Summery: ONE SHOT! Post HBP. Draco, everyone's favorite Malfoy, is in hiding with Snape after Dumbledore's "death" waiting for Voldemort to call them to his side. Will Draco accept the Dark Mark, or will he...?
Disclaimer: I own nothing except for the idea. All Harry Potter belongs to our much beloved J. K. Rowling, and the song lyrics belong to Evanescence and what ever their publishing company is.
A/N: This is my first fanfic people so please review and tell me what you think. Should I continue or leave it as is? My goal is to perfect my writing skills so please review, and if you must... flames. Thanks:)
Imaginary
A gloom had settled over the night sky. The moon hid behind an ebony curtain of darkness, and the stars where lost in its stormy clouds. Beyond Hogwarts, past the Forbidden Forest, in a run down hut just outside of a small Scottish village awaited two reluctant servants of the Dark Lord.
"What have I done," a platinum-haired boy whispered into his hands? "What have I done?"
Draco had fled Hogwarts with Snape after the "professor" had killed Dumbledore, and they came here to wait for Voldemort's call. Snape had not talked much, and neither had Draco for that matter, once they arrived the night before. Neither man was willing to speak aloud his heavy thoughts.
"Why didn't I just take the old man up on his offer?" Thought Draco, "Then I wouldn't be stuck here in this filthy hellhole with Snape awaiting the beckoning of a mad man. I'd be with my mother at the manor waiting for father to be . . . my parentsThat's why I'm here, damn it! The Dark Lord will kill both of them if I dare deify him."
Outside, from the village, a haunting voice that Draco knew from a muggle radio filled the air:
I linger in the doorway
Of alarm clock screaming
Monsters calling my name
Let me stay
Where the wind will whisper to me
Where the raindrops
As they're falling tell a story
Draco buried his suddenly tear-streaked face in his shaking hands trying to make everything go away, make everything normal again. He would open his eyes and be back at Malfoy Manor desperately trying to please his father and play the unemotional, egotistical, self-righteous role of a respectful Malfoy.
"Malfoys don't cry!" his father's words echoed through Draco's mind. He quickly wiped his eyes. He'd always been a disappointment to Lucius as a son. Draco really didn't have that mean streak in him as everybody believed. No, he was just a boy, a boy who wanted more than anything for his father to love him.
"God I hated it there at home then, but I'd give anything, anything, to be there now." He looked back through the door and saw his godfather sitting in a chair, his back against the wall; head tilted back staring blankly at the ceiling. Snape seemed to be trying sleep, but the boy saw the hollow look in the professor's eyes. "He wants to be here about as much as I do" the boy realized. Draco's eyes wandered to the older man's bared arm and stopped cold on the Dark Mark...
"Please Merlin let me be imagining things." Draco whispered to nobody.
In my field of paper flowers
And candy clouds of lullaby
I lie inside myself for hours
And watch my purple sky fly over me
. . .But the mark did blazed ebony on Snape's forearm. A million thoughts blurred in a fury through the young wizard's mind faster than he could keep track of. He merely stared, his mouth hanging slightly open, begging God, the devil, Merlin, and who ever else might be in the area, that his Godfather would not notice the thing radiating off his arm.
Seeming to hear Draco's wish, the Dark Mark grew darker and started pulsing like a living heart. Snape gritted his teeth, and squeezed his eyes shut not evening bothering to look at his arm. "Draco!" He called holding out his hand.
"Fuck"
Draco reluctantly, slowly, walked over to his godfather, and Snape caught hold of his wrist. "Hurry boy, our Lord does not like to be kept waiting."
A loud snap echoed in the room as they appariated, leaving behind the lonely hut as a stale wind blew through the door.
Don't say I'm out of touch
With this rampant chaos - your reality
I know well what lies beyond my sleeping refuge
The nightmare I built my own world to escape
Snape and Draco arrived at the end of a very unlit corridor. Shadows played over the rib-shaped columns on either side, or at least what appeared to be shadows. The corridor itself was long and bare like the inside of a whale, with two tall wooden doors and a torch on either side, at the far end of the corridor. Draco, rubbing his ears to make sure they were still attached, felt a sudden dread stab through his gut.
Snape said not a word, but started forward, his robes flaring behind him, with the stride of a proud man being led to the gallows. His eyes never left the two wooden doors. Draco stared after him for a moment, gulped and put one foot in front of him willing the other to follow suit. He kept his gaze down at the marble floor. All the fire seemed to go out of Draco Malfoy. He couldn't have uttered a single witty word, even if Potter where standing in front of him in teddy bear pajamas. Draco did not want to find out who, or what, was behind those doors.
But as soon as the pair got within five feet the doors burst inward, blowing out the torches. Snape looked down at Draco for the first time and the boy met his eyes both wishing to be somewhere, anywhere, else, and they walked in to greet their master.
In his head, Draco still heard the song playing.
