Draco left a note on his pillow asking for essence of dittany the next morning in hopes that the house-elves would find it when they came into his room to tidy. He had woken aching all over and rolled out of bed most unwilling. The new skin over his rising welts stretched painfully with each movement. The lines still showed plainly, a rusty red, across the backs of his hands and he guessed, touching his fingers gingerly to his nose, that the most recent cut across his face did as well. He couldn't look forward to the questions his classmates-- and particularly Theodore, Crabbe, and Goyle-- would ask him. He could only be thankful they couldn't see the scarring wounds across his back and that his hair, grown longer since he had left England, would cover the worst of them across his nape.

As Draco pulled on his fur-lined boots, his thoughts wandered toward Dobby, his family's old house-elf. At the Manor, three years ago, before Potter had freed the elf, Dobby would have been at his side the moment Draco had managed to drag himself to bed. He'd have had the dittany ready and maybe spells as well. He'd have stayed with him till he fell asleep, maybe even curled up and slept at the bed's foot, and been there when Draco awoke.

Draco had once gotten horribly sick, when he was eight-- influenza the healer had said-- and Dobby had stayed by his side the entire week and half, trying to get him well, to keep him in bed, but not bored, had run back and forth between the bedroom, the library, and the kitchen. Everything-- even the chicken soup-- Dobby had brought to him then had been made with oranges-- flavored with orange juice or orange peels or garnished with orange sections. For breakfast it was a whole orange or an orange scone and a glass of orange juice. Even now, Draco avoided the fruit on principle and recoiled from the smell.

Draco felt the corners of his mouth drag down at the thought of the elf's toothy grin, his green, globular eyes gleaming as he had put the breakfast tray on Draco's bedside table and propelled himself on thin arms to the mattress.

His stomach seemed to knot as he dropped the boot laces and let his eyes wander toward the smooth stone that the elf had given him the night he had snuck into the Manor to say his goodbyes. It lay on top of the bookshelf, above Grindelvald's diary, Secrets of the Darkest Arts, and Magical Methods of Stealth and Concealment hidden behind the pair. Draco remembered the moon shining silver in Dobby's green, orb-like eyes, the broad grin-- broader than Draco had ever seen it-- on his face. Draco had often wondered where the elf had found the stone. It reminded him of the stones on the small, bayside beach that at low tide appeared at the base of the headland cliffs on which Malfoy Manor rested. Draco's favorite tutor had taken him there on occasion. He remembered grinning at Prentice Greengrass' smooth excuses as he had looked coolly into his father's glare. We're studying ecology, biology, geology, earth science, physics... None of those things had meant anything to Draco then.

He pushed himself to his feet, took one final look at the smooth black stone and, snatching his cloak off the desk chair, strode out into the narrow, dark, and dank corridor. The Dark Lord had unlocked his door without coming in, if he had ever locked the door last night; Draco had fallen asleep without hearing the click of the lock.

--

"My God, Draco!"

Draco sighed. "Hello, Theodore."

"What's happened to you?"

"Your face is all funny," Crabbe gaped from across the table.

Draco had been thinking about this as he climbed the disused steps from the dungeon to the ground floor and along the entrance hall to the great hall. "I tried to go for a fly last night. The enchantments around this place are strong though."

He sank onto the long bench at the table, poured himself a bowl of granola beneath the avid stare of Theodore Nott, Crabbe, and Goyle. "Pass the milk?"

Goyle snatched the jug away from young, blond-headed Faelan Rowle with a growl.

"Thanks," Draco muttered, taking the pewter handle from him.

"So what happened? With the broom?" Theodore pressed.

"I hit the barrier," Draco lied, spooning up some of the cereal. "Like a stone wall, it was. I fell, smashed the broom."

"The Nimbus 2001?" Theodore moaned.

Draco missed a beat. Would he need that broom again? Could he fly out of the grounds? He doubted it very much. He shrugged. "It wasn't top of the line anymore anyway. There's the Firebolt, like Potter has."

Draco turned, the back of his neck prickling, to meet the Dark Lord's fierce, firestorm glare, the red eyes flown open as he sat at the center of the staff table. The headmaster's seat, Draco realized, the seat where Dumbledore ought to sit. The red eyes narrowed. His mouth was a very thin, straight line across his white, skull-like face. Draco shivered beneath the glower, but tried to smile up at the wizard. It was the first look the two had shared since the Dark Lord had pronounced him dead and Draco had to hope that even now, perhaps, he might buy himself one more chance.

