Chapter 10
Neville awoke slowly, the pounding in his head warning him to be cautious of any sudden movements – but it was not just a hangover, was it? There was something else he should remember, wasn’t there…?
“Open your eyes, Mr. Fane, we know you’re awake.”
Damn it all, why did he always have to get the intelligent villains? That muggle fellow, Bond, always faced megalomaniacal madmen intent on world destruction or domination – brilliant in theory, but hopelessly impractical – but of course, Neville faced a very sane, very experienced man who knew much more about power and influence, and who was nothing if not terrifyingly pragmatic.
A man, moreover, who had always intimidated him as a boy, and had continued to do so even into adulthood.
Someone out there was laughing at him.
A short, sharp slap bought his eyes flying open, dispelling any inclination to amusement.
Draco Malfoy looked down at him – was standing over him, because he was currently tied hand and foot to a chair against the wall – with a calm, patient expression. For a moment Neville panicked, sure that his disguise had run its course and he was regressing back to his normal self, but there was no recognition in Malfoy’s eyes – only that terrifying patience – and so he breathed a sigh of relief.
Naturally those sharp eyes caught it, and narrowed. “In your position, Mr. Fane, I would not find this situation reassuring. Perhaps you could tell us what you find so comforting?”
Neville ignored the sarcasm. Us?
Patrick Kelly stepped out of the shadows in the corner of the room. “He’s an Auror,” he accused. “Words don’t intimidate them.”
Neville flinched. How did they know? Did someone betray me? Has Malfoy still got contacts inside the Corps? Both of his tormentors noticed it, and suddenly their focus sharpened, their eyes narrowed in speculation. Merlin’s Balls…
Now, he was afraid, as he hadn’t been before. They’d made him. They would trace his presence back to Ginny’s investigation – after she had sworn there were no hidden tricks in her open assessment of the situation. Even given her past association with Malfoy, she could be in serious danger…
This interrogation was no longer a joke.
Nevertheless…
“What do you suggest, then, Mr. Kelly?” Malfoy’s drawl was insufferably blasé. He eased himself down into a chair, crossed his legs, and began to examine his nails. “Tell me what intimidates brave, bold Aurors.”
The Irishman shrugged. “That depends on what action the particular Auror has seen, where they’ve served – who they’ve fought…”
A raised brow. “Well, Mr. Fane?”
Neville scowled. He was terrified, and they were playing mind games with him? “Fuck you, Malfoy,” he scowled. He worked some saliva into his mouth, looked his childhood menace straight in the eye, and spat in his face. There was a moment of enormous satisfaction, and then –
Kelly backhanded him so hard his head jerked back and hit the stone wall with a sickening crack, and blood flew from his split lip in a spray of scarlet pearl drops.
When he could see again past the blinding pain and the flashes of coloured light, Draco was calmly wiping his face with an immaculate linen handkerchief. “If you are quite finished,” he said gently, “I would like you to answer some questions for me. I think you know very well what they are…”
He had learned the price of open insolence. Instead, sullenly, he turned his face to the side and refused to answer.
Kelly grasped his chin and forced his face around, squatted down so that they were both eye to eye with each other, and spoke in a very low voice. “Answer the man’s questions, boyo.” In his other hand, he held his wand with negligent, threatening ease, tapped it significantly against a very sensitive part of Neville’s anatomy, sending shivers down his spine. “It’ll go worse for you if you don’t…”
Neville breathed hoarsely, trying to meet Kelly’s eyes steadily without blinking. But when he spoke, it was not to Kelly, but to his master behind him. “Why don’t you just use the curse and be done with it? Isn’t that your preferred method?”
There was a short, sharp silence, and then, “Ah,” Malfoy said quietly. “Now that is interesting…”
**************************************************
Why don’t you just use the curse and be done with it?
Draco registered the impact of that particular verbal blow, but didn’t give any indication of it. It seemed their false Mr. Fane knew very well of what he spoke, and what it would mean to him – to Draco Malfoy, who had killed his own father in such a fashion – and what a grievous mistake it was to reveal such intimate and in-depth knowledge of his affairs.
There were very, very few people who knew the true details his father’s death.
Rather than explaining things, their prisoner had only inspired more questions. But Draco was not entirely sure, now, that he wanted those questions answered…
************************************************
It was seven a. m., and Ginny was beginning to worry. Neville had not yet reported in, and while it was entirely possible that he could have picked up another Larissa, or Clarissa, and simply lost track of time, she did not believe it.
