Harry hadn't liked the boy in front of him from the moment they'd first met. The kid was always pointing fingers at people, looking down on this one and that one. But now, Harry's opinion of him had changed a little.
Was there something wrong with this guy's brain?
After hearing from Ezio that quite a few wizarding families in the Wizarding World arranged marriages between close relatives to preserve their so-called pure bloodlines, Harry had begun to see wizarding families of status differently. He'd gone to school and studied history, after all. Of course he knew about some of the things that had happened in England's royal family.
Marrying close relatives made their children much more likely to suffer from congenital illnesses, deformities, and other problems. The boy in front of him was as pale as a Vampire, so perhaps this was an outward sign of some defect caused by close-relative marriage.
A trace of pity entered Harry's gaze. Children were innocent, after all, and they had no say in what kind of debuffs they were born with.
Clearly, Harry wasn't very good at hiding his thoughts, and his gaze stung the boy. A flush struggled to appear on his pale, bloodless face. The pride and superiority he'd worn so openly vanished, and the boy frowned and snapped, "What are you looking at?"
"Hahaha." Ezio, standing nearby, couldn't help laughing at the ridiculous scene. "Two dimwits and one grouch." Harry had never heard the joke, but he joined in the laughter anyway.
The two boys standing behind the pale one were burly and looked rather fierce, but they couldn't hide the foolishness practically radiating from them. When Ezio laughed, they inexplicably grinned too, as if they wanted to join in.
It was such an artistically beautiful sight that Harry couldn't help laughing.
"And who are you?" The pale boy, unable to see what was funny, turned and glared at Ezio.
"Why don't you introduce yourself first, Mr. Grouch?"
The boy narrowed his eyes. He was indeed very unhappy, but Ezio's clothes made him seem like someone important. Perhaps he was a wizard from another country, here to study?
"Malfoy." The pale boy lifted his chin and spoke proudly. "Draco Malfoy."
"Oh, the Malfoy family that claimed he'd been controlled by the Imperius Curse and paid the Ministry of Magic a fortune to get off? His dad was a Death Eater, Harry—a lackey of Voldemort."
A cold wind seemed to sweep through the compartment from Siberia. The three boys standing there shuddered, as if some word had terrified them.
"Is that true?" Harry's eyes turned cold at once as he stared straight at the boy, whose face had gone pale again.
"There's a chapter about the Death Eaters in this book, Modern Dark Arts Investigation. Lucius Malfoy was accused of being a Death Eater, but the book says his father 'cleverly bribed the judges and escaped punishment.' As one of the Sacred Twenty-Eight, the Malfoy family certainly had the means to do that. From what I've read, nearly every accused member of a Pure-blood wizard family used similar methods to escape conviction."
Ezio rummaged through his bag and pulled out a book two fingers thick.
"You're talking nonsense! My dad wasn't—"
Draco practically shrieked, but before he could finish, Ezio cut him off.
Ezio opened the book to a page displaying a photograph of his father standing trial and held it up for him to see. Lucius had been young then, but looked haggard. Even in black and white, his unusually pale complexion stood out. He wore shackles and sat in the trial chair.
"See? Your dad has a Dark Mark on his arm. That's the Death Eaters' mark."
Draco looked as if a Dementor had sucked a piece of his soul away. His legs buckled, and he almost fell to the floor.
"Want to teach him a lesson, Harry?" Ezio asked eagerly.
"Do you want to fight?" Harry asked. At this point, he couldn't bring himself to care that the two bodyguards behind Malfoy had arms as thick as his calves. He took a deep breath, as if that would give him a little more strength.
"No need to fight. But I can make him wet his pants."
Harry stared at him in surprise. Hearing this, Malfoy, whose legs had been trembling, was furious. But when he felt Crabbe and Goyle's solid frames behind him, he regained some courage.
"Listen, Harry, there's a spell called—"
Ezio wasn't the sort to dawdle. As he spoke, he raised his hand, and his wand instantly sprang into his palm.
An ominous green light appeared at the tip of the wand. A terrible flash of green blazed through the compartment!
"Avada Kedavra!"
The instant the green light erupted, Harry's head hurt as if it had burst apart. He remembered the nightmare that tormented him at night once more. In it, a woman's voice screamed his name, begging someone to spare him. At the same time, a slender figure tried to throw herself in front of him, but a dazzling flash of green light passed by, and the figure fell.
Tears streamed down Harry's face in that instant, though he had no idea what was happening. But somehow, he knew that was his mother's voice.
The muffled thud of two heavy bodies hitting the floor jolted Harry back to his senses. He clutched his forehead, tears dampening his wrist. He wiped his face haphazardly and saw Draco kneeling on the floor, completely stunned, while the two burly boys lay toppled behind him, their fate unclear.
"See? He wet his pants."
Ezio said it lightly, then flicked his wand. An invisible force lifted the two fallen boys and casually tossed them into the corridor. The compartment door snapped shut, startling Draco out of his daze.
"Shh. Don't scream. It hurts my ears."
Ezio put a finger to his lips. Draco's scream died in his throat before it could escape. He clutched at his neck, stifling every sound.
"Ezio, you... you just... what was that?!" Harry's eyes were red-rimmed. He didn't really understand what had just happened, but his instincts told him it couldn't be anything good.
"That was the Killing Curse... one of the Unforgivable Curses!" Draco said in a trembling whisper. "You killed Crabbe and Goyle... You killed them!"
The heavy thuds behind him hadn't escaped Draco's ears—unless he was deaf. And when he heard the name of the spell, he'd already imagined the whole scene.
"You'll be sent to Azkaban!" He looked at Ezio in terror, then immediately lowered his head.
The smell of urine spread through the compartment.
"Tergeo."
Scourgify wasn't as effective as Tergeo against bad smells, or even poisonous gases. But with Draco's wet trousers, the smell would keep spreading.
"Now, tell me why you came here to find Harry."
Draco shrank back, but didn't dare refuse to answer. With fear pouring uncontrollably through him, he stammered, "I only... only wanted to make friends with him and get to know him."
"Your dad was a Death Eater, and you came to make friends with the boy who defeated Voldemort?" Ezio raised an eyebrow.
"I'm telling the truth!" Afraid Ezio might hit him with an Avada Kedavra too, Draco hurried to explain. His words were utterly sincere; he looked ready to tear out his heart and offer it up. "I know my family had something to do with You-Know-Who, but we weren't the only ones. Lots of wizarding families were involved. I didn't even know my dad was a Death Eater. It's true! I've heard about Harry Potter since I was little. He defeated You-Know-Who, and I was curious about him. I only wanted to meet him."
At that, Harry's expression softened a little. Draco was unlikely to be lying to them in this state, and deep down, Harry was a good kid.
"Don't talk to people like that anymore, and don't point fingers at them. Like you did with Hagrid," Harry couldn't help saying.
"I'll change! I will! I swear! I swear by Merlin!" Draco, who'd already wet himself in terror, wouldn't dare say no now—even though it was Harry speaking, not Ezio.
"So now..." Harry looked at Ezio. "Why don't you run for it, Ezio?"
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