Year 5 - Stockholm

Chapter 18

Simple Plots

A dark corridor lit with a single candle stretched endlessly in darkness. It was impenetrable by the naked eye. The faded green and gold wallpaper peeled in the corners near trim boards. Each portrait was shielded in a white veil. It felt a mausoleum. The air stagnant as death, dusty and aged.

The mahogany wood creaked. Each step a betrayal of presence.

It was narrow and tight throughout the home. The stairs ascended in a sharp angle and descended in a seemingly slide down the levels of the townhouse. The railing, an ancient broken spindle nightmare. Chips in the woods. Long scrapes down the center steps.

The mumbling whispers of voices from within a grave. Their ghoulish tones set the hairs on the back of the neck stiff with a cold sweat.

Hell. It was a living hell as the night bled in through the walls. Surrounding. Suffocating.

Hermione kept her arms stretched out to keep the walls from caving in as she walked. It was the dead of night. Her mind kept her conscious in its constant state of tension. Of terror.

She roamed the halls in pitch black. Her heart sped as the shadows fell across her vision, blacker than black. Nothing but an abyss to stare into. What stared back worried her most. The whispers of the dead. The eerie emotion of the house. Burned out names in family wallpaper and haunted memories of a dead home. It was enough to stay her sleep for a while. A long while.

"The coming tides of cleansing," a voice whispered.

"The rise of the Dark Lord. It will restore the world under Morgana's rule."

A sharp hiss echoed. "Deattthhhhhhhh."

"The world will bathe in the blood of the filth, refresh grounds anew, rise a new era of the wizard."

Her feet hurried down the stairs. A sensation of hands clawing at her gripped her chest in panic. They were speaking to her!

She fell her hair pulled from the messy plaits. Her hands tensed against the railing. The next floor was a pool of darkness. It felt cold. Lonely. Cursed. She stared in through a faded black into the deepest depths of the hue.

A board creaked under foot. Whose foot?

Through the dark, a face appeared. It was scarred. Two hollow, sad eyes split through.

"Remus," she breathed. Hand on her chest.

He acknowledged her with a subtle raise of his gaze. "Not a restful sleeper?"

"Not recently, no."

His voice was something she remembered much brighter, with conviction. "Then our restless paths were bound to cross."

A few more steps he ascended. His body grew into the soft candle light. The man wore tattered and ripped clothing, relaxed. Nothing constricted. It must have reminded him of a full moon...

The limp strands of his hair fell as his head titled. "I have been meaning to speak with you. The time has never felt right. I don't suppose you would oblige me in a spot of tea?"

She nodded. "Gladly."

They pair walked down the stairs together. Their feet creaked the boards in a noisy chorus. It drowned the whispering voices to nothing but a figment of imagination. The air changed. Grimmauld Place filled with the smell of parchment and ink and strong tea and butter? Her stomach growled up in need.

The long stretch of corridor was no longer threatening. A comfort fell upon her mind.

No shadows chased her. Spirits of the grave no longer cursed her every breath. The threats of the collapsing walls were all in her head.