TW: Death of a side character, psychological torture, derogatory comments about sex work.

Chapter 2: And Let This Feeble Body Fail

Hermione Granger. Fucking rebellious little cunt of a Mudblood. She hadn't changed one bit. Still, she wore the stubborn air of superiority about her though she'd been reduced to little more than the filthy Muggles she was spawned from. Always so proud, so daring.

She disgusted him.

And now Draco would be forced to show her exactly where her kind stood in the Dark Lord's world. He'd have her tied to a stake before the end of the week, the ash of her flesh billowing in a cloud of degradation.

He blew air through his lips, keeping a cool disposition despite the malice that burned through the tips of his fingers. It wouldn't do to let her see how she affected him—the predator never weakened in the face of its prey. "Into the Grotto, Weasley. I need to retrieve a special little concoction for our guest of honour before I meet you down there."

He watched as the oaf gave a single nod and detoured away from the front of the castle. Weasley pushed Granger along, her steps measured with fear. Draco unsheathed the dagger from his boot. The engraved moniker, To the Vigilant Comes Glory, gleamed by light of the moon as he pricked his finger, spilling a single drop of blood before the silver nitrate coating cauterized his skin.

The door swung open, and he was greeted by the stench of unclean bodies and necrosis, made worse by the stale air. The scent marked what his life had become. His every moment was brimming with the horrors of his own doing. The Devil's arithmetic—four prisoners in, two discarded like waste once he'd finished with them—was a delicate and precarious balancing of numbers that kept his mind occupied and animated him. Voldemort's favorite marionette. The enveloping despair in the atmosphere ached through his bones and rattled his teeth.

Without a word, the lanterns along the corridor sprang to life, the flames licking impossibly high in the wake of his anger. Cells lined either side, the occupants within little more than skin and bone. He cared none for their suffering, though he winced as he heard Parkinson's shrill laugh echoing against the stone.

Her methods were questionable at best, preferring starvation and forced gluttony in alternating cycles to drawing blood. She found starvation to be an effective motivator to draw forth the information she needed. No doubt she was playing with her food before she ate it. The thrill she was gifted in taking lives and inflicting torture made his stomach roil.

Arriving at a makeshift door of iron and infused bone, Draco entered in silence. Ever The Healer, Nott kept his laboratory well stocked with various instruments and potions used in his interrogations. He played with biological materials, and in his brilliance, concocted diseases and resurrected plagues known only in lore. Draco made a mental note to request a sample of Nott's handiwork for the second round of Granger's questioning.

The lab was normally pristine in Nott's departure, so the rivulets of blood that ran toward the drain in the floor, dripping from the trolley bed were a queer sight. Draco made his way through the lab, running his fingers along the vials of swirling cocktails, towards the door of his own interrogation room.

Draco crossed the room and tapped the glass door to his apothecary cabinet. His eyes skimmed over each vial in turn as he mentally compared the merits of the contents. He landed on a bottle with a thin saffron-coloured liquid within, plucked it from its resting place, and slipped it into his pocket.

Undoing his buttons from their holes, he worked his jaw. He would punish the grotesque bitch for spitting on him. His robes set aside, he took a deep breath to steady the fury coursing through him. He strode from the interrogation area and down the corridors toward a set of stone stairs carved into the furthest passage.

"Please… help," a feeble voice implored from a cell on his left. "I'm dying, please."

Without stopping his stride, Draco ground his teeth and from under his breath muttered, "Avada Kedavra."

The poor sod was better off dead than subjected to Pansy or, worse, Bellatrix. The light of the lanterns lining the Grotto glimmered emerald as he approached the stairs. Descending, he stopped and listened to Weasley reprimand her for putting her life in danger. Draco would never have thought any member of the Weasley family could have it in them to turn against the precious Mudblood, but as he rounded the corner, Weasley shook his head at her stupidity, clutching her arm as he shook her. "I can't save you now, Hermione."

"Underling Weasley!" Draco called, and the soldier straightened his back to stand at attention. "Why is Granger not shackled yet?"

