A Story of a Short Ending | T.R

Chapter 4 - Dungeons

A warm humid evening in a small village filled with laughter and loud music from open doors and windows along the main street. To a stranger who wound up in the village by accident, it could've looked like they were celebrating, perhaps a birthday or a local holiday Malfoy wasn't aware of.

He also wasn't in that village by accident. He left Avery's room just to end up with a task of his own 10 minutes later. He noted a pressing silence in the Manor at 9 in the evening, coming to an easy conclusion that Lestrange wasn't present, so wasn't Rosier. He left his friend to sulk over his newly discovered wife in his bedroom and after bowing his head to Riddle, left the Manor to find the person he was tasked with.

The rain stopped and left behind a splotchy ground, making it a hard task for someone dressed so expensively to find his way around a village that seemed to be older than Hogwarts itself. The old small houses were made of wood and stone, giving the village that centuries-old look, which also was why the village didn't have better tropes than mud.

Looking around it wasn't a hard task to spot her, in the middle of the crowd that took its partying and enjoying the evening outside, rather than sitting in a stuffed room with smells worse than behind the bar's kitchen where they discarded spoilt foods. The woman enjoyed herself, the dark stains of spilt drinks on her clothes were the evidence of her eventful evening, spilt in a dance or from the unsteadiness of her hands after the amount she drank.

At least that made the task easier, he supposed, she wouldn't be as fast and successful with her wand in such a state. Watching her from the corner of the street as he leaned on the stone wall of the alley, he wondered what could've intrigued his Dark Lord about her. Was it the way she danced or sang along to some of the loud village songs? The thought alone made him roll his eyes, he wasn't in a position to question his Lord's choices anymore. Not anymore.

When Riddle saw him as his second, someone he could rely on he dared to offer his improvements or ideas, dared to ask the question why. Not until he was shoved back into the line with everyone else, just an ordinary follower who didn't get to pass the orders or be the one closest to the Dark Lord. The change stung, more than he would admit to himself. He chose to let Riddle into his house, his home. The place his family cherished for years, his ancestors, his parents until the day they retired and moved to another estate they owned, leaving him in charge of the house and the life in it.

Sometimes he wondered if he made a wrong choice by offering Tom too much, letting him stride in and out of the place as if it were his own. He supposed being the man's second in command was an acknowledgement of his strategic abilities and a favour to not feel like a guest in his own house. He was wrong so now it didn't matter, the countless vases and portraits he had to repair after some of their brawls or after his friends would decide to joke around and destroy some of the rooms. That time he couldn't manage to hold himself back from throwing one of the nearby standing broken vases at Lestrange for breaking another heirloom of his Mother. Viridian spent a week bringing Rodolphus healing potions.

He looked back at the woman dancing and singing, her carefree attitude made some of his stored anger burn under his skin. Was she just a girl Riddle wanted to throw into his dungeons? Perhaps she was the daughter of someone in the Ministry or the thick-pocketed people from their social circles, he couldn't know, didn't really want to. Assessing her clothes one more time he noted the outline of her wand in her pocket, she wasn't all that defenceless after all, even if in her condition trying to take out her wand could cost her her life. Not that he cared about it, considering he was about to put her in that exact situation.

He didn't know how long he stood there, a dark and empty alley between two empty buildings with doors and windows boarded up tight. He watched the crowd lose their energy, their dancing becoming a combination of swaying and stumbling, and many leaving back to their homes after finishing their drinks. She remained, chatting with two other girls about something he couldn't figure out from such a distance. He wasn't the right man for missions like these, staying hidden in the shadows for a person of his complexion and looks was a hard task, considering his over-than-average height and family-famous white hair. Yet he did it when he wanted to, and not failing a task for his Dark Lord was worth the effort. Staying another night in the dungeons of his own house wasn't his plan for the near future, the fact that he knew all the weak spots and possibilities on how to get out of every single cell in those dungeons, wasn't much comforting considering he couldn't let Riddle know he can do that. While finding some quiet in the dungeons as a child he quickly mastered the art of escaping cells that didn't change much for the past little more than a decade.