True Fear

"I'm only honest when it rains
If I time it right, the thunder breaks
When I open my mouth
I wanna tell you but I don't know how"

It’s their first Defence Against The Dark Arts lesson of the new term and the minute Harry laid eyes on their new professor he knew there would be no messing about this year (or any of the years after, if the rumour that the curse on the position has been broken was to be believed). The teacher was all sharp lines, all anger and coldness. He held a particular dislike for one student in particular however. The professor took one glance at Draco and his scowl twisted into a satisfied grin. Harry shuddered. He just knew that this man had lost someone to the war. He glanced across the room to where Draco stood alone. He almost pitied him. He would, if it wasn’t Malfoy .

The teacher directed them to their desks one by one. Draco had caught sight of the suspicious glean in the teacher’s eye and his expression shifted. Harry thought it was going to be a sneer, a scathing comment or a glare. He was wrong. Draco sat with a grimace and eyes too distant to belong to the furious boy Harry saw earlier.

The professor swept to the front of the classroom, standing tall and rigid as he revealed that they’d be covering the old material in order to catch anyone up who’d missed their final year due to... “Complications in the education system”. Their first lesson? Boggarts.

“I need a volunteer.”

Something twisted in Harry’s chest.

The professor’s grin only grew more pronounced as he zeroed in on Malfoy and waved him up to the front. “You.”

Draco swallowed. His next words were carefully calm and polite with only the slightest of tremors running underneath. “Sir, please could I stay after class and do the exercise instead? I really don’t think-“

“Silence.” The professor snapped and Draco’s mouth shut. “There will be no special treatment given in this class. You will go first, Mr Malfoy.”

Harry didn’t know such glee and loathing could be expressed in one sentence at once and he’d been taught by Snape for six years.
It felt almost wrong to watch Draco cave, to watch him quietly push his chair back and walk up to the professor, head bowed. To have to reach an arm out to ask for his wand.
To watch a professor use his position to get even on a child.

“On a Death Eater”, Harry reminded himself.
That didn’t quite lessen the awkward feeling in his chest, however.

//

Draco sighed at the Professor’s ruling but he didn’t fight, he didn’t argue as he walked up to the professor with the odd air of a convict walking up to an executioner. He put his hand out, asking politely for his wand and watched the man consider it. Consider whether he’d get away with letting a Death Eater be mauled by a boggart. Draco thought he’d probably get an Order of Merlin for it.
The Professor gave him the wand.
Draco almost thought it was a pity.

Slowly, Draco approached the rattling cupboard as the professor laid spells and charms around him.

“You’re Eighth-Years now.” He said, still casting. “I think you can all handle a measly boggart.”

“Since you’ve faced god knows what else and are still rooming with a Death Eater” the pause seemed to say.

“This spell will form a barrier. We won’t be able to intervene until the time is up.”

Draco wondered if the professor would’ve still cast that spell if Harry was up here instead.

“This spell will act like a recording device so you can watch your actions back later and see how you can improve.”

More like the teacher could watch his least favourite student quake in fear- not quite as satisfying as an AK to the face but a good start.

“And this spell…”

Draco stopped listening at that point, too focused on the door through which his worst nightmare will step.
He thought he knew what it was going to be.
He’s wrong.

The handle twists, the door swings open.
It isn’t Voldemort’s frayed robe that peeks from behind the door, nor his father’s elegantly polished shoe.
It’s his own.

His clone emerges from the wardrobe and closes the door elegantly behind him, fixing his blazer.
Someone mumbles in confusion behind him but Draco just cocks his head, confused.
He hesitates.
And that’s when it strikes.

//

It grins at him, smile like a knife.
He stalks towards him as Draco backs away, wand unsteady in his shaking grip.

“Back for more?”

He doesn’t understand. His worst fear- is himself? He’d laugh if it weren’t such an odd, awful thought.
He stares at his clone, really looks at him. This Draco is dressed exactly as he was when he tried to kill Dumbledore- When he fought at the Battle of Hogwarts. When he defected, again and again. And this Draco has his sleeve rolled high, exposing the writhing Dark Mark for all to see.

