Let's Remember It All
CHAPTER FIVE – Decisions
Professor Dumbledore made the announcement the day after the message had appeared. "Hogwarts is closing. You must understand that this is for your own safety. I am sorry no more could be done."
He stepped off the podium and the students erupted in angry shouts and protestations, though the Slytherin table remained silent, some of them even grinning.
Malfoy had gone very white. 'No!' He thought. 'I won't go back there, they can't make me!'
"Yes!" Blaise cried. "School's out! This means we get an extra month of doing nothing!"
"No," Malfoy replied slowly, after nobody said anything. "It means we get a lifetime of doing nothing. Hogwarts is closing for good, so they'll be no train to get on next September, and we don't get to finish our education. And who's going to want to employ and unqualified wizard?"
Blaise looked blank, but Crabbe and Goyle grinned stupidly. "No more school! No more school!" Goyle chanted until Malfoy hexed him.
O
They were shocked, of course, but, as Harry said, Hogwarts was never going to be forever, and this was just cutting the plan a few months short.
Ginny raised her eyebrows at the word 'plan' but said nothing.
O
The train left at eleven o'clock the next morning and all along the train, students were sticking their heads out of windows to catch one last glimpse of the castle.
The previous night, Harry, Ron and Hermione had waited until all but themselves had gone to bed and then spent the last few hours of darkness visiting their favourite places and watching the sunrise from the top of the Astronomy Tower.
"It's not like we're never going to be able to come back," Ron said bracingly. "When this is all over, it can reopen. Can't it?" He added uncertainly, but nobody knew what to say.
O
Malfoy hadn't got much sleep that night either, though not because he was reminiscing. His thoughts were on the future, and what was waiting for him at the Manor.
"It must've been him." Blaise muttered. "Think about it. You've got to have the Dark Mark to cast the Morsmodre Curse, and we were all in the common room. He told us where to be so we could stay out of trouble!"
He was in a compartment with Blaise, Pansy, Nott, Crabbe and Goyle. His eyes had drifted closed so they thought (he assumed) that he was asleep. He had heard them having this conversation twice since the day before, but they had always clammed up when he interrupted them.
"Exactly!" Pansy was saying. "If he told us to be somewhere, he had a reason. He obviously didn't want us to know what he was doing, so if we were asked where he was, we wouldn't have to resort to Occlumency!"
Nott snorted. "I think you've misunderstood Malfoy completely, Panse. He's not that noble. My guess is he wanted all the glory to himself."
"Glory?" Blaise snarled. "You think he's going to be thanked for causing the closure of Hogwarts? That was the one place where the Dark Lord knew Potter would be, and now he's never going to be there again. So, really, Nott, work it out. Do you honestly believe that He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named will glorify him? Use what common sense you have and think things through before you open your mouth in future."
Crabbe and Goyle were leering idiotically again. Nott was dumbstruck. Pansy looked nervous. Malfoy would have smirked but he was trying very hard to pretend to be asleep.
O
Their arrival at number 12 was remarked only by a subdued Tonks and a suspicious Mad-Eye.
"We're trying to keep a low profile. Not draw attention to ourselves." He said when met them at the station. "Molly and Arthur send their apologies but they had to work."
"Work?" Ron wrinkled his nose in confusion. "But Mum doesn't have a job."
"Not that kind of 'work,' work for the Order!" Moody hissed. "Now, please keep quiet until we get back to Headquarters before you make us any more obvious."
Harry grinned as Ron's face turned a deep crimson, and he followed Moody out the station with Ginny at his side.
Ron looked at Hermione, who was craning her neck to look along the platform. "Looking for someone?" He said, and she jumped, looking flustered.
"Me? No. Who would I be looking for?" She laughed nervously. "Let's go, shall we? Don't want Moody to think the train has cursed us into oblivion." She set off at a fast walk and Ron hurried to catch up.
O
Draco waited until everyone else had left the train before he got off.
Pansy had gently shaken him when the train had drawn into the station, and he had made a great show of waking up slowly, yawning and stretching. She had wanted to wait for him, but he had waved her away with empty promises of regular letters.
Eventually he left the comfort of the train compartment and walked – as slowly as he was able – towards the door. On the platform, the last people left, were three people in long, black cloaks.
He stared at them apprehensively, but they turned and walked away without saying a word.
On his way out, Draco turned to take a last look at the Hogwarts Express.
For the first time since he had seen it, the station was empty and the train was still.
It was almost as if the last link to Hogwarts was dead.
O
Harry had naïvely assumed that living at Headquarters would be fun. Nothing could have been further from the truth. Conversations between adults were hushed, with frequent furtive glances over shoulders; Molly Weasley seemed to have a never-ending list of chores for them to do; and they were not allowed outside.
"If I have to do this… one more time… I… am going to kill… someone." Ron rasped out between chesty coughs. They were changing the sheets on the beds and Mrs Weasley had insisted they beat the dust out of the duvets before putting on more sheets, though because the restrictions they were forced to do it all in the already-dusty attic.
"Oh, don't be so melodramatic, at least we don't have to clean the bathroom again." Ginny admonished. There was a collective shudder as they thought of the second floor toilet they had been forced to scrub (the Muggle way, as everything inside that particular room seemed to be immune to magic) from top to bottom. "Exactly. So let's just get on with this without complaining."
Ron looked appalled. "Ginny. You're starting to sound exactly like Mum."
