The Wishbox [Draco-centric, PG-13] Part ii
Title: The Wishbox
Author:
mizbean
Character(s)/Pairing(s): Draco/Pansy, Draco/Blaise, and shades of future of Harry/Draco because I'm a shipper, but mostly Draco-centric.
Rating: PG-13
Wordcount: 11,000
Summary: If you could have anything in world, what would you wish for?
Author's Notes: My
ownficfest submission. Written for
catsintheattic. Thank you to
kennahijja for giving me the opportunity to write this story.
Part i
[ YOUR WISHBOX WON'T HELP YOU IF YOU THINK YOU'RE GAY. ]
"God, Quidditch is dull." Zabini rolled his eyes as they exited the Malfoy family box. Ireland's victory over Bulgaria had turned the crowd of World Cup revelers into a sea of green. A drunken sea of green.
Draco moved quickly to sidestep a puddle of vomit. "Then why are you here?" he snapped, irritated less from the present company than Bulgaria's surprising loss. Zabini had somehow ceased to be irritating earlier in the summer, right around the time he had shown up on the Malfoy family doorstep in search of a distraction from his latest stepfather's passing. Now Draco just found him bewildering.
Zabini shrugged, looking sideways at Draco, his gaze sending color to Draco's cheeks.
Draco thought it might be Zabini's height, but he just seemed older. And more experienced. Draco changed the subject. "I wonder where my dad went off to."
His father had disappeared before the game ended, taking along Goyle senior. Others had gone too, and Draco felt put out that he didn't get asked along.
"Who cares," replied Zabini, halting. He was eyeing the revelers with obvious distaste. The mood of the campsite had turned rowdier. Firecrackers were shooting off from all directions, many were singing, and Draco thought he heard someone scream.
"Let's go somewhere," Zabini said, tugging on the sleeve of Draco's robes. "Yeah?" He had moved closer, his hand brushing Draco's shoulder.
That relatively simple request took a hell of a long time for Draco to compute, and he realized he was standing slack-jawed when he heard Zabini start to laugh. Draco's ears were burning when he muttered, "What?" -- even though he heard it quite right the first time.
Zabini merely laughed again, which in itself was a rare thing, but Draco thought his teeth looked unusually bright under the night's sky. That Pansy had chosen that moment to burst onto the scene caused Draco no shortage of relief.
Draco wrapped his fingers around Pansy's elbow, leading her away. "Funny. Absolutely hilarious," he muttered, so very pleased that no one could see the color of his cheeks.
~ * ~
Pansy's lips tasted wet and vaguely like sticky pudding. It was after dinner -- after he had spent his meal squeezed next to Viktor Krum and barely eating -- that he had accosted her just down the stairs from the Great Hall.
She didn't look at all displeased with Draco's sudden change in interest in her, a blond curl twirled around her finger. "So we'll be going to Hogsmeade, then?"
Draco blinked. "Sure." But haven't they always gone to Hogsmeade together?
Draco didn't grasp what Pansy had meant until she grabbed him by the hand. He stared at it as she led him toward the common room door. "First you have to take me to The Three Broomsticks, and then Honeydukes…"
~ * ~
Pansy twirled around, her pink dress robes fluttering in her wake. "Well, what do you think?"
She was wearing lipstick a shade too red to be flattering, her blond curls piled and lacquered high atop her head. Draco was all too aware that Zabini was standing behind him, watching them both when he replied, "You look nice."
Pansy's eyebrows twitched, and Draco tried desperately to recall the types of compliments his father always paid to his mother. "Lovely. You look lovely."
"Really?" Pansy's face split into a wide smile.
~ * ~
The Great Hall was transformed into a wonderland of ice and snow. Couples were swaying to the music, breaking apart whenever McGonagall and Snape's watchful eyes turned in their direction, and outside, Draco found himself pressed against a cold castle wall.
"What're you doing?" he managed to gasp, holding his hands up too late to stop Zabini's forward trajectory.
"Took you long enough," was Zabini's gruff reply.
Somewhere inside Pansy was still waiting near the punch bowl while her boyfriend was being kissed like the world might end tomorrow. If that may seem like an exaggeration, it was only because Draco was woefully inexperienced in that regard, a few hasty kisses with Pansy aside. Finally, they broke apart, Draco still clutching the wool collar of Zabini's coat. "What-" he gasped, heart thudding in his chest, "was that for?"
Zabini smirked, still a half a head taller. "Had a hunch."
Draco's mouth went dry, his hands dropping to his sides. "What that supposed to be a joke?"
Zabini grinned, fingering the collar of Draco's shirt. "What do you think?"
Draco thought that he hated it when someone answered a question with another question. It was so very Slytherin. He leaned forward, wanting to kiss Zabini some more when Zabini abruptly backed away.
Draco soon saw why. Pansy was standing a few steps away. He wondered how much she had seen.
"Where have you been?" she cried, fists balled at her sides as Zabini muttered an apology and made a hasty retreat.
Draco was caught between chasing after Zabini and trying to placate Pansy. He decided to do neither. "Nowhere," he retorted harshly, walking off in the other direction, ignoring Pansy's tears.
Besides, Draco felt rather like crying himself.
[ YOUR WISHBOX WILL NOT DO YOUR HOMEWORK. ]
"Mister Malfoy."
Draco looked up and shrank under the weight of Snape's glare. "Yes, Professor?"
"You do know what a three-foot-long essay looks like?" Snape held up a roll of parchment, Draco's homework, for the entire class to see.
There was a titter of laughter from the Gryffindor side of the classroom. Draco scowled darkly before replying, "Yes."
"Then can you explain to me why even Weasley managed to write more about the medicinal properties of bubotubor spores than you?"
Draco shifted in his seat, the Inquisitor Squad badge pinned to his robes catching in the light. "No."
"I expect better of you," Snape said, low as he walked past.
[ YOU SHOULD NOT USE YOUR WISHBOX TO WOE YOUR GIRLFRIEND. ]
"You're hurt."
Draco was letting Pansy attend to his wounds, her handkerchief carefully blotting the blood on his face. He attempted a smile, which hurt like hell. "You should see the other guy."
"Really?" Pansy's eyes lit up.
Merlin, she was so easy. Draco sometimes felt guilty.
