Hunting For The Sun

CHAPTER SIX

Bleeding Within

It was a wonderful day, and it flowed into a wonderful evening. I was so excited as I struggled into my new dress that I nearly fell over. Of course, that might just have been the dress. I tried several times to do my hair, and in the end gave up and used magic. So in laser blue silk and ringlets, I made my way down to the hallway. I was so nervous that I trembled, but I fixed a smile to my face and shook the panicking thoughts out of my head. As I rounded the last bend in the staircase the hallway, with its massive oak desk, came into view.

Malfoy stood with his back to me. He wore his usual long black wool overcoat, and expensive looking trousers from what I could see. His head was tipped back and he appeared to be examining the stained glass porthole window over the door. I stepped down and tapped across the parquet floor in my posh shoes. Malfoy turned, an odd little smile of satisfaction on his face, and held out a white fur cape for me to wear. I stepped into it, muttering little thanks that I don´t recall saying. I suppose I was too scared.

Now I was in front of him, I could see that he wore his usual black shirt, black suit that was expensive enough to exchange for a house, and a silk tie, this time it was white. His collar was already undone, and my knees went even weaker.

`We don´t have far to go,´ he told me, tucking a loose coil of hair behind my ear. `We may as well walk, and you look absolutely stunning.´ He kissed my temple, and even that caused him to bend down quite a lot. I felt very short. He slipped his arm around my waist, and held the door for me.

The streets were still pleasantly snowy, and no trace of the horrible blizzard could be seen in the peaceful little biscuit-box scene. We weren´t alone as we walked down the street. A couple came out of the Ministry after us, and a few families who had been out to dinner or making a snowman drifted past, laughing. I felt like I was a part of it, but when I glanced up I could see a figure on a rooftop over the bridge. He or she was crouching, and obviously planning how to jump over. I felt a keen blade of guilt. I could be there.

But then why would that make me guilty? I was warm, dressed in lovely clothes. I could do magic, I was with a man I loved, regardless of whether or not he loved me. Why should I want to be stealing food in the dead of winter? I wasn´t guilty. I was smart.

`Something wrong, dear?´ Draco asked lightly, stroking the back of my hair.

`Oh? Nothing, nothing,´ I said, looking at my feet to cover the moment.

`Lovely night, isn´t it?´ he said, squinting up at the stars, so bright I could almost feel warmth on my face. `Cold, though.´

`Yes,´ I said, trying not to think of my friends, freezing in a sewer somewhere.

`Cheer up!´ Malfoy urged. `I don´t want to go with a misery guts.´

That perked me up like no amount of caffeine. I immediately plastered a silly grin across my face, making Draco double up with suppressed laughter.

`Frigid,´ he muttered, blowing cold air into my ear.

`Hey!´ I protested, scooping a handful of snow and hurling it at him.

But it stopped in mid air. Malfoy grinned like a little boy, and pointed at the back of a snooty looking woman´s head. The snowball pelted off in another direction, splattering all over the lady´s coifed hair. Malfoy stuck his leather-gloved hands into his pockets and walked off briskly, whistling, as the woman spun angrily to screech at the troublemaker. I laughed, and jogged to catch up.

`Are you going to be alright?´ he asked, linking his arm with mine.

I was puzzled. What did he mean? Did I look ill? Oh god. My nose was red, wasn´t it? I shot a hand up to it defensively.

`I mean with all us official Baddies,´ Malfoy laughed. `You´re funny.´ He cuffed the back of my head gently, and kissed my hair.

`I´m not!´ I pouted, folding my arms.

`Alright,´ he said, still grinning. `Whatever you say.´

`Shut up!´ I snorted, trying and failing to kill him with my glove.

`Now, if you´re going to refuse to behave, I´ll have to carry you,´ Malfoy said seriously.

`No!´ I squealed, trying to run, but he grabbed me around the waist and slung me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes while I kicked at him and pummelled his back with my fists. I was dying of laughter, it was so much fun. I felt high. I would swear that I was, looking back on it. It was almost like a spell. The ease of the feelings that you feel when you´re being controlled somehow. Even when it isn´t magical, you know that you can blame someone else when you´re following orders, and it relaxes you. That was how I felt. I didn´t know at the time, I´ve only just bothered to think about it. He carried me all the way to the huge mansion along the street. Draco put me down just outside the massive gates, and I sorted myself out before we were greeted with a bow from a porter.

Malfoy straightened a coil of my hair again, and I brushed his with my fingers. We linked arms, assumed sophisticated smiles, punctuated by giggles, and walked to the door.

`Good evening,´ a butler murmured.

`Good evening to you,´ I said graciously, nearly tripping up the step, and resisting the urge to laugh. Malfoy snorted, and held me up by one arm. I think the butler thought we were laughing at him, but we didn´t care.

