Disclaimer: All credit for characters and world belong to the genius that is J.K. Rowling. Otherwise, plot is mine. :)
Murmuring a spell, he pushed open the heavy door. The room was chilly and smelled of mildew.
"Lumos," he whispered, reluctant to raise his voice. No one knew he was down here and he was liable to be killed if he was found. As his wand tip ignited, he turned and closed the door behind him, magically sealing it again.
As he turned back to evaluate the room, it took him a moment to find what he was looking for. There along the back wall was the dark shape of a person and he approached as quietly as he could and crouched down in front of her.
The shape moved ever so slightly and he let out a breath he didn't know he had been holding. She was still breathing.
As carefully as he could, he rearranged her into a sitting position, laying his wand next to him on the ground so he could use both of his hands. She barely stirred at his touch and that alone terrified him. In the pale light he could hardly make out her features as her face and hair were matted with grime. When she was propped up against the wall, her legs stretched in front of her, he assessed the damage. Her lip was split, there was an oozing gash on her forehead and there was a trail of dried grime coming from under her hair by her ear.
He realized dimly that the filth she was covered in what appeared to be her own blood. The poor lighting made the blood look black and a small voice in the back of his head suggested that perhaps mudbloods really did have dirty blood. He shook the thought away with annoyance and disgust. That kind of thinking had gotten them all here and poisoned his mind before he could even be given the chance to make his own opinions. He had been taught from a young age what to think, when to think it, and above all else, not to question what he was told. The memories of his upbringing and where it had landed his family made him irrationally angry so he pushed them away. Now wasn't the time to wallow in self-pity. Redirecting his attention, he began to tend to the girl in front of him.
The black stains on her face, neck and clothing were from injuries and it dawned on him that she was barely breathing. Reaching out, he put his index and middle finger on her pulse point at her neck.
There it was, slow and determined. Her heart was beating and her breathing was weak but she was still there. Thank Merlin, he thought unconsciously. He withdrew his fingers and sat cross-legged next to her, moving his wand to between his foot and his knee so that the light aimed up to her face. The smell of mildew and blood, the shadows and the sight of her mangled body made him shudder.
It wasn't supposed to end like this, he thought filled with rage. Bloody Potter was supposed to win. He was supposed to have killed Voldemort and saved them all, but the selfish bastard and gone and gotten himself killed. Twice. And here the survivors were, barely hanging on and paying dearly for it.
"Gods, Granger. Not so bloody perfect now, are you?" he murmured aloud, resentment coloring his voice as he began pulling her hair away from her face, wincing as it tugged free from the dried blood the was crusted everywhere. When he had pulled all the hair away he murmured a spell he had heard his mother use and watched as it all piled on the top of her head, knotting itself. The thought of his mother made him wince.
Now that the godforsaken bushy-ass hair was out of the way he could see the full extent of the injuries on her face. The cuts stood out in stark relief but what really alarmed him was what he hadn't noticed before. Her nose was flattened, clearly broken thought from what he did not know. The trail of blood down her neck traced up to her ear where there was a clear bite mark on the lobe.
With revulsion, he leapt up and away from her comatose body. He had been here already. He had touched her and marked her. He had bitten her. With a rush, his stomach surged and he vomited, once…twice until it subsided into coughing. He wiped his mouth with a grunt and vanished the sick and turned back to the broken girl, sitting back in his position.
A closer look showed the faint beginning of finger print bruises formed around her delicate neck.
"Granger, what did he do to you?" he asked and with a sigh set about healing her. He couldn't remember where he picked up the knowledge to heal, he just remember that it always fascinated him when his mother had kissed away his childhood scrapes and bruises and with a single word they had faded away.
"Vulnera sanentur, vulnera sanenteur, vulnera sanentur," he chanted thrice and watched at even the deepest of gashes began to knit together.
"Episkey," he said and cringed when her nose popped back into place with an audible crunch.
"Tergeo," he sighed and the dried and fresh blood began to fade as if being rubbed away.
He looked over the rest of her body, with care and noticed her arm had an additional sickening bend. Broken bones weren't something he knew how to fix but when he had fallen in the garden once, his mother had used some spell to splint it until they got to St. Mungos.
"Ferula," he intoned, praying it was the right spell and watched with relief as a splint appeared out of nowhere, righting her arm and binding it into immobility. With a glance back at her face, he was happy to see that the scowl of pain had faded into a look of peace.
