Chapter Text
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"Human behaviour flows from three main sources: desire, emotion, and knowledge."
- Plato (The Republic, 375 BC)
"We appear to be at an impasse," The Dark Lord spoke coolly.
Not an eye in the damp, stone room dared to peer. Group meetings were rare post war. Whatever the topic, it couldn't have been good.
Draco, fortunately, couldn't care less.
His bored eyes of grey found his father – frazzled and full of fear; nothing new then. His glare continued and circled around the room of death eaters old and new. For some, the winning of the war had given fuel to their extremisms. Most who joined his ranks now did so simply for safety. In a world the Dark Lord had ruled with a totalitarian iron fist for five years, anyone who opposed him was either dead or in hiding.
Draco's views were simply neutral. He cared not for muggles nor wizards at this point. His family was broken, his friends either slain or gravely changed. For half a decade, he had been floating with no purpose.
He paused his scanning at The Dark Lord himself. He had grown weary with time, his pale, placid skin vacuumed tight to his bones. A shell of a man that would not die. The frail lord rubbed two long, bony fingers together, as if he were trying to rid a sticky substance from them that displeased him, then continued to speak at a leisurely pace:
"It has been brought to my attention that a new prophecy has been made."
Hushed whispers filled the room, quickly silenced as Voldemort raised a skeletal palm upwards.
"It was rather displeasing," he nodded at a scrawny Stan Shunpike – an apt replacement for his favoured (now deceased) thrall, Pettigrew. Both were ratty, complacent and appropriately terrified of their master.
Stan shakily pulled a white glowing orb from his dark robes, cleared phlegm from his throat, and tapped the glass thrice with his wand. Through his own gravelly voice, he spoke the prophecy:
"The year turns… and one long overlooked, with forgotten knowledge, lost to the past, shall rise… The Lord of Darkness awaits… the clash shall kill them both… Shadows scatter… light seeps through the veil… Yet destiny twists… it is not the chosen hand… not the hand the world foresees… Still… the chosen hand… still… the end."
The Dark Lord's already thin lips became a pencil line – for a man that feared so little, this irked him. Quite right too, a prophecy was not to be taken lightly.
"Some of you may recall, after the death of our dear Harry Potter, the rebels were captured. Most killed or enslaved." A slither of a smirk appeared at last on the man's lips – the recollection of the deaths amusing him. "Potter's closest allies were captured for extraction of information. Unfortunately, due to an unforeseen set of circumstances, a handful escaped. Not far, admittedly, but to the wrong room, certainly."
Voldemort paused to crack his weak neck, closing his eyes in annoyance. When they opened, they found Draco's father.
"Lucius, as it was your mistake, would you care to continue?"
Malice laced The Dark Lord's tone, making his father's throat bob with a dry swallow.
"It could not be helped, My Lord, the girl… she was stron–"
"I did not ask for excuses, Lucius. I asked for explanation."
Lucius nodded solemnly, his eyes now glued to the stone floor.
"With the… admittedly great power of some of the prisoners, we chose to store them in the department of mysteries. The walls were fortified and there were plenty of… instruments that eased our extraction."
Eased our torturing, Draco thought; wishing he wouldn't honey-coat the atrocities performed by those present.
"Most stayed captured and have since passed."
Murdered.
"But I regret, a handful escaped. Not that they got very far," Lucius hurriedly said, daring to look up to their master. "Those guarding managed to corner them in another room."
"And what did that room hold?" The Dark Lord teased, reaching down from the velvet armchair he lounged in to place an affectionate stroke to Nagini.
"Time turners."
"I thought they were destroyed seven years ago after the students broke into the ministry?" one of the Carrows asked.
"Indeed," Lucius said. "They were unstable. Broken. We only collected them to be later fixed. Only an idiot would be stupid enough to use them."
Or desperate enough, Draco thought.
"They escaped at a great cost, they're almost certainly dead, My Lord."
"Lost things can be found," Voldemort said, paying close attention to scratching the right side of his snake's head.
"Surely not?"
"It seems some survived."
"Which? Not the girl?" Lucius asked.
"The girl."
Not a soul needed to ask which girl. They knew.
Granger.
For someone so young, skinny and quite frankly, lacking in the greater blood, she had become a constant source of irritation for The Dark Lord. She was alive in whispers and rumours. Draco, of course, knew of the Time Turner mishap. One could only assume she died. But in her disappearance, she had been made a martyr to the masses. Tales of a friend of Potter's with a knowledge that would put an end to the reign of darkness passed from town to town. In five years, Draco had travelled around every inch of the world hearing these folk-tales, doing the bidding of his master without question. Any hesitation would only cause dire consequences for his mother, who had been hanging by a thread since her incorrect assumption of death of Potter. Had The Dark Lord not checked his pulse with his own two fingers and finished him off with a second killing curse, the boy who lived could have caused much mischief.
Secretly, in the depths of the night, with the blood of innocents on his robes, Draco wished he would have. That they lived in a very different future. Not one whose only solace was a prayer to a long-assumed 'dead woman' bearing the power of knowledge.
Granger was not dead though… now that was interesting.
