They were near a river, that was as much as Draco could tell. The smell of fish rotting in years of muggle pollution and neglect permeated the area through the mist that clung to everything. His mind wandered to thoughts of Dementors, of ragged black cloaks gliding in and out of the narrow alleys, their rasping breathing sending the mist into the air like a snake using its tongue to find heat, the fog pulling happiness from the air to its horrid master. Pulling hope. Perhaps my thoughts are not so far fetched, Draco said to himself.
"Quit dallying!" the lanky man in front of him hissed, startling Draco by slipping out of one of the narrow alleys to grab Draco by the collar of his tunic, tugging him violently in the new direction. "Or do you forget that the entire Order will be out looking for you by now, not to mention most of the Ministry."
Draco shrugged out of the grip he was held in. "It was you who did it, not me." His voice was not defiant as he had been months ago at the Slughorn's Christmas party. He was quiet, matter-of-fact.
The man drew in close, his black eyes glaring straight into the boy's through greasy black hair that had fallen in front of his face. "I did what you could not do! Remember that!" he whispered in harsh tones. He spun quickly on his heel, the hem of his robe swirling below him as he ducked once again into the blackness. Draco hurried to keep up through the twisting maze of the decrepit village.
At last they came to a wasting house at the end of a narrow lane, its features indistinguishable from the other buildings they had passed, save this one seemed to have all its windows and roof intact. They ducked into the deep doorway of the house, a long, almost hallway like approach to the building that held a darkness in it that served to repel the ceaseless mist. Draco's companion slipped out a long wand and proceeded to create several complicated patterns in front of the blank surface of the door, his lips drew taut but unmoving as he cast the spell. A soft click echoed from the lock, and with a macabre creak the door swung open slowly. Draco moved forward to enter the home but the wand bearer stopped him, moving inside the door with soft, slow steps, Draco pulling his own wand from his sleeve and following close behind.
The apprehensive calm of the room they had just entered was shattered with a series of startling event. There was a flash of light so bright that Draco involuntarily flinched, drawing his head deep into the side of his hood and clenching his eyes shut. Behind him the heavy oak door slammed shut with a thunderous crash. Somewhere ahead of him he heard the sound of shattering glass. Although quick to recover from the sudden shock, Draco thrust his wand forward as almost an afterthought, unsure and almost uncaring about whatever could be attacking.
A glance around showed no attack coming, and Draco found himself more interested in the room itself than the intruder now squirming in midair. Faint candlelight struggled to cut through the murky dim of the room, the destitute spirit of the home content to yield just enough to allow the occupants to see, even if it was still uncomfortably dark. The room itself was a sitting room with several worn and uncomfortable looking armchairs sitting on a threadbare throw rug, arranged to face a fireplace, now glowing with a low fire, a small wooden table resting between them. Lining the walls were tall bookcases filled with a dull rainbow of book bindings and checkered scroll cases with crumbling parchment. One bookcase was turned out away from the wall, large hinges mostly hidden by the design. Behind it lay a hallway that emptied into utter darkness after a few feet. The air of the room was stale, musty from the books and the grim from outside the walls, a mausoleum ready for a family visit but neglected for ages.
He finally turned his attention to the third occupant of the room. Dangling by his ankle several feet above the shattered remains of a wine glass and an ancient bottle of wine on the dusty wood floor was a pitiful excuse of a man. He wore a tattered shirt and trousers under a faded gray cloak too large for him, one that may have at one point been a deep scarlet or purple, that had fallen downwards to cover his head. He struggled to free uncover himself with small, frantic movements which caused his whole body to twitch as he slowly began to spin by the invisible rope holding him. His hands were horrific to Draco, each for a different reason. One was gnarled, stubby fingers ending in cracking yellow nails that were longer than his mother's well manicured nails. This hand had one digit missing, a jagged stump that looked as if some small animal had nibbled the finger off in tiny bites. His other hand was glimmering silver, reflecting the meager light of the room and somehow amplifying it. Yet this hand was cold, lifeless, inadequate replacement for something that may have been ugly, but was nevertheless alive and human. A heartless gift from a heartless master.