Something was wrong. She could feel it.
He had been found out.
************************************************
Patrick Kelly was glad that he was not the poor fool of an Auror currently enjoying the full focus of Malfoy’s attentions. A brave, bold Auror – wasn’t that what Malfoy had said? There had been real venom in his words, true anger – the man had been an Auror himself, once upon a time. He had fought for ten brutal, disheartening years against the most bloodthirsty Dark Wizard Britain had ever seen. He had spent far too long in an Active Service Unit, fighting the dirty, vicious fight that the newspapers never saw, and that most of the lily-white politicians preferred not to acknowledge.
And then, when it was all over, when there was no more need for the extreme pragmatism of the war-time Aurors, when ruthless killers were liabilities rather than vital assets, he had been cast off. Had his father’s cold-blooded execution occurred during the war, rather than at its very end, it would have been overlooked, covered up –
“Mr. Kelly,” Malfoy ordered tersely, “go and see what Higgins has found out about Harry Fane, Auror.”
Kelly nodded, acknowledging the order. They had already done a rigorous security check on Harry Fane, ordinary citizen, but evidently the Auror Corps had established a very thorough false identity for their plant, because he and Higgins had been well and truly taken in. As soon as they had – as tactfully as they could – informed Malfoy that their bartender was a plant, he had ordered another check, this time of the Auror Corps’ records.
He met Higgins in the other man’s office, saw him frowning down at a thick dossier, entitled ‘Fane, Henry Olivier’. He raised a brow. “I wouldn’t have pinned our Mr. Fane as a Frenchman.”
Higgins shook his head, removed the old-fashioned half moon spectacles he used for reading. “No, nor I. But that’s not the only thing that’s out about him…”
“Oh?”
“Special Agent Fane has been in Spain for the last six months, pretending to be a sympathetic Basque wizard – he came back the day before our Mr. Fane applied for the job. There’s no way this operations could have been prepared this quickly – and certainly no way he could have shed all his Spanish mannerisms so quickly either, unless he’s a phenomenal undercover agent, in which case we would not have caught him.”
“Go on,” Kelly said, intrigued. “What are you suggesting?”
“That our Mr. Fane is not this man,” he tapped the dossier, “at all, but someone else using his identity.”
“Or his appearance…”
Higgins looked at Kelly, drinking in the implications of that thought.
*******************************
“Ginny, you can’t go,” Tonks argued. “If he has Neville, then he knows all about you. It’s too dangerous.”
Ginny pulled on a pair of soft, black leather gloves and faced the older woman resolutely. “I sent him in there. If I hadn’t convinced him to take the role, if I hadn’t flaunted the investigation under Malfoy’s nose, he wouldn’t have been found out. I can’t just leave him in Malfoy’s hands – we all know what’ll happen…”
As so many, many people had told her too many times before, Draco Malfoy was an aristocratic Slytherin. There were no discernable differences between him and those of his classmates who had chosen the Dark Lord; all that separated them was restraint and a very, very thin change of intentions. The Death Eaters were amoral, ruthless and sadistic? So was Draco. The Death Eaters reveled in destruction and degradation, in fire and blood and murder? Well, and some part of Draco did too – some deep, dark place in his soul that he preferred not to explore.
He had a dark side. And there were times when he let it run free…
“I have to save him,” she said again.
Tonks sighed. “Then at least take someone else with you. Don’t go in alone.”
But Ginny’s mind was made up. “No. If I take anyone else in, they will become a target too.” She stopped, turned to Tonks, who knew more than most about the details of her relationship with Malfoy. “He won’t hurt me – no matter how angry he is, he won’t ever turn against me. I honestly believe that, Tonks.”
Tonks’ expression stated clearly that she thought Ginny was mad. But in the face of such utter conviction, she could only give in and hope that Ginny’s faith in Draco Malfoy was justified.
Because if it wasn’t…
*******************************
Polyjuice.
He’d thought they had impenetrable safeguards against the bloody stuff and all other similar potions – random drug tests, strict monitoring of all liquids brought onto the premises, surveillance spells in the restrooms – but in a club where illusion and oblivion was the raison d’etre, it was impossible to completely eradicate any and all consciousness – and physique – altering substances.
His own spells, spinning sex and illusions as it did, were some of the most potent narcotics in wizarding England – but the Malfoy magic had been around much, much longer than any of the Ministry’s laws.
