Disclaimer: To paraphrase philosophy: I dreamt once that I was JKRowling. When I awoke, I wondered: am I a fanfic writer who dreamt that I was JKRowling, or am I JKRowling now dreaming that I am a fanfic writer. This taken into account, it is impossible for me to say that I am not JKRowling. Although if this is a dream, it doesn't matter anyway, and I could say really odd things up here like Orange the Smurfing toadstools before I infect you with my bubblewrap, or Beetles only dance the hula when the pizza's in a mood, or that I don't own Harry Potter or any related characters etc. JKRowling does, and actually, I'm not her. Didn't even dream I was her. Though I did once have a dream about Draco giving Harry and Hermione Christmas presents, tastefully wrapped in Potter Stinks wrapping paper. Disturbingly, I think he gave them both a velvet skirt. Never trust your subconscious.
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A/N: A large amount of my previous week has consisted of grabbing my friends by the shoulders and jumping up and down while squealing 'Guess what! Fallen's got a thousand reviews!' Which, as you may have already noticed, it has done. What can I say but a massive Thank You to everyone who's read and supported me so far? You've all been brilliant, whether you've reviewed faithfully every week or only once. Everything you've said has entertained me, interested me, told me something I didn't know, complimented me, intrigued me, and given me the confidence to actually carry on writing. I really mean it – one of the best things about writing this story is tumbling out of bed at some unthinkable hour on a Saturday morning to read the first-in reviews. (And then, of course, going back to sleep, to dream of next week's chapter!) Thank you!
You may also have noticed that the first chapter of Macbeth is up; and the Monday/Friday schedule seems to be working so far! (Could I ask – did I send an update notice about Macbeth to the people on my Fallen e-mail update list? I can't remember if I did or not…) The school workload doesn't seem to be too vile so far, especially now I have free periods, which makes me quite hopeful that I can juggle two simultaneous fics.
Anyway, onto the chapter. Enjoy!
Ystyriwch: a oes dihareb
a ddwed y gwirionedd hwn:
Gwerth cynnydd yw gwarth cenedl
a'i hedd yw ei hangau hi
(Translation:)
Consider: there is a proverb
that tells this truth:
The value of progress is a nation's shame
and its peace is its death
Gerallt Lloys Owan, from Etifeddiaeth
Aberddewin was a pretty little town, the kind of place you found where suburbs met countryside and any change was slow and gradual. North Wales, as if that wasn't obvious from the name. It was an hour's journey from the coast in those Muggle contraptions called cars, slightly shorter by broom, instantaneous by Floo or Apparition. The kind of place tourists came for a relaxing week with their children. River, library, park, hedgerows, fields, trees, sky.
It had been founded in the Middle Ages by some of the most liberal Pureblood families. Their intention had been to create a place where wizard could live side-by-side with Muggle – keeping the existence of magic a secret, naturally, but in all other ways treating them as equals to wizardkind. The town's name reflected this: Aberddewin, which in the Welsh tongue meant 'mouth of magic river'. The Muggles believed this to be a reference to the river that flowed through the town, but the wizards who founded it had a double meaning in mind. This foundation, this first generation of Aberddewin, was the mouth or spring of a river of magic and wizardry, which would flow through the ages in harmony and tolerance towards the Muggles who were their neighbours.
But Pureblood had married Muggle, and half-blood had married half-blood, and Mudbloods had been born and become part of the community, until the wizarding bloodlines were hopelessly corrupted. Which, of course, made the town a perfect target.
The massacre began at sunset.
It was one of those particularly vivid sunsets you only get in late autumn, early winter: the ones where the daytime is slowly dying and knows it. The ones where the sun looks like a disc of flawless gold, perfect light, as if it's trying to make a last defiant stand – I am alive – even as the clouds above turn pink and orange and blood-red, last light soaked into cotton wool.
The Muggles and Mudbloods did the same: tried to make a last defence, a last attempt to cling onto life, even as the light faded from their eyes and they crumpled to the floor. It was Avada Kedavra for the first, the lucky ones who got a quick painless death with time only to breathe in air for a scream that was never sounded. When the defences had fallen and the villagers were reduced to helpless, quivering victims; then the violence begins, the slow bleeding and the Cruciatius and the Dark Arts and the pain.
