The Mudblood

Chapter 122 : Year 6

The amazing Drainey fanart was made by https://www.quotev.com/29338974 :)

The common room had been desolate when I'd passed out on the couch the evening before, but somehow, when I woke up the next morning, it was even emptier than before: Draco Malfoy was no longer wedged between the couch and me. He was gone.

Thoughts of him lingered in my mind, though, as I slumped down the corridor to my dormitory. Had the scene in the Manor with Malfoy and his son been a vision of the future or simply a dream? It seemed awfully real, too real...and yet...did I want it to be? Draco's son had certainly looked like him, but...had he looked like me as well, or had that just been my imagination? Was that boy our child, or Draco's with some other woman? The Vow bound me to Draco, but it didn't bind him to me. He was free to marry whomever he wanted, even if it killed me. Would that be his choice? It was impossible to tell with him, but...I hoped not.

I realized when I arrived back in my room that I'd forgotten to take Snape's potion before going to sleep the previous night, but I didn't really care. Voldemort wouldn't give a damn about Malfoy's future child...would he? The kid would be a half-blood...if I would indeed be the mother. The only part of the dream that I could see him caring about was the fact that he hadn't been present in it. That could have meant he was dead, or it simply could have meant that he'd managed to take over the wizarding world and had moved his headquarters to the Ministry of Magic. Either way, though, I just didn't care. All I could think about was the boy...and what Malfoy had said to him.

It did sound awfully like me he was speaking about, didn't it? We'd "always" flirted, but there had been times when our feelings were uncertain—even now. And, of course, I did irk him to no end. It just pained me to think that, if I did become his wife, he would still be concerned that I didn't love him the most after so long...

"How was your party last night?" Astoria asked me as we exited the dormitory. Melody was still wrapped in a cocoon of black blankets, and Ashley hadn't returned to our room after last night's party. Most of the Slytherins hadn't, actually.

"It was...fine," I replied with a shrug. Astoria was wearing far less glitter than usual, but she still looked fabulous, and despite the sadness looming behind her brown eyes, she radiated poise. "Why didn't you come?"

"I had some batches of shampoo to concoct. Business is booming, Lainey. Even if this place is going to hell, girls still need to look gorgeous. I still think you should invest in some of my shampoo—"

"I'm poor, Astoria," I interjected flatly as we strolled through the barren common room. "Ask me again in the few years once I've inherited the Malfoy money."

"Of course, of course, you'll need it then. As much as you hate to admit it, Mrs. Malfoy needs to look perfect, and your hair is still far from it."

I rolled my eyes but didn't discourage her. It was nice and...normal to hear her sound so snootily optimistic about something. All sense of normalcy dissipated, though, when we arrived in the entrance hall and heard absolutely no noise emanating from the Great Hall. When we peered in, we found that only about ten students were present, which would have been ordinary on a weekend morning, but it was Friday, and the teachers were looking suspicious. I was hesitant to enter, but, luckily, the sight of Harmony Flemming jogging down the stairs gave me an excuse not to.

"I'll meet you in there in a minute," I told Astoria, who was too busy looking over papers regarding her business to care. As she sauntered into the gloomy Hall, I retreated toward the steps, and Harmony was so focused on the floor that she nearly bumped into me when landing in the entrance hall.

"Oh—Lainey," she blurted, brushing some of her messy blue hair out of her face. There was a slight puffiness to her eyes that could have been from sleeplessness or crying. Either way she didn't seem well, and I wouldn't have expected her to after the events at the party. "I...didn't think I'd see you here. Everyone's zonked after last night... And you disappeared with Malfoy..."

"So you automatically assumed that we'd bonked in the Slytherin dungeons and wouldn't show our faces today?"

"Well, I dunno..." she mumbled as she traced her foot along the floor. "You two were fairly, um...intimate at the party."

"I don't want to talk about Malfoy," I lied as dismissively as I could. "I'd rather discuss what happened with you...and Harper?"

She cleared her throat and glanced back at the staircase as if someone else might actually come. "I was...a bit of a bitch, huh?"

Biting my lip, I squinted upward in contemplation. "Well...just a bit..."

Though she let out a laugh, I could hear how forced it was. "I probably shouldn't have kissed that other kid... I just...don't want him to treat me like his little sister. And I don't want him to think of me as this pathetic little girl that's got a crush on him. That wasn't what it felt like when we were at his house, but here...he's a sixth year and I'm a fourth year, and he's still in love with Melody."

"That doesn't mean he doesn't care about you...too," I added with a wince. "He was certainly upset after the...incident."

"I didn't actually want to hurt him," she sighed, running a hand over her scalp and pulling at her hair. "I just...I dunno. I was angry. And so I was cruel. Just like Melody. Perhaps he'll fall in love with me simply because I'm exactly like her."

"You are nothing like Melody. She would have done the same exact thing and then laughed in Harper's face about it. Your guilt proves that you're better than her. In fact, you're even better than me. I definitely wanted to hurt Malfoy when I did that to him a few years ago. Even now I don't feel bad about it—"

"Malfoy is a prat. Harper is..."

"Also a prat," I finished with a smirk. "All Slytherin boys are. Pretty sure it's one of the sorting hat's requirements. Just like all Gryffindors are reckless. It was one mistake, Harmony. It won't ruin your relationship with Harper forever. I think the real problem is that even though you want to apologize, you can't."

"Right," she said through a dejected exhale. "This sucks. S'pose I can write him a note, as long as he burns it afterward... Can you deliver it to him?"

"Of course."

"And...can you make sure Melody doesn't see it? She'll mock me forever for being sappy and soft. Don't try to deny it. You know she's cold-blooded."

I didn't know that for sure, though. Even though Melody had rebuked her care for all humans the evening before, there was something more to her than pure, cold hate...

∆

Harmony took an entire week to write her note to Harper, who, though he'd been conspicuously melancholy, refused to read it when I did give it to him. Though I wanted to do all that I could to mend their relationship in a way that my relationship with Fred never could, I had my own issues to deal with.

After the night we slept on the couch together, Malfoy ignored my existence in the same fashion that he had in our younger years when we'd fought. His immaturity was noticed by everyone, considering they all thought we were "official" after our "kiss" in the Room of Requirement. But, that was precisely the reason he was ignoring me; not only did everyone else think we were in a relationship, but I'd insinuated that we actually were. And despite how far we'd come over the past few years, Draco Malfoy still couldn't have that. It was beginning to make me believe that maybe I wouldn't be the mother of his son.

But then...who would be?

That was the question I enjoyed dwelling on least.

The atmosphere within Hogwarts was just as frigid as the atmosphere outside Hogwarts as January wore on. Snow drifts probably would have trapped us inside the castle if it weren't for magic, and after the punishment and torture that the Carrows issued daily, everyone would have gone mad if they couldn't take a frozen stroll outside the castle walls every now and then. Mine were usually with Melody, who was, to no one's surprise, immune to the cold. She always read while we walked—or pretended to. Her lips were always twisting with words she wanted to say, but her eyes were fixed on one part of the page, unmoving. I didn't prod her for explanations; I could feel her reserve gradually unfurling during our afternoons in the library.

By the end of the month, Astoria and I were convinced that Ashley had forgotten about this month's competition, and neither of us was inclined to mention it to her. Astoria and Anderson had reverted to their previous incivility while Malfoy continued to shun me, even when we were beside each other in Dark Arts or forced to be partners in Arithmancy, therefore Astoria and I were perfectly content with the discontinuation of the couples competition.

But, as so often was the case, my contentment didn't last long.

On the last night of January, a Saturday, I'd been blissfully and dreamlessly asleep for an hour or two when I was suddenly jolted into awareness by Ashley shaking my shoulders.

"Get up, Lazy Lainey! Everyone else is already in the common room!"

Moaning, I turned on my side to peer over the bunk bed at Ashley, whose blonde hair was in a ponytail and whose hands were on her hips. Astoria was slipping on her pink silk robe on the other side of the room while Melody was muttering curses in the bed beneath mine.

"Why is everyone in the common room?" I asked rather groggily.

"For January's competition! Dress warm!"

"Dress warm?" I repeated, but Ashley had already disappeared from the room. With a glance over at Astoria, who seemed equally as disgruntled, I tugged a sweater over my tank top and trudged out into the corridor in my pajama pants and slippers.

"Ashley said dress warm," I pointed out to Astoria, who still wore only her robe with a skimpy nightgown beneath.

"It's impossible not to be warm when you're as hot as me, Lainey," she insisted, flipping her perfect hair over her shoulder. My hair was likely a tangled mess, but for some reason Astoria chose not to mock me for it. Probably because when we emerged in the common room, we both immediately noticed that Malfoy and Anderson were speaking to each other—civilly...almost cordially. Perhaps it was only because they were on the same team, but they both seemed to tense a bit when we approached them.

Malfoy was dressed in his classic black suit, but, judging by the wrinkles, he'd fallen asleep in it before being summoned to this meeting. Anderson wore thick wool plaid pajamas, and for once he wasn't petting Smellfoy. They made an odd pair, the two of them standing there together, but right now they seemed to share contempt toward either Astoria or me, bonding them in the most unorthodox way.

