Abyss

Chapter 19

When she woke up, she thought that she had been thrown back to the wolves. The cell reminded her far too much of Voldemort's dungeons. She was lying on her side in a corner and the prison bars looked out into other cells and the corridor between them. Unlike the dungeons she remembered, though, there were other prisoners in these cells. Had there been a battle through which she had been unconscious?

No, these prisoners looked ragged, dirty, like they had been there for years. They huddled in curled balls, heads buried in their arms, muttering to themselves, crying, screaming.

Icy realization clenched around her chest. From one hell into another. They thought she was guilty. Professor Snape and Professor Dumbledore and the Aurors had listened to her testimony, and she was in Azkaban. The people who she had thought would take her back, wrap their collective arms around her and comprehend exactly what had happened to her during the course of her imprisonment--they thought she had done the unforgivable and joined the Dark Lord.

The frigid tendrils of her revelation tightened, spread, and she saw the dementor drift past her cell in the corridor. It paused, turned to face her, and opened its mouth, imbuing her with all its despair and coldness, taking the happiness of her past, the happiness of being with the Order before the kidnapping. She saw herself at Hogwarts during her fourth year.

"I see no difference." She swore her heart broke into a million pieces after that comment. How did Snape know that mentioning her looks would be the perfect insult, the insult that would echo in her ear longer than Draco's 'Mudblood'?

Another deep, rattling breath from the dementor.

Her parents' tortured form there on the lawn, their bodies cursed beyond recognition. Eyes accusing. Voldemort dipping his fingers into their blood and bringing it to her. The burn of the brand, the Dark Mark, the sign of the Dark Lord's followers. The shattering of her mind.

Another swallow of happiness.

The slide of the slick edge of a knife running through her shoulder blades over the bumps of her spine. Sharp, stinging pain and the feel of warm breath against the blood welling into the thin canal the knife had created. Lucius' voice in her ear, "I could split you in two. Open your legs." She did not, and the knife continued to slide over the small of her back.

"Are you sure?" Lucius asked, whispering in her ear.

She parted her thighs. He thrust into her, setting the knife aside. Hermione knew better than to reach for it.

The dementor passed her by and went on to the next prisoner. Hermione gasped in air, her mind her own again. Azkaban. Harry Potter's best friend convicted of aiding Lord Voldemort and contributing to the deaths of Ministry officials. Rita Skeeter was going to have a field day with the fall of her nemesis--she could see the lurid headlines and all the terrible speculation by people who had no idea what they were talking about. She could see the Minister of Magic checking the prisoners and spitting in her face. She could see and hear Voldemort laughing at her. His plan had succeeded. She almost wished he would break into the prison and take her back. At least Voldemort knew the truth and knew who she was and what he had put her through. She had no false notions of the Dark Lord. The Dark Lord could not disappoint her--she had experienced every bit of his deviousness and derogation.

But, no. She shook her head, her hand over her eyes as she internalized her despair. Better to be in Azkaban than to join him. Better to be here than really fighting against Harry and Dumbledore. She could not hurt anyone here. She would not betray them again. Never again. She wanted to be on the right side, even if no one believed her.

She brought her knees closer against her. Her eyes were open, and she held her open-sleeved arm out against the floor so that she could see the Dark Mark and remind herself that she was not going to be a Death Eater. She would be safe, no matter how unhappy she was.

The dementor came back at regular intervals. At least she thought it was the same one. Ever since the departure last summer of a majority of dementors in favor of the Dark Lord, Azkaban had been short-staffed. The remaining dementors stayed simply because they now had a larger feast without having to compete with hundreds of others. It meant that Hermione did not experience all her worst memories all the time, but she had enough despair on her own without the dementors feeding on her happiness.

Like Sirius, it was easier for her because she knew she was mostly innocent and her containment in the prison was the safest option--these thoughts did not make her happy, but they made the punishments by the dementors bearable. And part of her wanted the punishment. She knew that she had betrayed the Order. She may have been coerced, but she still betrayed them. When the dementor passed her cell, it brought this thought to the forefront with other memories until it was always there, even when there was no dementor. If the Order did not want her and Voldemort did not want her, she was going to open her mind to the dementor without a fight, yield her happiness because she no longer needed it or wanted it.

Time seemed to stretch. All the screams and cries of other prisoners melded with hers--so like Ignorance, the echoes, completely devoid of hope, prisoners lost in their own minds. She wondered how many of them were innocent.

