Chapter 1 | The Malfoys
"Father, I'm bored," Draco whines.
He's annoyed with being in the sweltering air. How it warps unpleasantly in the haze of late summer sun, glimmering off the limestone in blinding shards. It's interrupted only by the cool shadow of his body like a stain on the grey slabs. The austere courtyard is surrounded by oppressive hedges stretching to the sky—clearly the work of a wizard with little desire for happiness, and an affinity for intimidation.
Draco reaches lazily into the air to snatch up an old golden snitch. It's worn out, lists to one side and makes for a predictable catch every time. It's insufferably boring.
He releases it into the air, waits a few wishful moments for it to do something interesting, and when it doesn't, he snatches it from the air.
"This snitch is old," he drones. "I'm never going to make the Quidditch team at Hogwarts with such rubbish practice."
"We'll buy you a new one at Diagon Alley," Lucius says, barely looking up from behind a copy of the Daily Prophet.
The front page features a large moving photo of Dumbledore with a ridiculously long white beard, blinking from behind glinting half-moon spectacles and adjusting a tall, pointed star-embroidered hat. The headline reads: Dumbledore celebrated for commencement of 75th year as Chief Warlock of Wizengamot.
"I thought you said Dumbledore was a crackpot, good-for-nothing muggle supporter?"
That comment prompts his father to raise an eyebrow and glance at him with an icy blue eye above the paper. "At least that message made it through your thick little skull," he scoffs. "He certainly is a crackpot fool. Letting in all sorts. The more mudbloods he allows to fraternize with our kind, the more squibs you'll see in our society, mark my words. How he can sympathize with them, I'll never know..."
"Dobby!" Draco calls, letting his head fall back to the chair, closing his eyes against the warmth of the sun. He hates the feeling of sweat beading on his face. Whoever invented robes didn't consider warm weather.
There is a loud CRACK and a bedraggled house elf appears, twisting his little hands around a stained pillowcase that hangs limply from his bony shoulders.
"Y-yes, master Draco?" He squeaks, green eyes wide in fear like saucers.
"Get me some parchment and a quill," Draco says, barely offering the elf a glance.
"Yes, master Draco," Dobby says, bowing and taking three meek steps backwards before disapparating with a CRACK.
Draco tosses the snitch dispassionately into the air and catches it, crushing one of the fragile golden wings between his fingers.
CRACK.
Lucius whips the elm wand from his walking stick. "Goddamn elf, enough apparating!" he barks.
Draco instinctively flinches, but Lucius's curse flies past him and lands on the elf, who is tossed across the limestone, tiny limbs flailing in somersaults.
It's over quickly as it began. Draco feels a chill down his spine, mingling with the strangest new sense of anticipation. He's been at the end of his father's wand often. Seeing that power unleashed on another creature makes him wonder suddenly what it'll be like to have those curses flowing from a wand of his own. It won't be long now until he can feel it for himself.
Dobby crawls limply towards them, pathetic dribbles from his nose dirtying the ragged pillowcase. "S-sorry Master," he says, lifting himself from the cobblestones and twisting his little hands together in anxiety. He bends in such a devoted bow that his long nose nearly touches the ancient interlocked stones.
Lucius rises swiftly from his chair, nearly knocking the elf over with the tail of his robe on his way into the manor. Dobby squeaks as the bottle of ink he's fetched for Draco slips from his bony little fingers. It smashes to the stones in a pool of blackness, forming dark rivulets between the stones.
"Seriously, elf?" Draco snaps impatiently, flinging the snitch at Dobby and watching with satisfaction as it ricochets off his large eyeball with a faint crunch. He catches it casually as it rebounds towards him. At least that was a little entertaining.
Dobby drops to his knees, soaking the hem of his ratty pillowcase with ink. "Forgive me Master Draco, Dobby will fetch another one right away, sir –"
"Don't bother," Draco snaps, lifting a pale hand to shield his eyes from the sun. "Just go find me something to do. I'm bored to death."
"Yes sir, right away sir," Dobby rises, black ink dripping from his knees. He shuffles meekly to the manor and disappears in the cool shadow of the doorway.
"Ugh, that elf is good for nothing," Draco spits, whipping the defective snitch across the rigid gardens, lodging it firmly into the towering cedar hedge along the perimeter.
From a lounge chair shrouded in the shadow of the towering garden walls, a delicate figure rises, cloaked in gauzy black robes—Draco's mother. Narcissa combs a veil of white hair behind her shoulder and approaches him. She remains silent—even her footsteps are wispy, nonexistent in such an effort to shrink herself into nothing. So like her, Draco thinks. To sit in obscurity her entire life unless called upon. It fills him with pity and disgust and protectiveness all at once.
"Draco darling," Narcissa says, reaching her fair fingers to his cheek, "behave please. Your father hates when you're angry."
Draco feels his cheeks burning. He slaps his mother's hand away.
"I'll be angry as I like," he grumbles, trying to stand and clumsily disentangling his robes from the curled iron serpents embellishing the chair's legs.
Narcissa surprises him with a biting grip upon his arm, stopping him mid-step. Her silver eyes cut into his. "No, you won't."
The tightness of her nails digging into his skin is unwavering. Narcissa's eyes film over in a dull glaze. She tugs at Draco suddenly, burying his face in her chest. At eleven years old, his eyes barely reach her milky collarbone. Her skin is cool relief against his cheek.
"Do NOT ruin tonight for your father," she says. "Rufus may not have won minister, but his influence is wide-reaching. And we are so utterly tired of hiding in our own home. We need to show the Ministry our loyalty. It's survival, Draco," her arms tighten around him, lips touching his slicked hair. "One step out of line..."
He can hear the trembling in her voice and he knows what she's afraid of. But he won't be afraid of it anymore. "Fine," he says, wriggling free and escaping into the cavern-like darkness of the manor.