Family of the Gods

Family of the Gods

The world had changed in three hundred years, the time since she had been put up on her pedestal. Her prison hadn't been altered much; a witch's graveyard was one of the few remaining sacred places in this torrid rush of near-complete Muggle dominance.

Example and point: Stonehenge hasn't been touched in several eons.

The Sacred Ground of Lady Lilith were much the same. In the three centuries she'd been guarding these graves, protecting the souls of the magical even in death the only things to be altered were the amount of spare grass lining the endless plains acquired for these deceased women of such great strength. And the fashions, the clothes of the maniacally sobbing became far more Muggle than she could have ever expected, hems flew upward, sleeves went out of fashion, hair changed with the wind, and shoes were given added lift each month.

Hermione eyes the last group to trail out just before the sun falls from the heavens then counts to seconds before dusk arrives and she can move, go have a chat with one of the local vampires or the black cats who keep the crows from claiming the spot behind her ear as home.

With practiced ease she flows off her stage, positioning herself there every morning in a wicked game of how many cramps can possibly be acquired in one phase of the season. The cement molded to her flesh melts away to reveal her tan skin still soaked up sun even though she was, during the day, an idol for all intents and purposes. The robes of rock that had been chiseled over her skin smoothed with each step, becoming a heavenly lavender silk matching the wreath of lilies framing her crown, and half her weight fell away, though she was still just as pregnant now as she had been when she was imprisoned.

Apparently it's against the rules to be carrying the spawn of the enemy.

Knowing she had purposely been shoved into these ridiculous clothes for their explicit impracticality she tried not to let the gods see her frustration of having to lift the hem to step over a puddle, or the way her feet blistered terribly in her leather strapped shoes knotted tightly up her ankles.

Hermione often walked in the cemetery at night, perpetually protected by her nine-lived warrior--Sprats, who was sleeping in the willow some dozen miles back. Part of her recalled having a cat at one time, but she'd given up trying to remember every little detail of what had been her life.

Because now, of course, she was neither alive nor dead. There were a handful of them--Maidens as the powers liked to tag them, who fell successfully through the classification system. Not Undead because they could always be forgiven and die eventually. Not goddesses because they no longer had their magics. And not muses because they had their limits--six heavy wrought iron gates of vine, and spiked in poison walls of towering stone.

So they were just an abnormality in the magical hierarchy.

The Maidens. Except this was absurdly ironic as they'd all bedded the wrong man. Or in the off case of Justin--no, still bedded the wrong man.

A newbie vamp stood guard of the mausoleum door, he was fidgeting something awful, a serious lack of discipline. "'Night," she said, pushing at the door.

His arms flew out in front of her, barring the fun waiting for her. "You're not allowed in there, vampires only, and you reek of humanity."

Hermione backed away, one step and a half. Pinching his waxy cheek she smiled sweetly, "Vampires have no sense of smell. Did the boys in there tell you that? Did they tell you about a slayer too?"

Suddenly the gangly boy tipped over, face first down in the grass, teeth making an interesting sound as they grated on a tombstone. "'Course they told him 'bout the slayer," replied Pansy, holding a gray stone magic sword in her hand, the weapon she's used to fell the vampire wanna-be. "Come luv, into the beast's belly." Hermione allowed Pansy to guide her into the eternal party place for the coven of the month.

The blonde's belly stretched farther out than Hermione's, clearly Harry had been closer to fatherhood than...what was his name? Shrugging Hermione adjusted the virgin white strap beginning to slide off Pansy. Pansy was the Maiden of winter magic.

What celebration did Hermione get? The Imbolc fertility festival.

"Hello boys," cried Pansy, throwing her arms open drunkenly, even though she couldn't have had more the spatter of November rain that fell that morning.

The Undead scooted apart to allow their queens some room. Hermione sat next to Penelope and immediately began twisting her cornsilk hair around a pointed finger. Your nails get quite long in after three hundred years without a manicure.

After six hands of gin, two of poker, and one of spades without sandbags the vampires had been reduced to losing pitifully at Go Fish. Penny was the first to feel the sensation, moaning reluctantly she whined, "That hell ball's back, I can feel my pedestal baking."

Penny rose furtively, sweeping her black robes up around her thighs so she could wade back out to the middle of the pond where her island throne wait. A true Lady of the Lake, except with swollen ankles.

"Ugh," complained Hermione bitterly, tossing the vampires back their lost clothes. "Can't have material possessions, lucky demons."

