Hate it or Love it

Disclaimer – I do not own Harry Potter

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Hate it or Love it
Poisoned Ink
Chapter 13
It Ends Tonight

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Lucius let out a small cough as he landed in the cold and slimy office at Azkaban. The candles shone dimly in the room, most of them settled on a desk in the center of the room. A short man quickly stood up in his chair behind the desk, patting his robes, attempting to unwrinkled them.

“Mr. Malfoy,” the man walked over to Lucius, extending a dirty and rough hand, “John Slanton at your service.”

Lucius grimaced but shook the hand anyway, trembling in the cold air.

“I’m the head administrator in Azkaban,” John went on and introduced himself, “I take orders directly from the Minister.”

So this is another oblivious idiot that follows Fudge, Lucius groaned inwa5rdly, but forced a tight smile on his face.

“Well,” John stepped back and picked up a heavy string of keys off of his desk, “We’ve booked the best room around.”

Lucius grunted. Even the best room in Azkaban didn’t sound too good to him.

John gestured Lucius to follow him out of the office and onto the main hall.

Azkaban was exactly how Lucius remembered it. The slimy stone walls dark with dirt and cold by the presence of dementors.

“The dementors don’t come here often,” John commented, as if he could read Lucius’ mind, “They prefer the cells where all the prisoners are at. They only come when they are asked for a meeting.” John paused and grimaced, “Which is never often.”

Lucius gulped. He hadn’t forgotten the presence of dementors, the bone penetrating coldness. Damn Dumbledore for sending him here. Damn himself for volunteering like an idiot.

“Here we are,” John stopped in front of a wooden door. Lucius pushed it open hesitantly.

The room was dark and cold. It was barely bigger than a cell, with a small bed against the wall. The wall was hardly better than the walls outside. Despite the dirty wall paper that was plastered over the surface, the wall still seemed to drip with the dampness. In the center of the room stood a shabby table with wet paper scattered on the surface. Behind the table was a small chair, shaking in the cold air from its uneven legs. On the other side of the small room stood a fireplace, although it looked like it’s never been lit. Dirt infected the place where logs of wood used to be.

“This,” Lucius gestured to the room sharply, “This is the best you have?!”

“The only guest room we have,” John said nervously, his fingers twisted in his dark robes. “We don’t get a lot of visitors that stays overnight.”

Lucius’ nose twitched slightly.

“What about you?” He snarled, looking at John as if he was a piece of worthless trash.

“Well…” John stumbled and laughed nervously, unconsciously stepping back several steps, “You see, Mr. Malfoy, its not allowed for me to switch rooms with any visitors…”

Lucius swore under his breath, his head filled with plans to murder Dumbledore when he gets through with this.

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Niveus let out a frustrated grunt as his body collided with the hard floor of the dungeons.

“Niveus!” a voice cried in the hallway behind him and footsteps could be heard. Arms came around him and squeezed him tightly.

Niveus sighed. Draco was always the enthusiastic one. He let his body fall limp in Draco’s arms, letting Draco play with his paws like he was some kind of doll.

“I see your father has sent the dog,” Severus commented, sneaking behind Draco and wrapping his arms around him silently.

After spending months at the Malfoy Manor, seeing anyone who lived in the castle was a delight, even if it was Severus.

He shuffled over to Severus slowly, putting his paw on the dark man’s ankle for a brief moment, testing to see if the potion master would explode in front of him.

Instead of kicking Niveus away, Severus only scowled, his face showing his discomfort.

Niveus didn’t know what to do then. Was he supposed to run to the potion master and cuddle, hoping he would be cute enough to get the potion master to take him to anyone else? For a long time, cuddling was the only thing he had to do to get whatever he wanted. Now he didn’t know any other method. All the other ways he had used: black mail, threats, event negotiations—those ways seemed foreign to him now.

After awhile he decided cuddling was indeed going too far. Instead, he laid on the potion master’s foot.

Draco grinned and turned around, planting a chaste kiss onto Severus’ lips.

“He likes you!” he said excitedly, reaching down to ruffle Niveus’ back.

Severus merely snorted, and Niveus felt the foot beneath him shift.

Niveus quickly scooted away from Severus. The dark haired man didn’t enjoy him being touched, maybe the only exception of Draco.

He strolled cautiously into the kitchen, trying to not look back at the dark eyes that were following him.

The table sitting in the kitchen was quite exquisite. The dark wood was laced with silver on the edges. Niveus strolled closer to a leg of the table, gazing his reflection on the silver edge of the table.

As strange as it is, it was the first time Harry has looked at himself closely in a dog form. He stared at the leg of the table, eyes wide, turning around slowly once in awhile. He didn’t look the same as he thought he did—when did he get so fluffy? He supposed it was Lucius’ fault, petting him all the time.

It was then he realized that he missed Lucius.

