Chapter Six: A Lesson in Humility
I've spent a large portion of my life ensuring that people ignore me. I've always said very little in conversations and if you had asked someone what they knew about me, they would restate my name with a puzzled expression, one of those faces that kind of blends into the background and fades into nothing more than a random wall poster in memory: easily ignored. I've also been certain never to accomplish anything so that my name never showed up on documents or in speeches. I was never the student who saved Slytherin at the last minute with additional House points or the first kid on the Quidditch tryouts list. Basically, I've existed not to exist.
I have never missed those days more than I do now, crossing the threshold of the Great Hall amidst utter and complete silence, all students making no attempt to hide their staring. Any conversations that had been going on died as soon as I stepped through the doorway and I catch sight of an owl, perched on my usual seat, an owl that I know.
The owl has beady purple eyes that make you involuntarily shudder and great black spots that make you think it was burned in some horrible accident or perhaps an experiment gone terribly wrong. The owl has talons that literally glint in the light of the false sky above with a silvery shine. The owl has always creeped me out and it belongs to my mother.
It stares at me with the rest of the room, except it stares through the slits it calls pupils and slowly yet fluidly tilts its head to the side, eying me like its next kill. In its talon is gripped a letter, but it's not just any letter . . . it's a Howler.
What did I do? I think frantically, trying to come up with something. There's no answer to be found, however, so I do the only thing I can think of and continue towards the long bench. I hold my head high and force my arms to swing carelessly at my sides. I try to force a smile on my face, but then I catch Draco's eye. He shakes his eyes only, but it's enough. As I near my spot, he lifts his plate ever so slightly to reveal a pile of ashes: the remnant of his own Howler and a clear sign that I'm not the only one being subjected to yells.
"Father," is all he mouths, and with the close timing of the two, I know that it's not a coincidence. I gulp involuntarily and gingerly take my seat, shaking with anticipation. I reach for the letter and—at a speed that now rivals a drunken turtle—open it.
"BLAISE AUGUSTUS ZABINI," it shrieks, eliciting laughs from around me and a bright flush from my own cheeks. Nothing is quite as embarrassing as your mother screaming at you in public.
"YOU HAVE COMPLETELY SHAMED ME! YOU ARE LUCKY THAT I'M NOT LEAVING YOU ON THE STREET!"
I must have really screwed up for her to toss aside the customs that demand a united family front. This thought scares me even worse, and I find myself gnawing at my lip.
"I THOUGHT THAT YOU KNEW TO BEHAVE YOURSELF, YOUNG MAN! SNOGGING THAT POOR GIRL WAS UNCALLED FOR AND IMPROPER! YOU ARE TO COME HOME THIS INSTANT ON A SPECIAL LEAVE FROM THE HEADMASTER! I WILL NOT HAVE ANY SON OF MINE RUINING THIS FAMILY'S REPUTATION!"
You would think that it would be better now that it was over, but you'd be wrong. I could practically die right before the entire population of Hogwarts of embarrassment. My face is flaming, and I notice Ronald Weasley and Harry Potter laughing hysterically at the Gryffindor table, the rest of the students in the hall either following suite or trying to avoid my glare. I turn to Draco, and he looks as embarrassed as I do, not to mention more tired than usual. His eyes have a hollow look to them that no amount of food could ever fill, the look of someone who knows of their coming and unstoppable doom.
That look behind his eyes is enough for me to want to do something, enough for me to cast aside my own embarrassment. So, I do the only thing I can think of: I begin to laugh like Potter and Weasley, only louder and lengthier. I stand up from my chair and throw myself to the ground, choking out laughter in great heaves and rolling in fits of hysteria. I laugh so hard that tears begin to streak down my face. After a few seconds, I allow myself to calm down and smile as if for unseen cameras.
I allow the flush to disappear from my features before standing and dusting off my robes. I carefully brush the ashes that remain of the Howler into my hand and begin to skip about the room, sprinkling them as I go. A pinch for Harry Potter, a touch for Ernie MacMillan, and the largest dash for Ronald Weasley, sprinkled directly in front of his nose.
