[HP] Butterfly Bound -- Chapter 03
Title: Butterfly Bound
Chapter 03: Won't Come Out
Rating: M (and/or R)
Words: 4,158
Summary: 6th year AU. Theodore/Hermione. When Harry lies dying from an unbreakable curse, Hermione is desperate to find a cure. After a summer of hell, Theodore wants nothing to do with the war. A Nott family heirloom provides the answer to both their prayers, but only if they can work together to survive the heirloom's demands. And even if they succeed, there's still a war to win...
Notes: Written for the 2012 Finish-a-Thon and
edellin's fic request.
Warnings: Torture-physical/emotional, psychological mindfuckery, kidnapping, gore, disturbing imagery, cannibalism, and death.
"Crucio!"
The Muggle woman shrieked and dropped, writhing, and kept on screaming a long ragged sound that held a desperate plea for mercy in it, though it was shrouded and over-whelmed by her agony. Theodore resisted the urge to cover his ears. It would not block out the sound adequately and it would give away his discomfort. He could not afford that. Not here and now. He shifted slightly, leaning back into the heavy drapes that, when the alcove he stood in was not in use, were left closed to keep it separate from the main hall, and cast a glance at his so-called companions.
So-called because the only things that glued them together were that all of them had a parent, or two, who were heavily involved with the Dark Lord and they were all Slytherin. Flint was at the forefront, watching closely as possible, though sweat beaded his forehead and Theodore doubted he was there of his own free will. He was proving a point to someone, probably his father, to show he could handle watching the brutality. Malfoy, too, was watching at the front, his fingers clenched on the bannister as if he wanted to turn away and knew better than to dare--not with Crabbe and Goyle watching. For the same reason, Theodore did not leave the room. Instead he affected boredom with the proceedings below and envied Blaise bitterly for Blaise was out of the country, visiting Italy with his mother, and did not have to watch this.
The woman kept screaming. Theodore wondered if they would hold her under until her mind broke and then give her to the werewolves or if they would let the curse go on until her heart stopped. He hoped for the latter and, because of that hope, suspected the former more likely.
Parkinson hovered next to Malfoy, looking torn between watching with wide eyes and holding onto Malfoy and not watching at all and being unable to decide either, compromised by not looking and not touching but not leaving either. The too-pale faces of Daphne and Astoria Greengrass were a contrast to the emotions crossing Parkinson's face. Warrington had his arms crossed over his chest, standing slightly in front of the Greengrass sisters as if to shield them though none of them lifted a wand to silence the screams.
They knew the penalties for that.
This was their testing.
Overall, Theodore thought, we fail.
He felt comfortable including himself in the failing group when that meant he didn't find pointless cruelty to be an intriguing concept. Crabbe and Goyle, he thought, passed. Or, if they did not, were far better at hiding it than the rest of them. Parkinson and Malfoy hovered on the edge. Warrington--he couldn't tell, just that he had the decency to try to keep the Greengrass sisters out of it as much as possible. But of course, Daphne was engaged to him. Any good fiancé would do the same, then, and that left Theodore less certain of his motives in any way.
And yet, he thought they all preferred the endless, climbing to madness, screams of this woman when compared to what Greyback had done when he'd taken the stage the three nights ago, under the light of the full moon. I never want to see him eat anyone ever again.
Bole had been unable to handle watching and had left the alcove. It had been two days since any of them had seen him and none of them held out much optimism for his survival. In this way, the Dark Lord finds the pure-bloods who can stomach his reign of terror. Theodore's eyes slid to watch Astoria as she leaned against her sister. And punishes the moderates and light-siding purebloods.
All along the great hall of the long-forgotten castle that the Dark Lord had claimed as his own there were similar alcoves. Each of them had pure-bloods of varying sympathies in them, forced to watch what happened below. They had been promised, if they survived the summer, they could go back to their homes, their families, their schools. Theodore suspected that a great many of their parents had been forced into silence with the promise that, if they kept the disappearance of their children a secret, they would get their children back.
He didn't know for sure, though. No newspapers were permitted within the castle and none of them were allowed to write. There is most of the summer to go. We shall all be broken by the end of it at this rate.
The woman's screams stopped abruptly in a broken gurgle.
"Her ribs snapped," Flint reported. His voice was harsh. "Punctured a lung. She's choking on blood now."
Daphne closed her eyes, going two shades paler, and wrapped an arm more firmly around Astoria's shoulders. Malfoy shivered as Parkinson peered down and then drew back, shuddering herself. Theodore remained where he was--ostensibly watching but angled just so that he couldn't see the victim. He could still hear her, sobbing through the hacking coughs that were thick with liquid, but he didn't look.
He wondered if the others could tell, or if they thought he had a full view and wasn't turning away.
"Is she the last for the night?" It was Crabbe who asked what all of them wanted to know but had not dared verbalize. Crabbe could because Crabbe could say it with disappointment in his voice.
Theodore swallowed bile.
