28. Blaise Zabini's Decision

The daydreams were gone. Somehow, writing to his father had scared them off. The days passed, but the happy mental images of scores of white-blonde children overrunning Hogwarts wouldn't come back.

He tried to console himself with the thought that his fantasies had been a tad impracticable anyway. Where was a woman who could give birth to twenty-four babies?

But the fact remained that he, for yet another time, had lost something he had liked.

...

He did his morning walks, spent the afternoons sketching, and went for a swim after sundown, hoping the calm daily routine might help him to regain a state of inner calmness as well.

The beach had gone quiet. Save for the occasional toddler, there were hardly any children around anymore. All the shrieking and shouting, the laughter and the noisy games had vanished with them. The overall number of tourists had not decreased, though. Now, the majority of them were elderly people.

The most plausible reason for the rather abrupt change seemed to be that Muggles had schools, too, and that their older children were expected to be back there by the beginning of September.

It was odd to think about getting off the Hogwarts express and heading towards the carriages. It seemed like a lifetime ago that he had not been able to see the creatures that pulled them.

While he sketched grazing sheep or seagulls diving for fish, his thoughts wandered twelve months back. The atmosphere at Hogwarts had been changed dramatically right from the start. Anxiety had hung in the air. It soon had become fear and, in the end, sheer terror. The regime the Carrows had established had made look Umbridge's like a walk in the park.

Blaise Zabini had become Head Boy. Whereas a large number of both students and teachers had been surprised, Draco had seen the logic of that choice right away – the new headmaster had spared himself the necessity of interacting with a disgraced Malfoy on a regular basis. And by doing so, the man had added another ounce of disgrace to Draco's already impressive score.

Draco had tried not to blame Zabini for something Snape had done. On the contrary, he had striven to maintain his reasonably good standing with him. But a variety of duties had quickly taken up all of Zabini's time, and he and Draco had exchanged not more than a few words of polite small talk once in a blue moon. It had seemed to Draco that Snape's move had lost him – as some sort of side effect – the closest thing to a friend he had ever had.

Draco remembered Snape's smug stance and the speech he had made – We need a young wizard who will represent the finest Slytherin principles and who is also capable of reining in unruly students from other houses.

Zabini had been up to that task indeed, just in an unexpected way. Draco still marvelled at his former classmate's quiet pluck. Of course, Zabini had been far from challenging the Carrows openly; he had acted on the sly. He had upheld the Slytherin principle of being guileful. With unruly behaviour, he had dealt by not bringing it to the attention of those who would be sure to take offence.

Obviously, neither Snape nor the Carrows had ever got suspicious of what their Head Boy was doing behind their backs, or else Zabini would have ended up chained to a dungeon wall.

Draco had been ignorant of what was going on for a full eight months. That long time was not only due to Zabini keeping his distance, but also to Draco's inability to imagine that a Slytherin – any Slytherin – would play an active part in thwarting the Carrows and their evil activities.

Draco had caught on to Zabini's attitude one night late in April. He had had another of his breakdowns in Ghost Girl's bathroom when he suddenly had heard voices in the hall outside. He-Carrow had been there – and Zabini. There is nothing to worry about, Professor. It's only the bloody ghost sobbing in her u-bend. I've just checked. Carrow had commended Zabini for his watchfulness and walked off.

The point was, Zabini hadn't checked. He hadn't known whether there was someone in the room besides the ghost, and if so, whether this someone was a frightened, little girl from Hufflepuff or, in fact, a seventh-year Slytherin student who was at his wits' end.

How often Zabini had outmanoeuvred the Carrows, Draco couldn't tell. There was only one other occasion he knew of. Zabini had cast Disillusionment Charms on Pritchard, Bole, and Wilkes thus helping the three first-years to elude a livid She-Carrow, who had been chasing them for Merlin knew what petty transgression.

Over the year, there had been several incidents that had left the Carrows at a complete loss: students inexplicably escaping from dead-end corridors, people being tipped off before raids took place, or hard evidence of someone's disobedience disappearing in a mysterious way.

