Gray: Scorpius Malfoy and the Blood Runes

by Fiery Gray

UNDER EDITING! (I): After a trauma, the Malfoys are reluctant to send their son off to Hogwarts, especially after Scorpius gets off to an eventful start and nothing goes as planned. He finds things are wrong at Hogwarts under the rule of a dangerous headmaster who has it in for him while in the shadows lie an even greater threat than anyone could have foreseen. COMPLETE

7. Chapter 7: Seeking

Parts (29-34)

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I

Chapter 7

Seeking

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Part 1: The Assistant's Assistant

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The second week was much easier for Scorpius, everything settled into comfortable routine after he had a better sense of what it was like at Hogwarts and what was expected of you. Not that it always was easy, despite what Calderon had said he still worried about the blood runes and Varanian.

He genuinely did enjoy the lessons though, he lived for his next Flying lesson even though he had to force himself to not stray away from the allocated area and sway from instructions. The second lesson wasn't quite as good as the first, his broom kept randomly veering to the left and they had to take a ten minute break when Michael crashed through a window and had to be taken to the hospital wing, he was a better flyer than Albus though. Scorpius still loved being in the air though, even tedious instruction and a class full of talking students couldn't take that away from him. He couldn't wait for the next one. Despite his love for flying he did turn down Hal's offer, he had no time to take him up on it and just because he loved flying it didn't mean that he wanted to be on the Gryffindor Quidditch team.

After Flying his favorite lessons were easily Transfiguration and Defense Against the Dark Arts, he found both of them equally fascinating and exciting. He loved hearing about the different branches of Transfiguration and such, Albus would groan when Professor McGonagall started to lecture them but he would only sit up straighter. Defense Against the Dark Arts was equally interesting, he loved when Professor Ashain would go on a tangent about a particular spell or creature or his experience with either. The practical aspect of both could be hard work at times but he enjoyed the challenge, made him feel more of a sense of accomplishment when he continued to excel at both.

He excelled at Charms too but he didn't enjoy it, he was all too aware of what had happened before, while everyone else relaxed a bit and enjoyed the class. Scorpius would be on edge, focusing intently on just carrying out the task and not hurting anyone. Professor Flitwick kept a really close on eye on him when he was performing magic and he thought everyone else held their breaths a little whenever he raised his wand. History of Magic was the only other subject he didn't like very much, he didn't think anyone - excluding Michael and possibly Rose - did. He thought it was easily the most boring class although he still did his best in it, paying attention and keeping up with his homework. You still had to do a subject even if you didn't like it - at least until you were older and could drop subjects - and Scorpius didn't want to fail any subject, it would just prove he was weak to his parents. He was really worried about his family, they still hadn't replied to his letter and he really was beginning to think that he was disowned.

He liked Astronomy, despite the lack of magic use and the fact you had to get up in the middle of the night to do it, although he knew some people in particular really hated that. The view was incredible and the stars were beautiful to look at, his mind had a habit of fantasizing about flying under them at night that he had to try to get out of. In the very first lesson the professor pointed out the constellation bearing his name, it made him feel oddly special to be named after something so incredible.

He liked Potions and Herbology too, learning about what the different potions could do and about the different plants was quite interesting even if they weren't his favorite subjects. Potions was alright, he just didn't enjoy mixing potions as much he enjoyed performing spells. Herbology wasn't as practical as he would have liked although Professor Longbottom wasn't as bad a teacher as his father had made him out to be, although it could be painfully uncomfortably at times.

Once Albus asked the professor something about Dumbledore's Army, it prompted him to talk about his time being trained in secret by Harry Potter while they were under the rule of a sadistic Headmistress and even showed them the coin. Scorpius had wished the ground would swallow him up when the professor mentioned his father as being one of Umbridge's Inquisitorial Squad, even Michael had looked at him funny for that. It actually made him oddly angry that his father hadn't even told him about it, he'd just pretended like he was a loving father when secretly he was this whole other bullying person. He couldn't help but wonder what his father would think if he knew about what Varanian, maybe he would care because Varanian had injured Scorpius but about the other students? If Scorpius wasn't on Varanian's bad side, would his father approve of blood runes and everything? Was his father really that cruel? Scorpius didn't like Nott but even he didn't deserve what was happening.

It was all a lot to remember and take in though, he wasn't surprised Michael was so overwhelmed by it all. Scorpius had struggled with everything muggle when he was first taken, it was like a completely different world that you had to get used to. For Michael it had to be the same, only the opposite as he was thrown into the magical world rather than the muggle one but Scorpius did sympathize and try to help him where he could, getting picked on by James and his friends and tortured by Varanian probably didn't help him much either. Michael still put a brave face on though, he was the one who tried to cheer everyone else up when their spirits were low and make light of everything. When he lay down to sleep his smile would vanish and he would look sick with worry though.

Scorpius didn't have as much free time as the others though, he spent time with them when he could but he did still have his year's worth of detentions to do. How long the detention varied as much as the actual punishment, some lasted barely an hour while others lasted until dinner although they took up most of his weekend. It did cut into his homework time majorly, if they lasted until dinner then he had to stay up and work on his homework by the light of his wand or go down into the common rooms. It was easier to do it in the common rooms but the stares he got did put him off, unless Molly Weasley sat with him. He was surprised the first time she came and sat opposite him, they stayed up late talking as they worked on their studies. He was pleased, he felt comfortable around her and when you were with people the others looked at him less. She believed him about the Charms incident being an accident, even told him about how she'd accidentally turned her friend's head into a teapot in the second year when she'd completely missed the tortoise.

"Accidents happen, Scorpius," she'd said comfortingly, "we're here to learn after all. Least you have power and no one wants to mess with you anymore, that's got to be a plus!"

He didn't mind staying up late to do homework after that, he liked his time with Molly. The detentions themselves weren't actually as bad as he'd thought, he even came to enjoy it sometimes. Calderon would take him from his last lesson of the day but what he did after that was anyone's guess, sometimes he would be left with someone else and they'd assign him his task for the day or other times left alone with a chore. The tasks varied greatly depending on who he'd been left with, some were things like writing lines or sorting books while others were more hands on. He particularly enjoyed Tuesday where he peeled potatoes with the house-elves, he didn't enjoy the task exactly but he enjoyed talking with the house-elves as he worked.

The best though was when Calderon couldn't think of anything for him to do and just had him go along with him for awhile and help out, the assistant's days were as varied as the detentions. There didn't seem to be much happening in Hogwarts that Calderon didn't know about, there was more to his job then just doing things for Varanian. If any of the Hogwarts staff had a problem or even just something that had to be done but they didn't want to do it then Calderon was the one they called to deal with it, he hadn't been exaggerating too much when he said that teachers didn't like doing things.

Some seemed alright and only called him with a genuine problem that they couldn't handle alone or to ask him to help with a particular lesson while others seemed to expect him to do everything, the Arithimancy teacher actually had Calderon grade his student's homework because he couldn't be bothered. He thought it was rather unfair that the assistant got dumped with everyone's problems when he was clearly capable of doing more, he was grading NEWT level homework without difficulty and has already saved everyone's lives on the train. Although Calderon himself seemed perfectly content. There was a noticeable difference between how some of them treated Calderon and how he treated them in turn, most seemed to respect Calderon and be on friendly terms with him and most had been given nicknames by him while others seemed to look down on him and treated him like dirt, those Calderon referred to by their last name and always got to them last.

The Arithimancy teacher in particular was bad for this, he came across as very lazy and very aloof. He didn't even refer to Calderon by his name, just as 'assistant' and demanded rather asked for anything. The first Saturday morning Scorpius was left with him, he made him do lines and referred to Scorpius as 'the assistant's assistant' or 'boy' rather than his name and spent the whole morning complaining about the price of silk robes.

That particular detention Scorpius didn't enjoy but generally it wasn't so bad, especially when he was with Calderon. Calderon seemed to know the layout of the school by heart, the shortest routes, the shortcuts, even the secret passageways and he was picking up much more of the layout himself just by walking with the man. Scorpius enjoyed their conversations too, he felt completely at ease around the assistant even if his random usages of non-verbal wandless magic and high-pitched laughter seemed to bother some people. He still had yet to see Calderon use a wand or say a spell aloud, yet he used magic quite a lot helping out or just walking along the corridor.

The day he was allowed to stop using a walking stick, Calderon literally danced down the corridor, twirling around and clapping his hands in time to music. Waves of light that looked like sheets of music played alongside him as he danced along, he was singing too but it was lost in the song, some people seemed to rather like it while others were wide-eyed. Scorpius just awkwardly walked behind him, waiting for his task and trying not to think about the tryouts happening that day. Molly had been worried about someone trying out who was better than her and taking her position, Albus had wanted to try out too, despite the fact he couldn't stay on his broom for more than five minute intervals but Varanian had refused to let him or any of them off blood rune duty.

"Merlin's bloody..." Professor Ashain muttered stepping outside of the classroom to see what the commotion was about, shaking his head and scowling, "Calderon, what on Earth are you are doing? Are you insane?"

"Quite possibly," Calderon answered with a burst of laughter as he stopped in front of the professor, or at least continued dancing on the spot to the slightly quieter light music hovering around them, "look Ticcy, no cane!"

"Yes, yes well done," the professor commented still scowling as he tried to hand the assistant a piece of paper, "can you just stop moving for two seconds? You're so hyperactive, I swear you're worse than my three year-old! There's Varanian's stupid weekly assessment."

"Sorry, Ticcy," Calderon offered as he stopped moving and clapped his hand, the music and lights died in an instant before he took the paper.

"Why do you call me Ticcy? I'm not a clock, Calderon!"

"You seem to be in a bad mood, Ticcy."

"What's there to be in a good mood about? Varanian has us trapped in the middle of nowhere."

"Hmm..." Calderon mused folding his arms thoughtfully, "can you do me a favor?"

"If I do then will you stop calling me Ticcy?" Professor Ashain wondered tiredly.

"Hmm... No. Scor here has to have a detention, would you give him something do to while I go do some stuff for Varanian? He can help you with something, he's a hard-worker."

"I don't need help with anything."

"Then just give him lines," Calderon shrugged before turning and starting to skip away, "thanks, Ticcy."

"Wait! I didn't say yes! Calder- Dammit," Professor Ashain called after the assistant before he slipped out of sight, the professor sighed heavily, "well I guess you're doing lines, Scorpius."

Scorpius nodded and followed the professor back inside the classroom, usually lines weren't his favorite detention activity but Professor Ashain was his favorite teacher so he supposed it could be worse. It was a lot better than what his allies were suffering through at least. Professor Ashain led him up the small stone steps at the front of the class, Scorpius hadn't been up there before and he saw it was a small office room. There was a small table with chairs and a few bookcases crammed with battered looking books, a few tapestries decorated the walls. There was a desk too, a stack of parchment on one side that looked like homework ready to be marked but what really drew his attention was the cluster of photographs on the desk.

They were muggle photographs. He'd got used to seeing them with Marvin, the pictures didn't move. Scorpius always hated them, he always thought the people in them looked so trapped, they couldn't move after all, they were just stuck in that one position forever. It seemed cruel. Professor Ashain's pictures all seemed to be of the same people, the professor himself in muggle clothes, a pretty slender woman with wavy straw-colored hair and sea-green eyes and two small children. Scorpius walked over and picked up the nearest one while the professor was searching for spare parchment, the eldest was a little boy with wavy dark auburn hair brushed back and the same eyes as the woman while the younger was a girl with straw-colored hair and dark eyes.

"Don't touch those, please," Professor Ashain told him as replaced the picture before handing him some parchment, a quill and some ink, "go sit at that table and write 'I must learn to obey Varanian's stupid rules' a hundred times and see how long that takes. I'm sorry, I'm not good at detentions. I never had any so I'm not quite sure what they're really supposed to entail."

"Okay," Scorpius agreed and went over to sit at the table, starting out on the lines. Professor Ashain looked at the pictures for a moment before sighing miserably and taking a seat at the desk, tackling the pile of parchments.

"Some people are just... argh!" the professor grumbled to himself, "this boy's spelled werewolf as W-E-A-R wolf. Who writes wearwolf? Its unbelievable. Who teaches these kids to spell? If I'd spelled that badly at half his age then my grandfather would have had me over his knee in an instant, wouldn't be able to sit right for a week but at least I could spell. Okay I know that's too harsh but Wearwolf, honestly and for a third year. Well I am marking you down for that Mr... oh for the love of- how can you spell your own name wrong!"

