Malediction: the love and life of Astoria Malfoy

Chapter Four

As the years passed, I only got weaker. The best way I could describe my overall time at Hogwarts was like a book. A book filled with pages of Daphne and me, maybe a journal or biography. Letting the pages flutter beneath my thumb, getting the faint smells of paper and ink, seeing a few words here and there as the paper glides. Sometimes the paper gets stuck, and for a second, a whole page is visible, memorable, but all and all, it only takes a few seconds, and the last page is encroaching near, and the book is about to fall right out of my hands.

    The book fell out of my hands during the end of my fourth year, when the reality of Daphne's impending graduation settled in.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

    Up until that point all was decently well. Every year at Hogwarts was the same old thing; I studied, followed around Daphne, and listened to the common room complain about whatever shenanigans Harry Potter and the rest of the Gryffindors were getting up to at that given moment (the brigade of whining usually led by Draco Malfoy).

Each year, the adventures Harry got up to were progressively darker. Something was looming around Hogwarts, something toxic and horrifying. The Slytheirn common room was now dormant with chatter, but teaming with apprehension.

Many of them knew what was going on, knew their families were involved, and knew their lives were about to change.

    The domino effect began when rumors spread that the Dark Lord was back in my third year, and despite what might have been thought about a pure-blooded Slytherin family like the Greengrass', we had no death-eater ties, and thus we were just as in the dark as anyone else.

When that year concluded, it was made official, Voldemort was back.

    My fourth year was shrouded with fear, it hung in the castle and consumed the wizarding world. Then it happened, Dumbledore was killed, and with him, the Hogwarts I knew.

    Mother and Father didn't want us going back to school, even though we Greengrass' would most likely be sheltered from the violence of the Death Eaters. But Daphne insisted, she loved Hogwarts and believed Dumbledore was a fool. With him gone, and Snape as Headmaster, she expected this year to be her best one yet.

    I on the other hand didn't quite share in her confidence. She was just so much braver than I, like when she joined the Inquisitorial Squad, but I was too scared.

The whole idea of Professor Snape being Headmaster seemed wrong. How could we be protected from Dark Magic with a Death Eater in charge of the school? However, despite my fears, I went back for my fifth year. I couldn't imagine staying home all year without Daphne. That was one of the worst mistakes I'd ever made.

        *    *    *

I expected change. Anticipated a new regime of power. But what it was? Torture and violence reigned, dark magic prevailed, and muggle-borns --

    What happened to muggle-borns. . . .

I was never tolerant of muggle-borns. I fully believed pure-bloods were superior. After all, magic has been in our blood for centuries, how was a mudblood ever supposed to compare to that?

But what I witnessed -- the screams and cries I heard from the dungeons. They had invited muggle-borns back for the school year, and when they arrived, were either imprisoned or used as targets for torture spells.