A Wand From an Olive Branch
A/N: I got a pretty fair response about 'A Raven With an Olive Branch', nearly a comment every day when averaged. I guess that's not enormous when some people have like 4,000. Yet, since I've finished one of my summer reading assignments, I'm rewarding myself by writing a sequel for you all. If you haven't read the first story, it'd help, but you don't need to, or it'd be a chapter. I'm warning those who do, that this is more from Draco's side of things, and it does have more internal stuff. By the way, this is NOT DM/SS, though it might look that way. Hope you like it. Do review!
I wrote this about a week ago. I must ask you pardon my tardiness. I had to have my friend send the right sort of link to the log in page and then I had to re-install my cookie-thing. I couldn't get in. Sorry, dears. ;)
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, unless J. K. Rowling decides to share. Please?
The day after that incident, Draco happened to pass Luna in the corridors. As she meandered by, the usual dreamy expression was on her face, but her mind was seemingly in Hogwarts; that moment Draco and Luna were side by side, he could swear he heard a whispered, honest thanks from her.
He couldn't imagine the reason for her gratitude. It was not as though he had returned the photograph due to kindness, or in penance. He had planned on giving it back in a few more days just to avoid trouble. If Luna's father was hot-tempered, then it could be called theft. Of course, Lucius would bail him out, but no one could guard him from his sire's anger...No, that wasn't true, but it was ever-present in his ideas and motives.
He conveniently ignored that silver frame the picture was in, the one which he had bought as a gift for Narcissa.
Luna did not have many close friends, so no one heard of this, much to his relief. Still, it was on his mind, and he now had no excuse to discuss this, like he would if the rumor went it's rounds. Part of him knew that he shouldn't desire to confide in anyone, that a Malfoy should never have any emotions meriting a conversation. In fact, whatever feelings he might have must be correct, merely because they were his.
What, then, was this longing for a second opinion? Perhaps he needed only for someone to bolster him and assure him that he had not 'gone soft'. Yet, he knew he was really craving advice, which a Malfoy should have no need of.
It would take something greater to shake Draco from his confidence, so he concluded that Looney's madness must be catching, and whatever haze he was in soon would disippate. Hence, he could choose someone to talk to...Who?
It had to be someone who was either trustworthy, craven, or sly enough to keep the matter to themselves. Only a handful of people could be trusted, and these people Draco secretly admired, so he would not confess to them. Someone cowardly or docile would balk, and agree to all he said, so it came to naught. He had to pick a person who would manipulate him if given the chance, and a who would speak truthfully if Draco sought their opinions.
Impossible! There were no Robin Hoods in Slytherin! What's more, it was imperative that this person could be black mailed or intimidated. It was more likely that pigs would fly...No, Neville might make that happen...It was more likely that Hagrid and Snape would be wed by the Dark Lord himself, with Dumbledore acting as the flower girl and Potter organizing the entire affair!
"Mr.Malfoy." Snape hailed him calmly. "Are you loitering in the halls?"
"No, sir, I'm not." he lied smoothly.
The professor canted his head in acknowledgement and made no argument, but when Draco's stance relaxed, when he decided he was safe, Snape drawled "You were not loitering, Malfoy? I've been following you for considerable amount of time, during which you walked in circles several times. Your excuse?"
"I...ah...was...looking for someone." That was partly true.
"Yes, and who?"
"I was looking for Goyle." That was a mistake. Goyle rarely ventured anywhere alone, and the occasions he did were when the others were late for a meal. A cunning man like Snape was not fooled, and despite his false favor of Draco, his ironic hatred of treachery won.
"My office now." he said simply. The hint of a smile curved his thin lips up beneath that crooked nose, while an annoyed Draco shuffled his feet in the Potion Master's wake. Once in the classroom, Snape majestically marched in. Pointing his wand wordlessly, Draco took a seat near the front of the room.
While Draco focused the worst glare he dared towards his teacher, the man sat down behind his desk and quietly began to grade a stack of essays. For about half an hour, Draco maintained his anger, but then he had ask what his punishment was. Snape paid him no heed, which was the best way to irritate him.
Fuming, Draco reined his annoyance tightly, determined to ignore the other person wholly. Not much later, the petulant student had to notice Snape, because he started tapping the tabletop in front of Draco sharply.
While Draco was musing over Snape's long fingernails,--Was that clear nailpolish?-- he asked "Yes?"
"What were you doing in the halls?" Snape inquired, looming over him like ghoul.
"Loitering?" he suggested dryly. Draco knew nothing of Snape's skill in judging the mind, but he understood that he would require a very convincing alibi, so he was stalling.
"Clever."
"Really, I was just bored."
"Bored?"
"Yes."
"So why weren't you outside where most of the other students are? Or with your...friends." Draco took umbrage at the tone of this, and replied harshly "Do I look as though I go outdoors often? Hagrid might be there someplace with his...whatever the hell they are."
"Language, Mr.Malfoy." Snape answered, wondering where Draco had picked up that phrase. Christainity was strictly a Muggle concept, not often see among wizarding families, whatever their alliance. "So, why were you not with your friends?"
