The Dragon Variation

Chapter Forty Six

Hades Is Awake

Narrator

She is expendable. She can be replaced. Yet.
The Dark Lord is threatened by her very existence.
Keep your enemies closer. Then eliminate.

Once the Dark Lord is close to closing his game—he will have sacrificed all of his pawns to save himself.

That's how the game is played. It's the rules.

Olli thinks it's about fucking time to break the rules. But she's playing the long game. Calculated. Strategic. And brutal.

The Manor very quickly became overturned with Death Eaters within the three last days Olli and Draco were stuck there; Lucius had volunteered to have the Manor as the next Death Eater Headquarters for the Dark Lord. The activity around the mansion was criminal and pure malevolence, more and more rooms were warded with privacy enchantments ever since Lucius and his unit were assigned with new tasks immediately on their breakout to proceed with torture of captured Order members.

Olli would walk by curiously to see if any doors had been left open, to which one was. She stumbled backwards to see a person beat so badly their face was unrecognisable to anyone, they had to start putting initials of captors on doors so there were no mix-ups.

After that disturbance, all rooms were locked and cast with silencing charms, so the screams were just muffled ripples in the airways. Most rooms were warded until it was only Draco's and Narcissa's corridor were the only ones left untouched.

Draco wanted to leave as soon as Olli got back to his room that night, after Olli watched Lucius rush from the drawing room in a flight of fear. He had grabbed Olli by her neck, he had left fingerprints on her skin—she quickly utilised herself when she discovered the Cruciatus curse was an invalid algorithm on her. 'You can't fight fire with fire Olli, and you have a raging ablaze inside you,' Olli recalled her mother telling her during some mind resilience training.

Draco just wanted to get her away. So far away from it all. But he couldn't bring himself to leave his mother—he wanted to be with her as much as possible for the remaining three days they were there. After Draco was dragged from the drawing room, Narcissa whisked him away to kitchen and banished the death eaters in there so she could heal her son as best she could. There are two gaping dents in the back of Draco's right hand, and identical dents in his left shoulder where Lucius struck his cane. He looked at the damage in his skin and broke down in his mother's arms and cried. And cried. And cried.

Olli appeared in the kitchen threshold, untouched, unharmed—without so much as a scratch. Caesar refused to leave her side, doing his best to protect Olli despite the limp in his front right leg. Olli's stomach turned inside out to see Draco in such an emotional state-to watch his entire ice palace mind melt as he slumped in Narcissa's arms, holding on tightly to her. Something she imagined seeing after Draco scraped his knee when he was a child. He's breaking.

Olli walked into his view, his eyes barely left the floor from exhaustion, he couldn't even bring his head up from Narcissa's shoulder. Olli's heart sank further into her chest to see him so defeated by someone he used to look up to as a child. It's breaking her heart. Olli helped him to bed and let him sleep for an entire 24hours.

In those 24hours, she apologised to Narcissa for everything, for causing such a stir in the family—she apologised for feeling like her presence just provoked Lucius. She felt responsible for all the commotion at that it was best for her to leave to relieve some tension. Narcissa did her best to convince Olli that she wasn't to blame and none of it was her fault and that she is the best thing for Draco, but Olli—she couldn't help believing that all she does is get Draco hurt—when she's supposed to be protecting him. Narcissa was distraught. Olli couldn't help feeling that Lucius just used her to tear away at Draco. She was responsible for Draco's torment. It was best for her to go. She'll see him again within a few days—it won't be that bad. This was the best way she could keep him safe. Away from her.