I know, I know, I'm the worst. It has been forever since I've posted. I'm sorry; I'm just a poor college student with no time on my hands between band, my major, and my minor. I've actually got a lot of time right now so expect at least two chapters right now.
Chapter 10: Splitting Dahlia's Heart in Two
Dahlia made her way down the stairs towards the dungeon for potions, her body aching with every step. Madame Pomfrey did all she could to help, but the soreness wasn't going to go away for a while. She sighed lightly as she took another slow step.
"Dahlia!" She heard a sharp female tone above her. She looked up, sweat dripping down her face. Professor McGonagall was looking down at her with a stern but pained expression.
"Yes?" She huffed.
"Professor Dumbledore would like to see you." She told her, and Dahlia slumped over in defeat.
"I'm already almost down to the dungeons… I don't think I can make it back up the stairs." She cried, tears of defeat forming. Professor McGonagall's expression softened, and she made her way down to Dahlia's stair. She held out a helpful arm and Dahlia grabbed on lightly. Professor McGonagall lightly lifted Dahlia's arm over her shoulder and started to slowly drag her back up the stairs.
"Dahlia… Are you alright?" Professor McGonagall asked, and Dahlia felt the light burning of the unbreakable vow that started up every time McGonagall pressed about the burden Dahlia carried on her shoulders.
"Not really, but I will be one of these days." Dahlia reassured her, and she could feel the concern Professor McGonagall was blazing into her core. Professor McGonagall gave up with a sigh and continued to half-drag her back up to Dumbledore's office. Once they got there, Professor McGonagall set her down gingerly then set about sending her up the stairs with the password. Without a word, but with a heavy sigh, Dahlia limped her way to Dumbledore's office.
"I don't care what you say, Albus!" She heard Snape hissing loudly. "You're offering the boy up as bait!" He continued in a crescendo of tone that equaled his anger.
"Severus, I-"
"Sh… I believe Dahlia has arrived." Snape interjected as she slid closer to the door. The door started to open on its own and Dahlia continued to hobble towards them.
"Ah! Dahlia, my dear! How are you doing?" Dumbledore exclaimed, urging her to sit with a flick of his wrist towards one of the chairs.
"I'm not doing too well, Professor. I made it halfway to the dungeons when I was stopped by Professor McGonagall and sent back up here… Why aren't you in class Professor?" She questioned, preferring to keep the topic of conversation off herself.
"I instructed everyone to work on their Shrinking Solutions while we spoke. I have Filch keeping an eye on them." He answered, still very clearly fuming on the inside. Dahlia couldn't help but internally scoff at the mention of the potion they were working on in class that she already managed to perfect. Even having skipped a year in potions, she still found the class easy. Once you mastered the purpose of each ingredient, you can learn how to make anything correctly despite what the book may tell you.
"Well, now that we've got the pleasantries out of the way, let us begin," Dumbledore started, and Dahlia raised one of her eyebrows in a questioning fashion "We need to discuss the nature of what you're contact with Harry can be. Now, I know-"
"No."
"Pardon?"
"No. You're not going to tell me I can't speak to him. He's in my house. His best friend here is George and Fred's brother. You can't tell me not to befriend him." Dahlia snapped in response and Snape let out a heavy sigh.
"It's like talking to Lily all over again…" He interjected, heart ache very clear in his tone.
"Severus, please… You're not making this any easier." Dumbledore chastised, and Dahlia started to feel her face warm with anger.
"I can't help the fact that the girl is so similar to her mother." Professor Snape snapped back, and Dahlia stood up in frustration.
"Stop talking like I'm not here! I get it, I'm my mother's daughter. I'll never know what that really means, but I am. Can we please get to the point here?" Dahlia screamed out in frustration.
"Right, well… Personally, I feel a relationship with your brother will cause nothing but complications. I can almost guarantee you'll be needing to come up here to close your wounds at least once a day at first. I say this purely for your own sake, Dahlia. You can attempt to maintain a friendship with him if you'd like, I'm just not sure if you feel it will be worth it." Dumbledore explained, and she scoffed in astonishment.
"You really think I wouldn't find it worth it? If you had just found out you had a sibling but couldn't tell them, you wouldn't at least want some form of relationship with them?" Dahlia sneered back, fury clear in her tone. "I can't believe this. I won't stand for this. I am going to let things fall where they may, I will speak to him and be friends with him. If that means I need to come up here all the time to keep from bleeding to death, then so be it. However, nothing you can say will keep me from being a part of his life." She stated with force and Dumbledore's eyes crinkled up with the proud smile on his face.
"Dahlia Potter, you fierce young girl. Nothing can stop you, can it?" Dumbledore questioned as Snape continued to sneer towards the ground in a strange silence. She could've sworn his eyes were glistening with tears, but she didn't say anything. "Well, then so be it. If you need me, send a flourish of your wand my direction and I'll be with you as fast as I possibly can." Dumbledore explained. Professor Snape's head finally shot up from his pensive staring contest with a speck on the floor and made eye contact with Dahlia.
"Send one my way as well and I'll get to you as well." He stated curtly then turned his gaze towards Dumbledore. "Isn't there something else you'd like to discuss?" Professor Snape urged, and Dumbledore pursed his lips.
"I'm not sure if I'm quite ready for her to know about that yet." Dumbledore responded, and Dahlia clenched her jaw.
"No, we aren't playing this game. If I have to play by your rules, then you need to keep me informed. I'm here, speak to me." She demanded to which Dumbledore sighed in response.
"Very well then… Severus?"
