MORALITY ⟶ Angelina Johnson [1]

Chapter Forty-Six

[Chapter Forty-Six]

Since the Second Task, it seemed the school was set on hounding the Champions to figure out just what exactly had taken place under the lake water. The only ones who were really informed outside of the Champions were the judges as the merfolk had explained what they had witnessed during the task. But unfortunately, as Angelina had informed Saros, the crowd of spectators had done nothing but stare at the surface of the water for almost an hour before he finally arrived back first. It had been such a relief to see a sign of life because everyone had been practically dying of boredom by that time. The problem was, Saros didn't want to talk about the task, with anyone really.

Of course, he obliged by telling Angelina and the rest of their friends what had taken place once he entered the waters, but Saros didn't want to discuss it with anyone else for many reasons. For one, it had not been a pleasant experience for him at all as he had done perfectly fine in the beginning, only to almost practically lose it all by the end. The Grindylow hadn't managed to take his remaining leg as he feared, but even so, it had actually left some scarring behind, even with the help of Madam Pomfrey's healing. It was still a dark creature and there were things that magic couldn't fully heal.

And if that wasn't enough, Saros was still carrying a lot of guilt on his shoulders after Harry had appeared with not only his hostage, Ron, but Fleur's little sister, Gabrielle, as well. He knew it wasn't their responsibility to look after the other hostages and it turned out that the people taken weren't actually in danger, to begin with. The song itself just had been something placed to motivate them to look harder. But Saros couldn't help but think that he would want someone to save Draco if he was unable to do so and he hadn't even put in the effort to do it for someone else.

He tried to justify it in his mind, claiming that if it was actually Draco that had been left behind instead of Fleur's little sister, that Harry wouldn't have bothered to save two hostages. He would have gladly taken Ron and swam away, leaving Draco behind. However, even Saros didn't feel right trying to justify it in such ways. It was just a matter of the fact that Harry Potter was a better person, one that Saros wanted to be but hadn't quite reached yet. Saros was still stuck in the mindset of just looking after himself and his family for the most part because that was all he had ever done, that was all he was ever told to do.

Even then it hadn't benefitted him to solely look after Draco anyways. Instead of bringing the brothers closer and finally making Draco understand, the Second Task seemed to do more damage than good. Once again, Draco had gone back to ignoring Saros and this time, it was more painful than anything for the eldest Malfoy. The Second Task had taken what he would sorely miss and it turned out to be his little brother, despite the arguing and all the drama that was taking place, it was true that Saros would still miss Draco the most.

But it was like it didn't count for anything because Draco didn't seem to care. He went back to his daily routine of avoiding Saros and pretending like he didn't exist. Saros was still a blood-traitor in his eyes and because Saros refused to apologise to their parents, Draco was going to have nothing to do with him.