Кассандра Клэр - Draco Veritas

At the foot of a small hill the road forked; they went left, towards what should have been the lights of the Park. The town was dark: the inhabitants had battened down like a ship in a storm. Everything would be locked tight. They ran towards the Cold Christmas Inn and past it, the sound of baying growing closer and closer behind them.

Draco knew the hellhounds of Malfoy Manor well enough, from his childhood. Twice the size of ordinary dogs, with long slavering jaws and pupilless eyes the size of oranges, they had given him nightmares for years. It had amused his father to purchase rare monsters and turn the hellhounds loose to hunt them across the grounds; Draco had seen the hounds pull down a full-sized gryphon and rip it apart with their teeth and claws.

Hellhounds were also fast. Very fast. Draco knew the three of them had a head start of almost the full length of the gardens; he also knew it would not be enough. By the time they reached the clearing where the broomstick were, the sound of yelps an barking behind them was so loud it sounded like the crackle of a bonfire.

Harry spilled into the clearing first, then Ginny, and Draco last. The clearing was just as Draco remembered it: the Inn up on the hill in the distance, the broomsticks stuck fast in the tree overhead, the steep incline that fell away to the iced-over river.

Harry stopped under the tree and spun around, his red cloak flying out.

"Ginny — get your wand out — quickly — "

Ginny fumbled for her wand, but terror had made her fingers clumsy: she dropped it. Stricken, she bent to retrieve it, picked it up and pointed a shaking hand at the Cloudbursts, lodged in the tree trunk as if they hand been locked there. "Acci-" she began and gasped, a strangled wail escaping her throat. Draco spun to look behind him: coming through the darkness between the trees were at least seven vast and slinking forms, ornamented with fierce jewelry eyes.

Beside Draco, Harry swore, once and fiercely. A moment later Draco felt something grasp his arm: it was Harry, his grip as hard as iron. /I´m sorry/ he said in Dracoś head, and then he seized hold of Dracoś other arm and pushed him, hard, into Ginny. Caught completely off guard, Draco staggered; Ginny clutched at him, and the two of them tumbled precipitately down the steep incline that led down to the river, rolling over and over in the snow.

From a distance it might have looked like a gentle roll down a snowy hill, but it wasn´t: there was a great deal of ice, and jutting broken branches that tore at them. Draco heard fabric rip, and a stinging pain shot up his arm. They fetched up against a rock with enough force to knock them apart. Draco heard Ginny cry out, then rolled and came up, coughing and spitting snow. When the coughing subsided enough for him to breathe, he rubbed his sleeve across his wet face and it came away silver: not with snow, either. Blood. He was coughing blood.

But there was no time to think about that. He struggled into a kneeling position, pushing his soaking hair out of his eyes. Beside him Ginny had already fought free of the snowbank and seemed to be trying to struggle to her feet. He looked up but could not see anything but the incline above them, marked with a ragged path where they had tumbled down it.

He seized her by the shoulders and shook her hard. Later she would show him the place on her upper arms where his fingertips had pressed dark, coin-sized bruises into her skin. "Don´t move," he hissed at her. They were kneeling inches apart; he could see himself in her dilated pupils. "Do you understand me? — Stay down here and don´t move."

She nodded at him with wide, frightened eyes. "Is Harry — "

He didn´t answer her, just released her and stood up. Then he ran.

It was not easy getting up the side of the hill: the snow was so thickly frosted over with ice that when he stumbled and his hands went through it, the ice broke and slashed at him like glass. Also, he was weak — his breath came short and the blood pounded in his ears, deafening him. He could not even hear the hellhounds, which panicked him more than any noise would have. Damn Harry for knocking him down the hill; stupid grandstanding heroics. He held on to the fact that if something had happened to Harry, he would know. Perhaps Harry had managed to get one of the broomsticks down, somehow; perhaps he´d run into the Inn, perhaps someone had opened their door to him, hearing the furious barking…

Finally Draco reached the top of the hill and was in the clearing; he ran forward a few steps — then stopped. And stared.

Harry stood where he had, in the same spot in the center of the clearing.

In his red cloak, he was as clearly marked against the white snow as a splash of blood or paint. He was very still, standing with his hands at his sides. Snow from the disturbed tree branches overhead had sifted down on him, starring his black hair with white flakes, covering his shoulders.

He could have been standing where he was for hours; for all the expression on his face, he could have been admiring the view.

Around him in a semicircle, leaning on their haunches, sat the hellhounds, their razored paws dug deep into the snow. Their eyes were fixed on Harry: an unblinking row of fourteen red-gold orbs, licks of flame in the darkness. Their mouths were open, dripping black saliva and the sound of low growling came from their throats. They stared at Harry, and Harry stared back. His expression was set. He did not look frightened.

The choking taste of blood filled Dracoś mouth again and he wondered for a moment if he were going to be sick. /Harry…?/

Harry didn´t move or turn to look at him; he was still staring at the hounds, and a small smile came to curl the corner of his mouth. He raised his right hand, palm up, and as he did his cloak fell away and Draco saw that at his belt, the runic band was blazing as brightly as a bed of red hot coals. "Go," Harry said to the seven fierce, wolf-like creatures, who snarled and pawed at the ground. "Get out of here!"

And they went.

As Draco stood at the inclineś edge, shaking with cold and reaction, the seven nightmare creatures turned tail and walked stiffly out of the clearing. They looked indignant, like dowagers who had been invited round for tea only to discover there were no biscuits left. They went in an orderly line, one after the other, and only when the last one had disappeared between the trees did Harry slowly lower his hand and turn to look at Draco.

He was quite pale, but composed. Bright spots of color burned on his cheekbones as if he had a fever. "I´m sorry I pushed you," he said mildly.

"I hoped, if they thought I was the only one…"

"What did you do?" Draco whispered. "I´ve never seen them obey anyone

— not even my father. And your cloak — they hate red — my father used to have a gameskeeper he paid to dress up in Gryffindor colors and torture them through the bars of their cages — "

"Your father," Harry said in disgust. "Why do you even bother calling him that?"

"What did you do?" Draco said again, dizzily, hearing his own voice sounding very small in the winter air. He found he was holding his left arm with his right, the cut along his forearm having opened up again during his fall down the incline. "What did you — "

The world tilted forward and he staggered; Harry reached to catch him, but Draco twisted away from Harryś hand and righted himself by seizing at a nearby tree branch.

"Don´t touch me," he said.

Harry looked horrified. "Don´t be angry, I — "

"Itś not that. I´m bleeding, and your hands are all sliced up." Draco held his left arm up; the cuff of his shirt was soaked through with silvery blood. "I don´t know if itś safe to touch me or not." He leaned back against the trunk of the tree, exhaustion threading through his veins like its own cold venom, and let his eyes slip shut. "You should have just let the hellhounds eat me — probably they´d have choked to death on the poison before they ever got round to you."