Covered in Crimson

For the first time since he’d awakened, naked and covered in blood, Draco opened the exterior door of the small cottage. He stood on the wooden covered porch that spanned the breadth of the structure’s northern side. A white painted railing, weathered and peeling, surrounded the edge. Now mostly in shadow because of the late afternoon sun’s position in the sky and a growing cloud cover, he squinted to make out details of the items he saw. On the far left, he saw a faded yellow wood and rattan rocker, the ladder back partially obscured by a tattered crocheted throw, color indeterminate in the gloom. A small stack of wood rested against the building’s façade. To his right, Draco saw a dry and dead plant resting on the railing. By the looks of it, the pot had been there for years. A small wooden chest sat in the far corner; it seemed to be the only thing that might contain anything, and he moved to inspect its contents.

Draco lifted the lid, rusty hinges creaking and groaning at his intrusion. This corner was too dark to see anything inside, so he dragged the surprisingly heavy box to the porch’s center where the light was a little better. This suddenly made him realize that, once darkness fell in no more than an hour, he’d have no light in the house. Recognizing that this was a more pressing problem, he lugged the chest into the house and set it aside momentarily in favor of looking for lamps, candles, anything that might be used to generate a light source. He was so lost without a wand to cast Lumos or magical lamps to light. He wondered, just how did Muggles manage? He absently recalled something called eckel-something-or-other that had been described in that Muggle studies class so long ago, but remembered absolutely nothing more about it. He had no idea whether this property was even equipped with the stuff, and even if it was, he had not a clue how to use it. Another question for Granger when she was up to it.

He didn’t remember seeing anything that would do the job on his search of the sitting room, or in either bedroom. The kitchen might have had a box of matches, but although he vaguely knew what they were, he didn’t know how to light them. “I’m nearly useless here,” he snorted in self-deprecation. “I’ll never regret more than this moment that I didn’t pay attention in that bloody class.” He understood that even if he could figure out how to light the matches, he still needed something to set them to, like a candle. That, he hadn’t yet found. He had abandoned the basement when he’d found the two boxes of clothing, and at least half of the space hadn’t been explored. That should be his next stop before it got too dark to see a thing.

He carefully made his way down the stairs and into the section he’d ignored earlier. Relief and gratitude flashed over him as he saw that this side of the basement was still lit by the dimming sun filtered through three small rectangular windows at the top of the wall, just under the flooring of the main level. He saw two wooden work benches, each about a meter high and two meters long. One held a long, narrow metal box, which had a small lock looped through the clasp on the front. He tugged on the lock and was pleasantly surprised when it easily released in his hand; it was rusted nearly all the way through. He opened the lid to find a collection of thin metal implements, some with wood handles, most with at least some rust dotting their surface. He didn’t know what they were or how they were used but, he guessed again, Granger might. Setting the box at the foot of the stairs, he decided he’d bring it into the sitting room for further inspection. There was nothing on top of the other wooden bench, but he smiled broadly when he saw what was beneath it - a lamp, not dissimilar to the kind you’d find in Malfoy Manor or any other Wizarding home. It held some kind of liquid in the bottom, which he assumed was fuel of some sort. He’d lay heavy odds that Granger would know exactly what to do with this. As soon as she awoke, he’d make this first priority, assuming she was able to communicate well enough to tell him what to do.

Finding nothing else that seemed to be of immediate value, he brought his latest treasures up the stairs, carefully balancing the lamp on top of the metal box. He set them on one of the tables in the sitting room then went back into the kitchen to see if he could find the box of matches he thought he’d seen. After rummaging through a couple of drawers and cabinets, he found them sitting on the back of a large metal, um, thing that had four circular rings on the top and four circular knobs on the front. Whatever it was, he again had not the slightest idea.

Moving back to the sitting room with matches in hand, Draco decided to quickly check the box he’d brought in from the porch before waking up Granger. Resting on one knee before the wooden crate, he lifted the lid and peered inside. “Huh? Jars of pickles?” Draco was surprised, to say the least. “Who keeps ten jars of pickles in a box?” he muttered, shaking his head in amusement. “Well, it is something to eat that’s better than absolutely nothing, I suppose.”

