DISCLAIMER. None of the characters used are a creation of mine. They belong solely to JK Rowling.
Hermione blinked open her eyes, staring warily into the dull greyness of the stone chamber she seemed to be inside. Her throat ached with the effort of trying to breathe, her lungs not quite filling up.
She tried rubbing away the dirt in her eyes when she realised the truth of her glaring reality.
Her hands were chained to the wall, her fingers bloodied at the tips, and her broken wrist only just healed, the scar already a fading yellow.
A fading yellow..
She gasped.
How long have I been here?
She felt true horror creep up her spine as her mind reeled to make sense of things. She seemed to have been drugged if her lethargy and sluggishness were any indication. She wondered if the nails on her fingers had been scratched away in her attempts of escape.
Her eyes scrucnhed up close as her head pounded with the flood of questions. Memories began making their way to the forefront of her mind, blurred vision and faint voices rearing their way in.
Her arms hurt. Her legs hurt. Her head hurt.
Everything hurt.
Her ears were ringing, her back sending out wisps of pain which ran up and down her body every few seconds like a shock of electricity would.
She groaned under the weight of her agony, her lips dried and parched, the black of the room intensifying and creeping in on her all at once.
There was a whirring noise. Her head jerked in its direction, sending a spasm through her neck and pulling her asunder once again.
'And she still persists,' she heard a voice whisper into the quiet of the room, making the hair on the back of her neck rise.
'The spell is only just beginning to work, My Lord,' a low female voice rumhled.
'We cannot risk exposure.'
'You must not worry, Master.' Another male. 'This is an unplottable location. Only the Malfoys are privy to this jewel of a place, protected by charms stronger even than the Fidelius. Nobody shall ever find the girl. She will die here and her rotting body will forever lay under this roof for eons to come.'
Hermione strained her ears to listen but her body kept rebelling. She could only just catch snippets.
The room was quiet once again. How long ago had they left? Had it been only minutes? Hours? Days? Longer?
Who was the man? Was it.. was it Voldemort? Had she been captured? How could she have been captured? She was one of his own.
Colours twisted and turned before the back of her eyes.
A quiet winter night. Sparks all over the place. Harry agonously howling.
She gasped. She had been flogged! She had been tortured endlessly before Harry had sprung into action. But each of his aims had been ruthlessly thwarted.
Who had been the woman? The one with the hooded eyes. She was evil. An evil witch come alive from children's stories. Who had it been? Beatrice? Bethany? No.. those names were sane. They sent no shivers up her body. Who had it been?
She slowly opened her eyes only to find herself staring at an even darker black.
She wrung her hands, her broken wrist still entrapped within the silver chains. Her grogginess caught up with her as she attempted to prop herself on her elbow. She felt around with the fingers of her free hands, the vestiges of glass bottles and vials scattered around her.
What was she being fed?
Some strange, unbidden force tried to pull her back into the abysmal ends of her mind.
'NO!' Her throat ached. No. There were tears in her eyes now. No. She had been fighting too long. No. Her breath hitched as her body was wracked by gut wrenching sobs, her lungs failing to keep up. No, please, no.. not like this..
There was a sudden desperation that clung to her as her eyes wandered around aimlessly, nothing ever making sense, everything a blur of black and black and only black.
The haze wrapping around her mind grew stronger as she fell onto her back, the cold stone beneath just barely calming the slashes of burns against her bare skin, her robes already chipped away.
Hermione crouched low beneath the sinks as the troll advanced, knocking them off as he went. Her face turned green. She was almost ready to faint.
'HERMIONE!' An eleven year old Harry yelled, his voice panicked.
Hermione's eyes shot up to his face as some semblance of hope returned.
There was a ruckus as Ron jumped onto the head of the raging troll, his wand stuck up the troll's nose.
There was a flicker of light and suddenly the memory flipped.
Ron waved his wand around, the charm on the tip of his tongue, his nerves frayed with anxiety. Two simple words. Wingardium leviosa. But then he suddenly stopped. His face tilted towards Hermione's, an evil smirk set upon his lips.
Harry came to stand beside him, his hand resting on his shoulder, both sets of eyes trained on the girl's face as the troll lunged at her.
Hermione screamed as she came to her senses, the vivid dream still within reach.
That had never happened, she kept telling herself over and over again. Harry and Ron had saved her. The night had been the foundation of their friendship. That had never happened.
Never.
Harry's eyes gleamed scarlet as Ron threw his head back, laughing cruelly.
NO!
That had never happened, she repeated inside her head, the pain in her limbs beginning to register.
