Draco
Malfoy Manor
March 1998
Draco and Narcissa kept a brisk pace as they trekked in the direction of Bellatrix's cackles.
"Come identify your classmates Draco!" Bellatrix bellowed out in a sing song cadence, which only caused the hairs on Draco's arm to rise.
He was about to turn the corner when Theo came into view, blocking him from his path.
"Theo move," Draco's rasped out in a frenzied way.
Theo cast Narcissa a knowing look, to which she nodded and proceeded ahead. Draco tried pushing himself forward with his mother, but Theo would not let him pass.
Draco's hand shot to his wand holster, ready to cast unforgivables if necessary.
"Can you handle yourself in there?" Theo asked, keeping his voice measured and calm. Draco took a shallow breath, only then realizing that he had not been breathing.
"You won't be doing anyone any favors if you don't get your shit under control, right now." Theo told Draco, his command domineering.
Draco nodded curtly, and took another breath. Theo was right. Draco was blinded by fear and fury. If he didn't manage his emotions, he could not handle the situation.
"Bella isn't calling for me or Pansy. We're going to hang back, but will be close by to help. Just call for us."
If it wasn't for the perpetual chest crushing panic Draco felt in that moment, he would have been properly touched by the loyalty of his friends.
Theo, finally, stepped aside and let Draco proceed to the atrium.
The young Death Eater did his best to pace his steps casually. With each stride, he forced a strangled breath into his lungs begrudgingly, wishing he did not need air.
It would be indefensible to fail at this point. He had spent the better part of a year cultivating the image of the perfect Death Eater, doing everything in his power to be in the right rooms, to be acceptable to the right people, in order to be present when it counted if she were to ever be caught.
Draco took another steadying breath. Seeing her would be an immeasurable shock to his system, one he would need to brace for. He needed to be a cold granite slate of indifference.
"Dracoooooo" Bella called again, her piercing voice clawing at his skin as he turned the corner to the atrium.
He trained his attention on his Aunt alone, but took in a cursory peripheral analysis of what was going on in the room.
In the center of the grand atrium was a pile of what looked to be three bodies. Bellatrix was pacing back and forth in front of the heap, twirling her wand in her right hand, giving a skip to her step periodically. She was beaming at their luck at finding Potter (hypothetically).
Behind Bellatrix stood a menacing group of snatchers, and to Draco's horror, Fenir Greyback, the brutal werewolf. Draco honed in on Fenir for a moment longer to confirm that his menacing gaze was fixed on the witch in the middle of the heap. It took everything in him to slow his heart rate. If Fenir so much as twitched in Hermione's direction, he would not hesitate to act.
Over to the side of the room was his mother. Narcissa was a blank slate; showing not an ounce of emotion in any one direction.
Standing next to Narcissa was her opposite: Wormtail. A body in constant motion, eyes flickering like there was a short circuit in his brain. But then again, that was how he always behaved.
"Bellatrix," Draco called out coolly as he neared his aunt. Out of the corner of his eye, down in the heap, he could already feel her warm brown eyes on him.
He nearly caved, but caught himself in time and kept his mind on Bellatrix. There would be a time he could look at her, but not now.
"Draco…" Bellatrix began, her chest heaving up and down, mouth open slightly, panting out quick excited pants. "I think we have Potter!"
"Think?" he questioned dismissively, sowing doubt in Bellatrix's resolve. "That doesn't inspire confidence Bella"
Her eyes bulged. She abruptly approached Draco, dragging his arm to position him in front of the captives.
"Something's wrong with his face, but you'll be able to identify him, right?" the crazed witch questioned him. She wagged her hand before the group, imploring that Draco look.
His attention moved to a wizard with messy brown hair in front of him.
The face was nearly unrecognizable; it was puffed so round that their eyes were almost completely obstructed, and the skin puckered in a painful looking way. Like a dozen bees had stung him directly on the face.
Even so, Draco knew immediately the wizard before him was Potter.
Draco took a breath while rolling his eyes, intending to enhance the doubt festering in Bellatrix's chest.
