Through The Looking Glass

He stared into the looking glass, entranced by the images he saw. He saw himself, only the person in the mirror was very different from the way he pictured himself. Very different indeed.

A tall boy stood before him. He looked like he didn't fit in his body, like he was trying to get out. The boy's ribs stuck out from behind his pale skin. The person in the mirror looked unhealthily skinny; fragile, breakable, like a china doll.

Wisps of silvery hair fell across his face, almost blocking his vision. The rest of it was tousled, but still somehow looked neat. Cold grey eyes stared back at him, and he was taken aback. It didn't feel like the person in the mirror was him; the person looked much too cold, much too cruel.

The boy smiled wickedly at him, and he smiled back.

His body was all angles; there wasn't a smooth curve there. Everything about him was sharp, his limbs, his cheekbones, his eyes, even his words.

He looked down at his arms. His skin was so pale it was almost white, white like the hard marble statues that the artists made. Along them trailed white, puckered scars; so light they almost blended in with his milky skin. They ran horizontally across his arms, and he could see the veins that ran behind them. Some of them were from his sword fighting lessons, some he had made himself.

It wasn't that he wanted to die. If he did, he would have cut parallel to his veins, instead of perpendicular. No, he just wanted to feel the pain. The pain made him certain that he was still alive. It made him feel alive.

He admitted he was a bit of a masochist.

He sighed and went to get dressed for his sword-fighting lesson. In three steps, he crossed his room to his closet. With long thin fingers, he flung open the door.

All his clothing was black. He liked black. It made him look sinister, and when he wanted to disappear, he could just slink into the shadows, unnoticed. He could blend in with the background, to avoid all the boring people out in the world.

He finished dressing and unsheathed his sword. He had gotten it for his thirteenth birthday, when the lessons had first started. It was the perfect size for him.

The blade was a shiny silver, with a bit of a blue tint when rays of light bounced off it. He knew it was sharp, that had been tested at his last lesson, when his instructor had told him he needed to work on his offensive and he had accidently cut open the man's face.

The hilt was a midnight blue, with a clear dragon - his namesake - wrapped around it, when it met the blade. He didn't what the dragon was made of; it was more delicate than glass, but also harder to break. He supposed that some people might have found it harder to use, with such a decoration, but he felt that the dragon gave him comfort and strength. The whole hilt seemed to shape to his hand.

He felt it had certain magical qualities to it. Someone had told him once that it had been made long ago by an ancient race of people who had specialized in the making of such weaponry. They were now extinct, having been hunted down by others who had wanted them dead. They were said to be evil, the other side good.

He sighed. It always came down to good and evil. But how could the makers of such beautiful things possibly be evil?

For people like Harry Potter, things like this were always black and white, as was the rest of their life. Gryffindor was good, Slytherin was evil. The "good" side had to work to defeat the "evil" side. Sure, there were some exceptions, but as they saw it, weren't there exceptions to every rule?

But for people like him, things weren't that simple. Situations were painted in shades of grey; nothing was ever for sure. They fought the "good" side because the "good" side attacked; for them, it was an issue of self-defense.

Years ago, he had come to the conclusion that there was no such thing as evil. It was all an illusion, created to try and make the world a simpler place. Unfortunately, its creator never stopped to think about all the destruction that could arise from it.

The world was such a mess. Wars were being fought everywhere, in both the wizarding world and the Muggle one. He followed the Muggle news when he could; after all, those people had come up with some pretty powerful tools. He was eternally grateful that most wizards hated Muggles so much, if they had gotten their hands of some of the weapons... It was best not to think about it.

His family was such a joke.

They expected far too much of him, his life had been planned out since the day he was born. Then one day, they had finally realized that he wasn't going to end up being the perfect Malfoy son they had wanted him to be.

He knew he was a failure in their eyes.

They tried to hide it, but their expressions told him everything, and he could hear their whispered words at night. Once, he had dared to ask them if they loved him.

"Of course we do," his mother had gushed, but he could see it in her eyes. They didn't love him. They loved the image of a son they had created. They loved the person they wanted him to be, the person he would never be.

Life was just a big disappointment.

