Is the Dark Lord abroad? Hermione wrote, then sat back to wait for his reply. She'd just had an interesting conversation with Griphook and she was fairly sure that, if Voldemort was out of the country, she might just survive it.
As far as I know, yes, he wrote back after ten minutes. She'd almost fallen asleep. Why?
I need the data for an equation, she wrote, then felt guilty for not giving him the whole truth. We're planning something risky, but it will go much better if he isn't just around the corner.
I don't like it.
The numbers are good.
I still don't like it.
\\
They wanted to break into Gringotts. They had an almost viable plan, too. Except they had Bellatrix's wand but no Bellatrix. And no exit strategy.
"Yeah, but you could do a spell or something. Make it look like she was with us," Harry said with such conviction she almost believed it.
Instead, she left Shell Cottage under the cover of night. The boys planned to make their move the next afternoon, but she would finish it before then.
She dressed in plain dark robes and only brought Bellatrix's wand (everything on her would be confiscated), and Apparated to Diagon Alley. Fred and George's shop was dark, as were most of the storefronts. Fortescue's and Ollivander's were notably empty. Not just empty, but destroyed. There were empty wand boxes spilled out the window of the wand shop.
Gringotts looked the same as it always did. Monolithic. White.
The goblins watched her warily from the moment she stepped through the door. Her wanted poster hung on the wall, but she'd lost so much weight from the time on the run that she almost could've made a case for not being the one in the picture. She knew she looked emaciated, and then there were the deep bruises of eye sockets. That was why the goblins were watching her, of course; she had the look of somebody on the run, and that sort of person wasn't welcome in upstanding banking establishments.
There were three witches and a wizard in the lobby. One witch took one look at her and ran for the exit. The wizard stopped what he was doing and stared.
The goblin clerk she went to, Bogrod, knew the wand had been stolen. Maybe she was just being paranoid, but she was sure he knew. It was the way his eyes crinkled when he said, "This way, ma'am." He was looking forward to trapping her in some awful security measure (Bill had given them a summary, mostly trying to dissuade them from the plan).
She followed Bogrod out of the lobby, past a wizard in dark robes asleep in a chair, and to the familiar little cart. Bogrod sat in front, Hermione sat in back. She kept Bellatrix's wand out, holding it loosely on her lap like she'd forgotten it was there.
With a jerk the cart moved off, gathering speed. They began twisting and turning through the labyrinthine passages, sloping downwards all the time. She couldn't hear a thing over the rattling of the cart on the tracks.
In no time at all, they were deeper than Hermione had ever penetrated within Gringotts; they took a hairpin bend at speed and saw ahead of them, with seconds to spare, a waterfall pounding over the track. Her heart raced, but the cart went through the water and carried on. She spluttered, glaring at the goblin. Bogrod looked back at her, disappointed. Neither of them said anything.
The cart carried on, twisting and turning, slowing down at last. They came to a halt at a decorative landing of sorts, a marble platform for disembarking the cart with a carved stone railing to hold onto. She didn't touch the railing, Bill's warnings echoing in her ears. Again, Bogrod looked disappointed.
"Lead on," she instructed him sourly, rolling her eyes when his back was turned.
The goblin stooped and retrieved a leather bag. Something metal clinked when he picked it up. She held the wand more tightly in her fist.
They turned the corner and there it was. A gigantic dragon was tethered to the ground in front of them, barring access to four or five of the deepest vaults in the place. The beast's scales had turned pale and flaky during its long incarceration under the ground; its eyes were milky pink; both rear legs bore heavy cuffs from which chains led to enormous pegs driven deep into the rocky floor. Its great spiked wings, folded close to its body, would have filled the chamber if it spread them, and when it turned its ugly head toward them, it roared with a noise that made the rock tremble.
Bogrod didn't even blink. He dropped the leather bag and pulled out a small metal instrument that made loud, ringing noise like miniature hammers on anvils when he shook them.
"Come along," Bogrod said, shaking the thing. The noise echoed off the rocky walls, grossly magnified, so that the sound might as well have been coming from inside her own head.
The dragon let out a hoarse roar, then retreated. She could see it trembling. As they drew nearer she could see scars made from vicious slashes across its face and guessed that it had been taught to fear hot swords at the sound of the metal instruments. It was cruel.
Bogrod pressed his palm to the wood of a vault door, and it melted away to reveal a cave-like opening crammed from floor to ceiling with golden coins and goblets, silver armor, the skins of strange creatures—some with long spines, others with drooping wings—potions in jeweled flasks, and a skull still wearing a crown.