"The schedule says two more," Flint said, after a long moment where no one else even breathed.
"Are we going to be kept here for the summer, do you think?" Theodore asked, to draw attention away from the way Astoria's face crumpled. She was only twelve, poor thing. He kept his voice as bland as he could. "Not that I mind," or would admit to minding, which most of the people here understood, "but most of us have summer homework and while Professor Snape would understand if we do not have it done, none of the other teachers would."
They stared at him like he was speaking another language.
He didn't blame them. Homework was the last thing he wanted to be talking about and, yet, it was casual enough that he thought it might be a viable topic, as if he really didn't care what was going on below them. Across the hall he could see the pale faces of other purebloods. Some Hogwarts age, others older.
Thank god for small mercies, he thought, that there are none younger.
Even Astoria, for all her youth, was going into her second year at Hogwarts. Looking at her, it didn't make much of a difference but Theodore pretended it did. If he stopped pretending then he was going to go the way of Bole and he didn't dare--he didn't have the excuse, even, of being from a moderate family. His father, had he not been in Azkaban, would have been down there, talking to the other Death Eaters.
No answer to his question came but that was all right. He watched across the hall, in silence, trying to guess who was on the other side and if they were doing the same as he was. Who watched, who didn't, who passed and who failed and how to tell when that all depended on what side of the war you were on.
Frankly Theodore thought that, even with all of this, he fell into the moderates. He had no wish, no interest to deal with Muggles--even the Muggleborn were only to be tolerated by him, truthfully, though they had the important part, they had magic--but all the same, these last few days had proven something to him:
He had zero interest in seeing anyone killed. He had even less than zero interest in doing any killing himself.
Theodore had suspicions that before the Dark Lord let them leave, those that had made it through the gauntlet of horrors, would be forced to kill at least once. A graduation exercise, so to speak. A way of dirtying their hands to keep their mouths shut. The Dark Lord wouldn't curse them to do it. If they didn't, they were dead. The rules of self-preservation meant that was enough of a goad for many of them to kill.
It would be enough for him, he knew, brutally honest with himself. Theodore had no intentions of dying here.
He hadn't spoken of his belief. He knew some of the others had guessed where this would go. Right now, with the exception of Greyback's attack, which had been the first they'd watched and done for the shock value, the deaths had been relatively clean. Horrific, but clean.
They could not stay that way. Already, this woman's torture and death was worse than what had occurred the past few nights.
Behind them, a door opened and a masked and robed Death Eater slipped into the room. None of them moved. The Death Eater did not leave the room and, instead, settled down on a chair to watch them watch the next exhibit.
Daphne's face turned stony. Astoria's lower lip quivered but no sound or tears escaped her. Malfoy looked like he was made of wax and even Parkinson looked like a wet blanket.
Theodore's fingers itched for his wand and he resisted the urge to toy with it. No need to give everyone a signal for how uncomfortable he was. Some would take heart from it but others would carry the tale directly to their parents and the Dark Lord.
I can't wait for this summer to end.
And yet, it was an ugly thought knowing, too, that by the end of the summer he'd either be a murderer or he'd be dead. That goes for all of us.
The next woman they brought out was stark naked and from her expression, she'd watched the last woman be tortured and had guessed what was in store for her.
Theodore clutched the stoic edges of his demeanor closer around his heart and wished he dared to close his eyes.
None of them did and none of them turned away.
In other alcoves there were likely students from other Houses, from other countries, and he had no idea what it was that they thought and did in order to endure.
In this alcove, however, they were all Slytherin. That meant something.
Hogwarts, at least, forces us to learn to survive.
Even when the woman was placed under the Imperius and forced to rip off her own arm, none of them flinched.
To do so would be to forfeit their own survival and they all knew it.
We're not brave, he thought, face expressionless. Not in a way that's loud and flashy. But this is our world and only the strong survive.
And being able to be strong, here and now, took its own sort of bravery.
As the woman, bleeding profusely from where her arm used to be, lifted the ravaged limb in her other hand and took a bite out of it, forced to do so by the Imperius Curse, Theodore wished, a little, that his bravery was that of a Gryffindor's.
Then he could do something stupid and it would be decided. He would probably die.
But watching the woman eat herself, he thought that might be the easy way out.
A commotion across the hall drew his attention. Red hair, he realized, shockingly so. A Weasley? Or is it another pure-blood? They were too far away to know for sure and none of them asked their watcher.
None of the Slytherins moved more than their eyes as they watched the red-head struggle, presumably with the watcher in that alcove, and then, seemingly winning, leap down.
It was magic that kept their legs from being broken as they landed on the main floor.
Green light flashed and the so-called wannabe hero collapsed, dead.
Helping nothing, helping no one, and dying quickly. The easy way out. Theodore held himself rigid and didn't look away when they forced the woman, bleeding to death under the Imperius, to stand, to make her way over to the body of the person who'd tried to do something to help her, however foolish and ill-thought out it had been, and pluck the eyes from the fresh corpse.
She ate them.
