The Tombs
Draco walked down the long corridors, not knowing where he was going, but following the direction he had seen the returning guards coming from.
The place was huge and sprawling, but Draco’s one inborn talent was a wonderful sense of direction. He always knew where he was going. The entrance to the tombs would traditionally be located at the very middle of a castle. It was not a secret anyway, he discovered. There were even signs pointing the direction. He guessed that the Tombs had been much used since Voldemort moved in.
There were two guards at the entrance, and Draco slipped through them easily - it was a little like playing Quidditch, and slipping through the bludgers, only easier. None of the guards exhibited what Draco thought of as any intelligence.
The steep, dark narrow stairs smelled rank. They were poorly lighted, and water dripped down the walls. Draco had to be very careful not to make a sound, as the stairwell was echoing even the slightest breath.
It must be quite creepy for the two guards up at the top. He inched his way along, and had gone quite far, only to find that the people he thought were talking downstairs, were actually climbing up the stairs. It was another two guards, and the stairway was not wide enough for two people, unless they made room for each other.
Draco did not really want to have to climb the 200 odd steps he had already negotiated, but seeing no option, started up again, ahead of the guards. After they had gone a few more steps however, he heard two more guards start on their way downstairs. He looked around frantically, but there was no niche that he could hide in. They were coming closer every second.
He considered lying flat along one of the walls but the guards would feel him as they squeezed by each other. Panicking, he did the only other thing possible, and started to climb up the walls.
It would have looked easy to a person accustomed to rock climbing, but Draco had never tried before. The huge stone bricks were slippery and slimy with moisture and mold, and his fingers clung for a hold. His foot, clad in mercifully flexible dragon hide boots, skidded twice from in between the cracks of stone. A few times he felt things with his fingers slimy things that he would rather not have felt.
He made the mistake once of looking down, and felt his stomach roll. If he fell, he would hit the stairs and keep going until he reached the bottom. He lost his footing again as he looked, and nearly fell, but saved himself in time, digging his fingernails into the moss between two stones to give him some leverage.
He could see his hands now, jutting out from the invisibility cloak, but there was nothing he could do about it, he didn’t have time to fiddle with it, he had to climb. Luckily his hands were dirty and it was shadowy. He was just in time.
Two guards passed underneath him, talking loudly, and laughing at something, and then he saw them squeeze past the other guards on their way down. He waited, his brow furrowed in concentration, and his fingertips clinging to the walls, and then he used their loud voices as a cover when he dropped again, like a cat, landing lightly although he had dropped more than his own length onto an uneven surface. His fingers throbbed.
He continued on the long winding way slightly faster now, as he knew the talking and footfalls of the men in front of him would be masking any noise he made.
The air became more rancid the further down he got, and the lights burned more feebly. It was impossible to see how far the winding stair went, until he reached the bottom, and then it was a surprise. A dark corridor, shiny with slimy mold stretched before him. He walked along it, skidding a little in the shiny green wetness. Skid marks showed where previous Death Eaters had fallen. The walls dripped, and the loud echoing of water somewhere in the distance sounded menacing.
Draco slipped past the two guards easily. They had sat down at a table with a flickering lamp, and a bottle of firewhisky, neither of them looking very happy about it, and both hunched morosely in their robes.
The entrance to the room he needed lay in front of him. Inside, huge stone slabs lay around the room, looking a little like a flattened Stonehenge. The cold seemed to be intensified here, and Draco’s breath showed a cloudy white. The light here was more like moonlight, white in quality, giving the room an almost ethereal look. Pools of water lay on the uneven floor, and a quantity of miscellaneous mouldy rubbish lay stacked against the walls. Rusty rings were attached to the walls, some with chains attached, leeching their iron down the moist stone like old bloodstains. The remains of what could have once been a beautiful set of shelves with glass bottles on them stood at one side of the room. Now the shelves were rotting, and the bottles covered in spiders’ webs and mould.
Peter and Narcissa lay on their backs on a stone slab, beside each other, their hands by their sides. The pale moonlight made it look almost as if they were asleep.