Night fell and Aberddewin burnt.
The hedgerows crackled and seared with flame, driving sparrow and magpie and blackbird to the air, their nests abandoned to the licking fire. Corpses floated in the river, eyes wide and unseeing. In the park, children lay dead on the roundabout, on the slide, blood trickling across the metal. Swings had been turned into gallows.
The library, standing tall and proud in the town square, was being gutted: the well-loved books piled into the centre of the square, a pyre, to burn the people who once had eagerly thumbed their pages. Mainly corpses: some alive and bound with thick ropes, screaming or pleading or crying or too dazed to do anything. Of course, the wizards and witches among them have had their wands snapped in two, preventing them from fighting back. It will be fun, the Death Eaters think, to watch them burn.
Lucius is watching; a supposedly anonymous figure in the same cloak and hood and mask as all the others, but everyone knows who he is, recognises his build or his stance and gives him the proper respect. The Inner Circle know what he is, the others – those now levitating the books from the library or taunting their victims – know who he is. They are all afraid.
Fear is a useful emotion, Lucius muses as he watches the book-pyre being built; a useful one, because you can manipulate people with it. Make them feel afraid and they will do anything. Like that woman, one of the captives, a Mudblood if he recognises her correctly. On her knees, crying, holding bloodied and rope-bound wrists to her captors and pleading. He can hear her voice clearly. 'Anything, I'll do anything, just please don't do this, don't kill me.' That is fear, and it has led to begging and loss of dignity. Fear can also be used to blackmail people – do what I say, or I will do something you fear – and you can control them. More subtle than Imperius.
He remembers teaching Draco these things; long lists of emotions that others felt and what they were useful for. Fear can be used for manipulation; you can control most people if you find the thing they fear and use it. He remembers being taught these things by his own father.
The woman is being tortured, now. He hears her screaming, punctuated by brief pauses, soft moans.
Harming people is an instinct for him. A need, like hunger or thirst; a lust that needs fulfilling, and this massacre is a feast. Except that feasts imply emotion, and for him there is none.
All the books have now been levitated out of the library; the pyre is done. He hears the woman wail, sees her take refuge in a friend's shoulder, a dark-haired woman who tries to hug the Mudblood back. A Muggle? She is defiant: she spits at a Death Eater, anonymous in robe and mask, who casts Cruciatius on her for her trouble. She doesn't scream.
This is another oddity of humans: they do not all react to things in the same way. Half-Fallens, if they have the same information and equal powers of logic, will all do the same thing in any given situation. They have the same instinct, after all, the same lack of these messy human emotions. Yet look at these women: they are both in the same position, both have the same knowledge of their imminent death by fire, yet one weeps and begs and cries and the other spits and swears and holds her head high. Why the difference?
Emotion, of course. Lucius has never understood why two humans can feel differently in any given situation. It is nonsensical.
The Death Eaters gather in a circle around the books now, chanting and jeering at the victims as they're levitated onto the pyre of books. The dark-haired Muggle shouts back, but cannot be heard. Bound tightly by the leg-locker curse, they cannot escape. They are doomed.
The corpses of those who were killed in the town square are added to the pyre, strewn atop the books along with the living. More screaming, more sobbing, more defiance. An incendio sets the books alight, and the Death Eaters shriek in something like joy as the firelight flickers off their masks.
This is politics. It is Voldemort's first attack of this size; the Death Eaters are excited, overjoyed at the large-scale murder of man and woman and Muggle and Mudblood. It would please the old Pureblood families too: the ones who had not joined the founding of Aberddewin had been very much against the idea of living alongside Muggles. They had always supported the eviction of the non-wizards and Mudbloods – a town founded by wizards should remain a purely wizarding town - but the Ministry had opposed it. Voldemort had done it, and there would be new recruits soon from the families who had campaigned for the cleansing.
The pyre was burning properly now, and the first acrid scents of burning flesh were filling the air. Flushed beneath their masks, the Death Eaters were silent, watching with rapt fascination as the flames licked higher and the corpses caught alight, as the high weeping wails were cut off to leave only the crackle of the fire.
Afraid, unafraid, defiant or pleading – it made no difference now. They were dead, and their bodies would soon be ashes. Nothing else was important.
