Title: Chained Wings Of Hope

Author: Pikola

Pairing: none, but may become a Harry/Draco

Beta: none, but I'm looking for one if anyone is interested

Archive- sure, just e-mail me for permission first

Rating: so far, I'm making it PG-13, but more than likely it will change soon into R, so be warned.

Warnings: AU, Child abuse, future Draco/Harry (that's m/m relationships, so if you don't like that, don't read it.) This was written before Book 5 came out, so nothing from Book 5 applies to this fic. Hence the AU part. Basically, Book 5 never happened.

Summary: To everyone, it seems like Draco Malfoy lives a charmed life, full of aristocratic privileges and a father who indulges his every wish. But what if that life was a lie, a facade so no one would see the truth?

Disclaimer: I do not own Draco Malfoy (damn!), Lucius Malfoy, Harry Potter or any characters in the Harry Potter world. They belong to J.K. Rowling. That's all, I think. Oh, I don't own Concrete Angel either. It belongs to the wonderful singer Martina McBride.

I apologize in advance. I was listening to Concrete Angel by Martina McBride and I started to write this.

'words' means thoughts

Dedicated to the victims of child abuse and those who have survived

Chapter 1- A Shameful Secret To Hide

"You fail again Draco, and there will be a price to pay," Lucius Malfoy hissed at his son, as his hand roughly grabbed Draco's arm. "Do you understand me?"

Draco inwardly winced from the pain in his arm and knew there would be more bruises there, one more mark of shame to hide from everyone. Outwardly, he simply gazed up at his father with no expression in his eyes. "Yes, Father."

Lucius let go of his son's arm and Draco fought within himself not to rub his sore arm. Draco mentally noted to remember to bring plenty of long-sleeved shirts to put under his robes until the bruises faded. Without another word, Lucius turned and stalked out of the room, his robes making a swishing noise that continued to reverberate in the high-domed room of the Malfoy Manor long after he had left. Draco counted to 50 and slowly peeked around the corner to assure himself that his father was really gone. Draco checked the empty corridor again, and then sighed in relief. Draco gathered his dignity as best as he could and began to make his way back to his room. Once there, Draco slowly removed his high-necked robes. In front of the full-length mirror, he assessed the various cuts and bruises that marred his body. On his back were several cuts from shards of a vase his father had thrown at him in anger. On his upper arms were several bruises of varying sizes, mostly because when Lucius got particularly angry, he had a tendency to leave bruises while roughly flinging Draco around the room. There was a particularly bad one on his right arm when his dad picked him up and threw him 10 feet across the onto the bed. Or the one a little bit below that one when he got thrown into the wall. The worse bruise was the one around his neck where his father had picked him up and held him up against the wall by his throat. Luckily, Draco had a couple of high-necked robes he could wear to hide the bruises until they faded.

Draco sighed and reluctantly put his robe back on before exiting the room for dinner, praying silently that he would be able to avoid his father's wrath for four more days. 'Four more days,' Draco thought, 'and I go back to Hogwarts. Four more days until I can leave all this behind...'

Author's Note: Sorry it's so short, but I didn't know what else to write. Anyhow, I'll try and post it as soon as I can. I am currently writing without a beta reader, so if anyone would like the job, I would be very grateful. Until then, any reviews are very much appreciated by me.