In the thirty minutes or so that he’d been searching the porch and the basement, the light coming from outside had begun to dim quickly and considerably. He hated to wake Granger after such a short time, but they’d be sitting in complete darkness if he waited much longer. She was frightened as it was, and Draco didn’t think she’d appreciate not being able to see where he was or what he was doing. She, with good reason, didn’t trust him. With an apology ready on his lips, he went back to the bedroom where he’d left her, and knocked twice on the door before opening it. The sound had been enough to rouse her, and she slowly opened her eyes.

“How long?” she whispered hoarsely.

“I’m sorry to wake you so soon, Granger. It’s only been about half an hour at the most. I really need your help on a couple of, uh, Muggle things and it really couldn’t wait,” Draco explained.

“Wut?” she squeaked.

“Lighting. I don’t have any idea how to get lighting for us in this Muggle house, and it’s getting dark really fast,” he said.

“Swit.”

“Swit? What’s that? Sorry, I don’t understand.” Draco looked at her, confusion writ all over his face.

Hermione lifted her hand about six inches off the bed and pointed toward the wall. Draco followed her gaze to a tiny white thing that was sticking out from the flat surface. “That?” he questioned.

“Ya. Up.”

Shrugging, Draco moved to the wall and flicked the little knob in the direction Granger indicated and jumped about half a meter in the air, squealing like a little girl when the room was flooded with bright light from above. “Whoa! Is that eckeltricity?” Draco’s eyes were as wide as saucers.

Hermione couldn’t help but to crack the faintest smile. “Ya.”

“How did you know it would work?” he queried.

“Wot. Pump,” she explained.

“The water? It’s pumped from something?” Draco was thoroughly confused. Things just didn’t work this way in the Wizarding world.

“Ya. Tank,” she expanded.

“Well, okay then. We have eckeltricity. I suppose that’s a good thing?” He met her eyes looking for confirmation, which she supplied with a nod. “So anywhere I find one of those little knobs, if I flick it up, it will turn on lights?”

“Ya.”

“How do I turn them off?”

“Down.”

“Oh.” He had the good grace to be embarrassed over missing this incredibly simple concept, and blushed to his ears.

Hermione rolled her eyes, but with more amusement than disgust. It was clear that the young wizard was entirely out of his element. She’d have to provide a significant amount of guidance to keep him functioning in this environment.

“Um, Granger, what about heat? It’s awfully cold, and it’ll just get colder as the sun goes down. Any ideas?”

She huffed in frustration. How could she explain a furnace and thermostat without being able to speak? And that scenario also assumed that there was fuel for whatever type of heating system this house might have. Draco could see the irritation in her expression.

“I know, you’re having trouble talking. Um, do you know why that is?” he probed, not a little worried about what she’d tell him he did to cause that particular problem.

“Bit tung.”

Oh, that wasn’t so horrible, he thought. “You bit your tongue?” he confirmed.

“Nnn. You.”

“Oh shit. I bit your tongue?” Draco dropped his face into his palms, utterly mortified. “I’m sorry, Granger. For the hundredth time, I’m sorry.”

“S’ok. Swe dow.”

“It’s not okay, and we both know it, but I’m happy that the swelling is starting to go down, if I understood you correctly.”

“Ya.”

“Hey, would it help if I gave you another piece of wet towel that you could suck on? If we had ice, that’d be perfect, but I couldn’t find anything that would supply ice, even if I knew what made ice in the Muggle world,” Draco rambled.

Hermione raised her hand to stop his blabbering. “Ya.”

“Great. I’ll get it for you right now.” Draco was inordinately relieved to be able to leave the room for a moment to attempt to recapture a tiny sliver of his dignity. “Merlin, what a colossal shit I am.”

When he came back with a small hand towel that had been soaked in the icy tap water, Hermione’s eyes had drifted shut, and he thought that she had fallen asleep again, so he returned the wet towel to the sink. But as he re-entered the room, she opened them again, watching from her position on the bed behind him as he folded a once-colorful patchwork quilt and set aside some bed linens. His deliberate moves and focused demeanor were so dramatically at odds with the young man she’d known in their last two years at Hogwarts. He’d been rash, wild, and erratic in everything he did, especially in their sixth year, before the school had closed. His eyes even looked different, less glazed, and sharper. Even through her own mental fogginess, Hermione could see that something had changed, something big. She prayed that it was a change for the better.

“Maffoy,” she whispered.

