Remembered Fire

REMEMBERED FIRE

Part Three

Minister Henry proved to be a jovial appearing man in his mid-fifties, very amiable, very grateful that Draco had dropped his own ‘busy schedule to help them with their little problem’. He had escorted Draco to the Magical Law Enforcement Department, and introduced him to the American’s counterpart to Kingsley Shacklebolt, Micah Trundeldale, Chief Inspector. His subordinates were not Auror’s in America; they had the official title of Magical Enforcement Officers. He’d been greeted by Trundeldale, a harried looking man with a brusque disposition, and then shown into the room where all of the evidence had been collected. Two of the junior officers stayed with him, showing him the reports, displaying the evidence.

As the morning progressed into afternoon, and Draco went over each report and saw the findings, the picture had become clearer. There were survivors of the war in Britain at work in the southern part of the United States; the evidence was incontrovertible. What was also very clear, and his heart had jerked hard in his chest on first seeing the unmistakable magical signature on one of the dead, was that someone was utilizing Harry Potter’s wand in the covert war against the new forces of darkness.

“It’s not that we don’t appreciate the help,” Officer Edwards had said a bit wryly as Draco studied the wizard photos of one of the victims. This one had been decapitated, and the lingering signature of the use of Harry’s wand hovered over the body if one knew what to look for. Draco did. “But we’d like to take these people into custody and have them stand trial.”

“Ah, the whole ‘fairness under the law’ doctrine set down in your Constitution,” Draco said with a slight smirk as he studied the photograph. “Applies even under Wizard law, does it?” The young man had colored slightly.

“Well, there is that,” he said. “But if we can’t question them, we have no idea who’s behind the whole thing.”

“Perhaps the holder of the wand knows who is behind it,” Draco had mused quietly, moving to the next photo. This time, the victim had been neatly beheaded as well, a very clean, surgical kill, and after wincing a bit, Draco had leaned closer, studying the photo, his attention caught by something on the throat just below where the head had been removed from the shoulders. He pulled his own wand from his sleeve and waved it over the photo, muttering “Engorgio”. Immediately, the photo expanded in size, and Draco studied it for another moment, and then lifted his eyes to the two officers with him.

“You fellows missed something,” he said without condemnation. Immediately they both leaned closer to where he was pointing.

“Son of a bitch,” the first one breathed. “We did miss that.”

“You may want to go back and study the other photos. If that is present on all of your victims, then you have something very different at work here.”

That had been hours before, and as he closed the door to his suite and crossed to one of the two large arm chairs to collapse into it with a heavy sigh, he found himself torn. He’d really had no choice but to come; the evidence of Harry’s wand was everywhere. But the American’s had more than just a burgeoning group of Death Eater’s to deal with. This group, apparently, was made up exclusively of vampires. What Draco had spotted on the throat of one vigilante victim after another was the tell-tale scarring left when a vampire was ‘turned’, the two perfect puncture wounds, round and white against the skin over the jugular.

Draco had had several experiences since the war with Vampires, and while part of him sympathized with their plight, he found their whole make-up faintly disturbing. These were not like other magical creatures; they had once been men and women with families, lives. Through no fault of their own in most cases, they were now no longer human but something else, not quite alive and yet not dead, not human and yet not a creature in the way a centaur or an elf was. They were similar in some ways to werewolves, and yet not that either. They could still masquerade as men regardless of the cycle of the moon, and that made them confounding… and dangerous.

In most cases their condition had also rendered them supernaturally beautiful; it was part of their state as well. As with all predators, whatever force of nature it was that had created them had also imbued them with what they needed to hunt successfully. Birds of prey had keen eyesight and talon like claws, big cats had stealth and speed. Vampires had the ability to seduce their victims with a look, a word, a scent. They had the facility to make them malleable with a touch, and transport them to heights of ecstasy while draining their life blood from their veins. The whole of their existence was about seduction, and survival, and loathe as he was to admit it, they had always faintly fascinated Draco. Even during investigations, he kept his distance from them. Something inside of him had told him that he was one of those who would be susceptible to their allure, and so he’d always been very careful to keep his distance, and to avoid eye contact when in their presence. And they sensed that about him, he feared. There had been that one, just before Harry had died, that they’d brought in for questioning. What was his name again? Something French.

