CHAPTER 15
DRACO'S chest tightened in abject horror and disgust. The image of Pan kissing Weasley in Flourish and Blotts, that filthy disgusting blood-traitor who could hardly call himself a pureblood, had burned itself into his retinas over the weekend hotter than Fiendfyre ever could.
He wished he could gouge his own eyes out with a spoon if that would only make the horrible image stop.
Draco thought he'd do anything, just make it bloody stop. He was sitting in his and his parents' shared room in some decrepit shithole in Diagon Alley while Mother and Father were awaiting their trial in front of the Wizengamot for their crimes against the wizarding community, well, more so Father's than Mother's.
They had been escorted to the Ministry by none other than Brennan himself, the wanker, with Pansy's cousin's husband had come to collect his parents almost the moment they checked in, knowing they couldn't stay on the run forever. It was Mother who had convinced Father to come back and attest to their family's actions and pray that the Wizengamot's jury would be merciful. Draco was left alone in the room to his own devices, curled up in the furthermost corner of the room, with his elbows resting on his knees.
His legs shook violently while his pale grey eyes narrowed wistfully into the dancing flames of the fire roaring in their room's hearth, though the warmth and light did not reach Draco Malfoy's heart or soul.
If anything, the almost eighteen-year-old in another month felt cold.
Cold and alone, wallowing in his misery, though it had felt this way for the better part of a year.
Draco…Draco…why didn't you reach for me? You could have saved me… Set me free. Take me away from here… He could hear Pan, whispering things to him, but he couldn't see her.
Every fiber of the young wizard's being itched and burned, hotter than dragon flame, to go to her, yet he could not bring himself to move off the bed.
His pale, long fingers closed into shaking fists as he furiously pounded at the sides of his head, hitting against his coarse and rough white-blond hair that was in these days, in desperate need of a trim. Pan's face was everywhere. It was all he could see since he'd come home.
Her oval-shaped face was now permanently planted into his mind, stuck like a Permanent Sticking Charm, and he couldn't get rid of her, even if he wanted to.
Every time he tried to close his eyes to take a small nap in the hopes of waking up and realizing what he'd seen was just some horrible nightmare, Pan's beautiful white and wide smile would shine against Draco's eyelids. He knew he did not deserve to see her smiling at him, though it did not stop the burning rage spiraling throughout his entire body. He wanted nothing more than to take his Aunt Bellatrix's dagger and carve it right off Pan's pretty face because she wasn't smiling at him anymore.
Whenever Draco did summon up the courage to open his eyes, even here, in the desolate darkness of their room in the inn, all he could see were Pansy Parkinson's deep dark eyes, beckoning him to her side again like the succubus that she was, with just a single look. Except, now, he realized, as an abrupt bitterness seeped into his stomach, they would never look at him again, they'd always be set on George.
It made Draco want nothing more than to tear out her retinas. But Merlin, Draco could practically feel his hands running through her newly short soft dark hair now and— NO!
Draco instinctively caused a shower of red sparks to burst forth from the tip of his wand, causing the edge of the blanket on top of the cot to nearly catch fire that he stamped out with his shoe. He gritted his teeth and sharply turned his head towards the inn room's window.
He knew he shouldn't think about her anymore, but he knew that telling himself that wouldn't matter at all. Pan still even after he broke up with her, had him wound tightly around her little pinky finger, and she didn't even know it. Or maybe she did, and that's why she'd gone for Weasley in his absence.
At this rate, he wondered if showing his face to her again would get him nothing but a well-deserved slap to the face and a glower from her that would linger on the already tender wound that was his broken heart worse than salt. He frowned. Why the hell was she off with that bloody bastard Weasley that did not deserve her, and demeaning her status and herself by working in the wizard's shop, too?
Weasley couldn't handle a woman like Pansy, not as he could, and it infuriated Draco to think there was a chance that Pansy would never choose him ever again.
The ship had long since sailed for Draco to see reason, and if one were to look at him now, with the dark purple bags clinging to the skin underneath his eyes, how prominent they were becoming, his hair tousled and in need of a comb, one could argue that perhaps Draco Malfoy was not in his right mind, and maybe he wasn't. But all he could concentrate on now was Pan and the feelings she'd brought out of him since coming home. The intense arousal…the aggravation…the fury at seeing Pan snogging Weasley.
He stomped his foot on the wooden floorboards of their room and shook his head violently. Why couldn't she have waited for him? He—he was going to come back, to explain everything, why he'd left her, but she'd bloody moved on. What in the seven bloody hells did Weasley of all wizards have that he didn't?
He was poised, well dressed enough. He was intelligent, way more than Weasley could ever be, though he knew the surviving twin wasn't stupid. He was smart enough to run his shop which seemed to be doing fairly steady if not great business. He was wealthy enough. But still, Pan had chosen George.
Draco decided he couldn't take it anymore. He felt as though the walls of this decrepit hovel of a room were closing in around him, and like he might very well crawl out of his skin if he didn't leave, now. He was not going to sit in this room idly while the witch entrapped in his darkening heart as the days passed slipped through his fingertips. Not a second time. She was going to be his and his alone.
He would make Pan see that he was the only one who matched her. Not Weasley, nor anybody else.
He slowly turned his head in the direction of the inn room's door, his lips curling upward into something of a wild and feral vicious snarl.
"Pan," he growled in a low, dangerous tone.
He rose from the bed he'd been sitting on, gripping onto his wand tightly that his knuckles had turned bone-white with the effort. He was going to take care of Weasley.
