A/N - Thank you to those who have taken the time to review. As always, you
keep me going and your feedback is much appreciated.
Chapter Six "Woe unto him that buildeth his house by unrighteousness, and his chambers by wrong" Jeremiah 22:13
The next morning Draco went for a long and very fast ride on his Nimbus 2001 over his estate. It was early in the morning and he could feel Autumn in the air. The leaves on the trees in the estate woods were turning gorgeous shades of brown, red and gold. He was wearing a turtle neck sweater under his practice robes and the air felt cold on his cheeks.
When he landed finally, he had some colour in his cheeks and lips and his eyes were bright but he didn't really feel much better. Another night of tossing and turning had exhausted him. Hermione's mention of Harry's Merlin Award was haunting him. He threw his broom on the ground and flung himself under a tree in the outskirts of the family woodlands. He put his face in his cold hands and breathed deeply.
Precious Harry Potter, he thought savagely! Perfect bloody Harry Potter! Why was he always the hero, always the victor, always the centre of attention? Why was he so popular and so loved and so honoured all the time? He was an orphan brought up by Muggles and just because of a bit of luck when he was a baby - protected from Voldemort's curse by his mother's powerful counter curse, everyone thought he was special. He wasn't even good looking. He was average height with an average build and average brains but everyone thought he was just so bloody wonderful! He was a nobody brought to prominence almost by accident. Yes, he had gone on to defeat Voldemort at every turn during his years at Hogwarts but it was Professor Snape - a Slytherin - who had gotten rid of the maniacal wizard in the end.
Just the sound of Harry Potter's name burned along Draco's nerves like acid. He knew deep down why he hated Potter. It all went back to that day on the Hogwart's Express when he had offered his hand in friendship to the famous boy only to have it coldly disdained. He had never been able to forgive Potter for that. When Harry had be-friended Muggle-borns and the Weasleys who were old enemies of the Malfoys, he had seen there was no turning back. He and Harry were destined to be enemies. Once Potter had begun attacking Voldemort, the enmity was sealed for good. His parents would never have allowed him to be friends with someone with Potter's loyalties and he had sided with his parents as he always had.
A muscle jumped in Draco's thin jaw. Not that siding with his parents had ever done much good apart from saving his own skin. Burning silver eyes stared resentfully into the shadows of the woodland floor. His parents had never given him the approval or attention or affection he had been seeking by displaying the attitudes and loyalties that they had required. He picked up a fallen branch beside him and threw it forcefully into the woods in anger. For all his money, aristocratic looks, impeccable manners and carefully nurtured alliances Draco felt like a failure. Not even his parents had approved of or loved him and most of his peers hated him. Potter's on-going recognition and popularity was just a never-ending reminder of his own failures despite all the advantages he had started life with. The fact that Potter came from a rather ordinary background just rubbed salt into his wounds.
He stayed in the woods for a long time.
* * *
That afternoon, Snape came to visit him. "I understand that a team is coming out next week to start dismantling a Dark Arts store in the Manor," he said without preamble when he found Draco directing House Elves in one of the main dining rooms as they moved furniture out.
"Yes, that's right," Draco said shortly, un-nerved by Snape's keen examination of him.
"I'm glad you decided to do that immediately," his old Professor replied approvingly, beginning to pace at one end of the dining room as he watched the House Elves work.
Draco felt slightly gratified that his actions were being approved of. It made such a nice change from being treated with suspicion and dislike. "I don't want there to be any chance of anyone using those materials to do again what happened at Gillamoor," he said, his face set and his pale eyes glittering in the late afternoon Autumn sunlight.
"Quite," Snape agreed brusquely. "Dumbledore has asked me to invite you to the Ministry next week while the team begin work on the Dark Arts store. There are some Aurors there who want to ask you about Death Eater activities," he added.
Draco nodded. He had known that invitation was coming and he had no objection to co-operating if it would help prevent another Gillamoor in the future. "That's fine," he agreed.
"You'll receive an owl about it on Monday," Snape said with a nod. "Did you enjoy your afternoon with Hermione?" he asked, finally sitting down in a chair near one of the room's two fireplaces.
Snape had taken him by surprise. "Er. Yes, I did actually. It was very interesting and Hermione was an excellent hostess," he said stiltedly.
