7,709CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: DEEDS & FORFEITS - PART II
Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Scotland
Madam Aset's Horcrux, inside the Room of Requirement
(real date and time unknown)
.
Draco let her hand go and Hermione walked to the bed alone. Behind her, the door to their private room was locked with a loud 'click'.
She turned and took a seat, and then gave her lover her full attention…
Only, it wasn't Draco looking back at her.
It took her a moment to react to that terrifying fact, to calm the racing of her heart as she realised she was looking at a fraud wearing Draco's face. "Hello," she finally settled upon, figuring it would be best not to pull a tiger's tail, especially without her wand, which she'd left in the main room. "I don't think we've met yet."
The fake Malfoy frowned and his gaze narrowed with suspicion.
"The eyes," she told him, waving a finger at her own for example. "They're grey, not blue."
The imposter sighed at having been caught out and dropped the illusion.
Eros—who else could it be, really?—was certainly as handsome as his namesake, and his wings were an amazing display of white and gold plumage. The instant the deception melted away and he was fully revealed there was no doubt in Hermione's mind that she'd been right about him, too: Eros was Fae. The odd tilt to his spring-green eyes, the perfect mouth and sculpted jaw, the wings…and the body cut with muscle and fit for pleasuring. He was, in a phrase, every girl's perfect dream.
"I knew you'd figure it out," he admitted, and even his voice was something out of a fantasy, rich and dark, tempting. "You're a very clever witch."
Crossing her legs to afford her some modicum of protection, as well as to send the signal that she was unafraid—a ploy, as inside she was shaking to her core—she met his eye and refused to blink first. "Flattery won't win you any points, I'm afraid. So, am I to assume you're 'Eros'?" she asked, probing not just for answers, but for how they were revealed. "Because you certainly don't look like a 'Psyche' to me."
His full lips curled with amusement. "I haven't any lady parts. It's the dead give-away."
"Cute," she said, catching the pun. "Really, why the coy disguise? Why not just appear to me as…you? Clearly, we have no problems conversing with each other."
"Talking wasn't supposed to factor into what we do here, beautiful."
His use of Draco's nickname for her as well as his implication had her running cold. "Don't call me that. You haven't earned the right to refer to me in such a casual manner. And are you saying you were intending to seduce me dressed up as my partner?" She scoffed, maintaining the illusion of being unruffled. Inside, however, she was screaming at the thought of how easily he might have accomplished such a thing, given how hot she was for her snarky, sneaky boyfriend. "Even if you'd gotten the eyes right, I think I'd have noticed the difference in your kisses."
"Perhaps." He shrugged. "It hardly matters. By then, you wouldn't have cared."
"Because you're the god of sex and so irresistible?"
"Exactly."
It was impossible not to roll her eyes at such an audacious claim. "Let me guess again: the end goal was breaking us up once Draco had discovered I'd cheated on him?"
"That and impregnating you, yes."
Now she really did laugh. It was amusing, if also a tad insulting to catch him trying to trick her again, especially as she'd so easily caught him the first time. "You can't. You're not real. That-" She waved at his form. "-is not your body. It's a construct, the same as the rest of this place. There's nothing of you here, certainly not what's required to make a baby."
Very assuredly, he shook his head. "Merging our bodies would allow me to place a piece of my essence into you. I am spirit and magic combined, and what is life if not that manifested in the womb of a woman?"
He may as well have dumped a bucket of ice water over her head.
Suddenly, the idea of him getting her pregnant wasn't very funny…or ludicrous.
"If you dare touch me like that, I'll destroy you," she promised him in a venomous tone of voice, one that matched the fury burning through her blood at that moment. "Permanently."
Eros seemed surprised by such an aggressive response, as if he hadn't expected this darker, sharper side of her personality. In truth, Hermione rarely let it show. It was a part of her she rarely indulged; the last chance had been upon Dolores Umbridge, and before that Rita Skeeter. The Sorting Hat had sensed it years ago, though…had known her ambitious nature was tainted with a darker desire for control and power and a will to do whatever it took to win, which is why it had wanted to send her to Slytherin. When she'd been twelve, that side had been channeled into getting top marks and proving to those who'd disparaged her that she could take whatever they'd dished out. As she'd aged, however, and come into her own, that need to please others had taken a backseat to pleasing herself. She no longer felt beholden to behaving.
As she stared at him across the room, she allowed Eros to see all of that in her eyes, to reflect upon the witch she'd grown into and to recognise the fact that she would end him without losing any sleep over it, if he dared carry through with his threats.
He seemed genuinely perplexed by her reaction, as if he wasn't used to anyone thwarting his charm. "How would you do such a thing?" he asked, his brow crinkling with worry. "You can't escape here without being set free."
