Disclaimer: They're not mine.
WARNING: THIS IS NOTHING LIKE SILVER SCARS. This totally dark and not at all nice. I've been tired. All the animals are in Fantastic Beasts and where to find them. Sorry for any mistakes. TW FOR RAPE
I wake up at 4:37 am in a cold sweat, breathing hard. Everything I see is blurry and I can still feel the remains of my nightmare breathing down my back.
Ants.
It feels like a thousand ants are crawling over me, up my arms and legs and in between my fingers and toes. I'm still batting at my skin madly, trying to get them off when I realize I've been dreaming and that I'm in my dorm not laying on the ground of the Forbidden Forest, and there are no ants. At least not tonight.
It doesn't matter. If not tonight then soon I know, but for now, my heart stops pounding and I fall back on the bed and try to breathe again. As soon as my heart is beating normal, the pain hits me in the chest and I almost cry out. It's been a week since I've been to the Wraiths and each day the pain gets worse and worse until I crawl into the woods practically screaming for them to come and feed off me.
The Wraiths.
I found them by accident when I was in the woods one night after hours on a dare. It was some stupid Slytherin haisings game to be alone in the forest without being caught and I had to do it if I was to maintain my princedom over the pack of fools. But I was afraid of the dark of all things. Terrified because the child in me knows bad things happen to you in the dark. Things come up behind you and take you places you don't want to go, make you do things you don't want to do and you can't fight back in the dark. People say that shadows are just the absence of light... but I know better. Shadows are more real than light. They can kill.
Now I know it was my fear that called them first. Of course at the time I didn't. I was wandering alone in that forest, listening to the movement of unseen beasts and watching spiders weave their death nets in the dew. They came out of nowhere. Electro-plasmic beings with twisting half shapes and dark empty eyes that shone with hunger. They wove like liquid electricity between the shadows hissing with oozing hunger. They fed off of fear. But when I saw them first they took on the shape of my mother and I felt safe because she was the only person I knew who cared about me. It's a ploy they use on their victims to lull them into reassurance before they suck them dry. They are worse then vampires because when they feed off your life force. They take everything, including all the pain. But the emptiness they leave is worse than any physical hurt; it eats and gnaws at you until there is only one way to stop it and that is to let them feed off you again. And again and again and again until there is nothing left of you but an empty shell. They are worse than dementors because they kill you slowly, oh so slowly. And in the morning you wake up in the dirt with ants crawling all over your skin.
The ants can't help it. It's their instinct to feed on corpses.
The wraiths leave acid marks across my neck that sting for days, but a high neck robe can cover that and it's minor compared to the ache.
The longer I stay away, the more the gnawing grows until I break and I find them again to take it all away. The nightmares are just reminders that I'm doomed.
"For Merlin's Sake, Malfoy, what have I ever done to you? Why can't you just leave me alone?"
"Because, Long-ass, you're SUCH a stupid fat fool without my help that - add my own special affects - and you're the best entertainment we have. Besides, Dumblesnore won't let us hunt bowtruckles or kill puffskeins, so what are we supposed to do for entertainment?"
All day I feel it creeping over me but I don't want to go to them yet so I fight back. And lash out.
Crabbe and Goyle are both laughing and Neville is turning red with anger. It makes him look like a disproportioned tomato with eyes. The swelling curse I put on his nose promotes the image.
"Is that all you Slytherins know how to do? Prey on helpless creatures?!"
"That, and fat-ass imbeciles," I say as I turn to leave and let him figure out how to get back to his common room. Between the weight of his nose and the knock-kneed hex I sprung on him, he'll probably have to crawl.
Crabbe and Goyle are still behind me snickering when another pain-wave hits me and I almost fall. They stand looking at me like two trolls drooling and I have a mad urge to blast the both of them to hell. They deserve hell. Why my lackeys have to be the stupidest, most incompetent fools in this damn school is beyond me. I make a comment about Pansy having worn me out the night before and they buy it. Thinking fast I make up something for them to do and throw a riddle in to be sure to keep them busy for a while.
When they're gone I crawl to a room and search in my robes for iocaine. It's numbs the pain fast but it won't last for long and I know soon I'll have to be back on my hand and knees, crawling through the dirt, begging energy-psyphons to suck the life out of me and drain away the pain.
I've lived my whole life on my knees. I crawled before I walked and I crawled under my father and here I crawl for the Wraiths. Sometimes I miss home. There I was broken, but here is no different except I have to pretend and pretend and it's incredinly draining. I miss my mother crying. She's beautiful when she cries. I miss the sound of my father raging and the crack of my head hitting the floor when his fist shoots out at me. I miss the coppery taste of blood in my mouth. I can handle that much better than the mixed signals I get from people like Dumbledore and Snape. I hate not knowing who the enemy is. It was easier at home.