"Sounds frustrating."

"Yes it is. Think homework's tough, try marking it. You want them to do well but they go and write about wearwolves."

"That sucks," Scorpius commented awkwardly, the professor did seem to be in an unusually bad mood but his curiosity got the better of him, "Professor, if you don't mind me asking... Whose in those muggle pictures?"

"They're my family," Professor Ashain answered with an odd mixture of pride and sadness in his voice as he picked up one of the photographs, "my son Antonius Brutus, he's five now. My daughter Cassia, after my mother and she's only three... and of course my wife, Skye... I miss them, its three months today since I last saw them."

"What happened to them?" Scorpius asked, starting to wonder if they'd been murdered by Death Eaters or Shadows or had gone missing or something. He hadn't realized his spoken his last thoughts aloud until the professor's eyes widened in shock.

"No, no nothing like that! As far as I know anyway. Why would you even think that?!"

"Sorry, I just... sorry, my mind kinda jumped to the worst outcome. Go on."

"Well... about nine years ago there was a particular bad incident, as you know I was an Auror and we were trying to track down a rather vicious Death Eater named Roland Seraph, he didn't do too much of note during the war but in the years after he was good at banding together Death Eaters in hiding to fight back, he was causing quite a stir at the time. Basically we had a tip off about his whereabouts that turned out to be kinda wrong and a trap and um... I won't go into detail but a lot of Aurors died, a lot of Death Eaters too but Seraph got away and Harry and I were lucky to get away with our lives, I nearly died though. Woke up in hospital a week later, not an experience I'd like to repeat but I was awarded a commendation from the Minster himself."

"Congratulations," Scorpius offered impressed but Professor Ashain just shook his head.

"No, I didn't deserve it, those Aurors who died deserved instead. I don't want to be commended for killing Death Eaters, killing should never be commended. And you know just because Death Eaters are bad, it doesn't mean they don't have families and brothers who love them and wish they were still alive," Professor Ashain continued and Scorpius got the impression he was referring to his own brother, "I needed a break from all that for awhile, from magic too so I thought I'd try living amongst muggles for awhile. That's when I met Skye and we fell in love and everything was perfect and I was happy but I... kinda... never told her I was a wizard, she's very skeptical about things like that and I was afraid she would take it badly. I figured as long as I didn't use magic - or at least not use it around her - then it didn't matter. Somehow it completely skipped my mind that our children would almost certainly be magical."

"Yeah. Half-bloods."

"Yes. I was covering up their magic since they were babies, I knew I had to tell her at some point though, preferably before the first Hogwarts acceptance letter arrived. And then on her third birthday Cassia managed to make her cake dance, she was rather pleased by this but Skye was rather not. I had to tell her then, about being a wizard and magic and everything and I got my wand and showed her some magic to prove it... and... she seemed to be taking it better than I'd thought... Until she told me I was a freak and I was evil for turning our kids into freaks and she never wanted to see me again and I should stay away from her and them and... yeah," Professor Ashain said, he sounded devastated and looked heartbroken, pain flickering in his eyes. It made Scorpius angry, it was just more proof that muggles were bad, "I did what she wanted for awhile, thought she just needed some time but then I started trying to talk to her and finally she said that she would call if she changed her mind and until then to stay the hell away so... so now I just keep hoping that she'll call and everything will be okay again."

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Part 2: Lucius' Day

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Lucius was pacing around his study anxiously, he'd pulled every string he had left in order to get him into Hogwarts as he'd been told to do. Scorpius' broom lay on his desk, the Dart was rather simply named but was currently the fastest broom on the market as well as the most expensive, he'd decided at the very least some good could come of it as Scorpius would gain a broom and be able to try out, he may not succeed but Lucius hoped it might remind his grandson of his hopes and dreams. He'd sold his soul for the boy, he wanted him to have the best life possible. He was all set on his end. However his mysterious new... acquaintances had yet to give him the cloak he was supposed to be discarding for their test, it was almost time for him to leave and if they weren't there soon-

"Nervous, Lucius?" a voice spoke from behind him and Lucius jumped as he saw Brutus leering at him from the corner of his couch, he hadn't been there a second a go.

"You're late," Lucius snapped angrily snatching up the broom but Brutus held up his hand as he stood.

"No, I'm not. The master wishes for you to see something before you go, had to make sure it was in place for you to see first. A few minutes makes no difference to the master."

"Well it makes a difference to me!"

"And the master really doesn't give a damn about what makes a difference to you," Brutus pointed out, snatching the broom from him and tossing it aside before he offered out his palm, "take my hand, Lucius."

"I'd rather not."

"I can't show you if you don't take my hand, if I can't show you then the master won't be very happy with you and you don't want to be out of the master's favor."

Lucius sighed heavily and reluctantly took hold of Brutus' grotesque misshapen hand, he saw a flicker of a smile in the man's dark eyes before the shadows engulfed them. It didn't feel like apparating, Lucius felt like he'd been thrown off a cliff. It was as if the air had been forced from his lungs and he felt naked as wind was gliding across his skin, chilling wind that made him want to shiver. He wasn't sure if he did shiver, he couldn't see nothing for the shadowy darkness, he couldn't even breath, he just clung to Brutus' hand for dear life.

Then it was over. He staggered into Brutus gasping for breath, his knees felt weak and he wasn't entirely sure that he wasn't going to pass out. Roughly he felt himself being shoved away and he was knocked to the ground, Lucius struggled to care in that moment, just sat against the wall breathing heavily.

"Don't worry, you get use to that."

Lucius shot the grinning man a dark look, he didn't want to get used to that. Whatever that was. It was the first time Lucius realized that they were no longer in his study, it looked like a drawing room, much smaller than the one at the manor. In fact he thought it was about the same size as his study, perhaps even smaller and crammed with frilly decorations, flowers and photographs. Brutus started muttering spells and casting them at each of the four walls as Lucius managed to get to his feet and collapse onto the couch instead, his eyes wanted to close... He felt a painful slap against his cheek, blinking his eyes open as he was roughly hauled into a sitting position.

"You need to be up for this, Malfoy," Brutus growled quickly before turning away, Lucius barely had time to register footsteps before a young brunette woman appeared in the doorway.

"What the-" the woman started to say as she brought out her wand but was cut off as Brutus disarmed her with a non verbal spell and kept his wand aimed on her, her eyes widened in fear.

"Maria Snyder, is it?" Brutus questioned of the terrified woman who nodded, Brutus' grin only widened, "why don't you take a seat? Take that chair from the desk and bring it over here, chop-chop now, we don't have all day."

Maria Snyder swallowed fearfully and took the chair from under the desk by the doorway, carrying it over to them and placing it down beneath the chandelier. She opened her mouth to speak before Brutus grabbed her and forced her onto the chair, she burst into tears instead.

"Please don't hurt me," she sobbed, "I don't have a lot of money but you can take as much as you want."

"The master isn't interest in your money. In fact the master isn't interested in you at all, you see your father agreed to help us in exchange for making sure you don't go to Azkaban for jinxing that muggle. The master held up our end but your father decided to turn against us and the master really despises traitors."

"My father's dead!"

"Oh, I know. My associate killed him, he can't be with us today because he has to work at his other job unfortunately."

"Are... Are you going to kill me too?" Maria asked tearfully, her eyes were bulging with terror but Brutus only laughed.

"No I'm not but believe me, death would be preferable to this but the master wishes Lucius to see what will happen to him and to his family as well if he doesn't do as he's told... I truly am sorry for this," Brutus told her, sounding regretful as he backed away from her.

Maria looked as confused as Lucius felt before he noticed the shadows advancing on her, they seemed to vanish as they stepped through her. Abruptly her body started to shudder, like she was having a seizure. She started screaming as her body convulsed worse and worse, screaming and screaming as sparks of light and dark seemed to jump from her body. Lucius tried to look away from Brutus grabbed his head, his nails digging in painfully to Lucius' scalp and forced his head to turn and watch, it seemed to last forever but in reality was probably only a few minutes.

Finally her screaming subsided and she stopped moving, her head was thrown violently back to face staring up at the ceiling. The Specters shot out of her in all directions and from her mouth floated a strange ball of light, no bigger than a fist. Brutus let go of his head to go over to it, he took a box thing from the inside of his coat and caught the light-ball in it before replacing it in his coat.

"Is... Is that her soul?" Lucius wondered fearfully but Brutus shook his head.

"No, its not the same as a Dementor's kiss. They don't suck out the soul, they tear it to shreds, rip it in pieces to feed off of it... there's nothing left. She was a witch, the master's taught them to leave the victim's magic, raw power that the master likes collected."

"Why?"

"Only the master knows."

"You people don't ask questions? Please, Brutus, we used to be friends, we served the Dark Lord together. If I'm losing my soul then I'd at least like answers."

"Friends?" Brutus repeated before laughing heavily, "pretty sure you looked down on me, you all looked down on me for my family, for looking like this, people think it means I'm an idiot. Only the master recognized my brilliance, the master loves me and the master chose to save me especially and enlist me in this cause."

"Surprised your master would trust someone who turned on their last master."

"I never turned on Him! When the master saved me I was knocked unconscious, by the time I woke the battle was over and the Dark Lord was dead. You're the one who turned on Him, you're the traitor. The master is greater than He ever was," Brutus snarled defensively, "the Dark Lord was brilliant but also let his obsession with immortality get in the way of his progress, the master learns from His mistakes and the master will not fail like He did."

"I would like to meet your master, I'd like to meet the one who owns my soul and if I'm going to be working for someone then I would like to meet them. I have a right to speak to them in person."

"The master can hear you."

"Well then you heard me! I want to meet you and I won't do another damn thing after this unless you talk to me yourself, at least give me that," Lucius told the invisible presence, he had an odd determination to meet the one who would take his soul.

"I'm sure the master will consider it," Brutus told him blandly and waved his wand.

A length of rope appeared and wrapped itself around Maria's neck as a noose. It took Lucius a moment to realize that while she seemed to be staring sightlessly at nothing, she was still breathing. The noose rose into the air and hung her from the chandelier, Brutus kicked the chair from under her and her body dropped. Her leg twitched for awhile before her whole body went limp, she wasn't breathing then. Brutus nodded as if pleased with his work before putting away his wand and offered his hand to Lucius once more.

"Please, can't we just ap-"

Lucius was cut off as Brutus grabbed his arm instead and tugged him into the darkness, a moment later Lucius was falling to his knees in front of the couch in his study and gasping for breath once more. He didn't know how anyone was supposed to get used to that feeling. A cloak was tossed over his shoulder and he tiredly looked up at Brutus, the other man seemed completely unaffected by the transition.

"We'll be in touch," Brutus spoke as he stepped back into the shadows and vanished. Lucius sighed heavily and angrily slammed his fist against the leather couch.

"And now my hand hurts," Lucius mumbled irritably as he shook his hand and got to his shaking legs, trying not to think about the girl losing her soul to those things... he shivered, almost wishing he didn't know his fate. He didn't want to lose his soul, he didn't want that to happen to him. He wanted it to happen to his family even less though, they'd targeted the woman just for being some guy's daughter. It wasn't fair, the guy was apparently dead after all so what purpose did it have? Other than to show him what they were willing to do.

Miserably he put on the cloak and grabbed the broom, checking the time quickly and realizing that Brutus had made him late. Frustratedly he headed for the fireplace to Floo himself to the school, the headmaster had been explicit about punctuality but he supposed it couldn't be helped. He stepped out of the fireplace and tried to put it all out of his mind even though he felt weak, at least he would get to see his grandson. He smiled at that.

"What the hell are you smiling about? You're late," a man snapped at him immediately and Lucius lost his smile. He was a tall, slender man with stringy blond hair and silvery gray eyes that were glaring at him as he sat in the headmaster's chair.

"I got held up, is that a crime?" Lucius sneered, he didn't like the man's attitude and as he looked around the room he almost thought that he'd come to the wrong place. Before when he'd come to the headmaster's office there were portraits covering the walls but they were all turned away, Lucius thought it was disturbing.

"I have better things to do than wait on Death Eater scum like yourself."

"Are you the headmaster, Varanian is it?"

"Yes."

"Pippy, I-" a second man started as he came into the room, he stopped when he saw Lucius though. The man seemed to get even paler than he was already that made the half-healed wounds on his cheeks look even more livid, his dark eyes widened fearfully and never left Lucius' face as he walked over to the still glaring headmaster, dropping the piece of paper he was holding on the desk, "what's... what's he doing here?"

