been a Gryffindor if she went to Hogwarts for her schooling.
He had begun the process of creating Jack after witnessing Rosier's slicing hex hit Hermione. Her outraged gasp of pain made his brain itch unpleasantly. Seeing the thin, newly healed cut on her neck after he tried to mend her flesh together made him uncomfortable.
He didn't like seeing her flawless skin marked up, and he couldn't fathom why. Perhaps he knew that it would become a problem if the Hogwarts DADA professor suddenly had to take time off. Or perhaps he didn't want to see her marked by anyone but him.
All he knew was that he wanted to hurt Rosier for landing a spell on Hermione, and he wanted to throttle her for letting herself get distracted by his presence. She was also so reluctant to maim Rosier that he didn't want her to have any negative thoughts about their little "dueling club," at least not yet. He needed her fully committed first. She was to be his perfect pawn.
For any spells that may cause undue pain or potentially irreversible damage, the dummy will be sufficient for Hermione's learning experience, for now.
For the next few hours, Voldemort and Hermione went through the wand movements of different spells and cast them on Jack, who was wonderfully cooperative.
As expected, the little witch memorized the incantations from the reading he gave her. She was also skilled in nonverbals and tried to bring that skill into casting these new spells. The sheer speed she learned things was impressive.
Before he left to travel the world, he had tried using similar coaching tactics with his Knights of Walpurgis in their private dueling club, but no one had come close to being as sharp and talented as the young witch before him.
He took a chance on a stranger, and it was luckily the right call.
"Now that you know the hexes to accumulate pain over time and impart crippling anguish, let's start on speed changes."
He quickly conjured seven snakes in succession a few feet away from them and hissed at them, commanding them to fight each other in Parseltongue.
Curiously, Hermione didn't seem surprised that he was communicating with the snakes.
"This is an illusion of haste." He cast the spell first on himself, then at Hermione with a quick flick of his wand. Time seemed to slow all around them as the snakes bobbed around and struck at each other in comically slow motion.
Hermione could only stare at the snakes with wide eyes. He removed the spell and banished the snakes with a single swipe of his wand through the air.
"You can cast it on yourself so all your movements are at least double their normal speed. It's all about perception. The downside is that you tire just as quickly, so use it wisely. If you want to slow down your opponent, you can give them an imagined burden and hinder their movement and attacks. It can be made strong enough to prevent all movement as well. This is better than petrifying your opponent because they wouldn't know the counterspell to this."
"Why not just break their legs?" she asked impassively. He was sure she was provoking him on purpose, as if she expected him to choose the most violent methods to subdue his opponents.
"Well, aren't you a bloodthirsty little witch? Sometimes, you just want to mentally impair them because they may have other uses for you."
She nodded as he continued, "Now, I know we didn't use these in a dueling setting yet, but I wanted to see where your spell work was at. After she quickly replicated the spells several times without any problems, he announced that they will be able to move on to other spells next lesson.
"Here's your new training regimen." He pulled a sheet out of thin air and gave it to her. "I'll leave you with one last spell for you to think about. It's another advanced arcane spell, and should only be used to bring some control and defense to a chaotic battlefield."
He turned his wand in a series of complex movements as a large swirling ball of dark violet energy appeared in front of him.
"Now, throw any hex or curse you want at me. It doesn't matter what kind. You don't even need to aim straight at me, just in this direction," he commanded.
As if she'd like nothing better, Hermione began to cast a series of vicious hexes directly at him. Every single hex and curse was immediately sucked into and negated upon entering the ball of energy.
"I call it the Singularity, and if you cast it in front of you, it will absorb and nullify all incoming spells nearby. It's different from a simple shield in that you can cast offensive spells as it works to defend you. However, it does take quite a bit of magical energy to cast and hold."
"If it takes so much energy, why not just use a Feedback dome shield that reflects curses back to the enemies?" she asked.
"The Singularity is more predictable and controlled. If you use a Feedback shield, you risk the reflected hexes and curses bouncing randomly towards your allies. You usually don't want that if you have any allies with you, unless you thrive off chaos."
"Don't you? Thrive off chaos?" she asked irreverently.
So, she was deliberately being difficult with her questions, as if she was accusing him of something.
He smirked. "Behave, little witch."
Her breath hitched and she looked away quickly. After a pause, she asked more seriously, "Does it work on the Killing curse as well?"
He held his breath for a second, wondering if he should confirm or deny the truth. He was reluctant to share with her so many of his secrets in one day. But he found himself saying, "Yes, it does. The Killing curse cannot be blocked, but that doesn't mean it cannot be absorbed and negated."
It was ultimately irrelevant. She could never cast this spell anyway, few could.
He didn't immediately get a reply, so he turned to watch Hermione's expression. Her lips were slightly parted as she watched the swirling vortex of magic. The violet energy illuminated her alluring dark eyes, where he could see a fire burning within its depths.
He recognized that expression — that look of enthrallment. He imagined he looked the same when he came across something that excited him. It was the first time he's seen that look on another.
It was hunger — hunger for the secrets of magic. His secrets.
"Will you show me?" she asked, whisper-soft.
A frisson of anticipation descended his spine. "Yes, Hermione. When you are ready.
A/N: For the spells, I was influenced by RPG games I used to play, like Guild Wars and Mass Effect. The spells from canon HP universe aren't very fun to me. But this is fanfiction anyway, so anything could happen!
What did you guys think of Voldemort's creepy Inferi practice dummy? Or that spell that forced Hermione to relive her "happy" memory? I'd love to hear from you!