19. & 20. June 1996

It was a cold night in London, especially without a roof over your head and with barely more on than some linen wrap and knickers. Hermione sat in the corner of a backalley, somewhere in London and tried to figure out what to do with herself. She sat with her back against the brick walls of some run down house that was about three floors high and looked at a house, not two meters in front of her, that was about the same height.

Her parents didn't even know that she existed, her friends had obviously all readily agreed to kill her off and she had no idea where she could turn to. She didn't know any vampires, let alone if there was a place they meet up at. She hid her face in her hands and tried not to despair. Nobody was about to help her, she had no one and if she calculated correctly from the position of the moon, she had about two hours until the sun would go up and burn her to ashes. If she was honest with herself, she had to admit that being burnt dead sounded like an attractive option right now.

"Now, what do you do here, all alone out here, little lady?" asked a voice from her right. She didn't like the voice, it was hoarse and her nose registered a strong smell of alcohol that she would've smelled even without her enhanced vampire senses. She looked at him through her fingers and wondered if he'd see her black eyes and the dangerous red in them. He was far too distracted by her body. His clothes were little more than rags. He wore a dirty shirt of some London football club and his leather jacket had several cuts and tears, just like his jeans.

"Beat it, I don't want to hurt you." she growled and immediately shunned herself when she realized how pathetic that must had sounded.

"Oho, kitty got claws. Don't worry, I'll be a gentle lover." he cackled with his hoarse voice. He came a few steps closer and Hermione could smell the blood through the alcohol. She was hungry, she realized. But he was a human and she didn't want to hurt him. She knew she had to eventually – hurt someone. But she didn't want to do it just now, she wasn't ready, she told herself.

He stepped even closer and was just barely a jump away from her. Another step and she would do it, she knew. "Get away from me. Please. Leave me alone or I'll..."

"You'll what, kitty?" he laughed and stepped a few more steps closer, so that he stood over her.

"Kill you." she said quietly and the beast in her took over. She jumped from her sitting position and rammed her claws through his throat. His eyes were locked in surprise and he gurgled blood instead of screaming for his life. She lifted her left hand and finished him by driving her nails through his temple. Blood streamed from him and with the last pumps of his heart, more and more came out.

Hermione was ecstatic, panicking, laughing, crying as she lowered her fangs deep in the flesh of her prey. Even through the filth and alcohol his blood tasted wonderful. It was far from what her fathers blood had tasted like, but nonetheless it was amazing. Like gravy and fried fish with delicate mayonnaise all connected in a lovely thick liquid that flowed down into her stomach. She brought her jaw together and ripped a part of his flesh off. It was chewy, leathery but all the more delicious in its tenderness. From the bite came more blood and she eagerly sucked it all up with such gusto that the remaining human part in her froze solid in horror. His blood was rich with poisons ranging far beyond fat, alcohol and nicotine. She tasted the spicy aroma of medicines, experienced what crack tasted like in the bloodstream and she archived those tastes even if she couldn't connect them to substances just yet.

So she ate and drank from the man for an hour without being disturbed. She gnawed on his bones and cleared one arm, the flesh around his neck and part of his right shoulder until she decided that she was full. By now, her human parts had shut off, as she was unable to look at what she did. She acted purely on instinct and just like that her instincts decided that it was time to search for an hideout.

She could smell the river from where she was and decided to try her luck at the docks. Jumping over roofs, with huge leaps over large streets, she moved fast towards the docks of London. It didn't take her long, just a few minutes until she saw the new and old docks, the busy ones and the abandoned halls. She quickly went for something far off the busyness without being noticed. She moved gracefully over the roofs and containers while making barely a sound.

It was an old, brick walled industry hall with nothing in it but dust, some old machines and leftover crates that were broken open long ago that she decided on being her new home for the day. Hermione pulled one of the crates with her and placed the small opening of it against a corner of the brick walls so that the sun would have no angle from which to hit her in her sleep. She crawled into the crate and laid down into a corner.

It didn't take her long to find sleep, but when she found it, nightmares came with it. Several times, Hermione shot up from her slumber and just barely kept from screaming in horror. She saw herself cutting through the rows of her loved ones. She saw Dumbledore obliviating her parents and their blank stares when she asked them to hold her. She wanted to cry, but once again no tears came from her eyes. She just silently sobbed until she fell back to sleep again.

