Darling

Draco awoke some time later. At nighttime, which he knew because his drapes hadn't been pulled closed and the night sky was visible through his bedroom window. He groaned and tried to sit up. His head was stuffed with cotton. His arm ached.

"That's my boy," his father said from a chair across the room.

"Whafoos..." Draco slurred, then winced. How stupid. Damn it, damn it.

His father chuckled. "You've made me very proud, Draco." He got up and crossed the room, tall and graceful and looking none the worse for his time in Azkaban.

"Thank you, sir," Draco breathed, blinking himself awake quickly. His father's weight dropped onto the edge of his bed. "The plan worked, mostly. I had... contingencies..." He frowned. "Did... he..."

Lucius tilted his head. "Whatever you're going to say, Draco, don't. What I can tell you is that our esteemed Lord did not order those young men to turn on you. They've paid for their foolishness, rest assured." God, he looked so... happy. Lucius Malfoy was practically beaming with pride. Draco couldn't help smirking a little. "Possibly the only thing that spared their lives," he continued, "is that your plan succeeded even in spite of their treachery. Good work, my boy."

"Succeeded," Draco repeated stupidly. "I don't really remember..."

"Banged your head in the process." His father frowned. "You really must be more careful."

"Okay," Draco agreed. His father shot him a look. "Yes, sir," he amended. "Could I..." Dinner hours had always been strict, but it was worth a shot. "Could I get the elves in with something to eat? I'm nearly done in with hunger."

Lucius Malfoy winked at his son. "We can bend the rules just this once," he promised, and stood to leave.

"Father," Draco said hastily. "Is Mum... Where's Mum?"

Lucius' grin softened. "She's gone to bed near two hours ago, son. I'm afraid your antics have quite worn her out. Be kind to her for a few days, will you? Else she'll be a bear to get on with."

Draco raised his brows. "Then you... waited for me to wake up...?"

"Of course I did." His father quirked a brow at him. "My only son, whom I haven't seen in nearly a year, succeeds in his first mission as the leader of a team! I had to pass on my congratulations."

Draco risked another greedy grin. "Thank you," he said again, trying to stay cool and collected.

Lucius smiled and swept toward the door, where he stopped again and looked at Draco over his shoulder. "One might think you're trying to show up your own Father, at this rate," he said softly, and just like that, Draco's good mood was demolished by the stone of dread the words dropped into his stomach. As with most things his father said, it wasn't the content, it was the delivery. It wiped the smile right off his face, and he paled, suddenly thinking twice about getting the elves in with dinner.

"Of course not," he said, sounding a little forced. His mouth was dry. "Good night, Father."

"Good night, Draco."

##

He did manage to eat, of course. Without him even asking, two house elves appeared with his dinner, piping hot, freshly prepared on a silver tray. The stone in his stomach vanished instantly at the sight of the tiny roast bird, dressed in raspberry sauce and surrounded by delicately steamed vegetables he couldn't remember the French names for, no matter how often Mother drilled him on them.

"And wine," he murmured dreamily, reaching for the goblet. Ahhh, home. Where he could drink wine whenever he liked and be served with style and attention in his rooms. All right, so it was a little smidget of wishful thinking; Mother'd have had an attack if she'd seen him take supper in his rooms. He pulled on the goblet daintily. Father had ordered it, he could tell. A victory toast in the Malfoy fashion. No need to be so obvious about touching glasses or talking over points of planning style. Just a glass of fine red. Draco smiled wistfully.

One might think you're trying to show up your own Father...

Draco froze, rolling the second swallow of wine over his tongue. Could he - wrong question. Would he? He bravely swallowed the mouthful and closed his eyes, picturing his father, smiling and proud. "My only son," he repeated very softly. "You've made me very proud." He stared into his goblet then and willed himself to trust. And failed. "You're..." he said aloud, to the one elf still attending him. "Liddy, right?"

"S'right Master Draco sir!" she piped, bowing and scraping. She dropped the silverware she was polishing in order to wring her ears under her chin. "What can Liddy be doing for Young Master Draco, sir?"

