Never A Memory

a/n: I officially created a compilation of music to listen to while writing this story. For those of you who are familiar with my writing, you know that is a very good sign, lol. You're good hands, I promise.



If you would like to know what the music consists of, e-mail me at shinigami_liason_nefie@yahoo.com and I will send you the playlist.



This chapter turned out much longer than originally anticipated but I am excited about it because it is the kickoff for the first climax. The chapter is full of veiled answers and forshadowing. I very much hope you enjoy it.



***







~Cruelty, the Ultimate Intimacy~



Four days later...

***



Witherwings dipped below the clouds and felt Harry Potter shift between his wings. Harry leaned down and searched the British countryside for the house. Spotting it, Harry pulls out his broom and jumps on it. Witherwings lets out a cry of indignation and Harry flies the broom near his head so he could speak to the massive Hippogriff over the roaring winds.



"I need to speak to the Parkinson’s," Harry shouted. "I need you to return to the Madam Leilane's and guard the objects I've entrusted to you with your life."



Witherwings blinked and tossed his head back.



"Thank you," Harry said as he turned his broom northeast. "I'll owe you one."



Harry twisted and shot down through the atmosphere, the wind whipping around his body, the cold frosting around his nose and mouth. Down and down, at breakneck speed, until the houses down below did not look so much like toys anymore. Harry lurched left and swept through a small forest, dodging around the trees, his heartbeat gone with the rushing wind.



Finally, Harry was through the brush and saw the Parkinson country estate straight ahead.



Pandora Parkinson, Pansy Parkinson's aunt and godmother, had inherited the estate and taken Pansy in when Pansy's mother passed away abruptly two years ago. The cause of death was mysterious in some ways. Patricia Parkinson had been ill with bilateral pneumonia for nearly sixteen months before she died; however, while the Wizarding World had numerous charms and medicinal herbs that would instantly clear out the woman's lungs and recharge her immune system, Patricia had refused any treatment and suffered until she died in her sleep a year and a half ago. The Parkinson family refused to comment on the matter.



The Parkinson’s escaped any affiliation with Lord Voldemorte and his Death Eaters, except, of course, through Draco as his birth engagement to Pansy had always been known. Suspicion had warranted the Parkinson’s to hide among their own circles until society's nerves had calmed and they could roam freely once again. Yet, all the same, suspicion was never enough to convict and the Parkinson family was left alone with the repeated comment that, "This, too, shall pass."



Harry Potter had mild and sometimes a bit strong, distaste for Pansy and her family but knew they were a pureblood family that had chosen no side during the Eve War and had escaped unscathed. Harry and Ron would often trade information with them, also knowing, that the Parkinson’s had never been naive to Death Eaters and Lord Voldemorte's circle.



Today, Harry Potter had questions about Draco Malfoy.



Harry landed his broom thirty feet from the main gate, feeling the press of the wards around the estate, and waited. A house elf popped out, took Harry's broom, and quietly led the young Auror inside the Manor. The house elf left Harry inside a receiving room where a roaring fire warmed the plush furniture near it. Harry turned in a circle, his eyes searching, and finally spotted Pandora Parkinson seated in a corner, watching him over the rim of her book.



"Mr. Potter," Pandora murmured, closing her book and setting it aside. "Be welcome."



Pandora had a wealth of blue-black, wavy hair that she often piled atop her head, exposing the curve of her throat and causing her features to look slender and more refined. Today, her hair was coiled at the nape of her neck, loose, in a simple Lover's Knot and renegade tendrils brushed against her cheeks and left her liquid pools of dark blue eyes in flickering shadow.



Harry thought she looked five years younger with her hair down, and was going to tell her so, when she spoke again.



"You look terrible, Mr. Potter," Pandora said, leaning forward in her seat to peer at him. "Where on earth did you fly in from?"



"China, actually," Harry said, glancing down at his windblown, tattered, and extremely dirty flying robes.



"Ahh," Pandora said, sitting back. "Beautiful country."



"Yes, it is," Harry said, fixing a buckle on his glove. "Been there recently?"



"Not for years," Pandora replied softly, steadily returning Harry's gaze.



"Right," Harry said. "I'll get straight to the point then."



Pandora smiled indulgently.



