Adult-FanFiction.org : Harry Potter

Somewhere in Time	By : serpentinred Category: Harry Potter > Het - Male/Female > Hermione/Voldemort Views: 64471 -:- Recommendations : 6 -:- Currently Reading : 8
Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter and I don't make any money from these writings.

Chapter List
- 40
- 41
- 42
A/N: Huge thanks to my beta, catcachoo (from PI)! Special thanks to Nerys for checking the chapter over for logic and FLOW. Many thanks to those of you who read, rated, and especially those of you who reviewed: e-cam157, Abyss, Blacklabyrinth8, Rena, Tourniquette, Aviendha, nitesfool, Fleur K., and Kat!

Review replies can be found here: http://serp-replies.livejournal.com/11207.html

~-0-~

Chapter 41

It was nearly midnight before their "conversation" ended with a stalemate, and when Hermione opened the door and stepped through the doorway, she found herself at the end of two wands.

"Hermione," Ginny breathed out, relieved, before immediately lowering her wand and throwing her arms around Hermione. "We were so worried about you."

"Did he do anything to you?" Harry asked in a hushed but worried voice after Ginny released her.

"Other than snogging you," Draco muttered on the side.

Silence followed his words, and even Draco seemed uncomfortable about the fact that he had been the one to open the can of worms. A suspicious shade of red tinged his cheeks, and Ginny averted her eyes, looking at the wall instead of Hermione. Harry scratched the back of his head with his eyebrows furrowed, and the frown deepened when Tom appeared at the doorway next to Hermione.

"What did you do to her?" Harry demanded, his eyes hardening.

Tom's arm suddenly snaked around Hermione's waist as he raised an eyebrow at Harry's question, as if he were asking the obvious. Frantically, Hermione tried to struggle out of his hold but to no avail, and her angry glare was answered by an infuriating grin.

And the man had the audacity to wink at her.

Although they had seen Tom and her snogging, she still felt uncomfortable letting them see her in such a position with him. It just didn't seem right.

Nonetheless, both Hermione and Tom were surprised when Harry showed no emotions towards Tom's moves. With a start, she opened her mouth, not wanting him to hate her because of what happened—even if she felt that he did have a very good reason to despise her.

"Harry, I—" she began to say but was interrupted by Harry.

"I think we should talk about this after we return to Hogwarts," he said, his eyes softening when he turned his attention back to Hermione.

Hermione bit her lower lip and nodded. After all, none of them wanted to make a scene out of it in front of Tom, and too many things concerning the future might come out during their "conversation." She kept her eyes on her friends with caution, and her worries were slightly alleviated when none of them were looking at her with hateful or disgusted expressions.

It was then that she realized exactly how much she cared about the approval of her friends. The moment Harry gave her an encouraging smile, on top of gratefulness, guilt crashed down on Hermione, and she almost wanted to apologize to him right then and there. She wanted to explain to him and reassure to him that no matter what happened between her and Tom, she would never, ever betray him.

However, he spoke before she could open her mouth, and his next words both made Tom's body tense and made her appreciate her choice to become Harry Potter's friend.

"Don't worry," Harry said with a nod, the smile still on his face. "I trust you."

~-0-~

Although they found it strange that Dietfried hadn't returned home last night, their curiosity was spiked when Draco told them that Ernsta considered it normal for their host to disappear for a few nights in a row.

"And she has no idea where he's gone," Draco said in a low voice as he, Harry, Ginny, and Hermione gathered around the fireplace.

Hermione was more than glad that they had finally gotten a time to sit down and talk without Tom eavesdropping on the side. Throughout the entire morning, he had made it a point to annoy the other three time travelers by being intimately close with her. However, his efforts had been thwarted by the fact that none of them seemed the least bit bothered. Hermione would have laughed if she had not been the reluctant accomplice of his botched up attempts.

Nonetheless, she hadn't seen Tom after lunch. So, she assumed that he was either hiding in some corner or his room blaming his failures on Harry (as usual) or plotting some other stupid stunts to get a rise out of her friends.

"Where do you think Dietfried is?" Ginny asked.

"Ernsta might be lying about where he is," Harry said.

Hermione shook her head. "I don't think so, if you're suggesting that she killed him. Why would she do that? I doubt she would murder her husband out of the blue."