With a casual shrug and a chilling smile, she replied, "I'm fairly certain Fiendfyre will do the trick."
It was amusing to note the panic in his expression as he realised she was right.
"But that's…insanity! You'd all die, too!"
"Not if I targeted you and Psyche first," she told him without any hesitation or an inch of remorse. "With you both burned to ash, this horcrux would be destroyed, setting us free."
"But only if you timed it right," he argued, grasping at straws, "and were very lucky."
"Only takes a second to Disapparate, and I'll take my chances if push comes to shove." She met his eye and silently dared him to test her Gryffindor's mettle. "Will you?"
Eros stared at her as if he was seeing her for the first time. Clearly, he was contemplating how sincere she was versus his own plans. After a lengthy pause, he conceded, "Sounds as if you've thought of everything."
"Naturally."
He cleared his throat.
"Well, this does put us in a bit of a jam, doesn't it?"
"Only if you allow it to," she pointed out the obvious. "We don't have to play this game anymore. You could just let us all go."
In a blink, he was suddenly kneeling in front of her, close enough for his breath to be felt through her silken dress. He put a finger to his lips in a warning for her to be silent, and then his gaze went distant, as if he was listening to something far away, sounds she couldn't hear.
Seconds ticked by, and in the stillness, Hermione was acutely aware of how very quiet it was. Where was Draco, she wondered. Where were the others? Were they all safe? Where was Psyche?
"It's safe to talk now. She's…distracted," he admitted to her at last, blinking as if he was mentally shaking off some type of mind spell. "I can't let you out. I don't have that power here."
Well, that just confirmed her earlier suspicions about the homeowner of this demented, little abode, didn't it?
"Psyche did kill you, didn't she? This is her horcrux."
Eros' wings drooped and he seemed to curl in on himself with sadness.
"It was the only way for us to be together…and the only way for her to stop me."
She stiffened, alarm bells going off in her head at such a bizarre confession. "Stop you from what? What exactly did you do to her?"
"What didn't I do?" He huffed out a bitter sound, and his lovely featured twisted with an ugly cynicism. "I was her mate…and she was mine."
Like a bell going off in her head, it suddenly occurred to her that the answer to this bizarre love suicide-murder had been right there in front of her for most of the night: Draco had admitted that Madam Aset was a Sex-Witch, and everyone who had studied magical creatures knew they were the human offspring of Veela.
Veelas had bonded soul mates…just as all fairy folk did.
Eros was High Fae.
"Oh." She felt her heart tug with sympathy. "I see. Veela are related to the Unseelie Court, according to Newt Scamander's Fantastic Beasts: Cases." She glanced at his magnificent white and gold wings, the mark of a Seelie Court fairy. "And you… How is it possible you could be mates? You're supposed to be mortal enemies."
He pressed his lips together, looked at her with a rebellious gleam in his eye.
"You want to confess. It's painfully obvious to me that you do," she told him, channeling a little Slytherin manipulation into the mix, hoping it could pull out of this man the answers she'd been struggling all night to discover. "And you've been in here an awfully long time. Haven't you ever had anyone to actually talk to about this, aside from Psyche?"
To her surprise, it seemed to work. Eros again appeared confused and torn. "I…wouldn't know where to start."
Deciding a little sympathy might be all he needed to prod him along, she patted the bed next to her. "Come sit by me, and just start at the beginning."
He seemed to consider her offer for a long time in silence, and for that span of time, she was sure he would reject her attempts to win his trust, but then to her surprise, he let out a deep, soul-weary sigh and simply surrendered.
Taking a seat next to her on the bed, he turned in her direction as a penitent might to their confessor, hands clasped together and resting on his thighs. "I…I love her," he began, sounding as if he desperately needed her to believe that important fact before they went any further. "I would do anything for her…have done." He looked down at his folded hands. "She's my whole world, quite literally now."
"Tell me about her," Hermione coaxed in a gentle whisper, speaking to him as one might a young, frightened child who was guilty of all manner of ill-behavior. It had certainly been her father's best weapon in getting her to confess her youthful sins, anyway. "Tell me about you both. Help me to understand."
He nodded a bit eagerly, as if this was information he'd been waiting a long time to set free. "Psyche's real name is Sabrina Peverell, and she'd been born into one of the most noble and esteemed pure-blood families in England. Sadly, her mother had died giving birth to her, and she'd had no siblings, and so she'd been denied the joy of a large, boisterous family, like your Weasley friends. She'd lacked affection from a very young age, and as a result, she'd grown into a cold, quiet child, envious of other people's happiness and the love they shared."
"What about her father? Wasn't he in the picture?"
