The Elder Wand
Sunday, March 16th, 1997
Draco was positive that in all his sixteen years he’d never been more terrified. It felt as if with every passing second he was adding to his list of things to be worried about as he looked around at his surroundings and found, to his horror, he had no clue where he was. It was still daylight, so he had to still be in England, right?
He was being dragged across gravel, and while it reminded him of Malfoy Manor, it was also different in a way which made his thoughts yell danger danger danger despite the fact that his former home was probably the worst place to be. No, instead of hedges patrolled by his father’s brilliant albino peacocks, magnificent, yet uniformly white gardens spanned on either side of him, filled with pale roses, lilies, hydragas, azaleas, tulips, carnations, iris’, the list went on. And up ahead, Draco could see the mansion if he forced his head to lift upwards. Not quite as large as the Manor but no less magnificent, standing out starkly against the white flowers in pitch black.
There was no gate guarding this home, only massive double doors that when Yaxley strode forwards to knock on - Travers still gripping Draco tight, though he was so numb from the torture he couldn’t imagine bolting - they were pulled inaward by a skinny little elf who looked like she hadn’t been fed in weeks.
“Crouch sent us,” Yaxley barked down at her, and she bowed her head before stepping back and pulling the doors further back to allow the pair of Death Eaters and their prisoner inside.
They dropped him on the entryway floor, and Draco easily collapsed, unmoving. He was feeling better, or at least his senses were returning to him, but he didn’t want Yaxley and Travers to see this as they argued over whether they should wait for Crouch or tie him up now. He instead stayed frozen and darted his eyes around his surroundings, searching for the exits and weapons. Because he was wandless, and didn’t have a clue how to defend himself.
There was a grand staircase before them and a set of double doors to the left and an archway to the right. The only possible weapons he could make out was an umbrella in the umbrella stand - he’d seen what Harry had done with the umbrella at Grimmauld Place - a poker leaned against the fireplace through the archway, and…
He almost smirked at the sight of a sword held by a knight statue beside the archway. A real sword, if a bit blunt, but good enough to defend himself with.
Maybe even - no, he wouldn’t. He wouldn’t have to, because he didn’t have to on the Astronomy Tower, and his friends would get him long before it came to that now… right?
The Death Eater’s arguing was interrupted by a loud crack, and Draco turned his head around just enough to make out Barty Crouch Jr’s sandy blonde head out of his peripherals.
“Did you search him?”
Yes. They had when they first apparated outside of the property. “Yeah. But the wand’s gone, Barty.”
There was a long pause following Travers’ statement, which Draco, based on all he knew about Crouch - or thought he did - was surprised by. He’d expected the man to rage and shout, but then again, perhaps not all insane people were like his aunt.
Instead, Crouch ordered swiftly, “Tie him to the chair,” and he must have nodded at something because he didn’t specify with words what chair he was referring to any further, yet the pair of Death Eater’s instantly seemed to know, grabbing him by the arms and dragging him across the polished floors through the archway, into what appeared to be a drawing room, smaller and cozier than his own. He saw portraits and smaller pictures lining the walls, bookshelves, and coffee tables, but when he squinted to see what they showed, he couldn’t make them out due to the fact that someone had shattered their glass coverings.
Travers and Yaxley threw him into an armchair next to the fireplace, which sat dead and cold, but Travers lit it up in seconds with his wand while Yaxley withdrew his own to make tight cords wrap around the boy and pin his limbs down to the chair. He’d been in this position before, of course, in his own home, but that time he’d had Harry to save him.
He wasn’t so sure who he’d be able to rely on this time.
“We did find this, Barty,” said Yaxley as Crouch strode into the room, arms crossed behind his back, and removed the telescope and eyeball they’d taken out of Draco’s robe pockets. Or rather, Ademar Spinnet’s robes which he still wore, ill fitting and unnatural. Barty held out his hand to take the objects, eyeing them intently. Draco watched his reaction just as closely, but nothing could prepare him for the wide, yellow-toothed grin that spread across his face as he turned to meet Draco’s gaze dead on.
“Did you know I’m the reason he ever had to use this?” He raised the eye up, held between two fingers, before his own, as if looking through it like he did for a year. “Back when he came with his Order to arrest me. And your aunt, and the brothers, of course. They knew we’d put up a fight, but they didn’t expect me to fight, oh no,” he shook his head, lowering the eye and chuckling. “They were still reeling from the shock of it, you know?” He cast his gaze around the room, and Draco followed it to a partially intact black and white photo of a woman sitting on a picnic blanket, clapping as a little boy before her teetered and tottered through his first steps. “The son of esteemed politician Bartemius Crouch, who was on fast track for Minister, being a Death Eater? And the cause of such heinous crimes, at that? I’m sure - some part of them - they didn’t want to believe it. Positive, in fact.”
Draco knew he was. When it came to human behaviors and emotions, Crouch seemed to be a specialist, which he wasn’t the least surprised by. He’d read the old news reports in Fourth Year when they (the Quartet) were researching all they could about Crouch Sr’s son; member of the Slug Club, Prefect, Head Boy, and achiever of twelve Oustandings on his O.W.L.’s, and twelve more on his N.E.W.T.’s. The man was a genius, whether it pleased him to admit it or not.
“But fight I did, and well, I must admit. Too well for even the great Alastor ‘Mad-Eye’ Moody.” He airquoted the name and threw his head back, laughing sickly. “I took him down. Took his eye for good measure. Maybe if I escaped I would’ve had a prize…” He shakes his head, staring back into Draco’s gaze, which was imploring, searching for any cracks he could use to break free. “It would have been rightfully mine, afterall, by wizard’s dueling rights. Just like how Dumbledore’s wand is mine.”
