the
R A P U N Z E L
C O M P L E X
- Saeriel -
- Dim Aldebaran -
:i:
Chapter Three
…and Fowl is Fair
"I want to stay as close to the edge as possible without going over. Out on the edge you can see all sorts of things you can't see from the center."
Kurt Vonnegut
:i:
"Madeleine."
The gargoyle slid aside with an almost distrustful expression on her face; they had a history, the gargoyle and her. She had once tried to enter Dumbledore's office without knowing the password. Thanks to her parents, she had not known too many sweets, and after a time she had tried to force her way up. They both bore the resulting scars.
She had taken her time getting there, as if slowed by the slog of thoughts in her mind: her neurons spun about, coming up with choice phrases, explanations, excuses. She had practiced her facial expressions in passing windows, twisting her lips this way and that, wrinkling a brow, crinkling the eyes, all for just the right expression of innocence. Her voice, too, in the deserted corridors, adjusting the tone so it lay in the domain of empathy, not sympathy; equals, not teacher and student.
It seemed only fitting to her; she had done enough Order business to earn that right. If he challenged her reasoning… well, she was not a child anymore. She was in the Order, now. One of them.
On her way up the stairs, she evened her pace to her usual rushed lope; still, it would be better if found no reason to suspect her. Perhaps he already knew of her fallacy, but there was that chance that, just maybe, he didn't. The slender needle of hope was enough—if she was wrong, all it would do would prick her.
If she was right…
She tried not to think of the consequences.
The door: she put on her worried-but-curious-despite-herself face and entered.
Dumbledore's office, as always, had that feel of quixotic agelessness, whimsical silver contraptions whirling this way and that, maps and scrolls stacked up in plateaus and mesas, often topped with a tome or two of arcane knowledge—
"It's new, that one."
Hermione looked up, blushing; he had caught her looking at a wonder of bronze wires and sparkling vials, balanced precariously on a Penseive's edge—Voldemort's Pensieve. "It's a Mnemosynaether, isn't it?"
Dumbledore's eyes twinkled in such a manner that she could see it from twenty paces away. "Ah, yes. I thought you'd take a liking to it."
She frowned, walking deeper into the Headmaster's office. "But those are ancient, no one has ever figured out how they even work—"
Dumbledore only smiled.
Mnemosynaethers were peculiar devices. Historians speculated them to be built by a lost order of magi even before the great Sundering of Wizards from Muggle kind. However, the engineers had deemed this impossible—Mnemosynaethers were built with enchantments never even dreamed of in those ages. Few even existed, and because of their… select applications, little thought was given to them except for old men with a whim.
Fortunate, really, that this old man had both the whim and the application at hand.
Dumbledore gestured to a seat; Hermione sat down, examining the hieroglyphics on the parchment before her with mild interest, having taught herself various forms the previous year. They detailed the fall of Atlantis; was this, too, linked to the Mnemosynaether?—no, it was another mere curiosity in a room full of curioses.
"As you well know," Dumbledore began, "little is known about Voldemort's childhood."
She nodded, deciding that her feigned ignorance could be cast aside. "The Pensieve," she prompted.
Dumbledore nodded. "I will make this brief: I have been collecting memories of his childhood in an attempt to understand him."
"So you may defeat him," Hermione finished.
Again—a nod. "Thus far, I have only been able to retrieve one memory from this particular Pensieve—the rest have been 'deleted', one could say."
"Hence the Mnemosynaether." She feigned dawning understanding; she felt a curious twist in her stomach as she did so.
"Precisely." He gazed at her; she was unsettled by the pale eyes and looked down at her hands. They twisted in her lap. "The memories Lord Voldemort wishes to hide will be far from pleasant, but, if you will, I will share them with you."
She could not help but nod. Then, thinking herself too eager, she added, voice melding anxiety and hope, "Do you really think I'm the right one?"
"I have been… sharing these with Harry," Dumbledore replied slowly. He looked intently at Hermione through his half-moon glasses. "Initially, he would have been the only one, but given how... intimate your work is with Lord Voldemort, I think it is only right."
Harry already knows—
—the Chosen One who can't do his Potions homework—
—who can't even stand up for his friend—
"I'll do it," she replied.