Pansy toddled out of the dank crypt, shielding her eyes against the freshly rising sun. The fiery crackle of a blacksmith told Hermione that Pansy's skin was already plating itself back into painful rock. "Bye," she hissed quickly as she fled, sprinting as quickly as she could in her condition. The only thing Lucius and Severus had ever agreed upon was putting her on display for the world to pity, she could only imagine what their ghosts would do if she became a statue in the middle of an open plot, ready to be filled with an actual deadun.

In furiously close time she arranged herself on the podium and steeled her body for the brimstone fire effect the sun would have on her flesh, sewing a concrete sunburn over her arms and down her torso, the last bit to go her eyes, seeing through their blank curtain of rock.

She watched the usual bout come and go. The Italian witches here to mourn the passing of their husbands, again, as though they hadn't been coming in here with too much foundation and heavily dyed red hair for the past forty years.

Then the string of funeral cars boarded the slim drive and wand carrying victims of death's pain climbed from them, ebony heels shined in respectful tears, handkerchiefs patted at eyes so as not to rub away mascara and rouge, and the bitter wind infiltrated the thin scarves acting as the hems of dresses. Black and red rose petals litter the tops of caskets and Hermione asks her constant question--what good are flowers in death?

She takes a liking to the young boy who comes and presents his loved, and gone, one with two rubles for the ferryman. He's not like the last string of men who've been here, breaking down constantly, confusing their daughters, and shaming their forefathers. But this boy, eighteen, the same age she was she they blasted her ass on to this block of stone, isn't dressed to sob inconsolably. His face is set, lined hardly; eyes like ice floating in the vestiges of snow beginning to spout from the clouds.

Graveyards are gifted with the ability to have crappy weather all year long.

His unknotted tie blows against his denims jacket, and his hands tap a tattoo in the thighs of his worn khakis, both knees sorely being missed in this newly arisen winter. Blonde locks of hair scatter over his eyes and he turns away, head bowed briefly for a click before coming back up proudly.

The wind freezes the tears on Hermione's granite cheeks like dangerous ice crystals dangling from the tree's fingers.

That night Hermione finally gave birth to a raw baby. Two vampires became dust for asking for a snack. Looking sadly at the baby boy she kissed him on the forehead.

"Come back with us," pleaded Draco, taking his son in his arms. The baby found the black leathery wings immensely amusing.

Sadly Hermione shook her head and repeated, "I just cried for a stranger. You were the greatest love of my life and I hadn't, can't, even cry for us."

"Why did you cry for the boy?"

Shrugging Hermione rationalized, "Because he couldn't cry for himself." Draco looked taken aback when his lover added as an almost after thought, "I couldn't cry for us, we never deserved it."

"We didn't?" questioned Draco, hurt crawling into his eyes try as he might to muffle it. "Why not?"

"We never tried to change the world for anyone but ourselves," replied Hermione easily, kissing Draco on the cheek and rubbing her snoozing son's bald.

"I love you," revealed Draco, the words feeling incredibly foreign on his pale white lips as Hermione climbed back on to her jail slab, arranging her robes over a belly growing flat again and hair infusing itself with the youth of a Maiden.

Sharply Hermione looked at him with eyes quickly being shingled over. "Don't ever forget to tell him that."

It would be another three hundred years before Hermione felt she had finally cried for the love of her life. Her son was grown, following in the footsteps of a grandfather generations earlier, building the empire he was always meant to rule. Hermione tried her best to guide him in childhood when his father brought him to the witch's grotto, pointing him maternally to the important places, keeping him off her alter.

Draco sat on the tombstone directly across from her pillar, chin in hands and elbows on knees. He looked dejected, like an angel had come along and sprinkled him with fairy dust.

The sun set and Hermione clambered down for the last time, toga resplendent in gold, a satyr's harp in her hand, and good magic back at her fingertips.

"What're you now?" asked Draco bemusedly.

Hermione examined her new fashions critically. "I'd say I'm not Pluto's favorite, but I may be Persphonia's handmaiden."

Draco's eyebrows wrinkled over gleaming eyes of intelligence. "Did it never occur to you that Nia went into that marriage of her own free will?"

Hermione nodded, examining the fabric running the length of her bare feet, natural. "I'm ready to leave, I'm free of everything, everybody. You put me up on that pedestal; I just had to find the strength to get off of it.