The Search For Life and Death

THE SEARCH FOR LIFE AND DEATH

 Chapter XXIV

 The Secretive and Sinful

“Are you frightened?” Ginny asked.

Harry looked over at her, startled by the words. “What?”

“Are you frightened?” she asked again, nodding her head forward at the white nothing that stretched for as far as they could see. They had been walking for what seemed like hours, but it was impossible to tell while trapped here in this realm, in a dream. It was the third night that they had fallen asleep and slipped into the Realm. They had spent most of the time walking, and very little of it talking. The silence was beginning to get on Ginny’s nerves.

“No,” Harry said, after some time thinking. “I don’t think so.”

“I suppose you wouldn’t be,” Ginny admitted. “Everything that you, Ron, and Hermione have been through, it’d be hard to find this frightening.”

Harry cocked his head to the side, thinking. Their footsteps made no sound as they moved through the white world.

“I wasn’t really scared then, either,” Harry said. “Not for me.” He glanced at her briefly, thinking of the Chamber of Secrets and seeing her lying on the floor in front of the head of Salazar Slytherin. He had been frightened then, but for Ginny. “I suppose I don’t really get scared for my own life when it comes down to it.”

“Why not?” Ginny asked, looking at him.

Harry shook his head. “I don’t know. It’s never really been something to worry about. I mean, before Hogwarts, there was no one that really cared about whether or not I got hurt. It just didn’t seem to matter.”

“But it does matter. Your life does matter, Harry.” She reached out and grabbed his hand. “You should be frightened for yourself, too. Not just your friends.”

“You’re all that matters to me,” Harry said, meeting her earnest gaze.

Ginny felt her cheeks flush with heat. She knew he meant his friends, that he meant Ron and Hermione most of all, and Remus and Sirius, but the way he had said it made her blush until she was sure her whole body was as red as her hair.

Harry seemed to realize what he had said because his own cheeks flushed and he looked away from her. He didn’t say anything more, but he also didn’t let go of her hand.

The students were back!

Hogwarts was aflutter with activity of all sorts now that the new school year had begun. The creatures that lurked behind the scenes or in quiet corners rushed about in excitement, performing their required tasks.

Ghosts floated about, keeping an eye on things, though often getting distracted, as the dead are wont to do, for the goings-on of living beings did not interest them as much as it had when they were alive.

The paintings were a different story as they flitted amongst their frames and moved about the school, gossiping and trading tales. News abounded from student to student in Hogwarts, but it was the paintings who truly spread the word so fast. They were thrilled to have students in their halls again, to watch them as they grew in strength, and as they danced the precarious dance of the teenager, becoming girlfriend and boyfriend as quickly as they became ex-girlfriend and ex-boyfriend. It was almost too early in the year for such things, but the paintings had become good at reading students over these many years and some were giving off signs. And some who had been together the previous year were no longer. They could not wait for those stories to unfold. The paintings would spread the tale out across the grapevine and soon everyone would drink in the drama. What fun!

The creatures most excited that the students were back, however, were less noticeable than the ghosts and paintings both. The house elves who lived and worked in Hogwarts leapt with joy at having their children back in their halls, for nothing pleased a house elf greater than to have families to tend to and masters to serve.

“Breakfast time! Breakfast time!” shrieked Loppy, a tiny little house elf with massive ears that seemed to dwarf her head. She skipped frantically through the kitchen, shrieking the call to arms, and a group of twenty house elves followed her.

These house elves split into three groups. The first group, of seven, moved to a long line of brick ovens that lay stretched out on one side of the kitchen, each oven set above a small counter. The seven house elves needed no direction as they began to prepare ingredients and make breads and pastries for the breakfast table.

The second group of house elves moved to stoves, where they began to cook eggs and fry up bacon, bangers, and the like. 

The third group of elves split themselves into smaller groups, two of them setting the House tables with plates and silverware, another taking care of the Head table. Two elves cleaned the floors of the Great Hall, while another gathered serving bowls and utensils and putting stasis charms on them to keep every piece of food fresh and warm (or cold) until it was removed by a student to be eaten. Cereal was poured into large serving bowls, milk placed in a jug, jam and butter and clotted cream put into small dishes and set to the side.