The iocaine is finished and it's not enough to stop the twisting in my head. I'll manipulate Pansy or Blaise into stealing more from Snape for me later, but for now I can only double up like a weakling and wait for night.
"Ron? Ron are you in here?"
I look up and the youngest Weasely is looking at me with too many mixed emotions on her face for me to read. Of course the fact that my vision keeps fading in and out doesn't help.
"Get out of here, brat," I spit.
She looks more than happy to leave and is gone before I blink. Damn. I try to stand but it makes me sick and I wish it was night so the Wraiths would come and take this away. I'm not stupid. I know they cause the pain. But I need them as much as they need me.
"Are you alright?"
I look up. The brat is back.
"You look ill."
I want to hit her hard. I want to say something outrageously callous, enough to make her cry and I want to see if I can twist her into getting me more iocaine. I pick the second option.
"Well this confirms it. You must be the randiest of the Weasely whores to grace this fine establishment. But one: I don't touch Gryffindors, you are all lame in bed and two: If that's you idea of a catch line you have a lot of work to do."
I have the satisfaction of watching her turn red with embaressment and then white with furry before she spins on her heels to stalk out. But before I can force out a snicker she pivots back and, heading towards me with amazing speed, she yanks me up by the collar and cracks her tiny fist across my jaw.
For such a little thing she hits hard.
All I can see is white and I think I might just pass out. The brat's display may have just pushed me far enough to blackout.
"When I wake up, brat, I'm going to make your life a living hell."
"Too late, fate already beat you to it. And you're not going to pass out."
She's right, I'm not and when my vision clears I can see her standing above me glaring. She thinks I'm in too much pain to react to what she just did. Big mistake on her part. I grab her robes and yank her down, bringing her to her knees in three seconds then I take her throat, almost throttling her. It feels good to have her in such a vulnerable position.
"You think your life is hell? You haven't got the faintest clue my little fisted whore. I'll make you wish your mother had strangled you with the umbilical cord when you were born by the time I'm through with you. Longsnottom's problems will look like April fools pranks in comparison."
She looks afraid now and she's beautiful when she's afraid, like my mother. The brat is homely enough generally, but fear makes her wide-eyed.
I want to say more, but suddenly her expression changes to confusion and concern and it breaks my concentration. I feel another belt of pain coming when she says, "What are those burns on your neck? Where did you get them?"
I didn't realize my collar had slipped. She reaches up to touch my scars and I hit her so hard she falls back and cracks her head on the floor. I feel sick because I have seen this scene too many times before and I just hit a girl for no reason like my father. I reach to help her up but she shies away and I want to hit her again, but not as much as I want to smash my fists into a mirror. When she looks up at me, wiping the blood off her mouth she's afraid.
"Don't come near me; I'm dangerous," I whisper as she leaves.
If she tells her brother, I'm a dead man. I may have to kill her first.
When night comes, I go to the bathroom and cast a spell I know for invisibility. I told the guys that I had a rendezvous with Pansy and I sent Crabbe and Goyle to keep her away all night so no one will be surprised if I'm not there. It's ridiculous leaving this early because the wraiths only come at the darkest time of night, but some part of me wishes -prays- that if I come sooner so will they.
The Forbidden Forrest at night used to scare me out of my mind, but now I barely see it as I crawl through the bracken towards the deep dying places where they will come. They stay away from the unicorns and the centaurs so I have to go places where doxies breed and horklumps infest the ground. By now I can't even hear the hum of insects or the sound of the augruey wailing in the trees. My whole body hurts so much I can't think at all and when I finally see the burning glow of the wraiths as they find me, I'm crying for joy.
They look like pieces of the night sky cut out with some sort of light glowing in them. They look like live shadows. They look like a thousand images of my mother trying to protect me from my raging father and I smile even as the blinding white heat seers behind my eyes. As they feed off me, dragging out everything from inside, they weave around in between the find line that separates pleasure from pain. I can't breathe and I'm choking and the colors all hurt my eyes and I can feel them take away the pain while they take everything else. I'm used like a whore by them all and towards the end it's all pain and finally I pass out like a sack of flesh on the dead leaves.
In the morning I wake up at 4:37 and the ants are crawling all over me. They're in my hair and moving up my back and I beat at them frantically but I can't get them off. Get them off! Somebody get them OFF! But no one comes even when I scream. The centaurs never cross here and unicorns always run from wraith victims. I'm raking my hands through my hair and I think I'm bleeding. My neck hurts from fresh burns and if I don't get back to the dorms I'm going to get caught.
Things are under control later, but I know it's only a matter of time before I have to go to them again.
