Competition: The Ultimate Death Eater Contest by Miss Bella Riddle of HPFC
Word Count: 1,190
Prompt: Lucius or Draco Malfoy #5 "Sometimes you have to get your hands dirty"
It was over—the war was finally over, but Draco Malfoy didn't feel much like celebrating. Maybe it was the fact that everyone was glaring at him as if he was some sort of traitor, (which, mind you, he was) or maybe it was the fact that one of his best friends since he was a toddler was dead. Whatever it was, when everyone else was in the Great Hall mourning loved ones or toasting the end of Voldemort, Draco was not joining in the festivities. Professor McGonagall was overseeing the whole mess, trying to distribute the St. Mungos Healers that had just arrived to the people who needed attention and directing people who were looking for family members or friends to Luna Lovegood, who had a list of every participant in the battle that was known. Finally, Draco drew the remains of his bravery together and walked up to his professor.
"What can I do to help?"
She looked down at him skeptically through her wire rimmed glasses that she had somehow retained throughout the fight. The sharp look wasn't exactly fair—he was trying to help after all.
"We are still missing several students," she said, choosing her words carefully as if afraid that he would whip out his wand and start killing the injured people lying propped up next to her.
"Do you want me to look?"
That look again. Draco sighed and inwardly rolled his eyes.
"The sixth floor corridor is in ruins."
Draco walked out of the Hall, ignoring the disparaging looks that were thrown his way by his classmates. Even if he had never managed to do it before, he was going to do something good and then they'd all see. Draco picked his way through the Entrance Hall, trying his best not to remember Bellatrix cursing her helpless victim there only hours before. It felt like years ago that he had gone to sleep in the Slytherin Common Room. Part of the staircase had been torn apart completely, so Draco had to leap over a two foot gap. It certainly hadn't been the most frightening thing he had been required to do over the past few hours.
He continued on his way past paintings that had been blown out of their frames, the owners moaning in the portrait next door. The door to the Charms room was hanging by one hinge, and the blackboard was splattered with a dark substance that Draco had no desire to get any closer to. Up and up he walked, occasionally forced to balance, gymnast-like on narrow edges that had once served as stairs.
Finally he reached the sixth floor. McGonagall had been right: it was a wreck. Draco could see the dawn, fiery on the horizon thorugh a gaping hole in the castle wall. Merlin knew what kind of spell would have had to be cast to have destroyed the magical protections.
"Hello?" he called.
There was nothing. Draco was beginning to think that McGonagall had sent him on a wild goose chase when a faint voice answered him.
"Help!"
Draco stumbled through the rubble towards the sound of the young girl's voice. It had come from the odd arch structure that had been formed by part of the
Ceiling when it had collapsed and a part of the wall. Draco pointed his wand at the ruins and flicked it expertly.
"Wingardium Leviosa!" he said.
Nothing happened.
"Don't you think I tried that already?" came the slightly snarky reply from underneath the trap.
"Well, what do you want me to do?" he snapped.
"Try to shift some of the rubble."
Draco sighed and got down on his knees next it and began to move the wreckage. It was tiresome work, and after a few minutes, his arms began to feel as if he had been doing it for days. He didn't seem to be making much progress. The trapped girl was silent; perhaps she was dead. Shaking his head of this perturbing thought, Draco continued his labor.
"Thank Merlin," said the girl when her head at last came into view, smeared with blood, and covered in bruises and dust older then she was.
Draco had wormed his way into the crevice where she was and found that he could stand up so long as he bent over.
She was clenching her jaw as if in pain, but Draco supposed that she was pretty enough. She had brown hair that was powdered white from all the grime from when the corridor had exploded and brown eyes.
"Are you all right?" he asked.
"Oh, I don't know. Take a look at my leg, would you?"
Draco grimaced at the sight. Her leg from the calf down was imprisoned beneath a large boulder. At least that explained why she hadn't dug herself out. She still had her wand out, though.
"I've been trying to numb my leg a bit, but I don't want to accidentally paralyze myself or something. I keep calling for Colin to help me out, but he probably escaped, and left me behind. I'm going to get him for that."
"I don't think I can levitate the rock," he said, inspecting it from all angles. He didn't want to be the one to tell her that Colin Creevey was among those motionless in the Great Hall. She'd find out soon enough anyway.
"Wonderful deduction," she said dryly.
Draco muttered a spell under his breath. A second later, he picked up the rock and set it down away from her leg. Featherlight charms really were useful. She breathed a sigh of relief and closed her eyes, unwilling to see it. Draco wished he could too. It was so horribly broken that Muggle doctors wouldn't have been able to fix it.
"Let's get you down to Madam Pomfrey," he said.
There didn't seem to be a way to get her to walk, so Draco cast the Featherlight charm again and scooped her up as easily as he would a child. She wasn't much more than a child, he noted, but then again, neither was he.
"What's your name?" he asked.
She smiled at him. "Astoria Greengrass."
They made their painstaking way downstairs. Draco had to be careful not to drop his charge, so it was twice as difficult. Astoria didn't shut her mouth once on the way. She asked questions about Voldemort, what he'd looked like, and a blow-by-blow account of the duel between him and Harry. The little details Draco had gleaned from all the celebrating (he hadn't been there for the duel) were all picked over. She was very curious, to say the least.
When at last they reached the Great Hall, Madam Pomfrey fixed Astoria's leg in a few minutes. She bounced up, good as new.
"Thank you," she said, leaning over to kiss him on the cheek.
She disappeared into the crowd towards certain heartbreak. Draco smiled after her. Yes, getting his hands dirty was definitely worth it.
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