"Attention, everyone!" Ashley demanded before Astoria or I could attempt to give our respective partners an awkward greeting. The chatty Slytherins slowly hushed and averted their gazes to where Ashley stood at the center of the room. She was wearing a furry green hat now, and her Slytherin scarf was wrapped around her neck and draped over her thick wool cloak. "I know you've all be waiting anciently for me to announce this month's competition—"

"I think the word you're looking for is anxiously," Harper piped up from where he stood amongst his teammates.

"No, I meant anciently because you're all getting so old waiting for me to announce it! But it's not my fault that I couldn't announce it right away—it was yours! In case you don't all know, every member of my team bought each other gifts except for stupid Ryan and Melody! Ugh! I have spent this entire month trying to discover if they secretly bought each other gifts. But, anyway, now that I've gotten to the bottom of everything, we can dive into the next competition—"

"What were the results of December?" Travis asked from beside me.

Ashley's eye twitched. "I don't want to talk about it—"

"Your team's not winning, huh," Travis concluded with a chuckle. "Sucks for you, Pucey—"

"Shut up!" she shrilled, throwing her head back so violently that her hat nearly fell off. With a sigh, she composed herself and addressed the group as a dignified leader. "My team has twelve points. Your team has...fifteen." She nodded toward us, and Travis began to cheer. "The other two teams are doing so bad that their points are insignificant—"

"Hey!" Pansy interjected as she threw up her hands.

"Shh!" Ashley hissed before glancing back down at her clipboard. "The individual couples' scores are close but...Lainey and Draco are winning."

She shot us a nasty scowl as she said the words, but I could only manage to blink. Malfoy's eyes might have been boring into me, but I didn't know because I refused to even peek in his direction.

"All of that will change tonight, though," Ashley assured us breezily. "Tonight we will have...a snowball war!"

Travis instantly burst out in ridiculing laughter. "A snowball fight, really? That's what we're doing? I'm going to demolish all of you—"

"Zip it! This is no ordinary snowball fight! It is a war!"

"Okay, cool, so there aren't any rules and we can abandon all of our morals?" Travis clarified.

"Do any of us have any morals?" Theo Nott questioned, eliciting snickers from his fellow Slytherins.

"Unlike Quidditch, there are a few rules, like no murdering and...well, that's all," Ashley concluded with a shrug before skimming over the notes on her clipboard. "We'll all go out into the freezing night now so I can teach you how to create magical snowballs—"

"Let them figure it out on their own," Melody droned without looking up from the book she was reading. "If they can't, they deserve to lose."

"You're right!" Ashley declared before anyone could protest. "You'll all have to figure it out on your own. Thank you, Melody. Your esteem on this team has been redeemed."

"Oh good," Melody responded in the most unenthusiastic tone I'd ever heard. Ashley didn't notice, considering the other three teams were now complaining about their lack of snowball knowledge.

"Shush, shush, everyone! I need to explain the goal!" Ashley shouted over the elevating volume. "If you discover how to properly magically arm your snowballs, they will freeze the person you hit with them! Whoever gets frozen loses a point, and whoever freezes the other person gets a point. The last team with unfrozen players wins!"

"Wins what? More points?" Anderson questioned.

"No, they just get to brag!" she snapped before chucking her clipboard onto the couch and starting for the exit. "Let's move, people!"

"Don't you reckon this is a bit dangerous?" Noah Palmer piped up as the Slytherins shuffled toward the shifting boulder. "What if the Carrows see us? I don't want to lose my position as Prefect—"

"I'm a Prefect too!" Ashley reminded him, as if anyone really needed reminding. "Since this competition is being run by a Prefect, we can't get in trouble!"

Noah looked skeptical, but he wisely decided it was best not to argue with Ashley, and, like the rest of the Slytherins, he trudged out into the dungeon corridor.

"Can I go back and get my cloak?" I called up to Ashley, who led the horde, as I shivered in my sweater and slippers.

"I told you to dress warm!" she sang back condescendingly. My eyes slid over to Astoria, who waltzed beside me in her scanty robe, but she was smirking.

"Hold still for a moment, Lainey," she instructed as she pulled out her wand. I paused with uncertainty, and before I could question her she cast a nonverbal spell on me that brought sudden warmth to my body despite the chill, dank air. "A spell that I created so I can wear sexy dresses in the winter. You're welcome."

I was so momentarily perplexed that she and the rest of my team left me behind and I had to jog to catch up with them.

"Why aren't you doing the spell on all of us?" Anderson griped as we ascended the stairs.

"Because Lainey's the only person I care about here," Astoria replied with a cruel simper.

Malfoy's eyes slivered in offense. "What about me?"

"Are you deaf? I just told you that I only care about Lainey, and since you've been a bit of a prick to her lately—"

"Astoria—"

"Gossiping about me to your friends, Mudblood?" Malfoy spoke over me as we landed in the entrance hall. Our voices carried with the high ceiling, and I was surprised neither of the Carrows swooped down to reprimand us.

"Don't be so full of yourself, Malfoy," I countered hotly. "I think it's obvious to anyone with eyes that you've been a prick to me lately."

He huffed out a breath but could find no defense for himself, and so our team exited the castle in silence as the others all chatted gleefully about strategies and spells that would magically arm their snowballs.

Due to Astoria's ingenious spell, snow didn't soak my slippers as Ashley guided us to a wooded area between the lake and the Quidditch pitch, where the thick trees cast eerie shadows over the snow-laden ground. In the distance, I could see the silver hoops glinting in the light of the moon, and the lake was like a sheet of glossy black paint on the opposite end of the tree cluster.

"Okay," Ashley said, her voice nearly drowned out by the wind. She was facing the entire crowd of shivering Slytherins, her back to the spooky trees that would be our battleground. The boundaries of this game were still unclear to me, and I thought she would elaborate, but she merely clapped her hands and shouted, "GO!"

"Go?" I repeated in alarm as Ashley and her teammates began to pack together snowballs. Pansy's team was retreating toward the Quidditch pitch while I was suddenly being ushered toward the lake by Malfoy and Anderson.

"Let's set up a base!" little Lorene, Travis's partner, commanded as she led us through the maze of trees. We were running now, all eight of us, as snowballs suddenly began to whiz past our heads. When we arrived at the clearing between the woods and the lake, panting and red-cheeked, we realized that Flora Carrow was no longer among us.

"Shit, she got frozen," Kevin Bletchley said as he stared back into the dark that we'd just escaped from. Ashley's team had stopped their pursuit, but I didn't imagine it would be long before they found us. "Should I go back and get her?"

"No, she's gone," Lorene said humorlessly as she whipped out her wand.

"She's not dead," I insisted with a laugh. "This is just a game—"

"Help me build a wall of ice," the young girl interjected as she began to magically construct a barrier between us and the forest, layer by layer. Kevin joined in readily, but the rest of us could only gawk.

"Damn, she is a badass," Travis muttered to me as he admired his partner's magical skills.

"I can't even do that," Anderson agreed. The ice wall before Lorene was rapidly growing as Kevin attempted to copy her futilely. Even though he was a fifth year and she was a third year, she was clearly the more skilled one—perhaps the most skilled one out of all of us.

"Remind me again why we allowed Ashley to drag us all into this?" I prompted as I glanced around at my four other unproductive teammates.

"Well—" Travis began, but his voice was cut off by his partner's.

"Someone's coming!" she hissed back at us as she continued to compose her wall. "Why aren't you all making snowballs!"

"You didn't tell us to!" Travis exclaimed as he began to grab snow in a panic.

"Since when am I the team leader?"

"Since you started bossing us around!"

"This is pitiful," Malfoy intoned from behind me, causing me to jump. I hadn't noticed him lingering there, and when I glanced back, his face and hair looked so pale against the darkness of the lake. He was fighting off shivers, and his jaw was hard as he reached down and scooped up a pile of snow. After compiling it into a ball, he pulled out his wand and muttered a spell that made the orb of snow glow in his hand.

"You know the spell!" Anderson accused as he scrambled to grab snow. "Why didn't you tell us, Mal? Mud, get some snow—"

Anderson's last word was interrupted when a snowball pelted him in the head, coating his entire body in a sheet of ice that rendered him frozen in the awkward position he'd been crouching in. All of us whipped our heads past the edge Lorene's ice wall, where Crabbe's round form was materializing out the darkness. At least ten glowing snowballs were wedged in the crook of his left arm as he used his right arm to hurl them in our direction. One just barely missed Astoria's head, and she yelped and ducked behind Lorene, who had acquired her own snowballs. None of them had been magically altered, however, so when she did manage to hit Crabbe, he was sparkled with snow rather than frozen. Ultimately, it was one of Malfoy's magical snowballs that halted Crabbe's attack, knocking the oaf to the ground like an oversized block of ice.

"Nice hit," Lorene congratulated Malfoy as she dropped her useless snowballs and aimed her wand back at the accumulating wall of ice. "Now help me fortify our area—"

"Screw that," Malfoy barked as he gathered another ball of snow in his hands. "You can all squat here behind in your ice fortress while I go out and kill everyone—"

"Fine, bring Fitzroy with you," Lorene commanded as she nodded toward me. "Greengrass, you take the other side of the woods with Anderson—"

"Vince is—frozen," Astoria said almost breathlessly as she stared down at him with wide eyes.

"I meant Travis," Lorene corrected without glancing away from her ice.

"Mm, I do love the way you say my name," Travis cooed. "If I wasn't dating Rachel—"

"Leave, all of you," Lorene groaned with an eye roll.

