Draco let out an awful yell, which roused his fellow Slytherins from their torpor. Zabini straightened himself, managing to look contemptuous even in his sleepy state.
“Ah…is poor ickle Draco having bad dreams? Dragon under the bed?” Zabini jeered with an awful rendition of a baby voice. Crabbe and Goyle both looked nonplussed at the unexpected awakening and gawped at him openly.
If Draco had been the type for Muggle dueling, this would have been the time, but the nightmare that had awoken him was still too horribly ingrained in his mind.
“Bring them to me,” the high, cold voice commanded, sitting upon the throne-like chair Draco recognized as being the same one he had sat on dreams before.
“They’re not…they’re not here,” Draco said, his voice quavering as he cowered in the corner of the now familiar dungeon, the tiniest fraction of light provided from the lighthouse.
The voice was higher and colder than ever as it spoke. “Draco…let us play a game to submit to my will.”
“No…please…” The long white fingers wrapped around a yew wand in an almost loving manner, the Dark Lord raised his wand.
“Crucio!” Pain beyond pain attacked him, the feeling of sharpness and heat flaying every inch of his body like fire, never ceasing until he raised his wand once more to lift the curse.
Sadistic pleasure was evident in his voice as he said, “Tell Lord Voldemort why you have not succeeded in the task I have given you.”
In a strangled but sure voice, Draco heard himself say, “I am not a murderer.”
A laugh escaped the Dark Lord’s lipless mouth that could have shattered glass. Draco’s ears were ringing from that laugh. “You are not a murderer. You are quite right…you don’t have the backbone or the necessary evil to be. It is I that am the murderer, the greatest wizard of all…I am Lord Voldemort, and tonight, I will teach you why it is impertinent to disappoint me as you have done.” The Cruciatus Curse was inflicted on him once more, this time more terrible than the first time.
The pain intensified with every passing second. His skin was surely being scorched from the heat, his whole body searing as he twitched and writhed involuntarily, and his yells filling the capacious dungeon. As he throbbed on the ground shrieking in pain, he heard the gleeful cackle of the Dark Lord, and noticed that the light in the lighthouse was gone. Darkness enfolded in the dungeon, with only the Dark Lord’s pitiless red eyes visible. Death would be preferable to this almost unendurable pain…
“Shut up, Zabini,” Draco muttered, pulling the sheets off of him. He felt like the Cruciatus Curse had really been used on him, and he was only aware that his legs were twitching when he heard the noise of the thump on his bed. The twitching stopped immediately, but it felt like his heart had at the same time.
“You’ve got some problems, I’ll say,” Zabini noted importunately, his haughty eyes looking at him pitilessly in a perfect mirroring of the Dark Lord’s eyes, save for the gleaming red.
Problems…if you only knew, Draco thought sourly, a bitter taste in his mouth as he fell back against the pillow and shut his eyes.
Surreptitiously glancing around in the mostly secluded library, Hermione reached for the Marauder’s Map Harry had lent her, feeling much the way she did whenever occasions arose that required rule breaking. Draco Malfoy’s name jumped out at her in the Slytherin dormitory, where he was alone. The little dot marking his name seemed to be pacing around a certain area, and she continued to watch it. For several minutes, the little dot representing Malfoy paced around the same area. She sighed, and let the Marauder’s Map rest and returned to her work, admonishing herself for getting distracted.
It was a glorious day, and “perfect Quidditch conditions” as Harry had said. In a state of rare absentmindedness, she decided to give her work a rest and return to it later, her eyes itching from tiredness. She could do with a nap…
Theodore Nott glanced sulkily at the ever-mounting workload he had left to do. He was tempted to save his work for tomorrow, but blotted his quill with ink once more to begin his Transfiguration essay. He heard the scuffling sounds of somebody leaving---Hermione Granger had just left the library, vacating the seat that he favored when he was in the library. He gathered his belongings and moved over to his favorite armchair. Not that it was any different from the one he’d been sitting in before, but it was the position of the armchair he liked, offering him a view of all the dusty volumes of books in the library. There was something comforting about being in a library, a place of knowledge, of cold hard facts. Theodore liked facts”a lot more than people, to be truthful.
The precise wand movement to Untransfigure a recently Transfigured object is a complex motion even qualified witches and wizards have difficulty performing, he wrote. He dropped his quill and let out a heaving sigh. Sixth-year was even more laden with work than their fifth-year, which was OWL year.
He eyed his surroundings edgily, and on his right noticed an ancient piece of parchment, which had squirming black scribbles. He welcomed the distraction, intrigued as he picked it up with a thrill of excitement. With some shock, he found his own name, Theodore Nott completely stationary in a place that was labeled, The Library. He realized a few moments later that this piece of parchment was, incredibly, a map of Hogwarts. What he had taken to be squirming black scribbles were all dots with assigned names. Experimentally, he left his seat and meandered around a few shelves. His name moved along as he did, and when he returned to his seat, so did the dot.
