Draco Lucius Malfoy
June 5, 1980
September 21, 2010
Adored Son and Beloved Friend
Lighting the tip of her cigarette with a wave of her gloved fingertip, Hermione stood at the foot of Draco's gravesite staring at the headstone, the marker being half-covered with snow. With eerily calmness, she exhaled the smoke, the smolder wafting throughout the frigid air.
The snow was up to her shins, the coldness permeating her boots and tights and making her legs cold, but she paid no mind to the glacial weather. Because she was here. In Wiltshire. At the Malfoy Manor. At Draco's gravesite. He was in the ground. Beneath the snow, dead grass, frozen earth, he lay for all eternity next to his Grandfather Abraxes.
"Damn you, Malfoy" she whispered and dropped her spent fag, kicking snow over it. It was mostly likely sacrilege to smoke in a graveyard, even worse, upon a grave, but she hardly brought herself to care.
"Care to share, Granger," said a voice from behind her. She craned her neck and saw Theodore leaning against a tall headstone about six meters away.
"It was my last one," she lied and pinned her focus back on the headstone, hearing the soft crunch of footsteps moving towards her. When Theodore arrived at her side, albeit a respective distance away from her, they stood in silence and let the sound of the wind fill their ears.
After a while, Theodore tilted his head back slightly and stuffed his hands into his cloak pockets and said, "I was there when it happened. Blaise, as well."
Throat constricting and swelling, she rasped out, "So I heard."
"Would you like to see it, too?"
Feeling her heart drop and stomach rise, both colliding with a nauseating slap from Theodore's question. Horrified, she stared at him, thinking surely he did not ask what she thought she heard. Why in the world would she want to…
"Yes," she heard herself say in a hushed, withdrawn tone and without a word, the man left her side, trekking back to the manor.
Hermione dreaded going back inside Malfoy Manor but knew it was inevitable. Alex was in there and had not been ready to see his father's grave. Blaise had offered to stay with him, her knee-jerk response being no. Yet, her son wanted to stay. He wanted to know his grandparents, and difficult as it was for her to accept and to not pull the 'I'm your mother. Do as I say' card, she regrettably stayed and picked at her breakfast while all the other last minute visitors joined in.
During breakfast, Hermione set certain conditions with Narcissa and Lucius; the first one being, she had to be present if those two ever found themselves alone with Alex...which she botched thirty minutes later when needing to see Draco's gravesite. Blaise then offered to stay with her son, but that hardly made her feel better. She distrusted everyone currently in the manor, excluding Alex, and even including Rose Weasley. Nevertheless, Blaise was a bit more tolerable than the rest.
Great Gods, she refused to believe she left her son with those lunatics!
Hastily, she caught up to Theodore, both entering the manor simultaneously where the house-elf named Mippy took their cloaks and gloves and offered tea.
"Master and Mistress is in playroom with Master Zabini and Mistress Parkinson-Weasley and children," the elf explained. "Mippy will take Master and Mistress's guests there."
"Miss Granger and I will be tending to another affair, but do tell your Master and Mistress we'll be along."
Hermione opened her mouth to tell Theodore she preferred stopping by the playroom to check on Alex, but he grabbed her wrist and Disapparated them into a darkened area. So dark, it was nearly impossible to see where they were. For a moment, she feared Theodore had ill-intended plans for her but relaxed when he said, "Lumos," and saw the brightened tip of his wand. The spot of light moved and pointed to the left causing daylight to stream through a separating veil, a curtain. The outside brightness washed over her surroundings, exposing them.
The room they were in was large with lacquered wooden flooring and an elegantly polished fireplace which ignited as if sensing human life. She moved closer to the flames and rubbed her arms, for the room was icy. From there, she noticed the king-sized, four-poster bed with a white and gunmetal color scheme. A grand, luxurious chandelier hung from the middle of the dome-shaped ceiling, the crystals reflecting the winter day. She glanced back at the window and strolled towards it, ignoring Theodore as he un-pocketed his flask and nursed it.
"We're still in the manor," she stated when seeing the Malfoy graveyard below, her breath fogging the window.
"Indeed," Theodore said and she saw him going near a corner of the wall. The creased corner separated and a stone pensieve perched on a pillar-like platform emerged from a hidden nook. The man cupped his hands on the basin's rims and peered down. His Adam's apple bobbed meticulously but aside from that, he displayed no emotion. Silently, Theo lifted his right arm in a beckoning gesture, an empty vial floating into the waiting hand and coming from the hidden compartment. Sticking his wand into the pensieve, he withdrew a wispy strand of memory and coerced it into the empty vial.
