Part III: Draco MalfoyDust swirled through the column of light that fell across the pale face of a sleeping teenage boy. His face twitched a bit, and he rolled over in annoyance. He did not want to wake up. He knew nothing pleasant was waiting for him today. His father was probably dead by now, and he did not want to face the owl bringing the notice. He fully planned on hexing the accursed beast the second it appeared at the window. Not that he cared if his father were dead, really, he just didn't want to be bothered with all the paperwork and his father's will and other such piddling legal nonsense. That is what was bothering him, of course. That's why he had been feeling like this for the past week, with the Death Eater trials running their course: as though time had slowed to a standstill and the world was holding its breath, like he wanted to scream and cry at the same time. It is certainly not because he cared about the fate of Lucius Malfoy. His father had never cared much for him either anyhow. Draco knew where he stood in this family. He was well accustomed to being little more than a valuable commodity. He knows well that his worth only extended as far as Lucius Malfoy requiring an heir to carve into his own image, as a matter of pride and legacy and little else. His father certainly never cared about him as a human being and a son. And Draco hated him for it too. So why did he feel as though he were on the verge of crying?
Angry at himself for a million reasons and no particular reason at all, Draco vigorously rubbed at his eyes and forced himself awake. He was not going to sit in bed feeling sorry for himself all day, no matter how he felt. He was a Malfoy and whatever else, that meant above all that he was a master of pragmatism. He rules his emotions. He is not ruled by them. Draco also knows that emotion is a weakness, never to be shown and to be felt as little as possible.
You are a Malfoy. You do not cry.
That lesson was one of his earliest, and memories of his father strapping him and ignoring his cries were plentiful. After a while, he had stopped crying out as the leather stung his legs. Crying never did any good. Crying, like all expressions of emotion, is a waste of energy and a quick way to lose face. Face is everything, after all. If you cannot save face amongst your peers, you will never be respected. If you are not respected, you will never have power in this world.
Do you want to be weak? Do you want to be prey to the whims of more powerful men? Power is everything, Draco. Everything else is an illusion for sentimental fools.
Draco stared at the dawn through the window, squinting his eyes at the impossibly bright sunshine beaming in. What right did the sun have to shine on a day like this? There was nothing good about today. Or any other day, as far as he was concerned. Things never went as he thought they should. Life was bloody unfair sometimes. Nothing bad should ever happen to a Malfoy. Until recently, he thought nothing bad could happen to the Malfoys, that the stars were against any misfortune on his part. Apparently the universe had been a bit distracted lately.
Draco glanced about the room, his eyes pausing on old toys piled in the corner, the racing brooms leaning against the wall, the beautiful and expensive robes and fur-lined cloaks lining his wardrobe. Everything he had ever asked for. All this junk had meant so much to him just weeks before, as proof that he was from a powerful family, superior and deserving of the world. Proof that his father, through Voldemort, would insure him everything he deserved.
Now, however, it seemed like a pile of useless garbage collecting dust, utterly meaningless. Over the years, he had always thought like he would finally feel complete after getting that perfect broom and making that perfect catch in the next Quidditch game, that the right robes would make his beauty impossible to ignore by any. He just knew that Voldemort would take over the wizarding world and he'd finally get the respect and obeisance he knew he should have, that the world would be his also, in time. All his house mates at school respected him. They were all his allies. But the emptiness at his core would not go away. He'd ignored it as foolishness on his part until now. Now, as the rift grew wider, he could not stop thinking about it.
He'd always felt to some degree like there was something rather pointless and wrong with it all though he knew not what exactly. Now, he felt it more acutely than ever before. After all, what was the point of all of this? Why spend a lifetime accumulating power, prestige, and wealth, only to have it stripped away at the point of death? The grave was the great equalizer, after all. King and pauper both returned to the dust of the Earth. For a time, Voldemort seemed to hold the promise of immortality, but he now knew what a lie that had been. It had been nothing but an intoxicating fantasy, and that dream was now undeniably over.
