Title: Absolution
Characters: Draco Malfoy
Forum/Challenge: The Golden Snitch's Tiggerific Times / The Golden Snitch's Prompt of the Day / HPFC Friends Competition
Prompts: (character) Draco Malfoy / (dialogue) "I'm sorry, do I know you?" / Write about someone taking Polyjuice Potion.
World: Post-Hogwarts AU
Word Count: 800
Other: 5 points (Mahoutokoro, House Mizu) each for Tiggerific Times and Prompt of the Day
"Come here often?"
Draco Malfoy looked to the witch who had saddle up next to him. He let his eyes linger at her chest for just a moment—her dress just hinting at the ample bosom underneath—before he turned back to his drink.
"Yes. I'm quite the regular, actually. I enjoy that the other patrons leave me to enjoy my drinks in peace. " He hoped she got his, what he though was quite explicit, message.
She didn't.
"I've only been here a couple times. It's a great pub. Really friendly people. It's nice to come somewhere where you can get away from publicity and what everyone thinks they know about you and just be, you know?"
Draco raised an eyebrow. He knew exactly what she meant. None of the patrons ever bothered him, though given his post-war infamy he was sure they all knew who he was. It was the first pub that hadn't kicked him out before he could order his first drink, and for that he'd spent his evenings buying their finest firewhisky and overtipping the bartender.
It wasn't much, but it was better than sitting and drowning his sorrows alone in the Manor.
He nodded once in reply to the woman, and shored up his shields. She was too friendly to be innocuous.
She waved down the bartender and ordered something called an Old Fashioned. The bartender nodded and returned with a drink that smelled like sweet whisky.
She swirled her glass and looked long at him. "It must be hard, to keep those Occlumency walls up all the time. Don't you ever get tired?"
Those very same Occlumency walls kept the surprise from showing on his face. Only a handful of people knew he was an Occlumens: Severus Snape, who'd died at the Battle of Hogwarts, his mother, who was vacationing with his father in the south of France, and, to his utter chagrin, Harry Potter.
He looked again at the witch. She had dark, straight hair and cinnamon eyes. She was of average height: only a few inches shorter than him in heels. She was pretty—beautiful, even—but her knowing look was throwing him for a loop.
"I'm sorry, do I know you?"
Her smile grew slightly. "Perhaps." She sipped her drink. "I know you."
He scoffed. "I'm sure."
She crossed her legs, her right foot lightly running against his charcoal trousers. "I know you were dealt a shit hand. I know you don't hold your experiences against your parents, even though they put you in the crosshairs of a raving lunatic. I know you feel you have a lot to atone for, but your galleons can only assuage your guilt so much. I know your pride keeps you from seeking forgiveness from those you've wronged."
His heart caught in his throat—she'd summed up what he'd learned after years of drinking and self-loathing—but he never once let his face reveal how on the mark she'd been.
He stared at her. "What do you want from me?"
She tossed back her drink in one gulp, set in on the bar, and put her hand on his thigh. "Repentance."
He stared at her hand. "What do I get in return?" He looked up into her eyes, staring right to his soul.
"Absolution."
They'd taken a room above the pub. He'd let his shields down and confessed his crimes; it hurt too much to keep it all inside. He'd cried—something he hadn't done since the war—and been soothed by the woman who was so familiar yet who, for the life of him, he couldn't remember. He melted into her comforting touch, and he felt the weight of all the wrongs he'd committed evaporate.
And after he'd poured out his heart to the mystery woman, it only felt right that he kiss her.
She'd kissed him back, and that night, wrapped in her arms, he felt himself purified of his sins.
When he woke in the morning, naked as the day he was born and wrapped around the witch, he was only moderately bewildered to find himself immersed in a heap of curls where, the night before he'd easily slid his fingers through her straight locks.
He'd figured about halfway through the night that she'd been Polyjuiced; her demeanor was so familiar, yet he couldn't place her. And if the witch was Polyjuiced, sent to cleanse him of years of evil and wrongdoing, willing to give herself over completely for his deliverance, there was only one witch it could be.
"Granger," he drawled, running his hand along her side. The hair on her skin raised at his touch. She turned over, a tentative smile on her face.
"Malfoy. How do you feel?"
He leaned in to kiss her and whispered, "Free."