A Kind of Wild Justice

In a dark and bleak dreamscape lightening slashed across the sky, illuminating a cliff face and the tumultuous waves below. A twisted and gnarled stump of a tree, outstretched over the cliff's edge silhouetted black and terrifying. And in the distance there was a mansion.

Far underground, in the dank and fetid dungeons of that mansion, crawling with rats and other more unspeakable vermin, a boy, naked and chained, was bestowed the mercy of being denied the killing curse. His fate, it was however, was to endure the only one such forbidden curse that could parallel Avada Kedavra in its infamy and reputation for evil: "Crucio!"

The boy screamed. And such it was, as the lightening crashed and the ground shook with thunder, that Draco Malfoy lingered on the brink of death until hours later, the chains stopped their rattling and the lower levels of the mansion fell silent as the grave they had become.

Harry Potter jerked forward from his pillow, eyes wide and unseeing. The same nightmare, thrice in a week... and it was only Tuesday night. As before, the lightening shaped scar in the middle of his forehead throbbed. Flipping on the bedside lamp and putting on his glasses, Harry fumbled for his diary and transcribed the dream in detail. He had found that this technique had really helped him along with his nightmares. Every time Voldemort got slightly tiffy it seemed that Harry got a dream about it, and although writing them down didn't stop them, it at least helped him come to terms with the phenomenon.

Naturally there was no point in trying to get back to sleep. His dreams had never before been so personal, and it was just too disturbing to dream of someone he knew being tortured and killed, even someone as horrid as Malfoy. Things had been bad enough after Cedric Diggory had been murdered during the Tri-Wizard Tournament. Deep in his heart Harry knew that he wasn't responsible but that didn't mean that he had to stop telling himself that he was.

It was just that... it was too much death, everywhere he went; he seemed dogged by it. And these dreams made him feel terrible. Countless times he had wished something horrible to happen to Malfoy, and now it seemed that... well, it couldn't be, Harry reasoned with himself, not all dreams are real. Some normal people actually have dreams that are symbols for what is occurring deep within their own subconscious. But what if...

He got up out of bed and into the en suite bathroom. At least this summer he didn't have to deal with bloody Uncle Vernon barging in demanding that he either shut up or not sleep at all. Luckily for Harry, Ron's father had subtly taken him aside at the train station when he returned to London and told him about a Wizard/Muggle currency exchange office in the south end of Diagon Alley. He must have known of course how dire Harry's home situation was, and well, a boy had to have his own independence. After all, he couldn't be living with the Weasleys all the time. A rented room was the answer.

Harry stripped out of his pyjamas and stepped into the shower, turning on the hot water full boar before adding the cold. He frowned and tried to scrub away his uneasy feelings...Why do I feel so guilty? The rational part of his brain told him that he didn't even know if it was real, but deep in his gut, Harry just knew it somehow, Draco Malfoy was dead. And he was sorry for it. He stepped out and shook his mess of hair free of water and towelled himself dry. Tomorrow was the first day back at Hogwarts; there he would find out what was really going on.

"Malfoy's dead?! Gosh Harry, are you sure demons can be killed?"

"Ron!"

Harry looked at his friends exasperatedly, "Look, I don't know. But I saw what I saw, and I saw it three nights in a row, and my scar burnt each time, and it's exactly like all the other dreams I have had where the things that have happened were true!" He was on the verge of becoming hysterical (Curse me for not being able to sleep, this is all too hard to explain, he thought angrily to himself) and Hermione could see it.

"Calm down Harry," she said soothingly. "We believe you. That you had a dream, at any rate. Until we get to Hogwarts and see whether or not Malfoy's there, that's all you should let it be. You may have dreamt that he died, but you've also dreamt that you duelled the Easter Bunny and was made King."

Ron choked on the chocolate frog he was eating.

"That was told in confidence, Herm!"

"You know what I mean. But until we receive any more information, there is nothing we can do." She finished by crossing her arms in front of her and looking, to Harry, like a (much) smaller version of Mrs. Weasley being strict. Harry glared at her and Ron buried his head in his hands.

The tense silence was broken by snorts of suppressed laughter from Ron's corner of the carriage, and Hermione started to grin. Eventually Harry's eyes softened and he too could see the humour in the situation. "Alright, alright," he chuckled, "it was funny. And it wasn't King, I was made Supreme Emperor."

"Of the bunnies!" burst out Ron.

Their laughter could be heard down the corridor of the train. Soon enough, the door to their compartment slid open and two scruffy red heads poked into the room, "Having fun, eh?" George said. "This is entirely unsatisfactory! Stop it at once - or at least let us in on the joke."