Draco walked over quietly, trying not to let his footsteps echo, and looked down at his mother a long while. She had died to save him, and he had only opened one of the many letters she had sent him, while she was alive. She had never known he had opened it. He would never be able to change that now. He whispered now, “I’m sorry,” and was momentarily surprised to hear his voice echo around the walls. He waited, but did not feel any kind of closure. ‘Sorry,’ was inadequate for what he was feeling.
He waited a moment longer, imprinting her face on his memory, and then walked around the slab to Peter. Peter looked asleep too. His face looked bruised and battered in the faint light, but he also looked younger, and almost at peace. Draco felt awkward, but murmuring an apology, felt under his robes for the ring, and broke the necklace holding it. He felt he should say something. “I wish I had known you were my brother in law,” he said softly. “I would have been proud. Lilah made a good choice. I am taking the ring to her. She wanted it. I know you never knew that I liked you very well, but I will never let you down. I did listen to all you told me, even if I pretended I hadn’t.” Even in the quiet and to himself, he felt ridiculous saying it aloud, but after he had finished, he was glad he had.
A thought occurred to him, he walked around to his mother, and removed her engagement and wedding rings. “Any woman would be proud to wear these,” he told her silently, and that seemed to do it. He felt a little better. If she was with Sirius now, perhaps she was better off. She certainly had not had much happiness since her marriage. With the upcoming war, she would have had even less. Now she had escaped forever.
**************
It was lucky he had good reflexes, as he jumped sideways when he heard the hiss. At first he looked around for a person, the sound was like that of an indrawn breath, but then he realized that the sound had been from lower down. It was Nagini. Draco held his breath, but snakes have a good sense of smell. Flickering her tongue in and out, she faced his direction unerringly. Draco wondered if she could see him through his invisibility cloak, and when she next struck, moved out of the way just in time. The snake’s head followed him so quickly he knew he was right. She could see him. She herself almost blended in with the dark shadows in the room.
Draco began to sweat. He shot an Impediment curse at her, but it bounced off her scales. For all he knew the snake recognized him, and would tell Voldemort of his presence in the tombs. He had to stop Nagini. He stood tensed for her next strike. He could not use his wand, as he knew it would be certain death if he took his eyes off her. Running would not help. Snakes “ especially one that size “ were as faster than he was.
************
Upstairs, Parvati tensed as the doorknob rattled. Crabbe slipped into the room, sounding like a handful of elephants, but obviously trying to be as quiet as he could. Parvati tensed as he held a lantern up to the bed. Lilah’s face was still half covered by the blanket. Crabbe started as she stirred in her sleep, and Parvati gave a soft caw. Crabbe, frightened, slipped out. Parvati felt a cold sweat start, and transformed quickly into a mouse form, so that she could follow Crabbe.
Had he seen that it was Lilah and not Draco? She followed him towards a lighted corridor, but could go no further, unless... She was in luck. Crabbe stopped to talk to a Death Eater. There were only a couple of feet in the open for her to cross. She took the chance, and dashed inside Crabbe’s robe. She trembled at her nerve. Crabbe was going towards Voldemort’s audience chamber. She scrambled inside the lining of his robes, and clung on for dear life. Did Voldemort never sleep? It was about four in the morning. She strained her sensitive ears for sound.
“He is in bed asleep, My Lord,” Crabbe bowed, his nose nearly touching the ground.
Voldemort hissed. “Strange then, that I cannot see him… Everybody else seems to be in sight.”
‘I knew it!’ Parvati thought to herself. ‘Oh dear “ I had better doctor a few other people’s drinks or something so that he believes it is the result of the map going wrong.’
“I looked at his face, My Lord,” Crabbe said anxious to prove that he had done his job well. “I know it was him.”