"I thought as much," Dumbledore said cheerily. "The Mnemosynaether needs a day or to draw the residual memories from the Pensive; shall we speak again then?"
She nodded—then hesitated.
Dumbledore caught this and smiled. "Potions next hour? By all means, stall here, if it pleases you. I understand Slughorn is out with a nasty bout of flu."
"And—" she hesitated again. "Should I tell Harry?"
He looked across the rim of his spectacles. "I figured you two could do with some time to cool off," he said. "I hope you don't mind."
She nodded—he had sensed her envy, however brief.
Yet here I am—I have lied, and he does not know—
But he must know!—yet he has not said a word…
"Is everything alright, Miss Granger?" Again, the eyes, eyes that knew Legilimency—
"I'm fine," she responded, and added with a grin, "—though I haven't studied for the Potions test."
Dumbledore nodded thoughtfully. "Order business?"
"I'd ask you to explain it to Slughorn, but I assume Snape's taking over, in his absence?"
The twinkle returned to Dumbledore's eyes. "Good luck, then—unless there is something else?"
She shook her head, and left.
The door closed behind her. She didn't stop walking until she was out of range from the gargoyle; she ducked into the nearest niche and leaned her head against the wall, reveling in its cool solidarity.
Merlin… he knows…
He knows and he still told me…
Her stomach tightened; if she could bear the shame of tears, she would have cried.
He trusts me.
:i:
She didn't need to have studied; her classes came to her instinctually now. However, Snape was overseeing today, true to her guess—and he would be making this intentionally difficult, undoubtedly.
For the test, she had to brew a potion, of her choice, that induced lucid dreaming. She chose the Hagarian Set—a potion that, though the most complicated of the choices, would provide the most pleasing mixture of control and spontaneity.
It took her half of the double-potions—the first done. Things came to her more quickly, these days—she had created and downed a Daedelian Potion over the summer, an old potion that would, over time, enhance her mental facilities up to tenfold. The improvements had been disappointingly slight thus far, though the improvement was still there. An artificial wolf, perhaps, but a wolf she would become.
When she held up the gold-hued potion for inspection, Snape came swooping in, his reflection on the vial a bat sweeping over the harvest moon. "Done already, Granger? Ten points from Gryffindor, for cheating."
"Professor, I did not—"
"See me after class." And he swept away, the very bat.
I didn't do anything wrong! her mind protested—
—but then, her rationality kicked in. Assumptions were annoying; but she couldn't stop those first thoughts, twisting through her mind like falling scarves. He needed an excuse to talk to me in private—he wants to talk to me about Artemis—Merlin, he must know, he must have something for me about him—
Anticipation made her mind swirl. Snape was still quite the double agent; he had been out again last night, she could tell by the dark rings in his eyes. They would not have been able to do the raid on the former Death Eater lair if Snape had not accompanied them to the inauguration of their latest lair in the Loire Valley.
She forced her hands still as she put her potion ingredients away. The others had heard, of course. She had been meeting with Snape several times a week. She had gotten the idea from Harry, really—Snape was a wolf, but an old wolf, his slowing mind disguised only by his sharp tongue. Genii always fade young. However, he was still a master of his art, and his instruction was a welcome challenge after the monotony of the rest of school.
Several Gryffindors threw her envious looks as she slipped her cauldron into its slot. The looks the Slytherins gave her were something less innocent, though she was used to the teasing by now. Snape still viewed her as an overeager whore for knowledge, which, in a way, she was: but if there was any attraction between them, it was for fellow minds, fellow half-wolves, lurking in something so shadowy and dark they could only see each other's silhouettes. Physical desire for him was unimaginable; it simply could not be in such a relationship.
She still had more than an hour. Snape had taken on the appearance of a Stoker vampire, and was now occupied with glaring at Neville's hissing potion, as if willing it to explode. Pathetic, really—a wolf fallen to the self-gratification of failing students.
As if sensing her derision, he turned and gave her a look, fast and sharp, as a mongoose might.
She went up to him. Neville looked distinctly grateful, but ashamedly so; he had recently discovered pride, and intervention was a blow. "You wanted to see me?"