Soon, the kitchen was filled with the smell of breakfast - eggs and sausages, bacon, scones and oatmeal and all the rest. Pumpkin juice was poured, tea was steeped, coffee was made, goblets were shined, and along with all of this came the sound of singing.

Twenty-one house elves, less than a quarter of the number who served at Hogwarts, began to sing a song as they prepared breakfast. It was not a song in English, nor in any language that had been used in over three thousand years. The words were ancient, they were beautiful, and they were beyond meaning.

The house elves sang, as they always sang when they worked in the places where humans could not hear them, but none of them knew the meaning of the words they used. They knew the tune, knew the words, but the meaning had long been lost to them long ago.

Dobby the house elf, whose job this morning had been to polish the floors of the Great Hall, found tears dripping from his tennis ball sized eyes. He struggled to choke out words that he had hummed along to as a house elf babe, wrapped up in his mother’s arms as she taught him the words.

If someone had asked him, Dobby would have said that he was sad. He was sad because the song he was singing was sad. He did not know the meaning of the words, could not have said what story they painted, but he knew somehow that it was a sad one, and he could not help but cry great tears at the thought of such sadness. If he had explained this to any of the other elves, they might have also realized how sad the song was, but none of them asked Dobby. In fact, very few of them spoke to Dobby, because Dobby was a perverted creature, an elf that was paid, and this was a horrible, horrible thing and Dobby was so strange, too strange, and the others would not consort with him. They would work with him, but they would not talk to him. They did not want to become strange.

Dobby did not let this bother him on most days. He was a strange elf, but also a happy elf, usually. Except he suddenly found himself wishing that he had never been taught the words to this song, because he did not want to sing along with the others. He did not want to hear this beautiful words, which spelled out so much doom.

But Dobby said nothing to the other elves and continued shining the floor, scrubbing at the stone with soapy water and salty tears, all the while singing softly under his breath.

“Would you look at this bright country, Gred.”

“Bright indeed, Forge. White as Merlin’s shining bottom, it is.”

“Oh? And you know this how, I wonder.” George said, looking at his twin.

“Polished it meself,” Fred said, puffing out his chest proudly.

Neville didn’t know whether to laugh at their antics or sob at the obstacle before them. They had wandered through the white world for three days, off and on as they woke and went to classes and went to bed at night, and they had seen nothing but the great expanse of white. Neville had begged in his head for something to appear, something to cut the endless blankness from the world, and he had received an answer to his wish, but now he didn’t know how to deal with it.

Before the three of them sat a lake as large and as vast as the lake on Hogwarts grounds. It was not blue, however, or green with algae or even clear. The water was viscous, thick and slow, and as silver as the blade of a knife.

“We’ll have to go around it, I think,” Neville said before he could think to stop himself.

“Eh, you’re right,” Fred said, sounding disappointed. “Might be different if there was a tree in sight. I wouldn’t mind testing my hand at making a raft.”

“A broomstick’d be better, though,” George said. “Not that we have one of those, either.”

The three of them stared out across the lake for a long time, and then Neville finally started walking, heading around the left side of the lake, wondering how far it stretched.

He had been walking for probably about ten minutes before he registered that he could hear footsteps behind him. He stopped and turned to fine the Weasley Twins following him.

“What are you doing? You’ll have to circle the other way.”

Fred and George glanced at each other. “You’d think he’d be more grateful for the company,” one admitted, though Neville didn’t bother to suss out which.

“I think he’s just confused,” the other said. He looked at Neville. “Y’think we’re just gonna let you wander off without help? Be a bit nasty of us, wouldn’t it?”

“You said Paelius was to the right of the lake,” Neville said, remembering clearly how they had mentioned their artifact called them down the opposite side as his.

“We did,” one twin said.

“And that’s not gonna change if we follow you for a while.”

“But-”

“You can’t tell me you want to be alone.”

