AN: Hello people I am finally back! I've missed you all. I want to thank all of you who have reviewed and followed this story even when I'm lazy and don't update for a long time. But since I feel guilty for not updating in such a long time I promise to focus and try to update at least once a week. Again thanks to those who added this story to their favorites and those who follow my updates. It's wonderful readers like you who make me get off my lazy butt and write another chapter. I hope you enjoy and please review. It feeds my gigantic ego. Much love, Mimi.
Chapter 6
It was a cave.
A damp, dark, and moldy cave that terrified the young women. The heavy chains attached to her calves restricted her movement; they were, however, the only link to reality that she possessed.
She was a prisoner.
The war in the wizarding world might have reached its completion but the Darkness remained. As did a group of rogue Death Eaters, and she was their prisoner.
She didn't know how long she had been a prisoner. Her mind remained numb from the trauma of her experience in the cave. It could have been one week or one year; but to her there was no difference as the days merged together in a looping nightmare.
Across from her lay another young girl, chained to the walls of the cave but unlike herself she did not move. She was dead.
In all her time there, she had seen many girls come and go. Always pushed in. Always dragged out.
Most ended up like the one across from her, their dreams and hopes forgotten, their bodies broken after torture and rape.
She seemed to be the only one that remained. Always there. One step away from the abyss of death, held back by a chain and her stubbornness to survive.
She was a survivor. Her father had always told her that she was as stubborn as a mule and she refused to let some psychopaths end her life. It also helped, if she tried really hard to be positive, that she was a trophy to the "Beast". Since the first day she had been captured she had become a chew toy to the werewolf.
She endured torture and rape like the other girl but she wasn't shared. In a way, he was her protector and her executioner as well.
Her mind was dragged back from her musings by the Beast, who was carrying another girl into the cave. The girl looked older than her,
' But then again I feel old beyond my age,' she thought.
The Beast dropped the girl unceremoniously onto the ground and she landed with a splash. She was naked, like the rest of them, but like her, she still had hair. Dark curly hair.
She watched as the Beast began to pull at the girl's hair, and winced when the girl moaned in pain. No one was allowed to have hair, except for her. She smile without humor about the irony; she supposed that being the Beast's bitch had some perks.
But she couldn't make herself believe it when she looked down at her torso and was faced with the bruises and bite marks that had become like a work of art in her body.
She was surprised to notice that not all of the girls hair had been ripped out, and flabbergasted when the Beast pulled out his wand and created a cut across the girl's cheek. Blood ran down the girl's face and her curiosity grew as she saw the Beast wipe if off with a handful of hair.
She wrapped herself in a little ball when she saw the Beast turn and give her his undivided attention. She almost gagged when she heard him say,
"No pretty, don't go and get jealous. You know you're my favorite."
And she couldn't help the feeling of repulsion she felt when he pulled at her hair, not hard enough to rip but hard enough to hurt. Every one of her experiences with him involved pain.
She turned to watch him walk away and pondered why exactly he had needed the bloodied hair.
Tonks considered herself a lucky woman most of the time. After all, why shouldn't she? She had a wonderful husband who loved her, a beautiful baby boy, and a job that she loved. But as she appeared in front of number twelve Grimmauld Place, the former Order of the Phoenix headquarters and now the home of Sirius Black and Harry Potter, she felt anything but lucky.
Like her husband and cousin, Tonks had come to love the boy like a son. Besides the fact that he was her son's godfather, Harry Potter had proven to be a strong yet sweet man, who truly did not deserve to continue suffering for the actions of a mad men. Who even from the death continued to wreak havoc in the young man's life.
She walked into the old Black ancestral home and walked down the stairs and toward the kitchen where she could hear Harry and his best friend Ron joking around. Before entering she took a deep breath and prepared herself to land a heavy blow on a young man who had seen far more death and destruction then anyone else his age.
She walked in to be greeted by the smiling faces of both boys, or rather men, for the war had destroyed more than life; it had also destroyed the innocence.
Harry smiled and asked, "Hey Tonks, where is everybody? Sirius should have been back by now. Do you know where he is?"
Tonks smiled sadly at the young man and for once regretted the Order's decision to withhold the tattoo of the Order from the two boys. She remembered McGonagall's saying that the boys were too hard headed to remember their own safety if something was to happen to a member of the Order and it was best to leave them without. But really if they had received the tattoo she wouldn't have to be the one to tell Harry about Hermione.
"Harry, I have something to tell you! You better sit down," and stopped to let him take a seat, "it's about Hermione! I'm afraid….I'm afraid that her home wa…."
She was cut short by the arrival of an ash black owl with a package attached to it's leg; who landed in front of Harry and extended his leg toward him. Harry looked curiously at Tonks and then took out his wand checking the package for any Dark magic. When he was satisfied that the package was clean he untied it from the owl's leg and watched it fly away. He turned to Ron saying,
"I guess he didn't need a reply!"
