Harry awoke in the night with Sirius's name on his lips, something he'd thought he'd recovered from that summer after weeks of reliving it each night.
"No, not again," Harry bent his head forward and cradled it in his hands, desperate to rid the image from his mind. He tried to think of anything that would change his stream of thought. Nothing worked, even Malfoy brought images of his father, who was there and who dated Harry's mother which could have kept her from marrying James who was best friends with Sirius. And it continued on and on until the darkness and stillness of the room drove Harry to grab his cloak and leave, searching the corridors for some sort of relief. He walked, staring at the stone floor, letting himself bump into walls on occasion and end up staring at dead ends as well. Eventually he found himself in the long corridor with Slytherin House contained behind the walls and he looked up, seeing the shadows curled at the end of the corridor. All he wanted then was for someone to appear from within them and offer a hand, to talk to him or listen to the tornado of grief within him.
No one appeared, only the shadows, looking coldly at him without expression. Harry finally stepped forward, but stopped as the sound echoed loudly off the walls, the rustle of fabric and soft pad of his foot seemed so loud. From the corridor behind him came a voice.
"I'm sick of this, everything about it, this damnable sneaking we do just to end up right back where we started," the drawl of the Malfoy family echoed harshly into Harry's ears, snapped him up from within the cyclone and forcing him into the alcove containing a large urn.
"Where exactly did we start Draco?" a voice identical to that of the Potion Master answered back.
"Without any information and on that nymphomaniac's least-trustable list. I'm busting my arse every sodding night just to show up, get oggled by those creepy men and thrown out before they start talking about anything important."
"If you want information from the Dark Lord you have to gain his trust."
"How? Have sex with him?"
"I never said that Draco."
"But we both know I could get absolutely anything from him if I did and don't be such a prude Severus, it's not like I could anyway," Malfoy answered sharply.
"Why is that? Are you really so conservative?"
"Gods Severus, the Veela thing. Being descended of the Malfoy family which is traditionally at least half Swedish Veela, I am also and, since the genes are dominant, I am limited to only give myself, body and all to the mate pertained by the magic in my blood and theirs. Veela are all restricted like that."
"Ah yes, you're inheritance and becoming a world lusted for model."
"I am gorgeous, that's true."
Malfoy and the Potions Master came into sight, Death Eater masks in hand. Harry made a very conscious attempt not to explode. "That was never in question Draco. We're straying from the point, did he tell you anything about Morag?"
"No, he and all the others I asked said they had had no idea a student had been killed before the report. I personally think it was that psycho new combat instructor Tains, she's a nutter if I've ever seen one, and she's got that "prophecy" gift. Maybe the riddle was some cryptic insanity she inherited from that aunt of hers." Malfoy said, placing his hands on his hips.
"It's a possibility but not well supported, anyone could have come up with that riddle. At least we've decoded it to be talking about Potter," Snape said.
"Please, everything is about Potter."
" "There will be crimes, never ending. The devourers of doom come and go as easily as rain. A bolt of white in a sea of black. Bring forth the Prince of Darkness and the white bolt. Sacrifice." Dumbledore and I also took the devourers of doom to be the Death Eaters, and we're not sure about the Prince of Darkness," Snape said, unfolding a piece of parchment with the riddle written on it as well as a large amount of extra writing.
"Voldemort? Maybe it's a command saying they both have to die to regain peace." Malfoy looked at it.
"Maybe, but who could have decreed it then? And why?"
"I don't know, but we need to figure it out, hopefully before another student shows up with their blood finger-painted all over the corridor walls."
Harry sat there for a second, the Prince of Darkness, Slytherin was the house of Darkness, Malfoy was the Prince of Slytherin, it was a shaky concept but it had least had a thread. That seemed to be the approach of the riddle maker, he being a bolt, taken from his lightning scar. Then why did Malfoy have to die? Why was he required?
"Do you think this may have anything to do with your…unusual birth?"
"You mean being ripped out of a dead woman and fostered by my father's real wife? The dead woman being a Veela who died to keep me from the hands of the most evil cretin semi-alive? It's possible."
Snape sighed. "You and Potter are very alike in how you lost your mothers, both died protecting their sons from Voldemort, both women he had fallen in love with and tried to woo at some point. Perhaps it is Voldemort who made the decree-"
"No! I refuse to believe that my mother died to protect me from that freak just to have him command that I die with the Boy-Wonder. It doesn't make sense, there's no way, no way at all," Malfoy threw the mask down the hall and it skidded to a stop near the urn Harry hid behind.
"Why are you so upset about this?" Snape didn't seem all to comforting.
"At least there are people to tell Potter about his mother, what a wonderful person she was and all that bullshite. Thing is, no one even knew my real mum even existed, I didn't even know she existed until the beginning of this bloody summer when Lucius pulled all this shite on me and turned me into some fucking eye candy for the world. There's no way she died for this, this me, I can't think she let me live so I could become a sacrifice to keep the peace. I won't think it," Malfoy collapsed to the ground.
"She couldn't possibly have died because she knew she'd give birth to the other half of the only thing that could appease the evil monster? If that's not an honorable thing to die for what is? Look at me Draco," Snape knelt and turned the blonde's face towards him. "I know you didn't ask to become a model for the universe to oggle, you didn't ask to become a trophy to Lucius's egotism and Malfoy lineage. But all you can do with it now is run with it. If this really means you and Potter have to die to end the reign of terror, will it really be so bad? You'll pass through this wretched war-torn world and into whatever if anything lies outside us. Can you imagine it?-the greater world you face with this new destiny?"
Malfoy sighed heavily. "I can, but I don't want it, not really. Why can't we just kill the Boy-Wonder and let me live in alcoholic bliss? I personally won't miss him one iota."
"Because, alcoholism isn't good for your liver," Snape pulled the boy to his feet.
"Fuck it," Malfoy rolled his eyes and stood away from his professor. "I'm going to bed, I'll see you at breakfast, correct?"
"As always," Snape smirked at him and turned to look down the hall. "I'll see you at breakfast Mr. Malfoy."