Кассандра Клэр - Draco Veritas

The next words Harry spoke left his lips without any conscious thought at all. The smoke, the dizziness of not having eaten for days, the pain in his hand, and the instinctual magic he was conjuring had put him into almost a trance state. In that state, his mind reached back into itself for what was almost his earliest memory — his mother, leaning over him and singing softly, and the song she sang was one of magic and protection.

There was a soft sound, like the threads of a frayed rope parting under strain. The smoke in the Pensive suddenly shot upwards, out of the bowl, like a serpent rising up under the ministrations of a snake-charmer. The scarlet smoke rose up and up, winding around Harry. It wound around him three times, tightly, and he felt the pressure as if the smoke were a silk cord binding him — once around his forehead, once around his throat, and once around his heart. He was, for a moment, blinded by the red smoke, and deafened by it, too. He saw only scarlet shadows, heard only the beat of his own heart.

Then the silence was broken. He heard a voice inside his head. It spoke to him as he had thought only Draco could speak to him: without words, but saying everything.

It is done. You are protected.

And the smoke vanished, funneling back into the Pensieve like water being sucked back down a drain. Within a moment, the smoke had returned to its previous color, and the Pensieve looked just as it had an hour before, entirely untouched.

Harry blinked and gasped in air — his throat burned from breathing the acrid smoke, and his face was sticky where his tears had made tracks in the dirt and soot that covered him. He felt worn with exhaustion, but strangely relieved. Slowly, he lowered his head, and rested it on his bleeding hand. It's done, he told himself, echoing the voice in his head. I am protected. Now I can do what I have to do. What I was born to do.

Now I can kill.

Hermione scrubbed the back of her hand wearily across her eyes. This was the third afternoon she'd spent inside the Althea Thoon Memorial Library in Diagon Alley. She'd never thought she'd feel this way, but she was sick of the inside of the library. Probably because her research wasn't getting anywhere.

Hermione had always been able to bury herself in work, the more complicated the better. But she had never been quite so preoccupied as she was now — thoughts of Ron and Harry crowded her mind, compounded by worry over Draco, who looked worse each time she talked to him — and didn't anyone else notice? Didn't they care? She knew he was clever enough to hide things from Sirius, but what about Harry, the one person who should have known instinctively, the one person who might actually be able to get Draco to do something about it. She itched to owl Harry but she knew perfectly well that he'd tear up any letter she sent without reading it. Oh, he was stubborn. Damn it.

She glanced up and around her and sighed. The library walls were paneled mahogany, very dark, and hung with paintings of famous witches and wizards. Hermione had taken a seat underneath a portrait of Rowena Ravenclaw in dark blue robes, hoping it would give her inspiration.

Instead she was haunted by the lingering feeling that Rowena looked disappointed in her.

She stood up, stretched her aching muscles, and went back to the floating card catalogue along the east wall. She'd already asked the bookworms to do at least four searches for her, and she was fairly sure they were tired of her requests — it was hard to tell, though, when dealing with worms, even extremely intelligent, magical, slightly fuzzy ones.

One slithered over along the top of the catalogue and waved its pale gold antennae at her curiously. Hermione sighed again. She'd already run searches on poison, injuries, blood, glowing, silver, weakness/debilitation spells, and phosphorescent. She hadn't come up with anything — there didn't seem to be a potion or poison that caused blood to glow. There were potions that caused people to glow, and several cosmetic spells that promised glowing and revitalized skin, but she had a feeling that this wasn't a cosmetic spell gone horribly awry. (Although, with Draco, anything was possible.)

The bookworm waved its antennae impatiently. Hermione sighed again and gave it her last shot, "Could you search the Magical Armaments section for me? I want to know what weapons glow themselves, or cause glowing injuries to be inflicted."

The antennae waved again, and the bookworm wriggled busily away.

Hermione watched it go, stifling a yawn. She knew it could take hours for the worm to scour all the books in the Weaponry section, and she really was deathly sick of being indoors. With a resolute shrug of her shoulders, she went back to her desk, retrieved her blue wool cloak, and hurried out the doors of the library into the weak winter sunshine.

Diagon Alley was a hive of activity. Less than five days were left until Christmas, and it seemed as if every witch and wizard in England had descended on the narrow maze of shopping streets around the Alley.

Floating red and green ribbons wreathed the tall metal lanterns, tiny enchanted gold angel statuettes trilled from the tops of Christmas trees.

Hundreds of owls swooped overhead, carrying packages emblazoned with the WPS logo (the Wizarding Postal Service, for those who didn't own owls of their own — the owls were notorious for losing packages en route, and Ron tended to call the WPS "Whoops" for short.) Hermione passed a brass colliery band energetically playing "Adeste Fidelis" as she rounded the corner of Petticoat Lane.

The windows of the Lane were devoted now to displays of beautiful winter dresses and dress robes. Hermione slowed her pace, looking in the windows. She had never been terribly interested in clothes, and still wasn't — she liked to look nice and clean and presentable, and every once in a while to wear a smart skirt or sweater, but the sad truth was that everything she owned tended to get ink stains on it after a while. She liked pretty things but never seemed to have the time or inclination to work tirelessly on her appearance the way Blaise or Pansy did, unless it was a special occasion.

Having Harry in her life a boyfriend had made her think about her appearance more, but now…she looked at her reflection in the nearest shop window and sighed. Tangled hair, draggled face, nubby old sweater and wrinkles in her tights. Ugh. Her gaze drifted upwards towards the dresses in the window display. She narrowed her gaze. Hermione loathed frothy party dresses, anything covered in lace or beads or masses of flowers made her queasy. But these were really rather nice — straight clean lines and jewel-colors, dark reds and greens and blues. And she did need a dress for the wedding. And she didn't want to arrive looking like she'd been dragged backwards through a jungle of Fluttering Ferns, since Harry was going to be there. She intended to look fabulous and sweep past him with a haughty glare that would crush him like a bug. Well, she didn't want him crushed, really. Perhaps just slightly squashed. Dented, maybe.

It was decided. Hermione squared her shoulders and pushed the shop door open, smoothing her hair down as best she could with her gloved hand. She knew she didn't look her best, but it was unlikely she'd run into anyone she knew.

Unlikely, but apparently not impossible. Hermione took a few steps into the store, her eyes adjusting to the dimmer light. Rose-shaded lamps threw a pinkish glow over everything: elegant dresses were displayed like bonbons under glass cases and hanging on walls. There were daring short dresses, long dramatic black sheaths, and confectionery-pink frocks with lace edgings. Over by the window, a short-haired brunette girl stood patiently which a tall witch with an iron-gray bun deftly applied Pinning Charms to the hem of her rose-printed dress.