"Mrs. Parkinson--"



"Miss, please, I am not yet married," Pandora said in a wistful voice as her heavy-lidded eyes gazed through her dark lashes at Harry.



"Ms. Parkinson," Harry reiterated with a sigh. "What is the significance of Malfoy spreading blood over a white rose at his mother's funeral?"



"You mean Draco," Pandora said, her shadowed eyes giving nothing away. Harry always thought her eyes looked like the ocean at night.



"Yes."



"How do you know about that?"



Harry did not respond and he stood there stoically, trying to stare the answer out of her.



"He afforded her an honor and a curse simultaneously," a quiet voice said behind Harry.



Harry turned and regarded Pansy Parkinson, thin features and small, pug-like face giving her a frail air that she wasn't. Her black hair had grown and her eyes had softened, but Pansy Parkinson was always going to be the Pansy Parkinson from Hogwarts to Harry. Cruel, smug, and very much pureblood.



Pansy wore creamy white robes and her black-gray eyes were as shadowed as her aunt's. "He proclaimed her the final pureblood from the Black Legacy. The blood on the rose means that the Black line ended with her."



Harry frowned. "I don't understand."



Pansy smiled, a gesture that was not unkind. "Of course not, Harry Potter. That is what separates us."



"Why would it be a curse?" Harry clarified.



"Because Draco stated that he would not continue the Black line in front of her sister, her uncle, and many other pureblood families." Pansy's mouth pulled down and she glanced away and stared into the fire. What she left unsaid was that Draco also publicly refused the engagement between himself and Pansy, who had fawned over him since before their first year.



"But he isn't a Black, he's a Malfoy," Harry murmured and immediately felt foolish for saying so. Draco Malfoy is the offspring of Narcissa Black and Lucius Malfoy, and while Draco wouldn't carry the Black name into the next generation it was still a part of his heritage and prestige. It was a powerful union, the day Lucius and Narcissa married, and an exciting day for pureblood families when Draco was born.



"Malfoy loved his mother," Harry said. "Why would he do that?"



Pansy glanced at her aunt who stared back at her for minutes at a time. Harry began to shift nervously before Pandora made a minute movement with a finger and Pansy began to speak.



"It was more than a curse, Potter," Pansy murmured, still gazing into the fire. "It was an insult to the entire Black family and especially the Malfoy family."



"Draco had discovered a book that described pureblood family trees much differently than the ones at his home," Pandora said quietly. "Draco was outraged and destroyed it. Then his curiosity got the better of him and he began researching through other books. He would travel over the summer to library after library, comparing genealogies and family trees."



"Draco found out what all pureblood heirs are told when they come of age," Pansy whispered, the words nearly swallowed by the angry flames of the fire. "We are pure by default."



"What?"



"Most pureblood families have renegade heirs who sympathize with Muggles and are called blood-traitors," Pandora explained. "They are blasted from the Family Tree and thereby disowned. It is our way of keeping our lines filtered and sanctified."



Harry thought of the Black Family Tree at Grimauld Place and the names that were blasted from it. Isla Black, Phineas Black, Marius Black, Cedrella, Alphard, Andromeda--Tonks' mother, and Sirius--Harry's own deceased godfather.



A wizard had called Draco "...a blood-traitor of the worst kind..." at Draco's memory of Narcissa's funeral. Harry turned to Pansy and nodded for her to continue.



"Even so," Pansy whispered and Harry leaned closer to hear her. "Some ancestors were devious. We should have been more careful with so many Slytherin blood relatives."



"Most pureblood families have ancestors who snuck in a muggle-born wife or husband, had an heir, and was not found out until generations after that," Pandora said in her quiet voice. "It's happened a time or two, but even that is enough to taint what we have considered pure."



"Draco realized this and he hated his father for lying to him," Pansy murmured. "Even more than he hated him for following a mad wizard who was the son of a Squib and a Muggle. Draco claimed that Lucius was the real blood-traitor."



"And yet, young Draco obeyed his father out of fear," Pandora said, "even though his rebellion sparked in secret times."



"He even defied the Dark Lord," Pansy said in a hushed voice.



Harry nodded. "He tried to cut out the Dark Mark."



Pansy nodded, eyes wide.



"So what does all this have to do with his mother?"



