Lord Voldemort has never understood loyalty.

He steeples his fingers together, unfamiliar, and yet familiar at the same time, the trusty yew wand held secure. Malfoy Manor is exceedingly quiet, silence that is only interspersed by the haunting cries of peacocks, but he likes it that way, likes the silence...solitude had been rare for so long...

Disappointment is familiar, and he is disappointed, because some of his best, most faithful Death Eaters are falling into relapses. We endured Azkaban, their thoughts say, but Lord Voldemort does not trust- not after that glimpse he caught in Narcissa Malfoy's thoughts before her Occlumency shields sprang back.

Lucius has a son, and the son will make for excellent leverage, but then he will have to trust Selwyn...

No.

He must not take any risks. Killing Fudge had been too impulsive, but it had helped the air of mystery. Lord Voldemort must look at this with logic, logic that has never failed his yet - the mudblood will have to wait. No, he must give Dumbledore his time, he must let Dumbledore arrange his pieces, arrange his pawns, and then, Voldemort will re arrange it to his wishes. There is a chronology and he must not disturb it.

And of course, he thinks amusingly, Durmstrang Institute is where Igor Karkaroff will be. Karkaroff may be a coward, but he is no fool. Having the Tournament at Hogwarts would have increased his vulnerability. It is deeply satisfying, to know the power he holds.

Even perhaps, the mudblood will not have to wait for that promised death.

Loyalty he does not understand; loyalty he does not reciprocate, but he knows manipulation and he knows how to use his leverage.

A filthy mudblood is nothing more than an irksome fly.

Voldemort does not trust, but in his life, to lie is as natural as to breathe.

In more than six months, this was the first time Hermione had a nightmare.

She had a knife in her hand, and the Durmstrang boy was wailing at her feet, and now the tip of the blade made the slightest of cuts under his right eye and Hermione was both disgusted and curious, and the blade moved a little further-

The scene changed.

In all those dreams, Hermione had been Lord Voldemort; she had heard that high, clear voice issue from her own throat, she had felt the yew wand in her own hands, she had felt the venom behind each curse she spat...

But today, today, she had been an outsider. It was like mind- reading or something, something that was only supposed to exist in fantasy books.

It terrified her.

That's it?

Ron's handwriting was as messy as ever, and ink had blotted messily at the end of his letters. Hermione had no idea why it made her want to smile.

I'm being quite serious, Ron. That's all there is in the clue, scrawled Hermione. She could almost imagine his brow knitting in thought, the greenish light filtering in the room he was sitting in, red hair bright in the dim light. Hermione waved her wand at the duplicating parchment, increasing it in size.

So...your clue to the second task is just...fire?

Unfortunately, yes.

His writing came more hurried now.

You'd better use that advantage then. Merlin knows its desperate when I'm asking you to go to the library.

Well, one word isn't much of anything to go by. Karkaroff seemed to be having an aneurysm that a mudblood had won.

Don't call yourself a mudblood.

Hermione sighed aloud, pulling her muffler tighter and started to write.

Yeah, well, let's move onto something new.

Is it just me, or are you spending too much time with Terry Boot?

Is it just me, or are you spending too much time with Bulstrode?

If she was back at Hogwarts, she might have even laughed.

Yeah, right. I don't know if you've noticed, but fires aren't that easy to get rid of.

Hermione pursed her lip, tucking stray strands of hair behind her ear.

Suggestions, Ron? Probably something that can put it out, but I don't know how plausible that'll be...

You could start with something that might protect you from the smoke...

'This is Sanne,' said Krum, gesturing with his hands to the blonde, short girl that was standing beside him. The room they were in had a vaulted ceiling and was dimly lit, casting shadows over their faces.

Hermione smiled politely, hoping it didn't come off as a grimace. She had been about to say hope she doesn't carve out our eyes, Krum, but what was the guarantee that the girl wouldn't take the words to heart?

The girl who stood with her hands linked with Sanne was taller than Krum; she had dark hair with streaks of red. Her blue eyes were so pale they might have been grey.

'And this is, of course, Nevena.'

Now nodding to the boy beside Hermione, added Krum: 'Adrik.'

'Nice to meet you,' said Adrik feebly and Hermione gave a feebler smile in response.

'Good duel,' put in Sanne.

'Delacour was better,' started Nevena, sneering. 'Granger was just lucky. I don't see what's the big thing here, Sanne.'