"They can become...aggravating." Snape smirked, understanding how many of them could be dull company. He had felt just the same as a student, except that was one reason why he hardly had company at all.
"Lastly, what did you lie for? I didn't think even you were so inclined towards it. Practicing for the future?"
It was only then that Draco comprehended how incensed Snape was over a careless falsehood. Draco was supossed to be his favorite, his pet, if you will, and here he was berating him!
"I didn't want to come waste my time in here."
"So you waste your time in the corridors?"
"Um, yeah." Draco muttered. How could he get out of this? He had clearly underestimated Snape.
"Again, why did you lie?" Snape repeated, while Draco racked his mind for an appropriate response. He couldn't tell Snape the truth, because Snape would surely bring this to his mother's attention, but there weren't many options.
"Because I was trying to find that mudblood Granger. I'd heard a new story about her and..."
"Except that Potter and Weasley are on the Quidditch pitch with Ms.Granger, and you knew this because I heard you complaining that Slytherin was not getting enough time, which is true." Snape had to reprimand Draco for his cursing again, which only served to harass the generally patient teacher further.
Cold and grim, Snape offered "If it is important enough to keep so private, then it may be important enough for Veritaserum."
"Oh..." Draco murmured darkly. That would be even worse, so he dejectedly admitted defeat. Realizing his victory, Snape restrained himself from reveling in it, and levitated his chair so it was across from Draco. Sitting, taciturn, he awaited the boy beginning.
And Draco did not, not immediately anyway. Somehow he was hoping that if he remained mute long enough, Snape would give up, but his own tolerance had grown thin in enduring nearly forty-five minutes of watching Snape read the essays.
"Well...I suppose I must, right? You know who Loon--Luna--Lovegood is?"
"The odd blonde chit from Ravenclaw?"
"One of them."
"Reads that foolish magazine backwards, upside down...?"
"Yeah..." He sighed, thinking how his mother would scold him for speaking without grace. Yawning in spite of himself, he continued "So..It's a bit of a...tradition to...take a few of her things, but we give all of it back a couple days later." he hastily added.
Snape nodded; he knew this before, but there wasn't a way to prevent it, and he did not wish to leave Draco too cross. He was expected to bend rules a little for the children of Death Eaters, in an unspoken way. Frankly, his curiosity had gotten the better of him this time. "Continue." Snape urged.
Hoping he wouldn't be punished either for taking the photo or for giving it back, he cleared his throat and resumed. "I had this old picture of Looney...Yeah, anyway, I had this picture--And that's it!--of her with her dead mum. She came up, asked for it, so I gave it back. Can I go now?"
Instinctively Snape realized this was not the complete story. Sighing, he steepled his bony digits and quietly commanded "Honestly, Mr.Malfoy, you have spent three quarters of an hour doing nothing. I've done my tasks, so I have time to spare. I will take as much time as I must."
"But why?" Draco complained. This sort of thing was not funny when inflicted on him!
"This is my job, one of them, at least."
"Well, your other job--"
"Yes, yes, but this is none of your concern until you've come to age. I would think that would be the very reason why you would rather speak to me than to the Headmaster?" Snape interrupted, purposely using Dumbledore's formal title.
"I suppose so," Draco seemed to be calmed marginally, however, he then added "but suppose I'd prefer not speaking at all?"
"Oh, whatever will I do in that case?" Snape asked sarcastically, but his tone was too flat and his posture too rigid to make it amusing, as though he didn't care enough to move.
"Fine..." Draco grumbled after glancing at his watch. A wicked scowl marring his countenance, he asked "What do you want to know?"
"Why you were loitering in the halls."
"I told you!"
"No, you did not, Mr.Malfoy. I take it this Luna Lovegood is something to do with it? Your girlfriend perhaps?" He had to say it. He knew he should not have, but even icy men like Severus Snape had to surrender to temptation at some point. For one sadistic as he, the temptation was to torture someone he should not.
Draco gawked, his eyes widening to the point of almost matching Luna's "Absolutely not!" he cried. Snape chuckled and informed him by inquiring "Now do you have the incentive to reveal this whole tale?"
"Sure." Draco's voice was nonchalant, but Snape believed approval may have been in his stony eyes, mixed with a generous amount of annoyance. "I was wandering around thinking. Between Pansy and...just about every first year, it's impossible to concentrate...I have to tell you what I was concentrating on?"
Snape nodded; Draco hesitated, thinking:Bastard, bastard, bastard!
"Draco?" Snape prompted. Startled from his monotonous litany, he feigned a cough and started once more: "What was bothering me is that...I ought to go back...The other day, I was out by the lake, and Luna comes along, sticks this big list in my face, and asks if I sto--took any of it. We have a bit of a row about it, nothing too seriously, but then she's go off saying 'You know how it is with your father in Azkaban.' What a bit--"
"Draco."
"Ahem..Luna says that, and so I begin feeling...pity." He spat the final word out in disgust. He hated Luna for forcing him to feel it, hated Snape for forcing him to admit it, hated Lucius for being in jail, hated Potter for putting him in it, hated Narcissa for insisting that he follow the footsteps of his father, in that he marry well, produce an heir, and join the Dark Lord, hated Pansy because she was their choice, hated Voldemort for not making this better. He hated them all for making him vulnerable, and hated himself for allowing it.
