by Van © 2023
		Chapter 3

Breakfast in the Black Horse Inn's public room was plentiful, delicious, and greasy—but in a perfect way.  There are times when a full English fry-up breakfast is not a daunting proposition, and after being the targets of last night's daunting "sheet-mummy" dream sending spell, today was such a day for Hermione and Elspeth.

Thus fortified against whatever trials and tribulations the day might hold, the Undersecretary and her Auror Protector sallied forth into the village.  The morning air was chilly so they were both wearing their raincoats, and even though the probability of more rain was low, Hermione was still clutching her tightly rolled umbrella.  The day was seasonably cool, but the cloud cover was sparse and white and the intervening sky a vibrant shade of cerulean blue.  It was a brisk, clear Yorkshire morning.

Surprisingly, Hermione and Elspeth struck pay dirt on their first followup interview.  They entered a charming shop specializing in souvenirs and local crafts and were greeted by Mrs. Hornsby, the pleasant forty-something proprietor (and witch) they'd met yesterday.  After the usual greetings, Hermione indicated the shop's collection of quaint little dolls riding broomsticks and clad in stereotypical witch costumes.  They were in a group (a coven, perhaps?), and dangling from the branches of a tree branch display among stained glass sun-catchers, prismatic crystals, and other decorative trinkets.  "A local legend?"

Mrs. Hornsby smiled.  "Indeed.  The 'Giggle Witch' is a cautionary tale.  She's notorious for making off with disobedient, unruly, less than ideal children who neglect their chores, resist washing, exhibit disrespectful attitudes, and generally cause trouble for their hardworking, virtuous, and long-suffering mothers."

"Let me guess," Elspeth grinned.  "The witch pops them in her oven and bakes them into ginger biscuits?"

"Hardly," Mrs. Hornsby laughed.  "She comes in the night and spirits them away, makes them giggle 'til they become polite, congenial, and boring model children, then pops them back into their beds."

"Of course," Hermione smiled.  As a rule, Hermione disapproved of tickling, but the Giggle Witch sounded more innocent than most fairy tale torturers.

"According to the legend," Mrs. Hornsby continued, "she lived in the old keep out near Sheeps Scar Cairn.  Nowadays it's nothing but a tumbled down ruin, but in its day it was supposed to have been quite grand."  She winked.  "Also, it was guarded by a troop of terrible fey warriors that dispatched any and all hostile intruders with enchanted spears and magic arrows that never missed."  She opened a drawer in the base of a display cabinet and handed Hermione a folded map.  It was parchment and black ink, rather than muggle-style three-color printing on white paper.  Hermione unfolded the map and beheld an elegant depiction of the village of Giggleswick with all the prominent features and local attractions neatly labeled using florid calligraphy.

Mrs. Hornsby produced her wand—which caused Elspeth to let her wand drop from her sleeve and into her right hand; however, the ever vigilant Auror managed to restrain the impulse to disarm and/or blast the charming proprietor into next week, in no small part thanks to the quick and surreptitious warning frown directed her way by Hermione.  Mrs. Hornsby didn't appear to notice either the appearance of Elspeth's wand or the exchange between her two customers.  Anyway...

Mrs. Hornsby's tapped the tip of her wand to a small pile of decorative rocks drawn near the northern edge of the map, then sang in a surprisingly melodic voice.

♫♫♪♫   "Rowdy youngens ye attend, and heed–my–shout!   ♪♫♫♪
♫♪♫♪♪   The Giggle Witch'll get ya if ya don't–watch–out!"     ♫♫♪♫

Instantly, the rocks assembled themselves into a tiny castle and a minuscule cartoon witch on a broom began orbiting its central tower.  "There," she chuckled, "that's the exact spot a pair of naughty girls such as yourselves should avoid at all costs."