It seemed ridiculous at first. All this time that he tried to get away from the older Malfoy, all the time he cuddled and licked and snuggled, trying to get out of the Manor—how did that become something alike to adoration? When did he stop thinking of Malfoy as the ultimate enemy and started to think of him as…Lucius?

Niveus could only imagine what Hermione and Ron would react to his new…feelings. Ron would probably jump to his feet and knock him out cold, attempting to drown him in a sea of counter-jinxes that Ron think Harry needed. Hermione would understand, of course, and coo and squeal at them every time they appeared together. Oh yes, she would shriek out to everyone about how adorable they were.

Niveus shook himself, trying to get the image of Lucius out of his head. Who would have known this arrangement would trigger this…warm…feeling inside him? He growled against and chased those thoughts out of his head. It is a hot day and maybe he was hallucinating.

Him, the boy-who-defeated-the-greatest-evil-of-the-century, the one who everyone sends colorful fan mails to, having a crush on the dark, cold Lucius Malfoy, who was an ex-death eater?

Yes, he was definitely hallucinating.

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“There we are,” John led Lucius in front of a ratty door, splinters sticking out from the rotting wood.

Lucius crunched his nose at the site of the door. Was there anything in Azkaban that wasn’t rotted?

He quickly darted out his hand and turned the doorknob, shrinking away from it as quickly as possible as if it was a poisonous snake. The door opened slowly, squealing on its way, and revealed a small office.

“After you,” Lucius gestured politely to John, not wanting to be the first one to breathe the rotting air in the room.

John beamed visibly at the gesture, leading the way into the office. Lucius stepped in after him hesitantly.

The first thing Lucius noticed was that there were no shelves in the tiny office. Piles of paper were stacked on the floor, occasionally some escaping their stack and fall limply to the ground.

“Very organized,” Lucius commented sourly, using his foot to lift up a piece of paper from the floor. The paper floated in the air briefly before falling again, several feet away from its original place.

John flushed slightly.

“Well, no one really cleans this office,” he said, shifting on his foot, “We don’t’ use this much. It’s full of records…”

Lucius raised his eyebrow, his interest perking up as he heard the last part of that sentence.

“Records?” he asked, leaning forward slightly to get a better view of the scattered paper, “Records of what?”

John bent down and picked up a scattered sheet of paper.

“Prisoner records,” he said, after scanning the piece of paper, “Sirius Black.”

Lucius snatched the paper away from John, scanning quickly and muttering quietly under his breath.

He wasn’t disappointed. The paper had everything—from the reason of imprisonment to family backgrounds and most importantly, the dates.

Lucius waved the paper quickly in front of John, his excitement building.

“Everyone is recorded here?” he asked.

“It seems like it,” John replied, “We have the dementors to do the records for us. Surprisingly, some of them can write…no one enters the actual prison but them.”

So the records weren’t perfect. It must have taken the dementors awhile to realize some of the escapes, like the case of Black. Dementors aren’t the brightest creatures.

“Non one enters the prison?” Lucius asked, putting the record of Black back onto a random pile.

John shook his head.

“On one except when we have visitors. Which is almost never…”

That would explain why he didn’t see anyone else but the dementors during his stay in Azkaban.

Suddenly the room turned colder. The walls cracked under the cold. John looked around nervously, scrambling towards the door.

Lucius threw him a confused look.

“Dementors,” John answered as if it was blatantly obvious. “They’re here to mark the records.”

Lucius shuddered at his last encounter with the dementors. No way was he spending more time with a creature that would suck out his soul.

“Let’s go then,” Lucius cast a last look at the records before following John out of the door.

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Niveus snuggled in Draco’s arms contently, keeping an eye open once in awhile as Draco gave him a guide of Hogwarts. Had to give him a tour so he won’t get lost in this big scary castle full of monstrous stair cases, Draco had said to Severus. Other wise Lucius would murder him for putting his cute and fluffy pet in danger. Niveus could vaguely remember Severus snorting, murmuring something along the lines of “would be doing Lucius a favor if the dog dies”. Niveus didn’t blame him much though. He should have known anything adorable would be the death of Severus Snape.

He was disturbed by a sudden swing of Draco’s arm as he leaped from one moving staircase to another.

“Ah, the library,” Draco smirked, putting Niveus down in front of the library door. “A boring place really. Dumbledore will be mad to know that we have a more varied collection of books in our manor…”

Niveus growled and softly butted the door with his head, cutting off Draco’s rambling.

“Oh. Right.” Draco stared at the dog briefly before pushing the doors open, revealing rows of bookshelves, some hitting the ceiling.

Draco frowned as an almost excited squeal came from the dog and Niveus ran into the door, soon disappearing in the rows of bookshelves.

“Oh great,” Draco muttered under his breath as Niveus vanished, “Another book worm in the family.”

