Draco Malfoy and the Disownment Project
Chapter Eleven
Disclaimer: See Chapter One
A tangible sense of House unity had overtaken the Slytherins. Banding together under a common goal and with the leadership of Draco Malfoy, the Housemates were living in a harmony they had never known. They had all helped each other out before, of course, as one of the earliest lessons a Slytherin learned was to stick together. Whenever someone was in need, another member of the House could always be found to help. Despite this bond, however, peace and rapport were two things that were rarely found in their dungeons. Slytherins loved a good drama, and they delivered it whenever they could.
They were all feeling the change. Not a single squabble broke out among them. They were contented, at least for the moment, to enjoy the friendship they had with one another, and to do what they did best—plot to bring the enemy down.
Draco, unsurprisingly, was their hero. He was their leader and the face of their cause. Blaise was held in very high regards, as well. Even Theodore Nott was being hailed for his 'self-sacrifice.' Draco was tempted to spread vicious gossip about Nott and his Hufflepuff girlfriend, but Blaise forbade it. She had put Nott under her special protection, and as she phrased it, "Theo, you and your sweetheart can write love letters until you both die of sappiness. I'll see to it that no one will ever find out."
As was usual, however, there was a dark spot on his otherwise luminescent horizon. A part of him felt bad that he was essentially feeding his Housemates a falsity. It was an extraordinarily tiny part of him, but it was there nonetheless. Yes, it was one of Draco's plans to drag Gryffindor House through the mud and tarnish their reputations, but it wasn't as much of a priority to him as Blaise had made it seem. When he confided this to her, she merely smiled.
"Well, Draco," she said, "I have to commend you—this way of thinking will make your Gryffindor infiltration much easier."
"Are you saying I think like a Gryffindor?"
She folded her arms.
"Draco, you're arguing ethics. Is that something a Slytherin does?"
Draco looked at her, dismayed.
"Good Lord!" he cried. "What am I becoming?"
"No, no, this is good," Blaise insisted. "Though I must admit that the fact that you're feeling remorse about anything, particularly lying, is sort of staggering."
She urged him to forget his conscience for the moment (not a hard task, to be entirely truthful), and remember what he had in front of him. He had to admit things were looking wonderful now that his House was on his side. Besides, their strange brand of enthusiasm was infectious. Every time Draco had even the slightest bit of Gryffindor interaction, the Slytherins practically went into fits of rapture.
The interaction was becoming almost disturbingly frequent. Lavender in particular was going out of her way to talk to Draco, and to his profound surprise, other Gryffindors were following suit. Parvati, though she still surveyed him with suspicion, had expressed thanks (not to mention thorough bewilderment) for Draco's behavior handling the fight Theodore Nott had picked with Seamus. The insufferable Irishman's best friend, Dean Thomas, had also approached Draco with words of gratitude. But perhaps the most surprising of all was the attention Draco was now getting from Seamus himself. It was as if the torture he had given the Gryffindors in years of yore was now long forgotten. Seamus was almost absurdly appreciative of Draco's heroic actions.
"You saved my life," he said earnestly. "I'm indebted to you, Draco. I don't know how I'll ever repay you!"
"Oh, it was nothing," Draco said breezily, though this answer was apparently, in Lavender's words, both 'humble and noble,' and brought him even more Gryffindor recognition.
Through some bizarre shift in perception, Draco was now being hailed as something of a hero in the eyes of many Gryffindors—something Harry Potter found intolerable.
"I can't believe you!" he shrieked when Seamus and Dean returned to the Gryffindor table one day at lunch. They had just come from visiting Draco. The social call had been quite beneficial to Draco, who had received a slice of pie from Dean and a Ballycastle Bats badge from Seamus. "Malfoy is our enemy! He's been our enemy since day one! Just because he lost his mind for a moment doesn't make him a good person!"
"Calm down, Harry," said Parvati soothingly. "You're going to give yourself a coronary."
Blaise, who had been listening to the exchange with a malicious glint in her eye, sauntered over to the Gryffindor table.
"It's all right, Harry," she cooed, throwing an arm around his shoulders. "I'll make it better."
Potter's eyes went wider than Draco had ever seen them. It was as if Blaise was really the Dark Lord, coming for his soul, instead of a slightly diminutive schoolgirl. He stiffened noticeably and shrugged off her arm as his Gryffindor peers stifled sniggers at his reaction. By now, Potter looked apoplectic with rage.
Blaise returned to the Slytherin table, collecting friendly back slaps and words of praise as she went. Draco, however, was not amused.