“I wonder…” Voldemort did not say anything for a while. Then, just as she felt Crabbe shuffle his feet, Voldemort hissed, “Then you can take a message to the Head Griffin Keeper. I am not going to keep Snape around any longer. Get the griffins ready to feed tonight. We will loose all the prisoners. After you have spoken to the Head Griffin Keeper, you had better see the Head Jailer, and let him know that all prisoners are to be in the arena at 8 tonight, including Snape. And I want him to triple the guard on Snape’s cell. I want people in there with him too. And they are not to play cards or drink. That Malfoy girl visited him a couple of times, which I don’t mind. Nice to get the prisoner’s hopes up “ it makes them much harder to break, but I am still looking for her. And after that, you had better report back to me, as I want to be sure you understood your directions, and gave the letters. If you heard wrong, you can join the prisoners.”
Parvati guessed Voldemort must have either had someone writing the letters as he spoke, or had a quill do it for him, for Crabbe was given two letters to deliver. After that, he must have waved Crabbe away, because Crabbe started walking slowly backwards, bowing, and sweating. Parvati could smell the sweat on him. She herself was feeling scared and she hadn’t even seen Voldemort , only heard his voice.
Crabbe was obviously not too anxious to stay within Voldemort’s hearing, as he almost ran out of the august presence. Once he was in the shadows again, Parvati leapt from his robe and ran along the wall. The walls were clear, and she could smell nobody near, so she transformed quickly, pulling her hood over her head, in the manner of a Death Eater, and entered the dining hall. She joined a line for soup with others taking the night shift. With some sleight of hand, she managed to drop a bit of the anti-screening potion into the soup that was being handed out as she queued for her meal. She took a bowl herself as it was handed to her, and drank it. It was the first food she had eaten that day, and she felt the better for it. She noted with satisfaction the amount of people drinking the soup.
Hopefully people would be winking out all over the map soon. As she hurried back along the corridors, she managed to shake some more potion drops into the drinking water urns that stood along the walls. Finding an empty room, she transformed into a mouse, and ran along the walls until she reached Draco’s room, where she slipped underneath the door.
She transformed back to a raven, and fluttered up to the bedpost. Lilah was still asleep. Parvati was young and healthy. In spite of the horrors of the day, she had worked hard and was replete with some filling soup. She was worried about Draco, but overcome with all that she had experienced that day, she fell asleep.
***********
Draco leapt over one of the stone slabs. If he hadn’t been so quick, Nagini would have had him. He felt her strike his cloak. The invisibility cloak was making it harder for her “ perhaps she couldn’t see him as well as he thought. He heard her fangs striking the stone where he had been standing, as he swirled around and sidestepped quickly.
He looked around frantically, and saw a huge old rope hanging down from the middle of the room. As she struck again, he threw himself at the rope, and swung to the other side of the room. As he swung, a silent stone trapdoor opened in the middle of the room, and the sound of turbulent water increased. Draco saw swirling foam below him. As he let go of the rope, the trapdoor closed as silently. Could all snakes swim? He doubted it “ not in water like that anyway. He looked around for a weapon besides his wand.
There were some rocks, if he could get to them, but rocks would make a sound and call the guards. He saw a rusty iron grille at the side of the wall, and a few wooden planks.
Nagini thought she had him now. She was weaving towards him very slowly, but confidently. She was actually on top of the trapdoor, but there was no way Draco could get to the rope without being bitten. He shot a jinx at the snake, but it ricocheted off her scales again, and petered out harmlessly on one of the stone slabs. Draco shot another spell to try and Stun the snake, but that too, rebounded, this time striking one of the slabs with a louder crack.
As Draco leapt up onto another stone slab to evade Nagini, the two Death Eater guards entered, alerted by the noise. Nagini struck again, but by some lucky chance missed. The two guards however were now aware of a presence that shouldn’t be there. One of them ran forward, and stood on the trapdoor, the other loosed off a torrent of jinxes to the wall where Nagini was pointing, missing Draco by inches. However, the volley of rebounds as the jinxes hit the walls and bounced off the wards helped Draco by confusing all of them.
