A Writer's Tale

Chapter One: In the Beginning

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And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light.

God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness.

Genesis 1: 3-4

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"Are we going to get those in Flourish and Blotts, father?" asked Draco, indicating the book list in Lucius' hand. Draco walked faster, trying to keep up with Lucius as they sped along between the shops in Diagon Alley.

"No. I will be getting these at Flourish and Blotts. Draco, as I told you before, we haven't got all day to wander around taking in the sights." He spat out the last word as though it tasted bad on his tongue as he eyed a couple of people who were undoubtedly Muggles taking their daughter into the Apothecary. "I will be getting your books while you are fitted for your school robes here," he finished as they reached Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions, sounding annoyed to be shopping at all. "I will be next door. Don't dawdle."

As Draco entered the shop and looked around, a short witch in robes of mauve walked over and asked, "What can I do for you today?"

Still lost in thoughts of how short his father had been with him, Draco looked startled that the witch was talking to him. "I uh, need robes."

"Well, I had assumed that much, dear, as you are in my shop instead of Quality Quidditch supplies. What kind of robes are you looking to get?"

"Uhm, for school. Hogwarts."

"Ah, that wasn't so hard now, was it? Come this way." She led Draco to the back part of the store, where there were footstools arranged on the floor and mirrors all along the walls. "Just step up here, and someone will be right along to take care of you."

"Thank you."

As Draco waited to be fitted for his robes, his mind wandered for the hundredth time that morning to Hogwarts. He was so excited about going away to school that he could already feel--also for the hundredth time that day--the knot of nervous tension in his stomach start to form.

Draco had been taught magical theory and history in school, but that had been all. The Ministry of Magic had heavy restrictions on the teaching of practical magic to any child under age and outside of a proper wizarding school. He had, of course, learned a few hexes and charms from friends, and his father had even hired someone to show him a few things to be sure he would be ready for Hogwarts, but other than that, this fall would be the first time Draco had really done magic. Finally turning his power--which he could feel pulsing through him when he was either upset or calm enough--into something real was something he had been waiting for all his life.

Hogwarts also meant meeting new people. Draco had had two friends for as long as he could remember. Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle. They were together at each other's houses for dinners and parties since they had been little boys. Draco liked Vince and Greg, but no more than came with comfort and regularity. It would be no shock to anyone that these two weren't exactly the smartest of people Draco could have spent his time with. They couldn't hold conversations for very long, never read anything lengthier than a comic book, and certainly didn't share Draco's passion for writing. But they were loyal, and, after all, that was the quality that Lucius valued above any other, so Draco kept his dull-witted companions close.

Yes, Draco was very much looking forward to the coming year. Charms, Transfiguration, Potions, it all sounded so fantastical to him, even growing up in the wizarding world as he had. He was especially looking forward to Quidditch. He had been on the team at school the last 3 years, and showed great promise as a chaser. He hoped to get on his house team.

Draco looked up from his thoughts when the door to Madam Malkin's opened and a thin boy with messy black hair and glasses walked it. After saying something to him, Madam Malkin walked the boy to the back of the shop and stood him on the stool next to Draco's, covered him in a long black robe, and began to pin it to the correct length. Draco took in the boy's face, and thought he recognized the look of trepidation in his green eyes. "Hello. Hogwarts, too?" he asked.

"Yes," answered the boy.

"My father's next door buying my books and my mother's up the street looking at wands," Draco told the boy excitedly. His mind wandered back to thoughts of winning games for his house. "Then I'm going to drag them off to look at racing brooms. I don't see why first years can't have their own. I think I'll bully father into getting me one and I'll smuggle it in somehow." The thought made Draco chuckle quietly. "Have you got your own broom?"

"No," was the other boy's only response.

"Play Quidditch at all?"

"No."

"I do. Father says it's a crime if I'm not picked to play for my house, and I must say," said Draco, imagining himself flying up and throwing a quaffle right through the tallest of the hoops he had seen pictured in Hogwarts: A History. "I agree. Know what house you'll be in yet?"