He was startled by her calling his name, having been convinced that she was sleeping. Turning to face her, his face was placid as he spoke. “I didn’t realize you were still awake. Let me get that towel back for you,” he offered.

“Way.” She lifted her hand to indicate she wanted him to stop.

“Sure. What else do you need?”

She narrowed her eyes and looked straight at him. “You OK?”

Draco’s jaw literally dropped open, his shock was so great. “You really are a piece of work, Granger. I’m fine. But thanks for asking.” He shook his head, still stunned. He hesitated before speaking again. “Why do you ask?”

She shrugged slightly, casting her glance downward. “D’frn.”

Draco folded his arms across his chest, feeling just a little bit defensive. “I’m different? To what? And how would you know? As far as I can remember, I haven’t seen you in more than two years, until yesterday.”

Hermione huffed, again undoubtedly frustrated with her inability to speak without significant pain. She shook her head, trying to convey that she was currently unable to communicate her message. She waved a hand in a gesture of dismissal, just for good measure. He’d have to wait for an answer to these questions. “Tow?” she requested.

With a sigh, Draco accepted that she had tabled the topic, at least for now, and nodded. He left her briefly to retrieve the wet towel from the adjacent bathroom.

When he handed it to her, she met his eyes and nodded her thanks, opening her mouth to gain some relief from the cool cloth. He smirked just a little at the decidedly odd sight of Hermione Granger with a wet towel stuck in her mouth. She rolled her eyes, not ignorant to the strangeness of the visual. She tossed her head toward the door, indicating that he should leave.

“No problem, Granger. I get it. You want me out of here so you can go back to sleep. I’ll go now, but we’ve got some talking to do later, so you keep that thing in your mouth to get the swelling down more.” With that, Draco flipped the light switch down and stepped out of the room closing the door behind him. Hermione shut her eyes, and drifted off to sleep, thoughts swirling about what had happened with and to Draco over the last five or six years.

Draco went to the sitting room and searched the wall for one of those little knob things that turned on the overhead lights. He finally found it near the entrance to the kitchen, and was rewarded with the expected flash of brightness when he followed Granger’s instructions. “Okay, that’s pretty simple. I could get used to this eckeltricity stuff if I had to,” Draco mused. He sat on the dingy sofa, leaning his head back against its top. His headache had dulled, but the lump on his temple was very tender. He could use some ice as much as Granger. He closed his eyes for a moment, just for a little relief against the unaccustomed brightness. It was definitely getting colder, and it would likely dip into the frigid range overnight. He hoped that Granger would wake up in time to give him some guidance on how to get the fireplace working. His eyes popped open suddenly as an idea flashed across his brain. “It’s going to freeze outside tonight!” he exclaimed. Jumping up from his seat, he dashed into the kitchen and looked for anything deep enough to hold water but shallow enough to allow it to freeze quickly - and still get the block of ice out. The glasses wouldn’t really work – too deep – but the two small plates would probably do the trick, and yield enough ice to give a little comfort to her mouth and his head. He filled both plates with about a half-inch of water and carried them both to the front entrance. He set one of them down to open the door and then placed both on the wooden decking, returning to the sitting room with a satisfied grin. “I’m not quite so useless after all,” he decided. It had been a long stressful day; he leaned his head back against the sofa, and dozed off for about an hour.

When Draco awoke the sun had completely disappeared and the sky was black. He had developed a bit of a crick in his neck, and his head still ached, but he did feel a little more rested and calm. He figured it was about time to check on Granger, so he rose and stretched, working a few kinks out of his sore muscles.

Draco knocked twice on the bedroom door and called out her name, “Granger, I’m coming in.” He opened the door and saw that she was awake and had removed the towel from her mouth. “Feeling better?” he asked.

“Yeth, thanks,” Hermione lisped out, but it was definitely more understandable than her previous attempts. “Rethted. Thor all over, tho,” she stated.

“Yeah, I’m sorry about that,” Draco offered once again, rubbing his hand across the back of his neck, eyes downcast.

“Thtop apologithing. I get it,” she snapped, growing annoyed and confused at his unexpectedly contrite behavior. “Jus move on. Pleathe.”

His cheeks colored and he nodded. “I understand that you don’t want to talk about what happened, Granger. But at some point we’re going to need to confront this. I’m absolutely serious when I say I don’t remember what happened here, or even know where we are or how we got here. I’m guessing that you have an answer or two to those questions, and I need to know. I’ve reached a few conclusions based on your condition and mine when I woke up, but there’s clearly more to it. I never thought I’d say this, but I need you, Granger, to help me figure out exactly who I am right now.”