Henri? No, that wasn’t right. Oh, yes. Hermes. Hermes Gautlier.

He rubbed his hands over his face as his mind went back to the case, and to the night they’d been questioning Gautlier. Veritaserum was not effective on Vampires, so they’d had no idea if anything he’d been telling them had been the truth, and his faintly superior attitude had infuriated Draco even as he’d been drawn to the man’s dark-haired, dark-eyed beauty.

His face had been all strong planes and angles, his eyes liquid brown, his black hair hanging to just past his shoulder blades. He’d been dressed impeccably, from his Armani suit to his Prada boots, and he’d worn a blood red ruby stick pin in his tie and a huge signet ring with the same color stone on the index finger of his left hand. “As an inside joke,” he’d said with a rakish charm. He’d been supercilious, and snide, and completely uncooperative, and even so, Draco had felt drawn to him and Gautlier, damn his soulless existence to hell, had known it. The shrewd smirks he’d sent Draco’s way all evening had been unsettling. Only one thing had gotten to Hermes Gautlier; and that had been the complete icy indifference of Auror Harry Potter.

Draco had watched in fascination as Gautlier had turned his seductive power on Harry full force, and Harry had merely eyed him indifferently. It had been intriguing to watch; the vampire, trying all of his seductive wiles to distract the young Auror; the Auror, impervious, unimpressed, undeterred. Harry had not been affected during the entire three hours they’d questioned the vampire before being forced to release him for lack of evidence, and Draco, by simply watching, had been as aroused as he’d ever been in his life. He’d all but attacked Harry the moment they’d been alone, and been eternally grateful when his lover hadn’t questioned him about the source of his sudden need to be taken against a wall. Three weeks later, Harry had been dead, and he’d not thought of Gautlier in nearly two decades.

He rubbed that back of his neck with a slightly unsteady hand. At the end of the day, the only conclusion that he’d been able to reach was that there was, in fact, an underground movement at work in the southern United States, populated by wizards very familiar with the dark work of Lord Voldemort. Many of the attacks and spells that had been used against an unsuspecting Muggle population Draco had seen before. There were Muggle families that had been attacked, the dead all bearing signs of the Avadra Kedavra, Muggle authorities baffled by the complete lack of any evidence of violence. A bridge had fallen, government officials had been attacked and killed; Draco had seen it all before, at the beginning of their war against darkness. But there was clearly something else at work here, too. Disappearances within the Magical population of people who had been outspoken proponents of the same pure-blood mania as he’d seen in the beginning with Voldemort, just as the ranks of newly minted ‘Death Eaters’ appeared to be growing. Draco had a sinking suspicion that there was a Vampire cult at work in the situation, with one central figure who fancied himself the ‘new Voldemort’, stalking and turning those of a like mind in an attempt to create an Army that was swift, fast, preternaturally strong, and almost indestructible. The very thought of it was terrifying.

Then, on top of that, there was this vigilante out there, using Harry’s wand, destroying these creatures, sometimes at a rate of two of three victims a day. Draco sighed again and rubbed his hand over his weary face. He still had no idea who could possibly have the wand, where they’d gotten it, and how that had any connection with the disappearance of Harry’s body. With a soft groan, knowing sitting there and going back over it in his mind wasn’t going to help and would most probably just keep him awake, he stood and took a bottle of wine out of the secreted bar and went to his luggage to find a dreamless sleep potion.



He was running through the mist. It had been years since he’d felt the sensation of his legs pumping and his heart racing, but he felt it then... running, even though his leg throbbed and his lungs screamed, and terror streaked the length of his spine…

When a hard hand shot out of the darkness and grabbed him, he shrieked inelegantly and tried to jerk his arm away, but the grip was too firm, bruising his arm, shoving his back against a hard surface. He was naked… why was he naked?