He didn't answer but grabbed Granger around the waist and tossed her over his shoulder. She was already growing weaker from malnourishment and her struggling. Draco watched as his Underling placed Granger on the rugged surface of a nearby stone. A place to pinion her into submission, two sets of rusted shackles protruded from it. Weasley grappled with her some more, attempting to restrain her arms first before he wisened up and drew his wand.

Relishing the way the metal gave a sharp clink as it wove into place and confined her, Draco slid the potion from his pocket. "Weasley, get the fuck out. Retrieve Grand Executor Zabini."

The Underling had been straddling Granger as he fought her limbs and was breathing heavily now that he was at less of a risk. She begged beneath the weight of him, pleading with him to just kill her. Weasley leaned back over her knees, huffing and out of breath before he rose slowly. Draco grew agitated with his indolence and flicked his wand at the imbecile. "Flipendo!"

Weasley flipped up through the air and flew back, crashing against the stone. "Next time I tell you to get the fuck out, see that you do so posthaste," Draco admonished, rolling up the sleeves of his oxford as he stepped over Weasley's crumpled body.

He turned to Granger, stretched out and wrestling against her confines. A frown widened across his face, the prospect of her suffering causing his heart to skip a beat. Odd. Draco brought his hand to his face and pinched his bottom lip, unable to mask the unwelcome sensation. "Look at you—Queen of the Mudbloods, lying on your throne of insurgency. Tell me, how did your little act of rebellion fare?"

Draco drifted in her direction, sizing her up as he kept enough of a distance to give her hope. As though he would go through all of this trouble just to use a mere Cruciatus on her. She glared at him, refusing to acknowledge defeat though he could see fear in her eyes. As he approached, he held the potion between two fingers. "Do you know what this is?"

He wiggled it before her face as she scrunched her eyes and tried to kick her legs to no avail. "Get away from me!"

His hand reached out to clasp her jaw between gripping fingers. "This is the second time I have asked a question and received no answer in return. I asked, do you know what this is?" he hissed. "Don't make me pry your eyes open."

Granger opened her eyes, glassy with tears, and looked at the yellow liquid. Draco could see her calculating every possibility in her mental catalog. Her head slowly tipped side to side. "No."

"This is a little something of my own creation. Surely you remember the properties of both angel trumpets and larkspur?"

Terror flashed over her face as she once again began to thrash against her metal bracelets. His hatred bubbled to the surface as he ran a hand over her forehead, pushing her hair away from her face. "I see you remember our childhood lessons on poisonous plants. Not to fear, I'm not going to kill you; I'll merely make you wish for Death's sweet embrace."

"You bastard! This war will be won—by the right side—and I will make sure that you're killed first!"

Draco ground his teeth at her words, running his palm over her thigh as he climbed in a single swift movement to straddle her hips. The right side. Pathetic excuses for heroes. "Granger, I only meant that I wasn't going to kill you now. Make no mistake, only one of us will walk out of this castle on two legs. The other will be carried out by six men."

Tears formed in the corners of her eyes, fresh and filled with fury. He pulled the stopper from the potion vial and took her jaw in one hand. "Open your mouth, Mudblood."

She struggled to keep her jaw clenched, but it made no difference. All it took was a single drop on the inside of her lip. Draco watched as it slid down and trickled over her teeth before he closed her mouth and rubbed his fingers over it to quicken its effects. "Let it do its magic," he cooed viciously, summoning a candle from a nearby lantern. "Right now, I suspect there's a pain, low in your stomach as you fight the urge to vomit it all up. That is only the beginning, doll."

Her eyes—a haggard shade of fawn, at best—bored into his, defiant. Unease slid through him. Draco leaned back and flipped her onto her stomach, hiding those deadened orbs from view. His palm pressed her face into the stone, and he could feel her teeth biting into her cheek as it did. Her complexion waned as the potion worked through her, weakening her from within. Her jerking ceased and her hands balled into fists, the potion taking hold in her body. "Typically, I enjoy the fight," he chuckled darkly as he leaned over her to whisper in her ear. "But with you, I am going to enjoy the psychological damage far more."