And there was the rage, as in a second, quick as a flash, the entire chair was tipped backwards and Draco sucked in a quick breath from the shock of it. Crouch had grabbed the back of the armchair with one hand and in the other he held his wand, pressed up to the cords pulled taught around Draco’s chest.
“Where is the wand, Draco?”
Gritting his teeth, Draco spat out, “Lost it. Dropped it at the Ministry. Maybe if you hadn’t tortured me so well -”
He howled as Crouch flicked his wand and cut a thin, but deep slash right through his cheek. “You’re lying! Don’t you remember I taught you, Draco? Don’t you remember what I said to your dear friend Harry Potter last June? Maybe I should refresh your memory,” he dropped the chair so that it teetered back onto solid ground and grabbed hold of the armrests, leaning forward so he was so close to Draco’s face, bleeding and fighting so hard not to look scared, their forehead were almost touching. “‘We both know you are far smarter than that.’”
It had become a terribly hard endeavor to keep his face straight, but maybe, just maybe, if he aggravated Crouch enough he’d throw him out of these bounds to hurt him clearer and he’d find a way to bolt. He really had no other options wandless.
“Maybe when your friend there tackled me,” he jerked his chin over at Yaxley, scowling over Crouch’s shoulder, “I hit my head too hard.”
Crouch stepped back and with a harsh slash of his wand cut through all the cords at once, grabbing him by the shoulders and hauling him to his feet then throwing him to the floor. Just as Draco knew we would.
“Maybe he didn’t hit you hard enough,” he growled, fuse finally burned out, which Draco supposed was good because now he could see the glint of the sword in his peripherals as he pushed himself onto his elbows and managed to slide backwards enough to have it in his line of sight. But now that he was looking into Crouch’s eyes he realized just how wandless he was. Just how ridiculous a plan he had.
He stretched out his arm and pointed his wand right at Draco's chest, but when he muttered, “Accio wand.” It of course did nothing and Draco tilted his chin up triumphantly, managing to maintain his cocky exterior just barely. He was cracking, he could feel his very Occlumency walls crumbling, but far be it for his pride to be weak in front of Crouch.
Wiping sweat from his brow, Crouch pointed a finger at the boy and began to chuckle madly. “You…” he berated in between chuckles. “You really are getting on my nerves now… How about this?” He stood straight and began to do circles around Draco, who watched him, feeling like a cornered animal on the inside, desperately trying to remain proud on the outside.
“I’ll let you go. Oh yes, I will. I’ll give you a bit of a head start,” he stopped in front of the boy, then bent down and leaned forward so he was up in his face. “And then the chase will be on. I, Yaxley, and Travers will chase you down for days if we have to, because eventually you’ll have to show the wand, wherever you’ve hid it, and if not, then you’ll be the most perfect bait then, won’t you? And pretty soon, that wand will be mine.”
Draco didn’t even give time for himself to process those words and the shiver running down his spine to reach his toes, immediately blurting, “So you won’t give it to You-Know-Who then? That’s why you didn’t take me to him?” He lifted up his arm, shaking his sleeve down to show the Dark Mark as if Crouch needed a reminder he had it. “You never even called the Death Eaters.”
Crouch, to his credit, was also good at masking his emotions, and after the bursting of his fuse he’d immediately contained it once more, clearly, as he only frowned down at the blonde and said, “One.”
Draco creased his brow.
“Two.”
He recalled Crouch’s words from moments before and, catching sight of the sword in his peripherals, scrambled to his feet.
“Three.”
He lunged for the dull blade, struggling to rip it out of the empty knight’s grip.
“Four.”
Yaxley and Travers ran forwards, alerted, most likely, by him possibly obtaining a weapon, but Crouch held them back, and Draco stepped away from the knight armor with the sword in hand, adjusting to it, judging its weight, and how well he’d be able to use it.
“Five.”
Then he ran. Ran so that he was out of reach of the Death Eater’s voices and had no hope of knowing when they would finish counting, focussing only on sprinting up the steps and off down the halls, until he literally skidded to a halt - sliding on the polished floors in polished dress shoes he wasn’t accustomed to, and ran into a barren, wide ballroom, shutting the doors carefully and grabbing a chair and dragging it over to push against them.
Would that stop a single spell? No, but it might slow them down, and it was those thoughts Draco had to rely on. That logic, because this game of hide and seek may never end for him until Harry arrived, but if Crouch wanted him to fight, then Draco was prepared to fight for however long it may take, wandless or not.
-*-*-*-
“What are they wearing?” asked Narcissa Malfoy hours later as she stood before her fireplace, hugging herself and eyeing the tied up group of teenagers closely, but really only focusing on three of them, all dressed in identical navy blue robes.
“Ministry uniforms. Magical Maintenance, I think. Say they work there, first year of working. Fresh out of school, they say,” explained Greyback in his gravelly, dark voice. “But I promise you it’s Potter. Look at his scar!”
Harry winced as Greyback suddenly seized him by his hair and dragged him forwards, pulling along his friends with him, including an unexpected captured Dean. They were all tied in a bundle, and very recognizable save himself, as Hermione had hit him with a stinging jinx almost instantly to mask his appearance. It didn’t seem to have fazed Greyback, however, who recognized Hermione from the Prophet and Harry’s scar paired with his glasses, as well as the absurdity of a group of three traveling with four wands.
