100quills #1.45: Who?
Sorry, roannaweenie, this is not your fic; your promised piece of fluff IS being worked on though, I promise! BTW let me brag to everyone here what a sweet picture Roanne drew for me! I made it into the icon I'm using for this post.
Title: What to Think
Genre: drama, romance, angst
Time: post-HBP
Length: <3000 words
Rating: R
Characters: Pansy, Narcissa, [spoiler], [spoiler]
Summary: Pansy appears at Narcissa's door and gains entrance by claiming to have something Narcissa wants desperately. In these dangerous times, can anything be taken at face value?
Pansy apparated onto the lawn of Malfoy Manor. Actually more like the field next to the lawn of Malfoy Manor. She was still getting the hang of apparating, but after thoroughly checking herself for any missing body parts, she decided that everything was alright.
She could see the mansion. It actually wasn't that far away... suddenly she realized that this field was the formerly immaculate lawn of Malfoy Manor. It obviously hadn't been tended for months. Pansy supposed that Mrs. Malfoy, alone in the house, with her husband in Azkaban and not even a house-elf, had let appearances go to hell for once.
Unless... unless she wasn't there?
She clutched her handbag to her chest and wrestled once again with the fear in her stomach. She is there... she just has to be!
She steeled herself, squared her shoulders, and marched towards the front door.
As she drew closer, she noticed that all the curtains were drawn and shutters were closed. She bit the inside of her cheek to take her mind off it and forced herself to go forward. When she reached the door, she set down the bag, transferred her wand to her left hand, and knocked.
Nothing happened. She heard no noises.
She knocked again.
Nothing.
She knocked again and called out "Mrs. Malfoy? Mrs. Malfoy? It's Pansy Parkinson. I need to see you!"
Nothing.
She knocked again. "Mrs. Malfoy?" she shouted as loudly as she could.
Nothing.
Taking a step back and taking her wand in her right hand, she pointed it accusingly at the house and shouted, "Mrs. Malfoy, I know you're in there! It's Pansy Parkinson and I'm not going away until you see me!" Then she stepped forward and began to pound at the door with her left hand. Almost immediately she heard latches and locks turning and stepped back just in time to avoid taking the door in the face.
Narcissa Malfoy stood on the other side. Pansy simply stared. She had heard the phrase "looked like death warmed over" before. Mrs. Malfoy looked like death warmed over and then stuck into the freezer. She was pointing her wand at Pansy and her expression was anything but friendly.
"Well?" the older witch said sharply. "What do you want?"
Pansy came out of her shock. "I need to speak with you. May I come in?"
"People need lots of things," Narcissa replied with a nastiness that stunned Pansy into silence again. "Some people need to keep their little pug noses out of other people's business!"
The door slammed shut and noise of latches and locks came again. "You tell those people that they need to think up a much cleverer trick to get into my house!"
Pansy stared at the door for a moment, letting her anger build, picked up her handbag and began slamming it against the door. "Let me in!" she screamed. "I'm not in league with anyone!"
Nothing.
"Let me in, you crazy bitch! I know you're listening!" Pansy screamed, "Or I'll start shouting all of Draco's secrets! I'm sure there's an Auror or two keeping watch on this place-" She stopped screaming because the latches were making noise again and once again avoided a broken nose only barely.
"Come in," said Mrs. Malfoy icily.
She crossed the threshold into the main hall, and was pleasantly surprised to see that it was neat and dusted.
"Stop looking around my house! Justify yourself to me immediately or you'll regret it!"
Pansy stood her ground. She was about the same height as Mrs. Malfoy, but her traveling boots made her slightly taller. "Are we safe here? Can we be heard?"
"Not by anyone I don't want hearing," Narcissa replied, with a very Draco-like sneer.
Pansy thought fast and decided honesty was, for once, the best policy. "I'm pregnant," she said. Narcissa's expression did not change. Exasperated, Pansy added, "It's Draco's, of course!"
For a moment Narcissa's expression still did not change, and then it slowly, slowly softened to a passive look of contemplation. "Come with me," she said.
Pansy put her wand into her pocket and followed, hoping the gesture would inspire some confidence.