But Polyjuice in a false employee was not just the sign of a person seeking to hide and correct physical defects. It was a sign of a profound deception…
“Perhaps, Mr. Fane,” he said slowly and deliberately, “you would like to tell me the truth? What is your name?”
There was no response.
Once more, he said it. “Tell me your real name…”
Again, nothing but stubborn silence.
He sighed, and began to roll up the sleeves of his robes. “Very well, Mr. Fane. We’ll do this the hard way.”
For the first time, the false Harry Fane’s eyes widened, and he saw fear darken their depths.
It took a further half an hour and the application of a number of quite brutal curses before the impostor was willing to speak. And then, his voice hoarse and broken from screaming, he whispered two words that honestly shocked Draco Malfoy for the first time in a very, very long while.
“Neville… Long…bottom…”
Suddenly a number of puzzling things became quite clear. A number of nagging questions were resolved – and a very unpalatable conclusion seemed to be the only answer, as much as he wanted to deny it.
Ginny had deceived him.
************************************************
It was only just past eight in the morning, and the entry hall was deserted. Ginny shivered as she registered the oppressive silence, the air of tension – it all pricked at her highly developed survival instincts, the subconscious forebodings that had saved her life several times over. There was a firm, crisp tread of footsteps coming towards her, and she turned to see Higgins coming to greet her.
She had, after all, had an appointment.
But it seemed that Higgins – whom she had always thought of as an old, burly teddy bear – was suddenly very serious, very grave. There was something very wrong here, no matter that she had come fully expecting it.
The old, battered man looked at her with strange, unfriendly eyes. “He knows,” he said, almost accusing her. “He knows what you’ve done.”
She could not meet his gaze.
“I’ll tell him you’re here,” Higgins said quietly. “You’d best be careful.”
******************************************
It was surprising how much it hurt. Ten years on, and this kind of betrayal still stung, when he knew damn well he should be immune – in fact, he should have expected it. Her first loyalty had always been to the Ministry, not to him.
Higgins knocked on the door, ignoring the slumped figure tied to the chair. “Ms Weasley’s here,” he said woodenly, extremely discreet. “She wants to speak to you.”
Draco looked up blankly, not quite comprehending – Ginny? Here? Now? – but Kelly cleared his throat, and he snapped back to reality.
Ginny. Here. Now. She always did have the most spectacularly bad timing…
He washed his hands, dried them, let his sleeves down again, and brushed past Higgins on the way out.
**********************************************
As soon as she saw him stalking towards her, she knew that she had made a mistake.
She knew all the signs of Draco Malfoy in a temper – and all the varying degrees of it – and knew further that she had not just picked a bad time, but that this time the temper was aimed directly at her.
But, being Ginny Weasley, she squared her shoulders, lifted her chin, and stood her ground. “We need to talk, Malfoy.”
He ignored her, walked straight up to her, invading her personal space, and grabbed her by the arm, his grip tight, almost bruising. “You lied to me,” he breathed, as if he could not quite believe it. “You stood there, looked me in the eye, and you lied to me.”
Unfortunately, that probably meant that he had found her out – and the small flicker of apprehension sparked her temper. “Oh please, Draco, don’t be naïve. It doesn’t become you. Everybody lies.”
“No,” he said, still eerily calm. “Not everybody. Lie to your boss, lie to your friends, even lie to your family, if you feel you must, but don’t ever, ever lie to me.”
“Why should you be the one person who matters? What gives you that right? You lied to me, ten years ago –“
“I have never lied to you,” he snapped. “Not once, since you became the most important –“ and he cut himself off, denying her any signs of vulnerability that she could attack – would attack, in her current temper, in his. And it was temper – here was the vitriol of ten years of misunderstandings between them, rising to the surface after years of slow simmering. They argued in quiet, normal tones that were all the more vicious for their civility.
Slytherin aristocrats did not shout. There were times when she thought it would have been better if they did.
“The most important what, Draco? More important than your vengeance against your father and all your other enemies? More important than the honour of your precious House? You used me so that you could get close enough to kill your father – he was always the most important thing in your life, not me. You killed him and then you walked away…”
“No,” he snarled, frustrated. “I killed him so we could have a new beginning.”
“You put him down like the rabid dog he was to clear the Malfoy name.” Draco went white, his head jerking back as if she had struck him. “Did you lie to him then, and speak of mercy? You say your father never lied to you –“
“Enough,” he breathed. “Stop.”
“No, it’s not enough. It will never be enough until -”
“Stop!” he warned, before he did something quite unforgivable.