Eros's lips curled with hatred. "That bastard… Her father was a self-indulgent addict. He loved his wine, women, and gambling, in that order, and had racked up so much debt from his spending habits that by the time Sabrina was of age, the family was in total financial ruin and their reputation worthless. As a result, she'd had no dowry to offer a prospective beau, and her family's ancestral manor house was lapsing into disrepair. Sabrina did her best to take care of things—she mended her own clothing, cleaned the house with her magic after the house-elf servants were sold off to others, and traded for food in the local village. She'd counted every Sickle twice and hoarded every Knut. Her life was a tragedy, thanks to her father's carelessness."
"I'm starting to get the picture," Hermione said, feeling a bit sorry for the Madam of the cards. "So did she run away? Is that how she ended up in a gentleman's establishment?"
"If only it had been such a choice, perhaps this darkness inside her-" He shook his head. "One evening, in a drunken haze and while playing cards, that fool father of hers had lost the deed to his home in a fast round of Vingt-Un. Desperate to win it back, he gambled away the only thing of value he had left: Sabrina, herself. He lost, of course. The man who won was a pure-blood aristocrat who owned a gentleman's establishment in London, and it was clear what his plans were for Sabrina, since he already had a wife."
Good God, her own father had gambled Sabrina off to the whorehouse! What kind of parent would do such a despicable thing? It was no wonder she was so mean-hearted and spiteful! Not that her misfortune excused her for over a century of the sadistic mind-bending of others, but it certainly made the woman's twisted, black heart a bit more understandable.
And therein lay a complication: pity for their 'horcrux host' was ill-advised, as it was becoming clearer to Hermione that Psyche might not be completely stable for good reason. Yet, her priority should be to find a way to get herself and her friends out of this bind, not fix what was broken in Sabrina Peverell and her lover.
Or were they meant to be one and the same?
Perhaps this was the solution…
"It's a horror to even imagine now," he continued. "Eighteen and only a year out of Hogwarts, a virgin who'd never even been kissed… When Lord Peverell had handed Sabrina off to the owner of the brothel, she'd had only the clothes on her back—which the house's owner had taken great pride in promptly stripping off her before he'd taken care of the problem of her innocence."
So they were talking rape, too.
"She was the courtesan then," she asked, "not you, but her?"
He gave her an odd, little smile that seemed to tell her, 'wait for it, there's more'. "The Madam of the house, the owner's wife, saw Sabrina's beauty hidden under the weight of starvation and deprivation, and for the first three weeks, she'd worked at fattening her up and teaching her the proper decorum for servicing clients. Two months in, and Sabrina had become the star attraction at the house, having been a fast learner. About six months after that, a Sex-Warlock came to the house." He looked at her when he said, "His name was Angelo Zabini."
Hermione felt as if she'd just been sucker punched.
Blaise Zabini's ancestor was a Sex-Warlock? But then that would mean… She thought back on what she knew about her classmate, and the rumours that had always whirled around him. Behind hands and spoken in giggles and whispers, he was said to be a voracious and skilled lover, but she hadn't believed it. She thought that mere gossip around the castle.
So Blaise might very well be a Sex-Warlock, too. Did Ginny know?
"Lord Zabini took one look at Sabrina and knew her family's secret heritage. I don't know if the man did it to help her or hurt her, but whatever his reasons, he paid to bed her that night. He used his sex magic to awaken Sabrina's inner Veela, and then he left, never to return."
"Wait, what did you mean by 'woke-up' her Veela? I don't understand," she admitted.
As someone who spent inordinate amounts of time in the library reading anything and everything she could get her hands on, Hermione knew that most of the research on the species had been done by the various members of the Scamander family, and then only over the last century. Although their work had been well-presented and factual, the section on Veela mating habits had been, she recalled now, sparsely detailed.
As members of the Fairy family, Veela were known to be innately hedonistic creatures, and their exotic allure was unavoidably experienced by everyone in the vicinity, as evidenced every time the Bulgarian Quidditch cheerleading squad or half of the Beauxbatons Academy's student body showed up somewhere. Their prowess in bed was legendary, and yet like the courtesans of Muggle Europe, they and their descendants were often looked down upon by 'polite' society for being so entwined with their 'baser' sexual natures. That reputation wasn't improved by the fact that many of them ended up in the sex trade industry in one fashion or another.
From what Eros was implying, however, it seemed that a Sex-Witch's inner Veela wasn't a part of them that was awake from birth, but rather something that 'slept' until some other kind of magic came into contact with them.
"Are you saying that Veela only…activate…when in the presence of another Veela?"
She felt stupid even saying such a ridiculous thing aloud, as if they had an on-off switch for their inner creature. Still, Eros seemed to understand well enough.
"Simply being in each other's presence isn't enough," he corrected her. "Only when their bodies unite can a sleeping Veela can be awoken." He seemed so forlorn about it, as if it was a curse to be so afflicted. "Usually that means sex, but… Like knows like, and as with all Fae, a touch is sometimes all it takes."
