Of Doves and Dragons

Chapter Thirty-six: Patchworked Past

"They said I'm going nowhere, tried to count me out. Took those sticks and stones, showed them I could build a house."

-Katy Perry, Daisies

Draco immediately grabbed Ember's arm. He wasn't sure why that was his first instinct, but the cold distant look in her eyes juxtaposing the intense panic attack she had only just been on the edge of, with the apparently not-so-random reveal of his mother-in-law gave him caution.

Olivia blinked harshly before searching the area around them. She angled her body sideways, invitingly and spoke anxiously, "Get inside."

Draco looked around them too. The cottage was on the outskirts of a town, the closest building was a house a quarter mile away. Unfortunately they needed a place to lay low, to figure out where they were, and so he made the executive decision.

He urged Ember, who had feet made of cement, towards the door keeping a firm grip of her arm. They shuffled through the doorway, and he kept a skeptical eye on the woman he had only seen once before. He didn't trust her, and certainly had a multitude of things he wanted to mouth off at her, but he had to trust that somewhere buried in the depths of her black heart she didn't want her baby to die.

Olivia shut the door behind them and wrapped her cardigan around her tightly, shifting in her place, without words to say. "Why are you two here?"

"Where is here?" Draco asked, eremitic.

"This is home." Ember answered, staring at the decorations littering every inch of the walls. Her eyes fell to her stranger of a mother. "Or was one of them." She said patronizingly.

Draco vigilantly looked between the two Knight women and instantly felt as if he was out of place, before settling on Olivia for any sort of confirmation. The woman ignored him almost entirely as she stared at the remains of her daughter with disquieted eyes. "Let's speak in the sitting room."

She turned and led the way down the narrow hallway. Ember begrudgingly followed, taking in the comfort of Draco behind her and inhaled deeply. It was meant to calm her down but instead she stumbled to a stop, choking on the familiar smell of cedar. Draco's chest hit her back at the abrupt stop.

Ember started shaking, clinging to anything to keep her from seemingly disconnecting into a panic attack or instinctively apparating. The scent attacked her and unlocked another line of memories; little moments, jumbled together, connected by an invisible string flashing before her eyes. She whimpered at the onslaught, the pain in her head forming into nauseating pressure.

Draco grabbed her shoulders to steady her. He wanted to ask her if she was okay, but clearly she wasn't and instead he settled for whispering in her ear, "It's going to be okay." He kept a hand at the base of her spine and pressed her forward.

He would make sure it was okay. He wasn't going to let anything happen to her in this house. The first sign of any aggression, he was hexing Olivia and getting Ember the hell out of there.

The sitting room was dressed as exotically as the entry way. For a family that had seemed to be on the run, they had an impressive collection of unnecessary items. All of it seemed impersonal, things draped over to cover the fact that there were no pictures and no noteworthy collectibles.

Ember moved in a fog to sit down on the couch, bringing Draco forcibly down beside her, across from her skittish mother. Her neurons were firing at an alarming rate to the point where she couldn't quite focus on one thing. Her senses were oversaturated and she could have sworn she had broken her toe on the monkey statue sitting in the corner of the room in her youth.