Neville opened his mouth, then closed it. “No,” he said, confused. “I don’t.”

“Yeah, well, us neither. We’ve got each other, mind, so we’re never really on our own.”

“Not so long as we’re together.”

“But another person about isn’t nothing to shake a wand at.”

“Unless it’s a pretty girl. Then I’ll shake my wand at her.”

“But you’re not a pretty girl-”

“So please keep your pants buttoned,” Neville said, interrupting them with a look of pleading horror on his face. Both twins laughed uproariously.

“We’re coming with you, Neville. We’ll keep you company. At least, so far as we can.”

“And if we can go the whole way with you, the better for us. Then you can come with us to get our artifact. Sounds like a good deal, yeah?”

“Why are you doing this?” Neville asked, even as one of the twins put an arm around his shoulders and started him walking again.

“We like you, Neville, me lad. We think you’re the right proper sort of bloke to do decent by us.”

“You took our sister to the Yule ball last year and gave her a good time, after all.”

Neville shook his head. This couldn’t be about that, not now.

“But really, that’s just a good example of your character. No, Neville, you’re a resource we two have realized has gone untapped.”

“Four years in the same House and we never even considered that you might be someone we could trust with our secrets, with our trade.”

“Your… trade?”

“We’re pranksters, Neville.”

Purveyors of mischief and maraudering.”

“Tricks and games and all manner of fun.”

“And wasn’t it a surprise to learn that quiet little Neville had a side of himself that leaned toward that, as well?”

“Indeed, brother mine, it was a shock. Why, to hear the suggestion come out of your mouth to prank us, the Weasley Twins extraordinaire. Why, we were shocked.”

“Awed.”

“Flabbergasted.”

“And, we admit, charmed by this secret side of you, Longbottom, dear boy. Why, we’d like to bring you into the fold.”

“Make you one of us.”

“And if, by chance, bringing you into the fold of the Weasley Marauders gets you to tell us what sort of pranks Little Miss Granger is planning to hit us with ahead of time, well, we would be grateful. Wouldn’t we, Forge?”

“Indeed, Gred. Indebted, even.”

“Certainly, we would have to repay that person for all their kindness.”

“And for sparing us the humiliation of being reduced to acing our exams.”

“What a travesty that would be.”

“So what do you say, Neville?” Fred asked, one arm around Neville’s shoulders and the other hand held out for him to shake. “Partners?” 

Draco was taking advantage of the abandoned Common Room to finish up a Potions assignment. Most of Slytherin House was away from the dungeons, either in classes or taking their free period and enjoying time outside or at least elsewhere. Some students were in their dormitories, but as they were not bothering Draco, he was not concerned with them.

He had just put the finishing touches on his essay on how one would go about collecting and using a bezoar when Theodore Nott came trotting into the room with a sly smile on his face. “Well, well, what have we here?”

Draco grimaced as he rolled up his homework and stuffed it into a pocket of his robes. He would probably get points off for it being smudged and wrinkled.

“I thought you’d be run off and hiding from all the big bad Slytherins, Nameless. But here you are, sitting out in the open.” He twirled his wand in his fingers as he moved through the Common Room. “It’s like you want someone to come along and find you.”

This was how it had been since school started. Although Draco had been rescued by the aurors and taken to St. Mungo’s, his father had escaped and it was his father who made it to the Ministry first. Lucius had spoken to the Minister and he had had his son erased from the Malfoy line. He had also reported his wife attacked and murdered by an unknown assailant, and though he had not said, he had implied that it was Draco’s doing, that whoever had done it had been following Draco’s orders.

He was a minor (and that was probably the only thing that saved him from true harm) and so could not be tried as an adult under the circumstances, the Ministry lacking proof of his involvement, but it was no doubt enough for Lucius to have taken all of the Malfoy power from Draco so it could not be used against him. Not just the money and the fame, but a name. Any name. Even a child with the name of a Muggle-born would be listened to before a Nameless. Lucius had taken away any and all chance that Draco might have had to be heard, to claim his father murderer of his wife, maimer of his son.

