The Hard Road

Chapter two

-/-/-/-/-

The carved walnut door at the end of the long hallway opened to exactly the same silver and green bedroom he had left before Christmas break almost three years ago. Draco's old Nimbus broom and the Slytherin house Quidditch jersey hung beside his first golden snitch. His prefect and house boy badges were proudly displayed in a shadow box beside his final report card bearing straight A's and the letter naming him valedictorian. Rows of textbooks filled one bookshelf while pictures filled a second. There were some with his mother and father from family holidays, a young Draco wearing a carefully tailored black suit standing beside grandmother and grandfather, and one with Aunt Bella and Uncle Rudolfus laughing and playing cards with his mother and father. His stomach knotted as he passed one with Crabbe and Goyle at Hogsmead and found the pictures of his Hogwarts friends. Three quarters of them were dead, either at the hand of Voldemort, The Order, or The Purges.

Knocking shook him back to reality. His mother touched his arm. "Some mail arrived, while you were... Away."

Maltby summoned a heap of wrapped parchments mixed with actual envelopes bearing muggle stamps.

He quirked an eyebrow. "What's all this?"

His mother waved over it. "It's yours."

He gingerly unrolled the first parchment and cringed. A woman gushed thanks for rescuing her son and granddaughter from the ministry's purges. Fury roared over him as he tore the letter to ribbons. "Don't they understand? I'm not some sort of hero."

"Perhaps you are, to them."

"Don't they know that the only reason I saved any of them was to discredit The Order? I would have sold every one of them into slavery or burnt them alive if I could have gotten revenge any faster."

Her eyebrow quirked. "So that's why you sent Potter, Granger, and Weasley to America?"

"One has to know how to curry favor with Arthur Weasley and Kingsley Shacklebolt."

"I suppose a coward would accept twelve concurrent life sentences rather than betray his men?"

His fury turned into nausea as another idiot's letter gushed. "Burn them all. I don't want to read a single word of their delusional blather."

Truthfully, he wanted to start completely fresh. Escape the residue of the life he lived before, but he couldn't. There was a picture of Pansy with her silky hair and perfect smile. Before he wrecked her. It looked nothing like the sunken cheeks and hollow, dazed expression she wore when she wasn't crying. There, her teeth were white and straight, not broken, brown nubs set into flaming red gums. Another showed Vince. Bull strong and loyal as the day was long, yet how did he repay him? Draco still had nightmares of his body writhing beneath the undulating sea of fire, and for what?

He wanted it gone, all gone, from the Quidditch trophies to the pictures to the green and white sheets.

His mother pinched the bridge of her nose before letting a long sigh drift out. The pile evaporated with a flick of her wrist. "Foolishness does not suit you." With that, she turned and left his face burning.

He had to get out before the mire engulfed him and sucked him back into the shambles of his old life. And so he ran and ran and ran, until the pain swallowed him whole.

A dew covered Draco lay shivering beside the smoldering remnants of a small fire. Leaves rustled above his head, sending a shower of twigs and acorns all over his face. He eyed the huge eagle owl perched above him. "Raj? Was I that easy to find?"

The eagle bobbed its head and hopped down beside him. "Sorry, I don't have any breakfast." It scratched around in the dirt while he untied the parchment. His mother's neat script bore a brief message: Breakfast would be at seven. Greg Goyle was due at ten.

Draco rubbed his eyes. "Tell mother I'll be back soon."

Giant ashy billows floated across the beaten grass as he doused the coals in the purple light of false dawn. His skin crawled and itched. Should have known better than to sleep in the grass.

-/-/-/-/-

Greg's square head sat on top of thick shoulders. Somewhere in the last two years, his best friend's neck had completely evaporated. Even through a loose fitting polo shirt and khaki pants, the man was a musclebound beast, but he seemed shorter. Draco stood up straight, expecting to be looking up as usual, but instead found himself looking straight into Goyle's eyes. His old friend clapped him hard and wrapped him in a hug. "Look at you, Drac. They said you were skin and bones, but I didn't think they meant actual bones. Merlin, what did they do to you in there."

