CitySleep – Thank you dear. I hope you enjoy this new chapter.
Tsukuyomu – Yes! Yes and YES! I would love you to help me out! I just don't know how this whole beta reader thing works? LOL. I will drop you a PM, dearie. I am glad you are enjoying the story! It makes my heart go all over the place.
Moi – Thank you so much for reviewing! Your reviews are very refreshing to read. I love your thoughts and inputs and they actually motivate me to write more and more.
KitChi – Ahhh you make me blush. At first I thought I should write a jerk Salazar Slytherin but as I started to write my Salazar came out like that. LOL I am glad you approve though! PS: I also love Draco x Hermione! We should totally be dramione buddies J
Chapter IV
"Run, we are being hunted!"
Hermione blinked once and then again. The young witch simply could not share the same enthusiasm that the man in front of her was experiencing. Being hunted was not something to be excited about. The mere thought of being hunted almost made her run screaming like a banshee. But she held herself together because being hunted was unfortunately something that she had experienced before. And that was why she managed to still her emotions and was able to think coherently.
"This is not funny!" she hissed at him as she watched him take one of the horses, "Being hunted is not funny!"
"I heard you the first time," he replied and even though she could not see his face, she was sure that he had rolled his eyes at her.
Her mind went back to what had happened just moments before. Muggles hunting down witches was not unheard of. However, she had never imagined that they had organized groups for that effect; especially groups led by a wizard. Hermione looked up and saw that Salazar had climbed in the saddle; he walked the horse over to her and was now holding his hand out for her so she could climb up behind him.
Her arms went around his waist and she looked at the Inn's main door. She gasped slightly when the muggles came out running, shouting and protesting but she could not understand anything that came out of their mouths. She didn't need to. They were beyond angry, fury twisted their faces as they tried to chase them down but their stolen horse was now going at full speed, leaving them behind.
She could feel his chest tremble and she realized that Salazar was roaring with laughter.
"You are mad!" she added in English and shook her head. A ghost of a smile flickered on her lips as he looked at her over his shoulder. The mischievous gleam in his eyes made her almost forget to breathe.
"You are skilled with a wand," he spoke and sounded genuinely surprised.
She didn't know whether she should feel offended or flattered but in the end she decided to take it as a compliment and for the first time she grinned at him. However, her grin suddenly faltered when a yellow flash of light went past her, missing her by mere inches.
Salazar cursed under his breath, realizing that they had run right into a trap. He should have seen it coming. It was Jonathan he was dealing with after all. He tried to steer the horse to the best of his abilities but there were too many of them.
From the corner of his eyes he watched the witch raise her wand, "Protego!"
A bright blue transparent shield suddenly appeared and his eyes widened slightly when the spells that were meant to hit them were rebound directly off back towards its caster. He suddenly held the witch in high regard as it was not everyone that could maintain such a shield much less make the spells rebound or ricochet off in other directions. He wondered where she learned her magic and thoughts of who she truly was started to invade his mind but he forced them away as now was not the time.
Hermione noticed that this time there were no muggles chasing them down and she couldn't for the life of her understand why they were being chased down by a mob of angry wizards. Were they working together? Since when did wizards work for muggles… or was it the other way around? Was this what Salazar meant? When there were things far worse than a dark wizard?
A loud cry escaped from her lips as she was violently thrown of her horse. She rolled on the unleveled ground, groaning as she hit her head on one of the rocks. She barely had time to register the pain as she frantically looked around. She spotted their horse on the ground, dead. A cold shiver licked her spine as these wizards were not afraid to use the killing curse. She tried to sit up and gasped in pain, probably a broken rib.
Her eyes stopped on her companion and she saw him on his knees. He struggled to stand but it was no use, he was surrounded. The wizards all but one had dismounted their horses and circled the kneeling man. None spared her a look, probably not deigning her worthy of their time. After all, she was simply Hermione Granger. What was she in comparison to one of the founders of Hogwarts? A nobody.
"Do not be foolish." One of the wizards spoke, his wand poking Salazar's throat, "Drop it."
Salazar, however, did not seem quite keen in obeying. He was clutching to his wand so tightly, that his knuckles turned white. Hermione did the same. Letting Salazar Slytherin die would mean the death of her. And then suddenly, a thought coursed through her that made her sick to the core.
All of this was her fault.
If Salazar had not saved her from that crazed wizard and had not insisted to bring her along, none of this would have happened. By staying with him, she had altered the course of history beyond repair.
