Dementor kiss

Chapter 21

Road

Harry

The pain of the cold ground beneath his tired body, awakened him to the plick-plock of the softly falling rain outside, and the freezing atmosphere inside.

Harry sat up exhausted, still too numb to feel the cold, and finally looked around to understand that, somehow, he was no longer in his living room.

The place around him was shady, light only by a few torches along the walls of what appeared to be a hallway; Dim orange lights dancing on gray stone as old and worn as the bones of an ossuary.

Suddenly, not far from where he stood, the cries of a tortured man confirmed what he already suspected.

He was in Azkaban.

How or why he had appeared here Harry could not be sure of, but it could be related to the object controlling the Dementors and that remained in Ministry's care. Perhaps when he received the curse it had necessarily transported him here. As the object kept the Dementors in Azkaban, it was to understand it could as easily move one to where he was supposed to be.

In fact if Harry had been the one designing the artifact, he would have gifted it the same.

Thinking how he was supposed to register as a dementor to that contraption...

Harry looked at his own self.

Indeed his clothes were gone, replaced by a spotless white robe. Curios, the new dementor touched briefly the fabric, looked at his own hands; he didn't feel any different; the only new characteristic as of now being his white robe… even if it did not seem to have a third of the softness that had characterized the one Draco wore. But Draco wasn't much changed either by coming to be a white dementor.

Maybe he would change some more when taking his first soul.

Suddenly, a more high and horrid scream echoed down the hall, reminding the auror of how dangerous it was to remain still in this place; even more now, in his intermediate state. Not fully a dementor, not really human, and too vulnerable to encounter the Dementor Lord.

So he left his curiosity for when, changed fully, he was no longer in such heavy danger.

Walking cautiously from shadow to shadow, all senses alert, as he scouted his surroundings to understand where in Azkaban he was, and after having left several turns behind, Harry came to a silver carved door immediately recognizable as one of those that sealed the levels underground.

Therefore, all the prisoners here should be supernatural creatures.

Looking carefully into the dark interior of some of the cells, Harry identified a few rigidly drawn shapes lounging on their cots. From outside he could not see the pallor of their skin, but their unnerving stillness was easy to recognize.

"Vampires."

Hermione had told him that the fourth level of the basement was flooded, and since this place was not, he should be in the vampire area of the first to third basement levels.

As Harry was pondering the new information, suddenly, a strange feeling, like a thread getting taut, assaulted his insides.

Cautiously he fled deeper into the shadows, just when a Dementor appeared around the corner.

He seemed to be looking for something ... and Harry did not like how it gazed in his direction.

oOo

Hermione

An involuntary moan escaped her throat. God ... she hurt all over.

"This must be how Charlie felt when that dragon knocked him over."

With slow agony Hermione managed to open her eyes, needing to close them as she recovered.

It was like trying to look inside a washing machine, as dizzy as she felt. But after a minute or so of slow breaths she managed to dispel the headache enough to look at her surroundings.

Firelight was still the only illumination of the room, as from the windows only the blackness of a stormy night could be seen. Not enough time had gone by for the sun to rise, so she couldn't have been out for more than a couple hours.

Hoping to find Harry still caught between the roots she had conjured, Hermione felt the beginnings of panic rise in her stomach at seeing her best friend gone. In fact, the wood where he was supposed to be was not only vacant, it looked charred, as if it had been hit by lightning or consumed by fire.

Worried for her friend, Hermione tried to get up too quickly, dizziness making her knees weak. Realizing she was not going to be able to stand if she kept half fainting, the auror took her wand -which had fallen from her hand to the floor when she lost consciousness- and quickly ran a few basic healing spells over herself.

The dizziness and most of the exhaustion dissipated with the magic, but not the entirety of the worry, that had, thankfully, been taken under control during the routine auror healing.

Now, calmer, cautiously, she stood up and approached the charred remains to better survey what was left of the makeshift restraints.

"What could have done… - gently Hermione touched one blackened wood edge, and it dissolved into fine ash. - this?"

As the last word left her lips, her brain jumped into gear and the auror remembered the thunder heard just before falling unconscious. The sound had been slightly off, too strong to come from the storm outside.

"Could it be…?"

Hermione dashed to where she had fallen, picking up the bag that had been left on the corner of the room, and began rummaging inside until she found the notes both Harry and her had collected about the Dementor curse. Turning the pages urgently, scanning them and discarding useless information until she found what she sought.