Then night came and she felt the beast awaken once more, the moon calling out to her. She tried to hold back, to control what she had become but her savage instincts took over with all their power, swallowing her human intelligence whole and replacing it with the need for more food.

Her consciousness took a backseat as the monster that was Hermione Granger crawled from her hideout and sniffed the air for a lead on something edible. Not far from her, she smelled young blood. She climbed up on the roof and experienced her new enhanced sight for the first time in all its glory. Dark corners seemed lit like on broad daylight, even though the moonlight barely touched them. She saw scents. She recognized trails of people and the smell and genetic trail they left behind. Smallest parts like hair from their brows, scurf and snot painted paths on the concrete. One trail was especially interesting as its owner smelled like she was in a panic and fighting. Droplets of blood mixed between the natural scent of her and promised Hermione an extraordinary meal.

Hermione followed the trail with her eyes while moving over the roofs. The trail became stronger and soon enough Hermione heard angry shouts and screams. A woman and a man in a fight for something Hermione couldn't care less about. His shouts were full of anger and a bit of fear. Her screams were of desperation, panic and defiance. It played in her ears like the sounds of a string quartet that accompanied a dinner with their melodies.

She took a few last jumps over the black roofs and found herself looking into a newer warehouse with a variety of crates and cartons all around. Inside were the man, pressing the woman against a wall with her face while he tried to get her trousers off. She fought him, cut him with her long nails and screamed for help. He shouted at her to shut up while he cursed her for her defiant stand against him. Hermione nearly laughed at the easy catch. She just opened the roof-window, stepped trough and let herself drop onto the man.

The impact was hard, and Hermione brutally slammed the man into the ground. The cracks his neck made and the twisted way in which his limbs stretched out from his body told Hermione that he was dead. She knelled down to him and inspected the man shortly. Broken bones showed through his neck.

"Th-Thank you." the woman stuttered behind her.

Hermione just let out a quiet cackle, turned around and enjoyed the horror in the woman's eyes when hers met Hermione's. "What are you?" the woman breathed, unable to scream in the presence of what she could only describe as a demon.

No answer, just a jump, a bite and even more blood. Once again it tasted glorious and filled Hermiones stomach with its wonderful warmth. She ate for hours and this time she took her time to get the especially juicy parts. The woman had a lot of fat on her as she was completely untrained. Her muscles were full with little fat-cells and Hermione left over her belly as it was barely more than lard, held together by her skin.

The man on the other hand had trained muscles and barely fat on them. He was the more delicious meal for her as she dug in the flesh of his upper legs.

Back in her mind she hated herself and tried to keep herself from eating. She felt like she did it automatically. Her arms ripped of the flesh and moved it to her jaws were they got chewed and devoured with faint squishy sounds. Hermione felt like she was on autopilot – as if she was inside an machine that worked on its own with her as a passenger. She didn't want this, any of this. She didn't want to hunt people like prey and then slaughter them like cattle. She didn't do it. She just looked at it from a position of helplessness.

But she felt how it changed her. Hermione felt how her magic became more pronounced, how her senses got sensitive for smaller things and broader spectrums. With every bite, more previously unknown colors came to her eyes. Blacks became more nuanced while such colors like green became even more detailed. She began to see the differences in the green coating of the forklift that stood next to her. It had had a single color before, but now she saw the differences between places where the painters did a good and bad job with a never before seen clarity.

Her nose became so fine that she was able to determine the scents around her with striking accuracy. Seagulls or pigeon, Hermione knew it somehow. She could smell the difference of salt or pollution in the feathers of the bird. She smelt the last bit of middle-europe forest in the wood of the crates and knew that epoxy glue was used to press the layers of carton together that held the metallic scent of screws and other metal products in it. Steel, copper and some faint scent of silver were in the box next to her.

And then her hearing. A rat, not fifty meters from her was just sniffing on a piece of bread some worker probably had as lunch. On the other side, on a boat on the Themes, a sailor shook out his sweaty shirt over the bulwark and cursed in Spanish. She heard the cars all around in the city, the people going out for party or late night business, the sirens howling, doors and windows closing, shop owners sighing and children begging their mothers to let them stay up longer. It threatened to overwhelm her and it would've, if it wasn't for her magic overwriting most of it.

