A Dream For The Dead

A Dream For The Dead

Chapter 37

King of Cowards

The darkness was forever encroaching and the cold was growing in a cheap imitation of life in the corners of Draco’s mind. He reminded himself that the cold and the dark were not life, but neither were they Death. They were empty threats toward the real, toward the living. They sought to consume what they could not know, could not be and masqueraded as a danger far more powerful than they were.

They were illusory.

Too bad the pain isn’t.

The shackles dug deeply into his wrists and pulled his shoulders taught, his arms stretched wide to each side in a somewhat ironic pose. His robes had been removed, leaving him with nothing but a pair of trousers. His sectumsempra scar was bleeding more steadily now, streaming very slowly into itself, the interconnecting lines making a strange pattern on his chest. Given who his captor was, Draco found it difficult to understand why he was standing shirtless.

Either Thomas has fallen even further off his rocker than I previously assumed, or he wants to see the effects of his torture on me.

Draco considered the possibilities for a moment.

That might be the same thing.

Draco coughed, the cold having dried out his throat and the steady stream of screams having ripped it raw. He steadied himself and stared directly into the eyes of the Dementor’s Kiss, the eyes of Dean Thomas.

There was a cold sweat dripping down his face and into the hollow of his collarbone. He could feel his body heaving as it tried to deal with the cold and the pain without collapsing.

“Are you tired, Malfoy?” Thomas asked in a falsely saccharine tone. He pressed his wand to dip in Draco’s collarbone. “Are you hungry? Sore? Broken?”

Draco knew he wanted to hear an affirmative answer. Thomas wanted him to beg, plead and possibly offer up anything if only to save himself. Draco had seen prisoners doing those very things and he, himself, had been forced to ignore their pleas. He knew Thomas was trying to astound Draco with the irony of the situation, but it was meaningless to Draco.

He had never tortured Thomas. Not personally. And though Draco did not try to save him either, there were other more guilty and more powerful people on whom Thomas could have vented his rage.

“You will not break me,” Draco told him. He had long since outgrown his habit of whimpering and cowering in the face of danger. He supposed the triggering event had been the birth of Scorpius.

What kind of a father runs from danger to save his own skin and doesn’t stand to protect his son?

I will not be that kind of father. Not ever.

“Are you so certain, Malfoy?” Thomas asked him quietly. There was an edge of malice in his words and a spark of madness in his eyes. Draco had seen that kind of madness only once before and he did not want to consider in whom. “How do you propose to defend yourself from me without your wand? I suppose if I released you you could try to best me with brute strength.” Then Thomas paused, considered Draco and let out a mirthless bark of laughter. “But you’re a pureblood, aren’t you? Muggle fighting techniques are beneath you, aren’t they?” Thomas leaned in again and the tip of his wand pressed deep into Draco’s skin, threatening to puncture his trachea. “Helpless without your magic, aren’t you skullsucker?”

Draco kept his face set, trying not to give into the urge to resort to sarcasm and endanger Scorpius and himself further. He did not point out the fact that if Thomas was so proud of his Muggle heritage, it seemed somewhat contrary to be torturing Draco with the use of a wand. Or magical creatures, for that matter.

“Whatever you want from me, Thomas,” Draco said sharply and with all the venom he could pour into his words. “There’s no need to involve Scorpius. He’s an innocent, isn’t he? What sense is there in hurting a child? Do you really want to lower yourself to that level?”

Draco hoped that his logic would appeal to his captor, but Thomas’ eyes only flashed darkly and a dangerous grin split his lips. Draco watched in muted horror as Thomas said nothing but shifted his position and held out his wand, pointing the tip instead at Draco’s Marked forearm. The former-Gryffindor grinned wolfishly and then pressed his wand to the Mark with a whispered spell.

Suddenly the faded green tattoo burned a bright black and sent waves of electric fire through Draco’s body. It felt similar to the Cruciatus curse except that it was deep within Draco’s blood and flooding his brain. It forced up memories of all he had ever done under the title of Death Eater and refused to let them fade.