"I can't positively identify him," Draco remarked, gesturing towards Harry. "I've never seen Potter look like this"
"Well obviously," Bellatrix grunted impatiently, pulling Draco closer to the mangled face. "They must have done something to disfigure him!"
One of the Death Eaters or Snatchers, Draco couldn't tell anymore, and did not care, stepped forward.
"It's true. The witch with them cast a stinging jinx. We checked her wand!" The Death Eater reported proudly, looking for praise for the forethought at casting priori incantatem.
Draco's mouth pressed flat, hiding his anger. Why was it his fucking luck that the normally brain dead group of snatchers and Death Eaters turned one up that had a functioning brain cell on this day, of all days?
A new awareness tugged at him.
He couldn't fight it off, but he felt his heart ache. It was Hermione who cast the jinx. And of course it was her. Who else but her would have enough wits about them, while being chased at that, to disguise Potter to avoid him being successfully identified.
It took everything in him to not find her face among the bodies.
Draco rolled his neck and looked back at Bellatrix.
"You can call the Dark Lord if you like, but I will not identify whatever this is as Potter. You deal with his wrath if you're wrong."
Beads of sweat pooled at Bellatrix's forehead, her overall complexion giving the impression she may even faint.
"But what about these two," Bellatrix pressed, her voice rising an octave in desperation.
"What about them?" Draco cast off flippantly all while refusing to look at who she was gesturing at.
"The red head is obviously a Weasley," Bellatrix snarled. "And this is clearly the mudblood bitch Potter has been dragging around."
He couldn't move his body. His chest was contracting in on itself.
"Just look, it's obviously them!" she screamed as the essence of her concerning powerful magic shook the room involuntarily.
He turned his head away from Bellatrix, skipped Weasley all together, and looked at her.
All he could do was dig his fingernails into his palms to not lose control once her honeyed eyes met his. He knew that every second he let himself drink her in, he stepped closer and closer to the edge of abandoning all sound judgment, killing nearly every living soul in the room, and absconding with her until she was finally some place safe.
But he held himself at bay. Not only because acting in such a way would jeopardize his ability to save her without collateral damage, but because he knew he had to be the type of man who could solve his problems without killing. He had to be good enough for Granger.
He was inspecting her for too long, but the longer he looked, the more difficult it was to tear himself away. The eyes staring back at him were confused, like she was working out a riddle in her deeper sub-consciousness.
Sadly, but with some relief, Draco could confirm she no longer looked at him in the same way.
Draco finally moved on, staring briefly at Weasley for good measure, who had his head cast down, and then back to Bellatrix.
"I can't be sure" Draco finally provided, but it lacked the edge it had before. He knew he was getting sloppy. He was wavering and letting emotions bleed through his stony exterior.
In a moment of weakness, his eyes flickered for the briefest of seconds back to Granger, and then back onto his aunt.
Bellatrix stared at him, long and hard, her wand mindlessly twisting between her fingers. Her eyes shifted to Granger, and then back to him.
Fuck.
Shit.
"Wasn't this the mudblood that you were rumored to have been with last year?" Bellatrix questioned, using a tone that was both menacing and laced with disgust.
He steadied himself, setting his face with a profoundly bored expression.
"A rumor that grown adults indulged in regarding students still at Hogwarts?" Draco clashed back, infusing his tone with malice. "Yes, there was a rumor, one created by school children that was unequivocally false."
Bellatrix's black eyes continued to bore their way into Draco's as she worked something over in her mind. Subtly, his hand moved at a minuscule pace towards his wand. The air in the room had shifted.
Narcissa cleared her throat. Draco and Bellatrix snapped their attention to her, shattering the building tension.
"I think what would be wise is to get an anti-swelling salve to apply to this persons face so we can properly identify them before making any rash decision," Narcissa offered calmly.
Draco nodded, perhaps too eagerly. Bellatrix looked at Potter once again, then back at Narcissa, and then finally back to Draco.