'Don't Potter and Weasley ever get suspicious?'
Hermione looked up from the Arithmancy book on her lap. 'Of what?'
Draco made a vague gesture that appeared to take in the whole library. 'This,' he said. 'Don't they notice that you spend hours in here?'
He watched as she leant back in her chair, considering; the same face she got when he asked her about emotions, or when a teacher asked her to work out a problem. Eyebrows down, slightly furrowed, eyes slight narrowed; she liked to glance upwards too, as if reading an answer written on the ceiling above her. He was used to that expression.
'They do,' Hermione said, 'and they have asked about it. But… well, you know what I'm like. I've always spent extra time in the library doing research or schoolwork or just reading. True, I am spending a lot more time here now... Ron asked about it, and I said I had homework and NEWTs were coming and he should start taking school more seriously too. The kind of thing I always say.' She offered Draco a somewhat apologetic half-smile; he returned it with a proper one.
'And that worked?' he asked.
'Well, Ron hasn't pushed it. I don't think either of them is really going to bother as long as I don't start abandoning them. In fact…' Hermione glanced guiltily at her watch. 'I should probably go in a bit. I haven't seen them since lunch; Harry was organising Quidditch things after dinner and he asked Ron to go along with him.'
'Flaunting his Captain's badge under Weasley's nose?' Draco asked. 'Is that wise? I'm surprised Weasley didn't go off in a sulk and refuse to speak to him again.'
Hermione was momentarily speechless. 'How did you know that?' she asked in amazement.
'Know what?'
'That Harry's Quidditch Captain; he only found out this morning. And that Ron's jealous.' Hermione clarified.
'Well it isn't exactly secret knowledge,' Draco pointed out, as one would to a particularly slow five-year-old. 'The Quidditch fanatics and Potter-worshippers have been buzzing with the news all day. And it's fairly obvious Weasley would be jealous. He's always been jealous of Potter, ever since he became Seeker, in fact. And who could forget their massive fight during the Triwizard Tournament? The whole school was talking about nothing else for weeks.'
Hermione stared at him in disbelief. 'I knew people talked about Harry, she began, slowly and incredulously, 'but they can't talk about us that much. I mean, I could understand talking about being Quidditch Captain, and they always talk when there's things in the newspaper or when they think he's the Heir of Slytherin or something, but about having a fight? And being jealous?'
'Potter's famous, in case you haven't noticed,' Draco said wryly. 'People are going to want to discuss him, and talk about him, and dissect his private life at great length. Except he hasn't had any major articles in Witch Weekly, none that anyone's told me about anyway. Yet.'
'That's…' Hermione paused. 'Why didn't I know about this?'
'It's not some massive conspiracy, you know. People talk quite openly.' Draco shook his head, the rather bubbly feeling he identified as amusement dancing just below his breastbone. 'You can't say you've never noticed people talking about Potter?'
'Well, sometimes…' Hermione was cut off by the rather startling entrance of a tawny owl, swooping low across the ground from a hidden window in their secluded corner. It perched on the table by Draco; pecked his shoulder.
'Raphael!' he chastised it in a whisper. 'You know you aren't meant to come into the library!' The owl gave a quiet but urgent hoot, holding its leg out towards Draco.
'That's not your owl, is it?' Hermione asked, frowning.
'My mother's,' Draco answered shortly, untying the scroll from Raphael's leg. 'It's a good thing we're in a hidden corner…'
He unrolled the parchment, watched the text change beneath his hands and started reading.
My dearest son,
I haven't been able to write until now; your father has been watching me recently, and even with the charm on the letters I was too afraid he'd catch me while I was still writing the separate letter. He knows I'm writing to you, but he hasn't been able to prove it yet. Given time, I think he should slacken his attention. Don't be slow or lax in replying; he won't see anything more than a frivolous ramble from Pansy's mother in that letter and it may help assure him that all my letters are as meaningless.
He was summoned half an hour ago – I think he was expecting it – and left; I took the opportunity to write. I may not have much time, so I'll have to be quick.
Emotions are never easy at the best of times; at the worst of times they can be positively impossible, and I know that this can't be an easy time for you be any means. I admit: I was afraid you might become depressed. Many of the accounts mention things like that, but – as far as your letter shows me – you seem to be coping. I wish I could be there to see; how often are you happy, how often sad, how often afraid and excited and content.
