Beautiful Darkness
by EssTheDreamer
***Chapter Six***
Of Cerberus and Crystal Futures
Hermione was quietly working on her potions study. After last week, when Draco had shown her how different ingredients produces different potions, as well as different methods, she decided to test everything out. Potions was quickly
She had gotten far into her study, devoting entire days and nights to this project, save for the times when she read and practiced other things. When her mother asked her what she was doing, she said she was doing a scientific study on the effect of different substances and how they react to each other, going as far as to bring out her journal of findings. Of course, she had to glamour away parts where it said things like "potions," "wizards," and other things like that, but she left the ingredients, diagrams, and results on the page.
Her mother loved to hear that her daughter was taking initiative on her scientific goals even during the summer, as she'd had heard her co-workers complaining about rebellious teenagers that were constantly testing their nerve. Mrs. Granger even gave her permission to stay over at the library, with food, although she worried about her daughter's protection.
Hermione knew her mother had nothing to worry about; she had wards protecting this place, powerful ones, if Draco's indications by owl were enough, and she'd even put a spell of invisibility over it. She planned on hiding it even further using the Fidelius Charm, she wanted this safehouse to be what it was, a safehouse, for as long as possible.
As she was writing down how root of asphodel had both good and bad properties, as well as how it would steadily increase the lasting effects of a potion, she heard a ruffling in one of the adjacent rooms.
She paused her writing; how did someone get in? She'd set the wards, along with Draco, to make sure that they would be alerted anytime someone apparated in, even if it was they, themselves.
She dropped her pen, and slowly and soundlessly walked near the door of the room where the sound was coming from. She had her wand out, a Petrificus Totalus at the tip of her tongue and ready to go.
At the sound of something crashing down, she jumped into the room, and she froze the moving object in the room.
"Akita? What are you - never mind," said Hermione, stopping as she realized she was talking to a dog. She removed the Petrificus Totalus from the dog, and then noticed that the dog was shaking, and quite roughly, indeed.
Just then, as Hermione was making her way towards the dog, a flustered Draco popped into the room, and was immediately at the end of Hermione's wand; she had quickly adapted to popping out a wand whenever her brain felt it was necessary.
Draco frowned at her wand pointing at his face. "You know, you're getting too dependent on your wand. You're wandless magic will lose its power, if you concentrate all your magic into a stick," he said, kneeling on the floor and picking up the puppy, petting him.
Hermione rolled her eyes, and dropped her wand to the ground quite suddenly, splaying her fingers instead of gripping onto the vine stick. Much to Draco's surprise, she used a wandless charm to change his mussed up blond hair into being gelled back, almost, and to fix his ruffled clothing into such a state it looked as if his clothes had just been pressed and cleaned. She also summoned a mirror, and handed it to Draco, with a raised eyebrow, as if to challenge him into again saying she was losing her touch with her wandless magic.
"Wow. I look like I'm twelve again," he remarked, staring at his reflection and running his fingers through his hair to revert it into a natural, flawlessly imperfect state. "Fine, you've proved you're not dependent on your wand. I admit I'm wrong," said Draco, admitted grudgingly, passing the mirror back to Hermione.
Hermione laughed at Draco's pouty expression, and put the mirror on the potion's counter. Once she'd calmed her laughter, she remembered her original question. Pointing at Akita, she asked "How'd he manage to apparate here? And without either of us feeling that he'd apparated here?"
Draco sighed, running his fingers through his hair even more, making it messier, though it didn't look bad, though Hermione grudgingly. "I took him on a walk. It's quite suffocating at the manor - and - my aunt, she tried to torture him, and I'm telling you, it hurt like hell," he said, wincing at the memory.
"Hmm … is this the familiar bond at work?" asked the brunette, wondering how Draco felt Akita's pain
"I guess, but the familiar bond is only supposed to be a light connection. I guess Bellatrix - my aunt - applied a lot of magic and force on the Crucio. Anyway, Akita was shaking quite a bit, so I figured I'd cheer him up by taking him on a walk, to the muggle world. Then, this stupid muggle cat hissed at him while he was still getting adjusted to how he'd been tortured. He took off in a speed, and instead of continuing, he disappeared into thin air. I apparated everywhere I possibly could, until I came to check here," he said, rubbing his forehead with his fingers
"Wouldn't your familiar bond allow you to discern his location?" inquired Hermione.
