A/N: Sorry for being late to post this. The chapter somehow disappeared from my folders. I'm still not sure what happened to it because I didn't delete it. Thankfully I still remember what I had written so it didn't take long for me to rewrite it.
Chapter 9: Ghost of You
"Is mistress pleased?" Dobby asked, wringing his ears as he waited to hear from Hermione. Hermione smiled as she knelt down to his level and embraced the elf in a hug.
"I am very pleased, Dobby. You have done a good job," she assured him before she pulled away from him. "Now go and take the day off with Winky. I will call you if I need you." Dobby nodded, bowing then he disappeared. Hermione turned back to face the cage.
Within the cage was a pudgy man trembling as he stared at the young witch before him. Hermione smiled as she wrapped her hands the bars. There were many charms on the cage preventing the man within from escaping or changing his form. She wasn't going to lose him this time.
"Hello Peter," she greeted. Peter just trembled harder. He had known that the Black Rose would come for him; he just didn't know that it would have been her who was behind everything.
"What…what do you want?" He asked, his fear making his voice squeak. Hermione chuckled.
"Oh Peter, I am going to have so much fun with you," she told him. "I am going to teach you a lesson to why you should never betray your friends and their children." Peter whimpered. "The last time I saw you…you managed to escape." Her features harden. "But the last time Harry saw you, you were cutting his blood from him."
"My Master…" Peter started but Hermione waved her hand, cutting the trembling man off.
"Is nothing," she snapped. "You had friends who would have gladly laid down their lives for you and you betrayed them, for what? Jealously? Greed?" she shrugged. "I promise you this; you will be facing them again when I'm finished with you."
"You can't kill me," Peter tried to bluff. "That's not what the order does." Hermione shook her head sadly at the older man.
"I don't work with the Order. I do things my way," Hermione promised him. A clock chimed somewhere in the background and she looked at her watch then looked at Peter again. "I have to leave, but don't worry. I will be back to deal with you later."
"You're leaving?" he asked, hope betraying his thoughts. If she left, he would have the chance to escape, if possible. Hermione just giggled.
"Oh no, I'm sharing the fun. I have someone else to invite so you will just have to wait and see," Hermione promised him before she left, leaving him alone.
~_HxH_~
Cho Chang sighed to herself as she filed the folder into the cabinet and looked out of the window. Things had changed so much since she had left Hogwarts. It had been dangerous for Muggle-borns and Half-blood to go to Hogwarts but they prevailed but many of them had disappeared into the muggle world as soon as they graduated.
She bowed her head slightly as she remembered getting the news that Harry had died during the summer after her sixth year. She had been devastated as she had briefly dated the young man. That was two people she had dated had died. She still hadn't recovered from losing Cedric the year before.
"Hello Cho," a feminine voice greeted behind her. With a gasp, Cho spun around with her wand coming up, pointing at the stranger who was partially shrouded in darkness. They also had their hood up, hiding their identity.
"Who are you?" Cho asked. The figure chuckled.
"You know me; after all, you did have problems with me being friends with your…ex-boyfriend…if he could actually be called that."
"Granger," she hissed. Hermione pulled the hood off, revealing her identity to Cho.
"It's nice to see you again, Cho."
"Why do you want?" Cho asked, not once lowering her wand. "You're supposed to be at Hogwarts."
"Am I not allowed to see an old friend?" Hermione asked as she ran her fingers over the table, caressing the papers still laid out. "Besides, the better question is…what do you want?"
"We're not friends," Cho snapped, pulling the papers out of Hermione's reach and started piling them up. She then frowned as she looked at Hermione, curious to what Hermione meant. Hermione chuckled.
"I have someone that I would like you to meet. I'm sure you will…love it."
"What are you talking about?" Cho was curious, Hermione was different from the last time they had seen each other.
"How would you like to get your hands on the man who killed Cedric?" Hermione asked. Cho froze as she stared at the young woman before her. Flashes of statements from the newspapers started up in her mind and she gasped. She had stopped reading the papers after Harry's death had been announced. They had lied about Harry so many times over the 4th and 5th year that she had a hard time trusting anything they said.
"You're the Black Rose," she said before shaking her head as a wry smile crossed her face. "Of course, you would be the Black Rose. After all, no-else has much of a reason to take down Death Eaters than you do. I can't believe I never saw it before." Hermione smiled.
"Don't worry. You're not alone in that. Many people, who find out that I'm the Black Rose, blame themselves for not figuring it out quickly," Hermione assured her.
"My guess is they are people you caught and killed," Cho muttered. Hermione shrugged.
"They all hurt Harry one way or another. I had to make it clear that I wasn't going to stand by and let that happen. He died because of them." Cho nodded, understanding where Hermione was coming from. She had felt the same after she lost Cedric. When Harry admitted that Cedric had died because he wasn't meant to be there, she had been furious. He had been killed just because he was in the wrong place at the wrong time.
"You have the person who killed him?" Cho asked and Hermione nodded.
"He betrayed the Potters to Voldemort," Hermione informed Cho. "He was their secret keeper and he betrayed them. He owned a life debt to Harry yet he still betrayed him to Voldemort by cutting his blood out. I have him safely tucked away and I will not lose him, not this time." She looked at Cho. "And I thought you would want in on it. But before I take you to him, I have to extract an oath from you. I can't have this going back to Dumbledore or Voldemort. I'm not finished." Cho nodded.
"I'm in," she swore. "I'm not gonna talk to anyone about this. They let Cedric's murderer go free. If they had believed Harry in your third year, then he would have never been able to kill Cedric that night." Cho's features were hard as she clenched her fists.
Hermione reached out a hand. Cho placed her hand in hers and they both disappeared with a crack.