"What is your Potter preoccupation?" he snapped.
"Ah," Blaise said. "You must be unusually angry to be using alliteration."
"This isn't a joke, Blaise. You have some sick fascination with that boy."
"Once again, Draco, I must point out that for six years you did the same thing."
"I did many things, but I never once cooed in Potter's ear."
"Which is a good thing, because you'd never live it down. And you know what I meant."
Draco stabbed at his meal with unnecessary vehemence.
"Oh come on," Blaise said. "The opportunity was too good to miss."
Draco merely gave a righteous sniff.
"I don't have time for your frenzies, you know," said Blaise loftily.
"I am not in a frenzy."
Blaise looked at him, biting the inside of her cheek. She wore that infuriating 'trying to keep from laughing' look again.
"Really, though!" said Draco. "Why must you do things like that?"
"It's fun," said Blaise simply. "What's your problem?"
"Nothing," said Draco moodily. "Nothing. I have no problem whatsoever."
"Did you run out of shampoo or something? Did you have to borrow Goyle's?"
"No," said Draco.
"Did Pansy try sitting on your lap again?"
"Thank the heavens, she did not."
"I'm not going to wheedle any longer then," she said unconcernedly. "If you're going to be stubborn, so be it."
"If you must know," said Draco irritably, "my character died."
Blaise looked at him blankly.
"Your what?"
Draco heaved a long-suffering sigh. "My character, remember? In the book you borrowed from Pansy? The character that was originally named Harry and you said to just charm his name to read 'Draco' from now on?"
Blaise nodded in comprehension, then laughed.
"Guess you shouldn't have switched the names around then."
"It was a rather stupid suggestion, actually," glowered Draco.
Blaise laughed some more, then turned to talk to Nott.
Draco ate the remainder of his meal in what he thought was a dignified silence.
They had the rest of the day off to do as they pleased. Blaise informed him that she was going to finish her homework, and she sidled off to somewhere; he presumed she was going to the common room. He didn't have any plans, so he thought he'd go to the library to finish his reading—he wanted a new, less gruesome book from Pansy.
He was disrupted though, when, upon entering the library, a group of Gryffindors waved him over to where they were sitting. Seamus and Lavender in particular were looking thrilled. Dean looked vaguely intrigued and Parvati kept shooting worried looks at Potter, who was sitting beside her. Potter was scowling at his parchment. Ron Weasley, who was sitting beside him, was torn between trying to calm his best friend down and arguing with the bushy-headed know-it-all Granger.
"Over here, Draco!" whispered Seamus. "Come on, we'll make room!"
He shoved Dean off his chair and offered it to Draco. Draco accepted it with a small smile at Lavender. Dean had to get a chair from the other side of the library.
"What do you want?" Potter asked suddenly.
"Nothing," said Draco innocently.
"We invited him, Harry!" Lavender said angrily. "Stop being rude."
"Oh, sure, everyone tell me to stop being rude!" Harry said hotly. "Never mind that the stupid git who you're currently befriending has been rude to every single one of you since first year!"
"Harry, you need to be careful," said Granger in her annoyingly superior way. "All this anger can only lead to bad things, you know."
"Now you're on his side?" Potter said somewhat shrilly. "What is wrong with you people?"
"I'm not on his side, Harry," said Weasley defensively. "I wouldn't do that to you, mate." He glared at Granger.
"Honestly Ron, just because I'm not telling Malfoy to return to his evil lair does not mean that I'm betraying Harry!"
"Well, you'd think that after all the times he's called you a...you know..."
"A Mudblood?" Draco supplied helpfully.
Parvati, Seamus, and Dean gasped.
"I told you so!" said Harry. "I told you! What did I say? He's evil!"
Weasley now had his wand at Draco's neck.
"I was only giving you the word!" Draco protested. "I didn't mean anything by it!"
"You shouldn't have said it in the first place," growled Parvati.
"I'm sorry!" said Draco.
"See, he's sorry Hermione!" said Lavender. "Draco's changed!"
Potter and Weasley didn't look as if they believed it, but Granger surprised them all.
"It doesn't matter," she said. "He didn't say it meanly, anyway."
Potter returned to pouting at his parchment, and Weasley turned to gape at Granger.
"What are you saying?" he demanded.
"I'm saying to drop it," she said coolly.
"Hermione, he called you that name again!"
"I can look after myself, Ron! Could you just stop it?"
"I can't believe you're just going to let him get away with it!"
