The Hunter And The Haunted

Part 4

The floorboards creaked behind her, but before she could make a move, Hermione was grabbed by her throat and lifted off the chair.

She gasped, heaving, clawing weakly at the thick fist holding her up easily.

"Stop," She wheezed. "Please!"

Millicent Bulstrode just grinned back. She was missing a few teeth, but her smile spread out wide to the very corners of her face.

"The Hunter's going to be pleased," she boomed, her grip on Hermione's neck squeezing slightly tighter.

"The Hounds will be hunting the mudblood tonight. And The Hunter will be pleased with me." She repeated, a mad gleam danced in her eyes.

She drew Hermione closer to her face, her breath smelling of decay, growling:

"The Hunter might even reward me for this. For Potter's mudblood, Hermione Granger."

Her feet were still dangling off the ground, the vice-like grip on her throat threatening to grow tighter, but in that moment of weakness, Hermione wondered if the foul smell from Millicent's mouth would spell her death.

Not one patron looked their way, content with the continuity of their existence even in the face of another's impending demise. As Millicent strode with Hermione in tow, her pleading eyes turned to Aberforth one last time. Begging.

Aberforth raised his brilliant, soul-piercing blue eyes and met her own, its shade a twin to Albus Dumbledore's, his brother.

And as he continued to watch, expressionless, as though his only worry had been damage to his precious inn, Hermione could not help but a cold drop in the pits of her stomach. The same eyes that led them on year after year. Speaking of bravery and courage.

Feeling let down one more time by Albus Dumbledore.

But even as Millicent threw her into a caged wagon chained to a thestral, Hermione hugged her legs. Regretting it immediately as she lurched forward when the thestral took to the skies. It was no surprise that Millicent was horrible at flying. She was the same person who resorted to an absolute fistfight when she couldn't beat Hermione at a duel.

Harry had to pry Millicent's thick body off Hermione back then.

Harry. Harry. Harry.

Her best friend. One of her first friends.

Harry, Ron and Hermione.

The golden trio.

Inseparable, unflinching, even in the face of the Dark Lord as children.

The War had ravaged them in ways even Professor Trelawney could never have foreseen. Even though her prophecies were never something Hermione had any faith in any way. Could any seer have possibly seen this unfolding?

Then it hit her. A memory of something Harry had said; something Dumbledore had told him.

"Do not pity the dead, Harry. Pity the living and above all, those who live without love."

Like the killing curse to the chest. No longer breathing or feeling.

Just hallow. Empty. Cold.

As the thestral rode through the skies in the most undignified manner, Hermione felt nothingness for the first time. The crumbs of hope ebbed away in the tide of pain and grief.

For she was alive.

And she was alive without love.

She had wiped her parents' memories. They had been living in Australia for years now. Not an inkling of knowledge of their daughter, their only child.

How proud they were, to have a witch in the family.

She choked on a sob stuck in her throat.

She wished she was back home, with them.

She wished she hear her mother reprimand her one more time for eating too much candy and ruining her braces.

She wished she had never received the letter.

That she had grown up muggle. Become a dentist. Just like her parents.

The girl she was five years ago would have turned her nose down at her in this pitiful state; regretting her magic. But the girl she was five years ago had her best friends.

Had hope.

Had not been ripped apart.

Broken. Healed and broken again.

Now she was being taken to the Hunter and his Hounds.

The world had always been so cruel, so unkind, and with Voldemort and Albus Dumbledore dead, the world had turned to chaos.

Bellatrix Lestrange had survived the second war and was blinded by fury at the loss of her precious Dark Lord. Bellatrix was more than just a death eater. She was perhaps the most loyal of the Dark Lord's supporters and also bore his child, a young girl named Delphini. The girl was barely a year old when the Dark Lord had been defeated and three years later, Bellatrix was still waging a war that had no end so that her daughter might inherit the world and Voldemort's legion of death eaters and one day restore her father to his glory.

Hermione squeezed her eyes shut. The dilapidated cage rattled and groaned as Millicent continued her assault against the skies, frightening away any bird in the ten-mile radius, being more noisy than necessary.

All Hermione could think of now was that either Millicent was surviving on Felix Felicis or sheer dumb luck, but it was a wonder that Millicent hadn't been shot down from the skies years ago; given her appalling flying skills, and how she was going to survive the Hunter and his Hounds.