Draco is left scarred, abandoned, nameless and alone, and Lucius Malfoy walks free because he has a name and Cornelius Fudge in his pocket.

Draco never thought he would claim to hate the Malfoys, and yet here he was, hating them. He hated them so much.

Nott stepped up to Draco, barely a foot between them (and when had Draco risen to his feet?), and the twirling stopped. Nott pointed his wand at Draco’s face. “Didn’t your father teach you anything? I mean, I thought that last lesson finally would have knocked some sense into you.”

Draco clenched his teeth and his hands tightened on his Potions textbook, but he said nothing. Nott was too thin and physically weaker than most of Slytherin House, even for a wizard, but the boy made up for it with a strong magical talent that few of the other Slytherins in their year could best. Draco was not one of them. He’d never win a fight against the other boy.

“Not talking, I see.” Nott started twirling his wand in his fingers again as he began to circle Draco and the table he stood in front of, like a predator circling his prey, or a vulture his piece of carcass.

“We’ve had quite a good bit of excitement lately, haven’t we, Draco? Your mum’s copped it, and your dad’s disowned you. He’s left a pretty mark on your face, but that’s just a testament to your refusal, isn’t it?”

He leaned his hip against the table in front of Draco, bending forward so he could whisper into Draco’s ear. “Our master is back. He’s returned and he’s ready to take back this world for our kind. Are you really going to let that opportunity slip by? Hmm?” He tilted his head, peering into Draco’s eyes despite the fierce glare aimed at him. “You could be so much more than what you are, Draco. You could make your father so proud. I know you’ve always wanted to be like Lucius.”

“Theodore.”

Nott jerked up at his name and Draco barely managed to not leap away from the other boy in his shock. He hadn’t heard anyone enter the room, but he turned to see Blaise Zabini standing not five feet away, regarding Nott with those hunter’s eyes.

A sneer curled across Nott’s mouth. “Zabini. Are you here to save the day? Little Draco’s knight in shining green and silver.”

He didn’t sound concerned, but Draco wondered if he might be a little frightened underneath the sarcasm. Whether Zabini or Nott was better with a wand, Draco couldn’t say. They were both better than he was and he wasn’t ashamed to admit that.

Well, maybe a little ashamed when it came to Nott.

But if Draco had to choose, he would rather face Nott than Zabini. It had nothing to do with magical power. Nott made Draco nervous, but Zabini scared the hell of out him. He’d never seen Blaise fight before and part of him hoped he never did. He expected the boy was as much a shark in his wandwork as he was in his movements. Zabini was a predator, one that, if at all possible, Draco would avoid being the prey of.

Zabini had his wand out, a steady hand holding it at chest level with Nott. “Draco,” the darker boy drawled, “you have other places to be.”

Draco didn’t argue. He turned and left the room, trying very hard to keep his pace a casual walk and not flee. He thought he just might avoid going back to the dormitory tonight. It would probably be safer.

Any place was safer than in the line of fire.

Zabini waited until Draco had left the Common Room to advance. Although Nott tried to appear unconcerned, the way he immediately tensed gave him away. Zabini didn’t say anything, but moved closer, his wand still held steadily in his hand.

He was within a foot of Nott when he finally spoke.

“What was that you were saying about a knight in green and silver?”

Nott whipped his wand out, a spell already flying from the tip of it in an arc. Zabini deflected it with a shield spell, as well as the second spell that came flying at him. The third one he dodged by leaning to his left, at the same time flicking his own wand.

A disarming spell sent Nott’s wand flying from his hand. It struck against the floor somewhere behind the far chair. As Nott glanced toward where it had landed, Zabini sent off three spells in quick succession: a tripping jinx, a striking curse, and leg-locking jinx.

Nott fell to the floor, groaned as something struck him sharply in the head, and his legs snapped together.

Zabini raised a slender eyebrow at the boy before him, remaining quiet until Nott regained his senses enough to focus on his face. He crouched down next to the dazed Slytherin, face impassive and eyes unblinking in their stare.