"You remember me saying to you about Lucius Malfoy wanting to visit his grandson for some stupid Quidditch thing," Varanian said to the dark-haired man who dressed like a filthy muggle, Lucius wrinkled his nose in disgust that they let people like that work at Hogwarts, he was probably a squib or at least a mudblood.

"I remember you saying that you'd turned him down."

"The Ministry overruled me. Isn't it obvious? They're all against us, Marius, the Ministry has been corrupted by the dark influence by the Death Eaters once more. They sent their ringleader to see what defenses we have before they launch their attack."

"I'm right here!" Lucius exclaimed angrily, the headmaster could at least wait to discuss his insane paranoia when not in his presence, although considering the people who now owned him wanted to test the school defenses on Specters he supposed that perhaps the paranoia was justified. He was beginning to regret insisting Scorpius be sent to Hogwarts, then again maybe he was better off as far away from the Specter people as possible.

"Good, you should know that we're on to you and if you attack my school then we will stop you and I will kill you."

"Glad we have that cleared up," Lucius muttered, seriously wondering about the headmaster's sanity, "so where's my grandson? I mentioned it in more than one letter that I was coming, I assumed he would be here to greet me."

"We have new regulations about the mail, Scorpius hasn't received it yet," Varanian spoke up calmly and the other man, presumably Marius, shot him a dark look, Lucius also scowled wondering what could be keeping his mail from him, "besides he's in a detention. Isn't he, Marius?"

"Doing lines as we speak," Marius muttered.

"After this is done I expect him to go back to having a detention."

"Why does he have a detention?" Lucius wondered in surprise, Scorpius wasn't a trouble-maker and he'd heard nothing of any detention in the boy's one and only letter.

"He nearly killed his class."

"How?!"

"Marius can tell you as he takes you there. You're to be escorted everywhere while you're on school grounds, you're not to be left alone at any time."

"Please Pippy, I can't. Not him."

"You will do it, or else."

"How wonderful," Lucius mumbled sarcastically. Because I don't feel enough like a prisoner with a Specter inside me, he thought bitterly as he took off the cloak and discarded it on a nearby chair, "also I'm rather hot, I'm going to leave my cloak here."

"It's minus temperature outside," Marius pointed out quietly, "if you want to watch Scor tryout then you'll be outside in the cold."

"Marius, if the Death Eater wants to be freezing then let him be freezing. Let him suffer, he deserves it," Varanian interrupted with a slight smile as he stood and headed for the door, "now I have to get back to supervising Markus and the others' detention."

"Michael!"

"Whatever his name is! I can't be expected to remember everyone's names, that's what your for!" Varanian called back from out of sight, his voice getting quieter as he his footsteps retreated into silence. Marius remained standing before the desk, unmoving. Lucius cleared his throat and the man flinched, Lucius decided he must be rather slow and even considered just leaving and see if he followed but he didn't know where Scorpius was.

"Well?" Lucius spoke up after a minute and Marius finally looked fearfully back at him, he tried to speak slowly to make sure the man understood, "you're taking me to my grandson, remember? Scorpius Malfoy. The one doing lines."

"I'm not stupid, I never was," Marius told him sounding slightly defensive but still was nervous looking, odd lights starting dancing around him and he fidgeted awkwardly with his arms, "come on then."

"What's with the lights?" Lucius wondered unnerved by it, it reminded him slightly of the light ball from the color as Marius started to lead him to the exit.

"Don't you like it? I'm doing that."

"Well done," Lucius muttered sarcastically, shaking his head at how bad Hogwarts had gotten as he followed the crazy man with the lights all around them, "can you stop that?"

"Is that better?"

As he spoke the lights changed color and became more like patterns flowing around them, ever changing and ever moving, Lucius scowled but it was slightly better. They continued walking in silence for awhile, Marius kept his head bowed miserably and didn't seem to be paying much attention to the lights or to where they were going.

"How are you doing that?" Lucius couldn't help but ask after awhile, "you're not even looking at them, you have no wand, you've said no spell."

"It's magic."

"Could you try be more specific?" Lucius snapped and Marius flinched again, the intensity of the lights increased.

"I learned to control it, the magic. I still can't stop it but I can control what it does, I can use it on demand too."

"Why not just use a wand like everyone else?" Lucius demanded irritably and Marius frowned.

"Don't you remember me?" Marius asked and Lucius' scowl deepened, he looked at the man intently. He did look vaguely familiar but Lucius couldn't place him, he shook his head and the lights all turned red, "how can you not remember me?!"

"Why should I remember you?" Lucius wondered as Marius led him into a classroom.

"Yes!" Marius snapped, his voice getting strangely high-pitched and the lights flared all around them, "you... you tortured me! I was only thirteen years old, how can you not remember that?!"

"Well I don't remember that. I don't really like remembering things from the wars anyway, I have some unpleasant memories."

"No!" Marius shrieked and snatched Lucius' walking stick from his hand, drawing the replacement wand he kept hidden inside it and aiming it for Lucius' neck, the lights became fire blazing all around them, "you don't get to say that! You tortured me! You tortured me. Do you have any idea what the Cruciatus Curse feels like?! Do you have any idea how painful it is?! Do you know what that does to a child?! You and the others made our lives hell, every second... How can you not remember?!"

"I don't know," Lucius sneered irritably, he really wasn't in the mood for it and he had no idea what the man was talking about. The wand trembled in Marius hand like he wasn't used to holding one and he looked on the verge of tears, Lucius didn't think he was in danger although he could feel the intense heat from the flames, "but I don't remember you, I guess you're that insignificant. Now just give me back my wand and calm down, it was years ago, it was nothing, get over it."

"It wasn't nothing to me! I can't forget! I can't use magic normally because of what you all did to me!"

"Well what do you expect me to do? Apologize?"

"You wouldn't mean it. I want you to remember!"

"Ah yes... that Marius, of course I remember you now so you can calm down," Lucius invented but this just seemed to infuriate Marius more, the fires blazed blue, they were so hot Lucius could feel the sweat on his brow and see it on Marius' as the man fought back tears.

"That wasn't my name. Don't lie to me," Marius whispered but lowered the wand and shoved it back into Lucius' spare hand, "watch him Ticcy."

"Bloody lunatic," Lucius muttered irritably as Marius ran off and the magic flames died, he was about to call after him that he still needed to take him to Scorpius when he noticed the boy out of the corner of his eye. He saw Scorpius and a man he didn't know but he presumed was 'Ticcy', standing at the top of the stone steps to the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher's office looking down on them.

---

Part 3: The Quidditch Tryout

---

Scorpius descended the stairs awkwardly, caught somewhere between anger and fear and outright horror that his grandfather had tortured Calderon. He knew Death Eaters had done bad things, his knew his family had done bad things but it was all vague and general. It was different knowing your grandfather had hurt someone you cared about it, it was different seeing someone so distraught over it. He had no idea why his grandfather was even there or why he was carrying a broom, was that the only way Varanian allowed people into the school? Was he there to take him home? If he was then Scorpius intended to refuse, at least until he made sure Calderon was okay and got Rose's letter about Varanian to smuggle out to her parents.

"What happened to you?" his grandfather - Lucius- asked immediately, the broom fell from his fingers as he went to reach out to the half-healed mark on Scorpius' face. Scorpius angrily jerked his head away and his grandfather's hand jerked away as if burned, he didn't want to be touched by hands that had tortured people.

"Don't touch me," Scorpius snapped, trying to get around Lucius to go after Calderon but the elder Malfoy blocked his path.

"Where are you trying to go?"

"To make sure Calderon is alright, obviously, you upset him."

"Of course, you're worried about the deranged lunatic who attacked me. Honestly Scorpius, you're supposed to be spending time with normal people to make you normal again not crazy people who attack your family," Lucius complained and Scorpius glared at him angrily, forcing himself not to blurt out that Calderon had saved his life, all of their lives.

"If Calderon was attacking you then he wouldn't need a wand, and he's not a lunatic. He's a good person, the kind of person who'd risk his life without hesitation to save others because its the right thing to do... And you have no idea what he's done for me, more than you ever have," Scorpius snarled defensively and Lucius looked taken back, "and how could you torture him? How could you torture anyone? And then you just turn around and pretend like you don't even remember, you're... you're a coward! Just a coward. A bully and a coward, that's all you are. And you know I always hated being put in Gryffindor but at least I know I'm nothing like you."

"Scorpius..." Lucius started to say but seemed to struggle for words, "you have no idea what I've done for you, what I've sacrificed for you so don't go saying things like that. Just because a silly old hat put you in Gryffindor, it doesn't mean you stopped being a Malfoy. And maybe you're more like me then you think, you're far from a saint now. I'm sure you've done things that aren't so good too, things you regret possibly or at least know aren't good and I'm sure you'll do more before you get to my age, its part of life. I have enough things I regret without adding torturing people I don't remember to the list, I wasn't pretending."

"How can you not remember torturing someone?" Scorpius wondered bitterly, he may not know what it was like to be tortured magically but he'd at least suffered at the muggle's hands and he could never forget that.

"I don't know, did you ever consider that maybe he got me confused with someone else? Torture is very mental damaging."

"He seemed pretty sure to me, you know he was really happy before you showed up. Why are you here anyway? If you're here to take me home then I don't want to go, why are you taking me instead of my parents anyway? Wait, they are okay right?"

"They're fine and I'm not here to take you home!" Lucius exclaimed and Scorpius did feel mildly relieved, he liked having things to do at Hogwarts despite Varanian, "I'm here to do you a good deed, to help you. I brought you this broom, the Dart, fastest broom on the market."

"But first years aren't allowed brooms and I don't understand how that helps me anyway," Scorpius pointed out in confusion and Lucius took a deep breath before continuing.

"You make it extremely difficult to do a good deed for sometimes, you know? It's so you can tryout for Quidditch, I explained it in the letters that you apparently haven't got yet. You've been taking about being a Seeker since you were so young, its your dream and you have to start somewhere."

"I don't really care about that anymore. Didn't you always say that it was a stupid dream and being a Quidditch player isn't a very good career choice anyway?"

"So I can't have a change of heart? It was your dream and... and you shouldn't give up on that, not because of some filthy muggle scum. It made you happy and... and I do want you to be happy, no matter what you think of me," Lucius told him awkwardly and Scorpius was stunned, he found him torturing Calderon easier to believe than that. He wasn't quite sure what to say, he just stood there in the increasingly more uncomfortably silence as he was stared at expectantly, "aren't you going to say something?"

"I... I don't know what to say."

"You could say thank you or we could just go to these tryouts before you miss out."

At this Lucius picked up the broom and handed it to him, Scorpius still didn't really want to be part of such a stupid game, even though he loved flying but then again it would be rude to just turn round and refuse to do it. It was still suspiciously nice of his grandfather, Scorpius couldn't help but wonder if he had an ulterior motive, that was definitely easier to believe. Lucius started leading him away and Professor Ashain was on their heel, Scorpius had almost completely forgotten about him.

"You don't have to come with us," Lucius sneered at the professor. Scorpius managed not to sigh, was his grandfather really incapable of being nice to anyone for more than five seconds?

"Calderon said to watch you," Professor Ashain pointed out blandly with a hint of disdain in his eyes as he looked at Lucius, "so I'm going to watch you."

"Why? Its not like the headmaster insisted I be escorted everywhere."

"Really? That sounds exactly like Varanian," the professor stated as they kept walking and Lucius looked like he regretted saying that.

"What kind of name is Ticcy anyway?"

"My name isn't Ticcy, Calderon just calls me that because... well I don't know."

"Because he's insane?"

"You don't get to say that about him," Professor Ashain snapped almost defensively.

Lucius seemed to roll his eyes at this and turned his attention back to Scorpius, quizzing him about almost killing his class and his studies in general, also about his cheek that he vaguely brushed off as bullies and made a point of saying Calderon was the one who'd helped him, it was a half truth. Scorpius patiently told him about the accident in Charms as they moved outside into the cold, it was freezing outside under the ominous overcast sky, Lucius seemed oddly proud of his power more than concerned that he'd injured people. He moved onto quizzing him on his subjects and seemed pleased with Scorpius' progress with spells, although thought he should think more of potions.

