Gravity

Chapter 11

It started with Draco walking down a dark, wet hallway. At first, he saw only a door before him, at the end of the hall, and nothing around him but a black void. As he walked, the details filled in. The floor was concrete, with cracks running across it like the rungs of a ladder. The walls were plaster, cracked along the edges, revealing the brickwork beneath. He could hear water dripping somewhere in perfect time.

Drip. Drip. ... Drip. Drip ...Drip. Drip.

As the entire hallway came into focus, he realized the building was one he'd been in before, many times, and Draco was completely and utterly terrified. Panic and fear had twisted his nerves into a frayed mess in the pit of his stomach, resulting in labored breathing and sweaty palms. The abandoned warehouse on the river near the Channel was where the Dark Lord flexed his more creatively evil muscles.

Behind him was a steel grey door that magically led onto the most twisted, narrow passageway in Knockturn Alley. In front of him was a black door, the other side of which promised discomfort at best, excruciating pain at worst. Never death through this door; that one was red. After passing the halfway point, he noticed that it seemed to be staying a fixed distance before him, and he could no longer approach it. Draco's heart rate sped up and he clenched his hand so tightly around his wand that he feared he would puncture his skin. Frantically, he started to run, but the door didn't move any closer.

There was a sound of hollow laughter to his right and he jumped, startled. Keep moving. He started again, to more laughter. Draco glanced at the floor, hoping for some explanation of why the door loomed at the same distance, only to discover that his feet weren't moving. He'd taken steps in inches instead of feet. His heart pounded.

There was no return from the black door and Draco knew it. The hallway was one way and he'd been there many times. On each visit during the war, his thoughts had turned progressively more toward running, not just from the door but from everything behind it, everything it stood for, but he couldn't leave his duty, his destiny.

Draco stopped running and stared at the door.

Then he was in the enormous room on the other side, standing in the middle, a bright light shining down on him. A blood-stained guillotine stood behind him to the right of the door. A rack was hidden behind the red curtains to his left. Devices that hadn't even been given names were in rooms that branched from the one where he stood. He knew; he'd seen them all in action. He'd put men and women in those rooms, been the direct cause of their suffering and heard the screams as the tortured begged for mercy, offered information, money, anything to end the suffering.

Hollow laughter rang in his ears and he moved forward, always forward, toward the source of the blinding pain in his arm. A monster with red, slitted eyes awaited him.

Draco.

Bile rose toward Draco's mouth and he swallowed hard. The snakelike creature's movements were as fluid as water, deadly and swift.

Closer, Draco.

Draco had no choice but to comply. He walked with as much purpose as he could muster and ended up shuffling his feet. An unknown force propelled him and he stopped at the foot of the dark, stone rock out of which a throne had been carved.

Bow.

When Draco was on his knees, the Dark Lord snapped his fingers, something he only did when he was very, very angry. Every fiber of Draco's being was stretched taut.

We have a new victim. She is ... for you.

Draco knew he should be grateful - he'd been given the honor of taking a life - but he knew something was wrong. He hadn't done anything especially outstanding to deserve the gift.

Bring her.

The blood flowing through Draco's heart-pumped though his vena cavae, into the veins of his arms, legs, fingers, and toes, transferred to the capillaries and oxygenated in the lungs, then back to his heart to begin the cycle anew-froze at the sight of the broken, bloodied woman who was dragged into the room between two Death Eaters.

He knew her. He screamed ...

And sat straight up in bed, chest heaving, gulping in air by the lungful, drenched in sweat.

Directly opposite his bed, hanging on the wall, was the painting Hermione had given him. It was the first thing his eyes landed on and he stared at it, unblinking, focused on one particular star that pulsed with the rhythm of the sea, until his vision cleared and he couldn't see the images from his nightmare.

When the horror passed, Draco fell back onto his bed, limp and spent. The sun was rising; he could tell by the color of the light on the wall. He had no desire to get up, no desire to think or move or breathe. All he wanted was to forget, to be free.

He started to shiver. When he'd sat up, the blankets that had been clutched to his chest had fallen to his waist and he had left them there. Now the sweat on his skin was evaporating, chilling him. Draco absently pulled the covers to his chin, staring at the painting, scared to fall back asleep.