I chuckle lightly and then make my way over to Millicent herself, grabbing her hand with a sweep of my arm. Then I kiss her hand lightly before pressing my lips into hers and dipping her nearly to the floor without breaking the kiss. When I pull away, I grin boldly at her and turn to do the same for the rest of the school. I bolt up to the teacher's eating area and slide behind the podium before anyone can stop me.
"Fifty points to Slytherin for an outright magnificent show," I bellow deeply in my most over-the-top formal voice, "—And! Fifty points from Gryffindor for the existence of Ronald Weasley!" I turn to see Professor McGonagall approaching me with a look that tells me she's running out of ideas for how to handle me. Unluckily for her, I have no plans of getting caught today.
"That will be all!" I call hastily before taking off again. I quickly mutter a spell and the entire room fills with roses so high that several heads are completely covered.
"For you, Millicent," I call over the top of the screaming that's beginning to fill the room, "My one, true love!" With that, I blow a final kiss in her direction and take off, running out of the Great Hall without having eaten my food for what feels like the millionth time.
When Draco finally catches up with me, I'm shoving several robes into my black and gold-studded trunk, along with my cauldron that's dingy with overuse and my Transfiguration book. I doubt that I'll have much time for homework while I'm gone, but it doesn't hurt to be prepared.
"What . . ." Draco begins, a frown on his face but a twinkle in his eye, "in Merlin's name was that?"
"That," I begin with an equally solemn tone, "was what we call fun. You really ought to try it sometime." I finish the statement with a wink, not entirely sure when they became second nature.
"Fun?" Draco's jaw drops disbelievingly, and he raises an eyebrow dramatically, something I know he's only doing because we're alone. Still, I'm happy to be rubbing off on him.
"Aww come on, you know my mother's being ridiculous anyways. No one is ever going to let us into the Sacred Twenty-Eight, and if anyone is a disgrace to the family, it's her and all her failed marriages. I'm simply making the most of a messed-up situation."
Draco chuckles lightly, "That's fair," he admits with a slight nod, "It's also what mine was about, by the way. My father questioned me hanging out with such a loose cannon, or as he put it, a liability."
"Oh my goodness!" I exclaim with a smirk, "We must raise your insurance rates!"
Draco's eyebrow shoots up again, this time in confusion, and I realize that I've done it again. Just like Sherlock Holmes, insurance rates aren't something that I should know about.
"You know . . . insurance? I heard about it during that summer trip when I went to visit mother's husband's mother: my step-grandmother, I guess. She was telling me all about it, how you pay a group of wizards to protect your things, as in insure them against threats. If something happens to make protecting it more dangerous, like if there's somebody who wants you dead or is a 'loose cannon' . . ." I make quotation marks in the air, "They raise the rate at which you pay for this insurance against threats, also known as the insurance rate."
Draco simply stares, incredulous.
"I dunno, mate, maybe she was messing with me. She didn't seem to like me much."
He nods curtly, "She must have been, because I've never, ever heard of such a thing."
"Anyways . . ." I continue onwards, "do you think Ginny Weasley could be convinced to come home with me?"
Draco makes a gagging noise and scrunches his face in disgust, "Why on earth would you want that?"
"Very funny . . ." I roll my eyes. "But can't you imagine how irritated with me mother would be if I not only 'snogged' some random Slytherin girl, but I also had the audacity to bring back with me another random girl, a girl who is not only from Gryffindor, but also is from a family of blood traitors. Hell, I'd pay her practically all the galleons I can put my name to if she'd come with me!"
"You really do want to die, don't you."
"Draco, Draco, Draco," I wag my finger in the air, "You misunderstand. I want my mother to die from shock and then roll over in her grave when I defy the odds and marry Ginny Weasley!"
"Again with the marrying her thing! Blaise, you have to stop saying that! I know that you're joking and only out for a laugh, but imagine what might happen to you if word gets out? There are plenty of pure blood activists that could do who knows what to you and wouldn't hesitate if they thought that you were about to marry into a family like that."
"But don't you ever wonder if it'd be worth it? Worth it to defy our parents and make choices of our own for a change?" I know it's a long shot right now, but I have to try.