Nott turned too, following Draco's gaze, but he quickly turned away with a shudder. Draco guessed he too could feel the heat of frustrated power that seeped from the Dark Lord, like rising water, toward Draco.

"My God, Draco," Nott said again in a hoarse whisper. His voice rose with his horror to a shrill, "What have you done? That's not about a broom..."

Draco shook his head, still holding the Dark Lord's fearsome gaze, trying to grin through the trembling that had taken hold of his fingers and was creeping up the nerves of his arms.

"He's angry," Crabbe mumbled unnecessarily.

--

Signs were up by lunchtime. The convicts were all growing restless, freed but still shut up inside the castle, prisoners as Draco was. Now, they were doing something about it. They had appealed to the Dark Lord, no doubt, or been incited by him to begin teaching his pupils how to Apparate. Draco was standing before a poster near the front doors of the castle when Theodore came up behind him. Theodore kept his eyes away from Draco's scarred face.

"Wicked!" the other boy exclaimed, quickly reading the sign.

Draco shrugged but was holding back a smile. Apparition, the magic of disappearing from one place and appearing in another. He knew one couldn't Disapparate from inside the Durmstrang grounds, the Dark Lord would have seen to that precaution; Hogwarts had it. The rush of wind that preceded and ended every Death Eater meeting Draco had yet witnessed confirmed his guess. He had noticed it was only after this gale that the Death Eaters could Apparate in or Disapparate out. But even the Dark Lord couldn't extend his influence indefinitely. How far could the spell reach? Draco, as he led the way into the great hall, looked toward the row of square windows behind the staff table. The sky was blue today, pale and icy, but nevertheless clear. Through the glass he could see the jagged outline of the snow-covered mountains that fenced the grounds, the dark green of the pine forests that climbed their lower slopes. Surely, Draco thought, his influence could not stretch far into that woods. Probably, just beyond the grounds' end...

"Look! Fish and chips!" Theodore said, grabbing for a plate and grabbing Draco from his thoughts.

Draco looked about at the fried fish and potato wedges. "Someone must have tipped off the house-elves," Draco agreed, accepting the plate Theodore passed him. Theodore still wouldn't look at his face.

"This day gets better and better. English food and we get to work with some of the most renowned Death Eaters out there! Learning some of the coolest magic!"

"Yeah," Draco murmured. "Real great."

"So are you going to tell me," Theodore pressed, dropping his voice again, "what really happened? If you don't want Crabbe and Goyle to know..." The two had yet to arrive.

Draco shook his head mutely and bit into a chip. He glanced quickly around the table, but it was more boisterous than usual and no one was paying them any mind. "You're clever, Theodore. But I won't tell you."

Theodore opened his mouth, but at that moment Crabbe and Goyle lumbered up to them and collapsed on the bench opposite.

--

The Apparition lessons were to happen after dinner and were mandatory for anyone seeking to enter the Dark Lord's service the posters proclaimed. Theodore brought a filched library book-- or maybe it was his own-- with him to dinner and went on about the theory and practice of Apparition that its pages contained. Draco, edgy at the thought of having to spend time with his lunatic aunt and the rest of the convicts, found his continuous jabber irritating, though he preferred it to Theodore's vain attempts to draw his secrets from him. Yet after perhaps twenty minutes, he could take no more, and snapped, "You sound like the Mudblood Granger, Theodore. Do us all a favor and shut up."

Theodore turned his green eyes on Draco. For a moment it seemed he would retaliate, but then he merely snapped the book shut and buried himself in the thick vegetable stew the house-elves had served tonight.

When dinner ended, much to Draco's displeasure, it was the Dark Lord himself who ordered them all to stand and who swept the tables and benches up against the walls, creating a fairly open space in the middle of the hall, such as Draco had seen when the Death Eaters gathered. He dropped his eyes as the Dark Lord's gleaming gaze swept around the hall, and Antonin Dolohov, with his twisted face, barked at them to spread themselves out. Theodore was standing a few feet beside Draco and Crabbe and Goyle were behind them. Mulciber, his father's old partner, raised his wand and a wooden hoop clattered in front of each of the students.

"Nice one," Dolohov commented to the older, white-haired man.

Mulciber shrugged, "It's what we used when we were learning."

"Okay, everyone," Dolohov called to the students, "the object is to try and land yourselves inside those hoops. That's as far as any of you will be going for a while."

"Apparition is really pretty simple," said Mulciber. "It's all about being sure of yourself."

"You have to clearly think about the place you want to be-- inside these hoops tonight--" said the pockmarked Rookwood, stepping up beside Dolohov, "and then you simply step forward and turn, picturing yourself in the space."

