For years, he'd been in a chronic state of boredom. Bored to the point he often looked to his twisted imagination for entertainment; imagining himself as part of the middle class, as a poor "serf", as a muggle, as an eviscerated corpse at Voldemort's feet.

Now he imagined a life in which he could never go back to, his old life, with that same strong desire, but at the same time, he didn't want to go back to that life. It was an easy, but ignorant life.

His senses came back to him and he realized he was in the living room and Hermione was hovering above him. He was never good with reading emotion. She was looking at him in the eyes like a potion gone wrong but easily fixable. No anger or malice, just a curiosity for what had gone wrong.

"You shouldn't.." She begun when she noticed him moving to sit up.

"You were right, Granger. About-"

"About the passages?" She was quick to fill in his words, her words quick and light on her tongue, eyes as hungry for information as he'd been for adventure none too long ago.

"Yes." He grunted as he sat up, "Did I...black out?"

"Yes, Dear." Mrs. Weasley said from her spot across the living room on the opposite couch, "Little too much Morquin."

"I thought you said there weren't any passages."

"I didn't think there were. But I remembered something."

"Do you know what's in them, then?" Hermione continued, "In the passages, I mean. Could it help us at all with-?"

"I don't know." He answered bluntly, pushing himself slowly from the couch with a deep-throated grunt. He pulled himself into a sitting position and held a hand against his forehead, eyes closed in forced thought. "I remember my father going through a door...and.."

"Draco..? Draco, get back to our guests this instant."

"Where're you going, Father?"

"Are you deaf? ...Go!"

"He told me to go back to our guests when I caught him...We had the Goyles over..I-"

"Hogwarts will be interesting I think, don't you?"

"It's a pitiful school with an old devil running it. It'll be boringly cruel."

...it was when I was young. It's foggy."

"I've searched every inch of this house...or so I thought. We'll have to go over it again. We'll get everyone to help this time. If it could do us any good, it would be something at leas-"

"Maybe it's not in the house.." Draco murmured, his voice faster than his brain and as the words exited his mouth, he was surprised to find them in the air and reach his ears. He was unsure as to what made him say this, but Hermione was tossing the remark around in her own mind as well.

"Not in the house? That would be unusual...but not unrealistic, I suppose. Did you remember it being outside?"

"I..I don't know." Draco shook his head.

He looked up to meet her eyes.

"Hopefully this'll help us in some kind of way, the passage I mean, but-..." She paused, thinking carefully as she often did in that electrical city of a brain, firing and firing again, shooting across her brain in a firework show, "But something found in your home. Your father and mother's reputation...Are you willing to..?"

"What reputation?" Draco snorted, "Anything to take him down is fine by me. Understand me, Granger. I'd rather die than see him live."

Hermione watched his hardset eyes burn into hers. It was then she realized she'd never seen Draco determined, nor burn this much hatred for someone. She thought he'd seen his ugliest side, his utmost fire- not even close.

For the one person he used to bow down to, he found himself determined to see him dead.

Hermione suddenly discovered an understanding she'd never been able to find for him. They were finally the same, working to a similar goal on the same team with an equal fire and passion.

Song Bird Sacrifice

11

Draco ripped the door open by it's hinges, fueled by a sudden memory. His father had pushed him down those pagoda steps in a rage, desperate to open the latch, never being able to.

"It's my mother's...not my fathers."

"Then why was your father-" Hermione begun.

"He was trying to get into it but couldn't. It's sealed with magic- she must've a locking charm that was only effective against him."

"He never figured it out?" Ron asked.

"My father was paranoid about everything. My mother and him got into fights frequently about trivial things. He probably assumed it was nothing when he couldn't get into it."

Draco pushed the door all the way open, feet firmly on the ladder rungs and hands on either side of the opening, beginning his descent.

"Draco, be slow dear, the Morquin may not be all out of your system yet."

He pulled his wand from the back of his pants, tucked into the back of his dress pants.

"Lumos!"

The cleanly cut cavern was made of tiles, mossed over and cracked, but beautiful in a way that an older person can be viewed- with respect that they were once beautiful but are consequently older now.

"What'd you think's down here?" Ron asked aloud, descending carefully, using his own lit wand to look for himself in every crevice he passed.

"Spiders." Harry whispered.

"Don't do that to me, Harry."

"Ooh, Spiders, Ron..." Fred whispered.

"...Big fat fuzzy ones." George continued.

Draco was ahead, moving his wand around slightly to ensure he wasn't missing anything important, Pansy to his immediate right.

"Pansy, I've needed to talk to you." He whispered to her quickly.

"Yes it'd be nice to know more than just what I've been told by the Griffyndor Gang."

"They explained things to you?"

"Yes, but-...who did this to you?"

"What?"

"Who hurt you?"