“And we found these…” Which he pointed out now, holding out the four long sticks (plus Dean’s), Dumbledore’s popping out against the others for its sheer length. Harry tensed, watching, through the slits left for vision in his puffed eyelids, the Malfoys expressions carefully, reminded of his capture in this house when he’d verbally pleaded for Lucius to think of his son and do one good thing, and by all accounts he had let them go. He could have fought back, but chose instead to let his son escape. He could only plead mentally now that he’d make the same decision as a flash of clear recognition passed over his face as he stared down at the wands, and his eyes met his wife’s for the briefest of moments.
They knew. They had to. Their own son’s wand sat there, and surely at least Lucius recognized the legendary wand of Albus Dumbledore in the stack.
“Well?” Greyback rasped and the blondes looked back at him dead in the eye.
“I don’t see it. What happened to his face?”
“A jinx. But it doesn’t matter,” Greyback dragged Harry ever closer to Lucius, standing steadfast at his marble fireplace, so that he was up close and personal with his boyfriend’s dad. “Surely you can tell?”
Even with so little vision Harry could see the turmoil wrecking apart the man’s psyche, but as his eyes flicked to something past Harry’s eyesight (his wife, no doubt) he shut his slowly opening mouth tight and frowned. Harry could practically feel Greyback’s seething behind him.
“What’re you playing at, Mr. Malfoy?” the werewolf growled.
“I haven’t a clue what you’re -”
“You know it’s him! I’m not a fool! You and your wife are planning something.” Harry felt himself get thrashed around slightly as Greyback no doubt made angry gestures to express this, and his vision blurred, but he caught flashes of Lucius’s hair, Greyback’s scruffy beard, the sparkling chandelier overhead, and the marble fireplace. All of the house looked as if it had never been touched by his flames last summer, making him despise the ruse the Death Eaters had put up that they’d abandoned the place all the more.
“If it is Potter,” Narcissa interjected in a cold and clear voice he’d once found hostile and grown to understand was just as loving as Molly Weasley’s. Not now, however. Now, this voice commanded only respect in her own home as a swing of blonde hair entered his view. “Then where is our son? He is meant to be traveling with them, isn’t he?”
“Well that’s why there’s five wands -”
“None of those belong to my son,” she stated, holding her chin high, and Harry thanked Merlin repeatedly in his head. In fact, he thought he’d never be able to thank Merlin enough for that statement. “And I ask you again; where is he?”
There was a long beat of silence where all Harry could do was watch Narcissa and Greyback stare each other down through small slits of vision, before Greyback suddenly grabbed Harry by the shirt and spun the bundle of prisoners around.
“What about the Mudblood, then?” The Malfoy’s were forced to now look down on Hermione. Thankfully, Narcissa was spared from saying anything when the drawing room door suddenly swung open and a woman’s voice spoke out. Unfortunately, it was possibly the last voice Harry wanted to hear right now.
“What is this? What’s happened, Cissy?”
Harry listened, helplessly, to the clack of Bellatrix Lestrange’s heels as she strode over to them, and peered down at Hermione through her heavily lidded eyes. He sucked in a breath through his teeth, quiet as possible, but she recognized her in a second.
“But surely… This is the Mudblood girl? This is Granger?” She looked over her shoulder at Lucius, seemingly having a staring contest with his wife with how intensely they were attempting to speak to each other with just their eyes. He quickly tore his gaze away from her to his sister-in-law, eyebrows raised in an innocent expression.
“Hm? Granger? Granger who?”
Narcissa looked as if she might kill him.
“Hermione Granger, the missing Mudblood! The friend of Potter!” Bellatrix whirled back around, staring straight at Harry now, who tried his best not to make any movements under her gaze, but even after two years she still filled him with dread to his core. “Now that I think of it… this boy…”
“Is Potter!” Greyback said, exasperated. “I’ve been trying to get these two to recognize him but they refuse to.”
“Well,” stated Bellatrix bluntly, beginning to tug back her sleeve, much to Harry’s immediate horror. “If it is Potter, the Dark Lord must be informed at once!”
“I was about to call him!” blurted out Lucius suddenly, hand springing forward and clasping around Bellatrix’s wrist, so that she couldn’t touch her Mark. “But - er - I didn’t want to jump to conclusions.” he straightened and gestured between him and Greyback, “We were just discussing how there’s only three here, and if it was Potter he’s meant to be traveling with Draco -”
“Draco, who just broke into Gringotts bank Polyjuiced as you a month ago, Lucius?” Her voice was thick with contempt, and it was clear this was a sore subject for all present, as Greyback’s lips pulled back in a yellow-toothed grin of malice, Narcissa wasting no time in boring into her sister in something almost like a glare, and Lucius paling more so than he already was.
“Now, Bella,” he said, speaking shakily but as gently as he could. “There was no need to mention that… incident.”
“But of course there was! Afterall, don’t you recall, Cissy, that the Granger girl was also Polyjuiced as you?” She turned to face her sister, still being held by Lucius, who now fully glared back.
“What are you suggesting?”
Bellatrix smiled, willfully ignorant to the increasing icy tension building in the air around her as she lifted the hand not held by Lucius palm up in a shrug. “Nothing. I’m just pointing out certain strange details such as the strangeness of these children’s choice of disguises,” she addressed the bundle of teenagers, smirking down at them all. “Tell me, where did you happen to find strands of my sister and brother-in-law’s hair?”
“That’s enough, Bella -”
“No, no, no,” Bellatrix waved her free hand at her sister, not tearing her eyes away from them. “Let them speak.”
