Chapter 3: Awakening
Draco came awake with a gasp, bolting upright. He was in bed in the hospital wing –
Which one?
He looked down at himself and gave a shuddering sigh of relief. The pajamas he wore were green, and emblazoned with entwined snakes. Definitely his own world, then. Draco Black wouldn't be caught dead wearing something like this.
Well, maybe for a joke.
He focused for a moment on his breathing, on slowing it down, and noticed with a faint tinge of uneasiness that he seemed to have retained some of Black's mannerisms from the dream. His posture, for one – Black's body had sat carefully straight and balanced almost all the time, unless he was lounging. Draco preferred to slouch, or drape himself on things; it took less effort. But at the moment, he was sitting upright in the bed, shoulders balanced above his hips, breathing from his belly instead of his chest.
Breathing like a singer.
He tried to stop that train of thought, but it was as futile as trying to halt the Hogwarts Express without a wand. All his memories from the past night of singing, of music in general, came flooding back.
I loved it. He couldn't deny that, no matter how hard he tried. It had answered some desperate need inside him, something he'd been ignoring for so long that its fulfillment now brought him a pleasure almost like pain. The way the notes vibrated through him, the harmonies his voice created with the orchestra or another singer, and the applause of the audience at the end of a song...
They liked me. Hell, they loved me. I even heard a few people calling for an encore.
And the story had fascinated him. The deformed genius striving for beauty and light, but trying to get there through darkness and hate... how he had killed and kidnapped to try to find love, and then love found him, and he gave up everything he'd fought for because of it...
I thought it was cool how he would send her a rose, just one red rose with a long stem, and she'd know it was from him.
Just as he thought of this, he happened to turn to one side.
On the table beside his bed lay a single long-stemmed crimson rose.
Draco stared at it for a few seconds, forgetting even to breathe.
Was I wrong? Am I still dreaming?
But his fingers touched the stem, then the petals, without passing through them. One of the thorns pricked him slightly, though not enough to draw blood. And the scent of the flower was sweet and dark and heady, like an aged wine.
Who left this?
Somehow he knew he would find no note, no clue to the person's identity, not even the black ribbon the Phantom had tied around his floral offerings. This was going to remain a mystery, as much of one as where these dreams of his had come from in the first place.
Or even more. If I wanted to, I could believe that I made it all up, that I hallucinated that other world while some separate personality ran around here terrorizing people, that I thought up the dreams the same way, and that I therefore need to check myself into St. Mungo's immediately. But there's no way I'm hallucinating this...
Or am I?
He was still trying to decide if he was hallucinating the rose, and whether he wanted to be or not, when Madam Pomfrey came around the end of the screen and settled the question. "I see someone's been here while I was gone," she said briskly. "Nice of them to bring you that – let me get you some water for it."
Draco's hand tightened around the stem as the nurse walked away. Then he cursed softly, looking down at the two bleeding punctures on his palm.
Guess it's real, then...
Which left him with a very large question, or rather two.
Who in the world could have left it, and why?
Whoever left it has to have known what I was dreaming. The rose is part of the story, it was on the cover of those programs, it and the mask...
But how could anyone know what I was dreaming?
He'd seen the dream through to the end, and all it had left him with was more questions.
But maybe now I can get some sleep.
Draco put a stasis charm on the rose and kept it in his wardrobe, where the other boys couldn't see it. He had no doubt they'd tease him unmercifully if they found him mooning over a flower. But he felt, superstitiously perhaps, that it was his good-luck charm, and that as long as he had it, the dreams would stay away.
He had reason. Ever since that night in hospital, he hadn't dreamed of the fog and the veiled woman, or of Black and his world, at all. Instead, his dreams were filled with story and song, color and light, and he woke up in the mornings humming the tunes he'd heard and sung during the night.
It wasn't until an episode nearly three weeks later that he found out these new dreams weren't nearly as harmless as they seemed.
