Battles don't end when war does. Everyone still has to pick up the pieces or step over them as best they can. Even the so-called villains.
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The last crystalline droplet hung suspended from the mouth of the small glass bottle, glimmering in the torchlight, and then falling silently into the wooden cup of water below. The ripples on the surface settled quickly into smoothness before a wasted, pale hand dipped a finger experimentally in the liquid before grasping the vessel and raising it to thin lips. For an instant, no one made the slightest sound, neither the drinker as he quietly drained his draught, nor the dark, cloaked, silent watchers.
Everyone knew what to expect; all were familiar with the effects of Veritaserum.
The prisoner set the crude chalice on the table before him with a gentle finesse that betrayed his former wealth and status and then brushed at the few strands of unwashed platinum that strayed into his eyes. His hand went limp, and then he raised his head, his eyes surrendering but proud, and Draco Malfoy smiled at his interrogators, his face older than his eighteen years, but still quick and pointed.
"Ask."
The dark-haired youth before him shifted in slight surprise and fingered the bottle in his cloak pocket. Had the potion been strong enough? No drinkers before had ever done anything but answer questions and most certainly had never spoken first. No, Malfoy's eyes easily confirmed that his mind had succumbed to the inevitable willingness of the brew, but a soundly mad light still danced at the edges, gilding the slate-gray of the irises with gleaming silver.
Hermione, sensing Harry's hesitation, spoke first. "Malfoy," she began, vaguely annoyed that her voice should choose that moment to tremble ever so slightly, "do you know why you are here?"
That frightening brightness still flickered in his eyes. "I do." For a moment, she thought he was going to laugh. "You all hate me. I'd be surprised that you haven't killed me yet, except that I know how saintly and stupid Potter is. But you all still hate me." The words flowed from his tongue with drunken smoothness, yet he slurred not a syllable, making sure his captors caught every word.
"You're a Death Eater," shot Ron, his freckles dark against his ashen face.
Malfoy said nothing; it had not been a question. He did not smile, either, but amusement swirled with the madness in his eyes.
"You are accused of heinous crimes," said Harry hoarsely, finally finding his voice.
"How legends magnify the great," muttered Draco, studying the cup that had held his Veritaserum.
"You will answer our questions," continued Hermione, "before we return you to your Azkaban cell."
Draco's wasted, bony fingers drummed against the side of the cup, and it fell on its side with a clatter.
"When did you begin working as a Death Eater?"
He cocked his head at the slightest angle. "I worked for the Dark Lord longer than you ever knew me, but I was not marked as one of his elite until last year."
Ron's hand grasped the prisoner's wrist, turning it toward the light, but it was a pale, smooth expanse, completely unmarked. Draco's eyes were laughing again.
"Explain 'marked,'" demanded Hermione.
"A charm so powerful it was quite nearly a curse," replied the pale boy, faint sing-song delight in his voice. "It burns through the layers of flesh as a mild Avada Kedavra—" his eyes noted the shudder that ran through the trio before him "—branding through skin, nerves, and blood with Death, marking in pain and fire a vow to the lasting power of the Dark Lord, painting the serpent-tongued skull…"
Harry held up a hand that trembled only the least bit. His eyes were tired, as old as sleep itself, and pain etched itself in the lines of his face. "There is no mark."
"And where is the Dark Lord ere he finds his third life?" retorted Draco, and for an instant, his being was as empty as a Dementor's victim.
Hermione shivered, but the Slytherin boy's gaze turned to Ron instead when it had grown brightly alive again. "Miss your sister?"
The red-haired boy's face clenched.
Draco's hand moved unsteadily through the air as if he were brandishing a wand. "A simple incantation to finish it all. She went so simply, so easily. It was almost sad."
"You were the one who killed Ginevra Weasley?" asked Harry, his teeth pressed together.
"Oh, yes," replied Draco lightly, his eyes following some nonexistent object moving along the ceiling. "The Dark Lord always said she was a stupid, gullible little thing, a delight to possess." His eyes remained unfocused, but a malicious, satisfied grin flitted over his face. "Weak. Pitiful. I don't know if she even realized she died; she was so unaware."
Ron had gone very white now. "You killed my sister?"
"Yes," repeated Draco, "I said that already." He sounded vaguely irritated, but his eyes remained nonchalantly fixed upon the ceiling.