Fortunately, Harry’s friends weren’t stupid enough to say a word, so slowly Bellatrix’s smirk morphed to a frown.
“See? They know nothing -”
“That is the Granger girl!” shrieked Bellatrix, thrashing against Lucius’s grip, which tightened ever more even as she clawed at his hand with her nails. “You can’t deny it! And that must be the Weasley boy! Which means this has to be Potter! If you were going to call the Dark Lord then call him!”
“Wait!” Narcissa called, for Bellatrix had torn out her wand from her pocket, prepared to use it against the wandless Malfoy matriarch. At once, all eyes turned to her, expectant. She stood for a moment, lips moving soundlessly, still clearly developing an idea, before she suddenly said, “We’ll all be dead if we bring the Dark Lord here and that’s not Potter. It would be best to hide him away in the cellar for now, until that stinging jinx wears off. In the meantime, we can question these two for where Draco is. The Dark Lord would be most pleased to be gifted with both the boy and news of the whereabouts of his sought after wand, wouldn’t he?”
Harry, who was gradually believing Narcissa was on their side, had to praise her for her wits, because the prospect of angering Voldemort clearly struck fear into Bellatrix’s eyes, but the possibility of presenting him with Harry and Dumbledore’s wand both on a silver platter pleased her greatly.
“Very well,” she flicked her eyes threateningly to Lucius who stepped back cautiously, letting her go. Free of him, she immediately slashed her wand at the robes tying the teenagers together and waved over the snatchers. Behind her, Narcissa released a sigh she was sure her sister wouldn’t see and Lucius stepped comfortingly closer to her.
“Throw these two down to the cellar,” she shoved Harry and Dean forwards, and they stumbled into the pair of Snatchers waiting arms, immediately beginning to be dragged across the floor. “And make sure that boy isn’t harmed! If it’s Potter…” She shook her head, and Harry could just make out when he lolled his head a certain way, her malicious expression as she turned back to Ron and Hermione, watching him go in horror.
Harry just saw Bellatrix pull a silver knife from within her robes and raise it an inch from Hermione’s face, before he was being dragged down the stairs - at least not thrown, as he had been the last time he’d come here - to the cellar he knew too well.
“Reckon she’ll let me have a bit of the girl when she’s finished with her?” Greyback said once they’d reached the bottom of the steps, dropping the boys but making sure to point his wand at them threateningly as he pulled the heavy wooden door open. “I’d say I’ll get a bite or two. Well, at least she’ll get to die with her boyfriend.”
With that he shoved the two of them in the dank and musty cellar filled in total darkness and slammed the cellar door.
Almost immediately, the long drawn out scream of a girl came down from the drawing room above, and Harry had to bite his lip down hard to keep from shouting himself as he listened to not only that, but to Ron’s shouts of horror from above. With the darkness, it felt as if he was back in the cave, and Hermione was in pain and she’s going to die and it’s all his fault -
No. They needed a plan. Narcissa Malfoy had done all she could to get Harry down here in the first place. She clearly felt he’d find a way to escape from here, so he needed to find one. There had to be a way.
“Who’s there?” A faint voice called out suddenly, and Harry and Dean both spun around, squinting into the darkness. A shadow was moving. “I saw the door open,” the faint voice continued, “Who is it?”
“Luna?” Dean called out and it was Luna, Harry was positive of it. He knew that lofty voice anywhere.
“Yes, it’s me! Oh no, I didn’t want you to be caught!” Luna said, and Harry truly felt bad for the sadness in her voice.
“It’s Dean and Harry,” he said, trying his best to continue to ignore the voices from above and squinting into the darkness, trying to make out Luna. “We were caught by Snatchers. Ron and Hermione are upstairs -”
He cut himself off when he suddenly heard Bellatrix’s voice, interested in what she was saying.
“I’ll ask you again! Where is the wand? Does Draco have it?”
“Yes! But we don’t know where it - No, stop, PLEASE!” Hermione’s screams filled the air and Harry winced as Ron’s shouts echoed it.
“You’re lying! Why are you wearing those robes, boy? Break into the Ministry again?”
“Let her go -” This time Ron howled and Hermione cried out his name. When Luna spoke again, her voice was even fainter, and Harry could tell she was worried about them.
“What is she angry about?”
“They don’t know where Draco is. They want his wand but er - trouble is we don’t know where…” Harry hesitated, then thought it best to keep the fact that they did indeed have Draco’s wand a secret, even to his friends. “Either is.”
“Answer my questions or I’ll run your girlfriend through with this knife!”
“NO! HERMIONE!”
Rising to his feet, Harry started to feel his way along the walls for any cracks or crevices. Any way out whatsoever.
“There’s no way out, Harry,” said Luna, no doubt hearing the sound of his palms slapping against the stone. “The cellar is completely escape-proof. Remember Cedric was down here all year, and Mr. Ollivander has been here for a long time too. He’s tried everything.”
“Ollivander?” Harry turned around from the stone, squinting into the darkness. He could see only Luna’s shadow a few feet away from him. “Is he down here?”
“FINE WE BROKE IN!”
“What were you there for? ANSWER ME! CRUCIO!”
Hermione’s screams were so cutting, Harry felt he was in physical pain. This was worse than the cave, when he’d known she had consented to the pain hse was experiencing and had ordered him to keep moving. When he could at least see her, hold her, comfort her. Now he was alone, in complete darkness, a room sealed completely, and his best friends were getting tortured far out of his reach. Draco was lost, maybe in even more pain, and Harry was all alone.
