Silencio

Chapter 6

Draco awoke with a jerk, his heart beating hard and fast and his breath coming out in gasps. He was alone. Of course, he was. He knew he wouldn't be able to get any more sleep, so he sat up, rubbing his eyes, and looked at the clock. Four o'clock. This was going to be a very long day.

Sighing, he got up and began dressing himself.

He had had another nightmare, of course. In the dream, he had failed, and he had had to watch while his mother was tortured, violated, and killed, before they turned on him. There had been more to the dream, much more, but he chose to block it out. He got the general idea. He had to get this thing done, he had to, or his dreams would come true in the worst way.

He hadn't been as distracted by last night as he had hoped he would be.

Damn Mudblood, why did she have to be so difficult? He hadn't wanted to tie her up for the duration. He'd just wanted to punish her a bit for making him wait so long and laughing at him to boot. So, fine, he had gotten a little carried away, but he hadn't done anything she didn't like. He knew for a fact that he hadn't. He had ignored her words and let her body speak to him instead, and the response he had gotten had been overwhelming.

Still, she had refused to give in, to give him what he needed. Yes, he had needed to be inside her, but more than that he had needed... more! He wasn't really sure what he was missing, but it did not involve her fighting him and denying him her touch and kiss.

Ok, so maybe he had miscalculated a little bit with his punishment. Hinting of another girl had not been the smartest thing, but he hadn't been able to take it back without looking like a fool. Instead, he had hoped to make her forget. No luck.

He did not need to have these problems on top of everything else. Perhaps he should simply just... let her be. Stop pursuing her. She clearly didn't want it enough, and, after last night, he was only left more frustrated than ever.

This thought did nothing to improve his disposition, and he was left feeling the need to be destructive.

He took one of the table-lamps and hurled it against the wall. There was smashing of glass and clanging of metal. This helped a little bit but not enough. He took out his wand and flicked it about. Furniture toppled over, lamps and mirrors smashed, cloth ripped... He wasn't satisfied before the room was in shambles and even then he just felt a dull emptiness.

Glass crunching under his boots, he turned and left.

*****

The day turned out to be just as long as he had feared. Classes were stupid. People were even more stupid. The food might as well have been sawdust. To top it all off, Granger seemed to be everywhere he looked. Just his luck. Finally, he was avoiding her, as he should have been from the beginning, and then he couldn't turn around without seeing her either with or without her friends.

The next day wasn't any better, nor was the day after that. After a while, the days just became a blur of lessons, meals, naps, and his ever-present mission.

Previously, he had spent weeks scheming to get Granger alone, and now he came across her alone on multiple occasions. It was driving him crazy. She had something he wanted and she didn't want to give it, so why couldn't she at least have the decency to hide out in her common room, or at the library, or anywhere she wasn't likely to run into him?

One time, he rounded a corner to see her come down the empty hall from the opposite direction. She stopped as if to say something, but he couldn't stand to stay and hear it, so he just blindly walked on, only semi-aware that he bumped into her shoulder in doing so. Didn't she understand? He didn't need all of her talking and poking and teasing. He was done with it. She was now free of him at last.