My heart begins pounding in my ears and I pull my knees to my chest, trying desperately to stop shaking. I look up at Draco, silently pleading. His jaw is clenched tight. The look in his eyes is so despairing…I begin to realize that I may understand what is happening.

He lifts his wand once more, and for a very brief second, the despair is etched across his face. A moment later a frightening resemblance to his father take its place, and he hisses the word I dread.

"Crucio!"

It's awful. Worse than before – if such a thing is possible. I fall to my side on the ground and try to swallow back my sobs and screams. I refuse to give Lucius that satisfaction. I push myself onto my knees, trying to stand through it – to retain some sense of dignity – but seconds later I fall to the floor again, twitching unnaturally as the agony continues. After what feels like hours but is really only moments, I catch in the corner of my eye Draco lowering his wand.

Though the room is spinning around me, I look up at him, trying to focus my vision. I manage to lock onto his face for a moment, and I see, to my surprise, a tear sliding down the side of his face, leaving a clean streak through the blood and scratches I gave him. He turns toward the opposite wall, away from Lucius, for just a second. Quickly he brushes his hand across his face and blinks back the moisture from his eyes. Then he hardens his expression and turns back.

Lucius smiles at his son, but something catches his eye. His smile vanishes, and he shoots a glance down at me. No, not at me – a few feet past me. Draco and I both follow his gaze. Two feet away from my hand, which lies limply open on the ground, is the glass vial Draco had placed in my grasp right before Lucius had entered. It must have rolled from my hand when Draco stopped the curse.

Lucius crosses the room and bends down to pick up the vial. He holds it up to the light, turning it this way and that. Slowly, he looks around at Draco.

"How did she come to have this in her posession?" He speaks slowly, through clenched teeth.

Draco hesitates – which is a terrible mistake, for Lucius takes it as an answer. He walks over to Draco, stopping only inches from him. Draco stares right back at his father, not moving from the place in which he stands.

"I will give you one chance, boy, to give me an honest answer. One..chance…" Lucius raises the silver-serpent head of his cane and presses it up under Draco's chin. It seems Draco has made his choice; he stares silently at Lucius, not even blinking.

"It would appear you, like this filth here, have lost your ability to speak. But…I think you have made yourself quite clear through your silence, Draco."

Lucius slips his wand from the top of his cane. He throws the vial to the ground where it smashes into a hundred tiny pieces of glass, and its clear liquid contents seep into the shallow cracks of the floor.

Draco breaks his father's gaze for a brief second to look down at the broken vial. But in that time, Lucius reaches out and grips the hair on the back of Draco's head, pressing his wand to his son's throat.

"If you can explain yourself, I might be able to forget this new misdemeanor…"

Suddenly, both of them shudder, and step back from one another. Lucius releases the back of Draco's head and grasps at his left sleeve, pulling it up past his wrist. Draco is doing the same. I feel an odd chill race up my back. I see the Dark Mark on Draco's arm, and it almost looks as if it's moving – as if the snake is sliding through the skull's open jaws.

"The Dark Lord has arrived." Lucius says, his voice suddenly hoarse. He looks back at Draco as he slips his wand back into the cane. "I am sure the Dark Lord will have some things to say to you regarding what has just occurred." Then he turns to me. "And you…he has something special in mind for you, Mudblood whore."

He storms up the stairs, Draco following close behind. At the last second before the door closes, I see Draco point his wand behind him and motion with it. The door clicks shut, and the glass vial reassembles itself before me, liquid and all. Now I know who it was that loosed my chains that first night.

I wait a few moments after the door has closed before I take the vial. Ignoring the the hundreds of dreadful thoughts pushing to the forefront of my mind at this news of Voldemort's arrival, I remove the small cork and push back the torn edges of my shirt from the wound. Slowly, I pour the liquid over my wound, drop by drop. I have to bite my tonge to keep from crying out. Fortunately, the pain does not last long; even so, it's a good pain – one that tells me the cut is healing. And I can actually see the redness fade. After I finish covering the whole cut, I recork the bottle and place it aside. I crane my neck to examine the results: the angry red color has faded to a healthy-looking pink, and the cut is now half the width it had been seconds ago. The pain is lessened as well. I look at the vial in my lap and I am so tempted to keep it, to hide it so I can use it again – for I know I'll need it. But I have to be smarter than that. I pick it up and crawl on my knees to where Lucius had just destroyed it. After hesitating a couple seconds longer, I throw it down, and for the second time this evening, it smashes into a hundred pieces.

Ugh, I know…the angst thickens. Sorry this chapter was shorter…but worry not! Two more chapters are already on their way.