Chapter Four
Slave loved the outdoors almost as much as she loved books. The way the light filtered throught the leaves, the way the ground was covered in layer after layer of dead leaves, and beneath that, dark green, fuzzy moss that felt like carpet. It was better than any magic, and it was like a spell, all at the same time. Master led her along, tapping trees with his knuckles, muttering about what he needed. He took wood from trees to make the beautiful wands, the wands that Slave wasn't allowed to touch. She climbed up the trees for him and skimmed off ideal chunks from the tender, vulnerable white flesh that lay behind the rough bark.
Master held out tree lice to offer the belligerent bowtruckles as she climbed, secretly enjoying the sight of her slim legs and firm behind as any man from eight to 98 would. He knew what a prize the girl was, and loved her as much as any man could. She was so kind and innocent, kept that way by the Ultimate Master, who owned their minds as much as their bodies. Master didn't mind that, though. He was doing what he loved, making wands, and she was doing what she loved, reading books, so they were content with their private, lonely lives. Master was glad Slave liked the boy. She hadn't ever seen a boy that she knew of, the closest her memory came to it was Ultimate Master, and he was no boy, so of course she liked this nearly perfect specimen of a young man. That was inevitable.
- - - -
Severus Snape looked into the mirror, a small hand mirror, and laughed. He loved the power he had, and the powerlessness of Draco, locked away to a wooden bed in a tree house, hoping he would come and tell him that everything was alright, it was safe to return. The mirror showed Snape the dark interior of the primative house, where he now kept two geniuses imprisoned in their own minds and one heir imprisoned by his own body. He had no plans to see Draco, to tell him that no one blamed him for Voldemort's terrible death, which was the truth, to tell Draco that they thought he was dead and the Death Eaters would rejoice his coming. He would simply wait until the right moment to tell Draco a lie, keeping him with those half-useless worms he kept in a tree. Laughter burbled up in his throat and he released a deep, threatening cackle, sending the few Death Eaters around him scuttling elsewhere.
- - - -
Draco woke to the empty room. It was geting dark, and the room was filled with a half-hearted afternoon glow. He tried to get up, but, looking down, he saw manacles, matching exactly Hermione's. Terrific, Draco couldn't help himself from thinking. The day just got better and better. After a few minutes of waiting in the increasing dark, Hermione and the old coot walked in, arms full of wood wrapped in rough cloth. They lay the wood down by the door and Hermione walked over to Draco.
"Are you hungry? I was planning on whipping something up for tea. Would you like anything in particular?" Slave asked.
"No, I'd like to shove these manacles right up--"
"Mr. Malfoy, manners, manners. Go along, Slave," Master interrupted. Slave walked up the stairs abashedly, her chains clanking irrately as she walked up to the kitchen to prepare the evening meal. "Now, Draco, my boy, you mustn't talk that way around Slave. She is a very dear girl, very innocent, as it were, and I would prefer she stay in such a state. Now, do you promise to be civil?" Draco glared at the old man and gave a very unconvincing nod. "Honestly, boy, you are so ornery, I won't be surprise when one of us knocks you silly one day. I should leave you chained up here for a week, and see if your disposition changes," the old man said as he unlocked the chains. "Now, you have a while to look about if you like, before tea time, but don't eve try to go past the big tree outside, or you'll get a nasty shock, and the last thing I need is a half-dead boy on my hands." With that, the old man dragged his creaky bones up the stairs and left Draco to his explorations. Outside was exactly as you might expect a forest to be. The trees had been thinned a bit around the house, but other than that, there was nothing extraordinary. It was the house itself that was the spectacle. The house was actually a hollowed out tree, held up and kept unrotten by magic. The tree was at least ten meters diameter, and so tall Draco could barely see the top. Seeign nothing else of interest, he reentered the tree house.
Inside, there were six platforms, an attic of sorts, and the common, or ground, level that opened out to the outside. The first three platforms were curtained away from the prying eye, the fourth was the wand making room, full of wood, little cupboards full of wand cores, and carving tools. The fifth was the kitchen, where Hermione hummed by the stove, and the final platform was the dusty old library. There was a line hanging from the ceiling of the library that allowed the door to open and the ladder to fall down. Draco climbed this ladder and peeked around, but only saw a few half-rotten books that had bad bindings and broken wands, the stuff Master and Slave refused to throw away but didn't want to keep.
- - - -
Slave watched the soup simmer and the water boil, her mood matching. She was only trying to be kind to the boy, and he had been rude to her for no reason. But she might have been even more angry at Master for stopping him from saying what he was about to say. She threw the willow bark violently into the water, burning her hand on the scorching pot.
No, I'd like to shove these manacles right up-- what? What did he want to shove the manacles right up? She put her hand in her mouth. For as long as she could remember (which was not very long at all, admittedly) Master had been keeping away information. Of course she was full of all sorts of information, but he kept her innocent of a certain kind of information, the very things she longs to know, to be as fluent in them as she was in the ingredients it took to make Veritaserum. What did Draco Malfoy want to shove those manacles up?
The memory of Master taking her out to get unicorn hair came to her. He said that it was much easier to get unicorn hair from the actual unicorn if you had a maiden with you. When Slave had asked about maidens, Master had blushed and said some things weren't meant to be spoken about in mixed company. This memory frustrated her to no end. She knew about the powers of unicorn hair, and the things that made unicorns come to you, a maiden being one, but she didn't understand what it took to be a maiden, why she was one, and who else was one.
Perhaps this new Draco Malfoy would tell her the things she wanted to know...The thought cheered her considerably, and set her to humming as she watched the soup simmer and the water boil.
- - - -
"Supper!" Hermione called lightly, drawing the old man and the young boy to the table. All three were consumed in their own thoughts, and none noticed the silence of the room, broken by the scrape of spoon against bowl only.
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A/N: I'll just clarify the layout of the tree house for you right quick, in case you were confused or curious.
storage/attic
library
kitchen
wand making room
Master's bedroom
Slave's bedroom
Draco's future bedroom
common/ground level
There. That's from the top down. I am very tired, so don't insult the crude manner in which I laid this out. Sorry for any errors. Alert them to me if they are glaringly obvious or crucial to the plot or parallelism in my story. Don't be afraid to R&R.