"No," replied the black-haired boy again, sounding distracted.

"Well, no one really knows until they get there, do they? But I know I'll be in Slytherin; all our family have been." Draco thought of what his father told him. The family of Malfoy has been made in Slytherin. That is where you belong, and don't even let the thought of any other house enter your mind, Draco. Imagine if you were put in Hufflepuff. I'd have to take you right out of that school. "Imagine being in Hufflepuff," Draco echoed coolly. "I think I'd leave; wouldn't you?"

"Mmm."

"I say, look at that man!" Draco said as he looked out the store window. There, he saw a man that as closely fit the description of a giant as any he had ever seen. He was huge. Eighteen feet tall and nearly as wide, Draco would have guessed. He watched as he gave the boy next to him some kind of a signal.

"That's Hagrid. He works at Hogwarts."

"Oh," Draco answered, remembering yet another conversation of his father's, this one overheard as he talked to one of his colleagues. "I've heard of him. He's a sort of a servant, isn't he?"

"He's the gamekeeper."

"Yes, exactly. I've heard he's sort of savage--lives in a hut on the school grounds and every now and then he gets drunk, tries to do magic and ends up setting fire to his bed."

"I think he's brilliant."

"Do you?" Draco asked distastefully. He decided to try and change the subject before the conversation became unpleasant. "Why is he with you? Where are your parents?"

"They're dead."

"Oh, sorry," Draco responded, totally embarrassed at having just forced a total stranger to tell him about his dead parents, and attempted a segue. "But they were our kind, weren't they?"

"They were a witch and wizard, if that's what you mean."

"I really don't think they should let the other sort in, do you? They're just not the same; they've never been brought up to know our ways. Some of them have never even heard of Hogwarts until they got the letter, imagine." Draco, who had been waiting for his letter for years and had read Hogwarts: A History front to back several times thought this was inconceivable. "I think they should keep it in the old wizarding families. What's your surname, anyway?"

But before he got his answer, Madam Malkin had told the boy that he was all finished, and he got down from his stool. "Well, I'll see you at Hogwarts, I suppose," he said happily to the boy as he left.

When his robes were finally done, he stepped outside of the little shop and saw his father leave the bookstore, his mother along side him. Just as he was about to open his mouth and ask about his new wand, his father said "Well, that will do then. These last couple of things can be gotten by the help. I really do have to get back to the Manor. Come along, then."

That night, Draco reached under his mattress and got out his magic notebook. It was covered in a deep blue suede and, once locked, would only open when he whispered the secret password into its spine. Having done this, he took a moment to leaf through the pages of creamy parchment, covered with many different colors of ink and protecting many different adventures and dreams. Thanks to the Page Replenishing charm, he had been using this same notebook to chronicle his fantasy world since Nana Grace had given it to him for his 10^th birthday. Tonight, he added another. It started with his father grinningly buying him a Nimbus 2000, and ended with the Quidditch Cup in his hands.

***

Every day for the next month seemed like a week, but Draco was surprised to see that, looking back from the opposite end of August, it all had seemed like one big excited, nervous blur. As he entered the dining room to have his last dinner at the Manor for months, he found that his parents had both already sat down. His father eyed him impatiently. Narcissa hadn't even looked up.

"You are late, Draco," Lucius said to him imperiously.

"Yes, father. I am sorry. I was packing," Draco replied as he sat at the table.

"Very well, Draco. Chester will be taking you to London in the morning to board the train."

Draco looked up from placing his napkin on his lap and gaped at Lucius. "What? You aren't taking me, father?"

"Not unless I have recently had my name changed to Chester. Which," he added, taking a sip from his crystal wine goblet, "I would never do."

Draco looked crestfallen. He had so wanted his father to see him off at King's Cross.

"Do close your mouth, you are not a fish," was the only form of goodbye Narcissa had given Draco before he left for Hogwarts.

***

"Son, the train is about to leave. I just want to tell you that you have made your mother and I so proud. We know you'll do wonderfully at Hogwarts."