"Draco, go fetch some salve," Bellatrix waved off her nephew, immediately turning her back to him.
With his Aunt's back to him, and the other Death Eaters distracted with their fear of Bellatrix, he chanced one more look at Hermione.
She was watching him, her eyes hungry for answers and swimming with confusion. He couldn't understand the depth of that look, and worried momentarily that perhaps the actions they took the year prior to keep her safe were not effective.
Then, her look transformed into something bordering on disgust. And despite it all, he breathed a sigh of relief that their plan may have worked as he excused himself from the atrium.
Draco made quick work of getting to a medicine cupboard to secure some salve (which was a cooling salve that he transfigured to read as an anti-swelling salve), then sprinted in the direction of his room for the port keys.
With his door secured shut, he approached his desk. Ducking down, he cast a spell on a flush section of wall that lifted away to expose a ridge that could be pulled back.
His fingers fumbled against the leverage of the secret spot. The panic was mostly contained, but his body protested in small movements.
Finally latching onto the edge, he yanked it back only for his body to go subzero.
Where there should have been a black velvet pouch was nothingness.
"Fuck!" Draco yelled, pulling himself out from under the desk, now looking around his room frantically.
"Draco"
His arm was already poised in front of him, his wand rigid in the direction of the sound. Once his eyes focused, he found that it was his father standing in his entry way.
"Father?" Draco called out, his voice sounding small in a way it always did when he spoke to the Malfoy patriarch.
Lucius stepped in from the doorway, his frail body looking as if it was on the verge of collapse. He shut the door behind him before speaking.
"I destroyed the port keys," his father said with voice thin with fatigue. Draco tried to appear placid at the insinuation, but Lucius shook his head. "Draco, I know about them. Your mother told me back when she gave them to you."
Draco's whole body stiffened.
"I don't know why or how you're using them, but I can suspect it has to do with your keen involvement in the muggle program," Lucius took a step into Draco's room, bringing himself to the back of an armchair and steadying his balance against it.
"Bellatrix has been suspicious of how you are managing the apprehended muggles. I got rid of them earlier today. I didn't want her finding anything to hold against you."
Still, absolutely still. Draco refused to let his body react.
Lucius stared at his son with a look that Draco couldn't comprehend. The room and his head were absolutely spinning but he retained his focal point amongst the chaos. He had to get back to the atrium to make sure nothing happened to Granger.
"Draco…" Lucius spoke hoarsely, which centered Draco's darting eyes. "I'm…so sorry. "
For a second, the Malfoy heir thought he had been hit with a stunning spell. Draco shifted uncomfortably under the gaze of his father.
"I never wanted this to be your life" Lucius continued, his eyes looking watery, now unable to hold Draco's confused look. "I failed you"
Draco's voice had escaped him, not to mention that the room felt devoid of any oxygen. His hand that had been tense around his wand, readying it against his father if he stood in his way, felt loose to the point of nearly falling through his fingers.
"Father…" Draco finally croaked out. He didn't know what to say. His mind was reeling.
Draco took a step towards him, but Lucius put a trembling hand up.
"Please do not say anything. My occlumency is not what it used to be," Lucius voice cracked with emotion. "I can see you've made a choice to do something good. And you are a far better man than I will ever be for doing it."
Before Draco could say or do anything, Lucius turned, opened the door, and walked away. He was again alone in his room.
Draco's hand shot out to his desk, steadying his precarious balance.
For the majority of his life, nothing mattered more to Draco than his father's approval. It wasn't until a year prior that he ever made a choice that reflected his values, what he wanted. A choice he knew would discount him from ever achieving what he craved from his father. But it didn't matter. Granger was all that mattered.
Yet somehow, doing precisely the opposite of what Draco would have expected his father to admire, earned what looked like respect.
He sucked in a ragged breath, which hardly helped in lowering his racing heart rhythm, and turned to hurry back to the atrium. He needed a new plan.
Draco's pace slowed as he approached the entryway to the atrium, reminding his body to act indifferent and nonplussed. But as his steps slowed, the deafening silence that replaced the previous soft murmurs from the open room felt like sirens in his ears.
