Simple Kind Of Life

The King's Daughter

Time was a problematic matter these days. Not knowing whether the way the seconds rolled quickly by was for the greater good or for the destruction that was going to take place when that time was up added to the scheme of it all.

If time kept speeding up that meant more of a chance of finding the answer—of finally being able to drop all the files scattered around them and put them back in the archives where they belonged: in the section of resolved cases.

But what if that time kept speeding and nothing came of it? What if all their hard work and concentration was for nothing? What if those eight days of digging deep and searching high were just useless? What if they just wasted all that time to end up where they had begun?

It was maddening, every second that ticked by mockingly on the clock, but Draco couldn't lose himself in that. He couldn't stop and ponder whether his work was going to help or be utterly useless. All he knew was that he had to keep trying. He had to keep his focus completely submerged into every minute that passed, especially because he had everything riding on it.

And that everything was his daughter.

"Are you ready?" Looking away from the photograph of his children on his desk, Draco was met with a pair of intense brown eyes.

It had been about a week and something since he was lifted from the bind Tanya Rowle had placed him under. It had been a week since he’d finally got the rhythm of his walk back, the function to his brain, and the control over the venom he spilt.

"Well?" Hermione repeated, looking warily at the man.

Taking one last glance at the photograph and taking a file of records off his desk, Draco headed towards the door where his wife waited for him. "Let's go,” he replied simply, something internally hurting as she gave him a blank stare in return and turned away from him.

She started walking ahead of him with a fast pace to her steps as she proceeded to leave him behind. She was unwilling to walk beside him like husband and wife or two worried parents. All he could hear between them was the clink, clink, clink of her heels and the breathing of their bodies from the distance. All he could see was the back of her head, her brown waves falling beautifully and sending the scent of cinnamon towards him. It was the smell of home that invaded his senses.

There were things that were still left unresolved, vital things, but what Draco knew this far was the reason why Tanya had lifted the spell during the moment she had. She knew perfectly well that it’d be more wasted time for Draco and Hermione and for the entire department that was subjected into this case if he tried to make amends to his marriage.

But that was the thing Tanya Rowle hadn’t counted on: that Draco would choose to ignore to fix things with his wife. He couldn’t, after all, because there was no time. Tanya had vanished with his daughter and Rose Weasley, and that was top priority than to explain to Hermione that she’d bewitched him.

Hermione was still unwilling to be around him unless it meant business. Draco could see that depression, that anger, that ineptitude that burned in her eyes every time he allowed himself to glance at her without shouting his truth. He knew what he had to do, then. Draco couldn't attempt to fix things while she suffered. Time passed by even more and that meant risking another one of their daughters. Especially when they had recieved terrible news about Demetria the night before.

Dean had notified them that Demetria's condition went from a neutral comatose state to something even worse. The charts started showing that Demi's barely-there signals of life were withering away and no Healer had a clue what to do next. And with a deep sympathetic expression and a few technical terms, Dean told the Malfoys that their youngest daughter did not have enough energy to sustain her own life, and that any minute now it’d be the end.