Hermione giggled (and Elspeth returned her wand to her right sleeve).  "Thank you," Hermione said as she refolded the map, then asked Mrs. Hornsby to box and wrap a Giggle Witch doll with purple trim and have it delivered to their room at the Black Horse Inn.  She then paid for her purchases and they left the shop.

"Well..." Elspeth purred quietly, "was that another warning... or an invitation?"

Hermione smiled.  "I strongly suspect that while you and I were enjoying that delicious pizza last evening, we were the topic of discussion at every pub and tavern in the village.  It would seem the popular consensus is that they should now fully cooperate with the pair of charming representatives of the Ministry visiting their quaint little hamlet."

"Either that or give us enough rope to hang ourselves," Elspeth muttered.

Hermione's smile widened.  It was her Protector's job to be paranoid, but she seriously doubted a nefarious conspiracy was unfolding all around them.  Doubtless, the "Giggle Witch" was one of the countless local myths and folk tales found across the face of rural Britain.  They'd investigate the ruined keep—meaning enjoy a pleasant stroll in the Yorkshire countryside—then return to Giggleswick and start asking polite but more directed questions about Giggleswick's long but poorly documented history of local abductions.

Also... if the legend turned out to be interesting enough, Hermione might pen a letter to Luna Lovegood and suggest "The Giggle Witch of Giggleswick" for a future article in The Quibbler.  Luna was always on the lookout for interesting, unusual, and harmless magical ephemera with which to fill her father's magazine, which as he grew older was becoming her magazine.  It will make for fewer things she has to make up out of whole cloth, Hermione mused.  She was kidding, of course.  Luna's imagination might carry her away now and again, but at her core her school chum "Loony Lovegood" was a serious journalist... of a sort.  In any case, The Quibbler was that kind of read.  It was fun, not a serious journal; but fun has its place, right?

They stopped at the small grocery and general store across the street and purchased the makings of a picnic lunch of bread, cheese, cold cuts, potted meat, tinned sardines, hard boiled eggs, fruit, a thermos of hot tea, and a wicker basket in which to carry it all... then followed Hermione's newly purchased map to the appropriate edge of town.

First making sure they were unobserved by any muggles in the area, Elspeth produced her wand, reduced the picnic basket and its contents to thimble size, then slipped it into her raincoat pocket.  Meanwhile, Hermione used her wand to reduce her brolly to a size appropriate for decorating a rum-based cocktail and placed it in her raincoat pocket.  Finally, as the last of the morning dew was still lingering on the grass, they transformed their sensible high-heel pumps into stylish knee-boots with textured soles suitable for hiking.  Hermione's were black and Elspeth's cognac-brown, both with gleaming satin finishes.

Thus fully prepared, the Undersecretary and her Protector set off in search of whatever was left of the alleged abode of the legendary Giggle Witch of Giggleswick.

In the UK and across much of Europe, the traditional and cherished "Right to Roam" grants the general public free passage across most public and private lands for purposes of hiking, angling, and other forms of harmless outdoor recreation (with reasonable restrictions, of course).  Most fields and pastures are protected by rock walls or modern wire fencing, and any gates encountered are usually closed and locked; however, there are often convenient "stiles" incorporated in the barriers that are specifically designed to provide pedestrian access.

Some stiles are quite simple, like "cattle guards," grates across roads or paths with the gaps between the slats sized to deter large quadrupeds, but there are also many clever traditional designs, including steps on both sides of the fence with a vertical pole to serve as a handhold, also free-spinning gates ("turnstiles"), and all are intended to bar passage to persistent and/or unusually intelligent cows, horses, and sheep.  (Goats are another matter.  Goats can climb trees.)

Anyway, Hermione and Elspeth had little difficulty traversing the pastures and fallow fields between Giggleswick and the indicated site of the ruin.  There were single-lane roads in the area that eventually would have taken them to their destination, but they would also have taken them all over the area and added many unnecessary miles to the direct route.  Also, they'd have had to dodge muggle traffic, even if automobiles, lorries, and horse-drawn carts seemed to be few and far between.  The as-the-crow-flies (or as-the-witch-hikes) route was much shorter and faster... and was also an invigorating and enjoyable stroll-in-the-country on a day like today.

