Resurgence of Evil

CHAPTER 12

When I arrived at the Burrow, I closed and locked the door, before setting my back against it and slumping ever so slightly in exhaustion.

"What happened?" asked Sirius.

I started. He’d crept up on me like a – well, like an escaped convict. "Don’t do that!"

"What’s that?" He came forward, looking at the sword with interest.

"I should think that would be fairly obvious."

Sirius gave me a quelling look, and I sighed, taking the sword and placing it on the coffee table. I went to my room, pulling my sweater off, and toed off my shoes. In jeans, a t-shirt and socks, I went to the kitchen and started to make a sandwich.

Although I wasn’t hungry, I made myself eat it, knowing that lack of appetite was one of the side-effects of the Mark and that, while not deadly, it was still dangerous.

I glanced out of the window. It was nearly evening, and the sun was setting. I turned on the radio, and began listening to it with one ear as I continued to examine the viscous green substance. Nearly an hour later, I tried to massage away the furious headache raging behind my temples.

"-and it is confirmed, just now, by the Head of the DMLE. Robert Hardesty has been found dead in his home, with no evidence of any violence done to him. In the words of Arabella Figg, senior Auror in charge at this scene, "It looks most definitely like the Killing Curse." It seems that the terror inspired by You-Know-Who has not died with him. The wards on Hardesty's house were still intact, and it appears that this killing mirrors the seventeen others that have plagued the wizarding world since the fall of You-Know-Who. It has been recently confirmed that several of the witches and wizards who have died mysteriously in the last month include Louise Avery, Marissa Goyle, and Evan MacNair, who were previously assumed to be missing.

It seems that the dark times are not over, and the wizarding world's celebration has been too much, too soon. I for one am tempted to disbelieve the reports of the Dark Lord's fall. This is Dennis Creevey with WWN."

I sat up straight. Goyle, MacNair, Avery - all related to the wizards I had killed with Voldemort , and all Death Eaters themselves. What was this sudden deluge of death? An attempt to flush out the 'missing' six Death Eaters, and determine whether they were alive or not? Was the new Lord simply ridding himself of useless followers? Or was this something else - more incomprehensible?

Swearing violently, I groaned and rubbed my head. A migraine was tearing it's way through my skull - and Creevey's foolish public disclaimer of the Dark Lord's death was a sure key to beginning a panic.

There was a roar in the fireplace, and Harry shot out, covered in soot, catching himself before he could hit the table. Coughing sharply, he quickly moved out of the way. A bare five seconds later, Ron followed. Hermione was last, turning and closing the Floo connection to the house for the night. Ginny, finally beginning to show the first vestiges of her pregnancy, entered the kitchen, and she and Harry exchanged a passionate kiss. Ron made a whistling catcall, and I smirked, and the two pulled away, Harry grinning and Ginny blushing. She leant over and whispered something to him, and Harry flushed.

I simply raised a brow, and Harry said, "Shut up, Malfoy."

"Me?" I asked innocently. "I didn't do anything!"

"Hermione, check his stitches," ordered Harry with a grin. "Ginny and I have something to . . . discuss, upstairs."

I snorted. "Don't let your discussion be too long - you never told me what happened with Hardesty and Calwell." I more than half suspected that they had died during interrogation, and their deaths had been faked, but had no proof.

He flapped a hand at me impatiently, as he and Ginny rushed out of the room.

"Geez, they're like teenagers," said Ron, grinning.

"Ron!" said Hermione, flushing. He came up behind her, and wrapped his hands around her waist, bending down to tuck his head on her shoulder. She turned in the circle of his arms, lifting her hands to cradle his face. I slipped out the door without interrupting.

In the bathroom, I checked the cut on my arm. It was nearly healed - which was abnormally, disturbingly fast. Another device enacted by this new Lord, so that I couldn't simply insert an IV and drain the fluid. No, I was forced to open a new cut in my flesh every week. Grimacing, I carefully cut the threads and removed the stitches. There were fourteen in all, and by the time I had removed the last one, the holes from the first had already closed, without leaving a scar. I rubbed my head again and left the bathroom.

There were . . . noises . . . coming from the kitchen, and I decided that it wasn't nearly dark enough to keep me from taking a walk. I grabbed a sweatshirt on the way out the door, and began to wander aimlessly. I set off in the direction opposite several sheds, and strolled, hands in my pockets. After twenty minutes I was well out of sight of the house and hoping that I wasn't about to get myself lost.