"So, Sabrina's inner Veela 'woke up' after this Zabini Sex-Warlock had sex with her?"
He nodded. "After that, Sabrina struggled to control the beast inside and its insatiable needs. A newly woken Veela is an addict to the sexual high. They hunger for it and the energy it gives them."
"Energy?" Now it was her turn to be utterly confused by the turn in the conversation. "You mean sex rejuvenates them?"
Eros' eyes slid sideways to take her in. "They feed off of it, literally. When they have intercourse, they're also eating away at their partner's life aura."
She could count on her hands how many times in her life Hermione's jaw dropped to her knees. "Are you saying they eat people?!"
"In a manner of speaking," her companion hedged. "They can kill a person if they take too much energy from them during sex. It's not their fault, though. The Veela…it takes over sometimes, and when it does, the person inside has to fight it for control."
"How horrifying!" Hermione admitted. To not have control of your own body would be as terrible as if someone used a person's TWN against them. "Sounds like a curse to me."
"It is," Eros told her. "The Veela were the first Fae to embrace dark magic. Long ago, they'd used it to ensnare others to do their bidding and to gain political clout within the Seelie Court in a bid to take it over from the High Fae. When they were caught breaking Fairy law, they were punished for it: magically cursed to forever devour that which they loved most. Then, they were cast out of the Seelie Court. That's why Veela now are insatiable. It's not just love and lust they crave, but also survival."
"Cast out? Then…they founded the Unseelie Court, didn't they?"
Eros' confirmation tied together so many open holes in her knowledge about the Fae, about Veela, about why their Courts were at war, and why Madam Aset may be a touch 'round the bend now. "Tell me the rest of Sabrina's story," she bade her handsome ally. Perhaps within his tale, she would learn what it was the Madam of the cards really wanted and needed from them. That could be the clue to getting out of here sooner, rather than not at all.
Eros shifted his wings, finding a more comfortable position for them. They draped across the coverlet like a feathered cloak, and Hermione had to restrain the urge to reach out and stroke them. Fae magic was influencing her a tad, she knew. It was designed to draw her in and enchant her.
"Like in all other things, Sabrina was a fast learned and she soon dominated the Veela's hunger," Eros continued. "Eventually, using its lust as a weapon against her clients, she gained a reputation for leaving at her feet a trail of brokenhearted rich aristocrats, men and women who'd spent their fortunes to have a single night with her. They'd gifted her with jewellery, dresses, anything she'd wanted, and she took it all…took what she felt was her rightful due for a lifetime of having been humiliated and made to scrimp. And yet despite draping herself in their furs and their necklaces, she'd refused each marriage proposal. She took the name 'Psyche' as her courtesan alias, and soon word got around that she would only marry the man who could sexually conquer her."
"Challenge accepted, I take it?" she wryly asked.
Eros didn't bother denying it. "I was from a rich family, a rake with my own reputation for leaving women wanting, thanks to my Fae heritage. After hearing the rumours about Psyche, I knew I had to have her, to see which of us would come out on top."
"So you'd planned to use her and ruin her, just to prove you could?" She gave him a disapproving look. "That's shameful."
He dropped his eyes to the carpet. "I know it now. But I was cocksure and young. I believed I was the best lover in all of England and could defeat her record and bring her to her knees. At that time, I had a long list of women and men who were willing to follow me into Hades itself, if I'd asked."
"So you went to the brothel and took the alias 'Eros', believing you were as capable of seduction as the mythological god."
"Yes, and I also chose the name to send Psyche a message: that I would be the one to captivate her, just as Eros had done with his Psyche in the story." He hung his head. "You're right, it was terrible hubris. I knew it then, but still I was determined to be considered peerless in the art of sex. So, I paid an exorbitant rate to spend the whole night with her, nearly all of my inheritance that remained. I didn't care about the money, believing I could always obtain more by seducing some hapless, rich widow. My only condition to the house's Madam was that Psyche not be allowed to see my face…that we meet in the darkness, just as Eros took his Psyche in the ancient stories. First, it was because I didn't want her knowing me, so she couldn't find me again the next morn. I'd intended to humiliate her, not marry her. She was never to know my identity. After…"
"Let me guess," she interrupted, "everything changed because you'd discovered the truth: that you actually did want her, and not for some idiotic ego challenge."
