Disclaimer: I do not own anything related to HP. It all belongs to JK Rowling, Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Inc., Warner Bros., and any other entities involved.
The wards were keyed to the property's owner. This thought kept going on in Draco's mind as he sought to find an escape. The Weasley girl lay exhausted in the pallet; another torture session would surely kill her.
And the thought of facing Harry and telling him that Draco hadn't been able to save his girlfriend, he couldn't bear that.
It was funny, in an ironic kind of way. Draco had always believed in what his father said. Until he was imprisoned in Azkaban. That period without his constant supervision had led to him reading Muggle books, watching their movies, involving himself in another world and realizing that what he had always held as true were carefully fabricated lies, perpetuated by his oh so loving Father, who in hindsight took on the features of a madman.
This led inexorably to his burying the hatchet with the Trio, and becoming friends with them. He found that they were unlike anything he'd ever expect. Weasley with his thoughtful attitude towards life, often masked by fiery passion. Hermione with her penchant for following any thought to its logical conclusion, and Harry, who always looked for the best in any person and was willing to bear the most outrageous burdens.
It was Harry especially that his thoughts kept returning to. Being near him, being his friend, led to other discoveries of a carnal nature. Like the fact that he liked being near Harry, liked to look at his chapped lips, at his slight blushes. At the Gryffindor-Ravenclaw game, when he looked at Harry in his Quidditch clothes, he realized he was gay, or at least bisexual.
Ever since then he had tried to catch Harry's attention, in that kind of way, but it proved a Herculean task. Malfoy used innuendo like a cutting blade, suggested and flirted like the consummate pro he was, but all Harry did was look glazed for a second, sometimes blush and quickly look away, and act as if nothing was wrong.
So things with Harry were, to put it succinctly, stagnating. Just last month he'd confessed to Harry that he was gay, in the Gryffindor common room, and all that Harry was done was act supportive and swear that it didn't make any difference to him. As if it was that easy!
Then school left for the summer, and Draco went back to the Manor to discover that Voldemort had freed his second in command from Azkaban, and Lucius was as dictatorial and free with his fists and curses as ever.
There were daily beatings, and they kept getting worse. Draco was no stranger to the Dark, but last term he'd felt that, if he turned to Dumbledore, he might as well renounce it, which he had promptly done. All through school he had borne the ridicule and scorn of his classmates without resorting to Dark curses, which had been really difficult. However it seemed no one noticed, not even Harry.
Lately though, there was a pressure that needed to be released, and he did not know how he was going to be able to withstand the darker passions.
Then yesterday Lucius had turned up with Ginny Weasley, who had apparently been captured during an outing in Diagon Alley. Draco had surreptitiously entered her dungeon and given her a potion against Dark curses, which had helped a lot; but he knew it was a question of time until Lucius tried again, or worse, invited other Death Eaters or Voldemort to the proceedings.
Lucius had caught him peering in Weasley's dungeon, and had promptly backhanded him. He was about to start on the beatings when a beautiful Eagle Owl landed and offered a letter on his leg. Lucius took it, and from his scowl, Draco could tell it wasn't good at all.
Draco turned out Lucius' rant, as was his wont:
"Useless brat…" Check
"Parasite…" Check
"going to disown you…" Wait!
"I didn't know you were this sick, whelp, to think I raised you, I should've killed you in your crib, you shirt-lifter; just wait until I'm done with you, you won't know what hit you!!"
"Oh, oh" Draco thought, "He found out I'm gay, he's going to kill me."
Lucius took out his cane and directed it towards Draco, saying "Crucio!" There was agonizing pain for Draco, but he had gotten used to it somewhat. He was able to hear Lucius muttering: "Ok, the spell for disowning is this: Hereby thy…."
Hearing this and suffering from Cruciatus, Draco felt completely overwhelmed by the unfairness of it all, of his life at Hogwarts, and at the Manor, of having survived 16 years of abuse to get nothing in return. He was alone, and no one was going to help him. It was then he decided to give in to the Dark, to welcome it into his life, to embrace a part of him he had long denied. And he grew strong.
He stood up and looked Lucius in the eye. He shouted "Silencio!" and the spell hit Lucius, silencing him. He then said "Accio wand" and Lucius' cane came to him. He wasn't surprised in the slightest that he had done wandless magic. It felt like something had completed him.
Pointing Lucius' cane at him, he shouted "Crucio!" and watched his father writhe in pain all over the dungeon floor. Meanwhile Ginny had woken up and was watching this with eyes wide as saucers.
Draco lifted the curse and said "Stand up, cocksucker! You pretend to revile me because I'm gay but you are an expert cocksucker. I watched from the shadows as you serviced your lovers, scum!" "I'm going to lift the Silencio, but be forewarned: If you are not very careful, you will be hurt."
