Another strangely long chapter, which even I didn't expect. This is a different viewpoint and a different set of emotions I suspect. In response to some of the comments; I'm not saying that any of the previous chapters depict desirable grieving behaviours of emotions, but that they do represent the real pain, grief, loss and guilt that lies behind the surviving friends and families eyes. It's a topic not often covered in depth, possibly because many do not understand, others are afraid and many more don't know how to put their agony into recognisable words.
It goes without saying that this is a dark fic. It's unsettling, it's frightening perhaps. It is unnerving to sift through the shards and the broken edges that are left behind after a suicide of someone close. There's no gentleness about the emotions and no pretty way to cover up the howls and cries of guilt and anguish.
Whatever your thinking on the matter though, welcome to another chapter. Try not to cut yourself.
Chapter 7: Unfinished Business
Draco paces. I watch. This I know is the beginning of a pattern. Draco paces and I watch. This cycle repeats itself day after day, almost without fail. Draco pacing. Me watching. Vincent staring sulkily away into the distance, watching something only he can see. Pansy plaiting her hair and fretting. All the while Draco paces and I watch.
I know I should say something. Something useful, something helpful. But I don't know what to say. I never know what to say. It isn't just me. Vincent is just as lost and even Pansy, who usually has words for everything, has no more words than the rest of us. But my role is to serve. I should know what to say. I should be able to help. I don't. So I watch Draco pace, my eyes following him across the room. I want to say something that will make it all ok again, that will bring everything back to normal. But I don't have the words and so I watch.
Everyone thinks me and Vincent are just stupid, that we are lumps of useless flesh with no brain or thoughts of our own. Everyone. The Professors, even Professor Snape does even if he would never say it. The Snakes stick up for their own. We're muscle, not brain. Everyone knows that. Everyone except Draco and Pansy and Blaise. I can't blame them. Words just don't come easily to me. It's even worse when they are written down.
When the words are written down they squiggle all over the pages and it takes all my concentration just to make them sit still. But if I'm making the words behave then I can't listen. And the words won't behave if I stop trying so hard. So everyone will have finished the chapter and I'm still fighting them. Maybe Draco could pretend that he understands, but I can't. So McGonagall or Sinistra or even Professor Snape will ask a question, but I'm still making the words sit still and I don't hear. So I get it wrong. Or even worse, I don't answer at all.
I'm not stupid. I don't think Vincent is either. It's just some things look different and I don't see things as clearly as other people do. Pansy and Draco and even the Granger mudblood, the words just flow into them. They breathe and they have understanding, knowledge… power. I have muscles. I could beat any one of them into a bulk. I can hit a bludger across the field. But that's not being a wizard.
A wizard doesn't rely on fists, Dad says and Dad is always right. He's far better than me in all the ways that matter. Not just the book smarts but the proper smarts. The kind of smarts that a mudblood will never understand. Real strength. A wizard uses his wand, Dad says. But using a wand means making the words stop moving and sometimes I think it was simpler before I had a wand.
I think Professor Flitwick gets it. He puts the squiggly words into sentences when no one else is looking. But he's the only one really. Sometimes it even makes me almost wish that Flitwick was my Head of House. Almost. He makes the moving words seem more clear. But I'd never be clever enough for Ravenclaw, even if I could make the words seem right. Everyone knows that. Especially me. Professor Snape does all right by us snakes anyway. Mostly anyway. I wish he was here now. He'd know exactly what to say. He'd know what Draco needs in a way I can't even imagine. He'd know and he'd make it right. He'd fix it.
I don't know how to fix it though. Instead all I can do is watch as Draco paces stiffly, his hands clutched tightly at his sides and lips so thinly pressed together that they are almost invisible in that pale, aristocratic face. Conflicting emotions clearly war on his sculptured features, but it is a sheer rage that I can see simmering fiercely just beneath the surface of those cool, grey eyes. It's a rage unlike any I have ever seen, coiled tightly like a serpent within him, just waiting for the moment it lashes out.
