Death Eaters... Forever?

“Kyera, welcome to our modest home,” Narcissa – Draco’s mother – greeted me. Modest my ass, I thought to myself. The house was practically a mansion. And I’d thought my house was big.

She played the gracious host, showing me my room and ensuite, where the house elves had already placed my baggage. She then showed me around the entire mansion. She told me some of the history of the Malfoy family, and I had to admit, I was intrigued greatly.
She left me to my own devices after that, and apart from the occasional house elf, and dinner, which I had to attend, I saw almost no living soul. That is, until Draco came along. I was sitting on the edge of the huge pool outside, dipping in my feet and pondering whether to practise flying on my Firebolt when suddenly, firm hands pushed me into the freezing pool. You’d think they’d have central heating, but of course they didn’t. I wasn’t that lucky.

I came up spluttering, trying to keep moving to prevent myself from freezing to death. Getting out of the pool quickly, I grabbed his shirt before he could move out of reach and pulled him toward the pool. He was strong, but off balance, so I managed to push him into the pool. When he’d stopped floundering, he gave me a murderous expression, and as he pulled himself out, I backed away. Grabbing my wand from where it was sitting by the pool, I pointed it at my room.

“Accio Firebolt!” It took all of five seconds to reach me, and I jumped on it just as Malfoy reached me. Moving just out of his reach, I laughed and flew away.

The next morning, I woke with purple blotches all over my skin. Luckily, I knew a reverse spell, which Snape had taught me when I’d come to him with a similar condition – Malfoy’s fault as usual. When I came downstairs, I smirked at his surprised expression when he saw my perfectly normal skin.

The war between Malfoy and I secretly continued, unknown to Lucius or Narcissa. On the night before we were attending the Quidditch World Cup, Lucius Malfoy left the house without a word, and wasn’t back until well after I was asleep.

We were up early, ready for the World Cup. Lucius had received box seats, with the best view in the whole stadium. Unfortunately, I had to sit by Draco, and stuffy witches and wizards looked disdainfully at us children in the front row. I wasn’t able to look for the Weasleys, Harry or Hermione, but I spotted George once. I was able to tell the difference even from that distance, which was a great advantage to me, when even Mrs Weasley couldn’t figure out who was who.

The only words Lucius gave me were warnings to stay with Draco, and not to wander off. I intended to comply, although I wanted to be as far from Draco as possible.

However, to my surprise, I had a great time with him. The game was nine hours long, but I enjoyed every minute of it, along with an excited and surprisingly friendly Draco. We even talked civilly in the more boring moments of the game. Ireland won, and I knew Ron – Victor Krum’s biggest fan – would be over the moon.

The Bulgarians put up a fair fight, but Krum’s amazing Seeker skills won the Cup when he found the Golden Snitch.

Afterward, Draco and I went back to our massive tent, where we were to stay for the night. Narcissa had gone off to buy souvenirs, and Lucius had – as usual – disappeared. I was feeling happier than I had all holidays, even when I was plotting revenge on Draco.
After a good game of Wizard Chess, in which Draco won admirably, he went off to find his friends. I was about to do the same when he came running back.

“We gotta go! NOW!” I looked at him blankly, not comprehending what was happening. He grabbed my arm and dragged me out of the tent. The scene hit me with ferocity, and I had no trouble keeping up with him after that. Screams of agony and fear split the air, which was full of smoke from multiple fires burning down the tents. My first thought was of my friends who were here, but there was nothing I could do but prey for them.

And then we saw them. We’d been running from the fires towards an even bigger danger. Death Eaters. A procession of them was walking toward us, leaving chaos in their wake. Smaller groups of Death Eaters were setting fire to the tents and terrorising anyone in their way.

Behind us, the flames roared high, while to our sides and front were Death Eaters, hundreds of them. I looked around for an opening and saw one. It led into the forest, but I was more than willing to brave the creatures there if it meant escaping this.