In a way Scorpius was glad of the distraction because as they reached the Quidditch pitch his stomach decided to churn anxiously, a bunch of students were gathered listening to some boy giving a speech about his hopes as newly appointed Quidditch Captain and to not to take his decisions personally, they would be based off skill alone. He recognized the crowd vaguely as Gryffindors that he'd seen around, Molly and James were the only ones he really knew by name. They all stopped to look at him as he approached, he stomach practically did a somersault at that and he swallowed nervously.

"Oh good, they don't seem to have started yet," Lucius offered in a tone resembling cheerfulness, "go for it, good luck."

Lucius seemed content to clap him on the back at this and head towards the stands, Scorpius supposed it was good that he'd be in the air soon because his legs felt like lead and his feet lumps of ice that didn't want to move towards the sea of eyes.

"Relax, Scorpius," Professor Ashain told him comfortingly and Scorpius almost jumped, he'd expected him to follow Lucius but then Lucius was still in sight.

"First years never make the teams, this is pointless. I'm just going to fail and everyone's going to mock me for it," Scorpius blurted out worriedly, lowering his gaze.

"Don't worry about it, don't think about trying out, don't think about succeeding or failing. You've mentioned you love flying more than once, just have fun like you do in the lessons. Forget everything else, as long as you enjoy yourself than it doesn't really matter if you fail because you still got something out of it."

"Thanks," Scorpius muttered and exchanged nervous smiles with the professor before he went after Lucius. Scorpius took a deep breath, that did make him feel better and at least if he failed then he could check on Calderon faster, before carrying on towards the others, "I'm here to try out."

"Alright, next time try to be on time, Malfoy," the lanky Quidditch Captain who'd been given the speech told him, he had a mop of dark stringy hair that covered his eyes and Scorpius was half surprised that he could see through it.

"Next time don't come at all," James jeered at him, "you're just going to fail, regardless of what fancy broom your Death Eater grand-daddy got you."

"Hey," the Captain growled, "enough with the attitude, its bad sportsmanship to mock the other players and we're Gryffindors, we do not lower ourselves to those standards regardless of who the other person is. We're not bad sportspeople and we're not cheats. Is that clear?"

"Yes," James said sulkily but the Captain seemed content with it.

"Okay, Malfoy, you didn't miss too much. I'm Cole Stampson, I'm sixth year and the new Quidditch Captain," Cole informed him before turning back to address the crowd, "as I was saying, there's a lot of openings this year. Some of our best players just graduated and Victoire has opted to drop out as our star Beater to concentrate on her exams, so plenty of room for the rest of us to prove ourselves, eh? I know some of you were told that certain positions would be yours this year but I intend to do this fairly, I'm judging you on what you do today so try your best everyone, you can always try out next year and I'll be picking plenty of reserves. Now, I want everyone to get in the air and do laps to see how you can fly."

"I wish you'd told me that you were going to try out," Molly commented to him as they all mounted their brooms.

"I didn't know, grandfather kinda sprung this on me."

"Which position are you going for?"

"Seeker," Scorpius answered nervously as they rose into the air.

"In your dreams, Malfoy!" James hissed at him, howling with laughed as he zoomed between the two of them and took off.

"My cousin can be a real ass sometimes, just ignore him," a boy said and Scorpius was surprised to see a stocky dark-skinned boy was the speaker, he had a shock of red dreadlocks though and his smile was kind, "best of luck to you."

"Thanks, you too," Scorpius offered.

"Don't need luck, I got skill," the boy told him as he winked, "they don't call me Fast Freddie Weasley for nothing but thanks anyway."

"No one calls you that but you," Molly pointed out but Freddie only laughed and sped off.

Scorpius smiled slightly as he joined the laps with the others, he held back a bit at first as he was used to the broom vibrating if he went too fast or too high and he wasn't used to the Dart. After awhile, Cole announced he wanted to see how they did at dodging and released the Bludgers and he couldn't hold back then. He was darting and weaving his way through the sky to dodge the speeding black balls, the air seemed to be in chaos and a few people dropped out. Some just went to land on the ground, they in particular looked terrified while a few others got hit by Bludgers and while some rejoined the fliers, others just stayed down.

Scorpius wasn't paying them too much mind, he was too busy flying but he was enjoying himself, it was more challenging than either of the classes had been and he got kind of a thrilling rush from dodging the speeding balls. The Dart was impressive, its handling was so perfect that Scorpius almost felt the broom was a part of him, he could move more fluidly than he had with the school brooms. And the speed! He could go faster than he'd ever gone on a school broom and still the broom felt itching to do more, the cold was forgotten as he glided through the air.

He was disappointed when Cole called them all to a halt, looking around Scorpius saw that he was the youngest left still in the air and that Molly, Freddie and James were all still there. He was glad for Molly and Freddie but a small part of him had hoped that James would've dropped out, anything to wipe that smug smile of his face or at least so that he couldn't taunt Scorpius about his flying. Cole had them land once more and asked each to say what position they wanted, the majority seemed to want Chaser, which Scorpius supposed was because their were more of those positions open and more Chaser positions on a team anyway.

Cole seemed to start with the Chasers for this reason, he had them practice passing to each other first as well as to the non-Chasers just to give them more variety of people to practice with. Scorpius was really glad he wasn't trying to be a chaser, he may not be a bad flier but he found the chunky Quaffle awkward to handle while on his broom, he wasn't too bad at throwing it to the others but catching it was more difficult, especially when Cole had them do so in motion. Next they had to try score it through the hoops, Scorpius was thankful that he didn't have to do that and could just take a short breather and watch them from the sky, Cole forbade them from landing again to test their stamina apparently.

Cole left them to do that for awhile, while he moved onto the Beaters and had them practice with the club as he made the Bludgers go after them. He also had the other non-Chasers do so for reasons that were lost on Scorpius, he really didn't enjoy that part very much. The Bludgers were heavier than he'd thought and swinging the bat to hit them required more force than he'd thought, the first time the bat was knocked from his hand and James, along with a few others screeched with laughter, made even worse by the fact that James had an impressive swing although Freddie - who was going for Beater - was easily the best out of all them, even than the older boys who tried out. The other times Scorpius did manage to hit the Bludgers harder but the force left his poor arm feeling like it had been ripped out of the socket.

Next up was the Keepers, Cole annoyingly seemed to be doing the Seekers last. Cole had the people trying out as Keeper take it in turns to guard the rings from the Chasers who were practicing scoring still, half trying one end and half trying the other and also had the non-Chasers and non-Keepers try score as well. Scorpius had been worried about Molly until he saw her play, for quite a petite girl she could certainly hold her own in the air. There was no competition at all for Keeper, Molly was that good, her reflexes seemed to make up for her size and even the Chasers who'd been doing well struggled to score against her. In fact none of them scored against her.

Scorpius thought Cole was finally going to move on to testing the Seekers but instead he announced that they would be doing a practice match, not quite a practice match as there would be no Seekers and an excess number of players. There were three trying out for Keeper, he had two defend one goal and appointed him to be Molly's second Keeper. The Chasers he divided in half and had the third person trying out for Seeker go with them to make up them an even number, while he used James to make up the numbers for the Beaters before having them practice. Molly just told him the smallest ring and she'd take care of the other two, Scorpius nodded obediently and did his best.

The sky was a flurry of activity as the swarm of Chasers and Beaters, the extra people seemed to just make it all the more chaotic and Scorpius kept forgetting which ones were on his side as he just tried to defend his goal, he had no idea what the score was either but he thought his side were winning. He made a better Keeper than he had a Chaser or Beater, it wasn't too difficult just the one ring although he didn't find it very enjoyable having the Quaffle shot at him constantly, he felt rather battered and breathless by the time Cole called them to a halt but at least he was trying. He told them that the game would continue but he was releasing the snitch and the three Seekers had no teams, they just had to catch it. He picked two of the Chasers to take over Scorpius and James' positions and announced he'd be making the numbers with the Chasers - Chaser being Cole's position in the game - after he released the Snitch. This was it.

He watched the winged golden ball fly away and tried not to panic, Cole told them to wait until he told them to go after it, to give it a chance to get away. The trio just hovered in the center of the chaos, James looked as smug as ever and the third person was an older girl who just looked exhausted.

"You're going to fail Malfoy," James sneered still smirking, "you suck at pretty much everything else, you're an idiot to even try out. I've got this, its in my blood while nothing but failure, foolishness and evil runs in your blood. I'm glad you're grandfather's here to see you fail, your family should know how much of a failure you are."

"I don't care that I'll fail, I've had fun," Scorpius told him with a genuine smile, he was in the air and James' insults couldn't touch him, he'd tried his best and thrown himself into everything, his broom was amazing to fly and... and he was okay. He was worried about Calderon still, his limbs were tired and his body was battered but he was okay. He felt like a weight was lifted off his shoulders and he sat up straight, James just looked bewildered before Cole yelled for them that they could go.

The three of them shot off in different directions immediately, Scorpius just flew higher into the air, so high he could see the whole game and just hovered above the makeshift match while the other two darted around searching. He looked beyond the players, the Bludgers, the chaos and the Quaffle, zoned out the noise of it, after all he was pretty sure they'd been out there for hours and his mind had become accustomed to it. He let it all fade out, none of that was what he was looking for. He was looking the the Snitch, the Golden Snitch. He was looking for something small, a small flash of gold. He scanned it all, wondering if maybe he should be closer the way that the other two were-

And then he saw it. Just a glint, like the shine of a coin when the sun touched it but somehow he knew it was what he was looking for, gold flashes didn't move after all. He ushered his broom into action and dived for it, noticing out of the corner of his eye that James had noticed it too or possibly had just noticed him going for it. Either way, he sensed rather than saw the boy speeding towards him but he was faster, he was better. He reached out his hand, forcing his broom to go faster than it had been before, it sang at his touch and as he got closer the flash become a golden ball. He snatched it out of the air and pulled the broom back up as James hurtled past in the space where the Snitch had just been, Scorpius couldn't believe it. He clutched the tiny ball ever tighter in his hand as if to reassure himself that it was indeed there, drifting lazily on his broom as he gazed at it. He had caught the Snitch.

"Everyone stop! The Snitch has been caught!" Cole called and activity skirting on the edges of his vision stopped as they all started landing on the ground, Scorpius still didn't tear his eyes from the ball as its little wings stopped fluttering. He landed one handed, barely even noticing as his shaking legs touched solid ground once more and rain started pouring from the sky, "Malfoy caught the Snitch."

"HE CHEATED!" James' voice screeched abruptly and Scorpius flickered his gaze to the angry Gryffindor stalking over to him, "he cheated! He can't be the Seeker! He's just a first year! And a Malfoy! I'm supposed to be the Seeker! He cheated! He cheated!"

"How exactly did he cheat?"

"His... His broom! Its a faster model than mine! I would have caught it if not for him cheating with that broom, he's a cheater. I demand we do it again."

"Blaming brooms, really?" one of the crowd muttered but James looked beside himself.

"But its true!"

"Well a rematch won't even help if he has the same broom."

"Give us school brooms," Scorpius offered, he really didn't like being accused of cheating, "then we're on even ground."

"It's raining," James snapped as the rain pelted down, "he's a first year and a cheater, just disqualify him."

"I'll give you one chance, Potter but only one," Cole commented and James glowered with fury, "someone grab some school brooms, only you don't be catching the snitch. I'll fly up and throw a Sickle into this weather, whoever catches it before it reaches the ground gets to be the new Seeker."

---

Part 4: Pride and Prejudice

---

The rain was really pouring heavily, it was difficult to see through it even on the ground, Scorpius heard the crackling of thunder from the darkening sky and a few people looked nervous. By the time Scorpius was handed one of the school brooms his skin was soaked through, he was too numb to feel the cold though. He didn't like giving up the Snitch though, the last lingering longing for his childish dream didn't want him to and Molly almost seemed to pry it out of his numb fingers. After she did, he felt oddly detached and depressed.

"I'm out," the girl would-be Seeker announced shaking her head as when Freddie tried to hand her a broom, "this is stupid, Malfoy already won."

"He only won because he cheated," James sneered angrily, "you're going to lose now, Malfoy, everyone will see you for the worthless cheat you are."

"Be civil," Cole snapped and got out one Silver-Sickle, "both of you go to opposing ends of the field before the rings and wait there on your brooms, hover just before the tallest ring and don't move until I throw it."

