Chapter 3: The Monster
By Callisto Callispi
"Come here."
Hermione shook her head, averting her eyes almost shyly from the man who offered her his hand.
"Come now, darling."
Still, she shook her head, backing into the hungry shadows. She heard the music -- heard how chiming it was. A child sang it, and it sounded like the voice of heaven itself. But Hermione felt strange, just accepting that white hand. It was so white and smooth and yet pulsing so that she did not know whether that the man wore gloves or not. And besides, did she even know the man? Did she even trust him? Did he even…love her?
Love her? What in the world was she thinking about? She hardly knew this man!
"You don't want to?" he asked, his face in shadows so that she couldn't tell if the remorse tingeing his voice was true or false.
Hermione shook her head, gasping as she took a step forward toward him. Damn. Damn! Her feet, as if some magnetic force pulled her body along, were taking small steps toward him. Damn it, damn him! He was doing this to her!
"Oh, God, darling. Don't resist. Please. I…love you."
Unbidden tears flooded Hermione's eyes. A sadness she did not feel welled up in her body. I love you too, her mouth wanted her to say. But Hermione knew that she didn't love him. She didn't even know who he was.
"D-darling," she whispered. Hermione was horrified, and yet her feet carried her toward the mystery man. The man hidden by the shadows whose white hand, gloved or not, was trembling with anticipation, with desire, with hunger. "Darling," Hermione said once more, a bit more loudly. Her feet. Her arms. They stepped, stretched toward that man. Damn him! Damn him to hell! It was so hard to hold back, this desire, this pounding longing.
"DARLING!" she cried, her voice broken with sobs, and Hermione ran toward that man and leapt right into his arms…
When Hermione opened her eyes darkness greeted her. Then, she felt the pain in her head. A mild curse slipped from her lips as her fingers threaded in her hair in an attempt to reach the scalp. Ah, the aching. But Hermione took a few breaths, eyes closed, and slowly, the pain receded mostly through the efforts of her own will. Then she opened her eyes.
That same looming, drafty darkness surrounded her, but Hermione knew she was inside. Placing her fingers on the ground -- carpeted finely -- she pushed herself up to her feet, finding that she felt as if she were swirling and the world in response swirled in the opposite direction from her. She stumbled about until she came to rest against a smooth wall. It felt like wood. And as she stood against that wall, trying not to gag, little bits of recollection flooded back to her. What was this place? Why the darkness?
Sorrow. Beauty.
The two concepts rushed to her. Hermione clutched her head as images assaulted her. Roses, glistening with diamond drops of dew. A chill autumn wind, something like cold magic under that blood-red tree. The orange and purple sky sleeping with mystery, with knowing. Tears trailing a silver streak down a reddened cheek. A waltz upon the glass floor with planets and stars glittering under their feet. The universe resting in her arms. Two strangers in that garden of tangled ivy and crimson blood, lost in the embrace of music and lust. Here in this world is where you want to be.
And Hermione opened her eyes, thinking, Yes, here, I feel so alive. She was so aware of every little thing. The pain she felt only intensified in this world. The thoughts were so much clearer. The desires so much stronger. Even she herself felt so attached to his world -- not heavier, at least in terms of more mass, but almost as if the gravity were stronger in this world, as if it were trying damnably hard to keep her rooted here.
But…why? Hermione did not get any answers, even though she racked her brain for any. She hated feeling this unsure. She hated not knowing why something happened. God, where was she? Why was she here in this world where gravity was skewed only for her? She could hardly jump an inch off the ground, and even walking took great effort. And why the hell couldn't she see?
Hermione gasped, feeling something suddenly materialize in her hand. It was long, hard, cylindrical, and cold. It also felt a bit slippery...almost like dried wax. She stifled a scream as the tip of that object lit up, her eyes almost burning with sudden orange light. But Hermione did not drop it, and instead held it shakingly up to her eyes. A candle. A lit candle. A candle that lit all by itself.
