Disclaimer: Owned by JK Rowling Inc.

Summary: Hermione's bubbling resentment of her position backfires. Warnings: violence and cursing.

A/N: Okay, this is the second part of the last chapter. Don't I update fast? That's what being stuck in rainy Ecuador will do to ya!
Now firstly, I want to caution: don't be alarmed by how this chapter ends. This story, believe it or not, is a romance, though it may not seem like it right now. I know a lot of people won't like the ending of this chapter, but I'll move on quickly, and the story will get happier, I promise. Oh and Rikkod-- I didn't put much thought into it, but I assume that the war would be all magic. Not sure why you'd think it would involve tanks and planes and stuff. Anyway, thank you for all your comments, I hope you enjoy this chapter (eeeek) and please review if you do.

Feeling the wood caress her fingertips, Hermione brought the wand up to chest, flared out her arm, pointed and cast.

"Wingardium Leviosa."

Her target, a collection of books strewn about Lucius's floor, began to lightly shake and then slowly hover, until they reached a height about eye level with Hermione. Seeing this, she beamed. God, it felt good to do magic again.

Before she had left, Pansy had given her a wand to help with her daily duties. It was a heavily restricted wand, incapable of casting anything but the most basic spells, and Hermione was also wearing her magic restriction collar. But still, the thrill of casting a spell had always excited her. And it had been so long since she had been allowed to hold a wand.

Of course, with magic, everything was easy. Books were levitated and then sorted back into their rightful spot on the bookshelf. Torn curtains were re-sewn and re-hung on the windows. Shattered glass un-shattered, broken furniture un-broke. Magic could do anything.

In fact, cleaning Lucius's room was proving to be remarkably easy. After an hour Hermione was nearly done, so to avoid an entire day with nothing to do, she decided to stop with the magic and re-sort the remaining books by hand. Of course, doing this meant a grim reminder of what books Lucius would have normally read. She picked up a copy of Post War Mudblood Extermination, a book at home with the rest of his collection, and shuddered. She was lucky to be alive.

After re-sorting that and a couple of other books, she reached down and grabbed a dusty grey tome. Turning the book over, she gasped at the title, Intelligence on the Order of the Phoenix Members. During the war, her side had had a similar book, Reports on Higher Order Death Eaters. She opened the book to the index, and ran her finger down to G. As she suspected, Granger-Hermione, was there. She quickly turned to the corresponding page, and read the description.

Granger-Hermione: Fearsome and immensely talented mudblood witch. Directly responsible for the heavy losses incurred at skirmishes in Reading and Cardiff. High ranking OOTP member, believed to be in charge of the OOTP defense of Wales. Extremely gifted with magic and tactics, flying may be her only weakness. Lord Voldemort has labeled her a priority enemy of the state, and as such all Death Eaters are instructed to make her capture or death the highest priority. Due to her personality and blood lineage, she will almost certainly not allow herself to be captured alive, thus it is advised that killing spells be used upon immediate contact.

She dropped the book back on the floor. That last sentence ripped through her. She will almost certainly not allow herself to be captured alive. It had been true. She would have never allowed it, would have rather died. She had had pride, been in command of hundreds of people, was respected and admired by her side and feared by the other. She had been fearsome. Her friends had all been killed, all died noble deaths fighting for what they had believed in. She had been captured, and now look at her. Dressed up in a maid's uniform, slave to a high ranking Death Eater, cleaning the study of a deceased even higher ranking Death Eater. And grinning with happiness because her master had allowed her to use a levitation spell. She was pathetic.

But then she remembered the pain. The torture, the beating, the rapes, the starvation---she would do anything not to go through those again. As much as she hated herself for it, as much as she cursed herself for compromising her principles, Hermione wanted to live. She wanted to wake up every morning with the faint sense of hope that one day she would be free again, that Voldemort would be gone. She didn't want to die. She didn't want to go back to prison. And so she picked up the book, placed it on the bookshelf, and resumed cleaning.

When Pansy came home, dinner was waiting. Hermione had spent the past hour preparing it, using all the recipes and skills she had acquired in the idle moments during the war. Pansy was impressed.

"Why slave, this food looks positively delicious!" She patted and rubbed Hermione's head, in the same manner one would pet a dog. Hermione tensed at this treatment. She half-resented, half-appreciated being treated like a pet. It made her feel safe, but also brought back the unpleasant reality of her status.

They sat down to eat, and much like at breakfast, they mostly ate in silence. Pansy was again reviewing various documents while eating, occasionally humming to herself. Hermione, with nothing to say or do, watched her eat. As before, there was something slightly odd about Pansy, and she couldn't quite figure out what, until Pansy grabbed a piece of steak. It was then that Hermione noticed it, what had been bothering her. Pansy only used her right hand. She cut the meat with her right hand, and then grabbed a fork with her right hand to eat it. She shuffled through her papers with her right hand, wrote notes with her right hand, scratched her nose with her right hand. Her left hand lay still on the table.

