Dark, grimy, and cold- Knockturn Alley was as unwelcoming as usual. Hermione had been in the Alley for far too long and she was losing precious time. She was standing in the shadows observing the stretch of brick where Breaken Alley should be. The girl assumed that there was some sort of magic password that would allow her entrance but, for the life of her, she couldn't figure it out. So, she was waiting for some other patron to come along and show her. Unfortunately, in the past ten minutes, not a soul had even stopped to look at the entrance.
Knowing that asking for help was asking for trouble, she observed the area around her to pass the time. Hermione had been into Knockturn Alley a few times herself. Most shops in the Alley had a small books section. She considered herself a right book fiend and the strange knowledge that Knockturn Alley held was tantamount to irresistible. Truthfully, the Alley wasn't as dangerous as some believed. It was dirty and slightly derelict, that much was true. But its bad reputation came from the fact that many of Britain's Magical rejects were safe to do their shopping here. Vampires, werewolves, half-breeds, the homeless, and more were all shunned in the brighter Diagon Alley. Here they were free to exist in relative, albeit dirty, peace.
The actually dangerous areas were the other Alleys connected to Knockturn. Some of the more famous was Nox Alley (where the magical brothels were) and Clackett Alley (where one could find anything for sale, anything) but there were a plethora of smaller ones. Hermione hoped that Breaken would prove to be one of the safer ones. Though just in case, she had her robe hood up and her wand ready.
The witch watched as all kinds of creatures passed her. Two vampires headed into Tofts Tailors. Vampires were always identifiable by their easy, graceful gait and unnatural paleness. A street woman was hawking small beaded bangles which she claimed were enchanted while her two small children ran around chasing each other. Their giggles and shrieks attracted attention and while some frowned and grumbled, many smiled and tossed knuts the woman's way. Hermione's attention was quickly turned from the children when a figure stopped in front of Breaken Alleys entrance. She walked casually towards the figure concealed behind a vendor's cart. Hermione watched as they withdrew their wand, placed a gloved hand on the bricks, and etched a thief's cross above it. Unexpectedly, the hand disappeared and the figure walked forward, seemingly swallowed by the bricks.
Well, Hermione thought, striding forward, seems straightforward enough.
She figured that, if she died, being eaten by a wall was an interesting way to go. The witch copied the figures' moves and took a deep breath before walking into darkness.
Breaken Alley was very different from Knockturn Alley. In fact, it was vastly different from any place Hermione had ever been. The place was permeated with magic. One could almost see multi-colored tendrils of it swirl through the air. It smelled old, ancient even, and somehow, dangerous. It also smelled a bit like piss so Hermione stepped lightly. To the left was a tall brick wall that went straight up, almost as far as she could see. Across a narrow stone street was the storefronts. Most had no signs and the few that did were so faded they were almost illegible.
Hermione sighed to herself and looked around for the figure that had led her to this place. They had disappeared. The crowd of patrons was small and boisterous and showed no sign of the cloaked figure that had led her here.
"Move it, girly." A strange man growled at her before shoving her aside and entering a shop.
"Rude," Hermione mumbled under her breath as she straightened herself and set off down the Alley. She went slow, sticking close to the stores whilst she searched for Bakers Trinkets and Treasures. Most of the stores had a blank front, no way to see in, and no signs-only a plain door. When a patron entered or exited Hermione could hear loud, raucous voices, cheers, and a volley of strange noises; though, when the door closed, all was silent again. She wondered why one would bother spelling the store silent when every time the door opened one could hear everything occurring within.
She continued to slowly search the Alley while being careful not to draw attention. Hermione was observing a shop sign when she was alerted to a commotion in the Alley. A witch and a wizard were standing opposite each other and the crowd began to form. People poured out of the shops, some running. The noise level rose in the Alley whilst Hermione was shoved forward by a harsh shoulder. She spun around before feeling another jolt from her left. The girl was being pinballed around by the forming crowd. She was doing well enough to keep hold of her wand as the group serged around her.
"Ahh!" Hermione exclaimed in pain when a sharp elbow found purchase in her ribs. She spun around to find the perpetrator but was distracted by the large CRACK! of a wand that rang through the air. She turned to discover that she had ended up in the front row of the large crowd. The jostling had stopped and the witch took the opportunity to observe the people around her. The (clearly) vampire to her left looked thrilled and she watched as her gleaming white fangs slowly grew in her excitement. Hermione quickly turned to her right and saw several wizards and mix-breeds in various states of excitement. The girl decided it was best to focus her attention on the empty circle before her and the figures that had called the crowd.