Draco stood up and stretched, slowly making his way to his wardrobe. He reached to the back and pulled out a soft dark blue cotton robe, one of the simplest outfits he possessed. He ran a comb through his hair and was about to slick it down like he had done every day for as long as he could remember, but for some inexplicable reason, today he didn't. He just couldn't be bothered with it this morning; it took too much energy to move. He took his wand off the night stand, stuffed it in his sleeve as an afterthought, and started down towards the smaller dining room the family used when not entertaining company. The light streaming in through the high stained glass windows was bothering him all the more as he slowly walked the corridor. Damned sunlight. Damned morning. Why did dawn have to come before it is wanted? A slight twinge between his eyes told him he'd soon have a full blown headache.
He turned around the corner and stopped quite suddenly. There was a figured hunched over a cup of coffee and the Daily Prophet sitting at the table. No, this was impossible. Draco stared and wondered if he was still dreaming, but dismissed the thought as the throbbing in his head spread to his temples and reminded him that he was indeed quite conscious. Draco was snapped out of his reverie as the statue-like figure unexpectedly looked up at him with an odd expression.
"Good morning, Draco."
Draco was quite confused. His father was dead. He was supposed to be dead.
"You're alive."
Draco regarded his father carefully. He had an expression on his face that Draco was quite unused to. It was not the stern mask he'd grown used to from infancy, nor the shallow annoyance or anger that occasionally cropped up. He wasn't sure what it was. He looked almost melancholy, but that was preposterous.
"So it would seem."
His father paused for a heartbeat, as though considering his next words carefully.
"They let me go."
Draco blinked in drowsy confusion.
"Why? How? I've been following the trials, I can't imagine that they would ever..."
As Draco's inquiry trailed off, Lucius' expression shifted again, as though he were afraid of what Draco's reaction to what he was about to say would be. Draco could not get used to this sudden appearance of emotion on his father's face. It just didn't add up with what he knew about his father.
You are a Malfoy, Draco. Never show emotion. Your enemies will use them against you. You must stamp feelings out. They are a sign of vulnerability that others will take full advantage of.
Was the man who told him those words time and time again the same man sitting before him now?
"To be honest, Draco, I'm not quite sure what happened. "
Lucius briefly laughed half-heartedly. Further dumbfounding Draco, he shook his head, continuing with a half-smile on his face.
"That Potter boy.... He spoke on my behalf. I don't understand what happened, but I'm here, Draco. I'm still alive."
Draco just stared at him, wondering if this truly was his father, or if someone was trying to play a nasty trick on him involving polyjuice potion or some odd spell. But nobody save a Malfoy could get past the magical wards protecting this home without invitation...
Lucius tried to read his son's expression but could get nothing from him. He had trained him well. Far too well. Again he was reminded of his treatment of his son and guilt crept back into him.
"Listen, I'm not going to talk about the trial. It doesn't matter now anyhow. I want you to understand something..."
Lucius looked down. He wasn't sure what he wanted say to his son. That everything he had taught him was wrong? That he was sorry for misleading him, for mistreating him? It sounded hollow even to himself. Draco would laugh. This is too damn difficult! He had whispered poison to the minister of magic, deceived an entire society, and quietly destroyed anything that had gotten in his path, but he could not even talk to his own son. He could not bring himself to admit he was wrong to his son and beg forgiveness. What if Draco refused to take him seriously? What if he simply laughed at him and decided his daddy's gone mad? Would he ever respect him again? Was it too late to save Draco from making the same mistakes he had?
Draco raised an eyebrow and regarded him with cool suspicion. After a full minute's hesitation on Lucius' part, Draco began to turn and head back toward the door. Lucius briefly covered his face with his hands and gritted his teeth.
"Draco, listen to me, please."
Draco stopped instantly. His father had never said "please" to him in his life.
"I thought I'd get the owl with the ministry's announcement of your execution this morning."
Lucius did not look up. He spoke quietly, almost to himself, and Draco had to strain to hear him speak.
"And you'd have cared nothing at all and had every right to not care. God, Draco, what have I done to you?"
Draco stared hard at the figure before him. Was this man his father? His father had never felt a moment's guilt in his life. Guilt was not for Malfoys. Malfoys do not make mistakes. This was all highly confusing. He sighed. Nothing was right anymore. Voldemort was dead, his father was acting like some weak Hufflepuffish mudblood, not like the high-born aristocrat he was. Everything was completely wrong with this picture.
