my heart lingers in your hands
Chapter 3
If ignorance is bliss, I must be ecstatic.
—tumblr
The creature had a red snarl when it came to her door.
(It had been almost six years since she last saw it. The last time being the night of Nana's burial, when she had turned nine.)
Hermione did not notice the creature at first, too preoccupied with thoughts of the events that led to her current emotional conflict.
(The act was all slips and slides against sweat-slicked skin and heated kisses from the moment the first article of clothing hit the floor. Hermione clutched broad shoulders as an insistent mouth clamped around her nipple and suckled greedily. Her moans were forthcoming with no indication to stop.
His large hands grabbed her legs and split her thighs apart to reveal her center. A finger stroked her, and the male chest above her rumbled in appreciation at her wetness. A second finger joined the first and they both groaned as his digits sank into her most secret of places easily.
"Hermown-ninny," Viktor growled into her ear. She clamped around his fingers in response.)
She liked Viktor, she truly did. He was kind and clever and broad and handsome and understanding and—
(Viktor collapsed next to her, harsh panting breaths tumbling from his lips.
Hermione lay still. She'd come – she could feel the evidence running down the inside of her thighs, mixed with Viktor's own release – so why did she still feel so empty and dissatisfied?)
—and totally all wrong.
She paced around her room, hand tugging harshly on a curl as she chewed her lower lip.
"Brat." The voice came from behind her door. Cold, angry, and inspiring instant dread in the brunette's heart.
Hermione stopped pacing and stared at the brown piece of wood that was the only thing keeping her safe from whatever was on the other side. (She knew very well what that was, she would never be able to forget his voice, whether it be a beautiful baritone or a gravelly rasp.)
She stumbled back and fell to the floor in her haste to get away from the creature.
"You have defiled yourself," it snarled. The voice was nearer, as if he were pressed right up against the door as he spoke.
Hermione's breaths came out in erratic puffs, her heart pounded so hard in her chest she was sure a rib would break before this encounter was over.
There was a shimmering in the air and then the creature was standing in her room, having walked through the door as if it weren't even there. Her muscles spasmed with the need to get away even as her limps were frozen in place.
"Well, brat, what do you have to say for yourself?" he snapped, baring teeth that had sharpened since the last time she'd seen them.
(He was just as beautiful as she remembered. Older, and perhaps sharper, but still of unearthly beauty.)
He growled as he stepped closer to her fallen figure. He crouched in front of her like that night in the clearing. And Hermione instinctively closed her eyes against the pain she knew was coming next.
Instead, there was a tingle on her face and she cracked one eye open to see that Voldemort had his pale hand resting on her cheek. Almost affectionately. Her stomach churned at the thought.
Adrenalin overcame her frozen limbs, and Hermione thrust a hand out to shove him away from her. Her hand went through him like he was just a hallucination.
"Tsk, tsk, little witch. You should have more faith in your grandfather's wards. They still retain their pesky purpose of limiting my influence beyond the ash trees." His mouth moved and words came out, but Hermione could only focus on the phantom hand at her face and the fear in her veins.
"Answer me, brat," he bit out the word, intending to hurt her, humiliate her. Just as she had done to him. "Who was he?"
She finally found her voice. "W-what?"
"The boy who took you, who you allowed to soil you." His teeth ground together, creating a grating sound that put her teeth on edge.
Hermione stared. This was why he was here? To gauge the identity of the one who had taken her virginity? Hermione would have laughed if she weren't terrified of what the creature would do to Viktor if he found out.
"N-no one," she stuttered out, unconvincingly.
"Really?" he sneered, beautiful face transformed into that of a predator's.
Suddenly there was anger and it bolstered her confidence. "My body is my own. What I do with it is my business, who I allow to touch me is my business!"
Voldemort's snarl grew and only then, faces inches apart and breaths ghosting over each other, did Hermione notice the dark, red stain over his mouth.
"What is that?" she asked, eyes wide.
Voldemort startled. "Nothing." His denial was fast.
"Did you kill someone!" her voice was a shriek. She faintly heard footsteps outside her room but paid them no mind.
His intense gaze softened, and his guarded eyes made him harder to read. "That is none of your concern."
"None of my concern? You come to my door with blood on you and demand to know who I'd given myself to, and you have the audacity to say that the identity of your victim is none of my concern." Anger and rage, loathing and hate, that was all Hermione felt as she rose to her feet to tower over the creature.