"Am not!" She replied crossly.
Harry and Hermione rolled their eyes and went back to beating the duvets, and so, before too long, the room was full of dust.
O
Draco felt it as soon as he passed through the gates. It was as though a cold wind had swept through him and robbed his body of all its warmth. He was still shivering by the time he reached the house, though it was June and the sun was beating down from a clear blue sky.
His welcoming committee had disappeared, so Draco picked up his trunk and began to make his way up to his room. Half-way up the stairs he found his mother.
She started. "Oh, Draco! I didn't hear you arrive." She was whispering, and kept sending terrified glances at a door just below them. "You'd better go to your room. Your father's a little busy, I'm afraid."
That was no problem; Draco had no desire to see him. "Okay," he shrugged.
Narcissa forced a smile, and Draco could not help but wonder where his mother had gone.
O
"Mum, just leave it." Charlie muttered.
"I most certainly will not!" Mrs Weasley replied heatedly. "There is no way that anybody is bringing anything illegal into my house-"
"Funny you should say that, 'cause last time I checked, this wasn't your house." George said loudly. "It's Harry's."
Everyone turned to look at Harry, who suddenly felt extremely uncomfortable.
"And I'm sure Harry won't have any problem with us keeping some completely legal extra stock here, will you Harry?" Fred rounded on him.
"Er, well, if it's legal, and won't inconvenience anybody, I guess it's okay…" He trailed off under Mrs Weasley's murderous glare.
"Cheers, Harry!" Fred beamed, and bounded out of the kitchen.
"No problem." He replied weakly, and sank into the nearest chair.
O
Draco didn't see anyone apart from his mother for a week of him being at the Manor, and even she seemed to want to avoid him.
Had he not know any better, he would have thought it was just the two of them in the house.
He found them in the library.
The books were gone. In their place were rows upon rows of hideously mutated limbs and faces.
He wanted to be sick. He wanted to shut his eyes and push the destroyed faces of so many out of his mind.
He recognised some of the faces. Underneath the annihilation, underneath the waste and the ruin, were people, real people with real lives.
The bile rose in his throat and as he was turning to leave a slight twitch made him look to the corner.
They were all naked, but for whatever reason it was impossible to tell if they were men or women. Chains bound them to the wall and forced them to sit in gruesome positions that stretched their arms and legs into horrific contortions.
Their bodies were covered in cuts and bruises, and their skin had turned a yellowy colour.
Draco retched. He knew these people. They were the Muggles who ran the shop in the village.
"Draco, dear boy, you're just in time to see the show!" A dangerously soft hiss came from the shadows. "But never fear, when the time comes, we won't be so hard on you. For you are a pureblood, but this scum deserve no better treatment than the rats." The voice spat.
Draco heard none of this. He had stopped paying attention when the voice had said "we won't be so hard on you…" So Blaise had been right. He was going to be punished.
"But for now, we have a little… entertainment. Come closer, Draco, and watch this filth die." Voldemort crooned, and Draco walked into the dark.
O
"Something's wrong." Hermione said.
"I know. Fred, I think we put too much basil in the sauce." George agreed.
Hermione was not impressed. "I'm serious… I think…" She was silent for a few seconds. "I think something's wrong."
"Well, that really clears things up. If something's wrong-"
"Quiet." She snapped. "Something's going to happen. I can feel it." Hermione announced. Then she continued to eat her tea, leaving Harry, Ron, Fred and George looking thoroughly bemused.
O
Draco walked back to his room in a kind of trance. He was shaking, there was a sheen of cold sweat all over his body and his legs were about to give way.
By some happy miracle he managed to reach his room without having collapsed, and he promptly threw up into the toilet. For at least an hour he was unable to move, so he just lay draped over the toilet bowl, trying to forget what he had just witnessed.
When he was sure he could shift without being sick again, he crawled over to his writing desk, grabbed some parchment and wrote the words:
'I can't do this anymore.
Please help me.'
He addressed it, and attached the short letter to his owl. Then he lay down and curled up into a ball on the floor.
O
Dinner was a particularly rowdy affair that night. All the Weasleys (minus Percy); Fleur and her little sister (who was visiting from France; Lupin and Tonks; Mad-Eye had dropped in; and, to Mrs Weasley's great displeasure, Mundungus had appeared, claiming to need to see Dumbledore for some reason.
So it was during an extremely heated argument about house-elf rights that the message arrived.
A silver phoenix appeared above the table and Dumbledore's voice said in commanding tones "Malfoy Manor. Bring as many as will come."
There was silence for a split second before all hell broke loose.
Mr and Mrs Weasley went into protective parent mode, ordering Ron, Ginny, Harry and Hermione to stay where they were.
However, Moody had other ideas.
"You heard Albus, Molly, 'as many as will come.' You can't stop Harry and Hermione from coming. Right, Remus, you start informing the rest of the Order, duplicate Dumbledore's message to as many people as you can think of. Molly, Arthur, check wands. Make sure we're able to get to where we want to be. Tonks, we're leading the advanced party." He added grimly.
O
The room was freezing. Draco could feel the parts of his body still in his control turning slowly blue, but the temperature was the least of his worries.
They had come for him while he was sleeping. All Draco had seen was a group of cloaked and masked figures before everything had gone black.
He had woken in the same position as the Muggles had been in earlier; chained to the wall and naked.
And he was going to die.