The slippery, revolting feel of Wormtail inside of her, on top of her, spent and sweating, telling her he wished she wanted him.

She deserved to remember.

Voldemort telling her that the Order would never trust her.

Gods help her, he had been right.

Her parents floating from the ground, dropped into the fire.

Her fault.

The hollowness of her stomach, skin pale and almost blue in the moonlight, shivering under a damp blanket that only made the cold worse. The rats that were her only company.

She was back there. She might as well be.

The dementors were stretched too thin for them to be the only guards. There were human guards, too, some Azkaban prisoners themselves but of a lesser infraction. Two paraded the corridor with the other dementor. They looked in on her each time they came by her cell. She must really be a novelty. Or perhaps the Dark Mark was what made them stare. Maybe they had already heard rumors. Hermione did not care. Let them look as though she were an animal on display. Sometimes she looked back at them, lifted her head in acknowledgement, but mostly she just stared off into the distance, her mind firmly set on unpleasant thoughts of the past.

Then one of them stopped, keys rattling in his hand. She sat upright, watching him. The cell door opened, and the guard walked in. Like the others in the prison, his face was unshaven, his hair unkempt and filthy, and when he grabbed her shoulders, the permanently manic gleam in his eyes boring into hers, she struggled. She knew what those eyes meant--she had seen them before.

His fingers slipped. He began muttering. "Stupid little girl, little girl, doesn't know, wild like a stupid little girl, doesn't know she's, stupid little girl..." His hands fumbled with her clothes, trying to grab her. "Little girl leaves, doesn't, she doesn't, stupid, girl, little girl, leaves, fights like a stupid little animal, stupid little girl, free and she, little girl, fights..."

She was weak from the heavy misery of the dementors, and her efforts faltered, slowed. Finally, she was limp, his arms around her shoulders to hold her still. Whatever he was going to do to her, he could do. She was not going to fight the inevitable.

The guard kept mumbling as he lifted her to her feet. "Finally, little girl, girl, girl, stopped fighting, stupid animal, come with me, little girl, animal, free, stupid, little girl..."

He led her out of the cell and down the corridor. Hermione could feel the sightless eyes of the dementor on her back, but it did not pursue her. It had easier prey, and the Ministry told it that it could not feed from her anymore. It was always resentful when they said it could not feed, but when the creatures left, it could not sense their happiness, and he forgot.

The guard held her close to him as they descended slippery stairs, arms still around her shoulders, bracing her as her feet stumbled on the dampness and moss. His muttering was meaningless to her, and her thoughts turned to what was happening. Maybe she was being taken to another cell, one that had more dementors to feed on what little was left of her happiness. Maybe they were going to execute her, or worse, hold her down while a dementor took her soul.

For the first time, she stiffened, and her struggles began anew. She did not want to lose her soul, not that. She had lost her friends, her parents, her mind, her life, but she was not going to lose her soul. The guard cursed as he felt onto his arse, and they slid, fell, and rolled the rest of the way down the stairs. She clawed at his arms, which had not budged from her shoulders. Muttering, he kneed her thighs open so that he could grab a leg. She squirmed like a rat, but the guard was strong, and he shouldered his way through the door.

He threw her to the floor and pointed to the fireplace where green flames flickered. A Ministry Floo operator took Hermione's arm and pulled her to the fire before throwing in a handful of powder.

"The Ministry Vestibule," he called out in a clear tone, and he pushed Hermione into the flames. The world around her disappeared as she traveled through grates. When the spinning stopped, she stumbled forward, falling to her hands and knees, covered in ash.

Coughing and blinking, she gathered herself together and stood to see Remus Lupin waiting for her, hands clasped behind his back, his face inscrutable beyond the tired eyes and lined face. He looked like he had not slept.

She just stood there, looking at him, bewildered, refusing to think about what it might mean to see him. He must be there to tell her he wished he had never believed her, that she was worse than Wormtail and did not deserve to even be called by name.

"You're innocent, Hermione," he said softly.

The words could not seem to make it past the wall of self-blame she had constructed around her mind, and she stared blankly at him.

"The Wizengamot decided that you are innocent," Lupin repeated. He took a tentative step toward her. "I am here to take you home."