I could see the lights of a small village in a tiny valley several miles to my right, but the land was a gently rolling moor in all other directions.

A slight ringing trilled through the air. Surprised, I turned, looking for the noise. It was several seconds before I realized that it was coming from me. I pulled my cell phone out of a pocket in the sweatshirt. I frowned - Hermione had borrowed it. She must have put it back in my sweatshirt and forgotten to tell me.

"Hello?"

"Hello, son."

I froze, gripping the phone tightly. "What do you want?"

"Oh, I was just wondering if you knew who the new leader of the Death Eaters is."

Suspicion overwhelmed me. "I don't believe you."

"Please, Draco." The sneer was almost palpable. "When you were approximately five years, eight months old, I decided that every day you would receive two pieces of bread, two pieces of fruit, a small cut of meat and a small salad. When you were ten, you ran away and were missing for nearly five hours. You received two-hundred and eighty three lashes, one for each minute you were missing. In August of 1995 you were first presented to the Dark Lord, and you were initiated on the fourteenth of that month, following your - shall I say, most skillful - torture of the Muggle Norman Alcott."

I sucked in a quick breath. I was nearly certain that no one but my father and myself knew all those details. But there was no knowing how much he had - willingly or unwillingly - disclosed to others.

"This proves nothing," I said harshly.

"Did you find my gift for you, Draco?"

"Yes, both of them," I replied grimly.

There was a slight laugh, muffled, from the other end of the line. "Next time I shall tell them to be a little more discreet," the voice whispered.

I froze. He wasn't talking about the vault - he was talking about the Death Eaters. I quickly slammed the phone shut, ending the call, and breathing hard. A faint laugh reached my ears on the wind. Deciding that discretion really was the better part of valor, I grabbed my wand and Apparated to the house.

Very nearly unnerved, I walked into the kitchen. There was a slight gasp, and I quickly turned and left. How could I have forgotten . . .

I looked at the cell phone in my hand, and it rang again. I nearly dropped it, but forced myself to open it.

"Do you really think you're safe there?"

"Son of a bitch!" I threw the phone against the wall with all of my strength, and it splintered into pieces, the light dying slowly.

I sat on the couch, taking deep breaths, trying to regain my shattered composure. Footsteps rushed down the stairs, ran in from the kitchen. I lifted my head and saw Hermione, Ginny, Sirius, Harry and Ron staring at me. Ron recovered first and said, "Geez, Malfoy, I mean, I knew you weren't getting any, but that's going a little overboard, don't you think?"

"Ha, ha," I replied shortly. "It's nothing. I just - lost my temper. One prank call too many." I gestured toward the phone and Sirius huffed. Hermione frowned.

"Where'd you get that?"

I looked at her. "It's my cell phone. It was in my sweatshirt. I thought you'd put it there and forgot to tell me."

She stared at me, and Harry said, "Hermione forget something? I don't think so."

"No," Hermione said, and she walked to the kitchen, returning with a cordless cell phone. "I didn't put it anywhere - I left it in the kitchen. Here." She handed it to me, and at that moment, it rang.

Hermione jumped, and I pried my fingers from around the phone, opening it carefully, and put it to my ear.

"Draco, Draco, Draco." There was a tsk-ing noise. "That definitely broke a rule. You know, of course, that you must be punished."

"Go to hell." My voice was too calm, even serene, and I wondered at it when just the sound of that voice made me want to scream.

"Language, Draco." There was a sudden, silent static and the noise of the phone on the other end being dropped. I heard a muffled shout, an incantation, and then pain scorched through me.

I dropped the phone, staggering back a step. My arm was glowing through the shirt, and the glow was spreading. "Oh, fuck!" I gasped. I pulled my wand, pointed it at my arm, and cried, "Finite Incantatem!"

Almost nothing happened, and I reached for the sword, still sitting on the coffee table. Grabbing it by the hilt, I twisted my wrist so that the sharpened edge was upward. Before I could think about it, I placed the mark on the blade, and pulled.

The edge was razor-sharp. I almost didn’t feel it slice the skin - until the corrosive green fluid flowed out, and sizzled as it touched the blade, turned to steam. I managed not to scream, but the pain swirled through my senses, and I staggered back another step. Something hit the backs of my knees, and suddenly I was sitting on a couch, with both blood and liquid Avada Kedavra pouring out of me.

I didn't know how much worse it could get, but I had a hunch that this was nowhere near as bad as it was going to be.