"Professor Quirrel came back this year with a rather odd fashion of holding himself. He took a year off to find himself and came back a lot more… Panicked. I've got my eye on him, but I'd like you to keep an eye on him as well. There's something I think he's after. Something not very many people know about. It's called the Sorcerer's Stone." Professor Snape explained and Dahlia's eyebrows furrowed.
"The Sorcerer's Stone? Where have I heard that before?" She mused and Professor Dumbledore chuckled.
"You know, you would have done well in Ravenclaw, Miss Potter." Dumbledore retorted and Dahlia felt the usual lump in her throat that magically appeared whenever he used her real name. "It's a stone that Nicolas Flamel created and used it to make the Elixir of Life, which he has used to extend his and his wife's life for well over six centuries." He explained.
"What does Professor Quirrel want with the Sorcerer's Stone? He doesn't seem like the type to want eternal life; he even seems to fear life." Dahlia questioned and Professor Snape almost let off the hint of a smile.
"We're not exactly sure, we just think he's up to something." Professor Snape explained and Dahlia let out a small sigh.
"Got it, I'll see what I can do. In the meantime, I would like to get back to class if you don't mind. I can't be late for Herbology again. Professor Sprout will kill me." She excused herself and started to hobble without waiting for a response.
"Dahlia…." Dumbledore trailed off and she hesitated by the doorway. "Be careful." He added and she nodded slightly then left in hopes of getting a little time with the twins in Potions before Herbology.
"You realize we're going to the same place. I could just disapparate us to the classroom." Professor Snape said quietly as he kept her slow pace.
"Don't you think it would be a little odd if we showed up together?" Dahlia grumbled and he sighed at her defiance.
"At least let me get you a little closer." He offered and she rolled her eyes then held out her arm. He gingerly took hold of her arm as if she were about to break then with a pop! they were down the hall from the Potions classroom. "I'll see you in there, Dahlia." He added then strode off, his robes billowing dramatically behind him. Dahlia put a hand on the wall to steady herself as the dizziness set in and closed her eyes.
"Damn wizards." She mumbled under her breath and continued to take in deep breaths to try to keep herself from vomiting.
"You alright, D?" She heard a familiar small voice and her heart started to race.
"I'm fine, Draco. Go away." She hissed, keeping her eyes on the ground.
"You don't look fine…" He pushed and she snapped her head up in his direction, immediately regretting it because a sharp pain attached itself to the base of her skull.
"I'm. Fine. Draco. Go. Away." She hissed again with her teeth bared. He flinched and she had to sit down from the dizziness.
"Dahlia… can we talk?" He asked and she scoffed.
"There's not much else to say, is there? You don't want anything to do with a mudblood, and I want nothing to do with a bigot who can't see past that the only person who ever truly cared for him isn't 'pureblood'." She spat back at him and he clenched his fists.
"You don't understand. I can't be nice to you. If word gets back to my father that I treat you the same as my pureblood friends… I'm dead." He tried to explain himself and she felt the keen sting of tears fresh in her eyes.
"So… Let me get this straight… You'd rather make me feel worthless, than deal with your father who makes you feel worthless? Me; the one person who always loved you. Who sheltered you from your fathers' rage. Who always loved you. It's kind of funny… Back before everything-… Y'know what? Never mind. It's not worth saying." Dahlia told him, ending in a whisper.
"No, tell me."
"… Back before this all happened, I always imagined us running away together and living happily ever after. I saw you as my person. But now, I'm not even sure I know you anymore and I'm not sure I even want to." She told him, her voice starting to quiver at the end, tears now streaming down her face. She could see how much her words hurt him because his eyes started to glisten with tears themselves.
"It's too complicated now. I always thought that you being a wizard would make things easier, but I think it's harder than ever now. Before, my father didn't even think of you, now he thinks of you as an abomination." Draco explained and it was Dahlia's turn to flinch. She barely managed to make herself ask the next question on her mind:
"And what do you think of me?"
Draco pursed his lips and thought of what to say. "I think what I'm supposed to think is that you are an abomination…"
"But what do you actually think of me?" She whispered back, finally lifting her head to look him in the eye.
"I think that the more we talk… The more I'll come to resent you for causing me so much pain with my father… So I think, unless we keep our friendship the deepest of secrets, we can't be friends anymore," Draco whispered back, pain obvious in his voice. "I think the only thing we ever can be… Is enemies." The last words stung the most and Dahlia couldn't help but let out a sob. Pain overwhelmed her and she transformed it into anger and stood in a flash.
"Then so be it. Go find your minions and explain to them why your crying. Explain that you just decided to rip your best friends heart out, then go ahead and tell them who your best friend is- or was. Just don't you ever come crying to me about your bloody father or anything ever again Draco Lucius Malfoy. You're a fowl coward with no heart and I never want to hear from you again!" She yelled at him in a fury. At first, his eyes widened with surprise, then they narrowed into slits and he stood himself.
"If you ever talk to me that way again, you low-life mudblood, I'll have to put you in your place; enslaved at my feet. You deserve nothing more and will never amount to anything besides being a floor mat that I can wipe the shit off my shoes on at the end of the day. Never address me that way again, or I'll carve mudblood into your forehead for everyone to see so everyone knows you are worthless." He snapped back and Dahlia's eyes widened and her jaw dropped. Her knees buckled and he strode off into the unknown. She found herself sinking to the floor, then sliding over to a corner behind a statue where she wouldn't be seen. She grasped at her chest and pulled her knees in to make herself as small as possible and started to sob uncontrollably.