And he laughed as he slowly unwrapped the package, but his laugh was cut short as he opened the small box inside the wrapping and looked at it's content. He looked up with a confused face, looking back and forth between Ron and Tonks.
It was only second later when he said,
"This is a joke, right!"
Tonks walked toward his side while Ron went around the table to peer over Harry's shoulder. And what the three people saw shocked them and terrified them like nothing, since the end of the war, had.
In the small box lay, soaked with blood, a small handful of curls. Curls that Harry and Ron recognized immediately as the ones that belonged to their best friends.
Before Tonks could even open her mouth Harry and Ron shot out from the kitchen, up the stairs, through the hallway and out the door. Tonks who had followed couldn't reach them before she saw the signs of apparition.
She stood in the door way of old Grimmauld Place with her hands at her hips and all she could think to say was,
"Bullocks!"
Sirius Black was living a nightmare. He couldn't make himself stop looking at the picture still clutched tightly between his hands as his best friend read his brothers journal. His eyes continued to shed the tears of loss and deception that his brother had forced upon him. He looked at the woman that his heart had been missing, because while his mind and brain didn't acknowledge her, his heart recognized the beautiful creature that had tamed it and left a void for more than seventeen years.
His hand unconsciously traced over the face of the known stranger as if caressing a long lost lover. His finger touched the image of the baby girl wrapped in her mother's harms and Sirius couldn't contain the scream of rage as his anger grew for everything that could have been his and had been taken away without a fighting chance. His mind brought up the image of the first time he had laid eyes on Hermione Granger, his daughter. An uncontrollable sob overtook him as he remember their first meeting where he had felt a pull of recognition that he had ignored, for how could he have know the thirteen year old muggleborn?
But she was his, his mind countered. Hermione Granger was a Black, a beautiful gift from Merlin created out of love for a woman he couldn't even remember. And like every other happiness that had occurred in his life it was marked by tragedy. That incredible person that was his daughter had been taken away before they even had a chance.
His other hand curled on the ground, and clutching a fist of sand he promised himself that if Bellatrix Lestrange had harmed even one hair on Hermione Granger's head he was going to kill her, and enjoy every minute of it.
Remus Lupin looked up when he finished reading the entry on Regulus Black's journal and looked down at his sobbing friend. He had to admit to himself that he was in a state of shock. He just could not believe that Hermione Granger was really Sirius's daughter, nor could he believe that this moment of joy for his friend was marred by the nightmare of knowing that the daughter he didn't even know he had, had been captured by rogue Death Eaters.
He didn't want to think it, or even mention it to his friend, but Remus knew that the chance of Hermione coming out of this alive was slim to none.
He knelt down in front of his friend and grasped his shoulder trying to give off the comfort that Sirius so desperately needed.
"Sirius?"
When Sirius remained bowled over he shook his shoulder gently and said,
"Sirius, we need to go! I know your hurting right now but Harry needs you. Dora left a long time ago and Harry probably already knows. You need to be strong! For Harry!"
Sirius remained where he was, as if his body couldn't remembered the muscle movement that it took to get up. He whispered something that Remus couldn't catch and he was forced to lean in closer to hear his friend say,
"For Harry? What about Hermione? What about my daughter?"
And another sob overtook him. Remus pulled him forcefully of his feet and looked him square in the eyes,
"Listen to me, right now Harry needs you and you need Harry. You need to calm down and think! You are of no use to Hermione, your daughter, if you're a nervous wretch. Now get up! By this time Harry is probably in the Granger home tearing the place apart. You need to think of someone besides yourself!"
Sirius lowered his eyes, shame in every expression in his body as he though of his godson and of the Grangers who had died for the revenge of a crazy bitch.
He began to walk toward the Grangers house, Remus following closely beside him.
When both men arrived in front of the Grangers home they heard Ron's loud voice as he shouted,
"Where is she you bloody git? Where have your Death Eater friends taken her?"
Which was followed by loud crash. Both men hurried inside to find Ron holding up a fist while Severus Snape laid on the floor holding his cheek.
Ronald Weasley had punched Severus Snape. And Snape didn't look happy.
But both men were more focused on the intensely quiet figure of Harry Potter. He stood apart from the forensic wizards and the figures of Ron and Severus. His gaze was fastened on a trail of blood.
And both Sirius and Remus felt their hearts break when he turned around to see them with broken eyes, like a little boy who was lost. His faint whisper brought water to their eyes,
"They've taken her!"
AN: So what did you guys think? Let me know if I suck or if you love me in the review section. Oh and if one of you wonder readers would please help me by being a Beta for this story please contact me. I've been trying to find one forever. If your a certified one at Perfect Imagination even better. Anyway, thanks for reading. And don't forget to review. Don't give up on me, I will finish this story. Even if it's the last thing I do. Until the next , Mimi.