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The clock is ticking for the final battle, so here is our last big of Hogwarts before all the chaos. The plan was to start the war today because it's May, 2, but we can all raise our wands today for the chapter that will come soon ;)
I hope you all like this chapter!
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The rest of the break seemed to carry a bit of lethargy for all the people at Malfoy Manor, the bodies of the snatchers and Pettigrew were disposed off, and the place was cleaned out, still nothing seemed the same and most of the time, the house was just quiet. The three Lestranges were distant, the two brothers would whisper around, but didn't seem like they were ever in agreement with one another.
Draco spent the rest of his holiday taking care of his father and worrying about what was going to happen from now on, the Dark Lord had not returned nor did anyone else show up at the manor, but it was clear to everyone the residents of the house had fallen from grace.
Draco eventually returned to Hogwarts with his mother's wand after she claimed it was better suited to him then the one the snatchers were using, but it was not the same as his own and he found himself resenting Harry, if only a little. The news of what happened at Malfoy Manor hit some of the Slytherins and he received both pity and avenged looks from his peers, for he had completely fallen out of his position despite his supposed rank as part of the inner circle.
"We always knew the Malfoy's were weak" said Grabbe loudly in the common room and Draco had to use all of his control not to respond.
As expected, many people didn't return to school, including Ginny Weasley, which just made some of the other students more angry, but Draco ignored them all as well.
The only good news was that Daphne had returned wearing a nice necklace that she told him was a portkey.
"My parents left already, the Dark Lord is distracted, so they knew this was the best time. I heard Flint and Higgs left too, apparently Oliver Wood used his permission to travel 'cause of quidditch to smuggle a bunch of people out of the country. Theo and I will leave on the first sign of trouble, you should come with us" said the girl
"I can't, but take Pansy with you. I know Blaise think he can protect her, but I'm in a bit more trouble than you guys know"
Neither Daphne nor Theo questioned him, they only promised to take Pansy, by force if needed, and that was more than enough for Draco.
On the day after his return, Draco wrote a note for Longbottom so he would know both Lovegood and Dean Thomas were fine. He left it with Pomfrey so she could give it to Terry and he would send it to the Gryffindor, which was a ridiculously long way to send a message, but it was the best thing he had.
Draco faded in the background, not important enough for the Carrows and not hated enough between the students now that he had been tortured enough to satisfy them. There were also more important news flying around like how the Dark Lord had violated Dumbledore's grave and how Harry and his friends had been extraordinary in running from him once again. Speculation spread like fire and the resistance grew stronger, so the teacher had pretty much reached a point where they were mostly pretending to teach the older students, focusing only on not ruining the younger ones.
This gave Draco the opportunity to actually study more advanced healing and also to help more students he found laying around the corridors. Initially they would just try to get away from him, but eventually some of them accepted he was there to help, even if there were always the ones who would throw Ginny Weasley at his face and go away, preferring to be hurt then let him heal them.
After a while, Draco did notice that people started to disappear more, some of them just went away and never came back and it was driving the Carrows mad not knowing how people were escaping from the school, especially because it didn't seem to stop Longbottom at all, he was still fighting them and encouraging other to do it too. The boy was becoming as popular as Harry Potter, he was the new symbol of hope, so the Death Eaters decided the best thing to do would be to go after his old grandma to try and get him to submit.
It had indeed turned quite difficult, even for Draco, to get a hold of the boy to warn him, so he once again sent a message through Pomfrey. He was surprised however when the old lady did not immediately run, only doing so after putting her attacker in St. Mungus, which left Longbottom very smug and therefore, more hurt. Draco was surprised the boy hadn't any permanent nerve damage yet, but he did worry that if he kept that up, he would be joining his parents on Mungus, Amycus certainly had entertained the thought a few times.
The Carrows started to make all kinds of limitations to get the little delinquents, they ordered the house elves to not give them food outside of the great hall at meal times and they tried to catch them as they slept only to find out they weren't always in their dorm. Draco knew they were using the room of requirements, but not how they were getting around the limitations the Carrows were implementing.
Eventually, Amycus proved once more that he couldn't be trusted and that absolutely no one was safe in the school, not even the Slytherins. Draco didn't know how it started, but Bulstrode's little Ravenclaw friend decided to defend one of the Patils and the three of them ended up being attacked, a group came by to help them escape, but Bulstrode was not the athletic sort and she was the one who ended up paying for the entire thing.
She was just a half-blood after all.
This kind of occurrence however wasn't such a big deal anymore and none of the people that would help Bulstrode were either able or near her to do so, which was why Draco found her hours later thrown away in an alcove. He moved her to the nearest classroom and took the potions he now carried with him and woke up the girl to try and treat her.
