Prologue
Harry Potter sighed happily as he strung up this year's lot of birthday cards in his bedroom at 4 Privet Drive. He'd received presents from numerous people, including (most surprisingly) the Dursleys. They'd presented him with a small handkerchief – granted, it was stained all sorts of colours after Dudley had used it to mop up the remains of his disastrous picture-painting craze – but it was still kind of them. Harry was contemplating how grand it was to be fifteen – wow! Even the number sounded mature. He was about to turn in for the night, when a bedraggled eagle owl swooped in through the open window, dropped a sodden piece of parchment onto his bed, and flew out again. Harry picked up the letter, unfolded it, and proceeded to read.
July 31st 1995
Dear Harry Potter,
I know that receiving a letter from me must be the last thing you ever expected, and I wouldn't write to you either except for the fact that I am ignoring my natural pride – because I need help and you are the only person in a position to do so.
I wouldn't be at all surprised if you tore up this letter and burnt it to ashes and scattered the ashes on the wind – because you hate me. But then again, I haven't told you who I am yet.
((Harry had kinda figured out who it could be at this point – well, let's just say it wasn't exactly Neville…))
I'm really begging for your help, and I don't beg, but I am now, and Potter you gotta help me, 'cause you're a good guy and good guys do idiotic things like risking their lives to dig their most hated enemy out of a hole that isn't really your problem, Potter, and I have a bad feeling that you've figured out who I am and the letter will be keeping you warm in your fireplace but I really don't care anymore, I'm in deep shit and if you don't help me then I'm gonna end up in azkaban with the dementors feeding on my soul even though I'm not sure I have a soul anymore, Lord Fucking Voldemort's seen to that.
Okay here's what happened. I showed up at home with hex marks all over me, no thanks to SOMEONE and I don't even know why I'm reminding you of this, 'cause then you'll hate me all the more and even before I wrote this letter my chances of aid from you were slim to none. Now I figure they'll be none to minus ten. And anyway, my father doesn't even look twice at me. He doesn't fucking care, and you don't know how it feels Potter because you have no fucking parents, and alright so my parents aren't exactly loving at the best of times, but if someone attacked me they'd definitely react but this time he didn't. He just told me to follow him and I did, and we went down to this place I'd never seen before, and who was there but Voldemort and some sniveling bald guy and a big snake.
Don't get me wrong, Potter, I was shit scared, and Voldemort called me to him and asked me if I wanted to become a death eater, in as many words. And I wanted to say yes – I mean it's a great honour, to be chosen so young, and I'm still 14, and I opened my mouth to say yes, but what came out was no.
There was this silence and I was yelling inside my head what the fuck did you say that for?? And he asked me again and this time I thought I was gonna say yes but what I actually did was tell him to go fuck himself.
I don't know what the fuck got into me Potter, I think I'm going mad or something but anyways I ran outside, 'cause the look in his eyes said like he was gonna kill me very very slowly and I'm not as brave as you, Potter – I cant understand why I admitted that – and I jumped on my broom and took off heading for hogwarts 'cause I knew he couldn't follow me there.
So here I am camping in the forbidden forest and it's not something I would advise, Potter. I don't know what you're gonna do or even if you're gonna do anything – for all I know this letter might be roasting marshmallows by now – but a really decent thing you could do is to come down here and kill me yourself 'cause if Voldemort finds me I'll probably take a year to die.
Oh yeah – happy birthday.
Yours sincerely,
I'm really begging here Potter,
I'd really appreciate if -
Ah, fuck it
Draco Malfoy
Harry paused when he got to the end, staring in disbelief at the scrawled signature at the bottom. He didn't know what to make of it. Finally, he propped the letter (now dry) onto the shelf beside the others (after all, Malfoy had wished him a happy birthday, had he not?). He'd figure it out in the morning.