What Were We to Darkness

I was accustomed to the bleak semi-darkness of the Manor, with my attraction to the shadow world I have always preferred winters. People rushing home in their black robes through the darkening streets, but I feel an overwhelming sadness when I look at old buildings and the dark surfaces of neglected unpainted, fallen down homes where people once lived, it is for the first time I have seen this color come to life…

I see the dark crowds rush homeward, with their heads bent in perhaps fear or maybe in happiness, I feel like the night is one with us… it helps cloak our worlds, our belongings in a blanket of darkness as if once we are safe in our homes we can once again return to the dreams of our long lost riches, our past legends of gods and monsters, our dreams of chivalry and valor.

I watch the darkness descend over the bodies of homeless muggleborns and their broken bodies, it comforts me for some strange reason to see their despair hidden from prying eyes. I watch men and women pull the cape of night behind their lengthening shadows. I walk alone my own shadow blending in with those of other men and I wish I lived in a world where grey was not so black and white was not so grey.

But who am I to complain, I am one of those thieves who has slowly stolen the color from this world, leeching it out with my actions. I have turned my world grey by spilling red but I am too much of a coward to face the thought of colors returning again. For every color is an emotion and I am now used to a world without emotion for only death is grey and white and now I am used to death.

It is my worst nightmare to see all the colors rushing, bleeding into a wild spectrum, proceeding to stain my soul. A deep, luminous jade of calm or perhaps a scarlet of lust or perhaps a cerulean of strength, no I cannot fathom these colors and I try but in my worst nightmares they choke me, surrounding me head to toe in a million hues, covering my matte grey body in suffocating colors. I cannot survive these emotions… not with what I have done. Not with what I have become.

I am a beast though my scars do not show on my countenance they are riddled upon my soul, pockmarked, red and raw.

I was there when we caught her and I wanted her dead. She was the single living soul who I feared and now she was here, close enough for me to destroy her and yet I couldn't.

Hermione Granger, the warrior.

….

Draco Malfoy had changed, it was there in the way he held himself; the kind of dark, dangerous energy that crackled surrounded him like an impenetrable shield. His face was stoic and his body still but his eyes flamed with…fear? For her, of her?

"She is my prisoner." He said quietly, his low voice stilling the restless herd of Death-Eaters all braying for her blood. "Tie her and the boy up, I will see to it that they are delivered to the Dark Lord." He said as he turned his back to her and walked away.

Hermione had never seen more animate eyes, unconsciously she wondered what was going on in that mind and how he had managed to tame it in a manner that it showed nowhere but within the deepest recesses of his mind. Even though she had seen him just seconds ago it was hard for Hermione to recall anything but his strange eyes that skewed into her, the rest of him was blurry. Like a reflection on water, his edges softened by the mundane, shadows blurring over her eyes in an effort to make her forget him.

He was fading; she thought… her mind fuzzed with unclear thoughts. He was fading into matte black.

…..

I have exams coming, so I'm sorry for the short update I plan to reveal how the whole war happened in the next chapter but this was just a little Draco and some Hermione. Unfortunately real life demands are too pressing.