Draco waved her off, annoyed. "Answer me a question," he demanded. After she'd nodded and bowed again, but before she managed to open her mouth to spew more nonsense, he continued, "Did you pour this wine yourself? Straight from the bottle?"

She nodded, eyes wide and nervous. "Liddy-!" Draco leaned over and physically put his finger to her mouth to shush her. She shut up and, if possible, her eyes got wider.

"The bottle you got yourself from the wine cellar?"

She nodded again, then shook her head, then cried out and dropped to her knees, where she started bashing her head into the floor, a dull thud on his thick carpet. Draco crooked a brow. He'd fallen on that floor before; it was nearly impossible to hurt oneself without first pulling up the two inches of plush carpet that ran nearly the length and breadth of the room. He let her go for a minute and a half before he sighed loudly and she got the idea that she wasn't actually accomplishing the self-flagellation she could enjoy in her usual exquisitely tiled kitchen environs.

"The bottle from the wine cellar," he said again. "Who fetched it?" He tried to keep his voice kind. House elves were unbearably annoying, but if they thought you were angry, it was Hell and a half just trying to get them to utter a complete sentence, least of all cart away your used dishes.

"Master said not to say!" she shrieked, sobbing. She set about bashing her head into the pillowy carpet again, but this time, Draco found no mirth at the sight. He sat feeling decidedly cold there in his warm house, windows thrown open to catch the summer air. He got goose pimples and had to remember to breathe.

His father... hadn't poisoned him. It wasn't possible. Probable - it wasn't probable. He set the glass back down onto the silver tray delicately, eyeing it. Then he looked at the glorious golden baked bird with its dressings; raspberry anything was his favourite, which he tried to remember whether Liddy knew. Dratted elves. His father knew, of course - there'd been that incident the summer he turned ten, with the raspberry bush and, well it wasn't worth thinking about.

"Oh God," he breathed. His head ached, and he had to fight off a bout of nausea when he realised he had no idea whether it was because he'd cracked it a good one during the mission or because red wine always gave him a headache or because his father had poisoned him. "Oh God," he nearly sobbed, dropping his face into his hands. His appetite was gone.

"Master Draco is needing something else?" Liddy said timidly, postured awkwardly in mid-head-bash. She blinked up at him with wide eyes.

No, you stupid treacherous fiend! his mind replied. His tongue felt too thick to work properly. Instead, he just looked up at her from his fingers and then closed his eyes again to massage the bridge of his nose with the fingers of both hands while he tried to get his breathing under control. After a moment, he felt the slight weight of a person just about the size of a smallish house elf crawl up onto his bed.

Draco hadn't had tender moments with the house elves of Malfoy Manor. Generally speaking, they were terrified of him, and he didn't blame them. He'd had a habit of acting out against his father by mistreating them, and damned if they didn't seem to lap up the negative attention even as they scrambled out of a sullen or irritated young Draco's path. If he thought they had any sort of real emotions at all, he might have felt badly about it.

So when Liddy climbed up onto his bed without asking, or having been asked, rather, he looked up at her with distrust.

"Here," he said doubtfully. "What are you at?"

Liddy knelt on the bed in front of him, blinking her wide shining eyes at him. "Mistress said to give Young Master Draco a message."

The house elves were more afraid of his mother than they were of him, if only because she was an adult and could be as cold as ice if crossed. Draco was just a destructive puppy, compared to her. Sure, he'd been known to chase them around with burning sticks as a tot, but she was the Mistress. Knowing that allowed Draco to feel some small amount of pity for Liddy.

"And it is...?" he prompted, wondering idly whether he could force his paranoia to extend as far as his mother. He couldn't, but it wasn't by a terribly comfortable margin. Stupid Voldemort.

Liddy looked nervous and wrung her hands around her ears even harder. The tips were turning pink. She closed her eyes and adopted a recitative pose that he remembered acutely from his own arduous pre-Hogwarts tutoring. It looked stupid and overdone on the wrinkly, malproportioned house elf, but if he sneered even a little, she'd waffle and waver and it'd be another thirty minutes before he'd get his mother's message.

