All characters in the Harry Potter Verse are the property of J.K.Rowling's creative genius. All hail.
Prologue
The loud bang of the bolt on the cell door exploded through her sleep and the shriek of rusted hinges reverberated in her skull till she thought her eardrums would tear. It didn't end there, though. The door wouldn't open, of course, which is only natural when one takes into consideration the fact that it hadn't opened in…three years? Had it really been three years since the Dementors had left?
It scraped to a halt only a few inches from the frame and the men on the other side wound up having to violently shoulder it open. Sparks flew as the metal scraped, screaming, against the ancient, blood-covered stones of the cell floor. Finally, it bounced off the wall behind it, and swung, wounded and limp like a broken wing, the creaking sounds it made like an old woman's tired weeping.
From where she lay, the woman on the floor saw two pairs of boots approach her. Vaguely, she wondered at how used to darkness her eyes had become in this place. The thought led her to try and remember the sun. She could recall it as a brilliance; a fearful, white-hot thing in a world of greys and blacks.
She couldn't remember colour. The Dementors had taken colour from her within the first two years of her imprisonment.
Here they come again, wailed Jabber.
They can't harm us. So long as they don't bring back the Dementors, they can't hurt us more than they already have, said Hiss, as calm as you please.
Nevertheless, the woman on the floor felt fear rise in her, like an unstoppable iceberg, lifting up her arms so that she found them shielding her face before she'd even realised it.
No beatings! sobbed Jabber. Please don't beat us!
Hiss merely hissed wordlessly, spitting like a cat.
The owners of the boots heard nothing, though, as they stood at her head. She didn't even whimper.
"This is her?" asked the man with the cleaner boots.
"Yeah," confirmed the other. "Tha's 'er, alright."
Shiny Boots knelt down and bent to peer into her face. Long, white, blond hair cascaded down and hit the dusty floor at her eye level.
And with it, the colour 'Gold' remerged into her life.
She recognised him in a painful, painful second, even though she hadn't seen him in over sixteen years, and felt something inside her open up that she'd thought was dead. Her history, her life, her achievements and failings and dreams came flooding back like a river breaking a dam.
This man had almost raised her. He'd been an older brother, a mentor. At one point she'd aspired to nothing other than being like him in every possible way. He was here, before her, peering into her face anxiously, searching for recognition.
Oh God, she'd missed him.
She opened her mouth and tried to speak but all that came out was an empty wheeze of breath. Some part of her throat had dried up and hardened from disuse.
His face contorted as if she'd stabbed him in the heart with her pathetic attempt at communication and tears began to slide down his face.
"You look like a corpse," he murmured. Despite his evident grief, his voice was as cold and collected as ever, with its frosty, bitter edge that she knew and loved so well.
It almost made her laugh.
Almost, but not quite. After close to two decades in Azkaban, laughter and tears were quite beyond her.
For once, Jabber and Hiss were silent.
"I can hardly tell it's you, Baby," he sighed. "Maybe I expected too much of you. Maybe you aren't…yourself anymore…"
What a peculiar turn of phrase, thought the woman.
That's what THEY'D like to think, spat Jabber furiously. If anyone's kept their soul in here, it's you…
That's because she never had a soul to begin with, Jabber, replied Hiss amused. Or so THEY claimed…
The woman lay on the floor and tried to think. Jabber and Hiss had a point. At most, she was a shadow of her former self; Azkaban had robbed her of aspirations to the point where if breathing hadn't been automatic she would have stopped that too, long ago. She hadn't moved from her place in a few months now, in fact, and probably couldn't if she tried.
But she hadn't cracked.
She'd listened to them all crack one by one… Bellatrix, Barty Crouch jr., both the Brussiers. All of them had lost awareness and sanity in here at one point or another. Screaming and crying and begging were normal activities in Azkaban. It was when they started laughing hysterically as the Dementors fed off them that you knew they'd finally lost it.
One by one, they'd all laughed. One by one.
All except her.
And Sirius….
The man with the long golden hair began to sob again. She'd never seen him like this before and she knew him well. Growing up, she seen him turn hard and sneer at the best of them. Cornered, this man turned to steel instead of crumbling. The woman had a feeling that even if he'd ever been caught and put in Azkaban for his…affiliations, he would have found a way to either get out or kill himself out of spite. So what on this earth could reduce him to the heap of blubbering mush she was currently witnessing? What did he need?
Why was he here?
