Slytherin's Warning

8 - Neighbours

Sonnet 907
In memory

High night it wound to Cana's quiet town
High magic it did fill the sights and air
But soon for Cana 'twould come tumbling down
Attacked, and slashed, left crumbled on the stair
The next full moon, a monster's face did form
And fingertips, they melted into claws
Though silvered fur in theory kept him warm
His friends gave pity not; but they did pause
His neighbours that same night did drive him out
With wands and spears and bloodlust ringing cries
"Be gone, beast, we'll not have your kind about"
See Cana, how alone he weeps and cries
The circle turns, as life shifts up and down
And Cana in the lake himself did drown

--page 67, Full Moon: An Anthology of Werewolf Literature

When Lupin did not immediately answer, Draco repeated, "Potter is dead?"

"No."

If Potter was alive then why was Lupin so upset? Draco guessed, "But someone died. The weas--Weasley? Or Granger?"

"Ron jumped into the path of a Killing Curse meant for Harry." Before Draco even had time to react to the words, Lupin went on, "I have to go--I have to be with them. I'll be back tomorrow or the next day, or--well, before the moon, in any case." As he spoke he summoned a bag from the other room and packed more clothes inside. Then he was gone again.

Draco sank down on the bed. In a strange way, because of their enmity, Draco knew Ronald Weasley better than he knew some of the people in his own house. He could predict how Weasley would react and what words would set him off better than he could have with Nott.

He'd imagined Weasley dead often enough, nearly as much as he'd imagined Potter so. He'd imagined the redhead bloody and screaming while the Dark Lord looked on and laughed. But the reality felt quite different. He wondered where the body was, if Granger had closed her boyfriend's sightless eyes, if Potter had carried his friend's body away from the scene of the battle.

Shaking off the melancholy thoughts, Draco retrieved the box of essays and took them out to the main room. Unable to concentrate on the complex dissection of runes, he turned to the next essay. The first words had a familiar tone and Draco was unsurprised to see that this was Lupin's article. His former teacher wrote in much the same way as he spoke, measured, logical and distant.

The emotional detachment somehow made the rituals described in the essay all the more horrific. For the essay was all about sacrificial rituals, the darkest of the dark sort of magic. The lifeblood of a virgin, the hearts of ten children, Lupin laid out what was known about each ritual. He wrote of a theory of ancient warriors--that eating the eyes of a fallen enemy gave one their eyesight, that eating the enemy's heart gave one their strength. If only this essay was as difficult to understand as the runic one!

He read about another ritual, one done under the gaze of the full moon. Three werewolves were needed, killed by stripping the pelts from them. As the mortally injured animal transformed back into human form and died, the dark energy of the werewolf curse was released. The one in command of the ritual could, by speaking the correct words, summon that energy into himself.

Draco read through the whole essay, despite his growing disgust, but as he finished it he had to resist the urge to vomit. It was one thing to cleanse the Wizarding World of dirty blood, but those rituals--they were sick! He began to understand why the essays referred to the Dark Lord losing his humanity.

Had the Dark Lord really done all those things? It was just speculation, after all. But Draco cast his mind back the Dark Lord's face--as Draco first knelt before Him, as the recruits listened to Slytherin's warning, even as Draco was being punished for his failures. He hadn't noted the Dark Lord's expression at the time, lost in his body's pain, but now Draco could recall flashes and slightly blurred features. He recalled the look of bliss and twisted pleasure as his Lord tortured him.

Yes, he believed the Dark Lord had performed some or all of those rituals. Admitting that to himself felt physically painful. He didn't want to imagine the man--the Lord--Draco was brought up to follow doing such things. He wondered if Master Snape knew about those rituals, then reflected that Snape could even have provided assistance in some of them. The very thought made Draco ill.

His dreams that night were strange and frightening. He was in his Quidditch robes, flying over the pitch at Hogwarts, when he saw the other players weren't moving, just hovering in the air. He was near the Gryffindor goals, so he called to the Weasel, "Taking a little nap, Weasel?" Weasley didn't react and when Draco flew closer, he saw that Weasley was dead, body slumped over his still-floating broom, his eyes wide and empty.

Panicking, Draco flew across the pitch, seeing Ginny with a slash where her throat should be, blood drenching her robes, flew towards his own team. But instead of his teammate's faces, he saw Master Snape and his father and the Dark Lord. Then they weren't on brooms anymore but in a silvery clearing, and his father said, "You shall kill that one, or you shall no longer be my son."