It was both physical and psychological torture.

Draco knew he was screaming and he knew he was pulling madly at the iron shackles. He also knew that they would never break nor release him. Everything around him was reinforced with powerful magic set into the very objects by his own ancestors. It would not break without being allowed to.

When the pain subsided, the memories did not. Draco did everything in his power to push them back into their respective boxes, scrambling wildly to reassert some kind of control over his own mind, to find some order in the chaos of his emotions. It was not working.

The Dark Mark on his arm was still sizzling as though it had just been imprinted with a branding iron. Soon he realized that there was a maniacal laughter echoing in his mind and outside of himself.

Thomas was laughing at him.

“You can’t talk your way out of this, Malfoy,” he informed Draco unkindly. “Your skullsucking son is no better than you are. I am doing him a favour here. This way, he will never have to grow up and find out what a coward he and his father are. This way, he will be free of the stigma of being a Malfoy.” He smiled in an almost caring way. “I’m saving him really. Saving him from you and from your mad master. Scorpius will never belong to Voldemort as you no doubt want him to.”

Draco stared, completely dumbstruck, for a moment. Had Thomas just…

Voldemort? Has he gone mad? Or, madder than I initially knew?

“Thomas, look, I don’t want Scorpius to follow Voldemort,” Draco said slowly. “You’re quarrel is with me, is it not? Scorpius doesn’t have to be here for this. You can do what you please with me, but release him. Let him out safely. You can save him that way.”

“Silence!” Draco pressed himself back into the wall. Thomas wasn’t right at all. For the first time, Draco wished he had alerted Potter. A literal lunatic was hard to predict and was just as liable to kill Scorpius if he was spooked as to release him. Then again, someone in a psychotic break might also be more likely to make a crucial mistake. Draco only hoped that he would have the power to take advantage of such a mistake if it were to occur.

Thomas paced like an angry dog before him and flicked his wand. The dense darkness of the cellar suddenly lifted slightly and the walls on either side of Draco were illuminated. To his left he saw the crumpled body of his son. His heart raced and he tugged on his restraints unconsciously in an effort to run to his side. He couldn’t quite tell if Scorpius was alive or dead and that fact alone distressed him deeply.

I’ve been screaming loudly enough to wake the dead for the past who knows how long… He would have stirred at the sound, wouldn’t he? Draco immediately shook away the chilling cold that set into his mind and had nothing to do with the encroaching Dementors. NO. Scorpius is fine. He must be. He has to be… Thomas wouldn’t kill him without me to witness it, surely. It wouldn’t be painful enough for me…

All the justifications that Draco tried to put to it only filled him with more doubt and more fear. As a result of the fear, he felt himself grow simultaneously hot and cold, brimming with anger and needing to reach his son.

“What have you done to him, you bastard?” Draco cried, feeling his warring emotions fill him with a wild and dangerous magic that he had never encountered before.

It would have frightened him had he not had far more important matters to worry about.

“I don’t know, Malfoy,” Thomas whispered, walking over to Scorpius’ limp figure. He stooped near the little boy and lifted his head to face his father. Scorpius looked far paler than usual, his lightly blond eyelashes dusting over his cheeks. He looked both ill and serene. It was deeply alarming. Draco clenched his jaw and fisted his hands.

“Don’t touch him, you filthy mudblood!” Draco spat before thinking about it. He should have bitten his tongue but he couldn’t bear the thought of his son being touched by his captor.

Thomas’ face split into a very angry smile and his eyes twinkled with uninhibited, wicked delight.

“That’s the Malfoy I know,” he growled. “Nice of you to finally show your true colours.” Draco growled deeply and fought uselessly against the shackles. “But I wonder, if you are still so deeply hateful of muggleborns, why are you cavorting around with a half-blood like Harry Potter?” Thomas tapped his chin, pretending to be pensive. “Ah yes. Perhaps it’s because he’s such a public figure and can give you all the fame you’ve always wanted. Perhaps because Harry is good and kind, if a little mislead, and you intend to use him to your benefit.”

