Draco's Point of View


Yaxley strides ahead and stops, scuffing his boots in the dirt before extending his right arm abruptly—so fast that it smacks into my chest, winding me. My father's cane pushes through the undergrowth distastefully. There's no need to worry about wards this time, not like the last time I was here with Potter.

Two looming shadows guard the large wrought iron gate, stepping aside to flank either side when Yaxley approaches first. The short, stout woman curtsies as she greets my father. He doesn't even acknowledge her. I glance at the man on the other side assessing me with a lopsided leer and realize these are the Carrow siblings. They have not been to the Manor in a long time. Then again, I haven't really been here in years—not as a member of the family or even as a welcomed guest.

Inside the entrance hallway, a couple of house-elves who have been dusting and cleaning the long red carpet freeze, clearly not expecting intruders during their nightly chores. They quickly animate and scurry away like rats into their passageways in the walls—the same ones Potter and I had snuck through the last time we were here.

"Greyback!" my father calls, his voice breaking through the awkward silence we've been stewing in for the last thirty minutes. His voice reverberates around the empty halls like it used to when I was a child. The sound alone causes a twinge in my chest. A long-dormant feeling stirs within. I guess old trauma dies hard as I shift uncomfortably in my robe.

A large, seven-foot-tall man rounds the corner swiftly, coming when called like the loyal lapdog he's always pretended to be around my father. They exchange a brief look before Greyback leans forward, pulling my wand from my robe pocket and slipping it deep into his slick trench coat. He huffs loudly, digging his nails into my arm as he pulls me forward. I don't fight it because there's no point. I could pull and try to yank my arm back, but to what end? What would it get me besides a beating? I haven't forgotten that the handle of my father's cane comes off to reveal a blade. My forearm itches.

Greyback continues dragging me down the hallway, and I hear the faint murmur of voices from the cells downstairs. Their voices echo up the stairwell. It's not surprising that they would be occupied. What's surprising is when Greyback passes the stairwell and steers me down the western corridor.

"Where are we going?" I ask, puzzled. He doesn't reply, just continues on his path, his boots banging loudly in the empty corridor. I don't think homes are supposed to sound like this. This open vastness doesn't fit the image of family homes I've seen others experience. It doesn't fit with Blaise's family home in France. Family homes are supposed to feel small, cozy, and crowded with people who want to be around one another.

Greyback stops outside a door, the brass handle lightly covered with dust. Its dormant state suggests it's been untouched for years. My bedroom door. He loosens his hold on my arm but snakes my forearm before I can unravel myself from his grip completely. Taking his wand from his back pocket, he presses the sharp tip deep into the soft tissue of my wrist. It heats quickly, burning a thick red band that glows tersely before encircling my entire wrist. It cools, and the red fades to a lighter color. A small rivulet of blood seeps out along the new tattoo's edge. I sneer up at Greyback, bewildered and perplexed, as I wipe away the pooling blood with the sleeve of my robe.

"What is this?" I ask, examining his unreadable face. He grunts in response, pushing me into the bedroom.

"A failsafe," he answers, slamming the door. The swing of the door kicks up years of dust that swirl in the early morning light cascading through the aperture in the curtains. The sun will continue to rise even when you argue against it. A new day dawns whether you want it to or not.

I feel uneasy in my childhood bedroom as the blood dripping from my wrist mixes with the disturbed dust on the faded wooden floor. Had it been at my mother's request to leave my room untouched? Perhaps she thought she would have gotten word of my return in advance and been given time to adequately prepare my room. The dust, grime, and stale weight in the air lead me to believe she must not have been privy to my father's plans for my return. Not surprising in the least since my mother wasn't privy to very much regarding my father and the running of the household. Especially after the bathroom incident in my second year at Hogwarts. She was downgraded to level three authorization with the house-elves. Any query or request that wasn't mundane or to do with the day-to-day running of her side of the house had to go through a chain of command before being approved. I wonder what level—if any—I've been afforded. Less than my mother, perhaps, or will I have to grovel at my father's feet to get a glass of water?

