Draco's Escort Service

Chapter Nine

It took Potter awhile to catch him. Draco made sure of it, figuring the Gryffindor would be rather annoyed. In that he was right. Draco halted finally and hovered in the air. When he glanced over, he met Potter’s stormy green eyes. He smiled pleasantly.

“Why did you do that?” Harry demanded.

“Do what?” Draco asked innocently.

“You know very well what!”

“Because I wanted to,” Draco said levelly. Harry flushed and dropped his eyes. Malfoy waited, but Potter seemed at a loss for words. Draco grinned. If he’d known it would be so easy to disconcert his rival he would have started kissing Potter years ago.

“Behold, Norwich,” Draco said and waved expansively. The city was visible on the horizon. “Where do we go from here?”

Harry scanned the area. “North,” he said finally. “There’s a ravine… I’ll know it when I see it.”

“Fly north, look for ravines. You Gryffindors make such excellent plans,” Draco said. Harry ignored him and took off. Draco chuckled and followed. For some reason, he was in an excellent mood.

They flew low and carefully in order to avoid Muggle onlookers. Draco suggested waiting until evening, but Potter was afraid he wouldn’t be able to find what he sought in the dark.

Finally, they traversed a large sheep pasture and skirted the edge of a hill until Potter cried out, “There!” He dropped like a shot to what looked like the crumbling remains of an old well. Which turned out to be exactly what it was, Draco discovered as they dismounted. Potter peered down into the darkness.

“What exactly is down there that would cause you to risk dryads, centaurs, fairies, killer canyons… and my company?” Draco asked.

Harry met his eyes soberly. “The object that is keeping Voldemort alive.”

“I thought he was dead.”

“Gone, but not dead. He reverted back to the vaporous state he was in during the first eleven years of my life. I’d like to prevent his return.”

“Yes, that was quite annoying last time.” Draco thought Harry might be a bit off his rocker, but he decided to humor him.

“Okay. So, we go down into the well,” Draco said. “Another delightful day in the life of a Gryffindor.” He leaned over and cast a light spell. It revealed nothing but stone stretching away into the darkness.

“I’ll go first,” Harry said. Draco ignored him and hopped lightly into the hole. He cast a levitating spell to slow his fall, and then lit his wand again. The well was hellishly deep and when Draco finally landed, he was hip deep in brackish water.

“What am I looking for, Potter?” he called.

“I’m not sure. A passage, most likely.”

“Not sure,” Draco muttered. “Lovely.” He pressed on various stones. After five minutes, he started losing the circulation in his legs from the cold water.

“I’m not finding anything, Potter!” A stone hurtled down, barely missed Draco’s head, and splashed into the water. Draco glared upwards. “Bloody hell! Are you fucking trying to kill me?”

“Sorry! I’m coming down. Ah… can you slow me?”

“No, I’d rather you knock me cold landing on my head.”

The light was suddenly blocked out and Draco quickly cast upward to slow Harry’s fall. Potter splashed down next to Draco. It was a tight fit, and dark again until Draco cast another Lumos.

“Okay. So now we’re in a well. Wet. And cold. Are you sure this isn’t just a ploy to get me alone?”

Harry pulled at his hair in customary annoyance and then spoke in a strange, hissing language. Part of the stone wall fell away, taking the water with it. A passage was revealed and the well water washing along the floor caused something to stir. Draco stepped forward and brightened the light emanating from his wand.

The entire place seemed to shift.

“Snakes,” Draco said, trying to suppress his horror. The walls and floor were practically covered with snakes of all types and sizes.

“You’re a Slytherin. I thought you liked snakes.”

“Not all of them at one time.”

A cobra reared itself and bared its fangs at them. Others were slithering quickly toward them, stirred by the water, light and motion, no doubt. Draco stepped prudently behind Potter.

“Fine, I admit it! I’m a horrible Slytherin. I hate those nasty, scaly, slithering, poisonous horrors. The thought of actually touching one makes my skin crawl.”

Harry actually laughed, which annoyed Draco because it was definitely not the time for laughing. Not when a horrifying mass of reptilian hell was looking at them with dead-flat eyes and pointy dripping fangs.

Harry talked to the snakes. Draco had quite forgotten that Potter knew how to do that. The reptiles halted and seemed to be listening to him.

“Voldemort put them here. They’ve been breeding and feeding upon each other, unable to escape. It’s horrible.”

“Horrible,” Draco repeated, although he didn’t really see a downside to having a large herd of venomous snakes safely contained in an underground pit.

“Can you free them?” Harry asked.