"Draco, darling-"

That familiar dread the word induced tugged at his navel like a portkey made of vomit, but he schooled his face into sternness as Liddy continued obliviously.

"-I am so happy that you are all right. Now that your father is back at home, I hope you will make an effort to put your mind back to your studies. I have arranged for you to continue at Hogwarts in the fall, rather than stay at the Manor; our Lord requires that his followers be highly educated, intelligent wizards, and has graciously granted my request." Liddy heaved a great breath when she was finished, then leaned forward and took his limp hands from his lap while Draco stared at her, the revulsion slow in coming since it was playing second string to feverishly working out what his mother's message really meant. Before he could stop her, she'd brought his knuckles to her mouth and brush a kiss over them. Liddy looked up at him and held his hands between her own. "You are my beloved, only son."

Draco stared, and after a couple of drama-laden seconds, Liddy's eyes went wide and she jerked her hands back in the same movement that catapulted her off of his bed. She grabbed onto one of his bed posts and bashed her head into it a couple of times before he could get his head together to tear her away from it.

"Stop, you daft idiot!" he cried, tossing her to the floor. "You'll wake someone up!" Then he collapsed to his knees, suddenly overcome with weariness. There was no mistake about it; his wine had been dosed for sure. It was a distressingly similar feeling to that first week after coming home after... the Tower. He hadn't been able to sleep despite the exhaustion he suffered for his entire sixth year, and Professor Snape had given him something. But like his tonic, they'd kept that from Lucius - less a protection from his wrath and more a kindness to a crazed man in prison. Clearly, he'd found the Professor's supply.

Thank goodness he hadn't drunk the whole goblet. He would have, once. But he was soberer, now, and far more paranoid.

"Young Master Draco!" Liddy cried, wringing her hands. She righted herself and crawled over to him while he blinked stupidly at her.

"Liddy," he breathed. His head felt light, but he was still himself, still aware. Just felt freer, that's all. He wasn't giving in, because Malfoys don't. Grace under pressure, the best rise to the top, purity is everything. A thousand other platitudes that were easy to believe when you weren't kidnapping some slow kid's mother. He should have drunk it all. "Liddy," he said again, and she nodded eagerly. Probably afraid I'll go spare and set her on fire or something. "Can you fix me a sandwich?" he said, slurring a little.

She nodded. "Liddy can make any kitchen thing, Young Master Draco. Chicken? Ham? Cheese? Young Master-"

"Stop calling me that," he grumbled irritably, falling backward to sit on the floor against his bed. "I'm not young any more."

"As Y-... Master Draco wishes," she agreed, sounding glum. Just a little glutton for punishment, wasn't she? He was too tired to be overly annoyed.

"Cheese and pickle," he murmured, leaning his head back and closing his eyes.

When he opened them again, there was a plate set next to him on a little silver tray on the floor, sandwich thick with ham and cheese and pickle and lettuce and no tomato, and just a little raspberry dressing, which worried him, but it was decidedly a different sauce than what had been on his bird earlier. And thick slices of seasoned bread. And a tall glass of milk, like he was ten. For a moment, he was incensed and looked around for Liddy to chide her. Hadn't he only just said he wasn't young any more? His temper died when he saw her curled up in her tea towel next to his wardrobe, fast asleep.

Mother would have had a fit. The elves had a perfectly serviceable cupboard in a little building behind the house to sleep in, after all. Father might have certainly tossed the elf out and possibly beaten her for the insolence.

But Mother had sent an elf to kiss him good night, and Father had drugged his wine. So he ate his sandwich and let her sleep until he was done. Then he crawled over to Liddy and nudged her awake.

"Mum'll go spare if she finds you slept here," he said apologetically. "Sorry."

"Couldn't wake Y-... Master Draco, sir. So sorry, sir!"

