If I made any mistakes in translating Runes, sorry... my knowledge on the subject is only as extensive as Google's.

Rain was pounding ruthlessly upon the windows of a Gryffindor tower, distorting the moonlight that filtered through the stained-glass panels. It was past midnight and most of the students had found their way back to their beds by now, with the exception of one figure that still lingered silently in front of the hearth of the Gryffindor common room.

Harry was seeing spots from having stared into the slowly dwindling fire for so long, but something inside of him half-expected to find his godfather's face staring back. Several times he had jumped, thinking he had spotted Sirius, but it was just an oddly shaped log or an irregular pattern in the dancing flames.

He finally tore his eyes away from the fire and let his head fall into his palms, slowly massaging his forehead with the heels of his hands. If Sirius were here, he would know exactly what to tell Harry… He could still conjure up his godfather's concerned expression; one eyebrow raised slightly higher than the other, the crow's feet around his eyes, the downturned corners of his mouth…. "Don't do anything rash, Harry. If Voldemort has her, that's exactly what he'd want for you to do. The Order's doing everything they can to locate her, but you have to trust us. Don't make a bad situation worse."

No… no, that was all wrong. Damn it! Sirius face blurred and distorted, and became Hermione's. Those words were Hermione's. Her hazel eyes swam in tears as she reached out to him, but she was too far away, and faded into black. The face of his friend he couldn't protect…

"It's all my fault!" he growled at the fire, fighting the urge to break something, anything. Harry's fists were clenched so tightly that his nails dug into the flesh of his palms. "It's my fault she's fucking kidnapped. Voldemort is using her to get to me…"

And in one swift motion, everything on the coffee table in front of him was flung to the floor. Papers scattered, books and quills landed with a muffled clunk, an inkwell shattered on the rug, leaving a dark black pool reminiscent of blood.

And Harry remained a trembling silhouette against the dying flames, warmth beginning to sting his eyes.

He felt as if he was going mad. He needed Hermione's levelheadedness now more than ever, her cool intellect. And Sirius…. he needed answers from an adult, facts from someone that wouldn't sugarcoat them for him. Anyone he asked was going to tell him what he wanted to hear.

At that point, the crackling of the fire and the drone of the rain might have been soothing, had they not reminded him how empty and alone he really was.

Sunlight streamed through the bay-window blinds in a blatant mocking of Hermione's dreary attitude the next morning. If she had been close at all to finding a way out of Leo's flat yesterday, she was leagues away now, not only crippled by her lack of wand, but by her bum ankle.

She had been silently berating herself for acting so foolishly and impulsively yesterday, unsure of what had come over her in those moments of panic. Hermione Granger was the brains and the common sense of the Golden Trio. Hermione Granger was not supposed to panic, damn it, and now she was paying for it.

When she had awoken that morning, Leo was gone again. It didn't really surprise her. She hadn't expected him to stick around; he didn't seem much for company, namely hers, even when she was just sitting in silence. What did surprise her, though, was that she awoke to find her stocking torn off cleanly from the knee down, and her ankle set and wrapped in ace bandage, the sharp stabs of pain having dulled to a throbbing ache. And by the unevenness of the wrappings, Leo had done it the Muggle way, Hermione was almost sure of it.

Why would he bother with the effort if he could just use magic? Perhaps it was a charm he had never quite mastered, but even the most novice Wizards could usually perform simple healing spells, and he had already shown himself to be an extremely proficient one. Hermione shuddered involuntarily at the memory of his Legilimency…

Nothing in this world enthralled Hermione Granger more than a challenge, a mystery; and Leo Black was just that, if not one of the most enigmatic people she'd come across. There were so, so many questions that begged to be answered, questions surrounding his magic, his past, his very existence… and yet, something inside Hermione urged her not to come forth with these inquiries just yet. If she had learned anything after five years fighting alongside Harry, it was to trust her instincts… she knew that, somehow, she would have to gain the trust of this newcomer, this man who had waltzed into her life and turned everything completely upside-down.

That thought was not a particularly comforting one. It implied time and patience… both things she knew she had very little of.

What confused her even more were these conflicting sentiments of hers, the clash between the half of her that needed a plan for escape and hoped for rescue, and the half of her that urged her to stay put, to find out more about Leo and where he came from. She had come across an opportunity that it pained her to imagine letting go of, and she couldn't immediately discern the better of the two ideas. She preferred to not have grey area in her decision-making, and this was nothing but.