“Riddikulus.” Draco says, his wandwork immaculate.
Nothing happens. His mind goes blank.

The doppleganger laughs and tuts at him condescendingly. “Oh, Draco. Did you really think that would work? You can’t get rid of me- you know that, right? Or else you wouldn’t be here to torture yourself some more.”

Draco’s forehead furrows.

The clone frowns at him. Then it grins. “Ohh, I see. Obliviated. Nice touch, Bella.”

Draco flinches at the shortened name, mind already racing. He hears a gasp from behind, traded whispers. It was lying, it was a boggart, playing on his fears and it was lying. He’d know if he’d been Obliviated. The Healers at St Mungo’s would’ve known. His mother would’ve known. But would they have told him?
Draco steels himself. The second rule of scaring off Boggarts- you don’t argue with them. You don’t let them get inside your head.

“Riddikulus!” But nothing funny comes to mind. The Boggart doesn’t disappear.

“Poor, pathetic Draco Malfoy. You couldn’t be a Death Eater. You were too much of a coward. The minute the Dark Lord asked you to raise your wand to someone you couldn’t do it. Someone else had to do it for you.” He laughed. “You couldn’t join the Light, either. Same problem. No matter what you did, what you said, what precious little clues you left, they still didn’t care and you still couldn’t do it. You couldn’t summon the balls to turn your back on your father and no one came running to save you.
Because that was what you wanted, wasn’t it?”

Draco’s backing away now, right up into the barrier. It sparks at his back, sending shivers down his spine as his clone comes closer.

“You wanted a hero, a Saviour-“
The other Draco smiles, studying Draco’s expression with unrestrained amusement.
“The Saviour.”

He wheels away on one heel and suddenly Draco can breathe again, stretching out his shaking hand, holding it up to the back of the Boggart’s head.
He can’t bring himself to say the words.

“After all, he saved everyone else, didn’t he? What was one more person, what was one more life? You wanted him to sweep you up off of your feet with the rest of his ragtag gang and tell you it was all going to be alright, that you could defect and join the Order and your family would be safe. You would be safe. How utterly pathetic.”

The Slytherin thinks his knees are going to give out and suddenly he’s hideously aware that everyone can hear this, Harry Potter can hear this- but the thought vanishes with the next words.

“You thought he’d saved you in that bathroom in Sixth Year.”

Draco starts.

“As you bled out on the tiles, and your vision swam, all thoughts of hexing and hurting ran out of your mind. Myrtle screamed bloody murder behind you and all you could feel was gratitude.” The boy practically spits the word over his shoulder.

Draco flinches.

“Gratitude for the fact that it was finally fucking over. That you wouldn’t have to kill anyone. That Potter had vanquished the villain and that your mother wouldn’t have to worry about you anymore. And then Snape showed up and you had the gall to be disappointed.”

He turns to face Draco with a thin smile. “You see, Draco, that’s why Potter would never try to save you. He knows you’re not worth his time. He knows that you’re a snivelling coward at heart. Why would a lion want to be play friends with a snake?”

Draco holds the wand out in front of him, his whole body shaking. “R- Riddi-“
He grimaces, giving himself a firm shake. Shadows coalesce around him, blocking his peripheral view of the classroom behind him, spreading until he’s in the only lit spot in a black void.

“Why are you still trying? You know that there’s no point.”

He had to shut this thing up, he had to lock it back away- “RIDDIKULUS!”

“There’s no escaping me, Draco. There’s no escaping what’s hiding inside of you.”

“RIDDIKULUS!”

“And the thing is, you’d rather think yourself a coward than the alternative.”

“RIDDI-“ Draco falters, wand wavering.

“But you know it’s true. You fear me, because you know I could be real.”

“Well done, Draco.”

Draco starts and he hears screams from behind him as a voice, serpentine and all too familiar hisses through the air-

“No-“ He says, shaking his head firmly. “No.”
Why hasn’t that fucking timing spell worn off?! Surely this was too complex for a mere boggart to create?

