A/N: One hundred percent AU. Harry and Ron left Hermione behind to look for Horcruxes and then Hermione's mandatory presence at Hogwart's is requested.

Pairing is Hermione/Draco, rated M for themes of profanity, perhaps smut, torture, and death.

Let me know what you think :)? X

MEMOIRS OF AN UNTOLD STORY

CHAPTER THREE:

THE RIDDLE

oOo

"Hermione, come with me to Madam Pomfrey, she'll heal your cuts" Ginny stood in front of Hermione to stop her walking.

"I've already told you I'm fine" Hermione stressed, "Nothing's broken, okay? Just a few superficial cuts. Go check on Neville and Luna though".

"Hermione" Ginny's voice wavered "She used the Cruciatus Curse on you. Are you okay?".

"Are you?" Hermione countered. She walked past Ginny "I just need a hot bath and a sleep. Go, I'll see you in the morning".

"If you're sure…" Ginny replied. She offered Hermione a goodbye smile and walked the other way, hurrying out of sight.

Hermione hobbled down the rest of the corridor, cursing under her breath as she reached the Head's Dorm. "Beedle the Bard" Hermione muttered and the portrait swung open. Hermione hopped inside and closed the portrait door behind her. The dorm seemed empty as she slumped down on the couch and pushed up her skirt slightly to see her leg bleeding underneath it. Must have been when Alecto flew her into that wall.

Just then, a door slammed shut from behind her and Hermione jerked round, ready to defend herself if need be.

"Just me" Draco smirked "What's got you so jum…" he stopped short when he saw her bleeding thigh. That's when he took another look at Hermione and his gut plummeted when he noticed her bleeding lip, dirtied clothes and the small cuts up her arms.

"What the fuck happened?" Draco came closer, looking at her bleeding thigh.

"Alecto happened" Hermione winced as she moved slightly. "You're not surprised are you?" she snapped "I would have thought you'd be second in command to the little game of pass the torture".

Draco stood up straight and disappeared into the kitchen. He returned instantly with a bowl of hot water and a cloth.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Hermione raised her eyebrow.

"Cleaning your wound since you didn't go to Madam Pomfrey" Draco knelt before her "Tell me, why didn't you go to Madam Pomfrey?".

"And pretend it didn't happen?" Hermione frowned "It happened, no denying it".

"Yes but that doesn't mean you have to suffer when you have magic" Draco shook his head as he pressed the wet cloth to her leg and Hermione jolted forwards.

"Fuck" she hissed.

"I can heal them for you" Draco pulled his wand from the back of his shirt.

"No!" Hermione flinched slightly "Dark magic did this to me, and dark magic will not fix it" she eyed him warily.

Draco sighed and put his wand back "Look, this is just stupid to suffer unnecessarily, come on I'll take you to Madam Pomfrey".

"Malfoy just leave it" Hermione snapped, swearing after it as Draco continued to clean her cut with the hot water. "I don't want it healed".

"Never had you down for a bit of sadism, Hermione" Draco frowned.

"It's not like that" Hermione looked away "What I'm fighting for, what Harry is fighting for… What happened tonight just made me stronger in the defeat of the Dark Lord. So I will accept these wounds and walk around with them, proud even, because I know that good will always triumph".

Draco, who had been staring at her, broke his gaze and continued cleaning her thigh, trying to stop his gaze from focusing on her pale and smooth skin.

"And if a couple of hesitant students see just what the Dark side is all about then I'm happy to shock them" Hermione added with a sad smile.

"The bleeding's stopped" Draco spoke up, looking down to see a clean leg with a slight cut about 10 inches "Wrap it in bandages though, so it doesn't get infected".

"Why did you just do that?" Hermione frowned, only now realising that the Prince of Darkness himself had just cleaned the leg of a sworn enemy. And a mudblood at that.

"I feel partly responsible" Draco answered truthfully "And even though my own cursed fate is inevitable, doesn't mean yours should be too".

"Why do you feel responsible?" Hermione asked quietly.

"I left to find Professor McGonagall" Draco stated "Except I couldn't find her and then I ran into Snape. He said he would handle the situation and flitted off. I came back here… If I hadn't of left…" he frowned.

"And this from the man who claims not to be good" Hermione said pointedly "You know you just proved yourself wrong, right?".

"We're done" Draco snapped, picking up the bowl of water and returning the kitchen. He returned with his usual stony face set in place "For your information, Alecto is a loose cannon in the Dark Lord's empire and he needs you alive to lure Potter here. You see where I come in? As long as I keep you alive, especially from Carrow, my job's already half-way done. It's not really protection, you see? More like… insurance".

