Disclaimer: Characters, settings, and themes from the Harry Potter universe are property of J.K Rowling. I neither own, nor am making profit from the writing or sharing of this story.
He'd been there, rotting in that cell for eleven months and twenty-three days—not that he knew the count. He lost count a long time ago. For the first few months, it was easy; he knew by the passing of the guards and the consistency of the gruel they shoved through the bars. As time wore on, though, he started to lose track of time, of himself, and of everything around him.
By the time six months rolled around, the monotony of dark walls, porridge, and no one to speak with had taken its toll. Draco was huddled in the corner of his cell. His Azkaban jumper, which was baggy to begin with, now hung like a loose sheet around his gaunt frame. Each time he moved, some ache would plague him, some angled and bony part of his body would scrape against the floor and remind him that the sludge they fed him was not enough. It was never enough, and that was when he could manage to eat it.
At first, he spent the solitary confinement thinking about his family and the things they'd done to end up here. His father was to spend six months in a cell and then receive the kiss. His mother would spend the same six months and then be released on two years' probation at the manor. Draco received a full year of imprisonment and then release with a year's probation. They each had their own journey to the halls of Azkaban. They each had their own demons to battle.
After a while, when all of his demons were fought and gone, when he sat there shivering in the cold air coming through the grate above him, he could only hear the whispers and screams. Sometimes, they were his own. Like an animal, he occasionally prowled the room, stalking the space for some thread of hope—some bit of humanity to hold on to. He often remembered the words Harry said to him before they ripped them apart. I'll always find you, Draco. There were days he wished those words would fly like birds out of the grate and never return. They pecked at him and devoured him whole. He sat there, waiting for Harry to find his pathetic self in the shadows of the night—or perhaps day, he could not tell—and rescue him.
He often thought of rescue. Would the golden trio face down a hoard of dementors, battle through the aurors, and take him from this place? Dreams, waking dreams, plagued him. He wanted this so much that he could taste the sweet smell of Harry's cologne on the tip of his tongue. He could inhale that familiar musk of fake confidence and warmth. Merlin, what he wouldn't do to be warm.
Once, he saw Bellatrix. She passed his cell as they shoved the tray through. She was naked, holding her hands out in front of her. Her hair was long, wild, obscuring her face, but he knew that manic laughter. He would know that bit of insanity anywhere. As she stalked past, the gangly skeleton of her slinked and squirmed, chanting the praises of Voldemort and the pureblood regime. There would be a reckoning, she said. They were coming. The auror holding her arm gripped her a bit tighter and shoved her forward. He told her that Voldemort was a pile of ash he'd pissed on and that she was about to get the best kiss of her life. Draco shuddered and retreated to his corner.
Draco wakes up violently; he's covered in a light sheen of sweat and is shivering. The door to his cell is thrown open and he shields his eyes for the lumos that enters is too bright. It's all too bright. His arm is blocking his view and he's not sure if it's an auror or a dementor, so he cowers closer to the corner. A rough hand grabs him, hefting him upward. He weighs nothing, and is thrown around like a rag doll. His head lolls, bobs and is jerked back and forth until he's alert enough to stand on his own. A binding spell hits him and his hands are tied together with thick rope.
"Are you daft? Walk, fucker." He'd been standing still for a few moments and hadn't realized someone was speaking to him.
So he does. One foot in front of the other. He's done this. He knows how to do this—walking. Walking he can do. The rest, he's not sure about. Breathing is automatic, sometimes. He has to think about it sometimes. Other times, it just happens. He stumbles, and the auror laughs at him, kicks his hip while he's down on his knees.
"Get up, you worthless piece of shit." His hair is yanked, and he has no choice but to follow it upward or it will come out. All of it will come out. Some of it has already. "Walk or we'll drag you." He hadn't seen anyone else to make up the we, so he wondered for just a minute if a dementor was hovering nearby. He couldn't feel them anymore. They just were. Always were. Rattling brought him to attention. It was not the normal rattling of bars and bowls; the usual banging of gruel containers on doors and grates. It was the jangling of keys and the insertion of one into a lock. It clicked and turned. He heard the distinct grind and snap when it fit into place. The door swung open and everything was too much.