Her thoughts were interrupted by a sudden, loud gurgling noise that she realized was her stomach. What time was it, anyway?

Hermione supported herself with the armrest of the sofa and strained to see over the half-wall separating the living room and the kitchen. The stove clock read 9:41. Well, that was just wonderful, wasn't it? Leo might not be back for hours, and she wasn't willing to wait and see whether he'd have the decency to bring her food. As she held the armrest to steady herself on one stocking foot, she realized that she had been wearing the same outfit for three days now, hadn't bathed, or even brushed her teeth…

Regardless of Leo's absence, she suddenly felt extremely self-conscious. It was rather laughable, considering that she had plenty of other things to worry about at the moment, but she had always cared a lot about hygiene and cleanliness. She suddenly decided that food could wait.

As she hopped towards the corridor with the bathroom, Hermione lamented the fact that she had yet to master the Undetectable Extension charm… if she had just been able to cast it on that purse that Aunt Helga had given her for her birthday, she'd have all her essentials with her and wouldn't be stuck using… well, whatever it was that she was about to find in Leo's bathroom.

And she wasn't about to wear this itchy tweed dress forever. Maybe…

She stopped in the middle of the corridor with her hand on the doorframe to steady herself. The bedroom door was ajar, and Leo's chest-of-drawers was in plain sight…

She felt her face flush with heat immediately. Hermione, what on earth has come over you? Wear one of Leo's shirts? LEO's shirts? Honestly, are you mad? It's not like you're a guest in his flat, you're a bloody captive for Merlin's sake! And you don't know where his stuff has been, you don't know who he is, you don't have any right…

Hermione nearly laughed aloud at herself, worrying about manners when she had been carted off against her will. But those thoughts fizzled when she remembered her hand-wrapped ankle. She still was unsure what to make of it. She had a difficult time believing that he had done that out of the "goodness of his own heart."

Regardless, the idea of going through his shirts was completely inappropriate, she argued with herself. Okay, all right. It was! But it wasn't like I was really going to, of course.

Hermione did know that she never would have actually done it. It was only a fleeting thought… albeit a disturbing one. The simple fact that it had even crossed her mind left a bad taste in her mouth.

She pushed the girlish fantasy from her mind and turned to enter the smaller of the two rooms. The bathroom was small and dingy, like the rest of the flat, but she was amused to see a clutter of hair care products surrounding the sink area, and immediately grinned at the thought of Sirius. A gray towel hung from a lonely hook by the shower's frosted glass door, and for a moment Hermione recoiled at the idea of using the same towel to dry her body as her captor used for his… but then again, she had entertained the idea of wearing his clothing.

She made a mental note to discuss some… things… with Leo later.

Hermione made quick work of her dress, struggling to pull her stockings over the bulk of the wrapping on her ankle. It felt odd to be completely naked in this foreign bathroom, almost as if she expected Leo to have installed secret cameras everywhere to keep watch on her like in those Muggle reality television shows. The thought was absurd, she knew, but all the same, she didn't waste time getting in the shower.

She maneuvered the handheld showerhead away from her wrapped leg with some difficulty, but the end result was far better than she'd hoped: Leo apparently kept a good stock of Sleekeazy's shampoo and conditioner.

And when she finally emerged from the steaming room, she knew that was just what the Healer ordered. Hermione may have still been hopping around, but she didn't feel like as much of an invalid, and she certainly didn't feel the weight of being a victim pressing in on her from all sides. She had done her best to let most of her negativity wash down the drain with the soapsuds, and embraced this new, perhaps short-lived, feeling of empowerment.

She had cast aside the ripped stockings in favor of bare legs and made use of Leo's toothpaste as well, but didn't dare take any more liberties at the moment. She was already unsure of how Leo would react. It helped, though, that she hadn't really done anything wrong… she shouldn't be made to feel guilty for taking care of basic human needs, should she? And after all, Leo hadn't been nearly as angry as she had expected after she tried to escape.

Her stomach would have preferred she not dwell on the questions raised by the ambiguity of Leo's actions, but as she grudgingly tried to block out the pain from her throbbing ankle and hop towards the kitchen, a faint scratching noise stopped her cold.

