Once upon a time, I swore I would never read HP fic.
But some of it is just so GOOD and I broke down and
gave in. Then, I said I wouldn't stoop to writing it
and here I am posting a story. Gah, I have no excuse
except the stress of midterms. I woke up a week ago
with this in my brain and I had to write it so it
would shut up and let me study.

For the curious, the theme song for this piece is 'Mad
World' from the Donnie Darko soundtrack.

====================================================

Disclaimer: I don't own them. But if anyone wants to
buy me Draco for Christmas, I wouldn't say no.

Warnings: Slash, Dementia, Death

Pairing : DM/HP

Rating: PG-13

Summary: By hook or by crook, a Malfoy always gets
what he wants in the end.

====================================================


~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A Beautiful Thing
by Carole
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

One of his earliest memories is of the sea. It is the
impression of sand beneath his feet and the denial of
the first breezes of autumn under a sky of perfect
blue. His father would no doubt have been disappointed
if he had known. That sort of question, however, was
not anything his father would have thought to ask.

When he was four years old, a child with storm grey
eyes and laughter that filled empty rooms in spite of
disapproval, his family visited the beach. Or, more
accurately told, he and his mother made their way to
the sand and surf. His father was otherwise occupied
in a nearby town ruining the career of a ministry
official and did not need a rambunctious boy
underfoot. That did not remain part of his memory, for
a child is excited at the prospect of an afternoon of
games free from stern glances and does not care about
business of that sort no matter what family he comes
from. The realization that such things were of
importance to note came later.

His mother cast a tracking spell and another to ward
him from danger, no doubt anticipating his eventual
escape from even her hawkeyed gaze. Indeed, the break
for freedom came quickly, as he ran for the sheer joy
of it and smiled even as he tumbled to the ground. She
did not join in his amusements and did not lower her
poise to chase him. She had no reason to fear
deliberate harm, for her spells would keep him from
malice or at least give her warning. And she had no
reason to fear him drowning. He had always hated the
water.

He ran for what passed as miles to a four year old,
ran until the empty beach became dotted with faint
blurs that turned into people as he drew near. These,
however, were people as he had never seen before. They
sat on large pieces of coloured cloth and wore
underclothes instead of robes. Some played in the
water while others reclined on the ground. His head
turned left and right as he walked through them.

"My castle!" It was more a squeal than a yell. Sand
from another's hand fell into his hair and moved,
itching, down his back. He turned indignantly.

A girl glared back at him with hate in her eyes and
tears at their corners. Her gaze travelled from him to
his feet and he too looked down. He was standing on an
pile of sand that looked very much out of place.

"It's only sand," he said, sniffing, still unsure of
her anger.

"You broke my castle."

It didn't look much like a castle. Castles were of
stone and rose into the air cutting against the sky.
They certainly weren't things that crumpled under the
feet of little boys.

"It wasn't a very good castle then."

She stomped her foot in derision and, at the movement,
more sand rolled off of half destroyed towers. "It was
so. What do you know? It was good until you stepped on
it."

Then she knelt down and attempted to press sand back
into some arrangement. He looked at it. Perhaps it was
a castle indeed. But that wall was all wrong. No, that
would never do. He crouched and flattened it. She
squawked and moved to hit him, but he pushed the sand
over three inches and built it up again. She stared at
his actions.

He looked back and she dropped her eyes to the sand.
Then she grabbed a bucket.

They moved together, rebuilding the inner walls,
filling buckets with wet sand and she laughed as he
tried to avoid the water while doing so. There were no
more tears in her eyes and that made him smile back at
her.

"I'm Mandy," she said at last and stuck her hand out.
It was as dirty as his own. He raised an eyebrow at it
and then bowed with a flourish, introducing himself.

She giggled at his name and he frowned, face as stormy
as his eyes. Her words blocked his angry outburst.

"I wish I had a name like that. I hate Amanda and
Mandy sounds stupid."

"Why don't you pick another one?"

"'Cause that wouldn't change anything. No one would
use it."

He promised to pick her another name. His forehead
knitted together as he thought. He finally chose one
from one of the ancestors that hung in the hall by his
room because he liked how it rolled off his tongue.

He called her Amelia and she blushed happily.