"Do it." Salazar replied, "I dare you." His lips twitched upwards into a smirk, his blue eyes fiercely locked with the man that had his wand pointed at him, "You have never taken a life before, have you? Do not tell me you are a trainee. What? Is this your first hunt?" he taunted and he knew he hit the mark. The man's hand was shaking and he looked around for support from his comrades.
"Do not pay heed to his words," the man still mounted on his horse spoke and Salazar's lips broke into a smile.
"Jonathan. How nice of you to join us. You were hit pretty bad back there, are you alright mate?"
Everyone seemed pretty uncomfortable as they all had their wands ready. They knew who this man was. He was the heir of Slytherin. Murdering him meant repercussions would be in order. And no one wanted to be hunted down by the man's family or worse by the man's friends. They heard of the quartet fearsome stories and how together they could accomplish all kinds of terrible magic.
Hermione did not understand what was being said but she knew that these men were not here to chat and make friends. She was certain of one thing though; they should not have ignored her. Swallowing down a cry of pain she quickly got to her feet. A few of the men turned around, their wands ready to shoot her down but she deflected their spells with a simple motion of her wand.
Salazar took advantage of the much appreciated distraction and was able to break the wand that had been poking his neck. The man gasped in horror at his broken wand and fell to the ground clutching tightly to it as though his life depended on it. Salazar's whole playful demeanor disappeared and a ferocious expression was now in place. He pointed his wand at the wallowing man and a flash of green illuminated the forest.
Her heart was racing and her breath was rough and despite of the tiniest movement causing her great pain, she rushed towards the blond-haired man and she hugged him tightly. Salazar's eyes widened at the gesture and he felt a strong yank at his person. He could only watch as Jonathan's own killing curse came at him in slow motion before the scene before him changed completely.
Salazar fell on his back with a bushy-haired witch on top of him. She took deep breaths and shook violently against him. He looked around in astonishment as they were no longer in the same woods. In fact he had no idea where they were at.
"What did you do?" he asked, lifting her chin to make her look at him.
"Did you really have to kill that man?"
The question caught him off guard, surprise etched in his features. "You do realize they were there to kill us." He replied, lying on the grass completely and closing his eyes. "I do not know what you have done but you ought to teach me."
Still straddling him, Hermione shook her head, "Not until you have taken me to Hogwarts."
Salazar opened one eye and he smirked, "You have been there before haven't you?"
Her eyes widened slightly and she opened her mouth to contradict him but his index finger found her lips, "I do not appreciate being lied to. I will not press you for answers… for now." He added and closed his eye again, "Now allow me… just a few moments of rest."
She snorted in disbelief and then looked down at him. She felt her cheeks grow hot at the position she was in and slowly and discreetly tried to remove herself away from him. As she rolled away to lie next to him she found herself looking at the locket around his neck.
Hermione quickly looked away as memories came to her. She could see Harry and Ron, both taking turns to hold the damned thing. She remembered the arguments and how vile the object had become when turned into a Horcrux. She closed her eyes shut and tried to push the memories away and away they went only to be replaced with fresh recent ones. The look on Salazar's face when he took that man's life had scared her. He had looked like a complete different person then. It was like the man wore different masks at all times and she could not tell which was the real him.
As she tried to turn into a comfortable position, she let out a cry of pain. She felt warm arms come around her and she fought the urge to break free and run for her life. She knew she was being silly, that so far he had never did anything threatening or showed ill intentions towards her but the fact that he took a man's life out so easily did not sit well with her. She tensed when he began chanting something in a language entirely different from the one he spoke with the other men. It sounded gentle and beautiful and she slowly felt the pain subside. She wanted to ask what he was doing to her but she found her unable to interrupt. She felt that it was not right to.
She could feel her eyelids grow heavier by the second and just before they closed against her will she realized that she had in fact felt this type of magic before.
It was the same magic that protected her and her friends.
It was Hogwarts magic.
His magic is beautiful, she thought before she turned her back on the world and fell into a painless and peaceful sleep.
This sucks, this sucks, this sucks, Rowena chanted over and over in her head, anything to distract herself from the disgusting, suspiciously warm water sloshing around in her boots. She decided then and there that she was going to kill Godric Gryffindor once she got out of here. What the hell did the little turd think he had been doing, sending her here of all places to look for "abnormal things." Everything Rowena had seen so far had been abnormal! She was cold, tired, and filthy and it didn't help that she now had no earthly idea where the hell they were.