“Don’t run, Draco,” the voice whispered against his ear, and this time it sounded desperate even as the hot breath brushed against his face, his ear. “Don’t run, not from me…”

“But it’s not you,” he said, his body shuddering as lips touched his jaw, glided to his throat. Draco’s heart pounded beneath his breast bone as if it were trying to escape. “It isn’t you, not anymore…”

“But it is,” the voice entreated. “Look at me, Draco. It is.”

Draco shook his head even as he was compelled by hard hands that gripped the sides of his head to look into the face that floated into his line of vision, the face that had haunted his dreams for years. He saw the hard cheekbones, the square, slightly cleft jaw, the straight nose. The glasses were gone, but the eyes were just the same; green as grass, lit as if from within, framed by thick black lashes and topped by brows the shape of a raven’s spread wings. Those eyes, his eyes…

“Oh, God,” he sobbed roughly. “Oh, God…”

“You see, it is me,” Harry said gently, his hand easing along the line of Draco’s jaw. “It is me.”

Draco felt himself lifted then by an eerily strong arm and his legs flailed for a moment before they lifted and locked around a firm waist. He felt the arm around his back tighten even as a blunt shape pressed against the most vulnerable part of him. “Oh, please,” he whimpered, hands scrambling up the long line of a muscular back. The skin beneath his palms was smooth, and cool, like marble. “Please…”

And then he was crying out as he was breached without warning or preparation, and his body bowed against the twin assaults of pain and pleasure. He felt the lips at his throat, felt the tongue touch his skin…

“I need you, Draco,” the mouth said against his neck. “I need you…”

He sank his hands into the thick wealth of black hair and hung on as hard thrusts drove him up the wall and angled his head to the side in silent supplication, even as he knew that it was wrong, that what was possessing him was not the man he’d loved. He felt the sharp fangs brush his skin, find the pulse point and pierce easily into his vein, and sweeping pleasure roared over the flushed surface of his skin. Where he’d not even been hard moments before, orgasm was streaking the length of his spine and exploding in a burning rush between their heaving bodies, painting their stomachs with his release even as a the low growl sounded against his throat. He felt himself begin to go cold…felt his heart begin to struggle even as he held on tight and found himself welcoming the return of the darkness…

He surged up in the bed, heart hammering in his throat, body drenched in sweat. He sat in the middle of the massive four-poster, staring frantically around the sumptuous room and trying desperately to get his bearings. It took a few moments for him to recognize where he was; that he was in his room at the bed and breakfast and that once again he’d wakened from a nightmare. He swallowed heavily, pushing at the hair that had fallen over his eyes, and looked to the side at the lighted image on the Muggle digital clock next to the bed. 12:27, it read and Draco covered his face with his hand. 12:27. It had been years since he’d been wakened by night terrors at 12:27, years since the significance of the time had made his heart ache and his eyes burn. He’d read it on every report of that night that had been written; Time of death: 12:27.

Sighing heavily, he swung his legs over the side of the bed, becoming aware in that instance that inside of his silk pajama bottoms was sticky. He paused, eyes opening wide as he stared down at the dark stain at his own groin. Good heavens, it had been… years since he’d had a wet dream. What the hell? And then his brow furrowed, and he stared at the vial on his night stand. He reached over and picked it up, just to be sure, and saw that it was empty. He’d taken the dreamless sleep potion, so why was he dreaming? If he’d bought it from an apothecary he might think it had been the ingredients, but he’d brewed that one himself. Thoughtfully placing the empty vial back on the nightstand, he stood, pausing a moment to allow his leg to stabilize beneath him, then crossed to his luggage to take out new pajama’s.