Draco glances around wildly and clamps his hand over my mouth. "Blaise!" he demands, elbowing me in the ribcage, "Don't be stupid! You know that purebloods are the only wizards that deserve their magic! Stop this nonsense! I don't want to have to publicly shun you!"
"Draco," I answer when he releases me, "What if we actually had a choice?"
Draco turns on his heel and heads towards the door. He stops and turns to face me before opening the door. "I don't know what's gotten into you, but this needs to stop. I won't be in contact with you until you get back here, whenever that is. It'll appease my father and hopefully give you some time to think about what's really important here. Put this nonsense away and we can still be friends, which is what I think both of us want. Goodbye Blaise."
I sigh dejectedly, slightly hurt that he's so narrow-minded. I knew he would be this way, of course, but if there was any way to save him besides the elaborate plan that I have in place, I would do it in a heartbeat. Regardless, I refuse to turn towards where he was standing until I'm certain that he's far away.
Pureblood houses are all the same. It's probably a stereotype of some sort, but I'm telling you that it's true. My house—not that I really consider it to be my house—is the same. If I had to sum it up in one word, I know exactly which I would pick: snobbish. The path to the door is, and I'm not joking, smooth and unblemished obsidian, running like a river of ink from the road. Beautiful? Sure, I guess. Pointless? Definitely. These are exactly the kind of things that make me uncomfortable in the lap of luxury, the lap that I've lived in my entire life.
If find myself there now, feet surely slipping out from underneath me were it not for years of practice. I'm clothed like a Muggle, only a rich one. I'm not sure if the pureblood community is aware of the similarity in their clothing. If they were, they'd likely claim that the Muggles stole the idea. I'm wearing a ridiculously stiff collar of black with gold patterns of the Zabini crest embroidered into it. The remainder of the crest—the fancy scrawl of the letter "Z"—is fashioned into my tie pin, the pin that sits uncomfortably against the emerald green of my school tie. My shoes, likewise, carry a definite resemblance to the crest, a choice made by my mother when she sent a servant to the train station to greet me.
The house looms threateningly before me, a deep pointed archway hiding the door from view like the entrance to a forbidden cave. The gleaming bricks of obsidian add to the menacing feel, flanked on all sides by dark wood, almost burnt in appearance. Tall, darkened windows peer at me, some of the curtains closed, but others deepening into darkness. Two angry-looking spires stare at me from either side of the building, and the entire thing is framed with ugly purplish roses that scream of poison and thousands of secrets that have been kept far too long. Along the inky path rest evenly spaced plum trees, the boughs heavily laden with rotting fruit.
I trudge onward, a bounce to my step that is definitely forced, but I'm not giving up on this game of power just yet. Even though the unusual silence surrounding the grounds is almost enough to stop me in my tracks I maintain my leisurely pace, trying to ignore the unease rising in my chest in the absence of the usual bustle of servants and house elves.
When I finally reach the front door, I very nearly attempt to peer through the purple and green stained-glass windows surrounding it, the manticore of the Zabini crest making the thing truly horrible to see. However, peering isn't exactly a display of confidence, so I push open the door and ignore the manticore-shaped knocker that I was technically supposed to use. Oh well, today is the day that tradition can die.
"Mother, I'm home!" I shout through the emptiness of the darkened hallways. I'm beginning to wonder what on earth is about to happen to me, but sometimes acting like you control the situation is a very important step to actually controlling the situation. I continue my theatrics from school because in this case they're very likely necessary.
"Mother?" This time I allow a bit of confusion into my voice. "If you wanted to meet me elsewhere, you could've simply told me. It isn't like I'm a difficult man to reach . . ."
"Man?" her soft voice permeates the room coldly, though I can't place where it's coming from. "You most certainly aren't a man, Blaise. You're still such a child, and so very naïve."
Suddenly, her fingertips come to rest directly against my shoulder, and I freeze, afraid of the heavy feeling that I remember from when Professor Moody preformed the Imperious Curse on me, the curse that he told me she'd likely used on me before.
"Lumos!" I cry out the moment I regain control of myself and reign in my terror.
"What, scared of your own mother?"
