Chapter 5
Malfoy: The Nest

1992

"Just l-lemme t-try again!"

Marcus Flint tried his very best to not laugh as the tiny blonde boy frantically wiped at the blood pouring from his nose. The rest of the team were still roaring in laughter, recalling how just a few minutes ago the whistle blew, they all kicked off their brooms, and their one tryout flew promptly into a nearby tree.

"I don't think so, mousey boy," he said, waving his wand to stop the bleeding. "Try Potions maybe? That might be more your thing."

"Please!" Draco pleaded, "I can fly well! I've practiced around the manor!" He was clutching on the sleeve of Marcus's robes now. "It might be just this Cleansweep! I'll use another broom! I'll have my dad buy me a new broom! He'll buy us all brooms!"

Marcus thought about his options. If he wanted to keep his team in the games, he really needed a seeker to replace Higgs.

And let's face it, no one else showed up at try outs. Bloody Slytherin shut-ins and their weird indoor hobbies. Gryffindor had tryouts for days. He thought bitterly.

But that kid DID just slam into a tree.

"I said no," He said gruffly, staring the kid down. The kid was staring back up at him, tears forming in his eyes, heels dug into the ground. He seemed as if he wasn't taking no for an answer. Stupid AND stubborn.

The snitch floated above the kid's head, slowly circling, a gold halo whispering a little sing-song: Give-the boy-a chance.

"Fine, one condition." He said as he scooped the snitch up, "FETCH." He tossed it back high into the air, and kicked off his broom, the rest of his team jeering and whizzing behind him, and Draco scrambling to that old Cleansweep that almost doomed him a few minutes ago.

It was completely dark when he finally caught it, long after practice was done, and he burst into the Common Room handing Flint the snitch with filthy, shaking hands.

The new brooms were a plus, but that new kid? Stupid, stubborn, not very good at Quidditch when you think about it. But he was extremely, irritatingly persistent.

The first game was, as expected, a disaster. And so was the second. And the third. The first time he actually caught the snitch was already mid-season, at a Hufflepuff-Slytherin game. Bole had picked him up and the entire House screamed like banshees.

"The Greenest and Meanest!" Pucey hollered, pointing at Draco's tree and the whole team cackled. Snape huffed and rolled his eyes but they knew he was secretly fond of all of them.

Stupid, stubborn boy. Flint chuckled to himself. Just like the rest of us.

1994

The Common Room turned the bright morning sunlight into a rich emerald, cooling and comforting Pansy's swollen eyes. The room was in shambles, the aftermath of the Yule Ball.

"There, there," soothed Daphne Greengrass, sweet and sarcastic, stroking Pansy's head on her shoulder. "How dare he ignore you all night long. Why do you even LIKE him? He's such a prat. Remember that time he was acting all tough and cool and indifferent, but he was secretly afraid of hippogriffs?"

"And when that hippogriff snapped his arm like a twig?" Tracey Davis offered, Daphne laughed even more.

"Remember when he challenged Nott in arm wrestling," Daphne gestured in his direction, "and Nott almost snapped his arm off… AGAIN?"

"Remember when Mad-Eye Moody turned him into a ferret? A bloody ferret!"

Pansy remembered the tiny beady eyes and the squeaking and finally managed a little chuckle. She had been scandalized at that time, but in retrospect it was pretty hilarious.

"He did get into Slytherin team the hard way," she offered, "Hard like wood." Their laughs tinkled like green glass bottles. "He's a terrible date," Pansy rubbed her eyes, and the blonde hair and silver eyes floated into her mind again. She bit her lip to stop crying. "But I still like him."

"But whyyyy?" Her gorgeous friend whined. Pansy thought for a while.

"I dunno."

"Well… I mean Draco is cute." Daphne relented.

"He's pretty smart at potions," Offered Tracey. "And he's just like a people person, y'know? Outgoing, and talkative and the Slytherins just like him. And-"

"Alright, shush, Trace, keep it in your pants," Daphne said, rolling her eyes. "I thought it was Pansy who fancied him, not you."

"He saved my life once," piped up Crabbe who was just passing by.

"GET OUT OF HERE CRABBE YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT WE'RE TALKING ABOUT!"

As Daphne, Crabbe and Tracey bickered in the background. Pansy turned to Theo, who was sitting quietly in the corner, picking at the corner of a Christmas present. "Why do YOU like him?"