As I shook Dad's hand, I heard the whistle of the Hogwarts Express telling me to cut the goodbye short. "Goodbye, Dad."

"Have a good time, son."

"I will, Dad. Hug Mom for me."

And with one more warm smile, I turned and boarded the train, my trip to school finally beginning.

Draco put his quill carefully into his bag and locked his notebook, wishing he had written something a little closer to the truth. He was finally on the way to Hogwarts, but not feeling nearly as happy about it as he should be. It wasn't that his father hadn't taken him to the train; he knew there was little chance of that, as busy as Lucius had been lately. What his trip to school had been missing was a farewell from Nana Grace. In all his life, Draco had never had a first day of school that didn't involve a wish for luck and a kiss on the forehead. Since her death that winter, Draco had missed her very much, but as he looked around the empty train compartment, he felt as though he had never missed her more.

A few minutes later, Vince and Greg came back from tracking down the snack trolley, their arms loaded down Cauldron Cakes and excited looks on their faces. "Well don't you two look terribly pleased with yourselves?" snapped Draco, who was still very upset. "It's not as though you had to kill those cauldrons yourselves."

"Draco," exclaimed Greg, as though he hadn't heard the boy's biting tongue at all. "Guess what we heard? Guess who's on the train, Draco!"

"Harry Potter!" shouted Vince, with a look on his face as though he had won a quiz show.

"What?" asked Draco, shocked and disbelieving.

"Honest, Draco. We heard it from Pansy, who heard so from Blaise. He's just a few compartments down," answered Greg.

Draco jumped from where he was sitting next to the window and motioned for Greg to show him where they had heard Harry Potter supposedly was sitting at that very minute.

"Ain't that something? Harry Potter. Harry Potter, Draco!" Vince said in awe.

"Yes, yes," Draco answered, far too busy with the thoughts running through his own head to pay any attention to the one that must have been bouncing off the empty halls in Vince's. Harry. Harry is going to Hogwarts. I am going to be going to school with Harry Potter. He's on this very train. I've been on the same train with him for hours! I knew he must have been around my age, but... Harry!

Before he knew it, before he had even thought of what he would say to him, before he even realized that he was about to come face to face with Harry bloody Potter, they had arrived at the compartment. Omigod! He got one quick glance at his reflection in the glass before Greg slid open the door. Draco's eyes quickly took in a dark haired boy. He recognized him from Diagon Alley. He looked to the other, tall and gangly with ginger hair. That couldn't possibly be Harry, he thought. He looked back at the first boy, and stepped into the compartment, Vince and Greg behind him.

"Is it true? They're saying all down the train that Harry Potter," Draco felt an uneasy tingle run from his stomach and spread out to his limbs as he said the name, "is in this compartment. So it's you, is it?"

"Yes," answered the boy who was the Boy Who Lived.

All that time in the robe shop, and he was Harry Potter? What did I say to him? I'm sure I sounded like an idiot. In any case, he certainly felt like one now. Vince and Greg had pushed their way farther into the compartment to get a better look at Harry, which did nothing for Draco's already sour mood. He made a move to nonchalantly elbow Greg in the stomach and send them back behind him again, but then he noticed Harry looking at them.

"Oh, this is Crabbe and Goyle," he said impatiently. "And I'm Malfoy. Draco Malfoy." He heard a noise come from the redhead that was unmistakably a snigger trying to be hidden. How dare he laugh at me in front of Harry! "You think my name's funny, do you? No need to ask who you are. My father told me all the Weasleys have red hair, freckles, and more children than they can afford." He turned back to Harry, and hotly warned, "You'll soon find out some wizarding families are better than others, Potter. You don't want to go making friends with the wrong sort. I can help you there," and extended his had, finally, to Harry Potter in friendship.

But that is where this story differed from all those which Draco had written in his notebook. Harry didn't take it. "I think I can tell who the wrong sort are for myself, thanks," he answered coolly.