She stopped.
Neville awoke slowly, the pounding in his head warning him to be cautious of any sudden movements – but it was not just a hangover, was it? There was something else he should remember, wasn’t there…?
“Open your eyes, Mr. Fane, we know you’re awake.”
Damn it all, why did he always have to get the intelligent villains? That muggle fellow, Bond, always faced megalomaniacal madmen intent on world destruction or domination – brilliant in theory, but hopelessly impractical – but of course, Neville faced a very sane, very experienced man who knew much more about power and influence, and who was nothing if not terrifyingly pragmatic.
A man, moreover, who had always intimidated him as a boy, and had continued to do so even into adulthood.
Someone out there was laughing at him.
A short, sharp slap bought his eyes flying open, dispelling any inclination to amusement.
Draco Malfoy looked down at him – was standing over him, because he was currently tied hand and foot to a chair against the wall – with a calm, patient expression. For a moment Neville panicked, sure that his disguise had run its course and he was regressing back to his normal self, but there was no recognition in Malfoy’s eyes – only that terrifying patience – and so he breathed a sigh of relief.
Naturally those sharp eyes caught it, and narrowed. “In your position, Mr. Fane, I would not find this situation reassuring. Perhaps you could tell us what you find so comforting?”
Neville ignored the sarcasm. Us?
Patrick Kelly stepped out of the shadows in the corner of the room. “He’s an Auror,” he accused. “Words don’t intimidate them.”
Neville flinched. How did they know? Did someone betray me? Has Malfoy still got contacts inside the Corps? Both of his tormentors noticed it, and suddenly their focus sharpened, their eyes narrowed in speculation. Merlin’s Balls…
Now, he was afraid, as he hadn’t been before. They’d made him. They would trace his presence back to Ginny’s investigation – after she had sworn there were no hidden tricks in her open assessment of the situation. Even given her past association with Malfoy, she could be in serious danger…
This interrogation was no longer a joke.
Nevertheless…
“What do you suggest, then, Mr. Kelly?” Malfoy’s drawl was insufferably blasé. He eased himself down into a chair, crossed his legs, and began to examine his nails. “Tell me what intimidates brave, bold Aurors.”
The Irishman shrugged. “That depends on what action the particular Auror has seen, where they’ve served – who they’ve fought…”
A raised brow. “Well, Mr. Fane?”
Neville scowled. He was terrified, and they were playing mind games with him? “Fuck you, Malfoy,” he scowled. He worked some saliva into his mouth, looked his childhood menace straight in the eye, and spat in his face. There was a moment of enormous satisfaction, and then –
Kelly backhanded him so hard his head jerked back and hit the stone wall with a sickening crack, and blood flew from his split lip in a spray of scarlet pearl drops.
When he could see again past the blinding pain and the flashes of coloured light, Draco was calmly wiping his face with an immaculate linen handkerchief. “If you are quite finished,” he said gently, “I would like you to answer some questions for me. I think you know very well what they are…”
He had learned the price of open insolence. Instead, sullenly, he turned his face to the side and refused to answer.
Kelly grasped his chin and forced his face around, squatted down so that they were both eye to eye with each other, and spoke in a very low voice. “Answer the man’s questions, boyo.” In his other hand, he held his wand with negligent, threatening ease, tapped it significantly against a very sensitive part of Neville’s anatomy, sending shivers down his spine. “It’ll go worse for you if you don’t…”
Neville breathed hoarsely, trying to meet Kelly’s eyes steadily without blinking. But when he spoke, it was not to Kelly, but to his master behind him. “Why don’t you just use the curse and be done with it? Isn’t that your preferred method?”
There was a short, sharp silence, and then, “Ah,” Malfoy said quietly. “Now that is interesting…”
**************************************************
Why don’t you just use the curse and be done with it?
Draco registered the impact of that particular verbal blow, but didn’t give any indication of it. It seemed their false Mr. Fane knew very well of what he spoke, and what it would mean to him – to Draco Malfoy, who had killed his own father in such a fashion – and what a grievous mistake it was to reveal such intimate and in-depth knowledge of his affairs.
There were very, very few people who knew the true details his father’s death.
Rather than explaining things, their prisoner had only inspired more questions. But Draco was not entirely sure, now, that he wanted those questions answered…
************************************************
It was seven a. m., and Ginny was beginning to worry. Neville had not yet reported in, and while it was entirely possible that he could have picked up another Larissa, or Clarissa, and simply lost track of time, she did not believe it.
