To Dream of Reality
Disclaimer: The characters in this story belong to J.K. Rowling. I'm merely borrowing them for the time being. This will be slash. Don't like it? Don't read it. Otherwise, enjoy.
Dreams surely are difficult, confusing, and not everything in them is brought to pass for mankind. For fleeting dreams have two gates: one is fashioned of horn and one of ivory. Those which pass through the one of sawn ivory are deceptive, bringing tidings which come to nought, but those which issue from the one of polished horn bring true results when a mortal sees them.
Homer (800 BC - 700 BC), The Odyssey
Draco dreams in shades of gray.
The dream starts out the way it always does. He's lost and alone, walking barefoot through the shadows. The location varies from dream to dream; Hogwarts' dungeons, a hedge maze, the labyrinthine halls of Malfoy Manor, empty roads, and occasionally when he's had a really bad week the Forbidden Forest.
His breath is always visible in the cold night air and there's usually something or someone hunting him, shadowing his steps with predatory patience. Of course, sometimes he's simply searching for someone and that's almost worse. He knows he needs whoever he's looking for desperately, but they hide themselves away heartlessly and no matter how meticulously his gaze sweeps over his surroundings he never catches more than a teasing glimpse of them.
This time he's walking through Hogwarts and the ghosts of years gone by go about their business around him, seemingly unaware of the towheaded teenage boy amongst them. He slides through the gaps of the crowd, padding towards some unknown destination in search of some unknown person. The urge to find the hidden one wells up inside until it almost chokes him and his pulse pounds in his temples mercilessly. A translucent woman with dark hair laughs at another ghost's joke and it echoes in the recesses of the hall, mocking him.
Everything is either shadow or light; there is no color among these shades. It's a monochrome memory of an age that Draco never witnessed and the ghosts pay him as much heed as he pays them, which is to say none at all. This time, he comes as closer to finding what he needs than ever before, but he is stopped by the portrait of a cheerful obese woman in a horrid dress.
She has no sense of fashion whatsoever, but Draco is too involved in his never ending search to deliver the cutting, sarcastic comment the situation deserves. "Password, dearie?" And it echoes oddly in his skull, washed out and distant like it would be if he was underwater.
I'm drowning, he thinks, but cannot say it.
I'm drowning, I'm drowning, I'm drowning and there's no way -
"-out of it, Mr. Malfoy. I said, snap out of it, young man." Draco comes to, gasping and blinking, his eyes blinded by the brightness of the candle in McGonagall's grasp. It casts a luminous circle around them, turning the rest of the hall into an impenetrable sea of shadows. McGonagall looks different and it takes a moment to realize why. Her hair is down and she's wearing a robe over her nightclothes, her mouth compressed into a thin line of disapproving worry.
Draco reels back, stumbling and she steadies him perfunctorily. The stone floor is cold against the bare soles of his feet and oddly comforting. Just like my dream, he thinks distantly. "I-what? Where am I? How'd I…?" He shakes his head, pressing against his temple with one hand and tries to figure out what's going on.
"You seem to have wandered your way to Gryffindor Tower, Mr. Malfoy. I'll escort you back to the Slytherin common room." The dream is already fading into blurred images, leaving him perplexed as to what was real and what was not.
"I'm not in trouble?" He asks, still too muddled to be contrary. McGonagall casts him a sharp glance, her eyes softening when she saw the genuine confusion in his face. Snape usually manages to catch him before he walks out of the dungeons and the Potions Master never wakes him up, only guides him back to bed with a paternal patience only Slytherins are allowed to see him display. The fact Draco's been sleepwalking since he was six and still hasn't managed to break his neck is quite surprising, but despite Draco's continued luck Snape dourly predicts that each time will be his last and therefore haunts the corridors in order to prevent any mishaps.
"The staff is informed of your habit of sleepwalking. Come along, Mr. Malfoy." Draco gives one last glance to the snoring fat woman over his shoulder, the sensation that he's missing something causing goosebumps to rise on his arms. It is on the edge of his brain and if he concentrates on it for just a little while longer he'll remember that -
"Don't dally now." And it's gone. Draco follows her, yawning and wondering if he'd startled the Transfiguration teacher with his presence. He'd made his mother scream in fright once, having snuck up on her in the dead of night. He grins sleepily at the memory and lets McGonagall escort him back with passiveness uncharacteristic of him.
It was just a dream, just the dream I'm drowning that he always has.