“I knew that you could do it.”

“Why not?” His clone asks, the infuriating smile back on his lips. “Why not?”

“I could never-“

“You could.” The Other Draco promises. “You could easily have been me, still could be. It’s all in here, all that darkness. Creeping under your skin.” He traces Draco’s outstretched arm, looping amongst the narcissus flowers dotted around the snake that still lingers on his forearm. “Through your veins.” His fingertips brush along his pulse point. “You’re dark to the core, Draco.”

Draco shakes his head. “No- No I’m not. I’ll never be you, never-“
The Boggart’s form shifts and then he really is his clone, down to every detail. Down to the curly blond hair, down to the flower tattoos twirling around his body. Down to the muggle clothes and the bruises under his eyes.

“You think playing pretend will change anything?”

Draco bristles. “This is not pretend, these are my choices-“

“You can’t escape your roots, Draco.” The Boggart stalks towards him again. “It doesn’t matter what clothes you wear, what colour you dye your hair, who you date and who you marry. It doesn’t matter if you change your name and move to a run down muggle town in Louisiana.” He moves right up and personal, inches from his face.
“It doesn’t matter who you love. You have Malfoy blood running in your veins. You are darkness. You are chaos. Whatever you touch, whatever you love- it dies.”
He backs away, just slightly.
“What did you say to your father, at the end of the summer? Oh yes- ‘The Malfoys- the family you can always count on to make the world a murkier place’.”

The Boggart smiles. “So you see, no matter what you do, you’ll always be Dark, Draco, and you know it. People will always mutter ‘Death Eater’ under their breath as you walk past, they’ll always tell their kids not to play with yours, jobs will always turn you away. Restaurants will say every table is reserved even if you reserved one yourself and no witch or wizard in their right mind could ever love you. You radiate darkness. People will always suspect you of evil, from now until the day you die.”
He laughed.
“Or am I wrong? Hasn’t it been like that from the day you got back?”

“With good reason-“

“Yeah.”

Draco realises he’s backed himself into a corner. Literally and figuratively.

“Save us all a load of bother and just embrace it.”

Draco’s wand falls. “No.”

The doppleganger’s expression turns sly.
“Then maybe you need to hear it from somebody else.”

Draco watches with mounting horror as from out of the shadows materialises Harry Potter, murder in his eyes and his wand in his hand. The Slytherin doesn’t have time to think whether or not it’s just part of the show before the Gryffindor is barrelling towards him, wand raised.

“Potter-!”

“You killed them!”

“What?”

Potter- no, the Boggart- shakes his head, tears glittering in his eyes. “You killed- murdered- them all! Ron, Hermione- Fred-“ he breaks off, in tears. “How could you, Malfoy? I knew you were cruel but god- You- You grew up with them! You knew them-“

“No-“ Draco starts, but then the bodies materialise at his feet and he backs away, bile rising in his throat. Granger lies at his feet, limbs twisted at horrific, unnatural angles, eyes glassy and unseeing. He steps back and there’s something there too, another corpse staring at him with betrayal in their eyes. Wherever he looks, wherever he steps is a corpse. Bile rises in his throat and a hand flies to his face. He gradually becomes aware of the blood soaking through his trainers when Harry speaks again.

“You’re a murderer.”

“No-“ He begs, shoulders hunching, his body twisting into itself as if he could disappear out of time and space itself.

“A Death Eater.”

“Potter, please-“

Harry wades through the blood towards him and Draco raises his wand, the spell already on his lips. “Riddi-“
And the scene changes.

Harry is lying on the ground before him, glasses bent and askew, glass cracked. Bruises litter his face and visible skin and a trickle of blood trails down from his nose.
He looks up at Draco, no fear or pleading on his face. Just acceptance.

“Again, Draco.”

Draco jumps back and practically throws his wand at his feet. He realises the stupidity of the move within seconds and leaps to reclaim it but the Boggart does nothing.
Instead, Draco watches as his Doppleganger, the proud Death Easter materialises, striding up to Potter with a smirk on his face.