Then, he would make Pan listen to him and have the pretty witch all to himself once again.
Draco licked at his lips as he grabbed his jacket and left the inn without looking back. If Mother and Father were to return and he wasn't here, then so be it, though they'd given him strict orders to stay put till they returned, he could not—would not—let Pansy slip away. Not now, and not ever again if he could help it.
"I'm coming, Pan," he whispered. "I'll set you free from Weasley's hellish stupid shop."
Some folks would say love and absence made the heart grow fonder, but in Draco Malfoy's case, his love for Pansy Parkinson was an obsession, and it only made the wizard's heart grow darker.
He was distracted enough not to look back as he turned on his heels and made a beeline for Weasley's Wizard Wheezes, for if he would have, he would have seen former Death Eater, Rodolphus Lestrange, peering at him from behind a side alleyway, a satisfied little smirk tugging his lips upward into a smirk.
DRACO took the streets of Diagon Alley at a full-on-sprint, a singular young wizard with a singular purpose. Any passerby who looked at him as they viewed him thought the boy mad.
Perhaps they were right. It was true, he was mad, he was nearly out of his mind that Pan could have chosen Weasley. His love for Pansy had created a sense of a crazed urgency within him.
He was desperate to find Pan, to just talk to her. To make the witch listen to his reasons why he'd left. And if she didn't want to listen, then, there was always the Imperius Curse, or Petrificus Totalus to ensure she wasn't bloody going anywhere without hearing him out.
He didn't want to curse Pan, but he would if she left him with no other alternative.
Simply covering the distance between himself and Weasley's joke shop had been the extent of Draco's plan. He didn't even know what he would bloody say to her once he was finally in the witch's presence, after nearly three weeks of being away from her, wanting nothing more than to Disapparate from his parents' presence, to find her, to talk to her and explain himself, but knowing he couldn't.
He didn't give a shite if he seemed a nutter, or absurd. Everything he had to say to Pansy Parkinson, and the determination that this time, he wasn't going to be stopped for anything as they weren't in the middle of a fucking war, were the only two things of which Draco was aware of.
With no memory of the path he'd just run, he burst into the front door of Weasley's Wizard Wheezes and was nearly blinded by a vast array of almost insulting colorful products on the walls.
He shouted her name. "Pan!" Draco roared, his desperate scream echoing off the walls of the shop.
There was no one at the front of the shop, at least not that he could see, and he felt his heart swell with hope at the sound of a pair of footsteps that could only belong to a witch.
They were light, too featherlight to belong to that of a wizard.
"Excuse me, sir, can I help you?" came a witch's voice, soft, mystical sounding, polite, and jovial, though as Draco whirled around on his heels to face the newcomer, his heart sank to the pit of his stomach.
The person who now stood opposite him was not the person who he'd hoped for. A petite witch of average height stood in front of him, holding what looked to be a box of Skiving Snackboxes.
Draco could remember the twins selling them throughout the school, the Nosebleed Nougat ones were especially popular, alongside the Puking Pastilles, though Draco hadn't cared for them.
The witch gingerly set the box down on the front counter and took a cautious step forward.
She wasn't dressed in any staff robes that Draco could see, though she carried herself with an air of confidence and assurance, Draco was sure that the witch was Weasley's employee.
She was a vision of loveliness with her cropped golden blonde hair making her skin shine like freshly poured milk.
He almost thought for a moment that perhaps the stunning creature that seemed close to his and Pan's age had Veela blood coursing through her veins, but then just realized she took good care of herself.
Her makeup was light and natural, though she didn't need much of it to highlight her pretty features. The witch's sky-blue eyes met his, and Draco felt his heart falter over its beat. He watched as she let go of the box of Snackboxes she had been unpacking when he'd made his less than a subtle entrance.
"Sorry, give me just one moment, and then I can better help you, this box is a lot heavier than it looks," she murmured in an apologetic tone, turning away for a moment, and letting Draco get a good look at the young pretty witch's elongated neck. Her profile was astounding as she fidgeted with the last bit of packing tape on the boxes' lids. The way her earlobes seemed to flow into the angles of her jawline.
The cute blonde witch with the delicate, almost elfin-like features shot Draco another glance out of the corner of her gaze, and his cheeks flushed. Embarrassed at having been caught staring at her, he sharply turned his head away, though not before he caught her quirking a thin blonde eyebrow at him.
When Draco looked away a little too quickly, she shrugged her shoulders and brushed her hands on the front of her dark blue flowing peasant blouse, and then brushed her hands on the seat of her jeans.
She was a real credit to those jeans, everything a wizard could want in a witch like her.
You'd be lucky to find one just like her in ten thousand lifetimes.
"Okay then, I guess you don't seem to need any help," she mumbled shyly in a soft voice that reminded him of melted butter on freshly baked bread, her bright blue eyes taking on a twinkling sheen that Draco suddenly wished was meant for him and him alone. "If you change your mind and need help with anything, just shout or send up some red sparks with your wand. I'm easy to find. My name's Verity."
She made to turn on her heels to go, though before she could, he wanted in his mind more time to linger. But he also remembered why he had come here and was brought back to himself somewhat.
"I-I was hoping to speak to Pan—er, I mean, Pansy, I….heard that she works here now, is she in yet? I'm her…her boyfriend, could you tell her I'm here?" he blurted out, grimacing as the words were ripped from his lips before his mind even knew what he was saying. He bit down on his bottom lip and waited.
The witch whose name he now knew was Verity froze in her tracks.
He watched as her shoulders squared and her posture suddenly became tense and rigid.