Hermione tried to hide her shock at the words coming out of his mouth but she knew she probably wasn't doing a very good job. As he was about to walk past her to his bedroom, Hermione stumbled up, holding her leg. "Wait" she watched as he turned around, unsure.

"Do it" Hermione stood there, waiting.

"Do what?" Draco frowned.

"Do the Cruciatus Curse on me" Hermione replied "Right here. Right now. It won't kill me, it won't hurt me more than I already am. Let's see who's little theory is right? Because, the Cruciatus Curse doesn't work unless you really want to inflict pain for your own pleasure. So do it. Be all Death-Easter badass and do it. Prove your truly soulless and evil".

Draco laughed slightly, shaking his head "You wouldn't be able to handle it, Granger. Trust me… It feels like your flesh in on fire, like someone is cracking your skull open over and over again, it feels like-".

"Like there are invisible knives all over you, ripping your flesh apart and no matter how much you scream it won't ever stop?" Hermione interrupted him "It feels like someone's hand is around your heart and when they squeeze so tight you think you're gonna die from the pain, or at least pass out, but you don't… The pain just continues… right?".

Draco's pained eyes reached hers and it suddenly dawned on him exactly what kind of torture she had gone through.

"Goodnight Malfoy" Hermione looked away, gripping her leg as she walked into her room and closing the door behind her. She was going to get into a really hot bath and sit there until she felt slightly normal again.

The possibility that she may never feel normal again scared her. It scared her more than the arrival of the Dark Lord himself.

And she hated it.

oOo

Hermione woke, refreshed yet still slightly sore. She'd had a long bath the night before and almost fallen asleep in the tub. Stubbornly, she did what Malfoy suggested and wrapped her leg wound in bandages before putting on her school uniform. As she dressed and looked in the mirror she noticed her bandage peaked out slightly from underneath her skirt and apart from that, the small cut on her lip and the several bruises on her wrists, she looked absolutely swell.

Who was she kidding? She looked terrible. Hermione applied her usual make-up, checked her hair and noticed it was sleeker than usual and grabbed her books as she left her room. "There they are" she noticed her black converses from last night and sat down on the couch to put them on. Several noises emanating from the kitchen told Hermione that Draco was already up and probably had been for some time. She wouldn't have been surprised if he hadn't slept at all, seeing as his face always looked exhausted and tired now.

Hermione stood up slowly, still feeling pain from her leg and grabbed her books, opting to silently leave without having anymore useless and annoying back and forth with Malfoy. Hermione shut the portrait door behind her and began walking slowly towards the main hall. She received some looks off of people, some of curiosity, some of hatred and some of compassion. When she entered the great hall she saw Luna sitting at the Gryffindor table with Ginny and Neville. Physically, they looked great but Hermione knew emotionally that wasn't the case. Madam Pomfrey must have healed their wounds and sent them for a night's rest, without questioning what the hell had happened, of course.

"Hey guys" Hermione approached the table and slowly sat down across from Ginny and next to Luna.

"How did you sleep?" Ginny asked worriedly.

"Fine" Hermione let out a deep breath "How about you?".

"Barely, kept having nightmares" Ginny replied quietly.

"Is everyone okay?" Hermione asked, looking over at Luna.

"Oh they made me right as rain" Luna smiled sadly, looking away.

"I'm so sorry Hermione" Neville whispered, checking to see if anyone was listening "I swear we didn't involve you at all, Alecto was just looking for a reason to go after you".

"It's okay, I know" Hermione dismissed it "But now, I definitely know why I'm here; to lure Harry and Ron out of hiding. If they think I'm being held captive and tortured, they'll come running".

"Do you really think they'll come?" Neville asked, intense.

"I don't know" Hermione sighed tiredly "I don't even know what was going through their minds when they left me so I genuinely have no clue. But everything we do is being watched so we gotta be careful. And no more D.A stuff".

As Neville eyed Hermione more closely, he frowned again "Why didn't you get healed Hermione?".

"I refuse to pretend it didn't happen" Hermione replied as she began eating some toast "If anything it's a reminder of fighting the good fight, never letting evil win, never letting it control you. I'll get past this, we all will. The dark side can be quite seductive, alluring, if the students see what really goes on behind closed doors, I don't think any of them would want to sign up. That's what happened to Draco, he signed up without knowing what really happens and suddenly he's in too deep and doesn't know what to do".

