Dear Readers I'm sorry about the delay I've been doing all sorts of stuff for my junor year AHHHHHHH! Well here it is and don't be too mad at me I will have it updated soon I swear on my login name.

Chp. 10.

Hermione awoke the next morning to a pitter-pat of dishes.

"Is mistress awake?" Hermione stretched and yawned smelling the freshly made breakfast.

Hermione jumped out of bed and ran to the warm meal as soon as Ella put it down to eat trying to eat politely yet quickly. Hermione kept eating and as she was half way through her meal she felt a splitting pain that started throbbing in her temple. She tried to ignore the pain at first, but it kept stinging. Hermione groaned and shook her head, but that just made it worse.

Ella asked, "Does mistress have a headache?"

"Hmm…" Hermione groaned in the affirmative.

She felt like she was swimming and couldn't breathe. She closed her eyes trying to balance out. She really didn't need this right now.

She felt a cold goblet being shoved into her hands by Ella's tiny hands. "Here, mistress."

Hermione opened her eyes and saw a goblet made out of silver in her hands. "It will make the pain stop."

Hermione drank it all down and felt the potion freezing in her throat. Soon the tingling numb in her throat disappeared. Her mind started to clear and everything became clear. It felt like everything was in much better focus and had much sharper edges.

She slowly put the goblet down and put it on her breakfast platter. "Feeling better mistress?"

"Yes, thank you Ella. But how did you know I would have a headache?"

"Master gets them sometime."

"Who is your master Ella?" Hermione asked absent-mindedly.

"I dare not speak his name mistress."

Hermione felt uneasiness in her stomach. How did she not conceive that she was his house elf?

In an attempt to see how faithful Ella was to her superiors she asked, "Please don't call me mistress just Hermione."

"No miss I can't I don't want any trouble." Hermione hurried along with her breakfast knowing that Ella couldn't be persuaded. She was done for and she knew that she would never have friends ever in this miserable place. The one person she thought she might be able to trust was no longer available.

She finished breakfast very quickly and with her belly very full stood up and changed her robes.

Hermione stood in front of the door and asked Ella, "Will you lead me Ella?"

"No mistress I can't." A slight panic drove itself into Hermione's heart. Why wouldn't she take her?

"Please Ella?"

Ella shook her head. "Master won't allow me."

Hermione looked at the door and sighed out deeply, how was she ever to find her way through the dark hallways? And why wouldn't Voldemort allow Hermione someone to escort her? Maybe he wanted to see how lost she wold get before he had to come get her.

She knew that she had no other option she had to at least try to find her way to the meeting room. She was going to try her hardest to find her way.

The door swung open and Hermione timidly closed it behind her. She narrowed her eyes trying to see in the dark. She held her wand high and said, "Lumos."

Everything around her lit up but nothing beyond that came into view and she started feeling edgy. She quickly paced down the hallway taking a right and a left trying to remember the way Ella had showed her to go, but Hermione soon felt lost. The doors around her seemed all the same. None of this stuff looked familiar to Hermione and she knew she had lost her way.

She needed to find someone to show her the way or else she'd never find her way in this labyrinth. She tried to open the door nearest to her but it wouldn't budge. "Alohomora."

The door opened but when she entered all she found was another hallway that with lots of doors on it. How big was this place and what in the world was going on.

Hermione went back to the original hallway and closed the door and opened another. She swung open the doors and entered a large room covered in portraits. The door slammed behind her and she turned around to face the door. No one was there and as she turned around to look at the room a hand gently breezed her hair.

She wheeled around to face Voldermort with a small smirk on his face. Hermione let out a squeak. "Good morning how are you?"

Hermione was still in shock and her sentence slipped out before she could stop it. "Well besides the fact that you scared me half to death! I'm fine thanks."

Hermione closed her mouth shut as soon as she realized what she had just said. She rarely let her emotions run away with her, but with lack of descent food, sleep, and anyone to talk to Hermione had reached her breaking point. She also hated admitting that she had been afraid of him. Voldemort's face was mad and amused all at the same time.

"Well I see your emotions do leak out." It took everything Hermione had just to make sure she didn't spit in his face or curse him to oblivion.

She clenched her fists and ignored the headache, which was racing to her temples again.

"Well it seems your boiling point is harder to reach then your friends which isn't such a high compliment." Voldemort touched a twinge of fear, anger, and loneliness all at once. She sniffed in anger and just clenched her fists as hard as possible.

"Well it seems that your borders are easy to reach and I can get a response out of you easily enough. You have to learn to control your feelings, use your anger and don't cap it in."

Hermione clenched her teeth together and said, "I would rather let my emotions over run me and have a heart than be you and not have one."

"Dumbledore was the person who told me what I just told you."

"At least Dumbledore understands that emotions cannot always be under control."

"Did you ever see him express emotion?"

"Yes."

"What?"

"Anger, directly at you."