The blonde slowly turned around and fidgeted with a long black raven necklace she wore around her neck, chewing on her lip and suddenly looking increasingly uncomfortable as her blue eyes looked to the right and left, as though she were searching for something, or rather, someone.
His suspicions were confirmed the moment Verity opened her mouth.
"Charlie," she called out in a nervous voice, causing an overwhelming ache to flare to life within Draco.
His heart sank to the bottom of his stomach as he watched George's older brother, Charlie, admittedly one of the cooler ones alongside the oldest, Bill, round the corner.
Charlie Weasley was an inch or two taller than Draco, stockier, and had way more muscular, all muscle underneath his simple black sweater. Charlie Weasley was a handsome chap, right on up there with Bill in terms of his good looks, a shocker for the Weasley crew, if Draco was being honest with himself.
Stubble was growing along the red-haired wizard's angular jawline, his hair a thick mop of red fiery curls. The sleeves of his simple sweater were rolled up, revealing Merlin only knew how many burn marks and what looked like dragon claw scratches he'd gotten.
He'd always known Charlie was an animal enthusiast, but he'd never imagined it was this much. Draco's face paled as the previously calm expression on Charlie Weasley's face soured and he crinkled his nose, looking as though Draco were no better than an ant he'd just stepped on with his faux dragonhide boot.
Nevertheless, though his voice was slightly cold, he tried his best to maintain a calm expression as his concerned brown eyes flicked towards Verity, who, it didn't escape Draco's attention, he eyed with affection.
"What's wrong, Ver?" he asked, causing Draco's heart to sink to his stomach as the taller wizard came over and clamped a rough and calloused hand on the blonde's shoulder, squeezing the bony appendage, suggesting to Draco that they were close. "Is this ferrety little git bothering you? I can have him removed if he is," he barked roughly, narrowing his eyes until they were nothing but mere slits.
Verity pursed her lips thoughtfully as she looked towards Charlie, her expression softening somewhat as she kept her gaze fixated on the tall wizard's concerned stare for a moment, her eyes drifting down to rest on the man's large hand resting on her shoulder. She then flicked her gaze back up to Draco.
He grimaced and furrowed his brows into a frown as he thought he swore he saw a tightening of the beautiful blonde witch's jaw, an unreadable expression flitting through the young woman's bright sky blue eyes. Her irises seemed to be darkening, almost cerulean the longer the three of them lingered out here in the middle of the shop for anyone to see.
Finally, she seemed to regain control of her voice.
"No, Charlie, don't. There's no need for that, I don't think he means any of us any trouble here," she encouraged the older Weasley in a soft voice, before turning to look once more at Draco, and let out a frustrated sigh. "I'm sorry, sir. Pansy has today off. She's finishing a project for Mr. Weasley. I don't know why you want to speak to Pansy, sir, but I don't think that's a good idea. Maybe you and I should go talk somewhere in private. There's, er...something I think that you should know. Have you had lunch yet? I'm happy to sit down and talk with you over a butterbeer or something to eat," Verity offered softly.
Her suggestion nearly caused Draco to jump out of his skin in alarm at the suggestion that he be left alone with this creature whom he didn't have a shot at, as she was Charlie's now, by the look of it, by the annoyed look he gave him.
"Well, guy? Aren't you coming? I get an hour for lunch and the clock's ticking. I think you and I should talk somewhere, alone, I think I have something you're going to want to hear, and I'd rather you hear it from me instead of someone else," Verity said, an edge to the beautiful blonde's tone that hadn't been there before, as she fixed Draco with a rather pointed look. She moved around to behind the front counter and bent at the waist to fetch her purse from underneath the storage compartment where employees kept their belongings and moved out from the counter and waited for him, rather impatiently.
"It's…er… Draco, and yeah, I am, ah...thanks, I guess, for lunch, Verity, that's nice of you, " he muttered, trying to ignore the light pink blush flushing his cheeks with color or how Charlie's face turned mottled and crimson with outrage at the idea of leaving a beautiful witch-like Verity alone with Draco.
She nodded curtly and turned towards Charlie, her cool expression almost melting there on the spot, touched by the look of anger and concern he shot her. Only the gentle touch of her hand on his arm seemed to calm the taller and older wizard down somewhat and supplicate his growing annoyance.
"We'll be fine. He deserves to hear it from me, rather than anybody else, Charlie, but you're sweet to worry about me. I don't think he means me any harm, and I've got my wand," she murmured in a soft voice. "You'll watch the shop while I'm gone, then?" she asked, chuckling a bit as Charlie, while not looking happy about the idea of her having lunch with Draco, merely grunted wordlessly in response, and turned away. He headed towards the back without another word, though not before shooting Draco a withering look over his shoulder as he went to find Ron and let him know what was happening.
Draco could only stare numbly and didn't even move until he felt a slight tugging of his shirt sleeve and turned to the front. He realized that Verity wasn't waiting around for him and was taking matters into her own hands, literally, and dragging him outside.
Beginning to feel somewhat flustered and embarrassed by the trouble he seemed to be causing, Draco reluctantly allowed himself to be led out of Weasley's shop that was an assault to the senses and into the fresh air of the bustling streets of Diagon Alley. Now that the war was well and truly over for good, everybody seemed to be in a mood to celebrate. Though celebrating was the last thing he felt like doing.
Draco's feet felt like lead in his shoes as he let Verity take the lead as she led him towards the Leaky Cauldron. The two of them were lucky to get a table outside on the patio and away from the noise of clattering plates and cutlery and people talking animatedly over their meals.