"Why do you have a pensieve here?" Hermione asked, thinking it strange Theodore had one dwelling in Malfoy Manor. Why wouldn't he have it at his own place?
"It's Draco's," he said, corking the memory and letting it float back into the hidden nook.
"Draco's?" Hermione marched over, stopping when getting to the basin. Staring down and then into the hidden nook, she sharply inhaled when seeing shelves of vialed memories. There had to be at least twenty of them. "These are his?"
Theodore said nothing and touched the tip of his wand to his temple, extracted a memory, and deposited it into the pensieve and stepped away to give her space. "You wanted to see."
Hesitantly, Hermione stepped where he had been and gripped the basin's rims and lowered her chin. Exhaling, a tear escaping from her eye and dropping, and causing ripples in the awaiting memory. She didn't really want to see but as she dipped her face into the basin, it was more a matter of needing to.
A falling sensation overwhelmed her like she was a drop of ink was shooting down from a murky sky into a glass of water. She landed joltingly on the back of a broom behind a hunched over Theodore who was wearing black Quidditch gear. In the crook of his left arm was a quaffle and he was flying towards three hoops. Rain poured from the greyish, cloudy sky and Hermione saw a figure fly towards them. It was Blaise dressed in dark grey Quidditch gear, and he flew downwards and up on Theo's left side, his dark eyes on the quaffle.
"Give us a kiss, mate," he taunted and dove towards them and Theodore abruptly dropped, the handle of his broom shooting straight down, the rain-sopped grass coming up on them quickly. Hermione's stomach lurched and fought the instinct to wrap her arms around Theodore's waist, reminding herself she was not going to fall off the broom. Unless of course he did. And thankfully he did not and shot straight up at a slant, the hoops closer in sight.
A familiar looking man rose up to block Theodore, and Hermione wanted to call him Herkins…Harrows, Harper? Yes, Harper, and Theodore was unfazed by his arrival, merely slowing his broom to a full stop.
"Not even going to try?" laughed Harper, a bludger darting by and hitting the handle of his broom and breaking it off in shards. He spiraled to the ground as Theodore threw the quaffle into one of the hoops, scoring. The ball was then caught by another familiar man, and his name had to have been Pucey. He was wearing dark grey Quidditch gear like Blaise and Harper with a playful yet competitive gleam in his eyes which slackened when his eyes focused on something passed Theodore's shoulder.
Making a half-circle on his broom, Theodore searched for what had caught Pucey's attention, and Hermione's eyes widened when seeing Draco with his black Quidditch outfit billowing in the wind. Her heart seized and she was unable to prevent the smile forming on her lips at seeing the sheer determination set on his handsome features with his arm stretched out and the Snitch flying teasingly away from him.
Beside Draco was a man dressed in grey that Hermione did not recognize and appeared a few years younger than most of the other men. He, too, had his arm stretched out, his hand opening and closing in feeble attempts to grasp the Snitch.
"Don't let him get it, Malcolm!" shouted Pucey from behind her and Theodore.
At that, Hermione saw Draco shift his body weight over and down, thus, causing his legs to lose their grip on his broom. His gloved hand encircled the fluttering golden ball on his way down to the ground, and it was like watching him fall in slow motion. The man called Malcolm reacted belatedly to Draco's fall and flew down to help him but was too late. Draco hit the ground back first and winced and waved off Malcolm's helping hand.
"I only fell a few feet. I'm fine," he griped and groaned when bending his knees and curling up into a sitting position. He then climbed to his feet, brushed off the wet grass remnants with his free hand and then stuck his other triumphantly into the air. Those donned in black clapped, including Theodore, only his was out of sync with the others, slower and less enthusiastic.
Hermione watched Draco smirk arrogantly up at his friends and then a peculiar expression washed over his face and his arm descended back to his side, the Snitch flying out of his hand. It was like he had suddenly lost his balance, and she watched as his left leg took a small step back for support which failed him, and he fell backwards onto the grass with a soft thump. He lay there unmoving.
"Oi, Draco, get your lazy arse up!" howled Blaise and swooped down over his friend.
Knowing this was it. This was where it happened, the walls of Hermione's throat constricted and swelled, tears gushing down her cheeks.
"Why aren't you doing anything?" she cried at Theodore's back. "You're just sitting here on your stupid broom doing nothing! All of you are! Can't you see he's not alright?!"