The ballroom we entered then had been done up as an ice palace. Huge glass icicles hung from the railing of the galleries surrounding the marble-chequered floor, and a Christmas tree dotted with tiny fairies reached the dark ceiling. Many well-dressed couples stood here and there, and I stopped laughing. It was too serious for laughing. People turned to us, and a few rushed over to greet Malfoy. They ignored me totally, of course, but Draco wouldn´t let me go. I wanted to, and got this uncomfortable burning under my ribs. Why couldn´t I walk away? He wasn´t holding onto me, I could just tell somehow. This wasn´t where I was meant to be. I should be outside. I should wait for him there, but I couldn´t move my feet. The more I tried to move, the more it burned. I tried to collapse in pain, but I couldn´t. I wanted to yell out, but my mouth was fixed in a silly grin. My heart was thrumming against my ribs like a drum. I started to get dizzy. Red and black clouds fired up behind my eyes, and I wobbled.

`NO!´ I cried. I half-spun to the door, but my feet were stuck, so I fell to my knees. I was crying through scorching eyes.

`What are you doing?´ Malfoy hissed, looking at me writhing on the floor. I saw him through blurred vision, and I could see he was angry. I was in pain. Why was he angry? `Get off the floor!´

I let out a broken wail. Some of the snobs came to try and help me, but were somehow thrown away. Malfoy was standing over me protectively, eyes blazing and fists clenched. I could see a shimmering dome around us. Someone tried to run over, but Malfoy made a pushing gesture with his hand. He was surrounded with a ball of fire now, but it was black. The man was thrown across the room.

`She´s mine!´ he boomed. `I am the only one who can have her!´

I was sobbing and beating my head against the floor. The aching, jarring pain was necessary somehow, and I kept doing it. My feet were detached, but I had no will to crawl away.

`You´re mine!´ Malfoy cried. He snatched me up from the floor, and slung me over his shoulder again, but this time it was to keep me out of the way, not playing a sweet little game. He pointed out and spun a full circle. Flames seared across the room, destroying all the beautiful decorations, and setting many of the people alight. In the midst of the destruction, he ran away.

My stomach crashed against his hard shoulder, and I screamed at the top of my lungs. The only things I could control appeared to be my voice and my heart. We shot into a dark snowy alley. Malfoy hurled me at the wall, winding me totally. I was gasping for breath, but only breathing out. A cold fear that I would never breathe again in time clenched me, and I slid down to slump against the dirty wall. My fur cape trailed in the dirt.

`Why are you fighting me?´ Malfoy demanded, red fire flickering in his eyes. I remember seeing him like that. His face was in darkness, and I could only see the outline of his features. The stars shone through his golden-lit hair, but his eyes blazed red in the dark.

I tried to say `what´, but nothing came out. I settled for struggling for breath while looking at him with a questioning face.

`Don´t you bloody give me that!´ he spat, hitting me with an open palm. He wasn´t immensely strong, but in that state I could have been blown over by a gentle breeze. In this case I flattened against the floor, my cheek hitting cold stone. A throbbing sting started up, but I ignored it. I stayed on the floor, unable to move without Malfoy wanting me to. `Why are you fighting me? I won´t ask a third time.´

`I´m not fighting you,´ I said weakly, pressing a hand to my cheek and sitting up, finding that I could.

`You´re cursed, you little whore. The fact that you ran the first time ensured that it was required.´ I didn´t understand, and frowned at him.

`Don´t you see?´ he whispered, crouching to bring his face right up to mine. `I´ve been controlling you since I first captured you.´

Aghast, I subconsciously flicked my mind over the last time I was caught. It was that first time. I could only have been about seven at the time. It was when my parents had died, in the first wars. I had met a tall blonde boy, but I hadn´t recognised him.

`You´ve been under a spell for ten years,´ he breathed nastily, his breath ruffling my hair.

`You´re lying!´ I snapped.

`You don´t remember, and nor do any of the others, but you killed Nike. They all believed you, but she wasn´t the first, was she? Who else died when they were alone with you? I think it was about four people.´ My breathing stopped, then quickened. My mouth dropped open as he took off the spell and it all came flooding back to me. I stabbed them. I pushed one off a building, but it wasn´t whom I had thought. I saw my friend´s stricken face as I pushed her off the railing. I saw Nike and heard her ask me `Rae? Kid, what are you doing?´ Then I saw myself run them all through.

`How could you?´ I breathed.

`I needed you,´ Malfoy said lightly. `I called you to the Ministry. You came. I decided you needed to love me, and you did. Don´t you think it´s odd that you hated me all your life, then you met me and loved me? I caused that. If it weren´t for me you´d be dead. I had to keep you alive. You have no idea how much work went into what we did to you. I could decide what you thought. What an interesting power that was.´

`You´re the reason all this happened?´ I choked.

