herself magically bound to a pillar, Harry across from her.
She could just see Harry over Salazar Slytherins shoulder. He still looked groggy and dazed from the Stunning spell, and there was a spreading bruise on his cheek where the spell had hit him. Her heart ached, looking at him. As if he hadn?t been through enough, as if they both hadn?t been through enough. But why Harry, why always Harry?
Then Slytherin moved in front of her, cutting off her view of him.
'I?m so sorry to have interrupted that tender moment you were having,' he said, looking down at her out of his sleepy black lizard eyes. 'Would you believe that I once interrupted my Rowena and my miscreant cousin Godric in this very room, in much the same…situation?' He cocked his head, and his eyes raked her face and then her body. She wanted to squirm away, but the ropes held her fast. 'I imagine you would believe it, wouldn?t you,' he murmured. 'A betrayal like that leaves its marks even down through a thousand years. And you appear to have the same rather disgusting proclivities that she did. How unfortunate, a pretty little thing like you. And I was almost planning to let you live, before.
What a disappointment.'
Hermione squeezed her eyes shut and turned her face away from him. Her heart was pounding hard in her chest, so filled with loathing it felt as if she might burst. Her one consolation was that without Ginny and Draco, he couldn?t open the Orb. She hoped they were far, far away.
'What do you see when you shut your eyes?' he whispered, laying cold, long fingers against her cheek. 'You remember, don?t you,' he said. 'How it was, with us. The rooms in this castle, where we were together-'
Hermiones eyes flew open. 'I remember nothing,' she spat at him.
'You?re disgusting. Don?t touch me.'
'I am disgusting?' he snarled, and his lip curled back over pointed teeth. Her stomach lurched. He stepped back, taking his hand from her face. 'You. I thought you were like her. I looked at you through his eyes and I saw he loved you as I had loved her. And so I took you. I would have made you my Source. But years of breeding with Mudbloods and Muggles has corrupted the pure line of her blood.
You are not like my Rowena. You stood next to my Heir on the stairs and I saw how that sword burned your arm, and I realized. You are no Magid. You are nothing. An ordinary girl, Muggle-born, my servants tell me. Not worthy to be a Source of mine. Not worthy to wear her face, not worthy to have her blood run in your veins.
You?re nothing.'
Hermione glared at him in furious disgust. 'She didn?t love you,' she hissed. 'I have her memories, and I know. All she ever was to you was something to possess and to control. And she realized that, and she didn?t love you. She loved Godric. All you ever were to her was something evil, something foul — '
He hit her. His ringed fist hammered up into her jaw and her teeth met in her lip in a burst of agony. She gasped and through the haze of pain that darkened her vision, she saw Harry throw himself forward, the ropes that bound him to the pillar dragging themselves out to their fullest extension, but it still wasn?t far enough for him to reach Slytherin.
And Slytherin turned and looked at him. And smiled. As terrible a smile as could be imagined. 'Little Heir of Gryffindor,' he said. 'You look so much like him, but he was never as slight as you, or as breakable. But like you, I think, the most breakable part of Godric was always his heart. You wouldn?t have thought it to look at him, but there it was. Now — watch me,' he smiled, and Hermione heard with dread in her heart the torturers smirk in his tone. It was oddly reminiscent to her of Dracos voice, as he had sounded years ago when his only goal in life seemed to be to hurt Harry as much and as often as possible. She tensed, feeling instinctively that Slytherin would go for her as the most direct way to hurt Harry. But he didn?t.
He lifted the Invisibility Cloak he had been carrying wrapped around his right fist, and from a pocket of his robes he drew a long, thin-bladed knife. He looked at Harry. And then he plunged the blade of the knife into the Cloak, shredding it. The knife tore through it with the sound of rending cloth that was also a also held a sound like screaming. Hermione gasped, but there was nothing she could do; within seconds the Cloak — that had been James Potters, that had accompanied Harry, Hermione and Ron on so many adventures, that had saved their lives, that had been the one thing Harry had ever had that had once belonged to his father — was in ribbons around Slytherins feet.
And Harry didn?t move, or speak. He bowed his head, as if he was unable to look, but she saw his shoulders shake. And it was unbearable, the worst pain in the world, to see Harry suffer and to see him look defeated. She wanted to scream and to howl in rage and despair, and if she could have gotten free of her bonds, she felt sure she would have killed Slytherin with her bare hands. There was no sound in the room, except the sound of Harrys uneven breathing, and her own ragged gasps in her ears, and the sound of the door opening.
The door. Hermione flung herself around inside the ropes that bound her, and saw with mingled dread and amazement the double doors swing open as they had swung open for her and Harry, and Draco and Ginny walked into the room.
Draco went first, and Ginny came after him. He was gripping his sword in his hand, and Ginny had her wand out and ready. Their eyes raked the room, passing over the walls, passing over the pentagram on the floor, passing over the Orb, and then passing over Harry, Hermione and Slytherin — and moving on as if they had seen nothing at all.
An uncontrollable exclamation tore its way out of Hermiones mouth. 'Draco!' she cried. 'Ginny!'
Neither Draco nor Ginny turned around or reacted as if they had heard anything at all. Hermiones gaze went to Harry, and her heart faltered at the expression on his face. He was staring at Draco fixedly, and with an expression of complete shock, as if he couldn?t quite believe what was happening. She had a feeling he was trying to speak to him as he often did, mind to mind, and was getting…nothing.
Slytherin, meanwhile, was laughing. And taking no care to hide the noise he was making. 'They cannot hear you,' he said. 'They cannot see you. We are behind an Obfuscatus charm — simple, but effective.
Watch.'
Hermione watched, helpless to tear her eyes away. She realized that she could not hear what Draco and Ginny were saying. Ginny had paused and was talking earnestly to Draco, one hand on his chest, looking up at him with dark, serious eyes. She wore a rather archaic-looking pair of breeches and an oversized black sweater that was probably Dracos: it swallowed up her delicate frame. Hermione could see the gold chain of the Time-Turner glittering against her throat. And Draco — slender in his dark clothes, with the sleeves of his shirt pulled up; she could see the black rose of the Dark Mark on the white skin of his inner forearm. He reached up a hand and pushed back the untidy silver hair from his forehead, glancing around the room, and she begged him silently, see me, see me. But he didn?t. He shrugged finally, and then he reached out a hand and laid it on the surface of the Orb.
'No,' whispered Hermione, and then louder, 'No, NO!'