He saw a werewolf and froze, sending a pleading look to Master Snape. Snape gave him a cold look and said, "Kill it or you shall no longer be my student."

He knew the werewolf was Lupin; it could be no other. He thought it recognized him too, but maybe that was just his imagination. The Dark Lord commanded, "Obey me, or you shall no longer be a Slytherin!" Trembling, Draco raised his wand...

and jolted awake, gasping for air and still shaking. It had seemed so real; he had felt his Quidditch robes flowing in the wind, smelled the blood, felt the way his fingers clenched around his wand as he walked forward. The room was dark and full of shadows, and Draco wished desperately that dawn would come soon. He got no more sleep that night.

Weasley's death was in the Prophet the next day, a small name in the usual list of the victims. There was no real information about how he died, just a note that he was preceded in death by his mother, sister and one of his brothers, and that he was survived by his father and four brothers. Draco wondered if the Prophet didn't know Weasley was Potter's friend or if the Order of the Phoenix had somehow prevented more information from escaping.

Lupin returned the morning of the full moon. He said nothing about where he'd been and Draco didn't ask. At length, Draco said, "Am I going to the Longbottoms' again?"

Lupin roused himself from the cup of coffee he'd been staring into. "No. With Neville back in school, Augusta has other relatives staying with her, relatives I don't trust in the discretion of and with whom I don't believe you'll be safe, even as Jacob Elliott."

"So I'm staying here?" Lupin nodded. "And you'll be here as well?" Another nod.

Draco tried telling himself that he wasn't nearly so afraid this time, but it was a lie. He felt the same terror as last time, the same lack of appetite--though he noticed Lupin not eating as well. After the time when they would normally eat supper, Lupin (who had been resting on the sofa much of the day and did not even bother to cook anything) carefully rose and made his way into the kitchen. At his first movement, Draco put his book down and watched. Lupin pushed aside the rug in the kitchen area, revealing a trapdoor. He unlatched and opened it. The door opened facing away from Draco, so he couldn't see anything.

Lupin descended--it looked like he was climbing a ladder down--closing the door behind him. Draco used the toilet and then barricaded himself in his room. The moon rose as it always did and Draco kept his wand poised at the door the whole night, even when his arm began to ache and feel heavy. And much to Draco's surprise, as sunrise ended the cries from below he drifted off to sleep.

When he awoke Draco knew it was late, nearly noon. When he opened the door he didn't know what he would find. But there was Lupin, slumped against the cupboard under the sink. The cloths were laid out, but Lupin wasn't treating his injuries, just sitting there, his eyes closed. At the sound of the door, he blinked a few times and rubbed his eyes before slowly reaching for a cloth.

Draco silently went into the kitchen and made himself some lunch, acutely aware of each of Lupin's movements. Sitting in his room and eating despite his queasiness, Draco felt as though he could still see each new welt on his former teacher. How many more full moons could Lupin's body take before it gave out completely?

He kept shooting little glances at Lupin as the older man--as the werewolf read the newspaper, arms trembling slightly even under its negligible weight. Lupin seemed unaware of the scrutiny or of the fact that Draco hadn't turned a page in his own book in quite some time. Finally Draco blurted, "I'm very good at Potions."

"I'm sorry?"

"Best in the class, definitely better than the mu--than Granger."

"All right...." Lupin looked perplexed, like he didn't quite know Draco's point. Perhaps he truly was unaware of the jumble of thoughts preoccupying Draco.

Draco drew a breath. "I can make the Wolfsbane Potion."

Lupin's face was unreadable. "That won't be necessary, but thank you."

Relief washed over Draco, and if it was accompanied by the slightest amount of disappointment, it was only because the potion would have been a fine exercise for his skills. "Well, I could. Just wanted to make sure you knew. That I could. Make it, I mean." Why was he getting so flustered?

Lupin finally smiled. "And I appreciate that. Thank you, Mr. Malfoy."

The smile seemed genuine, and Draco found himself adding, "You can call me Draco, if you want."

Immediately he wanted to take the offer back, but Lupin's eyes lit with real pleasure as he said, "Draco," as though testing the sound of the word. "Thank you, Draco."