Theodore wished he could self-Obliviate.
"Nott."
Theodore paused in his reading--a treatise on the Dark Arts in medicine--and then glanced up, one finger marking his place. "Malfoy."
Draco Malfoy looked like crap. His face was tight and drawn and his hair slightly disheveled, like he'd forgotten how to charm it into place. He hadn't, Theodore knew, it was just that this place, wherever it was, was getting to him.
It was getting to Theodore too, though he took greater pains to hide it. In that, his colouring--dark hair, dark eyes, and skin that tanned rather than burnt and peeled like Malfoy's--aided him. If he looked a little drawn, well, it was because he was up at all hours reading through the castle's library.
Malfoy stepped in, uneasy, perhaps at the coolness in Theodore's voice. Or perhaps not, Theodore thought, watching the way that Malfoy struggled to hide his discomfort and the way his gaze flitted, like a scared bird's, around the room.
After a moment, Theodore took pity on him. "I'm surprised to see you here," he said, "no one but me has been much of a fan of the library."
It was, as Daphne had murmured, too Dark for their tastes given that they already had their fill of Darkness in each evening's mandatory 'entertainment'. Theodore didn't share that comment with anyone else but he understood it. Books had always been his friends though and he was loathe to give up one small bit of familiarity when this entire summer was one long unsettled state of mind.
"It's summer," Malfoy said, his shoulders relaxing slightly. He'd gotten the message; no one else was in the library right now. "What sort of person wants to spend their days trapped up with musty old books after doing that for most of the year already? Honestly, Nott."
"And yet," Theodore murmured, "here you are. Bored?"
Malfoy's laugh was quick, sharp and brittle. "None of us are," he said, throwing his head back arrogantly. "It's been an enlightening summer."
The words were right, Theodore thought critically. The arrogance was a good cover. Malfoy managed to not gesture to his newly Marked arm, which was even better.
But none of it hid the way there was something wild, panicked and lost in the tightness around Malfoy's eyes. Something fragile.
I don't want to be involved in this, Theodore thought hard at him. Not when our fathers are both imprisoned due to their own mistakes and you're being punished for your father's transgressions.
That led down the garden trail to thoughts of what it would mean for him. If Malfoy was being punished this way, with some impossible task (they'd been told as much, though no further details, by the other Death Eaters last night at dinner), then how were they going to punish him?
"I can recommend a book," Theodore said, after a silence a few shades too long, "if you want more enlightenment in your hot summer days." The sarcasm was layered on thick but it was nothing out of the ordinary, as anyone who knew them from school would know.
And I can see Crabbe lurking behind Malfoy. I don't think Malfoy is aware of it, though.
Every instinct Theodore had begged him to bow out of the conversation quickly, before Malfoy said anything that implicated either of them in things that he didn't need spread around. Things like a doubt for the Dark Lord. A fear of him was expected but doubt, like a wildfire, was undesirable.
"No," Malfoy said, with a twisted smile. "I don't want a book. Walk with me?"
The way he said it made it an offer and there was something in the tone that left Theodore trying to figure out the angles and ramifications of this. Was Malfoy to lead him to a punishment?
But... he knew Malfoy better than most, since for five long years they had roomed together. Theodore didn't think he was lying. If there is a trick here, it is one being played on Malfoy as well.
"What about a fly?" Theodore suggested. "We're allowed, right?"
Malfoy looked at him, surprise crossing his pale face. "I haven't heard it said that we're not," he said slowly. "Which is not the same as permission to do so."
Theodore slipped a cloth bookmark into place and closed his book, setting it on the table where anyone who wanted to see what he was reading would be able to do so easily. He was under no illusions that they were under surveillance enough for that to be a reasonable assumption. Not when there were a great many purebloods trapped on the castle grounds and at least half of those wanted out desperately.
He knew. He was one of them. The wards prevented anyone from leaving the lands surrounding the castle, though they were allowed outside, which Theodore considered both a kindness and a cruelty.
"Then let's go," Theodore said, standing. "If we're doing something wrong, someone will stop us. If we aren't, then we'll get to enjoy being up in the air."
Malfoy, thank Merlin, had enough sense to not comment on the fact that Theodore had never expressed a particular inclination towards flying before in his life. Indeed, Theodore had suffered through the first year's mandatory broom lessons, passed them, and promptly avoided using a broom as much as possible.
"Sure," Malfoy said, his stormy grey eyes direct. "I want out."
Crabbe took the message to mean they were still talking about flying. Theodore got the real message. Perhaps Malfoy did know the other boy was there, behind him.
"You'll fly rings around me," Theodore said easily as Crabbe melted away into the shadows and he and Malfoy fell into step. "Take it easy, all right?"
"I'll show you a few tricks," Malfoy said, a faint smile hovering on his lips for what Theodore thought was the first time all summer. "You never know, maybe you'll get good enough one day to try out for the team."
Theodore scoffed and they continued their, to all appearances, amicable conversation about Quidditch as they headed outside. No one stopped them. That was, he thought, in some circumstances to be considered permission.
