Family Relations

Draco was inordinately glad that the enormous fairy was stealthier than she looked. She fluttered impatiently above him, pointing frantically at the beach with one hand and holding a finger over her mouth with the other. He nodded at her and sighed to himself, as he crept towards the edge of the trees. AhhhhhHaaa! there was the stupid hut. Oh, but there were the two men as well. They appeared to be peeking into his and Potter's hut. What pervs. One of the men turned slightly and the moon cast its light down the side of his face. Yes, just as Draco had thought, it was his father. After all, who but a Malfoy would have hair that could qualify for the description "like gold spun"?

Draco was relieved, his father would certainly know how to get him off of this stupid island, and Draco would just tell Dumbledore where Potter was when he got back to Hogwarts. Simple and easy—the best kind of plan. He took a step forward, intending to rush over to his father and fall at his feet (provided the man had some fresh clothes for him, or at the very least a bar of chocolate) when the other man turned as well and Draco realized who it was. He quailed. McNair, the executioner. Draco shivered. They called McNair that for all sorts of reasons, not the least of which his job for the Department of Magical Creatures. Still, if his father was with him then there couldn't be any sinister reason for his appearance on the island. Certainly Lucius was come to look for him. McNair must just be there for…support?

Of course he knew he was lying to himself. Draco sighed and slumped back against a coconot tree, setting off an avalanche of the horrid things. Ok, perhaps not an avalanche, two fell.

"What was that?" McNair hissed at Lucius.

"Coconuts, obviously."

Coco-nots, Draco mentally corrected.

McNair raised an eyebrow at Lucius. "Don't you think you should be just a little more suspicious? One might think you don't really want to find that boy of yours."

"Don't be ridiculous," Lucius flipped his hair. "I have every intention of finding my son, and if he's with that Potter brat when I find him, and the Potter boy is still alive, I'll help you finish the job."

McNair cackled coldly. "You expect me to believe you'd kill your own bratling?"

"It's what My Lord orders."

"You are too liberal with your interpretation of my orders, Luuciuuss." Voldemort's hated voice slid down Draco's spine.

Lucius turned and bowed slightly at the dark form emerging from around the side of the hut.

"Apologies, My Lord."

Voldemort waved him off. "I simply said that if we find your son and Potter in cahoots, that the Malfoy line would be in great peril. I don't believe I specified that it was your son who would be punished."

Draco saw an icy smile begin to bloom on McNair's face, before he checked his father's reaction. Lucius appeared as cold as stone, if slightly blue around the lips. But then, perhaps that was a trick of the moonlight.

"Of course, I'm sorry." Lucius agreed.

"Naturally though," Voldemort added. "We'll have to kill the boy as well."

"Y-yes, naturally."

Draco's eyes widened as he heard his father stammer.

Voldemort's gaze shifted to the trees. "If the boy were to come forward, and hand Potter over, then I'm sure he could be salvaged for some use."

Lucius followed his master's gaze toward the forest and took a step towards it. McNair reached out and put a hand across his chest to hold him back. "If the boy were to come forward," he hissed.

Draco stared at the three men. He tried to take a step back, but was already pressed against the tree. His father couldn't be serious? He expected Draco to either kill one of his classmates or be killed? His father expected him to willingly consent in the real live death of… a person? It was all well and good to posture about mudbloods and muggles but…his father couldn't actually be a murderer? Could he? Draco gasped. He was. Everything anyone'd said about Lucius was true.

Even as Draco thought it he felt the first familiar tingles of his father's legilemency push against his mind. For once, Draco let the man see what he was thinking. My father, murderer, Voldemort, kill me, kill Potter, Dad. He felt Lucius recoil from his mind, then push again with fear, anger, horror, pleading that Draco would understand. He didn't mean it, he wouldn't do it, but he was a murderer, and it was either Potter or Draco—or both. Draco shook his head and threw up his mental defenses, then he turned his back and ran.

Draco ran. He ran straight past Alicia even though she fluttered at him and motioned for him to stop. The last thing he needed right now was incessant questioning. He had to get back to the waterfall. Or no, he couldn't go back to the waterfall. Voldemort and his lackeys—Draco cringed, his father —were certainly tracing him. He couldn't go back to the waterfall directly or they would know where Potter was.

Draco stopped. He realized then that he'd made a choice, a choice that he hadn't even really had to think about. Everything that Voldemort was, was wrong. He had chosen Potter's side, had even chosen to protect Potter. He'd thrown away his father.

That stung. Part of him still wanted to turn around and go back. The hell with the rest of the world, the hell with Potter and muggles and mudbloods; he wanted his Dad back. All of his life his father had been this mythic man, an actor on the stage of life. Draco had admired the way that his father could effortlessly portray one face in public, and shed it the moment he got behind the walls of his home. Well, imagine that, the outer façade wasn't such an act after all. All of his life, Draco had admired a man who would lie to his own family, and would murder to play his part.

Draco felt bile rise in his throat and bent over to puke into a nearby fern. When he gathered himself and sat back up, he glanced around and realized he was completely lost. He'd run off in no direction, often changed directions, and now he had no direction. No idea even, of where the beach and the "baddies" were. He sat down in the dirt, flicking some vomit off of his sleeve and buried his face in his hands. Potter was probably dying, or would be found and would die. He himself was lost in the woods with three men who would kill him when they found him, he reeked, and he just really wanted Dumbledore to show up and take him away from it all. Dumbledore had promised once, that it was as easy as saying the word, for Draco to be free. Sitting alone in a strange, not to mention bizarre, forest, he wished very hard that he had said the word. Nothing happened.

He felt Alicia fluttering above him before he heard her. She was amazing, and thankfully quiet in more ways than one. She landed beside him and cooed wordless comfort into his ear as she petted his back. Draco was never one for crying, so he didn't, but the body wracking sobs were there nonetheless. It didn't seem to matter that they were dry and hot. Alicia patted his back harder when he had trouble catching his breath, and imbued him with soothing magic until he calmed.

"Are you ready now?" she finally asked.

Draco looked up at her and sighed. He nodded. He didn't know what she was asking, but he was ready for something.

Alicia placed a hand on either side of his face and held his head so that he looked into her eyes. She smiled, and kissed his forehead softly. "Yes," she said, almost sadly.

He felt magic of some kind pouring into him, and Draco leaned into her hands as he fell asleep.