"Find someone else to stare at!" Draco snaps the words at me harshly, his eyes lit with an uncanny light. It worries me in a way that I cannot explain, not even to myself. "You look even more dense than you usually do, Goyle, and that's saying something! I wouldn't have thought that possible!"
"Sorry, Draco," I say softly, lowering my gaze obediently to the floor without thinking. Some lessons are learned early, almost from the cradle in fact.
Such subservience might seem strange to muggles and blood-traitors and half-bloods, all of those with the watering down of the old traditions. But us pure-bloods still hold by them and they are what make us strong. To me and Vince, this is our entire purpose and it is no small purpose. The safety of the only Malfoy heir is resting in our clumsy hands; his health, his honour and his pride. Mr Malfoy has entrusted us with the most precious thing in the world to him; he has entrusted us with his son.
But Draco doesn't just accept the apology as I would have expected though. Instead, he whirls back around, that barely constrained rage sparking like fire in his grey eyes, a rage now aimed squarely at me. I flinch back, rocked by the force of it in a way that no physical attack could ever make me do.
"Yes, sir. No, sir. Three nifflers on the roof, sir!" He spits the words with a venom I usually hear reserved for mudbloods and traitors to our kind. The Weasley's and the half-bloods. I stare at him blindly, bewildered and hurt in equal measure. "In the name of Merlin, grow some damn balls, Goyle!"
"That's enough, Draco," Pansy remarks in a far sharper tone that she usually uses on Draco. Shock briefly covers his face, only to be quickly surpassed and replaced by his characteristic sneer. "Taking your issues out on Gregory isn't fair and you know it. If you want a fair target, then shoot at me. Or is that not allowed because I'm a girl?" She sneers the last word as an insult, holding Draco's gaze challengingly, her eyes bright with a strange malice. She speaks again into the growing silence. "Well!?"
Draco shoots a vicious glare across the common room and the small gaggle of first years who had been lurking unobtrusively next to the fire scuttle from the room as though set alight. I can't blame them. I would too if I had any choice in the matter. Seeing the look on Draco's face, I am tempted regardless of duty and purpose.
Dad always says that there's a look that some wizards get, a look that says someone is going to die. He says Mr Malfoy has that look and I believe him. Dad also says that if I ever see that look on Draco's face, I need to get out. Leave the room by the swiftest and most direct route possible, as quietly as possible and fetch someone. Then he muttered something about Merlin helping those who help themselves and cleaning blood stains off fine Persian rugs. I know the look Dad was describing. Draco is wearing it now.
Yet Pansy seems utterly unfazed as she stares down Draco, even as Vince and I exchange equally worried scowls. Mr Crabbe Senior must have given Vince a very similar talk and the other boy is edging backwards towards the door. I have my wand in my hand, but I don't know what I'm meant to do with it. I am to protect and serve Draco, but I'm not sure that really extends to hexing an unarmed girl sideways. Even if that girl is Pansy Parkinson, and Pansy could never be classed as unarmed even stranding naked in a field somewhere. She has a knowledge of offensive magic that rivals even Draco's. Some things are taught young. Almost from the cradle, in fact.
"So you've got nothing?" This slip of a girl taunts the heir of Malfoy house blithely, stepping forwards almost provocatively, a distinct sway to her hips. "Don't you need to prove your manhood? Hit me. Hex me. Do something spectacularly stupid that will ensure Professor Snape murders you quietly in your sleep in such a way even your daddy couldn't suspect him of? Or is daddy's little princess scared?"
Draco lets out an unarticulated growl from the back of his throat, a growl most unbecoming of the scion of the Malfoy house. It's in that loss of control that I finally understand just what Pansy is playing out; what she's doing. She's baiting him. Deliberately taunting him. Forcing him into a flashy confrontation well away from prying eyes and gleeful whispers spread in the corridors. She is approaching the nest of the dragon and sticking her head straight into the fire. Someone is going to get burned. I just wish I was more certain that it isn't going to be me. I'm better with numbers than with words and I still think my chances of escaping unscathed are slim. Like unbelievably slim.