"I didn't know you liked Muggle things," said Artemis Moon to him at breakfast one morning, tossing her blond hair contemptuously.
"What?"
"You were humming a Muggle song. I heard a Muggle singing it once, on a street corner. It's about doors or something stupid like that."
Draco's mind supplied the relevant lyrics. Close every door to me, hide all the world from me...
"I didn't know it was a Muggle song," he said, thinking fast. "I probably heard it the same place you did. I was just humming because I was thinking about something else."
Artemis sniffed but refrained from further comment.
"Have you heard?" said Daphne Greengrass, leaning over the table. "They're doing a Muggle musical show here, at Hogwarts. The Headmaster thought it would be a good morale booster." She made a face. "Who wants to be in a stupid Muggle thing anyway?"
"What kind of musical show?" asked Draco, trying to sound casual.
"I don't remember. I think it's an opera, though."
"Not an opera," said Blaise Zabini, sitting down beside her. "The Phantom of the Opera."
Draco dropped his fork. "They're doing that? Here?"
"Yeah. I just heard the Gryffindors talking about it. They're all excited, hoping for parts." Zabini smiled sardonically. "What d'you want to bet the Golden Boy and his friends get all the star roles?"
"Who else would take them?" asked Artemis with a little giggle. "No decent witch or wizard would go on the stage. It's vulgar. Music's all right, I suppose, but who wants to watch a load of people cavorting around and playing 'let's pretend' like a bunch of little kids? And who on earth would ever want to do that?"
Draco's mind yanked him backwards to the night he'd spent inside Black's head.
All right, this is the big climactic scene. Everything's been building to this. You have to convince the audience that you, the Phantom, will kill Raoul if Christine doesn't stay with you. If you can't make them believe it, they'll lose interest. Think you're up to it?
No.
Pessimist. Just try it.
I don't even know what I'm supposed to be trying!
Put your mind in a place where she is all you want, everything you want. If you can't have her, then no one else can. And you'll do anything to get her and keep her. Have you ever wanted anything that badly? You don't have to tell me what, just tell me, have you ever wanted anything like that?
Er... yes, actually.
Perfect. Use that. Just think about whatever it was that you wanted when you look at Christine.
To Draco's amazement, it had worked. He'd been able to feel the power he exerted over Christine, Raoul, and the audience. They were his at that moment – he could make them feel anything he wanted them to, and they would believe whatever he told them. The scene was his to do with as he liked.
He'd never experienced anything quite so intoxicating in his life.
But I can't try out for this play. Everyone would laugh at me. And there's no way I could work with Potter and his gang. Maybe they like Black, but they don't like me, and I don't like them. They're...
With another slight shiver, he realized he didn't really know any more what they were that he didn't like.
Artemis' word came to mind. Vulgar. It meant uncouth, uncivilized, common, and he supposed Potter and his friends were all of that. But with Black's lingering memories in his head, he couldn't quite shake the feeling that maybe a little vulgarity, in that sense of the word, might be a good thing.
So I can't try out for the play. I can still stay interested. And go see it. Maybe I'll tell Potter he did a good job and make him wonder what I'm up to.
Draco grinned. This had the potential to be fun.
The talk around the table had turned to other things, so he had no qualms about staying lost in his thoughts while he finished breakfast. It didn't hurt that he was sitting on the correct side of the table to observe the Gryffindors without looking like he was doing much of anything.
Potter, Weasley, and Granger. They're almost never apart. They go everywhere, do everything together. What would that be like? To have people who did that with you because they wanted to, not because their fathers told them to? He cast a critical look down the table at Crabbe and Goyle, both stuffing their faces.
What would it be like to have friends?
Of course, if Black's memories could be trusted, he already knew what that would be like. Black had not only friends, but siblings. Including a twin sister, and her identity had simultaneously baffled Draco and scared the pants off him.
How in Merlin's name did he end up calling Granger-Lupin his twin? She can't be – not physically – I could understand just calling her a sister, because they grew up in the same house, but twin?
