Professor Malfoy

51 | the vanishing

Chapter 51
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I force my eyes to stay opened even though I'm so tired. I know that falling asleep would mean loosing consciousness over what's happening now and I can't let myself do that. Not when there might be more of those scary men around.

I'm shivering with goosebumps all over my body, the night is still young and freezing cold. Especially here, above clouds. The fog below us is thickening every time I look there.

My body is leaned against Draco's back, my hands tightly wrapped around his torso. Buckbeak is flying fast, but he's being careful with us. Although if we have to sit on him for another hour, my legs and butt will go numb.
Draco is strangely quiet, we haven't really talked since we took off. I think he's just being very cautious.

I still don't understand what's happening. I can't grasp my mind around it. I though we were going to have a nice weekend together and now we're just...two runaways.

I think of Hogwarts, my home, and immediately long for my warm cozy blanket, for the green flames in the fireplace, for a cup of hot cocoa that's always served around Christmas time.

Draco's sudden movement wakes me up from my thoughts. "There! See? I knew it was here somewhere," he says loudly and points his hand down at a bigger village beneath us with just few lights on.

I didn't even realize we were flying lower, much lower until my stomach makes a turn. I'd empty it if I had some food in it. I've been hungry for hours, it's only coming together now.

We land on a plain right next to the village and Draco send Beak to hide himself.

"What do we do now? It's night,"

I can see that he has no plan.

"We walk around until we figure something."

A horrible idea. It's freezing and it's dark night, there's nothing to figure out. People are sleeping, the streets are empty and I'm growing impatient by Draco's patience and calmness.

"Does anyone even live here?" I ask, it comes out like more of a sob. I can't help it anymore.

"Looks like it," he points at smoke coming out of the houses. I imagine the people inside them sleeping peacefully in the warmth of their beds, dreaming of something nice.

As we wander around for more, the village structure becomes familiar to me. For some reason, I feel like I'm not here for the first time. The street lights are only dim, but they provide enough light for me to recognize some of the architecture. It's one of a kind.

"Wait, what is this village called?"

"Oak meadows." His voice is shaking. He's freezing as well.

Oak meadows...it sounds so familiar. I must've been here in the past, when I was a child. I remember asking my mom if this was some kind of a faerie village because it sounded like it.

Then the realization hits me. I stop walking and look back at the cemetery we just passed.

"I think my grandparents are buried here."

Together, we take a look on the cemetery tomb list behind a glass board and start searching for the place of my grandparents' final rest.

"Was it 20?" Draco asks me from a few feet away from me. I can't see him, only his wand illuminated with blue light of lumos spell.

"It's A23," I tell him as quiet as possible. It's rude to wake up the dead.

I walk three isles of tombstones, ignoring the creepy silence around this place. It's giving me goosebumps.