In Diagon Alley, admittedly, there was a plethora of curious characters. For evidence, you only needed to step into Flourish and Blotts whilst Gilderoy Lockhart buddied up with Harry Potter for the wizarding press a few years ago-for more, a simple turn of the corner should do the trick.

And at this turn of the corner, I did find a most curious and mysterious character. And I was shocked at this stranger. A strange occurrence for me-I was only generally shocked when Harry Potter and the like were put down by an authoritative figure, which didn't happen nearly enough, and perhaps when Crabbe or Goyle said something vaguely intelligent or useful. And I practically lived in Hell itself, and constantly walked the street of Knockturn Alley, and had even visited Azkaban with my father one year, when he found it paramount to talk to one of his friends of years past. So, I was pretty desensitized and shockproof by now. I thought.

But simply one viewing of the being before me, and my shock knew no bounds. It wasn't a bad type of shock, such as when you realize that one of your professors has found it convenient to transfigure you into a.a ferret.No.it was the type of shock that everyone dreams for, something like the shock of when you think that you're walking into jail and the moment you step in the door are ravished by an enormous group of naked, beautiful lesbians. Most unfortunately, I haven't lived the scenario, but I had just lived the shock.

Stepping out of Flourish and Blotts, was Gabrien.

My soul hurt insanely. I longed to run up to her like the child I was when I knew her, and kiss her feet. I only wanted to feel the compassion emanate from her that I had become so familiar with when I was.a victim.

And I couldn't. The shock that might have held joy now caused me to want to run away. I didn't want her to see the new "me", so different from the needy boy she had known.

Because now I was Draco Malfoy, the cold, distant, cruel adolescent who ruled the fifth year Slytherins and who played as the highly dangerous Slytherin house Seeker for Quidditch. I wasn't the miserable wretch that I had been when I knew her. She would see through my façade, and bring me back to my misery in the cold stare that she reserved for when she knew that you were fooling yourself and the world. I didn't want it. My soul aching, I quickly swept towards her, hoping that she wouldn't notice me trying to run past her into Flourish and Blott's. A ridiculous hope.

As I opened the door to the store, relieved that she hadn't said anything, my relief was quickly wiped away as I heard her grave voice behind me.

"Draco, it was so very kind of you to say hello to your old angel," she said.

I could feel myself turning to face her, ever so slowly, ever so painfully.

"Look at me, Draco," she said, amused at my discomfort. "I'm not asking you to commit suicide, you know."

I felt a thousand knives stabbing at me as my faltering gaze finally reached the stare of her strong blue eyes. I looked away.seeing her was far too painful, especially seeing her see me. She looked exactly the same, one of those sweet benefits of immortality, and she felt exactly the same. By feeling I mean her aura-it was so strong that you could sense her from far away.

Which is why I didn't understand why I hadn't felt her near me. I had been oblivious as to her existence. It confused me, it saddened me.and with my confusion and sadness my anger rose, like a demon pushing at me incessantly, threatening to possess.

I felt cold, thin fingers soft beneath my chin, lifting my head to meet that of hers. Her complexion was rosy, her unusual white hair in a short white bob, her youthful face serious.

Her eyes narrowed as I quailed, the edge of her thin lips curled.

"Whatever happened to my Drakon?" she whispered quietly, probing my mind with an intensity that I almost cried out in horror. I didn't want her to know me, I didn't want anyone to know me. But I did.hadn't she always been my pillar when.when.

I pulled back, my eyes blazing, I could tell.

"I don't want to see you, look at you. Nothing happened to me. I grew up. I've learned things. I don't want nor need you any more. Leave me. I no longer call for your intervention nor your protection."

An obvious sadness crossed her face in a flash.I felt a slight jab of guilt for wounding my angel who had always been there to heal the pain of my.family life.

And as quickly as the sadness crossed her face, a rage replaced it, and I could have sworn that I saw flames in her blue eyes.

"You would leave me. My very memory, You like being victimized by your father? Should I detail you as to the predicament in which I first found you? Or have you erased it from your memory, as you are trying to do to me?"

I tried to keep my eyes cold and steady, but felt myself on the verge of tears.

Her eyes flashed; I flinched.

She opened her mouth as if to speak, and then paused, taking a moment to plot out her next words so that they would bite most.

"Let us go back about, say ten years, Drakon," she said, once again pausing. I could feel a guilt pressing into my soul.that it didn't burst in pain and sadness was a blessing in itself. Her name for me, the name that she had once explained was the Grecian version of my name, was slowly ripping away the mask that I so often wore.

"Ten years ago, I traveled this earth, miserable that I was bound to the fate of helping others and redeeming myself. I was bound to the planet, its people, and their fates in my hope for death.

"As I traveled, resentful and lonely, Drakon, I heard the crying of a young boy. His weeping was wrenching my heart, and his plaintive cries for his mother were so piteous that I changed my attitude immensely and searched for this poor, distraught boy, I worried that he was dying, perhaps, or worse, still living and still seeming as though he would be forced to live through whatever horrors were now plaguing him.

"I found you, Drakon. I found you.

"And what was so wrong with you, my Drakon?"

My gaze dropped to the floor.

"My father."

I could not say more. I would collapse in tears and hug close to my angel of not so long ago, which was anything but fitting behavior for the cruelest boy in the Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry. I was, after all, still in Diagon Alley-who knew who would see me? Who had already seen this exchange??? Guiltily, I wished that Gabrien would leave me, and perhaps bump into me when I was alone, when it might be acceptable to be vulnerable.

Gabrien, I could tell, was forcing herself to give me a sympathetic smile. The stress displayed on her face was insane-she was so obviously fighting with her side that pressed her to humiliate me, make me realize how much I had needed her before, and could still need her. The other side, that which knew my pain and cared for my comfort.or obvious lack thereof.was winning out though.

Gabrien's ice blue eyes pierced my cold gray eyes, which I could feel tearing at the intensity of her gaze and the intensity of the memories that seeing her had conjured up-the memories that I had so longed to forget.

"Drakon, I will be seeing you again this year," Gabrien said, with a weak smile, "I'm afraid that you may want me more than you ever did before, even if you don't realize it. But I am going to be at your school this year, and I will see you."

I must admit that I was completely shocked.

"Will you be there with me?" I could hear the plaintive pleading underlying the question that I had struggled to keep flat.

Gabrien laughed lightly; I was crushed.

"I'm not going to be there with you, Drakon. You aren't the only that I've helped, that I'm helping, you know. I have a new charge."

I could feel jealousy running green through my veins, and for a moment flashed on the fact that only an hour before I had been running amok through Diagon Alley with Crabbe and Goyle, completely devoid of any reason for any jealousy. And now, with a stroke of the impossible, I was with Gabrien, and jealous of her new charge.

I couldn't get over how impossible this entire scenario was. And had Gabrien said that she would be at Hogwarts this year? My confusion and disbelief was overwhelming,

"I'm losing you, Draco," Gabrien said sharply. In fact, as she said it, I could feel myself being pulled towards something. "Draco.Drakon.I do believe in you. I'll be seeing you at school, my Drakon. Tread lightly."

Suddenly, I awoke, my hair close to my scalp with sweat, I was in my room at the Manor, surrounded by all of the hideous memories that my Dream Gabrien had conjured up, one hand outstretched, reaching for my dream and a return to it, the other straying towards my phallus in an erotic gesture that only Gabrien could have brought on.