Chapter 4: The Word

Draco slammed the book shut. Nothing. He couldn't find a single passage about horcruxes. Worthless library. Even the Restricted Section was a joke.

The Hogwarts library didn't begin to compare to his father's collection of books at home. The answer was bound to be there, in one of the many oversized volumes which lined the walls of his father's study.

But Draco wasn't at home, and so he had spent hours here, in this pathetic excuse for a library, looking for any mention of horcruxes, any mention at all. And so far, he'd come up with a fat nothing. His eyes stung from scanning pages for the word. Horcrux. Horcruxes. It was burned in his mind even though he had never seen it. He took out his quill and wrote the word on his parchment, just so he could see it for real. Horcrux. That must be how it was spelled.

He didn't have the slightest idea what it meant. And more importantly, he didn't understand at all why he cared. Maybe it was just because it wasn't the cabinet. It was something else to think about. A relief, and yet quickly becoming equally frustrating. It was another dead end. Another question he couldn't answer.

To hell with Harry Potter and Slughorn and their damn horcruxes. He was beginning to hate them all as much as the cabinet. He should never have listened to a damn word Potter said.

One more book. He'd look at this one more book and then stop. He opened the heavy cover. Dust wafted from the pages into the air, making him cough.

Draco had taken a seat in the far corner of the library so that he wouldn't be disturbed while he poured through the large pile of books in front of him. He had pulled anything at all that had seemed like it might have to do with dark magic. For surely horcruxes were somehow connected to dark magic. Slughorn's tone had left Draco no doubt on that front.

He'd been using the sunlight from a nearby window to read, but the light had slowly darkened into a deep grey, and it was getting harder for him to make out the words. The book's elaborate script danced and blurred before his eyes. This was useless.

From the waning light, Draco could tell it must be dinner time already, and still he had found nothing. What a waste of hours. His time was more valuable than this.

Draco suddenly had the urge to rip the heavy pages in his hands to shreds. He closed the book quickly before he gave in. He didn't need to be explaining that one to Snape.

Snape. Snape would now what horcruxes were, Draco was sure of it. But there was no way Draco was going to ask him. Snape was already on his case enough, trying to find out what he had planned for Dumbledore.

For a moment Draco thought about just telling Snape everything. Snape would probably not only know about horcruxes, but he'd also know what Draco was doing wrong with the cabinet. Maybe with Snape's help he could finally get the damn thing fixed.

But no. There was no way Draco would give Snape the pleasure. Or the power.

Though, to be honest, Draco wasn't even sure anymore why he shouldn't confide in Snape. Because if Draco failed, then none of this would matter. He'd be dead at the Dark Lord's hand, or at least by the Dark Lord's wand. Was his pride worth that?

Draco hadn't asked for any of this. This whole year had been a hell he didn't deserve, and the world owed him. This wasn't how his life should be. It wasn't fair.

Maybe he'd go find Pansy and give her some of the attention she clearly craved. She had grown increasingly impatient with him since she'd returned from winter break. Draco suspected that she might even be contemplating moving on to Blaise. Draco hadn't been planning on interfering, as it had meant that Pansy had stopped nagging him. But now Draco felt like living a little. It was time he had at least just a taste of the way things were supposed to be. Time to put Blaise in his place.

No doubt Pansy was at dinner with the rest of them. He'd make a late, attention-getting entrance, resume his rightful place, and then get Pansy to sneak off with him.

But when Draco got to the Great Hall, he found Pansy and Blaise fully engaged in an impenetrable flirting match. They were talking about the upcoming apparition lessons, and arguing about who would succeed in apparating first. They had apparently even made a bet over it.

Draco thought about joining in--no doubt he'd be quicker to learn the skill than either of them, and so he might as well make some money off of it. But something about the way that Pansy was fluttering her eyelashes at Blaise made Draco hold back. He clearly wasn't needed here. He sat back and watched the proceedings with feigned disinterest.

It would be excellent to be able to apparate. In fact, at that moment Draco wanted nothing more than to be able to apparate far, far away from the Slytherin table in the Great Hall. He'd been there for several minutes now, and Blaise and Pansy still had barely appeared to notice his arrival. Crabbe and Goyle weren't meeting his eyes either. No doubt they didn't want to be drafted into another evening of standing guard while Draco worked in the Room of Requirement.

Anger burned in Draco's stomach. Sometime, while he had been doing exactly what he had to do, they had all moved on, without him. And now there was no going back.

