For those of you knew (or guessed) the secret, I am very proud. I did leave the clues in the first chapter cause I wanted people to know. It's more fun that way. Anywho, thanks to everyone who read and/or reviewed. This story is very dear to me and it means a lot that other people are enjoying it, too.
Ferretgirl1023: Niffer! Jen. Darling. Hello. Why do you insist on bragging on knowing what is going to happen in my stories? Does it really matter that you know? The only reason you know is because you're my sister and I have a compulsive urge to spill all the details, which is why you already know your Christmas present.
Dragonsbane: Well. . .your guess is close. Correct, actually, though that isn't what I was talking about. Good enough. *tosses cookie*
Izanami Hime: We all love that Horny Potter, don't we?
Bunny-kuo: Yet another lover of the Horny Potter. Was there a fic with a Kali Draco? Hm. I haven't read it, at least I don't think I have. Ah well. And *scoffs* I like Ron. *grins* And – er – yeah. She is someone's daughter. *tosses cookie* The slashy bits – er – eventually is longer than I care for it to be but this is story is going to be an epic. When it's finished, the parts without slasy bits in them will be miniscule.
Tinetinytina: Geesh, you ask a lot of questions. You will just have to read for the answers. *winks* I didn't plan out Hermione's crush but, for now, I'm making it Justin Finch-Fletchley because I have a crush on him.
Spirit Stone: I hurried but you can keep your cookie. I'm on a diet.
Jammie: Here, have a cookie anyway. *tosses cookie* I'll give you a hint. The answer is in the first chapter.
Demon Rising: Yes. Er – not really. Not as far as I know. Those are the answers to your questions in exact order. Thank you for the envy. I'll take it in abundance. But then again, I thrive on compliments like that. I'm glad you love it. Ladies and gentlemen, you have heard the understatement of the year. I like Kali, too. Enjoy this chapter.
Evil Laughter: Hey Pokemon pal. Thanks for reviewing. Joel said to tell you he loves you, too.
Amarantha Liriel: Well look who was paying attention. *claps and tosses cookie* I'm in such a happy mood since I looked in the mirror this morning and realized I'm pretty.
SkySong: I like Kali, too. Harry and Draco are crazy. I figured they could balance each other out.
Disclaimer: I am JK Rowling about as much as Voldemort is a candidate for sainthood. You could sue me, but you would get a guitar pick and $12.00. It really isn't worth it. I am making no money (obviously, according to my bank account) off this trifle of a story.
Special thanks to my betas. I love you all.
And now that the many preliminaries are out of the way, on with the show!
Falling
Chapter Three
The sky was already dark and rain was falling to the ground in dull, dreary sheets as the carriages pulled up to the Hogwarts castle. A sinking feeling manifested in the pit of Draco's stomach as he realized this was the last time he would be in one of these carriages and coming up to Hogwarts for his first day back. He climbed out of the carriage and was followed by the other students he had silently been riding with. So far, there were very few students who weren't gawking at him when he passed, and Draco hated every minute of it. He would never know how Potter had put up with all the attention and all the staring. He almost felt guilty for putting some of that attention on Potter. Almost.
Draco had packed his things the night before so he didn't have to do much else but get dressed when Narcissa told him to get ready to leave for the train station. Their goodbye had been brief, Narcissa wrapping her arms around her son and kissing him on the cheek before leaving. It had been a mutual decision that the choice of his residence at the Christmas holidays would be decided upon when Christmas was closer. Neither one currently felt it worthwhile to make plans for an event that was over three months away.
On the train, Draco had found the compartment that Ruby Cabot and her friends were in and took a seat by the window. He knew they were staring at him, probably whispering about him as well, but Draco didn't really want to be with anyone else. Draco didn't want to be with anyone at all, but since the option of having a compartment all to himself was out of the picture, he figured sitting with the girl who had saved his life was just as well. Part of him loved her for it because now he knew. His father had loved him but things had gone to shit and he would never be feeling the pain he was if Ruby had just let him die. Without noticing it, his fingers began to trail over his arm where the healing cuts were and he soon fell asleep.