I lay down on the bed and face the window, watching the disturbed dust flutter down slowly like tiny specks of glass glinting against the light. It's very early. I think of Granger back at the Burrow, hopefully safe. I could try the window. Run to the equipment shed and grab an old, raggedy broom and just go, but Greyback's words linger. A "failsafe," he had said. I don't think he burned this red band into my wrist for nothing. How far could I get into the sky before this band, acting like a magnetic pull or giant lasso, wrenches me out of the sky, plummeting me back down to the earth? Not far, I imagine.

Years away I had spent, and all those memories are interlaced with my father's words repeating in my head now. An "allowed" vacation. The freedom I had clung to and the idea of a possible future away from all of this. A possible future where it would be safe to continue at Granger's side had been nothing but a farce. A prolonged lie led with the hopes of it causing more damage the longer it was allowed to go on. A rat running through an endless maze must also relish its momentary freedom. My father's cruelty is renowned. Especially against his own family.

I hear a scraping sound, low along the skirting boards that encircle the room. My earlier thoughts make me think it might be a rat. I reach for my robe pocket only to remember it's empty. My wand taken. Even a prisoner wakes up a free man every morning before they take in their surroundings and remember.

The noise turns into a hollow scraping sound that moves hastily along the inside of the walls. In the far distance, in the deep of the house through hidden pathways, trails, and rust-encrusted cells, I hear a faint scream. It jolts me alert as the house-elf entranceway door opens halfway in the wall by the old armoire. I see the shadow of a house-elf scurry past, probably on its way to start breakfast. I lean my head back on the pillow, and the weight of it causes a rush of stale, musty air to leak out. I look up at the ceiling, tracing the pattern as someone curses loudly from the elf's passageway. I spring toward the end of the bed, staring into the small gap in the door as two eyes meet mine. Two human eyes.

"What the fuck?" I shout, hopping out over the end of the four-poster bed as Pansy Parkinson crawls out of the elves' passageway, dusting off her red, swollen knees.

"Draco?" she asks, unsure, staring around my childhood bedroom.

"You're home?" she questions. The word 'home' sounds strange and strained coming out of her mouth.

"Pansy? What are you…" my voice hitches, cutting off as she steps forward into the light. She's wearing a very short, very theatrically staged maid's outfit and, to my dismay, clutches a feathered duster to her chest when my scrutiny becomes too intense.

"Pansy? What the absolute fuck are you wearing?" I ask incredulously. Never would I have expected to run into Pansy in my house, much less her wearing a Halloween maid's outfit. She looks down in answer, swishing her skirt from side to side.

"You don't like it? What else should I entertain guests in?" she asks sarcastically, her voice high-pitched with feigned innocence. The smile she plasters on is fake, and her eyes are like two blank discs.

"Pansy," I call again, confused as I reach out. She shifts back quicker than I expect, and I lose my footing a little.

"Don't touch me," she says in the same almost lilting voice. But it's all fake. One look at her face and you can see that. She notices me looking and rewires her face into a look of cheery, quiet optimism.

"Your face," I note, taking in the discoloration around her right eye and her swollen upper lip. Bruises of all colors and stages of healing are painted across her entire body like an unfinished canvas.

"Bruised and bloody women at Malfoy Manor are hardly a cause for concern," she giggles manically. "Your very own mother knows that more than anyone else," she adds.

Her expression drops its pretense as that distant screaming starts again before it's abruptly cut off. Her eyes twitch and water briefly.

"Is there anything you need?" she asks, not even bothering to wipe away the tears falling along her cheeks.

I try to move toward her, but again she backs up.

"What do you mean need? Pansy, what are you doing here, and why are you dressed like that?" I shout, angrier this time. Why would she ever be here? She should be off somewhere safe. Doesn't she know this is the last place in the entire world anybody with a sane mind should be?

"This is my service outfit. I am required to wear it from 7 p.m. to 3 a.m. when my services are called upon," she states simply, as if rehearsed. Perhaps something she's heard several times before.

"Services?" I ask uneasily. I look at her outfit again, and a ball lodges in my throat.