"No. Just concerned about what you'll do." I turn to face her, my eyes boring into her matching ones. People say that she's beautiful, but all I've ever seen is filth. Her eyes are the only thing that resemble me in the slightest, her hair a soft blond that falls to her knees in slight waves and her skin fair from lack of sunlight. She's dressed in a casual black gown, cut exactly to her figure, the only jewelry the gigantic diamond on her finger from her last wedding: number eleven, I believe.
"Now," I continue, "Can we please get to the point?"
"Oh my dear, dear boy . . . I never had the intention of doing anything else." Her voice reminds me of poison, probably helped along by her perfume, which reeks of artificial flowers that are supposedly the latest fashion. Shivers roll up my spine.
"Okay, okay so you've been keeping up with your how-to-be-creepy lessons. How . . . nice."
"Enough of your petty name-calling, Blaise Zabini." She emphasizes the last name, likely aware of how much I hate it. "I have other, more pressing matters at hand, so this needs to be brief. I'm assuming by now that you're aware of some of my more rare . . . talents?"
"You mean failing at marriage? I wouldn't exactly call it a talent . . ."
"—You know what I mean." She interrupts, giving me a glare that is so very hateful that for a moment I can't believe this woman is actually my mother.
"Fine, I know that you've used the Imperious Curse on me, if that's what you mean. I also have to assume that you've used the same Curse on your many husbands, or possibly the Killing Curse."
Mother smiles, a wicked glint to her deep brown eyes that I sincerely hope will never be found in mine. "Then you'll understand the deal you're about to make." She beckons to a darkened room to my right, where I can suddenly hear the quick breaths of struggle. I gulp, wondering what in Merlin's name I'm being dragged into.
Mother swiftly claps her hands, sending servants that I wasn't even aware of from their hiding spots to open the curtains and allow light into the space. There—tied to a chair and gagged—sits something that makes me suck in a quick breath and shake my head slightly in the desperate hope that I'm dreaming. I'm not. For there, very much real, sits none other than Ginny Weasley.
"What the hell are you doing with her here?" I demand, turning to guard the girl that has suddenly found herself under my protection, until a thought pops into my head and I remember the mark that my forearm bears and think of the consequences of doing things that could be labelled as pro-Dumbledore. I blink as slowly as I dare and then lower my wand from its position against my mother's throat. I turn instead to face Ginny, the girl who now appears to be terrified and somewhat angered.
I shake my head a bit, daring to hope that this girl will understand that I mean her no harm, but like Hermione when I pretended to hate her guts, I doubt that Ginny will get it.
Out loud, I speak in a different tone. "My apologies, mother. It simply startled me, that's all."
Mother smiles evilly, and I know that this likely won't end without a sacrifice of my morals in some form or another. "No apology necessary, son. I brought her here so that you could practice the skill for which I'm so well known. See, I heard a rumor that you and this . . . this thing . . . intended to marry one day."
I could slap myself.
"Of course, I knew instantly that such rumors couldn't possibly be true, but I might as well be sure. I thought that this could be the perfect opportunity for a little mother-son bonding. Don't you?"
I feel about as sick as I did the last time that I performed an Unforgivable, and I fight the urge to throw up. I can almost feel my sentence in Azkaban growing and the thought pushes some blackness into the edges of my vision. I nearly collapse onto the floor right then and there, but I remember what's at stake and it's plenty to keep me going.
"Mother, of course there is no reason to doubt my loyalty to you. I have never strayed from your word and have always kept up the good name Zabini. Perhaps you're right. Perhaps this could be a good bonding moment."
Mother looks pleased, and she opens her mouth to speak, but I cut her off.
"—But perhaps not. Dearest mother, you seem to have forgotten a thing or two. Number one, I've learned plenty of things that I didn't need any of your guidance for. And of course, I don't take orders from someone like yourself."
Mother gasps, and Ginny looks to be a mixture of surprised and relieved.
"Believe it or not, I take orders from very few people anymore." With that, I push up my left sleeve and reveal the Dark Mark, something that I doubt I'll ever be comfortable with doing. In the deafening silence that follows, I draw my wand and shout, "CRUCIO!" as loudly as the Howler that I got only days before yelled across the Great Hall. Mother instantly crashes to the floor and I seize my moment to unbind Ginny and apparate away from this ghastly place, the place that I silently swear never to enter again.