Voldemort was becoming angry himself. Hermione didn't care anymore how it would make Voldemort feel now all she cared about was trying to see how he liked it when his own tactics were used against him.

"I can see it, your afraid of losing your power. All you are is scared and the only reason you have ever done anything is for more power out of fear."

"Isn't that the only way power is accumulated, fear?"

"No power should only be gathered when battles have to be fought against the malevolent."

"But then again that's fear of the malevolent isn't it?" Hermione was not prepared for fighting a battle with Voldemort over the definition of evil and the nature of fear. If she stopped this battle now she could come back later and live to fight another day and regain her pride. Or at least that's what she told herself.

She growled in a hushed voice, "What may I ask is the lesson for today?"

Hermione felt surprised, he twitched his cloak in annoyance. What did he want from her! His emotions sometimes seemed so over controlling yet when she submitted he became angry.

"This is a labyrinth that I created last night and when you walked out of your room this morning you started wandering about it. Sometimes you'll reach doors that lead to other hallways and sometimes you'll encounter a dilemma that I have set up for you.

There's another trick to this shadowed area. I will be following you and attacking you at random moments throughout the obstacle course. I will give you a 3-minute head start. You may begin."

He said this all in a very calm translucent voice and gave a look of satisfaction in her direction and the message couldn't be clearer; I will beat you.

Hermione was sure he would but she was determined not to lose her cool or make any major mistakes. She took herself onto a random hallway and took another and another until she reached the inside of a dark room. She didn't dare close the door behind her because she could hear the heavy breathing through narrow nostrils.

"Lumos!" Hermione didn't try to think and reacted on instinct. It was a Toros tat had long horns and big black eyes like a well. It was groaning in pain and looking at her. She didn't even think and backed up as fast as she could. She jiggled the handle to the door, but it wouldn't open. She grabbed her wand and stared straight at the Toros in front of her. It was coming fast as she thought of all her books, thinking of Toroses. Close enough to see its outline she could see it's eyes smoking and it's nose ring glint.

Random pages flitted before her. P. 93 horns are too heavy, only way to relieve pain is to rape people, sensitive spot the crotch. How to kill? Star charts came to mind. No. Too big and thick to kill. Stopping flow of sperm would kill them.

Hermione panting raised her wand, "Stupefy." The Toros had become a breath away from her. Her aim had been direct and the Toros was slow to crumple on the ground. Hermione needed an exit unsure of how long the spell would last.

She moved around her want lit and just as she had found it Voldemort came crashing through.

God Damn this man, "I hoped shoving you in here would have made your reaction time faster."

Fuck you came to mind, but Hermione kept her temper and attempted to stun him. He put out a shield in one fluid movement and quickly retaliated back.

Hermione put out a poor shield, but was kept safe. He pointed his wand at the Toros and was able to wake it up pretty fast.

Voldemort gave out a chuckle of disbelief, "Come on Hermione show me what you've got."

Hermione whipped out her wand as fast as she could and disabled the Toros. Voldemort sent a curst her way in the mean time that she tried to deflect to some effect. While Voldemort tried to enable the Toros again she sent a curse his way that bounced off a shield he easily produced.

Voldemort sent a curse her way that she dodged. The Toros was right behind her and she pulled some very fast spell work by dodging the Toros and stunning it. All of this was done so quickly Hermione as amazed at herself.

She ran from the Toros and blocked a curse sent by Voldemort. Panting she dodged until she got to the door and screamed at it as panic flooded her system, "Alohamora." It burst open and she slammed it closed behind her. She ran as fast as she cold through hallways closing all doors behind her. She felt her robe bellowing behind her and prayed Voldemort wouldn't find her.

She didn't realized at first when she closed the door that something was in this room. A pair of golden eyes looked at her though the darkness. Hermione lit her wan and turned around to see a baby leopard, a Nundus.

Oh god, she was dead, all the diseases it was emitting was already killing her. She couldn't think her brain froze. A bubblehead charm came out of her mind. She fumbled with her wand and expertly cast the charm.

The leopard came closer to her trying to smell her. It twitched its tail in curiosity. Hermione was frozen in fear if she attempted to fight it her delicate bubble might burst and she would die. A touch at her shoulder shocked her and she turned around to see Voldemort's face.

Damn his man, how had he followed her! And how could he be so old no to have a bubblehead charm? "Her name is Cassandra, she's yours to keep. I had hoped you would find her today." Hermione felt like laughing in rage. "You've got to be ballistic! This is a Nundus. It will kill me the minute I take off his bubble head charm!"

"No she's not toxic. I clipped her you could say and she belongs to you." He popped the bubble as Hermione tried to find the truth in his face.

He looked her straight in the eye and said, casually, "Your quit safe."

The cat took a step toward Hermione smelling her hand. Hermione cautiously patted her head looking at her happy curious eyes. Cassandra stood next to her and twitched a lot. She liked Hermione's patting and purred. Hermione liked Cassandra maybe this was the friend she most desperately needed.