Scrambling, he turned his pockets inside out for anything, coming up with only his H.O.O.D. coin, glowing in the darkness enough that he could finally make out Luna’s defined shape, along with Dean and Ollivander’s, crouched in the corner, thin and frail.
“Ooh, is that your old HOOD coin?” Luna asked, stepping closer and he nodded, squinting to read what it said, as there was no reason why it would be glowing, before the light faded and he wouldn’t be able to.
‘I’m at the Crouch mansion. He wants to use me as bait for you. Won’t call Riddle.’
Harry breathed an audible sigh of relief. Draco was alive, and even if he was with Crouch, even if he was bait, that fact alone was enough to give him the strength to step closer to Luna, tucking the coin - which had faded out again - into his pocket, and ask, “Is there any supplies here? Anything we could use?”
“An old nail,” she said. “We use it to break stuff, it’s really sharp. There’s a water jug and a food tin they refill to keep us alive, but no, not much. I told you, Harry, we’ve tried -”
“What about the windows?” Harry recalled Draco mentioning windows in his stories of the cellar he’d tell him on nights at the Burrow when he couldn’t sleep, scared of the dark and fearing when he woke up he’d be back there.
“They sealed them when I tried to climb up to them.” Luna explained, which also explained the complete and total darkness they were now subjected to.
Hermione screamed worse than ever.
“What did you take from the Ministry, you filthy little Mudblood?”
“Nothing I swear! Please! We didn’t take anything -” She was cut off by her own screams.
“HERMIONE!”
“Not a single thing? Hah! Likely story…” The screams continued on, and they listened breathlessly to Bellatrix’s clacking heels. She was circling like a prowling lioness around Harry’s friends, he knew, thinking of her next question. “What’s this around your neck, then?”
Harry felt his heart drop to the bottom of his soul. Earlier, before the Snatcher could break into the tent and grab them, Hermione had hurriedly grabbed the locket and thrown it over her neck. If Bellatrix took it… All that hard work… All that searching…
Without another second thought Harry ran full force at the door, slamming against it. The voices and footsteps halted. Panting for air and rubbing his shoulder, Harry knew he’d gotten their attention, so ran back and forwards at the door once more.
“What was that?” came Lucius Malfoy’s voice. “Did you hear -”
“Of course I heard it!” Bellatrix shrieked. “Wormtail! Go and check what that noise was!”
There were more footsteps overhead and Harry backed away from the door, tightening his fists, and turning his head slightly to whisper to Dean and Luna, but keeping his eyes on the door. “We’re getting out of here, but we’re not without a fight. I’ll tackle Wormtail from the top. Dean, get him from the legs. Luna, grab the door and keep it open.”
“I should tackle him from above,” came Dean’s voice from the shadows behind him and Harry turned to see a tall shadowy figure getting closer.
“What?”
“I’m taller than you,” his fellow Gryffindor friend said. “I’ll take his head.”
Harry couldn’t help but grin, to himself of course, Dean wouldn’t be able to see it, proud of the boy he’d taught along with so many others a year ago.
“Yeah… that makes sense…” Wormtail’s footsteps thudded down the stairs. “Get ready…” He walked to one side of the door and knew Dean was doing the same on the other side, judging by his shadow, and could even see he was guiding Luna along, tugging gently at her hand.
“Stand back,” called Wormtail’s voice through the heavy wood, raspy and wheezy. “Stand away from the door. I’m coming in.” With that he pushed the door open and for a split second Wormtail stared into the near empty cellar, save for Ollivander, watching the scene with wide if watery eyes. Then Harry locked eyes with Dean across from him, nodded, and lunged forward at Wormtail.
Harry dived for his legs and Dean tackled him behind, tucking his arm under his neck and pulling him down. The force of both easily brought the small man down in seconds and Harry grabbed his wand arm and slammed it onto the floor, Dean covering his mouth to muffle his cries.
As Harry scrambled to try and get Wormtail’s wand out of his fingertips and avoid the sparks it was spraying, he suddenly felt all air sharply cut off from him and gasped, though little air was sucked through his lips; Wormtail’s silver hand, brilliantly shining in the light from the doorway Luna was keeping open as told, had closed around Harry’s throat.
“What was it, Wormtail?” called Lucius Malfoy, voice easily drifting in through the open doorway.
“Er - Everything’s clear!” Dean shouted, trying his best to imitate Wormtail’s wheeze. “I’m punishing the prisoner’s now!”
“You’re going to kill me?” Harry let go of Wormtail’s arm and clawed at the metal fingers, glaring into the pair of watery eyes staring wide eyed at him. The eyes of the man who betrayed his parents. “After I saved your life?” Wildly, he recalled the debt he’d mentioned back in the Shrieking Shack. “You owe me, Wormtail!”
And then, miraculously, those silver fingers slackened, and, shocked, Harry scrambled back and onto his feet, staring down in shock as much as Dean did, still pinning him to the floor. They watched as those small watery eyes widened, just as shocked at what he’d just done, staring down at his hand as if it had a mind of its own.
And maybe it did, because as Harry bent down to slip his wand out from his slackened grip, he saw Pettigrew’s eyes dilate. Harry’ own eyes followed his gaze to the hand, and he gasped, horrorstruck. The fingers were moving towards his own throat, and he highly doubted this was any voluntary suicide.
