History education has failed our children. If you can not fathom HOW something happened, only THAT it happened, it is doomed to happen again.
And we are seeing it right now in the massive upswing of misogyny, xenophobia and nationalism.
You think women got the right to vote by signing petitions? Women were jailed, tortured, humiliated, murdered and painted as crazy by all media. Ring any bells? Does this seem strangely familiar?
When you fight for your rights, the only way is violence. If the education system actually cared about our future and improving society they would be honest about it. Rights are won by outright war against the establishment. Not begging, not asking, not fucking, not behaving. Violence.
I am horrified at the indifference of the whole world, at the silence of the Red Cross and inaction of the blemished UN.
They could put pressure on Hamas to free the hostages. Instead, they support inane students with their abysmal ignorance and their support of Hamas (they dare chant “We are Hamas!”). A real nightmare.
You were perched on a pillow on the floor of the common room, the emerald flicker of evening flames illuminating the pages of some forgotten relic of a book that nobody had probably read in the last century. But you did.
Draco gulped, fingertips itching to grab the bundled stack of papers in his robe pocket, brittle sheets delicately wrapped in dragonhide.
He’d arrived late, curfew prowling for the Inquisitorial Squad always pushing him well past when his housemates had fallen asleep. Except for you, who appeared to spend the pre-weekend evening face first in some book or another.
That’s how it always was with you, always a book.
Yet for some horrific reason he wanted to talk to you. And he was terrified you wouldn’t want that.
How had he arrived at this juncture in his life? Sweating at the prospect of speaking to a girl he’d been attempting to understand for months? A girl who, by all intentions, probably wouldn’t care about his conversation in the slightest? Like the great stories she read in dusty, leather bound books, it took time.
It began in First Year.
Most Slytherins possessed an appreciation for traditional things, but you were… different.
You were quiet and tended to keep to yourself. That wasn’t particularly un-Slytherin of you, but it certainly didn’t help people understand the rather bizarre interests that flighted your fancy. Namely, old literature.
Most of your housemates couldn’t be bothered with you, something that appeared to bother neither you nor them. Well, mostly.
When Parkinson mentioned it at dinner a few weeks after the sorting ceremony, Draco hadn’t thought much of it. “She reads all these strange books,” she hissed, squinting down the table at you where you sat drinking pumpkin juice, nose tucked in a leather-bound book.
Draco shrugged. “What’s the matter with it?”
Glaring at him, Pansy reached for her goblet, held it like a wine glass, mimicking the high-society women she’d studied, the ones she would one day become. “It’s terrible. The first few weeks we’re supposed to make friends. She surely hasn’t made any.”
“Are you offering?” Goyle asked, digging into a piece of pie.
She upturned her nose. “Hardly.”
And that was that.
Until Fourth Year.
Parkinson had dropped into her seat for breakfast. It was the day after returning for the year, and Draco had hardly given himself time to think of what the year’s woes would bring. Thankfully, she was able to clue him in.
“It’s awful,” she lamented, stabbing a strawberry with her fork. “I’m roomed with that horrid bookworm!”
“What’s wrong with that?” Draco asked, glancing toward your spot at the far end of the table. Somehow you’d claimed it in First Year; nobody bothered to deny it to you since. “At least she’s quiet.”
She rolled her eyes. “She never leaves her room except for class! I’ll never have any time to myself.”
Crabbe chuckled. “Maybe it would do you good to stop shagging everyone in the girls’ dormitory.”
A huff. An irritated glare. Okay, maybe joking wasn’t going to rectify Parkinson’s issue.
“I’m sure you could ask her,” Goyle offered. “She seems fine.”
“She’s probably a loon,” she whispered, “Nose always in a book. Hardly talks to anyone.”
“I’ve only seen her talk with Loony Lovegood.” Crabbe bit into his toast, hoping confirming her opinions would shut Parkinson up.
She gestured toward Crabbe, a delicate movement that didn’t match the frustration in her voice. “See! And I have to room with her for the year!”
“Find out what she reads,” Draco insisted. “Then we’ll know what she’s up to.”
After three weeks of classes, Pansy was spilling the latest girl she’d been flirting with, and Draco’s mind snapped back to their earlier conversation.
“Did you ever find out what (Y/L/N) likes to read?”
“Oh,” she shrugged, waving a dismissive hand. “She goes through them so quickly. There was a Burbage I think, then a Eunice, a few Leontines or something of the sort. She said they weren’t Muggle; we wouldn’t still be rooming together if they were. But I don’t know who they are. Anyway, back to Ava. You wouldn’t believe what she said!”