She made the same inflection for Granger as one would for communicable diseases. Her haughty face was alight with crossing beams of light, pointed chin raised.

'Funny,' said Hermione icily. 'I'm sure Delacour cries herself to sleep with the same excuse.' Yes, she had been lucky, but should she go undefended?

Anyways, it was a very weak retort.

Nevena raised an eyebrow. 'Subtle. It just won't get you anywhere.'

Krum made an attempt at small talk, failing miserably.

Later, when everyone's gone, and they're the only ones left in the cold room, Krum sighed audibly, mussing his hair. It reminded her of Potter; the memory of being pressed against the wooden door of Grimmauld Place; that summer seemed years ago and Sirius with blood all over his front-

'I take it they've suddenly shifted personalities today?' Hermione asked, looking out of the tall, yet narrowly spaced window. It was nearly evening, and she felt cold to the bone, but some of the Durmstrang students were edged around the lake, shouting and laughing.

'Huh?' asked Krum; apparently he had not heard anything.

'Nothing,' Hermione said quietly.

'They haff made their opinions.' said Krum.

'I don't give a fuck what your friends think.'

He turned, the dull light shading his face. There was the faintest of smiles on his face.

'I vas about to apologize,' he explained.

'There's no need of your apologies.'

'You can't vait to leave, yes?'

'You seem to know me well.'

Krum did not attempt to introduce Hermione to his friends again, but Sanne seemed to have taken a liking to her. Adrik was increasingly neutral about it all, and nodded at her in the hallways.

It felt too much like pity.

So Sanne seemed to make a game out of making Hermione talk with her; she sat next to her for meals; she introduced Hermione to books not there in the library; she seemed to hang on even when Hermione was clearly hating it all. Hermione could have flashed the message in neon letters and Sanne would have still droned on about her 'litt'e sizter'.

The image of the boy strewn on the ground, a gory 'X' cutting into his cheek was burned into her eyes. To her, it was like some justification for the Death Eaters, like she needed more proof, needed more nightmare fuel.

Sure, the boy wasn't a mudblood, but what Sanne had done to the boy was a fraction of what the Death Eaters might do to mudbloods.

(Years in Slytherin ensured that mudblood was comfortable on her tongue.)

Hermione had never felt so lonely, so scared, so alienated. What she wanted was her normal; what she wanted was Hogwarts and chess with Ron and arguing with Terry Boot and Luna Lovegood about the Quibbler's conspiracies, sneering at Potter's lacklustre Potions performance, researching with Padma in the library, Ron and Bulstrode arguing for the thousandth time, maybe even Zabini and Greengrass with their cryptic words-

(When had she ever gotten what she wanted?)

'Hoping they might keep exams this year, Granger?'

Hermione stirred, her hands cupping her chin, elbows pressing sharply against the wooden library table. Meagre sunlight streamed through the glass windows, and Durmstrang was rejoicing the weather outside. In Hogwarts, this sort of weather would have been enough to forfeit a Hogsmeade trip.

Adrian Pucey grinned at her; the sight was disconcerting. He gave a long whistle, flopping himself onto the table.

'Selwyn's lording it, by the way. Laura says that the Gryffindors are gonna do something daft, sooner or later. More daft than usual, of course.'

Hermione did not answer, but glanced at the clock and then Pucey. The talk was veering into politics, as it always had to be when it involved Hogwarts, nowadays. Pucey had never called her a mudblood. He had never gone out of his way to be deliberately kind, either, but in Slytherin, that was as much as decency went. She knew he didn't like her; he found her too fussy or too radical. Of course, the last point was usually in relation with Draco Malfoy, but again, fairness did not go hand in hand with Slytherin prefects.

'Is he?' she asked, now scrawling down some notes on advanced bubble headed charms. Pucey glanced at her tiny handwriting and said,

'Your writing's ant- like.'

'Remarks about my penmanship aside, what you here for?'

'Two Slytherins...far away school...and this place is ridiculously cold- I have no idea how these furs manage-and you've heard about the Yule Ball this winter of course...'

Hermione tsked. She really didn't care about Balls, but McGonagall had told her that champions needed to dance. And Hermione had never been very confident in her dancing skills.

