Restoration

Chapter Twenty

***

"You have to tell me the truth, Elara," Draco insisted upon questioning her how she even knew of his task and her association with his family. It was one of the few times he called her by her first name.

"I will, I promise. When the time is right," she faltered. Although not fully content with her bleak response, he decided to follow her orders and go to bed.

"The show's over," Elara unlocked the doors, swishing past Vincent and Gregory as they chuckled, already thinking of how they were going to tease Pansy with the information they had obtained - the fact that Elara had locked herself and Draco in his bedroom for a good ten minutes.

Now fully awake and pulsing with adrenaline, Elara knew she wouldn't be able to fall asleep for a long time. Her mind was all over the place, as she was trying to work out how she would be able to stall explaining to Draco her involvement with his family, trust him enough for him not to tell a soul, and most of all, keep him protected and keep her promise. And the one place she knew she would be able to shut off her mind and find answers was by shifting realities, something she had become a sort of an expert in.

Albeit dangerous doing it by oneself, she couldn't wait till the next day to practice with Anthony and Harry. She hoped and kept speaking into the universe to not get stuck, as there was no one around her who would know how to pull her out of it.

Less than half an hour later, Elara opened the doors to the so-called waiting room, where she was greeted by her younger self. Incredibly cheerful, she was drawing ugly caricatures of Pansy on the floor.

"She has a hideous nose," little Elara giggled as she observed the older version walk in, staring at her drawings on the ground.

"She looks better here than she does in real life," older Elara pointed at one of the drawings, in which Pansy's face was drawn on top of a dog.

Walking over to blue painted doors, Elara listened to a very familiar humming coming from behind them.

"Oh. You're going there again. Don't worry, you're safe," the little Elara gave her words of encouragement as she noticed older Elara reached for the only doors that didn't lead to any different reality, but dreamworld instead.

And they weren't even her dreams. They were Draco's. Like before, older Elara didn't suspect a thing and her mini version kept quiet about it, letting her figure it out in her way at her pace.

Elara entered the room with a smile on her face, taking in one big and final breath as she squeezed her fists, entering the unknown. Momentarily blinded by the illuminating light, she walked in hands first, ready to grip onto the first thing she saw, or in the worst-case scenario, fight someone off.

As she adjusted to the light, she observed her surroundings. Somewhere in the Forbidden Forest, she assumed she was quite close to the lake as the sun bounced off something in the distance. She didn't recognize the place immediately, as she had never been there before. Thinking that her other version of herself, in a different reality which she believed she was in, had some business to do there, she began exploring the area. It didn't take her long to reach the pier, which leads into the Great Lake, located underneath Hogwarts.

"Not you again," she groaned to herself, noticing the figure sitting at the end of the pier. Walking over to him quietly, she gave herself away as the wooden boards squealed beneath her feet.

"Dotson! Thought I'd see you here sooner or later again," Draco greeted her, his eyes staring somewhere far in the distance.

"Why are we here?" She sat next to him, trying to distinguish the structure he had been staring at.