"Yes, but there was more to it than just my humbling. I knew the minute I'd touched her that Psyche was Veela. We are Seelie and Unseelie, on opposite sides of a Fae divide that has not been breached since its inception, and just to touch caused us both physical pain." He ran a frustrated hand through his lovely, dark hair. "And yet, I didn't care, because the minute our fingers met..." He went still and his eyes glazed over with memory, and it was clear to Hermione from the longing in his gaze that Eros had truly loved Psyche once upon a time. "It was the sweetest ache I've ever known, touching her. She was…magnificent. The other half of my soul, despite our Court's opposition, the piece of me I'd never known I was missing, but desperately needed. It was the same for her. It hurt us both to come together like that, but the exquisite pleasure that followed was worth it. I went back a few days later, unable to get her from my mind, to purge her from my blood. I'd spilled my seed into her three times that night, you see, and for a Fae male, that mates us to a single female for life. And she'd bitten me during our coupling, too, binding me as her consort-mate in the tradition of the Veela." He stoked over his throat with an unconscious hand, highlighting the one imperfection Hermione could see upon his beautiful form: twin scars created by a pair of sharp fangs. "I couldn't afford another night with her, though, so I sat outside her window. I couldn't stay away. I was in the throes of lust and love for her by then…"
The agony etched into his face was enough for her to fill in the blanks.
"You heard her with other men."
The growl he emanated reminded her of the one Draco had made once or twice during this game. "I grew crazed, threw myself on the feet of the house's owner and its Madam, begged them to allow me to take Psyche from there, but my Psyche was their best courtesan. She brought them fame and riches, and they refused to let her out of her contract. She was magically bound to serve them so long as they held her paper."
"There's always a way out of every contract," Hermione stated assuredly, thinking of Daphne Greengrass' contract and remembering her earlier promise to help the witch find a way around it so she and Nott could be together. "You just have to know where to look and how to consider its loopholes in different ways."
Eros shrugged. "Perhaps, but I have no skill at such things, and neither did Sabrina. She was trapped…and I with her, bound by our mating."
He was oddly silent after that, and Hermione began to get an itchy feeling between her shoulder blades again, one that told her what he wasn't saying was as important to this tale. "You did something, didn't you?" she asked, observing him with a careful eye. "That's what you meant by her needing to stop you."
His lips twitched with a dark cynicism that could be classified as borderline madness. What had being inside this horcrux done to this man?
"I think you're smart enough to put it together," he said, glancing at her through his impossibly long, black lashes.
She took a deep breath and let it out nice and slow to calm her fast beating heart.
"You murdered her lovers," she guessed.
He didn't bother denying it. In fact, he almost seemed boastful when he related the details of his kills. "The house only opened in the evening for customers, so when they came for her at night and waited for her in her room, I would sneak in, snuff the lights, and smother them until they breathed no more," he admitted. "The first time she took the blame. Told the Madam her Veela had slipped her control. The house owner found a way to make it seem as if the man had been mugged by a street thug and thrown into the Thames. But my jealousy was all-consuming. By the third death, the house owner and his Madam-wife began to suspect that one of Psyche's lovers was responsible instead…as did the local constabulary."
Hermione put a hand to her brow, a bit distressed that she was sitting next to a confessed murderer and talking with him as calmly as one might discuss having tea. "I hate to ask such a cold-blooded, evil thing, but if you were willing to go that far, why didn't one or both of you simply murder the house owners, destroy the contract, and run?"
"Why would Sabrina do so? For the first time in her life, she was in a safe, comfortable place. She was well-fed, well-cared for, and never had to worry about counting Sickles of Knuts again. Besides, by then, her Veela was almost in full control of her body."
Despite the fact she knew Veela had a fierce temper and could morph into their creature form at the slightest provocation, still Hermione was surprised to learn that a Veela could actually overtake its human host. Nothing she'd ever read on the subject had even sniffed at that possibility. A magical creature specialist like the Scamanders she was not, but she had done enough reading up on them for her classes...and when she was bored and in the library, looking for other topics to learn more about, too.
"How is that even possible?" she asked.
"Veela are, essentially, vain and narcissistic and as such, they are slaves to their baser instincts and emotions. The need to sate their desires and needs comes before anything else," Eros told her, regret stamped across his features. His wings drooped again. "In killing off the Veela's food source, I'd acted as a possessive mate, rather than a caring one. I'd denied the Veela its sustenance out of jealousy and it became enraged that I would dare abuse our mate bond in such a way. It began to believe I was trying to kill it, rather than kill those that were a threat to our mating."
"It slipped the rails," she absently said, mulling that over. "Was it really that strong that it could convince her of such a thing, though?"
Seeming agitated at the thought, Eros hopped to his feet and began pacing the room. "Her Veela…it's a powerful creature, more so than any I've ever encountered. I believe its strength might be why Angelo Zabini ran after spending the night in Psyche's arms. He was wealthy, could have bought out her contract and taken her with him. Two Veela lovers can sustain each other in perfect harmony, both feeding to and from each other. But he ran instead, and I think…no, I'm sure it was because he feared her Veela."