--
"Tell me everything," said Narcissa. They were sitting in a small, comfortable and simple room. Pansy was in a large green armchair with her bag on her lap and Narcissa sat on the other side on the edge of a chaise longue.
"Everything? Can you be more specific?" Pansy heard the archness in her tone and sighed. "I'm sorry. I don't want this to be so confrontational."
Narcissa leaned forward. "Did he send you?"
Pansy laughed. It was a silly reaction, but her nerves were certainly on edge. She calmed herself. "I'm sorry. No one sent me. I came on my own directive."
"Who knows you've come here?"
Pansy wanted to say Probably the whole Ministry by now, if I was right about your house being watched, but instead she said. "I didn't tell anyone I was coming here. I left a note for my parents that I was seventeen and I needed to leave and they couldn't change my mind so not to look for me."
"And you think this will be effective?" Her eyebrow raised; it was another Draco expression. Pansy wished he didn't favor his parents so much, because it was interfering with her ability to think.
"I don't know. I also wrote that their first duty was to my brother and sister, and that they ought to get them to Australia like they were planning and stay there. They might listen to that. It's only my father I'm worried about, he-" She waved her left hand a little as if to brush it off. "It's not important. They will certainly inform the Ministry that I have gone missing. I don't know how that will go."
"How did you get here?"
"I left my house and took the Knight Bus to London. I went to this Muggle place called an airport... they use it to travel between countries, I learned about it in Muggle Studies... anyway I bought a ticket to Canada for two weeks from now. I used my mother's name."
"Where did you get the money?"
"I stole it from my parents, of course. I don't have any money of my own. Luckily they had a bunch of Muggle money because of planning to go to Australia. I picked the wrong kind and had to get it exchanged-" She waved her hand again. "That doesn't matter either. Anyway, I bought the ticket, went into a bathroom and apparated here. It was all a waste anyway. I didn't think about whether this place was being watched. You don't have to tell me how stupid that was. I can't think anymore."
"What's in your bag?"
"Things I can't do without," Pansy said, and then sighed. "Would you like to see what's in it?"
"No, just tell me," said Narcissa. She sat back a bit farther.
"Medicine, my diary, some photos, gifts, some food, money, Muggle money, a few books... toiletries, a hand mirror, my dress robes, lots of pants-"
"Nothing... unusual?"
"No... Merlin, I wonder if it all apparated alright!" With an expression of alarm Pansy righted the bag and was undoing the clasp when Mrs. Malfoy interrupted.
"Not right now, Pansy," she said hastily. Pansy looked up, pleased that she was being addressed by her first name, which seemed hopeful. Mrs. Malfoy leaned forward again with what she probably intended as a kind smile on her face. "Now, Pansy... you and my son."
"Yes," said Pansy, feeling very young indeed.
"You were intimate?"
Pansy reddened. "I didn't mean for it to happen when it did-- Draco was so..." She couldn't think of any words to continue. She'd known she would have to tell her former intended mother-in-law why she hadn't managed to keep her virtue-
"That part is alright," said Mrs. Malfoy, as if she knew what Pansy was worrying about. "I don't think any less of you. Boys can rush things, can't they? I remember my own school days." She smiled generously at Pansy.
Pansy felt even younger. She wished Mrs. Malfoy would stop looking so motherly.
"So you've been intimate with my son."
Pansy bit her cheek again and nodded, feeling a fool.
"And..." Narcissa seemed to hesitate... "And only my son?"
That bounced Pansy right out of her mortified silence. "Who do you think you are!" she said hotly.
Narcissa's motherly look vanished away as if it had never been there. "I'm trying to determine if I'm going to be a grandmother or not. Don't be stupid. You should know I would want you to prove both the pregnancy and Draco's paternity. Let's put our feelings aside and speak plainly, alright?"
Stiffly, Pansy said, "I am sure I am pregnant. After-" She hesitated and started again. "I went to Madam Pomfrey and she said there's no question. But I'm not very far along at all, only six weeks in now, so it could easily--that's what the medicine's for, to- to keep it." She looked down at her flat midsection, still somewhat unnerved by the idea that something alive was in there. She looked up again and her eyes flashed. "And it has only been Draco, ever since fourth year--and if you think I was intimate with anyone before then, I might as well leave now!"
