Corruption

CHAPTER NINE

Crystal

There was a sort of bleeding of colours, until they stepped fully through, but it felt like stepping through treacle. Lara recalled the horrible feeling of being covered in some kind of invisible goo. Then it snapped, and they stood, the four of them, on the mile long plain around the fortress of black stone. With every step, horrible memories shuddered through her. She could feel Draco trembling beside her, and knew it was the same for him. Harry and Hermione just looked bewildered and frightened, especially as Draco cried out and fell to his knees.

Lara dropped down beside him, shouldering her memory aside.

`Are you okay?´ she asked, trying to make him sit up straight. He was curled over, with his face buried in his hands.

`They´re beating me!´ he choked.

`Be strong,´ Lara told him. `It´ll be over soon.´

He nodded, and wiped at his eyes. She helped him to his feet, and wrapped her arm around his waist to help him.

She was bleeding badly, but he kept whipping. She bent over, as his foot was on her neck. The cruel leather bit into her soft skin, but she clenched her teeth and held out.

Lara shook her head and rubbed at her back. Cold winds whistled over the plain, and her hair strayed across her face and flared behind her.

She had to keep running. Two had fallen down already, and had been killed. She didn´t have to run fast, but if she walked, stopped, or fell, she would die. Her legs burned, and the air she drew into her lungs just wasn´t enough.

Lara pressed a hand to her chest and coughed blindly. Hermione grabbed her arm in concern.

`What is it?´

`Visions,´ Draco answered coldly. `They didn´t want us back. We´re going through all the horrible things that happened to us here. I´d imagine she´s being made to run,´ he said clinically, examining Lara´s shaking form. He began to talk again, but it was cut off by a sharp intake of breath as he began to writhe and wince. Hermione watched with horror as ugly bruises rose on his arms, and vanished as he recovered. Hermione looked at Lara, and saw that blood had soaked through her sleeves.

`You´re bleeding!´ she exclaimed.

`I was,´ Lara corrected. `I was being whipped here before. They cut my back.´ She squinted, and looked away.

Hermione´s mouth fell open, and she watched Draco pale again, and shake. How had he kept it bottled up, even though he could remember all of it? Maybe that was why he was such a bastard. All was forgiven now, certainly.

Lara was running again. It was the day she escaped. She was holding her skirts up and running for her life. Scorch marks appeared on the ground as they tried to curse her, but she leapt out of the way just in time. Tears of panic, terror and frustration streaked down her dirty face.

Lara was coughing and choking, tears pouring down her face. Harry could see her past Malfoy, who had stopped to clutch at his wrists. She fell to her knees, and howled at the stormy sky.

`Not far now,´ Hermione said, shaking her shoulder.

Lara, instead of being reassured, jumped up and ran as fast as she could. Draco´s cloak streamed behind her, and so did her now bloodstained hair. Her legs pounded the rocky ground, but this time she was running to, not from. Draco swore, and ran after her.

Harry, who had never seen the cold, sophisticated boy run before, was amazed at his speed. Draco tore after her, and they ran together to the walls of the fortress. Harry glanced at Hermione, she returned it, and they ran to the black walls as fast as they could.

~*~

Glory left the hall after making her announcement. They had accepted her very well as their Regent. It was nothing to what Lara was, but she would stand in for their beautiful leader as long as she could. It was a true honour to represent someone so amazing. Glory stroked the velvet of her new cloak. She certainly didn´t mind standing in like this. It had its perks, after all.

~*~

Lara shoved the door, and to her surprise, it slid open. Dusty air washed over their faces, and both experienced visions of being slammed against the doors as a punishment. There was a crack, and Draco clutched his arm, which was hanging at a funny angle. Then, a second later, it was normal again. Lara gave him a questioning look, and they stepped in.

`What about Potter and Granger?´ Draco asked.

`They´ll only get hurt if they come in,´ Lara told him, pushing the door shut.

