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Part Two | Pain & Fire
Thirty-Six. Same Game, Just Different Levels
Neither wished to admit quite how much they clock-watched on the morning Draco - and Millicent, Pansy supposed, was due to return to Hogwarts. Nor were they willing to admit the collective sigh of relief that escaped both of their mouths when the Head dormitory door was flung open, to reveal the familiar, pale blond figure that was one Draco Malfoy.
The remainder of the holidays had passed in waves; some incredible, full of love and laughter, others anxiety-fuelled resulting in Pansy and Neville clinging to each other, in every way they could, simply to have something, anything, wish dampened the want, need, to run out of the castle - despite knowing that was an entirely physical impossibility, for Neville at least, and attempt to find their friends.
He'd arrived when she had expected him to, but what she wasn't expecting, well, not fully expecting anyway, was the utterly haunted look that was projected upon his ashen face, the hasty advance he made into the living room, and the three words that he spoke in greeting, "Pack your things."
Blinking, Pansy glanced briefly at the equally flabbergasted looking Neville, and rose slowly to her feet. "Well, hello to you, too."
Draco's left eyebrow rose to the middle of his forehead. "Hello," he replied, blandly, before striding towards the door on the other end of the room. "Make sure you're packed," he repeated, turning briefly to face the couple. "We might not have much notice."
"Wait a sec-," Pansy began, but Draco chose to ignore her words entirely. Frowning, she watched the door slowly close behind him, "-ond."
"That was...interesting," Neville observed from behind her.
Muttering darkly, Pansy glared at the now closed door. "Downright rude, is what it was."
As it happened, both Neville and Pansy had ensured they were packed, having done so when they were still expecting to leave a few days after Blaise, Theo and Daphne, and therefore they had little choice, Pansy knowing full well she wouldn't be able to enter Draco's bedroom, to sit themselves back down and pretend they hadn't just waited eagerly for her dormmate's arrival.
It took Draco two and a half hours to reappear, and neither Pansy nor Neville held any clue as to what had kept him for so long, however, neither pressed the matter, knowing full well that Draco had just spent the entire Christmas holidays in the company of less than pleasant individuals, Voldemort himself being the least pleasant of all.
As he took his usual seat, Pansy noticed Draco's brow winkle slightly as he shuffled his behind this way and that. Not thinking that it would be possible that he'd realise that Pansy and Neville had not only occupied his seat, but ensured themselves both a hexing were Draco to ever find out, Pansy decided to steer any conversation away from Draco's frowning and buttock maneuvering.
"How's your mum doing?"
"Shit," Draco replied, his tone dry. "Really shit."
"And you?"
Shrugging, Draco - who seemed, at least, to be satisfied that his chair cushion was satisfactory, replied, "Also shit, I guess. But I'm alright. Managed to avoid him knowing that I know why Theo and Blaise were no-shows."
"I really hope they're alright." Pansy realised her voice was closer to a whisper than anything else, and felt Neville's hand rest gently on her knee as she spoke.
"They've not been found," Draco replied, "I'd have known."
Pansy nodded, the familiar tightness in her chest that appeared whenever she thought of her friends waiting to meet her and Neville, and finding no one, threatened to make her heave, like it so often did. She knew they could say a thousand things in that moment, but none would offer any more comfort than what the three already knew. And so they didn't.
This time, it was Neville who addressed the other wizard. "Draco?"
"Yeah, mate?"
"Dean, and Luna...they got away okay, they weren't..." he trailed off.
Draco's grey eyes scrutinised Neville for a long second, before he gave the Gryffindor one short, sharp nod. "They were alright, hungry, I'd venture, and probably pretty sore from sleeping on the floor of the cellar, but they were alright."
Pansy's peripheral vision informed her that Neville nodded in response. "And Harry? Ron and Hermione?"
Snorting a laugh, Draco let out a sigh. "Fuck me, you should have seen Potter. I'm assuming that Granger or Weasley hit him with some kind of strong stinging hex. His face was blown up like a bloody balloon, was almost unrecognisable, which was the point, I'd imagine. Funny though, or it would have been, given any other circumstance. I'd have paid a great deal of money to have caught Potter like that in class."