Finally, they skirted the site of the Sheeps Scar Cairn, a jumble of boulders that might have been the remains of ancient tombs or minor standing stones... and approached the keep as indicated on the map.  They passed through a grove of black poplars... and on the crest of the low hill directly beyond they beheld a large pile of tumbled boulders overgrown with thorny brambles.  They most certainly were the remains of an ancient man-made structure, and also looked like they would be an excellent opportunity to encounter slithering snakes.  It was certainly not an inviting setting for a picnic.

Elspeth paused... then whipped out her wand and held it casually at the ready.  "Do you feel it?" she muttered.

"The warding spell?" Hermione responded.  She slowly drew her own wand... then cast a general purpose Revelio spell.  The air shimmered... and the boulders disappeared and in their place stood a modest but stately castle!  The keep itself was a large, central, round tower, and there were smaller round towers at the corners of what was left of the curtain walls.  Everything was overgrown with vines and other vegetation and the structure showed significant weathering and damage, including a wide breach that would obviously have been quite difficult for hypothetical warriors to successfully defend for very long... even if they were fey, terrible, and magically armed as the legend suggested.

"That was a minor glamour," Hermione observed, "more like a polite 'do not disturb' sign that an actual attempt to hide the castle."

"More potent barriers remain in place," Elspeth noted.

"They do," Hermione agreed, "but most are designed to repel muggles.  Otherwise, a site like this would be crawling with scores of muggle tourists, all arriving and departing in chartered omnibus caravans... and there would be a gift shop selling souvenirs and prepackaged unhealthy muggle-snacks with indefinite shelf-lives."

"Tour buses," Elspeth said evenly, her attentive gaze continuously scanning the castle.  "Muggles call them tour buses."

Hermione smiled, then continued.  "There are also active defensive spells against magical attack and to prevent the use of Apparation and other forms of magical transport."

As they watched, a large flock of ravens rose from the keep and began orbiting the castle like a swirling black cloud and cawing loudly in their typically annoying manner.  This went on for several long, loud, raucous seconds.

"Caw!  Caw!  Caw!  Caw!  Caw!"  Etc.

"Why the hell are they treating us like a pair of filthy egg-stealers?" Elspeth huffed.  "We haven't done anything... yet."

Hermione smiled, took a step forward, and cleared her throat.  "Ahem."  She then spoke in a polite but authoritative voice well short of a shout.  "Thank you!  But we're coming anyway!"

The ravens ceased their racket and collectively paused... flapping their wings and hovering in midair... then randomly dispersed into the surrounding forest.

"Shall we?" Hermione suggested, smiling and gesturing up the hill and towards the vine covered breach in the castle wall.  As they drew closer... the outline of the foundation made it clear the breach was the site of what had probably been the castle's gatehouse.  A path had been cleared through the tumbled stones... across the overgrown courtyard beyond... and up to a massive portal in the main keep.  It was made of ancient gray timbers bound with dark iron bands and studded with bolts.  Thanks to a fallen section of side-wall it looked like it would difficult if not impossible to open; however, there was a single-person door set in the main portal and it was unobstructed.  Also, it was the clear destination of the path under their feet.

"Shall I?" Elspeth offered, pointing to the inset door with her wand.

Hermione nodded.  "Carefully," she warned.  "We don't want to appear rude."

Elspeth smiled back, then flicked her wand and cast a spell.  "Alohomora!"

There was a loud click, the door swung inwards on silent hinges, and they found themselves facing a long, dark, gloomy passageway as wide as the main gate and with a high arched ceiling.  They cautiously stepped over the threshold.  Regular small openings overhead suggested "murder holes," tiny portals placed to allow defenders to rain arrows, boiling oil, and other discouragements down on the heads of hypothetical attackers.  Tracks on the dusty stone floor suggested regular foot traffic, but no one was waiting to greet them (or tell them to buzz off).

