Be Careful
43: What Wish You Tell
By Anne B. Walsh
Draco had worried that Weasley might struggle on the way into the Manor, but the Polyjuiced Gryffindor couldn't seem to get the knack of walking in a girl's body, and stumbled behind Draco unresisting as Draco towed "her" down the lane towards the gates.
Should probably try to think about him as Granger. Make it less likely I'll slip. Granger, Granger, Potter's Mudblood Granger…
Draco pulled his captive close, put his right arm around hi—her—and raised his left above his head, his Mark granting him and W—Granger passage onto the grounds. Once inside, he quickly shoved her away, keeping a firm hold on the lead rope he'd conjured around her neck. "Need a shower tonight," he muttered, shuddering. "Extra soap…"
Granger's color rose, and she snarled something impolite through her gag.
Perfect. None of them know the real Granger, so none of them know she ought to be all stiff and pale and ignoring me with dignity. She'll play right into the way they expect a Muggleborn to behave. I might actually pull this off…
"Come on, then," Draco said, giving the lead rope a tug. Granger staggered forward a pace or two, glaring Killing Curses at him—her eyes are the wrong color, though, would be even without the Polyjuice—Potter could pull it off, but he's not here, not unless I made a mistake with the hairs and we're going to have a random changeover at the half-hour mark—
The thought made him chuckle, and he started for the house, dragging a furious Granger behind him. The door swung open at his approach.
Just like in rehearsals, Draco. Play it young, eager, hungry for approval.
The only person in sight turned on the stairs, startled, as Draco pulled Granger inside with him.
Perfect. Big smile, a hint of mean…
"She followed me home, Aunt Bella," Draco said, grinning at the witch. "Can I keep her?"
Narcissa Malfoy turned her head sharply as she heard a familiar voice, followed by her sister's crowing laugh, coming from the entrance hall. What is Draco doing home? He should be at Hogwarts—
"—spotted her in the woods outside Hogsmeade, and I was able to chase her down," Draco was saying as Narcissa hurried into the entrance hall. He leaned on the bottom of one of the banisters, a rope held loosely in his hand, its other end looped around the neck of a brown-haired girl with her hands tied behind her back. She was muttering into the gag covering her mouth, staring in mingled hatred and fear at Bellatrix, who was several steps up from Draco and beaming down at him.
"Was Potter with her?" Bella asked. "Any sign of him at all?"
Draco shook his head. "I'd have followed her further, tried to track him down too, but I didn't want to lose my chance at her. If he was in earshot, though, he'll have heard her screaming." He turned to flick a contemptuous look across Granger, as Narcissa realized the girl must be. "She claimed he wasn't anywhere around, but she'd have said that whether he was or not…"
"Of course." Bella began to smile, and Granger shrank back, blanching. "But we can have a few answers out of her in short order."
"Answers out of whom?" said Lucius, coming around the stairs. "Draco, why have you—ahh." The sound was one of profound satisfaction as he saw the tethered Granger. "Potter's Mudblood, I presume?"
Draco nodded, tying the rope in his hand to the end of the banister. "She practically begged me to catch her," he said, stepping away to circle Granger, who eyed him warily, as if estimating how close he'd have to be for her to kick him. "Crashing about in the trees as if she had a Leg-Locker on her. Do you think the Dark Lord will want to question her himself? Should someone call him back to tell him she's been caught?"
Lucius and Bellatrix laughed at Draco's eager tone. "All in good time, my son," Lucius said, coming around to clap Draco on the back. "I assume you have her wand?"
"It was lost while we were fighting. I didn't bother retrieving it." Draco looked worried. "Is that all right?"
"Perfectly," Lucius assured him. "So long as she no longer has it, she will be no threat to us."
Granger's eyes went to Narcissa, who nearly took a step back. The terror and desperation in that look threatened to overwhelm her, and she sensed somehow that the girl was holding herself in check by the thinnest possible thread of courage and strength.
Still, she is controlled. She is neither screaming in panic nor thrashing about hurting herself in an attempt to harm us.
Perhaps the reputation of Gryffindors is deserved after all.