Narcissa regarded her shrewdly. "I believe you, Pansy. I'm sorry for some of what I've said here. You're not the only one who's had trouble thinking lately. Wait here, I'll be back soon."
"Wait," Pansy said as the other witch stood up. "I have to know. Is he dead?"
"Who?" Narcissa answered, pausing at the door.
"Draco!" She said, exasperated.
She looked uncertain. "Wait here, Pansy." The door closed behind her. And locked. Pansy leapt up, realized that there was nothing she could do about it, but decided that swearing was unlikely to hurt anything, so she said a particularly choice word and sat down again.
For the first 3 minutes Pansy simply sat, fidgeting. Then she opened her bag and began poking through it. When she was satisfied everything that ought to be there was there, she sat some more.
Thanks to her watch, Pansy knew that precisely twenty-three minutes had passed when the door opened again, and was about to make some remarks about that when she was stunned into silence by the sight of her former teacher, Severus Snape. Narcissa was standing behind him.
"Let me talk with her alone, Narcissa," he said. She nodded and left.
"Profess- I mean-" She was tongue-tied. What ought she to call this man, who was known to all of wizarding Britain as the murderer of Dumbledore.
"Yes," he said. His voice and appearance did not seem to have changed at all. "Terms of address are rather unclear in this situation, hmm? That puts you at a disadvantage, for to me you remain Miss Parkinson."
Pansy was fed up with all of this. "I suppose you're going to ask me the same questions Mrs. Malfoy did," Pansy said sulkily, studying her nails.
"No, Miss Parkinson," Snape replied. "I won't be asking you any questions at all."
Surprised, Pansy looked up into Snape's black empty eyes.
--
Suddenly Pansy found herself remembering things. The day of Draco's release... seeing him in the common room, him telling Crabbe and Goyle "Not until later," him taking her hand and leading her to the seventh floor, with that hunted, gaunt expression he'd worn all year.
"Draco, what's-" she had tried to ask.
"Not yet," he'd said darkly, "It's not safe..."
--
Why isn't Snape saying anything?
--
The memory skipped a bit in a strange way. Draco telling her to close her eyes and pulling her into that hidden bedroom. When she had opened her eyes and seen the dimly lit bed, with something between outrage and relief she had started to say "Is that all you-"
"Do you love me, Pansy?" he had interrupted suddenly. Stunned, she stared at him. They had told each other "I love you," a thousand times, of course, but always with a smirk, a sense of pride and self-satisfaction. She had never seen Draco look at her as if he needed her. Their attraction had always been based on self-sufficiency.
"Of course I love you, Draco."
He had stepped closer. "This is serious, Pansy. Don't say it unless you really mean it."
She had tried, for the first time in a long time, to be completely sincere and open, to say what she really felt. "I do love you."
He had stared into her eyes for a moment and then embraced her, hard, and whispered, "I love you too," so harsh that it was almost a hiss.
--
This is ridiculous. Why I am thinking of this now? She tried to think of something else, but the memory kept coming.
--
"I know that you've said no before, Pansy," he had continued, "But I really need you right now. It would mean so much to me."
She had pulled herself out of his embrace with difficulty, her face contorted. Outraged that all he wanted from her was her body. Relieved that her body was all she was being asked for. She had opened her mouth to speak, but he cut her off.
"Please, Pansy. I want to make love to you... before it's too late."
Her heart had felt like it was caught in her throat. Too late? But she dared not ask, because being told would be dangerous, stupidly, incredibly dangerous. He was making Draco do something terrible, perhaps deadly. It was much better not to know. But Draco needed her. If he couldn't share his mind with her, was it too much to ask to share his body?
She had nodded, and he had stared at her with an expression of almost disbelief, and then he had practically thrown himself at her.
--
Pansy's face grew hot. The more she tried to force the memory away, the more insistently it resurfaced. She tried to think, but it was mortifying, standing there, remembering Draco's tongue slick against her throat and hand slipped inside her knickers, while her former head of house stared impassively into her eyes---
Legilimency, legilimency you idiot! She felt as if a separate part of her had screamed this. Fight it, do something!
