Zapped
Flint was a fucking cunt.
Everyone typically was in Draco’s eyes, apart from his mother and a very select few others.
Potter was on the list purely based on the principle that they were enemies, naturally Weasley followed. Daphne and her sister Astoria had the most irritating voices and their lack of propriety despite being pure-blooded was grating to his nerves. His father could often be found near the top of the roster.
But people like the Flint’s, the Goyle’s, the Crabbe’s, and even his aunt Bellatrix held a distinct dwelling in his levels of abhorrence. They were the kind of people that went above and beyond, the kind of people that took pleasure in other’s suffering, the kind of people that he had been endlessly surrounded by since childhood. The witches and wizards that lived to serve. While his family, the Parkinsin’s, Nott’s, and Zabini’s served to live. They were two wholly different beasts owned and controlled by the Dark Lord.
Draco tensed when Flint’s words began the altercation with McGonagall, his blunt fingernails digging into the palm of his hand in both anger and contempt. Flint always found a way to say things that were better left unsaid. Always found a way endanger those around him with brash words and lacking an understanding of social cues. It was probably why his aunt Bellatrix had taken a liking to him; Flint was the devoted brainless soldier that Draco would never be.
McGonagall assessed them. Not all the eighth years, just them, the treacherous Slytherins. Her sharp eyes lingered on him a moment longer than the others and Draco did what he had gotten too good at over the last year and a half, he froze. Any and all emotion slipped from his face, his jaw relaxed and his fingers uncurled, taking only shallow breaths to minimize any movement of his chest. His complete and utter stillness kept Voldemort from noticing him on occasion and he hoped it would work against the unwanted attention of the professor who stood before him.
He heard the restraints snap into place and for some odd reason, Draco felt a sense of relief. Relief that he and his friends had escaped the repercussions of another one of Flint’s outbursts or relief that Flint would be far away from him. The scar that ran across his left collarbone tingled at the thought. The scar Flint had placed with a carving knife when he had ignored a summons from Bellatrix the night before Dumbledore died. It had been a warning.
Draco had been so wrapped up in his thoughts that he didn’t even notice everyone leaving until Blaise sent a bolt of electricity over his shoulder that gave him a small shock upon reaching him. He blinked, pivoted, and took purposeful strides to catch up ignoring the lingering bite from the curse in the middle of his back.
His zap happy friend clapped a hand on his shoulder once Draco settled in step beside him. Why did his friends suddenly feel the need to touch him? He shrugged Blaise’s hand off and gave him a look telling him to keep it off. Two hands raised in mock surrender beside him.
“If I had known she was going to be our Prefect, I would have joined Marcus.” Daphne whined to Goyle a couple people in front of him.
“Oh honey, you still can.” The sweet words were laced with venom as they dripped from Pansy’s mouth. Draco almost let a laugh slip out but swallowed it down knowing better than to add fire to their incessant drama.
“Well, at least our chances of surviving the year with our sanity has increased.” Blaise commented to no one in particular.
Theo threw a saucy look over his shoulder. “Being sane is far overrated and way less fun.”
Draco grinned but read deeper into the meaning behind Theo's words. He was about to inquire as to which Nott parent he could thank for the silent psycho laying beneath Theo’s golden retriever façade, wondering briefly if even Pansy or Blaise could see the darkness lurking within, but decided to file the observation away for later use.
He did his best not to let his gaze linger on any spot for too long in hallways on their way to wherever they were going, he wanted to put off seeing the ghosts that were no doubt waiting for him for as long as possible. When his brain seemed to finally catch up from his freeze in the Great Hall, he realized they were in the back of the castle and were swiftly approaching a large ornate mirror.
He despised mirrors.
The bodies of his friends and the others he had been blindly following came to a stop just in front of it. A honeyed voice began speaking and he had to fight off the heated goosebumps that ran down his spine and threatened to melt his carefully crafted icy indifference. His head snapped up, forcing himself to examine the reflective glass to see who the voice was flowing from making sure not to look at himself in the process.
Was that… Granger? No surely not.
She was supposed to be at the ministry with The Boy Wonder and his deadbeat ginger sidekick… they wouldn’t be able to survive without her. He had grown complacent in the last few months. He should have assessed the students at dinner, should have taken a mental note of who he might come in to contact with so he could be prepared for anything that came at him.
Draco blinked. And then blinked again to make sure he was seeing correctly. He watched her reflection as she responded to someone and then she slowly dragged her eyes up to look at herself in the mirror. His spine straightened to full height and he held his breath as the girl’s teeth sunk into her bottom lip before they opened again.
“Hermione Jean Granger.”
Air spilled out of his nostrils in a flurry. She didn’t need to be here... She wasn’t supposed to be here. He felt his mind retreating just as the sleeve of his robes were grabbed above his elbow and a force pushed him forward through the doorway that the now clear mirror revealed.