It was unnecessary, perhaps, but she had a very different definition of 'unnecessary'—'unnecessary' was the middle class, the public school system, the political moderates, the IQ 100. The extremes were all that mattered, really—and baiting Snape seemed properly risky to her.
He swept off again, to the potion storage room. She followed; she could feel their eyes following her, wondering, wondering what exactly they talked about behind closed doors—or, to those following the curve of her neck, the sweep of her hips, what exactly they did.
Such rumors were disgusting—but they were doomed to fly about. She had learned to bear them from Harry. Just watching him suffer second year had built her up for the fourth with Skeeter. She had a taste of what it would be like to be Harry Potter, then—the bad sort, though. She had never tasted godhood as Harry had.
She closed the door behind her. The musty smell of potions enveloped her like a warm blanket, oddly comforting. Snape did not look pleased; she clung to the scent of griffin bladders like she had never thought possible. Perhaps it was petty on her part, but he was old, she was young, he was unapproachable, she was naïve. She just had to deal with it until even he saw her as an equal.
"You have one minute," Snape hissed, turning to face her, "before it's a detention."
She let the sharp scent of rosemary guide her words: "I'd like to know why you sought an excuse to see me after class."
"Excuses are what we are, Miss Granger." His voice was like honey, slow, smooth, golden—then sharp, bitter, fermented. "You already make them yourself."
—just as always, subtle accusations—
She could not stop the thought: He is what I will become, isn't it?
Her stomach made that awful twist, as if being gouged out.
Her first thought was for how Snape knew: the Pensieve must have had a trigger on it, alerting Voldemort, who must have thought it amusing to tell of Hermione's insistent curiosity. Did they laugh at her pathetic attempts at decoding, did they mock her sudden infatuation, did they count the hours until she fell into their ranks, drawn by this infuriating infatuation—
"While you were… investigating last night, I was entertaining Death Eaters. Macnair mentioned the Dark Lord's latest affair."
The heaviness of the room smothered the beating of her heart. "What is it?"
"The Dark Lord has a lover."
—Merlin—
Artemis—Voldemort—
Not just brother wolves, but mates as well—
She sat on a convenient stepladder. "Explain."
His eyebrow raised. "Would you like an exact quote?"
She shook her head. "Is he a threat?"
Damnit. 'He'—I should have said 'she'—the most obvious thing to guess—
Snape caught her mistake and spun it back at her. "Most likely. He is quite the prodigy, I am told."
She was stung as if slapped; only a slow blush to her cheeks revealed her shame. "What can you tell me?"
"Only Macnair's drunken rant."
"Repeat it."
"The summary, or the complete spiel? You Gryffindors have such delicate ears."
She bit her lip. "Everything."
Snape murmured a spell of auditory recall; his voice changed to match Macnair's, duplicating the words exactly: "Didy' see that new bastard yet? No? Curse him for me, won't you? Damn beardless boy, not even of age, can't hold his liquor—spilled things out, shouldn't be said. Lucius got him drunk last night, very 'pset. He never gives us scars, but Lucius has 'em, got a royal Crucio, he did, by His own 'and. No one saw it, dunno what really happened. No one sees that bastard, but he's gonna pay, we'll get 'im later. No, don't go already, the womenfolk are comin' in soon, Goyle says they're virgins, the lot of them, we're thinking the boy'll show up, get a taste of somethin' sweet that he won't get from Him —"
"Enough," Hermione interrupted. "An overview?"
The summary was brief, and mercifully clean: "Lucius got the boy drunk; the Dark Lord is obviously quite attached to him. He's quite young, some sort of prodigy around your age, and—" he raised an eyebrow "—a 'pretty boy'."
"What does Dumbledore plan on doing about this?" She managed this quite calmly, relative to the roiling of her stomach.
"Nothing," Snape replied. "Foolish, really, but only to be expected."
Lovers—her mind spun, the world turned, yet she could not stop breathing.
Ravings of a drunken man, she rationalized. Giving a name to a relationship too complex for him to understand, too veiled for him to even see in its entirety.