But Draco lost interest after that. Whatever Parkinson had been trying to say slipped past his mind as words like Burbage and Leontines flickered through his mind.
He found them in the library over the weekend. On shelves coated with a thick layer of dust, he found ancient philosophies, texts on politics, memoirs of the first magic users.
At least you were erudite; something he certainly couldn’t say about Parkinson, Crabbe, or Goyle.
He kept an eye on you after that, followed your fingerprints as they trailed the dusty covers. Suddenly, there was a lot more he wanted to read this year other than textbooks. Sometimes he would purposely arrive to class late, just to peek at the title of your latest book. He wanted to understand the knowledge you were cleaving to.
Over summer holiday, Draco found himself perusing his father’s private library, asking about authors well beyond his father’s years. Tired of the pestering, his father unveiled a new room to him. At least, new to him.
“This was my father’s old study,” he stated. That curt tone disguising the pang that went through his chest at the sight of the dusty old desk and barren chairs. “Do with the materials as you will.” With a great swoosh, he disappeared down the hall.
Draco hardly came up for air that summer, drowned in swirling scripts and reprinted texts. It nearly took his mother dragging him from the room for any Fifth Year preparations to be made.
But it had led up to this moment, staring at you as the green light painted the high points of your cheeks, dancing against the tips of your lashes. It felt like now or never; like his first time on a broom, he just had to take that faithful step.
“What are you reading?” he asked, voice slicing through the silence. Suddenly his heartbeat was drowning out the cracking of the fire, the distant rumble of rain on the lake’s surface echoing down, down down--
“Junius,” you said, staring at him with surprised eyes.
This was a test. He had to know what to say.
“Seems a bit late for inquisitions into ethereal magic, wouldn’t you say?”
You glanced down, shutting the frayed cover. “Perhaps. I would’ve gone to bed eventually.”
A silence lulled between you, awkward, unnerving.
“I brought you a book.” The words jumped out of him before he had time to consider what he was saying.
You arched a brow as he fetched the brittle pages, holding them out toward her, closer than before, though he couldn’t remember getting closer. “It’s Quantavius. An original.”
He could see the curiosity washing across your face, practically pulling you to the pages. “And how do you know I like Quantavius?”
“I know things,” he shrugged, delight pinging through his chest like confetti before his internal celebration deflated.
You looked away. “I can’t.” Suddenly the book was being pushed back toward him, you were standing uncomfortably, glancing toward the exit.
He tried to stop his face from falling, but it was harder said than done. “Why?”
“I don’t want to owe you, Malfoy.”
His brow furrowed. “Owe me?”
“You’re on the Inquisitorial Squad.” Your eyes burned with challenge, his pulse jumped. “I don’t want to owe you.”
“It’s important that I’m on the Squad,” he shot back. “Someone has to push back against those idiots causing terror.”
You shook your head. He couldn’t blame you; even he couldn’t believe the bullshit he was spouting. “You know that’s wrong.”
“It’s what Professor Umbridge wants,” he argued, chest aching as he knew his chances with you were slipping from his grasp. “It’s what’s right for the school.”
“Sophronia,” you said, waiting for the recognition to pool in his eyes, a recognition that did not come. “Not everything that’s encouraged is right. You still have a lot to learn, Malfoy.”
You vanished up the stairs before he could say another word.
For those who didn’t know, I went to a Christian school for my high school education (7th grade to 12th grade) but I was definitely not Christian. This is only important for two reasons 1) there were May fellow students who were not allowed to be taught evolution or anything about dinosaurs (something many kids would learn in 1st or 2nd grade). 2) the people I still hang out with we’re not raised Christian ether.
Now what would you expect me to think when one of them confessed that they didn’t believe that dinosaurs existed. What would you do if someone who was studying to be a nurse and had taken biology classes with told you “I always thought that dinosaurs were mythical creatures similar to monsters and dragons.” I genuinely thought they were kidding as we both went through all that education and both were raised similarly dispute going to a Christian school. But then she said this and that was when I knew she was serious. In 8th grade we went to a museum for a seminar on I think the planets or a local bird species (it was a case study subject). As we made our way through the museum there was a section dedicated to dinosaurs, that was when they realise people were serious about dinosaurs and their experiences.
She is still confused and is now asking for some old books and documentaries I have as to get a further understanding.