They rebuilt the castle, adding towers and turrets
until it far outstripped the one he had trampled
underfoot in sheer grandness. A woman in a hat of
grass came over and complimented them on their work.
Her clothes were bright, her limbs bear and her eyes
crinkled with kindness. Amelia called her 'Mum'. She
asked his name and where his family was. He pointed in
the direction he had come from. When she asked, they
carefully explained every battlement and wall. He
wished his mother would ask questions like that.

When she left to rejoin the rest of Amelia's family
they continued their stories, adding on tales of
danger and excitement. Sometimes the woman and the man
she was with would wave at them as they lived a
thousand battles of magic and adventure.

Amelia mocked his seriousness when he corrected her
with things he knew, stripping the limits from their
games. "It's pretend, silly." And in time he believed
her, forgetting the rules and restrictions of reality.

They both saw it glittering, a diamond in the sun.
Amelia was the one to walk to it and pick it up,
interrupting their dragon hunt. She turned it over in
her fingers and he came up beside her. They stared at
it with the wonder of youth, platinum blond and dirty
curls on heads bent over a piece of shimmering glass.

"It's a magic crystal." He met the declaration with
agreement as he looked and saw himself in its depths.

Amelia pressed it into his hand. "It's pretty like
you."

He did something he had never done before and kissed
her on the cheek, an affectionate child with his
friend. It was also something he would never do again.
The woman in the large hat pointed and laughed with
her husband. It was warm laughter, just like her eyes.

When he was a great mage striving to use the magic of
the crystal to destroy his enemies with his faithful
friend at his side he saw her striding across the
sand. The long robes were out of place in this site of
flesh and colour.

"Mother," he said respectfully as she glared at Amelia
and her family. She did not reply.

Her fingers grabbed his hand too tightly and pulled
him away. Her lips were a thin line etched in her face
and they did not stir as he looked up at her. She did
not even look down. Instead, she strode with purpose
and her pace forced him to struggle to match. He
turned to Amelia and saw her wave, but stumbled
instead when he tried to reciprocate and barely caught
himself. He gripped the rainbow coloured glass tightly
in his fist as they moved away from the water.

They never visited that beach again.

If he could have recalled with clarity, the knowledge
that the girl and her family were muggles would have
been an easy revelation in later years. Time, however,
does not lend itself to precision and all he has now
is the faded image of curls against a September sky
and what it means to truly smile.

When he was six, he showed the crystal to Pansy as
they sat by the pond at his home. It was a beautiful
thing and he longed to share it with someone, as if it
would be enhanced with another's appreciation. None of
the other boys, sons of his father's friends, would
have done anything but look at it with scorn. She
picked it up carefully and examined it with a piercing
gaze. Then she threw it in the water, her nose turned
upwards.

"It's not magic at all. That's stupid."

He stared at where it fell in horror, but did nothing.
There was no doubt he could have summoned aid, could
have retrieved it with crying and begging and fussing
as those around him tried to quiet him once more.

This did not even cross his mind. Instead, he took
Pansy's hand and led her into the house and back to
her mother. Pansy had already forgotten the incident
and nibbled on a cookie as soon as it was offered,
toying with her dress.

He left the room as quietly as he could. He did not
whine, did not speak of his loss and did not lower his
dignity. Many would have been surprised that a boy his
age would show such decorum at the loss of his
favourite bauble. They would indeed have been
surprised at him, for he often held tantrums for this
or for that, spoiled as he was.

But a Malfoy child wants Quiddich brooms and fancy
toys and artefacts of power. A Malfoy did not long
after a cheap piece of coloured glass that shimmered
his reflection when he cupped it in his hands and cast
broken rainbows on his wall when the sun from his
window fell behind it.

But that is the past, that is /before/, when he truly
knew nothing of the world beyond the manor's halls. It
is what everyone says doesn't matter, even as the past
still hooks skeletal fingers into his very flesh and
drags itself with him wherever he goes.

By the time his is seven, his smile is that of his
father's. It is a cruel ironic twist of lips, a sneer
much too old for his face. No one notices, or if they
do, they say nothing. Really, it doesn't matter either
way.

In his third year he sneaks out of his dorm often. His
attempts at sleep are interrupted by thoughts of the
golden trio and he stares at the ceiling, wondering
after their activities, until he leaves to hunt them
down himself. It is a hunt he has yet to succeed in.