"He talked to me—"
"And to Harry, and to senior members of the Order," Snape interrupted smoothly. "The Order will do nothing."
Her heart accelerated; she wondered if it was the thyme in the air, the foxglove, the dragon heart, or if it was her, out of control, irrational. "And—us?"
"'Us'? There is no 'us', Miss Granger, nor will there ever be."
"You think I'm a fool," she shot back. "A fool who wants to be what only luck with the chromosomes can provide. Maybe I am, but I still have to know."
Snape drew her potion from his robes and passed it back to her. It looked like ancient honey, now, having aged. "Take it tonight," he said, "and pester me again tomorrow. I have better things to do than deal with infatuated little girls."
And he opened the door; class was almost over, though everyone was still hunched desperately over their cauldrons. "Sweet dreams," he murmured as he swept out the door.
:i:
The potion was heavy against her thigh, warm and smooth like a promise. She had no interest in lunch, so she returned to the dorms—only to find Ron and Lavender snogging on the couch. They didn't notice her presence as she climbed the stairs to her dorm—nor did they notice as she turned at the top, and watched for a moment.
It all seemed rather repetitious to her, the same… movements, the same parts—surely the same sensations. Wouldn't it be boring after a while? They seemed gluttonous, feasting on something for so long it had lost its flavor. Roman of them, really.
Artemis—will we be like this?
Or never at all—?
She dismissed this. Idle fantasy, she told herself.
—and even so, his body is not his mind—
She considered this, now lying down on her bed, face up, eyes too open. The potion gleamed like a harvest moon, yellow, but hazy, as if a cloud had passed over.
She had only Astronomy, in the evening, hours later—she'd have time for a dream, she'd have time to find out for herself—perhaps it would still be imagining, but it would be real enough for her—
She fingered the potion, raising it above her head. The canopy turned a warped shade of maroon through the vial. To drink, or not to drink—that is the question.
She knew what she would dream about: she had never dreamed of lust or its requisite yearnings. Would she find an addiction, a furthering to this frustrating infatuation, a desire that not even her rationale could abate? Perhaps she would steal ingredients for subsequent doses, and perhaps Snape would let her, watching her fall into a cycle he knew she would never break? It had become like that for knowledge, she knew, and maybe artificial love wouldn't be so different—
She considered Ron, Lavender—
Do I want to be like him—
Addicted, and not even caring?
There was something that deepened the wound, some thought that swept across her tender mind like a cruel scimitar—but she drifted, and drifted, the vial slipping into her pocket as sleep took her.
:i:
It wasn't the lucid dream of the Hagarian Set, but it was decent enough. She drifted upwards through the haze, up and above until that which had awoken her became apparent.
She glanced at the grandfather clock—three in the afternoon.
And—that knock again.
She glared at the door, willing Harry and his pathetic apologies away. She didn't want to fight, she didn't want to argue, she didn't want to heal their friendship—she had other things, more important things to deal with—
It occurred to her the knock did not come from the door. She sat up in bed, looked around, and nearly fell back into the rich coverlets.
"I heard you didn't try out for Quidditch."
Hermione snatched her wand and went to the window. Lupin had an uncertain hover on an old Cleansweep. "What in Nimue's name are you doing?"
"Something's come up," Lupin replied succinctly.
"Does Dumbled—"
"Yes," Lupin said shortly, "but really, we have no time." He gestured towards the broom.
She leaned out. The Grounds swirled beneath her like a melting emerald. "You had better have a bloody good Cushioning Charm," she muttered, and slid onto the broomstick, clutching at his midsection.
She felt inertia begin to pull at her gut, twisting it in a way that made guilt feel like a mere twirl on the merry-go-round. Resolving not to look down never worked, but she tried anyway—
Merlin, she thought. Lupin twisted his head backwards when she snatched at his robes, nearly tearing them from his thin frame. I hate flying.
She had not grown up with broomsticks and Levitate charms, nor had she grown up reckless and wild. Even though her trust in her spells was near absolute, she could not help but wonder about the inevitability of mistakes and deterioration in the enchantments.
Perhaps her fear was the mere result of a rational mind: faith in nothing, doubt in all?