The second of the Weasley twins, Fred, pushed his brother out of the way, saw Harry and dropped to one knee. "Ah! Your majesty! Emperor Harry!", he cried, twitching his nose and waggling his hands which were on top of his head like rabbit ears.

The rest of the trip was spent playing Exploding Snap.

After a long journey, the Hogwarts Express docked at the platform. The trip from London had been without the annual carriage visit from Draco Malfoy and Co. and as the twins went off to greet their other friends, Ron elbowed Harry in the ribs and said, "He probably deemed the train to common for his pretty feet and opted to take his family's golden carriage and diamond encrusted horses to school. You'll see, he'll be alive, and we'll just have to go back to wishing he wasn't. Cheer up, hey?" His last words fell short of the humour in his voice; Ron was worried about Harry. "Seriously, you've been through too much to be in the dumps, you'll jinx us if you keep going on."

But Harry furrowed his brow and didn't reply.

The Sorting Ceremony went as smoothly as always. Sitting at the long Gryffindor table, under the enchanted ceiling with its starlit sky and floating candles, and drinking a pitcher of pumpkin juice, Harry felt at home again. The biggest surprise was to see the new Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher would be this year. Gasps filled the room as Professor Lupin entered the Hall and took his place at the teachers' table next to Professor McGonagall, Head of Gryffindor House. The Slytherin table were in the midst of shouting their objections when Professor Dumbledore stood up and raised his hand over the throng. "Professor Lupin's condition is known to us all here at Hogwarts. Our Potions Master, Professor Snape has made modifications to a very strong potion that will control our returned teacher's symptoms. In addition, extra measures have been taken to assure that Professor Lupin is absolutely no threat to you at all. Unless, of course," he smiled, "someone does not complete their homework."

Ron, Hermione and Harry grinned and clapped with the rest of the Gryffindor table at the return of Professor Lupin. Dumbledore waved his hands and the feast began.

Draco Malfoy was not there.

Later, in the Gryffindor dormitory, as they were putting their things away and re-accustoming themselves to their room, Harry turned to Ron; "But that's just the thing, we hated him so much! I mean... it's just... well--"

"I know," nodded Ron, noting privately how Harry chose to use the past-tense in 'hated'. "It's like speaking ill of the dead in advance, it doesn't sit right. I know what you mean. Same thing happened to some great uncle-or-rather on my father's brother-in-law's side. Right lunatic and he was horrid to all the kids apparently, and everyone wished he would die, and then when it happened, mum and dad said it was the worst feeling in the world. Like they'd made it happen." He sighed. "But listen Harry, I don't think Malfoy's that easy to get rid of. He'll turn up and give us hell, no worries. You'll see." However, secretly Ron was happy that Malfoy hadn't been on the train to torment them, especially Hermione. The words "Hitler-youth" sprang to mind whenever Ron thought of that arrogant bastard. He just didn't want to party about it if it was going to upset his friend.

One by one, the lights in the dormitory went out.

Harry lay in bed, having already placed spells that would prevent anyone from hearing if he cried out in his sleep (his propensity for nightmares had made this precaution more of a habit than anything else). "Lumos," Harry's wand flickered like a candle, illuminating the Marauder's Map. "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good."

The crumpled piece of parchment lit up with tiny coloured dots labelled with names. The dot named Albus Dumbledore was in the kitchens, Filch was roaming about the third floor with Mrs. Norris and Harry's friend Hagrid was in his cabin. But it was just as he thought, Malfoy was not at Hogwarts.

"Mischief managed," frowning, he put the map away and got under the covers. Despite all the drama, it was great to be back home. It was true though, while Harry's peers looked forward to the summer holidays, he dreaded them as others might the thought of returning to school. Life in the Muggle World just made him lonely. There, he was no one and completely on his own, and nobody cared whether he lived or died. And although sometimes he hated being a celebrity just as much, now that he had practically grown up in Hogwarts, he couldn't stand loneliness of any kind. He'd grown up relying on his friends for support so much, due the fact that he'd gotten none from his Muggle family, that he couldn't bare being parted from them. Ron, Hermione and Sirius' letters were what had kept him going in his apartment. The thing was, Harry would have loved to stay with Ron. But his two natures - the longing for friendship and support, and his desire to become fully independent were in conflict.

With these thoughts floating around in his head, Harry drifted off to sleep.

Harry's rhythmic rise and fall of breath filled the dorm, falling in time with the choruses of other boys, already drifting away in sleep....