The Carrows had cooked up schemes between themselves. Draco supposed that they had kept Snape posted about their doings. The other teachers had always been in the dark. In all probability, the Head Boy had usually been the first to learn about new designs, and who besides him would have had the means of passing on information or of delaying the hateful siblings for exactly the few seconds somebody needed to bolt?

It made sense, didn't it? There had always been more to Zabini than met the eye. Zabini would have had the brains and the talent to best Granger, but he simply couldn't be bothered. Quite the reverse, there had been tests when he had written down faulty answers on purpose. Draco had only once found the nerve to ask about that. Zabini's reply had been thoroughly enigmatic: It perfectly suffices that I know what I know. I'm under no obligation to inform the rest of the world about it.

Draco had had his last private conversation with Zabini almost exactly one year ago. Forgive me for being blunt, Malfoy, but you don't stand a chance. You won't win, and you're already too far in to be able to quit. It really wouldn't be prudent to seek your company.

And Zabini had stayed away from him ever since.

Draco had promised himself to seek answers that would hold true, and here was one of them: It hadn't been Snape's move that had ended their quasi-friendship, it had been Blaise Zabini's own, well-pondered decision.

...

29. Contrast

He was sitting a little way off the Coast Path on a fallen tree. While his fingers were busy sketching the seascape, his thoughts wandered, like so very often, back in time.

They all had turned their back on him, first Blaise, then Pansy, and eventually even Crabbe and Goyle. He had never been particularly close to anyone else, and it had always been clear that he couldn't expect much support from his teachers. Snape was a singularity. He had saved him twice that fateful night – first from having to kill and an hour later from being killed, but the man had since snubbed him.

Draco had been on his own, and he hadn't been prepared for what he had to face. Nobody at Hogwarts had been prepared for Alecto and Amicus Carrow. Their malignity defied description. They hadn't been deranged the same way as his aunt, they had thought up their wicked schemes in cold blood, and they had undoubtedly surpassed themselves when they had come up with the idea of forcing students to use the Cruciatus Curse on each other.

Some people had downright refused to do it, namely Gryffindors who were brave rather than bright. Others had made half-hearted attempts, but nobody had really had what it took to cast an effective Cruciatus. The memory of his aunt raving about the curse still chilled Draco today. Hatred isn't enough. Loathing isn't enough. Fury isn't enough. You need to really want to cause pain; you need to want to enjoy it.

That was, in fact, the point of all magic – you had to really want it. But by the time the Carrows had made students use the Cruciatus, Draco had already suffered too many of those curses himself to hope he would ever become good at casting them. So he had resorted – like many others – to cheating. Being good at performing common spells non-verbally had come in handy. He had used Jelly-Legs or Trip Jinxes, immediately followed up by Tarantellagra. The combination resulted in what seemed to be violent jerking since the victims lay on the floor while their arms and legs carried out wild, uncontrollable movements. He had rounded off the simulation with Gemitus and Cruditas. Cruditas caused stomach cramps; it did hurt, yes, but it was nothing compared to a genuine Cruciatus, and Gemitus made the victims scream in a loud and convincing manner.

In the beginning, it hadn't mattered much whether the feeble tries at the real curse or ruses put up instead caused little to nearly no pain. The Carrows hadn't checked too closely but had been content with the sight of twelve-year-old children writhing on the flagstones, and none of the targets had known what a Cruciatus was supposed to feel like. Even though the Carrows had used the curse frequently as punishment, the victims would still attribute the evident differences to lack of practice and experience in fellow students.

Things had taken a turn for the worse when Crabbe and Goyle – of all people! – had suddenly got good at performing the curse. From then on, an increasing number of students had known what to expect, and everybody putting up a show had run the risk of disclosure because there had been no guarantee whatsoever that the targets – especially ones from other houses – would be prudent enough to keep their mouths shut. The Carrows had always encouraged students to tell on others.