Series Masterlist: The Failed Education of One Draco Malfoy
Pairing: Draco Malfoy / Female Reader
Summary: Everyone has a story to tell. When Draco discovers a Slytherin girl with some odd reading habits, he realizes it may be time to find the library.
Rating: Teen and Up
Warnings: Swearing, injuries, canon-level violence, implied/referenced torture. Creator has chose note to use archive warnings.
One - Quiet Beginnings and Dusty Shelves
Two - Hidden Messages
Three - Cells and Escape Routes
Four - Wordless Days
Five - New Beginnings
Epilogue
Draco smoothed the front of his cardigan and adjusted his ring, twirling it once, twice, thrice around his finger for good luck. You were watching him from the doorway, an amused smile twitching on your lips.
“Don’t be nervous. You’ll do great.”
He gave you a halfhearted grimace through the mirror. Hopefully things would go well, but the ache in his gut wouldn’t let him believe it could go well. The headline from the morning’s paper still skittered through his brain. Ex-Death Eater Draco Malfoy Unveils War Novel on Motives: An Exposé by Rita Skeeter.
You reached forward to squeeze his arm, chase away the worries that danced in his mind. “Everything will be great. I just know it.”
He managed to give you a real smile that time, hand reaching up to meet your own.
You liked to tell people Draco had taken to writing “like a duck to water,” but that hadn’t been the case at all. The stories seemed to pull him under, drowning him in the clamber to escape from his soul. Really, they wrote themselves. Draco just listened to what they wanted him to say. He could only hope that he would be able to explain it, coherently make sense of his intentions in some capacity.
Thankfully, The Quibbler was sending someone relatively relaxed to do the interview. At least, that’s what the owl had claimed a few days prior when they reached out. He was a bit choosey with his interviews, though not increasingly so because few deigned to write genuine reviews about his novels. Thankfully Luna’s paper was relatively unbiased against him, so there was that. He hoped whoever he was meeting—Argon? Adergon? He couldn’t recall—wouldn’t make things too difficult.
He felt your lips graze his cheek, pulling him from his thoughts. “You’ll do great, darling. And I’ll be here with lunch when you get back.”
Your unwavering support always shattered any fear he possessed.
~
They met at a coffee shop, informal but cozy, for the interview. Draco sipped on some green tea as he waited, idly watching the people meandering along the shop windows across the street.
It was a quaint weekend morning; it made him think of waking up early to play quidditch in the yard before breakfast when he was a child. He felt like he’d been transported worlds away from whoever that little boy had been. Maybe that was for the best.
When the shop’s bell dinged, Draco started, retracting his hand from his cup as a man reached out to shake.
“Draco Malfoy?” Draco nodded, inwardly chuckling at the man’s politeness in feigning ignorance on who Draco was. His face has been printed in enough papers, no one would ever be able to forget post-war Draco in all his gaunt, exhausted glory. The man carried on regardless. “Adeon Heinrik. Nice to meet you.”
Draco’s smile was stiff, but it always was with strangers. Polite formality had been ingrained in him since birth; using it nowadays always made him uncomfortable, a muscle memory he didn’t care for.
Adeon settled into the chair opposite him, charming a quill like he’d seen Skeeter do all those years ago. Perhaps this was payback for all the times he’d subtly suggested Potter was up to more antics to get the paparazzi on his tail. Now Draco understood the discomfort of interviews.
Additionally, a recording device was placed on the edge of the table, charmed to catch their conversation and store it for later broadcasting. Radio interviews had become quite the literary rage; how could The Quibbler resist expanding their reporting style?
Adeon adjusted his tie, clearing his throat subtly. “This is The Quibbler Book Talks and I’m Adeon Heinrik here today to discuss Draco Malfoy’s latest work. So, Mr. Malfoy, this article will be focusing primarily on your newest work, Snow on Peacock Street, a war memoir on your experiences with Voldemort, as well as the tale of your rocky relationship with your current wife.” Draco nodded, and Adeon continued. “However, before we discuss your newest novel, I’d like to take a look at your other works. Dark Absolute and Scaled Terror were released seven and three years ago respectively. Two Young Adult themed works, you delve into the fictive worlds of Algernon and Evelyn where the protagonists face incredible choices between family, faith, and country. You also released a collection of essays titled The Purpose of Family, which was later synthesized into a children’s picture book four years ago. Children, teens, you’ve focused on a young audience up until recently. What’s your motivation for writing a war memoir now, for honing in on an adult audience?”
