Resurgence of Evil

CHAPTER 13:

Harry picked up the phone and put it to his ear. A puzzled look crossed over his face, followed by one of disgust and then, confusion. Ron was helping Ginny, her eyes wide as she stared at the blood and green gore, to a seat.

The stillness of the room was broken as Harry extended the phone to me, and Sirius rushed out of the kitchen with a towel. I hadn’t even seen him leave. Taking it from his hand, I pressed the cloth over the bleeding cut.

"It's for you." I looked at the phone for a long moment before taking it slowly from Harry and putting it to my ear.

"I trust that now you know not to defy me."

"Think again." I kept my voice hard, unyielding. To show weakness was to be eaten alive.

"Oh, but that was just a small sampling of the destruction I can wreak, Draco. Imagine bleeding out your life from a cut on your arm. Did you ever wonder how that green liquid was generated?"

I sucked in a breath - I hadn't thought to consider where it came from, assuming that it was a magical byproduct of whatever curse had been placed on those with the Mark.

"It's your strength," cackled the voice. "You connection to all magic, magnified and bent to my will. It will kill you, and you can't keep cutting holes in your flesh - after all, you heal, don't you? And if I were to unleash the curse on you, you'd drain yourself dry."

There was a peculiar satisfaction in the tone that turned my stomach.

"Liar," I hissed.

"You wish."

"Say what you wanted to say."

"You will deliver Harry Potter's baby to me, when it is born in five months."

"Excuse me?" I couldn't keep the shock out of my voice. "You want me to do what?"

Of anything I might have anticipated, this was definitely last on the list. No, it wasn't even on the list. I felt sick.

"You will give me the child of the one who killed Voldemort. There is no choice. You will comply."

"If I don't?"

There was a moment of silence. So far, I had been equivocating. Twisting words, conversing with political doublespeak, and avoiding giving a definite yes or no. That was at an end.

"You know the consequences."

"See how much I care." I snapped the phone off, threw it to the floor, and said, "Annihilate."

Just as it began to ring, the phone was blasted into pieces. I leant back in the couch, still feeling vaguely ill.

"What just happened?" asked Ron, giving me a wary glance.

I opened my mouth to speak, and Hermione said, "In detail, please," leveling a look at me that would have done McGonagall proud.

"Well, that was someone who claims to be my father."

"But he's dead," said Ginny.

"I know that!" I snapped. I rubbed my temples and waited a minute, then, glancing around the room, began again. "I first got a call maybe fifteen minutes ago, and whoever it was claimed to know who the new Dark Lord is." I pressed the cloth tighter against my arm, sliding further down onto the couch. "There was a good deal of threatening."

"Why did he call?" asked Harry.

I closed my eyes, took a deep breath. "He wants your baby."

"What?"

"He wants me to take your baby when it's born in five months and deliver it to him."

There was a stunned silence that exploded as Harry stood and began to swear, loudly, violently, and colorfully. I dizzily wondered how much of that he'd learned from Sirius.

"Draco? Draco!"

I blinked, opening my eyes to find Ron looking at me carefully. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah. I - "

"Shit," Ron swore, and I realized that blood was running down my arm, over my hand and through my fingers. I must have sliced the artery, I thought blearily. It was a wonder I hadn't ever done so before.

I felt my arm lifted up, and I was lying flat on the couch. It was ridiculous, really. I'd only stayed at the Burrow twice, and I'd ended up unconscious on this couch more often than I'd slept in a bed.

I don't know how long it took for my thoughts to clear, but when they finally did I felt bone-weary.

"Why does he want our baby?" asked Ginny, looking as pale as I felt.

"He said, he wanted the child of the one who killed Voldemort."

Harry frowned. Despite the fact that he knew I had killed Voldemort, I could bet that he'd caught something that my exhausted mind had missed.

"He said that? Exactly?" Harry pressed, face intent.

I nodded.

"Interesting," he murmured.

I felt my eyes shutting, and blinked rapidly. "Do you have a pensieve?" I asked suddenly.

Harry looked started, but Hermione immediately stood and raced out of the room. In a few seconds she walked sedately back, with a small box.

"Where'd that come from?" asked Ron, frowning at it.

"I went to my office," Hermione said quickly. "There's a new - well, we're only in the experimental stage of downsizing the pensieve. But it works," she assured Harry, who was staring at the small box with a look of disbelief. There were reasons, and good ones, why pensieves were so large and made from specific types of rock.

I placed the tip of my wand at my temple, and carefully extracted a copy of this night's events. It was a silvery thread that detached from my skin, and I carefully dropped the memory into the pensieve.

There was a moment of silence as Harry immersed himself in the memory. I reached out, touched his shoulder, and watched as he quietly absorbed the rush of events. At the end, when the line between past and present became thin, I said, "Harry."

He jerked out of the memory, and looked at Ginny. She was very white, her face tight with worry. He stood, walking to her, and put his arms around her, whispering in her ear.

Hermione leant forward, and carefully dipped a finger in the memory's residue, floating in the silvery liquid. After she had experienced the events, I called her back, and did the same for Ron. Ginny also came stiffly forward to hear the exact conversation that demanded her baby.

I looked at the clock, squinting to keep it from fading out of my vision. I carefully removed the cloth from my arm - the blood flow had stopped, but the cut was deep, extending for several inches on either side of the Mark.

I tried to scrub the drying blood off my arm with the cloth, but it was already crusted brown over my skin.

Glancing up, I saw Hermione approaching, and Ron was carrying a bowl of water, steam rising from it. A cloth was slung over his shoulder.

Hermione sat next to me, a needle, thread and scissors in her hands. She took my arm and began to sew it up. Trying to ignore the pain, I looked at the sword.

No blood marred it's steel - in fact, there was nothing on the blade. No blood, and no trace of the viscous green fluid, or marks of corrosion from it's acidic nature. I frowned and reached for the hilt.

"Haven't you had enough of that for today?" asked Ron pointedly.

I frowned, and wrapped my fingers around the hilt, raising the blade in front of me and twisting it ever so slightly.

"What's wrong?" asked Hermione.

"That green fluid, it's very corrosive. It's so acidic that it can eat through some types of stone. Only spelled glass can hold it, and the charms have to be renewed consistently. So there should be some sort of mark, patina, damage, something on the blade. As far as I can tell, there's nothing. I mean, I'll have to look at it more closely, but it's still . . . odd."

Hermione gave me a strange look. "Did it occur to you that there might be a protective spell on it?"

I snorted. "Of course. But it also eats through magic - that's why I have to re-spell the glass I use every three days or so."

Hermione frowned, and tied off the last stitch carefully. "There," she said. "Try not to do that again, I'm getting sick of sewing you up."

I looked at her face, but she was smiling slightly. I grinned, and said, "Yes, Mrs. Weasley, ma'am. I'll try not to cut my arm open again."

The three of us glanced at each other, and broke into laughter.