"Oh, shut up!" chorused the other Gryffindors. Weasley and Granger shut their mouths and returned to their work. After a few minutes of uneasy quiet, Potter looked at Draco expectantly. Draco met the short boy's gaze, his eyebrows raised.
"Well?" said Potter impatiently, tapping his foot.
"Well what?" Draco asked, confused.
"Aren't you going to ritually sacrifice one of us?" Potter said, throwing his arms in the air.
"Why, do you want me to?" Draco said with a smirk.
Potter stomped off in a huff, followed closely by his minions, Weasley and Granger.
"He's got a bit of a problem, doesn't he?" Draco said conversationally. Lavender and Seamus nodded in reluctant agreement. Dean looked tempted to say something, but stopped himself. Parvati, however, gave Draco a withering glare.
"Yeah, Harry has a problem," she said. "That whole He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named thing, you know." She made it sound as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.
"Really, though," said Draco, "you'd think he'd have a better attitude."
"And you are the virtuous model upon which he should be replicating himself, right?" said Parvati with a short laugh. She stopped abruptly when she realized that the entire table was staring at her, their mouths slightly open.
"What?" she snapped.
"Parvati," said Lavender slowly, "are you all right?"
"Why wouldn't I be?"
"That sentence!"
Parvati looked puzzled for a moment, before shooting them all a look of venomous exasperation.
"Oh, come on!" she said. "Just because my sister's in Ravenclaw and I'm not, and just because I'm a little giggly, that doesn't mean I can't say bigger words!"
"If you say so," said Dean. Parvati looked at him for a second, then shoved him off his chair. She settled back over her Divination homework, seeming satisfied with herself.
They slipped into another uncomfortable silence. Draco realized with a jolt that he looked very odd just sitting there staring, and hurried to take his schoolwork from his bag. He removed his quill and a bottle of ink, then feigned work on his Transfiguration essay. He wrote his name neatly at the top of his parchment, embellishing it unnecessarily. It kept his hands busy while he thought.
It was amazing what a difference a couple of days could make. He would have never imagined, this time last week, that he would be sitting in an almost completely friendly environment amongst his former enemies. Sure, Parvati still didn't seem to like him very much, but Dean was politely willing to accept Draco's personality modification, and of course Seamus and Lavender were practically bending over backwards to do Draco's bidding. He found it enormously astonishing that he was very close to Step Two of his Disownment Project: Befriending the Gryffindors. It was a relief to know that some of his hard work was starting to pay off. Lavender kept 'accidentally' bumping into his foot under the table, and Seamus asked every five minutes whether there was something he could do for him.
Draco wondered if he was suffering from sort of depression. He was almost sad to have to put his spying days behind him, which was a crazy thing to be upset about. Besides, he reminded himself, his spying was not really done. He still had many things to find out. His new status with the Gryffindors was an important part of his plans, and would enable him to try on a new persona: that of the undercover agent. It would be a delightful challenge pretending to be reformed. He would have to convince his enemies that he was a changed man, and that he now wanted to count himself among their numbers. He could already anticipate the sheer adrenaline rush this arduous task would bring, and he couldn't wait to get started. Just wait until those Gryffindors really started opening up to him. He'd dissect their every move to discover their flaws and weaknesses. He'd painstakingly record their quirks and idiosyncrasies until he was confident that he knew them like the back of his hand. He'd let the word slip to his father that he'd gone soft and was joining the opposite side. Lucius would go into a rage and, if all went well, would disown him immediately.
And when he was ready, Draco would strike. He'd put his knowledge to use and bring them all down—his father, the Gryffindors, even that moron Voldemort—as he gained the power to break through by himself and become his own Dark Lord.
Yet, there was a part of him that was frightened by the prospect of doing it alone. He'd miss Blaise's company. As useful as she'd been when they had to stay hidden, she couldn't be of very much help when he went undercover.
"Er, Draco?" Seamus asked.
Draco jumped. He had been lost in his thoughts and hadn't noticed what was going on around him.
"Yes, Seamus?"
"Could I have a word with you? Outside of the library?"
"Sure," said Draco. He carefully put his books in his bag and walked to the doors with Seamus. Once they had entered the corridor, Seamus turned to look at him, an odd sort of look on his face.
"I think you know what this is about," he said formally. His hands were in his pockets and his gaze was steady and determined.
"Um, actually, I don't," said Draco, utterly confused as to where this conversation was going.
Seamus was silent for a moment, as if he were struggling to find the correct words.
"I want to talk to you about Lavender," he said finally.