Barging through the door, he found a room dimly lit by torches, with not a person in sight.
He calmed his panic and went to the next place he thought they would be: The Dungeons.
Having descended the stairs two a time, all while preparing himself for whatever may await him on the other side of the doors, Draco pried open the several inch thick wooden door and was thrown back at the calamity of the situation before him.
There were near constant shouts that he couldn't distinguish. Wormtail was there, shifting uncomfortably on his feet by the bars of the holding cell, yelling at times for the prisoners to be quiet, looking overwhelmed by the authority he had over the charges.
To his left was Theo. His friend anchored Draco's eyes momentarily, sending a signal of warning.
There were more occupants in the cell from earlier in the day. The energy had changed as well. Those behind the bars were uneasy and displaying sheer panic.
Weasley was shuffling back and forth at the bars, screaming bloody murder into the ceiling. Draco couldn't make out what he was saying though. Potter, now more identifiable with his swelling reduced, also paced back and forth, though less aggressively than Weasley.
When Potter saw Draco, he stopped in his tracks and locked eyes with him. Luna, Dean and Ollivander were standing alert, off to the side.
Luna's face was uncharacteristically somber, Draco thought.
Where was Hermione?
His eyes scanned the back of the cell, then around the room. Hermione was no where to be found.
His eyes went back to Theo who nodded towards Wormtail, and then angled his head back up and out of the dungeon, like something was happening outside the room.
Without a second consideration, Draco grabbed his wand, pointed it at Wormtail and cast "Imerio"
Ron was startled enough to cease his screaming for a blissful fraction of a moment to allow for Draco to properly set the Imerio curse which set Wormtail off in the direction of his father. It was the first, and only thing he could think of.
Wormtail turned, and left the dungeon. At which point, Ron began screaming again but this time, he was able to hear him say over and over again, "Don't hurt her"
Draco turned hurriedly to Theo who was already in front of Draco, trying to steady him.
"Bellatrix took Hermione. They just brought up the Goblin too." Theo explained quickly. "When you left Bellatrix she discovered they had the Sword of Gryffindor."
Draco's body was already moving towards the exit when Theo turned him back.
"You need a plan, what's the plan?" Theo held Draco by the shoulders, but Draco wasn't looking at him. He was trying to move away.
"I'm going to kill them all," Draco mumbled, again trying to break away. Theo held him tight, this time shaking him.
"Draco don't be stupid," Theo sounded panicked as he tried to shake sense into his friend.
Then, a blood curdling scream tore through the Manor, reaching even the depths of the dungeons.
His entire body felt as if it ceased to exist. He was crumbling around Theo's touch. His eyes began to burn fiercely, and as he heard Ron's screams, he wanted to add to the chorus.
"Draco!" Theo shouted, his voice shaky with consternation. But he couldn't see anything, other than red. Theo gripped his shoulders and convulsed him. "Draco!"
Draco shook his head, the blood still coursing through his veins painfully, as if he was being burned from the inside.
Draco twitched his head to the side.
He needed to save her.
Malfoys could apparate from within the Manor. It was the only option.
Just then, a crack sounded from the holding sell.
They all stilled and looked at the tiny figure which appeared out of thin air, now standing in the middle of the cell.
"Dobby is here to help Harry Potter!" called the tiny, eager voice. Draco immediately recognized his old house elf.
House elves had different powers than witches and wizards. Draco knew this because in their stolen moments alone, Granger would attempt to indoctrinate him into her ways of thinking on house elf rights. He would give his left leg to have her lecture him just once more about House Elves.
"Dobby how did you find us?" Harry questioned breathlessly, rushing back from the bars to the center of the cell where Dobby stood.
"Harry Potter asked for help, and so I came!" Dobby answered.
"Dobby, can you take people out of here?" Harry rushed out. Draco had moved towards the bars and was paying apt attention to the conversation.
"I believe so!" "Dobby nodded emphatically.