Sort of.
The fact that they were being allowed might mean that they would later be punished for it. It was a possibility that couldn't quite be ignored.
Once they were outside, though, Theodore gave into the urge to respond to Malfoy's confession now that Crabbe had disappeared. No doubt another watcher would be along soon.
"I'm glad we're out," Theodore said as he stretched. There was a broom shed on the grounds. They made their way towards that. "Sometimes you have good ideas."
"Prat," Malfoy said, without heat. "This was your idea. Take responsibility for it if we get in trouble."
"I think we'll be found equally guilty," he replied lightly. "And isn't that a comfort?"
"Not really, no." Malfoy hesitated, then said, "I hate Muggles."
Theodore gave him a level look. "So do I."
"But this is…" Malfoy's voice dropped even as he kept the same faint smile he'd had before. "Not my idea of fun."
"Well," Theodore said, a warning in his voice as they stepped into the poorly-lit shed and surveyed the brooms critically, "what else can we do?"
Both of them were silent.
What else could they do?
I have no wish to die, Theodore thought, and neither does Malfoy.
But they dropped the conversation in favour of flight. Neither of them were surprised when Flint and Goyle came by less than ten minutes later to join them.
They never revisited the conversation. Malfoy's gaze was troubled, afterwards, a little more often. Theodore pulled further into himself, spending even more time in the library.
Both of them were thinking over their options.
Neither of them found them much to their liking.
Five weeks later Theodore watched expressionlessly as Astoria Greengrass used the Cutting Curse on a man and then stood there, as blank-faced as a professional, while the man bled to death.
The Death Eaters clapped their approval and didn't notice the fine trembling in her shoulders as she raised her head proudly and left the room at their permission, her dignity wrapped around her like a cloak.
Good girl, Theodore thought. Stay alive.
It was what they did, as Slytherins. Survive. He didn't know what the purebloods from the other Houses were using as their reasoning to stay alive. To his mild surprise, all four Houses were making an approximately equal showing.
They'd all lost some and all of them knew that those who'd lost were killed. He wondered if their parents would raise a fuss about their murdered children--if they would dare to do so when the Dark Lord had already proven to be able to walk through their wards with impunity.
Perhaps, he thought, it was fear that kept them all alive now.
There was only this and then they were going to be sent back to their homes for the last week of summer. It was a risk, they were taking, letting them go. But in order to leave, as he'd predicted, they were forced to become murderers.
That will keep us silent, I think. And Dumbledore, it seems, has no time for anyone now that Potter's come down with something that amuses the Dark Lord a great deal. There is no redemption there, no protection. We are on our own.
Daphne Greengrass was next. She passed.
Then Malfoy. He passed too, his face pale but composed.
Then it was his turn.
Theodore stepped out of the dwindling line and stood stoically as the Muggle he'd have to kill in order to leave the room alive was brought in. He noticed the details--a sprinkle of stubble, too-wide blue eyes with too much white showing, a coat that was new--and filed them away for his nightmares.
Astoria had been able to get away with using the Cutting Curse because she was only twelve, her birthday in two days, and no one expected a twelve year-old's magic to be able to support the weight of using an Unforgivable.
The rest of them were not so lucky.
Theodore stared at the man who looked at him with uncomprehending dread, summoning his self-loathing and his hatred for this situation both, and flicked his wand at him with a gesture that was so controlled it looked easy.
"Avada Kedavra."
Green light flashed and the man sagged, dead.
I want out, Theodore thought as he nodded his head graciously to the applause and left the room without a backwards glance at those left behind.
But how?
Four days later, after having been immersed in the Nott family library for the majority of the time since he'd stumbled out of the Floo, Theodore had part of what he hoped would become his answer.
More troubling was the fact that for all of the conditions required, he had no way to fulfill them on his own.
Still. It was a start. Theodore flipped through the pages of the book and leaned against the shelf. Sunlight, normally comforting, was banned from this area of the library. If his father had been home, he'd have beaten him for daring to enter this part of it. But my father is not here, Theodore thought rebelliously. And I, I will not be forced to recreate his mistakes.
The book was small and slim with yellowed pages and a deep purple cover that was made of dragon hide. The words Butterfly Bound were emblazoned on the spine, the front of the book left blank. A satin bookmark, a brilliant scarlet, was attached. He curled his fingers around the book's spine, closing it gently, and slipped it into his bag, then carefully rearranged the shelf where it had been to look as if there'd never been another book there. The house elves would say nothing, could say nothing--his father had removed their tongues years ago--and his father was in Azkaban, thanks to Harry Potter and his friends.
But it paid to be careful anyway, he thought, and murmured a spell that would obliterate all traces of his presence at this particular shelf.
Then he left the library.
He had summer homework to do. After that, he promised, he'd look into getting around some of the conditions. He was, after all, clever.
It shouldn't be too hard.
Modesty had never been a virtue of his. And he'd never been this motivated before.
