Precious Mudblood
Ch 13
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The Dark Lord cracked into the
room and a heavy silence fell.
He stood a moment stock still and
looked around and then seemed to notice Ginny.
“...Hermione?!” he shouted and actually
ran full pelt across the room to the
body on the floor skidding in the blood to a halt and dropping to his knees.
Hermione peered out from around
the edge of the chair cautiously.
The expression on the Dark Lord’s
face was terrible. He looked horrified
and wounded.. As if he were reaching for someone he
cared for..
Could he tell it was Ginny already perhaps?
Was that why?
Was his hand shaking?!
She watched as the Dark Lord
reached for the red and white towel over Ginnys head
hand hesitating and then finally seemed to steel himself and twitch the towel
away from her face..
His expression metamorphosed
rapidly.. his shock and
horror turned to blinding relief, then rage.. oh wow..
God he looked pissed..
But then his expression changed again
and became...thoughtful.
“Hermione?....”
he called gently as if trying to summon a timid cat.
there aren’t that many places to hide here.”
She uncurled herself from the
chair and stood up.
Voldemort looked at her confused
and she remembered that she was only wearing a bra and thong.
She looked down at herself and inspected her bloody arm.
put her robes back on.
He saw her arm and jumped up,
striding over to her and turning her arm over and over.
“you are unhurt.” He stated finally, looking into her
eyes speculatively.
“Yes” she said.
“Or no!
hurt. You conned me!!”
“What is all this about?” he waved
in a general circle about him. “How
happened? Why are you standing in your
underwear.. not that I
necessarily, it is merely.. unusually underdressed for
a bloodbath.”
Hermione responded matter of
“Ginny is here because I had her
brought here. She’s dead because I killed her”
The Dark Lord’s eyes widened
slightly and she thought she detected something approaching approval
“-And I am in my underwear because
I needed to convince Dilly I was injured in order to get you here so that I
could see your face upon finding her, and I didn’t want to dirty my robes.”
The Dark Lord appeared to require
a moment to digest. He turned away and
moved to sit in the chair by the fire.
“Are you telling me, Hermione,
that in the.. oh..
left this morning you for some inexplicable reason designed and carried out a
murder in..what would appear to be relatively cold
blood to judge by the way the girl is tied.. which
also involved not getting your preferred
robes dirty so that you didn’t have to choose another for the ceremony?”
Lord Voldemort had
“I suppose.” Hermione
responded.
He immediately drew his wand and
drew a sigil in the air in front of him, igniting it
with a tap.
A few moments later Severus
apparated in and did a rapid shocked scan of the situation
..blood, dead ginevra, Hermione
in her underwear.
He raised an eyebrow and stepped cautiously forward. “My Lord?..
Lord Voldemort smiled a wan
smile.
“I am not sure
“..At least.. I don’t recall any rumours of a body count while she was at Hogwarts”
Severus turned to look at the body
on the floor again. “it
was Hermione?!” he said incredulously.
She stared at him coolly.
“So it seems” the Dark Lord responded
with faint astonishment and pride still clinging to the edges of his
voice.
“It appears Hermione has absolved
me of my part of our wand oath without forcing me to release her from her
promise, since I truly.. had
Weasley on her bedroom floor..
“Yes.. I’ve
thought about that” Hermione mused aloud.
“I’ve decided you can break my wand.
I’ll go live in the muggle world, if you like.
The Dark Lord leapt to his feet “
You can’t do that. You
“Yes well you’re a liar.
me into agreeing. In the worst
possible way you set me up..
I ..I
All the things you said. I didn’t realise until
She lost her grip on where she was going with the thought and grasped at the
closest flapping string of meaning.
“..it
only struck me this morning just what my mind had been trying to tell me.
whole business.
I don’t know why you want me to take your mark but I don’t want it. I don’t choose it!!
I retract my decision.
Toss me out of the wizarding world., see if I
care” She folded her arms and glowered
at him.
“But if that is what you want, why
did you kill Ginevra, Hermione”
“BECAUSE SHE
BETRAYED ME!”