Draco frowned in irritation. "I said it's all right!" he huffed, even though he hadn't said anything about it at all. "You just have to go to your own room now." She nodded with wide, fearful eyes and with a pop, was gone.

##

The next morning at Malfoy Manor was a bustling one. Draco customarily slept in over the summer - one of those things he knew he could get away with - but even he couldn't escape the crack of Apparating elves and the general murmur of Death Eaters in the halls. In his halls, he thought with a stab of panic. What were Death Eaters doing in his wing?

Draco threw the blankets off himself and swung his feet out over the floor. He was still a little woozy from his father's attempt to poison him, but he'd slept off most of it and felt strangely... fine. Like, his stomach felt fine, his head felt fine. His arm, when he stripped for a shower, was bruised, but didn't ache. He felt fine. In the light of day, the notion that his father had dosed him with a sleeping draught that Snape himself had brewed specifically for him seemed a lot less sinister. It didn't exactly engender a wealth of trust, but it wasn't that bad.

Twenty minutes later, he was dressed in khakis and a long-sleeved black polo shirt with the Slytherin crest on the left breast and stood at the top of the grand staircase that led downstairs into the main house.

"All right, Draco?" a nameless death eater murmured up at him, out of breath not ten steps up. "I was just coming to fetch you for breakfast."

Draco smiled thinly at him, trying to place the face. It was unsettling having strangers in the house. Unsettling and irritating and threatening his newly-won good mood. He spread his hands to his sides to display his fully dressed, ready for breakfast self, and then gestured in front of him. "Shall we, then?"

"Draco, darling," his mother chimed once he was near enough to hear her without her having to raise her voice. He nodded, waited uncomfortably for Death Eaters to get the hell out of his way, and then went to her at the low end of the table, bending at the waist to kiss her on the cheek. She cupped his face in her palm before he could straighten all the way and looked into his eyes.

"Draco, darling," she murmured again.

Draco frowned. "Mum?" he said back, then glanced at the rest of their "family friends" assembling at the breakfast table. "Mother," he asserted then, standing up. He nodded at his Father on his other side and sat in the chair between them. Their "friends" milled about, snatching fruit and bowls of various imported cereals and tea, apparently never having had proper weekender breakfasts before. Draco frowned and tilted his head at the tableau, irritated at the lower class of wizard they'd been forced to take into their home, and therefore feeling just a bit more like himself. So he grinned and reached for a plated apple, the slices neatly piled and drizzled with honey.

His mother watched him, and he watched her watch him from the corner of his eye for a long moment before he just looked at her plainly, a brow arched in question.

"You haven't eaten," she murmured softly, leaning in.

"What?" he said stupidly, mouth suddenly dry.

"Liddy told me, darling," she murmured, even more quietly. She searched his gaze questioningly. "Are you ... feeling quite well...?"

Draco glanced away, not quite looking at his father, but acutely aware of his presence. He didn't answer quickly enough.

"Answer your mother, son," he said genially, but Draco knew that tone. It was the same sort of tone he used when speaking to those that should have known their betters but refused to acknowledge it. The tone he used when he knew something they didn't know he knew.

Draco faked a laugh, and it sounded genuine even to his own ears. Thank you, Aunt Bella, you crazy old bitch. "Liddy left a tomato on. You know how much I hate them." He looked at his father, brows together in apology. "Thank you for the choice of wine, Father. I'm afraid I was still a bit too woozy to drink it. 'Know your limits, my boy,'" he quoted, raising a finger in a passable imitation of Lucius that brought a smile to the elder Malfoy's face.

"Indeed," his father agreed, and poured him some orange juice.

Draco eyed it, then the apple his mother'd been so keen on him eating. Then he looked up at the rest of the table, where various of the Death Eaters glanced at him every so often with variations on the popular theme, "Malfoys and why they should die mysteriously while I get the credit."

Father wouldn't... All right. He might. In order to get back into the Dark Lord's good graces, he might - what was he considering! His own father? But Father wasn't... himself. He laughed like himself, at things Draco could reasonably predict he'd laugh at. But he had a manic look about him since getting back. His eyes didn't seem to rest on anything. Unless he was boring a hole into your soul with his gaze, he seemed to look right through you. It was unsettling, at best. At worst, he was a raging lunatic waiting for the right moment to start foaming at the mouth.