"Goyle, Bellatrix also had her share."

"She did the writing didn't she?" Draco nodded, "She's famous for that...but...Goyle's..just jealous. He's been jealous for a long time and-"

"I know. I don't care about that. I care about Voldemort."

"Revenge is...Draco, it's hateful and cruel and...I know this feeling. Wanting vengeance. But it's ugly."

"What's happened to you?" It was honest curiosity, his eyes searching her eyes that were trying to escape his.

She was silent for a moment, then finally answered: "I grew up. Like you."

He took this thought and examined it within his mind for a moment before storing it for later inspection.

"It's not just revenge. It's what has to be done." He finished.

"Just promise me you'll keep level headed...sensible."

Draco looked to her and gave her a rare smile, "Malfoy's are always sensible. I'm the last left- I have to make a good example."

Pansy smiled back, but a sense of anxiety remained in her eye.

A door came into the sphere of light surrounding himself and he stopped at it, looking at it cautiously. In a brief second, he imagined everything that could be in there.

Although his parent's reputation, whatever it truly was, had crumbled in the last year or so, if there was anything that would worsen his mother's reputation...

It didn't have to get out from the group, that was true. But what if it did? No, no, they're too good for that, Draco thought, but, would he want to live knowing his mother was less than he thought?

Did he want them thinking less of her?

Was it truly any of their business what was in that small room?

But he had led them there. He had given this to them. Offered it to them.

A bad feeling rested inside of him.

"Draco?"

"Sorry." He whispered, then grabbed the knob, but found it was locked.

A small shock ran up his arm in surprise. Sweat broke out across his forehead. He released the knob, blinking at it. It was an omen. Turn back, turn back.

"It's locked?" Harry asked, moving forward beside Draco, hand clasped on the knob in an instant.

"Alohomora." Harry tried, but found no difference when he attempted to open it again, "Alohomora Duo."

Harry's stumped expression brought Hermione up to the challenge, "Let me try this one: Portaberto."

She reached to open it, twisted it with the expectation to have triumphed against the cursed door, and found herself also stumped.

"It must be locked by something incredibly strong.." Hermione whispered, "I can't think of anything else it could be."

"Ugenum."

Draco's opened the door the smoothly, lips dry and hands shaking.

"Ugenum?" Hermione reeled through her memories, every lesson and lecture, "Ugenum? I've never heard that one before."

"It's something my mother made herself." Draco replied, stepping into the small chamber, "We used it when I was younger. Silly stuff really- little birthday letters and useless things. But it was effective against my father if need be."

Hermione looked up, pausing in her thirsty search to think over what he'd just said. Made herself? Between herself and her son? To keep things away from his father?

The amount of passion and magical ability and time it took to create a spell or charm was aweing. And for what? To keep birthday wishes from her husband? And she used it to lock her secret study knowing that she used a charm that only Draco knew how to ward off?

Draco looked around the room in aching silence, like something evil was lying within those walls, hidden and laughing at his panicked expression. There was nothing he could do to change it if something was in there- but it was the act of finding it before anyone else did. But then again...what did it matter who found it first? They'd all find out eventually.

Pictures hung on a congested board, decorated with photos of himself and others, but paid little attention to it seeing nothing very significant to it.

A book shelf sat against the wall directly opposite to the door, to the right was a desk and to the left was a trunk. Dusty, old, and it smelled like secrets. Draco moved to the desk, palms flat against the desk, looking through papers, opening drawers frantically in search for something, anything.

His fingers gathered documents, opening them and declaring them useless by the time he'd read second line. Hermione was gathering them from behind with closer inspection. She was about to tell him to start stacking them a little neater for her when he suddenly stopped.

His fingers had snatched, unknowingly, a photo, and as his eyes locked coldly on the face, his heart sunk and fingers became gentler.

It was a photo of his mother and himself, taken by Elda Cross, an old nanny he had when he was younger. It was on Draco's first day of school. He was at the train station, Birnbaums in hand, excited. His mother stoof beside him with a congenial look on her face and though she seemed worried, the look was genuine. Something rare in Malfoy photos.

Her skin was stretched across her skull, tight and youthful but on the edge of age. Her hair was neater then, the way he remembered her always being: beautifully put together, always perfect, everything in it's right place.

He pocketed the photo as quickly, as he pocketed the emotions rising. The hate for Voldemort, Goyle, all of them.

No time for that now.

He went back to the drawer.

Empty.

He went to the next, useless papers piling on top of each other for Hermione and Mrs. Weasley who had joined her.

When it was ruefully empty as well, he looked beneath the desk, and then hurriedly continued to the bookshelf, looking over the names of the bindings beside Pansy who'd taken to doing it minutes before.

"Slow down, you might be missing things." She whispered to him, eyes darting to meet his eyes.

