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Cold seeped into her bones. The icy porcelain basin beneath her trembling palms did little to steady her. Mirroring her gaze in the glass, a single question echoed in the quiet room: “Why me?”
Dark trails of ruined mascara streaked down hollow cheeks. Neat silver hair, once impeccably kept, sat tangled and frazzled above wide, hollow eyes, eyes full of a desperate, unfamiliar terror. The reflection staring back wasn’t a Malfoy. It was a stranger.
Malfoy had never been one for self-pity, yet now it suffocated her. Hot tears spilled unchecked, blurring her vision no matter how furiously she tried to blink them away. Each attempt to gather her composure crumbled immediately, a relentless Sisyphus pushing against a crushing weight.
Her fist struck the rim. Once. Twice. Thrice. Pain bloomed across her knuckles, dull and irrelevant against the inevitable. A month, perhaps two, before her impossible task claimed her life. Driven by sudden, blinding rage, she lashed out, striking and kicking the porcelain as though it were the man whose death had become the price of her family’s survival.
Throbbing bruises swelled along her hand and ankle. Snapping under the weight of her own fury, she drew her wand with a shaking hand. “Diffindo,” she whispered, as if it would solve her problems. The sink severed from the wall with a deafening crash, shattering into jagged shards across the tile. Water burst from the ruptured pipe, pouring over the floor in a steady tide. Slumping against the wall, she slid down into the cold pool, her chest heaving with unrestrained sobs.
She wept for her hopeless predicament, her family’s fate, and the future that was fading before her eyes—a life alongside the boy—
No. Thoughts of him had to be crushed. He stood on the opposite side of this war, loyal to Dumbledore and surrounded by the wrong crowd. Besides, her attempts to kill Dumbledore had gotten Weasley sent to St. Mungo’s, and Katie Bell, one of his chasers, had died by the necklace—how could he ever forgive her?
He would hate her, she knew he would—if he ever learned what she had done this year, or why. Yet a small, fragile part of her clung to the desperate hope that he might understand. They had gone to the Yule Ball together, after all, and she had stayed by his side near the lake after Cedric's death, and again when he lost his godfather. Were those moments real to him, or had they only ever mattered to her?
She was a monster, she knew that well enough. Her father had raised her to reflect his image, and she had played her part. She had bullied one classmate until they jumped from the Astronomy Tower and drove another to a mental collapse until their parents pulled them from Hogwarts. Did Potter see that side of her, or had she managed to keep it hidden?
Her life was coming apart. The Dark Lord's task had left Dracaena with no escape. Either way, someone she loved would pay the price. Succeed, and Potter would hate her forever; fail, and her life was forfeit. She couldn't help but wonder if the Dark Lord knew about her feelings for him, using them as one more cruelty against her.
She lost track of time sitting in the cold, wet bathroom, simply weeping into the silence.
The steady splash of water overflowing onto the stone floor was the only sound left to mark the passing minutes. She pressed her forehead against her knees, shivering as the chill soaked through her robes, numbing her skin but doing nothing to quiet the tempest in her mind.
Then, the door creaked open.
Footsteps echoed softly across the wet tile before stopping at the threshold. Dracaena froze, her breath catching in her throat as a shadow fell across the slick floor toward her.
She scrambled to her feet, drawing her wand as she wiped away her tears with the back of her hand. Harry raised his wand the moment she moved. “Potter!” she spat. “Come to laugh? Or did you finally figure it out?”
Harry hesitated, a flash of confusion crossing his face—the same bewildered look he used to get when Snape singled him out in Potions. It was very cut-
She forced the thought away before it could soften her resolve. “Well? Cat got your tongue?” she sneered, standard defiance masking the tremor in her voice.
Harry’s grip on his wand tightened, his gaze sweeping over the shattered basin, the rushing water, and the dark circles framing her red-rimmed eyes. “I didn’t come to laugh, Malfoy,” he said quietly, his voice cutting through the steady rush of water. “I came because I heard you sobbing. I knew something was wrong.”
“Nothing is wrong!” Dracaena snapped, stepping forward, though her boots sloshed heavily in the rising pool. “Everything is exactly as it’s meant to be. So leave, Potter. Go back to your precious friends before you get yourself hurt.”
“I’m not leaving,” Harry insisted, taking a tentative step closer. The water rippled between them. “I know that Voldemort made you a Death Eater. I know you’re terrified, Dracaena.”
The sound of his voice saying her first name hit her like a physical blow. Her wand hand shook violently, light sparking from the tip as panic and pride warred within her chest. “You know nothing!” she screamed, raising her wand straight at his chest. “ Imperio!” Harry dodged the unforgivable curse by diving into a nearby cubicle. “Impedimenta!” came his response, raising his wand over the cubicle door. She narrowly dodged his jinx, and it hit another sink, fragmenting it.
“Come out, Potty!” she screeched. “Stupefy!” A hole was blasted clean through the door, and Potter let the toilet get hit. He finally stepped out of the cubicle and flicked his wand upward. She only had a moment to react and then-
“Protego!” Her shield charm blocked his Dangling Jinx. “Was that your ace in the hole, Potter? I’ve known that spell far longer than you!” she yelled with forced bravado.