Draco wanted to retch at the thought of using Harry that way and found his stomach churning at the way Thomas spoke his name. As though they were old friends.

They were old friends.

“You have no right to call him that,” Draco bit out, his knuckles white from his balled fists. “You stole his wife and betrayed him. You’re no friend to Harry Potter. You’re just a hypocrite and a psychopath.”

Thomas’ face contorted in a mix of confusion and loathing. He raised his wand and flicked it at Draco, whose entire body erupted in searing pain. Draco ground his teeth, refusing to scream, but he had to screw his eyes shut lest they burst. He was shaking violently and the wound on his chest split open further.

“I did not steal his wife,” Thomas snapped. “Ginny and I have been together since we were sixteen! Harry was just jealous. He’ll come around eventually. When I get you out of the way, anyway. You and your filthy Slytherin lies are clouding his mind!”

Another flourish of his wand and the pain subsided, but very slowly. It left Draco panting and bleeding, his vision spotting. He was not a teenager anymore. Hell, he wasn’t even in his twenties anymore. Draco was by no means an old man, but he simply did not have the endurance he may once have.

He fought to stay conscious and alert because his son required it. He fought to find more energy, more power so that he could do something and save Scorpius. He needed to be a hero, if only one time in his life. If only for his child.

There is no better reason than your child to justify doing something stupid.

“But that really isn’t the point, is it?” Thomas got to his feet and the unpleasant smile was on his lips again. “I must control myself. I can’t keep torturing you physically, however much is pleases me, or else you might expire or go mad before I can properly torture you mentally.” He paused and considered Draco. “Scorpius needs to be awake for this, I think. Wouldn’t want him to miss his family reunion.”

Before Draco could say a word, the madman pointed his wand at Scorpius’ limp form and muttered a spell. Immediately the little boy roused, blinking sleepily as though he had only been resting. Draco was reminded of the previous Christmas, when Scorpius had been determined to stay up with Draco and his parents while they talked late into the night. He had fallen asleep on the sofa and, when Draco went to collect him and bring him to bed, Scorpius had fluttered his eyelids and sleepily asked if Santa had visited yet, completely forgetting that he adamantly denied belief in Father Christmas because it was childish.

Draco fought the urge to cry, worried that his son might not see Christmas this year if he couldn’t do anything to stop Thomas.

“Father?” Scorpius asked, his voice raspy and quiet. His eyes widened in terror as he noticed the blood and the chains that bound his father in place. He tried to reach out for Draco, presumably to help him, but he was met with the tip of a wand. Then he glanced up and took note of their surroundings and the man who stood before him. Scorpius’ angelic face transformed instantaneously to a vicious glare and he reached into his own pocket for his wand to pull on his attacker. He gasped when he realized it was gone.

“Looking for this?” Thomas said in a wicked voice, swinging the wand before the younger Malfoy’s face. Draco watched as Scorpius made a move to snatch it and he cried out.

“Scorpius, stay back!” Draco said, trying to remain authoritative and keep the quiver from his voice. He did not completely succeed. The boy looked up at him in surprise and fear before dropping his hands. “It’ll be alright, son. Just stay where you are, alright?”

“But father, you’re bleeding!” Draco suddenly wished that Scorpius was more daft than he actually was. But his son was too intelligent to accept foolish platitudes that would have reassured other children. “He’s hurt you and kidnapped us both.”

“Please, Scorpius,” Draco said more quietly this time, trying for the staying calm that only his mother could ever achieve. “Just do as I say.” Thomas was laughing now and Scorpius’ expression was icy and cutting. “Thomas! My son does not need to see any of this. Let him go!”