Hermione's legs could not hold her, and she collapsed. Lupin caught her before her head hit the ground, and he braced her against him. She was too shaken to protest.

"The Wizengamot heard the Auror's testimony, but Dumbledore overruled the verdict with his authority as Headmaster. I think he used the fact he knew about Voldemort's return two years ago and no one wanted to believe it to appeal on your behalf."

"He... he believed me?" Hermione asked weakly.

Lupin paused. "Yes."

Hermione noticed the pause. "I'm not going to be accepted back completely, am I?" she said, bowing her head against his shoulder.

"Professor Dumbledore does not blame you for what you did when you were with Voldemort," Lupin replied. "However, his reservations are for your Dark Arts activities while you were at school. He tried to protect you from that, but you engaged in Darkness that few Aurors even see until about ten years of service."

Hermione allowed herself a wry smile. "So I suppose asking to join the Order finally is out of the question."

"I'm afraid so, Hermione. And I agree with them."

"I know," she whispered. "I wouldn't trust me either. I don't trust myself. It's ironic, though, that I taught myself the Dark Arts for the Order, and now I have no chance to help. I can only stand back and watch." She laughed mirthlessly. "The Dark Lord was right. He knew what he was doing when he let me go. I don't want to imagine what things will be like when I return to school, what kind of rumors will spread and what I'll hear."

Lupin swallowed. "It will be difficult, Hermione. I know how difficult it can be when you're tainted in the eyes of the world. I'm right behind you every step of the way."

Hermione pulled back. "I appreciate that. But I've lost the Headmaster's trust, and I suppose my Head Girl responsibilities have been stripped from me..."

"No," Lupin said dryly, "you're keeping that. There are only a few more weeks left in school, and the Headmaster saw no reason why the honor should be removed if it had not been throughout your absence--and he pointed out instances of Head Boys and Girls with serious infractions. There will, however, be a considerable blemish in your permanent file--criminal records are not easily hidden--and you will be under twenty-four hour supervision for an indefinite period. I've been instructed to give you this."

He thrust a wrist cuff at her in disgust. "It will alert the nearest Auror if you venture anywhere suspicious. The basic British wizarding areas as well as your home town are your free limits. The Continent is obviously not permitted. To put it bluntly, you're on extended probation, and it's not likely they will ever let you off, not after the Dark Arts and your prolonged exposure to Voldemort."

Hermione did not even flinch as she wrapped the cuff around her wrist. It tightened around her flesh to fit her. "From Lord Voldemort's shackles to the Ministry's."

"Hermione," Lupin said. "Do not ever think that you were wronged by being brought back here. It's constraining, but it is more freedom than you would have been given under Voldemort, at least if you never joined him. There will still be opportunities. There are those of us in the Order who do believe you and trust you."

"Professor Dumbledore doesn't," Hermione replied. "None of the Aurors do, and Ron hates me now, which means that the Weasleys are not going to be pleased at all. I remember when that article by Rita Skeeter came out about how I was playing with Viktor and Harry. They'll find an ice sculpture in my place by the time the Mrs. Weasley is through with me. They may treat me like a... a daughter when things are going well, but they were never quick to have faith in me when they had reason to believe someone else. And who are they going to believe? Us? Just us? Did you see the way Harry looked at me?"

"Harry believes you," Lupin said quietly. "Completely. He and I had a long talk last night. The only reason he did not come with me today is because he had classes, and Minerva did not want him to miss them, not this close to N.E.W.T.s."

"So she doesn't believe me either."

Lupin hesitated before answering, "No. Ron talked to her first, and she is angry that Albus did not come to her straightaway. Ron acted on impulse, and he and Harry aren't talking--I'm not certain, but they may have come to blows about it after I left the common room. I don't know how Arthur and Molly or the rest of them will take it, but I want you to know that Harry and I are on your side. And Professor Snape."

Hermione snorted. "After he Stupefied me? After that interrogation? He doesn't believe me."

"He convinced Albus not to expel you from the school. It was his interrogation report that made the Headmaster ultimately believe in your good intentions, if not your commendable actions." Lupin looked straight into Hermione's eyes. "Hermione, Professor Snape knows that every word you said was true. If you ever want to talk to him about anything, about your imprisonment, about other people's hate against you--because you will been the subject of hatred--anything, his door is open to you. Remember, Hermione, he, too, is under the brand of the Dark Lord. He, too, bears the burden of Voldemort's service during his espionage when he acted like a loyal Death Eater and engaged in Death Eater activities. He knows what you are feeling, Hermione, and he does not want to see a girl like you sink under the weight of your imprisonment with Lord Voldemort. He will help you."