Draco sat stiffly in his seat while the beautiful blonde assistant to Weasley took the opposite chair, taking a moment to get herself situated, and slung her purse strap over the back of her chair. She muttered a half-hearted thanks to Tom the barkeep when the tottering old hunchbacked wizard stopped off with glasses of iced pumpkin juice for them both and a fresh basket of fish fingers and custard.
"Thanks, Tom," she chirped happily, digging into her wallet in her bag to give him his three Galleons for her half the wizard was owed for their meal. Only when Tom went away did she turn back to Malfoy. Her lips pursed into a frown as she shoved the basket of fish fingers. "Eat something, Draco, you're skin and bones."
His eyes widened in alarm and not wanting to be rude, though not particularly hungry, he shoveled a fish finger into his mouth.
"You—you know who I am?" he managed to gasp out, nearly choking on the food as it went down.
She quirked an eyebrow and propped her elbows up on the table and rested her head in her hands, studying Draco from across the table with an odd expression on her features.
Verity almost rolled her eyes. What a question. But she refrained from doing it.
"Sure, I know you, Malfoy, I sat behind you in Potions, Herbology, and Transfiguration every day for the better part of two years until I graduated. You were a year behind me. You don't... remember me, do you?" she questioned. She flinched and took a sip of her drink. She wasn't sure why her voice held such dread.
Draco looked uneasily at her and compromised for the awkward silence that now lingered between them by taking a sip of his chilled pumpkin juice through his straw. The drink was cold and a welcome relief from the heady May heat that swept through the crowded streets of Diagon Alley, made worse by the number of bodies packed in close together as everyone fought to get to wherever they were going.
"N-no, I—I'm sorry, but I don't, Verity," he stammered by way of response as he looked uneasily towards the blonde. Shame speckled along his cheeks.
He tried to think best how to phrase what he wanted to say, and in the end, threw all caution to the wind and let his desperation get the better of his plans as he addressed Verity.
"Why are we meeting here?" he scowled, the edges of his mouth pinching and turning downward as he looked around the crowded outdoor patio of The Leaky Cauldron. "Why won't you tell me where Pan—Pansy—is?" he corrected himself, trying to remember to sound professional in front of her. If he appeared crazed, like he was beginning to feel, he knew that this pretty witch would be less likely to help him.
"I told you, she's not in today," replied Verity, a little curtly as she lifted her gaze to better look Draco in the eyes.
The beautiful blonde's gaze was severe, something Draco found to be a bit jarring, given the young witch's usually light-hearted countenance, from what he had seen of her.
She took a moment and ate another fish finger, dipping it into the small cup of custard sauce on the plate in front of them. She took her time chewing and swallowing before answering.
"Why did you come back? Why d'you want to see her?" she questioned him solemnly, sounding curious.
Draco frowned and gave the blonde a knowing look.
"Pansy, Verity. Where is she?" he eyed the witch. "You work with you, don't you, do you have her address, then?"
Verity frowned, looking annoyed at Draco's intrusion.
"You should have stayed away," she finally declared, annoyance flaring to life behind her sparkling blue eyes.
Draco's desperation got the better of his plans and he revealed the nature of his visit to Weasley's shop sooner than he'd expected.
"Please, Verity," he begged, he, a wizard who was unused to begging for anything, now begged the beautiful blonde coworker of Pansy's. "I—I know that I have no right to believe that Pan would see me after…everything, but I was hoping I could speak to her."
Verity sighed in frustration, raking a slender hand through her short blonde hair in agitation and tiredly closing her eyes.
"You're the last person she needs to see right now," she answered in a clipped tone, her voice sounding cold.
Though when she opened her eyes, her expression softened somewhat at the stricken look in the younger wizard's pale grey eyes. She knew this was the real reason he'd come back, and now, she was going to have to be the one who would be the bearer of bad news.
That, over the largest butterbeer The Three Broomsticks had to offer, on Sunday night, she'd gotten Pansy to spill all the details and revealed to her new friend that she and George were dating.
Their date had gone so well, he'd asked her by the end of the night and Pansy hadn't hesitated to say yes, for her part. Pansy now was someone else's girlfriend.
An expression akin to pity flitted across the blonde's face as she shoved aside their now-empty basket and her drink, now full. She forced herself to say the words she'd been trying to avoid.
"Draco…." Her blue eyes fell with regret as she shook her head. "I know this is going to be tough for you to hear, but…Pan, is, er…well…sort of…with George now. Together," she emphasized, her voice trembling.
Draco reeled back into his chair, looking as though Verity had hit him square in the chest with a well-aimed Flipendo Knockback Jinx.
All his hopes were now crumbling to dust. In an instant, Verity watched with dread forming in the pit of her stomach as Draco Malfoy's pallid face turned sour, his grey eyes darkening to rage-filled slits.
"Seriously?" he spat, disgusted, remembering all too well the kiss he'd accidentally witnessed through the window of Flourish and Blotts, hoping that his mind was merely playing a sport of his vision on him.
"Yes," Verity answered in a clipped but guarded tone. Her stance was stiff as if she knew that Draco was on the brink of imploding in fury. "Mr. Weasley gave Pansy a job when her roommate left her high and dry on her own. She had nowhere else to go with…with her parents dead, and I guess time brought them together. She's his girlfriend, Draco," she told the crestfallen blond wizard, albeit remorsefully so.
"Don't call her that!" Draco snarled viciously, his eyes now burning with rage as his hand curled tightly around his glass of pumpkin juice hard enough that she heard the glass start to crack.