“No -” Instantly, Harry was tugging at the hand to pull it back but it was both too strong and the metal too slick, he fell backwards when it suddenly pushed right back and watched on helplessly, Dean scrambling away to Luna’s side, just as horrified, as Pettigrew was strangled by Voldemort’s ‘gift.’ And Harry understood everything, all at once as he watched the scene; at a single moment’s hesitation, this weapon made by the Dark Lord himself was designed to turn against its user, which would be all too easy for such a coward.
“No! Dean, Luna, help me!” All three of them, selflessly, lunged at Wormtail this time to pry the hand off, but not even Dean raising Pettigrew’s wand and pointing it at it helped. The man was turning blue, and then pureple, and within seconds his opposite hand, also frantically grabbing at the silver one, had dropped to his side, slack, and his eyes were rolling back to his head.
With a final twitch and then a howl from Ron and Hermione combined above, he lay still on the cellar floor.
For a moment, the group was silent, then Harry pushed himself to a stand, glaring up at the ceiling, where his friend’s scream continued to bounce off of the walls.
“C’mon,” He nodded to the open door. “Let’s get out of here.”
Luna ran to help Ollivander to his feet and together the four of them crept up the cellar stairs and down the corridor back to the drawing room, silent as could be. Harry crouched behind the crack in the door, peering into the room, seeing with his full eyes now. He knew the swelling in his face had to be all but gone, and would be completely gone in minutes.
The Malfoy’s were standing at the stone fireplace, Narcissa holding onto her husband’s hand, pressed against his side, and Lucius gazing on, pale and frightened. The Snatchers even looked perturbed by the sight at the center of the room, where Bellatrix stood over Hermione’s body, Slytherin’s locket dangling in her fist, Ron laid beside her and clearly weak, but still stretched a shaky hand out to his love.
“What is this?” She demanded of the two.
“Heirloom…” Hermione wheezed.
“You expect me to believe that? This is the mark of Salazar Slytherin! See this Cissy?” She dangled the necklace before her sister’s eyes, which squinted upon it. No one in the room seemed to recognize the artifact, thank Merlin…
“What is it, boy? Why did you want it? Answer me!” She pointed her wand at Hermione and once more she released a heart wrenching scream, writhing on the floor. Ron turned over on his side, eyes wild, reaching for her, but when the cold of the knife suddenly met his chin, he froze.
“It’s Draco’s. He found it,” Ron coughed hard, and Harry was horrified to see blood run down his chin. He noticed his other hand was held tight against his gut, and had a horrifying realization that Bellatrix must’ve wounded him with the knife, maybe on purpose, or quite possibly by accident in a fight to protect Hermione. “Slytherin and all that. He gave it to us. Before…”
“Before he vanished? Vanished where?” Bellatrix tightened her grip on the knife, pointing it at his neck now. “Answer me, Weasley. What happened to my dear nephew?”
“He ran…” Hermione croaked, head just barely lolling from side to side. “He ran before they caught us…”
“To where?!”
“I dunno…”
“CRUCIO!” Clearly just out of anger and spite this time, Bellatrix hit the both of them with a torture curse na dHarry turned away from the sight, not bearing to see it, instead focusing upon his companions, and building a plan.
“Give me Wormtail’s wand,” he whispered, holding out his hand, and Dean dropped it in his palm obediently. “I can hit Bellatrix with a disarming charm, but I’ll need you two to take care of the Snatchers. If you can tackle them, I think that’ll be enough. They aren’t the most competent. Hopefully I’ll be able to get Greyback in time, too.”
“What about the Malfoy’s?” Dean asked.
“They won’t attack us,” Harry instantly blurted but also realized almost immediately they wouldn’t believe his reasoning, and it was too long a tale for him to try to explain in whispers, so instead he reasoned, “Malfoy doesn’t have a wand.” He knew Narcissa was formidable, but neither Luna nor Dean would know that.
The screams faded, and he turned back to the crack in the door. Bellatrix was circling the two, preparing her next question. For once, Harry didn’t listen, instead aiming Wormtail’s wand through the crack in the door at Bellatrix’s wand hand, concentrating his hardest, remembering all of Lupin’s teachings, and whispering, “Expelliarmus.”
Bellatrix’s wand soared through the air at the same time Luna pushed the door open and she and Dean sprinted out, and as they tackled the two nearest Snatchers, Harry sprang forwards and caught it from the air, pointing it towards Greyback and bellowing out, “Expelliarmus!” catching his wand too.
Then he was yelling “Stupefy!” at him and all of the Snatchers, along with Luna and Dean using the Quartet’s wands, along with Dean getting his own back. Soon body’s littered the floor all around them, and Harry had just turned his wand on Bellatrix only to see a sight that made his heart drop.
“STOP OR SHE DIES!”
Bellatrix had lifted up Hermione and was holding her silver knife to her throat, close enough to break skin. Ron lay unconscious at her feet, not even stirring anymore, and Harry had a sinking suspicion Hermione was unconscious too.
“Drop your wands. Drop them, or we’ll see exactly how filthy her blood is!”
Harry, Dean, and Luna, all holding wands up straight before them towards her head, didn’t move an inch.
“I said, drop them!” this time Bellatrix, previously breathless, screeched, pressing the blade close enough to Hermione’s throat that beads of blood appeared.
“Okay!” He panicked, throwing Wormtail’s wand to the floor. Dean dropped his, and Luna’s dropped one he recognized as Dumbledore’s, which would have been funny in literally any other situation.
“Good!” She instantly looked pleased. “Now, Lucius, pick them up!”
“You do not get to give us orders in our own house!” Narcissa shouted, glaring at her sister, who rolled her eyes like a child.
“This again! Cissy, this is no time for arguing, now pick up those wands, Lucius.”