Ruffling through his robe pockets, he pulled out a small brown bottle and unstoppered it. With careful fingers, he applied the dittany over the healing wounds. His spells would fix them but would still scar. He hoped this would eliminate that.
He couldn't imagine her pretty face marred with the ugly scars of torture. He had never been a fan of hers. Then he scoffed and snorted aloud. That was putting it nicely. He had loathed her since the day they had met.
She has been bossy, loud, obnoxious and a generally a brown-nosing little shit. Then it had made him hate her. Now with the clarity of growing up and seeing the true evil in the world, he could admit he was just exceedingly envious. If she hadn't been in his year he would have paid no mind to her at all. But since she was often in his classes, he never got the glory of getting the top marks, which made her his enemy. Sure, he had hated Potter and Weasel but they were harmless and stupid. She was the threat and once she was befriended into the trio she became unmercifully confident when before she was just mousy and holier-than-thou.
It wasn't even until the summer after his first year that he had learned what the word mudblood meant and that Granger was one. After a particularly brutal lecture from his father about being disappointed in him for being bested by a filthy mudblood, his petty hatred of her was fanned into a flame of revulsion. After eleven years of being raised in a house where the word muggle was synonymous with scum it couldn't be helped. What he wouldn't give to go back with all the knowledge he had now; to just be able to tell his eleven year old self that there was no difference between muggles and magical folk aside from ignorance and to stay aloof from the prejudices because just look where they had led him. Shaking the anger away, he went back to his application of the dittany extract.
He shifted his position and watched as the drops began to erase the marks. Easing her out of her sweatshirt, he blushed slightly as it revealed a thin camisole out of which a pale pink bra peaked. He was trying to help and didn't want her to wake and see him as a threat, or worse a pervert. Looking away hurriedly, he searched for more marks to fix. Flipping her arms over he put a few drops on the scrapes on the palm of her hands and scanned upward. His gag reflux rose again as he saw a word carved into her forearm.
"Mudblood," he mouthed as he traced the pink scars.
The arm flinched as he traced and the movement startled him. Looking up suddenly he saw her eyes open and staring at him.
There was no trace of recollection in the mud brown eyes. They were empty: devoid of feeling and thought. But she didn't pull away, just looked down to where his fingers were still on her forearm. Then she looked back up at him and stared. After a few seconds, something in her eyes flickered and sharpened.
Recognition flashed through her eyes followed by a myriad of emotions until her eyes flat lined to apathy. She didn't say a word, didn't struggle, and didn't move. She just stared off into the distance in an uncomfortable chilling manner.
He opened his mouth to try to speak. No words came out at first but after a few times of clearing his throat and coughing, he managed to stammer, "What did he do to you?"
Her eyes flicked back to his briefly and then away again. She didn't answer.
"Damn it Granger, what the hell did you let him do to you?" he roared, forgetting the need for secrecy and silence. Anger flooded over him like a wave, unrelenting and surged through him. She didn't even look at him this time.
He realized he had tightened his grip on her wrist. He looked down, shocked, and released her. White bloomed in the shape of his fingerprints traced with red and faded. Then he started sobbing.
Sinking his head into his hands, his sobs wracked his body but no sound escaped from his mouth aside from his labored breathing. He cried for his sham of a life, for his dead godfather, for his friend and family. He cried for the evaporation of his hopes that had disappeared as the scrawny green-eyed git had hit the floor. He cried for this girl sitting in front of him who he had hated for as long as he had known her who was practically a living corpse.
Eventually his sobs lessened to hiccups and he mopped his face off angrily. It wasn't like him to loose control but it was all so hopeless. He looked up to see her looking at him. No empathy in her eyes, no compassion or life. Her eyes were dull and vacant. It freaked him out. He needed to get out of here.
Scrambling to his feet, he ran out the door of the room, ignoring the pins and needles in his legs from sitting for so long. Not caring if the door slammed behind him and not caring who saw, he ran and ran until he realized he couldn't breathe anymore and he collapsed. His feet had taken him outside to the ground that were empty but for signs of carnage and devastation. He lay in the grass not caring if it was soaked with blood or dew. Nothing mattered anymore. He had won and all his dreams for the future were gone. Gripping his left forearm he fervently wished things were different realizing the mark was searing his flesh. He was calling but in the only show of revolt that he could muster he didn't move. Draco Malfoy laid there, her empty eyes haunting him as his mind faded into sleep.