"It's actually not that abnormal," Draco said slowly. "Remember what I was saying the other day? Well—" He leaned towards them. "—Abraxas mentioned to me that Ernsta married three different men before she married Kaufmann, and all three of them died."

"And I doubt it's because of natural causes, if you're being so secretive about this," Hermione said.

"Nobody could prove that she killed them, but she didn't seem quite upset to see them go," Draco replied with a shrug.

"You better be careful then, since you're the only one she dares to speak with now," Ginny said with a smirk. "The future heir to endless gold … you seem like a perfect catch for her."

"That is if we do get home," Draco reminded her.

"At least she's giving you all the attention now," Harry chortled.

After last night, Ernsta apparently labeled Hermione and Ginny as "extremely dangerous," since she would run the other way whenever she saw the two of them. Much to Hermione and Ginny's pleasure, she also kept her hands off Tom and Harry. Therefore, the only person whom she would talk to was Draco, though she did not seem to be “romantically” interested in him.

"Getting jealous now, Potty? Perhaps you wish to go into the storage room with her again?" Draco retorted, effectively halting Harry's laugh.

"I think this should be our main concern right now," Hermione cut in before the two young men could start arguing with one another again. "What are we going to do now? Herr Dietfried was going to ask around for us, but the only information we have right now is that Dumbledore went into the forest."

"Then we enter the forest," Harry suggested.

"Nobody came out of that forest alive, Harry," Hermione quickly added.

"Count me out," Draco said.

"Sure, we'll leave you to Riddle's care. I'm sure he would be enthusiastic about that," Ginny replied.

"Dumbledore's our only hope to go back home, and he got into all of this because of us. We can't just walk away when we've finally found some leads about where he is," Harry said.

After a short pause, Hermione spoke up, "If you're going in there, we're all going with you, Harry." When she saw both Harry and Draco open their mouths, she added, "No ifs, ands, or buts. We're all in this together, and we're all going into that forest together."

"What about Riddle?" Draco spoke up.

"What about him?" Harry asked.

"Wouldn't he get angry if we left without him?" An unsure expression appeared on Draco's face as a small shiver ran through his body.

"Did you really think he was here to save Dumbledore? He wouldn't give a troll's snot about Dumbledore's safety," Harry replied.

"And you can always say that you were worried for his safety if he asks," Ginny sniggered.

Leaving a short notice on the tea table for the Kaufmanns, just in case they looked for them, Harry, Ginny, Hermione, and Draco headed out towards the direction Dietfried had pointed out to Harry the previous day.

Since it was past midday, there were many villagers strolling through the streets. Along the way, they stopped at some shops to pick up necessary equipment, such as some canned foods and tents. They learned it the hard way not to mention where they were heading towards after the first shop lady. The woman's mouth dropped open and refused to sell them anything, pleading them to return home.

"Can't we go tomorrow morning? It's getting late now … what if there are werewolves?" Draco whimpered after they hurried out of the shop.

"Then we can tell them how friendly you are with Greyback," Ginny replied.

It might have been because they had heard too many negative things about it, but shivers ran down their backs the moment they stepped into the premises of the forest. For some strange, unknown reason, though the villagers seemed frightened about the prospect of entering the forest, there was no one guarding the path that led into it.

"It's because they're all too frightened. Did you see the look on that boy's face when he saw us walking this way?" Draco asked when Harry mentioned it.

"Let's go," Harry said instead, moving forward.

"Shouldn't we at least figure out which direction to look in?" Draco asked, hurrying after them and casting unsure looks around the woods.

"I doubt anyone followed Dumbledore in here," Hermione replied with a sigh.

"We'd have to try our luck," Harry said.

"And possibly get lost in here?" An alarmed look appeared on Draco's face.

"Unless you have a better idea," said Hermione, "other than going back to the Kaufmanns' house."

Draco opened and closed his mouth a few times, but when nothing came out, they continued walking further into the forest. Perhaps he figured that it was not a good idea to piss off the Gryffindor witches, since he did not make any objections afterwards. However, he always made sure to stay right behind Harry.

"You've even survived the Dark Lord. Merlin knows that you'd get through anything alive," he answered when Harry told him to quit following him around.