Hastily, he let go of his cup and shoved it aside just then. She quirked a brow at him.
"But that's what she is, Draco," she pointed out, her words clumsy and blunt as she took a sip of her drink through her straw, studying his angered and flushed expression over the rim of her cup in a curious manner.
Draco shook his head, not willing to believe his hearing. "No!" he began to shout, ignoring the way a couple of customers seated at the tables behind them turned to glare at him for his unexpected outburst. "No, that's wrong! It's all wrong! She loves me, witch, I'm the one she should be with!"
Verity remained unfazed by the younger wizard's outburst, her quiet understanding quickly giving way to shocked disbelief at how the nearly eighteen-year-old was behaving like a child throwing a temper tantrum because he didn't get his way. She was sure she'd never seen such appalling behavior.
"But you gave up that right," she clumsily reminded him. "Pan told me how you left her the night of the Battle," she said. "She gets this look in her eyes whenever she talks about it, she loved you, Draco," she tried to supplicate him. "I'm sure of it. She respected you, trusted you, saw some goodness in you."
"How?" Draco demanded. "She—she couldn't stand the lot of them when we were all in school together," he growled. He was confident there was some other reason, other than Pansy Parkinson's own heart, that would have caused his witch to agree to date Weasley.
He couldn't begin to comprehend that Pan would have developed feelings for someone she once hated.
Verity looked taken aback by his question, but less so than she expected to be as she answered steadily.
"Time drew them close, I guess, and Mr. Weasley was kind to her, one of the first," she announced, her face unintentionally betraying her fondness for the odd but cute couple.
She would be the first to admit that George Weasley and Pansy Parkinson were cute together, but more importantly, good for one another.
"I think…" she paused, her blue eyes growing distant as if she were seeing a vision from someplace else, someplace that Draco could not follow lovely Verity. "I think that they love each other. And in time, you'll have that same happiness too, even if it won't be with whom you expect. Even if the person is right in front of you, and you can't see it for yourself. But you need to give yourself time..."
A faint smile crossed the blonde's expression despite herself.
But unfortunately, her delighted look only caused Draco's rage to incense within him further.
"What, like you?" he snapped, almost meanly, and instantly regretted his words the second they were out of his mouth. Swearing a few choice words under his breath, he flinched at the look of antagonizing hurt now brimming in the beautiful blonde's blue eyes, and it was there again that he caught the faraway sheen in her eyes, as though she were seeing something else entirely and was far away from The Leaky Cauldron. Her odd expression of this strange, faraway, mystical look now frightened him.
It was as if she knew something about himself. Something that he had yet to discover, and his fear manifested itself in the form of his mouth that sometimes got him in trouble.
"What is it?" he stammered, his tongue suddenly feeling heavy and useless in his mouth. "Are you a—" he blurted out as the thought came to his mind, but before he could say another word, Verity interrupted.
"A Seer?" she questioned, a knowing little smirk tugging the corners of her mouth upward.
Only when he nodded, looking uncomfortable, did she continue. She nodded, almost eagerly.
"You caught me," she grinned, a bit of rake in her smile. "My mum was one. I inherited the gift from her. I can see the future of everyone around me that I'm nearby, but I wish I could turn it off most of the time if I'm being honest. It's not that much fun if I know. I'd rather…figure my life out along the way, the fun way, and surprise myself every once in a while instead of knowing it all, it takes the fun out of something that I already know is going to happen. Just like I saw you coming to the shop today. Just like I saw me taking you to lunch. Like you'll bolt out of here before you can pay your half of the bill. Like you're not going to get to talk to Pansy like you were hoping to, Malfoy," she sighed, closing her eyes.
Draco gaped at the beautiful blonde, hardly daring to believe the words that were coming out of her mouth. "You—a—and me…?" He stammered, suddenly shy. Then his brows furrowed as he remembered Charlie. "But what about—" he started to ask, but again, Verity held up a hand and quickly cut him off.
"Just a summer fling. He'll go back to Romania at the end of August and since I have to stay back and take care of my Pop-Pop, whose health isn't the best, I can't go with him, though he'll ask me three times to come. But each time, I tell him no," she answered, her voice sounding suddenly shy.
She spoke again in that mystical voice laced with confidence, that Draco knew he'd be a right bloody wanker to question. But he was still having trouble believing it and asked the blonde another question.
"So then how do…?" He asked, gesturing to her with a wild wave of his arm, suddenly not sure if he wanted to know, but now couldn't stop fantasizing about it. She caught him looking and shot him a wink.
"Why on Merlin's green earth would I tell you everything about our lives, Malfoy?" she teased. "What's the fun in spoiling all of it? It's the same reason I didn't tell you what I was when you waltzed into the shop screaming for Pan at the top of your lungs. Because people treat me differently when they know what I am, always asking me to tell them their fortunes or reveal their futures, and I can't do it," she asked him, a slight teasing note to her voice now as she looked at him, though the witch's expression then became serious once more as she straightened her posture. "I know you want to ask. And no. It's not happening. Pansy is staying with George. They're together, for good. Nothing you could say to your ex-girlfriend is going to convince Pansy to change her mind."
"Why?" Draco shouted, unable to hold in his anger any longer. He slammed his hand down forcefully on the table, sending their empty basket scattering to the ground. Several customers shot them reproachful looks, but Draco and Verity both ignored them all. "I'm the one she should be with, not Weasley!"
Verity watched in abject horror as Draco Malfoy's expression transformed into that of a wizard who'd gone mad. But Draco carried on, oblivious to the pretty witch's obvious growing discomfort.
