Chapter 01 – Enter Old Friends
Draco Malfoy quietly crept past his father's study and snuck up the stairs to his mother's room. If his father caught him there he would be punished, he didn't want to think about how. He froze as he heard his father's chair scrape across the floor. He heard footsteps approaching the door and braced himself for the door to open and his father to see him, hurriedly thinking up excuses. The footsteps turned and gradually became fainter, the louder again, fainter, louder. Draco let out the breath he had not realized he'd been holding. Lucius Malfoy was pacing. He did that a lot. As Draco reached the door at the top of the stairs he heard the chair scrap against the floor again as his father sat down. He touched the door hinges and whispered a few words and the hinges greased themselves, allowing him to open the door silently.
He stepped into the small hallway that connected the rooms of his parent's suite. His parent's bedroom was the first room on the right and the door was open. He could see his mother lying on the bed, she looked so fragile.
He went to the bed, and softly shook her awake. He frowned as he saw the large, purple bruises on her arm and shoulder. That normally didn't happen, but the force of the curse had thrown her against the wall. He was willing to bet they would be gone by morning. Lucius wouldn't leave any evidence that could be used against him.
She had tried to stand up for him again. He told her over and over that it wasn't worth it, that Lucius would only hurt them both instead of just him. She never listened to him, and she always got hurt.
She smiled up at him and accepted the water and soup he had brought her. He wished he could heal the fractures and pains she had suffered but he knew if he did his father would know and it would only bring them more trouble.
"Are you gonna be okay?" he asked her, "Stupid question," he berated himself, "of course she's not going to be okay, she has to share a room with him."
"I'll be fine Draco," she answered. Narcissa never let her son know how terrified she really was of her husband, little did she know how much he saw, and he knew better then to believe her when she said she was fine.
"I have to go back, he won't like it if he finds me up here." They both knew who he was talking about, "Tell him I told the house-elf to bring you something, that'll explain the food."
"Goodnight son." She did not reach out to him, nor did he embrace her, they both expressed affection in there own way and they understood one another.
Draco went back to his room as quietly as he had come, and collapsed on his bed. As soon as he sat down he heard his father's study door open and Lucius heavy tread slowly moving up the stairs. He took in a deep breath; he had just barely escaped trouble. He pulled the covers over his head, not even bothering to undress, and slept.
Narcissa started as her husband slammed the door shut. She watched him as he prowled the room preparing for bed. He left his clothes in a heap for the house-elves to clean and stalked to the bathroom, leaving toiletries strew about.
His wife sighed, tomorrow they would wake and the room would be spotless, she wished he wouldn't do that. The elves had enough to worry about without playing nanny to a 43-year-old man. She used to be able to tell him these things. 20 years ago, if she had told him to clean up his mess he would have laughed and thrown the clothes at her. She remembered a time when she had done just that, she had thrown the robes back at him and they had actually had a pillow fight. Now she didn't dare tell him to do anything, he would probably throw something not as soft as his robes.
He paused in the doorway of the bathroom, sniffing the air and frowning.
"I smell soup." He told her, "Has the boy been up here?"
"No." she answered. Lying came easily now, she had years of practice. "One of the house-elves brought it up."
"Then he told them to send it up." Lucius made for the door but was stopped by the voice of his wife.
"Oh leave him be he's just a boy." Narcissa looked up at the man she had once loved and struggled to contain the fear she felt in her heart. "Come to bed."
Draco woke the next morning with a splitting headache. He groaned as he rolled out of bed, easing out the kinks that came from sleeping fully clothed. As he walked towards his private bathroom his wardrobe opened and black silk robes flew out and neatly arranged themselves across his bed, any mess from the day before picked itself up and when he entered the bathroom a line of toiletries followed him into the shower and set themselves along the shelf. The hot water turned on on it's own and he sighed as the falling water beat out some of the knots in his back.
His thoughts drifted back to the day before and the events that had led to his parent's argument. He had left the house early to meet some friends at a local bar. After getting thoroughly drunk on Merlin only knows what they had crashed some vampire party, and he spent the afternoon dancing with some dumb blond vamp, eventually winding up in her bed.
He had come home hung-over, dead tired, and covered in bite marks. His father had been disgusted. He considered the vampires and anyone else less the Death Eater rank to be below his son or any other self-respecting pureblood. Draco had had to endure a long list of sins he had committed against the family name and thought he was getting off easy with about fifteen seconds of Cruciatus to sober him up when his mother had stepped in. She had started of with how he was only a boy and it was a hard life and he deserved a little fun every once in a while and blah blah blah. Of course that had made his father even angrier and she had been cursed right along with him.
He stepped out of the shower and wrapped a huge black towel around his waist, examining himself in the mirror. His chest, neck, and shoulders were bruised and purple, covered in now painful fang marks. There were others, in places his father couldn't see.
"And thank Merlin for that or he would have killed me this time." His father was always on about preserving the family blood, staying pure. He remembered the first time his father had caught him, he had been 12, kissing some girl he had met in Hogsmeade. As it turned out, she wasn't as pure as she had told him, had a great uncle who was a muggle or something, but that was enough for Lucius. He had flued Draco home and he hadn't returned to school for a week.
Draco grunted as he heaved his stiff legs off of the teak stool he had been sitting on. He dropped the towel, as he had air dried in the bathroom there was no need for it, and walked across the room naked, not caring that he strode past the open bay window that covered all one side of his spacious room. He snapped his fingers and his robes flew to him adjusting themselves to the most flattering form. His shoes and sock marched out of the closet and came to rest at the foot of his bed. After putting them on he called his wand to him with a muttered "Accio" and it flew from the table where it had been sitting since he came home the night before.
At that moment his father banged open the door. Draco winced, that door was fine mahogany; there was no call to treat it like that.
"Get your cloak and mask," his father's voice was tense, as if the upcoming event was not precisely to his liking, "we have an audience with the Master today, we leave in 10 minutes."