“Because she
sold my freedom with her lies!”
“Because..
Sev
it, I couldn’t stand to have to face
that horrid cow’s deceitful face all the bloody time knowing that there was not
a damn thing I could do to her.
That she was protected BY THE DARK LORD AS
A REWARD FOR BETRAYING ME!!
“I had to destroy her Just in
case. ...If I had to look at her every
day.. Merlin..
Her mind added, entirely against her will – ‘I needed to see how Voldemort
The Dark Lord looked at her, taken
aback.. He rose and walked very slowly and cautiously,
as if not to frighten her, until he stood before her and looked down into her
defiant hurt eyes. “you
were jealous?!” he murmured, in a
tone of wonder. “You orchestrated and
carried out this...truly marvellously bloodthirsty and ice-cold murder,
unhindered by the small fact that you were locked, wandless, in a room while
your target was.. anywhere..
that I might care for Ginevra?
...
you”
“NO!
you why I did it” Hermione cried but it sounded hollow to her own ear.
Severus looked aghast.
“Fine.” The
Dark Lord spat, turning away.
“If you will not accept my mark, I cannot force you to take it.
oath. You do not have to leave unless you want to.
you wherever you wish to go and leave you there.”
“But you will not return if you
decide to leave, Hermione! I will not
allow it. I will not
..pander.. to
this kind of behaviour.”
He stared into the fire again and there was a bitter look on his face.
Hermione felt wrong-footed.
what to make of this statement. She
turned to Severus and he raised an eyebrow, his expression screamed “I don’t
know either!!”
The Dark Lord seemed to remember
something and spun..rounding on Severus.. “Oh
yes. Now I remember,
that was why I summoned you Severus.
What did you both talk about this morning?
Severus looked uneasy.
about – “
“No, Severus, show me.!”
Hermione exchanged a look with Severus,
who swallowed.
“Show me from the moment you woke
up until the moment you left. Should
there be any missing time you will feel my anger”
Severus expression showed his resignation.
He appeared to expect to be punished whatever the outcome at this
point.
He strode to the Dark Lord and
Hermione stood and wrung her hands
and tried to think why the idea that she could freely leave didn’t fill her
with jubilation. She should be over the
moon, deciding between the Caribbean or a south pacific island.
Instead she felt.. forlorn.
This morning she had awoken, curled in the embraces of the two most brilliant
wizards on the planet and had felt..warm..
like self imposed exile.
The Dark Lord had seemingly
finished scanning through Severus memories..
can you not simply accept me as your lord and let me enjoy you as we both know
you desperately want me to.. Why must you
Hermione looked at him sadly.
the lie.. I just can’t make out where it is yet.
the trap closing around me and its worse because I wish it all were not an
illusion.”
“This morning, when I woke up
“But everything is just lies and
manipulation. If I let myself believe
anything around me then I’m a fool. I don’t believe it when you say you’ll let
me leave. It’s just a ploy to make me
in a cage.
Like this room..these robes.. all
your attention.”
“Its
very simple. You want something from
me. You require my willing participation
you are using honey rather than vinegar.
When you saw Ginny and believed it was me, I thought you were upset, but it was
self interest wasn’t it?!”
The Dark Lord’s face displayed
nothing. She rounded on Severus. “
He sneered at her. She ignored it
“You know what it is
it is happening to me! Yet you would
stand by and watch it anyway, whatever it is.
I can’t trust you Severus
To have the chance to be this close to you, to actually talk with you...”
“But it doesn’t matter. I finally
understand that you have no ideals, no principles, no loyalties bar that to
“ENOUGH!!” the Dark Lord roared
and his magic flared out like an explosion, like waves of fire.
Severus and Hermione both dropped
like stones, falling to the floor whimpering and mewling, unable to move for
the prickling wonderful threatening heat of his magic.
The stifling glorious weight of it shifted and flexed now as the Dark Lord
paced in front of the fireplace.
