Promises
Disclaimer: Nope. Zero. Zip. Nada. Not Mine.
A/N: Just a short drabble that popped in my head.
I'll come for you. I promise.
Her heart-shaped voice swam in the darkness before him, her curls hanging low as she snuggled up to him for one quick hug before she darted away to carry the information back to her Order so that he wouldn't be risking his life in vain.
He laughed, the sound ringing bitter in the empty, cold air. It fell flat and muffled against the heavy, oppressive atmosphere prevailing in Azkaban, despite the fact that the Dementors had all left. Colder, crueler creatures had come to replace them, and though nobody knew their names or exactly what they did, people swore that they left a trail of despair behind them wherever they went, and that where they stooped to rest, grass never grew again.
Grass. He could barely remember what it looked like. It was fresh, and it grew, and it was green—green. He tried to remember what green looked like, or red, or blue, or even that awful color pink, but all he could see was the black of his walls and the grey of the cot and the dirty muddy color of his lank hair and the pale, brownish color of his dirty skin.
He thought perhaps he might have been in here for maybe six months, but he couldn't be sure because he didn't have a window and he didn't remember where the door was since it was never used anyway, and he never saw the sun. Food appeared in his cell when it was time to eat, but it was irregular and sometimes, if he missed it, it disappeared again, so it was of no use to measure time by. A light dimmed and brightened slightly as time went by, but it was never bright enough to really be able to tell the difference.
And time ran like wet ink and left long wet smears that blended into each other until there was nothing but one large black streak of time that went on and on and on, with bits of darkest black when his inhuman jailers passed by and the despair overwhelmed him and he woke up huddled in the far corner of his prison, curled in a ball and whimpering and shaking.
Sleep was no refuge. Their eyes, accusing and dead and tormented staring at him, pointing long bony fingers that had teeth marks and strips of flesh cut off, huddled together, more and more of them. A Muggle girl he had Crucio'ed that day for his initiation, her long blue-black hair dull and matted with blood, large black eyes staring at him as her heels kicked out at the floor and she coughed and coughed, choking on her own blood until a large red bubble formed out of her mouth and grew bigger and bigger, a thin red haze over her lips, until it burst, and a stream of dark black blood flowed out of her mouth, and it was all over.
A Squib, screaming as he was thrown to the ground and given to the werewolves, hungry and starved and ready for meat. His skin torn brutally apart by long incisors over three inches long, holes with torn, lacerated flesh around it as teeth sank and tore. On his arm was a large bite mark, a mouthful of flesh torn out, leaving strings of muscles with no where to go, the white of bone exposed, blood clotting on the edges even as it ran rapidly down his arm, his eyes screaming for help.
The Death Eaters, laughing and pointing at him, sneering and raising heavy canes. Voldemort's red eyes, glinting snake-like in the darkness as he raised his wand to deliver yet more pain. MacNair, laughing as he murmured, "A spy, are you now? A wee traitor? Always knew you were soft, boy. And what are you going to give me to make my silence worthwhile? A touch of that pretty arse, maybe?" and then his horrified gurgle that trailed off to a choked silence as he felt a knife slip between his ribs.
Memories, always more memories, overwhelmed him, until he could not tell the difference between waking and sleeping and he wondered if he was in a prison after all, or just caught in the hell of his own mind.
And over and over the chant of the memories, the one promise, the warm sweet promise that held so much in it—home, love, safety, warmth—all the things he had never had but thought he might have had, if only, if only…
I'll come for you. I promise. Brown eyes that were so soft and warm as they smiled up at him…
And hours turned into days, and days turned into weeks, and weeks turned into months, and—
I'll come for you. I promise. But somewhere along the way, Draco Malfoy had stopped believing in promises.