Millicent Bulstrode burst into the common room. Like Draco she was still dressed in her Slytherin Quidditch uniform. "Potter's suspended. Umbridge did the deed in McGonagall's office five minutes ago."
"See?" Draco said to Pansy.
She looked like she might combust with glee. "Oh, Draco."
Alone, in the opposite corner, Zabini rolled his eyes.
[ YOU MUST NOT USE YOUR WISHBOX FOR REVENGE. ]
"You're dead, Potter."
It wasn't just that Draco was angry. He felt like his whole world was crashing down around him. He had spent the last two days in a daze, and he had begged his mother via Floo to let him come home, but she had refused.
It was just by luck that he had found Potter alone in the Entrance Hall, unprotected.
"You're going to pay," Draco warned, his voice low. "I'm going to make you pay for what you've done to my father."
"Well, I'm terrified now," Potter replied, sarcastic.
Draco thought he ought to be.
~*~
The wishbox was back where it belonged, on Draco's bedside table. Draco sat on the edge of his bed, a gentle breeze blowing in through his open window, ruffling his hair.
It was after midnight, the sprawling Manor empty except for his mother locked behind her bedroom door. Draco never hated being alone more.
He picked up a square of parchment and contemplated it, unsure how to articulate what he wanted into simple words.
He wanted to make things right again, so his mother would stop crying. He wanted to be a man just like his father. But most of all, he was sick of feeling so powerless and so very young.
But grown men don't play with toys, a voice chided inside his head as he slipped his wish into the box. He recited the spell and lay down atop his bed to wait.
He didn't have to wait for long. The light in his room was dim -- there were only a few candles burning -- but his presence was as unmistakable as the two red eyes glowing at the foot of Draco's bed.
Draco scrambled off the bed and knelt down, one knee touching the ground. "My Lord."
A hand, dry and cold, touched Draco's cheek where it lingered, brushing away the tears that were falling from Draco's eyes.
"You wish to serve?"
Draco nodded, and realizing he should speak, he blurted, "I'll do anything. Anything to get my father back."
"Of course."
Draco looked up at the Dark Lord's face, relief flooding though him. It was more than he could have possibly have wished for. "You will help me get my father out of Azkaban?"
"Of course, he is of great value to me." Voldemort's hand lifted Draco's chin. "As are you, Draco. You are my future."
"I'm-I'm honored." Draco would have thought he'd be terrified, but he wasn't. He wanted this more than anything.
Draco pulled up the sleeve of his shirt and held out his arm. He didn't flinch when Voldemort pressed his wand to it.
~*~
Draco's mother wasn't so calm. "No. I won't let this happen." Frantic, she grabbed Draco by the shoulders, pulling him to her, the fabric of his robes bunched in her fists. "Your father did not want this."
His mother was a tall woman in her own right; nevertheless Draco was now taller, and he easily pushed her away. She let out a wail and crumpled to the floor in a heap, her long hair hanging like a curtain around her face. "You're wrong. Father believed in me," he told her.
"Cissy, you're embarrassing yourself," said Bellatrix, watching. She looked darkly amused by her sister's breakdown. "You knew this day would come."
It might have been the sanest thing Bellatrix ever said, and her words appeared to give Narcissa some resolve. She looked up at her son. "What is he making you do?"
Draco adjusted the sleeve of his shirt, the skin of his forearm still tender and raw. "Nothing I can't handle."
[ SOMETIMES A WISHBOX CAN WORK IN MYSTERIOUS WAYS. ]
He was handling it.
"You're not suiting up?"
The disappointment in Pansy's voice was obvious. The Slytherin team was short one player already. He already got an earful from Theodore Nott. It's not like he needed to hear it from her too.
"I'm not feeling well," he snapped back. He was sitting on top his bed, staring at the opposite wall. The dormitory was otherwise empty, the game due to start in a half hour.
"Really?" It was apparent that she didn't believe him.
"Really," he retorted icily. He rolled his eyes, and that was when he noticed for the first time Pansy had an old Potter Stinks badge pinned to her Slytherin scarf. For some reason, he found that darkly amusing.
"What?" said Pansy when he began to laugh.
"Nothing," he said, shaking his head to clear his thoughts. He got to his feet, and laying both hands on her shoulders, he urged her around so that she was facing the dormitory door. "Pansy, go to the game."
"But - If you let me help-"
"I'm fine," said Draco, cutting her off.
~*~
He was handling it.
"Where are you going?" Zabini's voice was low. The corridor was empty, but it still was after curfew.
Draco ignored him and kept walking.
Zabini finally caught up to him on the landing between the fifth and six floors, accosting him next to a painting of a young woman. She shrieked and covered her eyes.
For a blissful moment Draco allowed himself to be ravaged, Zabini's hand roaming freely down the front of his robes, but reality insisted. Draco had a task. He could not afford to waste time.
He steeled himself and sent Zabini stumbling backwards. "Don't touch me," he snarled.
Zabini recovered his footing easily. "Give it up. Everyone knows you're a poof."
Draco thought that was hardly the point. He turned toward the stairs, going up, but Zabini stopped him again, this time grabbing him by the arm.
Draco glared down at him. "If you don't get your fucking hand off me, I'll hex your dick off." Draco meant it and Zabini wisely dropped his hand.
"Pansy finally figured out how to spread her legs, huh?"
Draco knew Zabini was only trying to get a rise out of him, but he didn't have the energy to do anything about it. "Just leave her out of it." He turned to go again.
"Right," Zabini called after him. "You look like shit. You know that?"
Draco snorted, stopping halfway up the stairs. "I'm touched you care."
"Pansy's at her wit's end."
"And I told you to leave her out of it."
"Fine," snapped Zabini, looking anything but. Draco knew Zabini avoided violent contact as a rule, but he looked very much like he wanted to slug Draco, his fists clenched at his sides.
Draco was at once grateful for the space that was between them. "Go back to bed," he called.
"You're an idiot," Zabini retorted.
Draco rolled his eyes. "Like I said. I'm touched you care."
Zabini said nothing more. They were both Slytherins. There was no need to get maudlin. And besides, Draco knew Zabini wasn't an idiot. He wouldn't get in the way.
"Go away. I can handle it," Draco said.