These two hands, which made his lip curl up into a familiar sneer, was enough for Draco to recognize the man even before the struggling sap freed his head from the cloak. His wispy hair with its missing patches almost touched the ground below, his beady eyes darting around the room until they rested on Draco's companion. The look was the same Draco had seen the man give the one time he had met him before, last year in his father's study accompanying the Dark Lord. It was the look of a man trapped, a rat that had backed himself into a cage and now couldn't find a way out.
"Severus!" he squeaked out in choked surprise. "I didn't expect you to have returned so soon! Didn't know they changed the length of the school term."
"Wormtail, why are you in my home?" Snape sneered, his wand still pointed at the animagus.
"I was sent here, to wait for your return," he said meekly, with just a hint of disapproval in his voice.
"You were sent here to wait for me, yet are surprised when come home and catch you drinking some of my best wine. Do not lie to me Wormtail. I think you remember what it is like if you lie to me." He had come in close to the hanging man, squatting down to talk directly to the man's face as he jabbed the tip of his wand into Wormtail's cheek.
With a yelp Wormtail pulled his face away from the now orange glow of the wand. "The Dark Lord, he, he..." he began, stuttering over his words.
"Ah yes," Snape drawled, retracted his wand and standing. "The Dark Lord." He turned away from Wormtail and moved towards one of the far bookcases, gesturing for Draco to take a seat as he did so. Draco took the chair indicated, coughing due to the dust his sitting kicked off the chair into the air. He shifted his gaze between the two other men, his thoughts still caught up in himself, though he was curious what the former professor would do.
Snape found a latch in the bookcase, and with touch of his fingers the shelves began to swing forward with the same slow creak the front door had made. He scooped up a dusty bottle of firewhiskey and two clean looking glasses, and shut the cabinet with his elbow. He placed the three objects on the small table by the fire and turned back to Wormtail.
Snape repaired the wine bottle and glass under Pettigrew, the wine unfortunately lost by this point, and he sent both flying back into the kitchen. With a flick of his wrist, Snape released the spell there was another flash, again causing Draco to wince his eyes shut. Wormtail was now on the floor, struggling to stand up and once again becoming lost in the oversized cloak.
"Calm yourself Wormtail, there is no need to pull yourself off the floor on my account."
Freeing his head from the cloak, Wormtail glanced nervously over at Draco before jerking his head back to Snape. "The Dark Lord—"
"Will be curious to know of our whereabouts," Snape cut him off. "He no doubt already knows what occurred at Hogwarts tonight, but he should be informed that Draco and I have escaped and will be joining him shortly when it is safer."
"I," Wormtail tried to begin again.
"Should be leaving immediately," Snape finished for him. "I don't know why you are in my home but I know it is not under orders for the Dark Lord. You are fortunate that for now I do not care since I can find use of you. Return to the Dark Lord and tell him what I have told you to tell him."
"But you said it is dangerous now," Wormtail whimpered. "I... I should wait, with you!"
"Wormtail, I send you as a courtesy to him, for he knows I did not intend to return to him this night regardless of the outcome. As for danger, remember that the Dark Lord cares very little for most people's lives, and even less for your's. Go, now."
Wormtail stared in defiance for just a moment before pulling himself with some trouble to his feet. He darted to the door and opened it, slipping into the night. Draco could here the crack of Apparation through the closing door. With a quiet click, the portal closed again.
In the same manner that he once swooped through the halls of Hogwarts, Snape was suddenly by the small table. He poured a bit of firewhiskey in the glass and handed it to Draco. The fair haired young man took the drink, staring at the shimmering red liquid rocking gently as the drink changed hands. He threw his head back and downed the liquor in one shot, ignoring the nearly overwhelming burning sensation in his throat.
"Are you injured?" Snape asked. His voice had lost much of the edge that it had when he spoke to the departed Wormtail.
Draco looked up, his gray eyes staring into Snape's black. The older man gestured to Draco's head. He reached up and felt around his head with his hand. Moving it away, he saw there was indeed blood. Feeling one more time for an actual wound, he shrugged. "Must be someone else's." He reached for the bottle and poured himself another drink, this time sipping it slowly.
Neither said anything for a long time, Draco staring into the fire and Snape content to merely watch the boy with a contemplative look on his face. To Draco, the room was closing in on him, and with a quick glance around the room he could see why. The bookcases all leaned slightly in towards the end of the room, while the corners of the room were all slightly off right angle. There was nothing right about this house. Nothing right about him.
Unable to avoid it any longer, he simply said, "He's going to kill me and my family, isn't he?"