Draco remembered the first "training session" after the Easter holidays. The little Ravenclaw boy had looked ready to wet himself with fear. Draco's own fear hadn't been any less because he had known that Carrow would monitor him most closely after what had happened at Malfoy manor during the holidays. With not only the teacher present but Crabbe and Goyle as well and, to make matters even worse, wielding a borrowed wand, using his usual fake routine had been no option. He had had to come up with something less risky and had decided on Imperius, the one Unforgivable he could cast. While he had dragged the skinny boy to the furthest corner of the room, his heart had hammered harder than a year earlier on the Astronomy Tower.

Yet, his plan had worked; Carrow had been fooled.

Although the trick had saved his neck once more, Draco felt none too good about it. To this day, he didn't know the boy's name or what the offence had been. He only remembered the boy's frightened face.

Immersed in his gloomy memories, Draco didn't notice the girl until she flopped down next to him on the tree trunk.

He looked at her in utter surprise. She wore a grey sweater with a hood plus the usual bluish Muggle trousers. She was no older than twenty and she certainly wasn't underfed.

"How's things?" she asked.

"Do I know you?"

"Not as such," she grinned. "You tried to run me down in the hall of a lodging house last week."

Her words gave him a start.

The grin on her round face grew wider. Everything on her seemed to be well rounded, somehow. Her head with its very short, brown hair looked like a Quaffle.

He rallied. "Please, accept my apologies for my inappropriate behaviour."

For a moment, she seemed stunned. Then she broke into a bout of mirthful laughter. "That's all right," she said at last, still chuckling. "I would also have run like blazes when an owl had come into my room."

"You've been in my room?" he burst out.

"Are you mad? There was a live owl sitting on the bed! It was busy eating a sheet of paper or something, but when it saw me, it started to hoot like crazy. It spread its wings, and I assure you, I ran to my room at the same speed you had come down the stairs. Debbie and I didn't dare to leave the window open in case the ugly bird decided to pay us a visit."

She suddenly reached for his sketchpad.

"May I?"

Not bothering to wait for Draco's consent, she leafed through the pad.

He held his breath. Besides the many sketches showing seagulls with the promontory in the backdrop there were also ones filled with dread and Chimera-headed flames. She didn't wonder about them, though, if the steady rhythm in which she flipped the pages over was any indication.

"You aren't half bad at sketching," she observed, handing him his possession back. "What I really wanted to ask is what exactly is a 'stupid muggle oaf'?"

Her question brought unwonted warmth to his cheeks.

"It's ... an expletive that was kind of popular in my dorm at school. I'd rather you forgot you ever heard it."

"I might be persuaded," she said, her grin taking on a mischievous quality. "You could give me your phone number. I happen to be from Wiltshire like you."

"How... how do you know I'm from Wiltshire?"

"Mr Penwith told us."

She was about to say more, but was interrupted by another girl who stood flanked by two bicycles a short distance away on the Coast Path. Bicycles were a two-wheeled means of transportation popular with Muggles. Draco liked them, too. Unlike cars, they made neither stink nor noise. He also thought the name bi-cycle to be quite fitting. Apparently, Muggles weren't completely daft all the time.

"Stop flirting, Trish, and come already!" the other girl called. "We're lagging behind schedule."

"Sorry, I must dash; Debbie's getting impatient," the girl said, rising.

He stood as well, acting on manners drummed into him when he was a child.

"It took us two days more than planned to get to St Ives. Now we have hurry back home," she elaborated. "Maybe that's just as well. Sleeping in Ole Penwith's Owl Lodge again would be creepy. Okay then, nice to have met you."

"Likewise," he said automatically.

Instead of walking off, she took one of his crayons, snatched the sketchpad from him and scribbled something on it.

"There," she said, thrusting crayon and paper into his hands. "Ring me up once you're back in Wiltshire."

Bewildered, he studied her writing. It was a series of numbers.

He spent half an hour trying to figure out whether the figures contained an encoded message. However, he wasn't able to discern any pattern, and eventually he gave up.

Muggles were weird folk.

- ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... - ... -

...

Author's note:

Many thanks go to Nooka and Athaeth for beta reading.