"I'll take the lead, Madam Undersecretary," Elspeth suggested (or, given her official role, ordered).

"Very well," Hermione answered, waited for Elspeth to take three paces forward... then followed.  In the murky corridor far ahead they could see a junction of smaller passages with one leading to the left, a second straight onward, and a third to the right.  The only light was from the open door at their backs, so both witches cast a Lumos spell and the tips of their wands began glowing with a harsh but adequate white light.  The walls appeared to be completely intact, at least in the immediate area.  There were no fallen blocks on the floor; however, the passage could use a good sweeping.

They continued forward... and suddenly—Bam!—the door slammed shut behind them!  Then, several things happened, all more-or-less at once:

●  A strong blast of wind blew back their hair and caused their open raincoats to flutter!

●  Both of their wands were jerked from their hands and shot away down the corridor!  Thanks to their still active Lumos spells they resembled a pair frantic fireflies fleeing into the distance!

●  Elspeth shrieked, stumbled to the floor, and began flailing her arms and legs!

●  Hermione nearly stumbled, but managed to remain on her feet!

●  Finally, countless tiny motes of glowing light rained down from the murder holes and swirled around them like a luminous snowstorm!  They were now the only source of light.

"Elspeth!" Hermione shouted as she lunged forward to assist her collapsed companion.  In the flickering, intermittent, uncertain glow, all she could clearly see was Elspeth's rumpled raincoat, parts of the rest of her clothing, and her now inexplicably empty boots!  The young Auror herself was conspicuous by her sudden absence!  But then, the jumbled pile of clothing began to move... and something small—much smaller than Elspeth—shot from the heap and took off down the corridor with what might have been a flash of reddish fur!  It was quickly lost in the darkness!

"Elspeth!" Hermione shouted, but received no answer.  She blinked and shook her head, trying to clear her mind... but the swirling motes were buzzing in her ears like so many glowing bees and making it very difficult to concentrate.  "Stop!" she commanded, waving her empty hands.  "Go away!"  The motes didn't go away, and easily evaded her thrashing arms and batting hands and continued buzzing around Hermione's head in an increasingly concentrated and accelerating whirling cloud!

Then... Hermione's eyes rolled up in her head, she stopped waving her arms, seemed to loose consciousness... and collapsed to the floor!  Thankfully, just before she landed on the hard stones, a levitation spell took hold and she gently settled the rest of the way... achieving a soft landing.

The motes winked out of existence all at once—as if someone had thrown a switch—and the corridor was instantly plunged into total darkness!

The young vixen ran and ran and ran.  There was just enough light in the cave to allow her to see.  She had the keen and totally dark-adapted eyes of a nocturnal predator, so it was easy; however, it wasn't at all clear exactly where the light was coming from.  It was as if everything around her was radiating a pale, unwavering glow.  No matter.  She continued to run.  It was the thing to do when a fox was in danger, to run!  Hiding would have been better, of course, much better, but there was nowhere she could hide.  It was in a very strangely shaped and inconveniently unobstructed cave.  All of its vertical walls were uniformly straight, as was the perfectly level floor under her pads, as was the horizontal ceiling overhead, and everything—walls, floor, and ceiling—stretched ahead as far as she could see!  Running was her only option!

Suddenly, the floor under the fox's rhythmically churning legs vanished—(!!!)—and she found herself plummeting into a deep and seemingly bottomless pit!  She yipped and barked in the manner if her kind, scrambled for purchase on something, anything, but continued dropping into the yawning depths below!

And then, after several truly terrifying seconds, the fox abruptly stopped falling and hung suspended in midair!  Then, she was abruptly transformed!  No longer a sleek, vulpine predator with gorgeous red fur, white face and belly, and black legs and bushy tail (with an attractive white tip), she was now a gangling, pale, slender human, with pink skin and long, orange, fluttering hair!