~*~
The bathroom door burst open, hitting the wall with a bang, and inside Draco sank down onto the cold tile floor.
He wasn't handling it.
The sobs came easier now. It might have been after he nearly killed Weasley that Draco stopped feeling ashamed of his tears, but Draco tried not to dwell on that for very long.
A soft sound above him told Draco he was not alone, and for once he was grateful for the intrusion.
"Don't," he heard someone say, and he looked up to see a ghost floating down beside him. She stared at him through a pair of thick glass lenses. "Don't cry."
Draco snorted. "Who're you?"
"Myrtle."
Myrtle was ugly, had the sort of drab hair that would have given Pansy fits and wore thick, Potter-esque glasses. She looked like no one he'd ever associate with in real life. Her voice grated. She was a ghost.
But he told her everything: his impossible task, the anguish he caused his mother, the isolation he felt from his friends, his feelings of failure. The words spilled from his mouth, and when he had finally finished the ghostly girl sniffled, her own eyes brimming with tears.
"Will you come visit me again?"
Draco knew he had no business making promises to anyone.
"Okay," he said.
[ A WISHBOX CAN SOMETIMES MALFUNCTION. THE MANUFACTURER BEARS NO RESPONSIBILITY SHOULD THIS OCCUR, AS THIS CAN SIMPLY BE CONSTRUED AS BAD LUCK. OUR APOLOGIES. ]
Red eyes haunted his dreams.
Terrified, Draco slipped out of his dormitory and padded through the sleeping castle.
"Why am I doing wrong?"
It was a simple question, plainly asked, but the vanishing cabinet provided no answers. It merely stood there, broken and dusty, in the Great Room of Hidden Things.
"FUCK!" Draco screamed, and after taking several gulping breaths of air, he tried again, quieter, "Why am I doing wrong? Why won't you work? Why? Why? I've tried everything--"
He was shouting again. Draco wiped the tears from his eyes and began to laugh. All else had failed; he supposed trying to reason with a bloody piece of furniture was the best he could do.
~*~
He was being watched.
Potter was about as stealthy as an overgrown sheepdog. Draco had known Potter had been trailing him for weeks now.
What puzzled Draco was why he didn't actually mind.
"Would you save me, Potter?" Draco asked during one of his madder moments, delirious from lack of sleep, the Dark Mark on his arm turned red and raw. "Like you save everyone else. Would you?"
Once again, the vanishing cabinet didn't answer.
~*~
Draco's whole body was shaking. "I can't do it. ... I can't. ... It won't work… and unless I do it soon ... he says he'll kill me."
He looked up and saw his tear-streaked face in the cracked mirror. And then another face appeared behind him, colored white with shock.
Draco spun around.
~*~
Draco barely remembered being carried into the infirmary, Snape's frantic instructions to Madam Pomphrey were but a whisper in Draco's ears, but the hate Draco saw in Potter's eyes he could recall vividly, and days later when he was well enough to go back to his dormitory, Draco took a detour instead.
He stood before the vanishing cabinet newly resolute. "This time you're going to work."
[ A WISHBOX MAY NOT GRANT THE IMPOSSIBLE. ]
Draco couldn't stop shaking.
"Well, then, you must get on and do it, my dear boy," Dumbledore said to him even as his body was slumping lower against the ramparts of the tower.
Then, bizarrely, the old man began to smile.
"Draco, you are not a killer."
"How do you know?" Draco cried.
[ A WISHBOX MAY CARRY YOU HOME. ]
Draco was being crushed into his mother's chest. He couldn't breathe.
"Well? Did he do it?" It was Bellatrix, sounding frantic.
"Hush, Bella." If possible, Narcissa's grip on Draco tightened. "Severus?"
Sounding out of breath, Draco heard Snape respond, "It is done."
Narcissa's relief was palpable, and she finally loosened her hold. "Thank you, Severus." She drew back, both hands clutching the sides of Draco face, and looked him over.
He could see how worried she must have been, her eyes red rimmed, her forehead lined. Guilt weighted on Draco's shoulders. "I--I'm sorry."
"No." Narcissa shook her head. "You're safe. You're home safe."
[ A WISHBOX WILL NOT TURN YOU INTO SOMETHING YOU ARE NOT. ]
Draco could barely see the outline of the old man in the gloom of the dungeon room. "Get up," he barked. He pointed his wand.
The man, Draco remembered meeting under happier circumstances as a boy shopping for his wand, shifted where he was lying on the floor, but did not rise. "Young man -" Ollivander started to say.
"Shut up," Draco shouted back, his wand shaking. "Get off the floor."
"But surely you understand that I'm too weak to stand." The man's voice was reasonable, which sounded all the more maddening to Draco's ears.
Draco wiped the sweat from his forehead, starting to feel ill. "Don't make me hurt you," he warned.
"But you mean to hurt me. That's why you're here."
He, of course, was right. Draco's mouth filled with the taste of his own vomit. He had no stomach for this sort of thing, and he knew all too well what happened to spineless Death Eaters who couldn't do their duty.
"Do you remember when you came into my shop to buy your wand?" Ollivander asked, after waiting patiently for Draco to compose himself and clean the sick off his shoes.
"Of course. Why wouldn't I?" Attuned to the dark now, Draco could make out the features of Ollivander's face, the old man's silvery eyes glassy as they stared back at Draco.
"I remember as well. Hawthorn and unicorn hair." The wandmaker turned his head to face the opposite wall. "I thought then that you might have taken another path."
"What?" rasped Draco. "What's that supposed to mean?"
Ollivander didn't answer, and Draco steadied the grip on his wand.
"It doesn't matter. I have no choice." Clenching his eyes shut, he aimed his wand. "Crucio."
~*~
"Are you all right?"
"What?" Draco said, staring into Looney Lovegood's wide saucer eyes. He had a tray of food in his hands, dinner for Malfoy Manor's newest prisoner. He shoved it into her hands. "I'm fine."
"If you mean to torture me, it's all right. I'll try not to cry."
Draco blanched. "I'm not-- I mean I don't--" He stopped himself before he could say anything more.
Lovegood was still wearing her Ravenclaw uniform from when she was snatched off the train, the skirt torn at the hem. "But it would be better if you let me go."
