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The winding path up to Shell Cottage was sandy and clung to the edge of a seaside cliff. Salt wind tugged at Drusilla's black robes and the hem of her green pleated skirt. From a distance the little house looked almost charming, with its white walls against the grey sea. Up close, however, it was smaller and shabbier than she had been led to believe, but she tried not to hold it against the residents. It wasn't their fault they didn't know better.
A plain wooden cross and a low headstone stood atop a little hill nearby. Her throat tightened, and she kept her gaze fixed far away.
Drusilla stopped on the front step, straightened her tie, smoothed her wind-tangled hair, and tightened her grip on the briefcase.
"Potter better appreciate this..."
She lifted the knocker and banged it three times, hoping the noise didn't sound too impatient.
Fleur Delacour, blonde and inhumanly beautiful, opened the door almost immediately. Warmth and the scent of fresh baked bread spilled out, as well as a subtle soothing aura that the quarter-Veela naturally radiated.
"Drusilla! Welcome." Fleur kissed both her cheeks and guided her inside. "Come in, come in. You must be tired from your travels."
"I am, thank you. Thank you for inviting me to your home," Drusilla said politely. "It's very lovely. And-"
She stepped into the sitting room and stopped dead.
Bill Weasley sat in an armchair by the fire, scarred face unreadable as usual. His younger brother George leaned against the mantle, arms folded. Their sister Ginny stood near the window, already watching her like a hawk. No doubt all three had hands on their wands, just like her.
Drusilla's gaze moved over them one at a time.
"Is this an interrogation," she asked, "or an intervention? Because I assure you I don't need the latter. I can quit whenever I want."
No one answered. No one even breathed. She crossed the room and took a seat in the middle of the couch without being invited, briefcase resting in her lap.
She looked at George. "You must be Percy. I believe we went to school together."
George's expression flattened. "George. We did."
"Apologies. All you Weasleys look alike to me. Bill I already know, and is fairly recognizable. The tomboy must be Ginny then. Unless I've miscounted again."
The air cooled. Bill's mouth twitched once, almost a smile, but he said nothing. Ginny's eyes narrowed and looked absolutely murderous.
George pushed off the mantle. "Let's get this over with. Harry's like a brother to us. You're a former Death Eater. A Malfoy. You've spent years making his life a living hell, not to mention ours. We don't trust you. We don't like you. And we don't like you seeing him."
Drusilla inclined her head. "Thank you for skipping the pleasantries and being honest. It's rather refreshing, but I never asked your permission." She glanced around the room. "Does Potter know about this little gathering? No. Of course he doesn't. He would never have allowed it. Sometimes his naivety can be positively adorable."
Fleur appeared with a silver tea tray, the picture of gracious calm, and began pouring drinks and putting out freshly baked bread.
Drusilla opened her briefcase, drew out a dark bottle with a heavy wax seal, and held it out. "Firewhisky for the house. 1618. Very good year. I thought it the least I could do, since you've been kind enough to invite me to tea."
Fleur's expression brightened with shock, then genuine pleasure. She took the bottle carefully. "Merci. That is... unexpected, and most generous." She set it on the sideboard as though it were priceless, then returned to pouring tea. The others eyed it as though it might be deadly. Drusilla hardly blamed them. It wouldn't be the first time she poisoned Firewhisky, after all.
She closed the briefcase and rested it against her leg on the floor. She accepted the tea, thanked her host, and raised the cup to her lips before frowning.
"You know, after months of court hearings and being forced to answer countless inane questions and spill my deepest, darkest secrets to people I despise, I can smell Veritaserum from a mile away despite it supposedly being odorless."
Without ceremony she took a sip. The others stared in disbelief, then watched for any sign of deception, and checked the cup after she set it down.
"You drank it," Ginny said, blinking. "You actually drank it."
"Of course I did. It's tea, and I'm English. And I'm thirsty." She turned to Fleur. "It's quite tolerable. Thank you."