"Draco," said Bella, leaning on the banister to look down at her nephew. He turned a shining face up to her, looking rather like a puppy hoping for a treat. "For such good work, I think you deserve a reward. What would you like best?"
"Not to get in trouble for being out after curfew," Draco said promptly, making his father and aunt laugh again. Even Narcissa managed a smile. Perhaps her son was indeed the young man he had seemed to her in those few days in the summer…
"Come now, think bigger than that," Bellatrix mock-scolded, shaking her finger at him. "You are the son of a pureblood house and line! The world is open to you, if you have the wit to ask for it! What do you truly desire?"
"Well…" Draco looked away, kicking at the floor with one toe. "It's sort of silly. But I guess if anyone could do it, you could."
"Tell me," Bella urged. "If it is in my power, and if the Dark Lord does not disapprove, you shall have it."
Draco nodded. "Mother." Narcissa looked up in surprise. "Do you remember when I was very young, and you took me to Gringotts, to a vault I'd never seen before?"
"To—ah, yes." Narcissa could easily see how that visit could have made a strong impression on her son. "There had been a report of an attempted robbery," she said to her sister. "I wanted to be sure your treasure was safe—the goblins reported that it was, and I have no reason to mistrust them, but there is no substitute for seeing with one's own eyes…"
"Of course not." Bella looked back at Draco. "How old were you?" she asked.
"I'm not sure. I think five, maybe?"
"Yes, five sounds right," said Lucius musingly. "Robberies at Gringotts are few and far between, and you were quite small when the last one occurred, Draco. Old enough to speak and understand, but not yet in lessons all day."
Draco inclined his head in thanks to his father, then turned back to his aunt. "I've always remembered that visit," he said, his cheeks taking on a faint tinge of pink. "And I've always wondered if the shelves of helmets and goblets and armor and things are really as tall as I remember, and if the gold is really piled so high. So what I want… it's stupid and childish, I know, and I shouldn't even ask, but…"
"Do you want to revisit my vault at Gringotts, Draco?" Bellatrix asked, laughing at the hopeful look which came over Draco's features at the words. "Never mind, I can see you do. When is your next Hogsmeade weekend?"
"It's November, 22 November—Aunt Bella, really?" Draco was quivering with suppressed excitement.
"I will speak to Severus myself."
"Promise?" Draco said, tilting his head to one side as though he were again five years old.
Bellatrix smiled. "You have the word of a Black and a Lestrange. I should make sure the new charms have taken proper effect in any case…"
Narcissa allowed herself a silent sigh of relief. For a hideous moment, she had thought Draco was about to ask for a chance to torture Hermione Granger with his own wand.
This is an odd request, perhaps, but harmless. Though how long will it be before his own ideas of fun are contaminated by what is all around him?
"Will I get to watch the Dark Lord question her?" Draco's voice broke into her musings. "Will you call him back now? Or did he not want you to call him for anything but Potter?"
"Refresh my memory," said Lucius, frowning. "Did you, or did you not, Draco, mention that… Miss Granger had screamed when you captured her?" His tone made the title an insult, which Granger returned in kind through her gag.
"At the top of her lungs." Draco winced, rubbing his left ear. "I'll have to go up to the hospital wing when I get back, get my hearing checked."
"Did she recognize you? Mention your name, perhaps?"
"Only seven or eight times," Draco drawled. "Why?"
"Yes, Lucius, why does that matter?" Narcissa asked her husband. "Why should it be important—" She broke off with a gasp as the answer came to her.
"Because, Cissy," Bella purred, "if it should happen she was lying—if Potter was there after all—if it should happen he heard who was abducting his dear little Mudblood friend…"
"He will come," Narcissa whispered in shock. "He will attempt a rescue."
"Indeed." Lucius smiled thinly. "And the Dark Lord will not fault us at all for waiting to summon him if we can present him with the boy who has so often escaped us in the past. Think of the rewards he will give us for that…"
We might survive the war. More, we might be returned to some semblance of humanity. Narcissa had to lay a hand on the wall beside her to hold herself up. My family could yet be saved, and all thanks to my son's quick wandwork and quicker mind.
