Be Careful
63: What Pieces You See
By Anne B. Walsh
Draco sipped his pumpkin juice and watched the high table out of the corner of his eye. If Professor McGonagall wasn’t using every speck of her self-control to keep herself from murdering Alecto Carrow, it was only because she had to save a little to let Amycus live.
And how she’s managed to not attack Snape all this time, after he killed Dumbledore and pulled the Head’s chair out from under her, God only knows.
Snape himself was watching the Gryffindor table, which buzzed with chatter as the news of Ron’s note traveled up and down its length. The Ravenclaws were whispering as well, and Draco had been on the receiving end of several nasty looks from the older girls. It seemed Ginny had spread the word about Luna.
Oh, so it was perfectly fine for you to call her names and steal her things, but when I come into the picture, then suddenly you care about her...
Granted, what he was supposed to have done was a couple orders of magnitude worse than petty theft or teasing, but it was the concept that mattered.
Still, the way things are running, they won’t dare try to get back at me for it. As long as I keep my wits about me, I should be fine.
Under the table, he crossed his fingers.
I hope.
After dismissing the students from the Great Hall, Severus hurried out a side door, headed for a small back staircase which would let him out one hallway over from the Slytherin dormitories.
In his own home, with forewarning of my arrival, Draco felt free to defy me. Let us see what happens here, in my territory, and when he is taken by surprise...
He pushed aside the thin stone slab which veiled the stairs and stepped around the corner, bringing the jovial conversations of the Slytherins on their way to bed to an immediate halt. Several of them gaped at him, and Severus heard whispering in two or three places farther back in the crowd.
Good to know my reputation still holds firm. Now to find—ah.
“Malfoy,” he said, crooking a finger at the boy. “Come.”
“Tell you more later,” Draco said to the girls who’d been listening intently to his story, and came forward through the crowd. “Yes, sir?”
The tone was civil enough, so Severus let the hint of irony on the honorific slide. “Follow me,” he said without any other explanation. “The rest of you should get some sleep. No doubt you are eager to be fresh for your new term tomorrow.”
Turning, he started down the hall, hearing Draco’s footsteps behind him. Not this left turn, but the next... if memory serves, there are unused guest rooms here...
The room at the end of the hall had its door ajar. Severus pushed it farther open, lit his wand, and waved Draco inside. The boy’s lips twitched as he entered. Apparently, something about the room amused him.
Let it be his downfall, then. Amusement is weakness when it comes to the mental arts.
Severus shut the door and turned to face Draco. “I will have the truth from you about Miss Lovegood,” he said, noticing with some satisfaction the flash of fear which crossed Draco’s face at the mention of the name. “And I will have it now.”
Black eyes held gray in an unbreakable gaze.
Dear Mum,
Don’t be too surprised if your special friend seems a bit stressed tonight. He tried to get the truth about Luna out of me yesterday. I fobbed him off with the abbreviated presentation of What I Did on My Holidays, and now he’s sure at least one of us is mad. You don’t have to tell me it wasn’t nice, I know that already, but it was very funny and what else was I supposed to do?
Breakfast is almost over so I’d better finish up. Everyone here sends their love. Hope to see you in Hogsmeade at the end of the month.
Draco
P.S. What are the odds of his interrogating me in the same room where we stayed that first night at Hogwarts?
P.P.S. Can you send me a couple of Audio Recording Spells? Luna’s had an idea and I think it sounds like fun.
Severus stared dourly at the empty glass in his hand. Part of him longed for the oblivion alcohol would bring, but a larger part was all too aware that by some quirk of his metabolism, he was seldom too drunk to dream.
As well, I waken more slowly when I have been drinking, meaning it would take longer to escape from a nightmare.
And nightmares I will have from those images, though they will be nightmares of confusion rather than those of fear...
Instead of reaching for the bottle once more, he drew his wand and removed the memories he had encountered within Draco’s mind, then dropped them into the Pensieve sitting on the desk and lowered his face into them. Perhaps, when he had looked them over, they would begin to make more sense.
Or perhaps they will remain as nonsensical as they are.
The first memory involved a small girl with a strong resemblance to Hermione Granger. She was of the age to be a first year, but no student Severus recognized, and she was singing a Muggle Christmas song he knew vaguely from snatches overheard on the radio.
Something about wanting only the one she loves for Christmas, nothing else. Typical sticky-sweet sentimentality.
Still, the scene seemed familiar to him, as though he had seen this, or something like it, long ago. Though it was lacking a person, someone who should have been beside him...
Severus looked askance at the empty space beside him. Perhaps I should have checked the expiration date on that bottle. Any drink which makes me hallucinate about attending concerts with Sibyll Trelawney cannot be good for me.
Shaking his head, he moved forward through the memories in order. There seemed to be a great many involving parties, and he paused over one in particular, wondering when or where Draco had caught a glimpse of Petunia Evans and the fat man who seemed likely to be her husband Vernon Dursley.
Especially in such a good mood as this memory would have them. From what I remember of Petunia and what I can assume about any man mad enough to marry her, joviality was not high on their list of desirable character traits.
Another long sequence was set in the Great Hall of Hogwarts, but the Great Hall such as Severus had never seen it. He hadn’t even been sure it would be possible to make the place watertight, but apparently it was.
A swimming party, with gillyweed provided. He stifled a laugh as the mysterious girl who had sung earlier swam up behind Draco and pulled his swimming trunks partway down. Draco yelped silently, spun in place, and stroked off after the girl, who was paddling away as fast as she could for her bubbly fit of the giggles. Mischief optional.