Fleur nodded and gave an apologetic smile that Drusilla thought was probably genuine. She took a sip herself as if to try and make them even.
"Then why-" Ginny started.
"Because I'm a Slytherin and can appreciate underhanded deceit," Drusilla said, losing a little of her patience. "And because after having my every thought laid bare to the Dark Lord, and to the Ministry, I have no privacy left. I have no intimate thoughts that haven't already been combed through. Nothing. I'd probably have answered your questions truthfully even without truth serum out of habit. I'm afraid you've wasted a small fortune on me."
"You've built up a resistance to it, haven't you?" George sneered.
"Of course I have," she said, almost offended. "I've become quite skilled at shielding my mind with Occlumency. If I don't wish to answer a question, I'm no longer compelled to. The potion still pulls, but I can refuse if I so desire. I'm also quite adept at telling half-truths and avoiding half-lies. And so long as the person believes what they're saying to be true, it is true as far as the potion is concerned."
"Perhaps we should just skip to the Cruciatus curse," Ginny mused.
"Not in my house," Fleur said tightly.
"That would have been my suggestion," Drusilla said humorlessly. "If this were a battle of wits, I'm afraid I'd have you all at a disadvantage. As it is, you're Potter's family, and so long as I'm free to leave whenever I wish, I will do my best to answer your questions without deceit. You'll just have to pay close attention to how I word my answers."
They remained silent for a few moments, and the three Weasleys looked at one another. George and Ginny seemed to have a private conversation that even Bill wasn't privy to.
"Alright," Ginny said, taking a seat directly across the table from her. "I'll start. Why exactly are you such a nasty cow?"
Drusilla's mouth twitched. "My father's a bastard and I've always been a daddy's girl. My mother's sister is Bellatrix Lestrange. I'm afraid madness might run in the family."
Ginny looked less than impressed. "That's it? Your parents are terrible people and you were simply emulating them? I could have already told you madness runs in your family. On both sides, I'd imagine."
"I sense some resentment there," Drusilla said. "Understandable. My father deserves to be locked up in Azkaban for the rest of his miserable life. If you're wanting an apology for him putting a cursed diary into your school bag and getting you dragged into the Chamber of Secrets, get in line. I never got one either, and I only just discovered that was his doing recently. Though in fairness, he didn't know it was a Horcrux, or that it would open the Chamber."
"I don't believe you."
Drusilla gave a short, derisive sound. "Potter tried telling me, but I wouldn't believe him either. He actually thought I was the one controlling the basilisk on Father's behalf. Imagine his surprise when he found us both lying in the Chamber unconscious."
"If you hadn't stolen the diary from him, you wouldn't have been."
"True, but if I hadn't, the Dark Lord would have likely possessed Potter instead of me. I was a stupid twelve-year-old girl who thought she'd stolen the diary of Harry Potter. I wanted to learn whether he cried himself to sleep missing his mum and dad. Or because I said something mean to him. Or maybe discover he still wet the bed, or something. And I paid for it. Dearly."
"Not dearly enough," Ginny said simply.
"Of course it's because of that horror I first developed a crush on Potter. Just like you, I'd imagine. Except I never quite outgrew mine. It only grew worse, even after I was made a junior Death Eater."
"Do you expect us to feel sorry for you, Malfoy?" George interjected. "Because you haven't gotten nearly what you deserve."
She looked at him, showing her first real emotion of the afternoon. Her face twitched unnaturally as she fought the potion's compulsion to immediately answer any and all questions without the benefit of choosing her words.
"I'm not some sniveling twit. I don't need or want your pity," she answered, struggling to maintain her composure. "If you want an apology from me, it's yours. I sincerely apologize for all my misdeeds and my behavior over the years. I make no excuses for myself. I love my mother and father despite knowing what they are. All I ask is that you imagine yourself in my shoes. Raised by the parents I was raised by. Forced to become a Death Eater at sixteen. Given an impossible task under threat of watching my mother tortured and killed."
