"Catch Malfoy!"
Before Draco's foot even hit the bottom step, George had thrown (with much force) a balled up grey t-shirt. It was worn and stretched but Draco could already tell it smelt fresh and clean.
"Move your arse Malfoy - we haven't got all day." George trailed off towards the dining table - where he could see Mr Weasley carefully drawing up plans.
Draco looked down at himself, in his red blotched shirt. He was suddenly very aware of the blood that stuck against his skin. The blood of so many. He quickly whipped his shirt off wanting it away from him.
"Heh - Not bad -" came a cool voice from behind him.
He spun, still shirtless to face Ginny who was watching him, casually sipping a cup of tea from an armchair.
"Azkaban's diet and exercise regime seems to work - figures." She smirked as Draco rolled his eyes and yanked on the t-shirt. She might thought that she bothered him - but she didn't. He could take jibes and digs and remarks. He was a Malfoy, and he had been raised by his father.
Ginny lowered her tea and gestured to the t-shirt.
"He must like you Malfoy - that's Fred's."
Draco glanced down, sure enough there was an 'F' embroided over the chest. He felt itchy. Maybe the bloodied shirt was a better option.
"I don't like him!" George shouted from the dining table - still looking at Mr Weasley's plans. "And the F stands for ferret."
Ginny smirked into her tea. She waved Draco towards the kitchen.
"There's a plate of food for you on the side if you are hungry." she stood up. 'How is she?'
In agony and wankered on fire whiskey, he thought. What a stupid bloody question.
'As expected I suppose.' Was his more polite reply, 'Though Azkaban doesn't offer a doctorate in medicine so I don't really know,'
Ginny regarded him passively for a moment then turned to saunter up the stairs.
'You sarky sod, shame you were Slytherin terrorist…' she paused turned and smirked at him, 'in another life we could have been friends.'
Blaise had always had a secret crush on the fiery red head, in fact most of his year did. Blood traitor or not she was a bombshell. A man eating Gryffindor. Blaise wouldn't have stood a chance.
Draco stood awkwardly at the bottom of the stairs, wondering - not for the first time- if now was the moment to just leave and make a go of it on his own. He doubted the Ministry would look for him now. He cupped his wand, wondering if the restrictions still remained. Despite the world crumbling into a pile of shit around him, he couldn't help but feel the epiphany wash over him.
He was free.
Free from the obligations and expectations of his family, free from a cult he was never sure he ever believed in, free from punishment. This next choice he made would be his own.
His choice.
It seemed almost foreign.
'The door is there Malfoy,' George said, Draco met his eyes. 'Or you can stop pissing about and get your arse over here.'
Draco only paused for a second before joining them at the table.
He glanced at a home made map, rough scribbling of village names and miles distance. Here and there were stars marking what Draco deciphered to be local Wizrding families. He noticed the name Lovegood not too far away. He hoped they would not have to make contact anytime soon. The good thing was they were realitivly rural so less infected. The bad news - that made it trickier for supplies.
'We have contacted Bill and Percy,' Mr Weasley began,
'My older brothers,' George clarified.
'No word from Charlie yet. But the owls may take a while to make a round trip to Romania... if they can that is.'
Draco would be very suprised if they did. Surely, the first thing Kingsley would have done would be to block the boarders, the last thing the world needed was to be ransacked by a load of infected wizards fleeing from the UK. Draco shivered at the thought of the world over run - maybe it already was.
Speaking of monsters...
"Where is Fletcher?" he asked. He couldn't smell him - so he assumed he was lurking elsewhere.
"In one of the bedrooms upstairs," replied Mr Weasley.
"Have you locked the door?" Draco asked, his eyes narrowing. He didn't trust the little mole, not one bit. There was something so off about him, almost inhuman. He wasn't convinced the potato of a man was any danger but he wasn't taking the risk. He was clearly unhinged, and Draco knew first hand that a man with a bent mind could set the world on fire if he wanted.
Mr Weasley paused for a second. "Not yet." He said simply. He straightened. 'I'm going to check how many chickens we have, if we are in here for the long hall lets at least make sure everyone can have breakfast!' He said it with a smile but they could all tell it wasn't reaching his eyes. His very tired eyes.
George decided he would pop out too, something about checking if the field next door still had some cows, leaving Draco to gaze absently at the plans on the paper.
A quiet grizzle made him jump. He spun seeking the source.
Snuggled in the corner of the living room by the fire, nestled in a bundle of hand stitched blankets, a little chubby arm ascended and waved.
Draco had forgotten about the baby. He looked around, hoping someone would appear. The baby's grizzling grew stronger, till he was nearly bawling and Draco felt a pull on his chest and subconciously walked towards him.
Draco had never been around babies. Even in his family, children were often kept out of sight until they were old enought o know how to sit silent and obey.
He had often heard of the maternal instinct inside women, the pull, the primal instinct to protect.
As he approached the small, pink, blubbering creature - he decided it wasn't just maternal at all. Only a monster would sit and let a small child cry without comfort. Still - he had zero clue wht he was supposed to do.
He peered gently over the side of the old crib. Big, glistening brown eyes stared back at him - eyes nearly far too big for his face. They peered at him through long blonde eyelashes and Draco could sense a pain he knew only too well. He didn't actually know exactly where he had come from, only that Granger had found him. He couldn't be muggle - he'd be dead. He had to be magical, and he could only assume a muggleborn orphan. The baby began to cry, louder this time and Draco knew he was asking for a comfrot that Draco wasn't sure he knew how to give. Slowly, he put his hands in to pick him up.