Draco turned and briskly walked out of the room, breaking into a run once he was out of his father's line of vision. He felt like the world had been ripped out from under him. He had told Potter on the train after Voldemort's return that he had chosen the losing side. He had been so certain, so confident in the infallibility of himself, his father, and Voldemort. It had been drummed into him from birth that the pure-blooded families of ancient lineage were the true inheritors of the Earth, that their waning power was temporary, and that one day, they would once again seize power like they'd had in pre-Christian Europe, if only they kept the faith and stayed vigilant and untainted by muggle and mudblood ways.
Draco sat down on the couch in front of the window in his bedroom, looking at the calm scene below him. The Malfoy Manor sat on a magnificent tract of land in the heart of Wales, untouched by muggles and modern life. A small lake was positioned a short distance from the old stone mansion, and beyond was a deep old-growth forest. Although it did not harbor the vast assortment of creatures that the forest on the Hogwarts grounds did, it held its own quiet mystery that never quite lost its captivating appeal to Draco. The land was unplottable, and inaccessible to any but the Malfoy family and their guests. The Malfoy family had moved to Wales in the second century AD from what was now northern France, and deep and ancient magic permeated the entire estate. Draco idly wondered if his father even knew what all the enchantments and charms that protected his home were.
What did his father know anyhow? It was a jarring revelation that shook Draco to the core of his being. His father was fallible. Ultimately, he was just another human being. And by extension, so was Draco. What difference did blood make in the end, then? He suddenly dreaded returning to Hogwarts. He had never cared that he was either hated or feared by the other students before, when he'd been so absolutely sure that he was a superior being lightyears beyond any of them...
Draco pressed his forehead against the cool glass of the window and closed his eyes. He felt like crying again, but this time he wasn't quite so sure if it was worth the trouble of fighting back. What did it matter anymore? Even if his father was still alive, the man would never carry the influence and power he once did. People would always look askance at him, being found among the ranks of the Death Eaters twice. Also was the fact that the wizarding world at large had lost much of its respect for the old families in general, as so many of them were revealed to be supporters of Voldemort, or at the very least, steeped in the so-called Dark Arts. There was really no denying it any longer: the days of the old families were coming to a close. The pure-blooded population was dwindling rapidly, each generation bringing fewer and fewer children, meanwhile the number of mixed blooded and muggle-born wizards and witches ballooned. The fall of Voldemort really was just the final nail in the coffin. Blood and ancestry had meant less and less before the fall of the Dark Lord, but now it was truly worthless. His name would now be, if anything, a detriment. The path his forefathers walked was now closed to him. Draco would have to make his own way in the world, but what path could he take? His father's quest for power and absolute control now seemed hollow and empty, but Draco knew of nothing else. His entire world had been washed away in a single crashing blow.
Draco was suddenly startled as he noticed movement from the corner of his eye. His father was in the room, moving over to sit on the couch next to him, turning to look out of the window that Draco had been staring through a moment before. Draco turned and looked at his father, waiting for him to say or do something, anything.
"I have never seen another place like this. No land is as fair and beautiful as our home. Our family has been living here for over nineteen hundred years, you know. The Malfoy family has long been one of the most powerful wizarding families of Europe. Quite a legacy, indeed."
Lucius turned and looked at his son's impassive face.
"You are the last scion of this ancient family, Draco."
He turned back to the window, lost in himself, but Draco continued to watch him expectantly. He had heard this speech innumerable times before, but never in such an odd tone.
"Yet even if you have twenty children, Draco, I fear that the Malfoy legacy is over... at least, in its traditional form. The world has changed, Draco. The old ways are swiftly being forgotten. This land once harbored more than just our small family, Draco. I don't recall if I've ever mentioned it to you, but once an entire community, of both magic and muggle peasants lived on this land, tilling the Earth under the strong arm and patronage of the Malfoy family. But they have long since moved on. The old altars of the forest lay empty. The power of the old families is broken...
"I have taught you what my father taught me, and what his father taught him. The Malfoy ways have kept the family strong for centuries, but now I fear that it was all for naught. All the efforts of this family through the generations have ultimately come to disaster. What do we have to show for ourselves, Draco?"
Draco said nothing, but Lucius was not really expecting an answer from him, so he provided one himself.