Her mouth was dry and her voice was like a croak. "What are you doing... stop it..."
--
Draco entering her for the first time, her cry of pain that seemed to bring him to his senses, his new gentleness, her tongue caressing his, the dampened sheets, that indescribable feeling---
--
"No! Stop!" she said, covering her face with her hands.
--
His body shuddering over her, filling her---
--
"STOP!" she screamed, starting to cry.
"I have stopped, Miss Parkinson." Snape's voice seemed the same as ever. "But I am afraid I have not finished."
"Why are you doing this?"
"The Dark Lord will want to know everything Draco told you."
"Him," she groaned, twisting in the armchair and hugging her knees to her chest.
"Quite."
"He's dead, then... Draco's dead..." she moaned, pulling on her hair.
"I didn't say that."
"Don't treat me like a child! If He needs to know from me what Draco told me, that means that Draco's not around to ask anymore."
"Your logic is perfect, but not necessarily complete," Snape said. "For example, does unavailability necessarily imply death? Hypothetically, your young lover could be alive... and hidden."
She started to look up in disbelief, but quickly recalled herself.
"I won't do that again without telling you first, Miss Parkinson."
She laughed humorlessly. "Then why did you do it in the first place?"
"Let us be hypothetical again. Assuming that Draco Malfoy is alive, and assuming that I know where he is and the Dark Lord does not," Pansy raised her head to look at him, unwillingly, but needing to see his face. "Assuming that, then I would to be quite sure where your loyalties lie before revealing my own, wouldn't I?"
"Hypothetically," said Pansy, wide-eyed.
"Hypothetically," Snape agreed. He gave her a slight smile.
MY NOTES: The "hidden bedroom" is the RoR, but since Pansy just assumes that it's always a bedroom.
I wrote this because I'm sort of agonizing over the whole "What happens to Draco?" issue, and the "Is Snape good or what?" issue, so I started writing a fic where Pansy doesn't know either. And I was thinking about the way that Pansy said "HIM" to refer to Voldemort in HBP... and so the fic just sort of assembled itself in my head.
I intended it to be ambiguous but of course my personal preference (Draco lives and Snape is good) had to assert itself at the end a bit!
Title: What to Think
Genre: drama, romance, angst
Time: post-HBP
Length: <3000 words
Rating: R
Characters: Pansy, Narcissa, [spoiler], [spoiler]
Summary: Pansy appears at Narcissa's door and gains entrance by claiming to have something Narcissa wants desperately. In these dangerous times, can anything be taken at face value?
Pansy apparated onto the lawn of Malfoy Manor. Actually more like the field next to the lawn of Malfoy Manor. She was still getting the hang of apparating, but after thoroughly checking herself for any missing body parts, she decided that everything was alright.
She could see the mansion. It actually wasn't that far away... suddenly she realized that this field was the formerly immaculate lawn of Malfoy Manor. It obviously hadn't been tended for months. Pansy supposed that Mrs. Malfoy, alone in the house, with her husband in Azkaban and not even a house-elf, had let appearances go to hell for once.
Unless... unless she wasn't there?
She clutched her handbag to her chest and wrestled once again with the fear in her stomach. She is there... she just has to be!
She steeled herself, squared her shoulders, and marched towards the front door.
As she drew closer, she noticed that all the curtains were drawn and shutters were closed. She bit the inside of her cheek to take her mind off it and forced herself to go forward. When she reached the door, she set down the bag, transferred her wand to her left hand, and knocked.
Nothing happened. She heard no noises.
She knocked again.
Nothing.
She knocked again and called out "Mrs. Malfoy? Mrs. Malfoy? It's Pansy Parkinson. I need to see you!"
Nothing.
She knocked again. "Mrs. Malfoy?" she shouted as loudly as she could.
Nothing.
Taking a step back and taking her wand in her right hand, she pointed it accusingly at the house and shouted, "Mrs. Malfoy, I know you're in there! It's Pansy Parkinson and I'm not going away until you see me!" Then she stepped forward and began to pound at the door with her left hand. Almost immediately she heard latches and locks turning and stepped back just in time to avoid taking the door in the face.