Scorpius just nodded and started his walk to the opposite end of the pitch to James, it took him a moment to realize that some of the others were walking with him and muttering their support while the rest went after James or headed towards to the stands. He was surprised by this, Gryffindor hadn't exactly given him a warm welcome after all but apparently their desire to have the best Seeker possible to win and James' bogus claims on brooms outweighed his parentage. At least to the ones who followed him. Despite James being her cousin, Molly never left his side until he was mounting his broom and then they all backed off out of his way.

He hovered there easily, gazing across as the distant figure of James opposite him through the haze of rain. He gripped his broom tighter, a part of him was worried but another part of his mind wasn't the slightest bit interested. He'd already proved himself after all, he'd already caught Snitch, already done it and James' claims that the broom made a difference was ridiculous and desperate, if they were any other two students then he had a feeling that Cole wouldn't be doing this at all.

He turned his attention back to Cole, the Captain was in the air half way between the two of them but over by the stands. The sky growled in disapproval and lightening cracked the sky as Cole's arm whipped back and the Sickle was flung into the storm, it almost seemed to be in slow-motion as the arm moved and the palm opened, barely visible through the furious rain.

Scorpius was moving before he realized it, not taking his eyes away from flicker of silver between the rain drops as it arched beautifully and started to descend. The broom vibrated in protest but he didn't care as he sped towards it, he didn't even blink in case he lost sight of it as it fell. It was almost on the ground by the time he reached but he plucked it from the air easily, he practically stumbled off his broom as he was so close to the Earth and a few moments later James was landing beside him.

"You cheated, I know you cheated!" James shrieked at him, "I wasn't ready, its raining too hard, that wasn't fair! We have to do it again."

"We both know that I didn't cheat," Scorpius said plainly, he wasn't worried anymore. James hadn't had a clue where the coin was until Scorpius caught it, he knew he was better than James at this, James may be good on a broom but Scorpius was too and more observant, "insult me all you want, use all the excuses you want but we could this all day and I'll beat you every single time."

"You... but... I," James stammered and Scorpius saw tears in the older boy's brown eyes, "do you know long I waited for this day? The day I would become a Seeker like my parents, do you know how badly I've wanted to do that? I've wanted that for as far back as I can remember, its my dream. Do you have any idea what that's like?"

"I have an idea."

"Well I hope you're happy, Malfoy, because you just destroyed my dream."

James' voice caught as he spoke, the tears becoming lost in the rain and Scorpius looked down at the silver coin in his palm, the scar on his wrist was just visible from under his sleeve. He didn't feel happy, he felt numb. He tried to imagine how he would have felt if he'd never been abducted, it was surprisingly easier to imagine himself like he'd been before, when he'd been 'normal' like his family wished he was again. That person would be happy, that person would be smiling and delighted that he was one step closer to his dream. But he wasn't that person anymore, he had been abducted and Marvin had already destroyed his dreams.

"Take it," Scorpius whispered, offering out his hand with the coin for James who blinked in shock, "be the Seeker if you want, if its your dream because its not mine anymore. It's enough knowing that I could have been a Seeker, that in another life I could've been good."

"What? You think you can offer me a stupid coin and I'll suddenly like you?"

"No, I hate you and I don't give a damn what you think about me. But I'm not cruel, you can have it if it means that much to you, if you want it then take it."

It was only after he spoke that Scorpius noticed the crowd that had assembled around them, everyone who'd tried out was gathered around along with the people who'd been watching from the stands. Some people started calling out in protest about him letting James 'guilt' him into giving up while others urged James to take it because clearly Scorpius couldn't hack it. James just stared at the coin, his hand twitched and for a moment Scorpius thought that he would take it. He didn't though. His expression hardened and he angrily knocked Scorpius' hand away, pushing him back as he did so with enough force to knock Scorpius to the muddy ground.

"Take your Snitch and go to hell, I hate you," James spat before storming away.

"Eugh, how rude," Lucius' voice complained as Professor Ashain helped him to his feet, "then again, what do you expect from a blood-traitor? Pathetic excuse for a wizard if you ask me."

"We don't call people that in school," Professor Ashain pointed out tiredly.

"Are you done here?" Lucius asked, turning abruptly on Cole who stammered awkwardly in reply.

"Err... Basically yeah bu-"

"Excellent, we can get inside out of this rain and cold. Come, Scorpius and You, grab his broom."

"I'm not-"

The professor's protest was cut off as Lucius was walking away briskly and taking Scorpius with him, he tried to awkwardly wave his bye to the other players as he was hurriedly led away. He had wanted to stay and hear who'd made the team but apparently his grandfather didn't care who else made the team, or possibly just wanted to get out of the bad weather. Lucius didn't let go of him until they were back inside the castle, Professor Ashain on their heel again as he carried the Dart broom.

"Well done, Scorpius," Lucius congratulated him sounding genuinely proud, "first years almost never make the teams but I'm not surprised that you did. You were easily the best player there, Gryffindor really doesn't have a lot of talent."

"I thought some of them were good," Scorpius offered awkwardly, he may not like Gryffindors very much but that didn't mean all of the players were terrible. Lucius seemed to just decide to ignore that.

"Shame about the weather though, freezing and wet are not the most pleasant conditions."

"Shame you upset Calderon, he can like... suck the water off you," Professor Ashain commented and motioned with his hand, presumably the way Calderon did it and Scorpius was reminded of his worry over the assistant, "just like that."

"Why can't you do that?"

"I don't know how he does it, he just always is doing stuff."

"Figures, you're just useless," Lucius announced and started walking again with Scorpius by his side, Professor Ashain remained back behind them, carrying the broom and muttering under his breath.

"He's not useless," Scorpius said defensively, "he's a good person and he's my favorite teacher."

"Merlin's... Scorpius, we really need to have a talk about the kind of people that you're supposed to be around," Lucius informed him and glanced back at the professor before lowering his voice, "he's a disgrace, his father had him and his brother by two different women while still in Hogwarts! His mother was a blood-traitor, she was killed for trying to save mudbloods from Death Eaters. He's a former Auror himself, he caused an explosion that killed no less than seven Death Eaters and won an award for that, would you believe? Some of those were friends of mine. And then there's his brother... Brutus was a Death Eater before and now... I don't know if Ashain is involved or it just happened without him knowing but you can't trust him."

"What?" Scorpius wondered with a scowl, he'd been following for awhile but his grandfather had lost him at the end. Lucius just shook his head and looked oddly worried.

"It doesn't matter... but just trust me, try stay away from him or at least not be so friendly to him."

Scorpius rolled his eyes irritably, he liked Professor Ashain and the man had been put on probation just for defending him with Varanian. If he there was anyone he shouldn't trust then it was his grandfather, Lucius had tortured Calderon after all and he really hoped that it wouldn't ruin his relationship with the assistant, although he couldn't blame Calderon if it did. His grandfather talked a bit as they walked, telling him about what happened in his absence, which happened to be not much. They came to a halt at the gargoyle that guarded the entrance to Varanian's office, Lucius' eyes widened slightly.

"Ah, it appears I don't know the password. If you would give it to the statue, Ashain."

"I don't know it," Professor Ashain pointed out and Lucius shot him a dark look.

"Ethel," Scorpius spoke and the gargoyle obediently moved aside, both men looked at him in surprise, "he took me here after the Charms incident. It was his wife's name."

"He has a wife?" Professor Ashain exclaimed as they started to go up, "that poor woman."

"She's dead."

"Oh."

"Death Eater's killed his family."

"That might explain his behavior a bit."

"Did you kill her?" Scorpius asked of his grandfather, Lucius' eyes bulged in shock.

"Of course I didn't!"

"Would you even remember it if you did?"

"Yes!" Lucius burst out while Professor Ashain started looking around the office in amazement, "what kind of person do you think I am?!"

"Not a good one, you tortured Calderon."

"Would you just get over that?!"

"Some things you don't just get over, they change you forever," Scorpius said quietly as he thought of the muggles again, "how could you do that to someone? How can you not feel bad?"

"I did what I was told, I did what was necessary and it doesn't mean I enjoyed everything I had to do. I still don't remember what that man was talking about but I'm sure I had a good reason, assuming he isn't mistaken."

"You could just say 'I'm sorry' like a decent person would," Scorpius pointed out looking away from Lucius but he heard the man sigh.

"I'm sorry. Are you happy now?"

"You need to apologize to him not me."

"Scorpius please, you literally wouldn't believe how bad my day was before I came here so could you try to cut me some slack," Lucius told him as Scorpius looked back to him, Lucius looked unusually anxious, "I know that you're not particularly happy with me right now but... I... There's some things going on right now that you wouldn't understand and I don't know... You never know when the end is near... Life's too short."

"What are you talking about?" Scorpius wondered and saw a strangely vulnerable expression on his grandfather's face.

"I know we don't have the best relationship and maybe that's partially my fault, we don't always see eye to eye about things because I wish you would believe the right things that I believe but I know I'm not perfect and perhaps its good you're smart enough to form your own opinions on things... maybe in time you'll just realize that I'm right because, I just want what's best for you," Lucius continued awkwardly and unusually emotionally, "but you know I always admired your strength, you're a strong person and not even those bastard muggles could take that away from you, Scorpius."

"Is something wrong?"

"I just... I don't know how long I have left, I'm... I'm getting older after all and I just... I want you to know... I want you to know that... I love you," Lucius said and his voice broke on the last as he pulled Scorpius into a hug, "I love you so much, and don't you dare doubt that, no matter what else you think of me. My family is more important to me than anything, no matter what happens and you, Draco and Narcissa mean everything to me. You're the best things in my life and I'd do anything for you and... and I just want you to remember that, no matter happens, I love you."

Scorpius wasn't sure what to say, if he didn't know any better then he'd say his grandfather sounded like he was on the verge of tears. He was tempted to say that he loved him too but he was still angry at him for torturing Calderon, Lucius had never said any of that to him before though so it seemed rude to turn round and say that to him. He decided to just stand there silently, let his grandfather hug him and stroke his hair like he was doing. Scorpius was slightly worried about what was prompting Lucius' behavior, was he going senile? Was there something wrong? Did he know something that Scorpius didn't? Was Lucius dying? Was he dying?

"Aren't you going to say something?"

"I don't know what to say," Scorpius pointed out as his grandfather pulled away, his composure regained.

"You could say goodbye," Lucius offered before turning to Professor Ashain who was standing awkwardly as far away from them as he could while still being in the room, "make yourself useful and pass me my cloak."

"You mean this cloak?" Professor Ashain started to say as moved closer and he reached for a cloak that had been tossed aside but paused to shudder violently before his fingers touched it, he frowned slightly before handing to Lucius' awaiting hand, "why didn't you wear it if you knew you would be sitting outside in the stands in the cold?"

"Because I didn't want to, okay?" Lucius growled snatching it from him as he moved over to the fireplace, "there's barely enough Floo powder here for me to get home."

"At least you can go home."

"What was that?"

"Varanian's very strict on the usage of Floo powder at the moment, be glad you have any."

"Alright. Goodbye, Scorpius, I'm sure you'll do great."

"Bye," Scorpius said as his grandfather departed, he heard Professor Ashain sigh with relief, "I'm sorry if he offended you or was being mean to you."

"Well yeah he kinda did but it's okay, its not like my day could really get any worse. I miss my family. And its not your fault or anything, your grandfather gives me the creeps like Varanian does anyway," the professor sighed again and started heading towards him, "come on, I don't think Varanian would like us hanging out in his creepy office."

"What's creepy about it?" Varanian asked and the both of them nearly jumped out of their skin in shock as the headmaster came into the room, his hair currently black and his expression angry.

"The pictures. All facing the wall. When Dumbledore had this office they were all... you know facing outwards like pictures are and there was a shelf with the Sorting Hat."

"Well I'm not Dumbledore, am I?"

"No, you most definitely are not."

"Was that an insult?"

"No, not at all. We'll just... go now."

"Why are you in my office anyway?" Varanian demanded and stepped in front of them as Scorpius tried to folllow the professor to the door, the last thing he wanted was for either of them to be in even more trouble with the headmaster. He also mentally kicked himself for letting Lucius leave without the letter Rose had wrote to her parents to inform them about Varanian's torture.

"Seeing my grandfather off," Scorpius answered and the silvery eyes shifted to him disapprovingly.

"I figured but why? And where is Marius? I told him not to let that Death Eater out of his sight."

"There was an emergency," Professor Ashain invented before Scorpius could tell the same lie, he didn't want Calderon to be in trouble either and Varanian looked even less pleased than usual, "so he went off to deal with it and told me to watch Malfoy instead."