"Look..." a snarling voice behind him made Draco pause.
When he turned he fought the impulse to jump. Standing behind him, so close he could smell the revolting stench of his warm humid breathe, was Fletcher. Draco looked down on him - he could only imagine how his face probably looked like his father's right now. Disgusted. Draco had seen the scum and dregs on humanity in prison, but this man made every cell in his body cringe. Draco looked into his eyes, he was not fond with the way he stared back. Wide, full of secrets swimming in a sea of insanity. Somehow familiar.
"Look at what?" Draco asked him, stretching taller using only his eyes to peer at Fletcher nearly two foot below him.
"At you." Replied Fletcher, his voice grainy, in almost whispered tones. "Look at the Death Eater lay his murdering hands on the mudblood baby." Fletcher grinned a manic smile, and Draco noticed that despite it being grotesque with cracked lips, black, cracked and missing teeth - it was full of joy. He took half a step closer to Draco, so his face was mere inches from his chest.
"Are you going to wipe away the blood of his kin on his blankets?" he whispered. 'It would make him a fitting funeral shrowd, not that many were buried..." Fletcher did a massive inhale through his nose, a look of escasty plastered on his face "I can still smell the flesh and smoke!"
Draco felt sick. These were war crimes he had not part in, but he had seen them. He still did in his nightmares. Nothing that Fletcher was saying had any correlation - was he getting under Draco's skin? Fuck yes. Butit wasn't just his words that bothered him, Fletcher's tone and persona - why was he talking like that. He had met Fletcher during the war years, a ratty stout little man that scurried his wares in the dark corners of Diagon Alley. A coward, a leach. Not this - whatever this was.
He hadn't been there. Who had he been talking too?
Draco assessed the man like he was a rabid animal. Could the human mind really crack so fast?
Rabid animals are unpredictable and dangerous, he mused to himself.
They need putting down.
Fletcher stayed where we was, smiling like a demonic clown up at him - waiting for Draco to reply. But he didn't. Instead, he picked up the baby, who was lighter than he imagined, and skirted around Fletcher like he was the plague. Although he kept his distance, Draco stared at him the whole time. Unblinking and unyielding, challenging and daring Fletcher to make a move. But Fletcher watched him back like a hell hound puppy, still wide eyed and smiling and gleaming with a putrid glee. Draco watched him as he picked up his satchel and whispered something to it - still watching Draco as though he was gossiping to something hidden inside.
Heading out the back door Draco looked down at the little chubby tear streaked face and sighed. He shifted him in his arms, with zero idea how he should actually be holding him.
He had to talk to Mr Weasley - Fletcher was a ticking time bomb.
When would shit stop getting so complicated?
Mr Weasley was still pottering around the garden, a little notepad in his hands and a pencil behind his ear. He looked up at Draco, surprised to see him holding the baby.
'Little tyke wake up hey?' He mused strolling towards them. 'I didn't take you as the baby type, no offence Mr Malfoy.' Mr Weasley smiled gently down at him.
'I'm not.' Replied Draco, looking down also at the bundle in his arms, he quickly looked back at Mr Weasley. He decided to be matter of fact.
'Fletcher was threatening him.'
Mr Weasley's smile dropped. 'What do you mean?'
Draco paused, thinking of how he could paraphrase the conversation without throwing himself under the bus too.
'He was referencing war crimes committed against muggle borns. Things that only the inner circles would have seen first hand…' Draco felt his face drain of colour, he was sweaty and trying not to think about the images that haunted him. 'I don't think he is who we think he is… he knows too much. Something about him isn't right, I don't trust him around the baby, or even the women in the house.'
Draco suddenly thought then of Hermione, he'd been trying not to, of her alone sleeping on the bed, half naked, injured and vulnerable with that dirty mole of a man watching her with that creepy smile. He felt clammy.
Mr Weasley ran his hand through his grey and ginger hair. He looked up at the sky and gritted his teeth.
'Well talk to the others, we'll think of something. Isolate him in a room or something until we figure something out.'
Draco was relieved but confused. He'd almost been expecting a battle. No one has said anything since he had been here, in fact they had nearly welcomed him with open arms.
'You've very hospitable Mr Weasley… I can't imagine be being here is easy for you.' Draco didn't want to be sympathetic, but he was grateful. They didn't need to help him out of the ministry. They could have left him there. They probably thought about it.
Mr Weasley scratched his chin.
'Listen Mr Malfoy, I'm not saying I trust you - honestly I don't. But I trust your self preservation, if you say something is dangerous I believe you. I don't know how deep your loyalty lies if any of us get into any real danger but I'll let you prove that to us if and when it comes to it. You need to know, Molly and I never agreed with your sentence. I will never agree with or justify your choices but…'
Draco reluctantly locked eyes with him.
'you were just a boy Malfoy.'
There was an awkward silence. Draco didn't want to say that he'd be loyal, or that he'd changed or that he regretted every choice he ever made. He didn't know if that was true yet. He didnt want to disrespect the first man to show him kindness in forever with a lie. So instead, he awkwardly nodded.
'Besides,' he began, taking pencil from behind his ear and jotting something down, 'We are in a completely different war now aren't we. Let's see if we can both stay on the same side.'
Mr Weasley looked up and offered Draco an unsure but genuine smile.
'Dad!' George's voice ran out from behind the back of a barn. 'Dad you had better come and have a look at this!'