He didn't say anything in reply but instead gave up on the book hunt and started in next to Ginny, Harry and Ron at the trunk.

"Anything?"

"No, documents and documents and-" Ron was cut short.

"Wait. There's a little box here." Ginny lifted it from the sea of papers.

Pearlescent white columns made up the four vertical edges, the entire else being an emerald green material. Draco impatiently allowed her to attempt opening it, but after having no luck, handed it off to Draco.

"Ugenum." Draco said quickly, prying open the box.

He analyzed the single content of the box, an envelope that he whispered the same charm to and opened with shaking but quick fingers. He emptied the envelope into his hands to find a series of moving photographs.

He gathered them and looked at the first one.

"What are they? Just photographs?" Ginny asked from her position on the floor, legs crossed, looking up to study Draco's expression. Her voice was soft to not temper him.

Though she had spirit, an inkling of anxiety rested in her, and although she was thoroughly convinced Draco was definitely changed, she had a constant fear of angering him. The images of him, slamming his fist again and against into Goyle's face flashed back to her. She never thought he'd do that to her- on the contrary. But the image gave her enough anxiety to always think twice before saying anything. It was an irrational fear that she felt within time, she'd probably kick, but for now, haunted her.

"No, they're not just any photographs. They're photographs that should've been destroyed."

"What?" Ginny asked, standing to accompany him, moving a little closer and waiting for his opposition. When none came, she took it as his permission and moved beside him to look at the photograph.

A childish looking Draco sat there in his room, a teddy bear with a bow just as large as himself sat beside him. He looked blankly at the camera and rapidly gave a smile when realizing his mother was taking a photograph, then suddenly beside him the bear begun to levitate.

In the next photograph that Draco unearthed from the pile, there sat the same scene, but the camera appeared to have dropped based on the angle it was at and showed Narcissa attempting to set the bear back down while Draco clearly appeared upset at the scene before him. Spontaneously, the bear begun to shred into small pieces.

"What's happening there?" Ginny whispered, brow furrowed and clearly disturbed.

"Unintentional magic."

"Like when you shattered the windows."

Draco nodded.

"Well," Harry started, "How's that grounds to burn it? When I was younger, before I knew I was a wizard, I did unintentional magic loads of times."

"It's a problem if you're in a family like mine." Draco paused for a second, "It's not just unacceptable for a Malfoy to have little control over their magic, it's unacceptable for any 'Dark Lord Following Family'. The Dark-...Voldemort thinks it's a sign of tainted blood. Muggle blood. It's grounds to kill a child. Perfectly acceptable in old fashioned families like mine."

"That's barbaric." Ginny said incredulously.

"And illegal. That's a very outdated school of thought. Honestly." Hermione followed up quickly.

"Why would your mother keep it?" Ginny looked back from Hermione to Draco again.

Draco murmured, "I suppose she couldn't destroy it. She always liked it."

Draco turned to the next photo which was of an older woman, a few more proved to be of the same woman in different places. One holding a baby far too young to be her own and another of her beside Narcissa with tea, both smiling tiredly at the camera. It was obvious by the height that the last photo was taken, that it had to of been taken by a child, so Ginny guessed Draco had taken it.

"An old woman?"

"Elda Cross, my nanny turned tutor when I was young. She turned out to be half muggle and my father fired her. These aren't endangering anyone but my father wouldn't even say her name after learning she wasn't pureblood like she'd said and he told my mother to destroy all the photos of her. I always thought she had."

More photos proved to be ones irrelevant so Draco carefully put them back into their box, locking it again with the same charm. He'd come have a look later he reasoned to himself.

Harry scanned his eyes around the room, "I don't suppose there's anything we could use after all-"

"No, there must be something we could use." Draco whispered, "She created this entire chamber to hide photographs? She could've hidden those just about anywhere."

"They were photographs that could've gotten you killed. And if she just couldn't part with them, then this seems very necessary." Ginny reasoned politely, watching him let her words wash away as nothing but noise.

"If anyone's interested, I'm still reviewing these documents with Mrs. Weasley. These could be helpful as well, you know." Hermione announced, brow furrowed as she re-read a sentence.

Draco continued back at the desk, looking at the contents left on it once again. Papers were gone, in a stack that Hermione had picked up again of course, and nothing but quills and clean rolled parchment left.

Hermione looked up to him, "Draco?"

"Yes?" He seemed impatient, running a hand through his hair and looking hurriedly at the bookshelf, as if some secret code might arise from the bindings.

"When you became a Deatheater..."

The word brought him back to her at full force.

'When I became a Deatheater...'

The memory flashed back to him. Green light. Blood spill. Shaky hands. Misery.

"...did you have to sign a paper?"

"...I don't remember. Why?"