In my field of paper flowers
And candy clouds of lullaby
I lie inside myself for hours
And watch my purple sky fly over me
Lord Voldemort, in all his dark glory, sat in a cold marble throne in the center of the room all around him in a circle were his loyal scum sucking death eaters bowing low to their Lord, whom looked more like a humanoid-snake accident to Draco.
"My dad is one of them" Draco thought with disgust as he approached the death eaters.
"YES BOY YOUR FATHER BOWS TO ME AS LOW AS THE REST OF THESE "SCUM SUCKING" DOGS." Voldemort's voice bellowed.
Draco jumped a foot into the air, his intoxicating silver eyes wide with absolute terror, and tried to stammer out an apology.
"SAVE IT MALFOY. YOU ARE AS ANNOYING AS YOUR FATHER, LET US HOPE YOU ARE NOT AS DISAPPOINTING AS HE PROVED TO BE TOO."
The death eaters, whom were raising to their feet starting laughing, and Draco actually went for his wand, red fury running through his pure-blood veins enough for him to forget momentarily where he was. Snape, who was just standing there like a bodyguard, started to make a move to stop his godson from getting himself into more trouble, but stopped himself before he touched the boy.
Voldemort laughed, "TEMPER, TEMPER BOY," he told Draco, and too his death eaters he smirked, "I DO BELIEVE YOU ARE UPSETTING THE YOUNG MALFOY" He then looked toward Snape. "YOU HAVE DONE WELL MY DEATH EATER, VERY WELL INDEED. I HAD GIVEN UP HOPE ON YOU WILLINGLY REJOINING ME, BUT YOU AND THE BOY HAVE PROVEN YOUR UTMOST LOYALTY TO ME, MORE THAN ANY OTHER SERVANT. YOU HAVE GIVEN ME THE DEATH OF ONE OF MY GREATEST ENEMIES, AND FOR THAT YOU BOTH SHALL BE REWARDED.
Snape bowed low and almost graciously, "Thank you my Lord you are most kind."
Draco on the other hand was just fear struck and just stood there unwilling to move.
Voldemort stood and walked to the boy. In a much softer voice the Dark Lord said, "As for you, I will grant you the greatest of all honors even though you yourself did not kill Dumbledore, you still managed to get my death eaters, what none of the others could accomplish, into Hogwarts. For this service I will grant you the Dark Mark.
Draco Malfoy, finally gaining his voice, looked up at Lord Voldemort, and gave the barest of whispers, "no".
"WHAT!" The Dark Lord bellowed. Snape looked at Draco like he was insane, mentally trying to tell him to shut the hell up, but Draco would not hear it.
Draco had snapped in that moment, he just didn't care what happened as long as he wasn't bound to this lunatic. "I said 'NO' damn it! You are fucking mad! I don't want anything to do with you are your FUCKING DOGS! YOU'RE SICK MAN, SICK! NO, NO, NO, NO NOOOOO! You can take your Dark Mark and shove it up YOUR ASS!" Draco screamed.
Voldemort roared, and all his death eaters, even Snape cowered and backed away into the shadows as to not meet the wrath of their almighty Lord. "YOU STUPID DIM-WITTED BOY! YOU SHALL SUFFER!"
Voldemort raised his want like a trident above his head bellowing "CRUCIO"
Draco fell to the ground writhing in agony, clutching his body. His bones felt like liquid fire danced over them, pulling at his flesh. Draco couldn't even hear his own screaming over the pulsing in his ears.
Through the pain Draco thought, "God just let me die, please just let me die." And his world blacked out.
Swallowed up in the sound of my screaming
Cannot cease for the fear of silent nights
Oh how I long for the deep sleep dreaming
The Goddess of imaginary light
Draco woke up still screaming in his bed at the small dirty hut just outside of the Scottish village. His body was coated in sweat and as rigid as an ironing board. Panic gripped him tight, until he started to look around the room, with the blankets clutched around his naked torso.
"Oh God, Oh Merlin. Thank you. It was just a dream; it was just a dream. I imagined it all." He sighed in a strained relief. Snape was still snoring like a dragon on the other side of the roomHe snorted and rolled over. "God the man sleeps like the dead..." the boy thought.
Draco stopped still suddenly, and leaned towards the window hear. The song, the beautiful muggle song was whispering through the village like a ghost.
I linger in the doorway
Of alarm clock screaming
Monsters calling my name
Let me stay
Where the wind will whisper to me
Where the raindrops
As they're falling tell a story
In my field of paper flowers
And candy clouds of lullaby
I lie inside myself for hours
And watch my purple sky fly over me
Don't say I'm out of touch
With this rampant chaos - your reality
I know well what lies beyond my sleeping refuge
The nightmare I built my own world to escape
Draco slammed the window shut tight, with a shudder not from the cold. "It was just a dream." He whispered "Just my imagination."
fin