Chapter 3: Hibernation

The Great Hall; December 1997; about 11 PM

Draco paced in with measured steps, back aligned so vertically as if challenging the doors to refuse him. He was nearly out of their reach when he stopped, as if something had risen that needed to be answered.

Harry watched wordlessly as Draco turned again to face the door. He would not have been angry if the other boy had walked out and left. However, Draco only stood there, scrutinizing the doors, looking for some flaw or flame.

And then, he began to strike.

The sudden violence seemed unnatural, coming from Draco Malfoy. He was not a peaceful boy by nature, but it was such a strong show of emotion that the action was abnormal. He beat his fists against them; they would not yield, and he continued pummeling in fluid repetition until the hall resonated with the sound of his blows. His face was calm, a forced calm that had been built up and could not be stripped away, while his hands were frenzied and soon bloodied by rage.

Harry could only watch, the snow-light haloing his dark hair. Draco's blows fell evenly, turning his anger into grace, a controllable fury that was unlike a tantrum and unlike a brawl, but instead meticulous revenge.

When it was done, he sank to his knees, his breaths heaving yet still so calculated, as if gauged for the most emphatic result. It was perfection; a difficult thing to master, and yet Harry could look to Draco and see it passed off day to day. The boy had precision, flawed, now, by fire.

Draco closed his eyes to the blood pulsing down his fists. It slid over pale muscle on one arm and dragon-hide on the other; he raised both hands, ran them along the door slowly.

Wood equaled fire, his greatest fear, and he saw it all again with his eyes dull and lightless. The beginning of an endless winter. It was hard to remember, now, that there had been life before that fateful ending, when the snow was still controlled above him.

Yes, before that ending day.

The burning day.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Malfoy Manor; August 25, 1997; about 3 PM

It was summertime again, and there was something about Draco Malfoy that refused to believe in summer. Even in late August, with the season at its most potent in the course of the week before school, the fact was painfully evident.

It wasn't quite the skin that seemed untouched by his seventeen years, or the eyes that looked like snowy shadows; more, the feeling in the careful way he judged his footfalls on the path, a stark contrast against the year's lazy months. The manner in which he shifted his arms with grace that made every stride a mission accomplished.

It was the way that the boy built a winter around himself, no matter the season.

Of course, he had never liked summer. Despite this, he was strolling across the grounds with no particular aim in mind. This was ultimately peculiar- every other action was premeditated, always strategizing, like the snowflake that waits for the most surreal instant to fall. There was never a moments rest, never a moments sleep and peace. Only cold calculation, as cold as snow.

It was what he most feared. To lose it all and watch as the snowdrifts so carefully planted in his life came plunging down. It was why he looked on to September 1, and saw the first day of the last year of his life.

He had always known there was a world outside Hogwarts. In all his years there the outside world was like a legend, a myth. A scary story to frighten you until you left the lamps burning at night beside your bed. But now…now, it was all too tangible, and he was more frightened by it than any nighttime fear could cause.

Come time, the years would pass and he would wake to find himself the cold old man atop the hill, with the ministry job and the trophy wife, both which he had never loved. He would have that son, the one you knew you would grow up despising. That snobbish, spoiled prat of a son that he feared to confront.

All would come fluttering down.

Enough walking. He stood on the edge of Malfoy land- he hadn't realized he had come so far, where a line of evergreens stood sentinel and marked the end of propriety and the entrance to the Muggle world. Several meters from this line was a different tree, this one old and grand, towering brilliantly above him, and attached to its ample trunk was a box. Portkeys were distributed strategically about the grounds contained within these simple boxes, for emergencies and Draco's own convenience. He withdrew the galleon tucked within and felt himself yanked into some magic's control.

The heat was simply unbearable, like summer temperatures taken to the worst possible degree and multiplied. The foyer was in flames. As Draco appeared, falling to his knees and feeling them jolt on the marble, his sight caught on a family portrait wreathed in orange licks of fire and spread, horrified, from there. Everything- the curving oak stairwell was an arc of fire sidling down from the upper story, the roses his mother had put out this morning were already burned away and smoking heavily. He could not breath, he could not think, and he had lunged for the doorknob to escape when his father stumbled in.

"Save me!" he shrieked. Draco could only stare, his father's robes burning across his shoulders and back. "Help, Draco, save me! Save me- my Lord, he was angry- Draco!" His blackened fingers curled around the hem of his robes, leaving a trail of charcoal. "Please! He has cast a spell, I cannot leave the house!-," Horror, the horror, his skin of his face burned away and his eyes- oh, his eyes, red like a demon's, red and tearing and…

Run.

Run, get out, "Get away from me!"

"Draco!" His words slurred into one continuous scream. His hair had begun burning. Draco tried to pry his hands away, the fingers of his other hand working the doorknob in desperation. The ceiling was on fire, with its ornate beams blazing and the gold trim clattering down around them as the woodwork burned away. The door was open- the air was clear outside. His father still clutched at him so that he could not escape and run, ignore that feeling of obligation and the smoke so heavy and so suffocating and so desolate-

"Get off! Bloody hell, get off me!" He kicked disdainfully as if uncaring, while the fear and the agony simmered excruciatingly within him; Father screamed, pawing at his burning face. The heavy beams began to fall. Get out, get out, what the hell are you doing in here, get off-

The sleeve of his left arm caught fire from his father's hair. Screaming, screeching, so loud and so, so horrible, help, let go of me, get off, peel away your dirty, dirty hands, screaming as if he was being tortured at the gates of hell, an endless struggle. He pulled desperately away, crawling for the door just out of reach.

"Avada Kedavra!" His father fell limp as Draco lowered his wand, the screams sinking down his throat and finding refuge in the silent thing that had been his cold heart. Draco's own screams echoed, and he ran, ran, ran and cascaded down the steps. Hell, bloody hell, and he was the devil, the wand in his hand smoldering. The Manor, flames lighting every window, was bizarre and oddly beautiful, reminding him of candlelight.

There was no snow to make the horror hiss away in steam.

There were no words to heal his burns.

There was only the Dark Mark, invisible in a cloak of haze.