Chapter 3

Draco scrubbed himself quickly, trying not to look anywhere but at Cecilia's face. Her skin was pale, with an unhealthy undertone of gray that made him nervous, her lips bloodless, except for the vivid red gash where her teeth had ripped it open. He fumbled for his wand, muttering a Cleaning Charm on the heavy robes he'd discarded before throwing them back over his wet body. He knelt at the edge of the tub, and tentatively put his hand on her shoulder.

"Cecilia," she said quietly. Her eyes flickered open and she flinched away from his touch, losing her precarious position and slipping under the water. She struggled back up, gasping and choking on inhaled liquid. Draco patted her back and waited until the coughing fit had passed before reaching for the soap and washcloth again.

"I can do it," she protested, fumbling for the cloth with a hand that still twitched and jerked. Her fingers spasmed and the cloth fell through it, earning a curse that would have made Draco chuckle if it hadn't been so pathetically weak.

"Better let me," he stated, and took the cloth up again over her protests. He kept his eyes firmly on her face as he washed her body clean, both of them humiliated. "Sit up," he said brusquely, reaching for the shampoo. She managed to come upright, arms wrapped around her knees, and huddled in a miserable ball as he worked the soap through her hair. His fingers found the tender lump where her head had struck the floor and she sucked in a breath through her teeth, muttering something in a slurring, liquid language.

"Why did you fight him?" he finally asked, sluicing warm water over her head from a cut glass pitcher. "You had to know..."

"That's why I did it." Her words were blurred with water and exhaustion, her fingers barely twitching when she tried to gesture. "Because he would do it, and because I'd rather take the pain than what he's offering."

"He's your father."

"No." Her eyes blazed up at him, wild, insane blue, and her battered mouth curled into a sneer of disgust. "He's not my father- he's the sperm donor- and what he is now isn't even that. He killed my mother, killed my grandmother, with his evil. He'll kill me too before I willingly give him anything."

Draco thought of his father, locked in a cold cell in Azkaban, of his mother with her frantic eyes and bitter aura of despair and rage. She's right, he destroys everything he touches, he thought.

But he offers such power, a sly voice whispered in his mind. And the power is worth the price.

"We should get you into bed," he said aloud.