Pansy heard Neville swallow beside her. "They were alright, though?"
Draco's brief reprieve of humour seemed to disintegrate. "Granger wasn't. Bellatrix got her pretty bad. Carved some shit into her arm with a knife. She was alright though, by the time they escaped she was up and walking, so I imagine she won't have had any lasting effects, not physical ones, anyway."
Neville didn't reply, and neither did Pansy, the words of someone far too close to home rang through her brain. My stance on the matter is irrelevant. This is the game we must play, Pansy. Granger, lying tortured and mutilated. That was her father's game, in its rawest and truest form, Pansy knew. The thought wasn't a pleasant one.
Not able to bear the silence that had befallen the three, since which a good five minutes had passed, Pansy turned her head to face Draco, once more. "Why do we need to be prepared to leave at such short notice?"
It was the first time since arriving back at the castle that he lied to her, and for the first time in a long time, Draco's eyes refused to meet Pansy's. "Because we don't know what'll happen now, the Carrows will be tracking down Longbottom," Draco nodded at Neville, "to fucking execute him, and we need to prepare for possibility we have to just go."
She didn't press the matter further, as much as a large part of her wished to. "Alright," she replied, her voice level. "And...Millicent? Did she just bottle it or…?"
"Fuck knows, she wouldn't speak to me on the train," Draco's tone had rapidly changed to one of something just short of anger, "fucked off down the other end then wouldn't open the carriage door, then once we arrived in London she was off. I didn't see her until we boarded the train to come back," this time, his eyes bored into hers in the way they always had. "I don't know what happened to her over Christmas, Pans, but I don't know if she's still on our side or… " he paused, "I don't know."
"She is," Pansy said, more to herself than anyone else, and with more conviction than her gut told her to believe. "She was just scared, she told me she was."
"She better be," Draco snarled. "I've known that girl for most of my life, but if she turns on us now and anything happens to my mother, or you, she won't have to worry about the Dark Lord. I'll kill her myself."
"I don't like this," Pansy said, swallowing. "I know why you want to, but...I don't want you to, if the Carrows see you…"
Neville tightened the grip of the hand that held hers. "He's one of my best friends, and he deserves to know."
Draco had been watching the exchange with his signature trace of a frown present on his face. Suddenly, he rose from his chair. "How certain are you that he can be trusted?"
"Seamus?" Neville looked at Draco. "I'd bet my life on it."
"Alright. What if I find him and bring him here?"
If Neville hadn't been sitting down, Pansy was fairly certain he would have taken a step backwards. "Not to sound rude, or like I don't appreciate it, but why would you do that?"
Draco considered Neville for a moment, before replying, "Because, for some fucking laughable twist of fate, right now you're the closest thing I have here to a best mate, besides this one," he nodded his head in Pansy's direction, "and as much as you are such a fucking Longbottom, I don't actually want you to thrown down with an Avada between your shoulder blades. Especially if they're being led to believe you've gone AWOL."
Charming as always, Draco
"Such...a Longbottom..."
"Merlin, I know," Draco sighed, "and you aren't just a Longbottom, you're the Longbottom."
Neville's tone was dry, but laced with amusement. "I can see how being around such a, oh - my apologies, the Longbottom would be awful for you."
"I'm glad you see where I'm coming from, Longbottom."
"You'd really get Seamus?"
This time, Draco's sigh was dramaticised further. "If I must."
"Well, he'll be on the Seventh Floor, I don't know how to explain without-"
"Hang around the Room of Requirement, got it," Draco replied, and sauntered off, exiting the living room without so much as a backwards glance.
Neville's face held an expression of absolute dumbfoundedness.
Draco hadn't been gone longer than twenty minutes before a sharp knock at the door demanded both Pansy and Neville's attention. Frowning, Pansy tentatively made her way towards the entrance, making sure Neville had quietly taken himself through to the kitchen.
