Кассандра Клэр - Draco Dormiens

Caught off guard, Draco stumbled. "What?"

"I saw your face when we came into that room, and again just now when Harry almost walked on that bridge," said Sirius. "You wouldn't have told Lucius bloody anything, you're much too proud for starters. You forget, I was around back in the day when Voldemort was going around torturing people and using Veritaserum like it was Pepperup Potion. I know what resisting Dark magic looks like." He grabbed Draco's chin and forced his head up. "Bit through your lip, didn't you?" he added, sounding approving. "Very good."

Draco wrenched his head away. "What's it to you?"

"Not much," Sirius admitted. "But it might mean a lot to them," and he gestured towards Harry and Hermione behind them on the path.

"They wouldn't believe me."

"Try them," suggested Sirius.

"No," said Draco. "They were so ready to believe that as soon as the spell was off me, I'd turn right around and stab them in the back," he added with intense bitterness. "Hermione looked like she was going to spit on me. They didn't even ask."

"You didn't exactly offer, either."

"If I was Harry," snapped Draco, "she wouldn't have to ask, she'd know."

"You're not Harry," said Sirius with brutal honesty. "Not any more."

Draco jerked his head aside so that Sirius couldn't see his face. "Harry the hero," he said in a tight voice. "He gets to walk home with Hermione, and I wind up chained to the Dog Man."

"Take a word of advice from the Dog Man, then," said Sirius. "You're not doing a lot to further your own cause at the moment. Just tell them the truth, Malfoy."

"I'm not sure I'm a Malfoy any more," said Draco. "And I'm not Harry either. I don't know what I am."

Hermione had begun to lose track of time when she heard Harry give a sudden whistle of amazement. She glanced up and saw what he was looking at — a huge chasm that bisected the ground in front of them. It was narrow, possibly no more than thirty feet across, but it looked very, very deep. It wound back and forth across the barren ground like an uncoiling serpent. There was obviously no way around it.

"It's a bottomless pit," said Draco, looking at it with some uneasiness. "Or it might be a Depthless Chasm, I'm not certain. No…I'm pretty sure my father did say that he'd asked the landscaper for a Bottomless Pit." Draco shrugged. "Either way, I wouldn't recommend falling into it. It might have no bottom, but you'll be falling a long time."

"Trust your family to have a Bottomless Pit, Malfoy," said Harry darkly. "Other people have shrubbery in the garden. You have a Bottomless Pit."

"More unusual than shrubbery," said Draco. "Handier, too."

"Enough bickering," said Sirius sharply. "How do we get across?"

"You can't," said Draco, "If you were a Malfoy, you could walk over the chasm without a bridge. But you don't." He cocked his head at Harry. "Well, maybe you do, Potter, care to chance it?"

Harry shook his head fervently. "No way."

"Of course," Draco added, "if I had my wand…."

Sirius handed it to him and held his wrist while he performed a spell. There was no flash of light, but a bridge appeared — more of a narrow walkway, really, that hugged the side of the chasm. It was barely wide enough for two people to walk side by side.

"I don't much like the look of that," said Sirius.

Draco shrugged. "It's what we use when we have to get across with someone who isn't a Malfoy," he said. "It's safe enough. It crosses the Pit farther down."

"You first," said Harry to Draco, and they went.

They were about halfway across, walking two by two along the narrow path, when they heard it. A sort of whirring, thrumming noise directly overhead. Hermione glanced up, trying to see past the ten feet or so of cliff that stretched above them, and saw that the others were doing the same.

"What is that?" she said.

They all glanced at Draco, who looked baffled. "No idea," he said shortly.

"Get back against the cliff wall, everyone," said Sirius sharply, and they pressed themselves into the shaodw of the rock. After a few minutes, the noise died away and they started walking again, although more slowly.

"That sounded almost like…a helicopter," said Harry under his breath to Hermione. "But it can't be. Not here."

" It wouldn´t work," she agreed. "Too much magic in the air."

"Some sort of flying monster?" said Harry worriedly.

"It didn't sound like any kind of animal-" She broke off as the whirring, grinding noise came whirling overhead again, this time accompanied by a flash of intensely bright light. Whatever it was had circled around and returned. They huddled back against the cliff. Then something suddenly soared over their heads-something big-if Hermione hadn't known better, she would have thought it was a helicopter or a plane, but it couldn't be-"Get back here," said Sirius roughly, and Hermione realized that he was talking to Draco, who had moved forward and was standing on the path, out of the shadows.

The bright overhead glare turned his hair to the colorless color of lightning. He was doing something with his hands-but his left hand was tied… wasn't it?

"Sirius!" said Harry sharply. "He's got his wand-" Sirius whipped around. Draco jumped back, furiously tugging at his wrists.

Somehow, in the confusion, he had gotten his wand out of Sirius' pocket and freed himself. He yanked the last of the magical ropes from his wrists and dropped them on the ground. He had a very odd expression on his face — half triumph, half despair.

"You can go on without me from here," he said, turned, and ran back the way they had come.

Sirius dropped to all fours in canine form and bolted after him.

Several things happened at once.

Draco, hearing Sirius behind him, skidded to a stop, whirled, and ran sideways -

off the walkway and into thin air. He hadn't been lying, he could walk on the air above the chasm. His feet kicked up bright silver flashes as he ran, like a knife striking sparks from metal.

Sirius, obviously startled, gave a yelp of shock and began skidding to a halt.

Harry, seeing Sirius' distress, started to run forward. And suddenly stumbled, his foot tangled in Draco's discarded bindings. He pitched forward silently, rolled, and slid off the edge of the walkway, out of view.

Hermione's heart stopped.

"Harry!" she shrieked, running to the side of the walkway and casting about wildly. "Harry!"

"I'm here," said a faint voice directly below her. "But I think my arm is broken."

Hermione fell to her knees, crawled to the very edge of the path, and looked over.

At first she saw only darkness, which resolved itself slowly into a pattern of shadow and lesser shadow. She made out Harry's white face, turned up to hers. He was gripping an outflung rock with one arm. His other arm hung at a strange angle at his side. His legs were dangling out over the chasm — deep and black and endless.

"Harry," she breathed. She flung herself onto her stomach and inched forward until she could reach the hand that was gripping the rock. She seized him by the wrist and hung on tightly. "You're all right," she said frantically, "just hang on, Harry-" She turned her head, looking desperately for Sirius, saw him about thirty feet away, watching Draco running through the air to the opposite side of the chasm. "Sirius!" she screamed. "Sirius, come quickly!"

There was a loud cracking noise, and a piece of the rock Harry was gripping crumbled away. He skidded downward about two feet, pulling Hermione with him.

She threw the arm that wasn't holding Harry around a rock and braced her knees.

The gravel tore at her skin, but she stopped sliding forward.

She looked down at Harry again. There was nothing but her own strength keeping him from falling now, and she was gripping his wrist so tightly that she could see her nails digging into his flesh. "Hold on," she said, her voice cracking alarmingly, "just hold on, Harry, Sirius is coming-" She could see Sirius loping towards them at top speed, racing with all four feet, and yet he didn't seem to be getting any closer at all.