Riddle [Tomione, On Hold]

Chapter One

Chapter One
The Battle

Hermione Granger pumped her legs as fast as she could, her footsteps a steady tap tap tap tap on the stone floors of Hogwarts as she tried to ignore the sounds of the battle that raged on outside the building's walls; the sounds of pain and fear and anguish.

And death.

So, so much death.

The stone hallways that once bustled with so much chatter and milling students were now eerily quiet, and Hermione could feel a chill run down her spine as she imagined each and every one of their pale faces and lifeless eyes as Voldemort would stand and laugh over their broken and dead bodies.

And she refused to let that happen.

She ran and ran and ran, past through the Great Hall and up to the countless stairs that seemed to mock her; tripping and stumbling and scrambling over her own tattered and mud-stained— or was it blood?— robes and wishing that she had chosen to wear clothes more suited to the occasion.

A jet of bright green light whizzed past her ear and bounced off the wall, nearly scratching at her face as she tripped at the top of the wooden steps and sent her wand skittering to the wall opposite of her.

The witch could feel blood trickle down her leg, where a small piece of broken wood was jutting out, and gritted her teeth at the strong bursts of pain that came along with the injury as she pulled the piece from her flesh.

She could do this.

She had to do this.

Bracing for the overwhelming pain that she would feel once she would stand, she pushed herself up and leaned against the wall to favor her injured leg and began limping to her wand as fast as she could.

Her wand was only a few feet away and after that, the Room of Requirement would not be too far to reach.

However, before her hand could grasp at her wand, she heard a sickeningly familiar voice lazily utter a single spell that made the small feeling of hope within her flicker and die out, its smoke only leaving a faint trail of what had once been there before disappearing completely.

"Accio wand."

And snap, just like that, her wand flew so far out of her reach and towards the Death Eater that stood over her defeated figure.

"Too bad," grinned Bellatrix Lestrange as she started to dance around Hermione, her wand floating mockingly in front of her face as she weakly attempted to reach out to it.

The wounds and bruises that she had taken from the battle outside were now taking a toll on her as her adrenaline began to fade, and she wished for the first time that she had taken her muggle gym classes more seriously.

Not that it mattered now.

She was still going to die either way.

"Tell me, mudblood," Bellatrix spat the word out, as if it was venom, and yanked at Hermione's hair. "Do you want to die slowly or do you want to die like how your pathetic little muggle-loving Dumbledore did, on his knees and begging for mercy?"