Even if his fellow Slytherins would not betray him,
more from fear than loyalty, he often is anxious about
discovery. His midnight wanderings are interspersed
with periods of secreting himself away until danger
has passed.

One night, he stumbles into a room he does not know
through a door he has not seen before in a familiar
hallway. He listens breathlessly to Filch's mutterings
as the man walks by and turns to survey his temporary
domain.

And almost betrays himself when he sees that Bloody
Potter git standing in the room with him.

He clamps his hand over his mouth to stifle his gasp,
then moves forward in confusion. This Potter does not
speak, though his lips move. There are no exchanges of
poor wit and childish hatred here. Nor does Potter
leave the far wall. He cannot as he is caught in a
piece of glass.

As he moves closer, Potter looks at him and smiles. He
stops just in front of the mirror, for mirror it is,
the rest of the room reflected with perfection. But it
is not the whole mirror that reflects his own.
Instead, he raises his face to Potter's and stares
into emerald green, stunned by what he sees. Green is,
after all, his favourite colour.

He sees himself in those eyes and, for a moment, he is
real. He is not a pawn on a chessboard, a golem of a
villain given a temporary half-life, a cut out
character in a play where he is not allowed to change
the rules. No, instead he is there and he matters.
Even if everyone he knows, his father, Dumbledore, his
'friends', the Dark Lord himself, think otherwise he
knows that Harry Potter can see HIM.

It is not hard to guess the identity of the mirror as
its name is hidden by a trick that could fool only a
simpleton. //Erised,// it reads. //...Desire// He vows
to come back the next night, even knowing it is
foolish and dangerous. He knows of many things that
lead to death and madness and this time he does not
care. So he comes looking the next night and the next
night and the night after that.

He never finds the room again except, perhaps, in
dreams.

Often, he wakes with words on his lips that he does
not know and tests them, tastes them, as he rolls them
in his mouth. He does not speak them aloud. He has
learned that others look at him strangely if he does,
even Crabbe and Goyle exchange nervous glances. It is
as if they are a type of madness come bubbling to the
surface. Their nuances reverberate inside his head,
bouncing off the walls of his skull and not out of his
mouth when others might be listening.

Time passes slowly as he waits. Others think he waits
for his chance in the spotlight, his chance to rise in
the Dark Lord's sight. That is not what he is waiting
for, but he mentions nothing. He does not know the
name of what he is seeking, but it too is a type of
madness that is better not to be spoken of with
others.

He keeps fighting with Potter, enjoying the
momentarily exhilaration, saying things that make the
other's body vibrate with rage. Yet all he sees is the
reflection of Potter's glasses as they flash and not
the eyes beneath. He wonders what Potter would look
like without them.

By his final year, he has a mark burned into his flesh
and into his soul. Strangely, for someone who hates
being under the control of others, he is not angry.
Even stranger, he is not excited as one who has been
prepared for this since birth should be. He rebukes
those who boast and any who have also gained a similar
station learn quickly to be silent even among their
own.

It is not only his quick tongue that they fear.

He is the perfect Death Eater. He completes the tasks
he receives with an efficiency that terrifies those
around him and stuns those who thought him lacking in
cunning or intelligence. It is only when it is
important that such things fail him. It is only when
he plays childish games that he loses.

His father's hand rests on his back in
congratulations. It is warm and he shakes it away to
stand on his own. Those too near him back away. Soon,
those of his house have to work to conceal the fear in
their eyes. He eats his dinners without joining in
their conversations.

The misplaced ambition that overtakes others and
causes them to falter in their steps is missing. He
sneers at their outrageous risks and, as they fall, at
their remains. It is not that he lacks ambition; it is
that his goals are not the same as those around him.

Only twice does he falter on his rise.

The first time, he steals a muggle girl with curly
dark hair from a household sentenced to die. When he
looks at her he remembers when magic and miracles were
the same thing. He shapes the word 'laughter' on his
tongue and it means something more akin to joy than
mockery. It is a definition he had forgotten.

He leaves her with no memory of his face on the door
of Severus Snape's ancestral home, knowing that those
who keep the place will bring it to their master's
attention. He has no doubt that the traitor will find
her a safe haven.

For his second failure, he keeps the knowledge of
Snape's true betrayal to himself. Instead, he applies
himself with fervour in Potions and watches his
professor with eyes that burn feverishly. He is
watched in return and sometimes he attempts to smile
to remove the strain on the face the probes his gaze
for secret knowledge. The expression that he gives
offers no one relief.