"And who the bloody hell d'you think you are, telling me that what, we'll be a thing by the fall?" he snorted, finding it difficult not to roll his eyes. "You're starkers, Verity, you're bloody insane, I don't give a damn if you are a Seer or not. Trelawney was one, and she's a half-baked tosser most of the time who only knows how to find her way around the bottom of a sherry bottle, so why should I believe anything you say?" Draco insulted angrily. "I'll find Pansy," he seethed. "When she sees me, she's not going to be able to deny I'm the one she cares about," he passionately told the stunned blonde witch. "Then she'll go with me, and Weasley will be all alone in his stupid pathetic shop," he grinned rakishly, already seeming sure of his victory.
Verity's cheeks were flushed at hearing Draco insult her soon-to-be-former job.
At least a dozen retorts to defend Mr. Weasley and his enterprise burned on the tip of her tongue, but she held them all back, knowing such horrible words she itched to spit at Malfoy, she'd be stared at for saying in public. And if that happened, she'd be banned from The Leaky Cauldron.
She would be leaving her job at Weasley's Wizard Wheezes by Friday to start her new paid internship at the Ministry of Magic in their Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures in their Beast Division. She would be working alongside the likes of Mr. Cecil Lee of the Werewolf Capture Unit and famed Magizoologist Newt Scamander.
Though she had loved every second of her three years of working for Fred and George Weasley in the shop and had gained valuable experience that had helped her land the internship at the Ministry, she would miss her coworkers. Pansy especially.
She was beginning to grow rather alarmed and flustered at the Malfoy boy's erratic behavior, though she had seen all of this unfold in a vision, just last night over tea.
There was something else around the only Malfoy heir too, darkness emanating from the boy's aura the nineteen-year-old witch couldn't pinpoint. She shook her head, her lips pursed into an unmovable line.
"She's not just going to up and leave, Malfoy," Verity remarked, confidentially as she leaned back in her chair and folded her arms across her chest. "She's got a better life now, one that she didn't have with you," she pointed out, her words cold and impersonal but also true.
"Then…then I'll take her." Draco feverishly began to create scenarios in his mind, watching them unfold in his mind's eye as though viewing them all in a Pensieve. "When she's finally away from Weasley, she'll remember how much she loves me. I know it. And you and me, sorry to disappoint you, won't happen."
Verity could only stare at Draco in disbelief. Had Malfoy lost his mind? She frowned. "I—I can personally guarantee you she's not going to let that happen. I've already seen it," she pointed out, in case Malfoy needed a solid reminder of what she was as she looked earnestly at the former Slytherin.
He scoffed and rolled his eyes. "You and your abilities," he sneered. "What makes you so sure she won't come with me of her own free will? Hmm? Let me guess. You 'saw' it." Draco snapped, confident in the feelings Pansy once nursed for him, sure that this witch, Seer or not, was wrong.
Verity huffed in exasperation as she looked across the table into her future boyfriend's eyes with a saddened frown. It killed her, to see Draco's heartache like this, knowing the trials and tribulations Malfoy still had yet to face, as his parents were set to serve one year of house arrest, confined to their manor for the better part of a year following Lucius's trial in front of the full jury of the Wizengamot, which would end at five. Their family's wealth would somewhat diminish over that single year, considering Lucius wouldn't be working, though their only son would be humbled by it. Come the beginning of September, he would be more emotionally ready for her but now was not that time.
"I did see it, since you asked," Verity sighed, a strange little wistful smile on her face that made Draco instantly want to wipe that smirk off the beautiful witch's face. But he controlled himself and let her speak. "Pansy gives George something tomorrow. Something that causes him to make up his mind about her," Verity whispered, drawing in a deep breath as the blonde witch's sky-blue eyes took on that familiar distant look, as though she were peering into a moment in Pansy's lives, infuriating Draco in the process that she could see it herself and he was left out here in the dark, only able to take the Seer at her word. "Someday in the future, they'll marry," she announced shyly, breaking the news to him softly.
Draco could only stare in silence, his dream of getting back together now shattered by this beautiful witch's words.
But before he could say anything, Verity continued talking.
"You know Pansy better than most of us do, Malfoy, George included," she said solemnly. "You don't seriously believe she'd just up and leave? You didn't even give her anything to work with that night of the Battle, you just…left her, without a word to her."
"That wasn't what I meant to do!" Draco exploded, remembering how his parents had urged him away, how they had fled the moment the fighting on all sides had intensified, people were dying left and right. "I...I was going to come back and tell Pan everything, but I...I never had the chance. We...we fled..."
Verity squinted at Malfoy, seriously, as though searching the younger wizard's pale grey eyes for something. However, the intense scrutiny he was now being subjected to under the pretty Seer's gaze all but made him squirm in his seat. The pit in Draco's stomach clawed its way up to his heart.
He wanted to be the one who would have married Pansy someday.
But he was blinded by his love for Parkinson, that he didn't give a damn how this would hurt Weasley. "If I can't make Pansy listen to me, then I'll...then…then I'll duel Weasley for her heart," he nodded, watching curiously how Verity's face instantly sagged with the enormity of his suggestion.
"You've got to be kidding me, are you...are you doing me over here, Malfoy, is this your idea of some sick joke or what is this?" the blonde witch snapped, a bark to her tone that had not been there before, and immediately sounded wrong to Draco in her shy and sweet voice. "Oh, I'm sure that's exactly what Pan wants for her new life here in London," Verity snorted sarcastically, reaching for her cup, and taking another sip of her pumpkin juice. "Listen to yourself, Malfoy, for just one second," Verity demanded. "Merlin's Beard, do you even know what it is that you're saying?" She begged him to be reasonable.