"But you didn't?"
He shook his head. "Not at first, but after the second murder, it began whispering in her ear, feeding her lies about me, about my motivations. It told her I'd wanted to enslave her in that lovely, lonely house of pleasure, just as Eros had once enslaved his Psyche in the myths."
Hermione recalled what she could of the Eros and Psyche story, recalling how the God of Love and Lust had ordered the west wind to capture Psyche and whisk her away to Eros' private sanctum, and how she was well cared for within its walls, but couldn't leave. All day, she would lead a hum-drum existence waiting for the night to come, when Eros would visit her in the darkness and couple with her. Every dawn, he would leave, denying her the chance to learn his true identity…or to leave his home. For months she'd remained locked in that pattern…a prisoner to a male's desires, her own forever unrealized.
"Would it be correct to assume that, like in the myth, your Psyche was determined to find out the truth of your identity, the mate she'd claimed, but whom she'd never even seen?" When he nodded, his eyes growing sad, she guessed what came next. "You weren't well-received by her or her Veela, I take it."
He smirked. "Obviously."
"Why not?" She looked him over, noting his perfection. He was an exemplary member of the male gender. "What could she possibly have taken offence to?"
He gave her a pointed look.
It occurred to her what he wasn't saying. "Your wings? You think being Seelie Court Fae was the problem? Why? Love is in the heart, not in one's genetics."
"That is easier said than lived," he told her with a glance over his shoulder at his lovely appendages. "Besides, there was my reputation, too. She'd heard from the Madam the rumours of why I'd sought her out to begin with, and thanks to her Veela's whispering, believed it still to be the case that I was attempting to crush her spirit. She viewed our mating as a trick I'd played on her to force her to kneel at my feet."
"I assume you told her the truth?"
"Yes, of course, but would you believe your sworn enemy capable of such a drastic and sincere change merely because you once spent the night in each other's arms?"
She shrugged, thinking of the impossible situation between her and Draco, and finding it difficult not to still be amazed where they'd ended up. "Technically, I did just that tonight."
"But you and the Malfoy boy are not enemies, not really. You don't actually want to kill each other."
Her answering laughter was filled with mirth at that. "Well, there are certainly days I think we would both argue that point. Seriously, beyond that though, our different House sortings and magical lineage automatically pit us as anathema to the other. And really, we are opposites in almost every way that matters. Yet, those differences are actually intriguing enough to keep us both interested, rather than repel us. At least, they are on my end of things. I would hope it was the same for Draco."
He frowned at that as he considered her words.
"Do you know the one thing this horrid game has taught me?" she asked him, noting again how very familiar he seemed to her. Something about him reminded her of someone else... Unfortunately, it was only a ghostly thought in her head of a passing resemblance to someone she knew, although to her frustration, she couldn't place a name with the idea. "I learned that not only will you have preconceived notions about the other person that might not be true, but the world will also have opinions about what you should and shouldn't do, how you should and shouldn't feel about that person. The relationship between you is yours to unravel and reveal, though, not anyone else's business. What matters most is how a couple feels about each other once their cards are all down and laid out."
Eros really seemed to take that in, to roll it over in his mind.
"Even so," he agreed, "at the time, her rejection...I didn't take it well. It deeply hurt me."
There was unspoken meaning in between those words that Hermione parsed out.
"So you hurt her back."
He nodded and seemed to deflate as he recalled what came next. "We were cruel to each other. There were awful words, she slapped me, I scared her by threatening her. I was so angry, but more than that, I was...afraid. I was losing her and nothing I said could change her mind."
"So you kept killing her patrons."
"Yes, and to retaliate, she kept inviting more to her bed."
"It became a sick game you played against each other."
"Yes."
"And to stop it, she finally killed you."
"In a way, yes."
Well, that was a sufficiently confusing answer! "Tell me about the night it ended," she coaxed him. "Make me understand why and how it went wrong."
His eyes went distant again with the memories. "She'd gone down to dine before the House opened for business for the night. I'd sneaked into her room, waited for her. I was bored so started playing with her favourite deck of cards. She would sometimes use them with her clients to role-play."
"The same cards as the ones we're using for this game tonight?" Hermione asked, excited that she might learn the origin of the mysterious deck.
Eros confirmed it with a nod. "They'd been a gift from the house owner after he'd raped Sabrina...a way to buy her off, I suppose. I'd heard her through the window once brag to one of the other women in the house that they'd belonged to a Muggle Queen of England, given to an unsuccessful suitor who was the house owner's ancestor. The house owner had thought them intriguing for their history, of course, but because they'd been gifted to his family by a Muggle..." He shook his head. "The man was a staunch pure-blood conservative. To him, the cards had been something he could convince others had value, but he felt them common and unimpressive, himself."
