This Bitter Earth

SIXTEEN

I am blown away by the reception of the last chapter. WOW. Y'all are the best readers anyone could ever ask for. Love you all.

Beta'd by my darling Bree who means everything to me. Seriously, just amazing. I cannot say thank you enough for everything she does for me and this story.

Soundtrack- "Beautiful Crime" by Tamer and "white dove" by Koda

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SIXTEEN

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Draco kept his focus on the cracks in the floor as he forced himself up.

Thick black lines cutting through the worn wood. There was a knot missing and he could vaguely feel air moving up through the hole.

Sitting up hurt. The scars were new and tight, barely covering his sliced flesh. His head was worse. Swirling and thumping enough to make him sick, but Draco bore it. He was no stranger to pain. Under Granger's care he was getting... well, not better, but... healed.

He stared at the cracks in the floor. They stretched to the wall in long, straight, unbroken lines. Each one the same as the next.

Was he the same?

No. The answer was easy. Something had changed in him, but he just wasn't sure what.

Draco thought cracks on a different floor, ones that had been sharp and serrated, tearing up Theo's skin as he shook from the torture curse. Draco's curse.

His vision narrowed in on the line in between his feet. It felt like he could just slide down into it. Hide down there. Crouch in the darkness and wait for everything to be over. The war, the pain. Maybe even his whole life.

But he'd miss her.

He didn't want to go into the darkness without her.

He couldn't lose her. Not again. Not ever.

Not when he had just barely gotten her back. It had almost been a year now since she had seen his mark and left him because of what he was. Who he was.

"I don't want someone like you to love me." Draco could almost hear the words floating out of the gap below him.

It was awful having to watch her live her life and not be a part of it. Not be able to grab her, hold her, touch her.

His fingers twitched on his knee.

But she had come back, she had given him a chance to set it right and he had fucked it up. Failed.

He had lost her again.

Without her it was as if the earth had opened up and swallowed him whole. He had been alone, but pressed in on all sides at the same time. He had freed his Father, but trapped himself in the process.

The lines on the floor started to blur and Draco's eyes burned as he stared down at them.

Long and straight, just like the bars of the cage he had trapped her in when he got her back. It felt like torture to watch her cry because he wouldn't let her go, but not as bad as the anguish of not seeing her at all.

What choice did he have? What choice was there when the only time his lungs worked was when he was breathing in her vanilla and cinnamon scent? The more she pushed him away, the harder he held on. Draco knew what was waiting for her outside his walls.

And he knew what it was like inside them without her too.

Empty. Cold. Dark.

Just like the cracks on the floor.