Chapter 8: Taking Sides

6th June 1997

‘Malfoy!’

Someone is shaking him; the person’s nails dig into the flesh, through the thin fabric of his - Ron Weasley’s - shirt.

‘Please, Malfoy, wake up!’

Tentatively, painfully, he opens his eyes, and Ginny Weasley comes into view. Her face is ashen and tear-streaked.

His head hurts.

‘Weas - Weasley? What happened?’ He hears his voice and is vaguely shocked at how hoarse and far away it sounds.

‘You used my wand, Malfoy,’ says Weasley, and he realizes that she does so between sobs. ‘You used my wand and you drove the Dementors away…’

‘I ... I drove the Dementors away?’

‘Yes,’ replies Weasley, ‘but we need to go, Malfoy. They only just fled, I have no idea if they’ll come back, and it’s clear that this is the most unsafe place that we can possibly be in…And no one’s come yet, I don’t want to imagine why. D’you think you can get up?’

‘I - ’ Gingerly, as she lets go of his shoulders, he attempts to push himself up off the floor. His legs feel weak, and she has to reach out again to steady him as he slowly straightens up. Strangely, as he lifts up his heavy head, body half against Weasley’s, the world that swims before him is almost disappointingly as it was before. The glass wall, the chandelier, the books they had opened left on the table - are untouched.

But Weasley chokes another sob, and tendrils of frost remain in his chest.

~

‘Gin - Ginny, are you alright?’ Ron Weasley rushes up the stairs towards them, but it is a shock when Weasley grabs his free arm none too gently and leans him onto himself.

Wryly, he wonders if it is time he accepts that he is already a part of them.

‘We heard you screaming, Gin,’ says Potter, and already he is - unnecessarily - pulling her at the waist, away from Draco, towards himself. ‘And - and we could feel them…’

‘The wards didn’t hold them,’ he finally speaks, ‘It’s the glass. We have to get to some place else. I suggest the dungeons would be safe.’

Granger nods at this; she and Groan are at the bottom of the stairs, wands drawn. Then her eyes narrow - ‘Malfoy, were you the one who cast that last Patronus?’

He looks straight at her for a moment, not speaking, before nodding.

‘But how…’ her voice trails off, and then she shakes her head as if to clear it. ‘In any case, I don’t suppose we have the time to think about that now. We have to get out of the library, and if they’ve attacked the rest of the school we’ll have to go out and fight. There’re so many non-magical people in the school, it’ll be a massacre if the Death Eaters and Dementors really mean to attack. And Higgs told me - there are Aurors on the grounds, but most of the Order should be planning the attack on the Death Eater quarters.’

‘Right,’ says Potter, and reluctantly, he finds himself registering the decisiveness and clarity in his countenance. He almost catches himself feeling grateful for it. ‘Ron, you had better bring Ginny and Malfoy to the Slytherin dungeons, and stay with them at least until Ginny recovers. Malfoy’ll lead you through the quietest route he knows. Hermione, Groan, you’ll come with me.’

~

They make it to the dorm safely; still, even as he has chosen, unfortunately just as Potter directed, ‘the quietest route’, he finds it strange that the halls they pass are eerily empty, silent.

He still does not trust himself to walk however - Ron Weasley took to Levitating him halfway out of the library - and Ginny Weasley still looks like she could faint at any moment. He should be thankful for the quiet.

Ron Weasley mutters a quick ‘Finite Incantatem’ and he finds himself unceremoniously landing on a loveseat in the Common Room. He shoots him a look, but Weasley simply retorts, ‘It’s a soft place to land, what?’

‘You must have chocolates around, don’t you, Ron?’ asks Ginny Weasley, who seats herself across from him. Her voice is steady at least, if small. He wonders what exactly the Dementors made her see.

‘Yeah, I do, of course. I’ll go get them,’ replies her brother, and he lopes off in the direction of the Seventh Year Slytherin boys’ dorm.