“I’m not overly fond of Death Eaters. Or their spawn, for that matter. On a normal day, I’d like you no less than I like Draco, but I have an even larger distaste for hypocrisy. As someone who lost their mother, I thought you might appreciate Draco’s delicate situation.” He studied Nott as the boy began to sneer. “I supposed wrong. Your father mauled you with presents, gifts, and attention, buying your loyalty to the Dark Lord before he even began to rise again.” He leaned closer. “You’re nothing more than a whore.”

The leg-locking jinx snapped and Nott jerked his legs apart. He raised his hand and his wand shot into his hand, a banishing charm cast at the far wall sending him skidding across the carpet and away from Zabini. He pushed himself to his feet and raised his wand, protego charm deflecting the full body bind that flew in his direction. He sent a second banishing charm, this time at Zabini, but it was redirected at the far wall with a gaping wave of his wand, sending the decorations on the mantle flying about the Common Room.

The third banishing spell made a loud cracking sound against a raised shield. Zabini’s hand shook as he struggled to hold his protego charm up against a prolonged banishment spell. The cracking sound came again, like the ice over a lake breaking, and then a sound like fabric tearing.

The shield spell shattered into pieces and Zabini let out a startled sound in the back of his throat as the banishing spell flung him backward. He grunted when he hit the far wall.

Nott steadied his feet and walked over to the wall where Zabini had struck. He’d fallen down behind the sofa and lay there, groaning.

“My father,” he said, “taught me the truth about our kind. Wizards are meant to be pure. They’re meant to breed pure. My father knows that magic is tainted by the filthy mudbloods this school lets walk through the doors every year, and once the Dark Lord is back in control, this will be one of the first places we clean up. We’ll kill every mudblood in this place, and every filthy little mudblood supporter.

“And you, Zabini.” Nott grinned, twirling his wand excitedly in his fingers. “You’ll be mine. When the time comes, I’m going to hunt you down and I’m going to banish your balls, right into the Dark Lord’s hands. Then guess who will be the whore!”

Zabini lunged off of the floor with too much strength for someone who had been dizzily groaning a moment ago. Nott yelled as he was tackled to the ground, but the sound was cut off as Zabini’s hands circled around his throat.

Wand still in hand, Nott tried to shout a spell but could get no words out. He bucked and writhed, fighting to dislodge his attacker, but he wasn’t strong enough and his feet scrabbled uselessly against the carpet, trying to find purchase. The hands tightened their grip.

Zabini was straddling the weedy boy, his weight holding him down. There was an almost bored expression on his face as he watched Nott’s face turn red. He watched impassively as the boy’s cheeks began to gain a tinge of blue, his pale lips quickly darkening with color.

Nott beat against Zabini’s face, shoulders, chest with his arms, but the weight around his throat remained. His chest ached and his head was pounding, and the whole world was beginning to take on a light, dizzy feeling, a bit like he was falling asleep. His limbs were beginning to feel heavy and Nott felt his wand slip from his hand. His fingers dug against the hands at his throat, trying to pry them off, but they held fast. He tried kicking, hitting, bucking, but he was trapped.

His head jerked up and down, the back of his skull striking the floor and making everything spin. He could feel his arms striking anything within reach, but he couldn’t stop them moving. His legs, too, were kicking and he couldn’t seem to still them. There was a hollow feeling growing in his chest, replacing the pain there, and he could feel his heartbeat racing, hammering a panicked tattoo against his left temple. There was a pressure somewhere below his stomach, but then the world seemed to tilt, and he thought for a moment that he was falling, spinning backward, over and over, no ground beneath him. He felt himself blink, the movement seeming too slow, and when he opened his eyes again, he could barely see Zabini above him. There was just a blur of grey and green, and beyond that, a light. It was soft at first, but it began to grow and get brighter, until it consumed Zabini and drove his face from sight. All Theodore could see was the light, and it was warm. He thought he could see someone’s face there, a woman, smiling back at him. He reached out a hand for her.

