Disclaimer: I'm not sure why I bother…
Blood Price
Chapter 3: Pissed and Pressure
I wished, again, that everyone would leave me alone...
All they did was ask and pry, trying to get me to talk/ But I won't, not to them, not to anyone. I hadn't spoken since Dumbledore and Mr. Moody had brought me here, to Hogwarts, from my cell in Azkaban.
It was only my first night here and I already wanted out. Sitting down on my four poster bed in the Slytherin dormitories, I drew the curtains closed around me and huddled silently among the green and black satin sheets. I knew I wasn't going to sleep. Sleep brought back all the nightmares and emptiness and fear. Slowly, that feeling of being swallowed by a void and consumed by what I'd come to know as the "Red Room" came, just like it did every night.
Squeezing my eyes shut, I tried to will it away, but it did the metaphysical equivalent of laughing at me mockingly.
I reached desperately through the forest colored drapes around my bed, groping through my bedside drawer. A knife I had snuck from dinner found my hand. Clutching it close, I rolled my sleeve back. The Red Room was all around me now. Its walls a solid crimson, the floor slick with blood.
Bodies, three bodies, on the floor.
It was cold. It was always cold here.
"No, no, no!" I gasped, shaking my head.
You know how to make it go away, Samara, a voice whispered in the back of my head. It was the Gray Voice. The Voice knew, always, how to make the Red Room disappear.
I placed the knife blade against my skin.
Do it, urged the Gray Voice.
Pressing down, the serrated edge cut into my flesh. Dark red fluid flowed as I drew the blade up my arm, making an inch long wound. Pain bloomed along the incision, chasing away the Room and the Voice. My eyes fluttered shut, relishing in the temporary relief.
After a few moments, I pulled a handkerchief from my pocket and wrapped it around the bleeding cut, just above my left wrist.
"Samara?" a feminine voice called uncertainly.
God-fucking-damn.
Footsteps, and then a hand pulled the curtains back. I slid the knife under my leg and shook my sleeve down to cover my arm fully. I glared at the intruder, a girl, a simpering whore called Pansy Parkinson.
"Professor Snape wants a word with you," she informed me airily. She seemed vaguely annoyed that she'd been reduced to being a messenger-girl.
I gave her a look that I hope translated to "go to hell".
"He said if you don't come on your own, he'll send someone to drag you. And he'll give you detention."
Damn it.
Sighing, I clambered off my bed and, without looking at Pansy, ascended the stairs into the Common Room.
The other students stopped what they were doing and stared at me. One boy especially seemed to think I was there for viewing amusement. He was a tall youth with white blond hair and, I think, light…gray? eyes. From what I had been able to glean from the gossip at the Feast, his name was Draco Malfoy, his father was a Death Eater, he was wealthy, and he was good in bed.
The last was not something I'd really needed to know.
Malfoy intercepted me as I walked passed him and his little gaggle of followers/admirers. To tell the truth, he was good looking, and if I had been the girl I'd used to be, I would have flirted shamelessly.
Right now, I was tempted to break my silence and tell him to fuck off.
Seeming to sense my hostility, he spread his long fingered hands into a placating gesture. It would have appeared completely sincere if he hadn't smirked. "The Professor," he drawled, "wants me to bring you to his office."
Oh joy.
"Follow me," he added, walking towards the entrance to the Common Room.
Leading me down farther into the dungeons, he was surprisingly quiet. No questions, not jibes… It was…nice.
Maybe he wasn't the evil, shallow bastard I thought he was.
Malfoy brought met o a closed oak door, opened it, and motioned me inside.
The room was chilly, and the desks stone with stains all over their surfaces. A few cauldrons simmered over low flames at the head of the room.
No one was here.
I glared back at Malfoy. Ignoring the glare, he nodded and made a small hand motion, indicating me to move forward. He rolled his eyes too, saying, "Snape is always bloody doing this. Don't worry, though, he'll swoop in soon enough. He just wants you to be too creeped out to talk back."
Oh, of course.
Shrugging, I went to examine the contents of the cauldrons.
The first one I inspected held a bubbling dark green liquid that I knew to be a powerful and reasonably complex potion that caused the drinker to heal internal bleeding. The next on was clear and odorless. I wonder why he's brewing so much Veritaserum? Also a complicated brew.
I could probably get it right on the first try.
"Do you always stick your face near unknown solutions, Miss Shoreglade?" a quiet and cold voice inquired scathingly.
Looking up, I discovered the man who undoubtedly was Snape standing right across from me, on the other side of the table. Black eyes stared down at me from a long, thin, and sallow face. A large hook nose and thin lips kind of made him look like a corpse, or a Halloween mask. Of course, I was just being cruel because I didn't want to be here. Oddly enough, though, I was sure that I'd seen him somewhere before coming to Hogwarts.
His eyes flicked past me and he ordered, "Go, Mr. Malfoy. I have already spoken to you on these matters."
I head the door to the chamber slam closed.
Snape continued to stare at me. I gave him an equally annoyed look. What the hell did he want?
"You will not" he finally stated coolly, "do something that foolish again. In this room, you stay away from a cauldron you are unfamiliar with."
Fuck him. I knew what I was doing, glaring at him to convey this thought.
Completely ignoring the look, he continued, "Headmaster Dumbledore wants you to be looked after, and has instructed me to appoint a student to do so. For some reason, he believes you are a danger to yourself. That student will be Mr. Malfoy, whom you have already met."
Instinctively, I pulled my newly cut arm closer to my body and farther away from him. Snape's eyes darted to my left arm as it moved and, in one sharp movement, he had pulled my arm out over the pot of Veritaserum. He pushed back the sleeves of my robe and blouse and ripped off my makeshift bandage.
Shit.
Helpless, I could only watch as he took in the array of scars and half-healed cuts in addition to the freshest line. I could seem him put it together. Grip tightening, his expression projected anger. "What, in Merlin's name, possessed you to do this, you idiot girl?" Snape demanded, hissing.
Compelled to answer by who knows what, I whispered, "It… It helps. Cutting, causing pain… It helps drive that Red Room away." Out loud, I sounded weak, lost. It didn't sound nearly as bad when the Gray Voice said it.
"Idiot," he growled. Pulling out his wand, he drew me away from the table and tapped my arm. The new cut and the still-healing ones closed and were gone. "What is this bloody 'Red Room'?"
"It's just that, bloody and red and cold and—and…" I snapped my mouth shut. I didn't want to talk about it anymore. "Leave me alone!" I yelled instead, yanking free.
"You will cease this foolish behavior, Miss Shoreglade. If I hear of this from Mr. Malfoy, you and I will be paying a visit to the Headmaster."
A small tendril of rage uncoiled from deep within me. "Fuck you! It's none of your business what I do. If this is how I choose to cope with my whole family being slaughtered, then you have absolutely no right to interfere! It's my body, and I'll treat it how I decide! Who do you think you are? My father? Well, you're not. So you can go to HELL!"
I stormed out of the room, completing my childish display by slamming the door with an almighty crash, and went back to the Common Room. The large chamber was virtually empty, except for Draco Malfoy.
I did my best to ignore him, but when I reached the door that lead to the girls' wing of the dormitories, I glanced back.
He winked suggestively.
Jerk. Stupid, horny jerk.
Given that opinion, I still fell asleep think about my so called "guardian".
In the morning, I was surprised by two things: I had slept, and that the Red Room had been kept at bay from my dreams by none other than Malfoy.
What would Freud say about that?
Then again… Freud didn't have Death Eaters who would swoop down and collect payment if his unknown blood family pissed them off.
I did.
So screw it.