Blinding light came into the hallway where Draco half-stood, half-crouched behind the auror. His eyes squinted, trying not to immolate in the fire that assaulted them now. He slowly looked beyond the door and realized that there was a long, winding stair. The auror grabbed his shirt forcefully. Together, they moved through the doorway, out into the inferno, and the door slammed closed behind them. Then it began. His torturous walk down the stairs lasted an eternity. Each time one leg lifted to descend onto another stair, his bones ground together and his muscles screamed against the abuse. He pushed on. There was a reason he was outside. It was the end. Which end, he was unsure, but it was an end, and he was ready for it. Whether they were going to let him go, or if a dementor would be waiting for him at the bottom of this staircase, Draco was ready.
Just as quickly as it began, his eternity was over. He sunk into the sand in relief, plunging his hands deep into the grit and wriggling his fingers there, reassuring himself that he was back on some sort of soil. The auror allowed this for a moment, as he pulled something from his belt. It was a knife and Draco's breathing quickened. Rather than a slit throat or some other slow death, one rope is cut. He leaves the other. Draco sighs, and the auror laughs, walking away. That makes Draco nervous, as he sits there, alone in the sand on the shores of Azkaban.
In that moment, Draco realized that he was alone. Completely and utterly alone. He did not know when the last time he'd eaten was. The last bit of water he'd been given was more than a day past, that he knew for sure. Out in the sun, he realized that it was not hot; it was not even warm. He began to shiver as he watched the waves crash against the rocks around him. There was only a small landing there where the sand kept him on flat ground and not falling over the cliff. That's when he felt it. Outside of the cell, away from the confinement of Azkaban, the overpowering feelings of grief and loss were less. Therefore, he felt the approaching dementor with a very real fear. It clenched his stomach and took hold of his breathing- stilling it and then releasing only in short gasps. Out here, he was unprotected. No one, it seemed, was coming to help him. He looked around. No one could find him here.
Words were foreign to him now. It had been a couple months since actual sounds came out of his mouth rather than just in his mind. His jaw worked at it for a minute, and he clawed frantically at the sand. His nailbeds had already been scraped raw on the concrete of his cell floor and the raw glass of sand grains digging there helped ground him, bring him back into the now. While he tried to cast the spell he knows by heart, his legs would not support him. They are too weak from the journey out of the prison and down the stairs to move him even a meter beyond the spot where he sits, crying hoarse whispers to the gods. When words begin to form, tears roll down his cheeks. The dementor is so close, he can feel his throat constricting. Fear is overwhelming him, but he is digging further down into the sand, on his hands and knees and waiting for the kiss that would surely end his life.
At the end, when the spell slipped from his lips, the only thing he remembered was the way Harry's arms slipped around him as they lay in bed. They were too tired from making love to move and Harry whispered softly in his ear, "I love you." Everything went black.
There, in the quiet spaces of death, Draco could smell Harry's cologne. He could feel those warm arms wrapped around his emaciated shoulders and stomach. There was a moment of stillness, then, as he sunk back into that embrace. When Draco's eyes opened, there was nothing. It was a black void and there was only the tight pair of arms wrapping around him, gripping him tighter and trying to coax him back downward. He heard the rapid whispers of Harry's voice, "You're home, you're safe. Draco, I swear you're home, and you're safe. You're home…" They faded in and out as Draco's heartbeat thumped louder in his ears, thrashing about wildly in the grasp of someone who surely was not Harry. "You're safe. I love you, Draco. I swear to you, you are home now. You are safe. Please believe me. You are safe now. I won't let anyone take you again. You're home now, you're safe. I found you."
He listened to Harry's voice for many hours, the soft mouth against his neck and the warm arms keeping him from running as the sun rose to greet the dawn. It wasn't long until Harry's voice grew hoarse and they both fell asleep from exhaustion. When he woke again, Harry began anew. Draco listened to the words for several days before he believed that he wasn't dreaming.