Love Bites (Harry Potter: Official Dragon Tamer, Part One)

Swan Dive

Friday - Late Evening
30 October 2009
Draco's POV

I arrived at the Ministry a few moments later, wondering what could have possibly occurred to require a goddamned summons now, at nearly eleven pm on the eve of a goddamned holiday.

Instead of heading to our offices on the ninth level, I exited the lift at level two and made my way to Department Head Bones' office.

The wizarding world had let out a collective sigh of relief when she'd reappeared after Voldemort's defeat, having cleverly staged her own demise and going into hiding upon learning of the target put out on her.

I'd been a bit nervous... alright, terrified, during my interview with her.

I mean, here I was, the son of Lucius Malfoy, one of the top-ranking Death Eaters, an ex-Death-Eater myself, applying for a position that, literally, reported to almost no one within the entire goddamned ministry, and even then, very rarely.

Bones, true to all reports, proved to be wise, fair, and, most importantly, forgiving, and, well... the rest, as far as my career was concerned, was history.

Entering Department Head Bones' regular office usually wasn't very difficult, so long as you had an appointment and her secretary buzzed you in.

Entering the small, private office reserved for her briefings with Unspeakables?

Nearly impossible unless you had every right to be there.

I walked up to the door and pressed the tip of my wand to the small coil in the ornately carved panel of wood that was encrypted with intricate spells enabling it to read my wand.

I had to stoop slightly to position my eye to stare passively into a second whirl on the door that ensured my eyes were my eyes, no matter what glamour I might arrive in; a third swirl read my fingerprint, something that did not change, even with Polyjuice, fascinatingly enough.

I always felt like such a graceless twat standing there for those few seconds, crouching the awkward dozen or so centimetres to line my eyes up with the one reader, my left arm reaching across to hold my wand up to the wand reader, while my right crossed back towards the finger reader on the left, because of course, like everything else in this world, it was designed for right-handed, short people.

A quick, horizontal laser of light flashed down the entire portal, which, morbidly enough, was used to ensure that these three parts of me were attached to one singular body and not being held up by two or three individuals trying to gain access.

To be honest, that was always a rather squicky image to have right before entering these meetings.

"Good evening, Agent Malfoy," Department Head Bones greeted me, rising from her desk.

"Evening," I replied, eyes flicking down to where Williams sat in one of the chairs facing Bones' desk.

The fuck was he doing here?

I usually went on these sorts of missions alone... that was kind of the point.

He gave me a little, half-hearted wave and a quick shrug, informing me that he, too, was wondering the same thing.

"I'm sending you both on this because it pertains to the Erised case," Bones began, taking a seat behind her desk and shuffling through some parchment on her desk.

"You'll be reporting to a Muggle crime scene, down in Clapham, the coordinates should be appearing on your mobiles shortly.

"Use your Ministry-appointed MI5 glamours. The Muggle police are expecting your arrival."