"You don't remember?"

"No, I don't. Why do you ask?"

"There's a document here with your father's signature. And it has that same symbol from your arm on it, the dark mark."

"How can you not remember?" Ron interjected.

"It was something I was forced into. I barely remember it at all. I did what they told me to do and left. All I knew was my parent's lives were at stake."

Ron held this as satisfactory, albeit suspicious, and went back to his searching. If it'd been a week ago, he wouldn't of let it go, or let his suspicion fade so quickly.

Draco folded his arms and looked around the room once more.

"I suppose there's nothing in here of any use after all." Draco murmured, "Unless that document you have is worth anything, Granger."

"It lists vague duties of a Deatheater."

'As you take upon this mark, remember your duty as a faithful servant in his army.'

Draco came back just as quickly as he'd slipped into the memory, but his head felt lighter and legs slightly weaker.

He took the chair beside the desk slowly, head in hands for a moment as everyone else finished up their individual searches. Potter flipping the pages of books while Ron felt against walls and pulled on candelabras and Ginny flipped through more of the documents that had been in the large trunk.

Draco leaned back and looked at the photos pinned on the wall. A few depicted him at his quidditch games when he was younger and gave him a home sick feeling. Others showed him of Goyle and Crabbe, together, smiling when they were about six.

This gave him a feeling akin to an illness.

But also prompted his next thought.

What happens in a week?

"When I was at the meeting..." Draco began and everyone simultaneously stopped, dropping what was in their hands and turning around.

It'd been an awkward topic, in the back of everyone's mind, at the tip of everyone's tongues, but swallowed and swallowed again until it'd become a regurgitated topic, mushed and muddled into a ball of confused questions, resting in the gut of each of them.

"...Voldemort wanted a plan from me. To kill Dumbledore. He expects it to be done within the first week back."

"What did you tell him?"

"I said I'd gained your trust. And that I was going to pretend to confess to Dumbledore. Act like a victim. And when he least expects it- kill him."

There was a thick pause, an uncomfortable one that Draco suffered through, knowing they were all wondering the same thing: 'you were lying, right?'

"What'll happen next week?" Ginny asked, "When you have to go back to Slytherin? With 'murderer' written all over your body and Goyle in the same room as you sleep in? And...and what about Dumbledore?"

"I don't know." Draco replied, "I-..." Draco leaned back again, pausing, "I don't know." The words didn't seem like enough to describe the tremendous amount of confusion inside, but it was all he could let go from his lips.

He'd thought about killing him.

Not Dumbledore.

Goyle.

Get his revenge once and for all.

Killing Bellatrix too and maybe...

...while he was at it...

Voldemort.

He found his hand raking through his hair, heart racing, beating out of his chest.

Yes. It's what had to be done.

"You have to tell Dumbledore about the mission." Harry said in the silence, cutting Draco's thoughts in half, "He'll have an idea."

He looked back to him.

"Tell him? Oh, right. Yes."

Draco imagined Goyle beneath him. His wand pointed to his skull. Avada Kedavra.

Kill that fucking snake of his too. Nagini? Yes, Nagini.

Make him cry a little.

Stab him forty seven times in the chest with a knife.

He imagined how every stab into his bloodless heart would make him feel. No magic. Just murder. Muggle murder. It's what he deserved. Mudblood.

He was the only one deserving that title.

"Draco."

Draco looked up.

"I've looked through all these paper. They're nothing that could really help us, but should stay down here. For your own protection."

All that those two pricks took from him. His family, his pride, his happiness, his life. All the deception Bellatrix played against his mother: she always thought she had a soft spot for her son. No, evidently not. He had fresh cuts to prove it.

The only justice they'd ever done from him was wake him from the darkness he'd been shrouded behind for so long, brought him to the surface and let him breath the air that everyone else did. Let him see with his own eyes for once.

See the justice that needed to be done, pushed bravery into his cowardice soul by making him fearless of death.

He feared living more than dying. Feared torture worse than death.

Death was an option, but not until he'd been avenged.

"Ready to go back to the surface then?"

Draco looked back up to the board, full of photos of him and Goyle, him and Crabbe. Altogether. Like a Golden Trio.

He imagined standing from there, tearing down every photo, burning them and laughing as the ink disappeared into the fire.

His hands shook with the willingness to do it.

He stood, nearing the board, and just as he'd been ready to pluck a photo out of place, he heard the wooden board beneath him screech and a small whirlwind took the papers, neatly stacked by Hermione, up into a flurry and the bookshelf begun to vanish.

Behind it, was a dark room, suddenly lit by a hanging candle under a charm of some sort, and exposed individual tables.

Harry looked into the room first, Draco moving quickly to his side. The items were strange, and strange was a soft word for it.

A locket, a blue necklace, and a golden cup.