He moved forwards but his wife tugged him back by the hand. Harry held his breath because, well, this was it, wasn’t it? This was the moment where Lucius chose a side, as Narcissa clearly already had.
“Stupefy!” Or Luna could whip out Ron’s wand, hidden behind her back, and cause Bellatrix to drop to the floor, the knife clattering across the wood, Hermione dropping beside her boyfriend, limp and unmoving as he was.
Instantly, Harry and Dean dove for their wands and raised them up in time to meet Narcissa, standing in front of her husband protectively, with her own raised. The air was tense for a long minute, then, and Harry stared into the couple’s faces, finding all the features that reminded him so painfully of Draco, alone and hurt at the Crouch mansion. But he knew, deep down, they cared about him just as much as he did. He could see it in those gray and sapphire eyes, passionate but sad.
They reminded him so much of Draco’s, it was almost painful.
“Where is he?” Narcissa was the first to break the silence, the whisper cutting through the tense air like a knife, and following it, Luna lowered her wand, Dean’s quavered a fraction, and the couple’s expressions softened from cold stone to warm love.
“Crouch’s house. He kidnapped him,” said Harry, who couldn’t help the swell of joy at the flicker of anger flashing their features at the name.
Slowly, Narcissa lowered her own wand and walked over to where Dumbledore’s lay on the floor. Everyone simply flinched when she bent on one knee to pick it up in her hand, no doubt thinking all Harry had in nights where he stared at it in Draco’s hand in the bed across from him, turning every once in a while. Such a simple weapon, to have caused such pain.
“This is it? This is what he’s after?”
“Yes.”
Rising, Narcissa strode to Harry and held it out. A peace offering, which her husband tensed at, taking one step forward, then hesitating.
“Maybe it would be best, for Draco, to just -”
“No,” Harry turned and looked rigidly at Lucius Malfoy, quickly picking up the wand from Narcissa’s hand before she too hesitated. “If your ‘Dark Lord’ gets this it will be over for all of us. I won’t be able to stop him, and do you honestly think he’s going to let you three live? Even if he does and only kills Draco, he’ll make sure every second of your lives is filled with terror and grief,” Harry paused, breathed in a deep sigh, then asked the request he’d been developing ever since he realized Narcissa was on their side. “I need you to apparate us to the Crouch mansion, then call You-Know-Who there. He’ll see Crouch has let your son and I go, and hopefully… He’ll no longer find him useful.”
The pair’s eyes widened, and he could feel Dean and Luna’s shocked expressions on him too. “You want Crouch to die?” Lucius exclaimed.
“I need him to,” said Harry, trying to convince himself of the fact too as he spoke. “He won’t stop until he’s the first to get this wand,” he held up Dumbledore’s for emphasis. “And I don’t think he’ll be so loyal to your Dark Lord after that.” A realization suddenly sparked in his head, and he took a cautious step forward, holding his hand out, it brushed against Narcissa’s, frozen in the air from when she’d held up the wand. She was startled, but didn’t turn away.
“He put your son’s name in the Goblet of Fire. From day one all he’s wanted is to kill him, and he won’t stop until he has. And I think…” Harry sighed deeply. “I think Draco’s running out of energy to keep on running. So please, for the sake of that boy, help us.”
He looked directly in Narcissa’s eyes, but she pulled away, because of course she would say yes, but for this to work they needed two yeses, so she turned to meet the eyes of her husband, staring at the Potter boy in wonder.
“Draco adores you,” he blurted, catching Harry off guard so much he stepped back an inch. “He always has. But I never thought… You love him, don’t you?”
It wasn’t really a question, because Harry was certain Lucius knew the answer, so a small little nod would be enough to suffice because well… Whenever he tried to say the words lately, they just got clogged in his throat. He wouldn’t bother trying.
“Then…” Lucius breathed in through his mouth and nose, deep and carrying all the tension in the room with it, so when he spoke, it had truly shattered. “Let’s go save my son.”
Narcissa beamed like the sun and embraced him in a tearful hug, and Harry himself even felt like crying.
-*-*-*-
If asked to explain the past couple hours, Draco would be caught at a loss. All he knew was that he was sure he’d broken many records in running, outrun some of the once well perceived brands of racing brooms, and now felt as if he required new lungs because of it. Not only that but there was now blood on the blunt sword he wasn’t sure belonged to Yaxley, Travers, Crouch, or even himself, and more blood he was certain was his own scattered across his body from the recent running he was now doing through the thick briars surrounding the Crouch mansion.
Who would surround their home in briars? The Crouch’s reasonably, but it still felt quite over the top and ridiculous to even a posh boy like Draco, though he couldn’t dwell on it much as he was fighting for his life and all that.
Eventually in his running and in dimly acknowledging the fact that the sky was so dark it had to be well into the night now, Draco ran square into his boyfriend Harry Potter, who he was positive had to be a hallucination by the shock of such an encounter.
“Harry?” he croaked, feeling the hands on his arms and smelling that woody smell he didn’t truly appreciate until his first Potions class this year, and now wished would never go away because of how grateful he was to have it back. “Harry!” With that he fell into his arms and sobbed, feeling all the terror of running for your life in a house far from your own could slip away from him.
“I’m right here Draco, and I’m never leaving. Not ever again…”
He didn’t notice his parents watching many, man feet away. He didn’t see Yaxley, with a slash through his arm bursting with fresh blood, Travers, with a deep cut along his cheek, or Crouch, un-cut by his sword but bruised, stumbling through the briars and freezing at the sight of the blonde pair. He was too busy hugging his boyfriend.
