I am so sorry for not posting-craziness, school, and a broken hand (meaning wrist and two fingers ((Long story short, if you're gonna ski down the side of a mountain, wear wrist guards and dodge trees as fast as possible :P)).) has impeded my progress on the story. I'll do my best to post sooner than this!
Disclaimer: I own nothing but the plot-everything else goes to the amazing Jo Rowling
Chapter 4: Fathers
"—he's my son! How dare you accuse him, after all he's done!"
"Exactly; he's your son! We all know how great of a person you turned out to be, how do we know that he's not just like you?"
"Stop fighting, honestly!"
"Please, not here. People are starting to stare!" Scorpius stirred in bed, not quite sure what was going on. Was that his mum? Wha- why was his mum here? Why was everyone shouting?
"Let them stare, he's my son and I'll defend him until the end."
"Until the end? Well, that may be coming a lot sooner than you thought."
Scorpius heard loud gasps and he attempted to open his eyes, but they felt as though they'd been lined with lead.
"WANDS AWAY! Mr. Weasley, I would have thought you knew better than this; need I remind you that you are an Auror now? And Mr. Malfoy, perhaps you'd like to explain why this shouting match was initiated?"
Scorpius struggled to open his mouth—his tongue felt like the Sahara Desert, only drier.
"Dad?" He croaked, forcing his eyes open. Rather, he succeeded in opening one; the other stayed firmly shut and aching.
All Scorpius could make out were about half a dozen heads floating around in front of him—to be honest, it was making him feel ill.
"Scorpius, I thought you'd… you're still here." The blonde head sounded choked up. That couldn't be his father. Dad never cried.
"Crocodile tears." A ginger head bobbled sickeningly. Scorpius resisted the urge to gag as it seemed to float around as though on strings.
"Ronald, be civil!" The bushy haired head collided with the ginger one, overlapping and forming a grotesque, lumpy head that leered down at him for a long moment.
At which point, Scorpius fainted again.
Scorpius awoke with a jolt, eyes wide and frantic. What was going on? The fire, had it been taken care of? Had anyone died? What about all those people he'd dropped off at the Astronomy Tower? And those last two at the lake?
Scorpius started to move, but let out a strangled groan of pain. At least now he knew he wasn't dead; death was supposed to be pain free.
"You're awake now? God, you scared us all." He attempted to twist his head to look at who was talking to him, but any movement conjured total pain.
"Don't move! You shattered five ribs, broke your left leg, and managed to split your skull as well. You're exceptionally lucky that Madam Pomfrey arrived as soon as she had." A voice said.
"Where am I? The Hospital Wing?" Scorpius croaked. His throat felt as though he'd had a whole bottle of Skelegrow shoved down it—for all he knew, he could be right.
"Now you are. They just brought you back from St. Mungo's intensive care unit." The voice said. "Here, drink this. Madam Pomfrey told me if you wake up, you'd need to drink fluids as soon as possible." Scorpius felt a straw brush against his bottom lip. He took it gratefully and slurped down the cool, refreshing nectar of the gods: water.
"Thanks," He gasped, the thirst quenched. "You wouldn't know what time is it, would you?"
"It's nearly three 'o' clock in the morning. Headmistress McGonagall brought you back about an hour ago." The voice said, yawning.
"Did I wake you up? Sorry."
"Scorpius Malfoy, apologizing for something? I never thought I'd see the day." The voice laughed, and he could tell it was a girl. "No, it's alright. I was awake anyways."
Scorpius sat in silence for a moment, trying to fall back asleep, but his body didn't feel hurt or tired. If anything, he wanted to get up and make sure no one else had been injured.
"Is everyone alright? Did they all make it out of the Tower alright?" He rasped, throat still sore from the smoke.
The girl coughed, "You were the most badly hurt out of all of them. The majority of the Gryffindors had managed to escape on their own; but about ten or so had been trapped."
He mentally tallied the people he had managed to rescue and nearly jumped in alarm. "What about the other three I didn't manage to find? What happened to them?"
The girl coughed again, a rough raspy sound similar to his voice. "Headmistress McGonagall and Professor Potter rescued them. The most severe wounds were smoke inhalation, minor to moderate burns, and general scrapes and bruises."
Scorpius relaxed, his muscles screaming in pain from his tenseness. "That's good. Did they find those two Gryffindors by the lake? The boy and a girl?"
"Mmhm. They were both fine, just stunned from the crash. Actually, one of them shot sparks to notify Madame Pomfrey. It's a good thing she thought quickly." Scorpius laughed at that.
"So, she didn't freeze up like with the beam? That's good…" He yawned, eyes drooping slowly. "That's really… really good…"
Rose shook her head, still watching Scorpius as he drifted back to sleep. Crazy boy… He could have gotten himself killed; he almost had!