Narcissa Malfoy stood on the other side. Pansy simply stared. She had heard the phrase "looked like death warmed over" before. Mrs. Malfoy looked like death warmed over and then stuck into the freezer. She was pointing her wand at Pansy and her expression was anything but friendly.
"Well?" the older witch said sharply. "What do you want?"
Pansy came out of her shock. "I need to speak with you. May I come in?"
"People need lots of things," Narcissa replied with a nastiness that stunned Pansy into silence again. "Some people need to keep their little pug noses out of other people's business!"
The door slammed shut and noise of latches and locks came again. "You tell those people that they need to think up a much cleverer trick to get into my house!"
Pansy stared at the door for a moment, letting her anger build, picked up her handbag and began slamming it against the door. "Let me in!" she screamed. "I'm not in league with anyone!"
Nothing.
"Let me in, you crazy bitch! I know you're listening!" Pansy screamed, "Or I'll start shouting all of Draco's secrets! I'm sure there's an Auror or two keeping watch on this place-" She stopped screaming because the latches were making noise again and once again avoided a broken nose only barely.
"Come in," said Mrs. Malfoy icily.
She crossed the threshold into the main hall, and was pleasantly surprised to see that it was neat and dusted.
"Stop looking around my house! Justify yourself to me immediately or you'll regret it!"
Pansy stood her ground. She was about the same height as Mrs. Malfoy, but her traveling boots made her slightly taller. "Are we safe here? Can we be heard?"
"Not by anyone I don't want hearing," Narcissa replied, with a very Draco-like sneer.
Pansy thought fast and decided honesty was, for once, the best policy. "I'm pregnant," she said. Narcissa's expression did not change. Exasperated, Pansy added, "It's Draco's, of course!"
For a moment Narcissa's expression still did not change, and then it slowly, slowly softened to a passive look of contemplation. "Come with me," she said.
Pansy put her wand into her pocket and followed, hoping the gesture would inspire some confidence.
--
"Tell me everything," said Narcissa. They were sitting in a small, comfortable and simple room. Pansy was in a large green armchair with her bag on her lap and Narcissa sat on the other side on the edge of a chaise longue.
"Everything? Can you be more specific?" Pansy heard the archness in her tone and sighed. "I'm sorry. I don't want this to be so confrontational."
Narcissa leaned forward. "Did he send you?"
Pansy laughed. It was a silly reaction, but her nerves were certainly on edge. She calmed herself. "I'm sorry. No one sent me. I came on my own directive."
"Who knows you've come here?"
Pansy wanted to say Probably the whole Ministry by now, if I was right about your house being watched, but instead she said. "I didn't tell anyone I was coming here. I left a note for my parents that I was seventeen and I needed to leave and they couldn't change my mind so not to look for me."
"And you think this will be effective?" Her eyebrow raised; it was another Draco expression. Pansy wished he didn't favor his parents so much, because it was interfering with her ability to think.
"I don't know. I also wrote that their first duty was to my brother and sister, and that they ought to get them to Australia like they were planning and stay there. They might listen to that. It's only my father I'm worried about, he-" She waved her left hand a little as if to brush it off. "It's not important. They will certainly inform the Ministry that I have gone missing. I don't know how that will go."
"How did you get here?"
"I left my house and took the Knight Bus to London. I went to this Muggle place called an airport... they use it to travel between countries, I learned about it in Muggle Studies... anyway I bought a ticket to Canada for two weeks from now. I used my mother's name."
"Where did you get the money?"
"I stole it from my parents, of course. I don't have any money of my own. Luckily they had a bunch of Muggle money because of planning to go to Australia. I picked the wrong kind and had to get it exchanged-" She waved her hand again. "That doesn't matter either. Anyway, I bought the ticket, went into a bathroom and apparated here. It was all a waste anyway. I didn't think about whether this place was being watched. You don't have to tell me how stupid that was. I can't think anymore."
"What's in your bag?"
"Things I can't do without," Pansy said, and then sighed. "Would you like to see what's in it?"
"No, just tell me," said Narcissa. She sat back a bit farther.
"Medicine, my diary, some photos, gifts, some food, money, Muggle money, a few books... toiletries, a hand mirror, my dress robes, lots of pants-"
"Nothing... unusual?"