Not that it mattered. She looked down and nearly died. The world whirled like a Charybdis of color, and she, Odysseus, clinging to his own brand of life.
They spiraled, up and up and up—where the casual Muggle could not see, or perhaps to find the place from above, with all of Britain stretched out below them as a great map. She jammed her face into Lupin's robes when she thought of the necessary plunge from such heights. The scent of cloves seeped into her whirling mind—the smell of lycanthropy, she thought vaguely, sickly sweet, like death.
His worn robes were oddly soft; she concentrated on the texture, the warmth, the scent, anything to rid herself of that terrible pulling on her gut. She squeezed tighter at her midsection; there was a suspicious woosh of air past her, as if they had quite nearly missed something that would not have been a pleasant thing at all to crash into.
"Where are we going?" she asked. Her eyes stayed tightly shut—idly, she wondered if her imagination had overdone the horror of flying, it wasn't so bad—
She opened her eyes, then closed them again. I hate flying.
—but why the Forbidden Forest? Not even the Death Eaters venture there—
Her throat caught, and not from inertia. They've allied themselves to giants and Dementors, werewolves and vampires—what now?
She heard the sound of a different sort of thunder and gasped. No—nononono—
They've always been their own, how could they do this, how could they stand subservience—?
The slowing of the broomstick was somehow more gut-wrenching than the flight itself. She idly wondered how Lupin could breathe, given how tightly she clutched at his midsection.
When the world had stopped, she opened her eyes. They hovered just above the canopy. Though the midafternoon sun shone like a heliotrope, the forest below was black and green, like powdered malachite. "Lupin, wha—"
Lupin half-turned on the broom. "There isn't much time. We are deep in the centaur territory, in the Forest. Are you familiar with its history, by chance?"
Hermione nodded, already recalling the passing mention from Hogwarts, A History. The deep Forest had been a fierce battleground between the Romans and the local Celts, the battles were concentrated in this area, and were some of the bloodiest in all of Britain. This was due to the centaurs' inclusion: they had never been fond of civilization, not the sort that the Romans brought with their taxes and gladiators and aqueducts. The Celts had often drawn the legions to this place, counting on the centaurs' aid—but once their Lord had fallen in battle, they forsake the humans, leaving the Celts to their eventual doom. This had been a turning point in centaur history; before this point, they fought in the more idealistic battles alongside humans.
Lupin saw the cogs in her head turning and grinned. "There's some things that aren't in the books—things we had to get from Firenze. The centaurs have come to mourn the anniversary of the death of one of their legendary Lords. We would have told you sooner, but Firenze informed us that our—previous choice wouldn't work."
The irony, she thought as the broom sank down, that the very place they swore off humans is where they'll join in our affairs once more.
And—why? That question rang in her mind even as she slipped from the broom. "What am I supposed to do, exactly?"
He gave a small, tired smile . "Make friends," he said. The broomstick began to rise—and she was already lost in her books of history, in those vague allusions to centaur rites, in the careful evasions of what the authors didn't know. "Hermione, be careful—"
It was like a whisper in the forest, closing in around her. She scarce heard it.
So little was known about centaurs—few humans were tolerated, and none since the days of Merlin had been welcomed. She would be relying on this sacred time of mourning to halt the lash of hooves; beyond that, she was female, which was better than egotistical males in their eyes. Her face was known to these centaurs, and not in a good way, due to previous adventures—and adventures only occurred if you were doing something wrong. You never had adventures if you were going about your business the right way.
She had been in the Forbidden Forest before—on her little flings with danger in previous years, and more recently on Order business. She had never gone this deep before, however, not all these kilometers in… did things get more dangerous, the further you went in, or was it not a matter of how deep you went in, but how bad you wanted the danger—
She breathed the scent of darkness in. Where the centaurs gathered, she did not know. She had heard the sound of them only moments before, the sound of them moving in a great stampede. Their speed suggested escape; their direction implied that, whatever they fled from, it was heading towards her current position
She drew her wand and slid into the hollow of a yew tree. The creatures of the Forbidden Forest had never been completely catalogued; perhaps it was some unheard-of monster that chased after the centaurs, something strange and terrible that nothing could ever escape from—
A slow silver drifted into the clearing. She ran through the possibilities, muttering the appropriate curses for each beneath her breath.