Something was wrong. She could feel it.
He had been found out.
************************************************
Patrick Kelly was glad that he was not the poor fool of an Auror currently enjoying the full focus of Malfoy’s attentions. A brave, bold Auror – wasn’t that what Malfoy had said? There had been real venom in his words, true anger – the man had been an Auror himself, once upon a time. He had fought for ten brutal, disheartening years against the most bloodthirsty Dark Wizard Britain had ever seen. He had spent far too long in an Active Service Unit, fighting the dirty, vicious fight that the newspapers never saw, and that most of the lily-white politicians preferred not to acknowledge.
And then, when it was all over, when there was no more need for the extreme pragmatism of the war-time Aurors, when ruthless killers were liabilities rather than vital assets, he had been cast off. Had his father’s cold-blooded execution occurred during the war, rather than at its very end, it would have been overlooked, covered up –
“Mr. Kelly,” Malfoy ordered tersely, “go and see what Higgins has found out about Harry Fane, Auror.”
Kelly nodded, acknowledging the order. They had already done a rigorous security check on Harry Fane, ordinary citizen, but evidently the Auror Corps had established a very thorough false identity for their plant, because he and Higgins had been well and truly taken in. As soon as they had – as tactfully as they could – informed Malfoy that their bartender was a plant, he had ordered another check, this time of the Auror Corps’ records.
He met Higgins in the other man’s office, saw him frowning down at a thick dossier, entitled ‘Fane, Henry Olivier’. He raised a brow. “I wouldn’t have pinned our Mr. Fane as a Frenchman.”
Higgins shook his head, removed the old-fashioned half moon spectacles he used for reading. “No, nor I. But that’s not the only thing that’s out about him…”
“Oh?”
“Special Agent Fane has been in Spain for the last six months, pretending to be a sympathetic Basque wizard – he came back the day before our Mr. Fane applied for the job. There’s no way this operations could have been prepared this quickly – and certainly no way he could have shed all his Spanish mannerisms so quickly either, unless he’s a phenomenal undercover agent, in which case we would not have caught him.”
“Go on,” Kelly said, intrigued. “What are you suggesting?”
“That our Mr. Fane is not this man,” he tapped the dossier, “at all, but someone else using his identity.”
“Or his appearance…”
Higgins looked at Kelly, drinking in the implications of that thought.
*******************************
“Ginny, you can’t go,” Tonks argued. “If he has Neville, then he knows all about you. It’s too dangerous.”
Ginny pulled on a pair of soft, black leather gloves and faced the older woman resolutely. “I sent him in there. If I hadn’t convinced him to take the role, if I hadn’t flaunted the investigation under Malfoy’s nose, he wouldn’t have been found out. I can’t just leave him in Malfoy’s hands – we all know what’ll happen…”
As so many, many people had told her too many times before, Draco Malfoy was an aristocratic Slytherin. There were no discernable differences between him and those of his classmates who had chosen the Dark Lord; all that separated them was restraint and a very, very thin change of intentions. The Death Eaters were amoral, ruthless and sadistic? So was Draco. The Death Eaters reveled in destruction and degradation, in fire and blood and murder? Well, and some part of Draco did too – some deep, dark place in his soul that he preferred not to explore.
He had a dark side. And there were times when he let it run free…
“I have to save him,” she said again.
Tonks sighed. “Then at least take someone else with you. Don’t go in alone.”
But Ginny’s mind was made up. “No. If I take anyone else in, they will become a target too.” She stopped, turned to Tonks, who knew more than most about the details of her relationship with Malfoy. “He won’t hurt me – no matter how angry he is, he won’t ever turn against me. I honestly believe that, Tonks.”
Tonks’ expression stated clearly that she thought Ginny was mad. But in the face of such utter conviction, she could only give in and hope that Ginny’s faith in Draco Malfoy was justified.
Because if it wasn’t…
*******************************
Polyjuice.
He’d thought they had impenetrable safeguards against the bloody stuff and all other similar potions – random drug tests, strict monitoring of all liquids brought onto the premises, surveillance spells in the restrooms – but in a club where illusion and oblivion was the raison d’etre, it was impossible to completely eradicate any and all consciousness – and physique – altering substances.
His own spells, spinning sex and illusions as it did, were some of the most potent narcotics in wizarding England – but the Malfoy magic had been around much, much longer than any of the Ministry’s laws.