"You're lying," Varanian snarled as his hair turned crimson, "he just got upset about what the Death Eater did to him and ran off like a coward."

"Hey!" Scorpius snapped defensively, "he's not a coward, my grandfather tortured him and he had every right to be upset."

"Ah so again you just confirmed my suspicions," Varanian pointed out and Scorpius mentally kicked himself again.

"So what if it does?" Professor Ashain spoke up sound angry, "you're the one at fault. Being tortured is a hard enough thing to go through as an adult, let alone as a child and you seem perfectly aware that Calderon went through that and you deliberately made him face his tormentor when he clearly wasn't ready. What kind of person does that? That's practically torture itself, you're no better than the Death Eaters."

A flicker of fury crossed Varanian's eyes as he drew his wand, Scorpius was sure he would have used it if Professor Ashain hadn't been so quick to draw his own wand with impressive reflexes. Varanian seemed to notice this too, he seemed to debate for a moment whether it was worth attacking his Ex-Auror employee, Professor Ashain looked incredibly nervous but his wand arm didn't waver. Varanian visibly seemed to force himself to reign in his temper and slowly, ever so slowly, he lowered his wand and the professor reluctantly did the same.

"Get the hell out of my office, both of you," Varanian snapped and neither of them needed telling twice.

---

Part 5: Branded

---

Lucius arrived back home and sighed heavily, suddenly feeling very cold and alone. Draco and Astoria had gone to have lunch with Astoria's sister but they were always there for longer, Narcissa had gone to Diagon Alley to find some gift for Scorpius as she thought he could use some present to cheer him up when he didn't make the team but when she went shopping she was always gone for longer and always came back with more than she'd gone out for. It did seem slightly pointless considering Scorpius had actually got the position although she would probably just turn it into a congratulation package.

Lucius had been rather impressed by his grandson's flying and couldn't help but feel more than a little proud that Scorpius had not only got Seeker but had beaten the Potter boy to do it. Although he didn't think much of the Gryffindor Captain for indulging Potter's claims of Scorpius cheating, blaming the broom was the most ridiculous childish excuse for failure that there was and everyone knew that. He wished that Scorpius hadn't been mad at him though, trust a crazy person he honestly didn't remember to turn Scorpius against him.

He was concerned about his grandson though, he'd brushed off Draco's concerns about the possibility of people giving Scorpius a hard time but he had had the mark on his cheek. Being in Hogwarts for only seventeen days and already being physically injured didn't say much for the school, he was glad that Scorpius was doing well in his subjects and was clearly a powerful wizard but not being miserable was important too. He hadn't mentioned any friends to him either, which meant that either he had made friends with the wrong sort of people or that he hadn't made any friends at all. As he walked to his study he couldn't decide which was worse. Scorpius' defense of Ashain worried him too, he had no way of knowing whether Ashain was involved with 'the master' like his supposedly dead brother or not but the last thing he wanted was Scorpius mixed up with those people too.

"I see you're back," Brutus said and Lucius jumped as he entered his study, seeing Brutus sitting in his chair at his desk and casually and casually drinking his Superior Red wine.

"Well help yourself, why don't you," Lucius snapped irritably but Brutus only grinned and downed the last of his glass, immediately wiping his crooked mouth with his sleeve and refilling it.

"Well I had to do something while I was waiting for you to come back," Brutus pointed out as he shoved the glass towards Lucius, "have some, you'll need it."

"Can't help that the tryout took so long and why are you waiting anyway? Aren't I done for the day? Did it work?" Lucius questioned as he walked over to his own desk, "and how long do I have anyway? I want to know how long before you take my soul."

"One question at a time, Lucius, you're not quite done for the day and I have to take the cloak back anyway. The Specter was banished so no, it didn't work but the master still thought your visit was quite enlightening. And as to how long you have left... it really depends on how useful you prove to be to the master. So there, now drink your poison."

"Drink my poison," Lucius muttered as he sighed and hesitantly picked up the glass, Brutus instead took a swig from the bottle, "eugh, didn't your mother teach you manners?"

"Never met the bitch, took one look at me and dumped me on my dad," Brutus growled before he grabbed a small bubbling cauldron that he apparently had had on the floor behind the desk and placing it on top, "seriously, drink up. I have a high tolerance for pain so believe me when I say that this hurts like hell."

"What... What do you intend to do to me?" Lucius wondered worriedly as Brutus stood up and walked around the desk to him, rolling up his sleeve as he did so.

"This," Brutus said simply and showed him the inside of his forearm, where his Dark Mark had used to be. Only there was new mark there now, a skeletal snake twisted across the thick arm with the head in the center, sticking out its forked tongue. It didn't look like a tattoo either, it looked like a brand, like it had been burned into the skin. Lucius blinked in shock, he was sure the forked tongue had just flickered at him, "the master dislikes those of us with Dark Mark scars to have them, the master fashioned a new symbol for us to bear in its place, the symbol for the master's organization, the symbol for the Soul Eaters."

"Very creative name," Lucius commented sarcastically and Brutus growled in disapproval as he pulled his sleeve back down.

"The master thinks so, the Specters do sort of eat souls after all and the Dark Lord took lives not souls. Besides, the Ministry is currently calling us the Shadows which is also a rather apt choice, the master is ever so fond of the title of Shadow Master. One day the world will know our true name and tremble in fear at the mere mention of us, the way they do when someone so much as whispers the name Voldemort," Brutus told him and Lucius couldn't resist shivering at hearing the name of his former master, he regretted it as it seemed to prove Brutus' point who grinned, "so drink up. Or don't if you want to suffer more or refuse and the Specter will destroy you."

"But I'm not one of you! I don't even want to be one of you! You're just making me do stuff because I gave up my soul. I just wanted my grandson to live and would like to hold onto my soul for as long as possible, it doesn't mean I want to be a... Soul Eater as you say you call yourselves."

"The master wishes you branded, regardless of your willingness."

"Fine," Lucius muttered and eyed the liquid before starting to drink it while Brutus folded his arms and waited, Lucius drank as quickly as he dared drink fine wine. He just wanted it over and done with, to get out of his damp clothes and not have to look at Brutus' ugly face for another second, "done."

"Good," Brutus grunted and motioned for him to sit on the couch, Lucius reluctantly did so and rolled up his sleeve as Brutus took out his wand, "you ready?"

"Just do it," Lucius snapped as he wondered what the potion was for if Brutus was going to use his wand.

Brutus roughly grabbed Lucius' wrist in a vice-like grip with his non-wand hand and aimed his wand at the scarred forearm with his other, Brutus seemed to hesitate slightly before muttering a spell. Immediately a crimson light burst from his wand and into Lucius' arm.

He hadn't been kidding about the pain. He felt like his arm was on fire and tried to pull it away but Brutus held him tight, keeping his wand over Lucius' arm and moving it as if tracing a pattern, with every movement Lucius was hit by another wave of pain. He bit his tongue to stop himself from screaming, he promised himself that he wasn't going to give any of the satisfaction of hearing him scream.

Abruptly Brutus let go but the pain only intensified, he felt like like someone had plunged a knife into his arm, a red hot knife that tore through the flesh. And the smell was sickening. It was the smell of burning flesh, he realized, he could smell his own skin burning. Lucius broke his promise and screamed. He screamed, closing his eyes against the pain and clutched at the arm with his other hand, it didn't diminish the pain. Not even slightly. He screamed again.

"This'll help," Brutus said and a second later he felt some damp fabric pressed against his arm, Lucius was about to scream that he was useless when he realized that it was helping.

Lucius opened his eyes and saw Brutus kneeling to run the cloth gently up and down his forearm, the cauldron had been brought over beside him and Brutus paused only to dip it in to the potion that Lucius assumed was what was helping before continuing. The pain was diminished but still there, his arm felt numbed though and the pain dulled the more Brutus carried on. After a few minutes he stopped and Lucius got a look at his arm for the first time, it looked almost identical to Brutus' except his was more livid and the skin around it looked dark like shadow.

"Why is my arm...?"

"The Specter is drawn to your pain, they're born from suffering," Brutus told him and Lucius reached a new level of horrified, he couldn't take his eyes from the shadow around the brand, "it'll go back to being dormant when the pain recedes enough for it to lose interest."

"Oh great, well how do I explain this to my wife? Did you or your brilliant master think of that?"

"Obviously," Brutus grunted, dipping the cloth into the potion once more before bandaging Lucius' forearm with it, "just say that you injured your arm and leave the bandage on it, dip it in the potion and re-wrap it every time it dries out so it'll continue to help with the pain. Or just suffer if you prefer. Welcome to the Soul-Eaters. We'll be in touch."

"Couldn't you be more specific of how long before..." Lucius started to ask but Brutus had already stepped into the shadows and vanished, "nevermind then."

---

Scorpius was relieved to be out of Varanian's office without either of them being hurt, or expelled, or fired, or killed. He had actually thought that Varanian had been going to attack Professor Ashain for a moment, even though he'd had his wand out. He supposed Varanian must have decided to think better of it and possibly doubted he could best the former Auror in a duel, even if he could beat Professor Ashain then it would still be harder to keep him quiet about his habit of attacking his own staff, children were easier to control.

"Where are we going?" Professor Ashain asked after a few minutes of walking, he still looked anxious and was thumbing the handle of his wand nervously. Scorpius liked the professor's wand, it was the only one he'd seen with a crystal at the end of the handle, it made his seem very bland in comparison.

"I don't know, I was following you," Scorpius admitted, he'd just been lost in his thoughts and blindly following but it dawned on him that the professor must have been too.

"Ah well I wasn't really thinking... I really thought Varanian was going to attack me then, he is mad or what? I had all the defensive spells I know running through my mind ready and was already planning the best way to get you to safety and neutralize the threat. Mad-Eye really ingrains that Auror stuff into your mind, eh?"

"I guess so," Scorpius said awkwardly, not really knowing who 'Mad-Eye' was but the professor didn't continue as they both looked around the deserted corridor and tried to get his bearings, "I think I've passed through here with Calderon before, these are mostly spare unused classrooms that are used for storage or just nothing."

"I think this is the corridor that Varanian told us was off-limits, we shouldn't really be here."

Scorpius nodded vaguely before they passed a door with a sign on it, a sign reading 'KEEP OUT' in huge thick black letters. He stopped walking to look at it, he remembered passing it before with Calderon as the corridor was almost like a short cut, the lack of people meant not having to fight through a crowd to get by. He'd queried it and Calderon had told him that Varanian kept some stuff in there that he'd rather not have disturbed, he'd been busy at the time but now he was curious.

"Come on, Scorpius," Professor Ashain prompted, realizing Scorpius had stopped and went back over to him. The professor shuddered as he stood beside the door, "what is wrong with me today? Best keep out like it says, don't have a good feeling about it."

"Calderon said that Varanian kept some stuff in here that he didn't want anyone to know about, aren't you curious as to what?"

"No. Well possibly yes but its none of our business so leave it alone now."

"What if it's something dangerous? Or illegal? Or both?" Scorpius wondered as he tugged at the handle but it didn't budge, "oh, nevermind its locked."

"Oh please, alohomora," Professor Ashain muttered as he aimed his wand at the lock, that clicked as if unlocked and the door creaked as it opened a touch, the professor looked nervous, "pretend that you never heard that spell. Seriously, I know how good you are with spells and it could be used irresponsibly. Not that I think you're irresponsible, its the spell and if anything I'm the irresponsible one for using it in front of you but I wouldn't if you were not you because I trust you but its not really important. I just ramble sometimes, I shouldn't though, its no wonder people think that I'm boring. Anyway, I'm just going to make sure there's nothing dangerous or illegal in here, since Varanian's... well you know. Stay here."

With that Professor Ashain handed him the broom that he'd still been carrying and went inside the room, Scorpius tried to wait patiently like he'd been told but every second made him worry more. What if it was something dangerous and the professor was hurt? What if Varanian found out and fired Professor Ashain? He hadn't really thought it through, then again, he hadn't really expected the professor to go in, he'd just been venting his curiosity. He pushed open the door and saw the professor was very much alive, studying the object in the room.

"Didn't I tell you to stay?" the professor complained half-heartedly.

Scorpius wasn't listening though, he was transfixed by the object. It looked like the same stone material that the blood rune discs were made of, only it wasn't a disk but an obelisk, it was about the width of a person and about a head taller than Professor Ashain. What really drew his focus were the runes on it, carved deeply into the stone and going all the way down the sides in single file.