“Oh no,” Thomas said before flicking his wand at Scorpius and conjuring lesser shackles to keep him in place as well. Scorpius gasped and cursed himself. He knew that if Scorpius had tried to attack Thomas, he would only have gotten cursed or killed… but watching him be bound was no easier to see. “You’ve ruined all my plans by telling your spawn to stay his hands. I intended to give him a matching set of scars to yours.” Draco’s blood ran colder than before and his pupils turned to pinpricks. “But it is quite necessary he see you for what you really are. He needs to know the truth about some things.”

Draco was breathing heavily now, trying to take in whatever details of his surroundings that he could. He knew the cellar well, but had repressed so many memories of it that he could not remember if there were any weak points in the wards, in the shackles or the walls themselves. He felt a wild magic growing within him, but did not know enough about uncontrollable magic to know what to do with it.

“You can bring her in now,” Thomas said suddenly, calling out toward what Draco knew must have been the doorway. The blond’s head snapped up and he watched as two blonde women entered the room. One was limp and clearly unconscious, floating a few inches above the ground. The other was very much aware and levitating the first woman. Draco knew them both, but wished that he did not.

“Astoria,” Draco hissed as his former fiancé dropped his wife to the ground in a small heap. Aurora –or rather, Ophelia, though Draco would never manage to call her that –did not stir, but laid there as Scorpius had.

“You may call me Ms Greengrass,” she informed him icily. Her features were simultaneously round and sharp, but in all the wrong places. Her hair was a dull, ash blond, tinted with green and her skin was yellowish. The whole made her look wan and ill. Her eyes were a dull blue, uncertain of their hue and too watery to ever match the sharpness of her words.

“Is this your revenge on me for marrying Aurora in your stead?” Draco asked unkindly. Astoria puffed up indignantly but undercut the movement with a nasal laugh. Draco winced at the pitch. There were many reasons that he could never have married Astoria.

“I would never have married you, Draco Malfoy,” she sneered. “My grudge against you has nothing to do with this poor wretched woman.” She nodded vaguely to Aurora. “I am a Greengrass! We are pureblood nobility! We were never accused of anything so base as murder or torture! We were neutral throughout the war and never sided with the Dark Lord!” She proclaimed their neutrality as though it was a badge of honour but Draco only snorted. The Greengrasses were more hypocritical than the Malfoys could ever be. “Then, after the Malfoys were stripped of their power, prestige and money, my parents told me they had arranged for me to marry you!” She shuddered from what Draco was sure was disgust. He felt a similar feeling grow in the pit of his stomach as he listened to her prattle on. “It was unthinkable! I was destined for a much more prestigious marriage than the likes of you!”

Draco snorted again, this time more audibly though it tore at his already raw throat. He shook his head.

“Is that why you’re still unwed and unpromised?” he asked coldly, his trademark smirk back in place. He would have liked to keep it civil, but he couldn’t. Scorpius would understand and Draco could remind him that civility and kindness were far more important than the ability to cut someone to shreds with words. But it did help. “Is that why you had to lower yourself to physical labour to live? Mummy and Daddy cut you off when the marriage fell through and no one else would have you?”

Draco was not ashamed of having worked to pay for his family and their lifestyle, to reestablish their former status, however he could. Astoria was still under the delusion that she was better than everyone else. She was a greater fool than Draco ever was.

“I am not unattached!” Astoria defended. Then she wrapped her arm around Thomas’ neck and purred unpleasantly. Draco’s eyes widened and Thomas’ face remained impassive. “I have Dean here. After we take care of you, we’re going to marry.”

Draco could quite decide if he should point out that Dean was also seeing Harry’s ex-wife or that he was a muggleborn first. Pureblood nobility apparently only distinguishes between Death Eater and non-Death Eater, not blood status or sanity. Draco only gave Thomas a pointed look.

“Well, I’m sure that will turn out just as you planned,” he hissed coolly. “And tell me, if Aurora did you a grand old favour by stealing me away, why is she unconscious on the ground?”

“That’s the fun part,” Thomas said cruelly. He flicked his wand and Aurora stirred, blinking similarly to Scorpius and rubbing what seemed to be a rather swollen lump on her head. She glanced around and then gasped before scampering back toward the wall behind her. She was trembling.