A cleaning spell and fresh pajama bottoms later, he was headed back towards the bed when he realized that the room felt close, and stuffy. Detouring to the windows, he took hold of the pull and opened the drapes enough to reveal one set of doors, and bright moonlight flooded into the room. He unlocked and opened one of them and instantly a cool breeze, fragrant with the scents of flowers and the ocean, flowed over his still flushed skin. He closed his eyes and let the cool air waft over him, then opened them and was about to turn when something out in the garden caught his eye. He stopped, leaning forward to look more carefully.

A chill ran the length of his spine and he stiffened on a harshly drawn breath. Someone was standing in the middle of the garden, about thirty feet away, staring at the Inn. No, he amended in his mind; not at the Inn, at the porch, and through the porch, at him. He started to step back instinctively, but then the figure moved slightly and moonlight splashed across broad shoulders encased in black leather, lit the long elegant line of a sturdy leg, caught in the blue black waves of a thick head of tousled black hair.

Draco gasped and pushed the door open, stepping out onto the porch, but by the time he reached the railing, the figure was gone, vanished as if it had never been there at all. He leaned over the wooden balustrade and searched the gardens frantically, but there was no one there.

Straightening, he wrapped his arms around his chest, his body shaken with a deep chill. He’d seen… what had he seen?

“Christ!” he muttered explosively, backing towards the doors. What the hell was wrong with him tonight?

Ignoring the remaining closeness in his room, he firmly closed and locked the doors and pulled the drapes closed, but it was still hours before he fell into a fitful slumber.

Draco had not gone back to sleep until nearly six and had been awake again at seven thirty, and the headache that had lingered for days had taken up full residence behind his eyes. When he’d gone downstairs for breakfast, he’d noticed Muggle law enforcement activity in the park, and had paused, glancing at Samantha who stood near the doors, watching the police.

“Is something amiss?” he asked politely.

“Well, something is,” she answered. “But we’ve no idea what.” She turned back to him with her reserved smile. “Your car is waiting in the rear, whenever you’re ready.” He’d nodded, fetched a muffin from the table, and gone on his way.

When he’d arrived at the Ministry, the offices of Magical Law Enforcement had been in an uproar; there had been another vigilante-type execution during the night. Draco’s eyes had widened when he’d learned that the body had been found just that morning by a jogging Muggle, in the park in front of the Inn where he was staying. The Ministry now had that mess to deal with, and it took them hours to make contact with a wizard who worked under cover within the morgue and get the body replaced with a transfigured transient, and the actual victim transferred into Ministry hands. It was late afternoon when Draco was invited to accompany the investigating officers down to inspect it.

Draco was not fond of morgues, but he’d spent his fair share of time in them when he’d been a working Auror. He entered the cold, sterile place behind the two men, and held back as they examined the decapitated corpse, head neatly aligned but still not attached.

This one was a woman, an attractive one, and they muttered over that, speaking together about what type of person could kill even a female vampire in such a way. Draco thought of his aunt Bellatrix, and thought that they’d simply never encountered the right type of woman.

“Decapitation is infinitely more humane than a stake through the heart,” he said softly, and they turned to glance at him, then went back to their examination without further comment.

When they stepped aside, he drew his wand and approached the body, speaking revealing spells softly under his breath. Immediately, several things began to occur. A faint glow began to shine around the body, deep blue, indicative of death. There were runes within the glow, swirling over the victims wounds and head, each of these a clue as to cause of death. And time. Draco stared at the one that read 12:17 in hieroglyphics, and felt a tremble run through his hand. He muttered another spell, one his American co-horts did not know, and saw the runic symbol for Harry’s name appear briefly over the chalk white forehead before fading almost as quickly as it had come.

“Anything new?” one of the two young officers asked, eyes avid. They were quietly in awe of Draco with his aura reading and his runic scales, and he spared him a quick glance.

“Just more of the same,” he answered. No one this side of the ocean had yet to pick up on the involvement of Harry’s wand in the murders, and he intended to keep it that way if he could. He stepped back, pocketing his wand, rubbing his damp palms on his trousers.

