Кассандра Клэр - Draco Sinister

The walls were bare, but Hermione knew, as if by memory, that once they had been hung with tapestries depicting a unicorn hunt. And the ceiling had been enameled with stars. There had been couches along the walls, long couches covered in pillows of scarlet and emerald and blue, and she remembered having lain down on those couches, and not alone, either…

Hermione felt herself turn scarlet and was very glad that she was invisible. Oh my. She looked down, realized she was clutching the Lycanthe, and released it quickly. The feeling of memory pressing in on her faded slightly. She was fairly sure that she was still bright red, though. How does one do that on a couch without falling off?

"Hermione." It was Ron, speaking into her ear again, or near her ear.

He couldn´t see her, so he was pretty much speaking into her neck.

"Do you hear that?"

She raised her head, a little dizzy. "What?"

"Listen. Someoneś crying."

Hermione swiveled her head, listening. And heard it. The faint sound of sobbing, coming from behind one of the closed doors.

"That doesn´t sound like Ginny," she said, positively, but Ron had already grabbed her hand and was dragging her towards the door.

She felt him glance around, then push the door open, and they went through.

This room was low-ceilinged and bare, and evoked no memories in Hermione. At least, it looked bare at first glance, and was very dark.

But then, as she stared, she saw a patch of greater darkness, a huddled shape like a puddle of shadow, in one corner, from which the crying sound originated. As she and Ron moved uncertainly towards the shape, she realized — she knew — that it was not, of course, Ginny. The crying was the weak, plaintive crying of a child, but as they drew closer it became clear that this was in fact, an adult. An adult man, short, round, and plump, whose balding head glimmered in the faint light and whose sniveling cries were very, very familiar…

"Wormtail," hissed Ron, in astonishment.

Wormtailś body jerked to attention with a rattling sound, and Hermione saw that there was a cuff around his leg, chaining him to the wall. It wasn´t an adamantine cuff, only rusty metal, but then he wasn´t a Magid. "Whoś there?" he barked shrilly.

Hermione caught at Ronś arm, but it was too late. He had stepped out from under the Invisibility Cloak and was standing with his wand pointed at Wormtail, his blue eyes blazing with rage. "You," he hissed. "Murderer."

"I never murdered anyone!" squeaked Wormtail, thrashing about in his chains as if he could get farther away from Ron somehow. His eyes were huge and fearful. "What are you doing here?"

Hermione pulled the cloak off herself and rushed over to Ron, catching at his arm. "What are you doing?"

"I´m going to kill him," said Ron. "Somebody ought to have, a long time ago."

"Ron! You don´t know how to do the Killing Curse — "

"I can try it till I get it right," he said, his wand still aimed at Wormtailś heart.

"Go ahead," said Wormtail, in a sneering, squeaking voice. "There are wards up all over this room. One spell, and the guards will be all over you."

Ron looked furious. "You´re lying."

"Ron!" Hermione lunged at him, grabbing his wand arm and hanging on. "Don´t!"

"I´m not going to," he said quietly, his eyes still fixed on Wormtail.

"But I want to know what he knows. And if I can´t do a spell, I´ll break every bone in his miserable body."

"Do I look like I know anything?" spat Wormtail. "Do I look like I am still my Masterś most trusted confidante? He said I betrayed him — I nearly allowed his Heir to die. He kept me alive but he took — this."

And with a snivelling gasp, he ratcheted back his right sleeve, and held out his arm.

Hermione swallowed her nausea. His hand was gone; his pale, pudgy arm ended in a blackened stump of scar tissue. She had no sympathy for him — if there was any one person in the world she hated without reservation, it was Wormtail — but the sight was still sickening.

"Do you know what his plans are?" she demanded, her eyes fastened on Wormtailś pudgy, fearful face. He was sweating profusely, as he usually did when he was afraid, the sweat seeming to come from a deeper place than his pores, as if he actually sweated fear. "What does he want with Harry?"

Wormtailś eyes widened. "Heś got Harry?"

Ron almost seemed to be vibrating with rage. "Don´t pretend like you don´t know," he snarled. "Itś your fault — all of this is your fault."

In response, Wormtail, his face striped with sweat and dirt, glared back at Ron, and spit on the floor at his feet. "Go on and torture me if you want," he said, his voice still squeaky. "I can´t get away. I can´t stop you. Do it."

Ron didn´t move, just stood where he was, waves of anger pulsing from his body. Hermione put her hand on his arm. "Ron, come on," she whispered. "Heś not worth it. We´ve got to go."

Hermione put her hand on his arm. "Ron, come on," she whispered. "Heś not worth it. We´ve got to go."

Ron allowed her to lead him away, although he glared back over his shoulder at Wormtail as they went. Her heart ached for him — she knew he had felt somehow as if Wormtail was his responsibility, as if he should have known about Scabbers and done something. And it just wasn´t in Ronś nature to torture a man who was chained up and couldn´t get away, no matter how foul or evil that man might be. He was probably blaming himself for that, too. She was about to say something to him, something reassuring, when Wormtail spoke from behind them.

"Itś the Orb you want," he said.

Hermione spun around, Ron beside her. "What?"

"The Orb." Wormtailś round chin was sunk into his fat neck, his eyes glittering with what could have been malice, or could have been fear. "If you can get to that and open it before he manages to fill his bargain with the demons — you might have a chance. Thatś the last thing he wants."

Ronś hand was tight on Hermioneś wrist. She remembered Rowenaś quiet voice, telling her about the Orb, its powers. "Where is the Orb?" she said, her voice unsteady. "Where is he keeping it?"

"When you were first here, do you remember that he took you to a room with a tapestry in it? Itś in there. Find it, open it — if you can figure out how — you might have a chance."

"And how do we know you´re not lying?" she demanded.

Wormtailś eyes flashed briefly. "You don´t."

"Bastard," Ron hissed under his breath, and Hermione began to lead him towards the door again, her back prickling with revulsion and fear. When the door had closed between them and Wormtail again, she unfurled the cloak, and threw it to Ron. Then she reached around her throat, and took off the Lycanthe. She placed it in the palm of her hand. "Ultima thule," she said, and the Lycanthe swung around to point north.

"What are you doing?" Ron demanded.

"The room he was talking about was in the west part of the castle. I remember seeing the sunset out the window while I was looking at the tapestry."

"Hermione," protested Ron, shaking his head so that his red hair fell into his eyes. "You don´t believe him, do you? Heś probably leading us into a trap. If he wants us to go west, I say we go east.

West is probably some room full of guards or something."

"We´re got the cloak," said Hermione, a little weakly. "It wouldn´t hurt to check."

Ron gave her a steady, searching look. Reluctantly, she nodded, and replaced the Lycanthe around her neck. "Fine. We can go east.

Maybe I´ll start picking up some sign of Ginny in that direction."

They wrapped the cloak around themselves, and headed towards the easternmost corridor. It twisted sharply to the right, then to the left, then to the right again, and just as they turned the last blind corner, they ran directly and without any preamble into the arms of a large group of gray-robed guards.