And so Draco found himself once again leaving his circle of friends, without explanation, and heading out alone. He didn't want dinner. He rarely had an appetite these days. One of the few things Pansy had said to him recently was that he was getting thinner. He hadn't been able to tell whether this was a compliment or not. His trousers hung lower on his hips. If he had gone home for the holidays, no doubt his mother would have taken him to have new clothes fitted. But as it was, even the feel of his clothes reminded him how he had changed, how everything had changed, so quickly. His very body had changed.

Draco didn't have anywhere to go, and he didn't feel like wandering the grounds. He found himself in the empty Slytherin common room. A fire burned in the fireplace, flames licking at one another, glowing bright white, with warm threads of orange licking at the dark shadows beyond them.

He bypassed the comfortable chairs and couches, though their green and silver velvet cushions beckoned, and sank to the ground directly in front of the fire, arranging himself cross legged on the stone floor. He stared into the heart of the fire, breathing in the scent of smoke and of burning wood. He wanted to touch the flames; he even reached out as if to do so, but something held him back.

Draco wanted to be the one to change things, but he didn't know how.

He had so few options. The necklace had failed, as had the poison, apparently. The cabinet was still the main path before him. Why was his life dependent on a damn piece of furniture?

He'd have laughed, if he wasn't too afraid the laughter would turn into tears.

When he hadn't been looking, he had been born into a war. It wasn't his choice, and he saw that now, in the fire, in the dancing flames.

But he couldn't allow things to go on like this. Something had to give.

There was a curious scent to the air in Snape's office. Heavy, like parchment, but not musty. Maybe like wax, like a candle that had burned too long. It made Draco think of staying up late, finishing an assignment. Perversely, it felt safe, like a blanket. Draco wanted to wrap himself up in it.

But he was anything but safe. And he couldn't stay for long.

It was 3 AM. Draco had pushed the door open certain that he'd trigger a thousand wards, or perhaps that he'd find Snape asleep in his office, right there at his desk. He wouldn't have been surprised to learn that Snape slept in his office every night.

"Lumos," he whispered, his body tense.

In the soft glow of the spell, he saw that he was alone. Snape was nowhere in sight. There was nothing but warm silence and this safe, comforting smell.

And books. So many books.

Draco's heart beat fast in his chest, hammering away as he looked. He scanned titles, searching for books that wouldn't be on the shelves of the library, books he hadn't seen before, or perhaps ones that his father would never allow him to open.

He pulled a particularly large, ominous looking volume off the shelf immediately above Snape's desk. Hopefully it wouldn't be one of those books that groaned or started to yell.

The book opened noiselessly. Black scrawl graced heavy cream colored pages. Horcruxes. He needed something, anything, any clue at all. He still knew nothing, not a single thing, about horcruxes. But the word wouldn't leave him alone.

This book spoke of curses and traditions that surrounded curses. Some of the details made Draco shudder despite himself. What would Snape do with information like this?

A foolish question. Snape was a Death Eater, just like Draco's father. They had uses for these spells. He was surprised that Snape kept such a book in his office here at Hogwarts. Wouldn't this give away his allegiance to the Dark Lord?

Dark spell after dark spell, some written in languages that Draco didn't recognize. Languages not mentioned in Hogwarts. And for all he knew, one of these unintelligible words meant "Horcrux." But fat lot of good that would do him.

He closed the book with a bang, and then caught his breath. Shit. That was too loud. He needed to keep himself under control. He couldn't be careless, he couldn't get caught.

Draco took a stilling breath, and cast a silencing charm, just in case, before choosing another book. This one was small and red, the leather cover soft with age, with the title embossed on the front in gold. It was simply titled: Powerful Spells.

Oh, and he was in luck. It appeared to be a series of entries in alphabetical order. Excellent. He flipped through the pages. They were feather light. E... F... G... H.

Homorphus

Horn Tongue

Fuck. Nothing.

Didn't that fucking figure. From Homorphus to Horn Tongue. Maybe Draco had hallucinated the whole thing. Maybe there was no such thing as horcruxes. Maybe he was really, really losing it. Cracking under the pressure. For example, what on earth was he doing here, instead of in the Room of Requirement? Horcruxes weren't going to save his parents' lives. Or his own.

Draco sank into the leather chair in front of Snape's desk. It was surprisingly comfortable; he'd have imagined that Snape would have the most uncomfortable chair possible, just to make some sort of statement.

But it was quite comfortable, the leather soft and fine. The wood was refined, the lines fluid, like the furniture in his mother's sitting room. Snape was full of surprises.

But unfortunately, his office had as of yet yielded no surprises about horcruxes. If the damn things existed at all.

Draco looked at the clock. It was still only 4.30, hours before anyone would be up. He had time, and there were many more books to look through. He was here now, he might as well follow through on this insane goose chase.

He pulled down a large pile of books and dug in.