However it had happened, it was, to Black, an accomplished fact. He and Granger-Lupin were never far from each other, and if something happened to one of them, the other knew. They sometimes finished each other's sentences, and Draco seemed to recall something about some form of mind-reading available to them, if they both agreed to it, but the memory was sketchy, and Draco didn't push it. He recalled that Black had walled him off from some things because it would make trouble.
Of course, how it could, when I'm here and he's there, I have no idea...
But that wasn't what he was thinking about right now. The girl with far too much information crammed into her frizzy brown head, that was what he was thinking about. Or who. He spent a lot of time thinking about her these days. Every morning when he woke up, and every night before he went to sleep...
Ye gods – am I in love?
But as he thought it, he knew it wasn't true. It wasn't every day that a statement appalled him on two separate levels, for two completely different reasons.
She's a Mudblood! clamored his sensible, pureblood self. Your father would kill you!
She's your sister, insisted that tiny part of him that had converted itself completely to Black's way of thinking, and which Draco had strenuously tried to deny until he realized it wasn't really doing any harm. Even if she doesn't know it. Besides, she likes Ron.
Weasley, Draco corrected himself absently, but then gave in. All right, Ron. It doesn't hurt to think about him that way. And there are a lot of Weasleys. Not as many around here as there used to be, but still.
The only other Weasley currently at Hogwarts was sitting just a few seats down from her brother. Draco found his eyes drawn to her. Ginny. I wonder if she'll play Christine here too? Does she sing?
For a moment, he worried that he might have escaped being fixated on a Mudblood only to end up with a blood traitor on his mind instead, but a quick examination of his thoughts showed he was wrong. His interest in Ginny Weasley was less even than the brotherly regard with which he reluctantly regarded Granger these days. He just wanted to know if she'd be singing Christine.
And who are they going to find to play the Phantom? Harry's out, he's too straightforward and too nice. He'll probably be Raoul, like he was there. And I don't think Ron will want a big part like that, even if he had the voice for it.
He shrugged. Not going to be me, so not my problem. I wonder if Hermione will play Madame Giry again? And Luna, Meg?
Ah, now he came to a touchy subject. Lovegood. Loony Lovegood. There she sat at the Ravenclaw table, immersed as usual in her father's dodgy magazine, her wand behind her ear, emitting small puffs of blue smoke.
Black loves her. He wants to marry her.
I don't think I've ever said three words to her. Or if I did, they were probably something like, "Move over, you."
Could I... love her? He bit his lip, staring at her. And if I did, what would happen? Would she... love me back?
What would my parents say? Or hers?
Hell, would she even like me? She doesn't know anything about me!
Except that I'm a first-class prat, probably, since she's been hanging around with Potter for a year or so now...
For some reason, it was suddenly terribly important to him that Luna Lovegood think well of him.
Oh no. No. It can't be. Not already, not this soon, it can't be happening now!
But it was too late. Draco squeezed his eyes shut, cursing himself for a fool.
Oh, Malfoy, you bloody idiot, you've really done it now. You went and fell in love with a totally inappropriate girl. No, you didn't even fall – you threw yourself into love with her. And she has no idea you exist. Or if she does, she thinks you're pond scum.
He let his chin rest in his hands, staring at her. He couldn't decide which of those options was worse.
It shouldn't matter! It shouldn't matter one way or the other, because I shouldn't care about her, because there is nothing between us! Nothing, and there will never be anything, so I need to stop staring at her right now!
He could turn his eyes away, Draco discovered. It was harder to turn away his heart. He kept thinking of Lovegood all day, in class, at meals, in the common room, and as he went to bed. He buried his head in his pillow and groaned. Black, I'm going to find you, and I'm going to kill you very painfully...
"The queue starts over there."
"What?"
Black jerked a thumb over his shoulder. "The queue for the people who want to kill me painfully. You'll have to wait your turn. I don't have quite as many as Harry, but there's a fair few who wouldn't mind getting a hold of me."
