The man apparated Draco away.
'Let's take you to join your horrible little friends shall we? You look like you should be at school. Who are you?'
Draco remained silent.
'Very well. I know where you belong. He'll make you speak alright.' The man chuckled to himself. He tied a blindfold around Draco and apparated away again.
Draco's leg was still dripping with blood when they arrived outside of a very familiar house. Draco was escorted up the long drive to the manor that had once been his home. White peacocks still waltzed about the grounds, which were as immaculate as ever. In many respects, it looked as though nothing had changed. Greyback knocked on the door three times and a frightened face opened it. The elf bowed and welcomed them in. Behind the man's back, Draco gave Dobby a small smile and a look that clearly meant shut up. The door to the smoking room opened and out walked a man Draco knew only too well.
'Greyback. What have I told you about bringing guests in still dripping? It took months to wash the blood off of the carpets last time.'
'Sorry, Sir. I'll.'
'You'll do nothing. I'll handle this. Dobby. Remove the lump and stop the bleeding. Then tidy up what this boy has dripped everywhere.'
Draco's long hair was covering his face, a fact he was thankful for. Surely his father would have recognised him otherwise.
'Well done Dobby. I'm surprised. Take him to join his friends.' The elf led Draco down to the cellar. Draco had loved hiding there as a child, its cool damps brought back memories. Happy memories, of playing hide and seek with the elves whilst his parents were out. Draco walked in and the door clanged shut behind him.
'Who's that?' The voice sounded familiar.
'Luna?'
'That's me. Who are you?'
'Give us a sec.' Draco said, thinking. His hands had been tied behind his back by the elf, but he could still wriggle them a bit. Could he manage this?
'Lumos.' Slowly a ball of light began to fill the room. It was a pitiful sight. Spread out in front of him were four people. Harry, Hermione and Luna he knew, and in the distance was someone he didn't recognise.
'You've got your wand?'
Hermione asked.
'No.'
'Then how?'
'It is possible, Ms Granger, to go without a wand if one know what one is doing.' Came the croak from the unknown man.
'But that need a really powerful wizard.' Hermione replied.
'Shall we worry about that later?' Luna asked. 'Has anyone seen the nail? I think it was by the water jug.'
Ollivander passed the nail slowly to Luna, who carefully hacked away at the ropes keeping Draco's arms immobile.
'I haven't seen you in years.' Draco said, out loud, although very much to himself.
'What do you mean?'
'The nail.' Draco said, flipping out of his private world and back into the real one. 'I had a lot of fun with that when I was younger. Used to come down here and bang it into the wall over there, pretend I was digging for treasure.'
'Really? Well, I think you may have saved us a lot of discomfort then. Thank you.' Ollivander said. 'You don't know any ways out of here do you?'
'Other than that door? No, there's not one. I've looked, believe me.'
'Pity. I don't suppose you'd be able to magic it open would you?'
'I don't think so. This light took enough effort and that's easy compared with unlocking the door.'
'I suppose so. Pity. Well, nice to meet you again, young Mr Malfoy.'
'Call me Draco.'
'Of course.'
Draco turned his attention to Harry.
'What happened to you Harry? You look awful.'
'Hermione did it. When they turned up she cast a stinging jinx so I couldn't be recognised.'
'Good thinking. Probably saved your life. Well done Hermione.'
'It was nothing.'
'If you say so. How did you get found?'
'I said it.' Harry said simply.
'What?'
'The V-word.'
'Oh Harry. Oh well, we're still alive aren't we. No-one's broken anything, and we're all here together. I even got healed into the bargain, although it was apparently so I wouldn't drip on the carpet.'
'What?'
'Of course, you'd left before it happened.'
'What?'
'Oh, right, yeah. Well, after you left I ran downstairs and locked myself in the kitchen. It kept the snake out, but then V-word turned up and blasted the door. I had a massive oak splinter stuck in my leg. Must've been a foot long.'
Suddenly they heard footsteps on the stairs, Draco hurriedly extinguished the light before the door opened, to reveal Lucius Malfoy.
'You. The last one to get here. Come with me.'
Thank goodness, he still hadn't been recognised. And there was his wand.
'It's been a long time, hasn't it Draco?'
'I suppose it has.'
'Well, sit down. We're going to have a chat.'
'Great.' Said Draco, his tone making it clear that this was not at all the case.
'No need to take that tone with me young man.'
'Sorry, I'm just not in the habit of having conversations with the lackeys of mass-murderers.'
'Nor am I in the habit of talking to blood traitors. You and I both know Draco that your friends are doomed. Even if the rogue individual who impersonated me at the ministry turns up, he won't be able to beat me. No, you're quite in my power.'
'Rogue individual. That's no way to talk about your son.'
'I have no son. Not since you were sorted into Gryffindor. I had to, it's all in your Grandfather's will you see. No heirs from Gryffindor, just Slytherin. I've been working to undo all that though. All you have to do is give me Harry Potter and you can come back.'
'No.'
'I'm Sorry?'
'I said no. I'm not going to give up my best friend to a man who wants him dead. Even if that man is my father.' Draco's eyes narrowed as he looked at his father. He never had been a good man had he?
'Your mother would be upset, were she still with us.'
'She's dead. You wanted another heir and you forced her to have one! She's dead because of you!' Draco spat.