Draco clapped Goyle's back, which may as well have been carved out of oak. "You don't want to know."

"I owe you my life. If you hadn't got me out, I'd be like Pans. Anything I can do. I mean anything. Just say the word."

Draco's stomach knotted as pain surged into his chest. Goyle patted him on the back and muttered in his ear. "Drac, its not your fault. You got her out."

He was nauseous. "She came back for me, and look at what that got her."

Goyle shook his head. "She made her own choice." With that, he launched into his own story. He had taken over the superintendent's position at one of the family's furniture importing businesses in The United States. Money was rolling in as the cost of American domestic production rose. He laughed about old plants the US closing as companies shifted their businesses overseas.

Draco had never particularly cared about the plight of the hoi polloi. Mostly, they were lazy complainers. He did, however care about his fighting men. They were hard chargers who had stood with him through thick and thin. They needed good paying jobs to support their wives and children, and to rebuild after the purges. The shift of work overseas was a worrying trend. Jobs were still available, but they demanded more hours for less pay.

Mischief bloomed in Goyles eyes. "Draco Malfoy's gone soft on muggles?"

His face burned as Goyle teased him about getting himself a muggle girl. Greg elbowed him with a smirk. "Never know the difference when the lights are off. You know I'm right. Come on, broaden your horizons."

Draco stared at him. Goyle had been one of the most loyal, all the way to the end.

Greg laughed. "Look at all the trouble that pure blood bullshit caused? Look at how inbred they are. Crazy. Deformed. Sterile? We're so lucky. My folks are still trying to set me up with one, but I won't do it. I won't go any more than halfblood, but I'd rather have a muggle witch. I can't stomach the idea of my kids turning out to be fucked up like The Carrows and Umbridge. Remember what they did when they thought nobody was watching."

His mother's words echoed in his brain. He clapped Goyle on the back and put on a smile. "Ugh, that was something you can't unsee. Of course I don't believe any of that. You and I had to put on the face like everybody else. I'm just looking forward to getting back together with Daph."

Goyle's smile shined. "That's the Drac I know. I'll scare up a couple witches and we'll have a good time. Knock the rust off so you remember how it works."

Something must have happened to Goyle in America. He had never voiced the slightest doubt of pureblood ideology, and now he was talking about finding a halfblood girl there. And resorting to prostitutes when you had old money like his? Draco didn't need any of that. Daphne would be over soon enough and they could put the last two years behind them. They reminisced for another hour before Goyle left to visit his aunts and uncles, but promised to return the next day.

-/-/-/-/-/-

His hopes burned bright with the arrival of Lord Greengass. He was itching to see Daphne. Memories of her bright smile and inviting touch had bouyed him during the worst times. In hindsight, he should have noticed her absence.

He'd be cursed before he cried in front of the man, but Lord Greengass swore he'd Aveda Draco if he caught him within a half mile of his family. Wouldn't stand for the stain on the Greengass name, and all... His mother must have had some inkling, she had been dropping hints about backup plans. He should have known there would not be much demand for a convicted war criminal, but the rejection burned raw after two full years of resting on that hope.

It was everything he could do to maintain his composure as Lord Greengass dripped insults on his head. He wanted to blast the fool's teeth through the back of his head. Slice cutting curses into his lungs. Teach the pompous ass about crossing death eaters. Draco had killed plenty of men. Braver and harder men than the one standing here, but, Azkaban loomed large in his mind.

He excused himself from the old man's seemingly endless tirade, stripped out of his suit, and headed out for another run of the grounds.

Trees and bushes flew by. This time, he sprinted down a different path. He pushed as hard as he could, peeling off miles. Soon, the stabbing in his side deadened the pain of rejection. Potter would have killed the bastard, and they would have given him another medal for it. He laughed at the thought.

