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Chapter Seventeen

Anarchos

"I refuse to accept this. I have not agreed to this arrangement, and as the sole focus in this matter, although I'm being spoken of in third person, I demand that these Summoner training lessons be not forced upon me."

Dumbledore's eyes twinkled as he smiled at Draco. Both Harry and Draco were still recovering from the exploding of the hippogriff stalls, but, being athletic, and special, they were almost back in normal shape now. And, of course, after the first few days of pain had passed, they had begun their normal bickering in the Hospital Wing for the rest of their days spent healing.

"I am sorry to say, Draco, that Harry, Charlie, and I did not consider the fact that you might reject my idea. However, it appears that you say you do not want to be trained by them, is this correct?"

Draco, seated firmly on his chair, every part of him glowing palely besides his dark cloak and grim, rebellious blue-grey gaze, glared at Dumbledore. "Do not paraphrase my words back at me, Headmaster. I know what I said, and I meant it, and I repeat, I demand that these Summoner training lessons be not forced upon me. I loathe both Potter and Weasley, individually. They are both truly disgusting in their own personal ways, and," here Draco gave an evil sneer towards the silent, somber Charlie, and then an equally malicious glare shot in Harry's direction. He continued, "And anything you might say or suggest to try and force these lessons upon me, I will object to."

"Well than, Mister Malfoy, I suggest that you immediately sign up for choir."

"Choir? Have you gone mad?"

Draco stood up, slowly and angrily, his every movement, word, and emotion, graceful and precise. Stalking forward, he placed his hands down on the Headmaster's desk, glaring in outright fury at the bright blue gaze of the old, wise wizard. Harry was troubled, yet also awed. The power, the elegancy, and the beauty of everything Draco did and said amazed him. How could a human have been born so graceful and majestic?

Dumbledore leaned forward, giving Draco a kind yet somehow equally determined stare. "Young man, I would advise you not to so openly accuse me. Although I respect your opinion, you need not be so rude about saying it. Summoner training, I promise you, would be very thorough and not very difficult. Although not Summoners themselves, Harry and Charlie are capable of teaching well. By choir I mean that most Summoners who refuse to use their powers banish them. Otherwise death comes early. The only way to banish the power is to sing a very long, very magical song. But the lyrics, language, and style of this song take years to learn. You must choose; either be taught the song, or accept going through Summoner training by Harry and Charlie. Either way, whether you go through Summoner training or choir training, you will be spending much time learning."

Draco's nails dug into his palms so hard, he was sure that they bled. But he did not care, ignored everything except the cold, defiant fury that coursed through him, and the direction of that fury, Dumbledore. "Who would teach me that song?"

Dumbledore smiled.

"Why, me, of course."

The next day, Draco's Summoner training began.

-----*-----

The wind blew breezily about, the leaves and branches of trees swaying, blades of grass rustling quietly amongst themselves, caterpillars munching contentedly on their lunches. The day was meant to be peaceful, busy, content...happy.

However, it was not so for Draco Malfoy.

A war raged inside him, as fierce as a thunderstorm. Ignoring his inner turmoil, he kept even higher than usual his pretense of neutralism. He made sure his only emotion anyone would see today, if any, would be stubbornness, anger. This day was his, as was, once ago, the life he led. He felt it wasn't so anymore, though; was he the leader now? Or had Fate taken over as authority, and would he now be rendered as clueless to his future as the rest?

His eyes gazed fixedly upon a spot in a distance. This spot grew ever larger, slowly moving towards him over the brink of the hill. The wind tussled Draco's glossy hair, silver and glowing in the bright sun, flashing out at the dark spot approaching him like a light house beacon.

Draco lazily traced his fingers through the air, wondering if sparks, or more explosions, could be made by him willing it. Yesterday, his first Summoner training, had went well--on his terms. Of course, he hadn't learned anything. How could he possibly learning anything from two people who, for one, weren't Summoners themselves, and both whom he hated?...or so he told himself, repeatedly, ignoring the pinprick of particular memories of Harry Potter...