Teachers at school called Draco "Mr. Malfoy," but he'd never quite gotten over expecting to see his father behind him when he heard the name. And although the thought was painful, he knew it was almost certain he'd been stricken from the family tapestry by now, to join the likes of Sirius and Regulus Black.

A few weeks later the Daily Prophet had a story of an attack on Diagon Alley which left nearly twenty dead. Now that Hogwarts was back in session, most of the casualties were adults and smaller children, like six-year-old Nicole Barber. But some students were pulled out of Hogwarts by their parents in a desperate, last-ditch effort to keep them safe. That made it all the more ironic that when such students did fall. And one of Draco's classmates did. Parvati Patil, Gryffindor to the end, rushed out into the street to fight the Death Eaters and paid for it with her life. There was no mention of her twin sister, so Draco assumed the more cautious Ravenclaw had survived.

Draco was doing the word puzzle when Lupin emerged from his office. "I'll be back later," Lupin said, and then was gone.

He'd been doing that more and more since the full moon, disappearing for hours at a time with no explanation. Draco wondered at great deal about where Lupin was going and what he was doing. He looked up several more unlocking charms in Lupin's books but always met with the same result. He did not bother asking for details; he knew Lupin would not trust him with any.

And, the thought came swiftly to him, why should he? Lupin knew how Draco longed to return to his place at the Dark Lord's side; Draco was certain of that much. So he didn't know why it should upset him that Lupin did not trust him... but it did.

Lost in his thoughts, Draco didn't hear the approaching footsteps until it was almost too late. It was a distant shout that snapped him to attention. Lupin had suspected the house was being watched--what if it was the Ministry? Or had a Death Eater broken through the wards? Draco closed the book he'd been gazing at without really seeing and put it neatly on the coffee table. Then he went over to the kitchen, keeping below the level of the windows. He could hear other approaching voices now.

Amazed at his own calm, Draco lifted the rug and unlatched the trapdoor, opening it just enough to slip inside. He could only hope that the rug would fall correctly to cover the door as he closed it again; if the trapdoor was exposed.... But now the door was closed and he was plunged into darkness. Nervously licking his lips, Draco raised his wand and whispered a sealing spell on the door. It would not hold against a determined attack by many wizards, but it was all he could do.

He could feel that he was on a ladder, so he descended carefully, wishing he could cast Lumos but thinking it too risky. From above there was a crash and then voices swelling louder, invading the quiet of the cottage. It was difficult for Draco to distinguish individual words, especially as sounds of things crashing covered them.

Was it Death Eaters ransacking the cottage? Draco certainly hoped not. It was common enough for Death Eaters to burn or otherwise destroy the houses of their targets, and Draco doubted his hidden underground room would survive the destruction. On the other hand, if it was the Ministry it meant they suspected something, and it would be obvious to anyone who bothered to look that more than one person lived here.

Another thought struck Draco; what if Lupin returned in the middle of this? Or the invaders waited for him to return? He always Apparated directly to the main room--he would have no warning, and Draco knew no way to send him one.

At length, it grew quieter, and finally Draco could make out no sound at all, even when he stood on the ladder's highest rung to listen. But what if the invaders were waiting silently in ambush? He did not dare to go upstairs yet. A Lumos was probably safe enough, though. Retreating to the bottom of the ladder again, Draco cast the spell, and gaped at the room around him.

It was like something out of a horror story. The room was stark and cold, the cement walls reinforced with steel. And everywhere there were splatters of blood. It streaked along the walls in rusty stains. The floor--where Draco had stood, where he had sat--seemed to have a dull brown-red carpet. Panicking, Draco checked his robes for traces of it, but found none. It was all dry now, a mute testimony to Lupin's actions each full moon.

He could make out the tread of paws on the floor, canine paws, with dots where claws met cement. Draco threw up once, then again, the room closing in around him. He was dizzy, he was horrified. How could Lupin enter this room so calmly? How in Merlin's name was he still alive?

"Draco? Draco?"

Lupin's worried voice was enough to bring Draco back to himself. He somehow managed to unseal the door and called, "Down here!"

A moment later the door was open and light streamed in, and there was Lupin, looking concerned. "Are you alright? Can you make it up the ladder?"

"Of course," Draco sneered, but there was little force behind the words. He cancelled the Lumos on his wand and made his way back up to the rest of the house, blinking when he saw the state it was in. The tables and chairs were broken, the stuffing ripped out of the sofa and covering everything like snow. The bags and jars of food were slashed and broken, particles of flour in the air and juice seeping into the carpet.

