Deliverance | Draco Malfoy

Twenty-Nine

A/N: Oh, she's a long one...

tw: This chapter contains sexual content. Read with caution.

My hand found my throat as I clenched it, gasping for air and trying to choke on the scream that I had produced. For so many nights now, I had been waking up with tear-streaked cheeks and sobs escaping my throat.

I had been seeing things that I don't wish to see. Horrible imaginary thoughts that I hoped would never become a reality. Fear had crept its way up the dark corners of the room that the candles weren't bright enough to touch, and had been stalking over me from the heights of the ceiling like death himself waiting to pounce.

I had cooped myself up in here to avoid the conflicts I'd have to face outside that door. There were too many questions I didn't want answered, and too many lies that could be spread to keep me pleased and content. I never knew what was real anymore, or who to trust. Nothing seemed to fit the narrative I thought I had finally created in my head.

"Tundra?" I frantically patted the areas of the bed surrounding me, finding that the covers fell flat every time. "Tundra, where'd you go?" I croaked out before I sniffled.

I couldn't take this loneliness. She was who I had been counting on these last few days in solidarity. Without her here, it felt like the monsters in the world would soon start to pay a visit and dig their way under my skin like they had down so often in my past.

My dinner sat untouched on the bedside table. I had tried to send it away with my wand, but it had come right back as if the Manor itself had rejected my attempts. Fucking Malfoy and his control-freak tactics.

I moved slowly as I picked up one of the candle lamps beside me, and I checked all my surroundings as I tried to inch my way across the cold floor of the room I had been living in.

"Tundra, please." My voice broke as I looked around the room for her, my heartbeat growing in pace as I feared she'd jump out at me when I least expected it. The door was cracked open and I inhaled a deep breath as I prepared myself to venture out of the room.

If she wasn't in the proximity of my door in the hallway, I was just going to have to suffer without her for one night. It was well into the night. No one would even have to know I left the room, I just had to slowly creak the door open a little further.

"Tund-AHHH!" I dropped the candle to the floor and jumped back into the room.

Draco had been sitting on the floor across from the doorway, his back against the wall and his knees tucked up towards his chest. At one point, his arms were carefully draped over the tops of his knees and his head was hanging down like his chin was pressed to his chest.

But that was before I scared him just as badly as he had frightened me.

Now he was alert and wide-eyed in the dimly lit corridor. His wand was in his palm and at the ready, but he slumped back against the wall with a thud as he relaxed more.

"Fucking hell, Draco! What are you doing?!" I hissed at him quietly, looking up and down the long hallways to make sure no one else was stirring around after my noisy interruptions tonight.

"What does it fucking look like I'm doing?" He lazily rubbed his eyes with his fingertips and gave me a groggy look from the floor.

"If I knew the answer, then I don't think I'd be asking, dipshit," I responded with an edge to my voice. Tundra's bell collar slowly drew closer from next to Draco's leg before she slipped past my feet and reentered my room. "Did you let her out?" I accused him.