CRIMSON.
It was all Elara could see as she stumbled forward, forgetting that she was ankle deep in water and she steadied herself on the wall as she forced her feet around the corner.
Her blood curdled as his spilled out from where he lay, sprawled out on the floor at an unnatural angle. He was soaked in blood, his white shirt dark red and sticking to him.
A scream ripped from her throat and she sloshed through the water, collapsing next to him.
"Draco!"
Crimson blood blossomed all over his chest like scarlet flowers as he gasped for breath, his face drained of all colour.
"Draco - Draco -" Elara resisted the urge to hurl and forced herself to pull it together, shoving her panic away. "Myrtle! Myrtle!"
The ghost appeared out of the sink, her eyes two wide saucers. "He's dead! Potter killed him -"
"He's not dead!" Elara snapped, her shaking fingers moving to unbutton Draco's shirt. "Get Snape!"
"S-Snape?"
"Yes, Myrtle! Now! Or, Merlin so help me, I will -"
Myrtle disappeared immediately.
Elara turned her focus back to Draco's shirt. Her hands were trembling, violently.
His eyes were open but unseeing - she nearly sobbed at the sight - but his chest was heaving in desperate breaths, his heartbeat erratic against her fingertips.
"Draco -" She finally got his shirt open and her stomach contracted so violently, she resisted the urge to throw up.
His chest was covered in slash marks - as if an invisible sword had cut through him - and blood was seeping from all over. His chest, his throat, his shoulders.
His chest fell and rose, rapidly, and with each movement, blood spread out into the water around them, staining everything red.
She needed to stop the bleeding. She didn't even know what kind of curse this was - she couldn't perform a counterspell.
She swallowed the sob rising in her throat and reached for her wand. She could conjure bandages, heal some of the wounds to stop them bleeding for at least a few seconds -
Her wand - Fuck, fuck, no, no - she'd forgotten her wand in her haste to leave her dorm.
Elara nearly collapsed next to Draco in despair. He was going to die. He was taking his last breaths and she'd be responsible for it. Because she'd forgotten her bloody wand.
Tears blurred her vision and through the haze, she could make out his silver eyes, the light slowly dying out of it, his fingers spasming at his side.
No. He couldn't die. She wouldn't let him.
Think, Elara, think. What was the point in being in Ravenclaw if she couldn't even find a way to stop -
Her breath caught in her throat and she ripped the shawl from around her shoulders.
She summoned all her strength and ripped it down the middle and then again and again.
"Hold on, Draco. I'm here. You're going to be okay," she sobbed, barely able to form the words. She steadied herself, slid her hand under his shoulderblades and lifted him enough to get one of the strips of cloth under him, pulling it up and around his shoulder and tying it over a large slash near his collarbone.
He was deathly pale now - his eyelashes fluttered and his breath rattled in his lungs.
Elara forced her quivering hands to tie the strips of cloth around him, wrapping them under his back and around to his front, knotting them tightly.
His bleeding was slowing - the water around them turned pink, instead of blood red - but his fingers stopped spasming, his breathing becoming more violent.
It was then that she realised.
Whatever curse this was - it worked on the inside too. These weren't surface level cuts.
Draco was bleeding from the inside out. And she could do nothing to stop it.
Her head spun as she tied the second last cloth around his torso before pressing the last one to the base of his white throat.
She'd covered most of the big cuts - there was nothing else to do.
Tears dropped from her face, landing on Draco's chest and she heaved a sob, combing his soaked hair with unsteady fingers.
"Draco - I'm so sorry - hold on," she choked out, leaning down to press a kiss against his cold forehead. "Please don't leave me, Draco. Please. Please."
Nausea rose in her like a wave and she forced it down, her hands drenched in his blood, as she pressed the cloth tighter against his throat to staunch the bleeding.
The water was turning dark red again - the curse was counteracting against her effort to stop it.
You're too good for me. One day, you'll realise it.
Her hair fell down around her face, the tips brushing his face, as she cried. She was helpless - she couldn't do anything to save him.