“Where am I?” she asked breathily. “What’s going on? Who are all of you?”

Draco’s eyes widened and he opened his mouth to speak, before noticing something about Aurora. Her eyes were different. They were sharper than they had ever been, even in the dim light of the cellar. She was more aware.

“Aurora?” Draco asked quietly, a dreadful sinking feeling in his stomach. “Aurora, are you alright?”

She looked at Draco, confusion and fear on her face. She shook her head.

“Why are you calling me Aurora?” she asked, pushing herself up off the ground, using the wall to brace herself. Draco’s face hardened and he wished deeply that Scorpius was not in the room. “Who are you?”

“I… I’m Draco Malfoy,” he replied quietly. He could feel Thomas’ and Astoria’s eyes boring into his skull, their terrible grins in place. “I’m your husband.”

Confusion, fear, terror and disgust chased themselves across Aurora’s face as she processed the information. She gasped, looked down at her hand and then spotted the rather large diamond ring. One hand to her mouth, she shuddered and shook her head.

“What? No! No, no, no,” she began rambling, horrified. Draco’s bit his lip hard, seeking wildly for a spell he might cast wandlessly to deafen Scorpius to his mother’s words. But nothing Draco could do could blind him. “I can’t be… I can’t be married… and you!” She looked up at Draco, her eyes wide. “You’re that Death Eater boy, aren’t you? You’re… you’re evil!” She began trembling and Draco gritted his teeth, glancing from her, to Thomas, to Scorpius in the corner. Scorpius’ eyes were wide and his brows were knitted in confusion. He was shaking his head. “I would never marry you! You’re completely vile!” She made a violent noise of disgust and shuddered again, rubbing her arms as though trying to scrub away the feel of Draco on her.

“Mother?” Scorpius’ frightened and hurt voice pierced the tension in the room. Draco shut his eyes and felt the magic in his grow and growl. The woman who was now only Ophelia looked over at the boy, her face a mask of revulsion.

“M-mother?” she asked, apparently fighting the urge to vomit. “I’m your… I had a child?” She shook her head again, trying to shake away the notion itself. “I bore the son of a… of a Death Eater? Of a snake… a villain!” She began to shake and flail, pushing away from the boy. “I didn’t want… you can’t be mine!” She looked accusingly at Draco. “You must have raped me!”

Draco actually winced, he gritted his teeth and then turned to Scorpius, ignoring the woman who was never his wife.

“Scorpius,” he said, trying to sound reassuring. “It’s alright. Don’t listen to what she’s saying, alright, son?”

“Papa…what’s wrong with…” Scorpius couldn’t finish his sentence. Draco pressed his lips together, trying not to cry out. Scorpius only called him ‘Papa’ when he was very frightened or very hurt. Draco imagined he was both.

Draco turned his attention to Thomas who was giving him a horribly smug look.

“You imperiused her?!” Draco hissed at him, his anger growing every minute. He didn’t care about who Aurora really was, or what was done to try and hurt him, but he could not allow this abuse of his son’s heart to go on. “For twelve years? Just to hurt me?!” Draco tore at his bonds. “Are you mental?!”

The question was somewhat redundant but Thomas took offense anyway.

“You deserved to be punished!” he nearly shrieked. Draco set his shoulders and felt the magic begin to filter into his blood. “You came out of the war with nothing! No wounds, no death, no punishment!!” The wild magic seethed through him. “Instead you were given fame and fortune as wizarding Britain’s Quidditch star and heartthrob! People loved you instead of hating you like they should have!”

“I don’t care!” Ophelia suddenly shrieked. “I don’t fucking care what’s wrong with either of you! Merlin! Just let me get the fuck out of here!” Draco growled and glared at her, yanking on the chains again and finding that, this time, they gave a little as he did. She was swearing in front of Scorpius and –regardless of whether she cared about him or not –he was still a child. “I feel so filthy… so violated.”

