Trapped in gold

A corse scream wrenched through the halls. Echoing off the gold leaf in the high ceilings. It sounded like a dying animal, the echoes enhancing the sound ten fold to send a wave of cold dread down the boys spine as he sat in his study.

A scream filled with fear and panic. The scream of his mother.

He barely registered in his conscious mind that she was in trouble before he was out the door. Images of what would cause his mother to scream like that flashing before his eyes as the shadow of the alien sound still hummed thought the manor walls. His riding boots thudded down the halls soft carpet like the drumming of a deaf man; eratic. Any rhythm his steps might have made disappeared as he stumbled past furniture and attempted to gain a longer stride. His pail fingers slightly marked the ivory walls as he hurried around corners in an inelegant swirl. Years of training to be fine, to be a gentleman, lost in a moment of worry. He had never heard her scream before. . . what if mother was injured?

When he burst around the corner to her hall his heart started to thud in a tribal dance of dread and confusion. The pumping of blood almost a hindrance as it sent slight shock waves through his skin. Anger and fear began to beat at the insides of his skull.

Two men where in the hall looking into the open door of his mothers room. The first was unfamiliar and plain. Brown clothes on brown skin all underneath brown hair. But the second man, leaning casually against the door jam and smiling into the quarters was only too familiar. A red head much taller then he, with freckles and worn clothes. Ronald Weasley.

Ron pushed himself off the door frame and strutted slowly inside, each fall of his enormous feet on the Egyptian carpet but a soft thud in the silence. “Well, well.” He drawled with barely concealed glee, “you must be ferrets mother. I’m afraid you’ll have to drop the blanket, it might be cursed and we’re here on official ministry business you know. Can’t take any chances.”

Coming to his senses the boy rushed forward to his mothers room, completely ignoring the ‘hey!’ released form the unknown man in the hall. She was backed up against the edge of her bed with a blanket clutched firmly over her body. A wet towel on the flood and her still slightly dripping hair attesting to the bad timing of the Weasleys entrance. With the same pail hand that had marked his expensive walls Draco reached out to remove the freckled digits attached to the edge of the blanket and placed himself between the two. He stared with hate filled eyes at the red head and snarled protectively.

“Leave her alone!”

At his words Draco felt a small hand clutch the back of his robes as she hid behind her grown son. At 16 he was tall enough for the slight woman to disappear behind as she trembled in fear. Lucius Malfoy was not home and both of them knew it.

Ron smirked at the protective manner in which the boy shielded his mother and let go of the blanket with a careless flick. “Ferret!” he called out with mock warmth and friendship, “I didn’t know you where home! Isn’t this wonderful! Dads looking around the house right now for any illeitemitems (raid, you know?) and he told me and Mundungus here to check and see if anyone was home. I was just about to frisk your mother. So if you don’t mind moving aside. . .”

“I wont have your filthy mudblood loving hands on my mother!”

Rons face went red with anger as he pulled his wand on the unarmed boy. Dracos wand was still sitting in his room where he’d been before his mad dash to Narcissas side. A litany of curses which would rid him of the two ran through his mind in helpless panic.

The plain brown man stepped forward and pointed his wand at the boy too. “Come on laddy” He croaked out in a whiskey burnt voice, “We’re just doing our job. You just step aside like a good boy and I’ll frisk you while Ron here checks you mum. He’ll be real gentle like. I promise.”

When Draco made no attempt to move the brown man suddenly shot forward wrapping an arm around Draco throat and wrenched him forward before slamming him into a wall. Chocking slightly from the pressure Draco watched in his peripheral as his mothers blanket was ripped away and hated freckled hands started to move over her body as if searching for a hidden weapon. The boy struggled but was only rewarded with a tighter grip from the brown man. His mothers silent tears fell to the ground, but he couldn’t move to help her frozen form because the thumb digging into his throat was too strong and was making his limps feel weak and numb.

Shifting his focus back to the brown man Draco was met with the double vision of a scrutinising stare. Everthing was in double and slighly shaking colours. His knees felt limp and pained.

“You’re a pretty little thing though aren’t ya?” the man wheezed out with two mouths as the blond felt even fainter and everything but the mans doubled head went blurry. The thumping in his ears almost drowning out the voice whispering not an inch from his face. “Yeh. . . your just like your mother in the face. Not like that no good dad of yours at all.”

The heads leaned in closer and the corse and sandpapered tongue of the right one licked it’s way up the boys cheek. The blood filling his skin in an attempt to leave his head made the taste buds a painful swipe. It felt like razor blades scratching into his skin and the instinct to throw up from the attention was mounting in his mind. He was too numb to move at all. He coudl feel his face turning red and could swear he could fit git grow in size as air and blood flow was denied access to his brain. The last thing Draco heard before his world turned to black was a sharp cackling laugh and the words “You even taste pretty.”
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
\"Draco!\"

The voice swam into the darkness and made him suddenly aware of his heart beat. Aware of his arms in their uncomfortable positiod hid his legs curled under him tingling with pins and neddles. That word drawing him from the land of nod into a half awake state where he battled between a suddenly panic filled inner voice demanding he save his mother and a sleepy second voice insisting all that is important was back in Nod.