Even so, there was no denying the truth. Scorpius Hyperion Malfoy, the Slytherin Sex god, the pain-in-the-ass, that no-good, son-of-a-Death-Eater had saved seven lives two nights ago.
Rose remembered the fear with vivid clarity, the overwhelming fear that had locked her brain in that moment of crisis. And she remembered Scorpius bursting in, looking bloody and burnt, and him blasting away the beam in an instant.
She looked at his scratched, fire-scorched face and gently traced the outline of the deep cut on his forehead. From the distance, it almost looked like her uncle's famous scar, but Scorpius's had slashed through his eyebrow, stopping just before his eyelid.
Rose cupped his cheek with her other hand and gently touched her lips to his, whispering the words meant only for him.
"Thank you for saving me."
Scorpius sat up slowly with the aid of Madam Pomfrey and several fluffy pillows and surveyed the Hospital Wing. The beds were, for the most part, empty. Only a few other people were still recovering; he recognized the 4th year Colin Creevey passed out on a bed while Fred Weasley was in a bed a row over and seemed to be telling jokes to the vast Weasley clan around him.
Scorpius sighed and stared at the heavy bandages that wrapped around his forearms. He'd probably dreamt about his parents being here—Father would never come back here, he'd said it himself. There was simply too much history, and now that Harry Potter was teaching, that was an even bigger reason for Father not to come back.
"Are you alright, Scorpius?" Scorpius turned his head as far as he could without too much pain and could barely make out reddish, curly hair. And with all the damn Weasleys at Hogwarts, that wasn't much of a clue.
"I'm fine. Just tired." He pretended to yawn and picked idly at his bandages. A hand touched him lightly on the shoulder, one of the few spots that didn't hurt.
"Don't do that, it'll just make things worse." Scorpius recognized the voice as the girl from yesterday night. "I hoped you're not too tired, because I heard that some people were coming today."
"Who—?" He started, but no sooner than the word had left his mouth, the door to the hospital wing flew open. Scorpius craned his neck again and his jaw dropped. He winced and hauled his mouth back shut.
"Bloody hell…" She whispered, equally shocked.
The Minister of Magic, Kingsley Shacklebolt, Professor Potter, and Headmistress McGonagall walked through as though they owned the place. Behind them Scorpius saw his mother and… his father.
Father looked quite ill, as though the mere thought of being back at Hogwarts was making him sick.
"You are Scorpius Hyperion Malfoy, age 16, and Prefect for Slytherin house?" Shacklebolt said in a slow, deep voice that rang with power.
Scorpius cleared his throat. "That's me, yeah."
"Please describe the events of Tuesday, March 5th for us, starting from 5 o clock in the evening."
Scorpius recounted his story; how he had seen the Tower on fire, how he had flown to Gryffindor tower and broken in to save the people, leaving out only the bit about how he hadn't finished the essay on dementors for Professor Potter.
"All I can remember after that was flopping on shore. The rest is all just… blank." He coughed and grabbed the cup of water by his bed with his good hand, which trembled slightly as he tilted the cup to his mouth.
"And you didn't see anyone fleeing the scene while you were flying toward Gryffindor tower?" Headmistress McGonagall asked sharply. "No one at all."
Scorpius shook his head. "I didn't think to look down; I was too focused on trying to make it before the tower collapsed or something."
There was a loud coughing fit that sounded like a noise of disbelief. Scorpius watched them all turn and saw a tall, broad-shouldered man with ginger hair walking towards him.
"Why did you care? You're not a Gryffindor, you're a Slytherin." The man asked. A curly haired woman slapped his arm, attempting to pull him back.
"Ronald, stop it this instant!"
"What exactly are you insinuating about my son, Weasley?" Scorpius's mouth nearly dropped as his father stood in front of the man, glaring eye to eye.
"I'm not insinuating anything; I just don't think it's wise to trust someone whose father's a liar and a coward."
"Dad!" The girl next to him protested.
"Not now, Rosie." Scorpius's eyes widened to the size of Galleons. The Golden Trio was here, right now, in this very room. Alright, one of them seemed hell-bent on murdering him and his father, but it was the Golden Trio.
"Mr. Weasley, restrain yourself! This young man saved the lives of seven Gryffindors; including your daughter!" Scorpius blinked in surprise; Rose? He'd saved Rose?
"How do we know that he didn't have something to do with this, hmm? Slytherins have wanted to get revenge on Gryffindor ever since the Battle at Hogwarts." Mr. Weasley growled. Scorpius twisted as far as he could and picked his wand up from the bedside table, muscles screaming in protest.
"Here." He said shortly. "Perform Finite Incantatum; you'll see that I never used any charm to start or light a fire."