The bookcases were empty, charred books scattered all around, and it looked as though someone had taken an axe to the bookcases themselves. Hesitantly, Draco stepped towards the bedroom, and saw it had received the same treatment. The pillows and mattress were slashed, likely with a knife, and downy feathers spilled out of them like guts. The chair and wardrobe were destroyed, the clock taken from the wall and smashed. Clothes lay in a jumble and the floor, and Draco detected a strong odor coming from them.

Lupin's office door was still closed, but the washroom had not escaped the devastation. Openmouthed, Draco turned to Lupin, who had watched him taken in the state of the house. "I'm glad you're all right," Lupin said, and Draco heard the relief in the other man's voice. "For a moment, I was afraid--well, no matter. I'm glad you're all right. Though I'm sorry you had to see...."

See what? The downstairs room? The state of the house? "Who did this?" Draco finally asked.

Lupin nodded to the wall by the front door--now splintered and lying on the ground in pieces. There were messages scrawled across the wall: YOUR KIND NOT WELLCOME HERE and DEATH TO MONSTERS. "I suppose it wasn't the Ministry or Death Eaters watching the house after all," Lupin said quietly. "Just people from the town a few miles away. I'll have to start buying groceries somewhere else, I suppose."

"I don't understand," Draco said, still staring at the messages.

"I think you do. Would you want a werewolf in the neighbourhood?"

"But you haven't hurt any of them, have you?"

"What does that matter?"

What did that matter, indeed. Draco hated werewolves. He didn't enjoy living with one. He wouldn't want one living anywhere near the Malfoy estate, and he could see his father hiring those of the peasant class to drive such an interloper out. So why did he feel some of the hurt that Lupin must surely be feeling, even if none of it showed on his face? And why did Lupin's calm resignation make him feel so angry?

"I've owned this house for quite some time," Lupin was continuing. "Every few years something like this happens, though fortunately I've never come home in the middle of it."

"They shouldn't have done it." Draco was surprised by the vehemence of his own voice. "They shouldn't have. They should know by now that you won't hurt them."

"They're afraid," Lupin said. "The vitriol against werewolves always goes higher yet when people are also afraid of other things. And I cannot blame them. A werewolf gone to the side of Dark is terrifying indeed."

Draco thought of Greyback and knew that Lupin was right. But he said stubbornly, "I can blame them," and offered no further explanation. He didn't have one.

Lupin studied him, but only said, "We shall salvage what we can," and strode to the bathroom, casting spells as he went. Draco didn't know any household repair spells, but he did know a few cleaning charms, and he went about the house casting them. He also cast Reparo on the jars in the kitchen (though he could not magically replace their spilled contents) and the splintered chairs.

The bathroom and kitchen were mostly restored, though there was very little food left, and the bedroom nearly so (the gouges in the wardrobe would be tricky) when night fell. Lupin managed to find a dry package of pasta that had survived the destruction, although without any sauce it was incurably bland.

"I'm sorry about your books," Draco offered. He also wondered how he would spend his days, with nothing to read or study.

"Don't be." Lupin smiled at Draco's puzzled look. "I spelled them to be flame-retardant. Their appearance now is an illusion I set, so the people who tried to burn them would go away satisfied. There may be a little damage, but not much. Over the next few days I can teach you how to restore them." His smile faded. "I'm more concerned about the lost food...."

Although Draco had dished up too much pasta, he forced himself to finish the rest of it. He could not throw away any food, not after seeing Lupin's distant expression. There was nothing he could say.

The next day, Draco paused from restoring books to take the Prophet first. Skipping over the headline (WHERE IS POTTER?) he went straight to the list of the dead, and gasped softly at one of the names.

Lupin looked up. "What is it?"

"Padma Patil is dead. Her sister's death was in the paper yesterday."

"Yes," Lupin said heavily. "I heard about it yesterday."

"Was it an attack, like for Parvati? It doesn't say."

Lupin hesitated, searching Draco's face. "She killed herself."

Draco stared down at the page, the letters seeming to rearrange themselves into something foreign and impossible to understand. He'd heard that a Slytherin upperclassman had killed himself, a year or two before Draco came to Hogwarts. That explained why the paper gave no details of her death, though. "Why?" he asked. But not waiting for an answer, he threw the newspaper aside and picked up another battered book. "Finite Incantum!"