A/N- If you've been following the evolution of this chapter on my Live Journal, then I'm sure you've read this entire chapter already. If not, this was an idea I originally gave to a RL friend of mine to use for his creative writing class. He never ended up using the idea, but I liked it so much that I decided to turn it into a fic simply because I had Draco and Ginny in mind when I gave him the prompt.
The title is thanks to the brilliant turkish, who got the idea from a song sharing the same title as my fic by The Divine Comedy.
Thanks to eugenia for the beta. :)
Through a Long and Sleepless Night - Chapter 1
He chanced upon it much like the others did.
By simply wandering about the streets of Dublin; somewhat safe from the bloody awful mess he created back home.
The older man accompanying him on his Irish holiday was holed up in their cramped room, fast asleep when the younger
man slipped out, tired of the tedium.
It was in the alley just outside of their room - a mere sliver of trampled brick and garbage. The most unexpected of
places for finding anything worthwhile.
When most people find something they weren't exactly looking for, they might say that they "stumbled upon it". In his case, this phrase was quite literal.
As he dropped down from the stair's ladder onto the cobbled street below, he lost his footing, slipping and tripping, falling backwards into what should have been a solid stone wall -- a wall that would have knocked the wind out of him. So when he fell right through the wall, as though he was going beyond the veil, he flailed even more, trying to grasp onto something, anything, as he made his decent into the darkness.
An obsidian, peerless darkness. One where he couldn't see mere centimetres in front of him. Where it felt like he was slowly floating back down to the surface of the earth, light as a feather, moving through liquid silk, his eyes and hair shining like beacons in the totality of that endless night.
He landed on solid ground with an almost feline grace - feet first, bending his knees to cushion the fall, holding his arms out next to him to steady himself. He wobbled a bit before freezing in the position that he landed in, turning his head to assess his surroundings.
Still darkness; as though he were dropped onto a blank canvas. Suddenly, some semblance of scenery began to form around him. Up ahead he saw it; slowly coming into focus as he hastened toward it -- a sprawling field, an inky black lake, a foreboding forest. And then he really saw it: the imposing oak doors latticed with iron and fortified by enchantments, the towers with their tiled steeples, the worn stone steps leading up to the threshold. It was a place he called home. He knew its passages, its rooms, and its most secret of places - it was both beautiful and frightening.
To be back was impossible. There were no bodies strewn across a blood-splattered lawn. There were no cloaked figures battling a battalion of teenagers. There was no sign of life.
He glanced behind him, seeing the way that he came: a swirl of black hovering a metre behind him.
He didn't know where he was, but he had a feeling that knowing the way back would come very much in handy.
Satisfied, he made his way to the doors of the castle, pushing them open with relative ease.
Inside, there was life. Students and teachers milling about, all heading toward a set of open double doors. Cocking his head, he followed, spotting a couple of his friends in the crowd.
The closest one was a fair, raven-haired girl; an emerald green ribbon pulling her hair away from her face. He reached out, hoping to tap her on the shoulder, alert her to his presence, only to have his hand float through her body; whispers of matter fluttering away from his solid hand like smoke.
He stared at his hand in shock, turning it around over and over, inspecting it at various ranges.
He turned to a boy next to him, this time curling his hand into a fist, going for the boy's stomach.
And just like before, his fist went through; as though the punched boy were a ghost.
He ploughed through the crowd, stepping through each foggy apparition until he finally entered the hall.
He started for his table only to halt in his tracks, unnerved at the sight of seeing himself already seated at the table. He sucked in a sharp breath, wondering just what the hell was going on.
The only reasonable thing he thought to do was to stay put, lest his doppelganger move on elsewhere.
After five minutes, the doppelganger rose from the table, exited the hall and ran up the stairs just outside of the large room.
He followed on, stopping just as he saw his double enter a room whose doors vanished upon his arrival.
It very quickly became all too familiar, and the blond boy slumped to the ground, willing the nightmare to end. For that's what it was: a nightmare. A night terror that had been plaguing his sleep since the day he ran from his home land; forcing him to relive that night over and over again anytime he dared to close his eyes. He knew what was going to happen next, knew every detail, and he couldn't bear to stay and watch his crimes.
Springing up, he ran blindly down the hall, rushing toward the stairwell.
He turned a corner, running into someone.
The force of it caused him to fall back, landing rather ungracefully on his arse; the other person following suit.
He looked up to see a girl around his age, wearing shorts and an oversized shirt. Her thick auburn hair was pulled back into a ponytail; her side-sweeping fringe partially covering one eye in that moment.