Beside me, Malfoy had already gathered four snowballs and charmed them all. Without meeting my eyes, he offered me two and I took them gingerly before the two of us set off beyond the ice wall, mute but alert. Malfoy's tension was prominent as we trekked deeper into the woods, his narrowed eyes darting around through the shadows and trees for signs of movement.

"I'm...surprised that you actually knocked out your minion," I said hoarsely. When he made no reply, I cleared my throat and added, "Ashley's going to explode more than she typically does when she finds out."

Malfoy snorted, which was the first semi-positive reaction I'd provoked from him in weeks.

"So...how'd you learn the spell?" I asked as I nodded toward his two snowballs. He kept switching them between his hands, probably because he wasn't wearing gloves. I wasn't either, but I'd opted to rest my snowballs between my forearm and my stomach, both of which were covered by my sweater that cold no longer penetrated.

"Crabbe let it slip. Knew because he's spent this entire month helping Ashley search for it. Her story about trying to find Harper and Melody's presents was rubbish. She just couldn't figure out the spell that would make this snowball war work."

"Hm, so Crabbe tells you the spell and then you use that knowledge to freeze him? It's clear to me now why you weren't placed in Hufflepuff. Not a loyal bone in your body—"

"If you have something you'd like to say, Fitzroy, spit it out," Malfoy demanded as he paused his strides and whipped around to face me. Color was surfacing in his pale cheeks, and I couldn't tell if the tremor in his body was due to anger or the cold.

"I think I've made my thoughts obvious," I replied coolly as I dropped the two snowballs and crossed my arms over my chest. They remained glowing and intact at my feet, but I wouldn't have cared even if they had shattered. This competition was trivial in comparison to the questions that had been coursing through my mind for the past three weeks. "You're disloyal to everyone except yourself. I was a fool to ever think differently—"

"Please," Malfoy cut in with a disdainful eye roll. He opened his mouth to voice his explanation, but then his eyes narrowed as they fixated on my arms, which were still crossed over my chest. "You're not wearing a bra, are you?"

"What—How—What?" I blurted as I hugged my torso even tighter. "I—didn't have time to—And I didn't think—How can you tell?"

The corner of his lips curled devilishly despite the fact that only a moment ago we'd been preparing to engage in a heated debate. "You enjoy making things impossibly easy for me, don't you?"

"What things?" I questioned, but my ignorant inquiry only broadened his smirk. "I did not choose not to wear a bra—and certainly not because I thought it would make things easier for you. You all mock my bra anyway, so maybe I just won't wear one anymore."

He shrugged as his eyebrows jumped. "I'm not opposed."

"But you are disgusting," I countered, and while I'd intended to sound agitated, his good humor was rubbing off on me. It had been dormant for so long, and while I knew this moment of lightheartedness would be fleeting, it was reassuring to think that perhaps we could resume our relationship where we'd left it, like we always did after these petty fights.

His grin faded with his next statement, though, and he had to stare at a tree to his right as he said, "Or I'm just...attracted to you." When he reverted his attention back to me, I must have been gawking, because he added, "Don't look so surprised, Mudblood. I've said it before."

"Right," I said, composing myself with as much dignity as I could muster. "You're physically attracted to me, but you can't stand my personality. That must be why you left me alone on that couch—"

"I left you alone on that couch because I can't be what you want me to be," he interjected, his tone verging on desperation. "I am disloyal, and that isn't going to change. Not for anyone—"

"But least of all for me?"

His jaw shifted as he stared up at the bare branches that laced above us. "Even if I..." He shook his head. "Do you think...do you honestly think my parents would ever let me be with you—a half-blood? They don't care too much about it now because they know it's nothing serious—"

"They—what?"

"They think what everyone else does: that we're just casually hooking up for fun—"

"They—But—we aren't—"

"I'm aware," he said flatly, his icy gaze now trained on me. "You made it clear that that wasn't what you wanted when you refused to kiss me while I was 'drunk'."

My mouth opened and closed as I worked through his implications. "But...that is what you want? That's all you want from me? Casual snogging? But you—you asked me to sleep with you on that couch—"

"Because I had a headache," he groaned, rubbing his forehead.

"You...were just using me?" I demanded, my voice reaching a volume that would easily be heard by any of our lurking opponents. I didn't care, though. I didn't care if some snowball froze me. My heart was already a frigid, lifeless vessel, frozen in my chest. Malfoy had seen to that.

"You can heal me and I can heal you. It's fair—"

"It's not," I said numbly, shaking my head. When my voice escaped my lips again, it wasn't so hollow. "It's not fair—"

"Fine, it's not," he agreed, dropping his snowballs in aggravation. "It's not fair. That's why I left you alone on the couch. I can't give you what you want! I can't—I can't marry you. I can't marry a half-blood. My parents would never allow it—and neither would the Dark Lord."

I gagged back any rage-filled words I'd been meaning to spew when he added that last statement. Maybe he was only being so cruel because he thought that his parents and Voldemort would never let us be together, but how would he react when he found out that they would not only allow it, but they would also ensure that it happened? Was he using them as a scapegoat—as a way to make it seem like this wasn't his fault? Like it wasn't him that didn't want to marry me?

"Would you even...want to?" I managed to ask. "Marry a half-blood, I mean. Would you even want to if you could?"

"Stop trying to be ambiguous. You know I'd never want to marry a half-blood. Unless—"

Words stopped flowing from his mouth the moment a magical snowball slammed his back and knocked his rigid body onto the snowy earth. My eyes bulged as I stared at the spot that he had been, the spot that was now occupied by Pansy Parkinson and Theodore Nott. Pansy's messy dark hair was speckled with white flakes of snow while Nott's brown hair was flawless styled, and they both wore warm cloaks to combat the chill. I wondered if Malfoy would get hypothermia, lying there frozen in the snow—

"It's so pathetic how she thinks she has a chance with Draco just because they're partners in this stupid game," Pansy ridiculed to Nott as if I didn't have ears. Both of them had glowing snowballs ready in their arms, but mine were still sitting in the snow at my feet, and I knew the moment I moved, one of my competitors would freeze me. "Draco would never seriously consider anything less than a pureblood."

"I dunno," Theo disagreed as he juggled the snowballs. "The Dark Lord chose Fitzroy as one of his own. She's a Death Eater, a Seer, and a Potter. She's got a fairly lengthy list of attributes despite her blood status."

"Being a Potter only makes her even more unappealing," Pansy scoffed. "And you've heard Draco over the past few weeks, talking about how annoyingly desperate she is—how she thinks she has a shot at being his girlfriend, as if Draco Malfoy would ever stoop so low."

I gritted my teeth, knowing Pansy was just trying to get under my skin and knowing I couldn't let her. Malfoy wouldn't have said those things...would he? Well, yes, he probably would have, especially to his friends who he'd always derided me to. But did he mean them? If the conversation we'd just had was any indicator of his true sentiments, then yes, he probably did.

"You two aren't on the same team," I said, pushing out all dejecting thoughts. "But you're working together?"

"We made a temporary truce," Nott informed me with a shrug. "Parkinson demanded that I help her find you and Draco so she could show off her superior skills to Draco by demolishing you—"

"And then you froze him!" Pansy fumed as if she'd just remembered.

"He can still see us," Nott insisted as he peered over at Malfoy's open eyes. "Hopefully he can't hear us, or he would have just heard your pathetic plan to gain his affections."

Groaning shrilly, Pansy readied one of her snowballs in her hand and then launched it at me. I ducked just in time and heard it collide with the tree behind me, encasing the bark with ice. With a sigh of relief, I straightened my posture and met Pansy's crazed eyes.

"According to your standards, you shouldn't even need to destroy me to win Malfoy's affections. Just the fact that you're a pureblood should suffice. But...it's been how many years that you've been pining for Malfoy with no avail? Seven, maybe? Malfoy may have rejected me for my blood status, but he's rejected you for your personality. I'd much rather be hated for an insignificant, uncontrollable trait of mine than my rotten soul—"

Pansy chucked another snowball at me, but I was ready for it this time, and when I ducked down to dodge it, I retrieved one of the balls that I'd dropped and flung it directly at her face. Her eyes were wide and her pug nose was scrunched as the snow collided with her flesh, and so that was how her face froze as her body tipped back into the snow.

Theo was actually laughing, and I thought he might congratulate me, but instead he applauded me by chucking one of his own snowballs at me. Every part of me solidified into ice as I met the snowy ground with a thump. The fact that I could hear that thump was enough to distress me, and as Nott sauntered away with a "See ya later, Fitzroy", I realized that Malfoy had been able to hear the entire exchange between Pansy and me.

Part of me hoped I would stay frozen here under this canopy of tree limbs forever, that way I would never have to discover what Malfoy had thought of this encounter with Pansy. Or what heartbreaking words he'd almost uttered after that torturous unless.

∆

Obviously, my team did not win the snowball war. Ashley broke past Lorene's ice fort and demolished her and Kevin, while Travis and Astoria were taken out by Melody only moments after departing our base. Pleased with her victory, Ashley took no time to delay divulging the details of February's task. She arrived at Slytherin's table the next morning with her clipboard in hand and addressed the rest of our groggy House with disturbing enthusiasm. Considering it had taken almost an hour for Ashley and Melody, the only two unfrozen players at the end of the game, to thaw all of us, the majority of our House was still chilled to the core, shivering as we ate our toast.