Hermione wanted to ask him if he knew how Dobby died but decided against it, since Harry would undoubtedly start feeling guilty about it again.

"Do we at least have any general idea where we are?" Draco asked after a while.

They stopped in their footsteps, and it was then that Hermione realized that they had wandered off path. There was no longer any signs of the village, and besides the footsteps they had left behind, there were no other paths. Tall evergreen trees, covered with snow, surrounded them and covered the steep upward slope to their left. The down slope to their right was more gradual, but their sight was still hindered by the forest. An out-of-place tall lump of snow sat a small distance away from them in the only area that had not been taken over by trees.

"Does that seem strange to you?" Harry turned around and looked at Hermione.

"Very," she admitted, keeping her eyes on the small hill of snow.

Despite Draco's objections, they still made their way towards it, helping one another over more difficult areas. At the edge of their destination, Ginny lost her footing and nearly fell if Harry hadn't been holding onto her. They then realized that it was not a hill but a cave. With a flick of her wand, Hermione melted away the snow in front of entrance. It turned out that the path leading to the cave sloped steeply downwards, and more than half of it was lower than the grounds surrounding it.

"It's more like a burrow than a cave," Draco muttered.

"Excuse me?" Ginny snapped.

Thankfully, Draco remained quiet, and each of them withdrew their wands before entering the cave.

The inside was a lot bigger than it seemed. They walked for nearly three minutes, and they were nowhere near the end of it yet. The further they walked into the cave, the darker it became, until their only sources of light came from their wands. Jagged rocks were scattered all over the floor, making the trip tiresome and painful when they stepped on a particularly sharp rock. Draco kept his complaints to himself, only grunting when he accidentally stepped on something, and even that stopped when Hermione discovered a patch of blood on the floor.

"I think we should go back," Draco suggested, his face paler than usual.

The sound of something falling on the floor stopped whatever answer Harry was going to give him, and they stood still, wondering if they stood a chance against whatever was at the end of the cave. When nothing came out of the dark and attacked them, Hermione took another step forward and was forced to stop when she took in the scene in front of her.

It appeared that they had reached the end of the cave.

If the weather was not as cold as it was, she was sure that the cave would have stunk of rotten flesh and blood. The walls were painted in a grotesque shade of red.

Dried blood, a voice in her mind told her.

Piles and piles of bones decorated the floor, some of them cracked open while others still had strands of flesh attached to them. She momentarily wondered in disgust and horror if the humans were killed by being thrown on the walls before being eaten by the monsters.

"Let's get out of here," Harry said after finally finding his voice. The panic in his voice was apparent, and she was sure it was, too, on her face.

Before they could move, Hermione noticed something moving amongst the bones.

"Wait."

Slowly, she walked towards where she saw the movements, and screams echoed through the cave when a hand came out of nowhere, grasping feebly at thin air. After calming down, she bent down and moved the bones aside with a flick of her wand. To her surprise, there were not one but two survivors underneath.

Upon seeing this, Harry and Ginny hurried over to help Hermione carry them out. Once the two young men were placed on the floor, Hermione proceeded to heal some of the wounds to the best of her abilities. However, there was nothing she could do for the dark-haired young man's broken leg except casting a spell on it to numb the pain. They would have to find a Healer back in the village to completely fix it. He did seem to be in a better condition than the other young man, who looked like he was having some difficulty in breathing normally.

"What are they doing here? I thought villagers didn't dare to come in here," Draco said.

"I have no idea. We'd have to levitate them back to the village," Hermione said. "There's no other way they can make it back there under this condition."

"Shouldn't we get going immediately then? Who knows when that thing that did this to them will return?" Draco asked frantically.

He was unwilling to round up the end, so he ended up levitating the blond-haired young man while Hermione levitated the dark-haired one. Harry and Ginny walked ahead of them, their wands at the ready for any signs of monsters.

"What?" Draco suddenly asked in front of her, and he leaned towards his charge. "What are you trying to say?"

The others stopped and concentrated on what the young man was trying to say.

"Trolls," the wizard Hermione was caring for replied instead, and the four of them looked at him instead.

"Trolls?" Draco repeated, alarm written all over his face.

