Prologue
His mother’s lips said it was a great honor, and her face was appropriately serene, but he knew her tells: a hand twitch she tried to hide by clasping them together, her fingers brushing over her wedding band, and the very very slight sway when she tried to stand still. She would never be direct. His aunt said they all learned Occlumency as soon as they could—a twelve, thirteen, fourteen. Otherwise nothing was safe, not even in your head, she cackled, and then she began to cry. She was like that after the second bottle.
His mother told him to dress in all black, and insisted on helping him with the buttons. Her fingers shook.
“A personal conference at sixteen,” his aunt said, lounging on his bed. “What an honor.”
“Bella,” his mother said sharply.
“It’s an honor.” He felt them have a pointed stare-off. They were having a lot of those. Like when his aunt tried to sit in his father’s seat for dinner.
“I didn’t say it wasn’t.” His mother sounded polite, but firm.
"Your reticience is noted," Aunt Bella hissed. "Not only by me, why do you think our favor has fallen so? Why do you think that—"
“Please leave us.” His mother pointed towards the door. She crossed her arms.
His aunt looked hurt. She lurched forward, to get off the bed, or stumble towards her sister, Draco couldn't say, but his mother had clearly had enough. She flicked her wand and his aunt was thrown out of the room, wine bottle smashing against the far wall.
"Tell Miri to clean up," she ordered, and shut the door. He could hear his aunt singing to the portraits, and cackling. They waited for her to wander out of earshot before leaving.
His mother kept her hand on his back as they walked to his father’s study. It wasn’t his anymore. Draco had heard the portraits talking. Even if his father left Azkaban…there was talk of turning Draco from Heir to Head at seventeen. He hoped that wasn’t the case. It had been hard enough at the one visit they’d been allowed. He didn’t—he didn’t want to see his father again like that.
For the past few days, the study had been holding an honored guest, who would soon be leaving England again with his most devoted servant, because they had been tipped off about the coming raids. They would return for the New Year with reinforcements. It was a great honor, his mother kept saying. We have been chosen. Then she would rub her wedding ring, and Draco would know she was talking just to be heard, and not to say anything.
The Dark Lord was not seated. He stood in front of the fireplace, the snake making lazy circles around the base of his cloak.
“Hello, Draco.”
Draco bowed, the way his mother had showed him. When you talk to him, his mother had said, look him in the eye only if he commands, and think of the sea. His aunt grudgingly admitted that he was strong enough at Occlumency to hold his ground, but his mother was still worried. She told him that it was because nervousness displeased the Dark Lord, but Draco knew better. So Draco thought of the sea. He didn't know how to push his mother out of his mind yet, so it was the least he could do.
The Dark Lord began to speak. He had an honor to bestow on Draco. A blessing, if so he chose. “I have done this before only once, to your mother’s family, and was cruelly disappointed. But you are not your mother’s son, are you? You are your father’s.”
Ocean, big, blue, waves, foam, tide, beach, sand, wet, clouds, rain. I love the ocean. I went to the ocean with Selma. I went with my parents. Toes on the surf. Cold on the sand.
“I am rebuilding my kingdom, and I need your faith, and your hard work, and I am putting my very precious hope in your name.”
We used to have a cottage by the sea, in France. I quite liked it there. I wanted a day out there instead of my seventh-birthday party.
“Your family’s loyalty has been tainted by a number of regrettable errors. So I offer you a great cleansing. Rid your House of your blasphemies. You might find the task daunting, but the glory would be great. I want you to cleanse Hogwarts for me.”
Once when I was six my mum and my dad took me out to the ocean on a clear sunny day and I played with a crab I found on the beach it had one missing leg and I cried I said how can he walk and my dad said Watch and then Reparo and then the crab had all its legs—
“For how can we ensure a rotten tree won’t produce rotten fruit?”
And I watched it skitter back under the waves and I laughed and I laughed—
“For how can we enter a strong man’s house, if we have not destroyed the strong man?”