Snape examined the boy. He believed what he said but Draco was so well- brought up that he often had difficulty relaxing and just being a normal eighteen year old. He doubted any of Hermione's friends ever thought of her as an 'excellent hostess' although in fact she was. They just liked hanging out at her place - in droves, he thought sourly. They usually cleared out whenever he arrived but as they got used to him, they hung around a bit longer than they used to. Snape wasn't keen on sharing Hermione with anyone but he knew he had little choice in the matter as her group of friends was too large. Fortunately most days she was buried up to her eyeballs in text books and it was only them that he had to tear her away from and that was hard enough.
"I saw a 'movie' for the first time. It was quite fascinating to look around a Muggle house. I'd never seen one before," Draco was saying, pointing to the next piece of unsightly chrome furniture for the House Elves to take out.
"Oh yes," Snape said, knowing what a movie was having seen Hermione watching them quite often during his time as her guardian. "I hope you'll make friends with her. She's a reliable friend and would do anything she could to help you," he added pointedly.
"I'm surprised she wants to be friends with me. My guess is that she doesn't really, you've put her up to it," Draco said proudly, his back stiff.
"I asked her to extend her support to you, yes but it was completely her idea to invite you to her eighteenth birthday party. I didn't know about that until afterwards," Snape replied honestly, watching him from under half-lowered lids.
Draco's lips parted in surprise but he quickly closed them again. That bit of information did put a different light on it. He decided to invite her for morning tea and a tour of the Manor one day next week, maybe on the weekend. "Oh," was all he said.
"I have something for you," Snape said, suddenly changing the subject again. He pulled a bundle of parchments out of his robe. "These are a copy of Voldemort's papers. I haven't read them myself but Dumbledore thinks they may be useful to you. He does ask that you destroy them after you have read them as the Ministry does not want copies of Voldemort's theories and ideas in circulation." He put the papers on the ugly glass and chrome dining table.
Draco's pale eyes flickered over to them. "Thank you," he said faintly. "I'll make sure they are destroyed as soon as I've read them."
Snape merely nodded and got up to leave. "Is there anything I can help you with at the moment?" he asked formally.
Draco smiled without warmth. "No, thank you," he replied quietly.
Snape nodded again and then apparated. Draco stared at the spot where he guardian had just been. What could Snape do for him, he wondered? Could he give Draco back an untainted family name? Could he give him Potter's recognition and popularity? Could he give him a different past with more affectionate and less demanding parents? Could he take the obnoxious black mark off his left inner forearm? Could he make this feeling of utter emptiness and pointlessness vanish?
* * *
Draco stayed up all night reading the papers Snape had left for him. They were organised like scientific documents but had very little scientific method applied. The experiments described were not well-conducted and much of the methodology was left out so the reader could not follow the logic of from a to b to c in order to understand the conclusions drawn. The conclusions seemed to be rather superficial to Draco and were not backed up by enough evidence to make the results convincing.
He realised quite quickly that the documents were more about propaganda than careful scientific studies. For example, according to the papers the Muggle-born wizards had thicker boned skulls than the pure-blood wizards. What this was supposed to signify rather baffled Draco. The papers claimed that it meant the brains of the Muggle-borns were smaller and less- developed than that of the pure-bloods. When Draco searched for concrete data to support these assertions, he could find none that was thoroughly researched and extensive enough to be at all credible. The papers also claimed that Muggle-born wizards produced more squib children on average than pure-bloods but there was no real statistical substantiation to support it.
Draco was getting a terrible, terrible headache. Was this the 'evidence' that his parents had based their hatred of Muggle-borns on all those years? If so, it was pitiably weak - almost ridiculous. His parents had always told him that introducing Muggle-born wizards into wizarding society would eventually weaken the magical strength of the wizarding community as a whole over time. If these were the only 'facts' that supported that belief, then it was a lie. There was nothing amongst all of Voldemort's studies to suggest that he was irrefutably right or even close to it.
At his parent's trial, he had heard not only of their involvement in Gillamoor but their activities 20 years earlier before he was born when Snape had been an active Death Eater too. "All those people died for no good reason," Draco murmured, staring sightlessly into the fire in the study he had taken over from his father. "It was all a huge, stupid, unconvincing lie."