"Harry have Dobby go up and get Hermione now!" Ron demanded, nearly shoving Harry with his urgency.
But then Harry looked at Draco.
"Malfoy" Harry addressed him, his eyes honed on a former enemy. "What is the best way to do this?"
"Harry!" Ron yelped. "Don't trust him!"
Harry's attention on Draco did not falter.
Draco hated everything about Potter. Hated his undeserved fame, the fact that he wasn't even that good of a seeker yet everyone gave him so much credit for being one of the best, and more than anything, for making Hermione Granger solve all of his problems.
But Draco could tell in that moment that Harry knew something that Draco thought he shouldn't.
For whatever reason, Harry Potter seemed to trust Hermione's life with Draco.
"I can apparate out," Draco told Potter. He nodded for him to go on. "Have Dobby take everyone out from down here."
Ron screamed, "Send Dobby to get Hermione!"
"No," Draco answered coldly. "It's too dangerous," it looked like Ron was going to chastise Draco for being cowardly, but continued, "For Dobby"
Ron looked as if he was choking on his own words.
Draco looked back to Potter, and because the Chosen One seemed to know something, he risked divulging why he wouldn't risk Dobby's life, "Granger would never forgive me if I sent a house elf to die for her."
Harry gave Draco a laconic nod, and he could see Harry was doing all he could to center his own reeling emotions.
Before Draco could even consider the fate of his Mother, of his friends, Theo stepped in.
"Go. Narcissa, Pansy and I can handle it," Theo spoke sincerely to Draco, letting a lightness linger in his voice.
"You're staying back?" Draco asked pointedly. Theo nodded at Draco, then looked over to Luna whose eyes were swimming.
"We don't have a plan for me to leave…" Theo started, Draco ready to interrupt to understand what he meant by 'plan', but Theo went on. "Draco we don't have time. I'm fine, but you have to go. You're the only one that can apparate out of here, other than apparently house elves and we don't have time to organize the Manor elves."
Draco's face steadied. Theo's expression was strong and unbreakable.
"Theo," it came from a voice that was too soft for the current surroundings. Luna was huddled up against the bars, her whole body gravitating towards where Theo stood.
"I'm sorry Luna, I can't go right now," he said moving against her, his voice cracking in heartbreak.
Luna, nodded. Her features seemed to glow with pure adoration.
In a fluid movement, Theo guided Luna's small face to his, still with bars separating them, taking a tender kiss.
Draco looked away, attempting to use breathing to calm him.
But that was shattered when Hermoine's screams tore through the dungeon, leaving his nerve endings raw and ready to fire out haphazardly.
"Potter," Draco roared out, "we need to go now. I can apparate all five of us. Don't tell me where we're going, just focus on it and I'll be able to take us there."
Another scream. They were coming too quickly and terror was wracking every last bit of Draco's resolve.
Draco tried to steady the violent shake of his hand. "Pretend you overpowered us. Disarm me to give reasonable doubt if this goes sideways," Draco rattled out quickly while opening the gate with a set of keys. He couldn't risk alohomora on a wand that could be checked.
When Potter did not move to take his wand after being ushered out of the cell, Draco continued on brashly.
"Bellatrix is already suspicious of me, she'll go after Granger to get me to break if she has any more reason. You need to disarm me!"
"OK," Harry finally answer, giving no indication he thought it odd that Hermione could be used as leverage to get him to crack.
Now standing awkwardly in front of Draco, Harry reached out and took the outstretched wand, taking it as his own.
Theo dug into the satchel across his chest and tossed a spare wand to Draco, and another one more reluctantly to Weasley. He discarded the bag choosing to go wandless into the fight.
Another scream, and what was left of Draco's good will to not murder was crumbling.
"We need to go now," Draco spat out fiercely. And with that, Harry took a position behind Draco and Ron behind Theo, and they began to scale the steps from the dungeon.
They reentered the atrium, which was still completely void of any life. A fresh soul crushing scream of Hermione's bounced off the echoey walls. It was coming from the Drawing Room. Draco moved them quickly in that direction.