"No... Merlin, I wonder if it all apparated alright!" With an expression of alarm Pansy righted the bag and was undoing the clasp when Mrs. Malfoy interrupted.
"Not right now, Pansy," she said hastily. Pansy looked up, pleased that she was being addressed by her first name, which seemed hopeful. Mrs. Malfoy leaned forward again with what she probably intended as a kind smile on her face. "Now, Pansy... you and my son."
"Yes," said Pansy, feeling very young indeed.
"You were intimate?"
Pansy reddened. "I didn't mean for it to happen when it did-- Draco was so..." She couldn't think of any words to continue. She'd known she would have to tell her former intended mother-in-law why she hadn't managed to keep her virtue-
"That part is alright," said Mrs. Malfoy, as if she knew what Pansy was worrying about. "I don't think any less of you. Boys can rush things, can't they? I remember my own school days." She smiled generously at Pansy.
Pansy felt even younger. She wished Mrs. Malfoy would stop looking so motherly.
"So you've been intimate with my son."
Pansy bit her cheek again and nodded, feeling a fool.
"And..." Narcissa seemed to hesitate... "And only my son?"
That bounced Pansy right out of her mortified silence. "Who do you think you are!" she said hotly.
Narcissa's motherly look vanished away as if it had never been there. "I'm trying to determine if I'm going to be a grandmother or not. Don't be stupid. You should know I would want you to prove both the pregnancy and Draco's paternity. Let's put our feelings aside and speak plainly, alright?"
Stiffly, Pansy said, "I am sure I am pregnant. After-" She hesitated and started again. "I went to Madam Pomfrey and she said there's no question. But I'm not very far along at all, only six weeks in now, so it could easily--that's what the medicine's for, to- to keep it." She looked down at her flat midsection, still somewhat unnerved by the idea that something alive was in there. She looked up again and her eyes flashed. "And it has only been Draco, ever since fourth year--and if you think I was intimate with anyone before then, I might as well leave now!"
Narcissa regarded her shrewdly. "I believe you, Pansy. I'm sorry for some of what I've said here. You're not the only one who's had trouble thinking lately. Wait here, I'll be back soon."
"Wait," Pansy said as the other witch stood up. "I have to know. Is he dead?"
"Who?" Narcissa answered, pausing at the door.
"Draco!" She said, exasperated.
She looked uncertain. "Wait here, Pansy." The door closed behind her. And locked. Pansy leapt up, realized that there was nothing she could do about it, but decided that swearing was unlikely to hurt anything, so she said a particularly choice word and sat down again.
For the first 3 minutes Pansy simply sat, fidgeting. Then she opened her bag and began poking through it. When she was satisfied everything that ought to be there was there, she sat some more.
Thanks to her watch, Pansy knew that precisely twenty-three minutes had passed when the door opened again, and was about to make some remarks about that when she was stunned into silence by the sight of her former teacher, Severus Snape. Narcissa was standing behind him.
"Let me talk with her alone, Narcissa," he said. She nodded and left.
"Profess- I mean-" She was tongue-tied. What ought she to call this man, who was known to all of wizarding Britain as the murderer of Dumbledore.
"Yes," he said. His voice and appearance did not seem to have changed at all. "Terms of address are rather unclear in this situation, hmm? That puts you at a disadvantage, for to me you remain Miss Parkinson."
Pansy was fed up with all of this. "I suppose you're going to ask me the same questions Mrs. Malfoy did," Pansy said sulkily, studying her nails.
"No, Miss Parkinson," Snape replied. "I won't be asking you any questions at all."
Surprised, Pansy looked up into Snape's black empty eyes.
--
Suddenly Pansy found herself remembering things. The day of Draco's release... seeing him in the common room, him telling Crabbe and Goyle "Not until later," him taking her hand and leading her to the seventh floor, with that hunted, gaunt expression he'd worn all year.
"Draco, what's-" she had tried to ask.
"Not yet," he'd said darkly, "It's not safe..."
--
Why isn't Snape saying anything?
