LuLu
Narcissa manages to corner him the day before he left. He’d been reading the last chapter for his summer History of Magic assignment, casually sprawled out in a patch of light coming through the library windows, willing himself to be ignorant of the plans his father had for him that evening. How the bastard convinced his mother to let his ‘training’ continue he’d really like to know.
“Darling, may I bother you for a moment?”
Draco looks up, smiling and shutting the book, “You’re never a bother.”
She returns the twinkle in his eyes, and it’s then that Draco notices she has something hidden behind her back. “Do you remember how I promised you two surprises in Diagon Alley?”
“Yes, but with Black escaping it’s really fine-”
“ Draco . I’m not done, love.”
He shuts his mouth, but does sit up so he can face her better. Even Lucius knows that when Narcissa Malfoy speaks, one listens.
“You see, darling, I was gone far too much in the past year, and I know your father isn’t exactly the over affectionate type like you and I. While in Paris, I noticed the group of wizards I was inclined to stay around kept a certain type of animal I grew rather fond of, naturally I assumed you would too.” She brings her arms back around and storm-grey eyes meet bright blue ones. The cat-like creature is small, most likely a kitten, but confident as if the thing owns the house already. Fur white as snow, save the few specks of what looks like silver, tail far too slender, yet bushy at the end like someone had sown a patch of fur and the very tip. Draco’s itching to pet the thing, so when his mother sets it in his lap he almost squeals.
“I haven’t named her yet, and yes, ‘her’ is appropriate. Despite her appearance, she’s not a housecat. Rather, a fetching Kneazle. I know your father is training you to protect yourself from such things, but with the Dementors and Black on the loose, I couldn’t risk you going back to Hogwarts with only an owl, this girl here will protect you, guide you when you are lost, save you from those with ill intent, and give you company when I cannot.”
The Kneazle purrs in his lap, rubbing her head into Draco’s stomach that is growing warm with affection. She didn’t know about the abuse, she assumed it was to protect him, of course she allowed it. She would do anything and everything to keep him safe. “Thank you, mother.” He swallows, throat unbearably clogged, “I can’t explain how much this means to me.”
“Well you never have been good with words, have you? Name her already! I’d very much like to stop calling her ‘Draco’s Kneazle’.”
“How did father allow this?” He asks before he can stop himself. Narcissa’s eyes narrow, he quickly makes amends. “I mean, doesn’t he hate animals? He barely let me keep Poly, not to mention how he keeps the owls locked up if they aren’t in use.”
“Your father,” she begins in an angry voice that has Draco’s eyes widening, “could stand to be a little less of a blithering bastard sometimes. Now take your pet and go pack, we’ll have to leave early to avoid the Dementors.”
Draco starts out the door, cat in arms, only to pause and recollect his books, meeting her eyes with a soft smile he rarely displayed these days, “Parvos Lumen Malfoy. Parvy for short, or perhaps Pretty as a nickname, maybe even just LuLu.”
Narcissa nods her approval, “Why Parvos Lumen?”
He’s almost out the door when she asks, so he has to turn just enough for himself and LuLu to look at her, “Because, mother, maybe a Little Light is exactly what I need.”
LuLu warms up to him like she’d been personally birthed for his every need. Within an hour it’s like she knows him better than he knows himself, keeping still while he studies, rubbing against him when he begins to get frustrated. When there’s a knock on his door, one he recognizes as his Call for Crucio, LuLu blocks his path, growling.
“What is the meaning of this?!” Lucius snarls, opening the door and glaring down at the thing that suddenly looked a whole lot scarier than it had a few seconds ago.
“It’s okay!” He tells her, brushing a hand across her back, “It’s okay LuLu, stay here. I’ll be back, love.”
LuLu makes a few noble attempts to get him to stay, complete with blocking the door, or trying to block the door and too adorably small to do it.