"So they were a mundane set of cards?" she pressed. "Not magical?"
"Not when she'd received them, no. But Sabrina had been a gifted witch, clever like you. She used magic to bring them to life."
Hermione didn't like the sound of that. "I can only think of one way she might have achieved that..."
"Blood magic," he confirmed. "Hers, though. Of that I'm sure. She hadn't wanted any of the other girls in the house or the house owner to be able to use them without her permission. Possessions among courtesans were coveted and dictated status, and the cards were another way to enhance Sabrina's reputation. She didn't want others to steal that from her."
"So she used dark magic to animate them, making them...sentient, like a Howler."
He nodded.
"And presumably she came in, found you in her room, and killed you over the cards, turning them into an accidental horcrux and trapping a piece of your souls together in here?"
"Not...exactly." He sighed, rubbed the back of his neck, and his wings stretched out, slowly extending as far left and right as they could go before folding back in and tucking themselves against Eros' back. "I was turning cards, reading the text from the last game she'd played. Back then, they were only Deeds and Forfeits. It struck me when I was about half way through the deck that Sabrina had...she'd done all the things printed on the cards with other men and women." He glanced over at her, and there was such despondency in his eyes that it hurt to look at it. "I looked in her closet and her jewellery case... I knew then she would never leave with me. As I said earlier, she was rich from her endeavours between the sheets, but that was when it really occurred to me that she was rich enough to have already bought out her contract, yet she hadn't. It didn't take a genius intellect to determine why: she'd loved being a courtesan. It gave her power and a certain kind of freedom that she, as a regular pure-blood witch, would not have had normally in our society."
That much was probably true, Hermione thought. Sabrina had been born into a time-period where women were still property of men, even in the wizarding world, where they were a little more liberal about things compared to the Muggle world. Still, she probably would have been forced to marry some pure-blood her father would have chosen for her, had her father not been a drunken lout and gambling addict. At her particular level in society, her position would have been relegated to birthing heirs and attending balls and, maybe even, engaging in a hobby deemed 'appropriate' for a member of the Wizarding Ton. Most likely, she wouldn't have loved her husband, but instead made a 'smart match' for property or wealth or to combine to bloodlines. Her life would have been tedious and controlled; a gilded cage for a lovely bird to wither and die within.
"She could go out to the opera or to balls, if you patron wanted to take her," Eros continued. "She could wear clothing that staunch pure-blood fashion would not normally allow women to wear. She could read bawdy poetry books, be decadent, dabble in political intrigue behind the scenes, and enjoy indiscriminate sexual relationships with a variety of people, all of whom were hers to pick and choose."
-None of which a woman of the Beau Monde would have been allowed to do back then, Hermione knew from her understanding of wizarding and Muggle history.
No wonder Sabrina had wanted to stay.
But her Veela had chosen a consort-mate, even if it was hateful of that fact, and Eros' Fae had chosen her for its mate. They were locked together between her desires for her freedom and her ambition and his jealousy of how those things kept her from him. "Did you attack her?" she asked in a horrified whisper, her hand flying to her throat in a protective gesture without conscious thought. "Did you try to kill her, too?"
He abruptly paced his way over to the window that looked out over the lake, seeming agitated and restless. "No, I...I begged her to leave with me." He slammed his fist into the glass in frustration. "I offered her everything I had left if only she would come away from the house with me. She rejected me again. Then...she started to cry."
To say Hermione hadn't been expecting that response was an understatement. Did Sabrina's tears mean the woman had wrested control back from her Veela? Or had she just been so overwhelmed by the offer that her emotions had finally broken under the stress of the situation?
"I knew she loved me then, as I'd loved her," Eros stated with conviction. "But we both felt the hopelessness of our situation: mates who shouldn't...couldn't be together." His wings slumped towards the floor again, indicating his disappointment and distress. "We were poison to the other, and yet were as helpless to the throes of our addiction as opium users." He turned, and as the moonlight lit up his profile, it was only then that Hermione belatedly realised it was still night outside, despite the fact it should be sometime in the early morning. "We agreed then... It was the only way to be together. Trapped inside a horcrux together, we believed we could touch without pain, for these aren't our real bodies, only pieces of our spirits. We could love in here, feed each other and sustain the other."
"But a horcrux requires one of you to remain alive, to murder in coldblood the other," she reiterated what they both already knew. "That act alone rips your soul apart. And because the spell is dark magic derived, it warps and taints everything and everyone it touches."
He didn't disagree, she noticed.