"I can't do that," Draco snapped back.
"No. I didn't expect you to."
He had to ask, "What about Potter? Is he going to save you now?"
"No. I expect he has more important things to do." Lovegood didn't appear to be overly bothered by this, however. "Don't worry. I'll be all right. Mr. Ollivander has been lovely company." She indicated the frail man pitifully moaning on the floor behind her.
Draco frowned. "I'm not worried."
[ ALL SALES ARE FINAL. MANAGEMENT REGRETS ANY INCONVENIENCE THAT MIGHT CAUSE. ]
"And ze problem ees?" asked Monsieur Petit in heavily accented English. He looked perplexed as Draco set the wishbox down on the counter of Petit's shop.
"Ze problem is that the wishbox is broken," Draco snapped back. "Fix it."
The shopkeeper made a face and picked the wishbox off the counter to give it closer inspection, Draco watching impatiently. It had taken a considerable amount of effort and risk for him to travel to Paris, but he was desperate. International Floo travel was expensive, not that he didn't have funds, but there was also the matter of buying the border agents' silence and arranging for Crabbe and Goyle to cover for him back at school. He didn't wish to think what would happen if word got back to Headmaster Snape or the Dark Lord that he had left the country. He would lucky to live to see the end of the day.
"And why do you think ze box ess broken?" Monsieur Petit asked, still inspecting the box. He poked at it with his wand and frowned.
Draco's hand balled into a fist. "It doesn’t work anymore. Everything's gone wrong. No matter what I wish for everything just gets worse!"
The shopkeeper sighed, setting the wishbox back on the counter. "Perhaps eet ess because you are not wishing hard enough."
"I am wishing hard enough," Draco shouted back, his fist pounding on the counter.
The shopkeeper shook his head. "Zee, a wishbox ees a mysterious thing. Eet works een mysterious ways. I told your mother zo when she purchased it. One can never know." He pushed the wishbox toward Draco. "Ze wishbox ees not broken. Non."
[ A WISHBOX CANNOT CHANGE THE PAST. ]
Draco stormed back into his dormitory room, drew the wishbox out of his robe pocket and threw it into the bottom of his trunk. The much-abused box splintered in half, rendering it useless, which Draco thought was just perfect. He kicked the trunk once and collapsed on top of his bed, his head in his hands.
"How was your trip?"
Draco dropped his hands from his eyes and looked across the dormitory. Zabini was sprawled atop his bed, paging through a magazine. "What trip?" Draco asked.
Zabini turned another page. "You need to pay Crabbe and Goyle more," he said without looking up.
Draco blanched.
"Don't worry. I covered for you," and he added, teasing, "You're an idiot but a fetching one."
Zabini's magazine had dropped a fraction, and Draco could see from his expression that he was smiling. Draco knew better than to get his hopes up, but couldn't help asking, "Does this mean we're--" Zabini had all but ignored him since their confrontation sixth year.
"No." Zabini put down his magazine. "I told you. Death Eaters are bad for my health and well being."
"I can't help that now," Draco cried, exasperated. "It's too late."
"I know." Zabini picked up his magazine again. "Too bad."
[ YOU MAY WISH FOR A HERO. ]
The Dark Lord was angry. The Mark on Draco's arm burned. He was sure his father felt it too. Draco caught him tugging on the sleeve of his robes.
"It will be over soon," Lucius assured him. They were sitting side by side in the drawing room, a large fire roaring in the hearth in front of them. Still, Draco felt a chill deep in his bones that no fire or being under his parents' roof could take away.
Lucius lowered his voice. "We will find a way to get back in the Dark Lord's favor. We will reclaim our rightful place by his side."
"How? How will we reclaim our place?" demanded Draco, flinching from another stab of pain.
"Trust me," said Lucius, wincing.
Draco looked away. He no longer wanted to be by the Dark Lord's side.
There was a commotion in the hallway.
"Draco," he heard his mother call. "Come here. Do you know this boy?"
And that's how Draco came face to face with the one person he hadn't dared to wish for.
[ OF COURSE, YOU MAY ALWAYS WISH FOR A BRIGHTER FUTURE. ]
"Why didn't you identify me?" asked Potter, looking genuinely curious as he added more sugar to his coffee. "I was so sure you would."
Draco's eyes dropped down to his own coffee cup. He had run into Potter in the Ministry lobby. It had been years. He could have just said his polite regards and gone on his way, but on a lark he had decided to invite Potter to get a cup of coffee. The Ministry canteen was just down the stairs. He really didn't expect Potter to accept.
Draco reached for a sugar and fumbled with it as he tore open the paper wrapper. "I was … happy to see you." His spoon was stirring a cyclone inside his cup.
Potter laughed. "You didn't look very happy."
A smile threatened on Draco's face. "No, I wasn't." He took a sip of coffee and nearly spit it back into his cup. He had added way too much sugar. "I know it doesn't make sense…" He trailed off, embarrassed. He actually thought very little about the war. It made getting on with his life a whole hell of a lot easier. "That's all over with, anyway." He picked up another packet of sugar and dumped it into his cup.
Potter looked thoughtful. "Good thing."
Draco nodded, still stirring his coffee.
"Why did you invite me to coffee?"
Draco narrowed his eyes. "Why so many questions, Potter?"
"It's my job."
Right. Potter was some big shot Auror now. He knew this was a mistake. Potter probably thought Draco was trying to curry favor or pay a bribe. "I suppose you should be running along. You know how people talk."
"Oi. I'm not done with my coffee yet." Potter looked offended, and then a predatory-looking grin spread across his face. Draco figured it was some sort of Auror intimidation trick to get Draco to spill his dark secrets. "Did you know Blaise Zabini works in my office?" Potter asked, leaning across the table.
Draco smirked. "Yes, I did know that." Zabini still wouldn’t sleep with him, but they had kept in touch.
"If you get him drunk he'll spill all his secrets."
Draco took a moment to parse the idea of Potter and Zabini drinking together. "Really?"
Potter gestured toward him with his coffee cup. "He has stories about you."
The blood started to drain from Draco's face, and then he gaped. "Wait. Did you just wink at me?"
"Do you always put so much sugar in your coffee?"
"Do you always ask so many questions?"
