He was not a coward. Draco Malfoy was nota coward. What did it matter if he didn't kill Dumbledore himself? Dumbledore was dead, wasn't he? What did it matter who killed him? Draco wasn't responsible for his headmaster's death—that doesn't make him a coward.
Yet there he stood, his wand trembling, pointing straight at Rose Zeller's face, wondering why he couldn't cast the spell. Her piercing, brown eyes were staring straight back at him, and he could see the fear behind her cool exterior. Zabini could torture people. Even Crabbe and Goyle could, and Draco wasn't even sure they could read. Surely, this shouldn't be so hard.
"Come now, Draco," Alecto drawled, the corner of her mouth turned up in a smirk. "Come on, don't be a coward."
Draco Malfoy was not a coward.
"Crucio."
The thirteen-year-old shrieked in pain and agony, falling onto the floor of the dungeon. Her face paled, and Alecto laughed. Her laughter spurred Draco on, and he pointed his wand with more fervor, causing Rose to crumple into a ball on the floor. Even after he lifted the curse, she lay there shaking.
xxx
Hogwarts had changed. The corridors were near silent between classes, and students were frightened that talking out of turn would land them in detention. Pranks like Fred and George's would not have been tolerated, and if you were even a moment late to a class led by one of the Carrows, you could expect detention for a week.
Professors McGonagall and Flitwick especially loathed giving detention, because detention was no longer a lesson in respect, but physical abuse led by none other than Alecto and Amycus Carrow, the new Defense Against the Dark Arts and Muggle Studies teachers.
At the center of the Head Table in the Great Hall sat Professor Snape, the new headmaster. Next to him sat the Carrows, and the rest of the table was lined with the same jovial professors that had always been there—but none of them smiled anymore.
"Gin, this is getting out of hand," Neville declared at breakfast on the fourth week of school. "Do you see Rose Zeller and Romilda Vane? They look like they went through hell last night."
"Lavender, too," Ginny murmured. "We need to do something."
"I have an idea," Neville said, reaching into his pocket and withdrawing a gold coin. He placed it on the table. Ginny looked at it, shocked, and then smiled back at him.
"Dumbledore's Army," she whispered.
"Still recruiting," Neville finished.
Ginny slung her bag over her shoulder and grinned at Neville before exiting the Great Hall. On her way to her Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom, she checked to make sure the corridors were completely empty, and then raised her wand to the wall in front of her. With nervous strokes, she wrote on the wall in red: Dumbledore's Army: Still Recruiting.
Stepping back to admire her handiwork, she could hear students coming up the stairs and knew she had only moments to leave the scene. She bolted around the corner and managed to slide into her seat in Professor Carrow's class before most of the other students had arrived.
As the other students filed, in Ginny could hear them whispering about the message she had written on the wall.
"Still recruiting?"
"Can this mean—you don't think Harry's back, do you?"
"He can't be!"
"Do you think I could join?" Ritchie Coot asked excitedly.
"Join what precisely?" Amycus Carrow asked as he strode through the door. He looked irritated, and Ginny was sure he had seen the writing on the wall.
"The Quidditch team—tryouts are this weekend," Ginny said quickly. She pointed at the Quidditch Captain's badge on her robes. "Coot wanted to know if he could try out this year."
"For some reason," Amycus began, his eyes narrowing. Ginny tried hard to maintain eye contact. "I think you're lying to me, Weasley."
"He was talking about Quidditch," Colin Creevey piped up.
"Detention, Creevey—and if you speak out of turn again, it'll be the week."
Colin shrank back in his seat, looking nervous. Ginny glanced at him, trying to summon some sense of what Harry would do. Harry surely wouldn't let Colin suffer for something he'd done. Harry would stand up and make a statement—Harry would convince other people that action is necessary. Without knowing fully what she was doing, Ginny stood.
"He was talking about Quidditch, and it's not fair for you to give Colin detention when…" her voice trailed away as she noticed the manic glint in Amycus Carrow's eyes.
"Detention, Weasley. The week."
xxx
Ginny had barely sat down to dinner before Blaise Zabini was behind her with his arms crossed, waiting impatiently. "Time to go, Weasley. Detention."
"Zabini, I just got here," Ginny argued. He grabbed her collar roughly and pulled, causing her to stand abruptly.
"Now," he hissed, and he dragged her out of the Great Hall.
When he threw her roughly on the floor of the dungeon, she swore loudly. Standing with their backs to the wall in front of her were two second years she didn't recognize, Colin, and Kevin Whitby, a fourth-year Hufflepuff. She stood and brushed off her robes, crossed her arms, and glowered at Zabini. Beside him were Malfoy, Crabbe, Goyle and Theodore Nott. Sitting calmly at Professor Slughorn's desk was Alecto Carrow, looking pleased.
"Weasley, first, shall we? Let's make an example for all her little followers," Alecto grinned toothily, making Ginny cringe. "Draco, what do you say?"
Draco raised his wand. Ginny could see the hatred in his eyes, and she simply glared in return. He held his wand steady, pointing directly between her eyes, and waited.
"Come on, Malfoy—I haven't got all night, and I'd like to make it back to dinner," she taunted against her better judgment.
His grip hardened and he whispered, "Crucio."
Ginny shrieked. Her eyes rolled back in her head, and she tangled her hands in her hair, gripping it wildly as she landed with a thump on her knees. Her breathing became erratic, and she fell onto the ground. Draco lessened the curse enough to allow her to raise herself onto her hands and knees. She spit blood onto the ground and wiped the excess away from her mouth before staring up at him with absolute disgust in her eyes.
With defiance ringing in every syllable, she spat out, "You think I'm scared, but you're nothing but a coward, Malfoy."
xxxxx
A/N: I apologize for how rough this chapter is. I'm just getting back into fanfics, and introductions are a tough spot for me, but the action will pick up a bit next chapter and we'll get some D/G going on ASAP! And as a side note, this entire fic will stay true to the seventh book, up until the epilogue.
I'd love a beta to read over and edit chapters for me, so if anyone's interested, please message me.
Also, reviews will make me very happy.