Chapter 54 Dudley
Chapter 54 Dudley
Draco was ripped away, Dudley tried to grab hold of him but his hands were covered in thick rope, his ankles were tied together too. He lost his balance in the shock and toppled forward off the bed, hitting his head on Draco’s side table as he floundered, unable to break his fall.
Draco was across the room from him in an instant, an invisible force dragging him violently, kicking and screaming across the floor. Rope appeared from thin air and wrapped itself tightly around Draco’s wrists and ankles. Draco could no longer kick but he was still screaming, ragged hoarse expletives in the direction of the doorway. It broke Dudley’s heart.
‘FUCK YOU! GIVE HIM BACK! Stop it! Go away! HE’S MINE! LEAVE HIM ALONE!’ Draco was rabid, spitting and writhing, tearing at the ropes around his legs. The ropes around his wrists wound like tendrils up his arms, securing them together with punishing tightness.
Dudley turned his head to see two figures enter the room and shut it with a soft click behind them. Lord Voldemort and Lucius Malfoy.
‘I am bitterly disappointed Draco.’ A tone of exasperated resignation. Like a toddler had been caught stealing from the biscuit tin.
Voldemort approached Dudley, he seemed to float.
‘What a strange choice Draco… look at this thing.’ He gestured at Dudley’s incapacitated body.
‘An ugly, overweight muggle? This is an unforgivable lapse in judgement Draco.’
Dudley couldn’t help it, his stomach tied itself in knots at the insults, they still hurt. Voldemort manipulated Dudley’s face with one of his feet, kicking it roughly one way and then the other.
‘DON’T TOUCH HIM!’ Draco spat from the other side of the room.
‘How dare you be so disrespectful.’ Lucius looked outraged and slapped Draco hard around the face.
‘How have you allowed yourself to be corrupted by this?’ Voldemort pointed at Dudley.
‘I will never understand it. You could have had your pick of the pureblooded daughters of England. Yet you’ve chosen this dirty, fat lump. He’s not even the right gender Draco. Truly… to taint your pureblood with this filth?’
‘FUCK YOU!’ Draco screamed it with more venom than he’d ever thought Draco capable of.
‘Enough.’ Lucius commanded
‘You will respect the dark lord.’ Lucius seethed at Draco.
‘Crucio!’ Lucius aimed the spell directly at Draco and it hit him with a flash of green light. The air split with Draco’s agonising scream.
Dudley knew that pain, he knew it so well, the ice cold, burning hot, bone crushing pain of the cruciatus curse. He cringed, imagining Draco’s poor body enduring that earth shattering pain.
Draco screamed and it was somehow worse to hear Draco’s pain than it was to feel it himself. Dudley felt a scream grow inside him, buzzing in his ears.
‘STOP IT!’ Dudley bellowed at Lucius.
As he shouted Dudley noticed that his bonds had disappeared, the rope was gone! Dudley began to scramble to his feet, he made it half way across the room before Voldemort hit him with a spell that knocked him clean over and the ropes were back.
Lucius had stopped torturing Draco, distracted by Dudley’s sudden break for freedom. They both stared down at Dudley, nonplussed.
‘Lucius. Take this thing away now. I never want to see it again.’ Voldemort had a tone that suggested being in the same room as Dudley was offensive to him.
‘No. Please no.’ Draco was sobbing freely, his body wracked and heaving with emotion. They were feet away from each other, but they could not touch, both were securely tied. Draco was struggling to breathe.
‘It’s okay my love. I’ll be okay. Don’t worry about me. Remember what we promised?’ Dudley didn’t know quite where he was finding his strength from. Seeing Draco so broken, he couldn’t fall apart himself, he needed to be strong now, be brave for Draco. Though he couldn’t stop the quiet tears falling from his own eyes.
‘Dudley!’ Draco’s voice was a strangled whine.
‘It’s okay. Be strong my love’ Dudley pulled the words directly from his heart.
Lucius and Voldemort watched them. Lucius looked disgusted and Voldemort quietly amused.
‘Take it away’ Voldemort instructed. Lucius stepped forward, he touched Dudley’s chest, and with a loud crack they were both gone.
Dudley slammed into some grass, he was still restrained and Lucius left him on the ground. Now he no longer had to keep himself together for the sake of Draco the emotion he had buried erupted to the surface. He let out a moan and curled into the foetal position. He laid there and let the sadness pour out of him.
Lucius was talking to someone above him but Dudley didn’t care, he couldn’t hear what they were saying he could only hear Draco’s heartbroken voice calling his name. Lucius knelt down next to him holding something, Dudley couldn’t see it clearly through his tears but Lucius asked him to touch it and the grass underneath him was quickly replaced with smooth stone.
Wind howled and the sounds of angry waves crashing against a cliff edge in the distance.
He was suddenly heavy with a sense of dread. Someone had amplified his despair and thrown it back at him. He was somewhere dark, in every sense of the word. It was eerily quiet, the silence disturbed only by the distant sound of chains and the slow drip of water slipping down the walls. Azkaban was devoid of any warmth. Dudley sat up, he was in a large triangular room. The walls were made of a dark stone, it seemed to absorb all light, making it difficult to see properly. The air was damp and heavy, Dudley felt like he was suffocating, he couldn’t catch his breath. An sense of misery and hopelessness entered his bones, so big it felt like it would never leave, despair was buried in his bones now.
Even after everything that had happened to him in the last few months Dudley had always had hope, a light in the dark. This place snuffed it out and Dudley succumbed to the wretchedness.
Lucius was across the large empty room, taking to a skinny man behind a desk. He was dirty, and wore all black. Dudley found it hard to care what they were talking about. The skinny man pointed at a door to his left and Lucius nodded.
Lucius waved his wand releasing Dudley’s feet, then he dragged him up by his hair and bundled him into the small room. Dudley tripped on the doorframe and fell back to the ground. It was even darker inside the smaller room, the ceiling was low and oppressive, and it smelled rotten and fetid. Lucius stepped through and the door behind him secured itself with a metallic clang.
Lucius rounded on him, Dudley was still tied at the wrists but his feet were now free. A voice in his head told him to stand up, face this man on his feet but it was drowned out by a much louder voice that insisted there was no point, so he stayed there on the floor. Lucius was leering down on him, for the first time Dudley found that he didn’t care, Lucius could do whatever he wanted, it could never be worse than what had already happened. Reliving the break in Draco’s voice as he said Dudley’s name for the last time.
‘Alone at last.’ Lucius teased.
Dudley gave him nothing, he had nothing left to give, he just laid there on his back staring into the blackness of the ceiling.
‘I’ve dreamed of this you know? I could never really let loose at the manor, you never know who is listening. I have to keep up appearances, as you know. But here…’ he gestured to their dismal surroundings.
‘Here we can do whatever I want, no prying eyes. I think we’re going to have a lot of fun.’
Dudley’s lack of fear was clearly irritating Lucius, his power play wasn’t working.
‘Nothing to say Dudley?’
Dudley stared straight upwards, attempting to leave his own body, if only he could will it hard enough he could leave this place and fly back to Draco.
As if he could read Dudley mind Lucius tried again.
‘He’s probably dead.
Draco, I mean. Voldemort does not abide disloyalty. Fucking a muggle? Well that’s unforgivable I’m afraid.’
That did it. Dudley began to cry again and Lucius perked up at the sound.
He knelt down over Dudley and kissed him on the mouth. Dudley let him.
‘There there Dudley, don’t cry yet, we’ve only just begun.’