What she expected, or rather, the only circumstance she could imagine, was to come face to face with a suspicious Seamus Finnegan mumbling something about Malfoy instructing him to come here. Why Draco wouldn't have accompanied Finnegan, Pansy didn't know, but yet this still seemed the most plausible occurrence.
What, or who, awaited her, however, was not Seamus Finnegan.
Her voice, when she spoke, had an unusual squeak to it. "Hi."
"Millicent."
"I don't remember you ever calling me that."
"I don't remember you ever abandoning us," Pansy replied, keeping her voice as steady as she could.
"Please let me explain."
"Why should-"
"Please!"
"Are you on his side now?"
Pansy could see tears begin to form in her friend's eyes. "No. No, I-I'm not, but I need to explain...I need to talk to you alone, please," she repeated the final word in a whisper that Pansy could hear was laced with desperation.
Knowing that Draco would throw a fit if he saw Millicent right now, the blond didn't trust her, and Pansy knew that Draco's trust was a fickle thing that, when tested, was stubborn at best and downright resentful and enraged at worst. Throw in what she would bet a lot of gold was the worst Christmas of his life, and the heightened restlessness that came with their escape being imminent, Pansy didn't think that Draco would be willing to listen to one word that passed Millicent's lips.
"Fine," Pansy hissed, as years of friendship bombarded the confides of the boundaries she wished she could throw up against the witch. "Meet me in an hour and a half, in the dungeons. The alcove."
"Okay," Millicent tearfully replied. "Thanks...Pans."
Nodding briefly, Pansy didn't wait for Millicent to disappear before closing the door.
"Is that wise?" Neville's voice rang out from behind her.
"I...don't know."
Draco, with a very agitated Seamus Finnegan in tow, arrived shortly after Millicent's visit.
The Irishman's eyes widened at the sight of Neville. "You're going to have to give me really good reason to trust anything he," Seamus spat, "or she," says.
"Good afternoon, Finnegan," Pansy replied, her tone bitter. Making niceties with Seamus, of all people, not being entirely high up on her already dwindling list of social activities.
It took far longer than it had Luna, or even Ginny, to get Seamus on side, but eventually, the wizard, much to Pansy's relief, nodded. "Alright, say I believe you, what's so important that I needed to come all the way here, to hear?"
"Mate," Neville patted the other Gryffindor's shoulder. "Sit down."
As Draco relayed the story of Dean and Luna's capture, Pansy noticed Seamus become paler and paler as his breathing hitched and his eyes reddened.
"He's alright?" he directed the whispered question towards Draco, all traces of animosity gone, in its place...was something else. Something more, Pansy strongly began to suspect, than friendship.
"I believe he is perfectly fine."
Seamus's face fell into his palms, shoulders shaking as Neville clapped him on the back, and Pansy felt her mouth dry up. Intrusive, that was how she felt, and that was what drove her through the door at the back of the room, and into the kitchen.
She felt Draco's hand on her arm. "You alright?"
Pansy, not knowing entirely how to answer, her thoughts diverting between Seamus, to Millicent, to herself and Neville, and Draco. "It's no different," she whispered. "No different for us, than Finnegan, it's all…"
"We're all facing the same game, just different levels," Draco stated with a nod. "Dealing with the same hell, just different devils. Although, I'm not sure that entirely works when the devils are the same, but you get the jist."
"I do." Checking the timepiece situated on the wall above Draco's head, Pansy swallowed. "Draco, do you trust me?"
"You know I do."
"There's something I need to go and do, by myself."
He didn't press her, or even frown. Instead, he simply said, "Okay," and accepted her quick hug, before she hurried out of the kitchen, and back to the living room. Sharing a quick look that encompassed many things, primarily, Love you, and be careful, with Neville, still offering comfort to Seamus, Pansy left the Head dorm, and went to meet Millicent.
She wasn't at all certain which of her battling gut feelings she ought to follow; the one telling her that this may very well be a trap, or the one that scorned her for being so untrusting of someone that, until a week or so again, Pansy had considered one of her best friends. War will do that: make you untrusting, Pansy supposed.