On his way downstairs, he stopped in front of the mirror again. He didn't use it much, but some reason, today; it kept drawing him to it. He stared into it.

He looked so colourless. His clothing was the only dark thing about him, other than that; he was as pale as a ghost. His hair looked white, his eyes looked white, his skin looked white; there wasn't a bit of colour in him.

He could almost see something reflected in the background. The boy in it smiled at him, the facial features he knew so well looking so different. He realized how little he smiled.

But now, he could make out the boy’s surroundings. Behind the boy, the land was full of life. The sky was a pure sapphire blue, the grass as green as emeralds. Everything there looked so healthy, so vibrant. He was sure no wars existed in that paradise.

Two people appeared behind the boy. They looked exactly like his parents, except that they didn’t have the frowning faces his parents usually carried. Instead they were smiling proud smiles. The boy, he looked like he belonged.

He saw his hand reached out longingly for the mirror, trying to seize the world he couldn't have.

He took a step back, ready to leave, and all of a sudden, broke into a run at the mirror. He didn't know what he had expected to happen.

Perhaps he had thought that he would have jumped through the silver glass, and be cast into that perfect world he longed to live in. Perhaps he had thought that the mirror held a hidden world; one he could use to escape.

Instead, as his full weight hit, the fragile glass shattered, the reflective shards flying into the air. They hit him and sliced through his skin, leaving cuts all over. Thin dribbles of blood flowed down his face.

He stood, shocked, glass shards still raining around him.

The sound had brought his mother running. "Oh Draco," she said, sounding exasperated. "That mirror was an antique, and it was just brought here this week too. I only put it in your room because I thought you would take good care of it. It’s irreplaceable!"

It was funny that she would think of the mirror before considering his health. She must have realized that too, for the next question she asked was, "Are you hurt?"

He shook his head.

She continued her ranting. "Draco, whatever am I going to do with you? Just when I think you’re beginning to change, to actually have some ambition, you prove me wrong again! I don’t know why the hat put you in Slytherin, it seems to me you don’t belong there at all!"

He guided her gently towards the door, knowing there wasn’t much he could do to stop her in this state. "Don’t worry Mother, I’ll fix it later. I have to prepare for my lesson now, Gaston will be furious if I’m late."

She broke down completely at that. "Oh Draco, I’m so sorry. I try to be a good mother, really, I do. It just never really works out well. And here I am, always interfering when I shouldn’t be." She sighed. "Go off, I’ll send someone up to repair it later. You needn’t worry about it." She plucked a handkerchief from her purse and dabbed at the spots of blood on his face. "Are you sure you’re all right?"

"Positive, Mother," he said dryly.

"All right then," she said, sweeping out the door grandly. "I suppose I’ll see you later."

He watched her leave. She was always being like this, shouting at him one minute and apologizing for it the next. She was right about one thing, she wasn’t much of a parent to him, she had the worst timing in the world. He plucked a piece of glass from his sleeve and sighed deeply. He seemed to be doing a lot of that lately.

To others who saw him, he seemed to have the perfect life. A mansion to live in, caring parents, enough money to feed a small country, servants to do everything, and on top of that, he wasn't exactly ugly either.

But that was as much of an illusion as anything else.

His life was far from perfect.

He looked down at the hardwood floor that was covered in glass. A particularly large shard lay at his feet. From it, the boy in the mirror smiled at him. It wasn't a genuine smile; in fact, it seemed to be mocking him of the fact that he hadn't managed to leap into the mirror.

He didn't care. It was just another failure to add to the list.

Long long ago, someone had asked him, "If you could choose to be anyone, would you choose to be yourself?" He had said yes then, wondering why anyone would ask such a question.

Now, he wasn't so sure.

He stepped around the shards on the floor, ready to leave. Just as he neared the door, something caught his eye. It was a piece of the backing of the mirror, which had also broken. There was some sort of writing on it. He leaned closer, so he could read the elaborate lettering.

It didn’t make much sense. It definitely wasn’t English, or French, or even Latin. He frowned and left, knowing he was already late.

A piece of mirror fell from the curtain and fell next to the words, reflecting them to show what they truly meant.

I show not your face but your heart’s desire.