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A/N: Because of computer problems, we've been gone for much longer than we intended. We are now using a new computer, though, and the next chapter should be uploaded in a couple of days, after we're through proofreading it. Cheers!

9– The Dungeon

In which Hermione doesn't have a very nice time.

When Hermione woke up, she was lying on a hard, cold stone floor. Something was dangling above her head. She already knew what it was before her eyes had adjusted to the gloom. She could smell it. Garlic.

She tried to get to her feet, but could barely move. It was because of the garlic, she supposed, and because of her fierce craving for blood. She had read all about the effects of garlic on vampires, but could never have imagined how it would really feel.

She must have been out for hours. With no windows, it was impossible to even tell if it was night or day. Although her head was spinning, she slowly began to recall what had happened.

Again she tried to sit up, in vain. She could hear the sound of footsteps outside of the dungeon. The lock clicked, and the door opened.

She lifted her head. She had expected it to be the Old Malfoy come to explain himself, but outlined against the light in the doorway was Crinkly the house elf bringing a tray of something. Hermione thought she could smell fresh blood.

"Are you awake, miss?" asked Crinkly.

She made a croaking noise of assent.

"Master said to Crinkly to give you this to eat."

Why keep her alive like this? Wouldn't it be easier to just let her starve?

"I can't move," she whispered in a voice unlike her own. "Please help me."

Crinkly looked frightened.

"Here miss," she said, scurrying over with the bottle of blood. With Crinkly's aid Hermione managed to down all of it, although some of it spilled out over her face.

"Thanks," she muttered. She felt a little bit better, though the stench of the garlic still overpowered her. Crinkly stood up hastily, and nearly tripped over her own feet in her hurry to get out of the room. The door closed with a loud clang behind her, and Hermione could hear the key turning in the lock once more.

Nothing else happened for several hours. She remained on the floor, dizzy and ill.

The next day – or so she thought, having lost all real sense of time – the footsteps returned, but this time they were heavier, and she could also hear the clunk-clunk-clunk of a cane. The lock clicked and the door opened to reveal the old Malfoy, who had decided to pay her a visit at last.

"How are you feeling today, Miss Granger?" he asked pleasantly.

Hermione glared up at him and kept her mouth shut.

"I see," he said. "I thought the blood would strengthen you enough to speak. I would be most interested to learn more about you and your friend."

His last words triggered something within Hermione, and she couldn't keep herself from bursting out,

"What have you done with Harry? Where is he?"

"He is fine, for the moment."

For the moment. The threat, though unspoken, was nevertheless quite clear. She would have to tell him anything he asked her about. But what did he want from them? She couldn't think straight because of the garlic, so chances were she would say more than she would like.

"So," he said. "To begin with, would you mind terribly telling me more about Mr Potter?"

She would, but couldn't see that she had a lot of choice, so, stalling, she said,

"He's my friend."

"So I gathered. But who is he?"

"I don't know what you mean."

"As a person. I do not care much about social or political standing, as you know by now. Describe to me what kind of a person he is."

"You could talk to him yourself," said Hermione, who felt very tired.

"But I want to hear it in your own words. Is he a good friend? Is he loyal to you? He went through a lot of trouble to help you, that is clear."

"Well, of course he did. And what do you mean by loyal? Why do you ask?"

"Because I want to hear your opinion, of course. It is not unusual for a newly made vampire to suddenly find herself quite devoid of friends she previously considered close. Yet he came with you here. I wonder, what did he think of this little quest of yours? Did he believe you would succeed?"

"Well, no," Hermione said before she could stop herself. "I mean, he didn't think there was much of a chance, but neither did I really. We just thought it was worth a try."

"Why then, if you did not think there was much of a chance, did you put your friend through all this?"

"I didn't force him to come."

"But you knew he would."

"I didn't know. He could have said no."

"Did you imply that you would have gone regardless of whether or not he went with you?"

"I… well… what's the point with all this anyway?"

"My dear girl, I am merely attempting to get an idea of your character, and his. You cannot begrudge me this."

"Yes I can."

"And why is that, might I ask?"

"Well, because… just because, okay? Go away."

