Tainted Lace

The putrid ambience was worsen with the shower of rain. He was hauled out by an invisible hand. Suddenly, he was flung towards his right and he fell, landing on all fours.

Being the brazen fellow he had always been, he stood up crisply. He brushed off the dirt that were on his sleeves and turned around, facing the vista of the Dark Lake from the cliff.

She walked up to him, “Malfoy.”

He did not reply.

The both of them stood looking down at the Dark Lake. Under the moonlight, they could only feel the soft prod of raindrops on their skin. Raindrops intricated the surface of the Dark Lake, which made it seemed so ethereal like a dream yet vivid to the eyes.

“It would be bloody nice to sink in there. Imagine your soul travelling fathoms below from the surface of the world, far away from the noises and pollution,” he surpressed his usual smug. “Life is but a scant reverie if compared to death.”

“Stop being so morbid, Malfoy,” tears welled up in her eyes. “You’re being sentenced to DEATH!! The dementor’s kiss!! Bastard, can’t you be an ordinary person, just for once, before you die?!”

He turned his cold gaze towards her, “Malfoys are not ordinary people, Granger. Our emotions and feelings are unpredictable, especially to Mudbloods.”

Mudblood. She allowed that foul term to devour her, smother her, obliterate her. Since the beginning of time, that was her name, her identity to him. She swallowed back the tears that almost burst out from her eyes. She must not be feeble, not in front of him.

“You know, Harry and Ron died last year.”

“I knew. I saw their bodies.”

“They said they’ll come back.”

“Their souls, I assume.”

“No.”

Silence.

“Nothing returned. Nothing. If you’re gone too… I am left alone.”

Once more, silence filled in the gap between the two arch enemies. They still looked at the Dark Lake below, looking at the intricates that formed languidly. He held her hand. She flinched at the touch of his rough skin texture.

“Do you remember that time we were in the empty classroom?” he asked.

“When we were both Head Boy and Head Girl?” she inquired.

He nodded, “Our first time,” he smirked.

“Erm… yeah,” blushing, she replied.

At the sight of her flushed cheeks, he laughed. Not with sarcasm, not with malice. “I found it endearing whenever you blushed, including the time when we did it.”

She flustered when he turned to face her and carressed her cheeks. “You knew that I hate you.”

He planted a deep kiss on her lips. Savouring the texture and curls of her cinnamon hair with his hands. She put her arms around his neck as she took in the firewhisky sensation from his tongue. His hair was like soft silk in her hands and she was reluctant to let go.

Gingerly, he pushed her away and turned his back towards her. The dark shadows of the dementors surrounded him and soon, he was obliterated by the malicious shadows.

There were no shouts, no screams, no protests, not even a moan of distress. When the dementors floated away, he laid on the solid ground, cold and dead. A smile painted on his cold visage.

She did not cry. She knelt down beside his body and touched his eyes, his nose, his lips.

Dumbledore and the Minister shook their heads and left.

Before they took their fifth step, a puissant green light penetrated the surroundings. The Minister turned to check on Hermione but what met his eyes petrified him. Dumbledore continued his way back to the castle in the rain, “Tainted, tainted…”