All Is Dust
Harry Potter belongs to a rather nice and very rich Scottish lady, since I am none of those things the smart money is on me not owning this intellectual property.
Also this is my first attempt at fiction so please review and give me feedback
Prolog
I hate opera. There is no other more polite way of putting it . My father could compliment the entire performance while at the same time making it clear that two hours of his time had just been wasted, and that that time's value was worth more than the accumulation of every heartbeat that the entirety of the cast had left in their chests. I don't have that talent. So instead I tug at my mother's arm and whisper into her ear as she leans close, "Mother must we really listen to this garbage? Those people are hardly worth our attention."
My mother glances down through her pale blonde hair and smiles indulgently at me. "Sweetheart we aren't here to listen to the performance. We are here to be seen to be listening to the performance. Your father is a very important man and very important men must be seen doing things that very important men are supposed to be seen doing." I glance back up at her sourly, fold my arms across my chest , and look back at the lady on stage "And listening to whales dressed like Vikings is something that important men do?" I mumble back under my breath.
My sulk is interrupted by my father nudging my leg with his cane. "Silence Draco! The intermission will begin shortly and then we may leave, until that time contain yourself and behave like the pureblood scion that you are!"
I lean back in my seat and feel my mouth twist in distaste. I finger the wand I had just received the day before through my robes. I know my father hates these things as much as I do, The only reason that he comes to these charity functions is to, in his own words, " Show to those that matter that I have enough influence to be invited, and to those that don't that I care enough about whatever inane cause is being supported to attend." He usually spends the next thirty minutes to an hour talking about how the only cause that is truly worthy is our own.
Bored, I glance around the top box where we are sitting; there is the Minister sitting three to my left. Behind him is Daphnie Greengrass sitting with her mother an enraptured look on her pretty face. Note to self, when it's time to make out the marriage contracts for me in a few year either refuse to be betrothed to her, or demand a clause in the contract to exempt me from going to these bloody things. Speaking of nut jobs that enjoy this trash Crouch is sitting far down on his row with a house elf of all things perched between him and the last seat, which is empty. According to father the only reason he ever comes is because his dead wife and son enjoyed the opera so much. Hu, I thought that self-flagellation as a sign of mourning went out of fashion ages ago. Oh well father always did say he was a bit of a freak.
After what feels like an eternity finally the nightmare is over and my family begins to file out of our seats. My parents and I politely make our way past a frantic looking Mr. Crouch and his crying house elf and begin to run, as my father calls it, the social gauntlet.
Eventually after the tithe of the palm pressing and hand kissing that social decorum demands had been paid, we at last emerged out of the opera house on the corner of Diagon ally and began to make our way to Borgin & Burkes in order to check on a purchase that my father made a few days ago for the "special" trophy room under our living room. I walk along through the light rain, my right hand held lightly in my mother's white gloved hand and my left in my father's strong grip. Suddenly I hear a horse whisper behind me , "So this is what the traitor does while our master's faithful rot in a daemon infested pit."
I have never in my entire, though admittedly, short life seen my father move so fasts. My hand is dropped as he whirls to the side and begins to unsheathe his wand to face the black cloaked figure that has appeared behind us, but before he can bring his weapon to bear a scarlet hex leaves the stranger's wand and impacted on his father's chest, hurling him backwards and into the ally wall. My eyes are locked on his unmoving form. The shock flowing through my body is overwhelming. My father is the greatest wizard ever! He is my idol! He is all I have ever wanted to be! And there he lays in a crumpled heap on the ground, rain falls softly on his upturned face and drips into his sightless eyes. Slowly swirls of crimson begins to appear in the pool in which he lay. Through the shock and numbness I feel my mother pull me behind her, using herself to shield me from the dark cloaked madman that had just taken away her husband. "Please! Who are you? What do you want? If it's money I can give you as much as you like, but please let my son go! " Slowly the man drew back his hood to reveal a crazed sunken eyes set in a sickly white face. "Barty? Whispers my mother in shock as she slowly backs away.