`They can still get in,´ he reminded her.

`No, they can´t. You have something of Voldemort´s don´t you?´

Draco considered it for a moment, then pulled up his sleeve. Around his wrist was a silver band, carved with serpents. `I´d forgotten that,´ he admitted.

`You remember? You had to have an item that Voldemort had enchanted to get in.´

They, subconsciously perhaps, linked hands, and stepped up the steps into the castle. It was just as it had always been, only it was empty.

`What are we hoping to find here?´ Draco asked her, peering down the corridors and shuddering through visions.

`Voldemort, really,´ Lara shrugged. `I don´t know. I just knew I had to come here.´

`What for?´ Draco asked.

`I just did.´

`What are we going to do?´ Draco persisted.

`We´ll find that arsehole, and dispose of him,´ she said firmly.

`We´ll try. Remember, it´s not like he´s feeble anymore.´

`I can get him,´ Lara insisted. `I was his daughter. I will kill him for what he´s done.´

They traced the four-years familiar path to his study, down a long flight of stairs and stood before the bronze doors again. They stood alone in their corridor, as nothing else was this low down. They were in the basement itself here. This time the gates were black with neglect, but they still coursed dread through Lara´s body. She stepped up to them, and pushed on the handle.

Even though they were four times her height, both swung open smoothly at her touch. Lara was surprised, to say the least, by what she saw now. Water had flooded the huge room, and lapped at the fourth of the five steps down into the room. Under-lighting from old spells gave the water an eerie blue-green glow, and the light bounced the colour onto their faces. Lara looked at Draco, not sure what to do next. He was squinting at the surface of the flood, his eyes flickering. He seemed to be looking for something.

Lara glanced across the huge room to the steps on the other side. At the top was a small stone landing, with marble and gold balustrades around it. The carved mahogany door into the long hall before the staircase up to the study stood slightly ajar, and candlelight slanted across the water.

`Only one thing for it,´ Lara sighed. She tucked her hair behind her ears, and walked to the steps. The water wasn´t looking too warm from where she stood, and her quick mind was roving over various other ways to get across. Getting wet certainly wasn´t her thing. She sank her booted foot down onto the next step, and winced at the chill.

`Why couldn´t I have been born perfect?´ she muttered irritably, wading deeper into the icy water. `Goody-goodies never have to go waist deep into freezing, possibly cursed, water. They just turn into eagles and fly there.´ She made a grunt of distaste in her throat, and shifted the neck-chain of her cloak. The water was pulling it back.

She was dragging her numb legs into the middle of the room when Draco swore loudly. `Stop!´ he yelled. She halted in mid-stride, and turned back to face him, a scowl on her light-dappled face.

`What?´ she demanded.

`The spells haven´t grounded...´ he began, but at that moment, the familiar tube of glass shot up around her.

For a moment she just stared, then started to hammer at it with her small fists. Nothing happened, of course. Draco was wading towards her, but it was slow going. He cursed noisily, and slapped the surface of the flood, but Lara couldn´t hear anything. Suddenly, Draco ducked out of sight. She saw a dark shape moving under the pool, and his head burst up outside her prison. He raked his fingers through his hair, and spat over his shoulder.

She was crying now, the air was beginning to run out already, and she was panting in terror. Lara started to feel faint, and her banging lessened. She gave the glass one last thump, before slumping down under the surface.

Draco watched Lara´s eyes slide out of focus, then close, in abject terror. He elbowed and kicked at the glass, but it wouldn´t shift.

`Adamantine,´ he growled, swearing and kicking it again, even though it was no use.

A stream of bubbles rose from the pale gold patch that signified Lara´s hair. He didn´t have much time. Instead of casting about him wildly for an answer, Draco thought about it in silence.

`Wingardium Leviosa!´ he whispered, pointing his finger at Lara. Wands took too long. She floated up out of the water, looking for all the world as though she was being hanged. At least she was out of the water, he had a little more time. He ran his mind through all the spells, and what they could do. Nothing would break adamantine, for sure, but what had side effects?