"Good morning, my lovely friends," Ashley greeted as she stepped up to the empty space between Astoria and Crabbe and raked her vibrant blue eyes over the grumbling crowd. "I have an announcement to make."

"What is it? That your team is winning because you're a bunch of cheating wankers?" Anderson questioned as he picked at the platter of bacon in front of us.

"No," Ashley barked, hugging her clipboard tight to her chest. "My team is actually...tied with yours, unfortunately."

"Ha," I blurted, nearly spitting my food out onto Astoria's plate. "We're still not behind you, even after last night's horrible defeat? Did Malfoy tamper with the score sheet?"

"Draco was with me last night after the snowball fight. He wouldn't have had time to tamper with the score sheet," Pansy injected with a snooty smirk. She sat amongst the seventh years, and, as I shot her a disparaging look, I realized that Malfoy wasn't amongst them.

"Actually, Draco was with me last night," Nott corrected with a suggestive eyebrow wiggle that made Blaise choke and Pansy seethe.

"Actually, you're all lying just to bother Lainey since Draco was on Head Boy duty after the competition. I know because I'm Prefect," Ashley said as she tapped on her Prefect badge. "But enough talk of Draco! He's not even here to hear the marvelousness that is February's competition!"

Harper groaned audibly on my left. "We're already staring the next competition? I've barely had enough time to praise Melody for her outstanding performance at the last one—"

"January is over!" Ashley nearly yelled, drawing the attention of the other Houses. Luckily we were far enough away from the professors' table that the Carrows either didn't hear or didn't care to intervene. "We are moving on to February now! And I have decided that for February, since it contains Valentine's Day, we're going to do something romantic!"

"Oh no," was my immediate response while Anderson simply began to gag. Astoria was staring down at her nails to avoid Anderson's gaze, but Harper was openly gawking over at Melody, who, obviously, didn't even flinch from her reading.

"Oh yes!" Ashley countered as she did an odd little jump. "Are you all ready to hear what the romantic competition is going to be?"

"Only if I can switch partners," Pansy grumbled with a snobbish glance in Goyle's direction.

Ashley's nostrils flared as she slapped her clipboard down on the table. "No partner switching! Everyone will stay with their assigned partner, and this month you will be required to kiss your partner...IN PUBLIC!"

Anderson actually hacked up his food this time, and Melody tore her focus away from her book to snort.

"That sounds like something I won't be doing," she droned before jumping her eyebrows at Harper and then resuming her reading.

"Define the word required," I prompted Ashley as my eyes slid tentatively toward the empty spot that Malfoy should have been occupying. I was too grateful for the fact that he wasn't present to even wonder where he might be.

"I can't define it, Lainey. I don't have a dictionarary—"

"She doesn't want a literal definition," Anderson snapped, wiping his mouth as he glared up at her. "She wants to know what you mean by it. Do we—have to kiss our partner? Are we bound by some magical oath?"

"No, but if you want points then you must," Ashley answered as she picked up her clipboard. "I hope you don't, though. You and Astoria are probably the only couple on your team that would, and if you don't, then my team is sure to pass yours!"

"I'll do it!" Travis declared from farther down the table, causing heads to turn. Lorene shot him a look of pure disgust as she inched away from him and continued to chew her breakfast sandwich with a wrinkled nose.

"Do it, then," his older brother taunted.

"I'm not gonna do it now," Travis muttered, his cheeks blazing red when Harper's vicious scowl fell upon him.

"You're going to cheat on my sister?"

"Uh...no—"

"What are the requirements of this competition?" Astoria asked loudly before the two boys could commence an argument.

"You must kiss your partner in public—"

"Define in public," I interrupted, altering Ashley's matter-of-fact tone to one of agitation.

"I don't have a dictionarary!"

"How many people must see the kiss?" Astoria asked as patiently as she could. Anderson was gaping at her as if she'd grown a third eye. Apparently he hadn't thought she would even consider this task of the competition as a possibility. I hadn't expected her to either, but...she had been eyeing Anderson differently this morning, and by that I meant that she acknowledged his existence at all, a step up from the glassy expression she'd been sporting for the past month.

"Twenty people must be witnesses," Ashley responded after consulting her clipboard. I was about to question the necessity of so many witnesses when a smooth voice obliterated all of my thoughts.

"Witnesses to what?"

Slowly, my head pivoted to the right to find that Malfoy was just sliding into the empty space between Anderson and Pansy. His expression was smug as he retrieved an apple and sunk his teeth into its skin.

"Your kiss with Lainey," Ashley informed him so casually that he almost didn't catch her words. When he did, though, he blanched and had to force himself to swallow the chunk of apple in his mouth.

"My...what?"

"Don't listen to her, Draco," Pansy cooed as she stroked his arm. "She's just talking about her dumb competition—"

"Everyone must kiss their partner in public this month because of romance and Valentine's Day!" Ashley reiterated with just as much animation as before. "The kiss must happen before Valentine's Day—"

"That only gives us two weeks!" Anderson complained indignantly.

"Will it take you longer than that to convince yourself to let your lips come in contact with Greengrass's gross lipstick?" Melody droned, raising her eyes toward Anderson in cruel amusement.

"It's not that gross," Anderson tried to mumble, but it was mostly incoherent to anyone sitting farther from him than I was.

"This should be the easiest competition of them all!" Ashley scoffed with a dramatic eye roll. "All of you who follow through with the kiss get two points, and all of you that fail lose two points."

Malfoy emitted an actual laugh as he shook his head. "Just give Fitzroy and I negative points now, Pucey. There's no way in hell—"

"Oh c'mon, Draco," Nott prodded with a crooked smirk. "You didn't seem so opposed to kissing her at the party."

Malfoy shrugged and gazed around the Great Hall as if he were disinterested. "I'm not opposed to kissing anyone after a few drinks—"

"You seemed opposed to kissing Coral Dent instead of Lainey," Harper sang, peering his head around me and Anderson. At the sound of his voice, Malfoy twisted his head in our direction, and our eyes met for the briefest of seconds. His expression didn't change, though; he remained aloof and indifferent at Harper's claim.

"That's because I had a few too many drinks," he explained to everyone in his superior tone. "Everyone knows that if I'd been in my right mind, I would have chosen Coral."

"Anyone in their right mind would have chosen Coral," Travis chimed in, causing Coral's head to perk up. I didn't really care about what Travis had to say, though, or even what Coral was saying in response to him now: My mind was focused solely on Malfoy's lie. He hadn't been drunk at the party, and though he'd had a debilitating headache, he'd been capable of consensual thought and he'd meant to do what he did—or what everyone thought we did, anyway.

"Hey, Ash," I said over the conversations that were sparking up around the table. "Why don't you count our kiss from the party for this competition?"

"Because that happened in January, Lainey. This is February—"

"I know," I said, lowering my voice as I leaned across the table toward her. "But you and I both know that I have no intention of kissing Malfoy again. So just give us two points—"

"There are no exceptions to the rules!" she shrilled, shielding her clipboard from me as if I might steal it and "tamper" with it.

"Fine, then knock us down two points," I commanded unwaveringly as I nodded to her clipboard. "It's not going to happen."

Ashley shrugged as she whipped out a quill and filled in our section of her point chart. "Fine with me."

Lowering my head, I peeked over at Malfoy to see if he'd heard our exchange, but he was already engrossed in a conversation with Theo and Blaise. It was fine with Ashley if we didn't kiss this month, and clearly it was fine with him as well. So, then...why wasn't it fine with me?

∆

(Note: When Lainey and Draco are passing notes there are some parts that are supposed to be crossed out but Wattpad doesn't have that function so I put those parts in parentheses) 

"I found some more information on the Lupins," I said as I flipped through a magical ancestry encyclopedia that I'd found in a dusty old corner of the library, which was where I was located now. Melody sat across from me with her arms crossed and her eyes scanning the textbook on the table before her, her efforts still focused on vampire research while mine had shifted from Clairvoyance to family history.

For the past two weeks I'd spent most of my free time in the library, hoping to discover some knowledge about my family's past—real and adoptive. For the past two weeks I'd also spent a considerable amount of time watching couples snog in public—and avoiding Draco Malfoy. Many of the partners, like Blaise and Daphne, had had no issue with snogging in front of others, as they did it all the time, but other couples, like Malfoy and me, had evaded each other completely in fear that the other might spontaneously plant a kiss. That wasn't really why I was avoiding Malfoy, though. Our mutual silence was due to the fact that he was an intolerable git and I was a pathetically desperate half-blood.

Hence the family history research.

It wasn't so much that I cared about my blood status, but that I was now more conscious of it than I had been even as a Slytherin Mudblood. There was nothing I could do about it, of course, and no amount of research would change the fact that Malfoy was an ass for rejecting me just because I wasn't pure enough. If that was even the reason at all. I'd never been pure, and yet I'd thought that maybe—

"I don't care about your family history," Melody grumbled, pausing her reading momentarily to glower at me. Even with the fading light streaming through the window beside us, her green eyes looked unnaturally dark, and I wondered if they were just permanently stuck in that hue.

"You don't care about Lyle's family history?"

Her nose twitched at that, but she continued reading nonetheless. "You should be aware by now that I don't have time for that."