‘Does Weasley frequently forget that he is a wizard?’ he sneers, pulling himself up from the loveseat. A brief wave of nausea passes over him. ‘He could have just Accio-ed his chocolate over here.’

‘It’s supposed to be the holidays, he probably forgets,’ replies Ginny Weasley, her expression distant. She seems to be looking past his shoulder. He resists the immediate impulse to turn around, and instead keeps his eyes trained on her.

‘You’re about as bad as Potter with Dementors, aren’t you, Weasley?’ he finally asks, but managing to check the venom in his tone. He tells himself that he would, after all, rather invite answers than retorts at this point.

‘I doubt anyone’s good with Dementors, Malfoy,’ she replies, and he finds himself almost relieved to hear a faint steeliness return to her voice. ‘And there were a lot of them, and it wasn’t as if you were helping until that one Patronus you cast.’

‘Which happened to be the one that saved the both of us?’ He reminds her, arching a brow. Her eyes finally return to him, but her expression remains unreadable. ‘You owe me now, you know,’ he continues, and his tone is almost sweet, and light.

‘Whatever for?’ Finally, her voice rises a tad, and there is some colour in her cheeks.

‘For saving you, of course,’ he replies smoothly, and allows his features to light into a smile that he knows does not quite reach his eyes. ‘And it would be the second time, considering. Or perhaps the second and a half.’ The last line comes out soft, almost as an afterthought.

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘Well - ‘

‘Ginny, Malfoy?’ comes a third voice, and his head snaps towards the fireplace at the end of the room. A boy’s head has appeared in it; he looks vaguely familiar - probably a schoolmate from another House.

‘Terry!’ exclaims Weasley, ‘Why are you in the fireplace?’ And then, hastily, at the boy’s narrowed glance in his direction, ‘Malfoy’s with us now - it’ll take some time to explain.’ She ignores the look that Malfoy shoots at her.

‘Okay…’ says the boy, who he now recognizes as Terry Boot, a Ravenclaw Mudblood from his year. Boot’s eyes still linger on him with a distinct dislike and distrust. ‘It’s not entirely convenient for me to tell you where I am right now, but someone told me that I may be able to find you and Harry and the others at the Slytherin dorm. My family’s over at Hogwarts, and just a bit ago my older sister texted me that something was happening, that Aurors are bringing them to some kind of panic room…’

‘So d’you know if they’re still fighting, out there in the rest of the Hogwarts grounds?’ asks Ron Weasley from behind them; he has returned to the Common Room with his arms laden with bars of chocolate.

‘From what my sister could tell me, the Muggleborns and their families are safe, but the Aurors and staff who went off to deal with whatever it was the problem haven’t yet returned, though the Aurors who were left with the students and their families are telling them that they haven’t received any signals from them that they need assistance or that they should start evacuating to the next safe house. So we reckon that the situation should still be containable. On our side, we haven’t gotten any signals either - ‘

‘On your side?’ asks Ron Weasley, while his sister asks at the same time, ‘Signals?’

Boot hesitates, before jerking his head towards Draco. ‘Are you sure we can trust him?’ He asks.

Ginny Weasley glances quickly at him, before directing her attention back to Boot. ‘It’s not like he’s entirely well-liked among the Death Eaters at the moment - they carved up his arm,’ she explains, to Draco rather excessively, but he at least appreciates that she does not reveal more of what the Dark Lord has done to him. He shudders just to think that a Mudblood like Boot would know that he had been stripped of his magical abilities - even if, judging from recent events, such had only been a temporary state.