Being free of the Silencio, Lucius said "How dare you, cur, to treat me like this, I will skin you alive, I will…"
"Tssk, tssk, Daddy dearest, you didn't hear me. You need to be punished." He directed the cane to Lucius and muttered "Imperio!"
Lucius tried to fight the curse. Once the Dark Lord had tried to put him under Imperio, but Lucius had successfully resisted. So he was sure of this venture, which dismayed him the more when he found he could not resist the curse at all. The attack was too powerful, the magic too strong to be resisted.
Draco waved the cane at a fork and transfigured it into a sharp-edged knife. He said to Lucius: "Take the knife and cut off your tongue. I'm sick to death of your stupid words."
Lucius was floored; he would never have believed Draco capable of this. The boy was too weak, he always gave in to Lucius, Potter and Granger always beat him. How could he do this? He tried to resist but the urge to obey was irresistible, as inexorable as the tides.
The relentless order forced Lucius to raise the knife to his tongue and cut it. The pain was worse than the Cruciatus, and the blood seemed to pour endlessly out of the gaping wound.
Draco directed the cane to Lucius and intoned "Cauterio" to cauterize the wounds and "Evanesco" to make the blood disappear. Finally he had shut his father up; never again would he have to hear his stupid words.
"Well, Father, what happened, cat got your tongue? Or should I say Dragon got your tongue?" Draco said with an irrepressible smirk, and at that moment he truly looked like an avenging angel, full of passion and death.
He said "Accio parchment and quill" and grabbed them when they appeared through the dungeon's door with Seeker's reflexes.
He said to Lucius, "Now, old and tongueless man, you will write your last Will and testament. I would not normally bother, but then I sneaked into your office last night and found out that, in the event of your death, you left the Malfoy fortune to Voldemort, and that won't do at all, you sick fuck!"
"So get to write" Draco ordered Lucius.
Lucius grabbed the parchment and was compelled to write:
"I, Lucius Augustus Malfoy, being of sound mind and body, leave the entirety of the Malfoy fortune and entailed estate to my only Son and Heir, Draco Sergius Malfoy. This Will, written on Malfoy Manor, supersedes any previous Will or Codicil.
Signed by my own hand and witnessed by my Blood,
Lucius Augustus Malfoy
Witnesses
Draco Sergius Malfoy
Ginevra Weasley"
After Draco had Lucius sign the Will and add drops of his blood, he turned to Ginny and said: "Miss Weasley, would you please sign and witness that my dear Father made this Will of his own free will? Draco grinned evilly, sharing a unique joke with Ginny, for if it weren't for him, Ginny would surely have been raped, maimed or maybe even killed by Lucius. Ginny owed Draco a Life Debt now and he could collect it any time he wanted. Both Draco and Ginny knew this, they also knew that Draco would never call Ginny on this, for they shared so many things, their mischievousness, snobbish fashion sense, disregard for rules and traditions, and above all, an abiding love for one Harry James Potter.
Ginny had watched the whole proceedings with awe. Draco had withstood the Cruciatus curse and used wandless magic on his attacker. There was an aura of dark power around him now. Ginny had always find Draco physically attractive, had found his irrepressible snobbery attractive at times and annoying otherwise. Last term he had been very subdued, trying to shake off his Dark heritage and adapt to the Light. He had lost some of his spark while doing this, a fact unobserved by those closest to him, including oblivious Harry, but Ginny had noticed. She knew because she herself had been uniquely touched by the Dark, in the form of the Riddle Diary in her first year at Hogwarts. That experience had been draining, and yet, oddly liberating.
And now, the masterful display of Dark power left her breathless and even aroused. Draco had shown more fortitude than Harry, for he had turned the tables on his attacker and given him what he had so richly deserved. Draco had no help from friends or Order. It was a mano a mano between him and Lucius, and against all odds, Draco had won, and he had no compunction against taking a royal revenge.
Ginny went to the parchment and signed, cutting her thumb and putting some drops of her blood near her signature. Draco politely thanked her and made four copies of the parchment.
He then called on his owl Anubis. He tied the documents around its leg and told it to take the messages to the Heritage Department at the Ministry of Magic, the Daily Prophet, Gringotts and Albus Dumbledore.
After having Ginny resting in a chair he'd conjured and drinking tea, Draco said, "Well Father, speak up now! Hey, wait, I forget you can't speak now, uh! We'll have to do something about it." Draco neared Lucius and, looking him in the eyes, said "Legilimens!"
Draco entered Lucius' memories, relentlessly destroying his shields and raping his mind, for he had lost the restraints he had put upon himself. What he saw of Lucius' plan with Voldemort regarding himself enraged him so much that he was about to lose control. What allowed him to reign in his temper was the fact that the youngest Weasley was with him. He would not permit himself to hurt her because of untamed magic.
Making a supreme effort, he stopped and controlled himself. Staring at Ginny, he said "Miss Ginevra Weasley, would you like to wait outside and not witness this criminal's punishment?"