"We found traces of her in ancient history, pinpointed her location in time. She's the only logical person the prophecy could be about," The Dark Lord said.
"Who else survived?" Mundungus Fletcher asked, cowering in fear as his master's sights locked on him.
"Why do you care, Fletcher? Looking to rekindle a friendship?"
"Not at all, My Lord. Just curious is all."
"It matters not, it could only be her. If the prophecy has any weight of truth at all, that is."
"The Time Turners were severely unstable. They would break apart with one use. If she did manage to make it back to a moment in time, who knows the state she would be in," Lucius continued. "Our best wizards of time magic have examined the remaining devices and reported the subject, assuming survival, would almost certainly lose most their memories, experience extreme disorientation, and potential splinching."
"Nasty business," Mundungus muttered.
"It is highly unlikely that Granger will be a threat under her current condition," Lucius finished.
"Unlikely, but not impossible," Voldemort said plainly. "That is why I feel it is best we pay her a visit." A curl snaked at the corner of the pale man's lips. A plan forming before them.
"My Lord, it is impo–"
"Not impossible at all. Do you not have access to one of Nott's own Time Turners?"
"It only allows for five-minutes… not nearly enough time."
Voldemort shook his head coolly, a smirk still etched on his face. "Not that one. The other, you must know what I am referring to? Or did you forget that I see all, Lucius? There are no secrets amongst friends."
Draco fought to stifle a laugh at the insinuation that any man or woman in the room was a self-proclaimed friend of Voldemort. He doubted a soul in existence had once uttered the term for the man before them. But humour quickly disappeared when the reality of what he was alluding to sunk in. Theodore Nott, a real friend of Draco's, had indeed meddled with time. They assumed it was in secret, he had always been careful with his experiments. Nott disappeared post-war, assumed dead in the battle of Hogwarts that promptly ended with the death of Potter. He wasn't present at Hogwarts, but the fighting had bled into the ministry, where he was housed at the time of the battle; it would have been easy to kill a quiet death eater – only the loud ones left a trace. Until now, that was. Draco had never expected The Dark Lord to know of him, let alone speak his name.
"He made another. But… again, it is likely unstable. All vetted devices were destroyed. Besides, it is… missing."
"Missing?" Voldemort's voice went up an octave.
Lucius nodded, hiding a tremble of fear by pulling his fingers into a fist.
"Well, that is not good. I was hoping for you both to go."
"Both?" Lucius asked, looking up from the floor.
"Indeed. We found the Time Turner the Mudblood used in her third year."
"So, if we have a time turner, why not simply kill the girl the year before the battle?" Dolohov chirped, his molars grinding with the pleasing prospect of killing Granger. He always had a thirst for young mudbloods.
"Oh, it's unstable," Voldemort chuckled. "Why do you think they ended up thousands of years in the past. The only active ones were time-locked. One way travel – if they survived," Voldemort said coolly. "Granger's old device was less affected due to more recent use. I am told it could manage the trip and back. Perhaps," he added.
"And you wish for me to go?" Lucius asked, his eyes growing wide.
"No," The Dark Lord purred. "Your son."
All faces turned to face the, so far ignored, ashen haired wizard at the end of the room.
Draco, slightly taken aback, but not overtly moved, flexed his shoulders and locked eyes with the most feared man in the world.
"Not the boy," Draco's mother whispered. "I’ll go."
Voldemort chuckled at the motherly love. "To let you feign another kill? No. Think it an apt punishment for your errors."
"I'll go," Draco announced with little emotion.
"That a boy," Voldemort said. "You could put some pride back in your family name after all."
"It could kill him," Lucius choked.
"Yes."
"There's a great chance he would lose his memory or meaning once there?"
"Yes."
"And you still wish for my son to go?"
Voldemort flexed his thin arms in his armchair, shooing Nagini away with an artful flick of his wrist. "Your son has killed a satisfactory amount for me over the years. Top of the ranks of our own breed of Aurors, am I not correct, Draco?"
It was a fact the youngest Malfoy was not proud of. The only way he had continued over the years was to remain neutral in his own motives. The only thing that spurred him on was that if he failed, his mother would be first to go. The Dark Lord cultivated weaknesses and used them against every follower. And now, he was doing it again. If Draco refused, Voldemort would simply kill his father and ask him again, further refusal, his mother, then Astoria (though that loss wouldn't pain him too much) and so it would continue until he agreed. It was easier to cut his losses and consent now. Save for further bloodshed.
"I agree, can we move on?" Draco said.
"You've raised a spiky boy," Voldemort laughed with a croak, "I rather like him."
Draco shivered at the praise from the man he had grown to despise.
"You have tonight to set your affairs in order. I give you that kindness."
What a kind monster you are, Draco thought.
"Report back to me tomorrow morning and be ready."
Draco nodded, and with that, the room began to hastily disband. Many of the death-eaters scurried to the exit, some stuck around to add to their air of ease – though the long hairs that remained erect on the back of their necks proved otherwise.
Narcissa approached Draco quickly; her body language calm but her eyes betraying her. Terror pooled her grey pupils. She took his hand, and threaded her cold fingers through his, pulling her son along with her to the open door.