BANALITY : Draco Malfoy

50

On Monday, it is Ron's turn to watch over us. He has not been alone with me, and certainly not alone with Draco and me. They won't enter the same room. I do exactly as I am supposed to do. I read the books Harry picked up about simple spells and wand magic. It causes a sharp and painful ache in my head which I push through. It wasn't worth it for the other books. I certainly wouldn't bother for 1984. This is vital.

By lunch, I have learned half of the spells which are in the first-year curriculum for charms and transfiguration. I imagine that the sections on potions, herbology, and astronomy will be unhelpful. They are knowledge-based rather than spells, and my wand remembers spells while my brain remembers nothing else. After lunch, I flip over to the fifth-year curriculum to see what I can accomplish. The magic is much more difficult. I manage to cast a vanishing spell on a crumb from a piece of toast, but not the piece itself. So, I give up on the fifth-year curriculum. The only thing I bother with is what I ought to have learned in fourth year. I had only really known about two of the unforgivable curses. The Imperius Curse scares me more than the others.

When reading up on blackthorn wood, I learn that the wood is better suited to warriors. It would seem defensive spells are quite a bit easier for me to learn, therefore, except the Patronus Charm still, but that seems beyond my wand's powers. I learn about something that can happen to any wand when it breaks. It's called backfiring. When a wand backfires, spells are cast back upon the user. The book refers to it as similar to backfiring jinx. I find that jinx under the book about the defence against the dark arts curriculum. It seems easy enough.

In the room Draco and I share, I cast it on the wall.

I am sure how I should prove I accomplished the jinx. Eventually, I decide on using a disarming charm. After I cast it, I feel the wand in my hand shift, as if it's being pulled by an invisible force. It resists leaving. I cast the spell again, harder this time, and the wand slips from my grasp. It does not soar across the room. Rather, it only moves twenty or so centimetres out of reach before hitting the floor.

With that, I pick up the wand. I am unfamiliar with the wand movement, so we shall see if Marty had ever cast it before. It might be my only hope to force out a memory though.

"Crucio," I point it at the wall. I mean it desperately.

My wand begins to shake in my hand. It sputters and begins to burn. I drop it and it clatters to the ground. The sound it makes slowly whistles out. I try again, only for small sparks to fly out of the wand. It does not seem to agree with me. I do want it to happen. If it gives me my memories back, then the pain is a fair cost. I need them.

It seems I have no other option besides going downstairs.

Malfoy is doing research in the potion room in the basement. Ron is sitting on a chair in the room full of items reading. They are never in the same room and yet won't turn their backs on one another. Ron seems surprised when I come downstairs.

"How's training going?" he closes the file on his lap, but I see the picture. It's the mugshot of a young man. He looks ill. I don't like that I wonder if it's a Death Eater.

"Fine enough," I tell Ron.

"I'm not surprised," he says. When I raise an eyebrow, he continues. "Padma always complained that you never practiced and always did better. You were always busy with theory, if you were studying at all."

I nod.

"Anyway," his face sours, "back to work I suppose."

He turns back to his documents. I get a better look at the file. Reading upside-down hurts more. The man is older than me, though only slightly. Twenty-one. Death Eater.