The two figures held the most dangerous auras Hermione had ever seen. Both had an entourage of people behind them and they were all goading each other. The witch and wizard, though, were silent. Eyeing each other while their respective people threw verbal shots. The witch was short, not much taller than Hermione, with hard eyes and a scar that ran across her cheek and down her neck. She was dressed in a patchwork of dragon-skin armor with a long wicked-looking dagger strapped to her hip. Hermione thought it must be for show, but made a mental note to research the use of muggle weapons nonetheless.
The wizard, on closer inspection, appeared to be part Veela. His blond hair was cropped short and his allure was twisted into a harrowing beauty. Dark magic truly did warp all it touched. However, instead of being frightening, his allure was enchanting and Hermione had the shake free of it when she tried to take a step closer.
The witch stepped forward and, like a spell, all fell silent. "I'd say ya last fight was good, innit?" She asked the wizard. She grinned and turned around to face the crowd.
"Ya see, I can tell cause he dressin' like a right pureblood peacock now!" Her accent tilted her words as she screamed out to the crowd. They roared in response. The witch strutted back to her group as they jeered and slapped her on the back. The excitement rose until the wizard stepped forward.
He practically glided to the witch. They stood almost chest to chest, wands out. The crowd was silent again, practically gleeful.
He twirled his wand through the air and out poured glistening smoke. It rose up and spread out like a sheet before forming words. The smoke read, "Old timer, you better talk while you still can. I'm coming for the Ring and it won't take me more than four rounds."
As the crowd made out the last two words they ooe'd and hissed. (And Hermione wondered if that was how all deaf magical communicated, she'd have to research that as well) Then the witch then did something that amazed Hermione. She lazily snapped her fingers and a whirlwind sprang into the air, whipping dirt and smoke around and erasing his words. The girl had only ever seen wandless magic so casually from Headmaster Dumbledore. This woman was among the most powerful she had seen. The strong aura now made sense.
The witch rebutted, "There's a wannabe like ya in evry pit in Breaken." She took her wand and pointed it at his chest. Her wand was particular. It was an amber wood, not too long, not too short, with strange etching on it that Hermione couldn't quite make out.
Her attention was drawn back to the witch as she said, "But you're the only one tha gets the privilege of gettin his ariss kicked by me."
The crowd exploded again and Hermione realized that all this was all posturing. Their egos were competing with each other (and threatening to suffocate the crowd in their enormity). They reminded her of prize boxers she had seen on the telly. Her dad and mum would never let her watch but sometimes she would catch glimpses. She realized the witch and wizard were doing the same thing. They were just having each other on and revving up the crowd. The two continued to pick at each other with increasingly meaner taunts when everything went, frankly, to shit.
Hermione remembered that it started with a single, hoarse voice screaming, "MLE!". Then there were flashes of color and pain and noises and Cracks of magic and the crowd ran. Hermione was thrown about, trying desperately to stay on her feet. She started casting homocessabit, the general calming hex, as fast as she could. She figured if she could calm the crowd around her then she wouldn't feel so much like a rag doll. She cursed herself for staying to watch the fighters instead of slipping out of the crowd. Her spell seemed to be working. The crowd around her would slow their frantic running enough for Hermione to make her way into the closest shop (away from the MLE which she did not want to be stopped by). She caught a glimpse of the fighting witch with the scar. The woman was walking, calm as day. She slipped through the panicking people like they weren't even there. Hermione took a brief moment to be amazed at the power the women held when she lost sight of her as a Boom shook the earth. Hermione's body hit the ground, hard. The girl's very vision swayed and a sharp sound was ringing in the back of her head. She briefly regretted not following her parents through the floo.
Oh no, Hermione thought, oh God no.
Her wand was missing from her right hand. She panicked. Wrenching herself up onto her knees, she patted the ground, desperately searching for the familiar carved wood of her wand. Her vision was still blurry and she felt the aftershocks of the blast (for which she had the MLE to blame). The witch was grabbing anything that felt like a wand. She was sure that many were just sticks, but she hoped that her wand would end up in her clutches.
"Oph", Hermione gasped in shock.
A strong hand had grasped her forearm and yanked her onto her feet. The witch was overcome with panic and she struggled and kicked out. The figure, seemingly a man, that had grabbed her was slightly blurry and cloaked in black. Not MLE, then. Suddenly, she was flashing back to another man grabbing her. Her magic bubbled in the air around her. She felt it crack at the man's hand and he jumped but didn't let go. Her vision slowly settled and she realized that the man dragging her was the figure from before. The one that she had followed into the Alley.