Snape, unaware of this inner tempest, stared unwaveringly towards Draco, startled, but unaffected outside. Arching a brow only, he replied "Go on."
Confused by his aloof attitude, Draco was emboldened and obeyed. "Yeah, I gave the bloody photo back...with a frame." He halted to see his professor's reaction, but there was none, so he summed it up with: "So that's what was on my mind."
"A guilty conscience over a 'good' deed?"
"Yes."
"And what have you to ashamed of? Most would be glad for it."
"I'm better than most."
"Mmm-hmm...Answer me."
"If I'm...I mean, I am better, so why did I be...nice to her?"
"You understand that more than I." Snape said, not unkindly.
"How useful you are. It's not like Dumbledore keeps you around to beautify the castle or anything." he retorted sardonically. Snape looked peeved, but felt that this was to be expected when he had instigated first. Draco's expression was much the same, since his taunt elicited not even the merest glare. It was odd for Snape, which proved just how much he desired to hear the rest.
Draco muttered something about how inhuman Snape was. To his surprise, the answer was "This is a flaw?"
"Are you daft?"
"I promise I am not. Do answer my question, Mr.Malfoy."
After some ill-concealed insults, Snape's patience was rewarded when Draco begrudgingly said "Yes."
"Why is that?"
"Well, it's not always...but sometimes..."
"Like when?"
"Like if I'm the one that needs help." he declared arrogantly, his pointed face turning upward as if he expected a marvelous beam of light to encase him.
"Knowing your father as I do, I wouldn't think that is a statement of his."
"So what? I can't think for myself?" Draco snapped, unusually ardent, as he was the previous day when Luna brought up that man. His jaw was clenched, as were hands, and he leaned forward. Both of them were shocked when Draco's wand was swept into the open from it's haven in his left sleeve, tucked into the small hole he had cut in the closer layer.
"Put it away!" Snape all but shouted, leaping fleetly to his feet with the rustle of his thick robes. "All I meant was that, before now, you have never shown that your opinions differ even slightly from his. Lucius would've said that a Malfoy needs no help."
"Oh, and a lot of good that idea has done him. No one has helped him now, now that he is in the prison and a liability." Draco cynically said as his teacher sat down again.
Snape never knew there would be a situation in which he would defend Voldemort, but it was for both their sakes; it would avert suspicion from himself, and keep Draco from committing a major error. The way he spoke almost sounded negative towards the Death Eaters, and by association, the Dark Lord and the cause. So he reminded Draco sympathetically, sadly "No, he does not forget those who have served him well. He forgets nothing, nor does he forgive those who doubt it."
His youth was more apparent now at the true fear seen in his eyes when he realized the full extent of his words. People in his position were censored, some for lesser transgressions, by murder most often. Several of those burned off names from the old Black genealogy could be found on tombstones, or plain markers if there was nothing left to bury...
"I had not meant..."
"Consider what you say in the future, consider your actions." Snape replied, not even scolding.
"Of course..." he murmured, pallid.
Snape observed with an awkward blend of kinship and repulsion. Just because none were forgotten did not mean they were saved. It was tragic that Draco could not mourn for his father, not that he would, or wanted to. He really was not free to have his own thoughts.
It was appalling that Voldemort should have control like this. It made Snape thankful that he could protect his mind, and liberty to some degree.
It was barely a second until Draco rebuilt his composure, and then Snape asked, after setting a silence spell, and some strong protection charm, about them "Are you are saying that this is regarding more than the events with Ms. Lovegood?"
"Of course not." came the haughty reply, with a searching gaze. It put Snape on edge, and after he had instructed Draco to be cautious!
"Let me say this, and then you may go. You must decide for yourself what is wrong and right. Not everyone bothers to question what they have been told, so they become tools to whoever they allowed to mold them. You have begun in doing something Lucius would not. Do you aspire to be your father?'
Draco shook his head, not at first, but not half-heartedly when he did, and avidly awaited the rest while trying to pretend he was not paying so much attention.
"Then you have to think, and ask yourself if helping Luna was wrong or right. Like you said, one day you may require help, and it just might be Luna who provides it. Don't seek advice more clear than this. I can't lead you, nor can any other, unless you accept it. You must be wise in whom you trust to do this, and as Lucius would say, it is best to trust solely yourself."
It not only contradicted Lucius's actions, but his own, yet it was right in a sense. The means justified the means; he was, after all, Slytherin. Whether Draco would later join Voldemort, oppose him, or a medium between if one could exist for a person so involved, Snape knew that this logic would soothe him later, so had no guilt. There was bias in his statements, but only plain to him, and Draco did not question any point as he glided from the room.
He had not come to a conclusion on the problem involving Luna, or the greater one it represented, but he was relieved to know that he was choosing the solution. Draco also deemed that Snape was a far better role model than his own father ever was.
A/N: Notice the irony? I just love riding the fence, but did you? Let me know, and if I'm flamed, I shall happily admire how pretty fire is! Burned cookies to you, and yummy ones for anyone else that reviews.