Tears briefly touched her eyes but then were gone in a flash. "All I ever wanted was my mother and father to be proud of me, and for them to be safe. In the end, I was as much the Dark Lord's pawn as I was Dumbledore's. Personally, I think the old man knew how the war would turn out from the very beginning."
She poured herself more tea, sat back, and rested her eyes for a moment. She was suddenly exhausted, and knew from experience it'd only get worse the more her defenses were beaten down.
George leaned forward, eyes hard. "Did you ever actually want Harry dead? Or any of us? For all we know, you're the one who killed Fred. Are you?"
Fleur's voice cut across the room, sharp. "George! That is enough. She is a guest in my house."
George and Ginny didn't look away from Drusilla, whose face twisted and contorted. Even Bill looked curious to hear her answer.
"I did not kill Fred," she said, the words forced out between her teeth. "I fought on your side during the Battle of Hogwarts. I accidentally poisoned Ronald our sixth year together in an attempt to kill Dumbledore. I have never killed anyone, and I could not kill him even to save my own mother from being flayed to death. I wanted Potter dead, then I didn't. Then I did again. And then I realized I'd rather die than see him hurt. When the Dark Lord said he killed Harry and produced his body, I have never been more heartbroken in all my life."
She coughed suddenly and violently into a handkerchief. Specks of blood dotted the white silk. A side-effect of trying to resist the truth serum.
Drusilla took another sip of tea, her hand shaking slightly, and kept her gaze on the cup even after setting it down.
"The only reason I'm still alive, or at least not rotting in Azkaban prison is because of Potter. He's an absolute fool for loving me. He was my one shining hope when I was in the abyss. He saved me. He freed me. I love him, and I will happily give my life for him."
George shook his head. "We're wasting our time. We can't trust a word she says. She's a potion master, and for all we know, she could be immune to Veritaserum, or took a cure before coming here. Did you?"
"No, and I think I've answered enough questions for now," she said, wiping her mouth. "The truth hurts when you're a Slytherin. Your turn. Does your father love you?"
Ginny looked offended. "Of course Father loves us. We're his children."
Drusilla nodded. "My father also loves me, but he has a peculiar way of showing it. For instance, he prostituted me to the Dark Lord just two weeks after I turned sixteen. He also watched as the Dark Lord left his mark on his only child."
With some ceremony she rolled up her left sleeve. On her forearm was a skull with a snake slithering out its mouth. It had faded some in the months since Voldemort's death, but the snake still writhed despite being dead.
Silence held for a long moment, and she looked at the mark with scorn.
"Not a moment goes by that it doesn't burn, or that I don't feel his evil inside me. It wasn't enough for him to just be in my mind. He also had to be under my skin too."
Drusilla lowered her sleeve. She was about to take another sip of tea, seemed to think better of it, and sat in silence, waiting for painful questions and even more painful answers.
"Your father actually watched?" Ginny's face had gone pale.
"He held me steady," Drusilla said quietly. "To make sure I didn't pass out. Said it was the proudest day of his life. Bastard..."
Ginny shook her head. "I agree with George. We can't trust a word you say. The only reason you switched sides is because anyone with a pair of eyes could tell Harry was going to defeat Voldemort. You're nothing but a snake in the grass. It's all you've ever been, and it's all you'll ever be."
Bill spoke for the first time, voice low. "That's enough, Ginny."
"No," Ginny said, but with less heat. "It isn't. I don't care if everything she says is actually true. I still don't see what Harry could possibly see in her. Do you?"
"Not the slightest," Drusilla said quietly, not meeting any of their gazes. "But Potter isn't exactly a saint either. He can be quite dangerous when he's lost his temper. I think I'd rather face the Dark Lord than Potter when he's truly cross."
"You can't be serious," she said, disgusted just looking at her. "Now I know you're lying."