"Time for what? A boyfriend? I think you made that abundantly clear to everyone when Harper tried to sing his new song to you in the common room this morning."

A sadistic smile stretched across Melody's lips as her eyes rose to meet mine. "I hope he finally got the message."

I sighed, recalling how Harper had attempted to serenade Melody with his guitar and his "Valentine's Day Song" but had been hexed across the common room before even singing the first "Melodyyyy". He was still in the hospital wing now, to Ashley's chagrin. It was, indeed, Valentine's Day, the deadline for February's task, and since Melody and Harper had failed to kiss and Harper was now incapacitated, there was little hope of gaining more points for her team. Like Daphne and Blaise, Ashley and Crabbe had performed their public kiss on the first day of February, but Hestia and Vaisey had both refused, meaning that Ashley's team was still at the same amount of points as last month. They would win this month regardless, though. The other two teams didn't contain any real couples that had any intention of publically kissing, and my team was practically hopeless. Travis had managed to peck Lorene in the common room earlier this week, but she proceeded to punch him after, so Ashley only gave us one point.

"Well, even if you're done with Harper, wouldn't you be interested to know that I found Lyle's name in this book?" I teased as I pushed the encyclopedia across the table. "Look, they're all there. Garren, Evan, Lyle—Muggles."

"His name is crossed out," Melody growled as her fists clenched.

"Because he's deceased. Look, my dad's is too—"

"I'm not interested," she began to say, but then her eyes narrowed on the page. "Your name is there."

"Probably because I was adopted," I said with a shrug, but she ignored me as she drew her wand and pointed it at my name. Before I could comprehend what she was doing, the pages of the book began to flip rapidly until they landed on the header "POTTER".

"There."

"Oh—um—thanks—"

"Don't thank me for doing something that anyone with common sense would have done—"

"That was not common sense. It was..." My words trailed off as my eyes honed in on the library's entrance, through which Malfoy was currently walking. Two years ago I would have sneered at him and two months ago I might have waved at him but now I felt weird about even looking at him. I redirected my gaze to the book in front of me and rubbed my temples. "This is a long-ass family tree."

"The Potters were purebloods," Melody told me without removing her eyes from her own book. "Until your father ruined it, that is. Married a Mudblood."

"Oh shut up, you're a half-blood too. There isn't too much on my mum's side, but my dad's..." I paused, scanning the names that stemmed above "JAMES POTTER". His father, Fleamont, and his mother, Euphemia, and then his mother's mother...Elaina—

I tapped on her name in the same fashion that Melody had and the book magically skipped a few pages until I landed on the short biography of Elaina Hendry, who was, as Lupin had said, a Seer. She was deceased now, but she'd been a well-known Seer in her day and was said to have had some extraordinary Seeing abilities...

"I think my great-grandmother was a Clairvoyant too," I whispered, mostly to myself, since I assumed Melody wasn't listening. "I wish she were alive still, so I could talk to her..."

"There's always the Resurrection Stone," Melody put in, her dry voice making me jolt in my chair.

"The—what?"

"There's a legend of a magical stone that allows you to speak with the dead. I've been looking for it when I'm not plotting my father's assassination."

"Oh...I didn't know..." I said as barely a breath as my brain teemed with the possibilities of such a stone. If Melody found it, she would want to see Lyle again—as would I—but it would also be wonderful to see Ray and Sirius and Cedric and perhaps even Dumbledore, if only to apologize for being the cause of his death.

"I'm going to destroy it when I find it," Melody stated abruptly, and I had to blink to comprehend her words.

"You—what? Why?"

"No one should have to return to this awful world once they've passed on," she said, staring out the window at the flimsy flakes of snow that drifted from the sky. "And I know if you get your hands on the Stone, you'll try to bring Lyle back."

"You wouldn't?"

"Not unless it was permanent, and it wouldn't be," she answered darkly. After a moment of brooding, her eyes landed back on my book. "That's who you're named after."

"Yeah, I suppose... James's grandmother... My father's grandmother... It's still weird for me to think about—that I'm a Potter. That these people I've never known are my family." I motioned toward the names on the pages, the strangers that shared my blood. "It...makes sense, though, that I am a Potter. I got my Clairvoyance from this lady—Elaina—I s'pose. She must have passed it down... The Fitzroys couldn't have given me this ability, not even the Lupin side. And, of course, You-Know-Who wouldn't have given me either of these stupid marks if I were a Fitzroy."

Melody watched as I pulled at my left sleeve and then touched behind my right ear, where the slave mark was concealed by my hair.

"When did you find out about it?" she inquired as she stared intently at my right ear.

"Er...Malfoy found it on me two years ago—"

The snort she expelled sounded oddly like "Typical", and I rolled my eyes at her.

"It wasn't—never mind. He found it, but I didn't know what it was at first. I still don't know everything about it, which is just proof that I'm the worst Clairvoyant Seer in history."

Melody didn't deny it, but she didn't scoff or make a snide comment either. Instead she stared pensively at the window, half covered in snow. "Voldemort isn't in you, but a part of him is attached to you—bonded to you—in a way that can compel you to do things. Like Gaudiums and those that they Latch onto."

My eyebrows shot up at the fact that she knew this—that Gaudiums could be influenced by those whom they Latched onto—but she continued before I could question it.

"That attachment makes you like him. Gives you the ability to speak Parseltongue, just like he can. Makes spiders hate you, just like they hate snakes—and him." She nodded toward a tiny black spider that was scurrying along the windowsill. "Certain magical beings look at you and see him, your master—"

"Spiders hate me," I repeated quietly as a revelation clicked in my brain. "They—They attacked me—in my first year—a horde of spiders attacked me—"

"Usually they flee," Melody explained, unfazed by this confession, "but I suppose if there were a lot of them they would have attacked you. Your snake presence isn't particularly strong. Only a fragment of Voldemort is bonded to you. You don't get that much of his power."

"That's...so bizarre," was all I could think to say as I stared at the lone spider climbing up the windowpane.

"Now would probably be a good time to tell you that when I kill Voldemort, you'll likely die with him," Melody said with such nonchalance that I thought she was kidding. But Melody Flemming did not joke. And her expression was somber enough to confirm the truth of her statement.

"I...I die...if he dies?"

"It's possible," she said ruefully, drumming her fingers on her book. "Depends how strong your bond is. If you're lucky it won't be a slow death, but it could take years. Years of slow decay, like me... But you hate him enough that you could survive. And you're a witch. Muggle slaves were weaker, which is why most of them died without the powers of their masters."

"I...don't know if I'm ready to die," I admitted, staring past Melody where Malfoy was skimming an aisle of books. The rest of the wizarding world would crumble if Voldemort survived, but at least Malfoy and I would have a chance of a future, even if he didn't want it. Our future with that boy—potentially our son—had to be better than death. "Even if it means that You-Know-Who dies, I don't know if I want to die too."

"Hm, well, I'm not going to spare him for your sake," Melody replied as she slammed her book shut. "You may be the only member of our little friend group that I can tolerate, but the fact that I dislike you less than everyone else doesn't quench my thirst for revenge."

My eyes slivered at her skeptically. "You'd still kill him, even if you'd be killing me as well?"

"It's never the annoying people who die, Fitzroy," she said while standing from her seat, "so I think you'll be fine."

I wouldn't be fine, though. Even if Voldemort died and I survived, nothing felt like it would be fine. Fred and I were obsolete, and I doubted even the Dark Lord's death could reconcile whatever we'd once had. Malfoy and I were back to being enemies, and if Voldemort died, perhaps Malfoy wouldn't be cowardly enough to go through with the arranged marriage, and the power of the Vow would kill me. Maybe I would die no matter what.

Though I considered leaving the library with Melody and going to dinner, Malfoy was still here, now sitting at a table unaccompanied. With my encyclopedia wrapped in my arms, I trekked the distance between us as if I were walking into my inevitable death. Maybe Melody had just been trying to scare me, maybe she'd been lying, but maybe I wanted it to be true. Maybe I had no future after Voldemort; maybe my fate was really intertwined with his, just like my brother's.

Who was I kidding, though? Harry was the Chosen One—chosen by some divine magical power to defeat the Dark Lord. I was chosen by the Dark Lord to be a bloody slave. I was nothing in this war, just another pawn that would die with the rest, un-heroically and without any mourners. Would Malfoy come to my funeral? Judging by the way his face twisted when I slammed my book down on the table across from him, probably not.

"Do you want something?" he asked blandly, his eyebrows barely raised. There were a lot of things I wanted, but none of them rolled off my tongue as I stared at him. "If you want to kiss me, now's not the time. I counted. There are only thirteen other witnesses in here."

"You heard what Pansy said," I blurted instead of addressing his comments. I couldn't find my voice when I tried to elaborate, and he appeared just as confused as he ought to with my lack of context.

"What are you talking about, Fitzroy?"

"You heard what Pansy said during the snowball war," I repeated, struggling to keep my voice steady. "You were frozen but you could hear her. I know you could. Do you think I'm pathetic, Malfoy? Do you think I desperately want to be your girlfriend? Do you think—"

"Shhh!" Madam Pince hissed as she scurried past our table. "Quiet, or I'll kick you out!"