So... he might have possibly considered some horrible act of family disloyalty.

His mother, though, certainly wouldn't have poisoned his apple.

Unless Father had suborned her. Shit. Did she look entranced? Oh, who was he kidding? Narcissa Malfoy nee Black made it a point to look entranced and dreamlike, when she wasn't being severe and demanding. He swallowed nervously. Even if they hadn't done something untoward, someone else might have.

He must have been too obviously nervous.

"Don't worry, son," Lucius muttered, leaning in close enough that Draco felt his breath on his ear like a brand. "Everything's all right. We're coming back up."

Draco looked back at him in surprise. His father was smirking, that knowing smirk Draco modeled to a tee. Don't worry, son. We're coming back up. He didn't know where his father got that idea, what with all the looks trying to kill them, him in particular, he didn't mind being fervent about pointing out. But if his father said it, he probably knew something Draco didn't, again.

##

He didn't end up being murdered at breakfast, which he was distressed to find was becoming a common way he'd started classifying days. Happily, every day thus far had that cheerful designation, so he went through lunch with a bit of confidence. Only a true low-life would murder someone at lunch.

All of your "family friends" are trying to be low-lives, his backbrain insisted. He ignored it and spent the afternoon following his mother's orders; he had piles of make-up work from the sixth year that he'd missed due to "illness," plus summer essays and readings for his seventh year. He hadn't even started, because until that message from his mother, he'd assumed his school days were over.

Lucius sent him drinks, Narcissa sent him tiny sandwiches. The rest of the Death Eaters left him alone in the library, because, he thought, most of them probably couldn't read anyway. It was almost like his father'd never been arrested and the Dark Lord had never come back, and his family was safe and happy again.

"Let's have you a birthday party, Draco." His father leaned against a heavy bookcase laden with old tomes of magical lore.

Draco looked up, brows together. "My birthday was last month," he said cautiously. "I've already turned seventeen..."

Lucius smiled in understanding. "And I missed it," he said, stating the obvious. "You don't have to talk around it, son. Things have been set right. Our Lord has seen to it."

Draco nodded, sensing danger, but completely at sea when it came to the whole "from whence it comes" part. His father was starting to sound like Aunt Bella. All the same - "It's all right, Father," he assured him. "I don't need a party."

"And your sixteenth as well," Lucius mused, apparently ignoring him. "We'll get the decorators in, you think?"

Draco frowned. He wasn't trying to be selfless or grown-up about anything; having a birthday party when it wasn't your birthday was just ... embarrassing. And would stand a stark reminder to anyone who'd accept an invitation - thin on the ground as such people might be - that his father'd been arrested for mucking about with the boy who lived, Saint Potter, and had sat rotting in Azkaban for a year before "our Lord" had seen fit to get him out. Draco wasn't certain his ego could take much more disgrace. "Father, I-"

Lucius smiled wearily at him and sank into a thickly plush reading chair near the smallish ornate writing desk Draco customarily worked his studies in while at home. "Just something small then, perhaps," he interrupted. "Family - and family friends - only." He winked - again. It was disconcerting. "I remember being a boy, Draco. You don't want your fussy old mum and dad pattering over you in front of your friends. I understand. We'll keep it simple."

Draco swallowed. His father didn't understand him at all, but it really wouldn't do to enlighten him. Oh yes, Father. You do embarrass me, for failing, for getting caught. And his father would say... Draco sighed. Who knew what his father would say, after everything. Instead, Draco nodded, affectless.

His father smiled again, and this time it reached his eyes. Draco felt suffused with warmth again at the genuine pride and affection in his father's manner. "So, are there any close friends you'd like to send invitations to?" He leaned in conspiratorially. "Anyone you can stand being seen with your parents in front of? That Miss Parkinson's a bit of a looker, isn't she? Are you two still..." He waggled his brows suggestively.