"There are?"
"Yeah."
"Like who?"
"Well, there's Voldemort for one." Black ignored Draco's shudder. "He's less interested in me than in Harry, but he wouldn't pass up the chance to off me if he got it. My loving Auntie Bella – I think she blames me for what Mum did – and her husband and brother-in-law. Any of the Death Eaters, really. But the first man in line is my wonderful father."
"Oh."
"So, what did I do to you recently that makes you want to kill me?" Black regarded him curiously. "I would have thought you'd be after me before this."
Draco clenched his teeth. "I fell in love," he said resentfully.
Black snickered, and started whistling. Draco listened to the tune, and identified it without meaning to. Then he glared at Black. "Oi!"
"What?"
"It's not like that!"
"Not like what?"
"I'm not just – in love with love! I hate love! I want to get rid of it!"
"Why?"
"Because maybe it's all right for you to be in love with Loony Lovegood, but for me, it's not!"
"Watch your language," warned Black, frowning at him.
"All right, Luna. No matter what you call her, I can't be in love with her!"
"Well, I'd say you can, since it's happened."
Draco glared at him again. "Why hasn't anyone killed you yet?"
"Because my whole family is just like me, so we'd have to kill each other until we were all dead. And we don't care for that. So we just pester other people."
"Why haven't they killed you, then?"
"We have good reflexes."
Draco rolled his eyes. "Whatever. Look, joking aside, this isn't going to work. She's not my House, she's not my year, and she's weird. I know, I know you like her or love her or whatever, but you have to admit she's not normal."
"Who wants to be normal?"
"Me! I do! I want to be normal! And falling in love with Luna Lovegood is not normal!"
"You've never been in love before, have you?"
"No. Why?"
"Because if you had, you'd know it's not logical, or normal, or anything like it. That's why people like it, and hate it, and write stories and songs and poetry about it. It's one of the least normal things there is. And yet just about every human being there ever was falls in love at least once in their lives."
"How do you know so much?" Draco realized too late how young and sulky he sounded.
Black shrugged. "I've been in love since I was pretty young, so that's part of it. Watching what Remus and Danger do, and Sirius and Letha, that's another part. And watching Meghan and Neville – they were another pair like me and Luna, they just knew. I don't think they've ever said 'I love you' in so many words, but it's true. And then watching Harry and Ron mess up once or twice..." Black snickered. "That day Ron got the love potion by mistake... Lord, that was priceless."
"The day Ron got a love potion by mistake?" Draco repeated. "Who was it meant for?"
"Harry. You want to hear?"
Draco's pride tried to speak up. He sat on it. "Yeah, I think I do."
"Let's get comfortable, then." Black snapped his fingers, and a room materialized around them, its walls lined with books, large, soft chairs sitting back to back in groups of two or three.
"Your sister must love it in here."
"Oh, she does. That's her place right there." Black indicated an odd-looking wooden thing in the corner. "We call it Neenie's reading tree, because it looks like the tree she sits in back at the Den when she has a new book and she doesn't want to be disturbed."
"How did it get here?"
"It grew."
"It what?"
"Long story. I'll tell you after I tell the one about Ron and the love potion."
"All right." Draco sat down, feeling himself sinking into the chair.
I'm sinking into more than that...
And he had the feeling he really ought to mind more than he did, but it felt so good...
(A/N: No, I haven't died. I've just had a nasty case of writer's block. It wasn't particularly helped by HBP... what the heck? She can't do that! Well, I know, she can, because it's her world, but still... a seventh book that's not at Hogwarts, without any of the structure we've come to expect, and killing off Dumbledore... Humph.
Not that I won't be in line at midnight whenever it comes out. Please remember to review!
Oh yes, and the song Draco Black was whistling was "Falling in Love with Love" from The Boys from Syracuse, or, if you're like me, from the most recent version of Rodgers and Hammerstein's Cinderella.)