Disclaimer: None of the characters that you recognize belong to be. They belong to Ms. J K Rowlings and not me or else I wouldn't have to worry about paying for college in one and a half years!
Author's Note: Thank you to everyone that read and/or reviewed! I can't tell you how much it means to me!
Chapter 17
Hermione woke up with a gigantic headache and a rumbling stomach. She blinked her eyes a few times and discovered that she had absolutely no idea where she was. She remembered coming up to her room. She remembered turning around and then… then she got hit in the head and then nothing.
Hermione noticed that she was sitting on cold cement and her hands were tied above her head. She suspected she was in a dungeon or basement of some sort. She sighed. Why, oh why, can't I have a normal year? No, I have to be Petrified or help an escaped prisoner or be kidnapped. I so do not need this right now.
Just then, a door creaked open and some light made it's way into Hermione's eyes. She squinted against the harsh brightness and gasped as she saw a figure come downstairs to her.
"You!" Hermione shouted
"Yes, it is I." Standing there, in all her glory, was Jessica the owner of the Magical World of Muggles. She tossed her hair back and marched over to Hermione and practically slammed a tray with food on it down, a sneer on her face the entire time.
"Where am I? Who are you really? What do you want with me? How am I supposed to eat?" Hermione fired this rapid barrage of questioning without taking a breath, her stomach giving an extra loud rumble as the scent of food met Hermione's dainty nose.
"You honestly don't expect me to just answer all your question, do you? You're a prisoner. You're lucky you're getting any food at all from me," Jessica remarked in a snotty voice.
"Well, I'm not getting any food as my hands are tied above my head!" Hermione responded icily. She was getting slightly annoyed. Actually, downright infuriated would be more like it. This woman had kidnapped her for no apparent reason and was sitting there, sneering, as she told Hermione she should be grateful! Grateful? Hermione would show her grateful. Once her hands were untied and she polished off the food in front of her, of course.
"Well, I suppose I'll let you eat but I need to wait for my accomplices first," Jessica relented. "Can't trust Hogwarts' smartest witch not to run away."
"How do you know anything about me?" Hermione questioned. "I never even told you my name."
Jessica laughed without humor. "Oh, my dear girl. I know everything there is to know about you. From blue being your favorite color to your cat's name to how you sit and pluck your eyebrows every Sunday at ten p.m. since you can't stand to have them messy."
Hermione's mouth dropped open. "How do you know all that? You couldn't have gotten into Hogwarts." The wheels in Hermione's head were spinning at full speed. "Wait! What was that about accomplices?"
"You'll find out all that soon enough."
"Sooner than you think," a foreign voice spoke up.
Hermione's head swiveled and her eyes grew wide. "Professor Manchura!" she exclaimed. "You're an accomplice?"
"You bet."
Hermione's mind was on overdrive. Professor Manchra was the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher and had seemed perfectly normal and sane. Then again, they all had. Honestly, Professor Manchura rarely raised her voice and was generally liked by all students. She hid below anyone's radar though. She was the kind of person that could walk in and out of a room and no one would notice.
The door, which had slammed shut once Professor Manchura entered, slowly creaked open once again. Hermione squirmed nervously as she saw a shadow about seven feet tall of a person with pointy horns. Hermione's uneasiness quickly turned into curiosity as the shadow quickly diminished in size to about three feet.
"Berny!" Hermione gasped, as the very house-elf that had nearly killed her was standing not five feet from her. The horns hadn't been horns at all; they were Berny's ears.
"How? Why? I don't understand," Hermione moaned.
"You don't have to," Jessica snapped. "You're our peace offering so I wouldn't worry about anything. You probably won't be alive more than another forty-eight hours so just concentrate on making peace with yourself and what have you. Ok? Good. Eat fast, I'm getting bored."
Hermione's hands were released and fell like a lump to her sides. She made sure to eat the mush they called soup in front of her as slow as possible just to spite Jessica. Hermione was extremely confused and needed time to think about all the events that transpired before her. Hermione didn't have to wait long, as her two captures, each with an eerily similar look of hatred mixed with smugness, paraded back upstairs after securely magicing Hermione's hands in their previous position.
