Chapter 17- The Life and Times of Draco Malfoy (Complete but unedited)

“If you’re done gawking, boy, you can tell me what happened to Lucius?” I stared at the portrait of the man who had to be my ancestor and tried to come up with a reply. Maybe it was a bit reckless of me, but I didn’t feel like lying right now. I’d had enough of that. Perhaps I just wanted to be able to say it out loud.

“I killed him. Used him in a ritual and devoured his essence,” I said and felt something in me begin to breathe easier. I was right. Saying it out loud was a relief. My ancestor only stared at me with an inscrutable look and I patiently waited for his reply.

“Interesting. I haven’t heard of that ritual in quite a while. Even in my time, that thing was archaic. Very powerful though” He said while rubbing his chin in a motion that told me he was much more accustomed to having a beard.

“Not going to be offended or anything?” I asked with a small amount of surprise.

“Of course not. Lucius was nothing to me. A coward who stopped coming in here when I took offence to his subservience to that dark lord of his” He said while giving me a look of warning.

“I trust you aren’t also in service to that waste of magic” He added threateningly.

“No. No, I’m not” I assured him hurriedly. I hadn’t even known the man for ten minutes and I was already beginning to fear his disapproval.

“He’s even the reason I’m here. I’m packing up my things to prepare to move to a different home so he can’t find me” I continued in explanation.

“A different home? What of the wards?” He asked with narrowed eyes.

“No wards will keep that man out. He has power beyond power. A mastery of the darker arts that goes beyond anything the world has seen in the past centuries” I tried to do my best to convey the kind of terrifying opponent that Voldemort was.

“That matters not” He said

“And why is that?”

“The wards of the manor are impenetrable” I rolled my eyes as he said that. Of course, this was a Malfoy. The arrogance had to be expected.

“I jest not. The manor has two sets of wards. The first set is most likely the one you are more familiar with. Behind that, though, lies a second set. Empowered with the sacrifice of 300 muggle virgins and the Malfoy Matriarch of the time. Those wards shall not be assailed by any dark lord, no matter how powerful. The protection of the family is of foremost importance, after all.” He said with a look of pride on his face. His amusement as he spoke of the 300 virgins told me all I needed to know of his personal politics.

“I see. Still, is it not safer to stay somewhere I know will not be attacked than to depend on wards that might still be breached?” I asked him, still not completely sold on the idea of staying here and essentially daring Voldemort to try his best.

“And how did you come across this other property? The family owned few other properties in my day” He changed the topic and I chose to humour him,

“The goblins provided a list of the Malfoy family assets they were aware of. The home I speak of is one of them.”

“And you trust goblins of all creatures? You must be less intelligent than even your father was. To trust creatures solely motivated by their greed is to dance with a snake and hope it chooses not to bite”

I had to concede his point there. The goblins had bowed to Voldemort in canon. I had little doubts that they’d provide Voldemort with the exact same list they gave me if he so much as asked. Apart from that risk, I must confess a general reluctance to abandon the manor. If I could avoid it, then that’s what I would do.

“Tell me how to activate the second set of wards” I asked after a few seconds of silence. It felt like looking into a mirror as he smiled my smug smile and pointed at an empty stretch of wall. I walked towards it and passed through like it was water.

On the alter of the obvious ritual chamber was a red ward stone. Activating wards was easy. Much easier than setting them up at least. I waved my wand at the ritual knife in front of me, sanitizing and summoning it with the same movement.

I walked towards the stone and cut my hand with a quick movement and allowed the blood pour on the stone. It drank my blood greedily, turning from a darker red to a brighter, warmer red.

When I sensed that it had its fill and I felt the wards around the castle change in intensity and form. Before, they were a small curtain that covered the grounds, but now they felt like an oppressive weight covering the entire manor. It was impressive. Some part of me was even beginning to believe Armand’s assertion that Voldemort wouldn’t be able to break these.

Not without doing things that gave him no chance of hiding his return, at least. I returned to the study and turned to my still-smiling ancestor. “So… You’ve been here for how long again?” I asked in interest.

“I have lived in this study as a portrait for close to six centuries now. For almost as long as this manor has stood, in fact” He said with audible pride in his voice.

“Tell me everything” I demanded with a smile.

XXXXXXX

The Boy-Who-Lived

“Dumbledore, surely you don’t mean for the boy to be included in all the meetings. He’s not even of-age yet.” That was Mrs Weasley. You could always tell from the shrill voice and the completely unnecessary screaming.

“Harry has survived more than everyone in this room, including myself could claim. He was the one to give us confirmation of Voldemort’s return. After all that has happened, I feel that he deserves to know what is going on, at least.” Good ol’ Dumbledore. Defending me to the end.