It was only when the witch with the trolley came around when he bought a lunch that Draco actually moved. Most of it was wasted, as Draco picked at his food and then, putting it aside, Draco leaned back against the window and drifted off to sleep once again. He was awoken a second time by Ruby, who was giving him a gentle nudge and informed him that he should be changing into his school robes because they were almost there. He smiled, thanked her, and left to change.
Now he was being stared at again by people who hadn't been the one, or a friend of the one, who saved his life. He could tolerate Ruby. If he had been the one to find the almost dead body of one of his housemates, he would stare too. By finding him, Draco felt that she had some odd right of passage and he ignored the constant eyes settling on him. Everyone else, however, he could not tolerate and he was sick of being stared at as if some freak in a zoo. Don't feed the suicidal boy.
Peeves was prancing around in the rain and when Draco passed by him, he launched into a rather rude chant about Draco and his suicide attempt. He could vaguely hear McGonagall scolding the poltergeist but it didn't really shake him. This had happened last year and he figured that every time he passed Peeves, it would prompt some sort of rude behavior. What did Draco care, anyway? Peeves was nothing compared to the whispers that fluttered down the hallways at him. These were people he had to face, and everyone just kept going on about how 'unstable' he was. Peeves preferred the word 'dejected' and singing about Draco's woe. He grimaced. Draco had 'woe'.
He dropped in a seat at the Slytherin table in the Great Hall, making it a point to sit as far away from the other seventh year Slytherins as possible. No one really tried to get close to him anyway but Draco didn't want to be even remotely close to the others. When Draco had tried to kill himself, they had started to treat him differently, especially Blaise, which bothered him. Of all the people to treat him differently, Blaise was one of the worst. No one at Hogwarts knew he was gay, except for Blaise, that is, and probably Professor Dumbledore because he knew everything. He and Blaise had been together in their sixth year but Blaise had noticed Draco cut himself and after Draco had tried to take his own life, Blaise had started to treat him as if he were fragile and about to break. Fragile. Handle with care and don't feed the suicidal boy.
That had been too much and then when Lucius was gone for good, Blaise's pity, which he claimed was empathy, had been too much for Draco to take. He broke up with him rather curtly, and asked that Blaise not contact him over the summer because he needed the time to heal. Seeing him again was painful and from the look in Blaise's eyes, it was painful for him as well. Draco ignored it and turned his head away, wishing more than ever that those bloody first years would just get here already and the Sorting could be done and over with.
When the first years did enter, Draco saw a girl enter with them and she towered about a head or two over them as they approached the front. Instead of Professor McGonagall going into her usual, 'When I call your name' speech, Dumbledore stood instead to address the student body.
"I'd like to make a first announcement before the Sorting. This year, we have a new student among out midst. She is a transfer student from an American school, Chivington, and she will be joining the ranks of the seventh years. Since you should have been sorted years ago, I insist that you go first."
"Strauser, Mikailah," said McGonagall with a smile.
The tall girl walked up to the Sorting Hat, casting a glance at the staff table, and formed a small smile before sitting on the stool allowing the Sorting Hat to be jammed on her head. It was silent for some time and Draco was about to fall asleep when the brim of the hat opened up and it yelled, "GRYFFINDOR!"
Of course.
McGonagall's smile was bigger this time now that she knew this Mikailah was one of her own. Leaving the stool, the raven haired girl headed for the Gryffindor table and was promptly greeted by Potter and company. She had apparently already made nice with Potty, Weasel, and the Mudblood. Draco glared in her general direction suddenly feeling extremely unpleasant at having a new student and one who had joined Potter's praises and esteemed friendship at that. Draco had offered, and Harry had been rude. Mikailah Strauser shows up and Potter embraces her. Maybe if Draco had nice tits and a great ass then Potter would have been his friend, too. No matter. No use crying over it. It was only Potter after all.
Draco ignored the rest of the Sorting and eagerly anticipated when the plates would fill before him with food, even if he didn't plan on eating it. It would still be one step closer to getting the hell out of the Great Hall and disappearing into his dormitory. Unfortunately, disappearing into the Slytherin dormitory meant Crabbe, Goyle, and Zabini. Blaise. Bloody Blaise Zabini and his bloody gorgeous perfection. Draco sighed and began to grab at the food that had appeared before him but he still didn't eat much and only picked at the banquet before him, Draco figured he probably looked kind of pathetic.