For a week I wait from Ron to come and break my face apart, but he doesn't come. The brat must have not told him and that makes her a bigger fool then I thought. Sometimes I see her out of the corner of my eye but she's always gone like diricrawl when I turn around and it's beginning to bother me. When I see her in the library looking up a book on healing plants I come up behind her quietly, then pin her to the bookshelf.
"If I didn't know better, brat, I'd think you were avoiding me."
She tries to pry herself out of my grip but the sapling doesn't have an inch of leverage.
"If I didn't know better I'd think you were following me. I thought you didn't like Gryffindors, Malfoy, or do you just like redheads?"
Her sneer makes me want to hit her again and I snap her around facing me so quickly that her fraying robes tear. But when she's looking at me she looks afraid again and she's beautiful when she's afraid so I end up not saying anything. After a moment she realizes I'm not going to lash at her and she says "I saw a picture of burns like the ones you have in a book of Hermione's. Are they Wraith-marks Draco?"
Her voice is so soft it makes my throat constrict and I tighten my grip on her arms. If she says another word I just might hurt her.
"Wraiths are dangerous, Draco. It may seem like they're helping you but they can kill you."
"You little snot. Don't even go there. You just keep steering with your hot little crotch and don't strain you mind by trying to think. And why don't you start charging more from your lads for your services. Maybe you can scrape up enough knuts to get some decent robes."
I know I shouldn't have said that because in a matter of seconds the fear in her face has changed to furry and she knees me in the groin so hard I let go of her. Before I can I even groan she's slapped me and my nose is bleeding.
"Don't ever, EVER touch me like that again. If you come near me, I'll tell my brother and if he knows you've tried to hurt me, you'll wish your mother had strangled you with the umbilical cord when you were born."
She doesn't know I wish that every day.
She turns to leave but then faces me again and leans down to where I'm kneeling on the floor and whispers, "You should stay away from the Wraiths. They're turning you into a monster and your linage gives you a head start in that direction anyway. Not to mention the fact that they'll drive you insane and eventually kill you. Think about it."
I can't get that girl out of my head. When I try to sleep I see her terrified eyes and the concern she manages to muster up over me makes me crazy. I want to punish her for what she's done to me but I can't think of how without her brother finding out.
In twelve days I'm on my knees again. I know I'm in trouble when the Wraiths all look like her: thin, fragile and frightened.
It's getting worse in my head because I lash out at everything that moves. I look at myself in the mirror and I am a ghost. If I go on much longer I won't be more than a wraith myself.
I still only see her out of the corner of my eye but I can tell she's watching me. Maybe she sees what's happening to me. I don't know but I wish she'd go away. I was putting some wet behind the ears Hufflepuff in a body freeze when she walked passed. She just looked at me and then the kid and then me again. Disgust and pity. That's what I saw on her face. I'd love to wipe that look off of her face, but as much as I want to hit her, hit her hard, I don't want to hit her either. I want her to be afraid. I want to see her wreathe and shudder.
She doesn't find me attractive. It's so obvious in the way she looks at me, the way a dog-lover looks at a mad dog that ought to be put down. Pity and disgust. I wish I could make her scream.
I was sniffing iocaine in an empty corridor when she came up behind me.
"That stuff is only messing up your system more. If you really want to pain to stop, leave off going to the wraiths."
"You're not only a poor brat, you're a stupid one too. You don't understand shit about wraiths, or me, because if you did you wouldn't be here alone with me."
She raises an eyebrow and that pity/disgust look is on her face again. I swear I just might hit her after all.
"Whatever. Did you ever think there might be other remedies for the pain besides iocaine and another feeding? Have you even tried to look?"
"Did you ever think maybe I didn't want it any other way? Or did that not cross your-"
"What kind of sick idiot likes to hurt himself?"
How dare she? How does she fucking dare say something like that? So help me.
"I should tell Madame Pomfrey about you, before you get yourself killed." Her voice drops and that ridiculous concern is back. "I don't like you. But that doesn't mean I want you to die. You should try and get help-"
In a flash I whip my hand up to smack her across her ruddy face but she jumps back with this startled look and I check my self. She's look scared. Only a little, somewhere in her eyes, but it's there. Delicious.
"If you come near me again, I might just loose my temper, little lady."
We stand there looking at each other for a minute maybe. Judging. How much of a threat are we to each other? But she shakes her head and turns to go and I can only imagine what she's thinking. This Gryffindor sense of saving everyone is ludicrous.
When the pain gets too bad, I find myself crawling out across the grounds again to get to the damn forest. I tried to do the invisibility spell but it hurt so much that I couldn't get the bloody words out right so I'm creeping out relying on stealth alone. I'm half way across the flying yard when I hear her. She barely makes a sound on the wet grass but I KNOW she's following me. Stupid brat. If she thinks she can stop what's going to happen, she's mad. Stupid Gryffindor righteousness. If I were a nice person I would turn around and tell her that she's heading into a lot of danger. But then if I were a nice person, I probably wouldn't be here in the first place. Bloody stupid brat. If she wants to follow me she's at her own stupid risk.