She leaned her shoulder against the wall, sweat dripping down her brow, the searing heat making the ache in her back worse. She nestled her broken wrist in her nap tenderly. Her body was healing all by itself but it was not enough.
She yelped as the fog that had briefly lifted from her mind returned.
There was no concept of time in the cell. She had lost her bearings long ago.
She chuckled wryly to herself. For all she knew she had been decaying for ages.
Hermione threaded her fingers through Sirius' lush locks, her soft groans blending in with his as he ran his tongue over her lips. She shivered as his mouth dipped lower, the trail of fire he left behind with his touch casting her into oblivion.
They parted for the briefest moments, both of them gasping for breath as the darkened night settled around them in the forest.
He looked at her with reverance, his gaze a soft beam of light in her life.
She clutched at his robes to capture his mouth in another sweet kiss when she felt herself pushed away roughly. She felt herself fall onto the wet ground covered with moss and ferns, her lips trembling with hurt.
Sirius spat at her. 'Get yourself off of me, you bucktoothed know-it-all!'
Hermione groaned, her mind still lost to the twisted fabrications of whatever kept pulling at her sanity.
'Bye, Harry!' she said and did something she had never done before. She kissed him on the cheek.
Harry almost grinned at her but something held him back. His lips turned into a cold sneer. 'Honestly, Granger. It's time you found yourself some friends. Stop throwing yourself at every bloke you see.'
Her eyes struggled to open and break free from this nightmare.
There was the smell of rot and decay in the air. The sea crashed across the shore outside the tiny Manor on the edge of the world. The sun dipped down below as the velveteen darkness grew.
Hermione counted her breaths, her eyes wide open and her throat parched from sobbing all day. She felt herself disengage from her very being. She pulled her mind. She pulled her soul away from her body as Greyback loomed across her, his fingers poking holes in her sides, his touch burning her very skin.
She felt her throat constrict as he advanced upon her, the gleam in his eyes predatory.
A rustle of leaves. A warm whisper in her ear.
'I love you, Mione,' Ron murmured softly. 'I will love you till my very last breath.'
Her numb fingers almost reached out for him, a harrowing sadness pitting inside her as she felt Greyback tear through her, unadulterated screams of pain rushing out of her lips as the searing burn intensified. The burn was inside her, twisting into her very core.
Her eyes watered as Ron smiled at the atrocity before him, the warmth of his embrace not a second away and yet it felt like they were at two distant corners of the universe.
Why would Ron not help her? He had helped her. Harry and Ron had come rescued her.
Why was he watching her being torn into shreds? This wasn't her Ron. Her Ron was gone.. where was her Ron?
She grew frantic as her eyes opened, a stinging sensation building against them.
They're taking away my mind.
The war had cost her more than it had cost many. She had been stripped of her dignity. She had been stripped of respect. She had been stripped of her humanity. She had lost things nobody could imagine. She had lost far more people than she should ever have. But all her life she had prided in one thing above all else. And now she would slowly and painfully be stripped of her mind too.
She wept until the fountain of her tears turned dry. She beat with her hands against the stone walls until her knuckles streamed blood. She screamed into the silence until exhaustion pulled her under, desperation clinging to her soul.
What is happening to me?
The earth would change. The people would ebb and flow. But she would remain in these confines of her sorrow for all eternity to come.
Forgotten and tossed aside.
There were fresh tears in her eyes, sniffles breaking through the ringing silence.
She imagined Harry after he won the war. Would he ever find her? Would he come? She had lived and died for him and there was never a day when she wouldn't do it again.
But she was a wisp of a girl and had nothing more to offer. She was useless and broken. No longer the brightest witch of the age. She had been reduced to nothing. Nothing.
No, a voice that wasn't her own whispered inside her head. You're letting them win.
She gaped at the realisation. This was what they had aimed at. She was losing her mind? She was losing her rationale. She was losing herself.
She had never been the one to pray, not ever having truly believed in God. But as she lay in a puddle of her own blood, her body a battlefield of scars, she couldn't help but bring her broken wrist together with the other, her fingers clasped tight together and her eyes clenched shut.
And Hermione Granger prayed.
'The man had the audacity to raise his wand against you, my Lord,' a woman said.
Bellatrix, her mind screamed at her.
'Allow me to end him.'
'Ah, Bella, you don't understand. He wanted to save the girl.' Hermione felt someone gaze at her so heatedly she could feel it on her skin. 'It only helps confirm my suspicions. We have been grievous deceived. I plan to have this settled for once and for all,' he seethed. 'I need to know the scerets she's holding inside her pretty little head.'
