Warm But Tainted Blood (Drarry)

chapter twelve

Left. Right. Sliding— just a bit, just enough— underneath the table clothed structure. Footsteps, his pursuitors passing, the footsteps fading.

Safety.

Harry tries to catch his breath as he sticks his head outside the tablecloth again. He searches for the clock resting on the wall, sighing in relief when he finds it. It's 2:20, ten minutes until school is dismissed. He's upset he missed his last class, but it's not like it was his fault. Dudley had skipped his class just to torment him.

Harry pulls his head back underneath the table when he hears a muffled sob come from underneath it.

His eyes widen as he sees a girl huddled in the corner of the closed off space that he was too preoccupied to notice before— she's not much older than he, perhaps nine or ten. She's an Asian girl with long (very long) ratty hair than seems to drape over her shuddering body. She smells sickly (she smells like death.) Her eyes are bloodshot and eyebags designer.

"What's wrong?" he asks, shuffling closer to the girl. Her head snaps up and her sobs stop (her tears do not.)

She fiddled with a strand of her dry black hair. "I don't want to talk about it," she mutters softly. She's got a slight accent, but Harry can't tell where it's from. Harry has a burried suspicion that it's not a trivial matter, whatever she is crying about-- (she smells like DEATH--)

"Okay. What would you like to talk about?" he questions, hoping to distract the girl.

She eyes his hair. She runs a hand through his hair, and Harry takes the effort not the flinch for her-- he doesn't know her but guesses it doesn't matter. She deserves this small treasure. "Your hair is very pretty," she says.

"Your's isn't," he said truthfully-- a little harsh, "But it can be. You should braid it."

"I've never had my hair braided," she's said softly,"I wouldn't know how to."

Harry reckons he doesn't know how to, either, but doesn't let that stand in his way of immediately settling himself behind the girl and beginning a makeshift braid. It's nowhere near perfect-- Harry thinks it's far from it-- but it's very pretty.

"Thank you," she says smally. "You should braid your hair sometime, too. It'd be very beautiful-- and don't let anyone make you feel ashamed for admiring pretty things, okay? Promise me that, promise me."

"I promise," says Harry because he can feel the desperation in her words-- a frivolous effort to make an impression, any impression, on the world. She's dying, Harry thinks. She smells like death. "I think I'd look very pretty with a braid."

She nods with an age old weariness-- she's far too young to seem so old. It's not fair.

Harry leaves shortly after that, not knowing whether or not it was a good thing he hadn't caught her name. One thing is for certain and that is that Harry will braid his hair one day-- no matter how many times Aunt Petunia tries to cut his hair, it keeps coming back. It's almost like it can sense his promise, too.

∆¶∆

Merlin paced the forest with heavy steps. There's a merchant after him-- claiming him an overall evil and the one who destroyed his shop with magic. Merlin was unimpressed and voiced as such: the reck of his shop was so low tier in comparison to Merlin's magic. If he wanted to destory it, there wouldn't be anything left afterwards. Merlin felt quite insulted.