CHAPTER 11 – Secrets of a Chamber and a Family

"This, friends," Draco breathed in the dusty darkness, "is the holiest place of all in the Manor's defences… I give you," he said in a mock presentation, "the Deep Dungeon." He uttered the theatrical name with a sneer on his beautiful face and was pleased to hear the recognising sniggers from behind. "Yes, Ivan, our family has been an inbred, histrionic pile of incompetents, mostly, for the last hundred years. My grandfather, Ignatius, though I can't fathom how any mother would curse her child with such a name, renamed a lot of the castle for the worse. Thus," he declared dramatically, swinging his arm in a wide circle, his eyes narrowed in disgust and his pose mocking the whole thing, "he always would say; we stand in the Malfoy Chamber of Secrets." Harry's eyes widened at the name, Ivan's and one of the twins' snickers increased and the other brother simply shook his head in dismay.

"The…" The words didn't really want to come through, so Harry simply stood there with a seriously shocked expression, his mouth hanging daftly open.

"Yes, yes," his blond boyfriend sighed, "I know, it's stupid. I already told you that. It's like inviting every single auror in England over for tea to talk about your friendship with Voldemort. Now, hop along," he mumbled and suddenly dim lights went on. Harry couldn't really tell from where they were shining, since there was nothing to indicate a hidden source of light, but in the end he settled for the self-explanatory "magic" excuse.

A couple of corridors later they came to a wooden door with curious carvings. Harry understood some, meanwhile cursing himself for not paying proper attention in Ancient Languages – a course Hermione had forced him to take this year. Well, "forced" sounded so mean and Hermione was nice – it was just that she was so… determined. What little remained in his memory from those lessons, however, told him a lot about the carvings on the door.

There were runes and mystic symbols from all alphabets older than a thousand years that he had ever seen and more seemed to be alphabets he had never dreamed of. All the symbols he knew seemed to become words in front of his eyes as he watched them. Of the words, he only understood a fraction, but they almost reeked of formidable power and those he could decrypt reinforced that feeling.

"This," Draco whispered in a barely audible voice that spoke volumes of his respect for the door, "is the original safety precaution. All else are simply detours and things that can be overcome. This is the Door of Watching… and it has a soul."

"'Tis accurate, wizardling," came a voice out of nowhere, with a sound like stone carving in bone. "I am that, guesses or knowledge matter not. Now tell me, kin of my maker… why wouldst I let thee pass?" Two half-sphere shaped pieces of wood in the middle of the door rolled upwards and into a slit in the wood, revealing dull rubies in the shape of eyes. In the depths of those rubies, Harry could see a faint light.

"Because, mighty defender, I am what you called me – kin of your maker," Draco said calmly, with a faded smile on his thin, rosy lips.

"Prove it," the raspy voice commanded. Draco bowed twice and Harry almost thought he changed direction between the bows, as if bowing to two different entities instead of one. Then he took something that hung on the wall, a ritual dagger that Harry hadn't noticed before. He held up the dagger as if showing it to the door, before it flashed, in a movement too quick for the eye to perceive, across the pale palm of his hand. There was a muffled collective gasp and in mere moments, Harry had rushed to his side, ready to hold the slender body up with all his might, should Draco fall. It didn't happen.

"Here is my proof, kin of my kin, masterpiece of my ancestor's." With those words, he smeared the blood on his palm across the rubies, one after the other. The piece of wood that had moved before moved again, covering the rubies only to reveal them once more. Harry found a scary resemblance to two glowing, red eyes blinking with wooden eyelids.

Without further notice, the door swung open. Draco bowed twice again and the rubies were once more concealed. Close-up, the change of direction between the bows was even more distinct and Harry felt he simply had to ask about it. His question made Draco smile amusedly.

"You are right, Har. Perceptive, for once," he smirked teasingly, provoking a sulking look from Harry, which he wiped away with a light kiss on the darker one's cheek. Then he became serious once more. "There's a soul in each one of those things, though they look like rubies they are really the essence of those souls."

"Like you and your crystal?" Harry wondered, placing a hand over the pocket where he now constantly carried the Azure Tear.

"Yes, like that. They were kin of the Veela once, so I suspect it works the same way. I can't tell you what they were called or how they were, because I really don't know. Their species died out six and a half century ago, leaving nothing behind." The Anadyr brothers stood behind the two, watching silently, but Harry could not help notice that there were tears in the corners of the twin brothers' eyes and that Ivan faced the opposite wall with a blank expression. Draco continued.

"There are no accounts of their existence, except for a few in private libraries such as ours, because we – the wizards and witches of that time – were the reason they were wiped out. They were hunted, much like I've heard muggles hunt some animals when they sometimes almost catch a magical creature or two in the process. When the last one of those was extinct, however, any and all scripts that mentioned them were rewritten and the old text was burned."