Hermione took a deep breath to calm the thousands of emotions going around in her head. She needed to think rationally. Okay. I don't have my wand so magic for me. I don't know where I am or how I got here. I don't know what they want with me. Great. What advantage do I have? Hermione desperately tried to think of something comforting but found nothing. She didn't know how long she had been gone or what time it was. Harry and Ron may not even know she wasn't safe in her bed.
With so much going on in her head, Hermione, sometime during the night, fell into an uneasy sleep.
* * * * *
"Wakey, wakey, little Mudblood."
Hermione woke up to a voice calling to her and her first thought was Malfoy. Then she remembered Malfoy was not female nor did he know how to get into her room. Hermione blinked and everything came back to her. She saw Jessica sneering at her with a tray with a single grapefruit on it.
"Do you always have to sneer?" Hermione questioned. "Is it in the 'How to be Evil and Heartless Handbook' or something?"
Jessica turned her sneer into a frown. "Shut your trap, girl. Did I say speak?"
Hermione shook her head, while internally rolling her eyes. Do all these self-assured wanna-be Death Eaters have the same inferiority complex? She wondered.
"I didn't think so," Jessica said, nodding curtly. She then proceeded to pull out a chair that was slid under a small table in the far corner of the room and sit down. "We have to wait for her," Jessica explained in a clipped voice. Berny was standing far back with his arms crossed, not voicing his opinion in any words exchanged.
After a few minutes of silence, Hermione braved asking a question. "Why am I here?" she asked softly.
"You're our peace offering."
"But what does that mean?" Hermione burst out. "Peace offering for who? Who do you work for? Can't you tell me anything? I'm supposed to be killed remember? What can a dead girl reveal?"
Jessica looked long and hard at Hermione before answering. "I suppose I could tell you something. We worked for Him a long time ago but eventually He thought had no use for us. He kicked us out! Just like that! He pretended that we were desperately needed elsewhere but He never contacted us again. I waited there for ten years and no owl, no note, no nothing!"
Hermione didn't need five guesses as to who 'He' was. So these two women were Death Eaters but their master didn't even want them. "I guess you got pretty angry after he told you to leave, huh?" Hermione asked in her 'caring' voice.
"Yes!" Jessica's eyes held a dangerous glint to them now. "We did everything He asked! Everything! He ordered, I killed. He needs me. He'll be begging to take me back once I give Him you." Jessica's face held a sardonic smile. "Yes, little bloody Potter's best friend. He'll be begging. You'll see."
Oookay. So Jessica's gone off her rocker already. I wonder if Professor Manchura needs to be locked up in St. Mungo's as much as this psycho. Hermione knew she needed to keep Jessica calm since who knew what she could so in her state.
"What have your told out guest, Jessica?" a voice asked from the top of the stairs. Professor Manchura.
Jessica's head whipped around, her blond ponytail flying. "Nothing that will matter."
"Well I'm afraid whatever you told her will have consequences," Professor Manchura said solemnly.
"Who cares?" Jessica exploded. "We just need to give the great Lord Voldermort this pathetic brat here and we're back. We'll rise to greatness. Don't you remember? I can almost feel the power." Jessica had her eyes closed and her face held a dreamlike expression.
"I'm so sorry to disappoint you, Jessica, but the real Persephone Manchura is dead." Hermione and Jessica both looked up at the one who had claimed to be that very person.
"What?" Jessica screeched. She reached to get her wand from the table she had previously occupied but 'Professor Manchura' was quicker.
"Expelliarmus!" she called, her wand in her hand already. Jessica's wand came zooming to her.
"Stupefy!" Jessica dropped like a dead sack right onto the floor. 'Professor Manchura' swiftly turned to do the same to little Berny.
Hermione looked questioningly at the person who had just knocked out her supposed accomplice. "Who are you?"
'Professor Manchura' smiled. "Sorry we had to kidnap you, Hermione. But Dumbledore and I had to get Jessica."
"Who are you?" Hermione repeated.
"What, don't you recognize me?" she asked. Hermione shook her head.
"I didn't think you would. Hermione, I am Sirius Black." Hermione, whether it was from shock or hunger, fainted dead away.
~
Well, this chapter got up kind of fast. Please review!!! :) Chapter eighteen should be up sometime this weekend.
Don't worry, if you're confused, it will all be explained in the next chapter!