He was going to bleed out in her arms and die. Thinking he was just like his father - an evil, greedy Death Eater.
"You're not him," she whispered, her free hand combing back his hair and sliding down his cheek, thumb caressing his cheekbone.
He heaved for another breath, his chest expanding, violently, before contracting sharply inwards.
"You're not him, Draco." She forced the words out. Wanted them to be the last thing he ever heard. "You're not your father. You are good -"
She broke down, shaking, and leaned down to kiss his face again. The life was draining out of him - it'd all be over soon.
"I'm sorry." Her voice was strangled - she didn't even know if he could hear her. "I'm so - so -"
"Jacobs. Out of the way."
A swish of black cloak. Glittering obsidian eyes.
Elara fell back as Snape kneeled down beside Draco, cursing under his breath.
"Leave, Jacobs."
"No!" The word ripped from her throat. "No, no -"
"I will not heal him unless you leave," Snape hissed, already undoing the makeshift tourniquets she'd made. "You've saved his life. Now leave. Get McGonagall - Now, Jacobs!"
Elara stumbled to her feet, not willing to take the risk of staying. She didn't know if Snape would actually refuse healing Draco but she didn't want to find out.
She dragged herself out of the bathroom, pressing a hand flat onto the wall to keep herself upright.
McGonagall. She had to get McGonagall.
Elara didn't remember any of the things that happened afterwards.
She didn't remember crawling to McGonagall's room, banging on the door or Madam Pomfrey scurrying towards her and taking her to the infirmary. She didn't remember taking a Calming and Sleeping Draught.
The only thing in her mind was silver eyes, lifeless and unseeing.
|
She wasn't allowed to see him.
No matter how much she argued and pleaded and begged, the curtains stayed pulled around Draco's bed in the infirmary, blocking her from even catching a glimpse of him.
"You'll see him when he's fully healed," Madam Pomfrey told her, sharply, ushering her out for the third time that day. "He's not to meet anyone until he's strong enough."
"I just want to see him -"
"No."
With that, Elara was pushed out into the corridor.
So she headed to the library.
Slowly, things were coming together. The Vanishing Cabinet would need to be repaired with a spell - which one she hadn't found out yet - and the procedures would have to be carried out several times before it would be fixed.
The school was buzzing. With Katie Bell being hexed on the way back from Hogsmeade and Draco being attacked all in one night, the rumours became chimaeras, taking on different forms in the most preposterous ways.
No one knew who had done it - save Snape, McGonagall, Myrtle and Elara, it seemed.
Security around the castle doubled. Rules became stricter. Elara didn't dare sneak out anymore - even when she found the dorm suffocating.
"Elara, you look like you didn't sleep at all last night."
Elara looked up from where she was sitting on the couch, cross-legged, a book on Enchanted Objects opened in front of her. She was frustrated - every single book she picked up contained only around three lines of text about Vanishing Cabinets.
"Did you hear me?" Tracy waved her hand in front of Elara's face. "I said you look like you didn't sleep last night -"
"Just last night?" Elara responded, dryly, turning back to her book and turning the page.
Tracy faltered, a frown overtaking her features at Elara's curt tone. "I... I'm sorry?"
Elara waved her away, getting to her feet and tucking the book under her arm. "I'll see you later."
|
"You're avoiding us."
Elara froze from where she was packing up her things at her desk.
Potions had just ended and the last of the students were filing out of the classroom. Slughorn was talking to Theodore Nott by the door.
"I'm not," Elara said, finally turning to face Ron and Hermione who were standing behind her, looking at her with solemn faces.
"Yes, you are," Hermione said, backing Ron up. "Don't lie to us, Elara. You haven't spoken to us in a week."
"Since the day we went to Hogsmeade," Ron added, running a hand through his shaggy hair. "Elara, if you think you're a third wheel -"
"Third wheel?" Elara asked in disbelief, shoving her book into her bag and shouldering it. "If anything, I'd be more of a..." She counted in her head. "Seventh wheel."
She pushed past them only for Ron to grab her hand. "Elara. You know it's not like that."