He walked over to the professor and saw from the back one of the sides wasn't completely covered, attached to it was a pedestal with steps leading up to it, all of which was also of the same stone and engraved with runes. Professor Ashain was standing by the pedestal and running his free hand across the runes, Scorpius did the same before he walked up the steps to the pedestal. He swallowed nervously with he saw what was on top of it, there seemed to be different shaped hand imprints in the stone and in the center of it all was the same arrow rune that was on the discs. It was raised though and so sharp that at first Scorpius thought it was a blade, in truth it was just some strange black stone that had somehow been made sharp.

"Don't touch it," Professor Ashain warned and Scorpius realized the man was now by his side, "wouldn't want to accidentally activate it."

"This is to do with those blood runes that I asked you about... isn't it?"

"Yes, that arrow means 'sacrifice.' In this context anyway. All the other ones are related to protection, safety as well as strength and power... destruction. I think that..." the professor told him as he ran his fingers across the hand prints, "that every time someone activates it their hand print is imprinted into the stone, that symbol Tiwaz is branded into their hand and their blood is taken to fill all the runes. I don't think you'd survive that, its too much blood to lose."

"Do you think Varanian would really use that?" Scorpius wondered worriedly.

"No, he couldn't use it even if he wanted to. There's supposed to be three parts and this is only one, you need err... wards to mark the area the magic extends to and something that binds the spellmaster's soul to it, an orb and as far as I know Varanian has neither of those, its rare enough to find an intact obelisk let alone a ward and an orb. Besides he wouldn't use it, he'd need to some to die to activate it and who would willingly do that? Sacrifice is a powerful thing but it requires willingness. He couldn't do it himself because he'd be dead, the spellmaster needs to be alive for the magic to work. He'd be an idiot to use it anyway."

"Why?"

"Because Hogwarts is already magically protected! This magic would destroy that protection to replace it with its own and like I said, that's corruptible if the spellmaster is. Besides its not permanent," Professor Ashain explained moving his hands away from it and shivered again, "I'm more curious how he got his hands on it, like I said before its rare and ancient. My family is incredibly wealthy and my grandfather is a collector of magical artifacts like this, it was all he ever cared about but he could never get his hands on an intact obelisk or a ward although he did manage to obtain an orb, one of his proudest possessions. I'm not surprised Varanian doesn't want anyone to find this, its nothing sinister motive, its a fear of it being stolen. This is worth something between extremely valuable and priceless."

"I don't like it," Scorpius stated, he thought it was creepy even without knowing that people had died using it, died standing on the very steps he was then. He shivered.

"Now you're shivering too, best we get out of here and out of these wet clothes before we catch our deaths," Professor Ashain said as he ushered him away from the obelisk and out of the room, closing and locking the door magically behind them, "best pretend that we were never there, alright?"

"Alright," Scorpius agreed, wondering if telling his allies about it would be alright or not.

"Good," the professor said with relief as they headed back to the more common areas of the castle, "just go back to your common room, don't worry about the lines."

"Thanks. See you tomorrow, Professor."

"Yes. Sure. Tomorrow. Of course. Bye Scorpius," Professor Ashain offered as they parted ways.

Scorpius considered heading back to the common room, he did want to get out of his wet things and it would be good to put down his broom because he was getting some funny looks. His legs were already walking to go check on Calderon first though before he could think of things logically, he pushed everything else out of his mind for the time being. It wasn't a long walk before he was knocking on Calderon's door. There was no answer.

"Calderon? It's me," Scorpius called out nervously, if Calderon wasn't there then he had no idea where he'd he be, "Scorpius."

"I'm busy, Scor. Come back tomorrow," Calderon's reply came back tiredly from inside his room.

"Are you okay? I was worried about you... Lucius is gone now, you know."

"I'm fine."

"You don't sound fine," Scorpius pointed out and he heard Calderon sigh before the door opened, Calderon forced a smile that didn't touch the pain in eyes and leaned in the doorway. He looked like he'd been crying.

"I'm fine, see?"

"I'm sorry," Scorpius said guiltily, "you know about my grandfather, I-"

"Don't apologize," Calderon interrupted losing his smile but gestured for him to come inside his room after him, "you have nothing to apologize for."

Scorpius blinked in shock, it looked like a bomb had quite literally gone off. The bed was as neatly made as ever but everywhere else was covered in bits of paper, wood, shards of ceramic, glass, even lumps of candle wax. The floating shelves and candles were gone, the ball of light remained but it was so dim now that it was hard to make out anything. Even the walls showed signs of abuse, they had vicious spidery cracks running up and down the gray bricks. The only thing aside from the bed and the trunks beneath it that didn't looked in pieces was a picture from a newspaper clipping on the wall, Scorpius had never seen it there before but he recognized the woman it: Bellatrix Lestrange, his grandmother's elder sister.

"I... I'm sorry anyway," Scorpius offered awkwardly, feeling worse than ever, "I didn't know he..."

"Not many do," Calderon answered, leaning against the wall behind him, "and really don't apologize, you're not responsible for any of your family's actions."

"I still feel bad."

"Don't feel bad, I don't hold you responsible, I never did," Calderon pointed out but seemed to notice Scorpius' melancholy expression because he sighed, "look I'm going to tell you something about my past, you need to promise that you won't feel bad anymore."

"Erm... I'll try," Scorpius muttered anxiously as Calderon rolled up his sleeve and showed him his forearm, Scorpius was surprised to see it was badly scarred like from a burn, "I don't understand... did my grandfather do that to you to?"

"No, I did that to myself. Look closer," Calderon told him and waved the fingers on his other hand over the wound, Scorpius scowled in confusion before the lines of the scar became more livid forming an image of a skull with a snake... it was the Dark Mark.

"You... You were a Death Eater?!" Scorpius exclaimed in panic but Calderon looked offended and vigorously shook his head as he pulled his sleeve back down.

"But my parents were Death Eaters, Scor. My mother was seriously fanatical and when I was thirteen she grabbed a knife and... she carved His Mark into my skin, as incentive so I would know what I would become but I burned it off and forsook her plans because I don't want any of it. Quite frankly I never saw the point, blood-purity, power and for what? It's just pain and suffering and death and that's nothing good there. The good things are what matter, what are worthwhile," Calderon said and subconsciously seemed to rub his arm, "I told you once before that we're more than the blood we carry, you always have a choice and I choose to be different. My parents were... they did really evil things too... tortured and killed and maimed and destroyed and... all that bad stuff. I can't change what they did - no matter how much I wish i could - anymore than you can change what your grandfather did to me. At least you can take solace in the fact that he did turn on his master in the end, he chose to be different too. If anyone is at fault then its me for letting the past get to me, I shouldn't be upset."

---

Part 6: Outside News

---

"I'm sorry about your parents... and I don't blame you for being upset," Scorpius said finally, still reeling from the information about Calderon's parents being Death Eaters but he felt like he should say something, Calderon had been looking at him both nervously and expectantly and Scorpius got the distinct impression that it wasn't something the assistant usually went around telling people. He wondered if Varanian knew. He knew about Lucius torturing him after all, although why his grandfather would do that to a Death Eater's child, of all people, was beyond him.

"It's okay," Calderon muttered, not seeming to want to talk about it more but looked slightly relieved by Scorpius' reaction, he'd probably been as anxious about his reaction as when Scorpius was when he had to say he was a Malfoy.

Scorpius didn't blame him, he did wish sometimes that no one would know he was a Malfoy and wondered how much of a difference it would make in how everyone treated him. He didn't remember hearing about any Death Eater's with the last name Calderon though, either they had just hadn't been very famous Death Eaters or Calderon had just changed his name, both seemed plausible. He did feel bad for Calderon though, for having parents like that, he couldn't even imagine his own mother cutting him like that. It made him shiver.

Calderon must have took him shivering to be from being wet from the rain because he raised his hand and slowly drew his fingers into a fist, Scorpius could feel the damp being drawn from his clothes, hair and skin. The water seemed to gather into a ball in front of Calderon's fist, he tossed his hand into the air and the ball of water rose higher and exploded, showering the room with rain. Not a drop touched Scorpius however.

Almost as an afterthought Calderon gestured with his hands and more light shot out from them, swooshing around the room and repairing it. Scorpius watched in amazement as the light started reassembling the chaos, fragments of wood reformed into the shelves that the newly repairing items started cramming themselves back on to as if nothing had happened, even the cracks in the walls fixed into solid stone again. In a matter of minutes almost everything was back as it was, you wouldn't believe it had been destroyed unless you'd seen it. The only thing not as normal was the light, the candles lumped themselves back together but remained unlit and dumped on the shelves rather than floating and the ball of light remained dim. In fact when Calderon's magic light completed its work and vanished, it seemed darker than ever.

"There, all's fine," Calderon stated as he lowered his arms before making a very obvious attempt to change the subject, "so... how'd the Quidditch go?"

"I got Seeker," Scorpius told him and blinked in shock, it was the first time he'd actually said it aloud and the first time that it had really hit him with everything else on his mind. He was the new Gryffindor Seeker. He'd actually be playing Quidditch in real matches, flying and trying to catch the Snitch for real, "holy shit I'm Seeker."

"Isn't that a good thing?" Calderon guessed, the assistant's Quidditch knowledge was sorely lacking but before Scorpius could reply the door opened and Varanian came in, now with slick jet black hair with fluorescent green highlight.

"Marius I-" Varanian started to say before he noticed Scorpius and glared at him angrily, "why are you everywhere?! Didn't I tell you to get the hell out of my office?"

"I am out of your office. This is Calderon's room," Scorpius pointed out but Varanian didn't seem to care, he grabbed Scorpius' shoulder roughly and hauled him out of the room, "hey! We're having a conversation."

"Well my conversations with my assistant are more important," Varanian growled and drew his wand, for a second Scorpius was worried that the headmaster would hurt him again and from the way Calderon raised in his hand in readiness, the assistant seemed to fear for that too. But instead he simply flicked it, a pile of packages and letters popped out of the air and dumped themselves in Scorpius' arms, "your mail, sorry for the delay. There's something for you to do instead of bothering me. Now go the hell away!"

Varanian didn't want for a reply but slammed shut the door, leaving Scorpius awkwardly juggling a bundle of packages, paper as well as his broom. Scorpius was half tempted to stay and try listen to what they were saying, if not for the handful of students walking down the corridor and looking at him then he might have. He sighed and awkwardly started heading back to the common room, he supposed Varanian was just going to yell at Calderon anyway. He hoped that was all Varanian was going to do to Calderon anyway. He could at least have waited until Calderon had had more time to recover. He hated Varanian.

Scorpius was glad to be back in the Gryffindor common room, he was getting weirder looks than normal on his way there. He was slightly surprised when he got back to see that his allies were also there, sitting at one of the tables and studying. Usually they'd spend the whole morning in Varanian's detention, he'd seen Varanian several times that day so far but somehow it had only just dawned on him that it had to be the afternoon. The Quidditch tryouts had taken longer than he'd thought. He tried to make his way up to the dormitory quietly so they wouldn't notice him, he wanted to go through his mail first but they spotted him. Immediately the four of them abandoned their books to race over to him, he just carried on upstairs to the dormitory regardless.

"Why didn't you tell us that you were going to tryout?!" Albus demanded as they walked with up the stairs.

"Yeah we could have tried convince Varanian let us be there to support you," Abby pointed out before her tone turned to amazement, "is that the Dart broom?"

"Forget all that!" Rose snapped, "why didn't you come back here and get the letter about Varanian?! You could have asked your grandfather to send it!"

"Guys, give him some room to breath," Michael interjected as he held open the door for Scorpius, for which Scorpius was extremely grateful as he made it back to his bed and tossed everything down on to it. He sighed heavily, finally feeling his exhaustion at the long tryout session, "and erm... when you're finished breathing, why do you have a load of mail?"

"Varanian just gave me my mail now. I didn't think about it with everything else going on. Yes it is the Dart and I had no idea I would be trying out," Scorpius answered their questions patiently, his allies could be slightly annoying with their questions. Then again, if they didn't bug him with questions then sometimes he could go the whole conversation in silence and just listen. He sat down on the bed and reached for one of the parcels, hoping they'd get the hint that he wanted privacy to open it all.