"Yes," Draco lifted his chin defiantly. "I'm going to fight for her," he declared in a surefire tone that suggested to Verity without her even having to tap into her abilities that the wizard's mind was already made up. That was his Decision Made face, she knew well, having seen visions of it in their future together, and she knew that nothing she could say would change his mind.
But still, she knew she'd be damned if she didn't try.
Pansy was her friend, and the last thing she and Mr. Weasley needed was Malfoy interfering in their lives.
"You cannot do this, just think about what you're saying!" Verity spun on Draco, desperate to try to force the younger wizard to examine his so-called 'grand' plan. "If you waltz up into Mr. Weasley's shop and just start dueling him, you'll probably wind up dead, and you might cause Pansy to get hurt as well," she tried to illustrate the worst possible outcome in the hopes of dissuading Draco from his plan, though she knew it no longer mattered what she told him. Draco still wore his Decision Face, there was no talking him down.
Draco said nothing. He simply stood there, stock-still, like a stray dog or cat caught in the headlights of the Knight Bus, blinking owlishly at the beautiful Seer.
His mouth contorted into a pained grimace, his breaths grew shallow from hate. Verity carried on.
"What did you seriously think she was going to do?" Verity quietly continued to grill her friend's ex-lover. "Did you simply hope that Pansy would just wait for you, with how you'd dumped her that day, huh?" she scoffed and frowned, remembering the hurt in Pansy's eyes when one day at lunch at the Leaky, Verity had asked after Draco, remembering how thick the two of them used to be in school before she'd graduated alongside Fred and George in their year.
She remembered seeing the hurt in her friend's eyes, how Pan had poured her heart out to her, then, how much hurt Draco's abandonment had caused her. And though she knew her, and Draco's futures together were inevitable, she also recognized he was not yet ready for her and tried to make him see sense.
Pansy was a dear friend and she hated how her future partner had treated his ex-girlfriend.
Draco was quiet for a moment. Never, as he'd thought of the moment of seeing her again and being reunited with her once he and his parents came back, had it occurred to him that Pan might not want him.
Verity let Draco have a moment before the witch's practical nature took over once more.
She breathed out a steadying breath and continued. "You made your choice when you left Pansy by the Black Lake that day," she told her future boyfriend, her expression flat.
"It was the wrong choice." Draco's eyes filled with bitter tears as he blearily looked up at Verity.
Her expression, however, remained unchanged.
"It doesn't matter. It was still your choice to make," Verity confronted Draco. "Just like Pansy's made her choice. She's with Mr. Weasley now and is becoming a part of his family now," she told her future boyfriend, raising her head and jutting her chin out with certainty. "You need to honor her choice, Draco, and let her live her life in peace," she commented dryly, her jaw clenching with determination. "You've no right to disturb her or him by…barging in on them like this. You'd only upset her by surprising her, Malfoy. Don't. Please. If you've got any decent feelings in your heart left for her, don't," Verity begged him, very quietly.
Draco sat there, silent as an owl. Verity's words pierced his heart worse than any dagger ever could.
There was a part of him that was glad Pan hadn't spent her free time mourning what they could have had, but he didn't want her life subjected to his horrors. He was sure Weasley gave her all the love and attention that he'd not been able to when he and his family were forced to go on the run and then flee.
He tried to picture Pan as a wife one day, and maybe if she was lucky, mum to a couple of kids.
He almost let himself smile at the image in his mind.
Draco could see Pansy standing tall and proud, a vision of loveliness, a simple plain silver ring glittering on her left ring finger, the witch of simple tastes that she was, shielding her family. She deserved to be happy, and Draco knew that better than anyone else. But then, Draco's mind taunted him, seeing fit to remind him that the Seer had told him that Weasley would be who Pansy Parkinson would marry someday.
It wouldn't be his kids that she would care for, for Pan wouldn't be his wife. Draco's softened expression upon imagining Pansy in the role of a wife and mum faded almost as quickly as it had come to the wizard. Darkness shrouded his pallid features as they flooded his mind.
It was Weasley with whom Pansy would build her future and share in her life, not him.
The months that Draco had spent, missing the witch's presence by his side, regretting breaking up with her, imagining winning her back, burned a hole inside him. It was a void he was sure could only be filled holding Pan in his arms again, and hell be to Verity for trying to tell him otherwise. Who was he, to believe in a Seer's words? The only Seer he'd ever met was Professor Trelawney, and the witch was a right old bat.
Draco sat at the table, his face morphing into a mask of pure onslaught and rage. His hands balled into clenched fists. He shook his head, trying to clear away the soft resignation that Pan was no longer his away from his mind.
"No!" he shouted, slamming his fists against the thick oak of the table. "No way! She—she loves me, I know it! She and I, we're meant to be," he nodded vehemently, sure of himself, pocketing his wand and slipping it into its holster he wore around his belt and backing away as Verity copied his motions.
She sighed mournfully, her shoulders slumping in defeat as she grabbed for her purse and chucked a couple more Galleons on the table to pay for Draco's half of the bill.
"Draco, please," Verity begged him, near tears. "I beg of you. Please don't do this, it's not worth it! Confronting her, you're only going to get hurt!" Her blue eyes bore deeply into Draco's as if she thought she could force Draco back to his senses that way, but already, she could tell that it was no good.