"GET OFF ME!" Ginny screeches as soon as the rushing in our ears stops. She's on her back, but she quickly scooches away on her hands and feet, trying desperately to escape.
I want to care—I really do—but it's like something inside of me is frozen, like something broke. All I can do is stare blankly off into space. Ginny slaps me in the face, but it only feels like a light pat. I can hear her continue to scream and claw and even bite me, but it's like I'm locked into some other world. Gradually her screaming stops and she instead shakes my shoulders violently, demanding me to do something: anything. Even that doesn't last terribly long, and—though I can't say that I have a firm grasp on time right now—she leans against a tree across from me and simply stares at me with tears in her eyes, waiting.
I'm not sure how long we sit there for, but when I waken from my stupor, the sun is setting. My entire body begins to shake and suddenly I can't resist the urge to shriek, so I let loose a scream that echoes through the forest where we find ourselves.
"Blaise," Ginny questions when I finally fall silent, apparently at least brave enough not to run. "Blaise Zabini?"
I suddenly realize that she's talking to me, and I try to focus despite the blurriness to everything around me. "Yeah . . . that's me." I forget sometimes that there are plenty of people who don't know me despite my ridiculous stunts and elaborate pranks from this year's attempts to cheer up Draco.
"What . . . what was all that?"
"Excuse me?" The blurriness wipes itself away, replaced by a curiosity about this girl, the girl sitting before me calmly after being rescued from her kidnapper by a Death Eater.
I take in a deep breath before answering, "I'm sorry you had to go through that. Yes, I'm a Death Eater, but no, it's not because I'm a power-crazy Muggle hater. I guess if everyone knew my true thoughts and feelings, they'd likely call me a blood traitor."
"You earnestly expect me to believe that?" Sarcasm drips from her voice in great globs, and she raises her eyebrow in a manner that is worthy of Slytherin itself.
"You earnestly expected me to turn on my mother and rescue you like that back there," I counter, raising my eyebrow in return.
"Hmm . . ." Ginny scrunches up her face, apparently stumped by that remark. She glares at me in a fashion that must've taken years of practice.
"That's it? No threat to tell Dumbledore, no demand to be told more? No attempt to convince me to turn myself in?"
"Well . . ." she nods to herself with a faint smile, ". . . I could. Normally, I would. But it's like you said. You saved me, and I didn't really expect it of you. You also went against your own flesh and blood and behaved in a manner that is very contrary to that of any Death Eater I've ever seen. So . . . I guess you could call us even." Her smile blossoms into a grin, and suddenly I dislike the Weasley family a little bit less.
"Okay, we're even. What do you propose we do now?"
"I propose that you apparate the both of us to Saint Mungos immediately. We'll bang ourselves up a bit and you'll lie and tell them that you were wandering through your mother's property when some snatchers showed up and apparated you to one of their holding facilities where you found me. We both fought for our lives and managed to get our wands before apparating away.
"Of course, neither of us should be able to apparate with another person, and I don't think I can do it at all. You'll have to purposefully splinch yourself somewhere that isn't immediately fatal to make it believable, but it can be done. They'll fix us up and then contact Hogwarts."
"Good, I see only two problems here."
Ginny rolls her eyes, "And those would be?"
"Wait . . ." I frown slightly, "You're not mad that I found an issue with your plan?"
She scoffs, "Obviously I'd rather my original plan suffice, but we kind of need to get out of here, so now isn't exactly the time. Now hurry up and tell me what's wrong with it!"
"Okay then. The problems are that I can't have the staff at Saint Mungo's observing my Dark Mark . . ." I shudder involuntarily at the words and take a deep breath to refrain from losing whatever I've eaten in the past few hours. The stupid thing has become a curse, really.
"—and secondly?" Ginny interjects, looking confused.
"I can't have the wrong sorts of people thinking I rescued you. As you seem to be aware, saving you was at great risk to myself. I know that you won't understand . . . but it's important that I remain discreetly in the Death Eater's ranks."
Ginny nods slowly, seeming to silently decide not to argue with me.
"And what should we do about it," she asks.
"Do you know any heating spells?"