~_HxH_~
Peter had been trying to change into his rat form since Hermione had left with no success. He had even tried to break out of the chains that pinned his hands to the wall but he wasn't strong enough and he didn't have his wand on him. The elf that had found him and brought him to the Weasleys' Twins had snapped it, leaving him powerless.
The twins had tortured him themselves for a short time while asking him questions off a piece of paper. Whenever he answered it, one of them would write down on the paper before torturing him again.
They had finished and left him alone. He didn't know how long he had been in the room until the house-elf had shown up and brought him to his cell where he was introduced to the elf's mistress…Hermione Granger. He knew of Granger during his time as a rat under Ron's care. She had been the caring one, the one who had cared for Harry. He remembered Ron grumbling about Hermione being a nag and that she cared about Harry too much.
It was her cat that drove him from the boys' dormitory seeking shelter from the creature. When he had been revealed in the shrieking shack, he had tried appeal to Hermione's soft hearted nature but it had failed…until Potter had stepped between him and his other two best friends who were intent on killing him.
Now, that's all changed. Hermione Granger was no longer the soft hearted young girl she was then. She is now a cold hearted person who was going to have `fun' with him because he betrayed Lily and James, because he had betrayed Harry.
Peter lifted his head when he heard a noise and saw Hermione at the bars with another woman beside her. He froze at the sight of Hermione's grin.
"Hello Peter, I have brought my friend with me," Hermione greeted as she gestured to the Chinese woman. Peter relaxed slightly when he didn't recognise the woman. He had thought Hermione would bring Remus. Hermione smirked when she saw Peter relaxing. "She is Cho Chang, the girlfriend Cedric Diggory, the man you killed in fourth year." Peter froze up once more as understanding dawned on him.
"I…I…" Peter stammered and Hermione nodded.
"Yes, you thought I would have brought Remus," she told him before shaking her head. "He has already lost Lily, James, Sirius and Harry. I will not subject him to seeing another friend, despite you betraying him, murdered. I will not do that to him."
"He's nothing like I imagined," Cho admitted as she moved closer to the cell, one hand curling around the bars. "I always thought he would be more…darker looking. More evil."
"No, he's just a weak pathetic man who couldn't stand up to Voldemort," Hermione told her. Cho shook her head.
"It's insulting to think someone like him could have killed Cedric. I know that he had taken Cedric by surprise, but still…" Hermione nodded.
"Death Eaters don't like to play fair. They know they wouldn't win if they play fair." Cho chuckled darkly as she turned to face Hermione.
"Which is why you like to even the playing field?" she asked, gesturing her head toward Peter. Hermione smiled darkly.
"If they had captured me, they'd make sure I was tied down. All I'm doing is the same," Hermione promised before both of them looked at Peter who was trembling harder at their looks. He was beginning to get what they were implying. What he would have done to them if the Death Eaters had been captured was going to be returned ten-fold. He would be lucky if he even came out of it with his sanity intact.ermionHerh
"Do you want to have him alone or shall we share the fun?" Hermione asked. Cho smiled as she looked at Hermione.
"Let's share the fun," she agreed and both girls' smiles turned feral as they looked at Peter, who promptly pissed himself.
~_HxH_~
An owl made its way into the Ministry was a large parcel clutched in its talons. Upon finding the person who it was meant to deliver the parcel to, it swooped down.
Rufus Scrimgeor was busy holding a Press conference to try and assure the public that they were doing everything they could to stop the `Black Rose' from killing any more pureblood and catching Death Eaters. The public was beginning to think that the `Black Rose' was doing a better job than the Ministry.
The owl swooped down onto the table where Scrimgeor's assistant sat, dropping the parcel off then flying away before anyone could cast a tracking charm on it. Curious, the assistant looked at the package only to see `Urgent' written across in bold red letters. Frowning, she used her wand to cast a cutting charm, slicing through the sealing tape and opened the package, removing the tissue before her hand grasped something hairy and waxy.
Dread curled up in her stomach as she slowly removed the object and screamed, throwing the object away before wiping her hands upon her clothes, trying to remove the blood the best she could.
The reporters all looked at her when they heard her scream before seeing the object flying through the air before it hit the wall and landed on the ground with a sickly thud. All cameras started flashing as they took pictures of the object.
The Aurors rushed forward to push them back only for half of them to gag at the sight and the other half to turn pale.
Peter Pettigrew's head slowly rocked back and forth from where it had landed. Bruises were shown on his face with blood slowly pooling from the severed neck. His eyes had been removed, leaving behind gaping holes. His tongue had also been removed. The terror was frozen on the man's face and everyone got the message.
~_HxH_~
In two different places, Dumbledore and Voldemort stared at the front page of the prophet, the latest edition that had been rushed out shortly after the reporter had returned with the news and pictures of Peter Pettigrew's head, with a pensive look. Peter had been revealed to the world, proving that he had faked his death and had been a Death Eater due to the severed arm that had also been sent.
Sirius Black had been declared innocent while Peter got his award revoked, although too late. It bothered them because the Black Rose had done something that Harry Potter hadn't been able to achieve. They had gotten Sirius Black cleared…and they had killed Peter in the process.
It made them wonder…just much more blood would be spilled before the Black Rose would be stopped?
TBC
A/N: Well, the `bad man' has been revealed. I was never going to show the torture, we already know how sadistic Hermione can be and as Cho was also smart, we can be sure that she would be the same.
Before anyone goes off on a rant about how Remus should have been the one to help Hermione, I have something else in mind for him. Beside, Cho deserves some compensation for her boyfriend being killed by being in the wrong place at the wrong time. (I actually did like Cho in the books and I feel that she and Hermione could have been good friends if JK hadn't made her jealous of Hermione). And besides, who doesn't like to be tortured by two witches *whistles innocently*
-->