The Malfoy Project

𝟓𝟎 - 𝐖𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐋𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐁𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐡

¹

     Draco leads me out, in the opposite direction of the drawing room where Lucius and Narcissa still lounge, then down two flights of stairs. The whole time, he doesn't speak a word, striding with his hands firmly in his pockets. The silence is as thick as smoke. 

     Further and further we descend, down small staircases and narrow passageways. It's terribly dark in here, I think of remarking. Then I remember what the creature told me in my dream about talking too much.

     We come to what looks like the basement. The corners are piled high with what looks to be great tarp-covered mounds of disused furniture. A white face peeks out from under a flap — a cracked marble bust of a forgotten ancestor. Beside it, two broomsticks: a Nimbus 2000 and a newer one, both stiff with disuse. 

     We cross the floor to where a tall, heavy door waits in the darkness of the corner, half-hidden in shadow. I would not have seen it if he hadn't brought me to it.

     He points his wand to the heavy iron lock; the clacking of the unlocking mechanisms like thunder in the emptiness of the place. The door creaks open.

     The room on the other side is completely empty save for a stack of dusty crates and boxes that lined one wall, dimly lit from a sole window situated high above the ground. The belly of Malfoy Manor is as quiet as a tomb. I wonder if people have been tortured and murdered here.

     Have you brought me here to kill me? I want to joke. But it would have been in bad taste, and I quickly decided against it.

     I'm about to finally ask where we are when a silver glare blinds me, bright as a camera flash. When I blink it away, I realise it had come from a large mirror leaning against the far wall. It is nearly twice my height and just as wide, framed in burnished, twisting gold.

     "It's a Mirror of Erised." Draco's sudden voice bounces off the stone walls, trembling the musty air.

     I shake my head. "That's impossible. Dumbledore had it stored away after the war."

     "This is a different one. My parents acquired it at an auction years ago. It was broken, and they didn't find much use for it, but they were afraid Voldemort or the Death Eaters might, so it's been hidden down here ever since. I've been... I fixed it. Last night."

     "And you're showing it to me..." Because I have no parents? Because I wanted so desperately to be a journalist? I don't even know what to ask.

     Draco's eyes flicker over my face briefly. "You said you missed Cedric."

     The breath catches in my throat. He steps back, clearing my path to the mirror. "I can't bring him back from the dead," he says, "but at least this way, you can still see him, sort of."

     My feet feel like they have grown roots into the cement floor. From the corner of my eye, the mirror beckons me; inviting. I don't dare to look. I don't even dare to breathe.

     What if I see Cedric as he was when Harry had brought him back from the Tournament? What if I see him as he was in his casket? Pale, pale blue, and unmoving in liveless sleep, his eyes and jaws snapped shut by the mortician.

     Or worse — what if I see myself sitting at a desk, one behind a glass door? Calmly watching as Lucy the receptionist tells someone that I am busy and that they will have to make an appointment; toying with my nameplate with a sly, triumphant smile. Gabriella Ainsley, Editor, it would say. Weaver of Lies. Conjuror of Falsehoods and Gossip.