The question struck her so suddenly that she could hear Hiss and Jabber gasp as if they'd been struck.
This man was not the type who asked anyone for help. She of all people knew this. But here he was, after sixteen years, expending the man power and money to …sit and have a chat?
Not likely; that simply was not his way.
Either he was sent to kill her, or he needed something and needed it badly. His list of allies in the outside world must have dwindled indeed for him to look for friends inside Azkaban.
Buuuuut…she couldn't speak. And if she could anyway, she wouldn't ask. One of the more subtle side effects of being in Azkaban was maddening uniformity in the lonely darkness of prison. So maddening was this boredom, in fact, that after a while one tended to not care whether they lived or died so long as something happened.
So if Lucius Malfoy was here to kill her, well then he better make it interesting.
Lucius Malfoy.
She contemplated the name and all it meant to her. History, power, birthright…home…
He's not here to kill you. You already know that, sneered Hiss impatiently.
True. IfLucius Malfoy had been ordered to end her miserable existence he'd hire someone to do it. Save him the risk of getting blood on his clothes.
What's he here for, then, eh? Jabber snivled excitedly. To break us out?
Don't be a fool, Jabber, spat Hiss. We're not getting out. We're never getting out. I'd have thought you'd know that after seventeen years in this hell.
Then what's he here for? whined Jabber heartbroken. What's he here for!
The woman didn't know. But she was interested enough not to go back to sleep as Lucius began to collect himself and speak again.
"As you've probably guessed by now, I'm in trouble," muttered Lucius bitterly.
Aaaaah.
Well, of course he was. But she still couldn't tell how he expected her to do anything about it. The only thing she could do any more was die.
"I'm sorry I didn't come get you earlier…It's just that…I thought it was all over, you know. I thought HE was dead, and there were so many of us in prison. I was afraid for myself, for my family…" continued Lucius.
Should we tell him that you weren't surprised? giggled Hiss. Or should we let him grovel a little more?
Hiss was right.
When they'd first thrown her into Azkaban, she'd lingered and thought of many ways to cut her misery short, escape routes, suicides, rescuers…Lucius Malfoy had not been one of them. She'd known him well enough back then too. Lucius watched out for Lucius…and perhaps Narcissa…and Draco. No one else.
But she wasn't angry. It was part of his charm, as far as she was concerned. She'd tried to be like him, when she was younger, and she'd failed.
She tended to get too emotionally attached to people, sometimes…
Sirius…
Her thoughts were interrupted suddenly as the owner of the dusty boots suddenly came back into the cell and began furiously whispering to Lucius. She hadn't even noticed he'd left, so occupied with her discovery of a Malfoy in her cell was she, but she certainly began paying attention now.
"…Look, are you here to 'ave a nice cup o' tea or break' er out, coz our time's quickly runnin' out, Malfoy…"
"You insolent mudblood…there was a time when your kind whimpered at my feet!"
"Yeah well, you've fallen far since then, 'aven't you?" growled Dusty Boots. "Now, are you takin' this sack o' bones or what?"
"She's in no condition to travel, she might die…" said Lucius.
" Well, she's certainly goin' to die in 'ere, that's for sure. When they stop movin' even to eat or take a piss, that's when you know that it's all over. And this one ain't moved in months, now." Dusty Boots paused in his tirade to give her a gentle kick. Where his toe made contact with her body came a flame with searing pins and needles. "I'm surprised she's still breathin'. Usually takes a couple o'days to end'em once they stop carin'. .."
"You say she hasn't been eating?"
"Oh, aye. But we 'ave to feed 'em. Scrimgeour's orders from the Ministry. Dirty job, but somebody's got to keep these bastards alive till the Dementors come back, and let me tell you, that'll be my happy-day!"
Another silence. The woman wondered vaguely who Scrimgeour might be.
"It's now or never, Malfoy, make up your mind."
There was another silence, in which even Jabber and Hiss seemed to hold their breaths. Then, suddenly, Lucius pounced forward from his crouching position so that his hands where on the dirty floor right by her head and his mouth was at her ear.
"I'm sorry," he whispered furiously.
You better be, she thought, knowing full-well that whatever happened next would be against her will
"You probably just want to be left in peace…."
That was debatable…
"…but I need your help. No, I need you to owe me a favour. And this…this is all I can offer you…. Your freedom…"
Oh, well, then. If you put it that way, thought the woman non-chalantly as both men slid their hands beneath her body.
Then, the excruciating pain began.