Boy - (A 'Blaire Zabini' sequel) || Draco Malfoy

47 - The Grave

I zipped up my makeup bag, looking numbly up at my reflection in the mirror, a heaviness in my heart as I was reminded of the day I had first started Hogwarts.

A tentative knock at the door.

"Come in." My voice was morose as I stepped away from the mirror to brush the creases from my dress.

Black.

Narcissa stepped inside, her eyes bloodshot red as they met mine. I immediately looked away, terrified of the emotions that clawed at my throat.

I would not cry.

"Oh, Blaire," she sobbed, striding across the room to circle her arms around my shoulders, burying her face in my hair as her body shook through her tears.

I closed my eyes, willing myself not to break down.

"Come on," I trembled, stepping back to wipe her tears from her face before clasping her hands tightly in mine. "It's time."

*****

We walked silently, arms linked as we crossed the graveyard towards the chapel where we were to say our final goodbye.

Narcissa shook next to me, her body wracked in sobs, and I wondered how on earth she would get through this. She was so frail, so ill.

A mass of bodies clad in black turned to us, falling silent in respect as we approached. The pity on their faces was too much and, once again, I looked away.

A white marbled headstone sitting just feet away caught my eye. My heart stilled. I knew that headstone. I knew the body that lay beneath the freshly turned earth.

"You go on," I whispered shakily in Narcissa's ear as mourners began to greet us, "I just need a minute."

She nodded, although I wondered if she'd even heard me through her grief.

Reaching the grave, I crouched down, gingerly touching the top of the marbled stone, smooth yet cold beneath my fingertips.

"Thank you," I whispered as tears spilled from my eyes and wet my cheeks.

A hand clamped down on my shoulder, fingertips digging lightly into my flesh. I didn't flinch.

"Don't do this," a voice murmured behind me. His voice was thick, pained.

I reached up, clasping my own hand over his.

"It wasn't her fault," I whispered as my eyes glanced up at the name on the headstone.

Astoria Greengrass.

"I won't ever forgive her for what she did," Draco said, crouching down behind me as he tenderly stroked my back. "I'm glad she saved your life, but she was the reason you and Jack were in danger in the first place."

I closed my eyes, remembering.

The second the Killing Curse had fallen from Voldemort's lips, Astoria had thrown herself in front of me, the effect of her sacrifice killing Voldemort instantly.

Why she did that, I'll probably never know.

But, despite her despicable behaviour leading up to it, I believed that some part of her felt as though she owed me her life; that maybe, in some twisted way, she had loved me.

I had witnessed a sort of restfulness fill her eyes as her body crumpled at my feet. She had not looked like someone who had died in vain, but rather like someone who had finally found peace.

Clearing out the home they had shared in their forced marriage, Draco had come across a diary Astoria had been writing in. It was clear from her scribblings that she had been suffering from some sort of psychosis. We deliberated over whether to hand it to her parents due to the fact that it suggested she had been having an affair with her sister's husband, but in the end we felt they needed answers.