Draco murmured “Wingardium Leviosa!” and this time the spell worked. Nagini shot into the air, writhing and hissing her fury above one of the guards, who panicked. The other guard turned around, shooting sparks out of his wand like machine gun fire. Draco was hit, missed his footing, sending a large stone skittering across the floor, and lost his concentration. His wand arm dropped, and Nagini flew up into the air and then down again to hit the floor with a resounding SNAP! She was spitting mad, but the fall seemed to have hurt her somehow, because she was much slower in turning, which saved Draco’s life, and did for one of the guards. He was leaping to where he thought Draco was from the direction at where the stone had been kicked (accurately as it turned out), as Draco bolted away. Nagini struck the guard instead. He gave a howl of agony and dropped like a stone.
The other guard, now obviously under the impression that Nagini was attacking them for some reason, lost his head, and loosed off a shower of burning sparks again, spraying Nagini and the slabs liberally. Draco, crouched down behind one of the slabs grinned a little grimly, and watched Nagini turn irritably to face the guard, hissing in defiance. He could have run out now, but he had to finish off Nagini.
She had seen him, and he was pretty sure that she knew who he was, and could tell Voldemort. He had time to think now, and he remembered Harry. Harry and…the Basilisk! What had he done? He had blinded the snake so it couldn’t see. Draco didn’t know how he was going to blind Nagini; he didn’t have any sharp implement with him. But wait! He knew the conjunctivitis curse! He remembered Krum and the dragon in the Tri-Wizard tournament. If the curse worked on a dragon, it should work on a snake. He watched Nagini descend on the terrified Death Eater, who kept spraying her with sparks, regardless of the fact that they weren’t working to deter her in the slightest. A moment later, he too, lay sprawled on the ground.
Draco waited until Nagini had turned to face him, and then aimed straight for the eyes. It worked! She writhed in agony, and then came like a bullet straight for him. Her sense of smell was still intact. Draco loosed off another jinx, letting forth a smell of strong onions, and waited, knowing Nagini couldn’t see him or smell him now, and then leapt over her head, as she was about to strike. He only just made it “ her quick snake ears heard him, and she followed the breath of air. He felt her catch his robes again, and heard a small tear, as her fang caught in the cloth. He had to get her on top of the trapdoor. He circled quickly, as Nagini seemed to regroup and then regain some of her speed, and ran to the trapdoor, where he stood, braced. Nagini stopped, and considered, hissing viciously. Draco wondered if she actually did know where she was, and was avoiding the trapdoor.
He looked up at the rope above him. If his plan worked, as she struck, he would leap up and catch the rope, and she would fall into the water below. The rope looked a very long way up “ he hoped he could reach it. He kept himself braced. Nagini was circling. Perhaps she knew what his plan was? He was about to try ‘Wingardium Leviosa’ again, when she struck. Draco leapt for the rope, and just managed to grab it. His injured arm throbbed, but the trapdoor opened. Nagini hurtled down into the water below, and was carried swiftly away with the foaming current.
Draco just managed to swing the rope sideways, and landed with a thud, falling clumsily. His knees felt weak, and his arm ached terribly. He gave himself ten minutes, and then performed a mending charm on the fabric of the invisibility cloak, which had been burned.
Once he had regained some of his strength, he magically elongated the rope so he could reach it, and pulled on it again, standing well to one side and leaning down to investigate. The water was turbulent, but it ran through a passage that seemed to have air above it. Draco bent as far down as he was able, still holding onto the rope, and then looked across at the broken wood he had noticed earlier. It had once been a raft. He bet at one time people had entered and exited this way. He wondered why it was now disused.
His arm was stinging, and not hearing anybody around, he slipped off his invisibility cloak to look at it. He had a nasty burn across his forearm. No wonder it had hurt. Lucky his wand hadn’t been set on fire though, that was one consolation.
