After having some stressful couple of first days, we finally made it to sunday. I met with Draco on the common room, and we went to the Great Hall to grab some breakfast. After eating as quickly as we could without looking suspicious, we walked out the Great Hall, getting away from all the students, and started making our way to the seventh floor.
It took a moment, but we eventually figured out and were able to get inside the Room of Requirement, and we went our separate ways, so that finding the vanishing cabinet would be easier and faster.
"I think I found it." I faintly heard Draco say from the other end of the room. "Yes, it is the cabinet." I saw while making my way over to where he was, as he pulled a dirty blanket, revealing the cabinet underneath.
"Well, we better get started then." I said, inspecting the cabinet, trying to take in every detail that might be useful. He sighed, as he pulled out his wand, ready to start his mission.
----------
"Now, as I was saying, I prepared some concoctions this morning. Any ideas what these might be?" Said Slughorn, our new potions professor.
And of course Granger had to raise her hand. Poor little thing, so desperate to get on the teachers good side, it was rather pathetic if you ask me.
"Yes, miss...?"
"Granger, sir." She answered quickly, getting closer to the potions. "That one there is Veritaserum, it's a truth-telling serum." She pointed to one of them.
"Very good miss Granger."
"And that one there, terribly tricky to make, it's-"
"Amortentia." I interrupted her, rolling my eyes. I couldn't possibly stand her voice explaining this one too.
"Very good, miss..." He paused, waiting for me to tell him my surname. I looked at him, and as soon as he looked at my eyes, his whole mood changed. He got nervous, and it almost looked like his hands were shaking. "Are you... Is by any chance your last name... Riddle?" He said the last word more quietly than the rest, as if he was afraid of the name, afraid to ask, afraid of me.
"No, sir." I lied easily, but still frowning a little bit, how could he possible know? "My last name is Lestrange."
"Very well, miss Lestrange." He was very obviously trying to calm down, changing the subject back to the potions in front of us. "And do you know what Amortentia is?"
"Of course, sir." I smirked a bit, walking forward to get a closer look at the potion. "It's the world's most powerful love potion. Said to smell different to every person depending on what attracts them."
"You are quite correct. Would you mind giving us an example of what it smells like to you?"
"Of course, sir." I closed my eyes, taking in the smell from the potion. "It smells like apples" I remembered Draco and I, always including green apples in our breakfasts. "Cologne" I smiled, Draco's cologne. "And... Metallic." I said, taking a step back, going to my previous spot, next to Draco, who took my hand in his, and squeezed it.
"Metallic?" He whispered, obviously confused as well.
"I have no idea." I answered simply, trying not to think too much about what it meant, though I had a pretty good idea what it did.
~
I was eight years old, training on the room that had now been designated to my hand to hand combat and sword classes.
"Don't turn your back on me, even for a second. I could have killed you twice already." Said the man training me, I don't know him or how Bellatrix and Rodolphus got him to train me, but he's taught me a lot.
"I know, I'll do better." I said.
"Well then, let's see."
I ran to him, kicking his legs and making him fall on his back, but he pulled at my legs, making me fall to the ground too. I quickly jumped, getting up, but he had already gotten up too. He took his turn and tried to stab me on my left side, but I dodged it, and tried to take a chance and tried to cut him with my own dagger.
He dodged it too, and held my wrist, making me almost drop my dagger. But with my other hand I pushed him and went to get him on the neck. I did it, I had managed to get my dagger on his neck, making the slightest cut, only a couple drops of his blood escaping.
I was about to celebrate my little victory, but then I felt a sharp pain in my chest, just a little above the heart. I looked down to see his dagger had cut me, way deeper than I had cut him. I was now bleeding, a metallic smell filling my senses.
"Weak." Said Bellatrix, who had been watching our whole training session. She liked to make sure the trainers did a good job, but more importantly, she liked to make sure I was getting better, because I had to be perfect. "Start again." She ordered.
----------
"Agh." I winced a little, as the sharp blade cut me on the arm, making me bleed a bit. I was thirteen, training on the summer holidays.
"Slow." Said the woman training me. "You need to be faster, stronger. If you don't, you're gonna get yourself killed." We went back to the centre of the room, and she went and swung her sword at me, but I shielded myself with my own sword.
"I am fast and strong." I said, the clinking noises filling the otherwise silent room, as we fought.
"You're not fast enough. Faster".
"This is a waste of time, if you're not going to put in any effort into it Irya, you might as well just stop and let yourself die." Said Rodolphus, harshly.
"It's not a waste, Rodolphus, I can do it." I said, growing more and more frustrated.
"Don't tell me, show me."
The swords clang one more time, and when trying to shield myself from her next hit, my sword slipped from my hands and ended up on the floor, away from me.
My teacher stopped, seeing I no longer had my sword. "Go retrieve it."
"No." Said Rodolphus immediately. "Keep going."
"But she doesn't have her sword."
"I know" he didn't change his mind. "I want to see what she would do in that scenario, she won't always have her sword or wand to protect herself."
I took a deep breath, looking back at my teacher. I nodded, getting ready to fight. She quickly moved forward, swinging her sword aiming for my chest. I jumped to the side, dodging it, and tried to move towards my sword to be able to defend myself, but she got there faster than me, kicking my sword away and cornering me against the wall.
I saw her sword coming directly towards my face, and I did the only thing I could think of. I went to grab her wrist with my right hand, but she kept fighting, not letting go of her sword and not giving up the chance to win. I was still cornered against the wall, and the tip of the sword was still getting closer to me, so with my left hand I grabbed the sword tightly, pushing it away from me. The pressure with which I was clutching to the sword caused it's blade to cut deep into the palm of my hand, and blood was starting to run down my hand.