She stood at the mouth of the corridor, placing her hands on either wall for support, and listened.

scratch scratch… scratch scratch scratch…

She could feel the blood rushing in her ears as her pulse quickened. The noise was coming from Leo's bedroom. As she made her way over to the doorway (the drama of the moment significantly decreased by the fact that she was hopping gracelessly), the noise became louder. It almost sounded like…

A pair of piercing yellow eyes met hers, and she almost laughed in relief. The source of the "ominous" noise was a small brown owl that sat in a cage by the window, which had previously been blocked from sight by the open door. As she entered the room to get a better look, Hermione was surprised that Leo hadn't placed any wards to keep her from getting in. She was almost sure he was the kind of wizard to keep Dark artifacts around, if not, that he was just possessive of his things… and yet, he wasn't worried about her entering his personal space? Curious…

The owl hooted softly in greeting and she scooted herself along the edge of the bed until she was in front of its cage. It watched her warily but didn't back away as she approached.

"You nearly gave me a fright, you know," she said.

It stared back at her, unmoving. Hermione chuckled to herself after a long moment. "Look at me, talking to owls…" Although she must admit, it felt nice to know she wasn't entirely alone in her captivity.

At least she wasn't caged.

She leaned back on her palms and surveyed the room. It was much larger than she had originally thought, with several small alcoves hiding shelves with books and a worn leather armchair in one corner. But then again, Leo could've put a charm on it similar to the one on the tent she stayed in for the Quidditch World Cup…

Another pang of loneliness. Quidditch only reminded her of Harry and Ron and everything she was missing right now… she didn't want to think about any of that. She didn't want to think of pumpkin juice and schoolbooks and broomsticks, or Malfoy and Potions. She didn't want to think about the fact that she was wandless. As easy as it was for her to adapt to the life of a Muggle (having done it most of her life and every summer since her first year at Hogwarts), it didn't make things feel any more right.

Were they looking for her? She fell backwards onto the blue comforter and looked for shapes in the popcorn ceiling. She wished she had a Prophet to thumb through… some kind of tie to the magical world other than her kidnapper. Not that she expected there to be anything about her in the paper. Dumbledore would, of course, have kept things quiet, never one to attract more attention than necessary. Who had he set on the case? Lupin? Kingsley? Moody?

Wait a minute….

She sat upright so suddenly that the owl twitched, moving to the back of its cage and eyeing her warily.

Dumbledore.

Back at the apothecary, Leo had said that he "wasn't supposed to exist." Did he mean that he wasn't supposed to have ever existed? Or… could he have meant that he simply wasn't supposed to exist at this point in time? Or both?

Because there would've had to be at least been one person in the world who knew about Leo: The person who sent him his Hogwarts letter.

Hermione ran her fingers through her (now smooth and silky) waves. Dumbledore had to have contacted Leo at some point in time during his childhood to invite him to Hogwarts. The Ministry, of course, would at least have a record of his birth… unless someone destroyed it?

But what confused her most was why Dumbledore would keep such a big secret. Did Sirius even know that he had a son? He had been known for being something of a womanizer, but she hardly wanted to let herself think that he was, well, that kind of person…

Hermione tried not to dwell on those thoughts. She couldn't bear to taint Sirius's memory by thinking him capable of such things… but she had to admit, it was a feasible explanation.

She turned her attention back to the other question in her mind. "I'm not supposed to exist…"

But, realistically, he had existed at some point in the Wizarding community. That much was answered by the fact that Dumbledore would have sent him a letter. The only other reason why he didn't "exist", now, was if he had disappeared.

But why?

Leo had obviously never attended Hogwarts. There's no possible way he could have, as their years would have overlapped and they would have heard about him, for sure. So where, then, would he have learned Legilimency? Snape, Dumbledore, and Voldemort were the only wizards whom Hermione knew of that were capable of performing it; of course, she wasn't about to assume they were the only ones that could. She was sure there were tons of wizards that could do it, but according to her readings, it was incredibly tricky to learn and quite a feat to master.

That left her with one last theory… Durmstrang.

The thought made her shudder involuntarily. That place spat out more Dark wizards than history could keep track of… although it wasn't necessarily a breeding ground for evil (Krum was a wonderful example of a good egg), it didn't diminish its notoriety for such.

A bundle of nerves had begun to form in the pit of Hermione's stomach. If, in fact she was dealing with a former Durmstrang student, would Krum have known him? She had a sneaking suspicion that Leo was younger than she initially thought… after all, Sirius wouldn't have had a child at 15.

Unless he didn't know about it, the voice in the back of her head whispered, but she did her best to push those thoughts away again. No, she gathered that Leo was closer to Krum's age… but had they been in the same year, wouldn't Leo have come to attend the Triwizard Tournament? Or had he perhaps found a way to avoid returning to Hogwarts? Or… maybe had he been forced to stay behind?

