Chasing Shadows || Draco Malfoy x OC

(Summer) Year 5- Ch.91

**T.W.- Abuse**

A month had passed since Céline wrote the letter to the DuPont family. Since then her father stopped hitting her, so her bruises were healing, but he still didn't let her out of her room. He had Telly bring up meals to her, that was where the house-elf would try engage in some sort of conversation with Céline, but would give up after a few minutes of silence.

Céline for the most part didn't speak to anyone, unless it was to answer her mother's questions on transfiguration during her studies. She spent a lot of her free time just sitting on her wide windowsill, where she had made into a comfy reading area, and stared out the window.

Her parents wouldnt see her much. She did notice them getting busier than they usually did over summer, but she didn't think much of it. At this point she was also no longer feeling hurt, or anything for that matter, by her former headmistress. She understood that she was probably off to do that summer job with Hagrid that Professor Dumbledore asked them to do.

For a moment she felt silly to think that her problem even mattered anymore, there's a far more dangerous problem coming to them that they will need to face.

The doors of her room suddenly burst open causing Céline to jump in fright. She watched as her parents stormed into the room furiously.

"Who did you tell?" Her father yelled, grabbing her roughly by her shoulders. "Answer me!"

She looked at him startled and confused, "I-I don't know w-what you're talking about." She stuttered.

In an instant her father threw her on the floor and she winced at the painful impact.

"Don't you dare lie to me, girl!" He shouted, making her flinched.

"I'm not!" She cried.

"You told Madame Maxime, didn't you?" Her mother said angrily.

"Tell her what?" Céline asked. Yelping as her father lifted her up from her hair.

"Ze 'eadmistress 'az sent a letter of expulsion to Miss DuPont for 'er 'intolerable be'avior towardz a student'." Her mother said, irritably. "'Ow did you know where to send ze letter. I don't even know where she is."

"I never sent anything to anyone." Céline said hissing at the pain on her scalp. "I swear I'm not lying!" She said as she tried grabbing at her father's hands that were wrapped tightly around her hair. "P-Please let go."

He did just that by throwing her again, but this time towards her large wooden bookcase. The impact of her body slamming against the bookcase caused many of her books to fall off the shelves. She covered her head quickly to avoid getting hit by some of the heavy covers.

She heard the quick footsteps of her father approaching, and when she looked up, a hand quickly seized her throat. Her eyes widened from the shock and sudden lack of air.

"You are so hell bent on humiliating your family's name. Now I have to go deal with this in the ministry. That girls father came barging in, fuming at me about his daughter's expulsion in front of everyone." Her father hissed furiously and tightened his fingers around her neck, causing her to struggle some more as tears stung her eyes. "I don't know how you did it, but you can bet you won't see the light of day until it's time to ship you off again." He said, before roughly releasing his grip, dropping her to her kneees and he stormed out of the room with her mother in tow. The door slamming behind them and hearing a soft click from the lock.

The room was left with just the sound of Céline's coughs as she gasps for air. Her tears rolled down her face from the burning she felt in her lungs. After a moment of gaining some sort of stable breathing, she slowly gets up from the ground, pushing away the mountain of books that lay around her.

So many emotions rushing through her right now, confusion, sense of justice and relief, and fear of what her father might do to her if he wasn't able to get this under his control.

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Her father was livid with Céline, he came back that evening bursting into Céline's room. Startling her awake, he then ripped the covers off of her and grabbed her ankle. He then forcefully pulled her off the bed, making her hit her head on hard floor, and began dragging her out of her room.

Céline's breathing was rapid with panic. She was disoriented from being woken up suddenly and hitting her head. She screamed and cried, trying to plead with him to stop, as her father pulled her down the staircase by the ankle, but it fell on deaf ears.

Céline tried reaching for anything she could grab onto, the rails of the stairs, the baluster, any cornered wall or doorframe down the corridor, the couch or lamp in the sitting room, where she only knocked the lamp over, shattering the lightbulb.

He pulled her outside, where she got a hold of the doorframe as she passed it and desperately held on with her fingers. Her father let out an exasperated sigh, before letting go her ankle and then coming over stepping on her left arm. Céline let out a pained cry and her grip on the doorframe loosened. Her father then took a hold of her hair and began to pull her down the stone steps.

They came around the corner of the manor where there was a hidden door. Her father flicked his wand and it opened before him. Inside were a log set of stone steps that led to a damp stone covered room with three small little barred cells.

Céline's father opened one of the cells and roughly tossed her in, where she landed with a thud. Céline looked up at her father with her tear stained face completely frightened by what just happened.

"I told you that you weren't going to see the light of day until it's time to ship you off again." He sneered, his voice dripping with venom. "Maybe this time you'll learn how to behave."

"P-Please... I didn't... do anything..." Céline cried out in between sobs. "Please—"

"Enough," he snapped, "maybe if, and only if, you have behaved properly... I'll let you out." With the at her father walking away and back up the stone stairs, shutting the door behind him.

Céline crawled over to a corner, whimpering, and then wrapped her arms around her knees, where she cried in silence. She began to shiver, only realizing that she was still in her thin muslin fabric pajamas that were now covered in dirt and grass stained. She huddled closer and hugged her knees tighter, dipping her head down as she continued to cry.

After what felt like forever, Céline stopped crying, she finally looked up from where she sat and looked around.

She never knew they had this kind of room at her house. Why would they in the first place. The entire room was medium sized, and each cell was about an eight by ten foot in space. A stone wall dividing each one from each other. It was damp, and cold and the only light source came from two dim sconces on the wall on each side of the base of the stairs. The entire room smelled of mildew and the air was stale.

Céline could hear the drip of water coming from the other side of the room, and other than that and her own shaky breath it was quiet.

Slowly, she stood up, needing to move from sitting on an uncomfortable hard stone floor. She felt helpless, she didn't know what time it was, she didn't have her wand with her, even though it would have probably been useless to her there, but she felt a sense of safety having it on her. She wasn't sure when someone would come down here to check on her.

Céline wrapped her arms around her trembling body, trying hard not to breakdown and cry again. She didn't know why this had to happen to her, why she was stuck with such terrible people as parents. She felt stupid for not taking Professor Dumbledore's offer and now only wished to leave this place.