`Was I ever anything else?´ Draco smiled. He raised his arms up to the stars. `They called me dragon, death and destruction, and killing virgins.´ He lowered his face to look at me. `I live up to my name. You do to yours, and Nike did to hers, until you killed her.´

`My name?´ I said, trying to force what he said out of my mind.

`Yes, do you know what it means?´ Draco asked, dropping his arms back to his sides. He was insane, there were no two ways about it. He was cracked.

`No. What is with you?´ I said, still struggling to get over what he had made me do. I tried to sink it into my mind that it wasn´t really me, but I couldn´t listen to myself.

`It means deer,´ Malfoy said, ignoring my question. `And you know what deer do, they run.´ He laughed softly, more of a chuckle, really.

`You´re sick,´ I said, pushing myself away from him.

`No, you are. You´re the one who can´t control her actions,´ Malfoy reminded me. `Let me see, do you feel sick?´

I pressed a hand to my suddenly churning stomach.

`Trembling?´ I started to shake violently.

`Are you breaking out in a cold sweat?´ Malfoy asked clinically. I started to sweat on top of everything else.

`Oh, and migraines.´ My head instantly exploded in pain. Tears crept down my face.

`Doctor, what´s your diagnosis?´ Malfoy asked of no one in particular, but looking at me. `I diagnose, guilt,´ he hissed, bringing his face up close to mine. `Are you guilty, little deer?´

`I don´t need you!´ I roared, snatching his wand from his belt, which was about eye level for me, as I sat on the ground. `Stupefy!´

Malfoy tumbled back, and all the pain stopped. He blinked his eyes, and sat up.

`You made me lose concentration,´ he protested.

`I´ll kill you,´ I said in a voice trembling with rage. He looked up at the wand pointed between his eyes. `I´ll kill you before you can stop me.´

`I know,´ he said quietly. `I know.´ I knew, too. I knew it was true.

`Thanks to you, I´m quite experienced,´ I snarled, never losing focus. If I did, he would catch me, and I would lose this chance. `I don´t want to kill you. Thanks to your love spell, I still love you. If you take the spell off, I´ll let you live.´

`Will you?´ He didn´t sound convinced. `And why will you do that?´

`Because I love you,´ I hissed.

`You won´t when I take off the spell,´ he reminded me.

`Maybe you´re right,´ I said, trying to cover my embarrassment at not having thought of that. `But maybe I will. I´m masochistic like that.´

`Who knows?´ Malfoy shrugged. `But you have no idea how hard it is to pretend to love someone. All that time I spent pretending that I thought you were beautiful, and all those times I had to kiss you.´

`Shut up!´ I shrilled. `SHUT UP!´

`Now now, don´t lose focus, little one,´ he mocked.

`You asked for this!´ I shouted. `Avada Kedavra!´

If my magic power wasn´t enough, the will behind it was. A flash of green light bolted out from the wand, and hit him square in his chest.

`I didn´t mean it! I...´

But what he wanted to say didn´t come out in time, and I cast the wand down in disgust.

`I have become no better than you,´ I said finally. `That´s what you wanted, right? Well, I hope you´re happy.´ With great control, I turned and walked away. The stars looked at me differently that night. I was a five times murderer, if not more, and murderers aren´t welcome. I decided not to run anymore. I wouldn´t be what Malfoy said I was. For the first time in ten years, I was me, and not an extension of him. For the first time in ten years, I could do what I actually wanted to do, and I actually wanted to go to the sewers and explain. I would probably die trying, but who wanted a murderer anyway? No one would miss me, that was for sure. Malfoy was the only one in the whole world who needed me, and now he was dead. I had killed him. He never though I would, but he must have stopped thinking. He had released me, and I had killed him.

I wasn´t a deer anymore. Who knew if Rae was even my real name? It would serve for now, however. I bit down on my tongue, and tasted blood that was entirely my own. Malfoy wasn´t in there any more. I took a deep breath of cold air. It flowed down through a body that was mine to control.

I shall try as hard as I can to replicate my thoughts at that time. It won´t be easy, as I got fairly scrambled. One can get that way, when one finds out one´s entire world has been a hoax. One is a killer, and one doesn´t even know oneself. I chose, however, to adopt what I had become. I was a murderer, a thief and a liar. It suited me fine, but how was I to define `me´? I could create myself, and I planned to make the most of that power.

Maybe I would bend the truth a little. The rebels didn´t need to know all about what had happened, just that Malfoy had put a spell on me. Then of course that I had killed him. I would be a heroine, and I could be me. If they asked why I was different, I would tell them the truth, nearly. I would tell them that the spell had changed me. I considered for a moment, then turned back. I unbuttoned Malfoy´s shirt slightly, and pulled his dragon pendant out. I undid the chain with trembling fingers, and wrapped it around my own neck. I pulled the dragon ring off his stiff finger, and slid it onto my own.

`Spoils of war, Malfoy,´ I said.