Draco liked to feel things. Power, pleasure, gratification, pride. Warmth, the softness of his favorite sweater, the texture of his mother's handwriting on her weekly letter. The vibration of his footsteps on the stone floor of Hogwarts. He felt it all so strongly, so acutely that sometimes he forgot the bad.
Puppet.
It was a word he never heard, exactly. But he felt it just the same. Potter was right, in some ways. Draco was like his father. A cowardly puppet for the Dark Lord until the very end.
Oh, how he honestly detested the feeling, the loss of control, the helplessness. He was stuck under a swinging, descending pendulum of all that was at risk, of all he had to lose. The least of which was his pride.
On his walk from Snape's office, another talk about how his godfather could protect him, help him. At this point, Draco was past all that, if simply to keep his mother safe.
He touched the mark within his inner-arm and thought about the past, hellish summer. The days of lavish vacations and quality time with his family were long gone. Even if he was surrounded by more family than he'd ever wanted.
Bella, crazy, tortured, and frankly disgusting, Aunt Bella had been useful to him for two reasons. One, no matter how painful it had been, she had taught him a proficiency in Occlumency that not even Snape could puncture. And two, she'd cast doubt on his aforementioned godfather.
Not a bad doubt, exactly. But Draco was sharp, sharper than he'd ever (despite his too-large ego and inflated pride) admit to the world. (A lesson he'd ironically learnt from Snape himself. Keep your best gobstones close at hand, and only reveal them if truly necessary.)
Draco could not read Snape's true intentions. Did he think Snape was working against the Dark Lord? Not exactly. Perhaps parallel, but Draco felt, felt it in his very magical core, that Snape had a secret motivation, that perhaps wasn't either side's idea of the "greater good".
Sod the greater good. He missed the feeling of Hogwarts, the Hogwarts without suspicion and tall shadows of doubt. The paranoia and fear thick in the air like a miasma of something horrible.
The Dark Lord. A traitorous, dangerous voice whispered in his ear. Draco shook the thought away half-heartedly. He already knew of Draco's inner doubts and wavering loyalty. But it didn't matter if the Malfoy heir wasn't loyal, because the Dark Lord had Draco's fear. A powerful motivator.
His thoughts had led him down that corridor, the one with the cursed room with the bloody cabinet. He wanted to kick something, something breakable, because even when he wasn't consciously aware, his betrayal was always on the forefront of his mind.
He turned away, before the Come-and-Go room could provide him with something to kick, and continued his introspective walk down a different seventh floor hallway.
It was late, past curfew, and Draco had no qualms about using "prefect duties" as an excuse should he run into any teacher. He hadn't really expected to run into anyone, except perhaps other prefects, because even the bravest of his peers rarely left the safety of their dorms after the sun set. So it was a bit of a surprise, but more of an irritation, to see a Ravenclaw in his path.
It took him a moment to place her. She was sitting on a frosty window sill, peering across the lake, her blonde hair- rivaling even the Malfoy's in its colorlessness- glowing with moonlight. She was facing him, but didn't seem to notice his tall form, and had a look of such profound sadness on her face that Draco almost wanted to gasp at the sight. It was so unlike this girl, so alien, that he wanted to inquire after her wellbeing.
Because it was Luna Lovegood.
Looney, his brain corrected with no real conviction. She'd stopped being "Looney Lovegood" the night Draco had learned that she'd dueled the pants off of some of the Dark Lord's inner circle at the Department of Mysteries.
He wanted to be angry, suddenly, his nails making half-moon marks on the inside of his palms. This was a blood-traitor, but further- was the reason Draco and his family were where they were.
Ultimately, though, his fists relaxed. He didn't know why exactly, but he couldn't dislike Lovegood. Maybe it was the expression on her face, the decided downturn of the normally upturned lips, her namesake's merciless shine bringing all those details into stark definition…
He was turning to go when she spoke. "Would you escort me to my common room, Draco? I'm feeling rather faint."
The biting remark, so familiar and easy, was ready to be launched beyond the barrier of his lips, but he swallowed it away. He said nothing but walked over to her side. She jumped gracelessly from the sill and lurched forward.
Quidditch-quick reflexes sent his arm flying forward to catch her arm before Draco's brain caught up. He almost pushed her away when she was balanced, but in the end his pedicure won out any disgust he had. The hand stayed, and he was alarmed to see his fingers overlapping each other because of the thinness of her arm.
