"Well now, what do we have here?" The voice was followed by drunken laughter, and a few hacking coughs. The men following him had seemed to double in seconds, and they reeked of trouble as much as they wreaked of alcohol.

This was not a good situation, but Draco could see no way out. Call this karma, or just plain punishment, either way Draco Malfoy was in deep shit.

"Look at him...We got an escaped circus freak here in our own little alleyway." Another voice drawled from the dimly lit crowd.

"Yeah...He got all dressed up just for us."

More laughter.

Draco straightened, raising his chin, staring down these drunken fools. They had no idea what he was capable of, how dare these muggles mock him. He was exactly the person they should fear most. His Death Eater robes were no laughing matter, and he could have easily hexed them all in a moment...

If only he had his wand.

Draco swore silently to Merlin for ever going against the Death Eater code. He, himself, had participated in similar stunts. Death Eaters who pissed off the others were not treated lightly. And now this was his reward, being left in a muggle village without his wand. He was completely defenseless. At the mercy of drunken muggles.

"I think we need to teach him a lesson." The leader of the group, a badly shaved and pot bellied man, eagerly cracked his knuckles. Draco gritted his teeth, this was pack mentality, and all it took was one idiot to set off everyone else. How often had the Death Eaters used that very line on an unsuspecting wizard?

They surrounded him, and Draco finally admitted to himself that he was scared shit-less. Of fricking muggles.

Someone stepped on his robe, and Draco turned immediately, but the accuser had jumped back into the eager crowd. Another followed suit. Draco swore, and that seemed to finally set them off. A punch was thrown at him, and then all hell broke loose.

Draco had never sunk low enough to fight in the barbaric muggle fashion of using one's fists, and now that had come back to haunt him. Almost immediately he had been whispering curses and hexes, his hand making the natural movements but without his wand he was as good as dead. He had managed to dodge a few blows, but he was completely surrounded. In moments he had a black eye and bleeding nose, and his first attempts to fight back were laughed at. When he had finally hit someone it was a short lived victory; it just fueled them on.

"Ahhh!" he cried out, as an unknown amount of men pounced on him. Draco was thrown to the dirty street and pounded on as men laughed and swore into his face.

He was kicked repeatedly in his stomach and ribs, and any attempts to shield his body was useless. They came from every angle, hitting and kicking him with full force. Someone yanked his hair, pulling his head back, and someone else kicked at his face. Draco cried out as his jaw seemed to splinter in his mouth. The taste of blood was overwhelming.

At some point his arms were grabbed and he was dragged to his knees, and countless muggles took shots at him. His robes were ripped, dirtied and bloody, and Draco had never felt so much pain in his life. He coughed up blood as a knee slammed into his chest, and he collapsed forward, only to be propped up again by rough hands.

Then Draco saw the most beautiful thing alive. A flash of red light that was a beacon of hope; the stunning charm hit one of the men holding him, and Draco pulled away from the now limp hands. Their was a shocked yell as the muggles tried, in their drunken stupor, to make sense of what was happening, but it was too late. More beams of red light flashed around hitting muggle after drunken muggle, and their bodies crashed into the ground or the dirty brick walls of the alley. Draco coughed blood, digging his hand into his side from the pain of his bruised torso, feeling dizzy. He looked up shakily at the sight before him, and faintly heard a voice as he crashed again to the wet, dirty pavement. His eyesight went black before he could get a good look at the savior who was rolling him over.