Dreams are strange things. You see as though it is clear as day, and yet your perception is drastically altered from as it would be in the waking world. You see from all angles, hear thoughts and approach with anticipation (almost always accurate) of what is about to occur. As was it in Harry's case. He knew that it was the same castle that he had approached in his previous dreams. He also knew that it was actually a mansion on the inside, it was just that the old stone-work and ever-present sense of the ancient world rising up from the wet grass that added the extra dimension that made it possible to think otherwise. With the addition of there once being a gallows on this site into this consideration, it was a dark and terribly gothic place. Another interesting thing about dreams is that the dreamer does not think. Rather, they observe. By observing and not thinking, one can, for instance, observe the presence of a velociraptor lunging for your mid-section, but the chances of developing the cognition to run away are usually quite slim. In Harry's case, he knew that there were dark and dangerous things lurking in that grim building, but as captive to the rules of dreaming, he was compelled to remain on his trajectory towards the castle entrance.

He found himself eventually on the outside of what he instinctively knew to be the dungeon. The stone floors was cold and barren of feeling, as he entered the chamber and on it, he noticed, were several large and perplexing dark shadows. Harry slowly went forward and knelt on the ground, putting the palm of his hand against one of the shadows. He felt a flash of sensation - pain, suffering, despair... and jerked his hand back as though it had been burnt. It was smeared with blood. The shadows on the stone had been blood, slowly sinking into the stone-work. He stood up and looked around.

The ceiling was high, and from it hung chains with hooks - tinged red with dried blood - on the ends, swaying gently in a ghostly, non-existent breeze. They clinked occasionally with a soft metallic sound that seemed to carry memories of those who had once been strung up there. The hook currently dangling in front of Harry seemed to have something rotten still stuck to it. Then suddenly and without warning, the chains fell and clattered loudly all around him. Harry crouched down and threw his hands up over his head for protection, but a hook drove into one, making him shriek in shock. It echoed. It echoed a lot...

He looked up to find that he was no longer crouched in the torture chamber, but standing upright in a dark corridor, walking through an avenue of ancient family portraits. They glared at him like monsters - blonde, pale monsters with frowns etched eternally onto their hard, malevolent faces. As a dreamer and unable to run away, Harry remained transfixed to his path, walking onwards through the cobwebbed hall, despite his dully throbbing scar and growing feeling of unease. The paintings seemed to be becoming more and more familiar in his eyes. Eventually, he came to one he recognised and stopped dead in his tracks. The twisted face of Lucius Malfoy glared down at Harry from his frame with his hateful eyes and his nostrils flared in an expression of pure contempt. They were the Malfoy family portraits!

The next painting awaited, but Harry didn't want to see it - powerless, he stepped towards it and looked. Malfoy, Draco Malfoy. His picture filled Harry with terror, but he couldn't run away. The blonde haired boy was in the dungeon that Harry had just left, and he was hooked to the hanging chains, thrashing about like... like something inhuman. Harry wanted to look away, but as if he had just become aware that Harry was watching him, Draco's eyes snapped towards him, and for a second, Harry felt a flash of what Draco felt, and woke up screaming.

Harry ran to the bathroom and threw up.

"Oh dear God!" he stammered and hurled again. "What the fuh... - Oh God!" He staggered up and shuffled over to the sink to wash his face and mouth out, eyes watering. Needed to get rid of that awful taste. Ick. Bad. Sticking his mouth underneath the tap, Harry drank deeply, and then let the running water fall over his head and through his long mop of hair. As he washed his face, Harry suddenly felt a chill descend upon him making the hairs on the back of his arms and neck stand on end. He felt the indescribable but immediately noticeable feeling of being watched. I'm not alone - someone else is in here!

Slowly he rose, instinctively reaching for his wand at his side, only realising that it was on his bed-side table. As he straightened his body and lifted his head up from where he has been wiping his face on his pyjama shirt, he saw a reflection in the mirror - Draco Malfoy was standing right behind him! Harry spun around but no one was there. An abstract voice in the back of his mind quoted some lost line, "Darkness there, and nothing more.". Harry, in a shrill, tense voice said to himself, "Hallucination, not real!", and turned back around to face the mirror again. This time, the figure of Malfoy was closer. I'm still asleep, it's still a dream, he thought, staring at Malfoy's mirrored figure with his heart thumping in his throat.

"This is not a dream, Potter," said the reflection.

"Yes it is. You're a symbol of some forgotten insecurity, manifesting itself in my subconscious mind," he shakily replied.

"Yes, I'm a symbol of your astounding ability to be a complete and utter moron. Christ, Potter, what is it about you that makes everyone think that you're so smart? This is not a dream!"

Terrified and suddenly annoyed at the same time, Harry snapped, "Then what is it? Are you the Ghost of Christmas Past?"

"Try the Ghost of Draco Present. I want your help."

Harry turned around slowly, shaking from head to toe, to look at Malfoy who now appeared transparently in front of him. "I-I-I don't believe it. How? Why?"