Altered for the Altar

We’re spinning and spinning, and I’m being pinned against Draco while he squeezes my hand tightly. I try not to vomit and slam my eyes close. Things knock at my elbows and make them sting in pain before I tuck them into my sides. I’m off balance and trying to lean into Draco because he seems to be a pillar of strength even now, while our world is crumbling down around us and we’re being sucked through a vortex that is seemingly trying to crack my chest open.

Soon enough, though, just like all the times before, a wave of relief washes over me as my feet trip over the jagged ground of Earth. Safe, with nothing broken and my chest in one piece and my lungs working like they should, and my brain trying to reign in the scream that had been building in the back of my throat. I swallow as a gasp rattles out and try to keep myself upright.

Draco’s arms steady me with ease, pulling me into his side while he handles our luggage too. My eyes are watery when I glance up at him and they sting when the howling winds that are swirling around us beat into them. I move farther into his chest because he’s warm and contact with his body seems to ease me.

“Alright, then?” he quietly asks. He tucks pieces of hair behind my ear, clearing my face of the tangled strands.

I gulp down the bile that always rose in my throat after an experience with this strange form of traveling and nod. Draco lets out a sigh that I think make be something like relief. He stares down at me for only a moment longer before sliding his hand down to mine and turning me to face a decrepit shack. He starts for it while throwing our bags over his left shoulder.

“Where are we?” I ask quietly, sidling up to his side because he’d strayed away a little bit.

I needed contact. I needed to be sure that he was here with me and that we were going to be safe, or else I feared that I might collapse and never get back up.

“Somewhere in Scotland,” he answers. “This is a cottage my father bought for my mother one year. Nobody but the three of us knows about it, so I figure we’ll be safe for a week or two.”

“It… Well, it doesn’t look like a cottage, Draco.”

He chuckles and I’m relieved that he doesn’t take offense to my statement. I wasn’t trying to be snobbish or pretend to be above such dwellings, but I was confused as to how he thought something so fragile was going to keep us safe.

“Not from the outside, no. It’s a charm that wards off the locals, so they don’t come sniffing around. Just wait till you see the inside, Elizabeth. It’s grand.” He squeezes my hand, causing my eyes to flicker up to his face. “I think you’ll love it.”

The trek up the pebbled hill is short and soon enough, Draco is releasing my hand so to be able to ease the termite eaten door of the cabin open. I furrow my eyebrows and try to peak around his broad shoulders as he pauses in order to fish around in his pants pockets. It’s too dark, though, for my eyes to really pick up anything; the only things I end up being able to make out is something that I think is a dresser and a shabby curtain.

Interrupting my observing, Draco taps a finely carved piece of wood on the door. I watch with widening eyes as the place is transformed into a smaller version of Malfoy Manor. A fireplace springs up to my left as Draco eases his hand back into mine and starts to lug me in, along with our luggage. Roaring with flames that help provide a warm light, the fireplace aides in my eyesight, allowing me to roam over the spectacular room we were now standing in.

Everything was a dark green or blue, always trimmed in a cold, shimmering silver that seemed to be a consistent theme in the Malfoy’s decorating. Plush furniture was pushed here and poised there while little knick-knacks and elaborate sculpture-like pieces help finish out what I’m guessing is the living room. On one end, however, I notice that a little desk has been pushed into a corner and books are squashed on top of it, as well in a tall bookcase that rested beside the cherry wood thing.

Draco squeezes my hand and moves so he’s standing closer to me.

“Do you like it?” Breathlessly and with still wide eyes, I look over at him and manage a nod. “I hoped you would. Do you want me to show you to your room?”

I do; I want to be able to kick off my shoes and find something more comfortable to wear, but I know the second I’m left alone, I’ll breakdown. I don’t want to do that just yet, while everything is still buzzing in my mind and I’m still trying to grasp just what exactly happened.

“Would it be alright if we just sat down for a little while?” I ask.

Draco nods, his face clouding with a frown etched on his lips. “’Course. Probably should warm up a little anyway.”

Sitting our luggage down, he leads me over to the sofa that had been positioned in front of the fireplace. He lets me take my place before situating himself rather close. However, he doesn’t touch, even letting go of my hand before throwing his arm over the back of the couch. Subtly, I move closer, craving the feel of his warmth and the ease it brings me, before allowing my head to lull onto the space near where his hand was resting.

“Will you tell me what happened?” I whisper, glancing over at him.

His eyes stare into mine while he brazenly allows his fingertips to delicately play with a few strands of my hair.

“Before, I told you about how Potter had found out how to weaken the Dark Lord, do you remember?” When I nod, he continues. “He didn’t exactly have it figured out, is what I’ve been told, not then, anyway. But now… Now he knows how to severely weaken the Dark Lord, make it so it’s easier to kill him. It made the Dark Lord paranoid—he thinks someone from the inside has been feeding Potter information.

“At this point, he doesn’t even trust himself, so you can imagine what he done to others who he distrusted. He went mad and started slaughtering people, Elizabeth." He pauses here and swallows thickly, his eyes misting over just a little, his fingers still fumbling in my hair. Then he draws in a shaky breath and continues. "My mother told me to take you and hide. She was the reason I got out. We left just as he was killing the Dolohov’s.”

The woman who I’d met at the party, the one who’d scolded me for wearing the wrong color dress, was more-than-likely dead. In a way, I’m sad, because I know that she wasn’t all terrible and I don’t think she’d done anything that warranted her death. I wonder about Theo, though, and Blaise and Mrs. Malfoy… I wonder if he killed them too.

“What’s going to happen now?”

“We’ll reconvene with whoever’s left in a few days, probably. My mother will owl us with news, either her or someone else. Then the Dark Lord will gather everyone and we’ll start prepping again,” he answers, tone weary.

“You mean, after he’s murdered all those people, everything’s just going to go back to normal?” I ask in disbelief.

Draco pauses his work on my hair and tucks a few tendrils behind my ear before putting his hand back onto the couch. He licks his lips, avoiding his gaze to the intricate rug resting underneath our feet.

“I know how vile it is,” he starts. “These people… I suspect by now you know it’s fear that drives them mostly, so if the Dark Lord wants everyone to gather again and get ready to fight Potter, then you can bet anything that they will. They’re too scared he’ll murder them next to defy him.”

“What about my family, about me? What will that mean for us?”

“I suppose everything will stay the same. He’ll need the numbers your father is providing, especially now that he’s taken out nearly half of his own army.”

Sated with nearly all my questions answered, I sigh, closing my eyes once again because my head has started to throb a little. It’s a lot—such a big change in plans, but yet, everything is staying the same. People have died and it wasn’t safe to remain in the Malfoys mansion, but Draco and I are still to be married because what comes along with that is needed now more than ever.

I try to wrap my head around everything before deciding that resting and dealing with it in the morning is better. All I need now is the reassurance that my parents are safe, that Draco is here with me, and that, as of right now, nothing is crumbling onto our heads. And as I allow him to lead me into the room he says I can take, I feel alright, fearful and always with some type of worry pushing at the back of my mind, but alright for now.