What was going on? Where the was she? Like the candle, Hermione half-expected the answer to appear in her hand -- maybe a scrap of paper with a quick little note written on it, "You are in the deep bowels of the underworld. Enjoy."
Hermione squared her shoulders, sighing, and began walking. What a morbid imagination she posessed. She ran her fingertips along the walls, finding them to be of wood rather than the stone she expected. So she wasn't in a prison, was she? Perhaps a room? Then, if this was a room, where was the door? Every room had a door.
She walked around in the darkness. The candle, despite its brightness, could not brighten the whole room. In fact, the flame was nearly useless except for complimenting the pleasant designs of the golden carpet. But Hermione did not wish to be engulfed in darkness anymore. She hated feeling like a blind person, stumbling this way and that in total oblivion.
Within a few minutes, she found the door. In fact, the door was actually a set of double-doors, with two elaborately carved knobs in the center. With a sudden shot of delight, she wrapped her fingers around the handle and pulled it downward, pushing against the door with her arm. It wouldn't open.
Hermione paused. The handle worked, but the door wouldn't open. Perhaps it was stuck? But no matter how much she pushed and pulled, the doors, both of them, wouldn't open. She stamped the floor in frustration. What was this place? A fancy, wooden prison? Damn it! She tried to ignore the cold fear chilling her. She tried to ignore what would happen if she never got out of this infernally dark room.
"No, no don't think of that," she whispered. She then continued walking, hoping to find another set of doors, or better, some keys. She wanted to get out of this place.
Suddenly, Hermione felt her foot getting caught on something heavy. She screamed as she fell to the floor, dropping the candle and sending it soaring against the wall. Hermione opened her eyes, again finding herself in a darkness more dark than before, with the candlelight out. She tried to get up, and pushed against the floor to --
She paused. Hermione noticed that she didn't push against the hard floor -- instead, she pushed against something firm yet soft and warm enough that…
A body.
Her face paled a good four shades. Then she scrambled backwards, gasping, too scared to scream. A body. A body! Her first thought was that it was a dead body, freshly killed so that its flesh was still supple and warm. But then, from that same body came a groan. Hermione felt the breath catch in her throat. That moan -- she had heard it before, somewhere, some time.
"Fuck," the figure muttered quietly, raspily. Hermione remained quiet, scared yet curious. "Fuck," it said again. Louder, this time.
Recognition flickered within Hermione's mind. It couldn't be. On her hands and knees, she clumsily crawled over to now-sitting form, reaching out her hand blindly to find her fingertips stroking his soft, moist hair. "Draco Malfoy?" she whispered.
As if on instinct, he jerked away from her touch. "Who the hell are you?"
Hermione wanted to cry. So she wasn't alone. Thank you, whatever god was up there. She wasn't alone in this place. "You're here," she managed to choke out. How relief flooded her throat so that she couldn't even speak. "I'm not alone. You're here."
"Who are you?" he asked once more, though his voice seemed a bit softer. His fingertips reached out tentatively toward her tear-stained cheek. Strange. She didn't know she was crying.
Then a thought struck Hermione. Did she really want to tell Malfoy who she was? He would probably curse at her and run away in the opposite direction. She blinked. Perhaps not something as extreme as that, but… Hermione dried the tears from her face and scooted back so that his fingertips did not graze her anymore. "It's me," she said quietly. "Hermione Granger."
Silence loomed in between them. Hermione felt herself blush. She was crying in front of him. He couldn't see her tears in this darkness, but he sure as hell felt them. How mortifying. How could she lose her control in front of him like that?
"G-Granger?" He choked this out.
Hermione nodded, then remembered they could hardly see anything. "Y-yes."
He remained silent for a length of time. Again. The suspense was terrible. Then he erupted. "What the hell are you -- what the hell -- what is this place! What did you do to me? What did you do to my family!"
Family?
"Answer me, damn you!" he screamed, nearly hysterical. "Answer me, you bitch!"
Hermione cringed. Bitch? What was wrong with him? "Calm down, Malfoy!"