At 5.30 in the morning, he had found nothing, and he was beginning to feel nauseous from lack of sleep. He had a class at 8 am. He'd have to depend on tea to get him through to his free block, when he could slip away and get some sleep.

One last book lay in front of him. Old and black, with faded silver embossing, it didn't look particularly promising, though it did have a fairly impressive title. Magick Moste Evile.

Draco scanned the index.

And caught his breath. There it was. Horcrux. In the introduction.

It existed. He wasn't crazy.

He flipped quickly to the beginning and scanned the pages. He could hear his heart beat as if it were a scared bird, flapping its wings desperately inside his chest. And he still didn't know why he cared.

He read, his breath still caught in his throat, barely taking in the meaning of the words.

"Of the horcrux, wickedest of magical inventions, we shall not speak nor give direction…"

And that was it. Not another word on the subject.

Draco slammed the book closed. It trembled a little bit. He'd bet anything it would be moaning if it weren't for his silencing spell. How overblown. A whole lot of fuss for a book that had no information of help.

But now he knew there was information to be had. Draco rather doubted that horcruxes were truly the "wickedest of magical inventions," but still, it all begged the question:

What on earth would Harry Potter want with horcruxes?

Draco's mind began filling in the possible answers very quickly as he slipped out of Snape's office and headed back to the Dungeons. Cold, grey morning light was just seeping through the windows when he slipped into his bed, wide awake.

Snape's lecture today was interminable, and the air in the Potions room was still and stifling.

Draco stared blankly at his parchment, on which he had carefully written out one word, over and over.

Horcrux.

Now that he had slightly more information, the word held a new set of questions. What would the Boy Who Lived, the Chosen One, want with something so dark that even Snape didn't have any details about it?

There was one answer, staring Draco in the face, but it somehow rung wrong to Draco. And yet there it was. If Harry fucking Potter was meant to kill Voldemort, as the public opinion proclaimed, then dark magic was certainly one way to go about it.

But would Potter really wield something so dark? Didn't that just defeat the purpose of his whole oh so holy battle against all that is evil, aka the Death Eaters and Voldemort? Not that Draco bought into such a simple rendering, but he thought the other side did, and Potter was their savior.

Draco traced the word with his finger. The parchment was smooth. The ink was still drying, though, and stained just slightly, little grey black lines seeping into his skin.

Maybe Potter didn't know what he was getting into. That was more than likely. Potter hadn't been exposed to dark magic the way Draco had been, all his life. He probably didn't get it. Didn't understand the implications. He'd sounded so desperate, begging Slughorn for information about horcruxes. Yes, he didn't have a clue.

But then, neither did Draco. He knew horcruxes were dark, and he could hypothesize that they had power that would aid Potter in his quest against the Dark Lord. But that was where his knowledge ended.

He tried to imagine Potter as a powerful dark wizard, someone who could raise his hand, whisper some horcrux-related spell, and with that bring about Voldemort's demise.

Preposterous. How'd Potter end up being the savior of the wizarding world anyway? Just because he'd made it through a few encounters with the Dark Lord alive? Draco had now faced the Dark Lord himself, and lived to tell the tale. So he hadn't had the opportunity to be hexed by the Dark Lord as a baby. Did that really make all the difference?

Draco closed his eyes for a moment, and then opened them to stare at the parchment.

Horcrux.

He had been looking at the word for so long that they were starting to look like gibberish.

Now, instead, he wrote: Voldemort.

Draco prided himself in his elegant pensmanship. In inky black, Voldemort's name looked as deathly and foreboding as it possibly could. But like horcrux, it was just a word, just letters, just a series of lines and curves.

Carefully, Draco wrote one more word. Potter.

Harry Potter.

These names, all three of them now mattered, even if Draco didn't know exactly why. Laid out before him, as words, as black lines on parchment. Horcrux, Voldemort, Potter.

If Draco's conclusion was right--as was most often the case--Potter intended to kill Voldemort with horcruxes, whatever they were. And the world believed he could do it. In contrast, Draco was at Voldemort's mercy, his secret tool to kill Dumbledore, or to fail trying. More likely the latter. Draco's chest tightened.

This wasn't power, Draco realized, with sudden clarity. This was the exact opposite.

Suddenly he was overcome with desire to scratch out the beautifully written Voldemort, or to blot it out with a pool of ink. He settled for crumpling up the parchment. But the desperate feeling clawing at his chest only grew stronger as he looked up to find Potter's curious gaze on him.

Draco resisted the urge to grab Potter by the throat. Instead, he stared right ahead, ignoring Potter with the most supercilious smirk he could summon. To hell with Harry Potter and his horcruxes, and to hell with Voldemort too.