Oddly, his mind floated over the thought of Potter the year before. When he had summoned his broomstick. There was no way that window had been open. Draco lived in that dormitory now, and none of the windows opened. None of them even had catches. So...

`Accio, Lara!´ he cried, leaping back and tripping. He fell down into the pool, and raised his hands as Lara flickered and vanished from the tube, and reappeared just outside it. His spell released, and she collapsed into the water. He dove down after her immediately.

Lara´s eyes popped open, and filled with water. She took a breath, and gulped down cold, salty liquid. `Draco?´ she burbled, but only bubbles came out. She flicked her legs angrily, until one found something solid. She pushed off, and shot up to the air.

Draco was bobbing beside her.

`The water appears to have become rather deeper,´ he commented lightly, with the air of one saying that it was cloudy that morning.

`Shit!´ she choked. The bronze doors were open in the flood, and the water level had risen nearly to the top of them.

`Who would have thought, eh?´ Draco smiled, looking around them.

`Shut up!´ she snapped. `I´m trying to think.´

`Take all the time you need,´ he said, and promptly began to sink.

`Malfoy!´ she squealed, grabbing him by the scruff of the neck and pulling him back up. `That wasn´t funny!´

He grinned like a little schoolboy. `I rather thought it was, actually,´ he said smugly.

`Look, are we going to go after Him or not?´ she pouted.

`You know, you look quite adorable when you do that,´ he grinned, scrubbing his hand on the top of her head. She swatted him away angrily.

`We don´t have long. Are you coming or not?´

She ducked under the surface and swam off towards the study hall door, now completely submerged.

`Party pooper,´ Draco mouthed, before following.

~*~

`What do you mean, it won´t open?´ Harry demanded.

`Just the same,´ Hermione said curtly. `The doors won´t budge.´

`But Malfoy and Ryder went in!´ Harry protested.

`I don´t know!´ Hermione shrilled. `You´re the big strong boy, you do it!´

`Alright, I will,´ Harry sniffed, walking to the door and grabbing the handle. He leaned back and strained, pulling on it with all his might. After a minute he stopped. `You know, I think you´re right Hermione,´ he conceded.

`Harry, you have to push them,´ she told him.

`Oh,´ he said, looking a little crestfallen. He pressed gently against the door in preparation, and it fell through. He collapsed on the floor in the dusty entrance.

`Harry?´ Hermione gasped, rushing to his side. `Well, now I´m embarrassed!´ she said.

`Yeah, you and me both,´ Harry groaned, sitting up and rubbing his back.

`Why didn´t they wait?´ Hermione said, hurt.

`I don´t know, okay. Knowing Malfoy, there are probably vicious guard hounds around here somewhere that like the taste of human.´

`Oh, Harry. You´ve got him all wrong!´ Hermione frowned.

`Mmm, tastes like chicken,´ Harry persisted pointedly.

Hermione slammed the door and flounced off up the stairs.

`Hermione? Do you even know where you´re going?´ Harry asked. There was silence for a while.

`O-of course I do!´

`I do not want to get lost in Voldemort´s house,´ Harry insisted.

`In the words of a great wizard who won´t live to see the light of day again; Yeah, you and me both, honey,´ she hissed, coming back to him.

`Well, where do we go?´ Harry asked, looking around the dark, dusty chamber.

`Why don´t we just stay here?´ Hermione suggested. `Or we could go outside, there are no hounds, I´m sure of it.´

`It looks better than getting lost in here. I´ll bet there are booby-traps all over the place,´ Harry agreed. He turned back to the door, and pulled on the handle. Nothing happened. He put his foot against the wall and heaved. Nothing.

`Uh, Hermione?´ Harry said quietly.

`What?´

`I think we´re trapped.´

~*~