She huffed, taking a hand and moving her fringe out of her face so she could see. Upon seeing who she bumped into, her face contorted itself into a look of both anger and confusion.
"Malfoy?" she spat, scrambling to get up. "What are you doing in my dream?"
"Weasley?" the blond boy asked, just as equally confused as the girl, though, not nearly as enraged. "What do you mean 'your dream'? This is most certainly my dream. And how do you even know you're dreaming?"
"Just like you know that you're dreaming. They're called lucid dreams -- a dream in which the person dreaming consciously knows that they are having a dream," she replied as though she were quoting something from a textbook. "Besides, I'm in my pyjamas, so I know that I have to be dreaming. Why I'm having this dream in particular, though, is beyond me. What day exactly am I dreaming about?"
The blond boy gave her the once over. "You call those pyjamas? I thought that was your everyday attire. And I know that I'm not dreaming because I literally stepped into the dream. Plus, by your logic, I'd be wearing my pyjamas, too. And the day that you're dreaming about is the day that my life went to hell."
"What do you mean you 'stepped into' this dream? And are you referring to the day that you sent dozens of Death Eaters loose upon Hogwarts?"
"I mean that I stepped into this dream. And yes; that day."
"Oh," she breathed, scrunching her eyebrows together, trying to process what he said. "I'm afraid I still don't understand how I'm able to talk to you though. I haven't been able to talk to anyone in this dream. None of the times that I've had this dream have I been able to. I just walk around, watching the events unfold over and over again. I want to stop having this dream, but I don't know how."
"How are you having a dream of mine? And a recurring dream of mine, at that?"
"I don't know. I thought I made it clear that I didn't know a whole lot about wherever the hell we are?"
She turned away, bothered by the boy's attitude and his constant questioning. Giving him one last glance over her shoulder, she began walking toward the stairwell, determined to find a way to wake up.
The boy, still on the ground, leaped up, trailing her. He was far from finished with her.
"What do you know about this place?" he called out, causing her to stop halfway down the stairs.
"Not much. The only thing I'm certain about is that I'm dreaming. And this is slowly becoming a nightmare, since I found you, so if you would excuse me, I'm trying to wake myself up." And with a curt nod to him, she was off again, bounding down toward the entrance hall.
He followed her again, taking the steps two at a time to keep up with her brisk pace. He reached the hall before her, blocking her path as she stopped on the last step.
"Don't you want to know why I'm the only person that you've been able to talk to?" he asked, nearly spitting his words out.
"Well, I am curious, but because it involves you, I'm kind of afraid as to what that reason would be. I don't want to hear any of this 'true love' or you're 'on a mission' nonsense. I don't think I have the patience for that. Plus, I'd rather not lose my dinner, even if it is in the figurative sense. If you are in this dream in the real, physical sense, clean-up would be an absolute pain in the arse."
She moved to the side, trying to walk past him, but he mirrored her motions, determined to get some answers.
"Do you want me to prove to you that I'm here in the real, physical sense?" He held out his hand, his eyes flicking between his hand and her face. She started to reach for his hand, slowly raising one of her own, stopping just before she grasped his. "You'll be fine. I can't really hurt you. I don't have a wand, and like you said, clean up would be an absolute pain in the arse," he insisted, smirking as she finally wrapped her fingers around his palm.
"If something happens to me while I'm still asleep, Malfoy, I will hunt your scrawny arse down and make sure that no one finds the pieces."
The boy twitched a little, before calmly raising an eyebrow. "Oh, you wound me, Weasley, you really do."
She glared at him, but held fast to his hand, waiting for him to move.
After a careless shrug at her withering look, he ran, pulling her along, forcing her to lengthen her strides to keep up with his already long legs. They burst through students and teachers alike, waving their hands in front of their faces as they passed through the corporeal fog.
He let go of her somewhere on the stairs that led to the lawn just outside the doors of the castle, trying to remember which direction he originally came from. He paused for a moment at the bottom of the stone steps, looking in every direction before he saw the glimmering vortex near the forest, blending in with the surroundings.
She turned her head toward the horizon, taking note of the setting sun; the fair blue sky melting away into a burst of crimsons, violets, oranges, and cornflower blues. She looked back to the blond boy, his hair blending into his pale skin in the evening light.
"Where are we going?" she asked, stepping down beside him.
He pointed toward the forest, calling her attention to the swirling vortex of black at its very edge.
"What is that?"
He turned to her, a passing breeze whipping his hair and the leaves at his feet. "That's the reason why I'm here. That's where I came from."
A/N- Thanks for reading. Please review. :)