This isn't helping you. I know. I'm sorry.
Trust can be a difficult thing to grasp, but your definition was perfect – and almost poetic! If it was Hermione who helped you to understand it, then she is certainly a good teacher. Do you trust her? I suppose you must, to an extent, to talk to her; and at any rate it would be unfair to expect an answer.
You're right: friendship is complicated, and I can't offer any better description than the one you gave to me. I hope you'll know it when you find it (and I hope the same of love) but I can't say for sure. Some take to emotions better than others; but you are learning well, and I'm optimistic that in time you'll come to understand friendship, even have friends of your own. And love, and have a love of your own.
I have no idea when Lucius will be back; I had better finish here and send this quickly. I still have to write the false letter, and depending on the length of the meeting he could return at any time. I'm sorry. I wish I could say more; offer more advice.
Your loving mother,
Narcissa.
Draco finished the letter to find himself smiling and Hermione studiously examining her Arithmancy book. Not very studiously, obviously, because the instant he put the letter down she was speaking, eyes fixed on him.
'Does she have any news?'
The question was implicit – about the spy; about your father – and Draco shook his head. 'Father's at a meeting, and he's paying really close attention to her letters. That's pretty much all.'
Hermione frowned. 'Are you using an encoding spell? Or something to stop him reading it? Because I know a book-'
Draco cut in. 'Hermione, may I remind you that both I and my mother are Slytherins?' he asked. 'Of course we're using an encoding spell. One she found in her archives…'
'Really?' Hermione asked, leaning forward with a light in her eyes. 'What kind of spell?'
Draco picked up the letter, let it change and flicked his eyes over it; there was nothing in there Hermione couldn't be shown. 'You can read it, and see for yourself,' he said, dropping it on the table and letting the cover letter return.
Hermione leant over, cautiously at first and then with interest. 'Delphine… is that a false identity? What code is used, an Arithmantic one? It'd have to have a very difficult code to stop your father working it out…'
'Not Arithmancy,' Draco said, 'just a charm. Try touching it.' With a puzzled expression, Hermione did so – gingerly – and her eyes widened when the words changed before her eyes.
'The change is triggered when someone touches it and experiences an emotion,' Draco explained, and for a moment quite seriously worried that Hermione's eyes would fall out of her head.
'That's a brilliant idea!' Hermione said, almost reverently. 'He'll never be able to read the letter then… I assume he doesn't know about this charm?'
'No,' Draco replied, 'I only found out about it when Mother wrote to me.'
There was a pause, in which Hermione glanced guiltily down at the letter and then back to Draco.
'You can read it if you want to, you know,' Draco said, feeling suddenly slightly awkward about it. Hermione appeared to deliberate for a second before her eyes flickered to the parchment, reading quickly.
Her cheeks were red-tinged by the time she'd finished. 'I think…' she began, then stopped. 'What's your mother like?'
This seemed an odd question to Draco, who had to think a moment before answering. 'She's always been quite quiet, normally. Formal, too, though I think she picked that up from my father. And me. She always wanted to spend time with me, even just in the same room as me; she wanted to be involved.' Draco paused again. 'She didn't love my father. I think she loved me, though; I'm her son.'
Hermione bit her lip and glanced away, seemingly wondering what to say. 'Why did she… marry your father?' she asked eventually.
Draco realised he had absolutely no idea. 'I don't know,' he said, and that was that. There was another silence.
Hermione was looking away to one side, through a gap in the bookshelves that surrounded this secluded corner: she suddenly raised an eyebrow in a hard, stern kind of interest. 'Can you see that table over there?' she asked, pointing. Draco angled his head sideways, trying to get a good view through the books. Through a narrow gap, he could see Professor Delaney and a pretty brunette girl. The girl was sitting at a table, and Delaney was standing above her, examining what appeared to be the girl's work.
'I see it,' he said. 'What's so unusual about that?'
'Is that girl Pureblood?' Hermione asked, ignoring Draco's question and confusing him rather. Her eyes were darker than usual and fixed on the girl.
Draco took another good look at her; recognised her. 'Yes. One of the old families. Davies.'