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Originally posted on DW. Comment there. (Unless you want to comment here. That's fine too.)
Chapter 03: Won't Come Out
Rating: M (and/or R)
Words: 4,158
Summary: 6th year AU. Theodore/Hermione. When Harry lies dying from an unbreakable curse, Hermione is desperate to find a cure. After a summer of hell, Theodore wants nothing to do with the war. A Nott family heirloom provides the answer to both their prayers, but only if they can work together to survive the heirloom's demands. And even if they succeed, there's still a war to win...
Notes: Written for the 2012 Finish-a-Thon and
edellin's fic request.
Warnings: Torture-physical/emotional, psychological mindfuckery, kidnapping, gore, disturbing imagery, cannibalism, and death.
"Crucio!"
The Muggle woman shrieked and dropped, writhing, and kept on screaming a long ragged sound that held a desperate plea for mercy in it, though it was shrouded and over-whelmed by her agony. Theodore resisted the urge to cover his ears. It would not block out the sound adequately and it would give away his discomfort. He could not afford that. Not here and now. He shifted slightly, leaning back into the heavy drapes that, when the alcove he stood in was not in use, were left closed to keep it separate from the main hall, and cast a glance at his so-called companions.
So-called because the only things that glued them together were that all of them had a parent, or two, who were heavily involved with the Dark Lord and they were all Slytherin. Flint was at the forefront, watching closely as possible, though sweat beaded his forehead and Theodore doubted he was there of his own free will. He was proving a point to someone, probably his father, to show he could handle watching the brutality. Malfoy, too, was watching at the front, his fingers clenched on the bannister as if he wanted to turn away and knew better than to dare--not with Crabbe and Goyle watching. For the same reason, Theodore did not leave the room. Instead he affected boredom with the proceedings below and envied Blaise bitterly for Blaise was out of the country, visiting Italy with his mother, and did not have to watch this.
The woman kept screaming. Theodore wondered if they would hold her under until her mind broke and then give her to the werewolves or if they would let the curse go on until her heart stopped. He hoped for the latter and, because of that hope, suspected the former more likely.
Parkinson hovered next to Malfoy, looking torn between watching with wide eyes and holding onto Malfoy and not watching at all and being unable to decide either, compromised by not looking and not touching but not leaving either. The too-pale faces of Daphne and Astoria Greengrass were a contrast to the emotions crossing Parkinson's face. Warrington had his arms crossed over his chest, standing slightly in front of the Greengrass sisters as if to shield them though none of them lifted a wand to silence the screams.
They knew the penalties for that.
This was their testing.
Overall, Theodore thought, we fail.
He felt comfortable including himself in the failing group when that meant he didn't find pointless cruelty to be an intriguing concept. Crabbe and Goyle, he thought, passed. Or, if they did not, were far better at hiding it than the rest of them. Parkinson and Malfoy hovered on the edge. Warrington--he couldn't tell, just that he had the decency to try to keep the Greengrass sisters out of it as much as possible. But of course, Daphne was engaged to him. Any good fiancé would do the same, then, and that left Theodore less certain of his motives in any way.
And yet, he thought they all preferred the endless, climbing to madness, screams of this woman when compared to what Greyback had done when he'd taken the stage the three nights ago, under the light of the full moon. I never want to see him eat anyone ever again.
Bole had been unable to handle watching and had left the alcove. It had been two days since any of them had seen him and none of them held out much optimism for his survival. In this way, the Dark Lord finds the pure-bloods who can stomach his reign of terror. Theodore's eyes slid to watch Astoria as she leaned against her sister. And punishes the moderates and light-siding purebloods.
All along the great hall of the long-forgotten castle that the Dark Lord had claimed as his own there were similar alcoves. Each of them had pure-bloods of varying sympathies in them, forced to watch what happened below. They had been promised, if they survived the summer, they could go back to their homes, their families, their schools. Theodore suspected that a great many of their parents had been forced into silence with the promise that, if they kept the disappearance of their children a secret, they would get their children back.
He didn't know for sure, though. No newspapers were permitted within the castle and none of them were allowed to write. There is most of the summer to go. We shall all be broken by the end of it at this rate.
The woman's screams stopped abruptly in a broken gurgle.
"Her ribs snapped," Flint reported. His voice was harsh. "Punctured a lung. She's choking on blood now."
Daphne closed her eyes, going two shades paler, and wrapped an arm more firmly around Astoria's shoulders. Malfoy shivered as Parkinson peered down and then drew back, shuddering herself. Theodore remained where he was--ostensibly watching but angled just so that he couldn't see the victim. He could still hear her, sobbing through the hacking coughs that were thick with liquid, but he didn't look.
He wondered if the others could tell, or if they thought he had a full view and wasn't turning away.
"Is she the last for the night?" It was Crabbe who asked what all of them wanted to know but had not dared verbalize. Crabbe could because Crabbe could say it with disappointment in his voice.
Theodore swallowed bile.
