Draco
What a fucking waste of his time this all was… they may as well set up his cell beside his father’s now. He had no doubt he’d be a long-term resident by Yule.
The late-night chill of the open-air corridor sent a shiver down his spine as he wandered the blaringly silent castle. The only sound the click of his oxfords echoing against the stone floor nearly in sync with the pounding of his heart pulsing within his ears.
Of course, he couldn’t have a regular fucking meeting like everyone else. Blaise had said his meeting had just been between him and McGonnagall. Theo had said the same. They had discussed their courses and their plans for the future.
That was the crux of it all though.
He had no future. A diviner would tell him his future would contain nothing but a frozen stone floor surrounded by barren walls blanketed by the reverberated screams of his fellow prisoners.
The words of his probation Auror replayed in a haunting loop over and over again.
“If you so much as breathe in a way that I don’t like, I will cart your arse right back to daddy before you can so much as blink, Malfoy. Do you understand me? As I said when they decided to give you a chance and send you back to school, I see you. You’re nothing but a little fucking death eater placing blame on mummy and daddy for your actions. I’m just waiting for the day I can bind your hands and drag you from this castle.”
If McGonagall hadn’t given the man one of her more withering glares, he suspected that the Auror would’ve drawn his wand on him right there in her office.
He approached the potions classroom in the dungeons, unsure of when he had made the decision to travel down so many levels, and paused outside the door.
How many times had he visited this room late into the night, to sit in Severus’s office in complete silence as his godfather marked assignments? Even before he had been forced to take the mark, that office had always been one of the few places he felt as though he could let down his guard and simply be. He missed him.
He stood there staring at the door entirely lost in memories and grief, only returning to his body when he felt the gentle trickle of a tear begin to roll down his cheek.
Quickly he wiped it away with the back of his hand.
Malfoys did not cry, the mantra echoed in his father’s voice.
He allowed himself another breath before turning on his heels to return to his dormitory.
He rounded a corner towards the staircase only to find himself nose-to-nose with a grinning Oliver Rivers.
“Well, well, we’ve been looking for you, Malfoy.”
That was when he noticed there was another boy beside him, wand in hand. The look on their faces told him everything he needed to know.
“Down here plotting to off another headmaster, you piece of death eater shite?” the other boy taunted. He recognized the boy, but he wasn’t in his year. Merlin, what was his name? It wasn’t important at the moment.
“Leave me the fuck alone, Rivers,” he tried to channel his annoyed, unbothered tone as he moved to step backward for an escape but the other boy had stepped in holding his wand against his neck, forcing him back against the dungeon wall.
“I’d watch my mouth if I were you, Malfoy, or Darren here would just love an opportunity to repay you for what your family did to his aunt last year.”
Darren… That was the other boy’s name. Darren Gallagher. He was a seventh year in Hufflepuff if he recalled.
“I don’t know anything about your bloody aunt, but if you don’t remove your wand from my throat-”
“You’ll what?” Gallagher asked, “You’ll run to McGonagall? You’ll hex me? You’ll curse me? How far are you willing to go, Malfoy? Should we put it to the test? I quite think we’d all be better off if you were six feet under, but Azkaban will do. It’s where you belong you evil prick.”
He felt the wand press in harder against his skin. “They never did find her, but I know you had something to do with it. You probably fucking killed her yourself.”
“Who the fuck are you talking about? You’re deranged,” Draco drawled.
“CHARITY! CHARITY BURBAGE! SAY HER NAME! ADMIT IT! YOU FUCKING MURDERED HER!” the boy’s spittle raining against his face.
Draco’s stomach dropped. He hadn’t had anything to do with the death of their former muggle studies professor, but he had been present when she’d died. That particular scene had a permanent place in the rotation of nightmares that haunted him each night. The sound of her pleading for help atop his dining room table before the Dark Lord silenced her with an avada followed by the horrid, indescribable vision of Nagini slithering across the table, devouring her slowly.
He steeled his gaze, “I’ve never killed anyone. Now unhand me.” He was going to be sick. He needed to get away.
Rivers stepped in further, “You’re a filthy fucking liar Malfoy and we all know it. Why Potter testified for you, I’ll never understand. You don’t deserve to be here.” His sentence punctuated with the splat of a slimy glob of spit hitting his cheek before he was shoved hard and his back hit the ground.
“Shit, I think I hear Peeves, let’s get out of here,” he heard Rivers say to the younger boy before they turned and raced down the hall away from him.
Once he was certain they would not be returning, his shoulders sagged and he braced himself against the wall behind him. His panic roiled in his gut. He quickly stood and hurried for the nearest bathing chambers.
He practically threw himself onto the tile as his stomach emptied itself into the porcelain bowl for several long moments. His eyes and throat burned as he continued to heave nothing but acid. When the heaving sensation finally subsided he leaned back on his heels panting to catch his breath. Disgusting. He was covered his someone else’s spit, his own vomit, and now ruined his trousers by sitting on the floor of a bathroom.
Slowly he stood and turned to make his way over to the sink to clean himself. He nearly jumped out of his skin when he realized he wasn’t alone.
On the other side of the room, stood before a mirror, arm dripping in… was that blood?!
Maybe she hadn’t noticed him and he could slip away. He had dealt with more than enough bitching for the day.
But he couldn’t move. His feet were fixed to the spot as he stared at her as she fervently scrubbed at her skin roughly with a red-stained rag. He could see her lips moving but could make out none of the muttered words. Her hands and arm looked scarlet from the scalding water and angry scouring. His eyes narrowed to see what she was attempting to rub away.
The scar. He could make out the jagged letter d just above her wrist and he remembered. How he hadn’t seen it in person all year was a mystery to him. He saw it most nights in his sleep anyway. His aunt held the girl down against the marble floors of his drawing room, her inhuman cackling as she dragged her favorite cursed blade through her skin. Her screams pierced through his occlumency.
He had begged his mother to obliviate the memory from his mind several times. He had never felt like more of a coward than during that night.
He wouldn’t hide from it now.
He stepped up to the sink on the opposite end of the wall and went about scrubbing his face and hands of any remaining evidence of this awful day. When he was finished, he turned to find her staring at him, eyes rimmed red but full of daring accusation.
He said nothing. Only dried himself, nodded at her, and left without a word.