“What the hell are you doing with that thing ?” Lucius snarls the second they enter the torture chambers in the dungeon. He doesn’t have much time to respond before he’s hexing Draco into the wall, poking the end of his wand right into Draco’s still open arm wound. “You think a protector will stop me from training you? Do you think it will stop the Dark Lord from taking whatever he wants from you?! Do you?! ”
“No!” Draco gasps out, “I didn’t-mother bought her-I swear I did-”
A swift kick in his gut keeps him from talking, a few good hits from Lucius keeps him from thinking too hard about things until blood from his ebony cut is dripping onto the floor. How much time passes, he’s never sure. But he knows days in here are out of the question, if he focuses hard on how good it will be to get back to Hogwarts he can almost ignore what’s happening to his body. The only thing Lucius won’t do is the Killing Curse, just because it would be too messy for the man. The paper work, the trials, finding someone to blame….Lucius simply didn’t have the time. A real shame too, Draco would much rather prefer that to this shit.
“Go get yourself cleaned up,” he registers his father saying after what feels like years. “You have a train to catch in four hours, it would be a shame if a Dementor were to get you before you were within the walls of that wretched castle….”
----------
“Her name is LuLu? I didn’t picture you as the type to give animal cutesy names.”
Draco glares at his friends. Making sure all the wounds from last night were hidden had taken hours and keeping them hidden on the train was exhausting, but he found that if he didn’t focus on it, the concealment charms in place were easy. His mother had fretted and made him promise on several different accounts to owl him as frequently as he could, apparently she was going back out to Paris to stay safe of Black, Draco thought it was a bit dramatic of her. Or maybe his father just wanted to have the manor to himself, and so long as he, LuLu and his mother were safe, Draco couldn’t care less.
He’s really too tired to be doing much, but he doesn’t trust the train. Something could get him on the train, besides he could sleep at Hogwarts. Under nice and soft silk sheets...his friends all snoring beside him….the rush of water nearby and just close enough to lull him into a beautifully safe darkness…..
“Her full name is Parvous Lumen Malfoy, but that’s a mouthful and she likes LuLu much better.”
“She’s stunning!” Pansy coos, getting a white head to purr against her hand. The two hit it off rather nicely, LuLu even tolerated Crabbe and Goyle, and while Draco was still clearly her favorite, Pansy and Blaise seemed to come to a close second.
“I’ve read that Kneazles are one of the most loyal creatures to exist, some say they can peer into other’s souls and judge if they’ll be good for their master.”
Draco holds LuLu up so he can look her in the eyes, “Are you gonna protect me from my big bad enemies?”
LuLu just blinks at him.
The group goes back to talking and the cat curls up in his lap, asleep at first. She nearly takes him out with her, the warmth always calming and fuck when did calm equal sleepy? Had he really been anxious the entire time he was awake? How long had this been going on? LuLu’s fur starts to toughen up and quickly pulls him out of his mind.. Draco looks around to see what’s wrong. His friends pick up on it, the whole lot looking for any sign of trouble.
“Draco,” Blaise starts, “What do you-”
Lights cut off and suddenly LuLu is hissing, standing on the ground to face the door of their cart, back raised and ready to jump. Cold sinks in from the window, the ceiling, the floor, the door that’s slowly creeping open. Cloaked, hooded, and with the same skin of the dead that Draco’s learned to despise. He stands in front of the Dementor, pushing LuLu behind him, making sure to hide Pansy who had just been talking about how happy she was to spend the summer with her mom. One couldn’t be happy in front of these things, and he was least likely to get attacked, but god his legs were shaking. He could almost feel it, the sucking sensation. Like he’d been blown into the middle of an ice storm, like nothing good would ever happen. He would lose, everyone he cared about would die, everything he worked towards would be for nothing.
Draco looked into the endless black and felt fear, the crippling loneliness that followed him everywhere clogged up his throat, somehow the wound on his arm seemed to throb, and then it was happening. The creature leaned forward and he could feel it all slipping.
Seeing his mother come home, spending the day with her. Getting LuLu, falling asleep with something warm in his arms. Last year, when Harry had been saved, when Dobby had told him he was safe and freed. Snape smiling at some dumb joke he made, Dumbledore offering him a lemon-drop, Fawkes fast asleep on his shoulder. Pansy coming out of her dorm, groaning and not laughing nearly as much as Draco had when they accidentally matched their outfits. Blaise and him cuddled up watching books come to life. Crabbe and Goyle rushing to him to tell him they passed two of their finals with Exceeds Expectations. Draco alone at the top of the Astronomy tower, watching shooting stars. The small moments he treasured, all fading and falling away into images that left him chilled to the bone.