Draco tried to understand why his parents would get involved with so much murder on the basis of such flimsy logic and evidence but he couldn't wrap his mind around it. Maybe they never even looked at the information, he pondered. Maybe they just believed Voldemort because he was so charismatic and frightening. He wondered if it was just pure fear that drove them. They had to lay odds on either Voldemort or Dumbledore at that point in time. Maybe they figured it was less terrifying to be on the wrong side of Dumbledore than Voldemort, he thought speculatively. Or maybe they were just cold-blooded murderers who liked the power kick of having enough supremacy over someone to kill them, he thought miserably. He guessed he would never really know or understand his parent's motives. One thing was sure, it wasn't logic or any concrete proof that Voldemort was right that made them do it. There was obviously none to be had.
He felt very, very cold. He felt like he had ice water flowing under his skin rather than blood. He shivered slightly and poured a couple of fingers of scotch from his father's decanter on the desk. My decanter, he corrected himself. He swallowed it quickly and grimaced as it burned down his throat. He got up stiffly and glanced at the clock on the mantel. It was 4am. Slowly he threw each page on the fire and watched as each one was consumed. It was 5am before he went to his suite of rooms to try and get some sleep.
* * *
The owl from the Ministry came after the weekend. Draco opened it already knowing its contents. He was asked to be there the next morning at 9am to meet with some Senior Aurors. Draco was glad he had deferred his first semester at University. There was so much to do and it all seemed extremely time-consuming. He would already have missed a ridiculous number of lectures by now.
He was punctual as always and was shown into a comfortable room with plush armchairs, a small table, a large fireplace and rich drapes. Two Senior Aurors arrived on the dot of 9am, one man and one woman. They smiled kindly at him and gave him a cup of steaming, fragrant tea.
"The first question is, may we used a penseive to record some of your memories?" the lady asked after introducing them both. Her name was Ferenelle and his was Archimedes. Draco stared hard at Archimedes. He was quite young to be a Senior Auror -only a few years older than himself and very good looking in a rather stern way. He was dressed in flowing dark purple robes and carried a cane. His wavy, tow coloured hair was cut very short at the back, and his face was lean and angular. Draco didn't know it but it was the same handsome wizard Hermione had seen on the Night Bus the night she had gone out on the town with Harry and Ron a few weeks ago.
"Yes, that's fine," Draco replied to the greying blonde witch with kind blue eyes.
"Good. Thank you," she replied and went out briefly to bring in the penseive bowl.
The Aurors really wanted some background information on the Death Eaters' organisation and how they operated. Having only been a Death Eater for such a short time put Draco at rather a disadvantage when answering their questions but they were quite pleased to have his memories of his initiation and the few meetings he had attended.
"We will be involved in the dismantling of the Dark Arts room at your Manor," Ferenelle went on to say once they had finished recording his memories. By then it was late afternoon and they had already taken a break for lunch hours before. "We expect to gather far more information there but the data we've received from you today has been immensely useful and we're grateful for your full co-operation," she said pleasantly.
"I'll do anything to make sure there is never another Gillamoor," Draco said quietly, his pale eyes blazing for a moment before becoming subdued once more.
"So will we," Archimedes said severely. Draco jumped; it was the first time Archimedes had said anything all day. The man's piercing, dark blue eyes rested on Draco for a moment. "It's obvious to me from our time with you today that you are perfectly sincere and rather more innocent than most Death Eaters we interview. I am glad to see that Voldemort was defeated before you could be drawn any further into Death Eater activities by your rather notorious parents," he continued austerely. Draco merely nodded, his expression subdued.
"We will want to run some experiments on your Dark Mark if you don't mind," Ferenelle said, pouring Draco a cup of tea before he left. She went on to explain what they were planning as Draco sipped his tea. It sounded useful to him, so he didn't mind. He had deliberately given himself this time to allow for this kind of thing and he no longer wanted to hide anything. He was tired of hiding and pretending and being on the losing side all the time. He never wanted to be associated with anything like Gillamoor again for the rest of his life. There was enough mud to clean off his name. If he ever had children, he wanted to give them a redeemed family name. He was tired of being shocked and anguished by his parent's legacy and the Death Eater's real face. He was fed up with feeling emotionally battered by it all. He never wanted anything to do with the Death Eaters or the Dark Arts ever again.