"Why did you trust me?" Draco chanced in asking Potter, casting a look over his shoulder to Potter who was on his heels. A part of Draco felt suspicious at the immediate trust paid to him by a rival.
Harry gave Draco a meaningful look as they moved ahead. "Because I know you love her."
Draco's eyes screwed up, working to understand how he could have possibly known this. Potter wasn't on either his or Granger's radar as being a liability to their plan. He shouldn't know anything close to the truth.
Granger curdled screams shocked Draco's system once more. Her voice had become faint and more anguished.
"Bella may start firing immediately," Draco warned just before going in, his hand tightening into a fist at his sides, leaving his contraband wand strategically out of site, only there to power his upcoming apparition of five individuals. Potter gave him an appreciative nod.
Outside the doors of the drawing room, the four wizards looked at eachother, and without another word, burst through the doors.
In the middle of the room was Granger, his witch, lying in a lifeless heap at the feet of his psychotic aunt.
Taking quick stock of the situation, Draco saw the goblin was just meters away from where the two witches were, with a huddled mass of Death Eaters in the corner watching with glee at the proceedings. His mother was standing off to the side, looking deathly pale.
With the sound of their entrance, Bellatrix did exactly as Draco had expected, and fired off a spell in their direction, likely having no clue who it was aimed at.
What Draco hadn't anticipated was for that spell to be Avada Kreveda.
The green orb soared so closely over Potter and Draco's shoulder that there was a moment where Draco accepted that this was it and he was about to die. His eyes flicked desperately to Hermione's form sprawled on the ground, hoping to end his life with a moment of peace.
Potter, to his credit though, was nimble as he ducked away from the spell, and pushed Draco the other direction, saving them both from death. With the other Death Eaters now alert, the room exploded in haphazard spells of red and green.
Draco had to get Granger, Potter, the Goblin, and begrudgingly Weasley out of there. But before he could do anything, his line of sight caught Bellatrix lifting Hermione's limp body into a chokehold, placing the tip of a blade against his witch's neck.
It bellowed out of him before he could stop it.
"Bellatrix NO!"
Draco's wand was drawn, the cross hairs aimed precisely at his Aunt's head. Bellatrix had been focused was on another part of the room where Potter was causing bedlam, but after Draco's cry, her attention was piqued and turned to face him.
His aunt's eyes widened until they bulged. Draco's wand trained on his own blood, a pureblood, was enough as an admission of guilt as she would need to ruin him and his family's life.
Before anything could happen though, a stunning spell bounced off Bellatrix's shoulder, shaking Hermione loose from her grips.
Draco fisted a handful of peruvian darkness powder the moment he saw the opening. Throwing the powder at the center of the room, an explosion of darkeness rippled out from the point of impact.
With no visibility, Draco bee lined for the mass in the middle of the floor that he knew to be Granger's. As soon as he was there, he cradled her gently in his arms, her body though, was completely limp. A swell of dread bloomed fiercely.
Burning wetness was pooling at his eyes as he tried to bring his face close enough to see hers in the absolute darkness.
He let her die. The one good thing in this fucking world, he let it die.
His body began to quake as the despair and agony took hold of him.
But then, her body stirred faintly in his arms, and Draco could see through the darkness that her eyes open a fraction. He had moved his face close enough to see that her features showed life.
"Draco?" she coughed, looking disoriented from her position.
Then, Harry's body slammed into Draco under their cover of darkness.
"Go!" Harry roared. Draco had to trust that Harry had everything he needed to leave. Draco had the singular thing that mattered to him.
In a crouched position, Draco turned just enough to apparate them away from Malfoy Manor, focusing wholly on the destination in Potter's mind.
From that point forward, there was no going back. Draco had to trust that Theo and Narcissa could handle the fallout. He couldn't let himself fall apart about it.
As they spun, Draco grasped Hermione against his chest, vowing that he would never let her go again. And he knew, that whatever happened next, it was going to be OK. Because he was finally back with her.