They would have been more surprised about the fact that the survivors spoke English instead of German if they weren't now worried that there were more than one troll living in the cave.

"How many are there?" Hermione asked.

"Six, full-grown," the dark-haired young man asked, closing his eyes in tiredness.

"How in the world did six trolls move in here without the villagers knowing?" Ginny asked.

"I have no idea, but we'd better get out of here. Now," Harry said.

"Can't we Apparate back to the village?" Draco asked as they started moving again.

"They're too weak for it and might get Splinched if we try," Hermione answered, shaking her head. "What kind of trolls are they?" she asked her charge.

"Forest, sub-breed."

"There are sub-breeds of trolls?" Harry asked from ahead.

"Yes. The forest trolls around this region are supposed to be smarter than the average troll. They're sub-breeds of the regular forest trolls you see in other areas, but much, much more intelligent," Hermione answered. "The snow outside was probably done on purpose then, to prevent the prisoners from escaping while they're gone, and they've probably gone out to find more victims."

This kind of forest trolls was exclusive to Europe and was known to be slightly shorter than mountain trolls. The actual height of these creatures could not be estimated since they were hardly ever captured.

"What if it was a trap all along? And they're outside waiting for us?" Draco asked, alarmed.

However, none of them could answer him. They could only wish that they had not already become the targets of the forest trolls. It certainly did not help that their minds found it the perfect moment to play tricks on them. The light from the tips of their wands cast eerie shadows on the walls and would sometimes bounce off the dried blood on the walls and ground, creating the image of something moving.

She let out a sigh of relief when they walked out of the cave and was about to speak when something jumped out of nowhere and landed on Draco's charge. Draco let out a yell and threw a curse at it, but to their surprise, it had no effect on it. Before Harry, Ginny, and Hermione could cast a spell at it, it disappeared into the trees behind the cave.

"Where did it go?" Harry asked, looking wildly in all directions.

"It's hiding in the trees. It hasn't gone far yet," Ginny replied, keeping her eyes on the direction the troll had disappeared in.

Hermione held her breath when she looked at Draco's charge. Blood was spilling out of his head, and he didn't seem to be breathing. Crouching down, Hermione checked for his pulse with shaking hands. For a moment, she remained frozen next to the now dead body.

"Is … is he alright?" the dark-haired wizard asked, now sitting on the snow.

Drawing in a deep breath, Hermione shook her head. "I'm sorry."

"No … no … Friedrich!" he yelled, pulling himself over to his friend. "Friedrich! Wake up!"

She was about to comfort him, but then her attention was caught by movement in the trees behind him. She pulled out her wand and was about to cast a spell when Ginny screamed on the side.

"HERMIONE!"

She whirled around just in time to see a troll spring towards her, but before she could close her eyes and wait for her death, a flash of purple collided with the troll, striking it right on its side and successfully stopping it from landing on Hermione. She swiveled her head around, and her gaze landed on a familiar figure in black robes, standing behind her where she had seen movement just moments before, with his wand extended.

"Voldemort," Harry whispered on the side, and Hermione was glad that grunts of the trolls surrounding them were enough to cover up his words.

However, she could not deny that that was the name that went through her mind the moment she registered who had saved her life. Standing a few feet away from them was the Dark Lord, concentration making his features colder and harsher than usual as he stared at the trolls.

He was following us, was the next thought that went through her mind.

His dark eyes met with her brown ones before flashing over her body. When he was satisfied with her condition, he turned his attention back to the trolls.

Growls came from all directions, as if they were standing in the middle of a cage full of wild animals, and Hermione's skin crawled when she realized that they were surrounded. Four of the trolls, including the one that had been thrown back by Tom's curse, were in plain view since there were fewer trees around the cave. One of them crouched on top of the cave and boxed them in with the other three. The other two came in and out of view as they dodged around in the trees that surrounded the cave.

The trolls were a lot shorter than a mountain troll and somehow reminded Hermione of a cross between a troll and an armadillo. Its features looked like that of a troll but some sort of armor grew on its body.

"Normal hexes won't work on them," the young man they had saved from the cave told them as he, too, took out his wand. "It's going to be a matter of time before they capture us. Escape while I distract them."