The dream he’d had the night before had faded in his memory, but the events after he’d awakened had not. He’d seen a man in the park, across from the Inn, at 12:27. A man who even at a distance had resembled Harry so much that it had made Draco’s heart turn over. This woman had been murdered, with Harry’s wand, at 12:17. Something wasn’t right, didn’t add up. Either Harry was dead, and his wand had been taken by someone bent on impersonating him, or…

Draco turned and left the room quickly, and the young officers followed him, exchanging a confused look.

When they were outside of the door, he stopped and turned to them abruptly.

“I need an international floo connection,” he said briskly. “A secure one.”

“Of course, Mr. Malfoy,” the younger of the two said. “I’m sure we can arrange that, if you’ll just follow me?”

He followed them through the catacombs where the morgue was located to the lift.

“Something isn’t right, Hermione,” he was saying from his position in front of the fire. The image of Hermione Granger-Weasley’s head was floating in the green flames, and she was frowning.

“The runes don’t lie,” he went on. “I saw someone in the park across the street at 12:27, not a hundred feet away, and the time of death was 12:17. And it was Harry’s wand, again.”

“Clearly, someone is impersonating him, Draco,” she said pragmatically. “It’s the only answer.”

“Is it?” he asked, running a hand through his hair. “Is it the only answer, Hermione? The people here have no idea what Harry looked like, so there is nothing to be gained from impersonating him. And his body was never found…”

Hermione gave him a stern look. “Draco,” she began, her voice more gentle than her expression.

“Hermione, I saw this man,” he said quickly. “He… resembled Harry. Quite a bit.”

Hermione looked as if she were weighing her words carefully. “And how are your eyes, Draco? I know mine could certainly deceive me at that distance.”

“Hermione, I know what I saw,” he retorted hotly, feeling his temper surge.

“Forgive me, but I think you saw what you wanted to see,” Hermione responded gently. “Think about what you are suggesting. That Harry disappeared, nearly twenty years ago without a word to you, or to us. That he abandoned his children, even though his marriage wasn’t working. That he abandoned you.” She paused, her eyes level. “He’d never have done it, Draco. Not the man we knew.” Draco stared at her, but he knew that what she was saying made sense. He sighed and sat back on his heels. His leg was throbbing, but he’d needed her to say just exactly what she had, needed her cool head and her common sense. He was so weary that his own usually level head felt as if it had been stuffed with cotton, and his rational seemed to be tottering on the brink of complete collapse. He nodded then with a soft sigh.

“You’re right,” he said softly. “Of course, you’re right.”

She studied him sadly. “I don’t want to be.”

“I know, love,” he breathed. “I do; I know that.”

They’d discussed the cases for a few more minutes, then chatted about her children and things at the Ministry before he signed off. He pushed himself up hanging onto a nearby desk, cursing the fact that most floo conversations had to take place on the floor. It was several minutes before his leg felt steady enough to carry him from the secured office.

By the time he left the Ministry, it was after eight, fully dark, and he was utterly exhausted. The driver stopped in front of the large Inn, stark white in the bright moonlight, and Draco stepped out of the car. He was about to turn and walk up the steps to the leaded glass front doors when something moved in his peripheral vision, and he turned his head in time to see a shadow dart behind one of the large trees in the park. He stared for a long moment, so long his driver, who had opened the door for him, looked at him with a slight frown.

“Sir, is everything all right?” he asked politely.

“Yes,” Draco answered after a short pause. “I just…” he glanced at the man. “I think I’ll take a short stroll in the park, just to work the kinks out.”

“Mr. Malfoy,” the man cautioned quickly. “This is the park…”

“I know,” Draco interrupted him. “Believe me, I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself.”

The younger man studied his face for a long moment, then nodded respectfully and stepped back, closing the car door softly.