She—the human—gently landed in a pile of loose straw, and then—with a cacophony of metallic clinking and clattering—shackles, manacles, an iron belt, and an iron collar clamped shut around her ankles, wrists, waist, and neck!  All were connected by strong, hand-forged iron chains, and additional attached chains snaked away into the straw in various directions!

"Yip-yip-yip-yip-yip!" the woman barked in alarm and confusion, as if she was still a fox and not a naked, captive human.  She was young, probably in her early twenties, and any objective human observer would consider her slender but still voluptuous physique and even features to be quite comely.  She cleared her throat—"Yip!"—and once again tried to speak.  This time she succeeded.

"Hermione?"  (There was no answer.)  "Madam Undersecretary?"  (There was still no answer.)

Yes, the formerly running fox who had transformed into a naked and chained human captive was none other than Elspeth Tillyhope!

Elspeth looked around and considered her situation, which was... naked (meaning without clothes)... locked in chains (an abundance of chains)... and at the bottom of a deep, deep rectangular pit of dressed stone!  Her prison was roughly thirty feet on a side, and the ceiling...  Essentially there was no ceiling!  It was a lesson in perspective.  The softly glowing walls rose on all sides and converged to a pinpoint of green light... far, far overhead!

Elspeth's iron restraints were tight, but not uncomfortably so, and the connecting chains weren't especially restrictive.  That is, they provided abundant slack for all four of her limbs.  She was impeded by the weight of the rattling, clattering, hand-forged links, but could touch any part of her anatomy she cared to touch and could arrange her arms and legs in any manner she desired.  Still... she was locked in chains!  The manacles, fetters, and belt were wide and thick, but without any apparent hinges or locks.  Only staple-like half-rings for the attachment of the long, dangling chains marred their relatively smooth surfaces.  Her collar felt the same; however, of course, that opinion was based only on touch.

Then, Elspeth heard a scraping sound far overhead, looked up, and watched as a rectangular grid of stout iron bars began to slowly slide across the pit, something like forty or fifty feet over her head!  This continued until the grid blocked the entire opening... then stopped.  Elspeth was now locked in!  Not that it really mattered.  Even without all the chains she'd have been trapped.  Climbing out of the pit was clearly impossible.  There were no hand or footholds.

Elspeth's heart was pounding in her chest and her breath coming in pants.  Her Auror instruction had attempted to prepare her for the possibility of capture and imprisonment... but this was the real thing!  This was not a training scenario!

If not for the eldritch greenish glow of the stones, Elspeth knew she'd be in total darkness.  Being able to see was better, of course, but it did little to dissipate the despair threatening to overwhelm her heart and soul—but not for long!

Elspeth Tillyhope was made of stern stuff.  The Sorting Hat back at Hogwarts hadn't sorted her into Gryffindor for nothing!  Also, she was well trained.  Elspeth would find a way to escape... although exactly how she was going to do that she had exactly no idea.  She heaved a sigh and settled into the thick carpet of straw... which was pokey and irksome against her bare skin but unarguably better than the hard stone floor underneath.

However this turned out, Elspeth was not looking forward to writing up this part of her after-assignment report.  Her superiors were not going to be happy, especially Assistant Supervising Auror Potter.

All Elspeth could do was languish... and worry about what was happening to the Ministry of Magic dignitary she was supposed to be protecting, Undersecretary Hermione Granger-Weasley.

Hermione opened her eyes... blinked... and surveyed her surroundings.

She was sitting in a comfortably padded chair in a chamber she surmised was probably a part of the keep.  Its walls were whitewashed dressed stone and it had a vaulted ceiling; however, considerable effort had been put into "modernizing" the space with Rococo (or Rococo Revival) furnishings, including Hermione's elegantly carved and gilded chair.  Turkish or Persian carpets covered the stone floor, and deep red velvet drapes tied open with golden silk ropes and terminating in tassels and gauze-thin white curtains framed and covered the room's tall, deep, narrow, arrow-slit windows, respectively.  It was a patina of Victorian elegance washed over a Medieval setting.