There it was - a very vague description of the magical device that kept the Dementors prisoner in Azkaban.

"Any dementor that leave´s without consent, will be immediately returned to where it belongs."

The text was unclear on the method of such transportation, but she suspected that was the origin of the thunder that had knocked her out.

Though not entirely a dementor yet, the contraption must have detected and sent Harry to Azkaban.

"Without him being a full dementor ..." -Something twisted inside her at the understanding.

Vulnerable, half changed, his magic would not respond well, and even if it did Harry didn't have his wand. If he faced the Dementor Lord in such a state …

" Griever will devour him."

And no one would prevent it, because technically his friend was no longer human, or at least, not entirely human.

Worry accelerated Hermione's heartbeat but she had confronted far more terrifying odds, and with a firm shake of her head the female auror reigned in her feelings.

If anyone saw her now with her hair tangled and disheveled, clothing torn, and eyes tired but hard, they may have thought she was back at war.

"Kreacher." - she called.

After a couple of seconds of agonizing waiting, the malicious elf appeared clearly unhappy at being called by a dirty mudblood. However forced he was to answer by the command of his master, who long years back, ordered him to help his friends if, at any given time, they called him.

"Someday it could become necessary, could one day save our lives"; Harry had argued back then. Now, those words proved truthful.

All this time Hermione had resisted the use of such power over any living being. But at present she was glad for it. No time to go home.

"Bring me Harry's medikit, please."

With a murmur about the indignity of serving her, the elf disappeared with an angry pop, returning a moment later with the white suitcase before disappearing again immediately after.

Granger shrunk the briefcase to carry in her pocket, and grabbed Harry's wand, before ultimately, also taking the knife used in the ritual and strapping it to her waistband.

As prepared as she could be in such short time, Hermione took a handful of floo powder and stepped into the fireplace.

Luckily she was still admitted into the barriers of Azkaban, at least until Tomass trial was held and the case was closed, since, unlikely her friend, she had not risen in protest against the minister for Draco's situation.

A moment later the green powder hit the fire:

-¡Azkaban!- she called.

oOo

Draco.

He wanted to disappear, as rainwater is absorbed by the earth. Have himself engulfed by the warm and maternal depths of damp soil, never to arise again. He may become part of the plants and insects that feed from his tired flesh and soft organs. Getting rid of many small things until his only remaining were whitish brittle bones, and a vague memory almost forgotten.

Maybe then he would not need to suffer.

He wondered if even then he would be able to forget Harry, and if in some small part of what remained of him he would still remember. He suspected nothing he could do would erase the auror from his memory or his body, as long as something of Draco remained.

And he almost hated him for it.

Because it hurt too much to remember what was lost and what could never be.

At first he had not. At first he had been afraid to forget him, because the aurors love for him was the only thing that helped him move from day to day, and to forget that what was being done to him. Later, when the Dementor Lord destroyed all that remained of the warm Auror in Draco's care: his one and only letter. It had hurt so much ... And the memory had become a torture in itself.

He felt frozen inside in Harry's absence. And every time he fell into the cold clutches of Griever Draco got teared inside, losing himself strand by strand, as if in the end, after all, he would get his wish and shatter into pieces.

It hurt too much, it was horrible and agonizing and he did not know how much longer he could go on. He was tired of suffering. Tired of life, tired even to exist.

Mourning was the only thing he seemed to have the strength for lately. Merlin! He was so pathetic ... Lucius would be ashamed to call him son. Although really it did not matter anymore, after all, the proud patriarch of the Malfoy family was dead.

Draco could only be grateful his father was no longer suffering.

He would have done anything to be able to die and get to see his family again, even if they felt ashamed of him. But dementors were immortal.

Unable to achieve permanent peace Draco would have to learn to live with this suffering.

If he could.

He snuggled a little further in bed, feeling the touch of the old and heavy velvet on the skin, refusing to acknowledge the sticky wetness between his thighs, and burying his face in the pillow to sniff the familiar smell of dust and dry spices. Draco drowned pain in it and prayed again to get rid of life, because he did not think he could ever learn to live this way.

Not while he remembered Harry. No while conscious.

He closed his eyes tighter, calling for sleep, to forget at least for a few hours. But the effect of the potion was over and the needed sleep refused to come.