Keeping her wand grasped tightly within her fist, Pansy made her way through the cool stone corridors that made up the dungeons. Half expecting an ambush, Pansy gasped far louder than she would have liked, at the sight of Millicent standing there, alone, as stated.
"You came."
"I did," Pansy replied bluntly, and, at the sight of her friend obviously on the cusp of breaking down, purposefully softened her tone. "Okay, what's going on?"
"I-I couldn't do it, I wanted to, I swear I did, but my parents, Pansy," Millicent's voice was cracking as she spoke. "I couldn't leave them like that, the parents of a traitor, to be tortured or murdered or…"
"You could have told Draco that, you didn't have to ignore him-"
"Yes! I did, and no, I couldn't have told him! I'm not brave like you and Draco, and I'm not good, like...like Longbottom, he'd just think I was a coward, and maybe I am, but...it wasn't ever meant against you guys. I love you all, I love Theo, and I didn't mean to-"
"Look, Mills," Pansy purposefully used Millicent's nickname. "It's okay, you bottled it, and yeah, okay, Draco wasn't happy about it, and I wished you'd just gone with them, but it was hardly for a bad reason, and as long as you'd never turn on us,-"
"No, I'd never!"
"Well then, you could just leave with Draco, Neville and I in a few days, I'll speak to Draco and-"
"I would," Millicent's tears were falling freely now. "I really, really want to-"
"Right, that's settled then, now stop that crying," Pansy leaned towards Millicent, her arms outstretched.
"No! You don't understand... over the holidays, they...we, had...visits...I didn't want to. I-I didn't know what to say...I-"
This is it, Pansy knew. This is the reason she needed to meet me without Draco. Pansy was suddenly entirely aware of the sound of her own heartbeat.
"Mills, what are you talking about? Visits from who?"
"I told them, and I'm so…I'm so so sorry. They threat-threatened me if I didn't...and so I did. I-I told you...I'm a coward, and I know I've lost you, and Daphne...and Theo, and I'm so sorry...I'm so-"
The temperature of the very air that surrounded them had seemed to dip to well below freezing. "What the fuck are you talking about?!"
Millicent's tear-stained face rose upwards as another sound that wasn't Millicent's sobs or Pansy's ragged breaths interrupted them.
"Miss Pansy!" Whirling around, Pansy was met by the small form of a very scared looking, and very out of breath house-elf.
"Winky what-"
"No time, Miss Pansy, they have Mr Neville, and the other boy. Master Draco is there 's bad, Miss Pansy."
Had she not somehow remained standing, Pansy was ready to scream that there was no way there was any breath left in her lungs, or blood in her veins. "Who," she asked needlessly, for she already knew the answer. "Winky...who has Neville?"
"The Carrows, Miss Pansy. You must hurry, now!"
Somehow, despite having lost all feeling in her entire body, Pansy's legs began to move at the vague directions she gave her brain: move...Neville...move.
"Pansy-"
Turning for the split second it took to seek out Millicent's face, Pansy let out a staggered breath.
Millicent's words were strained, as her sobs crescendoed in volume. "Please forgive me, please…you don't know what it was like...they made me tell them, I-I had no choice. I..."
As the unwanted reality of what she may be heading to face hit her, Pansy's breathing was strangled as she shook her head, wanting nothing more than to hear a truth that Millicent wouldn't speak, for she knew, in that moment, Millicent's truth was the opposite. It wasn't leaving Theo and the others, or ignoring Draco, that she was so desperate to apologise for. It was the fact that Winky's words weren't shocking, or unexpected, to Millicent in the slightest. This, what Pansy now had to face, was Millicent's real indiscretion.
Pansy's voice reverberated off the walls and ceiling that surrounded her, and coursed through every fiber of her being as she stared, for the long second it took for her to scream the question she wouldn't wait to hear the answer to, at a girl that, at one point, she'd have done anything for.
"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!"