Chapter 9

"Where's Harry?" asked Ginny, looking up from her books. Even though it was a Friday night, she had stayed up late finishing up all her homework so she could be free on the weekend.

I've been hanging out with Hermione too much, she mused. Although actually . . . I haven't really hung out with her since the summer. She's been really busy these past weeks. Or maybe just elusive?

Despite the fact that it was a Friday night and only 1:30 in the morning, the population of the Gryffindor common room had thinned out, leaving only three others besides Ginny - Seamus, Dean, and Neville, who was intently following the game of wizard's chess being played by the former two.

"I think he's gone to Ron and Hermione's," said Dean, without looking up.
"Oh." She felt something nagging at her, though she wasn't sure what.

Fiddling with her quill, Ginny stared into the fire, appreciating its gentle flickering, her gaze reflected in its tender red flames.

Neville snuck a quick look at her, letting his eyes steal away from the board as Seamus took one of Dean's pawns with a triumphant, 'Ha!'

He took her in slowly, like one looking at a painting in a gallery, or watching the stars creep from the sky's velvet at dusk.

Despite having inherited her mother's height, Ginny's build was more aligned with that of her father's straightness than her mother's fuller figure, and like Ron, she had not escaped the thick red hair and freckles bestowed upon all who bore the Weasley name.

Neville had quietly admired her ever since last year, when they had shared the adventure in the Ministry of Magic along with Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Luna Lovegood. But even two years ago, he had been more of the short, round-faced, flaxen-haired boy he'd begun Hogwarts as, than the tall, stocky young man he was now.

His face was pleasant though toothy, and though he did not have a crush on Ginny (those feelings were reserved for someone else), he found she exuded a depth he longed to explore.

But how in Merlin's name do you ask someone to be your friend?

Neville, like Ginny, did not have a very best friend. In Ginny's case, it was her reserved nature that led her closest friends to be those she was already in close proximity with (Hermione, Ron, and Harry), and her not-so-close-friends to be fellow Gryffindors and fellow loners, such as the quirky and reclusive Luna, whom with she conversed on occasion. Neville's position as somewhat of an outsider (with the exception of when he would tack onto either Harry and Co. or Seamus and Dean, as had happened that evening), was simply because he was shy.

The tragedy that that befallen his parents had affected him more than he would ever know. In addition to having to deal with the biting inner pain, the bitterness and embarrassment that he sometimes felt, he had also been subjected to growing up under the strict eye of his grandmother. While she did love him very much, he had often found himself isolated from the bubbly and social childhood most young witches and wizards his age had experienced. For this reason, he sometimes also felt a warm affiliation with Harry, who likewise had been a lonely child.

It was due to this shyness ingrained in him that he and Ginny had only ever spoken a handful of times, only once or twice alone together. This part of his personality might have held him back at the moment his brain told his legs to move, except for the fact that the firelight had deepened the shadows on Ginny's pensive face, and scarcely before he knew it, Neville had risen and was sitting by her.

"What's wrong, Ginny?" he asked quietly.

She looked at him, tearing her eyes from the intoxicating flames.

"Not much." She sighed. "Just tired, I guess."

"Alright," said Neville, feeling slightly embarrassed. "I just -" he began. "Well, you looked worried and... well, like something was bothering you."

He gave her a nod, biting his lip, and stood back up.

"Well... g'night then."
"Wait -"

She looked behind Neville to where a yawning Dean was following Seamus up to bed.

"Well, I am worried a bit," she admitted, focusing back to the boy in front of her. "About Hermione. She hasn't been quite herself lately, and I haven't had a good talk with her in ages."

"Do you want to go down and speak with her for a bit?" he asked quickly.

"I would if I could," said Ginny, shrugging her shoulders, "But it's way passed curfew. I'll have to do it later."

"But you want to go?"

"I would," she nodded.

"Alright, wait here," Neville said, practically grinning. "I'll be right back"

"What are you going off about?" Ginny asked, wrinkling her forehead so a lock of hair fell across her cheek.

Neville winked mischievously at her, his face suddenly looking as round as it had been when he was a first year.

"Harry isn't the only one with an invisibility cloak."

---

He read the letter, his eyes backing into his skull.

My Father.

The dark vial he gripped in one hand.

I will not become his puppet. I have too much to live for... I'm better than that, I'm smarter than that, and I am not like Him. . . . I would not do to my son what he has done to me.I am not like him.

He choked on the tears that belied his resolve, and moved to smash the vial on the ground. His robes clung to him as he shivered for a while with the idea of what he was about to do. He retreated to the corner of the classroom he had slipped inside.

I'm sick of this. Fuck you. Fuck. You.

He closed him eyes tightly, trying to block out his father's face, pushing him to the ground on his stomach, roughly tearing off his robes. He was pressing him into the ground, moving over him heavily.

"Get off, No, don't..."

His face pressed into the stone, the stone pressed into him, pressing into him.

Disgusted, he sobbed out loud, mimicking the one other time he had broken down like this.

Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you . . . Well he did, didn't he?

Gasping, he pulled the stopper from the vial, the bitter smell filling him, his empty place where something had been brutally taken.

"You will obey me, boy."

I will obey you.

He drank it down.

"Crucio." Lucius bore down on him while he was on the floor, pulling up his robes, down with his boxers. Draco could feel his father fumbling above him, but he could not move.

And then the Horror. The sheer horror of knowing what was happening, unable to stop it, of flesh and blood in violation of flesh and blood.