He turned around to put on his invisibility cloak once again, and noticed suddenly that the rope had gone. Frowning, he put on his cloak, looking up at the ceiling, only to find that the rope was again hanging where he had first seen it. He thought he must be imagining things, but just to be sure, he took off his cloak again. The rope vanished. He felt about where it should be, but could not feel it until he put on his invisibility cloak. His spirits began to rise. This was the secret passage! That is why nobody had been able to find it. You needed to be wearing an invisibility cloak to find it. The house elf would not have known that. House elves had their ancient magic that transcended the use of invisibility cloaks.
That was what had confused Nagini “ she hadn’t seen the rope, so she didn’t know how the door opened! If only he could be sure that the passage still led somewhere, and that there was air the whole way along it! He pulled on the rope again, and murmuring “lumos!” leant down and looked as far as he could see. There was air above the water as far as he could see. It obviously had not been used for a long time. He wondered how safe it was. The water had a very strong current, and the foam was choppy and dangerous looking.
Draco looked at his watch. Almost half past four. Time he was getting back to bed. He took a last look at his mother, who lay sleeping on the slab, beautiful in death, with the moonlight shining on her, and went out into the hall. The firewhisky was standing unguarded on the table, and Draco lifted it, and gritted his teeth. He poured some over his arm. It hurt like hades, but he knew it would numb the pain once the worst of the stinging wore off. Then he made for the stairs.
Once again, he had to climb the wall to escape some guards descending, and it was even worse than before “ the pain in his arm gave him a lot of trouble, although this time he managed to keep his hands hidden. White, and shaking, with sweat pouring down his face, he made it up the rest of the stairs to the top.
Passing the guards now was a difficult trial, not a simple task as it had been when he went down. His legs had no spring left in them. Personally, if he was a guard, he would Apparate up and down stairs, rather than climb them. It felt a bit like climbing up the stairs from Euston Station, only longer, narrower, and more slippery. He found his way back to his room.
When he got back, he woke both girls. Parvarti rushed to transform, and help him out of his cloak, horrified at his arm. Lilah swung herself out of bed to take a look. “What is that? Let me take a look.” She bit her lip when she saw his arm. “Well, I can do a little for that.” She took a tube out of her robes. “It is balm for the griffins when they bite each other, but a little will probably work. They have very tender skin, so it isn’t as if it is going to really hurt you.”
Draco rolled his eyes and moaned, trying for the sympathy vote as she started to smear it onto his skin. It smoked slightly. She glanced up at him with a half smile, although her eyes were still desperately sad. “I was good at Potions Class you know. I make this stuff myself. What were you doing anyway?”
Draco sat wearily on the bed. “I had a little run in with Nagini. I went to find an escape route and to fetch you this.” He handed her the ring. Lilah’s eyes misted over, and she sat down next to him, giving him a hesitant hug.
“Draco, thank you. I appreciate this. It means everything to me.” She slipped the chain off her neck, and added the ring to it, so that both wedding rings hung together, and was silent a minute, head bent. Then she looked up, dry eyed and stony faced. “OK, I am going to fall apart when we have finished here, but we all need to get out of here first “ and I guess you have to rescue Snape.”
Parvati pulled the chair around, and sat on it backwards, with her arms on the back of the chair. “Dumbledore thinks Snape has vital information “ if he is still able to use his head, which is dubious at best from the look of him. We have to get him out fast, as Voldemort is going to feed him to the griffins with the other beasts tonight at eight. He has also tripled the guard on his cell.” She waited for Draco to ask how she had gained the information, but he was silent, thinking, his face in its familiar scowl.
At last he offered, “There seems to be a waterway under the castle. I saw a broken raft, and there is a trapdoor leading down to it, but I couldn’t see all the way along the tunnel. I don’t know if it is safe, or if it is tidal. I wouldn’t want us to drown. The only thing would be getting Snape down there, as we would have to pass guards, and that means a battle, as it is impossible to get up and downstairs without bumping into somebody “ I had to climb the walls, and there is no way the three of us could do that with Snape in the condition you say he is. And we’d have to get him out in the first place, which will be impossible now that he is guarded so securely.”