Potter grinned at him. "This is fun. We should do this again."
Author:
mizbean
Character(s)/Pairing(s): Draco/Pansy, Draco/Blaise, and shades of future of Harry/Draco because I'm a shipper, but mostly Draco-centric.
Rating: PG-13
Wordcount: 11,000
Summary: If you could have anything in world, what would you wish for?
Author's Notes: My
ownficfest submission. Written for
catsintheattic. Thank you to
kennahijja for giving me the opportunity to write this story.
Part i
[ YOUR WISHBOX WON'T HELP YOU IF YOU THINK YOU'RE GAY. ]
"God, Quidditch is dull." Zabini rolled his eyes as they exited the Malfoy family box. Ireland's victory over Bulgaria had turned the crowd of World Cup revelers into a sea of green. A drunken sea of green.
Draco moved quickly to sidestep a puddle of vomit. "Then why are you here?" he snapped, irritated less from the present company than Bulgaria's surprising loss. Zabini had somehow ceased to be irritating earlier in the summer, right around the time he had shown up on the Malfoy family doorstep in search of a distraction from his latest stepfather's passing. Now Draco just found him bewildering.
Zabini shrugged, looking sideways at Draco, his gaze sending color to Draco's cheeks.
Draco thought it might be Zabini's height, but he just seemed older. And more experienced. Draco changed the subject. "I wonder where my dad went off to."
His father had disappeared before the game ended, taking along Goyle senior. Others had gone too, and Draco felt put out that he didn't get asked along.
"Who cares," replied Zabini, halting. He was eyeing the revelers with obvious distaste. The mood of the campsite had turned rowdier. Firecrackers were shooting off from all directions, many were singing, and Draco thought he heard someone scream.
"Let's go somewhere," Zabini said, tugging on the sleeve of Draco's robes. "Yeah?" He had moved closer, his hand brushing Draco's shoulder.
That relatively simple request took a hell of a long time for Draco to compute, and he realized he was standing slack-jawed when he heard Zabini start to laugh. Draco's ears were burning when he muttered, "What?" -- even though he heard it quite right the first time.
Zabini merely laughed again, which in itself was a rare thing, but Draco thought his teeth looked unusually bright under the night's sky. That Pansy had chosen that moment to burst onto the scene caused Draco no shortage of relief.
Draco wrapped his fingers around Pansy's elbow, leading her away. "Funny. Absolutely hilarious," he muttered, so very pleased that no one could see the color of his cheeks.
~ * ~
Pansy's lips tasted wet and vaguely like sticky pudding. It was after dinner -- after he had spent his meal squeezed next to Viktor Krum and barely eating -- that he had accosted her just down the stairs from the Great Hall.
She didn't look at all displeased with Draco's sudden change in interest in her, a blond curl twirled around her finger. "So we'll be going to Hogsmeade, then?"
Draco blinked. "Sure." But haven't they always gone to Hogsmeade together?
Draco didn't grasp what Pansy had meant until she grabbed him by the hand. He stared at it as she led him toward the common room door. "First you have to take me to The Three Broomsticks, and then Honeydukes…"
~ * ~
Pansy twirled around, her pink dress robes fluttering in her wake. "Well, what do you think?"
She was wearing lipstick a shade too red to be flattering, her blond curls piled and lacquered high atop her head. Draco was all too aware that Zabini was standing behind him, watching them both when he replied, "You look nice."
Pansy's eyebrows twitched, and Draco tried desperately to recall the types of compliments his father always paid to his mother. "Lovely. You look lovely."
"Really?" Pansy's face split into a wide smile.
~ * ~
The Great Hall was transformed into a wonderland of ice and snow. Couples were swaying to the music, breaking apart whenever McGonagall and Snape's watchful eyes turned in their direction, and outside, Draco found himself pressed against a cold castle wall.
"What're you doing?" he managed to gasp, holding his hands up too late to stop Zabini's forward trajectory.
"Took you long enough," was Zabini's gruff reply.
Somewhere inside Pansy was still waiting near the punch bowl while her boyfriend was being kissed like the world might end tomorrow. If that may seem like an exaggeration, it was only because Draco was woefully inexperienced in that regard, a few hasty kisses with Pansy aside. Finally, they broke apart, Draco still clutching the wool collar of Zabini's coat. "What-" he gasped, heart thudding in his chest, "was that for?"
Zabini smirked, still a half a head taller. "Had a hunch."
Draco's mouth went dry, his hands dropping to his sides. "What that supposed to be a joke?"
Zabini grinned, fingering the collar of Draco's shirt. "What do you think?"
Draco thought that he hated it when someone answered a question with another question. It was so very Slytherin. He leaned forward, wanting to kiss Zabini some more when Zabini abruptly backed away.
Draco soon saw why. Pansy was standing a few steps away. He wondered how much she had seen.
"Where have you been?" she cried, fists balled at her sides as Zabini muttered an apology and made a hasty retreat.
Draco was caught between chasing after Zabini and trying to placate Pansy. He decided to do neither. "Nowhere," he retorted harshly, walking off in the other direction, ignoring Pansy's tears.
Besides, Draco felt rather like crying himself.
[ YOUR WISHBOX WILL NOT DO YOUR HOMEWORK. ]
"Mister Malfoy."
Draco looked up and shrank under the weight of Snape's glare. "Yes, Professor?"
"You do know what a three-foot-long essay looks like?" Snape held up a roll of parchment, Draco's homework, for the entire class to see.
There was a titter of laughter from the Gryffindor side of the classroom. Draco scowled darkly before replying, "Yes."
"Then can you explain to me why even Weasley managed to write more about the medicinal properties of bubotubor spores than you?"
Draco shifted in his seat, the Inquisitor Squad badge pinned to his robes catching in the light. "No."
"I expect better of you," Snape said, low as he walked past.
[ YOU SHOULD NOT USE YOUR WISHBOX TO WOE YOUR GIRLFRIEND. ]
"You're hurt."
Draco was letting Pansy attend to his wounds, her handkerchief carefully blotting the blood on his face. He attempted a smile, which hurt like hell. "You should see the other guy."
"Really?" Pansy's eyes lit up.
Merlin, she was so easy. Draco sometimes felt guilty.