When I was a child, my father would host parties in the north wing of the house. When they would occur, my mother and I would stay in the south side of the house. As far away as physically possible. Even now, I'm not sure if that was at my father's behest or my mother's request. But it didn't always matter. You could still hear the sound of the girls screaming. Whether or not my mother purposely chose not to silence the rooms we would stay in, I'll never know. All I do know is those parties ran late, and the sounds of those girls seemed to linger in the walls for days after.

"Pansy," I whisper, taking her in again. When had she become one of those girls? And why? She shies away from my pleading eyes.

"Is Blaise okay?" she asks, unable to distance herself from that fake smile she wears.

"What? Surely you must have heard? He's in France with his parents," I answer.

"That's good. That's good to hear," she says, starting to turn on her heel.

"Wait," I exclaim, reaching for her arm. When my fingers encircle her small forearm, she stares intently at my hand until I remove it.

"I must go to sleep," she says dreamily. "Girls who don't sleep are not girls men like to be around," she adds pointedly.

"Pansy, please. Talk to me. What are you doing here? How long have you been here?" I ask, careful not to touch her as she makes her way back to the passageway door. She kneels down, clenching her teeth when her knees press roughly against the hard wooden floor.

"Since the last time I saw you," she answers.

"Pansy, that was months ago. Almost a year ago. You've been here for a year?"

She leans her head into the passageway, looking up and down before glancing back out toward the bedroom door.

"Your father came and got me the day after I saw you," she whispers. "The very next day."

"But why?"

She peers into the passageway again.

"I think most of the house-elves are coming now. I should go," she says, climbing in.

"Wait," I plead.

"I'll come back later," she says, disappearing into the passageway.


Throughout the rest of the day, I hear movement in the passageway, and each time I'm disappointed when I see a house-elf scurry past. There seem to be a few more here since Potter and I were exploring the crawl spaces.

Food appears on the study table several times, but I allow it to go cold and disappear each time. Snoozing on and off in the bed, I shower when a house-elf comes to turn down the bed. He doesn't speak when I ask him questions, just moves around the room to complete its nightly tasks. No one comes to see me that night. Not even Pansy.

When three more days pass, I'm at a loss with what to do with myself. One of the house-elves leaves a rag behind, and I take to cleaning the bookcase to stop myself from going crazy. One of the Death Eaters stands outside the bedroom door almost always, day and night. But he doesn't say anything when I open the bedroom door and leave it open, listening to the sounds of the house breathing. On the bed, I listen to the comings and goings of guests. Some angry shouting and others leaving as if just visiting for a friendly afternoon tea. I recognize some of the voices, and others are a complete mystery to me.

At 7 p.m. most nights, the Death Eater leaves, replaced by a new one, but I hardly ever notice it. It doesn't make a difference to me who stands outside the bedroom door. It wouldn't matter if no one stood there because it's not like I can actually go anywhere anyway.

On day seven, my father comes to see me. He comes to the open door, placing his hand on the Death Eater's shoulder to dismiss him. To my surprise, when he enters my childhood bedroom, he seems awkward. Unsure how to move around this room that has housed a son he lost years ago.

"Draco," he acknowledges me on the bed. I put down the book I'd been staring at but not really reading.

He looks around the room, swishing his cane against the dusty floor.

"I'll send the house-elves for a thorough clean," he muses aloud. I'm unsure whether he wants a response.

"Come," he states, banging his cane with finality against the wooden floor. He turns and leaves the room. I follow, leaving the room for the first time in a week.

Walking through the labyrinthine maze of Malfoy Manor, I'm uneasy. Unsure how far I can wander with this failsafe embedded in my wrist. I know my area of effect is much smaller than Pansy's because hers had several colors. Mine just had red. What part of the house is dedicated to the 'red zone'?

My father stops outside one of the smaller studies in the house. The door is covered with a large tapestry of intertwined serpents. He pushes aside the tapestry. When I was a child, this room was mostly used for storage. I'm not sure its purpose is the same.