“With pleasure, my Lord.”

“No!”

“Crucio!”

And Draco watches, horrified, heartbeat erratic as Harry convulses at his feet, screaming. His other self just laughs.

“LEAVE HIM ALONE!”

“Again, Draco.”

“Crucio!”

The screams ring on and nothing Draco does affects it- he tries jumping between the pair but the spell passes straight through him, straight at Harry.

“Again.”

“CRUCIO!”

“RIDDIKULUS!!” Draco shouts, but in the end it’s futile- how could he laugh at this? How could he possibly turn this situation into something to smile over? He sinks to his knees before the other him, between him and the copy of the Boy Who Lived.
“Please- Stop hurting him!”

He gets no reply other than the shout of “Crucio!” and he hears Potter move behind him.
“What- What even are you?” Draco whispers to the Boggart, tears streaming down his face.

The Draco grins. “Finally.” He reaches down and cups Draco’s cheek, his touch clammy.
“Now you’re asking the right questions.”

And when Draco blinks, Bellatrix is there with her wand poised to cast and Voldemort at her back and all his brain can think is RUN.
He dives left as she whips her wand forward.
The wizard rolls to a stop and glances back over his shoulder. It’s him, again. The copy in the black suit, quaking on the floor.

“Do you remember this?”

“CRUCIO!”

He watches the mad glee flicker in her eyes as the witch casts the spell again and again and the copy- supposedly his past self- screams.

“Tell me, nephew.” His aunt kneels next to the copy, holding his jaw in a vice-like grip. “Are all the new Slytherins as pathetic as you?”
She releases him and he collapses onto the carpet. A dangerous gleam flickers in the copy’s eye and Draco wants to scream at him, wants to turn time back and prevent that awful, awful comment from slipping from his lips.

“They’re a great deal braver than you.”

He looks away as the boy’s back arches in agony, as his body whips back and forth on the tiles, unfiltered pain coursing though every last nerve.

“You asked what I am, Draco?”

Draco spins around, wand raised. The scene is gone, replaced by darkness again.

“I am the truth.”

“You’re lying. None of this is real. I am in a Hogwarts classroom and the spell is going to wear off any minute now and someone will come and deal with you.” Draco almost believes it.

The clone emerges from the shadows, grinning slyly. “Oh, Draco. You really think anyone cares? Hey, I’ll bet you a hundred that they’ve already broken out the popcorn.”

The memory of Draco screams in the background.

“But, to tell the truth-“ The Boggart smiles at its own joke. “You’re not there.”

Draco tries very, very hard not to lose his cool. To ignore the bait and not panic.
With every word, the illusion takes another step forwards and Draco one back until he’s pressed against the shield, sliding down the surface. Then, with a sudden lurch he falls back, falling through the barrier into thin air. It’s gone- he can no longer feel it there. There’s only darkness, them, and cold stone beneath his fingertips. His mind goes blank.
No.

“You’re not safe and warm in a Hogwarts classroom. You’re not facing a Boggart. Your mother never begged for you to come back and the Light never won the war.”

Draco thinks with a slight hysteria that he might be having a heart attack. His breaths are short and panicked, never yielding quite enough oxygen. He leans back on his elbows, looking up in fear, wand forgotten. The boggart leans in close.

“You never left the manor. You never left me. You’ve been here all this time, waiting for your aunt to get back. Being punished until the world ends.” It grins.
“Do you think Voldemort will kill Potter, when he’s won? Or do you think he’ll keep him around, just for fun? How long do you think it’ll take to break him-“

“R-Riddikulus!” He tries, one last time.

Grey eyes melt into green and Draco is staring into the eyes of Harry Potter yet again. His hair is wild, his pupils constricted to tiny black specks.

“How long, Draco?”

The Slytherin recoils and Not-Potter looks away, disgusted. “I should’ve left you to burn.”

Draco looks him in the eyes. “Why didn’t you?”

And just like that, the illusion shatters.

Draco takes one look at the horrified faces, tears still streaking down his cheeks and runs.