The summer sun felt too bright for the dungeons, even with the enchantments that kept the Slytherin common room cool and dim. Draconia sat by the hearth, watching the green flames flicker against the stone mantle. Greta sat opposite her, a heavy parchment spread between them, but Greta was not looking at the ink. She was staring at the way the light caught the edge of a silver goblet. The silence in the room was not empty; it was a presence that demanded a certain kind of stillness.
"You are doing it again," Greta said, her voice barely a murmur above the crackle of the fire.
Draconia straightened her spine and smoothed the silk of her robes. "Doing what, Greta?"
"Making things look easy when they are actually quite difficult," Greta replied. She picked up a quill and tapped it against the table. "You act as if the contract is just another piece of parchment to be signed and filed away in a drawer. But the weight of it is different."
"It is just a document," Draconia said, though her fingers trembled slightly as she reached for her tea. "My father sends many things home. Most of them are trivial, but this one has a specific shape."
"It is not trivial," Greta insisted. She leaned forward, her eyes searching Draconia's face for a crack in the composure. "You are negotiating a life, not a transaction. You can't just use math to solve a marriage."
Draconia looked away, focusing on a single green lamp hanging from the ceiling. "Everything has a price, Greta. If you know the value of the currency, the transaction is simple. My father understands value. He understands the necessity of a well-placed signature."
"But you are not talking about gold or bloodlines," Greta said. She set the quill down with a precise click. "You are talking about a way to escape. You think if you sign this, the debt is settled and you can go back to being exactly who you were before the corridor."
"The corridor was a singular event," Draconia said, her voice hardening. "It does not define the whole of my existence. It was a moment of bad temper and red sparks. Nothing more."
"Harry Potter saw it differently," Greta said, her voice dropping an octave. "He didn't look at you like you were a girl who lost her temper. He looked at you like you were someone who had just made a very expensive mistake."
Draconia felt a sharp prick of irritation at the mention of his name. Harry Potter was a constant, a shadow that she could not quite shake from the periphery of her vision. Whenever she thought she had found a way to settle her accounts, his name would surface like a buoy in dark water.
"Harry is a fool if he thinks he can read the intent behind a hex," Draconia said. "He sees the surface. He sees the red light and the way the boy fell, but he does not see the reason."
"He sees the debt," Greta corrected. "He knows you owe him something, even if you refuse to say what it is."
"I owe him nothing," Draconia snapped, though the lie tasted bitter in her mouth. "Everything with him is a favour or a debt, and I am tired of the bookkeeping."
Greta reached out and took Draconia's hand. Her skin was warm, a stark contrast to the cool air of the Slytherin quarters. "You are trying to pay for your reputation with a currency that hasn't been invented yet. You think you can trade your father's signature for your freedom, but the math is wrong."
"The math is never wrong," Draconia said. "One plus one is two. A contract signed is a debt closed. It is a simple equation."
"It isn't simple," Greta whispered. "You are trying to use a bribe to buy a person's respect, and you're using the wrong coins. You can't buy a feeling with a legal document."
Draconia pulled her hand away to wrap it around her teacup. The ceramic was warm, but the heat did not reach her bones. "You are being overly dramatic. It is a marriage contract. It is a way to ensure the Malfoy name remains intact while I navigate the next few years of my life. It is a strategic move."
"It is a way to hide," Greta said. She looked down at the parchment on the table, the one with the redacted names and the heavy, unyielding signature line. "You want to hide behind the ink so no one can see the girl who hexed a boy in a red corridor."
"I am not hiding," Draconia said, her voice rising. "I am positioning myself. There is a difference between a coward and a strategist."
"A strategist knows when the cost is too high," Greta said. She looked up, and for a moment, her eyes were glassy in the green light. "You think you are being clever, but you are just being careful. There is a difference."
"I have always been careful," Draconia said. "It is how we survive."
"But you can't survive on math alone," Greta said. "You can't calculate the way a person looks at you when you are being honest. You can't calculate the way Harry Potter refuses to let you be a liar."
Draconia felt a sudden, irrational urge to stand up and walk out of the room, to find a corridor and scream until the stone walls shook. The mention of Harry always brought a certain tension to her chest, a tightness that felt like a debt unpaid.
"Harry Potter is a distraction," Draconia said, her voice lower now. "He is a variable that doesn't fit the equation. He is an outlier in a perfect set of numbers."
"He is not an outlier," Greta said. "He is the reality."
"Reality is messy," Draconia countered. "I prefer the order of the signature. The order of the contract."
"The contract is a lie you tell yourself so you don't have to face the truth," Greta said. She reached out again, her fingers brushing the sleeve of Draconia's robes. "You are trying to pay for your life in a currency that doesn't exist."
"What do you want from me, Greta?" Draconia asked, her composure finally beginning to fray at the edges.
"I want you to stop pretending that the math will save you," Greta said. She wiped a stray tear from her cheek with the back of her hand, her movements quick and sharp. "The truth is the only thing that actually has value, but you are too afraid to spend it."
Draconia watched her, seeing the way the green light of the room caught the moisture on Greta's lashes. The girl looked tired, and the exhaustion seemed to run deeper than just a lack of sleep.
"It is not a matter of fear," Draconia said, though she knew it was a lie. "It is a matter of precision."
"No," Greta said, her voice breaking slightly as she looked at the empty, silent room. "It is the only thing that ever makes her cry."