"Hermione, he's a Death-Eater" Neville said pointedly "I'd rather gouge my own eyes out than sympathise for that prick".

"What are you talking about the Dark side being alluring?" Ginny asked "It's horrible, murder, bloodshed, evil!".

"Yes we know the truth" Hermione nodded "But I seriously doubt any of these young recruits really know what they're getting into. Think about it, using your magic for whatever you want? Consequence free? No personal gain, no-one to answer to, to be powerful and in control… It's alluring. Once they know what it truly means to be evil, they can't get out".

"Maybe that applies to some people" Neville nodded "But Malfoy… Malfoy's whole family is involved with Voldemort, he knew exactly what he was getting into Hermione!".

"He said they were threatening his family" Hermione leaned in, whispering "What would you do if you were in his position?".

Neville glared hardly "Thanks to Bellatrix, I don't have much family left, Hermione. Evil destroyed them. It's lucky my grandmother went into hiding otherwise they'd have killed her too".

"Neville, I'm sorry" Hermione sighed "I didn't think… You're right… Malfoy's evil… Pure evil" at that moment, Draco Malfoy decided to walk in the great hall, followed by Pansy Parkinson. They strolled towards the Slytherin table and sat down next to students Theodore Nott and Blaise Zabini.

As Draco's eyes looked up into the crowd and caught Hermione's gaze for the briefest of moments, she sighed. "Pure evil".

oOo

Hermione exited Amycus Carrow's class of the Dark Arts faster than her injured leg would allow her to go and tried to get away from the echo of Amycus's nasty stench. It was a tedious hour of her time and she really didn't know how much longer she would be able to deal with it, especially Alecto's class of Muggle Studies, which was anything but humane.

Maybe it would just be better if Snape revealed his true agenda and killed her, save her the torture of those classes. She still couldn't look Alecto in the eye, the night before playing over and over in her mind again.

That's why her focus and concentration wasn't exactly up to her A game when she slammed right into the person who stepped in front of her. Hermione let out a "Oomph!" and fell to the floor. She sighed and looked up to find the eyes of Blaise Zabini looking down at her.

"Sorry" Blaise offered her a hand up but Hermione glared, ignored it and slowly got up, gripping her bandaged leg. She went to move around Blaise but he stepped in front of her again and stopped her.

"What?" Hermione nearly barked "What do you want?".

"I was wondering if we could talk in private…" Blaise said calmly and softly, looking around left to right to see if anybody was listening into their conversation.

"Private?" Hermione raised her eyebrow "I'm not going anywhere with you!" she moved around him.

"Wait, please" Blaise followed after her as she walked away from him "I need to speak with you urgently".

"Are you sure you wanna do that?" Hermione snapped "Any pureblood seen with a mudblood may as well be a mudblood themselves".

"I just need to talk to you" Blaise struggled to keep up with Hermione's fast pace.

Hermione winced as the pain in her leg seared through-out her entire body and she stopped her fast pace to bend over and grip her thigh.

"Are you okay?" Blaise watched her gasp.

"Don't I look okay to you?" Hermione barked, having to lean against the wall "If I didn't have this injury I would have out-run you by now!".

"I don't doubt it" Blaise smiled slightly "You're Hermione Granger, the girl who's good at everything".

Hermione frowned and looked up "What do you want?".

"I don't think it would be a good idea to talk so openly" Blaise replied "What I have to say must stay secret".

"Well I'm sure as hell not going anywhere with you" Hermione glared. She sighed "Look, if this is about Draco then…".

"Draco?" Blaise frowned "What about Draco?".

"Nothing" Hermione shook her head. The pain in her leg was getting worse and she felt so damn dizzy and tired and weak. Hermione gripped her leg tighter and cursed herself silently for not going to Madam Pomfrey when she had the chance.

"Maybe you should go to see Madam Pomfrey" Blaise frowned.

"Yeah" Hermione weakly pushed herself off the wall, "Maybe I… shou…" her eyes rolled into the back of her head as she seemingly fainted, plummeting towards the floor only to be caught by Blaise.

Blaise held Hermione up awkwardly "Hello? Granger?" when he saw that Hermione was out cold he pushed her over his shoulder and began walking down the corridor carrying her body, heading towards Madam Pomfrey.

