A/N: Ok, here's my update.  I'm updating this one before Mutual Healing and Metamorphosis, under threat of angry reviewers, hopefully incenting more people to read this one.  It's really good, I swear! And the plot will speed up after this.  I just had to introduce our two torn lovers (even if they don't know it yet).  Anyhow, kudos once again to Offwhite and her amazing plot.  Nothing would be possible without her.

Thanks to Sarklover, bethany wood, and Kjata.  Read on!

Chapter 2 - The Voice of Power

"You fucking bastard.  You weak, perverted bastard."  The young man's lips curled into a disgusted sneer.

            Across the cold, ornate room, his father leaned lazily on an antique silver table and let out a sadistic laugh.  "Weak? Weak, Draco?  I am the only, merciful force standing between you and the harsh reality outside of our Lord's blessing.  I wield more power than you've ever even tasted, and that's saying a lot."  His countenance suddenly darkened from its former sarcastic gleam.  "Don't you ever call me weak.  I have purged everything weak from my life, just as I have taught you to do."

            Draco stood rigidly, his back straight and his shoulders thrust back, taking deep breaths to restrain himself from ripping the lies out of his father's throat.  He could feel the anger welling inside of him, seeping towards the surface and begging for escape.  Funny how the only thing keeping it from overcoming him was his father's training.  Never show emotion.  Weak.  Pathetic.

            Who's the fucking pathetic one now?

            Lucius shifted his weight easily and began to stroll towards the window, smoothly picking up a shot glass from a floating tray.  "And if you become a weakness, Draco, I will have no choice but to do the same to you.  Only the strong survive in this game."  The man turned back to his son, his cold, hollow eyes suddenly rushing to Draco's, even though he was standing nearly thirty feet away.  "I thought you were strong."

            The red-hot flames of anger boiled over and Draco dug his nails into the pale skin of his fists as he exploded.  "You thought I was strong?  Oh, Jesus fucking Christ, that's great father."  A humourless, dark laugh escaped from his young mouth, and his eyes darkened dangerously, a mirror image of his father's only moments ago.  "Because I am.  You're the weak one, you mindless prick.  You've spent your entire goddamn life serving a seventy year old man that barely even has a body of his own!  Ambition?  Strength?  Power?  Looks to me like you've taken the fucking easy way out.  You'd sacrifice anything for him, or rather, anything to stay on his good side.  If that's not weak, what the fuck is?"  Draco didn't even realize he was screaming.

            Lucius Malfoy's neck bulged in a grotesque array of purple veins as the anger that had gone unchecked and unchastised for so long manifested itself yet again.  In one swift movement he was at his son's throat, his face inches away from the boy's, his hot breath drowning Draco's air supply, his golden hair framing his face in a way that gave him a twisted, angelic appearance.  The ultimate perversion.

            His father's strong fingers tightened around Draco's neck, and he wondered for the umpteenth time why he didn't resist.

            "You will submit to our Lord.  It's your destiny.  Power is what you make of it.  This your chance.  Don't blow it, Draco Malfoy.  You know what will happen if you do."

            And with that, the demon disapparated downstairs, back to the Death Eater gala raging in the East Wing parlours, leaving his son to massage the bruises on his neck and curse everyone in the world from Voldemort to Lucius Malfoy to Harry Potter. 

            His icy, frozen eyes ravaged the room, searching for something he had been looking for as long as he could remember, but had never found.  He hurled himself wildly at the floating tray, smashing the decanter and its contents to the floor in a mess of priceless crystal and alcohol. 

            He ran down the long halls to his rooms, expending as much of the pent up wrath and passion as was possible.  Upon reaching his summer bedroom, he collapsed against the door in a weary gesture of defeat, leaning his forehead against its aloof dignity.

            After a few slow breaths, he slowly straightened back up and ran a hand through his disheveled blond hair.  It fell in messy pieces before his eyes, yet another barrier to any and every dream he had ever dreamt in his deranged world.

            He could hear the Death Eaters at the other end of the house, screaming in ecstasy and torture, some laughing, some probably dying, all at once.  The utter perversion and stupidity hit him with a full force yet again.  Mindless, idiotic pawns in a game whose puppeteer had passed his prime years ago.  The world was ripe for the picking.  The time was perfect.  Voldemort was becoming the very thing he taught all of his followers to fear with their lives – weak.  He became more and more dependent each day, and it seemed that only Draco was able to see through the contorted prevarications and lies to the truth. 

            And Draco was hungry for that truth.  The power that the truth offered.

            He was born for this.  The power of the unknown, of the dark and diablerie drew him like a vulture to a fresh kill.  It obsessed him.  It always had.  He knew he was made for great things, designed for a destiny that so far surpassed his father's petty accomplishments that the world would only be able to stand by in shock as his iron force swept wizard and muggle-kind alike.

            His mind was a brilliant caucophony of shrewd and perfect intelligence.  He was capable.  So capable.

            And it was all he wanted.  So little stood in his way.  Why did he hold back?

            The power tugged at him …

            He stumbled back to a settee, falling into the Slytherin green depths as his eyes closed in an inner struggle of diminutive ethic against rash gluttony.

            The pale lids sprung open within moments, however, at the memories of his father's recent assault.  Angrily, he fingered the marks left on his aristocratic neck.  The bastard had left a fucking mark. 
            No one should be able to mark me and get away with it.

            A low growl escaped his throat.  "Power is what you make of it," he had said.  Dumbfuck.  Lucius was one hundred percent right.  And Draco had every intention of fashioning a power that would leave the world staggering in shock.  Lucius's power, however … that was not a power that he had made.  He was a coward, a puppet with no balls whatsoever that groveled at Voldemort's feet at the slightest inference of offense.  Everything his father had ever taught him or made him read laughed bitterly in the background of his mind, mocking the hypocrisy that had raised him. 

            He had no choice but to believe the ideals that had been instilled in him since he before he could walk.  His only option, therefore, was that the one who had passed on these ideals was a weak loser, a worthless underling that had failed to practice his own teachings and had been consumed by one who had learnt them better.

            It sickened Draco.  It almost triggered his gag reflex.  There were no words to describe the disgust and abhorrence one develops when one learns that they have lived a decieved insincerity their entire lives.

            Draco refused accept.  He refused to bow down.  He wouldn't be shoved aside, or welcomed into a society of weaklings.  He had been taught to never blindly conform, and he wouldn't start now, even if it was his teachers who were asking him to do so.

            I hate you, Lucius.

            I hate you for being a wimp.

            I hate you for hating me.

            I hate your fucking guts.

            Draco rose to his feet and covered the space between the settee and window in a matter of moments.  He shoved open the windows and inhaled the crisp, midsummer-night air.  A slight breeze jumped through the window and laughed happily as it ruffled his hair and whispered in his ear.  The winds of change.

            In that moment, Draco consciously resolved to never back down again.  He would have this world, and he would grip it with a force of unparalleled power and strength.  The name of Voldemort would be a forgotten history text book name by the time Draco Malfoy was finished.  He would never submit.  To anyone.

            Suddenly, the voice of the wind became the voice of the power.  The voice of … that… thing, that elusive idea that he could never quite grasp or understand.  It lured him, nagged at him, and ate away his very soul.  In power, he was sure he would find it. 

            An especially loud scream found its way to his chambers, and in one swift, annoyed move, he spun around, silenced the room and locked the door.   

            All in good time.  Power is what you make of it.  All in good time.