"I don't care about money Narcissa. All I care about is the Dark Lord. That's all I have ever cared about. There has never been ANYTHING more important to me than the Dark Lord sweet Narcissa and that is why we find ourselves at this crossroads now. You see when the Dark Lord vanished I when looking for him! I did all in my power to find him! And what did your husband do? He denied him! He claimed to be bewitched! He pissed on our cause and our Lord just so he could keep his miserable hide out of Azkaban! Well you reap what you sow Mrs. Malfoy. You and your husband sowed treason and now the whirlwind is here to claim it's due."
"We did what we had to survive!" I finally glance up from the unmoving body of my father and up at my mother's face. I see tears streaming from her crystal blue eyes and mingling with the flecks of rain on her cheeks. My world is shattered. My father lies dead at the hands of this straw haired lunatic, the same one that now holds my mother at wand point.
"Do you have any last words Mrs. Malfoy? Perhaps some words of comfort to give to your son before I take you from him, hmm? Maybe something about good old English stoicism and keeping a stiff upper lip? Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the frantic screaming, and the pathetic denials of guilt are all very nice, but time is growing short and you may want to leave your soon to be orphaned son with some last words of actual substance."
After a few seconds of silence my mother slowly turns around and leans down to my eleven year old height so we are at eye level. "Draco, I want you to know that your father and I love you dearly. Everything that we have ever done we did for you. We both couldn't be more proud of you sweetheart." She gives me a shaky smile and leans in to kiss me on my forehead. "Be strong Draco." I hear clapping coming from behind my mother's back.
"Very touching Narcissa. I, more than anyone, can appreciate the gentle love of a mother for her son, but this really must come to an end." The man smiles almost in a sad way back at us. "I really wish that I didn't have to do this Narcissa, but examples must be made or the others who abandoned the Dark Lord will think that there is no penalty for betrayal." The dark cloaked figure slowly begins to walk towards us wand outstretched. "I will however make you a promise, the boy will be well taken care of by Bella when I return our master to power and he liberates his faithful from that pit." Suddenly I see I glint of panic in her eyes "No, please!" she whispers to him as he approaches.
When I was little I always dreamed of what I could do when I got a wand. I imagined that I would go off and have adventures like the ones I saw on the cover of Adventures of Harry Potter children's books, the ones I would always see in the stores but my parents would never get me. I dreamed that he and I could have adventures together, that we could save maidens from dragons, find ancient treasures in the depths of the great pyramids and most importantly build the world that my father always talked about, where the great ruled and the lesser knew their place, something I never truly understood the meaning of, but my father always spoke of it so It must be right. All of those fantasies paled in comparison to the simple all-consuming desire to be able to do something, ANYTHING, to save my mother. But it is no good. I got my wand yesterday. I may as well be a holding a regular stick for all of the good it would do her.
"Goodbye Mrs. Malfoy, I truly am sorry about this." And with that a bold of emerald energy burst from the tip of his wand and connected with my mother's back. I am looking into her eyes as the light leaves them. It seems like everything is in slow motion as she collapses to the ground, her angelic face famed by a pale halo of hair as it lays there, still and unmoving. The man is saying something to me but I can't hear him. All I can hear is a dull roaring in my ears. All I can feel is sorrow and numbness that seems to occupy every bit of space in my body. Slowly I look up at the face of my parents' killer. I feel the deep sadness being crushed and transformed under its own weight. Feel the sorrow compress in on itself and solidify into a new emotion. Hate. Hate so strong it feels like my veins have turn to ice and my bones to fire. I see the man lift his wand and a spell leap from its tip, forming a new grotesque constellation of emerald stars. I hear a shout come from behind the man and he takes off past me into the darkest parts of Knockturn ally with his pursuers, another man in a dark cloak and what looks like an elf or goblin running behind him.
I don't care. I look back down at my mother's still form and fall to my knees beside her. Ice crystals are slowly spreading from my feet in a ring, but again I don't care. I take my hand and gently brush away a stray strand of hair from her face, cradle her head in my hands, then throw back my head and scream with all of the pain and rage of my soul, the only witnesses as my cry echoes through the empty ally are the stars above and the cruel visage of a snake tonged skull.
AN: There will be a time skip to the end of fourth year next chapter, then one more set up chapter after that and another time skip and then the story starts in earnest. Thanks for reading!