He would be gone soon enough. All he had to do was keep out of Azkaban for the next three months, which meant no run-in's with old man Greengass.

Their manor stretched over a hundred-fifty square miles, and he had never actually seen it all. Now that he thought of it, he had never actually visited most of the family's properties. He wondered who managed them, especially given his family's absence over the last five years. Draco made a mental note to read over the specific wording of his parole, as their properties were connected by a private Floo network which The Ministry was not privy to.

For now, though, he turned his attention to sorting out his potion garden. The tangled rows were nestled by the side of a small creek hidden behind a hedge of brambles tangled with stinging nettles, wild roses, and two dozen wards and traps. It was ten miles from the manor house, by the crumbled remnants of an ancient field house. Snape had convinced him to plant one, and to keep it's location completely concealed from everyone. Ever since, he had been grateful for that piece of advice. His mind drifted to the war, harvesting ingredients under the cover of night and concealment spells. He had never brought anyone here, and likely never would.

He extended a hand and focused on the old digging fork in the hidden cache of tools. He was determined to wordlessly summon it, so he cleared his mind and focused more intently. A rattling, and then the clank of steel answered him. He concentrated on the picture of a wooden handle gently settling into his hand, but a woosh and a flash of brown darted past his head, sending him diving into the tall grass outside his plot.

Wood and metal clanked off to his right, and he groaned. Just a bit rusty. Again. This time, the garden fork cartwheeled past. The handle clonked the elm tree ten feet on his left.

He pressed his hands into his hips. "I'm not coming to you." He focused again on the vision of the fork on his palm, and it leapt into the air. He dodged right, grabbed left, and wrangled the fleeting handle. "Gotcha!" It jerked a few times and then settled into his grip.

He worked the garden, untangling his precious herbs and ingredients from the weeds and bushes which found a way in. Hacking took his mind off Daphne. Finally, he checked his mandrakes and noted they were long overdue for dividing. Perhaps tomorrow.

With the wards and concealments back in place as well as he could wandlessly muster them, he turned his attention to the crumbling stone bluff across the small stream's riffle. The water over the gravel bar was only three inches deep, perfect for a hidden crossing, and so he hauled an armful of clippings across and dumped them on the flat rock beside the face.

Draco's hands interrogated the side of the hill, searching for changes in magic or breaches of his wards, but found none. Now, he rummaged a second pile of rocks and uncovered a small stack of broken boards. Once assembled into a rectangle, he gave the corner a shove, and the pieces snapped together with a click. He carefully laid it on the vertical hillside within a quadrant of smooth rocks. He crossed an X across the rough hewn wood, waved his hand, and focused. Alohomora solo Draco!

Nothing happened, so he tried again, and nothing happened. "Fine!" He dragged his fingers in an X again, then waved them in a circle, finishing with a line straight down. "Alohomora solo Draco!" On the third try, the door sucked tight against the exposed layers of shale and sandstone and shuddered, allowing him to pry it open. The intoxicating aroma of a dried herbs, preserved animal bits, and old parchment bid him welcome. Once inside, it took four tries to ignite a single candle. The dim light revealed the abandoned mine he had converted into his own personal potion workshop over the summer of his third year.

He first surveyed the layer of dust for any disturbance, but was relieved to find none.

His fingertips drifted over the smooth, flinty rocks and chunks of cool slate bolstering the outside wall as he inspected his secret place. He climbed the wooden rungs of a handmade ladder to the ceiling and let his hands run across the wrought iron plates supported by massive oak timbers. He had installed this protection the summer after his fifth year to make it impervious to magic. He was not foolish enough to believe that it was impenetrable, as there was probably violent and destructive magic which could destroy it, or perhaps a giant could rip it apart. His tests during his sixth year proved its value. To the best of his knowledge, not even The Dark Lord had discovered his secret. To the outside world, it was just a hill which ended in a low bluff. The Ministry could not track him inside here, and he had no intention of revealing it.

