How...Unfortunate

4

"What of my clothes?" Draco asked, finally mustering up the courage to question about them. The Elf prince seemed a bit confused, as though uncertain why he was asking over them. Draco did not know why, it was obvious. He wanted his articles of clothing back. For one, he doubted that they had anything close to similar, and for another, Draco was not fond of wearing anything but what his father picked for him. They may be similar to his school clothes (hell they had the Slytherin crest on them for crying out loud) they were not, and they had been quite expensive to make. Furthermore, he would prefer to have his own items as opposed to having to once again borrow things. He was tired of feeling in debt, and they would bring a sort of foreign comfort that he was desperately needing.

"We had not yet decided what to do with them, would you like them cleaned and returned to you?" The Prince questioned, his eyes giving away very little in the form of emotions. It reminded him painfully of the noble balls and parties, and it was frustrating. He had always hated those parties in the first place, having to constantly be on his toes. Not as though he had to do anything different at home, but he could always hide in his room as much as possible. Here he was stuck dealing with this nonesense whether he wanted to or not.

"Yes," Draco narrowed his eyes, as though daring the Prince to refuse. As it were, he just laughed and agreed. It left him somewhat surprised. These people keep acting strange, and I really do not know what to do with it. He knew that they wanted something. After all, nobility always wanted something in return for services. It was not a surprise, and Draco was quite used to these types of things. He had prepared himself for it, but for some reason...this infuriating Prince just danced about with Draco's wishes.

"I will return them promptly. They will be cleaned before we take our leave to Imladris." Draco just sighed, nodding his head. He did not know where this Imladris place was, but then again he did not know where anywhere was. His lack of knoweldge about the basic geography of wherever he was located was bound to start raising brows if he did not get a handle on it. He was not even able to really play it off, as eventually something would be said that everyone knew, and Draco would be the only outlier. He was definitely not looking forwards to that, because how was he supposed to figure out what to say?

"Thank you,"

"It is no trouble at all," The Prince declared with a smile. Why is he so happy about this? Draco questioned. He should be leveling his assets. After all, he is in a better position than I am. Still, he could not help but be grateful that the Prince was doing nothing of the sort, though he was not dumb enough to believe this would continue. At some point Draco would fall out of favor, it would happen eventually, and that time would be where he had to tred extremely carefully, more so than he was already.

He had lost an idea on what more he could say, and so simply lapsed into silence, assessing himself. The Prince seemed to eventually take notice, and turned, leaving Draco to his own idle thoughts. This is going far too well. He thought to himself, unable to quite quench the nerves in his own mind. I expected some sort of...of something, but all that happened was my being stripped and healed. I just do not understand it. Now they are returned the garments that they took from me? And the most I must do is go to this Imladris place to see this lord and get healing? Not that it would do much...Draco idly traced the edges of the mark marring his forearm.

The Dark Lord had taken great pleasure in presenting it to him, just as Draco had taken great horror in the same. Things would never be the same, his magic forever tainted by the Dark Lords. In some cases, this was a good thing. his ability to easily use the Dark Arts increased, considering the dark nature of the Lord's own magic, but Draco had never truly had much issue with it before, no matter what his father's comments regarding the matter were.

There was no way to heal the mark, Draco knew from infinite research regarding the matter. The dark mark would stay as it was, forever, and he would be forever tainted by it. The Dark Lord was quite the sadist, and clearly far too possessive for Draco's own liking. He did not understand how his father decided to follow such an obvious loon. He supposed the Dark Lord had been a lot more...sane...when his father was young. At least, that was what the stories he had heard seemed to show. Whatever he had been before, it was obvious that he was not now.

"What am I supposed to do?" He whispered to himself, letting his knees come up and his head to rest on top of them. His forearm was still tucked tighly against his torso, too nervous now to leave it out in the open lest that damned healer return and mess with it. Draco did not even like to see it, let alone touch it, and yet it would seem as though these people had no regard for his discomfort. Which was strange, given how they suddenly seemed to care now.

He still was not entirely certain that it would not call the Dark Lord straight to him, though he supposed that if it were to happen it would have been done already. That, at least, he took some comfort in. Unless the Lord is able to choose who and when he comes...