Rolling my eyes at her, I considered just leaving on my own accord, but instead I yanked out the chair across from Malfoy's and plopped into it. His face was stony as he watched me rip open the encyclopedia and begin to read as if I'd been doing it the whole time. After a few minutes of collective silence, I thought he was just going to allow my inquiries to hang between us unanswered, but then a piece of parchment was slapped onto my book, and rather than reading neat print, my eyes were now skimming over Malfoy's messy scrawl.

I saw you when you were desperate to be someone's girlfriend, Fitzroy, so I know you're not desperate to be mine. Just had to tell the rest of them something to get them off my back.

Though my instinct was to tear the page in half, I suppressed my rage and grabbed a quill to write: So your friends started to suspect we're really dating and you HAD to shut it down by mocking me? (Is the idea of us) Are we really going back to where we started? Are we really going to act like first years again?

I was technically a second year when we met, was his response, and I had to dig my nails into my palms to prevent myself from destroying the note. When I glanced up at him, he was reading his textbook as if he weren't the world's largest prat.

If all you want from me is casual snogging, fine, but at least have the decency to be honest with me about it. Don't pretend that (you) we're friends (or that you) Don't play with my feelings.

His eyebrows shot up when he read that one, but still he refused to meet my eyes as he crafted his reply. It's not my fault if you're under the impression that we're FRIENDS, Mudblood. I think I've made it plain that we're not.

If we weren't in the library I would have screamed, but Madam Pince was still lurking, so I opted for scribbling a crass drawing of the violent actions I wished to commit against to him. His snickers initially startled me, but then, gradually, the grin on his lips mollified my growing aggression.

We do need to talk, he wrote. About (the party and the couch and) a lot of things. But I don't think it will matter anyway.

Why.

It won't change anything. It never does. We always go in the same circle and we never get anywhere.

Then let's jump off this damn circle and get somewhere.

Jump?

I threw my quill at him and left my book open as I stood and departed the table. Smirking to himself, he followed me out of the library, out of Pince's lair of silence, and into the third floor corridor, which carried the sounds of students traveling to the Great Hall for dinner. Malfoy hadn't brought his book with him either, but I was beginning to wish I'd brought mine. I found myself playing with my fingers, unsure of what else to do during this awkward walk. It wasn't until we were alone on a moving staircase that Malfoy finally decided to speak.

"I wasn't aware that circles were three-dimensional objects that one could jump off of, Mudblood, but I suppose you know more about Muggle concepts than me."

My jaw was hard with irritation, but it was difficult not to let the amusement show in my eyes. "Fine, it's a sphere. And I thought we were leaving the sphere behind, so quit it with the banter, will you? This is what irks me, you know. We'll go from not talking to this derisive joking and pretend that nothing negative ever passed between us. I thought we were going to be honest with each other now? Were you being honest with me during the snowball fight?"

"When I said that I can't give you what you want?" he clarified as the staircase finally mounted to solid ground and we descended to the second floor.

My eyes darted around the empty corridor for a solid minute before I finally said, "Yeah."

"I was," he confirmed without hesitation, and even though I'd anticipated that answer, my heart still sunk deep into the pit of my stomach.

"So...despite all the hints you've dropped about you wanting to...be with me, there's no...future for us? This is it? That just doesn't make sense to me—"

"You've lived in my house for over a year, Fitzroy. What part of 'I can't marry a half-blood' doesn't make sense to you?"

"The part where you said that you wouldn't want to marry a half-blood," I said as the volume of my voice involuntarily elevated.

"I didn't get to finish my statement," he snapped, any remnants of good humor dissipating entirely. "I was frozen—"

"Oh, yes, how could I forget about that pesky little unless? What was it going to be, Malfoy? 'I wouldn't marry a half-blood unless she was a Gaudium'? 'I wouldn't marry a half-blood unless I had to'?"

"Do you really think so little of me?" he snarled, spinning on me and halting my strides at the top of another staircase. When I really studied his face, I realized how gaunt he had become over the past few weeks since the Manor. Sunken cheeks, weary eyes, thin lips. Perhaps it was the lingering effects of Voldemort's curse, but part of me wondered if maybe he was relapsing into the anxious state that he'd fallen prey to last year.

"Still, Fitzroy?" he continued, running a hand through his hair as he fixated his attention on the wall behind me. "After all that we've been through together, do you really think that I look at you and see your blood status? Do you think I look at you and see the contents of your blood rather than the contents of—" His lips snapped shut and his face screwed with reluctance as he literally swallowed his pride. "The contents of your heart...?"

All function of my lungs terminated as my lips parted and my eyes bulged. Malfoy was such an avid liar that it was difficult to discern when he was being honest, but where he had a reason to tell his friends that he thought little of me, there was no purpose in fabricating this sort of lie.

"Hey, Mud!" Anderson called as he jogged down the hallway toward us. I'd diverted my focus from Malfoy before glimpsing his facial expression, but if he felt similarly to me, he must have been lividly annoyed. "Guess what A—Oh. Did I...interrupt something here?" he huffed as he stopped beside us and passed his brown eyes over us. "Well, s'pose it's too late to awkwardly scurry away now. Guess what Astoria's done?"

My sigh was ragged as I surrendered any hope of continuing this telling conversation with Malfoy. "What has Astoria done?"

"She's turned the fifth floor girls' lavatory into her beauty business's shop! Insane, isn't it? She's turned that dump into a glamorous hole of pink, let me tell you—"

"How do you know that the fifth floor girls' lavatory used to be a dump?" Malfoy prompted vindictively.

Anderson froze midsentence as guilt contorted his features. "I...may have snogged Astoria in there a few years ago...and then again today—"

"What!" I exclaimed in genuine shock. "Did twenty people see you? We have to tell Ashley—"

"No, no, it was...just us," Anderson admitted as he scratched the back of his head. "I...guess we're back together again...or whatever we used to be... Said she realized how much she cares about me when she saw me get frozen during the snowball war. It's making my ego swell a little bit."

"Clearly," Malfoy muttered with an impatient eye roll.

"Did you two kiss yet?" Anderson asked as he glanced between us.

"We were about to before you showed up," I said, but when Malfoy's eyebrows shot up, I hastily added, "Only joking. We're—um... Let's go get dinner, hm?"

"Yeah, I need some energy," Anderson agreed as the three of us started down the stairs. "It definitely got intense between Astoria and me in that bathroom—"

"Not interested in hearing about it, mate," I assured him as I clapped him on the shoulder. "Good for you, though."

"Yeah, I just hope she's not using me to get over that Muggle like I used Weasels to get over her...and then used her to get over Weasels... Now I'm not using anyone, though, don't worry, Mud."

I wasn't sure whether to scold Anderson on his previous lack of integrity or congratulate him on finally acquiring morals, so I was grateful when we descended into the entrance hall and were submerged in the sea of whispering students. The Great Hall was still designated a place of silence, though the Slytherins were far from following that rule. While the other Houses all spoke in hushed tones as they ate dinner, the Slytherins were laughing boisterously and yelling across the table as we entered the Hall.

My eyes kept flittering in Malfoy's direction as we took our seats amongst the Slytherins. He didn't chose the empty seat beside me but, instead, squeezed between Crabbe and Nott on the opposite side and grabbed a green apple without even acknowledging my presence. Had he been lying about his feelings moments ago? And even if he hadn't, did it matter what he secretly thought of me if he was too cowardly to admit it to anyone else?

"Attention, attention, everyone," Ashley intoned as she tapped her clipboard on the table. Most continued to chat, but she ignored them all as she scanned her notes and charts with dignified eyes. "It's...Valentine's Day!"

"No one's cared since, like, third year," Anderson scoffed as he savagely munched on a chicken leg.

"I haven't cared ever," Melody droned with a pointed look in the empty spot that Harper would have occupied if he weren't in the hospital wing. Perhaps it was better that he wasn't here to endure Ashley's castigation for his failure in this month's competition.

"Well, this Valentine's Day is special because it's the conclusion of the competition!" Ashley reminded us all, as if we could have forgotten with her constant talk of it. "Wasn't all of the public snogging this month so romantic?"

"Nope, nor is there ever anything romantic about public snogging," I disagreed as I piled food onto my plate. Typically I defaulted to starving myself when upset, but I was currently in an 'eat myself to death' kind of mood, which Anderson noticed with a nervous smile.

"Yeah... I agree," he said, flinching when I my tower of chicken wings collapsed and I cursed rather audibly.

"You can't talk, Fitzroy," Nott called from farther down the table. "You've snogged more people in public than any of us."

"Hm, says you, Slytherin's biggest slag," I countered with a patronizing grin.

Nott snorted carelessly. "You're mistaking me for Astoria, I believe—"

"Don't mock Astoria!" Anderson bellowed as he jumped out of his seat and menacingly pointed his chicken bone at Nott. The seventh years all proceeded to snicker, Daphne's cackles being the loudest, and so I chucked one of my uneaten chicken wings at Nott's face. He spluttered and swore as he attempted to wipe the grease from his face.

"Hey, Pucey, why don't we switch this month's competition to a food fight?" Nott prompted as his vicious eyes narrowed on me. "I call dibs on destroying Fitzroy—"

"Enough of this!" Ashley exclaimed with enough volume to silence half the table. "This month's competition is already complete, and I must tell you all the scores!" After clearing her throat, she held up her clipboard and said, "My team is currently...IN THE LEAD! Nineteen points, losers!"