\"Draco! Are you OK?\"

His skin jumped slighly at the words and two sets of golden blond lashes fluttered open and tried to focus on the blur of the room. \"hmm\" he returned to that familiar voice. That voice so much stronger then any of the ones in his head. \"I\'m OK.\"

As the blurs came into focus Draco saw his father sitting on the edge of his bed with a curled up Narcissa in his arms. Her thin fingers where wrapped around his cloak and pulling him closer as she breathed heavily into his chest. No tears, but short rapid breaths accompanied by a stony cold stare.

Pushing himself up off of the ground the boy made his way over to sit on her other side and place a hand on her now cevered back. His throat still hurt and when he wheezed out an apology to the woman she turned abruptly and focused her eyes on the red marks around hit neck.

\"Your hurt.\" she moaned out in regret and touched her fingers lightly to the marks before letting out a loud sob. The boy raised a hand to clasp hers to comfort her as his father rubbed soothing circles on her shoulder. \"I\'m a useless woman! I just hid behind you. I\'m you mother and I just hid behind you! I\'m suposed to protect you and I just hid!\"

Her slight form was wracked with sobs now and the two men hugged her in an attept to calm her down. Lucius went to get a vial of dreamless sleep and let her fall to the bed promising not to leave as she fell asleep with one hand still attached to her son.

\"Did they find anything, Father?\"

\"No. They knew about the chamber under the drawing room though. It was broken into. I didn\'t have anything in there. . .\" The older man started in a soft voice which fast turned into an angry yell, \"It\'s that God Damned headmaster, you know? He sends his little group here hoping to have me locked away. I wonder if he even realises he\'s friends are all perverts and rapists!!\"

The boy froze at those words and looked sharply at his father for confirmation. \"They didn\'t. . .\" but he coudln\'t even say the words. Had they done that to his mother? While he lay there blacked out oe fle floor?

\"No. But they might as well have. \'Frisk her\' my arse!\" the man suddenly stopped his tyraid and turned to his son to inspect the markings on his neck. \"Did they do anythign else to you?\" he asked before leavign to retrieve a healing potion.

\"Yes. . .No. . .it was weird. I don\'t think I want to talk about it.\" he replied. The older man came back with a bottle of potion and a cloth and started ot dab at his sons neck with it while peircing him with a seriouse stare.

\"You have to tell me, Draco. It could mean something. I\'ll have to make a full report to our lord and you know he\'s fond of you and your mother. Anything they did will help ensure they\'re taken care of.\"

The boy swallowed thickly and cast his eyes to the ground. \"They. . .I mean one of them, he licked me. I don\'t know why though. . . it was just weird.\"

Lucius\' movements stopped at those words and he looked up into a copy of his own silver eyes. A panic filling him at those words. If those on the side of the light had taken a liking to his son in *that* way then they would talk themselves into doing more.

It was the way they always worked.

The one who\'d done it would go back and laugh with the others about how uncomfortable Draco was. They would all laugh and think it was fun and games. . . but then someone would mention how beautiful the Malfoy heir was. How feminine the boy could be.

They would all start to joke about it. Lude comments about what they would do to the boy when they caught him. When they caught the boys father. He\'d diserve it they would reason. A Dark Wizard who would kill them all given the chance. And it\'s not like they really meant it. It\'s not like they\'d actually rape the boy. They where just laughing and joking.

But the idea would be there. And when they are again faced with the boy, when they are sparing verbally and Draco hit a nerve they\'d go away thinking those same thoughts, not laughing anymore. It wouldn’t be joke. It would be a punishment. The boy wont diserve it for being a Dark Wizard, he\'ll die ite it for personal reasons. They\'ll think about it in ernest and the boys natural aristocratic looks would not help the matter.

In moments of deep thought when the boys face fell into neutrality even Lucius and Narcissa found it hard to see him as a boy. Not that he looked like a girl. But his hairless jaw highhigh cheak bones made for a beautiful asexual look. The slightly pouted lips and short thick hair thonstonstantly fell into his face and covered his large silver eyes screamed \'hermaphrodite\'. And they would be thinking of him in *that* way when they next encountered the boy alone. On oposite sides of the war no doubt. They woudl meet alone and the boy just might find himself as yearned after as his mother had become. Because that was exactly what had happened to her. Lucius\' wife becLuciLucius\' whore to those who hated him. Smart arse barbs shot his way by the enemy.

\"You really do have a pretty wife, Malfoy. Mind if I give her a go?\"

\"You\'d want to be more carefull, Malfoy. Who knows what woudl happen to that slut wife of yours if you ever got sent away to prison.\"

\"I\'m just looking, Malfoy. It\'s not like I\'ve touched her. . .yet. Your still running free after all.\"

Lucius couldn\'t help but feel he was doomed to have the side of the light constantly after his family. Drawing out of his frozen thoughts the man looked into his sons eyes and asked him. \"Did he say anything?\"

The boy shifted uncomfortably and shifted hi gaze away and whispered out \"he said I even tasted pretty.\"