"Don't bring me into this," he said quietly. Pansy looked at him imploringly but said nothing.

"He… just needs me y'know? So I stick by him." Theo finally relented, struggling to explain. "Cause I've needed him before. And he was there." Daphne and Tracey burst out laughing and started crooning Celestina Warbeck songs celebrating their two friends' love story. But Pansy stared at Theo in understanding.

I like him because he's me. He's Theo. It's solidarity. It's a need. It's survival.

"What a fantastic night, amirite - Ow!" Draco Malfoy sauntered in wearing shiny green pajamas. Daphne had chucked a wrapped present at him and the way it shattered on the floor sounded like it was made out glass.

"Apologize!" She screeched. Tracey also began screaming and throwing presents at Malfoy. Theo smiled at Pansy, and took his own present, quite a large box, and threw it at Malfoy who was yelling obscenities.

Pansy took her own present - a luxurious black jumper- and shoved it into Malfoy's chest. He frowned at her, still not understanding why he was being assaulted by presents.

"I forgive you," she pouted, giving him a little kiss on the cheek. "But you're still a prat."

1998

The entire castle was fraught with tension. The Gryffindors, Hufflepuffs, and even the Ravenclaws had their wands up, pointed at them.

Pansy's decision came in a milisecond, she was the viper that hissed and struck lightning fast. She decided even before the question was posed.

"The time has come for Slytherin House to decide upon its loyalties," Professor McGonagall had announced.

And so the Slytherins thought about it. They stared at the accusing eyes of their classmates, the wall of red, blue and yellow in front of them, hostile and seething. They thought about green-tinged mornings in their Common Room, cold and damp, safe and hidden. It's just us in here.

They thought about dying for Harry Potter and his friends who had nothing but distrust and disdain for them. They thought about dying for Justice and Equality and the Greater Good, and all these abstract ideas that didn't do shit for them in their own shitty childhoods.

They thought about black cloaks and terrifying masks and the even more terrifying truth of who might be behind them. Fathers? Mothers? Siblings? Years of secrecy and ambiguity finally crumbling down. They thought about holidays, they thought about dinners in their homes. About family.

Most of all they thought about their friend. Their scrawny blonde friend with the gaunt cheeks, the haunted eyes, the cursed tattoo on his forearm. They remembered when he was loud, they remembered his strut. They remembered the kid who flew into a tree in second year, the frenzy of his first snitch, his first kiss in the courtyard, his taunts, his tall tales, his ornery Potions tutoring in the library, and how all these joyful things were sucked out of him like a Dementor's Kiss, in a span of a couple years, as he was forced to grow up beyond his actual age.

The boy they almost lost. The boy who may as well be marked for dead, but still lives.

The boy who, in any other turn of events, could have been any single one of them.

One by one, the snakes wound their bodies together, weaving a protective shield, a nest. Theodore Nott's arm was around Pansy Parkinson, shaking with anger. Daphne and Astoria Greengrass were clasping hands. Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle stood tall, their backs shielding Draco Malfoy, who stood there, staring at his shoes.

When they left, not a single Slytherin was left in the room.

The Gryffindors were called brave. The Ravenclaws, lauded as tactical. Hufflepuffs, fiercely loyal.

But for what they showed at the Great Hall, the Slytherins were called cowards.

In the chaos of evacuation, only Crabbe and Goyle noticed Draco slipping away from the crowd.

-
Author's note:

I always kind of abandon this fic, then it floats back into my consciousness.

Anyway, my headcanon for this one is slowly solidifying. It used to be just "the unsung Slytherin Song" but now I'm kind of getting the picture.

I call it my Malfoy: The Baby Rodent Beloved By Snakes trope. Basically the gist is that Malfoy isn't the teen leader of the Slytherin Gang. I mean, look at them! They're a bunch of super cool cats with troubling home lives and then there's …. Malfoy. Loud, brash, kind of stupid, kind of pathetic, gets in all kinds of trouble. But they love him. They celebrate him. He's like that annoying little brother who's sweet in his own way. Draco isn't Slytherin's Harry. He's Slytherin's …. Colin Creevey. They'll roast him in the Common Room but in the Great Hall, it's all fangs up when they go for him.

What do you think? Idk I really like this idea. I always thought that Harry and Draco's situations were two sides of the same coin. Sometimes even their behavior was same to a fault, like how either of them will insist on not getting help. But the Gryffindors and the Slytherins they surround themselves with will react to that in very different ways.