Millicent Bulstrode burst into the common room. Like Draco she was still dressed in her Slytherin Quidditch uniform. "Potter's suspended. Umbridge did the deed in McGonagall's office five minutes ago."
"See?" Draco said to Pansy.
She looked like she might combust with glee. "Oh, Draco."
Alone, in the opposite corner, Zabini rolled his eyes.
[ YOU MUST NOT USE YOUR WISHBOX FOR REVENGE. ]
"You're dead, Potter."
It wasn't just that Draco was angry. He felt like his whole world was crashing down around him. He had spent the last two days in a daze, and he had begged his mother via Floo to let him come home, but she had refused.
It was just by luck that he had found Potter alone in the Entrance Hall, unprotected.
"You're going to pay," Draco warned, his voice low. "I'm going to make you pay for what you've done to my father."
"Well, I'm terrified now," Potter replied, sarcastic.
Draco thought he ought to be.
~*~
The wishbox was back where it belonged, on Draco's bedside table. Draco sat on the edge of his bed, a gentle breeze blowing in through his open window, ruffling his hair.
It was after midnight, the sprawling Manor empty except for his mother locked behind her bedroom door. Draco never hated being alone more.
He picked up a square of parchment and contemplated it, unsure how to articulate what he wanted into simple words.
He wanted to make things right again, so his mother would stop crying. He wanted to be a man just like his father. But most of all, he was sick of feeling so powerless and so very young.
But grown men don't play with toys, a voice chided inside his head as he slipped his wish into the box. He recited the spell and lay down atop his bed to wait.
He didn't have to wait for long. The light in his room was dim -- there were only a few candles burning -- but his presence was as unmistakable as the two red eyes glowing at the foot of Draco's bed.
Draco scrambled off the bed and knelt down, one knee touching the ground. "My Lord."
A hand, dry and cold, touched Draco's cheek where it lingered, brushing away the tears that were falling from Draco's eyes.
"You wish to serve?"
Draco nodded, and realizing he should speak, he blurted, "I'll do anything. Anything to get my father back."
"Of course."
Draco looked up at the Dark Lord's face, relief flooding though him. It was more than he could have possibly have wished for. "You will help me get my father out of Azkaban?"
"Of course, he is of great value to me." Voldemort's hand lifted Draco's chin. "As are you, Draco. You are my future."
"I'm-I'm honored." Draco would have thought he'd be terrified, but he wasn't. He wanted this more than anything.
Draco pulled up the sleeve of his shirt and held out his arm. He didn't flinch when Voldemort pressed his wand to it.
~*~
Draco's mother wasn't so calm. "No. I won't let this happen." Frantic, she grabbed Draco by the shoulders, pulling him to her, the fabric of his robes bunched in her fists. "Your father did not want this."
His mother was a tall woman in her own right; nevertheless Draco was now taller, and he easily pushed her away. She let out a wail and crumpled to the floor in a heap, her long hair hanging like a curtain around her face. "You're wrong. Father believed in me," he told her.
"Cissy, you're embarrassing yourself," said Bellatrix, watching. She looked darkly amused by her sister's breakdown. "You knew this day would come."
It might have been the sanest thing Bellatrix ever said, and her words appeared to give Narcissa some resolve. She looked up at her son. "What is he making you do?"
Draco adjusted the sleeve of his shirt, the skin of his forearm still tender and raw. "Nothing I can't handle."
[ SOMETIMES A WISHBOX CAN WORK IN MYSTERIOUS WAYS. ]
He was handling it.
"You're not suiting up?"
The disappointment in Pansy's voice was obvious. The Slytherin team was short one player already. He already got an earful from Theodore Nott. It's not like he needed to hear it from her too.
"I'm not feeling well," he snapped back. He was sitting on top his bed, staring at the opposite wall. The dormitory was otherwise empty, the game due to start in a half hour.
"Really?" It was apparent that she didn't believe him.
"Really," he retorted icily. He rolled his eyes, and that was when he noticed for the first time Pansy had an old Potter Stinks badge pinned to her Slytherin scarf. For some reason, he found that darkly amusing.
"What?" said Pansy when he began to laugh.
"Nothing," he said, shaking his head to clear his thoughts. He got to his feet, and laying both hands on her shoulders, he urged her around so that she was facing the dormitory door. "Pansy, go to the game."
"But - If you let me help-"
"I'm fine," said Draco, cutting her off.
~*~
He was handling it.
"Where are you going?" Zabini's voice was low. The corridor was empty, but it still was after curfew.
Draco ignored him and kept walking.
Zabini finally caught up to him on the landing between the fifth and six floors, accosting him next to a painting of a young woman. She shrieked and covered her eyes.
For a blissful moment Draco allowed himself to be ravaged, Zabini's hand roaming freely down the front of his robes, but reality insisted. Draco had a task. He could not afford to waste time.
He steeled himself and sent Zabini stumbling backwards. "Don't touch me," he snarled.
Zabini recovered his footing easily. "Give it up. Everyone knows you're a poof."
Draco thought that was hardly the point. He turned toward the stairs, going up, but Zabini stopped him again, this time grabbing him by the arm.
Draco glared down at him. "If you don't get your fucking hand off me, I'll hex your dick off." Draco meant it and Zabini wisely dropped his hand.
"Pansy finally figured out how to spread her legs, huh?"
Draco knew Zabini was only trying to get a rise out of him, but he didn't have the energy to do anything about it. "Just leave her out of it." He turned to go again.
"Right," Zabini called after him. "You look like shit. You know that?"
Draco snorted, stopping halfway up the stairs. "I'm touched you care."
"Pansy's at her wit's end."
"And I told you to leave her out of it."
"Fine," snapped Zabini, looking anything but. Draco knew Zabini avoided violent contact as a rule, but he looked very much like he wanted to slug Draco, his fists clenched at his sides.
Draco was at once grateful for the space that was between them. "Go back to bed," he called.
"You're an idiot," Zabini retorted.
Draco rolled his eyes. "Like I said. I'm touched you care."
Zabini said nothing more. They were both Slytherins. There was no need to get maudlin. And besides, Draco knew Zabini wasn't an idiot. He wouldn't get in the way.
"Go away. I can handle it," Draco said.