"Calm down? Calm down! Like hell I will! What --"
"Shut up!" Hermione snapped suddenly. Surprisingly, Draco listened and did indeed quiet himself, though she knew he was seething. That little bastard. Didn't he think she was scared too? Insensitive worm. "I don't know what this place is, Malfoy," Hermione replied quietly, calmly, angrily. The darkness seemed so much larger now, so much more threatening. The warmth in her bones left her. A chilly draft overtook them, and Hermione slowly felt that anger of hers melting away. Instead, she felt dread. And fear.
"Can you sense…it?" Draco asked her in a whisper.
"Yes," Hermione replied quietly. "We need some light. I dropped a candle. Somewhere. When I tripped over you."
She heard a shuffle of clothes. "I'll try to find it," he said.
Hermione nodded and ran her hands over the carpeted floor, wondering what Malfoy had said. Family? Bitch? He had no reason to say anything like that. Were they his dreams, then? Like her and that man with the white hand? Goose bumps trailed across her flesh. Hermione gasped as she felt something like a cold hand gripping the edge of her spine, twisting it, fondling it, licking it…
"Arrrh!" she cried out, falling back down onto the ground. She curled up in a little ball, thrashing as hands held her down. As Draco held her down. But she didn't knew it was him.
"Hold still! Granger! Damn it! What's wrong with you!"
She kicked her legs at him. She bared her fingernails, trying to scratch that pale white skin. It was still doing it, licking the base of her spine, grazing its sharp teeth over it, running its tongue over the nerve endings, paralyzing each one with its honeyed saliva. She felt its progress from her spine, her actual spine wrapped around with layers of arteries, and toward her stomach. He licked there too, the squishy bag that held the acids that broke up her food, and instead of disgust, she felt a sudden spasm of warmth and an oozing sensation of pleasure. He had drawn blood inside of her body, and she liked it. What twisted lovemaking was this? The hot, steaming blood streaked through out her body, poisoning her, pleasuring her. It shot down her thighs, spreading them further. It shot up her arms, forcing them around her lover's shoulders, drawing him and his fingers close to her naked body. The blood shot up to her head, drugging her in a haze of crimson ecstasy until she lost herself, dreaming, hallucination. Without knowing, Hermione threw her head back to scream in utter ecstasy. No pain -- just a sense of sweet poisoning, like drinking hard liquor in a snowy valley. Finally, the blood reached her vagina, and the pleasure was too much for Hermione to handle. She bucked her hips, feeling her arousal (or was it the blood that he had drawn and led?) dripping out, her mind crying for him to fill her, to slam upon her core until he bruised her from within, just as he was doing now.
And the hands held her pinned onto the ground. The bed. He wouldn't let go of her.
"Please," she cried breathlessly as his hands tore off her chemise. "Let me go. Please."
"Little girl. Scream for me."
His teeth grazed the bare flesh of her breasts, pausing when his sharp canines reached the hardened peak of her nipples. Hermione threw her head back, hating herself as she felt her iron will melt and mesh with his own. His eyes, unusually yellow and red, glittered with amusement.
What was this creature of lust? What was this creature that raped her so completely, inside and out? And he hadn't even penetrated her yet!
And as he dipped his head down toward her abdomen, he breathed on her skin and whispered, "Come with me, Hermione. Don't resist me."
She lay in those cushions, hair spread out on the pillow, face glistening with sweat from this sick foreplay. She wanted with all her heart to resist this bastard. She wanted to grab one of those sharp teeth in his mouth and plunge it in one of his scary-looking eyes. Hermione had no doubt that the tongue darting in and out of her vagina was lapping up the blood. Warped bastard. BASTARD! She struggled to sit up despite the pleasure clouding her head, that crimson haze in her mind -- her own blood that he manipulated with such ease.
"G-get away…" she whispered throatily, digging her fingernails into the cushions of the bed.
He paused, and he looked up, those eyes shining with malice and hunger. "Get…away?" he asked as if he couldn't comprehend those words, his voice surprisingly cultured and smooth. Hermione blinked, trying to catch a glimpse of his face in this thick red fog. But she only saw traces of him -- his smooth, untarnished skin; his sensually full lips; his eyes.