"You'll see, Verity," he vowed, shaking his head. "I will win her back." His whole body shook with conviction. "You should have your fun with Weasley, because when Pan sees me, alive and well, she'll forget all about that red-haired vicious blood traitor," Draco let himself smile at the thought. "She'll know it's me that she loves, and I'm not going to leave her again."
"Draco, don't!" Verity called as Draco turned on his heels to leave.
Draco halted, but only for a moment, as he turned to smile at the stricken pretty blonde witch before leaving her.
"Just wait, Seer," he almost taunted her and the witch's natural abilities, much to her chagrin, his mind racing two steps ahead of him. "The next time you see me, Pan will be my special girl again, and your stupid vision will have been wrong," he promised, his grey eyes taking on a twinkling, insane sheen. Draco Malfoy Disapparated from the outside patio of The Leaky Cauldron, leaving Verity unable to call for him in defeat.
Verity tiredly squeezed her eyes shut and was about to send the Patronus to the shop to Charlie or Ron, whichever would intercept her message first, warning them of Draco's intentions to interfere in Pansy's life.
Though before she could, a towering hulking shadow appeared over her, and time seemed to come to a standstill. Verity looked up and was met with the strange odd dark aura she'd seen around Malfoy during the last twenty or so minutes of their conversation.
Her fear was so powerful, that she could not even scream, and one glance to the left proved that Death Eater Rodolphus Lestrange had modified all of their memories.
The other customers' expressions were dazed and confused as the Dark wizard approached. Before she could make a move for her wand in its holster she wore on her belt around the waistband of her jeans, a rough and calloused hand shot out and grabbed Verity by the front of her shirt and wrenched her away from the outside table of the Leaky. Before she could even scream, the blonde Seer found herself nose-to-nose with Rodolphus Lestrange's listless hardened black eyes and a rather poorly concealed yellow grin.
"Hello, pretty pet," Bellatrix Lestrange's husband crooned. "At last, we meet. You're a Seer, aren't you? I've finally caught up to you. I was hoping that you and I could go somewhere a little more private to have ourselves a chat, Verity." He was speaking to her like she was a twelve-year-old child, scolding her for something that she had done wrong. "You've caused me no small measure of grief, having to make me watch you all these months. I knew you were a Seer, your daddy was only too proud to brag about his girl's abilities at the Ministry once. I've kept my eye on you ever since, sweetheart. And now look what you're making me go and do, hun, you're making me Obliviate all these people in front of you. But I can make it stop for them. You can make it stop. You're going to tell me where I can find my wife's murderer, pretty dove, you're going to give me the address of their fucking home they call the Burrow, Raywood, Luv…"
Verity did not know what possessed her to talk about to one of Lord Voldemort's former followers in such a way, but the words were ripped from her lips as a fire seed of anger flared to life like a solar flare in the pit of her now-nauseous stomach. This was the reason she'd only caught snippets of Malfoy's future, somehow. Lestrange was using whatever Dark magic he'd learned throughout his years to...suppress her.
She wasn't sure whether she wanted to laugh or cry, and settled instead for insulting the Death Eater, though it would prove to be a bold and stupid move on her part. She already knew her future injuries and braced herself for the worst of them as her jaw set in determination and she felt her blue eyes darkening.
"Piss off, pisscloak, you think I'd betray my friends like this? I'm not telling you a damn thing, so you can do whatever you're going to do to me and then go straight to hell after you're done with me," Verity snapped in a rare moment of anger, her father's inherited temper coming out as adrenaline coursed through her veins.
Though the witch was still furious at how her conversation with Draco had gone, though she'd known exactly how it would play out, she still had to make herself go through the motions.
It infuriated her that she couldn't change anything, and now, she didn't know what was happening. She couldn't see this wizard's future or hers anymore, for that matter.
Tears began to come to her eyes as she shook her head, which was the wrong thing to do.
Lestrange grabbed onto Verity's arm and twisted the appendage roughly behind her back.
The pain of her arm being twisted forced the witch to move her body around in hopes of freeing herself, and her wand dropped to the cobblestone ground and rolled under the table. She felt him push her down into the table with only one hand. His free hand entangled itself into her short blonde tresses.
"Please," she cried. "Please just...whatever you're going to do to me, just get it over with, kill me already!" she screamed, though none of the other Leaky's customers were helping her. They couldn't, as Rodolphus Lestrange was somehow collectively modifying their memories all at once. No one would remember this.
"Shhh, you be quiet now, little dove," Lestrange shushed Verity softly and gently dragged his fingertips over her cheekbone in a surprisingly intimate way that made the beautiful blonde shudder violently.
She did not have time to register the pain that engulfed her as he yanked her hair, pulling her head back. In one swift movement, he shoved her head back towards the table, and her forehead slammed onto the hard wooden surface with a sickeningly loud thud that was sure to leave a nasty bruise and hurt like hell.
Verity saw spots blurring her vision and a tiny little cry left her lips. "Shush," he said again, and her head was yanked back again, and her head slammed down a second time, this time, with much more force.
This time, Verity felt no pain and heard no thud and saw only black. The young witch was already completely unconscious when Death Eater Rodolphus Lestrange carried his new prized possession in his arms, bridal style, and Disapparated from The Leaky Cauldron's outside patio area, and as he did, none of the Leaky's customers whose minds he had just Obliviated paid any attention.
No one was witness to the kidnapping of the nineteen-year-old witch and Seer Verity Raywood.
The only evidence that she had ever been there in the first place was her bag that no one paid attention to.