Author's Note:

This occurred to me when Quarantine started (myself and many other writers experienced a sudden creative shut down when the news hit). Something non-serious, something I could just jot down in quick spurts and share with you daily while isolation protocols continued. From there, I thought 'we don't see a whole lot of vampire!Hermione . . . . Oh, well, if I'm going to write a non-serious vampire!Hermione fic, then it's got to be a Lumione, because my Lucius fancast (Alexander Skarsgard) is most famous for playing a vampire, that's kind of inherently humorous.' And here we are.

Because I made this up as I sat down to write each day with no set-out storyline, things get a little goofy here & there. This was a creative exercise to reset my brain and lure the other plunnies back into the open.

DISCLAIMER: I do not own Harry Potter, or any affiliated characters, and make no profit—in any form—from this work.

Chapter One

She was in a box . . . .

Hermione couldn't quite remember how or when she'd gotten into this pitch-black rectangle of wood, though she tried desperately to recall any scrap of information as she ran one hand across the rough surface above her and scrambled to search for her wand with the other.

Her weapon was missing, but of course it was. Bloody hell.

She tried to keep her breathing low and steady, but panic was welling up in her chest. "Stay calm, Hermione, stay calm." But honestly, she was kicking herself a bit. She knew Wizarding London was not the same place it had been before the War. Voldemort had been defeated, but the darkness left in his wake had scarred their community. She'd left because of it, gone to Paris and Hong Kong, and so many places happy for the assistance of a 'brilliant war hero.'

Somehow, she'd been unable to avoid a desire to come home for long.

Pursing her trembling lips, she sniffled. "Had to get homesick, didn't you?"

Bracing her palms against the wooden ceiling, she pushed with all her strength, but after a little give, it wouldn't budge. Letting it drop back the increments she'd managed to force it upward brought something falling through the slats onto her face.

Brushing it away, she realized it was dirt. She wasn't simply in a box. She was buried in a coffin. Shabby, hastily-constructed, but a coffin nonetheless. How the bloody hell . . . ? And why? Hermione considered that the poor quality meant she could possibly break out with enough effort, but she had no way to know how deep she was buried. There could be a foot of dirt over her or six.

If she could only remember why this had happened to her . . . . Had she seen or heard something she wasn't supposed to? Where had she been exactly?

Nothing. The time between arriving at Diagon Alley to do a bit of shopping before heading to The Leaky Cauldron and opening her eyes to the blackness now surrounding her was a complete blank.

She had no choice. It would use up a good portion of whatever oxygen she had left, but she was going to have to scream her head off like an idiot and hope someone heard her.

Grey eyes narrowed, scanning the graveyard's bleak and dismal landscape. What was that sound? If Lucius didn't know better, he'd think it his father sniping at him from the beyond for the disgrace of being a pure-blood wizard whose wife left him. Such a Muggle thing, he'd have said in a voice dripping with scorn. She'd actually left a few years ago, he simply hadn't had the stomach to say the words aloud sooner. Especially not here, staring at the headstone of his too-proud father.

He couldn't blame Narcissa for going. If he could've left himself after the War, he'd have done so in a heartbeat.

"Oh, shut up," he said to the grave—words he'd never have dared to breathe when Abraxas had been alive. This was what he got for following some stupid tradition of visiting graves on birthdays.

Yet as he turned away, he heard it again. That sound . . . he strained to listen. That wasn't his imagination, and it certainly wasn't his father.

Drawing his wand, he waited for more sounds to give him a direction.

Hermione was sobbing by the time the coffin lid lightened against her hands. Putting the last of her strength into forcing it upward, she was rewarded with another sprinkle of dirt raining down on her.

Coughing and waving her hands before her face, she was not prepared for the tug of a Levicorpus lifting her from the box. The caster set her on the ground with an indelicate thud—an abrupt dispelment probably caused by shock.

"Miss Granger?"

She heard the surprised whisper from somewhere very near her face. That voice was familiar.

Blinking open her eyes, she stared back in disbelief. "Mr. Malfoy?"

Of all the people to come to her rescue!