She looked down at his hand, up to his eyes, to Hermione and then back to him. "I know," she said, gently, feeling guilty for her behaviour. "I'm sorry. I'm just - on edge."
She turned to leave, eager to go try her luck at the infirmary again, but stopped when Ron spoke again, his voice quiet so Slughorn and Nott didn't hear them.
"He used the Cruciatus Curse."
"Ron!" Hermione hissed, her hand shooting out to grab onto his. "Harry said not to say anything!"
Elara's fingers tightened around the strap of her bag and she swallowed hard, turning her head to face them again. "What?"
"Nothing," Hermione said at the same time Ron said, "Malfoy."
Hermione shot him a deathly glare but Ron seemed oblivious, his eyes still fixed on Elara. "I know that's why you're avoiding us. 'Cause you hate Harry for doing what he did to Malfoy."
Elara's nails dug into her palm. "Why in Merlin would I care about Malf -"
"Because you're you," Ron replied, simply. "And you're not going to side with your friends if they've done something wrong just because they're your friends."
Elara's heartrate slowed. They didn't suspect her and Draco - they just thought it didn't fit with her moral compass.
She blew out a sigh. "Can you blame me?" she demanded. "You didn't have to see Malfoy bleed out and almost die -"
"He's our enemy -"
"A childhood rivalry does not mean he deserves to die!" Elara defended, harshly.
Ron stared at her. "He used the Cruciatus curse. On Harry. Or at least, he would've if Harry hadn't cursed him -"
Elara felt the information settle in her mind and carefully, pocketed it away, taming her emotions. "What kind of curse was that?" She looked between Ron and Hermione. "That Harry used?"
Hermione shook her head. "We don't know. Harry didn't even know what it did -"
"And he decided to use it against Malfoy in the sixth floor boys' bathroom?"
"Are you listening?" Ron said, fiercely. "Malfoy was about to use an Unforgivable -"
"Yet he was the one dying on that bathroom floor!"
"Only because Harry saved himself! He didn't even know what the spell was -"
Elara shook her head. "I'm done here."
She strode out of the room, her head high, but couldn't shake the feeling that her argument was void and Ron was right.
If Draco had really been about to use the Cruciatus Curse on Harry -
She shuddered and decided to skip Charms, instead turning in the direction of the infirmary.
She was forced out as usual but this time, Pomfrey told her to visit next week. Draco would be strong enough to see her then.
It couldn't come fast enough.
Elara kept studying up on Vanishing Cabinets, sneaking books from the Restricted Section. She skipped the sessions with Dumbledore's Army and instead, spent almost every waking moment reading and jotting down notes.
And when the time finally did come, she stopped outside the infirmary, wondering if she could do it.
But she had to. He needed her. She knew that now.
Her footsteps were soft, cautious, as she walked in, catching Madam Pomfrey's gaze. It was eight thirty - still half an hour from the newly imposed curfew - and Elara had picked this time because it'd be when the fewest people were around.
Although people already knew that she'd been the one to find Draco that night, she didn't want to give them any more reason to gossip.
Draco was sitting on the edge of his bed, playing with the cuffs on his shirt. It looked like the same shirt he'd been wearing that night but scrubbed clean and newly pressed.
"Hey." Her voice was quiet as she approached him, clutching the strap of her book bag. Her palms were damp.
He looked up. She nearly sobbed with relief when she saw his eyes - silver and alive and scrutinising her. "It's late."
His words made her footsteps falter. She heard Madam Pomfrey quietly exit the infirmary, shutting the doors behind her.
"I needed to see you," she replied, coming to a stop by the foot of his bed. Her eyes never left him, scanned him from head to toe, making sure he was alright.
"Something on the task?" he asked, nodding to her bag.
She looked down, thinking of the Vanishing Cabinet and clearing her throat. "I'm working on it. Most books give close to no information."
He hummed low in his throat, his long fingers moving to do up the last few buttons on his shirt. "I see."
"Are you going somewhere?" Her heart jumped into her throat when he glanced at her. "I thought Pomfrey said you were to rest for another week."