Her breathing was labored as her mind raced a mile a minute. "Was it my parents?" she asked, fearing the answer.
She was given none.
Sparks flew through her brown mane. "Was it my parents!"
"No." The reply was soft in the face of her raging storm, but that one syllable gave way to instantaneous relief.
Exhausted, she turned away from him. "Go away," she mumbled, too drained to raise her voice.
In her peripheral vision she saw him reaching for her and prepared to use the last of her energy to distance herself when a flash of light hit his back.
Hermione and Voldemort simultaneously turned to the source.
Luna stood in the doorway, finger pointed at the creature, eyes hard and mouth a firm line. "Begone," she intoned. "You are not welcome here, fae prince."
Voldemort growled and Luna raised her finger higher; a threat, a promise.
With one last look at Hermione, Voldemort disappeared.
She didn't see him again until years later, but she knew he was always there. And sometimes when she looked behind her, there was a shadow not her own following her footsteps.
She never touched another man after Viktor.
The first time Hermione met Luna, it didn't at all go the way she'd expected to meet another witch.
It went like this:
"You're a witch," the words were said in a melodic, excited voice.
Hermione tensed immediately but forced herself to relax, knowing that it was improbable that she was the one being addressed. Nonetheless, her curiosity got the better of her and she turned slightly to see the person who'd spoken. A pretty blue-eyed blonde stood directly behind her, wearing the most color blinding tie-dyed dress with actual baby turnips sewed onto it.
"Hi, I'm Luna." The girl stuck out her hand.
Hermione blinked. She took the hand and shook it warily. "Hi."
"You're bonded, right? Usually, the bonds aren't so obvious but yours is like fireworks at night."
Hermione blinked again. "What."
"Oh? Did you not know? I thought since you were a witch…" she trailed off and Hermione's eyes widened in realization that this girl had, in fact, been talking to her.
"Who are you?" Hermione demanded. Her status was not something she'd planned on revealing to anyone. No matter how many centuries passed, it would always be dangerous for a witch to become exposed.
"I'm Luna," Luna replied simply, looking at Hermione like she'd asked something silly.
Hermione leaned closer and lowered her voice. "How do you know I'm a witch? Did he send you?" she asked urgently.
Luna blinked owlishly. "I'm a Whisperer, we see things not even magical beings can. And the golden aura around you let me know you're a witch. As for who sent me, well, I guess it was a he, but I don't think my father is who you mean." Her tone was light and airy as she spoke, as if her words were of no particular consequence.
Hermione's eyes grew wide in surprise. A Whisperer was a witch with the unique talent of being able to communicate with magical creatures, Nana had told Hermione, they were almost as rare as seers. To actually meet one…
Hermione sighed and ran a hand through her unruly curls. "I apologize for being so rude. I'm just—just, wary, I guess."
Luna smiled brightly and grasped one of Hermione's hands. "I understand. I'd be worried too if I was bonded to a fae."
Hermione reared back, tearing her hand away from Luna's. Her fingers splayed protectively over her hip where she kept Basilisk hidden. "How do you know that?"
Luna cocked her head to the side, blonde hair falling over one shoulder and catching the midday sunlight. "You don't have any nargles around you and that only happens when nargles are very scared or when there is magic that repels them. You're not at all a scary witch so it must be the remains of fae magic that once touched you – fae magic doesn't care very much for nargles, you see."
The brunette gaped. "You can tell all that just because there aren't any, uh, nargles around?"
Luna nodded, bright smile in place. "I know a lot of things," she chimed happily.
Hermione couldn't control the smile that twitched her lips upward. "I'm sure you do." This girl was like a ball of sunshine. She seemed odd at first, and perhaps she truly was in comparison to someone as down-to-earth and organized as Hermione, but there was this air around her that made it impossible to find her unappealing. Hermione wondered if it was some kind of magic or just Luna herself.
Unbeknownst to her – but predicted by Luna, if one were to ask the blonde – that was the start of a friendship of a lifetime.
A year since the fae prince appeared at her door, Luna came to her room, the bearer of the worst news possible.
"He's been crowned king, you know."
Hermione looked at Luna with a confused frown. "Who?"
The blonde's eyes were the clearest she'd ever seen when she said, "Voldemort."
(I'm coming for you, her dream had said. But perhaps it hadn't been a dream.)