~*~
The bathroom door burst open, hitting the wall with a bang, and inside Draco sank down onto the cold tile floor.
He wasn't handling it.
The sobs came easier now. It might have been after he nearly killed Weasley that Draco stopped feeling ashamed of his tears, but Draco tried not to dwell on that for very long.
A soft sound above him told Draco he was not alone, and for once he was grateful for the intrusion.
"Don't," he heard someone say, and he looked up to see a ghost floating down beside him. She stared at him through a pair of thick glass lenses. "Don't cry."
Draco snorted. "Who're you?"
"Myrtle."
Myrtle was ugly, had the sort of drab hair that would have given Pansy fits and wore thick, Potter-esque glasses. She looked like no one he'd ever associate with in real life. Her voice grated. She was a ghost.
But he told her everything: his impossible task, the anguish he caused his mother, the isolation he felt from his friends, his feelings of failure. The words spilled from his mouth, and when he had finally finished the ghostly girl sniffled, her own eyes brimming with tears.
"Will you come visit me again?"
Draco knew he had no business making promises to anyone.
"Okay," he said.
[ A WISHBOX CAN SOMETIMES MALFUNCTION. THE MANUFACTURER BEARS NO RESPONSIBILITY SHOULD THIS OCCUR, AS THIS CAN SIMPLY BE CONSTRUED AS BAD LUCK. OUR APOLOGIES. ]
Red eyes haunted his dreams.
Terrified, Draco slipped out of his dormitory and padded through the sleeping castle.
"Why am I doing wrong?"
It was a simple question, plainly asked, but the vanishing cabinet provided no answers. It merely stood there, broken and dusty, in the Great Room of Hidden Things.
"FUCK!" Draco screamed, and after taking several gulping breaths of air, he tried again, quieter, "Why am I doing wrong? Why won't you work? Why? Why? I've tried everything--"
He was shouting again. Draco wiped the tears from his eyes and began to laugh. All else had failed; he supposed trying to reason with a bloody piece of furniture was the best he could do.
~*~
He was being watched.
Potter was about as stealthy as an overgrown sheepdog. Draco had known Potter had been trailing him for weeks now.
What puzzled Draco was why he didn't actually mind.
"Would you save me, Potter?" Draco asked during one of his madder moments, delirious from lack of sleep, the Dark Mark on his arm turned red and raw. "Like you save everyone else. Would you?"
Once again, the vanishing cabinet didn't answer.
~*~
Draco's whole body was shaking. "I can't do it. ... I can't. ... It won't work… and unless I do it soon ... he says he'll kill me."
He looked up and saw his tear-streaked face in the cracked mirror. And then another face appeared behind him, colored white with shock.
Draco spun around.
~*~
Draco barely remembered being carried into the infirmary, Snape's frantic instructions to Madam Pomphrey were but a whisper in Draco's ears, but the hate Draco saw in Potter's eyes he could recall vividly, and days later when he was well enough to go back to his dormitory, Draco took a detour instead.
He stood before the vanishing cabinet newly resolute. "This time you're going to work."
[ A WISHBOX MAY NOT GRANT THE IMPOSSIBLE. ]
Draco couldn't stop shaking.
"Well, then, you must get on and do it, my dear boy," Dumbledore said to him even as his body was slumping lower against the ramparts of the tower.
Then, bizarrely, the old man began to smile.
"Draco, you are not a killer."
"How do you know?" Draco cried.
[ A WISHBOX MAY CARRY YOU HOME. ]
Draco was being crushed into his mother's chest. He couldn't breathe.
"Well? Did he do it?" It was Bellatrix, sounding frantic.
"Hush, Bella." If possible, Narcissa's grip on Draco tightened. "Severus?"
Sounding out of breath, Draco heard Snape respond, "It is done."
Narcissa's relief was palpable, and she finally loosened her hold. "Thank you, Severus." She drew back, both hands clutching the sides of Draco face, and looked him over.
He could see how worried she must have been, her eyes red rimmed, her forehead lined. Guilt weighted on Draco's shoulders. "I--I'm sorry."
"No." Narcissa shook her head. "You're safe. You're home safe."
[ A WISHBOX WILL NOT TURN YOU INTO SOMETHING YOU ARE NOT. ]
Draco could barely see the outline of the old man in the gloom of the dungeon room. "Get up," he barked. He pointed his wand.
The man, Draco remembered meeting under happier circumstances as a boy shopping for his wand, shifted where he was lying on the floor, but did not rise. "Young man -" Ollivander started to say.
"Shut up," Draco shouted back, his wand shaking. "Get off the floor."
"But surely you understand that I'm too weak to stand." The man's voice was reasonable, which sounded all the more maddening to Draco's ears.
Draco wiped the sweat from his forehead, starting to feel ill. "Don't make me hurt you," he warned.
"But you mean to hurt me. That's why you're here."
He, of course, was right. Draco's mouth filled with the taste of his own vomit. He had no stomach for this sort of thing, and he knew all too well what happened to spineless Death Eaters who couldn't do their duty.
"Do you remember when you came into my shop to buy your wand?" Ollivander asked, after waiting patiently for Draco to compose himself and clean the sick off his shoes.
"Of course. Why wouldn't I?" Attuned to the dark now, Draco could make out the features of Ollivander's face, the old man's silvery eyes glassy as they stared back at Draco.
"I remember as well. Hawthorn and unicorn hair." The wandmaker turned his head to face the opposite wall. "I thought then that you might have taken another path."
"What?" rasped Draco. "What's that supposed to mean?"
Ollivander didn't answer, and Draco steadied the grip on his wand.
"It doesn't matter. I have no choice." Clenching his eyes shut, he aimed his wand. "Crucio."
~*~
"Are you all right?"
"What?" Draco said, staring into Looney Lovegood's wide saucer eyes. He had a tray of food in his hands, dinner for Malfoy Manor's newest prisoner. He shoved it into her hands. "I'm fine."
"If you mean to torture me, it's all right. I'll try not to cry."
Draco blanched. "I'm not-- I mean I don't--" He stopped himself before he could say anything more.
Lovegood was still wearing her Ravenclaw uniform from when she was snatched off the train, the skirt torn at the hem. "But it would be better if you let me go."
"I can't do that," Draco snapped back.