Finally, he apparated home after agreeing to go back the next day to run the experiments.
Chapter Six "Woe unto him that buildeth his house by unrighteousness, and his chambers by wrong" Jeremiah 22:13
The next morning Draco went for a long and very fast ride on his Nimbus 2001 over his estate. It was early in the morning and he could feel Autumn in the air. The leaves on the trees in the estate woods were turning gorgeous shades of brown, red and gold. He was wearing a turtle neck sweater under his practice robes and the air felt cold on his cheeks.
When he landed finally, he had some colour in his cheeks and lips and his eyes were bright but he didn't really feel much better. Another night of tossing and turning had exhausted him. Hermione's mention of Harry's Merlin Award was haunting him. He threw his broom on the ground and flung himself under a tree in the outskirts of the family woodlands. He put his face in his cold hands and breathed deeply.
Precious Harry Potter, he thought savagely! Perfect bloody Harry Potter! Why was he always the hero, always the victor, always the centre of attention? Why was he so popular and so loved and so honoured all the time? He was an orphan brought up by Muggles and just because of a bit of luck when he was a baby - protected from Voldemort's curse by his mother's powerful counter curse, everyone thought he was special. He wasn't even good looking. He was average height with an average build and average brains but everyone thought he was just so bloody wonderful! He was a nobody brought to prominence almost by accident. Yes, he had gone on to defeat Voldemort at every turn during his years at Hogwarts but it was Professor Snape - a Slytherin - who had gotten rid of the maniacal wizard in the end.
Just the sound of Harry Potter's name burned along Draco's nerves like acid. He knew deep down why he hated Potter. It all went back to that day on the Hogwart's Express when he had offered his hand in friendship to the famous boy only to have it coldly disdained. He had never been able to forgive Potter for that. When Harry had be-friended Muggle-borns and the Weasleys who were old enemies of the Malfoys, he had seen there was no turning back. He and Harry were destined to be enemies. Once Potter had begun attacking Voldemort, the enmity was sealed for good. His parents would never have allowed him to be friends with someone with Potter's loyalties and he had sided with his parents as he always had.
A muscle jumped in Draco's thin jaw. Not that siding with his parents had ever done much good apart from saving his own skin. Burning silver eyes stared resentfully into the shadows of the woodland floor. His parents had never given him the approval or attention or affection he had been seeking by displaying the attitudes and loyalties that they had required. He picked up a fallen branch beside him and threw it forcefully into the woods in anger. For all his money, aristocratic looks, impeccable manners and carefully nurtured alliances Draco felt like a failure. Not even his parents had approved of or loved him and most of his peers hated him. Potter's on-going recognition and popularity was just a never-ending reminder of his own failures despite all the advantages he had started life with. The fact that Potter came from a rather ordinary background just rubbed salt into his wounds.
He stayed in the woods for a long time.
* * *
That afternoon, Snape came to visit him. "I understand that a team is coming out next week to start dismantling a Dark Arts store in the Manor," he said without preamble when he found Draco directing House Elves in one of the main dining rooms as they moved furniture out.
"Yes, that's right," Draco said shortly, un-nerved by Snape's keen examination of him.
"I'm glad you decided to do that immediately," his old Professor replied approvingly, beginning to pace at one end of the dining room as he watched the House Elves work.
Draco felt slightly gratified that his actions were being approved of. It made such a nice change from being treated with suspicion and dislike. "I don't want there to be any chance of anyone using those materials to do again what happened at Gillamoor," he said, his face set and his pale eyes glittering in the late afternoon Autumn sunlight.
"Quite," Snape agreed brusquely. "Dumbledore has asked me to invite you to the Ministry next week while the team begin work on the Dark Arts store. There are some Aurors there who want to ask you about Death Eater activities," he added.
Draco nodded. He had known that invitation was coming and he had no objection to co-operating if it would help prevent another Gillamoor in the future. "That's fine," he agreed.
"You'll receive an owl about it on Monday," Snape said with a nod. "Did you enjoy your afternoon with Hermione?" he asked, finally sitting down in a chair near one of the room's two fireplaces.
Snape had taken him by surprise. "Er. Yes, I did actually. It was very interesting and Hermione was an excellent hostess," he said stiltedly.