Drusilla raised a brow. "Say what you will about him, but the Dark Lord never gutted me like a fish. The single most painful experience of my life. Sometimes I wake up screaming because of it. I suspect I looked rather like one of Jack the Ripper's victims on the bathroom floor right about then."
"You deserved it."
"I never said I didn't. I seem to recall trying to cast the Cruciatus curse around that same time. I don't know if it missed or failed because I didn't truly mean it, but it's called an Unforgivable curse for a reason. I'm simply pointing out facts. I failed where Potter succeeded."
She brushed the hair off her scarred cheek, took a sip from her tea before setting it back down again.
"My tea's gone cold, I'm afraid. If that's all, I think it would be best if I returned to my quarters back in London. I'm not supposed to travel long, and I have more interrogations in the morning. It'd be an ironic shame if Potter and Ronald were sent to arrest me. If that will be all..."
George shifted uncomfortably. Ginny stared at the floor. Bill remained quiet, his expression thoughtful rather than hostile like theirs.
Drusilla stood, collected her briefcase, and turned to look at each of them.
"This has been a thoroughly unpleasant experience. But you are Potter's family. I may not like you, but I do respect you, at least for his sake. Thank you for looking out for him and his best interests. You'd all make excellent Slytherins. Goodbye."
She turned and moved toward the door, trying not to make it look like the struggle that it actually was.
Fleur intercepted her with a sudden, firm embrace and kisses on either cheek, followed by a peck on the lips like she were her sister. Drusilla went rigid for a heartbeat, then returned the embrace stiffly.
In quiet, fluent French she said, "You have a lovely family, Fleur. Truly. I hope that I can earn the right to be a part of it someday, but I have my doubts. I also refuse to make Potter choose between them and me."
Fleur held the door open, and also spoke in hushed French. "I am sorry for the ambush. I was not even made aware Bill's siblings were coming, or what they were planning until just a little while ago. Next time it will be only the two of us, and proper tea. Maybe we can share that Firewhisky you brought. It'd serve Bill right for deceiving us both."
Drusilla inclined her head rather than trusting herself to speak, and stepped outside.
The moment the door closed behind her, the residual calm of Veela magic began to fade. Drusilla touched her fingertips to her lips and frowned. "Damn French. They're worse than the Italians." She noticed her shaking hands and tightened her grip on the briefcase. "Idiot fools didn't need to go wasting their precious money. They could have just charmed me with a damn French Veela and Firewhisky..."
She spent several long moments collecting herself. She was afraid to start walking with the Weasleys watching and seeing how she was shaking like a leaf.
Eventually she locked her emotions and mind back down and walked the short distance uphill to the grave she'd previously ignored. She knelt, opened her briefcase, and after a bit of rummaging through potions and their components, retrieved a bouquet of flowers. She laid them carefully against the headstone.
"I don't recall ever seeing you around the manor growing up," she said quietly. "But I assume I was probably cruel to you. I was twelve and terribly immature when you left my father's service. But I make no excuses. I'm sorry. Thank you for saving Potter's life, Dobby. I am forever in your debt." She straightened the flowers. "You died free and on your own terms. I rather envy that..."
Drusilla stood, brushed sand from her skirt, and walked several minutes outside the protective wards of Shell Cottage, then Disapparated.
She appeared on a quiet lane in a sleepy little village in Scotland. An old stone church stood at the end of it, the door slightly ajar. She remained motionless for a long time, staring at the dark entrance made for witches and wizards in need.
She raised her wand to her throat. In her mind she heard her own voice speaking, and a softer, sibilant one layered just beneath it, both whispering the same curse. Sectumsempra.
If she listened close enough, it resembled his voice. A snake's voice.
Evil incarnate.
It was inside her mind. It was under her skin...
She took a shaky breath and reluctantly lowered her wand.
