Jörmungandr

Veritaserum

Hermione awoke freezing.

Shivering until her teeth chattered in her skull. Her parents had told her once that humans who lived in colder climates often had more worn enamel from their teeth chattering all day and night. She should make sure to bring an extra sweater and scarf everywhere she went.

She didn't know if they had made it up.

But right now her jaw hurt, her tongue felt too thick and dry in her mouth. She tried to lick, get some fluid, but there was only ice.

Something around her shifted, squeezed her entire body, suffocating as a collapsing glacier. Her ribs bruised, ached hollow in her chest. She could just manage to breathe. Only just. Hermione blinked and coughed and saw Tom sitting at a table a few feet away.

Reading.

Flipping the pages of a red book, like he was in the library studying.

His eyes burned brighter than she'd ever seen them. Like someone held rubies to the sunset. Circles of black underneath, exhausted.

His clothes were cleaned. A soft black turtleneck. His hair was neat, slightly damp curls like he'd just showered.

He was still in socks, no shoes.

Hermione realized she was trapped in the cold coils of the basilisk. Barely able to wiggle her toes, it had wrapped her in a pile. Its body, heavy. It's scales resisted magic. Not a bad cage. She could not aparate, she could not kill it, she was stuck. With its scales scraping her skin, flash-freezing her flesh. Constricted as tightly as any meal.

One word from Tom and she would be.

"What's her name?" Hermione weezed.

"Athesnezshesthia." Tom did not look up from his book.

Whatever heat Tom's blood had given her, left her soul strangely quiet, numb. Mind too slow.

"That's a mouthful."

And Tom snapped the book closed, his eyes tightening briefly. Flaring like the inhale of a cigarette. Cutting to her from the bottom of his eyes.

"She's over a thousand years old," he said lightly and turned to her, "Her full name takes minutes to speak. Would you like to die listening to me say it?"

"You don't look very capable of killing anyone right now—"

He snapped something in parseltongue, black forked, an order she didn't understand. The basilisk tightened around her. Crushing her chest to her ribs to her lungs. Squeezing them like caught prey. Tighter with every exhale.

Hermione squeaked. This would be a humiliating way to die.

"The Elixir of Life is a fickle thing," he spoke flatly, stood, and slowly crossed to the cabinet with diamonds and daggers and swords.

He pulled out Bella's knife. Three edged, crafted to pierce, bleed.

Hermione did not start hyperventilating. She was being crushed to death. It was impossible. All her panic had to stay inside, infecting her bones, corrupting her blood, until her heart beat white-hot and noxious.

Tom dragged his thumb over the edge. Sure. Unflinching as it split his flesh and dripped red down the metal.

"Like most dark magic, it takes a toll."

He grabbed a cup from a drawer, a bottle from the potions table, a fluffy white towel from a shelf and returned to her. Pulled the chair close, until they were eye to eye. Her, trapped in the coils, barely able to breathe. And him, looking paler than a corpse with fire in his eyes.