And then he was being apparated away by an old man for a moment he thought was Garrick Ollivander - but that was impossible - and fell asleep on the journey to someplace called the Forest of Dean (he’d heard a groggily waking Hermione suggest it after seeing Dean Thomas brought the idea to her head). This meant he just missed the arrival of Lord Voldemort on his way to at last finish off his most faithful servant for failing on more time, thinking he’d gained power over Albus Dumbledore’s wand in the process.
He had no way of knowing said wand was being carried far, far away from him at that very moment, placed back safely and curled tightly in the palm of Draco’s limp hand, its loyalties lying with the blonde and bleeding teen.
But he did meet a pair of green eyes across the expanse of sharply thorny bushes, glowing like beacons under the night sky, before they disappeared out of thin air. Not before Harry Potter made sure to raise up the golden pendant before his eyes; a subtle sign, like the serpentine S engraved on its surface.
Maybe he was leading him directly to Hogwarts, his next destination. He had to, no matter what battle would occur there, because the duel between the green and red was far more inevitable.
-*-*-*-
Monday, March 17th
Carefully, Dean propped Hermione’s head up with her bundled up Magical Maintenance robes, Luna doing the same beside him with Ron’s.
Sitting on a log across from them and beyond the simple fire they’d lit between them, Harry sat beside Ollivander, Draco leaned against him, drifting in and out of bouts of sleep, already glossy all over from Hermione’s dittany supply.
Harry watched him with pure love and adoration, before drifting down to stare at the wand in his fingertips and thinking of something, suddenly.
“Mr. Ollivander?” The old man, bent over a cup of tea they’d brewed using the tea set in the rucksack which Narcissa had given back along with the locket (which currently sat around Harry’s neck, cold against his chest, and he swore he could feel it pulsing, as if with a heartbeat of its own), perked up, eyebrows raised at the boy.
“Yes, Mr. Potter?”
“Could you er… identify these?” he asked, holding out Wormtail and Bellatrix’s wands.
Carefully, the wandmaker picked up the black, slightly curved wand, flexing it, turning it in his fingers. Harry was reminded of watching Draco carefully examine Dumbledore’s for hours on end.
“Walnut and dragon heartstring,” he said. “Twelve-and-three-quarter inches. Unyielding. This wand belonged to Bellatrix Lestrange.”
“And this one?”
He watched as Ollivander carefully examined Wormtail’s, frowning slightly as he recognized it. “Chestnut and dragon heartstring. Nine-and-a-quarter inches. Brittle. I was forced to make this shortly after my kidnapping, for Peter Pettigrew. You should know,” he looked Harry directly in the eye with watery blue ones. “These wands have changed their allegiances. Do you recall who won them?”
“‘Won them?’” Harry recalled Draco telling him how Dumbledore had ‘won’ his wand from Grindelwald, and Grindelwald from Gregorovitch before him. How Crouch was certain he’d be killed for suspicion of possession over Dumbledore’s. (How now he maybe was, though Harry had had no vision into Voldemort’s mind to confirm this fact)
“If you took it then it may be yours. Of course, the manner of taking matters. Much also depends upon the wand itself. In general, however, where a wand has been won, its allegiance will change.”
Harry mulled over his words. In general… “You talk about wands like they’ve got feelings. Like they can think for themselves.”
“The wand chooses the wizard,” said Ollivander, leaning forward imploringly. “That much has always been clear to those of us who have studied wandlore.”
“A person can still use a wand that hasn’t chosen them, though?” He thought of Voldemort using so many other Death Eaters’ wands.
“Oh yes, if you are any wizard at all you will be able to channel your magic through almost any instrument. The best results, however, must always come where there is the strongest affinity between wizard and wand. These connections are complex. An initial attraction, and then a mutual quest for experience, the wand learning from the wizard, the wizard from the wand.”
He breathed in and out, and turned to carefully remove Dumbledore’s wand from Draco’s hand, holding it out to Ollivander.
“Draco disarmed Dumbledore last June. Does that mean this belongs to him?”
“I think so,” Ollivander lifted the wand and examined it, squinting slightly. “Subtle laws govern wand ownership, but the conquered wand will usually bend its will to its new master. This is a curious device… You said it belonged to Albus Dumbledore? It’s old. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“It belonged to Gregorovitch years ago, it could be his design -”
“No, no, no,” Ollivander said, examining it more carefully as he had the others for its details. “It’s not his design either. Let’s see… Elder and Thestral hair core. Strange combination. Not rare but -” Ollivander’s brows were creasing in concern. He was now mumbling under his breath so that Harry couldn’t hear him.
“I’m sorry, Sir, I didn’t quite catch -”
“My boy,” He turned around and eyed him sharply, and Harry was shocked to see something like terror in his eyes. “This is no ordinary wand. This is one thought to be lost for centuries. Us practitioners of wandlore… I thought it was gone. But if it isn’t, oh then you aren’t safe!”
“I know,” Harry said sternly. “You-Know-Who’s after it, I know.”
“No, no, you don’t understand! Oh, my boy,” He looked past Harry and he suddenly realized the weight on his shoulder had lifted. Turning, he saw Draco rubbing his eyes and watching them curiously.
“What is it?” he slurred groggily.
“Mr. Malfoy,” the grave seriousness lacing Ollivander’s tone was enough to make Draco jolt and look wide awake for his next words. Unfortunately, that meant they cut their way through his core to their fullest extent. “I believe you are now the Master of the Elder Wand.”