Pity for Granger, for Potter, for those the Dark Lord would savage tried to worm its way into her mind, but she forced it out. She cared for her own people, her own kind, no one else. It was not safe to do otherwise.
Though I have wondered all my life what a world would be like where that was not true…
Safely in the cellars, Draco located the small opening into the side passage where the Manor-core was hidden and forced Granger through it before following.
I think it's safe to use his real name again now—I'll be going straight back to school as soon as I'm done here, and no one there will know what's happened. Good thing he's in Granger's body, though, his would never have fit through that little hole…
Leaning against the wall, Draco went into communication with the Manor. Keep sound in here with us, he told it. Don't let anyone else know we're here, much less what we say.
Weasley was watching him out of the corner of his eye, suspicion and disgust mingled about equally on his feminine features. Draco drew his wand with his right hand, feeling the confirmation of his request rippling through his left, and removed Weasley's gag. "Something you want to say?" he inquired.
Weasley treated him to two full minutes of highly unflattering description, encompassing every part of Draco's body and personal habits, then moving onto his parents and aunt. He was just about to start on the next generation up when Draco yawned ostentatiously. "You kiss Granger with that mouth?" he asked.
"Do I—no!" It was a high-pitched shriek instead of the manly shout of outrage Draco was sure Weasley had intended, but it got the point across.
"Why not?"
"Uh…"
Draco checked his watch and grimaced. "As scintillating as this conversation is, we're low on time. Listen up."
"Give me one good reason I should listen to you," Weasley snarled.
"Because I'm about to tell you where I stashed your wand and how you can find it when you get out of here."
Weasley froze with his mouth half-open. Draco kept talking. "Walk straight back from where you'll come out, about thirty paces for you right now or twenty if you're back to being yourself. It's in a tall elm tree with a cross carved at the bottom, in a hollow in the trunk about ten feet up. You can probably reach it from the ground in your own body, but if you get there before the Polyjuice wears off—you've got about half an hour, by the way—Granger's a tree-climber." He grinned. "I've seen her at it."
This piece of information rocked Weasley back on his heels, into the stone wall behind him. Draco let his grin widen a bit and went on. "There's a price on your freedom, but you'll understand that when you get where I'm supposed to be taking you. Which should be right now. So come on, and whatever you do, don't shout."
Weasley was silent all the way down the hall to the door of the particular cellar that had been made escape-proof (at least, for those unlucky enough not to have a Malfoy on their side). His face, or rather Granger's, was frozen in a look of blank incomprehension. It was an unusual expression to see on those features.
I doubt there's anything in the world Granger couldn't understand if she tried hard enough.
Whereas I'm probably going to throw Weasley completely with this.
"Have a nice escape," he whispered through brown hair, cutting the ropes off Weasley's wrists and opening the door with his wand. "And tell Potter his sister's a Slytherin."
A quick shove, a slam, and the thing was done.
Well, nearly done. I still need to arrange for them to actually escape…
Draco turned and went back up the hall. He'd do this from the actual Manor-core itself, to make it easier on himself.
I dug the tunnel down to our boundaries by hand, or rather by wand, before Weasley woke up. Now I just have to open the wall of the cellar and make a matching tunnel through our grounds to meet up with that one.
Hermione really is a genius—imagine thinking to check if the wards on the Manor's boundaries go below the ground or not. And I'm lucky that they don't. If they did, I'd have to be physically present where I wanted them to drop and no two ways about it. But since they stop a bit below ground level, as long as I keep my escapees nice and deep all the way to the tunnel, I shouldn't have a problem…
He knew there were charms laid on the grounds to keep exactly this from happening, but the overall magic of Malfoy Manor itself superseded any additional spells laid on top of it. The boundary wards, being in place so long, had become part of that magic. The anti-tunneling spells had not.
I always knew it was good to be me. I just never knew exactly how good it was.
Baring his teeth in a savage predator's grin, Draco slid through the camouflaged opening once more and vanished from sight.