I rolled my eyes conspicuously as I began to reconstruct my tower of chicken wings.

"Lainey's team is in second," Ashley announced giddily. "A pathetic sixteen points!"

"Mm, so pathetic," I mumbled as I stared at the growing pile of meat before me.

"It is in comparison to me. I have eleven points—with Crabbey, of course—while you and Draco only have three," Ashley bragged with a haughtiness that made me want to demolish my chicken wing tower.

"You sure about that, Pucey?" Malfoy questioned between bites of his apple. "I believe we should have seven points."

"No. Last month you had five and then this month you lost two, so that equals three." She paused for a moment and turned to her boyfriend to whisper, "It does equal three, doesn't it?"

He shrugged before stuffing his face with a dinner pie.

"This month isn't over, though, is it?" Malfoy inquired slyly.

"No, but the competition's deadline is today!"

"As in midnight?"

"As in right now!"

"Hm, what a shame," he drawled, his inflection bordering sarcasm. His eyes finally met mine with the craftiest of grins, and I figured he would drop the subject, but then he dropped his apple instead. I read his intentions even before he abandoned his seat and mounted the Slytherin table like a stage. Jaws dropped and conversations died as Malfoy stood up straight, towering over the rest of the Hall. Snape's eyebrows were pinched together in a uniform line as he glowered at his young colleague.

"Draco, take your seat," the Headmaster's voice boomed through the Great Hall. The Carrows were eyeing him ravenously, waiting only for the command from their master to pounce. To their delight, Malfoy ignored Snape's warning and remained with his feet planted on the table as he waltzed across it to stand above my plate. I stared up at his dark figure as he loomed above me, his blond hair glimmering in the light of the floating candles. The curve of his lips was so sexily mischievous that I almost forgot that we were in a room full of witnesses.

"Are you all watching?" he demanded with one collective glance around the room. Everyone was, indeed, watching with sealed lips and protuberant eyes. Malfoy hadn't forgotten that we weren't alone. And yet, he was all right with it. Perhaps this was all for show—some way of asserting dominance over the Slytherins by his ostentatious completion of this competition—but as he crouched down in front of me and leveled his gaze with mine, I realized that this wasn't a show for everyone else, but for me. A show of his affection, a testament to the truth that he didn't see my blood but the heart that pumped that blood. The heart and the soul that was me.

With one fluid motion, he shoved my tower of chicken wings to the side and extended his hand. "Join me, Mudblood?"

My eyes flew toward the professors' table, where the Carrows were now standing with their wands drawn. They would punish us for this, if only as proof of their superior powers. But, perhaps it was time that us Slytherins endured our share of punishment.

"Don't you like to cause a little mayhem?" Malfoy breathed, his heavily lidded eyes tracing the details of my face. I knew he saw my budding smile because instead of prompting me further, he cupped my face in his hands and broadened my grin with the force of his lips against mine. My eyes fluttered closed as he leaned into me, dropping to his knees as he surrendered to this public intimacy. The gasps and giggles of students and the stomps of the approaching Carrows penetrated my ears, but I tuned it all out as I honed in on the sensation of Malfoy's lips parting mine, his fingers brushing the tenderness of my neck. His lips tasted as sweet and sour as the apple he'd just eaten, as sweet and sour as him.

I shifted onto my feet, and at first Malfoy thought I was pulling away, but I was only joining him as he'd asked, stumbling to mount the table with my eyes closed and my body twined with his. We stood as one on this pedestal for all to see, his arm hooked around my waist and my arm hooked around his neck. My fingers got lost in his hair and my mind got lost in his embrace, and so when a spark of magical electricity zapped us apart, I felt as though my body was being violently cleaved in two.

Any hollers and cheers were rapidly replaced by screams as I fumbled backward, landing on Anderson, while Malfoy nearly crushed Melody and Ashley. Anderson and I both grunted as we attempted to right my trembling body, and once I was seated on the bench again, I found that Melody was aggressively punching Malfoy while Ashley was using her athletic strength to haul him off of her and into the space between her and Crabbe. His white-blond hair was disheveled, whether from my hands or the fall I couldn't be sure, but his cocky grin was unwavering as he winked at me from across the table.

Neither of our elated states lasted long, though, because the two Death Eaters that had electrocuted us hadn't resumed their seats at the front of the room; they were still stomping toward us, their smiles malicious and their grips rough as they grabbed either of us by our collars and hauled us away from the Slytherin table.

"I've been waiting to punish you for some time," Alecto hissed in my ear as she dragged me down the aisle toward the Great Hall's exit

"Where are you taking her!" Anderson demanded as he stood to follow us. Ashley's face was red with fury as she also stood, her wand in her hand, and I saw Melody's silver Target Knife glinting on her book, but I shook my head at them, pleading for them to remain stagnant and safe. The Carrows wouldn't hurt me—or at least they couldn't, unless they wanted to suffer the Dark Lord's wrath. But...would Voldemort even care if they tortured me? Was I even useful to him anymore?

"Let go of me!" Malfoy was barking at Amycus as the other Death Eater ruthlessly tightened the collar of his shirt around his throat. They were making quite a show of this punishment, but what would they actually do? They weren't opposed to chaining and torturing other students, but we were their equals in Voldemort's eyes...weren't we?

"This is the consequence of insubordination," Snape declared in a voice of indifference.

"You're just jealous because my mother never wanted to kiss you, you bitter old wart!" I called back to Snape with a laugh as we passed through the threshold into the entrance hall.

Though his face remained impassive, I could hear a tinge of resentment as he said to the Carrows, "Don't bother to bring them back."

The Carrows snickered to themselves as we stumbled through the entrance hall toward the staircase. I'd expected them to take us down to the dungeons and chain us in some cell, but instead they led us upward and didn't stop until we were within the Muggle Studies classroom.

Paintings of Muggles, enslaved or dying, mostly, were scattered over the walls, and Alecto had human skulls sitting like trophies on her desk. None of this was too appalling to me, though; I saw it every day in class, and I'd had plenty of time to cringe over the atrocious depictions on the wall. My attention now was fixed on wondering what the Carrows planned to do to us. Based on the fact that they were still grinning like hyenas, I suspected it couldn't be anything good, and the unadulterated fear on Malfoy's face wasn't very reassuring.

"You can stop with the act now. We know you're just trying to scare everyone else by dragging us away to unknown horrors," I snapped at Alecto as I attempted to pry my collar from her clutches. She clung to it relentlessly, her smile widening as panic settled in my expression. "You can't seriously be considering punishing us for that. Have we reverted the Umbridge era of no public displays of affection? We...kissed on top of a table. Who gives a bloody f—"

"Silence," Alecto cut in as she yanked on my collar and shoved her wand under my throat. "We've been looking for an excuse for so long..."

"An excuse for what?" Malfoy demanded, his tone riddled with trepidation.

"Yeh failed the Dark Lord last summer, Malfoy," Amycus reminded him as he pulled his wand across Malfoy's throat like a knife. "The Dark Lord may've had his way with yeh already, but we haven't."

"We saw how weak you were—both of you," Alecto chimed in as she dug her wand deeper into my flesh. "The Dark Lord doesn't deserve such incompetent cowards as his trusted followers."

"You're going to kill us?" Malfoy blurted as his voice went high. "You can't—You can't do that. My father—"

"Yer father is pathetic!" Amycus jeered, throwing his head back as he cackled. "Once we've gotten rid of yeh, he'll be next—"

"This is ridiculous!" I exploded as I made another attempt to wrench myself from Alecto's grasp. "The Dark Lord needs—he needs me. I'm his Seer. And I'm—I'm nothing without him." Though I nodded toward Malfoy, I evaded his gaze and stared down at my hands. "I'll lose my Seeing powers—"

"We've considered this," Alecto acknowledged, loosening her grip slightly. "Which is why we won't kill you—either of you. We have a better punishment in mind."

Nodding to her brother, Alecto nudged me toward one of the chairs—the exact chair that I always sat in during class, actually. Before I could protest, she slammed me down into it and tied my hands to the sides with an invisible magical binding force. When I tried to kick my way free, she did the same to my feet, and though I had a few crude words I wanted to say to her, I knew that being gagged wouldn't prove advantageous in this situation.

"What are you doing to her?" Malfoy questioned desperately, his eyes wide and his hair wild. I decided to look at him then—really look at him—and when our gazes connected, an expression passed over his face that I'd never really seen on him before. It was regret—but with apology. He was acknowledging that this was his fault and that he couldn't bear to see the outcome—that he'd made a mistake that he wished he could undo.

I didn't get the opportunity to give him my own look of apology or even forgiveness, though, before Amycus reached into Malfoy's pocket and pulled out the young boy's wand. Placing it in his trembling fingers, Amycus took a step away from Malfoy and let him stand there with his wand resting in his hand and uncertainty weighing on his mind. Rage flashed over Malfoy's features, and I knew he was going to try to fend off the Carrows, but Alecto spoke before he could even flinch.

"It's your time to shine, Draco," she cooed with a yellow-toothed grin. "Prove yourself worthy of the Dark Lord."

Pure bewilderment warped Malfoy's features as his eyes flickered between the two Carrows. "You can't be serious. You can't expect me to—to murder her. She's—she's my—"

"Yes, she's your girlfriend, we know," Alecto reassured him with sly eyes. "Which is why we wouldn't expect you to kill her. We require only that you torture her."