"Snape got her to let me off early," Draco answered, emotionless.
Elara's stomach sank. She needed to have a chat with Snape later.
"You should rest," she said, gently, finally dropping her bag onto the chair and moving to stand in front of him.
He stilled as she reached out, gently pushing his fingers away to help him do up the last two buttons on his shirt. His skin was radiating heat and she wanted to lean down and kiss him, straddle him, hold him tight.
Draco looked up at her through his lashes, his hand hovering over hers for a second before dropping away to land on the bed beside him.
"Are you feeling okay?" she inquired, forcing herself to focus on the question and not how close her hands were to his skin. She did the last button, fixed his collar and stepped away.
"Fine," he said, looking away. He picked up the rings on his bedside table, slipped them on.
Elara's eye caught a silver one she hadn't noticed before - in the shape of a snake, wrapping around his finger, two emeralds as eyes. The diamonds glittered in the light.
"Pretty," she commented, feeling bold and reaching for his hand, tracing the ring.
The skin to skin contact was searing - she resisted the urge to jerk away as she looked at him. "It's beautiful."
"Malfoy heirloom," he answered and she took some pride in the fact that he seemed put off by the contact too. "It's supposed to be enchanted against Dark Magic or something but we tested the theory multiple times." He shrugged, pulling his hand out of her grip. "Doesn't do shit."
She frowned at the loss of contact. "Oh."
The silence between them was heavy, resting on her shoulders like a weight. She didn't know what to say - it was obvious he didn't either.
It was enough. She'd seen him, made sure he was fine. He obviously was - he was getting ready to leave.
"Okay," she said, clearing her throat. Her hand reached for her bag, propped the satchel over her shoulder. "I'm glad you're okay. I'll see you later, yeah?"
Draco didn't answer but Elara was already turning away, embarrassed for no reason she could conceive.
She shouldn't have come. She'd been wrong. He didn't need her. He probably thought she was weird, clingy, obsessive -
A tug stopped her and it took a moment for her to realise he had reached for the strap of her bag and was pulling her back.
She made to turn to face him at the same time as he tugged harder and she was guided forward, her bag falling to the ground with a thud, as his hands steadied her on her hips. He had pulled her to stand between his legs.
She looked down at him, surprised, her lips parted and hesitantly, brought her hands up to his shoulders. He was warm through the material of his shirt.
His eyelashes fluttered at the contact. He tilted his head back to gaze up at her and Elara's legs turned to jelly.
His eyes were stern, his jaw taut. "You saved me."
Elara's stomach did somersaults. "Snape told you?" She hadn't meant for her voice to come out in a whisper.
He shook his head, slowly, not breaking eye contact and it was enough to steal the breath from Elara's lungs. "I was awake."
Elara's throat closed up.
"When I was bleeding out on that bathroom floor," he said, softly, turning his head and pressing his lips to the inside of her wrist in a small kiss, "you saved me."
Elara bit back a sob and felt tears hit the back of her eyes. "I - didn't. Snape -"
Again, Draco shook his head. "I would've bled out long before Snape got there if you hadn't done what you did."
Elara wanted to melt into him. He was being so - nice.
She inhaled, shakily, combed her fingers through his tousled hair. "I was so - so scared."
"I know," he said, softly, finally tilting his chin back down, breaking the eye contact. His arms wrapped around the back of her legs, tugging her closer, and he pressed his cheek to her stomach, letting his eyes shut as she continued to run her fingers through his hair. "I know."
They stayed like that for a few minutes and Elara tried to familiarise herself with the ups and downs of his chest, easy, normal, no longer gasps and chokes like they had been that night. His hair - dry and soft - underneath her fingertips, the warmth from his skin seeping into her stomach, his thumbs grazing up and down the back of her thighs in such a comforting way she nearly collapsed on top of him.
He was tired - weak. It was why he was melting into her, letting her hold him with no snide remark or sneer.
She savoured it. But she knew she couldn't have it forever.
So then she asked the question she knew would break the blissful silence they'd sunk into.
"Draco, did you use the Cruciatus Curse on Harry?"