Hermione was too weary to cry. "Get…away from me."
"From you, dear?" he sounded amused.
Hermione sucked in a breath as she felt his iron-hinged fingers around her throat, applying enough pressure for it to ache terribly but granting enough leverage so that she could just barely breathe.
"But I love you," he whispered in her ear, tongue darting out to smear her own blood against her cheek. "I love you so much."
Hermione's fingers tingled. She wanted to rip his throat out. She didn't want to hear his voice anymore. "No…you don't."
His grip around her throat tightened. Her breaths were but squeals now, shallow and quiet.
"Do not presume to tell me what I love and do not love, darling." His lips then captured hers, but the fingers around her throat did not loosen. Hermione tried to move, only to find her limbs as heavy as lead. She was suffocating. She was suffocating in this brutal monster's arms. Someone help her… Please…someone help her…
"Granger!"
Hermione forced her eyes open, though she knew she was going to die. That voice…
"Wake up! Granger!"
The fingers around her throat loosened. He stopped kissing her and jerked backward, as if burnt. "What? Why…" Hermione fell to the bed and closed her eyes. She knew his voice. And the monster seemed to as well. "The boy," he whispered. And did Hermione catch a tint of fear? "That boy…"
"Damn it, Granger, open your eyes!"
I'm trying, Malfoy. I'm trying so hard…
The monster backed away from her, leaving her the only one on the bed. She caught his smirk. "Well my love. It seems that I must leave you for now."
Then go, you bastard. But she almost didn't catch the monster's voice, for it was getting fainter and fainter. She felt herself sink into the pillows -- literally sink, as if it were quicksand. Her body was numb, her senses shot. But she knew it felt like flying, what she was experiencing. She knew it would lead her back, back to the world of sorrow and beauty. But did she want to go back there?
Actually, it seemed as if she had no choice, for his hands gripped her wrist and pulled her toward him. And Hermione almost smiled. She loved…
"GRANGER!"
Hermione's eyes shot open and she once against found herself in that black darkness. No more red. She wriggled her fingers. No more numbness. "M-Malfoy?"
He paused, and Hermione could once again feel his hard hands on her shoulders. "Oh my God, Granger, I thought you were --"
And Hermione could not help herself. She sat up and wrapped her arms tightly around Draco, weeping silently into his shoulder. "Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you…" she whispered between her sobs again and again.
His body stiffened, his arms lax. But she didn't care how crazy or weird he thought her. She didn't care. He saved her from that monster, so she kept crying silently and whispered without pause, "Thank you, thank you."
She held him for a long time, knowing that he must have been uncomfortable on his knees with her arms wrapped around his shoulder so harshly. But though he never embraced her back, he didn't pull away either. And she kept whispering, "Thank you, thank you…"
Finally, as Hermione's voice became hoarse from crying and thanking him, she felt him pat her back awkwardly. She finally pulled away, reluctant to be out of his embrace. His embrace made her feel alive, as if she were a sentient being. His embrace, that monster's embrace, was painful and numbing and so dominating.
"What the hell happened?" Draco asked. Yet despite his words, his voice was cautiously gentle, as if he expected another outburst from her and wished to avoid it if he could. Hermione almost smiled at his reaction. She wished she could see him, see if Draco Malfoy, the proud and cold Draco Malfoy, was burning with embarrassment or not.
"I…don't know," she replied truthfully, quietly. Though she did know some things. That monster, man, demon desired her for some reason. But…she didn't want to tell Draco that. Not yet. "Something twisted my spine. And I fell to the ground. I saw him, Malfoy." Her voice shook. Draco offered no comfort -- not that she expected him to. So she continued. "He had the most fearsome eyes. The most horrible eyes. And he kept leering at me, telling him to come to him. To come be with him. And…I almost did. I almost did go with him." Tears splashed down her eyes again.
"Why didn't you?" Draco finally spoke.
Hermione blinked. "What?" Then she gasped as she felt his hands cover her trembling ones.