--
The memory skipped a bit in a strange way. Draco telling her to close her eyes and pulling her into that hidden bedroom. When she had opened her eyes and seen the dimly lit bed, with something between outrage and relief she had started to say "Is that all you-"
"Do you love me, Pansy?" he had interrupted suddenly. Stunned, she stared at him. They had told each other "I love you," a thousand times, of course, but always with a smirk, a sense of pride and self-satisfaction. She had never seen Draco look at her as if he needed her. Their attraction had always been based on self-sufficiency.
"Of course I love you, Draco."
He had stepped closer. "This is serious, Pansy. Don't say it unless you really mean it."
She had tried, for the first time in a long time, to be completely sincere and open, to say what she really felt. "I do love you."
He had stared into her eyes for a moment and then embraced her, hard, and whispered, "I love you too," so harsh that it was almost a hiss.
--
This is ridiculous. Why I am thinking of this now? She tried to think of something else, but the memory kept coming.
--
"I know that you've said no before, Pansy," he had continued, "But I really need you right now. It would mean so much to me."
She had pulled herself out of his embrace with difficulty, her face contorted. Outraged that all he wanted from her was her body. Relieved that her body was all she was being asked for. She had opened her mouth to speak, but he cut her off.
"Please, Pansy. I want to make love to you... before it's too late."
Her heart had felt like it was caught in her throat. Too late? But she dared not ask, because being told would be dangerous, stupidly, incredibly dangerous. He was making Draco do something terrible, perhaps deadly. It was much better not to know. But Draco needed her. If he couldn't share his mind with her, was it too much to ask to share his body?
She had nodded, and he had stared at her with an expression of almost disbelief, and then he had practically thrown himself at her.
--
Pansy's face grew hot. The more she tried to force the memory away, the more insistently it resurfaced. She tried to think, but it was mortifying, standing there, remembering Draco's tongue slick against her throat and hand slipped inside her knickers, while her former head of house stared impassively into her eyes---
Legilimency, legilimency you idiot! She felt as if a separate part of her had screamed this. Fight it, do something!
Her mouth was dry and her voice was like a croak. "What are you doing... stop it..."
--
Draco entering her for the first time, her cry of pain that seemed to bring him to his senses, his new gentleness, her tongue caressing his, the dampened sheets, that indescribable feeling---
--
"No! Stop!" she said, covering her face with her hands.
--
His body shuddering over her, filling her---
--
"STOP!" she screamed, starting to cry.
"I have stopped, Miss Parkinson." Snape's voice seemed the same as ever. "But I am afraid I have not finished."
"Why are you doing this?"
"The Dark Lord will want to know everything Draco told you."
"Him," she groaned, twisting in the armchair and hugging her knees to her chest.
"Quite."
"He's dead, then... Draco's dead..." she moaned, pulling on her hair.
"I didn't say that."
"Don't treat me like a child! If He needs to know from me what Draco told me, that means that Draco's not around to ask anymore."
"Your logic is perfect, but not necessarily complete," Snape said. "For example, does unavailability necessarily imply death? Hypothetically, your young lover could be alive... and hidden."
She started to look up in disbelief, but quickly recalled herself.
"I won't do that again without telling you first, Miss Parkinson."
She laughed humorlessly. "Then why did you do it in the first place?"
"Let us be hypothetical again. Assuming that Draco Malfoy is alive, and assuming that I know where he is and the Dark Lord does not," Pansy raised her head to look at him, unwillingly, but needing to see his face. "Assuming that, then I would to be quite sure where your loyalties lie before revealing my own, wouldn't I?"
"Hypothetically," said Pansy, wide-eyed.
"Hypothetically," Snape agreed. He gave her a slight smile.
MY NOTES: The "hidden bedroom" is the RoR, but since Pansy just assumes that it's always a bedroom.
I wrote this because I'm sort of agonizing over the whole "What happens to Draco?" issue, and the "Is Snape good or what?" issue, so I started writing a fic where Pansy doesn't know either. And I was thinking about the way that Pansy said "HIM" to refer to Voldemort in HBP... and so the fic just sort of assembled itself in my head.
I intended it to be ambiguous but of course my personal preference (Draco lives and Snape is good) had to assert itself at the end a bit!