Narcissa, bloodied and lying on the floor, Lucius laughing above her, wand drawn, the ebony knife in his other hand, dripping with some maroon liquid. LuLu, mangled and barely breathing. Dobby, chained and being beaten by his father. His friends, proudly showing their Dark Marks, grinning and killing at the same time. Fawkes with his neck snapped, Dumbledore falling and falling and falling...Snape with wide eyes, some green light hits him in the chest, he stumbles. Harry comes into view, but there’s something wrong….the boy starts turning and-
“EXPECTO PATRONUM!”
Draco’s stumbles away, breathing heavily, LuLu rubs against his leg to comfort him, growling at the figure as it’s forced out of the carriage. A gruff man stands in the aftermath, brown hair disheveled and face in a deep frown.
“You there.” He says, turning directly towards Draco. “Are you alright? How are you still standing?”
“N-no idea,” Draco chokes out, “Must be LuLu, those things are bloody awful.”
The man laughs at that, pulling out a chocolate frog from his pocket and holding it out to him, “My name is Professor Lupin, and as much as I admire your bravery, Mr. Malfoy, I’ll need you to stop by my office first thing after dinner, must make sure the attacked students are safe and all.”
Draco can’t stop himself, but he does finally have enough feeling back in his body to realize two hands rest on his back. “There have been more attacks?”
Lupin nods, “Yes. You and Harry Potter. Quite some intriguing targets if you ask me, oh there’s no need to worry, Mr. Malfoy, I’m sure it was just a routine check for and fugitives, if you catch my meaning. I really should be off to see the driver now, do make sure to eat that, you’ll feel much better afterwards.”
And because Draco has learned his lesson about Professors offering him things to make him feel better, he quickly opens the frog and shoves it into his mouth. Somehow it makes his blood run a little warmer.
“Are you alright? What was that thing? What was it doing to you?”
Draco sits down mostly grateful for Pansy and Blaise’s support, and yet some part of him still feels ashamed. He ignores it in favor of explaining Dementors to his friends, trying his best to make it sound like it wasn’t all that bad.
“It was sucking your soul?!” Apparently he’s not doing a good job.
“Just the happy bits. They feed on the lighter things, like memories that make you happy. As long as they don’t kiss you, you’ll live.”
“Living and wandering around the earth all sad and empty isn’t the same thing Draco!”
He blinks at Blaise’s furious face. Wasn’t that how his year was going so far? Was he not living then??
His friends falter so he smiles, “Better than being dead though!”
They reluctantly agree.
----------
Call him obsessive, but the boy is looking like he can barely stand on his own two feet. Draco watches, partly amused, and partly concerned as Harry Potter shakily takes his first few steps off the train. Maybe he’s just plain stupid. There’s no other explanation for why he leans in close behind Potter, noting briefly that he smells of brooms and a winter’s rain, and whispers in his ear.
“You fainted, Potter? Was Longbottom telling the truth, you actually fainted ?”
He really needs Potter to turn on him and say something rude. To keep up the banter so Draco knows he’s actually okay enough to function normally, but instead it’s Weasley who glares at him. Potter actually relaxes a bit to Draco’s utter confusion.
“Sod off Malfoy!” The redhead yells, and because he hadn’t slept in so long and just got sucked by a Dementor and had to go through an interrogation with his friends, Draco gives his nastiest smirk. He’s opening up his mouth to retaliate when Potter beats him to it.
“Did you not faint your first time?”
Striking green eyes peer into his soul, as if telling him they will accept nothing but the truth. Draco can’t lie to those eyes, and he can’t fathom why, so he looks away.
“That was my first time- hey! LuLu! Get back here!”
Embarrassing him even further, LuLu completely and utterly disregards him, cosying up to Potter and purring while she rubs against his legs. Behind him, Pansy and Blaise stiffen. It’s not hard to imagine why, after all, here is LuLu, some magical protector and judge for her master, budding up with his sworn enemy. To make matters worse, Granger squeals with delight.
“Oi! Malfoy! I didn’t know you had a cat!”
“I don’t!” He snaps, picking LuLu up and holding her back from her weird love fest with Potter’s jeans. “LuLu is a Kneazle, and a fine one at that, now if you’ll excuse us, we have important places to be!”