I pulled Draco toward the forest just as a group of about seven Death Eaters spotted us.
We ran through the forest, and I was surprised to find I didn’t fall headlong over a protruding root, or straight into an oncoming tree. I didn’t realise Draco had fallen behind until I collapsed, legs shaking.

“Draco? Draco!” My voice was shaky and I sounded like a chain smoker from all the smoke from the fires.

I wasn’t scared of mental torture from the Death Eaters, as I knew Occlumency and Legilimency, and I could protect myself from basic attacks, but I knew I couldn’t protect myself from the Unforgivable Curses, among other things.

However, I was confident in my other gifts. I had secrets that, if known, would rock the wizarding world. Among these was my ability to use spells without my wand, which was formidable to say the least.

When I knew I wouldn’t collapse, I picked myself up and started running back the way I’d come, calling Draco’s name.

Lucius is gonna kill me. He told me to stay with Draco and look what happened, I thought as I looked for Draco. I was seriously worried about Draco, no matter how much of a git he could be.

As I got closer, the screaming became audible, and I thought I heard Draco’s voice, too.
I kept running towards the source of his scream, but slowed as I reached the forest edge. Not far from the tree I hid behind was his body. I sucked in a breath, but I could see the rise and fall of his chest, so knew he was still alive. For now.

He was picked up by two Death Eaters, among those that had first chased us through the forest. He was obviously unconscious, but didn’t seem hurt except for a small cut on his cheek.

“Where’s the girl? If we only bring this,” the man talking kicked Draco’s prone form roughly. I bit back a protest, knowing it was no good getting caught, too.

“Careful. That’s Malfoy’s son.” The first man swore.

“Lucius told us the girl was with him,” said a female calmly. Oh shit, that’s me they’re talking about. And Lucius was speaking with them?

I felt someone probing for my mind, and automatically put up my barriers. Too late, I realised this would give me away, but I knew it would’ve been worse if they’d looked through my thoughts.

“C’mon,” another male said. “Give me a hand with him – we’ll take him to Lucius.”
I sighed with relief. They were going, and Draco would be safe with his father. I hoped.
The group moved off with Draco in their midst, but as the last Death Eater followed them, they looked back. They hadn’t spoken, but I could tell it was a male. He looked into the forest, and straight into my eyes. His half mask prevented me from recognising him, but his sombre blue eyes seemed familiar. His mouth quirked up at the edges, and he turned and walked away.

He’d smiled at me? The niggling feeling that I knew him wouldn’t go away, but as I walked out of the forest and saw Harry lying near a tent, I put it out of my mind.

That was when I heard a voice.
“Morsemorde!” I saw the Dark Mark appear in the sky. And the man who had conjured it. I didn’t know him, but I saw his features clearly in the half-light.

He disappeared, and I ran over to Harry, who was just starting to wake up. He rubbed his head painfully as Ron came running over, with Hermione in hot pursuit.

I asked Ron where his family were, and he told me they were fine, they’d got away before anything had happened, and that his father had joined the Ministry’s group to try and stop everything. It seemed they’d succeeded, as there were only burnt out tents and the occasional scream where there had been absolute chaos. “Who did this?” Only then did we realise we were surrounded. I saw with great relief that it was Ministry people, some aurors, and Mr Weasley. It was he who stopped the Ministry from Stunning us simultaneously.

“That’s my son!” He hurried over to Ron. ‘You alright? Everyone okay?’ We all nodded and he gave a weak smile of relief.

“Who did this?” The Minister for Magic repeated, his voice urgent. I could see he was scared, but he was doing well at hiding it.

Harry answered for us. “It was a man – over there,” he pointed. “I didn’t see his face, but he went that way.”

The group followed his directions, while Mr Weasley stayed, leading us away from the forest.
“You know, Harry,” I said quietly, “I did see his face.” Harry looked at me sharply, looking surprised.

“How? It’s not light enough,” he replied in disbelief. I sighed.
“Never mind.” He annoyed me at times. He wasn’t the only one fighting Lord Voldemort. And he certainly didn’t trust me in my judgement, even if I was the only person who would’ve been able to see the man’s face clearly.