Snape examined the boy. He believed what he said but Draco was so well- brought up that he often had difficulty relaxing and just being a normal eighteen year old. He doubted any of Hermione's friends ever thought of her as an 'excellent hostess' although in fact she was. They just liked hanging out at her place - in droves, he thought sourly. They usually cleared out whenever he arrived but as they got used to him, they hung around a bit longer than they used to. Snape wasn't keen on sharing Hermione with anyone but he knew he had little choice in the matter as her group of friends was too large. Fortunately most days she was buried up to her eyeballs in text books and it was only them that he had to tear her away from and that was hard enough.
"I saw a 'movie' for the first time. It was quite fascinating to look around a Muggle house. I'd never seen one before," Draco was saying, pointing to the next piece of unsightly chrome furniture for the House Elves to take out.
"Oh yes," Snape said, knowing what a movie was having seen Hermione watching them quite often during his time as her guardian. "I hope you'll make friends with her. She's a reliable friend and would do anything she could to help you," he added pointedly.
"I'm surprised she wants to be friends with me. My guess is that she doesn't really, you've put her up to it," Draco said proudly, his back stiff.
"I asked her to extend her support to you, yes but it was completely her idea to invite you to her eighteenth birthday party. I didn't know about that until afterwards," Snape replied honestly, watching him from under half-lowered lids.
Draco's lips parted in surprise but he quickly closed them again. That bit of information did put a different light on it. He decided to invite her for morning tea and a tour of the Manor one day next week, maybe on the weekend. "Oh," was all he said.
"I have something for you," Snape said, suddenly changing the subject again. He pulled a bundle of parchments out of his robe. "These are a copy of Voldemort's papers. I haven't read them myself but Dumbledore thinks they may be useful to you. He does ask that you destroy them after you have read them as the Ministry does not want copies of Voldemort's theories and ideas in circulation." He put the papers on the ugly glass and chrome dining table.
Draco's pale eyes flickered over to them. "Thank you," he said faintly. "I'll make sure they are destroyed as soon as I've read them."
Snape merely nodded and got up to leave. "Is there anything I can help you with at the moment?" he asked formally.
Draco smiled without warmth. "No, thank you," he replied quietly.
Snape nodded again and then apparated. Draco stared at the spot where he guardian had just been. What could Snape do for him, he wondered? Could he give Draco back an untainted family name? Could he give him Potter's recognition and popularity? Could he give him a different past with more affectionate and less demanding parents? Could he take the obnoxious black mark off his left inner forearm? Could he make this feeling of utter emptiness and pointlessness vanish?
* * *
Draco stayed up all night reading the papers Snape had left for him. They were organised like scientific documents but had very little scientific method applied. The experiments described were not well-conducted and much of the methodology was left out so the reader could not follow the logic of from a to b to c in order to understand the conclusions drawn. The conclusions seemed to be rather superficial to Draco and were not backed up by enough evidence to make the results convincing.
He realised quite quickly that the documents were more about propaganda than careful scientific studies. For example, according to the papers the Muggle-born wizards had thicker boned skulls than the pure-blood wizards. What this was supposed to signify rather baffled Draco. The papers claimed that it meant the brains of the Muggle-borns were smaller and less- developed than that of the pure-bloods. When Draco searched for concrete data to support these assertions, he could find none that was thoroughly researched and extensive enough to be at all credible. The papers also claimed that Muggle-born wizards produced more squib children on average than pure-bloods but there was no real statistical substantiation to support it.
Draco was getting a terrible, terrible headache. Was this the 'evidence' that his parents had based their hatred of Muggle-borns on all those years? If so, it was pitiably weak - almost ridiculous. His parents had always told him that introducing Muggle-born wizards into wizarding society would eventually weaken the magical strength of the wizarding community as a whole over time. If these were the only 'facts' that supported that belief, then it was a lie. There was nothing amongst all of Voldemort's studies to suggest that he was irrefutably right or even close to it.
At his parent's trial, he had heard not only of their involvement in Gillamoor but their activities 20 years earlier before he was born when Snape had been an active Death Eater too. "All those people died for no good reason," Draco murmured, staring sightlessly into the fire in the study he had taken over from his father. "It was all a huge, stupid, unconvincing lie."