He felt it, distantly. Like it was happening to someone else, and he was watching. But he could feel it, and he couldn't stop it...

The liquid gushed inside of him.

Inside of me.

He fell to his hands and knees, it was eating him away.

I will not become my father.

Groaning, animalistic noises came from his throat, followed by a trickle of blood.

Did he ever love me?

No.

He clawed the floor with his hands, the pain writhing inside him.

I am not my father.

As if an epiphany had hit him, he jammed his hand in his mouth, fingers slipping roughly into his throat.

---

Ginny and Neville were securely under Neville's father's invisibility cloak, creeping slowly down the corridor. Neville had found the article the past summer, while rummaging in some trunks kept by his grandmother in her musty attic.

"I've wanted to try it out for ages," Neville had said as he showed it to Ginny in the common room, "But I was too nervous to roam about the school invisible by myself."

"I wouldn't want to either," said Ginny, feeling the fluidity of the fabric. "At least if we get caught we'll be in good company for the detention."

Neville hadn't stopped himself from smiling at her.

It's nice talking with Ginny. She's quiet, like me. And she doesn't make me feel stupid or awkward.

They were winding their way along the hall by the door stairs leading to the fourth floor when they heard the sound of violent retching.

"What's that?" asked Ginny, looking about them.

"It sounds like someone's really sick."

They followed the noise down a couple doors to a Transfiguration classroom. Neville gently pushed open the door that was standing slightly ajar.

"Hello?" he called out softly.

"Lumos," whispered Ginny, a light emanating from the tip of her wand.

In the corner of the room, the shadows harbored the shape of a person. Hunched on hands and knees, the figure had just finished vomiting on the cold stone, shuddering with each succeeding gasp.

Ginny ran out from under the cloak to the convulsing figure.Neville followed, pointing his wand at the bloody mess.

"Scourgify."

Ginny lifted the edge of her robes to wipe the person's slimy chin, lifting the drooping head.

"Malfoy!" she exclaimed in surprise.

Neville took a step back, grapping Ginny's shoulder. He'd been taunted enough by the boy to be wary of his arrogant peer, but Draco's eyes had rolled back in his head, the whites unnaturally glassy, and his lips had turned an evil shade of green. Ginny picked up an empty vial on the floor, showing it to Neville.

"We have to get him to Madame Pomfrey," he admitted.

"Mobilicorpus," said Ginny in a hushed voice, Draco's flaccid form following her eerily out of the classroom while Neville closed the door behind them.

---

Madame Pomfrey answered the knock on her door with a stifled yawn and a disgruntled look. When she saw the two students' unconscious cargo, she quickly ushered them in. The green taint of his lips had spread in a web around his face, his breathing becoming increasingly shallow.

"What happened to him?" asked the nurse gruffly as Ginny let him down on a pristine white bed. She handed the elder witch the vial.

"We found this on the floor beside him. I think he threw a lot of it up, but it still seems to have got to him." She looked at the still form of the boy she loathed for his arrogance and mean-spirited words.

I hope he's alright.

Madame Pomfrey gave the vial a sniff, waving it under her nose. She reeled back from the reek it gave off. Neville and Ginny recognized the bitter smell as being prevalent in the classroom where they had found Draco. She proceeded to hold the vial up to the light, reading a strange character set in relief on the opaque black glass.

"Where would he have gotten this?" she murmured. She looked both astonished and deadly serious, despite the pink curlers crowning her head.

"What is it?" Neville asked as the Mediwitch rushed over to a cabinet, frantically pulling off half a dozen bottles from the shelves.

"Basilisk venom," the older woman replied in a quavering voice.

He tried to poison himself.

Ginny's mouth fell open, though she was not as shocked as she could have been. "I don't have a direct antidote for it, but these are for dragon venom and snake venom... they should do the trick, but there's no guarantee. If he gets worse we'll have to call Dumbledore."

She started spooning a bright blue liquid into Draco's gaping mouth, his breathing growing ever more laboured. Ginny was holding his head up.

"Neville, open the next bottle for me." He obliged, and Madame Pomfrey poured a thick red goo past Draco's lips.

It looks like congealed blood.

Ginny pressed her lips together worriedly.

They all hovered over him expectantly for the next two hours, Madame Pomfrey administering some potion or other every couple minutes, having forgotten to shoo the students back to their rooms. Eventually, the gangrenous color faded from Draco's face and be began breathing normally. The trio watched on with trepidation.

After another hour Madame Pomfrey sighed. "There's nothing else we can do. He should be all better by tomorrow night or Sunday morning. I'm going back to bed." She raised an eyebrow at the pair. "You two should go to bed as well." Adding a meaningful look, she exited the infirmary.

Ginny yawned, shaking Neville's shoulder. His eyes had started to fall closed. "Let's go back to the tower," she said, getting up and laying Draco's head back down on the pillow.

Neville removed himself from his perch by the boy's feet.

"Why in Merlin's name would he want to bump himself off?"

"I don't know..." replied Ginny, looking at Draco's sleeping form one last time. A piece of parchment sticking out of his robes caught her eye. Curious, she pulled it out and unfolded it.

"You coming?" asked Neville, his hand on the doorknob.

Ginny motioned him over, holding out the letter, her eyes wide. Neville skimmed the parchment. His pupils flickered from side to side as he read. His mouth opened in astonishment.

"Well that explains it."