This was not what Blaise imagined. Fair enough, he had given Hermione some reason in the past to distrust him. He never openly insulted her or said anything remotely hurtful to her face but the fact he used to strut around just as arrogant as any pureblood with Malfoy, Goyle, Crabbe and Parkinson probably didn't do him any favours. He rounded another corner and was almost at Madam Pomfrey's ward when somebody quickly stepped in front of him.

"What happened?" Draco asked quickly, his eyes dark and unreadable. Blaise stiffened slightly. Draco Malfoy had always been quite a puzzle and that made him a danger either way.

"She fainted in the corridors" Blaise replied calmly "I was just bringing her to Madam Pomfrey's".

"And you just found her?" Draco's question was almost threatening.

"Yes" Blaise replied smoothly.

Blaise could tell Draco didn't believe him for a second but he didn't say anything else or move, just waiting. Slowly, Draco stepped aside and followed Blaise into the ward. Blaise put Hermione down on one of the beds and went to get Madam Pomfrey from her desk as Draco stayed by Hermione's side, staring down at her.

"Oh dear" Madam Pomfrey rushed towards Hermione and stared at the cuts on her arms, face and the bandaged wound peaking out of her skirt. "Why didn't she come see me sooner?" Madam Pomfrey snapped, frustrated. She began to unwrap the bandage on Hermione thigh.

"She's quite stubborn" Draco replied with a sigh as the bandage revealed the cut wound on Hermione's thigh. It had been bleeding and was beginning to blister and turn a shade of purple.

"It's infected" Madam Pomfrey rushed to her potions cabinet, grabbing what she needed hurriedly.

"Shall we go Draco?" Blaise asked suddenly, "We have Potions next".

"I know" Draco replied, not moving. He slowly took his eyes off of Hermione and up to Blaise. Draco began walking and Blaise turned to follow but didn't. He took his favourite pen out of his pocket and let it fall to the ground. Draco turned back, un-amused to see Blaise slowly bend down, back to him and pick it up.

Blaise rose up and gripped the bed Hermione was on in a false gesture. In a quick flash he slipped a folded note into Hermione's skirt pocket and turned around, smiling coldly at Draco. Draco didn't return the smile and waited until Blaise had joined him. They walked out of the ward together as Madam Pomfrey began flittering around the knocked out Hermione.

Draco's eyes followed back one last time before he disappeared round the corner with Blaise.

oOo

Hermione yawned as she stretched out on the hospital bed and turned over on her side, trying to comfy. Almost instantly her eyes snapped opened and she jumped up, cautious. What the hell? Why was she in Madam Pomfrey's ward? And where was her bandage? Hell, where was her wound? Hermione checked her arms and face and saw that the cuts were also gone.

"Hermione" Madam Pomfrey walked towards her "You're awake. How are you feeling dear?".

"Fine" Hermione rubbed her eyes "What am I doing here?".

"Mr Malfoy and Mr Zabini brought you in dear. Mr Zabini said you fainted" Madam Pomfrey replied "Your wound had become infected, I had to heal it".

"How long ago was this?" Hermione tried to remember the last thing she knew.

"Just a couple of hours ago, it's nearly dinner time" Madam Pomfrey replied "And don't worry, Professor McGonagall notified all of your missed classes".

"Thanks" Hermione said weakly as she took a sip of water from the table next to her. What was the last thing she remembered? It all came flooding back. The pain in her wound had intensified when she'd tried to walk away from Blaise and then she'd fainted in the middle of a conversation.

Instead of trying to understand what the hell Zabini was even playing at, Hermione slowly hopped off the bed, surprised to find it no longer hurt to walk. She actually felt great.

"If you have any problems just come straight back" Madam Pomfrey told her kindly as she walked away.

"Thank you" Hermione nodded her head as she walked out of the ward, down the corridor. She didn't know what Madam Pomfrey had given her but she suddenly felt so awake and energized. She felt like she could climb a mountain! Was it really dinner time already?

Hermione headed towards the Great hall and suddenly her energetic mood dimmed slightly as she remembered where she was. Hogwarts was enigmatic and majestic and age-old and wise, it was amazing and powerful and protected and now… To see it in the hands of evil was horrible and heart-wrenchingly painful. It was the quiet and reflective times like these when she wished Professor Dumbledore was still alive.

Hermione sighed and put her hands in her pockets when she suddenly frowned. She slowly pulled out a folded piece of paper in her left hand and quickly rushed to open it. In neat, clean hand-writing was the words;

'By the stroke of twelve on this eve night, the north long tower shall still be might. Seek what you may and fret not, the answers you need will soon be sought'.