"That's… horrible," Harry whispered hoarsely. "The muggles did the same thing during the Second World War – killing without reason and burning books." To this, Draco nodded slowly.

"It seems neither we nor the muggles are really getting any brighter, don't you think?" he asked silently. "There will always be more death, more destruction. Right now, I only want to live my life in peace. Why's that not okay?" Regardless of the despair that burned in the beloved grey eyes, Harry could find no answer. In silence, Draco brought out his wand, healing the deep, bleeding cut in his hand and in silence, the five young individuals walked into the room. Harry didn't even notice the room they had walked into, deeply immersed in his thoughts, explaining his total bafflement when he suddenly found himself standing in front of some sort of a computer. A flick of wand later the screen went on and Harry realised that there were several other screens in the room, all showing different views. The one they were standing in front of pictured the huge entrance to a cave of some sort, situated in a small glade and surrounded by trees covered in a thin layer of snow. Nothing in the picture moved, but for a few of the thinner branches, caressed by the wind. There were footprints in the snow, leading into the cavern and the same time Harry saw this, Draco hissed angrily.

"They're going to corner the pegasi, those bastards!" His face had suddenly turned a reddish shade, his eyes flashing dangerously and his voice hinted of rage on a very tight leash. "View, inside the cave," he commanded furiously and the scene changed.

It was a rather dark cave, lit by some luminescent pulse coming from the walls. The first thing Harry noticed was the group of brightly shining pegasi cornered in the far end of the cave. The second was the group of perhaps half a dozen individuals cornering them and what lay at their feet. Seeing the creature, like beauty incarnate even in death, Draco howled – a terrifying sound, full of heart-wrenching pain and loneliness.

"That woman… she's given our family nothing but grief." Draco muffled a wail by biting his lower lip so hard it almost started bleeding.

"Whom?" Ivan asked, careful not to speak to loudly or with any kind of aggression, and Harry was glad that the elder man was so considerate.

"Her," Draco growled, pointing at the only woman on screen, a prissy-looking witch with whitened hair and a stern, nasty look on her face. Harry decided that he dared clarify Ivan's question, since Ivan himself didn't look like he wanted to push Draco's rage any further. Harry hoped that he had a somewhat higher limit than the Siberian man.

"Who is she, Drake?" he wondered silently, sensitive enough to stay an arm's length away, realising that his beloved Slytherin didn't really want to be touched at the moment.

"You don't know who that is, Har?" Draco wondered stiffly. Then he paused, seemed to compose himself and shook his head, more as a gesture to himself than anything else. "Of course you don't, the Ministry has believed her dead for the past sixteen years, or she would be the most hunted witch on Earth." His blazing gaze returned to watch the ghastly witch on the screen.

"Who is it?" Harry wondered in a hushed voice, his eyes touched with terror, but even more with something Draco could clearly identify his own feelings for the woman with – that perfect mix of anger and disgust. Keeping his emotions on a tight leash, he continued

"That is Priscilla Montgomery. She's the most devious witch there ever was, not to mention that she went to school with Tom Riddle. She was one of his fiercest followers, cold-hearted and scrupulous – she was more or less his right hand. The reason they never realised she was still alive …" Draco trailed off as he watched the old woman on the screen give orders and sweep her knife-edge gaze out through the cave-opening and across the visible parts of the Malfoy grounds with burning commitment blazing in the depths of her black eyes.

"How come the Ministry never noticed she was alive?" Harry wondered in a coarse whisper. Draco was pulled back to reality and shrugged.

"Oh, her shape-changing abilities managed that. Much like Peter Pettigrew, although he was definitely sloppy in comparison. The entire High Council of Death Eaters knew that he was alive and could have pinpointed his location, had they thought it worth the while. Montgomery was much, much more careful than Wormtail could ever dream of being." Draco leaned back, his gaze still locked on the white hair and the piercing, black eyes.

"Is that why I've never heard of her?" his green-eyed counterpart wondered. Draco smirked nastily and shook his head.

"No, you've heard of her all right, but the only one who ever knew her truly was you-know-who himself – and he used to call her Nagini."

"Holy Raistlin's cold corpse," Ivan breathed. "My father has spoken of this woman – in whispers only and never much." Draco slowly nodded.

"I have always suspected her of so much…" his voice trailed off and Harry took the chance of putting a comforting hand on his shoulder. He allowed Draco to take his time, keeping silent but moving a little closer. A shadow of a smile flickered over Draco's face, but when it had passed, he seemed even more depressed.