Godric had insisted that he felt something or someone within the forest but she thought him to be slightly paranoid. It was called the Forbidden Forest for a reason. It wasn't like a group of wizards suddenly decided to have a tea party on the most dangerous forest in Britain. She sighed, this sudden paranoia only happened whenever Salazar was not around. When Salazar left on his little endeavors Godric would grow restless much like a father waited for his child to return home before curfew time.
"I want to go home," Helga suddenly whined, sounding ten years younger than she really was.
"Oh be quiet," Rowena snapped, focusing her wand higher so it could illuminate a much larger area, "It is not like I am having any more fun than you are."
"Nor I," added the man from the front of the line, his long dark coat stained and clotted with all sorts of gross-looking stuff.
"What are we even looking for down here?" Helga whined again, "Why can we not go back to the castle and just say that we did not find anything!?"
Frederic stopped and whirled around fixing the blonde-haired female with a bestial glare that made her stop dead in her tracks, a grumpy Rowena almost bumping against her back.
"Would you kindly shut up?" Frederic asked calmly, though the annoyed rumble that Rowena could notice in the man's tone told he was anything but calm.
"Hey," Rowena intervened and walked beside Helga, glaring at the man in front of her, "Leave her alone,"
Frederic brought his hands up, "Aye, as my lady wishes,"
Rowena rolled her eyes and she started walking again, "Godric would not send us all the way here if he didn't think something or someone was in the forest. When has that man's instincts ever failed us?" she asked and when neither Helga nor Frederic replied she knew that they were silently agreeing with her.
The three companions came to a halt at the same time when a loud, echoing moan suddenly filled the air around them. They immediately tensed and Helga who had been the only one with her wand hidden quickly brought it out, ready to face whatever was out there. The moan came again, louder this time. Both Rowena and Frederic shone their wands around wildly, trying to pinpoint the source.
"Is it just me or that sounded like a person?" Frederic asked what Rowena had been thinking.
"Hello!?" Helga suddenly called before Rowena could tell her to keep quiet, "Is anyone out there?"
"This way!" Frederic cried, rushing past Rowena and ran forward towards the tall menacing looking trees.
"Fred wait!" Rowena snapped as Helga ran past her in pursuit of her friend, "Something is not right! Wait!"
With a loud groan, the dark-haired woman finally caught up with her companions. When she fell besides them, she almost let her wand slip right through right through her fingers as she contemplated the sight before her.
Centaurs.
A garden of corpses stretched on and on into the distance, as far as the eye could see. A sea of lifeless eyes haunted the three friends and it was only when another moan echoed into the night's cold air that they were brought back from their initial shock.
Helga's face was as white as a ghost as she approached the poor suffering creature. She knelt next to him with tears quickly welling up in her eyes, "What is g-g-going on?" she asked, her voice breaking at the same time as her heart did. She stretched a trembling hand and touched the creature's torso, "It is dying…"
The centaur let out another cry that froze the blood in Rowena's veins.
"Something is not right…" she knelt next to Helga and gently pointed her wand at the centaur, "Salvabo Vitae, Salvabo dolore," she whispered and watched as the color of gold and silver surrounded the dying creature, "Salvabo Vitae, Salvabo dolore…"
Frederic walked carefully around the dead bodies, frowning when he could not find any wounds that could possibly explain their deaths. He could hear Rowena try a few healing spells and turned his attention back on them, "Try to make it speak." He said as he approached them.
Helga looked down and her eyes met the centaur's gaze. She could see the pain etched in them and she fought the urge to sob uncontrollably. She could not stand to see others in pain. "What happened?" she asked, hoping the centaur could give them a clue of what had transpired.
Rowena drew her brows together in sheer concentration. Why weren't the spells working? She tried to search for the source of whatever was afflicting this being and then when she finally encountered, she fell on her behind and a scream escaped her lips.
"Rowena!" Helga looked down at her friend in shock. Frederic knelt next to the dark-haired witch and he shook her by the shoulders when she wouldn't stop screaming.
He shook her harder and suddenly felt the hair of the back of his neck stand on end. Something indeed was not right. Groaning, he picked the screaming witch and hoisted her up, threw her over his shoulder knocking the air of her lungs. Rowena ceased her screaming but was oddly quiet and did not even move.
Helga stole glances between her friends and the dying centaur, "We should go…"
"Quick." Frederic added, "We need to get her back in the castle."
He marched on, leading the way trying to ignore a sobbing Helga following close behind. He had more concerning matters than consoling the crying witch at the moment; - like the frightening feeling of being watched.