I was sat in the Grimmuald place hallway as the adults discussed whether I was to be allowed to join in on their meetings. The entire discussion seemed unnecessary to me. I had no childhood to be preserved. I hadn’t been a child since Quirrel in first year, and even if there was any childhood left in me, then knowledge of the prophecy stole it from me.

I knew more about Voldemort than anyone else did, maybe even Dumbledore. I had some of his memories, after all. I was destined to kill him one day. Keeping me out of the loop was the height of irrationality. There was no good reason for it. None I could see, at least.

Maybe when the horcrux had still lived in my head, but Riddle had seen to that. I heard myself chuckle and then began to laugh hysterically. I could only imagine Riddle’s face when he got the news that I’d survived that night. Crabbe Senior had gone so pale I’d wondered if he’d joined his bestie on the other side when I walked into the funeral.

Speaking of Lucius Malfoy, I wasn’t clear on how to feel about his death. On the one hand, he was there at the graveyard and had tried to kill Ginny and me in second year. On the other, Dumbledore thought Voldemort himself killed him. As much as I hated Draco, I empathized with him. Losing a parent to the dark wanker couldn’t be easy.

Look at me being nice and everything. Dumbledore would be so proud if he could hear my thoughts right now. I guess it helped that he’d stopped being an asshole last year. He seemed to have moved past it.

Speaking of moving past things, the entire argument had gotten stale and everyone kept saying the same things over and over again. I turned to the door with a look of concentration, and waved my wand, opening it with a silent alohamora. Silent casting. Had to thank memory-Riddle for that one.

“Mrs Weasley, thank you for your concern, but I haven’t been a child for years. Voldemort…” I was interrupted by Doge dropping the glass he’d been holding as several members of the order cringed at hearing the name. The order of the phoenix. A fucking joke.

“Voldemort will never leave me alone. He’s tried twice now, won’t it be better for me to know what he’s up to and how you’re planning to oppose him than for me to be walking around blind?” I waived off Mrs Weasley’s halfhearted arguments and guided her to her seat before taking one for myself.

The rest of the order looked at me in shock. I guess calming down a rampaging Molly Weasley was an achievement of some sort. Dumbledore was the only one who didn’t look impressed. To be completely honest, he looked a bit suspicious.

Even after all his tests to make sure it was Harry and not Riddle in control, I got the feeling he still didn’t trust me. Not completely, at least.

“Now, after that bit of entertainment, can we get back on topic?” Remus asked with a tired smile on his face. The full moon was getting closer.

“Yes, Yes. The first step on our agenda is to solve our information problem. With Severus lost to us, there’s no way for us to get a comprehensive look at what Tom is up to, or even what his resources look like” Dumbledore started things off, and I tried not to smile as I imagined the fate of the asshole of a potions teacher.

The man had terrorized my life for the past few years. Was it so bad that I felt no sympathy for him? Dumbledore wouldn’t see things my way though, so I did my best to adopt an appropriately solemn expression.

“What do you suggest Albus? Should we get a new spy?” Doge asked with an expression that looked like hero-worship to me as he addressed Dumbleodore. Sometimes it was tough to imagine that both men were the same age with how Doge looked to be a full decade older than the ancient headmaster.

Power had many benefits indeed. I turned to look at the rest of the order considering Doge’s words.

“There’s no way to get a new spy without a truly extra-ordinary amount of luck. I could trust Severus with my life, but I would be loathed to do the same with any other sworn to Tom. Unfortunately, we will have to make do without an inside look, but that doesn’t mean we have to be completely blind to their movements.”

“What do you suggest Albus?” Mcgonangall asked with a frown on her wrinkled face. She looked to have aged a few decades in the past month. The attack on the yule ball had hurt her keenly. I guess being held under the cruciatus would do that to you. She’d also lost one of her favourite students so that was another thing weighing on her.

Hermione. Once again my thoughts returned to my fallen friend. Dumbledore thought tbhe pain I felt for her loss was a sign that I remained me and not Voldemort. I wonder how he’d feel if he knew that the pain grew more distant with everyday that passed. In the beginning, it had felt like she’d taken a piece of my heart with her. An absence that hurt more than anything else. A gaping chasm in the middle of my chest.

Now, it felt like the dull phantom pain of a missing limb. Sometimes, I looked to my side to ask a question and whenever I noticed she wasn’t there, I ached for her presence. I wanted her to hit my shoulder and tell me how stupid I was. I wanted her to sigh out my name with exasperation when I said something stupid. I wanted so many things, and I would be getting none of them. It took her death for me to realise that I loved her. Not just as a friend or a sister, but as something more. I was in love with Hermione Granger and I’d never even get to tell her.

My thoughts lingered on her throughout the meeting. I paid no attention to the discussions on using potion smugglers and continental wand shops to monitor the growth of Voldemort’s forces, or even using inside agents within Gringotts to monitor death eater accounts. I cared little for it all. The moment the meeting ended, I swept out of the room and made my way to the Black’s duelling room.