"Yeah . . ." Ginny stares at me dumbly through the slits of her eyelids, "Why?"
"We were in the middle of being sold for our magic in a very public place, understand? That way I couldn't possibly have hurt you without blowing my cover."
Ginny nods, the cloud of confusion still gracing her features, "Okay but what about the heating spell?"
"You are going to burn the living daylights out of my . . ."
"—your Dark Mark."
"Yeah. That. Anyways, I think that the dark magic embedded in the mark itself should instantly turn it to scarring, something that the people of Saint Mungo's won't try to fix."
"But won't the pain make it impossible to properly apparate?"
"No, but the severing charm will."
"Zabini, you—"
"—It's Blaise. Not Zabini: Blaise."
"Okay but Blaise, you couldn't possibly mean to slice yourself open . . ."
"Well, only if you're capable of apparating the both of us to Saint Mungos."
"I already told you I can't . . . well . . . I could maybe do it, but it's quite likely that one of us will get splinched . . ."
"Do it on purpose, then. Splinch me. We already agreed that it should happen. Everyone who knows me knows that I would've fought tooth and nail to get away from those snatchers, so it has to be believable."
"What if you die?"
"Make sure Theodore Nott is aware of it."
"What?"
I let out a breath from my nose and blink very slowly. "You heard me. Tell Theodore Nott."
"Why him? Is he . . . is he a Death Eater, too!"
"No, nothing like that." I hate lying more and more as the days go by, but I doubt it can be avoided right now. "Calm down," I continue, "I just need you to do it. If I die, you have to tell Theodore as quickly as possible."
"What about your family?" Ginny's confused expression is washed away by one of concern, concern that I find I don't understand. Why do all of these people feel things because of my actions when I hardly know them? First Hermione, now Ginny . . . I don't get it.
"Well, I doubt my mother will be terribly upset and that is the entirety of my family. Just mother and I."
"Why don't you call her mum or something normal? Mother is so . . . distant. So formal."
"Exactly. Now we really must be going."
Ginny nods and seems to understand something that I wish she didn't. I wish that she still knew nothing of me or my mother. I wish no one ever had to know anything of my mother ever again. But some things can't be undone.
"Incendio," mutters Ginny and my whole body stiffens and then curls towards my left arm. I bite my lip as hard as I can to try and block out the pain, but it doesn't help in the least bit. I find myself screaming and begging Ginny to stop, but to her credit she doesn't, not until the entirety of my Dark Mark is covered in flaming red and blistering material. When she stops I continue to lie there, convulsing as the feeling of intense heat continues to crawls up my arm. I doubt highly that I would have done this if I realized how much it hurt.
Swiftly, Ginny levitates some water from somewhere I must've missed and dumps it onto my flesh. A strong hiss follows the motion and for a second, I feel like I might pass out from the pain. Next, Ginny begins to cast healing spells that I was unaware of, spells that gradually remove the pain. Soon, the angry red color fades to a faint pink and soon enough is light enough to almost believe that it's my skin, unblemished. It seems surreal to look at my left forearm without having to fight the urge to be sick.
"You . . ." I stammer, ". . . thank you."
"You are an idiot, Blaise Zabini. You said that the Dark Mark would heal itself! You probably would've died here in the forest if you'd tried that yourself! I almost had to burn you to the third degree just to get rid of the thing! Do you even realize what that would've done to you? You probably would never have felt a thing on that area for the rest of your life! You are so lucky that I know some things about healing!"
I bashfully stare at the suddenly incredibly interesting ground, my cheeks nearly as red as my burn was just moments ago.
"I . . ." I trail off, not entirely sure of what I should be saying.
"Yeah, I thought so. Sounds like this wasn't your first dumb move, wither. You had to have had some sort of aneurism to think that becoming a Death Eater was a good idea!"
"I—"
"—Don't think I haven't seen the way you almost barf when you look at the mark!"
I'm taken aback by this revelation, and suddenly a small flame of anger bursts inside me and I stand up on shaky legs and approach her, standing very close to her face and glaring at her through squinted eyelids.