Astoria held out her wand and cast a wordless Stupefy at Ophelia before she fell to the ground. Draco might have thanked her if he had not been so consumed by hatred.

“I needed to let you get everything you wanted and then take it away from you. You thought Aurora was a pureblood and in love with you. She is neither of those things and now you’ve got a half-blood, bastard son and the knowledge that no one has ever loved you. By the end of the night I will have taken absolutely everything you have,” Thomas informed him triumphantly, but there was a cold pain in his words. Draco could hardly chart the way his brain moved between timelines. He stared, glaring and unable to speak. “Just like you took everything away from others. Stole their families, their loved ones, their lives and their sanity.”

“I lost everything but my family in the war!” Draco snapped because he had to, or explode. “I lost my dreams and my life. Then, after it was all over, I lost my dignity, my hopes, my pride and my father. He was tortured in Azkaban and was never the same.” Draco felt the chains slowly grinding free of the stone as the magic loosened. “Do not claim that I lost nothing. Everyone lost something.”

“LIAR!” Thomas hollered and pointed his wand at Draco again, casting a Cruciatus so powerful Draco was sure he could have died from it had it not been so brief. His screams echoed through the room and Scorpius was screaming with him. Then the pain was gone and Draco was bleeding more.

He could barely see because his vision was blurred and spotty.

“It doesn’t matter now anyway, does it?” Thomas seemed to have calmed down, but when Draco looked up, he could see that Astoria was slightly shaken by the sudden attack. “Now that I’ve taken your wife from you, I’m going to take your son.”

Draco wondered still that Thomas though he cared at all about Aurora/Ophelia. It was the way she hurt Scorpius that bothered him. But he had no time to ask. He was much too concerned with his son.

“Leave him alone!” Draco screamed, still tearing at the shackles. Thomas ignored him and Astoria trained her wand on Draco to stop him jerking. He stared her down briefly before turning his attention to Scorpius. He felt a swell of pride as he saw Scorpius standing his ground, staring Thomas down and unwilling to show weakness.

But he should never have to face the kind of danger that would require a stand like that…

Thomas cast a series of spells and Scorpius was lifted into the air, bound spread-eagled against the wall and frozen in place. The wild magic inside Draco grew and seared in him, as he watched, helpless, while his son was handled by a madman.

Then Thomas drew his wand down the front of Scorpius’ robes and split them open, revealing his pale chest. Draco was consumed with anger and revulsion at the notion that this man was undressing his son in any way. He knew, however, that Thomas intended to scar Scorpius like Harry had once scarred Draco.

But he did not know the right spell.

The magic in Draco changed and then the world began to spin as it often had, the darkness around him altered but there was no black hole sucking at his soul. It simple tilted the world and unsettled him further.

He watched as Thomas glared into Scorpius’ chest and knew that the words on his lips were that for a Cutting Curse.

And he knew that Scorpius would not survive if he succeeded.

+++++

Harry stood transfixed on the pathway, his own green eyes reflected back in those of the ghastly dog. His heart was strangely slow in beating and his breath escaped in dense puffs which he only partially attributed to the winter air.

Harry drew his wand and held it out but the dog did not move. It paid no mind to the so-called weapon and kept its eyes trained on Harry. He had the distinct impression, though he could not quantify it, that the dog was reading him, like a parchment, like a list.

The Auror took a tentative step to the side and the shuffled in the opposite direction, pivoting around Harry like fencers dance as their steel clashes. Harry could not take his eyes off the dog for a moment. He could not turn around. He knew that there was a point to its appearance and to the way it behaved.

The Grim is a signal that Death is on the horizon. But I’ve known that the Grim has been hunting me, haven’t I? Why is he not actually stopping me? Killing me and taking my soul?

The dog tilted its head to Harry in a move that often meant confusion, but there was a frightening awareness in the animal’s eyes. He was taunting Harry.

Or was he?

