Lies, Buried and Bound - A Dramione Story

Part Seven

The moment Draco left for break was the moment he decided upon something he'd never done before: he called in sick. Of course, the head of the Hospital Wing had heard about his awful encounter with Mr. Diggory and was more than amenable to Dr. Malfoy's request.

Draco went home to his manor and made a beeline for his personal washroom. He stood at the basin and looked into his own face. Amos Diggory had certainly done a number on him. His lip was split down the side, the bags under his eye purpled even more, and blood babbled like a little creek down his face.

He quickly dug into his personal medicine clutch and carefully cleaned away the sticky mess from his eye before scrubbing it raw with an antibiotic balm.

"Shit!"

The wound was pretty deep and the skin was slowly starting to rise. He probably should have swung by one of the Medical Witches and asked for a brief evaluation. He was a healer, but these things were better left to others.

However, there was no way he'd be returning to work in this state.

"I'll just have to bloody do it myself."

He pumped a small amount of numbing cream directly onto his skin and worked it around the affected area with a simple applicator. Buried in the emergency medical kit were a few suture needles and some nylon thread. Of course, none of these instruments had been sterilised.

Already more blood was beginning to drip from the cut over his eye.

He'd have to work quickly.

Draco entered his chambers and, in a lock-box, retrieved a needle driver and took his wand out of his pocket.

"Incendio," he said quietly. Magic coursed through his veins and married well with the core of his wand until a small flame sprouted from its tip. He ran the suture needle and its driver through the flame until he was satisfied with its cleanliness, but just for extra measures, he sprayed it with a disinfectant mist.

Draco washed his hands, gloved them, and took the needle to his face.

He'd come to believe over the past few years in training that he preferred the Muggle ways of medicine. It seemed to fulfil his thirst to help others more than just a spell or two to fix them up. But by no means was he not skilled in either. He just believed now that there was more to magic and health than its results.

"Son of a - " The numbing cream had dulled his pain, but there was still pain to be felt. It was still a sharp, curved needle passing through his skin. Draco wrapped the thread over the driver twice and pulled through. And after repeating this special knot three times, and he was certain that it would not unravel, Draco began the not-so-simple task of weaving the needle through his skin in a basic running suture.

He gnawed on his lip and groaned purposefully every time the pain became very uncomfortable.

About fifteen minutes later, the cut on Draco's lip had opened again, but at least he had sutured the wound shut to his satisfaction. There were eight stitches next to his eye.

"Christ, I look like Frankenstein," he muttered hopelessly under his breath. He licked his lips free of the blood and shut off the light.

He entered the library and found his mother lost in a book beside another young woman with long blonde hair spilled over the arm of the loveseat.

"Oh, hello Draco," chirped the young blonde. .

"You're home early," Narcissa Malfoy said, putting her book down.

"Hi, Mum, good afternoon, Luna." He walked around the seat and sat in his own armchair. "Hello, Blaise."

"Jesus, mate, what happened to your face?" the latter blurted, lifting his head from Luna's lap.