"Narcissa was a true pureblood," Pandora murmured. "The Black Family was untainted, so shrewd were they with their generations. After Voldemorte murdered his mother, Draco spat back in the faces of those of us who claim purity, those who did not come to his mother's aid, and prophesied with a few drops of blood that blood purity would soon come to an end for all wizards and witches. He damned us all."



"And then he killed the Dark Lord," Pansy said.



"So, Lucius was a...a what?"



Pandora smiled, her teeth flashing white from the shadows. "A Malfoy."



"And he wasn't a pureblood?"



"He was a pureblood as we consider it."



Harry was becoming frustrated. Pureblood intrigue had always confused him and now it was getting worse. "And how do you consider it?"



"For hundreds of years," Pandora explained, while Pansy remained silent. "We are considered pureblood by who we are and not so much by what we are. Some families were not so lenient, like the Black’s. The Parkinson’s shared those traits with the Malfoy’s and the Crabbe’s and the Zabini’s. We are cruel and merciless. We get what we want when we want it. And we are better."



Harry snorted.



"Laugh if you must, Potter," Pansy said gently. "But know this is why we are royalty among peasants. It is the legacy in our blood, not the magic."



"You people are crazy."



Pandora's smile widened. "Is it mad to honor your generations?"



"I want to know why Draco rebelled against purebloods and all you are telling me is that his anger was actually spurned from genuine pureblood fanaticism and that purebloods are better for other reasons besides the lies you have been screaming at Muggle-borns and Half-bloods for years and years!" Harry's eyes blazed as he regarded the two women.



"Please listen," Pandora murmured. "Lucius and Narcissa wished to right the tainted blood of the Malfoy family with Draco. They wished to create a wizard so powerful that even the Dark Lord would think twice before crossing him. They intended to make Draco a mirror image of his father."



Harry nodded. That, he understood.



"Draco was taught to hate Muggles, to torment Half-bloods and despise Muggle-borns," Pansy added.



"Yes, and then Lucius begins to follow one. Voldemorte. Draco learns later that Severus, his beloved godfather, was also a half-blood."



"And isn't that strange?" Pansy said, turning to look at Harry for the first time in nearly twenty minutes.



"Confused, Draco searches for and discovers many, many new things. Mr. Potter, it was never that Draco hated Muggles that spurned his rebellion against his father. It was that Lucius gave Draco something to be proud of when he lied to Draco about being pureblood. It was stripped away from him when he discovered the truth about the Malfoy family and the heritage of the Dark Lord. Would it matter at all that Draco was a pureblood if the strongest wizards in the world were Half-bloods and Muggle-borns?" Pandora clasped her long fingers in front of her and allowed Harry a moment to soak it in.



Harry nodded, beginning to understand Draco's frustration. His so-called purity was all he really had.



"And then his rebellion turned to blind hate when Voldemorte murdered his mother and his father continued to serve the Dark Lord." Pansy's eyes were back on the flames and her face glowed in the firelight.



"Draco is considered a blood-traitor because he did not kill Dumbledore," Pandora said. "And he made it ever so much worse when he claimed Narcissa as the last of the Black Family. This is why he is exiled and this is why he is pure."



Harry blinked. "Excuse me?"



"Purebloods are always cruel to those they love; it is our way, Potter. Compassion and kindness are done in secret places." Pansy's black eyes began misting over.



"Purebloods are cruel to everyone, then," Harry remarked.



Pandora laughed softly. "No, no, no, Mr. Potter. Hate and contempt is reserved for everyone else, hidden beneath a mask of beauty and tolerance. Cruelty is our way of communicating with those within our circle."



Harry shook his head, not understanding.



"Would you like a piece of candy?" Pansy asked suddenly.



Harry stared at her. "Not if it is poison."



Pansy laughed as if it was the funniest thing she had ever heard from him and handed Harry a small piece of spicy, cinnamon hard candy. Pansy popped one into her own mouth and watched Harry open the foil wrapping and carefully place it in his mouth. Spicy, sweet, and savory juices flooded his mouth. Harry closed his eyes and concentrated on the taste in his mouth. He loved how something could be candy and enjoyable and yet almost painful to eat.



When Harry opened his eyes, the two Parkinson women were smiling at him.



