tw// panic attack
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DRACO gets out of bed, dread deep seated in the pit of his stomach. It's the end of January in two days. The end of the deadline for his task.
A week ago, he had finally found out the issue with the Vanishing Cabinet and solved it. It was a simple spell that was much hard to come by, but after a trip into the restricted section of the library, he felt foolish to have not looked in there sooner. Harmonia Nectere Passus- there it was but just finding it wasn't enough. It was a tricky charm and it had took him two more days to execute it with precision.
The fixing of the cabinet had got half his job done. Which was a good thing and a bad thing. Because then, he had to focus on his other task. It had inevitably dawned upon him again. He had no way around it.
He had got the idea of poisoning Dumbledore after visiting the Weasley twins' joke shop with Zilliah all those days back. He wasn't foolish to use the exact same failed potion. It would've directly led to him without a doubt. But he had slipped a vile of it into his pocket when he was sure no one was looking. He had also taken a vile of the perfected potion too.
Then two days ago, he had secretly purchased a lethal poison and bewitched Madam Rosmerta, the lady of the Three Broomsticks pub, to slip it into the elfic wine set for Professor Slughorn to gift Dumbledore.
And it couldn't have gone any worse.
Turns out, Slughorn never ended up giving the wine to Dumbledore. Instead, he somehow gave a glass of it to Ronald Weasley and he had nearly escaped death just because Potter had the insight to give his best friend a bezoar. He had never liked Weasley but thinking of how he would've died, when he has nothing to do with the whole of Draco's task at hand, had sent him over the edge again. One more innocent life that could've been lost because of his carelessness.
The instant he had overheard the news from some random gryffindors passing by the hallway, his throat had closed up and his occlumency walls had shattered. He had bolted straight back to his room and cried into Zilliah's arms. She didn't ask a single question. She just held onto him, cradling him through the attack, her touch lingering all over his face and back. He doesn't know how but whenever he is in her arms, everything seems a lot more controllable. Almost like she was drawing his panic and fear onto herself to relieve him off the burden.
She had never demanded him for a clear cut answer as to why he is like this these days- why he experiences these constant panic attacks. She seemed content with him coming to her whenever he was in this troubled state. She didn't want to pry. She didn't want him to freak out and shut her out and drown in his anguish alone. She knew he would if she pushes him. So she just settles onto offering him comfort through all of it.
He looks down onto her, currently sleeping peacefully for the first time in almost two weeks. And he understands, despite all, the main reason she doesn't push him is because he never pushes her either. He knows how she can retract back into her shell if she is ever asked of what these nightmares that so cruelly haunt her are all about. He knows there are a thousand secrets that lie beneath her gentle and tired eyes. And as much as he wants to know all about it, he will have to be content with being there for her whenever she wakes from those deadly traps of her mind, shaking and sweating, her eyes mad and distant, like she wasn't even herself.
Two broken humans clinging onto each other to keep themselves from entirely crumbling under the weight of their wretched lives.
Could there be a tragedy more beautiful to ever exist in this world?
He crawls back into bed and tucks back the few strands of her silky hair that had fallen onto her face behind her soft ear, pressing a lingering kiss onto it shortly after.
She looks beautiful, only in her underwear and one of his white shirts. The taste of her from last night still lingers on his tongue.
Breathing in the familiar and comforting jasmine of her hair, he makes up his mind. He is going to inform his mother about the fact that he had fixed the cabinet today itself and meet with his next task tomorrow after he lets the death eaters into the castle. It's the only way. He has to take on Dumbledore in a duel by himself.
And it has to be tomorrow.
Or else, his family is put under the danger of death and Zilliah will be forced into this whole mess. No, he wouldn't allow that. He couldn't live with himself if he did. Not like, he would be alive either way.
Detaching his lips from upon her ear, he moves them to her temple and presses down on there, pouring every last bit of his passion onto it.
It all ends tomorrow.