"Yes, normally, but I think the crucio was too overwhelming for him, being a pup. I just didn't think dogs could apparate or do magic, save for - crap," he said, muttering the last bit.
"What?" asked Hermione curiously.
"Descendants of Cerberus, it's an old myth. Hades loved Cerberus, so much that in case anything happened to him, he'd created six single-headed dogs, and changed their form. He'd supposedly given them magic, too, to survive rather than being hunted into extinction or harmed. I didn't think it was true, but that's the only explanation I can think of," he said, his brows furrowed, petting Akita and calming down the poor pup's shaking.
"First off, protect Akita, don't toss him in some corner, Draco. Second off, send you aunt to a mental hospital, but if you can't, then show her that she shouldn't mess with your familiar!" exclaimed Hermione. "Third, I don't think I've read anything of Hades creating descendants of Cerberus."
"Wizarding myths are different from muggle myths, most of the time." Draco sighed. "Since I'm here, I suppose I can show you another form of magic."
"Another form? Do you mean transfiguration, or just light or dark magic," she said, the gears of her brain already turning.
"No. It's … uh, called Divination, basically prophesies and guessing - I mean, seeing the future."
Hermione snorted. "Ok, Draco, I've believed everything about the wizarding world so far, but, honestly, Divination? It sounds like a bunch of donkey dung, truth be told."
Draco smiled and shook his head. "Believe it or not, while it may be utter rubbish at times, the prophesies happen. There might be layers upon layers of prophecies covering up the one true one, but there are such things."
"I will not believe it till I see it, Draco. I believe in creating my own future, not look at some foggy crystal ball and squinting at it to figure it out," she said, shaking her head.
"Hmph. I'll prove you wrong, at least this one time. Wait here, I need to get some supplies from home," he said, gently dropping a much calmer Akita in her hands, and disappearing with a pop.
While Draco was gone, she picked up her wand and transfigured a chair into a comfy dog bed, and transfigured a cup into a bowl, and poured water into it. She put Akita down on to the bed, and patted his fur three times, before rubbing behind his ears.
"I'm sorry, little Akita, but I don't have any dog treats stocked. Next time, I promise I will," she said, deciding that if Akita was indeed a descendant of Cerebrus, he probably understood her as well. Akita had also seemed to stop the little bit of shaking that he had left, and was now peacefully curled up on the bed.
What kind of madwoman tortures a defenseless puppy?, wondered Hermione. She'll pay for this, she decided. Having been bullied all her life, Hermione had a knack of trying to defend the innocent, even if she herself acted a bit harshly and darkly.
While Draco was still gone, she cleaned up the table in the potions room, moving all of her materials to the counter so that they could do "Divination" there rather than a spot on the floor.
While she was cleaning up her potions materials and storing them away, Draco showed up.
"Sorry I'm so late. Had to do some digging around my room, Durmstrang doesn't care for Divination," he said, placing numerous things on the table.
"I wish I could go to Durmstrang," said Hermione, not sure how she would function at a school where she was to learn things that seemed foolish to her.
"No, you don't. Durmstrang students are practically all descendants of psychotic families, all of whom have the ability to background check you and then ruin your life if you have even a speck of muggle blood in your line. I've been the butt of many jokes for my half-blood cousin, Hermione, and if they found out your mum is a muggle, they'd burn you alive," he said, seriously.
"Hm. They'd make good allies, then," she said. At Draco's raised eyebrows, she said, "Keep your friends close, and your enemies even closer. Standard rule of life, Draco. The faster you learn it, the better."
Draco smirked. "Slytherin for sure. Though we do say 'make allies of your enemies and followers of your friends'," he said, thinking of a brief lunch date on which he'd gone on before meeting Hermione to meet fellow Hogwarts students, Pansy Parkinson, Blaise Zabini, and Theodore Nott.
"I'd like to be in Slytherin. Cunning, knowledge and ambition, what else could a person want?"