And we had cucumber-and-cream cheese sandwiches on white bread, and there was sand in my hair we had to wash out in the bath.
“You are my servant,” the Dark Lord whispered, “chosen to purge the meddling Albus Dumbledore, to restore Hogwarts to a bastion of purity.”
We sold the cottage when I was nine, so my parents could buy a “proper country house,” but a proper house has the family portrait in it. And a portrait means we're not ourselves anymore.
“It is a great honor to do this, and restore the Malfoy name, and reunite your House. All will be forgiven.”
But we still go to Mallorca. It’s nice there. Maybe we will go this summer.
“Look at me, Draco,” the Dark Lord said. Draco did. He focused on the reflection of himself in those snakelike eyes. “This is the greatest honor I can give. Become my loyal servant, and reap the reward.”
He looked down. Why did I go to Hogwarts? I should have gone to Beauxbatons like my mother wanted me to.
“I said, look at me,” the Dark Lord snarled. Then he tried to smile, but it didn’t express any kindness, or joy. “Remember, Draco, your father’s errors are your errors, and your mistakes are your father’s. You do not want to disobey. You do not want to fail.”
At this Draco lifted his head. “My Lord?”
“I would hate to have to waste pure blood. And your mother, and your father, and your dearest aunt. But I cannot have it any other way. Your father promised the wands of House Malfoy, and your grandfather promised the wands of House Black.”
“You mean…” His head was spinning. Kill Albus Dumbledore? Or—die. And watch his family die? He wanted his mother to step in.
“I tire of repeating myself, Draco,” the Dark Lord sighed. “Severus tells me you are a gifted student. Surely this task should come easy to you. Now give me your arm.”
The last statement rang with magic, and Draco’s left arm moved of its own accord. He didn’t dare fight it, but he didn’t understand how he was doing it; he wasn’t doing it. The Dark Lord pushed his sleeve up and pointed a pale finger at a spot on his forearm just under the elbow.
“Mosmorde,” the Dark Lord whispered. The fire in the hearth crackled and turned a sickly green. The room seemed to bend and stretch, shadows growing longer, darkness growing darker. Nagini multiplied: one snake to two to four to ten to many, slithering around him and the Dark Lord in a hushed figure eight. He smelled something burning, and watched, with horror, as inky black lines began to appear in his skin, carving the shape of a skull and a serpent. It was painful, and icy cold. He tried not to wince.
“I am expecting greatness from you, Draco Malfoy,” he said, as if this was a conference with a professor. As if Draco had just been assigned an extra assignment, or a redo on an essay, or he'd actually attended the bloody wretched career meeting with Snape. A tête-à-tête. About killing the most powerful wizard on his home turf. Because the Dark Lord couldn’t mean that, right? Draco was underage. He couldn't...no one...not Dumbledore. He couldn't mean for Draco to succeed.
“Come, Nagini,” the Dark Lord hissed, and swept himself up in the folds of his cloak, his snake wrapping around him, and then he disappeared, leaving only a faint after smell of slightly rotten fruit.
Draco felt like he was going to collapse, but he knew better than that. They were in front of the wide-eyed portrait of Abraxas Malfoy, so his mother did not embrace him. She gripped his arm in a way that looked light, but felt reassuring. It was the best she could do.
“It is a great honor.” Her voice was funny and tight.
“A great honor,” intoned the portrait of Abraxas, and the rest of the portraits in the room followed, “for which you have been chosen.” He heard a whispering in the hall. He imagined what they were saying. Draco has been chosen for a great honor. The Heir. The Heir to our House. Through the portraits in the Manor, to the dusty and empty House of Black, and even to select ears in Hogwarts itself.
“It is a great honor.” The word honor cloyed on his tongue. His mother escorted him back to his room and he kept his face blank to the whispering portraits in the halls, trying to think about the sea, and failing.