XVIII

"CRUCIO!!" Draco yelled into the cool air and swung his wand at Harry, who simple dissolved the spell with a swish of his wand.

"Confringo!" Harry pointed the tip at his opponent. Draco tried to divert it with a wind spell, but was too late and the curse spiralled towards him, only to dissolve at the ring's barrier.

"Is that all you've got?!" Hether-no, Harry laughed. "No wonder you can't do anything right by the dark lord. Explu-"

"Petrificus Total-" Draco cut him off, but he was quicker.

"NULIFERUS" Harry aimed his wand at the curse, nullifying it. Draco blinked. All the anger that had piled up within him dissipated and crumbled to nothing. There was only one person who had ever used the nullifying spell, and it wasn't Potter.

"Hether?" Draco frowned, and she rolled her eyes. Was there absolutely no way she could detach his emotions from his will? She opened her mouth to sneer but closed it when she looked into his eyes. They were broken, shattered by many mixed emotions. Hate. Anger. Envy. Sadness. Fear. They had all jumbled together to form one mass of despair. For one of the few times in her existence, Hether felt bad.

Her shoulders relaxed. "Yes, it's me. I'm sorry, Draco. I had too."

He looked destroyed. She blamed herself for becoming attached to him. Consoling humans at their lowest was something she wasn't skilled at.

"That'll be all for today," she spun around so she wouldn't have to see his face. "We'll pick up day-after-tomorrow. You should get some rest."

He didn't hold her hand the way he did before as they apparated. As soon as they reached the bathroom, he let go of it like it was a plague, and with a flourish of his robes, stormed out of the bathroom.

Hether sighed and rubbed her temple. Well done, the voice in her head nagged. Now he hates you. She shook her head to remove the thoughts. Father wouldn't be pleased that she resorted to that method. He wouldn't be pleased at all.

Draco walked with quick steps across the school and up into the astronomy tower. His legs ached with each brutal step and begged for him to stop and take a break, but he refused. So that people would see him weak, at a low? He scowled. He had himself to blame for being weak. Father always said he was weak, but he felt that was simply because he was never pleased by anything. Now Draco knew that he was truly weak.

He threw open the door to the top of the tower. He would show them he wasn't weak. He would kill Dumbledore. He knew the dark lord wanted him out of the way.

Draco looked up and out into the scenery and his scowl deepened.

"What are you doing here?" He spat.

The person turned to face him and he recoiled. It was that girl with the infection; the outcast.

"I came to think. Or am I now restricted from this area?" she scowled.

Draco narrowed his eyes. "Get out of here, you mudblood scum. Why don't you go think with the muggles you so love?"

Pain flashed in her eyes for a second before they hardened. The girl didn't say anything, but picked up a broad black bag that had been lying on the floor and left.

Draco let out a deep breath when he could no longer hear her footsteps and leant on the railing. He wanted to scream. He wanted to scream so that everything would crumble and fall; he wanted to scream so that at the very bottom of the rubble would be Potter's lifeless body.

And perhaps Hether's as well.

Veja didn't take orders from anybody. Not from the students, not from the staff, not from the figurehead that called himself the headmaster, and especially not from some white-haired cheapskate like Draco Malfoy.

They had no right to tell her to get out; to call her an infectious scum, to tell her to go back where she came from.

They had no right to tell her it was going to be okay, because it wasn't. they had no right to tell her to hang in there, because she had cut the ropes long ago.

They had no right to tell her to look on the bright side, because the darkness was all that she knew. It was everywhere around her – she saw it with the morning sun; she saw it as the moon rose.

The only voice she listened to was the one in her head. It was the one that gave her the flashes of reality, and it was the one who soothed her when everything was cold.

She crashed into someone hard, and fell to the ground just as hard. Her thoughts came to a screeching halt as she prepared her mind to take whatever was thrown at her. Veja groaned and scrambled for her bag, head lowered to the ground. The silence that followed was unnerving. Had she become so accustomed to the insults that they became as like white noise to her? She waited and waited, but it never came.

Finally, she looked up. It was the silent girl whom Draco had started dating. What a strange girl, they both thought. For Veja, it was because the girl hadn't said anything, but was simply looking down at her on the floor. Perhaps she was waiting for an apology? She looked as if she could hex her for life without so much as a word if she didn't render an apology.

For Hether, it was because she couldn't see anything. She couldn't see the girl's face – she had a thick bush of hair that fell around her face and partially hid every feature. She couldn't see the girl's mind either – it was something she naturally observed about people, like the colour of their hair or the colour of their shirt. But where her mind was supposed to be, was a blank wall. A blank, black wall. As Hether watched, she rose slowly from the ground, avoiding her eyes.

"Look at me."

Veja blinked. Was it compassion she heard? Or was it spite masked so pitifully that it sounded like she cared? A part of her refused to meet her eyes, but a part of her was curious. Her voice didn't have the normal taunting tone that others had, or the spiteful drip that she was used to hearing. So, she looked.

Like her, she was black. Black like the shadows, black like the soil she had been pushed into before, black like her mother's eyes were as of oft. Hether didn't say anything, but looked at her. Her future, she could tell, was bright. She would leave Hogwarts and find someone who liked her as she was, and would live the life she had always wanted.

The future was bright, but the look on her face said otherwise. Hether did not wish to interfere – it was not her problem to solve. She stepped out of the girl's path and continued on her way to the common room.

"You won't say anything?" Veja frowned at the girl's black robe.

Hether paused. "There is nothing to say."

It was as if she almost felt pity for the fate Veja had been resigned to. Yet she didn't seem to care – she would probably marry Draco and spawn more conceited Malfoys. Veja turned and continued on her way, head down.