"Miss Granger!" He hissed. "Relax yourself, I'm not going to hurt you."
Hermione was momentarily stunned that he knew her name and she promptly planted herself in the street. The rushing crowd was thinning and she could hear MLE officers getting closer. The man turned to look down at her and, not for the first time today, Hermione was stunned.
Looking back at her was a long hooked nose, black eyes, and a face that she had seen almost every day at school.
All she could think was, Oh god, I kicked Snape...multiple times.
"Come," He said hurriedly, "I've alerted the Headmaster. We must get to Hogwarts. We mustn't be found here."
He started pulling on her arm again, but the witch didn't wish to go to Hogwarts. She hadn't been shoved around a dirty alley, watched an illegal (almost) fight, and be hunted by the MLE, to not get the one thing she came to Breaken for. She didn't even have time to think; Hermione was overcome with determination. She held up the sticks she still had in her hands and prayed that one of them was a wand.
"Flipendo Tria!" She cast the knockback curse.
Professor Snape was violently flung back through the crowd with more force than Hermione had meant to use. She didn't have time to check if he was okay though, so she turned and sprinted through the sparse, but still panicking, crowd. She spied the shop she had been pursuing before this whole mess started. The witch pumped her legs, dodging people and hurled herself to the door. She flung it open and threw herself inside. Hermione slammed the door shut, cast a small locking charm, and then leaned against the frame breathing hard.
She looked up and observed her surroundings. A dark room was covered, floor to ceiling, with cupboards and drawers. There were webs and dust and knicks throughout the room. A small, unoccupied desk, a trashcan, and another door adorning the opposite wall were all the other noticeable aspects of the dreary space. Panting still, Hermione took the opportunity to sort through her stick collection and find her wand. She crouched down and laid her wooden treasures out on the floor. Sorting through them, she was beyond pleased to spy her vine wand. She gave a happy little sigh and the knot in her stomach disappeared. The girl gathered up the rest of the sticks and walked across the room to throw them into the wastebasket.
"Ow!" Hermione exclaimed.
The stick clattered to the floor and Hermione shook out her hand. Something had burnt her. A thin red line stretched across her left palm and it twinged as she stared at it.
Lying there, amongst the sticks, was an amber wand. It glittered up at her innocently and Hermione felt compelled to pick it up. (She acknowledged that today was a particularly Gryffindorish day for her.) The wand allowed her to take it and she stared at the strange carvings that ran along its surface. Most were symbols in languages she couldn't read. Some were small, amazingly detailed creatures; lions chased goats, dragons curled around the tip, and a little etching of a tree stood at the base. The wand was very familiar. The girl remembered that she had seen it before in the hand of the fighting witch with the scar. This was her wand. Hermione grew very pale, very quickly.
"I've stolen her wand." She whispered to herself, in disbelief. "She's going to murder me."
"No, she's not." A voice said.
A man, tall and slender and remarkably nondescript, stood leaning against the desk. Hermione had been too busy panicking to notice him come in - a fact that she attributed to her hectic day.
"Who are you?" She asked.
The man simply replied, "Samuel."
"Are you a wandmaker?" She asked, hoping that she had finally achieved what she came here for.
"Are you Hermione?" He countered.
"...Yes?" The girl said hesitantly.
The man nodded his head, "Garret Ollivander told me you were coming."
He pulled out his wand and Hermione tensed up. She relaxed when he summoned the sticks still lying at her feet and directed them into the waste bin. He also banished a box from his desk to one of the many drawers lining the walls.
The man re-pocketed his wand and shook his head, "I had even prepared a set of ingredients that may have fit you but, alas, it seems that was all for naught."
"Excuse me?" Hermione said.
He looked back at the teen, "You've already found your second wand. Better than any I could make for you."
Hermione frowned, "I stole this. It isn't mine and, besides that, it burnt me."
She held up her left hand to the wandmaker.
Samuel gestured for Hermione to follow him and turned to disappear through the back door. They passed a similar dark hallway lined with more cupboards and drawers. Samuel led the witch to another room and she was almost blinded by the brightness of it. When she adjusted, she observed a pleasant room with four tall windows looking out onto different scenes. One was a winter wonderland, complete with sledding children and snowmen. One a meadow, green and buzzing. One seemed to be downtown Paris for Hermione could spy the Eiffel tower in the back. The last was a manor home with ivy growing up the sides and a horse pasture. The rest of the room was a workstation except for two chairs on the far wall that faced a fireplace.