Bellatrix sighed heavily, her voice weary and tinged with frustration. 'Rational thought in a state like this is hardly possible, my Lord. At least not for as long as it takes for her mind to adapt which should be long enough. The potions are beginning to take effect. Her memories must have already started to twist into grotesque lies by now. It shouldn't be long before we have news, Sire. She will lose all that she is. She will never be able to tell truth from the lies. She will be pushed so far into insanity we might not even have to intervene.'
They're fake, she almost rejoiced. Those memories weren't memories at all. They were projections. It meant that she could fight it. She would not let them break her. She would fight and wait patiently for Harry to come save her.
She knew he would come.
'It is a terrible loss of the spitfire of a girl she is,' Voldemort chuckled.
Her mind played more tricks at her, stealing from her the opportunity to find out more. Voices turned hazy. Her delirium almost took over.
He let out a deep breath. '..I cannot hear anything. I cannot see anything. It is almost as if her mind has erected wards around itself, Bella. She is completely silent. It is a most peculiar thing. I have never heard anything like it before..'
'We have to do this,' Draco whispered fervently. 'What have we got to lose anyway? Everybody's dead. We will be too soon if we don't do something, for Merlin's sake! We have to do this. We have to.'
Hermione felt hot tears pool into her eyes.
Draco's body fell limoly onto the ground, his hands pushed against the two gaping wounds in his gut, his blood piteously gushing out.
Hermione's eyes locked with his, the wind picking up. Her face crumbled.
She turned to face Harry, his presence the only tether, his hold on her hand the only truth. She gasped as she felt her fingers slip, a gaping distance growing between them, a strangled cry rushing out of her lips.
She turned to see as Draco's carcass was reanimated, brought back to life. His legs carried him close to her, hurtling Harry out of the way. His hands clamped around her neck as the vortex of Time pulled at her.
She felt her breath quicken as Harry's body thrashed in the corner, her own life on borrowed time. There was a screeching cry to her right as she saw Harry's body still, the light in his eyes dim and long gone.
Hermione howled in agony, the wet trails on her cheeks a cruel understatement to her pain. She curled in on herself, choking on her own sobs as her heart split open.
'You are resilient, sister dearest,' Bellatrix cooed in her ear.
Hermione felt her shackles rising. She could hear the tapping of the older woman's booted heel against the floor. 'You have bled. You have been burned. You have been torn apart. And yet you survive. Pain lashed against your body doesn't break you, does it?'
Hermione cursed at the dizziness she felt, her mind once again beginning to lose its grasp on reality.
'.. so you decided to rebel. Ah, well, colour me surprised. I should have known. You were always weak. You rejected the age old truths of our ways. What a waste of pure blood. I lament its loss on you, I really do.
'I will break you, Hermione. You made it personal,' she laughed softly. 'You see, my darling husband is most upset with me. Now we cannot have that, can we? It really does put a dampen on things. I find myself not quite appreciating the strain on our relation that you have brought.' There was a pregnant pause. Her voice turned into strong steel again. She grabbed roughly at Hermione's chin. 'I vow to crush you, you silly bint. I will turn your mind upside down and laugh at the carnage I leave behind. You will rue the day you were born, my love. You will mourn yourself as I see your sanity leave you. You will be the ghost of who you used to be, you sweet thing. This, I vow to you.'
She stared listlessly into the darkness, another sore memory replaying before her eyes, the two flip sides of a coin battling for dominion.
She clutched at the short snippets of the days she remembered from her own time. She clung to them like they were their life support. Maybe in a way they were.
Harry had once asked her how long she was going to stay with him and she had whispered a silent forever in a breath's time.
Forever, she had said.
If there was a God why hadn't he told a young, eleven year old Hermione the end of her life? Perhaps she would have lived a little more. Perhaps she would have loved a little more.
Was this truly how she was supposed to go? Was this how her story ended? Was this the fruition of a life lived only in service to others?
If it was then there was a cruel God playing human in the catacombs indeed.
AN: I hope this made sense to you.
Thank you so much for all your kind words. I get writer's block. It's a bitch, man. But I'll sail through. Some of my favourite chapters are coming up so it should be easy enough to write them. I'm even excited to see how you guys will recieve them. So there's no need to worry because I'm definitely not dropping this story. I have every intention of finishing and even editing (I know just how many spelling errors there are but sue me, I'm lazy).
Thank you for being so patient. Every little review you leave behind means the world to me. Thank you so, so much to each one of you. You are too kind. :-)