Before anyone can reply, and that does include the traitor in his arms, Draco walks away, robes flapping in the wind, Blaise and Pansy scowling behind him. He ignores the green eyes he can feel piercing his back the entire walk to the castle.
In all honesty he completely forgets about them when he sees Snape. The man doesn’t look half as pleased to see him, and that is a very big warning sign.
“Mr. Malfoy,” the toneless voice says, although Draco swears he can sense worry under it all, “Come with me immediately. Your luggage will be seen to, you can bring your Kneazle, and do not worry about dinner. You will eat in my office.”
A completely unnecessary display, but Draco follows him anyways. It’s hard to ignore being watched with not only Pansy and Blaise following his back, but three new sets of eyes as well. He can’t shake the feeling that he knows who they are.
The two don’t speak until they reach Snape’s office, are inside the door, and have tea in their hands. Only then does the Potions Master’s facade crack.
“I was told you were attacked on the train.”
Draco pauses, tea sloshing for a moment, before nodding. LuLu doesn’t stray far from his side, but she also doesn’t seem to mind Snape, actually, she rubbed once against his leg before settling between them. He takes it as a good sign.
“I also was told that you withstood a Dementor for over a minute, and did not pass out.”
Oh fuck .
“It must be the result of LuLu,” he coolly replies. An upgrade from the stuttering he was sure he would have.
“Really? Because despite their protective nature, a Kneazle cannot withstand a Dementor for even fifteen seconds, much less a whole minute. Do you know what that tells me?”
Fuck , he didn’t want to know, so he doesn’t move. Not that it discourages his professor.
“It tells me that you have become a frequent visitor of Dementors, and I would like to know why. The truth Draco. Now.”
Bloody hell …..the boy looks into his tea and weighs his options. On the one side, he probably did need to talk about everything that happened this summer. He couldn’t do that with Pansy and Blaise, they would be murderous and refuse to leave him alone for longer than two seconds. He couldn’t tell Dumbledore, Merlin knows it wouldn’t do anything. That being said, Snape might be his last option….if the man wouldn’t turn in his father and completely fuck up the plan in place if he were to be a complete spy. No, Snape had too much of an emotional connection here. Maybe he could whisper it to LuLu in the dead of night, LuLu couldn’t do more than hiss and growl, and that wouldn’t jeopardize something so important.
“Today, Draco.”
Grey meets black and Draco lets out a sigh, the man never asked for the full truth, and that was really his mistake.
“They were at our house a lot over summer, sir. I couldn’t go anywhere without running into one, eventually I guess I built a resistance.”
Snape glares, he knows it’s not all there, but it’s all that Draco would give him.
“And did your father know about this?”
“Yes,” Draco swallows, “He had me stay inside for most of the time, but he can’t exactly control them….”
Another half truth, would they catch up with him one day? He hopes not. Either way, truth or lie, it seems to be enough for Snape.
“I see that you’re faring well, I assume someone has asked to see you to confirm this later?”
Finally, something he doesn’t mind admitting at all, “Yes, sir. Professor Lupin asked me to stop by his office after dinner.”
Snape seethes “Professor Lupin? Professor Lupin?! ”
“Um, yes sir? He’s the one who got rid of the Dementor for me.”
That seems to bring some sense back into Snape, who had been on the verge of breaking his tea cup. It would’ve been a shame really, they were having Draco’s favorite, a mix of mint and chamomile. Seeing a chance to cool Snape off further, Draco bites a rather large bullet.
“I saw my mother recently," he rushed out. "She came home the week that Black was found, brought presents and everything. This she told me to give to you.”
He pulls out a small package that had been given to him with the utmost care on the platform and hands it over. Draco had wanted to rip open the stupid thing and find out what it was, but seeing the brief flicker of happiness on Snape’s face made him glad he didn’t. Strangely, it’s more appealing to watch someone else open their own present.
A small vile, black and ornate, with a carving of a Lily on it. The label written in such perfect handwriting he can read it from his seat across the room; peppermint springs, encased with Lily, perfect for your happiness, Severus.
Draco hopes Snape takes the note to heart. From the smile slowly blooming across his face, he appears to. Which is good, because Draco has a professor to meet in exactly twenty minutes.