Draco licked his lips, fiddling with his ring under the table. “Well, Mr. Heinrik, the truth of the matter is that the children weren’t there.” Adeon’s eyes flickered with confusion, but Draco carried on, hoping his point would make sense. “Unlike the children now that have a bit of a reprieve, I was a child of the war. Although it was clearly the wrong side, it was a necessary burden that many of my peers faced as well. We had been raised on tradition and weren’t willing to sacrifice our families at any cost. However, the children, they aren’t having to make choices like that at present. My works remain fictional because I can’t undo my past, but I can place the readers into similar morally unsteady situations. Perhaps they can be more prepared to make their own choices after facing the situations in my novels.”
Adeon sat forward in his seat, eyes glued to Draco like a siren attempting to lure words from his lips. Draco took a sip of tea, trying to hide the nervousness he felt as Adeon stepped in with the next question. “That’s an excellent point. But your newest work is obviously a war novel. Why do you feel now is the right time to publish it? Have things settled enough that it’s the right time to critique the situation from both sides?”
Oh dear. “No,” he answered with a cool wave of his hand. Or, as cool as he could manage with the worry jittering through his nerves. He could feel it coming, the twisted commentary about his choices already lapping at his feet. “Truthfully, there will never be a ‘right time’ to talk about the war. No matter how much time passes, my generation will never be untainted by those experiences. My intention isn’t to advocate that my side was better, nor to paint myself as some perfectly good person. It’s merely to give an examination of the other side, to provide some humanity to the actions that occurred.”
“Provide some humanity, what do you mean by that?”
“Well,” he twisted his ring under the table, “there’s certainly a lot more nuance to human experience than the black-and-white exhibited in most modern war talks. In discussing the experiences I had, perhaps it can provide some humanity and understanding for those who have had or will have similar experiences. Of course, the Death Eaters’ actions—my actions—were reprehensible. Our choices should not be absolved based on a single text. Yet, the burden of choice is never easy, and being raised to take the wrong side or face death is a situation as old as time itself. Perhaps the reasoning behind my actions and others will help those who face similar situations again someday.”
Adeon nodded, glancing down at his notes. “I’m currently with Mr. Draco Malfoy as we discuss his latest work, Snow on Peacock Street. The war novel, published in late November, has received praise from Philanthropist Harry Potter as well as Minister of Magic Hermione Granger. However, less-than-stellar reviews have come from Head Auror Ronald Weasley.” He looked up from his notes. “Let’s discuss that for a moment. Any ideas on why the Head Auror dislikes your latest work?”
Draco chuckled, running his thumb along the edge of his teacup. “I’m afraid not everyone can have excellent taste in books.”
Adeon laughed, and Draco joined him. Something on the recorder flashed red before returning to green. He hoped it hadn’t broken. Adeon seemed unbothered.
“So is that all it is? He merely has poor taste while Minister Granger and Mr. Potter possess better taste?”
The thought put a grin on his face before he could really stop it. “It’s certainly a nice way of putting it.” Slowly, the smile dropped from his face. He twirled his ring again. Once. Twice. Thrice. “I suppose it’s more to do with our past and upbringing. Although I’m flattered Potter and Granger enjoy my work, I’m afraid I’m rather undeserving of their praise.”
“I see,” Adeon nodded, sensing Draco’s discomfort. “Let’s talk about your work itself for a moment. Your Young Adult novels have rather intense titles, I’m sure reflecting the nature of the work. Yet your newest novel is titled Snow on Peacock Street. It seems a bit lighthearted for a war story.”
“Partially because it isn’t. At least, not in the beginning. When I was a child, we had these marvelous peacocks. Bright and beautiful. They went to Naghini during the war, though; the last bit of brightness sucked out of the Manor. It seemed a fitting reminder of what once was, to describe it as ‘Peacock Street.’ Though, it also reflects my relationship with (Y/n).”
“Your relationship with (Y/n)? In what way is that?”
“She’s…” He looked for the right word. The English vocabulary didn’t seem to have a word spectacular enough for you. “She was a lightness then. She’s a lightness now, too. But especially then. It felt like the world was so hopeless and dark. And then she showed up with a book and changed my life. I couldn’t have survived without her.”
Adeon was smiling. Maybe his interview hadn’t gone so poorly after all.
“And she’s written a book as well, hasn’t she?”
“Yes! Yes,” he beamed, thinking of the smile on your face when you came home with the first printed copy. “Her memoir Forgotten Burns and Papercuts will be available for sale next month. It’s truly marvelous; I highly recommend reading it.”