"Don't be an idiot. As if they'd sit around and attack you once they see us running for it," Draco said, panic apparent on his face and in his voice.

"And we're not leaving you here by yourself," Hermione added. "We didn't save you from there to do that."

"I appreciate it, but it's not going to work," he said, giving her a bitter smile. "We came here with ten people, but Friedrich and I …"

"What are we going to do?" Draco asked.

Hermione looked at the trolls before glancing at Tom, who was now standing next to her. His eyes were still on the trolls that were hiding in the trees.

"Apparition," he replied.

"We can't. He's too weak for that," Hermione said, casting a Shield Charm when one of the trolls started charging towards them.

The troll collided with the ward and bounced backwards. However, no apparent harm had been done to it.

Annoyance flashed through Tom's face. "Bloody Gryffindors," he muttered before slicing the air with his wand and sending a bluish ray of light towards one of the trolls.

The spell forced the troll backwards, but otherwise, it seemed unharmed.

"It's useless! They've attacked wizards before, and they know we're going to get tired from using spells," the injured young man hissed at them.

"Aren't there any spells we can use?" Draco asked on the side, casting a spell at a troll that lunged at him. The troll crashed into a tree and landed on the ground, but within seconds it was up again, snarling and grunting at them.

"I've tried most of the spells I know, but they just rebound off their armor," the young man answered.

"Stupefy them together," Tom said to Hermione in a low voice. "Two Stunners combined might take one of them down."

Hermione bit her lower lip and nodded.

"Stupefy!" they both cast at the same time towards the troll closest to them.

The creature emitted a bloodcurdling screech as it flew through the air and crashed into a gigantic tree trunk. When it did not move, the growls of the remaining forest trolls became louder, and they started to pounce on the witches and wizards. In contrast to their previous tactics, the trolls no longer waited for them to think. Once the creatures stood up after been thrown off by a spell, they charged again, waiting for the chance to break through their wall of defense. After a while, Hermione could feel the strength of her spell weakening, but the trolls did not seem to be affected at all.

"Concentrate on firing together," Tom commanded.

Anger and determination seeped through his façade of nonchalance, and Hermione knew that it was for different reasons. On the one hand, he was angry that he was being bested by five forest trolls. On the other hand, he could not afford to use the Dark Arts with a stranger in their midst; she doubted he would have hesitated if the injured young man wasn't there.

With a sinking heart, Hermione noticed that the troll she and Tom had Stupefied together was regaining conscious as it stirred on its spot.

"Tom," she alerted him, nodding towards the creature as she and Draco fired at a troll together.

Tom's gaze hardened when it landed on the wakening troll, but he did not say anything.

"We can't keep going on like this. They're going to tire us out before we find a way to escape," the injured young man said, a look of agony appearing on his face.

With a grimace, Hermione realized that the numbing effect she had placed on his leg was receding, but she did not have the extra time to cast another one on him. The trolls were charging towards them at too fast of a pace.

"Protego!" Harry and Tom shouted at the same time, and with a start, Hermione realized that they had cast together, in the same direction.

Her mind didn't even have the chance to wonder if something was going to go wrong. The moment the spells left Tom and Harry's wands and met, a silvery-gold ward expanded around them, throwing the trolls much further back than they had before. Both Tom and Harry stared at the result in surprise before they glanced at one another, and the ward immediately disintegrated into nothingness.

"Watch out!" Ginny screamed as a dark figure landed on top of Harry.

Tom and Hermione immediately cast simultaneous spells at the troll, but it bounded away before the spells could hit him.

"Malloy!" Ginny yelled, causing Hermione to glance to the side.

With horror, she found Draco unconscious, and both he and the injured young man were being pulled away by two of the trolls. As if on cue, Hermione and Ginny cast an Incendio, which surrounded everyone, including the trolls, in a circle of fire. The trolls that captured Draco and the injured young man halted in their steps, but they did not release their hold on their victims.

Just when Hermione thought that all hope was lost for the two of them, the clouds above them darkened at an impossible rate, and before they knew what was happening, a bolt of energy crashed down on them. The last thing she heard before she lost consciousness was the loud thuds of her friends falling to the ground beside her.

And then all was black.

~-0-~
- 40
- 41
- 42
You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.
Report Story

Somewhere in Time