Hermione didn't know how to describe it. It was as if the magic in her pulsed in excitement. The patterns she had felt before, the waves of power, the calm stream of commands and spells through her tissue transformed into new sensations. She felt powerful, or at least that was how she would describe it. Like her senses, the way in which she felt through her magic became more detailed. She knew that at this very moment she could do wandless magic. No – not just wandless, entirely motionless. She could just will the world to change for her.

Every drop of blood and every muscle fiber enhanced her.

However, the price she paid was far too high. Full from her extensive meal she left the two half-eaten bodies behind and went back to her hideout where she would again be haunted by nightmares and her conscience.

***Countess***

2. Juli 1996

"Harry, the meetings about to begin. Join us... please."

With a heavy sigh Harry heaved his body from the comfortable armchair in his room in the Burrow. The windows were covered with a, for the sunlight, impenetrable cover of wooden planks and cloth. Everything to keep the newest pet of the Order save and sound, he thought bitterly.

With a glance onto his watch he checked the time and saw, with a shudder, that he merely got an hour of sleep in before Tonks woke him up.

"Harry..." the pink-haired metamorphmagi said in resignation. "You aren't supposed to sleep during the day. You know..."

"I know what Dumbledore said, thank you, Nymphadora." he spat back with venom. Yes, he knew that he wasn't supposed to. But it damn well was his nature now and the Order seemed to deliberately ignore that. He was a vampire now and as such, the sun exhausted him to no end, even if it was hidden behind walls and curtains. The mere fact that it was day drew on his energy. He just wanted to sleep a full days sleep. Something he was denied for weeks now. He couldn't sleep at night. It felt as if the moon called out for him and he grew restless. Just by sheer force of will, and by now, exhaustion he managed to sneak in some hours of sleep during the night.

With a sniff he smelled the irritation of Tonks at the use of her first name. Harry's nose had become so tremendously good that he could sense emotions by the scent of the reaction they caused in humans bodies and especially their blood. It was a useful sense to have, he thought. It gave him reliable information about the humans around him. Just Tonks was, sometimes, unreadable. Remus had said that it was because of her being a metamorph.

Harry also never felt like he wanted her blood. If he was honest with himself, Tonks smelled either bland, or when she did some of her more extreme transformations, downright repulsive. One of the reasons why the Order sent Tonks to deliver messages and reminder to him.

"I'll be down in a minute." he said before the young woman could order him once more.

The Auror in training nodded and closed the door with a silent click of the lock. Deep inside Harry felt terrible for the hard time he gave her. Tonks was trying really hard to not see the bloodsucking, undead creature but the boy becoming man, Harry Potter. However, he would still lash out whenever. He blamed his massive mood swings due to a lack of sleep, but he also knew that it had something to do with the smell of her blood. Just by instinct he was keeping her at more than arms-length. It took an actual, conscious decision from him to treat her nice and when he was honest with himself, it frightened him quite a bit. He wasn't supposed to be like this. He was supposed to be the kind and modest Harry, not some moody and bitter Mr. Potter.

But every time he looked into the mirror, evidence of his change reflected from the flawless surface. He had grown tremendously and rivaled Ron in height now. His muscles were those of an athlete, or martial artist. Slender, though, strong and without a hint of additional fat, they formed his body into the known image of a fighter. Then again, in combination with his eyes, one would be inclined to say predator instead. His iris shone in the known emerald green, just more intense and dangerous. They stood in such stark contrast to the black of the rest of his eyes that he had flinched away from the menacing image the first time he had seen it. Back then he had still the instincts of a human, combined with the hints of looks of a vampire. Now, the prey, the human in him was gone on all levels but his intellect. His magic was that of a vampire, spontaneous, powerful, refusing to produce a Patronus and his body completely ran on blood and refused to digest anything else.

With another heavy sigh, he walked to a bucket in a room. In it was ice, charmed to never melt, that cooled down flasks full of blood. Old blood that tasted stale and bland, sometimes downright disgusting. His 'diet' for the last weeks since the first day he awoke after the Ministry. Within the walls of the Ministry was the first and only time that he had drawn fresh human blood. Some unidentified Death Eater. A grunt that was at the wrong place at the wrong time. A vampire, fresh from his resurrection was nothing a mediocre wizard could fight against, let alone survive.