The pale, ethereal glow brightened. The whole clearing was dappled with it now, lending it a sort of beauty she had come to expect in the darkness. Her breathing accelerated—the danger she had faced before had been easy, simple, elaborate curses and traps she could unweave at her leisure. This—this came, whatever it was, came and she could not stop it, there would only be a moment and nothing else, one shot, one spell, one chance, with scarce a time to think—
The light filled the glade, now, casting bright shadows and dark pools of light. Maybe it could hear her heartbeat—maybe it was coming for her now—
Is this what I want?
The glade was silent; not even the wind dared trespass on the sanctity of death. Nothing would answer her questions except for it, coming to answer in the language of blood and fire…
Not Artemis, not a wolf—but danger, sweet danger that takes me even now?
She clutched her wand. It was slick with sweat. She had never been so afraid as nshe was now, so alone, and the glade just kept brightening with that damnable light, and despite it all, she found herself in a mad ecstasy. This was who she was, not someone atrophied by books—
Is my love of danger the cause of my infatuation? Her mind was calm; her body was not. Her skin had a sheen of sweat that glowed like a pearl in the effusing light. Or—is my infatuation the cause?
The place seemed washed in moonlight, drowned in fact, as the light poured in from beyond.
Would I be doing this if I didn't want the danger?
Her breathing must be music to the predator, hunting her down—
Would I ever have done this if not for a wolf?
She grasped her wand tighter, readying herself to face the monster, to face it down and let it know she was more than Hermione Granger, more than a half-wolf.
A ridiculous thought came to her mind—
What came first, love of danger or love of wolves?
What came first, the chicken or the egg—
The silence swelled up in a glorious symphony, swallowing her in its terrible beauty and sucking her downward, downwards into its hungry maw. The pull was so strong, this deep pull from her very soul, some music dark and deep, beyond Mozart, Grieg, Tchaikovsky—a silence beyond the stars, beyond oblivion—
Is this why he joined Voldemort's side—did he want danger, or did he want a wolf?
Artemis, who are you—
She ducked from her cover, a curse forming on her lips—
A unicorn stood before her, as she had never seen one before—the ones Hagrid had shown her had been pale stars compared to this, for this one was as a diamond, a supernova, something beyond even the most idealistic of words…
Merlin, she thought. She could make out its eyes, large, blue, the blue of summer skies, the blue of the predawn twilight, the blue of another's eyes, a mere memory of a memory.
It stood there. She could not help but run through the potion attributes as she stared, uses of powdered horn, its mane, its blood—immortality lay within a unicorn's blood, and with it, power, power even true wolves would emvy—
The unicorn stepped back.
Unicorns were attracted to innocence.
A terrible pain rose within her. Don't go—I'm sorry—I can't help myself— it's just how I am—
It stood still, still like dust in a tomb, like the stars in their death.
I know I have ulterior motives, she tried, but I'm here to help.
The eyes, so blue, so deep, like great wells, fathomless, beautiful—they seemed to look into her, not at her as they had moments before, questioning, seeking, knowing, omniscient. Someone could tell her the unicorn was God in that moment and she would believe it without question
Breaking the silence felt like sacrilege before this wonder: she tried using thought again. Things haven't been very pleasant. I'm trying to make things better for all of us.
The eyes turned deeper yet, and she lost all thought: they came closer, and closer, until she could breathe the faint scent of allspice, sweet, sickly-sweet death, like Lupin's scent, and she found herself, then, on the unicorn's back, and the ride was smooth, slipping through the forest in a ride as a needle threading silk, a dream, and she drifted into a haze where there only a sweetness like the taste of a first kiss, the scent of vanilla, the song of the dove and the feel of hope beneath the hand, trembling there, but soft and warm and tremulous as hope ever has been.
:i:
The Mnemosynaether was named after Mnemosyne, who, in Hellenic Greek mythology, was the "Titan of Memory", mother of the Muses, and one of the cleverer of Zeus' lust-objects: she escaped Hera's jealous attentions entirely, which is more than poor Io or Leto can say.