He checked the shelves and smiled. They were untouched. Now, he took an inventory, and found the supply of Veritaserum, Polyjuice, Skele-gro, Wolf's Bane, Healing draught and Wiggenweld were still complete.

Finally, he made his way to the back corner and knelt down beside the small fire pit. He rubbed over a dusty yellow rock set into the wall, and tapped the sharp corner three times. He drew a circle in the middle, and X'ed across it. A tiny click sent his smile blooming and his heart pounding. He slid the rock out, revealing a deep nook. Here lay his most prized potion stock, his Felix Felicis. He had never revealed this to a single soul, or let it slip that he had mastered making it. He had worked on it every free moment of his sixth year, and had finally discovered the secret in his seventh year, a week before... His chest knotted at the memory of Dumbledore's disappointment that night on the top of the astronomy tower. The old man had gone to bat for him so many times, and had gone so far as to prevent his father from whipping him every time he came in second to Granger. He wiped a tear off his cheek. It had been Dumbledore who had revealed the final secrets of the good luck potion, and how had he repaid the man. Even after Potter told him about Snape, that the old wizard has put his potion master under oath to intervene and put him out of his misery, his betrayal of the beloved headmaster still burned.

He counted the vials and found every single one present. In hindsight, he should have drunk a whole fortnight's worth before the Wizengamut. Trust our lawyers, father says, we've already made our deal. That lying crock of flobberworm shit! I should have known he would sell me out. Of all the betrayals, his father's hurt the worst.

Beside the vials lay three bags stacked full of galleons. He slid his hand towards the back, but stopped when his knee started to tingle and itch. No, I better not let them find out I have this. With a quick grin, he replaced the contents of his stash and then replaced the rock and sealed the enchantments.

He returned to the old bench and fished out a smooth branch a few inches shorter than he was tall. His fingers drifted over the grooved wood grain, searching for cracks and splits. When satisfied, he untied a dozen birch sprays hanging from nails in the ceiling beams. He thumbed through each bunch, checking for rot and mouse damage, but it was clean. He dunked the bunch into a bucket of water and found his hank of linen cord.

A snicker crept past his lips. The parole agreement says I can't own or fly a professionally made broom, but it doesn't say I can't make my own. Voldemort really was a nutter. He had forbidden all broom flying, and had even confiscated all of the flying brooms among his own followers. So, Draco learned to make his own. Didn't seem so mad when I bailed him out those three times, did he? He absentmindedly rubbed the tattoo etched into his forearm. The git hated brooms with a passion, but he gave me the mark after that third time, didn't he. His mind drifted back to himself, Crabbe, Goyle, Pans, and Blaise drifting low, barely concealed within the gaps in the treetops. Only the soft rustle of the hand scraped broom straw was audible in the breeze. Below, half a dozen black robed Death Eaters huddled around Voldemort, surrounded by A dozen Order of the Phoenix. Red, green, and gold hexes and jinxes ripped through the air, and then Dolohov stumbled under a direct hit. Yaxley twirled around, screaming and grasping his arm, and his father leapt away, but a flash of red sent the man to his knees.

Draco's wand came up and flicked a half turn. Their signal. They pointed the slow brooms straight up, rolled upside down, and dove, zig-zagging as they rained hexes and jinxes down onto The Order. Sirius' long hair whipped to one side as Goyle's stunner hit him. Tonks stumbled and fell over a log, losing her wand with a scream. Old man Weasley snarled and shot jinxes, but couldn't track the flurry of black through the inky night fog. Crabbe put Shacklebolt to the chase, and the rest of the order fell back in disarray. Draco landed hard next to The Dark Lord and pulled his father to his feet. The man was still wobbling, when he asked. "Can you apparate?" His father nodded and disappeared with a crack. He had just assigned Pansy and Blaise to fly the fallen out while Crabbe and Goyle kept the order at bay, when the Dark Lord beckoned.