"Like this!" Bellatrix Lestrange stepped forward and did a sort of pirouette, the skirt of her robe swirling around her, and reappeared with a crack like a whip beside the door so that the people standing nearby jumped, some cowering.

Some of the youngest students broke into a smattering of excited applause. They were very young, Draco thought, to be even considering magic like this. England's Ministry of Magic didn't issue licenses until a wizard was seventeen; even Draco, who would be sixteen in June, was young to be trying this.

"Destination, determination, and deliberation, that's what our instructors used to say," said Mulciber, nodding his head. "Only be sure to think only of the inside of your hoops. We don't want anyone splinching."

"No," agreed Rookwood, "but Miss Strout managed to make it here just in case." He waved a big hand at a tiny witch in Death Eaters' garb hidden in a corner of the room. She raised a hand and waggled fingers in a dragonhide glove at them.

"All right, you think you've all got that?" Dolohov asked.

People nodded their heads and there was some murmuring of agreement.

"Go!" shouted Rabastan Lestrange.

Draco stared at the inside of the hoop. I want to go there, he told himself. Inside the hoop. Inside the hoop and then to Hogwarts. He stepped forward into the turn, screwing his eyes shut. Something seemed to strike him from the side and he hoped, for a second as he threw his arms out to balance himself, that it had worked. When he opened his eyes, though, he was standing outside the hoop, looking down at stone floor of the hall.

Draco shot a look around at all the others. Several of the students had ended up on the floor. No one had landed inside their hoops, though one of the youngest shot a quick look around the hall and then merely leapt into the hoop the way he would jump into a puddle, wellingtons first. His celebration dance even looked like he was splashing about. Draco tried to contain the smile he felt slipping onto his face.

"What are you all looking about for?" Dolohov snapped. "We've done what we can. The rest is up to you lot. Try again."

They did, with no better results. Draco was beginning to get a headache from all of it when, several attempts later, there was shriek. Cat Yaxley had splinched herself. She wobbled on the spot, both her arms back where she had started, lying on the floor and beginning to leak blood onto the floor. Miss Strout waved her wand from the corner and there was a great puff of purple smoke that left poor Cat inside the hoop, bawling, but her arms reattached. Bellatrix strode over and yanked Cat to her feet and Miss Strout, tutting, led her from the hall as the whispering started; Bellatrix stayed behind.

"Bound to happen," called Mulciber over the heads of the students. "Splinching happens fairly frequently in the beginning. You've just got to be very sure that you want to leave, which the poor girl wasn't."

The lesson went on in the same way, with so many fruitless tries. Draco merely stood there the last ten minutes, a hand to his head. It felt as though a mallet were trying to pound through his temple from the inside. He felt faintly nauseous. In the chaos of the hall, he doubted anyone even noticed him, but--

"Malfoy." It was a faint hiss and Draco opened his eyes, let his vision swim and let a blur of white, red, and black resolve itself into the Dark Lord's face hovering above his robes.

"My lord," Draco murmured.

"You're not practicing."

"I'm sorry, my lord. Headache."

The Dark Lord frowned deeply and Draco's vision blurred, his head spun again. He thought he might just topple sideways onto the floor.

"It might help you," the Dark Lord hissed, like the sap boiling off a log, "to remember that you cannot make it to Hogwarts from this building, Malfoy. Nor will you. Ever."

The Dark Lord turned away before Draco could compose an answer, just in time to see Theodore Nott vanish on the spot and reappear, whole and unsplinched, inside his hoop. He peered around him, then gave a great whoop. "I did it! I did it!"

The Dark Lord walked away as the students broke into cheers, even some of the convicts joining in. Draco heard Mulciber call, "Well done! Well done, indeed!"

"Well," Dolohov said, looking around at his colleagues and the Dark Lord for assent, "I think that ought to be enough for tonight."

The Dark Lord, lingering now off to the side, nodded once.

The students all started to head out of the door, babbling excitedly. Crabbe, Goyle, and Theodore converged on Draco and together the boys began to make for the door as well.

"Well done," Draco was able to congratulate Theodore earnestly. He hesitated before beginning his next question, "Erm, how--"

But a hand, long-fingered and white, fell on Theodore's shoulder. All four boys stopped and whipped around.

"My lord!" Theodore gasped, quickly bending double in a bow.

Draco saw the familiar scimitar curve of the Dark Lord's lipless mouth. "I'd like a word with you, Nott. Linger here with me."