Filch was lurking around the seventh corridor with Mrs. Norris at his heels and Peeves the poltergeist was in the trophy room, moving around absurdly fast on the map, undoubtedly trying to break something for the chaos he was famous for. Harry Potter was in the Owlery, and Theodore’s fellow Slytherins were in the Slytherin dormitory. Theodore watched the little dots that were Zabini, Crabbe, and Goyle for a minute before realizing that Draco Malfoy was not among them…what could Malfoy be doing without his bodyguards and Zabini? Trés strange.
His eyes zeroed in on the dot that was Draco Malfoy, in the girl’s bathroom? Even stranger…Theodore figured that life couldn’t get any stranger when he noticed that Malfoy was not alone…he was accompanied by Moaning Myrtle, the perpetually glum girl usually found in her own U-bend…what in God’s name was Malfoy doing with Moaning Myrtle?
He considered taking the map with him, but let it stay there. Whoever had left it behind”and he had a shrewd suspicion it was Hermione Granger”obviously had not meant to leave it behind. Most people would have simply taken it, but Theodore liked to leave his tracks clean whenever possible. He packed away his things, headed for the dormitory to ruminate on his next track, a rare but startlingly nefarious smile spreading on his face.
“No one can help me,” Draco choked out to Moaning Myrtle, the bespectacled girl who haunted the girls’ toilet. Maybe it had something to do with being around somebody who was always in despair, but some of it seemed to rub off on him as he tried to restrain the tears that threatened to fall. The truth of his predicament had never struck him so strongly as it did now in the bathroom. He leaned further down the wall, his head in his hands and Moaning Myrtle looking at him with a mixture of sympathy and coquettish longing. “He’ll kill me…and my parents,” he said incoherently, the tears escaping and falling on his lap.
“Death was”is terrible,” Moaning Myrtle mused unexpectedly after a quietude had taken place for some time. “But you get to haunt the ones who taunted you in the past…Olive Hornby was horrified when I came back as a ghost and proceeded to follow her everywhere…in the loo, when she slept, at her brother’s wedding…”
Draco tuned out, feeling unsteady from repressed angst he was sure was ready to break out from him again as he tried to restrain himself. Death…I’m only living to breathe…maybe death would be preferable to this…this hell. Of knowing I’ll fail, of knowing I’ll die at the hands of the Dark Lord…
Slightly less red-eyed and calmer, Draco returned to the Slytherin dormitory, his mind completely blank and his eyes unfocused. On his way to the dormitory, he bumped into Nott, who was grinning in a way that made him feel uneasy.
“Malfoy,” Nott said, still smiling in an eerie fashion.
“What?”
“I know,” Nott proclaimed ostentatiously.
“Know what?” Draco snapped irritably. All he wanted to do was relax a bit before dinner, and Nott, the most antisocial person in the world of all people was getting in the way.
“Your secret.”
“My secret,” Draco repeated, trying to sound superbly disdainful, but something about his expression must have given away the certainty he didn’t feel. “Is this an attempt at jesting? You really ought to perfect your delivery and your inflections.”
“Your secret,” Nott said again in mock grave tones. “How would it be if everyone accidentally…found out?” Nott put a delicate stress on ‘accidentally’ that Draco liked even less than the smile.
How, how would Nott have found out about the plan? Draco’s blood felt cold when he remembered that Nott’s father was also a Death Eater”there was the vague possibility that the Dark Lord had told Nott’s father. But what could possess him to wield that information as a weapon now?
“But nobody has to know,” Nott continued, carefully watching Draco’s face, gauging his reaction. “If you resign.”
“Resign?” Draco reiterated blankly, trying to fight his inner building panic.
“As Chaser,” Nott clarified.
Draco thought his throat had stuck itself, words unable to form for a long moment. There’s no way he can know, he thought desperately. He had no idea who the Dark Lord had told of the plan apart from Snape and the Lestranges, his most faithful Death Eaters.
“You would…you would do that to me…for Quidditch? My God, you’re pathetic. Pathetic,” Draco spat venomously, now feeling incredulous indignation at the Machiavellian depths Nott would sink to for his coveted position as Chaser. Pathetic, but also potentially incriminating for him if anyone did find out… The facade of having no secret had been abandoned.
At least I’ve still got the upper hand when it comes to verbal taunts, Draco thought wryly. Without another thought, Draco’s hand flew to his wand, which he drew threateningly against Nott’s face, a reckless sort of fury coursing through his veins.
Nott laughed. “I’ll give you a day to think about it, Malfoy.” He laughed gaily again, a laugh that left Draco’s ears positively ringing. Nott walked jauntily away with a spring in his step that infuriated him.
The man of monosyllables can string sentences after all, he thought, feeling disgruntled as he pocketed his wand, the ruby in his ring glowing incandescently bright on his finger, almost as if a warning of what was to come.