Harry did not reply, but quietly braced himself for her next attack.
“Expulso!” Dracaena slashed her wand downward. The spell struck the stone pillar next to Harry, The spell struck the stone pillar beside Harry, rupturing the pipes and sending a roaring geyser of water across the bathroom. Blinded by the spray, Harry scrambled backward and barely managed to cast a Shield Charm.
“Stop it, Dracaena!” Harry yelled over the deafening rush of water, his chest heaving and hair plastered to his forehead. “I don’t want to hurt you!”
“Then you should have left me alone!” she shrieked, her voice cracking with pure anguish. She surged up from the water, her silver hair clinging to her face. “Confringo!”
A blinding flash of orange light erupted between them. The shockwave shattered the remaining mirrors lining the wall, sending glass cascading like icy rain. Harry ducked, feeling the intense heat singeing the air above him, before springing back up with his wand aimed straight at her.
Through the rising steam and rain of glass, Dracaena's eyes burned with desperate fury as she drew back her wand to cast another unforgivable. “Cru-!
And in that fraction of a second, something inside her snapped. She stared at him—the boy she had harbored secret feelings for throughout all those years of conflict—and hesitated.
She should stop. She knew that.
Yet some bitter part of her wanted him to understand her pain, to feel for one moment as powerless as she had felt for months. But looking into his emerald eyes, the horror of what she was becoming overwhelmed her. She did not want to be a monster. She would not torture him.
The cruel spell died on her lips. Her wand lowered half an inch.
From Harry's perspective, her hesitation looked like the final moment before she completed the curse.
In blind panic, he slashed his wand through the air, unleashing the unknown spell marked For Enemies.
“SECTUMSEMPRA!”
A thin red line appeared across her wand hand. She turned her head and looked at it. Then invisible blades tore across her chest, neck, and arms.
Blood burst from deep, ragged gashes, staining her soaked robes instantly as she collapsed backward into the flooded floor.
The crimson pool spread rapidly through the rushing water. Her wand slipped from her limp fingers, rolling into the dark tide.
Harry stood frozen, horror paralyzing him as Dracaena gasped for air, her hands feebly clutching at the weeping wounds. “No... no, no!” He fell to his knees beside her, his hands trembling over the blood pouring from her wounds. “Dracaena! I didn’t know what it did—I swear I didn’t know!”
Her silver hair drifted around her face as the water beneath her slowly turned crimson. Looking up at him through hazy, tear-filled eyes, the anger that had guarded her for years was completely gone, replaced by raw vulnerability. “Harry...” she choked out, a thin trickle of blood escaping the corner of her lips with every desperate, shuddering breath.
“You... really do... hate me,” she whispered, her voice barely audible over the roaring torrent of water. A single, clear tear cut a path through the crimson smeared across her hollow cheek.
“No! No, I don’t! I never did!” Harry sobbed frantically, plunging his hands into the icy, blood-dyed water to press down hard against the deepest gashes on her chest. Fresh crimson surged through his fingers, staining his sleeves and skin. “I could never hate you! Please—Dracaena, stay with me! Keep your eyes on me!” He fumbled desperately for his wand with a slick, shaking hand, trying to recall any healing charm, any counter-curse, but his mind was a white-hot mess of terror.
Dracaena’s trembling, blood-stained hand rose slowly from the water, her fingers reaching up with agonizing effort until they brushed weakly against his cheek, leaving a smear of red against his pale skin. “I just... wanted you to look at me... without seeing a monster,” she whispered, her voice fading to a thread of air as her strength slipped away.
“You're not a monster! Dracaena, look at me, please!” Harry cried out, wrapping his trembling arms around her, pulling her upper body onto his lap to hold her close against his chest. He didn't care about the cold water, the blood, or the room—only the horrifyingly fast cooling of her skin beneath his touch. “Don't close your eyes! Help is coming. Someone is coming. Snape is coming. Just hold on!”
Her breathing slowed, each shallow rasp weaker than the last. Her light grey eyes, once so sharp and defiant, began to glaze over, fixing on his face with a distant, quiet sadness. Her hand slipped from his cheek, falling heavily back into the rushing water with a final, soft splash.
“I'm sorry...” she breathed out on one last, faint exhale, and then her chest went completely still.
The seconds stretched into an eternity.
“Dracaena? Harry rocked her pale form, pressing his forehead against hers as hot tears spilled uncontrollably into her wet silver hair. He pressed his ear to her chest, listening with a terrifying desperation for a heartbeat that never came. The silence that followed was absolute and suffocating.
He sat in the flooded bathroom, cradling the girl he had killed as her blood swirled through the water around them. He stared down at her, unable to move, unable to accept what he had done.
He did not know how long he had been cradling her body when the door opened with the sound of laughter as Hermione entered the bathroom, laughing with Ginny. Their laughs quickly died away at the grisly sight that met their eyes.
The bathroom was ruined. Two sinks lay shattered across the floor, every mirror had been broken, and one cubicle had been blasted open. Water covered the stone floor, stained crimson with blood.
And in the middle of the wreckage sat Harry Potter, the Boy Who Lived, the Chosen One, cradling the lifeless body of Dracaena Malfoy, the girl he had never meant to kill.