Merlin, he hated this place. Nothing was in it for him. Every second he spent there was wasted breath to him. He could hardly convince himself of a reson to go back every year.
He sat staring at his dinner, unable to eat, though his fellow students seemed to be enjoying themselves a little too much. And as he sat, he fleetingly wondered weather his mother would have consented if he had asked not to be sent back this year. Of course, assuming that she had not had this very steadfast reason to force him back.
Truthfully, there were only two reasons why he even bothered attending classes.
The Dark Lord needed him. He had set him a mission. How important it made him feel; the greatest wizard of all time had asked for his aid. Only he could provide this service. He was special, outstanding in a crowd of a thousand. He relished his brain in that thought; he was one in a million.
He grinned at his plate in spite of his self pitty.
The clanking in the great hall continued, growing louder as pudding came around, but he could not hear it. He was delighting his mind in the high demand for his service.
His father had never even made him feel this worth while.
His grin faded just as quickly as it had come.
His father; he used to be most admired by a vast majority of the wizarding community. Until he was convicted of being a Death Eater. Then the public saw him for what he really was; a lying snake that bought his way into everything. Sure, he had spoiled Draco, but only after verbally abusing him, telling him he would amount to nothing if he did not arouse the approval of the Dark Lord, that he was worth about at much as a Crumple-Horned Snorkack, and would be lucky if he even amounted to half of what his father was. He had told him these things for so long that Draco actually believed him.
But he had the Dark Lord now. This was his new father, his new master. The Dark Lord favored him. He had faith in Draco, he knew he was worth something, that he was precious and he could not get his newest misison done without his help. He made Draco that he was something, gave him the attention hehad been starving for his entire life. He gave Draco a life.
He would do anything to please him, to let him know that his faith was not ill placed.
He had to get it done. He would stop at nothing.
Draco looked up from his plate, desperation almost unmistakably written across his features. He peered towards the staff table.
There sat Albus Dumbledore, eating his trecle tart, not a care in the world. There he was, with that damned benign smile on his face. He did not know.
Draco grinned again.
The old, senile Dumbledore did not know what was coming to him, did not know what he was going to get for standing opposed to the Dark Lord for so long.
A sickenning excitement ran through his blood as his heart began to beat faster and he shook with exhileration.
But how could Dumbledore have been so feared?
He looked like... an old, helpless man that was slowly dying. His right hand seemed to have already seen death.
Draco's grin broadened.
He could not help but think that this would be easy, that he would soon be favored by the Dark Lord above all the others and that He would forgive his bastard of a father. And that his beautiful and loving mother would be safe and happy again, like she used to be when his father was home.
There was only one thing that might stand to stop him.
Harry Potter.
Draco's grin fell once more into nonexsistence.
He moved his eyes across the Great hall, over to the Gryffindor table where Potter sat with his friends, laughing to no avail as if Draco hadn't just broken his nose moments before and left him stranded, under and invisibility cloak, on the Hogwarts express. Draco's face contorted as though he had just eaten a flobber worm.
Saint Potter, he heard himself sneering in his mind. How the bloody hell he managed to wedge himself into the middle of the Dark Lord's biggest plans was incomprehinsible. Four times, now, he'd been sucessful in stopping him form obtaining what he desired. Five times he had faced the Dark Lord and somehow, most unfortunately, still lived to tell the tale.
His stomache turned at the thought of him. He had to be careful; he had to be descreet and very sneaky. Potter had an eerie way of always knowing what he was up to.
And how could he have done? How could an idiot like Potter that hung around dung like mudbloods and blood traitors come off so omniscient? He was almost as bad as that fool Dumbledore!
But as he thought of Harry Potter's blood tratrous friends, his face softened. His eyes moved to the left, a little farther up the table where a pretty girl with a long mane of flowing red hair sat next to Dean Thomas, who had his arm securely around her waist. He wished hard he could be that arm, if only for a moment. He had dreamed of touching her beautiful skin, wondering how soft and warm it must be. She was the only other reason he had ever had to want to be in this place.
He loved her, for some unexplainable reason. He held on to that love, not knowing why. It lifted him up when he was down. Every night before he slept he invisioned Ginny loving him, and accepting him, no matter what he did. He just held her in his arms and she nuzzled him, lovingly, back, wanting to cover him in kisses.
But this only brought him down again, seeing that she would never have him. He knew that they stood for different things, that they came from opposite sides of the planet.
And that's what made him doubt. He almost hated himself for thinking it. But how could someone so perfect, so beautiful, be so wrong? Maybe she did have a point, maybe she was right. How could someone who was so happy all the time, who always seemed to have it together, who had everything that he never had and always wanted, be so incredibly wrong?
Her life was a far cry form his. It was full of love and laughter.
His was full self consciousness, knowing that if he messed up just once his father would not accept him. He spent every second of every day watching what he said, careful to please the right people: The kind of people that had loads of money and could get him on the good side of people in power. He had to be careful who he associated with; he had to keep up the good name of the Malfoy's.
Living without the acceptance of his father, trying ot please the Dark Lord so he would amount ot something, never being able to relax because of what might happen to his family name, and not being able to have Ginny all made him very angry. And he released that anger the only way he knew how; making other people suffer with him; especially Potter, who was so close to Ginny, who Ginny had fawned over for so long. Potter and his stupid friends, the mudblood, Hermione Granger, and the blubbering idiot who couldn't do anything right, Ron Weasley. He pittied Ginny for having such a rude, moron for a brother.
But then he looked at himself. Was he any less rude? And, if he was wrong about the Dark Lord being the right way, wouldn't that make him a moron?
Shut up, thick head, he told himself, forcing his eyes away form the beautiful vision that was Ginny Weasley. He could not, he would nnot, have second thoughts now. He would never know if Ginny was right and he had been wrong all along. This was all he knew, and this was all he could fight for. He could not waste the Dark Lord's precious time choosing between the life he had always known and taking a chance on the great unknown that awaited him if he sought after Ginny.
And then it struck him. He suddenly realized what it was that kept him from her.
Fear.
He was afraid of not knowing what would happen if he succedded or failed with Ginny. He did not know how his family would react. He did not know for sure if she would fall for him or not, at which point he would have nothing to turn back to. If he denounced what he was now, then he wouldn't have anything if Ginny did not want him. He was completely terrified of everyhitng that she represented; freedom from his life waited with her, but a prison of lonliness awaited her rejection.
Everything was clear where he was: Succeed and be honored, or fail and be killed along with his father and mother.
That was all he knew.
That was all he could fight for.
Everything was set into stone.
He had made his decision.
He had reached the pont of no return.