"Probably trying to pull our legs," commented Pucey, flying his broom next to Theodore's. "Bloke sniffles over a bleedin' paper cut."
Hermione refrained from yelling at him, not because Pucey wouldn't hear her, but because had said the truth. She had witnessed several occasions Draco bemoaning over a stubbed toe, paper cuts, and lack of sex.
"Hey, mates," said Malcolm, hopping off his broom and bending over to examine his unconscious friend. He removed the glove from his right hand and clenched Draco's shoulder, shaking him. He then stuck his fingers underneath the man's nose. "He's not breathing."
Theodore's back stiffened and then pointed his broom handle downwards and descended gradually.
Choking back a sob, Hermione saw Malcolm place his pointer and middle finger on Draco's neck, direct upon his friend's pulse-point.
Malcolm flinched and yelled in ire, "He's got no pulse." And then he mumbled to himself, digging his wand out of his pocket and pointing it at Draco. "Rennervate!"
Nothing happened.
Harper was second to rush over, and Blaise was the third, hitting the ground and sprinting towards Draco and falling to his knees. He shirked his gloves and Draco's to properly feel for a pulse at the wrist.
Theodore landed his broom and Hermione leapt off before he discarded it on the ground, running with him towards Draco even though she desperately wanted out of the memory. She had seen enough and staying longer meant torturing herself more.
The other team members landed, as well, and gathered around their friend, and Hermione watched them heartbreakingly point their wands at Draco, casting the Rennervate spell on him, desperation in all their voices. Even Theodore dropped to his knees, pushed at Draco's legs, having given up magically and was trying manually.
"We need to get him to St. Mungo's," he hissed which sounded so odd yet comforting coming from his usually distant and unconcerned tone. "Now!"
The rain began to worsen and Hermione started backing away when the thirteen teammates grabbed at each other, some grabbing ahold of Draco. As they Disapparated, Hermione was thrust upwards and out of the pensieve. Gasping for breath, she tilted backwards but was caught by Theodore who held her awkwardly.
"Let me go," she wheezed, tears spilling out of her eyes.
"You need to lie down," he said, trying to steer her in the direction of the bed.
"I need to vomit. Let me go," she moaned and he unhanded her. She stumbled a few steps and collapsed to her hands and knees, retching onto the floor. Shudders and nauseating spasms rocked her body as she emptied her stomach of what little breakfast she ate, feeling as though hours had drifted by before slightly calming.
"Why did you show me that?" she managed to croak, letting her body fall into a twisted sitting position, her hands still over her sick.
"Because you needed to see," he replied vacantly and waved his wand at her mess, cleaning it up.
Sniffling, she wiped her mouth and nose with her sleeve and stared up at him accusingly. "You did nothing. All of you did. You all watched as he died."
If her words cut him, he hadn't let it show. He merely stared back at her and said, "It wouldn't have mattered anyway."
Weakly but resolutely she climbed to her feet and sputtered at him, "What? How can you say that? He was your friend!"
"He was gone the moment he hit the ground. Nothing could have saved him. Not me and not the twelve other people on the pitch. What happened to him was inevitable. If it hadn't been there then it would've happened somewhere else a few days later or even a few days earlier. I'm sure Blaise explained to you what caused Draco's death."
"Please stop talking like…like…"
"Like what?"
"Like you don't give a shit! Like you're fine! Like you've accepted that Draco's gone!"
"I do care, Granger," he said evenly, eyes flashing almost dangerously. "But I'm fine and I have accepted it. You need to, as well."
"I've had three days where you have had almost two months to wrap your head around this nightmare? And…and why are you here? To torture me with that memory? Blaise could've given it to me."
"He refused. I told him he needed to, and he refused. It's why I'm here." He then added after a pause. "I also wanted to see the boy."
Hermione swallowed and let her eyes drift close momentarily, fancying the idea of downing a capful of Draught of Peace before snuggling into bed. The bed in the room must've belonged to Draco, and she wondered if the sheets smelt like him still or if they stunk dryly of dust and lifelessness.
"Let me take you to the playroom," she heard Theodore offer. "My presence is no longer needed."
A/N: Thank you to my readers, reviewers, followers, and those who have put this fic on their favorite list. I doubt that the chapter was enjoyable, but I hope it was informative, and I'd love to hear what your thoughts about it. I know a lot of you were hoping for more Alex, Narcissa, and Lucius action. That will be in the next chapter. I promise. :)