So he stays after class to ask Severus to help him
answer a very important question.

A word slips out between his lips and he asks its
meaning. It is not what the Potion Master had been
expecting and his answer is stumbled and out of
character. Snape had been waiting for a confrontation.

The response stuns him more.

"Thank you, Professor Snape. If loyalty is to remain
faithful to something... perhaps you should know this.
I will not betray you."

Then he walks out of a room silent save for his
footsteps and the rattling of breathing. He does not
expect to be believed.

The next day, Severus nods at him as he enters the
Great Hall and he knows that what everyone else takes
for a terrifying grimace in Potions when black eyes
look his way is actually meant to be something much
different. He is not the only one who does not
remember how to smile.

As months pass, he gains a fragment of meaning of
another word. Perhaps this is friendship, if just a
ghost of it.

As none suspect these failures, he is not surprised
when he is given another task. He is assigned with
eliminating The Boy Who Lived during the final months
of his duration at Hogwarts.

After years of attempts, of midnight searches, there
is a certain irony in catching Potter alone at night
when not even looking for him. He, instead, is seeking
escape from the stuffiness of his room and the nervous
stares of his housemates. Being a prefect has its
advantages and he no longer sneaks in and out of
shadows.

No, he walks with quick confidence into a person he
cannot see and grabs at air to catch his balance.
There are no convoluted plans in the actions at all.
His hands come away with a cloak of shimmering cloth
and the sight of startled green eyes meeting his. It
is anyone's guess as to who is more surprised.

"Well, fancy meeting you here, Potter." His voice is
still a superior drawl in spite of circumstances and
Potter reaches for his wand with a frown.

He wonders if his father would be proud of him knowing
that he is finally faster.

"Expelliarmus!"

Potter's wand flies from his hand and fear flashes in
his eyes as he falls. He leans down and presses his
wand under Potter's chin and the boy swallows.

With his free hand he reaches out and removes the
glasses that obscure the eyes before him. He stands
up, wand still pointed square at the Golden Boy of
Gryffindor. The thick heavy frames and lenses crack as
he drops them to the ground and crushes them beneath
his feet.

Strange, one would think Potter would look different
without them, but his eyes are the same. When he looks
into them, he is not there. His lips quirk. They form
what would have become a self-mocking smile on anyone
else, but on him it twists into a smirk instead.

Potter is the one who speaks first, forestalling his
speech.

"Draco, don't."

The voice is rough and cracking, as if the throat that
it comes from is desert dry and abraded like abused
flesh. No doubt it is, for Potter makes it raw with
the screams of his nightmares. It does not matter that
some of those nightmares are real.

He can practically hear Potter's thoughts. Truly, it
would be easy. Potter has no wand and is defenceless.
The other boy knows of the mark that even now burns
his skin. //Avada Kedavra.// He toys with it
momentarily, forms it with his tongue, but does not
speak, just like so many words before it. Instead, he
kneels down again and pulls Potter forward, kissing
him harshly. This is not tenderness or love. He is not
surprised when Potter kisses him back after a moment
of shock.

It is bravado and foolishness when he pulls away and
leaves the other there staring after his retreating
back. He knows that Potter could retrieve his wand and
end everything. He also knows he is throwing away a
chance at the Dark Lord's highest favour. As with most
things, he does not care.

The mark burns on his arm like fire.

The next day, everyone asks about Potter's glasses.
Potter mutters something about needing a change and
doesn't he look better with contacts anyway? He cocks
his head at Potter's stare.

The second time it happens he suspects Potter of
waiting for him. They push against each other with
bitter words and bitter mouths.

The third time, Potter's friends start to whisper
about where they think their saviour is vanishing to
at night to escape his dreams. The Slytherin's
speculate loudly about Potter and the Weasel, leaving
Granger's face indignantly red. He says nothing, but
his lips twitch. It seems strange that they speculate
on such things in times like these. Parents, siblings
and classmates have begun to vanish into the haze that
is memory and pain. Or perhaps they seek a
distraction. In spite of the losses, they think that
they are winning for the number missing are few. No
one asks what the Dark Lord is waiting for. If they
did, he might answer.