If the Lord were here he would have brought another vial for his relief, but for the first time since this started, he was not in the room.

Draco did not understand why the Dark Lord of the tower seemed determined to help endure pain that he himself had caused. And he did not want to know.

His mere presence made him feel like dying, and Draco was infinitely grateful for his absence now, even if it meant having to stay awake.

However the pain inside did nothing but worsen with each passing minute. It had stuck hooks inside and with every passing moment they twisted more in the soft remainings of his heart, blood pouring hot from still open and festering wounds. Soon his eyes were flooded, his breathing turned into brief spasms of agony, his body trembling and drenched in cold sweat.

"I can not go on like this, I can not." He needed to get away from the pain, he needed his sleep potion.

In the end he decided to go look for it himself. The Lord must have more in his laboratory.

All the inhabitants of the tower were forbidden to go there... but ... A new flash of agony made the decision for Draco.

Half crawling, half standing, he reached one post of the huge bed, and managed, clinging to it, to stand on legs too weak after long days without walking. If he had the energy, maybe he could have glided as all dementors were capable of, but his remaining strength was barely enough for walking with hands on the wall as help.

Clawing at the cracks in the stone, Draco started toward the door.

oOo

Griever Gryffindor.

The room was not particularly spacious, but it was enough for what he had in mind, and that was all that mattered.

Normally Griever would have used his own rooms for this kind of meeting, but Draco was sleeping inside right now, and he wasn't about to risk his fragile whites already precarious sanity by speaking about Potter where he could hear.

At least not until the Auror died and his soul was forever extinct.

The fragile blonde was in no condition to withstand any more than he already did, and if he discovered that Potter was in Azkaban, Griever knew he would try to help him again.

Thus getting hurt once more. And frankly the idea brought out... distaste? Griever supposed he could call it that. It was difficult to correctly identify such a strange feeling for him.

"Margaret."- He called, getting the female dementor to quickly refill his fine crystal glass.

He had summoned those darker Dementors in this room, with Margaret as servant for the drinks.

The place was not very different from the rest of the tower, with its well-preserved old furniture of dark wood, heavy velvet curtains and the windows covered by a thick layer of dust.

The only noticeable difference being the color that dominated the place; Blue. A dark and intense blue like a Veronica flower about to wither.

It was the only concession to the red and gold that prevailed throughout the rest of the tower, and maybe that's why he loved this place.

But even in such a soothing setting, his mod was precariously tense, teetering into fury.

The candlelight, the crackling fire, and the moonbeams that managed to get through the glass, dimmed under the influence of his aura.

The drink in his glass threatened to freeze, and only years of forced control enabled him to maintain a facade of calm. When a few knocks on the door, announced the entrance of William and four other Dementors.

"Take a seat"- His imperious tone was enough for the five to obey, taking their places around the table Lord Griever had chosen the head of.

They all waited in silence as their leader sipped his liquor slowly, taking time to survey them. They all had already felt the slight loosening of the threads that chaines them to their Lord, but the bind was still strong enough to command instant obedience, and fear was a powerful incentive.

The dementors were not foolish enough to think about betraying their forced loyalty, since everyone of them knew to act with leaf-like delicate feet when the Dark Lord was in such a mood.

His aura was oppressive even to others of the same fate, reeking of death and dying things.

"I honestly do not think I have to name the reason of your presence here." - Griever finally spoke coldly. The drink in his hand froze with a subtle crackle sound that made chills invade the audience.

He set the glass on the table as if it was suddenly insignificant. His apparent calm and tranquility didn't fool ANYBODY.

"Bring him alive." - Even if one of them had thought about disobeying, the cold cruelty of his voice convinced everyone to obey, if not by choice, out of fear.

William, his faithful dog, gave a deep bow.

"As you want."- and everyone else agreed.

oOo

Harry

He pressed his back against the wall for the maximum protection of the shadows, but the dementor kept moving, stopping here and there to look into one of the cells. As if he could feel Harry's presence near, but wasn't sure where exactly to look.

Harry had very few options. Trapped against the wall next to the silver door, the dementor blocked the corridor through which he had come. Which meant he couldn't risk trying to take that route, and he couldn't confront him with magic, as unstable as was his magic now even if he had his wand, which he didn't.

He could try to open the silver door as quietly as possible and sneak inside before being seen. If it would open for him, that is.