"How could you not think of it?!" Rose burst out still glaring at him angrily with her hands on her hips, "do you not pay attention when we're wracking our brains trying to think of a way to get him fired and locked up?! Or is it because you just don't care that we're suffering because you just get to hang out with Calderon while we're having runes magically carved into our skin?!"

"Of course I care!" Scorpius exclaimed angrily getting to his feet, offended that she could think that, let alone say it, "it just slipped my mind okay?! There was a lot going on, I know it wasn't half as bad as your day but there was still things worrying me and I just didn't think of it until it was too late. I'm sorry."

"Why would you be sorry? You get a perfect life, perfect grades, perfect at spells, perfect at potions, you're so perfect that you even managed to get Seeker as a first year!"

"I don't have a perfect life!"

"Yes you do! Perfect, perfect, perfect!" Rose screamed at him, "everything works out perfectly for the Malfoys! Nothing ever goes wrong! Or if it does then don't worry, tell a few lies and throw a few coins and you could just get away with murder even! You don't even have to be scarred for life because magically it doesn't work for you!"

"Rose," Albus said warningly and worriedly, "getting mad at Scorpius isn't going to change anything."

"I don't care! We're being tortured by a mad headmaster and he couldn't remember one stupid letter, one! Then maybe Varanian could be locked up and I could see my dad before he dies."

"He's not going to die-"

"You don't know that!" Rose interrupted sounding on the verge of tears before she ran off, Albus and Abby both went to follow but Michael was faster and they seemed content to let him go after her.

"I feel like I'm missing something," Scorpius said carefully, trying very hard not to be upset over what she'd said and realized he was now clutching at his scarred wrist.

He moved his hand away as if burned, he supposed it was better they think lowly of him like Rose did than know the truth about his past. Losing his sister and being held prisoner for almost a year definitely made your life about as far from perfect as you could get, he couldn't tell them that though, however those were things that you did mention outside of family because Lucius didn't like anything about their personal lives to be public knowledge. Albus sighed and started to take a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket, hesitating before handing it to Scorpius.

"Vic showed us this when we got back from Varanian's detention, apparently it came with this morning's post but well you know Varanian makes us skip breakfast and most of my other my cousins were at the Quidditch tryouts to tryout or to support the others. Its dated from three days ago."

Scorpius studied the page, it was from the newspaper. He didn't know why Rose would be upset about it, there was an article about an increase in price for imported goods due to the danger of them being attacked and another about a missing boy. Scorpius scowled at the second article, it was about a nine-year-old boy who'd gone missing exactly two weeks before his tenth birthday and was still missing two months later. He might not have given it much thought, except that Scorpius happened to go missing exactly two weeks before his tenth birthday as well, it was an odd coincidence but Marvin was dead and Lucius had told him that the others were imprisoned.

"Oops," Abby commented and snatched the paper from him, flipping it around and handing it to him again. That page was the headline, the picture featured the three Aurors he'd met before when they'd wanted to know about the attack on the train tracks, Rose's dad being in the center. Scorpius immediately understood why she was worried.

ATTACK ON AUROR!

Late last night an attempt was made on the life of acclaimed Deputy Head Auror Ronald Bilius Weasley, known for his efforts in the Second Wizarding War and personal involvement in the downfall of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named and for which he was awarded an Order of Merlin, as well as his continued work in bringing Death Eaters justice.

After staying late to work on the string of recent attacks that are believed to be the work of the Shadows, the thirty-seven year old father of two was believed to be ambushed as he left the Ministry. Witnesses report the sounds of a struggle being heard, an explosion was caused with enough force to be heard within the Ministry itself which alerted those inside to the attack. The fast action of famous Head Auror Harry Potter and fellow Auror Celestine Rooke is believed to be the only thing that saved Mr Weasley's life, they arrived in time to fight off the group of assailants before they could finish what they started. None of the assailants were apprehended, witnesses report them as 'vanishing into the shadows' despite anti-apparition wards in place.

The attack on Mr Weasley is also believed to be the work of the mysterious Shadow organization, their symbol was left cast on the wall beside him, in his own blood as with other victims. Mr Weasley was immediately rushed to St. Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries where he remains in critical condition, his severe injuries being non-responsive to traditional healing spells. Healers continued to work tirelessly all night to stabilize Mr Weasley's condition, as of this morning his condition is described as 'still critical but still alive, which is more than we can for any of the other victims.' Mr Weasley is currently the only known survivor of Shadow attacks, as well as the only one whose murder was interrupted but whether he will recover is still unknown.

Minster for Magic Kingsley Shacklebolt issued this statement this morning on the matter: 'The attack on one of own will not go unpunished, if anything it only increases our resolve to bring this Shadow Master and his entire organization to justice.' Despite this statement, there are no known suspects or even suspect descriptions of anyone involved with the Shadows and the whole organization remains the work of Dark witches or wizards unknown.

Scorpius was worried by the whole article, the Shadows were the ones who had attacked the train tracks after all. That wasn't mentioned though, nor more detail on what attacks it was talking about. He hadn't paid too much attention to the paper before, anything interesting was usually discussed by his family over breakfast so he didn't need to anyway. That was how it used to be anyway, since he'd been back they didn't talk about anything over breakfast except to constantly ask him how he was doing so he'd been out of the loop of events in the Wizarding world for over a year. He wished he knew more although from the tone of the article he got the impression that no one really knew too much about them either.

"I can understand why Rose is upset," Scorpius said carefully when he realized that Albus and Abby were both looking at expectantly, "I hope her dad will be okay."

"So do I," Albus admitted with a worried sigh, "he's my uncle too."

"I think he's still alive at least, Varanian may be able to stop us from getting our mail but he couldn't hide something like that."

"How morbidly comforting."

"Well that article is three days old, he's hanging in there and... you know that's a good sign."

"It's still worrying," Abby pointed out, "I'm actually surprised Dad didn't tell me, I don't know whether he - or any of the teacher's - really know or not. They get their mail checked too. Although Varanian has started letting them leave in their spare time, on the weekends mostly as long as you're specific on the time and stick to it. Although it does depend on Varanian's opinion of you according to Dad, the people that he hates he rejects on whim but he likes Dad well enough, let him go home last weekend... Was before the attack though."

"So what were the tryouts like?" Albus wondered and his emerald eyes lit up with excitement, sometimes Scorpius wished his almost-friend would have different color eyes to Marvin.

Scorpius awkwardly stumbled into an account of the tryouts, Albus and Abby both listening attentively as they easily had the most interest in Quidditch of the five. He was reluctant when he got to the Seeker tryout, worried about what Albus would think of him beating his brother. His excited expression did waver but he didn't say anything as Scorpius finished talking.

"Well done mate."

"You're not that upset that I beat your brother?"

"Why would I be upset? I feel kinda bad for James but you were just better, I want Gryffindor to win and he did get Beater. Freddie said the other two had good swings but were terrible fliers so Cole offered it to James, not like he's missed out completely," Albus said with a shrug before he grinned, "besides, I can't fly for shit so now so I'm going to life vicariously through you on the Quidditch front."

"Vicariously?" Rose repeated and the trio glanced to the doorway to see she and Michael had returned, her eyes looked a little red but she smiled nervously as they walked over to them, "isn't that a little too advanced for your vocabulary, Al?"

"Maybe you just underestimate me, my dear cousin. Are you feeling any better?"

"Yeah," Rose admitted folding her arms as she lost her smile and turned to Scorpius, "I'm sorry I snapped at you like that, I was just upset and I took it out on you. That was wrong of me and I'm sorry."

"It's okay," Scorpius mumbled and couldn't stop his hand from going protectively around the scar on his wrist again, "but my life really isn't perfect, you know."

"I know. And congratulations on getting Seeker, youngest since Harry Potter."

"I don't want to be associated with him."

"Better than being associated with the Malfoys."

"I am a Malfoy and we're not all bad. Look at all these things they sent me, do evil people send gifts?"

"Maybe they're evil gifts?"

"They're just sweets I think."

"Evil sweets?" Albus offered teasingly and Scorpius groaned, pulling off the paper on one to reveal it was a very normal box of fudge, "ooh I love fudge! Gran makes the best fudge but then there's no really bad fudge. Give us a piece?"

"What happened to it being evil?" Scorpius questioned raising an eyebrow and trying a piece, Albus looked about to start drooling.

"You can't have evil fudge!"

"Hmm delicious, tastes very... evil," Scorpius commented to which Abby chuckled and it was Albus' turn to groan, Scorpius smiled slightly and offered the box to them, "I'm not that cruel, you can all have some."

"Thank you," Rose offered gratefully grabbing a handful before Albus could and stating to pop them into her mouth, leaving Albus and Abby to pick at the leftovers, "I'm starved, we haven't anything to eat all day."

"Aren't you going to have any, Michael?" Abby asked of the mudblood, who remained standing back respectfully, "they were just joking about the evil stuff, its really good."

"Nah, then there'd be none left for Scorpius!"

"It's okay, take it all. Sure there's more anyway," Scorpius pointed out and offered the box to Michael, leaving them to eat that while he opened the packages which all were sweets, fudge or his favorite chocolate cake. He put them in a pile beside him and told them all to dig in, they thanked him and plopped themselves around his bed to gorge on the food pile while he turned back to the letters.

There were nine of them in total, four from his parents, two from his grandmother, two from his grandfather, one from his Aunt Daph. The two from his grandmother were really short, just asking him if he'd received and liked any of the packages that she'd sent and hopes that he would reply soon. The two from his grandfather were much more formal, the first was informing him about his impending arrival and plans for him to tryout, the first one asking him what color he wished his new broom to come in because apparently it came in light brown and dark brown and he wasn't sure which one that Scorpius would prefer. The second one was to complain about his lack of reply and say that he had bought the lighter one because the other color had been sold out and he was afraid that they'd all be gone by the time Scorpius replied.

The ones from his parents were mostly full of questions, wondering how he was doing and how he was coping. They also expressed their worry over his lack of reply, wondering if he was alright and reassuring him they didn't care what house he was in. They still loved, no matter what, and it wasn't his fault that the hat put him in the wrong house. They also pointed out repeatedly that he didn't have to be in Hogwarts if he didn't want to, the four Malfoys were more than capable of homeschooling him if it made him feel safer, if he preferred and that he didn't have to put pressure on himself to do well.

Usually it got on his nerves, that it made him sound like they thought he was weak and incapable of any independence but this time it didn't. Rose's dad was fighting for his life and Calderon's mum had carved the Dark Mark onto him, it made him more aware that it could be worse on the parent front and he was glad that his parents were alive, healthy and loving. He moved onto the final letter from his Aunt, that was the oddest out of all them and Scorpius read it and re-read it but still found himself scowling.

Dear Scorpius

How's my favorite little nephew? Although I suppose you're not really so little now that you're at Hogwarts! Well you're the littlest in the school but hey, you gotta start somewhere. Hope no one's giving you a tough time, if they are then just tell me and I'll knock them into the middle of next week for you!

I don't want to scare you or anything but I got a temp job at the Ministry, I heard some things and I really think that you have a right to be warned since they're keeping it quiet.

So there, now you know. Its probably best that you keep this information to yourself, you can keep a secret right? Like I said I'm not trying to scare you but I feel like you have a right to know that the Ministry think so just be careful.

All my love

Aunt Daph xxx

Scorpius felt like he was missing something, he had no idea what his Aunt was talking about. Why would she mention some things she'd heard and then immediately say 'now you know' when she hadn't actually said? The last sentence also didn't make much sense either. It was almost like the most important parts of her letter were missing or she'd forgotten to write them, she'd never done that before. Or maybe it wasn't her. If Varanian was reading the mail, what was to stop him from altering it somehow?

"Hey guys, that's enough," Michael was saying and Scorpius' attention went back to the others, "we can't eat too much, don't want to ruin your appetites for dinner."

"Yes, mother," Albus retorted mockingly through a mouthful of fudge, Michael raised an eyebrow at this before smirking.

"Albus Severus Potter, don't you dare talk to your mother with food in your mouth! Don't think that you're so old that I won't wash your mouth out with soap if you don't show me some respect. Now you get this mess cleaned up this instant and when you're done I want that bed made and this entire room spick and span," Michael told him sternly and Albus looked completely taken aback before the three of them burst into laughter, while Michael just smiled slightly, "I have a whole bunch of little brothers and sisters I'm used to taking care of."

"You're completely mental, you know that?" Rose pointed out as Michael started packing up what remained of the sweet pile.