Harry didn't remember his face, nor how he tasted. He only remembered how his head quickly cleared up and him sprinting after Hermione who had devoured two vampires as her first meal. An act that subsequently lead to her completely loosing it, or so he was told.

With a frown of disgust on his face he pulled one flask from the ice, got rid of the stopper and quickly gulped down the red, thick liquid that tasted as disgusting as days old butterbeer, or cold coffee with spoiled milk. Or any potion Madam Pomfrey liked to use, for that matter.

He waited until his hunger vanished, however unsatisfying it was and then checked on his sun-cover one last time. Black scarfs around his face, sunglasses, a bandana, a hood and cloak. Not one bit of skin was visible. He had learned the hard way. Sunrays hurt more than a Crucio.

A few minutes later, he stood in the frame of the door to the living room of the Weasley home.. He made sure to avoid any direct sunlight on his skin and stayed away from it even though he was covered in cloth from head to toe. Even through the wool and linen, stray sun rays sometimes caught his skin and burnt it severely. It was better to stay out of direct sunlight in the day. It would be even better to sleep through the day, he thought with insults against the headmaster in the back of his mind. It merely resulted in him barely getting sleep and a rather disastrous mood because of it. What was the point?

Three weeks have come and gone since the disaster at the Ministry. Well, Harry had to admit, it wasn't a disaster. If one did the numbers, it ended fairly well for the Order of the Phoenix. Several death eaters were dead, heavily injured and in jail. Voldemort had lost his most valuable fighter, Bellatrix Lestrange until the day he could find some cure for wounds that were infected with the venom of a vampire. Until that time Lestrange would run around with two stumps as arms and a constant graving for blackpudding, courtesy of Hermione.

Harry would trade in the miserable health and jailtime of every Death Eater if he could get her back. He remembered her in the Ministry. He remembered those feral eyes, the claws her hands had transformed into and most of all he remembered her fangs that were significantly longer than his own. He remembered when he had stunned her before she could rip Bellatrix Lestrange to pieces. Hermione hadn't even register it, it had seemed. She had just fallen over. He didn't even know why he had done it. But his fighting instinct had told him to get rid of the human eating monster first.

Harry shook his head to clear out the bad memories. His heart had already broken and he didn't need any more gloominess in his life. Figuring out how to live as a vampire among humans was difficult enough without imagining pools of blood, violence and open wounds. All things that, to his great shock, came as positive things into his mind, as long as Hermione's face was not within them.

In the living room to which he guarded the threshold sat the presently uninjured part of the Order of the Phoenix assembled. Now that Voldemort had gotten a fierce blow, they had another problem that needed solving. The Order had been on a monster hunt for a week now, and neither of them had even seen the beast, just whatever it left behind for them to find. Hermione was damn good.

Even Dumbledore had admitted that he was lucky to be alive after the attack of Hermione. Half an inch deeper and she would've torn more than just his breastbone apart. Something that Madam Pomfrey easily healed in one night, and the healer at St. Mungos even quicker. Just the old age of the headmaster kept him from recovering as quickly as the old man would like.

"The deathcount goes up as we speak. She has killed and... ugh... eaten six people by now. Muggle and wizard, nobodies safe. We have to call for help from the Hunters and we have to do it now." Molly Weasley said in the same, unfriendly voice she adapted lately whenever she spoke about the girl that once, if everything went as she liked, should've been her youngest sons wife. It was an ugly side that Harry had never suspected in her. In these discussions, Molly Weasley was the one that immediately called for blood. She wanted the 'Eater' dead. The Eater that knew her family too good for comfort.

"I have talked to the vampires. She still goes through her initiation. Her condition will soon go from feral beast to intelligent killer and then she'll be invited into the vampire Clans." Remus said, completely ignoring Molly's rant. "However, I also heard rumors that worry me."