Voldemort's thin smile bloomed and his eyes glowed red. "You are in every way superior to your father, in courage, in tactics, and in results. Return with me to the manor." With that, The Dark Lord climbed on behind him and they shot into the air. They talked as the cool air away washed the stink of defeat. The flight seemed to last only a minute, and they touched down softly in the grass beside Malfoy Manor's giant front door.

It seemed like ancient history as he wove each layer of thin twigs onto the end of the staff. He secured the row of figure eights with an incantation. Next came the layer of zig-zags followed by another round of incantations, and then chevrons. Each layer had to be done just so, or you were stuck sweeping. Or worse, five hundred feet up on a stick with no broom head. Twelve layers and it was ready for the fly-away layer. The outer coat was the most critical, so Draco took a break to rest his stiff fingers.

He whetted his old square blade and tested his edge. It was time to trim the broom. Draco ruffed and flapped the twigs, testing each one for buzzing and tangles while gently scraping snags and nubs. Done correctly, the broom would fly dead silent, so he took his time and checked every single stick.

He would take a silent and easily controlled broom every day. They had so many advantages over the whistling Firebolts and clattering Nimbuses. Sure, the exhilaration of rocketing straight up into a clear sky, or the thrill of outrunning an enemy across an open field was wonderful, but in real life battles, you lived because of the broom that wove through the treetops undetected. An attack succeeded because the enemy never suspected your presence until your sword slashed through his flesh. The expensive racing brooms really needed careful attention for proper control and they got squirrely at low speeds. Never mind their nasty habit of impaling riders on low branches.

His mind drifted as the old brown knife clipped tangles and stray twigs out of the broom's tail. What constituted a wand? What was the exact wording? Obviously, he could hold a stick in his hand, and he could do magic while holding a stick in his hand. So far, the fortune for lawyers proved extremely well spent, especially since The Ministry's own legal staff had been gutted in the purges. He wasn't exactly happy, but it could be worse.

He retrieved a jar of thick, brown paste and worked it into the broom. The straw swayed and rustled. The incantation was progressing well with ripples of movement stirring within the intricately woven layers. This had been one of the few things which did work at Azkaban. With nothing better to do, he had perfected every single aspect of it.

The hair on his neck prickled. Something was outside. Draco quickly performed another wandless incantation, waved his hands three times clockwise and once counterclockwise, and not a second too soon. Banging echoed through the wood as the door released from the wall with a shower of dirt. He leaned it against the opposite wall. A few hairs clung to the wood. They were silver gray with brown streaks, half as long as his fingers, resembling wolf hair. There were more than a few packs on the manor grounds, mostly to discourage wandering muggles. He brought them to his nose. They certainly had the characteristic dog smell, but there was something else familiar, so he got out his jewelers loupe and inspected the structure.

Bloody hell.

Just what he needed. A damned werewolf prowling the grounds. Snape had forced him to write more than a few essays on the subject. The loupe's magnification showed the characteristic tell of the chimera. A tiny human hair was locked inside the base of the longer werewolf hair.

That meant tonight was the full moon and it was well after dark. His mind raced. He had a broom, but no way out of his cellar without reconnecting the door. If he made a hasty exit, his hideout would be exposed and the beast had already sniffed out his entrance. He would have to figure out how to conceal the scent from its sensitive nose

The sensible thing to do was just camp out here and wait till morning. He had all the supplies he needed, and had endured more than a few nights without dinner in prison. The risk was that his mother may try to come looking or send someone after him.

Draco's hand ran over another rock wall. A quick incantation loosened the stones concealing a nook full of books. There, third from the end was the quarry. He slid the leather bound book bearing a green and silver Hogwarts emblem from between two paperback Muggle books with plain beige binding and titles that read a series of numbers and letters.