"Of course, my lord," Theodore crowed, still bent toward the floor.

"The rest of you head off." The Dark Lord reserved his fiery glare for Draco, who scurried away, Crabbe and Goyle lumbering after him. At the door, he threw an anxious glance over his shoulder at Theodore, his face shining now, split nearly in half by a wide grin, as he stood just behind the Dark Lord.

"Do you think he'll be okay?" Draco asked of his companions.

Goyle merely grunted.

Crabbe shrugged. "He looks happy."

"Yeah, but he doesn't know the Dark Lord like--"

A hand fell on Draco's shoulder too. He spun this time to see his aunt's gleaming eyes behind the wild curls of her dark hair. "Well, Draco, are you ready for your lesson?"

"Lesson? Oh." Occlumency. "Yes, Auntie, I'd like that."

She smiled at his use of her preferred title.

Crabbe was regarding Draco curiously.

"I'll see you guys, tomorrow."

Crabbe looked into Bellatrix's gaunt face then back at Draco. He shrugged and led Goyle toward the dark stone staircase up to the dormitories.

"Well, Draco?"

"Auntie? Can we wait just a moment? I think my friend Theodore should be out soon and I wanted to know what the Dark Lord--"

"The one who Apparated?"

"Yes, Auntie, him."

"I'm sure it can't be but good news."

"Still, I'd like to know."

"Oh, fine." She sighed and the loose ringlets of her hair blew off her forehead. "I was going to send you ahead of me and wait to get the Dark Lord's permission anyway. He was talking to your friend when I was headed toward him and it seemed... imprudent to interrupt."

A wise thought, Draco agreed silently, a little impressed by this good judgment of his aunt's; he wouldn't have expected it of her.

To Draco's relief, Theodore came skipping out of the hall only a few minutes later, his freckled face still a beacon. On spotting Draco, he hurried over. "Oh Draco! You'll never guess! The Dark Lord wants to induct me. Tomorrow! He thinks I'm ready. I'm to meet him during the afternoon classes for some sort of test and by dinnertime, I'll be a real Death Eater!" Theodore threw out his chest. "Oh! I wonder how long it'll take an owl to get to my dad?"

"A good while, I'd expect." Draco couldn't be nearly as excited for Theodore as he was sure Theodore was expecting him to be. He bit his lip. His aunt fortunately spotted the Dark Lord leaving the hall at that moment and hurried over to him. "Listen," Draco said lowering his voice to a whisper and turning away from his aunt and master, "are you sure about this?"

"What's not to be sure of?"

Draco didn't feel at all safe answering and so quickly shifted the conversation. "This test, Theodore, did the Dark Lord mention-- did he say what kind of test?"

Theodore shrugged. "I don't know, probably the stuff we've spent these last few months learning, right? The curses and skills it takes to be a Death Eater."

"And what-- what happens if you fail?"

"You think I'll fail?"

"No!" Draco quickly covered as his friends smile slipped to a frown and his face dimmed. "I only want to know if. I mean--"

"Draco!" It was his aunt. Draco turned to see her coming toward them again. The Dark Lord stood where he had left her, watching the two boys with glowing eyes. "Come on. The Dark Lord says we have an hour and half. Goodnight, Nott."

Theodore looked quite shocked, but pleased by this unexpected politeness from the convict.

"Goodnight, Mrs. Lestrange."

"I'll see you in the morning, Theodore." Draco was going to add, Think about what I said, but thought better of it. Theodore was smiling again.

"See you, Draco."

Bellatrix put her long-, grimy-nailed hand on Draco's shoulder and began to steer him off toward his dungeon room, as Theodore ascended the stairs in a daze of happiness, and the Dark Lord stood in the entrance hall watching them all depart. As they gained the dark, narrow stairwell, Draco saw the Dark Lord slash his wand downward through the air and heard the great rush of wind as the Anti-Disapparition spells settled again throughout the whole of Durmstrang Institute.

A/N: Okay, so I'd like to say that I love this chapter for its opening look onto Draco's childhood, and am glad to report that it appears the plot-- and Draco-- are progressing, something both seemed loath to do for a while there, but I believe all is fixed and back on schedule. I feel I must, though, apologize for the scene of the Apparition lesson, which I realize echoes the one from HBP quite a bit. I hope you will forgive me that. And I hope, hope, hope, hope, hope that you will leave me a review. Please! I have been rewriting this story, as you know by now, and have yet, though this is the 12th chapter, to receive a SINGLE review on the rewrite. Won't SOMEONE tell me what they think? Please?

Yours forever, Tsona