"My god, she's gone stark-raving mad, hasn't she? Her soul inside here with us, it's become evil. And most likely, her living self out in the real world as well." It was no wonder then why everyone who had played this game before them had gone depraved. They'd most likely already had the propensity, but exposure to the horcrux, coupled with Psyche's mind-games with the cards... "How did either of you even learn about horcruxes in the first place? It's not as if they're discussed in school."
"One of Sabrina's early paramours was Owle Bullock."
The author of "Secrets of the Darkest Arts", the most comprehensive guide to all things black magic. Thoughts flew through Hermione's head at a dizzying speed, then: this was how Voldemort knew how to make horcruxes—Sabrina had told him, this was how Lockhart had learned his wicked memory charms—Sabrina had shown him, this was how Dolores Umbridge had learned how to make a Blood Quill that she could sneak onto Hogwarts property and escape Dumbledore's detection—Sabrina had taught her... Because Owle Bullock's book was a guide for all of those things and worse.
She should know; she'd read the book, too.
A horrible idea began to form in her mind, then, as she considered all the ways dark magic could be used to defeat and destroy others... "You said it was possible for you to get me pregnant in here, despite not actually having a physical form. Logically, the reverse should also be true of a man in this game with Psyche, then." She looked over at her companion, willing the dread that was suddenly clawing up her chest not to erupt into a full-blown panic attack at any moment. "You said she was distracted earlier. Distracted by what exactly?"
Eros did not reply, but it was clear from the expression on his face that he was guilty of subterfuge.
She stared at him, her anxiety levels hitting the roof. He'd masqueraded as Draco earlier, which meant he and Psyche could change their forms at will... "You've been distracting me, haven't you? So she can-" She began swearing under her breath at having been so spectacularly tricked, her curiosity to discover the truth in all things the bait Eros had used to keep her in this room, her attention diverted from the others in the game, especially the whereabouts of her partner. "Where's Draco?" she demanded, baring her teeth in fury.
When the wizard across the room refused to answer, Hermione knew then that she'd guessed right once more.
She stood up and raced for the door, banging into it with her shoulder.
The exit was locked against her.
"No, no, NO!" she shouted, and cast wandless magic at it in desperation, a variety of spells, all to no avail. "Draco...oh, god...please, no!"
So wrapped up was she in escape, she didn't notice she was being caged-in from behind. "You need to know something else," her 'host' calmly said as his hand wrapped around hers on the door knob, holding her in place with a strength she hadn't expected and couldn't shake off. The shadow of a half-mad Eros menacing behind her, wings expanded, conjured the fantasy of the Angel of Death coming for her. Worse, Lucifer, himself! "The man who won my Sabrina from her father...the owner of the house who had raped her and claimed her virginity...his name was Septimus Malfoy."
Oh, Merlin, Draco's ancestor!
The reason Sabrina had given her lover the card deck and why Eros was willing to help her in her evil scheme now made perfect sense: Eros and Psyche both wanted revenge upon Draco for the sins of his forebear.
Heart constricting with fear, Hermione fought with an hysterical level of violence against Eros' restraining hold on her...all to no avail.
TO BE CONTINUED...
Author's Notes:
Foreshadowing hints for you:
Hint #1: Ignotus Peverell is who's great-many times over grandfather again?
Hint #2: Note Eros' physical description. Remind you of anyone?
Hint #3: Both living and horcrux Sabrina each have a particular target for revenge, both of whom have been mentioned in this chapter.
This chapter took a bit longer to get out than I'd anticipated, but now at least you have some important answers. More to come in the next chapters!
Your reviews are encouraging, as I love hearing your thoughts my lovely dahlings!
XOXO,
- RZZMG
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Musical Selection for this chapter: "Love Gone Wrong" by You+Me. Lyrics are as follows...
.
Baby, baby, don't you come my way no more
I don't want you knocking at my doors
Baby, baby, why you treat me so damn mean?
When I gave you my love, more than you ever seen.
Baby, baby, oh can't you see my pain?
Don't you understand what it's like to feel this way?
Baby, baby, don't you come my way no more.
'Cause it won't be like the way it was before.
Ours was just a love gone wrong.
Don't that sound like the same old song.
This time I'm gonna be moving on.
Cause baby I'm gone, I'm gone, gone, gone.
I'm gone for good.
Baby, baby, think you got this solely wrong.
You were missing just stood me, and my love and all alone.
Baby, baby, could've all worked out just fine.
But you came breaking me down.
And working me time after time.
And you say, "Baby, baby, oh can I see your pain?"
Don't I understand what it's like to feel this way?
Well, let me tell you baby...
Baby, baby, won't you step into these shoes?
Walk a mile with me, and then tell me who hurt who.
Ours was just a love gone wrong.
Don't that sound like the same old song.
This time I'm gonna moving on.
Cause baby I'm gone, I'm gone, gone, gone.
I'm gone for good.