Captured

Chapter Ten: Uncertainty

Bipsy laid a cool, tiny hand on Hermione's cheek, a pity well beyond how old she seemed to be shining there in her sparkling ocean eyes. "Bipsy knows that Hermione Granger is not like other witches and wizards. Bipsy has heard of Harry Potter's kindness, too. But you and Harry Potter is not growing up in the wizarding world. House-elves is supposed to treated this way." She patted Hermione on the cheek affectionately twice before backing up and disappearing with a crack.

Hermione let out a disappointed sigh and stayed kneeling there a moment longer before standing again, wincing at the various aches that lanced through her as she did. Her injuries were all practically healed at this point, but sleeping curled in a ball on the hard ground for weeks, even with a sleeping roll to cushion it, had resulted in a near-constant soreness within her.

She grabbed the basket, glancing inside to see an assortment of fresh fruits, cheeses, and bread, before she remembered what she had left hidden in the closet. She stepped into her small space that she had slept in for two weeks, crossing to her sleeping roll so she could pull out the book, cradling it gently and close to her chest as she did. She made her way back to her bed in the main room, noting that it got a decent enough amount of moonlight for her to probably be able to read by when tucked under the covers.

She crawled back into it, forcing herself to eat before she even thought of picking the book back up. She normally didn't mind reading while she ate, normally preferred it, actually. She was sure every student at Hogwarts, if they had their memories searched, would have a seemingly endless compilation of memories of Hermione Granger sitting at the Gryffindor table with her nose buried in a book, one hand propping it open as she deftly scooped her food into her mouth with the other.

But this book... it felt almost sacrilege, blasphemous to sully it with hands greasy or dirty from food. If she ruined it, it's not as if they could just go get another one.

Well, maybe. It is the Malfoys.

But even so, knowing how few copies there were of this in the world, she couldn't bear to hurt it. She thought it would physically pain her to do so.

So, she scarfed down her food, barely tasting it as she did. As soon as she was done, she wiped her hands excessively on her jeans until she was satisfied that her hands were as clean as they were going to be. Contentedly, she nestled against the headboard and propped the book open against her knees and continued reading.

She had left off when the people had begun leaving Cornelius' kingdom. Finally, there was no one left in the kingdom but he. For the first time in his life, he was utterly, completely alone. Growing up a prince before ascending the throne as the only heir, Cornelius had known nothing but comfort and the dutiful attention of countless servants throughout his life. This was the first time he was needing to do anything for himself, and he hated it. But over the years he became somewhat accustomed to it.

Of course, being left angry and sullen didn't help his interactions with outside people, so anytime someone stumbled across his kingdom, he scared them away.

That is until one day, when he was out hunting and he stumbled across a young woman who was searching for a rare plant to bring back to her family. She had traveled far, and had found her way to the grounds of his palace, thinking them to be abandoned and not realizing who they belonged to. She became distracted by the beautiful, enchanted rose garden and had just barely touched one of the full white roses when he found her.

Seeing her by herself, defenseless, he had grabbed her and whisked her back to the palace. She begged for him to let her go, said that her family needed her. He took her to one of his many vaults and told her she could send gold, but that she had to stay in return. If she left, he would take back the gold and everything they had bought with it.