"What is your problem, Pansy?" Draco snarls, his hand in one hand and that look of murder on his face. He takes another two steps forward, until he is looming over the smaller girl. I glance at the door in consternation. I want to get out. I want to get Professor Snape. He'd be able to calm this down. He'd know what to say to make this go away. But I can't because I can't leave Draco. I cannot, I will not, leave Draco. And so I stand and watch. Silently. Helplessly.
When the first curse flies, it is with such sudden force that I can't tell who cast it and within a fraction of a second the room is filled with flashes of light from all directions. Red light as vivid as blood, yellow light filled with sizzling intensity, dark blurs of colour hinting at a need to wound, to hurt, to injure. I react instinctively. There's no need for further thought as I watch a sofa explodes with fabric and inner stuffing covering the surrounding area. The fabric is still hissing slightly as it falls.
I react instinctively. I do my job; what I've been trained from my first breath to do. I raise a shield around Draco, the strongest magic I can force into it. The shimmering aura around Pansy suggests that Vince has thought one step further than me. He's right, Professor Snape would have our hides for potions ingredients if either of these two does any real harm to the other. But the very core of my being ensures that I protect Draco first and foremost. Above all.
Holding the shield takes nearly all of my focus and so I can do nothing else but watch the beautiful but viciously violent dance that Pansy and Draco are in the throes of. The two of them sidestep around the room, twisting and dodging, all the time hurling curses with an intensity that frightens me, curses that are moving so quickly that I cannot keep track. This is no practice duel. Both of them are out for blood. And neither of them is in the least bit concerned with the defensive magic; Draco because he has us for that reason and Pansy because she doesn't seem to need it. Vince's shield is almost unnecessary as she ducks and dive, rolls and darts away with an unnerving nimbleness. In that moment she almost doesn't seem human.
Draco however isn't dodging and my shield is taking a tremendous pounding from the constant blows that strike against it. I can feel the sweat building up on my forehead and starting to run in rivets down my back as I funnel every last inch of my magical reserves into holding that wall of shimmering light around him. Pansy throws curse after curse, all of them ridiculously overpowered, many twisting in such a way that I have to keep a full circular shield up at all times. And Draco doesn't dodge. He makes no effort at all to avoid her spells, absolutely secure in the knowledge that we won't let any harm come to him. We cannot let any harm come to him. If it comes down to it, Vince will drop his shield around Pansy to bolster my efforts, but both of us know that has to be the final option, the absolute final option.
Draco stalks his slender opponent, his expression feral in its intensity, a grin with no humour at all marked into his face. My entire world reduces to my ability to keep that shield in front of Draco, an unwavering shimmering wall of protection. I don't notice that my teeth are grinding together painfully. I don't pay any attention to the tightness of my back or how my shirt has become soaked through. I can't. I flick the sweat away from my eyes with a quick toss of my head, knowing the moment I take heed of my own discomfort is the moment I will fail in my duty.
So utterly focussed am I that it comes as a complete shock when the two combatants are thrown forcibly backwards, bodies hitting the floor with unmuffled thuds. The curse that Draco tries to hurl is bounced back at him, striking straight through my shield as though it were non-existent, to be met with an undisguised yelp and the crack of a bone breaking. I only realise that I have sunk to my knees as the sallow face of my Head of House looms over me. My entire body is trembling with a fatigue that seems to reach right into my bones. He eyes me critically and I nearly fall to my hands when a pale, slim hand reaches down to me. I look up at the foreboding figure in disbelief, but the hand is not retracted and after a shocked moment, I reach out and grab hold of it with my own meaty slab.
There's a surprising amount of strength in that cool grip, despite the fact that I can feel all of the bones in his hand. His grip is reassuring, a cold and dry strength to counteract the sweat slicked hand I offer him. He draws me carefully to my feet, supporting me with his other hand when I stagger and guiding me into the chair he has summoned behind me. It's a struggle to keep my eyes open as I sink into the soft fabric and watch that tall, menacing figure stalking towards Draco.