Boot affords him one more distrustful look, before starting, ‘Well then, I don’t suppose it’ll hurt to tell you. The quick version is, ‘cos most of the refugees in Hogwarts are Muggles, a few of us Muggleborns have been working with the Order to fix the way magic affects electronic devices, so that if anything goes wrong at Hogwarts, and the Muggles are left stranded, they can still contact the outside world. For those who have mobiles, pagers, laptop computers -we’ve been working on ways to allow the usage of these to be supported within Hogwarts itself. In any case some of the Muggle ways of communication can be just as fast as magical ways. And we’ve been teaching the Aurors how to use Muggle means of signaling and communications, because - ’

‘Because the Death Eaters could never bear to use such means, and they leave no magical trace,’ interrupts Ron Weasley. ‘That’s brilliant, Terry!’

‘Yes, well, I s’pose we have to use every advantage we’ve got, don’t we?’ replies Boot. ‘Now that I’ve got that out of the way, though, let me do what I’m supposed to do in the first place - I’m supposed to tell you to stay where you are, until you hear from me or anyone friendly again. Don’t leave the Slytherin dorm, don’t fight unless the fight comes to you first - they’re trying to keep the altercation at Hogwarts to a minimal while the Order concentrates on doing, ah, other work.’

‘So we’re just supposed to sit here, and wait?’ demands Ginny Weasley, her eyes narrowed. Her brother has a similarly mutinous look on his face.

Gryffindors.

‘Yes, well - they’re trying to contain the fight as much as possible, Gin,’ says Boot, almost apologetically, ‘in any case, it’s not like this is going to be the last fight. Once this one is over - when the Aurors and the Order have had the chance to regroup - you may be able to participate in the next one…well, they may even need your participation…’

‘What d’you mean, how would they know about that?’ asks Ron.

Boot sighs. ‘From what I know and understand - and don’t worry, it’s not much more than what you would know - what’s expected is that You-Know-Who’s conducting is a war of attrition. We’re just going to be constantly under siege, for a time.’

‘Until either side breaks, that is?’ he finally drawls out. He does not flinch when Boot and the Weasleys glare daggers in his direction.

‘Where’re Harry and Hermione, anyway?’ Boot asks the Weasleys, his features still betraying the hint of a scowl as he does so. ‘Aren’t they supposed to be with you?’

‘Well…they went to join the fight earlier,’ says Ron Weasley, somewhat sheepishly, ‘are you sure we shouldn’t go out to help as well?’

Boot curses under his breath - ‘I see I’m somewhat late then,’ he says, ‘but no, don’t go running out now, Ron, those are the instructions I’m supposed to pass on to you.’

~

It is another hour before Potter, Granger and Groan enter the Slytherin Common Room.

‘Thank goodness you’re alright,’ breathes Ginny Weasley; by now, the colour has returned to her cheeks and Draco leans back, eyeing the situation as she jumps up from where she was seated and rushes towards the trio.

Potter catches her and pulls her into an embrace, but Draco wonders, vaguely, if it can be definitively said that she meant to leap into his arms.

‘We’ve been waiting for you forever, Terry Boot told us not to go out there,’ says Ron Weasley, and he reaches to hug Granger.

Groan steps around the happy reunion, and nods curtly in his direction.

‘What happened out there?’ asks Ron Weasley, releasing Granger. Draco does not miss the way his hand lingers on her waist.

‘There weren’t any other Dementors, they must really have left after Malfoy’s last Patronus, but there were - well, Slytherins. The only adults among them were Dolohov and Jugson,’ replies Granger, and she shivers. Draco stores the reaction away in his mind for later examination, even as he starts at her mention of ‘Slytherins’. ‘I suppose it’s a kind of training exercise for them.’

‘What Slytherins?’ he finally manages.

‘Current Slytherins,’ replies Potter, his voice unpleasant and low with anger. ‘Vincent Crabbe. Gregory Goyle. Vivian Urquhart. Nicholas Harper. Miles Bletchley - ‘

‘It’s a bloody Slytherin Quidditch team reunion,’ bites out Ron Weasley, and his fingers are clenched around his wand.

A sharp coldness stabs his chest. ‘Are they - what did they - ’ he begins.