I pushed her again, and she lost her balance, stumbling backwards. I took the opportunity, and kicked her in the chest, taking the sword from her. She fell to the ground, and I stood over her, extending the sword to her neck.
"I win." I said out of breath, but proud that I managed to win, ignoring the pain coming from my hand, and instead focusing on the unique, metallic smell of the blood coming out of the wound. Knowing that I had pushed through the pain, and now seeing my teacher on the ground having lost to me, her looking at the blood on the ground that had dropped from my hand, suddenly made me feel something new. I felt something I had never known before, I felt powerful, like I was capable of everything I wanted. I completely loved the new feeling.
"You did good." Said Rodolphus, not looking impressed at all.
"I can do better. Again." I said, eager to feel again the control and power I just had. I was enjoying it.
~
"This is useless, we should just go to sleep." I said, tired as we had been working on the cabinet for hours now. It was now the beginning of October, and we still haven't managed to get the cabinet working, or even get close to it.
"Are you sure you don't know any spell that might help?" Said Draco, obviously frustrated.
"I'm sure, but I got a book from the library just this morning and I think there may be something useful." I said, thinking about the book I had sneaked out of the forbidden section.
"So why haven't you read it yet?" He was angry, not at me but at himself, I knew it. It made me sad seeing him so upset.
"Because I've been trying to help you all day." I sighed, sitting down on a sofa nearby. I was also stressed and not only because I had been trying to get the cabinet to work all day, and almost a month before that, but because the plan I had been working on about killing Dumbledore was finally going to be put into action tomorrow, as tomorrow would be the first visit of the year to Hogsmeade.
"Right, sorry." His voice now calmer. "I'm just so very stressed, I really need to fix this stupid cabinet soon."
"Hey, calm down, we still have until the end of year to do our missions, that's plenty of time and I'm sure we'll figure it out soon. And you're not the only one stressed here, I'm going to Hogsmeade tomorrow, remember?"
"You mean we are going to Hogsmeade tomorrow." Said he confused.
"No." I corrected him. "The two of us going together would be a dead giveaway, besides you got that detention with McGonagall." It was true, I'm sure Potter and his little gang were already suspicious of us, and I don't doubt for one minute that they will try to convince everyone that it was us, after I kill Dumbledore tomorrow. But by then it'll be too late anyway.
"You're right, you're always right." He said now smiling. He looked around for a bit, then back at me, but this time his eyes had a look of mischief, and he was smirking. "You know... I know a way to get rid of all our stress, relax a bit. What do you say?" He raised one eyebrow playfully.
The look he was giving me was really amusing, only he could make me laugh and forget everything at risk right now. "Oh shut up, Malfoy."
"What happened Riddle? Don't you feel like you need it?" He got closer, and rested his hands on my waist while I rested mine on his shoulder.
"You know what? I think I might just do." I played along. He leaned in, and we started making out. It's amazing how you can be so in love with someone, that even after years you still feel the same adrenaline rush and happiness that you did when you first kissed, even after a million kisses.
Draco was like my escape from everything, he understood me and had helped me since the start. He wasn't only my boyfriend, but also my best friend. He helped me and supported me in everything, it had always been that way. He has always been there for me, just as I have for him.
Sometimes it felt like he was the only thing keeping me from going insane, the only person who I felt like I could confide in and tell everything, even when it went against what we had been raised to be and believe. He is my rock, always making sure I know how powerful and smart I already am, and reminding me that even though I had always been pressed to seek perfection, it was okay if I wasn't, if I had flaws, if sometimes I was weak, he reminded me that no matter what, it'll always be us both, together.
After that we decided to go to the common room, since it was late anyway. And that night as we laid in his bed, cuddling under the silk sheets with my head resting on his chest, after being able to forget about the cabinet and my plan for tomorrow, I thought about him, about us and our future. Do we really have a chance at having a good future together? The more I thought about it, the more I realized that if I were to succeed at being the perfect asset I had trained to become, the less chance I'd have of having a future I actually wanted and chose for myself. I know if I become the asset he wants me to be, Voldemort will never let me do or be anything more than just that, than being a weapon. Another weapon for him, to help him do whatever his plan for the Wizarding World is. But the thing is, I'm not so sure I want that anymore.
I know I can be perfect, just as they want me to. I know I can do whatever they ask of me, I have what it takes, I can be a deadly weapon. And even though I know I can do and be all that, even though all I wanted, as it is what I had been raised to do so, is to make Voldemort proud, to serve him; I also know that is not everything I want to be. I want to be more than just another lifeless, soulless weapon for the world to fear and eventually forget, I want to feel loved, to actually be loved.
I find it ironic, how I was raised so that everything I thought of, everything I wanted would be to serve Voldemort, to be a weapon without a voice or choice. I was never showed love, because they thought it'd make me weak and distract me, so they thought if I didn't experiment love from them, then I wouldn't want it, that I would ignore it. That's what they thought, at least.
And oh boy did it backfire.
Now thanks to all that, here I was, sleeping in Draco's arms, thinking about our love and what it meant to me, how important it was for me. Afraid, because suddenly I seemed to be questioning everything I thought of as an absolute truth. What was supposed to be wrong, it just felt so right.
I don't think I'd ever felt more confused, about what I was supposed to do, to feel. I was beginning to question if what I was about to do in Hogsmeade was the right thing to do or no. If I had any other chance, other than the one that had been fabricated for me.
Even with my confused mind , Draco's heartbeat managed to make me relax enough. I fell asleep, and even though a thousand thoughts were still crossing my mind, I managed to have the best sleep I had had in months.
Still wondering how wrong was the right and how right was the wrong.