It's only then that something important occurs to me, something unbelievable in fact. If I wasn't too drained to focus on it, I would sit in wonder. It will come back to me for many nights to come. Professor Snape put me first. Before even Draco, his own godson. He came to me and he prioritised me. Both Draco and Pansy are lying sprawled on the floor, Draco's pale face set in a grimace of pain and still my Head of House came to me first. He looked after me. He put my wellbeing above that of the Malfoy heir. This astonishes me beyond measure.
"Was it your intention, Mr Malfoy, to reduce your vassal – in name and in law as Lord – to a dangerous level of magical exhaustion?"
The professor's voice is silky smooth, but my dad's voice reminds me once again that I am to beware of the snake with the silver tongue. I know with every fibre of my being that Professor Snape is dangerous; how else could he hope to fool Dumbledore? He is powerfully dangerous and he is quietly lethal and right now he is coldly furious. I just don't understand why. After all, I was only doing my job.
"Was this carelessness or was it criminal negligence, Mr Malfoy? Pray do enlighten me. I will be fascinated to hear your answer."
A potion appears in those pale, slender fingers and he floats it across to me silently, never taking that furious gaze off Draco. I gulp it without thought, my trust in my Heads of House absolute. Within moments, a flood of energy flows through me, rekindling my dwindling strength just as a wave of calm and peace sweeps in. I stare at the vial in some incredulity. That shouldn't be possible. One potion shouldn't be able to do all that. I feel restored, full, replete. I feel warm and safe, as though nothing in the world could possibly go wrong. Despite everything that just happened, I feel utterly content.
"That potion is one of my own device and creation Mr Goyle, and is not yet on the market. The calming effects are only temporary; however, it will continue to restore your magical reserves over the next twenty-four hours. If you do have any unforeseen or uncomfortable side effects of any kind, then I will expect to be informed immediately." Professor Snape turns that dark, harrowing gaze back to the prone form of Draco, his face as hard as stone as another wave of astonished gratitude sweeps through me. He noticed me. Not as a lumbering shadow to Draco, but as me. He saw me, Gregory Goyle. "Well, Mr Malfoy," he drawls softly, unblinking. "I am waiting. Absolute incompetence or criminal negligence? Which one is it to be?"
Draco just gapes up at the stern, darkly cloaked figure that is glaring down at him. Another realisation strikes me. Professor Snape used the legally binding words. The old words. The words I didn't think anyone still remembered except those of us who are defined by them. Vassal and Lord. Lord and vassal. But he spoke them as though Draco was constrained by an obligation to me. As though I were important.
"I am still waiting." Every word is measured and precise, a deadly calm running through them. I watch as Draco struggles to a sitting position, clutching his arm to his chest gingerly. "Do not presume to test my patience further, boy."
That last word is spat out with venom and I see Draco flinch back from it, his face losing whatever colour it still had.
"I didn't… I can't…" For the first time in many years, I watch as the careful Malfoy poise crumbles and disintegrates in front of my eyes. Suddenly, he is a boy again, a boy being skinned alive by a man he respects and admires above all but his own father. "I lost my… I'm sorry." He finally settles on. "I didn't mean to."
"That is what a four year old might say when they are caught stealing cookies in the dead of the night," Professor Snape drawls, his voice almost a hiss with venom dripping from every syllable. "That is why children are not entrusted with the bond you bear. How old are you, Malfoy?"
"Sixteen, sir," Draco has no choice but to respond as the silence stretches and the look in those dark eyes becomes even darker. The words come through gritted teeth though, humiliation clear in his tone.
"Act it, Mr Malfoy." The Professor snaps the words, and I can see them strike the pale boy like a whip. "To expect and to allow another to step in and do your duty is the act of a child. You do not have the luxury of being a child. And if I ever witness such a dangerous dereliction of duty again, for whatever reason, I will have you written up in the formal courts for it. I hope you understand."
With that he dismisses Draco from his attention as though he were nothing of import, a half-blood or a muggle even. Not worthy of his time or his energy and I can feel how deeply that rankles in Draco's very being. He wants to strike back, he wants to defend his honour, but even Draco isn't foolish enough to go head to head with that dark visage now though.