‘The Aurors handled them fine enough,’ replies Potter, and Draco hates that he almost cannot meet the fullness of his glare turned upon him. ‘They didn’t manage to go anywhere near the Muggleborns - the fight was entirely on the edge of grounds - and neither did they manage any lasting damage on the Aurors. The Aurors even managed to apprehend a few of them, even though Dolohov and Jugson slipped away; we just helped to transfer them to - ’ He cuts himself short, narrowing his eyes at Draco. ‘I don’t suppose we need to discuss that in front of you.’

‘After all, if circumstances were different, you would probably be with them.’

There is a thick silence. Draco’s jaw clenches, and he imagines, violently, terribly, that it might not be awfully difficult to wring Potter’s thin, malnourished neck with his bare hands.

‘Harry,’ starts Ginny Weasley, ‘Well - he wasn’t - isn’t. Isn’t with them, that is.’

Draco looks at her, surprised. Then he sneers, ‘Well, I certainly am not with your lot, either.’

The expression on her face infuriates him; it is almost matter-of-fact. In any case it is utterly devoid of evidence that she has been provoked by his remark. ‘Well, I don’t think it’s a matter of your choice, Malfoy…’

‘Draco?’

Collectively the small group turns towards the source of the new voice; at the threshold leading into the Slytherin Common Room are decidedly familiar faces.

~

‘Nott? Blaise? Davis? Brone!’ he exclaims. ‘What are you doing here?’ He notices that his Housemates are in travelling cloaks; all have Levitated trunks before them.

‘More Slytherins?’ Potter hisses, and in a movement his wand is drawn, his other hand pushing Ginny Weasley behind him. No one notices the tightening grip of Ginny Weasley’s hand around her wand, or the minute clenching of her jaw.

‘Relax, Potter,’ drawls Blaise, and Draco feels a wave of familiarity, almost comfort, in his tone. It is as if it assures him that everything is fine, as it should be. ‘We’re not here to attack you,’ he continues, then, flicking a calculatedly disdainful look at Potter, ‘Unfortunately.’

‘What’re you here for, then?’ asks Ron Weasley. His wand is also drawn, and notes of red touch his cheekbones.

‘Seeking refuge, of course,’ replies Theodore Nott for Blaise, ‘our families are being located elsewhere, but we were told that we can take up our usual beds in our dorm.’

‘Your families? You?’ sputters Ron Weasley at Nott. ‘Isn’t your father a Death Eater?’

‘Quite unwisely, yes,’ says Nott, calmly and perfunctorily, as if Weasley has just asked him about the state of the weather. ‘But I am decidedly not. And neither are Zabini, Zabini’s mother and her latest conquest, and Vaisey and his elder brother. And Tracey Davis,’ he adds, nodding slightly to the quiet, still girl next to him, ‘certainly cannot be one.’

‘Why would you need refuge, though?’ asks Potter, his voice still unwelcoming. ‘And why didn’t you seek refuge earlier, when they first moved the Muggleborns’ families in?’

‘Because, Potter, it would have been easier if we hadn’t had to make an obvious choice either way in the matter beforehand,’ cuts in Brone Vaisey, stepping around Nott and lowering his trunk to the ground. ‘In fact it would probably have been easier if we didn’t have to make a choice either way in any case.’

‘It’s not that we owe you any explanation, but we don’t exactly belong to a class with the choice whether or not to involve ourselves in the War,’ continues Brone, ‘And it isn’t as if the other side is going to accept anything less than full commitment, so - ’

‘So you thought you’ll have better luck with us?’ remarks Granger, her tone cutting. ‘This isn’t a war where you can afford to be neutral, Vaisey.’

Brone gives her a long look. Finally, he returns, ‘Well, unfortunately we can only promise not to get under your feet, Granger. You can hardly expect us to voluntarily throw ourselves into your endeavours.’

‘And that’s supposed to be enough for us to go to sleep next to you?’ speaks up Ginny Weasley. Her voice, however, Draco notices, is decidedly less harsh in tone compared to the other Gryffindors’.