"How long had she been a prisoner?" asked Hermione softly, willing herself to weep for her friend and almost-sister later, at a more appropriate time.
"Long enough."
"Meaning?" Ron's voice was quiet, but a savage rage was building in his tone.
"She broke." Draco paused, his gaze flitting to the faces before him and then returning to the ceiling. "Broke," he repeated lightly, as if he liked the sound of the word. "Thanks to her, we killed the loony Ravenclaw and then her too when she had no more usefulness. She was stubborn like you, Weasley, but she still broke."
A silence followed; no one could seem to remember their questions, and only Draco seemed unaffected by the revelations that had flowed from his mouth. He had grasped the Veritaserum cup once more, and seemed to be contemplating some mystery attached to it.
"I broke," he added softly. A shudder ran through his wasted frame, and he closed his eyes, his face strangely tired. "Father knew I would."
"What?" asked Harry sharply.
"Father knew I would," repeated Draco, his eyes dead, the madness gone.
"Your father was killed at the end of the war," said Hermione, almost gently. "That was nearly ten months ago."
Draco made no reply, but brushed unsteadily at his own face, trying to push the stray strand of hair from his eyes.
"What about your father?" persisted Ron.
"Ron!" hissed Hermione, "we're supposed to investigate war crimes, not pry into his personal life!"
"I don't care," snapped Ron, still quite pale. "He killed my sister!"
"That's not relevant," said Draco, his mad, sing-song tone tingeing his voice once again.
Hermione and Harry had to restrain Ron.
Draco's eyes were glittering again, faintly, like Veritaserum in torchlight. "My father loved nothing," he said. "He strove for power and money, but hated it anyways because it could all fall apart in seconds. It did. He married mother and had me, but he hated us too because we were human like him, and breakable. He knew I would break."
Hermione cleared her throat in the ensuing pause and made an attempt to bring the topic back to the originally intended subject. "We need you to tell us about the final plans that Voldemort put into action. There are still a great many good wizards and witches missing, and the Ministry believes that you may be one of the keys to finding them."
Draco gazed blankly ahead, with no indication as to whether he was listening or not.
They began listing people—not names, though that's what it sounded like, but real people, friends they had laughed with during their school days, people with hopes, fears, and idiosyncrasies, smiling beings whose hands warmed each other's when they met. Draco listened obediently, the madness flaring momentarily at the mention of some names, and the confessions flowed out with what might almost have been pride.
"I killed him too, but we dueled first…I watched and held the extra overcloaks for the other Death Eaters when they tortured her, but I don't know what they did afterwards. She's probably dead too…The Dark Lord wanted to interrogate those two personally if possible, but I don't know what happened to them when the war ended…He's dead; I saw it happen…I never knew he was captured…He's dead too…"
They finished with only a little hope, though it was more than they had expected. Draco had gone alarmingly white—a tint that was only compounded by his naturally pale complexion—but his eyes still seemed quite aware and thoroughly devoid of fear. His gaze continued to travel leisurely about the room, and once or twice he made faint sounds that might have been humming or chuckling; perhaps something he had not said amused him.
Hermione performed the simple charm to bind Draco's hands as they rose to escort him back to his cell. Frigid sweat had gathered on Harry's face through the course of the interview, and Ron's hands were shaking; his voice was too when he turned to the prisoner and spat the words "Pureblood monster".
Draco almost flinched, his eyes on the stone floor, but then he looked up, searching the red-haired youth's face. "Because you lost people?"
"Come, Draco," Hermione cut in, hoping to avoid a full-out confrontation, "we have to get you back to your cell."
"Only the winners can mourn their dead because only the winners are good enough to care, right? Death Eaters revel in destruction and never feel loss." His eyes were shining feverishly, and the corners of his mouth began to curve upward as he raved. "You're all saints in holy mourning, and we're demon scum good enough only to burn with the corpses of our fallen, because we're all fallen and broken like smashed chess pieces. Pawns. And nobody cares! Least of all us… Least of all…" His voice faded, his eyes turning heavenward again, and harsh laughter broke out from him, bursting from his throat. They stood in the hall like that, the three standing bewildered, listening to Draco's laughter reverberate through the stone passageway.
Crystalline droplets ran down his pale face, glinting in the torchlight.
Fin.