Hermione managed to turn her eyes
up toward professor Snape who, it seemed, was overpowered by the same ecstasy
as herself at present. He groaned in
joy.
She wanted to be closer to him. She
wanted the Dark Lord to come over and join them all.
none of this really mattered.
it matter if she was locked in a box and had her magic taken away?
“You believe I will take your
magic away from you, Hermione?” The Dark
Lord sounded shocked.
‘It doesn’t matter’, her mind sang.
The Dark Lord walked toward Hermione
and Severus and they each moaned at the shifting velvet firestorm of raw magic
undulating over them..
He crouched down onto his haunches looking at them both and
sighing.
“Oh Hermione..
What am i going to do with you?! You are
myself showing you mercy over and over again.
Have you any idea how ridiculous the idea that Ginevra Weasley might appeal to me really is?
But that wasn’t it, exactly, was it – you were afraid that that
was a lie.”
“But you can feel the truth!.”
“You are mine because your
The fact that I want you, just as I can feel you want me too, is but a side
effect of that fundamental truth.”
“You fear i
will take your magic away.. but
which Death Eater ever lost their magic by taking my mark?
powerless?
All my mark can do is prevent you from doing harm to my person
when we need to.
And since..I can feel that you have no desire to do
harm to me.. if you really do
not want it, I will not ask you to take it.”
“It...
renounce the wizarding world just to refuse my gift.
I have already told you twice what I wish from you.
I will tell you again under veritaserum if you really insist on being so
tedious.
Isn’t the thing you really desire
right here, Hermione? I know you don’t
really wish to leave. You were
disappointed when I suggested it.”
The Dark Lord reached down and
picked up Severus hand. Hermione watched
the potions master toss his head in bliss.
She desperately wanted..
He turned to her.
to the inside of his wrist and the man writhed, his back arching in pleasure
his lips whispering ‘My Lord..Yes’
“But I am ..hurt.
I invited you to join us. I
offered more than a brief tryst. I
offered you...”
He turned away, his face dark.
“-And Severus!
him, he still showed that he was
prepared to accept you. And you say you
want to leave! You tell me I deceived
you.”
“YOU MADE ME BELIEVE YOU WERE DEAD, HERMIONE!”
“In that puddle of blood over there, I mourned you”
The Dark Lords voice was cold and hard and it penetrated her vulnerable
body in the maelstrom of magic like nails from a gun. She wanted to weep
already weeping and must have been for some time.
“Please don’t send me away” she
whimpered, heartbroken.
The Dark Lord, still holding Severus
hand, now placed it down against Hermione’s cheek, being careful not to touch
her skin with his own hand. For a
moment, while he touched Severus hand, and Severus touched her, it was as if
all things in the universe were balanced.
Everything was right with the world.
Then he released Severus hand and the strongest note dropped out of the
chord.
It was still a faint warmth, but it was..less..
He scaled his magic back slowly
until she found herself able to function again.
It was still there, thrumming, but she could sit up.
same way. He looked at her sheepishly
and his face took on a note of sorrow.
“..Hermione..”
She looked away ashamed.
“I am not angry over
Lord waved his hand vaguely in the direction of the body. “In fact I am pleased
that you took the chance you correctly perceived would soon be gone, to avenge
your friend’s betrayal.
As you say... you expected better from her - she was a false friend.
his face hardened.
“But you have ..hurt me.. and
you have spurned both of us. ...Will you
be leaving?”
He waited, tension written all
over his body.
She opened her mouth but didn’t
know what to say. Every logical rational
inch of her screamed at her to say yes!
- To leave if this was truly being offered to her..but..
she found she didnt
She wished she could think clearly.
That infernal..wonderful..hum..
wished she could move closer. She could
see that he knew it too.
“Severus.
to cancel, you know..” He snarled
and apparated out of the room.
It was like the fire went out and
left only a candle in the darkness. She
felt tears burst anew from her eyes and looked at Severus, who seemed to be
almost sympathetic. He lifted a hand to
her and she rushed into his arms, clinging to him as if the world was ending.