‘I hardly expect we’ll be sharing a room with you, Weasley, as much as that may be a pleasant experience,’ smirks Brone, ignoring how Ron Weasley has grown dangerously red at his remark, ‘But yes, I suppose you’ll have no choice but to stomach our continued residence with you in the Slytherin dorm, for an indefinite length of time.’

A length of silence follows, as all in the Common Room digests what his words entail.

‘Well,’ speaks up Groan finally, ‘as we’re all staying together, perhaps introductions are in order?’

~

She already recognizes them, of course; Hogwarts is a small school - names and faces are learnt easily enough.

Brone Vaisey, she knows, is in the same year as her, one of the Slytherin Quidditch team’s Chasers - one of the best Chasers in the school, in fact. His father was a promising young Quidditch player who disappeared under mysterious circumstances early into the First War; of his mother Ginny has never heard anything definite. His older brother, Brett Vaisey, from what Ginny remembers, is a Seeker for one of the better-ranked professional Quidditch teams. He was in the same year as Charlie in Hogwarts.

Vaisey himself is tall, lean but muscular, handsome, perhaps, in a faded, detached way - he has a head of light ash-blond curls, high cheekbones and clear eyes the colour of which reminds Ginny of aged birch. He has never spoken up much in classes; it is only ever on the pitch, Ginny realises, that he captures any attention. Ginny has never had much direct interaction with him; ever since she started playing on the Gryffindor Quidditch team, however, he has nodded, unsmilingly, in her direction when their eyes meet along corridors between classes.

Theodore Nott is in Ron and Harry and Hermione’s year, a loner. At least, Ginny does not remember him ever being in the company of anyone. It is not lost on Ginny that he refers to his fellow Slytherins using their last names. Thin, pale, with a mop of dark hair and surprisingly dark blue eyes, his appearance is striking, if definitely gaunt.

Ginny has heard that his father is one of the more prominent Death Eaters, and she wonders what he thinks of Theodore Nott being in Hogwarts, now.

Blaise Zabini she knows, of course - even non-Slytherin girls have whispered, giggling, of his smooth dark skin and impossibly high cheekbones. He is as tall as Ron and about as inconspicuous, although for entirely different reasons. Ginny has never liked him - he is Malfoy without the tendency to explode in public, but just as predictably cruel in his delight in putting down fellow students, particularly those not of Slytherin House.

Tracey Davis she knows the least of. She is one of the quieter Slytherins, like Nott, and in the same year, but Ginny has also seen her with a clique of girls, mostly from Ravenclaw. Her hair is a rich, deep brown, long and falling in large, thick waves around her shoulders and her eyes are a pale yet distinctive blue. Looking at her closely for the first time, Ginny realizes that Tracey Davis is perhaps one of the prettiest girls in Hogwarts.

Save perhaps for Zabini, none of the group would have come to Ginny’s mind if she were to think, specifically, of the question of whether she would one day have to fight her own schoolmates - her stomach turns slightly at the thought of having to direct a curse at Brone Vaisey, particularly, who has accorded her the bare courtesy of a fellow Quidditch player for almost two years now.

It seems as if her thoughts are echoed in the minds of the others in the Slytherin Common Room, despite the hostile atmosphere when the Slytherins had first arrived - after the newcomers settled their things into their rooms and returned to the Common Room, Ron, having passed some of his chocolate to Harry, Hermione and Groan, awkwardly pushes his chocolate at them. Vaisey, Davis and Nott murmur their thanks and help themselves; Ginny catches a slight, unpleasant upward quirk of Zabini’s lips before he wordlessly takes a piece.

It is curious that it takes a war for them to sit together in this comfortable silence.