Draco tried to understand why his parents would get involved with so much murder on the basis of such flimsy logic and evidence but he couldn't wrap his mind around it. Maybe they never even looked at the information, he pondered. Maybe they just believed Voldemort because he was so charismatic and frightening. He wondered if it was just pure fear that drove them. They had to lay odds on either Voldemort or Dumbledore at that point in time. Maybe they figured it was less terrifying to be on the wrong side of Dumbledore than Voldemort, he thought speculatively. Or maybe they were just cold-blooded murderers who liked the power kick of having enough supremacy over someone to kill them, he thought miserably. He guessed he would never really know or understand his parent's motives. One thing was sure, it wasn't logic or any concrete proof that Voldemort was right that made them do it. There was obviously none to be had.
He felt very, very cold. He felt like he had ice water flowing under his skin rather than blood. He shivered slightly and poured a couple of fingers of scotch from his father's decanter on the desk. My decanter, he corrected himself. He swallowed it quickly and grimaced as it burned down his throat. He got up stiffly and glanced at the clock on the mantel. It was 4am. Slowly he threw each page on the fire and watched as each one was consumed. It was 5am before he went to his suite of rooms to try and get some sleep.
* * *
The owl from the Ministry came after the weekend. Draco opened it already knowing its contents. He was asked to be there the next morning at 9am to meet with some Senior Aurors. Draco was glad he had deferred his first semester at University. There was so much to do and it all seemed extremely time-consuming. He would already have missed a ridiculous number of lectures by now.
He was punctual as always and was shown into a comfortable room with plush armchairs, a small table, a large fireplace and rich drapes. Two Senior Aurors arrived on the dot of 9am, one man and one woman. They smiled kindly at him and gave him a cup of steaming, fragrant tea.
"The first question is, may we used a penseive to record some of your memories?" the lady asked after introducing them both. Her name was Ferenelle and his was Archimedes. Draco stared hard at Archimedes. He was quite young to be a Senior Auror -only a few years older than himself and very good looking in a rather stern way. He was dressed in flowing dark purple robes and carried a cane. His wavy, tow coloured hair was cut very short at the back, and his face was lean and angular. Draco didn't know it but it was the same handsome wizard Hermione had seen on the Night Bus the night she had gone out on the town with Harry and Ron a few weeks ago.
"Yes, that's fine," Draco replied to the greying blonde witch with kind blue eyes.
"Good. Thank you," she replied and went out briefly to bring in the penseive bowl.
The Aurors really wanted some background information on the Death Eaters' organisation and how they operated. Having only been a Death Eater for such a short time put Draco at rather a disadvantage when answering their questions but they were quite pleased to have his memories of his initiation and the few meetings he had attended.
"We will be involved in the dismantling of the Dark Arts room at your Manor," Ferenelle went on to say once they had finished recording his memories. By then it was late afternoon and they had already taken a break for lunch hours before. "We expect to gather far more information there but the data we've received from you today has been immensely useful and we're grateful for your full co-operation," she said pleasantly.
"I'll do anything to make sure there is never another Gillamoor," Draco said quietly, his pale eyes blazing for a moment before becoming subdued once more.
"So will we," Archimedes said severely. Draco jumped; it was the first time Archimedes had said anything all day. The man's piercing, dark blue eyes rested on Draco for a moment. "It's obvious to me from our time with you today that you are perfectly sincere and rather more innocent than most Death Eaters we interview. I am glad to see that Voldemort was defeated before you could be drawn any further into Death Eater activities by your rather notorious parents," he continued austerely. Draco merely nodded, his expression subdued.
"We will want to run some experiments on your Dark Mark if you don't mind," Ferenelle said, pouring Draco a cup of tea before he left. She went on to explain what they were planning as Draco sipped his tea. It sounded useful to him, so he didn't mind. He had deliberately given himself this time to allow for this kind of thing and he no longer wanted to hide anything. He was tired of hiding and pretending and being on the losing side all the time. He never wanted to be associated with anything like Gillamoor again for the rest of his life. There was enough mud to clean off his name. If he ever had children, he wanted to give them a redeemed family name. He was tired of being shocked and anguished by his parent's legacy and the Death Eater's real face. He was fed up with feeling emotionally battered by it all. He never wanted anything to do with the Death Eaters or the Dark Arts ever again.
Finally, he apparated home after agreeing to go back the next day to run the experiments.