"After you," Hermione said. Bill had warned her about that little trick too.
With bad grace, Bogrod stepped into the vault and crossed his arms over his chest. He glared at her while she slowly made her way in and crossed the threshold without taking her eyes off him. Of course, the moment she was through there was a muffled clunk from behind her: The door had reappeared, sealing her inside the vault. It was complete darkness.
Lumos.
Bogrod was gone.
Hermione shone her wand around the vault: Its beam fell on glittering jewels, Severus's copy of the Sword of Gryffindor.
She was careful not to touch anything. She stood where she'd been when Bogrod closed the door and shone her wand around. It was likely Hufflepuff's cup was somewhere in the vault, possibly the Ravenclaw item as well.
There were coils of chain, shields, goblin-made helmets set on shelves rising to the ceiling. Useless, pointless, pretty things.
There.
A little golden cup that sparkled in her wandlight.
There was a noise on the other side of the door. The dragon roared, and the metal instruments clanked.
"Well, shit."
It was all going to plan, but her plan really sucked.
The cup screamed when the fiendfyre consumed it. There was a swirl of thick, black something that filled the room, drowned out her wandlight, and then nothing. It was silent. It was dark.
And then the vault door opened.
"Expelliarmus."
The wizard in dark robes who had been sleeping in the chair was tall, lanky, youngish. He had a handsome face and an ugly bowl haircut.
There was a mad moment where Hermione wondered if she could use the dragon to her advantage. Maybe she could ride it out? Free it, leap onto its back… But she didn't have a wand, and she didn't have backup. It was just her and no wand—she could cast a Shield Charm well enough wandless, but recent events had only reinforced how not-combat-ready her wandless magic was.
"Shit," she said again. It made the wizard smirk.
\\
She ended up in a cage. First at the Ministry, in a holding cell all her own because she wasn't just any unregistered Muggle-born. Then, it was a cage at Malfoy Manor, outside around the back of the house.
She wished she could've kept her cool and stared out over the lovely grounds or some such, but she huddled in the corner of her cage, covered her head with her arms, and tried to remember if it was physically possible to shake to death. She didn't think so, but she felt like she might rattle apart from her own trembling.
They left her alone. Utterly alone. It was just her and the bars of the cage, the cold, and her stupid mind that wouldn't stop. She crouched in her corner in her cage, and she wondered if Severus would remarry when she was dead. She wondered if Harry and Ron would try to get into Gringotts without her. Perhaps Harry would die in the attempt (he was so good at antagonizing dragons, after all), and then there would only be the two Horcruxes left. She tried very hard not to think about Bast or Sofia or Ellie, but she utterly failed.
The only thing she didn't do was cry.
She sat in the cage for hours, until it was nightfall again. It was cold. She couldn't feel her toes or move her hands properly.
There was no way she could win even her first fight. Hell, she didn't want to win a fight. It was guaranteed to be more brutal than Bird's had ever been—Remy Bird had been in it for the money, winners survived; these were Death Eaters in it for sport, even the winners would bleed.
It was Bellatrix that dragged her into the arena—a large muddy pit behind a screen of leafy shrubs trimmed into the shapes of animals—by the hair. She expected to be insulted, slapped around, but after one last yank, sending her to her knees on a patch of mostly frozen mud, the other witch sauntered out of the arena.
Hermione looked up, then vomited.
She'd expected an enormous man, possibly an out-of-favor Death Eater or a Snatcher trying to be noticed. Instead it was a child, not even old enough for a Hogwarts letter. He was maybe 10, or a tall 9. Blond hair, brown eyes, pale skin. He was shivering from the cold, his lips blue.
The boy didn't look a thing like Bast—in fact, he looked enough like a Malfoy for her to wonder if Lucius was being punished—but he was so small and so scared.
Somebody was talking. A big, booming voice. She could hear his excitement.
"Undesirable Number Two, the dragon herself," the voice said, winding up to the big finish. "Hermione Granger."
She looked up into the stands, searching for the speaker, and she saw Severus. His eyes were locked on her. All the blood had drained out of his face. Even from the distance, she could see the white-knuckle grip he had on his wand.
She should've told him "Don't," or "I'll be fine," but she couldn't.
One of the Lestrange brothers (she couldn't remember the wanted posters well enough to tell which) had been speaking. When he finished his introduction and looked down at her, the arena was utterly silent.
A/N: You guys are awesome.