The first spell I used was one I didn’t even consciously know. The same was true of both the second and third spells. After a minute or so, I finally calmed down enough for the fugue state to disappear, and I began consciously trying to replicate the spells. I had to be stronger. It didn’t matter whether the spells I was learning came from Riddle. All that mattered was that what happened to Hermione would never happen again. I would not allow it.

XXXXXX- The Head of The Department Of Magical Law Enforcement

Another day, another bit of madness from our dear minister for magic. At this point, I was constantly fighting the temptation to tender my resignation and take dear Susan out of the country. The Bones family was once a great bloodline, rivalling the best that Britain had to offer, and now there were just the two of us. I swore to myself that Susan would not be the last Bones, and now, War was coming to the British isles once more.

“What exactly do you want me to do, Minister?” Fudge was becoming more and more unreasonable as the days passed. At this point, he was a laughing stock among the other departmental heads. Seeing shadows where there were none.

“Arrest him” He said as he sipped his tea like it was the most logical thing in the world. He spoke of arresting the most powerful wizard to grace Britain since Merlin himself like I could simply wave my wand and make the world bend to my will. He spoke like we weren’t bound by any laws or regulation, and that’s what had the alarm bells in my head ringing. I’d served under one Bartemius Crouch. I would not be serving under another.

“We can’t just arrest Dumbledore, Minister. There is due process to follow.” I tried to play the reasonable person here. To control my desire to lash out and call the man a psychotic unstable idiot.

“Bollocks the process” He screamed suddenly and I tried not to rear back in shock. THis was extremely odd for the minister. Fudge was the consummate politician. At this time, one would expect him to be clinging even closer to the headmaster. After all, there was no one the people of England turned to when war loomed close than Dumbledore himself. Even if he was going a bit crazy by calling Voldemort responsible for the whole thing, he could still be effective in preventing the other nations from actually declaring war on us as Fudge kept taunting them to.

“He spreads lies. He spews his poison to all who will listen. A vital time like this, and all he speaks of is the return of a dead man. Was it not he who proclaimed Voldemort dead all those years ago? He wants to be minister, I tell you.” He paused for more tea and seemed to be thinking things through. Maybe he’d see how insane this all sounded.

“You’re in on it too, aren’t you” Nope. I was wrong. He was coming up with more foolishness. The amusement on my face must not have been what he wanted to see because his face took on a red hue and he stood from his seat with a snarl.

“I won’t let you. You and Dumbledore. You think you’d do my job better than me. You think I don’t know what I’m doing? You think I’m an idiot” He screamed and moved to draw his wand before I swiftly knocked him unconscious with a flick of my wand.

Good fucking news. Whole world’s going to shit and our minister is fucking insane. I slumped in my seat to rest for a bit before I took my leave. No need to be seen leaving earlier than usual asnd raise some suspicions. I’d need to be out of the country by tonight. Were Fudge a more reasonable minister, then stunning him would be brushed under the rug as a moment of intense stress, but this man was a steam pot of aggression and paranoia.

I got up and prepared to leave when I noticed a weird smell. It took me a few seconds to trace it to the tea. A wave of my wand confirmed the tea to be magical in some way. A potion, I suspect. What could I do about it though? Was there even anything that could be done about it? An investigation, maybe? It was my duty to investigate.

Leaving the country was the only plan I had, and investigating this would throw that out the window. It put Susan in unprecedented risk, The family of a minister for Magic was always a tempting target. Could I knowingly do that to her? Were my oaths worth the inevitable threat to Susan’s health? Was my duty?

XXXXXX- The Spy

“Snape, another batch of burn healing paste, and make it snappy” The voice called out from outside the cell with its annoyingly youthful timber. I was willing to bet all I had, a fat good of nothing, that it was one of my former students.

This is what I’d become now. Locked in a dungeon in a place I did not know, wand taken from me, and my mind viciously battered by the Dark Lord on a daily basis. He’d become paranoid after the Potter boy’s body disappeared, and had insisted on seeing my mind. I’d thought it nothing but a routine scan, but this time, he went deeper than he ever had before. All the pride I’d previously taken in my occlumency was for naught. My shields, my layers of deception all fell apart before the dark lord, and he saw all.

A few minutes under the cruciatus was a pleasure compared to the pain he visited on me that night. A week later and I found myself here. In this dungeon where the most human contact I got was with the boy outside who came in with potions ingredients and instructions on what to make. I’d have come up with a means of escape already, but the dark lord made visits every week to ensure I wasn’t up to anything. He broke through what occlumency I managed to build and discovered all my plans one by one.

At this point, there was nothing more to do but wait and cling to life with hope. I’d fix things eventually. Believe in me, Lily.

A/N; I don’t think returning to Draco’s POV feels right after all this, so I’ll just end the chapter here. How’s it looking?