A Vampire in a Wizard's World
by Sarah Black
Chapter four.
She heard voices. At first as if she were listening from under the surface of water but the sounds were soon clear. She opened her eyes but did not see. She felt some sort of material, taut over her eyes and realized quickly she had been blindfolded.
How rude.
She decided to listen to the voices, which were not in her own head mind you, and thus try to find out what was going on.
"Stunned or not, Severus, it just isn't safe to have such a creature in the house. Think of the children!" A shrill female voice sounded, making her want to cover her ears.
"Actually, Molly," Severus replied not really seeming to want to be on first name basis with the woman, "She is not a creature. Vampires are quite clearly classified as beings, the same can not be said about a certain creature against which you have never voiced any sort of objection." He continued in a very acidic tone of voice.
"Remus isn't dangerous and everyone knows where his loyalties lie. The same can not be said about that vampire girl you have pulled up off the street!" The woman called Molly huffed before she continued sarcastically, "Do you even know her name?"
There was a pause.
"I knew it! You've gone and dragged some strange girl with fangs into our headquarters without pausing to think!" She was almost singing in triumph.
"Don't be a fool Molly. If I had not indeed paused to think, would I have taken the precaution of Stunning her and blindfolding her? I took her here because I deducted the werewolf would either be here or would be here soon. He'll be able to make sure the girl is registered properly, he has experience with that wing of the Ministry after all." Severus countered smoothly, sounding a bit obnoxious actually.
"Do it yourself, this is your mess!" The Molly woman cried out.
"If only I could, but as I have been ordered to, ah, get rid of her, it really wouldn't do for me to be loitering about near her. Which brings me to my next point. I've loitered about for long enough trying to knock sense into you and I am expected back presently." And with that she could somehow sense he was no longer in the room.
"That man is insufferable." The woman growled.
Footsteps, a door slammed, the turn of a key, silence.
No, not silence.
Scratching sounds beneath her, something crawling, nibbling, chewing, biting. She shuddered at the vivid memory of waking up in a tomb covered in vermin. She pushed the memory back into the darkest corner of her mind.
Next she heard voices.
"But Ron you know we mustn't." A female voice somewhere far away spoke. The sound of it irritated her slightly.
"It's not fair, Hermione. Harry must be going mental not knowing any of what's going on." A male adolescent replied, presumably Ron.
"You know what Dumbledore said. We can't write things like that in Harry's letters. It's too dangerous..." The girl named Hermione didn't stop there, but the sound of her voice went on her nerves so much that she searched for something different to listen to.
While she searched for something interesting she recalled a voice very similar to that of Hermione's which had belonged to a girl that had once been in her class.
Annette Lindon. Urgh, Annie lil' Lindon who was so smart and so pretty and the one everyone just loved. How she had hated that girl.
Funny... she hadn't thought of Annette in years. She remembered how bitter and jealous she had been and smiled at how trivial her old problems seemed now. If only her biggest problem now could be her hair colour or some such nonsense. That would be lovely. Some normal superficial troubles would do her good.
Her train of thought was interrupted by a very pleasant sounding male voice somewhere in the house.
"Molly! You nearly frightened me to death, how may I help you?" The man said and she could almost see the smile on his face. It was odd as she hadn't actually seen him, but the part of her mind she had begun to think of as the vampire part, silly as that of course was, seemed to respond very positively to this voice. She wondered why as she continued to listen.
"Oh, I'm sorry Remus, I didn't mean to startle you." Molly cooed to Sally's surprise. She had thought the woman could do naught but shriek. Then she frowned. Hadn't 'Remus' been the name of the werewolf she had spoken of with Severus earlier?
"It's quite all right I assure you." Remus accepted her apology nicely but at the same time something in his tone suggested gently that she ask what she came to ask.
"Well, then. Severus was just here." Molly seemed to get irritated at simply mentioning Severus, judging by the change in her voice. "He wasn't alone. He dragged some wretched vampire in here with him and he wants you to take her to the Ministry to have her registered. Merlin knows why." Molly sighed in what could only be interpreted as sympathy for Remus' poor luck with assignments.
"A vampire? Have you left it alone? What about -" Molly cut him off before he could finish. His voice was nice sounding even when he was panicked. ...
"Don't worry, she's stunned, blindfolded and locked in a room where I've strictly forbidden the children from going." Molly informed him soothingly.
"Of course, I should have realized. Severus is, after all, no fool." Remus said, sounding much calmer.
"Well, I can't see why it has to be you who takes her to the Vampire Registry. Alastor could do it just as well after the meeting tomorrow." Molly answered huffily.