Niveus, on the other hand, was having the time of his life. He could only imagine what Hermione would say when she finds out the best time he spent in the entire summer was staring at countless rows of books.

He scrambled through the library, heading straight to the restricted section. Because animagus transformations weren’t common among the students, he doubted anything in the open and normal section would help him. Plus, he already established that if he wanted anything useful, he should head straight to the restricted section.

“Niveus?” a voice rang out in the library. Niveus snuck into the darkened section before Draco can find him. The library seems massive now, due to his small size. Niveus jumped as high as he could. He could only reach the bottom two rows. The top rows of books looked down at him, piling as high as towers.

He vaguely remembers as spell to find a book in the library. Not that he could do any magic now, stuck in this form. He often wondered if he has done something wrong to upset the Gods in his past life, and if he should start praying and apologizing to them now for forgiveness.

He sighed. No use to complain now. If he wanted to go back to his original form in time for the start of the year, he would have to start looking for books now.

Niveus strained his neck and scanned the titles. Basic Guide to Occlumency…Wolfsbane…Voodoo magic? Hm…could be something useful, he supposed. Moving on…elemental magic, veelas…ah there it is. The animagus section.

He ran directly below the shelf that contained the book. It was in the third row, just above his reach.

Niveus growled. He staggered back a few steps and stretched, waggling his tail.

“Oh, there you are,” Draco appeared in front of the row, looking at Niveus sternly, “You should not be at the…”

Suddenly Niveus launched at the book shelf with all his speed, crashing into the wooden structure with a bang.

Draco stood with his mouth wide open. Did Niveus just…?

Niveus rolled over on the floor and groaned. Draco was at his side in a heartbeat.

“Niveus!” Draco cried, “Are you okay? Why did you do that? You know better to do that…”

Niveus glared at Draco as he ranted on, his hands turning him over to examine every part of his body to check for damage. He jerked away from Draco as his hands reached under his belly. Apparently that was a sensitive spot.

Draco rolled his eyes and eyed his pet in concern.

“Come on,” he reached out and grabbed Niveus behinds it’s front legs, lifting him up to his shoulder, “I better take you back.”

Draco’s concerned face disappeared out of Niveus sight and Niveus climbed on Draco’s shoulder, casting one last longing look at the book.

Yes, he thought sourly, I believe we have a problem.

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Lucius shuddered as the cold dungeon air pierced through his lungs. It was hard to see when the night swallowed the prison, even with the light glimmering off of the top of his wand.

For the thousandth time, he cursed under his breath. Fuck Dumbledore. Fuck Potter, Fuck Azkaban. Fuck everything.

The doorway to the storage room seemed colder than the rest of the air, if that was possible. Lucius looked back quietly, making sure he wasn’t followed, and pushed the door open.

Lucius winced as a wave of icy air splashed against his face, cutting into his skin like an invisible whip, leaving a path of stinging sensations across his cheek.

He took a deep breath, shuddering at the cold air that invaded his lungs. The dementors left not long ago, it seemed. Lucius scrunched his nose as the faint smell of rotten flesh burned into his senses. Only a dementor could leave an odor like this. They must have only left minutes ago.

Three small steps forward into the room, and he was nearly at the center. Lucius closed the door behind him with a soft click. He held his breath and stood still, his ears straining to hear anything, echoes, footsteps, anything suspicious coming from the other side of the closed door. When nothing came, he visibly relaxed and stared at the stacks of paper in front of him. Now how in hell was he supposed to find a bunch of death eaters in this pile of mess?

Several more steps, and he were right in front of the stacks. He knelt down slowly, careful to no make any noise with his motion, and brushed his finger down the pile, letting the sharp edge of the papers run through his fingertip.

There had to be some type of organization. The papers were important, at least to the dementors, so they must have a system of finding things. Lucius picked a random piece of paper off a stack, scanned the name quickly and put it back. The stacks seemed to be in alphabetical order b the prisoner’s last names.

Not long after he started looking for the piles he needed, he noticed while the papers are placed in the proper pile, the pile weren’t in their correct orders.

Lucius growled in frustration. There were at least 100 piles in the room, some letters dividing into more than 5 piles. If there weren’t any more signs of organization, it would take forever to find those files.

After several hours of flinging papers, Lucius had found all the major ex-death eaters. He picked one carelessly at the top and started to read the first page.

Lestrange, Bellatrix
Former Follower of Voldemort
Life Sentence
Cell #396
Age – 38
Date of Birth – 1962 May 23
Trial – July 13th, 1998

1998 July 14th – Enter prison
1999 January 1st- health check – stable
1999 May 1st – health check – stable
1999 December 1st- health check – mental medicine given

At the top of the paper, a very disheveled Bellatrix grinned at him and winked. Bella always had a thing for Lucius, and she had made it very clear during their time serving the post dark lord.