"Actually, I think being a Slytherin dressed in Gryffindor colors would be better. That way, you'd be Slytherin in that you're hiding, waiting to surprise everyone with your skills. You'd need Gryffindor courage to do that in the first place. I think you'd be a better fit for Gryffindor, you've got enough bravery to fuel your cunning and ambition."
"Yes, well, we can get to that later. I'd rather learn about what a delight Divination is, you know?" she said, with a playful smirk and a sarcastic drawl.
"I always knew you'd be a Seer, complete with the wonky glasses and frizzy hair," he replied with a serious expression, though his lips seemed to at a struggle of whether to maintain a neutral expression, or just let his smirk out. He pulled on a curly strand of Hermione's hair, to which Hermione slapped his hand off and ruined his hair by ruffling it all back.
"Oh, sweetheart, don't do that. I look like a pointy elf, and I'd rather not," he said smoothing his hair back, fake-pouting at Hermione.
"Then don't pull my hair, sweetheart," she said, using and emphasizing one of his nicknames for herm tilting her hair.
"Truce, I suppose," said Draco, sticking out his hand. Hermione put her hand in his, and he squeezed her hand, as if it was a way to make the truce more permanent. She squeezed back.
Draco looked away from Hermione's dark brown eyes, and focused on the crystal ball, and motioned to Hermione to sit down, as well.
"You've got to look into a crystal ball, unless you're blessed with natural Seer powers, who just get visions out of nowhere. Don't force the vision out, just stare calmly at it, and depending on the emotions and importance of the future, you'll see it in different ways," he said, staring at the swirling clouds inside the ball.
Hermione was still skeptical, she still didn't believe in the powers of Divination. Her mother was obsessed with fortune cookies and horoscopes, thought Hermione was wary of it.
She looked at what Draco was doing. He, funnily enough, was looking bored. Thinking that she should at least try, she sat down and grabbed the crystal ball.
She didn't feel anything special, didn't feel as if the future was in her hands. She let go of her forceful hold on the ball, and instead, started at the ball, just as bored as Draco. She squinted and widened her eyes, wondering if that would do something.
Nothing, just gray smoke. Again looking at Draco, she noticed that he, too, was staring at the crystal ball, frustration evident in his eyes, and a little adorable crease between his eyebrows.
Smiling to herself, she once again reached out to the ball, and wiped what looked like a blemish from the crystal ball.
When she touched it, she felt a brief electric shock at her fingertips, and let out a yelp.
The last thing she heard was Draco's voice asking her what's wrong, and his mercurial eyes glowing as she let the darkness take her.
Author's Note:
Ok, before anything else, I am so so sorry! This chapter is late, but with finals coming up and teachers squeezing in as many projects and tests as possible before the end of this semester and before finals, it's been hectic, and will probably continue. For this reason, I am going to give up my update schedule until life gets a hold of itself, so updates will be whenever I have a fully edited chapter to post that I am proud (or close to it) of.
I don't know how I feel about this chapter. It was more of a filler chapter, and more of a chapter to just show you glimpses of Hermione's learning. Also, if you can't tell by now, most of the stuff that Hermione's learning is stuff that I've made up/added onto what J.K. Rowling wrote, since we didn't go into too much detail with the education bit.
Some of you might think I'm putting in a lot of detail, but everything they talk about, see, or do, is going to come back at some time as something important in the plot. It's one of my favorite things to do when storytelling/story-writing, bringing up something as a small, miniscule detail, but later transforming it into something important, or near it!
Also, sorrynotsorry for the cliffhanger! ;)
Oh, if you've noticed, I'm not just EssTheWriter anymore, I'm EssTheDreamer! I figured that since I have a multitude of hobbies, I shouldn't limit my username to one task! My tumblr name has also changed from EssTheWriter to EssTheDreamer, so if you're not following or you are, then now you know! :D
Thank you all for following and favoriting, as well as reviewing! I read every single one of them, although I do not have the time to reply, I do read them! Also, thank you for still reading even though it's been such a long time since an update.
Au revoir,
Ess
Reviews are the ability to un-fog your future, see through a crystal ball, and a happy Akita! :D