'At that Lucius leapt from his seat and came at Draco, all magic was forgotten in his fit of anger. He charged at Draco and leapt at him, his hands reaching for Draco's neck. The chair Draco was sitting on fell backwards and Draco hit the floor, knocking the air out of him. He was feeling woozy, but that didn't distract him from the throttling, squeezing fingers around his throat. Those fingers which were determined to kill him, to remove the stain from the Malfoy tree. Draco's lungs burned as he fought for breath, no matter how he gasped, none came. His vision was going blurry. This was the end. Slowly Draco reached out, to try and fight back. His hands, unable to find their target began to flop. They settled on something wooden, cold and hard. The tears in Draco's eyes were blocking his vision, but everything else was clear as his brain desperately tried to record his final moments. Through his fingertips Draco felt every swirl and knot of the wood. He clenched his fingers around it and hit his father with the first curse he thought of. The force of the blast sent each sliding across the room, Lucius one way and Draco the other.
Draco woke to find himself staring into a pair of large, globe-like eyes.
'Master?'
'Dobby? What the hell happened. I'm feeling like a sack of trampled rose-compost.'
'You fought, Master.'
The memories started to come back to him. The friendly tone of the conversation had been ripped asunder by the unspoken hatreds that ran just beneath the surface. Lucius, never again would that man be father to Draco, had tried to strangle him and then. Then he had cast a spell.
'What happened to him, Dobby?'
'Master shouldn't look.'
'Dobby. Tell me what happened.'
'He's dead, Master.'
'Dead?'
'Yes, Master. There was a flash of purple light. And.' The elf fell silent, unable to describe what he had seen. Draco felt sick.
'Dobby, get the others from the cellar up here.'
'Yes, Master.'
Draco got to his feet slowly and rubbed his neck. It felt sore and his throat was dry. In the corner of the room was the sideboard. Draco walked over to it stiffly and bent down to pick out a particularly fine bottle of gin. Hmm that smelt good. Draco poured himself a generous measure into a cut glass tumbler. It felt just comfortable in his hand. Quickly Draco knocked back the fiery liquid. That was better. Armed with some Dutch courage, he headed over to where the body of his father lay, to look on the full consequences of his actions. He stood there for a full five seconds before he had to look away. The man's body had been turned inside out. Damn Dumbledore, it was all his fault. Why had he left him a book full of such curses as these?
'Draco? What's going on?' The familiar voice of Hermione struck his eardrums and barely registered. He had killed his own... No that man had been no father to him.
'Sorry?' He said at length, something, somewhere gently reminding him that Hermione had spoken.
'Was that?'
'Yes.'
'I'm sorry, Draco.'
'Don't be. He was nothing to me. What are you doing here?'
'Some elf called Dobby let us go. I assume that you did that.'
'Why?'
'Well, Dobby said that "the Master has said to let you go". I assumed he meant your Father, apparently he meant you.'
'What was that last bit?'
'Apparently he meant you.'
'How though?'
'What?'
'I was disowned Hermione. How can Dobby be calling me master and be accepting commands from me? He shouldn't be doing that.'
'I suppose not. What are you going to do about it?'
'Do? I don't know Hermione. I can't think right at the moment. This morning I woke up in a tent in the middle of nowhere and now I'm back here and I've accidentally used the Dark Arts to kill my own father. It's all happening so fast. I think I want to be alone for a bit, Hermione.'
'Fine. First we've got to go back to the tent though. Have you found your wand?'
'No.'
'That's odd. It wasn't with ours. Did he have it?' Hermione asked pointedly. Draco went to look. Yes, there was the handle of his wand. Draco pulled at it and it came free easily. It was only when Draco went t give it a wave that he noticed something wrong. It was too light. A closer look showed that the end had fallen off. No. Draco scrabbled around looking for the other half, but eventually had to conceded defeat. It was probably never going to show up. Draco's head fell. This was the pits, he'd started the day happy and now he ended it wandless, fatherless and hopeless. What could he do now? He wasn't any use without a wand and even Ollivander, even Merlin couldn't repair it without the other half. Sadly Draco threw the useless stump of wand away and went to join Hermione.
'Come on. Let's head back. Harry's waiting in the hall. We'll have to move camp again, but it shouldn't take long.'
'Yeah.' Said Draco sadly. What was the point. What sort of wizard was he now? Without a wand he could barely produce light, something even the most useless first year could do by this point in the term. Why did everything go against him? Sometimes Draco felt that some sort of God was out there, making fun at his expense, but now he was just feeling empty. Draco was fairly sure he had left his heart behind him when he arrived at the tent. There were the potatoes and the onions, they'd seemed like a valuable prize earlier this evening, but now. Now they were just things. Little things that didn't matter. They moved the campsite quickly, and Harry soon got the tent up and they went to sleep just as the sun was peaking above the horizon. Draco was haunted in his dreams by flashes of purple light and the image of his father dying at his hands. What had he done? He slept fitfully, tossing and turning, trying to get comfortable. In the end though, he gave up trying to sleep and went to the kitchen and sat down in the big armchair. Sitting there he tried desperately not to cry. Real men don't cry he told himself, but in the end the tears rolled down his cheeks. Suddenly he smiled, as the thought crossed his mind that at least no-one would see him crying, but it didn't last long and he cried until the tears wouldn't come any more.
