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o. a dancer with bleeding eyes
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The first time Draco saw him, the boy was very small.
His body didn't fill his robes; they hung from his thin shoulders like heavy curtains. The rest of the fabric dragged on the marble floor beneath his feet. He stood below Draco's nose--and Draco was then considered small for someone in his age. Bare toes peaked under his robes as he made his way to the corridors, passing Draco, without once sparing him a glance.
Draco was alone. He didn't invite Crabbe nor Goyle with him. Nightmares fend him off from slumber and he woke up with cold sweat. He wanted a walk, something to keep his mind preoccupied, far from the aches that littered in his small body. He didn't want to be a Malfoy when he left his chambers and made point to avoid Filch. He didn't want to be seen. He just wanted to feel like a proper child for once.
Draco let out a breath he had been holding when the boy ignored him. He clutched his robes tighter. He was not daft, Draco had hid his hair that would surely gave him away. Silvery strands that matched the moon peeking through the tall windows.
The paintings pretended they did not see him when he sat underneath their golden frames--they went about their days entrapped in the small illusion of Time. Yet, some--those with soft hearts, with concern etched within their oil painted eyes that cracked with the passing years--whispered questions as they passed by; asking "had you eaten today?" and something mundane such as "i saw a cricket tonight. have you seen one? would you like to see it?" in small voices, as if voicing scandalous gossips in midst of their court. They didn't make a fuss when he didn't answer any of them.
He thought he was going to cry again.
The second time Draco saw him, the boy was sleeping under The Whomping Willow.
He didn't think he'd seen him again, and yet there he was. The very same boy. Whisked in blissful slumber in the embrace of a giant, murderous, accursed tree. Entangled by its roots, swept under and almost unseen by the passing eyes--as if he was part of the tree itself.
In the daylight he could see him clearly then. His robes decorated in green and silver--a Slytherin. Of his own House. Draco swore at that moment that he had never seen the boy before in their Common Room. He swore he'd known, he would've recognized the small stature and the way his eyes gleamed in the dark.
Or would he?
By the third time, the boy had marched right up to him. They were in the Common Room. Draco remembered the day was quite sunny, lights trinkled from the tall stained-glass windows as he lounged on a sofa, reading a newspaper as Crabbe and Goyle went on and on about things he couldn't be bothered with.
Robes that hung from his small shoulders. Bare feet against the cold, stone floor. Eyes that gleamed red like rubies.
"Let me become your marchwarden," the boy spoke. Small body did not tremble beneath Crabbe and Goyle's towering ones. They were bickering, talking about how they would toss the boy out if he didn't bugger off. And yet, not once he bothered with them; eyes holding Draco's gaze with something that, back then, Draco couldn't quite read.
"My what?"
"Your marchwarden."
"Who do you think you are?"
They garnered quite the attention. A circle formed around them, some eagerly awaited for a brawl to break out. Draco wanted to scoff--they were Slytherins, they settled things with words, not brawns like the daft Gryffindors. Crabbe and Goyle, on the other hand, had another in mind as they began to crack their knuckles and slid out their wands. They asked Draco to say a word. The word. Anything that could set hell loose.
"Let me become your marchwarden," the boy repeated.
Draco wanted to strangle him.
"A marchwarden," he said. Annoyance dripping from his tone. He knew what a warden was, but a marchwarden? Either they were similar or not at all. Draco needed to know anyway before taking his sides. He knew he could set off chaos right then and there in the Common Room. He had the power, and it thrilled his childish self back then. The thought tempted him.
"I will be your hands, eyes, and ears. I will be your second. I will march for your name. Say the word and I'm yours."
Then, Draco was a child, he didn't thought what he was getting himself into. He didn't think it would even last. All he had seen was a childish request, a game, something that could possibly divert his mind from the darkness that edged his home.
Even if the boy spoke the truth, he wouldn't last a second with what Draco had to face in his home.
Perhaps it was desperation. Or madness. Perhaps it was something within the boy's eyes, brewing like storms. Perhaps in that moment, they shared the dread they felt. Something was going to happen, and they were at the center of it. The only ones aware of the consequences, scrambling to fill the echo before everything became swallowed by the earth.
"Why not?" he said. He did not realise the silence that fell. Excitement settled down. The pursed lips and scrunched eyebrows that decorated Crabbe and Goyle's faces.
The boy nodded. Then he swiftly turned on his heels and left, pattering off upstairs. The crowd dispersed. Draco was left back to his newspaper, trying to forgone the pit in his stomach that seemed to insist that he made a grave error.
By the fourth and the next, Crabbe and Goyle had only caught glimpses of a boy that barely existed, with butterfly footsteps and bleeding eyes. A second shadow that lingered, never far, ever present, trailing off behind their silver-haired friend.
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AUTHOR'S NOTE
okay so, i tried,,?? i guess?? i forgot how to write in a children's pov, so i try to cut off the flowery sentences i usually use, but then. well. it ends up like this.
here ye here ye romance is dead, pledge your entire life as a marchwarden to your significant other instead no karen, they're not gay they're just disaster twinks
look i'm not alright my anxiety is through the roof and i felt antsy from all this quarantine lockdown stuff because i am trapped in the house with my very loud very nosy family and i want es c a p e-
i'm a mess. this whole fic is just a dumpster fire at this point. quis ego sum,,
if you're still dense, btw, this is a drarry and viktor krumxoc fic. mainly focuses on drarry, where draco gets himself a wingman. viktor will show up soon with the rest of the goblet fire crew. just not now. but he will. i still want to shag him after all.
okay i'll just leave now before anything gets worse good day