The man was searching for something in one of the chests littered about the room. In the light, Hermione could see Samuel clearer. His blonde hair was lighter than she had thought, though his eyes were just as deep and he was much younger than she had thought. She'd placed him much closer to Bill Weasley's age.
Remarkably young for a wandmaster, she thought.
She grew slightly annoyed whilst the young man continued to dig around in his chest. The offending wand, which she was still holding and thankfully hadn't burned her again, could spell her death. Hermione wanted answers. Mostly, however, she wanted the wand gone.
"Here," she strode to the man, wand outstretched, "I don't want this. I will pay you to make me a wand, I promise."
"No! Oh no, no," he stumbled backward hands raised, "it'll kill me. Or at very least severely incapacitate me."
"What?!" Hermione drew back, "It could kill me?" The witch made a move to drop the offending object.
"No!" The man cried out at her. "Please, just wait."
But Hermione was tired of waiting. She was tired of the whole day. And, quite uncharacteristically, her eyes began to feel hot as tears struggled forward.
The man sighed and ran a hand through his hair in frustration.
"Listen, if I could make you a hot cup of tea and calm you down and explain everything, I would."
Hermione sniffed, trying to quell her tears, "Why can't you?"
"Because I have a strong feeling that Albus is coming to get you and I don't believe he'll allow you to stay and chat."
Hermione nodded, "Headmaster Dumbledore knows I'm here."
He pulled a book out of the chest and approached Hermione.
"This book is all I can give you to explain your situation." He handed it to the girl. "I will eventually expect it back."
She took the slim book and pocketed it in her robes, "Thank you."
He led her over to the chairs by the fire. Hermione sank into its fabric, feeling very weary, but trying to keep her strength (and more importantly her wits) about her.
"He should floo in here," Samuel said.
Hermione was confused, "Professor Dumbledore has access to your floo?"
Samuel gave her a slight grin. "Well, no, but he knows my father and it's only a matter of time before Albus convinces him to allow access."
Hermione nodded. She was curious but sensed that there were more important things to discuss.
Samuel turned to her, a serious look in his eye, "The wand didn't hurt you, it marked you. It is true that wands choose their masters, but some more than others. That wand, and few others like it, have chosen and marked magicals that it deems worthy to carry it."
Hermione held the wand up and looked at it again, wondering why it chose her.
"But," she said, "I feel nothing when I hold it. No hum, no sparks, nothing."
Samuel smiled, "That's the catch. It chose you for one reason or another, but now you must prove you are worthy. If you can win it over then you will do great magic. But only if."
"If I can't?" Hermione prompted.
Samuel shrugged, "It will find another. Clarissa Haunt was the last worthy before you."
Hermione swallowed nervously as she was given a name for the fearsome fighting witch.
Samuel smiled reassuringly at Hermione. "She won't come after you. She should understand that the wand was finished with her and found another."
Hermione felt quite relieved that she wouldn't have to dodge the second most powerful magical she'd ever met.
Samuel continued, "The book I'm lending you was a gift from my old master, which is why I'd like it back. It's a short history of the wand and a diary from the first witch who wielded it. It should guide you through this process."
A loud noise startled Hermione. She watched as Samuel looked down at his watch and stood immediately.
"He's coming soon," He turned quickly to Hermione. "I must go, I don't fancy seeing Albus again."
He held his hand out to Hermione and she took it. They shook hands, though Hermione wasn't quite sure why.
"It's been a pleasure meeting you, please come back to deliver the book. If you still have the wand I'd love to study it."
He paused,
"From afar."
Hermione nodded in agreement. It was the least she could do for the stranger that had helped her so.
Samuel leaned in, "Oh, two things before I dash, please try to get my Uncle back to his school as fast as possible. I don't like the idea of him loitering in my shop."
Hermione was stunned.
Uncle? she thought.
Before she could reply he was halfway across the room.
"Oh," he called, "and your wand's name is Lysiśtrata!"
With that, Samuel Dumbledore was gone, disappearing out into the hall. Not a moment later the floo whirled to life. Hermione took a step back as Professor Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, Order of Merlin, first-class, Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Supreme Mugwump of the International Confederation of Wizards, Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot, and, also, apparently Uncle Albus, stepped out the floo.
As Hermione regarded the kindly, bearded wizard, all she could think was, I think I'm done with surprises today.