He had always found the girl unpleasant, too much of a gossip and her little rivalry with Pansy would sometimes get too off hand, but he couldn't help but to pity her as she cried her eyes out over her own misfortune.
"They'd kill all of us if they could, wouldn't they?" she asked Draco in a quiet voice.
"Probably"
"I don't want to go back, but I can't sleep here either" she said.
The girl had blood on her clothes, her skirt was dry but it smelled of piss, she had a dry trail of saliva on her chin and her hair was a mess.
"Do you know if Mandy is alright?" she asked
"I don't, sorry, she might have gone with Patil to their hideout"
"I know where it is, but I can't get in, the door apparently knows not to let us in" she said and then she sneered "How's that… the good guys and the bad guys think we're unworthy"
"Trusting the wrong people can cost your life" said Draco.
"I just want to go home" she said, sounding very tired.
Draco helped her clear herself with a few spells so she could go back to the dorms, but he kept their conversation in mind. Mandy Brocklehurst, Bulstrode's Ravenclaw friend, and the two Patils, did not return to classes while the Slytherin was forced to be there and take all the humiliation of being disgraced, she didn't have peace even on the dorms. The other Slytherins were either ignoring her or mocking her and a few days later Draco learned from Pansy some of the younger girls came to their dorm to rip some of the girl's books and even some of her bras so "her big boobs would bounce all over" and Daphne had to try some spells to make her's fit the other girl.
"It's so childish!" said Pansy.
None of it sat well with Draco, he knew it was a small group, but Slytherin too had a few people that wanted nothing to do with the war or the Dark Lord, but the years of house rivalry prevented them from going to others and asking for help. Didn't they realise what they were doing? They wanted the purebloods to like the muggleborns, but they didn't care about the snakes and if they kept going all they were going to achieve at the end of the war was an inversion of roles.
Acting on feelings was never a good thing to do and Draco should have learned by now that despite his claims, he was just as impulsive as Harry and not very good at thinking when he was angry. He knew exactly where to go, so he just did, but he was quite foolish in not thinking about who would be on the seventh floor with Longbottom, which actually turned out to be a considerable number of people. Goldstein, the Patils and Brown all raised their wands when they saw him enter the room, but Corner, Boot and Finnegans just looked startled and apprehensive.
"How did he get in here?" asked one of the Patils, the Gryffindor one, and Draco ignored her to turn to Longbottom.
"Are you really just going to let Bulstrode take the hit on her own?"
Longbottom seemed actually surprised with the question, but he did look at least a little guilty.
"We don't even know her…"
"Ask Brocklehurst, they have been friends since forever and you had no problem getting her out"
"Mandy is not here, she went home" said Longbottom, but all it did was make Draco more upset.
"Oh so you do have a way out of the school, how lovely"
The cynical tone must have hit the right spot, because Longbottom threw his hands up.
"The fuck you want me to do, Malfoy, you can't just show up and demand I do things for your friends"
"Good, because she is not my friend, but she helped your friends so you own her at least a little bit of credit"
"Funny because I remember something about my friends not being trustworthy, but yours apparently always are"
"Completely different situations, I'm not telling you to trust her, I'm telling you to help her because clearly you can't see you are being as close minded as the people you're fighting against!"
The room was dead silent and only the heavy breathing from the duo could be heard.
"You're right" said Longbottom after a while and Draco was actually surprised by it "But the people here and a lot of people outside have put their lives in my hands and I do take that responsibility seriously" the boy looked around and his eyes stopped on Corner "you gave me the courtesy of trusting my judgement, so… I don't know that girl, what say you?"
"Just help get her out, you don't have to say much or show her much, she got her Hogsmeade privilege removed, so she needs whatever it is you're doing to get people out so she can go home. Her family is not directly involved, no one should ask her questions, you can always tell her to say it was one of the old passages that you guys managed to reopened or something"
"Ok" said Longbottom
Draco was going to just turn around and leave, but he took a deep breath and put his good manners to work.
"Thank you" he said and then moved to leave.
"Wait" called Boot "Can you get us salamander's blood? Slughorn is brewing some potions to help with the cruciatus, but since it's no longer permitted, the school can't get the ingredients, the apothecary in Hogsmeade is controlling how much we buy and we don't have enough money to bribe them"
"How much do you need?"
"Three bottles would be great"
Draco thought about it, making quick calculations, he could not buy them through mail order, so he would need to ask one of his friends to go to Hogsmeade, something he was still forbidden to do. It wouldn't be strange to buy one, they might get a second glance with two and three would be too suspicious, he could ask Pansy to get one and ask Blaise to suddenly remember he needed one too.
