Emily lay curled into herself, trying to ignore the yellow stains on her small, blanket-less cot. She hadn't been able to sleep since her arrival at The Manor, and was lost in a sluggish haze of thought.

There were many loopholes to Draco's semi-obvious plan.

For one, people were sure to notice her absence, and for another, Emily didn't quite think he had it in him to kill her.

Of course, she doubted that his father or Voldemort would share that hesitancy, thus the biggest flaw in her own strategy for survival.

She heard the door creak open and watched Draco slump in through slitted eyes. He handed her her meal begrudgingly, though it consisted only of a bland broth and a chunk of hardening bread.

Yummy.

"Look, I don't get why you don't just eat the damn thing," he said, obviously annoyed, "it would make things so much easier for the both of us."

Emily shot him a glare and turned her body to face away from him.

"Oh, yeah. Real freaking mature, mudblood."

After a pregnant pause in which Draco was impatient and Emily was unresponsive, he shot a quick stupefy at her and propped her upright, ignoring the stubborn death glare she was still giving him with her eyes.

However, force feeding her, he decided quickly, was not something he was interested in doing ever again, as all the food just dribbled down her chin.

Something that would tend to happen to someone cursed into not being able to move or swallow.

"I have to keep you alive for the next week until my Lord can come and decide what to do with you."

Draco admitted this in offer of an explanation.

He released the stupefy and stepped back, watching her eyes widen momentarily with fear, any denial of the situation dissolving quickly.

She was really going to be put at the mercy of Voldemort.

Draco's stomach knotted and he snarled out an insult to soothe his growing guilt. He just needed to remind himself how worthless she was and then everything would be fine.

"You're the effing Gryffindor! How about being brave for a second or two? I mean you did join that Army! Were you too stupid to prepare yourself in case you were captured or something?"

He chose to ignore her involuntary gasp of shock, for there was no suitable remark he could give.

Draco turned on his heel and spun out of the room, leaving Emily to her own morbid thoughts, and hoped to himself that dinner never came, for he could go his entire life without seeing her again.

…..

"I would eat," she began to say moodily as soon as she heard Draco's footsteps entering the room, "but all you bring me are stale rolls and crap soup that tastes like dish water."

"Well you are a mudblood, you're lucky to be fed even that." A new and yet familiar voice replied to her complaint, and Emily spun around to find herself facing Draco's father, Draco himself trailing behind and looking a tad green.

Mr. Malfoy drawled out insult after insult, each one promising a slow and painful kill from his master.

"It will be more excruciating than anything you could ever imagine." He smirked sadistically, apparently pleased with his threats.

Emily almost sighed with relief when she saw him walk to the door, her stomach had coiled so tightly with nerves she feared becoming sick.

Unfortunately, sensing she had let her guard down, Lucius Malfoy tossed a crucio behind him as casually as if it were an offhand thought.

.

Emily's body seemed to be ripping itself to shreds, her mind tearing itself apart.

Her shriek of pain was not something she was conscious of emitting, but it was sharp and tortured, going on and on until she had no voice left in which to scream.

Her insides were on fire and no thoughts entered her mind because all she could register was the hurt and the burning.

She could smell burnt skin, could taste her blood, could feel her life drain away.

And then it stopped, an instantaneous relief.

Emily looked up to see Draco staring at her, a stony expression in his tired eyes.

There was a thin moment of silence, Emily still gasping for air, until he began to speak, reasoning aloud to himself.

"My father.. my father just wanted to come and make sure you were being treated properly. He wanted to show me how to act around you."

Emily shifted uncomfortably and watched him through confused eyes, her mind too fogged with the ghost of her pain to register what he was saying.

"Draco?"

"I'm not Draco to you," he snapped, his eyes watering, "I'm Mr. Malfoy. And you would do well to call me tha-"

Emily cut him off with a malicious hiss, "did you get that from daddy dearest?!" She clutched her throbbing head. "Is that what he told you to say, is that what he taught you?"

Draco stiffened, "my father taught me many things," he spoke wildly, his eyes narrowing and his throat catching.

"Oh I'm sure Mr. Malfoy. Well, tell you what, Mr. Malfoy. How about you take your wand and shove it up your arse."

Draco let the crucio slip out before he could stop it.

And for that, he watched her fall back to her torturous insanity in a slow motion he was sure would repeat in his mind for many nights to come.

Draco stopped the curse as soon as he was thrust out of his horror and into reality, a feat accomplished only by her screams, and fled the room before she had time to look at him.

He didn't want to see what she held in her eyes.

.

A slender hand grasped his shoulder on his way down the hall, towards his quarters, and Draco looked up to see his father wearing a cold grin.

"Good job, son," his father drawled emotionless, watching him carefully.

Draco simply nodded, trying not to think about how his father's smile looked more than anything like a grimace.

He didn't want to know what that could possibly mean.

… …

"Well she's got to be somewhere, damn it!"

A fiery red head banged her fist against a table and looked up hopelessly at her fellow members of the D.A.

Derrick put his arm around Kat and squeezed.

"You guys have no theories at all," he probed softly.

A mass of teenagers shook their heads in synchrony.

"Well somebody has to! Get the word out to everyone on our side. We have to keep this underground, and we have to be successful! They've already won so many battles.. we can't let them have Emily too!"

Kat let out a small cry from beside him, and the room was filled with a mourning silence.

"We'll do the best that we can," Neville said softly from the front of the room, "and I sure as hell hope we find her, but I'm afraid trying our hardest and praying we get lucky is the only thing we can promise right now."