Harry shifted his feet and moved steadily around until he had reversed their original positions. He stood with his back to Malfoy Manor, facing the dog with its back to the gates. The dog’s tongue lolled out of its mouth for a moment, panting before it growled in was seemed an almost playful manner.

Then it bounded forward, directly at Harry’s chest. Harry raised his wand to cast a spell he did not know but the dog was too close. The Grim’s paws suddenly connected with Harry’s stomach and went through. His lungs closed and his stomach clenched, his entire body feeling frozen from the inside out, if only for an instant.

In moments the Black Shuck had disappeared through Harry, travelling like a ghost and leaving Harry panting, feeling as though he had just been bodily assaulted by a fifty pound sack of bricks.

He feverishly touched his own chest and stomach, looking for some kind of wound or mark, something to show where the dog had travelled. There was nothing. He turned around and saw nothing there either. The Grim had passed into and Harry wasn’t entirely sure it had passed back out.

Looking up at the dark and somewhat ruined Manor, Harry felt the world tilt to its side, giving him a different perspective on a very familiar scene. He felt different but could put no words to the change.

Harry tried to calm his breathing but there was an earth-shattering shriek that echoed from deep within the old building.

Draco.

+++++

“Dean.” Draco was surprised by the sudden interruption. He and Thomas both paused, shocked, and turned to look at Astoria. She seemed somewhat uncomfortable with what Thomas was doing and Draco could see that she was beginning to fear that her decision to take part in their scheme might have been a mistake. “What are you doing? The Dementors are getting restless.”

Thomas’ eyes shifted and he blinked.

“Yes, of course,” he said sharply, coming back to himself and lowering his wand. Draco silently thanked whatever powers there were that Astoria wasn’t completely mad, all the while beginning to feel the real power of the wild magic that was coursing through him. He knew what he had to do now.

Or at least what he could do.

He tried to prepare himself for the sudden onslaught of memories and horror. He knew that he was far more vulnerable to the Dementors now than he had been in his youth. He had regrets now. He had terrifying memories.

He had pain. Pain enough to make him faint.

Draco set up barriers in his mind and allowed only his fear for his son to consume him. The muscles in his arms and stomach were taught and trembling.

Thomas turned and Astoria’s attention shifted to the door and Draco was left unattended. The door flew open and an unforgiving darkness intruded. Innumerable cloaked figures, floating on the cold and sucking in all the happiness of the room infiltrated. Draco was immediately assaulted with the pain and the overwhelming sadness but ignored it. Adrenaline pumped through his veins and his magic escaped him, breaking free and running wild.

The room shook violently and the wards and spells embedded into the stone began to shimmer and lifted from the walls to hang in the air, like fairy dust in the sun. Draco threw all of his strength into one movement and yanked viciously on the chains that bound him. With a growling cry one of the chains snapped and the other pulled out a chunk of stone with the ring that hooked into the wall.

Thomas spun around, a look of shock and revulsion on his face but Draco swung around his left arm and whipped the chuck of stone attached to the chain directly at his captor.

Thomas was hit hard in the chest by the stone and sent sprawling on the ground, knocking into Astoria as he went. The Dementors swarmed in an immediately swooped over Draco and Scropius, desperately seeking to consume them. Draco’s magic covered Scorpius with a shield he had never used, nor known to exist before a cry erupted in the deadly silence of the Dementors’ attack.

“DRACO! Catch!”

Draco spun around to see a flash of Harry tossing him a wand. Draco saw it move in slow motion, much as he did the snitch, and snatched it out of the air in a single, rapid swipe.

“EXPECTO PATRONUM!” Draco cried, his voice matched by Harry’s as they cast the same spell. Visions of Scorpius’ birth flooded forcefully through Draco and shone through him. Images of Harry Potter standing before the Wizengamot and proclaiming that Draco was a fundamentally good followed soon after and a gyrfalcon more brilliant than Draco had ever cast emerged from the tip of his wand.

