Betrayed

None of these characters are mine, they belong to J K Rowling


Her head had never ever felt this bad she thought. Hermione attempted to open her eyes, but the effort of this tiny movement caused great lances of pain to shoot through her already aching head. Hermione remained as she was, breathing deeply, trying to lessen the throbbing.

As the pain began to subside, Hermione tried to evaluate her situation, keeping her eyes closed to start with.

Staying in the same position as before, Hermione realised she was lying down on her back somewhere. The material beneath her seemed spongy, but not overly think. She was cold. Very cold. As soon as she realised, she immediately felt even colder, and began to shiver slightly. This led to more pain shooting through her body, and this time, she gave out a little yelp.

She gave the pain a little time to settle, imagining lying on a Carribean beach, relaxing in the warmth of the sunlight. This didn’t really help her much, but it took her mind off the coldness she felt.

Gingerly, and experiencing pain, Hermione tried to open her eyes again. This time, in comparison with the other times, it didn’t hurt quite as much, although it still caused a horrible stinging sensation.

All she could see at first was grey. The ceiling was grey. The walls were grey, with a splash of brown. The floor was probably grey too, but she daren’t move her head to look. As her groggy vision became clearer, the grey focused, into grey stones all cemented together, instead of just a mass of grey. On the wall opposite her, hung a huge brown wooden door. It looked heavy, and very old. It also looked locked. The only light in the room came from a single light bulb, hanging from the ceiling, which wasn’t very bright. It looked like she was in a dungeon of some kind. The temperature certainly felt about right for a dungeon she thought with a bitter grimace.

Okay. So, she knew where she was. Now what should she do?

Hermione decided to try and move her limbs, and make sure everything was still working. She gently wiggled her fingers on each hand, relieved to find they were all still working. Next, it was the turn of her feet. Wincing, Hermione rolled her ankle about. It hurt a little, but didn’t seem too bad. Hermione had left her head until last, as she knew moving it would hurt the most. She was right, as usual. The agony she felt as she moved her head only a few centimetres caused her vision to blacken once more.

As her vision cleared, Hermione reached a hand up to scratch her now itching nose. The hand never reached the nose however, and Hermione’s alarm at the realisation that she was tied down somehow completely took her mind off the pain she felt only moments ago, rendering it to only a dull background ache.

Tenderly, Hermione tried lifting her other arm. Then her legs. These attempts were futile she realised, as terror consumed her.

Trying her best to think calmly, Hermione broke down in tears for the third time that day. If it was still day that is She had no idea of the time, or how long she’d been unconscious, where she was or even who had brought her here.

The crying soon led to helpless sobbing, as Hermione came to terms with her situation. She was a Gryffindor, and proud of it. These tears wouldn’t solve anything, she decided determinedly. First, she should determine exactly what the situation was that she was in.

It was clear that she was in a stone room somewhere, most likely a dungeon. It was cold, and she was lying on a thin, yet soft substance, most likely a mattress of some type she mused. There were some kind of restraints at her wrists and ankles, holding her down. The restraints did not appear to be metal, but were strong. Although they did not seem tight to begin with, it seemed the more she pressed and struggled against them, the tighter they became, until it was impossible to move her limbs at all.

Hermione forced herself to relax against the bindings, remembering the Devil’s Snare she, Harry and Ron had faced in their first year.

Harry and Ron. Would she ever see their faces again? She had never had a chance to tell Ron how she felt about him, although it seemed quite obvious to everybody else.

And Harry. Hermione had only ever felt friendly feelings towards him, and a maternal urge to protect him. How would he do in his quest to find the Horcrux’s without her knowledge? He wasn’t stupid, that was true, but he lacked the discipline to work hard, and had come to rely on her for new ideas and approaches to problems. The Advanced Potions book was proof he was lazy, and would take the easy way out, it definitely did not show him at his greatest.

Her mind was wandering again. Focus! She thought. There must be something she could do. She was securely bound, the door was most likely locked, they had gone to a lot of effort to keep her where she was, but they would probably have locked the door as well, just in case.

Where was her wand? Hermione began thinking again. It was in her robe pocket when she left Hogwarts, but did she leave it in her robes when she changed to her everyday muggle clothes?

With a start, she realised she hadn’t. She felt so stupid. After she, Ron and Harry had laughed at Moody’s ‘constant vigilance’ yet also taken it on board, she had forgotten to keep the one thing she relied on most in the world close to her.

But, back to her situation. As she was bound, and in a dungeony type place, it was highly likely that it wasn’t a member of the Order that had taken her. No, she decided, it couldn’t be. She trusted all of the FAITHFUL Order members, and Snape had gone into hiding. Even the twins wouldn’t do a thing like this. It was possible that they would abduct her, true, but they wouldn’t tie her down in a locked room without her wand.

Who else could it be? It was well known that she and Harry were close friends, she mused, so it was a possibility that someone had decided to hurt Harry by kidnapping her, or wanted her out of the way for something. But what?

While Hermione was racking her brains trying to think of reasons and a means of escape, the sharp, quick clacking of shoes on a solid stone floor could be heard. As the steps grew nearer the door, they began to slow down, until they stopped, most probably directly outside the door. There was the sound of a heavy key being turned in a lock, and Hermione held her breath as the door swung inwards silently, yet very eerily.

The form of a person was silhouetted against the brightness of the corridor, as Hermione turned her head away from the light. The door closed, and she turned her head back slowly, to see the identity of the other person in the room.

Hermione gasped as her brain realised who the person was.

“Snape!”