Draco set out towards where he had seen something dart behind a tree, and just as he was abreast of the large spreading Magnolia tree, up ahead he saw what was unmistakably a man in a long, dark cape skirt around a fountain and set off down a side path. Draco followed, careful to keep his distance, his eyes on the dark figure as it moved quickly away from the center of the park. Interest fully engaged, Draco picked up his pace as well, moving as quickly as his leg would allow.

When the figure exited the park, moving briskly under a streetlamp, Draco’s breath caught in his throat. It was the man from the night before; he saw the messy hair, the square shoulders. His heart jumping into his throat, he quickened his speed to match the man in front of him, even as the muscles in his thigh began to scream in protest.

He saw him ahead, then gasped when he seemed to disappear into thin air. Quickening until he was running, Draco made it to the place where he’d vanished and realized that there was a narrow alley that ran between two buildings, and he saw the cape disappear around a corner up ahead. Heedless of his own safety, he lunged between the two buildings, his footsteps echoing unevenly in the still darkness and followed, ducking low branches that swept over a wall behind a home, pushing through bushes that encroached through a wrought-iron fence.

When the alley spilled out into the place behind it, Draco paused, his eyes wide. It was as if he’d stepped onto the set of a Hollywood film, and a horror film at that. Up ahead he could see the imposing façade of a gothic style church, stained glass windows lit softly from within, but he was standing in the yard behind the sanctuary; the church’s burial ground.

All around him were headstones and square sarcophagus, chipped and weathered with age, some listing slightly, lying just inches above the ground. There were Celtic crosses and effigies of angels and children, and around one section that was a battered wrought-iron fence, leaning with age. The trees overhead were thick with gnarled, twisted branches and lengths of Spanish moss hung from them, moving slightly even though Draco could detect no breeze. Draco felt a chill skirt over the surface of his skin, and closed his hand over his wand even as he searched the murky shadows. There was a soft sound to his left, and the hair lifted at his nape as he turned in place, and saw that he was not alone.

They came out of the shadows, moving with a stealthy grace that was both beautiful and terrifying. He pulled his wand from his sleeve, but even as he leveled it towards them he knew that there was no way that he could fight off this many alone. There were at least twelve, perhaps fifteen, their faces cloaked in shadows but their movement’s intent, decisive. He braced his feet and continued to hold his wand outstretched even as they seemed to… flow around him, until he was virtually surrounded on all sides. And then they went completely still, and he could feel their eyes.

“I mean you no harm,” he managed finally, grateful that his voice sounded steady, looking from shadowed face to shadowed face. “I was simply following someone I thought…” his voice trailed off when a tall one stepped closer, and Draco caught sight of messy dark hair.

“You thought, what?” a deep voice asked smoothly. “That you knew him? That you’d loved him? Was that it… Draco?”

His name was spoken like a deep caress, and Draco swallowed heavily as the form moved closer. He looked… oh, God, he looked just like Harry, from the messy hair to the square shoulders, to the long, muscular legs. There were Harry’s eyes, Harry’s hands, but the voice… the voice wasn’t right, not at all. It was smoother than Harry’s had been, and there was something… an accent, perhaps, that wasn’t right.

White teeth flashed in the moonlight, and as he watched a wand was drawn from the sleeve of a dark coat, a spell was muttered, and the figure before him morphed from a vision of Harry Potter to another he recognized, another he hadn’t seen in nearly twenty years.

“Gautlier,” he breathed. The man before him laughed, and it wasn’t a pleasant sound.

“Bravo, young Malfoy,” he said as he moved closer, studying Draco carefully. “Or perhaps, not so young now, eh? Still handsome, but you have not been taking very good care of yourself. You look tired. Sleep disturbed? By nightmares, perhaps?” The superior smile deepened when Draco’s eyes widened. “I have learned many things since last we met, Draco Malfoy. Many, many things.” He twirled the wand in his hand negligently as he began to circle around him, and Draco watched him warily, moving as he moved. “Glamour spells being the least of it.” His smile grew predatory as he continued to move. “And you have been away from the Aurors too long, and have grown careless. What was your first lesson, hmmm? Never to go in alone?”