Hermione turned her face away. "I'm a Muggleborn girl with a Dark Mark. It doesn't matter how high my N.E.W.T.s may be--I'm going to starve in the streets. The reporters will go after me every once in a while just to report some new, juicy desperation that I've stooped to. And Professor Dumbledore doesn't trust me enough to employ another 'Death Eater' at Hogwarts. When I go home, it will be empty because I watched my parents die..."

"You have no home," Lupin said. He knew it would hurt her, but if she had to hear it, she should hear it from him. "It was destroyed a few weeks after your parents were taken."

The news struck her silent. Then, "If Harry doesn't kill him, I swear I'll do it myself. I don't care if I have to research... the blackest Arts... I'm going to... kill him." She doubled over, holding in the cries that screamed to be released.

"Shhh," Lupin said, reaching out for her, but she flinched away.

"I... I didn't do a-anything... wrong... I was just trying to h-help... That's all..."

"I know," he murmured soothingly. He looked around the vestibule, wary of the eyes that were on them.

"Look at me!" she screamed at him, holding her arm out. The Dark Mark smiled evilly at him. "I was damned before Voldemort ever put his hand on me! The minutes I decided to practice Dark Arts, they took over--they possessed my body so surreptitiously, I wouldn't have noticed if Voldemort hadn't enlightened me. He told me that I would have eventually come to him anyway, and he's right! I would have been curious until that curiosity led me straight to his door. Don't you understand? I would have gone to him!"

"No," Lupin said, but Hermione cut him off.

"Yes. Just... just Avada me now, before anyone else gets their hands on me, before I give up completely and find myself going back. Please," she begged.

Lupin grabbed her arm and held his hand against the Dark Mark, not to cover it, but to show that he could touch it. "It is a mark only. It does not define you. What you do with yourself is determined by your choices, and although you made some bad ones, you would have fought the Dark Arts. I believe that you would have, and you would have overcome them. But now... now is not the time to let Voldemort win. Now is the time to be strong against him and fight the Dark. Look at Severus. He knows that fight."

"He fights them everyday," Hermione said, bowing her head. "Every day."

Lupin lifted her chin. "Then you will fight. I have complete confidence in you. I do not think that Voldemort possibly could tear you apart so that you can never reclaim a shred of your old life. You were always too strong for that. You still have your marvelous intellect, Hermione. You still have your mind to keep you company, to hold you through the nights that you think you cannot continue. And you have a heart that I hope Voldemort did not break for good. I need you to find your old confidence. I need you to show that confidence to everyone who dares to insult you for something that you did not do. It will be painful. But I don't care how close to the truth they hit. None of them have any idea all the things you have been through, and even if you told them, they cannot possibly comprehend how you've been under the hands of a master. They have no idea."

Hermione's eyes glittered with tears she still restrained.

"I don't know what to do. I'll always remember what they... he... Nothing short of a Memory Charm can take them away from me, and I know better than to ask for one, even though... Where am I going to go? If I can't go home... and Hogwarts..." Hermione wiped her arm against her eyes, brushing the tears aside.

"You'll finish your education, blind everyone with your brilliance in your N.E.W.T. scores, and you'll come live with me until you can find your footing," Lupin said. "My flat isn't very big, but I keep people there sometimes, other werewolves who have fallen into the crevices and who need some time to reestablish themselves. I assure you," he said softly, "you'll find your way, just like they do. You'll know what to do."

"The Order doesn't want me at Grimmauld Place," Hermione said.

"No," Lupin agreed, "but I'm not doing this for the Order. I'm not doing this because Albus or Harry or anyone asked me to. I'm doing this because I trust you and because I like you. Like Severus, I will not stand for a girl like you to fail simply because the Dark Lord wanted you to. You're better than that."

Hermione sniffed, then struggled to her feet before collapsing again. Her legs did not want to hold her, and she felt hungry, battered, and weak.

"I'm not, you know," Hermione said as Lupin put her arm around his shoulder and helped her up. She remembered Voldemort's words--You are an extraordinary girl, Hermione. "I'm not better than that. I'm just... I'm not."

"You are."