"You begin to understand, Potter," Pansy whispered. "Why is it that we scratch are nails through yielding flesh during the throes of passion, Potter? Why is the sound of our screams so similar when we climax or feel the bite of the whiplash? Why do we always hurt those closest to our hearts so much more deeply than those we do not know? Why is it such a sweet, sweet torture to spend a few seconds savoring cinnamon candy?"



Harry looked away.



"This is what makes us what we are, Potter," Pansy whispered, her eyes gleaming. "Evil does not automatically come hand in had with being Slytherin. Draco wanted so badly for you to understand that."



Harry frowned. "Why?"



"Because you begged the Sorting Hat for any House but Slytherin."



Pandora flicked her dark sapphire eyes between the two old school mates and smiled. "What we have spoken of here today is usually only said in back rooms and in secret. Be courteous and do not repeat any of it."



Harry turned to her. "What if I had a Slytherin side to me that caused such cruelty in exposing you and your tainted blood?"



"Cruelty and honesty do come hand in hand," Pandora said, inclining her head. "Though you are mistaken if you view us as being disloyal. It was loyalty and not pity that stayed Draco's wand when he was sent to kill Albus Dumbledore."



"You're wrong," Harry said, shaking his head. "I was there. I saw nothing but fear."



"Wouldn't you be afraid too, knowing that families upon families would label you a blood-traitor for failing so miserably?" Pansy interjected. "Of course he was afraid."



"If Draco was loyal, he would have killed Dumbledore," Harry said.



Pandora's smile turned sad as her eyes darkened. "You sound like his father."



"At least he understands what it means to be cruel," Pansy said in a dead voice, turning back to the fire.



***



Hermione walked towards the door of her and Ron's flat as the pounding became louder and louder. "I'm coming," she yelled, annoyed.



With a flick of her wand, she dispelled ward after ward and pulled the door open. Hermione gasped when her brown eyes took in Harry's appearance. He was filthy and tired but it was his eyes that scared her the most. They were dark and shadowy, swirling with thoughts that sped through his mind. Hermione had only seen his eyes that dark once before; and it was the night his godfather was killed by Bellatrix.



"No questions until tomorrow, 'Mione," Harry whispered. "May I stay here tonight?"



Hermione stepped back and ushered him inside the flat. "Of course, Harry. Of course."



Ron came around the corner, brushing his teeth, to see what the commotion by the door was. Ron spotted Harry and stopped in his tracks, toothbrush hanging limply from his mouth.



"What the hell happened to you, Harry?"



***



a/n: As you can see, I took a bit of creative license here. I loosely base it off of JK Rowling's 'opinion' of purebloods and what she's stated in interviews; and not so much on actual fact from the books. It is the same with St. Mary's. God help me, but I have never been to Wisconsin and really have no idea whether or not a St. Mary's exists, lol. While the Black Family Tree is available for study, most of the so-called 'pureblood families' are not. Creative license is a beautiful thing :-).



alexkim: Thank you for your review. Good luck!



wizli: Cunning, manipulative, ruthless; absolutely! Whether it is canon or fanon, it certainly seemes to be true. The connection between Draco and Harry is exactly the same as Harry and Voldemorte, save that Harry's hate for Draco can be shifted and Harry's hate for Voldemorte couldn't possibly be shifted. Voldemorte was pure evil and Harry is not in the slightest. So the connection of the scar is a little different but not greatly. It is a way to smudge a little super-glue between the once-rivals. *grins wickedly* Opens up so many possibilities, doesn't it?



And there is more to the scar and Harry and Draco's connection; however, I would be a terrible writer if I gave THAT particular secret away too soon. :-)



thrnbrooke: Thank you for your review. I hope this chapter answers some questions. :-)



snakevamp: Thank you very much. Yes, Draco's glimpses of his memories terrify him. And with good reason too, eh? Draco will be out of the loony bin very soon, I promise. :-)



humpuuki: I was very glad that you picked up on that and tickled to death that it rubbed you the wrong way. It is supposed to. I must ask you to trust me, though. I have a very in-character reason for Draco to do that. Sadly, that explanation doesn't come for many chapters. Just...trust me.



I've wanted to write a first person journal entry for Draco for so LONG! It just never seemed to fit until the previous chapter. I'm glad you enjoyed. Intense emotions are the forefront of the next several chapters. Get ready for a rollercoaster! And thank you for your review. :-)