"Slytherin forever!" A shimmer of silver rippled through the snake's coils. A quill and ink were in a drawer nearby, so he found the blank page near the middle, and wrote,

Mother,

Sorry for missing dinner. There is a werewolf on the grounds. I am safe, but cannot risk exposing my location to the beast. I will return after daylight.

Sincerely,

Draco.

The words evaporated seconds after he wrote them. He left the diary open, and waited.

Three minutes later, Draco was hovering around the room, testing his new broom. Several of the tail twigs rattled when he flipped upside down, and it had a nasty buzz when he kicked off and landed. He returned to the bench and combed through it, picking out cracked bark and clipping split twigs. A healthy work up in river sand would fix most of that, but he was stuck here, and so he whetted the oblong scraper ground from a broken sword and went to work.

Two hours of scraping and picking left him bored and crosseyed, so he circled back to the diary page and found it still blank. He supposed he could summon Maltby, but the house elf had never been in here and he didn't want to change that. What he really needed was a safe exit to another place he controlled.

His smile bloomed. A route sending him to a completely different property would be even better, but then there was the risk to secrecy. Right now, the only way in and out laid completely within his control. An active exit meant somebody would find the place... But, they did own at least three hundred properties. Perhaps with careful planning, he could minimize the risk.

Rumbling echoed through the entrance wall. The werewolf was digging again, but the racket meant his charms were working. He smiled, it was one of his nastier spells. The creek's bluff self-rebuilt. The faster you dug, the faster razor sharp shale, spiny shards, and root bound gravel sprouted.

Once again, with nothing better to do, Draco performed a series of cleansing spells on the door. His goal was to purge every identifying scent out of the wood. Tomorrow, he would harvest some fresh wolfsbane to conceal the remains before locking the parts under a protective enchantment. The last thing he needed was the stupid beast eating his door.

An hour later, a mournful howl echoed through the walls and the digging stopped. Soon after, precise script swished across his diary page.

Stay safe.

Will delay breakfast until your return.

Love Mother.

A few minutes later, he extinguished the candles and chains wrapped around his arms and legs, dragging, screeching, groaning and hauling him into the darkness.

Cold sheeted his body. Brain numbing, arms and legs aching cold. A breath tickled his neck, and then a raspy moan and the stink of rotten flesh. He jerked to run but iron bands dug into his wrists as his hands slammed into the end of the chains. Warmth drained down his legs into the pool of slush which laid thick around his bare feet. Clicking noises echoed in his ears and a dozen points of pain roared into his chest. Stabbing pain, like someone hammering giant electric nails into his chest and back, went on and on and on, on and on and the only sound beside the moaning, clicking, slurping, and screaming echoing off the stone walls. His body was hauled sideways, tearing pain, broken ribs stabbing, and a thousand bony vultures peck-pecking, jerking, and pulling inside his stomach.

Buzzing and tugging turned into Potter's voice. "Get up! You've got to get up."

His breath left him as his robe tore free from the frozen floor and then ripped loose from his skin. Potter's warm shoulder was under his as he stumbled and clawed down the black hallway, stumbling up stairs that climbed and climbed and climbed. There should be a door, but there were always more stairs.

Chains wrapped around his legs and dragged him down, tumbling and thumping. stairs beat his head until the black world was a smear of stars, and he was hanging again, feet immersed in frozen slush with moans crawling through his ears and electric pain jabbing as ribs twisted to and jerked. Screaming pinged off the cold walls as his insides tugged and pulled like a thousand crows pecking and pulling.

He was screaming into the dark, punching and kicking to free himself, clawing at the bindings wrapping his soul when his Lumos burst white out of the darkness. The tatters of his shredded clothing tangled his throbbing hands and face. The heavy workbench legs were splattered with crimson. His raspy breath hitched as stabbing pains ripped through his chest. A ginger touch revealed a bruised rib. His head throbbed and his hand came back sticky and red. He wished for a bag of ice as he downed two bottles of healing potion and gingerly settled onto the hard floor.

It was just a nightmare.