"Look, I'm not an idiot! I screwed up with the burning thing back there, but don't you EVER think that I made an idiotic decision when I became a Death Eater! Don't you think that I would KNOW the consequences? Do you really think that I WANT to end up in Azkaban? I didn't do it because I'm some power-hungry maniac!"
It's Ginny's turn to blush, and she does so, her trademark red hair falling into her eyes as she ducks her head down. Several minutes pass, her occasionally stealing glances at me with her steely blue eyes and me beginning to prepare myself for the Severing Charm that I'm about to cast. Finally, I sit down, crossing my legs underneath me. I rip out the tie pin from my clothing, tossing the golden "Z" as far as I can manage. Then I turn towards Ginny and stare at her, my hand running through my dark curls as I wait.
Finally, Ginny sighs and scooches from her spot to sit next to me, pulling her legs underneath herself as I did moments ago. "Then . . ." she speaks hesitantly, as though expecting me to explode at her next words, "Then why did you become a Death Eater?"
"It's a long story, Ginny."
Ginny glances up to the sky, "It's getting dark now. I think we should wait it out here tonight, and we shouldn't sleep. Sleep deprivation will help our cover story along."
"I agree, but I wasn't going to sleep anyway."
"Don't trust me?"
"Insomnia, chronic. Runs in the family I'm told. My health can't be that great if I've been under the Imperious Curse I don't know how many times, anyway."
"Oh. Isn't it somehow 'against the Slytherin code' to tell people about your weaknesses?"
"Well, I'll make an exception for the girl who just suffered because I'm an idiot and my mother sucks."
"So . . ." Ginny fills the awkward silence, "we have all night. There's plenty of time for a long story about your decision to become a Death Eater . . ."
"Another time, Ginny, perhaps. I deal in secrets that I can't burden you with, secrets that aren't worth it to know." Suddenly, I break out into an amused smile, thinking about the irony of what I'm about to promise her. "Tell you what, you come find me in one year's time and I'll tell you everything, I promise on my honor, which is worth a lot more than my mother's life." Though my honor is good, the promise is rather worthless, really, because it won't matter by then, but it's the best I can do.
"Won't we both still be in Hogwarts?"
"I'm a Death Eater, Ginny. Death Eater. I can't make any promises."
"Alright then, I guess I'll have to take what I can get." I can feel it more than I can see it, but I'm pretty sure she's staring at me.
"What is it now?"
"It's just . . . you know I still don't like you very much."
"Well, I'm not exactly a fan of the Weasley family either."
"You're not exactly doing a great job of selling yourself, you know. First your mother kidnaps me, then you show up and admit that abuse is pretty much a thing in your family by acknowledging that she's held you under the Imperious and does it quite a lot. Next, you cast the Crucio Curse at your own mother, and then show me that you're a Death Eater. You come up with this brilliant plan to cover your identity that involves the both of us getting hurt, a plan that might not work, by the way, if they use Veritaserum. Finally, you almost turn me into a murderer, and won't even bother to explain why you've made the decision to become a Death Eater in the first place."
"Wow, you're right. I'm a jerk!" I light the end of my wand with a quick Lumos and then smirk at her in a way that would probably make the Malfoy family jealous. "Better idea, though. Let's leave for Saint Mungo's now." I flick my wand and mutter "Diffindo" towards my shin, repeating the incantation at my chest, arm, and face. I feel the blood begin to trickly into my eye and I quickly jab the wand a few inches away from it, causing my face to swell up like a mosquito bite the size of a Bludger.
I hear a sharp intake of breath beside me, but Ginny quickly follows suite, only she just slices her shoulder so that she can focus on apparating. Then she reaches for me in the darkness and with a pop, we apparate to the hospital.
With a swishing noise, I can feel a chunk of the side of my hand falling away from us as we swirl through the apparation process. I suck in sharply from the eruption of pain, but I can't afford to black out right now.
"Help!" Ginny yells, "Somebody help us!"
Now in the main lobby of Saint Mungo's, all eyes are on us, gasping and clapping their hands to their hearts at the sight, mostly me. I can just barely see, but I lift my hand curiously to examine the damage that's been done. I can see the bone at the side of it through the thick stream of blood that dumps onto the floor. I hate the sight of blood in large quantities and this time it's enough to send me into a world of darkness.