"The schedule says two more," Flint said, after a long moment where no one else even breathed.
"Are we going to be kept here for the summer, do you think?" Theodore asked, to draw attention away from the way Astoria's face crumpled. She was only twelve, poor thing. He kept his voice as bland as he could. "Not that I mind," or would admit to minding, which most of the people here understood, "but most of us have summer homework and while Professor Snape would understand if we do not have it done, none of the other teachers would."
They stared at him like he was speaking another language.
He didn't blame them. Homework was the last thing he wanted to be talking about and, yet, it was casual enough that he thought it might be a viable topic, as if he really didn't care what was going on below them. Across the hall he could see the pale faces of other purebloods. Some Hogwarts age, others older.
Thank god for small mercies, he thought, that there are none younger.
Even Astoria, for all her youth, was going into her second year at Hogwarts. Looking at her, it didn't make much of a difference but Theodore pretended it did. If he stopped pretending then he was going to go the way of Bole and he didn't dare--he didn't have the excuse, even, of being from a moderate family. His father, had he not been in Azkaban, would have been down there, talking to the other Death Eaters.
No answer to his question came but that was all right. He watched across the hall, in silence, trying to guess who was on the other side and if they were doing the same as he was. Who watched, who didn't, who passed and who failed and how to tell when that all depended on what side of the war you were on.
Frankly Theodore thought that, even with all of this, he fell into the moderates. He had no wish, no interest to deal with Muggles--even the Muggleborn were only to be tolerated by him, truthfully, though they had the important part, they had magic--but all the same, these last few days had proven something to him:
He had zero interest in seeing anyone killed. He had even less than zero interest in doing any killing himself.
Theodore had suspicions that before the Dark Lord let them leave, those that had made it through the gauntlet of horrors, would be forced to kill at least once. A graduation exercise, so to speak. A way of dirtying their hands to keep their mouths shut. The Dark Lord wouldn't curse them to do it. If they didn't, they were dead. The rules of self-preservation meant that was enough of a goad for many of them to kill.
It would be enough for him, he knew, brutally honest with himself. Theodore had no intentions of dying here.
He hadn't spoken of his belief. He knew some of the others had guessed where this would go. Right now, with the exception of Greyback's attack, which had been the first they'd watched and done for the shock value, the deaths had been relatively clean. Horrific, but clean.
They could not stay that way. Already, this woman's torture and death was worse than what had occurred the past few nights.
Behind them, a door opened and a masked and robed Death Eater slipped into the room. None of them moved. The Death Eater did not leave the room and, instead, settled down on a chair to watch them watch the next exhibit.
Daphne's face turned stony. Astoria's lower lip quivered but no sound or tears escaped her. Malfoy looked like he was made of wax and even Parkinson looked like a wet blanket.
Theodore's fingers itched for his wand and he resisted the urge to toy with it. No need to give everyone a signal for how uncomfortable he was. Some would take heart from it but others would carry the tale directly to their parents and the Dark Lord.
I can't wait for this summer to end.
And yet, it was an ugly thought knowing, too, that by the end of the summer he'd either be a murderer or he'd be dead. That goes for all of us.
The next woman they brought out was stark naked and from her expression, she'd watched the last woman be tortured and had guessed what was in store for her.
Theodore clutched the stoic edges of his demeanor closer around his heart and wished he dared to close his eyes.
None of them did and none of them turned away.
In other alcoves there were likely students from other Houses, from other countries, and he had no idea what it was that they thought and did in order to endure.
In this alcove, however, they were all Slytherin. That meant something.
Hogwarts, at least, forces us to learn to survive.
Even when the woman was placed under the Imperius and forced to rip off her own arm, none of them flinched.
To do so would be to forfeit their own survival and they all knew it.
We're not brave, he thought, face expressionless. Not in a way that's loud and flashy. But this is our world and only the strong survive.
And being able to be strong, here and now, took its own sort of bravery.
As the woman, bleeding profusely from where her arm used to be, lifted the ravaged limb in her other hand and took a bite out of it, forced to do so by the Imperius Curse, Theodore wished, a little, that his bravery was that of a Gryffindor's.
Then he could do something stupid and it would be decided. He would probably die.
But watching the woman eat herself, he thought that might be the easy way out.
A commotion across the hall drew his attention. Red hair, he realized, shockingly so. A Weasley? Or is it another pure-blood? They were too far away to know for sure and none of them asked their watcher.
None of the Slytherins moved more than their eyes as they watched the red-head struggle, presumably with the watcher in that alcove, and then, seemingly winning, leap down.
It was magic that kept their legs from being broken as they landed on the main floor.
Green light flashed and the so-called wannabe hero collapsed, dead.
Helping nothing, helping no one, and dying quickly. The easy way out. Theodore held himself rigid and didn't look away when they forced the woman, bleeding to death under the Imperius, to stand, to make her way over to the body of the person who'd tried to do something to help her, however foolish and ill-thought out it had been, and pluck the eyes from the fresh corpse.
She ate them.