My father pulls out a large set of medieval-looking keys on a ring, finding the correct key quickly as he unlocks the door. It takes an extra shove for it to open fully. Once inside, I see the reason why. The room is almost piled high with dusty boxes. My father swishes his wand, and the candles in the room spark to life, burning brightly.

The floor was littered with dust so thick it rivalled the dust found in my bedroom on the first day. Our muffled footsteps were broken only by the occasional cobweb stretching from one crumbling shelf to the next. Stacks of heavy, iron-bound crates and wooden boxes were haphazardly arranged across the room, some leaning precariously, as though they might topple over with the faintest disturbance. Each box showed different stages of water damage and was marked with cryptic symbols, initials, or labels written in fading ink—designed to mean nothing to anyone who didn't know what to look for. Of course, my father probably knew every secret in every box in this room.

My father turned, facing the south wall, and conjured a large board. Several old family names appeared in pristine white chalk, filling up half of the board.

"What are the names for?" I asked.

"Anything in this room with any of these names on it. Just dump it," he said, turning towards the door.

"Why?"

"There is little use in keeping the secrets of the dead," he replied, and left, disturbing the dust and letting the tapestry fall behind, covering the door. The light passing through creates a strange green, ethereal glow on some of the shelves.

The air in this room is heavy in a strange way. Like it was laced with the screams and shouts of the people whose secrets lay here. I looked up at the board to see if I recognized any of the names: Rockwood, MacNair, Rowell. I stopped when I saw the Crabbe name on the list as well. I thought back to Crabbe at Hogwarts. We had had a superficial relationship—sort of like the one I entertained with Blaise before I got to know him. I wondered if the family names written on the board meant they were all dead. It must be, because my father wouldn't want me throwing away blackmail material of the living.

I moved through the room, running my hand along the dusty boxes on the shelves, reading some of the names: stolen artifacts, possible turncoats, financial records, incriminating owl correspondences, and mixed-status relationships and infidelity, to name a few. Some boxes just had family names on them—Carrow, Crouch, Rosier. My hand hovered over the box marked "Parentage Verification Records (Muggles)." Although the word "Muggles" had been rubbed out, the ink smudging with "Mudblood" written in its place, I pulled it from the shelf.

Half the records at the back were mouldy from damp, water damage, but I filed through them quickly. Creevy, Cresswell, Finch-Fletchley… Granger. I ripped the file out, sliding my arm across the cover to remove the mold and cobwebs.

Her picture was on the first page. She smiled lopsidedly, tucking her hair behind her right ear before it reset again. It looked like her 4th-year school picture. I guessed my father hadn't decided to update her picture to the one that the Death Eaters put into rotation at the safe houses. I pulled the picture off the page and shoved it into my robe pocket. The next page contained her school records, known affiliations, and security risk assessments. A part of me was proud to see her security risk assessment score was high. Proud that even the Death Eaters were aware of her capabilities. But it was quickly replaced by fear. Perhaps if they had underestimated her, she could have stayed off their radar. But that was never possible for someone like her.

The next page went into detail about her parents—their lineage, jobs, and home address. At the bottom of the page, there was a picture of them waving at King's Cross. They looked exactly like the picture I remembered seeing of them at the Grangers' house. The next page was the one that grabbed my attention. It listed their home address in West Sussex. My fingers hovered over "Current Address—see page 13." I flicked ahead frantically, stopping when I saw copies of some sort of tickets—plane tickets, I realized. They had flown from London to Australia, stopping in Qatar for a layover of four hours. The information was so detailed that a lowly Death Eater must have been assigned to follow them and keep tabs.

Their current address was listed as West Lake's Shore. No house or apartment number—just a general area. Her father's job was listed as dentistry. Someone had inked in a question mark beside this job. Her mother, on the other hand, was listed as a caretaker at the Adelaide Zoo, located in the Botanic Gardens.

At the very bottom of the last page, it gave more details about their current information since January of this year.

Monica Granger, alive and still working at the Adelaide Zoo.
Wendell Granger, dead. "Passed away after long-term illness" (Details not provided due to non-magical nature).

I continued to stare at his name until my Death Eater doorman came to get me for the night.