His thoughts were confirmed when a voice behind him said, "You could actually eat that, you know?"
"I don't mean to be rude, but I would rather prefer to not have your company at this moment," said Draco but Blaise ignored the comment and sat down beside him.
"I didn't come down here on my accord if that's what you think. Pansy sent me. She's worried about you."
"What's she got to be worried about?"
"Because she's your ex-girlfriend, you tried to kill yourself last year, and she cares."
"What about you?"
"What about me? As far as you're concerned, you don't want any of my care. Or did you forget that?"
"I didn't mean it like that. I didn't want you to pity me."
"I never pitied you. It doesn't matter anyway. We're over thanks to you. Now, really. Why aren't you eating? Have you been eating?"
"Yes, Mother."
"Don't use that tone of voice with me."
"That phrase doesn't do much for your protest. You're only encouraging me."
At first Blaise didn't reply. "Look," he said, "why don't you come down and sit with us. You sat by yourself all at the end of last year. You don't want to start a year off like that. If anything, you need friends to support you right now. Come sit with us."
"And get stared at some more while everyone is careful about what they say because any wrong word might make me crack again? And get treated like I'm some unstable, escaped lunatic from Saint Mungo's? Call me crazy but I prefer my own company."
"No one is going to stare at you."
"Everyone stares at me, Blaise. Take a look around. I'm the freak who slit his wrists. In fact, I'm so unstable that I could do it again any moment. Maybe even right here in the Great Hall. Hey, Draco, want us to cut up your food for you? You shouldn't be handling sharp objects."
"No one is trying to cut your food for you, Draco."
"Not yet but you seem to be on the motherly kick. Maybe you'd like to cut it up later for me."
"Draco."
"Please go back to your seat, Blaise, and leave me be. I already have enough on my mind today without adding this little encounter to the list."
Blaise seemed to be carefully regarding Draco for a moment before his head hung and he stood up without another word, to return back to where the other seventh year Slytherins were sitting. Draco forced back the tears that were threatening to spill out of his eyes. The rule was being enforced again. He hadn't let himself weep since that night in the hospital wing, when his father told him that he loved him, and he wasn't about to allow himself the privilege of doing it again. After all, Malfoys don't cry.
Very little actually made its way into Draco's stomach during the feast and he listened half-heartedly to Dumbledore's announcements about the forest and forbidden items that Filch had decided to ban before slinking out of the Great Hall. Standing in the halls, he wasn't sure which way he felt like heading off in. The dungeons meant the Slytherins but he couldn't think of anywhere else to go. Draco felt no where near sleep and that meant he would be hiding under his covers with the curtains pulled around his four post bed in order to keep Crabbe, Goyle, and Blaise away. Granted it would give him time to think that he really didn't want, because the emotional pain was far too intense but he couldn't produce any other options.
No one else had come back yet and he muttered "Polaris" to the entrance of the Slytherin common room. He trudged up to his dormitory, the faint sound of the Slytherin prefect instructing first years coming up behind him. Once Draco made it to the seventh year boys' dormitory, he immediately began to dig through his trunk; there was only a catch of silver in the light before the dagger disappeared into the folds of his robes. Without bothering to dress, Draco climbed under the heavy blankets and pulled his curtains shut.
The sound of the other boys coming up for bed could be heard outside of the material shielding Draco away from them. No one spoke but he could sense their presence, hear them shuffle as they opened and closed their trunks dressing for bed. He knew Blaise was out there and Draco slipped the dagger under his pillow as he sat up and leaned back against the headboard. With his left hand, Draco rolled up the sleeve of his right arm and stared numbly at the thin scabs covering the areas where he had marred his skin. Picking at one of the slashes, a bit of the scab came off and Draco watched as a thin stream of blood oozed from the opening. He wanted to cry, scream, do something other than sit here and watch himself bleed, but being back at school caused problems for that. There would be no private time. There would be no moments when he could slash up his entire arm and watch the crimson bleed like watercolors so that the wounds were indistinguishable.
