Demarcus Bradley

Demarcus Solomon Bradley
Biographical Information
Born	24 October 1980
Died	2 May 1998, 17
City of Birth	London, England
Blood status	Half-blood
Also known as	Marc
Physical Information
Species	Human
Gender	Male
Eye Colour	Blue
Education
School	Hogwarts
House	Slytherin
Class of	1999
Neon

Though the Bradleys have been halfblood for hundreds of years, many members of the family feel that blood purity is achievable within their ranks. As such, they've always tried to negotiate marriage with purebloods (with little success). Various members have been found to be sympathising and fraternising with Death Eaters during the First Wizarding War.

In the buildup to the Second Wizarding War, the Bradleys practised their beliefs a lot more secretly, but no less ferociously. This was enforced in their only son at the time, Demarcus, from a young age. By the time he entered Hogwarts, he was good at keeping secrets, including his own.

Demarcus however had a problem - he couldn't understand Charms, or at least he was much slower than his parents expected him to be. The Bradleys insisted on maintaining the idea that a true Bradley would excel in all fields of magic, and thus placed pressure on him to achieve high grades. When Demarcus repeatedly and consistently failed to produce good results in the subject, he showed incredible stress and unhappiness at not being able to learn as quickly as his parents would have liked him to, and thus attracted the attention of the then trusting and very helpful Arcturus Hollingbury.

Time in Hogwarts

With Arcturus' patient tutoring, Demarcus finally started to improve in his grades and would find himself much happier when his parents expressed delight at his rising marks. However, he secretly harboured a sense of jealousy for Arcturus, one that envied his intelligence and curiosity for advanced topics, and forever aspired to compete with Arcturus in school. He asked Arcturus to do this out of 'friendly competition'. Arcturus, unaware of Demarcus' motivations, more than willingly took on the challenge, and no matter what Demarcus did he was always defeated by his friend. This contributed to a greater amount of jealousy and eventually growing contempt.

Come OWLs, his parents demanded and urged him to achieve higher than he usually did in school. They wanted him to achieve at least Exceeds Expectations in every subject, in order to ease him entering highly desired NEWT subjects and eventually entering the Ministry of Magic in order to gain approval from 'friends' who shared their agreements on blood purity. Demarcus, having never told them about Arcturus, felt he was under more pressure to achieve better and expressed this to his friend. Arcturus at this point simply agreed to help him, and even with that Demarcus' jealousy grew.

Demarcus only missed out on one subject in the end, but his parents weren't having it. They told him to pull his socks up and obtain Outstanding in all subjects in NEWTs. With this amount of pressure on him, Demarcus decided to set aside his jealousy and work with Arcturus, who appeared to have breezed through the exams (save for Divination). His grades rose further, and for a time everything was looking good. Though, he was paranoid that his parents would find out, that Arcturus was deliberately keeping him from achieving higher grades than him. Arcturus was always better, and he wasn't even trying! Blood purity stances were becoming more pronounced at this time from his family, and Demarcus began to listen to them more than he did his friend. His jealousy of this mixed-blood kid who studied in a Muggle school as a child and yet could best him in magical subjects without breaking a sweat intensified; the combination created an unhealthy belief that Arcturus did not deserve to be 'this good'.

Start of Darkness

He began to internally blame Arcturus for not teaching him concepts, when it was his own individual understanding of the topic that he overestimated. Further influences from fellow Slytherin students, mostly from Death Eater families, and the desire to be a part of their cliques meant that though he still went to Arcturus for help, he did it less so to avoid being seen with him, and treated it as a matter of shame rather than gratitude. Arcturus' silent grieving and worry meant he distanced himself from most of his friends and people in general, and yet was somehow still achieving high grades and a very hard stance against the Dark Arts, and that made it easier for Demarcus to pull away from his friend and dissociate with him.

One evening Demarcus was struck by the notion of his parents finding out if a Hollingbury, about whom they'd spoken not too positively, had been the help behind his grades rather than his personal development. In a bout of shame and paranoia and deep desire to please his parents, he decided to get rid of his friend somehow. Arcturus was still trusting of his closest friends, Demarcus being one of them, and so he could play his cards right until he had the opportunity. He was on the mark; Arcturus trusted him right into the Battle of Hogwarts, and he took the chance.

In Death

Demarcus did not survive the Battle of Hogwarts himself. After leaving the bathroom he felt elated by the sudden weight of burden lifted off of his shoulders and in his swelling confidence he attacked another student. An auror intervened, and due to Demarcus' lack of proficiency in carrying out a charm he was confident he could cast, he was overwhelmed. His plan to wipe Arcturus off the map failed due to the timely intervention of Arcturus' close friends Lyra Avery and Sebastian Cheverell, and of Madam Pomfrey's swift administrations.

Though he has been dead for over a decade, the lasting effects he and his actions on that night are still felt by his victim to the point that for Arcturus, Demarcus doesn't exist as a person - only a deeply seated, irrational fear of betrayal that Arcturus hasn't been able to get rid of because he never found out Demarcus' motivations, never understood why someone he considered his best friend would do that to him, and never wants to make people feel such dislike for him that they would go as far as to commit murder.