'Just as I thought,' Hermione said with a measure of black satisfaction in her voice. 'Look at the way he's acting.'
He looked again; the professor was currently smiling at the girl as he made a gesture, seemingly explaining something; she was watching in rapt fascination. 'I don't see anything unusual, Hermione…' he said slowly.
'You haven't been with him in Defence lessons,' Hermione said, finally breaking off her gaze. 'There's a definite pattern. He acts like the Purebloods – and some of the half-bloods – can do no wrong, like all their ideas are wonderful. While with the Muggleborns…'
'He's prejudiced?' Draco asked, frowning. 'He could be, I suppose. I know he was in Slytherin, and we do have a higher rate of bias, just because most of the old Pureblood families go in there…'
'He was in Slytherin?' Hermione asked, intrigued. 'I didn't know that… how did you find out?'
'He told me,' Draco began. 'I ran into him one night in the corridors and he asked me how I was… I meant to mention it to you at the time, but I forgot.'
'He asked you how you were? Does he know you?'
Draco shook his head. 'I've heard his name – Pureblood – but never met him.'
'And yet he stopped to talk to you, randomly and with no apparent reason.' Hermione mused.
'He seemed worried about whether I was doing okay as the "Slytherin outcast", as it were,' Draco explained, shrugging. 'I told him I was doing fine, and he said I could come and talk to him if I ever needed to…'
'Do you think…?'
'He's the spy?' Draco finished. 'It's a possibility. Lucius wouldn't choose someone too obviously connected with Voldemort, and Delaney does seem perfectly placed, especially if Father knew he was coming to teach here….'
They shared a significant glance.
'We'll keep an eye on him,' Hermione said slowly. 'See if he's watching you, if he turns up in places he isn't supposed to be, or it's odd for him to be. I mean, in time….' She trailed off, a horrified expression coming to her face. 'Time! I forgot, I'd better go, Harry and Ron will be wondering where I've got to…'
'And then they will be suspicious,' Draco added with a half-smile as Hermione began to throw things into her bag. A small, petulant part of his emotions whined that it wanted her to stay; he ignored it with a feeling of some achievement. He could do that, with the easier emotions; he hoped, someday, to do it with hard ones, like compassion and fear and things like that.
'Bye,' Hermione said, giving him a hurried smile. 'I'll keep an eye on Delaney, okay? You do the same; we'll tell each other if we find anything out…'
Draco nodded, said his goodbye, and watched as she left. He might as well do homework…
Ten minutes later, he heard a voice coming from the entrance to his little corner. 'Draco?'
He started, a feeling like having an ice cube pressed suddenly against the spine, then relaxed as he saw who it was. Ellen, looking almost shy, standing at the entrance to the alcove as though she required his permission to come any closer to his desk.
'Ellen.' He greeted her with a slight nod. 'How did you know I was here? This part's hidden…'
'I saw Hermione Granger leave a few minutes ago. She's one of the DA teachers, so I know her… and then I took a peek through the books and I saw you.' Ellen paused. 'Were you talking to her?'
'Yes,' Draco said; a sharp reply that would allow no further question. Ellen didn't ask, and after a brief silence, Draco enquired, 'Did you want something?'
'Well…' She could only be described as 'squirming'. 'Professor Snape set my class a really hard Potions homework, and I was wondering…'
'If I could help you?' Draco finished. He considered this for a minute. It was only first-year Potions; he could do that easily. The only question was whether he was prepared to help her; if he helped her once she could expect him to help her again with something potentially vital. However, he had already stopped the third years attacking her (after which in fear of Draco's Darker abilities, they'd never tried to curse her again. Though they had insulted her, called her names, stolen her stuff – all the common tactics of a playground bully). So perhaps this would be less important that it would otherwise had been.
And besides, his emotions were begging him to do it, and they were some of the harder ones to say no to.
Draco sighed. 'Bring it over here,' he said. 'I'll see if I can explain.'
A/N: I have to thank the ubiquitous Lou for providing both the name of Aberddewin (a completely fictional town) and this chapter's quote with translation. Diolch, Lou! Now, do I have to beg you to review again? It's very late, I'm tired and incapable of coming up with a decent threat. Review, or I shall curse you with constant exhaustion; how's that?
Review!