Here I stand before the men
Who will soon decide my fate
The room is cold, despite the heat
They glare at this dirt below their feet
The good, the brave, the righteous
Calling, lusting for my blood
I plead my case, but now I'm tired
No one cares, no one ever did
They could never see the truth I hid
Now, when the time has come,
I ask for their trust and mercy
They have none to waste
On anyone like me.



~Chapter Two~

Draco Malfoy. 1987-2004. Sixteen years old. He too had died mere days from his birthday. Unlike Cho's funeral there had not been inconsolable weeping family members. There had been no shocked friends, confronted with the reality of death. There had been no one at all.

He remembered the day after Malfoy had been cast out. He had wanted to go and tell them that they'd been wrong, that it was all an accident and it was his fault. He hadn't though, he'd been too afraid. He'd been afraid of loosing his friends, afraid of hurting his family, afraid of ending up like Malfoy. He too had never been to the muggle world; he knew he'd never last. And so he had kept silent. He was unworthy of his house.

A four years later the final war had begun. Many had died, many of his friends and many of his enemies. And many people who he thought were enemies, but helped win the war. Harry had died defeating Voldemort, as he always knew he would. Dumbledore had died soon after, having spent all of his energy helping make that possible. Snape had been discovered and executed. His father had been killed along with many other ministry members. So many deaths, one forgotten boy meant little.

Somehow Dumbledore's pensieve had come into his possession. He had looked at it curiously and found himself falling into a memory. It was Malfoy's trial. He watched as they dragged the blonde boy in and sat him before the gamit. He shivered under their cold gazes.

"Draco Malfoy, you are being charged with murder in the first degree. How do you plead?" A tall dark haired witch inquired.

"M-m-murder?" The boy repeated unbelievingly. "But, I never did anything like-I couldn't-" He broke off, unable to think clearly.

The woman frowned. "How do you plead?" She repeated impatiently.

"I, uh, i-innocent! I'm innocent!" He declared loudly, and then started as if the volume of his reply startled him.

"Indeed. Mr. Tiggle, will you please present the evidence?" The witch addressed a small, balding man who nodded and stood up.

"Exhibit Number One" He pulled out the mediwitch's report. "Cause of death, consumption of a deadly poison, namely heart break potion. This is a very difficult potion to brew; only someone very skilled at potions could brew this. Mr. Malfoy at the top of his class in this particular subject. He is very capable of brewing said potion."

"Exhibit Two, time of death" He said indicating it upon the report. "Mr. Malfoy's dorm mates report that he was in fact, not in bed at the time."

" Other evidence includes the well-known animosity between Mr. Malfoy and Harry Potter. Due to several articles in the Daily Prophet, Mr. Potter's infatuation with the deceased is well known. It is highly plausible that Mr. Malfoy killed this poor girl in an attempt to wound Mr. Potter emotionally."

The small man having presented his evidence took his seat. Another man stood up. This man had close cropped coal black hair and a frown upon his face that seemed to indicate he was not happy to be here.

"Exhibit One is moot. No one saw Mr. Malfoy brew the potion and the ingredients have not been discovered in his possession. There are also several others with the ability to brew this potion; Professor Snape the potion's master, Madame Pomphrey the school nurse, and Hermione Granger close second to Mr. Malfoy in the class."

Mr. Tiggle's counter to this was that Snape testified to not brewing the potion in years, Madame Pomphrey's potion knowledge generally ran to healing brews and antidotes, while having extensive knowledge of harmful brews, she herself has never made one; and Hermione Granger had an alibi and has been the perfect student for six years.

" Mr. Malfoy though in possession of a slightly troublesome record has never physically attacked anyone."

Mr. Tiggle brought up the incident in which he had brought out his wand to curse Harry in his fourth year, conveniently leaving out the fact that he was provoked.

The trial continued, all his past altercations with the Trio were brought up. The fact that it was childish rivalry was not important to Tiggle. The fact that he had been rather subdued this year was also ignored. In the end, the evidence had been too circumstantial and no conviction could be made. However, Tiggle had argued that there was enough suspicion that he should be expelled from Hogwarts. The gamit had agreed whole-heartedly, eager to weed out this troublesome death-eater spawn. They chose a much stronger punishment. Banishment.

Malfoy had pleaded with them. He told them he was in the library at the time. But as he'd snuck in after curfew without any witnesses this was cast aside. He told them how he'd matured this year, he hadn't had one fight, and he hadn't even called anyone a name this year. That was all schoolyard squabbles. He'd never given anything they couldn't take and they'd always gotten him back. He was no different then their precious Gryffindors. These claims were all met with derisive laughter. They had dragged him out protesting all the way. And that was where the memory ended.

The former Gryffindor shook his head. All of Malfoy's claims had been true. He really was not much worse then they had been. They'd never treated him as anything better than scum and he'd acted that way. Years later upon reflection, he had realized the Malfoy had acted as he did for a reason. He'd mirrored his father in hopes of winning his love, but upon discovering his father had no love to give, he had grown a bit nastier in his fifth year. After that summer though, with his father not present he had been given time to think for himself apparently. In fact, he had seemed to mature quite a bit that year, he wasn't running out to play big brother to first years or anything, but he'd defiantly mellowed.

Truly, though, it was not right what they had done. Hermione was just as good at potions, but she was not even suspect. They had found Malfoy and stopped looking even before they found any kind of 'evidence.' They would have never been so close-minded with a Gryffindor, or a Hufflepuff, or even a Ravenclaw. Slytherin however, was a different story. All the students in that house were nasty, vile, and cruel. That's why all the other houses tried their best not to associate with any of them. Now he realized that this treatment is exactly what made them act the way they did. People looked at them with disgust without getting to know them. Who wouldn't be bitter? He didn't even know what most of them were really like; he'd never even tried actually talking to a Slytherin. He frowned sadly thinking of the spies who'd put their lives on the line. Voldemort had never even suspected, most of the Order hadn't either. He remembered the agonized cries that had floated through the air towards their camp one night as Voldemort had tortured one of these traitors to the dark. They had to die to get the respect of the good guys.

If only they'd listened sooner, they could have spared more lives. They could have converted more lost souls. Their prejudice had blinded them. It was far too late for ifs.



A/N : Thanks to my one reviewer : ) I hope this is much easier to read, it certainly wasn't one block paragraph when I wrote it. I'm still trying to figure out format on FFN. This poem's by me, it's temp. title is "Blood" Please don't copy cause it's my shortest poem yet and I'm really proud. : )