"You mean, worry you more than usual?" Sirius asked cheekily. He had the least bit problem with the beast that ran rampage in London. Harry suspected it had to do with the unintentional saving of his arse by Hermione and him therefore being able to enjoy his new found freedom after a quick Wizengamot session. If she wouldn't had jumped Bellatrix, his godfather would've gotten hit by an Avada Kedavra and his innocence would've been for the stone that marked his grave. While it didn't undo the atrocities Hermione had committed after the Ministry, it surely made Sirius somewhat reluctant to catch and kill her.

"The Clanleaders, except for the most... conservative one, want her dead, just like us. Why that is, nobody would tell. I only know that the vampires are on the hunt for her and just as unsuccessful as we are."

"That's probably because she's an Eater. I can't imagine them wanting her in their ranks." Kingsley offered as explanation.

"They don't care. The guy I've spoken with is an Eater. They are accepted in their ranks and get cared for just as much as the normal vampires. No, the reason is a different one." Lupin said while rubbing his chin in contemplation.

"Maybe they're scared of her." Harry said quietly from the threshold. He had smelled the room, just as he did whenever he entered a new room. Most of the scents he knew, but there was something unfamiliar on Remus that he was able to identify just as Remus spoke of his meeting. It was, for a lack of a better word, fear. Everything the body offers when someone felt fear, it was on Remus and it wasn't his own. "I smell it on you Remus. The one you talked to, he was afraid."

"Your nose already became that good?"

"Just recently. I take it this is pretty much the last stage?"

"As far as I know, yes." Remus answered. "So, Fear, huh? I wonder why they'd be afraid of a sixteen year old Eater girl."

Sirius waved his arms up in mock surrender "She's not exactly watching her table manners. Maybe shes an exceptionally brutal Eater?" he offered.

Remus just shook his head. "No. There gotta be more. But I guess... I really hope we don't wake up in an even bigger nightmare when she ends her initiation."

"If you have something to say, say it." Alastor Moody barked out, irritated by the cryptic werewolve who seemed to always have more information about the dark creatures of Britain than he was willing to share.

"Its nothing – a legend, nothing more. Some werewolf packs on the continent get nervous and rumors spread. Just childish myths, really."

"These days, childish myths tend to cut your head off when left unattended." Moody gave back.

"Alright, but don't laugh." Remus sighed and held a hand up in surrender. "There's a pack in Germany, several packs actually, that heard of the case and think its the prophesied ascension of a new Count." He shook his head just to show how little he thought of what he just said.

"A new Count?" Sirius asked, honestly confused. Kingsley and Moody seemed to know what Remus was talking about.

"The last one is widely known as the Count that had united the dark creatures, undead and some other magical beings under him in the fight against the Ottoman Empire and later to strike fear in the heart of mortals. Count Dracula." Remus explained. "He was slain by vampire hunters of the Vatican and since then, the dark creatures wait for a new Count to arise and unite them."

"What makes a Count a Count?" asked Harry from the door frame.

"A Count is something like a natural leader for dark creatures. Werewolves, vampire, undead and several others like, for example, Veela, feel drawn to him. Even some humans tend to follow them. Or at least that is what the stories say that I've heard. There are a hundred different stories about how a Count arises and how they affect dark creatures. All have in common that the Count is cannibalistic in his first meals, that would fit, and that he will drag the mortal world into another Dark Age and therefore some parties are relatively twitchy when it comes to the subject. Especially the vampire Clanleaders seem to be allergic to the subject and forbade it."

Harry moved, silently like his new abilities make him able to, and sat opposite to Remus who held the gaze of the sunnglass covered eyes of the vampire. Harry's own eyes hadn't changed as much as Hermiones, but the white in his' was still replaced with black. He took the sunglasses off and watched with satisfaction the winces and frowns around the table. With his naturally stinging, beautiful green of the iris, his gaze became intimidating and menacing. Harry liked to use it to uphold at least a fraction of the little respect he had gotten from the Order in the first place. "If its true what you say, then that makes no sense. Why wouldn't the vampires rejoice when a Count arises?"

Remus held his gaze, but Harry could smell his discomfort. "No, Harry. You're a new vampire, barely out of your initiation, so you wouldn't know, but the vampire try..." his eyes met Molly's doubtful ones."...they really do try to make living with them acceptable. A new Count..."

"A new Count would destroy these efforts the moment he... or she in our case, enters the stage." Sirius finished.

***Countess***

Another chapter. I'm having fun with this, I hope you have fun as well.