~

‘Explanations, Draco,’ says Blaise, as soon as he joins him in an alcove in the Slytherin Common Room, partly hidden and some distance away from the fireplace. Potter, Granger and Ron Weasley are huddled in a far corner of the room; curiously, Ginny Weasley does not join them, instead resting her head on Groan’s shoulder, sitting with the other Slytherins closer to the fireplace. Draco supposes that they are making small talk and waiting for dinner - a harried-looking young Auror had arrived earlier to tell them that dinner would soon be served in the Great Hall.

‘What is there to say, Blaise?’ he replies, suddenly tired. He is glad to see his Housemate here, both an old friend and constant competitor, in what feels a good century ago. At the same time, he cannot but wish that Blaise had more sense than to open the conversation so.

‘They can’t patch that up for you?’ asks Blaise instead, and he nods at Draco’s upper arm. He winces; he has almost forgotten that the Dark Lord’s cruel Non Serviam still licks into his skin, the words clearly visible. The Weasleys, Groan, Granger and Potter have had days of seeing it, and hadn’t remarked on the fact that the sleeve of the old shirt Ron Weasley had reluctantly spared him does not quite cover the words. A hot flush rushes to his skin, and he resists the urge to pull the sleeve down.

‘I don’t suppose the intention was to allow anyone to patch it up,’ he mutters in reply. He looks up at the taller boy. ‘I would’ve thought you and your mother would manage to leave England, before it came to this.’

Blaise studies him for moment, and then replies, lightly, ‘We could have, I suppose, but Mother wasn’t quite willing to leave England.’

‘What, because of Future Husband No. 8? I wouldn’t have pegged your mother to be the sentimental sort,’ remarks Draco.

Blaise returns him another long, measured look. His reserved nature has always unnerved Draco, and Draco is suddenly and forcefully reminded of the edge of impatience and irritation that has always accompanied his longer interactions with Blaise in their years together in Hogwarts.

Then Blaise smiles, quite unexpectedly, but it is a small smile, steeped in bitterness. ‘You don’t think that she could, possibly, simply be unwilling to leave England for good, do you?’

It is certainly an unexpected answer. ‘But you aren’t intending to participate in the War, are you?’ he finally asks.

‘It is our full intention to survive here, whatever it is that we survive to,’ answers Blaise steadily.

‘Preferably without first losing our necks.’

~

The Great Hall has always been a sight, but never like this.

It has clearly been magically expanded; the staff table is much further from the entrance to the Great Hall than Draco remembers. The tables are decidedly longer, and there are many, many more people.

He realizes that most of them must be members of the Muggleborn students’ families - he recognizes their unfamiliar chatter and their strange fashions from what glimpses of Muggle London he has seen over the years, at King’s Cross Station. It is certainly disturbing, however, to see them milling about the Great Hall, interacting, eating - as if it is a place that could belong to them, as if they belonged to the place.

‘Mum, Dad!’ he hears Granger’s voice, and surprised, he sees her running towards a rather ordinary-looking, middle-aged couple. Granger collapses into their arms, and he realizes that Granger’s mother has tears in her eyes. He finds himself wondering how long it has been since they have seen Granger, and what they understand of what Granger has been doing - and then he finds himself inevitably thinking of his own parents.

‘Draco,’ says Blaise from next to him, ‘I’m going to sit with my mother. Do you want to join us?’

‘I - ’ he starts, then realizes, quite abruptly, that in this mass of people, he is quite alone. Blaise has his mother, and his stepfather-to-be. Brone has his brother Brett. Tracey Davis has disappeared into a group of Ravenclaws, and Theodore Nott seems to be deep in conversation with Timothy Groan, who is being led, slightly ahead of Draco and Blaise, by Ginny Weasley. Potter and Ron Weasley have joined the Grangers.

‘I - I don't...’

‘Malfoy?’ he turns, and realizes that Ginny Weasley has stopped, and is addressing him. Her expression can only be described as neutral. ‘You’re having dinner with us?’

He finds himself nodding, even gratefully, and as Blaise walks away to join his family Draco Malfoy follows Ginny Weasley into the heart of a Great Hall he no longer recognizes.

~