"No. I didn't expect you to."
He had to ask, "What about Potter? Is he going to save you now?"
"No. I expect he has more important things to do." Lovegood didn't appear to be overly bothered by this, however. "Don't worry. I'll be all right. Mr. Ollivander has been lovely company." She indicated the frail man pitifully moaning on the floor behind her.
Draco frowned. "I'm not worried."
[ ALL SALES ARE FINAL. MANAGEMENT REGRETS ANY INCONVENIENCE THAT MIGHT CAUSE. ]
"And ze problem ees?" asked Monsieur Petit in heavily accented English. He looked perplexed as Draco set the wishbox down on the counter of Petit's shop.
"Ze problem is that the wishbox is broken," Draco snapped back. "Fix it."
The shopkeeper made a face and picked the wishbox off the counter to give it closer inspection, Draco watching impatiently. It had taken a considerable amount of effort and risk for him to travel to Paris, but he was desperate. International Floo travel was expensive, not that he didn't have funds, but there was also the matter of buying the border agents' silence and arranging for Crabbe and Goyle to cover for him back at school. He didn't wish to think what would happen if word got back to Headmaster Snape or the Dark Lord that he had left the country. He would lucky to live to see the end of the day.
"And why do you think ze box ess broken?" Monsieur Petit asked, still inspecting the box. He poked at it with his wand and frowned.
Draco's hand balled into a fist. "It doesn’t work anymore. Everything's gone wrong. No matter what I wish for everything just gets worse!"
The shopkeeper sighed, setting the wishbox back on the counter. "Perhaps eet ess because you are not wishing hard enough."
"I am wishing hard enough," Draco shouted back, his fist pounding on the counter.
The shopkeeper shook his head. "Zee, a wishbox ees a mysterious thing. Eet works een mysterious ways. I told your mother zo when she purchased it. One can never know." He pushed the wishbox toward Draco. "Ze wishbox ees not broken. Non."
[ A WISHBOX CANNOT CHANGE THE PAST. ]
Draco stormed back into his dormitory room, drew the wishbox out of his robe pocket and threw it into the bottom of his trunk. The much-abused box splintered in half, rendering it useless, which Draco thought was just perfect. He kicked the trunk once and collapsed on top of his bed, his head in his hands.
"How was your trip?"
Draco dropped his hands from his eyes and looked across the dormitory. Zabini was sprawled atop his bed, paging through a magazine. "What trip?" Draco asked.
Zabini turned another page. "You need to pay Crabbe and Goyle more," he said without looking up.
Draco blanched.
"Don't worry. I covered for you," and he added, teasing, "You're an idiot but a fetching one."
Zabini's magazine had dropped a fraction, and Draco could see from his expression that he was smiling. Draco knew better than to get his hopes up, but couldn't help asking, "Does this mean we're--" Zabini had all but ignored him since their confrontation sixth year.
"No." Zabini put down his magazine. "I told you. Death Eaters are bad for my health and well being."
"I can't help that now," Draco cried, exasperated. "It's too late."
"I know." Zabini picked up his magazine again. "Too bad."
[ YOU MAY WISH FOR A HERO. ]
The Dark Lord was angry. The Mark on Draco's arm burned. He was sure his father felt it too. Draco caught him tugging on the sleeve of his robes.
"It will be over soon," Lucius assured him. They were sitting side by side in the drawing room, a large fire roaring in the hearth in front of them. Still, Draco felt a chill deep in his bones that no fire or being under his parents' roof could take away.
Lucius lowered his voice. "We will find a way to get back in the Dark Lord's favor. We will reclaim our rightful place by his side."
"How? How will we reclaim our place?" demanded Draco, flinching from another stab of pain.
"Trust me," said Lucius, wincing.
Draco looked away. He no longer wanted to be by the Dark Lord's side.
There was a commotion in the hallway.
"Draco," he heard his mother call. "Come here. Do you know this boy?"
And that's how Draco came face to face with the one person he hadn't dared to wish for.
[ OF COURSE, YOU MAY ALWAYS WISH FOR A BRIGHTER FUTURE. ]
"Why didn't you identify me?" asked Potter, looking genuinely curious as he added more sugar to his coffee. "I was so sure you would."
Draco's eyes dropped down to his own coffee cup. He had run into Potter in the Ministry lobby. It had been years. He could have just said his polite regards and gone on his way, but on a lark he had decided to invite Potter to get a cup of coffee. The Ministry canteen was just down the stairs. He really didn't expect Potter to accept.
Draco reached for a sugar and fumbled with it as he tore open the paper wrapper. "I was … happy to see you." His spoon was stirring a cyclone inside his cup.
Potter laughed. "You didn't look very happy."
A smile threatened on Draco's face. "No, I wasn't." He took a sip of coffee and nearly spit it back into his cup. He had added way too much sugar. "I know it doesn't make sense…" He trailed off, embarrassed. He actually thought very little about the war. It made getting on with his life a whole hell of a lot easier. "That's all over with, anyway." He picked up another packet of sugar and dumped it into his cup.
Potter looked thoughtful. "Good thing."
Draco nodded, still stirring his coffee.
"Why did you invite me to coffee?"
Draco narrowed his eyes. "Why so many questions, Potter?"
"It's my job."
Right. Potter was some big shot Auror now. He knew this was a mistake. Potter probably thought Draco was trying to curry favor or pay a bribe. "I suppose you should be running along. You know how people talk."
"Oi. I'm not done with my coffee yet." Potter looked offended, and then a predatory-looking grin spread across his face. Draco figured it was some sort of Auror intimidation trick to get Draco to spill his dark secrets. "Did you know Blaise Zabini works in my office?" Potter asked, leaning across the table.
Draco smirked. "Yes, I did know that." Zabini still wouldn’t sleep with him, but they had kept in touch.
"If you get him drunk he'll spill all his secrets."
Draco took a moment to parse the idea of Potter and Zabini drinking together. "Really?"
Potter gestured toward him with his coffee cup. "He has stories about you."
The blood started to drain from Draco's face, and then he gaped. "Wait. Did you just wink at me?"
"Do you always put so much sugar in your coffee?"
"Do you always ask so many questions?"
Potter grinned at him. "This is fun. We should do this again."