She Will Be Mine

He took a picture of her entire upper body first, then one just of her face. Then he moved to her arm and her hand, where bruises from the restraints were beginning to purple at her wrist.

When he had finished with the other arm she shut her eyes tight and sucked in a deep, shuddering breath. “Just do it, Malfoy. Quick, before I change my mind.”

Malfoy didn’t respond, but she felt him at the ties of the gown, pulling until they came apart, exposing her left breast. She heard the click of the camera. She took another breath. She felt him cover up her left side, and move the gown away from the right. She let out the breath she was holding in as the camera snapped another picture. He put the fabric back in place to shield her once again, and she sighed in relief and opened her eyes, only to squeeze them shut again when he moved to undo the middle tie. He separated the gown, careful to keep her breasts covered, for which she was very grateful.

Another click of the camera and he closed the gown. Hermione finally opened her eyes and looked at him. “Are there… more?” he asked gently.

She desperately wanted to say no, there weren’t. She didn’t want him to see her there, but she couldn’t bring herself to lie to him, so instead she shook her head yes, a single tear trickling down her cheek. He didn’t wait for her permission, he simply undid the last tie on the gown and opened it, revealing the white cotton knickers he had given her.

“Granger, please tell me he didn’t—”

“He didn’t. He didn’t get that far,” she whispered her reply.

“Oh thank Merlin,” Malfoy exclaimed, sounding truly relieved. She felt his hands spread her thighs slightly and her cheeks flushed with embarrassment. “He really got you though… Inner thighs…” He moved the waistband of her knickers down an inch and she cringed. “…Pubic bone… All the usual places… You must have escaped just in time.”

He snapped a picture of each of her inner thighs, where the words ‘Mine’ were blurred with smeared blood.

“If you could just pull the knickers down a bit, you don’t have to take them off.”

Hermione reached down with shaking hands, hooking her thumbs into the waistband of the underpants and pulling it down just enough to reveal the letters carved into her skin. The second she heard the shutter release, she let go and wrapped the gown tightly around her.

Malfoy put the camera away in a cabinet after enclosing it in a sealed and marked plastic bag. “Now, at any point did he touch your skin with his bare hand? We might be able to lift a fingerprint.”

She tried to recall if he’d ever touched her with anything other than his wand…

The smilling mask.

The rotting smell that stung her nostrils.

The wand. The pain.

On her lip.

The small droplet of blood.

Her nipple.

The prick.

The searing pain… and the blood. The blood that he had dabbed at with his pinky finger and brought to his lips…

“Just once… my right nipple… he touched it with his pinky,” she breathed out, knowing what this would mean for her.

He nodded. “I’m going to see if I can get anything from it, even a partial will help. He had time to clean all his other victims; they weren’t left with so much as a speck of dust.”

She swallowed deeply and released the gown she had been clutching to stay tight around her. Draco separated it so that only her right breast was visible. He pointed his wand at it, whispering a spell that made blue powder fly out the tip and settle on her skin.

“I think we may have got something.” She couldn’t help but to look down and see that the blue powder had started glowing at the peak. Malfoy had pulled out a small square of clear tape and was lining it up at her illuminated nipple. “I’m sorry Granger, this might sting a bit. This is how the Muggles do it, and, though it seems archaic, it’s actually the best we have.” He pressed the tape to her hardened bud and she gripped the sheets of the bed. “On the count of three: One… two… three!” He pulled off the tape and she couldn’t help it, she cried out.

“I’m sorry… I’m sorry… Shh…” Malfoy soothed, smoothing her hair back from her face. “We’re done. I can start healing you now. This will really help the investigation. I’m going to have a house-elf take it to the ministry this second so the team can get started.”

He snapped his fingers and a house-elf appeared in an instant. “Ella, take these things to the department, and make sure they get processed immediately,” he ordered the little elf, who nodded, gathered the many plastic bags and Disapparated with a snap.

Malfoy was again rummaging in the cabinets, pulling out two vials of potions, some gauze, and a glass container filled with extra-large cotton swabs. He brought them towards her and set them on the rolling cart next to the bed.

“First I think I should clean you up with some antiseptic potion, just to be safe. I’m not a Healer, but that’s what Madam Pomfrey always did for me. I didn’t exactly have to worry about infection with the others...” He trailed off, going quiet for a minute at the memories, but he soon continued. “I haven’t used this particular antiseptic before, so I’m not sure if it will hurt or not.”

“It’s fine,” Hermione said quickly. She didn’t really care how much it hurt, she just wanted to be done with this.

Draco dipped a cotton swab into the antiseptic potion bottle and swirled it around. When he removed it, it was saturated with orange liquid that smelled strongly of alcohol. He lightly swiped it against the miniscule cut on her cheek and she winced and ground her teeth. It did burn, but it wasn’t unbearable, just very, very unpleasant.

Soon he had disinfected her arms and hands as well. He set the jar of the orange potion down and picked up the other, much smaller container. “This is concentrated phoenix tears,” he explained. “I will dab it into your cuts. It shouldn’t hurt.”

“Ok,” she said quietly. She watched as he dipped his latex-covered finger into the small jar and withdrew a shimmering, crystal clear liquid. He smeared it over her cheek and put a drop on her lip. She instantly felt a cool, tingling sensation.

“How does it feel?” he asked.

She thought about it for a moment, before replying, “Cold… but it almost feels… nice.”

