Draco pushed himself off the couch, pressing his knuckles into the deep green leather of the sofa. His thin flesh turned white under the pressure and then flushed red. Draco flexed his fingers, staring at the red mark that had imprinted itself into his knuckles. The marks quickly vanished at the same time the dark mark gave a painful twinge. Both Draco and Theodore flinched minutely, and then met eyes. Now Theodore could see the more pronounced fear shining through Draco's eyes.
Theodore followed Draco's lead out of the common room and up into the dorm that they shared with Blaise Zabini, Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle. The three other boys were not in the room when Draco and Theodore entered, their footsteps were light and soundless and they took their seats across from each other, on their separate beds. They stared for a moment, each one not wanting to be the first to speak, but finally Draco Malfoy spoke up.
"You feel it too?" He said. It was not a question, but a statement in the form of a question. Draco knew dam well Theodore could feel it, and he hated Draco for knowing. Every time Theodore thought about the Dark Mark that was burning every moment of the day, his mind flashed back to images of the moment when he had received it.
It was dark, very dark. The kind of dark that people wake up to and wonder where they could possibly be, even though, to their knowledge, they hadn't left the comfort of their beds. He should have been sleeping, since he was only 11 years old, but he wasn't. It was the day before he boarded the train to Hogwarts. His father had woken him up at a very late hour and pulled him out of his bed and into the silvery moonlight of his bedroom. His mother, who had still been alive at the time, was sitting in the corner sobbing silently and the young Theodore wondered wildly what had happened. Without a plausible explanation, his father grabbed his arm and pulled up the sleeve of the top he was wearing.
"You will thank me for this one day, son." Theodore's father had said, and his mother let out a sniffle, unseen from the corner of the room. Theodore could feel his father's long, cold fingers holding his arm steady, pressing his fingertips into the flesh. Quite suddenly, Theodore's father had a wand in the hand that was free and was pointing it directly at his son. Theodore let out a gasp in surprise, but not in fear, never in a thousand years could Theodore have fathomed his father might do something of this nature to him.
Theodore watched in horror as his father drew something elaborate in the air above his forearm. He only had a moment to contemplate what this movement could possibly be before his arm began to burn sharply, as though someone had pressed a hot iron to him. Theodore's father was watching him with a pleased look on his face, his job was done and released the young boy, who immediately collapsed onto the floor. Theodore made no sounds of pain, anguish or betrayal, but simply lay, curled on the floor, clutching his arm as the Dark Mark slowly imbedded itself into his skin. Theodore watched with wide, watering eyes as the lines searing slowly into his skin as easily as if he was drawing on it with ink, but this heart much, much more then the tip of a quill, even a particularly sharp one.
His mother continued to cry, and when the pain had receded, Theodore stopped clutching his forearm in pain, and pulled his hand away. The amount of pressure that the young boy had been putting on his arm had left long, dark red prints across it, and in the center was the skull. It stared back unnervingly as the young Theodore examined it closely, knowing exactly where he had seen it before. The snake had curled itself around the skull, and was also staring with blank eyes back at the boy.
"Now, you can serve Voldemort at my side." Mr. Nott exclaimed to the boy, as though this was something Theodore would be interested in doing.
"I serve no one." Theodore said calmly. Bold words coming from an eleven year old, who was completely under the wand of his father.
That night, Theodore was thrashed so violently by the hand of his father, that he had rough bruises on his face, arms and back the next day when boarding the train. That night had turned Theodore into the loner he was today, because he refused to speak to anyone who reminded him of his father, and for a very long time, he even ignored Draco, until he found out that the exact same thing happened to that young man as well, on the exact same night. Since then, Theodore has not looked his father in the eye, nor spoken down to him, from fear, not respect. But Mr. Nott did not see the difference between the two, none of the Slytherin's he had conversed with, and probably the rest of them had the exact same ideals.
"Yea, I feel it." Theodore replied to the question Draco had asked simply rhetorically.
Draco's eyes darkened, this was bad news. "Crabbe and Goyle feel it too." Draco explained, watching Theodore's expression; "Along with the Riley Macnair, Elizabeth Lestrange, and Erin Rosier."
Theodore was mildly surprised that Draco had been able to accurately pinpoint everyone in the school who had been exposed to the Dark Mark. He was also surprised to hear that Riley Macnair had been given the Dark Mark, since she had been sorted into Ravenclaw, and the only known death eater in her family was her elderly uncle Walden Macnair. Theodore simply had the impression that all Death Eater Spawn were confined into the Slytherin house, but he shrugged it off as house prejudice. Not only students from Slytherin had the opportunity to be tortured by family members who just happened to be servants of the Dark Lord.
"So what does this mean?" Theodore asked quite unnessecarily. He knew what was happening, but hearing it from Draco would confirm it much more then his imagination.
"The Dark Lord wants us." Draco said, in a low growl that could barely be considering a whisper. Draco's leapt with fear for a moment, in spoken realization, but it soon hardened into an expression that Theodore was used to.
Theodore took a sharp intake of breath and let it out slowly, his eyes locked on Draco. "What do we do about it?" Theodore asked.
"I think…" Draco began. This was a first, Draco actually thinking before he acted. "We have to help… each other." Draco said finally, sounding incredibly like the Potter child planning a rebellion.
"With who?" Theodore continued to pry, wanting to know what sort of plan Draco was cooking up in his sly mind. Of course, the question of "who" was brought up with Draco's sudden resemblance to Harry Potter and his little friends, who were always cooking up insane schemes to "make the world a better place" or something along those lines.
"With the-boy-who-lives and his idiot little friends," Draco replied coldly, each word dripping with loathing and sarcasm.
"Not funny at all Malfoy." Theodore told him, calling him by his last name. His eyes flickered dangerously in Theodore's direction. Theodore knew Draco hated his last name now more then ever because of its ties to his father and his family.
"With the other Death Eater Spawn," Draco informed Theodore after a moment's paused, "With Riley, Elizabeth and Erin."
Theodore nodded, apprehensively, realizing the atmosphere that had formed around the two boys was slightly less tense, and that the Dark Mark on his arm was no longer burning as intensely as it was when he entered the room with Draco. "What about Crabbe and Goyle?"
"They are too loyal to their families," Draco explained, "They would go running to their father's the moment they discovered our plans."
Theodore nodded in agreement, the pair of them were particularly thick headed, but they knew the different between loyalty and disloyalty. Theodore opened his mouth to ask Draco how he could possibly come up with a plan like this, let alone actually go through with it, but Draco interrupted him.
"I have everything worked out." Draco said, which was a surprise to Theodore because this was the first he had heard of it. "You just show up in the room of requirement at 10:00pm tomorrow night."
Theodore was a bit shocked by these sudden plans he had tomorrow night after his curfew, and to be spending this time with Draco Malfoy was a big leap from his usual activities. Theodore and Draco just did not spend time together, with the exception of these talks about their families and their relations.
Theodore managed to suppress all of his questions and nodded once again. Draco nodded back, as though this was a formal agreement and there would be hell to pay if Theodore did not show up. Draco then pushed himself off the bed he had seated himself on and exited the room, leaving Theodore alone with his thoughts.