Alarmingly, Hermione realized her clothing had been substantially altered!  She found herself in a truly disgraceful state!  Her boots, wool skirt, and white blouse were all in place, as was her white, lace-trimmed demi-bra; however, her blouse had been unbuttoned nearly all the way down, exposing her bellybutton and a goodly portion of her bra-contained breasts!  Also, her raincoat, jacket, pantyhose, half-slip, and panties were all missing!  (Of couse, as her skirt was present, the absence of her panties was based on feel alone.  The skirt's wool fabric was now in direct contact with areas which it had not been before!)  In any case, Hermione was in shameful deshabille!

Even more alarming, Hermione was bound hand and foot and to the chair by an abundance of tight, thin, three-strand, manila or hemp rope!

Her arms were folded behind her back, her wrists crossed and raised to just below the level of her shoulder blades, and her arms pinned against her torso by neat bands of rope that passed above and below her breasts and yoked her shoulders, and all of her upper-body-bonds were hitched between her arms and body, tightening her bonds until they were quite tight indeed!  More rope bound her bare knees and boot-clad ankles together, and the ankle ropes were lashed and hitched to the lower left chair-leg!  Finally, additional neat bands crossed her lap, pinning her in the chair's padded seat, and crossed her already bound upper-body, pressing her against the padded chair-back!  She wiggled, squirmed, writhed, and tried to kick her legs (see also struggled, twisted, and fidgeted).  Her fingers groped between her back and the chair... but to no avail.  All visible knots were totally unreachable and none of her efforts caused any of the ropes to loosen or shift, no matter how hard she tried.

Hermione would have had quite a bit to say about such unconscionable, indecorous, and uncivilized treatment, but there was no one present with whom to lodge a complaint.  Also—"Mrrrmpfh!"—a generous wad of something soft and silky had been stuffed in her mouth, nearly filling it to capacity!  This might be the solution to the Mystery of the Missing Panties, but there was no way she could be sure.  Also—"Nrrrrrmf!—a long, narrow strip of what was probably linen cloth had been used to first cleave her mouth, thus keep the possible panties stuffing in place, then had been tightly and repeatedly wrapped around her lower face from just under her nose to just under her chin, and then knotted at the nape of her neck, under her hair!  Hermione was well and truly gagged!

And speaking of her longish brown hair, it was completely loose and framing her gagged and distressed face in a tousled and no doubt unacceptably untidy manner!  Hermione tossed her head several times... and added her now disorderly coif to her growing list of unacceptable things she could do nothing about.

The semi-undressed prisoner-of-the-chair explored her condition with three or four additional minutes of vigorous, struggling effort—"Mrrrrrm!"—but all she achieved was to make her brown locks flutter and to impart a minor bouncing oscillation to her rope-framed, bra-contained, and shamefully half-exposed breasts.  Finally, she heaved a gagged sigh and relaxed in her bonds.  (Her hair and breasts relaxed as well.)

Elspeth was missing.  There was no sign of her ginger Protector, even though there was still plenty of Rococo furniture in the room to which her Elspeth could have been inescapably lashed... like Hermione herself at the moment.  That assumed her captor or captors hadn't used up all of their available rope to tie up Hermione, of course.  Anyway, Elspeth was nowhere to be seen... fully clothed, semi-clothed, or otherwise... bound and gagged or free.  She hoped the young Auror had evaded capture and even now was summoning reinforcements from the DMLE to mount an assault on the castle and rescue Hermione's bound, gagged, and disheveled self... but she knew that was probably not a realistic expectation.

Hermione settled in to wait.  That is, she resigned herself to an indefinite period of languishing.  Languishing would appear to be her only option.  Rescuing herself was clearly impossible.