Draco made a face but took the opportunity to put some real thought into it, even though he was still planning to have Mother help him derail the whole party idea. Pansy was straight out. Crabbe and Goyle... he swallowed dryly. They weren't even really friends - just muscle. Muscle that hadn't been extremely friendly, of late. Nott? No... Zabini? Ah... no. The Greengrasses had remained cordial, but they weren't overly friendly with the rest of the "family friends." Draco sighed and shook his head. "They're all away for the summer," he lied. He'd alienated most of his House the year before by completely ignoring them, losing House points for poor school work, and then ultimately cementing his family's name at the very bottom of the list of Families That Haven't Screwed Up Too Badly. In fact, he might have knocked them completely off that list and onto a far more dangerous one.

"That's too bad," his father mused distractedly. He was quiet for a few more moments. Then, as suddenly as he'd shown up in the library doorway, he stood and excused himself. Draco sat watching the doorway for a long moment before bending his head back to the arduous task of rewriting an essay he'd completely ballsed up for Snape the previous year.

It wasn't like Snape to allow it, even for him, and he'd especially not expected it after Snape had had to come along and do his job for him up on the Tower. Mother'd probably gotten to him. He made a note to try to get away when they went shopping for his school books to pick something up for her in thanks. Funny to think, just a year and a half ago, he'd have sneered and considered it her duty to fix things like that up for him, and he'd have thought he deserved it, too. He'd been decisively reformed on that point, in the interceding months.

He worked on his essays until evening, which he didn't even notice until there was a soft cough from the doorway.

Draco looked up, bleary-eyed from having reworked essays for God knew how many hours. "Professor?" he murmured, surprised.

"Mister Malfoy," Snape intoned smoothly.

Draco raised his brows. The professor clearly wasn't fond of being made to run errands. "Can I get you... something?" he said stupidly, glancing around at all the nothing there was to get. Potions From the East? Perhaps a nice aged Necrology for the Overly Alive? Oh sorry, I'm afraid we're fresh out.

Snape raised a brow in reply. "That will not be necessary. Do join us in the Dining Room, if you can bear to tear yourself away from these more important things."

No need to be nasty, Draco thought, but only nodded with a touch of a smile. Snape was letting him make up essays, and he'd been taught manners, after all. He left his books open to their places and trotted out after the Potions Master. They were halfway through the wide foyer between wings when he remembered something.

"Professor," he said unsteadily. "I'm a little underdressed for supper. I'll just nip up and--"

Snape stopped him with a hand on his arm. "I'm afraid that won't be possible. You should have kept an eye on the time, Mister Malfoy." He leaned in close, his oily black eyes shining with ferocity. "Do you think," he said, his words dropping into place like carefully maneouvered pieces on a chess board, "that you can really afford to keep the Dark Lord waiting?"

Draco felt himself pale. "N-no, I don't suppose I can," he said, suddenly hoarse. Dark Lord, right. It was fine. Everything was fine. He skipped his morning tonic, and that'd been fine, right? And he probably hadn't had anything between yesterday's mission and that sandwich last night either, so he was probably fi -

Shit. Yesterday's mission. He looked up at Snape with wide eyes, but then hastily tried to school his expression, suddenly feeling sick. Shit shit shit - okay, it's fine. He turned away, intending to go against Snape's request after all, but the professor's hand was on his shoulder like a lead weight, and he stopped short. "Professor," he said weakly.

"Come along, Draco," Snape commanded, giving his shoulder a squeeze. He didn't have but a fleeting moment to consider how odd the gesture was before his whole attention was taken up with trying not to let fly the remains of the tuna paste and mustard he'd had for lunch.

He focused on breathing and didn't look around as Snape steered him toward the Dining Room. Just before entering, the Professor let go his shoulder and let him enter ahead of him, which, he supposed dully, was a bit of a kindness. He was far too old to require fetching; he knew what time supper was. Draco took his seat between his parents at the farthest end of the table from the Dark Lord and made the mistake of looking up.