Although the libido potion was not inside him anymore, Draco still felt it occasionally surge up again, but wasn't sure if it was just his imagination or not. If it still was in him, its effects were fading. But as the sparks of passion receded, his emotional turmoil increased, and over and over he pondered the night he'd spent with Harry Potter, in the isolated room.

Had the Gryffindor been right?

Was Draco really made up of all those contradicting things, strength, fragility, power, as well as, of course, darkness? Whether he was or not, Draco did not know how to mix all those things in his daily personality and thoughts. He didn't exactly want to change the way he acted, spoke, thought...who he was.

But that was the question, wasn't it? The problem. He didn't know who he was anymore. He was unsure about whether he should accept the easily attained dark destiny. And the other options of how to go about the rest of life...he didn't understand them. All his life, the one path he knew by heart was darkness. It was so easy; he was fluent in the ways of darkness, wickedness, evil, hatred...and pain.

Pain, however, he loathed. Inflicting pain used to be thrilling...now it wasn't. Ignoring pain used to be easy...now it wasn't. Feeling pain, physical or mental, used to be something he was immune to...now it wasn't.

Draco sighed as, with one last lazy wave of his hand, nothing resulted. Summoners were said to have been able to conjure magic without the use of a wand, a simple snap of the fingers...spontaneity obviously wasn't his forte though, in this case. Bugger it all.

He dug his fingernails into his hands and his eyes narrowed, as the dark spot now approaching him faster revealed himself to be Harry Potter. Draco scuffed his foot angrily against the ground, imagining the pained shrieks uttered by the blades of grass, if they could speak, as they were ripped from the earth. He slid down the trunk of the tree into a lying down position, his shoulder blades now resting against the tree's roots. He turned on his side, back facing the approaching Gryffindor, and began to boredly pluck grass and flowers from the earth as his gaze rested on a ladybug that sat docilely on a daisy.

He inwardly cringed at the mental image of the kiss, as Harry spoke.

"Malfoy, have you experimented with your powers like Charlie and I said to? I know the lesson didn't go well yesterday, with none of us three in the mood for it but, well, um..."

Draco almost burst out laughing as he remembered the scenario of yesterday's "first Summoner training lesson." Oh, how fun that had been. The whole journey out to the Quidditch field had been filled with he throwing millions of sarcastic remarks and insults at his "teachers," Harry of who had pleaded for Draco to be nice for once, and Charlie who had been hilariously unable to come up with any non lame comebacks, if any at all. It had been all Draco could do to stop from collapsing in a fit of laughter when they'd reached their destination.

And during the lesson he had done all he could to further aggravate both his trainers, irritating Harry by cracking the usual biting insults to the ones the Boy-Who-Lived held most dear, and infuriating Charlie by inventing new Weasley jokes and pretending to have believed a ton of ludicrous myths about dragons. He hadn't learned anything at all, and he'd bothered the both of them so much that they wouldn't have been able to try teaching him anything even if they had wanted to. Finally, in the end, he'd been released from the lesson, the rest of his classes, and having homework, by the luck of being noisy enough to attract Snape's attention and been dismissed.

The only bad thing had been that Gryffindor had only gotten ten points taken off. Damnit. Luckily, however, he'd been able to reach the line in between not-sick-enough, and go-see-Madame-Pomfrey to not have been forced to go to the hospital wing. Years of faking sick experience had taught him that. Damnit, I should get an award, I'm so good at faking sick! Better than Potter and his bloody scar, too. He always has to go see Madame Pomfrey. The git.

"Potter, I'm not doing any of the homework you and Mr. Weasel may have given me. First of all, I wasn't aware you two spoke a word to me throughout our highly enjoyable lesson. Secondly, I was taken ill and wasn't required to do homework. And lastly, you can't force me to do anything I don't want to do."

With that, Draco stood up and sauntered off, joyfully singing "Oh Potter, you rotter" all the way back to the castle.