When I stumble into the woods I'm not sure if I can make it to the clearing. It hurts so much I'm starting to see spots in front of my eyes and everything looks wavy and sick. Where are the damn wraiths? Shit, it's not the right time. but I can't wait, I can't. The under growth is thick and thorny and it's shredding my clothes. Somewhere in the back of my mind I can hear the scream of a Jobberknoll dying and the rustle of imps in the undergrowth but those are like insect buzzes in my ear and all I can think about is the wraiths and when they will drain me.
"Draco, you have to get out of here."
I gasp and jump a mile high when her hand touches my shoulder. I had forgotten she was there.
"What the fuck are you doing here?!" I hiss, but she ignores me.
"This place...this places wreaks like Death. We have to go."
She looks afraid but I'm not sure if it's for herself or me. I forgot how beautiful she is afraid and for a moment I can focus.
"You follow me all the way here and then tell me I have to go back? Stupid bitch, if you wanted me to stay away why didn't you stop me before I got here? Do you really think that there is any going back at this point? Do you?!"
Her head falls and she says, "I was going to stop you sooner. I just wanted to see where it was you went. I wanted- oh it doesn't matter. But we have to get out of here. I'm serious-"
I grab her arm to shake her, but she goes for her wand in one moment before she blasts me I pin her down on the ground. Now she's not frightened; she's furious again and I don't want that damn it.
So I kiss her hard.
Just to scare her.
And she has no leverage to fight me. So she bits my bottom lip and tries to head butt me. I had only meant to scare her. I wanted to see her frightened and then I was going to hit her with a memory charm and send her back to bed.
But instead I crack her head back on the ground before I ravage her body, ripping her clothes off and kicking her legs apart. I take her hard, very very hard. She doesn't scream once. Not even a whimper. When I'm finished with her I look at her face and her eyes are shut. Her face is screwed in up in a look that is pure pain and her whole body is shaking.
"Look at me," I demand.
She doesn't even wince in response. I move away from her a little but she is still pinned under me and as soon as she has the leverage she curls her body up in fetal position.
"Danmit look at me!"
She still doesn't move.
"Look at me or else, so help me I'll do it again!"
She opens her eyes then and looks at me. Now she is afraid. She's terrified. God, she is so beautiful like this. But I hadn't meant to do this. It wasn't supposed to be this way. Shit.
I try to touch her face but she flinches away and suddenly realizes she has room to move. In a second she's kicking and fighting and I have to crack her down again to keep her still.
I smile.
"I don't want the Wraiths to come. I don't want them anymore. They won't come unless they feel fear or pain and I don't have either. I won damnit!"
I'm telling her because that was what she wanted, for me not to keep going to the wraiths. But when I look at her again she crying and I realize I have her blood on me, all over me and that I've hurt her worse then any beating Father lashed out at me. It wasn't supposed to be like this. I pull her up and she only fights a little as I prepare to drag her back to the school. I'll figure out what to do with her later.
But then I feel sick run through me. I turn around and I can see them coming gathering and I almost scream. Why are they here? I'm not afraid and I'm not doubled over with pain this time. I'm not-
Then I look at Ginny.
Her head is lulling almost catatonically and her eyes are so wide with terror and pain that they seem to consume her whole face. They're coming for her. And then I AM afraid for both of us and I know if I don't act quickly-
I'm not quick enough. They know pain. They know fear. And they surround us in less than seven seconds. I feel Ginny cling to me and I see her open her mouth to scream..
I wake up at 4:37 in the dead undergrowth. I sit up slowly and scream because I'm not alone. Then I remember last night. She's on her knees paler than the ghosts that float around the school. Her eyes are wide and feverish and have a hollowness to them that makes her look lifeless. There are dead leaves in her hair which is plastered on her forehead and she faces me with tears streaking her dirty face.
She is rubbing her arms and batting at her skin.
"Ants," she moans in a thin voice. "I can't get them off! Get them off me! Please!"
Her skin is welted where they've bitten her and I see them crawling up her arms and across her neck. I wish I were an ant. Her neck is welted with the acid burns of the Wraiths. I want to fold her in my arms and lick her ruined skin, but when I touch her, she scrambles away crying. She trying to get away but she won't stop trying to fight the ants off.
"The ants, they can't help it," I tell her. "It's their nature to feed on corpses."
AN: I wrote this when I was 19 and stupid. Nowadays there are too many stories telling girls rape is sexy and this can't be one of them. The point of this is some people can't be saved. If this story ever triggered a victim of sexual assault, I beg for forgiveness.