But Polyjuice in a false employee was not just the sign of a person seeking to hide and correct physical defects. It was a sign of a profound deception…
“Perhaps, Mr. Fane,” he said slowly and deliberately, “you would like to tell me the truth? What is your name?”
There was no response.
Once more, he said it. “Tell me your real name…”
Again, nothing but stubborn silence.
He sighed, and began to roll up the sleeves of his robes. “Very well, Mr. Fane. We’ll do this the hard way.”
For the first time, the false Harry Fane’s eyes widened, and he saw fear darken their depths.
It took a further half an hour and the application of a number of quite brutal curses before the impostor was willing to speak. And then, his voice hoarse and broken from screaming, he whispered two words that honestly shocked Draco Malfoy for the first time in a very, very long while.
“Neville… Long…bottom…”
Suddenly a number of puzzling things became quite clear. A number of nagging questions were resolved – and a very unpalatable conclusion seemed to be the only answer, as much as he wanted to deny it.
Ginny had deceived him.
************************************************
It was only just past eight in the morning, and the entry hall was deserted. Ginny shivered as she registered the oppressive silence, the air of tension – it all pricked at her highly developed survival instincts, the subconscious forebodings that had saved her life several times over. There was a firm, crisp tread of footsteps coming towards her, and she turned to see Higgins coming to greet her.
She had, after all, had an appointment.
But it seemed that Higgins – whom she had always thought of as an old, burly teddy bear – was suddenly very serious, very grave. There was something very wrong here, no matter that she had come fully expecting it.
The old, battered man looked at her with strange, unfriendly eyes. “He knows,” he said, almost accusing her. “He knows what you’ve done.”
She could not meet his gaze.
“I’ll tell him you’re here,” Higgins said quietly. “You’d best be careful.”
******************************************
It was surprising how much it hurt. Ten years on, and this kind of betrayal still stung, when he knew damn well he should be immune – in fact, he should have expected it. Her first loyalty had always been to the Ministry, not to him.
Higgins knocked on the door, ignoring the slumped figure tied to the chair. “Ms Weasley’s here,” he said woodenly, extremely discreet. “She wants to speak to you.”
Draco looked up blankly, not quite comprehending – Ginny? Here? Now? – but Kelly cleared his throat, and he snapped back to reality.
Ginny. Here. Now. She always did have the most spectacularly bad timing…
He washed his hands, dried them, let his sleeves down again, and brushed past Higgins on the way out.
**********************************************
As soon as she saw him stalking towards her, she knew that she had made a mistake.
She knew all the signs of Draco Malfoy in a temper – and all the varying degrees of it – and knew further that she had not just picked a bad time, but that this time the temper was aimed directly at her.
But, being Ginny Weasley, she squared her shoulders, lifted her chin, and stood her ground. “We need to talk, Malfoy.”
He ignored her, walked straight up to her, invading her personal space, and grabbed her by the arm, his grip tight, almost bruising. “You lied to me,” he breathed, as if he could not quite believe it. “You stood there, looked me in the eye, and you lied to me.”
Unfortunately, that probably meant that he had found her out – and the small flicker of apprehension sparked her temper. “Oh please, Draco, don’t be naïve. It doesn’t become you. Everybody lies.”
“No,” he said, still eerily calm. “Not everybody. Lie to your boss, lie to your friends, even lie to your family, if you feel you must, but don’t ever, ever lie to me.”
“Why should you be the one person who matters? What gives you that right? You lied to me, ten years ago –“
“I have never lied to you,” he snapped. “Not once, since you became the most important –“ and he cut himself off, denying her any signs of vulnerability that she could attack – would attack, in her current temper, in his. And it was temper – here was the vitriol of ten years of misunderstandings between them, rising to the surface after years of slow simmering. They argued in quiet, normal tones that were all the more vicious for their civility.
Slytherin aristocrats did not shout. There were times when she thought it would have been better if they did.
“The most important what, Draco? More important than your vengeance against your father and all your other enemies? More important than the honour of your precious House? You used me so that you could get close enough to kill your father – he was always the most important thing in your life, not me. You killed him and then you walked away…”
“No,” he snarled, frustrated. “I killed him so we could have a new beginning.”
“You put him down like the rabid dog he was to clear the Malfoy name.” Draco went white, his head jerking back as if she had struck him. “Did you lie to him then, and speak of mercy? You say your father never lied to you –“
“Enough,” he breathed. “Stop.”
“No, it’s not enough. It will never be enough until -”
“Stop!” he warned, before he did something quite unforgivable.
She stopped.
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