𝐇𝐈𝐒 𝐃𝐈𝐑𝐓𝐘 𝐋𝐈𝐓𝐓𝐋𝐄 𝐒𝐄𝐂𝐑𝐄𝐓| 𝐃𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐨 𝐌𝐚𝐥𝐟𝐨𝐲✔️

𝐅𝐎𝐑𝐓𝐘𝐅𝐎𝐔𝐑|𝐎𝐔𝐑 𝐒𝐀𝐋𝐕𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍

MARA WILLIAMS

"Mara? Mara!"

Words swam like nightmares through my mind. They didn't quite sound real, distant somehow, like my head was underwater, muffled by the tides.

"Mara it's okay! -You're okay, you're safe now... He's gone." In another world, in another life, somewhere far from here that voice might have almost sounded familiar. But here, in this godless abyss it was just a cry to shatter the endless drone of static.

I surfaced with a great gasping breath, my lungs starving for air as Hermione's gentle words suddenly registered in my mind, syllables settling above the plane of white noise. "-Set her down here."

A feeling of warmth left me as I was put down by the Hufflepuff boy, who stared down upon me with a sadness, the unmistakable glint of pity catching in his eye. It made me feel weak. The way he looked at me as if I were some sort of kicked puppy. "You can go now Cedric." The Gryffindor girl said firmly, noticing my uncomfortable disposition.

"Hermione..." I choked out a sob, and at once she was kneeling by my side. "-Hermione, I'm so sorry..."

"You don't ever have to apologise to me Mara." She said softly, tucking a stray strand of raven hair behind my ear.

"-But I've ruined everything. I should've just stayed away." It wasn't spoken, but it was there nonetheless, lying just beneath the spoken words, the implication that I should've just stayed at Durmstrang, with him. Viktor showed his love with a heavy hand and closed fist, but yet at least it was constant. He was always there, the response was always the same. Somehow, some part of me longed for the solidarity, and valued it over these fragile feelings that Draco dared deny even existed.

Malfoy lacked the consistency I craved, he was as certain as the tides, never spoken and never sure just when they would flow, but when they did the swell was enough to drown.

Hermione gripped my shoulder, "Don't you dare say that! You haven't ruined anything at all," She tilted my chin with her finger, forcing me to meet her eyes as she said, "Mara in all honesty I'd be lost without you."

I found myself unable to look away from Hermione, and somehow my heart hurt a little less when I stared into her big brown eyes, like endless pools of honey glistening with the threat of tears. She was everything I could ever hope for in a friend, intelligent, fiercely loyal, and above all else she genuinely cared.

A sob escaped me as I threw my arms around her, burying my face in her thick hair. She held me too her, as if we were the only people left standing in this damned world as I let all the sadness and regret come flooding from my lips, "-But I hated you."

"I know and I deserved it." She said calmly, stroking my hair, to which I pulled away to stare at her in frustration, "No. You didn't. Not one bit of it, and that was so wrong of me, I'll never forgive myself for that."

Hermione gave a small but strangley sad smile, "It wasn't you, it was him. He turned us against one another, but we're better than that. We are better than he'll ever be."

For a while we were silent, we didn't need words to fill the empty air, the echo of our unspoken gratitude was deafening. But eventually I whispered, frightened that any louder and my hoarse voice would break as I gave her hand a squeeze.
"...Hermione, thank you."

The corners of her lips tugged upwards in a distinctly bashful way. "Now do you want to talk about what happened in there?"

"...I should never have gone with him." I began to feel the sadness seep through the cracks again, like a callus beast coming to swallow me whole once more.
-A disease of the mind, plaguing my every waking thought. "Everything's ruined now, I was better off living the lie."

"Who Malfoy? What did he do?" She said quickly, a worried edge in her tone. "Mara tell me he didn't hurt you-."

I bit my lip as I averted my eyes to the floor in shame. "No, he didn't lay a hand on me... He didn't have to."

"What has he done?.."

At first when I opened my mouth, the words refused to leave, instead catching on the tip of my tongue. It felt wrong to tell her? -Like it wasn't my secret to tell. Yet he'd made me a part of this, whether he had meant to or not. What was done could not be undone. "He's one of them." It was far too late for sorries and tears, there were no words he could say to deafen the blow. "He's a Death Eater."

"...Oh my God." She was left numb, and unsure of what to say, the boy she'd known since first year, the boy she'd hated so deeply since their first encounter, had succumbed to everything he never wanted to be.
-He had become his father's son.

I swallowed the nervous lump in my throat, "...Just like my father."

"Your father?" She repeated with a frown before her face fell entirely as the realisation dawned upon her. "...Fenrir Greyback..."

I pursed my lips with a solemn nod before I told her everything. Every fast and tiny detail of what had happened with Malfoy, the reunion with my father, my brush with The Dark Lord and my narrow escape from death.

"...It just doesn't make sense." I mumbled, "Why would he let me live? I'm of no use to him, and if anything surely I'm just a liability?"

"It makes perfect sense..." Hermione replied, her face contorting as if even the words tasted bitter on her tongue."Your father, Malfoy's parents, even Malfoy himself, they're all loyal to him, but to what extent? If he were to kill you would your father still follow him?"

Somehow I doubted the man who so callously murdered my mother would shed many tears at my death, and yet for some reason he had still been unable to kill me too... Was it love? -I doubted it. Yet still I couldn't help but feel that my death would've shaken his faith in The Dark Lord.

"-If he were to kill you, do you really think Malfoy could bear to go on, let alone face him... And as for his parents, they may be Death Eaters but their love for their son will always eclipse their loyalty to The Lord, no matter what and without Malfoy, they too would surely drift." Hermione said gently, as she straightened the collar of my robe. "Whether he'd like to admit it or not, without you they'd all fall apart. He needs you alive Mara."

She may be right, in the way that Hermione so often was, however I couldn't help but feel as if there were some deeper meaning behind all this. Something so dark, so impossibly sinister that not even The Dark Lord quite yet knew why.

***
QOTD- LAST CHAPTER I MENTIONED MAKING A SNAPCHAT GROUP, well we did a little demo version just to see how it faired and it was farrrr to chaotic with snapchat lagging and crashing for a few, therefore instead we have made a 🔥DISCORD🔥 server, the link to join is in my bio, just click on my profil! Come chat to us and get exclusive content and previews for HDLS and TAOLY!
-TFOA