Theodore wished he could self-Obliviate.
"Nott."
Theodore paused in his reading--a treatise on the Dark Arts in medicine--and then glanced up, one finger marking his place. "Malfoy."
Draco Malfoy looked like crap. His face was tight and drawn and his hair slightly disheveled, like he'd forgotten how to charm it into place. He hadn't, Theodore knew, it was just that this place, wherever it was, was getting to him.
It was getting to Theodore too, though he took greater pains to hide it. In that, his colouring--dark hair, dark eyes, and skin that tanned rather than burnt and peeled like Malfoy's--aided him. If he looked a little drawn, well, it was because he was up at all hours reading through the castle's library.
Malfoy stepped in, uneasy, perhaps at the coolness in Theodore's voice. Or perhaps not, Theodore thought, watching the way that Malfoy struggled to hide his discomfort and the way his gaze flitted, like a scared bird's, around the room.
After a moment, Theodore took pity on him. "I'm surprised to see you here," he said, "no one but me has been much of a fan of the library."
It was, as Daphne had murmured, too Dark for their tastes given that they already had their fill of Darkness in each evening's mandatory 'entertainment'. Theodore didn't share that comment with anyone else but he understood it. Books had always been his friends though and he was loathe to give up one small bit of familiarity when this entire summer was one long unsettled state of mind.
"It's summer," Malfoy said, his shoulders relaxing slightly. He'd gotten the message; no one else was in the library right now. "What sort of person wants to spend their days trapped up with musty old books after doing that for most of the year already? Honestly, Nott."
"And yet," Theodore murmured, "here you are. Bored?"
Malfoy's laugh was quick, sharp and brittle. "None of us are," he said, throwing his head back arrogantly. "It's been an enlightening summer."
The words were right, Theodore thought critically. The arrogance was a good cover. Malfoy managed to not gesture to his newly Marked arm, which was even better.
But none of it hid the way there was something wild, panicked and lost in the tightness around Malfoy's eyes. Something fragile.
I don't want to be involved in this, Theodore thought hard at him. Not when our fathers are both imprisoned due to their own mistakes and you're being punished for your father's transgressions.
That led down the garden trail to thoughts of what it would mean for him. If Malfoy was being punished this way, with some impossible task (they'd been told as much, though no further details, by the other Death Eaters last night at dinner), then how were they going to punish him?
"I can recommend a book," Theodore said, after a silence a few shades too long, "if you want more enlightenment in your hot summer days." The sarcasm was layered on thick but it was nothing out of the ordinary, as anyone who knew them from school would know.
And I can see Crabbe lurking behind Malfoy. I don't think Malfoy is aware of it, though.
Every instinct Theodore had begged him to bow out of the conversation quickly, before Malfoy said anything that implicated either of them in things that he didn't need spread around. Things like a doubt for the Dark Lord. A fear of him was expected but doubt, like a wildfire, was undesirable.
"No," Malfoy said, with a twisted smile. "I don't want a book. Walk with me?"
The way he said it made it an offer and there was something in the tone that left Theodore trying to figure out the angles and ramifications of this. Was Malfoy to lead him to a punishment?
But... he knew Malfoy better than most, since for five long years they had roomed together. Theodore didn't think he was lying. If there is a trick here, it is one being played on Malfoy as well.
"What about a fly?" Theodore suggested. "We're allowed, right?"
Malfoy looked at him, surprise crossing his pale face. "I haven't heard it said that we're not," he said slowly. "Which is not the same as permission to do so."
Theodore slipped a cloth bookmark into place and closed his book, setting it on the table where anyone who wanted to see what he was reading would be able to do so easily. He was under no illusions that they were under surveillance enough for that to be a reasonable assumption. Not when there were a great many purebloods trapped on the castle grounds and at least half of those wanted out desperately.
He knew. He was one of them. The wards prevented anyone from leaving the lands surrounding the castle, though they were allowed outside, which Theodore considered both a kindness and a cruelty.
"Then let's go," Theodore said, standing. "If we're doing something wrong, someone will stop us. If we aren't, then we'll get to enjoy being up in the air."
Malfoy, thank Merlin, had enough sense to not comment on the fact that Theodore had never expressed a particular inclination towards flying before in his life. Indeed, Theodore had suffered through the first year's mandatory broom lessons, passed them, and promptly avoided using a broom as much as possible.
"Sure," Malfoy said, his stormy grey eyes direct. "I want out."
Crabbe took the message to mean they were still talking about flying. Theodore got the real message. Perhaps Malfoy did know the other boy was there, behind him.
"You'll fly rings around me," Theodore said easily as Crabbe melted away into the shadows and he and Malfoy fell into step. "Take it easy, all right?"
"I'll show you a few tricks," Malfoy said, a faint smile hovering on his lips for what Theodore thought was the first time all summer. "You never know, maybe you'll get good enough one day to try out for the team."
Theodore scoffed and they continued their, to all appearances, amicable conversation about Quidditch as they headed outside. No one stopped them. That was, he thought, in some circumstances to be considered permission.