"So wizards have associated themselves with muggles? But why?" she asked as they walked side by side. They had been walking for a few hours and her legs were starting to protest. She wondered how far she had apparated them as there was no signs of nearby civilization.
Salazar glanced at the curious witch next to him, "Why not? Most of the wizards that choose to work for muggles are wanted by law," he explained simply, thinking that it was pretty obvious but even if she was not aware of this then it only added more fuel to his theory that she was not from around here; - as in, this place or even this time. Of course he would not voice his suspicions, not right now anyway.
She bit the inside of her cheek as she took in his words. She supposed it made sense. If they were wanted by law, then allying forces with hunting-witches muggles seemed to be logical thing to do.
"And what do you mean with law?" the question was out before she could stop herself. She was supposed to not attract too much attention to her lack of knowledge of this world. Good job, Hermione! She chastised herself.
He offered her a knowing smile and she tried to keep her face free from any expression that might give away her uneasiness. Instead of taking advantage of the situation and trying to get any answers from her, Salazar let a loud sigh escape and slowly moved his hands behind the back of his head, lacing his fingers together.
"You really know nothing," he said in slight disbelief, wondering just how different things were from where she was from, "There is but one guild that dictates the law for witches and wizards," he started, knowing he had her full attention now. Somehow, he took great pleasure in knowing that she was keen to learn and an avid listener. She had inched herself closer to him and was looking at him with an eagerness that he often saw in his student's faces back in Hogwarts. He suddenly missed home.
"A guild?" she enquired curiously, her tone was begging him to continue.
"Aye, little girl."
"Hermione." She corrected him for the fifth time that day.
A smirk adorned his lips, "Yes, Hermione." Her name rolled off his tongue quite nicely, "Merlin's order, it is called," he added and watched as her eyes widened in recognition. So she did hear of them, then. And that day when they met, she definitely recognized his name too.
Merlin's order! She had only read it in books and not once a guild with the same name was mentioned. Or did everything she read concerning the Merlin's order was based in this guild that Salazar spoke of? She was suddenly aware that he was looking at her intently, probably trying to read her from her reaction so she mustered her best smile and tried to look like her mind was not being loaded with question after question that she desperately wanted answers to.
She suddenly realized that Salazar had stopped. She turned to look at him, giving him a questioning look.
He clutched a hand to his chest and suddenly stumbled forward. She immediately shot her arm towards him, stopping him from falling face down. She looked up at him in worry as his face contorted in pain.
"S-salazar?"
"I need… home… something is not right." He gritted his teeth together and gently pushed her away when he felt that he had the strength to stand on his own again.
"W-what do you mean?" she asked, her voice was filled with so much concern for him that it warmed his heart.
He tried to mask away the pain but it was still visible in his eyes, "It's nothing little one. It's just… I'm needed at home."
"Where is home?" she suddenly asked and could not help herself from visibly shaking. Was he going to abandon her? She had nowhere to go. She didn't know anyone but him! He was all she had!
"Hogwarts, Hermione." He answered and suddenly wrapped an arm around her shoulders, bringing her closer to him, "Do you not wish to see it again?" he asked, sounding beyond tired but he tried to make his tone light and playful for her sake.
She looked up at him and all pretenses were gone. How long could she keep the truth away from him anyway? He was not stupid. He would find out sooner or later.
"I do." She replied and smiled a little, eyeing him still with obvious concern.
"Good. That is where we are heading. I do not suppose you can-"
"Apparate." She conceded the foreign word for him, "It's called apparate."
"Aye, apparate." He repeated the foreign word and tried to keep his mind from the pain that was afflicting him.
"Dark magic," Frederic replied flatly.
His words hung in the air for a few seconds before Godric finally found his voice, "Dark magic?" he hissed, straightening up and clenching his hand into a fist.
"It is the only explanation as to why she is acting that way," Frederic said, watching Godric carefully, as if afraid the dark-haired man was going to snap at any moment.
Godric shut his eyes tightly, eyelashes fluttering as if they alone were holding in the whirlwind of heart ache and hurt that churned within him, "It is naught but my fault alone," Godric Gryffindor uttered in a low, guttural voice, sounding completely unlike himself, "I have summoned Salazar. He feels too far away…"
"Godric…" Helga whispered, her heart aching for him as she started to walk towards him, "He will come. You know he will."
He abruptly turned his back to her, "We can only hope he gets here in time. Rowena will not last long."
His words cut through both Frederic and Helga's hearts as they still refused to believe that their friend was dying.