Something in the intensity of Lupin's voice made Hermione's lungs constrict, and she let him put an arm around her waist so that she could walk with him. Everyone was staring at them, but she did not care. She would have plenty more people stare. She focused on Lupin, knowing that he had judged her and did not find her wanting. It felt strange, being so close to him without a hand slipping over her arse or cool, calculating words insinuating themselves into her head so cleverly. What she saw of Lupin was open, trusting, his intentions the same they had always been since her third year. She remembered when he had told her that she was the cleverest girl of her age, how she had dismissed it at the time--only to remember it days later, feeling the praise encompass her with its warmth. Now as much as then, his good opinion meant more to her than he knew.

And Harry and, for some reason, Professor Snape believed her. She had people who would not hate her for the hell she had gone through. Now that she was actually walking away from the Ministry and on her way back to Hogwarts knowing that a handful of people would be beside her, she found that she could live one more day. And one more day after that. One day at a time.

"You ought to cover your Mark before we leave," Lupin said, a little breathless, and it occurred to Hermione that he looked pale and weaker than usual, like the full moon was coming. However, she did not mention it as she fastened each button until both sleeves were identical.

"You really do look odd in Severus' clothing," Lupin said.

Hermione managed a weak smile. "I suppose so."

"Everything is back at Hogwarts. All your clothes, your books--your wand was in the cage with Crookshanks," Lupin said. "We haven't taken inventory, but Alastor did a few Dark Detecting spells that found some books, but they were given to the Headmaster, who I believe is looking through them for the antidotes and counters that you spoke of. I don't suppose you will want them back."

"Professor Dumbledore can keep them," Hermione agreed. "I don't need... I shouldn't..."

Lupin slipped his arm around her waist again and began walking toward the exit. "I'm going to Apparate with you to the abandoned store on the surface," he said. "There will be a guard waiting for us there to escort us to Hogwarts."

"Escort me, you mean," Hermione said. "There's no need to gloss the truth, Remus. You've already told me everything."

"Escort you, then," Lupin replied mildly. "And there are probably going to be... well... reporters... a small mob. You've been hot news lately. Someone in the Ministry let it leak that you had returned and were awaiting trial for the Dark Arts. The press speculated from there."

"An ugly butchery of the truth?"

"Do you expect anything less?"

Hermione sighed. "I suppose not. Don't... don't let go of me. I might... I might fall."

"I won't," Lupin assured her, and they Apparated.

She had been warned, but the crowd that was there, the shouting and sneering of bystanders, the rabid attacks of the reporters, was nothing that she expected. She felt oppressed by the loathing around her, and she really would have fallen if Ministry Peacekeepers were not keeping the people at bay. A pair of Peacekeepers led Lupin and Hermione through the throng, but they could not stop the pieces of paper thrown at her, the small stones that hit her stomach, chest, and face. They could not stop the cruel barbs pointed at her and Lupin, nor the scavenging buzzards with Quick Quotes quills on their parchments, yelling questions like:

"How many people have you killed?"

"What Dark Arts were you practicing?"

"Does You-Know-Who Lord have a sexual preference?"

"Can you name any other Death Eaters?"

"How did you con the Ministry?"

"Did you kill your parents in a Dark ritual?"

"Are you really going back to Hogwarts to complete your year? Is Dumbledore really letting you back in?"

On and on, piercing cry after piercing cry until it all blended together into a banshee wail that she shut off in her mind. She ignored the increasingly filthy state of her clothes, and she and Lupin walked straight and silent, as though she were coming home from St. Mungo's and not from Azkaban.

"We're going to Apparate you to Hogwarts now," the Peacekeeper next to Hermione said. The crowd disappeared with a jolt, and they were at the Hogwarts gates.

"Mr. Lupin will take you the rest of the way, Miss Granger," the other Peacekeeper said, releasing Lupin's upper arm. They Disapparated with a crack.

"We still have an hour before the classes are over," Lupin said when she looked up the steep hill with some disconcertion. "We can take this slowly. We're going to your Head Girl rooms, and I am going to watch you eat a full meal and some chocolate. Then you are going to go to sleep and not worry about tomorrow. Tomorrow will happen when it happens, and you ought to have one night that you can enjoy. Is that understood?"

Hermione smiled, the first tentative, real smile she remembered having for the longest time. "Sounds good to me," she said.