It seemed clear enough on the records—Bellatrix should still be in her cell, suffering in this hellhole. Looked like he would have to pay dear Bella a visit.

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“What?” Draco snapped impatiently, looking up from his book to the dog near his feet.

Niveus tagged his leg again, looking up at Draco through his leash.

Draco sighed. Every since Niveus ran himself into that wall, Severus thought it would be a good idea to put the leash Draco had into good use. So they lost a toy of theirs, but at least it ensured the dog wouldn’t interrupt them with their…activities like it has dome several times.

Draco blushed at the memory. Severus had insisted something must be dome because having a dog to stare at him having sex was too creepy for him.

The dog at his feet whined again. Draco decided to ignore Niveus. It was normal, in a way. The dog had been acting this way everything he came to the library. Draco almost regretted for taking the pet with him, but Severus simply refuse to watch over Niveus, and the Draco can’t leave him wandering around in the castle. It just wasn’t his day.

“Stop!” he growled slowly at Niveus who attempted to chew a hole in his trousers. He looked around, still self conscious about talking to an animal. Plus he didn’t think the dog understood anything in English except “sit” and “fetch”.

To his amazement, Niveus stopped chewing his pant leg, and is now lying pitifully by his foot, glaring at Draco with his unique emerald eyes.

“Bloody McGonagall,” Draco muttered to himself. “A ten-feet essay on animagus over the summer? That stuff isn’t even taught till seventh year!”

Niveus jerked up his head. Draco is doing an essay on animagus? That means…yes. The book he was looking for was scattered across the table along with other books. Why did he not see that before?

Draco raised an eyebrow as Niveus barked happily and started to climb onto the table, jumping from chair to chair.

“As long as you don’t bother me…” Draco muttered and settled back in his work, keeping an eye on Niveus.

Out of the corner of his eye, he watched as Niveus made its way towards one of the books, flipping it open and started to stare at the pages.

At least one of us likes to study, Draco shook his head and gave the parchment before him his full attention. He had 9 feet more to finish before the day ends.

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“Bella?” Lucius called out to the empty hallway, the walls completely covered by bar doors of cells. Stone placard beside the cell door labeled them, giving Lucius a slight sense of direction of where he was heading. He knew he was very close now, as the cell placards turned to about 380. Oh yes, he was very close to his target.

Cell 396 was not much different than the rest. The iron bars were rusted and sharp to the touch, the stone walls moist and ripping with water. Inside of the cell were pitch black, not even a hint of moonlight came through the tiny window inside the cell.

“Bellatrix?” Lucius tried again, hesitantly this time, as if he was waiting to release a beast that would tear him into pieces. “Bella?” Lucius tried again.

The darkness remained silent.

Lucius moved the light closer and gripped the bars, and the light lit the small cell.

The cell was completely empty. The corners of the cell lay disheveled grass that used to be part of a bunk that now stood against the back wall with the sheets ripped to pieces.

A small cockroach scurried across the cell, as if trying to escape the coldness and recognition in Lucius’ eyes.

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It was midnight. The whole castle was covered by the suffocating silence, wrapped around in a pitch black blanket.

Light.

Light that had escaped from the gap under the doors, embroidered with moans and sighs.

Something was missing. The tinge of awkwardness and embarrassment along with the fevered wounds of love making.

Outside, a shadow traveled through the lit area.

A soft knock.

Severus looked up from the sheets, lifting his mouth from the soft neck under him. Draco groaned in disappointment.

“What was that?” he whispered, his body lifting up from Draco’s.

“Sev!” Draco whined, eyes wide in disbelief. “Come back…”

The knock was back, only louder.

“Do you hear that?” Severus asked Draco, who arched his body against what was left of Severus’ that was still close. “Sh…” Severus muttered, completely ignoring Draco’s wanton actions.

“Alright,” Draco said, frustrated, “Lets go and see,” he sat up from the bed, grabbed a shirt and pulled it over his head.

“Wait,” Severus sat up quickly, trying to stop his lover, “You don’t know…”

Draco merely ignored Severus and pulled the door open, letting the light from the bedroom fill the living room.

“What is it?” Severus peaked his head from Draco’s shoulder, looking alertly into the living room. “Its nothing…”

Suddenly Niveus’ body , that was right in front of the door, glowed and a loud crack filled the room. A Growl echoed through, which turned into painful screams.

The flow faded from the room. On the floor where Niveus used to be lay a very shaken and very naked Harry Potter.

“Fuck,” Harry whispered, having just noticed Draco and Severus stand by the door. Severus’ face was rapidly turning into a shade of lovely purple.

“Potter!” A shriek of rage echoed through Hogwarts, breaking the midnight silence.

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A/N

Sorry it took this long! At the bright side, this is a considerably long chapter…don’t forget to review!