When he heard the sounds outside of his bed still, Draco retracted the dagger from beneath his pillow and slid it back into his robes. Pulling the curtain back slightly, the fear of waking up the others boys too great, Draco slipped between the narrow opening and disappeared out the dormitory door. He made his way out of the dorms, into the direction of the Slytherin showers. Draco hated to feel dirty and right now, he felt no less that disgustingly filthy.
Turning the water on as hot as he could stand it, Draco stripped completely and stepped under the spray only to have his legs fail him as he fell to the tiled ground. Reaching out to his clothes, Draco grabbed his dagger and pulled it in the shower with him. His eyes roved over his hard, lean body taking in the scars that covered the lengths of his arms, his legs, his chest, and his stomach. Loosening his grip on the dagger, it almost fell from his hands but as it went to go, Draco's grip tightened it as if to prevent just that from happening.
With one swift stroke, Draco made a shallow gash in the top of his thigh and tightened his grip around the dagger's handle as the blood began to seethe from the wound where it joined the spray of the nozzle, only to appear a harmless baby shade of pink as it swirled down the drain. He could feel himself wince, his muscles subconsciously tightening at the act, as if any moment he would make a second attack on a random body part that was minding its own business. Draco had become the predator and the prey. Please don't feed the suicidal boy.
He could feel the tears welling behind his eyes. It's just the water, Draco told himself. I'm not really going to cry. It's just the water and it's stinging my eyes. Covering the cut on his thigh, Draco ducked his head beneath the spray and allowed it to soak his hair before rolling down over his back. Despite the intense heat, Draco shuddered and pulled his body to its feet supported only by the strength of shaky legs. Grabbing the shampoo and soap, Draco washed his hair and body before rinsing and then shut off the water. He stepped out of the shower, wrapped a towel around his waist, and grabbed his wand from the pocket of his robes.
A flick of the wrist and a few low, mumbled words later, Draco's hair was dry and he turned to stare in the mirror.
"That's a fancy trick you've got there," said the mirror.
"I'm not in the mood for your chattering," replied Draco, rather harshly.
"Touchy, aren't we. You aren't still in a foul mood over that little incident with your father, are you?"
"Rather cold of you, isn't it?"
"Well I am only a looking glass." Draco scowled. "That face isn't real good on you."
He turned from the mirror and began to dress all the while ignoring the whistles from the looking glass and the inquiries about the cut on his thigh. Draco was more than happy when he was fully dried and dressed, thus allowing him to escape the incessant racket of a looking glass that never really shut up. Sometimes Gabby, as he had taken to calling this particular mirror, got to be too much of a chatterbox and Draco would seriously considering sneaking into Gryffindors showers if only to exchange mirrors. Now was one of those times when the prospect seemed like a really good idea.
Instead of going back to his bed, Draco headed for the common room where the fire was just beginning to die out. The embers were giving off a soft glow and he sat by the flames as he stared into the flickering. A dull pain was aching at the top of his right thigh and Draco forced himself to concentrate on both this particular pain, and the flames of the fire. Any other thoughts were clearly unwelcome, and the reference to his father made by the rather tactless Gabby, was trying to prey on Draco's mind. He, instead, began to hum a child's tune that he had heard from the house elves when he was young. It did little to distract him but it was a start.
As his eyelids began to grow heavy, Draco welcomed the opportunity to escape from this world, and he sprawled out on the ground before the fire. He pulled his arms into his body as he lay before the fire and closed his eyes, the warmth spreading out over every inch of bare skin that was visible. The release was coming, and slumber took him over without mercy leaving. Draco, breathing lightly through a small part in his lips, looked very much like a small child. Don't feed the suicidal boy, indeed.
*~*~*~*~*
Loved something? Feel free to tell me so in a review and/or you may email me at angeldlsm00@hotmail.com and/or you may IM me at FoxyD227. If you hated something, do email me as I do not like to dirty up my pretty review page with flames. They spread like wildfire, don't cha know. *laughs at own bad joke*
Next chapter soon. I promise. In fact, it's already written, so all I have to do is send it to my betas.
