A Mandatory Alliance Chapter Four

A Mandatory Alliance

By: Provocative Envy

OOO

CHAPTER FOUR

To: A Self-Centered Egomaniac in Dire Need of a Good Shag

Once again, your letter has left me speechless. Your condescension is insulting as well as uncalled for! I tried my very hardest to start things off in a civil manner, but you’ve made it clear that you want to take no part in this foreign exchange program. And your comments about my mother are ungrounded and stupid, you narcissistic bastard. I gave you the “Pleasantville” version of my life, hoping to shield your nonexistent virgin ears from the horrors of an unwanted half-muggle witch’s life. I can see I made a mistake in making everything seem simply peachy. Let me make amends.

I was born in East Los Angeles, California, which is, to steal a muggle term you’re undoubtedly unfamiliar with, the “ghetto.” It’s a slum and a drive-by shooting zone, where rapists, transvestites, and mass-murderers hang out and “chill.” My mother, the overbearing chiropractor, had hit rough times when her pregnancy with me had prevented her from treating patients; her financial situation when I was born was less than satisfactory. My father, the aloof Russian who I’m starting to think forced intercourse on my convent-raised mother, didn’t know of my existence until I was eleven, when the Russian Ministry of Magic decided to let him in on the secret: he’d fathered a child, who had inherited a magical ability. No one was very pleased with the situation, I’m afraid to say.

My mother was revolted that she’d been harboring a “freak” in her house all that time. (After all, think of all the food stamps she wasted.) My father was dismayed to find out that his “tryst” with my mother had actually borne fruit. The Russian Ministry was dumbstruck that they were going to have to let an American into their fine institution of learning. I didn’t much care either way: all I was doing was switching a life of poverty for a life of the unknown, which didn’t seem all that bad. How naïve I was.

As soon as I arrived in Moscow, I was rushed into, what seemed to me, a brick wall. At the time I thought it was an attempt on my life, since in muggle movies there’s always an evil Russian mafia guy who tries to kill the innocent American spy. Not that I’m a spy, but I’m assuming you catch my meaning. Anyways, I found myself in a purple plush-laden lair with white tigers and little Communist men with beards running around waving wands. In the middle of all of this was my father, who was, irony of ironies, the Minister himself. As soon as he reached out to hug me, a deadly curse was fired at him by one of the bearded men, and his dead body was ravaged by hungry tigers right before my eyes. Lovely welcoming, eh?

After that, no one really knew what to do with me. They (the rest of the Ministry “officials”) finally decided that it would be prudent to ship me off to school anyways, since if my magic remained uncontrolled I could destroy the world, or something. In actuality, I think they all secretly feared that I would get very angry with them and unconsciously blow them up with my uninhibited powers.

From that moment on, I’ve put on this façade of cheerfulness and optimism, since that’s the only way it was possible for me to make friends in this godforsaken country. Obviously it won’t work in any other place.

From: A Witch Who Passionately Hates You

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“Sir? I-I-I mean, Pr-Professor?” Neville Longbottom’s quavering voice echoed throughout the dungeons, his eyes blinking rapidly as he tried to look up from the ground and into Severus Snape’s eyes.

“Longbottom, if your question isn’t remotely intelligent or worth my time, I assure you that there will be a painfully violent punishment in store for you this evening. And I won’t leave it up to Filch,” Snape replied silkily, his arms crossed domineeringly over his chest. Neville audibly swallowed, his hands shaking so badly that his tremors were visible even from the Slytherin side of the room. Draco Malfoy snickered at this pathetic display of weakness, surprised to discover Granger’s snapping brown eyes trained on him when he chanced to turn around.

“W-w-well, y-you s-s-s-see, I have a-a-a p-p-problem w-with m-m-my p-p-potion,” Neville stuttered.

“What was that, Longbottom? I couldn’t understand you through your tragic speech impediment. Please repeat yourself,” Snape ordered softly. Draco starting laughing at the horrorstricken expression on Neville’s face, hastily turning it into a cough when he felt a sharp nudge in his ribs.

“I h-have a p-problem with m-my p-potion, S-sir,” Neville said dismally.

With a world-weary sigh, Snape crossed the room and bent to look over Neville’s hopeless potion. Draco, out of ear-shot of the bat-like man, whipped his head around, hitting Granger with his glossy blonde hair as he did so.

“Ouch! Watch it, Malfoy! Your precious hair obviously has razor blades in it or something,” she whispered indignantly, rubbing a small cut on her cheek.

“However did you find out, Granger? Yes, I do indeed entwine fatally sharp objects into my hair for the express purpose of ridding the world of Mudbloods like yourself,” he spat back sarcastically.

“What is your problem, you malevolently pathetic ferret? You’re hallucinations that you’re better than me are becoming a good source of entertainment, I must say,” she murmured murderously. “After all, how could I ever compare to an inbred little egomaniac like yourself who harbors a senseless prejudice against me simply because he was told to?” Granger was fuming, her nostrils slightly flared as she pointedly shifted her weight so that her back was to him.

Draco was speechless. Considering that he’d never been speechless before in his life, this was an excrutiatingly new sensation, one which he wasn’t certain he liked. Granger had rendered him silent, and he was confused as to why. The words “senseless prejudice” and “simply because he was told to” echoed through his mind. Was that really all it was? Was he just like his insane father? Running around and following a random concept just because it was easier?

These troubled thoughts plagued him for the rest of the class. The more he contemplated it, the more likely it seemed that Granger had been completely right when she’d insinuated his lazy bigotry.

