Armistice

Armistice

The atmosphere in the Gryffindor common room was comfortably silent, filled with the warm sleepiness that permeates a room in the late hours of the night. Squashy crimson armchairs littered the space, emptied save one, the rest left only with softly dented cushions; imprints of the students so recently there. Only hours before voices had crowded the air, ringing with tones of frenzied focus and spirited gossip; papers had flown from hand to hand, the thump and swish of books opening and closing beating a rhythmic tattoo on the low wooden tables. Those voices lingered in the air in anticipation of returning full-force the following morning. Now however, the calm mystique of night prevailed. The young wizard bent over his letter, huddled close by the smoldering embers of the fire, preferred it that way. Harry leaned back in his chair, holding the paper up to the firelight, squinting to re-read the scrawling black print.

Draco-

I wasn't sure how to write this letter, I don't think I even should be writing it, but that's not what this is about. I had to do this... I don't know...haven't you ever needed to do something, something that you can't even understand? There's just this voice in your head, and after a while it gets louder and louder, and you know you have to do what it says, because if you don't it won't ever stop... That's what this is about. Things are...serious now.

It's not about school or purebloods or anything, or even that I just don't like you. Or that you just don't like me. I'm not expecting inter-house unity or anything, I don't even know if that's possible now...I don't think so. What I do know is we've outgrown this rivalry. It's time to stop shooting. An armistice, that's what I'm talking about. An agreement to acknowledge and postpone hostilities. Don't get me wrong we'll still hate each other. I'm not talking anything abnormal here; I know we can't just end a fight. But now isn't the time.

Actually, I want to stop...even though I know when a feud like ours is started, it takes over everything, the fighters, their world, the people they love...the world holds its breath waiting for two people to engage in the final battle. Black and white, good and evil, Malfoy and Potter. I hate that I can't turn away, put it down for good. There's nothing in our fights; they don't matter to me. But I know you can't walk away, that you're waiting for a final duel; that it has to happen. So later I'll find you, when we're both fighting in the war, when everyone knows the Malfoys' as a family of death-eaters. You'll have your duel, and then we can finish what we started in Hogwarts. I'll kill you then. So now we wait.

-Harry

This was the fourth copy, carefully re-written from pages of blotched writing and scribbled out words, sentences, paragraphs. He read it over again, a quick once over to be sure. He might have read out loud, to hear the words spoken, suffuse them with a sense of reality. But the quiet of the common room pervaded, the smoldering ashes dying in the fire grate guarding against the smallest sound. Harry read silently, and finally he allowed himself to smile. It wasn't exactly right, but the message was clear, the words were his, and that nagging voice in the back of his mind had subsided. He had written and re-written, read and re-read, and now he was finished. The words would never be as right. He held it up a moment longer, before crumpling the letter tightly in his hands and lobbing it neatly into the fire. Harry watched the paper burn, the edges blacken and curl; it was not until the last ember had grown cold, and every scrap of paper had dissolved to ash, that he made his way slowly up the stairs to the dormitory, the firelight playing shadows at his heels.

Far below the fading warmth of the Gryffindor commons Draco sat, bent stiffly over an icy desk in the Slytherin dungeons. Unlike Harry his desk was clean, his supplies orderly, and only one crisp sheet of parchment lay before him.

Potter-

You're flagging. I won't ask why, just fix it. There's no point in dueling with someone so beneath you, they can't even bring themselves to throw a decent jelly legs curse. I mean really. You've hit an all time low Potter, which of course, is fine with me. In the interest of communication I shall quote a muggle film: "Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn." Ring any bells? Your slightest discomfort makes me all warm inside Potter, but this is different.

I will not go down in history as the Malfoy who triumphed over a mediocre foe. Malfoys are not mediocre, it is unacceptable. Says so in the Malfoy code of conduct, clause 18 b, line 44. So you see, you need to buck up. I don't know Potter, go out and do vulgar muggle things, war dances, smear the entrails of small rodents on your face, squawk war-cries to the bleeding skies, just fix it...

What you can't, or won't seem to drum through that thick skull: circumstances have already spun out of your control. Even Oh great-man Harry Potter must bow and scrape to fate. That's right potter, bow to fate. Allow me a stroll down memory lane... We Malfoys pride ourselves on our ability to annoy, frazzle, disgust, and disembowel any enemy, all while looking fabulous. You were hot-headed, impulsive, amusing, and easily riled.

And you manipulated me, just as I manipulated you. Ours was the rivalry of centuries. I drew you in, you sought my weakness, I sought yours; we lived to exploit each other. Perfect rivals. And then you just...stopped. You're a miserable bastard Potter, but you were never a coward until now. Always remember that this fight can never end, it will continue as long as we live, and only we can end it. There is no turning back Potter. To fight is to live.

-Draco

The boy stared coolly down at his letter, now finished, carefully blotting the tip of his eagle-feather quill for the last drops of scarlet ink. He had no need to re-read his words; it was a fact of life that all Malfoys were naturally eloquent writers. The cold of the dungeon crept through his skin, sinking into the bones. He frowned over the words, staring down at the glistening ink. Draco raised his wand over the parchment, like a surgeon making the first incision, with a commanding flick of the wrist the letters peeled free of the page, stuck halfway- then were pulled neatly into his fist with a final swift grasp.

The words struggled for a moment beneath his fingers, stretching out towards the page, then subsided softly to a bloody pool of ink curled inside his palm. It seemed to glow in his white hand, as he tipped it slowly back into the bottle. The final bead of ink ran smoothly down his finger, trickling easily into the small sea of crimson. Draco sat, and stared down at the paper before him, nothing but a piece of spare parchment. A lone figure, lines blurred in the dark, his only identification the proximity to the blank white paper. Hours later it fluttered in a sudden breeze, before catching on a fey chill wind, and breezing away along the corridor. It was a long time before Draco returned to the Slytherin commons.