The adults looked at him, slightly shocked by his reaction.
"It seems a good a plan as any." Professor Potter said and cast the charm. Propulso, Reducto, Aguamenti, Accio, and the spells that he had done in Transfiguration were all that Scorpius' wand revealed.
"Is my son's innocence no longer in question?" His father asked; Scorpius winced at the cold, drawling tone that his father always took when he encountered any of those from his darker days.
"Yes, yes, things seem to be in order. But I must insist that he be placed on watch, for his own safety. Now that the school knows of his deeds, I fear young Scorpius maybe the next target of this arsonist." The Minister said after a time of quiet contemplation. "Thank you for your time, Headmistress."
The Minister and Professor McGonagall left the Hospital Wing, leaving a rather awkward silence between a fuming Mr. Weasley, an anxious looking Mrs. Weasley, a calm Professor Potter, and of course, his parents, both of which looked as though they wished to be anywhere but here.
Mrs. Weasley attempted to break the ice. "Rosie, how are you doing? We were so worried when we heard you and Freddie had been injured in the fire."
Scorpius glanced over at the bed next to him; Rose Weasley sat upright, the only sign of injury being the bandages around her left wrist and a smear of orange paste on her right cheek.
"I'm fine, Mum. If it hadn't been for Scorpius, I dunno what might have happened." Scorpius suppressed a groan—way to point out the elephant in the room.
Professor Potter regarded him carefully, as though he was seeing him for the first time. "Thank you, Scorpius. You did something that even Gryffindors may not have done. You saved my niece and nephew."
Scorpius's ears turned a light pink and he looked at his sheets. Mrs. Weasley turned to him as well, her curly hair tied back a bit and her face shining with emotion.
"You saved my daughter's life. I don't know what would have happened if you hadn't swept in on your broomstick and saved her." She nudged her husband with her elbow, who regarded him coldly.
Scorpius felt a shiver run down his spine as Mr. Weasley turned to face his father, who looked absolutely livid.
"Come near my daughter again, whatever the reason, and I will make it my dearest ambition to land you in Azkaban." Mr. Weasley said slowly, his ears red with fury. "Stay away from her, Malfoy." He swept out of the room and his last words chilled Scorpius to the bone.
"You'll end up just like the rest of your family."
His father glared at Mr. Weasley and set off in the opposite direction without even a goodbye. His mother hurried after him after planting a quick kiss on Scorpius's cheek.
Scorpius clenched his hands into tight fists, his nails slicing through the skin of his palms. Crimson blood rose forth and dripped down his hands, slowly turning the bed linens bright red.
"Don't do that! You're hurt enough as it is." Scorpius blinked in surprise as slender fingers unclenched his aching hands for him.
Rose held his shaking hands in hers, dabbing away the blood with a rolled up wad of gauze.
"I'm so sorry about my father." She whispered, her eyes trained on his bloodied hands. Scorpius shifted a little, resisting the urge to grimace at the sharp twinges of pain.
"Don't apologize. It's not your fault that your dad hates me. Nor is it my fault that my father seems to detest your entire family." Scorpius winced—the words had come out far more bluntly than he had anticipated.
"Uncle Harry said that he'd changed. Apparently, he used to be pretty awful… He called my mum a… you-know-what a lot." Rose mumbled and looked around. "Oh, where's that gauze? I thought I saw Madam Pomfrey set it down just over here."
She tended to his hands in a deep silence for a while, until Scorpius cleared his throat.
"Am I awful?" Scorpius asked as Rose clipped the bandages in place with a metal pin.
A shocked expression crossed her face. "Why on earth would you say that?"
"Humor me, Rose. Am I awful?" Scorpius repeated, eyes focused on her face.
"Of course not! I'd have to be heartless to say that, after all that you have done. You saved my cousin—you saved me." Scorpius looked away, obviously uncomfortable.
"Unless you didn't want to save me..?" She stared at him now.
"Don't be thick; of course I wanted to save you. It's just odd, alright? Malfoys don't save people. We're people who crave power and do all that we can to attain it; we're people who step over others for our own gain. Your dad is right—Malfoys are cowards." He sighed, defeated.
Rose stared at him and put a hand on his cheek, turning his face to look directly at hers. "Look me in the eye and say that."
"Malfoys are cowards." Scorpius unwillingly met her eyes for a moment, before looking back at his aching hands.
"You are not a coward, Scorpius." Shocked, he looked up at her, but all he saw was a glint of determination and then, her lips were pressing against his.
The kiss ended just as quickly as it had started, and Scorpius stared at her, utterly dumbfounded.
Rose looked at him levelly. "You are the bravest man I know."
Yay, so they kissed! And they're sober!
Reviews are greatly appreciated by temporarily crippled writers!