The night after he reports his current inability to
destroy Harry Potter, Severus warns him that he is
playing a foolish and dangerous game. There is only
one response he can make to the accusation.

"I know."

It is their last conversation and Potions class is
cancelled until further notice. Potion Masters are
difficult to find even at the best of times. It is
certainly not helped by the knowledge that pieces of
the previous one are being sent by owl to the
Headmaster.

When Blaise murmurs to Pansy about an overheard
conversation between Snape and Dumbledore, he takes
note.

The Zambini's are horrified to find their only son
crucified in the woods outside their house a week
later. Publicly, Death Eaters are blamed. Privately,
the investigation is ongoing.

Even this does not bring the right questions to the
minds of the Wizarding World. When it does, it is much
too late.

A single blow, a co-ordinated strike, wipes out half
the resistance. They only thank whatever powers they
believe in that 'The Boy Who Lived' is still just
that. While he is, there is hope.

Not that there are no casualties among the other side
and among his own housemates. Most have lost family
and others say that it is what they deserve. No one
comforts them, even those who are innocent, and no one
expects otherwise. Not even him.

Especially not him.

He is not surprised when Potter comes to him. Nor is
he surprised when afterwards Potter speaks of his
hopelessness and anger, of Hermione's death and of the
Weasel's now broken home with half of his siblings
dead and his father not yet found. He lets him vent
his rage and stops him from foolish actions. Potter's
revenge on Voldemort is made to wait and his life is
prevented from joining the numbers of the dead.

Potter does not ask about his family, about his father
lying buried under bodies on the dank earth and his
mother's arrest and subsequent interrogation and
execution. Nor does Potter ask about where he was
during the attack.

Thus, he does not have to tell him of Weasley's
snivelling face at the sight of Hermione's body as she
falls. He does not tell of how the boy escaped with
it, apparating from danger with the corpse while
leaving his own brother to die in the muck alone.

When Potter looks at him, he looks through him and all
that exists in his eyes is pain. People who don't see
you never bother to ask the right questions.

He makes one final failure as a Death Eater and it is
something no one expected except himself, though
Severus would have guessed it had he still been able.
When Potter plots revenge, it is he that is the
sounding board. There is only one other that the
Wizarding World's hope trusts and Ronald Weasley's
mental health is far from stable. He aids and refines
and plots and waits. The last he is used to. He has
been doing it for a long time.

He is the one Potter returns to covered in the blood
of his enemies. He is the one who hears a whispered
"He's dead, he's dead" in his ear as they fuck. Not
that he hadn't known already, with the mark on his arm
feeling like it was trying to pull his very soul from
his body mere hours before.

After they finish, Potter rolls on his back. He is
spent, but not yet sleeping. He props himself to look
at Potter and raises a hand to run down Potter's
throat. His regard is returned.

"Draco?" Potter asks. "What is it?"

He speaks then, words he does not know that have been
trapped for far too long. It seems like it should mean
something between them and hangs in the air like a
dead thing. It reminds him of Blaise, broken and
still. Potter stares to hear it, then smiles as if he
understands what is being said even if the speaker is
mystified.

"I love you too."

The smile falters when the hand wraps around his
throat and begins to squeeze. He is no longer
reclining and has both hands to do what needs to be
done. Potter is weaker than he expected.

The gasps become feeble and the struggles cease.
Potter lies still. Unmoving eyes stare up at him,
mirrors of a departed soul.

It is, perhaps, his greatest triumph as a Death Eater,
but he does not think of that.

For the first time in years, since childhood, he
smiles, truly smiles, and his face lights from within.
It becomes something other than a carving of flesh and
clay. No one, not his parents, not his house, not
Severus and not even Potter would have recognized the
expression on his face. One of those words whispered
in the dark has a sudden meaning, one he has been
waiting to understand for such a long time. So this is
what it means to be happy.

He wishes he could keep this forever, look at it
whenever he wants to, to see this whenever he takes it
out to enjoy. That is impossible, so he looks back
down at the one beneath him and memorizes everything.
Perhaps it is better this way, for there is no one he
can show it to and it needs nothing to enhance it.

Now, Draco can see himself reflected in Harry's eyes.

It is a beautiful thing.

END

Wow, wasn't that a fun ride? And this is the point
where I decide I'm glad I can never meet my
subconscious face to face.


Please review!