Her left hand was covered by her sleeve, but the tips of her fingers looked fine. Hermione leaned in slightly and cocked her head for a closer look. She couldn't tell what was wrong with it, what would explain its lack of use. And then she realized that the humming had stopped. She looked up to find Pansy staring at her, with an angry expression on her face.

"What's so interesting, slave?" Her tone was frightening.

Hermione could only stutter. "Um….uh…nothing, mistress."

"I see you've noticed my arm."

"No, mistress, it was nothing, I was just---"

"Shut up! I know you were staring at it." Pansy stood up from her chair, furious, as if to strike, and Hermione sunk into hers.

But then Pansy seemed to calm herself down. Taking a series of long breaths, she sat down again.

"Would you like to know what happened to my arm?" She spoke with calm.

Hermione stared at her, scared that this was a trick question and that whatever answer she gave would be wrong.

"I'll show you." Pansy pulled her sleeve back. "This," she said, revealing an arm that was covered with burns, scars and pulsing veins, "is what happened to my arm." It resembled a charred branch more than an arm.

Hermione flinched and pulled back. She was speechless, breathless. "Who…how did that happen? Who did that to you?"

Pansy smiled sadly to herself.

"You did."

Hermione stood still, trying to comprehend her meaning. Anger began to rise inside of her. Was Pansy accusing her of that? How dare she---how da---

"You and your friends at the Order of the Phoenix did this to me."

Hermione snapped. Now it was her turn to stand up in anger.

"How dare you accuse us of something like that!" she said, pointing at Pansy's arm. We at the Order of the Phoenix never once resorted to torture! Which is more than can be said about the brutes on YOUR side!" she spat.

Pansy's face began to lose its composure. "Sit down, slave," she said, obviously trying to remain calm and restore calm in Hermione.

But Hermione wasn't going to sit down. They had taken away her freedom, tortured her endlessly, killed all her friends. She had once been fearsome. But now the only thing she had were her memories, the pride she felt when she remembered what she had fought for in the war. Pansy wasn't going to take that away from her too.

"Fuck you," she growled. "Fuck you. You're not going to blame us for something we never did. You miserable bitch, you brought me here for this, didn't you? You brought me here so you could torment me like this. Well fuck you. You're not going to blame us for that worthless arm of yours." She had snapped.

Upon hearing these words, Pansy's eyes flashed with murderous rage, and the next thing Hermione knew, she was blinded by a huge flash of light and was thrown into the wall on the other side of the room.

Stunned, and in pain from the impact, she groaned and attempted to roll over on her side. A sudden blow on her face knocked her back. Pansy was standing over her holding a wand, shaking in rage, having just kicked her in the face.

"YOU FUCKING BITCH! YOU FUCKING MUDBLOOD PIECE OF SHIT!" she screamed at the top of her lungs. "YOU THINK YOUR SIDE WAS SO PERFECT, DON'T YOU?" She reached down and pulled Hermione up by her neck. Clenching her right hand around her neck, she began to squeeze.

"You fucking bitch, after you were captured your precious friends went crazy trying to find you. You think they didn't torture? YOU THINK THEY DIDN'T TORTURE!" she spat in Hermione's face and tightened her grip around her neck.

"I was in charge of a prison, and they raided it, and captured me. They thought I knew where you were." By now, tears had begun to form in Pansy's eyes and every muscle in her body was shaking. "They beat me half to death trying to get me to tell them where you were, they didn't believe that I didn't know. After they had beaten me, they started burning my arm, starting with my dark mark. Your precious, perfect boyfriend Ron told me if I didn't tell them, they'd start destroying my limbs one by one."

She pulled back for a moment, and pushed Hermione down to the ground in front of her left arm. "LOOK AT MY ARM! LOOK AT IT! THEY DESTROYED IT! IT CAN'T GROW BACK!" By now she was crying hysterically. "YOUR SIDE DIDN'T TORTURE? LOOK AT IT! THEY DID IT BECAUSE OF YOU! HOW DO YOU THINK PEOPLE LOOKED AT ME AFTERWARDS? HOW DO YOU THINK THE MALFOYS TREATED ME? DRACO DIDN'T EVEN WANT TO TOUCH ME!"

She lurched backwards and in a hysterical rage began kicking Hermione. Her blows found their target, and Hermione was quickly battered and bloody. Pansy, still sobbing uncontrollably, eventually relented, and stumbled away, her cries echoing down the hallway. Reaching her bedroom, she collapsed on her bed, eventually falling asleep after drenching the sheets with her tears.

Back in the kitchen, Hermione passed out in a pool of her own blood.