Snape did not answer immediately. He took several more sips of his whiskey before slowly stating, "The Dark Lord is not always predictable. He may very well reward you for your work on the Vanishing Cabinet, or he may punish you for taking so long. Dumbledore is dead, which may be enough for him to overlook the fact that it was not you who performed the curse."
"And my mother?"
"I will speak on her behalf, I do not wish to see Narcissa dead any more than you do."
Malfoy's reaction what not what Snape expected. He had expected the boy to make a comment on Snape's negligence to include him in asking for a stay of execution. Instead the boy merely nodded. "Good. Thank you."
"You're very calm about this, it's surprising."
"Maybe I'm still in shock. I've never seen anyone die before. Before tonight. It was so fast. He was just suddenly... gone." The last word stayed in the room, not so much as an echo but rather it hissed over the quiet crackles of the fire and hung before them both like Pettigrew had earlier.
Snape's face darkened ever so slightly, but he remained stoic. "The line between life and death is far more fragile than most people realize. Did he offer you protection?"
"Yes."
"And?"
"I think I was going to take it. He said he could protect my mother, and my father."
"You tell me this freely? Hardly befitting behavior for a Slytherin to offer information so openly."
Draco merely shrugged at this. "Maybe. I'm probably going to die anyways, so why bother hiding it?"
"Your fate is yet to be seen Draco. The Dark Lord may still have a use for you."
For the first time since the green magic had snuffed out the life of Dumbledore, the wheels in Draco's head began to spin. They, like his speech, started slow but picked up momentum. "Use for me? It's always comes down to that. He doesn't care about purebloods, its just one more tool to get others to follow him. This was never about making up for my father's failures, always about just doing what he wanted."
A small smile played on Snape's lips. "Ah, at last you are beginning to see."
"Does anything I've done even matter? Even if I had pulled it off without any problems I'd be in the same position, wouldn't I?"
Snape took a sip of his firewhiskey and then placed the remainder back on the wood table. He leaned back into the cushions, the sides of the chair creating shadows over his face. "The Dark Lord hands out and takes away favor on whims. Death may come at any moment for anyone, and in the end is the only fate of the Death Eaters. Each joins for their own reasons, but in the end those reasons matter little. After all, there is much to gain at the side of the Dark Lord, but any who feel secure in their position, with the wealth and prestige and power one receives as one of his followers, are delusional. All are dispensable to him. Perhaps in the end all we do is hope to delay our own demise. "
"It's not what I thought... I thought I would be keeping my family safe by doing what I was going to do anyways. And now..."
"You are not the first to doubt their choices Draco, you will not be the last. The question is what you do from here."
"If I don't... he's going to...I have to..." Draco stumbled over his words again, the thoughts of what was most likely going to happen causing an emotional storm that threatened to engulf him.
"What have I just told you Draco? Are you as thick as a Weasley? Your life is already forfeit to the Dark Lord, from the moment you allowed him to mark you! What you must do is decide what to do with that life in the time you have left. Make the decision yourself! Don't let fear of what will inevitably happen rule your life. Don't snivel about your fate or the fate of others. Choose your own path and walk it, but don't be stupid about it. Show the intelligence you have displayed in the past and not the pathetic cowardice you seem to have picked up from Wormtail."
"And if I stand against him? What then, will you kill me?" Again the final word stopped the conversation and held each of them in its grip as the two men locked eyes. It was some time before Draco asked, "Does it even matter to you?"
"An interesting pair of question, to which I do not have answers for," Snape said, standing. He moved around the chair towards one of the bookcases, opening it to reveal a staircase. He spoke as he moved. "In any case, I suggest you practice the Occlumency your dear Aunt Bella taught you. There is a spare bedroom that way if you wish to sleep, I don't believe Wormtail has polluted it." Snape paused, as if hesitating to say something more. He turned slightly to Draco, his right eye just visible through his long hair. With a slight shake of his head he stepped onto the first step, and the hidden door shut behind.
Draco did not sleep that night, but stayed by the fire, his eyes almost always fixated on the small flames and burning embers. At last, Draco Malfoy had reached the crossroads that would determine his life, a decision he would at last make on his own, one marred by the immature choices of the past. Occasionally his hand would drift to the burn on his left forearm, the skull and snake, and wondered how much of him was left, and how much was the burn.