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After a quick trip to the Owlery to send home the letter he had written, he makes his way to the Great Hall to get breakfast for Zilliah who was still fast asleep when he left her. Through the process of writing and sending the letter, he had made sure to keep his occlumency walls high up so that he doesn't feel a single thing. But as he walks into the hall, only to see Katie Bell in a conversation with Potter, his throat closes up.
There she stands, a person who would've been dead just because of a thoughtless mistake from Draco's side. And as he takes in the black hues of her eyes, locking down on him even from the distance, he knows there's some disfigured memory coiling back to the surface in her mind. It only threatens to shatter his own.
And like a domino set, everything tumbles apart in his mind as Potter looks over his shoulder and meets Draco's eyes. He looks around the hall, his vision already blurring.
He was going to let death eaters into this castle today, in here- this place all these students call home, where they think they're safe. He can't imagine the ruin he is about to bring to Hogwarts, to his own school, his own classmates, his own friends.
The walls crumble to powders and he staggers back, his vulnerable mind screaming within. And all he wants is to run to Zilliah, to let her hold him, to let her guide him through this. But she is asleep. She is asleep peacefully after a really long time. How could he ever disrupt that?
His head spinning, he makes his way to the Prefects Bathroom on the fifth floor. If he can't be with her, then he wants to be left alone at such a weak moment. He doesn't trust anyone else with it.
He would've never reached the bathroom properly through the blur of his vision and his inability to properly grasp his surroundings if he hadn't done it too many times before Zilliah learnt about his struggles.
His breaths troubled, he takes his vest off and throws it onto the floor, only for the suffocating feeling to grow inside his chest. He walks upto the sink, loosening his tie, his mind whirring, his heart pounding.
His Dark Mark burns. It always burns when he feels the regret in him. He never wanted this. Any of this.
He had nearly killed two people. He has to kill one tonight. He has to let other death eaters into the castle causing havoc and pain upon the place he had grown up in.
"I know what you did, Malfoy."
His eyes snap upto the mirror to see Harry by the entrance of the bathroom. He must've followed him here. Hands flat upon the ends of the sink, he forces his eyes into focusing upon the green ones meeting him. "Leave, Potter."
"You hexed her, didn't you?", he only steps forward, his wand raised. And Draco suddenly grabs his own from the pocket of his pant. "Katie."
"I said leave, Potter", Draco grits out through his teeth, his chest heaving, his head feeling like it was being stretched out from both ends.
"I know you're a death eater."
His whole system only clogs more at those words being utter at him.
He didn't want this. Any of this.
Before he can even think, he turns and shoots a curse at Harry. He deflects it, having foreseen it. Draco sends more his way and he deflects all of them onto the faucets and pipes, causing them to break, water spilling out with high force. "I told you to fucking leave", Draco howls, rushing behind a wall. But he can still hear Harry's steps advancing.
"You are the one who gave Slughorn that poisoned mead. You are the one who nearly killed Ron." Draco can make out the sheer rage in his voice. And it only makes him even more angry and stressed.
As Harry turns around the corner, with his wand raised, the killing curse starts slipping out of Draco's tongue, with no room for reason in his mind. "Avada-" He never gets to finish it.
"Sectumsempra", is the last thing he hears as he is blasted onto the flooding floor, his ears ringing. He can feel his skin tearing everywhere. His mind whirs even more as he had hit the back of his head. Pure pain is all he feels at every single inch of his body. And as he finally gets himself to look down at it, he sees blood soaking through his white shirt.
His eyes flick upto Harry who was utterly still in complete shock, his mouth parted.
Draco's vision darkens as the pain only increases. Through the multiple lacerations on his body, blood flows through and through. He doesn't even have it in him to raise a cry.
The last thing he sees before he passes out is the edge of a black coat and the last thing he feels is a hand brush his shoulder. But that doesn't matter to him though. All that matters is his last thought.
Zilliah, still curled upon the bed, sleeping in peace.
Zilliah Zilliah Zilliah.