"Miss Parkinson," the words are drawled lazily. "In my immediate assessment, you do not appear to be outwardly injured. Am I incorrect?"
"No, sir." When Pansy responds, it's with her head held high and no shame or fear in her tone. I have to smile slightly to myself. Therein walks a stunning match for the Malfoy heir; strength, grace and honour combined in such pride. It will be a great pity if the parents don't see the match in front of their eyes. "I have a minor graze to an elbow and a knee from your separation charm, and will require a decent nights rest this evening. I have nothing of import that requires medical attention from either yourself or Madam Pomfrey sir. I would also like to accept full responsibility and punishment for this display of inappropriate behaviour. I threw the first curse. Draco merely retaliated."
The Snakes protect their own, I think lazily. I suppose we have to. Nobody else is going to, after all.
"No." The single word is ice, but Pansy doesn't flinch from it. "Credit me with an above average number of brain cells, Miss Parkinson. That is not what happened and I do not appreciate or reward lies. You will serve a weeks' worth of detention for duelling and a further week for your lie. I will see you tomorrow, seven sharp. And that is in the morning." He greets Pansy's groan with a distinctly humourless smile. "For every minute you are late, I will add a further weeks' worth of detention. You do not wish to be late."
Pansy gulps slightly as those dark, hooded eyes turn to me and Vincent.
"Mr Crabbe, Mr Goyle," he remarks more softly, and if I'm not wrong I'd swear there is concern in his eyes. "I do not believe either of you are in need of further medical attention. If either of you feel the symptoms of magical exhaustion, or you feel in any way unusual Mr Goyle, you are aware of the wand movements?"
I nod silently, grimly wondering why I didn't think of that a mere half hour ago. Three snakes in the air and the whisper of Professor Snape's name is all it takes. Nothing more. There are matching alarms set into his quarters, the potions classrooms and the charm he wears around his neck. I've never actually seen the charm, but I have been assured by at least one senior that it's in the shape of a doe. I still don't believe them. A tightly coiled serpent now, charmed to alert him if one of his charge has immediate and urgent need of him, maybe. But a doe. Selsvey had to be having me on. Whatever form it takes though, it is hidden beneath those dark robes though and out of sight.
That dark gaze flicks back to Draco, his expression merciless and unforgiving.
"I will not ask for any further justification, Mr Malfoy, for I do not believe you can provide it." His tone is snide and hurtful, actively unkind in a way that makes my own hackles rise in Draco's defence, but I'm not that stupid either. "In case you missed it the first time however, I will inform you again that you near completed exhausted your vassal's magical reserves completely, to a recklessly dangerous level. You did this not because there was any real danger, but because of a playground spat. I am deeply, deeply ashamed of you. You will serve the weeks detention with Miss Parkinson, and will report to Professor McGonagall for a further month's detention of her choosing. You can be assured that you will hear from your father in due course."
He waits for a few long beats, but Draco doesn't move from his position or meet his gaze. Instead, he mutters something to his knees that I can't quite make out. Professor Snape clearly does though and he looks down at the crumpled Malfoy heir piercingly, compassion touching his eyes for the first time. There is something like pity in his tone as he responds to those unheard words.
"No, Mister Malfoy. I don't think any of us were."
With that he turns with the characteristic swoop of those long robes. I don't think I imagine the words muttered under his breath. In fact, I am certain that I heard them, I just don't understand them.
"I certainly wasn't."
With that he's gone, leaving Draco to pick himself up from the floor unaided, not a word about the arm that is so clearly broken. Those three words resonate strangely in my mind and I'm trying to figure out the question that the man was responding to. Pansy stands and puts her arm around the Malfoy heir as he lifts his face and howls, his voice distorting awkwardly on the words.
"I wasn't finished with you, Potter!"
No. I don't suppose you were. The Dark Lord certainly wasn't. One way or another though, Potter was certainly finished with us. With all of us.