"Bloody fucking hell, Lovegood, eat a burger." He found himself saying.
Her wide eyes found his own and this time, he did let go.
They stood in silence, regarding each other, the sadness slowly melting away from her face, but leaving something worse: emptiness.
"Let's go then." Draco snapped, hoping his impatience would hide his unease. She dutifully began walking, wand tucked behind her ear, but she weaved more and more like a drunkard.
Resigned, now, to his fate, Draco took a calming breathe, looked around, and grabbed Lovegood's arm. Merlin, was she thin, but with his steady grip, he got them to the Tower, and the portrait guarding it.
"What always ends everything?" The portrait asked. Draco was immediately irritated. But, despite her deepening detachment, Luna supplied the answer.
"The letter 'G'."
Before Draco could fully comprehend the answer, the portrait swung open and Lovegood hopped inside. She looked over her shoulder, one corner of her mouth upturned, and she said, "Thanks, Draco."
Before he entered his own common room, he summoned a houself. "Make sure Luna Lovegood in Ravenclaw Tower eats something with real nutritional value."
Draco tried not to dwell on it.
~This is a line break~
Draco didn't think of Lovegood for a few weeks, frustrated at his lack of progress with the cabinet. And his other task- he shuddered into his luke-warm potatoes and resolutely pushed them away. And then- there it was. He looked up, eyes searching the Ravenclaw table.
Lovegood was there, nose in a book, reminiscent of Granger. But her wand was behind her ear again, and she was biting her tongue in concentration. She wasn't eating.
Draco found himself wearing a nasty scowl. As if she could read his thoughts, across the Great Hall, Lovegood looked up, eyes immediately meeting his. With an eyebrow raised, he raised his fork, speared a potato, and popped it into his mouth.
She grinned, then, a tiny flash of teeth, like moonlight through the branches of a tree, and set her book down. Draco thought he should have known she would reach immediately for pudding.
~This is a line break~
The week before the Christmas holiday, Draco found himself alone with Lovegood once more, in the greenhouses. A wandering vine had stolen his bookbag, and he threatened the mother plant with fire until it relinquished it- but not before snapping his favorite quill.
He was swearing profusely and trying to repair it-the stupid plant had dripped sap or something all over it- and failing, when he felt someone sort of… float over. The gait could only belong to Lovegood.
"The sap contains anti-magical properties. Cleaning it the muggle way might help." Lovegood said, grabbing the quill between two fingers and wiping it carelessly on her skirt.
Draco wrinkled his nose at the green stain now marring her uniform. The stain itself seemed to glow. She handed the broken quill back to him and he hit it with a Repairo. Though it seemed sluggish, the spell did its job. He peered at the area where the break had taken place, but saw nothing out of the ordinary. It seemed as good as new.
He stood up from the ground and threw one last nasty glare at the offending plant. "Thanks, Lovegood."
He began to walk away but she grabbed his arm- just above the mark but he still winced and gave her a dirty look.
"Sorry, I just meant to give you something before the hols." She reached into her bag, brushing aside loose parchment and… turnip earings? Before finding a small tin.
He took it from her, rather dumbly, before looking around in paranoia.
"It's not cursed." She said. "It's a simple healing salve. For that continuous irritation on your arm."
And with that, she turned around, hair flying, and skipped out the door.
Alone in the greenhouse now, Draco edged away from the hissing vines, and opened the tin. It certainly smelled like medicine. Sharp and bitter. He pointed his wand at it and murmered some incantations. Nothing sinister at all revealed itself, and so, with an odd, unnamable feeling in his chest, he reclosed the tin and slipped it into his bag.
~This is a line break~
Surprisingly, it did not bother Draco that Lovegood professed knowledge about his Mark. If anything, he was almost glad someone knew, outside of it all.
Not that Lovegood really was outside of it all. She was friends with Potter and company, after all. But he didn't think she'd tell. And Potter already thought it was true, so why worry? After this year, everything would be different anyway.
He tried not to think of Lovegood's clear, grey eyes when he bought the cursed necklace.
Especially since the salve was the only thing that relieved the pain of the Mark, and her quiet way of caring was its own salve on his black soul.