My nostrils flared as I inhaled a breath. The expression of disgust on his face was enough to convince me that Malfoy would never willingly do it, but the Carrows didn't seem like the type to take no for an answer.

"A little bit of Crucio," Amycus sang as he waved his own wand in my direction. Malfoy's was still at his side, but I could see him twitching, preparing for a revolt.

"And if I refuse?"

Amycus's eyes lit up as he threw up his wand and aimed a nonverbal spell at Malfoy that brought him to his knees. An involuntary scream escaped my throat the instant that one expelled from Malfoy's. The contortion of his face and the unnatural twisting of his limbs was enough to blind me with tears, and Alecto cackled as I grunted and yanked futilely at the invisible bonds.

After a few moments of agony, Amycus withdrew, leaving Malfoy panting on his hands and knees as he struggled to regain composure.

"So, Malfoy," Amycus prompted as he crouched down to meet the boy's eyes. "What'll it be?"

"I...refuse," he snarled through gritted teeth as he glared up at the smug Death Eater.

"Good, then we'll torture you both," Alecto concluded as she stepped around my chair to face me with a sadistic smile. "Should we do them both at once, brother, or should we make them watch each other scream—"

"Please," I cried as despair overthrew any semblance of strength. I wasn't pleading with the Carrows, though; my eyes were locked on Malfoy's. "Please, Malfoy, just do it. Do what they ask. I can't watch—I can't—not again. Do it—do it now! I'll never forgive you if you don't—"

Malfoy jumped to his feet, but instead of aiming his wand at me, his target was Amycus. For a fleeting moment, I thought he might succeed, but Alecto was quicker, and she cast the Imperius Curse on Malfoy before he could comprehend that it was coming for him. His nose scrunched, and he shook his head as if he could physically remove the curse, but Alecto was twisting her wand, and as she did the curse seemed to tighten around his mind, slowly soothing the tension in his features until placidity characterized his demeanor.

"Now," Alecto began with a sinister twitch to her eye, "torture her."

All of our practice with the Imperius Curse proved to be for naught as Malfoy's body pivoted robotically to face me, where I sat strapped in this chair. I shifted my weight back and forth, attempting to tip it or move it in some way that might snap him out of this trance, but his emotions remained dormant as he took a step closer to me and lifted his wand.

The words had barely escaped his mouth when the undiluted pain slammed every nerve in my body. The curse snaked through me, severing my veins, my brain, my heart. Though no physical damage was inflicted, mentally I was bleeding out, all of my dirty half-blood pooling on the floor beneath Malfoy's feet. My heart was there too, so raw, so dark, so broken. It shriveled in the open air, rotting into nothing, not because of Malfoy's forced actions, but because of his absence. His body might have been the one torturing mine, but he wasn't here with me. He wasn't here.

I wasn't sure how long I writhed and shrieked in that chair, hallucinating about the death of my organs. The pain was worse than when Voldemort tortured me, and not because Malfoy was stronger; it was as if my body knew what wand the curse was flowing from, and every inch of me roared with the betrayal of the wielder.

A period of numbness ensued. My vision dipped in and out of darkness. A voice slipped through my ears but got lost in the crevices of my brain. Coldness wrapped around my skin like a blanket, while confusion wrapped around my mind like a cloud. When my senses were finally restored I was still encased in darkness—except for the sole candle lit beside me, illuminating the pale face above mine.

A splash of wetness hit my cheek, mixing with the salty dry tears that coated my face. Squinting, I was finally able to discern the details of the figure above me, and I was in no way surprised to see that it was Malfoy. What did surprise me was that, instead of sitting chained to a chair, I was lying flat the ground staring up at a Draco Malfoy who was crying. The Carrows were gone, and we were alone in this dimly lit room, accompanied only by the grief that hung between us.

"Where... What...?" I mumbled through my dry lips. My throat ached, and every muscle of my body was twitching at odd intervals, but, still, the sight of Malfoy looming above me, his pale hair hanging loosely around his emotion-ridden face, was enough to elevate the pace of my heart.

"I'm—sorry," he choked, wringing his trembling hands in his lap as he knelt beside me. Though I'd never heard those two words escape his lips before, there was something surprisingly natural about the way they rolled off his tongue, flowed from his mouth. Like the final piece of a puzzle had been placed, and a new picture had expanded before us.

"It—wasn't your fault," I managed to croak.

"Everything has always been my fault," he moaned, and somehow his voice sounded even rawer than mine. "Everything bad that's ever happened to you has somehow been my fault—"

"That's not true—"

"It is," he seethed, but I knew his anger wasn't aimed at me. "I've always been cruel to you. I've always tried to put you beneath me—but you're not. You're better than me in every way. And I just—I just tortured you—"

"You didn't. They did. This is what they wanted. They wanted you to feel guilty—"

"I am guilty! Everything I do is selfish. Kissing you in the Great Hall was selfish—"

"You did it for the team," I insisted weakly, but he was shaking his head before I even spoke the words.

"I did it...because I wanted to do it. Because I have wanted to do it for years—"

"We've kissed in the past—"

"But not like that. Not in public. Not...for real. I wanted everyone to see. Don't you get that? That was why I tried to kiss you at the party. I want everyone to know." Another tear slipped out of his eye, dripping onto my sweater, right above my throbbing heart. "I want you to be mine."

My mouth gaped, but no response came out. He looked away, but I couldn't stop staring at him.

"But it's selfish," he went on, his voice strained and his jaw tight. "Look what it's done—"

"It wasn't your fault," I repeated in a stronger tone.

"It was. Lainey," he implored, nearly stopping my heart with the simple utterance of my first name. He leaned toward me for a moment but then retreated, shaking his head as water streamed down his cheeks. "I hurt you. I always hurt you. And I'm sorry. I'm sorry for everything I've ever done—everything. Do you believe me?"

"No," I said quietly as I reached my quivering hand out to touch his. "Everything you've ever done—everything we've ever done—has led us to this. Some of it was wrong—maybe all of it was wrong—but I don't care. All of it has made me who I am and made you who you are, and I...I love us. I probably shouldn't, but I do. I love you."

My last confession was barely a whisper, but he reacted as if I'd shouted it to the world, dropping onto his side to lie on the cold floor next to me. I spun to face him, even though every inch of me ached and throbbed, and I closed my eyes as he pushed my unruly hair aside and brushed his thumb across the salty surface of my cheek.

"I can't give you what you want," he murmured, his breath pleasantly warm against my skin in this frigid room. "Even though I want to, my parents would never allow me to marry a half-blood, and I wouldn't marry a half-blood...unless it was you."

My eyelids flew open to find that Malfoy's face was only centimeters from mine. His grey eyes were bloodshot, but a wry smirk was inching onto his lips.

"I wouldn't marry anyone unless it was you," he finished as he caressed my jaw and drew circles around my ear. "You're the only one I want. You're the only one I've ever wanted. The thought of you...being my girlfriend, my wife, my—my anything is becoming more real to me every day, but it can't be real so I've been denying it."

"The only reason it can't be real is because you don't want it to be," I countered softly. "Your mother isn't as rigid as you think, and your father...well, I believe you know that I'd gladly kill him if it meant I could have you." His hand paused on my neck as his eyes narrowed playfully. "And as for the Dark Lord, he can fuck off. I'm done living by his standards."

The most genuine beam cracked across Malfoy's lips, and with both hands he gripped my face fiercely, as if he were afraid that if he didn't hold on tight enough I would cease to exist. "I love you. I love you more than I've ever loved anyone, and—and I don't know why, considering you make me want to explode—not in a sexual way, but in a furious way... And maybe sometimes in a sexual way," he amended with the friskiest of smirks.

Clucking my tongue, I shoved him onto his back, and he started to sit up, thinking I was truly irked, but I pinned him back down to the floor by straddling my legs over his hips and slamming my hands onto his shoulders. I'd expected my blaring headache to intensify, but, instead, as I slid my fingers through the softness of his hair and felt his fingers sneak under the back of my sweater, all pain began to lessen, diffusing past the realm of my awareness.

"I sometimes make you want to explode in a sexual way?" I repeated as I eased my torso down to his and pressed my lips to the corner of his jaw. His body tensed beneath mine, so I smirked on his ear and whispered, "Like now?"

"Just like now," he murmured against my throat as he raked his hands up the bareness of my back. Every connection of our flesh sewed a stitch in my mental and physical wounds, gradually mending me until I felt wholly unbroken. Not even one of Bletchley's potions could induce this sensation of ecstasy, this pure bliss that accompanied the full utilization of our healing connection. To have thought that anything less than this moment could truly satisfy had been an error on my part. Every quarrel we'd ever had seemed trivial now when bestowed with the absolute closure that resulted from the exposure of my skin to his.

It may have been cold with the stone beneath our bodies and dark with our looming black auras, but, like every aspect of my life, Malfoy managed to heat it with his passion, only this time it wasn't an explosion of fury...

Enjoy the sappiness while it lasts, haha, this is as romantic as it gets. It's so hard to write the "I love you" scene without making it cringey but I hope I did a decent job, ha.

Also, I've published a story with everyone's fanart, so if you have fanart that you'd like to be featured in it please send it to my email!

https://www.quotev.com/story/9865959/The-Mudblood-Fanart