“Why would I want to do that?”

“Malfoy!” Harry snapped.

“All right, bloody hell. But they had better not fucking bite me.”

Draco raised his wand and found the connected magical points in the room that contained the serpents like an invisible cage. It was a simple matter to dispel them. The mountain of snakes writhed and shuddered. Almost instantly, they wriggled and slithered through holes and cracks in a mass exodus. Some of them slithered past Harry and Draco; Malfoy found himself pressing close to Potter in disgust. Harry chuckled, but thankfully made no comment.

When the chamber was empty of loathsome reptiles, Harry walked forward. There were no exits from the room, but a few choice words in Parseltongue caused a section of wall to grate sideways.

Harry started forward, but Draco shoved him aside and pushed his way into the space revealed with lit wand held high. Harry followed, muttering.

They entered a large cavern with a small black pool in the center. Beyond the pool stood a jutting pillar of stone from which a niche had been cut. Resting in the recess was an object that curiously resembled an egg, although it was burnished silver in color and about the size of both Draco’s fists together.

Malfoy took a step forward and cast his gaze into every shadow, alert for anything. There was an odd smell in the room and his instincts were screaming.

“Stay back, Potter,” he murmured.

Draco took another step and instinctively ducked when something launched itself at him from the upper reaches of the chamber. A rush of wind lifted his hair and he felt the brief touch of smooth scales on his forehead as the creature passed over him.

What the hell was it? A winged snake?

That seemed to be negated as the thing twisted in midair and sank sharp claws into Draco’s shoulder. He yelped in surprise and cast Avada Kedavra at the thing, which released him and flapped away with a squawking hiss.

Great, a magic-resistant giant flying snake with claws. Occamy, he thought suddenly, recalling the name of the creature… but they were not usually resistant to magic. Which meant Voldemort had altered it. They were not normally venomous, either, but Draco could not count on that.

The creature attacked again and Draco slammed it into a wall with a sharp blast of force. It recovered with lightning swiftness and flew at him. Draco sidestepped at the cost of a slashed cheek. Bloody hell, the thing was quick! Malfoy followed the beast with several deadly spells that bounced off the scaled body. One of them nearly hit Potter, who skirted the edge of the pond, heading for the egg.

“Damn it, Potter! Can’t you wait until I finish this?”

“No… you don’t seem to be doing that well.”

“Thanks for the bloody vote of confidence!” Draco yelled as the creature swooped down on Harry. Draco’s hastily shot spell deflected the Occamy enough that the claws missed Potter’s head. Barely. “Damn it, Potter, can you at least duck?”

“No problem,” Harry said and dove forward. He reached the base of the pillar and sought for handholds. His proximity to the egg seemed to enrage the Occamy, who dove at him again.

“Bloody, stupid, reckless Gryffindor…” Draco muttered and plunged into the water, shooting hex after hex at the reptile. The creature’s fangs narrowly missed Potter’s head. At least Harry ducked that time. Draco’s spells finally seemed to irritate the Occamy and it launched itself in his direction—too fast! The claws tore into Draco’s midsection and bore him down. The pond was shallow—barely knee-deep, but Malfoy’s head went under water. Draco held his breath and fought to push the monster away, but it actually lifted him from the liquid and bore him into the air. He felt the claws tearing his flesh away with the movement.

Draco tried another Killing Curse while jabbing the wand into the Occamy’s open mouth when it tried to take a chunk out of his head. The spell seemed to jolt the creature and it dropped him. The world lurched for a moment, until Draco hit the ground and his breath left him in a painful whoosh. He struggled to pull air into his lungs, but could not even scream when he felt the claws tear into his back. In the next instant, fangs brutally drove into Draco’s neck and he felt blood spray across the side of his face.

He summoned all of his strength to roll over. The talons tore free from his back and the wings flapped for an instant. Draco gripped the creature’s neck when it reared back for another strike. He forcefully shoved the wand down the Occamy’s throat and cast one last Avada Kedavra. The creature seemed to radiate green from the inside out for a moment and then it lurched and fell over dead.

Draco sagged in sheer relief for a moment before he raised a hand and clamped down on his neck. Blood streamed from the wound at an alarming rate. He glanced over at Potter, who was hefting the egg. Harry looked over his shoulder at Draco.

“Malfoy! God, are you all right?” he yelled.

Draco tried to reply, but a strange, peaceful darkness was slipping over him. Potter leaped into the water and splashed through the pond. The last thing Draco saw was Harry’s worried face. Not a horrible sight, he thought, all things considered.