Hermione didn't feel like herself at all. It was as if her mind was full of fog. She was very uncomfortable with the feeling and hoped very much he would leave and let her sleep it off somehow, even though that would hardly help as it was probably the garlic which caused it.

Malfoy sighed heavily.

"It would be well for you to keep in mind that you will be here for quite some time. You may as well speak."

"Well, what can I tell you? We went back in time to find a cure for my vampirism, alright?"

"Let us look farther back than that. How, pray tell, did you become a vampire? Who bit you?"

"It was a young man I worked with. He had just been bitten himself, and I tried to help him. He didn't know what he was doing."

"Ah. I see. I thought it might have been one of my old friends."

"Does it matter?"

"No… I suppose not."

He gazed at her in silence for a while.

"But is it really that horrible to you?"

"What?"

"Vampirism. Is it really as unbearable as you claim? Is being free of it truly worth all this pain and effort?"

"Yes," said Hermione firmly, despite the protests of the small nagging voice at the back of her mind. "Of course it is."

"You have known it only for a very short while. It is difficult to accept it in the beginning; I know that, but gradually you come to see the world through new eyes. There is so much to discover, and so little time, for mortals. But when you are a vampire, you have all the time in the world."

This was undeniably true, though Hermione didn't like to admit it to herself. She struggled to find a counter argument, with the garlic smog filling her brain, clogging her thoughts. Finally, she said,

"But… to outlive all my friends and family… that would be awful…"

"That is of no matter. Soon enough you will come to realize they are quite superfluous. You will get used to it. You will see what is important, and learn to disregard that which is not."

"What… like Harry?"

"Yes, like Harry."

"But that's terrible! How can you say something like that?" she exclaimed, his words finally breaking through the smog, granting her a moment's clarity. "The way I see it, there isn't anything good with vampirism at all. Every night I'm forced to drink blood. I can barely control it anymore, and I keep thinking of killing people. You might say it's because I'm young, but I'll never get used to being like this! I'm dangerous to my friends, and I won't be able to marry someone according to the laws…"

"Aha. Now I begin to see your problem. But fear not. Him you will also forget about."

"I'll never forget about him. Or Harry, or anyone else."

"So you say now, but such love does never last. Humans are fickle. Changeable. You must learn instead to direct your affections to something more permanent."

"Like… what?"

"I will leave you to ponder that," said the Malfoy, and he turned to leave. Suddenly he looked back at her over his shoulder. "I will return in a fortnight. Then we shall see how much you are willing to forget."

With that he left, closing the door with a clang. She could hear his receding footsteps, and soon the door locked, apparently of its own accord.

At first she scorned his last remark, but as the days crawled by she began to feel afraid. Could it happen? Could she forget Harry and Ron, Ginny, her parents, Gringotts, Hogwarts, her life? The part of her that was still capable of rational thinking screamed no! yet a small insidious voice, which only seemed to grow stronger the more she tried to suppress it, whispered yes. It was very possible.

She had to get out.

How was she supposed to think up a plan, with that infernal garlic hanging above her head? She would have to do something about that, and soon. As she lay there in the dark with nothing but her thoughts for company, an idea began to form. She would have to get someone else to remove the garlic, or at the very least, move it a bit farther away. Then she might be able to think straight.

She could never get the old Malfoy to do it of course. But what about the house elf, Crinkly?

-

After what seemed like several days, Crinkly came back with a new bottle. Hermione felt weaker than ever. She wanted the blood, but had already made up her mind about what she had to do first.

As soon as the elf stepped through the door, she fixed her face into a panicked expression and started twitching, gasping for breath.

"I can't breathe… the garlic… ack…"

"Miss!" shrieked the elf, dropping her tray. "What is wrong?"

"The… the garlic… it's killing me…" she went into fake spasms. "You have to take it away…"

"I… I can't, miss," said the elf, sounding panicky herself. "I is not allowed to…"

"Please," Hermione whispered, trying her best to sound as if she was on death's threshold. "Can't you… move it? Please…" then she went limp, forcing her eyes to roll back into her head.

This, she mused, was probably the best bit of acting she had ever done. Perhaps the reason it worked so well was because it wasn't far from how she really felt at that moment.