Granger's arms slackened in the shackles and rested against the rock. "Don't touch me," she moaned, attempting to turn her head away from him and hissing as the stone scraped along her face.

"Not to worry, Mudblood, I wouldn't sully myself with the likes of you. I'm just going to have a bit of fun." With that, Draco blew out the candle, breathing its wisp of smoke into her nostrils. A sharp breath slipped from between her teeth at the pain. As he straddled her back, he felt the palpitations of her heartbeat, erratic and accelerated through the spaces in her vertebrae. "It's spreading now to your heart and lungs, starving you of oxygen while your heart sputters to keep up."

He dragged a hand over the length of her spine, mimicking the path the potion was taking. She squirmed and cried out as his second swipe neared her shoulders. "Next, your vision will begin to darken and you'll become disoriented."

Granger opened her eyes as if to test his theory. Blinking rapidly, she glanced around the room with cloudy eyes. As though caressing the skin of a lover, his fingertips glided over her eyelids. "I will rob you of your every sense before long. Just wait."

Her pupils were blown—a side effect of the potion—but she appeared to be having trouble focusing on any one thing in their surroundings. He felt her laboured breathing beneath him as she panted. Her fingers bent into tight claws at the sides of her head, twitching as her muscles succumbed.

Pleased with his work, Draco glanced over her body to her face. An absurd smile curved her lips as he leaned over her, studying her in the dim light. "Viktor! I can't skive off Charms, again!"

Hallucinations. Draco's favorite side effect of the potion. Curious that she would see that brute so many years after his death. "Tell me a little secret, Mudblood. What exactly are you going to do instead of Charms?"

"Don't make me say it aloud, Viktor. The others are listening."

With that, she let out a string of giggles that reverberated off the stone. Raising a brow to the haunting sound, Draco ran his teeth along her pulse point. Granger pitifully drew her shoulders up, trying to lessen the searing burn of his bites. "That hurts. I don't want to play this game anymore." Her voice had taken on a childlike quality, her cracked and bleeding lip turning down in a pout.

"This is only the first in a set of games," he promised, retrieving his dagger from his boot. He used the end of it to scrape along her cheek, hard enough to draw a thin line of blood.

"How did you get the sword of Gryffindor?" she inquired as a drop of blood skimmed along her skin.

Draco checked her focus once more, satisfied when her eyes continued to wander aimlessly. Her mind no doubt held secrets that would prove to be of utmost importance to the cause, but for now, he wanted to make her suffer. He wanted her to relive the worst moments of the war, starting with an example of utmost betrayal. With his fingers wrapped firmly in her nest of curls, he lifted her face from the stone. Her eyes glinted as a faraway sconce flickered and he entered her mind with brute force, knocking the wind from her lungs beneath him.

The first thing Draco notices was a tension so thick and precarious, it tasted coppery on his tongue. Potter had died at Voldemort's hand, Fred Weasley by Augustus Rookwood's, and Ginny Weasley was Bellatrix's little play thing. Even now, months later, while the Weasleys and Granger were hunkered down in a rundown lake house once owned by Gideon Prewett, Granger's heartache was nearly debilitating.

Everyone sat around the table, worry lines etched at the corners of their eyes and mouths. Molly Weasley sobbed, her face scarlet and raw from the salty tears. "My baby girl," she blubbered in a fresh round of wails and tears. The Weasley father rubbed her back, looking himself as though he hadn't slept in months.

Fred was gone, buried deep in the ground. But without Ginevra's body, there was an uncertainty that allowed their imaginations to run wild. Draco scoffed at the optimism that still swam in Granger's mind, even as her mind envisioned the most horrendous of scenarios. Still, her imagination couldn't touch the reality of what Draco himself had witnessed Bellatrix doing to the girl.

Ron Weasley rose from the table and headed outside. Granger followed, her own body aching with the sting of loss. She laced her fingers with his, and they remained silent as they walked down the pier. Draco wondered why she had once been this pathetically smitten with the oaf. He was moments from betraying her. "We'll find her," she promised, though the sentiment tasted stale even on Draco's tongue. She ran through possible search and rescue attempts in her mind, each one more dangerous and pointless than the last. The Death Eaters kept Ginevra Weasley under wraps, playing with her in the dark confines of Malfoy or Lestrange Manor.