He chose to give the second option a try.

"Everver."- Harry barely whispered.

The door opened a crack at the password. Thanking internally that they had not changed the passwords from last month, and hoping the dementor would not see anything amiss, as he was again engrossed watching through the bars of another cell, Harry opened the door just enough to slip inside, carefully closing it again behind him, and looked around.

Here the light was even scarcer than in the hallway, and the few lit torches that remained, just showed the outline of jagged descending stairs and nothing else. So with no other option, he began to descend them.

Soon it began appearing scum on the walls and floor; A green and slippery substance, nasty-looking, mold smelling and wet. The gloomy carved stone galleries covered in it, looked more like natural caves full of mystery, than the halls of a prison.

The stagnant air clung to his throat, as he breathed in the strong smell of salt.

Harry grimaced, but kept going.

Finally after some time of slow descent, he found the entrance to the new level... and water.

The place was flooded with stagnant, corrupt and putrid liquid. Strange and small algae had found their grip on the rock soil, and its greenish tips could be seen skimming the surface as skeletal fingers.

Harry knew then, that he was in the last basement plant. Which meant that, at least now, he knew for sure where he was.

He slipped in the wather carefully, checking its depth and feeling relieved when it only reached his knees. With the idea of finding out a new way up, he began to move through the last and strangest level of Azkaban.

All was nearly silent, with the dripping from a leak breaking the stillness now and again.

The place felt like catacombs, like an underwater graveyard. It was unnerving. Inert figures could be seen on moldy mattresses, looking like corpses swept away by the tide. Whitish creatures that certainly had to be vampires, nocturnal and now asleep.

So perhaps it was day outside.

"Potter"- A whisper so perfectly mingled with silence, that initially his mind didn't grasp, called for Harry.

But the moment he did, the ex auror turned to the sound, his body tense, his mind alert.

"Who's there?"- he hissed looking around warily. Back against the wall as a precaution.

"No need to get defensive, it's not like I can do anything from here." -

The voice was familiar but, Harry could not remember who it belonged to.

Someone was moving in the opposite cell. The light did not reach there, but he managed to distinguish wavy hair and an athletic body contour. Something clicked in Harry's brain at this, like a puzzle, and only one word surfaced to his lips.

"Zabini?"

"The one and only".-

The answer did not reassure the Auror, but he slightly relaxed his pose nonetheless.

"You are becoming a dementor." Zabini said from the shadows,his tone seemed to contain a strange and indefinable mixture of shocked surprise, anger, gratitude, relief and a sharp grain of jealousy, which left Harry confused and trying to measure how much of each had been in it, without obtaining a clear answer.

Intrigued, and knowing that his own answer did not pose a danger, he nodded.

"For Draco."- Zabini's voice broke directly to the core. No doubt there, just the assertion of a certainty.

Harry did not know whether to answer that. Could he trust the old Slytherin?

Blaise came to the bars, letting some of the dim light touch his lax hands, carefully closed around them.

Pansy had told him all of it, or at least everything she knew.

Draco was now a dementor. All by Potter. Stupid ungrateful bastard. During the last month he had imagined hundreds of ways to rip and tear the Auror to meath pieces. Bring his blood to a magnificent orgy of gore.

He had cursed Draco's fall for him. He had wanted to kill the Lord Dementor over and over, and over again. And virtually the same for Tomas, sometimes at the same time. Make them regurgitate their own intestines to start with.

But this ... this he had not expected. Even though Pansy had told him what happened, he was hard pressed to believe that Potter really loved Draco. At the end of the day, there hadn't been a sign of life from Potter in a month.

And now this?

But he needed to find a way to help hia friend before it was too late. Before he ceased to exist. How could his best friend endure alone in the hands of the worst monster of the tower?

No one had seen him since the ceremony. At least no one who was not a dementor, and they never said anything, even though they could.

He made a frustrated sound that was almost half a hiss, a legacy of his vampire nature, and clasped harder his fingers around the metal.

Potter, as always, was frustrating. But he was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt... for now.

"Potter ... "- He let the pain and exhaustion in his voice leak. For once what he wanted could not be get lying. They needed the Auror for this.- "Draco and Pansy are the only thing I have left. They are my best friends, my family. You should understand this."