“What are you doing with Harry’s wand?” Draco asked more forcefully than he would have thought possible, given the circumstances, but Gautlier merely laughed.

“I do not have Harry Potter’s wand, Malfoy.” He shook his dark head almost pityingly. “For someone with such a fine mind, it is taking you an abysmally long time to figure this out.” He continued to circle, Draco continued to follow him. “Think about it, Draco,” he went on in an almost friendly tone. “Why in the world would I be killing my own, my disciples? These are my children, my pets, they do whatever I tell them to do. They are ready to do my bidding, and make me the new Dark Lord.”

The vampires around him cooed and hissed, bared their fangs, and Draco knew then that there was little chance of his getting out of there alive. He was the only one among them with a beating heart, and he knew that they could hear it, could smell his blood. They began to move as well, milling restlessly, not approaching but weaving in and out, making a moving circle around the two of them. Draco’s eyes skirted to them, then back to Gautlier. “Someone has Harry’s wand,” he persisted, pointing his own at Gautlier’s heart. “And you will tell me who it is, or I will kill you.”

“Malfoy, if you persist in this nonsense, you will make me begin to question your intelligence.” Gautlier shook his dark head. “Someone does, indeed, have Harry Potter’s wand.” He smiled beneficently and spread his hands. “Can you not imagine who?” Draco’s eyes darted to the milling creatures around them, then back to Gautlier’s smug face. “Oh, come now. It’s not that hard. The person in possession of Harry Potter’s wand… is the man, himself.”

Draco heard him, heard the words, but it took a moment before they made sense. He tried to dampen dry lips, but his mouth was equally dry and his tongue felt glued to the roof of his mouth. “I don’t…” he shook his head. “That isn’t possible.”

“isn’t it?” Gautlier asked with a smirk. Draco shook his head again, more emphatically.

“He’s dead,” he wheezed. “I saw him die.”

“No,” the Frenchman said almost kindly. “You saw him wounded. You did not see him die.”

Draco blinked quickly, his hands going numb even as he continued to hold his wand pointed at the other man. “I did. I saw him die!”

The handsome vampire shook his head slowly. “Malfoy,” he said on an indulgent sigh, stepping closer. “You did not see Harry Potter die. He did not die from the wounds he sustained during that battle.” Draco lifted the wand until it was pointed at his face and tried to steady his stance, his legs trembling.

“He would never have just disappeared,” Draco argued. “Not if he’d survived. He would have found a way to let us know; he would have come to us.”

“You’re sure of that, are you? You’re so sure of the love he had for you that there are no circumstances you can think of under which he would have chosen to walk away?”

Draco shook his head so emphatically that his fringe fell over his eyebrows. “None.”

“Then you do not know him as well as you thought you did.”

Now it was Draco’s turn to hiss, to bare his teeth. “You’re a liar,” he seethed. “A goddamned liar. He wouldn’t have just left his children…”

“Ah, the kiddies.” Gautlier’s smile turned feral. “So young, so sweet. So vulnerable. So impressionable. Perhaps a father would walk away from his children, in order to save them from the knowledge of what he had become.”

Draco’s mouth fell open then as what Gautlier was trying to tell him suddenly became clear, and the cold in his hands seemed to spread up his arms. “No,” he wheezed. “No, that isn’t possible…”

“Ah, we have arrived there at last,” Gautlier said with a smile as he studied Draco’s shattered expression. “Yes, my friend. It was my brethren and I that attacked you that last night, wizards once, vampire’s now. I told Potter that his arrogance would lead to his destruction, did I not? I told him that he was foolish to believe himself impervious to us. When he allowed himself to be distracted by his pathological need to protect his lover,” he caressed the word almost obscenely, “he left himself vulnerable. He took a particularly strong stunning curse to the chest. He would, no doubt, have recovered from that.” He paused, his lips tipping up in an evil parody of a smile. “He did not survive me.”