Warm fingers curled around his, and then an arm slipped around his back, pulling him close. Two arms held him gently and he leaned his head against a warm shoulder as he was rocked. Theodore breathed in a scent that was both foreign and familiar, and wrapped in comfort, he sighed softly.

Then the arms around him slipped away. He lamented their loss in the back of his mind, but the greatest part of him was distracted by the spasm that rocked his body. He couldn’t seem to control his own movements, but his body was quivering. The light around him pulsed and began to dim, sliding away like water back into the ocean.

Theodore tried to follow it, a desperate sound escaping from his throat. He felt something release and he choked on a throbbing exhalation of pressure, the strangeness sending him staggering. He felt himself falling backward, back, over and around, and the floor was suddenly beneath him again.

His back arched, even as his body continued to spasm, and then a sound, half-squeal, half-gag, came from his mouth as air struck the back of his throat, burning its way down to his lungs. Then he was gasping and coughing, his head screaming in agony as the dimmed torches in the Common Room seared his unfocused eyes.

There was a presence above him, a pressure on his waist, but all he could see was a blur of grey and green. He thought that was important somehow - that it was dangerous - but he couldn’t put it together in his mind why. There was a movement above him, and then the pressure released, the blur moved to his side. Theodore gazed blearily at it.

“What?” he tried to asked, but the words slurred unintelligibly in his mouth, his lips feeling limp. He didn’t waste time on trying to articulate the word better. Speaking even that small amount left him feeling breathless and he focused on breathing. It seemed so difficult for some reason, and the air stung his throat with every inhalation.

“Hmph,” the blur murmured, sounding bored, or maybe disappointed. “Look how quickly the fight went out of you.”

The blur waved an arm. Nott thought it was an arm. He blinked, his vision beginning to clear. He watched the blur become a boy. Zabini. His wand in hand. A fight. A trick. Hands on him, on his throat. Legs around his. Being unable to breathe. The world ending around him, then returning. His body not reacting to his commands.

He caught the movement of Zabini’s wand, watched one of the pillows on the sofa change into a towel. He flinched when Zabini tossed it over and it landed on his chest.

“Clean yourself up.”

The boy rose to his feet gracefully, robes swishing around his body as he turned like water. He moved with quiet speed, out of the Common Room and up the stairs to the dormitories.

Nott grabbed the towel with a weak hand. He struggled to pull himself into a sitting position, his limbs feeling floppy and useless. He managed to slide back a few feet and slumped, exhausted, against the couch, his whole body aching. His skull was pounding and his throat was on fire, and it felt like his head flopped listlessly when he tried to move it, as though it was too large and heavy for his neck. He glanced down at himself, lips numb and feeling as though they were dangling open.

His eyebrows curved down in a frown as he saw that his robes had been sliced open from top to bottom, the edges burned, as though they had been severed with a hot poker. His trousers, too, were open, the button undone. The crotch of his trousers was soaked.

Theodore swallowed what felt like glass. His penis was bared for all the world to see, hanging in a state of clear satisfaction, cum still leaking from the tip.

He remembered suddenly the feeling of pressure against his crotch, the warmth that filled him. He recalled, too, the feeling of release that came later, and the spasms that had rocked his body, quivering through him. He remembered being unable to still himself.

Bile rose up in his throat and he rolled over quickly. Theodore heaved, his stomach rolling and churning.

He staggered to his feet, fell the first time he tried to walk, and found his balance. He dragged his arm across his mouth, trying to wipe away the taste of sick. His legs were mush and his body ached and the word whore kept echoing through his head in Zabini’s voice.

He glared at the towel in his hand and threw it violently at the couch with a snarl.

Oh, he was going to kill that bastard. He was going to cut off his balls and make him eat them, and he was going to kill him.

Theodore staggered around the Common Room, eyes scanning the floor, the furniture. He even looked in the fireplace. He couldn’t find it. His hands curled into fists, dull fingernails digging into his palms. Of course, Zabini would have taken his wand while he was lying prone and gasping on the floor. The bastard.

He would kill him slowly.