In response, Weasley simply gave her hand a squeeze before taking his seat at the end of the pier. Draco idly wondered if he was already contemplating offering Granger for his sister. While he was a weak Death Eater at best, he did turn his back on his long time friend. "It wasn't supposed to happen this way, 'Mione." His voice broke the silence with a choke. "All because we missed that fucking snake, Voldemort lives. Even Harry was killed, and yet He still lives, walking the streets and giving speeches like a king!"

Granger had no response to his little outburst, and Draco peered around her thoughts as she began flipping through every file labeled "Horcrux." She believed that relying on Neville Longbottom had been the crux of their mistake. Draco knew it to be their arrogance and naivete.

Cracks, like the snapping of whips, reverberated through the air, and they both sprang to their feet. Wands at the ready, they watched as Death Eaters appeared from thin air, their black robes billowing behind them. Weasley ran ahead of her, shouting curses at the top of his lungs as the Death Eaters watched, glee in their eyes at the readiness of the Weasley clan to fight. And to think, Draco had missed out on all the fun.

Granger shot a Disintegration Curse at the closest masked wizard, one he easily deflected. The rest of the Weasleys had flown out of the house, screeching spells of their own. Dolohov shot a curse in Arthur's direction, blasting away part of his shoulder in much the same fashion he had once blown away a chunk of skin under Granger's ribs. She winced as she remembered the wound.

Curious. Draco never knew about the curse Dolohov had inflicted on Granger.

Arthur dropped to his knees and another crack echoed through the air. "ENOUGH!"

The voice bellowed, sending birds scattering. Two figures appeared. One was a battered and bloodied Ginny Weasley. "Mum!" Her cry was weak, desperate. Lucius Malfoy had her grasped tightly. Draco's body stiffened at the sight of his father, his blood turning to ice as it slithered within him. Weasley wasn't fighting, but she wasn't unconscious either. Everybody in the clearing stopped moving, all turning to stare in the senior Malfoy's direction.

He moved to lift his mask, pushing it back on top of his head. His smirk was sinister as the Weasley matriarch tried to run toward her daughter. Four other soldiers moved forward, all pointing their wands at her. Molly attempted to hit the one closest to her until she was bound tightly by another. She dropped to her knees in front of Malfoy, her back stiff from the bindings. "Stupid woman. I'm here to offer you your daughter's life, and this is how you repay me?"

"Ginny!" the dragon taming Weasley screamed, though he was held into place by two burly wizards.

"What do you want? You've had her long enough!" Arthur howled, his wand raised and aimed at each Death Eater in turn. "We have nothing to offer you. You know this."

"You Muggle-loving imbecile. We're here for the girl."

Ron looked back at Granger, stepping in front of her as a feeble attempt at protection. Draco felt pure, unrestrained terror course through Granger in that moment. His father barked a laugh, and a few others joined him with rattling chuckles of their own. They'd gained the knowledge of the lake house from Ginny, but Draco knew they wanted all the knowledge Granger held. She was on the verge of begging Ron to just Obliviate her and let her go when the Weasley girl let out a piercing shriek.

Lucius had raised his wand to her neck, a small, makeshift bayonet at the end drawing a bloom of vermilion blood. "The girl!" he snarled, drawing the blade a little further through her flesh.

"Take her!" a voice rang clearly through the stillness of the lake shore. All heads turned in Molly's direction. "Just take her and leave my girl."

Arthur's sharp gasp was followed by, "Molly!"

Ron then put his hands out at either side, backing into Granger to try and shield her completely. "Mum, think about what you're saying!"

"I'm sick of living like this! I've already lost one of my children. I can't bear to lose another—can't you see this?" his mother shouted tearfully, eyeing Granger with something between pity and apology.

Lucius lifted his chin, looking down at the matron. "Finally. A Weasley with some common sense. Do as she says, boy, and I'll spare your life. And your sister's."