Draco didn't know what to do, what to think, or how to react in the least for a moment. He had planned this out in his head, on paper, countless times. For years, he knew that he would one day be a friend of Harry's. He hadn't known how or when it would happen, but one thing was for sure, and that was that when he offered his hand, Harry was supposed to take it. Not only had Harry not taken his hand, but that Weasley had insulted his name. Clearly, Harry had seen the blatant disrespect Weasley had shown him, and thought that his friendship wasn't worth much. He would just have to show him otherwise. He was so beside himself with pure shock and anger that he reacted the only way he knew how.

"I'd be careful if I were you, Potter. Unless you're a bit politer you'll go the same way as your parents. They didn't know what was good for them, either. You hang around with riffraff like the Weasleys and that Hagrid, and it'll rub off on you."

Harry and the Weasley stood up, Weasley saying, "Say that again."

"You're going to fight us, are you?" Draco asked, hating the Weasley even more for trying to pit he and Harry against each other.

"Unless you get out now." Even in Draco's rage and disappointment, he was able to take a moment to wonder at how brave and noble Harry sounded as he said that. It's supposed to be me standing next to him.

"But we don't feel like leaving, do we, boys?" Draco said. Even in the current state of the visit so far, he really didn't at all want to leave, not when he had waited too long to get this close to Harry. He certainly, though, didn't want to fight him. He spotted all the snack wrappers sitting on the seat next to Weasley, and said, "We've eaten all our food and you still seem to have some," trying to sound like he was brave enough that he'd never back down, and at the same time, draw some attention away from the fact that they were seconds away from a brawl.

Greg seemed to think that stealing the food was a good idea, because he reached down to pick up a Chocolate Frog from the pile, and just as he did, Weasley leapt forward and Greg let out a terrible yell. He had been bitten on the finger by what seemed to be a rat. Draco and Vince backed up a few steps as Greg swung his hand--rat still attached--around the room. Finally, the rat flew from his hand, and as Harry and Weasley followed it with their eyes, then Crabbe, followed by Goyle, pushed Malfoy out into the hall and all the way back into their own compartment.

"Well," Draco said dryly as Vince hurriedly slid the door shut behind himself. "That went well."

***

Draco stood on a stool in Malkin's robe shop in Diagon Alley, having his robes fitted. The door opened, and in walked a tall boy with broad shoulders. He had a head of thick black hair and round glasses hiding emerald eyes. The boy walked to where Draco was and stood on the stool next to him. After a moment, the boy turned to Draco and extended his hand. "Hello. I am Harry Potter."

"Pleasure," answered Draco. "My name is Malfoy. Draco Malfoy."

"Malfoy? Lucius Malfoy's son?" Harry asked as a witch pulled a robe over his head and went to work pinning. "He's quite a powerful man, isn't he?"

"He is. Are you here getting robes for Hogwarts this year?"

"Why, yes, I am. I hope to be placed in Slytherin House. You?"

"Yeah, me too. My whole family's been in Slytherin."

"Must be from a good family then," Harry said, with a smile.

"Of course. Do you play Quidditch?"

"Yes, I do. I am a Chaser."

"So am I," replied Draco, whose robes had just been finished. "Played on the school team last three years."

"Well, then, hopefully we'll be on the Slytherin House team together."

"Probably. I really must go, now, Harry. Dad is taking me to look at a new racing broom. I'll see you on the train."

"Sure will. Goodbye, Draco."

"'Bye Harry.

A month later, Harry and Draco were sitting in a compartment on the Hogwarts Express, playing Exploding Snap and joking about Hufflepuffs. ("How many Hufflepuffs does it take to light a candle?") Suddenly, the door slid open, and a too-thin, too-tall too-ginger-haired boy walked in. "'S Harry Potter in here? People's been sayin' he's on the train."

Harry looked at Draco questioningly. "Weasley," Draco answered him.

"Weasley? This is a Weasley? Quite as bad as you described. And clearly illiterate, given his speech."

"Get out of here, Weasley."

"Yeah, we don't want your kind to stink up the place," agreed Harry.