Chapter Fourteen
This is the penultimate full chapter. Exciting!
Please review and as always enjoy.
Love C.J.
Hermione walked for an hour or so before she realised what she was doing. Her mind was a sea of emotions. As she finally looked around her trying to realise were she was. She looked upwards to the large shop she was stood in front of and recognised it immediately. She smiled remembering shopping at Harrods before Christmas each year with her mother before she had gone to Hogwarts and thought of memories long done. She stopped for a minutes looking at the shop's display it featured two mannequins dressed in the most expensive clothes Hermione could imagine with a backdrop of trees flowering with spring buds it looked to the outside world as though the shop had transplanted a forest into its front.
"Snap out of it Hermione," she thought angrily "you were held my some horrible people for horrific reasons and you have escaped. What's wrong with you? Why aren't you happier?" Hermione turned into the underground pass buying a ticket from a beleaguered looking saleswoman. Hermione stood on the crowded lunchtime Piccadilly line as it travelled east to her flat. She exited the tube at Holloway Road, her flat was barely a hundred metres from the underground and when Hermione had moved to London she had used the tube regularly. She had never been quite sure why but something about being in the muggle world always felt right to her and reminded her of her parents. Hermione walked into the hallway of her flat, the place was quiet and Hermione saw none of her neighbours as she walked up the stairs of her flat. The building was in the art deco style and the lobby had a beautiful curved staircase that curled up a central chute in the middle of the building. The bannister of the stairway was inlaid with jade, amethyst and silver. Hermione had found it gaudy when she first moved to the building but it had grown on her. Hermione walked up the staircase slowly letting her hand rest against the banister.
She reached the door of her flat Hermione placed her key in the locked turned and pushed open the door. She entered her kitchen expecting to see Ron sat at the kitchen table. For some reason during her captivity she had constantly imagined Ron sat moping over her alone in their flat. Hermione saw the Prophet with her face on the kitchen table. Beside it was several letters in various handwriting styles. Hermione recognised Ginny's, Mrs. Weasley's and even Lavender Brown's. The last one made sense Lavender was now working at the Prophet and cynically Hermione thought she was probably taping up Ron for leads. For the first time since she had entered the flat Hermione suddenly heard a noise. She realised for the first time she was vulnerable, she had no wand and wasn't capable of wand less magic. "Could I apparate?" She wondered. "Possibly but not far." Hermione heard a second noise which was definitely female. She frowned at the source of the noise: her bedroom. Quietly Hermione tiptoed to the bedroom door. The door was slightly open and Hermione peered around it. On the bed was Ron visably naked being straddled by a slim brunette. Their limbs were entangled and Hermione was grateful both were looking away.
"Lacy that is amazing."
"You are pretty good yourself." The girl giggled in a high pitch laugh Hermione immediately hated. "Oh yes right there." Her voice changed climbing an octave in a second.
"There," Ron said his own voice dropping.
"Yes," she almost squeaked. Hermione walked into the room standing with her arms crossed.
"Hermione?" Ron suddenly asked his voice at his normal pitch. "Is that you?" he asked pushing the girl off him and crossing the room his hand outstretched towards her.
"Go away." She frowned pushing his arm away.
"But Hermione you-"
"I what Ron. I'm back ok. I was kidnaped by dark wizards that would have raped me. I escape and come back to find my loving boyfriend fucking some whore."
"I am not-" Lacy began.
"SHUT UP!' shouted Ron and Hermione simultaneously.
"Well," Lacy said huffily taking a seat at Hermione's kitchen table. Hermione looked from the girl in her dressing gown sat in her kitchen to Ron looking as though he was wounded.
"You know what?" She smirked "you made your bed Ron. Now lie in it. We're over." And with that she disappeared.
"Well that was rude." Lacy smiled "coming back to bed honey?" She asked Ron.
"No," he growled pushed Lacy's arm away from his torso.
Hermione re-appeared in Diagon Alley. She breathed deeply and heavily. The apparition had taken a lot of power out her body and she felt weak. She leant back on the walk behind her and gasped for air which obligingly filled her lungs and she felt oxygen flowing back into her limbs. Hermione stood up and for the first time looked around were she was. She realised for the first time that her aim must have been slightly off. She wasn't in Diagon Alley but Knockturn Alley. She felt her sight come into focus and saw that people were crowded around her. There was a tall man to her left looking at her as though he could eat her. Hermione shied away from him and bumped into a woman to her left, The witch was stringy and slim with a deeply lined faced she smiled cruelly at Hermione who saw she only had two teeth. Hermione tried to back away but felt the solid brick wall behind her back. The pair closed in and behind them Hermione saw other faces but her eyesight blurred as she sunk back onto the wall. Hermione felt her legs giving way and all she could see was blurring shapes.
"Get away from her." Hermione heard a voice shout. She tried to listen more but her hearing seemed to give out too and Hermione Granger slumped unconsciously against the wall of Kockturn Alley.