Honestly, she had no idea as to whom to ask. She had rather been hoping that someone would ask her instead, but that was too optimistic- she wasn't exactly pretty; and she could hardly expect the Hogwarts upper years to know her; the Beauxbatons students were too wrapped up in themselves (and maybe bitter); to the Durmstrang students she was someone strange or she was a dirty mudblood and they couldn't go with any of the champions or even Krum would've worked. She supposed she could always just ask Cedric to simply dance with her for the first one- he would be too nice to refuse. After that he could do whatever the hell he wanted, go snog Zaidi or Pucey, she didn't care.

'How many times have I told you you're rubbish at the small talk, Pucey?' she said airily.

He raised an eyebrow. 'You're insufferable, you know that?'

Hermione ignored the statement, and continued to write.

'Did I congratulate you about winning?'

'If I remember correctly, you wanted me to try the Firewhiskey you were drinking.'

Pucey laughed. It seemed strangely genuine. 'A win for Slytherin; a win for Hogwarts.'

Even if it comes from a mudblood, Hermione wanted to ask, but she didn't want to sound whiny or like she was a victim. You had to accept that fact and look for yourself. That was the only route to survival in Slytherin. Slytherin did not like queue jumpers.

'You're laying it a little thick, Adrian.'

'Ah, well, it's dreadfully boring here.'

She knew what he was aiming for. It reminded her of herself, trying to get a clue out of Krum, except perhaps, that Pucey was a lot more dignified. (This also might be because Krum had taken a strange fancy to her.)

'You could always ask Krum to show you around.'

Albus Dumbledore's bright blue eyes glanced at Hermione Granger with a jaded stare she had never seen in real life. Over this large image, bold headlines spread across the newspaper.

Albus Dumbledore adds extra protection to the Department of Mysteries; ten employees allegedly fired...Lucius Malfoy protests - points out that all ten employees were members of the Sacred twenty eight...

Hermione bit her tongue, seething. The article she was holding in her hand tightly, was crumpled around the edges; rage burning in her along with something like helplessness, something like fear pricking at her heart.

She was alone in the small Hogwarts carriage; Zaidi was outside snogging Cedric; but she didn't feel alone. She wanted to curse something. Burn something.

They were trying to make the purebloods seem the victims. All of Dumbledore's actions, all his new laws, they were all being twisted. She felt like she couldn't breathe.

She was too young to fight all this, she thought, blinking back angry tears. Too alone. Too scared. Too weak.

Don't cry. Crying got you nothing.

She stuffed her knuckles in her mouth. Where else could she go, what else could she do, would she ever be safe, ever be able to feel like she'd done her best?

She took a deep breath, trying to go over everything slowly, like fitting together a jigsaw puzzle. (Luke and her had been crazy over them for a while. There had been one with loads of pieces- some sort of picture showing an amusement park-)

Dumbledore was too busy to tell her anything. McGonagall had more things to do. Snape had never been useful.

And that was fine. She had to accept it and keep going. Again, she was just a fifteen year old girl; if Hermione was in Dumbledore's shoes, she wouldn't have even bothered herself to Floo to Durmstrang and at least try to explain things to some teenager.

(And to think she'd once trusted Barty Crouch Jr.)

She stifled a giggle, because it felt too deranged.

Sirius, she thought desperately. Sirius said he owed her something, that he still felt guilt over some thing done long ago. He called it his penance.

But most importantly, he did not hate Harry Potter.

She blinked away tears and started writing lengthy letters to Andromeda Tonks and Harry Potter. There was only one thing; she had to make sure the letters were not traced. A slightly amused smile broke across her face; thinking about rushing into fireplaces and Adrian Pucey's desperateness. A Slytherin prefect, a pureblood family, he ought to know exactly what she needed. And she had leverage.

She was a witch, she repeated in her mind, like some talisman, some mantra, with every jab of the quill, like she'd once done when she was eleven.

She found Adrian Pucey alone the next day, a sweet smile curving her lips, her tone sweeter. She was thinking about sitting beside Ginny Weasley in the yard behind the Burrow, talking about Tom Riddle and manipulation. The colourful wings of the butterfly, like stained glass, Fred and George hollering in the background and Tom Riddle's laugh echoing in her head. Maybe not just in her head.

'Hi, Pucey,' she was saying, looking into his dark, forever calculating eyes. he was certainly desperate. And very resourceful. 'Could you please do me a favour?'

Cheating, after all, is integral to the Tournament.