Lilah shut her eyes and clicked her tongue “ obviously a habit that induced thought. She opened her eyes again. “I was trying to tame one of the griffins enough to carry him off alive. They usually kill their victims, and carry them out of the arena to eat in the forests before coming back to roost at night.”
Draco and Parvati looked blank, so she explained. “I came in on an undercover assignment to rescue Snape. Martin was supposed to contact me, but if he didn’t, I was to abort. Well, he probably thinks I have aborted, as I am MIA so to speak. I was recruited, through Martin, as an Assistant Griffin Keeper. The griffins are Voldemort’s answer to the Hippogriffs, which he is sure are to be used in battle. My duty was to try to tame a griffin enough to pick Snape up, and carry him off alive, so that we could doctor him when he was away far enough, and Apparate in stages from the forest to a safe place. We can’t Apparate here in the castle at all. Voldemort likes being able to keep track of people too much.”
Draco looked up. “So aren’t the griffins going to work?” he asked. “You seem reluctant to use that plan. It sounds good to me “ they will never suspect we are taking off under his very nose so to speak. He would be much more likely to think we were going to try to invade the cell.
Lilah sighed. “Martin was going to bring me an invisibility cloak so that I could sit on the lead griffin, so that we got to Snape first. The head griffin keeper is a dodgy character, and I am not sure if he even knows how many griffins we have, or what they eat when they aren’t fed prisoners. The problem is that the griffins sometimes fight over their food, so I couldn’t be sure Snape would be safe.
They are also unpredictable, so the griffin might just decide Snape was a snack anyway. Charms aren’t very useful if the beast you are riding decides to take a bite of something. I think that is why Voldemort feels so secure feeding the prisoners to them. He knows none of the prisoners will escape. Actually, it is difficult to keep the griffins from eating the keepers! I have been attacked before now. I don’t think they will be very useful in a battle, but then Voldemort wouldn’t mind too much if the griffins eat his followers.” She added bitterly, “He would probably think it funny.”
“I could be a griffin,” said Parvati timidly, after a while, as none of them were coming up with any ideas.
Draco glanced over at Parvati. “Do griffins come in black?” he asked.
Lilah and Parvati laughed at the same time. “Yes of course!” answered Parvati. “There are no more golden griffins in Europe “ they were too visible to Muggle hunters, and were wiped out a long time ago. You only find them in desert areas now. Black Griffins are mostly nocturnal, so they are safe here. They are very hard to spot. Those that are, find themselves on Muggle News posted as UFO sightings.”
Draco met Parvati’s eyes, but spoke to Lilah. “Parvati could be a griffin. With you in the invisibility cloak riding her. She could even pretend to finish Snape off before she carries him away “ but I don’t want her getting hurt if she is attacked by any of the others. If you thought you could ride her and hold them off at the same time that would work. Then I could try the underground escape way, and meet up with you outside afterwards.”
Parvati checked her watch, and handed Lilah the flask of Anti-Screening Potion. “Better take another swig, and so shall I. We will need to be invisible for a while yet. We can give the bottle to Draco when we leave.”
Draco raised his eyebrows at her, but she was right. Time was pressing, and they needed to refine the details of their plan. They had no time to make another. Draco would need to be up and around soon. Lilah, who was better at cleaning charms than the others, mended and pressed his clothes and shoes so that they looked as they had before he had been climbing walls, as she talked.
Parvati made more coffee in the muggle fashion. It struck her that Draco had really accepted her. He had not sneered once, and his manner was far more natural. She could have wished for more romantic behaviour from him, especially after he had just told her he loved her, but she was trying hard to be sensible. After all, he had just lost his mother, found his half-sister (and whatever he said, she had to be related, looking so exactly like him), lost a friend, undergone the Cruciatus Curse twice, and fought a battle with a giant snake. And Lilah was with them. And she had just lost her husband. Added to which they were in a situation of extreme danger, and had an escape plan to formulate. She gave out the coffee, as Draco showered in the bathroom.
Actually Parvati was a little nervous. Lilah seemed to think she could keep Parvati in the front, but what if one of the other griffins saw Snape first before she could snatch him out of harms’ way?