He could see the room through slightly tunneled vision. They were surrounded by white, he frowned, for the first time in a while he didn’t understand what was happening. Was Hogwarts somehow a ruse? Were they being committed and locked away by the Golden Girl? This must be why she wasn’t at the ministry. Draco felt a smirk pull at his lips. How beautifully naïve they had been to think they wouldn’t face harsh punishment. He looked down at his new shoes trying to hide the odd wetness threatening to spill out from his eyes. Flint must have known, that’s why he made a scene and asked to be taken to Az.
She was talking again. Hermione. He felt her voice brush against him like cat begging for attention.
He jerked his eyes up, hoping his momentary defeat hadn’t been noticed and ready to lock himself away in the Manor, but the room was now bathing in color. Warm and rich earth tones exploded everywhere keeping him from walking down the stone pathway to his mind palace. A bang sounded causing everyone to jolt, he drew his wand out of habit, ready to defend or fight. Blaise and Theo noticed and shifted closer to him to hide his reaction as they all watched the fireplace swell.
Walls liquefied into glass, furniture appeared, trinkets and swings filled the space. He could feel the magic flowing through the room like he could feel the blood pumping in his veins. Everyone stood transfixed, lost in the space that was still whirring to life around them, but Draco’s eyes fell to the source of it all.
Granger stood to the side of their group, a shy and gentle smile flickered across her face. She squirmed in place a bit, almost as if she felt uncomfortable being here, uncomfortable with people judging her magic. What happened to the girl who knew she had all the answers? Where was the girl that had fire in her veins? The only person who had challenged him to be better instead of just allowing him to be the villain, where was she?
Her eyes danced across Pansy, Neville, Daphne, Luna, Cho, Blaise and Theo, Susan and Goyle. Slithering between their classmates that separated them until they landed on him.
Draco held her stare, cocking his head to the side in invitation to be the girl he remembered. The girl that would scowl at him and make him feel like he was an idiot. The girl that punched him for saying something he shouldn’t have.
Come on Granger, where are you?
The temperature in the room skyrocketed and his thick robes suddenly felt suffocating.
“I wanted everyone to feel comfortable.”
His mind whispered for him to run. To her or from her he didn’t know, but he did know that he needed to break whatever spell they were locked in. He felt a familiar zap on his arm and he looked down at the invisible sting while quickly brushing at his robes trying to ease the sensation.
Pansy practically ran in the direction of the girl’s dorm and the rest trickled after her. He would’ve moved to go to the boy’s dorm, but Granger remained in her spot and that meant he would have to squeeze between her and the one of the new wingback chairs. He drew in a ragged breath and tried to summon his mind Manor so he could regroup from the disgusting lack of self-control he had been exhibiting ever since the hallway and the mirror and her voice but then she was tumbling forward.
It only took him one hurried leap to reach her, wrapping his fingers around her upper arm and jerking her up.
“Watch it.” He growled.
Something roared to life deep inside of him as soon as he touched her. It burned. Draco swiftly let her go and walked away as fast as his feet would take him without running. He flexed his hand trying to air out the blistering sensation trying to cool it down.
Striding into his bedroom he sat down on the only unclaimed bed. It was against the far wall in the hexagonal room, it shuddered underneath his weight, the bedding and curtains promptly changing to a frosted midnight black. How fitting. He put his hands down on the crook of the mattress, gripping the duvet in hopes that it would ease the scalding still pulsing across his palm.
“Do I need to zap you again or…” Blaise said from the bed to his right.
Draco had his wand pointed at him before his friend had the time to say anything else. “First time was necessary, second was pushing it. Do it again and you’ll wish Flint was still here.” His voice taking on an edge he hadn’t heard in a while.
They sat in silence for a moment.
“But thank you for...” He sighed and let his shoulders round forward when the familiar feeling of ice licked at his hand and began spreading up his arm.
Blaise crossed his ankles lazily. “Want to tell me what exactly I broke up out there?”
“No.” He clipped, the ice almost fully encapsulating him now.
By the time he stood from his bed he was gone. His body going through the motions of undressing and pulling a pair of pajama bottoms out of his trunk that had appeared at the foot of his bed. He heard rustling around him and assumed Goyle, Neville, Blaise, and Theo were also readying for sleep. He probably would have thought it strange that Theo was being quiet for once, but Draco wasn’t there. He was finally opening the door to the Manor again and everything outside of the property felt like a distant dream.
He slid under the blankets that matched the color of his soul and felt the bed adjust its firmness to his liking. Embracing the cool quiet of his brain after it had strained and been pushed all day, his eyes closed on his physical body.
But in his Manor, they were still wide open, staring at the fireplace in foyer. The fireplace had never once been lit in all the years the ice Manor had existed. The fireplace that now held vigorous embers melting everything around it.
Bloody hell.