Sort of.
The fact that they were being allowed might mean that they would later be punished for it. It was a possibility that couldn't quite be ignored.
Once they were outside, though, Theodore gave into the urge to respond to Malfoy's confession now that Crabbe had disappeared. No doubt another watcher would be along soon.
"I'm glad we're out," Theodore said as he stretched. There was a broom shed on the grounds. They made their way towards that. "Sometimes you have good ideas."
"Prat," Malfoy said, without heat. "This was your idea. Take responsibility for it if we get in trouble."
"I think we'll be found equally guilty," he replied lightly. "And isn't that a comfort?"
"Not really, no." Malfoy hesitated, then said, "I hate Muggles."
Theodore gave him a level look. "So do I."
"But this is…" Malfoy's voice dropped even as he kept the same faint smile he'd had before. "Not my idea of fun."
"Well," Theodore said, a warning in his voice as they stepped into the poorly-lit shed and surveyed the brooms critically, "what else can we do?"
Both of them were silent.
What else could they do?
I have no wish to die, Theodore thought, and neither does Malfoy.
But they dropped the conversation in favour of flight. Neither of them were surprised when Flint and Goyle came by less than ten minutes later to join them.
They never revisited the conversation. Malfoy's gaze was troubled, afterwards, a little more often. Theodore pulled further into himself, spending even more time in the library.
Both of them were thinking over their options.
Neither of them found them much to their liking.
Five weeks later Theodore watched expressionlessly as Astoria Greengrass used the Cutting Curse on a man and then stood there, as blank-faced as a professional, while the man bled to death.
The Death Eaters clapped their approval and didn't notice the fine trembling in her shoulders as she raised her head proudly and left the room at their permission, her dignity wrapped around her like a cloak.
Good girl, Theodore thought. Stay alive.
It was what they did, as Slytherins. Survive. He didn't know what the purebloods from the other Houses were using as their reasoning to stay alive. To his mild surprise, all four Houses were making an approximately equal showing.
They'd all lost some and all of them knew that those who'd lost were killed. He wondered if their parents would raise a fuss about their murdered children--if they would dare to do so when the Dark Lord had already proven to be able to walk through their wards with impunity.
Perhaps, he thought, it was fear that kept them all alive now.
There was only this and then they were going to be sent back to their homes for the last week of summer. It was a risk, they were taking, letting them go. But in order to leave, as he'd predicted, they were forced to become murderers.
That will keep us silent, I think. And Dumbledore, it seems, has no time for anyone now that Potter's come down with something that amuses the Dark Lord a great deal. There is no redemption there, no protection. We are on our own.
Daphne Greengrass was next. She passed.
Then Malfoy. He passed too, his face pale but composed.
Then it was his turn.
Theodore stepped out of the dwindling line and stood stoically as the Muggle he'd have to kill in order to leave the room alive was brought in. He noticed the details--a sprinkle of stubble, too-wide blue eyes with too much white showing, a coat that was new--and filed them away for his nightmares.
Astoria had been able to get away with using the Cutting Curse because she was only twelve, her birthday in two days, and no one expected a twelve year-old's magic to be able to support the weight of using an Unforgivable.
The rest of them were not so lucky.
Theodore stared at the man who looked at him with uncomprehending dread, summoning his self-loathing and his hatred for this situation both, and flicked his wand at him with a gesture that was so controlled it looked easy.
"Avada Kedavra."
Green light flashed and the man sagged, dead.
I want out, Theodore thought as he nodded his head graciously to the applause and left the room without a backwards glance at those left behind.
But how?
Four days later, after having been immersed in the Nott family library for the majority of the time since he'd stumbled out of the Floo, Theodore had part of what he hoped would become his answer.
More troubling was the fact that for all of the conditions required, he had no way to fulfill them on his own.
Still. It was a start. Theodore flipped through the pages of the book and leaned against the shelf. Sunlight, normally comforting, was banned from this area of the library. If his father had been home, he'd have beaten him for daring to enter this part of it. But my father is not here, Theodore thought rebelliously. And I, I will not be forced to recreate his mistakes.
The book was small and slim with yellowed pages and a deep purple cover that was made of dragon hide. The words Butterfly Bound were emblazoned on the spine, the front of the book left blank. A satin bookmark, a brilliant scarlet, was attached. He curled his fingers around the book's spine, closing it gently, and slipped it into his bag, then carefully rearranged the shelf where it had been to look as if there'd never been another book there. The house elves would say nothing, could say nothing--his father had removed their tongues years ago--and his father was in Azkaban, thanks to Harry Potter and his friends.
But it paid to be careful anyway, he thought, and murmured a spell that would obliterate all traces of his presence at this particular shelf.
Then he left the library.
He had summer homework to do. After that, he promised, he'd look into getting around some of the conditions. He was, after all, clever.
It shouldn't be too hard.
Modesty had never been a virtue of his. And he'd never been this motivated before.
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