And she had seen, not a griffin itself, but pictures of them in her Care of Magical Creatures handbook, and their beaks looked very sharp and strong. She really didn’t want to be pecked, although if it meant keeping Snape alive, she guessed she could do it. And it was all very well for Lilah and Draco to talk glibly about her flying off with Lilah in the invisibility cloak on her back, and Snape dangling from her talons, but did they know how difficult that was going to be? Especially taking off? Snape would have been bad enough.
Parvati was glad that she regularly worked out with weights. Her ambition had been slenderness rather than strength, but she was quite strong. It all depended on how much room she had for take off. She had to make it look natural. She knew from once catching a rabbit as an eagle (mostly by a sheer fluke) that it was going to be insanely heavy.
Oh well. If she had known it was to come to this, she would have built up the necessary muscle, and downed protein shakes, but she hadn’t. It didn’t sound as if they had much choice. She needed Lilah with her, and they had to rescue Snape. It was a desperate effort.
Lilah had stopped talking and was holding her hand pressed to her mouth. Parvati felt a rush of sympathy, and flung herself down next to Lilah, putting her arm around the other girl. Lilah may act tough, but she was torn to pieces inside. What she really needed was to be able to grieve. Lilah didn’t say anything, but put her head into the crook of Parvati’s neck, and stayed like that for a while.
It was how Draco found them when he emerged from the shower, only a pinkish mark showing on his arm where he had been burned. Parvati looked at him. He was naked, but for a towel around his waist, and she had never seen anything so completely masculine. She had to swallow hard, but all her baser instincts leapt to attention. Other people may have thought him a trifle thin, his skin too white, his shoulders perhaps too round and his torso perhaps too long.
Parvati thought him perfect. She watched the muscle on his belly, and a slow ache started in her own. He was looking at Lilah however, with concern, and had not noticed her obvious reaction. Parvati caught hold of herself, and mouthed over the top of Lilah’s head, “Peter.”
Draco leaned down, and stroked his sister’s head awkwardly. It seemed rather a role reversal to him. Lilah had always been the one to comfort him when he was little, and now it was the other way around. He was thankful for Parvati. If she had not been here, he would have been more clumsy and awkward.
He picked up his clothes and retreated to the bathroom, Parvati watching the muscles in his back. He was really very gorgeous. And he was hers.
Lilah sniffed. “I guess we can’t all take showers. They’ll wonder where all the water is going.” Parvati smiled absently.
“The ranker we are the better. We will smell more like one of the pack when we join the griffins.”
Lilah sat up and looked at her. She had not been crying, her eyes were dry, but her nose was running a little “ the closest she had come to crying. “There was an article about you in the Daily Prophet a long time ago,” she said slowly. “I only just remembered.”
Parvati nodded. “Yes. I can do any animal, but everything is black.”
Lilah nodded, and laughed. “I remember! They said you lost the ability after you reached puberty.”
Parvati snorted. “No! I told them that I couldn’t do anything after they Stunned me about nine times when I was a Norwegian Ridgeback. They believed me.”
Lilah sighed. “I wish I had that ability,” she said. “I would love to go flying without a broom. I love my broom though “ Peter got me a Firebolt II as soon as they came out. It used practically all his savings.” She bit her lip.
Parvati nodded. “You don’t know how useful it is. I don’t like flying a broom much.”
Draco appeared out of the shower again, smelling fresh and bright. The girls glared at him, and he shrugged, grinning (Parvati noticed that he could almost grin naturally now) “Sorry girls! Guess you get yours this evening! Don’t worry Lilah, you have the invisibility cloak, and Parvati, couldn’t you just preen or something? I could run some water into the sink, and you could just splash around and have a bird bath!”
Parvati gave him a glare that had him smirking again. Lilah stood up. “Well, I am going to use the sink to splash in. And I’ll wash the coffee mugs while I am at it. Give you two a chance for some private time.” She went out, and Draco immediately moved over to Parvati, making her heart sing. She hadn’t realized quite how anxious she had been. He drew her into his arms, and held her.