"Contrary to what my father thought, I have always believed her guilty of what happened to my brother." Green eyes widened in surprise, only to narrow again. The Anadyr brothers turned their gazes away with deep sorrow in their eyes. The question that followed was cautious and Harry's hand did not stray from the shoulder where it had settled, seeing the desperate solitude that had dampened the raging fire in those diamond eyes.

"You've had a brother?" The question sounded carefree, but there were layers of emotion that were easily unveiled, were one to watch for them.

"Of course…" Draco mumbled slowly. "I had an elder brother once… and a little sister." Draco watched the screen, the terrible rage burning in his eyes for a second made Harry a little more disturbed and extremely anxious.

"Where are they now, Drake?" he wondered, not sure if he really wanted to hear the answer.

"It's been a long time," Draco muttered to himself, obviously not sure whether he wanted to answer, either. "I'm not certain… Oh, well," he sighed. "My brother was on his way home from Hogwarts, his second year and I was going to go there with him the next summer, when he came home from third year…" Draco paused, drawing a deep breath before he continued, "…and he never got to the apparation point in Hogsmeade where father would meet him." For a long moment, there was silence.

Harry gently stroke back some strands of hair that had fallen into Draco's face. And I though I'd had a bad childhood.

"They found him the next day…" Draco's voice broke and he straightened and stared into empty space, his eyes blank, before he had gathered the strength to continue. "He was lying beneath Whomping Willow, his body was bloody and cold… torn to pieces." No matter how much Draco tried to hide it, Harry suddenly felt a tiny shiver run through the lean body.

"Drake…" he whispered and embraced the pale young man, holding him close, but not daring to speak more, for fear that it might shatter the frail moment.

A minute later, grey eyes had stopped fighting their tears and the tears had withdrawn, leaving behind only reddened eyes. Draco felt unbelievably sad and a little angry. He had made a deal with himself, stating that there would be no more childish sobbing. He was a Malfoy, after all. With a deep breath and a strained sigh, he continued his story.

"A month later my baby sister was playing with her nanny by the lake… they were found drowned in a search when they hadn't come inside for dinner. After that, I was carefully watched and a few dead conspirators later no more attempts were made…" he choked. It was rather sensitive to speak of the assassination attempts, especially considering how hard they had been on his mother – who had almost gone insane – and his cold-blooded father, who after that found peace only in the possible resurrection of the Dark Lord. And me… ten years old and suddenly no siblings nor parents to rely on. But that weakness strengthened me, I'm not allowed to be so frail anymore. There are things that must be done; she can't do this to us… To me.

"Things have to be done," he said, turning to his beloved. "I have to go, Har, but I'll be back." He let his lips lightly brush Harry's cheek before walking out through the Door.

"Wait, Drahco," came a voice. "We will be accompanying you, for the sake of Anadyr pride, of course," Vladimir smiled. Draco let a tiny smile touch his lips for a second as he nodded. He silenced Harry's attempt to speak with a shake of his head, sadly locking their gazes for a moment, before turning away again, green emerald eyes following his every step until he was out of sight, hidden by the golden blonde hair of the Russian twins, when Harry was left to his own, dark thoughts with only the company of a black-haired, ghost-like man he didn't know.

In the fading daylight outside, Draco dealt out two commands – a stern one to a house-elf and a subtler one into thin air. The house-elf didn't answer.

It's a trap, Draco concluded to himself, walking briskly across the field. Or they would have come straight for me. I only hope… oh, drat, I can't get sentimental now. I have to be determined. Determined. In the darkness of his mind, the resolute young man's memory kept replaying a single face, over and over and over again. I don't have the time to be dull… if hope is to be had, it's that my orders are carried out efficiently. Now's not the time of thoughtless heroics, or Harry would have been by my side – my true epic hero… Now is time for protection of the nastier kind… and I'll need the stealth and wits of a true Slytherin, a true Malfoy.

In the darkness of a secret chamber, a house-elf scuttled to the only entrance and exit to the Manor itself with a tiny piece of parchment clutched in its right hand. It glanced around the tiny cell-like space anxiously for a second before disappearing like a put-out candle.

Somewhere above a great head turned to stare in the exact direction of the place that the house-elf had disappeared from, though there were several thick stone walls in between. Lips curled into a grin, baring sharp fangs, large as a human arm. It moved with a rustle of scales and breathed out something like a sigh, speaking in its own, rumbling tongue to the winds and the sky.

"So it begins."

There's going to be a little action too. Not much, but it will be a little fluffy, probably slightly cliché ( there's going to be violence, killing and blood but I'll keep the entrails to myself and in the end there'll be bonding over it grins).

So, I'm telling you NOW people – there will be violence in the next chapter. Not much, really, but it's better to shout a warning before rushing along, eh?

Reviews? puts on a face stolen from an angel