My first (and, for now, solitary) Harry Potter fic. It'll be short and sweet, but it is dark and covers dark themes (I mean, we all read that last book and caught all the underlying messages).
It is a Dramione, because that pairing fascinates me for some reason. *shrugs totally unapologetically*
Enjoy!
Soft
Chapter One
He had followed them.
When they escaped the Manor. He had leapt at the whorl of disappearing people, leapt through the enraged shriek of his aunt and silent reaches of his mother. He had latched on as the final pull took them over, and he had landed on damp sand.
There was screaming, maybe, and crying, and someone was crawling towards him.
Crying. 'Dobby, Dobby,' repeated over and over, like a mantra. Dobby. He knew Dobby. The elf his father had tortured.
The elf that had snuck him extra sweets late at night. Had taught his mother how to make hot cocoa when he asked her for it as a child after reading about it.
Screaming. No. No screaming. It had stopped. Maybe it hadn't even been here.
With him. In the damp sand and watery grey sunlight and salt water that washed around him.
Someone was crawling towards him.
"Malfoy," nothing more than a strangled gasp. He blinked. Brown hair that should have been bushy, but was matted down with blood and dirt and salt water.
Blood. Blood.
It was brown now. Dried. What should have been wet and crimson-red was mixed with the brown sand. Dirty.
Dirty.
No.
On the floor, the dark floor of the manor, it had been clean. Crimson. His aunt had shrieked her gleeful laughter. Granger had screamed and choked on a sob.
Her body had flopped, her head had bounced. Blood.
"Malfoy," the blood on her hand was dried. Not mixed with sand. Just blood.
Red. Brown, dried brown. But red when wet. Like his.
"Malfoy." His name, three times, and he moved suddenly, gripping her arm and pulling her closer.
She was real. Yes. He had actually done that. He had—
Run.
Leapt.
Escaped.
Something hysterical bubbled within him.
"Granger, Granger, Granger," it joined the litany of 'Dobby, Dobby, Dobby,' and from the house on the hill he hadn't noticed, someone came to help him the rest of the way to safety.
###
He didn't have a room. The little house was too small, and one room went to Ollivander, one to Lovegood and Granger, one to Potter and Weasley, one to the goblin, and one to the owners of the house.
Thomas was left in the living room with him.
He'd stared.
Draco stared back.
"You came with us."
"Yes."
"Why?"
Draco looked at his hands. Blood. Dried. Granger's blood. His skin itched suddenly. "I don't know." He hadn't had a chance to clean yet. Two bathrooms. One was for Ollivander and Lovegood, the other for treating Granger's injuries.
The Mark on his arm burned. He flinched and Thomas looked at the tattoo surrounded by raised skin a blazing, angry red.
"Why didn't you help her?"
"I don't know."
That wasn't satisfactory for either of them. Thomas was frail after imprisonment and being beaten during the journey to the manor, but he still found the strength to glower.
"What do you know?"
There it was again. Hysteria. Bubbling in him. They would probably kill him. Use him for his information, first, then kill him.
"I'm dead."
Thomas didn't quite meet his gaze. Looked at the wall behind his shoulder. "You're not."
"I am. My mother. He'll kill my mother. Torture her first. I'm hunted now. This side won't trust me. I've killed. They'll get the information I know. I'll tell them. Everything. Everything." Another litany. "Everything, everything, everything."
Maybe it was his hysteria that started Thomas off. First pacing. His fists clenching, and then he was in front of Draco, grabbing him by the shoulders and shoving him off the sofa. He hit the floor hard, shoulder catching on the edge of the coffee table.
"You're not dead!"
"I should be!"
"Fuck's sake, Malfoy, Hermione's torture is your fault!"
"I know, I know, I know," he stayed in that awkward, fallen position on the floor, gazing trailing over the details of the wood.
Wood, like the floor in the manor. This wood was better. Her blood wasn't soaked into it.
Thomas resumed his pacing. "She might die!"
Draco traced a finger along a crack in the wood. "Red."
Thomas paused. "What?"
"Red. Her blood is red. Like mine. It dries brown. Like mine. It was dirty with sand from the beach. That's the only dirt. Sand on the beach."
The other man crouched above him uncertainly. Draco kept his eyes on the floor. "You came with us."
"Yes." He traced another crack. "The elf is dead. I saw. He made me hot cocoa."
"You came with us."
"Yes."
He wasn't sure who started crying first. Maybe they had been crying the whole time. Thomas, when realizing Draco wouldn't move himself, rolled him into a more suitable position. The weight of someone curled on him was unfamiliar. Draco didn't fight it.
There had been rumors at school, Thomas and Finnegan.
Draco didn't care. Not anymore.