The scene blurred, and he was outside the castle, surrounded by witches and wizards in warm clothing. They were chanting together. “Five! Four! Three! Two! One!”
A huge, four-legged, multicolored shape plummeted from the Astronomy Tower.
“HAPPY NEW YEAR!” the crowd screamed, and spells shot from every direction at the bizarre object, which now dangled halfway down the Tower from a cord.
“What is it?” Draco, a few feet from Severus, bellowed at a girl his own age standing beside him.
“It’s called a piñata!” she shouted back. “If we can break it open—yes, there it goes now!” The creature, which Severus now recognized as a goat, exploded to massive cheers from the crowd, and a shower of tiny objects rained from it. “Come on, it’s full of sweets and we have to hurry if we want to get any!”
Severus froze the memory in place and looked sharply at the girl. He knew that voice, though usually he only heard it so excited over a new and difficult potion or an important Quidditch match.
And she is the last person in the world with whom Draco Malfoy should be willing to talk so easily. Not to mention how she likely feels about him, with their recent history.
Yet it was unmistakably Hermione Granger with her hand on Draco’s arm, tugging him towards the shower of sweets falling from the piñata.
At the risk of betraying my origins—curiouser and curiouser.
He let the memories play on, weaving in and out of casual parties and formal balls, noting in passing that there seemed to be two Luna Lovegoods in attendance at most of them.
Perhaps her mind has finally fractured under the stress of assault, and this is Draco’s way of seeing that.
A bit of a Christmas pantomime made him chuckle, as Draco, wearing a long coat and a curly black wig, shook his very realistic-looking hook skyward at the same girl from before, flying lazy circles above him. She was dressed now in puckish green, and several parts of the costume looked suspiciously stiff.
Likely padded pockets holding miniature broomsticks.
“Next time I’ll get you, Peter Pan!” Draco bellowed as the girl zoomed away over the heads of the audience, laughing.
I wonder, is this the person he secretly wishes he could be? Uninhibited, playful, friendly with those he has always made his enemies?
But whatever Draco Malfoy wished he could be, he was something completely different, Severus reminded himself firmly.
And his salvation, or lack thereof, is out of my hands.
He sent the memories shooting forward past him until he reached the moment which had thrown him out of Draco’s mind entirely and made him order the boy back to his dormitory before Draco could see how much the memory had shaken him.
Though since he is becoming frighteningly observant, likely he noticed in any case.
The memory was fogged around the edges, as though the person from whose mind it came had been overtired or under great stress at the moment. The important points, though, were quite clear.
The room was grand and spacious, of a size with those on the main floor of Malfoy Manor. A shimmering Christmas tree dominated one side of it. Sofas and chairs were drawn up around the tree, as though it would soon be the central focus of a sizable gathering. And seated on one of the sofas, robed in white and draped in blue, cradling an infant in her arms and smiling down with infinite tenderness...
Severus pulled himself free of the memory. “There will be a reckoning,” he promised himself in a low tone. “When he dares snoop even within my dreams... when he dares taunt me with her, with her face in that setting... yes. There will be a reckoning for him.”
But as he restored the memories to his mind, the last one slipped to the fore again. Without conscious intent, Severus closed his eyes and spent a few eternal moments admiring his Cecilia in a pose which would have done justice to any painter of the manger scene who had ever lived.
He did not see the portrait of Albus Dumbledore, on the wall behind him, slip out of the frame and disappear.
Draco Spellotaped shut the hand-size box he’d liberated from Zabini’s wardrobe. Judging by the mostly-empty state of the bottle of Weasley’s Wizarding Wheezes Love Potion Number Ten (“Better than a serenade!”), Zabini wasn’t about to try returning it, and would therefore have no need of the box.
Though I wish I knew what he’s doing with the potion...
Ah well. Not my business.
What was his business, at the moment, was getting the precious object currently reposing within this bright orange box safely to the people who could best use it. And unless he was greatly mistaken, the box itself would direct the owl carrying it.
Handy, when you’re trying to keep up with business at the same time you’re on the run.
He shoved the box into his schoolbag, picked up the letter to his mother which was his cover story, and left the dorm for the Owlery.
I think that little act with the Galleon did what I wanted it to, at least on Neville’s side. He’s been watching me more closely lately, and he doesn’t look as hostile as he used to. Ginny... well, she’s a Weasley, and the hair is truth in advertising. When she hates, she hates. But this might help change her mind, as long as her brothers do what I hope they will with it.
One owl got the letter, another the package, and they winged off in their different directions. Draco watched them go, until he became aware of a tugging at his robes. He looked down. “Evening, Dobby.”
“Draco Malfoy is wanted in the Headmaster’s office,” said the clothed house-elf with dignity. “Immediately.”
Draco sighed. “What’s Snape want with me now?”
“It is not Professor Snape who wants to see Draco Malfoy,” Dobby said, shaking his head. “Take Dobby’s hand, please.”
Draco reached down and closed his fingers around the house-elf’s.
Darkness squeezed its fist around him. He gasped, or would have if there had been any air.
This is Apparition—but you can’t do that at Hogwarts—
The Head’s office exploded into being around them. Draco stumbled but caught himself on the back of one of the guest chairs. “So if it’s not Snape who wants to see me, who is it?” he asked.
“It is I,” said a voice from the wall, and Professor Dumbledore walked into view in the largest picture frame. “Please, Draco, sit down. I believe we have much to discuss.”
Another day, another update... why not see if I can make it three for three? Super bonus points to anyone who gets the reference for Snape thinking Trelawney should have been there in the scene where Abby sings!