There was also the chance that he "disappeared" before his seventh year. And still, it was equally likely that he never even attended Durmstrang at all! Hermione sighed in exasperation, massaging her neck where a tension headache had started to form.

She usually couldn't help but get herself all excited as she formulated new questions and hypotheses. But where the pieces of the puzzle usually seemed to fall in place and make the picture clearer, right now it just seemed as if the pieces were more jumbled than ever. And more pieces kept appearing.

In addition, she hadn't a singe bit of evidence to point her in any direction; only speculation to go on. Hermione was thinking in circles; there wasn't a visible beginning to the story, and there certainly wasn't an end in sight.

She was startled from the depths of her thoughts by the owl's soft hooting. It had moved to the front of its cage once more and was staring at her intently. After a brief pause, it pecked on the wire of its cage.

"What's the matter, little one?" Hermione said softly to the creature, leaning in towards the cage and tapping a finger on the wire dome. "Do you need something?" She noticed an open bag of owl treats at the foot of the nightstand that the cage was sitting on.

But the owl stole its chance and nipped at her finger, breaking the skin before she could snatch her hand away. "Ow! You little…" She instinctively brought her finger to her mouth and returned the bird's glare. "Good luck getting a treat now, you little bugger. Patience is a virtue."

Hermione huffed and scooted her way to the end of the bed. She was preparing to leave the room when she spotted it through Leo's open closet door: a large, antique-looking trunk, not at all unlike the one that Barty Crouch, Jr. had kept the real Professor Moody in two years prior.

What was it doing here?

She had promised herself she would try not to go snooping. It was really an empty promise, she knew, but one made in an effort to try and keep from getting herself into any more trouble than she was already in. She knew that Leo was bound to find out that she was in his room (although she wasn't really to blame for that, it was his fault for not warding the door), but a small part of her had hoped that if he knew that nothing of his was touched, it would be a small step for her in gaining his trust. She wasn't about to throw away that chance.

But… she wouldn't really be touching anything, just looking, right? So before she could second-guess herself, she pushed off the bed and hopped over to the closet. As she neared the open doorway, she became aware of one very distinct difference between this trunk and Moody's: This one was wrapped in heavy-looking magical chains. Her heartbeat quickened when she realized that – despite being solidly bound – the trunk was cracked open on the left side, as if the thing had just splintered…. or been torn open, by someone, or something.

Now would've been the ideal time for her to leave the room, she knew. Leo could be back at any moment, and yet she felt almost rooted to the spot in which she stood. Against her better judgment, Hermione knelt on the wooden floorboards and crawled further into the closet to get a better look.

There were runes carved into the silver edges of the trunk, but they were so old and worn she could barely make them out. The one she did recognize was Algiz, or Protection, but without the other hieroglyphs she couldn't decipher it in context.

She reached a hand up to run the tips of her fingers tentatively across the cool silver casing, silently in awe of the faint hum of its magic beneath her touch. As her hand trailed around to the left side of the trunk where the chunk was missing, she came across a few more symbols that were just barely decipherable.

"Hagalaz," she murmured. Hail. Upheaval, discord, and destructive forces.

"Teiwaz… reversed?" Try. Frustrations and quarrels that sap the strength.

"Isa…" Ice. Stillness, patience, and sacrifice.

"Kaunaz…" Fire. A shining beacon of hope in the dark.

"Wunjo…" Joy. Peace, balance, and harmony, as darkness gives way to the light.

"Uruz." Death of a cycle or dark period.

Her finger had traced its way to the edge of the crack in the trunk, she realized. And indeed, it was more than just a crack; the leather had been ripped away, and whatever the trunk was constructed of was splintered, its jagged edges gaping outwards as if it had been punched out from the inside.

"Oh Merlin…" She ran her hand along the outline of the hole. Whatever had created this was not human.

And as she pulled back from the edge of the hole, a small tuft of hair came away in her fingertips. Coarse and grey.

Her heart suddenly jumped in her throat. No, she had to be wrong. She desperately wanted to be wrong, to not have the answer, just this once. But suddenly, she was back in front of the Whomping Willow again with Harry and Ron, being shielded by Snape under a full moon.

She dropped the fur from her trembling hands.

Yes, whatever had created this hole was anything but human.

AN: It would make me (and my muse) very, very happy if you left a review :)