It was massive and matched the brightness of the stag that exploded from Harry’s spell. The gyrfalcon crowed angrily and swooped at the Dementor that tried to penetrate the shield around Scorpius. The two patronuses swooped and stampeded respectively, driving the Dementors back out of the cellar.

“NO!!” an angry voice bellowed. The darkness did not completely dissipate but the cold ebbed slightly. Draco spun to see Thomas getting to his feet, his wand pointed directly at Draco’s chest. Astoria was scrambling around for her wand and Harry was guiding his stag down the corridor beyond the cellar. “I WILL KILL YOU!”

“No! Dean!” Harry cried suddenly, stepping over to where Draco was and holding out his wand. He seemed uncomfortable and pained, rather than loathing and hateful as Draco was. “You don’t want to do this! Draco is not responsible for what happened to you! Neither is Scorpius. You need to stop this and let me take you into the Ministry.”

Draco held out his wand, pointed steadily at Thomas. His magic swelled and thrashed within him, demanding vengeance.

“How could you possibly think he isn’t to blame?!” Thomas glared at Harry and then set his face. He shook his head. “No, Harry. He’s brainwashed you into believing his skullsucking lies! He’s a Death Eater and a Slytherin, Harry! But I’ll save you! I’ll free you from his clutches. He is evil!”

“He’s not evil!” Harry yelled back, the anger seeping into his words now. “Draco is… Draco is my sky!” Draco was shocked by the strange choice of words, but the world opened up next to them and began to pull on them then. The pull was different, though, and the tilt in the ground indicated to Draco that what Harry said was both true and necessary. He just didn’t know for what. “He is my sky and my freedom. I was lost for years, wandering aimlessly through life and chained by my own disappointment. He liberated me and gave me back the wind. He is my flight and you will not take him from me.”

Draco swelled with a euphoric feeling of overwhelming love and he was somewhat panicked by it. He didn’t understand, but there were words in his mind, on his tongue, that demanded to be spoken.

“He only wants to use you, Harry!” Dean informed him desperately, clearly recognizing the power of the words Harry spoke. “What can you be to him but a ticket to social acceptance and power?”

“Harry is what grounds me,” Draco said from somewhere outside of himself. The darkness changed around him and he felt somewhat dizzy. “He gives me focus and determination. I was flying adrift on the air and he brought me back to earth, gave me the strength to fight when I couldn’t before. He is my ground and my rock. He is the support I need to stand and I will not let you cut him down.”

Again, Draco did not understand many of the words he had spoken, but he knew, beyond a doubt and without reservation, that they were true. He could hardly breathe as he held out his wand to Thomas.

“You are fools, both of you!” Thomas proclaimed. “Voldemort will win if I don’t stop you! You cannot stay to taint the world with your lies and filth. You’ve lost your way, Harry. You’re fate lies within him now.”

Then Thomas raised his wand to Draco, the madness most clear in his clouded eyes and a grimace on his face. Then everything happened at once.

“SECTUMANIMA!”

“STUPEFY!”

“AVADA KEDAVRA!”

“CONFUTO IMEPTUS!”

“STUPEFY!”

A series of colourful flashes of light filled the room and hit various people and places. One was halted, three four hit their marks and for a moment there was a shining silence.

Draco then realized the light had come from Harry. He had stepped in front of Draco to take the hit from the spell Thomas had cast and, at first, Draco had thought that the spell had missed.

Now he could see he had been wrong.

Harry was standing, motionless and cold before, suddenly, his body began to dim under the power of a brightness that came from within his own skin. His solid self dissolved and left only a shining, blinding greenish white Harry.

Thomas had severed Harry’s soul from his body.

And then the black hole opened once more and began to pull Harry into it.

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A/N: So this chapter is MUCH longer than my others, lol. About double, actually. XD I hope you like it! It's kind of intense and Dean Thomas was NOT cooperating with me. So yes. Only two more chapters, I think. :D The final one and then an epilogue type business thing. *dancy-dance*

I love you all! Thank you for the reviews from the bottom of my heart! *throws love and candy and hugs at you all* heeee :)