“I’m sure you’re a bit biased in that regard, but I’ll take your word for it.” Adeon glanced back down at his notes. “Alright, we’re almost out of time for today. Would you mind reading a little excerpt from Snow on Peacock Street to close us off?”
“Of course, I’d love to,” Draco said, taking the marked book Adeon passed to him. It was only a few pages in, but hopefully it would be compelling enough to attract a few readers.
He cleared his throat, ring glinting in the light as he pressed the pages down to read.
They told me they loved me. But what really is love without death? What’s love without suffering and fear and hunger? How do you find love amongst everything? You can’t. It’s impossible. It may come in fleeting fragments, in silvery flutters like the faint trace of a Patronus. Yet you never truly find it until there’s nothing else in the way. When stripped bare before the masses, you find love.
Seldom is it expressed in gifts or other material, flowery things. It rubs you raw, claws at your throat, tears you limb from limb. Love is being faced with death and finding something worth living for. It’s the cold blooded fear before a battle, the ripped cry of the lonely, the desperation of a dying man. Contentment breeds complacency. But fear breeds love. I suppose that’s how I found her then. How I loved her amongst a darkness so pungent it rotted the soul and slaughtered person after person with it.
I didn’t love her in an all-consuming fury, not until the world was dark and she was there, blinding, brilliant, stinging against my fingertips like fresh fallen snow, to remind me that my life couldn’t be over yet.
I would learn many things from her, but this, love roaring against the dying embers of life, would be her ultimate teaching. It showed me more about the world than I could possibly describe, but in this text, I’ll attempt to impart that knowledge on you.
He glanced back up at Adeon, who barely looked composed as he shuffled in his seat, glanced down at his notes.
“That was Mr. Draco Malfoy reading an excerpt from his newest novel Snow on Peacock Street, available through Wizz Hard Books publishing company. Mr. Malfoy, thank you for joining me today.”
“Thank you for having me,” he nodded.
“That will conclude this week’s edition of The Quibbler Book Talks. I’m Adeon Heinrik, and I’ll see you next week when we join…”
~
The article had been a hit. His work had been rather well reviewed all things considered.
Yours had done even better. Hermione Granger had even written to you personally with compliments. Though, it seemed only fitting as the torture scenes hit a bit close to home.
Draco had nearly retched proofing those scenes. You’d had to hold him close for hours, reminding him that he didn’t know, that things had ended up okay. The two of you had made it out alive. He’d twisted his ring around his finger. Once. Twice. Thrice. You were alive. Things were okay.
Things were better than okay.
Headmistress McGonagall had agreed to let the two of you deliver your books to the library for students to read. Of course, the conditions required that you come during Winter Holiday when the students wouldn’t be distracted by your arrival, but that made things all the better.
Two copies, both as pristine and polished as ever, were handed to Madam Pince. She thanked the both of you, moving to put them on the proper shelves.
Rather than leave, you pulled Draco toward the back corner of the library, smiles curling on both of your faces.
It felt like ages since the two of you had seen the dusty shelves where you’d spent years playing chase amongst the covers. Names familiar and foreign dominated the shelves, mostly old, handwritten collections that would seldom be read. Only the passionate—only people like you—would pull them down to decipher the hurried texts, pulled straight from the soul of the authors.
Draco pulled his hand away from yours, tracing the cover of the worn, black notebook. It was no longer pristine, the interior scribbled and smeared with ink and the cover well worn with use. His novel, the original. It had been primarily completed after his first year of writing it, but he hadn’t been ready then to publish it, to even consider publishing it. Sometimes he still couldn’t believe he’d printed the words, had them reproduced. But he needed it. He wanted it.
Your hands traced over a set of carefully bound parchments. Your first draft, scratched out, written in the margins, revised. The raw, the original. Lines messy with emotion, edges crinkled with touch.
You looked up at the shelves. It had all begun with those shelves, with those books. Stories of ancient wizards and desperate souls. And, oh, how your lives found ways to mirror those stories, mimic the past.
Draco pushed two books apart, making space on the shelves. Delicately, you placed your set of parchments there, Draco’s notebook following.
Someone else could find your stories one day, remember your lives in all their messy, unpolished glory. But in the meantime, they’d grow dust waiting for another soul to remember, to wonder, to learn. The words would wait for a soul like yours.
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Taglist: @yucksiedoodles, @rachie-ox
A/N: Thank you for reading! It’s been so much fun writing this series. I hope you enjoyed. Sending you all the love! ~Silent