No. It would make her mother cry. And now it would make Potter cry as well. She couldn't have that. They'd both look utterly ridiculous crying at her funeral. That'd simply be intolerable, as would be giving her enemies the satisfaction.
For a long time she stared at nothing. She saw nothing. She felt nothing.
To cast a curse properly, you had to mean it with every fiber of your being. A kind of hatred the average person simply wasn't capable of. She wondered, almost clinically, whether she truly hated herself enough. In the back of her mind, it was more curiosity than pure self-loathing.
Drusilla had used dark magic on herself in the past. Small, private sessions that not even the Ministry knew about. Her one and only little secret still remaining. But she had never tried an Unforgivable curse before. Would it even work?
She raised her wand, pointed it at her own chest, and spoke clearly.
"Crucio!"
The curse took her instantly. She collapsed onto the flagstones, body seizing, a broken sound tearing from her throat. Muscles locked and released in waves of hot white agony. She couldn't breathe. Couldn't think. The world narrowed to the single fact of pain.
There was nothing else, and there would never be anything else.
Nothing but endless, unimaginable pain.
Her fingers finally spasmed open and her hawthorn wand clattered out of her hand, mercifully ending the Unforgivable curse.
She lay there twitching for several minutes, cheek pressed against the cold stones. Tears filled her eyes but did not fall. When the worst of the spasms finally eased, she remained where she was, breathing in short, shallow gasps, tasting blood where she had bitten her tongue. Her clothes were soaked from sweat. Everything hurt in a dull, residual way that almost felt good after feeling nothing for so long.
Eventually she forced herself onto her hands and knees, then to her unsteady feet. She brushed dirt and grit from her clothes out of habit rather than vanity, retrieved her wand and briefcase, and stood swaying for a long moment, head hung low.
The church door still stood slightly open. She stared at it until the shaking in her hands stilled enough that she trusted herself to walk. Then she limped toward it.
Inside it was dim and mercifully quiet. She found an empty pew near the back, sat down, and rested for the first time since she didn't know when. Certainly since before she received his mark and came under his ownership.
What she prayed for, even she couldn't fully be sure. She only knew it was the God's honest truth.
(Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed. I imagine this story taking a month or two before "Snake Out of Water", but it's ultimately up to you. It's toward the end of Drusilla's time being constantly interviewed and monitored by the Ministry, and while she's not facing Azkaban anymore, she's still not free yet. I feel as though Drusilla having a confrontation with the Weasleys was inevitable. Ron is Harry's best friend, and I think he'd have gotten to see a side of Drusilla the others never have, but the others would want confirmation for themselves. Bill is the eldest, and I liked the idea of Drusilla interacting with Fleur and considering her a friend, and also visiting Dobby's grave, which was important to me. Bill doesn't know Harry too well, which also makes him the least biased of the entire family (besides Charlie, of course). George is still grieving from losing Fred, and views himself as Harry's older brother. Ginny used to have a crush on Harry, and views him as another older brother she needs to protect from a dangerous woman. The Weasleys aren't wrong, but they're also not entirely in the right, which is what I liked about this story. Good people doing bad things, and bad people doing good things, all because they love Harry.
I also really like the idea that Drusilla didn't hate Harry enough in the Sectumsempra bathroom scene for Crucio to work properly, but she hates herself enough for it to work on herself. It's an interesting parallel in my opinion because the only two times Harry was ever angry enough to perform a dark curse was with Drusilla (Draco), and Amycus Carrow when he spat in McGonagall's face. Those were the only two times he was sufficiently angry and hateful enough for them to work. I know the ending to this chapter was sad, but at least we know it has a happy ending.
If you enjoyed this story and would like to read more, I've written five other Drusilla/Harry one-shots that you might enjoy, with more still on the way. Thank you for all the love and support, and I hope you enjoy the coming stories.
All credit goes to my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, Who has blessed me with this story and all of you wonderful readers. Thank you, and God bless)