Malfoy hurried to cover the wounds on her arms and hands. When he was satisfied that he had gotten every tiny cut, he took off the latex gloves and pulled out his wand. “This spell essentially sucks out the Dark magic that caused these cuts, so that the phoenix tears can heal them. When the Dark magic travels out of your skin, it will feel similar to how it felt when it went in… when the cuts were made…”

“Oh…” Hermione whispered, her lip beginning to tremble. She was afraid again… she didn’t want to relive that excruciating pain. “And what will happen if I don’t do it?” she asked.

Malfoy looked solemn before replying, “The Dark Magic will eat away at you, until there’s practically nothing left. I’d say in a few hours’ time your cuts will appear deeper, wider. They will bleed more, since the curse won’t allow them to heal. We estimated that the girls had been dead for approximately 24 hours when we found them, and that he had carved into them with the curse for at least two days before they died. When the bodies were discovered… they looked like they had been skinned. It was only after close examination that we could make out the words ‘Mine’… over and over and over again… deeper and deeper into their flesh. I vomited the first time I saw one…”

Hermione’s eyes were wide with horror. That could have been her. Instead of the few cuts she received, she could have had all her skin slowly carved off of her. Again she felt foolish for feeling sorry for herself, and worrying about the pain of getting the Dark Magic removed, when she could still be tied to the bed of rose petals while the Carver tortured her into insanity… and death.

“Ok… I’m ready,” she whispered hoarsely.

Malfoy brought his wand to her cheek. “Try to stay very, very still, alright? It’s really important that you don’t move.”

Hermione couldn’t answer; her throat had gone completely dry. Instead she gripped the sheets until her knuckles went white, and shut her eyes, trying to imagine she was anywhere but where she was.

Malfoy cleared his throat and started to chant in a low, deep voice. “Guarigione Bacio… Guarigione Bacio… Guarigione Bacio…”

The feel of burning, acid-covered needles slicing through her skin assaulted her once more, and it took every ounce of strength she possessed not to cry out. But then it stopped, and all she could feel was the tingling coolness of the phoenix tears. She breathed a sigh of relief, though it was premature, as he moved the tip of his wand to her lip, and this time, caught off guard, she screamed.

“Fuck!” Malfoy exclaimed, dropping his wand and shaking his hand in the air, hissing through his teeth. The wand rolled under the cabinets, but not before she caught a glimpse of it. It was glowing as if it was made of metal and had been left in a blazing fire for far too long.

“What happened?” she asked. Malfoy didn’t answer right away; he had gone to the sink to run his hand under the cold water. When he came back to the side of the bed, she saw that his wand hand was covered in angry red boils, and on his face he wore an annoyed scowl.

“You moved,” he bit out. Eyeing his blistered digits, she recalled the agonizing pain of the Dark Magic being sucked out, and she could hardly feel sympathetic.

“You’re torturing me! How do you expect me to stay perfectly still?” she retorted.

Malfoy was quiet… contemplating… and when he finally spoke, his words were eerily calm and collected. “You think I’m torturing you?” he asked scathingly. “Do you know what it’s like to torture someone? Do you have any idea how it feels to have some faceless being writing on the ground at your feet, screaming bloody murder… screaming for you end it… to kill them… But you don’t… You continue the Cruciatus Curse, trying to convince yourself that they deserved it for being born to Muggles… for having dirty blood… and you do this because you’ve watched your mother be brutally raped the last time you didn’t obey… and you know that if you mess up again, she’ll be killed… in front of you.”

Hermione was at a loss for words. She felt as if a gallon of ice water had been poured down her esophagus, completely extinguishing the anger she had momentarily felt towards Malfoy. In its place were guilt, horror, and remorse. “Malfoy, I’m—I’m sorry… So, so sor—”

“You’re sorry for what, Granger? That you’re an unappreciative bitch, or that you’re a hypocrite?”

“How am I a hypocrite?”

“You lay there thinking of me as the selfish, scared little ferret… the Death Eater… the enemy of the saintly Gryffindor Gods, but if I sat here calling you a know-it-all Mudblood, I’d be a bad person. You don’t see that it’s the same thing. If it was Potter removing the Dark Magic, you wouldn’t think for a second that he was torturing you; he’d be saving your life, because that’s what Potter does. But because it’s me, you’ve probably convinced yourself that my sick Slytherin mind is even enjoying causing you this pain… enjoying ‘torturing’ you.”

“Malfoy I—“

“Leave it, Granger. I’ll floo Potter to finish you off. I’m just a selfish Slytherin, and I’ve collected the evidence I need, and because I got what I want and don’t care if the Dark Magic disfigures you—since that in no way affects me and my case— I’ll just be going,” he spat in sarcastic pleasantness, bending down to retrieve his wand. Before she could even begin to think of something she could say to rectify the situation, the door was slammed, and, because it was just the day for tears, she began to cry.

Thanks to everyone who reviewed so far! As someone new to fan fiction reading your reviews was really exciting! I hope to write more soon, and as always HUGE thanks to Alexis for reading through this for me and posting it as well. And to Jullsy, I don’t think I’m going to post to ff.net because of the dark content. I might post to grangerenchanted eventually, but I am already asking a lot of Alexis, who I originally contacted not to beta but just to post this for me, and she agreed and volunteered to give it a quick read through and fix any obvious mistakes too. I share the computer with my sister and I would die if she found out that I was writing this so I can’t really post it myself. Maybe when I finish it I’ll see if she will post to other sites for me, or if anyone else wants to volunteer? Slick, huh? Haha… Anyways! Thanks again for reading! Don’t forget to review!