She looked at him for a moment, weighing what she saw and heard now against what she’d seen and heard the day before, and what she’d known of him since their fifth year at Hogwarts, when he’d become a dramatically different person for the first time. She knew that Draco could practically hear the gears turning in her head, recognizing how their fates were entwined, at least for the next few days. He was right about one thing, there was certainly a lot more to the story than met the eye, and she’d have little choice but to be his storyteller if bodies and souls were to be saved.

“I know. Jus need a little time. Pleathe,” she begged him once more, this time with her eyes more than her voice.

He sighed, but not with anger. “Fine, Granger. Take whatever time you need before we talk about this. There are a couple of practical matters that need to be dealt with now, though. Are you up to doing that – at least for a few minutes?”

“Thure. What do you need?”

“Thank you. The first thing we need to do is figure out how to get some heat into this place. I know you can’t really move around yet, but if you can talk me through a couple of things we can probably avoid freezing to death tonight. Okay?”

“Did you thee a furnath?”

“A furnath? What’s that? Sorry, I don’t know that word, Granger.”

She breathed deeply to gather strength enough to talk through the pain in her damaged tongue. “Furnace, Malfoy.”

He looked at her in confusion again. “Still don’t know what that is. I’m assuming it’s a Muggle thing, right?”

She nodded. “Make heat. Needth fuel like oil or coal or gath.”

“Let me make sure I understand what you’re saying. It’s a device that you put oil, coal, or gas into and it makes heat. Is that right? Are the fuels interchangeable?”

“Yeth and definitely no.”

“Okay – I got the basic concept right but there are different types of furnaces and they use different fuels, correct?”

“Yeth.”

“How do I recognize a furnace and how can I tell what kind of fuel it uses?”

“Big, metal, in bathement. Pipeth to and from,” Hermione gasped out. She was becoming winded with the effort of speaking so much, and she was beginning to think she might have at least a minor rib injury because deep breathing was very painful. “Retht pleathe,” she begged, unable to continue for the moment.

“No problem, Granger. Why don’t you rest for a few minutes and I’ll go explore the basement and see what I can find.” With that, Draco left her to recover and made his way to the door leading to the lower level. He quickly found the ‘light knob thing’ as he’d mentally named it, and the basement was now as bright as he could wish. The young man had a logical mind and while his knowledge of magical sciences wasn’t specifically helpful, many fundamental concepts across the Wizarding and Muggle worlds were more similar than he’d ever imagined. In particular, the scientific method of test and trial and of understanding pattern and path would stand him in good stead.

He looked around the basement and found four large metal boxes that might be a ‘furnace’. Now he would need to examine each to see if he could determine which machine was which. He ran into a little good luck with two items which were actually labeled “Deluxe Washer” and “Heavy Duty Dryer”. Both looked like they had seen better days, with significant amounts of rust at joins and corners. That left two large metal machines for him to inspect. They were also placed side by side, as the other two items had been, and seemed to be connected by pipes. Granger had mentioned pipes, so that seemed promising. He decided to follow the pipes to see where they led.

It appeared that one set went up through the floor into the main level of the cottage. The other set stretched from the machine on the left, trussed across the ceiling and into a large tank. The tank had a gauge on the top that seemed to indicate it was three-quarters full. That seemed to hold promise, if Granger could tell him how to get the thing started.

Draco decided that since he had full light now, it would make sense to look around to see if he’d overlooked anything else that might be useful. He poked through each corner, nook and cranny and was surprised to find a wooden cabinet tucked into the space below the stairs. He’d completely missed it in his last two trips down here. He opened the doors and found a small stock of cans, covered with a thin layer of dust. According to their labels, they contained baked beans, stewed tomatoes, peas, creamed corn and something called SPAM. Well, as long as they weren’t contaminated, they wouldn’t starve to death. He’d bring them up to the kitchen and get Granger to check them. They were Muggle things; she’d know. There was one thing, though, that was niggling at his brain. If this house had been abandoned for as long as it had appeared, why was the eckeltricity working? Didn’t that require service contracts and payments and such? “Odd. Very odd,” Draco observed.