Call Me Psyche - Dramione

16

Pansy Parkinson stood waiting on the pavement outside the gate of her parents' Whitehall row house, tapping her foot and smoothing her glossy black bob. When Draco finally arrived he was actually apologizing to her for being late, like the gentleman he'd been telling her he was for years.

"I was holding a baby and he spit his breakfast all over me," Draco explained. "I had to completely change my clothes."

"Baby?" Pansy nearly shouted in reply. "Where in the stars are you staying?"

Draco flushed, still unsure of whether he could trust Pansy, sick about almost giving Tonks away so easily. "It's no one you know," he snapped. "Distant connection. Take my arm, let's get on."

Grimmauld Place was nothing like the fine house he remembered visiting as a very little boy when his aunt and uncle lived there. The front door was still on its hinges but had been forced open more than once and was hastily rehung with half-cocked spells. It had been nearly a year since Corban Yaxley and the Ministry had discovered the house, ending the Fidelius charm that had kept it undetectable.

Draco held Pansy's hand back as she reached for the doorknob. "Wait," he said. "If we don't cover my Aunt Walberga's portrait, she'll tell everyone we were here. Bill warned me it's hanging right between the door and the tapestry."

"Right," Pansy whispered back at him. "Who's Bill?"

"Weasley's oldest brother."

Pansy gave a greedy hum. "Fit?"

Draco scoffed. "The werewolf scars on his face are a bit too rugged for me, but he's alright. And married, so stick to the Weasleys you know."

"Ron Weasley's fit, rugged, married older brother," Pansy repeated, looking off into the street as she imagined him. "Why would he be helping you?"

Draco was shrugging off his cloak to drape over Walberga's portrait. "I've got his wife on my side. You remember her. The pretty French champion from the Tri-wizard Tournament."

Pansy snorted. "The kissy Veela? Of course she'd like you. Let's go."

Their entry went smoothly enough, and in a moment they were standing in the hall, the ancient Black family tapestry swaying before them in the breeze coming through the smashed transom window.

"It's a shambles," Pansy said, hitting the tapestry hard enough for a puff of dust to rise from it.

Draco was crouched low, examining the far corner of the newest section of the fabric.

"Where's your face woven into this thing?" Pansy asked, peering into the faded black, green, and gold fibres.

"Here," Draco said, pointing. "Here's Mother, and Father is right next to her. And so right here, yes, there's me."

Under his finger was his own image, embroidered mostly in ivory floss but still severe looking. It was not moving like a portrait or photograph but it was somehow aging with him. Though clearly, no one had raised a hand to update, repair, or clean the tapestry in years. Even when Molly Weasley supervised the scouring of Grimmauld Place while it was the Order's headquarters, she was happy to let the tapestry rot untouched on the wall.

Pansy watched over Draco's shoulder as he traced a line up from the Malfoy family to the pairing of Bellatrix and Rodolphus Lestrange. And between the Malfoys and Lestranges was a single black singe-mark. "Here," he said, tapping at the scorched spot on the fabric. "Underneath this mark we should find the image for my mother's other sister, Andromeda."

Bending lower, Pansy frowned at the scorch. "What did she do to deserve this treatment from her own family?"

"Nothing," Draco said. "She married a Muggleborn wizard. That's it. Now tell me you can fix this."