Until the End ~ A Dransy Fic

XVI - The Initiation

Draco was shoved into a wooden chair by his father, who donned his own mask and joined the circle.

"Incarcerous!" screeched someone. Thick ropes flew into his ribcage and extremeties, binding him to the chair. He tried desperately to reach his wand in his right pocket, but his wrists were tied too tightly to even flinch or rotate.

A nervous sweat formed on the surface of his ice-cold skin as he struggled against the ropes. "Let me go!" he demanded with as much courage as he could muster.

"Incarcerous!" the same person squealed gleefully. Another heavy rope flew at him and landed right on his adam's apple, keeping his head fixed in place.

"Ack!" he choked. Draco did all he could do to loosen the restraints around him, but they remained firm, and he was squirming hopelessly like a fly caught in a spider web.

Slow footsteps echoed on the stone floor.

Here comes the spider.

"Good evening, Draco." said a piercing voice that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end.

An involuntary shriek escaped his throat, causing everyone in the basement to laugh. But he didn't care. He knew very well that terrible things can happen when you're at the mercy of the Dark Lord, even when you're not bound to a chair in your own basement.

"And how did I teach you to greet me when you find yourself in my presence?"

"G-Good evening..." he mumbled quietly, averting his gaze to the floor.

"I'm sorry, I didn't hear you." the man said lightly as he ran a long, thin finger along Draco's exposed arms and up to his chin. "Would you mind repeating yourself?"

His eyes widened as the man's claw-like fingernail grazed his skin. "Good evening, my Dark Lord!" he quickly recited.

"Much better," Voldemort decided with a mocking smirk. "What a good boy."

"D-Don't talk to me like I'm a child!" Draco scowled against his better judgement, letting his self-preservation get the best of him. "You can't just sit here and ask me to do things no adult is capable of and talk to me like I'm six years old!" He figured he was probably going to be murdered in this chair, but he'd at least like to go out with dignity.

"Silence!"

He winced in pain as the Dark Lord wildly threw a fist across his face. Any chance he had to make it out unscathed had just dripped down the drain.

"If you ever speak to me like that again, your consequences will be worse!" he spat. "Do you comprehend!?" 

Draco stared at the dark ceiling. "Yes, sir." he uttered, a phrase he'd uttered thousands of times before.

Voldemort scoffed and bared his teeth, turning to adress the room. "I'm sure you all have noticed that, despite all of our efforts, Albus Dumbledore is still alive,"

The Death Eaters all nodded. Draco prayed that Pansy's parents weren't amongst them.

"It just so happens that the very person who's job it was to exterminate him," he gestured to his prisoner. "Is sitting right here in this room."

Draco gulped. "Look, I swear I almost had him, I'll try harder!" he exclaimed. "Just please let me go!"

Voldemort turned back to face him. "That is what you promised before," he said angrily. "Now you've proved that I must put in place measures that will let me keep an eye on you."

"Wh-what do you mean?"

He sneered. "I think all you need is a little... encouragement. Yes?"

The Death Eaters all nodded in unison once more.

"But you must think of this not as a punishment, but an initiation. An occasion to celebrate! Tonight, you become one of us," he said. "One of mine."

"No, I don't want to join you!" he shouted defiantly, struggling once more against the ropes. "I'd rather die than be one of you!"

The Dark Lord smiled darkly, revealing a row of razor-sharp teeth. "That could definitely be arranged, my dear boy," he growled. 

But then he leaned in close and whispered so only Draco could hear. "Oh, but I knew you'd become one of mine the day you were born."

Those words struck pain in his heart. He knew he was destined for evil. He'd always known that some people were born heroes, like Harry Potter, but someone had to be the villain in the story. And it looked like it was turning out to be him.

Much to his chagrin, Draco's eyes began to water. "Let me go!" he pleaded, no longer able to disguise the panick in his voice. "Father, tell him to let me go! I promise I won't say a word to Mum!"

Everyone laughed, yet again, including Lucius. 

"What an altruistic son you have here, Malfoy!"

Draco despised the amusement that he couldn't see on their sick faces.

The Dark Lord raised his wand and spoke an incantation in what Draco assumed to be Parseltongue. Harsh black magic surrounded the tip and formed a blade-like shape. He honed it in on the boy's trembling left forearm, right above his wrist, which was getting ever more raw and bloody from pulling against the rough rope.

His eyes widened and his hair plastered itself to his forehead. "Please don't do this," he pleaded again.

When wand made contact with skin, Draco reached a level of pain he never knew was possible. He'd been given the Cruciatus curse more than once or twice, but this pain burned, stabbed, and slashed all at once

He let out a gut-wrenching scream that he didn't even know he was capable of making. "SOMEONE HELP ME!" he wailed at the top of his lungs as the despicable magic penetrated his skin, even though he knew that no one would be coming to his rescue.

Voldemort merely growled sadistically and pressed harder.

"STOP IT, STOP IT, STOP IT!"

"I can't take your whining, boy! Shut it!" Lucius shrieked as the Dark Lord continued to mutilate his son. He yanked off his glove and shoved it into Draco's mouth, who continued to cry out and bite into the thick wool.

Long sobs racked his body as a thick tattoo dripping with black ink caused the skin on his arm to swell up.

After what felt like hours, Voldemort waved his wand and the ropes disappeared, but Draco slumped over and remained violently shaking in his chair. Saliva pooled under the glove and dripped down his face as he miserably sobbed into it.

He could barely stand look at what the man had done to him. It wasn't a nice-and-neat ink outline of a snake like his father's Dark Mark, but a swollen and bloody mess.

Voldemort stood back to admire his work. "There," he said with a smirk. "It isn't as clean as I would've hoped, but it will gradually darken and heal up as you fully submit your loyalty." 

He held out his handiwork over the green lantern for the room to see as Draco groaned weakly.

"Here's to Draco L. Malfoy, our newest Death Eater!" Voldemort exclaimed as he tugged on Draco's tattooed arm, which was now leaking drops of ink, sweat, and blood.

"Nicely done, my Lord!" shouted someone in the back who sounded like his Auntie Bella.

"Welcome to our ranks, son." said his father, ripping out the glove from Draco's teeth and clapping him on the back, which caused him to double over and fall onto the cold floor.

His new Dark Mark feebly flickered green and throbbed in pain as the Death Eaters disapparated out of the room, one by one, including his father.

And there he was.

Left alone. His flushed face squished against the dirty stone floor of his own basement, with an arm he couldn't even fathom, let alone move.

His stomach dry heaved and his teeth wouldn't stop chattering as he silently let a tear fall from his right eye and drop onto the floor.