Weight. Weight. He wasn't alone. Thomas was there. Curled on top him, around him. In just as much shock as him.
"You came with us."
"Yes."
Bill found them that way, shivering on the floor, Draco covered in dried blood and Dean curled around him. "One of the bathrooms is open."
Thomas offered to let Draco go first, to get rid of the blood. Draco shook his head and pulled the other man with him. Bill murmured, soft and quiet and gentle, that food would be ready when they wanted, and he was glad Thomas was safe, and—he hesitated—if it was okay with Draco, he'd speak with him privately later about what happened, or maybe, if Draco preferred, Fleur would.
Draco nodded, in a shocked daze.
Bill had called him Draco.
Thomas was willing to shower with him.
He was alive. Alive. Alive.
Escaped.
###
He had chosen Bill to speak with. Fleur was beautiful, and surprisingly kind, and his Mark kept burning and despite the fact that Thomas had carefully scrubbed all the blood from beneath his nails, he felt unbearably filthy.
Bill had seen war.
Fleur had, had—she was beautiful and kind and he wouldn't show her his war.
They sat in silence on the front steps of the house. The ocean below flowed soothingly. Draco watched the waves. Sometimes he thought he could see a pattern.
"I went with them."
Bill nodded. "Yes."
"I don't know why."
"That's okay."
Draco's fingers dug into the steps beneath him. "Her blood is red."
Bill knew what he was talking about. "Yes."
"They'll kill my mother."
"She might escape."
Draco scoffed and felt something in his chest break. "She's not that powerful."
"Never," Bill's voice had changed, softened, hardened, and Draco looked at him. A fire burned in his eyes, "Doubt the power of the women you love."
"Woman. One." Draco's Mark burned again and he didn't bother to stifle his flinch. "Only one."
Bill let him set in silence. Bill was good, Draco decided. A red-headed Weasley, but a good one. He let a man to his thoughts. Let a man to his thoughts, but didn't let him drown in them.
"Tell me what happened."
Draco shook his head. He didn't want to. Didn't want to hear those screams or see that blood or 'Crucio' and 'I don't know, I don't know.'
Or the knife. And more screaming. And the blood trailing down her arm in small rivulets. Mudblood.
No. No. It was sand. The only dirt was sand.
But Bill was patient, and the ocean was soothing, and his Mark finally stopped burning. "They were caught. By Snatchers." His voice was not as emotionless as he would have liked, but didn't hold as much emotion as it should have. "And there was a sword. And my—my—" he choked on the word. She wasn't family, not anymore. "Bellatrix thought something. She took Granger and—and—"
He choked again, and warm fingers enveloped his arm, digging painfully into his Mark. It was that touch, maybe, that cleared his throat and his thoughts and let him continue.
"Granger was tortured. The Cruciatus curse. And something else. I don't know them. And a knife. A cursed blade that will scar. Trauma, physical. She hit the floor a few times. Blood." He stopped, breathing deeply, not seeming able to take any air in.
Those fingers squeezed again. He could breathe. "There was blood. It's all over the manor floor. It was—it was," he could do this. He would say this. "Red. Like mine. I'd never seen her bleed."
Bill gave him another squeeze. "But you had seen other Muggle-borns and Muggles bleed." It wasn't a question. It wasn't condemning, either.
"Yes."
"Why was this different?"
"I don't—I think because I knew her. I grew up with Granger, in a way. It was personal. I think. I don't know." I don't know, I don't know.
Bill pulled him closer. "It's okay."
"It's not."
"It is. You chose."
Yes. He had. Draco had chosen. Something shuddered through him and salt hit his tongue. He hadn't known ocean spray could travel so far.
It was only when Bill pulled him close, pulled him against his chest, that he realized he was crying again. Not just crying. Sobbing. His mind had broken, his spirit, too, perhaps.
He cried for all he'd done and all he hadn't, and Bill held him, stroking his hair as if he were a child. As if he hadn't tortured and hadn't killed.
The Mark started burning again and Draco flinched. Bill tightened his hold and squeezed again, so hard, so tight that pain overtook the one of the burn.
Alive. Chose.
Escaped.
Thomas joined them on the steps and curled against his other side.
Safe.
So, for those that don't know, my speciality when it comes to fics is Star Wars: The Clone Wars, and many of the ones I've read (and written that will never see light of day) have to do with the psychological affects of war and how that can, not to be redundant, shatter someone.
But they also have to do with healing, and since that's what I'm good at writing about, that's what this fic turned into. *another shrug and slightly sheepish and hopeful smile*
Please let me know what you think. I appreciate all reviews: the raving fans, and the constructive criticism.
Lots of love and kisses!