Harry came nearer to see his face. The light was dim, but once his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he could distinguish the features of Zabini's face and the twinkle in his red eyes.

He seemed sincere. But Harry knew better than to trust someone like him.

"I understand what it is to have good friends, if that's what you want To know."- the new dementor said in his most neutral voice.

But the vampire was quick to understand that the auror had his reasons, all well founded, not to trust him. Zabini would have to really show his feeling, if he wanted to be believed.

Clinging to the bars, Blaise tried to find the words that would give voice to his heart. Never before had he had to discuss this with anyone but the two who he loved, and loved him back.

He took a breath. For a moment not knowing how to start, what to say. Then he thought of Draco and Pansy, and what they would lose if this did not work ... and the first words escaped his lips, like a whisper lost in the memory.

"None of us wanted to go to war, despite our families pressure on us. Draco's parents, my mother, Pansy's parents, her older brother ... Everyone wanted us to fight for a crazy man, whose ideals were most absurd, whose desire for power led him to torture even his most loyal followers."- gently he shook his head, regretting their families decisions and their own naivety.

Harry could not help but be interested in the story. The staging of a tale that explained much of whom Draco had been and had become.

"It was absurd. But we had grown up with stories of the Lord that would bring the disappearance of muggles, and freedom for wizards. A world where we did not have to hide for fear of the memory of witch-hunts. By the time we realized our mistake and what kind of man the Dark Lord was we had already taken the Mark. Adults... no one wanted to listen to us…"

His gaze lost in the distance, remembering old words Harry wanted increasingly to listen to.

"I don't know why. Perhaps the long time under the influence of the monster's had also twisted them inside. But we knew we could not kill. We were not like them. At least not yet. And we were afraid of what would happen to us if we remained to participate in the war. It was wrong. It was terribly so."

Harry wondered if Zabini was even aware that he had a listener any longer.. the vampire seemed completely immersed in the memory. Speaking for himself in soft murmurs filled with pain.

"So we behaved like little snakes. We nodded and pretended agreement. And meanwhile we planned, prepared.. and finally one winter night before the war, we fled. We had been pilfering from our family accounts. They were so rich that a few hundred galleons, here and there, quietly hidden in other expenses, did not raise suspicions.

We took sufficient for all us three. Bought a house far enough away from any urban center to avoid being detected, close enough to a muggle city to confuse us with them. And with a beautiful garden, where Pansy looked after the roses herself, and Draco planted and cultivated ingredients for his potions. I just enjoyed the peace of mind you could breathe there. It was our home ... it was for the three years of the war. It was even when I turned ... "

Blaise's voice trembled, he blinked after a moment, as if remembering he was not alone. His eyes met Harry's ... and there was a vulnerability in the red depths ... Harry had seen in the eyes of all who had feared losing their loved ones in the war. One he had seen in the mirror more times than he would like. A gap of pain and fear and desperate longing to protect, even though it was impossible to do.

It had been years since Harry had seen such expression. The wizarding world was healing quickly from the wounds of battle. So now to find it again … it convinced him that while perhaps Zabini was not telling the whole truth, his love for Draco and Pansy was real and unconditional.

Zabini would die for them without blinking.

"The ministry locked us here a few weeks after the end of the last battle. We made a mistake, we thought we would get a fair trial. We had not done anything during the war, we were innocent. We believed that if we came out of our hiding place and we showed our refusal to take part in the fighting, we could resume normal life. Stop being afraid, always hidden."

Zabini pressed his sharp teeth together to contain the anger. Not to scream at the injustice. The bars digging into his palms but not important.

"But we were wrong. Our brands were enough for them to condemn us. We didn't had a trial, not a moment to say goodbye. We were separated and locked in this hell."

He looked at Harry with a deep anger not directed at him, but at all those officials and members of the ministry too terrified to think before locking three innocents in Azkaban.

Blaise knew few worse monsters than them.

" It was almost two years, nearly two years, until we were able to communicate again. When Pansy managed to get the work as maid that allowed her to move with some liberty inside the prison. She visited both of us and conveyed messages from one to the other. You can not know what those years made of us all. And what we mean to each other."

Harry appreciated the fierceness in Zabini's eyes.

"You want to save Draco, I want the same. In the state you are, half turned, you have no choice, You need me. Draco needs me."

The heartfelt words, the gleam in his red eyes ... there was one possible answer.

And he opened the door.