“You went out last night, didn’t you?” he asked. “I thought I told you to stay put with Lilah?” Parvati bristled a little, but told him her story, glorying in his look of pride in her. Draco was forced to admit that she had been right, and he was glad she had eaten. Lilah hadn’t eaten yesterday, and it didn’t look as if she was going to be able to eat today either. Parvati shrugged.
“We’ll pretend we’re dieting,” she told him. “But I am not prepared to starve completely!” she pulled his head down to hers, feeling the quiver that ran through her whole body as his lips touched hers. Draco felt it too, and she felt his lips quirk against hers, into a gratified smirk, while his hands ran possessively down her back. He was quick though. He kept an eye on the bathroom door, and held Parvati’s hands. Parvati was fascinated to see that his face was rather red. She had never before seen Draco blush “ if she had been asked, she would have said it was impossible.
“You know this is dangerous Parvati. I am pretty sure it will work, and then I can follow you out, but if anything happens, well, I would like you to have this.” His face was red, and he was obviously finding this hard. He held out a ring. “This was my mother’s engagement ring. Oh ““ he looked horrified, his face redder than ever, as she looked up at him, shocked. “I’m not asking you to marry me! Not yet at any rate. But yes, I do love you, and even if we decide to break up, or never see each other again, I would like you to keep this ring. If we ever do get engaged, you can choose whether you would like that, or another ring. I don’t have anything else I can give you, and I would like you to have something in case “ well, in case anything happens. You mean a lot to me.”
Parvati felt a lump in her throat. The ring was so beautiful, and Draco so serious and sincere. She slipped the ring onto her middle finger, and turned it around. It was lovely, fit perfectly, and warmed her from her finger onwards. Even more wonderful was the fact Draco wanted her to have it. All her fears were put to rest. If he gave her his mother’s ring, it really meant he cared for her. She didn’t have to worry about romantic eye contact and the fact that he hadn’t kissed her in front of Lilah. She couldn’t speak at first, so she reached up to kiss him again. “It is simply beautiful Draco. Thank you.”
Lilah seemed to have been listening in the bathroom, because now she came out, giving Draco a withering glance as he sprang away from Parvati. “I have seen people kissing before, you know!” she told him. Parvati watched Draco’s face start to look sulky, and loved him the more as he stood looking awkward. She could tell it felt weird to him in front of Lilah, and she wasn’t going to push him. She smiled at Lilah instead.
“I guess Draco and I will be going, and I will meet you sometime in the afternoon.”
Lilah was going to stay while Parvati and Draco went to the Great Hall again. Parvati would then flap out some time during the afternoon, and meet Lilah, who would take her to see the griffins. After they had escaped with Snape, Draco would try and confuse the hunt that followed if at all possible. He would escape later, when the furor died down.
Parvati leant forward herself and kissed Draco again, disregarding Lilah, and then became a raven, and flapped onto his shoulder. Draco took a deep breath, feeling sick again. “Good luck!” he told Lilah. “If I don’t see you before, I will see you outside.” She pulled him into an awkward embrace, and stepped back.
“Look after yourself!” Lilah told him, and vanished into the bathroom so she would be out of sight when he opened the door. Once he had closed it behind him, she picked up the invisibility cloak and put it on. With Draco and Parvati there she had been able to hold up.
Now, she held Peter’s wedding ring, and curled up into a fetal position on the bed, a pillow clasped to her chest. All she had to endure now was the visit from the house elves. They certainly wouldn’t mind her being here in her invisibility cloak “ theirs was not to reason why, they would just assume it her own business. None of them showed any loyalty to any of the Death Eaters, she rather thought that the castle had been taken over, and its lawful occupants slain. It was difficult to force a house elf to work against its will, but Voldemort was a very skilled wizard, and would use any means to get what he wanted. Lilah could probably have asked for food perfectly safely, but she was not hungry. Perhaps Parvati would like something when she got back.