"Actually, Severus is right to have me take care of it. No vampire would make an attempt to hurt me and the same can not be said about Alastor. Highly skilled as he is, he's still human." Remus sounded tired now, resigned.
"I don't believe I quite understand..." Molly, Sally could tell, was as perplexed as she was. She awaited the explanation eagerly. She felt certain that it would contain the reason for his immense appeal to her.
"Vampires, werewolves and various nocturnal magical beings have a natural affinity towards one another. Vampires and werewolves especially. They tend to feel very protective and friendly towards each other. It stems from a time when werewolves were the vampires' protectors during the day and the vampires were the werewolves' protectors when the werewolves were in their weaker human form. We sense allies in each other." Remus seemed saddened as he explained this. He had also sounded very much like a teacher as he spoke. He was probably the first teacher-sounding person she had ever liked. Though she was somewhat unnerved at the reason behind her, what had he called it? Affinity towards him.
She tried to arrange her aching and bruised limbs into a comfortable position on the floor, was unsuccessful so she settled down to listening some more, somehow ignoring her discomfort.
"I never knew! How on earth did Severus know about that?" Molly exclaimed, obviously excited.
"It is not without reason Severus is after the Defence Against the Dark Arts teaching post at Hogwarts." Remus replied and she thought she could sense amusement from his tone.
Wait a minute. Hogwarts? Defence Against the Dark Arts?
Wonderful. More nonsense to deal with, Things just kept getting better and better.
"Well, it's not without reason Dumbledore hasn't given him the position." Molly answered sounding very cheerful, or gleeful or something-ful about it.
Suddenly there was a strange sound that was certainly not in any other part of the house. It was right there with her in the same room. She wished she could see. If only she could move...
She tried moving and realized she could actually move quite easily. After the usual amount of kicking herself for her stupidity she thought to herself that she must not be, what had they called it before? Stunned! They'd said she was stunned. What the hell was that about? Well, she was probably not stunned any more. She wondered why she wasn't. Those people obviously hadn't planned on it wearing off.
There was that sound again! Followed be an evil sort of voice muttering mean sounding things under its breath. It had to be small because it wasn't coming from very far above. It seemed nearly level with her and she was lying on the floor! She shuddered as she was reminded of rodents. Maybe it was a big talking rodent.
Hah.
Werewolves, vampires and wizards okay, but talking great big hamsters? That was just too silly. Even for this crazy world she was apparently in.
She reached up to feel her blindfold, very aware that there was some... thing in there with her that she could not see. The blindfold was soft and she deemed it likely to be a scarf of some sort. She felt around for a bit with both hands and was able to find the knot after some searching in the confusion of her hair. While she searched for the knot she realized that she seriously needed a shower. A bunch of days being dead in a coffin, who knew what had happened to her before the funeral, a night spent on the dirty floor of a tomb and of course all that writhing around on the ground in absolute and utter torture.
She hoped to the gods and all that was holy that there was no mirror in the room when she finally managed to pull the knot loose and expose her eyes to the world.
There was.
Typical.
Of course, being of the female persuasion, she couldn't resist the powerful attraction of the looking-glass. Sadly, Sally would have been much better off with the blindfold.
"No reflection?" She asked the noise that kept muttering somewhere below and to the left. She felt sheer disappointment and disbelief.
This was the worst thing that had happened to her in her entire life. She had never felt as crushed and alone. Now who was she supposed to talk to? It wasn't as if she had a chance of getting back in touch with the few good friends she had back in the US and no one in this stupid James Bond country seemed to speak any sense.
How would she know if she had stuff in her teeth? She though to herself despairingly. How would she know if her hair was doing something wonky? How would she know the simple fact of how she looked?
It was at that moment, when her vanity shattered into a million broken pieces, when the muttering noise, below and to the left, decided to inform her of the following:
"You is being Muggle filth!" It hissed, drawing her attention in its direction.
It wasn't a big hamster. It was a bit like a hairless dog on two feet. She wrinkled her nose when she noticed the dirty loincloth it was sporting.
"Eurch." She replied to it, hoping it would go away if she expressed mutual disgust.
And what does Muggle mean, anyway? She wondered as the creature proceeded to make itself scarce.
"How come I don't understand anyone in this country? I know it's England, but it's still supposed to be basic English." She expressed in an irritated manner at the empty mirror. She kept staring at the thing, wondering if her reflection would appear if she looked at it for long enough.
Nothing happened.
Except the small explosion that was soon to be followed by an awful stench and an angry shriek.
"Who threw that dungbomb!"