"A bit of pretty land, a dusty old castle, and a pile of bits of metal in a Gringotts vault. We have won no just wars and saved no lives, but rather destroyed many. It was the ambition and tyranny of our ancestors that drove away those who lived in that city. Our family scorned its responsibility to those people, abandoned their love of them, and forgot them. Simple selfish ambition for greater power ruined us, Draco. I fear this land shall never be fruitful again, at least, not for us."
Lucius looked again at Draco, hoping to divine something of his child's present feelings, but his placid expression surrendered nothing. He truly was his father's son, the man thought grimly. He was now, anyhow. Lucius remembered what Draco had been like as a very young child. He had been a bright toddler, quick to smile and laugh, but also quick to cry. Lucius had perceived the child's open nature as weakness, and had resolved to teach the boy decorum fitting of a Malfoy. Lucius Malfoy never regretted anything so wholly in his entire life.
"We were wrong Draco. I was wrong."
Draco stared hard at an imaginary point somewhere between his father's shoulders. He felt as though the ground below him was crumbling, and that he would soon fall into an abyss. The tears that had been threatening him all morning made another jeer at him as he struggled to keep his frustration and fear from showing. He finally lost the battle as warm fingers pushed an errant lock of blond hair behind his ear, and a single tear traced a path down his slack face. He would rather die than cry before his father, but he could no longer prevent it, and no longer cared if he was beaten for it.
Draco waited patiently for his father's rebuke, but it never came. He finally hazarded a glance up at his father, and nearly gasped at what he saw. Lucius sat before him with his eyes closed, his lashes glistening with unshed tears.
Draco found the sight revolting, though he wasn't certain why. His hatred of the man before him flared up suddenly. He stood up from the couch and backed away. He wanted nothing more than to hex the man before him, though he knew he'd never have the courage to do so. Somehow, all of this had to be his father's fault. He just knew that it was the result of some weakness in his father, now displayed on the older man's face. He spoke, softly at first, but his voice rising with every word until he was practically shouting.
"What's wrong with you, father? Where did this weakness come from? What has happened to you? How could you let this happen to us? How could you be so weak?"
More tears slipped from his own eyes, but he no longer cared. The chasm that had been threatening to swallow him since the fall of the Dark Lord finally opened up, swallowing him whole. He sat down on the floor and wept in earnest. He was hoping, praying that his father would drag him to his feet and slap him, call him weak and unworthy, tell him to act like a Malfoy. His father did none of those things.
Lucius sat down beside his son, pulling the young man's head against his chest and wrapping an arm tightly around his shoulders. Draco's sobbing only increased as the boy wrung his father's robes in his hands as though he would truly be lost if he let go.
Draco hated himself for being weak and crying. He hated his father even more so for being weak and crying and embracing him like he were something precious instead of simply something necessary. He barely heard the man's voice at first.
"I'm sorry Draco. You're right, I am weak. I have always been weak. I know it seems like strange logic, but we were all weak, we who followed Voldemort. Such power is only a fleeting illusion that will betray you in the end, and I have let it betray us both. I led you down this errant path..."
Draco had never hated his father before as he hated him now, but he couldn't bring himself to let go of him. He could only bury his face in the man's chest and cry. The only betrayal he felt was that of his father's.
Here we are, father, crying like fools. You always taught me that such soppy sentimental nonsense was weak, and that power was the only law worth following, the only thing deserving of faith.
Voldemort had held his faith in power. Voldemort was dead. He was dust of the Earth, and would soon be forgotten in daily life. Draco finally unclenched his hands and stopped sobbing, but he could not bring himself to move from his father's embrace, nor could he quite stop the silent tears that still fell. He finally managed to draw the air to speak quietly, more to himself than to anyone else.
"Look at us. Sitting on the floor crying like cowards. Our ancestors must be rolling in their graves."
Lucius smiled genuinely and without malice for the first time since his own childhood.
"They can spend the next month doing backflips for all I care. They were the cowards, Draco. It takes much more courage to create than destroy, to love than to hate. You are right, Draco. I have been weak my whole life, and I have tried my hardest to make you weak. I just hope it is not too late for you to learn from an old fool's mistakes instead of repeating them."