Ginny wept, her entire body shaking with the force of it. Granger could see that she had been through hell and had no desire to return. Blood, crusted in black streaks, ran from her ears, nose, between her thighs. Her eye was nearly swollen shut and her hair hung in ragged clumps, cut carelessly with the blade of a dagger. "Ron...please."

"Step aside, boy. Or I'll kill her slowly and make you watch," Lucius warned, jerking Ginny's head back with a handful of hair. Draco curled his lip in disgust as he stared at his father through the filtered lens of Granger's mind. The hatred Granger felt for lucius Malfoy, however, was second only to Draco's own.

There was a moment of hesitation, and Draco could practically feel the conflict raging inside Ron. He glanced at his family members, pausing at each, before he stared down at his mother. Finally, his hands dropped, and he stepped to the left, leaving her exposed. "Take her!" Lucius snapped.

Granger tried valiantly to fight off Yaxley and Rosier as they advanced on her, sending spells in their direction in an attempt to maim them. The last thing she saw was Death Eaters seizing Charlie, Percy, and Ron before disappearing with them as Lucius pulled the dagger across Ginny's throat.

A searing pain in his left ring finger made him lose focus and jetty out of Granger's head. The dagger he held to her neck, in a fashion so similar to his father's murder of Ginny Weasley, shook in his clutches. His knuckles turned white, the bottom of the blade nearly slicing his own hand. He looked and the emerald eyes of the ring's snake darkened, the snake's jaw unhinging. Impeccable timing. Barking sobs rose in Granger's throat as he backed away, unrolling his sleeves and muttering a Lumos to the sconces along the wall.

"Well, well, well. What have I stumbled upon here?" Blaise Zabini's voice echoed through the Grotto as he looked from Draco to Granger. His gaze became transfixed on her, on the heaves of her chest and the tears soaking her hair.

"Zabini. I would like you to take the Mudblood upstairs for intake processing. See to it that she is walked through the main corridor, so that she might see how she failed to save a single soul."

Zabini's eyes dropped to where Granger's hands were pinioned over her head. She mumbled some utter nonsense about a mince pie, still fully under the potion's spell. "May I make a proposition, Malfoy?"

The burning in Draco's finger was searing into his flesh, blistering the skin. He needed to get to the Estate. Something was wrong. "You want to take her to your little whorehouse, don't you? Make her your crowning jewel?"

"I think nothing would be more demeaning or fitting for such a shining example of Mudblood arrogance, than to be degraded and used by those who reign supreme."

Draco began making his way to the steps. "Yes, and it has nothing to do with the fact that you can make a profit twenty times larger than you do with any other girl. Do with her what you will."

As he took the stairs two at a time, a stone slipped into the pit of his belly and he clenched his teeth in an effort to keep from vomiting.

xXx

Never a cheery home, Eau-de-Nil Estate had taken on a mournful ambience. The flames along the walls burned low, casting solemn shadows. The corridors, usually filled with the flitting of house elves doing their daily chores or with the scampering of Scorpius's feet as he chased after a children's snitch, were empty.

Draco tried to listen for the murmuring of voices or the hushed flurry of activity that usually took place when Astoria was having one of her bad days. As he climbed the stairs, he heard nothing at all except the scrape of his footsteps. Fuck. The silence was foreboding and his sense of dread heightened with every step toward her chambers.

The door was cracked, spilling out a warm sliver of light. He pushed it open and drew his bottom lip between his teeth as he assessed the sight: Astoria lay in her bed, looking more wan and pitiful than he had seen her that morning. Her eyes and mouth were open, but it was clear to him, even from where he stood, that her gaze was unseeing.

Scorpius sat at her side, his face buried in the blankets at her hip as he cried. Narcissa stood behind him, delicately dabbing at her own eyes. Theo Nott stood in the corner, wiping his hands with his kerchief. "I'm going to call it now." He walked to the grandfather clock in the corner and tapped his wand in the middle, freezing it forever at quarter to nine. He closed the glass clock face and a pearlescent smoke began to swirl within it. When the smoke settled, her face appeared briefly before vaporizing.