She waited with bated breath. Her idea was that, since the old Malfoy clearly wanted her alive for whatever reason, Crinkly would have orders to make sure she was marginally alright. The poor house elf hopefully didn't know that garlic seldom affected a vampire as badly as she pretended it did.

For a few seconds nothing happened, and Hermione started to wonder if her plan had failed. Then there was a faint cracking noise, and suddenly the garlic stench lessened considerably.

She opened her eyes slowly, and took a deep breath. It felt marvellous. The garlic was still there, but it had moved to the other end of the room, and the change was so great that she began to feel slightly alive for the first time in a week. Her mind was almost clear. But something else had taken up residence. Her vampire voice was whispering to her, now that it was no-longer subdued, and was getting quite vocal, as she was too weak to effectively repress it.

Blood… Now. I am very hungry.

"The bottle – bring me the bottle."

Fortunately, it was a metal bottle and hadn't broken when it hit the floor. Crinkly hurried over to pick it up, and quickly made her way over to Hermione. She greedily swallowed all the blood in one long gulp.

-

As the days passed, she gradually began to regain her strength. Whenever she heard Crinkly approach with the regular "meals", she would lie down on the floor and feign helplessness. She did not want word to reach the old Malfoy that she was recovering, since she still needed time to think of a plan.

She had discovered early on that she couldn't approach the door, or even look at it directly. Although she couldn't see it, she guessed that there was a wild rose, or a similarly powerful item nailed to it, to prevent her from leaving. Wild roses were among the most effective weapons used against vampires after all. She would have to find a way to get around that. She couldn't remove it on her own, and thought she would not be able to convince Crinkly to do it either. It wasn't as if it caused her any great suffering, besides the aggravation of being incapable of looking in a certain direction.

But if the rose couldn't be moved, the thing it was hanging on might be. If Crinkly opened the door wide enough, and if Hermione could position herself at the right angle, the flower would be facing the wall and she wouldn't be bothered by it. Then there was a chance to get past it. She would have to move fast, or Crinkly would have time to close the door again before she could get out.

But, she realized; it would be impossible to slip past Crinkly anyway.

You could attack her, said the voice of her inner vampire.

"No," she muttered to herself. "Can't do that. Sorry."

If Crinkly noticed her slipping out, she would be likely to use her magic to keep her back. It was obvious that the house elf was allowed a lot of freedom, and would do what she thought necessary in such a situation.

Could she convince Crinkly to help her? she wondered. The elf had tried to warn her and Harry off when they had stood at the gates of the house, quite probably because she had been aware of what usually happened to the Malfoy's guests. But Hermione knew too much about house elves by now, to consider this idea for long. However liberated she might be, Crinkly wouldn't go against a direct order from her master.

Could she be distracted? Was there a way to lure her so far into the room that Hermione could slip out and close the door before the elf had time to react?

-

The answer came to Hermione a few days later, in a flash of inspiration. She was waiting for Crinkly to bring her a bottle of blood, like she did every three days. She heard the pitter-patter of house elf footsteps, and suddenly it hit her what she had to do. How very simple it was!

She had grown strong enough to hover in the air by then, and she rose upwards just as the lock clicked and the doorknob turned.

She pressed herself against the ceiling and held her breath. It was costing her all her strength to stay up. She could feel her energy ebbing away with every heartbeat. She hadn't had a taste of fresh blood in three days.

The door opened with a creak, and Crinkly peeked into the room.

"Miss?" she squeaked.

There was a pause. Then the house elf stepped into the room. Hermione peered down at her anxiously. Was she going to close the door behind her, or chance a look at the ceiling?

But Crinkly, taking another couple of steps forward, left the door wide open.

"Miss? Where is you hiding?"

Attack her now! I want blood!

Hermione clenched her teeth and ignored the voice, though it took all of her self-control to do so. It was true that she had to act immediately, before Crinkly thought of looking up.

Silently, she swooped down and out through the door, managing to slam it behind her. The door locked itself on its own. She landed on the floor with a thump. Then she quickly got up and started running through the corridor, searching for a hiding place where she could safely collapse. Crinkly's frightened screams followed her long after she had stopped hearing them.

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A/N nr2: Wild roses are mentioned in Bram Stoker's Dracula as being effective against vampires.