Кассандра Клэр - Draco Sinister

Draco could feel the sword hilt cold under his hand. "No," he lied.

"No dreams."

The demon stood up. Draco tightened his grip on the sword, not knowing what he would do if the demon lunged at him — he couldn't imagine fighting it off while sitting down.

"You have no right to the sword," the demon growled. "What right do you claim?"

Draco thought for a moment. Then he said, very calmly, "I claim the right of inheritance. This sword belonged to my father, and my father's father, and his father before him. Your contract was not with my family, nor with me. Therefore I owe you nothing."

For a moment, the demon did not reply. Draco was disappointed. He had thought it was rather a good speech. Very Malfoy.

"You are determined to retain the sword," said the demon, at last.

"Your mind is made up?" "Yes," said Draco. "It is." The demon shrugged. "All right," it said, sounding almost cheerful. "Keep it.

May it bring you joy." And it vanished.

Draco stared aghast at the spot where it had been standing, feeling suddenly and vastly uneasy. He thought, rather randomly, of something his father had said — one of Lucius Malfoy's many useful pieces of advice. If a difficult task suddenly seems far too easy, someone is screwing with you. Be suspicious.

"Damn," he said, softly. "I've been had."

His eyes darted around the clearing, searching for any sign of the demon — would it come back? Would it come back, and bring others with it?

The clearing seemed quite empty, dark and silent, and then, out of the corner of his left eye, he saw a movement in between two trees.

He felt his hands starting to shake — this was too much, it was too much.

With a feeling of total unreality, he saw two dark-robed, dark-hooded figures step into the clearing, moving forward, utterly soundless. He tried to say Harry's name, but no sound came out of his throat. He let the sword slide out of his hand and pressed his back hard against the trunk of the tree.

The one thought in his mind was that somehow he had to get to his feet. Seizing the hilt of the sword, he turned it upside down, and plunged the tip into the earth. Then slowly, agonizingly, he used it to pull himself upright, trying to put as little weight as possible on his broken leg. He thought he heard the bones grind against each other, and felt his hand so slick with sweat that he nearly lost his grip on the hilt. But he was on his feet now. Leaning hard on the sword, his back against the tree trunk keeping him upright, but on his feet.

He looked up and through a dizzying swirl of colored spots dancing in front of his eyes, he saw the two dark figures moving closer.

Closer to him, and to Harry, who was still asleep.

He sucked in air through his teeth, and tried to draw his mind back, away from the clearing, the pain in his leg, his shaking hands, and concentrated hard on feeling happy. Happy, he told himself savagely, happy. He shut his eyes, and felt his hand where it rested on the hilt of the sword. It was cold under his palm, cold and full of power. His heartbeat slowed as his grip on the hilt tightened, and when he raised his left hand it had stopped shaking.

Concentrating as hard as he could on his happy memory, eyes shut tightly, he shouted at the top of his voice: "Expecto Patronum!"

Something huge, something vast and silvery-white, shot from his fingers like a bolt of summer lightning. The force of it knocked Draco backwards, and for a moment all he saw as he hit the ground was a sheet of white light shattered by black spots of agony. My leg -

— it hurts, God, it hurts. "Harry," he tried to say, but his voice disappeared as the whole world seemed to tilt and fade for a moment, everything spinning away into darkness behind his eyes.

I won't faint. I won't.

He forced his eyes open. And saw three very pale faces staring down at him. Harry, Ron and Ginny, all of them looking white with shock and surprise. He struggled to raise himself up on his elbows.

"The Dementors-"

"Malfoy," said Harry, reaching out and putting a hand on his chest, pushing him back down to the ground. "There weren't any Dementors."

"But I saw-"

"That was Ron and Ginny you saw," said Harry, and there was amusement in his voice. "Sorry."

Draco let his eyes flick from Ron to Ginny. They both nodded.

"Damn," he said, with feeling.

"Still, the spell thing was pretty cool," said Ginny. "And you looked very scary and all, at least before you shrieked and fell over and fainted."

"I think you're mixing up 'shriek' with 'howl of murderous rage',"

Draco said, and squinted at her. "Are you two all right?"

"The Patronus spell is supposed to protect you against threats," said Harry. "Ron and Ginny aren't a threat, so your Patronus just sort of…vanished."

"And I didn't even get to see it," said Draco mournfully. "Was it cool?"

"It was." Harry's tired, dirt-streaked face broke into a smile. "You did it, Malfoy," he said. "Whatever your happy memory was, it worked."

Draco was too tired to smile back at him, but he said, "You know, Potter, it really doesn't involve Hermione, a pair of luminous shorts, and — "

"I know," Harry cut him off. Ron and Ginny were now looking extremely curious. "I know when you're trying to wind me up, Malfoy. Okay," he added quickly, looking as if he were remembering the destruction of Lupin's office. "Most of the time."

Ginny was gazing at Draco anxiously. "You're shaking," she said.

"The shaking is a side effect of the terror," said Draco. "Don't worry about it."

Harry looked over at Ron. "Did you find anything?" he asked quietly.

Ron shook his head. "Nothing," he said. "Nobody around for miles.

No towns, no houses. We came back because it was getting dark." He and Harry exchanged an anxious glance. "I was thinking," Ron went on in a low voice, "maybe we could make some kind of stretcher or something. Hang it between the broomsticks. We can't stay here, and we've got to do something."

"It makes me nervous when you carry on about me like I'm not here," said Draco waspishly.

"An easily solved problem," said Ron. He grabbed Harry by the back of his shirt and dragged him a few feet away, where they commenced talking in hushed whispers.

Draco raised himself up on his elbows and looked at Ginny. She looked back at him with an indifferent expression. "Weasley — " he began, but she cut him off.

"It was a dragon," she said.

"It was what?" said Draco, startled.

"Your Patronus," she said, dispassionately. "It was a dragon. It was silver. I thought you should know."

Draco opened his mouth to say something, but was cut off by a hoarse shout from Ron, and another shout of surprise from Harry.

Ignoring the searing bolt of pain that shot through his leg, he twisted around to see what was going on. He saw Ron and Harry standing with their wands out, and beyond them the dark shape of a tall man. A stranger had Apparated into the clearing.

Lupin turned uneasily in the center of the moonlit grove, his ears pricked, alert for noises. He had not been in the Forbidden Forest for many years, but it had changed surprisingly little, and he had had no trouble following Sirius' directions. Of course, he and Sirius had crisscrossed these paths, four-footed, enough times as children that it was not surprising they were burned into his brain.

The Forest, being a wild place, spoke not just to his human senses but also to his wolf-sense. Through the narrow corridors of trees, he glimpsed the movements of tiny animals — the skitter of their feet, the pale green jewel-like flash of eyes. He breathed in cold night air and the attendant forest smells of mold and moss and animals, of things growing and things dying. He knew this forest was home not just to deer and dormice, but to giant spiders, vampires, hippogriffs, centaurs and unicorns, all manner of things magical, none of which he would have had cause to fear in his lycanthropic form.