Nott walked to Astoria, putting his fingers along her eyes and dragging the lids closed. "Astoria Malfoy, née Greengrass, may you cross beyond the veil. May the guardians of the afterlife rise to greet you. May you roam streets of gold, ne'er a worry or pain to plague you. May you feast with the Ancient Ones and may you keep watch over those who remain."

He ran a hand over Scorpius's hair and pressed his hand over his shoulder before stepping around him to grab his bag. Draco hadn't moved from his place by the door when Theo approached him. The two shared a look and Theo clapped a hand to Draco's shoulder as he passed. "I'll call Elphelbus. He was already on alert that they may have to retrieve and prepare her tonight."

Draco simply nodded. Though he held no love in his heart for Astoria, Draco never wished for her to meet Death in such a manner. His son still hadn't lifted his face from the bedding. He wailed now, each cry muffled. For as many magical deficiencies Scorpius presented, he gave back threefold in love for his mother. Though a boy of nearly five, he felt more deeply than most adults and had an understanding far beyond his years.

Draco met his mother's eyes and a sob tore through her chest, choked back behind a hand over her mouth. With a sigh, he pushed away from the wall and conjured a black cloth. Stepping in front of a mirror a few feet from her bed, Draco took a hard look at himself, clutching the veil in his hands. A man stared back at him, though Draco hardly recognized the wizard. The dull, dead look in his mismatched eyes frightened him, if he were honest.

Upon catching sight of Scorpius finally looking up from the bedside, he lifted the crepe cloth in his hand and draped it over the ornate mirror, covering the reflective surface. When he rounded the bed and put a hand out to touch Scorpius, the child flinched away and clutched his grandmother. Draco ignored the sting that tore through his chest and straightened himself. "Mother, why don't you take Scorpius to his chambers. Perhaps have the elves bring him some warm milk and draw him a bath?"

He was unable to meet his mother's gaze as his son clinged to her and refused to acknowledge him. Narcissa bent and lifted the small boy, nuzzling her nose into his hair as he lay his tear-streaked face on her shoulder. She carried him away, only to be stopped by Lucius in the doorway. "Why are you throwing such a fit, boy? She was about as useless to this world as a blast-ended skrewt. Breeding a Squib."

Draco crossed the room in remarkable time, his wand wedged underneath Lucius' neck before he could even contemplate his actions. His mother skirted quickly around them, grasping Scorpius to her bosom.

"If you ever speak to my son about his mother again, you'll be joining yours in the family plot."

"Is that a threat?" Lucius asked, an evil amusement flashing in his grey eyes.

"No, Father, it's a promise. You've become far too comfortable being out of Azkaban. Do you need reminding who the Master of the Estate is, then? Who the Dark Lord chose to be his right hand when you failed him so completely?"

Lucius lifted his chin away from the end of Draco's wand, though the movement reeked of indignant seething. "What is the point of raising him like a sheep for slaughter? The Dark Lord will kill him when he shows no signs of magical inclination in his eleventh year."

"That will not be a problem. And it certainly is none of your concern, Father," Draco pushed past the elder Malfoy, bumping his shoulder forcefully with his own as he did.

"What, are you going to find some miracle cure for hereditary insufficiencies?"

"If that is what it takes," was Draco's only reply as he strode from the room.

He clenched and unclenched his fists, his wand bowing in his hand as he stalked toward the far wing of the Estate. He wanted to rage, to break, to murder. Yet Draco did none of those things as he approached his son's door. He stood outside and listened to his mother murmuring to him gently.

"It is okay to be sad over your mother, Scorpius. Never let anyone tell you how you should feel." There was a soft shuffling and their footsteps drew further away, toward the bathroom. "Come now. Get in the bath and have a good cry."

Scorpius sniffled and Draco dropped his head back against the wall. He pressed his fingertips into his eyes, creating bright stars that danced like the constellations behind his eyelids.

Fuck.

xXx

A/N: Thank you to those who have read this and those who reviewed. A special thanks to ravenslight, who is the real hero for fixing my fuck ups. She edited through right before Draco leaves Hermione.