"I can get two, three would be too suspicious, my name doesn't have value anymore for bribing"
"Did Potter tell you anything about what he is doing?" asked Corner suddenly "he has been gone for a long time now"
"Michael!" said Longbottom
"We know they saw each other, maybe there is something we can do to help!" insisted the boy and Finnegans, although not saying anything, seemed to agree with the boy.
"Well I don't know anything, we didn't have time to talk with, you know… them trying to escape and my aunt torturing Granger"
"Is she ok?" asked one of the Patils, the ravenclaw
"I don't know, she was… not terrible, so she should recuperate, this is probably why they are laying low now, I think their next move should be to go to Gringotts, but I don't really know"
"Gringotts?" asked Longbottom frowning.
"My aunt kept asking Granger about a sword they had with them, something she thought was in her vault, she was really worried they might have been there, like there was something valuable there, she held on calling the Dark Lord until she was sure they had not been there. This means she is probably hiding something for him there, if they know what it is, they might want to get it"
The group was quiet again and Draco didn't really know what to do.
"If Malfoy is your informant" said Goldstein very confused "then what happened to Weasley?"
"Lots of makeup and Parkinson ripped her clothes off," Said Finnegan before turning to Draco " Ginny wasn't very happy about it"
"Pansy is dramatic, but she always gets the job done" said Draco defending his friend.
"Does she know…?" asked Longbottom
"No, it would be too dangerous for any of my friends to know, but they do know who I am, so they know where I stand and they will support me as much as they can"
Longbottom nodded, but the others still looked a mix of confusion and suspicion.
"None of you saw me, none of you will come to me for help unless it's a quick healing, I'm no longer in a position I can do for anyone what I did for Weasley. If you don't think you can keep your mouth shut I have no problem obliviating you"
"No one is getting obliviated" said Longbottom firmly "they are my friends!"
"Well, my friend let herself be obliviated, because she knew it was too dangerous to know" and that surprised Longbottom "The secrets we're keeping could cost us this war, it can't get out"
"And I will die to protect it if I have to!" Said Longbottom with full conviction, one that surprised even Draco.
The group looked eyes wide at Longbottom and him, only Boot nodded his head, apparently expecting something like this.
"So he didn't just have a sudden change of heart?" asked one of the Patils, the ravenclaw.
"No" said Longbottom
"Yes" said Draco at the same time and the other boy looked at him "I was always horrible to you and your friends, you know that"
"You're still horrible to me now" said Longbottom smirking, his face full of amusement "Whatever good side you have I've never seen it, but after all I heard from the people that actually got to see that, I admit that at this point I look forward to it"
"You might get disappointed, your source is unreliable"
Longbottom laughed and Draco couldn't help but smile too.
"Don't worry, my standards are pretty low at the moment" said Longbottom still smiling, but then he sobered up a bit "But this fight is bigger than us, so no matter what I have your back, our differences we can solve another time"
Draco nodded at the boy not really knowing what to say to that and turned to Boot.
"I will leave the bottles with Pomfrey"
The boy nodded and with a last look at the group, Draco left the room.
Still, despite Longbottom's nice words, Draco did spend a few days worrying about what would happen, but nothing changed for him, in less than a week Bulstrode was gone and everything went back to the way it was. Sometimes someone would look at him curious or puzzled, but he just ignored all of them, his medical services already gave him the fame of "soft", so the little attention from them was not noticed as anything special.
Pansy got him the salamander blood without asking him about it, but he could feel in her eyes that she knew he was up to something and she disapproved of it. She started to walk with him a lot more and hold his arm whenever Carrow was around, as if she didn't trust him to stay put while the man beat up one of the students. But despite her angry look and her fierce attitude, he could see in the uncertainty of her eyes that she was only pretending, that she was holding him in fear.
"I don't want to make you cry" he whispered to her eventually.
"Then stop breaking my heart"
Draco wished from deep into his heart that he could do it, but he knew by now that his promises would be all empty and that he was fated to break the hearts of the women in his life.
It was a few weeks later that something unusual happened and he received a letter, there was only his name on the envelope and a little curse to burn the thing if another person opened, a curse tied to blood, like a family member. Suspecting what he would find, Draco didn't open the envelope until he was shut in his bed.
Inside there was no letter, but a magical picture of his cousin and Lupin with a baby between them, the little hair he had as well as his eyes kept changing color and both parents smiled and Lupin bent down to kiss him before the loop started again. At the back there was just a name and a date.
Edward (Teddy) Remus Lupin
April 22, 1998
He was both happy and worried for his cousin, but more than anything he was touched she sent the picture and he spent quite a bit of time just staring at it, at the happiness of a new beginning. No matter how wrong it was on the eyes of his family and friends, that little life was something worth fighting for and he would do his best to make sure Teddy Lupin could grow up and live a happy life.