“Granger,” he called out, running after her just as she began to head towards Potter and Weasley.

“What?” she demanded rudely, her teeth clenched as she stared with unabashed dislike at the pale-haired chauvinist.

“I just wanted to…well…am I really just like my father?” Draco asked in a very small voice. Her face softened visibly, the angry lines fading into the smooth skin of an adolescent girl on the brink of womanhood.

“Yes, Malfoy, you are,” she responded evenly.

“I-I am?” he gulped out, his heart sinking.

“Indeed.” There was nothing else to be said, it seemed. She spun around on her heel to walk back to the two boys waiting for her down the corridor.

Draco Malfoy didn’t attempt to stop her. He was utterly bereft at the knowledge that he was a replica of the man he so loved to degrade. The man he often insulted in those stupid foreign exchange letters. The man he’d vowed to never, ever be like. Yet there he was, identical to him and oblivious to it. And Granger had had to point it out to him!

He wanted to blame her for his turmoil, to write an angst-ridden letter of complaint to his sadistic father and have her bludgeoned to death in the night by house elves. But that wouldn’t solve his problem. She was the one to alert him to his Lucius-like tendencies, so she should be the one to resolve the situation. All he’d have to do is find a way to blackmail her into helping him.

OOO

“Ron, stop! What are you-” Hermione Granger’s protests were cut off by the callused hand that clamped itself over her mouth. Ron Weasley threw himself on top of her, replacing his palm with his lips, much to Hermione’s disgust.

“Oomph-mer-ehrrrr-eggg-ahhhh!” she moaned into his mouth, horrified by the wet, slimy sensation invading her mouth.

Dear God that can’t actually be his tongue…, she prayed agitatedly, her arms flailing and her legs kicking out to prevent his onslaught of unwanted amorous intentions. He was too big, though, and she was too small, and nothing she did was stopping him.

“Well, well, well, what’s this? A romantic tryst? A feverish sexual encounter with the Beaver and the Weasel?” Draco Malfoy’s triumphant and highly amused voice cut through the suddenly awkward silence like a knife through butter. Hermione quit her struggling, closing her eyes in anguish. She knew what would come next: blackmail.

Ron heaved himself off of her, his frightened, guilty eyes darting from her to Malfoy. With all the bravery and honor of a Gryffindor, he made a mad dash for the door to the empty classroom, flinging it open and sprinting away from his near-rape victim and the slightly evil boy who’d caught him.

“Aren’t you going to go and chase him?” Hermione asked nervously. Malfoy wordlessly shook his head, approaching her stealthily.

“I don’t care about the dimwitted fire-crotch,” he replied smoothly.

“Then why don’t you let me go? You know, since you don’t care?” she inquired.

“You’re not the dimwitted fire-crotch, are you? I thought not. You see, I have a proposition for you,” he answered easily.

“Oh?” she countered, her voice cracking.

“Yes. I promise on my grandfather’s grave that I won’t tell anyone about your…extracurricular activities, so long as you let me follow you around and try to become more…wholesome.”

There was a very long moment of utter silence, broken only by Granger’s sharp intake of breath.

“What are you on?”

“Nothing. I swear. I’m serious, Granger,” he said, mildly irritated by her reaction. Dear God, was he that much of a prick?

“Well in that case…I don’t have much of a choice, do I?”

“No, I’m afraid not. I’m sure you understand that I could…twist the facts around a bit, you know, make into a steamy threesome between you, Weasley, and…oh, I don’t know, Snape?” He grinned inwardly at the sickened expression on her face.

“Oh for the…alright you have a deal. You can…be my lackey, if you insist. But,” she threatened dangerously, “if I hear so much as a word about something even remotely like…this, then I will personally see that your intestines are pulled out of your arse and fed to some of Hagrid’s Blast-Ended Skrewts.”

He was vaguely impressed by her use of imagery, but was loathe to compliment her, despite his desire to become good.

“First thing’s first, then,” she instructed him, businesslike. “We need to cut your hair.”

“What?” he said, aghast.

“Well, you can’t expect to be a decent person when you’ve got hair nearly as long as mine, can you? You’re a boy, not a hermaphrodite. At least, I hope you’re not,” she added as an afterthought.

“I really fail to see how my hair could have anything to do with my disposition,” Draco argued weakly.

“Well you’ve been a Lucius-clone all your life, so you’re judgment isn’t exactly credible, I hate to say,” she said loftily. He caught the twitch of her lips and realized that she was enjoying this. Two could play this game, Draco thought wickedly.

“Oh, alright. I’ll let you cut my hair. But,” he said forcefully, cutting of her clap of delight, “I have to add on to our little deal. For every thing you change about me, be it physical or otherwise, I get to alter something about you as well. Therefore, if you cut my hair, I want to dye your hair…blonde.” He smirked at the murderous glare she sent him.

“I think not, Malfoy. The agreement was that I help you become a better person, right? I don’t see how my hair color is relevant.”

“Which is why you’re not a Slytherin. Surely you know it’s part of my devious personality to milk this for all it’s worth?”

“I refuse to let you touch my hair,” she answered stoutly, crossing her arms over her chest.

“Oh, Pansy! You’ll never guess what I came across today! The Mudblood and the Weasel, along with Dumbledore, were in a devilishly intimate position today! I didn’t even know such contortions were possible!” Draco pretended to turn to leave the classroom, and wasn’t surprised when Granger grabbed his arm to pull him back.

“Fine,” she hissed. “You can dye my hair…blonde.” She gave an involuntary shudder at this ascension, and Draco rubbed his hands together. This would be fun.

OOO