"Why didn't you follow him, Granger?"
Hermione hesitated. Should she tell him? She must. Draco needed to know of the power he had in this place. She wasn't sure if it was strong or not, his power, but it was still power and influential enough so that the monster backed away at the sound of Draco's voice. And he saved her too. Draco Malfoy saved her, and Hermione did not at all begrudge him for it, especially considering the alternate option of her at that monster's side. Hermione paled at the thought and pushed it aside. "You called. You called to me. And I listened to you instead of him."
They remained like that for a few moments in silence. Hermione tried to wipe away the tears, and was nearly successful. Draco sat across from her, his hands over hers in a slight gesture of comfort. She wanted to see Draco. She wanted to make sure that he was real. She wanted to make sure that the person with his hands over hers wasn't that monster with those eyes again. She wanted to make sure that the man across from her was Draco, though deep in her heart, Hermione knew it was Draco. It was Draco who fell down with her in Hottsgobin Tower as the clock stuck thirteen. What irony -- her enemy was her greatest source of comfort.
Then Hermione breathed in. Draco jerked.
"Do…you hear that?" he asked her in a whisper. "The violins?"
It was almost inaudible, that lilting song, but Hermione knew it was there. "Yes."
"What…is it? That song?" Draco said, his voice shaking slightly. "I hate it."
It was a beautiful song, but Hermione found that she hated it too. She wanted to cover her ears, though she doubted that the song would fade out even the slightest bit. "I want light. I want to see. I hate this darkness."
"WELL, WHY DIDN'T YOU SAY SO!"
The two both jerked, trying to locate the source of that voice. But it boomed from all around them.
Suddenly, the chandeliers above them blazed with sharp, white light. One by one, they flickered on with a poof, trailing across the hall one at a time, flooding this room with unbidden, painful light. Hermione and Draco both slapped their hands over their eyes, crying out in indignation and pain.
"Well, the little lady did say she wanted light." Then it tittered gleefully.
"You little fuck," Draco snarled, squinting. "Where the hell are you!"
"HERE."
Hermione reached out, her fingers gripping Draco's robe as if he were her anchor, and slowly opened her eyes. She then gasped, finding herself staring at one of the most beautiful boys she had ever seen, a boy whose beauty surpassed that of a Veela.
"Oh my…" she whispered.
The boy grinned at her, winking almost seductively despite his youngish face and physique. Everything about him oozed sensuality, and Hermione felt herself blush.
Draco seemed to notice this. He nudged Hermione behind him, as if to protect her, and demanded at the boy, "Who are you?"
The boy grinned, displaying a shiny row of pointed teeth, and performed a weightless back flip in the air. But Hermione noticed the shackles on the boy's feet, those thick, black, heavy chains that bound him to this castle. Was he trapped here, like them? But the boy bowed, and when he spoke, amusement darkened his voice. "Welcome, Lady Hermione, Sir Malfoy, to my master's abode."
Hermione's heart jolted. His master! She gripped onto Draco more tightly.
"I don't give a damn about your master," Draco sneered, his arrogance unfailing even against this inhumanly beautiful boy. "I asked who you were. Now answer me, bondsman."
The boy blinked, the cheeky smile of his sliding down just a fraction of an inch. Draco stared at the boy, and the boy stared back, as if locked in a silent contest of wills. But then the boy regained his cockiness and replied, "Well, if Sir Malfoy insists." He stared at Hermione and again bowed deeply. "My master has been waiting for you, my lady. And I am at your disposal. I beg you to treat this unworthy Puck kindly."
Hermione's eyes widened.
"Puck?" Draco demanded skeptically.
And the boy Puck stared up at Hermione, promise glimmering in his chilly blue eyes.
End Notes: Ah, sorry about the messed-up sex. I'll try not to go all out so that this fic will be NC-17, since then I'd have to host it on my Skyehawke account. This chapter was actually difficult to write. I hope Hermione wasn't too out-of-character, but I really couldn't think of any other reaction for her with…everything that happened to her. Whoo boy. Please don't be too harsh in your reviews!