Draco felt his eyes begin to sting, and bile hit the back of his throat, forced down with a will. “You… you…” He couldn’t finish the thought, couldn’t bring himself to say it.

“Oh, squeamish, Malfoy?” Gautlier teased viciously. “Perhaps he was right to walk away, if this is your reaction what he has become.”

The vampire moved then, so quickly and so fiercely that one moment he was standing in front of Draco, and the next he was behind him, iron-like arm across Draco’s throat holding him tight against a chest that felt as hard as a granite wall. Draco struggled in his hold, his wand all but useless with Gautlier behind him. He slammed his foot viciously into Draco’s damaged thigh, and when his leg buckled the vampire grabbed his wrist and wrenched it hard. Draco heard the bone snap as white hot pain shot up his arm, and his wand dropped, useless, to the ground. Around them, the dark figures laughed and jeered, a roiling mass of writhing, soulless creatures.

Tears of pain blurred Draco’s vision as Gautlier grabbed a fistful of his hair and jerked his head to the side, and he shuddered helplessly when he felt the vampire’s moist breath against his throat.

“So, I’m to have your pure-blood, am I?” Gautlier crooned, lips brushing Draco’s neck, raising gooseflesh on his arms. He felt Gautlier’s tongue stroke along his jugular, and in spite of himself, Draco felt a surge of heat slither through his body and he shuddered again, but for a totally different reason. He felt the vampire laugh against his skin, and damned his body’s reaction even as he struggled to distance himself from the wave of pure lust that roared through him. “Give up, sweet man,” the dark voice sang against his ear. “For I offer you pleasure unlike anything you have ever known. You will welcome death in my arms, Draco Malfoy. You will beg me for it…” He felt the dark hair brush his cheek as a hard hand came to his chest, unbuttoned his coat, slipped inside to caress his stomach. Draco gasped when the hand slid lower, closing over him, squeezing him gently through his trousers even as he felt sharp incisors scrape against his skin. “Ah, you do like this, don’t you? I knew that you would, all of those years ago. I knew you would be the perfect little whore…” Gautlier paused then, and Draco felt his head lift. “He’s filling in my hand,” he announced into the darkness, and Draco felt swamped by shame that it was the truth. “Are you really willing to just watch, while I take your lover, Potter?”

Even through the haze of arousal, Draco heard what Gautlier had said, and his eyes flew open. He searched the avid faces in front of him, leering obscenely, then searched beyond them, into the gnarled branches of the trees, toward the fences, and the graves. He could see very little in the darkness, but his heart had begun to pound jarringly hard in his chest.

“Ah, he senses you, Potter,” Gautlier called triumphantly. “Just as I do. Can you really just watch while I make him one of us? You disappoint me…” Draco felt the head next to his move as Gautlier searched the burial yard. He tried to catch his breath even as the hand on his cock squeezed hard enough to cause him to whimper in pain. “I know that you are here, damn you!” Gautlier cried out. “I know that you are watching! Fine then, if are willing to sacrifice him, who am I to deny you?”

White-hot pain tore through Draco’s throat as the incisors burst through his skin, but the scream that echoed through the graveyard didn’t emit from his mouth. It was chilling; a sound of rage and pain, and then all was chaos. One moment, Draco’s throat was being torn open, the next the pain was gone and he was awash in warm liquid that flowed over his neck and his chest, down his arms, over his hands. The arm around his throat went slack and the body behind his fell away, and he collapsed onto his knees clutching his throat, his own hot blood coursing between his fingers. Voices echoed around him, running feet, heavy thuds, curses and cries, and all the while the inhuman screaming went on even as dizziness made his head swim. He pressed his forehead against the mossy earth, and then silence fell so abruptly that he wondered faintly if he’d gone deaf. The last thing he was aware of was another arm, coming gently around his waist, and a voice near his ear, achingly familiar, whispering, “You’re all right, I’ve got you,” just before his world went black.